in mo mon iac monaco. god bless america. >> and play poker and make millions. looks like chris moneymaker. >> willie, if it's way too early -- >> it's "morning joe." see you back here tomorrow. now they're using props. it's silly season time, following a big defeat in illinois, a desperate rick santorum and newt gingrich pounce on a gaffe by mitt romney's aide handing out etch-a-sketches as an example of what they'd say of the front-runner's history of flip-flopping. what does it tell us about romney and the fact he doesn't of get the benefit of the doubt from his own party? it's probably the most coveted endorsement since chris christie's, but jeb bush's backing of romney came in a written statement without the hoopla we've seen before. an endorsement based on reality, not a passion.

and hundreds rally in new york for slain teenager trayvon martin as the city commissioners vote no confidence on theirs police chief. still no word on what the shooter has to say in his own defense. it's thursday, march 22, 2012. this is "daily rundown." i'm chuck todd, right to my first reads of the morning, shake it up here. florida governor jeb bush's senate that mitt romney's nomination is inevitable was exactly the message team romney hope would drive the week. instead, the campaign's plans got, well, all shook up thanks to an unforced campaign error. jeb bush's statement in the wake of romney's decisive win in illinois came on paper released is the time for republicans to unite behind governor romney. lacking the enthusiasm and pomp like new jersey governor chris christie, you don't need to crawl into the mind of jeb bush to see the difference what an enthusiastic endorsement looks

like and what an endorsement of necessity does. still it fit the new title mitt romney was trying to give the new candidate. presumptive republican nominee. >> my cell phone rang, i looked tat. it just said jeb. he said, mitt i just want to let you know i'm endorsing you today. >> yet again tim romney stepped on its own good news day. this time a staffer not the candidate who flubbed. veteran aid finstrom responded to a question whether more conservative stances in the primaries will hurt him in november. >> i think you hit a reset button for the fall campaign. everything changes. it's almost like an etch-a-sketch. you can kind of shake it up and we start all over again. >> his opponents couldn't have come up with a worst analogy to fit the narrative political trap set by romney's opponents. for years the response became a rorshach test for romney's

world. political enemies pounced. by lunchtime etch-a-sketch was viral. dmc a video, the obama campaign quick to jump on the news. by mid-afternoon, both newt gingrich and rick santorum made it to a toy store to get actual etch-a-sketches and use them as props. >> if we're dumb enough to nominate him we should expect by the acceptance speech he'll move back to the left. >> this isn't a joke or a game. we're talking about important things in our society here. >> the campaign went so far, send an aide positive romney's campaign event in maryland handing out many etch-a-sketc s etch-a-sketches. an unforced error by the romney campaign but an air of desperation how quickly others 1yu6 jumped on this. a sign of campaigns potentially in their last throes. >> he said it's like an etch-a-sketch. >> he said it was like an

etch-a-sketch. >> this is an etch-a-sketch. >> an etch-a-sketch. >> an etch-a-sketch. >> how many have you have of used and etch-a-sketch. >> this is a spare etch-a-sketch. >> she could now be a presidential candidate. >> this is the first of what i'm going to now call my etch-a-sketch tour of america. >> you can't help but think about the irony, particularly of newt gingrich, who loved mets, the media, elite media and said, big ideas aren't debated seriously enough once these three hours and who's the one grabbing on to this desperate etch-a-sketch lifeline there to make a snarky point. anyway, the romney campaign has always been strong organizationally with a lot of unforced errors. boneheaded mistakes. remember these memorable flubs after big primary wins? >> i like being able to fire people. >> i'm not concerned about the very poor. >> well, this was a campaign and not a candidate mistake.

romney didn't handful well. first testily refusing questions. >> i'm not going to address this now. okay? >> what you see there is romney grabbed the recorder of a reporter to almost make sure he wasn't recorded there, but it's set up -- they immediate nieded to answer this some way so had a one question, and didn't use humor. >> organizationally, a general election campaign takes on a different profile. the issues i'm running on will be exactly the same. i'm running as a conservative republican. i was a conservative republican governor. i'll be running as a conservative republican -- >> conservative. did he hit that three times? my contrast, a couple hours later, ann romney's response. >> how's your etching of sketching going?

100 times on etch-a-sketch, i'm very sorry. >> i think that's a great i.d. pitch. great idea, piers. we'll have him do that tomorrow. >> one more thing. desperate to level an attack at romney that will stick, two opponents may have actually miss add substantive opportunity to go after him. at that afternoon town hall that became a feeding frenzy about etch-a-sketches, without prompting, he did a full throated defense of t.a.r.p. we haven't seen in months. here's what he said. >> there was a fear that the whole economic system of america would collapse. that all of our banks would virtually go out of business. that circumstance, president bush and hank paulson said we have to do something to show we won't let the whole system go out of business. i think they were right. some disagree. i think they were right to do that. >> another point apparently romney was going for. he wanted to make sure, emphasized it later, president obama doesn't deserve the credit

for keeping us out of a great depression. it's bush and paulson. interesting there, as the economy begins to recover and the romney campaign trying to make sure the president doesn't get as much credits as the public so far has been slowly been giving him. finally, the president will continue his effort to turn this political weakness of late on gas prices into a strength when he visits, actually there now, pushing oklahoma today. it's the southern end of the keystone pipeline. the president will announce an executive order requiring expedited permits in a review what the white house calls vital infrastructure projects including the southern part of the pipeline nap order establish as multiagency task force to identify the most urgent projects by the end of april. the republican candidates are already mocking the announcement. >> apparently the slipping pole numbers convinced him to announce the lower half of that pipeline. if we can get the poll numbers lower we might be able to get the other side, too.

>> president obama responded to the criticism in new mexico last night. >> you wouldn't know it from listening to some of these folks who are running for office. i won't mention their names. you know who they are. but producing more oil here in our own country has been and will continue to be a key part of my energy strategy. we've approved dozens of new oil and gas pipelines, and we've announced our support for more, including one i'm going to visit tomorrow in oklahoma. >> and this is the purpose of this trip. the administration believes they're not getting credit on what they've done, and ask the environmental community. they will tell you this hasn't been an administration that has been as friendly to their concerns as hoped. the president brought up one of his favorite facts. >> the fact of the matter is we use 20% of the world's oil. even if we drilled every square inch of this country we'd still

only have two or three or four percent of the world's known oil reserves. >> both of those numbers may technically be correct, glen kessler points out, non-secutor facts. considered proven reserves the oil must have been discovered, confirmed and economically recoverable with at least 90% certainty. however, including onshore and offshore estimateses ut easy do youment of oil may be 186 barrels. the president spent about two hours in new mexico. surprising, from touching down wheels to wheels up. 66% of oklahoma voters picked john mccain last election. he'll finish in ohio at an ohio state university center for

advanced energy research and development. all right. the next republican contest is in louisiana this saturday. rick santorum is in san antonio today visiting an insurance company but, of course, hitting the fund-raising circuit. so that's where we find nbc's ron mott. all right, ron. is it an all etch-a-sketch day? >> reporter: you know, chuck, good morning. we didn't go to the toy store this morning to see if there were any etch-a-sketches on the shelves there. we think he's probably going to leave that at home today. rick santorum is using tomorrow's anniversary, the two-year anniversary of the federal health care law as the centerpiece for his speech today. the campaign is calling this an important health care speech. all along rick santorum has said this is the reason why he's running for president. he was so offended by this health care law and says it impinges on the fundamental freedoms of americans and so we expect to hear some details about what he might propose in lieu of that. most of these candidates have said they would repeal the federal health care law if they became president.

so we do expect to hear some details for, perhaps, the first time from rick santorum about that. it's a beautiful room here. big, big insurance company here. interesting that he chose to take this invitation to talk about health care. while they are an insurance company, health care is a very, very small part of what they do here and we should point out as well, usaa is not endorsing any of these candidates. >> i aspum hesume he's trying t this as his way of going after romney? >> reporter: exactly. he says if romney becomes the nominee for republicans, the republicans essentially are give ago way the health care issue, which is a fundamental reason why they think they have got a good chance at taking back the white house. they say because the federal law is so similar to the massachusetts law, that how can mitt romney go and debate president obama on health care in the fall? they think that is a lost cause for hem on that issue in the fall. that's why rick santorum wants to hit after this pretty hard today. we'll see what specifics he brings out.

>> all right. ron mott in san antonio with the santorum campaign. thanks very much, sir. >> reporter: you bet. now to mounting outrage over trayvon martin, the murder ed florida teen. the step that could lead to the chief's ousz stter. now a no confidence vote. joining amative rally, trayvon's parents. a rally in new york city last night. >> i just want new york to know that we're not going to stop until we get justice for trayvon. >> our son is your son. stand up for justice and stand up for what's right. this is not about black and white. this is about right and wrong things. >> nbc's ron allen is in sanford, florida, and, ron, in one of the more striking things over the last few days is how little we have heard from george

zimmerman. what's going on on that front? >> reporter: good question, chuck. we've not heard from him, neighbors that we talked to say they asked him to move out of the townhouse where he lives. we don't know if he works. look forge family, trying to find him. he's basically disappeared and 26 some days since this accident happened to hide. he is in hiding. he told neighbors he faced death threats and was in fear of his life. he has not surfaced's no attorney. no spokesperson. the only party giving his side of the story is the police department standing by there. that he acted in self-defense. a statement issued recently saying they believe what actually happened there was that zimmerman was in fact not pursuing and confronting trayvon martin. they believe at the time this incident happened he was returning to his car in the complex, going to wait for police, and at that moment the police believe martin attacked

zimmerman. that's why they are maintaining his self-defense position. now, a lot of people in this community find that impossible to believe, based on what they've heard in the audio recordings, those 911 calls we've heard so much of in the past days. the pressure is increasing. tonight a huge gathering here. the reverend al sharpton, jesse jackson and others are converging on the cy. estimates, could be thousands of people here. previous protests have been hundreds's people. it's unclear what exactly will nap this town tonight but a lot of pressure on the police and community to do something in response 20 what's happened. >> and possibly try to release more information about the claims they're making. ron allen in sanford, florida, ron, thanks very much, sir. still ahead, battles on the hill, budgets, women's health rights. a view from the republican side with texas senator kay bailey hutchison who's coming up. later, the deep dive. going down the money trail. billions of dollars being raised

and spent. we nerver look enough where the money is going. we'll try to do that. first, look ahead as it's president's schedule. he woke up in oklahoma. how about that? anyway, on his way to ohio. you're watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. ♪ [ male announcer ] from our nation's networks... ♪ ...to our city streets... ♪ ...to skies around the world... ♪ ...northrop grumman's security solutions are invisibly at work, protecting people's lives... [ soldier ] move out! [ male announcer ] ...without their even knowing it. that's the value of performance. northrop grumman. ♪

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well, from contraception to domestic violence women's issues are at the forefront on the campaign trail and on capitol hill. joining me now, senator kay bailey hutchison. president is on an energy trip.

huge industry in the state of texas. i want to ask a larger question, and that was, two years ago i thought we really were on the verge of a comprehensive energy bill and policy and whether it was -- of some sort of connection with building of nuclear power plant, some new drilling, cap and trade. that it looked like there was just going to be this, all right, everybody had something they were going to like in it and everybody had something they weren't going to like. is it possible to do these giant, big bills anymore? have these compromises or do it piecemeal like is the case this year? >> well i don't think that that kind of energy bill is going to go through this year, but i do think we have such a division between the republicans and democrats. our energy sufficiency for our country that we will have a principle debate on what we ought to be doing. our position is we should be

using our natural resources so we don't have to depend on countries that are in turmoil in the middle east or in south america for our basic needs for our economy. >> it does seem, though, there is sort of consensus on that. right? everybody agrees that they want the u.s. to wean itself off of foreign oil. the question is, how much conservation needs to be involved? how much renewables? how much do you pursue the other energy aspects versus more natural resources? what is that balance? is that what really is the dividing line here? >> well, i wish there were a con sen consensus but i don't see a consensus with the president on that. he's had so many opportunities to increase the drilling in the gulf of mexico and he hasn't done it. we're virtually at a moratorium on drilling, and the keystone pipeline, he's saying, oh, yeah. we're going to have the end. we're just not going to connect it to canada. i mean, really, i don't think that's a consensus.

>> and the gulf, you had the bp issue, which you had to put a moratorium for the short-term while they figured that out and then they had lifted that, in time. >> they lifted the moratorium over a year ago. they just haven't issued any permits. it's ridiculous. they talk a good game, but there have not been -- i mean, they've been dribbling out. it's not enough to do what we need to do to make america have the capability to sustain ourselves with our natural resources. we have the natural resources. we want conservation. we want the alternative energy sources like wind and natural gas. these are great, but they aren't enough to make us self-sufficient. oil and natural gas will do that. but we haven't had the impetus from his administration we could have had and could have been energy self-efficient by now if

we had started years ago when we couldn't get the bills through congress and get things set up. >> when you hear -- switching topics. when you hear the phrase war on women and it's connected to the perception that the republican party or parts of the republican party as this conversation about contraception, about sonograms we've seen, take place particularly in state legislatures, what's your reaction when you hear that? >> well, i just think that's wrong. i think that the contraception issue was made into something that it was not. it was a religious freedom issue that a lot of people felt strongly about. and certainly no one is saying that we should have a role in telling women they can't have contraception, which is what the democrats are suggesting. that's absurd. >> there's a thing going on in the state of texas that has to do with the department of health and human services saying they're going to cut off

medicaid funding for family planning in the state of texas because of the governor's decision to implement a new plan that excludes planned parenthood from the state's medicaid women's health program. was that a mistake? >> we cannot afford to lose the medicaid funding for low-income women to have health care services. we cannot. we can't keep turning back federal funds that every state gets and then try to find money in our budget which is already being cut in key areas like education. i do think that the governor needs to sit down with the federal government and work it out so that we can have our share, our fair share, and not more, but our fair share of money for medicaid to help low-income women have their health care services. >> so it sounds like you think that he should not be excluding planned parenthood? >> well, you know, i can't say -- i think planned

parenthood does mammograms. they do so much -- so much of the health care, the preventative health care, and if they're doing that, then we need to provide those services. absolutely. >> all right. senator kay bailey hutchison, republican will texas. always a pleasure to you have on. >> thank you, chuck. >> all right. more fallout at goldman and for the golden arches. market rundown is next. plus following the money trail. the deep dive, deep pockets, not just bank rolling the campaign but following where the money actually goes. first, today's trivia question -- this week marks the 158th anniversary of the founding of the republican party mo. who was the first republican candidates? the answer @chucktodd o or @dailyrundown. the answer is coming up on "the daily rundown."

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the stories making headlines. that french gunman who held hundreds of police at bay 30 hurs was killed in a dramatic raid this morning. police stormed the home of 24-year-old terrorist if you will, mohamed merah. the suspect who opened fire with a submachine gun jumped out a window as police returned fire. merah was found dead on the ground, the suspect claiming links to al qaeda confessed to the point-blampg shootings of seven french citizens including three children shot at that jewish school. israel's defense minister says his country disagrees on how long they can wait to stop iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. sanctions and negotiation could be given a few more months to work. the new orleans saints will be without their head coach sean payton the entire 2012 season.

suspended by roger goodell, the harsher than expected punishment comes from coaches paying team members bonuses if they injured opposing players. the fund, though, was seeded by players. finally. how's this for a big apple circus? tebow mania is coming to the new york jets. tim tebow officially traded yesterday in exchange for two trade picks. mark sanchez is their quarterback. the team says they will complement each other. and jackie deangelis is here. what you got? >> good morning. start with mcdonald's. the ceo jim skinner is retiring after more than seven years at the helm and 41 years overall at the fast food giant replaceed by president and coo don thompson. under skinner mcdonald's upgraded added healthier items

to the menu and held on to consumers even during the recession with low prices. under his leadership mcdonald's stock is up 231%. big shoes to fill there. deutsche bank changed the legal stat its u.s. subsidiary. reports say deutsch restructured the unit in february so it's no longer a bank holding company a provision of dodd frank requiring foreign banks to meet the same capital and american banks requiring a cash injection, and goldman sachs going muppet hunting ordered a company-wide review of e-mails looking for derogatory terms used when referring to clients after a scathing "new york times" op-ed and resignation letter in which he said five goldman people called clients muppets. deep dive into the 2012 race for the big money. we're back in 30 seconds.

back in the watergate days, following the money. add shadow cast by super pacs. mitt romney raise $12 million. and spent twice what it brought in, still has $10 million on

hand. what's striking about that super pac number is this, half the february funding came from one man. texas home builder bob perry. more on him in a minute. if the name doesn't ring a bell, the key to sending swift boat ads from kerry. and a top echelon joining billionaires foster friesz and william dohr who did their part to keep the santorum campaign afloat pumping more than a million into a super pac. the red, white and blue fund and wife of simmons contribute $1ds million. santorum himself had a good month raising money. raised about $9 million on the heels of big wins in colorado, missouri in early february. santorum's ratings jumped, so did romney. newt gingrich's presence in the race completely bank rolled by one family.

actually one man. the chief executive in las vegas sands, sheldon. andalson and his family contributed $5.5 million to the broke super pac winning our future in the month of february. they have financed more than 95% of all money raised and spent by that group in 2012. gingrich himself pulled in just $2.6 million and spent all of it. on wednesday he made his pitch for more donations and took a shot at mitt romney's big money donors at the same time. >> i need your help. because i can't raise, you know, millions of dollars at a time the way governor romney does from the people on wall street who got the money by taking it from taxpayers i now recriycling it into politic and fund-raising all but dried up. paul pulled in less than $3.3 million. on the other side of the political ledger, much has been made about the president's good,

not great fund-raising. still pulled in just over $21 million. another chunk went to the dmc, spending much less than opponents burning through half of his february funds and leaving the campaign with $85 million in the bank. the super pac a sorting the president, official one backed by the president's team raised just $2 million. half of that came from one person. comedian bill maher. that's where the money is coming from. where's it all going? with me now, investigative reporter michael isikoff. we both have been poring through the reports. overusing the printer. we share printer. 25 reams of paper. first to bob perry. a couple things about him. fill me in. >> fascinating. first, he's the single biggest donor to the romney super pac. >> out of nowhere. >> and backing rick perry.

home state governor. he's now switched big time to romney. longtime conservative backer of conservative republican causes for years. the swift boat ads. his crusade in texas, tort reform pouring millions into electing texas supreme court justices and legislatorlegislat proposing rulings limits on lawsuits against companies like his, that build homes, and often -- >> there's something about the issue of immigration which may get conservatives upset. >> interesting wrinkle. this past year, rick perry killed a bill, his lobbyists, and some of the most influential in austin, kill add bied bill t would have cracked down on law enforcement to inspect, demand papers from people working on work sites such as bob perry, his home building firm.

why? because firms like his rely on immigrant labor in text and that would have hurt him. that contrasts with romney's hard line on immigration against rick perry. the single biggest donor. >> totally opposite sides. >> seemingly opposite sides. >> on an issue romney used essentially to torpedo previous opponents, including rick perry. >> one thing people will watch for is, does romney start to modulate that hard line on illegal immigration? especially was we get closer to the general election. >> where's all this money, a lot of money flowing this year? actually there's an argument to be made in some ways there's less. ship ways more. but where's all this money going? let's look here at supepac spen. of money on media. s 3$3.3 million. a big media firm, all the red, white and blue, srcp media,

stephen reed i believe. $3.3 million. look at romney. his reliance on super pac. $3.5 million spent on media by the romney campaign. use a firm, a conglomerate american randall, we'll get into that. restore future, $10 million in media. basically, more than just about 3-1. >> the super pac money is all going into media, attack ads. >> that's all, yes. >> all negative advertising. something like 99% advertising the romney super pac spent and going after santorum, going after gingrich. what's interesting about a lot of the money, when you look at these expenditure reports, a lot of them are going into these llcs. limited liability corporations where you have very little transparency into who's the owners, who are the partners? who's getting -- >> trying to make it harder for us to see who's getting paid?

we know -- you'll have, like, five consultants as partners of one thing. >> right. >> this got started. clinton did it with the november group back in the dpap bush did it with maverick strat jinchegy >> bigger and more pronounced than i've seen. totals are, in north of $15 million that the romney campaign paid for. who is american rambler? the company set you up to do media ad buy, also polling in there as well. >> throw it all in there. >> who are the owners? it's delaware corporation? we don't know? how is the money being divvied up. all that is obscured in the way these expenditure reports are made. >> one other expenditure that came out. one of the top expenditures in the gingrich campaign was newt gingrich. 150-some-odd thousand dollars to newt. we asked the campaign, well what was up? on the credit cards? all reimbursements, they claim. >> well, okay.

but, hey, look. >> how common is that? >> not very common at all. i think if gingrich was doing better, there would be a lot more scrutiny on, is he making money off the campaign? is he using this to sell his book, sell his dvds, all that. >> at this point -- michael isikoff, as you said, could have devote add 30-minute documentary to this. good to see you. up next, the principle panel. a shake-up in the romney campaign following all of this mess yesterday? we'll see. first, it's the white house soup of the day. kind of a quiet day. tomato bisque. you know how i feel about tomato. i won't harp on it. you're watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. i'm walt gale,

i worked at the colorado springs mail processing plant for 22 years. we processed on a given day about a million pieces of mail. checks, newspapers, bills. a lot of people get their medications only through the mail. small businesses depend on this processing plant. they want to shut down 3000 post offices, cut 100,000 jobs. they're gonna be putting people out of work everywhere. the american people depend on the postal service. the daily flashback, to this day in 1933, prohibition ends. when president franklin ro

rooseve roosevelt. alcohol legal. what should have been a great day for mitt romney, the attention once again diverted. romney received a covetsed endorsement from jeb bush, but you wouldn't know it from all the buzz campaign adviser eric fernstrom's comments drew. joining me now, ap journalist, liz and democratic strategist stephen mcmahon. all right. i've been torn and twisted about this story. and it is sort of striking how this cycle more than any we are -- it is nothing but the gaffe police. >> yeah. >> and, look, we can talk about the fundamental problems here with romney in a minute, but this gaffe issue. anybody -- it is -- there's an entire enterprise built on the republican side. i mean, you know, the democratic

side. the republican side. they look for the moment they think they gotcha. >> all about changes in the environment, in media and politics and the nexus of the two. all about tip it journalism. right? the little bits that make their way on to youtube or on to -- >> it goes viral and the moment. >> right. and people lose sight of, saying that people lose sight of the other stuff happening yesterday. romney's big embrace of t.a.r.p. >> in a way he hasn't done. >> right. every was enamored by the gaffe machine and the gaffe police. it really actually is detrimental to political journalism in the long run. instead of focusing on the big stuff, the media because of the political operatives as well as the changes in the internet are focused on these -- >> look, we can bash us, but actually, we're sort of -- we're not victimless. talking about --

>> right. >> at the same time, it's in front of us. look what santorum and newt did. grabbed on to it and ran. >> yes, but as discouraging as this might be from a journal icht perspective, playing devil's advocate, i kind of think it's important because it is giving the american public outside of the beltway, really seeing how people think about these things. how many people, just your average joe schmo are watching television thinking about the campaign in one way and can look up say to themselves, this is how they do it. say one thing running in the primary and swing towards the general, they think something else. it's important for the public to know that. >> the other consultant here. >> i think it's great. >> yeah, but what did eric fernstrom say that wasn't true? >> the old saying. om in washington, when you say something fundamentally true is it a gaffe. basically what he said is there going to be a reset here that's going to occur naturally. the reset has nothing to do with resetting positions. there's a structural nature of

this race that make it is a competitive race. i think he was referring to that. actually from a practitioner's point of view a great example of rapid response working well. the dnc heard it put a spin on it that probably wasn't present and made it a very, very effective rapid response and then, of course, santorum and gingrich picked it up and all had etch-a-sketches by the end the day. >> we were harking about this, mark halperin, mark on it constantly with obama, with bush, with clinton a group of supporters when they got attacked. light up e-mail, light up the phone, whatever, the tweets. romney doesn't have this. >> one more thing -- >> doesn't have a base. >> speaks of his fundamental problem within the party. he cannot -- he isn't beloved by the base. he doesn't have people coming out of the woodwork to defend him. it is, is it not john kerry in 2004?

right? >> oh, come on. let's not -- do we have to do this? really have to do this? >> he is, in nature, you don't see the enthusiasm that you saw for obama or hillary clinton or even john mccain last cycle, and it will be interesting -- >> they weren't nimble about this. how do you not -- i'm getting e-mails. this is absurd. call it out and be done with it. haven't been nimble. >> this has been -- >> candidate romney looked -- he just looked like i don't know how to respond to this rather than just -- bring out a magic eight ball and say -- who knows? have some fun. they don't know how to do that. >> here's what i think mitt romney is thinking about in his head, which actually probably makes him perform worse. this is sort of -- there's an aggregate effect to all this. a gaffe after gaffe after gaffe in this campaign, every time he does it knows it's worse and looks ridiculous for people paying attention. formatly for him most aren't

paying attention like they were in the general election. he has time to recover. it's all on tape and all in campaign ads. by the end i predict he's going to look rid outside. >> >> if you look at the people he's runs against, he doesn't have that much to worry about. >> his version of a victory lap. i'm going to give you another gaffe and still show you i'll beat you. >> exactly. more delegates. stick around. we asked, this week marks 150th anniversary of the founding of the republican party. who's the first republican presidential candidate? the answer -- of course, john c. fremont. the american military officer, and strong opponent to slavery. lost the 1856 presidential election to democrat james buchanan. we'll be right back. you're watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. etting g♪ [ female announcer ] nature valley granola bars, rich dark chocolate, toasted oats. perfect combinations of nature's delicious ingredients, from nature valley. ♪

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>> the big news yesterday was jeb bush. >> was it? >> it was supposed to be. michelle, i'm sorry. he did it on a press release, he never once made the case for romney, simply said he's the nominee and he will bring the message of -- it was a very tepid endorsement. everybody was hoping that jeb bush would run for the republican nomination. >> the even the president joked about it. jeb is the president now and he said i'm glad you're running for this office. >> jeb bush is so well respected, he's so smart, he's doing so many wonderful things particularly in education reform. so for romney to get the

endorsement, no heart how he got it, it can't be understated. especially if you think about jeb bush's advantage in getting the vote. >> romney has some really conflicting things, jeb is supporting him, his number one donor now on opposite sides on the immigration issue. so jeb did use his moment to promote marco rubio for vice president. dynamic, joyful, disciplined and principled, he has managed to find a way to communicate a conservative message full of hope and optimism. >> i think there are a lot of republicans out there who would like to see rubio on the ticket. the question is does rubio want to see rubio on the ticket. if you're looking at where president obama's numbers are and you're looking at his incumbency at this point.

does rubio want to be on a ticket that could very will lose this fall? >> i think jeb wants him to go down in flames because he wants to rise like a phoenix. >> if you're jeb bush, you want -- >> i'm trying to think of a last running mate, and maybe it's lloyd benson, where the political capital they had was greater than the nominee. >> also we take the hispanic vote perhaps down to 70% to maybe 55. >> a cuban republican is going to be able to respond to mexican independents. >> he can give a speech fluently in spanish. >> i'm not sure that that distinction is clear as if it's just another why guy from pennsylvania. >> everybody needs to pay attention to it and it's going to feel like it's coming from

right field. if you look at what's happened with trayvon martin. the young man that was killed in florida, there was an essence of racial profiling, if you look at the laws, all give permission for racial profiling and if we think that this election is going to come down to demographics, the republican party has a huge problem with the latino community. particularly with everything that's happening with the latino community. >> it's happening in the state of florida, this is going to reas resonate a lot and here it's resonating in a spring state. >> i'm surprised about that. there hasn't been a moment yet. >> romney was asked about it and he didn't say a word. >> normally i would do the purple poll which is out today. but there was a remarkable -- a

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