you very much. >> the last one comes from a william geist. hey, barnicle, it would look even better if you didn't tie it in the dark under the you win by giving people a choice. you win by giving people the opportunity to see a different vision for our country, not someone who is just going to be a little different than the person in there. if they are going to be a little different, we might as well stay with what we have instead of taking a risk of what may be the etch a sketch candidate for the future. >> i may have very substantial disagreements with governor romney. but there is no doubt in my mind that if the choice is governor romney or barack obama, we would

have no choice. the danger of obama is so great that i would hope that every candidate currently running, ron paul, governor romney, to senator santorum, that we would all agree that whoever becomes the republican nominee, we have one common goal, and that is to defeat barack obama, period. [ applause ] good morning. it's friday. thank god. thank god. it's friday, march 23. welcome to "morning joe." with us on set, we've got msnbc contributor mark barnicle, dressed for success today. what's going on with that? >> thank you. thank you very much. >> you know why he is doing that. >> why? >> it's his jets tie. >> oh. >> right? tebow. halo, new york. >> here from "the new york times" is charles blow. good to have you. >> nice to see you.

we have steve rattner. >> no charts today. >> why no charts? >> you called at 4:00 yesterday to ask if i could do this. some of us have a life. >> who? not me. >> i don't have a life. >> he's got a life? must be nice. and from washington, political correspondent for the huffington post sam stein. >> definitely does not have a life. >> zero life. >> barnicle, how are you doing, buddy? we didn't talk a lot about tebow yesterday. what do you think about this arrival here? >> you know, i think it's ludicrous. the first time that mark sanchez throws an interception or one or two interceptions in the game, the crowd will be shouting for tebow. >> did you see barnicle on his knees doing the tebow? >> i saw the tebow. >> he couldn't get up after. >> i did too get up. >> i liked the comparison in "the post" yesterday between tebow's lifestyle and sanchez's lifestyle. that was pretty interesting. >> is there a difference? >> oh, my lord. >> mark sanchez is a nice guy.

>> is there a difference? >> we like sanchez. but he is the real-life vinnie chase from entourage. >> really? >> yeah. i really do like the guy an awful lot. >> tebow did not have a role in "entourage." >> no, he did not. he also did not date kate upton. >> or anybody else for that matter. >> or anybody else for that matter. we'll just stop there. >> wow. >> so sam stein, my lord. help us. >> dogs sleeping with cats. the stay puff marshmallow man walking down main street. this is out of "ghost busters." you've actually got rick santorum saying that barack obama would be a better choice than mitt romney. what's going on here? maybe he wants to be the vp, right, for obama? >> that one was a head scratcher. i'm not even sure that's going to last another three hours. i'm guessing that the santorum campaign has to pull that one

back, because you can just see, you know, the obama campaign gleefully playing up this quote five months from now when it's romney versus obama, where they can say, listen, even rick santorum, his primary rival, said that obama would be preferable to mitt romney. and it's just, you know, it's a classic santorum sort of foot in the mouth unnecessary error moment where he didn't need to go that far. he just went there. >> let's look at exactly what he said. obviously, the next test is tomorrow in louisiana's presidential primary. and mitt romney, by the way, got an endorsement from a key conservative in the republican party, jim demint of south carolina. he told reporters on capitol hill this. i can tell conservatives from my perspective that i'm not only comfort with romney, i'm excited about the possibility of him possibly beating our nominee. >> wow. >> oh. i think we all need to look at this presidential primary and encourage the candidates to do a little self reflection here. what's good for our country?

the sooner we can make a decision, i think the sooner we can focus on the real problem, which is obama. >> holy moly. that is -- that is. >> kind of possibly. >> no, that's -- they are lining up. >> they are saying game over. >> when you have jeb bush one day coming out -- this is obviously planned. you've got jeb bush coming out one day. saying it. and then the next day you've got jim demint coming out saying it. this is a -- you know, this is game over. i would say the two most important endorsements. and i don't think much of endorsements. but the two most important endorsements any republican candidate can get, mika, is jeb bush. >> yeah. >> you're the girl with the far away look in your eyes. >> sorry. well, ok, i'm just saying -- this is like when we were talking to chuck todd and david gregory, probably two of the best analysts on television. >> i agree.

i love them. >> they live and breathe politics. every bit is exciting to them. and i'm sitting there, i think it was yesterday, could have been the day before, i don't know, kind of boring. sorry. all of this is kind of boring. >> you can at least look at me while i'm talking. >> i'm sorry. you're fascinating. yes. what? >> jeb bush, jim demint. two most important people in the republican party. and it may not be exciting, but if you want to talk about the end of the road, when those two guys start lining up, you've got jeb, the establishment choice, and jim demint, the tea party champion, boom, game over. which may be why rick santorum is starting to swing wildly. it's just -- it may be boring. >> it's over. >> if this is boring, then let's talk about tebow. what do you want to talk about? >> i'm just saying, i think there's a lot of injected drama in what is a game over. >> well, this is reality.

this is a sign post. this is the referee going nine, 10. >> yeah, this is the count. >> it's over. >> is it over? >> well, i think that -- i actually think that romney has a better chance in louisiana than most people give him credit for. if you look at mississippi's returns, romney won virtually every county that was along the mississippi river into mississippi by about two counties. those are all farmers. all those people identify with the businessman's mindset because they are all small businessmen. louisiana is bracketed on both sides by rivers. it's a mississippi river on the east. there's the red river on the west. these are all farmers. also, it has a disproportionately large number of catholics. mitt romney has been winning the catholic vote in almost every state that he's been in. and in the south, it's more moderate than other southern states because that's the louisiana area. that's the new orleans area. so i think -- i'm not saying he

wins, i'm saying he has a better chance than people are giving him credit for in the state of louisiana. >> charles, you have never struck me as a louisiana guy. i have never seen you wearing black and gold. >> i will dance after a casket. >> ok. i'd love to see that. >> one of the best scenes out of a james bond film. what part of -- >> north louisiana. >> ok. so romney, very interesting, you think romney has a shot. let's move from north louisiana to central florida. you have been a champion on this tragic case coming out of sanford, florida. there appears -- and i say only appears, because you never know, there appears to be some movement in the trayvon martin case. appears. >> well, i don't know exactly what that means. the sheriff, yes, temporarily stepped down. i don't know what that means, whether or not he'll be back, whether or not if you have a

boss who goes away and you know he'll be back are you going to behave differently in any way that will shame that boss if you know he's coming back. prosecutor has changed. >> they changed prosecutors. the government is appointing another special investigator. >> right. >> i think everybody statewide is starting to feel the heat. >> right. that is very through. there is a lot of heat here. this is a very small city. small police department. and they have bungled things to some degree. and that may compromise the investigation. and if even if it doesn't compromise it, it makes people lose faith in the investigation. and that's a bad thing because now it's not a local issue. it is a national, international issue. >> it's a local issue, a national issue, and unfortunately, mika, sanford, florida, has a history of this. before the example of the two men that shot the african-american claiming that it was in self-defense, that he was trying to run him over, they shot him in the back. they weren't arrested.

also, a police officer's son beating up an african-american homeless man. he got off. i mean, it's -- it goes on and on. >> to your point, there were a couple of changes. but the bottom line is, and thousands of people marching yesterday, this is what they really have a problem with, and that's the shooter, george zimmerman remains a free man this morning. claiming that he shot that young man in self defense. but the changes we have seen are sanford's police chief, who's been at the center of criticism for not arresting the gunman, has temporarily stepped down. the state prosecutor overseeing the case has stepped aside. protesters say it's not enough. thousands as you can see were at that rally in florida to demand justice yesterday. this event was led by reverend al sharpton, whose mother died just hours before this rally. >> i've got the news this morning leaving new york that my mother had passed. one side of me said to don't

come. but the other side of me said, my mother raised me to stand up for justice. my mother would have been ashamed of me if i wasn't here tonight. my mother raised me to stand with mothers and daddies like that. and in her name, i'm going to fight until zimmerman meets justice in the courtroom. >> you know, we actually were talking to al. we talk a good bit. his mom's from alabama. and we talked about it a good bit. and talked about my mom, his mom. he was saying that she was getting worse. and always -- because, you know, you see -- you see that side of al sharpton. i'm sure a lot of people saying, he should be with his mother. you know, you talk to him about it. and he's always talked about his mom. and it was painful, a long

painful decline for her. but i agree. that's where his mom would want him to be. >> yeah, where he should be. >> you have to totally respect him for doing that. >> totally. and i'm just giving the other side that people may not see. they see that fiery clip, and they may not understand how much reverend al's mom meant to him. but that's a guy that, charles, is doing what -- >> he's doing what his mother would have wanted him to do. >> exactly. i'm not being critical. i'm just saying critics, skeptics, would say, what are you doing there causing trouble instead of blah, blah, blah? it was the right place to be and, you know, people like al and you have brought attention to this case when a lot of the rest of the media world have been silent. >> i don't think anybody would criticize him for doing that. >> looking at the case, do we

have the clip of the former new york city police officer? because i want that one. at the rally, i think you know what you're going to get. but the whole case has been around this stand your ground law and whether or not this person in some way, shape, or form, george zimmerman, could have been firing in self defense. and this former new york cop says it's just not that -- it's not us making assessments here as civilians thinking where's the other side of the story. here is a professional looking at it from the vantage point of what he does every day. take a look. >> the vast majority of the issues in this case are pretty straightforward. it doesn't require any great deliberation. to be quite blunt, i think police supervisors, sergeants all over the country within 20 to 30 minutes after getting on the scene here, there would be an arrest. trying to create this -- i just don't understand why this whole process seems to be so stuck in place and needs so much analysis. this is not an issue of who killed this man. the issue is, is there any

justification? and there doesn't appear to be a sin tilla of valid evidence. >> mike, i don't understand why zimmerman has not been arrested. i say this today. i mean, we have gotten to the point now, this happened february 26, ok? the media was a little slow on it. charles was out there. al started talking about it a week or two ago. we started talking about it. but now everybody is paying attention to this case. and zimmerman is still not arrested. there is no justification for not locking him up on some charge. >> no. well, you know, as charles spoke to, it's a small town. 53,000 people. i think it's a 140-person police department. and a shooting like this, in a big city, a patrol supervisor shows up. there's a shooting team that shows up because there's a discharge of a police weapon. so they rope off the scene. they go through the thing. they would have listened to the

911 tapes. if you listen to the tapes, you have probable cause to arrest zimmerman right there on the tapes because he is asked, you're not following him, are you? he says, yes. they say don't do that. and then a few minutes later, he says, he's running now. he's running away. so he pursued trayvon. there's probable cause right there to put the cuffs on him, throw him in the car, take him to jail. >> and he's not a believable witness on the scene. a lot has happened after the night of the shooting that gives you probable cause. zimmerman is not believable the night of the shooting because he says, according to the police chief, that he got out of his truck. the only reason he got out of his truck was to check the street signs. the street signs are literally designed to be seen from the street. that is the reason that they look the way that they look. zimmerman has called the police 50 times in the last year.

he has always had to give street locations. it's a tiny gated community. are you trying to tell me that you don't know the streets in this tiny community? >> that's unbelievable. >> that's like somebody saying i live on the upper west side, but i have to get out of my car every time i'm at the corner of broadway and 79th to know where i am. it is not a credible reason to be outside the vehicle. >> the more you think about it, it gets worse. it doesn't get better when you look at the details. >> right. >> but beyond bringing him to justice, which i think is incredibly important, i think we'll learn a few things from this. i don't understand myself why there's any justification for anybody not a law enforcement officer carrying a .9 millimeter semiautomatic pistol around, and why that's good public policy to have such a thing. >> well, the law itself, the stand your ground law, which the governor first defended and then said well maybe we need to change the law -- >> well, the guy that authored the law said it doesn't apply in this case.

he wasn't standing his ground. >> he was in pursuit. >> he said the bill that i wrote does not apply to this case because the guy was running after him. >> right, right. >> this guy was seeking a fight. he was seeking a conflict. again, i just -- i want to know why the police chief, why the state attorney, why the new person assigned, why the new state's attorney assigned, you better get a grand jury together pretty soon to start looking at this thing specifically, because the evidence is overwhelming and as i've said before, and i will say it again without apology, if it were an african-american that shot a young 17-year-old white boy -- >> game over. >> game over. the african-american would still be in jail. the arraignment would have already happened. >> no question. >> and they would be talking about whether he was going to get life or whether he was going

to plead to the murder and get life or whether they were going to try to execute him. it's just the reality. that would have already happened a month later. and here we are a month later, zimmerman is still out there. and nobody in the state of florida has charged this guy who it appears sought this confrontation and killed this young man. >> you know, another one of the threads of this story, when you pull on it, other than the obvious lead of the story, the tragic death of this young kid, one of the threads that you pull on is the increasing, increasing power and ever-present power of the national rifle association as a lobby, to get legislation passed. not only in florida, but several other states. the stand your ground legislation. so they have opposed cop killer bullets over the counter. >> but, mike, that's not even the issue. this law doesn't apply. >> but, joe, the existence of the law in this guy's head may

have precipitated him to do something he would not have done if we did not have such laws. >> oh, come on. you can't blame the nra for this freak calling 911 50 times and saying he is mr. vigilante. >> it's only the nra that wants these laws. >> you think it's only the nra that wants these laws? i mean, this has been an ongoing discussion. this has been an ongoing battle. this is what we debated in first year law school about the castle doctrine, stand your ground doctrine. and there are a lot of really permissive laws in the '60s and '70s that came about that caused a backlash. somebody said, if somebody walks into my house, i'm going to shoot them dead. and then they were saying you had to run to the furthest possible corner of the house before you could do anything. so, yes, there is this back and

forth debate long before the national rifle association started lobbying for these legislations. i'm saying -- i'm on your side here. but it's not the nra. let's not try to find a straw man to knock down for political reasons. >> i'm not trying to be political, but let me ask you this question. in light of all of this, would you change this law or not or simply say this guy wasn't obeying the law, that doesn't mean you should change the law? what would be your position on this law? >> you know what? if i were the supreme court reviewing your question, i would say it's not germane and i wouldn't even review it because the stand your law ground has nothing to do with this case. the only thing that it has provided are law enforcement officers who do not want to arrest this man who killed a black man >> it has been used as a shield against them bringing justice to this case. >> just to take one thing off the table then, you're saying the stand your ground law is

fine. it just wasn't aobeyed here. leave it in place. >> i'll be really honest with you. i haven't studied the law close enough. what i'm saying is for purposes of this case, it doesn't apply. >> it would only apply if you believe zimmerman, his claim that he was -- he thought his life was in danger and he was in grave threat, because he says that he was returning to his truck and this kid, who he outweighs by 100 pounds, came out of nowhere from behind him and attacked him. and according to -- >> we've got tapes. >> not only do we have tapes -- >> he's lying. we know he's lying. >> according to the police chief, bill lee, zimmerman pulls the handgun from a holster on his body. so a kid who has never had a fight according to his mother. his mother told me he never had a fight. >> weighs 100 pounds less than zimmerman. >> attacks a man who is wearing a handgun.

and the kid knows that all he has is candy and a soda. >> right. >> you would have to believe that if you were on the scene to believe what zimmerman is saying. >> nobody believes it. >> well, the police believe him because they haven't made an arrest. >> no, no. >> well, the spokesman said that there was credibility to zimmerman's case, and that is why he was not arrested. and still is not arrested. >> and is this law part of the credibility? is the law used as an excuse? >> zimmerman is using it. >> that's sick. >> i heard there's a tape that may have a racial epithet in there. >> i've heard it. >> is there a tape out there somewhere? >> i've heard it. >> i can't tell what's being said. >> it sure sounds like it. >> i can't say. >> you can't substantively say that. >> it's what it sounds like. >> i have a question that i have not heard answered. was zimmerman allowed to return home that evening after the

shooting with his gun? does he still have his gun? >> my understanding is yes. >> did anyone test the gun? >> unbelievable. >> that is mind boggling. mind boggling. >> so they don't test the gun. but they -- >> i don't know if they tested it. >> but the guy is still out. he's not put in. he probably still has his gun from what we understand. and yet a 17-year-old boy who has skittles and iced tea, walking home, minding his own business, running away from this guy, dreamiscreaming for help i 911 tapes, is running away and shot dead and is drug tested. this is disgusting. absolutely disgusting. and again, the clock is ticking. when are you going to arrest this guy, florida? when are you going to arrest him? the clock is ticking. >> and the world is waiting actually. >> we really are. seriously. how much longer? he was shot dead with skittles

and iced tea. almost a month ago. how much longer? do you need help? we can bring some people like from other states to the state of florida. my home state. if you can't figure this out yourself. this is not complicated. and the longer you wait to arrest this guy, the worse it's going to be for you in the long run, whether you're a republican or a democrat. a conservative or a liberal. this is shameful. >> it's not america. that's for sure. >> this is shameful. >> it's not america of 2012. coming up, former presidential candidate michele bachmann will be on set here today. also, maryland governor martin o'malley. host of "the last word" lawrence o'donnell. up next, politico's top stories of the morning.

but first, bill karins has a check on the forecast. the weekend is shaping up for a big change. as you know, we couldn't hold onto this incredible summer warmth forever. it will be cooler this weekend. yesterday, detroit warmest temperature you have ever had in march at 86 degrees. boston at 83. now here's what's changing. the storm in the middle of the country right now bringing rain to chicago and the deep south is going to slide to the east coast. so for today, one more really nice day from d.c. to new york, all the way down through the southeast. but you see all the rain in the middle of the country? that's going to slide to the east coast beginning saturday afternoon and it looks like it's going to linger into sunday. if you have weekend plans, the northeast from boston to new england, a lot of rain on sunday. also the west coast, a new storm for you from san francisco to l.a. everyone in the middle of the country, looks like you'll enjoy a great, great weekend. new york city, one more day of summer and then a cooler, wet weekend ahead. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks.

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at 29 past the hour, time now to take a look at the morning papering. the unemployment rate for military veterans of iraq and afghanistan is showing signs of improveme improvement. the number dipped to 7.6% compared to 12% for all of last year. some analysts caution it's too early to tell if the progress is real. on monday, retired general stanley mcchrystal and tom brokaw will be on "morning joe." and the obama administration has approved guidelines that allow counterterrorism officials to lengthen the period of time they can retain information about u.s. citizens even if they have no known connection to

terrorism. the nam counterterrorism center now has five years to hold that information. previously, it had to be destroyed within 180 days. so another victory for the bush-cheney efforts in the obama administration. >> there you go. and in sunday's "parade" magazine, new york's first girlfriend, sandra lee, talks about what it's like having dualing public roles as a celebrity chef and live-in girlfriend of governor andrew comeau. >> all right. with us now, we have the chief white house correspondent for "politico" here with the morning playbook. mike, what are you looking at today? >> well, happy friday. >> yay! >> there you go. >> another sign that the republican establishment is ready to move on, is ready to get onto the main event, the super bowl, with barack obama. the republican national committee, which in the past has waited for there to be an official nominee to take their

orders from their new boss, the nominee, is moving ahead with building a ground game in key states. now, they are way, way, way behind what obama campaign is up to. but they are already focusing on nevada and colorado as states where there's tons of early voting. they figure that before election day, 80% of the presidential voters in nevada and colorado will vote. so they are focusing there. focusing in michigan and florida. and they are using the recall drive against governor scott walker in wisconsin. incidentally, the home state of the rnc chairman. they are also using that to build up their list, their organizations. >> sam stein, there are a lot of good things you can say about john mccain. great war hero and great servant to this country. but one thing you cannot say about john mccain was that he was the most organized guy in the world. so you had the obama machine's

extraordinary organization versus a less organized campaign. >> yeah. >> on this front at least, romney versus obama, have two people that -- this is going to be down to a science. and it sounds like they are already heading that direction. >> yeah. and one thing i would say is that romney brings to this process sort of this technical sense of how to run a campaign better than john mccain, better than his opponents. but the primary has proved that, you know, it's drained him of a lot of resources. and i called up the offices of romney's offices in new hampshire, iowa, and other primary states that have already gone just to see if they were still open. and he's closed down a lot of the offices. for instance, in new hampshire, in manchester, they have one office. there is still staff but they closed the office. so they have to rebuild the machine in some respects. so it's going to take a while. you know, he has a little under $8 million cash on hand as a campaign. that's going to increase obviously. but that's not a lot of money to begin a general election with. so he's got a lot of work to do,

even though he has the skills to do it. >> all right, sam. and mike allen, thank you very much. happy friday. >> happy weekend. coming up, a march madness upset. highlights next in sports. >> i know you're excited about that. >> i'm going to do sports. that's how excited i am. plus, find out which of these stories make the cut in willie's week in review. we'll be right back. i'm good about washing my face. but sometimes i wonder... what's left behind? [ female announcer ] purifying facial cleanser from neutrogena® naturals. removes 99% of dirt and toxins without dyes, parabens or harsh sulfates. so skin feels pure and healthy. [ female announcer ] from neutrogena® naturals. hey, heard any updates on the game? i think it's final seconds, ohh, down by two, shoots a three, game over. so two seconds ago... hey mr. and mrs. harris, where's kevin? say hi kevin. hi. mom, put me down. put...the phone...down.

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all right, mike. go ahead. >> well, your bracket is doing fine. i know that. >> doing great. >> are you sure? >> oh, yeah. your bracket looks great. all right. ncaa sweet 16 kicked off last night. number one seed syracuse taking on four seed wisconsin at the td garden in boston. first step, syracuse with the steal. the fast break, dishing it. he finishes this with the slam. he finished with 15 points. t in the second, the badgers playing catchup. brooks hits the three to make a one-point game, 48-47. wisconsin was 14-27 from behind the arc. skipping ahead to the end of the game. wisconsin down by one point. 20 seconds left. badgers have one last chance to win the game.

they can't penetrate syracuse's defense. jordan taylor throws up the three, doesn't go. the rebound. an air ball. time expires. syracuse, 64-63 the winner. >> wow. >> number one seed michigan state. tom izzo taking on four seed louisville and rick pitino in phoenix. in the second, michigan state down by six. lloyd can't hit the three, but green slams it home. louisville wouldn't let them get too close. chris smith open in the corner. drains a three. michigan state becomes the first one-seed to fall in the tournament, losing to the cardinals 57-44. and rick pitino is undefeated in the sweet 16 with a 10-0 record in his career. >> unbelievable. >> so, rick going to the elite eight. >> going to the elite eight. glad he's away from the celtics. he almost ruined that team. >> oh, stop it. >> he did. >> we love rick. >> i know. but he almost ruined the team and it almost ruined him.

florida beat marquette last night. and ohio state over cincinnati. with that, here is the elite eight picture so far. in the east, ohio state and syracuse will play tomorrow at 7:00. >> that's going to be a great game. >> in the west, florida and louisville. another good game at 4:30. watch out for louisville. they are good. >> and pitino. a great guy. >> sweet 16 games in the south and midwest. 7:15, number 10 seed xavier plays number three baylor. i have baylor in the final four. >> do you really? >> yeah, i do. >> this year's long shot, 13 seed ohio. bobcats play the number one seed north carolina. then ohio will go home after that game. later, the hoosiers face off against kentucky. finally, north carolina state takes on the kansas jayhawks. that will be a good game. last night, red sox 4, yankees 4. bobby valentine squeezed home the tying run in the bottom of the ninth. >> i love it. great game today, indiana and kentucky. >> yeah. >> indiana beat them earlier this year.

but i think kentucky, man. they may be going all the way. >> i sit there all day in front of the tv watching basketball and spring training baseball. >> you're pathetic. a pathetic human being. >> my team's out. >> who did you have? >> lamar. my cousin plays for lamar. out in the first round. i'm done. >> you shut off the tv? >> i'm done. >> all right. i appreciate your loyalty. up next, in addition temeo k mika's bracket, the must-read opinion pages. turn left.

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this is going to be helpful. call or come in today. fidelity investments. turn here. what a beautiful day in washington, d.c. >> ok. >> it's great. and tim tebow is coming to new york. >> must-read opinion pages.

i'll just take care of things here on my own. we have a couple. we'll start with this one. if obama care -- we had zeke on yesterday. i think you missed that. >> i love zeke. >> very good talking about the obama care trial so to speak. if obama care is upheld -- >> do you want to read that? >> yeah, i'm good. ok. it fundamentally changes the nature of the american social contract. it means the effective end of a government of enumerated powers, i.e., finite delineated powers beyond which government may not go, beyond which lies the free realm of the people and their voluntary institutions. the obama care is a central government of unlimited power of which citizen and civil society struggle to carve out autonomy. little wonder the president barely mentioned it in his state

of the union address. he wants to be re-elected. he'd rather talk about other things. but there is no escaping it now. oral arguments begin monday at 10:00 a.m. >> and so the battle begins. in "the new york post" opinion page, 31, michael tanner says next week the supreme court is going to be devoting six hours over three days to challenges on obama care. the affordable care act. the last time the court spent this much time hearing arguments in a case was in 1966, and that was the miranda rights case. sam stein, this is going to be such an important case for not only political reasons but also for constitutional reasons. what can the federal government require individuals to do? >> yeah. i mean, these are not insignificant legal arguments that we are considering here. i happen to think that charles is using a bit of hyperbole with

his column there. i don't think this is a huge overreaching intrusion. they are compelling people to purchase private insurance, not government-run insurance. but on the legal question, yes, it's fascinating and i'm sure for the administration very frightening to know that the thing they worked on for 16 months could either be struck down entirely or just lose its major component parts. >> i would think the president is not necessarily focusing on it because he got absolutely killed for focusing on it for a whole year. >> yes. >> and there are other things. move on. he has accomplished this. there are other things that we do need to focus on. steve rattner, we have a woman that we met in boca. 93 years old. and she sends me emails like critiquing the show. mostly my scarves. but this one is very long, and this one is about obama care and the pros and cons. and she asks this. could you do an hour-long show on it? it would take more than an hour to learn about exactly what is

in obama care and the comments about it are vague and incoherent. so how can i make up my mind about it unless i'm knowledgeable? as you can tell, i'm an independent thinker. i live in the heaviest populated republican county in the entire state of florida, so my choices are limited. i also wonder -- >> so people still don't know all this time -- all these, you know, a year and a half later. remember nancy pelosi said we need to pass it so we know what's inside it. most americans still don't know what this bill is about. >> do we have an hour? it's very complicated. one minute we have. it's very complicated. but i think the fundamentals are it brings insurance to maybe 30 million out of the 42 million americans who don't have insurance. it provides a lot of protections for people who have insurance that they won't lose it because of pre-existing conditions. your kids can stay on it until they are 26. they are going to have these exchanges to make buying insurance cheaper. try to control health care costs through a variety of mechanisms.

republicans don't like those either. and that it's all going to be paid for through new revenues, medicare -- additional medicare taxes and so forth. and so it is complicated. and it is a package. and i think you have to separate, though, the desirability of this policy from a constitutional question of whether the government can pass such legislation and put it in place. i think they are two slightly different questions. >> well, they are two different questions. but the bottom line of this case is, mike, whether the federal government can compel individuals to purchase health insurance. >> i understand that. to the 93-year-old woman -- >> joan. >> yesterday, when zeke emanuel was there, one of the architects of this policy, he was talking about the terrible failure in communications with regard to the health care bill when it was passed. and as it was being developed in the white house. he just said the communications about what was in the bill and the impact of the bill on each and every american was terribly poor. >> yeah.

and charles, we also are still having debates about how much is it going to cost. and the cbo has come out with new numbers that conservatives have seized upon. it's going to be more expensive, cause more problems. this is going to be a rolling debate for some time, regardless of the supreme court conclusion. >> right. and the supreme court conclusion may not be a complete up or down. so the supreme court can say, we don't like the mandate part but the other parts of it are ok. the supreme court could say -- they have a lot of latitude there. >> right. >> and whatever comes out is still a political football. you can argue it both ways. if the supreme court knocks it down, republicans can say this is why you need a democrat in the white house until you have a vacancy on the supreme court. the republicans can argue that this is why this administration is overreaching because this is unconstitutional. it is still a political football regardless of what happens. what does change, though, is

whether or not people are still covered in the way that steve was talking about. people on the ground. there are some people for whom this is a life or death situation. these are people who need coverage and will get it under this law. and they may not have it if the supreme court knocks it down. >> charles' point about this being a political football, the new numbers that the conservatives are talking about, they are exaggerating and misrepresenting. they do not change the fundamentals of this. >> all right. do you want to respond? >> well, we just don't know the long-term impact. and the cbo said as much in the report. that the obama administration is presenting the best-case scenario. republicans are presenting the worst-case scenario. and you've got the cbo basically saying it could go either way. right? >> there's a lot we don't know. i agree with that. we'll be right back with willie's week in review. today i'm talking to people about walmart's low price guarantee.

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guess what? here's what you've been waiting for. it's friday. so it's time for willie's week in review. >> i called john elway monday morning and let him know that i wanted to be a denver bronco. i am thrilled to be here. >> at number three, tebow mania

moves east. >> tim tebow is a great kid, and i said that. he's the one guy -- if i wanted somebody to marry my daughter, it would be him. >> if tim tebow is going to marry john elway's daughter, it's going to be a long distance relationship, because the arrival of peyton manning in denver pushed tebow into the arms of the new york jets. >> jets jets jets! >> the current jets quarterback put on a happy public face, but the greatest jet of all, joe willie namath, just couldn't bite his tongue. >> i can't agree with it. i just think it's a publicity stunt. i really think it's wrong. i can't go for it. >> at number two, another indonesian smoking kid. an 8-year-old in indonesia is trying to kick his two pack a day habit. his mother says he doesn't even go to school anymore because they won't let him smoke there. bad news for sure, but not quite as bad as that indonesian 2-year-old from a couple of

years ago who crushed lung darts like he was keith richards. there is no age limit in indonesia for smoking or for buying cigarettes. apparently, they are getting their medical information from 1950s tv commercials. >> yes, according to this repeated nationwide survey, more doctors smoke camels than any other cigarette. why not change to camels? and the number one story of the week -- >> it's almost like an etch a sketch. you can kind of shake it up and restart all over again. >> just hours after an impressive blowout win in illinois, the political conversation turned from mitt romney's front-runner strength to his inner etch a sketchness. >> had mitt romney been around at the time we were drafting our constitution, he would have just shaken it and just shook it up after it was approved to rewrite it. >> so i'm going to give it to you guys to play with, all right? she could now be a presidential candidate. >> earlier in the week, romney himself had accused president obama of playing etch a sketch politics.

>> the president is trying to erase his record with some new rhetoric. >> the 1950s etch a sketch was preceded as a political prop this week by the 1970s era lava lamp. >> that's a big lava lamp. congratulations. >> i'm a big lava lamp guy. i recommend it to everybody. >> reporter: by edison's lightbulb of the late 1870s. >> the government would have banned thomas edison's lightbulb. oh, by the way, they just did, didn't they? >> reporter: and by the pancake. >> these pancakes are as large as my win in puerto rico. >> oh, man. at least he didn't like -- i don't know. it's crazy. all right. very good. >> thank you, charles. >> sam stein, thank you as well. >> have a great weekend, sam. go sox. >> go sox. still ahead, former presidential candidate michele bachmann will join us on set. and next, "time" magazine's

joe klein and "the washington post's" eugene robinson. we'll be right back. not in this economy. we also have zero free time, and my dad moving in. so we went to fidelity. we looked at our family's goals and some ways to help us get there. they helped me fix my economy, the one in my house. now they're managing my investments for me. and with fidelity, getting back on track was easier than i thought. call or come in today to take control of your personal economy. get one-on-one help from america's retirement leader.

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drilled every little bit of this great country of ours, we'd still have to buy the rest of our needs from someplace else if we keep on using the same amount of energy, the same amount of oil. welcome back to "morning joe." top of the hour. a live look at the white house and another foggy morning in washington. mike barnicle and steve rattner still with us. and joining the table, political columnist for "time" magazine joe klein. and in washington, associate editor of "the washington post" eugene robinson. and the president talking about energy, the keystone pipeline on the front pages of the nation's papers. and "the new york times" saying that the united states is inching towards energy independe independence. and there's a quote that says, in the past, consumption rose, imports increased, and now every one of those trends are going

the other way. so fascinating. steve rattner, what's the president doing on energy here? >> well, first of all, what you just referred to really doesn't have a lot to do honestly with what this president did or previous presidents. we effectively have no energy policy. this is really the market at work. this is higher prices bringing out more supply, higher prices causing people to drive less. the resession having a huge impact on energy demand. the president is saying like every president, we need to do something. and he is saying that what we need to do should be a mix of everything. that we need to drill, that we need to have solar, we need alternatives, we need conservation. he is trying to go down the middle and saying we should have every piece of the energy puzzle. but the fact is, we haven't done anything at a government level to develop any of those things. >> no doubt about it. and as we have been saying for somemika, the french, 75% to 85% of their energy comes from nuclear. we have been frozen in place

since 1978. now we are talking about the possibility of natural gas. that is a political football. everything is a political football when it comes to whether it's the conservatives that are saying -- challenging energy technology or whether it's liberals challenging natural resources drilling there. >> and the framework of this story on the front page of "the new york times" is that the white house is sort of trying to push back at possibilities who have been blaming the president for rejecting the northern part of the project early in year. the president blaming congress, saying all the regulations are forcing his hand in terms of proper reviews. so they have been going back and forth with that. let's pull up the polls because a recent poll shows 57% of americans want the government to approve the keystone pipeline. 29% of those polled are against it. wouldn't be finished until 2014, some say, at the earliest. >> this is why you saw the president yesterday go to curbing, oklahoma, to talk about the pipeline. he has been on the wrong side of

this issue from the political point of view. >> and he is blaming congress for regulations stopping him from moving forward with the pipeline. that's laughable. he is trying to catch up. we all know that the keystone pipeline is not going to lower gas prices at the pump. steve, as you brought up, that energy is going to get into the market one way or the other, whether we pump it our way or their way. but joe klein, politically, the president can't allow consumers to think environmentalists are holding his energy policies hostage. >> and 69% of the public believes that the president has a major impact on gasoline prices, which is crazy. >> that is a tough one. and that's crazy for any president. that's bad news for future presidents. >> can i just add one other part of the equation to steve rattner's horn for him? one of the reasons why we're, you know, buying less gas is because we are buying more cars that are more fuel efficient.

gm, the company that he helped save, is running double or triple shifts for the chevy cruz, which gets 40 miles to the gallon. you know, and this is an important piece of legislation that the president pushed through, which is higher cafe standards, fuel efficiency standards for cars. it would be like 50 miles per gallon in 2020. >> this is remarkable. gene, of course, also we have a foreign policy that's been held hostage as well. speaking of being held hostage, the foreign oil now for a quarter century. at some point, americans are going to say, this is too expensive. we have got to become energy independent. >> well, yeah. the problem with that, of course, is that every step -- there's a cost involved. you know, you can get nuclear, you've got to get rid of the waste. you can drill the whole state of

north dakota. but that's problematic from the environmental point of view. i think you have to have an all of the above strategy. you just probably have to do it more intensively than we are doing it now. but, boy, it would take the pressure off foreign policy if we could get further along down that road. >> let's go there, because there certainly is a lot of means to cover regarding afghanistan. just for the record, one of the big headlines is that the army staff sergeant robert bales, who is accused in the massacre of the afghan villagers, is going to be charged today, facing 17 counts of murder, six counts of attempted murder, six counts of aggravated assault. so that moves forward. and, joe, you write this in "time" magazine. 10 is enough. it's long past time for the bulk of our troops to come home, which means the obama administration should announce that our drawdown will not pause

as previous planned in september but will continue in an orderly fashion. for the life of me, i can't see the rationale for the loss of even one more american life or limb there. >> or mind. >> or mind. >> or mind. and, joe, you just to remind viewers, we've been talking about getting out of afghanistan for several years. you are no peacenik. the left savaged you back in 2006 and 2007 for saying this surge just may work. we need to give it a try. and you talked about -- >> that was in iraq. >> in iraq, right. and you talked about the sunni awakening in the western part of iraq. and you were right. and here you're saying what we've been saying, enough is enough. come home. >> well, you know, i have also been to afghanistan four times. in the last three years. especially down south, embedding

with the troops where the fighting is. and the question at this point is, what's the mission? you know, the original mission was to go after al qaeda. we've done a pretty damn good job of that. >> we won. >> and, you know, as far as i'm concerned, we have two national interests left in afghanistan. one is to make sure that the taliban don't come in. and to do that, you fund the afghan national army, who are mostly northerners who love fighting the southerners, the taliban. they have been doing it for centuries. and i don't think that the taliban is going to march into kabul. >> let me stop you there, though, joe. that's not -- that's not a mission that we can control. >> that's right. >> and whether it's in 2012 or 2022 when our policy makers started blurring the line between al qaeda and the taliban, we lost this war. >> absolutely. >> let's just be very clear. that al qaeda wants to blow up

buildings in new york city and washington and kill americans. the taliban doesn't. they want to be left alone. >> we didn't lose the war. we won. >> no, i'm saying we won the -- the war, the part of the war that was an anti-terror campaign. let's just say we lost the mission when we decided to go after the taliban instead of just al qaeda. >> right. and i think that, you know, we can help the afghan national army by providing training and some air support. but that doesn't require more than 10,000 or 15,000 troops. it would be nice if we could use kandahar airfield as a base for special operations and drones. because the real problem such as it exists is in pakistan, which is where the remnants of al qaeda are. interesting thing, though, joe. i spent a lot of time talking to veterans and writing about veterans. and after the bales affair, i went back to a lot of the veterans i knew who are doing great things in this country,

who are running programs to help other veterans. many of them sergeants. and the striking thing to me was that, you know, they are not war wimps either. and unanimously, they say it's time to go. >> wow. >> ok. so i think it's easy for a lot of people to say, we've even seen some top republicans say quietly, off the record, that it's time to go. but how does a president say it without claiming victory and stomping his foot and saying america rules? i mean, there is a sort of concept that americans need to hear. i don't agree with it, that we have prevailed. we have won. and this wouldn't be -- how would he characterize it? >> we won. we won. >> really? that didn't work. mission accomplished. >> hold on. hold on. let me answer your question. >> ok. >> let me answer the question. >> i'm curious.

>> unlike iraq, where the war went on and on -- >> right. >> we accomplished our goal. our goal was to destroy al qaeda in afghanistan. the country that allowed osama bin laden to launch the 9/11 attacks from this safe haven. there are now the cia director reports less than 50 members of al qaeda in all of afghanistan. >> they'll pour back in. >> so you have to know -- it's important that you know when you've actually accomplished your mission. and when you can actually declare victory. and we should have been able to do that five years ago. >> right. >> we have blown apart al qaeda. now of course it's metastasized across the globe. >> how is it done now? of course we should have done that five years ago. of course we should. how a how does a president present that to -- >> you were here when we told

the president of the united states three years ago, do not triple the troops in afghanistan. you were here every day when we said our mission is accomplished. you were here every day when we said this has gone from an anti-terror campaign to trying to rebuild a country that was never built in the first place. so the president knew three years ago. he knew. listen, the ugly reality is, mike, it's just like vietnam. no politician wants to be the one blamed for the, quote, loss of a war. >> the reality of it is probably they cannot tell the truth right now because of varying elements. but they have a definition problem. you can't define win. you can't define victory. and you have a difficult time defining what the existing mission is. >> they have never been able to tell the truth about this for one reason, we are fighting this war against pakistan.

it is the network funded by the pakistani military. and, you know, you can't tell the truth about that if you're the president of the united states. >> what do you want him to say? >> ok. here we are now. i think everybody at the table agrees it's time to go. it's an election year. if you were running, what would you say to the american people playing the cards you've got now to explain how you're disengaging and why? >> i would say if you're in office, per se. >> i would say, ladies and gentlemen, my fellow americans, 11 years ago, osama bin laden and al qaeda launched deadly attacks against the united states of america, killed 3,000 americans. and we were determined that it would never happen again. and so over the past 10 years, men and women of this country and of other countries have worked together. we have destroyed the al qaeda network in afghanistan. we have killed osama bin laden.

we have made sure that this will never happen again. we have accomplished the mission that we set out to accomplish 11 years ago. now let's know when it is time to declare victory and bring our sons and daughters home. and that would be cheered by 90% of americans. >> absolutely. >> we've been seeing it for three years out on the road. for three years americans have been asking, why are we spending $2 billion a week in afghanistan? for three years in a row, mika and i have heard everywhere we've gone. we've talked to republicans, when we've talked to democrats. nobody knows why we are in afghanistan, joe. >> i'm actually shocked by this. i thought looking forward in 2010 and 2011, i thought they had it all teed up to have most of the troops coming home this year. and i thought that that would be, you know, obama would be able to go to the public and say, i ended iraq. we're getting out of afghanistan. the other thing we did there,

joe, we made it possible for the afghan national army to defend kabul, to defend, you know, the country, to the extent that it can. so we've done our job. we're gone. i'm kind of amazed that they have delayed it as much as they have. >> gene robinson, i have said it repeatedly on this show. it bears repeating again here. mika and i have probably given 400 speeches on college campuses, civic organizations, bookstores, over the past three to four years. >> every single place. >> we have yet to ask -- because we bring up afghanistan. and of course i bring up the debt. everywhere i go, talk about the need to rebuild america instead of rebuild afghanistan. we have yet to find one person in the past four years that have offered a spirited defense of this war in afghanistan. and it just leads me to ask, how could the president and how could republicans in congress be so disconnected from what

america wants? >> well, you know, joe, i have been sitting here around the table saying -- we've had this conversation before. you know, but our mission now as far as i can discern it is we are fighting the taliban. we are engaged in a war with the taliban to keep them from coming back in. now, does that make us materially safer day-to-day? does that really have an impact on our security as far as we can see? and my answer is no. we have gotten rid of al qaeda. the taliban is not going to have the capacity to harm this country. and/or the interests really in harming americans who are trying to harm them. so i just don't think it's worth the further investment. what we've done to military families and to our troops is incredible. >> exactly right. >> these repeated deployments. a year in, a year out. four times.

this is really kind of brutal -- >> and the gruesome injuries that these men and women come home with. >> look, the goal of our mission today, right now, if they were going to tell us the truth, is what you call forced protection. it's the slow incremental withdrawal of the troops in afghanistan, but leave existing troops in certain places to protect the forces as they withdraw. that's the goal to save american lives. the second goal is we have to heal or soothe the relationship with pakistan because this is going to be a special ops war for the next five or 10 years. we'll be on the ground there for the next decade in the special ops war. you cannot conduct a special ops war in afghanistan without the involvement of pakistan. >> 500,000 troops in afghanistan don't help us reach that goal. >> this should have been a special ops war from september 12th, 2001, on.

>> absolutely. and let's talk about this for a second. because it's fascinating if you go back and see what republicans and democrats have said about iraq, said about afghanistan, over the past 12 to 15 years, there's egg on everybody's face. remember barack obama in 2008 saying, this is a good war, afghanistan. let's win the good war. and republicans of course saying all the things that they had said about iraq after bill clinton and the democrats said about iraq. this proves that all of your war plans can be thrown out the second the first shot is fired. afghanistan is not the good war. it has not been the good war. it was not the good war for alexander the great. it was not the good war for the british empire. >> in fairness in obama, in 2008, al qaeda was still, you know, a potent force in that area. what obama did through special

ops, through drone attacks, was blast it apart. he didn't need 100,000 troops to do that, as joe biden advised him. all you needed was a special ops war. i wrote this in "the new yorker" in november of 2001. that this was going to be a special ops war. it's been insane ever since. >> and the reality, gene robinson, is that we do have these drones. that have scattered al qaeda and of course the drones are following them into somalia and yemen and following them into countries. i mean, it's an entirely new set of facts on the ground that do not require 100,000 u.s. troops. >> no. they don't. and we need to rethink how we fight these wars. you know, the answer is not to, you know, load up the huge transport planes and send a bunch of heavy equipment halfway around the world anymore.

but as everybody has said, though, we have to be mindful of the relationship with pakistan. my question is, how does it help our future relationship with pakistan or dealing with pakistan when in fact we are essentially at war with them because that's where the taliban is hiding? so we've got to make drone attacks and raids into pakistan that's not going to exactly endear us to this dangerous nuclear armed constantly disintegrating ally. >> that's right. al qaeda was hiding in pakistan. you can also make the cynical argument that when the u.s. troops get out, that allows pakistan to push al qaeda across the border, as if you read robert wright's book "the looming tower" happened back around 2000. and then we could blow the hell out of al qaeda on the other side of the afghan-pakistan border. but i go back to 2004. 2004. 2004.

on that plane flight with the special ops guy out of hurlbert field, flying up to washington. he is about to go back over to afghanistan. and i said, is iraq really a distraction from afghanistan? and this guy, as i said, did not like george w. bush. so he was not carrying bush's case. he said, well, i guess you could say that it distracts us. that maybe we could move 100,000 or so troops over. but only if you can move them to pakistan. because if you move them to afghanistan, it doesn't do you a damn bit of good. he goes -- 2004, friends. 2004. eight years ago, he said, our enemy is not afghanistan. our enemy is pakistan. and that's why this war is impossible to win. >> george w. bush on september 14, 2001, said our enemies are those who fund terrorists and harbor terrorists. the people who funded the terrorists for the saudis, the people who harbored the terrorists were the pakistanis, our allies. this hasn't made sense from the

very beginning. >> no, it hasn't. >> eugene robinson, thank you so much. your column in "the washington post" about the shooting death of trayvon martin and what it means for american society. everyone should read that. joe klein, stay with us. still ahead, we'll ask former presidential candidate michele bachmann about her trip to israel last week, and how she would deal with a nuclear iran. up next, david gregory on what's at stake tomorrow in louisiana's presidential primary. you're watching "morning joe" brewed by starbucks. americans believe they should be in charge of their own future. how they'll live tomorrow. for more than 116 years, ameriprise financial has worked for their clients' futures. helping millions of americans retire on their terms. when they want. where they want. doing what they want. ameriprise. the strength of a leader in retirement planning. the heart of 10,000 advisors working with you one-to-one.

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you win by giving people a choice. you win by giving people the opportunity to see a different vision for our country, not someone who is just going to be a little different than the person in there. if they are going to be a little different, we might as well stay with what we have instead of taking a risk of what may be the

etch a sketch candidate for the future. >> ok. >> welcome back to "morning joe." he really is saying -- rick santorum saying -- >> i think he nailed it. he is swinging wildly. >> he may be. but he's saying let's keep barack obama in the white house instead of taking a chance on the etch a sketch candidate. that will really woo them at the convention speech in tampas are won't it? >> joining us now from washington, we have the moderator of "meet the press," david gregory. >> david gregory. barack obama is as good as mitt romney. so let's have a -- so how long is it going to take? we ought to have a pool around the table, while march madness goes on, how long until rick santorum corrects that statement? >> yeah. i don't know. it's starting to remind me of 2000 and george w. bush and john mccain when they came together in pittsburgh. and we were all there watching for the body language to see, you know, how much mccain could conceal the fact that he really disliked bush, even as he was

endorsing him. but at least he really threw his arms around him in the course of that campaign. i mean, it's so interesting that santorum as he makes the case and tries to occupy this conservative space is really making the stakes that high, to say we either have a conservative movement candidate in this age of a changing republican party after the bush years, after the tea party movement. either we really go with a movement conservative, or everything else is just the same as a democrat in the white house. and that's a profound statement. but it's also a tactical statement about where it is that he wants to position himself against the fact that what is santorum -- what kind of real estate does santorum occupy? not much. if you look at his demographics, he's got evangelicals and those who self identify as very conservative. he's not really expanding that base of support. >> so, david, what happens?

we've of course a leading narrative this week has been it's over, because romney won illinois handily. the week before, it was romney is a flawed candidate because he came in third place in mississippi and alabama. so what is the narrative after santorum wins louisiana and possibly puts romney in third, and possibly wins wisconsin? then do we go back? are we jerked back to the romney is weak and this race is still open? >> i don't think there's been any reason to really get us off of a narrative that still has romney in a position where he's got to put together a couple of states that really put it away for him in terms of making it just almost impossible for santorum to either -- i don't think that anybody really thinks he's going to get to 1144 on his own, but that it becomes more and more implausible that he'll deny romney 1144 himself and sort of take it to the convention. but here is the problem for romney. i don't know you get to the point where you say, you know,

it's really over when jeb bush endorses him this week. big deal, right? only he does it in a whisper. you know, he puts out a statement and does an interview with a pittsburgh newspaper. doesn't appear with romney. doesn't do television interviews. it's his way of saying we want to be with romney, but not all the way, because down the line if he loses that is going to be a penalty for us. >> and dick armey and freedomworks came out this week, joe klein, and said we suppose, given the choice of having each one of our teeth yanked out of our head by cavemen, or mitt romney becoming president of the united states, six one way, half a dozen the other, but we're probably going with romney. even jim demint's suggestion that romney would not be the end of the world seemed limited. nobody is throwing their arms

around him, even as he is going towards big victory in illinois. you have illinois' top republican saying he's just not that great of a candidate. i don't know that i've ever seen this in modern american politics. >> this guy has perfected a new phenomenon. the bummer victory. every time he wins something big -- by the way, this is over. >> it's over. so why is it -- why can't -- joe, why can't republicans grace this man? >> because we found the perfect metaphor this week. he is an etch a sketch candidate. i mean, that gaff -- >> that is perfect. >> i think is going to haunt him the same way that i voted for it before i voted against it haunted john kerry because it gets right to the heart of the ethos. and the other really important thing about it, it's going to make it very, very hard, much harder, for romney to move back

toward the center away from this wild extremism he's had to have during the republican primary. >> he's going to do it anyway. i mean, this is where he wants to position himself. as we've been saying on this program, he wants to run as a fiscal conservative and a more moderate in the republican party. he has the base of support within the party to do that. as weak as he may appear, he is still moving toward victory. and i was saying to somebody yesterday, this is not a great moment for him now. this is not a moment of strength. when the party does coalesce around him, one way or the other, even if it's not with great love, he will begin to be a stronger candidate who can capitalize on all of the accumulated issues that will face this president, and that make him vulnerable. you know, we're in the middle of a big energy debate right now about who you blame for high gas prices, and whether the president has failed the leadership moment over there. there's going to be areas of vulnerabilities that a strong republican and frankly a more moderate establishment

republican is going to be able to exploit. >> so can we move to that, the keystone pipeline controversy with both sides blaming the other for stalling it? what do you think is going on here exactly? >> well, i think the president has been involved in a fairly transparent effort to go to swing states and say, you know, i'm for all kinds of different exploration and energy policy. and, you know, who's going to be with me? i think as you guys have been saying earlier, the problem is that everybody wants to blame government at some level for high gas prices, which is really not the way to look. but certainly it's fair whether it's the debt or energy policy to raise the question about where the leadership has been this washington. we've known about this problem for a long time and it's been punctuated by the way, by not only our involvement in the middle east but the bp oil spill where you have these great presidential moments of leadership, where we say we have got to get an energy policy that brings everybody to the table in order to give a little bit and try to chart a course toward independence.

and then nobody really is able to move on it. and that's why voters get so frustrated. >> when it comes to energy policy, here a phrase i bet you haven't heard in a long time. jimmy carter nailed it. >> thank you. >> 197 9, he nailed it. >> yeah, he did. he did. >> do you want to let that hang out there? >> i'm trying to figure out what he nailed. >> he had an energy policy that he talked about in 1979 that required great sacrifice by americans. >> rattner -- >> no. i was there. i was writing about it for "the new york times" but nothing ever came of it. >> that's what i mean, since 1979 we haven't done anything. we've been at it for 30 years. >> the moral equivalent of war. very exciting. >> and then nothing happened. >> nothing happened. >> so now david you have the president blaming the republicans for not completing the keystone pipeline. does this mean that it will get done, that the president will do everything that he can to make

it look like he is an energy friendly president? >> yes. keystone as we have been talking about is bad politics, because as much as you want to blame republicans for creating a false choice and putting him in a position where he couldn't make a decision this is still something that the president wanted to put off until after the election. and it seems like it's a fairly straightforward way to create new jobs in the energy sector. not necessarily that it's going to have an effect on gas prices, which are set by the market and influenced by forces in the middle east primarily and stability in the middle east. but it seems to me there's just room on both sides here for republicans and democrats to give up some of those things they hold the most dear. whether it's an opposition to exploiting natural resources, or a move toward, you know, trying to encourage and even invest in green energy. there's got to be some composite here that makes sense to people. and to give the president some credit, there's a number of things this administration was

trying to do that ultimately was derailed by events. whether it was expanding leases in the gulf and then bp happens, or whether it was, you know, approving new nuclear power plants and then japan happens. so, you know, this is some of the difficulty he's been in. and then you have something like keystone which becomes such a political topic that it's very difficult in terms of how i see it for the president to get out from under that. >> there's also a third category that neither party wants to touch, which is putting realistic taxes on gasoline to get our consumption down through market forces. >> it's a shock that it goes back to taxes with you. >> i would agree with that. >> well, we'll give the money back to people. >> you remind me of a certain beatles song. >> what? >> tax man mr. wilson. tax man mr. heath. tax man mr. rattner. >> david gregory, thank you. very good point, rattner. >> of course. mika wants to raise taxes on gas. >> she might be right.

don't rule out the possibility that she's right. >> how about getting rid of subsidies for oil and gas. >> i love that. fought for that for years and got run over by big oil when i tried for royalty relief. >> we'll continue this conversation whether the political debate will take over even the jobs debate for the fall. we have governors haley barbour and brian schweitzer joining us from montana. >> thank you. we'll talk to the chairman of the governors association, martin o'malley. keep it right here. [ male announcer ] for making cupcakes

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up next, former republican presidential candidate congresswoman michelle back bachmann will join us right here on set. "morning joe" back in a moment.

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good memories for us. but if you're out riding across iowa doing 10 town hall meetings a day, that picture probably made the congresswoman flinch. >> she got hives. >> you need a lot more java joes when you do 10 town halls a day. >> minnesota congresswoman michele bachmann. >> you survived. >> i survived. that's right. >> let me ask you something. you haven't endorsed yet, right, anybody? >> no, not yet. >> so if you were to endorse mitt romney, for example, would you say i kind of sort of possibly, well, he's the only one really who could go with him? >> we are laughing at these sort of nonendorsement endorsements. why is mitt romney getting all of these nonendorsement endorsements? >> how would you do it? >> it's like the old biblical

verse. it's lukewarm. almost like they want to spit him out of their mouth. >> i am the only former presidential candidate who hasn't endorsed. almost all of them, when they left the stage, turned around and endorsed someone else. and i really felt it was up to the people to make that decision. and i thought actually super tuesday would be the clarifying day, and it wasn't. but i think as we are going through, the numbers are going to make the decision. and i think the difference that i see now is there's a lot of fatigue among our party. they are really kind of tired of this. they feel like the vetting it happening and they want us to kind of batten down the hatches and make the decision. and i really don't want to be divisive in the process. i want to be a unifier. because we are factionalized. that's just the way that it is right now. we have to come together and reach out to independents and disaffected democrats. so at the right time i will get behind whoever the nominee is. >> i would guess, though, and you will do that, but i would guess your conservative base in

your district will be about as excited about you getting behind mitt romney, if he is the eventual nominee, as my conservative base was excited that i got behind bob dole. that was an ugly day. that was an ugly day. >> and did you do it? >> of course i did. >> of course. but i will tell you -- >> but afterward, i was thinking maybe i should have just had the teeth removed, without the novocain. it's going to be tough. >> but i will tell you, today is the second anniversary that obama care was signed. >> right. >> that is what my base is concerned about today. and so they want to make sure that we have someone who's actually going to repeal it. and i think that's what i contributed to the race. because i brought in this issue of obama care. when i started, governor romney said he was going to issue a waiver to deal with obama care. governor perry said he was going to issue an executive order. now there's only one right answer on obama care for our nominee. and it's full-scale repeal. they are all there. now that's a big change.

>> how does that make you feel, though? >> i feel like i made a pretty big difference in the race. >> i'm sure you did. but how does it make you feel that you could be endorsing a man who in 2009 in the "usa today" op-ed said he wanted that individual mandate, which we conservatives are hoping will be ruled unconstitutional, that he wanted barack obama to employ that in his health care plan? >> how do you factor that in? >> that's kind of rough. >> and i think that's where all of our base will have to hold the nominee, whether it's romney, whether it's santorum, whether it's gingrich, whether it's paul, we have to hold that nominee's feet to the fire on full-scale repeal and nothing else. because that's the only acceptable answer right now, because the fruit of obama care is that unfortunately rather than costs going down, health insurance spiked. and now we just learned this week that 20 million people according to the government are likely to be thrown off their employer-sponsored insurance. that is not what people want. so our nominee will have a very good story to tell on the

campaign trail about true free market health care that's going to bring the cost down. >> and you're referencing a cbo report that i think democrats and republicans are debating over. over which way it goes. i want to talk about israel. you just came back from israel. and you told us a fascinating story off-line that the israelis and the palestinian authorities both had a reason to sort of breathe a sigh of relief this past week over a botched missile attack against the israelis. >> yeah, well, i sit on the intelligence committee. so i took a trip to israel last week. and while i was in the air, unbeknownst to me, there were 110 rockets fired from gaza into israel. this is significant. there are about 1 million people who were at risk. and we had something called the iron dome that was deployed. that's a missile defense shield. the good news is that that missile defense shield stopped the incoming rockets, and not

one person lost their life. that was excellent. and i had met with the prime minister, netanyahu, in israel. they were thrilled obviously that the iron dome worked. and the palestinians as well were happy. >> and explain to our viewers why the palestinians were happy? >> well, because there's a new group that has kind of grown up in gaza and they are -- actually have a packing and affiliation with iran and it is called a new political islamist jihad and they are involved in trying to create more agitation rather than peace. >> and destabilize the peace process. joe, off question for michelle? >> back to obama care. stafrmt on israel if we can. >> a lot happening right now because iran -- >> how do you assess the iran threat? do you think that dish mean, people say netanyahu has said that as soon as the supreme leader gets a bomb, he is going to launch on israel. do you think that's true?

>> i think that israel right now assesses that we are at a different place than the united states assesses. they see that the capacity is there and what they are saying is if iran has the capacity, they are likely not going to issue a memo and tell the world when they are starting the development of that nuclear weapon and especially if they move it below ground, but now we have credible evidence that has just come out on the atlantic wire and it said that a par sheen facility that's southwest of tehran now has very credible evidence that they are developing a nuclear weapon at this military site. so they are demanding it be open. but there are things that iran could do if they are what they say they are, sway peaceful developer of nuclear power, which, you know, that is a completely different matter, if they are, then why not surrender your enriched uranium? why not stop all future production of enriched uranium? >> because if you are a develop, you have a right tone rich

uranium. >> but there's no -- but they don't allow the inspection. you said t. >> they don't have to turn of he -- >> they don't allow continuous, rigorous inspections. >> that's right. >> that gives the world pause. and you can see why the world would have pause. >> michael? >> this is serious. >> >> what do you -- what would happen in the middle east if israel, without asking us, makes a first strike on iran's nuclear facilities? >> this is a world-changing event, if israel has to take that measure. i think that's why you have seen so much discussion. i think israel has tried to put this discussion on the world stage but they are also trying to get the attention of allies to say they prefer not to go alone on this but if they have to, if it's the survival of israel, then they may need to. >> what kind of an ally would israel be if it carried out a first strike without first telling the united states? >> it could be an ally that sees a nod and a wink and goes, okay.

>> i don't think that nod and wink is going to be there? >> no? >> the united states military is unanimously opposed to going to war over iran this is -- what i think is happening is i think the israelis are part of grand strategy to put as much pressure on iran as possible with the sanctions and everything else. >> right. >> and this is a big bluff. >> but joe, do you think it is a fait accompli then that the iranians are going to get a nuclear weapon? >> they may, but i think it is also possible we are going to force them to the table because their economy is collapsing and the domestic political situation -- >> we are running out of time though. they need to get to the table soon, what i don't understand why we don't put the sanctions on sooner rather than later? why wait a couple of months? because i think they will be effective. i think the sanctions will be very effective. >> they already r. >> but let's accelerate the timetable and get it moving because i think that is what is going to get the iranians'

attention. this will change the dynamic of the world forever. remember what will happen there will be proliferation, saudi arabia will work toward getting a nuclear weapon. other nations will work toward getting a nuclear weapon. iran will share that weapon. imagine if they share that technology with hezbollah? with hamas? that's what the world is worried about, no containment. >> and congresswoman, also, we all remember the morning we woke up back in the 1990s, i remember heading to congress, picked up the "washington post" and found out that the pakistanis had a nuclear weapon. think -- we have been talking about afghanistan and the complications of afghanistan since september 11th. that ain't happened, karachi is a nice place to visit. >> general john allen came into my office on capitol hill two days ago and we talked about that and the dynamics that are changing on the ground with afghanistan and pakistan. you're exactly right and it is something we have to -- >> a nuclear weapon in iran will haunt u.s. foreign policy.

>> he lose options. >> congresswoman michele bachmann, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> great to see you again. joe klein, thank you as well. >> thanks, joe. >> the minnesota twins, i think. >> no cape cod summer league, wooden bats. >> the brewers, the brew crew. ♪ ♪

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taking a risk on what may be the etch a sketch candidate for the future. >> good morning. it is friday, 8:00 on the east coast. welcome back to "morning joe," as you take a live look at manhattan. back with us on set, we have mike barnicle, charles rowe, steve rattner and in washington, sam stein. >> sam stein, my lord. >> help us. dogs. sleeping with cats. the stay puft marshmallow man walking down main street. this is out of "ghostbusters." you have actually got rick santorum saying that barack obama would be a better choice than mitt romney. what's going on? maybe he wants to be vp, right, for obama? >> that one was a head scratcher, i'm not sure that is going to last another three hours. i'm guessing the santorum campaign has to pull that one back because you can just see,

you know, the obama campaign gleefully playing up this quote five months from now when it is romney investigators suss obama where they can say, listen, even rick santorum, your primary rival that obama would be a preferable candidate to mitt romney t is a classic sort of santorum foot in the mouth unnecessary error moment where he didn't need to go that far, could have stuck with the etch a sketch thing and he just went there. >> let's look at exactly what he said. the next test is tomorrow in louisiana's presidential primary and mitt romney, by the way, got an endorsement, a nod from a key conservative in the republican party, jim demint of sex sex told reporters on capitol hill this "i can tell conservatives from my perspective, i'm not only comfortable with romney, i'm excited about the possibility of him possibly being our romney." i think we all need to look that the presidential primary and encourage the candidate to do a little self-reflection here, what's good for our country. the sooner we can make a decision, i think the sooner we

can focus on the real problem, which is obama. >> he is saying game over. >> you have jeb bush coming out one day obviously planned, jeb bush coming out one day, saying it, then the next day you have got jim demint coming out saying it, this is a -- you know this is game over. >> this is like when we were talking with chuck todd and david greg rained they are probably two of the best analysts in television. >> they are great. i love them. >> fantastic. they live and breathe politics.

every bit of it is exciting to them. i'm sitting there, i think it was yesterday, could have been the day before, i don't know. kind of boring. sorry. all of this is kind of boring. >> you can at least look at me while talking. >> i'm sorry. you're fascinating. yes. what? >> jeb bush, jim demint, two most important people in the republican party and it is -- it may not be exciting but if you want to talk about the end of the road. >> yeah. >> when those two guys start lining up, you have got jeb, the establishment choice, and jim demint, the tea party champion, boom, game over, which may be why rick santorum is starting to swing wildly. it is just -- it may be boring. >> this is over. >> let's talk about tebow. what do you want to talk about? >> i'm just saying i think there is a lot of injected drama in what is a game over. >> well this is reality. is there a sign post.

this is the -- this is the referee going nine, ten. it's over. >> is it over? >> almost. >> i actually think that romney has a better chance in louisiana than most people give him credit for. if you look at mississippi's returns, romney won virtually every county that was along the mississippi river, into the mississippi bayou but two counties. all identify with a businessman's mindset because they are all small businessmen. louisiana is bracket on both sides by rivers, mississippi river on the east, red river on the west, these are all farmers. also, it has a disproportionately large number of catholics. mitt romney has been wing the catholic vote in almost every state he has been in and the south more moderate than other southern states because that is the louisiana area, new orleans area. not saying he wins but a better

chance than people are giving him credit for in the state of louisiana. >> charles, you have never struck me as a louisiana guy. >> i am a louisiana guy. >> never seen you wearing black and gold, never talking about the -- >> i will dance after a casket. >> okay. one of the best scenes out of james bond film, "live and let die." what part of -- what part of -- >> north louisiana. >> north louisiana. so romney is -- very interesting that you think romney has a shot. let's move from north louisiana to central florida. you have been a champion on this tragic case coming out of sanford, florida. there appears, and i say only appears, because you never know, there appears to be some movement in the tray von martin case. von martin case. >> i don't know what that means. the sheriff, i don't know whether he will be back, whether you have a boss that goes away,

you know he will be back or behave differently in any way that will shame that boss if you know he is coming back. prosecutor has changed. >> changed prosecutor. the governor is now appointing another special investigator. i think everybody statewide is starting to feel the heat. >> that is very true. there is a lot of heat here. this is a very small city, small police department. and they have bungled things, to some degree, and that may compromise the investigation and even if it doesn't compromise it, it makes people lose faith in the investigation and that's bad thing because now, it's into the local issue, it is a national, international. >> a local issue, it is a national issue. unfortunately, mika, sanford has a history of this before the example of the two men that shot the african-american, claiming that it was in self-defense, that he was trying to run them over, they shot him in the back. they weren't arrested. also, a police officer's son

beating up an african-american homeless man. he got off. i mean, it's -- goes on and on. >> to the your point there were a couple of changes but the bottom line is, and thousands of people marching yesterday, this is what they really have a problem with, and that's the shooter, george zimmermann, remains free man this morning, claiming that he shot that young man in self-defense. but the changes we have seen are sanford's police chief, who has been at the center of criticism for not arresting the gunman, has temporarily stepped down. the state prosecutor overseeing the case has step aid side. protesters say it is not enough. thousands, as you can see, at that rally in florida to demand justice yesterday. this event was led by reverend al sharpton, whose mother died just hours before this rally. >> i got the news this morning leaving new york that my mother had passed. one side of me said don't come. but the other side of me said,

my mother raised me to stand up for justice. my mother would have been ashamed of me if i wasn't here tonight. my mother raised me to stand with mothers and daddies like that. and in her name, i'm gonna fight unt until zimmermann meets justice in the courtroom. >> we had -- we actually were talking to al, talking his mom is from alabama and we talked about it a good bit and talked about my mom, his mom. he was saying that she was getting worse and always -- 'cause you know, you see -- you see that side of al sharpton, i'm sure a lot of percentage he should be with his mother. you -- you talk to him about it and he has always talked about his mom and it was painful, a long, painful, painful decline

for her. but i agree that is where his mom would want him tonight. >> you have to totally respect him for doing that >>ly to the respect him for doing t again, i'm just giving the other side that people may not see. you see that fiery clip. they may not understand how much reverend al's mom meant to him but that's guy that, charles, he is doing what -- >> he said he is doing what his mother wanted him to do. >> not being critical. i'm just saying critics, skeptics would say what are you doing there? causing trouble instead of blah blah blah. it was the right place to be. you know, people like al and you have brought attention to this case when a lot of the rest of the media world has been silent. >> i don't think you can krit a size him for doing that. >> look at the case, alex, do we have the clip of the former new york city police officer? okay. 'cause they want that one.

i think at the rally, you know what you're gonna get, but this whole case has been around this stand your ground law and whether or not this person in some way, shape or form, george zimmermann, could have been firing in self-defense. this former new york cop says it is not us making assessments here as civilians thinking where is the other side of this story. here is a professional looking at it from the vantage point of what he does every day. take a look. >> the vast majority of the issues in this case are pretty straightforward, doesn't require deliberation. to be quite blunt, i think police supervisors, sergeants all over the country, 20 to 30 minutes after getting on the scene here, there would be an arrest, try to create this -- i don't understand why this whole process seems to be so stuck in place, so much analysis. this is not an issue who killed this man. the issue is any justification?

and there doesn't seem to be a skin till la of valid evidence. >> mike, i -- i don't understand why zimmermann has not been arrested. we got into a point now -- this happened february 26th, okay in the media was a little slow on it, charles was out there. al started talking about it a week or two ago. we started talking about t now everybody is paying attention to this case and zimmerman is still not arrested. there is no justification for not locking him up on some charge. >> you know, as charles spoke to, it is a small town, 53,000 people, i think 140-person police department. and a shooting like this in a big city, a patrol supervisor shows up, there is a shooting team that shows up because there is a discharge of a police weapon. so they rope off the scene they go through the thing, we would have listened to 911 tapes. if you listen to the 911 tapes,

you have probable cause to arrest zimmermann right there on the tapes because he is asked, you're not following him are you he says, yes. they say don't do that a few minutes later, he says he is running now, he is running away. so he pursued trayvon. there's probable cause right there to put the cuffs on him, throw him in the car, take him to jail. >> and there's -- and he is not a believable witness on the scene. a lot has happened after the night of the shooting that gives you probable cause. zimmermann is not believable the night of the shooting because he says, according to the police sheet, that he got out of his truck, the only reason he got out of his truck was to check the "street signs." "street signs" are literally designed to be seen from the street. that is the reason that they look the way that they look. zimmermann has called the police 50 time within the last year. he has always had to give street

locations and it is a tiny, gated community. are you trying to tell me that you don't know the streets in this tiny community? that's like somebody saying i live on the upper west side but i have to get out of my car every time i get to the corner of broadway and 79th street to know where i am. it is not a credible reason to be outside the vehicle. for that reason alone -- >> you think about it, it gets worse, doesn't get better. >> it gets worse. but also beyond bringing him to justice which obviously i think is critically important. i hope we will learn a few things from this. i don't understand myself why there is any justification for anybody not a law enforcement officer carrying a 9mm semiautomatic pistol around and why that's good public policy to have such a thing. the law itself earthquake the stand your ground law which the governor first defended and said maybe we need to change the law -- >> the guy that authored the law, durrell peten, said it doesn't apply this case, he wasn't standing his ground. and he said --

>> he was in pursuit. >> he said the bill that i wrote does not apply to this case 'cause the guy was running after him. this guy was seeking a fight. this guy was seeking a conflict. and again, i just -- i want to know why the police chief, why the state attorney, why the new person that's been assigned, why the new state material that's been assigned, you better get a grand jury together pretty soon to start looking a this the thing specifically because the evidence is overwhelming and as i have said before, i will say again without apology, if it were an african-american that shot a young 17-year-old white boy, game over. >> over. >> over. >> the african-american would still be in jail, the arraignment would have happened. >> no question. >> and they were talking about whether he was going to get life, plead to murder around get

life or whether they were going to try to execute him. that is just a reality that would have happened a month later. here we are a month later, zimmermann is still out there and nobody in the state of florida has charged this guy, who it appears, sought this confrontation and killed this young man. coming up next, chairman of the democratic governors association, maryland governor martin o'malley, joins us on set. and host of msnbc's "last word," lawrence o'donnell is here. from tebow mania to etch a sketch politics, don't miss willie's week in review. but first, don't miss bill karins with a check of the weekend forecast. bill? >> i delivereded nice conditions the last week or two, you guys be nice to me. you will not like the weekend forecast though. today is the last day for areas of new england to really have the beautiful, beautiful weather. the problem spot this morning, down around new orleans. we have had a lot of heavy rain, some minor flash flooding, that is where the trouble is heading up to gulfport, mobile, pensacola, bill locks cism today

i mentioned it, last beautiful june-like day for new england. look at the temperatures in the 70s and 80s, slightly cooler and windy in boston. notice all the rain from chicago to indianapolis. see thunderstorms possible throughout illinois today, indiana, kentucky, as we go through the weekend that storm system heads east and that will make it cooler and of course, the rain a little wet. forecast in the middle of the country, you actually are going to see a beautiful weekend. the west coast, we have rain four, san francisco on saturday, then some of that rain will be in los angeles on sunday. as far as newt gingrich goes, sunday will be the wettest day four, the jersey shore up into southern new england. can't complain what a run we have had of unbelievable midmarch temperatures. you are watching "morning joe." we are brewed by starbucks. [ tom ] we invented the turbine business right here in schenectady.

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are too many irish-americans to acknowledge by name here tonight. i do want to thank martin o'malley and his band for rocking the white house this evening. it is said that the curse of the irish, as the governor must know, is not that they don't know the words to a song, it's that they know them all. >> 23 past the hour. joining us now, democratic governor from maryland, governor martin o'mallly. >> so you got a rock band? >> i have been playing irish music since i was 17 and the president very kindly allowed us, invited us to play at the

annual reception for the tea shop of ireland. >> that is nice. >> it was fun. >> i want to heart music. >> so what's big one? what's the one that always gets them? throwing the beer glasses against the wall? >> you can see, we wore coat and ties. they gave us three songs. the song that got everybody jumping around the most was "body of an american" by shane mcgowan. >> also with us host of msnbc's -- >> shouldn't be terribly worried, wary different genre than the chieftains. >> lawrence o'donnell is with us as well. >> in ireland it is mandatory for politicians to sing al so the point, political events, give their talk, get up and do something. >> i once spoke to -- had occasion to meet a former speaker of the house of ireland and add phrase that if you can't govern, well, by god, you sure as heck better entertain. >> exactly. >> so i have got two quick questions for you. >> what is mitt romney going do? >> he has tried singing.

okay, number one, are you going to run for president, because everybody says -- that is number one. first easy question. >> gosh. >> the second one is heard what is your answer to the first? >> my answer to the first i'm focused on doing the best job that i can. >> that's a yes. >> are you ready to endorse andrew cuomo for president? >> that is -- ready to endorse mitt romney. >> that's what it looks like, jo joe, o'malley versus cuomo a governor re-elected by a record number. got that in maryland, new york. >> former mayor. >> you want a former mayor. >> and he also sings. so, he has answered the first with a nonanswer and the second one, a much tougher question exall right orioles finally make the playoffs this year? >> oh, golly. hope springs eternal. mike and i were just talking about that before. we hope the -- we hope for the best for the orioles and they are a team that has a great, long and storied -- >> you know, what happened? growing up, back in the late '60s, early '70s, i'm following

brooks robinson at third, earl weaver no better than that. >> in the world series every year. these guys always in the world series. what's happened? >> every team goes through -- >> who's to blame? >> i am not here to talk about the -- >> can i ask about gas prices, please? >> no i want to hear him blame the opener. won't do that. >> we had a great ceremony recently where we put up a statue for brooks robinson, one of the nicest men that ever walked the planet and is right there as you come into camden yards, a great ball club with a great tradition. hey, there's peaks and valleys, he was and flows, they will be back. >> i went to world series game baltimore in the brooks robinson era, weirdest thing, they were not sold out that's how strange the baseball business had become at that point in time and people weren't going into the cities.

>> stories we can't tell on the air. talking about energy, the president is obviously trying to get ahead of sort of the police cal winds saying i support the southern half of the keystone pipeline, gas lines going up, most understand the president has absolutely no impact on this but it still affects the election. so what should the president do? >> affect election because it can affect the economy. for many, many months, the republican candidates were all banking on being able to say he took a bad situation and made it worse, the economy is not getting better but now we have had 24 months in a row of positive job growth, american manufacturing hiring again, foreclosures, unemployment down to three-year record lows and so the subject now switches and they want to switch the subject to gasoline. he is not doing enough on gasoline. i think what the president needs to do is stay continuously focused on job creation. yes. answered also needs to talk about the things he has done and

the things he has done well when it comes to domestic oil production t is a fact that we have now cut our depend dense on foreign oil to a 16-year low t is a fact that domestically produced oil is at an eight-year high and we have double reed newables. >> we read this earlier this morning but "new york times" quotes the council on foreign relations. lawrence? >> foreign oil from my 1970 cadillac in santa monica, $99 to fill up the caddie last weekend in santa monica. newt gingrich for president, that's my -- got that bumper sticker on the caddie. >> what some of us around the table, a lot of us don't understand too close to politics we don't understand how this hits americans' wallets. i really got it between the eyes four years ago when a very

conservative church pastor who had never voted democratic in his life was having to pay over $100 to fill up his diesel truck. and he said i'm voting democratic. this has to change. >> ask detroit if this isn't a price-sensitive issue. you watch suv sales collapse when -- which is a good thing in this situation, these number goes up like this. and politicians, there's nothing they are more worried about. we did -- the last time we did a gas tax increase was 1993 and it was 4.3 cents. that was it. the gas tax increase and all this panic and passed by one vote all the political panic, oh, my god, we will be blamed for raising gas prices, of course, within two months of enacting it, gas price also gone down by about 14 cents. so the fluctuation is so beyond the control of politics and yet that's exactly where the blame comes. >> has to do with international market.

mike? >> what happens within a state within you raise the gas tax in the state, to pour money into roads? what happens? >> there is no more popular revenue tax that you can ask people to pay than gas. >> you are proposing one now, right? 6%? 6%? >> i did. we proposed raising the gas tax. we don't have -- we don't apply our sales tax -- our 6% sales tax to gasoline what we propose was phasing in at 2% a year over the next three years, perhaps longer because we put a braking mechanism in there so in a year like this where spikes beyond 15%, we wouldn't layer that 2%. but i did propose that. >> mary land has no gasoline tax? >> we have a flat tax that flat tax is 23 cents, it was 23 cents when it was put in place in 1992. that is the last time we raised t. >> '92? >> gasoline was 1.08. now, gasoline has gone up to s so, as a way of indexing, we

did -- i proposed layering in 2% a year. most unpopular tax that you can ever propose is gasoline. everybody always knows what it is. but at the same time, if we -- the 23 cents flat tax, its buying power over the last 20 years has gone way down. so we cannot maintain our brings, our roads, our infrastructure, let alone expand them or improve them for the 21st century. >> are you still trying to get the legislature to pass this gas tax even though gas prices are going up? >> i am. and i'm also -- >> hesitantly. >> without enthusiasm. >> also very open to other suggestions. i mean, someone said our sales tax in maryland is about the ninth lowest in the country and some who said a 1 cent dedicated to transportation might be a better way to go it would raise as much in terms of revenues without actually taxing the

commodity and would be a way to diversify our transportation funding. the -- what people are in a better place to understand now though than they were is that the brings, the roads, they don't grow older -- as they grow old they don't go stronger around we need to make these investments in order to maintain them. >> a classic challenge because it is also a regressive tax and so, it is not with glee that democrats say let's go into this tax when they do. really, really one of the -- not gleeful. >> most aggressive taxes because it's working class people who are commuting let's say into baltimore, commuting from baltimore into washington, pick any city that this hurts that this hurts a lot more than guys with 65 cadillacs, santa monica. >> i'm not asking to you worry about t. >> concerned about the yacht, how much is this going to cost? >> diesel fuel. >> how do you actually propose -- do you say i know this is the most unpopular thing

i could ever do but or -- >> yes. i will tell you what comes after the but. >> okay. yeah. >> but we are all going to pay more if we do nothing. in other words, the cost of not investing in our infrastructure is that we waste more time sitting in traffic. we waste more gasoline idling in traffic and lose our quality of life as we see it erode. maryland now has the worst traffic congestion, not a great advertisement here, but the worst traffic congestion of any other metropolitan state. we can pay by being victims of circumstance or we can make better decisions now, make the investments now so we start getting out of traffic and so that's the -- that's the choice that we have to make. >> there is a price to traffic. you know, transportation engineers are talk about this all day long and no one really wants to hear it, it is a little complex in the economics, a real dollar cost to traffic to a vehicle being stopped to a truck being stopped on the ways to the

next delivery. >> let me ask you this, lawrence, a political question, you have always said, you said going back when we were at the reagan library talking about how democrats always lose on taxes, republicans used to be able to master the tax argument, what do you say about a governor who is thinking about running four years from now, almost see the gas tax ad in a 30-second spot against governor o'malley if he does do this four years from now. is this an issue, like i say medicare is an issue, if you republicans don't runaway from it they run into the fire and explain why they are doing what they are doing, actually negative can be turned into a positive. is that the same thing with the gas tax or other taxes if you are a democrat. >> the other thing is that no politician ever does one thing. so when the governor runs for president, there's going to be -- everything is going to be on the table that he did have an awful lot of other positives. bill clinton be, the last president to sign a gasoline tax increases did it in his first

year and got re-elected. >> all about creating jobs, really. an economy can create jobs but requires modern investments. what we need to figure out as a country what we are figuring out as a state, is what is the right balance? we have now -- we rank seventh in terms of the jobs we have regained coming out of this recession. 12th in terms of job creation on an annual basis so these things i don't happen by themselves. you have to make the choice to make the investments in the skills of your people, the education of your people and the infrastructure. >> none of the choices are easy. governor martin o'malley, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> really appreciate it. >> i want to heart band. >> can the governor sing us out here? >> i got a band for you. coming up, the rem general dear lyle lovett and his acoustic group perform here in our "morning joe" studio. we will be right back. [ female announcer ] here in california, our schools need help.

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legendary singer/songwriter and friend of "morning joe," lyle lovett, joins us on the program, he joined wuss a special appearance, with a special added band member. the at bum is "release me," i

know the feeling. tell me a little bit about the album and the compilation of songs. >> this is a compilation of songs i have played the course of my career, songs important to me and my very last record on my original record deal i signed back in 1985 with curb records and the universal music group. i'm proud of t. >> what will we start with? >> a blues song from 1928 written by a man named william moore and one i have played, gosh, since the '70s. >> you were talking about back in the '70s, this was sort of your big break, make at houston place, thursday nights were special nights for up and comers. >> they were. sort of the place where the night you played first, a place called anderson fair retail restaurant and the people that played there were just an inspiration to me. >> lyle lovett, take it away. i will get out of the way here.

♪ ♪ one thing i like about that gal of mine, one thing i like about that gal of mine ♪ ♪ one thing i like about that gal of mine, she treats me right and love mess all the time ♪ ♪ she walked in the rain and her feet got soaking wet ♪ ♪ she walked in the rain and her feet got soaking wet ♪ ♪ she walked in the rain and her

feet got soaking wet ♪ ♪ and this she said to every man she met ♪ ♪ mister, change a dollar, gimme one lousy dime ♪ ♪ mister, change a dollar, won't you give me one lousy dime ♪ ♪ mister, won't you change a dollar and gimme a lousy dime so i can feed that hungry man of mine ♪ ♪ she took me over to her cabaret ♪ ♪ she took me over into her cabaret ♪ ♪ she took me over to her

cabaret ♪ ♪ and we drank until the break of day ♪ ♪ one thing i like about that gal of mine ♪ ♪ one thing i like about that gal of mine ♪ ♪ one thing i like about that gal of mine ♪ ♪ she treats me right and loves me all the time ♪ [ applause ] >> lyle and his acoustic group, also backed joe up on an original song that joe wrote and you can watch that exclusively on our blog, mojoe.msnbc.com. we will be right back. americans believe they should be in charge of their own future.

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welcome back to "morning joe." business before the bell headlines. bank of america is testing a new program to give some homeowners facing foreclosure another option, instead of losing their homes completely, the mortgage release program allows them to stay put as renters. that is a fascinating story in the "new york times." also, of course in business news, too, lawrence o'donnell, you were very concerned, your 75-foot yacht, diesel prices, as you tool around the west coast, obviously, this is causing you and all of the big dnc deepers on the west coast a lot of concern what are you going to do there? isn't that something? we talk about these gas price and so many people are oblivious

to it but we talked about it before, no one issue impacts americans more than skyrocketing prices. >> the ordinary cost in a normal suburban life, you know how much you are going to in the course of a weeks, this costs much more, there is an instantaneous reaction to it hey, i'm not transfer a mortgage to a lease, what took so long? i just heard that. >> exactly. >> that seems like the way to go why have empty houses foreclosed on? what took so long? >> don't kick them out. >> the week it review. [ male announcer ] for making cupcakes

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at number three, tebow mania moves east. >> tim tebow is a great kid. i said that the one guy, if i want someone to marry my daughter it would be him. >> if tim tebow is going to marry john elway's daughter, it is going to be a long distance relationship, the arrival of peyton manning in denver pushed tebow into the arms of the new york jets. the current jets quarterback put on a happy public face but the

greatest jet of them all, joe "willie" namath can't bite his tongue. >> i can't agree with it i think it is a publicity stunt. i think it is wrong. i can't go for it. at number two another indonesian smoking kid. an 8-year-old in indonesia is trying to kick his two pack a day habit. his mother says he doesn't even go to school anymore because they won't let him smoke there. bad news for sure, but not quite as bad as that indonesian 2-year-old from a couple of years ago who crushed lung darts like he was keith richards. there is no age limit in indonesia for smoking or buying cigarettes. they are getting their medical information from 1950s tv commercials. >> yes, according to this repeated nationwide survey, more doctors smoke camels than any other cigarette. why not change to camels? the number one story of the week --

>> almost like an etch a sketch. you can kind of shake it up and start all over again. >> just hours after an impressive blowout win in illinois, the political conversation turned from mitt romney's front-runner strength to his inner etch a sketchness. >> and mitt romney been around at the time we were drafting our constitution, we would have shus shaken and shook it up after it was approved rewrite it. >> i will give it to you guys to play with, right? she could now be a presidential candidate. >> earlier this week, romney himself accused obama of playing etch a sketch politics. >> the president trying to reerareeerase it. >> it was proceeded by the lava lamp. >> i recommend it over to ebb. >> by edison's light bulb of the late 1870s. >> the government would have banned thomas edison's light bulb. oh, by the way, they just did,

didn't they? >> by revolutionary fifth century bc creation you can the pancake. >> these pancakes are as large as my win in puerto rico. >> there we go. on monday, retired general stanley mcchrystal and tom brokaw will be here on set. up next, what, if anything, did we learn today? ♪ [ 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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welcome back to "morning joe." lawrence, what did you learn? >> i learned governor o'malley had a band, i had no idea. an irish band. >> who would have thunk. >> you think he is going to be -- >> and he is undecided on running for president against andrew cuomo for the democratic nomination. >> that is how it is going to line up? >> the republican nomination is set now, we might as well get to work on the next democratic nomination. >> mika, what did you learn? >> you can find out on mojo.msnbc.com that joe can sing in a band. >> oh, no. >> don't do that. don't do that. >> lyle lovett. it is pretty good. >> think so? >> damn good. impressive. >> you know what i learned? >> mm-hmm. >> that the state of florida continues to drag their feet on a case that should have been