i remember you said a guy named jack scarborough would be okay. he will be holding me down. you know the show better than that. i learned that they are completely lost on the table. i learned that once again, they did not know before the story. >> where did he get? >> something like that. let's wrap it up. "morning joe." >> thank you. >> see you after the weekend. stick around for chris in for chuck. >> the president back where it all started. the hawk eye state trying to win over the working class swing voter who is may not be so geared up this time around. you are hired. we are waiting to find out what mitt romney wants in a running mate, but we know what he wants

in a dinner date. get ready to brick bread with the donald. go park the car in harvard yard. working on that for hours. the president and romney both spent time at one of the most vend rabl campuses and they have different runs on the same crimson track. good morning from washington and happy memorial day weekend. it's friday, may 25th, 2012 and this is "the daily rundown." i'm in for chuck todd. let's get to the first reads. we are heading to memorial day weekend and it feels like labor day and politics. president obama is hammering mitt romney more than five months before the election, trying to define him as a wealthy and out of touch corporate raider. last night at the fairgrounds, where romney famously sparred with hecklers, the president jabbed romney again and again. >> the gain from his experience as a financial ceo, it explains

something and why the last time he visited these very same fairgrounds, he fame usually declared that corporations are people. human beings, my friends. that's what he said. >> the president had this to say about romney's warning on the federal debt. nbc's senior political editor mark murray is here with me now. good morning, rock. did you like my boston accent? >> yes. you are like texas like me. >> we got that out of the way. i feel like there is a big debate over the bain attack. is it working or not working and is this the right time for it? did it complicate what barack obama is trying to do? you made an interesting point off line about the idea that the bain attack is not as far along as people think.

>> i don't think we will know for several months whether this is working or not. what is occurring over the past two weeks is a discussion in washington, d.c. and worth noting that the first obama campaign on bain that was unveiled had a buy of less than $100,000. when we are talking about big national buys for the campaigns, we are talking about 8 million or 9 million or $100,000. >> we followed up with the video and yet we had this big discussion over the past two weeks, airing out the narratives. is it fair or not and what were the parameters of mitt romneys of business work at bain. we have been having that discussion. it is this an effort to under cut the biggest asset on the economy. remember the swift boat attacks from 2004? there was so much debate on whether they worked or not. it went to under cut john kerry's biggest strength, his

military service. >> how much of this when it relates to private equity to bain, the average person in my estimation doesn't know exactly what private equity is or does and does not know what they do. when i hear it, i think the same thing i think when i hear mitt romney has a swiss bank account. he is rich and doing deal thaus don't know. how much of it is is stand in for this idea that mitt romney did these guys and barack obama is for everyone? >> it's a gut attack where they say he doesn't care about them. they want to turn mitt romney into the bobs from office space who are laying people off. they will say i want to save your auto industry job. jpmorgan and facebook of wall

street lately. >> i want to go back because it's an important line. he went directly and punishally and aggressively at mitt romney. let's listen to what he had to say and we will talk about it. governor romney warned about the debt. that's what he said. but he left out facts. his speech was more like a cow pie distortion. that's a compelling visual. a cow pie of distortion. really going aggressively. personally at romney, is this different than past campaigns or do we think that this is the worst the president is being nastier? is this different or to be expected? >> the "new york times" points out that it is a lot faster.

at this stage of the race, we would be hearing this from the vice president. president obama is actually going directly on the campaign trail. if we hear it, they say this is so much different than 2004. in the era of twitter and such fast news being, you have to make the arguments. the obama campaign believed obama is better than anyone else. i think we got a glimpse that was when president obama was talking about the bain and trying to reconcile, he made that point better than anyone else. better than anything we have seen thus far. it is a risk because you don't want the negative to go up and the positive to go down. >> thanks for mentioning that. great reporting and if you care about this, read it. i want to switch from the sublime to the ridiculous. mitt romney is incentivizing his donors of the possibility of a dinner with donald trump.

june 28th, this is new york city dinner with the donald. you see i want you. his hair looks less ridiculous in that picture than real life. what is this about? we saw this with george clooney. this is kind of drawing attention to how people like us talk about it. >> it's a way to raise money and they think they will raise money. they are playing with fire. george clooney on the other hand and donald trump made controversial and divicive statements so far. >> he still is on the birther thing. >> as you know in politics, what surrogates end up saying being fair game. you can make the argument that donald trump is a surrogate for the romney campaign. given his fund-raising help, jeremiah wright is fair game and president obama may not have been born in the united states.

reporters are going to be asking mitt romney if he agrees or disagrees and that could be a distraction. very smart about surrogates. we appreciate it. it's day six of the liberations in the john edwards trial. they are asked to review more evidence and spend more time deliberating the charges than the edwards defense team spent presenting their case. nbc senior investigative respondent has been in greensboro, north carolina since the start and joins us now. good morning. it looks like we have sundown there. what do we know? is today the day? >> good morning. we have no way to know whether today is the day. it doesn't feel like given the magnitude of the jury's request for exhibits. they will begin deliberations in about a half hour.

newscast afternoon we got everything in the case. it is conceivable, but based on the request for exhibits, they only yesterday began considering the two counts in the case relating to donor threats and they appear to have been spending most of the rest of the time talking about the case involving that. what you can extrapolate, there divisions and they are not going along swiftly. what we don't know is whether they are reconcilable and you will get a verdict or whether we can end up with a hung jury. you assume that this is agonizing for john edwards. do we have a sense of what he

has been up to while the jury deliberates? >> the last couple of days he left the courthouse for an acc college tournament. it was a couple of different teams. he is mostly up on the third floor and sometimes you will see him pace pacing the halls. it has to be tough and it's hard for us to wait. we are all pacing. imagine in your live is on the line. he has three young children and i know that he occasionally has seen them on breaks in the trial. it's agonizing for the entire family. >> lisa meyers has been there since the beginning and staying on top of it. thank you so much for the update. >> you bet. >> now to the middle east. no breakthroughs there. nuclear talks between iran and

six world powers in baghdad have come to an end without progress, but both sides agreed to meet again next month. let's go to that covering the negotiations for us. ali? >> things ended up in a stalemate and neither side wants to budge on the issues. the p 5 plus 1 said there was no way we would lift sanctions. the foreign policy chief said there was some common ground, but major differences still existed. the differences are insistent on enriching uranium at high levels that can be used. iran doesn't want to give up the trump card because that's the

strongest negotiating point. the two sides agreed on very little. they can barely agree on the second venue. they wanted the next venue, but they were supporting sanctions. as you said, the next round of talks will be going to moscow. all they could agree on was to talk more. at least the window of dialogue was still open. chris? >> needing to decide, i know there will be more from this. thank you for joining us. up next, failing students both democrats and republicans say they support cheaper student loans. why can't they put their money where their mouth is? john huntsman proves why he is democrat's favorite republican. a look ahead at the president's schedule. got the 11:00 a.m. daily briefing. a light schedule heading into memorial day weekend like the rest of the country.

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congress rejected calls from president obama and mitt romney to keep student loan rates down and both pears are paving the way for rates to double in july. with me now, thank you for joining us. >> great to be with you. >> people don't like congress. this is not news to you. when we have an issue like this where it's going to impact real people in a real way in july and congress cannot agree on anything, what are people to think? why can't we find agreement on something that i think if you

asked the members of the house, most would say we should do something about this. >> i couldn't agree with you more. this is a very clear symbol of the dysfunctionality of congress and the inability to get something done. this is not rocket science. the rates will double. student loans. the burden is high on middle class families. let's keep the rates at 3.4%. what's hard about this? you are seeing the senate not reach any agreement and the house unfortunately, the majority tacked on an unacceptable way to finance. >> my wife is a college coach and the idea of doubling this is -- whether you are a democrat or republican is intolerable. can we fix it? >> i am hopeful.

>> you wouldn't get out of bed in the morning. >> it really makes you shake your head. there other issues that are far more complex. this one is not hard. >> less agreement and legitimate discrimination. i don't want to harp too much on it. let's talk about virginia. we have a poll out yesterday with barack obama 48 and mitt romney 44 in virginia. in march barack obama was 52% and mitt romney scientist, but it doesn't take to show. how worried are you about barack obama's ability to carry a statement he did win. >> i am called the designated warrior. i worry about everything in politics, but i think that president obama has shown a fair amount of strength in virginia and consistently.

it's gone up and down, but he actually has shown the underlying strength. he will carry virginia again and if you look at the trend lines on polls, it's going to tighten up. and he surprising strength in virginia that impresses me. >> explain this as someone who has been involved in politics. barack obama carries the state in 2008. he wins the state overwhelmingly and republicans take back the state legislative majorities. why sthnt be? >> frankly it masks how competitive the races were. a change of a few hundred votes and they would have maintained

it. there is no mandate. democrats remain competitive and large parts of the state we dominate. >> i cannot let you go and i find this fascinating. a democratic congressman who ran for governor and lost the primary. is being rumored to consider switching parties and running against jerry conme in the future. are you worried? >> i welcome this development. it would seem to indicate and i would welcome that. the fact that they feel that they need to recruit the congress's democrat from alabama who doesn't yet live to represent them in 2014 is say welcome development and i look forward to debating to win the republican nomination. >> thanks for being a good sport

and thank you for joining us. >> after a volatile few days, the market run down is next. even more fallout from the lavish las vegas conference. all of course on the taxpayer's dime. and recall rivalry. can a last minute infusion help democrats recall scott walker? first today's trivia question. how many presidents earned degrees from both harvard and yale? tweet us the answer and the first correct answer will get the prize of pries. that answer and more coming up on "the daily rundown".

> the executive responsible

for the conference emblematic for government waste left the agency. he has been on leave since april for his in organizing the 2010 conference that costs over $800,000. the inspector general asked the justice department to conduct a criminal inquiry into his activities. less than two weeks to go until the recall election, the governor's association is pouring a million into the effort to oust scott walker. some officials expressed anger that the obama campaign and national committee have not contributed more. the convenience store clerk has been arrested for 6-year-old aton pates who disappeared. he is expected to make his first appearance in court this afternoon. we are minutes away from the

opening bell. happy friday. >> happy friday. it's good to see you. it has been a long week. we are watching this morning and it looks like the stock will open around $33. $5 below the initial offering price and there is still a lot of fallout coming from the story. we are continuing to watch and we are lucky enough to get on the ipo or watching as well. this caused a lot of pain and they were much more involved in this ipo than a lot of other ipos. one good bit of news, it is memorial day weekend and normally you see higher gasoline prices into the summer driving season. guess what. take a look. drumroll please. gas prices today with the current national average.

it is below what we saw a year ago and that is really good news. if you were looking at this, we have seen lower gas prices down by about half. that trend is expected to continue for the next couple of weeks and part is because demand is down and that's the bad part with the economy being hurt. the good news is supply is up. back over to you. >> awesome graphic and thank you very much as someone who will be driving a lot this evening. up next, crimson ties. for all the differences, one thing obama and romney have in common is the harvard education. what does it say about the two men vying for the white house? dr. chuck todd, hear his advice to 2012 college graduates.

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>> in the fight to align themselves with average americans, both president obama and mitt romney used their ivy league credentials as evidence that they are out of touch. >> we have a president who i think is a nice guy, but he spent too much time at harvard or not enough time actually working in the real world. >> woor we have degrees from harvard and i have one. he has two. what a snob. >> the irony is the president pointed out that both men attended harvard, all be it two decades apart. we examined the candidates' time as a parallel lives series.

i was saying to you, this is great stuff. people don't go to primary sources enough. we renew on someone who has done that. we have great stuff. i want to play a clip first from now romney adviser brad barronson talking about barack obama. let's play that and talk about it. >> he was more open-minded and would listen to the conservatives and would value and accept their contributions in a way that some of the other candidates would not. he ended up upsetting many more of his colleagues on the far left than those of us who were on the right. >> fascinating. not i think what most republicans would say about barack obama today. >> he was there specifically describing barack obama's time as the president as the harvard law review. it was a divicive election and barack obama won because the conservatives threw their weight behind him thinking in this

polarized environment, barack obama would be the bridge-builder who could connect. >> sounds familiar. >> the theme came out again and again. charles talked about a saturday morning course he taught where barack obama would show up on time and sit in the front row and when he would answer the question, this first year law student would say and al made the good point when he said this and he would interject barack, i'm teaching the course, not you. >> mitt romney doesn't focus as much on it, but harvard. you talked to his former classmate, howard brownstein about what mitt was like at harvard. here's what he had to say. >> he was living a that seemed like a throw back to what the 60s and 70s counter culture had rebelled against. not that there was anything wrong with it. it just seemed like more of a 50s lifestyle. >> this is actually not all

that -- mitt romney seems like he lives in black and white. he lives in the kind of beaver cleaver times and then he was not someone caught up in the hippy movement in any way, shape, or form. >> 1971, students were protesting and people described mitt romney as a boy scout in those days. he was older than the typical student and lived off campus and married with a son. that set him apart from the group and individuals told me stories about his devotion to the friends he made and the people he met. >> me because it's an active debate. they said mitt romney and the high school he went to and the allegations of bullying and lots and lots of people said who cares what he did in the 50s. does this stuff matter who they were? granted decades ago, but when

you were there, did it give you and does it give you insight into what they are today? >> when you look at the stories of barack obama the bridge builder or stories of mitt romney who may have been a little distant from a group of people, but had strong connections with individuals that he felt a personal tie to. you can see echoes of that today. generally speaking i think it's helpful to understand the president or presidential candidate through many lenses whether you are talking about the policy proposals or the profile they had in law school 20 or 30 years ago. >> i can't as a pick up basketball player, no one can see, but i have the soreness of someone elbowing me in the eye last night. you have a story that you got about president obama trash talking while playing basketball. i cannot let you go without telling that. >> the professor i mentioned was involved in the basketball association and barack obama was a famous trash talking jump shot

throwing defense playing basketball player and the team played prison. barack obama is a starting center and goes up against this guy who is a couple inches taller. he said what are you in for? the guy replays double murder. he told me the story that this is the only guy he has ever seen barack obama play where there was no trash talking and no defense. >> he's a pragmatist at heart. you don't trash talk to a double murderer. >> the invite to your basketball game, thank you for letting me plug that. a great series. >> thanks a lot. >> speaking of the college experience, it's a rite of passage for students across the country. the class of 2012 at maris college. 10,000 people gathered at the campus last weekend and among them, chuck todd received an honorary degree and delivered the commencement address giving

them sage advice. build a career by loving what you do. >> shouldn't come as a surprise to you, but if you don't like the work you are doing or the company you work for or the people you work with, you won't do a good job. then you never fulfill your own dreams. phi didn't love my job i wouldn't get up before the crack of dawn. i am tired a lot, but i have no other way. i love information and the sooner i feel my brain, the better i feel. when you feel that way about a job, it isn't work. >> we will post chuck's speech on our facebook page. check it out there. facebook.com/daily raun down. next, who will come out on top in the battle over bain and what's a campaign to do when a surrogate goes rogue? we will be here to wrap up the week and a programming note for

you, this sunday on "meet the press," an exclusive debate between martin o'malley and former presidential candidate newt gingrich. first, the white house soup of the day. it's english pea soup. i can imagine carson serving me that. so refined. you are watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. ♪ [music plays] ♪ [music plays] ♪ [music plays]

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>> i believe the nation should submit itself of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth. >> back to this day on 1961 when john f. kennedy set the goal of sending an american to the moon by the end of the decade. his vision was realized eight years later who neal armstrong

walked on the moon and john kennedy has a better ak cent than i do. dominating the week that was on the campaign trail. president obama mocked romney's experience while romney accused the pat of attacking capitalism. with the "new york times" and columnist with national review online. let's start by playing something from president obama yesterday in iowa. set the tone and come back and talk about it. >> he hasn't told you how he paid for a new $5 trillion tax cut which includes a 25% tax cut for nearly every millionaire in the country. 5 trillion in new tax cuts. that is like trying to put out a prairie fire with gasoline.

>> prairie fire with gasoline was the second most quotable thing. i said earlier with a pleasant visual. we have been debating on the show and have been talking about it, the president is being very aggressive about bain rhetorically. is it working? >> they certainly think it is. for president obama this is they believe this is a winning strategy. you can tell by the way a week ago now the obama campaign came out and speak of prairie fires, shut it downright away. they think this is his best possible strategy and going after the private equity. at the same time that's not the job of a president. the president's job is to create jobs. not to maximize profits and

president obama thinks that that's his best possible attack right now on mitt romney. it's really interesting. the idea of having someone who is pretty urban talking about cow pies, i am trying to figure out who gave him that phrase. >> david, obama earlier in the week, with corey booker and comments about prime equity, obama said this is not a distraction. this is what the campaign is about. is it? >> without a doubt. what surprised me about this conversation about bain is the surprise. we knew that this was going to be what this campaign was about. it was the newt gingrich playbook against mitt romney. this won. the romney campaign knew this was coming their way. electric at what he said anticipating the attacks. what you see is the disconnect

touching on what you and mark murray talked about with the amtrak corridor piece of the conversation beating occupy private equity and it makes the president look anti-capitalism and all of that, separating that out from what the rest of the country is receiving, trying to paint him as just an out of touch -- >> you mentioned what romney is saying. let's go back. >> when you hear that a businesslike bain capital was successful 80% of the time and 5% went bankrupt, that's a pretty good record. if all the president wants to do is talk about the failures, the nature of free enterprise. >> in a way it feels like deja vu all over again. i remember for a brief time, newt gingrich and rick santorum and rick perry all went after

this idea of vulture capitalism. what mitt romney is doing and spent his years doing it. was this free enterprise? they were shouted down in the republican primary and said it's ridiculous. does it work? >> so far it has not worked. i think the problem for mitt romney is it said worry about obama doesn't have this strong of a case. the inverse of that is this is as good as it gets. i don't think you look at 8.1% unemployment. i don't think they want to believe this is as good as it gets. this is the very best policies. >> i will ask a hard question quickly.

how does the obama white house think they can effectively win the question that jim and many republicans pose? they can win that argument. >> by shifting and i think they think by shifting that question to a different question, if you are asking if that's the question this is about, i don't think they win on that. they have to change the question and make it more about mitt romney and do you believe this guy can actually do for you what you need? can he spur the economy with his background looking at his ears of bain capital and vulture capitalism and can he do this? if the question is on -- if it's just a referendum on the economy, i don't think they do that well and they have to shift it. you have already seen them do a lot about taking us back to the policies that got us here to begin with. that argument. you will see a lot more of that.

i don't think they do well. >> we will be back with more from all three of you. it's trivia time and we asked how many presidents earned degrees from both harvard and yale? the answer is one. it was george walker bush. he has a degree from yale and harvard. the only president with degrees from both schools. you are watching "the daily rundown" only on ms nbc. , greats a great presentation. so at&t showed corporate caterers how to better collaborate by using a mobile solution, in a whole new way. using real-time photo sharing abilities, they can create and maintain high standards, from kitchen to table. this technology allows us to collaborate with our drivers to make a better experience for our customers. [ male announcer ] it's a network of possibilities -- helping you do what you do... even better. ♪ with the bankamericard cash rewards credit card,

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let's bring back our panel david, helene and jim, i want to talk -- i feel this has been the week of surrogate week. we started with corey booker and campaign nauseating him, since made a number of walk-backs. we end the week with jon huntsman, a romney supporter, endorsed him after get out of the campaign in new hampshire,

ran for president. this is what he had to say last night about mitt romney, his candidate, mitt romney and china. >> this is a typical trajectory where during a campaign season you'll talk about china in way you're hearing today. we have seen that in elections gone by. you get in the office, mitt romney has the ability to do what is most important. >> he is saying he's saying one thing now and will do something different and better when elected president. this is not the first time jon huntsman has gone off the reservation. i posed the question to the daily rundown team, is jon huntsman the worst surrogate of 2012. he's at least interested in jon huntsman as mitt romney. >> that is always the case. jon huntsman made the point during the nomination season when china would come up, this was actually at the crux of some of his debates on the stage with

mitt romney, that he thought there was demogragry, you would need to perform in a different manner. this is not helpful at all but this is not going to hurt mitt romney in any way. >> you don't vote against mitt romney because jon huntsman doesn't like his china policy. >> no doubt about that. this is no where close to what corey booker did to the president. >> let's talk about that. there are some surrogates for campaigns, everybody out on cable television talking about it. how responsible is a campaign or should a campaign be for the corey bookers of the world, jon huntsman of the world. i don't think he's in mitt romney's inner circle. >> we would realize sure gats are their own people with independent minds, probably get talking points and as booker demonstrated sometimes they listen, sometimes they don't. they're not outfitted with pain collars. >> campaigns would love that.

>> i'm not worried -- ahh, getting back on message. if somebody is a campaign spokesman, if you're paid by the campaign you're probably held to a higher standard, stay on message, don't deviate don't talk about your guy's flaws. isn't it true for every politician puts their interests first? >> the good ones, i hate to sound cynical the good ones are one eye on themselves, half of of an eye on the candidate. >> you don't find -- >> not many surrogates will say all the positions i've had before i endorsed this man were wrong and i have been persuaded to everything our candidate said is correct. >> helene i can't resist, speaking of straying off message, newt gingrich was on with chris matthews, i tweeted i thought it was arresting television if you're a political junkie, hard to turn away from. chris asked newt, a fascinating

question let's play the question and i'll come back and talk about it. >> favorite snake? >> probably a python. >> why? constrictor? >> big and passive. i would thought a black mamba, attack your nervous system, 15 minutes to live. attack like this. >> you are more ruthless approach to politics than i do. >> that is the greatest 15 seconds of television in at least the last 24 hours. newt gingrich says python, big and passive. he helene. >> i really miss him. don't go away, come back. >> we all did. >> where were the hard questions during the primary? this could have been a game changer. >> your plug? >> jim garrity on twitter. >> my beautiful nephew, hi

cooper. >> david? >> my whole team at yahoo news, the ticket is where you find the great political content. >> i will do my friend, andy schneider is getting married, i will officiate that is it for this edition of the daily rundown, have a safe and fun memorial day weekend. coming up next, chris jansing and company. maybe it's time to recharge the human battery. only the beautyrest recharge sleep system combines the comfort of aircool memory foam layered on top of beautyrest pocketed coils to promote proper sleeping posture all night long. the revolutionary recharge sleep system from beautyrest... it's you, fully charged. right now, receive two free recharge pillows with the purchase of select beautyrest mattresses.

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and by pooling more thankyou points from folks all over town, we were able to watch team usa... [ cheering ] in true london fashion. [ male announcer ] now citi thankyou visa card holders can combine the thankyou points they've earned and get even greater rewards. ♪ ♪ power surge, let it blow your mind. [ male announcer ] for fruits, veggies and natural green tea energy... new v8 v-fusion plus energy. could've had a v8. good friday morning i'm chris jansing. the president's campaign strategy right now, hit them early and often. attacking mitt romney by name over and over again this week. >> i know governor romney came to des moines last week. worried about a prairie fire of death. that is what he said.