captions paid for by nbc-universal television this morning, the campaign debate over who's got the skills to turn the economy around. that's what the fight about bain capital is about. the fight is not going away. cory booker made a big headline here last week by calling foul on anti-bain ad against romney. >> this kind of stuff is nauseating to me on both sides. it's nauseating to the american publ public. enough is enough. >>. >> there may be value for that kind of experience, but it's not in the white house. >> and so this morning the debate over bain, the economy and where things stand in the race. with us, former presidential candidate newt gingrich who will appear together with governor

romney next week and maryland's democratic governor, chair of the democratic governors association martin o'malley. gingrich and o'malley square off. then as we kick off a hot summer of campaigning, the state of the race and the key question, will either candidate be able to pull away. with us, mayor of los angeles, antonio villaraigosa. former head of hewlett-packard, carly fiorina. "new york times" columnist david brooks and from "the washington post," and author of "our divided political heart," ej dionne. maria schrifer and michael lewis about the advice they have for college graduates during this commencement season. >> class of 2012, you are dismissed! from nbc news in washington

"meet the press" with david gregory." good morning. so much campaigning ahead this summer. joining me the democratic governor of maryland, the chairman of governors association martin o'malley and former speaker of the house newt gingrich. great to have you both here and good morning. speaker gingrich, now that you are here and no longer as a candidate, you were here about a year ago declaring your candidacy. where are you in this race? are you unequivocally behind governor romney and do you think he can win? >> oh, sure, given this level of unchltment and this level of deficits it's very likely he will win and you'll see it pull away in september and october. >> what have you learned about mitt romney? >> he's tough. much tougher than i thought. he's a very good organizer, in the end he can organize at a

scale that can match obama, i couldn't. i think he's a good study. i think he really, woed hard at understanding when i beat him in south carolina, what he had to do to come back in florida, and so i have substantial respect for his ability as a leader to do the things he has to do to get the jobs done. >> you heard me frame this. who's got the skills? i feel this is a bain test over who can turn this economy around. the president defended himself and the attack on bain even though cory booker cried foul about it. this is what he said and then i'll have you respond. >> if your main argument for how to grow the economy is i knew how to make a lot of money for investors, then you're missing what this job is about. it doesn't -- it doesn't mean you weren't good at private equity, but that's not what my job is as president.

my job is to take into account, everybody, not just some. >> will he come across as anti-business with this line of attack? >> no, i don't believe that. in being fa, i agree with speaker gingrich during his campaign when he had to address that claim that romney initially made that oh, he created hundreds of thousands of jobs, a claim he eventually backed off of under the pressing and questioning. there are two things that romney has to recommend himself for the high office of president and one is his experience with bain capital where his job was to return profits as quickly as possible to a very narrow few rather than to create long-term jobs for the many. the second one though, which you don't hear him talking about at all is his experience in the public sector when he was governor of massachusetts. >> i want to get to that in just a moment, but speaker, respond to this, you called his time at bain exploitation. >> can i explain the bain issue? >> i think obama has the bigger

problem. he has the worst record of any president since the great depression. second, bureaucratic investment has been a disaster. we had one solar company that went belly up for $2.1 billion and we have solyndra at $185 million. obama has no model of effective job creation as compared to private capital and this is why it will fall flat on his face, plus i was very careful, i didn't go after private equity. he's going after all private equity in a way which explains why you had senator warner and the governor of massachusetts why he had the closest allies and senator feinstein and cory booker on the show. there were 15 or 20 democrats who say this is an inaccurate and wrong approach for the president to be taking. >> if the chief qualification is i'm mitt romney, i worked in private enterprise and therefore that experience is what makes me

a job creator when that's not at the core, and that's want the chief function. >> let me go a step further, because we'll get to his private record. there was 4.47% unemployment. whether obama wants to fight on governor romney's record or he wants us to fight on private sector romney's record, obama is deciding to pick a fight. this a little bit like the reverse of james carville in '92. obama picking a fight on the economy is probably the worst possible strategy for his campaign. >> i would like to disagree with that. we've driven unemployment down to three year lows. home foreclosures are lower than they were when president obama took office. we have put together the american people with effective leadership 26 months in a row of private sector job growth. that record will be contrasted sharply to what mitt romney did as governor which was in a relatively strong state, in a better time of our economy to

have that state ranked 47th out of 50 in job creation. >> the unemployment rate in massachusetts came down under his stewardship. >> the unemployment rate came down under different times and it could be driven down further, with more job creation if we would get beyond this sort of tea party destruction that anyone would try to prevent modern investments. >> what is the warning, though, from the president's campaign and surrogates about what romney policy would mean for job creation? on a national level? >> what is the warning? i think what you see and i think part of the armchair critics are missing is what with romney did, mr. romney, not governor romney, what he did at bain capital was to drive up debt by the companies that bain took over in order to return huge dividends

to a small little group of investors and then walk away -- >> you have the president's job counsel with private equity folks on there and you yourself, you have the department of business and economic department headed up by someone by private equity. you seem to recognize the experience the private equity. >> it's the leader of the united states. it's not the short-term return of profits to the few, but a long-term economy that creates jobs for the many. >> let's start down that road. why has unemployment come down? unemployment's come down? because participation in the workforce is at the lowest point it's been in three decades. people are retiring early because they can't find a job. people have given up looking. if you look at the gallup surveys, the number of those who are underemployed and quit looking is 19%. this is a disastrous administration, and candidly if you want to get into a fight over debt, from 47% in the

economy to 74% in three and a half years. this is why obama will have a hard time this fall. he can't fight over jobs because he isn't creating them. he can't fight over debt, and he has policies that people find unacceptable and romney has a straightforward case. can you afford four more years of barack obama? can you afford four more years of this economy? and can you afford four more years of this kind of debt? as david pointed out, the unemployment rate under romney came down. the fact that he was able to balance the budget as he had to under the law of massachusetts, and the fact is he does know a great deal more about job creation than barack obama. >> two things on the record, with regard to debt, governor romney drove up for the people of massachusetts, the largest per capita debt of any state in the union. that's a fact. when it comes to what with little bit of job creation was happening in massachusetts and

what was happening in the private sector at six times the rate that was happening in the private sector. his record whether it was at bain capital, and whether it was as governor of massachusetts, it was not a record of reducing debt and not a record of increasing private job creation, having the 47th out of 50 states. >> except if you look over time, most of the companies did well and most of them paid off the debt. if you look at staples, for example, it was enormous. i think the problem the president's got you're a normal america, look at the price of gasoline and the foreclosure rate which is coming down in part because so many houses have been foreclosed and look at the unemployment numbers and you say to yourself, why would i believe barack obama would be any better in the second term and that's why i think romney has a very strong case to say it's time to try a different approach. >> during the campaign you said, you know what? governor romney ought to have a

press conference and lay out what his experience was at bain? do you think he ought to do that? >> i think people looked at it and i can just tell you this is why i don't understand the obama campaign strategy here. bain has an issue that doesn't work because people looked at it in balance and you can pick a couple of companies that lost. you can pick a couple of companies that succeeded and as the governor of massachusetts said last week, it is a good company and a good track record. >> you said this is a character issue for romney, ultimately. his time in business and what he did. >> if you look at what happened, he had the press conferences -- >> is it a character issue to you and to the president? >> i think it's more of a qualification issue. there's nothing that governor romney did either in the private sector that created jobs or in the public sector that distinguished himself as a job creator. there's a tremendous amount of balance that's required to be president of the united states especially to bring our country

back from the disastrous aftereffects from the bush recession and the bush job losses and the deficit, 55% of which was caused by policies, tax cuts that benefited the wealthiest of americans rather than investing in a better future and a better economy with greater opportunities that our kids deserved. >> at this stage in 1984, no one on the reagan team was talking about the carter recession because they were talking about the reagan recovery. they were talking about the job creation under reagan. they were talking about the success of reagan. this is an administration that went from yes, we can to why we couldn't. the fact that this president's been president for three and a half years, he had a chance to fix it. it ain't fixed and the country knows it's not fixed on gasoline, it's not fixed on the economy and it's not fixed on the deficit and romney has a better shot at doing a better job than barack obama. >> i have two questions, one for you, speaker and governor romney.

if you cannot close the gap, what's the opportunity for him to actually prevail in the fall? you ran to the left of him on the immigration question. he gave a speech this week and didn't even talk about immigration. how big of a problem is this for him? >> he has to address it and barack obama failed on immigration reform even when he had a democratic council and democratic senate. he failed to fix it when he controlled the house and senate. second, he went out and talked to the hispanic chamber of commerce. he'll tell you, the number one issue is jobs. the number two issue is the price of gasoline, the number three issue is housing and the number four issue is education where romney spent the whole week on education and offered a very bold alternative to help poor children, particularly black and latino and white poor children have choices other than being trapped in a failing school. the question is if you campaign on those issues, if latinos conclude that mitt romney is

more likely that will have my family have a job and my child will have an education, does that overcome whatever the democratic attack is, and i think he'll get the same percent that george w. bush did what was in the 40s. >> that's a bold prediction given where they've been. >> it will take a lot of effort and a lot of campaigning. >> ron brownstein talks about what's the message? what's the job creation goal and the big idea in the goal, this is what he writes in the "national journal" column, today, frets one senior democrat close to the white house, voters don't have a sense of what obama -- obama would be playing with fire to wager that he can hold enough of those voters without providing them a more compelling and specific plan to improve their liefrs than he's offered so far. what is that plan? >> well, the plan is that in order to create jobs, a modern economy does require modern

investments. speaker gingrich describes himself as a pro-growth republican. i describe myself as a pro-growth democrat. we know what we need to do is to create jobs and how you do that is to innovate, to invest in education and invest in infrastructure. >> the governor has to spend more money on infrastructure in the country. >> you can't do less. how much less do you want for our country? how much less education would be good for our economy? how many fewer bridges can we keep in good repair? is that good for our economy? certainly not. >> obama takes a turn and the government spends more. >> no, the bottom line is job creation. last year, president obama because of his leadership in america, we created more jobs as a country last year than we create individual eight years of george w. bush. what mitt romney is offering is an alternative to take us back. back to the days of debt, back to the days of job losses and record home foreclosures and when people are given a choice,

particularly new americans, with more jobs and new opportunity or return to the days of george w. bush. they want to move -- >> speaking of bush they want to rub the 2004 campaign to make it a referendum. >> they have to do that because they can't live in the record, but look, let's talk about spending more. the president said he was shocked to discover shovel-ready jobs weren't shovel-ready. romney represents private investment. romney made an education proposal this week that would actually improve the education of poor americans and improve the education of american with disabilities while lowering the cost. if new york city if your child goes to a catholic school and costs two-thirds as much as the public school and they're dramatically more likely to go to college and the same thing with charter schools across the country and this is the fight not over more or less. it's a fight over better or

worse and the president has to defend public bureaucracies. >> before you go, you two were chosen for a reason. as much as you love your job and i know you love being governor about the great state of maryland. what advice would you give to governor o'malley? >> raise a lot of money. >> you have to be prepared and you'll spend two or three years on the road. mike warner being came back and ran for the senate. >> are you disappointed about the process? >> no, this has been a brutal, tough process at least since 1800 and it hasn't gotten less brutal and probably shouldn't. if you're not tough enough to get to the presidency. you're not tough enough to be president. so i have no regrets. it's a wonderful, amazing experience. calista says she learned two big

things. people are overwhelmingly nice even if they don't agree with you and money matters. those are her two lessons. >> would you like to be selected to be on the ticket with romney? >> i think that's highly implausible. i find that as implausible as you find it. >> are you likely to run in 2016 and are you waiting to see what biden and/or secretary clinton do? >> i'm not thinking that far. i'm doing everything in my power to help governors like tom barrett in wisconsin where the polls have greatly narrowed in wisconsin. it's an interesting choice. tom barrett has been a mayor and done practical things and brought people together to solve problems, versus scott warner, 50 state have had job creation and the only active governor with a criminal defense fund. >> another side to that story which we'll talk about at the roundtable as well. i'll leave it there.

thank you both very much. we'll hear from the roundtable on the rules of engagement and the race to the white house. also some of the new polls show a very tough race and we'll go inside the battlegrounds with the focus on ohio. mayor of los angeles, antonio villaraigosa, former chairman and ceo of hewlett-packard, carly fiorina and david brooks of "the new york times." and advice for the class of 2012 fr ahh, now that's a clean mouth. i wish i could keep it this way. [ dr. rahmany ] you see, even after a dental cleaning... plaque quickly starts to grow back. but new crest pro-health clinical plaque control toothpaste can help. it not only reduces plaque... it's also clinically proven... to help keep plaque from coming back. plus, it works in these other areas dentists check most. ♪ new crest pro-health clinical plaque control toothpaste. life opens up when you do. for extra plaque protection try new crest pro-health clinical rinse.

coming up here, we'll go inside battleground ohio, with our political

one of the things we want to

do between now and election day is go inside the battlegrounds and really focus on the states that will decide the election in the fall. today ohio, and i want to take you inside ohio as we look at some of the particulars of a state that was so crucial in 2008 will be again. you have the unemployment rate at 7.4%, below the national average. that's important. look at the '08 results it was obama's 52 to mccain's 57. most visited state by the candidates back in 2008. that's likely to also be the case this go around as well. i was in cleveland this past week. there's something of a renaissance going on there economically and that bears importance for this part of the state, typically democratic and it's really where the obama team will focus. what will be the big message? it will be auto bailout with which the manufacturing base will play out there. they understand they'll be up against headwind there and their focus will be in the south, cincinnati and this area, a lot of social conservatives there

and they'll have to turn out that vote in order to offset what's going on here. a lot to talk about moving forward including how things stand in the battleground states. the maris poll, it's the president's 48 to romney's 42% and they're both below 50 and more on the battlegrounds as we continue. let's bring in our roundtable now. here with us "washington post" columnist" and author of "our divided heart" e.j. dionne and the former chair of hewlett-packard carly fiorina is also with us and the democratic mayor of los angeles antonio villaraigosa. the mayor spearheading the return of the great los angeles damagers as they're off to a great season under terrific new ownership and mr. mayor, my divided sports heart. welcome to all of you here. i want to start, david brooks, where i ended with the governor and speaker. look what we've had so far.

we've had the war on women debate and hilary rosen's comments. what is fair game in terms of what people ought to be focused on? >> i think it's fair especially if you don't have agenda. i haven't seen either candidate talk about this. if you ask the american people, does either candidate have a big plan for the future? 36% obama, 31% romney and that's pretty bad. i question the obama decision to go after to start negative. they decide to focus a negative way and it seems to me self-destructive. people like obama, they admire him and they are starting negative and going extremely tough and extremely hard and looking for ads, the they had inaccuracies that were the basis of the ad. they said romney left two people out in the street. romney was gone by then. they said they were loading up

debt and dumping them. these companies have no higher default rates and starting negative not only distracts you, but also damages his personal reputation. e.j.? >> first of all, when george bush began his 2004 campaign against john kerry he began the attacks in february and march, so i don't see -- i didn't see any republicans saying the president should never attack his opponents and secondly the argument over bain is part of the substantive argument over the future of american capitalism. first, it's romney from the beginning was saying his role as a job creator at bain was the key reason why he should be president. thanks to this exchange even rush limbaugh has said no, private equity companies are not about creating jobs, but if you go back in the history it's one of the things we talk about about in my book, we argue about the nature of capitalism from the very beginning whether it's hamilton and clay arguing about

manufacturing and andrew jackson over the debate of the united states or woodrow wilson when the power of commerce of finance could be greater than that of government. we're trying to decide not whether to have capitalism or some other system. we're trying to decide what kind of capitalism do we want in america. i think the debate about bain raises real legitimate issues over how you should do capitalism in a way that benefits everybody. >> i just don't know that voters, carly, are going to the polls thinking about the great debate over the role of capitalism. if you're the obama team, you're saying this guy running against me is a financier. remember what brought on the recession? it's the financiers. he doesn't get you. that seems to be what they're after here. >> i find the attack surprising from many perspectives. first of all, capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than any other economic system in the history of the world. the way you do that is with a

job. third, successful companies create jobs. failing companies destroy jobs. i think president obama is indicating what many of us have suspected for some time. he actually doesn't understand how the economy works. bain capital, like many businesses, invested in small start-ups with the goal to make them successful. jobs were created. finally, i find this attack so strange. this was a man, barack obama, who went to the american people and said i am a community organizer. i am an untenured law professor. i am a junior senator who has not completed a single term. i am qualified to be president, but mitt romney, the governor of a major state with 25 years of experience in the private sector is not qualified to be president? i find it a very surprising argument, and i don't think it's going to work. >> mayor? >> well, look, romney's made bain and his experience at bain. he's claimed as the central plank of his campaign.

he said he was a job creator and the fact checkers said he didn't create the 100,000 jobs he said he did. he did create companies and laid off people and made money. he's very good at making money and the question is he good as creating jobs? he put that front and center and the campaign responded to it. it's not an issue of private equity. nobody is questioning the role of private equity. i actually worked in private equity for a couple of years about ten years ago, what we're questioning is is he a job creator? no. as governor of massachusetts, is he someone that addresses the debt? you heard martin o'malley say that he was -- had the highest per capita debt when he left massachusetts of any governor in the state. he -- he gave his successor a billion dollars in debt. so the fact is that he put his record front and center, and we

responded to it. >> a lot of this will circle back to the state of the campaign. as we head off into the summer of campaigning, let me show a head to head first, which as it did in ohio, you're still under 50% and the president has a slight edge at 47 to 43, but if you look at the advantage that the president now has, to me it goes to the point of how he's trying to identify and cast governor romney among hispanics, younger women, westerners all advantage to the president and all on that list, seniors, suburban women and overall in the battleground states. >> democrats have a huge demographic advantage that will get bigger over the years. the president has a couple of disadvantages. europe will end up the big story if greece falls out of the euro and disaster for any incumbents. so that's one of them, and then i think the tenor of the campaign will change. what will happen will become the new orleans saints and by that i

mean that normal competition will turn to bounty hunting and both people in both campaigns will get their juices flowing and they'll take meaner and meaner shots and that will suppress turnout and that will, i think hurt the president more because his favorability ratings are so much higher. >> it does beg a broader question. carly, you ran, and here's the cover of "the week," magazine, and billionaires run super pac attacks on race and religion. is this what david is referring to? are we now -- i guess the question is what does it take to get elected at this stage of the game? >> well, i do think that all of us look at the state of the campaign today, the end of may and believe that it will be both very close and particularly nasty, sadly. i think it is a sad comment when the political argument gets

reduced to questioning other people's motives, and frankly, i think president obama has been more guilty of this than anyone else. president obama and vice president biden are continually questioning people's motives, their heart and character. they don't get you. they don't care. it would be so much better, i think, for the american people if political debate was argued on the facts and it's not questioning someone's character and motivation. >> you do have romney attacking the president for going on an apology tour and not championing american exceptionalism. there's a motive question there, too. >> there are a whole series of things that governor romney said about obama that is simply not true, the apology tour is one of them. the united decision not only changed the law, but also gave a kind of social green light to all of these super pacs and the super pac ads are particularly dangerous because if i attack

you with my campaign money, i am accountable for that attack, and you can say that's outrageous, it's untrue, when these committees for good government put on an ad and say outrageous things, the candidate can sit back and say that's not me. that's someone else and those super pacs will put out hundreds of millions of dollar of ads. i think you're right. i think the president goes in with structural advantages. the difference this time than last time is the president vastly outspent john mccain in the last election and this time with the super pac money coming in from the right, i think it will be a real challenge to the president. >> i want to put up romney's advantages as we look at our own polling. among men, suburbanites, midwesterners, married women, and high-interest voters a slight edge there, but latinos are a huge problem for the republican party right now and our oversampling of latino voters with telemundo, obama has

a 61% to 27% advantage. is there anything that changes that advantage. for instance if marco rubio were to be on the ticket, do you think there's any potential for changing that dine am snik. >> some potential, not much. vice presidential candidates don't usually give youio a big bump, maybe in that state. david said something with respect to president obama's support among ethnics and other democratic groups and it has everything to do with the fact that the republican party has gone so far to the right. we saw that in the election on women taking this to the 1950s and talking about contraception and on the issue of immigration, talking about the south deportation of 11 million people. i don't know a country in the world that has ever south deported 11 million people. when he said the dream act was a handout. that's out of the mainstream of what most people think. when he failed to stand up and say anything when cain talked

about electrifying the border fence. so i think that's a big reason why. it's the policies of the extreme part of their party, but i didn't see, and i don't think any of us saw governor romney really challenge some of those extreme policies. >> i agree with him here with the republicans and the republicans are completely aware of this, karl rove is aware and marco rubio is trying successfully, and i think it will hurt them long term and i don't think it will hurt them this time for historical reasons. when you reelect an incumbent there are two things we know. first, it's a referendum, there are rarely choices and the referendum on the record of the last four years and not the personality of the candidates and so that, when you take that basic structure of reelect races that does hurt obama and then the final thing is when you ask people are you better off than four years ago? 35% say yes and that's pretty bad.

>> let me go around the table on a few other items that i wanted to get to quickly. that is in wisconsin, we called election in milwaukee mayor, tom barrett taking on scott walker who took on the unions and now you have a recall election. david, i heard you talk about this race as something that will be important for the fall. one of the fundamental issue in europe and here is we have welfare states that need reform. i don't like particularly the way the governor of wisconsin did it, but he did it, and if he supported it that would be green light for a lot of other reformers and it's a test case nationally. i'm also not sure why if he wins and why mitt romney doesn't also win. the next item up here has to do with trump. he's going to be campaigning with governor romney and newt gingrich will be there as well. again this week, donald trump was sticking by questions over whether president obama was really an american citizen.

how much damage is there, e.j., if you're governor romney if you're thinking of an endorsement of an ally that people never quite understood. >> i think if governor romney doesn't put out some very, very, very clear statement that he distances himself from this birther stuff. i don't know why he is hanging around with donald trump, but governor romney has not distanced himself from the right wing on anything. he hasn't taken a step back from the republican party. one thing i talk about in my book how conservatism used to be a balance between conservative concerns and community concerns. right now as you're seeing in the scott walker recall, i agree it's very significant, but it's significant in a different way from david. they're saying, wait a minute, we like consensual politics in wisconsin, where a conservative like tommy thompson never did the things that this governor is

doing. i think mitt romney has to step back on this sat some point and he hasn't done it yet. >> final item is the question of colin powell. will he endorse in this race? it came up in the context of russia and romney. one of his folks saying russia was the biggest strategic threat to the united states. colin powell was on msnbc and had this reaction. >> governor romney not too long ago said the russian federation is the number one geostrategic threat. come on, think. that isn't the case. i don't know if mitt really thinks that, or if someone told him. i don't know, you ask him. it's been catching a lot of heck from the more regular gop community. we're kind of taken a back by it. >> carly, quickly, is foreign affairs will be a target of opportunity against this

president? >> certainly foreign affairs are on the minds of many americans especially on memorial day when we think of men and women and their families. he'll make up his mind when he decides to, however, i think what governor romney probably intended was, it is true that we have the most unsettled relationship with russia right now, and we have a leader of russia whose motivations are, to put it kindly, unclear who has a very clear history. >> all right. we're going to leave it there. thank you all very much. we'll take another break here. when we come back, a special conversation about this commencement season and some advice for the class of 2012. joining me, two of the [ other merv ] welcome back to the cleaning games. let's get a recap, merv. [ merv ] thanks, other merv. mr. clean magic eraser extra power was three times faster on permanent marker.

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>> and finally, wherever you go in life, however fast you're going, remember this, whenever you are in doubt, pause. take a moment. look at all of your options, check your intention. have a conversation with your heart and then always take the high road. >> sage advice from maria shriver as the class of 2012 graduates and prepares to enter such an uncertain world, i wanted to reach out to two

celebrated voices in our culture and two highly sought-after commencement speakers. you just heard from maria shrivers who addressed the university of southern california annenberg school of journalism and author of "money ball," "boom rierang," and one my personal favorites, michael lewis. thank you for being here. >> thanks for having us. >> maria, let's pick up on that piece of the commencement address that you gave. the power of pause. what did you think that was so important for graduates to hear including someone in the audience that was extra special. >> my daughter was in that graduating class. i think we're in a rush, all of us to go out, and to be first in every business we're in a rush and i wanted to tell these young people, they're going out to uncertain timeses and they know

that far better than most of us and it's okay to pause, and it's okay not to know the answer, what are you going to do? what's your job? how much are you making and the concept of pausing throughout life is a very powerful concept i think and there's so much outward communication. i wanted to talk about the benefit of communicating inwardly with yourself throughout your life and you have to pause to do that. >> it's interesting, michael, because there is so much emphasis on the individual graduate as he or she goes off into the world and not enough emphasis on the idea of becoming part of a team and a sense of shared purpose, which i think resonates with a lot of young people. >> i think that's true. i think maria's point is very well taken, i've actually only done a few of these commencement speeches and each time i do them i do feel -- i wonder whether anybody's listening, and i do

kind of -- i'm a little skeptical about the power of words on these ears. i think back, and i'm actually giving a talk i supposedly heard 30 years ago when i graduated from princeton and not only do i not remember the talk or the speaker, i don't remember the event even happening, and i'm s thinking of what i'm telling these people and it's quite possible that i will be the only one that remembers what i say no matter what i say, but it's -- you know, when you sit and you think what do you tell people to make a difference in their lives as they go out into this world, the business of backing away from the pressures, from not accepting that you have to do anything, when you walk out the doors of university and giving -- and sort of, leaving yourself open to rare risks of that stage of your life is a pretty good message, because it is sort of the point in your life when you're 21, 22 years old when you are most likely to

take useful risks and as you get older you take fewer and fewer of them. i'll take that as my theme, but i doubt anybody will pay much attention. >> well, i don't know. maria, the thing that occurred to me and i've only done a few of them and i did a couple a few weeks ago and i think i'm not that much older than these graduates and then i realize, a, yes, i am, and b, i have more in common with their parents and then i get emotional because i think about my own kids and that's what seems to overtake me. >> well, they play the pomp and circumstance, you get very emotional and i almost burst into tears in the speech because i talked about being in awe at my first child graduating from college, but i think there are a lot of people our age who are speaking to these young people who have something very much in common and there are millions of people having to start over in their lives and who are having

to reimagine their lives and are having to take incredible risks and having to do things they never imagined and we're in this together, i think, depending on our age and there are so many women finding themselves in the position offic caretaker, nurturers and having to start businesses and i think as a nation, we're having to redefine who we are and what we're doing and we're strong step back and say i might have to take a risk i never imagined. i look for common ground with these graduates, they might be younger, but we're all starting out on a path in many ways that has no client of clear direction to it. it's scary and exciting. >> it is scary and exciting. michael, the other thing that feeds into this, the point you me made about risk and it's something you said in 2010. everybody says do what you love.

this was your advice. >> the challenge for you, i think, today is to find what you love and do it before you figure out how much that love is going to cost you. >> what did you mean by that? >> yes. you know, it is -- it's -- it's something, you know, you get dragged into these things because you're supposed to provide some sort of role model for them, i think. in a funny way, i think these speeches are misconceived. they probably benefit more from negative examples. if they would bring back some white-collar criminals or goldman sachs ceo traders or disgraced politicians to explain why you don't do what you do to get to where i am, that might have more effect, so i get to sort of explain how i got to where i am in this happy position of doing what i like to do, and i tell them that, look, was there a moment in my life when i was not much older than

you where the price of doing what i wanted to do seemed very, very high, the financial price and i was not 25 years old and i would not have gone and done it, because i didn't figure out how high that price was at the time. look, ten years later i never would have made the decision i made to do what i wanted to do because it would have seemed like it cost too much. so i sort of insistently said to them, look, this is the moment when you can pay that price because you don't really know what it is. so go for it. this is your -- maybe your one shot when you come out of here. so don't blow it by jumping at money, by doing the things that everybody thinks you should do because it seems successful. figure out where your heart is and try to go with that. >> maria, i want to come back and perhaps end on this point of

the inner journey that you talked about off the top and there was one commencement speaker in 1994 who was pretty near and dear to your heart and that was your late father, sergeant shriver and this is what he said in part. he said i am a man of consequence, the sergeant shriver known everywhere as maria shriver's father. the first thing i've learned is this, it's not what you get out of life that counts it's what you give is what is given to you from the heart. in another point i have one small word of advice, because it's going to be tough. break your mirrors. yes indeed, shatter the glass. in our society that is so self-absorbed, begin to look less at yourself and more at each other and learn more about your neighbor and less of your own. >> that's very valuable advice and it could be given by someone like my father who was a deeply religious and deeply spiritual man and i find people i talk to are redefining what success

means in their lives and they are going within to ask those questions and michael talked about changing course in his career. you can only do that if you step back and really have a conversation with yourself about what makes you happy, how you define success and for -- and be courageous enough to say maybe i don't define it in the way that will get me on the cover of "people" magazine or "time" magazine, but it works for me and that might be in serving people, taking care of your family, having time to coach a little league game and so i think people are in the process of redefining what success means, and i think that's a really great thing, and i think you can only do that if you break the mirror, pause, step back, take a beat and talk to your heart. >> michael lewis, whether you think the kids are listening or not, i'm sure as a dad you get up there and you're thinking of these big thoughts and thinking of your own kids at the same time. >> i'm mainly thinking if i give

the princeton commencement speech princeton will feel be on liked to admit them. >> not! won't happen! >> thank you both. great to have you both and i appreciate it. >> thank you. thank you. and programming note, we will reair on msnbc today at 2:00 p.m. eastern and again tomorrow at 6:00 a.m. and 12:00 noon tomorrow. check out our interview with ashley judd on meet the press.com. if it's southboununday, it's "m press." we honor and remember all of the men and women who have given

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