and you have to ask yourself this singular question. after all that's happened throughout the last year, this singular question. why? thanks so much for watching. "hardball" starts right now. numbers game. let's play "hardball." i'm michael smerconish in for chris matthews. spin cycle. it's become a monthly ritual. weaker than expected numbers come out, the president says he's making progress and so it was today when we learned that only 80,000 jobs were created last month an the unemployment

rate held firm at 8.2%. how's it going to play in november? despite the weak jobs numbers, republicans are nervous that mitt romney is kicking away a winnable election. it began with a tweet from rupert murdoch and now a lot of conservatives who never liked romney are saying i told you so. also, remember when pennsylvania's republican house majority leader said voter i.d. laws would help mitt romney win the election? here's what he was talking about. a new study shows that three quarters of a million people in the state don't have the proper identification and most of them are likely democratic voters. and not even scarlet ohara said the name ashley so much. >> look, ashley. >> that's not for you to say. >> that's joe wallach --

duckworth lost both legs fighting in remark and joins us tonight and our joe walsh highlight reel. exactly how many times did joe walsh stay the name? stick around. robert reich was the secretary during the clinton administration and jared bernstein served with vice president biden. explain to me the substance cht what's going on? >> it's actually job growth has stalled. 8.2% unemployment. same as last month, but we also would see that 80,000 jobs were created in june. the average monthly job growth of the last three months has been about 75,000 jobs. a substantial decline from the job numbers we saw in january, february and march.

now, it's a similar to a slowdown we have seen in previous years. the hope obviously is that we get more job growth later in the year. it's hard to make good news out of today's job numbers. >> mr. bernstein, where is it headed? i think we're aware of the statistics that since world war ii, no president's been re-elected when the rate has been north of 7.4%. is it likely that 8.2 could get under 7.4 between now and november? >> absolutely not. you never know, but that is way outside anyone's forecast. the most optimistic forecast i've seen to have the unemployment rate trending down a bit below 8% by the end of the ye year, important policies to generate more job growth. it's hard to see things change that much. >> this morning, governor romney was quick to attack the president and his policies.

take a look. >> the president's policies have not gotten america working again. and the president's going to have stand up and take responsibility for it. i know he's been planning on going across the country and celebrating what he calls forward. well, forward doesn't look a lot like forward. to the millions and millions of families that are struggling today in this great country. doesn't have to be this way. america can do better and this kick in the gut has got to end. >> the president also mentioned the jobs numbers in his speech this morning. >> we learned this morning that our business has created 84,000 new jobs last month and that's over all means that businesses have created 4.4 million new jobs over the past 28 months including 500,000 new manufacturing jobs. that's a step in the right direction. that's a step in the right direction.

but we can be satisfied because our goal was never to just keep on working to get back to where we were back in 2007. i want to get back to a time when middle class families and those working in the middle class have some basic security. that's our goal. >> mr. secretary, he used a golfing metaphor. is it time for the president to put aside the 9 iron and bring out the driver? does he need to do something more bold relative to the economy sm. >> i think so. it's hard for the president, obviously. he was correct. he was dealt a terrible hand in the worst economy since the great depression. i think he has going to have to say something more than we're making slow progress, i was dealt a bad hand. he's got to be a bit bolder. >> what might that be? >> well, he could say you know, wee going to have a, if i get the vote, obviously republicans

are not going to give him any votes. he can say if and when i do get the votes, we're going to have a new works progress administration. we're going to rebuild the nation's infrastructure, education. we are going to have a first class, a nation in every respect. we're going to put people back to work. we're going to fight and keep fighting for average working people. again, republicans are going to say as they have, we are not going to spend any more money. the president can say what about a middle class tax cut? exempting the first $20,000 of income from the payroll tax. i, president of the united states, am not going to stop making new proposals simply because the republicans say no. >> do you agree with the secretary? do you think the president needs to do something more bold? you look at the polls now, they're neck and neck and i think that governor romney is coasting along being the other guy thus far. >> i agree with your analysis

and i like bob reich's ideas. i think that's precisely the kind of thing the president should talk about. now, he doesn't need to introduce necessarily a bunch of new things. he can say absolutely correctly, i've got ideas that i've been trying to promote on capitol hill now for well over a year and some of them are just really good common sense. the last month, we shed 14,000 jobs in local education. 23 out of the last 24 months the public sector has shrunk. you should say folks, these are your teachers, police, firefighters and one of the programs that was most effective in term of getting medicine into is the quickly and helping communities to retain those jobs was fiscal relief to the states. then and you were both kind of getting at this. then it's absolutely the case for the president to have to explain to people who is

standing directly between them and a better economy, better opportunities and more jobs and that would be the congress. >> i'll be curious to see whether he makes this a campaign against the congress, meaning you've got to give me control back the house. crossroads is up with a new commercial going after the president's economic record. >> america's jobless rate is still too high. barack obama's got lot of excuses for the bad economy. >> head wind coming from europe. we've had a string of bad luck. an earthquake in japan. an arab spring. >> don't go to a bank teller. >> things we could not control. >> we've been a little bit lazy. but obama never blames washington's wild spending and skyrocketing debt. for real job growth, cut the debt. >> mr. secretary, react to that spot. there is this narrative that the republicans i think have effectively woven together of

all the debt having been incured on his watch because of his big spending. >> first of all, it's factually incorrect. a lot of the debt comes from the bush tax cuts, the drug benefit create created by george w. bush and from cleaning up the mess the republicans created and wall street created, but beyond that, mitt romney is an absolutely no position to talk about whittling the debt down when he's advocating a gigantic tax cut for the wealthy that he's not going to even pay for. so it's a both dishonest and hypocritical message. and blaming romney for having not a single new idea for bringing jobs back. not a single idea. >> what i see feeding that narrative, whether it's fact or fiction, we can discuss, is the supreme court's decision having been upheld as a taxes authority

of the congress. i can tell you, i can answer the phone for a living. i host a radio program where i hear from people who say see that, i knew i was going to get whacked with a tax to pay for obamacare and largely, the people asserting that have health insurance and won't be subjected to a penalty. >> i heard the same thing from a friend of my sister's. at this point, you need to do an information campaign and just like bob was saying, it's not that we should have a discussion about whether it's fact or fiction. it is fiction. the fact this, the congressional budget office very clear on this point, that this penalty, it's really a free loader penalty for people who can afford to get insurance but don't and shove those costs on to the rest of us, is is expected to hit 1% of the population and if you have insurance, it's not going to ding you one bit. >> the sales job by the white house has been terrible on that point.

i don't think that the white house has carried the ball in this regard. >> no, i don't think so. at all. i mean, i think that the white house is basically allowed the individual mandate and supreme court's kind of tax discussion to carry the day. i mean, mitt romney was saying that this is not a tax until recently and romneycare in massachusetts has the same mandate. again, what the white house needs to do it seems to me and others need to do is call it for what it is. it is this is about paying your fair share. it's about participating in a national health system. you will get it back. if younger and healthier people have got to pay into it, they are going to get it back when they are older and less healthy. this is all of us in it together rather than the republican view of all of us basically separate and apart. >> i want to show you something the president said, the president laid into mitt romney for his health care mandate language. the president questioned romney's principles. >> the fact that a whole bunch

of republicans in washington suddenly said this is a tax, for six years, he said it wasn't and now, he's suddenly rekrers verseded himself, so the question becomes are you doing that because of politics? are you abandoning a principle that you fought for for six years because you're getting pressure for two days? >> jared bernstein, quick final thought. >> we are deep into the silly season. this is one of the most inane debates we've had so far. look, if people who don't pay this penalty, people who can afford to get insurance but don't are placing an implicit tax on the rest of us who have to cover their uncompensated costs. it was part of his romneycare and now part of the health care plan. this is very, very simple and shouldn't be nearly as confusing as it's been. >> with regard to flip-flopping, mitt romney is not just a flip-flopper. he is a double somer salt triple

double dip flip-flopper. this guy has been all over the map on every single issue. that is an important quality to bring out to make people understand that it is an aspect of character. >> mr. secretary, thank you, coming up, republicans are worried that mitt romney is spoiling what could have been a winnable election and there are a lot of people who never likeded romney saying see, i told you so. i read an article... well, i read the majority of an article online about how older people are becoming more and more antisocial, so i was really aggressive with my parents about joining facebook. my parents are up to 19 friends now? so sad. ♪ i have 687 friends. this is living. what!? that is not a real puppy. that's too small to be a real puppy. [ male announcer ] venza. from toyota. wouldn't it be nice if there was an easier, less-expensive option than using a traditional lawyer? well, legalzoom came up with a better way.

we took the best of the old and combined it with modern technology. together you get quality services on your terms, with total customer support. legalzoom documents have been accepted in all 50 states, and they're backed by a 100% satisfaction guarantee. so go to legalzoom.com today and see for yourself. it's law that just makes sense. we've got a couple of new polls for this week from battleground states in the presidential race and for that, we check the "hardball" scoreboard. we begin in florida and a new we ask america poll has president obama hang on to a one point lead over mitt romney, 46-45. now to north carolina. where republican meeting poll shows romney with a five-point lead over the president, 50-45. we'll be right back. brain freeze cake donettes rolling hot dogs bag of ice anti-freeze wash and dry

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welcome back to "hardball." it began with a few tweets from rupert murdoch to shake up his staff. yesterday, "the wall street journal" which is owned by murdoch, published a blistering editorial. it said that romney was quote slowly squandering an historic opportunity to unseat obama. conservatives like bill krchrisl and laura ingram added on. >> advisers telling him, it's fine, take a week. should romney call the cease fire or get out there on the trail and get off the jet-ski. >> what's going on and how concerned should the republican candidate be? ed rendell was the former governor of pennsylvania and msnbc political analyst and stephen moore is on the board,

the senior exhibition writer. governor, if the criticism for coming from salon.com, you and i wouldn't be here having this conversation. >> right. no question about it. >> i was going to say, of what significance if any is this in showing problems that persist with romney's base? >> i think first of all, we've got to keep things in perspective. in terms of voters, this has no meaning at all. first of all, it's in the dead of the summer when no one's paying attention to politics except us. secondly, it's inside baseball. voters will be concerned with the campaign from september on. about convention speeches in the free debate performances. those are opportunities where mitt romney, if he does great in his convention speech, the debates, all this will be a thing of the past. in term of voters, it doesn't have an effect. where it could hurt mitt romney

is among contributors. >> it doesn't hurt him last month. he had a $100 million month. >> i agree. but the criticism has really reached an apex right now. that's the only place it could hurt him. i think right now in term of the voters, the outcome all inside baseball. >> stephen, i'm sure you saw today's "new york times," which reports on romney east relationship with murdoch. listen how "the times" describes one of the earliest encounters when he met with the board. quote, despite being prepared and animated, particularly on his love for data crunching, mr. romney failed to connect with mr. murdoch or the page editor instead of articulating a clear and consistent conservative philosophy, he dwelled on charts and executive management. at one point, mr. romney declared i would probably bring in mckenzie, the management

consulting firm, to help him set up his cabinet, a comment that seemed to startle the editors and left mr. murdoch visibly taken aback. tell us what the relationship is between the editorial board and governor romney. >> we've been tough on mitt romney. i know mitt romney personally, i like him. we didn't like romneycare too much and what you're doing this story on is the editorial we had the other day where we said look, governor romney, the game is on. let's get going. it's time to really take the gloves off and start hitting. i think one of the weaknesses of mitt romney's campaign so far has been that he's allowed these attacks against bain capital, against his business act and what he did when he was running that company, this should be an asset. this is a guy who created whole new industries. who provided the finances for

companies that have created tens of thousands of jobs sh unlike the president who's never created a private sector job ft he's on the defensive on this, obama's running ads against him and there's been little positive response on that. you know, governor, i agree with you that this is kind of a slow season for politics. a lot of people aren't paying attention to this kind of day-to-day combat, but i do think the major issue as you know is going to be jobs. we had a lousy jobs report today. and what mitt romney has to do in my opinion is really go after obama much more aggressively on his miserable jobs record. >> this is the criticism from "the wall street journal" yesterday. the the romney campaign thinks it can play it safe and coast to the white house and it's mr. om obama's fault. the message is obama isn't working. thanks, guys, but americans already know that. what they want to hear from the

challenger is some understanding of why the president's policies aren't working and how mr. romney's policies will do it better. governor, is there a candidate problem? a staff problem? is there neither? there's now a call for some shake up in the ranks of the romney campaign. >> well, i can't ever remember being associated with a campaign where there wasn't a shake up during the campaign. that's the nature of the beast and stephen, no offense, i read the editorials. >> music to my hear. >> probably goes over the head of the average voter. >> you read it and i think the mitt romney people do. i think we got our message across to them. >> i agree. but guys, remember, you want to save your best bullets for when the nation is focused. and i agree you can't let the summer go by and he certainly

can't coast in saying obama that's another good jobs vote for me. he's got to do more. what i would really start doing more is after the democratic convention. i'd come out with guns blazing the remaining nine weeks and really hit it hard. >> i think what stephen's looking to do, meaning the board, the journalists, is wake their candidate up so that by labor day, he's back driving the car. am i right? >> let me just say one thing. >> stephen's point is exactly right. what governor romney has to do is spell out what he would do differently. that's very, very important. it's not good enough to say the other guy's no good. people want to hear what he wants to do. >> now, he has a 57 point economic plan. you've run many campaigns, governor. you know this. you don't want a 57 point platform. >> 54 points too many.

>> i think we agree on that. it's got to be focused. one of the areas where governor romney and the campaign fumbled a little bit was in the aftermath of the obamacare edition. they couldn't even answer the question was it or not a tax. >> quote, the romney campaign's belief that it's about the economy and only the economy and they need to keep telling us stupid voters that it's only about the economy has gone from being an annoying tick to a dangerous self-delusion. i think you're starting to answer the question of does he need to do more than being the other guy. >> there's no question about that. he shouldn't, sure, the economy's a central issue, but he should be heard on other stuff as well. l no question about that. and i think for example, regulations, that's a very good theme. but he has to be specific. he's got to be willing to say what regulations are bad, how he

would change them and speed up. i think the problem with regulations is they take too long to enforce. we need to have a mechanism to speed up. that would get the economy going. but he's got to be specific about that. >> the only thing he has to do, he has to take on obamacare. this is now as you both know, going to be one of the two, three big issues this this campaign and the message from the romney campaign has been a little muddled an exactly how romneycare is different from obamacare. i know in this debate, when those two debate, the first thing obama's going to say is how is romneycare different from what i did on a national level? >> my final thought if i might, rick santorum got this right. mitt romney's the worst suited person in terms of his credentials to make that case and i think that's what's about to unfold. >> one thing if i could --

sorry. >> hurry. >> if he can come up with a replacement plan -- >> i agree. >> totally agree. thank you, both. up next, the joe walsh ashley banfield highlight reel and you can follow me on twitter, so long as you can spell smerconish. this is "hardball," the place for politics. ♪

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time for the side show. when you think brad pitt, you probably don't think conservative values. there's a reason. in addition to being a big time hollywood a-lister, pitt has been a big supporter among other things, of gay marriage. but get this. the actor's mother wrote a letter to a local missouri

newspaper in response to an op-ed advising christians not to vote for romney. she wrote any christian who does not vote on writes in a name is casting a vote for romney's opponent, barack obama. a man who sat in -- to mark the national day of prayer and is a liberal who supports the killing of babies and same-sex marriage. i guess that's why it's a good rule of thumb to steer clear of politic at family get togethers, right? and this one has the added touch of going viral. finally, illinois congressman joe walsh is drawing criticism for blasting tammy duckworth for using her military experience to her campaign. walsh spoke with ashley banfield yesterday and gave new meaning to the concept name dropping. >> because she's a war hero, ashley, that demands our

respect, but that doesn't demand our vote. ashley, this wasn't a slip up. i don't know about you, ashley, but right now, ashley, i can tell you. that's not what i said, ashley. ashley, no. >> because i am challenging you -- >> look, ashley. ashley. ashley. ashley. ashley. >> in an attempt to -- >> ashley. ashley, i'll say it again, ashley, this is what happens when you've got a congressman that's always out in front of people talking. >> the final tally, walsh said ashley 90 times, but let's flash back to a year ago. joe walsh was on h"hardball" an had quite a strategy for avoiding the specifics about a tea party backed debt plan. >> hey, chris, do you support that, chris? we have to stop that, chris. come on, chris.

chris, hey, chris. chris, chris, chris, chris. >> i love it. >> 61. 61 name drops for chris when walsh was on "hardball", so he broke his own record. tammy duckworth will be in later to weigh in on walsh's recent comments. up next, a new study shows that three quarters of voters say that the people of pennsylvania doesn't have the the proper identification to vote. most are likely democratic voters. ♪ what the... what the... what the... ♪ are you seein' this? ♪ ♪ uh-huh... uh-huh... uh-huh... ♪ ♪ it kinda makes me miss the days when we ♪ ♪ used to rock the microphone ♪ back when our credit score couldn't get us a micro-loan ♪ ♪ so light it up! ♪ even better than we did before ♪ ♪ yeah prep yourself america we're back for more ♪ ♪ our look is slacker chic and our sound is hardcore ♪ ♪ and we're here to drop a rhyme about free-credit-score ♪ ♪ i'm singing free-credit-score-dot-com ♪ ♪ dot-com narrator: offer applies with enrollment in

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tough day on wall street today. the dow fell 124 points, s&p

shed 13, nasdaq down 39. payrolls rose by a weaker than expegted 80,000 in june. the unemployment rate held steady at 8.2%. some are worried the report wasn't weak enough to get the fed to act soon and speaking of jobs, best buy is reportedly planning to eliminate 2,400 positions. that's it from cnbc, first in business worldwide. she tried to say and now back to chris and "hardball." welcome back to "hardball." with pennsylvania's republican-led legislature passed one of the toughest voter i.d. laws, it was designed to keep minorities from the polls, but tom corbett's administration

said it would affect just 1% of eligible voters. new data puts that number quite a bit higher. nearly one in every ten registereded voters is lacking a primary form of i.d. required. president obama you'll remember carried pennsylvania in 2008 by 11 points. now, the the counties he won are in blue. according to the new data, the highest concentration of voters without i.d. are in philadelphia, it's circled, and allegheny county, pittsburgh, to the west. penda hear is codirector of the advancement project and david, of the washington examiner. sometimes, you hear a story and it's taking place far from where you live and you're not quite sure of what to make of it because you're not on the ground cht this is not that story for me. i went to the community where i was born this morning and got

the local newspaper and it speaks of how 70,000 voters in two counties, bux and montgomery county, born in one, living in the other, are now in dejeopard and we have absolutely no history of voter fraud that would justify jeopardizing 70,000 people from exercising the franchise. what do you make of all this? >> well, i would start by backing up and looking at the larger picture here. first of all, the state is sending out letters to just about everybody in this category to explain what the new law does and what sorts of voter i.d. are acceptable. college i.d.s are generally acceptable in pennsylvania. the school can put the expiration date on in the form of a sticker. >> i don't think these are college students we're talking about. >> hang on. i'm just starting here. any sort of military i.d.,

driver's license in alternative form, but the idea is that anyone can get one for free. if they weren't doing that, i think it would, the fears might be more justifieded. and look, you don't need a history of people you know, marching in on and the numbers in the thousands going in and voting under other people's names in order to realize that yes, it's just common sense that people should show who they are when they vote. >> i don't have a problem -- i don't have a problem with that. let me just respond if i might then penda, i'll come to you. i don't have a problem with showing an i.d. before you vote, but you've got to be reasonable and take into account the community you're serving and say hey, what kind of an i.d. might the folks who reside here possess and when i look in my hometown newspaper and see in the county where i was born, 29,449 lack a driver's license and then the county where i live

now, 44,952. it really brings it home for me. penda, what's going on here? >> well, what's going on is that the state of pennsylvania has passed one of the most onerous barriers to voting i've ever seen. they knocked out three quarters of a million voters or more. that's registered voters. and for example, we're suing over this law and our case is going to court in a couple of weeks and we are very, very hopeful that the court will strike this down because we have a 93-year-old plaintiff who marched with martin luther king, who cannot get her birth certificate and therefore can't get the i.d. this law disenfranchises students. it's not true that their college i.ds are acceptable. people who are mostly low income. 85% of the pennsylvania colleges do not have an expiration date. >> all they need is a sticker.

that's what the law says. >> an you have to do that for so many people in such a short amount of time. there's no way that you can get an i.d. for close to a million people in this short of time. >> it seems awfully coincidental that as the country faces the re-election of the nation's first african-american president, you've got in excess of two dozen states going in a direction they've never gone before. >> in fact, these laws go back more than a decade at this point. my home state of indiana put one into effect i believe sometime the middle of the last decade. i don't believe in conspiracy theorys. >> i don't normally. you know, i think we went to the moon and i don't think much happened in area 51 and i think you know, kennedy was killed by lee harvey oswald acti ining al. >> the first time i heard it

wasn't required i wondered how in the world was it in the required. every voter in the mexican election had to show a photographic i.d. the pennsylvania law, there are some cases where people who have religious objections to being photographed, they don'tava photo >>rics say the ls are a solution in search of a problem and that the real agenda is tamping down democratic turnout. pennsylvania house majority leader mike turzai took some heat last month. watch this. >> we are focused on making sure that we meet our obligations that we've talked about for years. pro second amendment. first pro-life legislation abortion facility regulations in 22 years. done. voter i.d., which is going to allow governor romney to win the state of pennsylvania. done. >> voter i.d., which will allow governor romney to win

pennsylvania. that would seem to bring down the balance, wouldn't it, that this is about voter suppression. >> absolutely. we know, he admitted why this was enacted and we know there is a right wing group associated with the republican party that sent out these laws to the states and they were rammed through for partisan purposes. i'm a nonpartisan organization. i'm concerned about the voters and democracy, which is being bulldozed in an effort to gain a partisan advantage. we know that president obama won pennsylvania by 5 or 600,000 votes in 2008 and now, three quarters of a million people to a million people, we think, just of registered voters, not even counting the new people that will be trying to get registered are obviously locked out of voting unless they can balance all of these hurdles quickly. >> thank you for being here. up next, republican congressman joe walsh with still

trying to make the case that his opponent, tammy duckworth, isn't a real war hero despite loosing her legs in iraq. she joins us next. mine was earned off vietnam in 1968. over the south pacific in 1943. i got mine in iraq, 2003. usaa auto insurance is often handed down from generation to generation. because it offers a superior level of protection, and because usaa's commitment to serve the military, veterans and their families is without equal. begin your legacy, get an auto insurance quote. usaa. we know what it means to serve.

president obama has signed into a law a bill aimed to repair the country's roads and bridges and help college students pay for school. the president signed the law in the east room of the white house

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we're back. illinois tea party republican congressman joe walsh continues to face criticism for comments about his opponent, iraq war veteran tammy duckworth. here's a portion of what he said sunday. >> understand something about john mccain. his political advisers day after day had to take him and throw him against the wall and hit him against the he and say senator,

you have to let people know you served. you have to talk about what you did. that's what's so noble about our heroes. now, i'm running against a woman, my god, that's all she talks about. >> he has since said hebs duckworth is a hero. he told cnn crede. >> this wasn't a slip up. >> here to respond the tammy duckworth, who continues to serve following the loss of both her legs when her helicopter was hit in iraq in 2004. if i were to see you on the campaign trail, at an event, as part of your pitch or speech about your candidacy, how much woul i hear your talking about your military service versus your platform? >> i actually start all of my

discussions about you all know about my military service, but let me tell you about the time my family was on food stamps and my dad lost his job and how important it is for us to focus on the economy right now. you'll hear me talk about my military service in certain ways if i talk about health my woun an insight to the need for good health care. because my family would be bankrupt if i had just been in an accident. >> i can attest to the fact on your website there is a platform. you lay out your position on ten different issues. there's a jobs plan as well. the criticism he offers is this is the only thing you discuss on the campaign trail. you're here to say that's not the case. >> that's correct. i think mr. walsh is being irresponsible. he's being his usual irresponsible self. he last week cast some pretty bad votes. i think he was trying to distract voters away from that.

you're talking about the highway bill earlier, michael. that's one of the votes he cast that was so bad. he's the only member of the bipartisan delegation of illinois to vote against the highway bill. and he also voted to let student loans rates double. so this is typical of him to be irresponsible both in his votes and his words trying to distract people away from his failures as a congressman. >> you know what this really was problematic, i think, his comments were appalling. they were absolutely appalling. i was disappointed people in the audience had an automobile reaction either chuckling with him or agreeing, muttering under their breath. you know what i'm talking about. we just rolled that clip. >> yeah. i think he repeats things so much that even if they're not true, they start to sound true. focusing people away from the real issue. and in the case of veterans talking about their service, i think it's important that this generation of veterans who are coming home, who have high level

ops unemployment, high levels of post-traumatic stress, high levels of homelessness and suicides, they should talk about their service. so they can tell employers about the great leadership skills they developed in combat. the fact that they've been tested and are able to do is job and pretty amazing conditions. i hope iraq and afghanistan veterans are proud and talk about their service. >> these comments, they're not new for joe walsh. an interview he did with politico in march he said this about you. quote, i have so much respect for what she did in the fact she sacrificed her body for this country. now let's move on. what else has she done? female wounded veteran. she is nothing more than a hand picked washington bureaucrat. i think that's more offensive

than the audio we rolled. >> you're right, michael. this is not the first time he's attacked my military service. this is probably the third time. i've been silent in my response the first two times. this time, it was just enough he is going after veterans. there are 23 million veterans in this country who sacrifice so much. i've never claimed to be a hero. the heroes are walking in afghanistan or laying in their hospital beds at walter reed right now. it's unfortunate he chooses to go down this route. but it's typical of his irresponsible way of conducting himself. >> we need more civility. we have only 30 seconds left. what's the number one issue on which you are running? >> jobs and the economy. we need to make sure that we go ahead and transport that highway bill into jobs at the districts to fix our roads and get people employed. let's make sure we get some tax cuts for the businesses that keep jobs here. and also the one who is hire people who have been unemployed for six months. >> we appreciate your being

here. >> thank you so much. when we return, allow me to finish with separating fact from fiction about barack obama. you're watching "hardball," the place for politics. what's with you? trouble with a car insurance claim. [ voice of dennis ] switch to allstate. their claim service is so good, now it's guaranteed. [ normal voice ] so i can trust 'em. unlike randy. are you in good hands? i've got a nice long life ahead. big plans. so when i found out medicare doesn't pay all my medical expenses, i got a medicare supplement insurance plan. [ male announcer ] if you're eligible for medicare, you may know it only covers about 80% of your part b medical expenses. the rest is up to you. call and find out about an aarp medicare supplement insurance plan, insured by unitedhealthcare insurance company. like all standardized medicare supplement plans, it could save you thousands in out-of-pocket costs. call now to request your free decision guide. i've been with my doctor for 12 years.

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let me finish tonight with this. so i just finished reading author david maraniss' new book" barack obama: the story." he spent four years researching

the book during which his logged 50,000 miles, conducted 400 interviews. the result is the 600 page biography and it ends with his acceptance to the harvard law school meaning there's more to the story. while he told me his goal was not to vet the president's own memoir, many readers will be focused on the story and dreams from my father. the bigger story is what maraniss' revelations say about what others missed or did not seek to find. time and again where mere contentions have become the stuff of internet lore, maraniss uncovers never before revealed information. including about the president's birth. not long after president obama's mother delivered the future president, maraniss says a gynecologist dined with a friend who asked well, dr. west tell me something interesting that happened to you this week.

dr. west was a colleague of david a. sinclair who delivered barack obama and he responded with a quip. he said stanley had a baby. well, he went on to say that stanley in this instance was a young woman, of course, no miracle birth. stanley was white, the baby was black. the father was african with a funny name too. we never heard that during the birther debate. in the polarized world in which we live, many will reaffirm their admiration or antipathy towards the president. some will say it confirms a lack of vetting from 2008. but the takeaway on which all of us should agree is that the volume of coverage of our modern political debate should not be mistaken for quality. if the