president bush wants to extend some of the bush tax cuts but not for millionaires. >> i'm s.e. cupp. i'm steve kornacki. i'm crystal ball. young girls forced into sex trafficking. it's happening here in the u.s. there's a new national campaign to stop that. >> all that and my thoughts on what mitt romney must tell black america. "the cycle" for monday, july 9th starts right now. all right. the gang's all here. let's take it to the table.

crystal, doesn't it seem like the president is trying to put the gop in position to defend the richer americans the way he's defending the bush tax cuts issue? >> yes. he's got the tax centering on his time at bain, his attacks on the money in the swiss cayman islands. everyone under 250,000 or less, why don't we go ahead with that and then we can talk about whether for people on the higher end of the income scale we really want to move forward for a tax cut for them that would cost $850 billion over the next ten years and is the least effective form of stimulus according to the congressional budget office. >> i want to hear a little bit from the president talking about this. he's pushing to extend these tax cuts further for those who he says needs it the most, people making less than $250,000. not going to extend it for those above that threshold. it will set up an election year

battle over what role america's millionaires should play. >> we've tried it their way. it didn't work. and what happened? the wealthy got wealthier, but most americans struggled so i'm not proposing anything radical here, i just believe that anybody making over $250,000 a year should go back to the income tax rates we were paying under bill clinton. this is not just my opinion. the american people are with me on this. looks to me like a battle over the meaning of tax fairness, right? what are the republicans going to get out of this? >> they don't have to. this is just of course, symbolic, right. this is a chance to put a message out there. put republicans in a position and mitt romney in a position to come out and say why they don't want to raise taxes on a certain segment of the population. but there's really, i mean, interestingly not a whole lot of consensus over whether this is the right thing to do even within the democratic party. you had nancy pelosi, chuck

schumer coming out saying we might want to raise that bar to a million dollars. rightly, people making $251,000 might be covering a family of four or might be a small business owner. that's hard. >> yeah. go ahead. >> i mean, there's also an interesting "wall street journal" piece that came out today that talked about how senate dems are going to be a little reluctant to defend this. the quote we pulled says already as many as 6 democratic senators are hedging their bets as the economy looks worse. they haven't all declared outride postponement but they've expressed a willingness to negotiate a deal with republicans that would avoid raising taxes on anyone next year. there you have them. the usual suspects. >> swing states, red states. >> moderates. >> john tester, etc. >> webb, and the nelsons. >> but what's significant about this today, what i think makes it more than symbolic is, yes, this is symbolic in terms of the campaign but the campaign will

be extremely important for what happens in that lame duck session. if you elect mitt romney, these tax cuts, they're sticking withes in perpetuity. if you re-elect president obama, they are going away in some form. it will be negotiated. >> you can be certain of this renewed bush tax cut fight will make its way into political ads. political ad spending nearing $200 million and we still have four months to go. thank you, citizens united for opening the door on unlimited donations which is funding ads like these on the air right now. >> america's jobless rate is still too high. barack obama's got lots of excuses for the bad economy. >> head winds coming from europe. >> he have would' had a string of bad luck. >> an earthquake. >> an a.t.m., you don't go to a bank teller. >> things we couldn't control. >> we've been a little bit lazy over the last couple of days. >> but obama never complains washington's wild spending.

tell obama, for real job growth cut the debt. support the new majority agenda. i'm barack obama and i approve this message. >> president romney's first 100 days creating thousands of new jobs for virginians. >> but would it. the washington post has just agreed that they're not going to shipovers over seas. they want to move facilities in low wage countries like china and india. does virginia really want an outsourcer? chief in the white house. wanda summers is a political reporter. which one do you think will be more effective? don't you think the anti-romney ad has had a sympathetic edge? just as a piece of tell low vision that might resonate with the public? >> both recall compelling. if you look at the ad from crossroads gps, super pac not a

officially targeted. barack obama, nice guy, just seems to be in a little bit over his head. i think that certainly has some legs because it is so closely on message with the campaign which has been raising tons of money has been saying themselves. >> wanna, i have a clip i want to play from you from rachel mad doe, harvey weinstein and get your reaction to it. >> i'll give you an example of two movies that i distribute. i spent the exact same amount on both movies. one movie was called "the king's speech." $140 million it grossed, it did sensational based on its budget. the other picture we called "our idiot brother" and we spent the same exact money and it grossed $20 million. to me romney is our idiot brother and romney is the king speech. you can spend all the money in the world. if you've got a bad product, it doesn't matter.

>> wanna, does harvey have a point there. is putting money towards the romney campaign sort of putting good after bad? also are we going to reach a point with all of this money in both of these campaigns we're going to reach sort of a saturation point in terms of political advertising? >> you know, i'm no movie buff but i think that's absolutely the case. any time you're watching your tv or listening to the radio, it's imt possible to get away from these things. folks like you and i who do this for a living are tired of hearing it, i can only imagine what your average voter is thinking when you have super packs and campaigns absolutely inundating people with them. i think there will be a spilling over point where people will be turned off by this kind of stuff. >> they're not turned off by this kind of stuff. we have proof. that very self-serving harvey weinstein quote aside, we have proof. there was a story out just today or yesterday that in battleground states "usa today" gallup poll that in battleground

states where negative ads were airing, they by and large worked in obama's favor among a very small portion of the electorate that admitted these ads actually changed their mind. they overwhelmingly changed their mind for obama. so are these negative ads nefarious when they work for romney and, you know, altruistic when they work for obama? >> you're proving harvey's point though. >> is this disproving your case. >> but it's working for obama's benefit. 76% of people are swayed. no matter how much money they're spending on romney's campaign, is it really having the impact that they want it to? >> romney is making a ton of money. he's raising a ton of money. >> yes, he is. >> let's make sure that statistic is in proper perspective. we're talking about a disproportionate number of democrats. a lot of what that add is doing is bringing democrats who have been wavering home. that's different than taking undecided swing voters and

moving them. >> that's definitely the case. i also think there is a sense here where when you just hear oh, mitt romney's a business owner. he's an executive. he's a business owner. people on its face go, that makes sense. that sounds good. it's when you start to hear about his record both as governor of massachusetts and what he actually did in the private sector people go, oh, maybe that doesn't sound as great as i thought at first blush. >> romney's campaign strategy so far has been to say, i'm not that guy. i'm not him. who are you? who are you as a person? who are you as a businessman? who are you as a governor. i'm not saying i'm not him so the negative ads can define him and define him in the relatively early part of the game. >> i subscribe to the theory that there are diminishing returns my question is this kind of huge money we're seeing spent in the presidential level from super pacs, is this going to

trickle down? will it disproportionately favor one party to the house and senate level? obama can overcome the ads. >> money goes a lot farther. >> even more significant at the local level, at the statehouse level it makes all the differents. >> wanna summers, thank you very much. >> next, if you think the ads are bad, wait till you hear where the money is coming from. that and the lifestyles of the mitt and the famous as "the cycle" rolls on for monday, july 9th. ♪ i can't get no satisfaction r] when it comes to the future of medicare and social security, you've earned the right to know. ♪ ...so what does it mean for you and your family? [ female announcer ] you've earned the facts. ♪ washington may not like straight talk, but i do. [ female announcer ] and you've earned a say. get the facts and make your voice heard on medicare and social security at earnedasay.org.

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a new report is out highlighting a growing trend on

big corporations looking to influence campaigns. instead of donating to super pacs, they are instead pumping millions of dollars into tax exempt organizations that are immune to disclosure requirements. these organizations are set up as 501 c 4s. that's the federal designation for welfare groups. they outspent pacs by 1 1/2 times. i know we talk a lot about the effects of citizens united, but actually this particular phenomenon was happening well before that ruling came down. i know the sort of democrat argument is to repeal citizens united and this will save the world, but what would you do about something like this? >> just to illustrate the absurdity of this first of all, these 501 c 4 organizations are defined as social welfare organizations. carl rove started a social

welfare organization. >> you don't see him as a social welfare guy? >> could be my bias. >> both crossroads groups have taken an incredible role, i was talking about this, not just in the presidential race, but you look at the republican efforts in the senate, crossroads is really at the forefront of that. they started a brand new campaign in north dakota. so the obama administration has filed a complaint officially saying, let's call this what it is. this is not independent issue advocacy, this is a political advocacy group. there won't be any ruling or changed during the election. >> it defies any sort of common sense definition of what a social welfare organization would be. i think it says it all about how important transparency in the process actually is, that corporations have opted out of participating in the 504 c 4 super pacs in favor of being not only in the c 4 social welfare organizations where they're not disclosed but also increase sing

bely in 501 c 3s which are not only tax exempt but you actually get a charitable contribution tax deduction for contributing. alec, the american legislative exchange council is a 501 c 3 that they can contribute to. >> let me ask you if you would change your mind. if i told you 14 of the top 20 contributors and benefactors of these groups are democrat liberal progressive union groups. >> does not change my mind. not at all. >> coke brothers way down on the list. >> hold on. hold on. if you dig into the money that's involved, not the number of organization, it's a totally different story. >> no, it's not. >> yes, it is. >> top group, 66 million to the nra's $18 million. >> $400 million themselves, just the coke brothers. that doesn't matter. that's not the issue. the issue is the transparency. to your question if it was

lopsided to the liberal side, it's not -- >> it is. >> -- i still support the position that there's transparency in public financing. >> my problem is not liberal and conservative, it's the power and importance of voting is diminished. >> they don't get to vote. they don't get to vote. >> super wealthy people get to control the elections. >> they don't control the elections. >> absolutely. somebody throwing 400 million, 500 millions. >> corporations don't get to vote. i have to move on. from spending on advertising to advertising your view case in the hamptons, mitt romney is in aspen. doing, what else, fundraising. $50,000 for dinner, $10,000 for a photo op. he raised $106 million in june besting the obama campaign by $35 million. if all of that sounds like a lot of money, each side will raise

$1 billion each before november and still be broke at the end, right? >> right. >> possibly in debt. yeah. it does bring up the question. i mean, i'm kind of with steve. at the presidential level i think that you get to a saturation point. if you're the president, you're the president. when you show up at a microphone people listen. there are two things that concern me. one is the lack of accountability in these adds. we've already seen several incredibly misleading at best ads put out there. there's very little accountability behind it. we've also seen studies that show these independent groups ads are actually even more effective than the campaign's ads themselves which is this bizarre situation where not only is the campaign not in charge of their own message but these third party groups have he have little accountability, very little transparency and they're driving the message. they can say anything. they don't care with blow back. >> what you're getting into is mutually assured destruction.

neither side is it going to outraise the other. obama had so much more than mccain that that was disposit e dispositive. that's not going to happen. romney will out raise obama. it won't be an amount that will make the difference. >> let me ask you about the democratic tactic that we're start to go see rolled out over the weekend. debbie wasserman schultz was talking about mitt romney's swiss bank accounts, among others, and i'm wondering if you guys think that this is going to work. i mean, the idea is, you know, somehow talking about his money and his investments overseas, i'm not sure what the message is. >> it's not about that. >> bad investor? what is it? >> this is what -- we saw a preview of this in the republican primaries. >> sure. >> newt gingrich, rick perry, to a lesser extent rick santorum

played the class card. especially in south carolina where mitt romney got absolutely whomped. the idea is we're living in the era of the great depression, there is a consciousness for the first time about this pampered super after fluent elite, the top 1% that's been immune. >> romney's hamptons fundraiser. the democrats want to say that the republican party -- >> isn't it a double standard when president obama has a fundraiser? >> you asked me specifically about the swiss banks and i'm telling you if you're the democrats, you're trying to make the message that the republican party is in cahoots with the 1% top elite. they have offshore holdings. >> the president doesn't have swiss bank accounts and he doesn't have financial transactions in the cayman islands. >> does this disqualify mitt romney from being president? >> it doesn't disqualify him but this is the worst time in history for -- >> this i agree with. >> for a person who is a 1%er to

be running for president. >> his dad paid a 35% income tax rate and went above and beyond to not exploit tax loopholes and have issued 12 of his income tax -- >> coming up in the guest spot an author who says it will be different in this race, the author of "some of my best friends are black." coming up next in "the cycle." ♪ ions of men who have used androgel 1%, there's big news. presenting androgel 1.62%. both are used to treat men with low testosterone. androgel 1.62% is from the makers of the number one prescribed testosterone replacement therapy. it raises your testosterone levels, and... is concentrated, so you could use less gel. and with androgel 1.62%, you can save on your monthly prescription.

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this week mitt romney and joe biden will speak at the naacp's convention. what romney should say to black america, i'll tell you at the end. to pull at the hearts and minds of white people today we explore the impact of integration on white people. do we have a "d" fak tow integrated white society or do we socialize and reside and

worship with people from our own race. from black and brown people you'll exist in an integrated world. is it still possible for white people to live in worlds where they interact almost excludsivey with white people. some of you are saying duh. this man started his newest book after president obama's election when he real liedsed he had no black friends. how is that possible? the clef verily named book, "some of my best friends are black." tanner, do you have black friends now? >> i have lots of black friends and getting paid to spend four years figuring out why i didn't. but when you live in my part of brooklyn, which is about five minutes from your part of brooklyn, it's still pretty easy to go everyday without seeing a whole lot of black people. >> so how did you get to the point at life that you're at when you started the book in which you knew no black people? >> pretty easily, in fact.

that's why i went to write the book. i went to grow up in the suburbs of birmingham, alabama, at the whitest white flight suburb with confederate flag flying over the campus. there were no white people there except those bussed in and a couple of middle class black students who had integrated into the school. when you look at the history of real estate segregation and workplace segregation and church segregation which is still as king said, the most segregated hour in the country, it's entirely possible. we put these structures in place to integrate the country in structural ways and look at racial balance of neighborhoods. we looked at it as a quantitative measure. socially we still live in very different w0r8ds. >> in the book you talk about dr. king discussing intergroup and interpersonal doing and nothing each other on a deep level, socially, on a worship level. that is the key you say to racial progress, right? >> integration is a qualitative measure of the quality of a

relationship and what goes on inside it, not a quantitative measure of how black is this office? how many black people work at this company and so forth. that's the mistake we made in trying to measure how far we've come in solving the problem. >> tanner, i'm going to ask you about that. brown versus board of education set the standard that separate is not equal. some have argued that we are better off now in terms of racial equity in our education system as a result of brown because while it ended legal segregation, it did not end "d" f de facto segregation. do you think the african-american community has been well served by that decision? >> the problem isn't so much with brown v. board which was in a sense a little bit simplistic in its rendering that if segregation was bad, integration mu be good so we should shove

all the schools together immediately. the main problem was we tried to integrate the schools but when it came to housing segregation we didn't do anything to fix those laws. the 1968 fair housing act was basically gutted by republicans who didn't want any amendments that would allow people to be prosecuted for anyone segregating people. when we went and took school buses and tried to move kids or shuffle kids around the map all day long without doing anything to fix the housing problem, it really was a spectacular waist of time. >> tanner, is the housing problem a legal issue or is it that people want to live in communities with other people that look like them? >> it's both. it's a legal issue in the fact that some kmun knit tid core doned itself off and raised its property values and makes it difficult for people to get in

and have no public transportation. on top of that you have the problem we don't want to live together, blacks and whites and other ethnic groups. >> i had want to follow up with that. it's interesting to me the election of the first black president was the impetus to get you to think of that. i drew conflicting lessons. the general election, obama did relatively well for a democrat among white voters, better than a democrat since jimmy carter. there were some dynamics that emerged against hillary clinton. he really struggled with white voters in two places. one was app pa lasch cha and we're seeing that this year in places like west virginia and kentucky. the other was in states where there was a substantial black population and where the black populations and white populations were in close proximity. obama would roll up big numbers over clinton, but when you got

to pennsylvania, no florida, michigan, states like that, he was struggling with white voters. it seemed to be a clear link between sort of where whites had day-to-day contact with blacks. i always kind of puzzled me if nothing else. >> well, i think in those types of states, the states -- he did better in states that were completely lily white where he could run a campaign that was post racial and racial free. when he got into the deep south, he had to run two campaigns, one targeting the black chun knit at this and one tarktding the kmiet community and the general population which is how madison avenue is run today in all ad campaigns which is part of what i cover in the book. we bifurcated the advertising as well. that vol ka niezs the broadcast networks which is why we're watching different tv networks. >> tray brought up this issue.

what were your expectations in 2008 of obama and his election and this new era? did you have any and have they been fulfilled? >> yeah. i thought there would be this spiritual transformation, at least within black people of this idea that we could be president. we could really do anything. the highest glass ceiling being broken. when i was 12 i very seriously dreamed of being the first black president. i thought about it all the time. how would i do that? at some point in my early teenage years i just stopped thinking about it. the dream was sort of dissipated. i think i just realized that would never happen. a black person would never be president which is now tragic for me to think back about that kid whose dream just died on a lie, that a black person could become president one day. by the time i was 18 i was dreaming of being a political advisor. i dreamed from wanting to be

obama to being george stephanopoulos. >> and then you dreamed of being on "the cycle" with all of us. >> and i think back about that kid and that it was a lie. maybe not me but somebody could have been that before obama if we dreamt big 234u6. now in terms of policy, i had no elusions that obama would be the save i don't remember. he's not a black president, he's a president who happens to be black. he's not able to do special things for black people. we saw that in the election. he's not going to give us special -- when unemployment is double what it is for white people, he wants everybody to have a job. he's not going to have a special program that mayor bloomberg has had. >> is that a disappointment? >> i didn't expect that. i think at this level i expected let's get a man into the job and have that thing for our kids and

the policy things would happen later. tanner, thanks so much. i'll see you around brooklyn. get more black friends. coming up, meet the people looking to take down a big media company's adult services site and battle child sex trafficking. [ male announcer ] it's simple physics...

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right at your fingertips. [ rodger ] at scottrade, seven dollar trades are just the start. try our easy-to-use scottrader streaming quotes. it's another reason more investors are saying... [ all ] i'm with scottrade. i thought he loved me for real, but he made me work every day. he threatened me. he made me take drugs. he raped me a bunch of times and then he sold me to four, sometimes five men a day for $100 an hour. one time there was ten men in one day. i thought they would kill me. i thought i'd never get away.

my pimp advertised me on line at back page.com. that's how these guys buy me. that ad tells the true story of a 13-year-old girl who was repeatedly advertised for sex by her pimp on back page.com. it was produced by fair girls, with i is a nonprofit joining forces with lawmakers, attorneys general and clergy across the country to try and force back page's parent company, village voice media, to shut down the adult section of the site. village voice media makes an estimated $27 million on sex ads per year. we reached out to them for comment and got this response from their lawyer, quote, this is too complex and too important to address in a simple statement or soundbite. they offered to talk more about it with us later. we also came across this statement from ms. mcdougall said the company, village voice media, works with law enforcement to stop human

trafficking. it's counter productive because it drives traffickers back into the shadows where they have historically evaded law enforcement. joining us now is andrea powell, founder and executive director of fair girls and the young lady that we saw in the ad, actress and activist victoria pinnell, andre a, victoria, thank you so much for joining us. we really appreciate it. >> thank you so much. >> so i want to ask you both this. andre a, i'll start with you. what drew you to this issue and how did you decide to start your organization, fair girls? >> so fair girls got started because i believe no girl should be forgotten, exploited, or just simply left out on the streets. specifically, we were drawn to the issue of addressing online sex trafficking because in the past year fair girls, with i is a social service organization based in d.c., is seeing over double the number of girls we saw last year. the one common denominator,

every girl we see in d.c. who's being sold for sex is being advertised on back page.com. >> wow. you mentioned that the rates had 2kub8d. what's behind that increase in traffic? is it a recession air ri thing or is there some other factor that you're seeing, andrea? >> what i think is happening, 10, 15 years ago a pimp would get a girl, put her on the streets and five, ten, maybe even 15 men would see her in a night. but when you have a girl in a hotel room who's being advertised online, the pimp can get away with it much easier. he can hide behind the curtain, if you will, the hotel. and a man who wants to buy and rape a child or a young woman who's being forced against her will can do so by clicking a mouse on a website like back page.com where you could buy a couch and tv set. in a way it normalizes this world of sex trafficking so men think they can get away from it. >> victoria, you're an actress,

a phenomenal one. that ad moved me to tears. >> thank you. >> you are yo' an activist on this issue. i was wondering if you could talk about what raised your awareness about sex trafficking in the u.s. and how you got involved? >> well, i was doing an ad, a public service announcement. they got me in contact with ms. andrea. when i did the ad i was just thinking, you know, about my friend who i found out, you know, was a victim of -- might be a victim of sexual abuse. and, you know, when i finished the ad i went to washington, d.c., and i met the victim that i had portrayed. when i looked in her eyes, you know, she was trying to smile. when i looked in her eyes i could see that hurt and that pain. it was there. and that's what really -- you know, i was -- i think to myself every night, you know, i'm allowed to go to sleep, some child is hovering in a corner trembling knowing they're about to be sexually abused. that's what made me realize i

can't sit back and see this and not do anything about it. like andrea said, you're at the adult section of back page. that's why we started the petition on sign on.org. please tell village voice media to shut down the adult section. we ask that you please, everyone that is listening, spread the word by word of mouth. spread telling people to sign this petition, social media let people know that we need to stop this child sex trafficking. >> absolutely. angrea, i don't want to speak for everybody at the table, i have a feeling all of us would agree it would be best if these ads went away. i'm just trying to sort of understand here their resistance because this is a campaign that obviously does not make them look well. they don't come off looking good in this. i know certainly the village voice in new york has had all sorts of financial problems. it's not the paper people who

think of the village voice. we have the statistics of 26, $27 million a year from the sex ads. do you know what would happen from a financial standpoint? is this a life or death issue for them in terms of their finances? >> it could be. i'm not as familiar with their finances but i really believe is this can't be about money, this can't be about revenue. this has to be about the human rights issue that it is. when you're talking about sex trafficking online, anyone can go to this website and see that there are young women and girls being sold for sex. this is an illegal activity that they're getting away with. we're hoping that others will join us in these efforts. maybe their department of justice might be able to look at the criminal side. maybe advertisers could pull out their advertising until they shut down this section. these are real girls. just because it's online, it's

not something that's hidden. >> it shouldn't be a question of dollars and sense. >> exactly. >> andrea, victoria, thank you for joining us and your courage on this issue. >> thank you. upnext, luke russert is back. we'll ask our inside man why lawmakers are voting on health care again. ♪ the consequences? millions of americans will see their taxes on dividend income spike, slowing investment in u.s. companies and jeopardizing development in energy projects that create american jobs. ask congress to stop a dividend tax hike -- for all of us. i've got a nice long life ahead. big plans. so when i found out medicare doesn't pay all my medical expenses,

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work and republicans are trying to put democrats on the spot with a series of tough election year votes. weeks ahead will mark republicans 33rd attempt at repealing obamacare. debate begins tomorrow. next they'll talk about the defense spending and the bush tax cuts. joining us now from the hill is nbc's luke russ jert. >> wait a second. wait a secretary, wait a second. we gave him a new name, steve. >> it's bro-ssert. >> you're uncomfortable. >> the bro-ssert. >> i skipped the whole frat thing. i love it. >> i'll be the one to say bro-ssert from now on. >> or we could just haze steve now and just jump him right into the tradition. >> i've really stepped in here? >> yeah. you have to say it once, steve. >> let me escape to the interview with luke. >> coward.

>> luke, let's start with the bush tax cuts because that's in the news today. >> sure. >> okay. obama wants the extension for everybody 250 and under. republicans want the full extension. republicans are going to have a full vote sometime this month. i think my question to you is when is it that we're actually going to have a vote that's not symbolic and that really matters on the future of the tax cuts? >> there are a few things. i think what the house gop is doing now is they've taken a lot of heat about a permanent extension of the bush tax cuts because of how much it adds to the deficit, trillions over the next decade. what they're saying now, they're caging it and saying, we just want to extend it for a year so we have enough time to work on comprehensive tax reform. make the system more simple, more fair, those types of talking points. in doing that that would produce revenue which they say would pay down the debt. would you see that by the time the election rolls around? most likely not. any real bill here in congress or any real substantive work

will not happen most likely until 2013 because the popular assessment on capital hill is they're going to pass some sort of extender maybe come august, september that punts all of this into 250013 to have a new congrs look at it. if that doesn't happen, president obama gets reelected and speaker boehner's still here at the house, maybe they can cut a deal by january 1st. to think that republicans are going to try to bargain on this issue when they're very confident in their ability to take the house and senate come november and perhaps even the presidency, no one will move on this in a meaningful way at all. >> let me shift to the other major topic which would be health care reform obviously. we said the 31st attempt coming up for republicans to repeal this. that basically means they repeal it in the house and it dies in the senate because it's controlled by democrats. i'm concerned about the politics.

do you see it it's something they're doing for their own base because their base is so riled up they can't vote against it enough? do they really think they're faeking swing voters with all of these votes? >> there's a few things. obviously it meat to the base. it comes on the heels of the supreme court announcement. saying obamacare is a worst thing that's happened. number two though and from my conversation with gop aides, they're going to really harp on the fact that john roberts said this was a tax. they want to go out front and say that obamacare is a tax. that you're going for higher taxes. that is why there's a lot of consternation during that whole back and forth last week in the romney campaign about whether or not it was a tax or penalty. they're going to say this is a tax and that is what their attempt is to say to swing voters, well, you might like some parts of obamacare, but

please know that it is a tax and it's going to raise your taxes. then they're going to push the economic argument in terms of being a tax. a debate we'll have until november 6th. >> let me ask you about defense spending and cuts. leon panetta about a month ago said these automatic cuts, this was designed to be a meat tax. a disaster. and sort of a warning and imptous to get both parties in congress to look at this and take this seriously. what sense are you getting on the hill about defense cuts an s those cuts? >> they don't want to go there. the only people that want to go there are the dennis kuciniches of the democratic party. here is the issue. leon panetta saying this would decimate or defense capability, but number two, and this is

starting to come out now. look at states that would be heavily affected by these, a lot of folks whose diz posable incomes realitied to defense. virginia and florida. came out in the "wall street journal" today that if you were going to go forward with these cut, the pink slips would have to be about 60 days prior. do you think president obama wants folks in the norfolk area, virginia, that they could lose their job? neither side wants to deal with that. that's why it's expected something will get done most likely a temporary extension on all this from april to may of 2013 and the next congress and administration, current administration back and then deal with it. >> so, there's going to be a lot of punting in washington. >> punts. >> yes. >> no specifics, a lot of punting. i avoided any hazing rituals. >> give my best to sir

sweetness, toure. >> up next, toure's take on the pitch. that's ahead in "the cycle." n me without freshly-made pasta. you could also cut corners by making it without 100% real cheddar cheese. but then...it wouldn't be stouffer's mac & cheese. just one of over 70 satisfying recipes for one from stouffer's.

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mitt romney will address the naacp on wednesday. what should he say? what does he need to tell black america? white people think they got jobs problem, but black unemployment is at 14.4%. it stayed double the the white unemployment rate since 1972. what can be done about that? the large unemployment rate

contribute to the rate of black crime, which justifies shredding the fourth am amendment's guarantee to stop and frisks. what do we do about that? does he have an urban economic agenda that can revitalize the fore saken ghettos of america or perpetuate the faileded war on drugs? and does he have a plan to narrow the education gap between the races? there are also questions that are unique to mitt. did he ever believe that blacks are the cursed descendants to cain? what impression was left by the church's policy of racial discrimination that ended in 1987? in 2007, romney said he was moved by the ban's removal. >> and literal we want. even at this day, it's emotional. so it's very deep and

fundamental in my life that all people are children of god. i had no question in my mind that african-americans and blacks generally would have every right and benefit in the here after that anyone else had. >> but it was wrong for your faith to -- >> i told you exactly where i stand. my view is there's no discrimination in the eyes of god. >> i'd like to hear whether romney agitated for the ban's removal or just ak seccepted it. his father marched with activists in 1963 and pushed to end racial discrimination in housing. he once called himself quote a member of a minority group that knows the long time harmful effect of persecution and discrimination, thus linking his faith and passion for racial justice. does mitt feel the same link? if democrats are taking black

votes for granted, romney has a case to make and we must know if he understands that black problems are not is problems of black people, if your neighbors house is on fire, then you have a problem. if many ways, black america is a house engulfed in flames. what would mitt do? we're looking for answers. >> here's steve's advice for what not to say. 20 year ago when ross perot stood up and starteded talk b about how bad the economy was. you know who gets her fired up? you people. >> all right. that does it for "the cycle." martin, what do you think mitt should say? >> that's a very good question and i refuse to answer it. for week three, welcome and good afternoon. it's monday, july 9th. and here's what's happening.