court. the democrats try and make this a political issue every four years but this is a matter in the courts. it's been settled for some time in the courts. >> this is a matter for the courts. abortion rights are settled in the court. only the supreme court could change that and it's not like the president has anythingwho'sn the supreme court. you see, the problem with this is an argument, right? why have they not come up with a better answer for this stuff yet? it's almost like they don't want to. now it's time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell. have a great night. >> mitt romney's six-year campaign for the republican presidential nomination ends right here tomorrow night. >> i zach is stealing some of the convention spotlight. >> it just seems like mitt romney can't catch a political break. >> it's important that romney

accept the nomination this week. >> there isn't much time. >> this week, regular seasonal starts. >> the clock does start now. >> the republican party is now one day away from making governor mitt romney its official nominee. >> is mitt romney ready for his big moment? >> can he connect to the american people? >> i'm doing my very best. >> does anyone know who mitt romney actually is? >> all i can do is be who i am. >> the romney campaign is filling out its story trying to breakthrough. >> can mitt romney catch a break? >> this is an opportunity for him on thursday night to reintroduce himself. >> the people that i'm talking to say they've got to be nimble. >> this should be a winnable race. >> this is going to stay a pretty close race. anything can happen. >> so it is my privilege to proclaim the 2012 republican national convention called to order.

>> good evening from tampa, florida where the republican national convention will reconvene and officially nominate mitt romney tomorrow after tropical storm isaac forced the party to cancel proceedings today. on thursday night, mitt romney will deliver a speech here. the audience in the hall will, of course, applaud and cheer on crew. but mitt romney seems to know he might not be this party's dreamendream candidate. >> some people in your party don't like you. are you a candidate for the entire republican party? >> well, we're a big party. i don't know how many hundred million people or so are republican. around and i'm not sure that everybody is going to think i'm the ideal person. >> with 71 days until the presidential election, a new poll shows the race locked in a

statistical tie among registered voters. president obama polls at 46%, mitt romney polls 47%. when asked which candidate is more likable, 61% of registered voters say president obama. only 27% say mitt romney. chris wallace asked mitt romney about the likability problem. >> governor, does it bother you that according to the polls, people don't "like" you more? or is that not important? >> all i can do is be who i am? remember that popeye line? "i am what i am and that's all that i am"? >> mitt romney says during his speech thursday night, we won't be talking about my life. we'll be talking about policy. president obama says that congressional republly can party policy will become mitt romney policy. >> i don't think that if

congress presented him with some of the items that are in the republican platform at this convention that would, for example, roll back. >> joining me now, in tampa, nbc news tom brokaw and, tom, we of course go to you for history on night ts like this. two questions. the last time a presidential candidate quoted popeye? and then secondly, when is the last time a presidential candidate has been struggling so much with the likability factor in polls? >> it's been a while since we've had anybody struggle as mup as he has with the likability factor. in part, he had to become something that he wasn't naturally as a political candidate during the primaries.

people emerge from that process uncertain about just who mitt romney is. thursday night, he has to do a couple of things. he has to make sure that members of the tea party remain comfortable enough with him that they're so determined to get rid of barack obama and then, finally u he has to say to that independent couple in iowa, wisconsin, ohio and virginia, who may have not made up their min minds, at the end of the speech, does she turn to him or does he turn to her and say, you know, i could live with that guy. i'm comfortable with him. i know he's got a good background. now, tonight, i could see him for what he may be in our lives. >> and, joe, with this likability gap in the polls, it's astonishing.

you do not expect to turn to the big number and see that they are tied. >> i think it's a likely voters sample. that is one of the quirks of polling. sort of registered and likely tend to diverge a little bit. i think mitt romney, when he says i am what i am, that sounds like a ceo. ceos don't have to be liked. they have to be seen as competent. and i think he's going back, mitt romney, in a lot of ways, as his original campaign. i want to run this country like a business. i'm a successful businessman. now, the challenge, like tom just said, in the room when he's giving his acceptance speech, he's got a completely different audience. this is a party that now doesn't want to hear i'm a competent guy. it wants to hear barack obama is a socialist. it wants to hear a much more extreme message. how do you deliver that and say you know what, you're sober and sane enough to run the country. >> let's listen to mitt romney's

atec atempt at the joke that the president may not be american. >> i love being home in this place where anne and i were raised. aend was born in henry ford hospital; i was borned in henry ford hospital. no one has ever asked to see my birth certificate. they know this is the place that i was born and raised. >> jonathan, a well-known professional comedian called me today and said about that joke, you know what happens to jokes? people laugh. no one is laughing, they are cheering. that is a very different reaction. cheering that response is a different reaction than laughing at a skoek. >> right. it's not uncomfortable laughter. it's cheering. the thing i find more fascinating is how governor romney soaks it in. he soaks up the applause. you know, when you hear jokes

like that, when you hear some of the -- who knows what he's going to say thursday night. but if it plays to the tea party base and it plays to the far right wing of the party, how does that independent couple in iowa, what will they turn to each other and say to each other after they've heard some of the possible red meat that might be flown out here tonight. i mean, i remembered the speech that was given, i believe it was by our former colleague pat buccanon at the republican convention in '92, i believe -- >> when? >> 96. >> in '96, that friegtenned a lot of people. mitt romney cannot afford to come out of a convention where a lot of people are frightened. he has to come out having not only told the american people where he wants to take the country, but he must put meat on the bones. there is not enough specifics out there for people to turn to

each other and say, okay, president obama hasn't done a good enough job. at least i know what specifically he wants to do if he gets four years. right now, he hasn't done that. >> tom, one of the easier aspects is they tend to run the same place. do we get that feeling? oh, yeah, i know that play. i know that play. i don't know this play about suggesting that the president of the united states is somehow alien, foreign. i've never seen that play before. >> i have a contrary point of view about what he said. my own impression is, and i don't think any of us know what was in his mind. my own demonstration, he's about as awkward with humor as anybody i have ever seen obama this stump. as i watched him, he was obviously riffing at that point. he threw that out there. if that were part of a longer narrative from him. i would take it much more seriously than i do. i just don't know whether his

clear intention was to raise that once again. by the way, the pat buccanon speech, that was a long, very strident speech. it was molly ivans who said it sounded much better in the original german. that was a different time. i honestly don't know whether we can pin this on governor romney that he was trying to exacerbate, again, the birthing question. and my guess is, by next week this time, it will have a half-life of an ameba. not that i know the half-life of an ameba. >> the day after that joke was aired, the new york times ranl the story. and i believe it's the front-page story that the romney campaign has made its decision. they are doing all sorts of things to appeal to them.

so whether it's the welfare ad or this is intentional or not, it plays into that narrative. >> i think the time has well passed to even raise that question, by the way: i'm just saying i don't know for sure the depths of the al tier yor motives here. and if he doesn't make it back to it, of the thematic campaign, i think the country will be better served all the way across the board. you know, i was watching donald trump the other day trying to decide whether or not he would come here. if he comes and he's allowed to appear in some fashion. that's a dimpblt matter all together. he will not let go of this. and my hope is -- my guess is that the romney campaign doesn't want to have donald trump appear at this arena or even outside of it in the next couple days. >> some of the analysis -- trump himself suggested that he of

course had a speaking role here. but maybe he got rained out today. but apart from romney's motivation or how he might stumble into something, what he did stumble into is something that does echo because of donald trump spenlding over a year on others in republly can world talking about it for some period of time. that's one of the reasons people thought they were hearing something in the crowd. and then the crowd response that was conditioned by months of preconditioning in the republican world. >> i feel like romney is running a constant primary. so that pat buccanon that we remember from the '90s, they're now a majority of the base. they still feel like that he eve got to caterer to them. at some point, he's got to pivot. he hasn't found a comfortable

way to do it. they're taking great pains to high some of the crazy antics. but they still represent the majority of the base and romney is still feeling like he has to speak to them. i think to jonathan's point because they're working on working class voters. >> this is my 22nd convention. this is the most inauthentic, spontaneous convention i have ever seen. i must say. we used the talk about the witness of al gore. i mean, al gore looks like a stand up comedian next to this guy. you know? and that's a test that he's going to face on thursday night. he was candid enough to say i am who i am. and i don't know anyone his age who can undergo a personality conversion in front of a national television audience. what he needs to do is make the independent voter out there who is undecided comfortable with

him. >> yok thtom, it's not my 2 2nd convention, but i did watch every one of nose conventions that you anchored from one of these booths. i cannot thank you enough for coming in here tonight and giving us the honor of sitting in this booth with us. joy reid, tom browak, thank you all for. >> jaime: joining me tonight. according to the new york post, they have a report today ipd kating that chris cristie turns down mitt romney for the president spot because he believes mitt romney is going to lose. more interviews meaning more questions to mitt romney about his secret tax returns. the republican senator warns mitt romney that he is going to lose, going to lose if he continues to alienate women voters.

that's coming up. welcome aboard! [ chuckles ] ♪ [ honk! ] ♪ [ honk! ] ♪ [ honk! ] ♪ [ male announcer ] now you'll know when to stop. [ honk! ] the all-new nissan altima with easy fill tire alert. [ honk! ] it's our most innovative altima ever. nissan. innovation that excites. ♪ [ "human" by the human league playing ] humans. we mean well, but we're imperfect creatures living in a beautifully imperfect world. it's amazing we've made it this far. maybe it's because when one of us messes up, someone else comes along to help out. that's the thing about humans. when things are at their worst,

we're at our best. see how at libertymutual.com. liberty mutual insurance -- responsibility. what's your policy?

what's the difference between paul ryan and crazy republican congressman todd aiken? the answer is absolutely nothing. that's coming up on "the rewrite." helps seal in freshness. wow! that is fresh! am i still yelling? [ male announcer ] maxwell house flavor lock. always good to the last drop.

has oats that can help lower cholesterol? and it tastes good? sure does! wow. it's the honey, it makes it taste so... well, would you look at the time... what's the rush? be happy. be healthy. i've very respectfully listened to you. if what you want to do is put on a show and giggle every time i talk then i have no interest in answering your question. >> didn't i say on topic? >> do you want to hear the answer or don't you? >> i've heard you. >> okay, next question. go ahead, yes, sir.

and let me tell you something, after you graduate from law school, you conduct yourself like that in the courtroom, your rear end is going to get thrown in jail, idiot. >> in 24 hours, that man, that occasionally intemp rant man chris cristie will take the stage here and deliver the keynote address at the republican national convention. today, the unspoken governor woke up to this headline in the new york post. according to the post, christy told political insiders that there was a fat chance he'd be mitt romney's running mate because crhistie doubted that romney could actually wins. that means he's been watching this program and realizes that the presidential candidate has no chance of ever becoming president. that means chris cristie has seen our big wall graphic of the vice presidential losers in the

television age. all of whom have watched their political futures end the night they lost. cris trk ie was taking his place, besides sarah palin on our big wall of losers. in an interview that will air tomorrow on msnbc's tomorrow morning show, cristie responded this way. >> i was just completely shocked right now. and they never talked to me. >> joining me now, hosts of msnbc's the cycle. steve, you are a senior in new jersey political analyst here at the last word. i notice that cristie's denial there was not the standard, really tough, complete denial. he just said much of what's in that report.

was not true. there are stronger denials to issue. what do you make of this hole story. i think they're happy that they're out there. but if i don't buy the idea, if the idea is they're trying to put hey, look, and is there's issues that kept you from saying yes, i don't think that's what happened at all. the reason chris cristie -- the reason she was not asked is because of stories like this. because things pop up in the press that cristie or someone arpd them out there puts cristie's interest ahead of romneys. but i think cristie clearly has an incentive. more than most governors, he really has a balancing act. he's up for reelection next year. his popularity is not bad there.

new jersey is still a blue state. it's going to be doing well to get 53, 54 u 55% of the vote. he flirted with a@shl race last year. if it looks like he's trying to get out of a job, that doesn't look good, either. that story looks like hey, they wabted me, but, no, i've got better things to do. >> and one of the reasons that they said in addition to him thinking that romney was going to lose was the fact that he's so kmicommit to his post as governor in new jersey that he e he didn't want to leave it. >> and steve, you know, political insiders when they watch these things develop, they always know that the people within the party who are cont d contenders for the presidency actually want their no, ma'am nooe to lose because that opens up the opportunity to run four years lalter instead of 8 years latser.

and this is one of those stories thats it a little extra uncomfortable for cristie when he's giving his speech down here in tampa, there's some rnt according to the new york post to believe that not only does he think mitt romney is going to lose, he's actual lly rooting f hinl to lose. >> we don't need anonymous sources to know that. christy himself said it was an interview with oprah winfrey. as if it's a foregone conclusion that the republican nomination would be open in 2016. that's another one when that happened, the romney people looked at it and they're obviously -- think about the tax controversy. it was back in january when he was trying to gets away with releasing nothing about his personal tax reports. his top surrogate went on the today show and said romney

should put his taxzs out there. >> and i think the fact of the matter is chris christy, he actually thinks that any republican can lose in general. so he certainly doesn't think that mitt romney has a wetter shot at winning than he had. >> i fwlooef that. no one chooses to run when they think they can win. he's kind of the heat-seeking guy. christy was a national figurened begging him to run. and he knows that people won't be begging him next time. you only get begged once. so steve carnake had to include

the cancellation of what the ultimate out come would be if he did run. >> well, you know, one thing that i think was on his mind here was his own politics. he immediately tried to move up to take advantage of the attention he was getting. it was a big jump for him. you and he was completely wiped out. he miraculously rejuvenated his career by raising big bucks for george w. bush becoming the u.s. attorney. here it is. republicans all want chris christy to get in.

this guy is passing up his one gold nl opportunity to have the governor's office. he calculated that he'd get a better chance in 2009. and that's what happened. >> thank you both for joining me tonight. >> thanks, lawrence. coming up, mitt romney gets asked the big question. why, if you knew you were running for president did you continue to stash money overseas. that's coming up. and, later, if you thought todd aikens said the craziest thing about last week, here's another crazy thing that another republican had to say. and paul ryan agrees with both of these on policy. that's in the re-write.

[ gnome ] enjoying your holiday? ooo no. the hotel lost our reservation. nonsense! you book at travelocity, your reservation's guaranteed.

well, i did not book with travelocity, okay?!? [ female announcer ] get the travelocity guarantee any way you book, including our new app. you'll never roam alone. is now in our new starbucks refreshers™ -- a breakthrough in natural energy. made with real fruit, starbucks refreshers™ are delicious low calorie drinks you can feel good about. ♪ rethink how you re-energize. ♪ get a boost of natural energy with a new starbucks refreshers™, in three ways. natural energy from green coffee extract, only from starbucks.

mitt romney was asked a big question yesterday. why he stashes money in the cay men islands and swiss bank acounts. you will hear his answer next. and, later, a republican senator tells mitt romney today he will lose if he does not fix his problem with women voters. and on the re-write tonight, why there is absolutely no difference between crazy republican congressman todd aiken and paul ryan. that's coming up. sweetie, you have to scrub it first.

no you don't, honey. yes, you do! don't! i've washed a few cupcake tins in my day... oh, so you're a tin expert now. is that... whoa nelly! hi, kitchen counselor here. he's actually right... with cascade complete. see cascade complete pacs work like thousands of micro-scrubbing brushes to help power away tough foods even in corners and edges. so, i was right, right? i've gotta run. a cascade product has been chosen by consumers as best new dish detergent for multiple years. the economy needs manufacturing. machines, tools, people making stuff. companies have to invest in making things. infrastructure, construction, production. we need it now more than ever.

chevron's putting more than $8 billion dollars back in the u.s. economy this year. in pipes, cement, steel, jobs, energy. we need to get the wheels turning. i'm proud of that. making real things... for real. ...that make a real difference. ♪ out! your kind is not welcome here! nor your odd predilections! miracle whip is tangy and sweet, not odd.

[ villager 1 ] it's evil! if you'd try it, you'd know. she speaketh the truth! [ villagers gasping ] reverend? ♪ can i have some? ♪ to meet the needs of my growing business. but how am i going to fund it? and i have to find a way to manage my cash flow better. [ female announcer ] our wells fargo bankers are here to listen, offer guidance and provide you with options tailored to your business. we've loaned more money to small businesses than any other bank for nine years running. so come talk to us to see how we can help. wells fargo. together we'll go far. you've been running for president for almost eight years. the question is why didn't you,

years ago, somewhere over the last eight years, go to the people running your blind trust and say to them, let's get out of the swiss bank accounts. let's get out of the investments in the cayman islands so we can clear the decks politically. >> well, first of all, there was no reduction, not one dollar reduction of taxes by virtue of having an account in switzerland or cayman islands investment. the dollars of taxes remain exactly the same. there was no tax savings at all. and the conduct of the trustee and making ib investments were those legally owed and there was no tax savings by virtue of those entities. >> why not just go to them and say get out of these things. >> don't invest in anything outside the united states. i don't know whether dwsh i could have say in any foreign currency. only u.s. entities. and by the way, don't buy any foreign products.

don't have any japanese tvs. >> here it is. republican convention week. mitt romney's secret tax returns are still in the spotlight. and remember, mitt romney has experience with elaborate, illegal tax avoidance schemes. when mitt romney was the head of the audit committee from marriott's board of directors, he authorized marriott to engage in the notorious son of boss tax shelter, which involved creating fake paper losses to lower the company's taxable income. joining me now are former chief counsel for the house judiciary committee and former staff of dnc communicatio communications. mitt romney goes to elaborate lengths. let's remember, as we set the table for this discussion, he

helped marriott participate in a tax shelter that was ruled illegal by the i.r.s. and ended up costing marriott a lot of money. this is not someone who's hands are completely clean. here he is trying to tell us that there was absolutely no tax reason to stash money in the cayman islands, to stash money in switzerland when the cayman islands is all didn't -- in fact, there's no other reason for anything happening in the cayman islands except tax sheltery. >> let's put some noncommercial facts on the table. the purpose of investment is primarily tax avoidance. the congressional research service cost the u.s. taxpayers somewhere between 40 and 70 billion a year. investments in the united states are treated the same.

it's just wrong as a legal and factual matter. things like appreciation. things like the use for derivatives income. they're all treated very, very differently and romney knows that. third is the question of information. because of the secrecy in places like the cayman islands, it is almost impossible for the irs to get information to determine whether somebody is adhering to the law or not or whether they're bending the law. in fact, the irs has to use, as you know, lawrence, from being staff director in the finance committee, has to use things with very limited information and what deductions are being claimed. look at the case of mitt romney in 2010. he had $2.7 million in foreign income. he had a tax burden that he paid at the very most, $15,000.

that's 2.5%. how he got 2.7 billi$2.7 billio $57,000 tax liability is almost impossible to determine because of the secrecy rules. >> i wanted you to listen to the way mitt romney talks about this when he's with his friends, when he's with people he trusts. when he's with people who knows understand and appreciate and applaud hiding money from the government any way you can. and, o and, of course, he's talking to his donors. and he says big business is doing fine in many places. they get the loans they need. they can do with all of the regulation. they know how to find ways to get through the tax code. save money.

by putting various things in the places where there are low tax havens around the world for their businesses. karen, there he is. saying we go and we look for low tax havens. >> i mean, you guys have raised this question of maybe or maybe there were not things that were legal. but he's talking about a lot of it that was legal. wen they technically say we follow the law. that's another example of how the romneys are trying to parse their word, but really not telling you the truth behind those word. as you know, people try to get out of their tax obligation. this is what they don't want the rest of us to know. that means the rest of us are paying their share. what they're avoiding, we get

stuck with that bill. and these companies and these individuals are able to take advantage of all kinds of tax loopholes and schemes that i wish the resz of us had access to. here's the thing. he wants us to trust him to revise our tax code. so it's our money, but he won't show us how he may have utilized the tax code to make his money. >> karen hits on a very interesting point. as you've pointed out many times on the show, mitt romney claims that he sees business activities in bain capital in 1999. and then we learn in 2010 that he's taken $500,000, a half a million in detuxs for what he calls active business activities. those, according to the i.r.s., you can only deduct those if you're deeply involved in the petition.

romney has been kaugts not being particularly straight on this question before. it's manager like 138 active invest pts in the cayman islands. romney has an interest in 12 of them. so the idea saying that just trust me, most tax experts will tell you that the cloak of secrecy with these investments in cayman island is what allows for the gamesman ship. . >> there was some rule spending that was certainly going on. >> sorry, ken. we've got to get out of this. i want to thank you both for joining me in this, the latest episode of mitt romney's secret tax returns. the story that's not going to go away. thanks for joining me tonight.

>> thank you, lawrence. >> coming up, crazy republican congressman talking about abortion and rape. and one of them is paul ryan. this's next in the rewrite. and a republican center warns mitt romney and the republican party about their problem with women. expression of power... control. [ engine revs ] during the golden opportunity sales event, get great values on some of our newest models. this is the pursuit of perfection. 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.

[ male announcer ] dosing and application sites between these products differ. women and children should avoid contact with application sites. discontinue androgel and call your doctor if you see unexpected signs of early puberty in a child, or, signs in a woman which may include changes in body hair or a large increase in acne, possibly due to accidental exposure. men with breast cancer or who have or might have prostate cancer, and women who are, or may become pregnant or are breast feeding should not use androgel. serious side effects include worsening of an enlarged prostate, possible increased risk of prostate cancer, lower sperm count, swelling of ankles, feet, or body, enlarged or painful breasts, problems breathing during sleep, and blood clots in the legs. tell your doctor about your medical conditions and medications, especially insulin, corticosteroids, or medicines to decrease blood clotting. talk to your doctor today about androgel 1.62% so you can use less gel. log on now to androgeloffer.com and you could pay as little as ten dollars a month for androgel 1.62%. what are you waiting for? this is big news.

yeah, maybe not. v8 v-fusion juice gives them a full serving of vegetables plus a full serving of fruit. but it just tastes like fruit. v8. what's your number? why does the political media think that paul ryan is a serious person and that todd aiken isn't. that's next in the rewrite. and a republican woman tells the party to stop alienating women voters. that woman, of course, is a republican senator.

that puts us in control. our abundant natural gas is already saving us money, producing cleaner electricity, putting us to work here in america and supporting wind and solar. though all energy development comes with some risk, we're committed to safely and responsibly producing natural gas. it's not a dream. america's natural gas... putting us in control of our energy future, now. hey america, even though slisa rinna is wearing the new depend silhouette briefs for charity to prove how great the fit is even under a fantastic dress. the best protection now looks, fits and feels just like underwear. we invite you to get a free sample and try one on too.

gomery and abigail higgins had... ...a tree that bore the most rare and magical fruit. which provided for their every financial need. and then, in one blinding blink of an eye, their tree had given its last. but with their raymond james financial advisor, they had prepared for even the unthinkable. and they danced. see what a raymond james advisor can do for you. >> rape is rape. period. end of story. >> sorry, paul. it's not the end of the story. being opposed to abortion in all

cases including rape, incest and the life of the mother is the official republican position on abortion? but for decades now, republicans have been having a very easy ride with the political media who have been relentlessly incurious about the details of the republican antiabortion doctrine. until now. thank really thanks to republican congressman who showed republicans on the issue of the abortion. >> if it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. >> though the republican establishment tried to marginalize todd aiken, the truth is most republicans have crazy and indefensible thoughts about abortion, ip colluding paul ryan. what would you say to your

daughter or granddaughter about the abortion option if she were raped. all right, then. so there's a man of principle. there's the man with the courage of his convictions. and his daughter, apparently, has the courage of his convictions. she was raped, got pregnant and chose to have the baby and didn't even have to listen to a

sermon from her father about doing the right thing. >> okay, here's how you know a republican is running scared on rape questions. they always try to end the discussion with an emphatic verbal punctuation point. >> rape is rape, period. obviously, the republican pro-life talking points instruct republicans to use that word period whenever rape comes up to make clear to any inquisitive reporters it is time to move on. so, now, out-of-wedlock preg nanl si is somehow comparable to rape.

she got preg nant out of wedlock and she had the baby and we never heard her ultraconservative republican father that that was a ultra-stressful decision process for the family. what that baa foon doesn't seem to know is that not all out of wedlock pregnancies are unwelcomed. but we shouldn't get distracted by the nutty rationales that the no-rape exception republly cans cling to. we should care only, only about the governing policies that those crazy rationales make them vote for. and the policies that they vote for are identical toet policies that paul ryan supports. there is not one bit of difference between todd aiken and paul ryan on abortion policy. >> should it be legal for a woman to be able to get an abortion?

>> i'm proud of my pro-life record. i've always adopted the idea the position that the method of conception doesn't change the definition of life. >> paul rooip yan is opposed to. but when it comes to abortion policy for paul ryan, rape is just another method of conception. and when it comes to abortion law, for paul ryan, the rape victim, is the person he chooses to punish. the rape victim is the person whose constitutional rooigts paul ryan refuses to protect. today, rape victims have the constitutional right as interpreted by the supreme court of the united states to choose what to do. if the violent crime leads to pregnancy, paul ryan does not need to have that constitutional right. paul ryan actually believes that women and, yes, rape victims have one constitutional right too many.

for rape victims, there is absolutely no difference between paul ryan and todd aiken and the freak running for senate in pennsylvania. no difference at all. but the media seems to think that there is a difference. they treat paul ryan as a serious man while recognizing that the aiken types are just goofy. i can't wait to see the media explain that distinction to rape victims if paul ryan and his party get their way. if they manage to rip away the constitutional right to privacy which is the basis of women's constitutional right to choose abortion, then there won't be a rape victim in america who thinks there is a difference between todd aiken and paul ryan. ryan. black blank hey! did you know that honey nut cheerios

has oats that can help lower cholesterol? and it tastes good? sure does! wow. it's the honey, it makes it taste so... well, would you look at the time... what's the rush? be happy. be healthy. is now in our new starbucks refreshers™ -- a breakthrough in natural energy. made with real fruit, starbucks refreshers™ are delicious low calorie drinks you can feel good about. ♪ rethink how you re-energize. ♪ get a boost of natural energy with a new starbucks refreshers™, in three ways. natural energy from green coffee extract, only from starbucks.

the platform does not allow for exceptions on abortion with regard to the health of the mother on rape or incest. >> is that where you are? >> my position has been clear throughout this campaign. i'm in favor of abortion being legal in the case of rape and incest and the health and life of the mother. but recognize, this is the decision that will be made by the supreme court. >> that was mitt romney tonight trying to distance himself from his party's platform on abortion and rape and from his vice presidential nominee on abortion and rape. in that response, romney was following the advice given by republican center today. senator snow writes this is not where i hoped my party would be. the party will rebuild our relationship with women thereby

pricing us on the road to success in november. or will we continue to ice lay them and certainly lose this election. in a new poll, 1% of voters trust a better job than addressing women's issues. just 35% trust mitt romney to do a better job. joining me now, marie cox. here is saying right out loud, this party has got a problem. you've got between now and november to fix it. >> i think there's a lot to that argument. if you look at the gender gap, some of them are the states that have taken the strongest stances and taken the most extreme anti-abortion policies. women are day paying attention, you know. medicaid is something that we're not talking about as much as

medicare -- >> about it right now. >> well, it afeblgts women much more dramatically than mitt. and the cuts to medicaid are going to happen in the paul ryan bujts. it will happen immediately. there isn't this idea that oh, you don't have to worry about it immediately. and in making an economic argument. we talk about women's rights in terms of bodies, that's an economic argument, too. women recognize that control of their bodies is the way that we participate in society. that fundamental right being recognized as how we achieve e quality. >> it's having your choices taken away is not just a matter of having a baby or not having a baby. there's a whole array of choices in front of you that are taken away when the right to control your reproductive system is taken away.

>> someone who is opposed to exceptions for the life of the mother. that -- let's move beyond the rape thing. which we've dealt with. life of the mother has gotten not enough volume. >> i agree. it is life of the mother. and, again, i feel like that's something that, to me, when i look at the republly can party and i see the absence of women in the leadership, i just have to believe that must be why they don't understand how valuable it is or how unthinkable it is to present a woman with a choice like that or lack of a choice like that. i'm so glad that you brought it up. they also don't allow for abortions in the case of incest if the woman is not a minor. so, you know, it's only.

>> you know, i think i gets what they're thinking and then they come up with something like that. to me, it's almost do they have women in their lives. >> up >> up next, "hardball" with chris matthews. it's getting dampa in tampa! let's play "hardball." >> good evening. i'm chris matthews down in tampa. let me start with this republican convention down in tampa. i came down here with one thought in mind. this could be the game changer for mitt romney. here comes romney's chance to show his human side. i've seen it done before, in 1988 when george bush sr. came into the new orleans superdome and gave the speech of his life that certainly got to me. it must have gotten to the

country. but here i am in tampa, hearing a message that troubles me as an american. it started with that joke, so-called, that the republican candidate told friday about no one having asked him about his birth certificate. here's a guy, born to a famous family, raised in wealth and position, mocking a guy born with none of his advantages. had to weather the endless eth neck attack that he's not a natural born american. imagine the president of the united states having to produce his papers, just to prove he's in office legitimately, and that's how funny this birther thing has gotten. then i put it together with this new romney tv ad attacking obama for passing out welfare checks. and just to rub it in, to ensure that no one missed the point, did you catch romney following it up by saying, this was obama's effort to excite and shore up his base, passing out welfare checks. his base. i've lived through other politicians talking like this. it's not been good for america in the past, it's not going to be good now. welfare queens, young bucks buying booze with food stamps. i know the images that presidential candidates have used in the past.

so let's get back to his compassionate side, mr. romney, and you're not doing it yet. but we begin with tropical storm isaac. it's already postponed the convention by a day. that's tonight. and now threatens the gulf coast and cross over to new orleans. todd santos is with the weather channel. todd, size up what they're facing here in north america. >> all right, chris. you know, we're talking about a system that has a very large wind field, especially, referring to the tropical storm force winds at the moment. still a tropical storm. we just received the latest advisory from the national hurricane center. it came in at 70 miles per hour, as far as the sustained winds with this system. there's a look at the current stats with that. it's moving towards the northwest at 12 miles per hour. we do expect to see the system actually slow down a little bit in forward speed. that may compound some of the effects along the north central gulf coast. again, tampa, kind of dodging a bullet with that westward shift in the track. though still in line with some potential severe thunderstorms today, again into tomorrow. but there's a look at the folks that really need to be on alert with this, especially in and around new orleans, not just concerning, again, the central portion of the cone, but keep in

mind, we're talking about at least, again, a category 2 storm, if not potentially stronger than that as it makes landfall. and as you slow a storm down, it has a better chance of seeing some development as you go through the next couple of days. as far as where the system is headed after that, pushing up towards the mississippi valley, still a lot of uncertainty with that piece of the track, but we do expect this to be increasing to hurricane strength as we go through the next couple of days. storm surge will be one of the bigger issues, especially with a system that has that big of a wind field, 6 to 12 feet in and around the biloxi area, new orleans as well, some slightly smaller numbers down towards pensacola. also the power outage potential with this system is quite large to go along with that. so, chris, again, as far as tampa is concerned. you guys, i think this is now on the closest approach, and again, moving away from the area, but we could still see some showers and thunderstorms as a result into tomorrow. >> thank you so much, todd santos. michael steele was chairman of the republican national committee, the man who actually brought them down to tampa in hurricane season. howard fineman is editorial director for the "huffington post" media group. both are msnbc political analysts.

what made you think that this was a good time of year to come to tampa? >> because this is a great place to have a convention. these are great people, they're putting on a great event for us. and look, you take all of that into consideration, even as you've noted, and before, in 2008, we were in minnesota. we had an issue with a hurricane here in the gulf region, we stopped the convention. so, you know, the country's going to do what the country needs to do at the right time, in the right moment. but it doesn't impact the convention. we'll go on with a great convention. and thank you, tampa, for having us. >> what a politician! what a politician. just to keep it on that level of lightness. howard, why is it that we go to the coldest places in america for the primaries, in the middle of winter, why do we go to the meat locker up in iowa, it's always so cold there, and new hampshire, then the hottest part of the year, when it's sweaty and hot down here, we come down to tampa or atlanta. what's the thinking? >> i just remembered driving through a blinding snowstorm in iowa from one event to the other. >> to here. >> right.

on balance, i'd rather be here. >> i like it here too. >> let's talk about this campaign. it's gotten pretty nasty right now. i brought up this -- i'll keep talking about it tonight. michael, you're the former chair of the party. why do -- why does this candidate talking about things like welfare? by the way, mitt romney defended his campaign's welfare ad by saying this. it was actually an erroneous ad. he says president obama would drop work requirements for welfare recipients. in truth, the hss directive allows states more latitude in welfare, but insists that states improve employment outcomes, not reduce them. romney says obama's decision was a political move. he told the "usa today," quote, there's no question in my mind that the president's action in this regard was calculated to build support for him among people he wants to have excited about his re-election. just as so many of the things he's done were designed to try to shore up his base. and weakening the work requirement in welfare is an enormous mistake. why is he saying the president is trying to get more welfare recipients to vote for him by making it easier to get welfare checks?

is that not ethnically charged? >> it's not -- i don't think it's ethnically charged as you're alluding to, chris. but i think it's been documented, at the beginning of this administration's term, they did weaken those rules, generally with respect to the states encouraging them, in terms of the number of people they had on their roles. they've now gone to the hss and said, look, we want to make this a part of the law, we're going to amend the law, without congressional approval, by the way, to do this. >> that's erroneous. everyone checking this out has said it's dishonest. howard? >> first of all, a number of republican governors, including at one point, earlier on, in an earlier incarnation, governor mitt romney, asked for leeway in enforcing the work fair rules that went in originally with bill clinton, in the deal that was done in 1996. that's number one. number two, it doesn't abolish -- there's nothing that the president said, no order that the president gave, abolished the requirement that people work and study, often it's studying, for welfare.

nothing said that. and the ad is just flat-out wrong on the facts. >> but howard, on the facts -- >> the nuance to it, in real life -- no, the ad itself -- >> he gets people to study -- >> the ad itself says that barack obama basically, as chris translated it, wants to give away welfare checks. that's not what the president proposed. and it's not what he -- what states asked him for permission to do. >> but giving away the welfare checks, that's your interpretation of it. >> even the ad itself, mike. the ad itself says -- >> but the fact of the matter is, the loosening of these rules -- >> they're not loosening. loosening is not the right word. >> giving more leeway. that's loosening the rules. >> no, it's not. it's asking to be creative -- it's asking them to be creative -- >> the definition of the term -- >> okay. >> the ad's wrong. >> every single person who's looked at the ads -- and i want to know why they're running an ad like this. why would you run an ad like this, attacking welfare recipients and saying the

president's playing to his base. what does romney mean? >> they're not attacking welfare recipients, they're attacking the policy -- >> okay. >> -- that lessens the requirements that have been in place for over 20 years. >> let me ask you a political question, mr. chairman. why is he accusing the president of doing this to excite and energize his base? >> why is he -- >> why did romney say that, just recently? he just said it over the weekend, he's doing this -- he's making it easier to get a welfare check, because that's the way to excite his base. >> well, yeah, again -- >> do you want me to read them again? >> i don't need you to read it, i got it. >> what do you think? >> this administration, whether it's on gay marriage, or the hispanic vote, for three years he did nothing with -- >> but stay on the -- >> i'm just saying. going to those baseline constituencies and talking in terms that they understand, it gets them excited, that's what the -- >> let's talk to, howard, about who hears the dog whistle. i heard it. >> your interpretation of the dog whistle is your interpretation.

>> let's move on to another interpretation. >> here's what i know. i know that everybody, democrat and republican, campaign and noncampaign, has been focus grouping like crazy among undecided, working class white women. >> right. >> especially in places like ohio. but -- in every swing state, and what i'm told is that the republicans found, to their surprise, over recent weeks, that the welfare ad really worked with those women. now, they were surprised, because women don't, as often, respond on the welfare issue, but at a time when everybody's strapped, when everybody's struggling, old resentments resurface. that's my interpretation of what's happening. now, wait a minute, the romney people saw that, and they're defending and using and driving, with money, an ad that every fair -- every fair analyst, every fact checker from the -- every fact checker has said is just factually wrong. >> an ad that you just sat here and admitted that white women,

that part of that focus group, agreed with. so -- >> but it's a dishonest ad they agree with. >> the ad itself is straightforward. >> where's a 30-year-old white woman that agrees with this ad, against this old vestige of -- i assume you're talking racism here, and that's not what this ad is about. that's an easy leap for you guys to make. >> it's not a leap. because i allow you to go back to -- >> the process -- >> -- to mr. romney himself -- >> and playing politics with it. >> let me come back to what romney said, quoted here with susan page. there's no question in mind that the president's action in this regard was calculated to build support with people that he wants to have excited about his re-election. just as so many of the things he's done were designed to try to shore up his base, and weakening the work requirement is an enormous mistake. he's saying that obama did this to try to get people to vote for

him. what do you think of that. do you think that's why the president did it? >> i don't know why the president did it. i know that's the effect of what the president's done. in the sense that it does -- it does galvanize within certain communities a response. >> sure does. >> it's galvanized a response with you two. >> because i grew up with it. you grew up with it personally. >> absolutely. >> it's not a southern issue. >> the law has worked since 1996, chris. why do we need to change it now? >> because the governors have asked for more liberalism -- you know why, because sometimes training has something to do with getting a job. if they can get someone to go to school -- >> the ultimate objective is to get people who are on welfare into good work environments. and even a lot of republican governors have said, let's work with that and see how we can improve it. i think the problem is, in our discussion, was the word "loosening." the problem with the ad is that the ad itself says that the president wants to get rid of and has quietly gotten rid of all work requirements and welfare. that's not true. it's just not true.

>> look, i think all of this stuff is aimed at moving the white working class over to the republican candidate. i think it's rotten. but that's fine. i'll move on. in an interview with the associated press today, president romney says obama has embraced the extreme positions of house republicans. let's watch. >> he has signed up for positions, extreme positions, that are very consistent with the positions that a number of house republicans have taken. and whether he actually believes in those or not, i have no doubt that he would carry forward some of the things that he has talked about. >> let's go back to what i thought would be the optimistic view with this election, this wonderful convention down here is going to be about. i've seen it done before. i saw george bush sr. do it, where a president can come out of his shell, a candidate, and really embrace the american people in a way that he hadn't been able to do before. let's face it, thursday night, whatever the weather, he's going to speak to the american people, romney.

do you think he -- how would he cut through the problem he's had, this sort of opaque personality, this distance he's had from most people. how does he do it? will he try? >> i think, absolutely, he will try. and i think the way it's going to be set up is, you're going to have those voices leading into his speech on thursday night, that begins to craft that image, to create that image so you begin to see that other side. and i think of all the speeches between now and his, is ann romney's. i think she will have the greatest moment to really kind of get us inside that relationship a little bit, to show us a little bit of that side of -- >> howard, what do you make of that? >> what i make of it is the american people have serious doubts about re-hiring president obama as the economic steward of the country and the economy is the number one issue. in that sense, the election is there for the taking, for mitt romney. >> yeah. >> but the only way mitt romney can do it is to prove that -- to tell people what's inside of himself, not just as a guy with a spreadsheet, but as a guy with a heart. >> agree.

>> and if he can do that, not only at the convention, but thereafter, look at the current polls, he's got a chance to pull this off. it's there for the taking for him if he can do it, but instead, they've been running an entirely negative campaign. >> i think he can run the high road if he changes his mind. michael steele, thank you. and thanks for the weather. howard fineman, thank you. coming up, from the republican national convention here in tampa, the man who had hoped to be giving the acceptance speech is going to talk. we'll ask newt about this dog whistle and this romney dishonest ad campaign. also, this republican party wants to show one face to its supporters and another to a national audience here on television, that's why michelle and sarah and the w. are not really going to be speaking here. and four days of free advertising for republican presidential candidates. how seriously might the romney campaign be damaged if isaac shortens this one, reduces to it a day or two? finally, let me finish with

this tampa convention what it can be and what it shouldn't be. this is "hardball," the place for politics. we know a place where tossing and turning have given way to sleeping. where sleepless nights yield to restful sleep. and lunesta can help you get there, like it has for so many people before. when taking lunesta, don't drive or operate machinery until you feel fully awake. walking, eating, driving, or engaging in other activities while asleep, without remembering it the next day, have been reported. abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation, hallucinations or confusion. in depressed patients, worsening of depression, including risk of suicide, may occur. alcohol may increase these risks. allergic reactions, such as tongue or throat swelling, occur rarely and may be fatal. side effects may include unpleasant taste, headache, dizziness and morning drowsiness. ask your doctor if lunesta is right for you.

then find out how to get lunesta for as low as $15 at lunesta.com. there's a land of restful sleep. we can help you go there on the wings of lunesta.

welcome back to "hardball." well, nine months ago, my next guest stood between mitt romney and the republican nomination, only to be taken down in iowa with a brutal barrage of super pac ads. since then, the two have made up and newt gingrich is here in tampa this week, leading newt you, a set of workshops for republican delegates. and he and his wife, callista, are set to speak thursday evening during a tribute to ronald reagan. welcome, mr. speaker. you certainly engineered an excellent speaking spot. you've got a crew of wild people here. he's going to pay for beer afterwards. free beers on newt. okay, you've engaged in what i

consider very problematic rhetoric in the campaign trail. when you accuse obama, the president, of being a food stamp president and everybody gets into the birther fun and there's a -- i don't even know what game that donald trump's going to pull this week. he says he wants to go on the offensive with the birther talk. do you have a problem, thinking back on it, of having used ethnic politics, with terms like food stamp president? >> look, i find your assumption so absurd that it's hard to answer your question. >> okay. >> but let me take the birther thing for a second. >> sure. >> what mitt romney did the other day, people say, you ought to relax, you ought to be a little bit lighter. so he tells a joke. it happens to be a joke that serves him in a totally different way that you're calculating. it reminds everybody in michigan that he was born in michigan, he's a michigander, and the poll that came out this morning, he closed a five-point gap in michigan. >> how does that justify the use of that reference to birther talk, when birther talk has been poisoned -- >> it was a throwaway line. it's part of the common culture.

>> do you think it's funny that the president had to show his papers to shut down the birther talk? that he had to go to hawaii and get his documents released. do you think that was funny? >> i think that it is bizarre that people think that it is a challenge to be able to say, i was born there, here's my birth certificate. what's the big deal? >> because it hasn't stopped. because we've got members of your caucus, the republican caucus, like louie gohmert and these people that keep talking it up. >> but romney was making, by any reasonable standard, he was making what's called a joke. >> first one he ever told. >> and it was a joke that actually -- >> okay, let's listen to romney. here's mitt romney telling the joke. if it was a joke, there certainly was a punch to it. >> now, i love being home in this place where ann and i were raised, where both of us were born. ann was born at henry ford hospital. i was born at harper hospital. no one's ever asked to see my birth certificate. they know that this is the place that we were born and raised.

>> you know, it's amazing how -- you know how african-americans generally, at least people who have e-mailed me in the last couple of hours, how they react to this? do you understand they have a reaction? they think this is racial talk. that this whole thing about welfare cheats is relentless stuff -- >> i think there are a lot of people in america who listen to people like you -- >> i'm alerting them to this? >> who tell them all day, every day -- >> so it's my influence on them? >> you just had a panel where the guy who was black was telling the two guys who are white that they were nuts. saying why are you not sensitive to being black? i think michael steele knows he's black. i don't think this is a great shock to him. >> you can laugh about it, but you don't think you've used it in the past? what's a food stamp president? >> a food stamp president is a guy whose policies are so destructive, that he creates the longest unemployment since the great depression and he puts more people on food stamps, most of them white, than anybody else. why do you assume food stamp refers to black? what kind of racist thinking do you have --

>> let me tell you why. >> you're being a racist, because you assume -- >> let me tell you why. because from the beginning of paying attention to politics, ronald reagan would talk about the welfare queen, who was african-american. he'd talk about the young buck waiting in line -- >> he didn't say that. >> yes, he did. he talked about the welfare queen out in chicago -- >> who was african-american? >> yes. >> i don't believe he ever used the term who was african-american. >> he didn't have to. how about the young buck waiting in line for food stamps to buy booze with? this is a history we have here. and this lingo is so clear to every african-american watching right now. >> so we're not allowed to tell the truth about food stamps. >> you sit here and chuckle about it as if it's not a game you're playing. >> we're not allowed to talk about food stamps because your sensibility tell us that 35 years ago -- >> newt -- >> give me a break. >> you've got that diabolic smile of yours, and you know you think you're winning here, but everybody out there who's black or white knows exactly the game that's being played here. >> no, here's the game. you have the worst president -- >> oh, that's your shot? >> no, wait a second, economically. we just put up a chart today at

new university, which people can get at newtuniversity.com, that shows every recession since world war ii all of them are up except one. the obama depression is down here. >> okay. >> now, is that a racist -- >> let me ask you about romney and what he said the other day. why would romney say that obama is reducing the requirements -- the work requirements for welfare checks to excite and energize his base? wait a minute, why would he -- what does that mean? >> it means that liberals who hate the work requirement, the 101 democrats -- >> who are the liberals who hate the requirement? >> the 101 democrats who voted against it in 1996. >> i thought it was bill clinton who signed that bill. >> that's right. and when he said he would sign it, half the democrats in the house voted no. obama was against it, after clinton said he would sign it. >> so what's your point? >> my point is -- >> do you think most americans are against the work requirement? >> i don't think poor people noticed it, because i don't think that's in their -- but i think liberals loved it.

i think liberals thought, that's right, let's go back to dependency. why are we requiring poor people to work -- >> why don't you like dependency? >> you tell me. >> well, you tell me. you just say they like dependency. >> there's a book called "the trajy of american compassion." in which he outlined step by step to the degree to which the left dislikes requiring people to work. >> we just had howard fineman on the show who talked about how white working women are responding so well to this ad, as dishonest as it is. >> what is this editorial, as dishonest as it is? >> because every editorial, every fact-checking group of america, every single one of them that i checked, said this ad is dishonest. politifact, every one of them, says it's dishonest. you know it's dishonest. >> i don't think it's dishonest. i helped write the bill. >> who's getting rid of the work requirement? >> the obama administration. >> you're a perfect spokesman. >> wait a second, mathews. why would they have a waiver if they're not going to use the waiver? >> because getting education -- it's part of getting back to the workforce. no. because sometimes it's smarter to put a person in school so they can get a job. >> you're allowed to put them in

school. that's not a problem. >> that's not what they did. let me ask about this convention. when are you speaking, exactly? what time of night? >> i've got two hours a day for the next four days. >> at your school. >> and callista and i are speaking thursday evening, i don't know the exact time, because frankly with having canceled monday night, they're shaping -- but they're doing a tribute to ronald reagan, and we since we did a movie on ronald reagan, we feel it's a logical thing for us to do. >> what changed your mind about mitt romney? >> barack obama. >> go ahead. >> my choice is mitt romney or barack obama. for me, as a conservative, that eliminates everything. >> so whatever justifies the means? the means justifies the ends? the ends justifies the means. >> no, if you think -- you won't agree with this. but i think the re-election of barack obama is a disaster for this country. >> and what about -- >> and i think that romney is far better for this country -- >> what do you want romney to say thursday night that you haven't heard him say yet? let's put on your political hat,

which is generally on your head, mr. speaker. tell me how he turns that middle, thursday night? >> look, i don't think mitt romney should play games about trying to be somebody he's not. >> which would be? what would be playing a game? >> people say he's got to show his human side, he's got -- here's the choice. here's a simple choice for america. you've got a terrifically fun guy as president, who would be great to have a beer, but he's a plumber who can't fix the plumbing, and the house is getting wetter and wetter every day. you've got a guy -- >> how do you know this new plumber of yours is going to come over when you call him? >> because you've got a guy who has a tradition of turning things around, in business, in the winter olympics, as governor. and he's coming in and he's saying, okay. i've got a management personality. i'm actually kind of a ceo. but, by the way, we're going to have 4% economic growth, we're going to create millions of jobs, the country will be better off, and we'll have energy independence for america. >> so what's his problem? why isn't he winning big? >> i think he will be by november. >> okay. but i think we have a challenge

here. the question is, i think you're right about the plumber. the question people have is, is he going to come over when i need him. mr. speaker, thank you. we'll be right back from tampa, the site of the republican convention. this is "hardball," the place for politics.

this is what i love to do. talk to people, and actually listen! i'm going to listen to these people. so we're down here in tampa. where are you from and what do you think? >> i'm from tampa. welcome to tampa, mr. matthews. i saw you this morning, loved you on "morning joe." we're going to re-elect president obama. >> this is my hometown. i'm excited to be here for whoever wins. >> good for you. >> from tampa, florida. definitely for president obama. >> do you like this weather? >> love it. >> nadia from tampa. obama! >> oh, gosh! >> glen goodman from tampa, we have some events that my wife and i have worked hard to build.

>> dave trot from michigan, and all politics is locally, and the local folks aren't doing with well. >> duke, and i wonder how romney's going to rule when everybody in the senate goes against him, just like they went against obama. >> we'll see. >> what is a liberal? >> what's your answer? >> liberty. >> okay, thank you. i know where you stand. >> i'm ann from lakeland, and i loved you on "morning joe" this morning. >> aren't you nice. >> i'm mike from the university of florida. and all of the college students are going for barack obama. >> okay, thank you. >> hi, i'm maggie from tampa. i'm for obama, but happy to have the rnc here in tampa. >> that's nice. >> we're for obama all the way. >> are there any republicans here? we had one out of six. come here, come here. this guy. this guy's a ron paul man. tell me about ron pall. why you're mad he didn't get to speak this convention. >> he didn't only get to speak, but his delegates aren't getting seated, the party's changing rules. >> but you're a delegate, sir?

>> i was elected a delegate in oklahoma, but they didn't seat me, because the republican party changed the rules and ruled against us. >> okay, ron paul's spokesman speaks out. thank you. >> i'm amy, i'm from washington, d.c. and i live here in tampa and i'm for obama. >> we need some republican voices here. any republican -- yes, sir? you're a delegate, sir. >> charles, detroit, michigan. i'm a veteran. i want to end the war and bring our troops home. >> thank you! >> i'm from the bahamas. let's keep politics clean. >> i'm sheena from the virgin islands, and i want to know, are the republicans going to really take women the women's right to choose? >> okay, thank you. keep asking. thank you, all. thank you all. >> ron paul or obama, they're stealing the signs. thank you very much. disparate voices here in tampa. luckily, the skies stopped falling on us. we'll be right back in a minute.

tropical storm eye dick is ex-cloor >> tropical storm isaac is expected to come ashore late tuesday or early wednesday. the national hurricane center is warning of severe flooding if the storm hits high tide, it could be six to 12 feet deep. 78% of the region's oil production has been shut down. now back to "hardball."

our demographics are changing. and we have to change not necessarily our core beliefs but the tone of our message and the intensity of it. this is going to be a close election, but long-term, conservative principles, if they're to be successful and implemented, there has to be a concerted effort to reach out to a much broader audience than we do today. >> back to "hardball." that was jeb bush, of course, speaking the hard truth, you might say, on "meet the press" this past weekend. the republican party has an image problem, one that is not helped by the ridiculous comments by senate candidate todd akin, of course, not to mention the extreme abortion position, likely to be in its platform this week. so is the party trying to solve that problem in a meaningful way? of course not. their solution seems to be their version of see no evil, hear no evil. keep some of the more trouble-making voices away from the podium this week, that seems to be the strategy. the ceremony has been truncated, thanks to the forecast, of course. but even if the weather were perfect, here are some faces you wouldn't see in prime-time this week. tea party leaders sarah palin and michele bachmann, birther

donald trump, who said he had to cancel his trip here, and alan west and stephen king. the party is trying to pave over all the problems the republican brand has. will it work? david corn is an msnbc political analyst and erin mcpike is a reporter for real clear politics. thank you so much for joining me. david, it seems it's been cleaned up, the act. you've got ryan speaking, governor christie speaking. ryan speaking to the conservatives. the candidate and especially the candidate's wife putting a more moderate position or moderate face on the party. none of the people that most of us would call extremists are up there on the platform, especially during network broadcast time. >> well, this is what we can call the soviet part of the campaign, when you start photo shopping out of the picture what's been happening for the past year. so when you have, you know, michele bachmann calling people un-american, you know, she won't be there. you know, you had this republican primary, where you

had newt gingrich earlier, talking about food stamps. we had rick santorum saying that this is about the end of liberty, the end of freedom. they were very, very extreme and strident voices. and mitt romney, if he's going to win, and the conventional wisdom is he has to start making a play for some of the voters in the middle. and yet, that hasn't happened yet, keeping the crazies off the platform, maybe gives them an opening. but still doesn't really give them much of a case for the independence yet. >> and let's talk about some of the platform language. because normally you wouldn't speak about the platforms. they're boring. but this time around, the platform is so tough. look at the position on abortion. it basically says, give the rights of the 14th amendment, the ones we all enjoy as citizens, to the unborn child, right up to the point of conception. that means you've got this personhood thing out there, which means you're basically outlawing abortion. this is strong language. i'm not sure they want to get that in the front of the average middle of the road voter. do you think? do they want that out there? >> that's why mitt romney didn't really respond to that at all, because he doesn't want to create any kind of trouble with the base so that the base makes more noise about it.

>> how's he hide from his own platform when the democrats throw it back at him? >> what's interesting is, this happens time and time again, you've been covering this a long time. the ideologues of the party, it happens in the democrat party too, often take control of the platform, and the candidate often says, go ahead, platform doesn't really matter to me. it's what's on the podium. it's what the cameras see, when they record, that i care more about. so here they are, keeping the crazies off. but letting the extremists write the platform. >> and instead, they're having several names talk in prime-time like condoleezza rice and brian sandoval, the governor of nevada, both of whom are pro-choice republicans. that is the image that they want to project to a larger audience. >> we'll catch this stand your ground language under the second amendment. we support the fundamental right to self-defense, wherever a law-abiding citizen has the legal right to be. so they're getting into that, stand your ground. look at this. they want unlimited clips -- why would you make an issue of unlimited clips in magazines in your guns? not just certain kind of firearms -- let me get erin in here.

we oppose legislation that is intended to restrict our second amendment rights by limiting the capacity of clips or magazines. why do they want to have unlimited clips? this is really -- and supporting the right of state-issued concealed issue carry limits to cross state lines. they want unlimited gun use. >> remember that a lot of voters, throughout the midwest, are single-issue -- i shouldn't say a lot. there are single-issue gun rights voters in many midwestern battleground states, and they are also trying to appeal to them. >> but they're absolutists, these people. >> they are. >> when you don't put the more strident voices on the stage and let them say what the base wants to hear, then you let them write the platform. and you let the gun rights folks whatever they want. the immigration stance is hard-core. the abortion, no exceptions. and you just basically turn it over to the extremists. and you hope that those independent voters out there only see the pictures.

>> this goes back to you covering the campaign. you cover it very well. let me ask you a question. reasonable people are putting in their minds, is romney the man of all the commitments he's made, all the platform language, or is he secretly a moderate, secretly a pragmatist? he's had to cut all these deals with the gun people and the hawks and the no tax people, but in his heart he's a practical business guy. at the same time, he appeals to the people on the right. which is he? how does a voter know difference between the guy who signed off on all this stuff and what he really is? is there a difference? >> one thing we will know when he addresses the nation on thursday night is what he believes. this is the first time he is speaking to the entire country with his -- the largest audience. so hopefully, at that point, we'll see what his answers are. and if he has actually gotten -- >> do you think that will work? is this a litmus test, what he really believes? >> there's a story about mitt romney that to me says it all? in 1994, he wrote a letter

saying, we need equal full rights for all gay and lesbian americans. full rights. then when asked about it in 2007 he says you have to consider who i was sending that letter to. so deep down, i don't know what's there. i don't know if the speech will give us a clear indication. it will be written by his team of mad men. >> thank you. not crazy people, right? thank you, erin mcpike and thank you, david corn. up next, if this convention gets cut back to a day or two, it's possible given the weather in new orleans, what will the romney campaign be all about? will it be damaged by a cut in half convention? maybe it will be helped by the pr. from tampa, we're here at the site of the republican convention. we don't know when it's going to start.

we're back. with a tropical storm threatening to actually make landfall in new orleans tomorrow night, republicans here in tampa are debating how to move forward with their convention. republicans out here are concerned with the optics, you might call it, of celebrating in tampa while thousands of gulf coast residents, real people, are being evacuated to save their lives, and seeing their lives turned upside down, of course. throw in the memories of the botched bush administration response to katrina, and you're looking at a gop convention that may have to cancel more than just a few days of festivities. that's a tough blow to a presidential candidate who's hoping to use this convention in tampa to introduce himself in a real way to the american people. with me now is nbc's david gregory, moderator of "meet the press," and "time" columnist, joe klein. david what can you report is

going on in the heads of the top republican convention managers about the timing -- unfortunate timing of this hurricane racing through new orleans and this convention which is on schedule to reach its climax at the same time? >> well, you do have this conflict, chris. because you do have this incredible desire for as much time as they can get. they've got a lot of work to do at this convention. you've outlined it during the course of the program. which is romney introducing himself in both a personal way, but also in a more policy prescriptive sort of way. the people i'm talking to say they've got to be nimble. what they're really focused on are the big four. ann and mitt romney, paul ryan, and governor chris christie. those are the four key people. if they have to, you know, basically back up and build up more prime-time in each of the two nights, wednesday and thursday, they'll do that. if tomorrow has to be a day that's curtailed some, they're able to do that. i mean, right now, i think they're operating on the assumption that whatever may be headed toward new orleans won't

be so bad that it impacts what they can or should do here. we simply don't know. i mean, the bobby jindals, governor jindal has pulled out of giving his convention speech, we know. but again, right now, what they're saying is, you know, fingers crossed based on the forecast, and we just have to be nimble. >> well said. i think they're, just to use tv language, i've heard they might be very concerned what they call the split screen, where one-half of those people being evacuated, joe klein, and the other half is the celebration, the people with the weird hats on and all the fun stuff at most conventions, which is legitimate in most cases. >> well, it might be time to get rid of all those stupid, weird hats, period. they're like 19th century paraphernalia. and if the republican party -- if there's a split screen, i'll tell you, chris, there are a lot more weather junkies out there than there are political junkies. and this storm may bring more viewers to the republican convention than might have been there otherwise. >> they'll be be looking at the other side of the screen. >> and if it's a dignified

convention that's about serious things -- you know, we overthink these things. >> you make a good point. what are the serious things. david, you report well on this. who in the romney camp -- have somebody been able to tell you what they'd like to be the overall impact come friday and those sunday shows that they'd like imprinted in the american people's hearts and minds by next sunday, what is it they're trying to do? >> as i talk to republicans in congress, republicans out around the country, they say, look, if this is a battle of personalities, mitt romney is probably not going to win. it's got to be about ideology and about policy, about results. the republicans i'm talking to say look for mitt romney to really cast himself as a mechanic. as the car mechanic who can fix things. he may not be as eloquent, may not be able to set the room on fire or excite everybody, but he can get things done. now, there are risks that come with that. but i think that everyone is sort of gearing themselves towards going in that direction. you're seeing it from romney

himself when he says i am who i am. i'm a data guy. rather republicans saying he's about metrics. some of it can sound cold and distant. that may be the big risk, but that's the direction they're going. he's got to be the guy to execute and accomplish where they would argue president obama has not. >> you know, they seem to be of two minds in this because the presidential candidate has brought people to church with him, to his mormon church. that's unusual for him. he's putting more of ann out there publicly. much more family portrait. it seems like he's still thinking he can sell his personality, his family life. >> i think they're trying to do two or three different things that are cutting at each other. the most important message, and david is right, the most important message for romney to get across this week is it's about jobs. it's about the economy. it's about i can do this better than that other guy can. however, he picked a vice

president for whom it's about medicare. it's about abortion and social issues, which kind of muddies that message. and then the way they have used ann romney, i think, is unfortunate because too often she's had to be out there defending her husband on things like tax returns rather than just being the advocate for him as a human being. >> david, if you had to score this convention in advance and say what would be a success here, would it be that romney breaks through as a person, that he convinces people that i may not have the personality you're looking for, the bill clinton type feel your pain personality, but i'm the guy you need for this job? what would be a success? somewhere between? >> i think it's two-fold and i agree with joe. he's got to show who he is. he's a hard guy to get to know. whether it's his faith which is such a driving force in his life, the marriage, the fact he's a dad and grandfather and everything that means to him. that's got to come through. that was one of the things i remember from the 2000 convention about george w. bush

that came through so strongly. i think he's also got to demonstrate he's actually leading the republican party rather than the other way around. that's something he has been struggling with. and again, there is a vision. there's a vision to get people back to work. he's got to get back on the terrain that he wants to win on, which is making people think about the fact that so many people are out of work. who gives us the best shot to get back on track? i have been talking to people in swing states and republicans like in ohio where there's a belief there's more undecided voters than we know about in this base election. that's who he's talking to, people who are softly committed, who are not iron clad in their support of the president. >> here's the question, how does he address the convention hall? it's the oldest question in politics. they talk to the room, but it's broadcast. here is a guy that has to talk to people in the far fringe of the party, the birthers, the real hawks, the real pro lifers to the point of almost relentlessness. the people who don't like marriage equality. how does he still appeal to the

country? >> he's talked to the base to a fault in the campaign. he's never had a message for the vast middle. now he has a situation where he's being denigrated by his own base. grover norquist said he's going to be an auto pen president. >> donald trump is still promising to show up with his birther stuff. >> i never go there with donald trump. i don't acknowledge his political existence. >> this is the strangest thing, as strange as the weather, i have to say. when are they going to stop having conventions this far south this particular time of year. >> i like when you say that on the air. i like when you said that earlier in the program, chris. i like that. it's true because that is tampa. i want to say this is his question of reaching the middle of the electorate reach versus reaching the base. do republicans and democrats, you know, political professionals think it's a fool's errand to say to the american people, we can get things done in washington? are people too cynical. do they not believe washington

can do anything? is it about idealogical warfare, and we need to win as many seats in congress as we can and we have to take the white house so we can jam through the kind of change we want. that's what i'm going to look for, that kind of message or something to appeal to the middle of the electorate. >> i want to talk about the high road and the low road when i come back. david gregory, thank you as as always. thank you, joe. let me finish with the convention in tampa, what it can be at its best and what it certainly shouldn't be and already smells like. this is the place for politics, tampa. . pinch... and zoom... in your car. introducing the all-new cadillac xts with cue. ♪ don't worry. we haven't forgotten, you still like things to push. [ engine revs ] the all-new cadillac xts has arrived,

and it's bringing the future forward.

let me finish tonight with this. the republicans could win this election just on the arithmetic. you could argue they can't make something of an a-plus jobless rate and all of the underemployment out there, they shouldn't be in the running. the point is we can mostly agree on this. they shouldn't do some of the stuff they're doing on the eve of this convention, desperate or not. welfare cheats, food stamps, the birther game is below a major political party, including and especially the party of lincoln. i don't know why romney hooked up with trump, i don't know why trump is pushing the birther charge so hard. there oigt ought to be a conscience in this business. john mccain showed last time about the conscience. he refused to play the ethnic card, the he's a muslim card. and john mccain was losing when he refused to get down and

dirty. so why is romney, who is head to head now, and now faces a huge chance to pull ahead in his acceptance speech and in the three big primetime debates? why is he doing it? why is he taking these shots at welfare people and telling knee slappers about the birther sickness? it's a question that needs an answer and more important, it's a question we shouldn't be asking after all this country has been through all these years. asking after all this country has been through all these years. that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. "the ed show" with ed schultz starts right now. good evening, americans, and welcome to "the ed show" from new york. 71 days until the 2012 election. as the republican convention starts, mitt romney's lies to scare old white voters about president obama are starting to work. the polls are interesting. this is "the ed show." let's get to work. >> president obama quietly announced a plan to gut welfare reform by dropping work requirements. >> mitt romney blows the dog whistle on welfare and called it shoring up his base. >> no one has ever asked to see my birth certificate. >> tonight, eugene robinson and e.j. dionne on making this about race.

new polling numbers on medicare now show the republican lies are starting to work. howard dean is here with reaction. >> i don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees. >> and almost seven years to the day since the botched response to hurricane katrina, new orleans is bracing for hurricane isaac. we'll give you a live update from the big easy as the republicans get ready to party in florida. good to have you with us tonight, folks. thanks for watching. racial identity politics is now the number one strategy of the romney campaign. mitt romney has added a new twist to the false claim about president obama removing the work requirement from welfare. there's no question in my mind that the president's action was calculated to shore up his base. folks, the work requirement has not been removed from welfare. but mitt romney continues to lie about it. it's his campaign. now, he says this imaginary

change was done to make poor minorities vote for president obama. the romney campaign is currently running, count them, five separate campaign ads hammering the president with this lie. five of the last 13 ads endorsed by mitt romney are about bogus welfare claims. this is the latest dog whistle to white middle class voters across america. it comes on the heels of romney's so-called joke about the president's birth certificate. >> no one's ever asked to see my birth certificate. they know this is the place we were born and raised. >> republican chairman reince priebus was on the defensive romney's comments. he said, people should just lighten up. >> the fact of the matter is that he's from michigan. he was born in michigan. he's making the point that i was born in michigan. and you know what, we have gotten to a place in politics that any moment of levity is totally frowned upon by guys like you.

mitt romney continuously has said this president was born in this country. it's a non-starter. it's a dumb issue. it's a distraction. >> this is part of the new strategy. priebus claimed romney meant no harm and we should praise romney for being a good guy for the birther stuff in the past. karl rove tested this line out on fox news. >> the one guy who consistently dismissed this and defended the president as having been born in the united states and in the middle of a contentious primary was mitt romney and the white house never said thank you, governor romney, for acknowledging this and defending president obama. >> thank you? according to rove, romney is the victim and president obama is the bully who never said thank you to him? the romney campaign is using a lot of reverse psychology these days. here's a good one for you. former mississippi governor haley barbour told a reporter to name a campaign in the last 25 years where the dems didn't play the race card. think about that. haley barbour.

he's the guy who kept a confederate flag in his office and said segregation during the civil rights movement wasn't that bad. now, he's the romney surrogate on race relations. these comments are not coincidental. as the "new york times" reported this weekend, mitt romney is heading into his nominating convention with his advisers convinced he needs a more combative footing against president obama in order to appeal to white working class voters. makes sense, doesn't it? romney is actually no stranger to portraying president obama as a foreign menace and someone who hasn't had the white american interest at heart. >> sometimes i just don't think that president obama understands america. >> we have on one side a president who wants to transform america into a european style nation. and you have on the other hand, someone like myself, who wants to turn around america and keep america america with the principles that make us the greatest nation on earth.

>> i watched today a president who i don't think understands america. >> the course we're on right now is foreign to us. it changes america. >> expect to hear a lot of these comments and stuff like that in the coming weeks. there are two big reasons. the romney campaign is diving head first into racial identity politics. first of all, it works. remember this? >> i'm going to have food stamps versus paychecks. president obama is the most effective food stamp president in american history. >> newt gingrich was a presidential candidate who didn't even have a fully staffed campaign, but his racial dog whistling about food stamps paid off somewhere, in the south. he won south carolina with 40% of the vote. in georgia, his home state, the win was even bigger at 47%. and then of course, there's always donald trump who is the king of the birthers during the primary season. yesterday, trump told reporters he was glad romney addressed

the president's birth certificate. it happens to be an issue that a lot of people believe in. a lot of people who believe in the birther talk made donald trump the front runner for the republican nomination early last year. trump was never an official candidate. he just talked about the president's birth certificate a lot. here's the other reason romney needs to use issues like welfare and the birth certificate to appeal to white voters. because he can't win without them. john mccain beat barack obama among white voters in 2008, 55% to 43%, and it wasn't enough. romney needs to do a heck of a lot better. it makes sense for romney to defend his birther joke this way. >> it was great to be home. to be in a place where ann and i had grown up and the crowd loved it and got a good laugh. >> that's what this strategy is really all about. give the crowd a good laugh about the president being a scary foreigner. and hopefully the crowd is going to reward you with votes.

get your cell phones out. i want to know what you think. tonight's question, which party is playing the race card? text a for democrats, text b for republicans to 622639. you can always go to our blog and leave a comment. we encourage that at ed.msnbc.com. we'll bring you the results later in the show. i'm joined by msnbc political analyst and washington post associate editor eugene robinson and msnbc contributor and washington post columnist e.j. dionne, also author of the book "our divided political heart." by the way, there's no sense in me being down at the convention because no republicans want to talk to me anyway because all i do is point out the lies they throw out. gentlemen, this is about keeping the lies alive in a campaign as i see it. i mean, the power of fact checking, it seems like in modern day campaigns has diminished greatly. and i think that there was a time in american politics where there were campaigns that were really concerned about putting out commercials, god forbid if

they were wrong, what we're saying, because the media might call us on it. those days are clearly gone. this is one lie after another and keep it going. so the power of fact checking, i think, has diminished quite a bit. has the romney given up trying to really reach any one of these white voters and just has seen the polls as of late and feels the best way to do it is just to continue the lie? >> well, i think the campaign seems to have felt the need to move the needle. however, the needle could be moved, and so they're making this sort of appeal. look, obama is african-american. and that's a fact. and it's a fact there to be played on if the republicans want to play it that way. and that's what they seem to want to do. so all the stuff gets called out by the fact checkers and shown to be demonstrably false, the medicare attacks, the welfare attacks.

yet, just repeating them and repeating them, the romney campaign clearly believes that will move the needle. >> e.j. dionne, why is the welfare lie still being repeated as if it's gospel, the truth? why are they doing that? >> i guess the theory is if you put enough money behind something, it will sell whether it's true or not. and as gene said, it's very disturbing that something where a rules change that was asked for by among others, two conservative republican governors, this wasn't some radical liberal thing that obama did to welfare, and it doesn't end the work requirement. but i think the romney campaign was looking at the polls and seeing that the bain attacks were seeing that mitt romney is not exactly a natural fit with a lot of white working class voters and that obama has because of romney's candidacy a real opening with the white working class. so they are looking around for whatever could move some of those voters back toward mitt

romney. and i think unfortunately they're going down this particular road. and the best part of it for them is that if anybody calls them out on it, they're going to say, we're not talking about race. it's those folks playing the race card. that makes it pretty effective. >> eugene, do you believe republicans when they say, ah, mitt romney was just making a joke. it was just an off the cuff thing. he was having fun? we have to have levity in the campaign. your thoughts on that. >> har, har, har. it was hilarious, wasn't it? it wasn't much of a joke. and the only reason to go to birth certificate from this is my home town, that's not a natural leap. you don't go to birth certificate unless you have a reason to do it. and clearly, it was an obvious reference to the whole fake kerfuffle about president obama's birth certificate and an attempt to sort of blow that dog whistle.

>> e.j., there doesn't seem to be any down side of romney doing this because the african-american vote certainly isn't going to be there, the latino vote is going to be there. this is all upside. you might as well drive it home and make sure the radicals are out there in full support. >> i'm not sure in the long run it's all upside. we don't know what african-american turnout is going to be. we know president obama is going to win the african-american vote, 97%, 98%, 99%, but it matters a lot whether african-americans vote, and stuff like this is going to send a message that it's important to vote. i think secondly, there are middle class moderate voters who don't like racially tinged politics. and i think they're going to see what's going on here. and so i think there is a longer term risk to this, to romney, and that's why even though people will accuse those who call him on it of playing the race card, it's got to be called out because i think that can have some effect between now and

the election. >> eugene, you think we're going to hear any of this talk on the convention stage? >> i think they will be much more circumspect on the convention stage. what we'll mainly hear are attempts to tell mitt romney's story, to humanize him as a candidate. i think they will talk about medicare. that's been certainly in the air here in tampa today. they will talk about welfare, but i think they'll do it in a somewhat softer way from the stage. that's my guess. >> they're talking about medicare down there at the convention? >> oh, yeah. >> the latest poll shows they're fooling a lot of people. we'll have more on that later on in the show. but i really do believe that these -- this is the most dishonest campaign we have ever seen by a national figure in mitt romney and his campaign. he's got these lies, they're working on some americans. the polls are showing it. why should they back off now? >> it's only august.

it's only august. so save the superlatives for later. >> eugene robinson, e. j. deion, thank you for your time. remember to answer tonight's question at the bottom of the screen, share you thoughts on twitter at ed show and on twitter. >> coming up, the republican lies on medicare which we just talked about. what are they doing? they seem to be working. which is amazing because why would americans ever trust republicans to save medicare when they have been fighting it for generations? howard dean joins me on how the obama campaign should respond. that's next. stay with us.

coming up, the romney campaign medicare lies. what are they doing? if you believe the new poll numbers, they're working. mitt romney leading president obama with americans 50 and older when it comes to his handling of medicare? former dnc chairman howard dean with his reaction next. and paul ryan says the term forcible rape is just stock language.

while a republican congressman compares out of wedlock pregnancy to rape. we'll have the details. >> as the seventh anniversary of hurricane katrina approaches, new orleans braces for yet another storm. we'll have the latest on the tropical storm isaac later. share you thoughts with us on facebook and on twitter using the hash tag ed show. we're coming right back. yield to restful sleep. and lunesta can help you get there, like it has for so many people before. when taking lunesta, don't drive or operate machinery until you feel fully awake. walking, eating, driving, or engaging in other activities while asleep, without remembering it the next day, have been reported. abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation, hallucinations or confusion. in depressed patients, worsening of depression, including risk of suicide, may occur. alcohol may increase these risks. allergic reactions, such as tongue or throat swelling,

occur rarely and may be fatal. side effects may include unpleasant taste, headache, dizziness and morning drowsiness. ask your doctor if lunesta is right for you. then find out how to get lunesta for as low as $15 at lunesta.com. there's a land of restful sleep. we can help you go there on the wings of lunesta. welcome back to "the ed show." thanks for watching. what a difference a week can make. it looks like republican lies about medicare could be working. keep in mind, this is a program championed by democrats since it

was signed into law back in 1965 by president lyndon b. johnson. and of course, with president harry s. truman, the first beneficiary, the democrats did this despite all of the republican cries of socialism. here's the famous actor, some guy named ronald reagan back in 1961. >> now, the american people, if you put it to them about socialized medicine and gave them a chance to choose, would unhesitatingly vote against it. >> really? five decades later, it looks like republicans are still lying about medicare. they've come up with some brand new lies. romney's latest ad repeats the lie about how president obama is hurting medicare to the tune of $716 billion. >> obama has cut $716 billion from medicare. why? to pay for obama care. so now the money you paid for your guaranteed health care is going to a massive new government program that's not for you.

>> and the problem is this line of attack appears to be working. on the question of who they trust more to handle medicare, romney beats president obama 45% to 42% in a washington post poll. in another poll, president obama beats romney on the medicare issue but only by one point. and among those 50 years of age and older, president obama loses on this issue by five points. ever since candidate obama ran against senator john mccain four years ago, polls have shown seniors are pretty much predisposed to vote against him. republicans are now preying on that bias and doing a pretty good job of selling misinformation on medicare. it's still hard to believe the american public could see republicans as the ones to save medicare and handle it better. what's going on here? let's turn to howard dean, former governor of vermont and former chairman of the dnc. good to have you with us tonight. >> hi, ed, how are you? >> i'm doing fine.

sometimes polls grab people. this one has grabbed me because of the lies that have been put out there about medicare and it's absolutely hard to believe that we're so -- americans can be disconnected from this issue. what has mitt romney done to give the american people confidence that he's going to be a better steward of the program, medicare, which has served the country's seniors for generations? >> my own guess is these are lies. the $700 and whatever million dollars comes out of the insurance companies pockets, and romney's plan makes medicare go broke by 2016. it's a fat lie. there's two problems. the first is that these enormous corporations, the business community, has funded these lies, to hundreds of millions of dollars go behind this stuff. if you repeat it often enough, people believe it. it's sort of the old russian propaganda stuff. exactly the same technique. the second problem is this age group was not disposed to like

obama in the first place. this is the hardest age group for president obama. i think a lot of it has to do with their age, to do with the enormous change, the first african-american president, a new generation. and they're just resistant to change and frightened. i think it is a sleazy tactic by the romney people, but it's not surprising. politics is a tough game, but there's so much money behind the lies, that's what's making them effective, and they're told to a population that didn't like obama much to begin with in the first place. >> in the same washington poll giving romney a three-point advantage on medicare, another question was asked about ryan's plan to voucherize medicare, and 64% said they oppose it. does the obama campaign need to do more to educate the american people? >> yeah, they do. they really do need to do this. it's hard because of course they're being outspent hugely by the koch brothers and the other right-wing corporations who can give money now because of the roberts court.

without thinking twice about it. but they do need to defend it. they really need to go after the voucher system. the democracy for america has done a lot of polling on the question of the voucher system. it's a huge winner for the democrats in the swing states. in florida where they pay a lot of attention to medicare, romney is still down by four. that's important to know that. people are more educated about medicare in florida because so many people are on it. they pay attention to this issue. that was an interesting issue in tonight's poll. >> down by four? shouldn't he be down by like 25? >> yeah, but don't forget, we have the demographic problem. you know, obama does very, very well among young people, among the democrats, the classic democrats, the very, very diverse party, but he doesn't do so well against older white seniors. so with older white seniors. so the fact he's leading by four in florida where the older white

population is pretty well informed about medicare which they might not be in other states is significant. of course, if obama wins florida, the election is over for mitt romney. >> this goes right in line, actually, the medicare lie, with the birtherism, with the other type conversation that is out there. >> right. >> and with the welfare fraud and lie that is out there about it. i mean, they're going -- >> this is nothing new. this is the 1968 nixon southern strategy. when wallace did as well as he did, nixon decided he was going to get those southern democrats who were voting for wallace on racial issues and it's been done ever since. i'll never forget ronald reagan talking about welfare queens and pink cadillacs. this is a core republican staple. if you look at the republican party, it's almost entirely white, christian, and older. they're going to appeal to race because there's a racist wing of the party. it's not the majority, but enough votes to matter.

>> he's got to do better than john mccain did even though mccain won with white voters. it's clear what is happening here. >> the reason he does is he's in such trouble with latinos after his anti-immigrant stuff, he's never going to recover from that. he's got to make it up by talking about race in code words to his own base. that's what he's hoping to do. >> howard dean, great to have you on "the ed show." thanks so much. coming up, paul ryan says the term forcible rape is just stock language. and mitt romney makes his pitch to women. it involves romney care. joan walsh will weigh in on that. and a republican official in florida is standing up for voting rights. governor rick scott isn't happy about it. we'll tell you the whole story when we come back. stay with us.

welcome back to "the ed show." the gop is still reeling from the mess congressman todd akin left behind. paul ryan says he approved removing the term forcible rape from a bill he co-sponsored with akin. ryan is now claiming that the term forcible rape was only included in the bill as stock language. >> this is language that was stock language used for lots of different bills, bills i didn't author. and that language was removed to be clear and i agree with that. rape is rape, period, end of story. >> this is how republicans frame the issue of rape, in terms of

stock language. in the meantime, the akin remarks aren't going away, and his fellow republicans are having to respond. like republican tom smith. smith is running for the senate seat in pennsylvania. against senator casey. today, he was asked about akin's comments and abortion. smith went on to compare an out of wedlock pregnancy to rape. >> how would you tell a daughter or a granddaughter who, god forbid, would be the victim of a rape, to keep the child against her own will? is that something you would -- do you have a way to explain that? >> i live something similar to that with my own family. she chose life, and i commend her for that. no, don't get me wrong. it wasn't rape? >> similar how? >> having a baby out of wedlock. >> that's similar to rape? >> no, no, no. but put yourself in a father's situation, yes, it is similar.

>> joining me now is joan walsh, editor at large for salon.com and author of the new book "what's the matter with white people?" i thought it was white men. okay. >> all of us. >> great to have you with us tonight, joan. how do you consume the comments of candidate tom smith? how does this -- this kind of tone deafness affect the gop ticket? >> i mean, do they think we're stupid, ed? do they think we're not listening. it's just crazy. but one problem i have is on the one hand, this language is disgusting and ignorant. on the other hand, the real point, the real reason paul ryan can say it doesn't matter on some level and it's stock language is that there is no exception. they don't believe in any exception for rape and incest in our abortion laws. so you know, paul ryan just the other day said, well, the method of conception doesn't matter.

as though rape is just another method of conception. so you know, i can see why todd akin and tom smith are kind of stumbling, because their ignorance is so widely accepted and it really doesn't matter how -- >> so congressman paul ryan says the term forcible rape is stock language. meaning really don't pay attention to it, but it just happens to be in our platform. what does that tell you? >> i think that they're just -- they continue to wink and nod to their base. they continue to say that this election is going to be all about the economy, but they're being sure to gin up the culture wars with this abortion language. it's been in the platform. the reason ryan can be blase about it is it's been in their platform since 1992. they're sort of surprised that people are taking it seriously, but i think the right wing, the really extreme right is also making this a culture war sort of election in the republican party. they're really asking them to

stick to this language and talk about it. >> now we've got mr. romney out telling cbs evening news that he would support abortion in consequence of rape and abortion. i mean, they're all over the map on this, but also, will the real mitt romney please stand up again? here he is touting the health care plan in massachusetts, okay? and then he says, well, i'm going to sign a law that's going to get rid of obama care. what's happening here? >> right, he says that his massachusetts law was good for women, but he's going to get rid of it nationwide. and i think that the women of wisconsin and the women of florida who are going to lose their preventive health care, free preventive health care they get under obama care and lose their birth control with no copay, i don't think they're going to be hugely reassured by what goats on in massachusetts. the president's point is we have

to nationalize these standards and your health can't depend on whether you live in mississippi or massachusetts, and that was what was so bold about his move. right, he's shaking the etch-a-sketch again. remember when andrea saul made the same mistake, a mistake for her, but it's what mitt romney says. he thinks we're just going to forget about it. >> she was chastised pretty good by say hannity and coulter, and now romney is saying it. >> i think they called her a moron or something. >> address the title of your book. tell us what it is and why it's titled that. >> well, i am very concerned and very interested in the way that the republican party has pulled the white working class particularly in the white middle class over from the democratic party. you and i have had this conversation several times. you know, i think that liberals need to be a little more cognizant of the strategy as you and governor dean talked about. it was a deliberate strategy in

the '60s and '70s, but it also -- governor dean said one thing about southern whites. george wallace won the michigan primary before he was elected. it was a northern phenomenon where white ethnics got very nervous, not only about racial change, but about crime and a perception that government was given their hard earned taxpayer dollars to people who didn't deserve it. the cadillac driving welfare queens as we know. >> it's interesting, back then, america figured out george wallace. >> right. >> is america going to figure out mitt romney? >> you know, i think so. we have the story over the weekend saying his own advisers are concerned that he cannot close the deal with these white working class and middle class voters. they don't believe he cares about them. i think there's an opening for president obama to do better than people had expected earlier in this year because this candidate just isn't winning over those people. >> joan walsh, great to have you with us. thanks so much. appreciate it. >> there's a lot more coming up in the next half hour of "the ed show." stay with us.

if everyone had competed fairly and honestly, i probably would be the nominee being nominated this week. >> the pizza man makes a startling accusation about his fellow republicans. we'll investigate the charges. rick scott's plan to steal florida hits a major snag. we'll tell you why one republican with a conscience continues to hold up the florida voter suppression effort. and is the city of new orleans ready for another big one? >> brownie, you're doing a heck of a job. >> republicans are partying in florida as the big easy braces for isaac. we'll take you there live. m on.

t

mancreelarth aaranla u ow obo ou bmel t in t su uiny. upofme and mio i'wi upofme 'l w and [ wihe ou'lesido r . mio pa i'wi upofme 'l w use and [ wihe ou'lesido r . so wllst thde bend meen u. thsoe. wl

thncon po nrnlem rsrp izn edeo thsoe. wl hee t d hodsa iof qu yode im ew t welcome back to "the ed show." i have said repeatedly on this program, this is the biggest story in this election cycle. here's a slice of it again in florida. florida governor rick scott is working harder than ever to block the vote as republicans

kick off their convention in tampa. scott gained national attention in recent months for his attempt to purge 2700 voters in the swing state of florida. governor scott also signed a law cutting early voting days in florida from 12 days to 8 days. where have we heard that? so far, monroe county is the only county in the state of florida that has not agreed to scott's early voting measure. republican county elections supervisor harry sawyer, he's holding out. he's holding the line. he plans to keep the 12 early voting days in monroe county, saying there is no reason to crunch these early voting hours. they let people participate. we're supposed to make it easy for voters, not hard. governor scott is not impressed with sawyer's actions. last week, scott hinted he might fire sawyer. in a statement, he said, i will continue to take all necessary and appropriate action ensure that the laws are faithfully executed. sawyer responded to governor scott by saying, i honestly do take that as a threat.

they're threatening to remove me. monroe county, where is it? what is it? it's a swing county in a swing state. it's gone democratic by a very thin margin. in the past three presidential elections. and if governor rick scott has his way, he will hand monroe county to mitt romney come november. we're joined tonight by mitch seizer. chairman of the broward county democratic party. he's also on the executive board of the democratic national committee as a representative of the 14 southern states. mitch, good to have you with us tonight. explain to us the power that the governor has over harry sawyer here. can he fire him? i understand sawyer is an elected official, or am i wrong on that? >> no, you're exactly right, ed. he is an elected official. he's a republican, which makes this even more astounding. and he's basically said, kind of reminiscent of the 1970s, when gerald ford said to new york, drop dead.

it's very, very similar to that. he has said, i think it is discriminatory, i don't agree with it. you want to try to remove me, come and get me. it's courageous. of course, we have to remember he's not up for re-election. it gives him more courage, perhaps, but we're appreciative. he has never met an early voting day he didn't want to cut because he doesn't like when people vote, especially if you're a democrat and absolutely if you're a minority. >> what were the reasons? why go from 12 to 8? >> well, the problem is that the legislature, which is very republican in florida, had decided to cut early voting days. which was very detrimental to democrats and minorities and he cut the sunday early voting day from two times to one time which adversely affects african americans who go to church and

almost march to the polls as a civil rights rite of passage. they're doing whatever they can to suppress the vote. >> the federal courts are ruling on scott's measure in five counties. what's this going to look like? can you tell us about the court cases? and there's the map there that shows the counties we're talking about. and i think we can come to the conclusion that this has got to be heavy obama territory if he's going to win florida, am i correct? >> well, it is. it's hillsborough county, which is tampa, where the republican convention is right now. it's the keys, which is monroe and several other counties. these are civil rights counties, as designated based on the civil rights voting rights acts of the '60s. in which the justice department must approve certain plans and they basically have been at war with this governor, saying you're being discriminatory, you can't do these things. so what the governor did is he tried to have his secretary of state, the head of the elections division, go forward and say, hey, i'm going to pressure these

five counties and they all caved except the keys, monroe county. >> all right, so what -- the stance that sawyer is taking on this, did his statements, are they going to have an impact on the outcome here? >> it's really hard to tell at this point because he's really kind of a lone voice in the wilderness. as i said, he's really taking the governor head on with a lot of courage and said i think this is discriminatory. the federal courts, the three-judge panel said to do it otherwise would in effect be like closing polling locations, eliminating voting for african-americans. they were very, very clear. this governor, what he's doing, the republican party, mitt romney, and rick scott have a political problem. their political problem is they don't want certain people to vote. that's a problem to them. so what they have done is they have taken a political problem and come up with what they think is a legal solution to a problem that really doesn't exist as a way to suppress the vote as you have talked about continually

and because florida is a swing state, they're doing everything they can do to make sure. >> well, the governor of florida, pennsylvania, and ohio, they must have been smoking big cigars when they came up with this plan because this clearly is what they're trying to do. suppress the vote. steal the election, deprive people of their rights. making it a hell of a lot harder for folks. it's unfortunate. mitch, great to have you with us tonight. thank you. coming up, the pizza man is back. herman cain says if people had played by the rules he would be receiving the gop nomination for president? interesting. we'll bring you the latest next. stay with us i stepped on the machine, and it showed me the pressure points on

my feet and exactly where i needed more support. i had tired, achy feet. until i got my number. my dr. scholl's custom fit orthotics number. now i'm a believer. you'll be a believer, too. learn where to find your number at drscholls.com. coming up, do you know how much more fun we would be having if it was herman cain on the stage instead of mitt romney. he sounds off on the republican primary fight and what we says kept him from winning the nomination. >> and to the big finish, while republicans celebrate in tampa, residents of the gulf coast prepare for tropical storm isaac.

we'll look at the potential impact to the region and our gop. >> and our radio show is on sirius xm radio channel 127 monday through friday and on progressive talk stations throughout the country. noon to 3:00 p.m., hope you check it out. follow me on twitter at ed show and like the ed show on facebook. we're right back.

welcome back to "the ed show." 999 is back in the game. herman cain is down in tampa shaking things up in the republican convention. on sunday, the pizza man said if his competition had played by the rules, there's a good chance he would be receiving the republican nomination. >> the process is fair, but many of the people that are involved in the process are not fair. and they're not honest. if everyone had competed fairly and honestly, i would probably

be the nominee being nominated this week. >> we can only assume the competition cane was talking about includes people like michele bachmann, rick santorum, newt gingrich, ron paul, rick perry, and mitt romney. cain is partying with these unfair and dishonest people down in florida all week long. he might not have the guts to say it to their face, but it sounds like he has something up his sleeve. >> the attack on my character came out and it was coordinated. it had to be coordinated. >> by whom? >> we can't tell you by whom because we don't have proof, but we know it's coordinated. >> can you tell us if it was coordinated by a republican? >> i can't because i don't want it to jeopardize what we may do in the future to expose what happened. >> you heard it from the pizza man himself.

when it comes to lying, it's party before country. tonight, in our survey, i asked you, which party is playing the race card? 12% of you say the democrats. 88% of you say republicans. coming up, as republicans gather for the convention in tampa, most of the gulf coast is in a state of emergency. doug brinkley joins me next. stay tuned.

now is a time when i sense

there is a high level of anxiety. the timing of this storm coming on as fate would have it, the anniversary of katrina has everybody in the state in a sense of alertness. >> that was mitch landrieu just after he declared a state of emergency in his city of new orleans. tropical storm isaac is projected to become a category 2 hurricane by the time it takes landfall between tuesday and wednesday. but the name on everyone's mind is katrina. isaac is set to hit new orleans almost seven years to the day after hurricane katrina made landfall. and devastated the city. which is still struggling to fully recover. in the meantime, the show will go on in tampa for republicans. and after an abbreviated session today, the republican national convention is scheduled to resume as planned tomorrow. it looks like isaac will spare tampa and some conservatives see an opportunity to joke about it.

>> you know, we have so many things to be thankful for, so many blessings. including even, we can be thankful for hurricane isaac. if nothing else, it kept joe biden away. >> let's bring in doug brinkley, presidential historian, professor at rice university and author of "the great deluge." is it appropriate to be making light of this kind of situation? >> of course not. it's deeply irresponsible. this is the moment where the gulf south is in a near panic mode. anybody living in the ragged boot hill of louisiana or along the mississippi coast or in the city of new orleans is getting very worried. as you mentioned, katrina memories are very alive, and the fear is can we survive another hit like this? so it's not the time for champagne and balloons and jokes.

and that was an irresponsible comment you just played. >> this is also an opportunity politically, is it not? for the democrats to prove that government can work and be prepared as opposed to what happened at katrina. or is that a bridge too far? >> no, i mean, look, mitt romney just last week when in new mexico, said he doesn't know what the public lands are for. he said that he doesn't know what they're for because he wanted to open them up for oil and gas drilling. they're for the wild life refuges. that's our hope right now. the brighton island barrier islands. it's the story of the wetlands disappearing in louisiana and the destruction of the barrier islands that allows these hurricanes to come in and hit louisiana, just pound it without anything to slow it down. so that part, i think, of mitt

romney seems to me to not understand the need to save america's wetlands in louisiana and how important that is for american security. beyond that, you're seeing taxpayer dollars hopefully at work. new orleans has new pump houses, billions of dollars of money has come in through the army corps of engineers to try to fix that levee system, and only time will tell whether the city endures this. >> does this bring us to a discussion politically in this country about disaster relief? what should the federal government do, how far should tax dollars go? and i think there are conflicting philosophies, and it's ironic this is happening at convention time. the republicans first. but you know, their position on disaster relief has not been the best. >> no, and it began with george w. bush who took fema, which was a jimmy carter innovation, and they, you know, they gutted it. they dumped it in homeland

security, and you remember seven years ago, that brownie, you're doing a heck of a job, about mike brown of fema. since then, the obama administration has revamped fema. they're prepared much more so with this. we have a mayor like mitch landrieu in new orleans who is not a fool like mayor nagin was. and you have a city much more prepared to handle this. unfortunately, part of it is because new orleans is a smaller city because so many people weren't able to return home to the lower ninth ward or gentilly or east new orleans. but it is weird that you're going to be having a spectacle of a celebration in tampa and at the same time, on a split screen, seeing the devastation. mitt romney is going to have to change the tone of temper of his speech. >> that's what i wanted to touch on, the optics of this. if isaac hits new orleans, how do the republicans handle this? in terms of the convention, the split screen you're talking about. what do they say, how can they

be partying? how can they be doing the normal convention business, with you know, enthusiasm so high, when just across the gulf, there's a lot of hurt taking place? >> well, that's a big question. i thought today you would have thought the republicans would have gone with their full program on monday and with the idea of not convening on thursday. but if you're getting a large part of america could be in a blackout, let's hope not, but it's possible if this becomes a hurricane category 2. it's going to be very hard to have a festive mood in tampa because, ed, you'll come up with clips like you played in the beginning of my segment of republicans celebrating, laughing, while you're watching fellow americans in despair. this is going to be a moment when our federal tax dollars, the federal government is going to be there. it's our coast guard we're going to be turning to. we're going to be turning to our national guard to keep control

problems here. and on and on. so when sometimes we beat up on the u.s. federal government, and when you're in a dire situation after a storm, that's who you need, is uncle sam on your side. >> doug brinkley, thank you for joining us tonight on "the ed show." that's "the ed show." i'm ed schultz. the "rachel maddow show" starts i'm ed schultz. the "rachel maddow show" starts right now. good evening. >> good evening, ed. i'm looking forward to our long term nights long commitment starting tomorrow. >> i'm taking my watch off right now. >> that's right. there's no use counting the minutes. >> we don't wear watches on convention coverage. i got it. looking forward to it. >> thanks to you at home for staying with us for the next hour. contrary to what you may have heard, the republican national convention did actually get underway today. today was day one of the republican convention. and it lasted precisely seven minutes. actually, the opening and closing gavel were only about 30 seconds apart, but the overall proceedings around that did go on for a few moments longer. the republican convention has of course been delayed to account

for the impending arrival of tropical storm isaac which is now on track to make landfall as a tropical storm or potentially as a hurricane somewhere on the gulf coast late tomorrow night or early wednesday morning. even though the broadcast networks had never intended to cover today's proceedings even when it was going to be a full day of rnc activities. the cable networks including this one have committed to being there gavel to gavel. so all of us cable networks were there today for the seven-minute-long session. it was a short instance of rnc coverage, but still it was exciting. if you are a politics dork, there's always something exciting about the conventions. at least something in one of the conventions every year goes amazingly not according to plan. the first year that the conventions were broadcast at all was 1924. they were broadcast on nbc radio. and that turned out to be a great advertising hook that year to try to sell people radios. look at this. we found this in the archives today. cheer with the galleries when

the delegates march in. no influence needed for a gallery seat at the big political convention. get it all with the radiola. it used to be all for the delegates' wives and all of the big folks of politics. now it's for everybody. listen in, get it all with the newest radiola. that was the pitch back in 1924. buy a new radio so for the first time ever, you can listen to this year's political conventions because they're going to be broadcast. the very first convention ever broadcast was the one that came first that year, the republican convention in cleveland, ohio. the republicans renominated incumbent president calvin coolidge and then nothing else happened. it was historic because it was covered on the radio for the first time and technologically, that was an exciting thing. but even when not much happened at the republican convention that year. the whole broadcasting for the first time thing really paid off at the democratic convention because the democratic convention that year was nuts. it took the democrats 103 ballots to get their nominee

that year. the democrats had a huge fight with the ku klux klan at the nominating convention that year, and the klan won the fight. for the first time in history, a woman's name was put forward for nomination for vice president, and there was an actual bloody fist fight between delegates that was caught live on the radio and broadcast as a play-by-play fight by a man named norman brokenshire who happened to be covering the mic at the moment the fight was breaking out and he was sitting close enough to it that you could hear it on the radio. he later called it, quote, one of the finest donnybrooks i had ever seen. delegation signs were banged on opponents' heads, chairs and decorations destroyed. i had a ringside seat. i was letting the listening audience in on the fracas. the excitement of the coverage of the democrats' convention was about as good as it got that year. it turns out them being divided to the point of beating one another bloody on the convention floor and taking sides both against and for the klan did not

carry the democrats very far into the general election that year. they got beat to a pulp by calvin coolidge. that sort of airing of dirty laundry, having a national broadcast of the donnybrooks in your own party, the warfare among factions of what's supposed to be your own side. worries about that sort of thing was a real problem for the detectives in the first broadcast in 1924. but they're often a concern and a vexing concern for the planners of this year's convention for the republican party. here's a visual clue from today's short coverage as to that worry. look at the news coverage today, the few seconds that did technically exist of the rnc proceedings. there's reince priebus in this big arena that has not all that many people up. they have the signage, the vertical signs for when the sign will fill up with delegates. they seat delegations by state because of the one important piece of business that has to happen at these conventions. they have to do a roll call, so every state one after the other,

declares who that state's choice is to be the nominee for the republican party of the president of the united states. this is technically the business that they need to get done. it's the whole purpose of the convention. it can also be a dramatic and exciting thing. it creates this sense of momentum for the party and the nominee. each state says we want him, we want him. they all commit one after another to pick this candidate as nominee. it's exciting and builds and builds and builds, and when you get to the end, usually they do it on the last day of the convention, it's followed by the candidate himself having been named by all of these states, then giving his bigot triumphan speech as the nominee. want to know what ruins that for you as a candidate? when some of the states don't pick you. or when something else is happening out there when they're supposed to be shouting your name with adulation. the republican party this year moved up the roll call vote ahead of schedule. apparently out of fear it was

not going to be the big, dramatic, seamless building for mitt romney thing they hoped it would be. the "new york times" reporting last week that some supporters of ron paul were pushing to make their voices heard during the roll call vote. several supporters had signaled interest in making their admiration known for mr. paul on the convention floor. afraid that the ron paul delegates were going to ruin the moment in the sun for mitt romney as the republican nominee this year, the republicans took all of the ron paul heavy delegati delegations, they took all of those states and moved them up in the nosebleed sections. way out of the main section of the forum, you've got nevada and maine and minnesota and all of these other ron paul heavy state delegations. just exile to the outer fringe of the convention floor. while arguably less consequential states and territories whose lektorial

electoral votes don't affect the outcome on the election night were moved right up front. right up front, you could even see today were the northern mariana islands and puerto rico and american samoa. sure, their votes don't count in november, but what is more important for the tv cameras is they are unlikely to yell about raw milk and the gold standard. they have tried to move the roll call process out of the view of network cameras by shifting it to monday, today, the one day the networks were not going to cover the convention. now that the weather has forced a change in the schedule. now that the weather has canceled the proceedings all together, there's no way to keep the roll call totally out of network view. so the next best thing they can do is move the ron paul folks out of network view. but it turns out it's not just the ron paul folks who are planning to make the proceedings a less predictable, more spectacular broadcast moment. in addition to the ron paul delegations, a whole slew of different conservatives from the longtime antiabortion lawyer james bop to a bunch of supporters of rick santorum to a

virginia delegate named martin blackwell, a former reagan aid. to pro life groups, all of these folks now say they're planning to force another roll call vote at the rnc to protest republicans trying to change the nominating process for 2016. the romney folks have tried to change the nominating process for 2016 to make sure the front running candidate can essentially shut down insurgent and rival candidacies by locking up delegates at their own whim. republicans do not want those kinds of fights to be on the news. this is supposed to be the yay mitt romney convention and instead it's going to be that and also lots of other republicans, many of whom have big constituencies of their own arguing loudly in a big room in front of cameras about how mitt romney is big footing the process and shutting down the little guy and forcing a hostile takeover of the republican party's processes. the republican party does not want that on television. the democratic party wouldn't want something like that on television. as much as this sometimes seems

like a pre-scripted pageant, it isn't all a pageant. it's a working political event. when your party has divisions, those divisions tend to show at times like this. one of the largely forgotten great moments in televised party dissent that doesn't get talked about much but is an interesting parallel to what is happening right now is what happened in 1960. richard nixon had been vice president. the party was poised to pick him as the presidential nominee, which they did. two days before the convention was due to convene in chicago, then vice president nixon sat down with nelson rockefeller, the governor of new york, they met in rockefeller's fifth avenue apartment in new york city and the two of them personally, essentially, wrote the party's platform without anybody else's input. it became to be known as the compact of fifth avenue. as much as they thought it might keep unseemly fighting off the tv screens for the republican convention, everybody eventually

found out what these guys had done, and a number of people were visibly angry about it. none more so than this guy, barry goldwater, then a senator from arizona who himself had been nominated for president but who walked out during the convention to a nine-minute-long standing ovation. and then he gave a speech angrily announcing he wanted his name taken out of nomination for his own party. he declared his party to be essentially misguided. >> what has gone on here in chicago has been a demonstration of our serious intent to present to this nation a republican party capable of uniting divergent view points and presenting to the nation a true republican philosophy dedicated to the preservation of the eternal values of our society. >> barry goldwater chastising his own republican party that year for giving up its conservative roots. he said if republicans were

going to stick with establishment business as usual as embodies by this secret maneuvering by nixon and rockefeller, well then, republicans were going to lose in 1960. and republicans did lose in 1960. and when the republicans came back four years later at their next convention, the guy they picked to be their nominee was the guy who told them what was going to happen, barry goldwater. republican party right now is still unsettled as to what its new identity is post-george w. bush. the mccain/palin ticket didn't prove to be a stepping stone to a broader evolution to the party. sarah palin was not even invited to speak at this year's convention. the tea party waxes and wanes, but it has been largely co-opted by corporate funded, standard issue, establishment by any other name conservative megadonors and mega special interests. tea party uses the idea of small government as a brand. tea party doesn't even promote small government policies. among the politicians that adopt and drop the tea party name as is convenient with what audiences they're speaking to

and what election they're running in at the moment. ron paul folks have enough support that they have held shad doi -- shadow conventions. in minneapolis in '08 and yesterday at the university of south florida, ron paul spoke before a crowd of estimated at 7,000 very, very, very, very enthusiastic supporters. he explains he does not fully endorse mitt romney for president, but amid all of that sort of persistent factualism in today's republican politics, the figure who has the best chance at being this year's barry goldwater. the guy who comes in this year and says we're not huing to conservative principles, we're going to lose this year, but i'm the guy for the future, the guy who has the best chance of being that guy i think is this guy. i know it sounds crazy, but hear me out. when john mccain won the republican nomination in '08, the guy who came in second was mike huckabee. he got the second highest number of delegates after mccain. although highly placed democratic sources admitted huckabee was among their most

feared competition for this year for 2012, mike huckabee decided not to run again. instead, he has been building an empire outside of direct electoral politics. he hosts a radio show that competes directly by the show hosted by rush limbaugh. his show is syndicated on hundreds of stations. he has released a number of history dvd ds -- dvds for the home schooling. he stars in an antiabortion dvd for views like personhood and not exempting rape victims and incest victims. increasingly the antiabortion politics of republican candidates. he has formed a political action committee called huck pac, which has supported like minded conservatives, including a missouri candidate who was once thought of as a long shot, his name is todd akin. >> if it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. >> after those comments and the

ensuing fire storm, he went on mike huckabee's radio show and then the next day, he went on mike huckabee's radio show again to explain himself and to bask in the support he was getting from mr. huckabee even as the republican establishment was trying to shut him down. mr. huckabee then send out a fund-raising pitch on behalf of akin railing against the republican party establishment both in that letter and in a conference call this past friday with baptist leaders. mr. huckabee saying i have never seen an effort like what i have seen this week with party leaders coming together expressly for the purpose of taking one of their own wounded soldiers off the battlefield. excuse me, one of their wounded soldiers on the battlefield. and instead of coming to get him off the field and to the hospital, basically, opening up rounds and rounds of fire on him, and then running over him with the tanks of the trucks, leaving him to be ravaged by the wolves of the other side. huckabee said. comma, speaking from his fox news office in new york city. oh, right. he also has a fox news office because he has a show on the official media organ of the

republican party, which is the fox news channel. huckabee is the whole package. he's got tons of outside support. he's well liked, has a real constituency. has been organizing outside the party, and channeling barry goldwater from 50 years ago by paring his consent that the party will lose because it's not conservative enough. or even -- or he's been pairing that contention for himself with hints or outright assertions he'll still be young enough to run in 2016 after presumably his party loses this year after not taking his advise for not being more right wing than the party is. weather permitting, he is speaking at the republican national convention on wednesday night. we'll see what happened. parties like these things to be scripted, nonsuspenseful, but still vaguely exciting things. sometimes they get their wish and sometimes you end up fighting with the klan while the whole country listens in.

sometimes someone ends up angrily denouncing their own nomination and laying the groundwork for them to come back as the nominee four years later. sometimes these things end up being god's gift to the radio and tv news biz. joining us now, steve schmidt. republican company strategy. senior strategist for the mccain/palin campaign in '08. tell me how wrong i am about huckabee and barry goldwater in 1960? >> that mike huckabee, when you give consideration to him as a political figure in the country, timing matters in politics. if he had run this time, there's a tremendous chance he would have wound up as the republican nominee, but presuming a romney victory, he won't have a chance to run for eight years. presuming an obama victory, i think you will see great fissures in the republican party.

some of the unsettlement below the surface, you know, will come up. there will be a big debate in the republican party about the direction of the party. and mike huckabee is someone who will absolutely if he wanted to run for president, would be a formidable figure in the party. >> do you see what is going on in the republican party right now as people trying to set themselves up for 2016 in the event of a romney loss? right now, nobody can protect what is going to happen, but it's no shoo-in that romney is going to win. i feel like what we're seeing is people trying to set themselves up as the conservative alternative. >> when you look at the people scheduled to speak at the convention. chris christie, rand paul, marco rubio, paul ryan, mike huckabee. all of these people in their own right are people who may have presidential aspirations and the ability to run a formidable campaign. you may see the next generation of rivalries in the republican party, people whose careers are intertwined with the future history of the nation, but also the political history of the republican party. you may see them all previewing what's going to be many, many

years of history to unfold in front of us. >> with this akin thing still going on, mr. romney tonight made new comments about the akin thing, new strange comments about the akin thing to cbs news. still being asked about it, paul ryan still being asked about it. obviously, the republics are pushing it. but now people like mike huckabee are pushing it on the right as well. do you think the social conservatives actually sort of have a good tow hold for the future. everybody talked about the social conservatives fading away. they don't seem to be doing that. >> if you're pro life, you want to recruit people to the cause. you want to have people open their hearts up to the message of the pro life movement. and i would say that trying to do that through the todd akin issue is the wrong strategic approach to accomplish that. i think just like the royal family is learning in england and the republican party is learning with akin, it's really hard to fix stupid. that's what he is. todd akin --

an idiot. >> he's the naked prince harry? >> tough to fix stupid, and we're going to lose a u.s. senate seat. a high price to pay, a wrong issue for people to draw a line in the sand on. it would be much better for the party if akin would get out of the race. >> what about the ron paul folks? we see the delegations being exiled. seeing the northern mariana islands next to reince priebus and there's minnesota up there. they have the number of delegates ron paul was going to get. they changed the rules so the ron paul delegates that exist this year could never exist in 2016 even if things go the same way. the argument from the ron paul folks is, listen, you want more republicans, not fewer. you disagree with us on some things but you agree with us on most of the important things. engage with us, don't ignore us and pretend we're going to go away. >> think of an iceberg. most of it is below the surface. you only see a small part above the surface. with all of these conventions,

as true with the democratic convention as well. you have some groups of people there to cause chaos, to upend the rules, and other groups of people, many more with the rules on their side, that are determines to prevent any eruption of spontaneity at all over the course of the entire convention. the weight of the party's rules are on the side of the people trying to snuff out any spontaneity. these are scripted, made for tv events. they're as highly produced as the olympic games, for example. you don't know what's going to happen 100%, but these conventions have become less about having an undetermined nomination and much more about delivering a message to the american people every four years. i think that's what you'll see. >> and logistically, this year, that means american samoa, come on down. >> absolutely. >> steve schmidt is going to be part of the convention coverage going to start in earnest tomorrow. it's going to be a really fun couple of weeks. >> absolutely, it's going to be exciting.

tonight on a special republican national convention edition of "debunktion junction." ♪ >> a little death metal, i know, finally, right? that and other tampa centric clarifications next. [ male announcer ] if you stash tissues like a squirrel stashes nuts, you may be muddling through allergies. try zyrtec® liquid gels. nothing starts working faster than zyrtec® at relieving your allergy symptoms for 24 hours. zyrtec®. love the air. at relieving your allergy symptoms for 24 hours. to find you a great deal, even if it's not with us. [ ding ] oh, that's helpful! well, our company does that, too. actually, we invented that.

it's like a sauna in here. helping you save, even if it's not with us -- now, that's progressive! call or click today. no mas pantalones!

have given way to sleeping. where sleepless nights yield to restful sleep. and lunesta can help you get there, like it has for so many people before. when taking lunesta, don't drive or operate machinery

until you feel fully awake. walking, eating, driving, or engaging in other activities while asleep, without remembering it the next day, have been reported. abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation, hallucinations or confusion. in depressed patients, worsening of depression, including risk of suicide, may occur. alcohol may increase these risks. allergic reactions, such as tongue or throat swelling, occur rarely and may be fatal. side effects may include unpleasant taste, headache, dizziness and morning drowsiness. ask your doctor if lunesta is right for you. then find out how to get lunesta for as low as $15 at lunesta.com. there's a land of restful sleep. we can help you go there on the wings of lunesta. "debunktion junction," what's my function? true or false, inside the event

zone in tampa this week, you may carry six feet of this legally? you may carry six feet of this legally. you may carry six feet of this legally. but you may not carry six feet of this legally. this one is illegal. inside the event zone around the tampa bay times forum where the republicans are holding their convention. is that true or is that false? true. that is true. back in april, we reported that the tampa city council has voted on and passed a new set of special security rules and regulations for the duration of the republican convention. their first draft prohibiting any rope, string, cable, or wire longer than six inches. handguns, of course, were still allowed. heaven forbid there be any restriction there, but a seven-inch piece of string, that was way too dangerous. >> don't be afraid. i have weapons on me.

i have six and seven-inch pieces of string. this is not a weapon. somehow, this is. what is it about the string? what does seven inches -- i do have one made into a tiny noose. that's as best we could figure that seven inches of string might actually do some harm. >> after reported on tampa's proposed ban on string longer than six inches, the city decided to tweak their new rules. here's the new rule. prohibited items in the event zone include rope, cable, strapping, wire, string, line, tape, having the tensile strength of greater than 30 pounds and a length greater than six feet, not six inches. six feet. so this 20-pound fly fishing tippett is legal. this 30-pound test is legal, too. even if you have 6 1/2 feet of

it, but this 40-pound test, this is illegal. well, actually, 5'11" of this is legal. but 6'1" of it, that's illegal. that's all true. those are the rules. and now it's the job of police officers to eyeball the tensile strength of various lengths of string to discern the difference between this and this. true. amazing and true. all right. next up. true or false. tampa, the fine, fine city of tampa, the host city, weather permitting for the republican convention, tampa is the strip club capital of the country. the magazine "gq" called tampa the strip club capital of america, the "daily news" calls it the strip club capital of america, chris rock calls it the strip club capital of the world. the world. tampa, florida, the strip club capital of the country or even

the world. is that true or false? >> false, no matter what you have heard. in terms of strip clubs and adult entertainment per capita, tampa looked into this and concluded that las vegas is actually number one. put tampa doesn't even come in second. tampa has fewer strip clubs per capita than las vegas and fewer strip clubs per capita than cincinnati does. so tampa strip club capital of the country, no matter what you have heard, that is false. cincinnati, it turns out, is way strip clubbier, way. and finally, true or false. while tampa may not be called the strip club capital of the country, may not be called that accurately, you may have also heard in advance of the republican national convention, that tampa is the death metal capital of america. if you watch a death metal music video with the sound off, it sort of just looks like hair metal maybe with a little extra eye makeup, a little more blue filter on the lens.

when you turn the sound up -- ♪ then you realize it's something else entirely. it's the kind of metal that has the deathly guttural howling and the yay for satan anti-jesus plot lines in the songs. tampa, florida, the site republicans picked for their convention may not be able to hold a candle to cincinnati when it comes to strip clubs per capita, but america's death capital mecca, is that true or is that false? true. that is a true thing. tampa is considered the birth place of death metal. it's home to such famous death metal bands as deicide, that was their music video we played a clip of a moment ago. also the well known band obituary. also hate eternal and morbid angel and the band cannibal corpse, which bob dole tried to make very famous in the '90s when he criticized them publicly the year before he ran for president. bob dole's friends were not from tampa. they are from new york, but they moved to tampa because tampa is america's home sweet home for death metal. that is true.

death metal is the honest to goodness tampa experience. if you're in tampa for the republican convention, don't go to a strip club. wait until you go to cincinnati. check out death metal, and depending on where you go to the show, you're probably safe bringing in 6'2" of string with this tensile strength. maybe. depending.

the forcible versus legitimate rape story line that the republican party really did not want to drag into convention week has been dragged into convention week by the party's

presidential nominee himself tonight. rather unexpected comments from mitt romney personally on the subject. we have that straight ahead. [ female announcer ] how do you define your moment? the blissful pause just before that rich sweetness touches your lips. the delightful discovery, the mid-sweetening realization that you have the house all to yourself. well, almost. the sweet reward, making a delicious choice that's also a smart choice. splenda no-calorie sweetener. with the original sugar-like taste you love and trust. splenda makes the moment yours. on my feet and exactly where i needed more support. then, i got my number. my tired, achy feet affected my whole life. until i found my number. i tried the free dr. scholl's foot mapping center. in two minutes, i got my foot map and custom number. i'm a 440. that matched up to the dr. scholl's custom fit orthotic inserts with the right support and cushioning i need.

i am a believer. i'm a believer! i'm a believer. go to drscholls.com to find your closest walmart with a foot mapping center.

in 2008, john mccain lost african-american voters really, really badly, and he lost latino voters really, really badly. he lost asian voters really badly, and he lost other races that aren't african-american, latino, or asian really badly.

even though he still lost overall, the only way he was able to get the race as close as he did was because he did win a majority of the white vote. he did win 55% of the white vote. right now, the romney/ryan campaign is doing about the same with latinos, worse with african-americans. ron brownstein crunched the numbers and determined if white people make up the same proportion of the lek electorat they did in '08, the magic number that mr. romney needs to reach the white voting population is 61%. he needs 61% of the white vote. that means he needs to capture a lot more of the white vote than john mccain did four years ago. he needs more of the white vote than george w. bush got when he was re-elected in 2004. he needs more of the white vote than george w. bush got the first time around as well. he needs to beat bob dole in the white vote by 15 points. he needs to do more than 20 points better than papi bush did when he lost to bill clinton. he even needs to do better than

papi bush with white voters when he won. he needs better numbers than any republican candidate has in 28 years when ronald reagan was reelected with a nearly 20-point overall landslide margin. the only other modern election in which a republican got a higher portion of the white vote was nixon in '72 when he won the election overall by 25 points. so essentially, he won everyone. even among people who think mitt romney is going to win this election, nobody thinks he's going to win it by 19 points the way reagan did or by 25 points the way nixon did. and in the absence of a landslide, an overall landslide that big, how on earth can you plan to get that huge a proportion of white voters. who knows if it's feasible, but lord knows he is trying. >> i love being home in this place where ann and i were raised, where both of us were born. ann was born at henry ford hospital, i was born at harper hospital.

no one has ever asked to see my birth certificate. they know that this is the place that we were born and raised. >> amazing, no one is curious about my origins and my status as an american. nobody -- unlike some other secret kenyon presidents we all know. am i right? what's the difference, peeps. the romney campaign is also running ads about welfare, ads that are blatantly racially charged. showing images of hard-working white people and telling them that their black president is just going to start handing out welfare checks to people who won't even look for a job. as a special bonus, the policy claims behind the highly racially charged ads has been thoroughly debunked as the birther nonsense has been. it's just made up entirely in terms of policy matters. but the romney campaign is sticking with the strategy of campaigning on welfare. as ezra klein pointed out today, the romney campaign is running more ads about welfare than just

about any other issue right now. of the 12 ads posted to his website, five are about welfare. that's more than dedicated to health care, more than the number dedicated to introducing paul ryan, more than the number dedicated to the economy, the jobs, jobs, welfare queen platform. let's talk about welfare. mr. romney for his part took the stoking white racial resentment welfare strategy a step further this weekend, defending the welfare ads to usa today and accusing the president of taking this action that he didn't actually take on welfare as a calculation that was designed to shore up the obama base before the election. as if people on welfare are barack obama's base. especially the lazy ones. don't expect this to stop, though. the romney folks need to get to 61% of white voters somehow, and the romney campaign apparently believes that this welfare queen thing is working. romney campaign aides insisting to cbs news their racially dog whistling factually inaccurate welfare ads are totally working.

they're helping the campaign gain ground with middle class voters who are anxious about the economy. i wonder what other kinds of ads might help the romney campaign gain ground with these middle class voters they are reaching out for. the specific type of middle class voters they are reaching out for. the big media guy at the main pro romney super pac is the man who produced one of the most racist television ads in presidential history, the infamous willy horton ad. maybe he'll have some ideas. a republican strategist told the national journal, quote, this is the last time around -- excuse me, this is the last time anyone will try to do this. meaning this is the last time anyone will try to run a presidential campaign aimed at winning a slim majority of votes overall by winning a big majority of white votes. presumably, this is the last time we'll see this strategy because white voters alone will not be enough to win an election in the coming years as the country changes. and it might not be enough this year. but this year, the republicans are almost 90% white.

the new pew numbers say in terms of self-identified republicans, it's 89% white now, and the calculus the romney campaign appears to be making is if they can maximize that vote, maximize the white vote by any means necessary, maybe they can win with nobody else supporting them, which means we're about to find out whether you can win a presidential election in this country, in this year, the year 2012, by deliberately running against minority voters. joining us now is bob herbert. distinguished senior fellow. bob, thank you for being here. >> how are you, rachel? >> i hear you reacting to the way i was laying that out. is it because you can't believe they're doing this or do you think that their reasoning is faulty? >> you know, mitt romney has so many problems. he's an unappealing candidate. he's not a very good politician, and he's running a campaign without a message. it's a campaign that doesn't

have a theme. so what he's essentially doing is going all over the place, saying, you know, white people please vote for me. it's the only route that he and his advisers see to an electoral victory this november. but, you know, i think -- i think in 2012, in the 21st century, you can't win an election if that's the only thing that you've got going for you. i still think that racial appeals work. i still think that there is -- there are a fair number of people in this country who -- a fair number of whites who are hostile to blacks, who do not want a black president. i don't think it's anything close to a majority of whites. so if he needs to attract white votes to win this election and he does, it would seem to me that what would be better is to try to put forth a campaign that

honestly appeals to the concerns of white voters in this country. you could start with having a plan to develop jobs, having a plan to build a stronger economy, and that sort of thing. and especially if they're talking about middle class white voters because i think that is a crucial voting block. if you're talking about middle class suburban voters, for example, i don't believe they like racist appeals. i don't think they like extremist appeals of the right or the left. you know, so it just seems to me that it's not a great strategy. >> the other thing that's going on around the convention, obviously, beyond the party's control is the weather and the rescheduling and the rejiggering of the schedule that that entails which involves losing a little bit of their message. they wanted to have sort of theme days for each of the convention. they're trying to stick with some of the themes but that's screwed up, but the other thing that has happened is they have brought a lot of the socially conservative issues into the discussion this week.

the welfare stuff is so blatantly racial that it brings the racial discussion into mainstream discussion about what their strategy is. this isn't a cockamamie theory that i have cooked up about what romney is doing. seems blatantly this is what they are doing. there's also the stuff going on this seems pretty blatantly what they are doing. there's also the stuff going on about abortion, and there's a split in the party about that, which is going to be aired out a little bit i think with the mike huckabee speech and some of the fights on the floor, but they're also bringing that up themselves. mitt romney and paul ryan both doing interviews about that in the last few days. what happens in terms of their appeal racially to bring -- when they put forth those social issues up front? does that affect any of the racial inflection they've got? >> you know, i think it's all of a piece, and i think it's -- instead of forward looking, it's really backward looking. when you start talking about the social issues, what mitt romney is allowing to happen now is that he's becoming identified personally with all of these

issues. he's got paul ryan on the ticket now, so you have that whole rape/abortion issues that they don't know how to talk about. they're on the wrong side of the issue and they don't know how to try to explain it. >> they can't come up with an answer. >> and then they're doing these blatant racial appeals and then they've got an economic program that consists solely of tax cuts for the very well think. what is happening, i think, is that the voters are seeing that this is who mitt romney is. that he is not the moderate who has had to sort of play along with the right wing of his party in order to get the nomination, but he's basically a practical pragmatic moderate guy. but now he's being identified with all of these extremist issues. and i don't think that overall that plays well. >> i don't think it's the narrative he intended, certainly. it's interesting to see him off his game.

part of what presidents have to do is talk when the script goes wrong. >> exactly right. >> fascinating stuff. bob herbert, great to see you. >> you, too. >> the leader of a conservative poll watching group reportedly said he wants to make voting like driving and seeing the police following you. there was some fresh action on that today, an important update about how hard it will be for people to vote in perhaps the swingiest of all swing states this year. update on that is next.

news and lots of it from the great state of ohio tonight, where we have been covering the republican party's attempts in that state to make voting a lot harder. last week, we told you about a group called true the vote, which grew out of a tea party chapter in houston. true the vote exists to challenge voters. they challenge voters' registrations, then they challenge voters when they turn up at the polls. the first time they challenged voters at the polls was in the houston area, where they're from, in 2010. true the vote appears to have mostly targeted black voting precincts, sending white challengers to stare down voting booths filled with black voters. there were so many reports of an intimidating atmosphere in houston that election that the federal justice department sent observers in on election day. true the vote has had some big injection of funding of some kind. they don't say who their backers are, but now they're planning to have a million poll watchers

trained in time for november, all across america. they say every precinct in america will get watched. true the vote has been holding summits in key swing states. they held one in florida last month. they held one in colorado, where the republican secretary of state took time off from his low-profile purge of colorado voter rolls to give a speech to the group. and in ohio, where this tea party-organized challenge voters at the polls true the vote group planned an event for this past saturday. you might ask yourself where this power comes from, right? challenging voters? why do we have laws on the books that allow for challenging voters at their polling place? well, in ohio, the answer to that question is particularly ugly. in the mid-1800s, ohio passed a law that made it the duty of election judges to challenge anybody who showed up to vote and had a, quote, distinct and visible admixture of african blood. the voter would then be asked a series of questions about their heritage and where their kids went to school and the voter had to produce two witnesses about

their heritage. any judge who accepted the vote of a person with a distinct and visible admixture of african blood faced up to six months in jail. that was how challenging voters worked in ohio in the 1800s. in 2004, a judge blocked a vote by republicans to put 3,500 poll watchers in ohio precincts, the way the republicans wanted to use those poll watchers, the way the courts rejected, it would have meant that 97% of new voters in mostly black precincts would face a challenge, compared to only 14% of new voters in majority white precincts. this year, the challenge in ohio -- the question, i should say, in ohio is about when you will be allowed to vote. ohio's new republican majority cut out the last three days of voting before the election, including the weekend hours that had been especially popular with ohio african-american voters. ohio's republican secretary of state, john husted, at first also went along with the plan to

allow more early voting time in ohio's republican counties, and less early voting time in ohio's democratic counties. under public pressure, mr. husted, instead, announced that he was cutting early voting for everyone. so it's limited hours at night and no weekends. as we reported on this show last week, ohio's embattled secretary of state then showed up here on the list of featured speakers for the tea party challenge the voters true the vote summit in ohio this weekend! after we reported on that late last week, well, wait, suddenly his name fell off the list. ohio secretary of state suddenly was not going to attend the true the vote summit anymore, even though he'd previously been on their schedule. true the vote's summit did happen. john husted's appearance did not. so now mr. husted's office is not returning our calls. they used to return our calls, but since we started asking about his scheduled appearance at true the vote, they have gone radio silent on us. and that's not all. god bless ohio. among ohio's several troubles with running elections is that a great many people tend to turn up at the wrong polling places or even at the wrong precinct

table in the right polling place. by the tens of thousands, ohioans end up throwing out those people's votes. it's a known problem in ohio elections. but a judge today in ohio put that law on hold. the judge said it was not acceptable for so many thousands of ohio voters to have their votes wasted because a poll a person to vote in the wrong spot. this might be my favorite john husted favorite sentence of the day. "a husted spokesman said an appeal was likely." the husted spokesman did not say that to us, of course, but, still, apparently they're going to appeal, because they want were of those votes thrown out. anytime, mr. husted, you would like to talk about this with me one on one, i would love to have you hear on this show. anytime. [ male announcer ] if you stash tissues like a squirrel stashes nuts, you may be muddling through allergies. try zyrtec® liquid gels. nothing starts working faster than zyrtec®

at relieving your allergy symptoms for 24 hours. zyrtec®. love the air.

like a squirrel stashes nuts, you may be muddling through allergies. try zyrtec® liquid gels. nothing starts working faster than zyrtec® at relieving your allergy symptoms for 24 hours. zyrtec®. love the air. on cbs news tonight, republican presidential candidate mitt romney was asked again about abortion rights. there is some stuff to clear up on this issue, right?

he chose for his vice presidential nominee a man who co-sponsored legislation with the famous todd akin, redefining specific kinds of rape for the purpose of abortion policy. since then, when paul ryan has been asked about his own hardline position on abortion, even for rape victims, mr. ryan has responded by assuring his interviewers that only the president makes abortion policy, so don't worry. >> but let's remember, i'm joining the romney/ryan ticket, and the president makes policy. >> so don't worry about my policy, it's the president who makes policy, and there's no chance that as vice president, i would ever become president. see the problem with that argument? well, now watch how mr. romney himself compounded that problem tonight on cbs. >> this is the decision that will be made by the supreme court. the democrats try and make this a political issue every four years, but this is a matter in the courts. it's been settled for some time in the courts. >> "this is a matter for the courts." abortion rights are settled law in the courts. only the supreme court could an