romney heads right, let's play hardball. >> good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. let me start tonight with this, mitt romney. i remember when george wallace said there's not a dime's worth of difference between the republicans and the democrats. well today for those paying attention there's not a dime's worth of attention between mitt romney and the republican fringe. sarah palin accused the palin of powing around with terrorists.

romney today accuses obama of sympathizing with the attackers in the middle east. romney not only exploits the language of the right, he's enjoying it. the birthers say obama isn't one of us, wasn't born here. romney says obama sympathizes with the muslim killers. well today the state of kansas is deciding whether to let obama's name even appear on the ballot. the kansas secretary of state wants more legitimate my to run. his new talks of the food stamp president and one republican dominated state after another tries to limit minority voting, all in the idea of making the president one of the others. to learn how to be an american. well, the campaign is coherent. it's comp rehencive and is to work the working class white guy obama is not one of us.

he's one of them. a foreigner. and mitt romney is right out there overseeing every word of it. cynthia tucker is a columnist. i want to start with you, cynthia. watching it all, as i've just described it. everything going on. the voter suppression. the lingo, sympathizing with the bad guys. i've never heard such a coherent comprehensive effort to describe a guy as not really an american. as being in league with the enemy, at least. your thoughts. >> chris, this is a southern strategy at large. this is all about appealing to racially resentful whites. and i have to tell you, i have been very disappointed and surprised by mitt romney running his campaign this wayful i met him back in 2007 when i was still editorial page editor at the atlanta constitution. he seemed smart, savvy, moderate, rbl reasonable and

honorable. but i have to tell you, once he started running those outrageous ads on welfare, i knew that he had put his conscious -- if he has one, in a blind trust for the rest of this campaign. not only are they a clear effort to run again the southern strategy. -- this is about telling racially resentful rights that obama wants to change the work requirements so that black people don't even have to work to get government benefits. that's what the ads say. it's an outrageous lie. >> well -- >> it's a lie. >> ron, go ahead. talk about the whole thing. what happened in libya. we'll talk about the president's wonderful performance in a moment. the way that they're attacking obama. it's not as if he let the guard down. it's as if he's sympathizing with the enemy. it's not just an argument over

competence or strength. it's over loyalty. >> well, indeed. and cynthia is right. this is the southern strategy at large. real substantive political leaders in america. presidents, for instance, like fdr in the 30s or ronald reagan in the '80s tend to remake the party around their own core of beliefs. mitt romney doesn't appear to have a core that you can build anything around. so as a result the republican party remakes him. and the republican party is dominated by this -- you call them a fringe, but it's a larger chunk than that, these kind of tea party folks. you have to adopt their world view.

you have to blow the dog whistle constantly to reassure those people that you buy into that and that is what romney is doing. and we see what horrible trouble it's gotten him into with egypt and libya. >> the dismaying if not terrifying thing to watch is the way a lot of moderate white people, republicans and democrats say they don't hear the whistle. i noticed this week after the american deaths in libya the language of the other, portraying the president siding the the enemy. on tuesday reince priebus said obama sympathizes with the attackers in egypt. sad. earlier he restated. >> i also believe the administration was wrong to standby a statement sympathizing with those who have breached our embassy in egypt instead of condemning their actions. it's never too early for the united states government to

condemn attacks on americans and to defend our values. i think it's a terrible course for america to stand in apology for our values, that instead when our grounds are being attacked and being breached, that the first response to the united states must be outrage at the breach of the sovereignty of our nation. >> well, there's no space between this kind of talk and what we heard from sarah palin in the campaign four years ago. catch her act. >> we've seen an america of exceptionalism. yes, usa! usa! our o poen is someone who sees america as imperfect enough to pow around with terrorists who

targeted their own counted. >> well, this gets back to you, ron. we'll get back to cynthia, obviously. but it seems to me you've hit something here. instead of leading he's shrinking down into something smaller than he led the campaign as. i can be crazy too. i can talk like sarah palin. that seems to be the language it takes to win a republican constituency. it's sad to watch someone get smaller as the campaign goes on, reaching down to the people who think small and think everybody else is a foreigner but them. or whatever the game they're playing in the head is, somehow that justifies hatred. >> and the irony of this for mr. romney is he's doing this to further his own ambitions. he thinks his words don't have any real meaning. he can say whatever he needs to in order to get himself into the white house. but people who he needs to have

vote for him see a man without principle. see a man with no core, and see a man ho is decidingly, appallingly unpresidential. the business in libya just recently, this is an opportunity. he had no real responsibility, of course, but it was an opportunity for him to sit in the big chair. to look presidential. to do things and say things that presidents do or should say. and he couldn't do it. he had to, once again, cater to this duelusional far right, whih has a completely nonsense view of the universe we live in. >> thank you, ron, i think you nailed it. cynthia tucker, thank you for coming on. the violent protests sparked by the video spread to more than a dozen countries today, clashes broke out from europe to india, and some of the worst violence occurred in tunisia. police there said at least three

protesters were killed and dozens more wounded, all this despite pleas for calm by world leaders. meanwhile here at home there was a moving ceremony at andrews air force base at the flag draped coffins of the four americans killed in libya were brought home. they were met by secretary of state hillary clinton and president obama. both of them spoke in a somber and moving ceremony covered live by all the cable networks. >> the flag they served under now carries them home. and god bless the memory of these men who lay down their lives for us all. may god watch over your families and all who loved them. and my god bless these united states of america. why not use all your vacation days this year?

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welcome back to "hardball." mitt romney has faced criticism from leaders of his own parties for running a campaign short on details. a stealth campaign, if you will. he lays out his goals but doesn't explain the dirty details of what it would take to achieve them. they seemed to speak for many when they warned political risks were associated with romney's attempt. perhaps the problem is romney's policies themselves. he has a tax plan that gives the wealthiest americans big cuts, tax increases for the middle class. he fails to mention what it would mean in terms of cutting government programs. for romney it's simply better to avoid the details. this is not new to politics.

michael steele is the former chair of the republican national committee. let me be fair here. romney does give us a sense of what he wants to do. he talks about tax relief in terms of getting rid of the estate tax. he talking about reducing substantially the corporate income tax from 35 to 25. that's a big cut. from across the board, cuts for individuals. some 35% for the highest rate now down to 28. so you get a good sense of how he's going to make people happier. but then when somebody like dave, well, david gregory, my colleague here who works across the hall here. let's look what happens when david gregory tries to find out what's underneath the christmas present as the cost of the new thing. mitt romney saying under his plan tax rates would go down for everybody. how would he pay for that? he would take away tax deductions for the wealthy.

on "meet the press", he failed to mention a single example. let's watch. >> so everything i want to do with regard to taxation follows simple principles. keep the rates down. keep revenue up by eliminates deductions and exemptions and make sure we don't put any bigger burden on middle-income people. >> governor, where are the specifics of how you get to the map? >> well, the specifics are these. those principles i described are the heart of my policy. >> can you give me an example of a loophole you will close. >> people at the high end, high-income taxpayers are going to have fewer deductions and exemptions. >> here's the problem with mitt romney's tax plan, the numbers don't add up. and he will drop the corporate rate to 25%. all told that would cost $4 trillion over ten years. the problem, mr. chairman, is

that's a lot of money. and the question i have is why won't he tell us the deductions? you know the big three deductions. deductions for your house, your charitable and state and local. go where the money is. how is he going to go there? >> i'm not going to take issue with your point because i think it's a legitimate point. there is a great deal of specificity that will have to be put on the table. my hope is when we get to the debates we can get through some of that. the american people need to know. like wise, the same is true for the president. laying out specificitiespecific. how do you cover that $3 trillion of that cost? >> remember the chairman of the senate finance committee said don't tax me, don't tax you. tax that fellow behind that tree. somebody you never met. >> taxing the rich a lot more is not going to cover the cost of the health care system. it's not going to cover the cost

of protecting all he wants to protect in education. all the new teachers. all the money he wans to flow back to the states, where is it coming from? neither one of these gentlemen are being explicit or honest about how they're going to cover the burden. both are put on the bottom line of the american taxpayer. >> i think that's not accurate. first of all, the president put out and worked with john boehner to come up with a grand bargain. they put a lot of specifics on the table as to what they would do. when you look at mitt romney's plan you're talking about giing the insurance companies back the gimmies that obama care took away from them. increasing defense spending. zeroing out cap gains and others. dropping the big corporate tax. you do all of that, you put us now 4 or $5 trillion in the hole. romney won't give us one thing you will do. >> i agree with all of you. you threw in the ryan stuff, too. that's a ryan idea, right?

>> yeah. but i thought romney was running on ryan's program. >> romney's policy on federal spending is equally fuzzy. he promised not to cut defense spending. how you can you make those numbers work? if romney is elected then by his third year in office every single federal program that is not medicare, social security or defense will be cut. on average by 40%. that means medicaid, infrastructure, food safety, road safety, the postal service, basic research, foreign aid, housing,e iing subsidiesubsidied stamps. all that has to be cut by 40%. that's not remotely plausible. the consequences would be catastroph catastrophic. there's nothing there. >> that's not true. >> all the cuts are significant to me. i'm trying to give your politician a break.

there must be some reason to explain this. >> what republicans generally argue is the governments, you know, going back to certainly bush years and going back to reagan has grown. and so you have a new breed of -- which is really rather old school thinking of let's control the growth and size in spending of the federal government. all the things you just listed, i guess my question would be why can't we as a nation have an honest discussion about the value and worth and the expense of those programs. and maybe it's not a 40% cut. maybe it's a 10% cut. >> if romney is proposing the cuts, shouldn't he be in on the conversation? >> i think he should. the president can't run around the country talking about he wants to suspend the money and not tell us where it's going to come from. quite frankly, the rich aren't going to pay for the spending. >> baumds, he ain't running as a guy giving stuff away. >> are you giving me? >> and chris, one thing that has been left out. part of the reason -- >> i get it. he cuts opportunity scholarship for poor kids in the district of

columbia. that's an example. >> it's back in. >> back in because people screamed. >> and because of the wars. because of f the military spending. mitt romney wants to double down on the bush era military spending. if running around fighting foreign -- all over the country, you can't say you're going to cut that part of the deficit. guess what? that's why we have something called the cliff that we're heading for. >> the president should cut the drone program. >> that wonderful person talking is the same brain i have. you're better at it. you're better at saying it than i am. >> i can appreciate that. >> i'm just going to have you on. i don't have to think anymore. thank you, michael steele. you know more stuff. isn't she better than you? >> oh, please. >> up next, two presidential candidates walk into a barbershop. ever what would if mitt romney and barack obama got haircuts together? ♪

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back to "hardball." now to the side show. first break out the romney/obama impersonators. what would happen if the two met at a barbershop and got to talking pulp culture. >> good morning, whiner in chief. >> it's the great white dope. >> it wasn't easy going up against the vmas last night. >> obama, you're hip. how do i say it? you're urban. you're urbama. you must know all those mtv musical folks. >> sure. all of us black people know them. >> remember when madonna and britney kissed? >> no, do you. maybe we can start a boy band.

me, you, joe. >> good idea. i would like to call our band new direction. >> there's already one direction. >> we all know your direction, and look where it's gotten us. >> no, not my direction, one direction. >> it's just like you to think that there's only one direction. >> there is only one direction. that's the band name. >> all right. i got to go. >> well, that's just one part of the series entitled presidential clippings. next, what's in store for this guy? it's in the politics. >> his small talk has altered foreign policy. he once ran a marathon because it was on his way.

sasquatch has once taken a photograph of him. >> i don't always drink beer. when i do, i preefr dos aquis. >> can his small talk bring in campaign cash? the man who plays this actor has weighed in on the presidential race. that actor is teaming up with vermont house speaker to host a fund-raiser for president obama next week. it's no secret they weren't chums in college. huntsman was on both morning joe and andrea mitchell reports. today romney may have his vote, but not much else. zl what is the basic difference between president obama's strategy and philosophy versus what governor romney is proposing? >> i don't know what governor romney is proposing at this point. >> that might be a problem. >> that's kin of a problem, isn't it? >> it's kind of a problem.

>> have you decided whom you're voting for? >> i support mitt romney. i mentioned that a long time alas ago. >> when was the last time you talked to him? >> i don't ever talk to him. >> enough said. >> i don't ever talk to him. what a lie. and the conversation ends right there. coming up next, paperless discount... paid in full discount... [yawning] homeowner's discount... safe driver discount... unicorn discount. unicorn wearing a sombrero. olé... countless discounts -- now, that's progressive. call or click today.

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hey, good call on those mugs. can't let 'em see what you're drinking. you know, i'm glad we're both running a nice, clean race. no need to get nasty. here's your "honk if you had an affair with taylor" yard sign. looks good. [ male announcer ] fedex office. now save 50% on banners.