it's a whole different scenario he's in right now than just six months ago. alfred p. doblin, you get tonight's last word. thank you very much. >> voodoo politics. let's play "hardball." >> good evening piem chris matthews in washington. let me start off the week with this. the enemies of hillary clinton, by that i mean the partisan enemies have got their voodoo doll. it's called benghazi. every sometime they put the pin in, they hope it hurts hillary. every time they say the word, they hope it scares her. and now they have' got a select committee, an official committee of the congress devoted entirely to putting in the pens. it will endure for months and quite plausibly years as they stick it to benghazi. and they want to hurt the person they fear is unbeatable in 2016.

just listening to the chapting as they dwell on the incident they hope will puncture the political brand of the former secretary of state. they want her and every voter in the country when they hear the word benghazi to think hillary clinton. it's become an obsession bordering on cultism among republicans with even john boehner falling under its spell. you can almost smell the incense. benghazi, benghazi, benghazi. they keep chapting the word until it gets hillary to fall. could the cause of this bizarre right be a secret republican fear that while hillary clinton may be strongly positioned on the center left, they've got nobody on center right to stand up to her? now that christie got stuck on the bridge and jeb doesn't know whether he's going or coming. howard fineman is the editorial director of the huffing pon post. and michael hirsch is with political magds. in an article for politico, you called it the benghazi

industrial complex, quoting your piece. it's already too late for the truth. benghazi has taken on a cultural life of its own on the right. it's become embedded in the demonology of the conservative base. it's now short hand for a new generation of right wing conspiracy theorizing about the clintons that republican candidates know will excite conservative voters. benghazi has come to the 2010s what vince foster and whitewater were to the 1990s. you also say it's partly about making hillary clinton so disgusted with this nonsense she just decides to stay out of the race. tell us about your reporting, michael, how you' gotten into this, i think so well, but tell me what you know. >> well, first of all, chris, i don't think that benghazi has an issue would have much impact on hillary were she the nominee for president. i think the polls show that. >> to ple the bigger question is this week, her principle

ambivalence about running at all is getting back into this ugly political game that she has been dealing with for 20 years since sht lady and the vince foster allegations first came up. there's no accident that some of the conspiracy theorists are hawking back to vince foster and did he really commit suicide in the park and so forth? i think that's really the question. the question is she has not committed herself to getting into the race yet. does she really want to jump back into what she knows is going to be very, very ugly. i think that's where all of this benghazi conspiracy theorizing could have some impact on her. >> this almost near religious thing, howrd what, of this benghazi thing. and i have this weird sense about this, and everything is open to inquiry, it's like they don't want to inquire. they just want people to think bad, dark stuff. things evil happened here. and they don't really want to get to the bottom of it, if there is a bottom.

>> if they got to the bottom of it, they would find there wasn't much there and they would have to have think of something else to run 2014 and 2016 on. they want this to go on forever. they want a list of potential witnesses for this new select committee as long as the dictionary because they want to keep it going all the way through. there's some other elements here. i think mike's piece is absolutely terrific, but don't forget, the guy who's head of this new committee is a tea party guy from south carolina. he's all tea party. the tea party loved this from the beginning. it's a great fundraising thing. >> what does say? right before the election, kissinger said peace is at hand. a little bit early. but nobody is sitting around thinking about this. at worst, what the obama people are guilty of, at worst, and this is taking the toe pal republican argument, that i spun it a bit more in one direction than the other. okay? a.

>> that's all it is so far. they have to try to somehow prove there was premeditated intent to mislead based on actual knowledge of exactly what was going to lap and what happened. they're never going to find it. i think they know they're never going to find it. but as you say, it's a matter of faith, especially with the tea party and especially given the sort of demonization of hillary tradition that mike talks about. i will say this, though. i don't think based on the people i know and the reporting i've done that it's going to scare hillary off in the least. i think her view is she's seen the worst of it, she survived the worst of it and she will roll over these people especially because there's every possibility that the treys of the world are going to overplay their hand. >> hillary is a strong person. she ran for senate up in new york. can she walk away and say i quit because of benghazi? benghazi has become a code word

of sorts for the right. they're setting up a word association. hear the word benghazi, think hillary clinton. jason chafitz referenced clinton multiple times in regards to this -- i don't even want to call it a scandal. this thing. let's watch. >> i have a document in my hands, an internal state department bottom that hillary clinton's chief of staff on september 12, the state department told the president in the libyan congress that it was a terrorist organization that had committed these attacks. what happened, for instance, as journalist, uh yo do not know the answer as to why was the ambassador there? what happened, for instance, on april 6, 2012 when our facility was bombed. it was bombed again on june 12. the british ambassador has an assassination attempt. >> chris stevens, the ambassador was there because he wanted to be there. it was his call. that's the way the world work,

congressman. ambassadors make their own decisions. fox news host erik bolling made this accusation about why hillary clinton didn't go on the sunday shows that weekend. >> hillary clinton was the supposed to a, testify, and then b, go on those talk shows. and we asked the question, what's the reason for the terror attack and she was the one who would have had to have said well, it was the video that caused the attack. they knew she couldn't do that because she's going to -- she was going to run in 2016. and they could not throw her under the bus at that point. so she hits her head. she has to spend two weeks out of commission, can't testify, can't go on the talk shows and they send susan rice to do her dirty work. >> amazing how someone can talk with that blabber and no information. bolling didn't even get the timing right. the head injury occurred months after the sunday show appearances by rice. months after. and by the way, she did testify before congress. of course, some on the lunar right like that guy go even

furtherer. one tea partier blogged, this is how far they go now. hillary clinton, the butcher of benghazi. you're right on point here. this seems to be the only cartridge they have in their belt here, because i would go back to this. hillary clinton is a notch or two to the right on foreign policy from the president. especially on middle eastern politics. she's very much in the democratic center on thingings like trade where she's not so big for it, like bill. she's very much positioned right where you want to be in the sweet spot. they don't have a republican even close to the sweet spot to beat her. the closest was christie, and he's stuck on the bridge. >> yeah. i think their best shot frankly is to try to knock her out of the race before she decides to get into it. in other words, to deter her from entering because i do think, you know, there's no democratic field that can challenge her. i think everyone is in agreement on that. and you have others on the republican vied, with no one

able to take up the flag nationally at least yet. i do think that benghazi industrial complex, as we've called it, is largely about smearing her as best they can before any decisions are even made. >> but michael, why would this threat of a poo storm, to use a terrible phrase that she's just going to have to walk tlo this crap, basically. there's no way to work your way through it. if it isn't the failure to plan for more security or the incidents that night or the later spin, they just keep going from one issue to the other. they're never going to stop. i guess she's just going to say to herself, this is something i don't have to deal with. >> she is going to deal with it. her book, as mike -- >> books come much faster than the campaign. >> her book is coming. she's going to give as detailed an explanation as she ever has or ever will give. that's going to be the orthodoxy in that book. i think she's prepared for it.

>> by the way, her editors and publishers, they're going to vet it. they're going to say this has to directly hit the public concern here. and the right wing crazy as well. >> in fact, the investigations, the investigations have already taken place have said, in fact, there were administrative problems in the state department about security. and hillary has owned up to that. and she has said that her worst concern, her biggest regret as secretary of state is the fact that they didn't do more. but the republicans are going to have to try to prove that somehow she willfully, deliberately was not on her watch, which is imfobl show. i'm just saying. chris, it's for fundraising ultimately in the tea party. >> in oversea situations, especially in the countries like libya, still at war, had no real government, we were getting protected by militias in that area of benghazi. we have outposts that have been

attacked in ways that we're not prepared over in afghanistan. months after months would go with these terrible situation where is gis were stuck out in the middle of nowhere and overrun by taliban. this is life in a dangerous world. what do you think benghazi was like? it was a dangerous place. the chris stevens, who everybody loved had the guts to go into. and things broke bad. the militias weren't there to help them. they were on the other side. how many soldiers are we supposed to have following around diplomats in dangerous areas? you can't bring soldiers into those areas. those situations will not permit it. but anyway, that's too much common sense. >> it's been debunked. even the house armed services committee, majority republicans came to the conclusion that there was no way to militarily say stevens and the three other americans who died. the so even the republican right is divided on this question. you're right, stevens was in a very unusual situation. he knew a lot of these people because he had been there before. and so, you know, it was a

unique situation. but, you know, she does have to answer some questions about security procedures. there are legitimate questions here. it just doesn't have anything to do with a scandal that the republicans are trying to gin up. >> yeah. i'm also imprezzed with george will comes out and says basically the democrats would be smart not to participate in this so-called select committee. it must have dit heartened some of them. charles krauthammer, another huge brain on the right said basically they missed their chance on this baby the first time through. thank you, as always. howard, especially you. coming up, want to talk about a real scandal? how about the hype that got us into iraq. the smoking gun was going to be a nuclear mushroom cloud? that still heckles members of the bush administration. and the great proxy war in north carolina. three senate candidate, each with his own big-name sup poerts. rantd paul, mike huckabee and jeb bush for the accomplishment choice, of course. and the democrat, they love this

fight. and the jokes at the white house correspondent dinner tell us about some of the people who are thinking seriously of running in 2016. lots of nooifs in those jokes. >> let's face it, fox. you'll miss me when i'm gone. it will be harder to convince the american people that hillary was born in kenya. >> finally, let me finish to night with my grand experience yesterday before 60,000 students, parents and grandparents at the ohio state university. and this is "hardball." i don't . i love my son, but he never cleans up. always leaves a trail of crumbs behind. you're going to have a problem with getting a wife. uh, yeah, i guess. [ laughs ] this is ridiculous. christopher glenn! [ doorbell rings ] what is that? swiffer sweep & trap. i think i can use this. it picks up everything. i like this. that's a lot of dirt. it's that easy!

good job chris! i think a woman will probably come your way. [ both laugh ] republicans lead democrats by four points. 47 for republicans, 43 for democrats. that four-point margin may not

sound like a lot, but it's the highest at this point for republicans in "usa today's" polling in the past 20 years. we'll see. four years ago, the parties were tied at this point and republicans went on to win a net gain of 63 seats in the house.

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i want you to return my emails. i want you to keep me doing this for another sixty years. at kaiser permanente, we want you to choose the doctor that's right for you. find your perfect match at kp.org and thrive. the latest example of the maz security adviser at the time, condoleezza rice was invited to be the commencement speaker in new jersey, but students and faculty both protested her selection, citing comments like these from secretary rice. >> the problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly he can acquire nuclear weapons. but we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud. >> in a resolution calling for the university to rescind rice's

invitation, faculty members wrote, condoleezza rice played a prominent role in the bush administration's efforts to mislead the american people about the presence of weapons of mass destruction. this weekend, rice backed out of the commencement writing, rutgers invitation for me to speak has become a distraction for the university community. i understand understand and embrace the purpose and i'm simply unwilling to detract from it in any way. well, the state of the iraq war has not faded from those in the bush administration. you can see it right there. rut gers is just the latest land mine, if you will, off by a former push team member. and more of these lurk in the near future. as we await the release of the senate intelligence committee's torture report, not to mention another bush presidential campaign. both are msnbc political analysts 37 david, it seems to me there's a couple of issues here. one is a protocol, i've been lucky to be invited to.

i don't like people canceling anticipate pulling back. it seems like the invitation is sincere and accepted sincerely. in this case, i think the issue focuses on the iraq war. if i were a student protester or faculty member, i would say show up and explain why we got into that war. >> show up far debate on campus. >> in addition, yeah. >> or on its own. but to pay someone $35,000 -- >> oh, they paid her? >> oh, yes. $35,000. they're still paying her, even for not doing the speech. >> why do they pay people to give commencement addresses? >> i don't know. you can ask condoleezza rice why she didn't do it for free. but she was involved in this public policy disaster in which she herself was one of the key people who went out there and said things that either she knew was not true or it was her job to know was not true. she kept say, you know, the

tubes indicated they were developing weapons of mass destruction when she knew there was after debate about this. i think you could really hold her responsible. >> oh, i do. i like her personally, but i do. you know why? you missed the big baby. the big elephant in the room. when she said we don't want that smoking gun to become a nuclear mushroom cloud. she was saying we face nuclear war with iraq. are you crazy? >> and after ten years, it doesn't go away because the people who are dead are still dead. >> yeah. it will be interesting to see if there was a statute of limitations. clearly it has not run yet. and people's feelings are still raw. about her role in selling the iraq war. >> cheney is still out there who wouldholding his little salons for all these business guys sitting around. of course, we understand more than we did then. it's unbelievable. "w" has taken a bye here. he's become a fainter. it's hard to hate a painter.

>> i give condoleezza credit for being in the public sphere. it would have been nice if she had agreed to say a debate or to talk about the issue that those people wanted to talk about. >> but she, cheney, wolfowitz, rumsfeld, bush himself, they've never come to terms with this. in the books they've written, in any sort of public appearance, they've never shown any regret or come to even try to explain. bill krystal, krauthammer. they've gotten all a free pass on this. >> the pr, was it some impulsive mistake we all make. this was a deliberate campaign to get us into war. i call this the alley-oop play. this is judy miller from "the new york times" working with scooter libby and then working with the vice president. the alley-oop, you throw the ball near the basket and somebody tall puts it in. the coordinate effort to sell the iraq war to the american people was on full display on

september 8, 2002. a payment one new york times article by judith miller that had been fed to her by scooter libby was headlined. u.s. says hussein intensifies requests for a-bomb parts. the first sign of a smoking gun may be a mushroom cloud. then on "meet the press" edick cheney referenced a new york times story. the bush administration planted that very story. to make his point that saddam hussein was about to go nique leer. let's watch cheney in action. >> there's a story in "the new york times" this morning. and i want to attribute the "times" i don't want to talk obviously about specific intelligence sources, but it's now public that, in fact, he has been seeking to acquire and we have been able to intercept him and prevent him from acquiring through this particular channel the kinds of tubes that are

necessary to build a centrifuge. we do know with absolute certainty that he is using his procurementment system to acquire what he need to enrich uranium. >> people who care about this country watch "meet the press" to find out what's happening. ewe dimiller delivered scooter libby's stuff so that this guy on sunday morning could be there to talk about it. >> the key thing here, i hate to bring facts into this, but when he says we know with absolute certainty, at that time, there was a raging debate between the energy department experts and one guy at the cia over whether those tubes could be used for nuclear weapons. and all the real expert the said no. condoleezza rice was aware of that debate. they was in charge of coordinating this information. that's one of the biggest lies that she and cheney ever told. >> why did they do it? >> because if they gave people the real reasons or even a sophisticated argument for going to war against iraq. >> i never understood the reason.

the nuclear thing was never there. >> i think it was the grand idea of reshaping the middle east and creating -- you know, get rid of saddam -- >> i know the road to jerusalem runs through baghdad. the peace deal. >> exactly. >> why didn't they sell that? >> you try to sell that. you can't sell that. >> we think he may have weapons of mass destruction, we're not sure. we think this may lead to democracy, but who knows. we want to help israel, by the way, there's oil out there, too. . >> and we're going to give a huge boost to iran. we're going to really clear the decks for iran. >> you're so political because that's exactly what we left them with. a clan state. not a buffer. >> it's a client state of iran, which is now the great regional power. >> you wrote the book, but it's hard to believe that israel or any other country is safer now. >> iraq is still about to blow up.

>> i'm sorry about the way this was handled. maybe the people at rutgers should have checked out their faculty before they went and did this to avoid this. but it does make a statement, doesn't it? thank you, david corn and thank you eugene robinson. up next "saturday night live" finds that one person to vouch for donald sterming.

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much, we kept coming up with new inventive techniques that looked like they were designed by azssad and made by willie wonka. >> penny winkies. >> that's right, penny winkies. a delightful cousin of the throaty tug tug and the tickly wickly seats. whether you're boiling people alive or putting them to sleep by a tiny injection, in the end, you are getting the same result. >> gallous mu nor there. john sterling may have been banned for life from the nba but the folks at saturday night live found at least one former player who might be willing to vouch for his character. guess who? >> despite what you heard, i still have plenty of nba players that love me, like my dear friend, mr. dennis rodman.

>> all right. hey, listen, this is a good man. he's real cool. you all got to stop this. i know because i'm above all a good judge of character. and this is one of the greatest men i've ever met. right up there with my main man glorious leader kim jong-un. [ speaking korean ] >> only in america. finally, a tennessee lawmaker became the latest republican politician to compare the president's health care law to nazi germany. by stacy campfield took it to an unfortunately new level. here's what he said on his website's blog this morning, quote, democrats bragging about the number of mandatory sign-ups for obama care is like germans bragging about the number of mandatory sign-ups for train

rides for jews in the '40s. if he thought he was being funny, his state's republican party chairman certainly did not. he denounced the comment as ignorant and repugnant and demanded that campfield apologized. good for him. but he doubled down, releasing this statement, kwet quote, i regret that some people missed the point of my post. it was not to offend. it was to warn. and at no point in our history have we ever faced a federal government and administration with a lower regard for human life. and that is something i cannot and will not allow to go unchallenged. 186,000 people killed in that last war under the republican leadership. anyway, up next, a preview of coming attractions. it's jeb bush versus rand paul and mike huckabee in a proxy war in the tar heel state. .

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>> welcome back to "hardball." the 2014 primary season gets under way tomorrow in north carolina where three republican senate candidates, each backed by a potential top tier presidential candidate in 2016

are vying to take on kay hagen. the primary contest has become a microcosm of what the party's 2016 presidential primaries are shaping up to be. the establishment faction of the gop, represented by jeb bush and mitt romney is backing north carolina house speaker tom tillis, hoping to kel h cut off another tom achen candidate. the man they're worried is greg brannon being backed by rand paul and wants to force tillis into a runoff. and mike huckabee is backing fellow minister mark harris. alice stew wrart is a former adviser to the presidential campaigns of mike huckabee, michelle bachmann and rick santorum. we've got to go to alice first. it's an inside game for you. my question is, how does this thing work? if tillis wins, does he bring the tea partier wing, does he bring in the christian right?

do they all join him for the general against kay haguen? or is this going to be a schism in the party that lasts? >> no. he will unite them just as he has done as speaker. the fact that he's labelled as the establishment candidate he thinks is kind of amusing. he reminds me, and reminds everyone, that he used to be pta president just eight years ago. he's certainly not the establishment candidate of the gop. he's not only the support and endorsement of jeb bush and other strong republicans, but also he's got tea party support, the nra, the national right to life and other social organizations. he has already brought them into the fold as speaker in north carolina. and he certainly would plan to do so if he were to win the nomination tomorrow. >> it's interesting. you make your point by a different perspective. he's not a liberal. he's not a moderate. they're all pretty right hard candidates. >> it's right, far right and extreme right.

he may not be an establishment candidate in the sense that he doesn't want to be known as such. but he is running against a tea party candidate and a christian conservative. and he's basically picked up the mitt romney kind of coalition of the middle reasonable republican. >> let's take a look at some of the points of view here. there's not much light between these. let's listen to bannon and then tom tillis. >> the bill of rights does not grant one given right. the federal government could never infringe upon. the first law of natural raw is personal security. so the federal government shouldn't even be part of that law. local laws, state laws will take care of the violent criminals. >> find a way to divide and conquer people who are on assistance. we have to show respect for that woman who has serie ball palsy and has no choice in her condition that needs help and that we should help.

and we need to get those folks to look down at these people who choose to get into a condition that makes them dependent on the government and say at some point you're on your own. we may end up taking care of those babies but we're not going to take care of you. >> i'm going to get back to you. this is a big republican thing, getting people off welfare. forcing them off welfare. basically, treating them, as he did, as bombs. people who shouldn't be on public scenes but are because they're lazy. we have to get people with medical problems who need medical support to attack the people that he, the speaker of the house in north carolina sees as basically the free leaders, the bums. it's pretty clear what his attitude is towards people on public assistance here, isn't it? >> if you look at both of those sound bites what we're hearing from 9 candidates in north carolina and harris is the same, they want smaller government,

limited government. and speaker tillis made it quite clear that sound bite is in the context of making sure that if assistance is needed by those, whether they are the sick or elderly or disabled, the help that is needed to get to them gets to them. and it's not being taken away by those who take advantage of the system. >> what did he just say? that's not what he just said in the tape. he said you have to pay people who are sick and needy and sic them on as people you see as free loaders. i don't know why you're denying what he just said. he said it. >> the context of what he's saying is making sure that people don't take advantage of the system. and any assistance that is provided to people, whether it's north carolina or of this country is the assistance gets to those who need it and not allow people to take advantage of the system. and that's the context of what he was saying. >> just to repeat myself so it doesn't seem like i'm hectoring his wonderful guest.

this is what tillis, the moderate in the race said. and we need to get these people to look down at those people who choose to get into a condition that makes them dependent of the government. look down on them. >> this is a 20 14r version of the 47% remark. i'm not surprised in one sense that mitt romney is supporting this guy. these are the people that he's going to stand up to because that's what he's going to get there to do. it's interest, i think we're going to hear this comment a lot more as the campaign plays on. this is going to become what tillis is known for. this race hasn't really started to be engaged on both sides. kay haguen has this and i'm sure we're going to see a lot more of it. >> it does seem odd to have a leader of a state, who you talked to on the phone, saying our goal here is to get the sick people to attack the poor people. >> no, chris, what his point was and the context of what he said was to make sure we get

assistance to those who need it and stop enabling those who take advantage of the system. that's his point. >> wait a minute. what's the -- what was he saying to the people of cerebral palsy, get out there and look down on people on public assistance who you think shouldn't be on it. join an army against the poor people. what's the point of bringing the sick people into a battle with the poor people? what's the idea here? >> the context, chris, as i said, is to make sure that the assistance gets to those who need it. and if you want to look at the numbers, the fact of the matter is that he is doing well in n next. his numbers are head to head against kay haguen. he is doing well. >> i think you're right. >> if you look at kay haguen, she has just as much disapproval ratings as barack obama. and what we're going to see tomorrow is a clear referendum for someone that they believe can take her on in november. >> just get somebody on at some opponent, if you care about tillis to explain why he wants to recruit an army of the sick

to go after an army of the poor. it's weird. it's not your fault what he said, i don't know. you're trying to explain it. up next, middle of the nasty jokes at the twhous correspondent dinner. we learned a lot about who's running for president in 2016. that's coming up. a little fun, a little bit of noise here, too.

>> coming back with the nastiness at the saturday night white house correspondent dinner and what it tells us about who's

really running in 2016.

>> it was pretty rough out there at the weekend's white house correspondent dinner. it was saturday night and the evening featured its barrage of punch lines and cheap shots. as much as anything was about jokes, so called, it was also about pouring salt into open political wounds. and some people think that president obama was designating hillary clinton as his successor while treating his own vice president joe biden as a punch line. here he is. >> let's face it, fox. you'll miss me when i'm gone.

it will be harder to convince the american people that hillary was born in ken dia. >> it's a long time between now and 2016 and anything can happen. you may have heard the other day hillary had to dodge a flying shoe at a press conference. >> mao did he get them to pose for that? joe mchale didn't hold back either. his gags were also about hillary as president and biden again as laugh line. >> it's crazy again to think that joe biden is only one heart beat away from no one taking him seriously as president. >> hillary clinton has a lot going for her as a candidate. she has experience, she's a natural leader and as our first female president, we could pay her 30%less. >> sick stuff. anyway, biden and hillary

weren't the only contenders lampooned. it was open season for the 2016 field, especially chris christie who was there in attendance. april ryan and chris, april, it does seem pretty rough for the president. i know he and joe biden are friends dearly personal friends from what we can all figure. to basically write him off, saying hillary was going to be his successor. >> i don't think he wrote him off, but there's several factors in play. the president and this white house are trying to be neutral because they are aligned with both sides. the biden side and the clinton side, which is still that major machine, no matter the negative. and you have to understand that joe biden, i mean, even though, and i said it before, and i'll say it again, they tried to get joe biden with swag with that videotape saturday night. joe biden is this cool guy in aviator glasses driving a sexy

yellow sports car and getting a tattoo. they're trying to change his image as well, so there's a lot more going on for biden trying to bolster him up to this presidential guy who's not sticking his foot in the mouth where hillary has already made, even with the negatives that were joked about her husband at the dinner, the hillary machine is still, i guess, a little bit stronger and there is a truth in these jokes. >> chris, i disagree with april. i thought he just nailed them. i'm sorry, you have an opinion, i have one. >> yes, you do. >> my opinion is by saying my successor, hillary clinton, that's how you're saying this is my successor, it's a fact of life. >> i wrote about it today too, chris. i noticed that joke, the kenya joke that you played, it's a joke, of course, but i always say to people, in politics, there's nothing coincidental and accidental and that goes triple when you're speaking to a room that's maybe 1500 to 2,000 political reporters as well as

lots of major donors, elected officials. i just think the biden as class clown, not class president dynamic is dangerous for him. that's always been the question. you read any profile of the guy, from 2008 onward when he ran a second time. can he be serious enough? yeah, he's the guy with the raybans, but is that what we want in a president? and i think that's what it keeps coming back to. if that's the sort of story out there about him, even though he's the sitting vice president of the united states -- >> that wasn't -- april, when did that start? >> it wasn't always. it wasn't always. >> when did it start? >> let me say this to you. when we first look at a contender, presidential contender, it's his look. you can say whatever you want to say, but barack obama, many people contend he has, quote unquote, swag. he's rock star in chief. he looked presidential. bill clinton looked presidential. john kennedy looked presidential.

when you have that look, people want that. and then behind that look, they start listening to you. if you stick your foot in your mouth, there's a problem. >> okay. i want you to go at this guy. here's chris christie, does he have the look you're looking for? he was in attendance last night. neither president obama or joel mchale could resist. here's mchale ripping into christie for his response to the bridge scandal. >> governor, do you want bridge jokes or size jokes because i have a bunch of both, i can go half and half. i know you like a combo platter. i get that, i'm sorry for that joke, governor christie, i didn't know i was going to tell it, but i take full responsibility for it. whoever wrote it will be fired. but the buck stops here, so i will be a man and own up to it, just as soon as i get to the bottom of how it happened because i was unaware it happened until just now. i'm appointing a blue ribbon commission of me to investigate the joke i just told.

if i find any wrongdoing on my part, i assure you, i will be dealt with. i just looked into it, it turns out i am not responsible for it. justice has been served. >> april, that is great satire. that is great -- isn't it rich? >> it's very rich. >> the whole explanation for the last several months into one big, fat joke. >> exactly. it's like we're watching one of these reality crossover tv shows. let me tell you, something he was very interesting. he told me before -- we were sitting right next to -- joel mchale and i were sitting right next to one another at the dinner and he basically told me he was going in on christie. and i said oh. and i knew in my mind what it was about, it was about the weight. now, the issue is did he go too far? some people are saying yes. i mean just for political correctness and politeness, you know, to talk about someone's

weight is kind of bad and then do it in their face. >> you are so nice. you've been nice to joe biden and the president, to chris christie, you are so nice. thank you for coming on. >> i try to be. >> "hardball" is the name of the show, just remember that. chris, i read you, i love you, i learn from you, sir. thank you so much for coming on. we'll be right back after this. i procrastinated... on buying a car for... because i knew...

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trwith secure wifie for your business. it also comes with public wifi for your customers. not so with internet from the phone company. i would email the phone company to inquire as to why they have shortchanged these customers. but that would require wifi. switch to comcast business internet and get two wifi networks included. comcast business built for business. let me finish tonight with my experience yesterday at the ohio state university.

there i was looking out over 60,000 students, parents, grandparents and friends of the ohio state graduating class. my message was what you can learn from the successful leaders of this country. my first example was the importance of simply showing up is what separates the winners from the losers. the point is you have to get out there and make the connection. i spoke of how ronald reagan used his radio job covering the chicago cubs to get out to hollywood and get that first screen test, the one that got his career going in the movies. i spoke of how reagan continued to show up, even after his hollywood career faded. how he took whatever jobs he could get, including those in the new medium of television and ended up as a bigger career as host of general theater which i watched every sunday night growing up. even after he had gotten beaten by gerald ford in 1976, reagan went up on that platform at the republican convention and gave a speech that put him right back in the running for 1980. i spoke of how bill clinton, even after getting beaten for re-election as arkansas governor

went out campaigning the next day and ended up getting re-elected four times. now another guy got beaten for u.s. congress in chicago and then drove out with nothing but a map sitting in the passenger seat to parts of illinois where people had never voted for someone like him, least of all someone named barack obama. i told the ohio state graduates that whether it's a wedding you're invited to or a reunion that's come up or a job you want, you should show it with all the gusto you can muster. life is for people that are there, not sitting at home waiting for the phone to ring or their e-mail to get a reply. you've got to the in the other person's face, that nobody is coming door to door to see what you're like, what talents you have, what dreams you have when you put your head on the pillow at night. nobody is coming. you need to get out there and ask and never, ever say no to yourself. there's nothing i think is more important than giving young people the right advice about life, and to me what i have to offer is experience watching this country's leaders in action, learning what works for

them, what gets them to where they want to be. i love being at ohio state. i appreciate more than you can believe the generous welcome i received from everyone, even the conservatives in the crowd. i didn't go to sell my political philosophy, i went to help those young people, give them a little bit of an edge in what you and i know is a challenging world out there. if i helped just one young woman or one young man get his or her foot in the door, it was worth the effort. that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. "all in with chris hayes" starts right now. good evening from new york, i'm chris hayes. tonight we are taking you inside one of the most contentious battles in the country, the fight to sell safer, smarter guns in america. a battle that pits proponents of a game-changing technology that could save countless lives against a gun rights establishment determined to prevent si