the morning. if you thought gridlock on capitol hill had sunk to an all-time low, congress confirms it can go lower. the 113th congress is shaping up to be the least productive on record. it will pass just 127 laws. that's even worse than the last one, which was one of the most unproductive and unpopular congresses in popular history. but the 112th congress was more productive than this one. by this point in 2012, that congress had passed 147 bills. with just five legislative days to go before members head home to their districts for a five-week august recess, it's looking less and less likely that lawmakers will do anything to solve a couple of problems that a few weeks ago had every member saying needed to be dealt with. they were crises of the moment that needed action. first, there was the situation on the border. this afternoon president obama will meet with the presidents of guatemala, el salvador and honduras. he spoke with the president of mexico last night and with congress gridlocked, the white

house is looking into what it can do alone, acknowledging to nbc that it is weighing a pilot program that would potentially allow hundreds of hondurans to enter the united states after applying for refugee visas in their home country. now, if the program is successful, it could be adopted in guatemala and el salvador as well. the proposal first first reported by "the new york times." white house officials contend the "times" makes it seem as if they're more open to refugees. what the white house says the idea is, is to do this in speeding up the no that folks would get, to have it happen before they come into this country and suddenly the 2008 law which kept them here longer, made it harder to be a deportation, gets invoked. ahead of their white house meeting, the central american presidents are questioning the idea of beefed up border funds and are asking the united states for more direct aid into their countries. honduras' president told "the

washington post," quote, if you look at the root of the problem, you'll realize that your country has enormous responsibility for this. he's of course referring to drug trafficking to the u.s. as the root of the problem. meanwhile homeland security secretary jay johnson warned that this gridlock on capitol hill is going to cripple his ability to respond to this border crisis. >> if it doesn't pass, we're going to run out of money to deal with this, and i've got my cfo working overtime without sleep trying to figure out how we are going to pay for this if congress doesn't act. and basically that's not an option, because i'm going to have to dial back all the things we've done to surge resources, to deal with this spike unless congress acts. >> republicans are meeting right now on the hill, but action from congress in the next five days does not look promising. house appropriations chairman hal rogers said thursday he did not expect to release a border bill until the beginning of next week at the earliest. speaker boehner is already

preemptively blaming the president for pulling back on his effort to amend the 2008 push trafficking law. >> this is a problem of the president's own making. and then he tries -- says he wants to solve the problem so that we can stop this influx, but then he changes his mind. we've got a president that's awol. and the president ought to get engaged in this if he actually wants something to happen. >> what republican leadership is contending is that unless the president encourages democrats to support changes to the 2008 law, it's unclear what could pass the house. on the senate side, democratic aides don't anticipate that anything is going to move before the recess if it's clear that the house won't act. senate republicans don't want to have the bill hung around their necks during the recess if it's not going to become law. now it's becoming clear that some democrats are starting to feel the same way. mary landrieu says she plans to vote no on the plan.

west virginia's joe manchin is also leaning no. and the republican sponsors of last year's immigration bill are making it clear without changes to that 2008 law they won't support it. the white house still says they support changing the law. they haven't made a big campaign-style push among democrats to be with them on this, but they are working over senator dianne feinstein. she is the one who authored the original provision, the original 2008 law, and they're hoping that maybe she'll support an amendment to it that could possibly change things there. it's something that she claims she's looking at very carefully. the administration believes it needs more flexibility, she says, and has given her the legislative language to consider. we'll see if she decides to support it. now white house aides acknowledge they are working with feinstein but they're not optimistic. they believe if they can get her to change her mind on the 2008 law, then things could move. but they are not hopeful at this point. they're more pessimistic that they will not get their supplemental border bill, at

least before august. maybe, maybe they get that in the budget bill, the spending bill, the continuing resolution that happens in september. now, earlier this year congress passed veterans legislation to fix widespread delays in care. it passed the house 426-0. in the senate, it passed 93-0. but guess what, yesterday negotiations overcome biening the two bills disintegrated completely with lawmakers disagreeing over how much money should be spent. >> it is no great secret to the american people that the congress today is dysfunctional. and despite enormous problems we are getting virtually nothing done for the people of our nation. >> senator john mccain has called the stalemate embarrassing, saying these are shameful chapters. yesterday 16 major veterans organizations wrote to congress pleading for them to get it done. one piece of, quote unquote, legislation that is making progress on capitol hill, speaker boehner's plan to sue the president. that's moving forward after

being approved by a house committee and we expect it to get a vote on the floor next week. economic inequality is one of the issues president obama has tried to tackle on his own and with little success to point to so far. now one of the president's 2012 opponents is trying to craft a more compassionate republican response to the problem. former vice presidential nominee and house budget chairman paul ryan put out his own anti-poverty plan this week. ryan prides himself as being a jack kemp republican. kemp arguably was the last major republican who worked to break the stereotype that his party doesn't care about the poor. ryan may have been motivated by his own misstep a few months ago when he was criticized for blaming poverty on the tailspin of culture in our inner cities. at the heart of the ryan plan is a proposal to take more than $100 billion that's pipelined through 11 federal assistance programs and turn it into a single revenue stream sent directly to the states themselves. then the states would figure out how the money gets spent.

here's what he told the american enterprise institute yesterday. >> this new simplified stream of funding would become the opportunity grant and it would be budget neutral. the state would get the same amount of money as they would under current law, and not a penny less. in effect, the state would say give us some space and we can figure this out. >> under ryan's plan, state proposals would have to meet four criteria. it would have to direct all the funding to people in need. the state would have to hold people accountable through work requirements and to make sure the money is getting to the right people. the state would have to encourage more innovative programs and offer enough service providers to give people more choice and it would have to agree to use a neutral third party to keep track of how the state plan is working. a few other proposed changes include expanding the earned income tax credit for some workers and using block grants to fund education at the state level. all this comes against a backdrop of growing poverty

across the country. latest census figures show in 2012 more than 46 million people were below the poverty line, the highest the census has. >> reporter:ed in 50 years. some democrats are pushing back against ryan's plan. because the grants aren't as flexible as federal funding, they argue it would ultimately cut the social safety net. >> we want to put poor people in some kind of catch-22. and sending this money to the states, if my colleague's plan was in fact implemented, would be disastrous. just think about the states that won't even implement the affordable care act. poor people would be in serious trouble. >> joining me now, wisconsin republican congressman and the chairman of the house budget committee, paul ryan. congressman ryan, good morning to you, sir. >> good morning, chuck. >> let's talk about how -- give me an idea, if you have in your head, of what you think would be the ideal way a state might use your idea, your plan here, to

create an anti-poverty program that would work. >> the ideal way would be similar to how catholic charities already does it in states like wisconsin but without federal assistance. luther ran social services, america works. so there are already service providers out there, public, private, not for profit charities that do a very good job of customized case management of tailoring benefits to a certain need of a particular problerson. each person has a unique circumstance and need yet the federal government treats it all the same. so the vision here is let's customize aid to the person's need to focus on getting them from where they are to where they want to be, which is a good job and a good career. and by having local casework management, a person working with this individual, customizing the aid to meet their need. maybe she needs more child care and transportation. maybe this person needs more

skills training and education. customizing it so that you can get them to get their life back on track. the problem is our safety net isn't really working the way it ought to be. we have all these government programs with all these rules and regulations that are stove pipes of fragmented program that say don't make a lot of sense. if the status quo would be working, i'd be supporting it. it's not. we have the highest poverty rates in a generation, yet we're spending unprecedented dollars on these programs. so let's take those dollars and spend it more effectively to actually focus on results, outcomes, getting people actually out of poverty and customizing benefit to each person's particular needs. >> how much do you think the poverty -- the increase in poverty is simply the great recession and are we looking at this at a moment in time and saying, you know what, this is a huge rise now. this will subside on its own regardless of what the federal government does?

>> no, i think there's some cyclicality to it but it's really pretty sticky. these rates have been stubbornly high for far too long and there are unique circumstances in each person's life that irrespective of the recession have propped up high poverty rates. so, no, i don't think that this is simply because of the recession and i do believe that these 20th century programs written at a time when you had this sort of government one size fits all notion are ineffective for the 21st century at a time when we see great success stories out there. the point is, chuck, i've been around the country and there are fantastic things happening out in our country. we should empower those good works, listen to the boots on the ground and get local service providers, people who actually know the people in poverty, know where the jobs are, know how to get them on their feet and back together again, work with them and not against them or displace them, which is unfortunately one of the inadvertent results of

today's federal poverty programs. >> obviously the concern with some democrats on this plan, particularly of empowering the states, is that not every state will be as compassionate as you are and not every state -- so how do you make sure that that isn't the case and we don't see -- i mean you look at some of these states. you look where they have cut benefits and the poverty level has grown where they do have some of these -- some control to take federal dollars and cut it. >> so this isn't just your generic father's block grant. this is very different. it's a collapsing of the funding streams to go to the person, but there are requirements. a rot of federal requirements. first of all, the federal government has to approve the plan in the first place to make sure that the state has an effective plan in place to get these dollars and these services to the person in need. they can't take the money and spend it on something else. >> would this be part of hhs -- >> it would be an existing agency here in the federal government. >> which agency? >> that's something we can figure out later.

probably hhs, but that's, again, those particular details are clearly something we can get to. the point -- let me get to the point, chuck. the point is you have to target to these people in need. it's got to meet these requirements. oh, and by the way, we need to measure. that's the other thing. we don't really measure whether these programs today are working or not, so we need to have third-party measurement so that we don't have a service provider or a government cooking the books. we need objective measurements to see what works so we can learn lessons on how to improve going forward. i think that's just the outcome kind of based policy making we need to get to these days which we are not doing. >> now, it's interesting. your poverty plan is numberswise sort of conflicts with your budget plan. in your budget plan you call for some cuts in certain anti-poverty programs, including food stamps. you're not calling for that here, you're actually calling for some expansion of the earned income tax credit. so which -- which paul ryan

proposal is the one -- does this mean you would change your budget proposal to reflect your new poverty plan? >> i didn't want to get into a debate other the funding levels of the status quo. we could keep doing that over and over again. i want to talk about how to reform the status quo. the fact is that this program could occur under any funding level. i just didn't want to get into a debate about how much money do we spend on x, ymplt and z existing program. i want to focus on how do we change these government programs and reform these things. >> so we should ignore your budget proposal on some of these programs? >> no, chuck. what i'm trying to tell you is let's not focus on dollars and cents of the status quo, let's focus on reforming these programs so they work more effectively and then we can decide what level of funding is appropriate. on the earned income tax credit i'm proposing specific spending cuts to pay for the expansion of the the reason i think we could expand the earned income credit is i think that's a successful program. of looking at all that the

federal government does in the poverties base, it's pretty effective because it makes work pay. it brings people into the workforce. of all the people who are less likely to be in the workforce, 20% of childless adults between the age of 21 and 25 aren't working or aren't even in school. so this is a population that we want to get into the workforce and raising the eitc i think raises the incentives and rewards work and helps bring people into the workforce. >> before i let you go, a lot of chatter about congressional gridlock. one item on the republican house agenda, this lawsuit against the president. is this a productive thing for house republicans to be focused on in an election queyear? >> we're working on border security, foreign policy and many things at one time so it's not as if this displaces action on other items. we are very concerned about the lawlessness of the administration exceeding the executive branch's authority. the traditional constitutional way would be for congress to

exercise its power through the power of the purse. unfortunately, the senate is not interested in maintaining the prerogatives and the authority of the legislative branch and so that's why the speaker feels compelled to do this. >> and you support the speaker in this? >> i will vote for it. >> okay. paul ryan, republican from wisconsin, the 2012 vice presidential nominee. a fascinating new plan that you put out there. we're going to get a democratic response from chris van hall enafter the break. thank you, sir. >> thank you. you can catch more from congressman paul ryan, a much more extended interview this sunday on "meet the press" with david gregory. before we go to break, a quick look at today's planner. we've told you about the president's meeting with central american leaders. chris christie is campaigning in illinois today. he's been around the country all week long doing the business of the republican governors. we'll be right back. you want to save money on car insurance? no problem. you want to save money on rv insurance?

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before the break you heard from house budget committee chairman paul ryan describing his anti-poverty program. one of the leading voices criticizing the plan is maryland congressman chris van hollen. congressman, good morning to you, sir. >> good morning, chuck. >> so specifically i know the democratic charge is you don't like the block grant idea. i guess my question then is, then you must not like how the white house is allowing states to make up their own ways of medicaid expansion. how is what ryan is proposing that much different than what the white house is allowing so many states like indiana and iowa to do with their own versions of medicaid expansion? here's some money, we'll design a plan. how is that not similar to what paul ryan is calling for?

>> it's different in this way. what the administration is proposing with respect to medicaid does allow states to have waivers in certain areas on a case-by-case basis. what mr. ryan is proposing is a wholesale block grant of many programs, including the food and nutrition program, which we've always had as a guarantee for people at the lowest income levels to make sure that in their most difficult times at least they will get that food and nutrition assistance. under the ryan plan that guarantee is taken away, whereas when it comes to medicaid, no one is taking away your right to get medical assistance. that is a fundamental problem and that is the biggest single component of the 11 programs that the ryan plan would collapse. chuck, i do need to emphasize the point you raised, this total disconnect between what chairman ryan said yesterday and his budget. if you look at the 11 programs

under his budget, he would cut them in his budget by over 20% compared to current levels. so while he's saying today he's not going to deal with these in his budget, the budget they actually voted on has dramatic cuts, which put more people into poverty. >> let's take his plan as word in this respect and let me ask you this. why shouldn't states -- i mean i guess what i understand is with poverty programs, the administration is in favor of states designing their own education standards. the administration is in favor of designing its own ways of how to deal with medicaid. what's wrong with coming up with a program, and maybe you tighten it a little more than what ryan is proposing, because every state has a different challenge when it comes to some of their poverty issues that they design a program that maybe -- that isn't necessarily something that just fits in what the federal government says to do. >> well, as you indicated with respect to medicaid, that's already done.

and it's also already done in many of these other areas. if paul ryan wants to propose taking some of these programs, not including the fundamental guarantee of food and nutrition programs, and allow more flexibility with oversight, that's certainly something we can look at. but again, the battle here on capitol hill that has been most heated has been over the food and nutrition programs. that's what the republican budgets have been going after. and this proposal would really put that guarantee in the cross-hairs. let me just give you one more example, chuck, because this is an example of watch what people do, not what they say. so you heard paul ryan embrace the idea of expanding the earned income tax credit, which is a tax credit for low income workers. he proposes to expand that to include workers who don't have kids, childless adults. that's a proposal the president has, it's a proposal house democrats have put forward and we embrace that idea.

but here on the house floor today, house republicans are going to vote on a bill that dramatically scales back the child tax credit, which is a tax credit for low income workers with kids. and in doing that, they're going to put 12 million more americans into poverty, including six million kids. i urge everybody to look at this debate and vote on the floor of the house today. so we're a little troubled about a speech yesterday on poverty, totally at odds with actions today on the floor of the house that will put more kids, six million more american kids into poverty. >> hey, i want to ask you, speaking of speeches, one of -- in president obama's acceptance speech in charlotte in 2012, he said -- he talked up his plan to cut the deficit by $4 trillion and it left the implication this was something that was going to get tackled. you're on the budget committee,

you have been playing point in many ways for democrats in the house. are we going anywhere with deficit reduction? we're two years removed from the president talking about during the campaign a pledge to cut the budget -- to cut the budget by $4 trillion. are we going anywhere now? >> so two things, chuck. as you know, the deficit has come down dramatically in the last four years, as the economy has improved and as we've done two things. we have had spending cuts and we've also had the repeal of the tax breaks for the highest income earners. that has helped. now, if you look at the long-term deficit picture, we certainly need to do more. i know the president is disappointed that he hasn't gotten support from our republican colleagues for his balanced approach, which says we've got to do more targeted spending cuts and some reforms absolutely. but we also have to close these corporate tax breaks to help reduce the deficit.

and the republican position has been very clear and unmoving on this, which is they refuse to close a single corporate tax break or other tax break for the purpose of reducing the deficit. and if you don't take that balanced approach, you're not going to get there without hurting a lot of americans. >> okay, chris van hollen, ranking member on the house budget committee, maryland democrat, thanks for coming on. good to talk to you, sir. >> good to talk to you, chuck. up next, calls for a day of rage today after protests turned deadly in the west bank. palestinians clashed with israeli forces. they were outraged by the attack in gaza at this u.n. school. these images of bloodied floors of that school in gaza that was packed with hundreds of people seeking shelter under u.n. protection. we'll have more details coming up after the break. first, today's tdr 50 question. who was president when oklahoma opened on broadway? the first person to tweet the correct answer to @chucktodd

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well, the fighting between israel and hamas is intensifying. but so are the talks aimed at reaching just even a temporary cease-fire. secretary of state john kerry remains in cairo. he's meeting with egypt's foreign minister and the u.n. secretary general about a possible five-day truce deal. last night a protest in the west bank turned violent as palestinian demonstrators tried to march to jerusalem. palestinian health officials say 809 people have been killed so far since july 8th when this hot war began. 5600 more, that's right, 5600 have been wounded. in israel 32 soldiers and three civilians have been killed, more than 120 wounded. nbc news foreign correspondent ayman mohyeldin has the latest

from gaza. ayman, it's this strike on this u.n. school. a little bit of rhetoric from both sides here. israel implying that perhaps it was hamas that did this. any evidence to that? >> reporter: well, the evidence that israel has been citing as it has in the past is the report that actually came out by the united nations throughout this conflict that there were two vacant schools in which they found rockets they believe belonged to hamas. now again these were two vacant schools, not schools housing palestinians as the one that was hit yesterday. the israeli military for its part is saying that yes, in fact there was fighting taking place in and around the school with hamas fighters, but they are also telling nbc news that there may have been a possibility it was an israeli mortar that landed at that school that led to the killings so today the israeli military is suggesting an errant mortar may have landed

on the school. they are not taking full responsibility, they are saying an investigation will be launched. so too is the united nations. but the united nations for its part believes this was an israeli attack. not intentionally but nonetheless an israeli attack. they say it's the fourth such attack at a u.n. school in as many days, chuck. >> where are you on the idea of a temporary truce? when you look at the public relations side of things, israel sounds like they would love to try to find a way out, some sort of truce. is hamas ready to agree to anything? >> reporter: hamas has been very adamant about its position saying that it will not have a cease-fire unless it addresses the fundamental issue of lifting the siege on the blockade on gaza. for the past six years since 2008 or so they have had three different wars with the israelis. none of them have proud a lifting of the blockade as promised after each one of those conflicts. this time around they're really trying to stick to their position. what secretary of state john kerry is trying to achieve is

a -- to get under way but during that cease-fire hamas wants the israeli ground forces to withdraw entirely from the gaza strip. israel says it will not do that. that's a huge leverage point it has for the negotiations. it also says it needs to maintain that ground position until it destroys the tunnels that it says runs under gaza. so they have the opportunity of expanding the operation even further, chuck. >> ayman mohyeldin in gaza for us. a shot there, a little freezing now and then but we got it all in. ayman, thanks very much. please stay safe. well, it was 45 years ago that americans watched in awe as neil armstrong and buzz aldrin planted a flag on the moon. my colleague, nbc's jay barberry has covered every american space flight since. my conversation with jay about the greatest technological event of our lifetime and what he thinks about the stalled u.s. space program. [ female announcer ] for a brilliant smile there's a breakthrough in whitening.

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>> it's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. >> 45 years ago this month, july 20th, 1969, americans watched as apollo 11 commander neil armstrong became the first human to walk on the moon. before his death in 2012, armstrong told an audience that some experts predicted it would be too difficult to walk on the moon. >> but the human is remarkably adaptive and what we found out was that by the time we had just stood around in the cockpit for a couple hours, we were completely adapted. when we walked down off of the craft onto the surface, we already were right at home. and you'd really like it! >> what great enthusiasm. nbc's own jay barbree covered

that moment along with all of the other 165 astronaut flights and landings. he's now written a new book with fascinating new details from inside the space program called "neil armstrong, a life of flight." the author and long time nbc news correspondent and maybe my favorite colleague here at nbc, jay barbree joins me. jay, i think about all the other astronauts and many of them are larger than life figures. they went on to do other things larger than life. some of them are famous television commercial guys. but neil arguably speaking the most famous sentence in the 20th century. he really was a reserved guy. >> yeah, he never i ingratiated himself. he was happy living on his dairy farm. if his family was fed, clothed, everybody was generally happy,

that's about all neil wanted. he enjoyed life of a small town. it was a little town of 6,000 population. i was born in a town of 5,000 population. john after his passing, he said jay, you need to write this book. john just turned 93, the rest of the apollo astronauts are in their 80s. we all realized that we're in god's waiting room. if we're going to do this book, we better get it done now and get it out. we worked hard on it for a couple of years and hopefully we have it out. it's now on "the new york times" best-selling list and, you know, we're very proud of it. >> it was interesting about your introduction in the book. you said it was very important to neil that this be so factually correct, and in fact you write about some stuff here that nasa is not going to be happy about. share a tidbit or two. >> well, you know, they lied to

us about the rest period on the -- once they landed there. they said they were going to give them a four-hour rest period. well, what neil wanted to do as soon as possible was get the heck off of the lunar lander, get a sample and bring it back. of course after landing on the moon, that's what you want to do. you're not thinking about resting or sleeping. but they were afraid that they would have difficulty securing the lunar module under 1-6 gravity, chuck, so they thought they'd be at this for quite some time, so they told us that they were sleeping. well, they weren't sleeping. we found out a lot of other things from neil that we revealed in the book. we wanted this book to be for history. we wanted it in the libraries and so far it's going that way. >> obviously neil, before he passed away, was working with you in some ways to try to sort of bring the focus back to the importance of nasa, the importance of space exploration. it's taken a back seat.

it's taken a back seat here in america. it's taken a back seat in a lot of places. he was very passionate about this. what was his solution of trying to sort of re-engage americans into the importance of the space program? >> well, chuck, you know you and i talked about this several times. we were reporting back at the time what was happening, because it's been 42 years since we've been out of earth orbit with an astronaut. and richard nixon left us with the space shuttle program, and no president since richard nixon has really done anything. now we don't even have a rocket or a spacecraft that can carry an astronaut into space. we have to rely on the russians to get us to the international space station. this bothered neil quite a bit. he was for what he called the increments, the threes. you should be able to fly into space up to three seconds away in time to reach mission control and get instructions if you needed it and three days in which to return to earth.

once we mastered that, neil thought we needed to go on the next increment and keep going until we explored the solar system. we haven't really been exploring since we came back from the moon with men. of course we have a great program going on with the hubble space telescope and the robots on mars and all, but we need to get people out there because we live on a spacecraft 8,000 miles in diameter. it's finite. we're all going to have to get off one day and we better have somewhere to go. when the human species simply will not be any longer after we lose this only place we have, what neil called our cradle. >> i love when jay barbree refers to earth as just one giant spacecraft. anyway, up next, the widening gender gap that's been working against republicans. how can they fight back? they now lag by double digits among women favoring a democratic controlled congress. but first our tdr 50 soup of the day comes from callahan's in

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where you could save money on car insurance in half the time. esurance. backed by allstate. click or call. now to what may be the single most important aspect of the 2014 campaign in the midterms, the gender gap. yesterday we told you about the democrats. today a look at what republicans are trying to do to fix their problems with women voters. one number may mean the difference between a decent republican year and a wave and it's this one, 12. it's the number of points by which democrats lead among women voters on the generic congressional ballot in our latest national poll. at this time in 2010 democrats had just a one-point edge. that year we saw a republican wave. and though four out of the five female governors are republican, the party has lagged behind at the federal level. just 23% of women serving in congress are republicans. this cycle republicans are hoping a slate of more dynamic

female candidates, oregon's monica webbe and others can narrow the gender gap and boost their prospects. in the house they're counting on a round of recruits. from martha mcsally to elise stefonick in new york. mia love is another republican rising star. but despite some strong recruits, republican fund-raising efforts to boost women candidates are lagging way behind. another big challenge, efforts to drive up turnout among social conservatives which have a boomerang effect. here's what stephanie schriock told me on this show yesterday. >> our democratic women candidates and democrats in general are standing on the side of women, and you're seeing that in the growing gender gap. the republicans really have a problem on this, particularly with their opposition to access to birth control. they have gone so extreme that we can talk about issues that

really, really matter to women. equal pay, minimum wage, access to health care. >> joining me now, former bush white house political director sara fagen, she's also a cnbc contributor. sara, good morning to you. >> good morning. >> so this issue of the gender gap is clearly the difference between right now if you look at the contours of this -- of this campaign cycle, the difference between republicans having a shot at having a big year and frankly a status quo year. how do -- it's one thing to have good women candidates. it's another thing to address the issues that seem to be swaying voters. it seems as if the republican party has an issue problem, no? >> i don't agree with that, chuck. i think that we do have strong recruits, as you pointed out. and one of the things that will heparins at the ballot box and is importantly in the run-up to the election is the strong candidates. you take terry lynn land in michigan, for example.

earlier this year harry reid's super pac comes out against her saying she's waging a war on women, and she just got on air and essentially laughed at him. and really put the democrats on their heels. so one of the things that we're going to see in these races is that these female candidates do a much better job of articulating what is important to women sometimes than our male counterparts do. one of the things that has plagued republicans in the last two cycles is that many of the male candidates, they put their head in the sand and hope that this issue goes away, because it makes them uncomfortable to talk about it. we need to fight back and fight back much harder than we have in the past. >> well, on certain things. so let's take the issue of abortion rights and contraception. i thought it was interesting yesterday with stephanie schriock, president of emily's l list, she wasn't talking about abortion as an issue, she was pivoting and talking about contraception. is this the case where there is

apparent daylight on the issue of access to contraception, and i know there's policy arguments to say that's not true, that's not true, but the apparent daylight that that in itself has set back the republicans here on this?this? >> yeah, i don't agree with that either. i think the fact that democrats keep putting out there the notion that republicans are against contraception is really laughable. and again, you know, back to what i said a minute ago is republicans need to fight back on this. you talk about the hobby lobby decision where stefanie got on the air yesterday and said, essentially, it proves that republicans are against birth control. they're not against birth control. there were four very specific birth control, many christians and pro-lifers believe is nothing more than a early stajt abortion. when you explain it to people you get 60 or 70% of the public that says including 60 to 70% of

women that say, you know, i don't agree that we should force people to pay for what, i believe, is an abortion. and republicans can win on the issue. the biggest issue we have to explain it and take the fight back to the candidates and so the-called war on women. >> you think it's better articulated by women than male. >> i do. >> the democrats had at lot of success at electing women to the house and senate in particular. frankly, thanks to emily's list. it's been around for 20 some years. there isn't an organization on the republican side. a few have tried to get into the game. do you think that's something that the republican party needs to focus on and say, you know, there needs to be a counter point to emily's list that recruits women to run for the house and senate? >> yeah, i do. i think a more coordinated effort would be good.

some have tried and have had limited success. emily east list has been effective. there's no doubt about it. as you pointed out on the program yesterday, they're not talking about apportion this cycle. one of the reasons they're not talking about it because the country has moved to the right on the issue over the last 20 years. particularly when you start going into sort of a more nuanced discrepanci nuanced description of what is pro-life and pro-choice. it shifts and particularly in the south where they have a majority of the female candidates running for the senate. this is why you see the shift to minimum wage and equal pay, which i think, again, is very important for republican candidates, male and female, to are tech late a republican vision of a free market economy. >> former bush white house political director. thank you for coming on. >> thank you. trivia time. it was fdr who was president in

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oklahoma got a short trip this week. we start with the democrats. first up is state representative scott. experts say expect to see him on the national stage in the coming years. our next democrat is state rep emily. she joined the state legislature while in law school. let's turn to the republicans and meet state senator ha griffin. a businesswoman and chair of the senate rules committee. someone seems to be seeking higher office and senator

majority leader david holt. he took the state senate by storm. republicans hold so many of the top offices going to be hard for the rising stars to move up soon. that's it for the edition of daily run down. up next jose diaz balart. list of top-rated providers. visit angieslist.com today.

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the border crisis comes to the white house. three heads of state to meet with president obama. i have just interviewed one of them. we'll have that plus a preview from 1600 pennsylvania avenue. day of rage deadly protests in the streets as israeli rockets don't pound the gaza strip. and john kerry lobs a new attempt at the ceasefire in the name of humanitarian. and the renewed conversation about the poverty agenda here. i'll take a close look this friday, 25th of july. oo