it's 1:00 p.m. here in washington. angela merkel is at the white house this hour. just wrapped up a news conference with president obama where she again pressed for a peaceful regs lugs in ukraine. the u.s. is considering arming ukrainian forces. >> what i've asked my team to do is look at all options, what other means can we put in place to change mr. putin's calculus and the possibility of lethal defensive weapons is one of those options that's being examined, but i have not made a decision about that yet. i've consulted with not just

angela but will be consulting with other allies about the issue. >> translator: as to the export of arms, i have given you my opinion. but you may rest assured that no matter what we decide, the alliance between the united states and europe will continue to stand, will stin to be solid. >> just last week merkel and francois holland met in russia with vladimir putin. with possible emergency summit this wednesday in minsk. >> joining me now chris jansing, senior white house correspondent. what are the significant takeaways out of the summit with merkel and the president? >> reporter: certainly the headline, you're talking about ukraine and we knew this would be the focus of the oval office meeting. the president siz a decision has not been made. every indication from senior white house officials has been that definitely the clock is

ticking. now, you see them trying to walk the fine line, the president not making a decision and angela merkel who has been in close contact with vladimir putin has said there is progress being made on the peace process that has been put forth by both germany and france. we need to wait a little longer. the reality is that there's increasing pressure on this white house to do something more significant, providing lethal arms, that what has happened in the past, the agreement in minsk in september has been repeatedly violated and russia has taken more hundreds more square miles since that time. we've seen it although the sanctions have had an impact on the russian economy. they haven't changed vladimir putin's calculus. while the clock may be ticking no decision yet. the analysis has been done. but it looks like they want to take a little bit of a time here to see exactly where this

process goes. wednesday will be another critical day. ronan? >> of course, we saw the president striking a very cautious tone here today, is there anything coming up that would change that. we've seen more and morage tags from the hill to arm these ukrainian forces? >> reporter: i think there's always a question, where is that line going to be drawn. the president is unwilling to say where that might be. we already know that members of the senate armed services committee have put pressure on him and heard the indication from ash carter, his nominee to be defense secretary that he is leaning that way. so i think that there's a very small window where the pressure will be increasing on the president. as you know, ronan this is a president who very much believes in the idea of a coalition. his doctrine is about bringing other countries in and clearly the european union has stated they are not ready to make a move yet and strongly encouraging the president to

wait. >> nbc's chris jansing from the east room of the white house just as the summit with merkel and president obama winds down. today the president also addressed in the same conversation why he won't meet with israeli prime minister netanyahu when he comes to speak to congress next month. >> we have a practice of not meeting with leaders right before their elections two weeks before their elections. as much as i love angela, if she was two weeks away from an election she probably would not receive an invitation from the white house and i suspect she wouldn't have asked for one. >> vice president joe biden's office saying he's not going to attend that speech before congress because he'll be out of town. he would normally attend such a speech as president of the senate. if the prime minister was invited to capitol hill by john boehner, this has been controversial. some called on him to postpone the speech and others voiced intention not to attend. over to the middle east, jordan

vowed to continue its relentless air strikes against isis. jordanian air forces launching more than 50 such strikes since vowing revenge after the reported murder of one of their pilots held by hostage. the fate of kayla mueller remains unclear. there's been no news since friday when isis claims she was killed in a jordanian strike. richard engel is watching developments from istanbul. what sort of impact have the airstrikes had on isis so far? >> reporter: they are killing isis leaders according to secretary of state john kerry who spoke on "meet the press" questioned, since the air campaign began, isis has lost 22% of its territory. however, isis still controls the vast majority of the land that is -- that it captured since the last seven or eight months in iraq and syria. the air campaign is forced some

ice is leaders to change communications tas tactics they are not online as much, using skype, limiting trying to use messengers and having direct personal contact. it is having an impact but so far it has not turned the tide of the conflict and the reason it hasn't done that there are still no real effectives allies on the ground except for kurdish forces in northern iraq. in syria there's no free syrian army efforts to get them under way if there are even any efforts are behind schedule. >> richard we haven't had any conclusive news on that isis claim of kayla mueller's death since friday when they first made it. jordan came out and was very skeptical. what's the latest by jordanians or u.s. to prove or disprove what isis said there? >> reporter: i don't know what the fbi may be doing or may know i know the intelligence

community lit up when this first information crossed when isis posted online several photographs of a house that it said was near -- near raqqa and isis claiming that the woman, kayla mueller was inside the house and killed by a coalition airstrike. isis has not forwarded any other corroborating evidence. they released some of her personal data her home address e-mail, telephone number. so the person who posted that video had access to her personal information but didn't put out a video of a body or anything like that. i think these reports are certainly to be taken with some skepticism. >> still a lot of questions there. we know her family has come out and said they are still hopeful. we'll keep them in our thoughts. richard engel, thanks for that reporting. back home let's talk about

the weather. boston seeing snow for the third monday in a row. the city could get up to 2 feet more. you heard that right. you can add that to feet of snow already on the ground. look at those pictures. joining me from the arctic tundra formerly known as boston amanda what's the plan to keep everything running there? >> hi ronan, the snow is coming down in really thick flurries and only spoeszed to continue. we're seeing a few people on the streets, a few pedestrians, some are trying to get in a workout and running in the snow but conditions are getting brutal. it's a thick icy snow that stings your face in gusts of wind. this is record breaking snowfall in just the last 30 days. boston has topped the charts with more than 61 inches of snow in a short amount of time. this is really caused a bunch of headaches for city officials they running out of space where to store all of this snow. they need to melt it quickly before fresh rounds of snow come down. so in total they are busing 400

tons of snow and hour and hoping to keep up. main while, they are warning that this is also putting a great deal of strain and weight on many houses and rooftops. we've already heard reports of roofs caving in in the boston area. they are warning people to make sure they are aware of this issue. another issue bringing up is that boston is home to the oldest transit system in the entire country. the trolley system is really -- has aged equipment and dealing with severe weather conditions where the ice and snow is clogging up the system and it's causing extreme delays and extreme headaches for many of the commuters. so still bracing for this continue through the night and into tomorrow morning. >> that great city, boston strong but also boston cold right now. amanda, stay warm. let's check in down in texas where jury selection is beginning today in the trial of the man accused of killing

american sniper chris kyle. they will question 263 people attempting to seat a jury in the shooting range. the movie based on "american sniper" was released in theaters. the movie a major cultural phenomenon and playing a role in jury selection. joining me from stephenville charles hadlock. how difficult could it be to seat an impartial jury? >> reporter: the judge believes he can seat a jury. he has denied change of venue motions or delays in the trial despite the fact that a lot more people know about chris kyle now since the movie was released three or four weeks ago. he is from this area chris kyle was from this area. he went to school at charlton

state university and practiced at the shooting range here in the county where he was eventually killed by ralph. the question is was ralph sane at the time and bring up possible ptsd struggles through life in the military. but regardless of that fact, a lot of people have seen the movie but that doesn't preclude anyone from being a juror? texas. what you have to realize is that the jury and judge are going to be looking at the facts in this case. that's what the judge wants the jury to understand, put aside the movie and put aside the book and all of the media attention and look at the facts that will be presented in the next two weeks in this courthouse and then make a decision on the fate of eddie ray ralph. >> all of that much easier said than done. a challenging jury to seat there. charles hadlock, thanks. reality tv and former

olympian bruce jenner speaking out after being involved in a multicar crash on accident orn pacific coast highway in malibu, one woman was killed when her lexus was push the into oncoming traffic. he has issued this statement. it's a did he have vas tatding tragedy and i can't pretend to know what this family is going through at this time. police say members of the paparazzi were following jenner, there have been conflicting reports on that but also saying they were not a factor in the collision. we'll keep track of anything more to come out of that. in north carolina, a judge just dismissed domestic violence charges against carolina panthers defensive end greg hardy, this comes on the same day his trial was set to begin in charlotte. his accuser didn't show up to testify but told police last may that hardy had choked her threatened to kill area and threw her on a futon covered with guns.

he was convicted in a bench trial last year but appealed. stay with us everybody two of the world's most influential leaders just convened at the white house. president obama and angela merkel merkel huddling to con front the world's thorniest security issues. what you need to know after this. the answers. the solutions. the innovations. all waiting to help us build something better. something more amazing. a safer, cleaner brighter future. at boeing, that's what building something better is all about. ♪ ♪ you just got a big bump in miles. so this is a great opportunity for an upgrade. sound good? great. because you're not you you're a whole airline... and it's not a ticket you're upgrading it's your entire operations, from domestic to international... which means you need help from a whole team of advisors.

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hey matt, what's up? i'm just looking over the company bills. is that what we pay for internet? yup. dsl is about 90 bucks a month. that's funny, for that price with comcast business, i think you get like 50 megabits. wow, that's fast. personally, i prefer a slow internet. there is something about the sweet

meditative glow of a loading website. don't listen to the naysayer. switch to comcast business today and get 50 megabits per second for $89.95. comcast business. built for business. we continue to encourage a diplomatic resolution to this issue as diplomatic efforts continue this week, we're in absolute agreement that the 2 1st century cannot stand idle have us stand idle and allow

borders of europe to be redrawn at the barrel of a gun. >> president obama standing by angela merkel speaking to the press right after they held private talks this morning. covering a range of security issues from the fight against isis to iran, to of course ukraine. that's a big focus for both of them. there's a new diplomatic push from merkel to stop the bloodshed there and germany and france leading efforts to get ukraine and russia to the table this wednesday in minsk but republicans in congress leading a call to arm ukraine against those pro-russian separatists they are fighting. that puts the two parties directly at odds. the u.s. and germany on this. merkel is trying to convince the president not to send arms into the fray, ambassador mike mc mcfaul know a professor of political science of stanford university and here with steve

clemons, thank you both you. ambassador, would sending arms to ukrainian forces suffer diplomatic efforts? >> the specter of arms to ukraine has increased the activity for diplomatic solution. i think that is true. i think the fact that merkel is going back to minsk and with putin to meet on wednesday is a good sign. and i think what you're seeing right now in the diplomatic good cop/bad cop game is they are going to say let's get a deal done now because we don't want an escalation particularly with the americans involved. so at least for the next few days that's why i think you see the ambiguity where president obama just said and everybody putting hopes on what might happen on wednesday. >> a.m. boss dore, you have dealt with this regime in russia very directly and personally,

how damaging do you think it is if there is not cohesion between europe and the united states as the push is made against them? >> well without question putin's -- one of his major foreign policy objectives is to divide europe from the united states. you see that in the way he talks about the west. more recently, it used to be just the west. now it's the u.s. he's trying to divide that and more specifically try to nurture relations with certain european countries. that said, i think we should not overestimate the division between the united states and europe right now on the contrary, i see this as part of an integrated strategy to make a peaceful resolution. what comes next if it doesn't work and i'm skeptical it won't work by the way is another question, but right now i think it's premature to overestimate this division between the united states and europe? >> steve, tell me about the domestic political stakes here.

who is pressing for lethal arms on the hill now specifically and why? >> well, i think a lot of national security officials sort of a big chunk of the strategic class in washington view it needs to do something to raise cost to putin and are a kind of -- i won't call them hapless a military having a hard time with what russia injects into the conflict. there are some democrats sympathetic to this. there's a lot of that. my own concern is that there are others that who say have specific amnesia, the risk of an out of control escalation go and become a global economy tigs and that's something we need to consider along with the question of ukraine as well. >> steve it's a real political mine field exactly what tone the president o adopts on russia.

>> we're not looking for russia to be surrounded and contained and weakened. our preference is for a strong prosperous vibrant confident russia that can be a partner with us on a whole host of global challenges. >> steve how do you think that's going to go over with the more hawkish elements we've been talking about. >> the hawkish elements won't like it but the president was speaking to the russian people. they were extraordinarily important words. he's saying in contrast to what vladimir putin is telling his people, the united states is not trying to encircle you and make you poor. your leader is doing things that have led to the crippling of the economy but we want a socially and internationally responsible russia in the world. i think that's the biggest thing, that putin is playing to this notion that the united states is trying to further the humiliation and with things like

the european economic treaty with ukraine is to delve into areas that are traditional russian interests and putin is trying to turn that around and be the morning in moscow ronald reagan of his day and willing to pay a high cost for that very blatant blatant nationalism. >> germany has been hit hard by these sanctions on russia, a lot tied up in this for them. in december 58% of companies pold in germany have been hurt by sanctions, 36% would cancel projects due to sanctions. what are sanctions actually accomplishing and how are they resonating in europe right now? >> first of all, the data you just outlined is the evidence for unity between europe and the united states. i've been impressioned by it. second it is costly. it's not cheap. it's hard and it's hard for the chancellor to maintain unity for

sanctions, with respect to the impact of sanctions let's be clear about this. this is something that's going to take place over months and i would argue years. remember, i was part of the administration when we imposed sanctions on iran. and it took years in that weak economy to have an impact in terms of changing the calculus and that's the way we have to measure this current conflict with russia. i agree with steve about the importance of what the president said today about russia. he almost verbatim said what he said in moscow in july of 2009 about it is in the u.s. national interest for a strong vibrant prosperous russia. but until putin agrees with that, we're going to have a standoff and we have to maintain the course i think for a long long time. >> steve clemones, atlantic editor at large and mike mcfaul thanks both of you. this comes at a very important moment. we'll see how today's

conversations push forward this conversation about sending arms into the fray there on the ground. a lot at stake. another international story to update you on. nigeria pushing the presidential elections back six weeks because of boko haram but depending on who you ask, possibly because of politics. the government saying it needs to deploy troops to protect polling stations in territories threatened by the terror group. some are accusing the government of delaying this election to help the incumbent goodluck jonathan facing a former military leader in what's a very very tight race. a very security threatened country. president jonathan has been relatively popular but many in nigeria believe the military experience could help stop the boek co-har ram threat. it has stepped up attacks this year and in recent weeks it's spreading the conflict over the borders into nigeria's neighbors.

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♪ >> sam smith and mary j. crushing it last night at the grammys, look no further that today's grammy themed daily spike to fill you in. for an award named after a

device the twitter generation probably thinks is a ipod hooked to a bull horn, over 12 million tweets and counting, 4.1 million of them last night alone. the most popular trends in order, drum roll please, number one, this guy. >> before i've made this record i was doing everything to try and get my music heard. i tried to lose weight and making awful music. it was only until i start to be myself that the music start to flow and people start to listen. just a quick one i want to thank the man who this record is about, who i've been in love with thank you so much for breaking my heart. i got me four grammys. >> sam smith taking on the best new artist award, song of the year award and record of the yeerd year award. best pop vocal award. his name has over 1.2 million

mentions on twitter so far and he thanks the guy who broke his heart. sam smith's broken heart. grammys, not fair. number two kanye, i'm going to let you finish west, easy was not pleasy, he protested beyonce not winning and explained to our colleagues that he -- kind of -- >> the grammys, if they want real artists to keep coming back, they need to stop playing with us. we ain't going to play with them no more. beyonce video and beck needs to respect artistry and should have given his award to beyonce. by the way i got my wife and got my daughter and got my clothing line, so i'm not going to do nothing to put my daughter at risk but i am here to fight for creativity. that's the reason i didn't say anything tonight. you know what it means --

>> man, you're threatening the whole kardashian machine with a that kanye. hash tag who is beck has been trending and names kanye and beck brought in over a million twitter mentions. kanye's concern is curious since beyonce did take home three grammys making her the second most honored woman in awards history with 20 trophies. she's okay, we're not worried about beyonce. number three he's happy and also political. pharrell and backup dancing came in together for a hands up don't shoot guess tour. it was a striking moment that got mixed review, some calling it inappropriate and others using pharrell to use the stage in that way during black history month. stay with us just ahead we're going to look at the big rights issue of the day. a state judge in alabama wading smack into the middle of the

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gay couples in alabama getting married today. roll tide. the u.s. supreme court declining to step in today denying about alabama's request to extend a legal hold on same-sex marriages there. but the famed justice attempted to block weddings. he sent this order to judge telling them to not issue licenses effective immediately no probait judge in the state of alabama or any agent or employee of any alabama probate judge should issue or recognize a marriage license in consistent with the alabama constitution. sending confusion across the state. couples in shelby county were faced with this sign posted at the courthouse today saying due to conflicting orders this

office will notç issue any marriages -- any marriage licenses in the immediate future, gay or straight. joining us to break down what is a very confuse gs situation on the ground it seems, pete williams. we've heard over the wires right now that the governor in that state just weighed in and said he disagrees with the supreme court ruling but not going to take any action against the judges there. >> okay, so what you have is some probate judges and alabama has a situation instead of clerks it's probate judges, some are doing it, some or not. the u.s. supreme court is out of it. the state said would you please put a hold on the lower court order that has the started in the whole thing saying the ban is unconstitutional and the u.s. supreme court said no. footnote clarence thomas and scalia had a dissent saying this is not the way to treat states. we'll rule on this anyway, let's just wait. justice thomas writing for the two of them said maybe the fact that the full court is unwilling to do this sort of presupposes how the u.s. supreme court is

going to rule on this ultimate question. interesting little statement he makes. where do we stand? roy moore the chief justice in alabama is the administrator of all judges and what he said today unquestionably right that the order of a federal judge in alabama does not bind the state probate judges. correct. however, he may not be right that in telling the state probait judges they must obey the alabama constitution, which is at odds with the federal constitution on this question. he can't tell the judges in alabama, don't obey the u.s. constitution and there's a good legal arguement that the definitive statement is what the judge has ruled. one other thing, already some lawyers for gay couples are going to federal court seeking contempt citations against judges in alabama refusing to issue licenses. >> are those likely to go forward after of the governor said there won't be repercussions for judges?

>> when you get a federal court's back up against the wall they may want to stand up for the own ruling. they go back to the same issue who issued the ruling in the first place. it's going to play out for the next couple of days and going to be somewhat confusion. you can get licenses in some places and not others. >> right now there are couples who are in limbo from pictures of couples there some still waiting and unable to be married. >> some are saying all right, we'll give up in this county and go to another county. >> going back to the point to the dissent, does this presuppose or at least foreshadow how the court is going to act on the national question of margiee marriage equality? >> the court has been unwilling to put a stop to marriages and it seems odd if the full supreme court says there is no constitutional right why allow them to go ahead in the meantime. the supreme court will face two questions, license marriages and

does it have to recognize marriages legally performed in other states. there could be a halfway ruling. >> pete williams, thanks for breaking that down. always a pleasure. >> and the white house striking back after a string of hoeigh profile cyber security threats to celebrities and ordinary americans. how to report on those dangers next. calling winter an "underserved season". and before he quit his friend's leaf-raking business for "not offering a 401k." larry knew the importance of preparing for retirement. that's why when the time came he counted on merrill edge to streamline his investing and help him plan for the road ahead. that's the power of streamlined connections. that's merrill edge and bank of america. they say after seeina magician make his assistant disappear mr.clean came up with a product that makes dirt virtually disappear. he called it the magic eraser. it cleans like magic. even baked on dirt disappears right before your eyes. mr.clean's magic eraser.

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this week president obama will kick off the first white house summit on cyber security and consumer protection. we'll be looking at cyber threats raising more and more questions about the security of your data and raising more and more questions for reporters covering that hacked content. take for instance the most serious, life or death security breach yet, the taylor swift hack of 2015. hacked content from her account

is making rounds being hawked to the highest bidder by hackers and shown in detail by reporters. here's an in depth look at the content with hackers ss furnishing him with pictures and private messages with friends. sam biddle joins us now. we have seen the anthem hack compromise americans' data and chiplotle hacked over the weekend. why is so hard to track down perpetrators? >> for one thing they are spread around the world and using very unsophisticated methods to get in which don't leave fingerprints in the case of chiplotle i'm sure they guessed it or able to reset it. same thing for taylor swift. these are attacks that take maybe a couple of minutes at most. so there's not a lot of wreckage for law enforcement to go

through. >> sam, you mentioned taylor swift which you been covering. when this is a case of an individual's data it raises challenges on how to report the story. we talked about the sony hack and your reporting there. and at the time i remember you defended yours and gawker's rationale for running e-mails those being work e-mails and them being news worthy in your view. what is the argument for news worthiness when it's taylor swift's messages to a jonas brother. >> taylor swift is a public figure in the same way that the co-chairman of sony pictures is a public figure. these are people with immense influence and sway and show business who command an incredible audience. taylor swift is one of the most followed human beings on the plan e the way she used social media in public or private is of public interest. >> when you look at exactly the kind of data you were showing full disclosure i show up as a

footnote in the inboxes -- >> yes, you did. >> her private exchanges with lina dunham did an entire article of her flirting with nick jonas. what is the benefit of putting that out there? >> celebrities benefit from media coverage that is pretty much manicured to the exact specifications. i think any time you can show something that a celebrity has not fed an outlet, something that is actually earnest and sincere on their part, shows you their true nature. in the case of taylor swift, it was nothing -- there were no bombshells there. but it does show you what someone is like as a human being, not that they are public hollywood persona. >> you said any time you can show that. but is there a line you won't cross? any kind of private content you wouldn't put on gawker? >> of course just in the same way did he didn't publish personally identifiable

information, social security numbers, no one has interest in those unless they are an identity thief. >> you're not going to -- >> you did put up when you were covering sony hack people's e-mails half redacted -- >> that's right. >> and you stand by that decision? >> the people involved in that part -- difference between will smith and mid level drone at sony pictures who's an employee who is very clearly a victim of an attack like that. again, when you are in the same league as taylor swift orange angelina joe jolie, there's a different standard. lower level employees are not public figures by any mean. >> in your view that makes them more fame gameir game. the hackers you've gotten content from and sometimes

directly are almost certainly breaking this law. this hack of taylor swift's inbox is probably a violation of the communications privacy act wire fraud what this is essentially. you're giving those hackers a much bigger platform and airing their ask for money for nude photos. were there conversations at gawker whether that's encouraging legal behavior? >> look people were -- taylor swift's millions of fans were talking about her getting hacked far before gawker wrote about it. >> were they posting pictures from her inbox and asking for money for photo snz. >> i think the tmz allegedly wanted to buy these photos of taylor swift is newsworthy on its own. i don't think i created any line of bitters -- i also provided no means of contacting the hacker to begin with. if someone can go into the private account of a mega celebrity and exfill trait their data and put it up for sale, that is a news story.

i didn't say here's where you can get it or here's how much they are asking. again, we need to know what the vulnerabilities are out there via taylor swift or any private citizen. >> do you feel you're showing or running an entire article with nick jonas and taylor swift is highlighting vulnerabilities in the cyber security system we have? >> i think it shows what information we put up there and take for granted. if someone got night password they would have all of it. the nature of that information, we usually -- we assume it will be safe. we don't think much of it. you assume yours are equally secure -- >> not if you get to them. >> that's right. but look, again we need to think very carefully what we're putting online and how well it's protected and the answer is usually a lot and not very well. >> sam, i take a lot of points

you made about what is legal. it's actually very hard to hold a journalistic entity libel for publishing content if it's slightly note worthy for the public interest. i think it's a separate question whether one should air these things -- >> gawker is a tabloid publication, we have an interest in our reader's interest in the private lives of celebrities. when they become public figures and their information is leaked publicly, then right, you're going to be operating differently than the wal street journal or msnbc for that matter. >> i had thought of you as someone who differentiates in a reflective way what should be aired and what shouldn't. we'll leave it there. sam bidle, thanks. we're going to look at threats to your data all week long for our call to action this week. if you're passionate about this issue, there's something you can do. you can tweet congress and urge

them to pass the brand-new legislative proposal. we'll delve into that on the air this week and we have suggested tweets to send. you can let us know if you joined in on our call and what you're doing to protect your data with the #ronation. up next, the 2016 trek marches on. kentucky senator rand paul rallying voters in iowa this weekend. there's an interesting wrinkle. some the old guard of republicans want to see him stumble. we'll look at why. we're right back after this. clean. clear. brita water. nothing is better. push your enterprise and you can move the world. ♪ ♪ but to get from the old way to the new you'll need the right it infrastructure. from a partner who knows how to make your enterprise more agile, borderless and secure. hp helps business move

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we are back to a new look at the primary state that could make or break the politics. a new poll looks at new hampshire and how voters view the republican field. let's look at the numbers. 16% saying they would vote for jeb bush in that state's

primary. 13% saying they would vote for kentucky senator rand paul and 12% for wisconsin governor scott walker. finally in the rear, 10% for new jersey governor chris christie. one of the republicans in the fray rand paul was rallying across iowa another key battleground state. paul's appeal is mading old school republicans nervous though. party leaders like lindsey graham aim to keep this libertarian off the ticket. benji sarlin is following this. what are they doing to rand paul's ambitions. >> in the extreme case you have a few long-shot presidential candidates who are considering running themselves it seems just to debate rand paul and put him on the spot and create wedges over foreign policy. to lindsey graham formed an exploratory committee and bolt

and king are hawkish and have a lot of disagreements with rand paul and eager to debate him on the national state. >> how clear why the new numbers. the margin for error is 4.9% so the takeaway when you look at those essentially that paul bush, christie, walker, are they all neck and neck. >> compared to the last election there is no true front-runner. it is anybody's game in nps and the same in -- in new hampshire and in iowa. like last year there was a dominance in new hampshire. you'll see a lot of movement in the next year as candidates surge and plummet. >> and of course we just got out of the freedom summit where we saw new ambitions rise to the forward and some people stumble. what is the next big testing ground for republicans? >> there is a whole bunch of events in iowa and new hampshire. but the next big one is in

washington, d.c. that is the c pac, the big conservative gathering at the end of february. traditionally that is a huge launching pad for the presidential candidates on the republican side. you can expect to see every single big name giving a key note speech there and there will be a lot of attention from conservative activists and donors as to how they perform there. >> and we know you will be in the thick of it. we appreciate it benji sar lynn. everybody at home, that wraps it up for us today. thanks for taking the time. "the reid report" is coming right up. don't you dare go away. joy reid will miss you if you do. but not always. i've been coloring liz's hair for years.

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angela merkel are behind closed doors working on political and economic issues. the president and his german counterpart presented a united front for ukraine with a diplomatic solution. >> we continue to encourage a diplomatic solution to this issue and as diplomatic efforts continue this week we are in absolute agreement that the 21st century can not stand idle -- have us stand idle and simply allow the borders of europe to be redrawn at the barrels of gun. >> but they are of two different minds when it comes to supplying the ukraine army with guns. >> kasie hunt is at the white house. what is the takeaway from today's news conference? >> reporter: hi, joy. well president obama and angela merkel did prevent a unit