right now on "andrea mitchell reports," the cambridge police department has just released the 911 tapes of that call made during the controversial arrests of harvard professor, henry louis gates. the caller was a neighbor of gates. listen. >> do you think they might have been breaking in? >> i don't know, because i have no idea. >> after that call, gates was arrested on a disorderly conduct charge. more of the call, more of the tape, straight ahead in a live report. today, president obama is putting more pressure on china to do more about climate change. the president says that the united states and china must work together as the two largest

emitters of carbon dioxide. to put an end no global warming. >> the relationship between the united states and china will shape the 21st century, which makes it as important as any bilateral relationship in the world. that really must underpin our partnership. crunch time for health care. the senate is not expected to have a compromise before their summer break. meanwhile, house speaker nancy pelosi says that she is can. her chamber has enough votes. but she did not mention a timetable for putting it on the floor. >> it will win. but we will move forward. this will happen. americans, again, with pre-existing medical conditions are concerned about losing their jobs or changing their jobs -- and she's now a private citizen. sarah palin left with a signature blast. >> some still are choosing not to hear why i made the decision

to chart a new course to advance the state. and it should be so obvious to you. and one other thing for the media, our new governor has a very nice family too, so leave his kids alone. >> but did her attack on her critics hit the target or misfire? more on that coming up. good day. i'm andrea mitchell live in washington. we begin this hour with the just-released 911 tapes of the call from that incident that led to the arrest of harvard professor, henry louis gates jr. let's listen to more. >> i just have an elder woman standing here and she had noticed two gentleman trying to get in a house at that number, and they kind of had to barge in and they broke the screen door and they finally got in and when i looked, i went further closer to the house a little bit when the gentlemans were already in the house, i noticed two

suitcases. i'm not sure if these are two individuals who actually work there or live there -- >> you think that might have been breaking in? >> i don't know. because i have no idea. >> nbc's ron allen is live in cambridge, massachusetts. ron, thanks for joining us. thanks for your reporting on this and putting it into context. one of the striking things about the call and listening to the complete tape, as much as we've been able to listen to, is that the caller, the neighbor, never mentions race and has a lot of doubts. she says, i don't know if they live there. she refers them as to individuals, as to gentlemans. she is not as alarmed as we might have been led to believe. >> reporter: indeed, andrea. and when you listen to the tapes, it sounds like a very routine police call. the other thing that stood out for me, the caller said that an older woman pointed out to her what was going on, or she would not have noticed it. and i had not heard mention of that older woman before and we have not heard her account of the story. but you're right, the caller did

not mention that the men were black, which is how it had been first reported. and she tried to clarify that today, because she felt she was being cast as a racist individual in the media accounts of all that. but it is a very routine call. and we heard the police transmissions that were going on while the incident was happening. and there was some speculation that you might have heard professor gates in the background raising his voice. we didn't hear anything like that. we didn't hear anything from him at all and very little from officer crowley as well during the process. the tapes were all interesting in giving us some insight into the state of mind of the caller. they don't tell us much about what was going on when the incident actually happened. >> as you point out, they're not really dispositive, but they certainly indicate that the caller was not injecting race into this from the get-go. that whatever happened, happened between the two men once they got there. >> reporter: exactly. that's what everybody has been saying about this. somehow, this confrontation between these two individuals

escalated, and it was largely about the two of them. another unanswered question was, what happened to all the other officers who were there? at one point in the call, you hear sergeant crowley say, to keep the units coming, at a point he's already said that the individual has given me i.d. that says he's henry louis gates jr., but the officer still calls for the cops to keep coming and at one point still calls for the harvard police to show up. so we're still breaking this down, but there's nothing of professor gates on the tape, very little of officer crowley, and it all sounds very routine. but, clearly, wn that it escalated into a major confrontation that ended up in a disorderly conduct arrest for what clearly was not a break-in and escalated into a national dialogue, argument, if you will, about race in this country. >> and what robert gibbs indicated at his briefing this morning to the white house press corps was that that beer with the president and officer crowley and professor gates may take place within the next few

days. i think they're going to try to get that done very quickly and get things back to normal, or at least try to get things back to normal. maureen dowd in her column yesterday, in her signature way, says that from shakespeare to hitchcock, mistaken identity makes for a powerful narrative. a police officer who is proud of his reputation for getting along with black officers and for teaching cadets to avoid racial profiling feels maligned to be cast as a racist white boston cop. a famous professor who studies identity and summers in martha's vineyard feels maligns to be cast as a black burglar with backpack and crowbar. so she gets to the point of identity, and how each of these individuals felt put off for different reasons and people reacted, perhaps, to stereotypes, and it escalated from there. >> reporter: indeed, andrea. there's a point in this confrontation where sergeant crowley understands that this is, in fact, professor gates' home and that there is not a break-in. and a lot of people have asked,

why didn't the officer just walk away at that point? but, apparently, something happened between them, words were exchanged, or as professor gates has indicated in some of his interviews, perhaps he didn't say enough or he didn't say anything. but something happened that moved this to cross the line of disorderly conduct. and the police have really never explained what exactly that was. in one of their press conferences, they did point out that defining what constitutes disorderly conduct is one of the more difficult decisions that a police officer has to make. and we know that they are concerned about their safety throughout this entire situation, because officer crowley doesn't really know what's going on. but, again, there are a lot of -- there are still a lot of questions about all this, that the tapes don't really answer. andrea? >> ron allen, in cambridge, thanks so much. and back here in washington, the senate finance committee is still working on what some members hope will become a bipartisan health care proposal. how close is the committee to reaching a final draft? republican senator orrin hatch, he's a senior member of the finance committee and the

judiciary committee. also serves on the health education and labor committee, which has been crafting its legislation. senator, thanks so much. last week you, with some fan fair from the committee, you stepped away from those bipartisan talks. we are told by senator grassley, that fellow committee member, republican, who said this weekend, the odds are very, very good of a workable compromise passing this year. obviously, not before the august recess, but something happening this year. do you agree with that prognosis? >> i don't agree with that. i think we all need to work together and try to get something that would pass that would be worthwhile, that literally would cut costs, but also spread coverage to those who really deserve coverage. so i'm willing to work on that, but i just felt like i needed to walk away, because i was in disagreement with some of the approaches that i felt they were putting into the bill and i thought it was the honorable thing to do to not be there

under false presences. >> kent conrad, the budget chairman is talking now over the weekend about that co-oped plan, repolicing the public option. you've got senator kerry's cadillac tax on the cadillac plan, do those options move you any closer to being in agreement? certainly, senator kerry's plan did not. on the so-called co-op, i don't think that's going to work either, because senator schumer and other liberals are saying you'll have to have an inside the beltway federal coop on that would be the same as government takeover of health care. i don't think the co-op thing is going to go. it was a nice thought by senator conrad of north dakota, who was trying to come up with something other than the government-run system that most liberal democrats really want to have.

and i think senator baucus is doing this has best to try to bring people together. i comment him for what he's trying to do, but, you know, it seems to me that, number one, they want this government-run plan one way or the other, whether it's coopt or not. number two, they seem to want an employer mandate, which is a job-killing approach to health care. number three, they want to bring people, more and more people into medicaid with a full medicaid expansion and the states are up in arms about that, because they know they'll ultimately inherit all the costs on medicaid and they can't afford it. >> senator, we've got dueling blogs from budget experts over the weekend. you had a saturday morning post from doug elmendorf at the congressional budget office saying that the new plan coming out of the white house and some of the other blue dogs which would allegedly reduce medicare payments would only save $2 billion over ten years. that's the independent board proposal. then you had a response from peter orszag, who used to head

the congressional budget office, and knows most of the economists, probably hired most of those economists, saying that they were looking at the wrong data and basically saying, as a former cbo director, i can attest that cbo sometimes accused of a bias towards exaggerating costs and underestimating savings. well, perhaps your budget saving is from where you sit, but orszag very strongly objects to what the cbo is saying. do you have a dog in this hunt? do you know whether or do you have a judgment as to whether the cbo can be trusted on its $2 billion in savings from that commission approach? >> well, as you know, douglas elmendorf was picked by the democrats to head the cbo. now that he's giving what he thinks are true figures here, they're contesting it. to be honest with you, i expect them to attack him, even though i think he's been one of the best budget directors we've had my whole time in the united states senate. he's honest, he's calling it the way he sees it, and i don't

think anyone looking at it is going to say, like the president says, there's going to save money in the long run, there's no way you're going to do that. it's going to be more and more expensive. and everything is coming down to rationing. why do you think they want to set up this new group here in washington? five great doctors of the president will appoint just what can and cannot be done in health care. they want to do that for one person. and that's to ration care. >> but don't we ration now? we ration by access now. and we ration by income and class. certain people get more because they come in, you know, from a -- with a certain amount of insurance protection. i mean, isn't that rationing? >> i don't think so. you know, let's face it, when you're not getting the health care you really want, you're going to feel like it's rationing to you. so in that sense, yes, but let me tell you, they're talking about real rationing. that is saying that you can't have this procedure because you're a certain age in society.

just like in england, certain drugs you can't have because they're more expensive, even though they may work better for you. there are a whole raft of things that rationing would take away from the rights of people that i don't think we should go there. look, when it comes back to mr. elmendorf, i expect the white house and i expect the office of management and budget to attack him, but frankly, he's holding his own, he's a straight shooter, fair and honest as far as i can see. one of the best i've seen in the whole time i've been here. and i used to be on the budget committee. all i can say is that, you know, when you don't have a really good approach to things, you then start blaming others. and that's really what's happening here. they do not have a plan that's really being pushed by the president himself, other than this government-run plan. >> now, on your other hat, in judiciary, jeff sessions, the ranking republican, came out over the weekend in "usa today" saying that he is going to vote against judge society mayor in

committee tomorrow. i know you already said you were going to vote against her. so does this make lindsey graham the only committee member that you think will be voting with her? >> i can't speak for other republicans on the committee or for democrats, of course, but i felt like this was something, after looking at everything i possibly could to try to supporter, there were too many things i thought were wrong about her testimony and it's the first time i'm not supporting a supreme court nominee, and i feel really badly about it. because i like her. i think she's a good person in many ways. i think she's certainly got a good life story and i liked her family. but then, again, we're talking about one of the highest positions in the country today and i think she is found wanting in so many wayses that i just had to go against her. >> and you found her wanting because of rulings from the bench or because of things she said in her speeches?

was it her intellectual background, her -- what is the single thing that made you decide that she was not qualified. >> well, many of the above. frankly, there were some answers that she gave that i felt didn't make sense. i did not like the ricci case. nine of her ten cases were criticized severely by the supreme court, eight were reversed by the supreme court. she was criticized by the way she applied the law by the supreme court. and of course, i just felt like her answers on my questions with regard to the puerto rican legal defense fund were just not accurate. and i thought they were not forthcoming and i felt like, well, we need people who are forthcominging. we understand that some things they can't answer but some things they can. and i felt like her answers were not good. and last but not least, let's face it. her analysis of the second

amendment rights, i think, was very flawed and something that -- that's something i feel very deeply about it. >> you have no notion that she's not going to be overwhelmingly confirmed. >> i think she'll be confirmed, but that doesn't mean that i should support somebody that i feel is -- has not been totally forthcominging. you know, i feel badly about it, because i like her personally. and i hate to vote against anybody that the president puts forward as a judge far judgeship nominee. in her case, she has many things that are going for her, but some of these things were, in analysis, my analysis, left a lot to be desired. >> all right. orrin hatch, thank you very much. thank you, senator. >> you bet. straight ahead, alaska's sarah palin officially exits the governor's mansion and fires off

some parting shots against her opponents and the media. plus, inside the obama/clinton relationship. what secretary of state hillary clinton has to say about working for her former campaign rival turned boss, president obama. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. pecans! pecans! baked into crunchy oat bunches. taste the delicious surprise in every spoonful. new honey bunches of oats with pecan bunches. beautiful. to stand behind all who serve. ♪ to deliver the technologies... vital to freedom. ♪ to help carry hope to those in need. ♪ around the globe, the people of boeing... are working together -- for what matters most. that's why we're here. ♪

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alaska has a new governor today and that means sarah palin is now a private citizen. but on her way out of office yesterday, the former governor gave a somewhat rambling speech, which included a lot of political rhetoric and digs at her enemies and a defense of her record during her farewell speech. palin also took on hollywood. >> defend your spine to do what's right for alaska when the pressure mounts, because you're going to see anti-hunting,

anti-second amendment circuses from hollywood. and here's how they do it. they use these delicate, tiny, very talented celebrity starlets. they use alaska as a fund-raising tool for their anti-second amendment causes. stand strong and remind them patriots will protect our individual guaranteed right to bear arms. and by the way -- by the way, hollywood needs to know, we eat, therefore, we hunt. >> with us now, with margaret carlson, columnist with bloomberg news, and dan balz, national political reporter for "the washington post." also the author of the new book, coming out next week, the battle for america 2008, the story of an extraordinary election. welcome both. okay, we hunt -- we eat what we

hunt. presumably, you guys eat what you hunt also. i got to say, i watched the whole thing last night on c-span, just to make sure that i was seeing it right. dan, you know, you've written about this today, you said that palin continues to stoke passions among many conservatives, republicans, and generates fascination even among americans who disagree with her policies and think she is not qualified to hold the highest office in the nation. clearly, she does stir passions, and she's got the "it" factor, whatever it is, that makes her a political celebrity. >> she certainly does. i think that we've rarely seen somebody like this, who has sort of burst on to the national political stage in the way she did almost a year ago, and has had such a meteoric rise and a very short fall.

even in her departure yesterday, cable channels were carrying it live. it's an extraordinarily recognition of the fact that she has captured the attention of people. but i think as she goes forward, the question is, does she want to continue, basically, to stoke the passions of those people who already support her, or does she want to find a way to rebuild her credibility among people who might have been originally drawn to her, but have soured on her in the year that she's been around. >> margaret, is there a double standard here because she manages to say things when she talks about, some of the things she talked about in her speech last night, i can't imagine another politician getting away with it. i'm not talking about the political statements, i'm just talking about the grammar, the context of these kinds of speeches, yet they take off with her supporters. >> well, part of the fascination is, how does she do it? how does she get away with doing, as you say, what other politicians can't.

the disjointed speeches, the rambling, the kind of random attacks. you know, i assume everyone in alaska has weapons concealed and unconcealed. their state has very strong gun laws and the federal gun laws don't go after what she's talking about. she also, in that speech, repeated something that she said before, which is so off base, which is, "the troops are fighting to protect her against the media." you know, her first amendment right, when, actually, if the troops are fighting at all for the first amendment, they're fighting to protect the media against people like governor sarah palin. now, she's a private citizen, so maybe not. but she had that completely backwards and said it again and again, the way she said, i can see russia from wasilla, so therefore i'm conversant on foreign policy. so your question, andrea is a

good one in that i don't know another national politician who can know so little and say it so poorly and yet excite people so much. >> and clearly, dan, she's got a career ahead, to rally the party base, she's raising money, norah o'donnell has reported she's got $1 million in her pac and a lot of that was raised since her controversial decision to step down. so even though on national polls, you guys and "washington post" had a poll that came out on friday that showed only a 40% favorability, so she's really come down in the national polls, yet she still can excite out on the stump and she'll make a lot of money. >> well, she certainly will make a lot of money if she chooses to go that route. she'll be able to speak for a very high fee, has got a lucrative book contract, she can make herself a lot of money. the question is, is that really what she wants to do with herself? and i don't think we really know what her real priorities are going to be. if they are to continue to be a

force in national politics, i think one of the things that she's going to have to do is think about expanding the team of people around her. one of the criticisms you hear, and particularly from republicans, is that she has a very limited team of people around her and it's not adequate to do the kinds of things she needs to do. so one clear as to what her real ambitions are and the degree to which she might be successful at that will be what she does in terms of building up a political team that is savvy, that has her best interests in mind, but also knows how to maneuver through a very difficult environment. >> now, speaking of a very different kind of political figure, hillary clinton on with david gregory yesterday. this was clinton responding to david's questions about all those reports that she's been marginalized and that there are tensions in her relationship with barack obama. let's watch. >> here was a recent headline that got a lot of attention, not surprisingly, in the "los angeles times." clinton seems overshadowed by her boss, some analysts say.

you responded with a pretty sharp retort saying, i broke my elbow, not my larynx. >> that's right. >> but at times has this been a struggle? >> not at all. maybe because i understand the functioning of the united states government, the president is the president. the election is over. the president has to lead our country both internationally and domestically. i saw this when my husband was president. at the end of the day, it is the president who has to set and articulate policy. >> margaret, she got it pitch perfect there. and my reporting is that she and barack obama get along very well, that the tensions are at the staff levels, residually, among some of the people who work for each of them. >> tensions are usually at the staff level. and you wonder, did she break her elbow, was she elbowed aside because she was sidelined by the elbow, because there is some staff infighting for, you know, who's going to run the place.

more than most, president obama is his own secretary of state and he's done as much traveling and has had as many big trips as any in recent memory and he does it very well. so secretary of state clinton is doing what she needs to do, which is to be a good cabinet secretary. and she's -- i think she's become a great politician within this administration, in that she knows just where her place is and how to do it. and she answered every question, i thought, on "meet the press," exactly right. i mean, she has the perfect tone for being a number two or, you know, let's say joe biden is number two, excuse me, a number three. >> dan balz, there are really people who are closer, foreign policy advisers, she's the chief diplomat, but, inevitably, the proximity of the white house mean that people in the national security council, david axelrod,

on how to control the message on these foreign trips and foreign policy, they are going to be hugely influential with the man that they know so well and who trusts them so much. >> no question about that, andrea, but i think that's the norm you would expect to see in a white house. the president is surrounded by close aides and they have an influence on everything that he does and says. but i think that secretary clinton has handled herself quite well in this role. i don't believe that there are huge tensions that now exist between the secretary of state and the president. as margaret suggest, there often are at the staff level, but it's not clear how severe those are, even. there's been more of a problem with some of the things that the vice president has said than some of the things that the secretary of state has said. so i think her appearance yesterday has gotten very good reviews and i think it's an indication of why the president likes her. >> indeed. the team of obama and clinton

and clinton, in my observation, everywhere she goes, saying she represents the policies of barack obama. she seems very comfortable with that. thank you, dan balz. thank you, margaret carlson. good to see you. up next, more on the health care debate. what does president obama need to do to secure republican votes that he needs to deliver on health care? details coming up next on "andrea mitchell reports." it can be tough living with copd... but i try not to let it slow me down. i go down to the pool for a swim... get out and dance... even play a little hide-n-seek.

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and just take a look at these really cool live pictures from the space shuttle today. space shuttle "endeavour" astronauts weave through the fifth and final space walk of their mission. and after doing some rewiring and setting up cameras on the brand-new japanese lab, the crew took on a few additional tasks. only a handful of other shuttle flights have had five spacewalks weaved into them. the shuttle unhook from the international space station tomorrow and then return to earth on friday.

and still to come on "andrea mitchell reports," with both houses of congress saying that they won't meet friday's deadline for health care, what's next? you're watching msnbc, the place for politics. two medium cappuccinos, you're ready for the mid-morning rush thanks to a good breakfast. one coffee with room, one large mocha latte. medium macchiato, light hot chocolate hold the whip, and two espressos. make one a double. she's fiber focused! i have two cappuccinos, one coffee with room, one large mocha latte, a medium macchiato, a light hot chocolate, hold the whip, and two espressos, one with a double shot. gonna take more than coffee to stay this focused. stay full and focused through the morning... with a breakfast of kellogg's® frosted mini-wheats® cereal; an excellent source of fiber that helps you avoid... the distraction of mid-morning hunger. no thanks, i'm good.

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wow. it's okay, everyone. - thanks, hon. - you're welcome. announcer: yep, it's that easy, - with kingsford match light. - ( match strikes ) and welcome back. on the phone with me now is nbc's kerry sanders. he is at a checkpoint near the honduran/nicaraguan border. and on the honduran side and with him, the family of manuel zelaya, the ousted president, who's been trying to challenge that coup d'etat and get back into the country. what are the family's intentions? >> reporter: we are high in the mountains of the checkpoint where there are about 50 police officers and military members of the army who have set up a checkpoint. they're standing here with riot shields, everybody's armed, they're wearing helmets and the family of manuel zelaya, who has

been held in the country at a small town here for about 80 hours, have again returned to this checkpoint to ask for permission to leave the country. every time they come to the checkpoint, they are prevented from leave welcome even though in an interview with one of the lieutenant colonels in the military today, i was told specifically that they are not being detained, they can leave. but what i'm witnessing here is a prevention of them being allowed to leave. the military, apparently, has offered a helicopter ride for them to fly over the mountains and go to nicaragua, where they can reunite with their father and their husband, manuel zelaya, but 24-year-old zelaya is here with me now, she speaks english. so that offer of the helicopter, would you take it and if not, why? >> i wouldn't take it. because of how the military have been treating everyone here in the country with repression and aggression, and i wouldn't accept it because i'm not secure. >> do you feel that you will be able to leave the country?

are you a prisoner in your own country right now? >> of course, we are prisoners. we've been detained here for about 80 hours. and if it wasn't because of us having friends here nearby who asked us to come back to their house and sleep there and to eat there and they've been bringing us food and water, and if it weren't for them, we wouldn't be like here happy, i mean. >> reporter: well, she is in good health. her mother-in-law -- well, actually, the president's mother-in-law and his mother are having some health problems with blood pressure. they've been getting some doctor's attention. the mother-in-law had a prescription to go to a hospital, but she was prevented from even getting to that hospital. so at this point, it looks like a little bit of a standoff. interestingly, the 24-year-old zelaya, who i just spoke to, she was at the house the day that the armed men came into the house and the only reason she wasn't taken, she believes, is because when she heard the

commotion, she climbed under her bed and hid under her bed. what do you think is happening to your country now? and most specifically, what do you request of the united states, if anything? >> well, right now we're watching, and you're able to see that there's repression. the police and the military are together and they're not letting people go through. the only reason we want to go to nicaragua is because we want -- i want to see my dad. >> do you believe that the united states has a role here and what is it and why? >> of course. they've said that they're not in favor of the regime, though they are not okay and they're not happy that president zelaya is in nicaragua, and they're saying it's not right that he's in nicaragua. so i believe what the united states has to be condemning, it's a repression against our citizens, repression grens all of honduras, who are trying to say that they want to see

president zelaya. we've been here for 80 hours, and people can't move around freely. our rights have been practically canceled. i mean, we don't have any rights. we can't ride around freely in our country. we can't be able to speak. there's the newspapers and the news are not actually saying what's really going on and there's been people who's being, with aggression, taken out of the roads. >> and the this story, of course, andrea, is that there are at least three people, we haven't confirmed, but we believe three people who have died in the ongoing month here of this back and forth. so it looks like the standoff is going to continue here. and you heard her appealing to the united states to condemn the situation, which, as you know, the united states has done. not sure, you know, where secretary of state hillary clinton is going to go with this. andrea? >> thanks so much. kerry sanders, right in the middle of the action down there on the border between honduras and nicaragua.

and secretary clinton, of course, has condemned it, as has the entire organization of the american states, but there is criticism from some of zelaya's supporters that the u.s. has not been strong enough and that it, in fact, sends a signal elsewhere in the region that military coups can take place unchallenged. well, what a difference a week makes here in the united states. just a week ago, president obama was pushing for a full health care vote in both houses before the august recess. now, not so much. joining us now for the big story from the white house, savannah guthrie, our white house correspondent. and here with me, kelly o'donnell, our chief congressional correspondent. kelly and savannah, let's try to parse where we are in both houses. kelly, first to you. let's talk about the house. nancy pelosi says that she would win a vote on the house floor, but she won't take it to the floor until she knows says the votes. and right now, she doesn't. she doesn't have an agreement with the blue dog democrats. they need those blue dog democrats to even get it out of committee, get it out of henry

waxman's committee. >> exactly, to follow this you need a calendar and a chess board. the speaker keeps wanting to speak in very positive terms, indicating that she can do this. other members of the house, even influential leaders, are saying the votes aren't there yet. a lot of what is happening is going on behind closed doors, where we don't have a real sense yet of what the negotiations are going like on chairman waxman's committee. that is the committee on the house that is still working with those blue dog democrats. they say they are going piece by piece through it, trying to wrestle over whatever details the conservative democrats just aren't satisfied with. the speaker has really put a positive face on this. >> and she's surprised before, she's been able to produce the climate change vote and other compromises. savannah, at the white house, there's this new dispute that has flown up over the weekend over the budget director, who is the acknowledged health care expert in the white house, peter orszag, and his successor, doug

elmendorf, a democrat who is head of the nonpartisan congressional budget office and scored the latest compromise on saturday as not enough. only $2 billion of savings over the next ten years, which is not enough to sell it to skeptics in the senate and the house. >> yeah. and we saw peter orszag, the budget director here at the white house, kind of take a swipe at the cbo. this is the third time the cbo has kind of let the air out of the wheels of health care reform. the latest proposal being this medicare advisory board and the cbo said, look, you're only going to get about $2 billion worth of savings over ten years. what the white house says is, look, we never touted this as to pay for something that would entirely cover what they're trying to cover in terms of the gap on health care reform. so they're saying, look, we're not so disappointed by the cbo report. and yet you do sense the frustration. you can see it in this blog post that peter orszag wrote over the weekend, where he accused the cbo, which by the way he used to

run that office, of overstepping and said, look, they went well beyond than what they should have. so he's sort of quibbling with his former colleague over there, the cbo director, saying, your analyst doesn't really hold up. but at least in terms of today, the white house is not saying that the cbo is off, they're just saying, we're still looking for savings. >> savannah, before i let you go, the skip gates/sergeant crowley meeting with the president, the beer at the white house coming up soon? what are the signals? >> reporter: it's supposed to happen this week, actually, as early as this week. so we'll see. they're still trying to work out the scheduling. >> savannah guthrie and kelly o'donnell, thank you both very much. up next, sarah palin, the private citizen. more from her fiery farewell speech plus her prospects for the future. ♪ too bad i didn't know my credit was whack ♪ ♪ 'cause now i'm driving off the lot in a used sub-compact. ♪ ♪ f-r-e-e, that spells free credit report dot com, baby. ♪

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citizen. she officially handed over the reigns of alaska's governor and the former republican vice presidential candidate used that moment to sound off against a number of her targets. >> it is, throughout all of alaska, that big, wild, good life, teeming along the road that is north to the future. that's what we get to see every day. now, what the rest of america gets to see along with us is in this last frontier, there is hope and opportunity. and there is country pride. and it is our men and women in uniform securing it. we are facing tough challenges in america, with some seeming to be just be hell bent, maybe, on tearing down our nation, perpetuating some pessimism and suggesting american apologetics. >> democratic strategist steve mcmahon and republican strategist and former new york congresswoman susan molinari. okay. i would like somebody to tell me

what american apologetics are. >> i'll look for susan. susan, could you -- >> oh, no, no, you go first. no, i'm sorry, steve, you go. >> okay. never mind that. but as steve -- she has a lot of pizazz, she has a lot of power, and she has a lot of following. she had 5,000 people at the event yesterday. >> she does. and i think this illustrates beautifully the challenge for the republican party, because according to a "washington post" poll recently, her favorable ratio among the general electorate is about 20 or, i'm sorry, about 40%, and her unfavorable ratio is about 53%. among republicans, she's got a favorable/unfavorable ratio of about 70 favorable and 30 unfavorable. which means she would be a formidable candidate in the republican party, but wouldn't be such a good candidate once you get to the general election. i think she'll be looking at those numbers thinking, hey, if

i can get the nomination, i'll take it, but i think it would be a disaster for the republicans to sarah palin. and i hope they do. >> all that from what's apologetic. >> according to "the "anchorage daily news" the -- more governoring magazine. letterman won't be interested -- probably a fair assessment. >> it probably is. clearly governor palin was taken as a governor for a few years and jutted into the political spotlight. i think the introduction came out to this, this is someone who

went from zero to 100. clearly, i think this governor's going to be different. it sounds like everything he said that the focus is going to be on alaska. >> speaking to the republican issue, 70% popularity among republicans. she's got a lot of clout in the party. what does she have to do to have credibility nationally? >> she does have tremendous popularity in the republican party. how do you broaden that national base when you're not governor? when you don't have sort of the bully pulpit of governor itryind your reach? she was given a perfect platform as governor to increase that and what her plans are, not as a political spokesperson, it will be curious to see how she does that. >> all right. susan and steve, we have to leave it there, but it won't be the last we hear or talk about

sarah palin. and what political story will be making headlines in the next 24 hours? perhaps sarah palin. that's next. to ensure our forces are safer and stronger. to take the world we share to tomorrow and beyond. announcer: around the globe, the people of boeing are working together-- to make a difference. that's why we're here.

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it is because i love alaska this much, sir, that i feel it is my duty to avoid the unproductive, typical, politics as usual, lame duck session in one's last year in office. how does that benefit you? >> chris cillizza is with "the washington post" and author of the fix. how does that benefit you? >> it's a very, very, very fascinating speech. i think we expected no less from the former governor of alaska. i think what you saw in that clip you just played is sort of the appeal and the problem with sarah palin. the appeal is that she's all heart. she speaks from the heart. she's honest, unscripted.

the negative is she speaks from the heart, she's honest, she's unscripted. but it's fascinating to watch. i would guess even though she's out of office, we're going to have our eye on her for some time to come. >> i guess you're right. thanks so much. and i'm andrea mitchell in washington. tomorrow, michael nutter, bob shrum and pat buchanan. contessa brewer picks up our coverage on msnbc. he recommended citracal. it's a different kind of calcium. calcium citrate. with vitamin d... for unsurpassed absorption, to nourish your bones. some pharmacies make you work for it with memberships and fees. but not walmart. they have hundreds of generic prescriptions for just $4 for up to a 30-day supply

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