i'd like to know -- we'd like to know how did you become so wealthy on a government payroll? >> was that a low blow? sharron angle goes toe to toe with senate majority leader harry reid in their one and only debate before nevada voters go to the polls. did she deliver a knockout punch? >> i'm not a witch. i'm nothing you've heard. i'm you. >> by now you all know that ad or the spoofs of it. now meet the man using his magic

to create some of the most controversial and talked about campaign spots this year. >> hello voters. look at your ballot. now look at him. this is joe miller. now back to your ballot. you see his name. now look at her, now back to your ballot. sadly she is not on your ballot. why? because she lost. she lost to joe miller. look up. it's joe miller. >> speaking of ads, did you see that one? joe miller is spicing things up in his senate race in alaska. the chilean miners are heading home one by one. but they're being tight lipped about exactly what happened. i'm chris jansing this is jansing and company. we have nora o'donnell, summer con nish, joe hagan, fred davis and the reverend al sharpton will join us to talk about how he's trying to get voters of all political stripes to the polls. the bun disare asking was there a knockout blow in last night's

debate? well, it's the political fight everybody in the country is watching. nevada, sharron angle, heirry reid. they've been trading jabs, millions in ads over the airwaves. last night finally they did it in person. angle mostly on the attack. reid tried to paint his republican challenger as extreme. >> all these things i've talked about, my opponent is against those. she wouldn't do that. my job is to create jobs. what she's talking about is extreme. >> harry reid, it's not your job to create jobs. it's your job to create policies that create the confidence for the private sector to create those jobs. >> joining us now, msnbc's chief washington correspondent norah o'donnell, nationally syndicated radio talk show host michael summer con nish and ezra klein columnist with the washington host. set the scene for us, if you will, nora. how big was this debate considering how close this is and we're talking about arguably

the most powerful man in the u.s. senate. >> it may have been the tipping point for sharron angle. it's been neck and neck. harry reid's poll numbers have been miserable this entire season. probably one of the most vulnerable democrats in the country. sharron angle has been riding this tea party wave to raise nearly $14 million. i think jonathan martin of politico said there were more flubs than fireworks. in the end, it might benefit angle. >> one of those moments in the debate that we're all talking about is when sharron angle attacked reid about his lifestyle. let's take a look at that clip. >> you came from search light to the senate with very little. now you're one of the richest men in the u.s. senate. on behalf of nevada taxpayers, i'd like to know, we'd like to know how did you become so wealthy on a government payroll? >> senator reid? >> mitch, that's really kind of

a low blow. i think most everyone knows i was a very successful lawyer. i did a very good job in investing. her sug jex that i made money being a senator is simply false, and i'm really disappointed that she would suggest that. >> let's look, ezra, at that one little clip. does anybody help themselves, hurt themselves in something like that? obviously that was a well-practiced line or previously thought-outline by sharron angle. >> it was a good attack from angle. it's a normal attack. you're washington and you've profited off being washington. you're establishment and you lost step with the people here in nevada. i'll say, i think reid's response was effective and it looks like angle's attack was a low blow. we need to paint the context here. nevada has the highest unemployment in the nation. it's 15%. if the whole nation was in what nevada is in, we'd call it the depression. there's an enormous amount of economic pain there. when angle suggested this guy is out of touch and letting this happen, you know it's a pretty hard punch. >> michael, would it be fair to

say all the pressure really was on harry reid last night? basically she just had to hold her own. i think a lot of columnists put that she doesn't have to look like the extremist that she's been painted with some of her own statements frankly, and she wins. was it pretty much that simple last night? >> absolutely. it's the same reaction, chris, i had in watching the debate earlier in the week with chris coons and christine o'donnell. i think there's a curiosity factor about both christine o'donnell and sharron angle because so much has been written and said about each of them that people are tuning in, getting a look and perhaps walking away and saying, well, not so impressive on substance. but not as bad as i've heard. hey, maybe i can live with that if i really want to shake the senator shake the house in some of these congressional races. it's all about expectations. that's why in both this debate and the one earlier in the week, i would have to give it to the tea-party-backed candidates. >> i want to thank you michael

for coming on and talking about this. we want to also talk about one of the most closely watched governors races. former president bill clinton will stump for jerry brown later tonight at ucla. even though sarah palin is in california, meg whitman will not be attending a big rally tomorrow. whitman has another event scheduled for tomorrow. the latest poll shows brown has a seven-point lead over whitman as we head into the home stretch to election day. let's bring in cbs chief washington correspondent john harwood who is following the campaign in california, "new york magazine" reporter joe hagan, his latest article "the return of governor moon beam," and norah o'donnell is back with us as well. since you're out in craft, john, set the scene for us. what's the race like out there? >> first of all, chris, you know california misses you. it's a terrific race. we've got two very competitive races for senate and governor

featuring former ceos from silicon valley in the governor's race. meg whitman fell a few points behind jerry brown. jerry brown has been around for decades. his father was the governor here. he didn't need to spend nearly as much money -- actually no money at all to get california to know who he is. meg whitman spent $150 million. the race has descended into some side issues off the track from jobs and the economy lately. meg whitman was hurt by the revolution that she employed an illegal immigrant as a housekeeper. and jerry brown has been battling the controversy over a secretly-recorded telephone call in which one of his aides -- used the word whore in referring to whitman in the context of a deal with public employees, in particular police. interestingly governor schwarzenegger seemed to take a shot yesterday at meg whitman when he was asked about this on

twitter. and he said, the word whore is unacceptable. but it's appalling when anyone sells out. interesting tilt from that republican governor. >> never a dull moment in california. joe, your article was terrific, so well researched and you obviously had a lot of access. governor moon beam is the guy who once famously talked about making california a launch pad for a massive migration into space and seemed to have held every political office since then. of course, now, attorney general. but before that he was mayor of oakland, ran for president three times. who is the jerry brown running for governor in 2010? >> when he became mayor of oakland, he did reformat his identity as a tough guy who was probably a little more sober than the governor moon beam image that he had had. now i see in this race that he's the devil people know at this point. meg whitman, for all the money

she's spent, i think people know what she represents and the kind of things that she might do. >> but they couldn't be more different really. >> that's right. >> you talk about his sort of zen candidacy and she is this bill their pounding on the airwaves, $140 million of her own money. >> i think that money stopped working in august. that's when we started to see that the money was not making the polls go up any higher for her. people talk out there that you couldn't turn on a baseball game without seeing her face. she oversaturated the markets. it could be argued it was necessary. the media markets are fragmented in california. it's an amazing kind of choice. it's california. would we expect any less? >> except that in a blue state like california, there were republican hopes that that wave would extend to california. that they finally had not a career polltion tigs, jerry brown, but meg whitman, well-regarded business leader, woman, billionaire, those are rare figures. someone who could be chief

executive of the united states, could be president of the united states in terms of qualification some thought. she poured all this money in. and carly fiorina, there were high hopes she would be much further ahead. and now sarah palin is descending in anaheim, the mamma grizzly of them all. >> i want to ask one final question because one of the things i loved about the way you framed this story, we talked a lot on this program about americans and their feeling that somehow the american dream isn't within reach anymore, that they're afraid their kids won't get a good job, won't have a better life than they did. you talk about the california dream, the sunshine and the palm trees and the movie stars and all that. and how does this race sort of fit into that idea that california is a place throughout its history where people went to pursue their dreams? >> that's what they're struggling with out there and what the country is struggling with, which is that the fiscal reality of the state and the way

it's governed, it cannot be squared any longer. more people are leaving the state than going in. a reverse gold rush going on right now because there's unemployment at 12.5%. $88 billion in debt. it's sort of -- i think that's why you see a lot of ambivalence in the polls and why you see this kind of dead heat situation out there. i think people are incredibly frustrated and cynical. >> john can probably weigh in better than i can, yet california is still going to be the incubator for political reform, it's a place where you have on the ballot what could change congressional districting. some say it's the solution to partisanship in washington. we won't have these districts that are so republican and so democrat. you this fierce fighting in washington for what could cure what a lot of experts say, the junk going on in washington. >> the old saying that when california sneezes, the rest of the country catches a cold. >> reporter: exactly. the problem is governor

schwarzenegger has been trying to move some of those process reforms over the last several years. remember, he came in as an outsider. he wasn't so successful. we'll see how new waves of attempted reform go. but the level of cynicism among voters is so high, usually even if you get a constructive change placed on the ballot. it's pretty easy to take it down and get people to a no vote. the one thing i want to add, guys, in terms of the secret sauce for democrats here and why jerry brown and barbara boxer have been somewhat more resilient than some people thought in this year when republicans are doing so well, nationally, president obama, mid 40s. in california he's over 50%. that tells you something about why this is a blue state to begin with. >> and that is a crate cal number. john, thank you for that. joe and norah, great discussion. thanks for coming in. >> the secret sauce. >> making me hungry actually. >> exit stage left. the latest daytime dustup from the ladies of "the view."

you don't think it was planned, do you, norah? >> actually i don't. bill o'reilly was the guest yesterday and a conversation about a proposed islamic center near ground zero left two of the hosts heading for the door. check this out. >> 70% of americans don't want that mosque down there. >> where is that poll? where is that poll? >> what are you talking about? >> muslims attacked us on 9/11. >> no, no. extremists did that. >> i don't want to sit here. i don't want to sit here now. i don't. i'm outraged by that statement. >> you're outraged about muslims killing us on 9/11. >> you have just seen what should not happen. we should be able to have discussions without washing our hands and screaming and walking off stage. >> joy and whoopi returned to the stage a few minutes later after o'reilly apologized.

both o'reilly and behar addressed it on their own shows later that night. christine o'donnell's "i am not a witch" ad one of the most memorable this season. you'll meet the most influential ad man. a seventh grader is tired of being picked on bull bullies and is going to do something about it. are humans to blame for creating cancer? fascinating new research and it's coming from ancient mummies. ♪ [ upbeat instrumental ]

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this problem is getting so bad, evenment obama is addressing it. we're talking about bullying. in the span of 19 days the country saw fourteen age boys taking their own lives. all four relentlessly bullied before they died. >> our heart breaks when we read about what happened at rutgers,

when we read about some of these other young people who are doing nothing to deserve the kind of harassment and bullying that just completely gets out of hand. >> there is one youj man out there trying to take a stand. marco is a seventh grader who protested outside his school to try to stop kids from tormenting him and others. he joins us now. marco, it's good to see you. let me start with you because you say you've had your head smashed against cement four times. you're called names. we showed the pictures of you protesting outside your school. what happened after that? marco, are you there? >> yes, i am. >> we were having trouble hearing you. what happened the day after you held that protest? >> the day after i protested,

the bullying still continued. >> it didn't stop. they actually gave you a hard time for doing it? >> yeah. actually it seemed to get worse. >> what's your life been like? tell us a little bit about the things that have happened to you and how it's affected you both in school and at home. >> well, when i didn't tell my parents, i slept and i ate a lot. but then when i noticed that they did care and we actually did something about it, i just wanted to -- all the parents to know that this is a serious deal and it needs to stop. >> i'm listening to you, looking at you. you seem like a great young man. why are they picking on you? what do they say to you? >> they call me gay and they call me a fag and a lot of words i can't say on air. it's just getting out of hand. i go no, i'm not gay, and i'm not a fag. it's just uncontrollable. >> so what have teachers said?

what have school administrators said? what's happened as a result of all this getting so much publicity? anything at all? >> teachers act like they didn't notice me. they pretended me like i wasn't -- i didn't even do it. but there was one teacher, my second period teacher. she was telling me i did a great job. >> so what happens next for you? no one should have to go to school and no one should have to live their life constantly being tormented. what do you think happens next? are you going to stay in that school? >> no. i'm going to continue protesting, and i'm going to -- i've gotten a few phone calls from another district, a parent telling me they want me to help them protest. so sometime next week, i'm going to be protesting again. >> it's good to know that there are people out there giving you some support.

bravo to you for taking a stand on this. especially given your situation it's not an easy thing. thank you for being with us. we apologize for some of the technical problems. >> robby -- >> congratulations to marco for turning this situation around and trying to take control of it oovps. this is really a community issue. this is not a situation that can just be handled by an individual child, an individual family. this has to be handled on multiple levels. it really does take a ville taj in that situation. we need to educate communities out there as to what to look for in terms of bullying. we need to have teachers in the school who can identify it and nip this in the bud. >> and to people who say, you know what, this has been going on forever. kids are mean, they can be very mean to each other. you'll hear adults say it happened to me. it happened when i was in

school. we're hearing about it a lot more. >> it really wasn't identified as a problem until the '70s. the problem is webbing nolg, te. it's increasing the impact. if somebody getting attacked via text, facebook, the internet, where can they go? i think that's what's contributing to the increase in suicide. so we can no longer take this stance. yes, kids will be aggressive. but it's our responsibility to teach social, emotional intelligence and teach kids how not to be nasty. you don't want the child who is bullying because they just don't know any better or they're enjoying the power to then have to deal with the guilt of a child suiciding. we need to protect everybody here. >> without a doubt. robi ludwig, psycho trar pift and contributor to care.com. thanks for being with us. cancer kills more than half a million americans every year. is this disease a product of man's own making?

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almost all of us have been affected one way or another by cancer. you see the pink wall behind me. we put it there because it's breast cancer awareness month. now there's a fascinating new study that looked at almost 1,000 mummies and found that only a couple had any signs of tumors and what that's leading them to suggest is that it's modern lifestyles and pollution that may be the cause of cancers. dr. mark lip man is a world renowned unkolth at the university of miami's miller school of medicine. doctor, thank you for joining us. i found it fascinating. what do you think about this

study? >> it's extremely interesting, but there's a bit of misleading information. the problem is all of these mummies died young. cancer a disease that comes on as we get older. there's no doubt that the environment is responsible for most human cancers. absolutely true. the single greatest cause of cancer in human beings is due to an environmental factor, and that factor is cigarette smoke. >> let's look at the major causes of cancer here. cause of death in the united states. heart disease is number one. we see again cancer number two. is there -- does it seem to be -- >> you look at this study in relationship to the other body of research out there. do we know a lot more about environmental causes, about things like pollution, the things that we eat? >> well, i know people want to think that there's a simple solution, that it's ooh minor pollutant or something in the air or food that's causing most cancer. i'm afraid it's not true. half of all cancer is caused by cigarette smoke.

the other major cause is nutrition but not because of some minor component. we are bigger, we are fatter, we are larger, and that's the major cause of breast cancer. in country where people only got to be five feet tall and weighed 100 pounds, there was 1/10 as much breast cancer. the same is true for prostate cancer. pollution is important. i don't want to say it isn't. but it really isn't the major cause, environmental cause of cancer. >> there was an interesting statement because what you said at the beginning that a lot of these mummies obviously were young people, that they died much younger. they said they did find examples of modern-day problems. they found related diseases such as hardening of the arteries, examples of arthritis which they say actually dismisses the argument of the fact that the reason that they didn't find more examples of tumors was because these mummies were all young. you don't buy that? >> not completely.

look around you now. ask how many people that you know who are 30 or 40 have colon cancer or prostate cancer. these are diseases that increase remarkably as we get older. there's a huge success story here. heart disease is dropping in terms of incidence rates. we keep people alive wonderfully with heart disease. if you live longer, i hate to put it this way, no one gets out of this place alive. there's more cancer. i'm not dismissing what these authors have said. i hope you won't veer away from what i'm saying about cigarette smoking. bladder, paning yas, head and neck, tonsil, tongue and lung are all caused by cigarettes. >> dr. marc lippman, great talking to you. thanks. you know campaign season is in full swing when both the president and vice president have a full slate of weekend events. today the stump starts in

biden's home state of delaware, plus -- >> barack obama is the worst president in history. my generation will inherit a weakened country. >> meet the ad man behind some of the gop's most well-known political ads, this one from ben quail. christine o'donnell's "i am not a witch." lancaster. sure, i can download directions for you now. we got it. thank you very much! check it out. i can like, see everything that's going on with the car. here's the gas level. i can check on the oil. i can unlock it from anywhere. i've received a signal there was a crash. some guy just cut me off. i'll get an ambulance to you right away. safely connecting you in ways you never thought possible. onstar. live on.

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while most of us kick back and enjoy the weekend, president obama and vice president biden will be on the trail stumping for democrats and urging supporters from 2008 to make their voices heard again in november. of course, they're not the only big names on the road this weekend. we asked richard lui to tell us where all the big names will be this weekend. >> they're taking nothing for granted. the president and vice president are headed to delaware where chris coons is comfortably ahead of christine o'donnell by double

digits. this might be an opportunity to paint o'donnell as the new face of the gop and perhaps energize democrats on a national vefl. the president heads to massachusetts to help old friend deval patrick on saturday. the democrats there want to avoid another scott brown incident in the bay state. then to ohio, governor strickland vies for re-election while democrat lee fisher struggles to make up a double digit gap. ohio key for the president this year and then in 2012. let's talk about former president bill clinton on the road. the closer heading to california to help jerry brown in his bid for governor there. then to new mexico to help get diane dennish into the state house. the republicans, chris, are also working quite hard weekend, working over the weekend, looking at trying to change the balance of power in the senate. sarah palin goes to california underlining how some pundits believe left-leaning california might be in play this year in some of the races there. then to one of the largest conservative regions, she heads

to orange county, california, where she will be at the rnc victory 2010 event. finally for the gop, former new york mayor rudy guiliano will stump for marco rubio in florida for the senate seat there. that three-way race potentially creating a problem for democrats as the liberal vote may get split there. >> fun to talk about on monday. >> lots. they're calling him the don draper of the gop, the man behind the ads you're all talking about. >> i'm not a witch. >> barack obama is the worst president in history. >> and complete the dang fence. >> it's a huge story in "time" magazine where they're calling him the gop's hottest mad man. joining me now, fred davis, the guru on everyone's hot list right now. thanks very much for being with us. >> morning, chris. >> i'm fascinated by where these

ideas come from, and particularly the idea that you don't go to a candidate and say, here is a, b, c and d. you say this is my idea, take it or leave it. i'm curious about the reaction when you went to christine o'donnell or her people and said, my idea is to sit down in front of the camera in your black dress and pearls and say "i am not a witch." >> we needed a line in the sand t. conversation was between me and christine o'donnell and know one else. it was the first time i met her. we were going to film them the next day. i said you need to get this behind you. she got it. she understood. christine o'donnell, if you saw in the debate the other night, she is one sharp lady. they say we're down double digits. wait till you see what the numbers are on election day. she's great. she understood it. >> just deal with it and get beyond it. that's your idea, just deal with it and get beyond it.

you think that's worked and we weren't seeing that in the polls yet? >> it hasn't worked yet. you had to do it. you had to take the first step because you were the butt of every late-night joke. you were the lead joke on "saturday night live," of course. you have to say no more of that. from now on we talk about what's important to the people of delaware. you couldn't do that until you put that to bed. so we put it to bed. >> it wasn't just hear and the appearance bill maher. now it's become social commentary, your ad we're watching. let me play a little clip of the s&l parody as well. >> i'm not a witch. i'm nothing you've heard. i'm you. >> i am not a watch. i'm nothing like what you've heard. i'm you. just like you i have to constantly deny that i'm a witch. >> she brought that up in the

debate. does that help her? is this sort of the school of, all publicity is good publicity? >> i don't think it's all publicity is good publicity, chris, as much as it is -- i am like you. i can laugh at myself. christine thought -- i she she had gotten more wit and laughter out of the "saturday night live" thing, i'll assure you, than i did. she commented she thought that actress's hair looked better than hers did. she has a great sense of humor. she looked at it in a good way. >> we saw that was also the same strategy with ben quail, worst president of the world because he had been caught in this continue seer see over a racy website. you idea was to get people talking about this and mott the other controversy. of course, he did win the primary. >> we won the primary, won it handily, we wrr grotesquely out spent by another candidate. the difference on that was what

people have missed is that it's now finally, long after the primary election come out that those stories weren't true, that he didn't found or co-found this website. we knew that at the time. but you could either litigate that through the press or change the subject. so i was sitting there in dan quayle's breakfast nook with ben and he was being beleaguered by the press over this untrue story. i said why are you even running for this? he said because i think barack obama is the worst president in history and it's my generation that's going to have to suffer and do something about it. i had my piece of paper out and i wrote those words down. those words are really ben's words. and that's what he believes. >> you also did an ad for john mccain in 2008 when he ran for president. you told "the washington post" you wanted to use that footage of the reverend jeremiah wright in an attack ad but mccain overruled you. you said because he was a decent guy and because he was so decent

we couldn't use all the tools and that's a reason we didn't win. you believe that, he wasn't tough enough to win that race? >> totally incorrect. i didn't say he isn't tough enough. john mccain is one of the toughest people i've ever known. but he's decent. he wouldn't allow us to use something that he thought was a below-the-belt hit, right or wrong. >> i'm curious, how often do you go to somebody with the ad idea as you did to christine o'donnell and obviously probably in many of these cases you are meeting them for the first time. how often do they say no? >> i would say 100% of the time initially and then we talk about it and talk about the strategy behind it and where it's going to go. any ad campaign is more than one ad. you need to know what the last ad is going to be when you're working on the first ad so you can tell a story. if you have a compelling story

and the candidate gets it, often with changes, we'll come around and get to do what we set out to do when we walked in the room. >> all right. fred davis, it's fascinating. the "time" magazine article was fascinating. obviously your commercials are the ones everybody is talking about. i want to bring you back right after election day if, indeed, christine o'donnell wins and those polls are so very, very wrong. it's been great of you to talk to us now. thanks so much. speaking of eye-catching ads, joe miller is stealing a page from, yes, the old spice guy. >> hello voters. look at your ballot. now look at him. this is joe miller. now back to your ballot. you see his name. now look at her. now back to your ballot. sadly she is not on your ballot. why? because she lost. she lost to joe miller. look up. it's joe miller. >> while joe miller may not look exactly like isaiah must staff

fa, voters will take a long look at his campaign with 18 days until the election. how about this for "oops," somebody put the wrong name in the voting machine. it should have read rich whitney, instead they left off the n so it was rich whitey. crews in illinois are working overtime to make the correction. it's just on electronic machines, not on paper ads. we know why we're here. to chart a greener path in the air and in our factories.

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a new survey is shocking a lot of americans. i know it surprised me. an alarming number of u.s. military are struggling with personal debt. and the consequences affect all of us. more than 25% of those surveyed said they have at least $10,000 in credit card debt. one in four have trouble keeping up with the bills. another quarter of them admit to overdrawing their checking accounts. let's bring in jerry walsh, vice president of the financial industry and regulatory authority. also with us, retooird army colonel and msnbc military analyst jack jacobs. jerry, it was your group that conducted the research. what's the takeaway here? how bad is the financial situation? >> there's good news and bad news for the military, chris. it's very significant the amount of debt that military service members struggle with. when you look at the amount of debt that they have, that can

contribute to mission unreadiness. financial readiness frequently is what is so important for misread dins. >> if you're struggling with how you're going to pay your bills, how do you concentrate on your job? it's that simple, right? >> exactly. >> one of the things that surprised me is how often these military families move. you know they often go from place to place. but in the example, for example, of the wife of david petraeus. she said they moved 23 times in 26 years. how often did you move jack? >> in 20 years i moved 13 times. in one year i moved three times alone. >> your wife is still with you. >> yes. it's very difficult, very difficult to manage your finances, manage your life, your household when you're moving so frequently and particularly when you're dough employed and it's very difficult to talk with your spouse so that you can manage your finances. it's expensive to be in the military, and unfortunately most military people don't make enough money.

>> let's talk about how much they make. a new army private learned just over $17,000 a year. corporal over $22,000. staff sergeant will bring home close to $27,000. so what does that mean for the average family, jerry? >> what that means is that while some service members are doing a very good job of keeping up with day today expenses, what ends up happening is more of them turn to nonbank borrowing and to credit card lending in order to make their monthly bills add up and being able to make ends meet. being able to make ends meet was one of the four key criteria of the financial capability survey. that is one of the things we looked at. >> jack, what's the answer here? >> the answer is to pay these people a lot more money. in fact, they get lots less money than they out to. they're not going to get any pay increases commensurate with the responsibilities they have. when i first came in the army, a

private made $78 a month. almost none of the servicemen was married. high-ranking, noncommissioned officers lived in the barracks. today, lots and lots of soldiers are married, have children, responsibilities in excess of their capability to support them. on top of that you have the problem of deploying guard and reserve people, all of whom have to leave the jobs they have in order to take a huge pay cut to zer serve the country. pay them more is what i say. >> thanks for bringing all this to light. black voters have the power to tip the scales in several races this november. but only if they go out to vote. the reverend l. sharpton is launching a coast-to-coast nonpartisan education tour that targets minority voters. we'll talk to him next. [ commentator ] lindsey vonn! she stays tough! earlier, she had an all-over achy cold... what's her advantage? it's speedy alka-seltzer!

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over the past several months the racial climate seems to have deteriorated and this seems to run in utter contrast to the idealism that the country was endowed with after your election, so my question to you, what happened? >> oftentimes misunderstandings and antagonisms surface most strongly when the economic times are tough, and sometimes that organizes itself around kind of a tribal attitude. >> that is the president yesterday fielding questions from younger voters of an mtv town hall event and topics from race to immigration and all with the midterm elections more than two weeks away. the reverend al sharpton is set to kick off a coast-to-coast education tour to target minority voters. there is a new report showing that number of black voters is large enough to sway 24 hour rates, and reverend al sharpton joins me and he is a member of

the coalition for action. obviously, reverend sharpton, there are democrats who would love to find the magic formula to find the groups who so strongly supported barack obama to get to the polls. some indications are that they are disenchanted what has happened over the last two years and they thought that things would be better by now and we heard it at the mtv event yesterday and heard it several weeks ago when there was the cnbc town hall and a woman spoke movingly about wondering if this is her new normal, and what are you doing to do to convince the minority voters that they need to get out there? >> well, first of all, we have to talk about why do people vote? you vote because of your interests. i'm in los angeles today, and reverend tulles was just talking to me about how 48% of black men between 16 and 35 are unemployed. you are not going to solve that by not reinforcing the vote that

will have job bills like the president has put forward and other things to provide jobs, and bringing those who cause the economic crash in the first place. so what i am saying and i'm here in pennsylvania to go on to miami and then on to memphis is that have to fight to protect the interests. no magic wand is going to solve the problems, but if we don't vote, we will go backwards and invest in those who caused the problems that have become entrenched in our communities at a disproportionate level. >> and for the minority voters who say, reverend, look, we thought that we had spoeng, ake obviously washington has not listened because we are not seeing the results, and maybe they don't want to vote for a republican, and so disenchanted they won't vote at all, what would you say to them if they feel, i got out to vote, and look, we don't feel any better off than we were two years ago. >> i'd say, let's talk as adults in the political process.

when the conservatives took this country in 1980 with ronald r reagan they cam back and voted in the midterms and came back to re-elect reagan and then bush senior and lost eight years and then came back twice with george bush. the left wing conservative trickled down theory of body of politic, and they kept voting. we cannot vote one time and think that we are going to undo 22 years of a conservative right-wing move that would make those that want to see social justice and economic rights for middle-class working-class and poor people and turn this tide around. i think that when you lay that out, and i have spoken in the last ten days that morehouse college, and howard university and columbia, that young voters and people have to get out to vote not one time in 2008 and undo the reagan and bush years. >> reverend al sharpton, always good to see you, and thank you

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