several agencies into one. will republicans find a way to oppose a smaller, leaner government? live coverage this hour. the firestorm over former governor haley barbour's pardons won't go way with a possible manhunt planned to track down five killers who are on the loose. and joran van der sloot to be sentenced for killing a woman in peru. where is the justice for natalee holloway and her family? we're going to talk with a lawyer who represents the family. great to have you with me. it is friday, the 13th, if you didn't know. i'm thomas roberts. we have a really busy hour ahead for you. we start with the republican southern blitz. it is really kicking into high gear. the candidates making stops in florida and south carolina today to get their messages across to those undecided gop voters. but the real war is being waged over the airwaves with mitt romney unleashing this tv ad in south carolina today, defending his record at bain. >> this is a business mitt romney helped start. and this one. and this steel mill.

mitt romney helped create and ran a company that invested in struggling businesses, grew new ones and rebuilt old ones. >> so what do you do if you're newt gingrich and republicans are telling you now to back off of mitt romney and his business background? in newt's case, you go after the front-runner for speaking french. john kerry style. >> what has massachusetts given us? a liberal governor who wanted us to believe he's strong on defense. a liberal senator who wanted us to believe he was a man of the people. and a massachusetts moderate who runs away from ronald reagan. and just like john kerry -- he speaks french too. >> bon jour, mitt romney. >> he's still a massachusetts moderate. >> bloodbath. that new ad from newt gingrich, he's scheduled to speak live this morning. two separate meetings being held this weekend to find an anti-romney candidate to rally around. one is going to involve

evangelicals in texas. the other will feature tea party groups in south carolina which holds its primary just eight days from now. joining me is chad connolly, republican party chairman in south carolina. it is great to have you with me, chad. as long as we have this discussion of a splintered gop field on the other side of mitt romney, his poll numbers, they seem to be standing and standing really strong. assuming those numbers can hold up, hold steady, what is the message that mitt romney really needs to bring with him from south carolina, from social conservatives in your state as he moves forward? >> hey, thomas, great to be here with you today. thanks for having me. i really think that governor romney's run around the state now and doing his best to connect with people and i think if he shows he's a consistent conservative and he believes what he states and he stands by it, he's going to be fine. his numbers are holding. they're not so much the anti-romney meetings as much as groups trying to coalesce and figure out who they're for. it is a crowded field. and it is a -- anytime there is

a six-person field you see a lot of folks behind just about everybody. right now, i have good friends in all six campaigns. people that help me run for my campaign last spring. this is the nature of primaries. the gloves are off, certainly. it is a backyard brawl, but our folks will come together in the fall to beat barack obama. >> it is going to be interesting to see who is left with a kneecap after coming through south carolina. because the ads are pretty nasty. i want to talk to you about the tea party. it is the sub culture within the republican party. they're holding a convention in myrtle beach on sunday. do you think they're going to be talking about how to throw their support behind one candidate? finally sew it up so they can unite and figure out who they want to support, even if it does turn out to be mitt romney. the tea party favorite, nikki haley, she supports him. why can't they? >> i think the tea party in particular, there is no question they'll be influential. they folded into the republican party in a lot of places and they're the ones i'm talking about as they are in all different six camps.

i have tea party groups and friends who are backing just about everybody across south carolina. so, you know, everybody has got their affinity and they'll come together in the end. there is no question about it. the biggest goal right here is to make sure barack obama is simply the worst one-term president ever. >> we shall see how it all boils out, chad connolly, chairman of the south carolina republican party. thank you for your time this morning. i appreciate it. >> great to be here, thomas. take care. have a good weekend. president obama wants to shrink government and is planning to ask congress for the power to merge six government agencies and merge them all into one. the president is going to speak in about 15 minutes from the east room of the white house. we're going to bring you the remarks live as they happen. nbc news white house correspondent mike viqueira joins me to talk about this. mike, the president is going to be calling on congress to give him the power for this reorganization, the authority. exactly what is the president want to propose here and is congress going to get behind him on this one if they have been

defined as this obstructionist movement? >> reporter: that's a great question, thomas. there is both more and less than meets the eye here. very interesting. the white house is calling for the elimination, wait for it, one, two, one of them, the congress department. they're essentially calling for the elimination of that department. half of the budget of the commerce department is the national oceanic and atmospheric administration, the fine folks that help us predict the weather. they want to move that out to the department of interior, take the core functions of the commerce department and move them together with a whole bunch of alphabet agencies, the sba, opic, xm bank, ostr, all dealing with trade and commerce overseas. put them together in a new agency as yet unnamed. very interesting. the criticism from republicans is simply going to be, yeah, you might be in eliminating the commerce department, but it will live under another name. there will be virtually no job losses here in terms of the federal government. the republicans want to shrink the size of government, 1,000 to

2,000 jobs lost through attrition over the course of the next couple of years, saving about $3 billion in the proposals that the white house is putting together today over the course of the next ten years. but, look, the white house says a lot of the functions are overlapping, we need to streamline, we need to consolidate and the ask, what the president wants congress to do is to give him the authority to do this, to consolidate a lot of these inefficient organizations and agencies within the federal government in the white house under one umbrella and give him fast track authority to do so, that means quick votes, up or down votes in the house or the senate. >> saving money, cutting out government waste. we'll see how congress goes on this one. we're watching for the president as well. mike viqueira at the white house, thanks. president obama to be speaking roughly in less than 15 minutes. we bring you those remarks live right here on msnbc. now, to breaking news, reports say that the credit ratings of several european countries will be downgraded. downgraded as early as today by standard & poor's. the s&p has declined to comment

on the possibility that an announcement is eminent. just last month, though, the s&p placed 15 of the 17 euro zone countries on watch, on watch for this potential downgrade because of the debt problems. we're seeing the red arrows across the board there. the dow jones down by nearly 100. all of this is helping continually push the stocks lower. stocks already opened lower today after a pretty disappointing earnings report this morning by jpmorgan chase. we'll watch it for you today. >> appeared to be a real video of what took place. i think we're still waiting for a firm confirmation that that's the case. that kind of behavior is deplorable. and i condemn it. >> defense secretary leon panetta once again condemning the actions of a handful of remains seen on tape being urinated on by marines of dead taliban fighters, multiple investigations being launched as

this -- as the pentagon tries to really control the damage that is taking place around the world. nbc chief pentagon correspondent jim miklaszewski joins me now. where does the investigation go from here and is it fair to say this is a gift to the taliban? >> well, it could be. there is deep seeded concern here that anytime something like this crops up, that enemy forces could use it to rally their forces, even as a recruiting tool. and the taliban is already said that they intend to step up their attacks against american forces in afghanistan because of this. nobody has seen that yet. and at the same time, the taliban says, well, it should not affect the overall peace negotiations that are sort of in progress right now, but moving very slowly. so that yet has to play itself out. but investigators are going to look re closely at this action. they already talked to two of the marines on that tape. they're trying to track down the other two. they know who they are. but they have now been

transferred to other marine corps units. so that's just a matter of time. but, you know what is interesting about this, because we have seen these kinds of things happen before in both iraq and afghanistan, most of them much worse than that kind of video. but this is the first time we have seen the kind of organized hue and cry and condemnation from so many pentagon and military officials and secretary of state hillary clinton that, you know, these four individuals, these four marines have to realize by now that they're probably in deep trouble because it appears that the pentagon military and the u.s. government are interested in making an example of these four to make sure that these kinds of things don't happen again. they could face serious criminal charges. and if court-martialed and convicted, could actually face some jail time too, thomas. >> nbc's jim miklaszewski for us at the pentagon. thank you. i appreciate it. right now we're following breaking news out of north carolina. we're told that three men are

dead near the city of star. this after a disgruntled employee walked into a lumber warehouse and started shooting co-workers there. it happened this morning at the mcbride lumber company. the montgomery county sheriff says the suspect then fled and turned the gun on himself. he's now being treated at an area hospital along with a fourth victim who survived that shooting. we're going to continue to follow the story for any breaking developments and bring them right here as soon as we get them. also following other breaking news, monitoring the courtroom in peru where joran van der sloot is expected to be sentenced any moment now for the murder of a young woman. we're going to bring you that sentence as it happened, but you can see the anguish on his face and the sweat that is pouring out of his head. we're back with much more after this. wheeeeeeeeeeee! whee whee wheeeeeeeeeeee-he-he-heeeeee! whee whee wheeeeeeeeeeee! pure adrenaline.

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administration is warning iran. iran is threatening to close the strait of hormuz, a vital water way where a fifth of the world's oil flows through over day. senior administration officials say doing so would cross a red line that would force the u.s. to reopen the strait using military force. i'm joined by msnbc military analyst and retired army colonel jack jacobs. great to have you here. as we continue to talk more about this and brief ourselves on the facts about what is taking place, explain to all of us, do they really have the capacity to close the strait in iran or is this just a bluff? >> well, it might be a bluff but they certainly do militarily have the capability to close straits of hormuz. it is only about 23 miles across at its greatest restriction and the sea lane is not very wide there at all. they have the capability of laying mines and it won't take very much to mine the sea lanes

there. in addition, they have some kilo class submarines run very, very talent, difficult to detect, even with our current capability. but just their saying, just their threatening to do it made everybody jittery and just by saying it, it will restrict the flow of commerce through the strait. >> putting a carrier in the region is really not an option, in the strait itself. >> no, no, no. you're absolutely right. we can't turn it around. it is so narrow we can't get a carrier strike force turning around in the strait. it is not going in the strait. don't forget we have the capability of projecting our force through air power over really a long distance. fa-18s off the strike carrier, get refuelled in the air and can strike anything in the strait. but detecting these guys is going to be tough. just their threat of doing it

makes commercial shipments jittery. >> this is not media hype. this is something that we could see escalating within the next 90 days, correct? >> oh, yeah. it happened before, you know. and, yeah, i think 90 days or less. i believe the chance of there being an engagement of some kind maybe approaches 50%. i don't think it is going to escalate, but it could very well -- there could very well be a strike. and we're going to have to deal with it. >> congress is not the way to go. diplomacy is the way to go. >> through the back door. be quiet about it, talk to these guys but be very quiet about it. diplomacy is the way to go. remember this, there are some real cowboys among the republican guards who are operating both the submarines and the patrol boats. they have the capability, the authority to do whatever they want to do and they're able to make a strike whether tehran orders it or not. >> jack jacobs, jack, always great to have you. thank you, sir.

>> pleasure, thomas. >> a new poll shows slightly more that president obama to set the nation's course over the gop, a potential boost was campaign as the president gets ready to propose his own government reform plan. that comes up in roughly a few minutes from now. we'll take you there live when we get the president speaking. then five killers pardoned by mississippi governor haley barbour are on the loose. is there going to be a manhunt to track them down? is it going on as we speak and get them back behind bars? a full briefing after this. [ kate ] many women may not be properly absorbing the calcium they take because they don't take it with food. switch to citracal maximum plus d. it's the only calcium supplement that can be taken with or without food. that's why my doctor recommends citracal maximum.

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yoo-hoo. hello. it's water from the drinking fountain at the mall. [ male announcer ] great tasting tap water can come from any faucet anywhere. the brita bottle with the filter inside. ♪ [ gong ] strawberry banana! [ male announcer ] for a smoothie with real fruit plus veggie nutrition new v8 v-fusion smoothie. could've had a v8. welcome back, everybody. we're waiting live remarks from president obama this hour. he's about to ask congress for greater power to shrink the federal government. he wants to merge six sprawling commerce and trade agencies into one, whose overlapping programs can be baffling to certain businesses. thus eliminating a lot of bureaucratic nightmares. those agencies, the commerce department's core business and

trade functions, the small business administration, the office of u.s. trade representative, the export-import bank, the overseas private investment corporation and the trade and development agency. the goal, the big goal, would be one agency, one agency designed to help businesses thrive. the administration estimates as a result, 1,000 to 2,000 jobs would be cut, but that would be through attrition. there would be a savings of $3 billion over the course of ten years by eliminating due ining overhead costs. joining me now, richard wolffe and wendy schiller. thanks to both of you for being here. i want to give you the heads up if the president does come out, we're going to jump out of our conversation and get to him right away. so, wendy, let me start with you. senior administration officials say this idea is not just to make the government small, but better, better by saving time, eliminating bureaucratic nightmares. in your estimation, can it work? >> i think it can work, but the

question is will it resonate with voters? that's -- what you have to ask yourself, is this an attempt by the president to insulate himself. we know there are more federal employees than there used to be. i think this is a way of saying, listen, if romney is the nominee and he's mr. efficiency, we can be efficient too. president clinton decreased the size of the federal government and consolidated a lot of things. i'm not sure it resonates that closely with voters now who are not anxious to hear about more cuts, for example, we know that consolidating agencies probably means cuts to federal workers. so i think this is a clever attempt bit president. i'm not sure it is going to resonate that far and that wide and that deeply in a campaign season where the economy is really the focus and the question is do we want the federal government to be doing any of the things that these agencies do in the first place. >> so if it is not going to resonate with voters, is it going to resonate with congress? this move could be seen as aiming to blunt republican criticism if the president's policies have stunted business growth, really bloated the

federal government at a time of ballooning debt. but will republicans find a way to oppose this if the president is coming out saying he wants to save money, he wants to get out of debt? >> let me recalibrate what wendy said. i differ on a number of different things here. these are really practical things that the business community, which is very close to congressional republicans, they really care about, this he go to the federal government, looking for help with exports, and that's where these obscure agency export-import bank, opec, they really do have an impact. small business administration, that's the kind of thing businesses lobby government for direct help with. and it doesn't make sense the way this is organized. this is a sensible, maybe small, that's where republicans can go after it, they can say this is small fry compared to the debt ceiling limit that the president has just requested. but, you know, in terms of the politics, he's calling their bluff, saying you want to cut spending, you want to reorganize government, you want to be good

with business and regulation, here is an easy thing to do. if you oppose it, it becomes like the payroll tax cut. >> wendy, you brought up this point before, when it comes to resonating with voters, it is likely to draw new charges from the right that the president is more worried, more focused on the re-election rather than good policy. >> perhaps. i think richard's point is very well taken. it is very hard for the republicans in congress to say no to this, to try to streamline the federal government, trying to make these more effective for businesses that seek help. i completely disagree that this is anything close to the payroll tax. the payroll tax hit every single working american. that was just a total fiasco. i think that this, this is really an elite group paying attention, eleite business people, this will resonate with a small portion of elite people and i think the businesses that either have good connections with a lot of these agencies, they may not be that happy with the consolidation because when you make the kind of connections that they already have, they're not going to want to see a new

hierarchy, new bureaucracy, new structure that they have to reinvent connections with. >> that's the buzzword, consolidation as opposed to cut. this doesn't quite go as far as some of the gop candidates, like rick perry who vowed to cut the size of federal government who promises to eliminate the departments of commerce, education and energy, right? >> yeah, look, if the president is trying to compete on who can be more macho about closing federal agencies -- >> let's listen in. here's the president. >> welcome to the white house. i see all sorts of small business people here and i am thrilled to have you here. as small business owners, you know as well as anybody that if we're going to rebuild an economy that lasts, an economy that creates good middle class jobs, then we're all going to have to up our game. the other day i met with business leaders who are doing their part by insourcing, by bringing jobs back to the united

states. and i told them that if you are willing to keep asking yourselves what you can do to bring jobs back, then i'll make sure that you've got a government that helps you succeed. and that's why we're here today. i ran for office pledging to make our government leaner and smarter, and more consumer friendly. and from the moment i got here, i saw up close what many of you know to be true. the government we have is not the government that we need. we live in a 21st century economy, but we still got a government organized for the 20th century. our economy has fundamentally changed. as has the world, but our government, our agencies have not. the needs of our citizens have fundamentally changed. but their government has not. instead it often has grown more complicated and sometimes more confusing. give you a few examples.

there are five different entities dealing with housing. there are more than a dozen agencies dealing with food safety. my favorite example, which i mentioned in last year's state of the union address, as it turns out the interior department is in charge of salmon and fresh water, but the commerce department handles them in saltwater. if you're wondering what the genesis of this was, apparently it had something to do with president nixon being unhappy with his interior secretary for criticizing him about the vietnam war. and so he decided not to put noah in what would have been a more sensible place. no business or nonprofit leader would allow this kind of duplication or unnecessary complexity in their operations.

you wouldn't do it when you're thinking about your businesses. so why is it okay for our government? it is not. it has to change. now, what we have tried to do over the first three years of my administration is to do a whole range of steps administratively to start making processes, procedures, agencies, more consumer friendly. but we need to do more. and we need authority to do more. so today i'm calling on congress to reinstate the authority that past presidents have had to streamline and reform the executive branch. this is the same sort of authority that every business owner has to make sure that his or her company keeps pace with the times. and let me be clear. i will only use this authority for reforms that result in more efficiency, better service, and

a leaner government. a little bit of history here. congress first granted this authority to presidents in the midst of the great depression, so they could swiftly reorganize the executive branch to respond to the changing needs of the american people and the immediate challenges of the depression. for the next 52 years, presidents were able to streamline or consolidate the executive branch by submitting a proposal to congress that was guaranteed a simple up or down vote. in 1984, while ronald reagan was president, congress stopped granting that authority. and when this process was left to follow the usual congressional pace and procedures, not surprisingly it bogged down. so congressional committees fought to protect their turf, and lobbyists fought to keep things the way they were because they were the only ones who

could navigate the confusion and because it is always easier to add than to subtract in washington, inertia prevented any real reform from happening. layers kept getting added on and added on and added on. the department of homeland security was created to consolidate intelligence and security agencies, but congress didn't consolidate on its side. so now the department of homeland security reports to over 100 different congressional panels. that's a lot of paperwork. that's a lot of reports to prepare. that's not adding value, it is not making us safer to file a whole bunch of reports all the time. it has been a generation since a president had the authority to propose streamlining the government in a way that allowed for real change to take place. imagine all the things that have happened since 1984.

1984, we didn't have the internet. just to take one example. a generation of americans has come of age, land lines have turned to smartphones, the cold war has give n way to globalization, so much has happened and yet the government we have today is largely the government we had back then. and we deserve better. go talk to the skilled professionals in governmente in. and by the way, you won't meet harder working folks than some of the folks in these federal agencies. devote countless hours to trying to make sure that they're serving the american people, but they will tell you their efforts are constantly undermined by an outdated bureaucratic maze. and, of course, if you go talk to ordinary americans, including some of the small business leaders here today, they'll tell you that to deal with government on a regular basis is not always

the highlight of their day. over the past three years, as i said, we have tried to take some steps to fix the problem, to bring our government into this century. and in doing so to root out waste. so just to take some examples, we made sure that government sends checks to the right people, in the right amount. which should be obvious. but we have been able to prevent $20 billion in waste over last two years. just by making sure that checks are sent properly and we're reducing error. we cut government contracting for the first time in more than a decade. we cut a whole range of overlapping programs. we have tried to yank the federal government in the 21 century when it comes to technology and making everything we do a little more web friendly. by the way, that also helps in terms of accountability and

transparency, because the public can get on whitehouse.gov or other websites and see what is happening and track where money goes. so we have done a lot. but we have got to do more. we need to think bigger. today, i'm outlining changes we could make if congress gives the green light to allow us to modernize and streamline. these changes would help small business owners like you. they also would help medium and large businesses and as a consequence they would help create more jobs, sell more products overseas, grow our economy faster, and improve our quality of life. right now there are six departments and agencies focused primarily on business and trade and the federal government. six. commerce department, small fis business administration, the u.s. trade representatives

office. in this case, six is not better than one. sometimes more is better. this is not one of those cases. because it produces redundancy and inefficiency. with the authority that i'm requesting today, we could consolidate them all into one department with one website, one phone number, one mission, helping american businesses succeed. that's a big idea. [ applause ] we put a lot of thought into this. over the past year we spoke with folks across the government and across the country and most importantly we spoke with businesses including hundreds of small businesses to hear what works and what doesn't when you deal with the government. what is frustrating, what's actually value added.

and, frankly, in those conversations we found some unsatisfied customers. a lot of times what we heard was, you know what, the individual who i'm working with was really helpful to me, but the process itself is too confusing. most of the complaints weren't about an unresponsive federal worker, they were about a system that was too much of a maze. so take a look at this slide. i don't usually use props in my speeches, but this was useful. this is the system that small business owners face. this is what they have to deal with if they want even the most basic answers to the most basic questions like how to export to a new country or whether they qualify for a loan. and, by the way, this is actually simplified because

there are some color codes, you know? the business owners don't get the blue and the purple and it is all just -- there is a whole host of websites, all kinds of toll free numbers, all sorts of customer service centers, but each are offering different assistance. it is a mess. this should be easy for small business owners. they want to concentrate on m e making products, creating services, selling the customers. we're supposed to make it easier for them and we can, there are some tools that we can put in place that every day are helping small business owners all across the country, but we're wasting too much time getting that help out. and if congress would reinstate the authority that previous presidents have had, we would be able to fix this. we would have one department where entrepreneurs can go from the day they come up with an

idea and need a patent to the day they start building a product and need financing for a warehouse to the day they need help breaking into new markets overseas. one website, easy to use, clear. one department where all our trade agencies would work together to ensure businesses and workers can better export by better enforcing our trade agreements. one department dedicated to helping our businesses sell their products to the 95% of global customers who live beyond our shores. with this authority, we could help businesses grow, save businesses time, save taxpayer dollars. and this is just one example of what we could do. the contrast between this and this. sums up what we could do on the business side, but these kinds of inefficiencies exist across

governme government. there is a real opportunity right now for us to fundamentally rethink, reform and make our governments so it can meet the demands of our time, so it is worthy of the american people and so that it works. so this should not be a partisan issue. congress needs to reinstate this authority that has in the past been given to democratic and republican presidents for decades. in the meantime, as long as folks are looking for work and small businesses are looking for customers, i'm going to keep doing everything i can with my current authority to help. so to take one example, as of today, i am elevating the small business administration to a cabinet level agency. [ applause ] karen mills, who is here today,

and who has been doing an outstanding job leading that agency is going to make sure that small business owners have their own seat at the table in our cabinet meetings. in the coming weeks we're also going to unveil a new website, business usa. and this site will be ape one stop shop for small businesses and exporters and will consolidate information that right now is spread across all these various sites so that it is all in one place, and it is easy to search. so with or without congress, i'm going to keep at it. but it would be a lot easier if congress helped. this is an area that should receive bipartisan support because making our government more responsive and strategic and leaner, it shouldn't be a partisan issue. you know, we can do this better. we can provide taxpayers better value. so much of the argument out there all the time is, you know,

up at 40,000 feet, the abstract arguments about, you know, who is conservative or who is liberal, most americans and certainly most small business owners, you guys are trying to figure out how do we make things work? how do we apply common sense? and that's what this is about. i'm going to keep fighting every day to rebuild this economy so that hard work pays off, responsibility is rewarded, and we have got a government that is helping to create the foundation for the incredible energy and entrepreneurship that all of you represent. i'm going to keep fighting to make sure the middle class families regain the security that they have lost over the last decade. i've said before, i believe there is a make or break moment for families, who are trying to get in the middle class, folks trying to maintain security, folks trying to start businesses. there is enormous potential out

there, that the trend lines in our global economy are moving in our direction, towards innovation and openness and transparency, but we have got to take advantage of it. and you need a strong ally in an effective, lean government. that's what this authority can do. thank you very much, everybody. [ applause ] thank you. >> president obama there, talking about the fact that the government needs to change to catch up with how the citizens are living today, talking about the waste that is taking place in the different agencies and how to merge them better. six that he's talking about specifically. i want to talk more about this with my panel. joining me is former mccain/palin aide boris epstein, and goldie taylor. i want to start with you, boris. here are the big applause lines, the president saying when he talks about the six agencies he wants to consolidate into one, this is redundant, inefficient. with the authority he's

requesting today of congress, he would consolidate them into one department, one phone number, one mission, helping american businesses to succeed. coming out with this color coded power point presentation. how can people object to this when they're going back and talking about this in congress today and see what he wants to do, how can anybody object? >> twill it will be important t at the specifics of what he's proposing. republicans in congress should not oppose this and overcome this moniker of being an obstructionist coo isist congre that it is good to bring the agencies together and move ahead to the issues that they really care about, which is jobs. >> here it is, savings and cutting waste. a lot of people on the right will say this is more about his re-election campaign than it is about good policy. what say you? >> well, you're absolutely right about that. they're going to say two things. one that this plan doesn't go far enough, that the ability to

consolidate six commerce-related agencies into one single group, saving possibly $3 billion over the coming years, reducing government by about a thousand employees, is probably a good thing, but republicans will say that government on the whole is bloated and that red tape costs money. and that, you know, the american taxpayers, like you and i are, are stuck with that bill. they'll say it doesn't go far enough. and the second they'll say is, he's an opportunist, he's doing this because it is an election year. they're wrong on both counts. this is something that ought to happen and ought to happen now. and it is going to benefit on the whole the american people that we are consolidating government agencies. will it pass? who knows? only if i think republicans get something very meaningful, very tangible in return will they let something like this go through. >> so, boris, let's switch gears and talk more about the obama campaign, which is really jumping on the bandwagon while republicans are trying to jump off. but they started it all, so this

scathing campaign memo this morning is saying free enterprise isn't running for president, mitt romney is. mitt romney is trying to show people he feels their pain with a new ad. take a look. >> i think anytime a job is lost is a tragedy for the family, for the individual that loses the job it is just a devastating. >> unemployment is not just a statistic. being unemployed for a long period of time means families having a hard time making ends meet, it makes in some cases people having trouble in their marriages, losing faith, becoming depressed. it is a real tragedy. my job is to get americans back to work. if i'm president of the united states, i'll worry about your jobs, not my job. >> forgive me, i thought we would show the ad from south carolina. but that was romney on the stump in florida. given his background, can mitt romney channel bill clinton in any convincing way? turn this narrative back to his favor that bain capital was a good thing and that's why his business sense makes sense for

the white house? >> he's already done so. if you look at what happened in new hampshire where mitt romney took the majority of conservatives, and evangelicals and folks who generally would be more open to the populous trend -- >> i know, but now we have this big ad in south carolina, i mean, he's basically coming out of there with bloody kneecaps. they're taking all kinds of swipes at him trying to say the bain argument is a faulty one. >> what you're looking at -- >> boris, go ahead. >> so what you're looking at now, mitt romney has been able to do is actually give the argument that, you know what, if you want to go after my success in the private sector record, that's fine. what he's been able to do is get above the 30% national, he's leading in south carolina. since the attacks on bain capital started and boomeranged on newt gingrich and rick perry, mitt romney has been doing better. mitt romney will make the argument, go if he needs to point by point and say here's where we were successful and here's where there were mistakes

made. there were mistakes made in every job and every opportunity you take under. but overall, you're seeing his support grow since this bain capital thing has become an issue. >> it is a double-edged sword for republicans to get into this and try to take it to the people. goldie, is the right or has the right done the work for the obama administration, laid the ground work to say this is fair game, let's go? >> i don't know that they have done the ground work. i think moving into south carolina, the bain issues may very well rez nasonate because e talking about people who are dealing with kitchen table main street issues every day. these are people who are among the most unemployed in the country, who have the least access to affordable health care who have the least access to affordable housing, who have, you know, the least access to, you know, those kinds of things that help them to build wealth and a more sustainable life. so it is going to be tough for somebody like mitt romney, in a place like south carolina. i think the race will get a lot tighter. i think people like newt

gingrich and rick santorum, they're going to keep positioning him as the other. and i think that's working. >> boris, real quickly -- >> i think that poll is going to tighten. he is leading. >> it is playing well for him. >> all right, guys, we got to go here. >> he absolutely is. >> thank you very much. i appreciate it. we want to show you now a little bit of the first lady coming up in a moment. we're back after this. [ sniffs ] i have a cold. [ sniffs ] i took dayquil but my nose is still runny. [ male announcer ] truth is, dayquil doesn't treat that. really? [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus fights your worst cold symptoms, plus it relieves your runny nose. [ deep breath] awesome. [ male announcer ] yes, it is. that's the cold truth!

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time now for the sidebar. just when the republican national field was starting to narrow, it looks like it will be getting bigger at least in one state. >> i'm forming an exploratory commit to lay the groundwork for my possible candidacy for the president of the united states of south carolina. i'm doing it! drop them, jimmy. and with your help and possibly the help of some sort of outside

group that i'm not coordinating with, we can explore taking this country back. >> steven colbert handed over his super pack, not sure how well he will go ford with this. you do not hear something often like this, chris christie complimenting barack obama. those that under estimate bra-- get ready now to show you this, it's the first lady, the first lady, at a school in obama, now with the cast of icarly. it's a special screening of the first episode in i meet the first lady. the first lady talks to carly about her service to her country as a member of a family who is

in the military. rick santorum and rick perry and newt gingrich and jon huntsman have all failed to getting to ballot in one of or the other of up coming states. >> as we head toward next week's south carolina primary, some candidates will rise and others fall, what sets apart the success stories? a new book examines that and how to overcome it. simon reynolds is the author of the book, tharnks for joining m. i want to get people the context of the book itself, especially in the face of the political landscape, you said that failure is normal, it's a normal part of success and seeing the high achievements that our

politicians have made specially in the gop landscapes they have to love failure to have success? >> we think success should be easy and media culture tries to stress. that but what we see with the politicians, almost every one of them have had big failures to get where they are and we can all take a lesson from that. >> when we look at santorum coming in in iowa with a second place finish, one of the ideas you give is that you have to have an outrageous idea because it can inspire appraise worthy outcome. would that be a way to describe iowa for him in. >> yes, we have to remember all the time to get to the top, we have to take risks. the structure of success is full of calculated risks all the time. particularly in santorum's case.

>> as we look at this for the regular folk, the difference between failure and success in mastering your business or mastinger our own industries is as simple as 30 minutes a day, how so in. >> people that are successful have daietaiaily ritual. if you spend 30 minutes a day on your field on your industry, just getting a little bit better, learning a bit more. eventually you'll going to achieve. >> you say to tap in your inner and outer circles of influence, because somebody finds what that is how can a person best do that without looking, for lack of a better term, like a suck-up?

>> it's important to decide, most people have not decided who the circles of influence have. once you decide, the first thing you do is stay in contact. now, that is a simple thing to say and a simple thing to do but most people don't do it and the second thing is you give. we all know people who try and take from circles of influence and we detect that and no one likes that but if all you are about is helping the people that you know around you the law of giving back will work, they want to give back. >> it's a great read as all of us start into the new year, so many of us have probably already failed to our resolutions this far in. great to have you today simon, i appreciate it. >> i appreciate it too. >> that will do it for me today, see you back here monday at 11:00 eastern time.

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