right now on "news nation," going grand. despite being in the near tie, the polls with rick santorum in his home state, mitt romney tries to project the look after not just a candidate but the gop nominee, but was the big vent that romney planned the one he envisioned. plus, there's a surprise for team romney out there and it comes in the form of female republican voters. rick santorum picking up support with that group. president obama says anyone willing to claim they can bring gas prices down to two bucks is well. >> that's the easiest thing in the world to make phony election year promises about gas prices. >> a new ad is framing the president as celebrating the record high gas prices.

republicans are really latching on to the issue of hysteria related to gas prices. more loss of life. another day of violent riots. seven more people have lost their lives in this chaos. why one muslim writer is speaking out against what she calls misguided honor in her community. realtime meets real cash. big mayer's big donation to the pro-obama super pac and what he tweeted. everyone i'm tamron hall. the "news nation" is following rmitt romney's challenge to portray himself as the candidate. that's the stadium that seats

about 70,000 people high pressure his campaign had an elaborate set up on the 30-yard line that made for an odd photo op. a crowd of people with him on the field but the stands completely empty. right after laying out his plan to help people suffering, he had this odd comment regarding his wife and her number of cars. >> i like the fact that most of the cars i see are detroit made automobiles. i drive a mustang and a vhevy pick up truck. ann drives a couple of cadillacs. i use to drive a dodge truck. i had all three covered. >> let's bring in the panel. stephen, you're new to our team. i know they weren't expected 70,000 people at the football stadium, but that is a heck of a photo op. why not have it at the economic club where rick santorum had his

event. obviously they picked this location to go big, but they maybe should have gone home. >> it didn't work out the way they thought. the empty seats looked bad. he wasn't going to get 70,000 people to come see mitt romney during a primary campaign. i'm not sure the president would fill ford field. >> do we know why he changed the location? >> i think it was to make it a bigger event, to raise the stature and the profile of it and make it seem like a very big deal. that's a very impressive place. they had a nice stage for governor romney. it just fell flat. no one thought of what it would like like if you could see the empty seats. >> let me bring you in jimmy. i love you if more reasons but one is you shoot it straight.

when you make these goofs like planning this grand vent with everybody crunched in the middle of the stage or this comment about ann and a couple of cadillacs that she has. what are we to take of this from your vantage point? >> look, i'm almost speechless but i've never been speechless. i just don't -- here is the deal. you have a party. you overinvite because you know only about on two-thirds will show up. it's not complicated. it's almost like if i grow my hair out really long, it doesn't mean i'm not bald. you got to just deal in reality. mitt romney has major problem in america. not just in michigan, in america. people don't believe him. they don't think he's genuine and then he goes and says the trees are the right height and my wife has two cadillacs. seriously? >> this is the guy who did not back the auto bailout. we know that and he's talking

about the cadillac which was the epitomy of having success. we know this guy has cash. listen, he's talking about cutting taxes. i'm sure a lot of substantive things we will get to. i go back to when the president stood in front of what republicans called columns and accepting the nomination and they went on and on about this grand vision. how much money did it cost to have detroit field, just the light bill alone and he's talking about the town. i'm sure the people loved the nice paycheck, but what are we talking about here? >> it's almost political malpractice that they did this. this small crowd stuffed into a giant stadium. i think mitt romney is happy

that he made mentioning is a gaffe. there's one in massachusetts and another in california. it's almost max of john mccain's how many houses do you have moment. you have santorum up on the air with ads focusing on blue collar workers. focusing on the fact that mitt romney backed the financial crisis on that bailout but didn't back the bailout of the auto industry. i think the camp is pretty happy that mitt romney has stepped on his own message. this was supposed to be big day for him. what people are taking away is that his wife has two cadillacs and he likes the height of the trees in michigan. >> the average cadillac is 35,000. i don't know if that includes power windows or whatever they come in. i don't have car. you got two of those. let's talk about this michigan matter. why is romney in such a tight race? here we are a couple of days

before voting. you know your state. you know detroit. you know the outside areas much better than anybody here. >> yeah, he's got to same problem here that he has everywhere else is that voters are having hard time figuring out who mitt romney is. is he this very shrill, hard right social conservative. he's played that real hard here. he's made lots of gestures toward very radical ideas. that's not playing with the sort of mainstream republican voters here in michigan. it is playing with people on that far right edge, and so that's where it's resonating. he can't out conservative rick santorum. >> he says he is severely conservative. >> what does that mean?

i still don't really understand that phrase. it's not connecting with those voters be way rick santorum has. >> the nbc ma marist poll 39% say a true conservative. 52% says the person who can beat president obama. 37% think romney. 35% think santorum. president obama is 51%. romney 33%. you see them on the screen. what story line do you see from the new numbers? >> i think the story line is that mitt romney's let detroit go bankrupt editorial for the new york times really hurt him. this idea that he didn't support this bailout. he didn't support the $80 billion infusion of cash. i think that's the take away here. so many workers there in michigan affected by the auto

industry. i think that's the take away that you got a really strong president, so far in michigan. he won last time and this argument that romney has had that he's a hometown boy. that he relates to those folks in michigan. so far he hasn't been able to make the sale. >> speaking of making the sale before i transition to santorum. in your opinion, was there anything that came out of this romney speech that would have up staged what he did earlier. we know he rolled out his tax plan early to try to get some momentum going into the debate. did he say anything today that's a real sticking point other than number of cadillacs he owned? >> i think in some ways he didn't. a i think a lot of it we already knew. this tax plan, reducing the corporate tax rate. i think his rate is something like 25%. i think the take away is probably going to be this cadillac line. i was looking for him to say something about manufacturing. that's where santorum has really

run the table there saying he wants zero percent tax on manufacturers. he had the president really highlighting and restructuring the tax plan around manufacturing companies. i think he missed an opportunity and also missed an opportunity on capitalizing on a clear win at the debate. he's got this cadillac problem now. >> let me switch to ntorum here. jimmy, rick santorum will be on "meet the press." i want to play what he said last time regarding public collection and what he said about people that go to college. >> where else in america outside of school do kids go to place where they sit with people basically the same age, same socio economic group. that's not what life is like. we need to transform public education to reflect more of what the dynamism is in the private sector.

>> the bottom line is if you look at 62% of kids who go on the college with the faith commitment leave without it. i understand why barack obama wants to send every kid to college. i've floated the idea. i'm trying to figure out how we can make it work of somehow or another requiring colleges and universities who receive public dollars to have diversity. >> he has issue with public education system. his children are home schooled. he's got an issue with higher learning, college and what he might see as brainwashing that goes in there. he'sgoing to be on "meet the press". there's no audience to boo away these questions there. >> i wouldn't want to go up against david gregory. his premise is false. i grew up in south carolina.

i went to the citadel. you would think i would come out very conservative. i'm not. i'm a democrat. i'm an openly gay man. i don't recall being indoctrinated into the gay ways of the citadel. first and foremost, the issue of home schooling children, it's simple. either you believe in a strong public education system and this has nothing to do with teachers unions, either you believe in a strong public school system and a private school system or you don't. if he wants a dumb america, he can have it. i would prefer my niece and nephew have a good education. >> real quick. got to talk to you about this number with rick santorum and his backing from republican women seems to be increasing. now it's at 57%. last month it was at 44%. there were many people that painted this dire picture and

said he would be bleeding female support within the gop. this number doesn't show that. why? >> that's true. traveling with him a lot of women come to the rallies and they say how much they love him and back him and support him. the real question is can he do as well among independent women. you look at his race in 2006, he didn't get support among those suburban soccer moms. that's why he lost the race by 18 points. nost not a surprise that he's doing well among republican women. he wouldn't do as well in a general election with the general population of women, independents and democrats. >> thank you. have a great weekend. coming up, nbc news editor mark murray unveils our presidential battleground map. we'll show you how much has changed in four years.

plu plus. >> we have to run. >> she's in the middle of the deadly riots in afghanistan. at least seven more people were killed today. we are joined by a muslim blogger who says this is misguided honor and asks where was the same outrage when terrorists bombed mosques and took the lives after people. since it's an election year they are already dusting off their three-point plan for $2 gas. >> did president obama diffuse republican cant ecandidate who trying to get traction by blaming him for higher gas prices? is it still damaging the president? join our conversation. that's my twitter page. online dating services can get kind of expensive. so to save-money,

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[ gunshots ] >> right now the protesters have gotten out of hand. the afghan army is trying to stop them. they're firing off warning shots. we nearly got stuck in the protest and we have to run. >> at least seven people have been killed in the fourth straight day of protests across the country despite president's obama apology of the burning of korans of the largest military base in afghanistan. there appears to be no end in sight. what is the latest that you're hearing there? >> reporter: what we are hear sg that at least nine people have

died in protests throughout the country. we saw demonstrations in the western province as demonstrators were trying to attack the u.s. consulate there. a few people died in the east of the country as well. it was less violent than we expected this fridayed to be. we expected many afghans, thousands of afghan to go to the streets after friday prayer. we expected the sermons to be vengeful. we found there were certain that did preach that way. we had producers go to two different mosques here where they told the afghans that the violence is not right. it goes against the koran and you cannot kill people even fp they are westerners and nonmuslims. that may have saved more lives than any apology from a politician or a military leader. tamron. >> all right. please be safe.

thank you so much. as those deadly protests over the burning of the koran rage on, a muslim journalist in the state says the protest show misguided honor about that sacred book. when militants fire bomb mosques they don't apologize for the koran that burned and smolders in the aftermath of their takes. thank you so much for joining me. >> thank you so much. >> let me ask you. your blog has been up for day or so. what's been the response? >> it's been really awesome. i think people want to hear from inside our muslim community, voices of reason. we like to argue that we're a religion of peace. we sure don't convince the world of that if we start attacking bases and people and kill people over a book. i think that the voices of reason are what people want to hear out of muslim community. >> in your piece you brought out

the fact that we don't see this reaction when radicals bomb mosques and take lives. you point out no book, no matter how sacred is more important than a life. we've seen great loss of life there. obviously, it's processed different because we're talking about u.s. soldiers, westerners, who these people believe have disrespected and wronged their faith. >> right. in afghanistan, there's a word that means honor. inside of our muslim community we have such a sense of shame and honor that we become misguided trying to protect it. that's where we need voices of leadership in our community that be say no, it's not acceptable, and it's not honorable to kill to protect a book and that higher principles of the book are to live peacefully and with tolerance. >> we know that even here there are those that would use religion to manipulate, to whip people up into anger, hate,

discrimination. we see those very things here no matter what faith or where you show up on a friday, saturday or sunday to worship. we also heard in this last report that some religious leaders are coming forward and saying stop. this is after her initial report again that there were some who were whipping this people up into a frenzy of anger and frustration. >> yeah. i think that gives us hope. this shirt that i'm wearing is from afghanistan. it captures the beauty that comes out of the country. that's what we need to do is rise to the highest principals. there's a saying that's awkward but it says from a straw don't make a mountain, so don't make a mountain out of a mole hill. the principle is like that. it's let's be honorable in our lives and live as we would wish others to live with us. in that way, i have here the koran. i'm technically by many rule

books not supposed to open it or read it or touch it because i don't have my hair covered, but this is a back for all of us. it's a living being. the sacred objects that we got and we shouldn't die or kill over them. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. maryland is on its way to becoming the eighth state to legalize same-sex marriage. the governor is expected to sign the bill into law. plus, it pays to be smart and funny and politically incorrect. bill mayer gives president obama's super pac a big surprise check. sweet, nutty crunchy nut... can't wait 'til morning.

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we'll show you the newest battleground map. we'll show how it's shifted in the president's favor. the 9-year-old boy accused of shooting his 8-year-old classmate at school. he is released on bail. what his father is saying now. plus, the latest on the condition of the girl. that's good morning, veggie style. hmmm. for half the calories plus veggie nutrition. could've had a v8. over a million people have discovered how easy it is to use legalzoom for important legal documents. so start your business, protect your family, launch your dreams. at legalzoom.com, we put the law on your side. yeah, you -- you know, everything can cost upwards of...[ whistles ] i did not want to think about that. relax, relax, relax. look at me, look at me. three words, dad -- e-trade financial consultants.

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here is what the "news nation" is following right now. winter blast. a major storm is moving toward the mideast after pounding the midwest with more than eight inches of snow. plus. >> on one hand i've been told i can't say what i want to say on facebook and now i'm being told that i must say something they're telling me that i have to say. >> man rants about his soon to be ex-wife on facebook. a judge gives him a choice. go to jail or issue an apology on facebook. is that going too far? it's our "news nation gut check." i can't take it anymore. that's what sarah palin wrote in

an e-mail months before she actually left office in 2009. what else her e-mails have reveals. the national price of gas went up another four cents bringing the average to $3.65 a gallon. it's a crude reality the president addressed in that big speech knowing republicans and gop candidates believe they found a soft spot in the economy they can use to attack him. >> it's the easiest thing in the world to make phony election year promises. what's harder is to make a serious sustained commitment to tackle a problem. it went be solved in one year. it went be solved in one term. it may not be completely solved in one decade, but that's the kind of commitment we need right now. >> in case you need a refresher, here is a look wlat the candidates have been saying. >> his policy has been outrageous aents-american nerj.

>> he will continue to put the hold on natural gas and oil and coal. >> the president of the united states when he ran for office talked about, talked about how we need higher prices for gasoline. >> joining me now zachary. i won't turn you into a fact checker, but i will. is there anything said in those comments from the candidates that were accurate? >> these accusations about gaming the price of gas higher in order to benefit, that assumes a control as if you're manipulating the puppet strings of the entire industry that the president doesn't have. maybe there's something to be said for this is a president who has been more in favor of other sources of energy and not importing foreign sources of

gasoline or oil but i don't think there's anything policy driven about the current spike in prices. >> you have candidates, newt gingrich left a building $2.50 a gallon. is there anything this president or anyone else, if tomorrow, if they were in office could do immediately to change the course of these rising gas prices that we saw go overnight? >> the short answer is no. the irony is republicans preaching free market, blaming the president for what is a free market rise in the price of gasoline. this is a market force. it's being done by traders and international concern over tension in the middle east. >> we're talking about speculators which we had this same conversation when we saw the spike in gas when george bush was in office. >> we know there's more production in the united states under obama. there's enough global production. there's a lot of fear. if something happens in the

middle east the price of oil could go up because of a decrease in demand. the only thing the president can do is release the petroleum reserve. >> secretary timothy is look at it now. >> that's a dicy decision. while it creates more is up pli supply, but there's a global disruption of supply that we have enough oil for x numbers of weeks. >> we were talking earlier, mitt romney was supposed to reveal his economic plan, but the thing that's lingering and moving around twitter is this optic of this empty stadium. we know the facts as you presented. it's the hysteria that you zeroed on and the republicans think they have traction. >> the republicans are losing the economic argument that has

been so potent a few months ago. the economy, at least statistically is improving. you can't criticize them for trying to find an election issue that has traction. pric pric prices are emotional for people. >> looking at the strategic oil reserves. >> i think, again, you have to understand this is a political year, and they're going to use it. the belief that the president is responsible for this or can do something about it is fiction. >> good to see you. now to decision 2012. nbc news is out with its latest battleground map. who holds the answer, mark murray. i felt like i had a jeopardy question set up. you've been tweeting about this

all morning long. this is interesting and exciting in that it shows the shift of this country right now. >> the last time we did a battleground map like this was back in november. since november we have seen some things break in president obama's favor. his approval ratings are up. there's a lot of economic indy karats that is showing the economy has been improving. we had the republican primary season, which you look at polls haven't done the gop a lot of favors. what this shows is where it was almost virtually tied back in november where you had 196 electoral votes, now it's 227 for the dems and 197 for the republicans with 114s to ups. not is huge tilt in his favor but a noticeable one. we have some maps built up. let's look at the map of solid democrat states there.

>> that's right. these are your very democratic states. they will not be presidential battlegrounds come the fall. these rz the ones the democrats and president obama can bank away. >> i think it's intriguing when you look out west for many reasons with the toss up map. i just read an article that focused in on colorado and nevada because of latino voters. this article explored the west and how it can be won with president obama. >> that's right. there's one strategy, if president obama is able to end up winning new hampshire. if he ends up winning colorado, ending up winning nevada and nk new mexico, he can get 270 electoral votes or more without within any of the other big

battleground states. that shows you the importance of the latino votes. >> all right. have a great weekend. thank you so much. i know we'll be tauking more about this map. maryland is poised to become the eighth state to legalize same-sex marriage. be state senate narrowly approved the measure last night. governor martin o' malley says he will sign it into law soon, but the issue won't be over until november. opponents say they are preparing to challenge the law. a washington state court must decide if this 9-year-old boy who accidental shot a classmate at school have the mental capacity to know what he did was wrong. he sat before the judge crying while wearing an orange jump suit. the boy's father said his son made a terrible mistake.

the 8-year-old girl was shot in the stomach when the gunfired in class. prosecutors say they have enough information to charge that boy. he won't be arraigned until a court decide whether he should face the charges. airports in chicago have cancelled more than 200 flights. they are reporting delays averaging on this friday evening, 45 minutes for all flights. at least they have good hot dogs at midway. still ahead, dylan ratigan joins us. we'll find out what's behind his big smile. first, there's a lot going on. here are some things we thought you should know. the last batch of sarah palin's

e-mails as alaska's governor have been released. the e-mail shows she was fed up with mounting legal bills months before she resigned. the e-mails shows she was annoyed by scrutiny of her family and her work. bill maher is donating a million bucks to a super pac supporting president obama. he announced the hefty donation during a comedy special which streamed live on yahoo last night. he later tweeted quote, thank you everybody who hit me up after the show. obama donate was a surprise to yahoo too. fyi. those are the things we thought you should know. ♪

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tell your doctor if you have kidney problems, glaucoma, trouble urinating, or an enlarged prostate. these may worsen with spiriva. discuss all medicines you take, even eye drops. stop taking spiriva and seek immediate medical help if your breathing suddenly worsens, your throat or tongue swells, you get hives, vision changes or eye pain, or problems passing urine. other side effects include dry mouth and constipation. nothing can reverse copd. spiriva helps me breathe better. does breathing with copd weigh you down? ask your doctor if spiriva can help. i'm martin bashir. rick santorum hits the books this week.

first he takes on satan, then a woman's right to choose, now college. yes, mr. santorum is spreading the word about the evils of education. go team. now back to the university educated tamron hall. coming up at 4:00 p.m. eastern time, dylan ratigan wraps up his job tour. he's been tackling the problems facing the next generation. for college students that means massive debt and these days an uncertain job market. earlier this week the tour stopped in kentucky and also in ohio. today dylan is at the university of chicago. good to see you. >> nice to see you. they're all asking for you. >> i'll be there to visit soon. let me ask you, when we were, we're probably about the same age, out of school and the prospects were tough. people say go into engineering, certain things were foolproof occupation. describe to me what students are

saying now. how they feel about this climate despite the numbers? >> when you talk to individual students. this is the inspiring thing about young people in this country, there's almost an uncontainable optimism that exists in the individuals as you talk to them as to what it is that they want to do. what they can think they can do. what they think can be done. it's more a function of how much are we helping to unleash that. it's not a question of whether we have the optimism, whether we have the drive and willingness to work. the question is are we helping to unleash more of that or making that more difficult? the big issue when you talk to students and look at the educational system is debt.

nothing restricts your choices. i had a chance to take more risks and take lower paying jobs that i thought were more interesting because i didn't have to pay student debt. you talk to a lot of folks that are trapped inside that structure and it releases our options at a time we want to have as many choices as possible. it's one of those things you have 60,000 feet and six inches and you go back and forth. at six inches they're ready to go. the question is at 60,000 feet are we creating an environment to help them get out as much as possible. >> how engaged are they in the political process right now? this race for president. you have rick santorum, martin just mentioned it, we talked about it earlier. rick santorum saying that kids are being indoctrinated by president obama with college, of all things. >> who knows. i've only been able to talk to handful of people. it's not a trend or a poll, it's

nothing in that regard. there's a sense of more engaijment in their own community than the political process. there was a huge engagement in 2008. they the threshold for them to reengage this time is higher. there's a sense that getting involved with the national political process is something that can be very emotionally rewarding, but does not necessarily result in the sort of changes in your community that people sometimes hope they can achieve by virtue of the political conversation. we were out with a bunch of folks here in chicago. the conversation is much more about what can we do in our town, here, in our city to improve our hospital, our school. our electoral process, our crime, our public health and

less of a sense that attaching to this national political dialogue is really in some ways a recipe to get yourself betrayed basically. you're not going to get what you think you're going to get. >> you've been doing great job. i love that you cleaned up to go on a college campus. cut your hair and got rid of the beard thing and put a tie on. >> got to be respectable for america's youth. >> great job. i'll be tweeting you after this. be sure to catch dylan's show today at 4:00 p.m. eastern. chris brown could be in trouble again with the law. hundreds of people showed up to get a glimpse at if new nike sneakers. it's our pop culture round up. let's start off with chris brown. >> he really tainted what could

have been a stellar month for him. he got the grammy win. released two duets and now he's under investigation for theft for snatching and driving off with a fan's phone. >> why did he take it? >> she was up in his face. he didn't want to take a photograph. she followed him out of club and wanted to take his picture. >> he allegedly took her phone. no charges have been filed? >> it's under investigation now. they have not talked to brown yet. >> the next up is sasha baron cohen. he may crash on sunday. >> he turns everything into an opportunity to promote his crazy movie. check out this response to being ban frd tned from the oscars.

>> i'm outraged by being banned. while i applaud the academy for taking away my right to free speech. i warn them if me do not give me my tickets back, you will face unimaginable consequences. >> okay. >> they actually did not take his tickets away. they called him to make sure he wasn't going to do anything outrageous to affect the dignity. they asked him tnot to come in character. >> will they turn him away? >> it's possible high pressu. it's part of an oscar nominated film. he's going to go. >> i love a good pair of sfe sneakers, but what's going on here. >> crowds have been out of control. take a look at this.

>> where are they running to? >> they're at mall in florida which had the hugest crowds. hundreds of people have come out. nike only released a limited number of shoe. >> how much are they? >> 200 but going for as much as $5,000 on e bay. >> are they associated with any athle athlete. >> there's word that player might be wearing them at nba all star weekend. if lin is wearing it, it will be crazy rush to get them again. there's only a limited number out there. >> i don't get it, but i don't hate on it. : come can go up, going too far. a judge gives man two choices for ranting about his upcoming divorce on facebook. we'll tell you the two choices the judge gave him and if you think the judge just went too far this time. it's our gut check.

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time now for "news nation gut check." an unusual sentence for an ohio man who complained about his wife on facebook, apologize or go to jail. that's a true story. last november mark byron wrote, you are an evil vin ditive woman that wants to ruin your husband's life and take your son's father away from him completely, all you need to do is say your scared of them and they will take him away completely. the judge said the message violates her temporary restraining order against him be the judge said he had a choice. he could go to jail for two months or post a written apology to his soon to be ex-wife every

day. he's supposed to do it every day for a month on his facebook wall. he chose the apology but says it violates his free speech status. he must grant friend status to his wife or someone she chooses to monitor the page. what does your gut tell you? does that judge's order go too far. go to our facebook.com/newsnation and we'll be your friend. cast your vote. that does it for this edition of "news nation." have a great weekend. martin bashir is up next. [ male announcer ] the draw of the past is a powerful thing.

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