ad buy from crossroads gps. while the obama campaign is up and running with a $25 million ad campaign of its own. that $50 million total is for a month. joining me now is susan page and "washington post" columnist and nbc contributor. good morning to both of you. >> good morning. >> as far as attack ads go, is that going to get your attention? >> i think it will to some degree. it's fairly conventional but not as vicious as some of the ads you're going to see out there. i thought the important thing was in your graphic that you just showed. notice on the one side was crossroads gps and on the other side was the obama campaign. that's going to be it for the rest of the year. which is it's going to be out

there against obama. he hasn't raised as much on the super pac side. wall street doesn't like him and has not been contributing to that. i think on the conservative side there will be almost unlimited money to spend against obama and think that's going to be a disadvantage that the obama people have this team that they didn't have four years ago when they were able to vastly outspend john mccain. >> we have new numbers from the campaign itself and they're pretty even. mitt romney raised just over $48 millio -- $40 million. obama $43 million. do you see the gap closing at all? >> i think the democrats are in trouble when it comes to super pac spending. and this is based on basically half a month of fund-raising because they didn't start their coordinating fund-raising until the middle of april.

one thing about the crossroads ad. it's added at independent voter. it's not that they say he's bad man, you shouldn't trust him. they say he made promises. he hasn't kept them. so come over to our side. this is not a fired up debate. it's an ad that goes to independent voters in swing states. >> now i want to play one of the president's ads. here it is. >> some say our best days are behind us, but not him. he believed in us, fought for us, and today our auto industry is back, firing on all cylinders. >> you know, when this came out, the campaign made a point of talk about how he's running positive ads. i know it's one thing to say that and there's place for these positive, warm and fuzzy ads, but negative ads work. i wonder what you're expecting here, what we're going to be seeing. there were a couple of articles

written in the last couple of days how early this was getting negative and it's going to be obviously the most negative campaign we've ever seen. >> first of all, you are the incumbent, so you have to say positive things about the last four years. i not only don't think they don't have any choice in doing this. i think they're wise to do it because this goes straight up against the negative ads that will be shown about obama saying, look, they may be saying all these negative things about him, but look at the good things he did. i think it's have interesting it focuses on the auto bailout. that was a very unpopular decision and if obama wins this decision by carrying michigan and ohio, i think it will turn out that the bailout of the auto companies which is now doing very well was one of the most politically controversial ads he's made. i think you're going to hear about that from a lot of the

midwestern states. >> you'll hear about that from the obama side. speaking of the other side, i'm sure, susan, you saw the article in "the new york times," a group of high-profile republicans testing out an ad testing out obama to jeremiah wright, the person who leaked the plan, told the paper they were, quote, alarmed by the tone of this report. the money they were planning to spend on these acts. are they wading into dangerous territory, do you think. >> i think this is very perilous for mitt romney. they're saying he should have. the people who are urging this ad are saying john mccain made a mistake in doing that. what does mitt romney want to talk about? he wants to talk about the economy morning, noon, and night. he does not want to relitigate jeremiah wright and his sermons and elections with barack obama. that may be appealing, but mitt romney, this is not the topic that he wants to talk about. and if they put on millions of

dollars of ads on this topic, he will be forced to re1307bd to it. . >> meantime the president is also dealing with a republican party that wants to talk about the debt ceiling again and over hoagies at the white house yesterday, the president met with congressional leaders. he told them he will not have a repeat performance of the debt debacle. >> the president also made clear he refuses to allow to make a replay of last summer's self-inflicted political crisis that eroded confidence and hurt the american economy. >> i want to bring in chris mulholland. it's always good to see you. >> good morning. >> you know john boehner is planning to block this unless there are significant cuts to federal spechding. let me get your reaction to that. >> this is very unfortunate. the president wanted the congressional leadership down at the white house to talk about how he could boost the economy,

improve job growth. speaker boehner issued this ultimate tim. it absolutely reckless and irresponsible to threaten that the united states will not pay its bills. this is like us saying we're not going to pay our credit cards or mofrmt it would be a big drag on the economy when we should be looking for ways to boost economic growth. >> i want to play a clip of what congressman steve israel said last night about john bane when he was on "hardball." >> chris, thing the problem is the inmates are running the asylum. john boehner doesn't have control of his caucus. you know what america needs? america needs a republican party. >> do you thing that's right? do you think boehner apz is in

hard spot? >> there's no part the tea partiers are wagging the tail here in the united states. that's what brought us to the edge of crisis last year when they made the same threats with regard to the debt ceiling that. 's why you get big bipartisan votes out of the house, senate, democrats, republicans voting together on things like the violence against women's act, transportation bill. and yet when they come over to the house, the republican tea party caucus does not want to take that bipartisan approach. we would have already passed both of the those measures i just mentioned, the violence against women's act, the transportation bill, had the house republican simply allowed an up or down vote on that. but they're against compromise. it's always their way, 100% or no way, and that is not a way to solve problems. >> but getting into this debt ceiling fight again, do you think this is just part of their ideology? we know how the tea party folks

feel about the debt and they've been very clear. or do you thank they're looking at the possible political consequences for the president? look what happened last time. standard & poor downgraded the stock market. off when that happens barack obama's approval numbers go down i hope they're not using this to intentionally hurt the economy, but it is a self-inflicted wound on the economy. there's no reason we have to put ourselves in this precarious position. look. there's no need to reduce the long-term deficits. this issue is how. they say we should take the same balanced approach. we need to make tough cuts but we also need to get rid of a lot of the special interest tax breaks, especially for people making a million dollars a year.

republicans want to do it only by cutting, which means you end the medicare guarantee, you cut very important investments to help the economy grow, whether it's in education or infrastructure. so the problem with what john boehner's talk about, the speaker is talking about is that he's talking down the economy, creating uncertainty. i would also point out, chris, that the republican budget in the house, the one that the speaker supports would require us to lift the debt ceiling by 5$5.2 trillion. so their own budget violates the very rule that the speaker put forward. so this is -- he's playing politics, but the problem is it's beyond just politics because it really does put the economy at risk. >> congressman chris van hollen, also guide to have you on the program. thank you. >> thank you. good to be with you. >> let me bring susan and e.j. back. your editorial board wrote this,

e.j. i'll read it. it's not often that a senior political figure announces an intention to behave irresponsibly and risk inflicting great harm on the u.s. economy. it's even rare their the politician, having inflicted harm on the u.s. economic irresponsibly and inflicted harm on the u.s. economy, announces his -- >> i think it's outrageous to use the debt ceiling as leverage in a budget fight. it came out terribly last year. republicans never did this before. they never did it under a republican president. democrats might cast some votes against the debt skreelen under a republican president but they never threatened our country's credit. the one political problem for the president is while this is all on speaker boehner and it may hurt his party a little bit, the creation of chaos in washington and the appearance that we are ungovernable or we

can't govern ourselves ends up smacking the president back indirectly, even if he has no responsibility for this. i don't know if barren did this, whether it's to create peace within his party or create roils. >> they weren't exactly sitting around singing songs. let me play that for you real quick. >> i haven't heard kumbaya in so long i wouldn't even recognize it around here. >> i had to get that short little bite in here, susan. >> absolutely. >> is this what we're going the see until november? >> it's stunning to me that republicans in the house want to revisit the issue. last summer when they fought it last time right to the brink, you know, it hurt everybody. it hurt them. hurt them more than democrats, but e.j. makes great point. it hurts the president. man, i don't think americans

looked that scenario last summer and felt very good about what the government was doing. >> let me read to you, and i want to go back to jeremiah wright for a second because i was just hand add statement from the romney campaign. i'm just going to read part of it. this is about the norm times story that there's this independent group putting together an ad using the reverend jeremiah wright. here's what the statement says in part. pot's team said they would, quote, kill romney. and just last week david axelrod referred to individuals opposing the prot r president as contract killers. it's clear that president obama's team is running a team of character as is nation. we repudiation any efforts on our side to do so. that's from matt rhodes who is, of course, the campaign manager. what do you make of that, e.j. >> boy, wasn't that a nice statement? it said they are claiming to disown this ad with all that stuff at the beginning, trashing o obama and saying, basically if

you get these kind of asd it's your fault. i'll tell you what. if that ad campaign runs, i think one of its main effects might be to energize president obama's base, particularly among african-americans. and his base needs some energizing. >> could it do that, susan? and if he really wanted to, could mitt romney stop it? >> no, mitt romney could not stop it. that's one of the problems with the super pacs with the campaigns. it's not within their power. interesting that the campaign hit came out hours after the story. that's a sign to me, regardless of the kind of mixed tone that they take this very seriously and they would like to stop this if they could. >> susan page, e.j. dionne, thank you so much. >> when we come back, closing arguments under way at the john edwards trial. we'll have more for you after this. the best part of any great meal?

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under way in the john edwards corruption trial. tomorrow's wrap comes after an emotionally charged day of testimony. they rested without calling any of the major players to the stand including former senator himself, his daughter, or rielle hunter. i'm joined by legal correspondent valve na guthrie and school of law profesher mike rich. good morning to you. >> good morning. >> how big a risk do you think the strategy was to not take the stand himself, not call his mistress to the stand? >> that's the thing that the lawyers are going to be agonizing over for as lodge as the jury is out. could we have done more, did we do enough. every decision you make at trial is fraught with costs and benefits and they obviously made a calculation, specifically on calling john edward to the

stand, the benefits of that potentially were far outweighed by the potential damage. number one, his credibility is intacters. even if he could get on the stand and convincingly tell the jurors i didn't have that intent that the law requires, this is the jury who saw him on tape in the national interview lie about the affair completely convincingly, so would they believe anything he says. the other thing i think is more important, has he testified, the case would have been all about the testimony. everything the jury would be thinking about was is he credible or believable. they want him to be focused andrew young and his problems, the problems with the prosecution's proof. that's where they want them to focus on. >> let's go inside the courtroom if we can, mike. tell us what you think is the best argument by the defense, and what's the best argument by the prosecution as they go about

these closing arguments. >> well, i think what we're going to see is the defense team is going to be focusing very hard on andrew young's credibility and trying to convince the jury he can't be believed. really the lynchpin should be given no weight. on the other side i think the prosecution is going to focus on all of the other testimony they have that corroborated andrew young's story. so all the other witnesses they brought on that said even though andrew young himself may not be that credible of a witness, at least we have all these other folks who corroborated what he said. >> what's the key point the prosecution has to prove in order for them to get a guilty verdict? >> well, here, think the key thing they need to show is that these campaign contributions were made for at least if not for the sole purpose of helping at the edward campaign, that they were made for a real purpose to help the campaign. the judge has been a little

unclear in terms of how -- in terms of how exactly that needs to be defined, but it sounds like they need to establish that at least one of the main purposes of this money was to help the edwards cam pawn. >> so much of this, savannah, it's campaign finance law. it's not scintillating stuff. how difficult is it for the jury to separate the emotions of the case, their impressions of the people. what the nuts and bolts are of the law? >> i think it is hard. every time they're talking about the intricacies of the campaign finance law and the fact that john edwards needed that specific intent to violate the law, otherwise he's not guilty, those are very strong arguments. i think they need a very powerful human argument before this jury. think they need to stand up and say, look at this, injuries. we see a situation like this every week. it may not be a presidential candidate in every circumstance. why did he cover it up? it's not because of a campaign contribution. it's because he didn't want his wife to find out. it's the oldest reason in the

book. you know this isn't a campaign finance case. thank i have to make that kind of human appeal to the jurors and also talk about the strength of their case in terms of the finance campaign law and how confusing it and whether he would have been on notice that taking money, even for your mistress would be a campaign contribution. >> you know, it's worth noting they were offered a plea bargain before we even got in to the trial. so you wonder how much they will be sweating this tonight. it's going be a tough one. savannah, also great to have you in. michael, thanks to you. mike, appreciate it. we want to extend our sympathies to the kennedy family. they're facing yet another personal tragedy with the death of mary kennedy, the estranged wife of robert kennedy jr. law enforcement forces say this was an apparent suicide. the 52-year-old mother of four

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grueling. vice president joe biden's solution, ice cream. he made a stop at the dairy queen and supporters poked fun, if he could afford to buy ice cream for his staff and his supporters. >> do you got enough money? >> we're not charging him. >> we just saw -- >> i assume they were talking about financial assets. >> and mitt romney is getting auto tune treatment. the gregory brothers relating their latest video of romney's favorite things. ♪ i love people ♪ i love lace ♪ i was born here ♪ i love cars ♪ i love american cars ♪ i love you ♪ i love legs snooits i like man date ♪ ♪ i like this country.

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vice president biden is about to speak in martins ferry, ohio. now, here he was at a manufacturing plant in youngstown, attacking mitt romney's business background. >> i resent the fact that they think we're talking about we're envy, job envy, wealth envy, that we don't dream. they don't get us.

they don't get who we are. they don't understand, it seems to me. again, they just don't get it. >> joining me now is nbc latino.com contributor victoria desoto and chip. when it comes to this populous message, victoria, is he a weapon for the president? >> he is the president's secret w weapon. this is something neither the president can connect with or romney and he has the advantage of time. we're three and half months away. he can have biden out there, president obama stumping for him with three and a half months in advance.

>> then there's ooh the romney economics. it says as lodge as the government helps the guys at the top do well, workers of small businesses and communities, they can fend for themselves, but the country will be okay if the big guy is doing well. >> you know, chip, the message he's sending is romney thinks his rich friends should play by a different set of rules. is it working for him, do you think? >> i think it's -- joe biden's got a hard time being a secret, first of all. i want to comment on that. thank's the first time we've heard secret and joe biden together. >> the key to this is about the swing voters that bill clinton had back in, you know, 12 years ago. if he's looking for people in

places like pennsylvania and michigan and ohio. you know, blue collar, middle-class voters. i mean joe biden really does connect with that crowd, doesn't he? >> well, i think that's one of the reasons that obama picked him not only that, for his supposed foreign policy experience four years ago. look, what i think we're going to see is a heavy dose of joe biden attacking in this mode. i don't think it's a bad strategy for the president. he's got a good attack dog in this. they want to talk about mitt romney as opposed to what's happening in the chi since he's been president, which has not been good for him. >> and a as you can see, romney is launching attacks against obama talking about bill clinton. take a listen. >> bill clinton announced that the era of brigg government was over. president obama tucked way the clinton document in his large drawer of ideas. it's enough to make you wonder if it was a personal beef with the clintons but it probably runs much steeper than that.

>> what do you think he's try dog here, talking about bill clinton. >> i have no idea what strategy this is. first of all, he's underscoring his reputation as a flip-flopper. he does everything he can to be for them and then he's against him. what does he stand to whip with this? the hardcore clinton fans are not going the buy it. they're not going to support him. >> i wonder if it's going to backfire and make clinton-era economics look good. >> look, time heals all wounds. if you're going after moderates and independents and conservative democrats who may be upset going for gay marriage, this may be interesting, but i think tv may be too strong a way to get that out. >> do you think, chip, gay

marriage plays into all of this? >> i think it does in the senn that when you look at some of the swing states in north carolina, we've seen president obama who's up or down or tied. think some those states that were going to be important in november have swung opposite him and i think gay marriage plays into this. >> is he going to have to win those back? do you buy that, victoria? >> he has his pace. we're talking about the economy and social issues. the president needs to stay on message, which is keeping that core of independent voters with ventures such as gay rights and highlighting the strength that he has done in the economy. so i mean with romney's approach here, it's just nonsensical. >> do you think, chip, that ultimately until they start to focus heavily on the economy that all of this is white noise? >> i think it's a lot of white noise. at the end of the day it's about the economy. that's what everybody is talking about. the social issues motivate's

other's bases but the jobs in the economy is what's going to win or lose in the election. >> in the end, does it matter? >> you know, when i'm standing at the gas pump and when i see the numbers keep clicking by, that's what's going to matter. it's going to matter what i have a paycheck. so the social issues are a distraction. we need gay rights. we need immigration rights. >> i guess the question that's always raised is if you talk about these issues, and there is, you know, a group on the far right and the far left for whom they are supremely important even though obviously that doesn't necessarily mean they don't care about the economy, but as an energizing factor, obviously, chip, mitt romney has been a little slow to catch on. the president has some disappointed supporters from 2008. so in terms of at least energizing those folks who go out and they go door to door and they man the phone banks even in this age of twitter that's so important who write the $50

checks. the president has 50 million supporters, does it matter in that sense? sniet does. ite e important to me that mitt romney supports life and traditional mancht it will energize me and energize those who can get out and do all the things we decide. in 2004 president bush won the election based on the turnout, not the inmen dents. the base is going to be motivated by the issues that are personally important to them. jobs are important, but also life and marriage. >> that is the second part of the marriage. will some of the base stay home on both sides, right? >> absolutely. what we're seeing with romney in particular is he is scampering. yeah, the evangelicals in the south have just not bought him. if they have to choose between barack obama and mitt romney, they say yes. i thirg is really the worry for romney is in nosh are they going to turn out? are they going to leave their houses and vote for me.

>> victoria defrancesco soto and chip saltsman, thank you. great to see both of you. thank you very much. >> trayvon martin died to a single gunshot wound to the chest from a, quote, intermediate range. that frew the autopsy report. they also found the 17-year-old had a cut on one of his hands. george zimmerman says he shout martin in self-defense. look at this video in portland, oregon. a firefighter falling through a burning building. two other firefighters were able to quickly pull him back. remarkably he wasn't hurt. although he did get checked at the hospital just in case. for the first time in american history, minorities now make up more than half of which urn in the u.s. outnumbering the whites. the hispanics, blacks, asians, and those of mixed race account for 54% of the population. well gorks ahead an drink that cup of coffee.

it may help you live locker. a study in the new england journal of medicine found that men had a 10% advantage of outliving those who did not drink coffee. women, a 13% advantage. and this guy is in a hot air balloon running on a treadmill. what? we'll tell you all about it when we go down to the wire in 15. well, the country's largest cell phone carrier is set to end unlimited data plans for existing customers. cnbc's mandy drury is sneer you know, the reaction has been quite angry in some cases. the twitter has lit up with some of these comments. for example, let me give you a couple. geek go oh, great, verizon. thanks for break your promise

that i could use however much data i wanted. worst company ever. gary says verizon, long time verizon customer here, but if you take away my unlimited data -- >> they had tiered pricing and dropped the unlimited plan for new buyers. but now it's expanding its generation of its wireless network and customers wanted to upgrade their phones from the current 3g plan to sign up for the 4g will be required to sign on the new data share plan. >> let's talk shoes, skechers the issue company. they're accused of false advertising. now they're going to have to pay up. >> yeah, the ftc, the federal 2r5id commission just announced yed skechers did agree to pay $40 million to settle charges that it deceived consumers by, quote, making unfounded claims that shape-ups would help people

lose their weight. they still stand by their technology. they're saying they couldn't ignore the skpord ant cost spend defending those lawsuits. in multiple lawsuits in multiple courts across the country. the ftc also asserted that skechers made claims about its resistance runners and tone-up shoes. people who bought them are eligible for a refund from the ftc. facebook is set to filize its ipo price later today. expected to be in the $34 to $38 rise. it will be under the ticker symbol of whals? fb. ugh! all work and no food is making lorenzo very snippy. oh! seriously?! ♪ [ male announcer ] hunger getting to you? oh... [ male announcer ] grab a ritz crackerfuls. made with real peanut butter and whole grain.

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men are buzzing about a new finding in prostate cancer treatment. in lab study, a compound found in beehives stopped prostate cancer stopped the tumors by causing them to shrink. scientists hoch this may won day hold the key to curing prostate cancer. and this is martinsferry, ohio. running a little bit behind, but we're keeping our eye on it. family owned -- i think it's a family dealership in martin's ferry, ohio. there's a big difference between president obama and mitt romney including how much they're worth. a new white house report shows the president and the first lady are worth between somewhere $2.5 million and $8.3 million.

"forbes" magazine took a look at romney's worth and they came up with $230 million. let's get the details from the editor of forbes. randall lane. hairks randall, good to see you. >> you, too, chris. >> how do you figure it out? >> we get more details with someone like mitt romney because he's had to file a very detailed federal elections commission statement. we looked at all of his assets. he listed 180 assets. we put an amount on every one of them. while we talk about the tremendous sums of mon, there's $10 million, $20 million that even the billionaires themselves don't know because their assets are so great. with mitt romney, we were able to get very granular and do what we think is a definitive look at

mitt romney's wealth and this is one of the wealthiest men ever to run for president, probably the wealthiest major party leader ever. >> let's go through some of the items listed in the report. he had transportation assets worth $425,000. what's that? >> cars and we put horses in there too. >> horses too. okay. and the majority of his money is in something called debt security. worth 93 million. what's that? >> he's been selling stock, which makes sense. if you're running for president, who wants conflict of interest. and he's been buying notes and all sorts of debt which are a lot less controversial and then people can't accuse him of making money after it. he's got a very, very, very conservative portfolio as well as a conservative platform too.

>> including more than a quarter million dollar in gold. $16 million in cash. that's a lot more than they had in cash, right? >> correct. this is an exclusive -- he hasn't filed his new statement yet. i think that's coming next week. he's moved from $1 million, even eight months ago into $16 million in cash. so what that is he sold almost all of his stock. he sold 70 different class of stock. so basically what he's doing politically, positioning himself to not have any kind of trouble about conflicts of interest and he's moved a huge pile into cash which is of course the least controversial asset you can hold. >> they have real holdings, ann and mitt romney totaling $18 million. break that down for us. >> he downsized outside of boston from a $3 million house to a million-dollar condo. but the real money is in the

vacation houses. a giant house in new hampshire and a humongous beach house that they recently bought in la jolla, california. that said, we talked to real estate experts out there who are familiar with the property and it looks like mitt romney is a little under water on that so he's in many ways experiencing what a lot of us are dealing with, paying for something that's not quite what he paid for i. that's worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $8 million to $10 million. >> i don't think he's worrying about that loss necessarily or whether he'll be able to pay the mortgage if there is a mortgage. so the total you come up with, net worth, $230 million but that doesn't include the money they've put aside for their sons, right? >> that's right. they've got an irrevocable trust for the sons. we didn't include that because they can't take it back. they've given them trusts worth $100 million. if you take the entire family,

$320 million. >> so i'm just curious schl that a trust where they're getting regular payments from it door we know anything about that trust? >> there are two types of trusts. you can have these trusts you can take back if outdon't like the way it's being spent. but they put it in a trust that it is the sons' money. there are some stipulations on it, but mitt and ann cannot take the money back. it is not theirs and they can't -- the sons cannot be disowned. that is their money. so that's why we didn't include that. again, if you look at family together, you've got about a third odd of a billion dollars across the family. >> i don't think the reporters will be asking him as they did joe biden yesterday krks you afford to buy ice cream for everybody. >> he can buy one ice cream for everybody in america. >> randall lane, always good to see you. thank you. >> you too. >> if mitt romney is not the richest politician, who is? according to business insider of those currently holding office congressman michael mccall takes the three spot, worth $380

million. the runner-up daryl i sop who has as much as 700 million bucks and blowing everybody else out of the water, michael bloomberg. he tops our list at 18 presi$1 billion, fun fact of the day. the obamas are worth ten times more than the binds, 8.265 million versus 77 f$,000. hope potus picks up. can help you build a personalized plan and execute it with a wide range of low cost investments. hope potus picks up. get a great plan and low cost investments at e-trade.

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good morning, everybody. i'm thomas roberts. the return of reverend jeremiah wright. a gop super pac is considering resurrecting president obama's former controversial pastor. why would republicans go down that road once again? then the changing face of america. once again minorities surpassed

whites in the u.s. how is that going to impact america politically? and the jury could soon get the john edwards kachls we're watching the closing arguments as the details get under way. some big naples honored betty white at her club roast. >> too late to even run. i hope you have your contractor in because this thing runs forever. >> betty white is so old that on her first game show the grand price was fire. >> her first sitcom was called "hot for grover cleveland." what's more amazing is your parjts are here, give it up for adam and eve. this guy ran a half marathon, half this, on a treadmill while flying on a hot air balloon. he said he's trying to raise money for charity while running on land, sea, and the air. good luck to hill.

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so take your oral health to a whole new level. listerine... power to your mouth. i'm thomas roberts. reverend jeremiah write. a gop leading super pac funded byhe founder of tb ameritrade and the owner of the chicago cubs joe ricketts is now considering this proposal to launch tv ads reigniting the president's ties to the former controversial pastor. the ads and the $10 million campaign would be leading up to the campaign in september. who can argue the president mislead the nation by presenting himself as what the proposal calls himself a metro sexual black abe lincoln.