well. there is no rational route here. part of the reason they're not coordinated in this respect is because people recognize that mitt romney was an imperfect guy to critique health care. they will spend the next month, this republican party, trying to go after health care again, having a repeal vote again, all the while their candidate is the guy who gave them the model for health care. so they're in a bind. >> he has a history here. there is tape where he's saying as much. i want to play archival footage from "meet the press" when governor romney is talking about raising fees in massachusetts. let's take a listen to that. >> the fee's not a tax? >> if it were a tax it would be called a tax. >> that's gimmick. >> it's reality. i am not trying to hide from the fact we raised fees $240 million. >> we raised fees $240 million. sam, how much of a problem is it for the romney campaign? >> you remember when rick

santorum said the singular worst candidate for the republican party to run on health care would be mitt romney and everyone sort of laughed at him but it's true. mitt romney, you could not find a republican more tied to obamacare than mitt romney. of course, he would say he did it on the state and it's done nationally so the two are very different but he has so much baggage on this issue and rightfully so, because he's on record. he's called it and there, he said it's not a tax but he has called it a tax penalty so eric fernstrom did what he had to do. thiss a penalty, this is not a tax being leveled across the board. keep in mind, the penalty in massachusetts is bigger than the penalty that will be administered under obamacare. it's almost not quite twice but could be twice for some families so they have a real problem. i think fernstrom did what he can do, saying listen, it's not a tax, otherwise we raise taxes by double the amount obama did. >> the other question, margaret, is how much the word tax is a boogeyman for the american public right now.

i just think, maybe i'm naive. but i'm of the mind that once the american public sort of sees and sort of concrete form, the affordable care act enacted either in the coming months or by 2014, they will be more sort of warmed to the notion of a national health care plan and the notion that somehow a $90 tax which is effectively wha this is, is so detrimental to the future of our country, i think you lose a lot of steam in that argument. >> well, messaging has always tb central problem for president obama and this administration on the aca, so the question is can they turn around the messaging to say look, this is how much money we're talking about and this is what you get for it, and is that what they're going to do or will they get stuck again in this sort of ditch with the wheels spinning of how the messaging goes on selling this. >> they do like that ditch metaphor. we should actually talk about that. in terms of the practicalities of implementing the affordable care act, there was a lot of talk about how republicans if

they control the senate and of course the white house and the house will work through budget reconciliation to just peel the affordable care act back plank by plank. the other issue, i thought this was really interesting, getting deep into health care policy as i am want to do on a sunday afternoon, is the exchange question. the health care exchanges need to be set up by the states and states are already beginning to opt out of them. the "washington post" making the point that the deadline for that is january of 2014. if they are not set up, the federal government is supposed to step in, but there's all manner of disagreement as far as how prepared the federal government is to set up state exchanges if the states don't do it. >> you're putting your finger on part of the whole debate in the courts which is federalism, right? what's the proper role of the federal government. conservatives have argued the federal government is doing too much basically predicating all of its powers on this notion of interstate commerce and they have long sought to narrow that and that was the part of the opinion that was ultimately good for those critics.

but health care is a huge interstate problem and these exchanges and these approaches involve interstate solutions so that is where it makes sense to have the federal power. the other point between tax and penalty is, the reason why people don't like taxes is not just that grover norquist and a whole school of chamber of commerce, you know, attacks have really taken something they already didn't like and made it sound worse. it's also because people associate taxes as an automatic payment they make whether or not they use a service or whether or not they like what's going on. the reason why it matters when we talk about the difference, i think people who supported this which include both presidential candidates emphasize it's a penalty because that means the vast majority of people will never pay it. i think that is the substance beneath this rhetorical debate. >> somewhere between 2% and 1% will be affected by this. i know it's beleaguered but this was a conservative idea at some point in time not all that long ago. now all of a sudden it's become the big boogeyman for the

republicans. >> i do want to talk about, though, the stripping down of the affordable care act and some of its provisions. i mentioned the exchanges. the medicaid expansion is the other one which is of course, you know, states saying we don't want help from the federal government, we don't want to expand our medicaid roles. i don't -- the federal government is going to cover 100% of the cost of the expansion and then 90% through 2022. i don't know, richard. again, you don't think it's going to happen? >> i think the states that are the governors right now who are engaging in this kind of rhetoric will ditch it quietly and by the way, enthusiastically because they want the federal dollars. all of these states are really right up at the top of the list when it comes to getting federal money for transportation, anything. they want federal dollars and this isn't going to cost them. the other part of it is the repeal question. once we get beyond the cycle, if there is a president romney, he's going to be faced with either pushing ahead in the

first hundred days with his agenda or undoing the last guy's agenda. when it came to this president, president obama, with the idea of are you going to go and prosecute bush administration officials on war crimes, or are you going to say declassify some documents and move on, he chose to move on. i think a romney administration would be faced with the same thing. the states will take the money, the congress, the new congress, will want to go and work on its own agenda and so will the next president. >> i couldn't disagree more. i think at this point, this health care law has become such a toxic thing in the republican party that if romney were to become president and not do something about it, it would basically reaffirm all the fears that conservatives had about him to begin with. with respect to the states, too, you know, yes, there is hypocrisy from governors that do defend on federal money. rick scott made a big thing about rejecting high speed rail funds and hasn't compromised. what might turn them around is the fact that 900,000 plus people will not get medicaid access because of this. at some point, you do think you

pay a political price by denying 900,000 people medicaid. >> you are saying to the people of your own state we're not going to take this money to help you when you're sick. you're talking about texas, which has 25% of residents without health insurance. i understand the sort of political optics here but then there's the practicality of legislating and governing. you got to think, especially when the federal government is going to pick up the tab there's going to be a strong push by residents to say you got to do this. >> recovery act money. and they hated it. they wound out putting press releases, we hate the stimulus but we'll take it. come on. will romney have to do nothing? no, he will sign executive orders, he will slow things down, but repeal is a whole other question. that's if you can get to 60 votes and if you can convince people it's not a budget reconciliation measure. remember, 60 votes in the senate, no matter what happens in this election is going to be a real stretch for republicans. >> rob portman, in the "new york times," says you can't get everything through reconciliation with respect to appeal, just the budgetary

stuff. within the gop caucus there is confusion. >> surprise. dissent within the gop caucus. coming up, the obama campaign fills in-boxes with messages about low fund-raising cofferes. does it indicate urgency or desperation or something else? we will talk with bill burton. that's next on "now." with the spark cash card from capital one, sven's home security gets the most rewards of any small business credit card! how does this thing work? oh, i like it!

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thin coffee shops. people who i thave been out of work. you can tell it wears on them. narrator: he's fought to pull us out of economic crisis for three years. and he still is. president obama's plan keeps taxes down for the middle class, invests in education and asks the wealthy to pay their fair share. mitt romney and his billionaire allies can spend milions to distort the president's words. but they're not interested in rebuilding the middle class. he is. i'm barack obama and i

president obama spoke directly to top supporters on a conference call the day after

his health care law was upheld by the supreme court. but instead of celebrating that ruling, this was his message. the majority on this call maxed out to my campaign last time. i really need you to do the same this time. i'm asking you to meet or exceed what you did in 2008. that tone is reflective of the 14 e-mails from the obama campaign in the six days leading up to the june fund-raising deadline. from the president on tuesday, i will be outspent. from the first lady on wednesday, i'm not willing to let this happen. and from campaign manager jim messina on thursday, let's win this damn election. then on friday, from deputy campaign manager, they're bragging. she calls the fund-raising headline a huge deadline, a huge test and asks supporters can you set us right. then on saturday, from the president, this is important. ten hours later, from a seemingly exhausted and frustrated national finance director, rufus gifford, excuse me, i'm not going to lie, it's been a long, long week.

so excuse my bluntness. can you donate before tonight's deadline at midnight your time? joining us now from washington is the head of the pro-obama super pac, priorities usa action, former deputy white house press secretary and our very own money honey, bill burton. bill, a pleasure to see you. >> hi, alex. great to be on the show. >> it's great to have you on the show. you caught that very long oscar-winning intro that i just gave. how severe is the financial disadvantage right now, bill? >> well, i think that mitt romney counts on the fact that he can win elections by vastly outspending his opponents. it's how he won in 2002. it's how he won this republican primary where he was able to outspend gingrich and santorum three, four, five to one in a lot of these states and it's what he's banking on for the white house. i think they are going to have a lot of money on their side because the folks in the oil industry, the folks on wall street have a lot invested in mitt romney winning this thing

and they're not going to stop giving money. the koch brothers alone will spend $400 million to see to it that he's elected. the numbers are big. >> with missives and pleas like that, do you not run the risk of alienating or turning off some supporters? >> well, i think the smart folks who are sending those things out know what they're doing. if they thought it was hurting they wouldn't be doing it. what they're trying to do, i imagine, is engage, you know, a large number of the folks who support president obama but have been sitting on the sidelines. they look at mitt romney and say is this clown really going to beat president obama and the answer is well, maybe, if he has four or five times as much money as the president, then ye he may well have a chance at winning in november. i think that's what democrats have been trying to tell other democrats, that there's a lot of money that's going to be involved here and democrats need to come off the sidelines and get engaged if they haven't. >> bill, i have to ask you heading up a super pac that has had a hard time getting numbers

or getting numbers that are in the field of restore our future, the news that sheldon adelson is giving $10 million to the koch brothers, the koch brothers are giving $2 million to the republican association, donald trump, always in the mix, giving $100,000. have you had more success fund-raising given the republican sweep happening on the right? >> first, what's happening with donald trump that he's only giving $100,000? but yes, our numbers have been picking up and in fact, we're just now in the middle of $10 million we spent on television ads about mitt romney's time in the private sector and they're clearly starting to work, if you look at any of the numbers out there, any public polling or focus groups, they're clearly working. so our fund-raising has picked up considerably and the spending that we're doing is having an impact. >> i want to open up to our panel a little. margaret, when we talk about the advantages and disadvantages of having super pacs do your dirty

work, if you will, one of the things we talked about on "morning joe" was the message management, which is to say we saw a little of this during the jeremiah wright kerfuffle, the ads that were never actually aired or were never actually ads to begin with but took mitt romney off message. he didn't want to deal with it, he hadn't planned on dealing with it. in terms of message management now, obviously the koch brothers and restore our future are not coordinating with the romney campaign but i wonder how given that, that dilutes the efficacy of having a unified message where team obama seems to have a clear set of talking points. >> it is a concern that you can't control what other people are saying independently when they're spending independently. on the other hand, i think what you just referenced was kind of an early warning sign, red flag, and you know, the people who are spending a ton of money to support mitt romney's campaign don't want to mess it up. they really don't want to mess it up.

so in some ways you don't have to coordinate. it's like between twitter and all the surrogates and, you know, people out there from the campaign talking about the message, once everybody kind of circles the wagons it's not hard to see what the message is. >> i feel they have not workshopped a cohesive strategy in terms of dealing with three sort of foundational or if not fundamental planks of his candidacy and that includes his time at bain. there has been no sort of unified response, no sort of offensive message, just kind of a wan game of defense on that. his time, his personal wealth, and i think to some degree his religion although that hasn't really come up as much. certainly bain, that seems to be a soft spot for him. >> it's a soft spot because it's not really just been about bain. it's about the central premise for his candidacy that he knows how to create jobs. so they have correctly identified the people prioritize the economy and jobs, but his central claim is i worked in the private sector, therefore i know

about job creation. that has never really been fully established. he tip-toed around it. in fact, in his announcement video, he couldn't quite get there and he's edged into this territory and it hasn't worked, hasn't worked because he hasn't been able to make the case and it also hasn't worked because the other side has destroyed that case before he managed to establish it. so they're left with two really negative campaigns which will become more negative as we go on. we're just seeing the romney campaign really edge into this now. it's going to be ugly. it's going to turn people off. that's why you need to have those base motivating fights, whether it's about immigration or health care, because it's one base versus the other. this is not a pretty election. by the way, just one point, if this president is having money worries right now it's partly his own fault, for blowing the lid off public financing of campaigns in 2008 which was great then. doesn't look so great now. >> bill burton, i'm sorry we have to leave it there, my friend. i'm sure we will be asking you more questions about fund-raising in the coming days, especially. thanks for your time. >> thank you.

after the break, the romney games. the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. at the lake house.

the summer olympics come early for the romney family. the "washington post" reports about an annual competition held at the family's house in new hampshire. the romney olympics have long included a mini triathalon of biking, swimming and running that pits mitt an his five sons and their wives against one another. but after mitt once nearly finished last behind a daughter-in-law who had given birth to her second child a couple of months earlier, the ultra-competitive and self-described unathletic

patriarch expanded the games to give himself a better shot. sam stein, expansion of the games i think now includes a competition to see who can hammer nails into a board fastest. what does this tell us about mitt romney? >> the whole family doesn't have to hammer nails into the board. we invented that game. what does it say -- i don't know. they like crazy games. >> he likes winning. >> of course he likes winning. it's funny he has to expand the actual playing field of games to do it. but i'm not sure i can read too much into it. it just seems like a quirky little family trait, i guess. i don't know. >> we know that -- we talked about the veepstakes and every time romney goes away, there tends to be a little bit of a casting call for potential running mate. >> can rubio and portman hammer nails into the board. >> who can hang on to the monkey bars longer. >> whatever it says about romney

as a potential president, it says a lot about the olympics. synchronized swimming. here's a guy who actually ran an olympics or allegedly saved them. why are some sports inhe olympics and others not. now we have an answer. >> that is true. i think his management, his shepherding of the romney olympics -- >> i will say, i think what it does say, nail thing aside, is it's very much in keeping with what we know about romney. he likes structure and organization and my family vacations were like here's the summer pool pass, we're going to work. this is like you're not really left to fend for yourself. you know what you're doing, the day is structured and if you're not a competitive person, get with the game. >> they all coordinate their outfits. >> they gather i believe in the evenings for powwow sessions on parenting. which is what your family does. >> we had a large american gladiators backyard. >> that explains a lot. >> i think the other part of

this that goes to sort of the campaign is barack obama was very good about talking about himself without annoying people. he had books that basically told his own life story before he was famous, helped him become famous and that's partly because he was a good writer and he's intelligent, partly because of a comfort level that he had that i think he exuded, whether you liked him or not, he knew he was comfortable in his skin. we read these stories and it's all we know really about the family because mitt romney, even when he tries to open up and i feel for him in the sense that this is a weird presidential process we have in this country but when he tries to open it, it often brings very awkward or weird, and then we have these stories that are sort of secondhand or whatever they're trying to do there. i think that's a problem for him because ultimately the president is in your living room, you want to understand who he is and there's still this distance. >> his bt diplomat is still ann romney, who gets better every day. coming up, president obama's bain games. we look at how his message about governor romney's private equity

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that's barack obama. he also attacked hillary clinton with vicious lies. >> he continues to spend millions of dollars, perpetuating falsehoods. >> mitt romney has a plan to get america working. barack obama, worst job record since the depression. >> so shame on you, barack obama. >> i'm mitt romney and i approved this message. >> that was a new tv ad from the romney campaign calling president obama's attacks on his bain record untrue. but this weekend, the "new york times" reported the bain attacks are working. quote, propelled by a torrent of blistering television advertisements, president obama is successfully invoking mitt

romney's career at bain capital. polls are illustrating the impact of the attacks as well. in the latest nbc news/"wall street journal" poll, 33% of respondents in swing states said learning more about romney's business record gave them a more negative view of him. we were talking about this earlier in the show. how romneyas managed the bain thing. there was a moment during what i'll call surrogate-gate when people, including people, surrogates and bill clinton seemed to be off message as far as what the president was saying about mitt romney and his career at bain being fair game for criticism. it sounds like they're going rward with this and it's working among voters in swing states, white working class blue collar voters that the president desperately needs to get on his side. >> yeah, look, ads work and negative ads work really well. they can bring the candidate down who is putting the ads on air but the other factor in many of those swing states is the economy's getting better. romney's economic message also isn't really tracking with how people are feeling.

so on one hand he's saying the economy's terrible, i can make it better. but the economy's getting better and you're maybe not going to make it better for us as well. the situation's much muddier than it was at the start when romney set out his campaign and that's not unusual. these are long campaigns. remember when obama started out in 2007 it was all about iraq. by the time he got to the general election it was a very different state of affairs. negative ads will be turned on obama himself and he is going to see some decline in his numbers because there's plenty to go out there but the negative numbers, the negative framework, much more damaging for a candidate you don't know than for a candidate you do know. that's the problem. he's a blank page and someone else is filling it. >> does romney need to shake up his infrastructure? i will call your attention to two tweets from rupert murdoch, because why not. yesterday, at 7:32 a.m., he tweets early, mitt romney last week, tough old chicago pros will be hard to beat unless he drops old friends from team and hires new pros.

doubtful. today at 8:52 a.m., romney people upset at me. of course i want him to win, save us from socialism, et cetera, but should listen to good advice and get stuck -- actually, retweeted that second one, the et cetera part. we're at the thousand words. >> so rupert murdoch. save us from socialism, et cetera. that kind of boils down to where there's this fissure between what the koch brothers and the rupert murdochs of the world are bankrolling so much of the opposition to obama. what they feel and what is their hot button issues versus where is the economy, where are the jobs, those are the real questions. i don't think this election is going to be won or lost on rupert murdoch's fear of socialism, et cetera. >> but to his point, sam, we know the romney campaign is a very insular, very tight-knit group. we saw what eric fernstrom said earlier this day. he was author of the

etch-a-sketch comment. what is the likelihood there is recalibration? >> depends how these next months go, obviously. we in the media tend to put too much into who the advisors are and we don't really -- more so than what the conditions of the economy are, what the conditions of some of the policy debates are. the advisors can bring you so far. a good ad can be made by many advisors and certainly, better ad can be made by a better advisor. i'm struck -- >> thank you for that pearl of wisdom. >> you can quote that, everyone. maybe i should just stop there. that was pretty good. what i'm struck by is the choice to go after obama as someone who never lived up to his post-partisan credentials because i feel at this juncture, we all know that. he's been president for three years now. he's been mired in these terrible debates with congressional republicans. he's clearly not the post-partisan president who will bring in this era of civility so i'm not sure why of all the themes to start with, that's the one they did, especially when it's about bain right now for the obama campaign.

>> right. >> they should be talking about his business credentials. >> i do want to talk about problems potentially on the horizon for team obama. the "new york times" reporting this weekend about problems he may have with the generation of voters who are coming of age to vote now. they write a new core of men and women have come of voting age with views shaped largely by the recession and unlike their counterparts in the millenial generation who showed high levels of enthusiasm for mr. obama at this point in 2008 the nation's first time voters are less enthusiastic about him, are significantly more likely to identify as conservative and cite a growing lack of faith in government in general. >> that's right. so if you look at the unemployment numbers for these sort of 18 to 29 and then subsets of that, really quite high and kids who are college age or right out of college are having a hard time getting a job and that's making them disillusioned about their prospects and perhaps less focused or interested or optimistic about what difference it makes who they vote for. on top of that, there's the intangible which is the first time is different than the second time. it was cool in 2008, maybe, and

now it's just a different dynamic. >> it's a different campaign. >> he didn't need to win the national youth vote. he needs to win the youth vote in ohio, in virginia and certain other states. there's a very real probability shaping up he will lose potentially the national vote and win the presidency because of the electoral college. that has a lot to do with what they are doing with their swing state strategy. bill burton is advertising in very key states, in states where stuff like outsourcing and closing factories are toxic things to have attached to your resume. so that's why they're doing it. >> that's why those seem to be working in those states. that's also why, talking about microtargeting. targeting the hispanic community is pretty macro, but that, you know, obama has outspent romney 20 to one in spanish language ads. you know, romney came out and made some comments about immigration, saying that he would -- those who serve in the military and have advanced degrees will qualify for a kind

of permanence but as yet has not outlined -- >> they call this a misstatement, the advanced degree. the advanced degree they retracted. >> that's just too much ground for him and his party to make up in the next few months when it comes to immigration and latinos in general. this is a guy who ran to the right of newt gingrich on immigration to establish himself in the primaries. he cannot undo that in the next few months, especially against a president who is outflanked them when it comes to actually immigration policy as it happens right now. so you can put out ads, he may be able to make a little bit of ground but he's never going to make george w. bush's numbers among latinos. it's really doubtful whether he'll make john mccain's numbers among latinos and that's the really hard deficit for him to make up. same with young voters. it's not whether they show up or not. it's the margin of victory for obama. at the moment, it looks like it will be a blowout with young people and with latinos. i don't know what's going to change that. >> i'm just surprised how anemic

the effort has been on the side of the romney campaign understanding how much ground they have to make up. but of course, there are months left until november. maybe there will be something huge we just don't know about. after the break, we the people or me the people? kevin bleyer is out with a new book suggesting some dramatic rewrites to the u.s. constitution. he's coming up next on "now." you have to scrub it first. no you don't. yes, you do! don't! do! whoa, kitchen counselor here. see cascade complete pacs work like icro-scrubbing brushes to help power away tough foods even in corners and edges. hmm! cascade. love it or your money back. and how much the people in your life count on you. that's why we offer accident forgiveness... man: great job.

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♪ hello...rings ♪ what the... what the... what the... ♪ are you seein' this? ♪ ♪ uh-huh... uh-huh... uh-huh... ♪ ♪ it kinda makes me miss the days when we ♪ ♪ used to rock the microphone ♪ back when our credit score couldn't get us a micro-loan ♪ ♪ so light it up! ♪ even better than we did before ♪ ♪ yeah prep yourself america we're back for more ♪ ♪ our look is slacker chic and our sound is hardcore ♪ ♪ and we're here to drop a rhyme about free-crediscore ♪ ♪ i'm singing free-credit-score-dot-com ♪ ♪ dot-com narrator: offer applies with enrollment in freecreditscore.com. the constitution got a workout last week after the supreme court delivered its long awaited health care ruling. but with the nation's most important document turning 225 this year, is it time to scrap the whole thing and start again? in his new book, kevin bleyer writes if the constitution is such an astonishing document, such a landmark piece of literature, why no pulitzer?

why no nobel prize? if this supposed american masterpiece is so darned revolutionary, why was it never declared one of the ten best reads of 1787? and did you even notice that defense is misspelled? how embarrassing. for all the constitution's vaunted glories, it hasn't even been spell-checked. this is our founding document? joining us now from seattle is "daily show" writer kevin bleyer. he is of course author of the book "me the people." great to have you on the show. >> my pleasure, alex. i have to say i'm thrilled, honored and i applaud your wisdom for coming to me on this issue because i'm surprised the supreme court last week, as a self-appointed expert in the constitution, i'm a little surprised i didn't get a call from john roberts last week. i won't be offended and at least i have my health. >> the are no experts. we love more than the self-appointed ones, my friend. >> precisely, in this day and age. >> you make incredibly interesting and i guess

compelling arguments for changing the u.s. constitution, and you talk about making the executive branch into article one. i want to read, this is on the qualifications for the executive which is the president of the united states. no person except a natural-born and supernaturally reluctant citizen shall be eligible for the office of president. to that end, he or she shall be chosen at random from the subset of people who have never expressed interest in the job, no purchase necessary, odds of winning provided on request, and shall hold his or her office from now until 11:00 checkout. late checkout available courtesy fee may apply. tell us a little bit about your views on the presidency. >> precisely there. what we know about the presidency, this goes all the way back to george washington, we know that at heart we actually want someone to be a reluctant savior, to answer the calling. we also know in this day and age, that we want someone to be an average joe. so i suggest to the world the only way we know they will be both reluctant and very average is to choose them randomly. i will also say that i'm not the only person to rewrite the

executive branch. i was interested to see and i'm sure you saw this as well that a few weeks ago, mitt romney suggested a pretty significant change to the executive branch. he said, in fact, actually he said someone sidled up to him and proposed to him that while we have certain eligibility requirements for the president, citizenship, nation of birth and age requirements, he said you know what, it might be time to think we might add a provision to suggest that a president must have three years of business experience before he's eligible to be the president. i have to say, i have to tell you, i thought that was kind of mad genius on his part because this is mitt romney saying it. what he's really doing is reducing the number of people eligible to be president until it only describes him which is pretty good. never mind that it would have disqualified eisenhower, roosevelt and mccain as well. >> those guys. he probably should win the romney olympics and be able to hammer nails into a board the fastest. i want to open this up to our panel in new york. >> please do. please do. >> thank you, kevin. he does bring up an interesting

point which is the reluctance. we actually sort of have a president here in office who was not, is not a natural-born politician and i think has a certain amount of reluctance in terms of getting involved in the muck and mire of washington politics, certainly the sausage making, and his chief opponent is someone of a similar -- is cut from a similar sort of cloth. do you agree, richard? >> well, i suspect for a start that the president would limit those who are eligible for those people who can sink a three-pointer one out of three times from the point of his choosing. you know, the idea of reluctance is an interesting one. julius caesar, feigned reluctance but really wanted to be emperor. you can act reluctant without really being reluctant. these are super-competitive individuals. romney, obama, bush, they all loved winning games big and

small and kevin, good to see you again, but i do worry if you have reluctance as a criteria, people will be brilliant at feigning reluctance. >> you're right. i suppose we have to go back to george washington to find someone who was at least truly reluctant in his words and deeds. he didn't even want that second term but he decided to do it anyway. alex, i will take issue with something you said. i don't think that necessarily romney and obama or for that matter, richard, too, are cut from the same cloth. i learned recently that romney actually had suggested to the world that if he were to be president, he would consider foregoing a salary, which i know he's done this before with both the olympics and with governorship of massachusetts but it dawns on me that would be an interesting description of the president, someone who works on commission. he could do it finding bases of incentive. if he balances the budget, we will give him a billion dollars at that point. >> might not be too good for the president's wallet the way things are going. we have to leave it there. i don't get to talk to you about

your lunch with justice scalia which is pretty amazing. >> it's a fascinating story. i went toe-to-toe with him. i told him he might be fired if my new constitution was ratified. he had a great sense of humor. >> do you remember what you had for lunch? >> no. i can't remember a thing. of course i was anxious for the thing, i'm sure as soon as he poked a fork at me and said don't you dare change, he said don't you dare change lifetime tenure. at that point i realized i was about to propose changing lifetime tenure, my mouth got very dry. >> dry mouth, i'm going to leave it there. the book is called "me the people." kevin bleyer, thank you for your time. coming up, governor romney supporters are not just funding super pacs to help the romney. one donor just made a play to go semi-pro. we will explain next.

>> we've got it all covered at the aspen ideas festival. what israel is likely to do about iran. health care, the declining manufacturing numbers. we are live from aspen coming up next on "andrea mitchell reports." ♪ [ male announcer ] ok, so you're no marathon man. but thanks to the htc one x from at&t, with its built in beats audio, every note sounds amazingly clear. ...making it easy to get lost in the music... and, well... rio vista?!! [ male announcer ] ...lost. introducing the musically enhanced htc one x from at&t. rethink possible.

welcome back. time for "what now." an anonymous mitt romney fan has chosen to express his support for the candidate in an unusual way. paying to have the campaign's believe in america logo stamped on the jerseys of a semi-pro new york soccer club, fc new york. there you have it. ari melber, maybe, would such logos have helped the italians in their game yesterday against the spanish? >> ouch. >> i don't know. pretty much a blowout. >> the answer's no. >> the answer is no. apparently. apparently the answer is no. i think that it's fun.

i don't know if it counts as an in-kind contribution. this is another murky area. >> what a waste of money. a semi'pro soccer team in new york. >> we don't know if it's new york city or upstate. i don't know. long island, i'm being told by the control room. >> when people start competing for the semi-pro soccer fan vote in ohio, pennsylvania and florida, and when governor romney is out there for the opening singing "america the beautiful," we will know they have hit on something. >> that's the demo. >> every vote counts. >> mexico awoke to a new president-elect today, marking a return to power for a party once called quote, a perfect dictatorship. but that appears to be of little concern to many mexicans, particularly women, who call their new president bon-bon.

richard wolffe, would anybody call -- do we have any elected officials people would dare call bon-bon? maybe roberts by some on the left after this latest decision. >> the federal government in mexico has a few other problems other than confectionary right now. let's hope he can assert a strong center for a country with a few problems. >> yes. he is in many ways a cipher in terms of politics and policy. his marriage was a national sort of sensation but as richard says, there are things on his plate as incoming president. the narco wars probably chief among them. we will see how he fares. 75 years ago today, amelia earhardt disappeared during her attempt to circumnavigate the globe. today an expedition is under way to solve the mystery. i will talk to you about this, margaret, because i know you fly

in planes, commercial ones. >> it's a fascinating story for all girls who love to study her. i've got two daughters, just fascinating. we are all staying tuned. >> for anybody who used to watch "lost" they think she might have crashed her plane on an island and perished there. >> she could be in a weird time warp, that's why we can't find her? >> she's in a parallel universe. we need to send jack over there to save her. >> it might happen. >> that's how we will end the show today. thank you to ari, sam, margaret and richard. that is all for now. i will see you back here tomorrow at noon eastern, 9:00 a.m. pacific. until then, follow us on twitter. "andrea mitchell reports" is live from the aspen ideas festival. it looks beautiful out there. good afternoon to you, andrea. >> it is indeed. it's a great day. it's beautiful out here and lots of ideas to share. we have been talking about

the middle east. musharraf was here. we heard from stan mcchrystal, mike mullen, lot of defense experts and also, lot of conversation, education nation, we had two panels, another one coming up on the role of arts and education coming up later this afternoon. here today, we will be talking to peter orzach, jillian tet, charlie cook, a whole lot more coming up next. and the head of the aspen institute and aspen ideas festival on "andrea mitchell reports." ♪ i'm consolidating my sets. i'm not paying hidden fees or high commissions. i'm making the most of my money. and seven-dollar trades are just the start. i'm with scottrade. i'm with scottrade. i'm with scottrade. and i'm loving every minute of it. [ rodger riney ] at scottrade, we give you commission-free etfs, no-fee iras and more. come see why more investors are saying...

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that's right for you. right now on "andrea mitchell reports," when is a tax a tax? republicans and democrats play political word games, trying to define the supreme court's ruling to their own advantage. >> the chief justice has made it clear it's a tax on the american people. >> no. no. it's not a tax. it's a penalty.

>> but where does mitt romney stand on all this? wait until you hear what the romney camp told our own chuck todd this morning. plus, u.s. manufacturing plunges for the first time in three years. what does it mean for the recovery? ahead. devastating homecoming. residents in colorado get to see for the first time how much they lost as the state's worst wildfire in history continues to burn. and move over, mick jagger. we have the big city mayor who is not afraid to strut his stuff. new orleans mayor mitch landrieu. good day. i'm andrea mitchell live in aspen, colorado. the supreme court used the "t" word and that gave republicans a big opening to label president obama as a tax and spend liberal, or try to. but their only problem is, didn't mitt romney do the very same thing in massachusetts? that's what democrats are asking. chris cillizza is an msnbc

contributor and managing editor of postpolitics.com for our daily fix today. let's talk about this tax versus penalty. where does it all come down? wanted to show a little bit of eric fernstrom, the top advisor from the romney campaign, talking to chuck todd on the daily rundown this morning. >> the governor believes that what we put in place in massachusetts was a penalty and he disagrees wi the court's ruling that the mandate was a tax. but again -- >> so he agrees with the president? he agrees with the president that it is not -- he believes that you shouldn't call the tax penalty a tax, you should call it a penalty or a fee or a fine? >> that's correct. >> so how does this play out politically, chris? >> well, andrea, look, this was i think part of the reason that some republicans, establishment republicans, people who tried to get people like mitch diel, governor of indi