announcement the night before it was due to happen. rick santorum, bless him, said he will have a big announcement tomorrow in iowa. there no indication that is the big announcement is that he is quitting, but it's never a good sign when you say you are having a big announcement, the first thing everybody asks is are you quitting? rick santorum was not quitting. far from it. he was preparing to unload this bombshell on the presidential race. >> i am announcing today and have announced that i am going to be voting and supporting senator rick santorum on january 3rd in the iowa caucuses. the first time- >> who is that guy? anybody? rick santorum's major announcement is he got the endorsement of the secretary of state from iowa. somebody in republican politics said they have a big announcement, i am starting to hear a little boy out newscast yard yelling wolf!

wolf! it has nothing to do with the man with the beard at cnn. when they say there is a big announcement coming, that is a suddenly to ignore them. the chairman of the republican party this week announces exclamation point and all that he is going on the greta van susteran show to make an exciting announcement. are you ready? i hope you are sitting down. >> big news about the republican national convention and you are first to hear it here and we have that announcement. >> i'm proud tonight to announce as well a very prominent role for governor scott walker. my governor from wisconsin. your governor too for that matter, greta. >> the big exciting announcement is that not six republican governors, but seven republican governors will be speaking at

the republican national convention. did you know him from wisconsin? breaking news and flashing red lights. everybody freak out. just for the record there is such a thing as a major announcement. they do exist in the world. >> the god particle, a discovery at the world's biggest atom smasher who said as big as they get, what does it tell us about our world? the announcement in geneva hailed as one of the greatest scientific discoveries of our time. >> this is big. >> the long sought holy grail of the subatomic world. >> just for context's sake, discovering the god particle is a major announcement. we have killed osama bin laden. that's a major announcement. we have landed on the surface of mars. that's a major announcement. this is not a major announcement.

>> people like jon huntsman, i believe are the best person for the job. >> jeb bush jr., i'm sorry. you are i'm sure a nice guy, but you are not a major announcement. in the crucial swing state of ohio as we talked about last night on the show, the republican secretary of state announced yesterday this morning there was going to be a major announcement. a major announcement about voting in ohio. even though i am a nerd to big announcement announcements, this from the ohio secretary of state is worth paying attention to. not only is ohio critically important as the ultimate swing state in presidential politics, but voting rights in ohio are due for a major announcement. the whole country ought to be paying attention to ohio. we all remember the ohio voting disaster that was the presidential election of 2004. an estimated 170,000 ohioans

leaving their polling place without voting. the lines were just too long. by the way, that is a significantly larger number of voters than the number of victory with which he won ohio. in the next election, ohio fixed that problem and instead of having everybody overwhelm the polling places, ohio expanded early voting and made it so you can cast your ballot for 35 days leading up to election day. that really did help cut down on the lines. there were many fewer complaints. election day went smoothly in ohio. the problem for republicans is that the other thing that happened in ohio and the election of 2008 is that a democrat won. when republicans took control of state government in ohio there after, they decided to use their control to fix that 2008 problem of all the voting going smoothly and people not going home in frustration from their polling places without casting their

vote. after ohio republicans initially tried to eliminate 24 of the early voting days, under political pressure, they were only able to get away with cutting off three days of early voting in ohio. the last three days. that last three days includes the last sunday before election day when african-american churches like to make sure the congregation churches go out to early voting. that day will not be available for early voting. there was something going on ohio that i can't believe is not more of a front page story. eliminating those three days of early voting is not actually the biggest scandal. that is a scandal, but this is worse. the biggest scandal in ohio is happening on a county by county basis. the state's plan is to allow more hours and more days to vote if you live in a republican

leaning county than if you live in a democratic leaning county seriously. republicans on ohio county boards have been voting in favor of adding early voting on nights and weekends in republican-leaning counties. the republicans on the election bores in democratic counties are voting against extra voting on nights and weekends. county election boards are evenly split between democrats and republicans. the republicans are voting for expanded voting hours in the county s and voting against that in democratic counties. in the democratic counties weather republicans are objecting to expanded early voting, the secretary of state has personally intervened to break the tie to side with the objecting republicans and make sure that in fact democratic leaning counties will not have early voting on nights and weekends and the republican leaning counties will. here's what it means in real terms. democratic leaning county s like franklin and summit county is the homes of cleveland and columbus and akron where barack

obama won 2-1 and 3-2 and 3-2. those will not have early voting on nights and weekends leading up to election day. republican leaning counties, places where john mccain won like warren and butler counties, they will have extended early voting. nights and weekends. come on down. the republican secretary of state in ohio is personally intervening to ensure fewer voting hours in democratic than republican-leaning counties. yesterday that guy, the republican secretary of state said that he had a major announcement to make about the process of voting in ohio. oh, my god, i can't care about the boy crying wolf, i top the hear that announcement. this is an issue of national significance. anybody who cares has to care about how badly ohio is screwing this up. to have this insanely partisan out come where you have more

opportunities to vote if you are a republican and fewer opportunities if you are a democrat. a big announcement from the guy who is making that possible? let's hear that big announcement. the big announcement about voting in ohio today from the secretary of state. his big announcement is that you can change your address online. at a website. that's the announcement? that's the announcement. they put out even a follow-up later in the day to announce that several hundred ohio residents had in fact already changed their addresses. online. that's it. in terms of the glaring flashing red light siren democracy emergency that is under way in ohio, republicans are given more opportunities to vote than democrats in a presidential election year when ohio is maybe the most important swing state in the country? that's not big news. nothing to say about this. nothing to see here.

"washington post" columnist and contributor brookings institution and the author of our divided political heart. it's good to see you and thank you for being here. >> good to be with you and have the early swath given the story we are doing. >> i have to say i don't know if i'm predisposed to be more interested in issues like this than other people in the media. i don't understand why this is not a bigger story. do you see this as having national significance? >> it's huge. i think the explanation for why this is not a bigger story is a kind of paradox. this story is almost almost created in partisan terms as a republicans say this and democrats say that. it is entirely true that there is a big partisan element to the story. republicans where they have control are trying to make it harder for democratic groups to vote. occasionally they admit that as the legislator did in pennsylvania is make romney carry the state. this is much bigger than a

partisan story. we passed a great law in 1965 called the voting rights act. it was designed to tear down the barriers to voting, particularly for african-americans and this, what's happening in this election year, ohio is an excellent example. the most fundamental act since the voting rights act was passed. this thing that's happening in ohio is so blatant, we are supposed to believe in equal protection under the law. it can't make sense if you live in place it's easier to vote than in another place. there has to be legal action taken because i cannot this would with stand the scrutiny of any fair-minded judge. >> in terms of scrutiny in the political world and from the media, so much of the other reporting, the other attention that has been paid to voting rights has been on the issue of voter id.

we have seen the voting id laws changed in so many republican-controlled states. i think that part of the reason that that hasn't become more of a story than it has been is that the republicans have put forward a red herring that there is voter fraud fraud and voter id will combat a problem that they say exists in voter fraud. eye a red herring and that's what they are for. on the early voting issue, there is no fraud issue. there is no red herring and nothing that is a problem about early voting other than the idea that it might cost money. early voting is too expensive and be used to block interest and attention. >> why is it okay to pay for early voting in warren county and not early voting in i can yoga county it costs extra money. democracy is worth spending money on. the notion if there is a financial problem in some of

those counties, that should be taken care of. you cannot allow an election to be tilted by money. we are already allowing them in the campaign finance system. this is the kind of indirect poll tax. if you live in warren county and they have more budget problems, sorry, you will not have the same rights as people in other counties. i think that's at least the voter fraud thing is a huge red herring. this is another one. red herrings may get easier for them to vote. >> provided they live in democratic-leaning counties. "washington post" columnist and msnbc contributor and the author of our divided political heart. thank you for your clarity on this and thank you for taking the time. we asked the secretary of state of the great state of ohio to join us to discuss what it is he thinks he is doing with the

county by county voting rules in the state and we have not been able to secure his agreement for an interview, but we live in hope. do you remember when mitt romney's pitch to be president was all about the economy? what are your thoughts about anything but the economy? there is nothing but the economy. that's all i want to talk about. that was the way it was for a long time, but that changed now and the quantitative empirical data that shows how it changed is kind of nuts. we have that next. plus later on, the best new thing in the world comes with extra screaming with joy at your television. stay with us. the first trade route to the west, the greatest empires. then, some said, we lost our edge. well today, there's a new new york state. one that's working to attract businesses and create jobs. a place where innovation meets determination... and businesses lead the world.

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. if there is group of americans with which everyone agrees, we cannot mess with it is our veterans. a nonpartisan agreement across the country except apparently for one small highly visited well funded part of our country. that story is coming up.

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>> looking at the mitt romney campaign page is the cross section of a giant tree. you can read the rings of the tree to get interesting chronological data about what the campaign has done in terms of public message. the chronology of the campaign ads is fascinating and i always had a bit of a grudge about how bad the search engine is, you can arrange videos from the mitt romney campaign account and arrange the videos in chronological order as a pretty

empirically sound way of what mr. romney has been running on and when. that is a story with a surprise ending. check this out. mitt romney racked up the primary as you know in may. by may they no longer had to bother engaging with his one-time primary rivals and consider charges by rick santorum or even ron paul who pretended to stay in the race until may. the primary was over and the campaign was under way. here is what the mitt romney message looked like then. according to their archives in may as the general election was getting under way. >> have you had enough of president obama's attacks on free enterprise? >> layoffs, cut backs. >> you heard of solyndra. >> when others shied away. the leadership team stepped in.

. >> what would a romney presidency be like? president obama approves the keystone pipeline. >> we will keep america strong. >> that was in may. about ten tv ads. solyndra, economy scandal. jobs, jobs, the economy. drill, drill, drill, more jobs. then june. >> from day one, president romney focuses on the economy and the deficit. from day one as president, mitt romney's leadership will make all the difference on jobs. >> of course the economy is not where it needs to be. >> the private sector is doing fine. >> you had your moment. >> president obama moves to appeal the economy. then romney moves to cut taxes.

president romney stands up to china. president romney reverses the offshore drilling ban. day one, repeal obama care. mitt romney has a plan it get america working. >> that was the mitt romney campaign from june. about a dozen different ads. the economy and the economy and down with obama care and tax cuts and the economy. the specific reference to chine a drill, baby, drill, the economy. jen july. >> where did the obama stimulus money go? >> they will run more than it had been run in the history of the world. >> another reason america has lost confidence in barack obama. >> time we had someone whoa believes in us. >> freedom creates jobs.

>> everything will be focussed on getting the economy going. >> look at the 10 or so ads in the month of july to the economy. the economy and president obama is a liar. the economy, jobs, jobs, jobs, the economy. all but three were about the economy and jobs and the ones that were not were about how terrible and horrible president obama is as a person. say what you will, he has been very focused. his campaign has been focused looking at the thing that is the campaign did on their own terms, it's a great way to focus on what they were trying to do. what they started on their own terms. these are the things that the campaign was pay to say and get on tv. that message for the election in may, june, july, hugely dominated about 95% dominated if you add it all up. now all within the last week, we have this. >> who shares your values as

president barack obama never visited israel. he wouldn't have to work and wouldn't have to train for a job. they send you a welfare check. who shares your values? president obama used his health care plan to declare war. when religious freedom is threatened. who do you want to stand with? >> august is young. but there has been a dramatic turn in mitt romney's messaging. after focusing like a laser on exactly what he said he would focus on for may and june and july for the first three months of the general election campaign after doing dozens of ads exclusively focused, 95% focus on the economy, this week now we have seen three new ads and the subject is birth control, welfare and israel. what's going on? look, here's what's going on. if you look closely at the daily tracking poll, you can see not just that president obama is ahead of mitt romney by a couple of points, but you can see a

fascinating piece of data eme e emerging from that other 8% of people not included in the romney obama totals. the undecided. the number of undecided voters in gallup's daily poll has been between 6 and 8% for about the last month or so. that is to say there only 6 or 8% of registered voter who is haven't decided who they are going to vote for. we didn't get to that lower percentage of voters in the presidential race the last time around until october. it's only early august and we are at the point in the campaign which is usually a late point in the campaign where each candidate stops trying to persuade anybody who is undecided and in the middle and recognize there no people left to persuade and turn to try to turn out their bases of support. campaigns usually do not make that turn until october because the number of undecided people is not low enough to justify until october. right now the number is so low,

apparently it's justified. at least the mitt romney campaign feels that way. that turn is happening now. apparently for them, the economy is over. now it's time to rile the base. you get what i believe is the obviously and purposefully obviously racist welfare ad. you get the obama didn't visit israel ad and the contraception ad. there have long been only two pages in the mitt romney for president playbook. the economy and then anything else he needs to resort to to excite the republican base. he only has one page to turn and has now turned it in the second week of august. mitt romney had a very focused jobs, jobs, jobs message. that was what it was trying to focus on and that appears to be over. according to them, it is time to talk to the conservative base. instead of jobs, jobs, jobs, it is jobs, jobs, abortion. [ music playing, children laughing ]

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>> the rachel maddow show has been a fan of u.s. women's soccer. group outings to local establishments to drink beer when they are not supposed to, but they can play live and are cheering in the newsroom. waggling of artificial team usa. today was a great die. we would ordinarily make that a

front runner, but after today's equipment on the women's soccer pitch, there is something toxic and i can't wait for the best new thing in the world coming up. [ obama ] i'm barack obama and i approve this message. [ male announcer ] you work hard. stretch every penny. but chances are you pay a higher tax rate than him... mitt romney made twenty million dollars in two thousand ten but paid only fourteen percent in taxes... probably less than you now he has a plan that would give millionaires another tax break... and raises taxes on middle class families by up to two thousand dollars a year. mitt romney's middle class tax increase. he pays less. you pay more. has a facebook page these days.

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>> the cochair of the fund-raising team for mitt romney in the state of florida is the chief executive of this. full sail university. the reason i said the mitt romney campaign fund-raising cochair is the cher executive and not say the president of the school is because full sale university is a business. it is a for profit institution. when mitt romney gets asked policy questions about higher education, he brings up for profit colleges and as the po prosed solutions he brings up a specific school that it happens to be run by his fund-raising cochair. >> i was at a place in florida called full sale university. they provide a four-year degree for people in the entertainment world. production, media, broadcast and so forth. they hold down the cost by recognizing they are competing.

>> cited by mr. romney as an example of how to hold down the cost of education. it costs $81,000 to do a 21-month program in video game art at the university. that's what he said is going to save him from higher education costs. it is run by mr. romney's cochair. that part of the finances is definitely looking good for america. beyond just the ceo being a major fund-raiser, it is noted that they are technically owned by a private fund. the chairman is also a major mitt romney donor. they reported in the front page story on the financial ties to the for profit college they also noted that for that video game art degree program, the that costs $81,000, the on time gratuation rate is 14%.

whether or not you actually graduate, the median debt taken on by students to pay is $59,000. this is a lot of things. a solution to the high cost of higher education? it is not one of those things. here's another detail. in june of this year, the website gi bill.com had to be handed over. gi bill was bought by a marketing company in california. it looked like an official government portal and maybe even a military website where you figure out how to apply for and use the benefits if you are a veteran. really this marketing firm that owned gi bill.com was capturing the data that unsuspected veterans entered into it looking for official help and they were selling that data to for profit colleges. the marketing company settled in an agreement with multiple states and paid a multimillion-dollar fine and agreed to hand over the website

and now it ticks you over to the real website about your real benefits that should not result in a million high pressure tactic phone calls from for profit universities trying to get you to use your benefits paying for something like an $81,000 video game art program with a 14% graduation rate. mitt romney is a presidential candidate is not just tied to full sale university. he has been a big proponent of the industry. he will be speaking at another for profit college this weekend in north carolina. mr. romney plating his trough with this industry and doing so very aggressively has had a hopeful effect of putting a spotlight on this incredibly profitable industry and how much we are all paying them to be so profitable. tom hark in and the senate released a report on the industry, the product of a two-year investigation. the report was not good. >> for profit colleges charge

tuition and often provide an inferior education by experiencing sky high dropout rates, how are they able to recruit a steady stream of new students? the answer is for profit colleges are what i call a marketing machine. >> whether or not you graduate and whether or not your degree is worth anything in terms of getting a new job, perhaps only video games. whether or not you are able to repay the loans that you took out to be able to pay for these expensive programs. the business model of the for profit school industry is to market to you aggressively and get you to sign up. to then get you to take out loans to pay your tuition to the school and cash the loan checks. they get paid and you owe the money to whoever gave you the loan. more often than not, the entity ask the federal government. the 2009 school year, for profit schools got paid $32 billion in

federal money. one out of $4 they put out went it a for profit school. this is students taking out federally supported student loans to pay these schools. the reason is because there is supposed to be a federal interest in helping americans get a valuable college education. the more loans a student can take out, the monmoney the students can soak out of them. the more eligible you are as a student for loans, the more beautiful you are as a marking target for the schools. if you are a post 9/11 veteran eligible for the gi bill and for these schools, you area a very, very beautiful target indeed. since the post-9/11 bill took effect, 8 of the 10 have been for profit schools. as taxpayers are we are paying for veterans higher education.

that's what the gi bill needs. we have a national bill in doing that. they are marketing to veterans and that our taxpayer money is going to them. $4600 to go to public school. more than $10,000 for the same veteran to go for a for profit school. what we get for the extra money is a lower graduation rate and a higher student loan default skpreat a lot of profit to make sure these marketing machines are very, very very well politically connected. joining us now is the chief policy officer for iraq and afghanistan for america which full disclosure is a full organization they personally support. he is an iraq war vet and served ten years. thank you very much for being here. appreciate your time. >> thank for having me. >> is it your experience and work the vets that post 9/11 veterans are specifically being targeted by for profit schools?

>> they are absolutely being targeted. largely because of loopholes created before it chifted that classified the bill as private funding. we have controls on schools so they have an element of free market control that said we can have 90% of your revenue come from the federal government. 10% comes from customer who is want to buy your product. in terms of business, it's the best deal going. because of the loophole, that 10%, the gi bill falls in that 10%. so do dod benefits and benefits for military spouses. for every veteran or military member that they can recruit, that's nine more people on financial aid equalling $125,000 in new revenue per veteran. that is a huge incentive to line their pockets with benefits instead of providing the service they are supposed to be

providing. >> in terms of the service they are providing, the schools say that veterans are signing up and in dispo portionate numbers for for profit schools because it's a good way to get an education and it meets the needs of military families and the constraints by being in the military. what about that argument? >> there is a little bit to that, but 40% of all of your revenue is spent on marketing and recruiting and it's laser targeted at the military and at veteran's benefits. when i was a young officer and getting my benefits, it wasn't telling me how much i can use where i could go to college, but i can get this masters degree from this for profit college. they have unprecedented access. it's very hard for veterans to make a determination as to what schools they can go to. i can find out every piece of

sushi costs using my phone, but have no way to compare schools. that lack of transparency is causing problems with veterans looking around and trying to figure out what schools best fit their needs. sometimes it's an online college. there good for profit colleges, but they are drowned out by those looking to line their pocks with benefits. >> president obama signed an order in april aimed at part of this problem. protecting vets and vet families from deceptive recruiting and overly aggressive recruiting. did that help? >> i think it is going to help. it did three things. they need to report basic consumer information metrics. there is a lost information out of the department of education, but it's hard to sift through and it doesn't help consumers. it trademarks the phrase so these marketing websites and for

profit school who is want to create the deceptive websites can't use the phrase. that is actually copyrighted protected and allows veteran who is were excuse me scammed some way to not just complain, but to actually get a redress. >> chief policy officer for iraq and ach began stan veteran was america, thanks for helping us to understand this tonight. >> apologize and retract. those are two things that perpetrators of irresponsible news stories never do. i have a prime candidate for both of those things. next. choose to do. you do what you do... because it matters. at hp we don't just believe in the power of technology. we believe in the power of people when technology works for you. to dream. to create. to work.

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well today, there's a new new york state. one that's working to attract businesses and create jobs. a place where innovation meets determination... and businesses lead the world. the new new york works for business. find out how it can work for yours at thenewny.com. the world's best and world. coming up. #

>> i love the associated press. you love the associated press. whether or not you are aware of how much you love them. if you are a news junky and you are reading over the course of your day, you are marinating in the press content all day long. the ap is everywhere and jointly owned by the american news organizations who use their stuff. thousands of newspapers and radio stations and they have hundreds of news staff all over the world. they are the only organization with a bureau in north korea. by sheer sides, the associated

press is just indispensable. they are everywhere. because they are everywhere, because their consent is ubiquitous, when the associated press does something bad, it's weal bad. it's not one newspaper printing and if it's the ap, it's one bad story that ends up in a billion newspapers and radio stations. for example, when the associated press subenglished a shockingly bad article about kansas, it did not end up in a tragic newspaper. it ended up in the kansas city star and in the to the flint journal,

more than 300 of her fellow flinters watched the fight and more than 100 others watched and cheered at the auditorium at northwest high school where she goes to school. she not even a senior yet. four rounds later, the fighting pride emerged the winner. shields became the greatest female middle weight amateur fighting in the world. this is the first year that women's boxing has been in the olympics so she is the first

gold medalist in this class ever. we e-mailed her principal who wrote this to us. what you saw was a young lady who had a goal and she worked towards the goal achieving her dream for sheer work and determination. unlike the other lates boxing, up until she left the olympics, she had school, papers to write and scheduling and early finals w. that smile, you saw the true young lady. you think you had known her all your life. she much wiser than most 17-year-olds. she will set new goals and obtain them. she will only be 21 for the rio olympics. giving everything she has got, that is an seen. but this particular home town giving everything it's got for its pride and joy and an olympic gold medal to show for it. flint has take smen hard knocks, but flint, team claressa in flint, you are best new thing in the world today. yay. that does it for us tonight. we'll see you again tomorrow night. now it's time for "the last word

with lawrence o'donnell." flint has taken some hard mitt romney enlists the departed pope in his campaign against barack obama. while harry reid continues to press the tax issue, signalling to his fellow democrats, be not afraid. >> trouble in sherwood forest. >> a combination of apocalypse now and the deer hunter. >> president obama stepped up his critique of mitt romney today. >> the centerpiece of mr. romney's entire economic plan is a new $5 trillion tax cut. he expects the middle class to pick up the tab to pay for it. >> one of the greatest ideas, something known as the ryan plan. >> governor romney wants a culture war. >> who shares your values? declare war on religion. go against their faith. >> what was he thinking? >> i'm not exactly what the romney campaign is trying to accomplish. >> trouble in sherwood forest. >> why doesn't governor romney have the same kind of hold on the activist wing in his party

as the frnt has. >> if he had been in massachusetts under romney's health care plan they would have had health care. >> to respond to an ad like this by citing health care in massachusetts? >> erick erickson tweeted this -- "omg. this might just be the moment mitt romney lost the election." >> rish limbaugh, ann coulter, and erick erickson all go crazy. >> if andrea saul isn't gone and off the campaign tomorrow -- >> i like being able to fire people. >> i saw there was going to be a pron. >> democrats are fun unified. >> america has a serious choice to make. >> are you calling mitt romney a liear? >> yes. >> he is the worst republican in the country to put up against barack obama. >> if we don't run chris christie, romney will be the nominee and we'll lose. [ cheers and applause ] i'm chris hayes in for lawrence o'donnell tonight. two new national polls show president obama widening his lead on mitt romney as the