gwe if you like playing scrabble, this was your week, in politics, on capitol hill, and, soon, at the supreme court. it was all over the place. we talk about it all, tonight on "washington week." >> now is not my time. >> really, you don't need a title to make a difference in this country. i think that i'm proof of that. gwen: so that's who's out. what about who's in? herman cain is enjoying a boost in the polls. rick perry's raised $17 million in less than 60 days, and mitt romney is taking on the president on foreign policy. >> if you do not want america to be the strongest nation on earth, i am not your president.

you have that president today. gwen: 100,000 new jobs created last month, but not enough, as the standoff over the president's jobs bill intensifies. >> the question, then, is, will congress do something? if congress does something, i can't run against a do-nothing congress. >> nobody gets everything they want. gwen: and the supreme court prepares to tackle issues of religion, indecency, immigration, and the constitutionality of the new health care law. covering the week, dan balz of "the washington post," jeanne cummings of bloomberg news, janet hook of "the wall street journal," and joan biskupic of "u.s.a. today." >> award winning reporting and analysis covering history as it happens. live from our nation's capitol. this is "washington week" with

gwen ifill, produced in association with national journal. corporate funding for washington week is provided by -- >> we know why we're here, to give our war fighters every advantage, to deliver technologies that anticipate the future today. >> protect america everywhere from the battle space to cyberspace. >> around the globe, the people of boeing are working together to give our best for america's best. >> that's why we're here. >> additional funding for "washington week" is provided by prudential, norfolk southern, the annenberg foundation, the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers likes you, thank you.

>> once again, live from washington, moderator gwen ifill. gwen: good evening. all is now clear. two longed-for candidates have opted out of the race for the republican presidential nomination. and those in the race are starting to put all their fundraising cards on the table. so the field is set, but the contest is not. first, to the opt-outs -- one a current governor, the other a former one. >> now is not my time. i have a commitment to new jersey that i simply will not abandon. that's the promise i made to the people of this state when i took office 20 months ago, to fix a broken new jersey. so new jersey, whether you like it or not, you're stuck with me. >> after prayerful consideration and a lot of discussion with the family, i concluded that i believe i can be an effective voice in a real decisive role in helping get true public servants elected to office, not just in

the presidency. gwen: so that leaves the field to the candidates who are actually debating, raising money and preparing to challenge president obama, among them, rick perry and mitt romney, each gave high-profile speeches today. >> our

at that point, electability does become a bigger factor in people's minds. john kerry overdoing howard dean thinking he would be a tougher candidate against president bush. >> and i think some of the volatility in the primary is contributing to something we're not seeing, which is when the field will clear out. >> nobody is dropping out. >> nobody's quitting even though we know they cannot compete. there's only three or four of

them on the stage who will have the financial resources to actually compete. gwen: but if you're rick santorum, a couple of weeks ago, you were sitting in the men's room talking to herman cain and were complaining that no one invited you to debate. now cain is getting his moment. why drop out if you're rick santorum? >> i think that's what's driving this phenomena in this cycle. bachmann had her moment, perry had a moment. now cain has a moment. if you're rick santorum, you think, hey, i'm next. >> or jon huntsman. everybody can look and say there may be a path for me if things break the right way. gwen: i have to ask, where is michele bachmann now. she was a big deal a minute ago. >> she was and she is now, in our post-abc poll, she is at 7%. she's taken a tumble although she didn't drop much over the last month. she peaked the day she won the

iowa straw poll and has gone down since and she's staking everything on iowa. if you talk to her now, she says iowa is the game. gwen: she's losing staff as she goes along, shedding people, which we assume is a money issue. thank you both very much. it's safe to say none of the republican presidential candidates are fans of the jobs bill president obama is pushing the last few weeks, but neither is the president's insistence nor a new round of tepid, not disastrous, jobs numbers seem to be breaking the political log jam. one senator said it's the politics causing the log jam. >> i were when i was little and i was fighting with my brother and my mother put us in the back room and said don't come out until you're friends. >> she's talking about the super committee she's on, their ability to work something out.

but is that possible on capitol hill? that everybody gets in a room away from cameras and work things out? >> the smoke filled back rooms don't exist anymore. if they did -- i don't know whether they did or -- things have really kind of devolved into a political brawl here that, i got to say, call me mieve. when this jobs bill debate started, i thought something might come of it because when you looked at the time, in early september, congress came back from this recess and the public was hopping mad about the way they dealt with the debt limit. the economy continued to stall and obama's proposal, when he came out with it in early september, it wasn't a totally in-your-face partisan bill and he pulled on ideas republicans would support and republicans seemed to be on their best behavior so at the outset it looked like something could come of it and it's unraveled since

then. this week, it became clear, you know, eric cantor, the majority leader said it wouldn't come up in the house. it will come up for a vote in the senate next week but everybody knows it won't pass and everybody is focusing on the things they disagree on rather than the things they agree on. gwen: if they're playing chicken, waiting to see who blinks, what are they basing this on? everything we know is that people have lost patience with this kind of standoff. maybe they know something we don't? >> no, i think part of the problem is, unlike other deadlines that congress has worked up against like the debt ceiling and the government closing, this is one that nobody knows what the solution is. there's not a lot of confidence on either side in what their proposals are, so there's -- it's -- i mean, i think they've gotten to the point where they think they have more immediate impact in blaming the other side than in actually trying to get any one particular thing done. >> speaking of one particular

thing, are there pieces of this that could be broken out that could help people and maybe there could be unanimity on? >> unanimity, that's a little much. >> majority. >> once they get through this partisan phase and they have to have their up-and-down votes and blame each other, but there are parts of the obama proposal republicans might be able to support. one is, a payroll tax break that we're benefiting from that expires at the end of this year and it will be hard for congress to allow that to lapse. obama proposes extending it. >> there's been division within the democratic party about the president's bill. why is that? >> they're actually -- different reasons for disliking different parts of it and democrats being democrats, they bring those things up. there's some conservative democrats who think that the overall proposal, which is $447

than joan biskupic. >> we find rock 'em sock 'em in many opinions these days. just think of what they already have. we've got, can the police fix a g.p.s. device to your car without a warrant. what about cher who bleated out expletives at an awards ceremony, is that indecent? we have a plate of cases and then marching right in the middle of the court's docket in the election year are two hot ones, one having to do with the constitutionality of the obama-sponsored healthcare law and the arizona immigration debate. bothgw+i is

just as politically hot as healthcare and with the new law that passed in alabama recently, we have states doing lots of different things on immigration. is the court consistent on that issue or -- >> that's a tougher one but that's coming to us not as a straight constitutional matter having to do with, like, racial profiling. she's referring to the law in arizona that signed into -- i think spring of 2010, by republican governor jan brewer

there, saying if police suspect that somebody might be undocumented, his or her papers can be checked and with the obama administration has said this could lead to racial profiling but the actual court case has to do with the division between state and federal power and what happened in lower courts is that they blocked the effect of that law saying we think that the obama administration has some support on the merits so if it comes up to the supreme court and they take it, it will be on more of a procedural one than racial profiling so they could side with the obama administration on that, too. >> up on capitol hill this week, there was an unusual hearing where some of the -- several of the justices came and testified at the judiciary committee and we don't see that very often. what did you think about that hearing? >> i was thinking about you when i heard justice scalia say, learn to love the gridlock, because he said, hey, in his usual way of saying, hey. gwen: janet already loves this. >> that, you know, face it, the

framers of the constitution thought not everything should get passed but it was senator patrick leahy and the senate judiciary committee had justice stephen breyer up there to talk about the role of the justices under the constitution. gwen: it's unusual for justices to testify. >> the scene of the crime is the senate judiciary committee when they're trying to get through the process and only a handful of times have justices returned to testify on something so we thought it would be a terrific moment. gwen: they were comparing who got the most votes from the senate, and i think it was scalia. gwen: we'll talk about more of this, we'll keep gabbing on the web. you can find our "washington week" webcast extra on line at 11:00 p.m. eastern tonight. also on our website, you go into our vault and view our program

from 10 years ago this week when president bush launched the war in afghanistan. keep up with the developments on the pbs news hour and we'll do our best to make sense of it all next week on "washington week." good night. download our weekly podcast and take us with you. it's the "washington week" podcast at pbs.org. >> funding for "washington week" is provided by -- >> this rock has never stood still. since 1875, we've been there for our clients through good times and bad. when their needs changed, we were there to meet them. through the years, from insurance to investment management, from real estate to retirement solutions, we've develo id fnewasdeor the asncnafilllia cha enges ahead. this rock has never stood stillc

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