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additional funding provided by these funders: captioning sponsored by rose communications from dartmouth college in hanover, new hampshire, a special editn of charlie rose. >> rose: welcome to our program. we are live tonight from hanover new hampshire. earlier this evening, i moderated the republican pridential debate at dartmouth college. my co-hosts were karen tumulty of the "shington post" and julina goldman of bloomberg news. the debate focused on the economy and jobs. the candidates also addressed issues including health care, tax reform, and regulation.

here is a look at some of the highlights from tonight's debate. >> you can't get the country to go in the right direction and get washington to work if you don't have a president that's a leader. and three years ago we selected a person who'd never had any leadership experience, never worked in the private sector, never had the opportunity to actually bring people together. and he hasn't been able to do so. >> continuing to pivot off the current tax code is not going to boost this economy. this is why we develop 999. 9% corporate business fl tax, 9% personal income flat tax and 9% national sales tax and it will pass, senator, because the american people want it to pass. >> the last thing you would do is give congress another pipeline of a revenue stream and this gives congress a pipeline in a ses tax. a sales tax can lead to a value added tack. >> we're sitting on this absolute treasure trove of energy in this country and i don't need 999, we don't need

any plan to pass congress. we need to get a president of the united states that is committed to passing the types of regulations, pulling the regulations back, freeing this country to go develop the energy industry tt we have this country. >> the first person to fire is bernanke who a disaster as chairman of the federal reserve. the second person to fire is geithner. the fact is, in both the bush and the obama administrations, the fix has been in. >> i don't subscribe to the don trump school or the mitt romney school of international trade. i don't want to find ourselves in a trade war. with respect to china, if you start slapping penalties on them based on countervailing duties you're going to get the same thing in return because what they're going to say because of quantitative easing part one and part two you're doing a similar thing to yoururrency. >> alan greenspan was a disaster. aughter) everybody in washiton, libera and conservatives, said

he kept interest rates too low too long. the solution was lower them even more and they think that's going to solve our problems. but if i had to name one person that d a little bit of good, that was paul volcker. he at least knew h to end... help tend inflation. unlike hermann's plan, which could not pass because... how many people here for a sales tax in new hampsre? raise yourand. there you go, herman, that's how many votes you'll get in new hampshire. >> rose: joining me in new hampshire is a distinguished group of analysts my debate co-herself karen tumulty of the "washington post" and julianna goldman of bloomberg news. also matthew dowd bloomberg analyst and george w. bush's former strategist, mark halperin of "time" magazine, rich lowry and rich hunt and dan balz of the "washington post." i'm pleased to have all of them here as we look back al at something that took place merely hours ago i begin with hunt and this question. how did this debate if at all

change the republican race for the presidency? and the presidential nomination? >> first it was interesting in the issues that were framed and will continue to be framed on the ecomy. i think three things were dominant tonight. one, if you had any doubt that mitt romney was an adult and had gravitas it was clear he d tonight. if i were the obama white house i would not have liked this debate because mitt romney clearly looked good. secondly herman cain was really fascinating. he just... he's a compelling figure and that see it was good. on the other hand there are a couple things that wilcause him problem, the sales tax among others. thirdedlyly-- and matthew would know more than-- rick perry may have a lot of asset bus debate formats are not one. he was given an opportunity tonight by you and karen and julianna to lk about his economic plan and he chose to talk aut energy and he was given a chance on healthare and he started talking about medicaid waivers after spending the last three orour days trashing romney on romney care.

it was rely... not a bad performance just a lackluster performance. >> any reason you can explain that, matthew. >> it tells you when you judge these candidates in a vacuum before they're tested on a national scale. when you run for office... rick perry has won 18 straight races in texas. i was thinking as i was watching it and watched him over the last three debates, rick perry over the year ago said i don't want to be president, it's not something i'm interested in, i like austin, i want to stay in austin. we're now learning he was telling the truth. >> you mean he might get his sh >> he's acting like he doesn't want to go to washington. >> rose: dan balz? how does it chge the race if at all. >> i don't think any debate or almost any debate ever changes these races that significantly. >> rose: so rick perry hadn't been affected by his rformance in bates? >> well, one single debate but i agree with al, i thought that

everybody was looking at rick perry and herman cain. cain because he's on the rise and perry because he's on the decline. d romney was able to use this subject matter of economics to his advantage. the other two were not. i think al is right about cane that he is a buoyant personality d people like him and h has in the 999 plan something that is catchy and people are attracted to it on the surface. but this debate showed that his going to face a lot of scrutiny going forward if he continues to stay up in the polls and i wasn't convinced that he handled those questions effectively. perry again... this wasn't as bad i didn't think as some of his other debates but it certainly was not an effective or strong performance of the kind people might have been looking for. so i think that you know romney demonstrated again that he's very good in detes and the others are still ting to measure up. >> rose: so the question is which of the others will remain

as the challenger to romney and still... it's still a viable question? >> i think that perry because he has $17 million that he raised hathe capacity to keep going and to throw a lot of stuff at mitt romney which we all expect will happen at some point through television ads. cain because he has something people like has an opportunity but we don't know whether he's got staying power and tonight's debate didn't answer that question in an affirmative way. it didn't show cane has specific he's going to be able to carry forward. >> rose: karen, you were sitting at the table. tell me how you felt about the candidates and what surprised you about being here at the table and secondly what issues emerged at all in terms of the differences between them? >> well the single biggest surprise of the night to me i think wasthat there were a couple of questions that gave

the candidates an opportunity sort of connect with the populist anger in the country and that mitt romney of all people seemed to be the only candidate who took that opportunity and, you know, that was something of a surprise to me. and i'm also... i couldn't figure going into this what being at the table was going to do to the dynamic and i think in some ways they fod sitting next to each other it was in some ways harder to take the kindf shots that they can take wh they're separated by a few feet of distance and everybody's behind the lectern. it's almost like u're in your little fortress. >> rose: julianna? >> i got the sse that being seated around the table really energized everybody and ft much more comfortable juing in and being civil about it as well. in terms of the headlines or subject matters, mitt romney

while he did se more on the populist side of thing he is didn't necessarily come out answering the question about his authenticity because he also went ahead and said... essentially left the door open to another wall street bailout given what we're seeing in terms of potential contagion from europe. >> rose: rick? >> first of all, let me clarify i'm not the rich lry who came up with the cain 999. (laughter) >> rose: i thought about that. >> i thought you were going to be the next president. >> rose: do you know that lowry? is he a relative? >> i agree with everything that's been said. mitt romney he's like a boxer that has a couple inches extra ach in ese debate he isust seems to be operating at a higher level than everyone else and what brought that home to me in this particular encounter was the portion of the program where candidates were asking each other questions and he got three or four what were meant to be

zingers and handled them splendidly and probably won each of those exchanges. so cain had a good night because he was the center of attention. i don't know whether he so much defended the 999 plan but he certainly... >> rose: he reveled in it. >> he said what it was over and over again. someone joked whoever is the c.e.o. of godfather pizza now should come up with a $9.99 special right away. (laughter) take advantage of this marketin and perry is just mystifying. it wasn't a bad night butome of his answers were a little confusing. he was repetitive on the energy question and there's just this listlessness there so maybe matthew you're right. maybe this tells us why daniels and christie were right not to run because if you have to be talked into it maybe that's not a good thing. >> rose: >> that's what i was thinking. when these candites say i don't have it in my gut, it's not a burning desire, i think when you run for president of the united states and the thing you have to go through and all the things you have to to do you have to have a burning desire to do that and you don't feel it from rick perry.

(mr. halperin? >> the original question about what might have changed? it's very early. no one has ever been a front-runner andot had an extential test. so mitt romney almost certainly... it would be define history if he didn't have an existential test. but his performce and the performance of rick perry and his endorsement this afternoon from governor christie, what it goes for now for some segment of the press and the republican party is mitt romney inevitable? and wh's crazy about it is if you took the candates out and talked to republican activists around the country, poll thysings; even people in coress and said what are you looking for in a candidate? we want someone not from the east, who's been against bailouts, who's violently agait health care mandates, someone who's not an establishment figure. mney is all those things. the party is on a path to nominate someonen many ways out ostep with what the party is looking for. herman cain is more in line with that. that's why he's doing well. matthew said at a dinner last night i was at that cain could

be nominated. i thought that was silly last night. tonight i think it's true because romney will be tested by someone and tonight because of rick perry's performance you'd have to say despite the money dan mentioned that herman cain is just as likely to be the person who provides that test, ybe more likely unless rick perry does better. >> mark, i think's one other aspect of the things youticked off that republican voters are looking for and i remember sitting with two groups of voters in iowa very early thi year. these are not iowa voters in love with mitt romney like many republican activists but when you asked them the abstract question what are you lking for there anominee or next president, time and again they ca back to somebody who could deal with the economy an i think thatemains for him a trump card for republicans who in... almost all other ways can't warm up to him. >> and there's two other thing he is demonstrated tonight which he has demonstrated, fluidity on the economy, two others. 's fnd a way to talk about health care which is not

defensive which had merit and takes him off the defensive about what he did in ssachusetts. the other thing is he expresses anti-obama sentiment now very well. it's partly out of anger but partly out of sorrow and it's the message the white house fears. the president is a good guy, he had his chance, he failed, doing better. that's theessage republicans want to hear. >> charlie, let me pick up on this. i'm going to go back to perry. i find inexplicable... matthew's theory is probably as good asfully. he's taken out some of the toughest t.v. ads in the last couple days on romney care i have ever seen. if he believes those adds-- that's what they're spending money on-- why he sat at this table tonight and given several opportunities just totally passed. he just didn't rise to the occasion. i'm not trying to get a food fight going. i'm saying this is wha he tells us by his spending is what he believes and instead he's talking about medicaid waivers. it was absolutely inexplicable. and i think one of the reasons

romney did so well was because he was invested. they did ask him question but with one or two exceptions they didn't ask very good ones or pointed one. >> i think one of the things... i mean, romney i think he systematic, he goeshrough ese things like a baseball player. hi doesn't hit home runs or triples but he hits a bunch of singles and tries. he still hasn't in any way energized any passion in republicans. this didn't do it. he has become i think the head candidate of the republican party when the republican party is oking for e heart candidate. and i think herman cain is filling the space of the heart candidate and this was his first time in the spotlight and he performed very well for somebody that'sbasically never held public office. what i think could end up happening is that rick perry is probably not on a trajectory anymore in my view of being able to win the nomination. i think we're getting past that

point. what he could do is a scorched earth campaign against mitt romney causing him a lotz of problems and raising his negatives. he will be very good. he may not be good at debates but the t.v. ads against mitt romney will be exceedingly good. >> oh, that one he did on health care. you may disagree with it but it's one tough effective ad. >> rose: what does it say? >> it basically says... i mean, that obamacare and romneycare are indistinguishable, that mitt romney is the fliplopper, that you can't believe what he says and then he goes... >> rose: and this is why governor christie stepped forward to say that w intellectually dishonest? >> i'm not defending the veracity of the add ad. i'm saying it's effectivend tough. >> for me so far the biggest dog that has not barked in the series of debates is no one has really scored against romney on health care which i find baffling and he has a set answer that isn't... that has all sorts

of holes in it that cou be poked in it. he didn't raise taxes because they didn't pay for the plan. he didn't cut medicare because he's governor, hean't cut medicare. >> if a mandates unconstitutional federally it's okay on a state basis. >> but no one has been able to hit him on. that i was with romney yesterday and i agree with matt. he doesn't inspire and he doesn't connect but he impresses and if you talk to people who are supporters they'll say he can win and he's the right guy for the economy. >> rose: on the authenticity issue, he doesn't yet connect. >> there's where the doubts are. >> i was also struck by his argument sort of making a virtue of complexity. which is something where i vif not heard, the exchange wit herman cain jt saying tse things are just really complicated and i think that could also be the argument that he makes going forward as people

challenge his authenticity. as people challenge his record for everything that doesn't sort of just line up. >> rose: how willthat challenge take place? the debate format does not necessarily make that easy because off bunch of candidates and limited time unless you focus on anymore theirst 15 minutes on him. how ll the challenge to him take place? >> that is a very good question and quite franklyusually the way those kind of challenges happen is when a candidate slips up and makes mistakes. and thus far we have not in i don't think in this campaign seen mitt romney do that. and it's perhaps the virtue of having done this once before and also, you know, it does seem like the lesson of mitt romney's life is that this guy doesn't make the same mistakes twice. >> at some point we' going to stop saying it's too early to form an opinion about what's going to happen because we're

close to voting. i think the way he could still be stopped was mentioned earlier. television advertising. there's two tribes in the republican party now that have an interest in this, someone a pro-romney tribehich is going to grow with the christie endorsement, with the sense that it's romney or cain at this point unless perry improves. that tribe is going to give money to mitt romney and his super packs. the big question as far as i'm concerned now that other tribe that doesn't want mitt romney whether they're for another candidate or they simply don't want romney to be the nominee, they don't like his face, they don't like his health care law, whatever iis. how much money will go into that pot and how effect live those television ads be. >> i want to circle back to a couple points. i thought it was significant that one of the first words out of mitt romney's mouth tonight was leader. sort of setting himself up as not just the leader of the pack but someone who's able to fill this leadership vuum that we started asking aboutthe dysfunction in washington and thenlso coming back to the contrast between herman cain and rick perry sitting there. we gave opportunities for them

to spell out their specific plans. herman cain, whether he repeated 999 over and over and over again or not, he had a specific plan and when you asked rick perry about his specific plan the answer was energy and i'll be laying out my specific plan over the next few days. but this was a debate about the economy and it was pretty surprising he hadn't come in armed with some more specifics. >> rose: matthew, what's the test for herman cain? >> well, i think the test is he has to... he moves beyond... he has to move beyond the novelty candidate to a candidate basically people say i can see that person that's president of the united states. so i think there's a lot of republicans in polls that are saying i liked herman cain, he seems like a good guy, he's this happy warrior, he seems authentic, he's genuine. he's got a simple mesge. okay. so like him, but do they see him as president of the united states? i think he's going to have a series of momts if he's going

to be the nominee and be really considered by a majority of republicans he's got to demonstrate that they can see him in the oval office making those decisions whether it's on the economy or war right now he's doing a fanciful novelty candidate doing very well. supreme to see him as a president and that's the line he has to cross. >> charlie, in this debate was romney, this was ground that he's comfortable with. you know, a former c.e.o. ought to be able to talk about the economy. we know he's an effective... >> rose: on t.v. he has not done as well when the topics have turned elsewhere, particularly in foreign policy. he's going to get those kinds of questions in a more serious way today than he has gotten up to now and that's another area where he'll... this question of can you see him as commander-in-chief. he may well be ae to pass that test. he's got a strong psence but the depth of his understanding,

the complexity the way he sees the world, the answers he would give are all going t be revealinas to what... >> rose: as we talk about these things and somebody help me with the calendarwe're moving to the time in which the trigger is going to connect on the supercommittees, correct? >> right, they've got a report by november 23 or say they can't reach an agreement in which point the trigger is supposed to take effect. >> to so the question i hear is lots of people would see me knowing i was going to show up here and say you've got toet romney to be clear about how he will deal with the idea... >> rose: you asked him d he ducked it. >> and i asked him and he ducked it again. >> rose: which i think is interestg because i think... i think if romney was given truth serum-- and he knows he can give h annals in this-- romney would basically say we're going to have to come to a series of compromises. >> rose: >> what ronald reagan said in 192. but ronald reagan did that with an unemployment rate that was a point higher than what we are today. >> rose: and we are not the only

ones that think that about mitt romney. there's a bunch of republican voters that aren't voting for him that think... >> they think that that's what he's all about and that's what the reluctance is. that's why they don't trust him. they think he's just another guy that's going tgo to washington and do a series of compromises to make government work and that's not what they want. >> he has a trok record, that's what he did as governor some $300 million in clothing business tax loopholes that grover norquist as a tax increase is tonighthe said he would not but opento any sort of agreement that raises revenues. >> rose: in politics over the last several weeks there have been changes in terms of the calendar. who's the favorite now and how is it likely to play with florida going on the 31st, with iowa on the third. is where does that leave... >> we're still waiting forthe secretary of state of this state billardner, to set the primary for new hampshire. everybody thinks it's likely to be on january 10.

that means we have a calendar that looks very much at leastn the early stages like it did four years ago. i think the central strategic question for romney at this point is what does he do about iowa. it h been out there hanging around him all year. he has so far finesse whether he's going to make a serious effort. if there's an opportunity to win iowa it will be very difficult for them do that. >> rose: because they're likely to win here. >> then can parlay it into a victory here and this state, as we know,as been if i can toll front-runners so ngs could happen here. that would mean an early calendar that could be successful for him. but there is a risk in that and we don't know how risk averse he is. he has been relatively risk asflers this caaign. >> rose: when will we see candidates drop out because they lack funds? >> i think probably not until january because most of the people now who are short of

money are not the kind of candidates that have cadillac campaigns with pollsters and a lot of advertisers. >> rose: showing up for debates. >> so you show up for debates, there are debates all the way through those early contest so i don't see anybody in the rrent field... i may be wrong t i don't e anyone looking to drop out. senator santorum is improving his stock in the party in neral. newt gingrich doesn'tant to go out on a bad note and michele bachmann and ron paul are cause candidates a tht point who want to keep driving their cause. >> and they've got four and five million dollars. >> rose: i think what you're saying is interesting. you see signals and you're beginning to see signals of which candidates are basically beginning to fade. they may carry their way into januar it's like bruce willis in "the sixth sense." they're dead, they just don't know it yet. so they're going to close headquarters. huntsman moved his headquarters to atlanta. he's based here. that's a sign he's beginning to fade in this.

michele bachmann closed her headquarters in virginia. her staff... some of her staff has gone back to her congressional office. a bunch of all sort of things will happen. they may not say "i'm out of the race" but they deal a series of things that basically say this thing is going away, i may stay untiliowa. >> but if rick perry doesn't establish it as two-person race, there will be a romney alternative. someone will get a chance to at him somewhere. >> rose: someone who's in the race now? >> jerry brown and paul tsongas were the b threats to bill clinton. and what they're all telling themselves... and not unreasonably is this that there's a free-floating conservative sentiment that's briefly alighted on a series of candidates from trump to bachmann to perry now to cain. so if you're santorum y're sitting here thinking "why not me?" (laughter) >> charlie aee. d i think... maybe anyone else more than politics perhaps

including barack obama you'd like to have mitt romney's hand however let me pick up a bit on what dan said. iowa is a roll the dice for him. he knows if he can win in january 11 if he wins iowa and new hampshire, you can go through the motions but... >> has that ever happened, snow >> john kerry did it. >> rose: any sflb >> no. >> rose: but iowa as dan said, it's dicey. and this state as strong as he is now the unpredictability... i will tell you if you're jon husman, as much as we may laugh, he's in better shape than john mccain was at the same time 12 painful years ago. he's in better shape than gary hart was in 1983. >> i think the thing mitt romney has to hope for is that there remain a number ofther candidates who are at least out there and visible even if they're just drawing in the

single digits because his best hope in iowa is for the anybody but mitt romney vote to be split. i, they's tditionally in republican politics. the fruner that no one's excited about wins becau the conservative votes splits among various alternatives. we saw this with cain most recently andhe guy that no one's excited about but has the establishment support gets the nomination. >> let me put this down tonight. mitt romney has to play in iowa. he has to play in iowa. whether he dumps a bunch of money in there or not, if he's going to be sitting in the polls he's going to be either leading or in close second. it doesn't matter in people's minds he's playing in iowa. if he cannot sit there and hold ck... so once they judgeim on the fact that he's in first or second now he might as well dump his money in there. they're goindo go through that sttegy and think we have to do this, wll be judged on this, we're a national candidate, we

have to do this. and it's a roll of the ice and if he wins both it's over. >> rose: don't we now know hillary clinton had some doubts about doing it? going into iowa. >> and iowa was her worst state. romney has another bad ste, south carolina. so the good thing about him playing in iowaas al and dan and matthew have said, if he moves to iowa, wins new hampshire, he ends the thing. you know, it's true that... as karen said, that's the way the establishment front-runner has won. romney's benefit is there is no other establishment candidate in thrace because they all took a pass. so in iowa if he gets the bulk of the establishment vote he will win iowa because the establishment vote even with the tea party sentiment is a huge part of the eleorate en in theowa caucus. there's no doubt that as long as all these people are in the race... paul's got a base that's not going away, bachmann has a base that's declining but not going away. perry will get his share of the vote. it's very easy to see him winning iowa.

i don't think the pressure is on him because there's a precedent of mccain skipping iowa. me eel try to manage the expectations of that. >> rose: let's not forget this wonderful contrarian state up here, there's nothing they like better than to take someone who has won iowa and looks like an absolute foregone conclusion and say guess what, folks? >> rose: who's the best example of that? >> hillary clinton. >> barack obama. >> rose: barack obama. >> i mean barack obama had new hampshire won before iowa. >> 18 points. >> trust me, i know that. (laughter) >>ose: before we leave new hampshire, before we leave the idea of the republicans in this race was it is it about new hampshire that makes the voters want to rn upside down the apple cart? >> i think there's a couple things about it. first, there's a unique... there seems to be a unique disfavorable liking of people from texas in new hampshire. (laughter)

i'm going come up with here with my cowboy boots. >> rose: they seem to love you on the street, though. >> and there's a great coffee place. (laughter) >> rose: he wins iowa and then the maverick candidate john mccain wins a state by 18 or 19 points. rick perry even while... even when he was at his high point a month or so ago he was floundering in new hampshire. so that seems to be baked in. the other thing is iowa is about 100,000 caucus goers, many of them are driven by social issues. in new hampshire there's not... there is a social conservative element but it's a very small element. then you have thisriving of independent voters that can come in the primary which i think will come in very strong because there's no democratic primary. they can totally upset the apple cart. >> rose: and democrats can register. so you can get democrats voting. >> rose: and that's really when we've seen the big surprises in new hampshire is when there have been primaries going in eac party because until election day

you don't know which primary they're going to land in. d if you talk to david plouffe barack obama's campaign manager, he believes it was obama's strong performance in iowa that made the independents in new hampshire say hey, that's over with, let's play in the republican primary where it's interesting. >> rose: i want to ask julianna, what did you most want to ask that you didn't have an opportunity either because of format or because of time, because of everything else. >> i really actually wanted to ask governor romney about the loopholes that he closed in massachusetts that were criticized. >> rose: that were revenue enhancements. >> yes. and getting them to square that away where what he would do as president. whether he realistically could get away with not using that as a model. >> rose: karen? >> well, i just wish... it was unfortunately for julianna when

she was going round and round with him on hypotheticals. (laughter) >> i had a few other hypotheticals. >> rose: you didn't get to all your hypotheticals. >> i would like to have a better sense of what he would do if europe melts down. >> rose: i thought he was... he did not want to play on there. >> wasn't he strongly implying, although he di't want to say it, that he'd bail them out again >> yes. >> rose: because when i asked him the easy question about too big to fail he refused to say yes even though it suggested earlier that he wouldn't want to go to that point. >> but tt gs to this question we've be wrestling with that mark raised. everybody who's a front-runner does have a moment that's unexpected and that often goes to the core of the basic problem they have with the electorate. romney's is authenticity. if through some slipup in a debate a bad answer on onef these that suggests he's totally

flexible that he doesn't really know what he believes, that could open it up in a way that it hasn't yet. >> rose: so e authenticity is defined as... he doesn't say what he believes? is that it? >> because it's not politically savvy? because they think he's not of them? >> no, i think what they believe... i think he infected hielf with this virus in 2007. they don't kw what his core really is. what is your core? you were pro-choice and now you're pro-life. you were for your own health care bill, now you're against it. so there's all these series of things and they want somebody they think i know their core, i know who they are, i may disagree with them on certain things but i know who this person is and i know the fundamental values. there's a bunch of republicans that have no idea of that with mitt romney. >> rose: let me turn to barack obama, wres he as he looks at

his political fortune today and 9% unemployment, a little change in the economy but no good news early. >> well, charlie, he's in trouble. i n't think there's any way that you can sugar coat that and i don't think that anybody arou him thinks anythingther than that. >> rose: and he has to do what and appeal to whom in order to make his chance better? >> the simple answer is he needs to figure out a way to get jobs created in this country but, of course, as mitt romney said, things aren't that simple. >> rose: and the isn't that much time. >> so he's got to figure out a way to manage this problem in a way that recreates some confidence in him as a leader. i think at this point that's where he's suffering most. through republican strategy and tactics his own problems he's left the impression with people that he doesn't hav a clear answer and the leadership streth. he has to geback on top of

that. >> rose: someone once said to me that if in fact this election is a referendum on president obama he's in a bad place. someone said to me, though though, it's naefr referdum on the president, it's always a referendum on the future. what is it? >> i think he'll want to make it a choice. he'll want to go on the 2004 bush model where you're below 50 or right at 50 and you make the other guy unacceptable. i think problem he has on the economy, yes, he needs improvement on the economy but there's very few things he can really to affect that in e short term and it reminds me the position bush was inith the iraq war for so long going poorly and tse of us who supported the war were constantly saying give another speech about the iraq war. explain it a little more clearly. get a map so that you can explain it. and nothing was ever going to make a difference until conditions changed on the ground. i think that's where obama is with the economy. and it's not just that he has a little control over it, he's a hostage to fortune. he's depending on the soundness of the greek financial system

and the wisdom of the euro... european financial elite. that's not a great place. >> and they're relying on taking this argument of the do nothing congress and that's one of the giftthat the president... >> i was going to say these presidential reeles are only very few in these lets make a choice election. presidential reelects follow their job approval pattern. president bush's job approval in the runup from november back a year, his job approval never dropped below 46% a never got above 51% and going into election day his job approval was 51, he got 51% of the vote. bill clinton's job approval rating in 1996 wa 49 and he got 49% of the vote. no president has ever gotten reelected with a job approval under 47 going into election day. barack oba's job approval has not been above 42% in two months i don't see anythi changes over the next year to improve that. the only thing i think he can do

thigh ear going to try to obliterate whoever the republican is. the only way he gets reelected is if a third party candidate can peel off enough votes he's able to win this election with 42% of the vote. >> rose: third party candidate? >> well, the conditions exist as much as 92 when we had a third party candidate. but there has to be a human being and it's still unyear that could be and what their issue set would be. the president's jobs bill went down in the senate during the debate and he doesn't have much le to do. ing thei argument about the do nothing republican congress is in part for next year because the president's advisors look at their polling data and focus groups and say what the bt wants to do is popular yet he didn't do anything to put pressure on the republicans in congress to change their ways. >> rose: he can't translate his popularity into legislative victories. >> the popularity of his program.

the supercommittee is the big wild card what they do will affect the way congress anthe president do on a range of things, including spending and unemployment. the prospects of another candidate... matthew's right, that's the president's chance. depending if there was such a person they might drawotes away from obama as much as from the publican. rose: are there divisis within the obama strategy advisors. one group fighting another group in terms of trying to determine what is the... what do we go to the country with? >> there's a very small... >> rose: harry truman versus... >> there's a small number of people making the decision as as best i can tell they are like minded the one play they have left is to take public opinion to pressure congress to do something different. but it's not worked on this jobs package and that was his big windup, joint speech to a joint session congress. a lot of thought going in it.

no president in my career that i can recall has ever demanded congress do something that they actually did. it makes him look weaker and now they have to regroup and come up with something new to suggest they're working on jobs. >> i agree with mark. many times we think there's a division or confusion. i think problem is they all know this is not amarketing and communications problem. they can't fix this. >> rose: what kind of problem is it? >> it's a performance problem. >>ose: performance? >> he's going to be judged... even if he passed the jobs bill it wouldn't affect him politically until jobs start getting added to the economy. until the economy improves. he can give 100 great speeches, he can criticize congress, he is going to be judged fundamentally on the performance of the economy in this point. and he can't market his way out of this, that's the problem. >>ose: he's got a 9.1% unemployment rate problem and if you look at the strategy now they think that they'll be able to lift public opinion that's similar to the strategy they tried to employuring the debt ceiling debate where they were

the voices of compromise and pushing this grand bargain that that was going to help drive public opinion. and they were able to do that but it was pretty limited and when you compare it to the public opinion of congress the president advisor's see that he ended up rolling in the mud with pigs so he wasn't able to elevate himself to that debate and that's dragging him down. >> ros someone wrote a piece about it... obama has become a loaner. is that a fair picture of him today even though he's on the campaign trail all the time? >> it was interesting. i went on the last bus tour ov the summer and... in august and there was a very interting interaction which spoke to matt about at the time where a woman raised her hand and she said "mr. president, i slept for two nights in my truck, i just had ng cancer surgery so that i could come and see you because

my social security benefits... my disability benefits have been denied." and the president listened to her and he went into a discussion about social security and making sure that social securi is there for future generations and never once acknowledged this woman's hardship. this is a problem for him now to show he is connecting to people and he's out of practice from not being on the campaign trail and that's one of the things that the white house says he was so hurt by, by being in washington in august stuck with this debt ceiling debate but he couldn't get back into the campgn mode as a candidate. >> rose: that piece was written by scott wilson, one of our white house reporters and i thought it was a perceptive piece because i thought it captured theessence of president obama.

i think he is a singular person. if you think of his biography and the way he's written his biography in the book he wrote and the wa he's done his political career he has done in the a way he's tried to rely on very few people. he has made himself what he is and i think that in the white house he operates that way and i think in some ways it's been effective for him. he's obviously president of the united states when nobody thought four years ago at this time that he could be. on the other hand, as julianna points out, throughout his career as a national politician, he's had great difficulty connecting directly and'm pathetically with the public. at a time when the country is in as much agony and distress as people are feeling, that's a really difficult thing. >> charlie... >> i also think there's a problem in an incumnt president trying to sort of go

out in the country and act like a candidate. i was struck... when i was reading bill clinton's autobiography when he talked about how they were trying to push him out on the campaign trail a lot in 1994 and he went finally because he was needed throughout to raise money but he said ultimately people look at a president and once you're out there at these rallies and things, you don't look like a president anymore you look like just another politician. >> i agree with everything that's been said about obama. there's going to be a big but, though. i think we are ignoring the republicans and republican brand name. the republican brand name day is much lower tn it' been in years. 1980, 2000, 1992 when a party took over, that party, the opposition party, had a net favorable rating. that was important. toda the republican brand is terrible. it's around 31% or 32%. that's a problem for a party

because ultimely it's a referendum on the president but it's aut choices, too. ronald reagan won that election in 1980 in the last two or three weeks when he finally persuaded the american people he was an acceptable alternative. republicans have a big problem. our poll the other day, the "washington post," bloomberg poll, as we call it the bloomberg "washington post" poll... (laughter) >> ...it was interesting. because it ranks it on a whole host of issues that people are against the republican position. so i don't disagree with any of the bleak assessment about barack obama. i think he's higher than 42% but i think we can't ignore the fact that republicans still have work to do. >> the republican party brand really hasn't recovered from the late bush years. it had a smashing victory in 2010 but it was a viory on the back of a massive rejection of the other side rather than an embrace of the republicans. and on the issue of the stimulus i think house republicans at least realize that obama really... he is the guy who really, really wants to have a

fight. and it's better for them to back off a little bit. you'll see them pulling off some discrete pieces of this package that they can live with and say, look, we're compromising and being reasonable. >> and just to follow quickly on that point. the president still enjoys high favorability ratings. people sti like him. >> rose: the presint has to hope on the economy he's ending up. that's what he has to believe, even though unemployment might be just below 9%. >> i watched a focus group last week that was conducted up here and we were... a number of us were in washingto watching it on video and it was with mothers with younger children. and they went around the table and talked about the difficulties they are all going through and, very very poignant stories about how they're coping with life these days. when they got to the queson of president obama, one thing that

was striking was how in a sense forgiving they were. they talked about he's trying. he's working at it. this wasn't all his fault. i me, when you loo at a 42% approval rating, you expect in a group like that that you're going to hear more harshness. now, the unemployment rate in this state is lower than it is nationally by a good margin. but when i listened to that, as julianna says, there is still somethinthere that he can tap into, if he can figure out a way to tap into it. >> rose: is there anything about the republicans and the tea party that the public at some point will say in the end on the debt ceiling debate we're prepared to take actio that were not necessarily in the best interest of the country. you held the country's economy hostage. >> i don't know. you know, if the nominee is mitt

romney, everyone's goi to sort of smell on him... what matthew was referring to earlier that conservatives refer to. mitt romney opposed the debt deal, or said he did. i don't think anyone believes he actually did. >> rose: he was a gang of x kind of guy? >> he said he supported cut, cap and balance but it was entirely pro forma. and he... the challenge for the republican candidate is just going to be to appear reasonable, to meet that reagan at the end of 1980 test. >> one of the things i think about elections is it... pple ll fire somebody they like in this country. they will fire somebody they like as long as you present it in thaway. and i think actually mitt romney has begun to develop a very effective general election message which is "nice guy, great family, good person, in way over his head, doesn't know what he's doing, it's time for a change." >> rose: so the country's

prepared to fire the president? 2010 they fired the democrs. they didn't want the rublicans they said i don't like what's going on. in 2006 they weren't in love wi the democrats, they fired the republicans. in 2012 if we're in t same place we're in the economy, they're going to say "i like barack obama, he seems like a nice g, you're fired." if you look at the history of incumbents and who won and who lost, the focus should be on this theory beten now and the determination of the republican nominee. obama must be stronger by the time the republican nominee is selected or history suggests he can't recover in the general election run. we know that much of the country has rejected obamanomics. not everyone, but much of them. they're counting on, if romney's the nominee, romney's economic vision. they will say skewed to the wealthy, reminiscent of george bush and the policies that got the country into trouble. it will be difficult, though, to make that argument because obama has his record and in the end, this notion of romney has someone who can compromis, who in massachusetts worked with the democric legislature.

obama could ironically lose to someone who outflanks him on the question of can you get washington to work. >> rose: i want to come back to that question. >> therefore... quickly. their answers to your first question tonight, can you get pele to work together, what would do? those were tea party answers. no one was there sounding like bill clinton or george w. bush the candidate or barack obama saying i'm goingto bring the country together. that's the rhetoric... >> rose: because you can't do hit in the republican party? >> that's not the zeitgeist for the party now. but romney has a gener ection message just waiting to be borthe minute he can do it to start saying loo what i did. >> rose: then authenticity doesn't matter? >> i say he is right now for everybody that would probably judge this thing is mitt romney's the strongest possible general election candidate primarily because of the problem he has in the republican party which is he can turn this over, he can basically say, yeah, you know, those are all those things but, you know, i'm the kind of guy that can get the deal done. i think he's got to hide that as best he can and i think he's

doing that but there is is... as rich said, there's a smell on him among republicans like i know you're hiding something here. (laughter) >> to push back a little bit on this washington compromise. the idea that it's just so terribly dysfunctional. if you look back the last two or three years, huge things have been done in washington. tarp was done, this enormous, historic baiut on a bipolar basis. ... bipartisan basis. >> rose: that was all before 2010. >> well, when democrats had unified control huge things happened. historic things happened. the health care law, the huge stimulus bill, dodd-frank. even with the takeover by republicans prior to the republicans actually taking office you have a deal, a dooipt deal that not a lot of people like about the bush tax cuts and they have been debt limit thing which i know rubs people the wrong way but it was resolved. so our constutional system is...

>> rose: it resolved into a supercommit e in >> it's going to be a bit of a fizzle, but that, charlie, is ultimately bause there's a huge philosophical disagreeme about the size and scope of government and the role of entitlement programs in our country. and that should not be a problem that's easily solved. it's just not. you have to have a big national debate about it. and have an election or maybe a couple. >> but here's the question: is the lesson that republicans take away from having watched president obama and the democrats with unified control enact some very big things that that was a mistake because the country is still fighting over it or that when you've got power you do what you want to do? >> the latter. i think they are counting on if they hold the house, win the senate, and elect a republican president they'll have about 14 months where they can push historic legislation on a scale of what the democrats did the fit two years of the obama administration.

>> rose: and the country will continue to be ripped apart. >> right. >> well... i mean, they're elected on the basis of doing these sort of things... >> well, the democrats were elected on the basis of doing these sort of things and they rammed through things using reconciliation on health skir that the most personal... one of the most personal issues where obama himself said as a candidate you can only do these things in a bipartisan way, we're still fighting about it and we'll be fighting about it no matter who wins the election. >> democrats were elected to do those... >> i think what your question... the first question you asked herman cain-- which he did not answer and then nobody else was willing to answer-- which isthe fundamental problem going on. there's incredible dysfunction and polarization in washington and nobody... george bush got elected in 2000-- i'm fully aware of this-- to fix that problem. barack obama was not really elected to fix health care. he was elected to fix washington, the broken system in washington and he didn't do it, he made it more polarized. so n we're having another election with a huge segment of the voters out there saying i'm

disgusted at washington. they play like a bunch of babies why don't they get these this done? none of the eight candidates is willing to address how they fix the dysfunctional problem in washington. >> rose: one last question about obama before we close here. is it bond... in the end, is it simply whether something happens good to the economy and nothing he can do? >> oh, i think they can spend $800 million on negative ads to try to really damage the republican nominee. and tha can... remember, it's about the electoral college. he's probabl pretty safe in l but a handful of the states he won last time and with a little bit of improvement most of those states will come home for him. the challenge is, there aren't many mccain states he can play in. so he's playing defense in some places. >> he can take $800 million and hi a bunch o pple. he would be better off than putting it in t.v. ads.

>> rose: 30 seconds. >> onether thing we learned tonight with which identify is how good an aging middle age man n look when he has two young smart... (laughter) >> rose: who are you talking about? (laughter) >> this is pandering! (laughter) >> rose: all right, all right. thank you all for staying up late, getting up early, thank you very much, karen. thank you, julianna. thank you all for coming here this evening. thank the student from dartmouth who stopped by, thank the people of hanover and good night from new hampshire.