mails. [laughter]>> but that is conside opportunity or likelihood thateo use me as a character. >> >> what do you think i tree can be? can it be stronger than steel? can the treaty by degradable plastic? can it be fuel for our cars, or clothing, or medicine that fights cancer? with our tree cell technology, we think it can. weyerhaeuser, growing ideas. >> this attack by the federal government on religious freedom in our country must not stand and will not stand.

>> this week on "inside washington," a birth control debate in 2012? >> this latest ruling on women's access to reproductive health care, family planning, has been absolutely politicized in what i call an ongoing war against women. >> surprise, rick santorum takes three in a row. >> one of the great gifts i have had is that no one ever thinks i can win anything. >> no more mr. nice guy for mitt romney. >> rick santorum was a major earmarker. >> the largest joint federal- state civil settlement in the history of this nation. >> president obama does an about-face on campaign fund- raising. cpac comes to town. >> jimmy carter's failed presidency could reappear in the form of barack obama. captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org--

>> "congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof and." first 16 words of the first amendment of the constitution of the united states. when the obama administration orders catholic universities and colleges, hospitals, a catholic charitable institutions to offer birth control and other health- care plans, in spite of the catholic church's teaching that birth control is morally wrong, is the administration prohibiting the free exercise of religion? evan, you are a historian, a graduate of eight find law school. how about it? >> they mustaf focus group -- must have focus grouped htis to death, because it seems crazy what they are doing. no the finer points of

the law. it seems to be more about politics than a lead of the bid they must think that women will lap this up. >> nina, your beat is the supreme court. >> well, i am not the supreme court, but the supreme court ruled, and justice scalia wrote, as long as the law is neutral unequally applied to everybody, it is constitutional. the court has made rulings that if -- more recent rulings that give the catholic church's some hope that it might prevail. but this has been the law for over 10 years, in the federal government, in 28 states. but it comes up because of the affordable care act, what has to be offered as a basic service for women. >> charles krauthammer, md, is

the obama administration's mandate medically sound? >> they make it into a medical issue. it is not a medical issue. the idea that women are denied contraceptives is preposterous. it is not illegal to get birth control. are you going to force the catholic church to distribute contraceptives free of charge because the federal government says so rather than exempted them on the ground that it offends their doctrines? i think that is a clear open- and-shut case. infringement of the federal government on the free exercise of religion. >> colby, you regularly grapple with matters of conscience and your columns. the cardinal archbishop of washington says that the obama mandate is it violation of the basic rights of conscience and religious liberty. do you agree or disagree? >> there is the case to be made for an exemption in the legislation.

we are talking about employers now, not the church. once you become an employer, there are certain rules you have to obey. the minimum wage -- just because you are a catholic hospital, you cannot avoid the minimum wage, it does not mean you are exempt from osha laws. there is nothing that takes away their right to perform the basic function as an employer. in this case, it seems to me the administration is in a position to broaden this exception to these employers because of their religious nature. >> at week's end the white house was ready to announce a plan to try to accommodate religious employers on this, but my guess is it will not satisfy the bishops and will probably -- "new york times" reported on friday that they had been gearing up for this for months, and will probably anchor people on the other side. >> also, i think the bishops and

know that there is something on the order of 98% of catholic women also practice birth control. i don't think they are winning the argument -- >> the bishops also seem to be seeking to move the goalposts and to want a rule that applies not just to catholic charities and institutions, but to all catholic employers, private employers. there are two ways this can go. if this appears to women in particular, women voters who care about this issue -- if this appears to be a violation of religious precepts, the church will wind. if, however, this appears to be a war on contraception, and contraception is not cheap, then the church will lose and republicans will lose. >> politico and other news organizations have been reporting that bill daley, joe

biden sat down with the cardinal archbishop of new york and the president to talk about this. the archbishop leaves thinking, well, i think i've got this settled, and then the thing explodes. >> bill daley is no longer the white house chief of staff. >> i have noticed that. >> there was fighting when he was on staff. valerie jarrett has more clout than bill daley does and valerie jarrett was on the women's side on this. >> the administration has conceded the central argument of the church went explicitly exclude -- when it explicitly excludes anybody working in the church itself. >> that has always been the bar. >> i know, but let me finish what i am trying to say. if you work for the church itself -- >> you work for the building --

work in the building. >> it would be an assault on religion to make a church spend for contraceptives. but they site it is only the church, it does not apply to a church-affiliated charity. it concedes the principle that you don't want to violate the conscience of catholicism if you make a church give a custodian or a cook in the church these kinds of services. but it says it does not apply to a catholic hospital. on what logic should not apply to a catholic hospital? >> because the business they are doing is not the religious and business. it is primarily a secular business. ministers are exempt from the civil rights law. that does not mean that everybody else if employed by catholic charity, for example, is exempt from the civil-rights law. >> the church does a lot of social good, and they have a soup kitchens and they take care

of people. do we really want to drive the catholic church out of the business of providing for the poor and sick? >> that is the point that mark shields made last week. >> obama's on argument is that when someone does it works -- he said this at the prayer breakfast -- he is essentially doing god's work. he is saying that jerry, good works, are a form of religiosity, and then he denies the catholic hospital an exemption? explain that to me. >> i was recently treated at a catholic hospital. there was no exercise of religion as far as i was concerned any point. i just got medical care. >> principle -- >> the religious question never came into being. i was treated at that hospital the same way i would be treated at any other hospital. >> rick santorum wants this

issue and he had a great week. >> i don't stand here claiming to be the conservative alternative to mitt romney. i stand here to be the conservative alternative to barack obama. >> rick santorum beats mitt romney in colorado, missouri, and minnesota. he claims this is a turning point in the campaign for the nomination. do you agree, charles? >> i do. in colorado in 2008, mitt romney defeated john mccain by 60-18. this time around and he loses to rick santorum. he lost to santorum in missouri by 30 points, and what is important is that that is the one at a state where gingrich wasn't on the ballot. it was the one shot at santorum had to go one-on-one, and he crushed romney. it tells you how resistant the republican electorate is to romney as the nominee, and it also tells you that of all

possible alternatives, cain, rick perry, newt gingrich, and others, the only one who is plausible and remains is santorum. i think he is a threat. >> i heard howard fineman said on msnbc that mitt romney is like a giant hairball -- [laughter] that republicans caught up. >> i like your choice of objective sources. >> but do you disagree? >> "hairball" has a pejorative connotation. >> it is it only slightly worse than what came out of "the wall street journal" talking about the same mitt romney. they suggested ishis problem is that conservatives want by him. >> he cannot close the deal. >> it is not just that he cannot closed the deal, it is also on substance. as health care, his position on the poor, that they have a

government services to handle them, and he comes out for the minimum wage. >> "washington post," "romney stuck in lukewarm." >> it is a mistake to underestimate romney. millions of negative ads pointing out that santorum is a creature of washington and took a lot for earmarks. however, to win in november, romney is going to have to show that he stands for something. i think people admire his toughness, they sensed it, but he asked to stand for something. he has this 59-point plan that means the wwhat? >> his negative campaigning hurts him, even with republicans. the way he went after gingrich, if thhe tries that with

santorum there will be a backlash. santorumhis center empt compete with romney? >> he can. >> he can? >> not with money, but there are tricks here. romney is the season candidate, but this has always been a weak field. everybody has had his day. >> i have seen him campaigning. when he goes into this blue- collar vote, it really appeals to people. >> it does appeal to people, but campaigning in the bigger states, he cannot meet everybody. >> evan and i were talking about the gap between rich and poor, white males. >> lurking at all this is a book by charles murray that looks into this, where he talks about the growing gap between rich and poor in this country. he takes race out of it and just looks at poor whites. they are falling further and further behind rich whites.

it is a pretty depressing picture. there'll be a national debate about why that is, and you can see the sights forming. the left will say that it is a lack of economic opportunity, and on the right, i guess a social thing, a moral thing. >> i don't think it is it that simple, and i don't think most people on the left and right think it is simply a matter of morality or economic opportunity. we are a less mobile society today that europe is, which is an incredible reversal. >> if i could take us out of this lofty debate about the direction of the classes in society, romney has a problem. romney's problem is that he is selling himself as a businessman who will turn around america and knows how to make jobs. the problem is if that works, even when the presidency on that if unemployment is 10%. if it is 8.5% and sinking and people have a sense of the

economy rising again, it is not going to work. romney's problem is that he is not proposed anything. reagan had supply-side economics. romney needs an idea, proposal, something audacious michigan is coming up. the detroit economic club, that is exactly where he ought to do it, a long speech. what is he going to do? tax reform, entitlement reform, it doesn't matter. he cannot just say elect me, i know how to make jobs. >> romney cannot do it with a speech. >> let me slip foreign policy into this discussion. how much impact this foreign policy going to have on this presidential election? look at what is happening in syria. appalling. >> right now, not much. i think it is going to have a lot, not because of syria, but because of iran israel palms

iran, that affects everything. but with syria, there are tough choices coming up, because as the civil war gets worse, the united states and others are going to have to decide whether to put the thumb on the scale. do we do another libya, at this nato get involved? >> assad shows no sign of bending. >> libya was not a piece of cake. it was not a piece of tape that it was portrayed to be. right now it is in chaos. in syria that would likely happen, too, because there are many different factions in syria. there is not a united opposition. >> look, the question for us now is not the question we had in libya -- do you intervene militarily or not. there is a small number of americans who want to intervene. libya is the beach with an oil well. syria is a country with an air

force and army. it is a different proposition, a lot harder. the question is it to you arm the rebels or not. the state department position is that we do not want more weapons in this war. as it is, all the weapons are on the side of the bad guys. iranians and russians are pouring in arms. the russians vetoed the resolution so that they could continue to pour in arms. it is a slaughter. i don't see what is holding us back from giving arms, training, support, through turkey, which has brought in its lot with the rebels, which has a border and relations with the syrian opposition. that i think is putting your thumb on the skill without risking american lives. >> do you arm the rebels? >> i think they have been waiting for a broad consensus to arrive, where you get the arab states to agree to arm the

rebels. army rebels is a foregone conclusion as far as i'm concerned. -- are meeting at the rebels is a foregone conclusion as far as i'm concerned. it is going to happen. they are looking to get a consensus among the major players. >> you arm the rebels. what is the end game? >> the fall of the assad regime. >> you want to take him down because it will have an impact on iran. you weaken an ally of iran. >> colby is absolutely right. as opposed to libya, where it was not strategic, only a moral issue, there is a huge strategic prize at stake. if you bring assad down, iran has no allies in the middle of the arab world. hezbollah is weekend, hamas has to go elsewhere. the winners of the moderate arabs who support us.

>> evan, you ar m the rebels appeared what are the down sides? the law of unintended consequences. >> you have a civil war, and do you rile up hezbollah or hamas to, i don't know, attack israel? >> they cannot do that without having an ally like iran or syria behind them. >> the law of unintended consequences, we have seen a lot of that in the middle east in the last year or two, whether it is iraq, egypt, libya. the results are not always good. >> $25 billion mortgage a settlement with five of the nation's biggest banks. >> we have reached a landmark settlement with the largest banks double-speed relief to the hardest hit a home owners and some of the most abusive

practices of the mortgage industry and will begin to turn the page on an era of recklessness that has left some much damage in its wake. >> this is the $25 billion settlement with the nation's biggest mortgage lenders over foreclosure abuses that took place after the housing bubble burst. ok, colby, but 11 million homeowners are under water. something on the order of the $700 billion. this does not go near that, does it? >> no, it does in. -- doesn't. let's think of the people who did play by the rules but are also under water. they and not getting anything at all. what comes out of this that may be positive is some of the regulatory reforms that the institutions have to make, that they can no longer be the kind of robosigning, they have to have transparency in the transactions. but as for relief for the homeowner that is under water, there's not a whole lot. >> friday's "wall street

journal" calls this $25 billion bank job. >> people are not going to be made whole by this settlement, but consumer groups are supporting the settlement for this reason -- people got mortgages who should not have gotten them, but lots of people also got screwed, to use an inelegant term. we have heard millions of stories about paperwork lost. this allows the banks to reduce principal and deal with underwater mortgages, to use various mechanisms to allow people to stay in their homes, and it provides a mechanism that, hopefully with a monitor, an official monitor to make sure paper work actually does it work the way it is supposed to -- the banks were never ready for this onslaught

and that is how they found themselves in this terrible mess. >> this is about the third time that the government has taken a crack at this problem. the proof will be in the pudding. it doesn't feel like enough. $2,000 a person, what difference is that going to make? but maybe it is. >> it sounds good at least politically. >> but versus $700 billion? a tiny fraction. >> you say as a big number attached, which will help obama politically. it will look like he is doing something. the amount is a token amount. the beneficiaries are arbitrary. as nina indicated, some are getting, at others are not. it is the ultimate and job. the government gets money out of private industry, as it did in tobacco, as it did with asbestos, and it distributes its said that it does not increase the debt but it helps some asbestos, the ones who

made o>> tobacco are the lawyers, who ended somebody who suffered -- whi they realize that we g whi money come of a lack >> citizens somebody who suffered and up with lunch money. >ne at thet wyo staring down fromsantnati h may indeed be possible. somehow, jimmy carter's failed presidency could primaries at the end this month, which will form of barack obama. he has got to be thinking that. >> texas gov. rick perry in town for this weekend's conservative political action crewe will fixr on the bag the beat of his owne yonext wee. instead. >> is that the best clip you could find? marco rubio did a william jennings bryan yesterday

morning. all right, i will give you the benefit of the doubt of a lack of material here. it is going to be a big day for romney and>>ne at the statistict comes out at you, creep.hen u tk of the money spent by santorum has a way to say he is a player at the top level. i think he is not going to have -- what is most important is what is going to happen in the , which will be michigan and if michigan falls to santorum, that could really doom the romney race. >>opportunity or likelihood that president obama is now super pac bandwagon. i guess he cannot afford not to. jay carney has said that >> i more than any in history to prevent the lobg interest .

florida and what mitt romney was able to do with money have to disclose ever gingrich,t concentrates the mind wonderfully. they realize that we are going to need these super pac money te onslaught from the conservatives. >> citizens united. when you think of the money spent by these setbacks, 97% of the ads are negative. it is a torrent of downer -- >> can you an edgeth mails. [laughter] industry ran in negae ads against each other? instead of flying the friendly skies, it would show the other the negativity and the nobody would get on an airplane. people are surprised that people are >> politicians and hate congress you ads all day thay hope you have not given the aies>> is that these super pacsnonprof"

organizas, anybody who gives them anything. that is where money comes from. if i were running against gordon, i would have an issue campaign that says gordon the televisionreep.he occupies screen way too much -- >> you have been reading my e-