broken. as i look at the communication, there's nothing that says, i made a mistake. i got a wrong. i apologize now let me get it right. >> charlie:i read a usa interview with president obama and he talked about the fact he thinks the country is not caught up in the eye lee logical divide but caught up in the idea why things don't work, which is dysfunction in washington. there are partisan feelings about democrats and republicans but it's not an ideological thing. is that true? >> in statistics 2 to 1 more americans identify themselves as conservative. >> charlie:i'm say ideological in terms of extreme of either party. >> they don't want that. this election is not going to be decided by the extremity bull the people dead center who believe in a right of center economic approach and a leave us alone on social issues. so they're closer to barack

obama on sewingal closer to mitt romney on economic issues so they're torn. >> charlie:bait way there's a difference between independent and affiliated. >> check democratic and choose both. unaffiliated says i don't care. ly follow this on election day and that's t the problem is neither candidate is speak to go them in a way they want to be spoken to, or talking to them the words they want to hear. >> charlie:tell me about focus group. define and how you create it. >> i do it differently. mine are 25 or 30 people, three hours at a time. devices the size of a remote control and turn it up or down based on whether they agree or disatbree, persuaded or not persuaded. we measure an individual's moment by moment opinion, what they're seeing visually, what they're hearing, allows us to

break down every ad and every speech. on the floor three hours i have people crying, people yelling at each other. >> charlie:take a look. set thup for me. this is an ad obama keeping his word on equal pay signing equal pay for women. what should we notice about this ad. >> first off it's the best of the campaign. it's one of the reasons he has such a good advantage among women. no matter what happens in the election obama is going do better than mitt romney. the red line are swing republicans tbreen swing democrats. the higher the lines climb the more favorable the .ad >> charlie:roll ad here it. is. >> the problem in these cases isn't that the woman is somehow unqualified. they're doing the same job with

the same qualifications and they're being paid differently. the problem is employers aren't treating women fairly. that needs to be changed and i will chaipg it when i'm president of the united states of america. [applause] >> signing this bill today is to send a clear message making our economy work is making sure it works for everybody. ♪ >> charlie:so it's red and green. >> there's sew few ads maybe 1%h both parties because we are twied. the reason it's pow woreful. you hear his voice, see him speaking and see the record. >> charlie:you see the promise and the performance.

>> exactly. the next ad to look at america for prosperity. 2008 obama voters discuss why they have become disillusioned with his presidency. >> in 2008 i voted for barack obama. he was new had new ideas. now that we've given obama a fair chance and he's not able to do what we need him to do. >> he's doingen mediocre job. economy is the same. >> obama said he was going to help the middle class. that's where i am. instead it has hurt me. >> i have not seen the change i believed in. >> american for prosperity is responsible for the content of this advertising. >> charlie:what did we see. >> i didn't see the hope and chaipg i voted for. i'm the middle class and it hasn't helped. what's different about that ad. we have done it in two sessions that's been the best tested ad of all those tried.

it's real people. they are not actors. they embrace why they voted for obama in 2008 and tell you how life has changed since then. this is key. if you rip the bark off your opponents in the first 2 or 3 seconds no one is going to pay attention. if you have this deep announcer that sounds like the movie jaws. >> charlie:you have to draw them in first. >> you have to draw them in and you have to appeal to the public's decency first before you deliver the analysis of why the opponent failed. >> charlie:you and i talked before at cbs this morning about this ad about the coffin. why is that powerful? >> it's so powerful one minute ad done by i think it was families usa. >> charlie:right. >> which is super pack. >> it's done on behalf of obama. he talks about building a stage with his colleagues, ceo of the

companies comes on the stage firesever ri one and closes the plant. he says mitt romney made millions and mills of dollars he felt like he was building his own coffin and it made me sick. it was the end of the ad. you see this grown as someone who is very real talks about what bain capital did. single best ad. if barack obama wins in november and he wins because of ohio, it will be because of that ad. >> charlie:and they got it early as mitt romney was being defined. a lot of money on that advertising. some people will argue that mitt romney had to spend a lot of his time talking about himself because he has been defined by these kinds of ads therefore did not spend enough time talking about the future at the convention. >> and i think he let others

define what bain capitol is. he never defended economic freedom. >> charlie:didn't have the money to do that or some other reason? >> could have been independent expenditures. i don't think he took it seriously. referendum on the obama administration. >> charlie:which is what they wanted. >> it's lake the rolling stones song you can't always get what you want and if you try sometimes you don't get what you need. >> charlie:how powerful is this that it came up over the weekend are you better now than 4 years ago? >> it's brilliant. a significant percentage aren't better off than they were four years ago. if you change the question from you to the country, is america better or worse off. the romney campaign is on to something, it's not just you, me

and the people here. it's the country and barack obama is responsible for the country. >> charlie:you're not the only person in the world who does focus groups. romney people must understand this. >> i'm the only one who does them where people yell at each other, people go out afterwards for beers. it's a science, not just an art, a science of understanding how people react. if you listen carefully, the key to the best research is listening and maybe they didn't hear it or maybe they didn't ask the right questions but i will tell you something, it's deep and the reason why obama has the advantage is because they still think he's trying. >> charlie:the word they use is "care" too. you're going to argue with cares, try something. >> that's what they say to me. word they use to describe his administration, disappointed. not betrayed, not harsh neg tivment he is trying. not that he's failed.

he hasn't succeeded and we're disappointedded in him. he has a shot of winning that's undecided voters. in mitt romney's case he's a problem solver. ip i'm not convinced he understands me, that he understands those who work for a living. romney. >> charlie:suppose you were -- dial back to sort of the middle of the republican primary and you're trying to mitt romney both win the primaries which is a fruitful step for you of which there is no end, only an end if you don't win but if you win you have another step. what would you have done? how would you have tried to define yourself. >> chutely i would have gone at my business career, focus on that. not governor of massachusetts. only one out of 5 knew about bain capitol. he should have known 4 out of 5

would have known. >> charlie:here is the analogy you could make. we just watched the olympics. they love people who work hard and try and win. people who come back are the winners so we like winning. how would you define the pis story if it's not a story of the american success story? >> the crux of the campaign. it's not that i won. it's that you won. >> charlie:because we were successful. >> you were successful. we invested in staples it became an incredible company. it's about you, all about them watching me. if it becomes about him, he loses because then he's just a rich guy. >> charlie:so he missed the opportunity to say, it was not my success, it was your success. the mean and women who work at sports authority or staples or wherever. >> you going into politics? >> charlie:that's the point.

it always comes back to how peel feel, do they understand me, do they care about me, do they know i want what's better for my family. >> there are two great quotes number 1 is people will forget what you said to them but they will never forget how they made you feel. >> charlie:who said that. >> nelson mandela. >> charlie:let me repeat that people will forget what you said about them but will never forget how you made them feel. >> it's not what you say it's what people hear. >> charlie:i like it. >> that's mine.charlie:that's y? >> it's not has you say -- in this discussion here, it will be what people remember, what people heard from me rather than what i said that matters. >> charlie:so it's what you hear. >> exactly. >> charlie:thank you. good to see. thank you for joining us. see you next time. ÷2

tavis: good evening. from los angeles, i am tavis smiley. tonight a conversation with the founder and president of the huffington media group, arianna

huffington. now the democrats have a tricky task of convincing people to reelect president obama despite economical problems. also we remember michael duncan, gone too soon at the age of 54. we are glad you joined us. >> there is a saying that dr. king had that said there is right thing. i try to live my life every day by doing the right thing. we know that we are only halfway to completely eliminating hunger and we have work to do. fighting hunger in the u.s. as we work together, we can

stamp hunger out. >> and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> please welcome arianna huffington back to this program. she is the founder of huffington opposed media group. she is also behind chateau convention, a nonpartisan alternative to the major conventions, focusing on poverty, influence of money and politics, and the war on drugs. she joins us from charlotte. good to have you on the program. let me start by asking in your views on what the republicans

did in tampa last week. >> they must be wondering themselves what they did. this is a great opportunity to challenge the record of the last few years in terms of the economy, the middle class, poverty, but instead they have clint eastwood and the empty chair and a lot of empty speeches, more base on identifying who people are and their history and paul ryan saying a lot of things i agree common and now that the unemployed is not acceptable, the five napa how -- the fact the housing crisis have not been solved and that is unacceptable, the fact that kids cannot get jobs and that is unacceptable, yet offering no solution to solve this problem.

tavis: wt could they have done to take better advantage of all the opportunities they had last night? >> they would have to save the current administration did not bring a sense of urgency to the biggest problem facing america, which is the jobs crisis. this is the one big error of this administration. it is kind of inevitable, because for years in denver the president said the greatest danger was to bring in the same players and play the same games expecting an different results. yet that is exactly what happened, expecting the economy to recover without the kind of infrastructure programs, the kind of payroll tax cuts that

could have really brought about the jobs that are missing and that are really affecting all whole generation of young people ready to go to work. >> you have got tough words for this the administration over the last four years, and so have i, but you suggested you will likely vote for obama this time around, but you expressed reservations. do i read that correctly? >> i will vote for ross obama, -- barack obama because we only have two choices, and he is infinitely preferable, but my biggest concern is the fact they have not brought the same urgency that dr. king talked about and that obama talked about to the problems we are facing domestically and that we continue to be in afghanistan

even though there is no clear objective there. we are allowing young men and women to die or be maimed there and spending money without any key objective, and that is troubling that mitt romney did not even mention afghanistan in his speech, and i am sad and the one great thing about clint eastwood's speech is he did address afghanistan. he did urge all of us to do what we could to get out, and he got tremendous applause, so this is something that no longer has popular support. tavis: i want to talk about these three issues that are being covered at your shadow convention. so many of these issues never make it to the stage at either party convention. i should also say next week dr. west and i are going back on our and we are going

to battleground states this time around. you can follow us on this tour of poor people and their issues and how to raise this issue on the american agenda. you can follow this tour on huffington opposed. i get a chance to thank you for that, but of the three issues you are talking about, shadow conventions, tell me why we cannot get more traction, why it is mr. obama, mr. romney have not said more about it. with regards to mr. obama, four years ago he ran on a platform of eradicating poverty in america, but nothing has been forthcoming in this first term

with all the numbers but _ poverty is the new american norm. why not more from either of them? >> in our special interest politics, there is not a special interest representing the fopoor. that is why i am so grateful you are doing a tour, because so many of us in the media want to put a spotlight on the fact that we have 15 million more people living in poverty, but a lot of them are formerly middle-class who can no longer make ends meet, and this is the first generation in america where we do not expect our children to do better than we are doing common- law yet poverty -- than we are doing, yet poverty is hardly on

the agenda of either political party. at the same time, i think it is important to put a spotlight on what is working because there are good things happening. tomorrow we are bringing over 100 entrepreneurs, people who started a business, and even in these difficult times, and we need to put more spotlight on them to help of scale what they are doing, of the coast -- because the american spirit is alive and well. it is just not giving enough attention. >> but is the issue of poverty. let's talk about the war on drugs. if there was a time when that seemed to be front and center, a one. it was a front burner issue, but what happened to the debate, the real media conversation

about the so-called war on drugs? >> if you look at the timing, of the war in iraq happened, and then we started spending more time talking about the war on iraq and afghanistan, and the war on drugs was no longer front and center. no powerful interest group wanting to end the insanity of the war on france -- drugs. that is leading to half a million people going to jail for non-of violent and drug offenses, and the result of incarceration rates is we have millions of people who are felons and disenfranchised for life, so the unintended consequences are enormous and long-lasting, and what is interesting is the people are ahead of the politicians. over 90% of people believe

treatment is more affective, and yet politicians are worried they are going to be perceived as weak on crime. they are continuing to fight a war we are never going to win. >> the third issue covered at these shadow conventions beyond poverty and drugs is a corrupt and -- is the corruption of politics by money. i cannot imagine -- i wish i were there to hear the conversations going on about money in politics this time around to given the supreme court decision. what is being said at these conventions about money used to corrupt our political process? >> everything is much worse than in 2001 we took on this issue, and one thing that is particularly worse is the lack

of transparency with these super pacs, and we do not even know who is putting money into super pacs, so what we are seeing is a policy is really bought by powerful interests who not only spend millions of dollars on the election but also spend millions on lobbyists in washington. this is a very broken system, and everybody knows it. young people who want to change the world more than ever do not believe that is going to be down to politics, so we are going to see what the turnout is for this election, but young people are more disengage than in 2008. it thrives there are people but believe the only way to fix this

is a constitutional amendment. i see they have a petition they are asking readers to sign every day about this issue, but short of a constitutional amendment, what can be done to solve this particular problem? >> a constitutional amendment is something i am supportive of, but we need a public outcry. you notice in many moments of american history, it took a huge public outcry before things change, and that is a force that is needed, and now we have the power of social media that can help us organize so much faster and have our voices heard more effectively. tavis: this is one issue, and i suspect there are more, but this is one issue on which o