>> production assistance for "inside washington" was provided by allbritton communications and politico, reporting on the legislative, executive, and political arena. >> 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 ruling on access to reproductive health care, family planning, has been absolutely politicized i what i call an ongoing war against women. >> surprise, rick santorum takes three in a row.

>> of the great gifts i have had is that when things i can win anything. >> no more mr. nice guy from mitt romney. >> rick santorum was a major earmarker. >> the largest joint federal- state civil settlement in our history. >> president obama does an about-face on a 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. the first 16 words to the first amendment of the constitution

did when the obama administration ruled the catholic institutions to offer birth control under health plans teaching, isheir the administration providing free exercise of religion? evan, you are a historian and a graduate of find law school. >> they must have pulled this, because it seems crazy what they're doing. i don't know what the finer points art with the law here. i think this is more politics than law. the white house sure must think women will let this up, because they can really irritated, and rightly so, the catholic church. >> nina, your beat it is the supreme court. >> i am not the supreme court, but the supreme court actually

ruled, justice scalia wrote, that as long as the law is neutral and equally applied to everybody, it is constitutional. the court has also made rulings, more recent rulings, that if the catholic church of some hope that it might prevail. but this has been the law for over 10 years in the federal government come in 28 states. it comes up because of the affordable care act with what has to be offered as a basic service for women. >> charles krauthammer, md, is the obama administration's mandate medically sound? >> they are making it a medical issue. it is not a medical issue. the idea that women are denied access is preposterous women are not den -- it is not illegal to get birth control to the issue is, are you going to force the catholic church to distribute contraceptives a free

of charge because the federal government says so? rather than exempt them on the grounds that it offends their doctrine? i think that is a clear open- and-shut case. the infringement of the federal government, or the government, on the free exercise of religion. >> colby, you regularly grappled matters o -- with matters of conscience in your columns. an archbishop says that it is a violation of the basic rights of conscience and that religious liberty to do you agree or disagree? >> there is a case to be bad for a conscious clause exception. we're talking about employers, not the church. if you become an employer, there are certain rules you have to obey -- minimum wage. just because you are a catholic hospital does not mean you can avoid the minimum wage or are exempt from osha laws.

there is nothing that takes away their right to perform the basic function of an employer. in this case, it seems to me that the administration is in a position to give an exemption to employers because of their religious nature. >> at week's end, the white house was ready to announce a plan to accommodate religious employers, but my guess is it will not satisfy the bishops and will probably -- "the new york times" reported on friday that they have been gearing up for this for months, and will anchor people on the other side. >> you can expect the bishops to take that position, but they also know that 98% of the catholic women also practice birth control. i don't think the winning argument -- >> the bishops seemed to be seeking to move the goalposts at and to what is to apply not

just a catholic institutions but to all catholic employers, private employers. there are two ways this can go. if this appears to women voters who care about this issue to be a violation of religious precepts, the church will win. if this appears to be a war on contraception, and contraception is not cheap, the church will lose and republicans will lose. >> i am interested in the politics of this. politico and other news organizations reported that bill daley and joe biden sat down with the archbishop of new york and -- the cardinal of new york and the president on this. >> bill daley is no longer the white house chief of staff. >> i noticed that.

>> there was fighting within the white house staff when bill daley was on the outs. valerie jarrett has more clout than bill daley it does and she was on the women's side of this. >> the administration has conceded the essential argument of the church when it explicitly exclude anybody working in a church itself. >> that has always been the bar. >> i know but let me explain what i am trying to say. the premise is that if you work for the catholic church, you are exempt because it -- >> you work in the building. >> in church, it would be an assault on religion if you made the church dispense contraceptives. but it says that is only for a church. it does not apply to a church- affiliated charity. that is where the distinction -- it concedes the principle that you don't want to violate the conscience of the palaces of if you make a church give a

custodian or any cook these kinds of services. it does not apply to a catholic hospital. on what logic should not apply to a catholic hospital? >> the business they are doing is not the religious business. it is primarily our secular business. ministers are exempt from the civil-rights laws. that does not mean that anybody else is employed by a catholic charity, for example, is exempt from civil-rights -- >> the church does a lot of social good. they have soup kitchens and take care of people. do we want to drive hospitals out of the business of providing for the poor and sick? >> mark shields made that point last week. >> obama's on argument at the prayer breakfast is that he is engaging in god's work. he is conceding that charity,

good works, are a form of religiosity, and that he denies a catholic hospital exemptions on the grounds that it is not really a religious institution? explain that to me. >> colby? >> i was hospitalized recently at a catholic hospital. it was no exercise of religion as karzai wa concerned -- as far as i could see any point. i just got medical care. >> principle -- >> i was treated at a hospital the semi i would have been treated and any other hospital. >> rick santorum of this issue and he had a great week. >> i don't stand here to be the conservative alternative to mitt romney. i stand here to be the conservative alternative to barack obama. >> rick santorum beats romney in colorado, missouri, and minnesota.

he says 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 16-18. this time around, he loses to rick santorum. he lost to santorum in missouri by 30 points, and what is important is that that is the once a working which was not on the ballot. it was a one-shot where santorum had to go one-on-one, and he crushed it romney. it tells you how resistant the republican electorate is to romney as the nominee, and it tells it at all possible alternatives, cain, rick perry, newt gingrich, and others, the only one who is plausible is santorum. i think he is a threat. >> i heard howard fineman say on msnbc that mitt romney is like a giant hairball -- [laughter]

that republicans cough up. >> i like your choice of objective sources. >> but do you disagree? >> "hairball" as a pejorative connotation. >> it is only slightly worse than what came out of "the wall street journal" talking about the same mitt romney. they suggested his problems is that conservatives will not buy him. >> he cannot close the deal. >> it is not just that he cannot close the deal, it is also substance. he takes positions on the poor and it is at the poor have government services to handle them. "washington post" "romney stuck in lukewarm." >> it is a mistake to

underestimate romney did millions on ads in pointing out that santorum is a creature of washington and took money for earmarks. to win in november, romney has to show he stands for something. people admire his toughness, they sends it, but he has to stand for something. he has this 59-point plan which means what? >> negative campaigning hurts him even with republicans. the way he went after being rich, if he tries it with santorum, he will get a backlash. >> how does santorum compete with mitt romney? >> he can -- >> he can? >> he cannot compete in money, but there are vicious truths here. romney is very tough, he is the most seasoned candidate, but this was always a very weak field, and a centaur is their last man standing. everybody has had his day. >> i have seen him campaigning.

when he goes into this blue- collar vote, it appeals to people. >> it does it really appeal to people, but campaigning -- if you move in the bigger states, you cannot meet everybody. >> we were talking earlier about the gap between rich and poor white males. >> there is a book by charles murray that goes into this were he looks at the growing gap between rich and poor, and he does an interesting thing. he takes race out of it and he just looks at poor whites. they are falling further and further behind rich whites. there is going to be a national debate about why that is, and you'll see the sights of forming. on the left, that they will say it is a lack of economic opportunity, and on the right, they will say is a moral thing. it is a debate or tapping -- debate worth having. >> i don't think it it is that

simple and i don't think people on the left or right think it is just 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 class 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 that that works, you can win the presidency on that if unemployment is 10% rate it it is 8.5% and sinking, and people have a sense of the economy rising again, it is not going to work. ronnie's problem is that he has not proposed anything. reagan had a supply-side economics. romney needed idea, a proposal, something audacious. i think he will do it. he asked to make a speech. michigan is coming up. the detroit economic club, that is exactly where he ought to do

it. what is he going to do? tax reform, entitlement reform, it doesn't matter what it is. he has to propose an idea or something to he can just say elect me, i know how to make jobs -- he cannot just say elect me, i know how to make jobs. >> he cannot just do it on a speech. >> how much impact is foreign policy going to have on this presidential election? look at what is happening in syria. appalling. >> right now it is not having much. that because of syria, but because of iran. to take syria, they're pretty tough choices coming up, because as the civil war gets worse, the united states and others are going to decide whether to put their thumb on the scale. do we get involved, disney to get involved? > -- does nato get involved?

>> the idea was not a piece of cake. it was not at ease of take that it was portrayed to be. right now i guess in chaos -- right now it is in chaos. in syria, that would likely happen, too. 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 a beach with an oil well in syria is a country with an air force and army. it is a different proposition, a lot harder. the question isn't to you, the rebels or not -- is do you arm the rebels or not. the state department position is that we do not want more weapons in this war. well, all the weapons are on the side of the bad guys. russians vetoed the resolution

so that they could continue to pour in arms. it is a slaughter, and i don't see what is holding us back from giving arms, training, support, whatever eight needs, with turkey, which is thrown in its lot with the rebels. that, i think, is putting your thumb on the scale without risking american lives. >> after a -- i think they are waiting for a broad consensus to our rig -- to arrive. arming the rebels, 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 ending? >> the fall of the assad regime.

>> it will have an impact also on iran. you we get an ally of iran, and iran is a big player. -- you weaken an ally of iran, and in iran is a bit player. >> colby is absolutely right. as opposed to libya, which was only a moral issue, there is a huge prize at stake here. if you bring assad down, hezbollah begins on the fine, hamas passed to go elsewhere. the winners are the moderate arabs to support us. >> evan, one of the downside, the risks? the law of unintended consequences always kicks in. >> you have a big the civil war, and do you vial up his ball and hamas -- hezbollah and hamas to, i don't know, attack israel?

>> they don't have any capacity to sustain real action without iran and syria behind them. >> 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. >> but if that is what your principal is, you will end up with nothing in foreign policy. you have to take chances and make choices. >> a $25 billion mortgage settlement with five of the nation's biggest banks. >> we have reached a landmark settlement with the nation's largest banks that will speed relief to the hardest-hit all waters and some of the most abusive practices of the mortgage industry, and begin to turn the page on an era of recklessness that has left so much damage in its wake. >> this is a $25 billion settlement with the nation's biggest mortgage lenders over

foreclosure abuses that took place after the housing bubble burst. 10,000 goes to mortgage payments for underwater homeowners paid 11 million homeowners are under water. this does not go near that. >> no, it gets sent. -- think of the -- no, it doesn't. that's think of the people who did play by the rules and are also under water and they are not getting anything at all. what comes out of this that is maybe positive is the regulatory reforms that these institutions have to make, they cannot do the robosigning, that they have to have much more transparency in transactions. in terms of relief for the homeowner, there is not a whole lot of relief. >> friday's "wall street journal" calls this a $21 million bank job. >> i am not sure -- people are not going to get made whole by

this settlement. consumer groups are supporting the settlement for this reason -- people got mortgages who should not have gotten them. lots of people also got screwed, to use an inelegant term. because we've all heard millions of the stories about paperwork lost and everything, this allows the banks to reduce principle, deal with underwater mortgages, 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 that people -- paperwork does 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 the government has taken a crack at this problem. the proof will be in the pudding. it does not feel like enough.

what difference is it going to make? maybe it is. >> it sounds good politically -- >> $25 billion versus $700 billion? a tiny fraction. >> you say it has a big number attached which will help obama. politically it looks like he is doing something. the amount is a token amount, the beneficiaries are arbitrary. as nina indicated, some are getting, others are not treat the majority are not. it is the ultimate bank job. it distributed so it does not increase debt but it does help some individuals. like with asbestos, the ones who made out with asbestos are the lawyers, who ended up as billionaires' while somebody anended up with lunch money.

>> super pacs and cpac. >> president reagan must be looking down from heaven and in thinking that recordish and could be possible but jimmy carter appearing in the form of barack obama. >> texas gov. rick perry at cpac. ron paul, the man who marches to beat of his own drummer, decided to campaign in maine. >> 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, the lack of material here. it is going to be a big day for

romney and santorum. romney has to show he can address a conservative audience and rouse them. santorum has a way to say that he is a player at the top level. what is most important is what is going to happen in the primaries at the end of this month, which will be michigan and arizona. michigan falls to santorum, i think that could be -- could really doom the romney race. >> president obama is on the super pac bandwagon. jay carney said at the white house that this administration has done more in his bid to prevent the lobbying of the government. >> they looked at florida and what mitt romney was able to do against newt gingrich. it concentrates the mind wonderfully. they realize that we will need money to stand up to the

onslaught from the conservatives. >> citizens united. >> i think that of the money spent by these super pacs, 97% negative. aere it is a torrent of downer -- >> can you imagine if the airline industry ran negative ads against each other? [laughter] instead of flying the friendly skies, it would show the other guy with a plane crash in a river. nobody would get on an airplane. and people are surprised that people are skeptical of the politicians and hate congress. they are running ads all the day that say the other guy is a child molester. >> i hope you are not given the airlines a great idea. >> the other interesting idea is that these super pacs create nonprofit issue organizations, and they don't have to disclose ever anybody who gives them anything. that is where the majority of some of these super pac money

comes from. if i were running against you, gordon, i would have an issue campaign that said gordon peterson is a creep. he occupies the television screen way too much -- >> you have been reading my e- mails. [laughter] >> but that is considered an issue ad. we have our real problem not only with the negativity, but with the disclosure, and there is little opportunity -- >> and use me as a character. >> you get the last word. see you next week.