>> now, for the first 10 minutes .

>> the one thing we have not done, we have not watched a war. if some of these folks think it is time to launch a war, they should say so. >> some of these folks,

political battle lines drawn are clear. >> some of these folks, that actually turned into, that pressure on president obama to be tougher on iran, trying to do a remarkable opportunity on him to play the role of statesman, commander-in-chief, president, cautious pursuedent man. it also gave him a chance for a nice bank shot at benjamin netanyahu the israeli prime minister. president obama was lucky he was asked that question about the presidential candidates because he could apply that pressure. >> how much pressure is this on them when israel, the great staunch ally becomes a problem? >> the problem is he has less control over this than he would like. any time you are the incumbent, they can control a lot in terms of what the apparatus should

look like. he has not a ton of control over this. the exact moment of the juxtaposition of the commander-in-chief and these guys running around, it was something of a gift, i think, for president obama, but it was not all that long ago when he was the one running for president. i thought ahis word, these candidates have no responsibility, he probably would not have won the democratic nomination had he not been campaigning hard against the iraq war, and things change. i think overall the biggest worry for his advisors, the white house, and the campaign are high gas prices which are tangentially related here. if there is an episode in the middle east. i think all the uncertainty is there biggest concern here. >> this is an interesting point. on the one hand he has the advantage. jobs, 225,000 were added.

that's good news. but these gas prices, and it is something newt gingrich figured he can talk about every day. how much do these two things offset each other? >> i see energy policy as perhaps the republican party's biggest opening. because it makes the argument, it sounds like it makes sense, that if we were doing more, if we were drilling more, people understand the laws of supply and demand, that gas prices would go down. there is a perception this administration is not doing that. it isn't true. domestic production is actually high right now. and actually the cost of gas is controlled by thing way outside of the president's control, by the world market. most people don't know that. they think he's the president of the united states and he can get things done. >> the other thing the president has going for him and working against him, it seems like every good thing he has going, he has something bad, but a fraction -- a fraction of the republican party is a good thing for him, a

united democratic party is a good thing for him. but he also has time to build a general election strategy. >> he has time and he has the advantage of the oval office. he can generate regulations on housing. his housing policy hasn't worked until now, but he's thrown out the blizzard of clintonesque ideas to help veterans in the military. he can do things on immigration so that when his opponents on the republican side are competing with each other on those rough and tumble debates on who can be tougher on immigration, he can do something nice for latinos. >> i thought it was interesting what you wrote about deep in the bowels of the actual campaign they are leaving nothing to chance. >> leaving nothing to chance. i took a visit to head quarters, and i was stunned by the size of it. 300 people working in chicago, a lot more than that working across the country, and they are using every tool at their disposal, and the campaign has a

cleave scientist. -- has a chief scientist. he's sort of private. what it means is they are really using every -- through facebook and social media, using an litics -- analytics to find more barack obama supporters. to get small contributions and other things. one of the reasons is a lot of the people involved last time are not engaged this time. some were turned off, some have moved on. but they are leaving nothing to chance. it is going to be only a small impetus of elections. on the margins, things like this could matter. >> and we know they are arguing over the same 10% that romney wants. it is going to be a fight to the finish. thank you all very much. we have to leave a -- you a few minutes early toll give you a chance to support your local pbs station. we'll pick up where we left off on our "washington week" extra.

for more go to pbs.org/ washingtonweek. i'll be on line to getting it at 1:00 p.m. eastern time. keep up with developments on time and we'll see you here next week on "washington week." >> good night. >> download our weekly podcast and take us with you. it is the "washington week" podcast at walkweek.org. >> "washington week" was produced by weta which is solely responsible for its content. >> funding for washington week is provided by -- >> we know why we're here. to give our war fighters every advantage. >> to deliver technologies that

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yeah, i just want to-- as you can see, it's a part renovation project, and i just want to really see whether it's worth pursuing or i chop it into firewood, really. you have got quite a big job on your hands. first of all, is this the only one? no. it's part of a three-piece suite. so you've got a pair of these and a sofa. - yes, that's right. - this is an edwardian parlor suite. or it was an edwardian parlor suite. there's quite a lot to be done. what makes it nice is that you've got a really nice basic shape. you've got some inlay here-- mahogany shell wood-- but a big restoration to do. i think in my opinion - it's worth doing. - right. it depends on the size of your checkbook. - right. - how much are you prepared to spend? around about £300 or 400,

going up to about £1,000. i think it's optimistic at a thousand. done beautifully, by somebody who knows what they're doing, when it's done it's worth £2,500 to 3,000. right. oh, that's not bad. not bad at all. - bonfire? no. - ( laughs ) okay, then i'll have to look around. to look at something antique that belongs to the deep grass or the woodlands. what have you brought in here? - this is a man-trap. - wow. this is a man-trap. it weighs a ton. it's really a trap for animals, primarily. because this is known as the baiting plate. and the holes? these are just old bits of iron that they used. these holes don't mean anything. you don't think it might be to tie down the bait? well...

big chunk of meat, tie it down, so of course when it springs... if it'd been a man-trap, they wouldn't have come for meat. quite honestly, i think its specific purpose was to catch large animals but it also acted as a deterrent for men. - mm-hmm. - and i'm sure somebody would have put some sort of sign up if they'd actually had them, because these could obviously kill. - oh, yes. - presumably, we push these two brackets down... - and slide this forward. - ...slide these to stop it swinging back, and then you click it into that little-- yeah, if you open this over, then it goes in here, and then you lift up this plate a wee bit. so as soon as the animal comes along, puts its face... bang. it's a pretty cool thing, isn't it? i tried it with a fence stake, and it broke the stake. - you tried it with a piece of steak? - no a stake, a fence stake. oh, a stake. i thought you meant a piece of meat. - oh, no. oh, no. - what happened? it broke the stake. i'm glad to say they were banned in 1827.

1827? i didn't know that. so they really are relegated to history. obviously totally illegal. and the place for these is on the pub wall, isn't it? or on the wall of an old barn or something. can i squeeze it out of you what you paid for it? oh, yes, i think so. a thousand. £1,000? and you've painted it up? - yes, it was a terrible state. - yeah yeah yeah. and i sandpapered it and gave it a bit of cleanup. it's an absolute beauty. i think quite frankly you've paid about what it is worth. - mm-hmm. - i think, you know, if i had one-- and it is signed, though honestly i can't really make out-- no, i cannot make that out either. it's a great conversation piece, and if you're into man-traps and beast traps, this is the king of the range. thank you very much. thank you. made in staffordshire round about 1880. we see hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of these all of the time. nice things-- comforter dogs. they sat on welsh dressers.

um, not particularly rare. but this piece here, i want to know where he came from. well, as far as i know, they come through the wife's side of the family. - and these come from? - my mother's side of the family. - you married the right woman. - did i? well, i've done very well. well, he's a crafts champion. look at him. - isn't he fantastic? - well, we've never really thought of what it was. we actually had it on the telephone table, ld to put it away safely. well, you haven't got the other one, i don't suppose? - no, we haven't. - that is a shame. the size, for a start-- he's a fabulous size. in staffordshire, you do see larger staffordshire dogs than these. seldom do you see anything on this scale. the colors of the glazes... i mean, it's a brown lead glaze, and this tortoiseshell mottling on the bottom is really very attractive.

the important thing about him, of course, is where he comes from. i don't know. he's a scottish one. he is a scottish dog. a possibility. i don't think there's any sign of a factory mark. there very seldom is on spaniels like this, or i think they're-- i think they're sometimes known up here as... is it "wooly dogs"? is that right? - wally dogs. - ah, a wally dog. a wally dog. do you call him a wally dog? no, not that one, but we call these wally dogs, i think because they're just put on the wall, on the mantelpiece. - i think that's how they-- - is that where it comes from? - i think that's it. - it's not because it's a wooly dog? no. not that i know of, anyway. hairy, i suppose. um, date for this-- it's very similar, actually, to these staffordshire ones. so it's the second half of the 19th century. and they continued making them actually into the 20th century. i just think he's magnificent. he's just so much away from the usual.

haven't had a valuation ever done on these? well, there was one chap did offer us £200. he didn't? if he had offered you £200 for that, you should've taken it like a shot. this one, if he'd offered you... £800, it still wouldn't be enough. a single one of these at auction would be somewhere around£1,200. - gee whiz. - it's a very good thing. sure it is. ( chuckles ) brushes. any significance in the brushes? well, i happen to know that the brushes belonged to l.s. lowry. - fascinating. - yeah. and my parents were friends of lowry's. it was a friendship that was established in the 1960s and went on until his death in 1976.

and i don't know the circumstances for the brushes being handed over, but they were given to my father. well, i think this is absolutely remarkable, here in rochdale and almost in lowry territory, that we should be handling the tools of one of the modern masters of british painting in the 20th century. they're remarkable tactile objects, aren't they? and also you sort of almost feel there's an almost organic quality, as if it's an extension of the artist himself. - it's a link between the artist-- - very much so. it's the way the paint goes all the way down to the bottom. the value of these objects-- it's a very difficult one to speculate on, to be honest with you. to someone who's an avid collector of lowry, someone who wants to possess not only his paintings but the tools of his trade, a broad estimate and a comfortable estimate would probably be somewhere in the region of

£500 to 1,000. - all right. i had no idea... - somewhere in between. - no idea of that. - they're very beautiful. they're just lovely instruments of his trade, and it's a thrill to see them. - and it's a good job they were never cleaned. - indeed. - i certainly have, yes. - have you been looking after it for long? - well, i dropped it in the bedroom this morning, - oh no! and my wife wasn't too pleased about it. - she was a bit annoyed with you, was she? - she was slightly annoyed. - do you know anything about it? - i know nothing at all about it. it's a lovely little coach and horses. and let's have a look at the underside here. okay, well, we got all the marks here. we got the mark for w. goebel. he's the manufacturer. - and the v mark from west germany. - yes. and we've got the date, 1952. it's not a model number, but that's the date of manufacture. and it's manufactured by-- there's a hummel figure. can you see? we've just got hummel here.

- oh, yeah. i didn't even see that. - didn't even see it. i didn't notice that. no no, i didn't see that at all. these things are really really collectible. - they are? - yeah. well, it's not mine. it's my mother-in-law's. - ah. - so it's... are you interested in the value at all? yeah, i'd like to know the value for insurance purposes. - for insurance? - yeah. - it's a model i've never seen before. - you've never? i've never seen before. so i'm taking a punt at £500. - bit of a shock? - slightly, yes. have to load the money in here and gallop off back into central rochdale with it.