howard fineman with the "huffington post," and heidi. trying to soften it up, bring their only daughter here, bring bill in, the supportive spouse, i don't know. it seems like more of a cutting, gritty campaign than that. it doesn't seem about family home values or anything. >> it's a specific. what are the two demographics that she needs, chris? younger women, aka chelsea, and older white working class people who overwhelmingly -- well, who supported bill clinton and have fond memories of him. i was at the first rally he did yesterday, and you could definitely see how he came in with a different approach than hill tear and spoke to some of the working men and shared anecdotes from his campaign in 1992. and kind of made a more personal appeal to him that maybe she can't. >> did he seem to be out of breath, did he seem like he lost his guts? >> absolutely, he seemed like a different person to me. granted, it's been 16 years since i've seen the man in person, but he just seemed, i guess maybe the diet he's -- >> he doesn't have the big vol

joining me from columbia, south carolina, "huffington post"'s howard fineman. and an adviser to senator rand paul's presidential campaign. howard, what are we looking at here at the vegas strip, the big casino event of the week? >> reporter: all right. this is a national conversation. and the conversation here among republicans in south carolina reflects what john ralston was saying. you've got a situation where the democratic establishment in nevada, harry reid, namely, was but help hillary clinton. you have the same thing going on where the republican establishment, such as it is, is desperately trying to help marco rubio become the real challenger to donald trump. you've got nikki haley, the very popular governor here, who endorsed marco rubio. they have big set pieces with all of the established figures in republican politics here backing marco rubio. and i think marco rubio has gotten a bump out of that. i think the turnout is heavy. donald trump, i attended a donald trump rally last night in charleston. there were more than 2,000 people there. he still dr

i'm joined by political analyst and my my friend, howard fineman. he writes everything. he never stops writing and reporting. jane newton and ellie mays francesco chambers and ben kinsberg who knows far more. howard, what it is about the wasps that they have such confidence in defeat? what makes jeb bush think he had a great night? he's fourth or fifth or what? >> it only cost him $35 million, $35 million, to end, you know, in fourth place. with 11%. however, his point is -- i think it's valid. let's say stock car racing. donald trump is jeff gordon. he's like five laps ahead. you have four guys all trying to crash each other on the track of the race. you have kasich, cruz, bush and rubio and for that role to be the non-donald trump, it's true. jeb having spent like $55 million in iowa and new hampshire still part of that. i think not a big part of it. i think it's basically rubio and cruz and i would look at cruz as the likely number two going down the road. >> i see cruz in his own lane -- >> in the s.e.c. primary. >> i see him as the conservative. i see trump in the m

. >> i'm joined right now with jane newton small, howard fineman of the huffington post. ward, we've been through these, they never look alike. >> no. >> i remember coming out of nevada eight years ago, thinking hillary had it in the bag. she beat him out thereafter winning in new hampshire, she was on the road to win, it didn't work. this time around, bernie has a point. bernie sanders, these patterns do shift. >> the patterns do shift. the good news for bernie sanders is proportion representation, in other words, the way they decide the primaries, the way they count, will keep him in the ball game, every state, he'll pick uç delegates. >> you get 45%, you get 45%. >> yeah, that's the good side. the bad side for him is he needs some really big victories to put her on the defensive again. he has got to win overwhelmingly and it's difficult in this kind of mathematics to win overwhelmingly. the other thing is psychological. it's psychological as well as math. when he didn't win that thing he needed to win out there in nevada, when he didn't win that, that broke the spell. w

howard fineman put it, a guy with yelling up the administration building. that's what it was like. grand promises, grand arguments. >> he has been this way his whole political career. i dug deep and did a little retrospective before he became mayor of burlington. you have recognized the guy. yes, he's 30 years younger, but same message. income and equality. two party system, establishment. it is really the same thing. now, it looks like the democrat -- you could say it's the democrat party catching up to him. >> if it does? >> so far it is. he has got a voice here. i mean, look, we've seen this before. >> a big difference though. >> jerry brown tapped into this in 1992. he didn't do it his previous time. '92, bernie sanders is an extension of that. barack obama co opted it, you know, but he was able to be mainstream and establishment at the same time, he co-opted that what made him more powerful. >> times have changed. jerry brown talking about having a website. >> remember the 800 number. >> still works. still connected to jerry's political operation. >> you know what, young peopl

the former governor of this state, chief of staff to bush senior at the white house and howard finemanbal editor at the huffington post. i love this personal stuff. i've never seen this as somebody said today, combing his hair, a boy in the bubble. this is not about a man guy he's describing. christie at his worst and best. governor, do you like this kind of politics? >> i haven't endorsed anyone. >> do you endorse that kind of politics? >> i don't like that kind of politics. i don't. i don't mind going after guys on issues. i think the voters -- >> he is making it john edwards, you know what he's doing. >> i heard that. the voters in new hampshire have five wild days in front of them. i think it's a little different than in the past, in the sense in the past, this was when they sorted out issues and philosophy, they're going to do that, but also having to deal with style, the bluff and bluster. the last two or three days, people going around the state, casting a strategic vote, maybe not voting for their favorite, but in order to stop trump. >> you mean go for a guy like rubio or cruz

. >> here with me is howard fineman from the huffington post thank you three. was it emotional? it wasn't mental. why would he repeat himself over and over again in the most verbatim way knowing it's the same audience? >> i think marco rubio, who had a chance given his past recent days' performance of moving up in the polls, he had a chance here tonight. basically he blew it. he was rattled by the attacks by chris christie. he was rattled by chris christie, rattled by the attacks. so he went to a prepared line about barack obama that actually had nothing to do with the conversation. and that played right into chris christie's attack, which then got rubio to say it more and more. >> this isn't about oratory. if you went to a speech at a town meeting around here and a candidate came in and repeated themselves verbatim, you would think there's something ill about the person. what's wrong with this person, they repeated themselves over and over in the same debate. >> i think what's perplexing is they had days to prepare for this. they knew this was the attack coming. chris christie

fresh off the election coverage, april ryan of american urban radio networks, howard fineman and bloomberg view columnist, margaret collins. this a fascinating -- look right now, to remind ourselves, how chris christie went out. he went out as a slugger, taking down marco rubio and probably the most effective piece of prosecution to the point where it's almost like he shook the guy to death. here he is, offering a devastating below to marco rubio over the weekend. he called him out for his freshman senator for his robotic canned responses. look what it did to the guy. here we go. >> let's dispel once and for all that barack obama doesn't know what he's doing. he knows exactly what he is doing. let's dispel barack obama know what he's doing. >> the 25 second speech, that's exactly. >> the bottom line, this notion that barack obama doesn't know what he's doing is -- >> there it is. the memorized 25 second speech. >> we're not facing a president that did you know what he is doing. anyone that believes that he doesn't know what he's doing on purpose, doesn't under what he's dealing with here.

daily beast, michelle bernard is president of the bernard center for women and public policy and howard fineman, huffington post, political analyst. let's take a look at this fight now. there was a little hint of the cruz m.o. out in iowa, word that they put out apparently that they denied it was done maliciously, but he did apologize for putting out the word that dr. ben carson was out of the race. and then there was this official looking document that came out from the cruz world, that basically scared people into voting whatever, and those were the intimations. now we get the robo calls. >> now you get the calls and begins in south carolina, which is like a landscape with gasoline all over it, ready to be lighted by any match. it's the history of the state, politics is conducted there. presidential politics is conducted by a knife in the back. often racial. often that kiechbd tone. and also, very personal about people's religion, people's family, that's the way they play it down there. i think it's historical, because in south carolina, politics has been a matter of life and death in very pe

one thing he has to do tonight to cause less attrition, to keep the tire from losing its air as howard fineman said, is to convince his people that he's a winner, that he's going to win this darn thing. they don't want to vote for somebody who three weeks from now people realize they wasted their vote. how does he convince people he's going to win the nomination, i'm talking about donald trump? >> he has to come out looking really strong and like somebody who is unaffected by the iowa results, by all the headlines that called him a loser. somebody who has maintained that momentum inside of his own head at least. somebody that doesn't look like he's been biased by what the media has been saying. so when he comes out on that stage, he needs to present himself as somebody who is presidential, somebody who doesn't need the media to sign off on his campaign. somebody who could stand up to ted cruz, stand up to marco rubio, stand up to the tough questioning of the moderators. that perhaps is the most important thing he has to do tonight, somebody who comes out looking strong and not afraid of tough

and also with me is howard fineman, political analyst with "the huffington post."lobal editor director. montel, let me ask you about this. i think you like kasich because you're going to say so. i can't tell you the number of people who quietly come up to me and say i like this kasich guying and they include a lot of democrats. your thoughts? >> i think you'll find a lot of independents will realize that kasich is probably the only adult in the entire game right now. both democratic and the republican side. he has been in the congress. he was a congressman from ohio. he has been a part of our national balancing of our budget once before, and now in ohio, if you take a look at what he's done as a leader, he appears to be the only one that understands that leadership owes responsibility to bringing both sides together. i look at all the other candidates right now, and you look at who their constituents are, they believe if they are elected president, they're the only people they have to answer to. but there's a lot of people in the rest of this country who would like

i want to bring in msnbc steve kornacki, annie lenske and howard fineman. ward, you compared the beginning of this debate to a frazier, ali. they were going at it. >> i'm sorry to go after the old boxing analogies but it was quite remarkable. i've covered a ton of these debates. i haven't seen one that heated, that direct, that confrontational. also just two people. >> yeah. >> in a long, long time. >> that totally changed the dynamic. >> it totally changed the dynamic. and it's about this essential point of money and politics. bernie sanders is a heat seeking missile on this, there aren't ten democrats in the country who don't agree with him on the substance of that issue. >> yes. >> and that's the big issue that hillary clinton has got. >> and so you come to this point and you -- i felt sitting just above the audience in one of those little balconies that she came saying this is not going to be 2008 again, she knows what the stakes are, it's amazing when you look at this new q poll how we got to this point and really how substantive the debate was and how