. >> ari melber and dr. peterson are here. >>> the pizza man is officially cooked. >> i'm suspending my presidential campaign. >> we'll show you the cain campaign in 99 seconds. >>> and the republican vision of america is on full display in moorhead, minnesota. >> it's just to bust the union and the working class. there's no excuse with the record profits. >> tonight the workers of the american crystal sugar plant are on "the ed show" fighting corporate greed. >>> good to have you with us tonight, folks. donald trump wants to be the king maker if he can't be the king.

ari melber is an msnbc contributor and a correspondent for "the nation" magazine. chris frates is a correspondent for the "national journal." chris, thank you, and ari, thank. you know, i think it's important to talk about. these aren't guys and women making money on the job. it's not selling influence, apparently. what we're talking about is the development we've all seen. wealthy people, because they have capital and the ability to not have to show up to work for years at a time, and incredible leverage with other rich people, because rich people know rich people, that they can run for office with impunity and take chances on losing. they can come back year after year, until they finally win. >> yeah, i think that's exactly right, chris. politics is about what you have, what you need, and what you know, just like you said. so what we see with the explosion of the price of campaigns is that you either have to have a lot going in, you can be a self-funder, or you need a lot, which means that the people who may not be billionaires, they may not be mike bloomberg, the

. >> ari melber and dr. peterson are here. >>> the pizza man is officially cooked. >> i'm suspending my presidential campaign. >> we'll show you the cain campaign in 99 seconds. >>> and the republican vision of america is on full display in moorhead, minnesota. >> it's just to bust the union and the working class. there's no excuse with the record profits. >> tonight the workers of the american crystal sugar plant are on "the ed show" fighting corporate greed. >>> good to have you with us tonight, folks. donald trump wants to be the king maker if he can't be the king. there's infighting in the republican party like we've never seen before, and it's all being provoked by a reality television host. newt gingrich is silently on top of the national polls for the republican presidential nomination. he leads mitt romney by more than six points on average. in a new nbc marist poll from iowa, shows gingrich surging in the caucus state. with less than a month to go before voting. gingrich celebrated his good numbers

ari melber, ari berman, and krystal ball. that was wonderful from bud dy roemer right there, krystal. >> yeah, it was. and he's obviously got a big hill to climb in terms of the republican nomination. maybe he'll run as an independent or go about this another way, but i'm awfully glad he's out there raising the issue. and it seems like he's getting more buzz and there's more talk about his candidacy. and just having him out there advocating makes a difference. >> and if you look -- if he lays out his qualifications, fairly simply, governor of a state, served in the federal office as a congressperson, ran a financial institution, which was a small bank, which is the opposite of these too big to fail banks. this is going to be an ari-off, we'll see which ari is going to take this. >> i think we know who's going to take this question. >> in other words, what is the barrier to buddy roemer, ari, what is the barrier to buddy roemer being able to get this message more broadly communicated, ari. >> all right. ari berman, i guess i'l

i'm joined tonight by wendell potter, senior analyst at the center for public integrity and ari melbere.ç gentlemen, good to have you with us tonight. ari, how can he make this case? okay at the state level, not good at a federal level? how is he going to work through this? >> he doesn't get very far. it doesn't add up. if it's a good idea, a matter of personal responsibility, i do agree with him the way he puts it. it's true, one way or another society has to deal with the problems associated with health care and lack of health care. which is why i think having a mandate at the federal level that president obama pushed so hard for is a good thing. if that's true, it's true at whatever level you operate it at. that's why romney doesn't sound very convincing here. >> wendell, if mandates accomplish anything at all, why would it be good at the state level and not at the federal level? how do you see this? >> well, that dog just won't hunt because republicans have tried this at the federal level in years past. it was, indeed, birth by the heritage foundation. and it was a big part of rep

thank you, ari melber.lways good on this show. >>> up next, we've all seen this photo. an african-american trying to enter her high school in little rock, arkansas, the one she's supposed to go to in 1957 after it was ordered to desegregate. tonight, we'll hear the fascinating story behind that picture, those people, the white one and the black one. this is "hardball," only on msnbc. card - "buy books, not beer!" ♪ ♪ but the second that she shut the door ♪ ♪ girl started blowing up their credit score ♪ ♪ she bought a pizza party for the whole dorm floor ♪ ♪ hundred pounds of makeup at the makeup store ♪ ♪ and a ticket down to spring break in mexico ♪ ♪ but her folks didn't know 'cause her folks didn't go ♪ ♪ to free-credit-score-dot-com hard times for daddy and mom. ♪ v.o.: offer applies with enrollment in freecreditscore.com car insurance companies say they'll save you by switching, you'd have, like, a ton of dollars. but how are they saving you those dollars? a lot of companies might answer "um" or "no co

back on the east coast, that's ari melber, krystal ball, and toure. guys. >> hi. >> thanks, matt. >> hi. >> so, ari, let me start with you. you know, lawrence's interview with ginger white was very painful, but also, it's like a car wreck. it was kind of mesmerizing to watch at the same time. i guess the big question at this hour is will cain's unseemly exit from the race after he goes to the woodshed with his wife tonight, will that hurt his chance for the fox tv show, which was always the only rationale for his candidacy? >> well, i think you just coined a good sort of brand for this republican primary, which is mesmerizing pain. the thing about herman cain is that he is now contemplating going from pretending to run for president to not even pretending to run for president. no offense to you and the fine show that we're doing here, but i don't think this in and of itself is a major news shift. i do think that it says something about the republican party and that is the bigger part. and to the final part of your question, the fox news show, look, he

thank you, ari melber.s good on this show. >>> up next, we've all seen this photo. an african-american trying to enter her high school in little rock, arkansas, the one she's supposed to go to in 1957 after it was ordered to desegregate. tonight, we'll hear the fascinating story behind that picture, those people, the white one and the black one. this is "hardball," only on msnbc. [ male announcer ] you are a business pro. premier of the packed bag. you know organization is key... and so is having a trusted assistant. and you...rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle...and go. you can even take a full-size or above and still pay the mid-size price. here we are... [ male announcer ] and there you go, business pro. there you go. go national. go like a pro. >>> well, serious democratic efforts to hold on to their majority in the senate next november, ben nelson of nebraska announced today he's quitting. he's leaving at the end of his term. that means republicans expected t

walmart. >>> well, ari melber is in new york with a rant about new york. >> thanks, dylan.ther occupy wall street was working? well, it's working. look at budget deal struck this week in new york where the occupy movement began. governor cuomo xarnd on letting a millionaire's tax expire and for months he said he would keep that promise. that seemed crazy to some of us because there was a $4 billion hole in the budget that could have been covered by the revenue from the millionaire's tax and we even talked about it on this show but the tax was set to expire automatically, so if that's what the governor wanted, basically no way to stop him and three month ago, except for a couple of labor activists and a few reporters, no one was focused on this issue. it was not front page news. well, it's front page news today in the "new york times." that is because the occupy movement but income inequality on the agenda, which changed the conversation and some protesters spun off to work with local groups on this issue. they even dubbed cuomo governor 1%, and it altered the pressures in a

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thank you, ari melber.s good on this show. >>> up next, we've all seen this photo. an african-american trying to enter her high school in little rock, arkansas, the one she's supposed to go to in 1957 after it was ordered to desegregate. tonight, we'll hear the fascinating story behind that picture, those people, the white one and the black one. this is "hardball," only on msnbc. step that we find so comp? step that we find so comp? is it because taking a step represents hope? or triumph? at genworth, we believe in taking small steps every day to keep your promises, protect what matters, and prepare for a secure financial future. no matter where you want to go, one step at a time is the only way to get there. go to genworth.com/promises. >>> well, serious democratic efforts to hold on to their majority in the senate next november, ben nelson of nebraska announced today he's quitting. he's leaving at the end of his term. that means republicans expected to pick up control of the cornhusker's state seat. bob k

joining me today, casey hunt, ari melber and ben white of politico.t gingrich is a well paid s historian and not a lobbyist and newt gingrich defeated communism, all of this according to newt

joining me today, casey hunt, ari melber and ben white of politico.t gingrich is a well paid s historian and not a lobbyist and newt gingrich defeated communism, all of this according to newt gingrich. what has he not done? >> he hasn't won anything yet. >> picky, picky. >> this is newt

in the atlantic, ari melber writes, "this year the idea of iowa in presidential politics will probably that is less and less a part of campaigns. it rewards the passion of getting people to caucus for two hours, and yeah, it's demographically unrepresentative. so i think in a lot of ways, iowa is an anachronism, and if mike huckabee is any guide, it tends to nominate somebody who tends to go on to then not win the nomination. not always, but it did recently. >> erin, is this a conversation we have every four years, or is there something different about it this year? >> it's been increasing over the last couple of campaigns. as you remember, four years ago, there was a push to get some states earlier in the calendar. like florida. and like nevada. this year, florida made a push to come earlier and they won, so candidates are placing more of an effort on florida, like newt gingrich. like mitt romney. but also, arizona has tried really hard to move up in the california as well, and it's states with big cities that don't get to go early. and they want to see a change, because they have all

ari melber, krystal ball, and toure, who, by the way, as of this morning, we had no idea where the manas. he's really been missing for weeks. we ultimately found him on the west coast. i don't know how they even found him, but we dragged him -- krystal, i think, is the toure hunter. we sent her out to california to wrangle -- >> dylan, amazingly, they found me via e-mail. can you believe it? >> you know, only nbc and the cia have these methods of e-mail. your thoughts, ari, on the president's sort of effort to win back an estranged ally, if they ever were an ally. >> well, i think you hear these kind of conversations every four years around democratic candidates. the fact is that after african-americans, jewish americans actually form the most loyal base group in the democratic matter. there was discussions over whether that might change with barack obama, but it didn't. 51% approval is actually higher than he's doing among the country at large. so, yes, to the extent that there are generalized concerns with the president and the economy, they're reflected, but to me, the tracking numb

. >> charles blow, a columnist for the "new york times" and ari melber, a correspondent for the nationgood to see both of you. so, this is interesting. you just heard what steve grubbs had to say heard the soundbites, everybody going after newt, millions of dollars in television ads, charles, obviously last night, he had to defend himself there's been a lot of speculation on the ground in iowa his numbers are sling. what do you think is going on there? >> that is what we have seen with all the anti-mitt candidates. last night, what you say was mitt romney returning to what mitt romney should be doing, realizing that mitt is running against mitt. and everyone else is running tonight person who is the last man standing against mitt. and so what gingrich has to do is to survive. he has to survive and have the arc, the arc of his rise -- >> what does it mean to survive? >> well, i mean, he has kind of peaked right before the voting -- well, not voting in this case it is a caucus, but right before people start to cast ballots or whatever, however you want to describe it. he has to survive u