ari?rience in this, will they be able to prevent hundreds of millions of people from getting out? >> they are doing it. i was in china a few months ago and i can tell you i tried accessing twitter facebook, youtube. it's blocked. i was in thailand in myanmar. the control of the bandwidth they are controlling to the end user. it's terrible. they are only showing you what they want to show you. >> in other words, it is possible to put a filter in between citizens in china and everything out there? >>. >> they have the filters. i think the fitters will get wider. >> there are thousands of chinese on twitter, the twitter we know. they have sorts of ways to get on to it virtual private networks. >> why should you have to do that create an ad hoc slewing to something that should be to the user. >> there is a viebrant place and everything you are saying is true but it shows that it's impossible to complete shut things down. >> i think when the notion that social media was one of the driving force

to ari real talk.cusing herself on the arizona law. only eight justices will decide. everybody other than rick perry understands that if you have eight judges you can have a split decision. a split decision would affirm the lower court decision blocking the law but would not set a precedent. not so arcane when we understand the full magnitude of what we're discussing. ari, excellent scholarly you journalism. we're going to move some units of this is book on the show. >>> coming up, president obama issues an important executive order with the aim of combating human rights abuses. details are next in the what now. [ female announcer ] did you know the average person smiles more than 50 times a day? so brighten your smile a healthy way with listerine® whitening plus restoring rinse. it's the only rinse that makes your teeth two shades whiter and two times stronger. ♪ listerine® whitening... power to your mouth. >>> we need to be doing everything we can to prevent and respond to these kinds of atrocities.

ari, enjoy your time in the great northwest.k smashing with the half of space needle that probably is fake over your right shoulder. >> it's real. >> it's real, okay, wonderful. chris, have a wonderful weekend and wonderful holiday. whether you live with them or just visiting, like ari, families across the country are coming together to celebrate passover and easter. and next up, a sneak peep of what the white house has planned on this holiday of renewal as you can see, bo, the white house dog is ready to go. [ male announcer ] if you believe the mayan calendar, on december 21st polar shifts will reverse the earth's gravitational pull and hurtle us all into space. which would render retirement planning unnecessary. but say the sun rises on december 22nd, and you still need to retire. td ameritrade's investment consultants can help you build a plan that fits your life. we'll even throw in up to $600 when you open a new account or roll over an old 401(k). so who's in control now, mayans? >>> in addition to the religious significan

here and respond to ari. you go back to 2008 and look at how the battle between hillary and then senator obama, as the process went on, voters didn't start to dislike the then senator barack obama more. they didn't. they didn't start to dislike him more. you're now looking at a nominee in romney who's under water. in his favorable/unfavorables. he starts off in a weaker position than most candidates and quite frankly, you just don't want your candidate starting off under water when by the way we haven't really begun spending money to even attack him. so it's qualitatively different than '08. so it's definitely different you certainly don't see new people coming in and wanting to join the process like you saw in 2008. so i think it's fundamentally different from what we see now and '08. >> ari fleischer, cornell belcher, thank you very much for coming in. >> thank you. >>> we have breaking news coming in tonight. the l.a. coroner has just released the final autopsy report for whitney houston, and there are new

have -- ari.also. and also his book, "herding donkeys." >> thank as always. >> i appreciate it. >> let's call it what is it corporations divide us. >> we just renamed it. >> citizens my heinie. >> let's call it that. okay. 45 minutes after the hour right back on the "stephanie miller show." >> announcer: there's a tea party in her pants and you are invited. call now, 1-800-steph-1-2. eliot spitzer joins the new news network. >>this show will be unique because we will not settle for the easy answers. we're here because we're independent. ♪ >> announcer: stephanie miller -- ♪ and you didn't think i would hear it ♪ ♪ because i ain't no holla back girl, i ain't no holla back girl ♪ >> it is the "stephanie miller show." welcome to it. 50 minutes after the hour. i know this [ censor bleep ] bananas, right? >> right. bananas. >> i put my pompom down. getting everybody fired up. charlie pierce coming up in just a little bit. mike in l.a. hi, mike? >> congratulations number 11. >> thank you. >> number 1 in

here and respond to ari.you go back to '08 and look at how, you know, the battle between hillary and then senator obama, as the process went on, voters didn't start to dislike then senator barack obama more. they didn't. they didn't start to dislike him more. you're looking at a nominee in romney who's under water in favorables and unfavorables. he starts off in a weaker position than most candidates and quite frankly you just don't want your candidate starting off under water when by the way, we haven't gone spending money to even attack him. so it is qualitatively different than in '08. more people coming into the process wanting to vote this time around like you saw in '08. that's fundamentally different from what we saw in '08. >> ari fleischer, cornell belscher, thanks for coming in. >>> breaking news, the l.a. coroner just released the final autopsy report for whitney houston. dr. drew pinsky joins me, just ahead. he has plenty to say about this. [ male announcer ] if your kid can recognize your sneeze

as is senior strategist ari fleischer, and democratic strategist paul begala.s clear santorum wasn't going to overtake romney in delegates. why drop out now? was it personal considerations or political or both? >> let's start with political. it's been obvious for some time, but in the near future, santorum at several events, first of all, they realized the next big, big state where they thought they could win, texas, once they thought it was not going to be winner take all, they realized it was going to be very difficult. secondly, they tried very hard in many ways to get newt gingrich, who's been siphoning conservative votes away from rick santorum, to get him out of the race, that doesn't work. and third, the pennsylvania primary coming up. paul begala knows pennsylvania very well. it was going to be tough for rick santorum. their spin is they were going to win. talking to santorum advisers privately, they were not so sure. romney was spending a lot of money. and on the personal side, spending the weekend in the hospital with his 3-year-old daughter for the s

jim acosta is here and along with ari fleischer and gloria borger.at is the scene where you are in. >> reporter: it's a loud scene. they've been playing music behind me. gives you a sense of the mood here at romney headquarters. he's going to deliver a speech here tonight that is going to sound like a victory speech even though he has not gotten the number of delegates needed to clinch this nomination. he is basically there tonight. this is what he's going to be talking about. i have to tell you. this speech that romney will be delivering in just a few moments from now called "a better america begins tonight." there are some sharp elbows being thrown at the president tonight. at one point he will say during his speech according to excerpts from the campaign, because president obama has failed he will run a campaign of diversions, distractions, and distortions. so mitt romney is going to throw out some heavy artillery at the president tonight. it's basically what we've heard from mitt romney throughout this campaign. but tonight it's the pivot to the

. >> joining me now are crystal ball, a democratic strategist and ari melder, a correspondent for the nation and msnbc contributor. we have the big map, the big map should be on the wall there. that's the wallpaper of the show for the rest of the year. because we can never repeat this enough, ignore those polls of the whole country, where they show them tied or they show obama ahead by a couple of points, it all comes down to this map, the toss up states, there's nothing toels think about. >> and we spend a lot of time in the republican primary talking about the fact that the national polls don't matter, you have to look state by state. it's the same by general election, you have to look at these battle ground states. one thing i would point out, there's a tightening in these states recently. what you see if you look there, is both mccain and obama got a little bit of a nice bump after they secured their party nomination. i think it's going to be expected that things would be a little bit tighter right now after all of mitt romney's former enemies have suddenly decided that he's at le

in focusing too much on the flip-flop because i think some of the independent moderate votesers that ari fleischer said might take some comfort in that.

let's listen. >> ari wants to phone a friend. >> ari, the republicans are counting on rush to gin up the enthusiasm and he doesn't sound ready. >> he sounds like he wants to get out from under the role he's played. and he made a big mistake. >> i was going to say i welcome him to get out of that role. >> it's surprising to hear him talking this way at this stage? >> i think the entire statement he made about sandra fluke, but i think it stuck with him and he's sort of aware of the way he's playing out. the other piece with the voter id problem is organization. i'll give one example from last time, they had a video of jay z in michigan, giving a state specific voter turn out method saying to people, you don't need your id, if you have heard you need it, you don't. this time they're going to have some different outreach in places where you do need your id so. i do think you've got a campaign that's got an extra hurdle there but they have been good about localized, organized. >> let's hear biden talking about mitt romney. >> what would governor romney do? the truth is, we don't know for

ari's right. he's gone so far to the extreme he was attacking rick santorum from the right on contraception. rick santorum is to the right of the pope on contraception. he was attacking perry on immigration. women and latinos may be the most important constituencies in november. he has pulled himself out of the mainstream to the two vital constituencies. that's makes him a weaker candidate in november. >> dana, is an endorsement by santorum for romney is sure thing? >> well, i don't know if we're going to hear the "e" word come out of santorum's mouth in the next several days, but there's no question in talking to santorum and knowing what happened behind the scenes today which is a phone call between santorum and romney that he is going to work for mitt romney eventually in a big way. he may formally endorse him. an endorsement would not be a surprise. but i want to say about what ari was saying about conservatives, if somebody is going to go out and vote already and be a conservative, they're no

ari fleischer, paul begala and chief political analyst, gloria borger.paul, what did you think of romney's speech there? he struck upbeat notes but he hammered president obama pretty hard. >> i thought it was a well crafted speech. well staged speech. he's had problems in the past with his staging. it was a well delivered speech. i think it did hit the work he needed to do. i would say this, strategically he made a big mistake. six times at least in the speech he used some variation of the word "fair." fair and unfair. that's very much traditionally a democrat's turf, and if he moves this election to that terrain, then i think governor romney has some problems. i think people will look at the business record and the people he laid off while he paid himself millions and ask if that's fair. and he raised taxes for the poorest americans ask if that's fair. if i were advising him, i would say, mitt, don't go to the fairness thing. >> ari, do you think that's a problem for him? >> i guess this is one of the issues that you want to hear what you want to hear.

ari is right.s a fundamental problem that we shouldn't have a search that functions this way. now that we do have a system that function this is way we're getting the lesser of two evils with obama. i agree with that. and i also have to point out there is a qualitative difference between a meeting at a white house or a presidential retreat. that implies that you're hiking with the president and canoeing with the president. if you're canoeing with the president you're going to get a tax cut. that must be a rule. and i mean also, on an ideological level obama may be taking meetings with people who are slightly more in line with some other human interests like healthcare and not taking a dump on the poor. again, i think it is a lesser of two evils. >> you know, on healthcare i wish he was more in line with us. he did bring people to the white house who were connect with the health industry, but she does have a point. is it okay if some of those top donors are on our side? gay rights groups? they gave

let's bring back our panel, gloria, david, donna, ari. ari, rhett me stalet me start w.of the case she made? >> i don't think much of it. voters do think about the things she said but they go ahead and vote for mitt romney. what she says saying is not being proven out by the voters. rick santorum needs to get hot, stay hot. he got hot and then fell backwards and hasn't recovered. that's the fund mental dynamic of the race. it's hard to see it stopping. at a certain point every candidate needs to say at what point am i doing damage to the party and the chances of winning the presidency. i think rick santorum has the right to fight through pennsylvania. i don't think he has much beyond that if he decides to go that far. >> there's no doubt president obama became a better candidate because of the stiff competition he got from hillary clinton four years ago in the democratic primaries. is mitt romney a better candidate thanks to rick santorum? >> i don't think so. i think mitt romney is on his game when he's negative, when he's attacking his opponent, when he's attacking the

ari, they are attempting to bring 125 u.s. standstill to commemorate international workers day. and it's billed a day without the 99% to bring the nation's attention to the working class. >>. >> i think it could work. the last big national one was actually about immigration in 2006. .other days have gone more quietly passed by. here you've got the political topical interests they're going to do this and the conventions and we're going to see whether they get another food hold. >> what i find interesting is right after the times did a front page story about apple making billions of dollars and not paying taxes on it, it's interesting quite frankly these protesters, these citizen protesters frankly have a right and also somewhat of a mole hill to stand on because look, there's a lot of corporate tax loopholes out there and they should it be shut as well as with other things, as well. >> it brings the conversation back to the fairness issue, right? >> this is a good test, too, because they got a lot of attention back in the fall

w wcoavg sme who tsowba tnk again to robert, ari, raa and david.u back here tomorrow at noon eastern/9:00 a.m. pacific when i'm joined by the jonathan good night and joe ann reid. till then, finds us at facebook.com. andrea mitchell is next. happy monday morning to you. >> hi there coming up next, the leor in diplomatic crisis ot.dfga prenng fra? and the dbate over osama bin laden. plus a new human rights campaign to combat bullying in our schools. kerry kennedy and gloria ruben will join to us explain. andr"andrea mitchelleports" is next right here. power surge, let it blow your mind. [ male announcer ] for fruits, veggies and natural green tea energy... new v8 v-fusion plus energy. could've had a v8. with our babysitter. no. thes ♪es ! weuystouerat kay qui and t a blog ♪es ! weuystouerat rely? coldut om aacge? s. [ male ancer a wld filled "no," it'sice fally syes." new oscar mayer sects de meat. the tastes you le and no artificial presertives. it's yes food. it's real milk full of calcium and vitamin d. and tastes simply delicious. for those of u

ari, let me start with you.nk that whenever i see these reports, we need the kind of nascar system where every candidate has patches on them with who is response sore g i -- sponsoring them so they would have the big patches and the democrats would have the trial lawyers and the teachers' unions and everyone could wear funding in big patches. am i wrong? >> no, you're not wrong. i think senator durbin was the one who said they owned the senate, and i think there is a big contrast here to a very important trial that hasn't gotten a lot of attention yet, and that starts monday, the trial of former senator john edwards. he is being accused of misusing private donations for his mistress, raelle hunter, and has received prison time for it. i think that is such a strong contrast to all the numbers you just shared with the audience, because on theç one hand, you have these trumped-up corruption charge cases, that one doesn't even involve any campaign spending, and on the other hand what i think is perfectly legal whic

they're going to focus on the senate now. >> ari, you're shaking your head. but we're out of time. dana bash, ari fleischer, paul begala thank you. >>> we'll speak to lieberman in a moment. [ male announcer ] you are a business pro. monarch of marketing analysis. with the ability to improve roi through seo all by cob. 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. i'm going b-i-g. [ male announcer ] good choice business pro. good choice. go national. go like a pro. >>> keeping them honest. today was supposed to be the day for the killing to stop in syria. the day by which syria's dictator promised to stop murdering its own people. well, this apparently is how the assad regime keeps the promises it makes. shelling today in homs. pulled out of some provinces today. clearly not in this area of homs. apartment buildings going up in flames. the bombardment not letting up. tanks are still on city streets still firing in residential neighborhoods. secretary genera

political analyst gloria borger, ari fleischer. the romney campaign and the super pac that supports romney, they're going to be spending millions of dollars in pennsylvania to try to nail it down. >> they are because they would love nothing more than to defeat rick santorum in pennsylvania and make that be the final death blow to rick santorum's campaign. what could occur, wolf, could be a split decision. i've heard a lot of people say, while rick santorum might win the popular vote, mitt romney would be able to win in the delegates. speaking of delegates, we should also point out that tonight mitt romney is going to make a very big hole of delegates. rick santorum, i don't know, less than a dozen delegates maybe. >> maybe not. >> so it seems to me that this is a huge victory for mitt romney. and also today, barack obama made it clear, the president said, look, the person i'm running against is mitt romney. so while rick santorum may not be willing to admit that, today the president started to try and define mitt romney. so i think

john avlon is with me, gloria borger, ari fleischer and good to see all of you. ari, capitulation, question mark? >> capitulation? i think the writing is on the wall. only question is does rick santorum want to read it? what happens in a race like this, when you are the conservative in the race and you look at mitt romney and you say, how can he be winning, he's not conservative, it makes no sense. you say hang in there, the voters will come around. i don't think the voters are coming around. and that's what rick santorum has got to judge. >> look, i mean, rick santorum has notably failed to convert the big states he could have won. wisconsin one of them. he was up in the polls, then a bunch of big endorsements came in. the advantage of money and organization. and he's added the intensity of support. it's a sign of momentum moving in rick santorum's direction. but rick santorum is right about one thing. it is only half over with regard to rick santorum getting the number of delegates needed to clinch this nomination. >> you have done the math that would prove --