lou: ron christie, chris stirewalt, thank you.next, it appears to be open season on our embassy in the middle east. the latest on the terrorist attack and murder of the chief of security for the u.s. embassy in yemen. and things looking somewhat suspect over at the labor department. what is going on with this government? you know, i will tell you right now, it's not a conspiracy. but man, it sure does look like incompetence. by the way, what about public trust? the "chalk talk" is coming up next lou: some people are crying conspiracy and others are saying that it is just plain incompetence. darrell issa, house oversight committee chairman, on last weeks dramatically improved unemployment rate of 7.8%. >> it is not exactly a science as it needs to be and there has to be a better way to get those numbers are not good. today we learned weekly jobless claims held by 30,000 this week. down 30,000, and i mean the backup market attention. dropping down to 339,000 in the market -- the market rejoiced. a labor department spokesman admitted

thanks, chri stirewalt. here's what happens when you throw hillary cnton under the bus. she drives you off the cliff. what the secrary state said in a women's magazine has the white house fearing it jus lost women period. wooohooo....hahaahahaha! oh...there you go. woho....hahaahahaha! i'm gonna stand oh...there yup to her! no you're not. i know. you ow ronny fol who save hundreds of dollars switching to geico sure are happy. how happy are they jimmy? happier than a witch in a broom factory. get happy. get geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more. neil: di hi just knock barack for a loop no not on the bengzi thing but this woman thing? in the west wing someone wants to get a hold of hillary clinton and just throttle. it started innocently ough in a marie claire interview when the secretary o state was asked about the challenges women face with work and family. cutting to the chase, hilly essentially told them to shut up. ian snd whining. i applaud her fnk response. i don't like whining. for example, when fat people blame the condition on thyroid. by

thanks, chris stirewalt. here's wha happens when you throw hillary clinton under the bus.she drives you off the cliff. what the secretary of state said in a women's magazine has the white house fearing it just lost women period. americans are always ready to work hard for a better future. since ameriprise financial was founded back in 1894, they've been committed to putting clients first. helping generations through tough times. good times. never taking a bailout. there wheyou need them. helping millions of americans over the centuries. the strength of a global financial leader. the heart of a one-to-one relationship. together for your future. ♪ 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. neil: did hill just knock barack for a loop no n on the benghazi thing

thanks, chris stirewalt. here's what happens when you throw hillary clinton under the bus.s you off the cliff. what the secretary of state said in a women's magazine has the white house fearing it just lost women period. you see us, at the start of the day. on the company phone list that's a few names longer. you see us bank on busier highways. on once empty fields. everyday you see allhe ways all of us at us bank are helping grow oueconomy. lendinmore so companies and communities caexpand, greveryday you see all of us serving you, around the country, around the corner. us bank. oh, hey alex. just picking up some, brochuresposters copies of my acceptance speech. great! it's always good to have a backup plan, in case i get hit by meteor. wow, your hair loo great. didn't realize they did photoshop here. hey,ood call on those mugs. can't let 'em see what you're drinking. know, i'mlad we're both running a nice, clean race. no need to get nasty. here's you"honk if you had an fair with taylor" yard sign. looks good. [ male announcer ] fedex office. now save 50% on banners. neil:

thanks, chris stirewalt. here's what happens when you throw hillary clintonunder the bus.he drives you offhe cliff. what the secretary of state said in a wom's magazine has the white house fring it just lost women peri. follow the wings. neil: d hill just knock barack for a loop no not on the benghazi thing but this woman thing? in the west wing someone wants to get a hold of hillary clinton and just throttle. it started innocently enough in a marie claire interview when the secretary of state was asked about the challenges women face with work and family. cutting to the chase, hilly essentially told them to shut up. i can't stand whining. i applaud her frank response. i don't like whining. for example, when fat people blame the condition on thyroid. by the way the camera does add 50 pounds. it'srue. back to i will had. for women it could put this democratic ticket in hell. not the best timing since team romney-ryan have been getting "fast and furious" with females. after being thrown under the s on libya as some see it, is hlary clinton getting away as fast as she can fro

chris stirewalt is host of "power play" and a fox news correspondent. what do you think? the headline on the "des moines register" says a lot. reporter: the president took a huge risk on running an intensely negative campaign as an incumbent gray that. that is generally not one incumbent presidents do. they made a decision over six or seven months as to what has been shorthanded as the kill romney strategy. it works to some good effect and then romney had the first debate. he was different than what had been prescribed in the ads and he started to rise. now you see the president with no choice but to intensify those attacks and intensify the effort to try to kill romney in the closing days of the campaign. megyn: there is a columnist in "the new york times" that says obama's aura of defeat. apparently it was a right wing guy. i don't apologize his last name. reporter: he will definitely take the mention. megyn: he writes losing campaigns, they go negative heart greatly try out new messaging very late in the game. they hype issues, but only once or reporters are focused on

megyn: joining me now is chris stirewalt, host of "power play." according to voters, the uncommitted voters, they believe that barack obama won this debate by a slight margin. and they believe that mitt romney came out ahead of virtually every economic issue. what does it mean? reporter: it means that the context of the debate, there is the larger context of the election -- inside the debate, remember, the president has tremendously low expectations for him coming into this debate. he talked about his vigor and all that stuff. they tried to psych up the democratic base ahead of us. the base on the president's performance two weeks ago, for him to make eye contact with any sentiment human being would be a victory for the president. also, he did better in the second half of the debate than he did in the first half of the debate. as voters were scoring, he said yes, he was pretty good, he closed on that. that's different than what happens in the larger context of the election. in the larger context of the election, what the president needed to do was

and also, we just talked about this with chris stirewalt.ow this presidential election is all about women and his intent to show off its support with female voters. will it help that effort to have the most powerful woman in the cabinet take the fall for this. >> she is not taking the ball. if you are going to take responsibility, then resign. there are four dead americans. they didn't have adequate security at one of the most dangerous outpost you can operate in. should she resigned? she probably should. but the focus is on the president of the united states. david axelrod was on with chris wallace the other day, he made a reference that the president is, of course, responsible. megyn: if the president is responsible, why does he have time to go on the radio show, like one in florida, do hollywood events, etc. but he doesn't have time to do a press conference on an issue as serious as this? put politics aside. what happened was a tragedy. the american people have a right to know regardless of whether this is an election year or not. will it

chris stirewalt, thank you, sir. the romney team tried to take advantage of some newfound energy in that debate. ann romney, part of the gop's super saturday grassroots effort. she made a surprise appearance at an orlando call center. she joined volunteers working on the phones in the campaign's push to reach out to 2 million voters this weekend. while there, ann romney met one campaign worker who made more than 100 30,000 calls on governor romney's behalf. there are two remaining presidential debates, and one vice presidential debate. the two remaining presidential debates happen next tuesday, october 16, then the following monday, october 22. this thursday we go to kentucky for the vp debate. the following week, where do we go? they are traveling all over. it is in long island. right across the way. we will be looking forward to that. the vice presidential debate, they go against each other again sometime. fox news alert. israel stepping up its military defense just 48 hours after a mystery drone penetrated airspac

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital politics editor and host of "power play" on foxnews.com live. chris, hello from dallas. >> hi, megyn. meg and let's -- i'm still thinking about boca even though i've maneuvered over to -- moved over to dallas. [laughter] but these two candidates are eyes on the road. they are all about what's over the next two weeks and ground game. your thoughts on where we go in the wake of last night from here. >> well, here's the deal, even if the president can claim a victory inside the debate winning with some focus groups, not others, even if he can say that, he didn't achieve his objective, and the objective last night was to use the last remaining scheduled moment to reset an election that he's losing, that he's on his way to lose, that he missed his opportunity to reset the race. he came out swinging very hard against mitt romney, cometted on the attack, scornful, mad at mitt romney and really tried to take him down a peg. he didn't change the trajectory of the race because even those people who said the president won, a lot of them said that mitt romn

chris stirewalt the fox news digital politics editor and host of power play on fox news.com. mother nature hit the pause button on this race, you know, eight days out from the presidential election, chris, and, you know, at some point this week the thumb will be taken off the pause button, and where are we then? >> exactly. perfectly put, because by the time we get to thursday things will be back in full swing. you know what thursday is, thursday is into the hot zone of the election where you're so close to the vote that there is really not much time that people have, that candidates have to change the trajectory of the race and there isn't time for big concepts or big ideas to sink in and you're just down in that final scramble. so what hurricane sandy has done is taken away these days that both campaigns were planning to use to try to reinforce, or change the trajectory of the race, in romney's case reinforce the trajectory of the race, in president obama's to try to change it to get out from underneath romney. megyn: before we -- before mother nature hit that pause button

. >> andrea: chris stirewalt was on the air a couple hours ago and said this could be the break-away moment we've been waiting for. we haven't seen a candidate get this far ahead. it could be it. >> eric: put the poll up. number one, you like the likely voters best. 2700 people were polled. also, the dates, october 11 through the 17. so this is all post vice presidential debate. which means all the bump that joe biden allegedly had is in that number. >> bob: i don't think anybody suggested biden get a bump. if people did -- >> andrea: i want to get dan nash heredana in here. we had a big disagreement yesterday because i said no president under 50% has gone on to actually win. this is troubling. bob said it wasn't true. it is true. >> dana: i can't be the referee on that. >> andrea: you can't be candy crowley. >> dana: i will admit what i don't know. i think -- when i saw the numbers from today, i saw is this real? i'm a nervous nelly. i don't like to believe anything. something will happen, another shoe will drop. obama campaign must have something they'll roll out in the next couple

things political details than a guy who is walking encyclopedia on them, fox news digital editor, chris stirewalt. i had e opportunity to be there last night. i got to tell you it was in as much in his demeanor and delivery than the stuff he said that blew folks away in that room. and does this stuff resonate? es it have an impact? what do you think? >> well, hers the deal, comedy i about timing, comedy is also about expectations. just like politics, it is about expectations. and mitt romney knew that since he had this reputation aseing a stiff, and being this rich guy and being all of that stuff, a tea totaller who doesn't drink he had this expectation. he went in and ableo use thaa to ip it a bit. and cast himself as somebody who could poke fun at himself and poke fun at the president and laugh. he was very funny. he clearly had good kes but also delivered them the right way. look there is no comedy route that will put everybodover the top, but what you saw in romney was the same ing you saw in ronald reagan, that you saw in bill clinton, and that you saw in george w. bush, which was the abilit

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital politics editor and host of "power play" on foxnews.com live. when i prepared for this event today, chris, the daytime show now and the prime time coverage later, the experts told me in the materials i read that the vice presidential debates never really move the election that much, the most it's moved is three points. and i said to myself, three points is a lot in an election like this one. >> three points is a lot when you have a one-point gap, megyn. first, let me say, you are in a beautiful place in america, you are in a wonderful spot, and it's going to be a great fisticuffs tonight, so i'm very jealous. you're doing something awesome. megyn: thanks, chris. >> three point would be a big deal in this race where seldom has anybody been up -- the president's seen leads of over four points, but certainly if mitt romney were up four, that would be an awful big deal if that were to happen. the problem for joe biden is, you're right, the pressure is high in this debate because of the president's beating, the beating that he took at the hands of mi

alisyn: chris stirewalt is fox news digital politics editor and the host of "power play" on foxnews.com. hi, chris. what is going on in ohio, the all-important state of ohio, they are neck-and-neck. >> what do we know? we know you can't get elected president without ohio. it's a must-win for mitt romney. we know that the president tilted his entire strategy for the election to blocking mitt romney in ohio. tense of milliontens of millions of dollars of the roughist, toughist personal attack adds that we've ever seen from an incumbent president. they were folk is used on ohio and blue-collar workers to say mitt romney is a bad guy and you ought not vote for him. what we saw previously is that ohio wasn't acting like the rest of the swing states. that romney would go up or down in the other swing states but the gap remained in must-win ohio, largely because the president had run such a tough, negative campaign and focused so much on romney in ohio. and then poof, that debate took place, and now ohio, the gap is closed in ohio and more importantly for mitt romney it's starting to track wit

chris stirewalt is the host of power play on foxnews.com.r romney is buying ad time and the president is trying to match him while sending bill clinton and joe biden, to minnesota and michigan all thought to be in the blue-state column in this election, because he's trying to head fake us or he has a legitimate shot of winning those election tore kwral rich states. >> part of the reason is that there is so gosh darn much money in this year's election neither candidate is abiding by the old limits on spending and the money is out there so both candidates have deep pockets in their campaign, they say, let's take a try here, let's take a try here. it's very telling where the gambit is taking place, it's not on the red turf it's on the blue turf. it's in blue wall streets, pennsylvania, minnesota, those are places that democrats don't want to be worried about. particularly interesting is michigan which has been a bulwark of the democratic party as important to them as any other state where you see the race essentially tied. megyn: i want to talk

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital politics editor and host of "power play" on foxnews.com. they covered a lot of tkepl graph is. i love how they described who are the walmart moms. it starts out with women who have children, that's helpful. okay i didn't get that from the mom's part. okay. women who have children, they shop at dull mart a. good contingent of them were latina, and they sat around and watched this debate, chris and they came out overwhelmingly feeling that mitt romney won it and that he had significantly improved his image with them by 20 minutes. obama's image moved up just five. your thoughts on it. >> that is the most important demographic in this election in so many ways the romney campaign calls them coupon clippers. these are women who are moderate voters from swing counties who in fact are concerned about the economy, concerned about the direction of the country. they are not in crisis, but they are sure anxious, they are clipping those coupons, going to walmart, driving a little further for a tank of gas. what mitt romney did last night that spoke to

alisy chris stirewalt is fox fom.tfpola oolitics etor and hi, chris. what is going on in ohio, the all-important state ohio, they are neck-and-neck. >> what do we know? we know you can't get elected present wiou 'sus fitt . kw pside lt hnt strategy for the election to blocking mitt romney in ohio. tense of milliontens of millions of dollars o the rougst,is perl frcnt president. they were folk is used on ohio and blue-collar workers to say mitt romney is a bad guy and you ought not vote for him. what we saw previously is that ohio wasn't acting like the rest of sng ss. atou uow he sngtaut g must-win ohio, largely because the president hadun such a tough, negative campaign and focused so much on romney in ohio. and the poof, that debate took place, and now ohio, the gap is imrttlyt y oor tio ckithet toury. yeenempving in michigan, pennsylvania, wisconsin, florida, virginia, north carolina, colorado, neva, all the swing states no longer is ohi lagging behind the rest of them, but the surge br momtitti a mnndhae scceingor campaign that was counting on ohio

chris stirewalt is our digital politics editor. before we get to the independence, i know you were listening to the interview with mr. charlie woods. everyone is flabbergasted at what is happening on this program. what are your thoughts on our? >> well, the only thought you can have is that as a father, you hear that and it is heartbreaking. i think it is a heartbreaking story. the reason that is significant is because there are a lot of parents who have suffered losses of their children in iraq and afghanistan and other american heroes. in this case, it is a story that encapsulates what happened in benghazi and encapsulates everything about the people, especially the establishment that has been struggling to get a grasp on what happened. here you have in real-time, not just what the white house knew. not just that they were watching. but the calls for help to have three calls for help reviews -- it is going to lead to a lot of lead to a lot of consternation and a lot of frustration. then you think about how a father has to go forw

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital editor and also the host of the show "power play." chris, some events are being canceled because they are not being affected by hurricane sandy, but how many times have we talked about the likely voter polls, talking about how it will really matter or not romney loses ohio. no republican has ever won the white house without it. rasmussen came out with a poll showing that governor romney is taking the lead their. >> well, yes, here is the thing. we have seen all along that mitt romney could not quite close in ohio and he has continued to do better in places like florida and virginia. ohio has posed a difficulty, he couldn't close the gap with the president. what we have seen has been a slow-motion surge from mitt romney. it started after his first debate and has moved forward. it has been not a landslide or explosive, but what it has been a steady. that is what mitt romney has to like is that he he continues to gain ground. we know that ohio is essentially a tie. but before they had been a tie, now it is the other way. if you are mitt r

chris stirewalt is our digital politics editor. i want to get to the debate, but i have to start with this. when you look at the way the electoral map goes, it's like wisconsin and michigan and pennsylvania -- is pennsylvania back in play now? is that real? >> sure, it is real. what you are seeing is this big search for governor romney. the way that you put it is right. mitt romney can't get elected without ohio. the sentence is now that iraq obama can't win without pennsylvania. it is hard to imagine a path to victory for him. the change in this map, an amount fully illustrate that, a search could be nothing if it doesn't really manifest itself in the battleground states, and here are the blue states. since 1988, around towards mitt romney, he has to be concerned in chicago. megyn: i'll ask you as we have seen the polls tighten day after day since that debate in denver. is this about the debate? or is it about something bigger. >> it is about something bigger and defense. people are very concerned and the ability of our government

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital politics editor and host of "power play" on foxnews.com live. chris, it's been very interesting to watch this unfold over the past, you know, 15 hours or so where it was posted on drudge, and hannity talked about it with tucker carlson of "the daily caller," who, by the way, will be here later. and tucker was making the point that he believed that the president in this speech was talking about institutional racism against black people in a way that we hadn't heard from him. i was just looking for the quote. tucker's saying the message in this speech was the federal government doesn't like you because you are black. and then you've seen a lot of folks in the mainstream media come out and say that's not a news story, this is old tape, you know, at least portions of it were run -- tucker says not the relevant portions. so there's a real question about what, if any, impact this has on this presidential race four-and-a-half weeks out, almost five weeks out from election day. your thoughts? >> well, megyn, think about it this way for barack obama at t

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital politics editor and host of "power play" on foxnews.com. so the campaigns have got to see that, in particular the romney camp, as good news, chris, since he is shown as trail anything a lot of these swing state polls as well. >> well, certainly it's not good news if you're president obama. if that's true, if you really have 18% persuadable voters, this comes after fife months -- five months of the most stained, negative attack, most personal barrage against a candidate by an incumbent president that we've ever seen. if there's still 18% of the people that say, well, you know, i'm hope to this guy, i'm open to hear what he has to say, that would include some romney voters who might be open to the president, but when you'd have an incumbent,ou'd expect that much persuade about would be good news for the challenger, that the president hasn't been able to convince all the persuadable voters that mitt romney is, in fact, a vampire. megyn: now, we saw during the republican presidential primary that these debates really can have an effect. candidat

megyn: chris stirewalt, thank you sir. >> yes, ma'am. megyn: the president has aggressively defended the administration's handling of the attack in libya in recent days, most moat plea at this week's debate when he had a heated exchange at governor romney, the president saying he called this terror from day one. >> you said in the rose garden the day after the attack it was an act of terror it was not a spontaneous demonstration, is that what you're saying. >> please proceed, governor. >> i want to make sure we get that for the record because it took the president 14 days before he called the attack in benghazi an act of terror. >> get the transcript. megyn: well the same day that the president commented on the libya attack in remarks he delivered from the rose garden the president took off for las vegas where he took part in a campaign event and he said this. >> i want to begin tonight by just saying a few words about a tough day that we've had today. you know, we lost four americans last night who were killed when they were attacked at

joining us now to explain what to watch for and why it matters, chris stirewalt, our fox news digital politics editor and host of "power play" on foxnews.com along with marc thiessen, who's a washington post columnist and a former george w. bush speech writer. gentlemen, welcome to lynn university. here's the interesting thing i saw, stirewalt, in preparation for this debate. the president was 15 points up in the polls on foreign policy prior to debate number one in denver. now coming into this debate it is anybody's ball game. what explains that, and who has the most, the most risk in tonight's performance? be. >> well, certainly the greatest pressure is on the president who needs to change the trajectory of this election. because if things keep going as they're going, he will lose. mitt romney's momentum that he started picking up in that debate has continued, maybe it was slowed in the vice presidential debate, the second presidential debate, maybe, but the trajectory for romney has still been up nationally and in the swing states, so the president has a lot of pressure on him comi

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital politics editor and host of "power play" on fox foxnews.com live. is that all about the debate? >> well, yes and no. it's also in part that when the previous poll was taken, republicans were feeling crabby about mitt romney, so that was art potentially low maybe for the -- artificially low maybe for the republicans. the truth is, and we've known this really since 2010, since before the 2010 election, republican intensity and enthusiasm continues to be very, very high. now, democrats go back and forth, and mostly though this has been the story of the last two years politically has been that republicans are very determined that barack obama ought not be the president anymore, and democrats go back and forth about the fire that they feel to keep him in office. so that's something that we've expected to see. but as the president stumbled in the debate and as he's had a rough week, that problem's been exacerbated. megyn: all right. not to sound too cynical, chris -- [laughter] i mean, they wanted to vote for barack obama -- they were extremely likely to

let's ask chris stirewalt our fox news digital politics editor and host of power play on foxnews.com live, and stewart varney is the host of varney & company on the fox business network. thank you so much for being here. chris i want to start with you. what can either candidate say to grab, you know, america by the lapel and make them understand what each one of them wants to do to change our financial dire straits? >> it's a heck after lot easier for mitt romney on this one since he is the outsider and hasn't been in office and wasn't part of make thag debt and president obama has over seen in fact the unprecedented increase in size of the federal debt, and as a matter of fact in talking to senior people from romney land that is exactly what mitt romney means to do when he gets on that debate stage in denver, is go off the president not just on what romney says are ineffectual policies like the president's healthcare law and stimulus packages, but the cost of those policies as compared to romney's own perscriptions that call for smaller less expensive government. for the president w

chris stirewalt is our fox news digital editor and host of "fox news live." i know you don't say i told you so. but you came on this broadcast in the face of all these polls for weeks and pundits i should add who were saying, it's over, it's over, barack obama has this race sewn, don't bother watching for the next six weeks or eight weeks, oh, where is he going. >> i'm here, coming back. >> very unceremonious of your camera machine as i'm giving you a moment of glory. >> we can't just have nice things, megyn, they don't want us to have nice things. megyn: we don't know how it will turn out on november 6th but this is a horse race. >> not only is this a horse race we knew something before that the convention alwisdom didn't reflect was that in all these states where there had been scarce polling the democrats said, oh, he's got wisconsin seaso sewn up, michigan is sewn up. new hampshire. people were making broad assumptions about how the fall race was going to turn out. we have known all along, you and me is what would happen is people would do their very best