dionne, erin mcpike and mike. tone you have a lot of things to say to us. >>> and in "psycho talk" tonight, we're bringing you the top "psycho talkers" of the year. this is pretty tough. we had arguments in the office over this. the competition was tight. the top tier is only separated by just a few appearances. so we had to go by a number of appearances. in fifth place we have sean hannity and rick perry. who have each made five trips to the "zone." the kids on the curving couch over on fox and friends, they're in fourth place. they have seven appearances this year. third place, oh, i thought she was going to win it, but no. third place goes to congresswoman michele bachmann. she's an eight-time "psycho talker" on "the ed show." in second place, it's the pizza man, herman cain. his foreign policy gaffes and his 9-9-9 plan left him one entry shy of the top spot. >> oh, shucky duckie as the man would say. >> now it's time to crown the winner. the "psycho talker" of the year. it's the drugster, rush limbaugh, with t

erin mcpike, mike papantonio, e.j. dionne.o have you with us tonight dissecting the whole thing. >>> next on "the ed show," i'm going to show you why 2011 is a year this broadcaster will never forget. >>> "the ed show" survey tonight, is mitt romney trying to hide how rich he is? 98% of you say yes. 2% of you say no. you know what, i don't think he pays any tax. i mean, i think he's got it worked out where very cleverly, and by the law, he's not paying any tax. i mean, if he was paying tax, he'd probably want everybody to know it. >>> coming up, some of my favorite moments of this past year. stay tuned. o tolerance for such dastardly deeds. finally... [ male announcer ] some parties need a bowl of queso. made from creamy velveeta and zesty rotel tomatoes and green chiles. it makes any get-together better. but to be honest, i find the omega choices overwhelming. which one is right for me? then i found new pronutrients omega-3. it's from centrum. a name i trust. it goes beyond my heart to support my brain and eyes too. and these

chairman and pennsylvania governor, and live from des moines, iowa, where she's cover the race, erin mcpikerom real clear pot tick. thank you both for joining me. >> my pleasure. >>> let me tart with you, governor. rick an tomorrow is up, but not -- >> a cautionary note, polls are always difficult to measure, even in regular elections, primaries or general elections, but in caucuses, they're particularly hard to measure, because the caucus voter has to show up, spend about 2 1/2, 3 hours there, so the people with the most passion and most organization are likely to do better than they're polls, which is why i think rick santorum will do better, because his followers are the evangelical voters, they're passionate about them. he's spoken well, he understands the issue. are some of his positions wacky? of course they are, but that's not a problem for the core voters. mitt romney has the thinking republicans, saying i want the best person to vote obama, but they don't have the same passion. for newt it appears he's in free fall. it appears the negative attacks have work. it appears his stumbles

erin mcpike is the national political reporter for real clear politics covering the 2012 gop race.e over." in the atlantic, ari melber writes, "this year the idea of iowa in presidential politics will probably die." joy, do you buy into that? >> the thing with iowa, it rewards the kind of politicking 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

erin mcpike, thank you. happy new year. >> thanks. >>> coming up, a refresher course on the iowa caucuses. how they work, why there aren't any voting booths, and how they became so important. >>> after iowa, the candidates head to new hampshire. mitt romney has a commanding lead in the polls. he's campaigning in the state. good morning to you, ron. how is that event going? >> reporter: hey there, veronica, it's just wrapping up and romney just left to a pretty good applause. he's going back to iowa today. he'll be there through the press corps and it seems that his itinerary has surged. it seems at one point, two, three years ago, that mitt romney would stay away from iowa in the run up to the caucuses because he didn't want to necessarily be there if he wasn't going to finish strongly he there. now it appears that he could possibly win. he enjoys a summer home here. obviously was governor next door in massachusetts and has a strong base of support here. polling numbers here sulth that it won't be much of a contest come january 10th w

joining me nia-malika henderson, and writer for their 2012 block, and erin mcpike.egy, telling his team not to attack romney. thank you both for being here. nia, let me start with you. can mitt handle the pressure? >> it's funny, if you saw the interview with bret bair, he could hardly stand up to it it does look like what he's going to try to do is employ what could be called the pee-wee herman strategy of defense, essentially -- that's what it looks like he's going to do, but the question i think will be who is mitt romney? he wasn't able to answer these questions in terms of who he is, why the flip flopping. he basically said read my bhook. i think it will be interesting to see how he deals with this, especially if newt gingrich holds true to what he said, which is he won't go negative on any of these other republican candidates. he'll stick to the reagan rule, stay positive and train hi fire on barack obama. he might flip-flop on that and change direction in the way that jon huntsman did, in terms of saying he would be civil, and then attacking mitt romney. it w

we have erin mcpike, joe watkins, former aide to president george h.w. bush. and goldie taylor, host of the "goldie taylor project." goldie, you heard your colleague here on the panel, joe watkins saying that he was talking in a very political sense earlier about what this may come down to and the money that's out there and what may be something that would inspire herman cain to continue, because he's got potentially some red on the books that he wants to bring back into the black so he wouldn't end the presidential candidacy owing money. but that said, it's been suggested it comes down to the discussion with his wife of 43 years. so do you think herman cain woke up today and knew exactly what he was going to do? >> i think he did. but anybody who believes that herman cain either relied on his wife or his donors to tell him whether or not he should be in the race doesn't know herman cain very well. he keeps his very own counsel. while he may have conversations with his wife and donors and his staff, herman cain is a man who makes his own decisions, and that is

erin mcpike, joe watkins and goldie taylor. we're going to be right back. on back more as we await herman cain's announcement. congratulations. congratulations. congratulations. today, the city of charlotte can use verizon technology to inspire businesses to conserve energy and monitor costs. making communities greener... congratulations. ... and buildings as valuable to the bottom line... whoa ! ... as the people inside them. congratulations. because when you add verizon to your company, ♪ discover something new... verizon. so i used my citi thank you card to pick up some accessories. a new belt. some nylons. and what girl wouldn't need new shoes? we talked about getting a diamond. but with all the thank you points i've been earning... ♪ ...i flew us to the rock i really had in mind. ♪ [ male announcer ] the citi thank you card. earn points you can use for travel on any airline, with no blackout dates. nice, huh? yeah. you know what else is nice is all the savings you can get on cruze and traverse over there. oh! that's my beard. [ chuckles ] it's amazing.

erin mcpike, joy ann reid and joe watkins.ow 8%, they are in great shape. it fell below to 8.6 last friday but it could be going back up again sometime early next year. we'll see if he can do it. he didn't really sound optimistic in that interview. it depends. >> well, among things that we're considering in that 8.6 drop from 9 was the fact that 300,000 people said, i'm done, i can't even continue looking for work and there's a lot of part-time retail hires. but you're take on this, joy ann, in terms of what threshold the president needs to get to? >> i think it's entirely psychological that we need to be under 9%. i think the president being at 8.6 is going to be good psychology for the voters but i don't think there's a tit for tat. >> if the unemployment rate drops below 8%, which would be good for all americans, or do you think they would listen to mitch mcconnell, which would be to defeat the president? >> the gop would like to win back the presidency but i think they also agree that it would be great to get that unemploy

while aaron mcpike is covering the 2012 gop race for real clear politics and steve kornacki is political columnist with salon. thank you erin this interesting case of rick santorum. i have always believed that when you're in a crunch, erin, and you don't know what you're doing, you go back to basics. if you're a religious conservative, don't get your fingers dirty in this campaign. don't hold your nose. vote for somebody whose values you completely buy into it, and you'll always be proud of your vote, even if you don't pick a president. is that what's working for santorum, if anything is? >> he thinks that it is, but his poll numbers haven't budged all that much. he's starting to be tied with bachmann and perry, but the only two ads he has out in iowa are about him and social values and his record on social issues. and that's all he's talking about. but what is his economic message? this is an economic election, and that's not what he's talking about. it's going to be really hard for him to win iowa when everyone else is talking about the economy. >> well, and rick santorum says iowa voters know he's the choice for christia