former wisconsin senator russ feingold joins us on the badger state blues. plus, countdown to victory. the three, two, one strategy pushed by the romney campaign and karl rove may sound like a plan that doesn't fly. we'll break it down in our deep dive. good morning from washington. it is thursday, may 31st, 2012. this is "the daily rundown." i'm chuck todd. good stew for you today. my first reads of the morning for now the presidential campaign is being waged if you will on republican turf. six critical battleground states obama carried in 2008 but george w. bush won in 2004. five of the six actually are ones that bush won in 2000. last week we had polls showing the president with small leads in three of those states -- ohio, florida, and virginia. now a new nbc/marist poll showed the race even closer in states like iowa, colorado, nevada where it is a virtual tie. in nevada the president leads mitt romney among registered voters, 48-46. colorado the obama lead is one. 46-45. in iowa it is tied at 44-44. i'll have more on that later. the last time we polled

in mccain-feingold was in effect. corporate money to give directly to political parties. it also meant that you couldn't have politicians raising that kind of money. that is still the law of the land. what the supreme court did actually we're going to overturn laws from 1907 to 1947 and let corporations and unions run all kinds of political ads from their treasuries. what does that mean? it means when you buy toothpaste or detergents that money can be used to support a candidate you don't believe in. can you imagine someone calling up and asking for that kind of cash? we always say there is no such thing as a free lunch. there is no such thing as a free $10 million contribution. we saw in the 1990s the result of soft money corruption. you have those trade agreements. corporate democrats voting because of soft money for that. you saw the consolidation of media cutting out voices in radio and the repeal of glass siegal. almost democrats and republican voting for it, we get economic collapse, wall street greed. this is t

in june 2001, our former colleague, senator russ feingold of wisconsin, by predecessor's chairman of the committee held the senate's second and most recent hearing on racial profiling. i was there, there was bipartisan agreement about the need to end racial profiling. then came 9/11. the national trauma that followed civil liberties came face-to-face with national security. arab-americans, american muslims, south asian-americans faced national origin and religious profiling. one example, the special registration program targeted arab and muslim visitors, requiring them to promptly register with the i.n.s. or face deportation. at the time i called for the program to be terminated. there were serious doubts if it would help us combat terrorism. terrorism experts have since concluded that special registration wasted homeland security resources and, in fact, alienated patriotic arab-americans and american muslims. more than 80,000 people registered under that program, more than 13,000 were placed in deportation proceedings. even today many innocent arabs and muslims face deportation beca

have a constitution on the line by saying no more money in politics or very very limited mccain feingold which was bipartisan and it was supported by both parties because republicans don't like the fact that they have to spend a half a day down you're dialing for dollars begging for money either mccain feingold said twenty two hundred dollars is the limit the tillman act passed in one thousand and seven by teddy roosevelt another good republican said if a corporation gives money to a politician it's a felony people go to prison. let's go back to this it worked and you can't you can't regulate people's ability to participate in the process with with the tools and resources that we have available just going to an oligarchy well but no what you have to do is fight it i a have built two giant political organizations with an average contribution of less than fifty dollars raise millions of dollars but i have to do i go out of citizens united no i did that after citizens you know get it i can go out and i can people i'm going to because i have grassroots and i have a real message it does help

i spent a week trying to get people like barney frank and ru russ feingold.ave a serious debate, argument about foreign policy, national security, which i think is very important. should not be put aside simply on behalf of all the economic issues, entitlement reform, obama care and everything else. i think the ajc poll shows romney doing better among jewish voters than mccain. obama beat mccain in the era of hope and change. 3 1/2 years ago. 72-28 among jewish voters if you allocate undecideds, in the ajc poll it looks like 68-32, 69-31 split among jews this time. if romney can do much better among the country as he looks like he will do among jewish voters he will beat president obama which i think will be a good thing for the country. >> barney. you will have extra time. >> thank you. let me acknowledge the -- the rueful compliment that bill paid me, regretting that i wasn't dumb enough to challenge the p it is only, my refusal to run against the president that would endanger the chances of the public policy i want being accepted. i guess that is just one

my senate i'm sorry but the entire thing i mean i think not only should be struck down but mccain feingold should be brought back which would have said to that corporate lobbyist you can spend two thousand dollars you can spend half a million. setting the setting the price at two thousand dollars so i'm doing a fine here it's a job yeah well it's a very unpopular case i think it's somewhat mischaracterized but in my view citizens united is about more speech is about more speech being out there i think that the idea that the americans need to be somehow sheltered from critical thinking is wrong and i understand there's some things that i understand there can be abuses but there can always be abuses with speech and when you have that you need more speech not less i mean what you're talking about is restricting speech i believe that it's it's a rightly decided case to mischaracterize what in the press and there in the present state of the union he really called out the court i thought that was right is astounding is that it is that traditionally it was conservatives like like ever dirksen and

principally the things conservatives don't like about mccain are the mccain/feingold bill, which they feel really trampled on the first amendment, and his stand on immigration. and there are some other things, too. but those are big public issues, which he took i leadership position on and thought he was wrong. so how can we trust him to do what we think he should do. by the same token, 80% conservative voting record in the senate, surrounded himself with people like jack kemp, frank keating, sam brownback, ted olson, a whole number of other people who are very staunchly conservative people. so where do you go? if people get down to the election and they say, do i want john mccain picking the next three or four supreme court justices? or shall we leave it up to hillary clinton or barack obama, my guess is they'll largely say john mccain. >> are you going to sit this one out? >> no. i'm not really a political -- i'm not involved in everyday politics. but i don't think i'll sit it out. >> and finally, as a conservative, would you rather run against hillary clinton or barack obama? >> th

that's caused a former member senator russ feingold -- he said it makes it easier for corporate democrats to join with corporate republicans to destroy these programs. >> i don't think he understands what that is. what i believe is, the frame work of simpson/bold was a very important one. it took a harsh look at all of our spending. our defense spending. it had the proper balance between cuts and revenues that we have to have. what i didn't like was what it said about social security, but that could be handled separately. to extend its life. what this is about, though, the creation of jobs, how do we do is that? a balance between establishing our priorities, making cuts, making sure we're investing in the future and bringing in some revenue, our members have been -- we stuck with the president on the grounds that he had last year, he and speaker agreed to but the speaker walked away from. >> he said that the president upped the ante. >> that's simply not true. >> if this election is about the economy, the republicans are going to win. >> the fact is, this election, if it is about the econ

the bite from russ feingold said this is not the wisconsin we know and we need to move away from theular election. >> they got a million signature for recall. that is significant. right now, the temperature is shifting toward walker. >> some of the democratic groups withdrawing their ads to look at a loss coming up. i love the way the democrats are now trying to discount the importance of the election. this is their third shot on the issue. they want to make an example of walker because they know people they have been living high on the hog with the corrupt deal, contract with politicians for half a century. walker challenge if he is winning. they had one election in court in wisconsin, did not succeed. recall in the senate, did not succeed. if they don't succeed here, three strikes and you're out. huge defeat. >> bret: we will be out there on june 4, june 5. take "special report" on road in madison. an walkeshaw, wisconsin. that's it for the panel. stay tuned to find out the latest trend in pet ownership. blan [ tires squeal, engine revs ] ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] not everything pow

for a long time on campaign reform and we had a hand in the bi-partisan campaign react, the mccain feingoldill and we have worked with others to come up with a new way of dealing with this processes to empower small donors even more which you can do and obama did a lot of this to transform the system four years ago. but now it's been completed superseded by what the court has done. the idea that the billionaires aside, the corporation should be treated the same as individuals when they have one motive to make money instead of the multiple motives that people have and that money equals speech and the more money, the better. when you can have these billionaires or corporations basically drowning out everybody else and in this instance we are going to see so much of this independent money coming in the canal dates are going to be unable buy the prime spots, themselves. they are going to be secondary figures in their own campaigns. this is insane and anthony kennedy and john roberts have given us a political system that is worse than the gilded age. >> the justices had an opportunity to revisit

in 2002 congress changed the mccainn it passed mccain feingold and added a new definition.ayments by a third-party for expenses of a candidate. the question is that the prosecution has to show that these payments which were clearly made by a third-party were made because of and related to the campaign. >> judge jeanine: but wait a minute. what we just heard from dylon was that bunny mellon new that what the money was being used for but we haven't heard that john edwards knew what the money was being used for. and isn't that the issue, ken? >> yeah, this money never went into the campaign. this money was never part of the campaign money. this money went outside the campaign. >> judge jeanine: so i want to go back to clita. the money didn't go to the campaign. how is the prosecution going to prove that they violated the campaign finance laws? >> that is actually he one of the charges that the prosecution. >> judge jeanine: i know what the charges are. >> the prosecution contends and government contends is this is money that should have gone through the campaign fund and there

remember, a couple years ago, senator feingold from wisconsin, congressman obeystar over in the house introduced the clean water preservation act, the clean water restoration act. remove the word navigable. now, in this act, it gave the federal government through the e.p.a. the jurisdiction over navigable water, and that was what the law was. they wanted to take out the word navigable. therefore, the e.p.a. would have jurisdiction over all land in the united states. i mean, it's very simple. it was so -- so unfair that not only did we defeat the clean water restoration act, the people defeated senator feingold in wisconsin and congressman oberstar after they had been in for a long time. obviously, this is something that is not possible. it is overreach and everyone understands it. normally when the obama administration can achieve what they want through legislation, they do it through regulations. we see this in cap-and-trade right now. we see that the president tried to get legislation on cap-and-trade, which would have amounted to a $300 billion to $400 billion tax increase on the a

less than 50,000 votes between the two of them. '08 it obviously got away from republicans but then feingold scott walker wins in 2010. walker looks like he's going to hang on. >> narrowly ahead. >> hang on now. the romney folks will be very -- >> april. show the april battleground map and put it up. the ipad app, and we show seven pew toss-ups now, nevada, ohio, pennsylvania, virginia-others, we want to pace for the date-to-ta come out. you feel conventional wisdom shifting and i argue wisconsin out of the blue arguably and people want to put it in sort of a battleground negative, or even in middle of the gray. >> absolutely. >> and iowa, another one, while romney was ahead before, you could argue that -- back to even. >> sure. the economy in iowa is very strong too. >> looking at colorado, though, i've noticed there seems to be a lot of acknowledgement that romney's behind. >> oh, yeah. look, this is a state, sort of the socially moderate. >> look at you. >> socially moderate upscale outdoor outdoorsy, pro-environment, culturally more liberal than moderate, put michael bennett back in offi

expected to lend support z mayor tom barett's corner, debbie waserman-shults, former senator russ feingold. so stay with us forer

what's most ironic about this is that 10 years ago, before the mccain-feingold legislation, the pieceon, that's what created this current system. so now you have all the people that are responsible for the current regime complaining about the regime that they actually created through campaign finance reform 10 years ago. it's truly bizarre but it's very, very -- >> arthel: can you rebutt in 20 seconds? >> what i think is truly bizarre and truly ironic is a lot of the funders to crossroads are actually bankers in wall street so kind of the idea that you're putting out ads that are trying to connect obama to wall street doesn't make any sense. >> arthel: got to go, you guys. we'll see you next time. >> thanks. >> gregg: some shocking new details surrounding the 1979 death of a little boy in new york city. the sisters of the man now under arrest possibly knew something about the crime many, many years ago. and this woman is 104 years old, proud american who served her country during world war ii coming up. her war stories on this memorial day weekend. >> everybody tells me you look great

. >> and they can spend in the 30 day window that used to be banned by mccain feingold.someone comes in late and you're running for congress and someone three weeks before election day goes a $400,000 ad buy, you're in trouble. >> it could make a difference. and it was along free speech lines. a couple months later, then established speech now, another decision -- actually, something else was established. so then you have the whole idea that you can organize together, you can come together under one particular name and buy ads and spend limited amounts of money. you've got into the state where you're not supposed to coordinate. romney ran up against this particular group, ricketts group, which i think it was going to be called something like character matters. they were going to do a new super pack called that. and then you've got these other groups -- >> freelance. >> freelancing. you don't have control. that could be a good thing. you could say oh, that doesn't represent me. >> well, that's steve's point. >> and, also, this money, i think so for that chart that you sho

we have had mccain/feingold, and lugar/kerry and graham/lieberman and you could call them the butch cassidy things done. and i want to listen to kerry on lugar. he had something to say about this guy who had been his kind of moderation buddy. >> he refused to allow this march to unorthodoxy without ideology to get in the way of what is the responsibility of the senator an indeed the need of the country to have people come together and find the commonground. >> speaking of senators thrown out in part around this moderation question, let's bring in former pennsylvania senator arlen specter who represented his years for 30 years in the senate, first as a republican and then later as a democrat, and the and the author of "life among the cannibals." and that sort of title tells you about what is in the book. yu went through this yourself, and you were known as a contrarian, but your decision to break with your party and vote for the president's stimulus package cost you your seat. are you the exception to this, or are you the rule? >> no. that is what is happening in washington today, melissa. t

it's getting back to that neck and neck spot that it was after the primaries and also you have russ feingoldong the progressive base. and there is a new ad campaign going up, you know, the problem, i think, so far has been there hasn't been enough ads on the air for tom barrett and actually for months and months, walker had a huge advantage and it's just an enormous money advantage. so it's money against people. but at some point, barrett has to go on the air. he has just started to do so now. that could be decisive. >> i know one big question, matt, has been whether or not the dnc -- i know -- we know the republican super p.a.c.s are all over this thing and the koch brothers and all of the special interests supporting-to-scott walker. a question about what the dnc would do. i don't know whether you had a chance to hear but just in the last segment, brad woodhouse, communications director of the dnc was on the program. i want to play for you a clip because i challenged brad about wisconsin. let's listen and get your response. >> we absolutely are supporting tom barrett. remember the dnc and

spent about a week trying to get people like barney frank and russ feingold to challenge obama in theat work as well as my attempt to get jews to vote republican in the past. but look, we'll have a serious debate, a serious argument about foreign policy, about national security which i think is very, very important. it should not be put aside simply on behalf of the economic issues but also about and, reforms, about obamacare and everything else, and they do think your poll, the ajc poll shows romney doing considerably better than most jewish voters and mccain. obama beat mccain in the air of hope and change it country. change. if romney can do much better among the whole country, as it looks like is going to do among jewish voters, he will be the president obama which it would be a good thing for the country. >> no, thank you. party. you will have extra time. >> thank you. let me acknowledge the compliment bill paid me by regretting that i wasn't dumb enough to -- [laughter] it is only my refusal to run against the president in a way that would endanger the chances of the public poli

i spent about a week to try to get people like barney frank and russ feingold to challenge obama in the primaries that worked about as well as my thames to get used to vote republicans. we will have a serious discussion and debate about foreign policy. this should not be put aside on behalf of the economic issues, but also entitlement reforms, obama care. i think that your poll shows romney doing considerably better than mccain among jewish voters. obama pete mccain, 72-28. if you allocate the undecided, it looks something like 68-32, 69-31 split among jews this time. if romney can do much better on the whole country as he looks like he's going to do among jewish voters, he will be president obama, which i think would be a good thing for the country. >> thank you. let me acknowledge the room full complement bill paid me by saying that i was not dumb enough to challenge the president. it is only my refusal to run against the president in a way that would endanger the public policy that would like accepted. that is one more case where i try not to live up to be stereotyped people use rega

absolute ignorance of what happens in politics struck down" -- he was reversio referring toe mccain-feingold campaign finance law -- "that there would be a flood of money into campaigns unaccounted for and this is exactly what is happening." senator mccain, is it ever? in the 2010 midterm elections, the first after citizens united, there was more than a fourfold increase in expenditures from superpacs and other outside groups compared to 2006. with near three-quarters of political advertising coming from sources were prohibited from spending money in 2006. also in 2010, 501-c-4 and c-6 not-for-profit organizations, spent more than $135 million in unlimited and secret contributions. this anonymous secret spending rose from 1% of outside spending in 2006 to 44% in 2010. we are already seeing the influence of money on the 2012 elections. super pacs and other outside groups spent around $140 million in this election cycle. that's about twice of what was spend during the same period in 2008 during the last presidential election. in the two weeks leading up to super tuesday, outside pacs that supp

i spent about a week trying to get people like arnie frank and russ feingold to challenge obama to the primaries and that worked as well as my attempts to get jews to vote republican in the past. we will have a serious debate, a serious argument about foreign-policy and national security which i think it's very important. it should not be put aside simply on behalf of economic issues but also about entitlement reforms and about obamacare and everything else. i do think you're a ajc poll shows romney doing considerably better among jewish voters than mccain. obama beat mccain in the era of open chain -- hope and change among jewish voters. you allocate the undecideds proportionately in the ajc poll it looks something like 68-32, 69-31 split among jews this time so if romney can do much better among the whole country as he looks like he is going to do among jewish voters he will be president obama which i think will be a good thing for the country. >> bill, thank you. barney, you will have extra time. >> thank you. let me acknowledge the roof will calm for -- complement the bill paid me

>> well in 2010 when barrett ran against walker, he did absolutely as well as russ feingold against his opponent. they both lost in a republican wave. there is very little evidence that barrett was particularly a terrible candidate or anything. many people thought he ran a softer campaign than was necessary. in part, i think that's hindsight because things have gotten so ugly in wisconsin that now people say well why didn't you run like your life depended on it. people didn't anticipate scott walker would go the way he did. now you look at where the polling is today and what i can tell you is pretty remarkable. when this process started out all of the democratic contenders were well behind scott walker in the polls. as it has gone along the democratic contenders have all gotten closer to scott walker. the fascinating thing is that scott walker has declined. he spent $21 million since january and yet his approval ratings have gone from 51% in january to 47% today. and so there's a lot of evidence to suggest that the nominee is really in a position to potentially beat walker and the last