john harris is editor in chief of politico and david corn is washington bureau chief for "mother jones" magazine and an msnbc political analyst. to greats on the show. thank you, david, thank you, john. a big day for polls today, and none more stunning than this new cnn opinion research poll that shows that newt gingrich has jumped from 8% to 22% in less than a month. he's now neck and neck at the top with mitt romney while herman cain has dropped more than ten points. so basically, a switcheroo, john harris. cain has lost his place to newt. what's happening? >> well, it shows that there is a group of shoppers in the republican party, who are shopping for anybody but mitt romney. that's been the case for the past six months. we've seen it, various people go up and down, as cain is now facing some trouble in polls. a politico/george washington poll found his support eroding, especially as people learn more about the sexual harassment allegations. we've seen them shopping for somebody else. newt is clearly the beneficiary of that. >> david corn, your thoughts on this? newt is generally c

covering the week, john harris of "politico," charles babington of the "associated press," jim tankersley of "national journal," and alexis simendinger of "real clear politics." >> award-winning reporting and analysis covering history as it happens. live from our nations capitol, this is "washington week with gwen ifill," produced in association with "national journal." corporate funding for "washington week" is provided by -- >> we know why we're here. to give our war fighters every advantage. >> to deliver technologies that anticipate the future today. >> and help protect america everywhere, from the battle space to cyberspace. >> around the globe the people of boeing are working together to give our best for america's best. >> that's why we're here! >> additional funding for "washington week" is provided by prudential financial, norfolk southern. the anenberg foundation, the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. once again, live from washington, moderator gwen ifill. gwen: good evening. last week we told you about

john harris is new politico in chief. it shows real vulnerability there. >> there is no question these really underscore both the challenges of the economy, andrea, as you mentioned, but also how that has created an overall sour mood for the country, and that's the climate in which this election is going to be taking place. the highest in the two-decade history. 75%, three out of four people say it's on the wrong track. that's just a real headwind that affects president obama, but i would say it also affects any politician including the republican who he is eventually going to run against. >> and john, early today you were monitoring a panel on ronald reagan on some cinematic abilities that he had and how that contributed to his ability to perform as president. there will be another reception on that tonight with some of the motion picture studio heads. in comparison to barack obama and his ability or inability to connect with people, retail, political skills, how did ronald reagan as an actor help contribute to his ability to campaign and win the election

. >> joining me now john harris, the editor in chief of politico that broke the cain story. thank you for joining us. >> sure thing, john. >> how long has politico been working on the story? >> about three weeks. it seems to me this first came to our attention. we did some reporting. then we brought what we with had learned, our early findings to the cain campaign. didn't get a response for several days and then did get a response. we did a lot more reporting after this and this went through a careful editing process. so all told we have been at this two, almost three weeks. >> john did this story come to "politico" from anyone associated with another republican presidential campaign? >> lawrence, as you can appreciate on a story this sensitive, one this carefully reported and edited, i'm going to stick at what was in the story and we do not say where this story came from. in our original "politico" story. i will say what came to us was a tip. it is not what i would call concrete evidence. the concrete evidence was amassed through reporting a lot of hard reporting by the key

joining us john harris. thanks for being with us, john. politico followed up the original reporting with information about the national restaurant association and its decision not to endorse herman cain's candidacy. what did you learn? >> well, there was discussion within the national restaurant association where herman cain is remembered fondly and supported by many members as whether or not to give an endorsement to their former ceo. that revived a bunch of stories and a bunch of controversies that have been dormant for, as you say, anderson, a dozen years, with some people saying, wait a minute. we are not so sure we want to be out there on that particular limb. >> because of these allegations? >> a contributing factor, that's correct. and that may well have been a contributing factor of why this sprang to life. >> there's been a lot of criticism of your reporting. there was a tough article calling to question the reporting on the story, basically saying there weren't enough details in the story and ones about the settlement agreements.

appeared at a fundraiser in southern california as well announcing a new fund raising team including john harrisf the harass ranch beef empire and john spanos of the san diego chargers. >>> meantime herman cain accusing perry of mounting a smear campaign against him after more allegations of sexual harassment. a third woman is now says cain invited her to his apartment after a meeting. a pollster who we should note works for perry says he saw cain come on to a woman at a restaurant. >> i would challenge anybody that has statements to be made to come forward with the person making the statements. face mr. cain. >> one of the women was actually paid not to do that. cain's chief of staff blames rick perry because a perry consultant who worked for cain was aware of the allegations. perry denies involvement. the latest polls before the allegations showed cain led the republican field with 30% of the vote. >>> coming up, a sad ending for a great white shark rescued in mon monterrey and then release. we have heard of the freshman 15, but does it exist? researchers say no. >> my hips say yes, scott. i h

editor in quheef john harris point by point says on the document nation, cain's charg m documentationdocuments, we did request to share those documents as i would a request for anyone asking for our reporting materials. this is their response to cain's comment that they didn't talk to the women involved. the cain campaign not aware of who we talked to. we are not in a position to tell them who our sources are and asking them to respond to cain's comment when cain's campaign asked politico for rival campaign leaked the information to them, john harris' response said we did respond by declining to answer. we don't share our sources. >> very evolving story, shall we say, we'll get back to you. we have more later coming up as well. brian todd reporting for us. get to jack cafferty with the "cafferty file." >> it's starting to get ugly when it comes to those occupy protests going on around the country. in oakland, california, violent protests succeeding in shutting down the fifth busiest port in the nation last night. officials used tear gas on protesters who refused to leave. hundreds thr

i do think the president is doing what he is supposed to do and john boehner and harry reid did what they could do. the problem is john boehner who i think has potential as a good speaker cannot control his caucus. he is afraid of the members of the tea party and that is the problem with the republican party is. it cannot allow people who are afraid of their own base. that is where the republicans are. tavis: you said three times the president will win. he will win in part because his campaign strategy as we know is going to be one of running against a do nothing congress. well that message sell? >> it worked for have read -- harry truman. people want change. this will be a choice. whoever the republicans nominate will have a record of running up enormous deficits. trying to blame obama for but the worst thing that will have to deal with is this side here. they thought it was more important for them to try to win the election and then it was to do something good for the country. the president will be effective in hammering home, he already has been. he has not been a great campaigner

as my editor, john harris, said, of course we want more detail and to do more reporting. that's what happened this eke. and obviously we printed what we could print last sunday. and of course we had multiple sources on this. a half a dozen actually, as we mentioned in the piece. now, as for the detail of it, we were dealing with sensitive, you know, sources. sensitive information here. >> yes. >> and so obviously we -- we tread delicately when it came to that. as you noted, though, in the build-up to the segment, during the course this week, "politico," my colleagues, "the new york times" and others, have gotten closer to this in terms of the detail of what happened. >> right. but you had to make -- let me interrupt. you had to make a go or no-go decision. i think in a lot of news organizations an editor would have said, you have done some terrific reporting, you have great leads here, but you don't have it. you can't have a quote of what he said to any of these women. you're obviously not able to name the women. you don't have the details of the sexually suggestive behav

let's dig deeper on newt gingrich and a lot more with the political editor in chief, john harris.van thomas, they describe the day they quit the gingrich campaign in their new digital book. part of the political playbook 2012 series. thanks for coming in. this is a whole new world for you, publishing books, digital books. it's not just putting stuff online. >> it's also part of a new world for publishing. the traditional model of publishing. more and more people are reading books on kindle, on their ipads and they want this kind of detail. much more in realtime. some o the events that mike and evan report on are just a couple of weeks old, but we're taking advantage of technology and of this tremendous hunger for more detail about behind the scenes detail about these campaigns. >> i've gone through the -- >> number 50, if you allow me to post. rising by the hour. >> it's going to be, after this interview, it will go up more quickly. let's look at some of the nuggets in there because some really great stuff. two great reporters. newt gingrich. the worst day when everyone quit in hi

reports tonight say talks between john boehner and harry reid have failed to produce a scaled back agreement. listen up if you are taking metro this weekend. the subway system stopped train service on parts of the blue and yellow lines at three stations in northern virginia. the station at crystal city, reagan national airport were closed last night. now they'll be reopened in time for the monday morning commute. >> coming up later on 9news now tonight. >> the bleachers going up and down and being the loudest place to play in the nfl, it was awesome. >> legendary redskins come back home to celebrate rfk stadium. we'll take you there. >> i don't know what to say. i have never seen that before. >> oh my gosh, my husband would love that. >> i want to know where i'm putting my golf clubs. >> we'll tell you what they are talking about. a new product that may stop baggage fees. >> a nice day on sunday. mild temperature headed this way. here's a look at your wakeup weather. increasing clouds. by 11:00, we'll be mind. 54 to 59 degrees. i have your seven-day >>> did you know that on any given day in

this is from john harris, the editor in chief of politico.he point they didn't document this, plit politico says we declined a request to share the documents. on cain's claim that politico didn't talk to the women, politico says this. the cain campaign is not aware of who we talked to. we're not in a position to tell them who our sources are. cain also said that politico would not divulge to them who leaked the story to them. politico said we did respond by declining to answer. we don't share our sources. so a lot of push back between politico and the cain cam pain. >> interesting. so a statement could come today. and if a statement is to come, we still will not know the identity of that person which one would have to then think this is still going to add more fuel to the fire. >> yes, it probably will. and a lot is going to depend on what that statement says. it's one page. you can get a lot on a page. we're going to see if there are any specifics about this alleged incident. we don't believe there will be too many because there was a confid

later, the president of the alzheimer's association, harry johns, talks about a new report on the disease. that is live at 7:00 a.m. eastern here on c-span. sunday on c-span, newspapers, with the grover norquist, president of americans for tax reform, on the deficit reduction debate. that is at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. on c-span. >> in his new autobiographical narrative, decorated veteran and best-selling author karl marlantes comes to terms with his posttraumatic stress disorder decades after vietnam. >> i started telling this guy about my symptoms. jumping up in the middle of the night and running outside without knowing what was going on. you know, a car would honk behind me and i would get out of my own and just attack the car behind me. and he said to me, have you ever been in a war? and that hit me so hard. in the middle of this room, 80 people, i started bawling, snot coming out of my nose. if you have ever been in a war -- it was that simple. and when he got me back into some semblance of control, he said, you've got ptsd, have you ever heard about it? and i said no. >> sunday nig

john boehner, harry reid. you saw the way forward with the poison pill and the surtax, that's not going to go anywhere. basically it comes down to what you have to do in the house before the end of the year. you have government funding that runs out around december 16th. we have to figure out a funding bill by then? you have the medicare doc fix which delays cuts that doctors will get from medicare and the payroll tax extension and unemployment benefits. all those add $300 billion from the deficit. so, the question becomes, what is going to be involved in these negotiations and what are democrats going to have to give up to get the unemployment benefits. >> let's talk about the give ups. what's out there that democrats seem to be willing to give up in trading off for this payroll tax? >> the thing we heard the rumors all along is that perhaps you lesson the cut to the defense programs that would be targeted by the sequester. >> they want to go for the sequester. >> that's something that we heard. john boehner

. >> john boehner and harry reid met for 40 minutes to discuss the super committee.f there is not mcconnell census, we talk about the trigger in the law set to go in. the cuts that would automatically according to the law written happen. $600 billion cut from defense and $600 billion from the domestic spending. this is what the defense secretary said about the defense part, in a letter to herman cain. rough estimates suggest after ten years of the cut we'd have the smallest ground force since 1940, smallest number of ships since 1915, the smallest air force in the history. of course, we heard the lawmakers saying that is not going to happen. what about the super committee? let's bring in the panel. steve hayes for "weekly standard." a.b. stoddard of the hill. and syndicated columnist charles krauthammer. steve, a lot of back-and-forth today. optimism on one side and analysis it could be kicking the can down the road. what is your take? >> that is the question. what should you feel? optimistic or pessimistic. i'm pessimistic. think about the latest proposal from the s

he's twice won the pulitzer prize for harry chairman and john on this. out of the relative neglect that they had received compared to the president's that preceded and succeeded. after all, john adams is president between church rushing 10 and thomas jefferson. harry truman between you and clint roosevelt and. all are accounted figures, and history at a new icon who humanized history. and he is also celebrated the human stories behind great event that the building of the panama canal, the brooklyn bridge and also a historic tragedies like the johnstown flood. david mccullough is our season chronicler. his latest book is the greater journey, americans in paris. the 19th century story of americans turning back across the atlantic to discover the science, the art and learning of the old world, even at a time when other americans were churning physically to this specifics to discover national resources, national beauty of challenges of the american frontier. america was opening up a new world physically in the west while in reaching itself culturally and int

." >> the editor in chief there john harris.rning. >> hello, willie. >> this is great stuff. the nixon tapes. the presidential library releasing a 45-minute recording in which president nixon gave his firsthand account of a may 9th visit to the war memorial in 1970 where he actually confronted some vietnam war protesters. let's listen to it. >> my goals in vietnam were the same as theirs, to stop the killing and the war. to bring peace. one spoke up and said i hope you realize that we're willing to die for what we believe in. i said, i certainly realize and said candidly and honestly that i didn't have the answer. that i knew that young people today were searching as i was searching 40 years ago. >> so, john, what do we learn about these tapes that have all come out? >> well, you know, willie, we are so tired of the bitterness and the anger and the conspiracy theorys that sort of blame the messenger politics today. it is nice to go back to a more innocent time like the nixon administration where everybody just -- where politics

. >> dan has a history with harry dalton. johnaugh will assemble his team for its first practice since sunday's game. i doubt he us to remind his team what it means to head to seattle on sunday and take your business. dear ravens lost to tennessee after the big win over houston and the loss to jackson appeared the two ravens will leave for seattle on friday. how about the play? joe flacco to torrey smith. the biggest regular-season win and i can't remember. >> huge. -- the biggest regular-season win i can remember. >> a major tax hike is looming over maryland. triple the water and sewage tax. >> instant karma in wisconsin. woman saved the life of a man who came to her aid. >> it will be another nice day today. we will see some rain moving over the next 24 hours. >> we have an accident in the dundalk region. another one in essex. >> a gas main break in locust point continues to affect hundreds of people. >> allegations of sexual harassment continued to loom over herman cain's campaign. latest is coming up. >> should he stay or shou

ed harris is john mccain. >> heilemann: yes. >> smith: julianne moore is sarah palin. >> heilemann: yes harrelson is steve schmidt. >> heilemann: yes. >> smith: .mccain's consultant. who's playing obama? >> heilemann: there's no barack obama. >> smith: he's not even in there? you didn't do will smith,,i mean.? >> heilemann: no, i think, they decided the, the guy jay roach, the director, and danny strong the screenwriter. they did, did the ilm for us. they mmde the decision that in a two hour movie, they needed a tellscope on something. and they were very attracted tooreally telling the sarah palin story. and so the movie is really about palin and mccain and the 60 ays between her selection as vice president. >> smith: right. >> heilemann: .as the vicee3 president nominee on the republican side and the election day 2012. so there's no john edwards, there's no hillary clinton, there's no barack obama. i mean they appear. joe bbden appears in like news footage and, and stuff. but in terms of the actual, the, the action is really. >> smith: and, and the storylinee ú&'s really fooused on tha