krystal?tion because the fact of the matter is over a million women use birth control for purely medical purposes, nothing to do with contraception and in fact if he had bothered to listen to sandra's testimony, you would know that what she was talking about was a friend who had to lose an ovary because she couldn't afford birth control and sure insurance wouldn't cover it. that is what this is about. the other piece i'll throw in, even if this was just about contraception, bill o'reilly and all the right wing guys are pro-life, against abortions as we all are. guess what the best way to prevent abortion? have access to contraception. >> the president called sandra fluke, that took the story to a new level. o'reilly seems to be defending and siding with rush limbaugh tonight. >> well, of course he is, what do cowards do, they stick together. it's important we remember, they are trying to reduce sandra and this story to this is about sexual activity and sexual habits when it's not. just in the

he's still on the theme, krystal.acrifice, he doesn't get off that and talks about if you make a million or $250,000 below that you won't get hit. >> it's because it's something that resonates with americans. it resonates with american values. his whole speech is centered around a very optimistic message, a can-do message of we won't accept what is. the other thing that struck me about this is this was a speech at a fund-raiser, in front of his base, that was who was there. and yet you could play that speech anywhere in america and it's a message that resonates with americans across the country and that is something that in contrast to the republicans, is quite striking because their message has been so limit and so far to the right, talking about contraception and now rick santorum wants to ban porn, that it just doesn't connect with most american people. >> richard wolffe, the story that came out to the day the treasure trove that was part by seal team 6 revealed osama bin laden wanted to take out president obama an

and they win awards for it. >> krystal, what is your response to that? >> his whole approach is to make excuses rather than taking responsibility for his own actions. in his apology, to say that this was a poor choice of words and he has only apologized for using the word slut and prostitute, what alternate words would he have used, harlot or lady of the night been better? there is irresponsibility for the hateful words over the past 20 years of his career. if this was an isolated incident it would be one thing, clearly there is a pattern that needs to stop. >> he is not used to apologizing. in fact on his show today i listen to some of it i'm on the air at the same time, i listened to some of it and he's in in chartered territory. he's unstable how he should handle this because he doesn't know. rush limbaugh argued, terry, that sandra fluke is a contraception activist. and this was an attempt by democrats to change the subject from religious liberty tonight. moments ago bill o'reilly made the same argument. is that going to work? >> no, it's not. they a

krystal, let me tee it up back to you.ave been making a lot of news with this whole idea that we're debating of contraception in the 21st century. when these issues we thought were settled 40 years ago is shocking. but i have been hearing on our own network that you have been getting some traction getting advertisers ginned up to pull their ads from rush limbaugh after the slutty remarks he's been making. it seems to be the mattress companies pulling their ads first. should we make anything a about the fact it's the bedding companies that are most uncomfortable with this? >> i will add that this is unconfirmed, but auto zone is also pulling their ad. it's not just the bed companies. it's interesting that so many mattress companies advertise with rush limbaugh. but his remarks about sandra fluke calling her a slut, a prostitute, saying she should be compelled to release sex tapes have touched a nerve. he hit it this time. this has been a part of a series of events that have really got women, like myself, upset. we had komen

i'm joined by krystal ball and i want to know how this is playing in the middle of the country. we're joined by ohio state senator nina turner, great to have both of you with us tonight. krystal, i want to ask you first, isn't this about mitt romney, his leadership -- i think axelrod knocked it out of the park and the obama campaign made this an issue about leadership, what do you think? >> i think axelrod was too kind in his comments. to me, this is disqualifying. mitt romney has granddaughters and he can't even take the step of condemning calling a young woman a slut and prostitute and demanding her sex tapes. >> what about mrs. romney? is she concerned about this at all? when you have the president of the united states call sandra fluke, when you have questions from the media to the president at the press conference about this, we'll get to that in a moment how can the republicans say he's an entertainer. that what is they're saying. >> you know what this reminds me of, there was a moment in the campaign trail when a woman was spouting off about obama's a muslim and john mcca

from the politico news room, joe williams and krystal ball. david, i have to start with you. mitt romney in this republican race has had more roles than jack nicholson. rehad the oil loving nascar fan.

. >>> the latest on the boycott with krystal ball and politics with ohio senator lena turner. >> i believe it will be impossible for a moderate to win the general election. >> push is coming to shove in the disasterous republican primary. sam stein and bob shrum on the super tuesday aftermath. >> game change ii is starting to write itself. >> i wouldn't close that door, and my plan is to be at the convention. >> richard wolffe on the latest palin-sanity. >> the right wing conspiracy theorists get scooped. >> e.j. dionne joins us. >>> republicans just can't bring themselves to criticize rush limbaugh in any way, shape or form. the gop candidates have been so critical of president obama but they will not condemn out rainous attacks by a commercial talk show host. mitt romney punted on his first chance to address rush limbaugh. he was given a second chance and ran away from it again. >> my campaign is about jobs and the economy and scaling back the size of government and i'm not going to weigh in on that particular controversy. >> not going to weigh in on it. romney says he's not going to wei

joining us now our panel, karen finn finney, julian epstein and krystal ball. how many times have we polished the jewels only to find that romney can't be crowned. is he going to be the prince charles of the republican race? >> maybe she should stop talking about the birds and the bees and the flowers and the trees. >> and the dna. >> here is the problem he's going to have. he cannot close that enthusiasm gap. he's been consistent. i'll give him that. he hasn't improved as a candidate. he hasn't really picked up support. the irony here that the republican party wants this race to end sooner rather than later because his negatives are going up and because it's hurting their party when i'll give credit to my democrats, last cycle while we had a tough contested primary, everybody's numbers went up. >> that is a big difference. julian is this just about ohio? if santorum loses there, can he show off wins in other states and make a legitimate argument he's in the race. >> probably not. he's starting to trail in some of the southern states as well. i think this is a

back with me joy ann reed, krystal ball, and jim van dehie.harsh in the portrayal of palin? >> no, you're spot on. i think the reality is what was devastating. she was put in to a position she clearly wasn't ready for because of a really pathetic vetting process by the mccain people, and at the time john harris and i wrote that the pick, if you knew the backstory of how she got picked, was disqualifying for mccain. in some ways you leave the movie feeling bad for palin because she was ill quipped and nobody bothered to figure it out and they tossed her in there because she had all this celebrity appeal. they wanted the select appeal because they thought they couldn't win the election. so it's devastating for palin because the reality itself was devastating. >> we've all seen it. joy ann, did you think she came across as a more sympathetic figure? did you find yourself feeling sorry for sarah palin? >> i thought the parts that portrayed her as a mother were compelling and positive for her. that was about it. other than that she came across as s

joining me now is krystal ball and michael eric dyson. welcome. you are going up against one of most vile individuals in the media. advertisers are falling aside and yet rush is saying it's not hurting him at all. >> i think you may have uncovered something in your lead in. maybe he's a democrat plant. maybe obama should have put him there 27 years ago. look how its all unfolding. their whole line of attack is ridiculous. you can't defend the statements that limbaugh made. they are indefensible. they can't let it go. they have to find some way to spin this. the first attack was the people who are calling out limbaugh are hypocrites. the second is this bizarre, pathetic conspiracy theory which is nonsenseic larks. he's lost 50 advertisers but businesses, mainstream businesses are looking at the landscape and saying we don't want anything to do with this guy. we have a lot of places to take our ad dollars. we don't need to be here endorsing this. >> wen he says he's not bothered by this and it's like losing a couple of french fries. >> i don't know

teray, john heilman, krystal ball. you for joining me tonight. >>> ohio senator nina turner fighting the republican crackdown on contraception, introducing a bill that would require men to pass certain tests in order to obtain viagra, including a test of exactly how hard it is for them to function without viagra. >>> and what hath limbaugh rot? rush limbaugh highlighted a need for a women's voice in our politics. >>> and an exclusive tonight. the director about the just released documentary about president obama's first term, "the road we've traveled." davis guggenheim is here. [ male announcer ] this is lawn ranger -- eden prairie, minnesota. in here, the landscaping business grows with snow. to keep big winter jobs on track, at&t provided a mobile solution that lets everyone from field workers to accounting, initiate, bill, and track work in real time. you can't live under a dome in minnesota, that's why there's guys like me. [ male announcer ] it's a network of possibilities -- helping you do what you do... even bet

teray, john heilman, krystal ball. thank you for joining me tonight. >>> ohio senator nina turner fighting the republican crackdown on contraception, introducing a bill that would require men to pass certain tests in order to obtain viagra, include ing a test of exactly how hard it is for them to function without viagra. >>> and what hath limbaugh rot? rush limbaugh highlighted a need for a women's voice in our politics. >>> and an exclusive tonight. the director about the just released documentary about president obama's first term, "the road we've traveled." davis guggenheim is here. [ male announcer ] with six indulgently layered desserts, all at 150 calories or less, there's definitely a temptations for you. unless you're one of those people who doesn't like delicious stuff. temptations. it's the first jell-o that's just for adults. who doesn't like delicious stuff. ♪ pop goes the world ♪ it goes something like this ♪ everybody here is a friend of mine ♪ ♪ everybody, tell me, have you heard? ♪ ♪ pop goes the world

a georgia restaurant has d a sandwich that pokes krystal brown and rihanna that a lot of customers are chef richard miley of chops & and failedkinsville this sandwich of the week. they said that chris brown will be you up for eating a sandwich. number of customers were outraged. says that he has no regrets and that it will donate from the sale of the sandwich to an organization dedicated to stopping domestic violence. for bobbyrouble brown. zia's been arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence. chp said that he was arrested yesterday afternoon in the san "rango" valley. afternger was pulled over him talking on cellphone if without hands for unit and the appear to be -- he appeared to be impaired. >> tonight marks the first elimination for the new season of dancing. jbc shows us which stars ived on the dance floor and danger of are in going home. >> rochon fegan and his partner quickstep. the katherine jenkins and her partner got the same score with the giants. >> it was my alter ego. i don't remember anything. i came up and i said how did go? a> do you feel like trophy?r for

krystal ball, the reason for optimism.s not just talking about warmer weather. >>> as we head to break a sure sign of spring at the white house. mom and baby ducklings, back taking up residence, look at that. not in this economy. we also have zero free time, and my dad moving in. so we went to fidelity. we looked at our family's goals and some ways to help us get there. they helped me fix my economy, the one in my house. now they're managing my investments for me. and with fidelity, getting back on track was easier than i thought. call or come in today to take control of your personal economy. get one-on-one help from america's retirement leader. ♪ you make me happy [ female announcer ] choose the same brand your mom trusted for you. children's tylenol, the #1 brand of pain and fever relief recommended by pediatricians and used by moms decade after decade. i toog nyguil bud i'm stild stubbed up. [ male announcer ] truth is, nyquil doesn't un-stuff your nose. really? [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus liquid gels fights y

we turn to our panel, krystal ba ball. welcome to you both. apologies to darrell issa for being women. you and i were live on air when this whole thing erupted. both of us were disgusted. you decided to take action. what have you done? >> i got on twitter and i started voicing my concerns there. then, someone suggested to me the idea of let's put some pressure on his advertisers. the reason this guy is on air is because companies are sponsoring this vile trash. say to them, do you support these comments. if not, pull your ads. we are not going to patronize your companies until you do so. we started a twitter hashtag boycott o rush. this morning we launched a petition at boycottrush.org. it's really in its infancy. it has close to 10,000 signatures. this has struck a nerve. >> sleep train mattress said we don't condone negative comments directed toward any group. in response, we are pulling our ads with rush limbaugh and a second advertiser is also withdrawn. it's having an effect. >> that's right. select comfort said they will be pulling ads.

krystal ball is an msnbc contributor and joe williams is white house reporter for politico.ut rush limbaugh and the larmer question about a republican war on women. here is what he had to say. listen to this. >> i believe that democrats have a better story to tell to women about how we're going to solidify the middle class and grow this economy, make sure everybody has a fair shot, everybody's doing their fair share and we got a fair set of rules that everybody has to follow. >> the president also said that he did not want his daughters, if they chose to speak about democracy, to be hue mittuated and attacked in this way. has the president humiliated republicans who have refused to stand up and out right con deem rush limbaugh. >> i think by providing a contrast of class and grace and respect for women he has humiliated republicans. i'm proud the way this president personally called sandra fluke and spoke out on her behalf. one key thing that the president mentioned too is that women care about what's going won the committee. they care about their pocketbook issues. they don

krystal.picable and disgusting and coming from a loathsome individual who has no idea the class and the courage that it took for her to testify. don't forget, he obviously, did not listen to her testimony or doesn't care what was in her testimony because what she spoke about is a friend who lost an ovary because she could not afford birth control. this isn't just about contraception. this is about women's health. he should keep it up because he's making our case for us about how extreme and ob noxious the republican position is. >> we know that rush limbaugh is a particularly individual, but what do you think he means by he wants to watch students use the contraception pill? >> i have no idea. >> can you speculate? >> i'm not going to go into speculate or try to get inside the head of rush limbaugh or why he would say deplorable comments like that about a college student who is talking about something not just contraception but women's health. i'm really troubled and sadnded by the coursening

back with us, krystal ball, john capehart.eement reached but how do you think that conversation went between mr. romney and mr. gingrich? >> well, it's kind of one of those things. what does newt exactly bring to the table, right? his many endorsements? his many financial backers? what exactly -- >> he brings the much coveted herman cain endorse many. the sarah palin endorsement. what does he have to offer mitt romney? and for romney, he is not convinced that he is not better off having newt in the race, dividing up the conservative vote. that's out very well for him. >> i'm wondering whether he said, stay in, stay in. even though you've run out of money. >> i wonder if what newt gingrich offers is convention peace. can you imagine, you're the presumptive nominee and you go into tampa not knowing whether you're actually going to leave tampa as the nominee? and newt gingrich as we all know has the capacity for mischief. >> he's crazy enough to do it. >> but joe, even his friends are calling for him to throw in the towel includi

from the politico news room, joe williams and krystal ball. david, i have to start with you. mitt romney in this republican race has had more roles than jack nicholson. rehad the oil loving nascar fan. now the southern boy who loves his cheesy grits. given jack's marvelous role, i'm beginning to wonder if he's suffering multiple personality disorder given the amount of pandering he's having to do. >> i'm surprised he haven't started talking about vermin hunting. i don't buy bread, but i know lots of owners of the agra businesses. is he going to end up squealing like a pig. >> stop. >> i'm sorry. this race is landing itself more to mockery than political analysis. >> how could you imagine that, david? >> i watch the video clips of all the shows afterwards and we end up laughing more than discussing because it's so absurd for rom not to talk like anything other than the most elite upper 1% and newt gingrich with his grand yoesty becomes larger. he does look like the character in deliverance. >> the polls in alabama and mississippi have romney, santorum and gingrich all very clo

so go ahead, krystal. >> i was actually wondering.ed that you feel like our students don't learn very well by wrote. they are encouraged to ask questions from an early age. i was wondering if you could speak to that. i feel differently. i feel our education is quite outdated and focuses too much on that learning. do you see reforms that are encouraging or we need to push forward in that direction? >> well, i think we're going in the right direction where we're holding teachers accountable. at some point, we'll pay teachers differently. what we're doing is going in a way where technology can be used so it's individualized learning. some kids are video. some are audio. but in terms of our culture, our culture is a good one for education. we just don't do wrote. some people are upset about standardized tests. but the asian culture are not create cannive -- >> hold on. but you have just gone on national television and written off asia as a singular event, which i suspect a lot of asians might object to your willingness to silo them as lac

brian rooney tells the troubled tale of the krystal cathedral. steve hartman watches the ultimate spring cleaner at work and more, but first here are the headlines for this sunday morning the 18th of march, 2012. puerto rico holds its republican primary today. romney campaigned there yesterday and then went to illinois which holds its delegate rich primary on tuesday. the arab spring arrived in syria a year ago today, and 12 months and thousands of deaths later, the uprising continues despite a brutal government crackdown. explosions in damascus killed 27 people yesterday. this morning, a car bombing was reported in the city of allepo. also this morning an american teacher was shot dead in yemen by two gunmen on a motor psyche. it's unclear why he was targeted or who the killers might be. the retired ohio auto worker who was convicted of war crimes as a guard at a nazi death camp during world war 2 has died in a nursing home in germany. he was 91. nasa yesterday released video of the northern lights taken from the international space station earl

krystal. >> in some states it's going to be a problem. >> i think throughout the season it's sharpened romney. he's much stronger. his positions have been stronger, he's been stronger on entitlements and come wupg a tax plan. i think it's going to help in the general election. >> jimmy, can i -- >> thank you. john harwood made the comment that the campaign was hard. how is he going to bring the republicans together and be successful as perhaps barack obama was? >> well, think, you know, listen. when i talk to republicans and conservatives, look at the past two weeks. we've seen the president. we've seen a brand-new book, the president wants to get rid of all the bush tax cuts and raise taxes on everybody. i think the fear of that second obama term when he doesn't have to worry about second re-electi re-election, think that more than anything that mitt romney do is going to reunite republicans and conservativings to vote strongly in the poll and vote for whoever the republican is which is mitt romney, most likely or rick santorum. >> that'

. >> when it comes to the death of a loved one, krystal o'reilly is clear about reality, especially durings time of year. as she awaits trial for two bank robberies she allegedly committed to support a drug habit, she thinks about her two sons. 2-year-old maddox is being raised by her mother. her first son cameron was born with significant birth defects and died soon after. then her fiance died shortly afterwards from a drug overdose. >> i lost two of the most important people in my life in less than a year's time. at that point, nothing mattered, absolutely nothing. it didn't matter that i was pregnant, didn't matter my family was so scared because they knew how i felt. nothing mattered. i just used. three years later, i still haven't forgiven myself. i don't know. usually i don't even cry when i talk about it. this is the first time i've actually had to, like, deal with it, without getting high because i've been using ever since. like my sally says to me all the time, feel, deal and heal. i haven't felt, i haven't dealt and damn sure haven't healed. >> as the anniversaries of both deaths

. >> you can't win unless you play and fill out those brackets along be way the joining us is krystal ball and jonathan capehart and david corn. good day to you all. we have a lot to talk about on this thursday. when we look at romney, he may not want to see saturday. we're going to missouri. we're going to see a high evangelical vote again. struck out on two major states this week. >> didn't we already have missouri, which we did. they have a strange caucusing and voting process. we saw how this played before. rick santorum resonated in missouri and did well. march is a very tough month for mitt romney not just because of the basketball and people recognizing just how much he doesn't relate, but because this is a string of challenging states. i think going in to illinois next week, he has very little momentum and that's going to be a critical state. >> talk about string of difficult states. david, we have louisiana and texas. two other states over to see evangelical votes. so far this year, nbc news has found he has not. romney has not won any state where evangelical votes have been

and i say how about you, krystal? people drink too much. quickly, quickly. >> when we bombed afghanistan, that made a lot of people in this country happy. when we attacked iraq, that made people happy. was that a good idea for us? >> are you saying the happy index is correlated to war? >> of course it is, but these are things we did policywise that made a lot of people happy. >> i have to move on. >> the policy things that are actually connected to happiness are employment and having a lot of social time, leaisure time. those are actual policy things that make us happy. >> do you know what makes me happy? this pen. you have to be a real man to pull that pen out, dylan. >>> the panel stays. we'll bring them back in a second and now on to something of less consequence, but we should be happy to be able to talk about it in a free way and organize ourselves to do something about it. attention to the newest campaign by our friends over at united republic looking to lock the revolving door in washington, d.c. where politicians leave. they go to t