mark halperin is in washington.on's own mark halperin who actually got in three words last hour. we're going to let him talk a little more. >> so handsome. >> we did get him in on the most important item of the day is how they still let you smoke inside in vegas. >> i want to hear with him on that. >> god bless las vegas. also at the table, the host of the dylan ratigan show, dylan ratigan. mika, before we go to break, i want to say to you, everybody loves bad news. >> death and destruction. >> everybody said after the election the end was near. >> democracy would be over. >> i'm excited because this deficit commission came out with proposals that were austere. they were tough. i actually think they should have been tougher on the retirement age, but a lot of things that are politically impossible to implement. yet, look what's happened. >> who put together this deficit commission? >> barack obama. >> look what happened. these people come out, they give their proposal, the president doesn't back off. he doesn't send

the best-selling book "game change", mark halperin, which you wrote. i'll have you comment on this. let me put a portion of the book up on the screen. from the book, obama has failed to put forward what might be called the theory of the case, a sustained, compelling distillation of his vision of the role of government at this moment in history, the connective tissue between his inspirational rhetoric and concrete policy proposals, the absence of a theory of the case has persisted since obama arrived at the white house and it has left him worryingly indistinct figure, even among his supporters, with many of the left seeing him as a temporizing, compromising moderate while many of those in the center perceive him as having pitched to the left. is that how we see him? >> the white house is way too slow to the challenges that emerged with the tea party movement and within the republic republican. very enthusiastic supporter when he got elected, that comes off as arrogant to me and does not seem to be in touch. two fundamental issues in the economy, the economist and the think tank peopl

mark halperin is an msnbc senior political analyst. and john heilman's with the new york magazine. e authors of the book "game change." mark, you start with this thing. is this a possibility? let's talk about the tax cuts. it seems to me that everybody in america knows their taxes are going up this next coming january unless action is taken by congress to extend the bush tax cuts, at least for them. and the president's problem is he's unlikely to get a vote in this senate to extend tax cuts just for the group he wants them extended for, people under $250,000 a year. so he may be facing a choice come mid-december of whether to let this thing go, back to january, with the tax cuts not in effect. in other words, people facing a tax increase or it will all be blamed on him. so what's he do? >> look this is a test case for a lot of what the next two years are going to be like. the president's going to have a choice. all presidents face cross currents. on this issue and almost everything else the president wants to get done he can either get stuff done or alienate part of the so-called pr

we have mark halperin still here.blican senator from florida senator george lemieux here as well as the great willie geist. mika, there's jim demint, going back to pete wayner's column earlier this week, i can't get over the fact that mr. tea party -- i like jim. when i say i like people, i mean i like him. i like him personally. because i like him personally i'm trying to save him from himself. when jim demint says he's a champion of small government, a tea party guy and we want to only elect people that are going to take care of the debt, and then he pulls back when they ask him about social security, medicare, no, we don't have to touch that. we'll take care of it with waste, fraud and abuse. >> you see -- >> i want to send a picture of marco rubio telling the truth. and the debate against charlie crist, guess what? he did it in florida in the middle of the debate when it mattered the most. when telling the truth to senior citizens in florida was the hardest thing to do. and he won by 20 -- he got over 50% with thr

mark halperin? all polls, they're spectacular for the president, given unemployment, the coverage he's gotten in the last few months. that number, 43, 44, that right now continues to be his floor rather than his ceiling given that he's not launched a campaign, given that the republicans haven't been through the shredder. >> look at obama against romney. it's one percentage point apart, neck and neck. that may be the guy to watch. know? >> most likely republican nominee today. he's going to have to get through a very tough process. >> here is an interesting question. if you're a democrat, do you want someone other than president obama in 2012? 27% said yes. 64% saying no. i think there may be a lot of patience out there. am i wrong, pat buchanan? >> 27%, i don't know whether that's the white working class democrats of central pennsylvania or the liberals really unhappy that obama hasn't done what he's promised. i think that's sort of a troublesome figure there. frankly, i don't see the individual unl

to our program totonight the inside ste the midterm lookions with the authors of game change, mark halperin and john heilemann. >> pare part of what they saw in him and got harry reid and others in the book to bring barack obama, which was their worry about hillary clinton. what happens in four short years that coalition which he built to get the whitehouse and pass a lot of legislation has been shattered and now he's got to build some new coalition. >> the place is going to be the place where he can start to reclaim some credit for being a sent -- centrist. he's got this reduction commission that's going to come back inn december. pie all indications are whatever that group comes back with he'll put a stamp on and say this is what i want to do. even some very tough stuff. >> charlie: we conclude with the new tenor perstorming vittorio grigolo. >> we're talking about experience, about stories, stories that makes you feel, you know, makes you feel in love, make you feel pain inside, make you feel all these things all these emotions. in order to believe these emotions, to communicate those em

mark halperin is an mspnc political analyst. both are authors of the book "game change." k you start with this thing. is this a possibility? let's talk about the tax cuts. it steams mow everybody in america knows their taxes are going up this next coming january unless action is taken by congress to extend the bush tax kutss, at least for them. and the president's problem is he's unlikely to get a vote in this senate to extend tax cuts just for the group he wants them extended for, people under $250,000 a year. he may be facing a choice come mid-december of whether to let this thing go, back to january, with the tax cuts not in effect. in other words, people facing a tax increase or it will all be blamed on him. >> this is a test case for a lot of what the next you 2 years will be like neppresident has a choice. all presidents face cross currents. on this issue and almost everything else the president wants to get done he can either get stuff done or alienate part of the so-called professional left. the key is to show he can get things done and keep enough democrats on boa

thank you, mark halperin. >>> up next, joe miller is facing an uphill battle. i'd call it that.enator. he's organizing a spelling bee up in alaska. if you can't spell murkowski, you don't count as a voter. wait until we see what happens to those write-ins up there. he's trying to challenge everything up there. he doesn't believe anybody knows how to spell properly. [ female announcer ] kids who don't eat breakfast may not be getting the nutrition they need to keep their bodies strong. carnation instant breakfast essentials supplies the nutrients of a balanced breakfast to help build strong muscles and healthy bones. carnation instant breakfast essentials. good nutrition from the start. you could switch for great gas mileage or seats that flip and fold with one hand. you could switch for up to 600 highway miles on a single tank of gas. or the hundred-thousand mile powertrain warranty. over a thousand people a day are switching to chevy. they're not just trading in, they're trading up. qualified lessees can get low mileage lease on this 2011 malibu ls for around one ninety-nine a

mark halperin is also a conservative. sort of right wing type of figure. was made the senior political analyst at emerson b.c. so phil griffin has tried very hard to push back against the notion that m a c b c is liberal even though it makes people all of its money from its liver. primetime lineup now you definitely could say that the ad the polarization is what makes them successful and makes them not c.n.n. and these days now i want to switch gears and of course go into obama right now everyone is reeling from the after effects of the midterm elections that's from two days ago but first i want to get your take on what you think happened i mean look back to two years ago obama had this massive army of people behind you know i mean he could have been leading the populist wave essentially and somehow he had that being their target it all turned against him so why do you think that happened where do they all go wrong well what happened is that army did not turn out i mean they were they were mobilized in two thousand and eight with the notion of real change

msnbc senior political analyst mark halperin is editor at large for "time" magazine, joins us now. , mark. that was a very interesting reaction from joe biden. what about what palin did in the first place? >> well, the premise of your initial setup was, is she smart to do this if she wants to run for president? the answer is, it's a great way to get a republican nomination and horrible way to get elected. but sarah palin has made so many smart decisions since the 2008 campaign ended that i don't think we should just dismiss this was a way to raise her political standing. it none straights she gets more attention than anybody else and she has a great ear for rhetoric and how to talk about politics in a way to get attention and rev up the people already supportive of her. >> let's throw up the quotation from her new book. it hasn't been released yet. "certainly has wife expressed this view when she said during the 2008 campaign that she never felt proud of her country until her husband started winning elections. in retrospect, i gis this shouldn't surprise us since both of them spent