and mourdock's comments ingall vannized for a lot of people.much deeper than that. >> you're talking about mourdock's comments. the nrsc supported mourdock in his bid after he made his comments. the question i guess for the republican party, whether they come to their senses? neither akin nor mourdock won. >> yeah. >> it seemed to be a repudiation of all their issues on women's health and women's health care. and there is a fundamental understanding that republicans need to muzzle, if not excise the elements of their party that are putting this element forward. >> let's see, alex. last week the house republicans had an opportunity to show that they get it that women should be at the table. and what did they do? not a single woman chair. and then they -- of any committees. and then they got in trouble. so they appointed a woman chair of the administration -- administrative committee, right? so no. i don't think it's really sunk into the consciousness of the republican party yet that, you know, you need to take these issues more seriously, that t

. >>> one of those on the far right richard mourdock is still pointing fingers after losing the senateace in indiana. sounds like sore loser. this is "hardball" the place for politics. [ man ] ring ring... progresso this reduced sodium soup says it may help lower cholesterol, how does it work? you just have to eat it as part of your heart healthy diet. step 1. eat the soup. all those veggies and beans, that's what may help lower your cholesterol and -- well that's easy [ male announcer ] progresso. you gotta taste this soup. >>> back to "hardball." and now to the sideshow. a merry cliffmas from stephen colbert. >> everywhere you go you could see the twinkle in children's eyes because in just a couple weeks the fiscal cliff is coming to town. merry cliffmas. if the parties here cannot agree to a budget deal by january 1st, automatic spending cuts will kick in and plunge america into a second recession. and things are not looking too good. >> democrats and republicans are blaming each other for the negotiations. >> who's going to blink first? >> who's going to blink first? >> the white h

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. >>> one of those on the far right richard mourdock is still pointing fingers after losing the senatee in indiana. sounds like sore loser. this is "hardball" the place for politics. [ male announcer ] feeling like a shadow of your former self? c'mon, michael! get in the game! [ male announcer ] don't have the hops for hoops with your buddies? lost your appetite for romance? and your mood is on its way down. you might not just be getting older. you might have a treatable condition called low testosterone or low t. millions of men, forty-five or older, may have low t. so talk to your doctor about low t. hey, michael! [ male announcer ] and step out of the shadows. hi! how are you? [ male announcer ] learn more at isitlowt.com. [ laughs ] hey! and mr. geiss, good luck on your to the best vacation spot on earth. (all) the gulf! it doesn't matter which of our great states folks visit. mississippi, alabama, louisiana or florida, they're gonna love it. shaul, your alabama hospitality is incredible. thanks, karen. love your mississippi outdoors. i vote for your florida beaches, dawn. bill, th

richard mourdock in indiana, christine o'donnell in delaware, ken buck out in colorado.ob, i'm going to back to this again. when the chief ramrod of the right wing senate candidates leaves the post, who would replace him? how is this good news for the right? >> look, i'm not saying whether it's good news or bad news, i'm telling you what i think his calculation is. his calculation is he can be more of a free agent. i think he will get very involved in primaries, he will push hard right issues. i wish him well because the candidates he succeeded in nominating have quite often lost winnable seats. the notion, for example, that ted cruz -- the republicans were going to win that seat and it was going to be a conservative republican, but there are at least five senate seats and probably control of the senate that have been lost because of these tea party nominees, and he's driven that process. but you watch him drive it from outside. think of grover norquist and the influence he has. i don't like grover norquist. i don't like jim demint, but that's what i think he's thinking.

. >> from the "say what" category of entries come todd akin and richard mourdock. >> life is a gift from god, and even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape, it is something that god intended to happen. >> republican dreams to take control of the senate in 2012 had dwindled throughout the year, but akin and mourdock shut the door in those sentences. two words from romney reverberated all the way to november. his issue was the plan to prevent employers from hiring undocumented workers. >> people who come here illegally won't be able to find work and will self-deport. >> the concept of self deportation was not by itself responsibility for romney's dismal showing by his panics, but it greased the skids. also a moment where romney wished to have a mulligan, there was this -- >> there are 47% of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. there are 47% of people who are with him, who are depend upon the government, who think they're victims. >> romney calmed his remarks wrong. they also caused the deepest self-inflicted wound of the election. on the flipside -- >>

todd akin and richard mourdock of indiana. >> life is a gift from god.at horrible situation of rape that it is something that god intended to happen. >> republican dreams to take control of the senate in 2012 had dwindled throughout the year but akin and mourdock shut that door in a couple of sentences. >> two words from mitt romney during a primary reverberated through to november. the issue was his plan to prevent employers from hiring undocumented workers e. >> people who have come here illegally won't be able to find work and those people would leave the country. >> the concept of self-deportation by undocumented workers was not by itself responsible for romney's dismal showing among hispanics but it surely greased the skids. >> also in the cat fwoir of moments where romney wanted a mulligan there was this. >> 47% of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. 47% who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims. >> romney called his remarks completely wrong. they also caused the deepest self-infli

so will bill kristol go after mourdock of which he is a contributor? i don't think so. a lot of these scams are ridiculous but dick morris is relatively small potatoes. he's so vulgar and so ridiculous and he doesn't hide it very well and he's so transparent. but what about all of the others and the big stuff? so i think kristol, yes, he's right, but is anything going to happen? >> and when you're talking about the big leagues -- >> yeah. >> thank you very much for coming here to talk about this. frank rich is writer at large for a new york magazine. >>> my colleague lawrence o'donnell does not to prove why he is indispensable but yesterday he did it in the rewrite. it's coming up next. >>> the problem for boehner is, i oppose tax rate increases because tax rate increases cost american jobs. that gives you no room to give on rates. it is, by the way, not an original thought. who said this? the tax increase will kill job and lead to a recession and the recession will force people out of work and on to unemployment and actually increase the deficit. that's newt gingrich i

so will bill kristol go after mourdock of which he is a contributor? i don't think so. of these scams are ridiculous but dick morris is relatively small potatoes. he's so vulgar and so ridiculous and he doesn't hide it very well and he's so transparent. but what about all of the others and the big stuff? so i think kristol, yes, he's right, but is anything going to happen? >> and when you're talking about the big leagues -- >> yeah. >> thank you very much for coming here to talk about this. frank rich is writer at large for a new york magazine. >>> my colleague lawrence o'donnell does not to prove why he is indispensable but yesterday he did it. it's coming up next. . it's coming up next. i. it's coming up next. n. it's coming up next. . it's coming up next. t. it's coming up next. h. it's coming up next. e. it's coming up next. . it's coming up next. . a restaurant is hard, try running four. fortunately we've got ink. it gives us 5x the rewards on our internet, phone charges and cable, plus at office supply stores. rewards we put right back into our business. this is t

so will bill kristol go after fox news and mourdock of which he is a contributor? i don't think so.are ridiculous but dick morris is relatively small potatoes. he's so vulgar and so ridiculous and he doesn't hide it very well and he's so transparent. but what about all of the others and the big stuff? so i think kristol, yes, he's right, but is anything going to happen? >> and when you're talking about the big leagues -- >> yeah. >> thank you very much for coming here to talk about this. frank rich is writer at large for a new york magazine. >>> my colleague lawrence o'donnell does not to prove why he is indispensable but yesterday he did it in the rewrite. it's coming up next. [ sniffs ] i have a cold. [ sniffs ] i took dayquil but my nose is still runny. [ male announcer ] truth is, dayquil doesn't treat that. really? [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus fights your worst cold symptoms, plus it relieves your runny nose. [ breathes deeply ] awesome. [ male announcer ] yes, it is. that's the cold truth! [ male announcer ] yes, it is. try running four.ning a restaurant is hard, fortu

and richard mourdock in indiana who said pregnancy is resulting from rape are a gift from god. and finally, was barack obama's biggest stroke of luck, that video of mitt romney talking to those rich people down in florida about those lowly 47%. katty, what was the big lucky break? >> a lot of them they had control over. or some control over. the obama campaign. or it was the fault of the candidates. but it was "the new york times" that chose the headline let detroit go bankrupt. so that really was a lucky break for the obama campaign because it played so well in the campaign in ohio. it really ginned up so many -- so much antipathy in that state. chris: i like the one -- the joke of the campaign was you knew you were in trouble when you said the rape candidate. people would say which one? >> this is hard. there are so many choices. chris: go ahead, sam. >> i think it was the primary season. i think it was the debates. people watched all these candidates, most of them try to get to the right of genghes khan and most of them did. the one that stood out for me when people were wat

. >> bob, i would argue that the message got out from akins, got out from mourdock.hink a lot of -- especially the numbers show single women were really turned off -- they like the looks of romney in that first debate. a lot of numbers showed they like what they saw out there, strong performance on economics, but then they go, this other stuff is scaring me away. >> i don't think the structure of the race changed even after the first debate, and it wouldn't have unless the president turned in the same kind of performances the second and third time around. look, romney did reach out to hispanics. he reached out and pushed them away. he talked about 11 million people self-deporting. he used the phrase illegals. he did everything he could to make sure that -- rove and bush understood that constituency was critical for them. he said our ideas carried the day. they didn't carry election night. >> i think voters are very aware what the issues were and what side both sides took. speaking last night at a gala, senator-elect ted cruz, a real hero of the tea party from texas,

richard mourdock, the gop senate candidate in indiana talked about rape and pregnancy during a debate. >> god intended the pregnancy >> i think even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape that it is sometng that god intended to happen. >> and freshman house republican joe walsh of illinois insisted there is no such thing as an abortion to protect a woman's life or health due to "advances in science and technology." and missouri rep. todd akin's infamous remark about women's bodies shutting down to prevent pregnancy in cases of so-called "legitimate rape." stunned lots of women voters. as a result many vots told pollsters women's rights were a concern. in the end the women's vote went solidly for president obama as opposed to gop challenger mitt romney. and none of the three men who made strange statements about women's bodies won their races. on capitol hill the election brought the total number of women in the senate to 20, 16 democrats and four republicans, and 78 women in the house, 58 democrats, 20 republicans. as budget negotiations continued to loom, women were aske

leaders, the people here i cover, major, major heartburn, you see them there,ed to akin and richard mourdockbecame the problems the republicans were having in recapturing the senate. ed to akin, the republican senate candidate from missouri and richard mourdock from minnesota, made offensive remarks about women and rape and todd akin introduce the the concept of so-called legitimate rape, that if there was a legitimate rape, women somehow would not get pregnant and richard mourdock, the person, of course, who introduced the concept that rape could be a gift from god. that's what he said, and i'm sure he really didn't mean that. got them both into a lot of trouble. rightfully so. i suppose maybe the only nice thing they did also was perhaps, from my perspective, was help keep the senate in democratic hands. >> that's right. they definitely did, both of them and the lesson for all candidates, republican or democrat, don't talk about things like that. they will only get you in trouble, no matter what you say. speaking about getting in trouble, and this is obviously a serious one. ana your naugh

we need to do a better job i would argue that the message got out fuor akin and mourdock.s single women were really turned off. they liked the looks of romney in the first debate. a lot of numbers showed they liked what they saw and then they go, oh, this other stuff is scaring me away. that's what i think. >> i don't think the structure changed even after the first deba debate, even if the president turned in the same kind of performances the second and third time around. he reached out to hispanics. he talked about 11 million people self-deporting. he talked about illegals. he did everything he could so that was critical to the republican presidency wouldn't be there. the most extraordinary thing he wrote is our ideas carried the day. well, they didn't carry election night and that's what kouchblts. >> i don't thifrg so. i think voters are aware of what carries. look. speaking outside, ted cruz, a real hero from the tea party. here's what he said. you want to know why obama won 75%. tone. i think far more important was 47%. republicans nationally, the story they conveyed

. >> bob, i would argue that the message got out from akins, got out from mourdock. think a lot of -- especially the numbers show single women were really turned off -- they like the looks of romney in that first debate. a lot of numbers showed they like what they saw out there, strong performance on economics, but then they go, this other stuff is scaring me away. that's what i think. >> i don't think the structure of the race changed even after the first debate, and it wouldn't have unless the president turned in the same kind of performances the second and third time around. look, romney did reach out to hispanics. he reached out and pushed them away. he talked about 11 million people self-deporting. he used the phrase illegals. he did everything he could to make sure that that constituency which rove and bush understood that was critical to republicans winning the presidency wouldn't be there. the most critical thing he wrote was, our ideas carried the day. they didn't carry election night. that's what counts. >> i think voters are very aware what the issues were

when the koch brothers funded candidate study can and richard mourdock overreached on abortion in mississippi and indiana those republican sealed their political demise with female voters while damaging the brand of their party nationwide as well similarly when the koch brothers funded republicans in michigan rammed through anti-union right to work for less money legislation as the president called it they damaged their brand with working people now it's up to president obama to make sure he. he doesn't follow these cokehead republicans into the political wilderness by sticking retirement age people with a raw deal during these so-called fiscal cliff negotiations in an interview with a.b.c. news president bush that's airing tonight president obama hinted that he may support raising the eligibility age for medicare from sixty five to sixty seven years old as though he was reading straight from speaker john boehner his talking points when asked about raising the retirement age the president said what is true is we need to strengthen social security we need to strengthen medicare for future gene

. >> you might want to chat with roger and rupert mourdock for that matter. >> cenk: rupert is after me, too, i bet. who ising going to bankroll it? who is going to lead the campaign? let's sort it out. >> bankroll it? >> maybe i'm confusing that with rupert. >> i think bankrolling is the big boss. the big boss is bankrolling it. the rest of us are going to be your in-house. >> okay. >> we're all set. >> cenk: yeah, they're all set. they were ready to go, man. they have this little thing hatched up. they send in somebody to "interview" him and give him what they would like. it's amazing. it's amazing. and then if doesn't just go one way. it goes both ways. petraeus was also asked what would you like us to do on fox news? watch. >> i love roger. >> i know, and he loves you. and i'm supposed to say directly from him to you through me is first of all is there anything that fox is doing right or wrong that you want to tell us to do differently. >> cenk: all right, so apparently they're willing to take orders from petraeus as well. so now we've got a lot more for you on this, but let me s

richard mourdock, gone. todd akin, gone. and it's not just the election losses. the cracks are springing up all over the tea party kettle. this week, we learned that dick armey, the head of the major tea party group, freedom works, is out. one by one, gop lawmakers have distanced themselves from the tea party's once sacred anti-tax pledge. 44 and counting. and the american people are rejecting the entire movement. the group's disapproval rating has jumped 24 point since 2010. so the tea party's monster looks like its on its last leg. all i can say is, good rid dance. joining me now is former governor of pennsylvania, ed rendell, and now an msnbc political analyst. and joan walsh, an msnbc political analyst. thank you both for your time tonight. >> thanks, rev. >> my pleasure. >> joan, let me start with you. senator demint is out. how huge is that? >> i think it's huge, are reverend al. i really do. he said health care would be the president's waterloo while the president is getting ready to be inaugurated for a second time and jim demint is packing up his senate

how could you -- thank god that akin and mourdock came out with those extremist views. >> extraordinarynts. >> i thought, keep talking, boys, keep talking. >> when you watch the footage of those moments, neither of them had a clue that they said anything remotely contentious. i found that unsettling you could reach the point of potentially becoming a senator and actually have no clue that what you're saying is deeply offensive to many people. >> right. some men, mostly women, right? it was deeply offensive. >> do you feel that there's any form of real equality yet in america for women? >> we're one of the last countries to ever think of having a woman be president. but i think that's possible now, but it wasn't years ago. >> do you think hillary is likely to run in 2016? >> i don't know. but i hope after a four-year rest that she would run because she would be a great woman president. >> let's take another break and come back and talk hollywood. your great love. >> it is. >> i want to know who you think the greatest movie star in the world is, other than yourself. ♪ can you hear me ♪ po

replacement for dick army, and last but not least another guy who deserves consideration richard mourdock said pregnancy from rape is quote something that god intended." coming up, to discuss the problem with the tea party is andy croll. welcome back inside "the war room"," andy. >> what isgood to be back. >> what is behind the departure when he was the face and voice of it. >> dick army was the father figure of freedom works. he is keeping his cards close to the vest about the exact reasons for his de departure. he does not like the direction that freedom works is taking going forward. >> jennifer: really? >> yeah, he does not believe that freedom works is doing what it need to be doing to benefit and growing the conservative movement. he doesn't like where the leadership has taken the group and he has agreed to lucratively part ways with the organization that he really put on the map and he really made famous. >> jennifer: $8 million contract how can he be walking away from that? i'm interested in the disagreement. it's not a personality conflict but a disagreement. do you imagine that

mourdock calls for gun reform while fox news demonizes gun reform. there is a massive discorrect.he took a swipe at obama. words are good -- i'm paraphrasing. words are good but we need action. you could argue the largest obstacle, any kind of action, any kind of sane conversation about guns in america is fox news. two weeks ago today, we were talking about their crazysh unhinged, freaked out reaction when bob costas talked about gun violence for 60 seconds during the halftime of a football game. he was attacked for three, four days nonstop. what's this idiot doing? we don't need sportscasters talking about guns? this football player, talking about the kansas city chief, he could have strangled his girlfriend or killed her any way he wanted. it was the knee-jerk idiocy that fox news -- we talked about it at the time, what fox news has always feared is a sane, common sense discussion about guns and fox news operates as an appendage to the nra. so for rupert murdoch to lecture obama to do something about guns while his highest-profile media entity is designed specifically to silence

of rape, it's something that god intended to happen. >> reporter: akin and mourdock pretty much shutwo words from mitt romney reverb greated all the way through november. >> people who have come here illegally won't be able to find work and over time those people would tend to leave the country or self-deport. >> reporter: self-deportation by undocumented workers was not by itself responsible for romney's dismal showing by his sfpanics t it certainly greased the skids. and then there is this. >> there are 47% who are with him, who are dependent upon him whork believe that they are victims. >> reporter: romney called his remarks completely wrong. they also caused the deepest self-inflicted wound of the election. on the flip side, romney's vp day may have been the best of his campaign. the selection of paul ryan he can cited conservatives in a way romney himself had not. how many moments are there in an hour and a half. the president lost all of them in the first debate. the pictures tell the story of a man who phoned it in, panicking his supporters and providing an opening for romney.

the todd akin/richard mourdock wing damaged the republicans. now as the party decides whether to moderate or modernize, it has to repair its image, particularly among key groups. demographics are destiny. romney won a higher percentage of the white vote than any canddant since ronald reagan. by 14 points among white women, by 5 points among self-described independents. he won all these groups by more than george w. bush did in 2004, but he lost the election by a wider margin than john kerry. why? because the composition of the electorate changed. as the obama campaign predicted more than a year ago, the white portion of the electorate dropped from 74% in 2008 to 72% in 2012. the president carried nearly 8 in 10 non-white voters including an astounding 71% of latinos and 73% of asian voters and a of course, a whopping 93% of black voters. it remains a real question whether the democratic nominee in 2016 will be able to hold the obama coalition together, which also includes young voters, but the republican party is right to be re-examining its re

he backed todd aiken of the legitimate rape comments and mourdock of the other rape comments. the reason jim demint isn't in the majority today is because of jim demint. but jim demint says he's okay with that. >> i'd rather have 30 republicans in the senate who believe in the principles of freedom than 60 who don't believe in anything. [ applause ] well, let -- let me make myself even clearer. i would rather have 30 marco rubios in the senate than 60 arlen specters. >> arlen specter you might remember got driven out of the senate in part by folks like demint. he went to the democratic party and became the 60th vote on obama care. so that worked out well for demint. but demint does rather this being in the minority thing so much that he wants to seven out the rest of his term in the minority. when you're a senator and you even begin talking to another employer about leaving the senate, you have to file this paper with the senate office of public records. they do that so before a big vote on, say, an energy bill that will make oil companies really rich, you can't go to a big oi

republicans in primaries and then his candidate lost in the general election, including obviously richard mourdock, christine o'donnell, ken buck in colorado. what do you think is going to be the influence now for jim demint going into the heritage foundation? >> i think he's been a singular failure when you look at the candidates that he's endorsed. they have all lost. >> well, that is not entirely true. he says marco rubio was the first one that supported me. >> he doesn't have a good win-loss percentage. beyond that, i think it's just another sign of the disarray of the republican party and the tea party movement. i think they don't know what they stand for or what to do. barack obama says his higher popularity, republicans are completely not unified. they don't know which way to go forward. i think they have soul searching to figure out what they want to stand for and in reality what they need to do is be more balanced and more inclusive and change their views on some things if they are going to be successful. >> do you think it's possible that he saw the writing on the wall, chip? the l.a. ti

i'm not a witch o'donnell, todd legitimate rape akin and richard god intends for you to get raped mourdockdemint couldn't help himself on the way out giving speaker boehner one poke in the eye on the rush limbaugh show yesterday. >> i think it's safe to say boehner is not forcing either of you guys out, right? >> that's pretty true. might work a little bit the other way, rush. >> zing. is demint more of a threat to his party now he's outside the senate? as lbj famously said of jay edgar hoover probably better to have him inside the tent out, than outside the tent in. joining us is former chairman of the rnc, in a red sweater, msnbc contributor, the notorious michael steele. that is a fetching color for you, chairman. >> thank you. ho, ho, hey. >> chairman steele tell us what this departure means for the rnc? everybody is reading this differently. some saying tea he's going to become a thorn in the side of gop when at heritage, other people are saying get rid of him, let the gop become a party of dealmaking and legislating inside congress. >> i think there's truth to both of those. what's g

republican dreams to take control of the senate in 2012 had dwindled throughout the year, but akin and mourdockple sentences. two words from mitt romney during the primary reverberated through november. the issue was his plan to prevent employers from hiring undocumented workers. >> people who have come here illegally won't be able to find work and those people would tend to leave the country. >> the option was not by itself responsible for romney's dismal showing among hispanics, but it surely greased the skids. also among the categories where romney wanted a mulligan, there was this. romney called his remarks completely wrong. they also caused the deepest self-inflicted wound of the election. on the flip side -- >> he's going to be the next vice president of the united states. >> romney's dp day may have been the best moment of his campaign. the selection of paul ryan excited conservatives in a way romney himself had not. how many moems are there in an hour and a half? the president lost all of them in the first debate. the picture tells the story of a panicked man and providing an opening fo

todd akin and richard mourdock lost because the republican party didn't teach them to keep their opinionsit of a trollop. gawker describes her as lady of the streets freak in the sheets. she started to share a story about her own forays into the world of the insanely popular novel "50 shades of gray." she said i can remember a time in college when things got -- and then whoopi goldberg jumped in. barbara said i would just pretend to be asleep i was not chained up. oh! now i need to know what she was talking about. >> it was very quiet. what are you doing? what is happening? >> please stop it no don't. >> no don't. don't stop. [ laughter ] >> stephanie: what is it like to hear that voice in bed. oh, that's vary vary good. beyonce has signed a $50 million pepsi deal. in other words i get $0.50 to tell you how much i love sodastream. >> i think you got a free sodastream. >> stephanie: i did. and i'm happy to do it. it is a much better product. and more environmentally friendly. so take that beyonce. >> if you liked it why don't you put a ring on it. >> stephanie: i once cried to that song. y