i love nerdland sticker for you. 1860 in chicago, and he was not the front-runner at that convention. it took a lot of politicking and had absolutely nothing to do with vampire slaying. >> oh, sorry to say, i saw that movie. i'm sorry. >> whoa. we will have a segment on that later. next question, which was the first ever televised republican national convention? >> 1948, philadelphia. >> and who was the nominee? >> thomas dewey. >> it was 1940 convention in philadelphia. and it was a guy who by his name alone, you got to know wasn't going to win. w wendell wilke. by the way, wilke was womped by f dn fdr. >> it was a tough one. >> you don't want to be wendell wilke running against fdr. >> too much like james polk. just a thought. >> too much like james polk. >> all of these parallels. just a thought. >> the fourth one, 2008, what former member of a democratic national ticket had a role in the republican convention? >> joe liberman. >> yfs joe liberman speaking? >> because he's crazy. >> we don't do crazy here. >> he b

and we have foot soldiers onset here in nerdland. they won! even if the folks in power won't admit it. but first, paul ryan brings his medicare message to the sunshine state and he's taking his momma with him. >>> good saturday morning. i'm melissa harris-perry. and the biggest story of the week is about a partnership that is finally official. we all new it was eminent, but we had to wait for the official question and the decisive yes. media has been there from the moment the two decided to become one. no, not the engagement of jennifer aniston and justin therow. i'm talking about the republican rollout of romney/ryan 2012, or as i like to call it, argh! paul ryan is scheduled to speak at the villages near orlando. yes, the guy whose budget plan would change medicare as we know it into a coupon program speaking in florida to a group of seniors? we'll take you there live once we see him stepping up to the mike. and you are not going to want to miss that because i'm kind of hoping i'm hear the grammys go, arr! today this caps off an introductory

jennif jennifer beales joins nerdlands. her campaign against assault in the military. >>> and it's back to school time. the came of big ideas, or not. good morning, i'm melissa harris-per harris-perry, all so good a week ago when mitt romney picked congressman paul ryan as his running mate. one reaction across the aisle. we were finally going to have an election about ideas, sweet, baby jesus, the tide had finally turned. regardless of philosophies, both sides seemed ready to debate the issues. that lasted for three days. then things like this started to happen. take a look. >> so, mr. president, take your campaign of division and anger and hate back to chicago and let us get about rebuilding and reuniting america. >> and with that, the gloves were off, again. if you look at the news over the past few days, there wasn't much talk of ideas. actually, maybe one. over and over again. >> we have been very transparent to what's legally required of us. but the more we release, the more we get attacked. the more we get questioned,

you can come back to nerdland any time.pic and one very close to my heart. seven years ago this week hurricane katrina hit new orleans. i don't live there then but i do now. coming up, you'll take a tour of my house. don't miss it. humans -- even when we cross our t's and dot our i's, we still run into problems. namely, other humans. which is why, at liberty mutual insurance, auto policies come with new car replacement and accident forgiveness if you qualify. see what else comes standard at libertymutual.com. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy? introducing share everything. unlimited talk. unlimited text. tap into a single pool of shareable data and add up to 10 different devices, including smartphones and tablets. the first plan of its kind. share everything. only from verizon. get $100 off select motorola 4g lte smartphones like the droid razr. >>> as tropical storm isaac looms off the coast of florida threatening to rain on the republican convention parade, it's a stark reminder of how the gop c

princeton university and author of "governing america," and also joy and reed, contributing editor and nerdland friend. thank you both for being here. were you at all surprised to hear ryan invoke jefferson in his introduction to the american people? >> i wasn't that surprised. ronald reagan also tapped in and linked them not to the idea of more government but to the idea of free enterprise and freeing the government. so it's a familiar conservative theme and i think ryan who's been around in conservative circles for a long time is trying to govern that idea. my take hear on the declaration is it's bigger than that. it's elastic and it's a growing document just like the constitution is. it's a living document, not a dead one. although it seems silly, j joy-ann. it's like i'm totally ready to have a theory conversation with them. >> what they believe you just said is the problem. they don't like the idea of an expansive definition of liberty. they want to go back to a frontier america. nink you talk to conservatives and read a lot of what they write, what they're upset about, the popular media,