quote, access to newt gingrich. and quote, direct news interaction. we found out today in the "wall street journal" he was paid by the u.s. chamber of commerce. what did gingrich do for his $120,000 a year salary from the u.s. chamber of commerce? according to the "wall street journal," mr. gingrich's assignment with the chamber of commerce was to attend dinner. attend dinner or lunch with chamber officials every few months. $120,000 a year for access to newt. and for the honor of feeding near him. and so, yes, the chamber of commerce supported president obama's stimulus package and newt gingrich is campaigning against the stimulus so there's two facedness there. his health reform group was pro individual mandate. now he says he's always been against the individual mandate. you can find policy scandals. you can find policy scandals and hints about newt gingrich's shall re say transactional relationship with policy everywhere you look in his career. look around. if you get hung up on the little awkwardnesses, you miss the greater and vastly more enterta

quote, access to newt gingrich. and, quote, direct news interaction. we found out today in the "wall street journal" he was paid by the u.s. chamber of commerce. what did gingrich do for his $120,000 a year salary from the u.s. chamber of commerce? according to the "wall street journal," mr. gingrich's assignment with the chamber of commerce was to attend dinner. attend dinner or lunch with chamber officials every few months. $120,000 a year for access to newt. and for the honor of feeding near him. and so, yes, the chamber of commerce supported president obama's stimulus package and newt gingrich is campaigning against the stimulus so there's two facedness there. his health reform group was pro individual mandate. now he says he's always been against the individual mandate. you can find policy scandals. you can find policy scandals and hints about newt gingrich's shall re say transactional relationship with policy everywhere you look in his career. look around. if you get hung up on the little awkwardnesses, you miss the greater and vastly more enterta

if you know nothing else about newt gingrich, what is the other notable thing that's happened to newt gingrich since he's been running for president this year? what's the one other thing? back in june, remember, gingrich's staff resigns. gingrich presidential campaign implodes. gingrich to forge ahead after campaign staff quits. gingrich campaign staff resigns on mass. newt gingrich's senior staff staged a mass exodus off the good ship newt gingrich this summer. why? according to abc news, senior staffers demanded gingrich focused on pressing the flesh and fund-raising and stopped touring the country promoting film projects with his wife. he was focused on film premieres and book signings, one senior staffer e-mailed the team, quote, we didn't sign up to be hucksters for products for sale. this was a bombshell when it happened. everybody thought that would be the end of newt. there was also a question at the time of what exactly did the staffers expect from newt gingrich? with mr. gingrich you should have known what you were getting into, say, known on december 7th of last year, known

and i think tonight we saw the first newt gingrich, the more positive newt gingrich who sort of had ae patriot act debate, it was very, very interesting. the intellectual newt, but he was appealing which is something i don't think he's really been before. i think it's probably because he's more relaxed and he's doing better in the polls and people like him. i think he was more likable this evening. >> i think speaker gingrich came into the debate with the most to lose. i want to see how the immigration debate plays out. herman cain was asked a question about syria and started talking about the u.s. economy that to me is a sign of his weakness when it comes to commander in chief test. thanks to our panel. that does it for this edition of "360." you can see the debate in its entirety, next. [ male announcer ] tom's discovering that living healthy can be fun. see? he's taking his vitamins. new one a day vitacraves plus omega-3 dha is a complete multivitamin for adults. plus an excellent source of omega-3 dha in a great tasting gummy. one a day, gummies for grown-ups. in a great tasting g

a new ppp poll out today showing a national lead for newt gingrich. gingrich is at 28% in this new poll. herman cain is at 25%. mitt romney in third at 18%. a new cnn poll out today shows mitt romney in the lead with 24% but newt gingrich in a statistical tie at 22%. g newt gingrich is within the poll's margin of error. a private poll for a republican pollster in iowa that hit politico.com today shows herman cain and newt gingrich statistically deadlocked at the top of the heap among iowa republicans. this is the best day of newt gingrich's life. for newt gingrich, this is a 13-point surge just since june when his entire senior staff quit on mass. saying all he wanted to do was sell his books and his dvds, and frankly as staffers they did not think they were there to help huckster his products, they thought this was supposed to be a presidential campaign and they walked. these poll results are a slap in the face to anybody who thought newt gingrich was just out to sell books and dvds. newt gingrich celebrating his new top position in the polls tonight,

newt gingrich campaign. newt gingrich still doing more than a third of his upcoming events as book signings and dvd screenings. running for president it turns out is a great way to sell your stuff. the whole idea behind newt's stuff, the whole idea behind newt incorporated is that you should want to buy newt gingrich books and should want to buy newt gingrich dvds and want to pay thousands of dollars to get fake awards from newt gingrich enterprises because newt gingrich is such an important and very serious man. that is the whole marketing concept behind newt gingrich incorporated. and that dovetails really nicely with running for president because if you're newt gingrich, running for president sort of givings you a justification to talk about yourself in rather grandiose terms. for example, late last week at an event in michigan, mr. gingrich was asked about judges. dave wiegel at slate.com was at the event and quotes mr. gingrich as responding this way. "if you go to newt.org, you'll see an entire paper o

i guess is it too far fetch to think that given the polls where he stands right now, newt gingrich, he's already looking ahead beyond these republican contests? >> maybe. but probably not. i don't think so. >> i don't think so. >> this is classic newt. one thing that is really interesting about the debate, wolf, is that i think americans today saw the newt gingrich that we both covered in the '80s and '90s who was almost imperial and radiated the sense that he was the one that had the long term vision. i see myself as a transformtive figure back then. and that is the moment. what he is most in that expansive mode that i think he is the most likely to say something that is not preprogrammed, it can be rhetorically flamboyant. i do think he did a much better job as you suggested of explaining his position than rick perry d the national review editorial had a favor of him after the debate. even if you polled republicans, most would say it sun realistic to deport 12 million people. you have to make some decisions. >> i was surprised, how hard mitt romney came down on him saying this is a mag

but newt gingrich is different. newt gingrich is different from all the rest of these pachinko ball front-runners for five minutes. newt gingrich is fun to cover in his moment in the sun here. because newt gingrich has been around in politics in one incarnation or another basically forever. to trace the origins of the eyebrow raising stuff that newt gingrich is promoting now that he's the presidential front-runner, go back to newt gingrich's old cassette tapes. remember cassette tapes? for all viewers younger than me, this is a cassette tape. used to have boom boxes and machines in our cars that would play these things and sometimes your car would mess it up and the tape could get tied like this. one of the things newt gingrich did when he was on his way to becoming speaker of the house newt gingrich -- look, i broke it. no, there it goes. he took over a republican organization called go-pac and he would send republican coaching cassette tapes to republican candidates for office all around the country. not just peop

that's the whole marketing concept behind newt gingrich incorporated and that dove tails nicely with running for president. it sort of gives you a justification to talk about yourself in grandiose terms. for example, last week mr. gingrich was asked about judges. dave wiigle at slate.com was at the event. if you go it newt.org you see an entire paper on rebalancing the judiciary. it's the most common statement written by a political figure since lincoln's first inaugural in 1861. now, this is not somebody else's awesome paper that newt found somewhere and he's publicizing since the first naul ral. he's talking about himself. the most thorough statement of the constitution and balance of power since lincoln's first inaugural? when he was republican speaker of the house he was quoted in the "new york times" telling an audience, quote, people like me are what stand between us and auschwitz. america, do you want to vote for that man for president, the guy that things about himself that way. this is the pregnant pause? how about buying one of his books instead? >> i don't think there's any

there is even more good news inside that poll for newt gingrich. when asked who was most likely to understand complex issues, 43%, very overwhelming number for gingrich, said gingrich is more likely to understand complex issues. the next one down, 18% said romney. 12% of misguided republican voters thought cain has the ability to understand the complex issues the best. and 11% said ron paul. and when asked who is most qualified to be commander in chief, 36% gingrich. again, a commanding lead for gingrich on that question. only 20% said romney. 12% said perry. and a lost 10% said herman cain. in the politically most loaded exchange of the evening, newt gingrich and mitt romney sparred over the problem of illegal immigration. ç >> i'd staple a green card to the diploma of anybody who's got a degree of math, science, master's degree, ph.d. we want those brains in our country, but in order to bring people in legally, we've got to stop illegal immigration. that means turning off the magnets of amnesty, in-state tuition for illegal aliens, employers that

cain is still doing well in iowa's polls and his loss could be newt gingrich's gain. that may be the real news here. speaking of newt, the big political story of the weekend was his endorsement by the massachusetts union leader. this people that may be happiest are sitting in the white house. in newt wins the nomination, you'd have to think he'd be a much fatter target for president obama than mitt romney is. plus, mitt versus mitt. even if the obama campaign is happy about newt, they're preparing for romney. >> look, i was an independent during the time of reagan/bush. i'm not trying to return to reagan/bush. the principles that ronald reagan espoused are as true today as they were when he spoke them. >> there you go again. that's just a small part of a new dnc video that skewers mitt romney with his own words and to a devastating effect. also, the big political fight this year. republicans are fighting president obama on extending the payroll tax holiday. so let's get this straight. tax cuts are always good for the economy, except when democrats propose them. >>> and

that candidate is newt gingrich." new hampshire, as you know, holds the first in the nation primary. that's happening a week after the iowa caucus. so gingrich who has seen his campaign surge over the past several weeks actually is now picking up an influential endorsement. he has moved up in the polls in new hampshire as we know, going up to the double digits but still it has been mitt romney who has been surging and had at least 40% in a number of the polls so he's way ahead in polls but now gingrich who has become a front-runner could now really start to surge after this influential endorsement. our rachel vikville covers all things new hampshire for us. she is on the line now. raichel -- these newspaper endorsements come and go. this one carries some weight. >> sure, you are right, t.j. this is the biggest newspaper in new hampshire. it is closely watched both locally and on a national scale obviously. the paper says newt gingrich is not the perfect candidate, but as you said, they said that he is the best candidat

republicans think that newt gingrich lacks moral character. wait a minute. strong moral character. rite. the new flavor of the month. gingrich leads the pack ahead of mitt romney. this is the sixth national poll to put gingrich in the lead. but on the issue of having strong moral character, well, newt gingrich only musters 9%, well behind mitt romney. five months ago we were all writing off newt. i mean, he went to greece. his campaign staff was so upset, they went over to some guy in texas named rick perry. but he's back on top. talk about a political reclamation project, there it is. republicans, well, they are starved for someone besides mitt romney. now republicans don't really care about these three marriages, do they? they probably love it when he says he wants to get rid of child labor laws so he can put poor kids to work. well, newt gingrich says the ç 99ers should get a job after they take a bath. this is the strong moral character republicans are looking for. let's bring in radio talkers, bill press and also radio talk show host joe madison. gentlemen, good to have you wi

you'd start getting inspirational cassette tapes in the mail from newt gingrich. this is former republican congressman gill gutnic of minnesota who ran for congress in 1994. he told the pbs program "frontline" a few years later, "i started receiving the gingrich tapes when i was in the state legislature and when they would come, i mean, you spend some time in a car particularly going back and forth to the state legislature, when these tapes would come in the mail, i would open them up right away and put them in a cassette player within 24 hours. i mean, i, we, were always eager to get them. it was almost like a chalk talk with a great coach. "frontline" got the gingrich tapes back in the day. we're working now of getting copies of them now to the extent they still exist. in the meantime, we have the transcripts. newt gingrich in his inspirational republican tapes would tell republican candidates things like, "you favor a political revolution. you want to replace the welfare state with an opportunity society. you favor workfare over welfare. you want to lock prisone

if it's newt gingrich, well we all know newt, i served with him in the house.. it's a week republican field in my judgment. i think that will help the president immensely as he comes into the midwest. >> well, michael may have a different tactic there because of the 12 states. >> just a little. >> do you think the gop candidate must win or the ultimate gop candidate has to win to take the white house? michael, no republican has won the white house without winning governor strickland's home state of ohio. >> ohio will be at the top of the list. i think along with florida. what will be important for the gop next year will be to get back virginia and north carolina which they lost in 2008. they were huge losses in the sense that it began to eat into one of the core stint weconstit in the south and wrapping our arms around ohio sets in place the pathway to 270 votes in the electoral college. but i think it's doable. i think the president has a lot of baggage as they like to say. to care any this campaign. certainly, ohio will be competitive because of the state of

about the prospect of a gingrich nomination is, wow, we would love to see the debates between newt gingrichobama. and gingrich has risen up as perry has fallen away. as cain has fallen down. and he has risen on the basis of his debate performances, but now that i think as he moves into the head of the field, there's going to be a serious vetting that takes place of speaker gingrich. i think that all of his past history is going to be at the forefront of the race and you have all manner of issues like the fannie and freddie payments of almost $2 million and we'll see how these voters, many of whom are very upset about the bailouts, are going to respond to somebody who made millions of dollars on the basis of their insider knowledge. >> i have to ask if what you're saying there if you think that the newt gingrich surge might not be a permanent one? it's been a little bit of beltway common wisdom that in contrast with perry and bachmann and herman cain's surge, those were people who were not necessarily well known quantities as politicos and so when they surged it was inevitable that with scru

right now, cand \s>>> another shot of helium for the high-flying campaign of newt gingrich. the endorsement of a major conservative newspaper in new hampshire. >>> today, october's front-runner, herman cain, on trying to regain his traction. >>> and the air wars, dissecting political ads. the newt endorsement from the new hampshire union leader with editorial page editor andrew cline. >>> and then, all things political with "time" magazine's mike osheerer around a.b. stoddard of "the hill." >>> i'm candy crowley and this is "state of the union." >>> 'tis the season for endorsements -- or not. a big not this week in iowa from the family leader -- the influential social conservative group said it won't even consider backing herman cain, citing, in part, a narrative of questions versus clarity on the key issues of life, marriage, foreign policy, and presidential readiness. >>> joining us now from atlanta is herman cain. mr. cain, thank you so much for joining us here. i want to show our audiences, we noted you were the front-runner in october. this is our latest cnn/orc poll whi

he has the money to go the distance which newt gingrich currently does not. wouldn't count rick perry out. >> i think that perry will be better for your book. but i think newt's going to be better for television. thank you. chuck todd and john heilman. thank you. >>> coming up, newt gingrich won the endorsement from the manchester union leader. would the white house be happy if newt won the republican nomination? >>> and later, that devastating new dnc video against mitt romney. >> mitt romney invented obamacare before he was against it, you remember? >> well, that's what we did in massachusetts and that is, we put together an exchange and the president's copying that idea. i'm glad to hear that. obamacare is bad news. and if i'm president of the united states, i will repeal it. >> well, can the democrats make that flip-flop charge hurt hard enough? you're watching "hardball," only on msnbc. >>> barney frank, the congressman from massachusetts, has announced we won't run for reelection in 2012. the 16-term congressman from massachusetts has been in office sin

newt gingrich said he was for it.n as recently as a year ago before the latinos in the united states. he came out with the policy that said he stands for amnesty for illegal aliens. >> bachmann pointed out no mention of the 25 years and law-abiding and the other qualifiers that newt gingrich is putting on it now. what about that? >> first thing, i think you have to acknowledge that speaker newt gingrich is the only presidential candidate in all of the years that i have followed politicings who will affirm that the united states has a sovereign right to define and protect its border. you never hear anybody else talk about that. and the other thing you hear speaker newt gingrich talk about. yen 20 13. he will have provided operational controls of the u.s.-mexico border. currently, you have the secretary and department of homeland security say we have 40 percent control. i am sorry, that is a failing grade . speaker newt gingrich is talking about operational control in one year's time. if you have operational control you

check out newt gingrich. his website has shiny, new explanations for why he's changed his positions on the health care mandate, on global warming, on t.a.r.p., on what he called paul ryan's right wing social engineering medicare plan and luckily for newt, all of his new positions line up nicely with the conservative republican primary voters. well, also the veto -- >>> the video that went viral this weekend. campus police pepper spraying peaceful occupy protesters out at uc davis in california. the university's police chief was placed on administrative leave today and many students are calling for the university's chancellor to step down. >>> and look who has decided to take a chance on iowa, mitt romney. he may be trying to win it all up front, but if he loses out there and loses big, it could be all over for mitt. >>> finally, let me finish tonight with why i think november 22nd, tomorrow, should never be a day to remember john f. kennedy. >>> we start with the super committee's failure to reach a deal toda

>> i'm newt gingrich. >> i, newt gingrich. >> do solemnly promise to continue to be a good speaker. that my book will be way less boring than al gore's book. >> for republican committee roast in 1995, newt gingrich is back about me now. you have a sense of humor about yourself. >> you have to or else you'd go crazy. >> you have thick skin as well. you seem like the classic washington bruiser, able to deal with all the slings and arrows that get chucked at you. >> this is a free society. i'm allowed to have an opinion. other people are allowed to have an opinion. i relax and try to live it up. >> the key thing of the next election is going to almost certainly be not just the economy but jobs in particular. how to get americans back to work. that will be the battleground. where do you think you have the answers that barack obama doesn't have? and also, where do you think you differ, if you do, from the tea party and their aspirations in that area? >> well, first of all, i think with obama, he's the best, most effective food stamp president in history. more people are on food stamps th