take a look at this from the cnn/orc poll. among men, pretty much all knotted up between president obama and mitt romney. look at that among women. a 16-point advantage for the president. we saw that in our poll two weeks ago and saw that in other recent polls as well. here's one reason why. go to the next board. you can see here who is more in touch with the problems of women? look at that. mitt romney way behind barack obama when it comes to that question, zoraida. >> i saw this other tidbit. 6 in 10 women would prefer to have jobs outside the home than stay at home and take care of the house and family. >> yeah, we saw that because we asked that question after the controversy after hilary rosen's comments about ann romney. a little higher number for men but still, 6 out of 10 women feel that way. >> i thought it was a high number. it's not just gender. can you tell us about some other factors that are bringing them up? >> likablity is one. take a look at more of our numbers. who is the more likable person. president obama. w

i want to show our viewers a recent cnn/orc poll, and it's about who do you blame for these gas prices? oil companies, 55%, foreign countries 34%, the situation in iran 28%. here's what i want to ask you about. president obama's policies, 24% blame him for the rising gas prices. but 21%, just 3% fewer, blame republicans. this does not look like a clear-cut case of a political blunder. a lot of people blame republicans. >> why don't we just look at the facts, regardless of how polls reflect what people feel about the oil industry, which is not surprising. the congressional research service, which is not a polling operation, but analyzes objectively legislation, says if you raise taxes on oil production, the price of the gas at the pump goes even higher. this is an absurd suggestion when you've got $4 gasoline. what the president ought to be doing is approving the keystone pipeline. this is this massive private sector project that will bring energy down from our friendly neighbor, canada, to the united states. he's blocking it. what he's got to do is increase public production down here.

. >> reporter: a cnn/orc poll shows 52% of voters think president obama is better suited to be the commander in chief. you have to compare that to romney's 36%. >> speak of the presumptive nominee, what is mitt romney up to today? >> reporter: mitt romney is out and about fund-raising. this will be critical for him. he was in new york holding a fund-raising breakfast, about 1,000 donors there. the bot throm line -- bottom line, a source tells us he will bring in about a million dollars within the two-day trip. >> thanks for that live report. jamie? >>> coming up at 6:00, a 6-year-old hit by a dirt bike last night in ball. the latest on his condition and the search for who hit him. >>> a look at a local program keeping kids free. >> also, the arrest made in the phylicia barnes case and re action from her family. we'll she you then. >>> graduation is just around the corner. a new survey points to brighter spots in a fairly bleak job market. karin caifa takes a look at some of the hot jobs for grads. >> reporter: while the outlook for grads isn't great, it's better than in recent years. 2,000 h

according to a new cnn-orc poll, 90% said oil companies deserve some of the responsibility. 83% blamed foreign countries, some said iran and some said the president. 58% blamed republicans. >>> bad publicity over the product of pink slime has caused the processor to file for bankruptcy. the company said they're faced with an immediate and unanticipated liquidity crisis. they couldn't pay lenders last week without a loan which banks refused to loan. there are reports the company could lay off $850 employees. >>> a cecil county man starts out as a victim and ends up as a u.s. coming up, what police say happened when officers were called to vet a burglary at his -- investigate a burglary at his home. >> she gave up her job for her husband. what would have made her hall of famer husband proud. >>> they danced their heart out last night. a look at which stars might be safe tonight and which pairs could be going home. @ >>> silvia mackie was a model in california when she gave up that job to take care of her husband john. the first action was to move him to his familiar ground of baltimore.

take a look at this brand-new orc poll. 53% of americans said they will give mitt romney a second look wednesday the primaries are over. romney has the backing of two key republicans. >> it's clear now that mitt romney is going to be our nominee, and i will be proud to support mitt romney and do everything i can to help him win. >> reporter: it sure is official from senate minority leader mitch mcconnell. >> i support mitt romney. >> reporter: it's more than enough to keep mitt romney confident and staying and staying on emergency. >> when he wants to raise the tax rate that will impact a lot of small businesses. >> reporter: taxes could take a back seat to courting women voters. that's why the romney camp is pushing their so-called secret weapon, ann romney. this week's poll shows voters think president obama is more in touch with problems of women than romney by almost 30%. ann romney will be celebrating her birthday with donald trump today. it's a birthday party and fund-raiser all in one. michelle obama willÑi be speakig with -- at a couple events. >>> here's a name we haven't hear

if you look at the cnn/orc poll, this is about romney voters. more than 50% said they will be voting against president obama. only 36% said they will be voting for the candidate himself. >> romney is going to ohio tomorrow. they're fighting over the state, aren't they? >> reporter: they're definitely fighting over it. we got some insight into what romney's campaign has and. it's called bracketing, as term. they set out a host of radio interviews before his speech in ohio. take a look at this. romney's campaign parked the bus across the street from where the president gave a spee. tomorrow romney heads to tomorrow and gives the speech himself. now you get it. they're bracketing obama's entire trip there. >> thank you. we'll talk about what she just said about mitt romney getting another endorsement today. that's indiana governor mitch daniels. romney says that daniels shares his background in business and has used the principles. daniels is downplaying any idea that he might serve as romney's vice-presidential pick. >>> they're class -- their cla

." >>> a new cnn orc poll shows president obama's job approval rating is over 50% for the first time since last june, but americans are worried about rising gas prices, and in an election year, when americans worry, politicians act. the president wants congress to end tax breaks for big oil. >> it's time they got by without more help from taxpayers, who are already having a tough enough time paying the bills and filling up their gas tank. >> it will never get by congressional republicans. joining me from louisville, kentucky, senate republican leader mitch mcconnell. senator, i want to talk to you about gas prices. i know that you have suggested that this seems like a weird political move for the president to be making, that you don't think it will be popular. i want to show our viewers a recent cnn/orc poll, and it's about who do you blame for these gas prices? oil companies, 55%, foreign countries 34%, the situation in iran 28%. here's what i want to ask you about. president obama's policies, 24% blame him for the rising gas prices. but 21%, just 3% fewer, blame republicans. this d

this is according to a new cnn orc poll. and with the national average for a gallon of gas passing the $3.90 mark this week, the hardship is not letting up. bob, can you have a strong recovery with gas prices at this level or are we just all complaining? >> well, we are complaining, but it makes it much more difficult. the recovery is weak already, as we've been saying, so if you layer increasing gas price on top of that, it makes it much tougher. >> everybody wants to blame something, and this is what's interesting. is it speculators, oil companies, the government for having a failed energy policy? is it us? let's talk about playing the blame game here. the majority of americans now say they blame the oil companies for high gas prices. by a wide margin, americans are pointing the finger at big oil instead of either political party or either iran. no surprise when president obama chose to tap into that anger, he tapped into that this week. >> so american oil is booming. the oil industry is doing just fine. with record profit

>> cnn/orc polling is significant because polling suggested mitt romney was in a much weaker position heading into this general election season and you know, everything mitt romney is doing this week suggests he is attempting something of a reset for the general election campaign. the question is just how often his campaign will have to hit the reset button. mitt romney is hard at work on his general election checklist, like firing up tea party activists who were divided during the gop primaries, check. >> this campaign is just getting going. >> or getting up close and personal with voters who may have doubts he can relate to them. >> i think this election will come down to jobs and kids who has the capacity to create good jobs. >> or picking up one of those last high-profile endorsements still out there. check. >> it is clear now that mitt romney is going to be our nominee. i think mitt romney has a set of economic policies that can put americans back to work and, frankly, contrast sharply with the failed economic policies of president obama. >> reporter: and even explain shame for t

eric, i'll start with you, take a look, you probably saw at the top of the hour our brand-new orc pollross the country, obama versus romney right now, 52% for president obama, 43% for governor mitt romney. what does romney need to do in the short-term to pick up that number? >> not panic to begin with. there's a gallup poll out today showing romney ahead and a fox news poll showing the same. let's just remember four years ago at this time, john kerry was ahead of george bush. spring polling is probably the worst indicators of what's going to happen come november around labor day, things will begin to shape up. but mitt romney does have a gap in the poll whether they're ahead or behind with him. the poll shows that 80% of women don't even know what his positions are. there was a bruising primary, he does seem to some degrees out of touch and he needs to in some way figure out how to connect with women voters. >> donna, between men and women, registered voters across the country, among men, it's pretty close, obama 49%, 46% romney. but among women, president obama's doing much better, 55

take a look at our cnn/orc poll.ngs going in the country right now in 43% say well. 57% say badly. but if we take a closer look and take a look at the trend. 43% say things are going well now. in february, 40%, last august it was 24%. so you see, people are becoming more encouraged right now, and that could have a positive political spillover on the president if those kinds of numbers continue. >> the president would very much like the election forward looking and the reality is it will be about his record and there are few americans employed now than when he took office. no presence anyone was leched with 60%. and there's a consistent pattern where if you ask them about the policies and you ask about the record, the policies are unpopular and his challenge is to somehow change that conversation from his record to the future, but it's going to be hard to shake. >> there's going to be at some point he'll have to say, look, i've been president for almost four years. you can't just blame the bush administration for all

it is at 49% approval, 48% disapprove in our brand new cnn/orc poll that went up over the weekend. to previous presidents who won re-election? it's a little bit lower and under 50% compared to them at this time. you can see former president bush, former president clinton and reagan all in the low to mid-50s. president obama right on that line there where former presidents would have cut into the favorable rating in the years they were elected. zoraida? >> not a big difference, paul. we're going to take a look at the polls a little later in the 6:00 hour. thanks for that. >>> a 25-year-old michigan woman is facing two felony fraud charges for continuing to collect food stamps after winning the lottery. we probably remember this story. there was quite a bit of outrage when this came to light. amanda clayton spent monday night and was arraigned yesterday. prosecutors say she failed to inform state welfare officials about her lottery winner and cashed in on more than $5,000 in food stamps after collecting a lump sum lottery payment of $735,000. here's amanda's mom defending her daughte

you new orc poll says when it comes to being likeable president beats romney by, catch this, 2-2 '01. don't look now but that might be the most important number you hear this entire campaign. and what ann romney had to say about the story that won't go away. shamus the dog on the car roof. let me fin wish mitt romney's trash talk about the obama's needing to pack up. we begin with new details on that secret service sex scandal. nbc news investigative correspondent michael isikoff joins me right now. what do we got? >> this entire scandal that rocked the secret service dispute of less than $60. basically what i've been told from sources today is 11 secret service agents who were down there, part of the secret service advance team, went to this strip club in cartagena, the ply club, and that's where they procured these women, bring them back to the hotel, register them as overnight guests in the hotel, and the dispute arises because one woman was two agents, two members of the elite counter assault team. and what happened is there was a dispute over how much she wanted to be paid. she w

there's new cnn/orc polling that shows without santorum in the race, romney has a 28-point lead overgingrich. it appears to be game over for the primaries, and as we've already seen for both parties, game on for the general election. dana bash is with us tonight. as is senior strategist ari fleischer, and democratic strategist paul begala. it was clear santorum wasn't going to overtake romney in delegates. why drop out now? was it personal considerations or political or both? >> let's start with political. it's been obvious for some time, but in the near future, santorum at several events, first of all, they realized the next big, big state where they thought they could win, texas, once they thought it was not going to be winner take all, they realized it was going to be very difficult. secondly, they tried very hard in many ways to get newt gingrich, who's been siphoning conservative votes away from rick santorum, to get him out of the race, that doesn't work. and third, the pennsylvania primary coming up. paul begala knows pennsylvania very well. it was going to be tough for rick s

. >> i want to show our viewers and show you all, cnn-orc poll, and it compares the approval ratings of presidents in april of re-election year. we see president obama now is 49%, but if you go on down the line, everybody is 52%, 54%, 54%. is that -- does that signal anything? i mean, is this a race? we get this feeling for a little while that, oh, president obama seems to be on the mark. all of a sudden not so much. >> he is not on the mark. his advisors know he is not on the mark. it's a very close election, and fraijly, he is luckily to be at 49%. within the margin of error, he is right at the 50 point. it would be much more worrisome for him if he was in the lower or mid 40s. it's a tough election, and when you look down into these polls, people don't have the confidence that they had in him at the beginning of his term. >> conventionally, it's anything under 50% for an incumbent is not good news. >> not good news at all, and not to mention the other number we are all watching is the unemployment number, and if you look at the hifrtic statistics, presidents don't simply win re-el

gallup shows the race in a statistical tie, a cnn/orc poll, gave obama a nine-point lead, and reuters/ipso has the president up four, outside the pla pla margin of error. karen finney, nail-biter. >> yeah. >> we talk about -- i mean this is something we talked about when we were having meetings to discuss this very show. >> how about that. >> one of the things we talked about a general feeling perhaps on left that mitt romney's weakness as a candidate has given way to malaise and a general sense that the president has this, i don't need to participate, he's going to be fine. >> it's a matter we didn't have a contested primary, right people were think, i'll focus on what's happening in the house or senate races and then i'll focus on the presidential farther down the road. i would say, though, as a practitioner of politics, i'll be most interested to see where the polls are at about the start of the summer, because i do think it's only recently that romney is the presumptive nominee, and i say that with respect to mr. gingrich, but when we really have several weeks and some time of hea

. >>> the economy is number one issue this election season and new cnn orc poll says 43% of americanss improving. that's up 40% since february. 57% still think the situation is bad. 42% believe economic conditions have stabilized. 24% say things are starting to recover, and 33% believe the country is still in a downturn. all right. act like a lady and think like a man. that's the weekend's most anticipated movie. it's all about this. >> a lot of stuff i went through to get her, i wrote in the book to tell women how they can get the man they want. >> educated. you walk away knowing for the first time you actually get to see how men think. >> i volunteer to consult to the movie, but they said no. i'm apparently not that much of a man. >>> does the movie version of stv steve harvey's book live up to the grade? next. stay with us. in high school, i had a physics teacher by the name of mr. davies. he made physics more than theoretical, he made it real for me. we built a guitar, we did things with electronics and mother boards. that's where the interest in engineering came from. so now, as

issue as the nation heads toward the election which is tipping toward obama according to a new cnn/orc pollromney 52% to 43%. different picture looking at the the gallup poll, governor romney is winning within the margin of error 47% to 45%. congressman jeb hensarling, we love your choice of music. >> i like it, too. >> appreciate it. the ones in the polls are contradictory. how do you explain that? give me analysis on that. >> it's early in the process. november is a long time away. people are focusing, the president has an opportunity to use a basketball analogy to dribble up and down the court and do lay-ups as the republican primary works through. i'm confident the president is not going abable to run on his record, one of the reasons he's turned to the politics of the vision and envy. people will ask themselves are they better off than they were four years ago and for working americans the answer is no. >> if those very people ask themselves do i like the buffett rule the answer would be a resounding yes. new statistics in a cnn poll and another poll as well, this one says 72% in favor

his popularity still lagging well behind president obama in a new cnn/orc poll. 56% approval versus 44%orable opinion poll of romney is up to 44% from march. >>> propoegz a new route that would avoid nebraska's aquafor, major source of drinking water for the state, very important for the agricultural industry there. president obama had approved a different portion of the old route but denied a full permit for the original project. some ranchers this morning are saying this new route still, they think, is too close to those fragile sand hills. >>> bp says it has reached a class action settlement in the 2010 gulf oil spill. the total payout is estimated at $7.8 billion. but bp says the final tally could be even higher. bp says the deal will cover economic port and medical damage claims. a federal judge now has to grant federal approval of the settlement. more claims against transocean and haliburton. >>> jetblue pilot who suffered a midair meltdown is planning an insanity defense. clayton osbon allegedly left the cockpit, screaming about religion and terrorists, you'll recall, became enra

take a look at a cnn/orc poll from a week ago. 40% of respondents had unfavorable opinion of the movementis the tea party done or moving in a different direction? let's bring in will cain and lz granderson. happy monday to you both. >> good morning. >> good morning, carol. >> it sounds like a monday! pep it up, boys, come on! is the tea party still a player, lz? >> yes and no. you know? obviously, the person they wanted to be the gop nominee is not that person. it's mitt romney. so they have to try and swallow their pride a little bit. with that being said the biggest criticism about mitt romney is is the fact he stale hasn't appealed to conservatives which many correlate to being the tea party. yeah, a still a player and when it comes down to a vice president candidate their voices will be heard and i think you'll see that impact a lot more than the overall nominee's impact. >> i know we have been hearing this a while. on he -- op-ed in "the washington post" saying dick lugar. are we through with the so-called insurgent campaigns? >> no, it has lot maybe a little bit of steam. i would po

a new cnn/orc poll that shows the current system benefits the rich isn't fair to the rest.l of new york is the chairman of the democratic campaign committee joins us this morning. obviously, fairness in taxes is a big topic in this political year and no surprise that it's coming up in a political year. why do you think what eric cantor is proposing is not a good thing. if you believe him, he's saying 100,000 jobs would help women, sounds like it would help the middle class, as well. >> well, over one half of this so-called small business tax cut goes to people earning over $1 million a year. this is a typical bait and switch. you put a label on something saying it's for small businesses and you give away the store to millionaires. because of our debt, we have to dismantle medicare and then you pass a $46 billion tax cut for millionaires that's not paid for. i'm all for investments in the middle class, giving incentives to small businesses and this doesn't make investments and incentives and small businesses and moms and pops in the middle class. this is another unfunded, un

. >> mary, he backed up in the cnn orc poll, we asked who is more likable, likable? mitt romney 27%. so on this likability, mary, romney's got some work to do. >> this is not a personality contest. in other polls, and there were a spate of them this week, romney's beating obama hands down on the issues that factor most prominently in people's lives and they prioritize in this election, who is better to do the economy? who can create jobs? who can do bet or gas prices. yea. they love obama, they hate his policies. if romney is an awkward politician, i'm not sure that doesn't wear better over time than a telepromptered, smooth, too cool for school obama who all he ever does is trash his opponent as opposed to support his own policies because he can't. because people aren't working and they can't fill up their cars and they can't get groceries. so this is a referendum on the president. it's not a referendum on mitt romney's personality and the longer that the obama people run a popularity contest, the less successful is their potential. >> mary, here is an example of tha

the new cnn/orc poll, condoleezza rice on top of the list, 26% and second, rick santorum.ple. what do these two top picks tell us? >> kyra, i suspect that condoleezza rice is looking that the and saying holy cow herself. i think when she left office she said that what she wanted to do was a commissioner of the nfl. so i suspect this is a surprise to her as much as it is to me. >> do you think she'd do it? >> you know, i don't think she would. i think for someone who has never been in ekt welled office, elected office is very different from appointed office. certainly she's a very qualified woman, she's been a pioneer for african-american women and she brings important foreign policy experience and diversity, but no. i don't think she's interested in it and i don't think she's given us any indication that she's interested in it and, i think it would be risk toe put someone in who has never run for elected office. campaigns can be pretty treachero treacherous, as we've learned. >> what do you think? condoleezza rice? >> i agree with ana in the fact that she certainly would b

something that might be good for the president when you look at your polling because 64% of people polled in a cnn/orcbuffett rule. that their minimum tax rate is 30%. 64% favor it. 30% oppose it. the support was strongest in our polling among democrats, 76% of democrats say they support it. and 49% of republicans, almost half, support it. here's where it gets tricky. the people who study tax policy say, well, a lot of millionaires are paying a 30% tax, in fact, and when you look at a tax rate from millionaires and billionaires compared with average joe middle class americans, their tax rate in many cases is already higher than middle class americans because of all the income tax deductions and write-offs we get in the middle class. how much would that raise? a couple of different researchers an cnn money has great research and a fact about th this saying it would raise 5 billion in new taxes a year. not enough to close much so this is where it's definitely politics. if it appeals to those thinking the rich skates by it works on the campaign trail. >> is it just on their salary? >> most people who are