tom perriello suffered that fate. >> remember both perriello and hill voted for the stimulus, for cap and trade, for health care. 3-for-3 in difficult districts. >> ifill: thank you. we'll take the rest of them as the night goes along. thanks a lot. >> lehrer: now with more on what's happened so far here is hari sreenivasan in our news room. >> sreenivasan: thanks, jim. as gwen went over some of the key house races, let me get you up to speed with one of the most recent projections we have and give you a snapshot cof the republans' attempt to try and control the senate. les look at the texas governor's race right now. rick perry an unprecedented fourth term the ap is projecting the winner there. also in indiana the senate race was a pick-up of senator evan buy's seat by republican dan coats and i should say in the night arkansas senator blanch lincoln lost the spot to john bozeman the republican there. not a republican there in more than 100 years. they picked up that seat. in north dakota john hobin picked up a seat there. the republican beating out democrat tracy potter. and then ca

more people said they were less likely to support perriello because the president was there. if perriello is one of about a dozen, dozen and a half democrats who democrats believe can win without 50% because of third-party conservative challenger, perriello is sort of the outside example of this, because he is actually advertising on behalf of the conservative candidate. and that's why the president went there. >> let's talk more about the president. 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

tom perriello in virginia is an example. perriello outperformed what would have been the baseline expectations in his district. it wasn't enough for him to win. i think that russ feingold tried to do the same thing. i'm not sure that i see the evidence that the handful of people who really worked out that strategy were able to win. but look, michael, at the end of the day, unemployment in this country is close to 10% so to some degree i think that talk about messaging is overstated. so much that the democrats can do running into the gail force headwinds of an economy like this and hope and pray that it gets before before the next election. >> michael crowley, many thanks for your time. i appreciate it. >>> who is behind the computer worm. experts now say that the computer program was designed to speed up and destroy the centrifuges which iran is using to enrich uranium. we'll go inside of this cloak and dagger mystery next. you're watching "hardball" only on msnbc. he lightg, girlfriend. mnh-mnh. oh gosh! woo! it's this drab

the fifth district race is a huge for democrats and congressman perriello. president obama coming in there to campaign for perriello is not really surprising. if there is one embattled congressional democrat who it would make the most sense for president obama to go in and campaign for, and on the part of the democratic incumbent to embrace the president, it would be tom perriello. he has not run from the core parts of president obama's agenda. he voted for health care, the stimulus. he has not run from president obama. they stood next to each other just ahead of tuesday. if congressman perriello were to hold his seat, that would be very telling for democrats because this is somebody who has embraced the president. it would be similar in some ways to the governor's race in ohio, where gov. ted strickland similarly has not run from obama, has embraced him, has said, come stand with me. you do not run away from your friends, even when you are facing a tight election. >> the results are also available on our website, c- span.org. you can also find the debates o

tom perriello in virginia is a good example. it wasn't enough for him to win. i think russ feingold tried to do is same thing. at the end of the day, unemployment is close to 10%. to some degree, i think all the talk about messaging is overstated. there's only so much that democrats can do running into the head winds of an economy like this. >> michael crowley, many thanks. appreciate it. >> thank you. >>> coming up, who's behind the computer worm aimed at destroying iran's network? experts say the program was designed to speed up and destroy the center which iran is using. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] at&t and blackberry have teamed up to keep your business moving. blackberry torch now just $99.99. only from at&t. rethink possible. >>> the democrats are looking for a senator to run their senatorial campaign committee which as the name implies, exists to elect democrats to the senate. so far, no takers. that's because the democrats will be defending a whopping 21 senate seats in 2012, plus the two independents who caucused with him. it could prove to be much toug

that's where most of the losses were sustained. >> host: and as i looked at it, you mentioned tom perriello, that it wasn't just freshman who lost, right? >> it wasn't just newcomers like patrick murphy, also, in pennsylvania, but you had ike skelton, john spratt, paul kanjorski in pennsylvania. it, it was across the board young and old. right? >> is just because they had a d after their names. >> guest: well, that's the pattern here, and you look at the guy like ike skelton who's been just a great champion for the veterans and the men and women in our armed forces, he has represented a district that has leaned republican. that is a district that george bush carried in 2004 as is the district of john spratt. >> host: uh-huh. >> guest: and, you know, what the voters were saying was, look, we are impatient with the lack of a faster economic turn around. in every district there are other elements to the race. i should say that what was a big political storm was, certainly, made worse and turned into a, you know, type 2 hurricane, type 3, 4 hurricane because of all this -- [inaudible] themselve

tom perriello is one of those democrats -- a wave of freshmen and sophomore democrats being beaten tonighthe was a full-throated supporter of president's agenda. the president campaigned for him. so this is a big blow for the white house. in the midwest the republicans have already picked off two democratic seats including this one in the ninth district. baron hill. he was elected in 2006. he was a blue-dog democrat, katie, fiscally conservative but that wasn't enough to save him. he's defeated by todd young who was endorsed by sarah palin and who is a tea party member. >> couric: this tea party wave may in fact wash away many of the gains that the democrats made in 2006 and 2008. >> reporter: that's right, katie. take a look at this. this is particularly significant. you see this one up in the east. that doesn't seem like much but it's in new hampshire -- right now the republicans don't have a single seat in all of new england. frank guinta, another tea party republican defeats incumbent carol shea-porter. >> couric: joined by bob schieffer and jeff greenfield, two of the sharpest politic

the president campaigning for tom perriello and making a big case of that district. >> right. yeah, there was a big swing. republicans now hold 8-3 majority now and the virginia delegation and a sign of what happened nationally, andrea. the issues here in virginia where people were focused on cutting spending, job creation, lower taxes. getting people back do work, really dominated those campaigns and i think the republicans had the bert message on actually getting stuff done and fixing problem. it's part of what happened nationally. >> haley barbour, fellow governor, head the republican governors has spoken out against michael steel and the job he did. when do you stand on whether michael steel should be replaced by someone else as republican national chairman? >> well, i haven't said anything on that. michael steel was very helpful to me a year ago when i was for governor and the rnc did a great job supporting our campaign as well as the republican governors association, immensely helpful pap decision played in a couple of months by the leaders that we elect. two people from

. >> ...like congressman perriello or governor strickland and you see 19 state legislatures go to the other side, governorships in swing states, the democratic party set back... >> mm-hmm. >> ...what does it feel like? >> it feels bad. ( laughter ) you know, the toughest thing over the last couple of days is seeing really terrific public servants not have the opportunity to serve anymore, at least in the short term. and you mentioned... there are just some terrific members of congress who took really tough votes because they thought it was the right thing, even though they knew this could cause them political problems. with respect to the... the tax cut issue, my goal is to make sure that we don't have a huge spike in taxes for middle-class families. so my goal is to sit down with speaker-elect boehner and mitch mcconnell and harry and nancy sometime in the next few weeks and see where we can move forward in a way that, first of all, does no harm; that extends those tax cuts that are very important for middle-class families, also extends those provisions that are important to encourag

it has traditionally been viewed as a conservative district but perriello voted with the president on stimulus, cape and trade and on health care reform and has been aned advocate for the president. >> ifill: with 22% of the vote in, 55% for mr. hurt and 2% for mr. clark. >> i don't think where charlottesville is centered. that would be tom's base in the district. >> ifill: and the base of the university of virginia where a lot of young people are where president obama went to go rally the troops both african- american voters and younger voters. i would say that the chairman of the democratic campaign committee told me that tom is the great experiment. as stu said, if you can be in the mccain district and vote for stimulus, for cap-and-trade, for health care and get re-elected in this campaign year, you are a different kind of candidate indeed. >> ifill: that would be a bright spot, david chalian. stu roetenberg, we'll be talking to you all night. >> woodruff: the polls did close in the state of ohio at 7:30 p.m. eastern. and joining us now is karen kapler, the state house bureau chie

and yet, perriello not run away from the nomination. and he has also not run away from his vote, which is an interesting tech that he has taken. i think he did more town halls during the august recess of 2009 than anyone else. he took every question then did not hide from voters that were upset with, and he explained his position. and i think the white house is very interested in this race and that is why obama went down there to help him out. i think they want to show there is someone who can stand with the president and even in a conservative district, can still win. both sides have spent a lot of money in this race. perriello could very well pull it out. he could be one of the democratic surprises. host: elizabeth, democrat, good morning. caller: i want to say two quick things. the first thing is that i do not like to pull the plane card. -- blame card. but i would like to say that president bush is the pretty -- is pretty much the person who put this country in the position that it is. i would like to us, what could be done to turn

the tongman from virginia, tom perriello. george?ng to talk to the man saying he was elected last night to take our country back. rand paul. the senator-elect from kentucky. >> good morning. >> what were you elected to do? >> we have to balance our own budgets, but congress doesn't seem to have regard for balancing their own budget. the tea part want them to step up and do that. >> what does congress do about the tax cuts set to expire at the end of the year? the president said he doesn't want to extend the tax cuts to people making over $250,000. he says it will cost too much. are you willing to go along with him on that? >> it's a spending problem. not a revenue problem. we bring in $2.4 trillion. but we spend nearly $4 trillion. i think you can have a great depression on your hand and not a great recession if you raise taxes right now. >> will you come up with $700 billion in spending cuts to match that tax cut? >> if you're honest about how large this problem is, you have to look at the length and breadth and width of the entire

alan grayson of florida, tom perriello, virginia, with a voucher, a democrat, virginia, carol porter, a democrat, in new hampshire, chet edwards, democrat of texas and his demise has been predicted for the last 17 elections. glenn nye, democrat of virginia, alan boyd, florida, kathy doll kemper, democrat of pennsylvania, frank kratovil, democrat of maryland. joseph fit cao, one of the few republicans who lost his seat, a democrat from illinois and attend the district. those are some of the incumbents who lost their seats. delay. melanie on the republican minority caller: good morning to you both. first of all, thank you to c- span for having, i guess, the most non-partisan reporting out there. i always turn to you guys when i want to actually hear i guess some truth. but what i wanted to say, i just kind of wanted to backtrackms. brown was talking about the letter pelosi said and i think it is appalling that she is not seeing what their policies have done for this country -- to this country. i think they need to take some responsibility and stop blaming the bush administration for wha

of members, joe donnelly in indiana -- well, not, i'm sorry -- >> one i would add to that is tom perriellowho actually lost, but he ran an extremely strong campaign in a district that really had no, there was no reason to elect a democrat this year and made that race a lot closer. he was helped by obama in the last week, but he ran a very strong campaign. >> one interesting point we're pointing out in today's hotline spotlight, we'll give you a preview now, is the notion that the trifecta of senate seats, the symbolic senate seats that republicans thought they could pick up a while ago, the illinois seat held by president obama -- once held by president obama, the delaware seat once held by mike cause l and the nevada seat held by harry reid. the lesson, i think, from those three -- well, the three very different lessons. in the illinois you had president obama do everything he could in the place where he was most popular, but voters were so dissatisfied with government, 65% of illinois voters told exit pollsters they were either dissatisfied with or angry with the federal government. it i