ariana huffington, steve rattner, david frum and mort zuckerman. next up, what do the shipyard in tahrir square have in common? a lot. first, here's my take. i spent the last few weeks working on an essay for "time" magazine on barack obama's foreign policy. and in association with that piece, i interviewed the president last wednesday in the oval office. let me give you a few of my thoughts and impressions. obama seemed relaxed, calm, confident. i asked him about mitt romney's attacks on him as indecisive, timid and nuanced. i don't quite know why being nuanced is a bad thing but that is what romney said. obama responded that romney and the rest of the republican field are going to be playing to their base until the primary season is over. after that, he said, he looked forward to having a foreign policy debate. overall, i think it's going to be pretty hard to argue that we have not executed a strategy over the last three years that has put america in a stronger position than it was when i came into office, he said. i think obama has good reasons

steve rattner is not the brother of -- footnote.nt i'm not aunnoing to people they're related on television when they turn out not to be. but i think that when you look at this -- the idea that you want to segregate what bain did from good capitalism. there's bad capitalism and bad capitalism. predatory capitalism. rattner in his political piece, bain was one of the better of the private equity firms. they did less financial engineering, they did more managing. to me, whether that's true or not, i'm not in a position to judge because i haven't dove into the record, et cetera. creative destruction which is now a term, which everyone is talking about, is ugly up close. it's a sledgehammer, it cracks them over the skull. it destroys towns, right? if you believe in this, in the system, you believe other people pick up the pieces somewhere else and that money goes somewhere productive and the jobs grow in that. when faced with that, when faced with the actual reality of that, an actual debate in conversation about what creative destructi

steve rattner, msnbc political analyst, visiting professor, former democratic congressman harold ford jr. >> good morning. >> and the chairman of deutsch, donny deutsch. and in manchester, new hampshire, political reporter for the "huffington post," our good friend sam stein. i've got to say -- >> hello. >> -- this crew right here looks tan, mike barnicle. >> i'm seething with resentment already. >> i'm going to look at some of these numbers, joe. and we'll get you in on this. the republican presidential field now on the ground in new hampshire for a big push before tuesday's primary. mitt romney looking to lock up back to back wins. and if you look at the polls, he's going to do it going away. the latest poll after the iowa caucuses shows romney leading the back in new hampshire by 30 p points, 47 support. but look at this poll, joe. i don't know if you've seen this yet this morning. >> yeah. >> which candidate has the best shot at beating president obama? mitt romney, 65%. this is among likely primary voters in the state of new hampshire, 65% say he has the best shot. number two on

steve rattner says -- a democrat who comes on our show.his capital wing of bain, and he built it on his own. >> right. >> and it was ground-breaking what he did, and as steve rattner says, he's got a lot to be proud of. and that's a democratic financier saying that. but with that great story, how does he continue flubbing this basic question? >> why is it so hard? >> two things, you've commented on it and others have. they're not prepared. he doesn't have a substantive answer. i was thinking last night that there's another issue here. which is he's about the least folksy politician of all time. and tough issues require some combination of passion, like gingrich did and folksy, particularly in the south. and he ain't folksy, and that means tense situations become more tense by his mannerisms, the nervous laughter. >> michael dukakis. >> they told us he's lived on the real streets of america. >> oh, you know, i expect him to say i'm straight out of compton. can you believe that? no, seriously, that -- i've got to go to gene with that. that i

steve rattner, ed rendell and other democrats who understand how the world works says nothing wrong with bain capital. that's private equity. that's how you get main street working. >> did you see anything in that romney attack ad that wasn't about bain that you thought might be effective instead of this? >> oh, my god. well, we went over it yet. all i would do is show mitt romney saying that he wasn't a ronald reagan -- he wasn't a reagan conservative, he wasn't a republican, show him saying that he would fight like hell to defend abortion in massachusetts, saying he would fight like hell to defend gay marriage talking about gun control. that's the stupidity of this attack. if you just run those arguments. you take 15 points off of mitt romney in south carolina. >> joe, one last thing on bain capital. the best defense is roll out on the people they invested in. they were the sports authority, they were like you said, pizza hut. these are companies that americans can relate to. it's nothing that's not voodoo, not black magic. >> mitt romney spent part of his time yesterday trying to fend

hear 15% doesn't work, and then i hear republicans and others saying, well, actually -- and steve rattner actually it's 46% if you add what they paid. and how does that get me back to work? fairness in and of itself -- >> it's not fairness, it's basically saying right now you at home, you are paying too much compared to the other guys in taxes, they're going to pay more, that's going to help the deficit, that's -- >> who's paying too much? >> the average guy. it's all relative. >> the average guy is not paying too much because about 47% of americans don't pay any income tax at all. and, again, all i'm talking about -- i'm not talking about the fairness of the tax code. i'm talking about what tom and bob talked about. at the end of the day, you've got to connect with the guy sitting there watching tv. the woman sitting there. >> i think -- >> pure sentiment doesn't do it. >> that's not what he's saying. he's talking about american values, the core of this country. >> american values are great. how does that get me back to work? >> my logic if i'm at home. i go you know what? i want to get

and we also have financier and "morning joe" economic analyst steve rattner with us, mike barnicle backethnic slurs have been coming out of the -- >> mike murphy goes to a bar, he goes to a bar. what do the polish do at 11:00 -- >> we go to the bar. we're good. >> you got an e-mail from dan senor. it has the menu. he likes the black angus filet, he says it's pricey, but if your guy keeps speaking mandarin on stage -- >> i had a bet saying he would get double digits in new hampshire. if you look at new hampshire, is this a question of how well romney does and whether huntsman can go on after new hampshire? that's what it boils down to -- >> yeah, but it's a hard thing. to me the magic moment was what huntsman said to romney yesterday when he came back at him about there's something wrong with serving the president of the united states when he calls you to duty. and you spent years over there as a mormon missionary and you're asked to do it and there's something wrong with that? i think -- i don't think that gets you elected, but certainly excites me, the fact somebody can still stand up

steve rattner, when these attacks started said, this was a great company, and it was a company that mitt was blown away. >> well, he started it with a guy by the name of bill bain, his partner. >> right who pushed him off to do the capital part of bain. >> yeah. i mean, look, the romney story is truly interesting. kniss book captures romney in a way that no book has yet captured him and there are a couple of different threads to pull on. the politic, the being careful, we all understand that covering campaigns, but the two interesting threads are, the similarities between george w. bush and george herbert walker bush, that father/son relationship pap mitt romney and his father george and the romney family. specifically ann romney, who is so open, so warm, so articulate. >> and the boys, who are just -- >> and the boys. but those two threads are truly, i think, the most interesting aspects of romney regarding his character. >> that's true. >> and quickly, the bush relationship is a tortured relationship. mitt romney, unambiguously loved his dad. right? >> he did. >> nothing tortured about