restore our future is responsible for the content of this message. >> restore our future. they never say the word mitt romney, even though all his people and donors are involved in it. you're shaking your head? >> i agree with you. here's one reason why it's working here. first of all, the sheer tonnage. i've never seen in a concentrated space so much advertising, you know, from davenport all the way out to sioux city and back -- >> you can't escape it. >> you can't escape it. you can watch "entertainment tonight," you can choose anything -- >> the other thing here, newt is to some extent made vulnerable by the way he rose to prominentsy. >> how so? >> because he did in the debates. he didn't spend a year and a half here in iowa, becoming an iowan. rick santorum has essentially become an iowa. he speaks to iowa from the inside out. people know who he is, they know his record, they know what he stands for. the other reason this kind of advertising works is that most people here in iowa didn't really know anything very much about newt gingrich, so this negative advertising i

the super pacs are supposed to be independent, they don't coordinate, but, look, the restore our futureee former romney political aides. one of the chief fund-raisers for the romney presidential campaign leaves the campaign and then goes to work for restore our future. romney himself speaks at fund-raisers over the summer, for restore our future. so that tells you a lot about the connections between the campaigns and the super pacs. they're very closely related. and when the candidate himself speaks out, he's giving his implicit blessing, telling big donors out there, this is where i'd like the money to go. >> yeah. and jim baker running senior bush's campaign back in 1988, never called out the mccarthy people, the people running that american security agency campaign that was run, all those dirty ads. they never called up and said, please stop those dirty ads, they're hurting with us, because they liked those ads. anyway, thank you, michael isikoff, thank you to the great john harris from politico. >>> up next, just hours away from the results of the iowa caucuses tonight, what can we

restore our future is responsible for the content of this message. >> so that's restore our future. the pac that supports mitt romney. along with gingrich, rick perry feeling the backlash after calling romney a vulture capitalist. ironically, their attacks may be helping romney to lock up support from the conservative establishment which now has up until now has been hesitant to rally around romney. they're circling the wagons today. the president of the chamber of commerce says he is disappointed with the carrying on within the republican party. top republican donor barry wynn compared it to finger nails on the chalk board. wynn is now band onning the texas governor to throw his weight behind mitt romney as well. it's a big hit for the texas governor who is trying to reframe the issue as a critique against washington. >> listen, i love capitalists, free market capitalism in the state of texas has created over a million jobs. we understand how capitalism needs to work. but this corrupt and fraudulent activity that's been going on in washington, d.c. between them and wall street has

the money going towards restore our future is fully disclosed. >> that's not true. you should check out some of the press clippings, but karl rove has pledged $300 million through cross roads -- >> but that is not -- >> we don't have a republican nominee yet. i certainly hope that nominee's governor romney and woul like nothing more to have support from other groups. >> you can throw up the smoke screen to make it seem like one group is for one thing, there should be different, a whole different set of rules, but until they are, we're going to fight. >> thanks very much for both of you. i appreciate you're coming in and doing it together. i hope you'll come back and let us know what you think about this. their point of view and arguments they made about how close they are to the guys they're pushing for. >>> just five days away from the south carolina primary. how much do we know about south carolina? john avalon outfront and schools giving students high-tech watches. counts calories and weight and then tracks it. what are they doing with the information? and a lot

the money going towards restore our future is fully disclosed. >> that's not true. you should check out some of the press clippings, but karl rove has pledged $300 million through cross roads -- >> but that is not -- >> we don't have a republican nominee yet. i certainly hope that nominee's governor romney and woul like nothing more to have support from other groups. >> you can throw up the smoke screen to make it seem like one group is for one thing, there should be different, a whole different set of rules, but until they are, we're going to fight. >> thanks very much for both of you. i appreciate you're coming in and doing it together. i hope you'll come back and let us know what you think about this. their point of view and arguments they made about how close they are to the guys they're pushing for. >>> just five days away from the south carolina primary. how much do we know about south carolina? john avalon outfront and schools giving students high-tech watches. counts calories and weight and then tracks it. what are they doing with the information? and a lot

the best example, the pro-romney super pac called restore our future. million. that's how much restore our future spent on tv ads in iowa, and it's actually nearly twice as much as the 1.5 million spent by romney's own presidential campaign, and almost all of that super pac ad money has gone for hash attacks against newt gingrich like these. >> newt has more baggage than the airlines. he was fined $300,000 for ethics violations and took $1.6 million from freddie mac. >> i made a big mistake in the spring. >> haven't we had enough mistakes? restore our future is responsible for the content of this message. >> how much of an impact did these ads have? look at this. on december 4th gingrich is number one in iowa with 26% in the polls. that's the -- that very week the super pac ad blitz girns and by the end of the month, newt's support is cut in half to just 13%. now, most political analysts say the attack ads played a big factor, if not the only factor in, gingrich's fall. they were made, this is interesting, by larry mccarthy, a restore our future founder

. >> restore our future is responsible for the content of this message. >> now, restore our future is a super pac which supports governor romney. the supreme court ruling in the citizens united case gives super pacs the power to raise unlimited amounts of money and run ads without disclosing who's behind them, sometimes until months have gone by. critics say they also give a candidate plausible deniability. >> newt gingrich has been complaining, we ran a clip of him earlier, that you had former aides running a super pac that spent considerable money attacking them. he said you should just tell them to stop the attacks against newt gingrich. will you do that? >> it's illegal, as you probably know. super pacs have to be entirely separate from a campaign and a candidate. i'm not allowed to communicate with a super pac in any way, shape, or form. >> so you're not coordinating it in any way whatsoever? >> my goodness, if we coordinate in any way whatsoever, we go to the big house. >> mitt romney on msnbc. even as some reports were saying restore our future was outspending the gingrich forc

restore our future is responsible for the content of this message. >> so, rick, newt gingrich, your candidate, has given money to help the chinese limit their families to one child. you know, that's pretty -- is that true or not? it doesn't sound true. >> not to my knowledge. doesn't sound like newt beginning rix to me. people in south carolina know newt gingrich. it shouldn't be surprising. mitt romney's campaign is based on misleading utterances at odds with his record. yesterday i read in the huffington post that the net net number of 100,000 jobs only included the positive jobs and not the negative jobs. while he's got staples and sports authority that sell imported products from mostly china, manufactured overseas, he doesn't count the jobs where he took apart the companies and sent their jobs overseas. soy suppose that's fitting. >> you got your shot in there. we'll see. most of that ad we saw against it was accurate except for the chinese part, right? >> i don't think anything was accurate. >> you didn't mention anything. he was fined. he was reprimanded. >> no, no, no, no. chris he wa

restore our few tour is responsible for the content of this message. >> restore our future. a political action committee that support mitt romney. it spent more than $3 million on ads in iowa. many of them blistering grinning. super pacs like this can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money on behalf of a candidate and all candidates are benefiting. super pacs have to be independent and candidates aren't allowed to communicate with them in reality. >> how close are the relationships between the super pacs, like restore our future, and campaigns like romneys. >> technically super pacs are unaffiliated with the campaigns. however in reality, they are very much an extension of the campaigns. run by former senior advisers. >> gingrich called restore our future a phony super pac, saying that to romney. >> that's your staff and your organization. those are your millionaire friends paying for it. >> we called and e-mailed romney's campaign for response. we didn't hear back. contacted by cnn an official at restore our future, which is run out of this building in washington, would

the pro mitt romney group, restore our future takes the top spot.ch is accusing romney of trying to buy the election. >> he would buy it if he could. >> do you believe he is trying to buy this? >> you tell me. >> i will let you decide how you would describe it. for a state this size, to spend that number of dollars in negative ads aimed at one candidate is amazing. >> do you feel swift boated? >> romney boated. >> mark murray is in washington. romney boated as newt gingrich sees it. is this a surprise at the amount of money? >> it's not a surprise. we will see so much more money spent on ads. what has been interesting in the ad race in iowa is how almost unilaterally romney and particularly the pro romney super pack is hammering newt gingrich and without them being able to respond, when you show the numbers and restore our future spent some $3 million in ads, a really big sum for a state like iowa. the campaign spent just a million and when you admit romney's campaign, mostly on positive ads, you see a big disparity. someone like newt gingrich could

looking at the newt gingrich pac which has gone back and forth with mitt romney, super pac restore our future casino out in las vegas. given about $5 billion to living our future. look at jon huntsman. this is jon huntsman's father who -- he's essentially the principle backer of our destiny pac, worth about $900 million, the inventor of the burger king clam shell, the cartons. another person, bob kerry who has been giving a lot of money to the romney, pro-romney super pac restore our future worth about $660 million, given about $3 million so far, and romney's got a lot of other people with even deeper pockets than that who could help him out. guys like john paulson on wall street. a lot of money given to romney's super pac so far. and the last person i'll mention is foster frieze. he's an investment firm founder from wyoming. worth about $250 million. he's given about $400,000 so far we've heard to the -- to the red, white, and blue fund for rick santorum. but expect that number's going to go up. we've learned that they're going to be spending another $600,000 or so in south carolina. so lots

paying for it. >> reporter: we asked the romney campaign for a response but an official for restore our future comment on gingrich's criticism or discuss strategy. at least two people on that board are former campaign romney advisers. disclosures show that at least $500,000 was given to restore our future. hedge fund and possibly because of the holiday. the tactics used are legal and analysts say they work. >> the television ad attack on gingrich has had a huge effect on this race. there's no question that it enormously eroded his support here in iowa after it surged nationally. >> reporter: and analysts say because of the results in iowa, this is only going to intensify. restore our future is already using negative ads which holds its primary on the 21st. brian todd, washington. >>> a roller coaster ride is a simple way to describe the white house. wolf blitzer, as he mentioned the highlights of his day. i would like to point out i just went to your blog. you haven't blogged today. >> not yet. but i will as soon as i'm done with you. >> i see a blog from yesterday. >> north korea. could be a

"restore our future" is a super pac created to support romney.it spent three million in iowa to bash ey's rivals and president barack obama.this isn't just a republican tactic.mitt romney's america is not our america.priorities usa-a pro-obama super pac-raked in more than three million dollars in the same period. both groups, by law, aren't controlled by the actual campaigns.but they arr led byy former aides ann supporters. that means a third arty would need a huge bankroll to even think about running against the democrats and republicans. including congressional races, one analyst believes eight- billion dollars could be spent dollars for every man, woman and child in the country. after all is said and done, an american candidate can win more votes than his or her opponent& and still lose.it happened most recently in 2000, when al gore lost to george w. bush-despite winning half-a-million more votes.gore can blame the electoral college for that loss.the system designed by the founding fathersscreates a winner-take-all race in each of the 50 states.then those states cast votes for pre

according to the numbers so far, you know, the restore our future was very negative. maybe 100,000 out of eight million plus has gone to pro romney ads. >> ifill: that's what i mean, i guess. >> i think in every election cycle we hear there's a tremendous amount negative advertising and negativity. each time there's a different explanation for it, i think the super pacs are running negative ads. but you would have seen those ads from non-super pac entities as well. it has more to do with the politics than it does with the campaign finance system. >> ifill: robert kelner and john dan bar, thank you both very much. >> thank you. >> woodruff: now, to the continuing anger over wall street pay in light of the slow economic recovery. it's an issue that has often been front and center since the government bailed out big banks and other firms in 2008 and 2009. it's also helped fuel some of the occupy protests in new york and around the country today more than 500 members of the occupy movement took their messages to capitol hill, where they raised questions again about the ro

we've got a quick montage of anti-gingrich ads run by the restore our future super pac, and then i'll go to howard. >> newt has a ton of baggage. he was fined $300,000 for ethics violations and took 1.6 million from freddie mac before it helped cause the economic meltdown. newt supports amnesty for illegal immigrants and teamed with nancy pelosi and al gore on global warming. ever notice how some people make a lot of mistakes? >> probably a mistake. >> i made a mistake. >> i've made mistakes at time. >> oops. >> you know what makes barack obama happy, newt gingrich's baggage. newt has more baggage than the airlines. as conservative "national review" says his weakness for half-baked and not especially conservative ideas made him a poor speaker of the house. he appears unable to transform or even govern himself. newt gingrich too much baggage. restore our future is responsible for the content of this message. >> those ads being run not technically by mitt romney but by a group that might possibly have a feeling that maybe mitt romney would be a good president. howard fineman, before the

. >> woodruff: the "restore our future" superpac behind romney went after gingrich in that web ad. and in a positive spot, the red, white and blue superpac touted santorum's conservative credentials. >> rick santorum-- dedicated defender of the unborn, resolute leader in the fight against radical islam, courageous leader. >> woodruff: while the pro ron paul endorse liberty superpac made a web ad starring voters. >> ron paul has been consistent for more than 30 years. and he's been absolutely right about the most important issues facing this country today. for a closer look at the difference super pac spending made in iowa, and what might be ahead, we're joined by bill allison of the sunlight foundation, a nonprofit group that advocates government transparency and eliza newlin carney, staff writer for "roll call." we thank you both for being here. eliza newlin carney, let me start with you. remind me where these superpacs came from, they grew out of a supreme court decision, citizens united in early last year -- dish should say early 2010. >> early 2010. the citizens united ruling r

restore our future on our last contribution disclosure at the end of june there were several people who had given us a million dollars. >> reporter: the gingrich super pac, winning our future, recently received $5 million from las vegas billionaire sheldon adelson. did it occur to gingrich to turn the money down? >> might be able to do that. but we learned in iowa if you unilaterally disarm, you might as well not run. >> reporter: indeed, winning our future used some of those fresh $5 million to buy this anti-romney documentary. >> i can make a profit. >> reporter: it is so flawed that gingrich himself has publicly called on the super pac to fix the mistakes or drop the documentary altogether. of course, they don't have to pay any attention. although it's probably not what mr. adelson, the donor, had in mind either. but what do these multimillionaires expect? >> they want their candidate to win. >> reporter: but there has to be a so what at the end of that? if you win, what does adelson get out of it? >> he knows i'm very pro-israel. that's the central value of his life. he's very worri