that's kirk franklin off of roland martin's play list. i love that song. only sing, he kind of talks and his background singers do the singing. >>> roland is at the naacp convention in houston. today, mitt romney will be speaking before the group. one person who won't be there is the president. vice president biden has been sent in his place. that will happen tomorrow. let's talk about the reception potentially for mitt romney. what's the tone of what people are expecting? >> well, obviously, he'll get a colder reception. remember, senator john mccain spoke here in 2008 when then governor george w. bush was running. he also spoke to the naacp during the campaign. i think people are asking for is what is he going to say in terms of specifics. that is, he likely is going to talk about the economy. when you look at the plaque unemployment rate, over 14%. among the youth, 20%. housing. 53% of black wealth has been wiped out because of the housing crisis. so what will he do to change that, to fix that. not broad issues, specifics. that's what folks are looking f

we're joined by roland martin who has a lot to say about this. >> roland does?lieve it or not. >> i love roland martin. 35 minutes past 5 clock on the east coast. more finger pointing and posturing after house republicans voted to repeal president obama's health care reforms yesterday. repeal. >> it's gone? >> it went through. it went through the house which means doa at the senate. so democrats, of course, because of that are calling this a whole waste of time since there is montpelier way this thing's going any further than here. even if it did miraculously pass the senate, do you think the president would sign a repeal of his own health care initiative? >> nah. the justice department reviewing thousands of cases to find out if faulty forensics may have led to faulty convictions. the justice department has known for years that questionable evidence in some trials have led to guilty verdicts but no reviews of the cases have occurred. it will happen in cases that relied on forensic evidence. i feel like i've seen this on "csi." >> you'll see it in courtrooms bec

is the host of washington watch with roland martin and looking like roland martin this morninga pocket square happening. >> it is more like a shower cap. let me show you. you need a little color. you need color today. >> i do need some color. i don't know that i need a shower cap. >> will is so happy today he is not the target. >> target? >> look at that, totally changes the outfit. >> i like it. let's move on. get real this morning, we have seen screw ups like this before. remember the time the version of the kazakhstan anthem was played for an athlete at a ceremony in kuwait and the athlete took it well and smiled and kept her head down and this is a bigger blunder, i think. it happened at the london olympics, the north korean women's soccer team refused to take the field after the flag of south koreaas being displayed on the big screen next to the players. they eventually did return when the mistake was rectified and the match started late and the olympic organizers apologized proceed fusely. i wonder, is that it? can you imagine? >> i have to disagree about one thing. i don

roland martin. here's the ramones, good morning, guys. mid grade dark roast forest fresh full tank brain freeze cake donettes rolling hot dogs g of ice anti-freeze wash and dry diesel self-serve fix a flat jumper cables 5% cashback signup for 5% cashback at gas stations through september. it pays to discover. >>> welcome back. a few quick headlines for you. online attacks against the u.s. are on rise and the man in charge of cyber defense says we are unprepared to stop them. keith alexander says on a scale of 1 to 10 for cyber attack preparedness, the u.s. gets a three. >>> a major crackdown on the synthetic drug industry. 90 people were arrested and seized 5 million packs of fake pot and 167,000 packages of bath salt and $36 million in cash. >>> one of two new jersey state troopers, face disciplinary action resigned. the cara van was spotted at speeds topping $100. sergeant first class stepping down. >> our team this morning the starting point team for friday, ron brownstein and roland martin and w

cnn's roland martin has been calling for action from the beginning. roland, welcome "outfront."ly voice in drawing attention to this epidemic. police say it's gang violence. but gangs exist across america's cities. what's making things explode in chicago? >> it's interesting the police are saying it's gangs. i talked to a pastor who recently convened a meeting of about 20 well-known gang leaders. what they said is that even they are trying to figure out what's going on, that part of the problem is that the gangs in chicago have become so fractured that you have pretty much folks just doing whatever they want. i know it might sound crazy. it used to be -- organized crime was called organized for a reason. but you pretty much had these lone wolfs where folks are doing pretty much whenever they want. and even the gang members are saying, man, we really can't put a handle on what the in the world is causing the outbreak of violence in chicago. that was amazing to me. >> that is amazing. as you know, this spike coincides with former obama chief of staff rahm emanuel taking over as ma

let's get to roland martin covering the event all week. before we talk about president obama and his not showing up at the convention, let's talk a little about mitt romney yesterday. we heard some booing obviously when he talked about obama care. i know that at the end there was half the crowd roughly apparently stood to cheer. how overall would you say was the reception for him? >> i won't say they stood and cheer. in fact, when he came out half the room stood up, applauded him, being polite, half didn't and the same thing happened when it was over. there were certainly moments during the speech where he did get applause and when he talked about the importance of family and how he was going to make that a priority of his administration and then when he says he was going to defend traditional marriage and also when he talked about education, allocates federal dollars to each student, allowing parents to send their kids to any school they want to saying that kids should not be stuck in low performing schools, so that's where he got a lot o

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our friend roland martin will be back in just a moment.washington watch. >>> we want to start with breaking news. deadly storms on the move right now. violent thunderstorms have been slamming into eastern tennessee. happened overnight. reportedly two people are dead. dozens of others have been injured. let's get right to rob marciano in our extreme weather center with an update. hey, rob. >> good morning, soledad. this is an area that is highly populated during the summer months. a lot of tourism in the area. great smokey mountain national park. and this storm tore right through the area across there. rvs, tents, don't do a lot of good when talking about big trees falling down. because this complex of storms rolled through knoxville, tennessee valley, and just to the west of the appalachians and kind of converged over this area right along the park. winds gusting at times 70 miles per hour. that's multiple trees down. dozens injured. two fatalities, and still some folks that are hurt there they are trying to get out. right now it's quiet.

david from, bill adare, from politicfact, extensively covering both campaigns, and roland martin. bill, let me start with you. this wide question of who is being more transparent, is this president any better, any worse, about the same as other presidents? >> he's made considerable progress. he made a big promise. he said he would be the most transparent and open president in history. so he's set a high bar for himself. and he's had mixed success. there are definitely some things that he achieved in terms of putting data online, putting data from the economic stimulus. putting up the white house visitor logs. he has been very good at posting data. where he has not done well is resisting the gravitational pull of washington. to do things behind closed doors. he promised that he would open the health care discussions to the cameras of c-span. it never happened. and we have compiled some of these, and we found it's a mixed record of 13 core promises on transparency that we track on politic fact. he's got five kept, five broken and three we've rated compromised. so it's a mixed record

we have will cain and roland martin with us. >> we can't get roland's pretty face?e is inside the convention hall. >> we have major lightning in houston. we can't have the satellite pole up in the area. >> roland provides enough lightning himself. >>> romney branded himself as the serious adult, a strong leader. is that how he came off at the naacp, will? >> yeah, i do think so. i think he came off as something more than a serious adult. i think he came off as something he has never been accused of, and that is consistent. for once it seemed like he didn't take the temperature of the room or test the winds around him. he gave a message that he would have given anywhere. one about obama care, one about government spending, one about government growth. and i think he should be applauded for that, for that consistency in his message. it's not something he is commonly accused of. >> roland, did romney walk into that naacp convention trying to prove a point, not to black leaders but to his base? >> well, first of all, no one can actually assess that, because unless you h

will cain, roland martin. >> better than negative ads. >> true. real issue. >> and this small business owner will not be buying will's breakfast next time i'm in new york. >> i'll take you up on that, sir. >> yes. >>> the nominees are in for the primetime emmys. >> i don't really need to talk right now. >> bear with me. >> i have to talk about something kind of serious. >> oh, but why so serious? the people behind "mad men" should be very, very happy. the period drama now has a chance of making emmy history. [ female announcer ] great taste is always in style with lean cuisine steam bags. get our crispiest carrots and our snappiest peas all freshly steamed in just minutes. steam bags from lean cuisine. be culinary chic. >>> the emmys are still mad about "mad men." >> i want you to know that the day you saw something in me, my life changed. and since then, it's been my privilege to not only be at your side, but to be treated like a protege. >> fans know that this is a pivotal scene from "mad men's" fifth season. they are now up for its fifth best t

roland martin is here, cnn contributor and allison stewart, republican analyst. roland, explain the basics. people with a driver's license have a picture, they may be saying, i don't understand this. how could 1.4 million people not have a photo id? tell me who these people are. >> well, a lot of people don't have it because you're not necessarily required. you're talking about senior citizens. you're also talking about any number of minorities because if you're not having a checking account, you're not showing it. i'm a native of texas. i'm in houston right now. they also don't allow a student id, erin. now, the georgia law allowed for the public university students to use their student id but not private schools. but in texas, you can use your gun permit id to be able to vote but not a student id. that's what's so crazy. but also the legislature in passing this bill bypassed the normal procedure of two-thirds voting to approve the bill. they bypassed that to get this in. and so it raises the question, why would you do that -- why would you go against your normal

i am joined by roland martin and ryan.re but today was a damming editorials and criticized him the way he handles health care and said you're about to do it again on the obama's campaign allegations on outsourcing and you need to shake everything up. >> i think some elements are on target. it is true the romney campaign seems ton rattled now that momentumum seems to have shifted back to the president. on the other hand, i think that mitt romney were right in the first place to say we agree. >> his chief adviser? >> yes. we agree with the justices who said this is not a tax and the idea that you just accept whatever a majority says seems very strange given that conservative republicans have been critical of a lot of majority supreme court decisions in the past >> think they were trying to move it from a than issue. every day you're not talking about unemployment and the economy is a day that is good for president obama and the home team. >> roland, this also comes on the heels of rupert murdoch whose company owns "wall stre

roland martin and former chief strategist for george w.nna join us "outfront" tonight. i want to play a clip of an impressive attack by ohio's own john boehner. let's take a listen. >> i think the president's attack on the private sector in america is exactly what's wrong with this administration. doesn't give a damn about middle class americans who are out there looking for work. what he's trying to do is distract the american people in order to win his own reelection. >> tell us how you really feel there, john. let's talk about the importance of ohio. take a look at the current cnn electoral map. in this scenario, obama seems likely to start with 247 electoral votes. romney expected to get 206. 85 are a toss-up. suddenly obama is within five electoral votes of winning. roland, there's a reason obama has made eight trips to ohio so far this year. romney's made ten. what do you think president obama needs to do to win over the main street middle class voters in the buckeye state? >> actually if you go back to 2009, the two states he was im

cnn contributor roland martin will cover this event all weekend. the convention in houston. the first thing i thought, well, probably because the president thinks he's got the african-american vote sewn up so that would be sort of doubling efforts where they are not needed. but is that such a wise choice to make? >> i would never say one has any vote locked up because turnout is going to be a key especially when you look at some of the critical states. in 2008, then senator obama only won north carolina by 14,000 votes. that is still a state in play. you look at ohio and pennsylvania and florida, those votes are going to be critical. so i certainly believe he should have spoken to the naacp. the obama campaign says they have a very aggressive outreach effort to reach african-americans. >> at last count he had 95% of the vote sewn up among african-americans, at least in north carolina. we pulled the 2008 numbers, 23% of north carolina vote was african-american. and he had 95% of that vote. and he beat mccain by just 14,000 votes there, .3%. that was

roland martin joins me along with alice stewart. alice, there's something else that mitt romney said during that interview. he said, quote, from time to time i've been audited, i think as happens to other citizens as well. and the accounting firm which prepares my taxes has done a very thorough and complete job paying taxes as legally due. this seems to -- it confuses me even more. he's been audited, which proves the point we've been making for a while. he's never done anything wrong or remotely shady in his taxes. why won't he release the returns? >> why should he? he's acted in compliance with the law. he's produced the last two years of his tax information. he has never broken the law in this regard. why should he? if he does release two more years, the media and the obama campaign is going to want him to release ten or 20. this is a pathetic distraction from the obama distraction who would rather talk about something that the average person is not concerned about than what people are concerned about which is the obama administra