freely that we will not have characters quite like teddy roosevelt, road row wilson, william howard taft and eugene. but i think it is as important asy candidate -- i just came back from iowa yesterday. and what really strikes me is that president obama and his opponents agree on the definition of the campaign. every campaign people always say, this is the most important election in our history. actually, this time the candidates are really talking about a fundamental argument over the direction that our country is going to take. it is my view -- and this is the last reason why i think kansas was the right choice for a venue -- is that we have effectively been governed under a long consensus since the progressive era. that long consensus saw a balance between public and private, saw a major role for the federal government in both regulating the capitalist economy to make it work, and to ensure greater fairness. even while reagan did not overturn this consensus. you know, that great line about bogner's music that it's better than it sounds? ronald reagan governed more progressively than h

he handed over the reins to his friend taft, william taft, who he basically made president. taft was supposed to carry out his policies while he went abroad. so he was gone the third week in march, 1909. the expedition was organized by the smithsonian. it was a cutting-edge, scientific expedition of the time. and he went to africa for about a year, then he went to europe for three months after that. he was gone about 15 months. his son, kermit, was the photographer and his kind of -- he called him my side partner in the operation in the dedication of his book. kermit was 20, 19 or 20 years old, a little bit adventuresome, maybe too much for his father. he went off by himself at times and sort of scared his father to death. [laughter] but they had a great time. and photography was also very important. in fact, roosevelt said about the expedition that maybe the most important thing would be the photographs that they took. because they made a record of how the animals actually lived on the ground. at the same time, they were taking big game -- the smithsonian expedition brought

the osawatomie speech, one of his friends and supporter, a senator from new york, wrote president taft and said, for the life of me, i don't understand what's new about the new nationalism. i mean, it seems to me as if it's a call for the exercise of legitimate constitutional power. and that's all it is. so, you know, the conservative republicans at the time in 1912 and certainly in the person of taft himself, were not radical laissez faire -- you know, they didn't believe in a completely unfettered marketplace, rugged individualism, social darwinism. they were very much all in the school of a powerful national government, the remediating the problems that they could reach. but anyway, that being the case -- yes, please. oh, yes. and if you could speak -- these microphones, for whatever reason, are very hard to -- >> i'll do my best to be heard. >> be very close to the microphone. >> we can hear you. >> that's very kind of you. >> and you have to identify yourself. >> irwin snells, the hudson institute. and thank you for that remark, e.j. i was going along almost agreeing with you unti

taft was supposed to carry out his policies while he went abroad. he was gone the third week in march. the expedition was organized by the smithsonian. a cutting edge scientific expedition. he went to africa for year, then went to europe few months after that. he was gone 15 months. his son kermit was the photographer. call to my side partner in the operation in the dedication of his book. kermit was 20, 19 or 20 years old. a little bit adventuresome, maybe too much for his father and went off by himself at times. photography was very important. roosevelt said the expedition may be the most important thing would be the photographs they took because they may record of how animals lived on the ground at the same time they were taking big game charts. the smithsonian expedition brought back 11,000 from elephants down to in vertebrates. for long time the natural history museum had a huge hall for exhibit which they have taken down. only one thing left of significance on display and that is the white rhino which he shot. a tiny little tag. for long time

now, helen taft got interested in the exhibition. now, helen taft, she was the first lady at the time, and she contributed her 1909 inaugural gown. so, she set sort of the tradition of giving your inaugural gown. every first lady since then who has had an inaugural ball has given her inaugural gown. >> has anyone ever refused or balks at the idea? >> i don't think anyone has ever refused, but edith roosevelt, who we'll see around the corner, we'll also see her inaugural gown, she didn't have a lot of patience for this. she was not first lady at the time. but she said she didn't save clothing, that she cut it up and made other things out of it. so, she did not donate anything to the collection. her daughter, however, later did. and what she donated was the inaugural gown. but mrs. roosevelt wasn't kidding. the bodice had been removed from the dress. >> does that give us context at the time that that was a traditional, normal thing to do? >> mrs. roosevelt said she liked to cut them up and satin gowns or silk gowns made tea gowns. it m

>> taft says he'll get the ak-47 he originally promised them.alue. >> you sure? >> i ain't sure. >> we ain't doubting you. you gave us your word. >> i want to give it to you as soon as possible. >> i'm going to make every attempt to have it. >> you made a statement yesterday. you said before i even get excited with my girl, i'm going to make sure you guys have it. that meant a lot. >> you've seen it in action. you know better. you've seen the raw footage. so the issue we're having now is one of your boys has it? >> yeah. >> do they got rounds for it, too? or just a weapon. >> i'm pretty sure. it's a good one, too. >> all anybody would use that for is to send a message. >> no, you use that to make a funeral. >> more than one. make sure you don't freaking disappear and we don't hear from you as soon as you drive away. >> no, you going to hear from me. i'm going to take care of this. >> sandoval and carpenter have their doubts as they lead taft out the back gate. >> he could burn us. technically he got us a gun. technically he did what he said he w

this election of 2012 is all that stands between america andicaa taft fee, just as we were warned, the consequences in 2008 could be dire. >> if mr. obama should become presidentish really believe it will be hard to stop the economy from being socialized. >socialized. >> jon: socialized economy! if obama was elected in 2008. we were warned. and, indeed, barack obama did take billions of taxpayer dollars and redistribute them... to the banks. ( laughter ) so it's kind of socialism, in a dyslexic... ( laughter ) and what of our enemies abroad? >> i will tell you if he is elected president, then the radical islamists, the al qaeda and the radical islamists and their supporters, will be dancing in the streets. >> jon: talk about-- talk about hitting the nail on the head. if you were to replace the word "dancing" with the phrase, "donnelling unmanned drone missiles raining hell fire from the sky." so two for two. ( applause ) and by the way, in 2008, there would have been nothing... ( laughter ) allah we did was add a ( bleep ). in 2008, there would have been nothing you could do to defend

and during the 1912 campaign what he would engage the incumbent president, william howard taft in the first presidential primary campaign, roosevelt defended a full throated, pure democracy, as he called it. an easier method to amend the constitution. and the opportunity for the people to recall all public officials. including the president. as bill schambra has pointed out, the stand of taft and -- combined with ruthless steam roller machine politics, deprived t.r. of the republican nomination. and most likely a third term in the white house during which he might have enacted his constitutional program. but roosevelt's third party crusade for the right of the people to be the ultimate makers of their constitution, as he put it, aroused considerable enthusiasm. he won nearly 30% of the vote. and it is echoed throughout the 20th and 21st century. most of the aspirations that underlay that program have been firmly rooted in custom. an unwritten law that presidents derive their authority directly from the people. directly from public opinion. and i would argue -- i'll let jim make this a

robert taft and dwight eisenhower, i think if you got some younger -- that's jack kennedy. jack kennedy was tailor-made for the new age he came into. handsome, charming. he had all those skills. let me tell you when i was a journalism student, we had field observation week, and it was a week that john glenn went around the world. they took us over -- marvin aerosmith took me to the state department where kennedy had his press conferences in that room. this guy gets up from the washington daily news. he said, washington daily news, mr. president. when john glenn comes to town, they urged there be a holiday for all the school kids in d.c. kennedy looked down and said, this administration has always followed the policy of the washington daily news. it was just that spon taneity ad humor that even if you disagreed with him, which i did, made me think, the democrats really have something here. >> later we'll be talking about debates. richard nixon did not debate in 1968, nor did he in 1972. why? >> i think all of us didn't think he ought to debate. and neither did he. and we use

incredible con is it only lasted two years they passed the taft hartley act the blew up the right of individuals to form a union to a large extent at that point in time right about here it's thirty five percent unionization the country has the highest ever half hartley began that is structure that. harry truman introduced literally a universal single payer health care system they blocked that. truman ran against it and was so successful that the republicans didn't take the house again for forty six years so they've they collapse and they were followed by a rational eisenhower administration massive infrastructure investments eisenhower famously said should any political party attempt to abolish social security unemployment insurance and in the eliminate labor laws and farm programs you would not hear that party again in our political history is a tiny splinter group of a few of the texas oil millionaires an occasional politician or businessman from other areas their numbers negligible and they are stupid so that was the rational eisenhower republicans but then a generation later came

it ends up being taft. you have the creation of a new party which has its own divisions that people don't acknowledge as much. about the progressive era. you had a serious fight about issues of monopoly, regulation, the wisdom of an administrative state. progressives are always being accused of supporting this big, domineering state. but if you look at the origins of the progressive movement, there are real serious discrepancies in ideas about how these things would play out. progressives were concerned about an overwhelming state undermining the sort of direct democracy that they wanted. you then have this fight between the new nationalism, the new freedom, and you actually had a socialist movement. i mean, you had -- deb scored it quite well in 1912. you had constitutional fights about whether we would be the masters of constitution or continue in the tradition that basically put property rights above human rights. basically at the time everybody's trying to figure out how to deal with the issues of indus

dewey, taft, all of these guys, truman. but truman has been having problems with the jewish community. they don't think he is sufficiently pro-israel. and what he does is 13 minutes after the state of israel's independence or statehood is proclaimed, he is the first chief of state, we are the first country to recognize israel. and this helps solve some of his problems on the left with the wallace vote, but it's very chilling to see, chilling to read i think in "the new york times" that day or the next day that out of egypt, out of cairo muslim leaders are talking about a jihad against the united states of america. many things are part of that year which continue for a long time afterwards and into today. as the election goes on, we also see -- now, harry truman has this turnip day special session of the legislature, and the law of unintended consequence. he brings congress back in. congress doesn't want to come back in the middle of an election. but they come in, and they hold some hearings on, um, communists, communists in

taft, senator from ohio, leader of the congressional republicans, mr. republican, mr. conservative but not charismatic and the fourth is not even in the country. the general of the army, jug -- douglas mccarthy and tokyo running the former, i guess still present empire of japan and a popular guy but can he pull it off from faraway? he doesn't. he has entered into the wisconsin primary. he should when that. he doesn't. he stumbles and is out fairly quickly. there are not a lot of primaries that year. there's the new hampshire primary. there is always the new hampshire primary. there is the wisconsin primary which macarthur should win and doesn't. he loses a tooth harold stassen which elevates stassen. stassen as an outsider. he is a boy wonder. in 1938 he had been elected governor of minnesota and he was the youngest governor of any state ever and he quit. he is reelected saying it now if you reelect me i'm going to quit in four months and go into the navy and he is popular and elected. imagine being elected with a platform like that. he comes out, he's an international

certainly robert taft did do that. he did have inclination's, but when he sat down and study dated he would go against his inclinations when the data let in the way. that is the real question, whether we are aware of its and can consider, be open to, and consider it inconvenient facts and reconsider our predispositions. >> the elephant in the room religion and politics to follow up on that, and ideology, is and the elephant and their religion and the libertarians that want less government just one rule of law, but yet passing a law that restricts other people's rights, women's rights, other things, in all of this is serious to me religion and all the politics may also speak to this woman's question why they may vote against their economic self-interest. >> well, i think religion is an elephant in the room. there may be other elements, of hippopotamuses in the room as well. i will say this, but i think for william f. buckley jr. his convulses and was that nothing was more influential to him than that in that that affect

the reason for that is unlike 1952, eisenhower-taft, these guys were auditioning to run the party in different directions. what happens? we now have a reagan republican party. it is what you have conservatives supporting each of these candidates. it is called a winning. it is not a problem. it is confusing, but it is winning. we're not auditioning for a fearless leader. we do not need a president to tell us what direction to go. we want the paul ryan budget. [applause] this is very easy. it takes all of these liabilities and makes them fully funded and controlled by individuals. it takes bentinck down to 20% of gdp in 10 years -- it takes spending down to 20% of gdp. when the president to sign this stafuff. we do not need someone to think it out or designed it. we had a house and a senate. the leadership now for the next 20 years to be coming out of the house and senate. focus on a lasting the most conservative republican who can win and the most conservative republican who can win in each set state -- senate seat. [applause] this is a change. the democrats have been running everythi

one mother said her daughter witnessed the shooting and that it happened in the school taft tieria before the start of first period. another student says a boy stood up and started shooting and then it was chaos. the exact number of injured is not yet confirmed, but the sheriff says five students are believed shot. four boys and a girl. a brave teacher may have saved lives by running the shooter out of the school. >> the first team of officers went in, it was determined the students had run from the building. >> officers continued to search for more. though the fbi believes there was just one shooter. as students evacuated the high school, they went to the elementary school across the street where they waited for their parents to arrive. all schools in the immediate area are on lockdown and both the fbi and s.w.a.t. teams are on the scene. parents describe it as a close knit community, a place where everybody knows each other and no one would expect such a flare-up of violence. alexis christopherous, cbs news. >>> we will continue to follow this story throughout the day. we'll have the la

. >> the taft campaign we will talk b. >> we can.ad to deal with his own family ties, run in his father's shadow. his father's shadow that hangs over his head can't seem to shake it. >> what's weird about that i think for most voters, it is i recall vancy. talking about a man governor 40-something years ago, between 40 and 50 years ago and while george romney plays a role, kind of a -- the defeated role, it is of no particular reference to most people in michigan. he has this awkwardness when he tries say hose. he goes back to michigan and says the trees are the right height or the simple statement, i love cars. >> i'm sure he goes idaho and tells us how many potatoes he airport. his connection to the auto industry is tenuous. have had the headline, romney to auto industry, drop dead. while most michiganers favor it, the word bailout is a -- is a red light. it is more of a question of the broader effort to tie himself to something of importance for michigan that he doesn't seem to know how to do. can you give me an example of a time

and president william howard taft was famously, if not improbably, light on his feet. >> when we seehter moments, it's almost like a window to the person as opposed to the image too often presented. >> reporter: not too be outdone or outsung, mitt romney struck a patriotic tune recently at a campaign stop in florida. ♪ for amber waves of grain >> reporter: there is no question the president's political advisors are trying to make the most of these moments. they already put last night's clip on the web. you can get this as a ring tone ♪ i'm so in love with you >> reporter: after the president sang al green at the apollo, his numbers shot up. al green's numbers, that is. sales of his single skyrocketed. but spontaneous moments can give a president or candidate the kind of wall-to-wall good will coverage money can't buy. and to think they get it for a song. savannah guthrie, nbc news, new york. >>> that's our broadcast on a wednesday night. thanks for being here with us. i'm brian williams. we'll look for you back here tomorrow night. "rock center" tonight. good night. -- captions by vi

the heaviest president was howard taft. who was the first president?> george washington. >> reporter: who's the first after ban american president? >> obama -- first african american president? >> barack obama. >> reporter: how many of the u.s. presidents signed the declaration of independence? was it two, four, six or none? >> oh, my. >> we should know this. we're teachers of. >> reporter: the answer is two. >> i was going to say that. >> reporter: four presidents have been assassinated while in office, link on, garfield, mckinley and ken -- lincoln, garfield, mckinley and kennedy, six presidents survived attempts. what u.s. president won a pulitzer prize for his book profiles in courage? was it roosevelt, grant, kennedy or eisenhower? >> kennedy. >> reporter: what president had a pet mockingbird named dick? was it jefferson, fillmore, eisenhower or nixon? >> has to be nixon. >> reporter: virginia is the birthplace of the most presidents at eight. 31 states and the district of columbia have never claimed a native son as president. who is the best look

he reported to the secretary of war who was william howard taft. >> host: george washington goebbelsas the president of the canal zone? >> guest: yes. he had tremendous authority. like it said about himself, he was a benevolent dictator. it was a very paternalistic system. he was admired by many in the canal zone because he did run things very efficiently. it was a very orderly zone. he got the canal built faster than many thought it could be done. he prided himself on being a fatherly figure to the zone of workers. he would meet sunday morning with anyone who wished to meet with him from the lowliest washerwoman to a wheat supervisor and foreman but his authority, as fatherly as he might be his authority was complete. one observer said we all like the chief engineer but we know not to disagree with him or criticize him. if we do disagree with him we get deported real fast. >> host: what would you say was the level of labor unrest in the building of the canal? i am thinking about the auto strikes of the 30s, founding of the uaw. anything of that level? >> not really. it was an orderl

but the reason for that is that unlike about 52, eisenhower/taft, reagan bush, these guys were auditioning to run the party in different directions. okay? and so what happened? we now have a reagan republican party that everybody that ran for president wants to the run as ronald reagan which is why you have conservatives supporting each of the candidates. it's called winning. it's not a problem. it's confusing, but it's winning. second, we are not auditioning for fearless leader. we don't need a president to tell us what direction we want to go. we want the paul ryan budget which cuts spending $6 trillion. [ applause ] this is very easy. block grants all of the 77, plus welfare systems. takes the unfunded liabilities and makes them fully funded and individually controlled by individualers. it takes spending down to 20% and then down to 15% in out years. the republicans in the house have passed 24-plus bills that strip out regulations. we just need a president to sign this stuff. we don't need someone to think it up or design it. we have a house and a senate. the leadership now for the mode

whether it was farming affairs by taft benson, all of this stuff never stuck to dwight eisenhower. i spent several to not enough minutes talking to dean codlowski talking about civil rights. now just a taste for you all i started out with three paragraphs on richard nixon and civil rights. i now have three chapters on richard nixon and civil rights. he was the lead person and public affairs under dwight eisenhower pushing desegregation and pushing equal job opportunity. he was next to linden johnson in 1957 bringing republican senators onboard from the civil rights act in 1957. the story about lbj and richard nixon not getting along. i have their letters. they got along fine. they worked well together. richard nixon, taking all of these goodwill missions abroad to get them out of town so he wouldn't be around. every time with one exception. when richard nixon goes abroad the first person that sees him before he leaves to brief him is dwight eisenhower in the white house. the first person that richard nixon sees when he comes back is dwight eisenhower in the white house so the whole

now, helen taft got interested in the exhibition. she contributed her inaugural gown. she set the tradition of giving your inaugural gown. every first lady since then has given her inaugural gown. >> has anyone every refused or balked at the idea? >> i don't think anyone has refused. edith roosevelt didn't have a lot of patience for this. she said she didn't save clothing. she cut it up and made other things the out of it. she did not donate anything to the collection. her daughter later did. she donated the inaugural gone. the bodice had been remove frd the dress. it has a prop bodice. >> does that give some context of the that it was a normal thing to do. >> she said they worked very well as tea gowns. it may have been a quirk of hers or a thrifty quirk that she remade her clothes. >> why do we care so much? it seems on every occasion we're looking to see what they're wearing? >> i think we have become a red carpet culture thatlike to look and analyze what people are wearing. people were interested in what martha washington was wearing. i think it's because we look t

. >> very taft like. >> all right. enough. >> they are not monicals. they are called glasses. >> i like that word. >> you put the mono in monicals. to leave a voicemail, 212-462-5050 of the still to m could, the half time report 23r* tv's andy levy. >> tonight is sponsored by dog sleding. the winter racing sport most popular in the arctic regions of north america where the dogs pull the sleds across the terrain. thanks, dog sleding. >>> welcome back. let's find out if we got anything wrong so far. for that we go to andy levy. what is going on? >> not much. . >> great. >> good. >> thanks for asking. >> romney wins florida. anthony, you say you like romney's statement about "i don't care about the very poor. they have a safety net." he was trying to appeal to the middle class. i agree with that, but it is kind of a problem. he phrases things wrong all of the time and he makes it easy for their opponents whether they are other republicans or democrats to take them out of context. >> i still don't see poor people. >> are you like the opposite of bruce will

they haven't seen this much february snow since william howard taft was president 100 years ago. in the mountains it's worse. some areas have gotten more than four feet. >> that system is barreling east blanketing the snowy planes, they may be used to snowy winters in nebraska but as we learn from our affiliate. so much so fast is exceptional. >> nine inches of wet, heavy snow. main problem, downed branches blocking some interceptions and taking power lines with it. cutting service to 10,000 customers. >> all of this is making driving difficult and dangerous around des moines. >> here the roads are slick which caused drivers to have a lot of minor accidents but the big concern is when temperatures drop tonight, all of the slush on these roads could turn into black ice. >> down in dallas, it's not snow but hail that's making an impact. p yeah, this is definitely -- there's probably some golf balls in this. >> reporter: here in the south temperatures a lot warmer, as that system head this way, we're not anticipating any snow but we are expecting severe thunderstorms and plenty of r

the other two candidates were president taft running for re-election, and governor woodrow wilson of new jersey. and both these men being gentlemen said that they would stop campaigning for as long as the colonel was incapacitated. >> how did the election come out? >> the election came out as t.r. knew it would come out, with woodrow wilson winning, because the third party candidacy of t.r. and his progressives split the republican party. and elected woodrow wilson. >> i wrote down somewhere the actual totals on the vote. but my memory is he got 27% of the vote, and as you said in the beginning, got the most vote of any third party candidate. what did you learn in writing about this third party candidacy that would be of value in 2012 if there's a third party candidate? >> well, the candidacy, the party's candidacy did produce a progressive minority in the senate. which was -- had a good deal of power as a swing unit. but what i think is more relevant to today's political situation is that when a large minority of the country believes itself to be disenfranchised, excluded from power

kind of william howard taft approach i guess in some way his goal because he comes off it's not true he comes off as a regular guy he had a regular guy but he comes off as one he plays one on t.v. very well plus he doesn't carry with him of the baggage that a santorum comes with him of trying to run for pope christie would be able to actually run for president and that would be much more acceptable to the average american plus i should note that paul singer who's the number one donor to the republican party and it's behind mitt his son wants to marry a guy and so he's not going to be too crazy about backing candidates who are against gay marriage so that's that's that's very interesting and but christie is just about to veto gay marriage in the state of new jersey. as we speak well he's about to yeah you know that's why i asked to hesitate because he knows who his money comes from but on the other hand yes to survive in the republican party it's a tough call for these guys in the end though i think singur will go follow his money rather than his then his heart and remember when i say

between between the employees and the company and the management very well said and we need to repeal taft hartly and get carjacked past it's there we've got some work to do here general both of you thank you so much for joining us thank you thank you pastor story. crazy alert watch out where you post online or get sued pretty much generally the facebook profile has at one time or another been tagged in a less than flattering photo most people just laugh it off and untag the photo well not eric volz olsen sued his uncle for harassment after his uncle posted childhood photos of him in front of a christmas tree and added critical and testy comments to them to our knowledge no news organizations have obtained the photos in question but we're thinking it may look something like this which is found in the awkward family photos dot com site not surprisingly also lost his case for harassment and an appeal to a higher court court told him quote comments that are mean and disrespectful coupled with an i.q. as family photos do not affect a person's safety security or privacy and therefore do not cou

he began to realize that president taft was turning out to be a pretty ineffective successor. and that to this desire of t.r. to come back and articulate the hopes and aspir spispirations progressives that was getting stronger and stronger. but it wasn't until he actually returned in the spring of 1910 to discover how he'd been missed during his year abroad and how urgent the political priorities were that he reluctantly allowed himself to be coaxed back into politics. >> who was pushing him? >> at first it was governor hughes of new york who is a progressive governor, who needed political help then. i won't go into the details. but t.r. reluctantly agreed to do him a favor and help him campaign for primary reform. and by making that fateful decision to help out a struggling governor, he found himself sucked back into party politics. and by the fall of that year, was articulating all the new principles of progressivism. >> when did he signal that he was ready to go? >> to run for the presidency? >> yeah. >> he signaled that in january of 1912. by then the pressure for him to r

republican party the do nothing congress of one nine hundred forty six the radical republicans they passed taft hartly blow up the unions they blocked harry truman's attempt to have universal health care which you know that in two years just two years this was forty six the election of forty six election forty eight the republicans were kicked out of the house of representatives and they didn't come back until one thousand nine hundred six forty six years in the wilderness so this led to then moderate republicans like eisenhower and of course then the for crazies said oh we can't have this and so they came back with barry goldwater the right wing radicals saying no no we're not going to we're not going to go with that moderate eisenhower stuff and so you had goldwater goldwater blew up the election blew up the party brought back the moderates nixon and ford and that. brought out the crazies reagan and with and you know which was polish by george george h.w. bush which was followed by a right wing crazy george w. bush and you'd think that the party would be going into a moderate phase but it got