seditious. and they made them change the language of a letter from a bishop to his people. ladies and gentlemen, freedom is at stake in this election. we need to be the voice for freedom. and that founding document, the declaration of independence, at the end of the document, the founders signed their names. but the last clause of the document said we pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. ladies and gentlemen, every generation of americans doesn't create freedom, but they have in many respects a harder job. they have to maintain freedom. your charge tonight, your charge tonight here in missouri because we're not done yet with you here in missouri. you have a caucus coming up next month. go out and pledge, pledge, no, not your lives. maybe your fortune. ricksantorum.com is the website. but your honor. the honor that you stand on on the backs and shoulders of your ancestors. the people here in st. louis, missouri, across the country who sacrificed for the country, for the freems we have. america's honor. your honor. is at stake. go out and preserve the greatest country in the history of the world. thank you all and god bless. >> listening to rick santorum celebrating two wins in missouri and minnesota. we're still looking at the numbers in colorado right now at 11:00 p.m. the vote in, romney and santorum are tied. both at 37%. newt gingrich in third place at 17%. ron paul at 9%. what do you think of what santorum was saying? >> he's speaking the language of conservatism. it comes comfortably, naturally, from the very beginning, my wife, the rock, thank god. when you thank god, you know it's not a politician saying a line. it comes from the heart. >> it goes back to his piece in iowa where he talked about the hands of his grandfather, he was an immigrant of the country. >> what he does is talk to the people that i am of the conservative movement. i speak the language, it's in me, it's who i am. it's not an artifice, it's not training. it's natural. i think that's what his natural connection is with the conservatives. but he has that conservative language down to a lot of people who say i don't know if i can trust romney. >> your wife doesn't hurt you with conservative voters, by the way. no, no, it wasn't, but then he took a turn and he criticized barack obama, which, of course, is something as david was saying, he ought to do, but then he really hit hard against mitt romney and pounded him and said, mitt romney is the same as barack obama. and he paid no attention to newt gingrich, as if he wasn't even in the race. >> cnn is projecting that ron paul will come in second in minnesota. >> he did very well in the college towns, in st. paul and minneapolis. i'm not surprised. >> back to rick santorum, he didn't go presidential. but he is very different than a conservative like mitt romney. he's what we call a street corner conservative. he's for the working people of the country. there's a populous quality about the way he talks th s relates f people in a different way than romney tries to do and doesn't communicate. >> it's very natural. >> very natural, very natural, and he came up with a way against obama that is potentially more telling than what romney has been arguing. romney has been arguing he's wrong headed. what santorum is saying is he's basically a snob. and he's not listening to you because he thinks he's smarter than you. and he's associated with people who are looking at obama and say i respect him, but who does he think he is lecturing me about this, that, and the other? it's an interesting turn of the argument, and i would argue that republicans may find that a more potent argument than the one they have been making. >> the campaign moves to the midwest and the rust belt, former pennsylvania senator, he understands that language as well. >> one thing we wanted to show, we were talking, i think we have -- we can show you when you were looking at rick santorum, right next to 4i78 was a guy in the green tie. they said, he's a super pac donor. it is. the top donor and literally, as you were calling them earlier, sugar daddy. that's foster friesz. and he's a very wealthy man. he supports born-again evangelical causes. big investment manager. has given about half of the $730,000 super pac rick santorum has raised. you shouldn't have them with your campaign at all. it's interesting. >> on a big night like tonight, it's not appropriate. >> let me say this in terms of the speech. first of all, it is not that good. it has five ingredients. this was not a really -- i'm catholic, but i worked for a lot of pabaptists. >> sit yourself down? >> this is an opportunity for rick santorum to reintroduce himself to the conservative voters in arizona and michigan and the key states down the road. he didn't really do that. he has an interesting background as a blue-collar type republi n republican. he could have make that argument. instead, he wasted a lot of times, process, i have been outspend. obama thinks he knows better. >> that obama thinks he knows better is reverberating with conservatives. they want to hear that. >> i think you have to give him that, but he has to turn the stone of looking presidential. i don't think he's done that. he comes across more as almost a school boy. >> i want to bring in jessica yellin who has been with us all night as well. they have to be pleased to see santorum doing so well in two major states tonight to keep this thing going. >> this is great news for them, anderson. they're just watching the show and enjoying it. i mean, first of all, if this were to come to pass, they would love to run against rick santorum because this election will be decided in the middle, and by swing voters who prefer moderate candidates, and obama thought it would not be hard to make the case at the president is far more in the middle than rick santorum who tends to run on social issues, but they ultimately believe that romney will be the nominee, and it stretches the primary out, and it creates more weaknesses. here comes ron paul. it creates more weaknesses they can point to in romney and romney will get more negative in the coming days. >> ron paul and his wife. dr. paul is about to speak. let's listen in. he did come in second in minnesota. >> thank you, thank you. >> president paul, president paul, president paul! >> thank you, thank you. thank you for all your hard work, and believe it or not, we did very well tonight. had a strong second place, and it's going to continue. you know, we've had some good news today. maybe you have seen, but there was a recent reuters poll out today, the first time that we came in second in a national poll in the republican primary. and we do have to remember, you know, the straw vote is one thing, but there's one other thing called delegates, yeah! and that is where we excel. we know what to do by getting delegates. even in a state that ended up a little confusing, nevada, i understand that we're going to do very well in nevada in getting delegates. and of course, tonight, i have heard nothing but good stories about all of you staying around and going through the process. understanding the process, and voting and getting delegates. so when the dust settles, i think there's a very good chance that we're going to have the maximum number of delegates coming out of minnesota. there's other good news, too, and it's an ongoing caucus on the east coast, i think it's the state called maine. we're doing very well there, and we're going to hear results on that on saturday, and i think those results are going to be very good as well. but i want to really thank you for the effort and the one thing that i'm convinced of, those who join the campaign for liberty and promote this cause, really believe in something. i keep thinking, it must be a lot more fun believing in something that just campaigning for nothing. as a matter of fact, that's what makes it easy going because this is what the effort has been all about. and i have been so impressed. i have been involved for a long time, but it's been the last several years, especially since the last campaign four years ago. the world has changed dramatically, and our reviews are not only being accepted, they're being sought after, because for so long, people have said as long as we're rich and as long as we can borrow money and as long as we can print money and the people will take care of us and we won't have to worry, but guess what happened four years ago? all of a sudden, actually, the bankruptcy was declared, and this is the reason why the economy is in bad shape. the world economy is in bad shape, everybody thinks we're going to bail them out, and they think the dollar is going to bail them out, and most americans are saying no way you can do it. there's no way you can keep the entire system and the debt rising at over a trillion a year, and we have to challenge the entitlement system and the foreign policy that gives us these perpetual wars. the biggest problem we've had is convincing people who are in office that they're spending too much in washington. today, the american people are way ahead of the people in washington. and quite frankly, i think it's important to know that there's only one candidate and only one campaign that offers real cuts and in the first year of the new presidency, there will be $1 trillion cut from the budget. every once in a while, people tell me, ron, you could do a lot better if you would just change your tune on the foreign policy stuff, but guess what. it's the foreign policy that has built our campaign. some people think foreign policy is separate from economic policy, but what usually happens, and it's been known in most recent history, is foreign policy is the economic policy. fortunately, we never had to fight the soviets. over, i was very much aware of the fight with the soviets in the cold war, having been in the military in the '60s, but the soviets self-destructed because they expanded themselves toor far around the world and went bankrupt, and we didn't have to fight them, and we, unfortunately, are facing the same problem. we have expanded ourselves too far around the world, we have gotten in wars that are unconstitutional. we don't know why they're there, why they're over, the most important thing they could do is bring the troops home. and it would save a lot of money. we don't need to pay all this money to keep troops all over the country. 130 countries, 900 bases, but think, bringing all the troops home rather rapidly, they would be spending their money here at home and not in germany and japan and south korea. tremendous boost to the economy. you know, under war time conditions, people generally get more careless about their civil liberties. that's what happened in this country. we have permitted our government to undermine our civil liberties in the name of safety and security. we were told in this country that you should never sacrifice your liberties for safety or security because you'll end up with neither. this is the reason i have come to the conviction you never have to sacrifice your liberty if you want to be safe. never. we now are living in an age where civil liberties are poorly protected. we have a patriots act that has canceled out the fourth amendment. we have a bill that the national defense authorization act that permits the arrest of citizens by the military and without a trial and put in prison indefinitely. that's not part of what america is about and those laws have to be repealed if we want to live in a true republic. our government is too big. the bigger a government gets, the smaller our liberties become. government is way too big, and that's why we're losing our liberties. we're losing our economic liberties as well as our personal liberties. we must cut babbling. how did we get into this trouble. yes, there's always an appetite for big government. also this temptation of getting something for free, and alwaysm poor people. the trouble is when you endorse the principle of the redistribution of wealth, it gets handed off to the rich and they're the ones who benefit, become wealthy, and when they get into trouble, guess who gets the bailouts, the wealthy wall streeters and bankers. this is the reason there should be no bailouts at all. but there's a simple little trick that they played on us and the american people. that trick was played on us in the monetary system. they figured, well, it's a wealthy country. freedom produces a lot of wealth. that's fine, we can tax the people to a certain point, then people get annoyed. the politicians still want to pass out all the goodies, so they think we'll keep borrowing. until interest rates go up, aha, that's going to hurt the economy, so we have to have another gimmick. and that was invented in 1913. it was made a disaster in 1971. and that is the destruction of the currency through an illegal operation, an unconstitutional operation of the federal reserve system that we should address and have a full audit and find out where and how they're spending all our money. you know, we get into so much trouble because the constitution has been ignored, whether it's going to war or the constitution still says only gold and silver can be legal tender. it would be proper to send only people to washington and those who are there hold their feet to the fire that we want people to obey the law of the land which is a constitution, and you can't print money, go to war without a declaration and can't undermine our privacy any longer. the solution is not difficult. the solution was once well known in america, and that's when we understood and respected personal liberty. understanding that liberty came as the declaration of independence directed, from our creator. we have a right to our liberty, we should have a right to keep the fruits of all our labors. but we have undermined that productive system by having too much government, too much spending, too much borrowing, too much printing of money and regulations. so the reversal is obey the constitution, get the government out of the way. people say, there will be no regulations. no, the regulations would be tougher because the people who are supposed to go bankrupt would go bankrupt and they wouldn't get bailed out. [ applause ] but the wonderful thing about a free society is a prosperous society. we all should be humanitarians. and unfortunately, we who advocate that haven't done a good job over the years because we should convince people those who grab the moral high ground and say we're going to take care of the poor, what do they do? welfarism and inflationism, they produce the poor. it gives us the broadest distribution of wealth, the biggest middle class and wealthiest middle class. that's being undermined and destroyed and the problem can be solved with a true understanding and conviction and restoration of individual liberty. wonderful thing about the principles of liberty is that it brings people together because everybody woenn't use their liberty in the same way. if you understand that, you will tolerate other people and how they spend they money and how they run their lives as long as they don't hurt people. for this reason, people of diversity would come together. they would respect other people's liberty as well. this is why the solution is not that difficult. we have had this experimentation, we had the greatest success and we lost our faith and confidence, and that's what we need restored. we need to truly understand it. it's not going back to the old days. we don't have to go back to an old gold standard or to those principles. we need to go back and pick up the pieces and modernize it. we need an advancement of the cause of liberty and the understanding of liberty. this is the only solution if our goal be peace and prosperity, it's the only way you can achieve peace and prosperity. that should be our goal. it shouldn't be the goal of governments to run your life, to police what you do, to police other people around the world, nor to tell you how to run your economy and spend your money. it's the cause of liberty that we must restore, and we're well on our way and we're going to keep this momentum. thank you very much. thank you! >> ron paul responding to his second place win in minnesota tonight. clearly for him the battle continues in colorado right now with 26% of the vote in. rick santorum is in the lead with 42% of the vote. mitt romney in second place with 31%. again, just only about 26% of the vote in. if that trend continues in colorado, that is significant. >> it is. i think it's surprising to all of us. one thing that is heart to explain to folks back home is why, why did this happen? do you have thire theories abo? >> rick santorum didn't play in florida, didn't play in nevada. he picked his spaunts. he knows the caucuses attract very conservative voters, and that's who he was appealing to. >> romney can't leave the field open to him. >> he was running the state four years ago. he now came in third. >> he wins in minnesota i believe the day after the florida primary, but he has been in the state once. >> we're going to check in with john king to look at what is happening in colorado to look where the votes go to get a sense of how soon we'll be able to project this with 26% in. >> we should be cautious about colorado. we don't know the results yet. mitt romney still has a chance to win colorado from what i hear on the ground there. so don't jump to this conclusion that rick santorum had a sweep yet, but he's had a very good night. to answer your question, david, it does show a real fundamental conservative problem with mitt romney. he's not showed up in that part of the base yet, and this will be tested through the great primary. >> even if he gets a nomination, you'll still have that question which is how inthooenthusiastic the debates be because the last thing tea party voters wanted was an establishment candidate. you see the establishment. they had the establishment. >> about 60% of the vote, it's a drop-down. the turnout is still going now, and he's looking well, but to go down this far over the last 48 hours. weakthesness is involved, not ja message, not just the base. >> we have a couple weeks before the 28th when we're going to have the vone zoarizona debate. that's a lot of time. >> that is a lot of time, and candidates will fill that void with attacking each other. >> even with evangelical voters in florida and nevada, so again, you have to be judicious in how much one state carries to the next. >> let's take a look at where the numbers are. >> i want to bring in some of our correspondents at the headquarters. jim acosta is at romney headquarters in colorado. we haven't heard from romney. dana bash is at santorum headquarters. we have heard from santorum. let's go to acosta. we have a crowd behind you. getting ready at some point soon, to hear from the former massachusetts governor. >> that's right. and the headline tonight for the romney campaign might be boston, we have a problem. this is not the night romney was anticipating, although earlier in the day, they put out a campaign memo to reporters saying they knew tonight wasn't going to go in their direction. i got confirmation from a romney campaign source just a few minutes ago that the former massachusetts governor put a phone call in to rick santorum. he did not get through, did not connect with santorum, but he left a message of congratulations. we know that that did happen tonight. that hasn't always happened on every caucus and primary night, as we know. i can tell you this room, we talked about a few moments ago, was not even half full. it's started to fill in, but this room is still not completely full, and chekeep in mind, we're in the city of denver. this is a large metropolitan area, outside of the city limits, you have a lot of conservative republicans, and romney is not filling the room tonight. >> a huge loss for romney if he doesn't carry colorado. i think every was expecting he would. let me go to dana bash over at santorum headquarters. we just heard from the pennsylvania senator. he has won the primary in missouri. he has won in minnesota. the caucuses. we're waiting for colorado. what are they saying about the phone call from romney to santorum, dana? >> i don't think rick santorum has checked his voice mail yet, that's the answer, because deirdre wallace asked him if he heard from mitt romney, he said emphatically, no. maybe he'll pick up the message after he goes back and sits down with his wife and soaks in the evening he's had. it's interesting, we talk about the relationship between these candidates. you know, privately, the santorum campaign has said they generally had pretty good relations when it comes to the human element of this with the romney campaign. in fact, they noted that when santorum's daughter bella was in the hospital last week or the week before with pneumonia, not only did romney call him, but he put something on his website saying he and his campaign wish her well, and that's not something privately they noded that newt gingrich did. so you have an interesting dynamic going on between all of the candidates. when it comes to big nights and important moments, they seem to be connecting with one another. >> they are. we'll check back with you. i want to check in on the vote right now. we know what is happening in minnesota and missouri. in colorado right now, 28% of the vote is in. rick santorum still maintaining a lead over mitt romney. 41% to 31%. 15% for gingrich, 12% for ron paul. you can see the actual tally there, 1,931 for rick santorum. that's 495 votes ahead of mitt romney with 1,436. let's go to john king over at the magic wall. everybody simply assumed going into this that colorado was mitt romney's state and he was going to wip. he still might win because we only have 28% of the vote, but it's looking close between santorum and romney. >> if anyone is asking why did you expect that? let's go back in time, mccain was your nominee four years ago. he won colorado with 60% of the vote. look at this number, a caucus state. add that up. we're in the ballpark of 70,000 votes. fast forward here to almost 30% of the vote. not going to come close. this is the precincts. they're not coming close. at the moment, santorum with a 10-point lead. 28% of the vote, look at what's out. i want to bring you into this area right around here. and down here. colorado springs will be interesting to watch. go back in time, romney carried this area four years ago. the home of focus on the family, a group that supports santorum this time. an evangelical pocket here. we'll watch when those results come in. we have nothing from there right now. here is what is very important. i want to go back in time to show you four years ago. romney carried the denver area. not just the denver area, but the suburbs to the north, the south, and as you move out. important republican territory. adams county, 76% a year ago, now, santorum carrying it with 41%. here is what we're waiting on here, jefferson county, about 12% of the state-wide population. nothing right here. nothing there. four years ago, a huge mitt romney county. we're waiting. the count has been quite slow out here. let's go to 2012. the count was slow, we were stuck at 11% for about an hour. we have jumped to 28%. we're waiting for this to come in. one of the legacies will be people questioning caucuses, iowa, nevada, now colorado having a slow camp. again, very strong when you go back in time. romney, 67% of the vote out in mesa county four years ago. if you look at four years ago, you match up. rick santorum already from the denver suburbs is winning one county. we need to wait for the rest of this to come in. i suspect this is going to jump quickly. we have technical issues with the state republican party. jumps from 11% to 88twat%. if you go back to where we are, we'll take the telestrator up. this is -- this one, everyone in the romney came papaign will sao surprise, we didn't compete. those are rationalizations, you may call them explanations. front runners do lose sometimes. is it the end of the romney campaign? no. that will be a major setback, cause a bit of a jolt in the republican party. >> santorum who is ahead with 28% of the vote in colorado. if he goes on to win colorado, that's a huge step back for romney. he's there. we'll hear from him momentarily. folks there at romney headquarters, jim acosta is there, they're getting ready to hear from romney. we'll take it live, anderson. why i love covering politics. you never know what is going to happen. >> mitt romney's son right now is speaking to the crowd who is waiting for their candidate to appear, governor romney. we're of course going to bring that to you live. from what you're haerging from people on the ground, they anticipate romney pulling out some sort of a win. >> these are people in colorado, know the colorado field. and that's their assessment. they think it's going to be a romney win. >> there is the candidate right now. >> hey, guys. thanks, you guys. thank you. thank you. thank you so much. thanks, guys. thank you. now, that's a little smaller than the 2800 people last night at arapahoe high school, but you're just as loud. thank you. it's great to be in denver tonight. a lot of snow on the ground, pretty cold, but warm to be in the room with so many friends here. i want to say thank you to you. the race is too close to call in colorado at this point, but i'm pretty confident we'll come in number one or number two. i'm looking for a good showing. you kngees, i know there are people coming back from caucuses, but i want to say thanks for the efforts you made to get out to caucuses. and thanks to people in missouri and minnesota who took time to vote today. this was a good night for rick santorum. i want to congratulate senator santorum. i expect to become our nominee with your help. >> so i want to congratulate all of my fellow republicans. particularly senator santorum, and i look forward to the contest to come. we're going to take our message of liberty and prosperity to every corner of the country. and when this primary season is over, we're going to stand united as a party behind our nominee to defeat barack obama and restore the values that have made america the greatest nation in the history of the earth. now, three years ago, you may remember barack obama came to colorado to accept his party's nomination for the pres daenls, and he rented out a huge stadium. he got some of those styrofoam greek columns and had two tv screens that set the mood, and on that big stage, he made even bigger promises. he said that the democrats had a different measure of what constitutes progress. and then he went on to define it. under his definition, progress would be measured by how many people can find a job that pays a mortgage. that was his definition. what has happened? more americans have lost their jobs during president obama's term than during any other president in modern history and more americans have lost their homes during president obama's term than during any other in modern history. under his own definition, president obama has failed. we will succeed. again, in that same speech, he went on defining progress. he went on and he said progress will be determined by, again, quote, whether the average american family saw its income go up instead of down. and during the last four years, the median income in this country has fallen by about 10%. again, by his own definition, president obama has failed. we will succeed. candidate obama went on to say that we could measure progress by determining whether someone with a good idea can take a risk and start a business. do you see what has happened to small business in this country during president obama's term? there were almost 100,000 fewer new business start-ups this year than there were in the years before president obama came to office. so by his own definition, president obama has failed and we will succeed. one more promise. candidate obama said we could see progress in an economy that honors the dignity of work. under president obama, the average duration of unemployment has more than doubled. and there's some 14 million more people on food stamps today than when he took office. again, by president obama's own definition, he has failed, and we will succeed. now, this week you heard president obama on tv say that he deserves a second term because, and i quote, we have made progress. no, mr. president, under the definition of progress you made right here four years ago in denver, you have not made progress. three years ago, president obama just after his inauguration said if he couldn't turn the economy around in three years, he would be looking at a one-term proposition, and we're here to collect, we're here to take back the white house. this is a moment in time when our country is crying out for fundamental change and reform. washington cannot reform itself and washington will never be reformed by those who have been compromised by the culture of washington. this is a clear choice. i'm the only person in this race, republican or democrat, who has never served a day of time in washington. in the world i come from, leadership is about starting a business, not trying to get a bill out of committee. i have said over and over that this campaign is more about changing the soul of america or protecting the soul of america, saving the soul of america than it is about changing the president. we all know in our hearts that the soul of the nation could be corrupted by a washington culture of reckless spending, voting to raise their own pay, saying that they support term limits and then running for re-election time after time after time. it's that washington that we have to change, and when i'm president, we will. this is not a moment when we can continue to do business as usual. this is not a moment when we can expect those in washington to realize suddenly that they have been wrong all the time and they'll get it right next time. this is a time for real change in washington. fundamental, bold, dramatic change. now, i stand before you ready to lead the party and lead the nation. i've led businesses, i have led olympics, i had a chance of helping lead a state. president obama recently said he's learning. we say he's learning too little and too late. the pres daenls is not a place to learn how to lead. it's a place to exercise the judgment and leadership that has been learned over a lifetime, and that's precisely what i'll do. i know that many of us are concerned about our future. over the last 30 years, i can't tell you how many times i have heard that a situation is hopeless or a long list of reasons things can't be done, but i have never been good at listening to those people and i have always enjoyed proving them wrong. it's one of the lessons i learned from my dad. he never graduated college. he was a plaster carpenter. he was good. he could put a mouthful of nails and spit them forward. in his honeymoon, he put al aluminum paint in the trunk of the car and sold it along the way to pay for hotels. there are a lot of reasons he could believe lower, but he believes in america, and the america he believed in, a plaster guy could become the head of a car company, and a guy who sold aluminum paint out of the car could be governor in one of the states where he sold the paint. [ applause ] for my dad, for my dad and for hundreds of thousands, millions of others like him, and like my mom as well, this was the land of opportunity. where the circumstance of birth was no barrier to being able to achieve one's dreams. in dad's america, small businesses, entrepreneurs, these were encouraged and respected. the spirit of enterprise and innovation and daring do propelled our standard of living and our economy passed it on to every place in the nation. i refuse to believe that america is just another place on the map with a flag. we stand for freedom and hope and opportunity. these last few years haven't been the best of times. but while we have lost a few years, we have not lost our way. the principles that made this the greatest nation on earth and the leader of the world have not lost their meaning, they never will. we know we can bring the country back. i believe in america. so do you, and in this election, let's fight for the america we love because we believe in america and its founding principles. thank you so much. appreciate all you have done to help. we have a long way to go, and i sure love this country. thank you so very much. thanks, you guys! >> governor mitt romney speaking, not clear what is going to happen in colorado. 37% in the state for santorum. 577 votes ahead. romney with 30%, gingrich with 13%, paul with 12%. what else is romney going to say but look forward and try to get to the main points he usually does. >> he hit the main points he usually hits. he was gracious and congratulated rick santorum. he said he didn't know about colorado, but he did a couple things that were interesting to me. he took a hit at santorum indirectly by talking about the culture of washington, saying this race is about leadership, not about getting a bill out of committee. but secondly, he also struck a more populous tone, which we have not heard from mitt romney, and that is directly in reaction to rick santorum, talking about his father and the up from the boot straps story. and i think again, you can see that rick santorum is in his head tonight, not newt gingrich. >> sounded like a pep talk, like he was trying to give himself a little gasoline, i'm still good, i can still do this. this is going to be okay. it was not his best night in terms of winning, but i tell you one thing, he has momentum -- >> they just rushed somebody out of the auditorium. i don't know, all i saw was romney being moved away rather quickly from the gentleman, and they quickly hustled him out. we'll try to replay the tape. and governor romney, we should point out, does have secret service protection, and you see the difference given the number of people around him who are very carefully checking it out. >> they're good and they're fast. >> the other thing about the speech tonight, this is just mitt romney. he doesn't hit a lot of home runs, doesn't hit a lot of triples. doesn't strike out. he's steady all the way and over the course of a long primary like this, that is an essential ingredient to being successful. they have to take their losses, move on to the next state and keep going. every candidate suffers losses, they always will. >> i agree with that. you're right about the way he tried to go back to his father's story. it is an up from the boot straps story. it's time for him to begin on the speech. >> yeah. >> he needs to find a way to elevate himself. he has more to say and offer. very little in the speech about what he would do for america. obama got it badly wrong, and i'll change it, but where's the next sentence? >> look at his economic record, 59 points, 150-some odd pages. maybe very smart, but nothing massively inspiring, nothing transformative. maybe he thought that was practical. maybe it is time to come out and take a stand on things, come out and give more detail. he's going to put an op-ed out tomorrow, but trootie to be more aggressive, this is who i am. >> he wrote a biography. he needs to shift and run on policy. what drives you, how will you change america? sum it up, don't give me 150 pages. >> if the economy starts improving, and unemployment continues to go down, then mitt romney has an even larger hurdle, which is if he has been running on his business experience to rescue the economy -- >> they want someone they can trust, someone who will -- like gingrich or santorum who will go in the arena and fight for their values. romney will have a lot of selling to do. >> is he still the front runner? >> yes. >> i would assume he is. >> yes, he had 101 delegates going in tonight, and secondly, i also believe that unlike the other candidates, he's on all of the ballots, he's viable, and while newt gingrich had more momentum monday with santorum, romney has himself in place throughout the country. >> he better hope that gingrich stays in the race. he needs him right now. >> we have not talked about gingrich tonight, and that's not a good night for him. ron paul did better than him. >> in colorado with 30% of the vote, it depends on where the vote is from. wolf is standing by. let's take a look at the tape, what seemed to have occurred just a few moments ago. i believe there have been two instances where romney has had glitter thrown on him, and this may have been a third attempt at that. roll the tapes. >> glitter bomb. >> all right, doesn't look like anything particularly serious. let's go to wolf standing by with john king. >> the difference this time is that he does have secret service protection. and that's very, very significant. i'm going to go to john in a moment, but paul is standing by at gop headquarters in colorado. looks like a very close race shaping up. what is the latest over there? why is it taking as long as it is? >> well, let's go ahead and talk to the gop chairman right here. i think the question a lot of people have is we have some of the numbers, and people are wondering why the numbers are coming in so slowly? >> we're getting most of the preliminary reports from the counties. 129 different locations, 64 counties throughout the state. we have seen preliminary results coming in as the counties are finalizing their returns, providing us with finalized results. what we're hearing in terms of the reports around the state have been enthusiastic turnout, strong crowds. >> so you had a pretty good turnout. do you know how high? >> not yet. we got results coming in from around the state. a lot of the smaller counties releasing results. we expect those in the next hour at the latest, and we're report them on the party's website. >> as we look at the map behind you t looks like the counties have reported, but we haven't had a big influx from the urban counties, denver, et cetera, in the denver area. >> that's right. mest of the counties have two, three, sometimes six precincts in each of them. so it takes a while to compile that information. but the reports that are coming in from those major counties indicate that attendance was strong, there's a strong level of enthusiasm, and we expect to get the results quickly. >> thank you so much. hang on if you could. there you have it from gop chairman here in colorado. >> it's john king at the cnn election center. there's a lot of criticism after the iowa counts, more after the pace of the nevada counts. did colorado learn anything from the states and anything been put in place tonight, and is the chairman frustrated it's taking so long tonight? >> this is from john king. there was a lost of frustration after iowa about the counts, a lot of frustration in nevada as to whether or not the count went along quickly and accordingly. did you make any adjustments, and again, is there anything you can do to speed this up? >> we worked very hard with our county leaders and arctivists o the ground. was was important for us were that the results were accurate and certified. they're coming in quickly. it just takes a while to compile them by county. >> we thank you for taking time out. back to you. >> thanks very much. john is here with us, 30% of the vote now in the state of colorado is in. rick santorum continues to maintain his lead, 42% over romney's 30%. newt gingrich, 15%, ron paul, 12%. most of the state, we have no idea what is going on. taking a long time. >> taking a while, and including some major population centers. two ways to look at it, santorum has kept a decent lead from 11% to 25% to 38% and 30%. it's been in a 12-point to 15-point lead. he's keeping the same lead as the point tally goes up. the question is, why? here is a big county i showed you earlier. jefferson county, ability 12% of the population. we have zero. and it's a county that romney did well in in 2008. that doesn't mean anything about tonight. 2012, we do have adams county in. rick santorum winning. 100% of the vote in adams county. 41% to 31%, so a ten-point win. if you go back four years ago, romney won the county by 53 points over mccain. what happened four years ago isn't what is tracking today. you see the vote is still out down here. even though romney swept, almost, mccain one county, mccain one county. romney wins most of this area and most of this area. smaller rural areas that were swept, but as we look at the vote coming in, these aren't the areas just in colorado, minnesota, iowa, where santorum has performed well, evangelical voters, tea party voters, blue-collar republicans. what is out down here, instinct tells us that this is a good territory for santorum. what romney has to do is come in and make up the 10-point, 12-point lead, he has to come in huge here, huge here. this is where you have population, and has to hope that up here he can match some sof his take from 2008 in 2000 television. den, these are the smaller, on the kansas stied, as paul noted, this is mostly romney, a little bit of ron paul and a little bit of mike huckabee. this was mostly romney territory, and it's rick santorum territory tonight. if you're watching at home, green is a tie. if you have green, that's where you have a tie in a county. we're going to watch this play out. 30% of the vote, you heard the chairman say he thinks more will come in quickly. when this fills in, this county here, this is suburban denver, important republican territory, he needs to fill it in to have confidence. you see he's winning by 30 points in arapo county, but there's not much turnout. turnout is down. i'm sorry, if you look at the county, two thirds of the vote this time around. look at the difference. look at what you're looking at. about 8,000 votes when you add that up. that's two thirds of the vote this year. that's hiej. >> let's take a look at missouri and minnesota for a moment while i have you because we projected that rick santorum wins both. let's go to missouri first. a lot of people voted in the primary. it looks like he's gotten virtually every single county in missou missouri. there's u.n. outstanding in the north, but almost a clean sweep for santorum. >> a huge sweep. i want to go back to show you the difference. 138-63. you're looking at 230,000, 240,000 votes. huge difference. again, this is nonbinding. four years ago, it was a binding primary, this is nonbinding, but you see a huge sweep. this is disappointing for romney. even though it's not binding, he didn't win a county, but you go up to minnesota where it's almost 75%. that's a pretty good thumping. romney is running third. i want to emphasize this, romney running third at 17% in a state four years go he won with 41%. so there's more than a mathem mathematical blow here. it's got to be a psychological blow to romney. and four years ago, after mccain clinched it in florida, romney was running in colorado, in minnesota, in the mountain west saying we need a conservative alternative to mccain. and what are they making tonight, santorum, we need a conservative alternative to romney. >> a huge night for rick santorum. we're going to be speaking with rick santorum live. that's coming up in just a few moments. stand by. special coverage will continue right here in the cnn election room. a lot more news coming up. full analysis. special "ac 360" coming up at the top of the hour. stay with us. we'll be right back. ♪ ( whirring and crackling sounds ) man: assembly lines that fix themselves. the most innovative companies are doing things they never could before, by building on the cisco intelligent network. but proven technologies allow natural gas producers to supply affordable, cleaner energy, while protecting our environment. across america, these technologies protect air - by monitoring air quality and reducing emissions... ...protect water - through conservation and self-contained recycling systems... ... and protect land - by reducing our footprint and respecting wildlife. america's natural gas... domestic, abundant, clean energy to power our lives... that's smarter power today. so i'm glad it's with fidelity. they offer me one-on-one guidance to help me choose my investments. not just with my savings plan here at work. they help me with all of my financial goals. looking good, irene. thanks to fidelity, i can stay on top of my financial future, huh? 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