why weren't stricter procedures followed. who's at fault. you want to know who is the right wing going to blame if someone gets through. president obama. that's who. so before we get to that and our arms up about the inconvenience at the airport ask yourself how you'll feel. plus, progressives are setting up their own outside fund raising mmpb to answer outrageous and sometimes bogus charges and to match the republicans machine. also, president obama was in kokomo, indiana today, which has benefitted from the stimulus and bailout. is it just a messaging problem or something more? and remember the woman who confronted president obama saying she was tired of making excuses for him? she was laid off yesterday and joins us tonight. finally, sarah palin is still angry about flubbing katie couric's question. how about being angry at herself for not reading the newspaper or any thing. let's begin with the right wing's ginned up controversy over the new airline procedures. tim, which i read every morning. i go back to you on this, mr. connie. the day after -- that's your problem. the day after we get hit again. in our lifetime, you're a young guy, you're probably going to see it. is it going to be who did it, who let them through the door. what's going to be the question? >> i think you're going to have the government doing what it always does after something like that. >> what are the american people going to say after it happens? are they going to be looking for a scalp, aren't they? >> sure. if it's like the shoe bomber, he got in on paris. the underwear bomber, in amsterdam. when you can -- yeah, even the technology they're rolling out now might not catch it. >> so -- you're concern. what would you do? to catch the bad guys before they commit suicide on a plane or whatever. >> i think we do as much we can. >> specifically. you're a critic. >> congressman chafs said bomb sniffing dogs. >> why is he against the body screening? >> because it's wrong for the government to force us to get naked pictures or felt up. >> gene, you and i travel all the time. every time i get on a plane, i put up with it. i wait in line, go through the stupid driver's license. the guy puts me in line. most of the time, a metal detector, sometimes through the air blower. i've never been felt up with all that stuff, frisking. have you? >> one time, i went through the body scanner line. i don't mind the body scanner. >> anybody complain while you were there? >> no. >> one time, i must have had something in my pocket, anyhow, i got asked to step to the side and got frisked. i didn't actually give it a second thought. >> no -- >> does this bother you? >> it would bother me if they waned to send my daughter through. >> how old? >> my daughter's 3. >> would that scare her? >> i don't know, but when she's older if they wanted to send one of my sisters in law, anybody who doesn't want to have a naked picture of them taken by the u.s. government. the u.s. marshal service accidentally held on to thousands of these. >> a new poll shows that 64% of americans support the use of scanners in airports. 32% oppose them. that's about right, i guess. let's take a look at this questi question. should we look for terrorists instead of weapons like israel? this gets if serious question. the public is split. the pat down question, 48% say people think they're justified and 50% say they go too far. on the pat-down, it's used as a recourse or first recourse. >> if you are not willing to go through the nudie scanner -- >> what is this? first of all, when you were at the airport, you don't see what you described. go through the screen erer, wha offensive about that again? >> people should not have to get naked pictures. it's amazing to me -- >> who is looking at the -- >> tsa officials, but in the past when they said they aren't holing on to these, they are. through a freedom of information act, there have been websites that have gotten their hands on these pictures. >> oh, they have? >> did you object when bush was listening to phone calls? it's no worse. >> how do you stop people from going on airplanes and blowing them up. >> there's lots of ways. i'm going to reject the premise of your question because they said this might not have picked up the underwear bomber. it doesn't pick up stuff in your body cavities. my brother's got a fake knee. how are you going to tell a difference between the metal knee and the bomb. >> 9/11, the guys carrying box cutters, wouldn't you like to stop people from carrying box cutters in planes? nobody's going to put a box cutter inside them. i've got no problem with a metal detector. it's not taking a naked picture. >> what is this obsession? when did you first get obsessed with it? this seems to be a right winged rant. being pushed by the people on the right. why are you on the right who are generally for stopping frisk laws, generally the right wing is for -- generally speaking, the american right is tough on law and order and if a cop p wants to frisk him, you never had a problem with it. now, you have a problem with people being scanned. >> if this is leading to american's being more skeptical -- >> i think they're using it to attack the administration. the minute we get hit, they're going to blame him for not being tough enough. >> just because you're being tough in one area doesn't mean you're being broadly tough. >> let's take a look at huckabee. here's mike huckabee. one of the guys competing on what i call the western conference, calling for the president and first family to go through an added airport security measure. let's listen to him enjoying this fun fest. >> if he thinks this is an appropriate way for us to deal with security as he has defended, i've said, mr. obama, take your wife, two daughters and mother-in-law to washington reagan national airport and have them publicly go through the body scanner and full enhanced pat-down in front of others and if it's okay, then maybe the rest of us won't feel so bad when your wives, daughters and mothers are being put through this humiliating and degrading totally unconstitutional intrusion of their privacy. >> the language here, the heating up of this is like rush limbaugh with an echo chamber. drudge is on it, you're on it. the washington examiner is on it. degrading, dehumanizing. >> these aren't naked pictures. you should go on the internet sometime. there are a lot better naked pictures. these are shadowy outlines that are supposed to give you -- >> they're not flashing on the big screen either. >> 64% of our poll, 80% in another say use the scanner if this is the best technology you have. let's ask the question, is this the best, not the best, but we should use the best technology we have in order to keep people from -- with bombs from getting on to planes. that's basic. that's what people want. there's actually not an actual controversy here, it's kind of an artificial. >> i don't know what is going to happen at the airport tomorrow, but i've been going on planes, 200, 300 trips a year. constantly. i never have a problem with this. i wait in line, go through the line. i'm glad they're doing it. i'm for them and i never complain. do you? have you ever refused to go through one of these? >> i've had fights because i -- my wife points out no it's the rules half the time. i don't think the tsa has legitimate authority to force me to do this. >> here was another one of your crowd here. ginger said the united states was spending billions of dollars on scanners because of what she called a quote revolving door and consulting for companies that make the machinery and cited michael chertoff. i said last night, we contacted chertoff and his office released the following statement -- do you think we should go as far as israel? let's go to israel. should go to israel? >> they've got a smaller crowd. >> but we're facing the same enemy. the same organized terrorist conspiracy operation to try to find a hole in our security. 40 years ago, coming out of israel and asked me why did you stay in an arab hotel. simple answer, it was a dollar a night. why do you have a typewriter. they have serious efforts to find out who you are. they don't go for technology. should we do that? >> i'd like to see us more going for the person. i doubt we could pull that off. >> i wrote my column in today's paper, i did my internet chat on this, people were writing in, let's go to the israel system. that would last one hour. it's no way because -- >> i must say, when i'm flying to israel, i like being on those planes because i like that security system. >> you've got one airport and -- >> thank you. good guest. coming up, you're always a great guest. counting karl rove, david brof is a counterweight to groups that spend tons of money on this year's elections. will it make the difference for democrats come 2012? watching "hardball" only on msnbc. change student. what? they think you're a businessman, using our house to meet new clients in china. for reals, player? 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[ male announcer ] we understand.® you need a partner who can help you go global. fedex. after losing governor's races from pennsylvania to wisconsin, democrats feared the worst for president obama's chances of winning the key states in 2012, but a new study cast down, the university of minnesota looked at 550 statewide results dating back to 1968 and found no correlation between which candidate won the race in the state and political party of the state's government. isn't it amazing after all this talk? they won the same percentage of states in which that controlled the governor's mansion as republicans controlled. wow, it doesn't matter. the same was true for republican presidential candidates. at campbellskitchen.com. campbell's.® it's amazing what soup can do.™ welcome back to "hardball." a new democratic group called american bridge launched a talk on republicans in 2012 and try balance the right wing groups that dominated last year. can it fight back accusations? joining me now, catherine kennedy townsend. can you take on karl rove? >> absolutely. this is ridiculous. karl rove has not told the truth. he's raised $70 million more than the democrats in the last election and pretended -- he's lied about what is good for this country. >> oh. the big lie. >> the big lie is much more compelling. >> i want to talk about some of the people you're up against. i want to show you an interview with michele bachmann. what we had done was launched her into space because she thought we had investigations by the media of all democratic members of congress. here she is trying to answer that question, why she's thinking the president is anti-american. this is an interview she did last week with the bbc. this is what your group is going to be up against. >> thanks. >> you've suggested that president obama's anti-american. do you really believe that? >> i've been really concerned about the policies that come out of the white house and i think i share that agreement. they're jekting the federal government into buying an owning an equities shares. >> that's a different thing. you think the president of american is anti-american? >> the policies that are antifreeze enterprise are the ones not familiar to the united states. the government takeover of health care is a great example. that's not what we've done here historically in the united states and the people don't want to see the federal government control and dictate our health care. >> look at her eye contact. i asked her if she's under hip noes is. she's looking like she's waiting for somebody to flash a card. i don't know what her state is. she apparently just got blown away by leadership. >> they know she's a problem. >> this kind of bizarre behavior where you just stare into the camera an recite this. no, she talks about what, equity shares and -- >> it's totally strange and she's wrong about what we need to america. we need a strong health care system, which every other industrialized country has. if you do polls of the american people. they want health care. >> are you confident, i've read some of the material from david brock, he's a smart guy, the person running it. he said basically, the quest is can the president win this argument. i am stunned constantly by this president and his inability to command a group of surrogates. the presidential seems to be out there all alone. are you guys going to field surrogates, get them in the administration? get people out there, what? >> we're an independent expenditure. we're going to make sure our message which will support president obama and health care and financial reform and clean energy so we can be competitive with the emerging markets in the 21st century, we're going to make sure we have got our message out there. if you look at the polls, you can see that most americans agree with the democrats on the issues. what happened in the last election because of the supreme court citizens united case is that a small group of very wealthy americans bombarded the air waves with a very narrow message to help the special interest dwroups. we've got to fight against that. we're going to have people talking and we're going to be on the air waves and say, this is what's going on. make a bridge to the future. >> i've always been taken by the people along the railroad tracks. arlington. and what i've always been impressed by is the working white people. the regular people. stuck with bobby. how do you get those people back, the working class white guys, the regular people that don't benefit from big corporate money, from a lot of these trade policies, and yet voted republican. maybe out of cultural reasons. >> first of all, i'm glad you mentioned -- i think it's because they knew he fought for them. he took on thugs -- >> i'm getting emotional. >> it's true. and what you need -- >> how do you get the regular democrat back to the democratic party? >> i think it would be very helpful for the democrats to show that they're fighting for working men and women and that means making sure that health care, we're fighting for it and this is going to be better for your and your families. the same for financial reform. who has been ripped off by credit card companies who have raised rates and haven't shown it. i think one of the things that my father did so well is that he walked with people. he was in their homes. he listened. he heard. >> liked them, too. >> had a good time with them. >> you think a democratic party's gotten too elite? too ivy league? >> i think most of washington is a lot of as you know, most people have talking heads make over $250,000 a year. that's really what has happened in the last 30 years. that wasn't true when you were growing up, when i was growing up. i came from a very well off family, but a lot of friends weren't so lucky. now, you only talk unfortunately to yourselves. >> thank you. happ happy thanksgiving. we're joined by joshua micah marshall, founder and editor of talking points. i guess this is part of the rebuilding of the democratic party we're seeing here. this effort to try to match what looked to be a lot of fire power by the republicans. i mean, karl rove is amazing, whatever you think of him, he is darned good at organizing, raising money and belting out the message. >> a lot of this weirdly and we have so say this about president obama, was unilateral design. the democrats had groups something like this in 2004 and 2006 and president obama wanted to you know, for reasons that were maybe good in 2008, wanted to sort of centralize everything within his campaign. and they basically froze out these outside groups and for the same reason, weren't in 2010. after president obama won in 2008, i think a lot of people thought, okay, maybe he knows what he's doing and -- >> let's talk a law for a second. the ads that come on, probably have a lot of impact the last couple of days before election. nobody pays attention to the disclaimers at the end. all kinds of 513s, but all kinds of organizations that blast the party message on one side or the other. a lot of these have been directed at nailing democrats. is that what these organizations have the power to do, which is get the message out without a real return address on it? >> these kinds of ads are trying to convince people who have a very casual focus on politician any way. they're not focusing on is it the dnc or this outside group. it's not so much that president obama needed someone out there, birth certificates in hawaii or whatever. there was no one taking -- >> it would help. >> as long as you have to defend the fact he's one of us. you need a greek cohors. >> i think that's key, but in a political context, what's even more important, you need someone on their side basically launching attacks on the other side. if you're in a boxing match and one side is throwing a lot of punches and the only side, the other side is kind of holding up its arms and trying to block as many of the punches as possible. the person was just blocking. at best, it's going to be a draw. you're not going to win that because you're not hittinging. the democrats had a hard election cycle. >> you know henry the fifth won a battle with a lot of bows and ar rories. >> thank you for joining us. up next, sarah palin says she won't do another interview with katie couric. wow, she's tough. a real mama grizzly. she says she wants to clean up what she calls the sorry state of journalism. she's doing it on shawn hannity. the "sideshow" is next. you're watching "hardball" only on msnbc. ah, it's stinging a little bit more than usual! yeah, you'll get used to it. the longer you keep your high mileage car, the more it pays you back. get castrol gtx high mileage. it helps engines last longer by fighting the main causes of engine failure. i think a dime went up my nose. yeah, it happens. don't change your car. change your oil to castrol gtx high mileage. its more than just oil. it's liquid engineering. i won't. ♪ [ female announcer ] clear some snow. ♪ or spread a little warmth. maxwell house gives you a rich full flavored cup of coffee so you can be good to the last drop. princess of the powerpoint. your core competency... is competency. and you rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle. and go. you can even take a full-size or above. and still pay the mid-size price. i'm getting an upgrade. [ male announcer ] indeed, business pro. indeed. go national. go like a pro. well back to "hardball" now for the "sideshow." first, what do you read. them still fighting words for mama grizzly. she's not going to give that katie couric another sit-down. >> if you were to get back out there in the public arena and run for president, i mean, would you then do interviews with the lame stream media figures, another interview with katie couric? >> i would look forward to being more open than i already am. as for doing an interview though with a reporter that has such a bias against whatever it is that i would come out and say, why waste my time. no. i want to help clean up the state that is so sorry today of journalism and i've -- i would speak to reporters that understand that. the expectation the public has for truth to be reported. >> so let's get this straight. she's on fox. talking to shawn hannity. the crying opinion journalism. she's restricting herself to journeyist who agree with her so she can teach others how to get it right. right. katie couric made her look bad because she asked her a wide open, easy question. it was the answer or lack of it that caused palin all the heart ache. what do you read. it's still not a bad question. last night on larry king, george bush and his wife praised former president clinton. that's class. >> what do you think of his relationship with bill? >> i liked it. i took me a little while, i confess, but you can't dislike bill clinton. he's very likable and he was so good to george. george told me over and over again, he would let george have the bed and he's just really nice. i have a feeling that bill wishes he had a father like george. truthfully. you know what bill said when i called him my boy, bill, introducing him. he said those bushes will do anything to get another president in the white house. >> she's a tough cookie, but so right about clinton. said that while he enjoys living a quite life, he plans on marking his 90th birthday with another skydiving expedition. he was a flier in world war ii, he knows what it's like to be a risk taker and hero for a country. up next, president obama's failure to communicate. why does this white house seem to have so much trouble selling its good accomplishments. you're watching "hardball," only on msnbc. plus, children's advil® brings fever down faster than children's tylenol®. choose children's advil®. relief you can trust. progresso. hi. we love your weight watchers endorsed soups but my husband looks the way he did 20 years ago. well that's great. you haven't seen him... my other can is ringing. progresso. hey can you tell my wife to relax and enjoy the view? (announcer) progresso. you gotta taste this soup. each day was fueled by thorough preparation for events to come. well somewhere along the way, emily went right on living. but you see, with the help of her raymond james financial advisor, she had planned for every eventuality. which meant she continued to have the means to live on... even at the ripe old age of 187. life well planned. see what a raymond james advisor can do for you. the plan we worked on for your retirement makes sense. just stay on track. what is... that's the guidance you get from fidelity. thanks. stay on the line! whatever your destination, fidelity will help you get there. because when it comes to investing, you should never settle. fidelity investments. stocks getting pulmoled with the debt crisis and military tensions in the koreas. the s&p 500 losing 17 and the nasdaq tumbling by 37. funds checking korean stocks tumbled after north korea shot a small island. the widely held fund, an iq south korea small cap fund diving nearly 6% and we've got ireland's ongoing debt crisis. major firms were in the red and the dollar moved higher against the euro. minutes from the latest minutes of the federal reserve show they are sharply divided over more stimulus. 41 states gained jobs in october. the unemployment rate falling in 19 states. that is it from cnbc for now. we are first in business worldwide. now back to "hardball." there were those who were prepared to give up on kokomo and our auto industry. there were those that said it was going to be too difficult, throwing good money after bad. you remember the voices arguing for us to do nothing. suggesting we should just step back and watch an entire sector of our economy fall apart. we made the decision to stand with you because we had confidence in the american worker. more than any. and today, we know that was the right decision. we know that was the right decision. >> the elections are over, but he's out there on the stump. that was president obama today in kokomo, indiana. there's a new website set up that brags about his administration's accomplishme s accomplishments. we can see there's a lot to go on. the list of actions taken by the president is extensive. we're joined by jared polis and richard wolffe. congressman, i go through this list and am really impressed by this, here are some of the big things in the first two years. economic stimulus plan. gm and chrysler bailout. chrysler, gm, these are doing well. health care reform. it's passed. financial reform law, it's passed. the first latina justice on the supreme court. three women on the supreme court now. the most ever u.s. combat success in iraq. iraq ended that. the dover air force base is open to the media. no more covering up the remains of our soldiers coming home and stem cell funding is official. you can argue a lot of things got done. have they given up on dragging on accomplishments, sir? >> this has been an active two years, you highlighted some of the achievements. doesn't mean that everybody agrees or disagrees, they're all controversial, it would be hard for anybody to say that this president didn't accomplish a lot on the historical scale and a lot goes into the implementation phase. it's hard to take credit during the ugly sausage making process. the republicans dirtied up the waters as much as possible. they extended the sausage making and now, it's time to start taking credit and moving forward. >> richard got credit for bringing the unemployment rate back down. that was a morning before he came along, you know. this president seems to get a lot done and if the unemployment rate goes down a couple of poinlts, is he going to get credit? if the jobless number goes down, will we say he did a good job? >> you saw him today. he looks like he was campaigning. we have an auto industry. i had lunch with paul ryan in the middle of this. he said, let the whole thing collapse. >> by the way, that's the talk you get from guy that just won the senate race in pennsylvania, too. >> how are you going to win back votes in upper midwest by telling that kind of story. he's got to go out there and talk about his record and democrats do, too. >> that's the question, congressman, if moderate, might even call it center left politics. let's call it center left politics, which in this case, went along with bush politics, which was we got to save our major industries. we can't be so free market that we let the key industries die and why is that not a sellable argument and why is there libertarians out there like rand paul and toomey saying, let them die. how does that sell? >> i guess because they didn't die, i guess. >> a lot's up to the implementation. frankly, i was skeptical about the involvement of the federal government and auto industry. it's not something i supported initially, but it would be hard for anybody not to say it was implemented well. we kept a major american industry on its feet. >> this new poll shows who should take policy lead in this country. it found the majority of country wants congress to take the lead. 52% compared to 39% for the president. that is a verdict against him. >> democrats in the senate or the republicans in the house. i mean, we got a mixed verdict here. >> right now, the democrats control both houses through january. so it must be the democrats. >> what's interesting is seeing independents and democrats saying they want to see compromise, these two sides working together. republicans saying, no compromise, stick to your guns. i don't know that people have really gained out what policies they want here. clearly, economy is the most important thing. who's the leader here? >> let's look at three things coming up. number one, the bush tax cuts. what is your bet as a legislator representing a district in colorado. will we get a tax cut for everybody under $250,000 a year? will we get that for sure or is that in jeopardy? >> i think the key thing that the president needs to accomplish is to extend those tax cuts for the middle class. we can't let taxes go up for people making 60, 70, $80,000 a year on our watch. the president is spot-on with that. if we have to deal to get the votes for that, so be it. >> what about tax cuts for people under 250 a year. >> it's on republicans to figure out how to pay for that. >> you've just given away, you've said you're determined to get the tax cuts for people under 250 and the only way to do that is to get 60 votes in the senate. they have the ransom possibility here. >> they do and i think one key thing to make sure we do that is that it's a short-term extension. do it for a year, pay for it for a year and make sure it's not permanent. >> that's what they will do. thank you. it's great to have you. happy thanksgiving to you for joining us on "hardball." good luck with the book. name of the book? it will reach the top. next, remember this woman? she's faced it now. she's lost her job since that meeting. she's going to join us next coming back in a minute to talk about the real world she feared was coming and now, it has arrived. this is "hardball," only on msnbc. ♪ [ male announcer ] you know her. we know diamonds. together we'll make her holiday. that's why only zales is the diamond store. some changes come sooner than expected to the obama white house. david axelrod will be stepping down earlier than expected right after the state of the union speech in january or early february. and heading back to chicago to start the campaign effort there. and david plouffe, who ran the obama campaign will be coming aboard the white house in early january. the white house needs to get back on track after suffering the biggest midterm defeat and president obama, well he's ever suffered in decades and axelrod for plouffe may not be the bold move the president needs right now. oh! you know shipping is a lot easier with priority mail flat rate boxes. if it fits, it ships anywhere in the country for a low flat rate. plus, you can print and pay for postage online. and i can pick them up for free with package pickup. perfect! cause i'm gonna need a lot of those. wow! i knew i should have brought my sleigh. priority mail flat rate shipping starts at $4.90 only from the postal service. a simpler way to ship. 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[ male announcer ] ducati knows it's better for xerox to manage their global publications. so they can focus on building amazing bikes. with xerox, you're ready for real business. so they can focus on building amazing bikes. ah, it's stinging a little bit more than usual! yeah, you'll get used to it. the longer you keep your high mileage car, the more it pays you back. get castrol gtx high mileage. it helps engines last longer by fighting the main causes of engine failure. i think a dime went up my nose. yeah, it happens. don't change your car. change your oil to castrol gtx high mileage. its more than just oil. it's liquid engineering. i'm one of your middle class americans and quite frankly, i'm exhausted. i'm exhausted of defending you, your administration, the mantle of change that i voted for. >> that was velma hart at the cnbc town hall meeting on september 21st, her comments struck a cord with a lot of americans who also felt the change. now, she will soon find herself in the same boat as 15 million americans out of work. she joins us again on "hardball." thank you for joining us. we want anybody who has a great job offer for you, first of all, it would be very practical to call mr. robinson here at "hardball" on msnbc. let me ask you this question. you said at the time you were in that town hall looking face to face with the president that you were exhausted with defending the guy. are you more exhaust ed now? >> absolutely not, chris. there's been a lot that's happened since september 20th and i think the president has made his case about what he believes is positive advancement for this country, what he's done over the last 20 months to impact the country in a positive way and i've been pleased with that. prior to the 20th, if he was saying it, i didn't hear it or i tuned it out, but i've been paying attention and i've been impressed with that. >> the knock on president obama, you hear it, i hear it. he's cold, remote, a he likes t and play basketball or play golf with his staffer pals, he doesn't really get out with people and feel their painsome that where you are at with him or feel like he does connect with somebody like you? >> i felt the connection when was standing ten feet away asking my question. i felt the connection when he came through the line and took time to shake my hand and give me a word of encouragement. i don't know him as a person, so i don't know what he does. >> neither do i. >> outside of what i see. but that one with encounter, i think, impressed me and influenced me to believe that he is a very personable person. >> you think you got to him? >> i don't know. i -- i think he answered very deliberately my question very succinctly over and over again post-september 20th and i don't know whether i triggered that or a host of people trying hearing it. he cited several people in several of his comments that he had spoken to across the country that wanted to have, like i did, faith that he had it all under control or that somebody's, you know, got it and i remember specifically a speech where he talked about a person that he had met at a town hall forum or some type of a forum that said i just want to go to work tomorrow knowing you-all had this under control that is my exact sentiment. i can appreciate the position. >> my sentiment is that you are our joe the plumber and i think i like you much more. let me address the hot dogs and beans comment. i think it was saturday night, my brothers will correct me on this i think it was saturday night. you know, we had our spam years early on, chipped beef on toast which i actually detested, we didn't have much money. remember chipped beef on toast? not what i'm looking for? >> no, no, no chris, i don't remember that i'm too young. >> ha! get macroeconomic, talk about the big picture are we in a reset mode in this country? all getting -- not me, i'm pretty well off, i'm doing fine, but do you think we are all into a reset mode people are just going to get used to fact we are going to have a lot of unemployed people in this country for years to come? >> i don't think people are ever going to get used to being unenblind i don't think they are going to get used to high unemployment what has given me show. unemployment rate has stayed flat for such an extended period of time. i'm hoping that in fact starks sign of good things to come. chris, when we met before, i'm a realist, i'm data driven. the data tells me, at least if i can trust it that, in fact, we are on the road to recovery. it is a slow, painful process, but the hole that was dug dug to get us here was a very elongated process, much longer, i might add, than 292 months, 23 months this president has been in office. so the process to get us out is going to take a bit longer and i'm okay with that, as long as there's communication, as long as i understand that progress is being made, as long as i hear and see that certain things are being done that are intended to benefit me whether they benefit me or not. one of the things that i talked about, you know, maybe i will try that loan modification through the mortgage process and see if it works now. that was one of the things the president spoke very specifically about me b he said, vel marks that is something designed for the middle class. now i'm going to try that program and see if it works. >> i like to think i have some instinct about people and my sense watching you care very closely with the president, must be a huge moment in your life, is you knew something was coming in terms of your employment status, am i right? >> no accident know anything in terms. >> you didn't know it? >> i did know that my organization, like all nonprofits, i don't want to speak for all of them 'cause some of them are doing very well, but the community on a whole is challenged. we are -- the effects of bad economy affect nonprofits lastly and longest and i knew that lots of organizations were being challenged, not to mention the one that i worked for. so that's all i knew. and i was very concerned about what the long-term implications of that -- of that elongated negative impact, if nothing happened. and i think hard decision also to be made and i'm -- you know -- >> velma hart, you're great to come on the show. >> thank you. >> thank you for telling bust your situation. the name here is mr. robinson if off position worthy and appropriate for velma hart, please call msnbc's "hardball." thank you so much. have a happy thanksgiving as much as possible. >> you too. let me finish with why president-elect obama is right to step up airport safety, no matter how many travelers are inconvenienced. you are watching "hardball," only on msnbc. when i was 16, i was hired as a cashier at the walmart in marinette, wisconsin. that first job launched my career. since i've been with the company, i've been promoted ten times over the span of 11 years. today, i'm a divisional learning and development manager. we caactually help people develop in their own careers. my job allows me to make a difference in the lives of almost 100,000 associates in the northeast. if you think about it, that's almost 8 times the size of my hometown. my name is nick and i work at walmart. ♪ my name is nick and i work at walmart. thank you for calling usa pmy name peggy. peggy, yes, i'd like to redeem my reward points for a gift card. tell points please? 250,000. calculating... ooh! answer: five fifty! 550 bucks?! 5 dollar, 50 cents. minus redeeming charge. leaving 50 cents. say what? happy time! what kind of program is this? want better rewards? switch to discover. america's number 1 cash rewards program. it pays to discover. the same old way... consider this: things just got beautifully simple. introducing the duracell mygrid™. simple and smart. it's mygrid™. from duracell. trusted everywhere. think you can only charge one thing at a time...? consider this: drop & go charging for up to 4 devices at once... the duracell mygrid™. simple and smart. it's mygrid™. from duracell. trusted everywhere. let me finish tonight with a reminder of what we expect of our government. job number one, protect us. that's what the president of the united states has on his assignment sheet every morning he wakes up. it is what he has to worry about every night he goes to bedsome he up to the job? is he doing it? so, think about airline security from barack obama's point of view, from anyone who would be in the white house right now. they have to be thinking about one thing, what if it happens again? and then comes this question, what if it's right now happening? if right now, a cell of people in hamburg, germany or newark, new jersey, or somewhere in the murky world beyond our western civilization in a cave somewhere, someone is plotting in detail, an intricate position of getting someone on an american airline, 200 or more pass passengers with an instrument to blow that plane to kingdom come? you know what all the evidence we hear directly from al qaeda is this is precisely what the president of the united states, our leader is confronting that is his reality that is his world as he goes about getting up each morning, living through the day, working, trying to live and going to bed each night that is the knowledge he carries rent-free in his head. yes, we have to believe in his heart. so when i do my job here, i try to think not about the anger, frustration or testiness of the traveler, which i am about 100 times a year, but about the duty of this country to protect itself. tough believe this one thing. the day, the minute, the instant after an attack the question will not be how many tens of thousands of people moaned about getting scanned or searched it will be one searing question from left, right and center, who let that guy on the plane? and why didn't the president stop him? why did they let those hundreds of people die? so, this thanksgiving, let's thank god we have peo