Transcripts For MSNBC Republican National Convention 20120830

mr. ryan. chris matthews joining us from tampa. what's your reaction? >> for not supporting the simpson-bowles compromise. this is a guy who walked away from simpson bowles. i don't know how he can criticize the president for not doing what he didn't do. and he's failed to accept leadership. it was a verycon stricted, very negative speech that didn't have anywhere near the elevation of condoleeza rice's speech. thought cdoleezza reez's speech was spectacular. it was thrilling, american. it talked about the wonders of immigration, the brilliant people who come to this country to work and live and talked about it's not where you come from, it's where you're going. it was a complete smackdown do all of thutae attacks on barack obama's past. this speech was pretty much a canned political advertisementcome paadvertiseme compared to condoleezza rice. >> her speech was received very, very well in the hall. it was not at all toward mitt romney. what do you think of the comparative weight of the two addresses? >> they were both great, they were different. this was a wonderfully written speech by john mcconnell and mat scully, two of the great speechwriter in the republican party, in fact, in both parties. i think it was brilliantly delivered. i think mitt romney is the nominee, the head of the republican party. paul ryan is the head of the conservative movement in the united states. he's going to be for a long time to come no matter what the outcome in november. i thought the trumeperformance s tremendous. the struggles he had too de dea with, the death of his father as a young age, his mom, and just a word about condoleezza rice, who i also thought was a brilliant speech, condoleezza rice lives in america's most broken state, our biggest state, california, where the republican party is collapsed. i guarantee you tonight really for the first time ever, we heard condoleezza rice talk about domestic issues. there are stars lighting up in the california delegation looking at someone who could restore the republican party to office. it will be interesting to watch her over the weeks, the calls to ask her to run for governor. >> i parts of her speech when she was brilliant was when she was not talking about domestic policy. i want to bring in lawrence o'donnell. do we have lawrence with us? he was in the hall, able to see the speeches from there. give us your assessment? >> i agree with steve about the effect of paul ryan's speech, especially here in the hall. it was a truly exciting speech for this hall. as soon as he stepped on the stage, it was transformed in here. toward the end of his speech, he said bravely, we will not duck the tough issues. he said that after a speech that ducked the tough issues all the way through. it was biographical, it was anecdotal. but it did not get into the issues other than to talk about what paul ryan called raiding medicare by president obama. they're now taking on the medicare campaign as, we will save it and preserve it, which got cheered. and president obama has raided it. but other than that, it was a substance free speech all the way through. his delivery here was very effective. it shows how much promise he has as a campaigner. i also think when you juxtapose it to chris christie's speech last night, there's no comparison between the two. >> i thought this was better. >> very energetic speech. it sounded like a stump speech. this theme of nostalgia, even though he's the young stase of the conservative moment, he talked about back when i was waiting tables or in college, we had a tf america than what we have now. what has changed? he talks about capping federal outlays at 20%. every year he was in high school and college, they were above 20%. there's not some massive tyrannical expansion in the government which happened in the free days when he was out waiting tables where the federal outlays were 22% and 23%, and today with president obama. >> so that's the solution? >> it's what they always tell. >> when you go behind, three impressive speeches, they were much better than last night. in fairness to ryan, it was better than i thought he was. i thought condoleezza rice was all chris said. the problem is none of them told the truth. the fact is that ryan very eloquently misled people. he walked out of the debt commission. he lied about the plant in his hometown. it was closed in the end of '08 when bush was president, not under obama. if you want to have an eloquent person that does not tell the truth, this was a great performance. if you're going to match facts with the performance, they have a big problem. condoleezza rice stands on a platform where they preached all night states rights and talked about how she grew up in segregation. if the state's right isn't won, you still wouldn't get a hamburger at that lunch counter. so are you talking about education as the civil right. it is. then why are you off cutting the education budget? i mean, it's great poetry for those who want to be lured into some fantasy island, but the reality is what they advocate and what they theatrically presented tonight is two worlds apart. >> he's the best young conservative presenter we have seen in a long time. he is the young conservative that the party has been looking for. he's got good communication skills. he came out tonight, he looked really nervous early on. he got into his stride. he got the feel of the crowd. he got into a momentum. then he laid it on them. i mean, he got after the medicare, he got after the stimulus package although he forgot to mention he requested stimulus funds in his backyard. he also forgot to mention that his mother took a public bus to get to a state school to get back into the economy when his family ran into adversity and his father unfortunately passed away. but he's still perpetuating the lie about the $716 billion. he's perpetuating the lie about the plant. he's passing himself off as a guy in the middle of the country in home spun janesville. one of the people from janesville said, people must know he lied about the plant. he'll go out and tell the red-meat conservatives exactly what they want to hear. he's their new hero. >> the base calculation was that they could neutralize the fact the only thing he is known for nationally is being the kill medicare guy. we have a young guy, energetic. he can spin the story better than anybody else. he's a great performer, a political lifer. he's got great connections. we have to deal with the kill medicare thing. here's the problem, so he gets up there and he and mitt romney have been sort of fine tuning this ever since they picked him. they had a few rough first days, but now what they're doing and this would work so much better if they were the second convention other than the first, he's criticizing the president for medicare policies areul als in his policy. what he has proposed is a plan to privatize it. you get a coupon, a voucher, and then you buy private insurance. that's not that hard to explain and that's what the democrats get to do all next week. if you can explain it in 20 seconds, you could do that for three days next week in north carolina and this medicare thing because they have been pushing it so hard, it's not over on the republicans' own terms and i think the democrats are going to beat paul ryan and mitt romney with older people in a way they wouldn't have otherwise with medicare because i don't think they came up with an actual fact-based rejoinder to their biggest weakness with paul ryan. chris. >> rachel, the thing i look for in these speeches is who is the person in the podium at the l lectern talking to? i don't want to get too sectarian, but it was clear paul ryan was talking to people who think about rights as something that were produced by thomas jefferson, ignoring the people for whom the rights came in the 1960s. no reference to the fact that a good portion of the country was denied those roeths, especially the most important right to vote, up until 1965. it was given to them through a lot of effort and fighting between the two parties and it became a bipartisan effort led by lyndon johnson and evan dirkson from illinois. they never mentioned those things because they're talking to people, let's be honest about this, who didn't benefit at all from those civil rights. also when they cut medicaid and do it as if it doesn't matter, it's really for poor people, so cutting medicaid, cutting peo e programs for the poor, who are the losers in the paul ryan plan, they don't talk ability those people because they're not the people they're trying to get to vote for them. that's why i love condi rice's speech. she spoke to people of color. she spoke to recent immigrants. people working on route 28 and high-tech industries, the people who would relate to this country. she talked about people not being judged where they came from but where they're headed. people like barack obama, she po talked about them. i remember ed rollins 20 years ago saying the biggest mistake the republicans of california made was not appointing her to a senate seat. she would have been on course to be president all those years ago. she's a first-class american who thinks big and talks to the whole country. and i don't think ryan spoke to the whole country tonight. in fact, a lot of the speakers have not, and it's obvious if you listen to their words. >> chris, don't we need from paul ryan in part, don't we need from him the attack dog stuff? the fact he's going to go after obama like crazy. doesn't it set mitt romney up to talk about himself instead of going after president obama? >> you're right, the vp played the attack dog. ike took the high road, nixon took the low road, but i think we got past that. i think a lot of the recent vice presidents have refused to play the part. it's not automatic you're the dog attacking at the heels of the other party. you ought to give hope and spirit and a big picture of unifying america. i don't think paul ryan tried to unify america today. i think he tried to use the divisions economically to advance the cause of the better off people who deent want to be taxed and the upper middle class who think the benefits will come to them. and basically, ignored the bottom half of this country. i think that's not uniting the country. >> we're going to go to nbc's andrea mitchell on the floor with somebody we have been talking about a lot, with former secretary of state condoleezza rice. >> thanks so much. >> condoleezza rice, let's talk about the role of national security. this was the first time we have really heard about national security, yet america is -- has two wars, the two longest wars. and frankly, it's -- they're wars that were ordered by a republican president under your watch. >> they were wars, first of all, against afghanistan wbecause we were attacked by afghanistan, and because saddam hussein was a threat in the middle east. the iraqis are struggling, but they're rid of saddam hussein. they have democratic institutions they're trying to make work. we need to try to help them. so what we talked about here tonight is the role of america in the world. there are many other elements that are breaking, syria, the situation with iran, but american strength begins at home. that's really the message i wanted to send. >> the obama administration could argue there's a secretary of state whom you said you admire, osama bin laden has been killed. al qaeda has been seriously damaged and downgraded. the arab spring has led to freedoms never before experienced all over the region. why shouldn't barack obama be re-elected on the basis of a foreign policy record? >> first of all, we can argue about the successes of one administration ovr another. let's remember much of the machinery that was put in place to kill osama bin laden, to deal with al qaeda, was put in place after the immediate aftermath of 9/11 and it's a victory for two administrations that we have done so well against al qaeda, but the core of american strength is our economic strength. the core of the american strength is not to borrow money we can't pay back. the core is to speak loudly about what we want to see in the world for free markets and free peoples, to advocate for free trade, so the case here is that this is a ticket, paul ryan and mitt romney, that will bring those strengths because they understand the nature of american exceptionalism. >> what advice do you have for mitt romney as to whether we should take military action against iran either now or after november? >> this is a question that really can't be answered by someone who is running for president. this is a question only the current president of the united states can answer, and we'll only have one president at a time. and so i really believe that candidates need to talk about their principles, talk about the decisions, the basis on which they'll make decisions. talk about the strengths of the united states in terms of our values, in terms of our economy, in terms of a sense of who we are, because no one can know what the circumstances are going to look like on january 31st. you have to have confidence in the integrity and decision making skills of the person in the oval office that night. >> andrea, can i ask a question? it's chris matthews. >> yes, chris. >> could you ask the secretary, her speech was so overpowering and positive. was it kind of a rejoinder to all of the birtherism and the narrowness she's heard in her party? >> your speech, chris matthews is saying, was so powerful and so positive. was that a rejoinder to the narrowness and the birtherism that is certainly being heard in the republican party? >> well, i think on both sides of the aisle, frankly, we're hearing some voices for america to pull back. it would be a shame if america pulls back because we have done so much good in the world. i did want to send a message that we have broad responsibilities to the world, but broad responsibilities here at home, too. to educate our people, to continue to welcome immigrants, and so that was the theme of the speech, and i had a great audience. it was well received. >> you said in your speech, dr. rice, that a child born in the most segregated large city in the south whose parents could not get you a hamburger, taught you you could be anything you want to be, including president of the united states, and of course, secretary of state. you said specifically president of the united states. i know you have said you had no political ambitions, but that was a noticeable aspirational comment. knl i have said it many times, i think my father thought i might be president of the united states. i think he would have been satisfied with secretary of state. i'm a foreign policy person. to have a chance to serve my country as my nation's chief diplomat in peril and consequence is enough. i'll be a happy stanford faculty member and obviously i'll do what i can to help the ticket, but my life is in palo alto. and it's in public service and issues i care about, like education reform. >> do you feel there has been a very troubling question of race and of prejudice in this campaign by the birther movement and those who espouse it? >> the birther movement is an extreme. there are extremes on both sides of the political spectrum. the great majority of people here, i think the great majority of people in the united states of america believe we're one america. we're not an america that is ridden by race, although race is still a factor in our lives. the biggest place race is a factor is minority kids trapped in failing neighborhood schools. >> you said that's the civil rights movement of our era. >> if you're a poor parent and you cannot get your child into a school where they're well educated, we're condemning that child to a life of hopelessness. i do consider that the major civil rights issue of the day and i hope we can address it as a country. >> thank you very much, condoleezza rice, former secretary of state, professor, and now, obviously, political r orator. >> and new member of augusta national. >> i'm really honored and looking forward to playing there. >> thank you, rachel, back to you. >> andrea mitchell with condoleezza rice. there's a lot to chew on in that interview. everybody here in the studio in new york is popping over wanting to comment on that. but first, nbc's ron mott is on the floor with wisconsin governor scott walker. ron, to you on the floor. >> thank you very much. wisconsin governor scott walker with me. you got emotional during the speech. >> i did. >> explain. >> i knew paul well. i grew up down the road from him. what he said was not written on a teleprompter. when he talked about his dad, growing up with his mother, those stories were true to who he was, and particularly talking about the gm plant. a lot of folks went into janesville to go into the gm plant, when he talked about obama promising the plant, and it closed, that's the real deal. it shows it's not just some concept. this is the real deal in places like janesville. >> let me ask you about wisconsin and whether it's truly in play for november. a, do you believe that? b, how much does that have to do with you coming out on top in the recall? >> we thought when we won by a bigger margin than we won in two years ago, you can't win with more than 200,000 more votes with just conservatives and republicans, it takes independent and swing democrats, they came out and told us what they wanted. they wanted leaders who were bold, who were courageous, who make tough decisions. i felt mitt romney showed he was a reformer who could win in wisconsin. a few weeks back when he put paul ryan on the ticket, it took that point and took it much further forward not just because paul is from wisconsin, but because they view his tran transparen transparency. >> i raise this because you did, too. i don't mean to be a fact checker. but on the janesville gm plant, ittant is true it closed during the bush administration? is your criticism the auto bailout wasn't big enough to come back and reopen it? that was not barack obama shutting down the plant. >> it had two rounds of layoffs and closed down a few years ago, but it's a good example of what happens here. the irony is people said the ba bailout was good in places like janesville and kenosha, it wasn't. what they ended up doing was doing a bankruptcy that was a managed bankruptcy, which is essentially what mitt romney called for in the first place. we would have been better off and saved the taxpayers more money had they done it early on and might have saved plants like gm if they had done it early on. >> you think the auto bailout was not effective for wisconsin, for ohio, for other neighboring states there? >> it wasn't for wisconsin, if you looked at guys who works at chrysler in kenosha, they don't i think it's effective because they're not working today. we need more prosperity. he talked prosparity. those are the things independent voters and the base want in wisconsin. >> i hear you on the general issues. it's surprising to hear you run down the american auto industry in a moment it has come back. to see such a bright spot in the economy, you talk about it as if things haven't worked out in the auto industry since the bailout is a surprise, governor. >> it didn't in wisconsin and ultimately did in places like michigan and elsewhere, but it could have come back more effectively and sooner had they taken the advice of mitt romney early on and done a managed bankruptcy instead of spending all those dollars of taxpayer money. we wasted a lot of money. we did that in many other yare yeas of the federal government. it's one of many more indictments of the president. >> was there private sector credit available to save the auto industry? a managed bankruptcy would have been very effective. that's where they headed after several missteps along the way. >> it was not barack obama's economic policies that closed that gm plant. that plant was closed in december of 2008. it's in the washington post right now, governor walker. it had nothing to do with barack obama's economic policy whatsoever. you can't get away from that fact. >> no, what i'm saying is long term, not because of that plant then, but the idea of that coming back, the idea of the auto industry coming back is something that could have been more effectively done if they had more aggressively gone down the path of mitt romney's suggestion early on to go down a managed bankruptcy. >> are you making the case that that plant in janesville would have better employment today if they had followed mitt romney's theory of a managed bankruptcy? that you could guarantee in your economic model that that plant would still be employing and making things today? >> no. >> i don't think you can. that's the key here. >> the only one who made that promise was barack obama who promised the people in janesville that plant would still be open. >> before he was president. >> you're right, and he made that -- >> right or wrong. did it close -- >> if you're not going to let me talk, that's fine. apparently, that's what you do a lot of, but in the end, barack obama was the only one to make a promise. let me finish. let me finish. barack obama was the only one who made that promise. he's the one who made the promise. if he wants to live up to the promise, i'm not making a promise. i'm just pointing out what he said about what would happen. it didn't happen under his presidency. >> it couldn't happen under his presidency. he was inaugurated of january of '09. it closed in december of '08. how could he fulfill a promise when he wasn't in office. >> he said it wouldn't close. if it didn't close, he would have come back. >> retroactively he should have had it opened? >> i'm saying if it was effective in helping the auto industry, it would have been effective if it was his promise, but his promise failed which is why people aren't employed in janesville and kenosha and unemployment has gone up in the last month. 42 consecutive months of unemployment over 8%. sadly 23 million of our fellow americans unemployed or underemployed. paul ryan not only talked about that. he had an optimistic plan on how to move the country forward. we'll hear more details about it tomorrow. it doesn't matter how long you talk over me. those are the facts and the faths are the facts, and we're going to move our country forward. >> thank you for talking to us and being a good sport, and ron, thank you for letting us step all over your interview. >> much more ahead including tom brokaw and david gregory. this is msnbc's live coverage of the republican national convention. stay with us. hey. hey eddie. i brought your stuff. you don't have to do this. yes i do. i want you to keep this. it'd be weird. take care. you too. 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[ female announcer ] wells fargo. together we'll go far. hello, everyone. i'm lynn berry. here's what's happening. republican vice presidential nominee paul ryan took aim at barack obama wednesday night. he told the republican national convengsz the obama convention started with stirring speeches and is now surviving on slogans. >> and new orleans was spared a hit from hurricane isaac, but dozens had to be res cued from the gulf coast. >> now back to the convention. you want to save money on rv insurance? no problem. you want to save money on motorcycle insurance? no problem. you want to find a place to park all these things? fuggedaboud it. this is new york. hey little guy, wake up! aw, come off it mate! geico. saving people money on more than just car insurance. but last year my daughter was checking up on me. i wasn't eating well. she's a dietitian and she suggested i try boost complete nutritional drink to help get the nutrition i was missing. now i drink it every day, and i love the great taste. 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david gregory together in the convention hall. i want to start with tom, who impressed you tonight, surprised you, if you will? >> well, i think what we did was see the outlines of a big part of this debate that will be coming in the fall. you know, very often the great defense is a great offense. and when paul ryan went on the offense in defending not just their version of obama care -- of medicare, blaming medicare losses downstream on the obama administration, and he came back to that repeatedly, my guess is that we'll hear more about that tomorrow night from president romney. parten me, from presidential candidate romney. i was also struck, chris, by the fact that paul ryan talked about not needing a government to direct our lives, but he is a man, as i know that you have referred to this, who did vote for the auto bailout, he did vote for t.a.r.p. he did vote for both wars that were not funded and he voted for part d of medicare and spent his entire life in government, and to rememb tomorrow night, governor romney will talk about bringing a new presidential ethos to the office with his private sector experience and this man spent his entire adult life in government. >> interesting. david? >> well, i have a couple points. i'll pick up on what tom said. there's a kind of idealogical amnesia on the part of paul ryan. he represents this new generation, new strain of the republican party which at its core is about fiscal rectitude and responsibility, yet he didn't stand up to the bush administration on two wars, on major areas of entitlements, on the prescription drug benefit. all of those who thought that they were responsible for profligate spending, there's no mention of that. there's no mention of where they have come from as a party to get to this new place. it's also clear they don't want to really still be associated with president bush and national security. they can put condoleezza rice out front but not talk about iraq or afghanistan. they can even have her make the point, take the shot at the president about leading from behind when they don't really want to reckon with unfinished businesses in afghanistan and iraq. so i think these are the parts that will be picked apart by people who do not like this republican ticket. and maybe even though who are, you know, more middle of the road who will see some deficiencies here. one other point, chris, what i do think was effective is this line of argument of hey, what's going to change? if you think the economy is bad and you're out of work and don't believe in this president's leadership, what's going to change if you give him another four years? i think you'll hear mitt romney build on that. >> i was thinking of the american actress who played wholesome roles and someone saying rather sarcasticly, i knew her before she was a virgin. it seems like the record of the guy -- you point out the backing the bailout, backing the tax cuts, backing wars, backing prescription drugs, backing t.a.r.p. all those record points which are iconic, even, and he comes across as a man who is still a student of ayn rand and objectivity. i would love to hear what you thought of condi rice. i personally was blown away with her grander tonight. >> she has a great personal story to tell. i have know her for a long, long time. what a lot of people don't realize for condie because for many of them, her liez began when she showed up in the oval office as the national security advicar, after that, secretary of state, before there, she was an american studies expert. she had an extraordinary ear going across the russian provinces and picking up the dialect and talking to russians, especially about their military component. no one knew more about it than condi rice did. i was a little surprised she didn't talk in a more macro way about the challenges ahead of us, especially about the soviet union as we used to call it, now russia, because governor romney has identified that as our principle enemy. these are real issues that will come into play, whoever is elected in the next four years, and it seemed to me she could have given a kind of tutorial tonight for two or three paragraphs as least. when she talked to andrea, she said it begins at home with a stronger economy. she gave only one lines to the two wars of which she was one of the principle act tects although later she had reservations in terms of having real feuds with don rumsfeld when he was secretary of defense. she did have a powerful personal story to tell. you'll remember in los angeles, i think it was in los angeles, with colin powell talking about the need for affirmative action in the republican party and endorsing that. they have a strong personal relationship. mrs. powell and condi grew up in the same town, in the same neighborhoods. tonight, she went before the crowd and talked about the importance of immigration. didn't get much of a response to that, but it's a great personal story. >> a rejoinder to some of the more fringy elements of the party. david, you have kids in school. i was thinking about what you thought about her pushing e education, and she made a wonderful statement about religious tolerance. she and huckabee. they were saying basically -- and also it came up in ryan's speech. an attempt to talk, i guess, to people who may have proceduejud against people who may be mormon. it seems like all three of them tried to do that tonight. >> i really think there were speeches, parts of the speeches that were for the hall and parts of the speeches that were for the television audience. because this is as much about mitt romney as it is the republican party, how the party wants to present itself, how it wants to deal with certain real perception problems it has, real liabilities it has. those are two examples are condoleezza rice tries to do that. i'm struck by all of the talk about education reform. this is much more of a bipartisan issue. even though chris christie liked to take it apart and say the democrats are just for unions, the reality is it's a lot of the left that is behind strong education reform. michelle rhee and others who are liberals, who are pushing for this reform, and maybe there's a kernel that the parties can do together at the federal level to keep building on this even while they're tearing each other apart. >> even as we talk, chris -- i was going to say, even to expand on david's point, as we sit here tonight, rahm emanuel, the mayor of chicago, is locked in negotiations with the teachers union. and it's going to go down to the wire. he's being very tough on them. let me just correct a little math, if i can, as well, on msnbc, a mistake i made on nbc, one of the reasons i'm a journalist, because math was not my strongest point. but here's a man who is the same age as the vice presidential candidate, paul rye nl, and i said paul ryan when he was born, ronald reagan was in his second year of his presidency, it turns out i was wrong on that. david's math was as strong as mine, he didn't correct me, but in fact, paul ryan was in the fifth grade when ronald reagan was in his second term. he's very young, but you can see he's also a very practiced politician. >> that's great, a good thing, david, to have people from all ages here tonight. >> yes. >> thank you tom and david. ezra klein has been checking into the voracity of some of what we heard tonight. that's when we return. you're watching nsnbc's live coverage of the republican national convention. one is for a clean, wedomestic energy future that puts us in control. our abundant natural gas is already saving us money, producing cleaner electricity, putting us to work here in america and supporting wind and solar. though all energy development comes with some risk, we're committed to safely and responsibly producing natural gas. it's not a dream. america's natural gas... putting us in control of our energy future, now. it's the only way to get fresh coffee. not in my 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[ club scene music ] [ sigh of relief ] [ male announcer ] choose taste. choose prego. you see, even with all the hidden taxes to pay for the health care takeover, even with the new law and new taxes on nearly a million small businesses, the planners in washington still didn't have enough money. they needed more. they needed hundreds of billions more. so they just took it all away from medicare. $716 billion funneled out of medicare by president obama. >> and also by paul ryan and his proposals. but that doesn't make him nearly as angry or make him pause as meaningfully. the whole wall of max might come down to one issue in november. it may come down to one policy. it may hinge on medicare. part of why the choice for paul ryan for president was seen as a bold choice was his unpopular plan to end the medicare program the country has known and loved for roughly 50 years. democrats took the paul ryan choice as good news when it was announced. tonight, mr. ryan said again he wants the debate on medicare because he's the man who will protect medicare from the dreaded democrats who are really the ones who are trying to kill it, for the actual skinny on this much spun fact, luckily, we have ezra klein. >> hi, rachel. right, so the medicare fact. i kind of can't believe that we're actually now running this campaign on republicans telling democrats they want to cut medicare too much after what republicans have vote edfor in recent years. what the cuts are two major things. one, we pay private insurers about 14% more to cover the exact same group of people, and the other is hospitals agree to take lower reimbursements. when they say they want to repeal the cuts, they're saying instead of moving the money from hospitals who said theyio have it and private insurers that are getting paid more than medicare and putting it for health care for poor people as obama does or for budget reform as the republican budget reform does, they should give it back to the hospitals and private insurers. the broad sort of overarching narrative of that critique to, the thing that strikes me about it is when paul ryan and george w. bush did a major drug benefit expansion in the 2000s, they paid for it by putting it all on the deficit. they didn't pay for a dime or dollar of it. then democrats came in and said we're not going to do that anymore. they said we're going to pay for all of it. the initial house democrat proposal would have been a tax on rich people, but a lot of republicans said that's irresponsible. if you're going to do a health care reform, pay it it out of the heblth care system. so they did that, which they thought was going to get republican support. instead, republicans ran against them for cutting medicare while saying they don't have a plan to do anything about spending, and saying the act was a fiscally irresponsible plan, which goes to show the democrats did not find it easy to win for compromise or trying to compromise with what republicans said they wanted on this particular one. >> ezra, one thing on this. i mean, obviously, when people go from their previous roles into being on a national ticket, they're expected to abandon some optheir previously held positions. so famously, george h.w. bush was apparently pressured into becoming more pro life when he hadprieve c had previously been more pro choice. but paul ryan hasn't abandoned some of his other views onni i e issues like abortion. on this midkaer thing, he's making it sound like it was his mission all along to be the protector of medicare. is he doing a 180 from his previous position by attacking this thing in his budget, or could it be seen as an evolution or it is a total u-turn. >> it's -- a year ago, he had a budget that ended the traditional medicare program. there was nothing but private insurers in there and would have been a $6,400 cost shift to seniors. by far the most radical health care form anyone has put forward in memory. but it was a year ago, not when he was in fifth grade or 20 years ago. it's hard to get awa from that and say in our hearts, we would ever end the guarantee of medicare. it ended medicare and it was a year ago. >> you only have to go back about five minutes before that in his political record to when he was proposed a wholesale privatization of social security. they don't want to run on that now, but that's in his very, very recent past. thank you very much. you bring much light to what is otherwise a very heated discussion. we'll be back in a moment with more on paul ryan's speech tonight. you're watching msnbc's live coverage of the republican national convention. i love cash back. with the bankamericard cash rewards credit card, we earn more cash back for the things we buy most. 1% cash back everywhere, every time. 2% on groceries. 3% on gas. automatically. no hoops to jump through. no annual fee. that's 1% back on... wow! 2% on my homemade lasagna. 3% back on [ friends ] road trip!!!!!!!!!!!! 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[ voice of dennis ] poodles are one of the world's smartest breeds. ♪ bundle and save with an allstate agent. are you in good hands? there's natural gas under my town. it's a game changer. ♪ it means cleaner, cheaper american-made energy. but we've got to be careful how we get it. design the wells to be safe. thousands of jobs. use the most advanced technology to protect our water. billions in the economy. at chevron, if we can't do it right, we won't do it at all. we've got to think long term. we've got to think long term. ♪ welcome back to msnbc's coverage of the republican national convention. i'm rachel maddow in new york city. my friend chris matthews is in tampa. what do you think is the most important thing that happened tonight? >> i was wowed by condoleeza rice's speech. i heard in her vice and in the music in the words, the old eisenhower republican party. international, yes, but very concerned about civil rights, very positive about all americans joining together. i thought it was a great american speech. and as a speechwriter, i heavily applaud not just the words but as i say, the music behind that speech tonight by condoleezza rice. >> receiv rand al sharpton, wha did you think the most important thing was. >> i think some speeches were delivered better. they were totally removed from facts. i think ryan was clearly kotsaying things that factually are inaccurate. he talked about things he had walked out of, the debt commission, his own participation in the deficit. he misspoke as governor walker did about when the plant closed. i think condoleezza rice was good. i would like to see her talk about civil rights today like voting right in alabama where th she comes from. i think the reality doesn't bear some of the poetry of tonight, but at least the poetry was better than ralph kramden was last night. >> steve, i know you liked paul ryan's speech and condoleeza rice's speech. what do you think politically had the most impact? >> i think paul ryan did a great speech that i think connected to the middle class in this country that's hurting economically. very effective politically. the other people who had a big night tonight, another republican star is zoborn, suzaa martinez. republicans have to get over 30% of the his ppanic vote in the country. major league debut. >> quick review. most important thing. >> i thought the omission -- paul ryan could have told the story of where we went wrong as a party. all republicans say we were led astray, we became partisans of big government ourselves. i would have loved to have heard that story told. >> we have about 20 seconds. >> i think a star is born for the conservative right tonight. mission accomplished. the romney camp has to be very happy with the performance of paul ryan tonight. he represents a generation, i thought he did a very good job tonight of comparing music. saying -- there's a lot of poem who relate to zz top, the 40-something crowd, and that's who they need to connect to. he wasn't trying to win everybody. he was trying to connect to the people who hadn't made a decision yet. >> i say the diamond in the rough tonight was susannah martinez. i think her speech was stunning, actually, stunning. steve schmidt, al sharpton, ed schultz, chris hayes. we'll be back tomorrow morning beginning at 7:00 eastern, but our coverage continues next for example tampa with chris matthews. 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[ villagers gasping ] reverend? ♪ can i have some? ♪ when governor romney asked me to join the ticket i said let's get this done. and that's exactly what we are going to do. i'm down here in tampa i'm chris matthews of course down in tampa where all the action is going on. this is the part of town that the delegates come to after the action. we see them troop in here. this is paul ryan's party tonight. mitt romney is the main event tomorrow night but ryan showed he is the heart and soul of the party. tonight his speech was strangely on the attack but did it hold the optimistic message of his hero, ronald reagan. >> they've run out of ideas. their moment came and went. fear and division is all they've got left. with all their attack ads, the president is just throwing away money. and he's pretty experienced at that. >> the focus of ryan's speech was the president's failed leadership, as he said but provided few details about what a romney/ryan leadership would offer the country. >> it started out with stirring speeches, greek columns, the thrill of something new. now all that is left is a presidency adrift surviving on slogans that already seem tired. grasping at a moment that is already past, like a ship trying to sail on yesterday's wind. >> there is a heavy helping of deceptive language in the speech from medicare cuts and a closing of a gm plant. the plant shut down under george w. bush. he said the ticket would take responsibility. well, really? >> we will not duck the tough issues. we will lead. we will not spend the next four years blaming others we will take responsibility. we will not try to replace our founding principles. we will reapply our founding principles. >> but not for the closing of that plant in his hometown, apparently. the other big speech was from former secretary of state condoleeza rice. she talked about unifying america, not dividing it. we have a lot to get to tonight. but let's start with the key question for all what was paul ryan's message tonight? lawrence o'donnell, michael steele, and howard fineman, around the table, gentlemen, don't rush. say what you thought happened tonight. but let's start with ryan. >> ryan is a certifiable star. i don't care about political purposes or swing-voter purposes. every bit of the fact checking on his speech is utterly meaningless for the people who are going to decide this election. that 7% of the electorate they don't do fact checking they go with the gut. the medicare campaign he took on as straight ahead as you could expect him to. >> my mother and my grandmother, and you can talk about all the details you want. but his grandmother on alzheimer's relying and living on medicare and being grateful for it. that's not what we have heard from other republicans on it. he's going with a gut case on medicare and the phrasing they've chosen is politically brilliant given the position they are in. he is saying we are the preserve and protect medicare party and they are the raid medicare party. raid medicare to pay -- >> i think he was jumping biden out of his own game. >> democrats tonight at this hour after ryan have more reason to be nervous than they have had all year. joe biden now has a very real fight on his hands. >> the battle of the grandmothers. let's hear what he had to say on the question of medicare. >> and the biggest, coldest power play of all in obamacare came at the expense of the elderly. you see, even with all the hidden taxes to pay for the health care takeover. even with the new law and new taxes on nearly a million small businesses, the planners in washington didn't have enough money. they needed more. they needed hundreds of billions more. so they just took it all away from medicare. $716 billion funneled out of medicare by president obama. an obligation we have to our parents and grandparents is being sacrificed to pay for an entitlement we didn't ask for. >> moral indignation. >> the problem is that the answer to that is complicated. what he said is simple. the truthful full answer is complicated. simple tends to win with swing voters. >> what ryan did which i thought was special and important was to reach back to our efforts in 2010 when we talked about the senior health care bill of rights where we would protect seniors against the then $500 billion in cuts to medicare by the administration brought it forward and personalized it. he brought it to the table and said this cut is represented in the face of my grandmother. it's represented in the face of my mother. and that is a hard argument for joe biden and barack obama to take to the american people. because then it gets complicated. i love complication at this point. you have to explain the $716 billion in cuts and in the context of someone's grandmother and mother and guess what the next step is? we look to the future. we look at the 18-years-old and 20-years-old and gen-xors. he says i have a better plan and solution. follow us. we're going to give you choices that the government will not give you, that the government, in fact, wants to take from you. powerful night. >> they are get in trouble when they start walking down the road of detail. they're going to get in serious trouble. >> let me tell you, ryan -- do you think ryan could win the medicare argument against democrats who created medicare against republican opposition? >> i want to talk about something else. >> go ahead, you're free. >> which is this was a speech in which paul ryan used the words "old," "tired," "yesterday," "the past" repeatedly when talking about the obama administration. this is a way to get leverage on the obama legacy to paint barack obama himself as the old story as the old regime. >> last year's win. >> 42-year-old guy. first gen-xer on a national ticket saying that the government is not the answer. americans are suspicious of government especially younger people suspicious of government as they rely on government. i fknow about the facts. he is wrong about the 716 and voted no on the simpleson bowles commission. but that appeal he made tonight was one of the most effective political speeches i have seen in a convention and i've been to a lot of them. >> especially from a guy in the corner from a guy who is guilty as the medicare cutter. >> and mitt romney was barely mentioned, really. >> that's a pattern. >> it's a pattern. >> and if i'm barack obama i'm sitting there saying i don't like taking on this guy. >> the informed voters know who they are voting for. the people who are listening to simple messages and be vulnerable to 30-second tv ads are who this is directed to. >> but here is his message to college students. >> college graduates should not have to live out their 20s in their childhood bedrooms staring up at fading obama posters and wondering when they can move out and get going with life. everyone who feels stuck in the obama economy is right to focus on the here and now. and i hope you understand this too. if you're feeling left out or passed by, you have not failed. your leaders have failed you. >> you know, the sarcasm in that was so rich. the kid in his room he grew up in and the obama hope poster and he is stuck like in prison but didn't that take a shot at the kid and his hope. i wonder who he won with this argument. >> behind every sentence there is a policy they are ignoring. he said your leaders have failed you. these leaders are not willing to help anyone who is unemployed, left out passed by. that is the unemployed. they want to cut those benefits. they want to keep them in the economy with unemployment benefits. but it's an effective line. there is deception in every line -- >> he spoke in plain language about plain lives and plain places. and he did it effectively. i think he's a tremendously skilled politician who knows how to seem to be conceding a little bit to the other side. he says an act of gentlemanly concession. and the president was handed a difficult situation. >> and he clobbers him for 20 minutes. >> let's get away from nuance. here's ryan blaming president obama for a gm plant in his hometown of janesville that closed. but the plant closed under president bush. he must have known that when he said these words tonight. let's take a look. >> my home state voted for president obama. when he talked about change, many people liked the sound of it, especially in janesville where we were able to lose a major factory. a lot of guys i went to high school with worked at this gm plant. right there at that plant, candidate obama said if our government is there to support you this plant be here for another 100 years. that's what he said in 2008. well, as it turned out, that plant didn't last another year. it is locked up and empty to this day. and that's how it is in so many towns. where the recovery that was promised is nowhere in sight. >> that sad countenance looks unhappy because obama let him down in december of 2008 when the plant closed. what ability did the president have to prevent that plant from closing? >> probably none. >> was that not an openly deceptive claim? it's something that is checkable and known to be untrue by the candidate. >> those facts i know and you're right, the obama campaign's priority is to turn that guy and his baby blues into a lying face. >> by the time we get off the air. >> they better do it fast. if they let that guy escape on that they will do themselves a great disservice. he is a shrewd and tough politician. >> i don't know for a fact. i'm taking your word at this point. i haven't researched it. but having it out there, the obama team and all the others are going to go back and try to disprove it and show it is a lie. it goes back to what lawrence was saying before. it's out there and the way he said it -- i'm just telling you -- >> he's a liar. they have to turn him into one really fast. >> you need to do that and set that up. >> let's go to something else that wasn't a lie because it was politics but attacking the president for not backing simpson bowles when he walked away from it and people like my daughter work for that commission, they're heroes for this guy and then it was durbin and coburn. but here is the budgeteer and he walked away from the budget deal. >> watch his phrasing. >> he didn't say that. >> his phrasing about the plant gets him past any perjury charge. it's very carefully lawyerly written stuff and the stuff he says about simpson bowles is lawyerly written. if the obama campaign has to get into a fight about when the plant closed or what was it about simpson bowles about what you didn't like it will be hard to fight him. the fight they have to win is the medicare fight. that's the fight. >> he is tapping in to gen-x resentment and skepticism about government. that's what he is doing there. >> i wonder whether a goody two shoes pays a higher price when he is caught lying. >> his answer will be i would not go for a tax revenue increase. >> it's a long night and the big newspapers and networks of quality are working to find the truth. lawrence o'donnell defending the unscrupulous tonight, the rhetoric of politics which sometimes works unfairly. michael steele, good defense which is no defense, which is good. >> no defense on the facts, no. >> we'll be back at the republican national committee. i had hopes once of addressing you under different situation. but our fellow americans had another plan four years ago and i accept their decision. our president is not being true to our values. let's elect our next commander-in-chief and the next leader of the free world, my friend, governor mitt romney. >> welcome back here at channel site which is a brisk walk from the convention hall. and the delegates walk past here on the way to the bars and restaurants. george w. bush may not have been on tap tonight. but the message came through loud and clear tonight. let's listen. >> we can't afford to give governments in russia and china a veto over how we defend our interest and the progress of our values in the world. sadly for the lonely voices syria and iran and those in the world who feel forgotten in their darkness and sadly for us as well our president is not being true to our values. my friends, across the world people are seizing control of their own destinies. they are liberating themselves from oppressive rulers and want america's support. america must be on the right side of history. >> joining me is eugene robinson and david koren. i like mccain for his service to our country but he listed six islamic countries we should be at war with now. we got to go in syria and go against iran and get in war with libya and continue the war in afghanistan and iraq. it went on and on. >> great idea. it's unrealistic. he's unburdened by the responsibility of the presidency and that's a good thing. it's a good thing he doesn't get to go to war willy-nilly left and right the way he has consistently advocated. >> he used to be a man who cared deeply about service people who are stuck in a war that was started by great popularity. he was a victim of that in vietnam. but he attacks china. we have to stop using economic sanctions which rely on countries like china and russia and go in there militarily. >> it is empty hawkishness. there is no implication to act on it and deal with the consequences. it's just john mccain flailing. i have to say this. i think now he may have set a guinness record for giving convention speeches in favor of nominees he detests. he did it with george w. bush in 2000 and now does it for romney. >> you say this with tremendous knowledge of the guy. >> i almost feel sorry for him. >> i agree. remember why he picked sarah palin because he couldn't stand romney. let's look at -- my heart soars. i get in trouble for saying how thrilled i am by speeches. but i felt wonder in our country. but what a speech. it was grand. here is secretary of state condoleeza rice coming back into political life to share her personal story. toward the end of her speech he was talking about what it is like to grow up in the segregated south. >> and on a personal note, a little girl grows up in birmingham, the segregated city of the south, where her parents can't take her to a movie theater or to a restaurant but they have her absolutely convinced even if she can't have a hamburger at the wool worth's counter but she can be president of the united states if she wants to and she becomes secretary of state. >> and she talks about what draws people from all over the world to the united states to work at high-tech companies. >> people have come here from all over because they have believed our creed of opportunity and limitless horizons. they have come here from the world's most impoverished nations and have come here as engineers and scientists to fuel the knowledge-based revolution in the silicon valley of california and in the research triangle of north carolina along rout 28 of massachusetts in austin texas and across this great land. >> i was so impressed that she got people who disagree with what she is saying to cheer so loud. in this group the birthers who suspect barack obama because of his name who constantly chuckle at jokes about his heritage. and here is an african-american saying three cheers for people coming here to want to live here. >> immigration. she went there. it was a terrific speech and terrifically delivered. she has got so much better about that. she didn't talk about iraq or the war of choice that she and others led us into under false pretenses of wmd that turned out to be a crock. and number two her personal experience of jim crow segregation, we both went through that. we were born in the same year to middle class families in the deep south. we had a lot of similar experiences. she was friends with one of the girls killed in the church bombing in birmingham. they were -- they played at each other's house. and we come out with somewhat different feelings and electi s recollections of that era. mine is america being dragged kicking and screaming out of jim crow to a much better place where we are now. it wasn't easy. it didn't just happen. a lot of people fought and died for that to happen. >> what was the name of the church? sixth street? >> 19th street baptist church. >> she is giving cover to a party that is using racist tainted attacks. >> she is joining against it. >> but she is giving them cover. we are not so bad. we clap for condoleeza rice. and i can't get past the fact that when she reached the pinnacle of power after the greatness of america, she made false statements that led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people any rack. >> you think she made personally false statements? >> oh, yeah. she was in the middle of that. she is as responsible. >> i know the team did. >> and yet she gets off more easily because people like her manner and she has this other story to tell. >> they lied to cover up their lies. scooter libby paid for that. let me ask you about tonight, then. the whole question of the way they talked about rights. now of course we all love the founding fathers whatever their limitations were in terms of civil rights and accepting slavery in the constitution. but this crowd they were -- i don't mean racist but they addressed them as if they were white people and there was no sense that there was a civil rights fight. they acted like that didn't happen. >> and beyond in practice. >> as melissa harris talked the other night, she said god gave us the rights but it took the fight of your lives to get them in law. >> exactly. >> and in the '60s. >> the process of opening america and giving to all americans the rights that are enshrined in the declaration and the constitution has been a long bitter struggle and cost hundreds of lives including the civil war. it was a battle and it's a struggle that is ongoing. it's a process, not a destination. >> that's why i like diversity in the office place. is it the we. i'm careful to pay attention. who is the we we are talking about? >> all country is -- >> condoleeza talked about the whole country tonight. and i love that part. >> as i began it was a terrific speech. i just quibble with a couple of things. >> thank you gene robinson. it's a three-man judgeship. you're out. there were reminders of george w.'s administration and his policies tonight. coverage cots right here on msnbc. when governor romney asked me to join the ticket i said let's get this done and that's exactly what we are going to do. to those who question how once rivals can be now united, it's quite simple, we have barack obama to thank. [ applause ] >> my fellow broadcaster, mike huckabee. we have a real good republican right here. what did you like at the convention tonight? you watched it here i think. >> i did. i thought paul ryan was fantastic. he talked about the economy and how to get the economy back on track and how old ideas that once were new are no longer working. >> did you know that that plant closing in his hometown closed before obama became president. >> i did not know that. >> now you do. where do you get a hat like that? >> i bought it at the tampa airport. i thought condoleeza rice did a great job. >> how many liked her? how many are democrats? >> no party affiliation. what did you think? >> no party affiliation. >> how do you vote? >> i voted for both sides. >> did you vote for reagan? did you vote for clinton? >> no. >> did you vote for gore? >> yes. >> i'm a proud registered democrat and i work hard for our president in tampa. walking around talking to people and it amazing me what drives them to make their decision. and how undecided people lawrence o'donnell hit the nail on the head these 30 seconds bullets and statements that are made in these conventions which are a lot of them very much lies and can be traced back like you said in fact checking. >> we have to argue over the facts and see if they are true. >> i registered to vote when i was 18 in 1997 and i voted for president obama in 2008. and i'm going to vote for him again. >> thank you for waiting in line here. sir? >> i'm an independent. >> how long you going to stay independent? >> i wanted to vote for mccain but i voted for obama. i was born in s at an early ages destined for [ male announcer ] it seems like every company has a facebook page these days. but where's the relationship status? well, esurance is now in a relationship...with allstate. and it looks pretty serious. esurance. click or call. mitt romney has been loyal to his lovely wife who knocked it out of the park last night in this arena. he's been loyal to his sons, to his country, to his employees, and to his church. i'm sure now that the press is going to tell you, he isn't perfect. but my friends, for the past four years we tried the one that the press thought was perfect and that hasn't worked out all that well for us. >> welcome back. that's mike huckabee the former governor of arkansas quoted in "game change" as saying that mitt romney had no soul. he is out there to say he would stand behind romney and ryan. let's watch him again here now. >> i want to clear the air about something that has been said. people wonder whether guys like me, an evangelical would only support a fellow evangelical. of the fours people on the two tickets, the only self professed eve gel evangelical and he believes that life is expendable in the womb and beyond the womb and he tells people of faith they have to bow their knees to the god of government and have to comply with what he calls health care. the attack on my catholic brothers and sisters is an attack on me. the democrats have brought back that old dance, the limbo. to see how low they can go in attempting to limit our ability to practice our faith. but this isn't a battle about contraceptives and catholics but about conscious and the creator. let me say to you tonight, i care far less as to where mitt romney takes his family to church than i do about where he takes this country. >> for more on huckabee's speech tonight and the appeal to evangelicals let's bring joan walsh and joi reed. what did you make of that? what did you think of that appeal? >> i grew up methodist like george w. bush. but i thought it was odd. we know what mike huckabee's principles are. he wants the principles applied to government and to everyone. i was disappointed in huckabee. he didn't are bring the fire i expected. he has a nationally syndicated radio show. >> you think he wants romney to win or planning to try again next time? >> not everyone is in love with the guy. >> not a single one of them. >> tonight it seemed like some of the speakers like last night, waited for the last couple paragraphs of their speeches to pay for their dinner and mention the guy that put them up there. >> it was awful for mitt romney. but i have to say i was shocked by mike huckabee's speech. last week he was railing against the party and defending todd akin and now he is a good soldier and coming out and saying all these nice things about romney and what he was saying about barack obama not protecting life outside the womb what was that talking about? and that nasty crack about debby washerman schultz? it was sexist and soulless. >> explain the sexist part. >> making a joke about her voice. >> what is so funny about is it back in '08 a lot of democrats were afraid of huckabee. he has that evangelical believes but he is nice. he puts a nice face on it. that wasn't the case tonight. he lost the huckabee brand and he didn't move anyone. >> where are you from originally? >> i was born in brooklyn but grew up in denver, colorado. >> that doesn't work for me, the huckabee thing. it's too sugary. a little bit that -- >> we had salon reporters four years ago who went full huckabee. he was charming and played the guitar. but tonight there was none of that guy. it was the nasty guy and he left them cold in the hall too. >> let's talk about the people not speaking tonight. i saw michele bachmann in the crowd last night. that's it. she was running for president not long ago. sarah palin, who i argue was one of the great political stars of our time who can walk on the stage and wow us. this is like sudden death in the party now. >> i was struck by john mccain. john mccain had to hope for this guy who came in eight on "american idol" people were walking around and it was so loud with people making small talk while john mccain who was the nominee of the party four years ago, it was insulting and it was odd his placement. >> what is going on with sarah palin and fox? >> i don't know. >> a palin facebook posting, i'm sorry fox cancelled my interviews tonight. i wanted to take the opportunity to highlight senator john mccain's positive contributions to america and reflect on what the media put him through four years ago. but he has gone through much more than the liberal media can do to him in their efforts to harm this patriot. >> but that was a warmongering speech. >> fox had to cancel because of the condensed schedule. let's talk about john mccain. >> such disrespect to the president that leading from behind crack. >> were we supposed to lead the invasion of libya and syria and continue our wars in afghanistan and iraq and confront the chinese and go to war with iran without the help of economic sanctions. >> the fact it was buried. they tried to hide their past but it's the foreign policy team behind mitt romney are the same guys who backed the wars. the bush guys are behind romney. we may have buried mccain in the weeds tonight. but his ideas those are coming into the white house with mitt romney if he wins. >> let me give you a scary thought, joy and joan. if romney has no foreign policy of his own and is an empty shell, guess who wants to march into that shell. john bolden and dan who are smart and after tack lot and have a clear vision. >> and close to romney. it's bush/cheney 2. i think that's is what is around him. >> and i saw bolton yesterday at the convention center. i saw the mustache. >> thank you joy reid who has spotted john bolton here. and joan walsh. well thought out both of you fellas -- gals we say these days. two actors join me next to talk about the mystery man who may make an appearance tomorrow night at the convention. we'll be right back. direct rates side by side to find you a great deal, even if it's not with us. [ ding ] oh, that's helpful! well, our company does that, too. actually, we invented that. it's like a sauna in here. helping you save, even if it's not with us -- now, that's progressive! call or click today. no mas pantalones! we're back. the federal budget received plenty of attention in this convention. two actors who are members of the creative coalition are with me. they are advocating for something on the republican chopping block, federal funding for the arts. with me is tim daley and evan handler. romney is out for dumping of federal funding of pbs. your thoughts? >> you know, what we're interested in are the same things as the republican party and democratic party which is to make a strong work force after their schooling. early education in the arts and music keep people in school longer and score higher on the s.a.t.s and have more college attendance. it's one thing to create assembly line workers and another thing to look at apple computer innovations and the mars rover. these are kids who learned mechanical design. people don't come out of the womb designing mars rovers. they need to stay in school so they are not burdens on society. >> these are things that the programs and dance and all that stuff. >> condoleeza rice said that the k through 12 education crisis threatens the fabric of our society. we want to teach kids arts. they are three times more likely to graduate from high school. we are approaching a one-third high school dropout rate. in a couple of generations that is 100 million undereducated people. that is people asking for welfare and in the criminal justice system. a great way to prevent that is to teach them arts. >> what about the people who come along and say we have to cut something so let's cut the soft stuff. >> the national endowment for the arts is a minuscule part of the federal government. but every dollar spent reaps them $7 in taxes. that's a 7-1 return. that is a good business. if you don't want those returns then you are doing something not smart. >> why do people on the left support funding for the arts and people on the right the last thing they want to do is help museums or -- art museums or any kind of natural museum, zoos, anything like that except for newt gingrich. >> i don't find that to be totally true. we have run across allies and people doing good things? the arts. >> give me some names. >> the governor of iowa just made -- part of their core curriculum. utah and the government of utah does a great job in the arts there. those are two supporters. mike huckabee is a supporters. >> to answer in a negative way i think it's an easy talking point for the kind of cultural war that goes on. i think it's easy to rally working people who feel hay are ov -- they are overtaxed like at these people who want to be singers and dancers but we are talking about the facts that tim quoted. >> when you talk about the arts you can see someone's thought bubble. they are thinking of someone on "people" magazine or someone at carnegie hall. but we are talking about the people in little towns who would not have exposure to the arts. >> you know about the balmer curve that the principle of the arts, the museums and carnegie hall there is no money in it they have to be u.s. is diezed. these are not commercial enterprises. >> they flood dollars to the restaurants and th taxi stands and the shops that service the visitors and the hotels. these are incredible drivers of the economy. entertainment is the number two export of the united states of america. am i right? >> absolutely. >> when fortune magazine asked mitt romney where he he make budget cuts? >> first he said obamacare but subsidy programs, amtrak. i don't know what would happen then. pbs, the subsidy there, the subsidy for the national endowment of the arts and humanities. they have to stand on their own rather than receive money from other countries. i think that is based on economic ignorance. these are not the kinds of things that make profits. >> you cut amtrak. if you are creating jobs how are you going to get to work? as you said, better than i could. >> are we going the hear from clint eastwood tomorrow night? >> i don't know. you tell us. >> any other big celebs? i'm trying to think of republicans. there's tom sellic, right? and james kahn. >> bruce willis. john voight. >> he is way over. not many there on the right. thank you tim daly and evan handler. i will be back. it's all for me right now. the coverage of the republican national convention is over tonight. i'll be back tomorrow at 5:00 and 7:00 eastern for our full coverage for the final night of the convention and the speech by the candidate himself tomorrow night, mitt romney tomorrow night. and good night for us from tampa. we know a place where tossing and turning have given way to sleeping. where sleepless nights yield to restful sleep. and lunesta can help you get there, like it has for so many people before. when taking lunesta, don't drive or operate machinery until you feel fully awake. walking, eating, driving, or engaging in other activities while asleep, without remembering it the next day, have been reported. abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation, hallucinations or confusion. in depressed patients, worsening of depression, including risk of suicide, may occur. alcohol may increase these risks. allergic reactions, such as tongue or throat swelling, occur rarely and may be fatal. side effects may include unpleasant taste, headache, dizziness and morning drowsiness. ask your doctor if lunesta is right for you. then find out how to get lunesta for as low as $15 at lunesta.com. there's a land of restful sleep. we can help you go there on the wings of lunesta. it. you're watching msnbc continuing coverage of the republican national convention, paul ryan being joined by his wife, their three children and his mother could not have been better received. there was one interruption by protesters, at that moment, the interruption by the protesters, the loudest reception he had in his speech were people trying to yell usa, but from there it was all down hill. he had the entire crowd on their feet, absolutely a ton of energy. chris matthews joins us from tampa. chris, what is your first reaction? >> president, for not supporting the simpson-bowles compromise, this is a guy who walked away from simpson-bowles. i don't know how he can criticize the president for not doing what he didn't do. this is the whole heart of his attack on the president was that, failure to accept leadership. and he has failed to do that. i thought it was a very negative, nasty speech that didn't have anywhere near the elevation of condoleeza rice's speech, it was american, thrilling, talked about the route to america, the brilliant people who come to this country to work and live. it talked about it is not where you come from, where you're going. it was a complete smackdown to all the attacks. i thought condoleeza rice was spectacular tonight. this was a canned advertisement. >> steve schmidt, and reacting to what you both saw, obviously condoleeza rice's speech was received very, very well in the house, it was not all about mitt romney, the only compliments were in generic terms, nothing specific. what do you think about the comparative speech speeches? >> i thought they were great speeches, i thought this was a wonderful speech, written by two of the great speech writers in the republican party, in both parties. i think it was brilliantly delivered. i think mitt romney is the head of the conservative party, i think mitt romney is going to be for a long time to go, no matter what the outcome is in november. i thought as a matter of political performance, i thought it was tremendous. i think that the struggles that he has obviously had to deal with in his life. the death of his father at a young age. the story he told about his mom, i think has the ability to resonate with the suburban women, who are the key swing demographics. just a word about condoleeza rice, who i thought had a great speech. she lives in the most broken state, the biggest state, california, where the republican party has collapsed. i guarantee you tonight, really for the first time we heard condoleeza rice talking about domestic issues. and there are stars lining up in the delegation, looking at somebody who could potentially restore the republican party to office in california. it will be interesting to watch in the weeks, the calls for her to run for governor. >> i hear you, the parts of her speech that were brilliant was when she was not talking about domestic policy. but hearing her make that turn was memorable, given the attention that speech will get. i want to bring in lawrence o'donnell, who was in the hall, and able to see the speeches. give us your assessment. >> rachel, i agree with steve, the speech, especially here in the hall was truly an exciting speech for this hall, as soon as he stepped on the stage, it was transformed. toward the end of his speech, he said bravely, we will not duck the tough issues. he said that after a speech that ducked the tough issues all the way through. it was biographical, but didn't get into the issues of what paul ryan called raiding medicaid by president obama. they are now taking on the medicare campaign as we will save it and preserve it, which got cheers. and president obama has raided it. but other than that, it was a substance-free speech, all the way through. but his delivery here was very effective. it shows how much promise he has as a campaigner. and i also think when you juxtapose it to chris christie's speech last night, there is just no comparison between the two. >> i agree, it sounded like stump speeches, but this theme of nostalgia, that plays out. he talked about back when i was waiting tables or i was in college, we had this different type of america than we have now. and the question is, what exactly has changed? he talks about capping federal outlays at 20%, every year he was in college it was above 20%, there was not an expansion from federal government, when he was waiting tables, when federal outlays were 22 or 23% of gdp, and yet under barack obama, that is the thing they want the tell. >> the problem is that when you go behind, i think you heard three impressive speeches that were much better than last night. i think that in fairness to ryan, he was better than i thought he was, i think that condoleeza rice was all that chris said. the problem is that none of them told the truth. the fact is that ryan very eloquently misled people. he walked out of the debt commission. he lied about the plant in his hometown. it was closed at the end of 2008 when bush was president, not under obama. so i mean, if you want to have an eloquent person that does not tell the truth, this was a great performance. if you're going to match facts with the performance, they have a big problem. condoleeza rice stands on a platform where they preached about states rights and talked about how she grew up in segregation, well, if the state writers had won, ms. rice, you still would not get a hamburger. are we talking about education as a civil right? it is, then why are y'all cutting the education budget? i mean it is great poetry for those who want to be lured into some fantasy island. but the reality is what they advocate and what they presented tonight is two worlds apart. >> he is the best young conservative present we've seen in a long time. he is the young conservative that the party has been looking for. he has good communication skills. he came out tonight, he looked nervous, he got into the feel of the crowd, the momentum, i mean, he laid it on them. he got after the medicare, and he forget to mention that he requested stimulus funds. he also forget to mention that his mother took a bus to get to a state school to get back into the economy. he is pushing the lie about the $716 billion. he is perpetuating the lie -- here he is, passing himself off as the guy in the middle of the country, in homespun janejanesv. what do the people think there, he will go out there on the platform and tell the red meat conservatives exactly what they want to hear. here is their new hero. >> the base communication in picking paul ryan was that they could neutralize the fact that the only thing he is known for nationally is being the medicare kill guy. he is young, energetic, he can spin the story better than anybody else. he is a great performer. a political lifer, with great connections, he is loved by the press. we have to deal with the kill medicare, and here is the problem. he gets up there and he and mitt romney were fine-tuning this. they had a few rough first days but now what they're doing. this would work so much better if they were the second convention than the first, he is criticizing the president for medicare policies that are also in his own proposal for medicare. the novel thing that paul ryan proposed is to privatize it. so you don't get medicare, you get a coupon, you buy a voucher and get private insurance. that is not that hard to explain. that is what the democrats get to explain, if you can explain it in 20 seconds you can do it for three days next year in north carolina. and this medicare thing because they have been pushing it so hard it is not over on the democrat's terms. i think they will beat paul ryan on the medicare, because i don't think they came up with an actual fact-based rejoineder to their base, with paul ryan, chris? >> rachel, the thing i look for in these speeches is who is the person on the podium up there at the lectern talking? and i don't want to get too sectarian about this, but it is clear that paul ryan was talking to people who think about rights as something that were produced by thomas jefferson, ignoring the people for whom the rights only came in the '60s, no reference to the fact that a good portion of the country was denied those rights. especially the most important right to vote, up until 1965. and it was given to them from a lot of effort and fighting between the two parties. and it became a bipartisan effort, for some reason they never mention those things. because they're talking to people, let's be honest about this, who didn't benefit at all from the civil rights. that is very important to point out. also when they cut medicaid and they do it as if it doesn't really matter, it is really for poor people. so cutting medicaid and -- for poor, which are in fact the losers in the paul ryan budget plan, they don't even talk about those people. because they're not the people they're trying to get to vote for them. so it is very interesting -- that is why i love condoleeza rice's speech, she spoke to people of color, people in high tech industries, the kind of people we would like to draw to this country. she talked about people not being judged where they came from or where they're headed. people like barack obama, she talked about them. i remember ed rollins 20 years ago saying the biggest mistake the people in california did was not appointing her, she would have been on course to be president all of those years ago. she is a first class american who thinks big and talks to the whole country. and i don't think that ryan spoke to the whole country tonight. in fact, a lot of these speakers have not. and it is obvious if you listen to their words. >> but chris, don't we need from paul ryan, in part, don't we need from him the attack dog stuff? the fact he is going against mitt romney -- instead of just having to go after obama -- >> rachel, you're right, historically, the vp plays the attack dog. it started with dick nixon, in years past, but i think -- a lot of the recent vps,al gore refuse to play that part. it is not automatic you attack the other party, you ought to give hope, spirit and a big sense of unifying america. i don't think paul ryan tried to unify america today. i think he tried to use the divisions in america, economically, to advance the causes of the upper middle class who don't want to be taxed. and basically ignore the bottom half of this country, and i don't think it is uniting this country. >> we'll go to andrea mitchell, who is on the convention floor with somebody we have been talking about. she is on the floor with condoleeza rice. >> thank you so much. condoleeza rice, let's talk about the role of national security. this is the first time we have heard about national security. yet america has two wars, the two longest wars, and frankly it is the wars that were ordered by a republican president under your watch. >> well, they were wars, first of all against afghanistan because we were attacked on 911, and because saddam had been a threat in the middle east. and yes, the war is over, the iraqis are struggling. but they, at least are rid of saddam, we need to try to help them. so what we talked about here today is the role of america and the world. there are many other elements that are breaking, syria, the situation with iran. but american strength begins at home. and that is really the message that i wanted to send. >> the obama administration could argue that there is a secretary of state whom you have said you admire. osama bin laden has been kied. al qaeda has been seriously damaged, and downgraded. the arab spring has led to freedoms never before experienced all over the region, why -- should not barack obama be re-elected on the basis of a foreign policy matter? >> well, first of all we can argue about the successes of one administration or the other. let's remember the machinery that was put in place to kill osama bin laden was put in place immediately after 911. and it is really a victory for two administrations that we have done so well against al qaeda. but the core of our strength is the american economic strength, the core of our strength is not to borrow money we can't pay back. the core of our american strength is to speak loudly about away we want to see in the world for free markets and free peoples, to advocate for free trade. and so the case here is that this is a ticket, paul ryan, and mitt romney, that will bring those strengths, because they understand the nature of american exceptionalism. >> what advice do you have for mitt romney as to whether we should take military action against iran, either now or after november? >> well, this is a question that really can't be answered by somebody who is running for president. this is a question that only the current president of the united states can answer, and we will only have one president at a time. and so i really believe that candidates need to talk about their principles, talk about the decisions, the basis on which they will make decisions. talk about the strengths of the united states, in terms of our values, in terms of our economy. in terms of a sense of who we are. because nobody can really know what the circumstances are going to look like on january 21st. you just have to have confidence in the integrity and the decision-making skills of the person in the oval office on that day. >> doctor in your speech -- >> andrea, can i ask you a question? could you ask the secretary, the speech was so over-poweringly positive, but was it a row joineder to the birther and the narrowism she has heard in her party? >> your speech was so powerful and positive, was that a row joineder to the narrowness and the birtherism that is certainly being heard in the republican party? >> well, i think on both sides of the aisle, we're hearing voices for america to pull back. and it would be a shame if america pulls back because we have you done so much good in the world. i do want to send a message that we have broad responsibilities to the world. but broad responsibilities here at home too, to educate people and continue to welcome immigrants, so that was the theme of the speech, and i had a great audience. >> you said in your speech that a child born in the most segregated large city in the south, whose parents could not get you a hamburger at woolworths, taught you that you could be anything you wanted to be, including president of the united states, and specifically, secretary of state. you said president of the united states. i know you had no political ambitions, but that was a noticeable comment. >> i think my father thought president of the united states. i think he would have been happy with secretary of state. i am a foreign policy person, and to have a chance to serve the nation's chief deputy, at a time when the nation was at peril, was enough. obviously i'll do what i can to help this ticket. but my life is in palo alto, and my future is with students in stanford and on issues i care about, like education reform. >> and do you feel that there has been a very troubling question of race, and of prejudice in this campaign, by the birther movement, and those who espouse it? >> the birther movement is an extreme, and there are extremes on both sides of the spectrum. i think the great majority of people here in america believe we are one in america. we are not an america that is driven by race, although obviously it is a factor in our lives. but the biggest place it is a factor is for minority kids who are trapped in failing schools. >> you say that is the civil rights era? >> that is the civil rights of our era, if you are a poor parent and can't get your child into a school where they will be well-educated, we are condemning that child to a future of hopelessness. so i do consider that a civil rights matter of the day, and do hope we can address that. >> thank you, professor, former secretary of state condoleeza rice, and obviously, political orator, and new member of augusta national. >> that is right, and i'm really honored and looking forward to playing there in the early occasion. >> back to you. >> thank you, nbc's andrea mitchell with condoleeza rice. there is a lot to chew on in that interview. everybody here in the studio in new york is popping on over wants to comment on that. but first, nbc's ron mott is on the floor with wisconsin governor, scott walker. >> hey, thank you very much. scott walker here with me. paul is on the mind. you got emotional during this speech. explain? >> i did, i know paul well, grew up down the road from him. what he said was not read off the tele prompter. when he talked about his dad, his mother, those stories are real. they really are. particularly when they talked about the gm plant. a lot of folks from my small town went into janesville to work in that plant. when he talked about the promise of president obama, not closing down the plant, that is a real deal. this shows a disconnected concept. this is the real deal in places like janesville. >> let me ask you about wisconsin, is it truly in play, a, do you believe it? and do you think that has much to do with you coming out on top in this recall? >> we thought in june fifth that when we won by a bigger margin than we did, you couldn't win with more votes than we did two years ago with just conservatives and -- they wanted leaders who were bold, had courage, and took tough decisions. i felt mitt romney showed he was not just a republican, but a reformer who can win, a few weeks back when he put paul ryan on the ticket that took that point and just took it much further forward, not just because of paul from wisconsin, but i think they viewed him as a true reformer. >> governor, it is rachel maddow in new york, i raised this -- on that janesville gm plant, isn't it true that it closed during the bush administration? is your criticism that the auto bailout was not big enough to come back and re-open it? that was not president obama shutting down the plant? >> no, it actually had two rounds and ultimately closed down a few years ago. but it is a good example of what happens here, the irony of people saying the bailout was good for people in janesville, or kenosha, it was not. what they ultimately ended up doing was a bankruptcy, a managed bankruptcy. which was essentially what mitt romney talked about in the first place, we would have been a lot better off, saving the taxpayers money and it could have saved plants like gm, if in the private sector they did it early on. >> so you think it was not effective for other neighboring states there? >> not for guys who worked there in janesville or kenosha, what we need is prosperity. and it comes from the private sector, that is what paul talked about tonight. he didn't just talk about the budget, but freedom, and pros r prosperity, that is what the base cares about. >> i hear you on the general issues. it is surprising to hear you run down the american auto industry at a moment that it really has come back, and to see such a bright spot in the economy, you talk about it as if things haven't worked out in the auto industry, since the bailout. that is a surprise. >> i'm just pointing out it didn't in wisconsin, and ultimately places like michigan. but it could have done better sooner if they had taken the advice of mitt romney, instead of taking the taxpayer's money. we wasted a lot of money, did it in other areas of the federal government, it is one more indictment against this president and his administration. >> was there a private sector available to save the auto industry? >> again, it could have been quite effective. that is where they were headed after several missteps. >> it was not barack obama's economic policies that closed that gm plant. that plant was closed in december of 2008, it is in the washington post right now, governor walker. it had nothing to do with barack obama's economic policy whatsoever. you can't get away from that fact. >> no, what i'm saying is long-term, not because that plant then, but the idea of that coming back. the idea of the auto industry coming back is something that could have been more effectively done if they had more aggressively gone down the path of mitt romney's suggestion early to go down the path of managed bankruptcy, instead of going down the path of costing the taxpayers millions more than it needed to. >> so are you making the case that the plant in janesville would have had better employment today if they had followed mitt romney's theory of a managed bankruptcy that you could guarantee in your economic model that that plant would still be employing and making things today? no, i don't think so you can here. >> the only one who made that promise was barack obama who promised people in janes think that that plant would still be open -- that is -- >> in the end, barack obama -- is the only one who made a -- no, no, let me finish. >> okay. >> let me finish, let me finish. barack obama was the only one who made that promise. he is the one who made the promise. if he wants to live up to the promise. i'm not making a promise. i'm just pointing out what he said about what would happen. it didn't happen under his office -- >> how could he fulfill the promise if he was not in office? >> because he said it wouldn't close, it would have come back -- >> he should have had it open retroactively? >> no, it would have brought it back if that was his promise. but his promise failed, which is why people are not employed in janesville or kenosha, and we have seen unemployment going up, 42 consecutive months of unemployment up 8%, and sadly, 23% of our fellow americans are either under-employed or unemployed now. paul ryan talked about that. with an optimistic plan to move the country forward. we'll hear more details about it tomorrow. it doesn't matter how long you talk over me, those are the facts, and the facts are the facts. we'll move our country forward. >> ron, thank you for letting us step all over your interview. i appreciate it. >> thank you. >> and much more ahead, including nbc's tom brokaw, this is nbc's live coverage of the republican national convention. stay with us. 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[ female announcer ] get the travelocity guarantee any way you book, including our new app. you'll never roam alone. here is what is happening, the mayor of new orleans encouraging businesses to reopen their doors today. less than 23 hours after they were spare attend full wrath of hurricane isaac. paul ryan told convention delegates in tampa that america needs a turn around as he blasted the white house. mitt romney takes center stage tonight. now back to our programming. after four years of getting the runaround, america needs a turnaround, and the man for the job is governor mitt romney. well, let's bring in nbc's tom brokaw, and david greggor, who impressed you, surprised you if you will? >> well, i think what we did was see the outlines of a big part of this debate that will be coming in the fall. you know, very often, the best defense is a great offense. and when paul ryan went on the offense in defending not just their version of medicare, but blaming medicare losses down stream on the obama administration, and he came back to that repeatedly, my guess is that we'll hear more about that tomorrow night from -- presidential candidate romney. i was also struck, chris, by the fact that paul ryan talked about not needing a government to direct our lives, but he is a man as i know that you have all referred to this, who did vote for the auto bailout, and for tarp, and both wars that were not funded. and he voted for part d for medicare, and he spent his entire life in government. and tomorrow night, governor romney will come here and talk about bringing a new presidential ethos to the office that is based on his political experience, his private sector experience. and the man who lit up the room tonight has spent his entire adult life in government. >> interesting, david? >> i have a couple of points to pick up on what tom said. there is a couple of -- amnesia here, he represented the republican party, which at its core is about fiscal responsibility, and didn't stand up to the bush administration on two wars, on major entitlements as tom suggested. on prescription drug benefit. all of those responsible, this was not somebody who stood up against that. and yet there is no mention of that. there is no mention of where they have come from as a party to get to that place. and it is also really clear they don't really want to be associated with president bush and national security. they can put condoleeza rice out front, but not talk about iraq or afghanistan, even have her make the point, take the shot about the president about leading from behind. when they don't really want to reckon with unfinished business in iraq and afghanistan. i think these are parts that will be picked apart by people who don't like the republican ticket, and maybe those who are more middle of the road that will see some deficiencies. but i think what is important chris, this line of argument, hey what is going to change? if you areut of work and don't believe this leadership, well, what is going to change if you give him another four years? and i do think you will hear mitt romney build on that. >> yeah, i was thinking about the american actor who always played wholesome roles, and some said i knew her before she was a virgin. and you point out, backing the tax cuts, the wars, the prescription drugs, backing tarp. all of those record points when are iconic, even, and yet he comes across as he is still a student of rand, and government. tom i would like to know what you think about condoleeza rice, the grandeur. >> she does have a great personal story to tell. i have known her for a long, long time. what a lot of people don't realize about condy, for her life, as she showed up in the office, later, secretary of state. before that she was one of the great soviet studies experts in america. i had a great friend in that field, who said she had a great ear going across the russian provinces, and picking up the dialect, and talking about the military component. nobody knew more about it than condoleeza rice did. so i was more surprised she didn't talk more about it in a macro way, especially about the soviet union, as we used to call it. especially russia. because governor romney identified it as a principal enemy. these issues will come into play. and it seems as though she could have given a tutorial, about other challenges. when she talked to andrea, she said it really begins at home with a stronger economy. and she only gave one or two lines about the -- went to the mattresses, as they say, in terms of having real feuds with donald rumsfeld when he was secretary of defense. but she did have a very powerful story to tell. i remember in los angeles, i think it was los angeles, that colin powell talked about a need for affirmative action. tonight, condoleeza rice talked about the importance of immigration, didn't get much of a response to that. but as you say, it is a great personal story. >> and i thought a rejoinder to some of the fringes of this party, david, you have kids in school. i thought about her push on education. also it seems to me she did a wonderful statement about religious tolerance. both she and mike huckabee went from an evangelical background, it also came up in ryan's speech. an attempt to talk about people who may have prejudices against people who may be mormon. to really say it is not what church i'm going to, to where i'm talking the country. all three of them tried to do that tonight. >> there were part of the speeches for the hall. and parts of the speeches that were for the television audience. because this is as much about mitt romney as it is the republican party. how the party wants to present itself and deal with certain real perception problems it has, real liabilities it has. i think there are two examples of how condoleeza rice wants to do this. i have been struck about the talk about education reform. this is much more than a bipartisan issue, and even though chris christie liked to take it apart that democrats are just for unions. a lot of it is behind strong education reform, many who are liberals, pushing for this reform. and maybe there is a bit that they can do together at the federal level to keep building on this, even though they're tearing each other apart on these issues. i know there are people hoping this is the case as we talk. >> i was just going to say, chris, that even to expand on david's point, as we sit here tonight, rahm emanuel, the mayor of chicago, is locked in negotiations with the teacher's union. and it will go down to the wire. and he is being very tough on them. let me correct the math, if i can, a mistake i made on msnbc, one of the reasons i am a journalist, was math was not my strong point. this is a man who is the same age, the vp candidate, i said that paul ryan, when ronald reagan was born, he was in the second year of office. i was wrong on that david's math was as strong as mine, he didn't correct me. in fact, paul ryan was in the fifth grade when ronald reagan was in his second term. he is very young. but you can see he is also a very practiced politician. >> that is great, it is a good thing, david, to have people from all ages here tonight. thank you, tom, and as they checked into the veracity, that is when we return. you're watching msnbc's live coverage of the republican convention. on imy0'.. t mancreelararanla u ow obo ou bme t in t su uiny. ofme and miopsr. wi ofme 'l w and [ nnwihe oanu'lesido r . paiopsr. use s, sollst thdepndmd me u. use s, thsoe. wl o nrem rsrp izn edeo thsoe. wl het d sahodsa ofqu yode im ew t >> you see, even with all the hidden taxes to pay for the health care takeover, even with the new law and new taxes on nearly a million small businesses, the planners in washington still didn't have enough money. they needed more. they needed hundreds of billions more. so they just took it all away from medicare. $716 billion funneled out of medicare by president obama. >> and also by paul ryan in his of proposals, but that doesn't make him nearly as angry or make him pause as meaningfully. the whole ball of wax may come down to one policy in november, it may hinge on medicare. part of why paul ryan was seen in the most favorable light, was his plan to look at the mower march plan, because of his plan to end medicare, democrats took the paul ryan plan as really good news when it was announced. but tonight, mr. ryan said he wants the debate on medicare, because he is the man who will protect medicare from the dreaded democrats, he will protect it. >> right, so the medicare fact, and i kind of can't believe that we are actually now running this campaign on republicans telling democrats they want to cut medicare too much, after what republicans have voted for in recent years. what those medicare cuts are, basically two major things. one, we pay private insurers in the medicare about 14% to cover the exact same group of people. and the other is that hospitals as part of the affordable act care deal agreed to take lower reimbursements. so when mitt romney says they want to repeal those, instead of moving the money from hospitals who said you could have it. and private insurers that are getting paid more in medicare and putting it either towards medicaid as barack obama does, they should give it back to hospitals and private insurers. this is a bad enough idea, as i mentioned that house republicans, including paul ryan, who wrote the thing put it in their budget. the broad sort of over-arching narrative, the thing that strikes me about it is when paul ryan and george w bush did a major drug expansion benefit in 2000, they did it by putting it all on the deficit. the democrats came in, said we're not going to do that. we'll be more fiscally responsible and pay for all of it. the initial house proposal would have been a tax, a lot of republicans said it is irresponsible. if you're going to do health care you pay for it out of the system. so democrats tried to do that did this cutting of medicare, which they thought would help them get republican support. instead, republicans then ran against them, saying they didn't have a plan to do anything about medicare spending, and also saying the affordable plan is irresponsible. which just goes to show that you -- the democrats did not find it very easy to win for compromising or trying to compromise with what republicans said they wanted on this particular one. >> and one thing on this, obviously, when people go from their previous roles into being on the national ticket they are expected to abandon some of their previously held positions. so famously, george hw bush was pressured into becoming more pro life when he had previously been more pro-choice. but on this ryan-romney thing, paul ryan has not abandoned his politically difficult positions on issues like abortion. on this medicare thing, he is making it sound like it was his position all along to be the protector of medicare. is he just doing a 180 from his previous thing by attacking what was originally in his budget, or is this another angle on his position, or just a total u-turn? >> what is remarkable about it, the current budget is more in the ballpark. a year ago he had a budget that ended the traditional medicare program. and would have been a cost shift in the program. by far the most radical medicare program that anybody put forward, and frankly by memory. they argued, and moderated it since. but it was a year ago, not when he was in fifth grade, not 20 years ago. it is hard to get away from it, saying in our hearts we would have ended the medicare. it ended medicare, and it was a year ago. >> and you only have to go about five minutes before that in his political record to when he was proposing a wholesale privatization social security. that is in his very recent past. >> you bring much light to what was a heated discussion, you're watching msnbc's live coverage of the republican national convention. ♪ 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[ engine revving ] it's bringing the future forward. welcome back to msnbc's coverage of the republican national convention, i'm rachel maddow in new york city, chris matthews is with us, what do you think of the speech? >> well, i heard in her words, the old republican party, yes, but very positive about civil rights and all americans joining together. i thought it was a great american speech. and as a speech writer, i heavily applaud not only the words but as i said, the music behind the speech by condoleeza rice. >> reverend sharpton, what do you think was the most important thing in the speeches? >> well, i think they were delivered better. i think that the problem is, they were totally removed from facts, i think ryan was clearly caught saying things that are factually inaccurate. he talked about his own participation in the deficit. he certainly misspoke, as governor walker did, about when this plant closed. and i think condoleeza rice was good. i would like to see her talk about issues today, voting rights in alabama where they have photo id. i think the reality doesn't bear the poetry, but at least the poetry was better than ralph cranden -- >> what do you think had the biggest political impact? >> well, i think that paul ryan did a great speech that i think connected to the middle class in this country that is hurting economically. i think it was very effective politically. the other person who had a big night tonight. i think another republican star is born, that is susan martinez, i think they will see a lot more of her. the republicans have got to get more than 30% of the hispanic vote. she did a great job, major review for susan martinez. >> i thought paul ryan could have told the story of where we went wrong as a party. because all republicans said we were led astray during the george bush era. we became partisans ourselves of big government. i would have loved to have heard that story. but instead, it just disappeared down the memory hall. >> well, i think a star has been born. the romney camp has got to be very happy with the performance of paul ryan tonight. he represents a generation, i thought he did a very good job tonight of comparing music. there is a lot of people relating to zz top of that 40-something crowd. that is really who they needed to connect to. he was not trying to connect to everybody, but to people who had not made a good decision. >> i think the diamond in the rough was susan martinez, i think her speech was stunning. all right, tomorrow we'll hear from the candidate himself, mitt romney, we'll be back tomorrow at 7 eastern, and our coverage of the republican national convention continues next from tampa with chris matthews. en wa. where sleepless nights yield to restful sleep. and lunesta can help you get there, like it has for so many people before. when taking lunesta, don't drive or operate machinery until you feel fully awake. walking, eating, driving, or engaging in other activities while asleep, without remembering it the next day, have been reported. abnormal behaviors may include aggressiveness, agitation, hallucinations or confusion. in depressed patients, worsening of depression, including risk of suicide, may occur. alcohol may increase these risks. allergic reactions, such as tongue or throat swelling, occur rarely and may be fatal. side effects may include unpleasant taste, headache, dizziness and morning drowsiness. ask your doctor if lunesta is right for you. then find out how to get lunesta for as low as $15 at lunesta.com. there's a land of restful sleep. we can help you go there on the wings of lunesta. me to join the ticket i said, let's get this done. and that is exactly what we are going to do. i'm down here in tampa. i'm chris matthews. down here in tampa where all the action is still going on here tonight. this seems to be the part of town where all the delegates come after the action. we see them trooping in here after we do the program. i'm sure it will happen in the next few minutes as we speak. this is paul ryan's party, of course. mitt romney may be the main event tomorrow night, but tonight ryan showed he is, in fact, the heart and soul of this political party. what did we get from the vice presidential candidate tonight? tonight his speech was strangely, i would say, on the attack. didn't hold the soaring optimistic message as his hero, ronald regan. >> they've ron out of ideas. their moment came and went. fear and division is all they've got left. with all their attack ads, the president is just throwing away money. and he's pretty experienced at that. >> well, the focus of ryan's speech was the president's failed leadership, as he said, but he provided few details about what a romney/ryan administration would actually offer the country. instead we got attacks like this one. >> it all started off with stirring speeches, greek columns, the thrill of something new. now all that's left is a presidency adrift surviving on slogans that already seem tired, grasping at a moment that has already passed, like a ship trying to sail on yesterday's wind. >> there was also a heavy helping of deceptive language in the speech on everything from medicare cuts to the closing of a gm plant in his hometown. he accused the president of closing it. the only problem, the plant shut down under george w. bush. he told the ticket that a romney/ryan ticket would take responsibility. >> we will not take the next four years blaming others, we will take responsibility. we will not try to replace our founding principles, we will reapply our founding principles. >> if not for the closing of that plant in his hometown anyway. in contrast, the other big speech of the night was from formerle secretary of state condoleezza rice. it brought down the house with language that is personal and political. her speech talked about unifying america and not dividing it. we have a lot to get to tonight. let me start with the key question tonight for all. what was paul ryan's message tonight and how important is it. lawrence o'donnell is the host of the last word. michael steel a former chair of the republican national committee. the "huffington post" howard farmer is an msnbc political analyst. around the table, don't rush, say what happened tonight. let's start with ryan. >> ryan is a cert final star. for political purposes, swing voter purposes, every bit of the fact checking that we've been doing on his speech since he stopped talking is utterly meaningless for the people who are going to decide this election. that's 7% of the electorate. they don't do fact checking. they go with the gut. the medicare campaign he took on as straight ahead as you can expect him to. here's his medicare campaign. >> my mother and my grandmother. >> and you can talk about all the details you want, his grandmother on alzheimer's relying and living on medicare and being grateful for it. he said he was grateful for it. that's not what we've heard from other republicans about it. he's going with a gut case on medicare. and the phrasing that he choose is political. given the position they're in and the face that ryan's proposed, he's saying we are the preserve and protect medicare party and they are the raid medicare party. that's the language, raid medicare to pay for some other -- >> that's what i thought. i think he was jumping biden out of his own game. >> democrats tonight at this hour after ryan have more reason to be nervous than they have had all year. joe biden now has a very real fight on his hands. >> it will be a battle of the grandmothers. >> let's take a look at what he said on that very question of medicare. >> in the biggest, coldest power play of all in obama care came at the expense of the elderly. you see, even with all the hidden taxes to pay for the health care takeover, even with the new law and new taxes on nearly a million small businesses, the planners in washington still didn't have enough money. they needed more. they needed hundreds of billions more. so they just took it all away from medicare. $760 billion funneled out of medicare by president obama. an obligation we have to our parents and grandparents is being sacrificed all to pay for a new entitlement we didn't even ask for. >> moral indignation. >> the problem is that the answer to that is complicated. what he just said is very simple. the answer, the truthful full answer is complicated. simple tends to win with swing voters. >> michael? >> i think lawrence hit it right. what ryan did which i thought was special and important was to reach back to our efforts in 2010 where we talked about the seniors health care bill of rights where we were going to protect seniors against the then $500 billion in cuts to medicare by the administration and brought it forward and then personalized it. he brought it to the table and he said, this cut is represented in the face of my grandmother, it's represented in the face of my mother, and that is a hard argument for joe biden and barack obama to take to the american people because then, as laurence says, it gets complicated. i love complication at this point. now you have to explain the $716 billion in cuts and you have to explain it in the context of someone's grandmother and mother and then guess what the next step is? we look to the future. we look at the 18-year-olds, the 20-year-olds, the again xors, he says to them, i've got a better plan and solution. follow me, follow us and we're going to give you options, choices that the government will not give you, that the government, in fact, wants to take from you. >> right. >> powerful night. >> they'll get in trouble when they start walking down the road of detail. >> ryan, do you think ryan can possibly win the medicare argument against democrats who created medicare against republican opposition? >> i want to talk about something else. >> go ahead. you're free. >> which is that this was a speech in which paul ryan used the words old, tired, yesterday, the past repeatedly in reference to the obama administration. this was an attempt, and i think a very shrewd and successful one, to get leverage on the obama presidency to paint barack obama himself who only four years ago was the paragon of youth as the old story, old regime. 42-year-old guy. first again x exer and so many suspicious of government, especially younger people, suspicious of government and i thought this was one of the most effective. i know the facts. he's wrong on the 716 because he wanted to do the same thing and he voted no on the simpson boles commission. he was a deficit cutter. that appeal he made tonight was one of the most effective political speeches've seen in a convention, and i've been to a lot of them. >> especially from the guy in the corner. especially from the guy who's guilty as the medicare cutter. >> once again, mitt romney was barely mentioned really. >> yes, that's a pattern. >> once again, that's a pattern. >> that's a pattern. >> and if i'm barack obama, i'm sitting there saying, i don't like having to take on this guy. >> let's look where -- >> they have their minds made up already. the informed voters know who they're going to vote for. the people who are going to be listening to this and will listen to 30 second tv ads, that's who this will go to. >> here's his message to college students. >> college graduates should not have to live out their 20s in their childhood bedrooms staring up at fading obama posters and wondering when they can move out and get going with life. everyone who feels stuck in the obama economy is right to focus on the here and now, and i hope you understand this too, if you're feeling left out or passed by, you have not failed. your leaders have failed you. >> the sarcasm in that was so much rich. the kid in his room he grew up in, there's the obama hope poster, he's stuck there like in prison, lawrence. that was a shot. didn't that take a shot at the kid and his hope? i just wonder who he won with that argument. >> behind every one of these sentences there's a policy that they're ignoring. if you are feeling left out and passed by, you haven't failed. your leaders have failed you. they are not willing to help anyone who's unemployed, left out, passed by. they want to cut those benefits. they want to keep them in the economy even with unemployment benefits and so -- but it's a very effective line. there's deception in every one of these lines. >> he spoke in plain language about plain lives and plain places and he did it very effectively. i think he's a tremendously skilled politician who knows how to seem to be conceding a little bit to the other side. >> yes. >> he says it as an act of concession. let's admit the president has handled a difficult situation, then he proceeds to clobber him for the next 20 minutes. >> let's get away from nuance. here's ryan blaming president obama for a gm, general motors plant, in his hometown of janesville that closed. the only problem, the plant closed under president bush. he must have known that when he said these words tonight. that's what i want to get to. let's take a look. >> my own state voted for president obama. wh he talked about change, many people like the sound of it, especially in janesville where we were about to lose a major factory. a lot of guys i went to high school with worked at that gm plant. right there at that plant candidate obama said, i believe that if our government is there to support you this plant will be here for another hundred years. that's what he said in 2008. well, as it turned out, that plant didn't last another year. it is locked up and empty to this day, and that's how it is in so many towns where the recovery that was promised is nowhere in sight. >> that's what we're looking at. he sounds profoundly upset because obama let him down in december of 2008. what ability did the president have to prevent that plant from closing a month after he made the speech? >> probably nothing. >> was that not openly deceptive? something that's checkable, unreliably true and known to be untrue by the candidate? >> those facts i know, you're right, the obama campaign's priority is to turn that guy and his baby blues into a lying face. they better do it fast. >> better do it by the time we get off the air tonight. >> they better do it fast. if they let that guy escape, then they'll do a disservice. >> can i take the next one? you just said it wasn't accurate? >> i don't know for a fact. i'm taking your word at it at this point because i haven't researched it, but i'll say this, having it out there, now guess what's going to happen? the obama team and all the others are going to go back and trying to disprove, show it's a lie. you know what it is, it goes back to what lawrence was saying before. it's out there. it's the way he said it. i'm just telling you -- >> if he's a liar, they've got to turn him into one fast. >> you need to do that and set that up. >> let's see how they do that in the next couple of minutes. let's go to something that's not a lie but it's politics. he, the most credible guy in the budget world walked away from it. people like my daughter walked away from this commission. they're heroes, and then it became durbin and coburn. the whiz kid, budget tear, he walked away from t. he walked away from the budget deal. >> watch his phrasing. >> he didn't say that. >> his phrasing about the plant gets him past any perjury charge. it's very carefully lawyerly written stuff. the stuff he says about simpson bowles is very lawyerly written. if the obama campaign has to get into a fight or what was it about simpson bowles that you didn't like it's going to be very hard to nail ryan on stuff like that. the fight they have to have with him and they have to win is the medicare fight. that's the fight. >> he's tapping into gen examination resentment. >> i'm wondering if a goody two shoes has to pay a higher price. >> his argument on simpson bowles will say -- >> the networks like nbc are working festivally to find the truth. lawrence o'donnell defending the unscrupulous, the re torque speech. >> i love defense. >> i had hopes once of addressing you under different circumstances, but our fellow americans had another plan four years ago and i accept their decision. 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[ sneezes ] [ male announcer ] zyrtec®. love the air. join zyrtec® rewards. save up to $7 on zyrtec® products. our president is not being true to our values. let's elect our next commander in chief and the next leader of the free world, my friend, governor mitt romney. >> welcome back. we're here at channel side, which is a brisk walk from the convention hall. about this time of night the delegates start walking here to the bars and restaurants. george w. bush may not have been on tonight, but neocons were. their message came through loud and clear tonight. let's listen. >> we can't afford to give governments in russia and china a veto over how we defend our interests in the progress of our values of the world. sadly for the lonely voices of dissent in syria and iran and elsewhere in the world who feel forgotten in their darkness and sadly for us as well our president is not being true to our values. our friends across the world, people are seizing control of their own destiniedestinies. they are liberating themselves from america's rulers. they want america's support. america must be on the right side of history. >> joining me right now is the washington post's eugene washington. david corn. both are msnbc's political analysts. i liked mccain for service to our country. he listed six countries we ought to be in war with. syria, iran, stay in the war, somehow get back into the war with libya, continue our war in afghanistan and iraq. it went on and on. >> yeah, great idea. totally unrealistic. he is unburdened by the responsibilities of the presidency. you know what, that's a really good thing. it's a good thing that he doesn't get to go to war willy-nilly left and right the way he has consistently advocated since barack obama took office. >> you know, he used to be a man who cared deeply, and he does, about the service people who are stuck in a war that was begun with great popularity and ended up being unpopular. he was a victim of that as a pow in vietnam. now he seems to be for fresh new wars and he attacks china. we have to stop using economic sanctions which rely on united effort by countries like china and russia and go in there militarily. >> it's just sort of empty, hawkishness. >> yeah. >> because as gene said, there is no obligation to act on it and deal with the consequences, whether it be financial, militarily or strategic. it's just john mccain sort of flailing. i have to say this i think now he may have set a guinness record for giving convention speeches in favor of nominees he detests. he did it for bush in 2000, he does it now 2012. i don't know what he thinks about palin. >> you say this with tremendous knowledge. >> i almost feel sorry for him. this is like the speech he had to give in 2000. >> just remember why he picked sarah palin four years ago, because he couldn't stand romney. >> i always say how thrilled i am. i always pay for it. tonight again i felt wonder at our country. what a speech. i thought it was grand. here's secretary of state condoleezza rice coming back into public light from a sabbatical really to share her personal story. toward the end of her speech she talked been what it's like to grow in the segregated south. it's like you, gene. let's listen. >> and on a personal note, a little girl grows up in gempro, birmingham, the segregated city of the south where her parents can't take her to a movie theater or to a restaurant, but they have her absolutely convinced that even if she can't have a hamburger at the woolworth's lunch counter, she could be president of the united states if she wants to be and she becomes the secretary of state. >> secretary rice also talked about the greatness of america. what draws people from all over the world even today to work on high tech firms in massachusetts and california. let's listen. >> people have come here from all over because they have believed our creed of opportunity and limitless horizons. they have come here from the world's most impoverished nations just to make a decent wage, and they have come here from advanced societies as engineers and scientists to fuel the knowledge-based revolution in the silicon valley of california, in the research triangle of north carolina, along route 128 in massachusetts, in austin, texas, and across this great land. >> i was so impressed that she was so good that she got people who totally disagree with what she's saying to cheer so loud. in this group are the birthers. in this group are people who suspect barack obama because of his name, who constantly chuckle at jokes about his heritage. here's a woman that's african-american that say three cheers for these people that come here and want to live here. >> immigration, exactly. she went there. it was a terrific speech. terrifically delivered. she's gotten so much better at that. there are two caveats. one, she didn't talk about the debacle in iraq. she didn't talk about the war of choice that she and others led us into. it turned out to be a crock. number two, she and i have discussed this, her experience -- her personal experience of jim crow segregation. we both went through that. we were born in the same year. both middle class families from the deep south. we had a lot of similar experiences. she was friends with one of the girls killed in the search bombing in birmingham. they played at each other's house. and we come out with somewhat different feelings and recollections of that era. mine is more about america being dragged kicking and screaming from -- out of jim crow to a much better place where we are now. it was not -- it was not easy. it didn't just happen. a lot of people fought and died. >> oh, yeah. what was the name of that church, sixth street? >> 19th street baptist church. >> something like that. >> of course, she is giving cover to a party. you've been very hot on this. that's using racist attacks. >> she's joining against it. >> she's pushing against it, but she's also giving them cover. she's saying, look, we're not so bad. clap for condoleezza rice. i can't get past the fact that when she finally reached the power -- this pitiful power, the greatness of america, she made false statements that led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in iraq. >> do you think she made personally false standards? >> oh, yes. mushroom clouds, she was there. you read the book. she was in the middle of that. she is as responsible as dick cheney, as george w. bush, yet she gets off a little bit more easily because people like herman ner and because she has this other story to tell. >> just remember they lied to cover up their lying too. libby paid for that. >> she was as responsible as anyone. let me ask you about tonight then. the whole question of the way they talked about rights. now, of course, we all love the founding fathers, whatever their limitations were in terms of civil rights and accepting slavery and the constitution. but this crowd, they were addressing -- and i don't mean racist or anything, but they addressed them as if they were white people. there was no sense there that there was, in fact, a civil rights fight, that a lot of people were denied the most fundamental right up until 1965 to vote. they acted like that didn't happen. >> there we are. >> they acted like god gave us the rights. as melissa harris talked the other night, she'she professor, she said, wait a minute, god gave us the right but it took the fight of your life to get them in law. >> exactly. it did. it did. the process of opening america and giving to all-americans the rights that are enshrined in the declaration and constitution have been a long, bitter struggle and it cost hundreds of thousands of lives including the civil war. that certainly didn't end it. you know, it didn't end when slavery ended. it was a battle and it's a struggle that's ongoing. it's a process. >> that's why i like diversity in the office place. it's alls about the we. what is the we? you watch the speeches. who's the we we're talking about? >> our country as an romney said. >> whatever you say about condoleezza rice's war record, she talked about the whole country. she didn't narrow it. >> as i began. it was a terrific speech. i quibble with a couple of things. >> thank you, gene robinson and david corn. >> it's a three man judgeship, you're out. up next, the bush factor. w might not have been in tampa but the reminder of his administration and coverage from the republican national convention continues here on msnbc. >> when governor romney asked me to join the ticket i said, let's get this done, and that is exactly what we are going to do. to those who question how once rivals can be now united, it's quite simple. we have barack obama to thank. >> a fellow broadcaster, mike huckabee back in the political business tonight. let's talk about some people. we have a good republican here. what did you like at the convention tonight? you watched it here, i think. >> i did. i thought paul ryan was fantastic. i thought he talked about the economy and how we need to get this country back on track, how old ideas that once were new are no longer working. president obama had four years to make some changes. >> did you know that that plant closing in his hometown closed before obama ever became president? >> i did not know that. >> well, now you do. how do you get a hat like that? >> i brought it at the airport. i think tonight condoleezza rice did a great job. >> me too. how many liked condoleezza tonight? how many of you are democrats? >> none. >> so the democrats liked that. are you a democrat or republican? >> i'm registered no party affiliation since 1982. >> how do you vote? >> i have voted on the side. >> did you vote for reagan? >> no. >> did you vote for clton? >> no. >> did you vote for gore? >> yes. >> okay. good. good move. just kidding. >> i am a proud registered democrat and i work very, very hard for our president right now in tampa. walking around talking to people and it amazes me what drives them to make their decision and how undecided people. i think that lawrence o'donnell hit the nail on the head tonight when he said that these 32nd bullets, these statements that are made in these conventions which are -- a lot of them are very much lies and can be traced back like you said in fact checking. >> we have too much to argue over the facts to see if they're true or not. miss, what did you like tonight? >> i registered to vote when i was 18 in 1997, and i voted for president obama in 2008 and i'm going to vote for him again. >> thank you. >> sir? >> i'm an independent. >> how long do you stay an independent? in november what are you? >> i wanted to vote for my king. i'm from panama. my king was in panama. >> we'll be right back with more "ha "hardball." >> demand for the job is governor mitt romney. mitt romney has been loyal to his lovely wife who knocked it out of the park last night in this arena. he's been loyal to his sons, to his country, to his employees, and to his church. i'm sure now that the press is going to tell you he isn't perfect. but, my friends, for the past four years we've tried the one that the press thought was perfect and that hasn't worked out all that well for us. >> welcome back. that's mike huckabee, the former governor of arkansas famously quoted by the way in the book "game change" saying that mitt romney had no soul. he went to the podium tonight. he was out there to ensure his fellow christian conservatives he would stand behind romney and ryan, a vote that neither of whom are protes tanlt. let's watch him again. >> i want to clear the air about something that has been said. people wonder whether guys like me, an evangelical, would only support a fellow evangelical. well, my friends, i want to tell you something, of the four people on the two tickets, the only self-professed evangelical is barack obama, and he supports changing the definition of marriage, believes that human life is disposable and expendable at any time in the womb, even beyond the womb, and he tells people of faith that they have to bow their knees to the god of government and violate their faith and conscience in order to comply with what he calls health care. the attack on my catholic brothers and sisters is an attack on me. the democrats have brought back that old dance, the limbo, to see how low they can go in attempting to limit our ability to practice our faith, but this isn't a battle about contraceptives and catholics but about conscience and the creator. let me say to you tonight, i care far less as to where mitt romney takes his family to church than i do about where he takes this country. well, for more on huckabee's speech tonight and his appeal to his fellow evangelicals, let's bring in two msnbc political analysts. joy reed. are you evangelical? what do you think of that appeal? >> i grew up methodist like george w. bush, live and let live religion. i thought it was odd. we all know that what mike huckabee's principles are. he wants to apply them to everyone whether or not you are an evangelical. i was a little disappointed in huckabee. he didn't bring the fire that i thought he would. he is competing with rush limbaugh. >> do you think he really wants romney to win or is he planning to try again next time? >> i'm not sure which of these guys, christie, him. >> i didn't see anybody in love with the guy. >> not a single one. >> just in terms of word count, tonight it seemed like some of these speakers, like last night, the first night of the convention, waited until the last couple of paragraphs of their 20-minute speeches to pay for their dinner and mentioning the guy that put them up there. >> as they were getting off the stage. it was awful for mitt romney. i have to say i was shocked by mike huckabee's speech. last week he was railing against the party and he was defending todd akin. now he's being a good, excellent soldier and coming out and saying all of these nice things about romney. what was he saying about barack obama not protecting life outside the womb? what was that a reference to? >> i don't know what that is? >> practically. then he had that nasty crack about debbie wasserman schultz, sexist crack, she's not in the room. it was nasty and soulless. >> explain the sexist part to me. >> he's making a joke about her voice, i guess. that she's -- he hears someone practicing her speech in the next room. they make fun about her voice. it's sexist. >> back in '08, a lot of democrats were most afraid of huckabee. this is a guy with the same evangelic evangelical beliefs. he didn't move anyone. he didn't do the preacher thing. >> where are you from? >> i was born in brooklyn but i grew up in denver. >> that doesn't work with me, the huckabee thing. it seems a little too sugar pops. too sugary. a little bit of that pent show. >> we had salon reporters four years ago who went full huckabee. they thought he was so charming, he played the guitar. >> right. >> tonight there was none of that guy. it was a nasty guy. he left them cold in the hall too. >> let's talk about the people that weren't speaking tonight. i saw michele bachmann in the crowd the other night. she looked great as always. she was there with her delegation. that's it. sarah palin who i argue was one of the great political stars of our time who could walk on the stage and wow us, not even up there. this is like sudden death in this party now. >> absolutely. no, i was struck by and tweeted a lot about john mccain. john mccain had to open for this guy who came in like eighth on "american idol", right? while he was talking in the hall people were walking. people were walking around milling around where i was standing. it was so loud with people sort of making small talk while john mccain who was the nominee of this party four years ago. >>, i thought it was insulting. >> what's going on with sarah palin and fox. >> i'm sorry fox canceled all my scheduled interviews tonight because i sure wanted to take the opportunity on the air to highlight senator john mccain's positive contributions to america, to honor him, and to reflect on what a biased media unfairly put him through four years ago tonight. granted our honored war esteemed man has gone through more than our media can harm him. >> that was a war mongering speech. >> fox said they had to cancel because of the condensed schedules as a result of the shortened convention. >> me either. >> let's talk about mccain tonight. six countries he wants us to go to war in. >> we're out there. and such disrespect to the president, that leading from behind crack. again, i don't expect him to like him. he's the commander in chief. >> were we supposed to lead the in vags of libya, lead the invasion of syria, continue our wars indefinitely in afghanistan and iraq. confront the chinese, go to war with iran without any help of economic sanctions. >> right. >> the fact that it was buried. they did hide their past. people need to remember, the foreign policy team behind mitt romney are the same neocons, the same guys who backed these wars. the bush guys are behind romney. we may have buried mccain in the weeds tonight, but his ideas and foreign policy ideas, those are coming into the white house with mitt romney if he wins. >> let me give you a really scary thought joy, joan, if romney has no real foreign policy of his own, if he's an empty shelf in that part of his responsibilities, guess who wants to march into that, the w, people like john boldin, they are very smart, articulate and have a clear vision. >> very close to romney. it's bush cheney ii. cheney is back in charge. >> boldin, i saw him at the convention center yesterday. i saw him yesterday. >> see somebody wearing a bolton mask. he is a frightening guy. thank you joy reid who has spotted john bolton and joan walsh. both of you fellows well thought out -- gals. >> coming up. hollywood has made its way here tonight. they'll talk about the mystery man who may make an appearance at the convention tomorrow night. we'll be right back. tap... pinch... and zoom... in your car. introducing the all-new cadillac xts with cue. ♪ don't worry. we haven't forgotten, you still like things to push. [ engine revs ] the all-new cadillac xts has arrived, and it's bringing the future forward. we're back. the federal budget has received plenty of attention during this convention. two professional actors were part of the nonpartisan advocacy group, the creative coalition. they're advocating for something that has been on the republican chopping block, federal funding for the arts. with me is tim daily and actor and coalition member, evan handler. evan, romney has come out for dumping all of the federal funding for pbs. >> what we're interested in are the same things as the republican party and democratic party, which is making a strong, well educated integrated work force into the community after their schooling. the documentation the creative coalition has shown me that early education in the arts and music keep people in school longer, score over 100 points higher on s.a.t.s and have more attendance. let's take apple computer innovations and the mars rover. these are things that have been created by the people who are probably as kids copying comic books and doing drawing and needed to learn mechanical design. people don't come out of the womb designing mars rovers. they need their imagination stimulated, they need to stay in school so they don't become burdens on society. >> modern dance and all of that stuff. >> condoleezza rice identified something crucial tonight. she said the k-12 education crisis threatens the very fabric of our society. we have a cure for that. that's teaching kids art. they're three times more likely to graduate from high school. we're approaching a 1/3 high school dropout rate. in a couple of generations that's 100 million people who are looking for a handout. a great way to prevent against that is to teach them arts. >> what about the people that come along and say we've got to cut something so we've got to cut the soft stuff? >> look, the national endowment for the arts, first of all, is a minuscule part of the budget. beyond that, every dollar spent by the federal government reason them $7 in taxes. that's a 7 to 1 return, that's just good business. if you don't want those returns in vegas, on wall street, in your federal government, then you're doing something that's not smart. >> why do people on the left support the arts and funding for the arts and people on the right, i'm generalizing, the last thing they want to do is help museums or art museums, any kind of natural history museums, zoos. except for newt gingrich. >> i don't find that to be totally true. in fairness, we've been here and we've run across some allies and some people who are doing good things in the arts. >> give me some names of conservative republicans here who like the arts. >> the governor of iowa just made art education part of their core curriculum. the governor of utah does a great job in the arts there. so those are two supporters. mike huckabee is a big supporter of the arts. >> to answer your question in a negative way because i'm a better curmudgeon than he is, it's an easy talking point. it's very easy to rally working people who feel they're being overtaxed to say, look at these man by pan by liberals who want to teach people to be singers. we're not talking about that. we're talking about the facts that tim quoted. >> when you talk about the arts a lot of times you can almost see someone's thought bubble. they're thinking of some person on "people" magazine or some hoity-toity person wearing a tuxedo at carnegie hall. we're talking about little towns. >> you know the bomber curve, you understand that? >> no. >> the whole principle that the arts, basically even museums, the opera, carnegie hall, there's no money in it. these things have to be subsidized. these are not commercial enterprises. these are not blockbuster movies. >> they flood dollars to the restaurants nearby, to the taxi stands, to the shops that service them, all of the visitors, to the hotels. these are incredible drivers of the economy. entertainment is the number two export of the united states of america. am i right? >> yes. >> entertainment and military. >> when "fortune" magazine asked mitt romney where he'd make budget cuts he said, first, there are programs i would eliminate. obama care being one of them but also various subsidy programs. he mentioned amtrak. i don't know what would happen if he got rid of amtrak. pbs the subsidy there. the subsidy for the national endowment for the arts and humaniti humanities. i think they have to stand on their own rather than receiving money borrowed from other countries as our government does on its behalf. i think that's based on economic ignorance. these are not the kinds of things that make profits. >> well, look. you cut amtrak -- >> the academy of music for example. >> how do they get to work? it's very shortsighted, simplistic thinking as you said better than i could. >> i want to thank both of you guys. are we going to hear from clint eastwood tomorrow night? >> i don't know. you tell us. >> any other big celebs coming here? i'm trying to think of the republicans. there's certainly -- let's see. there's tom celek, right? >> bruce willis. >> john void. >> he's way over. he is way over. not many there on the right. thank you. tim daly and evan handler. i'm going to be back. it's all for me right now. the coverage of the republican national convention is over tonight. i'll be back tomorrow at 5:00 eastern for more "hard ball." the big speech by the candidate himself tomorrow night, mitt romney, his night tomorrow night. good night from us from tampa. 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