see in the polls, that it s starting to have let me read one of these for howard. you get in here, generally, before i give you more material to work with, generally, do you think the establishment is out to get romney? it s not like the old days. the establishment is not a unified entity. and to the extent that there is an establishment that descends from ronald reagan and george bush, father and son, it s largely behind romney. yeah. has been behind romney, and that s the problem. romney can t romney has a ceiling also. but talking to one of the biggest fund-raisers in the republican party earlier today, a centrist, as much as an establishment guy as there is, he says, yes, we will try to stop newt gingrich at all costs, even if romney fails, but the problem is, if gingrich wins the first bunch of primaries, we re not going to be able to do it. that s why all the money is being spent now. that s why in iowa, newt gingrich is undergoing a carpet bombing from sioux city to
have some structural advantages, and the republicans on what they re doing on immigration and driving away the hispanic vote is making the structural advantage for democrats even greater. if the obama campaign is smart and they are, they ll go to virginia and florida they ll say, you can maybe have these, but you ll have to spend $1 billion to get them. and it s going to be very difficult for the republican give me your mind s eye. suppose newt really cleans up his act and runs almost annize sizen hour campaign or a reagan campaign, and then mitt romney comes and grabs the center right back, therefore the center, how do you win? you have to win ohio, right, and you win florida, your state, right? the normal way? look, for republicans to be successful in 2012, we almost have to treat whoever our nominee is, obviously we want to pick the best one, but they re the placeholder. this election is a referendum on barack obama and the obama economy. if we allow the obama campaign to turn
they pick up the close wins, the always the deciders all the time, florida and ohio, both of which obama won in 2008, and then they went through, they lost the republicans in 2008. and finally to win, the republican nominee has to win any single one of the swing states you see here in yellow. this just seems to me so obvious. this is so uncreative by rove. all he does is he says we re going to pick up the ones that obama got, pick up the swing states, and pick up a democrat state or two. an eighth grader could have done what rove just did here. what is the originality in this? it s not original, but history is repeating itself in this sense. this isn t going to be 2008, where the president wins by 95 electoral votes. it s going to be one of these kinds of races where where the usual states go the usual ways? but what you re looking at now is instead of the democrats needing to a few states in order to be successful, which is what it was 8 or 12 years ago, the shoe s now on th
disdain that it deserves. kimberly, i think one of the questions i want to go to kimberly first, is this whole question can we engage in a war and actually end it? the old question of colin powell, can we have an exit strategy? we left. is that in itself a good exercise, being able to leave? there was an independent iraqi government that told us to leave. that s a good sign. so how could we stay? i think that s a good point. we have to keep telling senator mccain, we don t own these countries, they tell us when to leave. bob herbert, sir, have a nice vacation. i m sorry, a nice christmas period coming up. and kimberly, thank you for your service to journalism all these years. and when we return, let me finish with why the republican wise men want to stop newt with everything they ve got. and wise women, i should say. some of the best columnists on the right now are women. center right, that is. you re watching hardball, only on msnbc. lashes want volume or length? how abo
back to hardball. now for the sideshow. first up, game changer? think again. last night we report that mitt romney had won the endorsement of failed delaware senate candidate christine o donnell. well, let s look at how the colbert report covered the tea party favorite s return to the national scene. boom! mitt romney is back in it! christine o donnell s endorsement will cast a spell over primary voters. i m not a witch. okay, i m sorry, that s a bad metaphor. in fact, in fact this endorsement proves that she is not a witch, because a witch would have gone for the eye of newt. what about mitt brought o donnell around to romney? he s changed his minds about big, important issues over the year. you know, that s one of the things that i like about him, because he s consistent since he changed his mind. how did she lose? romney s response, i m pleased to have her on my team.