may not think much, but the feeling could be mutual. 41% of republicans don t want him running for president. again, we look at the numbers and scratch our heads. how much stock which we should put in? not a lot right now. republicans want to win and they re desperate to get back to the white house. lots of republicans are looking at chris christie. saying a couple of things. he clearly has the bridge scandal and they don t know how it s going to unfold. ittic mas a lot of sense to start asking questions about where is this going? where is this going to lead? there other republicans i might add who never liked chris christie in the first place. he thought he wasn t conservative enough and never will be able to win the nominati nomination. he is way too moderate to represent the new republican party. he still has those people who
really balanced budget running for the nominatio be running for the nomination. is there any value in the republican primary for voters to look at it and go well,nominati. is there any value in the republican primary for voters to look at it and go well, i don t agree with him, but i admire him to have sticking to his principles on? we ll see how he does in the debates. he needs to make his arguments much more coherently than he already has. earlier this year, for example, he got into a tussle with chris christie and chris christie came out on top on that. so when he gets into the combat arena of the republican presidential debate process, we ll see how he does. can he make arguments? can he advance his position? can he draw people in to positions that have typically been outliers inside the republican party. i would have argued, and i dare argued a year ago i thought he
enviable balance of the capital. would you make that claim today? i would say i m spending that capital on the war. not only did plummeting support for the war erode bush s second term, but he also overreached with the social security privatization push. his reform then collapsed under the weight of the other issues. they bungled the response to hurricane katrina and relations with congress soured to the point that when bush nominated harriet miers to the court, many republicans didn t even fall in line. after three weeks, bush was forsted to withdraw her nominati nomination. in 2008, his approval rating had sunk to a miserable 27%. congress had often been a thorn in the side of second-term presidents. it s a real question whether president obama will be able to forge a closer working relationship with congress this time around. then of course, there s the second-term scandal. clinton s second term dominated,
and whether she succeeds. also, republican platform supports extreme anti-abortion language. life, liberty and property to the unborn. exempting nothing including rape skin cyst from its law. the vast republicans don t even support the narrow definition they re talking about. we re going so show to it you, what the party says it stands for. we re going to ask the chairwoman of the platform committee to talk to us. charlie crist says the republican party has moved so far right there s no room in it for him. he s here to explain why he s endorsing president obama. plus we ll be monitoring the roll call throughout the hour to get you up to date on the inside action and the convention as mitt romney gets closer to clinching the republican nominati nomination. he needs 1144 votes. he s getting them. this is hardball, the place for politics. hey. hey eddie.
nominati nomination, in case you have forgotten with all the talk of mitt romney finally being the presumptive nominee. in fact, romney won half of the 24 delegates at stake in missouri s regional republican conventions on saturday. a new gallup poll shows mitt romney leading president obama by one point nationally within the poll s margin of error. meanwhile, president obama will visit some key swing states this week. he s going to speak at universities in north carolina, iowa and colorado. acting on student loans. and joining me now, politics staff writer for roll call shira it up9ñuáó and cnbc political correspondent john harwood. good day to both of you. good to see you. john i ll reach out to you first, mitt romney is beating president obama in the economy issue in the new nbc news/ wall street journal poll, 40% say that romney has better ideas to improve the economy compared to the president s, being ç34%. what s your read inside the