eric: right now we re out of time. fascinating. see what happens. liz, thanks as always. that does it for as you. jamie: great to have you with us today. we ll send you to washington. have a great day. thousands of nato and afghan troops are fighting resistant militariants. military officials are optimistic so far but it could take a month to achieve their goal in marjah. bic contai dick cheney and n haven t been shy about criticizing each other. the two vps are dishing it out today. is the obama administration giving up a major concession to keep the mexico u.s. border secure. all that and we re also live at daytona. i m shannon briem. america s news headquarters live at the nation s capitol starts right now. military officials say u.s. marines and afghan soldiers are now occupying a majority of the taltaliban stronghold of marjah. thousands of troops are fighting militants. they re facing sustained gun battles in streets littered with booby traps. it could take a
read every morning, updated throughout the day, check back often, log into firstread.msnbc.com. and if you were invited to a state dinner, how excited would you be? of course i would be excited. it s a state dinner, such a great occasion, even in it a recession for this country to have these kind of events. and it is significant and i think mark made a great point about it. we re not on the list, but we ll talk about it. that s the big picture for today. i m tamron hall. and i m david schuster. hardball with chris matthews starts right now. four democrats and a health problem. let s play hardball. good evening, i m chris matthews in washington. leading off tonight, the four horse men of the apocalypse, pestilence, war, famine and death. now they have four new names, lieberman, landreau, lincoln and nelson. the four democrats who just say no to a public option for health care. plus tonight, the bishop and abortion. the bishop of providence, rhode island has told