75,% of the american people are paying close attention to the debt debate. it s interesting because this president seems to think that he can take a page out of previous president s play books, nixon, ronald reagan, bill clinton and go over the heads of the press, districtly to the american people to make his point. but those presidents knew enough to use the oval office or the east room or use the power for presidency in very rare, pointed kinds of ways to persuade and cajole and educate the american people and this president seems to be engaging in campaign strategizing from the white house which is why i think he speaks criticism from the right and left. jon: what about the body language? i was struck while i watched that speech, he seemed very stiff. i felt i was watching the animatronic version from all of presidents from disney world. i think peggy noonen called him a martian if that helps. and over the heads of the press, because they re carrying him.
this? very much so. poll after poll shows that 65, 75,% of the american people are paying close attention to the debt debate. it s interesting because this president seems to think that he can take a page out of previous president s play books, nixon, ronald reagan, bill clinton and go over the heads of the press, districtly to the american people to make his point. but those presidents knew enough to use the oval office or the east room or use the power for presidency in very rare, pointed kinds of ways to persuade and cajole and educate the american people and this president seems to be engaging in campaign strategizing from the white house which is why i think he speaks criticism from the right and left. jon: what about the body language? i was struck while i watched that speech, he seemed very stiff. i felt i was watching the animatronic version from all of presidents from disney world. i think peggy noonen called him a martian if that helps.
and he let terrorists get a safe haven in afghanistan, and we ll have a challenge at home. no one stepped up and i think it will be a part of the debate. so far not so good. and i was fascinating, peggy noonen said we cannot lead without money and we re out of it. the president overruling the pentagon and top legal opinions at department of justice. is he within his rights to continue without congressional approval? and really, ultimately, what can congress do short of voting to defund the effort? well, that s all they can do. look, i mean, the war powers act has been an anthema. and president obama is trying to have it both ways and knows he couldn t get congressional approval for the libyan commission and that s tricky legal logic. you re a master of word and
three swords this the meet the press interview. one is the food stamp issue, went nuts over. two the embrace of romney care and third of course the ryan issue. i think gingrich had a pretty good argument to be made about the arguments of medicare and ration it, but lost in the media. judy, what about pleading the fifth. anything i ve said can t be used against me. peggy noonen wrote in a column this week, maybe young people would find newt refreshing because they ve never seen him before. thises a guy we haven t seen before either. not quite the old newt. one has to wonder. well, cal, to be fair to the media, it wasn t just the media that came down on newt. a lot of his fell no conservatives did as well. yes, he did. he spent 30 minutes on rush
them tearing down every person running for the nomination. i think that gingrich should sort of expect this stuff and relevant that he s running in a conservative primary where people actually care about these kinds of things. you know, he does have major baggage. he does have a lot to explain and has a lot to overcome. so you feel it s very accurate to describe it that way. peggy noonen had an interesting column and look, the change now the way we judge politicians if it s ongoing trouble, the way that john edwards was carrying on in the 2008 campaign and the past, the voters talking, to forget it. the i think the overwhelming media consensus, the buzz, the daily beast, saying gingrich can t win, can t win, everything we touched on. in the new rubble wrote, don t kid yourself. this guy could win. walter shapiro has been in a