communications effort is about shifting the blame. you have got everything he wanted more or less, blaming the rich, even though they had nothing to do with the struggles of the middle or lower end. now he s blaming huge historical forces which he has no control over. he s supposedly modeling himself on harry truman in 1948 but he doesn t have the buck stops here sign on his desk. megyn: ron paul was on here moments ago. he was saying it s not all obama. he was saying some of these conditions were created long before president obama. but is it good for the president not to take any responsibility, sort of say it s all thanks to the larger picture? i think what he said is true. the conditions of the current economy, financial meltdown, missing wages the recession
democratic senator ron widen and republican congressman paul ryan teaming up together for some dramatic new ideas on how to save the program. but the white house is already panning the proposal. chief washington correspondent jim angle has the breaking details live now from washington. jim? reporter: hello, megyn. this plan is a huge and significant political development. paul ryan has joined forces with democratic senator ronwideen to produce a medicare reform plan that will have an impact on the 2012 election as well as entitlement reform because the new proposal will leave traditional medicare in place as a choice for seniors. what this bill does is it embeds for all time a program that progressives have felt very strongly about, and that is traditional medicare will always be part of this program. reporter: which means democrats can no longer accuse ryan of trying to destroy
thing. republicans say newt gingrich, as far as his debating skills, they think he can go toe the toe with obama but can t beat him. i think that s the thing to watch. newt gingrich has to convince people he can beat president obama, and that s what voters are now weighing. megyn: and what about ron paul? it s looking more like he could possibly win iowa, but can he win any other state, bob? is he capable of winning in this nomination? i think it s doubtful. certainly, are his chances better than they were in 2008? absolutely. especially when you have so many in the race because he has a solid base of support around 20% maybe, can he have 50% of the vote as people drop out? because i think after iowa two or three candidates drop out. that remains to be a question. so can ron paul win? yes. could he win new hampshire? yes. could he go the whole way? the chances are against him, but he is more of a force than he
iowa. first, though, the latest rasmussen reports poll on the iowa caucuses which shows a tight race now between mitt romney and newt gingrich, ron paul still running very strong. look at the numbers, 23% romney, 20 gingrich and 18%, ron paul, all within the margin of error. but look at this new poll in new hampshire, gingrich has 16% there coming in third behind romney and ron paul which, of course, comes a week after the iowa caucuses. it shows a considerable slide in some of gingrich s support and an uptick on romney in that state. joining me now is bob cusack, managing editor of the hill. bob, these polls it s only two, it s not a national average yet in terms of all the polls, but it has good news for romney and not such great news for gingrich today, i would imagine. i agree, megyn, and this shows the importance of this, tonight s debate for newt
tonight s big fox news debate. a lot ofize are on ron paul. he s making a big push. his campaign events are packing in some of the biggest crowds. polls show he is in the running to take the top spot on january 3. congressman ron paul joins me live right here. it s a pleasure. how are you doing it? these folks showing up at your rallies it s not just older folks. younger folks. you seem to have energized folks across the continuum. i don t know exactly what happened. i have been saying the same thing for 30 years. but all after should therein is a lot of excitement. i think it s the conditions of the country and the world. my policies have all bent same. i have been saying the same thing. but i think it represents how bad after we are in this country. the economy is in sham bells and i talked about that and warned about it. foreign policy, i wanted a different policy because i thought we would get bogged down