match-ups with republicans. clinton beating trump 56% to 40%. and bush 51% to 46%. but sanders also wins in a theoretical race against trump, 59-38. and nearly ties bush, 47 for sanders, 48% for bush. so much to talk about here let s bring in the host of inside politics john king who is with me now. john, let s start with the head line, donald trump up six points from the last time cnn did a poll so his comments about john mccain and other comments he made ruffling republican leadership, they re only helping him. only helping him. now there s a ceiling, majority of republican party still opposes him. but he has his slyke in the 16th, 17 candidate race when you hear him saying i think i can win, you have to look at that. right now, he criticized john mccain a lot of us thought that breaks the rules. the anti-establishment republicans like him. part of it is issues. part of it is that he s kicking the other candidates. part of him is he says things they don t think other politicians
welcome back to the show. big news today on the battle over marriage equality across the country. in oregon this afternoon, a federal judge will hear arguments about the state s ban on same-sex marriage. interestingly, no one will even be in court to defend the law, which four gay and lesbian couples are challenging because the national organization for marriages last-ditch effort to get in on the court action was rejected. seven people in georgia challenged that state. shelton and chris from atlanta say, quote, it s really hurtful and offensive that the state of georgia is refusing to treat our families fairly. a lot going on in the same-sex marriage movement today. there s also a new book out about that movement that is ruffling a lot of feathers.
nbc news capitol hill correspondent luke russert joins me from cambridge, maryland, on the eastern shore. what more can you tell me about this gop immigration plan? well, craig, around 4:30 p.m. is when the leadership will announce this plan to their conference, and as of right now we re still waiting to get the specifics from them. what we do know is there will be some sort of pathway to legalization but not permanent i m sorry, permanent status but not full, shall we say, citizenship. that s an important distinction that s caused a lot of rangling or ruffling of the feathers. a sticking point as we mentioned before comes down to border security. you heard it from speaker john boehner. since we last spoke i spoke to some of the house gop conference and outside groups, one thing they re really still hung up on is what constitutes border security, what does it look like, and then even if they were to agree to some border security
will not be engaged on its own. the naval strike missile inflicted serious damage on the decommissioned foot long knm trontime. it s the latest generation surface warfare systems being developeded by the navy team. the polish navy is set to arm themselves with these missiles which clearly work pretty well. wow. yeah. it worked. ahead on starting point the first lady ruffling feathers over a decision to skip a diplomatic trip to china. michele obama says she has a good reason. we ll explain that next.
and that beautiful shot you re showing now where he picked up that very disabled child and what a moment. it s beautiful and the affection. remember during the inaugural mass there was another moment like this where he got out of the popemobile and embraced another severely disabled man, he really has a heart for these people, you see that, and i think this is going to be the mark of this papacy, a direct outreach to people. as he said to his priests on thursday, fredricka, he advised them to go look for the lost sheep and when you come back, you better smell like those sheep. he wants them amid the people and in the muck of life and perhaps that s where the church needs to be now. and departing from script, so to speak, but one has to wonder how many feathers he s ruffling by doing this. there are some who say because he appears to be a nontraditionalist that that is not sitting well with those in the vatican. yeah. is that true? i will tell you i don t know about in t