condescending and elitist. what joe was, joe was scrappy at times, rude, feisty. i think that s what he needed to do last night. i think he could have done without a few smirks. he could have done without a few interruptions. but i don t think it really hurt him. and i think when you talk about style, joe, one of the things we ought to consider is, as barack obama goes into that now very important debate next tuesday, the format s a town hall. and that makes it a little bit harder for him to be tough and challenging romney because you have to be responsive to questions that those voters ask you. so i think obama s task is a little bit more difficult next week than simply to recoup from the disaster in denver. all right. mark halperin, al hunt and howard dean, thank you all so much. it s good to have you on the show. thank you so much. we ll be right back with willie s week in review. you re a little boring. boring. boring.
should point out that president obama was not a muslim. and was not, was perfectly legally qualified. so senator santorum can say those things, but he s not, he s not in line with the previous nominee of his own party. listen very clear, i am not john mccain and i ve never been like john mccain. and i m not running as a candidate who is anything like john mccain. senator santorum, it s willie geist here, how do you change the dynamic of this race at this point. you thought maybe in south carolina, given your religious background, you might capture some of that evangelical vote. you did get some of it, but a lot of it went to newt gingrich, despite the beach ball and all the talk about his personal life. how do you change the dynamic of this race, given what joe has said as well about the state of florida being very difficult without tons of money and ground game. how does rick santorum pop up so we re not talking about a binary race? it s the fourth state, 46 other states to go.
blow it out. very good. happy birthday, mark. thanks. now you have to eat that. i ll share that with joe. by the way, if it s not your birthday, don t tell us. it s next week, we ll do it all again. we ve come too far. mike, let s talk about what happened last night. any surprises for you? yes, the surprise was the strength of the mitt romney win. he won evangelicals, nonevangelicals, conservatives, all across the board moderates, women, men, cleared the very high 38-point haleprin bar, 39%. in fact, his win is so impressive that romney folks today are going to start going to other republicans, other conservatives saying, look, it s time for the general, it s time to stop this nonsense. we ve tested him. everybody s gotten their shot. and it s time to move on, come behind him. boy, mike, it was a big win. and let me just say too. we always put a lot of polls up, the suffolk poll. we were talking about him losing a point every day.
with about 17%. newt gingrich and rick santorum went back and forth all night for fourth and fifth place. welcome back, everybody, to morning joe. we re at j.d. s tavern in manchester. we have mark haleprin, and national affairs editor for new york magazine john heilemann, and many more to come today. but first of all, take us off, joe, this morning in terms of what happened last night. you saw it coming. well, new hampshire is the land of romney. you come into j.d. s tavern, you talk to everyone, they go, i am mitt romney. you can just sense it on the streets you can shake that narrative. i m getting a lot of people going no, no. but he is as jon huntsman said yesterday, new hampshire s home boy. he had a good speech. a well-written speech, delivered fairly well for mitt romney. and the fact is that he did make
and the best to ann, of course. thanks so much. thanks, joe, mika, the whole team. good to be with you. all right. south carolina. still ahead, we re going to talk to the second place finisher in last night s primary, congressman ron paul joins the conversation. that should be interesting. and up next, david gregory, chuck todd, and andrea mitchell. you re watching morning joe brewed by starbucks. [ male announcer ] is zero worth nothing? imagine zero pollutants in our environment. or zero dependency on foreign oil. this is why we at nissan built a car inspired by zero. because zero is worth everything.