>> junket to the holy land congressman on a junket over there and they go down and taking a look at the sea of galilee and this guy, congressman yoder, decides he's going to take off all of his clothes, all of his clothes, he put the junk in junket. so what we did, this trip to switch and we said hey, let's put together a segment about politicians who have misbehaved in the past. >> congressman kevin yoder, congressman anthony weiner, congressman lee, congressman eric massa. >> they're saying i groped a male staffer. yeah, i did, i tickled him until he couldn't breathe and four guys jumped on top of me. >> misbehaving politicians, a look back brought to you by fluffo. >> yes, i groped him. >> that is a good way to start the morning. good morning, everyone. it's wednesday, august 22nd. welcome to "morning joe." with us on set we have msnbc contributor mike barnicle. no groping. okay? >> all right. >> gosh. >> all right. >> getting this. >> please. >> msnbc political analyst and msnbc contributor richard wolffe and columnist for "the washington post" ezra klein and with us from philadelphia former governor of pennsylvania and nbc news political analyst ed rendell. good to have you with us. >> good morning, mika. >> good morning. hi, willie. >> mika, how are you? >> thank you for coming back. >> pleasure. >> what was the deal with that? >> with brian with the chest hair. he did great job. i would have gone one more button up. >> did you tell him to do that? >> i did not. >> i know who did. lewis. >> oh, of course. >> you know this is what we do here because that's what he thinks. >> he's new. never listen to lewis. >> brian needs to learn that. gosh, if you're mitt romney, and you're getting ready for your republican convention, this is probably a little bit of a frustrating time because you'd want to talk about the different visions for the country and sort of choice of paul ryan as a way to set the table for a real conversation, and everybody is talking about an issue they don't want to talk about. >> uh-huh. >> abortion and this guy who will not leave. a deadline has come and gone that would allowed republicans to replace todd akin's name on the ballot for the u.s. in missouri. many in the republican establishment are pushing for him to bow out. missouri's senator roy blunt joined by four of the state's former republican senators in calling for congressman akin to step aside. yesterday mitt romney released a statement urging the congressman to, quote, accept their counsel and exit the senate race. mr. akin was defiant. accusing the republican presidential candidate of making a bigger deal than is necessary over the comments. >> if you were in romney's position, don't you think that he may have bid this thing up and made a bigger deal about it than he needed to? why couldn't he run his race and i run mine? >> can you name one person, one member of the united states senate, you know, lot of conservatives ran, paul, jim demint, marco rubio, mike lee, any current member of the senate that has called you and asked you to stay in? >> no. our polling data says we're still up a point. >> akin also released a new campaign ad apologizing to missouri voters for what he said. >> i'm todd akin and i approve this message. rape is an evil act. i used the wrong words in the wrong way and for that i apologize. as the father of two daughters i want tough justice for predators. i have a compassionate heart for the victims of sexual assault and i pray for them. the fact is, rape can lead to pregnancy. the truth is, rape has many victims. the mistake i made was in the words i said, not in the heart i hold. i ask for your forgiveness. >> ed rendell, that will make it all go away, right? >> no, not exactly. you know, i don't think akin is necessarily dead in the fall election. a friend of mine who is a consult whonts has done work in missouri says he can hang in there and make a battle of it. look, it's so much bigger than missouri. it's a jawing reminder this whole incident of all the things that happened earlier this year, the blunt amendment, roy blunt, was run of the most anti-women pieces of legislation i've ever seen. plus, mika, one thing i think has been overlooked we're heading for a collision course. you heard governor romney and congressman ryan say they are for an exception for rape and incest. >> right. >> on the ban on abortion. the republican party platform just accepted a plank that said there are no exceptions, there are no exceptions for rape and incest. so the question is, governor romney, congressman ryan, what about your own party's platform? it's a mess. >> we'll get to the platform which the governor of virginia is heading up, but richard wolffe, it's very hard not to separate paul ryan from this guy who is a disaster, a complete disaster, and as joe was saying yesterday, the republican party certainly put on a great collective show of strength against him and should be commended for that. having said that, there's this link that he may not agree with, but i'll tell you, leading democrats certainly will seize upon it. >> look, this is not contrived by democrats. we can talk about one guy's incredibly offensive and stupid comments, but this republican party, which mitt romney now leads, has chosen to put abortion and the debate about abortion right up at the top of the agenda. they have gone after this time and time again at a time of economic crisis and hardship when the country should be coming together with the best ideas and they've said, we're prepared to shut down the government but if you give us something on abortion that will be okay. and here, this whole tying together of the akin/ryan bill, to take another step. >> right. >> against something which is already banned which is federal money going towards abortions, that is itself not just troubling, because of what it says about this concept of forcible rape, when they went after that, they weren't just going after abortion and federal funds, they were actually trying to separate teenage pregnancies, statutory rape, when you hear akin talk about predators, what do we think of as predators? people who prey on teenagers. this bill they put together which thankfully did not pass, would have meant that more teenage victims of rape, more teenage mothers would come into play in this country because they would have been singled out. you know why they would be singled out because they thought teenage sex is somehow some kind of squishy thing that people get abortions with. that's the bigger debate. the bigger debate is this party wanting to have social policy changed for their own agenda at a time of economic hardship. >> look how easy it was to press the button and say go and just -- you could go on and on. >> on and on. here, ezra, first of all, paul ryan gets chosen and there are these exciting concepts about the conversation. and the national sort of debate over this country, and yet the romney campaign wants nothing to do with paul ryan's budget. now they want nothing to do with paul ryan's connection to this legislation. where are they -- at some point they have to move forward. i don't know how they get out from under this. >> this has been a surprise to me. i thought i understood the direction they were taking when they chose paul ryan. >> i do too. >> you want to be the tough choices campaign. we will be the folks who maybe will cut medicare, who will cut the budget in a very serious way. i don't understand why you choose paul ryan for a campaign that would never under any circumstances say how could we say we would cut medicare by a dollar for current retirees. because of this immediate collapse into a kind of incoherence the campaign has been less focused on the economy than before the choice. akin is not something that mitt romney wanted to happen. but there have been a series of not just events but also tactical decisions like trying to focus on medicare and other elements of the budget, actually trying to focus on why mitt romney unlike paul ryan would not cut medicare, that have created this void that, sort of this messaging incoherence that event and commercials and other things are rushing in to fill. it can't be good for them though. >> willie? >> i thought governor rendell, something you said was remarkable, which was that the plank, as part of the platform that would -- constitutional amendment that would outlaw abortion including of cases of rape and incest the timing was incredible. establishment republicans trying to paint akin as this crackpot and then two days later they come out with an official party plank that makes it their policy, their belief, that basically what he believes is their belief. i think the timing was striking on this. >> they're doing everything they can to shoot themselves in the head. i mean it's really stunning. >> you know, what's kind of overwhelming, maybe to a lot of people, is that when you look at the republican party, and you think of the phrase to describe many elements within the republican party as being conservative, that's fine. conservatism is fairly popular in this country. a lot of people want smaller government. smaller government. less government. this flies in the face of all of that. this is having the government right in your bedroom, right in your lives, on this one issue. and i get the sense and i'm probably wrong because i'm wrong most of the time, they have spent the last two or three days, talking about congressman akin and talking about this issue, and talking about the platform and it's in the news today, talking themselves right out of winning the election. because they have -- i would think, activated one demographic group, women, put them on alert, be careful. >> yeah. >> watch out. >> and you would think, you talk about the comments, willie, being one crackpot's comments here's the problem with the news coming out today, which you know democrats will seize upon again. turns out the doctor that gave congressman akin his ideas about how rape does or does not get a woman pregnant, his name is john wilkie and he served as president of the national right to life committee and he was a surrogate for mitt romney during his 2008 presidential bid. and while dr. wilkie's views have been widely dismissed by modern science, and logic, romney's '08 campaign embraced dr. wilkie and released a statement touting his endorsement saying dr. wilkie is a leading voice within the pro life community and will be an important surrogate for governor romney's pro life and pro family agenda. back in 2008. >> that's a release mitt romney will rexwrets. >> yeah, go ahead. >> i'll say this, i always feel bad for candidates like romney on this thing. they didn't know this guy that well. they certainly were not trying to endorse these views. there's something there which is just you get somebody that thought this. this is the problem when you get into bed with everybody from every part of the party no matter how extreme you come into the fray years later when something else they say becomes a huge deal. i feel somewhat bad for the romney campaign on this because this isn't the conversation they want to have and this guy, i'm sure they had no idea what he believed, but this has been to some degree the cost of capitulating to every segment of the far right in order to get this nomination. >> this is not a winning agenda. >> this is not good. it's not the campaign that the former moderate governor of massachusetts could have run. it's a campaign he did run to win the primaries, and now these are the long-term costs of it. >> that's the problem, right? he was trying to pretend, trying to prove he was no longer the moderate former governor of massachusetts. he was trying too hard. if you have a candidate who doesn't really know what he stands for and is just trying to get some advantage then you end up getting endorsements from people who serve a purpose who aren't really aligned with you and you trumpeted it because that proves something you are, in fact, probably to the really. >> ed rendell, how do you -- what more could the romney campaign have done in a situation like this if you can try to do some reverse psychology? did he -- when mitt romney went on camera for the new hampshire station, did he come out strong enough against akin? >> well, i think he did in this limited instance, but the problem is, as richard said, he's been catering to the far right all along. he missed an opportunity on the blunt amendment. remember he was asked about the blount amendment and initially said he wouldn't support or have signed it and then backtracked. that was his first opportunity to show a little distance in a coherent sensible policy towards women. she should have come out against the blount amendment. when rush limbaugh trashed that girl, he should have come out and infinitely stronger way and said that young woman was doing just what she had to do and rush limbaugh's comments were reprehensible, et cetera. it's an accumulation of things. also, vetting paul ryan. did they vet paul ryan well? did they understand he was cosponsor of this type of bill? did they understand he actually wrote and asked for stimulus money after denouncing stimulus? did they understand that in 2002, he avidly supported president bush's stimulus. doesn't seem to me they paid much attention to any of that. >> i would think on the issue of abortion especially they would look at what his record is, given this has been a tough one for mitt romney. i mean it's been an issue that -- >> impossible one. >> impossible one. issue you know at some point you're going to be asked about. how hidden is this legislation? >> but they probably did, right? what does mitt romney fear when -- in a campaign like this? he doesn't fear particularly that he won't be seen as -- that he'll be seen as moderate on abortion. he fears that the republican right, i'm sorry, will see him as moderate on abortion, that the base, the folks he needs to activate, to turn outs in this election to win a state like ohio, get ads showing him on both sides of the abortion issue, governor of massachusetts he's a moderate, would vote to uphold roe v. wade and it will shake their confidence. bring paul ryan, brings these fiscal credentials but has this 100% rating from prot life groups and that strengthens you. these groups can say even if you don't trust mitt romney, paul ryan is there and he'll keep him from being a squish. this is seen for them as a benefit at the time. >> ed rendell. >> a fatal flaw, if mitt romney loses this election he's going to lose it because his campaign never understood the republican base was coming out to vote against barack obama, period. they didn't need to activate it. it was ac vi tated on its own. and they should have from the time he clenched the primaries, they should have been moving decisively to appeal to those independent, moderate republicans, in the suburbs of every big city, the key swing voters, in so many different swing states. to design their policy, towards getting out their base, a base that was coming out, maybe they would have held their nose in the voting booth but they were coming out to vote against barack obama, i think that's a fatal flaw. >> barnicle? >> what's your reaction to all of this as a woman, as a mother of two daughters? what's your reaction? >> i actually think that -- i kind of feel sorry for the republican party at this point because this guy has made a joke of them and if this is how they really feel, the ultraright about, you know, the issues of rape, this doctor, i have to say, it gives me pause. they look stupid. they look incredibly stupid. and i'm not sure what they can do about this disaster of a candidate and maybe they've done everything they can do. i think mitt romney should have done more and i said it yesterday on the set. he should have spoken for the women in his life. and he should have spoken from the heart. and he should have been deeply insulted for them. that somebody like this can have such an important role in our country's future because obviously the senate, the makeup of the senate, is going to be one of the key stories that shape our political future, so i -- i think it's pathetic. they look like they're losing. and then the -- i do think that this has a direct link to paul ryan and right now, the question i'm asking myself, maybe ed you can chime in on this, is paul ryan who i thought was a good choice for the national conversation, is paul ryan a bad choice or just a choice that's being handled badly? >> i think a little of both, mika. i think given where they had to go and again, i go back to my point, they didn't have to activate the base, the base was coming out to vote against barack obama, i think they made a bad choice. i think paul ryan will do very well at the convention because he's smart, he gives a good speech, looks like everybody's next door neighbor, he comes across as not a threatening guy. he'll give a good speech and there will be a little chance for them to redeem themselves. but over the long run, i think they've done incalculable damage. i remember when christine o'donnell in delaware started making those crazy statements it almost helped joe sestak the democrat beat pat toomey. joe sestak wound up losing by a point because we kept hearing christine o'donnell on philadelphia television saying those bizarre things. a friend of mine came up to me after the recent incident after akin, i wasn't going to vote for obama, don't think he's been a good president, i can't vote for the other side, these guys are just nuts. >> yeah. >> scott brown. >> we got to get to the scott brown story. that's a great point. he really -- he's taken the opportunity to show himself to be -- >> and just -- >> level-headed guy. >> this is the week before the republican national convention. >> oh, my lord. >> a nightmare. >> we're talking about the definition of forcible rape. >> and whether or not -- >> legitimate rape. we're not talking about anything, not talking about the economy and frankly haven't talked about the economy since paul ryan was chosen. it's been medicare, it's been the budget and it's been now this week rape. so this is certainly not where the romney campaign wanted to be. let's look at new polls, nbc/"wall street journal" polls the wap the country is viewing the parties. 45% of registered voters have a negative view of the republican party. 45%. 36% have a positive view. 42% of democrats view the party positively. and 40% negatively. poll also reveals mitt romney received virtually no bump after naming paul ryan as his running mate. right now the obama/biden ticket leads romney/ryan, a national poll, 48 to 44. before ryan was added to the ticket, president obama was leading romney by six points, 49/43. taking a look at 12 battleground states, president obama has seen his lead shrink to 3 points, within the margin of error. the president's lead among swing state voters was about 8 points in july. one big thing romney does have going for him, only 31% say the country is better off since president obama took office. 42% say the country is worse off. ezra, anything jump out as you look at those numbers? >> you always have to be careful with battleground polling dealing with smaller sample sizes and brings higher levels of error. you want to see a number of them. in this election so far, the pattern has been that obama is stronger in battleground states than he is nationally. usually you're seeing the battleground polls return better than the national polls. the margin is a little flip here, four to three in this poll and a much more substantial deterioration inside the internals of the battleground polling than the national polling. i would like to see, you know, that ends up being backed up by other polls or not. >> you mentioned scott brown, before we go to a break. he spoke o