word, collapse. while newt gingrich is on the rise. if you ask me, i think you can t discount the fact newt gingrich spent millions of dollars against mitt romney in south carolina and that matters. but it is also the collapse of the basic justification for mitt romney. newt gingrich is killing mitt knit in the debates. two this week. supposed to be another one in florida on monday. mr. romney today making sounds about potentially not showing up for the monday debate in florida. the romney campaign kicking a whole contingent of press off their campaign plane today. the romney campaign warning supporters they expect to lose tomorrow. in 2008, john mccain kicked mitt romney s butt. this year, none of these other republican candidates is john mccain. but could mitt romney still be beaten the same way he was beaten the last time? on a day like today it feels more possible than ever. joining us next is the man who ran john mccain s 2008 campaign, stay tuned. i want to look natural, not na
romney, i think you will struggle to find somebody who is really, really fired up. he s a candidate that talks to your head than heart. but he s drawing big crowds at his events, too. i think their campaign has done a good job turning people out for the events they ve had. i know you watched the debate last night, second one this week that was scored heavily in favor of newt gingrich, both of them were this week. right. today at the romney campaign started casting doubt on whether or not they are going to go to the next debate. monday, in florida. you have been a campaign strategist, having seen what happened at the debates, would you be advising your candidate to not go to the next one, what is the risk and benefit there? not on a nationally televised debate. i don t see the upside. if it s something other candidates committed to, for a while now, on a nationally televised debate i don t know i would do that. i don t know internally what is going on with the romney campaign, b
him on that issue, wants to shield his time at bain capital from any criticism, they want to make it an asset only, nothing bad could be said. no matter how much they want to do that, the criticism of his time at bain isn t made up, it s real been around for a long time, even though the establishment succeeded in shutting down other republican candidates from talking about it, the republican party establishment cannot shut up everybody and the problems with bain are on main stream journalistic journal. it s in the wall street journal, reuter, tampa bay times, there is stuff to be reported on. since launching his campaign, about how great he will be on the economy because of his business experience, real questions have been raised and whether or not it s an asset, makes people more or less likely to vote for him. mr. romney has been clum si to the point of pitiful on adirection the inevitable questions how rich that work at bain made him. questions about all his wealth and what he has d
back in 1967 your father set a groundbreaking standard in american politics. he released his tax returns. not just for one year but for 12 years and when dethat, he said, one year could be a fluke, perhaps for show. when you release your tax returns, will you follow your father s example? maybe. i don t know how many years i ll release. i m take a look at what our documents are. tomorrow, south carolina voters will vote in the republican primary. tonight, it s friday. has there ever been a more appropriate time for a cocktail moment? in the week that mitt romney showed himself totally unable to answer questions about his millions, about how he made his millions and where his millions currently reside and what kind of view they have from their kay
john kerry went through this in 2004. president obama went through this in 2008 during the primaries, so i think these experiences will forge a stronger candidate but there is no doubt this is not the type of week you want to have. a week ago the consensus conventional wisdom among every political reporter, person that works in republican politics, mitt romney would win the south carolina primary and the race would be effectively over. and this has entirely changed over the course of the week and it is hard to imagine scenario where seven days ago you could have pictured having a worse week than the one he s having. seven days ago mitt romney won iowa. he had won iowa. he may be one for three at the end of the weekend, we thought he would be three-for-three. what was your mccain s campaign main strategy against mitt romney in 2008? what did you see as his biggest strength and how did you try to