>> are things going from bad to worse for governor romney ? a flurry of new polls shows president obama gaining ground. our new nbc news/ wall street journal " poll has the president at the key number, 50%. that's a five-point edge over governor romney and not only nationally. a brand new quinnipiac poll shows the president widening the lead in the key swing states of colorado, virginia and in vice presidential nominee 's home state, paul ryan , wisconsin. the president now at 51%. but again, as politico points out, the game is not over yet and they're not the only ones pointing to that obvious note out. let's bring in the news nation political panel for this lovely wednesday. erin mcpike and democratic strategist keith boykin and steve dais. you are no fan of mitt romney . you said he should not be the nominee and dpaugt him hard campaigning in iowa this time and four years ago. is this the man you expected, the guy that said these peoples are victims and appear to not show very much concern for that 47% that he referred to?
>> well, i want to take you back to some things i said in the primary, tamron. if you might recall, i told your audience to look at the contested proo e mares and what you found in states that didn't have high mormon populations that were contested of san or the um or gingrich, he lost middle class voters in states like michigan, ohio , for example. and this campaign really comes down to right now it comes down to what are voters thinking when they go in to the polling booth on november 6th ? are they thinking they're not better off than four years ago or mitt romney 's the very kind of republican that we don't trust, that we don't like and even a lot of republican base would rather not trust or like? that's what it's battle about right now and the president obama is having the narrative he wants which is, hey, mitt romney is not who you want. he's the very kind of republican from wall street you have rejected in the past and because it's a narrative he wants and romney is somewhat walking in to that you are seeing barack obama sustain some momentum in the polls.
>> okay. but that doesn't answer the question. is this the person you feared would be the nominee when you look at tease remarks?
>> yes.
>> this is the person you feared would --
>> yes. i think what -- sure, sure. i mean, this is why i pointed out the numbers of middle class voters. the reality is that this is a conversation that we need to have as a country, which is, we can't sustain this. just regardless of your philosophy. there's a survival instinct . we can't sustain this level of debt, period. that's a conversation we need to have. but when you're the candidate that's the essentially architect of obama care and backed t.a.r.p. and too big to fail it is real hard. some of your very supporters crony capitalists to take care of the system bankrupting us now and hard to be seen as the reformer to do something about this and that's why this plays right in to president obama and the re- election campaign 's hands.
>> erin , you heard garret hague and we know in the interview yesterday staying true to the word. he is trying to modify some of the more incendiary language, particularly referring to people as victims and imply that these people don't want better. they want to just live the rest of their lives getting a check from the government. is that enough to quell the firestorm that's coming also from people in his party and to use frank terms, they think he's blown it?
>> well, we are seeing that a number of senators and senate candidates and governor of new mexico all republicans are really not agreeing with mitt romney on this. they're saying that he's wrong. we haven't seen a unified response yet from the republican party and i think that's mitt romney 's biggest problem. this is reverberating down the ballot and seeing republican candidates fall away from him. that's the big problem for the republicans over the next six weeks.
>> it is mott what he has said? obviously, in any case, you can look at, for example, democrats and the president said certain things and not all agreed with him particularly for health care battle. you won't always have your party 100% behind you. but when you say something to the notion that we heard from mitt romney , i mean, that goes beyond the pale of disagreeing.
>> you're right because it's -- about the philosophy and how they view a big chunk of the electorate, almost half. and when they are disagreeing with a world view of his, that's a big problem for republican unity over the next six weeks. that's the problem.
>> president obama said last night, he was asked to respond to romney 's remarks. here's what he said.
>> when i meet republicans, as i'm traveling around the country, you know, they're hard working , family people. who care deeply about this country and my expectation is that if you want to be president you got to work for everybody. not just for some.
>> so obviously, that line would get applause from, i would imagine, any audience in this country, but nonetheless, the president is up in the polls. and pretty much every category here. i mean, that would be the logical answer there. what else are you going to say? see the guy falling and sigh what's honest and true in your opinion.
>> when barack obama elected on election light night he said he would represent even the people that did not vote for him.
>> he says it's not a mistake. that the language, paul ryan says the same thing. it is inarticulate and not backing away from the core of what he said during that fund-raiser.
>> well, they should be because, you know, here's a guy who hasn't -- may notxes himself and may be part of the 47% for all we know telling everybody else they're freeloaders. that guy that doesn't -- who gets money basically for not working and perhaps isn't paying taxes. that's what people complain about. the larger problem though for mitt romney is republican philosophy ronald reagan on down is using government to help people. even the poor. the whole concept of trickle down economics is helping the poor. mitt romney is backing away from republican policies. they don't even believe this. the republican party 's always stated that their policies help the poor and the middle class but mitt romney 's saying he doesn't care about them. that's what's so devastating about it and republicans themselves are upset about what he's saying.
>> steve , i did not ask you specifically, are you upset about what mitt romney said? as a conservative, as a republican.
>> presigned. resigned. i mean, this has been a disastrous campaign. everything pegny noonan wrote in "the wall street journal " yesterday is 100% accurate. i would add to it. as conservatives, whether it's what we saw with the rules committee , at the convention, for example, what we saw with todd aiken, we have seen this campaign and the people around it go harder after us than gone after democrats or barack obama . this thing has been, this thing has been, really, an unmitigated cluster almost from the time that he became the obvious nominee and i have to tell you. you know, going toe to toe with the republican establishment five years in these primary cycles i'm not surprised by any of this. it's people that don't have a great vision for the country.
>> yeah. but you say the republican establishment, a lot of what mitt romney , a lot of his actions according to all of the pundits out there, it seems he is trying to play to the right of the party and include you. i mean, eric eriksson of red state and other conservatives applauded these remarks from governor romney and it's interesting that you're a conservative and you're not applauding what he said.
>> well, i think it's a conversation. i know why they're applauding it. they would like to use it to drag mitt romney to the right and stand for an issue and might cause a major conversation with the country. i don't think this is the right way to go about it. and using this kind of language, there's just certain terms and phrases you can use. trust me. i'm a talk show host . i'm a bit of an expert on this. there's certain phrases and things to say and once you use them it turns off the conversation. you cannot have a constructive conversation with people at that point and he's used some of that terminology, unfortunately.
>> steve , don't you think the problem of mitt romney is he doesn't have a core. nobody knows what he believes. the republicans aren't convinced he's a conservative. democrats don't know whether he's a moderate or a conservative. everybody warned people about this. jon huntsman said he was a perfectly lubricated weather vain and rick sanatorium said he was -- and now the fruit.
>> steve referred to peggy noonan , romney should look straight in to the heart of darkness where lies a republican defeat and almost couldn't lose. it was her assessment and she went down to roll off a number of issues and central problems with romney at this point. but erin , let's bring you back in. senator graham, interesting comments from him regarding romney . he needs to be talking about the economy and not in utah. he's not going to be beat because of money. he ought to be running in ohio and florida like he's running for governor and in virginia like running for sheriff. every time we would bring up an issue an we'd have a romney surrogate on, say he made an off the cuff comment, this is about the economy. we want to talk about the economy. and at every turn it seems they don't want to discuss the economy. even noted by senator lindsey graham , a republican.
>> look. mitt romney does want to be talking about the economy but he keeps getting taken off message. what i think is a big problem and hearing from the republicans is they are not seeing mitt romney out on the trail enough. he was just in atlanta having another fund-raiser. he's been off at many, many fund-raisers and we haven't seen him hold a lot of campaign events in some of the swing states . he had an event in ohio on friday. that's my home state. a huge swing state . 18 electoral votes .
>> down heavily in ohio .
>> you are right. it's a state that's been surprising to me he has not parked himself in and campaigned harder in. in fact, i wrote a story today about how michele obama is holding more public events over the past couple of weeks than mitt romney .
>> but the key -- the word i think you used is didn't park himself in ohio . you park a car. when's tied to there? the auto industry in ohio and he's stands with the auto industry and the other parts of the economy helped by that bailout. he's not found a way to defend his actions during that auto bailout and perhaps why he's not parking as you said in ohio . steve , what if anything can governor romney do to get conservatives like yourself enthusiastic and might be offended by the comments and even the middle class , you know, white voters out there who the republican party need right now? is there anything in the next 49 days to get the guy off the ropes?
>> there's one thing he can do and i think he has to do it in the first debate. where he has to be credible and sincere as a leader and got to take the attacks against him for being rich and elitist and successful and turn it to advantage by saying, yes, i'm successful and here's how i became successful by not doing things this president has done the last four years to make you not better off than you were four years ago and offer a short, concise, clear transparent plan with benchmarks that the american people can look at and say, hey, that's something to something if he gets in the white house . in other words, he's got to do what he's unwilling to do for this campaign thus far.
>> all right. steve deace, thank you. erin , thank you very much. keith is laughing at the advice. i think he won't take it. thank you.
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