are cleared for the big fight ahead. when will newt gingrich get the message? >> i was in philadelphia last night. not a single person ask me to op out. >> ozzie guillen is not so crazy about castro after all. >> biggest mistake of my life. captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- >> it started with a throwaway line on a ble talk show. democratic strategist hilary rosen at talking about mitt romney's not so secret weapon. >> "my wife tells me that what women care or what our economic issues." guess what, his wife has never worked a day in her life. she has never really dealt with the kinds of economic issues that a majority of the women in this country are facing in trams of how we feed our kids and send them to school. >> ann romney at rponded with her first ever tet. "i made a choice to stay home and raise five boys. believe me, it was hard work." rosen's comments at developed into a full-blown tsunami. network news shows lead with them. david axelrod -- "the comments were inappropriate and offensive." even the president weighed in, saying there is no tougher job than being a mom. hilary rosen has no official position in the white house or the obama campaign. why did this cause in motion -- commotion, mark? >> it terrified democrats. the question obama has against mitt romney is women voters, and one of the real achilles heels campaign is the inability to develop enthusiasm on family values of voters. this gives a wedge to romney, to make ann romney the embodiment of the stay at home mother, and it's backs, fairly or unfairly, of business in this and a patronizing attitude towar women who make that choice -- dismiss a finesse and a patronizing attitude towards women to make that choice. >> nina? >> mark is right. we all said stupid things on television, but this is in the category of "what was she thinking?" being a mother is away harder than what we're doing here. people pay nannies a lot so they don't have to do that every day. ann romney is the best thing mitt romney has going for him. >> hilary rosen does have children of her own and has a knowledge ids a tough job -- it is a tough job. colby. >> i heard the criticism before i heard what rosen said. i think barbara bush said it best. "i love working women, i love to stayt ho moms. whatever." >> you love all women. >> this is an issue that will hopefully be behind us. it has no bearing on how mitt romney will govern in the white house, when his wife does or doesn't do or did or didn't do. >> roger? >> the degree to which the obama mpaign was fearful of hilary -- theycomments attacked her immediately. hilary rosen -- you are right. no formal role with the campaign. she was so far off message that the next day -- >> nobody could find a basis for those statistics. there is a basis for this statistic, however. an ab c-"washington post" palm poll found a 19%- gender gap of women favoring obama over romney. he is forced farther to the right, having to re-litigating abortion and contraception. >> does this help close the gap? >> i think so. moving beyond a primary where he was contested by a cultural conservative, like rick santorum, and romney did either fill obliged to or out of conviction or terrell's respond and start to discuss these matters -- make no mistake about this -- in 2004, among married voters with children, george w. bush beat john kerry it -- only 28% of them in the electorate -- by 19%. john kerry, among other married voters without -- that is an important constituency to galvanize and turned out if you are a republican. >> let's talk about the campaign ads and rick santorum. >> miracle after merrill. -- miracle after miracle. >> what did santorum said about mitt romney as announced the suspension of his campaign? nothing, not a word. what romney nonetheless considered santorum as his nning mate? >> i am not taking anybody off the list. i don't have a list yet. i cannot say someone is on or off my list. >> ok, there's no list. rick santorum has decided to drop out of the race before he got clobbered again. he lost his 2006 re-election bid by 18 points in pennsylvania. santorum was all but ignored by moderators in their early debates. let us consider what rick santorum has wrought. did he make mitt romney a better candidate, or did he put him in a box, as "washington post" columnist e.j. dionne has suggested? >> i think rick santorum, who appealed to voters who like his ideology -- did not care if he was going to win or not, but like him talking about social issues. the candidate was one to talk about economic issues -- mitt romney. he forced mitt romney in a lile fthero th right and mitt romney wanted to go. now in the general, which is sort of begun already, mitt romney is having a harder time going back towards the middle and trying to pick up independent and moderate voters. that was santorum foster lasting contribution to the race -- santorum's lasting contribution to the race. >> college-educated males like him. who else, mark? >> conservatives like him, evgelicals, high iome voters. his profile is that of most republican nominees. about rick santorum, let it be said, he vindicated and validated what i think is the nominating process. he was david taking on the goliath bid he went connected with voters. but for this crop by the iowa republican party, he would have gotten a better left winning iowa that night. he thi in at sense it is important to note that he is one of the few candidates who has run for president and come out of the race stronger and better off than when he entered a bid that is an achievement. >> he has a good argument for retail politics. he was in those diners every day. >> he was, but newt gingrich also pushed mitt romney to the right. rick perry's stance on immigration, allowing romney take a position r tohe right. a succession of republican candidates moved romney to where he is now. >> i want to pass something else, but gilad. > -- go ahead. >> just quickly, romney was able to ignore santorum in iowa. santorum was able to emerge as the alternative because he got ignored at the beginning. >> leggs barack obama? ho iin h corner? -- who likes barack obama? was in his corner? >> women, african-americans, latinos -- >> younger voters. >> part of the challenge is to get them out but he had huge enthusiasm in 2008. clearly that is not there in the same way now. the registration of latino voters is actually down, and that is a problem for democrats. >> what about in a patent -- independents? >> let it be said about rick santorum, he won 11 contests, 11. in 1976, ronald reagan won at 12 and a = emerged as the leader of the conservative party. he has a chance to emerge as the leader of the conservative leader within the republican party. >> let it also be set about rick santorum that this is the guy who sa that barack obama was is n running -- was a snap for wanting children to go to college, and that listening to kennedy's speech about having no religion in politics made him want to throw up. in the first debate, and a year when it debates were more important than ever, rick santorum was a non-combatant. >> in fairness to him, he was marginalized because he was at zero in the polls. >> well, he had a chance and he blew it. he will be a good candate in 2016 if he gets chae. >> colby? >> hebrews' another thing, too, that there's a real fissure in the report -- he proves another thing, too, that there is a real fissure in the republican party. romney still has a problem with his base, although he is the nominee, or going to be the nominee. >> he did not get the catholic vote, even though he has every -- he is a very serious conservative catholic. let's try to figure out what the cotry would look like in a romney adnisttion, or second obama administration. >> if you want to spend trillions of dollars more in tax breaks for the very wealthiest of americans, even if it means adding to the deficit, gutting things like education and clean energy and medicare -- >> we have got enough, and we will make you live with what you have got r. >> roger wrote a column this week about the joy of putting money into money-market accounts. mit asell t yo money in a shoebox in the attic. roger asks, "the question for millions of americans find ways what, if anything, is the next president going to do for me?" >> mitt romney said in a speech recently that if you work hard and take some risks -- a word president, never uses -- there will be the opportunity for a better life in america. no guarantees, take risks, work hard, no governnt safety net, whicis what present obama promises. we will free the free enterprise system to work for you. forget about the government working for you. free enterprise will take care of you. >> president obama -- what is he going to do it for the person with money in the shoebox? >> he will try to keep the economy moving ahead so that the next person can survive to the next paycheck, and a robust recovery. a steady-as-you-no, we will move out of it together collectively, safety net for those who fall beneath. that is not bold. that is perhaps reassuring, but who is asking the question, what are you going to do for me? the mitt romney prescription will not work. >> mark, you wrote a column about the ryan budget and how romney is tied to it. >> what will be fascinating is if mitt romney did choose paul ryan as a running mate. whatever one says about paul ryan, he is the intellectual start of the republican party. as did i -- as it is might now come romney's record is that those who are comfortable will be more comfortable. barack obama said that the oer 98% of your taxes will be raised. you are only to raise taxes -- on the top less than 2% of americans, those making over $250,000 -- both of them are basically saying "free lunch." >> former president george bush said this week that if you do that, you are taxing small businesses and slowing down job creators. >> first of all, the first thing that what happened in the second obama administration is that the bush tax cuts would go out of the fact. there would be more revenue from that. that would happen instantly. there is this growing economic gap in this country, which obama would try to address some what, and obama is comfortable with saying that if you make money, we will help you make more money but i don't think he is opposed to some sort of sitting at -- safety net. he is a free enterprise guy, and i don't ow h that play in an economy where so many people are so scared. >> neither side seriously addresses the other problem we have, the budget deficits. both ryan and obama would only touch the trajectory a little bit, but those with the debt would still continue -- >>z the ryan budget is savage. budget is pretty -- >> everything gets cut except defense. the defense department wants to cut the budget. we have these weapons systems that don't work. congressman have them in their districts. and are pushing. >> super pacs are spending money like you cannot imagine. >> barack obama in 2008 became the first presidential nominee of either party since water gate not to accept public spending limits of public financing. he outspent john mccain 3-1. all rules are of. went to democrat makes a mistake, to -- once a democratic sen mistake, the republic of the deeper reservoirs, and it puts the democrats at a future disadvantage. >> are democrats sweating it out right now? >> that is absolutely true, but citizens united had not happened yet. we are in a whole different world where there is a parallel campaign that has all kinds of -- >> corruption. >> and the corruption we are going to see out of this -- i like that the supreme court is above politics, but this is one time when not knowing anything did not help them and not an appreciating what the consequences were going to be up on the chin this kind of money on our political system -- unleashing to spend money on our political system. >> after 2000 at the supreme court -- >> i don't think that i know very much -- >> bush's presidency -- >> they may have decided an election but it does not mean it didn't know much. >> you saw it already in the republican primaries but you saw it in iowa with the negative ads. you saw it after gingrh big time did you will see it with barack oma here is the thing -- super pacs are going to run these horrible campaign ads, and the campaigns are going to set "i didn't know." >> there will be many congressional races where at the last minute, half a million dollars will come in from one of the super pacs and destroy somebody. it will not matter that the tentative as it raised $15 million, $20 million for the state of i don't know why has been doing well. they can get leveled in the last week of a campaign and their plans to do that. >> the campaign's themselves are going to raise, i think in the end, $2 billion together. the first $2 billion campaign. this not super pacs. this ordinary americans contributing to republicans and democrats. obama is planning on a $1 billion raise. romney announced $600 million. it is going to go higher bid while americans did so much money to these campaigns, i don't know, but we do. >> well, we do know why they give it a lot of the bigger money, they want "access." >> it could be altruistic, brother and sister hurt, b -- sisterhood,r itould be exempt corporations. your selfish interests might be my altruistic objective. >> the bigger problem is that money is going to be used in such an negative white and turn off a lot of voters. the kind of stuff we saw in the republican primaries against gingrich, and i am not a fan of his, but the way they tore him up, the weight they tore into rick santorum, is a forerunner of what we are goi to see this year. castro, guillén, fidel the residents of little havana. >> we will not come to see any games here. >> i would like him to be fired from the shop. >> i am very, very sorry about the problem, what is happening, and i will do everything to make it better. >> that is ozzie guillén, manager of the miami marli, suspended for telling "time" magazine that he loves that raul castro and respects him. -- fidel castro and his cent -- and respects him. >> that is a guy who knows how to apologize. [laughter] >> it may not work for him. >> it may not work. what you saw by and large were cuban emigrants from an older generation. the average generation is not so insisted on parity. and theyove basell imiami. >> but the stadium sits at the heart of little havana. >> and it was taxpayer-funded. it is public relations problem. the bigger thing about ozzie guillén is not a "if i offended anybody it." he just cannot with m -- came out with mea culpa. because of our benighted policy towards cuba, we have elevated fidel castro to the position he has some work he has a mythic figure in much of latin america. >> 60"60 years and the expletive delted is still her." >> that is why he likes them, because he stood up to us. how many dictators has the united states supported over the years? a whole bunch, yet we still have th anti-castro feeling. >> athletes should stay away from politicians, politicians should stay away from athletes. he said at the wrong thing at the wrong place at the wrong time. >> that is the last word. see you next week.