but just in right now, new poll numbers painting a very telling picture of the race for the republican presidential nomination. we can now report that mitt romney is the candidate to beat in at least two of the crucial first four voting contests of the 2012 election with herman cain a sometimes close, sometimes distant second. our new cnn "time" orc poll of republican voters just released shows romney on top in iowa's january 3rd caucuses, leading herman cain by three points, but that's well within the sampling error of plus or mines. in new hampshire, romney has a lead over cain. in south carolina, a two-point edge for romney, again, within the margin of error. in florida, it's romney 30% to cain's 18%. before the polls came out, romney made it clear he's setting his sights very high. >> i think the greatest threat to my success would be president obama and i'm planning on beating him soon. >> let's talk about these new poll numbers with our chief political correspondent, the anchor of "state of the union," can candy crowly. looks like romney is doing really well now. >> right and he needs to do well in new hampshire because if he doesn't, new hampshire is where he can reset the republican primary. but look, we should put a cautionary note out there. because polls about the caucus are very tricky business. but what it shows you is mitt romney remains what he was when he started. the weak front-runner. we've called him that from the beginning and we've seen the number twos come up, go back down again. in the end, it reminds me of the election season when democratic voters dated howard dean and married john kerry. that in the end, here's going to be the primary question, who has the best chance of beating president obama? and in the end, that may well be mitt romney. he's certainly on his way. >> say what you will, at least the snapshot right now. we knew he would do well, be u the fact he's doing as well as he is just ahead of cain, that's pretty significant. especially iowa, there was talk he wasn't even going to try to compete there. >> but iowa is a different banana when it comes to those caucus caucuses. south carolina, there was so much talk, where his mormonism be a problem, but independents can also come in and vote in south carolina. so, that certainly can sway the outcome, so he is sitting pretty well at this point right now. >> these numbers are not doing well in any of these states. stand by for a moment, candy. while republicans are battling to find their challenger, the president is reframes i should say his fight against the republicans. and their event yul nominee. jessica yellin is joining us now. so, what is this emerging new white house strategy about? >> in the president's west coast swing this week, you've seen him roll out plans to help homeowners and grad yats with their loans. that gives voters a glimpse of the obama campaign's re-election strategy. have you picked up on the president's new message? >> we can't wait for an increasingly dysfunctional congress to do its job. we can't wait for congress to do its job. we can't afford to keep waiting for them if they're not going to do anything. >> yes, he's running against congress, but there's something else. notice a new message discipline? he was famous for it in 2008. >> yes, we can. yes, we can. yes, we can. >> now, it's back. >> pass this bill! we need to pass this bill. pass this jobs bill. >> began with his push for the jobs plan. >> one thing that sometimes hasn't occurred, the president says the same thing over and over again. repetition matters. he's out there selling it and giving people a real understanding that he has a direction for the county are in terms of not just jobs in the short-term, but in rebuilding countries economic strength for the long-term. so that's very important. >> important because right now, the president has a chance to define his message on the economy before there's a republican nominee. anita dunn was the white house communications director. >> president needs to play out their vision. >> for democrats, it's all about drawing a contrast with republican plans for the future. >> he seems to have made the turn streenlgically, wait, i need to talk about the future. >> but this republican thinks it's already too late. >> the fundamental problem for the president's message is that three quarters of the country believes we're off on the wrong track and so, they pretty well closed their ears to the president's message. president obama's message is not resognating with most americans. >> p president's trying to reverse that now. talking about polls, the current gallup poll shows 71 person of americans say the economic outlook is getting worse and 50% disapprove of the job the president is doing. those are are difficult numbers for a president to overcome. >> pollsters love to look at that key question. is the country moving in the right direction or the wrong direction and if it's moouing in the wrong direction, you know who they're going to blame. >> right, but if you can move that into the right direction, that's the key factor. >> he's got a year to go and hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign money he'll have to make that case. money talks. thanks, jessica, for that. we were talking in this brand new poll, rick perry, you know, he was doing a month ago so well. but if you look in these states, in florida, he's at 9%. iowa, 10%. new hampshire, 4%. in south carolina, he's 11%. in every one of these states, he either comes in third, fourth or fifth. not where he wants to be. >> it isn't and i think rick perry has been his own best looking back strategist when he said i shouldn't have done those debates because in general, the way most republicans have seen rick perry has been in these debat debates. he seemed tired, as though he didn't know what he was talking about. he would garble things. he came in and boy, swept right to the top and every debate, his numbers just got lower. he's got time, they all have time, but not much. it's november. as far as we know, the first contest will be in the first week of january in iowa. >> no one forced him to pick the fight in the last debate with mitt romney over service, his lawn service that romney may have had an illegal worker there. that was rick perry who decided to get into a fight with mitt romney on that. >> absolutely, so he has been his own worst opponent at this point and i think he was -- he's perfectly right in saying i shouldn't have done those debates. now, the problem is, you can't not do these debates. wouldn't have worked the other way, but the debates have done him damage. he needs to do better. there are plenty of opportunities between now and january in debates for him to do better. >> because if any of these republican candidates avoid the debates, you can make the case they're afraid to debate their fellow republicans. how could they ever debate the president of the united states? >> there have been debates in the past that have been fatal. there's been a fatal mistake made in them by a candidate or two, so again, there's time to make it up, but they're running out. >> thanks very much. we're going to have much more on the president's new strategy, much more on the republican race for the white house. james carville and ari fleischer are standing by to join us in our strategy session. also, millions of tons of debris from japan's tsunami found floating in the pacific. will it reach the west coast of the united states? hey, everyone's eating tacos outside bill's office. [ chuckles ] you think that is some information i would have liked to know? i like tacos. you invited eric? i thought eric gave you the creeps. [ phone buzzes ] oh. [ chuckles ] yeah. hey. [ male announcer ] don't be left behind. get it faster with 4g. at&t. ♪ ♪ and the flowers and the trees ♪ ♪ all laugh when you walk by ♪ and the neighbors' kids run and hide ♪ deep inside you, there's a person who refuses to be kept deep inside you. ♪ but you're not ♪ you're the one be true to yourself. what's healthier than that? jack cafferty has the "cafferty file." >> more americans are against gun control than ever before. gallup's annual crime poll shows support for various gun control measures at historic lows, including a ban on handguns. only 26% of americans now favor a handgun ban. that's down from 60% when gallup first asked this question in 1959. also, the poll shows that for the first time, there is more opposition than support for a ban on semiautomatic guns or rifles. 53% to 43. in 1996, these numbers were nearly reversed. congress passed a ban on assault rifles in 1994, but that expired in 2004. overall, support for making gun laws more strict is at its lowest level ever. 43%. as recently as 2007, a majority of americans favored stricter gun laws. it's worth noting the growing opposition to gun control shows up among all groups. only democrats, eastern residents and those without guns in their homes still favor stricter gun laws and there's not a single group with a majority in favor of banning handguns. what's interesting here is that americans are shifting to a more pro gun stance despite high pro file incidents of gun violence, like the shooting of gabrielle giffords and 18 others. gallup suggests the reasons don't appear to be related to crime. instead, the pollsters suggest the trends may reflect a growing acceptance of guns and of support for the second amendment. what was it then candidate obama said in 2008? that when people in small towns lose their jobs, they get bitter and quote cling to guns or religion, unquote. here's the question -- go to cnn.com/kafr fifile, post a comment on my blog or go to our post on "the situation room's" facebook page. >> thank you. when a giant wall of water slammed into japan in march, it killed thousands of people, flattened homes across the country's northeast coast. the water receded carrying countless pieces out to sea. all of a sudden, in the middle of the pacific. chad myers is tracking millions of tons of all this debris that's out there somewhere. chad, what do we know about the debris and is it headed towards the united states? >> it sure is. floating building, refrinl raters, parts of cars, propane tanks. thought to arrive in about three to five years. appears to be quicker now. why? the models the researchers got into were looking at debris not floating above the water. they were thinking about stuff that sits in the water and only goes with the current. well, this stuff is getting blown along faster and eventually will become a hazard. we're talking five to 20 million tons of stuff. this is all the lives that were taken from these people. the lives, their livelihood, their buildings, homes, boats. this is what they found near midway island. they didn't expect this to arrive for another three months because it was above the water line, so people are out there trying to get this debris out. but there is so much stuff in the water, wolf. we will have this on our shores many, many years. it will be 15 or 20 years before this goes away and boating in the pacific may slightly become a hazard and to the hazards of trying to surf in hawaii when you have a refrigerator floating in front of you. >> do we know if this junk out there is from japan or just junk collected in the ocean, if you will? >> if you walk along the beaches of oregon, washington and california, you see stuff washing up from japan, china, thailand, all the time. know this is from japan because the floats that are floating literally have fukushima on the side of them. so the boats being identified as from those areas around where the tsunami hit. yes, we know this stuff is from japan. >> they thought three to four years, but now it's speeding up. what's the cause of that? >> a boat was flat in the water, it would be a very slow boat. this is not a boat. this is not flat in the water. this is like a sail. so now when the wind hits this sail and not only this building probably sunk already by now. but other things are floating above the water and all that wind is pushing it much faster than the current, so the speed is, the researchers in hawaii think it could twice as fast now. by 2013 and into hawaii sometime early next year. >> chad, thanks very much. thousands of women in yemen are gattinging to pr test the government. why it included a fiery demonstration and the rangers could clinch the world series tonight, but the game has been postponed. and later, rick perry blames one thing for any mistake his campaign has made. james carville and ari fleischer are here to talk about that and a lot more. that's coming up bottom of the hour. ♪ for spacious skies ♪ ♪ for amber waves of grain ♪ ♪ for purple mountain [ male announcer ] for the first 100 years and for generations to come, thanks for making us a part of your life. ♪ whoa delivering mail, medicine and packages. yet they're closing thousands of offices, slashing service, and want to lay off over 100,000 workers. the postal service is recording financial losses, but not for reasons you might think. the problem ? a burden no other agency or company bears. a 2006 law that drains 5 billion a year from post-office revenue while the postal service is forced to overpay billions more into federal accounts. congress created this problem, and congress can fix it. hey, jessica, jerry neumann with a policy question. jerry, how are you doing? fine, i just got a little fender bender. oh, jerry, i'm so sorry. i would love to help but remember, you dropped us last month. yeah, you know it's funny. it only took 15 minutes to sign up for that new auto insurance company but it's taken a lot longer to hear back. is your car up a pole again? [ crying ] i miss you, jessica! jerry, are you crying? no, i just, i bit my tongue. [ male announcer ] get to a better state. state farm. a striking new study reflects a growing inquality in the united states. lisa sylvester is monitoring that. >> there's a new study and it shows that the nation's top 1% is getting richer at an astonishing rate the rest of the country is not seeing. the congressal budget office shows income for the top 1% of earners grew by 275% in the last 30 years. the middle class saw a 30% growth while the poorest increased by only 18% and a rare and defiant new twist to yemen's protest. muslim women are burning their veils in anger against the regi regime's new crackdown. it is highly symbolic to wear veils in women. they claim that their president is killing women and proud of it. at least ten women died yesterday in clashes with government forces. and singer amy winehouse died of alcohol poisoning. with alcohol levels more than five times the legal limit. the coroner called it a death by misadventure. the 27-year-old artist has battled with alcohol and drug abuse for several years, was found dead in her home in july. and if you were expecting to watch baseball tonight, it is time to make other plans. game six between st. louis and the rangers has been postponed until tomorrow night. the forecast in st. louis is calling for rainfall throughout the evening. major league baseball says it wants to play a game of this magnitude without any weather delays, so sorry, wolf, you will not be able to sit in front of the tv tonight and watch the world series. >> i'll watch piers morgan. that will be a good show. watch a little piers, walker, no baseball. thank you. a week of apparent blunders by republican presidential candidates. are they really mistakes or political tactics? plus, our brand new poll numbers just released this hour. james and ari are coming up in our strategy session. ♪ [ multiple snds ng melodic tune ] ♪ [ malennounc ] at northrop grumman, makthworld a feplace. th's value performance. northr gruan. mitt romney is the latest republican candidate to make a mistake in the glare of the national spotlight or was it something more calculated? joe johns is joining us with some details. what exactly did he do? >> month to go and it's been a long race. even for some candidates who have been running just a short time. mitt romney's recent slip-up, if fs the a slip v up, goes to show that rain must fall. if republicans didn't like romney's position on the union busting proposal in ohio, all they had to do was wait one day before he changed it. on tuesday when asked if he supports the ballot issue to restrict collective bargaining, romney gave the generic almost noncommittal answer. even though he just visited a phone bank where conservative callers were selling the measure to the public. >> i'm not speaking about the particular ballot issues. those are under the people of ohio, but i support the effort of the governor to reign in the squ squal of government. >> but by today, romney had a different answer. >> i'm sorry if i created any confusion. i fully support governor casic's question two in ohio. i know there are other ballot questions there in ohio and i wasn't taking a position on there. >> one would ban government from forcing people to buy health insurance, which might give pause to a reformer like romney. raising the question what happened was a mistake or political tactic. >> he walked into a call center for these two ballot initiatives and appeared to either not know what they were about or intentionally tried to dodge them to kind of protect his brand for a general election. so, it's one or the other. >> if it was a mistake, romney is not alone. perry's latest goof was stepping all over his big rollout with off the cuff remarks drudging up long buried questions about president obama's birthplace. >> it's fun to poke at him a little bit, hey, let's see your grades and your birth certificate. >> then the sheer strangeness of herman cain's latest ad, showing his chief of staff singing the candidate's praises and puffing a cigarette. author john avalon sees the ad as harmless, but not some of the other mistakes. >> it's worse a reflection on not only whether that makes a candidates look bad, not only makes a process look bad, but makes our country look bad. >> and adding to john's point that the cain ad maybe different, that ad has logged more than 100,000 views on its website. he's certainly cultivate d the image of an unorthodox candidate. >> we played it in full yesterday here in "the situation room" and it would have been a normal ad, but no one knows the chief of staff and smoking like that was a little strange. >> a throwback to the '60s. plus, the big smile at the end that cain gives. >> thanks very much. let's discuss what's going on in the world of politics. joining us now, two cnn political contributors. the democratic strategist, james carville, and ari fleischer, guys, thanks very much for coming in. ari, let me play a little clip from the interview that governor perry did with bill o'reilly last night on fox. because in that interview, governor perry is blaming the debates for his problems. >> these debates are set up for nothing more than to tear down the candidates. it's pretty hard to sit and lay out your ideas and concepts with a one minute response. if there was a mistake made, it was probably ever doing one of the campaigns when all they're interested in is stirring it up between the candidates. >> you think he's got a point in blaming the debate as opposed to himself? >> well, there's no question the debates are designed to stir it up among the candidates, but that's what being a candidate is all about. debates aren't everything, but they are important. if i were governor perry, i'd recognize the debates, plus, they become even more important a year from now. so, he does need to take the debate seriously. he needs to spend more time getting ready for them and shouldn't dismiss them. i think there's a wrong approach. >> we take a look at the little l picture. the president just landed at andrews ai