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>> that's pretty good. anyway we're back that was president obama today at the national prayer breakfast talking about his faith. he's also not shying way from a philosophical fight about what the government can do to help people. is president obama running himself? is he often running? now by msnbc's political analyst richard wolf and "time" magazine's mark hal pert. it's great to have you both. mark's of course an msnbc political analyst. i want to start with rich and go to mark. you guys are the experts. what's up here? >> well, about this time of year every year he does a personal speech. ...

He finds very reluctant thing, which is to go personal and public. >> what do you think? do you think we should have a president explain his religion to people? >> that's what people expect. no, that's what people expect. >> mark, are you comfortable with it, where a president has to defensively or offensively talk about what he believes in terms of religion? >> if it's what he believes in, then that's what the president does. anyone who's thinking of running for president against this guy should go watch that speech. was more than just about faith. as richard said, it was his philosophy. it w...

Accumulated averaging, rolling average, and the average just keeps getting better, mark. it seems to me a couple things -- i can think of three things. the stock market. when are the republicans who make the most money in the stock market going to say you know what, bush couldn't do this, this guy started off down near the drain and now he's up near the faucet, we're pretty high up. this all happened because he must be doing something right. the unemployment rate is perhaps going to start inching downward. the poll numbers are going up. is this creating a confidence in this man's heart? your t...

With men it does. there's this competitive thing. it's patriotic. they like that. you're asking about the personal situation. you can never win a microeconomic argument because people don't believe what politicians tell them about their own economic situation. so jobs have to come back in the real world for these people. but as a broad political message, works much better with men than women. >> your thoughts on that. last thought from you, mark. the whole question -- we argue about this all the time on the show, what i call from scranton to oshkosh. the wipeout this last november. can he brin...