Mike Ina Second News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

I don't know that it is. >> welcome back to "morning joe." it is the top of the hour. back with us on set we have thomas roberts, mark halperin, richard haass, and mike barnicle who's live in boston for us where it will be a bittersweet day. mike's going to join us a little bit later. in just a few hours the boston marathon will be held for the first time since the deadly bombings last year. 36,000 people will be taking part in this 118th run. the second largest field in the race's history. hundreds of thousands will be cheering them on though. security extremely tight with more than 3,000 off...

Considered almost solid blue. he's going to be in centerville. >> i want to open this up to the panel. we will get back to mike in a second. in terms of the defense question, governor, governor bob mcdonald said virginia is the home of america's military. the president put our defense budget on course for radical cuts that even his own secretary of defense says will be devastating to u.s. national security, of course referring to a deal made with republicans. >> mike has the answer to that. the republicans are weighted more heavily than the democrats in the congress. the answer is get your rea...

In play as well. >> and north carolina. virginia, though, is particularly important to them because it's harder, much harder for romney to win if obama picks up virginia. when you look at the map and the different states that they're trying to pick up, they think they look strong in ohio. florida seems like much more of a reach and that will go to romney. that just elevates the importance of virginia which is why you see him there today and tomorrow and have seen him there more than anywhere else. >> big free pickups, north carolina, indiana and virginia in '08. >> they wouldn't play in indian...

He is our congressional correspondent. mike, doug mckelway gave us a lot to think about because we're watching final flight of shuttle discovery as it gets retired because ever money issues. yet we had this hearing on capitol hill that is attacking some of this out of control spending. unfortunately speaking of all this, mike stand by for us. we'll be back to mike in a second. lots of breaking news today. this is the president. he will talk to us about the gas prices and a plan he says he has to bring them down. >> -- that produces more oil and gas here at home but also produces more biofuels ...