‘Meet the Press’ transcript for Jan. 6, 2008

MR. RUSSERT:  Our political roundtable, live from New Hampshire, after this brief station break.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT:  And we are back with my favorite New Hampshire law firm, McMahon and Murphy.

MR. STEVE McMAHON:  The Irish mafia.

MR. RUSSERT:  There you go.

MR. MIKE MURPHY:  One eight hundred results.

MR. RUSSERT:  Let’s look at the latest polls.  On the Democratic side, MSNBC/McClatchy, here they are:  Barack Obama, 33; Hillary Clinton, 31; John Edwards, 17; Bill Richardson, seven.  We polled over three nights.  On Wednesday and Thursday it was Obama, 27; Clinton, 30.  Friday, the day after the Iowa caucuses, Obama spikes, 39-32.

Here’s the breakdown.  Amongst Democrats it’s Obama, 30; Clinton, 33; independents, who make up 45 percent of the voters here in New Hampshire, it’s Obama 42-to-25.  And here’s the gender gap:  Men prefer Obama 32-19, women prefer Clinton 40-to-33.  Here’s the generation gap:  Under the age of 50, look at this, Obama 47-to-18.  Over 50, it’s Clinton 40-to-23.  Then viewers who prefer the quality of change in their presidential candidate, they prefer Obama 65-to-9.  Those who prefer the quality of experience, they say Clinton 49-to-15.

Mike Murphy, what does this say to you?

MR. MURPHY:  Obama’s going to be the nominee for the Democratic Party. One—these polling numbers show the generational stresses and all the differences, and one of the things that’s been prevalent in the argument is that she has experience, he has change, which way we’ll go.  The problem is the change power is much stronger than experience, so he is on the bigger, stronger side of the argument.  And these polling numbers are like a snapshot of a moving train, so I think her numbers are continuing to decline and his numbers are growing, which you can feel on the ground here in New Hampshire. So I think the Clinton campaign now is—they don’t have enough time to stop him here.  We’ll see what happens.  It’s still fluid, but I think the trend is Obama.  They’ve got to figure out a defense and depth strategy and try to stop him, but I think it’s going to be really hard.  Because if he comes out of here a winner and goes into South Carolina, which is half African-American in the Democratic primary, they’re going to need kryptonite to stop him.  He’s going to have all the momentum in the world.

MR. RUSSERT:  Steve McMahon, what do these numbers tell you?

MR. McMAHON:  Well, I think Mike summed it up pretty well.  I’m not sure that I agree that Barack Obama is going to be the nominee.  I think he certainly has the momentum right now.  The Clintons, anybody who underestimates them does so at their peril.  But you can see the stresses within the party, and you can see that he is on the, he is on the side of a wave that seems to be sweeping over New Hampshire.  And the question is, if he comes out of here, what can the Clintons do to stop him?  I mean, this was supposed to be the firewall state for the Clinton campaign, and now the firewall is on fire.  And so the question is, do you move the firewall?  What do you do?  At what point do you make a stand?  And I think they’ve got to start thinking really long and hard about that, because they—if they don’t stop him soon, they’re not going to be able to.

MR. RUSSERT:  And Bill Bradley, who ran for president in 2000, lost narrowly here to Al Gore in New Hampshire, is endorsing Barack Obama this morning, an indication that more establishment Democrats are willing to reach out and embrace the Obama candidacy.

MR. MURPHY:  Yeah.  I think he’s 70--Obama’s 72 hours away from having a whole new group of friends in Washington, the people for what’s going to happen caucus.  And—because they’re pragmatists, and they’re seeing this guy. And he is also—look at the turnout dynamic in Iowa, what we may see here, too.  He pulls new people into the process, and that is golden politics.  It’s real power, and it allows you to be a successful candidate.  So I think Clinton was banking on electability argument against him, but he’s showing a lot of power to go out and win elections with new people, and that’s a very, very attractive trait.

MR. RUSSERT:  Let me look at the favorable/unfavorable in this race, and this is interesting.  Favorable, Obama, 77; unfavorable, eight.  Edwards is 64-to-19.  Clinton is 62-to-21.  That issue was addressed in last night’s debate.  Let’s watch this exchange with Senator Clinton.

(Videotape)

Unidentified Man #2:  My question to you is simply this:  What can you say to the voters of New Hampshire on this stage tonight who see your resume and like it but are hesitating on the likeability issue, where they seem to like Barack Obama more?

SEN. HILLARY CLINTON (D-NY):  Well, that hurts my feelings.

Man #2:  I’m sorry, Senator.  I’m sorry.

SEN. CLINTON:  But I’ll try to go on.  He’s very likable.  I, I agree with that.  I don’t think I’m that bad.

SEN. OBAMA:  You’re likable enough, Hillary.  No doubt about it.

SEN. CLINTON:  Thank you so much.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Steve McMahon.

MR. McMAHON:  I thought that it was the best moment of the debate for her last night.  The first hour of that debate, she seemed a little tense and she seemed tired, and she actually seemed like she might be a little agitated. The second, the second half-hour, 45 minutes, she, she did great, after that break.  I think if you, if you look at her campaign, voters are making a judgment about not just where she is on experience and strength—they know she’s experienced, they know she’s got great strength—they’re just not sure how much they like her or whether they like her enough.  With Barack Obama, they know he’s smart.  They worry a little bit about his experience, but they like him a whole lot.  And right now, the likeability is working real hard for Barack Obama, and the experience isn’t working quite as hard for Hillary Clinton.

MR. RUSSERT:  How about his retort, saying “You’re likable enough, Hillary”?

MR. McMAHON:  Well, I thought it was—I mean, listen, I thought it was a light moment.  I thought it was an opportunity for them to kind of show themselves as people.  I think Barack Obama probably could have maybe been a little bit warmer, but...

MR. MURPHY:  Oh, I think...

MR. McMAHON:  ...I thought he was, I thought he was—overall, he did what he needed to do in that debate, which was not make a mistake, look presidential, and he did both of those things.

MR. MURPHY:  The best part of these debates is every once in a while you’re lucky enough to see the veneer get pulled back a little.  And fact is, they can’t stand each other.  And she’s thinking, “How’s this guy killing me?  I’ve done all this work, I’ve been this big superstar.” He knows that she has the big grind coming in the last attempt to try to stop him, so there was a little moment of truth broke out in politics.  The fact is she did pretty well last night.  But it’s not enough.  She needs a big game changing thing here, and just a decent debate performance won’t do it.

MR. RUSSERT:  It was interesting watching John Edwards last night.

MR. McMAHON:  Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT:  He came in second in Iowa, barely ahead of Senator Clinton.  He had to make a decision last night:  Was he going to go after Obama or Clinton? He opted to go after Clinton, playing for second place, in effect.  Let’s watch Senator Edwards in that exchange.

(Videotape)

FMR. SEN. JOHN EDWARDS (D-NC):  Any time you speak out powerfully for change, the forces of status quo attack.  That’s exactly what happens.  I mean, I didn’t hear these kind of attacks from Senator Clinton when she was ahead.  Now that she’s not, we hear them.  And any time you speak out, any time you speak out for change, this is what happens.

SEN. CLINTON:  I want to make change, but I’ve already made change.  I will continue to make change.  I’m not just running on a promise of change, I’m running on 35 years of change.

GOV. BILL RICHARDSON:  Well, I’ve been in hostage negotiations that are a lot more civil than this.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Nothing like a little humor there, right?

MR. MURPHY:  Yeah, that was great.

MR. RUSSERT:  A little flash of anger there from Senator Clinton.

MR. MURPHY:  Yeah.  She was kind of—what I interpreted that is she wanted to reach through the camera and grab the voters by the lapels, “You idiots, didn’t you read the plan?  I’m supposed to be winning here!” You can see the frustration coming through.  And I think Edwards was smart because he knows Obama’s going to win here, so he’s trying to beat her in to second to stay alive to either somehow have the miracle upset against Obama, or second, start to maybe being—he’s a young guy and he’s always on the make.  And so I think he might be looking at the long-term plan, so attack the one he doesn’t think is going to be around.

MR. McMAHON:  You know, you know, you can see where candidates kind of feel like they are in a race by just watching them on a stage.  With Barack Obama last night, I felt like he was growing into his presidential suit.  He was starting to imagine that he could be president of the United States.  With John Edwards you saw a guy who had nothing to lose.  He was going to be sunny and optimistic, he was going to talk a little bit about his, about his past and about why he’s in the race, and he’s going to try to paint Hillary so that he can be the guy who gets the one-on-one with Barack Obama later.  And with Hillary Clinton, it looked like she was almost trying to force, you know, in, in, in, in an athletic event, where someone’s trying to force a play every single time.

MR. MURPHY:  Yeah.

MR. McMAHON:  It just seemed like she felt like she had to do something big at every opportunity, and I think that, you know, if she had just been herself, if she’d been as warm and engaging at the front end of the debate as she was at the back end of the debate, it would have been a better debate for her.

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