good morning and welcome to "this week." down and dirty. >> when you run for president, everything is called into question. >> he should say that he's sorry. >> felony, dishonesty. charges fly in the campaigns' nastiest week yet. >> either mitt romney was misrepresenting his position, which is a felony, or he was lying to the american people. >> are these debates fair game or distractions from the big issues? which side is winning and how much will voters care come november? questions for our headliners, former white house chief of staff and chicago mayor rahm emanuel and new hampshire senator kelly ayotte, a potential running mate and top romney surrogate.

and outrage over those olympic uniforms made in china and the cover-up of sexual abuse at penn state. >> sandusky was allowed to continue with impunities. all that and more with our powerhouse roundtable. with george will, donna brazile, matthew dowd and that political odd couple, james carville and mary matalin. hello again. everything is happening at hyperspeed in this campaign. only july. and the obama campaign has already spent $100 million on campaign ads. most of them going over mitt romney. mitt romney and his allies have spent the same. in their latest ad said that mitt romney is lying about his record at bain capital. >> when the president doesn't tell the truth, how can we trust him to lead. >> the obama outsourcing attacks, misleading, unfair and untrue. america expects more from a

president. obama's dishonest campaign, another reason america has lost confidence in barack obama. and with that, let's get a response from obama's campaign chair, the former white house chief of staff and current chicago mayor rahm emanuel. good morning, mr. mayor. >> good morning, george. >> romney went further in an interview with abc's jon karl on friday, he demanded that president obama apologize for what he called "chicago-style politics," any chance he'll get one? >> first of all, you know, it's interesting -- no, i don't think so, because mitt romney said bain capital is his calling card for why he should be president. he doesn't talk about his record as governor of massachusetts. he doesn't talk about any other piece. he said that i created jobs at bain capital. it talks exactly in president obama's campaign about what mitt romney's record is at bain capital.

>> what he says that outsourcing occurred after 1999 when he left bain capital. i know that you point that s.e.c. filing -- >> george -- george, you say point to it. he signed it. he was chairman, ceo, president, you can't, as president of the united states, you can't have a sign on your desk, gone fishing. you can put that on the desk, basically, the buck stops there. you can't say to the s.e.c., i'm chairman, ceo and president, i'm not responsible, i'm not accountable. then he says the reason i should be president is bain capital. well, let's look at it. when you look at, it's not the record presented. that's the policies that led to jobs going overseas. he said, he told people, manufacturing is not part of our future. 500,000 jobs have been created in the manufacturing sector in the last three years, it is part of our future. if you're going to build and make sure that the 21st century

is again the american century -- >> do you really believe that what stephanie kotter suggestsed the other day that he committed a felony -- >> first of all, stephanie cited the law and it's very clear, s.e.c. is accurate or that's honest and the sec isn't honest. but both can't be accurate depicting the time. >> he said that it was just a formality. during that time, he was untangling his involvement with bain. >> george, he has made bain capital his calling card for the presidency, and when you look at it, it doesn't measure up to what he claims. and number two, on those filings, one is accurate and the other one isn't accurate. the second thing is, give it up about stephanie, don't worry about that, what are you going

to do when a chinese leader says something to do? are you going to whine? you can't do that. i would give romney his own advice, stop whining. if you want to claim bain capital as your calling card for the white house, defend what happened to bain capital and what happened to those jobs that went overseas, those jobs that were actually cut and eliminated. the companies that went into bankruptcy. that led to him advocating for the auto industry to go bankrupt. the president of the united states said, no, we're going to defend gm and today america's auto industry is -- and that is the facts. >> the campaign has been pushing very hard for mitt romney to release more of his tax returns, he said that the public has everything they need to know to understand his finances. we know that romney made a lot of money, what more will the returns tell us that we don't

know? >> george, there are two points are really important. first of all, mitt romney's own father said you shouldn't only release one year, he released one year. okay, transparency and what that says. he has released only one year, for the mccain campaign, he released 23 years. and he's telling the american people, i'm not giving you what i gave john mccain's people in 2008. when he gave them 23 years, john mccain's people went with sarah palin. whatever is in there is far worse than the first year. the romney campaign isn't stupid. they have decided that it's better to get attacked on lack of accountability to american people, versus telling what's in those taxes. they're not enjoying this. now the second thing, george, he did not just relatively, he paid

14%, about half of what a middle-class family pays. second is, you learned in one year, about caymans, bahamas and switzerlands, where his different accounts are. his tax filings look like an olympic village than a middle-class family tax reform. unless you have his taxes, and i have seen this in the oval office, george, there are going to be times in which the president of the united states has to make choices. will it be a middle class family's desire to get a tax credit for a child and help him raise him in a middle-class family or will we protect the bahamas, luxembourg? george, those are the trade-offs. >> i get that.

>> and in one year you have learned -- no, this is a big decision -- he has fully used what's legal and that's the problem with the tax code. >> i want to move on, he also said that you're all pushing these issues from the president who can't run on records. our polls do show that two-thirds of the american public think that the country is going in this wrong direction. and disapprove of president obama's job on the economy. >> and george, let's go to two very points, the same polls said that president obama would fight for the middle class and mitt romney would not. second, one of the most critical decisions made in the last three years about the economy, the industrial sector, obama went one way to keep the jobs here, the auto industry, saving 1.2 million manufacturing jobs. mitt romney would let them go bankrupt, why, because that's how he dealt with companies.

our auto industry today is thriving and creating jobs here. the reason was because, the president of the united states wouldn't throw the towel -- and that's a critical economic decision. >> okay, you made that point. you said that he's also going to be an outsourcer of jobs. what romney said in return is that obama hasn't done enough to stop jobs from going overseas. take a look. >> since this program began, 79% of the 2.1 billion in stimulus grants awarded through it, went to overseas companies. >> can you imagine the chinese communist party passing a stimulus package and importing, importing goods from the united states? >> outsourcing has increased over the last three years, doesn't it undercut the president's argument that mitt romney would be the outsourcer in chief?

here's the thing, the stimulus created -- i actually opened up a facility here in chicago, a health care facility was built with stimulus dollars. on the west side of the city and it's health care facility in a poor area and it created jobs. >> but some of the funds did go overseas -- as those democrats pointed out. >> george, when we started. america's battery industries, new batteries, only 2% of world production, today, we're close to 40%. directly out of the stimulus bill. those jobs are here in the united states. second is, here's the core issue, we just came out of a decade that was a lost decade for the middle class and in the next four years, we're going to have to decide a set of policies, and either the middle class have a chance to raise their kids, save for their college educations, save for their retirements, and own a home, the question is, what president in that oval office

will hear the voices, concerns and interests of the middle class or hear the other interests, the ones that have checking accounts in the bahamas, can use the loopholes that allow you to move money to switzerland and only pay 14% while you're making millions of dollars, that is the question that will sit in the oval office. which president will hear the interest of the middle-class families? >> let's put that question to -- thank you very much, mayor. we have senator kelly ayotte. senator from new hampshire, representing mitt romney. thank you for joining us, senator. >> good morning, george. >> you just heard rahm emanuel, these questions about the tax returns and mitt romney's tenure at bain capital have to bebe cleared up, because they go right at the heart of what the president is going to deal with the four years? >> george, what's most disappointing about this is the

president who ran as an inspirational leader, look at where we are right now, unfortunately with these attacks, it shows that he's small politician and running on small ball politics. no ad is going to decide this election. whether the president likes it or not. the economy and jobs are going to decide this election. his record on that is abysmal. we have had only 40 straight months of over 8% unemployment. dismal jobs reports. >> but the questions aren't just coming from the president and his campaign. as you know, just yesterday, the republican governor of alabama, robert bentley came out and said that he believes that mitt romney ought to release more tax returns. take a look. >> the best thing to do is to get everything out in the open, and just say, hey, i have nothing to hide. i'm going to release my tax returns. >> haley barbour and other top republicans have said the exact same thing. wouldn't that help put these questions to rest?

>> george, he has disclosed what he's had to under federal law. he's gone beyond that. he's released his 2010 tax returns. he's going to release his 2011 tax returns. but that's not what the american people are focusing on, they're worried about their own tax returns, whether they can find jobs, he wants to increase taxes on small businesses. they're worried about their tax returns. rising health care costs under the president's health care plan, that's the focus of this election. and that's what the american people are going to decide this election on. george, the most astounding thing that happened this week is the president's statement that the biggest mistake that he made in his first four years was not telling his story well enough. he doesn't understand that it's his policies that are causing problems and why we aren't turning this economy around and this story isn't going to get any better with four more years. i mean, look at the stimulus that mayor rahm emanuel cited.

we would be under 6% unemployment now with $787 billion of government spending and we're over 8% unemployment. >> it's more difficult, i think you would concede for romney to make that case, those republicans clearly worried that he's going to continue to face the questions if he doesn't release the returns, you're not? >> i think that the difficult thing is for the president to answer to his economic record with the failed stimulus, higher health care costs and look where we are, he represented that he was going to cut the deficit in half in his first four years. he's added $5 trillion to the debt. we have had no budget. and look it, right now, one of the things that's most disturbing, is our military is going to be decimated in january because across the board cuts. >> yet, at the same time, i have to go back to you on the tax returns, you're saying it's not going to hurt. hi also facing real questions on

bain capital. i want to show the filing that the obama campaign continues to refer to, back in 1999, mr. w. mitt romney is the sole shareholder, sole director, chief executive officer, president of bain capital and thus is the controlling person of bain capital. we also know that he attended board meetings of at least one company funded by bain. he received at least $100,000 for two separate years as an executive of bain. by a commonsense standard, isn't it hard to argue that romney had no active involvement with the campaign? >> george, by a commonsense standard, we all know that in 1999, he was working 16 hours a day to turn the olympics around which he did a great job with, so, he's addressed it, he wasn't running bain capital then. he was working at turner olympics. it's the leadership that he showed at the olympics and also as a strong governor that's what

he's going to bring to the white house to turn this around. >> how do you explain away that document? >> the president who's just -- you know, this has been addressed. bain capital said that he wasn't in charge then. not only that, we know that he had been working 16 hours a dayton olympics. we saw what he did with those olympics. >> why does he have a document that he was chief executive officer and president of bain capital? >> you know, again, i think this has been addressed. the president can talk all he wants about this. but it's the economy and jobs that are going to address this election and, on that, policies wanting to increase taxes on small businesses and the failed stimulus, not going back to washington, focusing on getting our economy moving and this fiscal cliff that we're facing at the end of the year, those are the core issues that are going to drive voters in november. >> some top republicans take your point, but they say that

governor romney has do a much better job of laying out an agenda for the future? our abc news/washington post poll shows that that can help him at this point. right now, more than half of americans are concerned about the next four years. president obama leads by 23%. does governor romney need to put out more aggressive, bold, visionary agenda? >> i think governor romney has a bold agenda moving forward that he's going reduce our debt, get our fiscal health in order. he has a tax reform plan, it's very different from the president's. not increasing taxes on small businesses. it's actually simplifying the code and lowering the rates. so he has an agenda moving forward. it's very important. he has the experience to get americans working again. this president isn't focusing, he's focusing on these small things because he doesn't want to focus on the economy which is where we need leadership now in our country. >> finally, you have been mentioned as a possible vice presidential candidate. running mate for mitt romney.

also over the weekend, we had this balloon of condoleezza rice, would she be a good choice? >> yes. >> thank you very much for your time. >> thank you so much, george. coming up, our powerhouse roundtable takes on the campaign's toughest week yet. mitt romney turned up in an unlikely place today, he gave a speech at the annual naacp conference in houstion, i don't know, maybe he confused naacp with nascar. president obama said that the biggest mistake of his first job was not telling his story to give americans a sense unity, in response, americans were like, yeah, fixing the economy would have been cool, too. plus, that made in america controversy. >> i think the olympic committee should be ashamed of themselves and embarrassed. and outrage over the cover-up at penn state. >> in order to avoid the consequences of bad publicity,

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my sknowing what to make and not when could help cut down on thousands of unsold baked goods per month. using analytics, we discovered when it's drizzling outside... people eat more cake. and when the temperature rises, panini sales go up. finding these hidden connections helped our european bakeries increase profitability by up to 20%. let's build a smarter planet. roundtable coming up, after this from our abc stations. when the president was elected, he talked about hope and change.

whatever happened to hope and change?

now it seems he's just coming right out of the box with these old-fashioned, negative ads. by starting negative, by going extremely tough and extremely hard, looking conventional, and frankly running ads that are inaccurate. barack obama's campaign and allies will run more negative ads against this republican nominee in 2012 than have ever been run in the history of the world. whatever happened to hope and change? [ romney ] i'm mitt romney, and i approve this message. ♪ ♪ made in america the u.s. uniforms were made in china, how could it be? >> i think they should take all of the unforms, put them in a big pile, burn them and start all over again. >> we should be showing our best, not just athletics but also best manufactured products.

>> you think they would know better. >> this is america. we landed americans on the moon. we should be able to make uniforms for athletes to wear in london. >> they say they'll have new uniforms for 2014. we'll talk about that in our roundtable coming up. let me introduce everyone, george will, as always, donna brazile, matthew dowd, plus our friends james carville and mary matalin. but, george, let me begin with this whole argument, that we saw all week long, the obama campaign said that mitt romney is lying about bain capital. hiding something with his tax returns. the romney campaign saying that the president is trying to distract from a failed record. who's winning this argument? >> romney is losing at this point in a big way, if something is going to come out, get it out in a hurry. i don't know why, given that mitt romney knew that

the day that mccain lost in 2008 that he was going to run for president again that he didn't get all of this out and tidy up for his offshore accounts. he's now in the politics business. george, i remember in 1994, in september, sitting in the ritz-carlton hotel on the boston common, talking with the republican candidate for senator, named mitt romney, at a time when he was going through a mild version of this, with all of the attacks on his private sector. the republicans have now nominated someone from a financial sector, at a time when the financial sector in extremely bad odor. hardly a day goes by, libor scandal, t.a.r.p., all of this conditions, the atmosphere in which this occurring. >> how do you explain how much it's hurting?

>> i don't think, respect my esteemed colleague here, people don't care where his bank accounts are. they care they don't have much left in their bank accounts. they don't care about his taxes, they care about their own taxes. this is a different election cycle. he's released 2010, he's releasing 2011, he has full disclosure, there's no tax advantages of being offshore. the democratic chairman has these offshore accounts, but it's a distraction. and it's not what people care about. and it hasn't hurt him anywhere. the obama campaign has spent $100 million, three-quarters of it negative and the dynamic hasn't changed. there has been movement back and forth, maybe some democrats coming home, but the dynamics hasn't changed. it's a dead heat. and the advantage on the issues that people care about most are going to mitt romney. >> george,

people living in subtropical climates, once your furniture is mildew, it's not coming back. you got to throw it out. bain is the mildew for mitt romney. bain is being defined as some kind of capitalism that got rid of jobs and offshore accounts and everything else. it doesn't mean he's going to lose the election. bain is going to be a net loser for romney. between now until tend of the campaign. i think the opinions have set in. i'm not saying that's the end of the election cycle for romney, but he's clearly lost this argument. and i think he's clearly going to continue to lose it. >> do you agree with that, matt? >> i agree that the bain thing is a problem, but i think it's been a problem for a long period of time. the republicans that ran against romney in the primaries didn't do it well. but it was a problem in the primaries that they didn't do well. neither side wants to run on their record.

barack obama doesn't want to run on his record, which is why he's doing everything he can to tear down mitt romney's record. >> although our poll has an advantage when he talks about the next four years -- >> he has an advantage of looking to the future. so, he wants to distract from that. mitt romney knows that he can't run on his record, he doesn't have a massachusetts record that he wants to run on. now bain is a problem. what we're going to have, 90% of what we're going to talk is about bad things about the other guy. my fear, george -- my fear is, on election day, this is going to be a very close election. whoever wins this election is going to have no mandate or no vision of where we want this country. and that's a problem. >> you served in at least two presidential campaigns, for george w. bush,

how do you explain why governor romney hasn't put out more of his tax returns? >> i have seen this with candidates and i saw this with dwi with president bush, that came out late in the campaign. and a number of other candidates that i worked for. i think it's two things. first, obviously, there's something there. if not he would say, have at it. that compromises what he said in the past about something. but i think the bigger thing is, it's arrogance. many of these politicians think, i can get away with it. i don't have to do this. that in the end is the problem that sort of walk into these, i don't have to do this, i can address in some other way. if everything was fine, he would have been out there. >> i want to get to donna, you're nodding your head. >> mitt romney released all that's necessary for people to understand something about my finances, end quote. something is a pregnant word. the cost of not releasing the returns are clear, therefore, he

must have calculated that there are higher costs in releasing them. >> and he's going to tough it out. >> drip, drip, that's the problem. that's how you get to the mildew in the first place. that's why there's a mold that the campaign has to get rid. look, the problem is, george, in 2002, to establish his residency in the state of massachusetts to run for governor, he had to say, well, i had a leave of absence, i was still here, technically coming back, technically doing this. but we don't know. he won't release again. he has a penchant for secrecy. my first question if, i were working for romney, i would get bain to release all of the relevant information, let's see what's on the record and also, i think he could clear it up by releasing his taxes from that period, as a gray area, and maybe we can find out more.

>> mary, do you think he can tough it out? >> can we put some real facts on the table? we know that the facts. he took a leave of absence to go run the olympics in 1999. he never returned to bain. he filed everything with s.e.c. that was absolutely by the law, letter of the law, that the s.e.c. required, being a shareholder or office holder, we did not put him in any managerial at bain. which were said by bain people working there. including a democrat for obama who ran for the senate. >> but he said that he had no involvement with bain. these documents seem to have contradict that. doesn't that add up to involvement? >> the charge is that he was

making decisions that somehow sent jobs -- which by the way the real issue here, lying to the american people about outsourcing is what this election should be about. outsourcing is not a goal of private equity or -- it's a consequence of the global economy. and it's one of the -- if there were investments made with bain that produced outsourcing that was with that money. what barack obama has done is outsourced jobs with our tax money. that's not what this election is going to be about. >> mary, is it not what you call a real fact that mitt romney gave to the mccain company when he was considering him as a running mate 23 years of tax returns? >> so what -- let's say he gives 23 years, puts two decades of tax returns out, is that going to produce two jobs? is it going to produce anything toward a mandate, anything toward the debate of what this is about?

if the charge that he's hiding -- >> you know, you know, if that's the truth serum in that cup, you were advising a candidate like mitt romney in this case, you wrould say we need to get this out here. that's what i need to do because the direction of the country is bad, mitt romney, mitt romney did the same exact thing that barack obama is doing to him. he did it to newt gingrich. he's saying the exact same thing that mitt romney said. you're taking my record out of context. he did the same thing to rick santorum. all of a sudden, he's running in a general election against a very professional group of people, against a very astute politicians, against a chicago machine that did exactly what he did. >> he's not saying that. >> there's no policy that will give mitt romney any cover that says, here's my jobs plan.

here's what i would do differently. >> let's take matt's other point james, james, how about his other point, if you run and win a campaign, even if you win a campaign like this, there's no mandate coming out to help the middle class? >> i agree. i think, i do believe that this is a 30-year problem that's been ongoing and i think -- i expect the president to actually talk about his next term and what he's going to do about the next term. and i think one of the big things that's happened in this campaign is kind of surprising, i'm a longtime reader of george will, he writes about the law of unintended consequences. we thought that the citizens united would help the republican

super pacs. the surprising thing about this campaign, the democratic super pacs have been much better, they have driven the debate much more than the republican super pacs. now, whether that continues through september and october, i'm not willing to say, but as of july 15th, it's the democratic super pacs that have driven this bain tax returns. whatever it is. for better or worse. >> the whole story about advertising, advertising dollars are just good as the product they're advertising. entire ford motor's marketing geniuses put behind the edsel didn't help, it wasn't a good product. >> one of the things that you're seeing with all of this, donna, is an absolutely deadlocked race, where somewhere 94% of the country have made up their mind. the can'ts are fighting over 5% to 6% of the vote in eight or nine states. most of the states are completely disengaged in this election.

>> that's why it matters to have this debate now, because what's happening, president obama's offense. he's engaging voters and he's closed the enthusiasm gap. democrats are coming back, they're more excited because they see a president who's out there defending his record on on the economy, stabilizing the economy, rescuing the auto industry, you know, bringing bin laden to justice, on and on. they like the fact that he has that fighting spirit and he eeh willing to take it. yesterday, in the rain, he was getting drenched, telling women, i'm sorry about your hair dos. >> one more issue before we move on, flash on the drudge report, on friday, showing romney narrows vp choices, condi emerges as a frontrunner. mary matalin, do you think that's a viable possibility to choose moderately pro-choice condi rice? >> not. i love condi. we all condi. she's vetted. she's tested.

she would be ready on did day one. she doesn't want to do it. in the case of condoleezza rice, when she says she doesn't want to do it, she doesn't want to do it. >> i mean -- >> choosing condoleezza rice would inject tremendous excitement in the campaign and remove all suspense from the outcome, you would have an uproarious convention in tampa, a challenge to her on the floor, you would have walkouts in delegations, and he would lose 40 states. >> i would rather have condoleezza rice than sarah palin, okay -- >> the other question coming this morning, you're hearing this a lot, from republican governors right now, they're saying, fine, whatever mitt

romney does on the tax returns, what he needs to do is come out with a much more specific, more bolder agenda. >> i actually think he needs to do -- he has a 59-point or 62-point plan, he needs a three-point plan, the problem in politics isn't too many specifics, the problem in politics is how do you pare it down with a vision or message? he needs a much more limited, a limited message. but the other thing i think that he has a problem with, is that most of his economic plan feels like it's a retread of something from 25 years ago, it feels like, what we're going to give you is more tax cuts, less government regulations, it feels like something in time gone by. i think a lot of middle class, as james' book said, lot of the middle class think that those solutions aren't going to help us.

i would figure out a three-point, five-point plan. >> well, we have the reagan example. win the cold war, cut taxes. lighten regulatory burden. we won the cold war. the first two still apply. again, 59 is less than three. pasquale said i'm sorry for the long letter, i didn't have time to write a short one. >> he's been the nominee for under three months, he's raising unprecedented amounts of money. what he's doing now is raising money to be sent in the fall, obama is burning through his money, he is burning through his money that he won't be able to recapture. mitt romney, what we found in all of the polls, what people say about mitt romney is, they

don't know who he is or what he would do as president. here's mitt romney, what i will do on day one? two complicated plans. or not having any plans. having been in that utah conference, he has very specific, 21st century plans for energy, for debt reform, regulatory reform, tax reform, it's very specific. it's all on his website. he's given great speeches. he'll be introduced to the country at the convention and he'll be great in the debates. >> in the first 12 days in july, in one medium market, in one state, columbus, ohio, two campaigns and the super pacs supporting them ran 1,648 commercials. now, we're going to learn, soon that the declining utility of political dollars, both sides will have enough and they'll find that the last political dollars buy nothing.

>> the least effective dollars in the presidential race, the most effective dollar is in the race for assessor. because we know these guys. the early definition on the challenges of 2004, made a difference. the early definition on a challenge of 2012 is making somewhat of a difference here, but now, his attitude -- people really know these guys, and so the next dollar in a presidential, the dollar that you spend on the presidential race is less than effective than a dollar in the assessor race. >> george, i think, mitt romney -- the people who are going to decide this election, are those who like president obama but don't like the direction of the country. that group of voters. the more mitt romney stays away from, hate this president,

dislikes this president, go ahead and like this guy, nice guy, nice family, he doesn't have the answers. i think that ultimately he has to focus. >> i want to switch topics. right now, the bombshell report came out from louis freeh on the whole scan dam dall at penn state. let's take a look. >> our most saddening and sobering finding is the totally disregard of the welfare of sandusky child victims by the most senior leaders at penn state. the most powerful men at penn state failed to take any steps for 14 years to protect the children who sandusky victimized. >> donna, all of the leaders of penn state, including the president, of course, joe paterno,

some are saying that the ncaa should stop, suspend the football program. >> i totally agree. there should be some penalty, some acknowledgment that there was gross abuse of children, neglect in their duties as officers of that university, when i read that report, george, all i thought about was the catholic church, the boy scouts, so many other institutions that have been implicated in these kind of cases, but what i like about the report at the end, he gave us 120 recommendations of how we can protect children in the future. he gave us a blueprint of how to avoid this happening. it's a sad episode. and something that should turn. >> james, i was looking at naacp. >> look, this is awful. people are talking about the death penalty of penn state football. that's a dumb idea. lives have been ruined, so let's go out and ruin more lives. let's suspend the program, who knows what he's going to do, let's take every contract that

has been signed, let's take the penn state/wisconsin game, everybody who has a motel in happy valley, let's ruin their lives. this is really a bad idea. let penn state football play, let them make money, bring the trial lawyers in. pluck that chicken clean. >> sitting between james and donna, two lsu tigers fanatics. we have grafted a multimillion-dollar industry on college football, discord, it's corrupting, you'll get this and elsewhere different forms of corruption. but always form of corruption. because big-time football has no business on college campus. >> george, one thing it's an awful situation. if you took jerry sandusky and

substituted jerry sandusky with the word the priest and joe paterno and substituted joe paterno with the word bishop that's what you have, it's an institutional corrupt problem. nobody said that let's give the catholic church the death penalty. is there something inside the catholic church needs to be changed? >> why isn't one year suspension? why isn't that appropriate? >> if we thik jerry sandusky and joe paterno is the only thing going in institutions, the only thing going on, we're fooling ourselves. >> but are they juniors, what do they do that there? what do you do with all of the contracts? how do you replace all of this? you're going to ruin a lot of

other lives to do something like this. and look, to george's point, yes, i'm a big college football fan, is it a kind of corrupting influence? yes, of course it is. we all know that. >> but college, we're going through this, we're looking at colleges, is more than just learning in the class room experience, i'm not a college football person, i didn't grow up with it, but it's your whole culture in baton rouge and lsu and it's part of these kids enjoying, moving into adulthood, and i don't think we should undo it. even though i think you're crazy to be obsessed as you are. >> we'll have to take a break right now. back with more of our roundtable in moments. nielsen revealed the most memorable tv moments from all-time. we weigh in with our own. this is our pool. ♪ our fireworks.

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hanging up here. it has a slight dimple. >> the supreme court of the united states has reversed its decision of the florida supreme court. and now my friends, in a phrase that i once addressed to others, it's tim for me to go. abc news has learned that osama bin laden has been killed. >> after a firefight, they killed osama bin laden and took custody of his body. a couple of the most memorable tv moments of all time. according to nielsen, the number one of course was the 9/11 attacks back in 2001. george, you have kind of an off the wall moment. >> i didn't have a television in my house until 23. i think what television does best is unscripted live things, live sports, of course baseball best of all, greatest game in my judgment in baseball history, was the 1960 pirates/yankees game seven.

won by bill mazerowski's walk-off home run, television did it. only television could do it. >> there is it right there. >> that's yogi berra playing left field. >> donna? >> there's no question, i have many -- but the one that sticks in my mind one that i will never forget, seeing the pictures of people struggling to get air lifted out of hurricane katrina, thinking about my own family, so that will always be the moment that i remember the brave reporters, the brave service people who risked their lives to save others. >> that was number two on the nielsen list. >> well, i picked the watergate hearings. that's why i got into politics. that's when i was 12, 13 years old. i remember going on vacation with my brothers and sisters, on lake michigan, northern lake michigan, they were all playing outside and i was fixated on the watergate hearings. we were confronting corrupt power. these two reporters basically took down a president. which, to me, brought me into

politics and what we do and why we do it. and all that, the watergate hearings. >> a lot of impact moments there. >> i picked man lands on the moon. i can never forget that. that someone actually walked on the moon. it's unbelievable. 9/11, my wife was in the white house. katrina, my beloved new orleans. >> that was the latest that i ever stayed up. i was 8 years old when that up. and all walter cronkite could say, oh, boy. i picked 9/11. not the date, but the first anniversary of, having been at the white house all day, i didn't see what the rest of the world and the country was seeing on 9/11. i saw it the year after the fact. it was more gut-wrenching the second time around. it's amazing how well it was

covered live and if you didn't see it then, it's still shocking. >> how much were you aware of what everyone else was seeing? >> nothing. >> while you were in the white house? >> we saw -- the only thing that we looked at the television is, captured in that iconic photo of the towers imploding and the vice president, we all saw that. we weren't watching tv. we had few other things on our plate. we didn't watch it for several days after, nobody watches tv in the white house anywhere. except home for the news. i can't even imagine, my mind can't wrap around the country seeing that. i still cannot grasp that. >> seeing that second plane go in live was shocking. all 20 of the top 20 were all breaking news, live events. i'm going to go in a different direction, i think i have number 43. that was the finale of m.a.s.h. 100 million people watched. alan alda in that finale of

m.a.s.h., it was the biggest audience. there, you see hawkeye right there. it was an incredible dramatic episode, as well. we won't see the same kind of audience for broadcast news. but that was great stuff. you can see the full list of the tv's most memorable moments on website at abc.com/thisweek. first -- ♪ >> three moments from this week in history. what year was it? >> elian gonzalez sparked a tug of war with cuba. this week, hillary clinton and rick lazio had their first face-off. >> hillary clinton ran for senate. >> that was a wonderful performance and you did it very well. >> i'm asking you to sign it right here, right now. >> we'll shake on that -- >> no. and in the fall classic, the mets faced the yankees for the first time.

>> there have been 96 world series, in 50 of them, a new york team has played, a lot of people look upon this series as iraq/iran war in spikes, they wish both sides would lose. >> was it 1998, 1999 or 2000? we'll be right back with the answer. ♪ [ male announcer ] how could a luminous protein in jellyfish, impact life expectancy in the u.s., real estate in hong kong, and the optics industry in germany? at t. rowe price, we understand the connections of a complex, global economy. it's just one reason 75% of our mutual funds beat their 10-year lipper average. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. request a prospectus or summary prospectus with investment information, risks, fees and expenses to read and consider carefully before investing.

so, what year was it? when did hillary clinton run her first campaign? elian gonzalez became a household name? 12 years ago, in 2000. now we honor our fellow americans who serve and sacrifice. this week, the pentagon the released the names of 11 soldiers killed in afghanistan. iers killed in afghanistan.

and finally, "your voice this week," today's question comes from ronald stanberry who asked, why can't we have a debate now between the presumptive candidates while there is time left to consider what each has to say to the other, face to face? great question. both candidates have an open invitation to join us to have that debate. i know that it's a long shot. we do know that the commission on presidential debates has a full slate of three presidential debates and one vice presidential debate kicking off october 3rd in denver. as i said, our invitation is open until then. that's all for us. thank you for sharing part of your sunday with us. check out david muir on "world news." and i'll see you tomorrow on "good morning america." we lost our edge. said,

well today, there's a new new york state. one that's working to attract businesses and create jobs. a place where innovation meets determination... and businesses lead the world. the new new york works for business. find out how it can work for yours at thenewny.com. by what's getting done. measure commitment the twenty billion dollars bp committed has helped fund economic and environmental recovery. long-term, bp's made a five hundred million dollar commitment to support scientists studying the environment. and the gulf is open for business - the beaches are beautiful, the seafood is delicious. last year, many areas even reported record tourism seasons. the progress continues... but that doesn't mean our job is done. we're still committed to seeing this through.