RomneyCare is not ObamaCare.  Regardless of whether Romney ever argued for a national individual mandate, it is a state program in a federal system, which makes all the difference.  States have a great deal more power than the federal government to impose on their citizens.  Scarborough simply does not know what he is talking about or is intentionally trashing Republicans.  Besides that, even if Romney actually wrote and gave the bill to Obama, which of course is absurd, he would still be the guy who is going to repeal it, and that's all that matters.  This country wants the bill gone and Romney is the guy who will do it.  The best Obama can do is call Romney a hypocrite at which point the country will say, no, really, a hypocritical politician?  They will then loudly say, who cares!  Repeal this disaster of a bill!

The state of the GOP is really not as bad as Scarborough says.  Joe's gloom is based on the tough presidential nominating contest the GOP is having and his perception of the field of candidates as weak.  But this ignores the reason for Romney's perceived weakness.  Romney is viewed as weak because he has not locked up the nomination yet.  He has not locked it up because conservatives have not supported him while moderates and independents have supported him strongly, at least until recently.  Independents don't like bitter party fights, so they have pulled back.  That's why they are independents.  There is no reason to think independents won't come back once the nomination is his.  He is not hurt by the social issues debate.  The real reason Romney has suffered  is because he has never decided to "catch his hair on fire" to excite the right, as he put it.  He is still perceived as reasonable and competent because he has not taken the bait from the red meat craving right.   Last, the right is going to vote for whoever the GOP nominates because they will be voting against Obama.  No force is stronger in politics than voting against someone.  This fact guarantees that all those folks voting against Romney in the primaries will be flying his flag higher than anyone else come November.  Doubt that?  Gingrich never fails to make perfectly clear that he will strongly support whoever the GOP nominates.  If Gingrich can say that, then even the most emotional partisan conservative will say the same thing.  So when the independents come back and the right joins with Romney, he will be a very strong nominee, perhaps the strongest since 1984.  I suspect Joe knows this.  He likes to bait the left wings goofs he works with. 

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After Romney pulled out a victory in Michigan, everyone expected Ohio to develop into a horserace.  But Tennessee was not supposed to be on Romney's list of possible states. But Romney is within three points of Santorum and is ahead of Gingrich in Tennessee.  If Romney steals Tennessee from Santorum, perhaps that will offset a narrow loss in Ohio.  Or if Romney is able to win both, Romney will go a good distance toward ending this process tomorrow.

In Ohio, it's looking like it will come down to a point or two. With Santorum being ineligible for 18 of the Ohio's 60+ delegates, Romney has a very strong chance of winning more delegates in Ohio.  Because of this, it seems like Romney is certain to have a winning narrative after Tuesday, no matter what the popular vote result in Ohio.  After winning Washington, which Santorum had hoped to take, Romney looks to be in the driver's seat.  Santorum is losing chances to retake the narrative.

CLICK A STATE TO THE RIGHT TO SEE CURRENT IMAGE CHART IN EACH STATE AND TO LINK TO CURRENT POLLING AVERAGES

Again we had 351,000 filed claims last week, the same number as the week before, until it was revised up this week.  We are seemingly headed for a four-week average very close to the 350,000 average that economists say will signal sustained job growth.  The Gallup poll, however, is showing that unemployment spiked back up to 9.1% this month.  Gallup's numbers always show up earlier than those of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.  In summary, the picture is hard to pin down right now.   

See this week's numbers here