JIM Mike, it seems that Hillary Clinton has dug herself into a Wall Street hole. Is there any way she can dig herself out of this thing?

MIKE Yeah, go bankrupt.

JIM (Laughs) I mean really what does she do?

MIKE You know Jim. She has been in this bubble for 30-40 years. One bubble or another. And I don’t know that she can do anything to get out of them. And the idea that you know that you might run for president, you’re thinking of running for president and you’re accepting these gargantuan speaking fees, not just from Goldman Sachs, but through other you know, corporate entities in this country and abroad. And you’re making you know, over a hundred million dollars between you and your husband in speaking fees, pump the breaks! If you’re running for president.

JIM Speaking of her and her husband. What do you think of her husband coming, sending her husband out to be the messenger on the fact that the Sanders campaign is running a sexist effort against his wife? You send the husband to be the messenger.

MIKE I would bet you some money that she doesn’t send him. I would bet you that it was just his own internal level of frustration and anger with the messaging of his wife’s campaign and the way the message is being received. Especially in this state which he regards as a home game for the Clintons. And I think there’s just a level of frustration and anger.

JIM Do you see any parallels between his comments about Barack Obama in 2008 and his comments about Bernie Sanders in 2016?

MIKE Only in the sense that I think both were fueled by anger over what was happening to his wife, her campaign and her messaging in contrast to a relative newcomer in their minds, to the national stage.

JIM Did you see Trump coming, 6 months ago, if we had this conversation? And I said this guy— that the Huffington Post won’t even cover except in the entertainment pages, is running for president, may run, may not run, what’s he gonna be doing in NH in 6 months… what would you have said?

MIKE You know, 6 months ago I would have said, I doubt that he’ll be in NH. 6 months I would have said, yeah I think he’ll probably drop out, get tired of it.

JIM Do you get the phenomenon now?

MIKE Yeah I do.

JIM What is it? You’ve written about it your whole life basically.

MIKE I do and as a matter of fact you see the same phenomenon, I was in a Sanders rally this morning, and you can see the same level of anxiety of the present, about the fear of the immediate future economically. You can see in both crowds, the Sanders crowd and the Trump crowd— a certain similarity in the way that people are looking at issues. And their frustration over what is not happening

JIM You know, you hear that Trump is saying now he would have won Iowa if it wasn’t for the Ted Cruz, but the reality is that he came in second. His brand is, he’s a winner, if he loses NH, which looks unlikely, if he loses NH, does he go home and do his laundry or does he stay in?

MIKE I think he stays in but I think he stays in badly wounded, perhaps mortally.

JIM You know, speaking of wounded, the highlight of Saturday night’s debate, I think everyone would agree, would be the fall from grace of Marco Rubio, who many thought was charging to the lead here, at least moving toward it. Courtesy of the governor of NJ, you spoke to Chris Christie about that whole exchange, yes?

MIKE Yesterday afternoon in a bar in Exeter, NH. He came in, I was right at the door, and he stopped, and I said to him, Governor, last night, I said for the 5 or 6 minute back and forth you were having with Marco Rubio, I said, did it at all remind you of Roberta Duran, sitting on his stool and going “no mas” nearly 30 years ago? And right away, he’s a sports fan, he said no no it didn’t, but I’ll tell you what it did remind me of, Mike Tyson, everybody has a plan till they get punched in the face. That’s Marco. That’s exactly what he said, and I think that’s exactly what happened.

JIM Nice to see you Mike Barnicle…