>> this is al jazeera america live from new york city. i'm david shuster. here is a look at today's top stories. yp morgan chase announced a $13 billion settlement with the government over the you bank's role in housing crisis. talks continue in geneva, and today president obama brief key members of the in the, and some u.s. lawmakers are pushing for tougher sanctions against iran. 23 people were killed in suicide attacks. al-qaeda said it was behind the blast. rescuers are still digging through the devastation in illinois as dozens of neighborhoods are leveled by tornadoes. eight people were killed early this week and hundreds of

thousands are still without power. an investigation into a deadly attack in the home of a virginia state senator who was injured this morning. hihis son was found dead. >> those are your headlines inside story is next. >> president obama has got a bad case of the aca blues. the prospects for changing the tune and the tone in his second term. that's the "inside story."

>> hello, i'm ray suarez. more than three years more than a thousand daze left in the obama presidency. despite the wobbly roll out of the affordable care act its way, way too early to predict how it will all turn out. but a new poll in the "washington post" said 70% of americans now think the country is on the wrong track. 53% believe the president is not a strong leader. on this addition of "inside story" we're going to take a close look at the challenges and opportunities for barack obama's second term. but first this background. >> america is great. and it needs to be restored to its greatness. [ cheering ] >> reporter: around 100 people gathered in a park near the white house tuesday to shout

their dissatisfaction with president obama. >> my name is larry clam, n. >> reporter: organized by freedom watch the rally now accuses the president of killing america. >> i see america dying. just being here reminds me of a country we're supposed to have. >> reporter: this rally is made up of the right of the right, at no time has this group been supportive of the president. still the protest in obama's backyard comes in at an especially low point for him and his administration. according to a new "washington post" "abc news" poll the president's approval rating has plummeted to its lowest yet. 55% of americans say they disapprove of the job the president is doing now. only 42% approve. the poll shows 50% of americans

feel that president obama is not honest or trustworthy in contrast to 47% of americans who think he is. the hidden credibility follows a partial government shutdown near national default after a stand off in congress, a series of nsa revelations on the extensiveness of u.s. spying, and now a fumbled roll out on the affordable care act. the president offered a long apology in last week's press prs briefing. >> i understand why folks are frustrated. i am, too. sometimes they take a look at what's taking place in washington, and they say not enough is getting on it that helps me with my life. regardless of what congress does, ultimately i'm the president of the united states, and they expect me to do something about it. you know, that's on me. i mean, we fumbled the roll out on this healthcare law.

>> reporter: first on the agenda is revamping confidence in the affordable caraffordable care a. they hope to have the website in 80% functionality december 1st. >> users were waiting an average of eight seconds for the site to load. and this past week the average response time remained under one second. >> the malfunctioning website hurt applicants before the roll out they were hoping to have half a million signed up by november. but they announced it had only attracted 106,000 enrollees thus far. next on obama's check list, figuring out how to handle newly canceled policies after termination letters from insurers blindsided millions of americans early this month. >> i was very shocked to find out that my plan was being canceled, and it was not

compliant. >> the president even admitted the cancellations were not what he expected. now he wants to extent canceled coverage for an extra year. >> people who have plans that pre-date the affordable care act can keep those plans if they haven't changed. that was already in the law. that's what's called a grandfather clause included in the law. today we're going to extend that principle both to people whose plans have changed since the law took affec effect, and those who bought plans since the law took effect. >> reporter: last week 39 house democrats splintered off party lines siding with the republican law to extend plans permanently and on the senate site, mary landrieu of indiana. >> in my view this may not be shared by everyone on the floor, but in my view it was not written as tightly as it should have been, as clearly as it

should have been. >> she is up for re-election next year. the fragmenting highlights a gap between the president and some members of his party between representatives and senators who are hesitant to be associated with the government's struggling for support especially with midterm elections approaching. >> joining us now in the studio to talk about president obama, his bad poll numbers and prospects for a successful second term are simon rosenberg, president of the new democrat network. phil galston deputy assistant to president clinton, and sara chamberlain, chief officer of main street advocase, a policy group. your diagnosis of where things stand? >> well, this is the nader administration in a moment of christ. they may be able to get through

it, but until they get their arms around the affordable care act and it's implementation they are not going to be able to do anything else. >> sarah, chamberlain, the same question. >> i think the republicans will take advantage. >> do you agree, that the aca is the game? >> absolutely. >> how much time does he have? >> no more than five months. >> and finally, simon? >> i agree, and i think there will be stages in getting your arms and the aca. there will be the question of whether the individual mandate can work or how it works. there will be other questions in the fall. i think the issue of getting the it in good shape. this is a complicated law, and if they can do that, i think he

has got--the democrats have a shot of having a good election next year. short of that it will be a tough election for the democrats. >> does success dispel quickly. >> we've seen strong growth. there are underlying structural things that the president can playoff, but if this does not feel like its getting better, it will be hard to do much else. >> sarah, is there a risk of piling on? >> not from the republican side. >> rooting for failure is not a slam dunk-- >> we're not rooting for failure. we're rooting for them to get

this corrected so they can move forward with other reforms. we don't want to see the american people fail. that's what is going on right now. they're losing faith in their government and their president. >> is it fair to say that main street may not be rooting for failure, but there are republicans on the hill who are? >> that's exactly true. >> november is a very long way away. >> not only is november a very long way away, but let's not forget that the republican party is not exactly riding high in the eyes of the american people right now. every survey that i've seen suggests that even after the past six weeks the american people think even less well of the republican party than they do of the democratic party. the margin is not unsubstangs. so i think there are real risks,

risks that could be exacerbated if they do overplay their hand. so i would council moderation at this point. if the other side is--if the other side is hanging itself, you know, you don't pull out a gun and start shooting. >> we'll look at more perils and prospects of both parties. this is "inside story." >> while you were asleep, news was happening. >> here are the stories we're following. >> find out what happened and what to expect. >> international outrage. >> a day of political posturing. >> every morning from 5 to 9am al jazeera america brings you more us and global news than any other american news channel. >> tell us exactly what is behind this story. >> from more sources around the world.

>> the situation has intensified here at the border. >> start every morning, every day, 5am to 9 eastern with al jazeera america.

>> i'm ray suarez, this is "inside story." we're talking about the challenging place the president and his team find themselves in right now, still with us are simon rosenberg, the new democrat network. phil galston and sara chamberlain of main street advocacy, a republican group. simon, even when the poll were really rough in the first term, personal attributes always scored well for the president. even if people didn't approve of the job he was doing as

president. but in these latest sets of numbers are there troubling things that show a lack of personal trust, a lack of leadership ability, starting an erosion of those personal attributes that may be much more worrying than i disagree with the president on the issues? >> yes, there was change now. there is a changing sense. the job he has in front of you, i think he can turn this around. if you really look at the decline and his numbers very much he'll have to demonstrate in some way that he has had a break, he screwed up and he has

to put things on a better track. state of the union, budget, he has mechanisms to reorient. he'll have to adroitly reposition. >> he lied about insurance. and the american people have lost their trust in him. i think it would be very difficult to get that back and makes him extremely vulnerable. >> is that a lie, you can keep your insurance. the reason you're losing your insurance is because your policy was sub standard by the affordable care act. >> he said over and over that you could keep your insurance if you liked it, and that's not what is happening here. i don't know if he knew ahead of time if that was ultimately the consequence but he clearly repeated that.

>> this is totally of his own making. when you look at when he or she is inaugurated it doesn't say anything about the hamilto hamin source of energy but it does say that the president must take care that the law is faithfully executed. they don't call the president the chief executive for nothing. it was the president's prime responsibility to set up a management structure to implement the law to create unity of command and got it to where it needed to go.

people who study management for a living tell me that everything in the management handbook was systematically violated in the course of implementing the aca, and that is on the president, and he has said so. >> simon, it's risky for a president to say, "i didn't know." >> yes, it looks like you don't know what is going on underneath yoyou. i think he made it clear that he knows that it's his responsibility. it's called obamacare. it's not called something else. it's really on him. they're giving indications.

is this going to the white house. if senior white house staff were replaced, and people were moved around this would signal that they're really taking ownership of this. if they just use scapegoats then i think there will be enormous questions about whether or not he needs change his management style. >> iis this something that someone in corvalis, oregon, who hasn't signed up for healthcare or is it for the politica politl class. >> he needs the democrats coming up. he has to play the outside game to the public, but he has to play the inside game better than they have. >> sarah, the real possibility

even with flawed and there is a wider group of people now saying flawed legislation, are you going to have a solid number of americans who have health insurance who didn't have it before. who have uncapped coverage who didn't have it before. who have kids who are covered in the 20's who were uncovered before. do you worry about if you're running a republican campaign next year, a critical mass, or one that will fill in of people who will admit that the law is not perfect, but on balance they may be better off. >> we're not worried about that because those are the parts of the law that the republicans supported. it's the other parts that we didn't support. but we believe in allowing your kids to stay on your health insurance. we believe in capping. so it doesn't cause people to go into bankruptcy. these are republican principles from years ago. >> but those are also things that can happen if you insure

insurer that is they'll have a pool of customers to pay for it. >> but are we sure we're going to have the new customers to pay for all of this? the young people are going to sign up for this? that's going to be the million dollar question as we move forward. >> at least we've got something to watch for. >> right, we do. >> more with our guests in a moment. you're watching "inside story." >> we find the fault lines that run through communities. >> the shooting happened about 30 minutes ago. >> companies... >> the remains of the fire are still everywhere here. >> the powers that be at home and around the world... >> not only do they not get compensation but you don't even have to explain why? >> well thats exactly what i said. >> we question authority. >> so you said we could get access... >> that's enough! >> ... and those affected. >> investigative journalism at it's toughest.

power of the people until we restore our fr

>> i'm ray suarez. this is "inside story." still with us is ar our guests,d

earlier bill galston said that the republicans have not setting the world on fire in the opinion polls. does this make it harder. >> if we hadn't shut down the government, the aca would have been the story. instead we shut down the government. we played our games, we reopened the government. the main street members opene oo open it, and then it switched to the aca problems. but we knew that the website was not working and it took a couple of weeks for the media to get on top of that because we could not get out of our own way. >> does that give people like you hope for the near future, that this creates, artificial as it may be to get the ship right? >> our country is floundering right now.

it's lurching from crisis to crisis. i'm hoping that both political parties will back off a little while and give the situation a chance to cool off. i'm not betting on it, but if you had three randomly selected citizens at this table instead of three people who allegedly are baring the inside story i think that's what they would be telling you. stop fighting, start fixing. >> but if you're fighting over something real, simon, aren't you tempted to keep on fighting until you prevail? >> yeah, i think bill's aspiration is noble but i think rubber meets the road months from now. we don't have a budget. the two parties have been able to get to a place of agreeing on a budget. there have been budget going on and boycotting of the budget,

and the republicans wouldn't sit down with the democrats to negotiate because of the divisions in their own party. some of the reasons that drove down the republican numbers some of the radical members of their party asking and demanding things that are unreasonable to the american people could become back in front of the news over the budget talks in december. i think once again we could see an opportunity for things to shift. it could be that the two parties come together, do something meaning fortunately and make the citizens happy as bill was talking about. it could be that we reinforce the divisions that have plagued the city for some time now. >> what if they do stop fighting, wouldn't the president have been weakened in the recent past making it hard to get some things done. >> unlike some others, perhaps, even if the president does everything right from here on out it's not going to be a rapid

recovery. it's not the v-shaped recession. it's more like recent recessions where you go down the long way and then you come back up quite slowly. rebuilding trust in your motives and confidence in your competence is a long slow process when the damage is as severe as it has been in recent weeks. so i think the president still has important agenda. immigration reform, and the kinds of public investments of vigorous growing economy will require in the long term, but he can't get though tha to that agl he achieves a certain equilibrium in the law. as simon said a few minutes ago there will be continuing challenges, even if the initial challenges wereover come. >> asking for a tough vote like

comprehensive immigration reform, sarah, must be a tall order with a weakened president. >> sure is, and in the house our members are just not there. they're not interested in taking that vote. >> dead for this congress? >> i would say yes. absolutely. >> even for the governing wing of the republican party? >> i think so. we're not--we don't have enough votes to get it through at this point even in the governing wing. >> simon, you just saw a new wrath of appointees rejected in senate committees. is that a sign of a president that no one is afraid of any more? >> yeah, i think there is something else going on, i think there is a dangerous anti-democratic impulse coming in to the modern republican party. what happened in the government shutdown was an effort to change the balance of power through extra constitutional means. and i think we're seeing this again. the republicans are taking an enormous risk.

they were punished in looking like they were more interested in playing politics than solving problems. and here we are on routine appointments. normal things that go on every day in washington. the republicans are gumming them up. >> is that the price to pay if the president is weakened? >> i think the president will have to do a better job at explaining what is going on and why it matters so much. this is undermining the governmentment united states functioning. this has nothing to do with him. this has to do with our system and our government. the government is playing games with our system, not him. he has got to distinguish between the two. i think he did a good job during the government shutdown and he has to do that again. >> and sarah, the risk republicans want to control that chamber again. >> sure it's a risk. and we will control it. we're going get the senate back the way everything is going we feel very strongly we've got great candidates out there. >> it's just a couple of weeks ago that people were writing an

obituary for the republican party. the president created some daylight for them. >> look, politics in washington these days is like what mark twain said about new england weather. if you don't like it, wait 15 minutes. i am confident predicting just about anything except the future at this point. so i'm not going to sit here now and try to figure out what the operative climate is going to be as very evenly balanced senate races are adjudicated. we just don't know yet, and i don't think it's responsible to suggest that we do. >> guests thanks a lot for being here. that brings us to the end of this edition of inside story. i'm ray suarez. good night.