joe. >> athena jones in washington, d.c. thanks so much for that. and thanks for joining us. i'm joe johns in for wolf blitzer in the situation room. the news continues next on cnn. thanks for joining us. i'm candy crowley. john king is off. new details about what happened and who was on board when a navy plane slammed into an apartment complex. and blood spills in syria with just six days to go until a planned cease-fire. can we trust syria's president to stop the crackdown? plus, is the job market getting any better? depends on who you ask. the bad news and the silver lining in a new jobs report. we begin with breaking news in the aftermath of today's fiery crash of a navy jet into an apartment complex in virginia

beach. at a news conference just now, city and navy officials say std they know of no fatalities, even though the fire after the crashed burned at least 40 apartments. also, the city's mayor tells cnn at least nine people including the two pilots were injured, and none of the injuries are considering ligfe-threatening. a virginia beach hospital reported it treated seven people, and except for one of the pilots all have been released. a navy spokesman revealed new details of the crash. >> shorting after noon we had a training flight, a two-seat hornet take off from naval air station yoeoceania. shortly after take-off that aircraft suffered a catastrophic mechanical malfunction. the specifics of which i don't want to speculate on. however, it resulted in the

forced ejection of that air crew. both of those air crew ejected safely. the front seater was a student pilot. the back seater was an experienced instructor. it resulted in their forced ejection and the lost of the aircraft, which impacted over my right shoulder here. >> the fire chief in virginia beach says a primary search of the five damaged buildings turned up no reports of fatalities. a secondary search is now under way. one of the first people to reach the crash scene took these pictures of the plane's shattered tail but also saw the fire ball immediately after the crash. >> i was playing tennis when i felt a huge plume of black smoke of coming off. i dropped my racquet, ran over to my bag and grabbed my phone and ran. as we came on the scene, large fire balls were coming up, there's ambulances coming in from everywhere. i hopped the fence to go around

to the side of the building where there weren't very many people. through the smoke you can see the end of the plane just sitting in a court yard. so i started taking photos and buildings were starting to collapse. i did not see anyone running out. i was told that there's a bunch of senior citizens that live in those buildings, which it worries me a lot. it was just unbelievable. law enforcement was really quick to get on the scene, but the amount of jet fuel that you could smell on the ground, it didn't seem right. these planes are flying over the virginia beach area all the time. it seems these past few months they've been getting more and more daring with their maneuvers. i play tennis. it's only about a mile away. they're starting to fly lower over us. it seems like they're going at faster speeds. it seems like they're pushing these planes a bit too far around the residential area.

>> but again, we should remind our viewers no fatalities reported. all the injuries seem to be not life-threatening. now, pat cavanagh says one of the crewmen that ejected from the jet came down in his backyard. >> i was in the apartment and i heard three big, loud booms. so i got up from the couch and went to my back door, and when i looked out, i saw a pilot on the ground, parachute hanging from the building. he had facial lacerations, so i ran outside to see what i could do to help him. i'm retired rescue. i didn't know the plane had hit the building until i saw the smoke. then we had to get a bunch of neighbors together to get him out of the area, pick them up and take them to safety. >> was he able to speak at all or was he saying anything? >> he apologized very much for

hitting our complex, and i told him, don't worry about it. everything is going to be fine. let's just get you out of here to safety. >> were you able to move him without any issue? was he hurt otherwise? >> no, i checked him over. i did a body survey on him. he was in shock still strapped to his seat. so a bunch of neighbors, we just picked him up and drug him through the other side of the parking lot away from the fire until rescue could get on the scene. >> virginia congressman scott rigil represents the district where the jet went down. he's a member of the house armed services committee and has been in touch with civilian and military officials today. what can you add to the body of knowledge here? candad cana >> candy, it's been a challenging day but a remarkable day, given that the primary search has indicated there's no fatalities, our prayers -- it looks like they may have been

answered here. we will know, i think, with more certainty as time goes on, but the hampton roads community, virginia beach today is the focal point here. it's a remarkable community. the number one district in the country in terms of men and women in uniform active duty and retired and reach out and when something like this happens the outpouring the community is remarkable. pastors and local businesses called me. our focus is making sure the families are okay who have been displaced. >> absolutely. a lot of people need a place to sleep tonight. i agree with you. we look at those pictures. i know you've seen them up close and personal. you look at the pictures, and you just can't imagine how no one was kimmed in this. it's quite the miracle. >> you're a member of the house arm aed services committee. there are reports out there that the f-18 has been troublesome in

year, there have been other crashes. can you shed any light on that? do you know of that? ? >> the f-18 has a remarkable record in termts of safety and in terms of combat effectiveness. we believe and i believe the evidence in records and data indicates that it's an extremely reliable plane. a real backbone of our arsenal, certainly on our aircraft carriers. so we'll look at the evidence, but it's got a tremendous track record. we're very proud to have them at oceania. i'm confident we'll move forward with the aircraft. this very difficult incident today is not going to deter that. >> congressman rigell, we know that the base closing commission had wanted to close this particular base. it suggested it because of, you know, the buildup of so many things around it.

obviously, worried about the danger of something like this, the safety record has been great, and this is the first incident we know there. is that a continuing conversation in that area, or are the people there happy to have the base and the base happy to be there? >> oh, absolutely. the partnership between the navy and virginia beach is extremely strong. so much work has been done in that area over the last several years, including support from the governor, governor mcdonnell. the mayor has led the effort there. our focus there today is not so much about encoachment because we have a remarkable track record there, but really on helping the families that have been displaced. so many are without a home tonight, so the red cross, my office, local city and state officials are really reaching out to the families. >> virginia congressman scott rigell, the crash occurring in his district. thank you so much for your time

tonight. we want to bring in pentagon correspondent barbara starr. just last hour a navy captain said at a news conference this was a catastrophic mechanical malfunction. witnesses say they say flaming coming out from the right wing. what could athat mean? >> i think his words are very critical here candy. the plane crash less than two miles from the runway perhaps just a few seconds after take-off at a relatively low altitude. the crew didn't even have time to really get the flight under way before it ran into this malfunction. there were reports now of flaming coming out from the plane and fuel coming out, and by all accounts this was not a controlled fuel dump. this was related to whatever catastrophic malfunction the plane suffered. so you're seeing both fuel and flame just seconds after take-off as it goes into the building.

this indicates a very extreme catastrophic malfunction. they're going to want to get to that flight recorder as fast as possible. they're going to want to secure every piece of debris they can find and do the forensics to see what clues they can get about what happened and what the crew can tell them. one student pilot although qualified to be in the cockpit and one instructor pilot. >> we know that both of them sustained injuries but not life-threatening but one is released. we learned there was not a purposeful fuel dump, and so reports that eyewitnesses say, hey, we fall fuel coming out of that plane is something that might point to this catastrophic malfunction. we also know that the pilots didn't have time to do much but eject. is that pretty much sum up what we know? >> yeah. it was interesting. i thought they used the words forced ejection. there was no choice here.

the ejection set seats were activated. that rocket propelled charge under the seat lifting them out. the cockpit cover blowing them away. normally when you have an injection, you eject at a certain altitude so juror parachute lefts you float down to earth at least relatively saflly. here if they did, in fact, eject at a relatively low attitude, it's interesting to see how they survive. that could have been a catastrophe. a lot of luck, a lot of skill, a lot of really good wishes apparently all coming together in this situation. >> pretty amazing. barbara starr at the pentagon, thank you as always. now to politics and the fallout from a job reports indicating the u.s. economy still isn't recovering quickly enough. the nation's unemployment rate is at its lowest people in three years, 8.2% p. they created

120,000 in march and that's half as many in february. president obama is quick to point out it is still an increase. >> our economy has now created more than 4 million private sector jobs over the past two years. more than 600,000 in the past three months alone. but it's clear to every american that there will still be ups and downs along the way, and that we've got a lot more work to do. >> a statement from mitt romney calls the job report weak and very troubling and proof the obama economy is not working. romney goes on to say after three years in office, the president has -- the president's excuses have run out. still ahead, we will speak with virginia's governor as we continue monitoring developments at the scene of today's navy jet crash in virginia beach. the deadly count jodown to what's supposed to be a peace deal.

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you'lled troop pull-back from the government. in the last 24 hours almost 3,000 syrians fled to turkey. one woman that crossed the border tells cnn there's a massacre in the syrian city of taftanaz. that is backed bip the chilling video posted on youtube on thursday showing dozens of corpses laid out in a mass grave. joins us is the host of cnn's va read. >> khaira. thanks for joining us. we're coming up with a tuesday deadline to pull back troops as the u.n. has requested. can we trust him to do that? >> reporter: we can't trust him to do it. he's trying to inflict as much damage as possibly before that date, because clearly at that point he will at least try to make the pretense of drawing back or they will be some pull-back, and what is clearly happening is they're trying to inflict as much damage as they

can. now, past tuesday if there were to be another uprising, another opposition forces were to mount some kind of challenge, i have no doubt they would beat it back. a u.n. cease-fire is not going to stop them from what appears to be a dedicated and brutal campaign to destroy the opposition. >> i talked to a couple of people in and around this particular situation today who said, listen, you know, in the end the u.n. can put in some monitors to make sure that a cease-fire holds. but eventually they have to go home, and they believe that president al assad will start over again. >> i think he'll wait them out. it's a big country, and you can't have observers everywhere. when you have cease-fires and freezes, you're freezing in place a highly unequal balance of power. on the one hand you have the government and intelligence

forces. their informal informants and paid informants. there's a network of repression that syria has. that all stays in place. on the other hand, you have a ragtag opposition movement. so a cease-fire at this point is not going to do much more than kind of preserve the status quo, which is essentially in the government's -- to the government's advantage. >> let me ask you and turn you to another place in the middle east, and that is egypt. there was a meeting this week between u.s. officials and officials from the muslim brotherhood. what does that tell you about at that relationship going forward? >> it tells us that the muslim brotherhood is serious about governing. they're trying to reach out to the united states and to provide some assurances about the kind of government they will have, na there will be elements of continuity. they have made clear on several occasions that, for example, they intend to abide by the

treaty with israel, the treaty that established relations and ends hostilities between egypt and israel, which is seen in some ways as the cornerstone of stability in the middle east. the fact that the brotherhood, which has long campaigned against that treaty for decades, would come up and privately assure and publicly made statements to the same effect, it would adhere to that treaty, that tells you they understand there is a difference between being an opposition party and dictatorship and being what is likely to be the single largest party in a new democratic egypt. >> does the u.s. have any realistic way they could go other than to accept this? there has been some hesitation, as you know, and to say, okay, we accept on the face of this that you all could certainly move forward and rule the country. we know the muslim brotherhood has put forward a presidential candidate. they said at first they wouldn't but now they have. how would that relationship

likely shape up, and is that what we're seeing the beginnings and anticipation of a major role for the muslim brotherhood? >> yeah. you asked exactly the right question at the start, candy, which is can the u.s. do anything but accept this? the answer is really no. this is the outcome of a democratic process that we have applauded, the world has applauded. so far the muslim brotherhood has not done anything that suggests they would sub vert that democratic process. they may have policies we disagree with, but that's different from trying to dismantle democracy itself. it doesn't mean we're going to like every law they pass and every policy they uphold. we have it to engage with them, because that's our only leverage. it's to try to moderate thbehavr by forcing them to govern and making them possible. if we cut them off in some way, we would lose all our influence.

remember, they would be able to find other sources of funding. we are now live inniing in a dit world than 20, 30 years ago. the muslim brotherhood can find money from saudi arabia, from qatar, from e you, from turkey. it's in our interest to have a relationship with us and they view us as a serious ally but at least a serious enter lock for. somebody with with a dialogue where we express our concerns and they express theirs. >> you can fareed every sunday morning at 10:00 a.m. eastern. next, appear update on this afternoon's breaking news. a navy jet crashes into a virginia beach apartment complex. also, kansas officials say the hoerld of a lottery ticket is looking forward to retirement.

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officials say they know of no fatalities in in fiery jet crash in virginia beach. at least nine people including both pilots were injured. a virginia beach said everyone except a single pilot has been treated and released. they blame the crash on catastrophic mechanical malfuncti malfunction. we'll have more in a little bit, but first, here's mary snow with other news you need to know right now. hi there, candy. it looks like someone has

finally cashing in on the $656 million lottery jackpot. the kansas winner who chose to remain anonymous gets $218 million before taxes. this ticket holder oped for the cash option and collected $157 million. it's one of three win it tickets that match the mega million. a desperate teenager got the money to sell his kidney for a transplant to get an ipad. they report five people including the surgeon now face criminal charges. in china iphones sell for the equivalent over 650 u.s. dollars and i pads for over 400. european airline ryanair is trimming its budget and crew members' waistlines. the airline is encouraging flight attendants to lose weight to save on fuel. ryanair isn't the first to take these odd, cost cutting

measuring. according to the economist in 2010 turkish airlines told the crew to lose weight in six months or lose the jobs. rick santorum's 3-year-old daughter is back in the hospital. they relaced a statement that did not detail bella's condition but asked for prayers and privacy. bella santorum suffers from a rare genetic disorder and was last hospitalized in january. on easter sunday tim tebow will have an audience of 30,000 people celebrating what they're calling their version of the super bowl. he'll deliver a 20-minute sermon in front of what's called celebration church in georgetown, texas. the pastor says it won't be a tim tebow show but a chance to honor one celebrity, and that's jesus. candy. thanks, mary. coming up, we'll have the latest from the navy jet crash, and a former navy pilot explains the protocol for ejecting from a plane.

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i'm candy crowley. virginia's governor will update us on the fiery jet crash that burned 40 apartments but as far as we know left no one dead or even seriously injured. the unemployment rate hit a

three-year low. we'll dig into what that means if you're looking for a new or better job. and a u.s. marine who criticized his commander in chief may be expressing his opinions as a civilian. we want to get back to that navy jet that slammed into an apartment complex in virginia beach. this is what's left. the two pilots on board the f-18 ejected from the plane and lived. rescuers are still searching this heavily damaged buildings for missing people, but so far no deaths and no serious injuries. bob mcdonald is on the phone from richmond. governor, i understand you've been to the scene. describe to me what it seems. as a big as a tv screen can get, i don't think it compares to having been there. >> candy, i have not been to the scene. we've had a number of our staff, state police, hazmat teams and other officials on the scene.

i've talked to the mayor repeatedly throughout the day as well as other officials down there and got first hand reports. i lived three miles from the scene for 21 years and also in the flight path of oceania air station and know the air very well. it is miraculous at this point with that much fire and damage and a heavy populated area like that that at this point there's relatively minor injuries. what we know is that there's secondary searching going on by police, fire rescue. some areas was too hot and smoky to get into earlier, and there's still more to be done. but it's incredible the reaction of our first responders, the bravery and the decision-making of those two navy pilots that stayed in there until the very end and probably drained fuel to prevent a larger inferno. it's great, great work by the navy in this tragedy. >> governor, what can you tell us about -- is it state involved now? are there things that they need

on the scene, or are they coping well without some state help? >> all the training and preparation with the navy and virginia beach police and state police and hazmat teams have gone through stayed great. you saw the scene today and all of them working in tandem and phenomenal work for the citizens and you saw them pitching in and helping with moving fire hoses and helping residents in the area. he wanted to help the pilot after he jeektejected and lande the backyard. really was the best virginia had to offer today. weerz hourses away from confirming a good friday miracle that there was no loss of life. it's preliminary but we're cautiously optimistic that all this rescue work and the pilots at the very end ejecting at the last minute saved a lot of lives. >> you know that area well, so

let me ask you about these reports that the base closing commission wanted to shut this down simply because of the encroaching population. what is the relationship? i know this is a pretty military area to begin with, lots of retire retirees. is this something that has caused any friction there? is there any feeling at all that they want this place closed? this is the first crash we know of that's certainly been of this magnitude. >> we're incredibly proud in virginia to be at the home of the pentagon, the greatest navy base in norfolk and in oceania where this f-18 took off from. there's a phenomenal relationship between the military and commonwealth and the surrounding areas. back in 2005 the last commission looked at moving some of those jets down to florida, and as a result several things that did not happen. but since that time we've made a

commitment both by the state and by the localities to put significant money, tens of millions of dollars into evading encroachment of the houses. we're moving some of those properties back in the accident potential zone. in fact, in this year in the budget i proposed about $7.5 million to buy properties around that area. so we're working on reducing congestion in the accident-potential zone. right now we know that all the bases over time, over 70 years training leading up to world war ii. most of the activity takes place outside of the land mass over the sea. occasionally there are touch-and-goes, mechanic qualifications that are around the base. we don't know what happened in this case, but there's always

the sound of freedom. there's always jet noise over that flight path day and night. >> thank you so much for your time tonight. virginia governor bob mcdowell, we appreciate it. >> thank you very much. >> what is a pilot supposed to do when a jet is going down? max carrie is a former navy pilot. >> they've practiced this so many times. they drilled this for hours and hours and hours. what do i do in this situation? what's my emergency procedure? what are my cues? what do i look at and touch? they would sequence that in a matter of seconds. they would go through 20, 30, 40, as many as 50 cues instantaneously to make a decision. now, in this situation right after take-off a very unforgiving environment. they would have had little time. what most people don't realize is that jet, when the engines aren't firing at full power, is like a stone. it's like a rock. it drops from the sky. so i'm sure that they did everything they could to save that aircraft, and then based on

those cues had to eject. >> witnesses on the ground say they saw flames coming from under the right wing. here's carrie's take on what that means. >> that tells you that they were about to explode, and that's the most frightening thing for a pilot. you're sitting on 10,000 pounds of jet fuel, which is essentially kerosene and they were sitting on 10,000 pounds of kerosene. those were the choices. >> amy miller saw the pilots eje eject. what did you see that made you know something was wrong? >> i was going into work. i work at the cleaners there in the shop, called s. ray bear cleaners. i was standing outside, and my boss and i were talking doing shift change. we heard the noise.

of course, we didn't think much of the noise because we hear jet noises all the time. however, when he made a comment about the noise, i happened to look up, and i see the plane coming down at an angle to the right. i see them -- i see the flames at the side wing. i see both of them eject, and the parachutes open. they went off to the right where the plane actually went down. >> when they ejected, you saw them coming out of the plane. i take it they went up before coming down? >> yeah. i mean, it just looked like something shot out of the top of it, which was them, and then the parachutes opened before it finished going down. it was already pretty low by the time they ejected. it looked like it was about to hit a rooftop, and that's when it went over. >> did they seem to be coming down -- >> i couldn't see what actually went down. >> did they seem as though they were coming down really fast? obviously, you did need some height for that parachute to open and catch some wind.

>> oh, yes. when i looked up up, it was already angled to the right and coming down and on fire. i saw flames. >> wow. wow. amy miller, quite a day there. we, of course, hope as i know everyone in virginia beach does that it continues to be good news and that no one, in fact, was killed today. so far that's certainly the news we have. thanks for your time tonight. >> thank you. turning now to the american economy. 120,000 new jobs were added last month, and that sounds like good news, right? it depends on how you look at it. it's only half the number of jobs that were added the month before, and mitt romney is using today's report as campaign trail amm ammo. we will hash out what this means in the race to the white house first. first, christine romans you crunches the numbers. >> since when is a drop in the unemployment rate a negative, disappointing? when you only create 120,000 jobs in the month and you created 200,000 plus for the

prior three months. that's the disappointment here. some economists say it fell because about 164,000 people, many of them white women, by the way, dropped out of the work force and so that's why the unemployment rate fell. let's look at where the jobs are or where we started to it lose jobs in the month. retail jobs. this is kind of interesting. 34,000 retail jobs were lost in the month of march. we've seen retail sales pretty strong in this country, to this caught some people by surprise. probably the only place you saw strength at retail was home and garden stores because of the good weather. a lot of people are watching this to see if it's some sort of harb harbinger of weakness coming for the consumer. look at the politics of it. here is the trend overall. this is that big, big job loss at the end of the bush administration and into the early months of the obama administration. hundreds of thousands of jobs lost every single month. here is this painful period,

this is stimulus by the way and census hiring where you saw job creation here. this painful period of wondering if we would have a double-dip recession. this is the trend since then. a lot of economists like to see this getting bigger and bigger. you have a slowdown in hiring here. seven more of these job reports until the election, candy. >> we want to get more perspective on this from cristea freeland, from forbes. we were on it this streak of three months of solid job gains and then this. the president says this is typical up and down. mitt romney says the president's excuses have run out. we could say for sure it's an election year. what's the truth here? can we tell at this point is this a normal bump in the road, or is the recovery losing steam? >> i don't think we can tell for sure, candy, but it is generally the case that recoveries aren't always straight lined. they do go a little bit up and down. christine was right that the

real reason there's so much disappointment today is not only that those numbers are weaker than the previous three months but the expectation is there's 200,000 jobs and 120 is a smaller number. we have hear from ben bernanke, the head of the fed, you know, a little bit of a premonition that this might be happening. he's been cautioning that the strong job growth was getting a little bit ahead of the strength of the economic recovery of growth in gdp. some people had been saying, you know what? the recovery isn't as strong as the job numbers have suggested, and that's what this month seems to be telling us. >> what do you think of the hit that we saw in retail jobs? what happened there? >> i think christina is absolutely right to pull that number out, and the most persuasive theory i have heard about that is that we are seeing the impact of ecommerce, so the retail sector overall is actually doing better. people are out buying, but as

all of us who buy things online know, you can buy stuff without actually dealing with a salesclerk. so i actually we are seeing the beginning of a trend, which is a strong retail sector, but not as many retail jobs. >> when you look at the unemployment rate, it's at a three-year low. a lot of people quit looking, and a lot of them are white women. s why that? >> we don't know for sure, and actually, that is a little bit of a new trend because at the beginning of the recovery you had people talking about how it was a shecovery. remember that? all of the arguments about the economy today was more friendly for women than it was for men. what we've seen in the latest job numbers is men getting new jobs more than women are. maybe women find the job market is more hostile to them, and

decide they're not going to look. part of what is driving that is one spot of light is the manufacturing sector. manufacturing turns out not to be dead, and there has been a recovery of manufacturing jobs. that has historically tended to be a pretty male space. >> global editor for at large for reuters. thanks, have a great weekend. >> thank you. coming up courting the women's vote. president obama tries to widen the gender gap on who holds the majority in his family. >> women are over half this country, and it's worked for us. not to mention 80% of my household if you count my mother-in-law, and i always count my mother-in-law. i'm always looking out for small ways to be more healthy. like splenda® essentials™ no calorie sweeteners. this bowl of strawberries is loaded with vitamin c. and now, b vitamins to boot. coffee doesn't have fiber. unless you want it to.

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an awful lot the closed door meetings this week on the schedule of republican presidential candidate rick santorum. he met with newt gingrich supporters governor rick perry in texas and with conservative leaders in virginia. joining us to discuss what these gatherings may mean, michael crowley, democratic strategist penny lee and senior adviser rick tayler. it's hard to mispronounce my name. rick, let me start with you, simply because you've been running this super-pac for newt gingrich. have you stopped? >> no. >> are you going to put more ads on the air for him?

as far as you're concerned, his campaign is moving on? >> i think the objective is to get as many delegates into tampa as possible. we'll do that by advertising. our fund-raising has been a challenge. i think it's been a challenge for everybody. >> how do you do that? you advertise for delegates? i'm not sure what you for delegates? i'm sorry? >> you advertise in the states to try to win some delegates. california's proportionate, maybe texas could go -- there's other states where it's proportional, so you can gather delegates here and there. >> so do niche advertising in places that might be friendly to him. >> sure. >> so as far as you're concerned, you will not give this up until he does or until the convention? >> exactly. newt gingrich is in charge and we follow his lead and we'll stay in as long as he wants. >> is it over? >> i don't think so. i hope it's not. >> of course you don't. in fact, every time i talk to you, you say, no, let's keep this going. >> let's keep this going. i think it's going to be interesting for rick santorum, because i think the question he has to ask himself right now is, what does he want to get out of

this? what does he want this race to become? does he want to set this up for a 2016 race? does he want a position in the cabinet? does he want to be vice president? because right now the math is not in his favor. >> and michael, does he want to lose his home state? >> i think there's a way to finish this with dignity. and i think he wants to calculate it so that he, you know, he might want to stay in and show some strength without burning too many bridges in the party, without attacking romney too hard, but if he sticks his neck out and loses his own state, he'll be remembered for having stayed too long, pushed it too hard, flamed out, and it's going to be embarrassing. he's got to calibrate it pretty carefully. >> "the washington post" had an article tonight about mitt romney and his wealth, which is going to be an issue. the democrats don't think it's the time now for a very rich man -- and he would be the wealthiest man to be president if he had. so they had an article about

using ethics disclosures rules. mitt romney has been able to hide some of the real basis of his wealth. we thought this was really interesting. this was a tweet from @barack obama. it says, so what's romney hiding? tweet @mitt romney to demand he release his tax returns, #whatsromneyhiding. i think it's amazing it came from the president's tweet. does that strike you? >> we are in a whole new world. >> why not let axelrod or one of his strategic advisers do it? >> it is surprising it came from the president directly. normally you let someone else handle those kind of negative things. but they are putting out the signal early that they are going to be responding to everything and be aggressive in their campaign going forward. so i imagine we'll see a lot more of this. >> candy, in part because i think the president needs to fire up his base, i think he wants to get his supporters motivated and i think there's been a wrap against him that he hasn't fought the republicans hard enough. and i think we've seen some moments already where he's

trying to dealt, i've got the gloves on, i'm ready for the fight. >> i would argue that a lot of people would like to see a presidential candidate, which we haven't seen on the republican side through this race -- look, you know, can we see someone act presidential? and the president has a great contrast, to me, over what this race that's been going on on the republican side, which has been about trivia, horse race and all that. the president has all these opportunities to actually act and be presidential. sending out a tweet, what's mitt romney hiding, that doesn't strike me as very presidential. >> the white house had a forum on women, which they've had every year, but it took a distinctly political turn today with the president talking about, at one point he said, is it fair to say that congress would do more with more women in congress? is it fair to say, he said, i think it's almost guaranteed.

is there such a thing as almost pandering too much to females? >> the president probably thinks he's got a good thing going. the gender gap right now between the president and mitt romney is enormous, it's quite striking. and they want to harden that narrative. the natural flow of the campaign will harden it. but they want to drive it home and harden as much as they can while they're able to. >> really quick, last word, like ten seconds. they're going to lose some of that women vote over the course of the campaign. >> but this is a gap that is paramount for mitt romney to actually have to close to be able to win. women are a key electorate. >> i think we would do better if we had more republican women. >> thank you so much. appreciate you all being here. come back. still ahead, eye popping 3-d images of those destructive texas tornadoes. we will dissect what these pictures show. ♪ [ acoustic guitar: slow ]

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welcome back. here's mary snow with the latest news you need to know right now. >> hey, there, candy. a marine sergeant is in trouble for criticizing president obama on facebook in various postings. sergeant gary stein calls his commander in chief, among other things, quote, the domestic enemy and a liar. they are recommending a dishonorable discharge for the marine. stein tells cnn he's entitled to his opinions. an emotional hugo chavez fought back tears on state television, publicly praying for

his health. the controversial venezuelan president spoke at a mass pleading wi pleading with god, quote, do not take me yet. the 57-year-old is battling cancer, but hasn't announced which type. he returned to venezuela yesterday after treatment in cuba. and check this out. it's nasa's 3-d animation of the monstrous tornados that hit texas on tuesday. it shows the height of the storms that ripped through dallas county. some reached up to eight miles high. the national weather service says as many as 13 tornadoes struck the area, damaging or destroying near 1,000 homes. pretty amazing, candy. >> wow. i always thought that storms, if they're not deadly, are so gorgeous, just looking at them. but those pictures, eight miles high. that's a pretty tall storm, when i look at that picture. it looks like a great skyline of some sort. mountains. >> so destructive. eight miles high isll