this time because he wanted to clean up russia's image ahead of the winter olympics in sochi but equally, many are saying, that vladimir putin felt confident enough at home and on the world stage to release the man who had, after all, been his arch political rival at this time. candy? >> thanks, christiane. and thank you all for watching "state of the union. "i'm candy crowley in washington. from all of us merry christmas and happy holidays. "fareed zakaria gps" is next. this is "gps" the global public square. welcome to those of you around the world and in the united states. i'm fareed zakaria. first, a star studded panel to look back at the year and ask what were the smartest moves on the international chess board? the biggest blunders? the most impressive players in 2013? then, the federal reserve signaled this week that america has emerged from its depths. i will talk to britain's finance

minister, george osborne, who argues that his nation's recovery proves that austerity actually works. later, is what the nsa does unconstitutional? i will ask president obama's first director of national intelligence, dennis blair, for his take on the controversy and india versus america. the dust up over america's treatment of an indian diplomat. it shows you a side of india worth watching. but first, here's my take. is income inequality the defining challenge of our time? president obama's december 4th speech on the topic provoked a lively debate on this subject. i think part of the confusion some people have is that when we talk about inequality, we often talk about he three different things. first, the astonishing rise of the very rich. second, the stagnant wages and poor prospects of the american

middle class. and third, the large number of people at the very bottom of the ladder. these are distinct phenomenon. they may be related. the rise of the rich might be causing the stagnation of the middle class but the research on that is mixed. one thing is sure. the super rich have grown worldwide but america is at the head of the pack. and it appears to be caused by many factors. some are structural. trends that reward superstars and globalization and technology and large and liquid financial markets. others are political. lower tax rates for the rich and the political influence of the financial sector. now, america has all of these things. superstars, technological innovation, huge capital markets, tax cuts and deregulation. it's not surprising that it has had the biggest rise in its super rich. would taxing the rich create a more dynamic middle class? perhaps but it's not exactly

how. it's also worth noting that america's tax system relying on income taxes principally is more pro-degreesive than european ones that get more revenues from sales taxes. the top 10% of americans pay 70% of all federal taxes. in new york city, top 1% pay 45% of the city's taxes. how much more should they pay? the stagnant middle class is clearly the most important challenge involving the most people. it's also the hardest one for which to find an enduring solution. this problem began 40 years ago. there's evidence that expanding rich crowded out the middle class but there's also a powerful story to be told about how technology, globalization and declining american education and skills have led to the stagnation of wages for the middle class. some argue that the real link between rise of the rich and fall of the middle class is

political. the rich have captured the political system and milked it to their advantage. and it's true that because of the vast role of money in politics, the well off and the well organized can often get special tax breaks and regulatory relief to help them. more broadly, look at what's happened in the last ten years in america. medicare was expanded dramatically. universal health care was enacted. energy policy has been changed against the wishes of big oil and coal companies. tax rates on rich have gone up at the federal, state and local level to at least a 30-year high. it was america that passed a stimulus program of almost $1 trillion to fight unemployment after the financial crisis. europe actually slashed social spending in the face of its worst unemployment in decades. on its face, this is not strong evidence of the political power of america's rich. of the three problems, the

easiest to fix is the one we spend the least time talking about. the fate of the poor who now number 46 million americans. since the poor tend not to vote nor lobby nor petition politicians, they don't get much attention and as a result government does not devote much energy or resources to their problems especially those of poor children who suffer from malnutrition, bad health, and poor education which cripple their chances of escaping poverty. the resources needed to change this would be a fraction of what we spend on the middle class in this country. we don't have all of the answers but if you're looking for a policy that would likely have the biggest effect on raising social mobility and reducing inequality, let's shift the attention from the rich and middle class and focus for once on the 46 million americans who are often forgotten. for more, go to cnn.com/fareed

and read my "washington post" column this week. let's get started. with nine days to go in 2013, i thought it was the perfect time to give the year a good old "gps" assessment. how did we do? how did the world's leaders behave themselves and are we finally seeing some real improvement in the economy? i have a true all-star gps panel to discuss it all. i have anne marie slaughter. bret stephens is columnist for "the wall street journal," and the economics editor of "the economist" and ian bremmer looks at political risk around the world. so brett, how do you think

president obama did for a completely fair and unbiased assessment? >> about as well as president bush did at a similar time in his tenure, 2005, which is to say it has not been a good year for him domestically for all of the reasons that we know since the disastrous rollout of obamacare which i think will be a rolling disaster. we haven't seen the end of it by any stretch. in foreign policy, this has been a year of american weakness. we saw it in gyrations about what to do with syria and the assad regime's use of chemical weapons. we've seen it in my view -- i have a sense there will be disagreement with this very ill conceived deal with iran. we've seen it in the skepticism of allies from japan and israel and saudi arabia who no longer feel can haonfident about amerin security guarantees that have been good for six decades. our allies are abandoning us and we're making a quest to gain friends who will never come our way.

>> anne marie, the obama administration would say we got a deal to get chemical weapons out of syria. we're trying to get a deal to get iran securely on a nonnuclear path. >> you just took my lines. those are hard accomplishments. i have been very critical of our syria policy and the optics of focusing more on chemical weapons than the tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of deaths was bad but the fact remains that we are getting chemical weapons out of syria and the framework agreement with iran is more than anyone has been able to do for a decade. it bodes very well. the fact that it exists is very important. i would say that there are two ways he's had a very bad year. one not his fault and one his fault. one not his fault is the congressional display of shutting down the government. our standing was weakened after the financial crisis. now countries look at us and say

not only can you not run your economy, you don't have a functioning democracy. not his fault but it's there and second is nsa spying scandal which no one pays enough attention to. if you think of the internet as its own realm of diplomacy, we did very badly this year and talk about damage to our you' european allies, to brazil and other countries that one hurt us. he hasn't fixed it. >> what do you think about this idea that america's standing, for whatever reason, has diminished this year? >> america's standing is an investment destination, america's standing as an economy has not diminished and despite obamacare, we see that. with the market reaction to the tabor, they like the economy. but u.s. standing in the world they should. in terms of foreign policy has absolutely diminished. i agree with the points syria has been in perception a disaster. unmitigated disaster for the u.s. and ability to stick with promises that they make.

and certainly hurt american allies in different parts of the world. snowden issue had a major impact. impact of the government shutdown and obama not showing up at the summit hurt americans on the partnership and won't get done by the end of 2014 as the signal accomplishment that obama could have in foreign l policy. one thing we haven't said yet which is also important is the second term team. hillary clinton is not there anymore. geithner is not there anymore. gates isn't there anymore. dael is not there anymore. >> john kerry has had an impressive start in terms of the energy ambition. he set out a bunch of different issues on iran and syria. even middle east peace process he managed to revive. it may not work out. better they're talking than they're not. >> kerry wasn't obama's first choice and conceived lack of trust in the way the syria situation played out, that did not look well for allies.

i give kerry high marks on continuing a bush administration policy on iran to get them to the table whether or not a deal happens or a good thing we'll debate. if you asked me marks to give kerry on do israel a bunch when it won't happen and no one cares, i wouldn't give them high marks. >> we care. we did he haefinitely care. >> the american people do not. and south korea and japan is much more. his asia focus isn't there and that's a serious problem given that's where americans need to be. >> what surprised you most this year economically? >> i think to go on from what ian said what struck me about the economy is what happened on wall street and what happened in the real economy. it's been an amazing year on wall street. it's been an amazing year in most markets internationally. you look at the economy now, we're beginning to see some strong acceleration and hope to see it in 2014, but it's a lackluster year. it's a tepid recovery.

we still haven't had that real acceleration that we want and in part because of the mess in washington again. it's been a recovery held back by stupid fiscal policy. we have discussed this before. cuts, sequestration, short-term fiscal tightening, 1.75% of gdp could drag a stronger economy down. it was a stupid thing to do. >> we have to wrap this up. we'll ask you winners or losers. i will point in one direction but you can take it where you want. putin, has he played a weak hand pretty well? his standing seems to have improved. snowden. syria. >> considering the difficulty russia is in on so many levels not the least of which is they can't keep growing their economy on commodities forever, in syria he's played a brilliant hand. in iran, he's doing it. big question is what his relationship with merkel and rest of europe will look like in the next year.

>> the most powerful leader in china in 15 years? >> easily. he's a winner. no question. when you look around the world and say we have a lot of weak leaders, he's the exception to that. >> who do you think is a big winner? >> i was going to actually -- i disagree on putin. he looks great in terms of the specifics he's done. more generally what's going on domestically in russia is bad. the economy is bad. the political dissent. he keeps pushing it down. keeps coming up. even the elites are quite dissatisfied. i think what you're seeing is classic foreign policy cover in russia for domestic unrest. i think he's going to look different at the end of 2014. >> who is the economic star of 2013? is there one? >> i guess ben bernanke but he had some hiccups in the middle of the year. the winner that has been unable to make the most of it is angela merkel. she wins big. she had a huge almost historic victory.

not quite enough to govern without a coalition partner and having to adopt all kind of policies she doesn't really like. >> up next, does austerity really work? britain's chancellor of exchequer, george osborne, will argue his case. n. open to bold ideas. that's why new york has a new plan -- dozens of tax free zones all across the state. move here, expand here, or start a new business here and pay no taxes for ten years... we're new york. if there's something that creates more jobs, and grows more businesses... we're open to it. start a tax-free business at startup-ny.com.

on wednesday, the united states federal reserve announced it was beginning the taper. that's the process which will end the extraordinary efforts put in place after the financial crisis to keep the u.s. economy from collapsing. the fed has bought up trillions of dollars of u.s. government bonds to keep interest rates low and stimulate the economy. and the obama administration pushed a large stimulus program to jump-start the stalled economy. our special allies across the pond in the united kingdom have taken the opposite fiscal approach in the five years since the crisis cutting down on government spending.

george osborne was the master of that austerity plan. he is the chancellor of the exchequer. he joined me here in new york. thank you, george osborne, for joining us. let me ask you to begin with you've been touting britain's growth. you've written an op-ed in the wall street journal. of course there are a lot of people who say britain's recovery has been very weak. the weakest in g-7 other than italy and there is a specific charge made, which is that it was your austerity program, especially the spending cuts, that is responsible for this weak recovery. let me read to you something larry summers said on british television. he said britain's economic policies, meaning yours, are powerful test of the efficacy of determined resolute austerity. and the results so far certainly have not been encouraging to advocates of that strategy. what is your response?

>> if you look at the situation the u.k. found itself in, we had one of the deepest recessions of any of the major economies in the world. gdp has shrunk. by over 7% of gdp. we had largest banking crisis of any financial center. biggest bank bailout. and we exited with a high budget deficit. 11% budget deficit. really only the united states had a similar size deficit and of course the u.s. has a reserve currency. that was a situation we were confronting. we set out a deliberate plan to bring that deficit down and reduce structural deficit to sort out some of the structural problems in our financial system and to rebalance the british economy. i think 3.5 years on, the british economy is currently growing faster than pretty much any other western economy. jobs are being created at a rapid rate each month and you can see a rebalancing happening. >> one of the points summers makes is the path to deficit

reduction ultimately lies in stronger growth. you pointed out britain and united states had comparable budget deficits soon after the crisis. the u.s. budget deficit has gone down dramatically more so than britain and the reason, summers would argue, we've grown faster and reason we've grown faster is we didn't have as much spending cuts and as much austerity. >> focus is on the structural deficit and there's been a fall in the structural deficit in the u.k. than any of the other g-7 nations and we have a consistent plan. people have been able to look at us and know what we're going to do this year and next year and what we did last year. we've been able to provide stability and confidence and predictability for families and investors into the u.k. and as a result i think people around the world are looking to the u.k. now and investing in the u.k. and job creation in the u.k. is

running around 60,000 a month which in u.s. context would be 300,000 jobs a month. that's strong. i'm first to say the job is not done. i think the central argument do you have to confront your problems yes or no, that argument that i said yes has been won. >> you have been aggressively trying to get the chinese to essentially invest in anything that is british. imports and exports, you have been trying to get the chinese to invest in nuclear power in britain. explain what's going on. i think this is quite different or at least the united states has a stronger sense of being a little wary of that kind of foreign capital. >> i start with this principle that a country like britain has to it earn its way in the world and to attract investment in the world and increase living standards of its population and has a government that lives within its means but an attractive place to do business. i see chinese investment as an enormous potential source of

wealth creation for the united kingdom. i want to see that chinese money helping to create british jobs and british infrastructure and of course we have national security checks and procedures as we would do with investment from other countries. i see china as a great source of opportunity. >> let me ask you about something. you have to put your hat on here as david cameron's principle political adviser. you have been called one of the architects of the strategy. you face a certain amount of opposition from what we would call in the united states, your base, that is hardcore conservatives, on issues like gay marriage, which david cameron has been very strongly supportive of. also on europe. do you believe that you will be able to weather these challenges from the base of the conservative party.

>> i'm a conservative that believes in reducing people's taxes, government living within its means, vested interest in education being overcome so kids are properly taught, welfare reform, i take those conservative boxes but successful conservative parties have to reflect the world around them if they want to represent that world in government and on an issue like gay marriage, i was a supporter of that, it's a conservative government in britain that made that law. that's something i'm proud of. i think on many of these social issues which are not as hotly contested as they are in the u.s. political debate. you have to aim off a bit and accept that it's a different context. i think in these areas, there's no reason why the conservative party can't lead the agenda. if you look at british history, it was a conservative who abolished slavery and

conservative who allowed women to have the vote in britain. we have a proud tradition of being progressive and i don't think we should leave that space to the left. >> george osborne, pleasure to have you on. come back often. >> thank you. >> up next, what in the world? why india is angry at the united states. i'll try to explain. there's a saying around here, you stand behind what you say. around here you don't make excuses. you make commitments. and when you can't live up to them, you own up, and make it right. some people think the kind of accountability that thrives on so many streets in this country has gone missing in the places where it's needed most. but i know you'll still find it when you know where to look. anncr vo: introducing the schwab accountability guarantee.

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now for our "what in the world" segment. the united states walked into a skirmish this week, not with china, not with iran but with india. why are indians so angry at america? they say that the united states mistreated an indian consulate worker arrested this week for allegedly falsifying a visa application for her live-in maid and paying that maid less than a third of the u.s. minimum wage. the facts of the case continue to emerge but the incident highlights that for all their similarities, big democracies, partners, india and america are very different societies. despite its impressive growth, india remains quite poor even if

the consulate the worker's maid was only paid $300 a month, she was making 2 1/2 times the indian national average. second, india has a recent history of diplomats being involved with visa fraud. this shouldn't be surprising unfortunately. india ranks 94th in the world for transparency and why are indian politicians feeding this outrage? they are up for election next year with 700 million eligible voters, this will be the greatest exercise in democracy the world has ever seen. all of those topics are part of my new special report on india called "india at the crossroads." the program airs next week in our regular time slot. here is a small preview. it's about how indians are trying to tackle some of their worst social ills in a modern way in a way that owes something to oprah winfrey. meet the tom cruise of india.

he's one of the biggest stars in bollywood, the song and dance film industry. khan took a big risk with another recent career move. he wanted to host and produce a television show exploring some of india's most taboo subjects. including its cast system. domestic violence. and abortion. you realize how strange this is. this is like tom cruise researching and hosting "60 minutes." right? >> it's unusual. i agree to unusual. i guess it's something that's been troubling me. something i felt like doing. >> the show translates to "truth alone prevails." that's also india's official international motto.

khan's goal a vivid in-depth discussion of the india's biggest problems in hopes of sparking a national conversation about the direction of the country. each 90-minute episode would focus on a different topic. >> we do a lot of research on each of the topics. once we gathered that material, we try to tell it to you in a way that it hits home. >> the first episode examined one of the nation's most troubling social ills. female fetalcide, the practice of abort iing a fee it tus becae it is female. thanks in part to the practice, men outnumber women in india by over 45 million. the problem is so bad that the government actually banned doctors from telling expectant parents the gender of their own fetus. >> ratio of girls against boys tilts dramatically and you'll

have huge sociological problems across the country. >> entire communities have been affected. in a satellite interview, a group of men were asked to raise their hands if they were of marrying age. when he asked them who was married? they all put their hands down. >> we discovered that they can't find anyone to get married to because there are no women in their area. it's absurd. it's reached absurd levels. >> you'll have to watch the full hour to get a sense of how india is dealing with all its problems. it's a great program. "india at a crossroads" next week in our regular time slot. if you want to understand where this huge, chaotic country is headed, this is must see television. we'll be right back. on. it's our job to make sure that it does. using natural gas this power plant can produce enough energy for about 600,000 homes.

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hello, everyone. i'm fredricka whitfield live in atlanta. a particularly nasty winter storm is creating extremely dangerous conditions on the roads. and snarling traffic as tens of millions of people head home for the holiday season. so far at least three deaths are blamed on the storm. the system produced tornadoes and torrential rain in the south and is fueling an ice storm that's moving through parts of

new york and new england. a story out of south sudan which has seen a week of deadly violence. the u.s. government believes several americans evacuated today on united nations flights. pentagon official have is been working to get them out. they aborted a mission to airlift americans yesterday after four u.s. troops were injured when their aircraft came under fire. and astronauts spent several hours yesterday trying to repair a broken cooling pump on the international space station. the next space walk was planned for tomorrow but is being delayed while they make adjustments to a space suit. and the bay area reporter stumble stumbles on an almost unbelievable story. a musician who helped carlo santana rocket to stardom ended up homeless on the streets. now after decades apart the two reunited.

that story of that reunion coming up on cnn. i'll have a chance to talk with him about that reunion. i'm fredricka whitfield. this week a federal judge ruled that the nsa's program that vacuums up data about all american phone calls is likely unconstitutional and a presidential advisory panel on the matter urged president obama to stop the practice and put in place major reforms on intelligence gathering. i wanted to put all of that to president obama's first director of national intelligence, now retired naval admiral dennis blair. admiral, what do you make of this court ruling? i know you're not a judge. my question would be if that ruling is upheld, does it cripple the nsa and ability to collect this data? how big a blow would that be? >> i think the larger question here and issue that ought to be discussed is this balance

between privacy on the one hand and protection on the other hand. it really is a tradeoff. when you're on the insides of the intelligence business, you're really driven by trying to find out who are the bad people out there who are making plans and intending to kill a lot of americans, a lot of innocent americans and you really are driven to do everything you can within constitutional limits to try to identify them and stop them and we have done an extremely good job so far i would say over the last 11 years, 12 years, since 9/11. the question is -- >> the panel is saying that you've drawn the wrong balance or the balance between security and liberty has been badly drawn and there's not enough protection of individual liberties and not enough checks and balances in place and a lot of what they are arguing for is not that you can't do these things but that, for example,

the fisa courts needs to have more rules and procedures and there needs to be a public advocate, what's wrong with putting in all of those kind of checks and balances? >> i don't see anything wrong with putting in additional checks and balances on the fisa court along the lines that have been suggested. you know, fareed, the main thing i look for in the program is whether actual harm was done to an innocent american by the program. has anyone lost a job, been harassed by the fbi, been barred from doing something as a result of the program. any innocent american? the answer is no. none of those have come to light. all of the concern is about the possibility of misuse of this information by the national security agency and the intelligence community. my experience is that

information is not misused and that having it available to efficiently check to see whether a foreigner who has been identified as a potential terrorist has called an american phone number is a useful check and has helped us thwart some attacks. >> senator widen says that it is clear now that the phone logging program that nsa uses, the big data mining program, did not in fact stop any terrorist attacks. the advisory panel's report makes that clear. your reaction? >> i think that's incorrect. i would cite the plans to set off a number of bombs in the new york city subways in 2009 on a pattern of the 2005 london attacks and i know that the information gathered by nsa under this program was a key

factor in tipping us off as to what he was up to and he was stopped before he could do it. i think that's incorrect. intelligence is a lot of different indicators put together when done well to find what's going on and this program has contributed to that and i believe it's constitutional. i believe it should continue. >> do you understand the kind of anger that this has generated around the world and in the united states because there's a sense the nsa and it's about the nsa has this technological capacity to look into almost anything, anyone's phone calls anyone's e-mails, and the response of the intelligence community seems to be trust us. we're not going to do anything really silly with this. >> i do believe and i tried when i was director of national intelligence to talk more openly about this program.

i think we can do that without talking about specific details which are what would have to be kept secret and this administration has done a bad job explaining it and had we done it from an early stage, then these revelations would have been less shocking. i think a couple of things are worth mentioning though. the scale of these programs is large because the scale of communications is large. and there are billions of phone calls, e-mails, tweets and other forms of communication being made all over the world. in order to find ones that are being made by those hostile to the united states it will require big programs, large commuters, lots of data. that simply is a question of scale and not a question of principles. >> admiral dennis blair, pleasure to have you on. >> nice to talk with you, fareed. >> up next, why a group of american professors have decided to boycott israel's academic

institutions. i have a response from one of israel's top thinkers.

this week the american studies association voted to endorse a boycott of israel's academic institutions. it's a small symbolic step of course but one that has resonated because it happened in the united states which is generally strongly supportive of israel. meanwhile, the war in syria threatens daily to spill over the border in the golan heights in egypt complicated what had

been a stable relationship and iran is now negotiating with the west. what is israel to do? one of the most keen observers of israel i know is a senior correspondent and member of the editorial board of a newspaper and has a new book called "my promised land." let's start with this boycott. this is something -- the kind of thing that people in israel have talked about and worried about which is a campaign that delegitimizes which is the phrase i often heard. what do you make of it? >> when i heard this news i was filled and am filled with outrage. there is a limit to the hypocrisy regarding israel one can accept. you mentioned syria and egypt. there are so many countries whose violations of human rights are so much worse than can be attributed to israel but there isn't such movements against them. this is despicable in many ways.

i think this trend of israel bashing and not recognizing the fact that at its heart and basis israel is a just country. israel is a moral endeavor. i find this outrageous in many ways. one is legitimate in criticizing israel policy. one is legitimate like my position that occupation is wrong. but to go against israel in such a way and to treat it as an evil power is outrageous. >> give us a sense of the mood in israel. one thing you said in the book that struck me is you call it the most intimidated country in the world. when i look at israel, when we were in graduate school we would look at the balance of power in and what israel worried about was the great egyptian army and the great seyrian army and they

are all in shambles. why is this country intimidated? at the heart of it. the tension is there and many of it's neighbors want israel to be eliminated. definitely iran which you just mentioned. it is still a goal but not only iran. i plead with the people who were criticizing israel to be aware of the conquers of the people and victims of europe who save themselves by creating that jewish national poll and are still endangered now. even though fearful or

intimidated one of the things you portray in the book is the viberancy of life in israel. is that party the economic boom and the technological boom that has taken place that has created the sense of v imtigor? >> i felt that both israelis have lost the narrative. on the one hand it is a nation on the edge. it is threatened in many ways. but the beauty of it and the suk s success is that we have not turned the life into passive on the contrary. we have turned it into a south of energy. one should have a look at this

amazing human endeavor of the people the homeless people that created a home for themselves and save themself physicallies and are endangered from that and are celebrating life in the most vibrant way possible. you talk about how israel is a just nation and a just cause in the book you talk about the historical tragedy and the case of your family from londons a remember. and almost did not realize or did not fully enter their consciousness that there were people in this land. it was not as the slogan went a land without people and a people without land. the design is that we had two

brilliant insights. we tried to save the jury from destruction and capacity. we tried to create a non orthodox home for a jewish civilization and create the power house for the eye tentity identity in that land. but the flaw is that this is really i would say that kind blindness is the source of the tragedy of the 100 year war. the palestinians were blind too. we were blind to the fact that they were people and they were blind to the fact that they are. my hope for the future is that they would get over it. we should acknowledge their existence and we can move forward into a better future

that remembers the past and the pains of the past but has a future with our children and theirs. >> it is a pleasure to have you. >> up next, a big flaw in iran. >> we'll explain. for teaching me not to take life so seriously. thanks for loving me and being my best friend. don't forget to thank those who helped you take charge of your future and got you where you are today. the boss of your life. the chief life officer. ♪ [ chicken caws ] [ male announcer ] when your favorite food starts a fight, fight back fast with tums. heartburn relief that neutralizes acid on contact and goes to work in seconds. ♪ tum, tum tum tum tums!

president obama's recent approval ratings are reaching new lows which brings me to my question of the week. which president has had the lowest approval ratings? is it barack obama, george w. bush or harry truman or

president carter? if you want a late president for your favorite gps fan. consider a gps travel mug. go to our website for a link to the cnn store. it won't get there for christmas but maybe happy new year. >> this week's book of the week is the great war. there are many new books out about world war i the war that changed history but none more arresting than this one with photographs. you see crowds cheering the announcement of hostility. and then the carnage a few years later. and now for the last look. i learned something new this week. i learned that after 1979 they banned neckties and pop music.

but they also banned ice skating rinks in theran where the ice palace was famous. but now skaters are back in business at the newly opened rink. one of the aims is to allow iran's athletes to practice for the upcoming olympic and asian games. but don't expect to see iran taking part in ice dancing competitions. some things are still the same. men and women are not allowed on the ice together. the correct answer was c, harry truman had the lowest approval ratings since 1937. only 22% of the country approved of his performance in february

1952. he had the third highest approval ratings in history. shortly after he took office in 1945 his approval ratings were at 87%. that is behind the bushes. george w. bush and george hw bush. thank you for watching the program. i will see you next week. hello everyone. these are the top stories this hour. snow, floods and tornados. a bizarre mix of severe weather that is affecting nearly half of the country and now it has taken a deadly turn on one of the busiest travel weekends of the year. and an american desperate to visit sudan may get out. carlos santana is reunited