route to the scene but again, this happening, this active well rescue in west georgia. quick heads up here. i am hopping a plane to new orleans. i'll be ringing in the new year from down there with all of you. this is a fun picture of my pal last year. see you on tv 9:00 eastern tomorrow night. "the lead" starts right now. will the winter olympics be safe? after two terrorist attacks in russia. i'm jake tapper. this is "the lead." the world lead. in fewer than six weeks, many of the best athletes in the world will gather in russia which was just attacked twice in two days by terrorists targeting civilians. will american athletes and spectators be safe at the sochi games? also in world news, call it plan c. rescuers are taking another crack at reaching a ship stuck in a sea of ice. will this attempt succeed? where other attempts have failed? and the sports lead. third prize is you're fired.

a slew of nfl coaches getting sacked today after their lackluster seasons. who will survive black monday in the nfl? good afternoon. i'm jake tapper. welcome to "the lead." we're going to begin with the world lead. terrorism at the olympics. it is always a fear, but the international sports event attempting to draw out the very best in humanity and drawing millions of innocent civilians packed in small, enclosed spaces, but now that fear is fresh after two horrific terrorist attacks in russia. the country where athletes and crowds from 85 nations will gather in fewer than six weeks for the winter olympics. in volgograd, investigators say a man triggered a suicide blast on a trolley bus, killing 14 people and injuring at least 28 others. investigators say there are strong indications that this bombing is tied to another in the very same city just a day before, when another apparent suicide blast at the volgograd train station killed at least 17 people and injured another 35.

now, no one has yet claimed responsibility for either blast. we will get to the likely suspects in a moment. volgograd is about 600 miles south of moscow and 600 miles or so northwest of sochi, which is the site of the winter games. the city is a train hub. russian president vladimir putin assures that security will be tight and the games will be safe, but the world stage presented by the olympics, well, it's been hijacked in the past before. who can forget the 1972 games, when palestinian militants killed 11 israeli athletes and coaches in munich, an attack that casts a long shadow over the games today. then there was atlanta in 1996, right here on american soil. two people died and more than 100 were wounded during the bombing of centennial olympic park. years later, anti-abortion, anti-gay domestic terrorist eric rudolph was caught and charged with that bombing and three others. just this year we got a painful reminder of the violence that major sporting events can attract when bombs killed three people near the finish line of the boston marathon in april.

so the real question is, will the men and women of the u.s. olympic team be safe after the torch is lit along with all those who descend on sochi to watch them? i want to bring in amy knight, author of several books on russia. she has been watching the ramp-up to the winter games closely. and peter brooks, former cia officer and deputy assistant secretary of defense who works with the heritage foundation. amy, i will start with you. after these two attacks, should we believe putin when he says the sochi games will be safe and secure? >> well, i think probably yes. the attack of course took place quite far from sochi and in volgograd, and i think that the russians have made it very clear, the russian government, that they are going to have extra -- they are going to really cordon off the sochi area, a large chunk of territory. they are making it very

difficult to get passage. you have to show passports and your identity. i think sochi itself will probably be safe. just remember, this happened quite a ways away. >> peter, in july, the leader of the chechen group, we don't know that they're responsible, but they vowed to use maximum force to disrupt the sochi games. how big a threat is this group? >> a big threat. they are on the terrorist list. they have been involved, the chechen islamist militants have been involved in everything from taking theaters to schools. attacks on train stations, aircraft, airports. this is a very, very dangerous group and is led by someone who is very dangerous and is public enemy number one in russia today. we have to take the threats very seriously and volgograd is proof of the pudding here. what we see after this is anybody's speculation. >> the state department, as peter referenced, considers it a terrorist group. the leader says they are certain

to eliminate the group's leader before the games start. that's quite a promise. how realistic is that? >> i don't think that's realistic. he's been hiding, umarov has been hiding in the mountains for a long time. i think this is a deep, deep problem the russians have with islamic militants and it has deeply rooted causes, and it's highly unlikely that they are going to solve it in the near future. so as far as the olympics go, that's a different question. but yes, russia faces a huge terrorist threat and it will continue as long as they can't somehow resolve this issue with the islamic rebels. >> peter, explain the significance of volgograd and what other cities obviously beyond sochi and moscow might be targeted? >> well, volgograd has a long history, it was called

stalingrad. it's a major transportation hub, lot of trains come through there, if you're coming to sochi. it's another soft target. most of the attacks have been in this region or in moscow. it shows this terrorist group, whoever it is, can strike just about anywhere. so far with impunity. two attacks in two days. it's significant that way. also, they don't have to strike in sochi to be successful. remember, terrorism is psychological. this is a public relations campaign. i think the terrorists right now are up because they -- this will bring people to their cause, increase the notoriety of their cause, fund-raising. it makes putin look bad, who is their main enemy. so there's a lot at stake here beyond just the olympics. obviously, the olympics are something russia, this is putin's olympics. he wants to showcase it and there is already a pall over it even though it's 40 days away. >> new york congressman michael graham released a statement today that read in part, we

cannot sweep these threats under the rug like we did with benghazi or the warnings from russia on the tsarnaev brothers and the boston bombing. is there anything americans should be doing about this? >> i don't really think there is. the so-called cooperation between russia and the u.s. on the terrorism issue really, as actually demonstrated by the boston bombings, has not been very successful and the terrorism problem that we're talking about with the olympics and in russia itself is really the kremlin's problem. i see very little opportunity for u.s. -- for the u.s. government to take any part in this. >> thank you both so much. appreciate it. turning over to our other world news, no matter how big of a letdown new year's eve might be, at least you don't have to spend it stranded in the middle of one of the coldest places on earth. 74 people might have to ring in

2014 aboard a russian research ship frozen in thick antarctic ice if the latest attempt to get them out fails. rescuers will now try to evacuate most of them using a chinese helicopter after the first two attempts to reach them failed. the ship has been marooned in the ice since christmas eve but the crew has enough warmth and supplies to stay chipper, at least in these videos they post online. >> it's absolutely spectacular here. magical winter wonderland. >> team spirit has been fantastic. it really has. >> the latest rescue attempt by chopper comes after not one, but two ice breaker ships were forced to turn back because the ice was too thick. coming up on "the lead," new details on the school shooting in colorado that killed the 17-year-old girl. how the shooter got his gun and why he should not have been able to get in the door. and in our pop culture lead, abc's robin roberts comes out in a facebook post. was she following the new

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centennial, colorado but so many questions remain. today, some are being answered as new chilling details come forth. i want to get to frederick pleitgen. >> we heard some of the things about some of the possible lapses that might have helped along in all of this but also, some of the details about how karl pearson planned all of this. as far as the security lapses are concerned, what we learned is he apparently got into the school through a door na should have been locked but wasn't and that door not only wasn't locked, it was even propped open so people could get in and out easier. let's listen to what the county sheriff had to say earlier. >> we know that the doorway on the north side that the murderer entered is supposed to be locked. unfortunately, it rarely is because it is more convenient for people to come and go from that area and not have to be obstructed by a locked door. >> the other interesting thing

is that karl pearson apparently was planning all of this for a very long time, and he also tried to mask what he was about to do and even went to the length of having a normal meal before going to the school and even going bowling alone before heading out there. so certainly some very chilling details that we heard from the sheriff today. >> in terms of the firearm, i know he brought other weapons with him to the school but in terms of the firearm, it seems as though he bought this weapon perfectly legally. >> that's something that certainly is going to raise a lot of questions. he bought this weapon, a 12 gauge shotgun, legally after passing a background check. he apparently acquired it on december 6th. what he did was, he used the time from december 6th until he carried out the shooting rampage on december 13th to acquire as much ammunition as possible. in total, he showed up at the school with 125 rounds of ammo and apparently, he was acquiring that ammo until about 30 minutes before the shooting so he was basically hoarding it in the days before that, and one of the things that the sheriff said today is that this shooting could have been a lot worse if

it were not for the heroism of one of the deputies who was guarding at that school. he believes pearson took his own life when he heard that deputy coming to where he was in the school library. otherwise, all of this could have turned out a lot worse. >> chilling details. fred, thank you so much. the family of jahi mcmath is working against the clock to keep their 13 year old daughter alive. doctors at children's hospital in oakland, california declared the girl brain dead after complications from tonsil surgery. her family says they have seen signs of improvement and have raised money to move her to another facility but the hospital says it's not aware of anyplace willing to take her. a judge has ruled that the hospital may unplug the ventilator keeping jahi alive after 8:00 p.m. eastern tonight. the hospital declined to comment on whether it would do so. a key member of the healthcare.gov launch is retiring. michelle snyder is the chief operating officer at the centers for medicare and medicaid services which oversaw the rollout of the affordable care act. she is leaving at the end of the

year and because, well, tomorrow is the last day of the year, she does not have much time left. her name came up in an october hearing when republican congresswoman marcia blackburn was grilling health and human services secretary kathleen sebelius about who was responsible for the website's many woes. >> michelle snyder is the one responsible for this debacle. well, excuse me, congresswoman, michelle snyder is not responsible for the debacle. hold me accountable for the debacle. >> the obama administration has been criticized over the last few months for the website's poor rollout and snyder is not the first to leave. the chief technology officer at cms stepped down in november to join the private sector. meanwhile, the administration released new enrollment figures announcing that more than a million people have signed up through the federal exchange since october 1st but that number falls well below the original goal of 3.3 million by this time. when the clock strikes midnight on new year's day, you can expect thousands in colorado to party like it's 4:20 at a fish concert.

the law making it legal for people over 21 to buy small amounts of pot takes effect on january 1st. it will make colorado the first state in the country to offer recreational marijuana stores. many of the store owners say they are expecting huge crowds when they open for business at 8:00 a.m. wednesday morning. cnn's casey wian joins us live now from denver. what's the state been doing to get ready for this? >> reporter: well, the state's been scrambling, jake, to put together a new series of regulations to govern this industry that has never been tried before in the united states. the state regulations are pretty much in place. there have been hundreds of businesses that have been approved by the state to operate these recreational marijuana retail operations, but there's a whole other level that these businesses need to go through and that's city regulations. some cities are not approving recreational marijuana sales. for those that are, there are very stringent requirements that these businesses have to go through. there's product labeling,

packaging requirements, there are different potencies that are allowed to be sold for recreational use versus medical use. there are labeling requirements. there are inventory controls, point of sale systems, different tax regimes. it's a very, very complicated process. so complicated that here in the city of denver, there's about 250 medical marijuana businesses. only 14 of them will be ready for recreational sales on wednesday morning, new year's day. >> beyond a surge in late night taco bell runs, what should we expect once these stores open? >> reporter: well, everyone here from the police to the business owners say they do not expect sort of a marijuana mardi gras type atmosphere because it's still illegal to smoke marijuana in public. they do expect, though, that there are going to be lines of people outside of these stores at 8:00 on wednesday morning, because there are predictions of

a shortage of recreational marijuana, because the time crunch from getting all of these businesses up and running, a lot of businesses say they are expecting to run out of recreational marijuana. they just don't know how soon they are going to run out so there's going to be a heavy demand and with that, there is going to be an increase in prices, they say. >> thank you so much. coming up on "the lead," he's the most successful driver in formula one history but after surviving crashes on the racetrack, it was a skiing accident that landed him in a coma. we'll bring you the latest on michael schumacher in the sports lead. later, more than six million kids have been diagnosed with adhd but did doctors oversell medication as the answer?

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welcome back to "the lead." now it's time for the sports lead. for more than a decade, he was the michael jordan of formula one racing. dominating the world's premier auto racing. his worst injury in all those years was a broken leg. but now michael schumacher is struggling for life after a devastating ski accident. schumacher was skiing in the french alps over the weekend when he fell and hit his head on a rock. doctors say he would not have survived at all if he had not been wearing a helmet. schumacher won 91 races and seven drivers' championships over his career. he won five of those championships with ferrari, before he retired in 2006. but then he returned to the sport four years later and joined the mercedes team before retiring again last year. cnn's rachel nichols joins us for this. a brutal day to be a coach in the nfl. rachel, first, what's the latest on michael schumacher's condition? >> yeah. you know, it's interesting, when

you see all the outpouring of support, you're reminded just how important an athlete he is to so many people around the world. you mentioned him being the michael jordan of formula one. just an icon. it is so agonizing to know that he is now in critical condition and his doctors say it's really hour by hour. they aren't predicting whether he's going to survive this or not. they say there's intense swelling in his brain. he was actually conscious right after the crash. the workers who helped him on the slopes say he was coherent at that time but just obviously got worse as the brain swelling developed and they did say if he hadn't been wearing that helmet, there is no way that he would have gotten this far. it really is amazing, this is a guy who raced one of the most dangerous sports that we have, barely a scratch on him. only broke a leg, that was the only injury he had. and he did have a motorcycle crash in later years when he wasn't racing anymore. he had neck and spine injuries. and now this injury, so apparently getting off the race

course has been the most dangerous thing for michael schumacher. we wish him a speedy recovery. >> we do indeed. the other big sports story, especially in this country, it's been a downer of a day in the nfl. more than a handful of coaches are out of a job. who got the axe today? >> well, as you can see, the murderers row before us here. mike shanahan, jim schwartz, greg schiano, leslie frazier, beloved by his locker room in minnesota but that organization has to sell new tickets for a new stadium and they say he has to go as well. so you've got six openings, including gary kubiak, who was fired in houston a few weeks ago in the nfl and hey, they might not be done yet, guys. there is a situation in oakland where we're still waiting to hear how that's going to go. the situation in tennessee is still developing. so a lot of people losing their jobs today, a lot of people not just the head coaches but the assistants. it tells you what a tough world the nfl is. there are 20 teams that didn't make the playoffs that are sitting around today and already six of them have said the head coach has to go. >> it is seth myers on twitter

who remarked it reminds him of the final scene in "the godfather" where all these rival gang members get whacked. in particular, browns players don't seem to be taking the news of their coach's firing too well. according to mike silver of nfl network, one browns player said quote, we are so dysfunctional, these billionaires need to pick somebody and stay with them. these aren't girlfriends. this team ended the season 4-12. are you surprised by the show of support for coach chudzinski? >> a lovely picture by the way of what nfl players think how their girlfriends should be treated but we'll leave that alone for the moment. the biggest thing with chud as the players call him in cleveland is that he was in that position for less than a year. he was installed less than a year ago. they traded away one of his best players in the middle of the season, and apparently, one of the points of contention with management was that he wasn't going to suspend a player a couple of weeks ago for discipline reasons that apparently ownership wanted him to quote, hold players more

accountable. he stood up on the side of the players. so not surprising, considering all that back story, that there is such a show of support for him. but it is surprising that after less than a year, they are kicking this guy out. there's no way that an nfl coach can install systemic changes that need to be done in an organization like the cleveland browns that have been losing so long, in less than a year. so the tolerance level is obviously not very high. a lot of backlash and criticism. browns ownership held a press conference today where they were just hammered by the local media, saying how can we trust you on your track record to pick the next coach, you just picked a new guy less than a year ago and you're telling us he's no good. so a mess over there. a mess where you are in washington, d.c., too, with the mike shanahan firing. lot of interesting stuff going around the nfl. we'll all of course be watching. >> the season continues, of course. i'm sure you saw my eagles barely win, but win nonetheless, last night. >> a win is a win is a win is a win. as your eagles know from a few seasons ago, all it takes is getting in.

it's a whole new season coming up starting this week. we've had several teams, the green bay packers, the new york giants, win a super bowl after barely getting in by the skin of their teeth in recent years. then it all starts again in january. it's anyone's game. >> rachel, thanks so much. we appreciate it. let's check in with our political panel in the green room. ryan lizza, the "new york times" says when it comes to tv, the president's a fan of everything from "breaking bad" to "house of cards." all good stuff. any other suggestions for the commander in chief's dvr? >> besides "the lead" obviously which i was surprised to see not on the list. i think as he enters this surveillance debate he might want to check out old episodes of "big brother." >> i appreciate it. the politics lead coming up next. stay with us.

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to health crusader and pioneer. that doesn't include some of the more colorful descriptions scrawled on the walls of new york city subways. no matter how you feel about mayor michael bloomberg, there's no denying his impact on the day to day life of new yorkers over the past 12 years, taking on everything from birth control to big gulps. it seems almost fitting that in his final act as mayor, bloomberg signed into law a controversial initiative that extends the city's smoking ban to include e-cigarettes. the law would make it illegal to use the battery operated cigs in offices, restaurants, bars and parks. some critics, including anti-smoking advocates, say the ban may end up doing more harm than good. cnn's poppy harlow has more. >> you know what the most amazing thing about this cigarette is? it isn't one. >> reporter: they are electronic cigarettes and they have become nearly as controversial as the real thing. >> this is how i ended up quitting smoking. >> reporter: aaron david ross smoked for ten years.

we met him at henley, a new york city vapor lounge. >> i haven't had a drag of a cigarette since two and a half years ago. >> reporter: here's how they work. liquid nicotine is heated up by a battery charged coil. there is no tobacco burn. users inhale and instead of smoke, there's a steam-like vapor. they have been in the u.s. less than a decade and increasingly big tobacco companies are manufacturing them. but limited research has been done on their health impact. >> i would like the science to catch up with what we're doing here. >> reporter: but you're still willing to do it. >> i am willing to do it because i think the alternative to just smoking all day, i think this is a better alternative. >> reporter: amy fairchild of columbia university school of public health co-authored this op-ed in the "new york times" making the case for e-cigarettes. a lot of folks say there's just not enough science. >> you can also make the case there is never going to be enough science, that there is always going to be room for another study. it's the dire urgent public

health need. this is one of the most important public health problems we face. >> reporter: she argues they must be federally regulated and not marketed to kids. i wish you could smell it in here. of course, it doesn't smell like smoke. it smells a lot like candy. no surprise, given all the flavors that they sell. critics argue when you sell flavors like cotton candy or like gummy bear, that can attract children. some states have age requirements on sales but not all. cdc data show nearly two million middle and high school students tried these cigarettes last year, more than double the number in 2011. >> e-cigarettes can potentially help some people but they've got serious potential harms that we know about. if they get kids to start smoking, that's really bad. if they get smokers who would have quit to keep smoking, that's really bad. if they get former smokers to go back to smoking, that's really bad. and if they reglamorize the act of smoking, that's bad as well. >> reporter: e-cigarettes are not regulated by any federal

body, and they are not an fda approved method to quit smoking. critics point out they can keep users hooked on nicotine. so what does the american cancer society think? >> cautious optimism with a number of caveats. what we don't want to do is to take something out of the hands of people which could, in fact, help people stop using the traditional burn cigarette which is the enemy. >> reporter: you get angry when people try to fight this. >> because it worked for us. we saved our lives with this product. >> i wouldn't be so angry if people took the time, our elected officials took the time to get educated. they're not. >> reporter: but as cities and states decide how to handle e-cigarettes, the industry continues to boom. >> time we take our freedom back. >> poppy, i'm laughing at stephen dorf in that ad. how big of an industry is this right now?

>> reporter: it is massive. a wells fargo tobacco industry analyst just came out and said that they are estimating that the market this year alone in the united states for e-cigarettes, $1.8 billion. even more surprising is their expectation that this market for electronic cigarettes is going to surpass the market for traditional smoke cigarettes in the next decade. if that happens, i think that will be astounding. what we don't know yet is what the fda is going to do. they have said that they could come out as early as this month, so that would mean in the next two days, with a proposed rule to regulate e-cigarettes. that could change the entire game and on top of that, there is still this big hanging question, is nicotine alone really safe to inhale. some studies say yes but more recent studies like one out of brown last week says not so fast. there are a lot of questions here and mayor bloomberg and new york city getting out in front

of this one, not a big surprise as he leaves office. >> thanks so much. in other political news, it is america's longest war and it may also now be its most unpopular. according to a new cnn/orc poll, support of the war in afghanistan has plummeted to 17% who currently support the effort and 82% oppose it. that's more than ever opposed the war in vietnam. it's also down from 52% approval for the war effort back in december of 2008, a month before the president first took office. so what happened over those five years to change america's mind and what does it mean for the future of the conflict? let's bring in our political panel to talk about it. cnn political commentator and washington correspondent for the new yorker magazine, ryan lizza. senior vice president for american values and new communities at the center for american progress, daniela gibbs and former spokesman for speaker of the house john boehner, terry holt. bin laden's dead, yet 60% of americans think we're losing this war and you saw this

unbelievable lack of support for it. what happened? why? >> i'm not really surprised. we've been at war now for basically 12 years and i think the american people are just tired of being in armed conflict. so despite the fact that the president said we are going to get out at the end of next year, despite the fact bin laden is dead, the american people are just ready to end. i'm really not surprised by these numbers. >> ryan, when i tweeted this information earlier, a lot of people on twitter were surprised by it because of the intensity of the opposition to the war in vietnam. but the truth of the matter is, opposition to the iraq war never got higher than 69%, and while the vietnam war, that war was a mistake, according to some. people not be as intensely against it but it is the most popular according to these polls. why do you think it's so different, because it's so long? >> one is the length and i think at this point, part of it is victory over al qaeda within afghanistan. i think most people don't understand why we're there anymore. if you think of this war as the

core of al qaeda has been driven from afghanistan, the taliban is still there, we still have unstable government. we did not succeed in creating a liberal democracy out of afghanistan the way that i think the bush administration first championed it. but i think it's partly the numbers are just a war-weary public and people not understanding the rationale for having a lot of troops there right now. >> speaking of troops, 2300 u.s. troops have died since the war began by cnn's count. a majority of those deaths, 1,664, have taken place under the current administration. obviously a lot of that is because the president sent so many more, tens of thousands of troops, to afghanistan. you send more troops to a place, more troops are going to get killed. do you blame president obama for any of the war weariness? >> the mini surge, yes, happened right at the beginning of his presidency. but we have been shocked by people that we have armed and that's one of the less well told stories of afghanistan. as we've tried to leave, the

people that we are arming, that we are giving the guns to, have started killing american soldiers. so as we retreat, the taliban knows we're leaving, they are biding their time and the american people are tired of it because they are weary but also because they have seen defeat, they have seen people dying by the hand of -- that gave them the arms to supposedly defend themselves. >> let's turn to a more enjoyable political fight in a way, from afghanistan, which is this pending fight we are going to see over the minimum wage both here in washington, d.c. and in states. an abc news/"the washington post" poll shows support for an increase in the federal minimum wage among both republican and democratic voters, including 50% of republicans. is this going to be the wedge issue if the democrats have their say for this year? >> yeah. i think it definitely will be. you have seen the president has already started talking about inequality and how that's the greatest challenge of our generation. i think the minimum wage is not just popular politically but

lots of studies have shown when you raise the minimum wage, you put more money back into the economy. i think there's a sense among americans that while the recovery is happening, it's happening for a very small group of people, so i think it wouldn't be great for republicans to get in the way of raising the minimum wage that will help so many people. >> terry, your former bosses said this is going to be a job killer. >> if most people said you would get $7.25 an hour, they would say i still can't live on that. i think most people would rather have a strong growing and vibrant economy where they had an opportunity to not just make $7.25, but $15 or $20 an hour. i think it's great that states, when they have been able to, have made this change but a federally mandated minimum wage on business, some people say it's a job killer. some say it's not. but either way, it doesn't solve the big problem. it's a political band-aid on an oozing political problem the president has which is his low popularity and the democrats are looking for something to campaign on in 2014. >> how do you see this playing

out? >> just forget -- putting the merits aside politically, the obama years have been a tale of two electorates, the midterm and the presidential. in '08 and 2012, the presidential year, he had a huge surge of young voters, non-white voters that helped him win re-election and win his initial election. he needs some issues to sort of make the 2014 electorate a little more like the 2012 electorate. this is a good issue to do that. >> although there is concern among democrats that republicans might let it happen and stand back as i think they did in '96, right? >> there was -- >> late '80s minimum wage raise. >> republicans did not stand against it. they kind of let it happen. >> it was a bigger deal. president clinton was trying to move to the middle and they balanced the budget, they lowered taxes. >> there was a negotiation. the business community got something. >> that's right. >> labor -- >> you won't see that with this republican party. i don't think so. >> thank you for being here. coming up, if your kid has

adhd, you have probably been told about the benefits of medication. now some doctors are questioning their own advice and we will tell you why. we have all seen the pictures of angelina jolie working with kids in africa. which celebrity was the most charitable in 2013? the answer might surprise you. there's no secondhand smoke in here... ...and no cigarette advertising around here. there's a reason we know this is really bad... ...and this is really good. there's a reason 2 in 3 people are surviving cancer. and we cannot be silent until it's 3 out of 3. this shout-out is for everything the american cancer society has done in the last 100 years.

make your tax-deductible donation by december 31st and help finish the fight. if yand you're talking toevere rheuyour rheumatologistike me, about trying or adding a biologic. this is humira, adalimumab. this is humira working to help relieve my pain. this is humira helping me through the twists and turns. this is humira helping to protect my joints from further damage. doctors have been prescribing humira for over ten years. humira works by targeting and helping to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to ra symptoms. for many adults, humira is proven to help relieve pain and stop further joint damage. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal events, such as infections, lymphoma, or other types of cancer, have happened. blood, liver and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure have occurred. before starting humira , your doctor should test you for tb.

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welcome back to "the lead." i'm jake tapper. now let's turn to some national news. they can be miracle drugs for kids dealing with adhd. they are also part of a multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical industry.

more than 3.5 million children are using medications to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, adhd, according to the cdc, the centers for disease control. now the authors of one of the most influential studies that first trumpeted the effectiveness of these pharmaceuticals back in the 1990s, those authors are now saying they're worried that the results oversold the benefits of using the drugs alone without other forms of therapy. so what does this all mean for your child? professor steven hinshaw of the university of california berkeley joins me. thanks for being with us. you were a researcher in this influential '90s study and the principal investigator for the berkeley study. do you think the pharmaceutical companies misused the research to downplay the effectiveness of non-drug therapy presumably for their own gain? >> i can't speak for exactly what the pharmaceutical companies did or did not do. they're in the business of creating medications and

promoting them. we do know that the initial publication from our study that emphasized the outcome of reducing symptoms showed often dramatic benefits of the medication but subsequent publications where we looked more broadly at academics and social skills and family discipline styles showed the clear and superior benefits of combining the medications with active family and school behavior therapy. >> this is what one of the study's co-authors told "new york times." i hope it didn't do irrepperable damage. the kids pay the biggest price in all this. what needs to happen now? >> i think several things need to happen. numb oer one, we have to recogne that adhd is a real condition but it takes a careful, thorough workup. a ten minute visit with the doctor is not adequate to the task who both overdiagnose and underdiagnose. second, if medication is prescribed, we have to evaluate carefully whether it works or

not. third, for most conditions, most of the time, adding intensive therapy with the family, with the teachers, teaching kids better social skills, makes the medication which gets the brain in better shape, now there's a skill boost so that there's a far better chance of getting that child back in the normal range. >> why is this coming out now, so many years later? is this just the natural evolution of a new drug? >> i think we go in swings and cycles in social and medical history. the initial publication from the mta study, the study i was associated with in 1999, showed the benefits of medication for symptom reduction. we published another paper a couple of years later showing the superiority of this combined multi-modal approach, and then newer medications, longer acting formulations have been out for over a decade now. we are seeing a dramatic increase in diagnosis of adhd and i think seriously scholars, consumers are reading the

literature to find out that it really takes skill building, not just symptom reduction, to give the best outcomes for kids and adolescents and adults who really need it. >> when i hear the number, more than one in seven children in the u.s. receiving a diagnosis of adhd by the time they turn 18, it feels like there might be an overdiagnosing. is that possible? >> i think it is possible. we know how to diagnose adhd. it takes many hours and teacher ratings and a thorough history of the child's development but there is also pressure academically on kids these days. there is also pressure for too often a quick and dirty diagnosis without the thorough history and testing that's needed. that's a recipe for in too many cases, overdiagnosis, yet at the same time, too many kids with mental health problems in the united states are getting no treatment at all. so we're both over and

underdiagnosing. i think we have to empower doctors and reimburse the kinds of assessments needed to make sure that we're accurate with all this. >> thank you so much. >> thanks for having me on. coming up in our pop culture lead, good morning america's robin roberts is the latest celebrity to publicly announce that she is gay. what's been the reaction? just by talking to a helmet. it grabbed the patient's record before we even picked him up. it found out the doctor we needed was at st. anne's. wiggle your toes. [ driver ] and it got his okay on treatment from miles away. it even pulled strings with the stoplights. my ambulance talks with smoke alarms and pilots and stadiums. but, of course, it's a good listener too. [ female announcer ] today cisco is connecting the internet of everything. so everything works like never before. [ female announcer ] today cisco is connecting the internet of everything.

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now time for the pop culture lead. it's a decision that is as personal as it can be powerful. good morning america co-host robin roberts, who is both my friend and former colleague, revealed in a facebook post what many in her life knew all along, she's gay. it's not as if roberts had been keeping her decade-long relationship a secret but it is the first time she's publicly acknowledged that she's gay. roberts has received a largely positive response including this

tweet from the first lady. i am so happy for you and amber. you continue to make us all proud. but it's not just the supportive reaction but the lack of reaction saying a lot about how far this country has come in its acceptance of homosexuality. >> good morning america anchor robin roberts inspired millions of viewers as she publicly fought a blood disorder diagnosis last year. >> later today, i begin what's known as pretreatment. >> reporter: thankfully, she won. >> i am so full of gratitude. >> reporter: now as she celebrates more than a year of recovery, she is making news again. last night she took to facebook to acknowledge her long-time companion writing i am grateful for my entire family, my long time girlfriend amber and friends. yes, robin roberts is gay. the reaction has been as subtle as the announcement itself. >> it seems increasingly odd, especially to a younger generation, for famous people to

have difficulty in being honest about something as fundamental as their sexuality. >> reporter: roberts' former cohost sam champion may have helped pave the way when he celebrated his engagement to his partner live on "good morning america" last year. >> i'm so, so lucky to have someone like this in my life. >> reporter: in a way, roberts seemed to be following the template of cnn's own anderson cooper. he came out in july 2012 in an e-mail to blogger andrew sullivan and like roberts, he was on a vacation when he did so. cooper discussed it in september when his talk show launched. >> i think it's important to just send a message to especially young people that there's nothing to be ashamed of and that you know, you can be successful and you can have a life and you can have many interests and this is one part of your life. >> reporter: somewhat casual scenes like this, it might be easy to forget that in the recent past and even today, coming out as gay could mean being pushed out of your profession. ell ellen degeneres faced risks when

she came out in '97. >> you nervous? >> a little bit. >> reporter: she caused an uproor when her sitcom character followed suit. celebrity sexuality remains the stuff of magazine covers. >> we tend to think of celebrities as we think of friends. the fact is, if you know someone who is gay, you tend to be less prejudiced, more open-minded, more supportive yourself. >> reporter: this year, the supreme court bolstered same sex marriage in two different rulings, with 53% of the public supporting gay marriage. but according to "out" magazine's editor in chief, the fact that it took roberts until this week shows society still has a long way to go. >> the fact that robin was not able to come out earlier, as someone who has been in a committed relationship for ten years, i think should make a lot of people feel ashamed,

actually. >> reporter: that delay may just be an acknowledgment of the tens of millions of conservative religious americans who, like "duck dynasty's" phil robertson, consider homosexuality to be a sin. this may simply be a business decision more than anything else, not to alienate those viewers. but as more stars come out, that strategy may fade. >> it is a cumulative process, continues to gather steam. i do think we are going to be looking very soon at a time when the very idea of coming out seems routine. >> president obama is not just staying away from the sochi games, he also appointed a delegation of openly gay athletes to attend the games such as billie jean king and others such as brian boitano. bad behavior es a sure-fire way for a celebrity to make news but a social change nonprofit called dosomething.org is giving

shout-outs to celebrities guilty of generous behavior. taylor swift tops the list for 2013 after giving $100,000 to the nashville symphony and headlining a gig in london for homeless kids. the british boy band one direction came in second. beyonce and the late paul walker also made the top five. walker died after his benefit for typhoon victims. you may or may not hope justin bieber makes good on this threat to retire. he's the first singer to make more than 200 kids' wishes come true for the make-a-wish foundation. 2013 is about to go down as the best year ever at the box office in the u.s. 2012 holds the record at $10.8 billion but it's looking as though this year will beat that figure by about 1%. no surprise, there were some hugely popular flicks this year. many of them, of course, sequels such as iron man 3 and the hunger games, catching fire. the hobbit, frozen, anchorman 2 still going strong. worldwide movie receipts are

believed to be about 5% higher than last year thanks to a booming box office in china. you will notice we did not mention the wolf of wall street there. martin scorsese's latest finished fifth place this weekend but the story has been a huge hit with a reality tv executive who wants to take the real wolf, a convicted scammer who leo plays, and build a reality show around him. the hollywood reporter says the idea is to have him help out people who have hit rock bottom. he is now a motivational speaker. of course he is. the executive says this is tv gold. no word when or where the show might air. make sure to follow me on twitter and also check out our show page at cnn.com/thelead for videos, blogs, extras. that's it for "the lead." i'm jake tapper. i'll be back in an hour anchoring "the situation room." first i turn you over to jim acosta filling in for mr. wolf blitzer. jim? happening now, terror in

russia. two deadly blasts in two days. could the winter olympics be next? i'll talk to a republican congressman who is afraid that security threats are being swept under the rug. plus, nsa hackers revealed. new revelations about an elite spy team that even plants bugs in computers before they are shipped to your door. and the nfl's black monday. we will take you inside the mass firing of pro football coaches and why they were sacked. wolf blitzer is off. i'm jim acosta. you're in "the situation room." a long-running battle between republicans in the white house is reigniting over the deadly attack on the u.s. diplomatic mission in benghazi, libya. some top gop lawmakers are challenging a new report that undercuts their claims about the attack and allegations of a cover-up by the administration. our foreign affairs correspondent jill dougherty is here. we are hearing angry push-back against this "new york times" report that really started as soon as that report came out. >> it