about what that illness might be. the nation's 41st president has had several health issues in the last year. let's get to cnn's athena jones live at the white house with the breaking details. right on the eve of the inauguration. what do we know. >> exactly. good morning, chris. well, we know from local reports that his chief of staff tells the >> doctors have a couple of theories about what might be causing his ailment and is expected to be discharged the next couple of days. he had a series of health issues over the last several years and it's always concerning when someone of such an advanced age is hospitalized he was hospitalized as a precaution. he spent about 7 days in the hospital that time and then in

july of 2015 he fell at his home in maine and broke a vertebrae in his neck so he's had some health concerns. he's also been incredibly active in other ways. he has jumped out and helped celebrate his birthday several times over the last 20 years or so by jumping out of an airplane but of course there are concerns right now especially moving up to the inauguration on friday this could effect his son, george w. bush's plan to attend the inauguration but we'll happy see what develops over the next couple of days. >> let's turn now to president elect donald trump. he was in washington last night attending black tie dinner for foreign diplomats and to meet members of his incoming administration. this as the list of house democrats that decided not to attend the swearing in just keeps growing. jason carol is live at trump tower in new york with more. what's the latest count.

>> well, still president elect when it comes to the inauguration it's not all about pomp and circumstance. he's still at odds with a number of groups including democratic lawmakers and the intelligence community. >> i know how safe this room is. boy oh boy. this place is surrounded tonight. >> with days to go with his inauguration donald trump toasting a room of 150 foreign diplomats and ambassadors. >> i want to thank you all for being here. we have great respect for your countries. >> trump introducing the diplomats to his incoming administration. touting his bid for secretary of state. rex tillerson. >> he's tougher than he thought. he goes into a country, take the oil, goes into another country: he's going to be so incredible.

>> at the exclusive dinner coming days after he criticized major european leaders and slammed nato. >> now vladimir putin saying he is familiar with some of the allegations about trump contained in a dossier published last week. putin defending the president elect denying any russian involvement in spying and dismissing the notion as, quote, rubbish. putin claiming that the allegations of russian intelligence having compromising material on trump was fabricated in order to undermine trump's legitimacy as president. cnn did not support the specifics of those claims. over a quarter of all democrats in the house. >> as far as other people that's

okay. i hope they'll give me their tickets. >> many of those skipping out citing trump's rebuke of civil rights icon congressman lewis after lewis called his presidency illegitimate. trump responding in a new interview. >> we have to have a smooth transition. i think he just grand standed. in terms of the president elect himself he said he would be writing his own address. >> thank you very much. let's bring in our panel.

>> all of us wish president bush a speedy recovery and hope he'll be out of the hospital in hours if not days but if he's not and president bush 43, his son can't go to the inauguration is that bad optics or there will be so much fanfare. >> you take that and add one more factor that is outside of trump's control on the weather. looking like a rainy friday. you have the potential for a deflating inauguration and that would really push up the president on trump himself to deliver some kind of speech and it's obviously nobody's fault. i do think trump pushing the democrats away from him. he is an incoming president that

really does need the stamp of broad approval in government because of what we see and how many americans are anxious and the more people that don't show up is just in the case of president bush it's nobody's fault but it's not helpful. >> we know the rule. family first. 92 years old. god bless him. i hope he's okay. obviously the president would probably defer to the health of his father and be there but this is going to be an issue. what's the plus minus in terms of 54 democrats? that's about 1 in 4. >> we have a list. >> what is the plus minus on who wins and who loses? >> what is important is the reasons they're not going.

some of them are saying that's what convinced them. it might have convinced representative lewis there's a real serious problem here and we're not going to not pretend that we're not teetering toward a constitutional crisis. others said the disrespect that was shown to barrack obama, the kind of tone of the entire campaign is not something that can be seen as approving. i need to do this for local politics. i don't know that this is one consolidated movement to try to undermine the legitimacy of this administration but people have good sound reasons in some cases even though they have something to lose their phone calls are not going to be returned and they're going to be in danger. >> after inauguration of the 54 democrats or whoever doesn't show up, then what? >> that's a good question.

you could blame this on the stone struck during the transition. most will lie low during the transition and stop jabbing at their opposition and that will help them earn a lot of good will on their way in. trump decided to do it differently. even though they're answering to their base we want to see them protest that over the long-term strategically they're better off being bigger than trump showing up at the inauguration and saying they want to work anyway they can and then inevitably when they can and reach irreconcilable differences on major policies they're going to say i did everything i could and it didn't work and that would put them in a better position to oppose trump and gain public

support for doing so. >> we hear when he goes low, they go high. not anymore. they want to set a harsh tone themselves but that's one. another that seems to be bubbling up more and more is the president elect battled within his own party over this first big bold move to repeal and replace of obamacare. when he said everyone is going to be covered even duffy said i have no idea what he is talking about. >> i think republicans on the hill really do have no idea what trump wants when it comes to obamacare and in fair bs sometimes trump talks like a liberal and he means it and other times he talks like a liberal but that's just his way of talk about a republican or conservative policy that he's eventually going to embrace and they're looking for sy signal to him as to what he wants in had

regard. that's going to allow him to get a lot of things done and push him to the west on health care if he wants to. >> political news outlets and gave them one of the first interviews and here's what he said about obamacare and health care going forward. this might be a little bit of insight. there's many people talking about many forms of health care where people with no money are not covered. we can't have that. so that's all we know. >> and if you take the long view of the way trump has talked about health care it's always been critical of obamacare. that word, obamacare. but going back to the first time running for president back in the 90s he was talking about a single payer and he praised single payer. actual government take over of the health care system. he prayed that during his presidential campaign in 2016 if

you are paul ryan you will be telling yourself for 7 months now i don't lof this guy and get unified conservative control and i get half the policies i want. every time he opens this health care release and has this it should have been a bracing warning that that's not how it's going to play out. >> everybody on the panel please speak up. directly to you it's seeming very, very real. they don't have the plan. tom price has his own problems right now. but they keep throwing out ideas and it seems like they are going to repeal this thing and have to just delay it because they don't know how to cover the people that are covered right now and pay for it unless they use the mechanism that's there right now which they protected. >> it's not so much repeal and replace as defunded delay and the easiest thing that they can do. they're not going to need help

from the democrats is just defund it. take down the medicaid expansion. you have a risk of people losing their care or having a cost. >> that's right. that's right. they're in a very tricky position. it's not quite right to say they don't have a plan. they have not agreed on a plan. they have a lot of different things they can do but they're getting it right now. >> it hasn't even started yet. two days from now allison and i will be standing in the rain at the inauguration. >> goody. >> that's when it is going. two days away. obama making a controversial president commuting the 35 year sentence, the harshest one ever

delivered for leaking to chelsea manning. he commuted the sentence. leaking 750,000 pages of sensitive documents and videos. about 7 years into her sentence. live at the pentagon with more. a lot of eyebrows are up this morning. >> indeed they are chris, good morning it was one of the stiffest sentences ever for a violation of the espionage act but now chelsea man as good getting out of jail. >> in a stunning move president obama commuting the sentence of chelsea manning. convicted of leaking classified government documents to wikileaks. now set to be released in may after serving 7 years of a 35 year sentence. >> i have serious concerns about

that when national security is at stake. >> the controversial decision going against the objections of secretary of defense ash carter and sending shockwaves through washington. >> especially for a president that made so much recently about the danger that wikileaks posed to commute private mannings sentence. very disappointing. >> manning, the transgender woman known as bradley stole thousands of classified military files including videos of u.s. air strikes in iraq that sparked concerns over human rights violations and a leak credited with putting wikileaks on the map. manning pled guilty, convicted of multiple charges including violating the espionage act. serving time in a military prison manning struggled with gender identity issues twice

trying to commit suicide after requests to be transferred to a civilian prison were denied. wikileaks celebrating the news. hailing it as a victory. but obama did not exonerate another famous leaker, nsa contractor edward snowden. >> mr. snowden fled into the arms of an adversary. chelsea manning was found guilty. was sentenced for crimes and she acknowledged wrong doing. >> now wikileaks founder julian assange indicated in the past he would agree to an extradition request to the u.s. if manning was free. no word on how that idea is progressing and as for edward snowden he can stay in russia at least until 2020. >> so many twists and turns to explore here with that story. we'll be doing that throughout the program. thank you. president obama shocked many in

the pentagon and the intelligence community by commuting the sentence of manning. why did the president do it? we'll discuss that, next.

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reductions in penalties for people. something he has done more on his term than the last 12 presidents combined but it is the commutation of chelsea manning, serving 35 years in prison for leaking classified materials and videos to wikileaks sparking controversy. let's bring back our panel. make the case. why did president obama do this? why is it okay? >> i don't know why it's okay. but there's a line of proportionality. but when he talked about cocaine sentencing disparities. you can commit the same crime and equivalent amounts of cocaine but one was in cooked form and powder form and one will be -- and it's not fairness

under the law. >> convicted of treason, yeah. so in this case, look, you can commit manslaughter and serve 25 years. he is serving -- she is serving 35 years so i think there was that and there's also the political side of it which is that to the extent that she was having issues for her to try suicide twice and to end up dying is not something he wanted on his record. >> let's not forget she is in an all men's prison. how much do you think her transgender status and suicide attempts played into president obama's decision. >> it's a theory and it's a theory that could make sense. i just think that given the damage that the leaks did to

national security exposing private cables and it leads to a lack of trust and when you're talking in the united states and whether or not things can be kept secret. and when you look at what's been going on with wikileaks over the past several months and more recently the sparring between trumps and democrats over whether or not wikileaks can be trusted and whether or not it's damaging to rely on them as a source this just doesn't make a lot of sense and i think political politically, this works to undermine arguments democrats have been making that wikileaks is a damaging organization and that the u.s. needs to do something about it. >> obviously, making the case people will see this as someone

getting excused for high treason, crimes against the state. it does seem a bit opposite because the democrats that are so heated up and obama has been so heated up about wikileaks and how terrible it is, it was a big signature of the administration. why send this message on the way out after what just happened in the campaign. >> and sort of looking back to before the campaign, chris, this administration has been so aggressive about prosecuting people that leak classified information but not only do you have manning but you have cartwright receiving a pardon and looking back earlier than that you had david petraus that leaked classified information to his biographer walking away with a slap on the wrist and now he

works at a great job in midtown manhattan. it's a weird way of cracking down in a way that may have had an effect on the willingness of whistleblowers and leakers to come forward and pulling back on the punishment at the back end of that process. >> do we have any idea what it means for the two other high profile leakers who promised via twitter that he would come back here to face justice if mannings sentence was commuted so he's going to stick to that now. >> never acknowledged anything wrong. ran off to russia. still trying to do damage to the united states in many people's opinion. he's not going to get consideration. assange the problems that he made may have had sort of a timing problem involved in it because if he had enough time to maybe walk out of the embassy and go through process in sweden and perhaps end up in the administration and still have president obama there to figure

out what to do with him that's one scenario. i don't know if he wants to take his chances witha president trump. >> why couldn't you string out this is a better situation for him. you have a new president that openly advertised what they did. put the hacks out there and told people to read it. why wouldn't he be in as good of a situation. >> i don't think we should trust what he says. he said a whole host of things and never follow through. this is something he probably never expected to happen and given such a high profile case and makes no sense on the merits given how damaging the leaks were so yeah, you know what, he likes donald trump and seems to think donald trump is a better president than clinton would have been. i don't expect it to happen. i don't think this guy has shown he ever keeps his word. >> stand by please. donald trump's pick for education secretary on sclil.

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four of president elect trump's cabinet nominees face congress today. this comes after a contentious hearing late yesterday for betty devos. >> good morning, yeah. really facing a tough and at times very contentious confirmation hearing up here on capitol hill. she is certainly one of trump's

most controversial cabinet picks and that was reflected in a sharp line of questioning we saw from democrats last night bringing up her support for school choice and the voucher program and even her political path being a major republican donor behind the scenes. >> can you commit to us tonight that you will not work to privatize public schools or cut a single penny from public education. >> do you think if you're not a multibillionaire, if your family has not made hundreds of millions of dollars of contributions to the republican party that would be sitting here today. >> if president trump moves forward with his plan to ban gun-free school zones will you support that proposal? >> it's another critical day up here on capitol hill and pressure is certainly mounting specifically on tom price he is donald trump's pick to be health and human services secretary and

he goes into this with a slew of insider trading accusations at his back. chuck schumer saying price may have broken the law and has called for an administration and democrats are calling for these hearings to be postponed until these ethics questions can be vetted. accusing republicans in his words of rushing to sneak this nomination through. >> thank you very much. so much going on down there and guess what, we have another brand new cnn poll. president obama's final report card. what do you think the number is in terms of approval of him as the job the nation needed him to do. we got the new numbers, next. ew, really? oh, it's our verizon bill look at them. line access fee, administrative fees, there are even taxes on top of them decent people shouldn't have to live like this (slaps "fee" off dad's head) did i get it?

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president obama leaving office with most americans viewing his presidency as a success. he ends with an 60% approval rating. that is his highest since 2009 and he ranks high among all recent predecessors getting positive marks in his final days in the west wing. only president clinton and president reagan left office with a higher number as you can see there. later today the president will hold his final press conference. let's bring back our panel these are confusing times. so president obama who you could say that vote for donald trump was a reputiation of the things that president obama stood for yet he has more higher approval ratings than donald trump. >> in some respects really is and part of this may be a reaction to donald trump that you saw over the course of the 2016 campaign when you had these two really unpopular nominees on

each side you saw obama's numbers steadily decline. some of it may be the economy and specific policies he was working on and early controversies of his administration but having somebody that you don't like to compare him too is actually probably advantageous to him. it does raise questions for the folks taking over in washington about what skill change the american people are hoping for. trump was elected to go in and blow the place up and there's still dissatisfaction with washington but i'm not sure how much dissatisfaction there has been with the way the obama administration itself has been handling it. >> you have to look into where there's strength and weakness and where the reaction to the right is going to be. >> well, other than fake news which i have already seen on

twitter in reaction to the new poll, i think we'll hear about the two midterm elections. 2010 and 2014 were about his leadership and policy agenda. no doubt about it. i don't think that we are where we are today without obamacare and a lot of foreign policy troubles the islamic state and other things in 2014 and i think that when you look at the president's record it clearly is mixed. clearly americans like him and they always have liked him and there's many things about his presidency that they liked. clearly the economy is doing better than when he came in and they're giving him some credit for that but his party is at one of the lowest points ever. he was never able to translate his success down ballot and down ballot democrats have suffered under president obama like they haven't in many many years and if you're going to give a president credit for what has gone right you have to give them credit for what has gone wrong and that's going to be part of obama's record and what you'll

hear from republicans as we make comparisons between obama and trump's low numbers coming in. >> yet here's another finding from a different poll. the wall street journal and nbc. they find the highest percentage of approval from obamacare since they began asking the question in 2009, today 45% of americans believe it was a good idea. 41% believe it was a bad idea. now obviously that's divided. that's not a huge number for obamacare but again highest ever in it's existence. >> it's interesting because we're having conversations about obamacare that we haven't had since the height to get it passed. people have seen it and kicked the tires a little bit and benefitted from it and even with double digit percentage increase it's from a low base and we're at least in the system and we have some hope and we can get a little health care, you know, having coverage for even a year new to go four or five years without see a doctor because you

couldn't afford it that's a really big change. >> also it's been attacked and it's become a mantra for the democratic party. >> it's basic to politics that now you're going to take something away from people. the reason it was so ferocious was that everybody understood once it's in place people are not going to want to see this taken away from them so now that we have talk about it getting taken away people are saying wait a minute. >> it's remarkable that i have heard from democrats in d.c. and elsewhere looking at the vway te white house and democrats are putting out this message about the consequences of appeal and asking where are you guys in 2010 and 2011, right? the law hadn't fully kicked in at that point so it might have been harder to talk about people

having their health insurance taken away. >> the most famous line was nancy pelosis that we have to stuck it before we know what's in it. that's the wrong message. >> they didn't do a lot of explaining. the benefits people are doing immediately and they're doing that very belatedly now. >> healthcare.gov the website and roll out was a disaster. hundreds of thousands of americans got letters saying you can no longer go to the doctor and discontinue and there's reasons to dislike the roll out. it's choppy. a lot of things haven't gone right leading up to the election. we saw a lot of rise in premiums. there's plenty wrong with this that give republicans an opening to replace it as long as they come up with something that people like. >> it will be interesting to see what president obama says in his final press conference of his presidency which should be happening today. thank you very much. >> coming up in our next hour, josh earnest joins us live to talk about his new approval number, chelsea manning, and what it's been like to be a

lifer with obama. few in the administration have made it as long as josh earnest has. >> programming note for you, be sure to watch the end inside the last days of the obama white house. that's tonight at 9:00 eastern only on cnn. >> president obama getting plenty of bush back for republicans for commuting the sentence of chelsea manning after being convicted of leaking sensitive government documents. we're going to talk to one of mannings supporters and a retired general. they're going to debate this controversial move, next. (avo) did you know two areas of your brain can make it hard to lose weight? contrave is an fda-approved weight-loss medicine that may help adults who are overweight or struggle with obesity lose weight and keep it off. contrave is believed to work on two areas of the brain: your hunger center...

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>> that's what the steelers are going through this week. more in the bleacher report. what is plaguing them? the bad timing for all of this, right? steelers head coach and posting video from their locker room after their win over the chiefs. >> it was foolish of him to do that. it was selfish of him to do that and inconsiderate for him to do that. we'll punish him and we won't punish us. that's why you see great players move around from team to team. >> he shows tomlin calling the patriots a bad name in the locker room. they play sunday at the afc championship game. >> you need to be on 75% of

ballots to gain induction and this is actually the last year they can keep their ballot anonymous and based on the ballots that have been made public barry bonds and roger clemens are not going to be getting in once again due to their ties to steroids but did see a big increase in votes so getting into the hall of fame next year? that's not out of the question. >> thank you for at a bleacher report. so praise and outrage about president obama's decision to commute chelsea mannings prison sentence. we'll hear both sides when we're joined next. look, anyone who thinks you gotta make a truck heavier to make it stronger, has been workin' too long without a hard hat.

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>> police say the suspect carrying two guns and dressed in body armor did try to escape. officers say lloyd suffered facial injuries when he resisted

arrest. >> texas law enforcement mourning the loss of one of their own and shot and killed after a suspect barricaded himself inside his home and was shot by police. he was killed in the standoff tuesday. they responded to a 911 call about an armed man in a backyard. the suspected gunman was later found dead inside the home. >> going about 50, 55, all of a sudden, boat veers to the right and the two are sent flying into the water. what was the problem? malfunction in the boats steering system? the passengers banged up but okay. thankfully both were wearing life jackets. you fishermen out there, do you hear that? wearing their life jackets. >> this is a great video to see how quickly something can

happen. >> commuting from 35 years down to 7. a court convicted manning of steeling secret government documents and providing them to wikileaks. we have investigative journalist and co-founding editor of the intercept and cnn military analyst and former commanding general for europe in the 7th army. thanks to both of you for being here. glenn, i know that you have called for this. for the release of chelsea manning for years. you have been lobbying for this. what was your reaction when you heard the news? >> well i was thrilled. it's by far the largest sentence for somebody in the united states she was kept in harsh conditions for 7 years. the un found her treatment was abusive and inhumane and what

she leaked to the publish even the u.s. military admits constitutes probably the most important journalistic archive or one of them that we have as reporters to tell the american people about what is taking place so it's an obviously just outcome. >> i have to say i'm extremely conflicted. i'm looking at it as a soldier, one as a former commander and one as a human being he released three quarters of a million documents which was a crime. it hurt the standing in the international community and effected other soldiers and intelligence officials and was disruptive to good order and discipline in the military. private manning is an extremely troubled young person and has been all of his life so from a soldier and commander

perspective i want to see him locked away for a very long time but from a human being perspective she served 7 years of her sentence and was very troubled and has a torturous personal life and has admitted to the crime and served period years so i'm not sure how i fall out on this quite frankly. it's just very troubling. >> what about that? others believe the information released by private manning did compromise national security and could have gotten people killed and maybe did because there's forces that are identifiable. >> it's totally reckless to suggest that there's a possibility that people got killed. >> this is what other military members said. >> u.s. military testified after a court marshall hearing they

search and investigated and not a single person was harmed as a result of the material. >> a direct result. >> so that's what the u.s. military says. actual journalists who investigate things rather than repeat what military officials say says there's zero evidence that everybody is harmed and this idea of calling her troubled as though she were mentally ill distorts what happened. this is somebody that volunteered to go to the iraq war believing her governments claims about what her government was doing there only to get there and find the reality was much different. she saw atrosties and war crimes and believed in good conscious she had to let the american public know and democracy and what they were telling was an absolute lie. >> hold on for one second

because i want to get the general to talk about this because correct me if i'm wrong, you knew private manning. >> i didn't know him personally. he was part of the unit that replaced my units in iraq. all you have to do is understand private mannings history and you can say she was tortured throughout her entire life in terms of her personal history. the history of her life from birth until she joined the army was troubling for anyone that takes a hard look at it and from the standpoint of whether or not someone was harmed there was testimony that says there was no correct harming of an individual but you can't talk about incorrect. it did effect military operations. it did effect our standing in the world and agents were moved because the wikileaks documents

did identify people by name and many people in the government were concerned about their wellbei wellbeing. >> and it cost the government a great deal too. from a human being perspective i can understand the president doing it. it was a compassion move forward a troubled individual and i will say that again but from a military perspective it is disheartening to see this. 7 years, is it enough? i don't know. >> what does this mean for other high profile people like edward snowden? julian assange tweet first degree chelsea manning sentence were commuted he would come back and face justice. >> well, the reality is there is no justice here it's a total double standard. if you look at somebody that actually leaked top secret information and most sensitive

material he didn't spend a single day in prison and unlike chelsea manning that leaked in order to inform the public, david leaked top secret sensitive material to his mistress but he has power in washington so he doesn't go to jail for a single day. chelsea manning goes to prison for 7 years because that's the double standard that the u.s. military uses for people that leak information. if you're powerful your permitted to do it and if you're not you go don't. >> private manning leaked three quarters of a million documents. more than just what would be considered whistleblower activity there were cables directed at the entire world. i don't think that you can conclude one was like the other.

and i think he has the wrong view about the entire thing. it isn't power versus nonpower. it's the vast extent of documents that were leaked and how they were leaked and what it did and i would suggest that private manning probably served the right amount of time and because of her past she needs to be released but that shouldn't be compared with anybody else. >> thank you for this debate. >> thanks also to our international viewers we'll be watching. for our u.s. viewers new day continues right now. >> things will be done beautifully but differently. >> we all serve people. >> we have to have a smooth transition. president bum balm understands that very well. >> i couldn't be there to celebrate his inauguration. >> we have a divided country and it's not divided -- >> i have serious concerns about

sentences when national security is at stake. >> chelsea manning was found guilty. she acknowledged wrong doing. mr. snowden fled into the arms of an adversary. >> do you think you would be sitting here today? >> as a matter of fact i do. >> they don't want people to get a good look at these people. >> these people. >> breaking news about america's oldest living former president. george h.w. bush is being treated at a houston hospital after falling ill. >> he battled a series of health issues in the last year. live at the white house with all the breaking details. what do we know. >> good morning, allison. well the former president spokesperson tells cnn he has been hospitalized since saturday for shortness of breath. he is responding well to treatmen a