live." it is go time. cnn newsroom continues right now with ali velezy in new york city. it's all yours. have a great afternoon. for the next two hours today and every week day i'll guide you through the maze of information coming your way. together we'll learn what's going on at home and around the world. i'll give you access to folks who can best explain what it means today and the impact beyond today and show case the best ideas in innovation and public education. my mission is to help you figure out how what is going on around you fits into your life. let's start right now. he is known as the merchant of death. an alleged russian armed dealer extradited from thailand to the united states going on trial for conspiring to kill americans. plus, the new buzz on those so-called energy drinks loaded with caffeine and alcohol. the fda just moments ago out with a statement saying, they're dangerous and they could be seized. i'll give you the latest on that. we'll meet real-life human oid robots, check it out, ready

to step up and be noticed in today's big eye. we begin with a revealing controversy in every sense of the word as americans prepare for the busiest air travel time of the year the folks in charge of keeping flyers safe are defending their procedures against a noisy and indignant back lash. everyone wants to be safe but it's clear we all have our private boundaries when it comes to scanning and touching. you've seen this viral video from san diego. a patdown that turned into a standoff. >> also we're going to be doing a groin check. that means i'm going to place my hand on your hip, my other hand on your inner thigh and slowly go up and slide down. >> okay. >> we are going to do that two times in the front and two times in the back. >> all right. if you would like a private screening we can m&i bank that available for you also. >> we can do that out here but if you touch my junk i'm going to have you arrested. >> actually -- >> security is everyone's responsibility. >> actually we're going to have

a supervisor here because of your statement. >> now, that would be passenger who recorded that walked out on the search and for that he faces a possible $11,000 fine. it does say at the airport you are welcome not to be searched but once the process has started you are not welcome to leave. he left and faces a fine quite possibly. most flyers skip or are spared the hands on approach in favor of machines. if you fly out of any of these airports you go through advanced imaging that raises its own set of privacy concerns. you've seen the pictures. these are the airports that use that not to mention health concerns. some people are concerned about radiation. already we've seen lawsuits against homeland security and tsa and then there's the opt out campaign urging folks to protest so-called virtual strip searches by not flying at all over thanksgiving or if you do, insist on the patdowns because they take longer and can tie up the lines. through it all, most of us claim to be just fine with body scans. a recent cbs poll, though, shows

81% of americans believe airports should use the state of the art scanners. only 15% disagree. so this may not be the ground swell movement that some people are making it up to be. for the second day in a row the head of the transportation security administration is facing lawmakers who seem genuinely sympathetic to his position which could be summed up as damned if you do and damned if you don't. our homeland security correspondent jeanne meserve tells us more about it. >> pistole was in front of a committee today and gave no indication the policies would change any time soon. travelers can expect to use either the advanced imaging machines or if there is some anomaly when they go through those or a metal detector they'll be subjected to the enhanced patdowns. members of congress had a lot of questions. they asked repeatedly, have you gone too far? here is one exchange. >> i've often wondered as this has kind of developed over time, at what point there is a tipping

point with the american public. you know, take off your belt, take off your coat, take off your shoes, take out your liquids on and on. and now advanced imaging and as you acknowledge, very intrusive patdown if you choose not to do that. does that worry you that maybe we're at a point here where this is not a vocal minority, that people just think you've over stepped? >> i am sensitive to that, senator. i know the threats are real and so when it comes down, what it comes down to is how do we balance? what i believe is that reasonable people can disagree as to the balance between privacy and security. so we all agree that everybody wants to be secure on that flight where we don't necessarily agree is what is the proper balance between that security and privacy? >> pistole said he made the change because a number of different reports by inspector generals and others indicated that the old patdown procedure

wasn't good enough, wasn't catching threats. he said that he, the homeland security secretary, and other top officials have all had this enhanced patdown. he acknowledged it's intrusive but said it's what's necessary. ali? >> terrorism is intrusive, too. >> yes. that's his point. >> i hope he says it more loudly because i'm not hearing that as clearly as we should. i have a lot of people sending things on facebook and twitter saying we might be overstating the ground as weswell movement. 80% of people think we do need the techniques and need to keep safe. it is an interesting discussion. he is more polite than i would be i suspect if i were involved in that testimony. >> he is a very moderate, cool, calm guy. >> yeah. >> what he kept trying to underline is this is about security. this is about keeping aviation safe. >> yeah. >> by the way, you mentioned in the intro the threat of possible fines against john tyner the guy who recorded that interaction

with the tsa screener. pistole said today that is still under review but there were strong hints he is not going to be fined. he said the only people who have been fined thus far are people who were actually trying to smuggle things through. >> right. >> through security checkpoints. >> right. i don't think the fine was meant to prove a point. he was making a statement. i'm not sure he sort of fits the intent that that fine was designed for. oh, well. all right. thanks for this. this conversation is not going to end any time soon as long as we still have the threat of terrorism. jeanne meserve, thanks so much. >> you bet. there are new concerns over cargo obviously on airports and that has prompted new precautions and could spell a quick end to something i enjoy a great deal given how much i travel. wi-fi on airplanes. now, it's by no means certain but some experts fear that airborne wi-fi could help terrorists detonate bombs. my next guest is an expert who almost took the reins of the tsa. errol suggesters withdrew his

nomination after months in partial limbo. he is now an adjunct professor of homeland security and public policy at usc and joins us from los angeles. thanks very much for being here. i was saddened on a very personal level that someone might say we'll take the wi-fi away in the plane but it's like the patdowns. i travel a lot and i think the priority has to be on staying safe. just walk us through why wi-fi on an airplane might now be a problem. >> well, ali, wi-fi gives the bomber the capability to either detonate that device on the plane, using a cell phone or using a computer, or, in fact, to -- through voice over internet protocol, perhaps detonate a device or device you saw in the multiple planes while in flight. and that's been a concern since the beginning. needless to say, it's a result of last month's cargo bomb threat, we realize that internet or wi-fi is not necessarily

required. >> right. is this one of those things where the wi-fi that's offered to you on a plane, the technology there, are they able to sort of limit what you might be able to do or is the fact that you got internet connect ivt on an airplane now worrying us that somebody could actually do something that you just need the internet to trigger? >> well, there is a worry but it's not a new worry. i know that one airline it does offer wi-fi and stated that voice over internet protocol or voice over ip is not possible on the aircraft so that's certainly going to limit it. as i mentioned earlier, this really is a concern that's not new. we saw in 1995 there was a plot called "operation bojeka" and ramsey yusef should sound familiar as he was the 1993 world trade center bomber had a shoe bomb he got on a plane and successfully detonated on a philippine airlines jet which killed a passenger. then six years later we saw richard reid again with a shoe bomb and last year with abdul

mutallab transporting a device in an underwear garment. there is an evolution in bomb technology and attack path protocol and more importantly a human element we have to pay attention to. it is the human factor that is the most important in the counterterrorism equation. >> you just saw mr. pistole testifying before congress and i know you're not in the business of critiquing what he might have done but i was sort of saying to jeanne meserve, you know, could he have, could they be doing a better job of marketing what they're doing and perhaps taking a stronger position against people who think that they're getting you their personal space while trying to keep flyers safe? >> i think you nailed the real issue here. the better job comes through education and, ali, you fly a lot as do i. i've spoken to people that plan to travel in the next two weeks. the highest peak travel season of the year. they're concerned about going to the airport. that concern, which elevates to a level of fear if you will, can

be easily mitigated through education. the secretary of homeland security janet napolitano had an op-ed out on monday in the "usa today" and it spoke to the things that people might expect or be subjected to. i think that's the beginning of the discussion. i think we have to have the united states traveling public part of the security system. >> right. you'd agree it's not really the most productive thing to do to call for some kind of a boycott or slowdown on thanksgiving, though, for the travel as some people are doing? >> i do not -- i don't agree with that. i think it's counterproductive. what happens is we have limited resources, how abundant as it may seem to the traveling public, the numbers of people working for tsa, we want the tsa officers to focus on risk. if the focus has to be a person who is intent on disrupting the system because they don't agree with the policies or procedures, now the focus of attention and the focus of the countermeasures is on a population that doesn't need it. we have another set of the population that's not intent on

going along because they believe that they have been wronged or it's not appropriate. that's undue. so i don't think an opt out is a necessary option here. i think we need to work with the tsa, work with the people that are screening, so we can then focus on the people in line who really should be going to secondary and deserving the more erroneous, i should say exigent protocol. >> yeah. very well said. thanks very much. we'll talk to you in another hour and get into what we can actually do because the concerns of americans are real. let's see if we can fix them. errol southers will join me again in an hour. staying on the topic of terror he is known as the merchant of death. an alleged russian arms dealer charged with trying to kill americans is now in a u.s. jail. i'll have a live report and tell you what this is all about right after this break. out of the very best america had to offer. ingenuity. integrity. optimism. and a belief that the finest things

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you may not have heard this guy's name but u.s. officials have been fighting hard to get their hands on alleged russian arms dealer viktor bout for years now. did a good job saying his name. now they have him. he is behind bars in new york. bout arrived on a special dea plane last night after thailand agreed to extradite him. he is expected to appear in federal court today. here is what we know about the man often called the merchant of death. he is a former soviet air force officer, the son of a bookkeeper, an auto mechanic. he speaks six languages. his alleged arms network include africa, afghanistan, south america. one u.s. official calls him the bin laden of the clandestine arms trade. all right. susan candiotti has been following the story. >> reporter: they finally got their hands on him after a very

long struggle but right now as we speak he is in court making his very first appearance before a federal judge. and viktor bout is someone that authorities say they were able to nail through an undercover operation that they called "operation relentless." here is what happened. back in 2007, part of 2008, some undercover or rather confidential sources for the dea worked in meetings, several meetings with viktor bout. according to the charges he agreed to sell them all kinds of ammunition and explosives and rocket launchers and ak-47s, surface-to-air missiles, this kind of thing. in order to kill farc or rather u.s. officials in farc, fighting the rebels in colombia. as part of the undercover deal, they arranged to sell all this material in this undercover operation. now, the u.s. attorney held a news conference a little while ago and he kind of summed things up about their case against

viktor bout. >> in a series of recorded meetings and telephone calls, in south america, in europe, and in asia, bout and his associate allegedly made clear that they were ready, willing, and able to provide a substantial arsenal to the farc for use against the united states. according to unsealed documents, here is just some of the deadly arsenal that viktor bout allegedly offered up. more than 700 surface-to-air missiles, 5,000 ak-47 assault rifles, anti-personnel land mines, c-4 explosives, and literally millions of rounds of ammunition. >> now, as part of the investigations arsenal, the u.s. government says it already has accepted a guilty plea from someone who was acting they say as an intermediary for viktor bout. so they've got him, they say, in

their back pocket, obviously this is someone who will be poised to testify against viktor bout. >> do we think viktor bout is staying in the u.s.? >> oh, he is staying here for now. he is in u.s. custody right now. he has to go through the system. russia, not happy about this. they're protesting it saying that the extradition was illegal. they're calling this deplorable. it really calls into question the future relations between the u.s. and russia. >> right. >> on many different levels. >> yes. >> the war in afghanistan, the drug war they've been helping with. nuclear arms treaties and the like. meetings coming up between the -- between russia and the u.s. government. >> but it does make you think about the soviet union because that was the last time. >> right. >> we were having tough relationships with russia. we'll keep a close eye on that. susan candiotti on the story of viktor bout. inflation hits a record low. sounds good, right? why are economists so worried? i'll tell you about it. "your money" up next. l. well, i'll do the shopping... if you do the shipping. shipping's a hassle. i'll go to the mall.

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some of the top stories we're following here at cnn, new numbers on the scope of unemployment in this country. cnn money.com has added it up and unemployed americans have collected $319 billion in jobless benefits over the past three years. benefits are scheduled to run out at the end of the month for about 2 million people if congress doesn't approve another emergency extension. haiti's worsening cholera outbreak has jumped the border into the dominican republic now. dominican health officials confirmed their first case and issued a maximum health alert. moments ago we got word from the florida department of health that a woman who recently traveled to haiti has been diagnosed with cholera in florida. the outbreak in haiti has killed more than a thousand people so far. strong storms ripped through the baltimore area leaving behind a trail of debris.

numerous homes are badly damaged including an apartment building that had the roof torn off. there were some injuries but none of them were considered serious. around 20,000 people, however, were left without power. this day and age, prosthetic limbs have come a long way. last week we showed you a remarkable story of a paralyzed woman who was testing out robotic legs. now similar technology is helping four-legged friends get around. we'll show you after the break. i said "sure." "well, let's grow some algae." and that's what started it. exxonmobil and synthetic genomics have built a new facility to identify the most productive strains of algae. algae are amazing little critters. they secrete oil, which we could turn into biofuels. they also absorb co2. we're hoping to supplement the fuels that we use in our vehicles, and to do this at a large enough scale to someday help meet the world's energy demands.

aspercreme breaks the grip, with maximum-strength medicine and no embarrassing odor. break the grip of pain with aspercreme. fido goes robo. a british veterinarian is giving some pets prosthetic limbs with technology that rivals what is used on humans. >> reporter: mitzie davis is walking again after being

trampled by a horse in june her owner was left with a tough decision. >> options were three legs, euthanasia, or give her the chance to walk. we had to give her the chance to walk. >> mitzie is just one of a few dogs in the world that can be labeled bionic. on this day dr. noel fitzpatrick is taking off her bulky leg brace and replacing it with a sleek, permanent prosthetic foot. he did this using a revolutionary device called an i-tap, custom built metal rod placed inside mitzi's leg. >> a permanent fixture, part of the dog's body. the dog just gets on with life. >> before it came into being there was no way to give an animal a prosthesis. >> itap technology has been also tested on humans. traditional prosthetic devices for humans can sometimes be painful and difficult to use. he says itap could be a remarkable alternative for people and their pets.

>> if what i do by helping my patients in their needs help other patients that are animals or human, excellent. i think it is the future, yes. >> rob marciano, cnn. >> man, that is a good story. all right. the fda ready to can the caffeinated alcoholic drinks that are popular on college campuses. i'll have the latest buzz after the break. one word turns innovative design into revolutionary performance. one word makes the difference between defining the mission and accomplishing the mission. one word makes the difference in defending our nation and the cause of freedom. how... is the word that makes all the difference.

all right. i want to bring you up to speed with some news we have from the fda.

they have warned four companies that their caffeinated alcoholic beverages were unsafe and could be seized under a federal law. now, you probably have been following this story. we were talking about a caffeinated drink that ended up sending a bunch of college kids to the hospital. it was called four loko, caffeinated alcoholic beverages. the maker of that drink preempted the fda yesterday by saying that it is removing the caffeine and other stimulants from the drink. dozens of other products, however, are likely to be targeted by the fda. let's bring in elizabeth. let me give you a couple -- elizabeth is there but can i just show you some of the names of these things, elizabeth, that are probably going to be targeted? these are the ones that the fda, okay. i don't have the names. i'll tell you, they're called charge beverages. that's the maker of a drink called core, new century brewing, maker of moon shot. fusion project which is the maker of four loko and united brands company which is the maker of juice and max.

joose. let's bring elizabeth in to tell us about these issues. these are caffeine and alcohol and other stimulants. independently not always the problem that they are when you put them together. >> right. lots of caffeine, lots of alcohol. what happens is that people were drinking these things, ali, and not realizing how drunk they were. usually when you drink a lot of alcohol you pass out. that's actually your body's way of keeping you from drinking even more. but when you heavily caffeinate yourself, guess what? you can stay awake and keep drinking. you don't get that nasty alcohol headache, either. so that was the issue and as you said, these kids in washington state ended up in the hospital. kids have ended up at the hospital elsewhere and sometimes officials are confused and think they're actually drugged. that's how drunk they are. >> what's the manifestation of this? they're drunk and really awake and then crash because the caffeine runs out before the alcohol effect? what ends up happening to these kids? >> right. that's basically it. they become so drunk that sometimes they're driving around and don't know where they are.

they wake up in strange places. they call it a blackout in a can. they basically end up blacking out. we actually went online, ali. there is truly a website for everything. there is a website called four loko stories.com where people are leaving the stories of what happened to them when they drank four loko. i'll say this is a blog so we can't confirm the identity or any of these stories. it is worth hearing about a couple of them especially if you're not a big four loko drunk drinker. one person said it caused me to jump out of a two story window and grind strawberry cake into the hardwood foyer of a friend's house. deep into my blacked out state i began running through campus in my underwear making death threats to anyone around me. and i tried to light a cigarette on a gas stove. instead i lit my hair on fire. then i cried because i thought everyone was making fun of me. which they probably were. so these apparently are the kinds of things that happen when you combine alcohol and caffeine in these large amounts. >> all right. so this company that makes four

loko, the fusion projects and the other companies, if they take out the caffeine and the torine and other stimulants, now you've got alcoholic drinks that are beverages, sort of sweet tasting alcoholic drinks. where do they fall? >> well, they're just still considered alcoholic beverages but i think what's important for people to know is that there is a ton of alcohol in these. they are 12%. i have a couple in front of me here. they're 12% alcohol by volume. beer is like 5% alcohol by volume. so you can see there is a big difference. plus see these bright colors? these are fruit punch flavor and green apple and blue raspberry and lemon lime and from what i'm told from people who drink them, you don't really feel like you're drinking alcohol. you feel like you're drinking juice and it's carbonated and feels kind of like a juice or a soda and so people are chugging them and as you can see they're large, 24 ounces. and possibly not realizing just how drunk they're getting. >> let me ask you, where does the fda or the government get

the authority to come in and do this? because can i drink a whole lot of rum and a whole lot of coke and a whole lot of coffee? i mean, why is there government regulation of this? >> you can. i've had several people tell me today, elizabeth, what is wrong with the fda? why are they taking this away? after all you can get an irish coffee at a bar or a rum and coke. a couple things going on here. one, this is one product that contains both of them that apparently has led to some problems. and number two, rum and coke isn't necessarily going to have as much alcohol and as much caffeine as these things are going to have and you don't chug those necessarily the way that people tend to be chugging these. so the amount of alcohol, the amount of caffeine in here, it can be a little bit hard to replicate in these large volumes. and that's why the fda said, you know what? as a product we don't consider this safe. >> interesting. elizabeth, thanks very much for this. we'll continue to follow this story to see what happens with the fda ruling. >> thanks. >> all right. it was an overwhelming smell

that led police to a temple in thailand. what they found was shocking. that story coming up next in globe trekking. [ female announcer ] you use the healing power of touch every day. ♪ now the healing power of touch just got more powerful. introducing precise from the makers of tylenol. precise pain relieving heat patch activates sensory receptors. it helps block pain signals for deep penetrating relief you can feel precisely where you need it most. precise. only from the makers of tylenol.

time now for globe trekking. first up bangkok, thailand. a disturbing discovery at a buddhist temple. police were called to the site because neighbors complained of an overwhelming smell. hidden in the temple were the remains of more than 300 human fetuses. police say they came from

illegal abortion clinics. the remains were wrapped in plastic bags and newspaper and placed in mortuary storage areas. six morticians have been detained for questioning. it is common for thai temples to have morticians who prepare bodies for cremation. abortion is illegal in thailand except when the pregnancy endangers the life of the mother or is a result of rape. going now to haiti the u.n. is making an urgent appeal for calm warning that riots triggered by the cholera outbreak are seriously hampering international relief efforts. these pictures sent to us by cnn's ivan watson and his crew vividly tell the story. rioters have placed burning barricades in the streets of the northern city of cap-haitien and the only way into town was to ride on the back of a motorcycle. the u.n. says all aid flights have been canceled. water purification and training projects have been cut back. demonstrators also looted and burned a world food program warehouse destroying 500 tons of food aid. the u.n. says at least one protester was killed by a peacekeeper acting in self-defense. many haitians blame u.n.

peacekeepers from nepal for the cholera outbreak. the u.n. says all peacekeepers have been tested and all results were negative. so far cholera has killed more than 1100 people and has now spread to the neighboring dominican republic. we just had a report a short time ago that florida health officials announced a woman who recently returned to florida from haiti has been diagnosed with cholera. we'll keep you updated on this as more information becomes available. let me bring you up to speed on some of the top stories we're following right now. the head of the tsa, you see him there, he admitted to concerns over airline passenger pat downes during a hearing on capitol hill this morning but says they are necessary to keep travelers safe. john pistole says the patdowns are more invasive than in the past and even admits being uncomfortable when he was patted down by a tsa screener. but, he says, screeners are always expected to treat people with dignity and respect. thursday's planned sitdown between gop leaders and president obama has been postponed due to scheduling conflicts with the republicans. the so-called slurpy summit will now be held on november 30th. president obama and congressional leaders plan to

discuss the future of key issues following the republican victory in the mid-term elections. general motors' trek into profitability takes a major step forward with the first stock ipo since emerging from bankruptcy. the company expects to sell around $20 billion in stock in what could be the biggest ipo in history. as a result the federal government's stake in gm will drop from 60% to just a third. taxpayers could recoup more than $11 billion. just two minutes we'll show you video of the president of the united states and some robots. it's true. you never forget your first subaru.

[trumpet playing "reveille" throughout] let's support the small business owners getting our economy booming with the first ever small business saturday. on november 27th, shop small. it's going to be huge. [trumpet playing "reveille" fades to silence] [ man ] save $523. save $345. 16 minutes could save you 16%. come on. isn't it time an auto insurer gave it to you straight? that's why you should talk to state farm. but not yet. first, talk to any one of the 40 million drivers who already have state farm. 40 million. yeah, that's more than geico and progressive combined. by a lot. 40 million drivers, more savings, and discounts up to 40%. where else are you gonna get discounts like that? but first, talk to your neighbors.

chances are, they're one of the 40 million. then call a state farm agent or go online for a free discount double-check. they'll find you discounts you didn't even know you deserved. like discounts for having a safe car. so go ahead. check with your neighbors. then call a state farm agent at 1-800-state-farm or go to discountdoublecheck.com. ♪ we love robots on this show and it seems president obama does, too. check out this video of the president checking out a couple robots this past weekend in japan. he attended the apec summit in yokohama. apec is short for asia pacific economic cooperation. he checked out the humanoid robot called hrp-4-c whose video went viral when the robot sang and danced last month.

the president was also seen riding on some sort of robotic chair that apparently goes really fast. he even got a bit of a surprise when the device wobbled a bit. check it out. you see? the robot chair is a concept car from toyota called i-reel. coming up in just over 60 seconds we'll introduce you to a new humanoid robot that is super strong and super stable.

you know how much we love robots on this show. we have the good fortune particularly when in atlanta to have the folks from georgia tech come over from time to time and introduce us to some of the robots that we've got. there is a humanoid robot they're working on at georgia tech. mike stillman is joining me now

from georgia tech. he is there in the studio. tell me about this, mike. what is this robot all about? >> thank you very much, ali. the robot is called golden crane. it's a humanoid robot developed by georgia tech in collaboration with shunch and the robot has super human ability to think about the world and be able to help humans by thinking about it. >> tell me, give me the back story. how does it understand what people are thinking? >> it doesn't. it understands about its environment and own body so it can take advantage of these skills and be able to use them to help people. >> how would we use him? give me some examples. >> one thing that comes to mind is if you have a search-and-rescue situation, something like what happened in haiti, and it has to interact and go in there and take apart the environment and move rubble out of the way it can actually use its whole body in order to leverage the dynamics of its own

system in order to be able to do this effectively and quickly. >> all right. so the issue here, tell me what the science is in making this robot which by the way looking at it i wouldn't think it's all that stable but it is strong and stable. how does that sort of compare to what we know humanoid robots to be like so far? >> well, typically what we think about with stability is static stability. so something like a bridge or something where the robot is basically standing there and it's actually less stable than you think because if you push on it, it will tip over and fall. whereas with dynamic stability kind of like a segway if you push on it, it'll actually move out of the way and be able to support that push. the same thing happens when you interact with the environment and push on objects. you can use your whole body to interact so it puts your back into it and be able to still maintain the stability of the whole interaction. >> so what's the -- tell me what the big gain is. let's talk about it whether it's a rescue or something. now the robot is not something i

have to be careful of or position a certain way. this is now a real helper. >> yeah, this is a real helper because he can move around fairly freely. he can interact with the world and you don't have to worry so much about, okay. what happens if he gets pushed? what happens? because fundamentally in the end he's just going to move and then adapt to that and come back. >> what, tell me where this is in development. who is likely to use it? >> so at the moment this is in the early stages of development. right now we're testing the things that make the robot think about the world and how it will use its body. later on we're actually going to refine the mechanisms and the brain of the robot in order to actually make it useable both in search-and-rescue scenarios as well as for certain people who want to try this out in their homes. for example to do moving. lift their couch. >> and would it be hard to teach this humanoid robot what to do? >> well, at the moment it's quite difficult to teach any robot what to do but this is precisely what we're working on

in our lab. >> that's why guys like you are around and it isn't left to people like us. >> that's the job. >> just don't teach him how to do my job. >> so basically right now what's going on is we're developing the brain. the idea behind it is that we have some certain things we've developed where the robots can actually think about the world and decide for example let's say you were going to the kitchen and there was a chair in the doorway. currently robots can't actually make the decision to grab that chair and move it out of the way. our robot can. it can actually pick up a chair, move it out of the way, and then be able to get to where it needs to go. so the robot can actually make these decisions for itself and then be able to proceed with whatever task you give it. so these are the kinds of brain activities, the kinds of functions that this robot will be able to do autonomously on its own as it is interacting with the environment. >> i like that. i like it. when that's available let me know because i want to try and

get that to clean up my place. mike stillman, assistant professor georgia tech, a robotics expert, the human oid, part of the humanoid robotics lab at georgia tech and he introduced us to golam. to check out research from the lab in georgia tech head to cnn.com/ali and i will link you where you need to go. sarah palin now answering the question on just about everybody's mind. the answer is ahead. in your cnn political update. i'm a random windstorm. shaky! shaky! and if you named your own price on car insurance,

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answering the question who should get tax cuts tops our latest political news at this hour. paul steinhauser joins me now from washington. hello, paul. get tax cuts? >> reporter: well, ali, let's ask the american people. i have brand new cnn corporation research poll numbers. you mentioned it, tax cuts. 35%, just over 1 in 3 say all americans should continue to get the tax cuts. refresh you remember these bush era tax cuts expire at the end of the year unless congress takes action. 49% say only families making $250,000 or less should get them and 15% say nobody should get it. another issue gays in the military "don't ask, don't tell." 72% say they favor allowing

openly gay people serve in the military. it may come up for a vote in this lame duck session. one last thing. the s.t.a.r.t. treaty with russia. should the senate pass this treaty? that is a big question mark. there's some push-back from republican members of congress. the president said he was going to get it passed. according to poll numbers 73% say the senate should ratify that nuclear treaty with russia. only 30% no. brand new on the cnn political ticker just a few minutes ago and i'll ask our cameraman to zoom in to the cnn political ticker. $115 million was spent on anti-obama campaign ads by the republicans during the midterm cycle. this is a record for a midterm election year. brand new numbers from the campaign analysis group. tinld find it of course on the cnn political ticker. >> you i thought you were going to tell me who you thought should pay for taxes. don't go down that road. >> doesn't matter what i think.

>> cnn of course committed to keeping you informed on all the important political news whether or not there is an election around the corner. the next update is just one hour away. for over a decade jay-z has been a hero for word play. now moving from writing rhymes to righting books. ou billy? what? i didn't buy this cereal to sweet talk your taste buds it's for my heart health. so i can't have any? if you can deprive me of what can help lower my cholesterol... and live with yourself. right. mmm, i worry about your mother. cry herself to sleep every night over my arteries, but have yourself a bowl. good speech dad. [ whimper ] [ male announcer ] honey nut cheerios tastes great and its whole grain oats can help lower cholesterol. bee happy. bee healthy.

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try capzasin-hp. it penetrates deep to block pain signals for hours of relief. capzasin-hp. take the pain out of arthritis. even if you're not into hip-hop, you've likely heard of jay-z. he's into everything. besides music he's a philanthropist and political activist and very big business man. tight with folks like warren buffett. they are shoulder to shoulder on

the cover of september's "forbes." jay-z is not on their richest list yet but with an estimated worth of $450 million i would say he's doing okay growing up in the projects dealing drugs. talks about that in his new book "decod "decoded." poppy harlow got a preview. >> that's about the best title, senior hip-hop correspondent about. >> i think you're really versatile. when i saw that, i had to have you on. >> threw you for a loop? what, what, what is she doing? >> we sat down with jay-z and tried to talk to him for a while. he's talking because he has this new book called "decoded." he breaks down the lyrics of 36 of his songs and what's interesting it tells his story rising from living in the projects to being a multibillion dollars, a huge icon around the world. i asked him why did you write the book right now? 40 years old, why was it the

right time? interestingly, it tied in with president obama. >> i wanted to make the case that rap is poetry for one and some of the decisions that we made to give those decisions context. why these songs are the way they are. why there's this certain gangster rap, why this -- is taking place in america. and it just felt like the perfect time to write it. >> you've said president obama had the courage to tell the press that he had your songs on his ipod. you've been a big supporter of his the entire way through. has he followed through on the hope that he promised? >> i think he has -- he has -- he's on his way to delivering that. but it's impossible for someone to take eight years of our last administration and turn it around in two years. it's very difficult to deliver on everything. i think he's moving in the right direction, yes. >> you spent hours meeting with

him. and you write in the book about that meeting and you say, i wish i could remember one thing. but it was more what president obama represents for you, people you grew up with, black children, black adults across this country. >> yeah. which means all children across this country. that -- us first. because it gives us another face, the hope of maybe i can be president of the united states. it takes for someone to do it for you to believe that you can achieve such lofty goals. >> and you insist rap is poetry and said chuck d. called this. does it have the responsibility to take it one step further? >> yes of course. you can entertain. it's everything. rap is entertaining. it's informative. it's provocative. it's funny. it's silly. it's all of these things. so absolutely. >> what do you learn on the

street? because you talk about being 13 and selling crack. did that teach you something of how to be a successful businessman or how -- >> all the things that you apply in business -- you know, they say that he has great instincts. but on the streets having great instincts can be the difference between life and death, not just losing a deal. >> he did follow that up with saying, look, i don't condone life on the street but that was my reality. selling drugs at 13 years old was my reality. and he learned instinct that you follow your gut to be a good businessman. >> did you ask him the obvious question about beyonce, his wife. >> no. >> you didn't have to ask his name because you know he wasn't baptized jay-z. >> sean carter. >> from brooklyn, 40 years old. remarkably successful. married to beyonce. what's your sense of him because you're in an interview largely

dominated by people in the entertainment industry. as a business reporter what was your sense of him as a businessman? clearly very successful? >> he's very successful. he owns his own clothing line. he made a $150 million deal with live nation to own his own record company and touring company. that's paid off very handsomely for him. what's interesting is he ties himself to big corporations -- coca-cola, budweiser and hp but he doesn't lend his name out. he's very involved in the creative process. i asked him why is that so important to you? he said it's my life. it's my name. i built this brand. >> in the book does he draw a line between his drug dealing and success in business? >> absolutely. because it's there on the street. and he said this later in the interview he learned how important trust was. you look the person in the eye and do whatever the deal is and trust them. he doesn't condone what he did but even president obama met with him. for hours he met. >> he's highly influential, no

question. >> he's very rich but guess what he said his most valuable possession is still his words, his lyrics. his mother bought him a three-ring binder and he hid it under his bed because he was afraid people would steal it. i said is that still your most valuable possession? he said absolutely. without that, he thinks he would have been incarcerated just like his friend was that it was in the same position as he was. >> interesting. great interview. you're going to be on the gm stuff tomorrow. the ipo comes out. i'm ali velshi with you the next hour. baltimore battered by storms. roofs ripped off homes. thousands of people left without power. plus, we're headed to the l.a. auto show for a look at the hottest new cars on the planet. it's a good year for cars. a lot out there. we'll catch one a veteran chef on a rare mission to grill thousands of steaks for u.s. troops. it's a smokin' hot mission.

americans prepare for the busiest air travel time of the year. the folks in charge of keeping fliers safe are defending procedures against a noisy and in dig nanltd backlash. everybody wants to be safe but it's clear we all have private boundaries for scanning, screening and touching or being touched. you've seen this viral video from san diego. it's a pat-down that quickly became a standoff. >> also we're going to be doing a groin check. that means i'm going to place high hand our your hip and slowly go up and down two times in the front and two times in the back. and if you'd like a private screening we can make that available for you also. >> we can do that out here but if you touch my junk i'm going to have you arrested. >> actually, we are going to have a supervisor here because of your statement. >> now, that would be passenger walked out on the search.

for that he faces a possible $11,000 fine. i asked about that because the signs say if you don't want a search you can leave. we're now hearing it's not after the search has begun. most fliers skip or are spared the hands-on approach in favor of the machines. if you fly out of any of these airports you could go through advanced imagery that raises its own concerns, privacy and not to mention health kernels. already lawsuits against homeland security and the tsa. then there is this opt-out campaign urging folks to protest so-called virtual strip searches by not flying at all over thanksgiving or insisting on the pat-downs because they take longer and could tie up lines. some people saying if takes place not in private as you're entitled to but in public so others can see how intrusive it is. through it all most of us claim to be fine with body scans. 81% of american believe airports

should use state-of-the-art technology. only 15% disagree. most of this debate is not around that state-of-the-art technology. some of it's about the pat-downs, how these tsa screeners have to touch you to find out. and just for context, remember that christmas day bomber, the attempted bombing on the plane that landed in detroit, the alleged bomber had the explosive in his groin. now, for the second day in a row, the head of the transportation security administration is facing lawmakers who seem genuinely sympathetic to his position which you could describe as damned if you do and damned if you don't. our homeland correspondent jeanne meserve tells us more. >> reporter: in front of the congress for the second day in a row and for the second day asked are you asking me if i'm going to change my policy? no, i am not. several members expressed discomfort with the current screening procedures. here's a sample.

>> i'm frankly bothered by the level of these pat-downs. i've seen them firsthand in airports in florida. i wouldn't want my wife to be touched in the way that these folks are being touched. i wouldn't want to be touched that way. i also understand you it would like to do everything to keep american people safe but there are limits. there has to be a balance here. what can we do to right this balance? i think we've gone too far afield. >> we know there are additional things that we could be doing to detect things. and we know based on pat-downs and ait, we have detected dozens and dozens say artfully concealed objects that could pose a risk to aviation. so for me, it comes down to that balance, as you say, and the fact that everybody wants to be secure on that flight knowing that you've been screened, i've been screened. everybody has been screened properly and we have a high level of confidence. >> reporter: pistole noted there have been a number of reports

that said that the old pat-down procedure wasn't good enough. it wasn't finding concealed threat objects. that's why they made this change. he did say, by the way, that he, secretary napolitano and other top officials within the department of homeland security had undergone this pat-down. yes, he said it's invasive but he argued it's necessary to keep aviation safe. >> did they comment on this movement to get people to either avoid flying on thanksgiving day or slow it down by demanding pat-downs as opposed to the advanced security measures? >> reporter: what pistole and others underline is we need the public's cooperation. we are trying to keep you safe when you fly. please cooperate with us. do what we ask you to do. nobody really knows how big this opt-out movement is. the organizers say the numbers are growing. there certainly has been a lot of traffic on the internet indicating is a lot of people are unhappy with procedures. but how many will act on that and choose not to fly or opt out

of those machines, we aren't going to have a sense of that until next wednesday, which is a very busy travel day and the day they're calling for an opt-out. >> i would interested to see how many who have legitimate concerns are more interested getting to their destination than making a point. jeanne meserve, we'll stay on this story. new kernels over cargo have prompted new precautions and could spell a quick end to passenger wi-fi on airliners. doesn't make me happy but some fear airborne wi-fi could help terrorists detonate bombs. my next guest an expert that have almost took the reins of the tsa. he's now associate director of the national center for risk and economic analysis of terrorism events. he's an adjunct professor of homeland security and public policy at usc and joins me from los angeles. i guess it doesn't take a lot of forethought to imagine that now if you've got passengers on a

plane who are connected to the internet, there is a whole new world open to them if they are people who want to do harm. >> that's true, ali. and wi-fi is certainly another option. unfortunately for every convenience and amenity afforded to travelers, there's going to be someone out there that will try to exploit it, whether they're trying to have that connectivity for free or obtain that connectivity for some nefarious purpose. so it does present a concern but certainly this is nothing new as a vulnerability. i know it's being studied. it was voiced as a concern by the department of homeland security, fbi and it's been around five years and being looked at. it is taken seriously but i don't think we should overreact. >> clearly this couldn't have happened, they couldn't have authorized wi-fi on planes and a growing number of planes without some good discussion about this. so clearly smart people have

talked about this and said we think the benefit outweighs the risk. then we had this recent bombing attempt with these bombs that came out of yemen and there's some discussion they might have had cell phone components that could have been detonated remotely in some way. does that up the ante on this discussion sf. >> you're actually very correct. there was a due diligence here. they have looked at this. we're in the risk management business when it comes to counterterrorism. american people have to understand there's no way to completely eliminate the risk. although it's probably one of the safest transportations in the world. as we move forward, what's important here sno the device or how a bomb could be detonated but the human factor. we have to get better at find sth bomber instead of the bomb. people should be able to get on board and not have that concern. when we get a person to the airport there are certain things you can control. you can control the knowledge of what's going to happen to you at

the airport and how better to get through that process and not be concerned with somebody being on board with a bomb. be part of the system and solution. >> if you want to talk about controlling the human element, doesn't it lend itself more to greater human action between tsa screeners and you the passenger versus less depending more on technology? >> actually, ali, i think it lends itself to greater diligence and efforts by the intelligence community. we want to find the people that might be prone to disrupt the system, attack the system, people plotting and planning on building bombs. we don't want to finds a device at the x-ray machine at the airport. we want to find people and thwart plots before they even get to this location. the onus really comes on the intelligence community in collecting raw intelligence, analyzing it. as the new initiative see something safe rolls out, the

american public must be part of the system in helping us thwart these plots. >> good to talk to you again. thanks very much for being with us and so clearly explaining the importance of the new security techniques that we're seeing put into place. ore y errol southers. we're faking you have live to the auto show. i'm a car guy. it's a good year for cars. [ male announcer ] gout's root cause is high uric acid.

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some experts say electric cars will make up 10% of cars by 2020. some of the hottest electric and hybrid cars of the future on display today at the l.a. auto show. joining us from los angeles is ted row laenltdz. i have to say the auto shows have gone through a few years where things weren't exciting and attendance down. people weren't buying the cars so they weren't making them the same way. it seems like the excitement is back. >> reporter: two years ago here it was like a morgue. excitement is back and a lot of the attention on the hybrids, the different types of alternative energy vehicles. the volt from chevy getting a lot of attention as you can imagine. they're rolling that off the production line in the coming weeks and starting to deliver it. chevy has a lot riding on the volt. 25 to 60 miles on a charge.

gas generator kicks in from there afterwards. $40,000 the sticker price. but it's not just chevy and the low end cars getting into it and manufacturers. check this out. this was just unveiled 45 minutes ago by mercedes. the "v" class f-cell. basically this is a hydrogen fuel cell but it's unbelievable some of the concept cars out there, ali. check this one out. this one also unveiled here at the auto show in los angeles by jaguar. it's the cx-75. you know concept cars sometimes they make it to production, sometimes they don't. this is a doozy. it's basically powered by microturbines. they have two -- the turbines power two generators. top speeds of this jaguar if it actually comes to fruition, 205 miles per hour. we're going to talk right now to steve cannon from mercedes-benz. we're going to do the interview in the back of pretty much one

of the most luxurious luxury cars out there. >> like a studio there. >> reporter: unbelievable studio indeed. first quickly talk about fuel cells and the idea that each company has sort of a vision for the future but we haven't ironed it out yet as a country. >> so you can see we're sitting in an ultra luxury sedan and talking about zero emission. that shows you the breadth and depth of mercedes-benz is all about. small series production we'll start with this year and go into it next year. powered by hydrogen but has zero emissions. the beauty is you have the range that you have can't get with a pure electric and recharge capability. you refill the hydrogen tanks -- >> reporter: which you also need infrastructure to do which is some in southern california. fuel efficiency going in many directions. it's going to be irnldz out.

quickly tell me about this doozy. >> this is the fastest ultra luxury sedan on the planet. this is literally a private jet on feels. it comes in two versions 62 and 57. as you see it has fully reclining seats. kind of every amenity that a driver -- in most cases they would be driven in this car. >> i would hope so. >> it's for a chauffeur. you have as much privacy as you want and as much luxury and amenities as you want. for example -- >> reporter: i'm getting the wrap because we have to pay some bills so that ali can afford one of these one day. 500 grand, ali, if you want one of these babies for somebody to drive you to work. >> you're right, i would like to hear more. but if i'm going to get pad we have to take a commercial break. enjoy yourself. auto shows are possibly one of the best assignments we reporters ever get. ted rowlands at the l.a. show. deep thinkers and they know

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okay. breaking news. susan kandz yoty has been following the latest on a russian arms dealer extradited to the united states in u.s. custody, brought before a court. asked to enter a plea. >> not guilty. it's to no one's surprise of course and entered on his behalf by a lawyer that had been appointed for him by the u.s. government. >> do you know this guy's name. victor boot? >> he's been around for years and years. if you follow these things called the merchant of death. accused of being an international arms dealer and in

this case to sell arms that he thought would be used to bring down u.s. helicopters and kill u.s. civilians working in colombia against the farc rebels there. what's interesting about the hearing it only lasted ten minutes but it was interaction between him and the judge. he stood up, used a translator even though he speaks six languages. the judge asked him -- she said it looks like you didn't provide me much information. are you employed? he just wrote -- he's been in custody since 2008. true, in thailand. any assets? he says, not in the u.s. cash, no. income no. obviously we'll be finding out more in the days and weeks and months to come. >> he has a lawyer, though? >> assigned to him a federal public defender. >> russia wants him back? >> yes, they do. >> russia doesn't think it's a fair extradition. >> looks like he'll stand trial no matter what russia says.

>> thanks so much. victor boot has claimed he's not guilty of the charges brought against him. when you think about smart animals lemurings ms may not be first that come to mind. but scientists are learning a lot from them. >> reporter: the first thing you notice about lemurs are their eyes. they are big and wide and full of curiosity. there you go. you are just the sweetest little thing. what are you thinking? that's what we're here to find out. what's going on in that little brain of yours, huh? that's what scientists at duke university lemur center are trying to figure out. and so far they are pretty impressed. they say urlemurs are deep thinkers. here at duke they have the largest captive collection of lemurs in the world. they have received a lot less attention than apes and monkeys when it comes to researching how they think but the folks here are looking into how lemurs

think because they believe they can offer insight into how our primate ancestors actually thought about 75 million years ago. isn't that right? duke university professor elizabeth brannon heads up the lemur research here. >> hey, pedro. thanks for helping out today. >> reporter: she says lemurs are so sophisticated when it comes to numbers, they rival monkeys. and like human babies, lemurs understand numbers without actually understanding language. we got to see for ourselves how smart they are. my jaw dropped as i watched these primates from madagascar take tests on a computer. this lemur has learned to recognize which square has more red dot s. he uses his nose. and if he picks the right one, which he mostly does, a sugar pellet drops down. they love sweets. >> we're asking can the lemur learn an abstract rule about numbers? can the lemur learn that he

always has a choose the smaller number or the larger number and apply this to pictures that he's had no training on. >> in this next test, the lemur has to work from memory. before the computer test the lemur was shown seven pictures but he never saw all the pictures together. scientists want to know if he can remember which pictures came first in the sequence when he's shown just two on the computer screen in no particular order. can lemurs think abstractly and infer things they haven't been taught directly? >> we're teaching him that one picture comes before picture "b" and "b" comes before "c" and we want to know whether he can figure out the relationship between "a" and "c." >> reporter: professor brannon says this lemur successfully memorized the relationship between the pictures and still refreshed it for this test even though he hadn't seen the pictures in the last two years. >> for a long time it was

thought lemurs weren't capable of doing a lot of things that other primates were and the cognitive domain. in some ways this is surprising. >> reporter: what else surprised professor brannon? that lemurs like humans avoid risk. >> we found out they don't like to gamble. >> reporter: because in this test they're told if they photograph the picture of the train they could get a bunch or possibly no pellets at all but if they choose the safe option, the flag photo, they always get one pellet. brannon says lemurs are smart enough to make an association between the photograph and the outcome. there are exceptions. but even when the risky choice will sometimes deliver more treats, most lemurs prefer the safer option, the photo that guarantees them one treat. >> even if we give them six,

seven or eight pellets in the jackpot, they still prefer a single pellet even though the average payoff is much greater in the risky side. >> reporter: why does any of this matter? professor brannon says it can help us figure out how our thinking is involved. >> what are the building blocks upon which human culture and system knowledge are built? and by studying these thought processes in lemurs and monkeys and apes and other animals, we can begin to shed insight into that kind of question. >> reporter: and while professor brannon doesn't expect lemurs to be learning calculus any time soon, she does believe we've only scratched the surface of their amazing intelligence. randi kaye, durham, north carolina. >> all right. can't get enough of those little things. if you want to see more of the amazing animals tune in at 10:00

tonight eastern. some without power and some without roofs after severe storms pounds the atlantic. [ female announcer ] in the grip of arthritis, back, or back joint pain?

aspercreme breaks the grip, with maximum-strength medicine and no embarrassing odor. break the grip of pain with aspercreme. okay. democrats in the house just had a vote about who they're choosing as house leader. right to dana bash for the results. dana. >> reporter: it is nancy pelosi. she will be the house minority leader in the new congress. the vote, ali, was 150-43. nancy pelosi getting 150 and the person who ran against her getting 43. that certainly is a big victory but it does show about a quarter of the democratic caucus voted for someone other than nancy pelosi. made it clear they don't believe she's the one to lead them into

the next congress. given the amount of power she wielded just a couple of months ago, that would not have happened. very much an indicator of the fact this caucus is still split on whether this is the right way to go. >> dana bash with the news that nancy pelosi will be the minority leader in the house. big storms, chad myers in atlanta at our severe weather center pup didn't give me the warning about this and i was on a plane last night from atlanta to new york. and everything started getting canceled and delayed as we were going up there. we sort of flew through it and it was rocky around the washington, baltimore area is where it started to get a little bit rocky. >> and it did. all night long it stayed rocky. let's go here and pick up the pace. this storm moved by the city into philadelphia, washington, d.c. in the overnight hours big storms in baltimore though. here are pictures of what happened in the overnight hours midnight to 1:00 a.m. especially in the northeastern part of the baltimore city. thousands now, about 10,000

people still without power. weather service out there looking to soo whether this was a potential tornado. the damage very small, only blocks wide this severe, but there was damage all throughout the city because the winds were gusting to 50 miles per hour all the way through the night. so we don't know yet what that's going to be but i bet by tomorrow afternoon we will know. there's the storm system running out to the ocean. the winds are still gusty right now. if you're flying this afternoon, airports are slow. planes are canceled because they can't get as many planes in the air and on the ground as they like just because the winds have to separate them a bit. you never want planes bumping into each other. >> i'm going to have to remember to tell you when i'm traveling midweek. when i travel midweek i never get the report from you. i better get into the habit to do that. good to see you. it was an overwhelming smell that led police to a temple in

thailand. what they found was shocking.

time for "globetrekking." bangkok, thailand. a disturbing discovery at a buddhist temple. police were called because neighbors complained of an overwhelming smell. hidden in the temples were the remains of more than 300 few han fetuses. police say they came from illegal abortion clinics. the remains were wrapped in plastic bags and newspaper and placed in a mortuary storage area. six morticians have been detained for questioning. abortion is illegal in thailand except when the pregnancy endangers the life of a mother or the result of rape. going now to haiti.

the u.n. is making an urgent appeal for calm. warnings that riots triggered by the cholera outbreak are seriously hampering international relief efforts. riders placed burning barricades in a northern city. the only way they could get into town was to ride on the back of the motorcycle. the u.n. says all aid flights are canceled and water purification and training projects have been cut back. demonstrators looted and burned a world food program warehouse destroying 500 tons of food aid. u.n. says one was killed by a peacekeeper acting in self defense. many blame peacekeepers from nepal for the cholera outbreak. u.n. says they were tested and the results negative. so far cholera has killed 1100 and spread to the neighboring dominican republic. just a short time ago florida health officials announced a woman who recently returned to florida from haiti has been diagnosed with cholera.

we'll keep you updated with more information as it becomes available. next up on "mission possible" we'll talk to a chef feeding troops around the world in style. after i got the job at walmart, things started changing immediately. then i wrote a letter to the food stamp office. "thank you very much, i don't need your help any more." you know now, i can actually say i bought my home. i knew that the more i dedicated... the harder i worked, the more it was going to benefit my family. this my son, mario and he now works at walmart. i believe mario is following in my footsteps. my name is noemi, and i work at walmart. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] at&t and blackberry have teamed up

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the pentagon says it's planning to serve up 244,000 pounds of turkey for troops overseas this thanksgiving. today we're going to talk about steak. joining us for today's "mission possible," someone doing his part to feed the forces by firing up the grill. harvey goff is in san antonio, the founder of steak team mission. harvey, welcome to the show. >> hello, how are you? >> excellent. that is quite a hat you've got

on there. tell me about steak team mission. >> well, back here after 9/11, a friend of mine named franks, i asked to go serve steaks in afghanistan and we had a little conversation about that. i can't tell you exactly what he said. he finally said okay and that started our career of serving steaks to soldiers in far away, dirty, nasty, smelly, ugly places. and that's what we've been doing ever since 2002. and we've been on about ten missions. i think this is 11 today. >> and who pays for this? where do you get the money for this? >> we get donations from our teammates. we get a few small donations from suppliers. but typically it comes out of our pocket. >> let's talk about what it means to you to be serving these troops. tell me why this is so important to you. >> well, what i say is freedom is not free and somebody's got to pay.

it's our way of paying back a little bit and to show our gratitude for the soldiers, airmen, sailors, et cetera out there in the dirty, smelly ugly places. we don't go where the uso goes, a bunch of danners and things. we feed soldier where nobody else likes to do. that's our specialty. >> what is the reception you get from the folks you go out and feed? >> typically where we go to these dirty places is the dining facilities feed pretty good food. the army food is pretty good. usually what we see in the eyes of the soldiers that we serve is you mean that you -- can't say the word -- came all the way over here to serve us a steak? that's what you get from the soldiers. the navy is a little different. they enjoy our food more than they enjoyed seeing us on the ship. >> and you are planning to expand this program? >> well, expand is not really a

good word. we plan to do it again a time or two depending where it is and what the timing is and so on, so forth. >> well, it is excellent work, harvey. thanks very much for joining us to tell us about it. harvey gough the founder of steak team mission joining me from san antonio. to learn more and how you can help head to my blog cnn.com/ali. i will link you to where you need to go to know more about steak team mission. from steak, the logical place to go is the stakeout. there he is live and in person. i have not seen him for so long. and i think he's got a slurpee with him. the president is going to have to wait for a while to get his slurpee. ed is getting ahead the game as he always is. [ commentator ] lindsey vonn! she stays tough!

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i mean, it is unbelievable. it's "the stakeout" with ed henry and he is in person. he's live. i don't think the two of us have talked live in person or on camera in quite a while. and he is there celebrating with a slurpee because there was supposed to be a slurpee submit at the white house. thank you for all your traveling waking up early in your hotel room in south korea and telling us how things go on behind the scene. what's going on -- >> reporter: it's 4:00 a.m. i don't want to play a violin but it was 4:00 a.m. >> yeah, it was 4:00 in the morning and you were in your cnn snuggie. what's going on with the slurpee? >> reporter: by the way there's an ultimate fighting guy, i think randy kutcher commemorative cup. that's about all i have from the official slurpee summit here because it didn't happen. it's supposed to happen tomorrow but it's been pushed back.

you remember right after the election the president said he was going to invite republicans over for a summit and jokingly became the slurpee summit because during the campaign the president kept saying he was working on the economy and the republicans were on the side of the road with a slurpee. bottom line, the president scheduled it for tomorrow. republicans say they never agreed to that date. they're busy. they have freshmen orientation and class photos, whatever is going on up on the hill to get ready for the new congress. meanwhile there's a lame duck session going on. they have rescheduled this for after thanksgiving. you have to wonder how the president deep down feels about this when he sort of called this summit and the republicans are saying basically they have to get their done right now. they have got every other thing going on -- >> we've been reporting it was a scheduling problem. i don't know what to think about that but as a regular person i

think if my boss needs something to happen and i had something else scheduled, i'd reschedule it. i understand the president isn't the boss of congress but it does seem kind of the priority. >> reporter: he's not the boss for them and maybe the republicans are trying to flex their muscles a little bit and say we're going to work on our own terms. robert gibbs put the best face on it and said it those there's bipartisan because the president picked a day, the republicans said it doesn't work. rather than throwing a fit the white house says fine, we'll reschedule it. but if you have to say basically because they agreed on a date for a meeting that's bipartisanship, it suggests right now that the president is trying to bring both sides together and maybe the republicans don't want to come along. we'll see. >> the high hopes here always with a new congress is that somebody gets a message and the people want the people's business done. an inauspicious start or not

read anything into it. >> reporter: i think that was robert gibbs' point. we have time here. lame duck and this week is gone because of thanksgiving so not a lot will get done anyway but the bush tax cuts are expiring at the end of the year. so they hope to get a compromise deal on that. looks like things are headed towards at least a short or long term extension of the middle class tax cuts and at least short term on the tax by the rich. talking about the economy and what not, 7-eleven is trying to make a buck off the summit. that hasn't happened yet. they're on this unity tour around the country. they have this flavor purple to the people flavor where they mix red and blue and it becomes purple because of the red states republican and blue states democrat. >> slurpees for the people. that's a good economy. that's capitalism for you. ed, good to have you back in the mix. i think we will spend some good time together over the course of the next few weeks.

ed henry on "the stakeout" with a slurpee. sometime for your cnn political update. bad news for anyone planning to run as an independent. cnn political analyst gloria borger joins me from washington with that news. >> reporter: can i get a slurpee? >> seriously. >> reporter: it's not fair. we don't get to get them. ed done does. let's talk about the presidential race because of course we just got through the midterm elections and what's left for us political junkies than talk about 2012. there is something getting a lot of buzz which is chatter that new york mayor michael bloomberg has been talking to talk show host joe scarborough on a third-party ticket. that sounds kinds of tantalizing except for a couple of things. one is that michael bloomberg has been onididid think thi i

inssib andan also this morning -- >> "starar trek" transmission thing happening with gloria. it's like you've been transported to another planet but you are back. >> reporter: have i? where did i leave off? >> i mean, it's one of those things could have been aliens just invaded your body. >> reporter: it's kind of like talking on a cell phone and you continue talking after the call has been dropped but you're not sure how long you have been -- >> it was only about five seconds so i think we're okay. >> reporter: let's just say bloomberg and scarborough not likely to happen but there are candidates who are obviously getting into the race. let's talk about this. a close adviser to newt gingrich came out and said he would be surprised if his former boss were not running. rick santorum is courting the vote in new hampshire. remember him. he's a former republican

senator. then of course, there's the candidate that everybody loves to talk about, and that is sarah palin. will it be sarah palin's washington? not so sure but she did give an interview that will be published this weekend in "the new york times" in which she says, quote, that she is engaged in the internal deliberations candidly about the possibility of running for the presidency, that she's beefing up her staff and that she's got to do more than just tweet about policy, which is probably -- >> this has been the interesting thing. she's the most anticipated candidate quite possibly in the history of candidates. what is the path for her to becoming president? >> reporter: as you know, she's quite polarizing. but when you're talking about that republican primary audience, which is what she appeals to, take a look at l some of the early states like iowa, which has a really large evangelical vote early on.

new hampshire she might play second. nevada she could do well. south carolina she could do well. so there is a path for her to the presidency. but getting back to our original topic, third party, if sarah palin is doing well and should get the republican nomination, let's just say, then that could mean that lots of republicans would form their own third party. i don't know. could happen. >> interesting. you have said things in the past that have come to pass. so i always hang on whatever it is you say. now i think you're kind of half an alien because of that thing that just happened. >> reporter: i am. but the other half is good. >> but you are our friend. great to see you always. our senior political analyst gloria borger. cnn is committed to keeping you informed. the next update one hour away. if you're looking for a used car hold on to your wallet. we'll find out what is driving prices so high. ♪

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♪ oh, worry, worry worry, worry ♪ [ announcer ] when it comes to things you care about, leave nothing to chance. travelers. take the scary out of life. taking the lead now. used car prices are at a record high. the average price $18,570 for a used car! why? simple. supply and demand. more people want used cars these days because the economy is so bad. there are also fewer cars out there. car companies have been making fewer cars because of the bad economy so there aren't as many cars out there for sell. in the past year 16 million or

17 million used cars were sold each year and now it's looking more like 12 million. last year's cash for clunkers program cut the supply of used car even more. is it worth it to buy a new car? manufacturers are cutting back on new car discounts so the cost of a new car is going up. interest rates are low and cars still pretty affordable but those recession deals for the past few years are not as good these days. that's today's taking the lead. but it does strike me that there was a question on there. i hope you got all that information and are welcome to submit answers to twitter or facebook to me. let's hear it for inflation, sort of. if you don't believe there's a downside to falling prices listen to my "xyz" when we come back. ordinary rubs don't always work on my arthritis.

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time now for the "xyz" of it. let's talk prices. new inflation numbers came out in what economists call the consumer price index. cpi increased only 1.2% over the year ending last october. but that figure includes volatile energy and food prices so let me draw your attention to what economists call core inflation, which tracks the cost of a basket of consumer goods without food and energy. the increase was much lower. 0.6%. that is the lowist year over year increase since 1957. in fact core inflation has rarely risen above zero for the last three months. why am i talking about this? because many economists fear prices could fall in the future. as enticing as that sounds, falling price s. are not a good thing. here's why. when prices fall demand for goods decrease. why would you go out and pay $500 to buy a new sofa when the

same couch could go down later? you're going to sit and wait forthright price. when that sentiment spreads around, it forces businesses to cut back on production/wages for workers, lay people off again. that downward spiral is what economists call deflation. it's no joke. japan suffered a so-called lost decade during the 1990s because of deflation. it created a downward spiral in japan's market and economy and hurt growth for years. the u.s. federal reserve taking no chances announced plans to inject between $6 and $9 billion into the economy. some complain it could fuel inflation. but ben bernanke and his group are betting that america will ultimately be better off with prices going up slightly instead of spiraling downward uncontrollably. we all like lower prices. but prices falling too fast is actually something that can hurt us all and hurt our economy. it's something to think about when you're thinking about infl