average nationwide. good news for drivers but bad news for economy. big drop like this in oil prices signal that investors think the economic slowdown is paiding up. >> double edge sword. low gas prices or major problem coming? friend. carter evans. that's it for us on "wake-up call." "american morning" starts right now. >> good morning, ali. stocks dive after the downgrade. i'm christine romans. wall street records its worst day since the depths of the financial crisis in 2008. overseas investors are selling at a staggering pace. what should you do with your money right now this morning? we're live across the globe with the news you need to know. >> and good morning to you. i'm carol costello. it started in london and street violence and looting has spread to three other cities in britain. we're live in london on the growing unrest. i'm ali velshi. a big weekend ahead for rick per

perry. planning stops in two primary states. could he be ready to announce he's running for president? we'll find out on this "american morning." all right. good morning, everybody. it's tuesday, august 9th. this is "american morning." the morning after the big 6.66% slide for the dow. >> unbelievable. >> it felt horrible. >> like deja vu all over again from yesterday. the world's stock markets are clearly in something of a tailspin in europe and asia the selling that started last week just keeps on going. it follows the worst day on wall street in more than two years. just take a look. the dow reacting for the first time to america's credit downgrade was down at the opening bell and never looked back. even as president obama went on television to try to reassure americans the markets still dropped. down 635 points by the time the closing bell rang. $1 trillion in wealth wiped out. hitting your average american

where it hurts most, stock portfolios and 401(k)s. reporters across the globe to take a look at what's happening the morning after. andrew stevens is live in hong dong but nina dos santos, good morning. looked as though european stocks were higher and then they were lower. the volatility continues. what's happening now? >> yeah. they're definitely down at the moment, christine, down to the tune of about 4% if you look at the day which had been the best performer between the ftse, the cac, the dax had been the stronger perform down 8% from the year just last week, but it's the one suffering today. ftse 100 down about 2.5%, similar situation for the cac 40 in france. just saying, christine, it's been a choppy morning. some of the stock markets after opening in the negative, pushed higher to the tune of about $1.24% but quickly shed those gains. we've been about ten minutes i

saw the chart shift into the red and the arrows go sharply lower. a number of the banks very much suffering, particularly in places like france because as the ecb is now into its second day of buying italian and spanish debt to bring the yields or the borrowing costs down for those two countries seems as though france and the united kingdom are the next two countries people are getting worried about. the head of jp morgan's fixed income department, someone who's positioned to comment about this thing is reported to have said that he wouldn't be surprised if france and also the united kingdom were also lower like the united states losing their aaa coveted credit rating and down towards aa-or aa plus. as you expect is gold, surpassing $1,750 an ounce. i was talking to a hedge fund manager yesterday and he said that's all he's buying at the moment. >> thank you so much, nina. >> live to hong kong now where the hang seng closed down by more than 5%. andrew stevens standing by live

in hong kong. what a roller coaster asian markets were overnight, andrew. what's the scene from your perspective? >> it was interesting what happened here today. for the first time, ali, we've seen governments through their state-owned pension funds, things like that, stepping into the markets to try to buy, to shore up their market. we saw it in soek. the kospi in south korea was down around 9% at one stage. this is a huge fall. the governments are now starting to take some action to try to stem the losses there, but it does give sellers -- some buyers out there, may not have much of a long-term impact. basically everybody is waiting to see what happens in the u.s. is there going to be any form of moves from the federal reserve to try to stop this, stop this slow down, restore confidence, to have a plan. there's a lack of a plan at the moment. ali, it's interesting, i was talking to a couple people today, there's a consensus building we could have another 10% fall before we start seeing

things clearing out here. so it's still very much on the downside. we saw asia pretty much tumbling across the board. australia did finish up, but we can't say that's going to last very long. japan down 1.6%. hong kong 5.6%. all the arrows are still very much red. >> andrew, thanks very much for that. we'll keep checking in with you. andrew in hong kong for us. british prime minister david cameron speaking outside his office at 10 downing street in london. let's listen in. >> people looting, vandalizing, thieving, robbing, scenes of people attacking police officers and even attacking fire crews as they're trying to put out fires. this is criminality, pure and simple, and it has to be confronted and defeated. i feel huge sympathy for the families who have suffered innocent people who have been burned out of their houses, and

to businesses who's seen their premise smashed, products looted and livelihoods potentially ruined. i also feel for all those who live in fear because of these appalling scenes that we've seen on the streets of our country. people should be in no doubt that we are on the side of the law abiding people who are appalled by what has happened in their own communities. as ever, police officers have shown incredible bravery on our streets in confronting these thugs. but it's quite clear, that we need more, much more police, on our streets and we need even more owe bust police action and it's that i've been discussing in cobra this morning. the metropolitan police commissioner said compared with the 6,000 police on the streets last night in london, there will be some 16,000 officers tonight.

all within the metropolitan police has been canceled. there will be aid coming from police forces up and down the country and we will do everything necessary to strengthen and assist those police forces that are meeting this disorder. there's already been 450 people arrested. we will make sure that court procedures and processes are speeded up and people should expect to see more, many more, arrests in the days to come. i am determined, the government is determined, that justice will be done and these people will see the consequences of their actions. i have this very clear message to those people who are responsible for this wrongdoing and criminality. you will feel the full force of the law and if you are old enough to commit these crimes, you are old enough to face the punishment. and to these people i would say

this -- you are not only wrecking the lives of others, you're not only wrecking your own communities, you are potentially wrecking your own life too. my office this morning has spoken to the speaker of the house of commons and he has agreed that parliament will be recalled for a day on thursday so i can make a statement to parliament and we can hold a debate and we are all able to stand together in condemnation of these crimes and also to stand together in determination to rebuild these communities. now if you'll excuse me, there is important work to be done. thank you. >> [ inaudible ]. >> u.k. prime minister david cameron wrapping up quick comments he and a couple ministers on their august vacation, not in the country, they came back on the third night after the third night, i guess overnight was the third night of rioting, looting, these demonstrations, and they really are having a problem getting a

handle on what's behind this and who's behind this. >> started with the police shooting but there's this undercurrent. >> it's more about the high unemployment rate, the deep cuts in government spending, that's why there are no jobs out there. one rioter, so to speak, was quoted in this article as saying, hey, i don't have any money, i don't have a job, why don't i partake, break into a store front and steal some stuff. >> this is something that economists and social scientists worry about when you get 10% unemployment and something studied many times you get social cohesion melts away when you have so many people out of work or -- so it's something that -- to watch. >> some sense that why follow the rules because the rules haven't helped me. >> that's right. >> we don't know. look, there's always in riots like this there's some element of hughley begans and some element, if we figure out how to address that. with the fears that nation

is slipping into another recession here, all eyes will be on the federal reserve today. it meets this afternoon and investors will be paying close attention to see if the fed says anything about the economy, whether the nation needs to adapt some kind of a new stimulus program, new kind of measures by the fed. what could they do or say to help? we'll be watching that. >> yeah. we really want them to say something. as we mentioned earlier, president obama tried to calm financial fears following the nation's credit rating downgrade. he said the drop from aaa to aa+ reflects the political gridlock, not america's tu credit worthiness. >> markets will rise and fall, but this is the united states of america. no matter what some agency may say, we've always been and always will be a aaa country. >> the president said he'll be presenting his own ideas on how to fix the economy in the coming weeks. after downgrading america's

credit standard & poor's announced giants fannie mae and freddie mac as well. a move that could increase the cost of buying a new home and could damage the fragile housing market. >> like they need anything else to damage it. over the next several days standard & poor's will downgrade hundreds of municipalities rated aaa because their debt is backed by the u.s. government. the agency must lower the agencies of the municipal bond issuers. one expert telling cnn money no need to panic, adding the default risk has not increased. better for investors to wait and not do much of anything on this. don't just do something. stand there. >> no kidding. in less than 20 minutes a check of how the u.s. markets may open and then at 7:30 eastern, we'll talk to jim awad, manager director of zephyr management about whether anything could stop this sell-off and what you should do with your money. talk back on one of the big stories of the day. are republican women unfairly criticized because they're

women? a double standard when it comes to criticizing politicians who are female. republican and tea party favorite michele bachmann, who has had a few missteps with historical facts says yes, she makes mistakes, but she unlike liberal politicians, doesn't get a pass from the media. bachmann told david brodie it's something she, sarah palin and other conservative women just have to deal with. >> she has been unfairly criticized and i think that we've seen that with other conservative women as well across the country, whether they are political commentators or whether they're in public service. >> this morning, conservatives are fuming over the latest "newsweek" cover that shows a startled looking bachmann with the title "queen of rage" one blogger saying can anyone say with a straight face that the mainstream media is not biased against conservatives. bachmann's critic haven't been

measured. ed schulz called her a psycho talker. remember this from jay leno. he holds nothing back when it comes to the so-called mama grizzlies. >> republican congresswoman michele bachmann now under fire for claiming the founding fathers eliminated slavery. well, and sarah palin, she is upset. sure, another female republican out there, trying to steal the dumb vote. oh! >> politics is rough for both women and men. just how rough, though, may depend on your gender. so the talk back question today, are republican women unfairly criticized because they're women? facebook.com/americanmorning. facebook.com/americanmorning. we'll read your comments later this hour. >> that should take my mind off all the discussion about the stock market. bring it on, i want to hear. >> coming up ahead on "american morning," more on the growing unrest we were talking about in britain. there have been more riots in london, fires, it's now spreading to other major cities.

prime minister david cameron has addressed the media. we're going back to london for some interpretation of that just ahead. the town turns off the water when the people need its most. people hot and really bothered by the move. it's 13 minutes after the hour. [ female announcer ] what if your natural beauty could be flawless too?

discover aveeno positively radiant tinted moisturizers with scientifically proven soy complex and natural minerals. give you sheer coverage instantly, then go on to even skin tone in four weeks. aveeno tinted moisturizers. then go on to even skin tone in four weeks. there's another way litter box dust:e purina tidy cats. tidy cats premium line of litters now works harder on dust. and our improved formulas neutralize odors better than ever in multiple-cat homes. so it's easier to keep your house smelling just the way you want it. purina tidy cats. keep your home smelling like home.

personal pricing now on brakes. tell us what you want to pay. we do our best to make that work. deal!

my money. my choice. my meineke. it's official, as if you didn't know, it is the hottest summer ever in texas and oklahoma. noaa says the average temperatures were near 90 for may, june and july. and that's for the whole day. dallas could set a record on saturday with 43 straight day of triple-digit heat. >> unbelievable. one texas town has turned off the water leaving boiling residents boiling mad. >> you tell them that this old woman's hot down here and not just because of the heat. 107 degrees in my blood because you people and those people down there will not get off their duff and fix this stuff. >> wow. >> she told them.

>> they really tell them in texas. >> yep. city officials in kemp, texas, made an emergency decision to shut down the town's water supply on sunday. the city says the underground pipes are rupturing in the intense heat wasting what little water they have left. the "dallas morning news" says the water could be back on by 4:00 p.m. today. the city is giving out bottled water to residents at city hall. >> you have highways that were buckling. never been tested for that kind of heat for such a long sustained time. rob marciano is in the extreme weather center. good morning, rob. >> good morning, guys. that heat and lack of rain, obviously, exacerbated the draught situation. we've been keeping what's called the drought monitor for about 12 years now and this deep, deep red that you see here that's what we call exceptional drought. that's the most extreme drought conditions and this is the largest footprint that we've ever seen encompassing a huge percentage of the lower 48. that gives you an idea of how

much this heat has really affected the drought situation there. the heat continues although the footprint for the advisories and watches has shrunk a little bit. that's encouraging, although if you live in dallas, it's not all that encouraging. 108 is what we expect to see today for a high temperature. are we going to cool down, break that record of 42 days in a row of 100 degree plus days. tomorrow we're up to 106. do we cool down at all come thursday? not really. looks like we will especially as we get towards friday and saturday and next week we'll probably cool down a little bit. looking for thunderstorms to roll into the northeast. probably will cause some travel delays as well. guys, back up to you. >> rob, thank you, my friend, we will check in with throuyou thr the course of the morning. rioting is now spread from london to three other cities, birmingham, bristol and liver pool. street gangs have been looting and setting fires in london. police have made more than 300 arrests. the violence was sparked by a police shooting this past

weekend. just minutes ago, british prime minister david cameron addressed the chaos following an emergency cabinet meeting. cnn's atika shubert is live in london. seriously, this is something that started as a police confrontation in an already tense country because of austerity and just continues to grow. >> well, this is it, i'm in ealing, which is normally a quiet, residential suburb known more for its pretty houses outside of london. as you can see behind me the shops have been looted, put on fire overnight. there's the shells of cars on the road here, and prime minister cameron was basically addressing residents of places like ealing saying we will use the full force of the law. here's what he said. >> let me first of all completely condemn the scenes that we have seen on our television screens and people have witnessed in their communities. these are sickening scenes,

scenes of people looting, vandalizing, thieving, robbing, scenes of people attacking police officers and even attacking fire crews as they're trying to put out fires. this is criminality, pure and simple, and it has to be confronted and defeated. >> reporter: i know i spoke to one woman here in ealing who said she had a harrowing night, didn't have any sleep because she was visiting a friend in ealing when the violence broke out and her car was parked right down this street and she barely had time to get it out before she said she saw a group of kids basically coming in smashing the windows and falling upon another car and attacking it with fire bombs essentially. she saw two cars go up in flames. and she says, you know, she's so scared she's saying the police did the best they could but they seemed completely overwhelmed. maybe it's time to bring in the army. this is what people are saying. >> atika, who are these riot

hers and looters and vandals? are they young people, mix of people more than 300 arrests. who's doing it? >> originally, it was, you know, this one -- this group in tottenham where it started but then basically groups of young teenagers took advantage of the violence and started sporadic looting in other parts of the city. now people are saying it's not just teenagers, a mix of ages on the street, now pure criminals are taking the opportunity to loot, steal whatever they can and they're getting involved in the action too. >> atika shubert, thank you, atika. just ahead on "american morning," a powerful storm raking china's northeast coast causing half a million people in the region to evacuate. soccer career doesn't pan out he will be able to fall back on his first grade education. a world class soccer team signs a kid to a pro deal. it's 23 minutes after the hour. no calorie sweeteners. this bowl of strawberries is loaded with vitamin c.

and now, b vitamins to boot. coffee doesn't have fiber. unless you want it to. new splenda® essentials™ are the first and only line of sweeteners with a small boost of fiber, or antioxidants, or b vitamins in every packet. mmm. same great taste with an added "way to go, me" feeling. new splenda® essentials™. get more out of what you put in. your nutritional needs can go up when you're on the road to recovery. proper nutrition can help you get back on your feet. three out of four doctors recommend the ensure brand for extra nutrition. ensure clinical strength has revigor and thirteen grams of protein to protect, preserve, and promote muscle health. and immune balance to help support your immune system. ensure clinical strength... helping you to bounce back. ensure! nutrition in charge!

ensure! purina cat chow helps you well-being. we're all striving for it. nurture it in your cat with a full family of excellent nutrition and helpful resources. purina cat chow. share a better life.

26 minutes after the hour. u.s. stocks took a beating yesterday, you probably know that already. uncertainty took hold of wall street and didn't let go. the dow lost 5.5%, the nasdaq dropped nearly 7%, the s&p 500 about 6.5% to start the week. on paper investors lost a trillion dollars in the market yesterday that's according to the will shire 500, the broadest index of u.s. stocks. stocks down about 15% in a few weeks but here's perspective, the s&p 500, the best indicator for what's in your 401(k), is now up 64% from the lows back in march of 2009. every single stock in the s&p 500 ended lower yesterday, financial stocks among the hardest hit.

bank of america dropped a staggering 20%, a huge sell-off due in part to the news that aig is suing the bank over hundreds of mortgage backed securities. investors saw a big drop in asian stock markets overnight following the selloff on wall street. european markets are taking a hit so far. both debt concerns in that region as well as fallout from yesterday's plunge in the u.s. markets has investors on edge this morning. lots of volatility in premarket trading for u.s. stock futures this morning. right now, the dow, the nasdaq, the s&p 500, all trading a little bit higher ahead of the opening bell. but boy, they've been all over the place this morning. investors are waiting for a decision on interest rates today from the federal reserve meeting in washington. that comes out at 2:15 eastern. economists surveyed by briefing.com expect the federal funds rate to remain unchanged at about a quarter of a percent. ben bernanke is not expected to give a press conference following that announcement. a new report out says any signs, any glimmer of hope the housing market will stage a recovery in the coming months

has vanished. that's thanks to a recent series of bad economic news over the past several weeks. it's going to take at least two years before median home prices return to the levels from the first quarter of 2011. that's according to an analysis of home price trends by case-shiller indexes. "american morning" will be right back after the break. i'm good about washing my face. but sometimes i wonder... what's left behind? [ female announcer ] introducing purifying facial cleanser from neutrogena® naturals. developed with dermatologists... it's clinically proven to remove 99% of dirt and toxins

and purify pores. and with natural willowbark it contains no dyes, parabens or harsh sulfates. dirt and toxins do a vanishing act and my skin feels pure and healthy. [ female announcer ] new purifying facial cleanser from the new line of neutrogena naturals. no, it's just for new people. hey ! chocolate, vanilla or strawberry ? chocolate ! chocolate it is !

yeah, but i'm new, too. umm... he's new... er... than you. even kids know it's wrong to treat new friends better than old friends. at ally bank, we treat all our customers fairly, with no teaser rates and no minimum deposit to open. it's just the right thing to do.

time to get out of bed. good morning, everyone. 6:30 eastern time. time for this morning's -- >> don't get out of bed on second thought. >> you must, because this is a temporary thing at least i hope so. we're going to talk to felicia in a minute about that. talk about the financial situation right now for a second. for a second day the painful downgrade of america's credit slamming markets across the globe. asia hong kong's hang seng closed down by more than 4%, japan's nikkei down by about 2% and in europe where trading is

under way the markets are in negative territory. bring us up, christine. >> i know. we'll have to see the stocks are up 64% from -- 64% from the worst levels in march. >> you found a positive statistic. >> we're watching this other very important story the remains of 30 u.s. troops shot down in a helicopter in afghanistan will arrive home this morning at dover air force base in delaware. the 30 americans included 22 navy s.e.a.l.s. it's the worst single incident loss of life for the u.s. since the start of the afghan war. and british prime minister david cameron promising more arrest and vowing to bring rioters to justice, violence and looting that exploded in london over the weekend has spread to three other citys. >> let's get a check of the u.s. stock index futures. felicia taylor. they were up and then europe turned around. >> it's erratic trading. futures up on the dow but then on the nasdaq they're down again, back and forth like this. gold is up another $61. >> unbelievable. >> what? >> it's at 1773.

tell me what that says to you. >> people are scared. >> yeah. >> people are scared. there's a lot of fear, uncertainty. we don't know where things are going to pan out today. what everybody will be watching for is any word from ben bernanke at the meeting. we will be looking for that at about 2:00 this afternoon and see if there's any hint about any further stimulus and whether or not he's willing to do something like that right now or is he going to play it safe. i talked to one trader this morning and he's concerned about hearing words about a stimulus because that means for him, that things are really bad. >> back to last thursday, this is kind of -- >> only last thursday u.s. >> right. but that was that big drop we thought was crazy 51 points on the dow, the european central bank came out and said they were going to buy bonds and some said, it's not far enough and others who weren't that concerned thought, oh, boy, the central bank is involved this must be serious and that's what some people are worried about today. >> i spoke to a guy at the nymex about gold and he said that central banks have been entering the market for the last couple

months taking up gold. that's also an indicatecation there is serious concerns about what's going to be happening and whether or not we will have the double dip recession. >> the president gave his speech yesterday and we know what happened after the speech, the markets tanked. ben bernanke may come out and say something as you said. so, i mean, what do investors need to see? do they need to see president obama come out with john boehner, perhaps, and present a united front to show investors that the bickering in washington will end? >> yeah. what they need to see is leadership. they need to see some concerted effort on behalf of both republicans and democrats that enough is enough. we are tired of hearing this bickering back and forth. it's got to stop. and it has to stop yesterday. not tomorrow. this is done now. if they don't get the message loud and clear i don't know what it's going to take. >> should congress come back from vacation? >> yes, i think they should to be perfectly honest with you. >> we need a plan. >> why are they all on vacation when the markets are going to hell in a hand basket. it's not okay. >> this is a serious matter. i'm not sure whether -- i'm not sure whether the vacation is the

problem or not. i don't know that getting them back in a room would help. >> i don't know that they know what to do. >> that's a worse statement. >> i'm worried about what happens before november 23rd, their deadline to get something done. >> the super committee. >> nothing that indicates the guys are on the track to compromising and making deals. >> we don't know what the super committee is, who's on it, where the spending cuts coming from, we need answers to these questions. >> why don't they just like up the schedule and get that done right now instead of waiting for that timetable. >> i think that is a really smart idea. >> on top of that whatever kind of thing the fed is going to do or the government is going to do in terms of a jobs stimulus or job package. the president would like to see payroll tax holiday extended, could the president ever get that through, you know, just say no to the president congress house i don't know? probably not. that might be the best thing we've heard first. move the deadline up. >> not fair to place the blame or responsibility on the federal reserve yet again.

we've already seen them come in twice into the marketplace with stimulus. is it really their responsibility to do it a third time? frankly, the first two times they did it, didn't help the jobs front. that's where we need to see action. >> you're right. >> felicia taylor -- >> she's more in tune today. >> i love that. >> the new york city hotel maid has filed a civil suit against dominique strauss-kahn. nafissatou diallo seeking unspecified damages of the former imf chief claiming physical, emotional and psychological harm. strauss-kahn is charged with sexually assaulting diallo in his new york hotel suite back in may. in cline na, tropical storm has weakened but still bringing heavy rains and gales off northeastern china. half a million people had to be evac with waited because of the storm. >> diana nyad's attempt to swim from cuba to the florida keys it's over this morning. the 61-year-old swimmer called it quits early this morning after 29 hours in the water. she was suffering from severe

shoulder pain, asthma and vomiting. nyad was trying to become the first person to make that 103-mile swim without a shark cage. she made it about halfway. almost halfway. >> wow. >> i still admire her. >> sure. absolutely. >> i couldn't have made it even a little -- >> trouble getting to the other side of the pool. i'm full of admiration for her. real madrid, one of the greatest soccer clubs in the world has gone to grade school to look for new talent. the team has signed a 7-year-old prodigy out of argentina. how good is he? he already just has one name. leo. espn says the kid will begin training in madrid in september. if all goes well, he should be ready -- >> who's he going to train with? >> i don't know. >> like a -- >> going to be ready to see action on the team between seven and ten years from now. >> by himself. >> i don't know. >> crazy. up next, a potential game changer for the gop. rick perry making big weekend plans, folks. is the texas governor about to

announce he's going to run for president? it's 38 minutes after the hour. [ male announcer ] this is our beach. ♪ this is our pool. ♪ our fireworks. ♪ and our slip and slide. you have your idea of summer fun, and we have ours. now during the summer event get an exceptionally engineered mercedes-benz for an exceptional price. but hurry, this offer ends august 31st. ♪ let me make you smile ♪ let me do a few tricks ♪ some old and then some new tricks ♪ ♪ i'm very versatile ♪ so let me entertain you ♪ and we'll have a real good time ♪ [ male announcer ] with beats audio and flash, you can experience richer music and download movies straight to the new hp touchpad

with webos.

wisconsin voters are heading to the polls today, deciding whether to recall six republican state senators. the state has been deeply divided since republican governor scott walker took over and decided to strip public workers of collective bargaining rights. democrats are hoping to take back the state senate if their recall effort succeeds today. the end of an era on capitol hill. the house page program which began in the 1820s wraps up at the end of the month. house speaker boehner and nancy pelosi say they cannot justify the $5 million a year program when pages are no longer needed to deliver messages for lawmakers since everybody pretty much e-mails each other. the program employs 70 high school age students each semester and for the summer. for now the program will continue. >> they don't have electronics? >> i thought the amazing part of that story they agreed to cut something. >> together. >> together. yeah. there you go. rick perry supporters gearing up for a big weekend, folks. on saturday the texas governor plans to make stops in south carolina and new hampshire, two, of course, early primary states.

he's hoping to steal the spotlight from the other gop candidates in the ames straw poll in iowa. perry supporters hoping to hear an official announcement maybe he's running for president. eric ericsson joins us live from the cnn center in atlanta. welcome to the program. i know your group is organizing this event and you can talk to him, do you know what he's going to say? do you think he's going to announce he's going to run or clearly signal he's in this race? >> i haven't talked to him but my understanding is he probably will say something clearly he's running for president. you don't go to south carolina and fly to new hampshire, just so everyone understands, he's been committed to come to our event since last year. we held our event in austin, texas, last year, decided to come this year, but my sense is, just based on media reports really, that yeah, he's definitely going to say something, but it's not going to be an official announcement. >> we know this week he had a big prayer meeting that got a lot of attention. give me a sense of what a rick perry presidential candidacy

would do to the republican field. people have been talking about and speculating about it for an awful long time. what does he add to the field? >> when you look at the polling numbers, mitt romney has a troubling sign he's fairly well capped at about 33% of the republican primary vote and there are a lot of other candidates there who are picking off the other 66%, 67%. romney has an advantage there in that the field is crowded. if perry comes in the field probably begins to consolidate behind a guy like rick perry and he will probably be able to get in a position to make it a one-on-one race with mitt romney in which case romney probably doesn't stay as competitive as he has been. >> you've said people like sarah palin, rudy giuliani would endorse a perry candidacy. >> i'm not sure. mark hall prin from "time" magazine put on twitter hearing rudy giuliani might endorse. a lot of people still think sarah palin is going to run. i'm not as convinced she is though. >> straw poll the same day in ames iowa, you think after the straw poll and with a perry

candidacy you will see people falling out of the pact and who goes first. >> i suspect newt gingrich is the first guy to go. out of money. rick santorum, i consider them former candidates for the most part. it's going to impact tim pawlenty early on because he's trying to set himself up to win in iowa but most of the polling in iowa shows if rick perry were to get in it pushes pawlenty down further and the top three become perry, bachmann and romney. >> as a true conservative what is it conservatives want to see? the tea party, you've defended the tea party and what happened with the s&p downgrade but the tea party has been widely blamed even by moderate republicans saying, you know, they're partly to blame for this whole downgrade. i mean does that -- is that what true conservatives want to see more of in the presidential race and from their candidates? >> yeah. i definitely think they want to see fiscal conservatism. it's funny a group that maybe has 36 members of congress who considers themselves tea party members been there six months to blame for the world's troubles. not really. they need somebody to stand up and be a strong defender of

them. i think rick perry would be. a guy the tea party rallied around in his primary in texas against kaye bailey hutchenson for now into his 11th year as governor of texas. he and barack obama have a lot in common. both replaced a guy named george bush. rick perry raised his while barack obama has his lowered. >> who has a jobs plan? i haven't heard a good one. keep cutting taxes, keep cutting taxes. we've been cutting taxes for a lock long time and the economy in the tank. what is the jobs plan? who do you think has the best one out there? >> this is rick perry's key selling point for a republican primary. half the jobs created were created in texas. that's a selling point. balanced budget in texas, $6 billion surplus and he's created a lot of jobs. >> one last question. question of the day today, pegged off this ""newsweek" cover of michele bachmann, some say caught her looking a little startled. are republican women unfairly

criticized because they're women? what do you think? weigh in. have you seen the cover? >> i have seen the cover. i'm not sure i would make that big a deal out of that "newsweek" cover. i would say, though, that i think michele bachmann is to a degree been benefited by a lot of the criticisms of sarah palin. it's hard to make the same attacks against two conservative women and not have it come across as sexist or something. when you have ashton kutcher, for example, and demi moore among others saying enough is enough with the bashing of sarah palin and others, i think at some point it's kind of been an exhausted topic. michele bachmann's benefited from it. the caveat for a lot of conservatives they shouldn't rally around someone because the media may be perceived to attacking that person. michele bachmann can stand on her own record. >> back quickly to one thing you saidp you said, you know, that the difference between president bush and president obama had a downgrade. a lot of people would point out that president bush had a financial crisis first. you really blame the president for the downgrade? this has been a long, ugly process that got us here. >> yeah. it's been a very long and ugly

process. i was kind of shocked the president's advisors said s&p made a $2 trillion math error and on the other hand it was the tea party to blame. when barack obama and the democrats controlled congress and the white house for two straight years, saw the warning signs and decided to go with health care and call it entitlement reform. >> s&p didn't say anything about health care. they said there was political dysfunction in washington that made the problem of too much debt a problem. too much debt is something we've had for a long time but never had a downgrade. the political dysfunction tipped it over the edge. >> it's a feature not a bug of the system despite what people are saying these days. i think the economic team in the white house is probably right, i think s&p told a lot of their people that -- who they advise they were going to downgrade, they found out there was an math error and for credibility sake they couldn't walk it back. they had to do the downgrade. that's what the president's economic team has said and they're probably right. that would explain what s&p did. it is a bipartisan problem but you can't downgrade for a political reason that we've had

forever. have we forgotten about the reagan years with the democrats in control or the republicans shutting down congress in '95 with bill clinton. none of those things were really a lot different than what we have today. >> we have to leave it there. eric ericsson, editor and chief of redstate.com. thanks so much. right back. it's 48 minutes after the hour. >> my name is grant mar sell less. i'm a saxophone player. i just walk into airports assuming that i have absolutely no control over any of it. it makes everything easier. at one time, you know what a plett tro nome is? my metronome went off in my carry-on. they freaked! you come back here. explain that. it's a metronome. whats is that? it's a practice instrument for playing music. tick, tock, tick, tock. terrorist alert. the metronome! i'm a curious person. i can't be on planes without books, without a computer or

music. that's what i like about this. everything is contained. my books are in here. i play word games. there's a cool game that they have called words with friends and it's scrabble you can play with anybody with an internet connection around the world. my buddy harry conic he and i do this constantly. there's been times they've lost instruments. i carry the big one on. i've been traveling like crazy. ♪ thanks to the venture card from capital one, we get double miles on every purchase, so me and the boys earned a trip to dc twice as fast! oh hi! we get double miles every time we use our card. and since double miles add up fast... one more chariot please. ...we can bring the whole gang! i cannot tell a lie. he did it. right... it's hard to beat double miles! read my lips -- no new axes! [ male announcer ] get the venture card from capital one, and earn double miles on every purchase, every day. go to capitalone.com. what's in your wallet? so, you're a democrat right?

like new splenda® essentials™ no calorie sweeteners. this bowl of strawberries is loaded with vitamin c. and now, b vitamins to boot. coffee doesn't have fiber. unless you want it to. new splenda® essentials™ are the first and only line of sweeteners with a small boost of fiber, or antioxidants, or b vitamins in every packet. mmm. same great taste with an added "way to go, me" feeling. new splenda® essentials™. get more out of what you put in. same great taste with an added "way to go, me" feeling. at exxon and mobil, our smart gasoline works at the molecular level to help remove deposits and clean up intake valves. it helps your engine run more smoothly and leave behind cleaner emissions. it's how we make gasoline work harder for you. exxon and mobil.

51 minutes after the hour. u.s. stock futures up and down all morning after the first ever downgrade of u.s. debt sent the dow plunging 635 points yesterday. overseas markets in asia closed lower, also down in europe where trading is currently under way. the remains of 30 u.s. troops killed in a helicopter crash in afghanistan over the weekend are due to arrive home this morning at dover air force base in delaware. their chopper was shot down by an insurgent rocket-propelled grenade. the chaos continues in britain. prime minister david cameron blames the rioting that has spread from london to three other citys on thugs and promises more arrests. the unrest was sparked by a police shooting over the weekend. kids in philadelphia being warned, get home earlier or face fines. mayor michael nutter imposed curfews after a string of youth mob attacks, involving 20 minors

one as young as 11 years old. football coach 84-year-old joe paterno hospitalized after accidentally blind sided during a practice. paterno says he's doing fine, expects to be back soon. even reportedly conducted his morning coaching meeting from his hospital bed. diana nyad her attempt to swim from cuba to florida without a shark cage, almost halfway into the trip when shoulder pain and asthma made it impossible for her to continue. you're caught up on the day's headlines. "american morning" back right after this.

now your chance to talk back on one of the big stories of the

day. with conservatives fuming over the latest "newsweek" cover of michele bachmann. we asked you this question, are republican women unfairly criticized because they're women? i must say that our facebook friends do not like michele bachmann, at least most of them who responded on our a page. this from edward -- what is it that tell you? this from james -- this from eileen -- keep those comments coming. facebook.com/americanmorning. and thanks, as always. >> moderate republican women,

moderate republican women tell me sarah palin and michele bachmann are not the face of the republican party for them, although they are the face of the republican party. they're the two you talk about most in terms of running for president. >> we tend to lump all conservative women together, right? they all believe the same thing, act exactly the same way and that's not true. that's not true of women in general. why would it be true of conservative women. >> when hillary clinton was sort of the face of women in democratic politics. >> i think so. hillary clinton got a lot of -- >> right. >> you're right. >> yeah. >> okay. let's go back a little bit. let's go back in time to "dirty dancing" making a comeback to the big screen. >> no. >> carol loved the original too much to mess with it. >> don't back baby in a corner. >> lions gate is remaking the classic 1987 film which starred jennifer grey and patrick swayze. the original choreographer kenny ortega is going to direct the remake. it went on to gross $214 million worldwide. the studio says the remake will include hits from the original

film as well as new songs. no word yet -- even watching the old clips is cool. makes you miss patrick swayze too. >> who are they going to cast? like the cast of "glee." not going to be the same. >> yeah. there's -- that's a movie i entirely associate with the cast. >> parents and grant parents have the same thing. can you believe they're remaking x. all the shows they're remaking. coming up next hour, london is burning, at least parts of it. violence spreading like fire across england. the prime minister weighing in, police trying to take back control. we're live in the u.k. when we come back. [ male announcer ] members of the american postal workers union

handle more than 165 billion letters and packages a year. that's about 34 million pounds of mail every day. ever wonder what this costs you as a taxpayer? millions? tens of millions? hundreds of millions? not a single cent. the united states postal service doesn't run on your tax dollars. it's funded solely by stamps and postage. brought to you by the men and women of the american postal workers union. ♪

that's how it is with alzheimer's disease. she needs help from me. and her medication. the exelon patch -- it releases medication continuously for twenty-four hours. she uses one exelon patch daily for the treatment of mild to moderate alzheimer's symptoms. [ female announcer ] it cannot change the course of the disease. hospitalization and rarely death have been reported in patients who wore more than one patch at a time. the most common side effects of exelon patch are nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea. the likelihood and severity of these side effects may increase as the dose increases. patients may experience loss of appetite or weight. patients who weigh less than 110 pounds may experience more side effects. people at risk for stomach ulcers who take certain other medicines should talk to their doctor because serious stomach problems such as bleeding may worsen. people with certain heart conditions may experience slow heart rate. [ woman ] whenever i needed her, she was there for me. now i'm here for her.

[ female announcer ] ask the doctor about your loved one trying the exelon patch. visit exelonpatch.com to learn more. okay. the first day without a aaa was a rough one on wall street after the worst day since the dark days of 2008. washington asking this morning, who are these people who downgraded america? who are they? all eyes on her eyes. why did "newsweek" pick this photo of michele bachmann for its cover? conservatives say they already know the answer. and rioters stripping shelves and burning what's left, every jail cell in london is

full this morning. violence spiraling out of control after a shooting unhinged the youth of a nation. a swimmer's quest for history is over. new overnight 61-year-old diana nyad forced to end her swim through shark-infested waters from florida to cuba on this "american morning." good morning to you. it is tuesday, august 9th. welcome to "american morning." a lot going on, so let's get to it. >> there are certainly tough times for the millions of you at home who have a financial stake in the markets as we begin this hour. overseas investors are reacting to yesterday's massive sell-off here in the united states. markets are trading lower in europe. they closed lower in asia. >> the declines coming after the worst day on wall street in more than two years now. traders dumping stocks for treasury bills. the very same thing standard & poor's downgraded on friday by the way. here's the damage. the dow down about 635 points, that's more than 5%, the nasdaq

and s&p 500 also both losing more than 6% of their total value. on paper that's a trillion dollar loss for the day. every single one of the 500 companies in the s&p 500 closed lower. >> we have a team of reporters across the globe. nina dos santos is live in london, andrew stevens live in hong kong, felicia taylor live with us in new york. start with nina where after opening higher, european stocks took a sharp turn south. where do we stand right now, nina? >> it's very sharp, isn't it? well, what we've got at the moment is a number of these indices are down to the tune of about 2%, the ftse, dax and cac 40. they are off interday lows. we had the dax down 4%. which is interesting to note, because this out of the three markets is the one that has lost the least, down by about 8% to 10% so far this year. what we've got at the moment, ali, we had stocks flirted with some gains for about 20 minutes during the session, trying to make some kind of a rebound, but it didn't last long and

investors don't really seem to have the appetite for investing in the stock markets here. safe to say anywhere else in the world. what we've seen is about $5.5 trillion ant counting now wiped off the world stock markets, focus on the ftse 14u7bz, for instance, in london where i am. this is a market since july 26th, has lost in excess of 900 points. we haven't seen those kind of losses since back in 2008 in the day to the credit crunch. one brief bright spot we're seeing on the markets is gold, surpassing another record of 1,770 an ounce and still rising. >> thank you for that. nina dos santos in london. >> to asia now, no let up in the sell-off that started last week. andrew stevens is standing by live in hong kong. good morning. >> good morning to you. yeah, no let up at all. we saw a big, big sell-off right from the open here. it did ease a bit when, as nina was saying, the european futures turned positive. there was a little buying going on here, but it really wasn't

that much. by the end of the day the markets were still down, not down as much as they had opened, but still fairly significantly into the red, particularly here in hong kong. it's a liquid market, easy to get out of. the market was down by 5.6%. japan down by about 2% or so. was down 5% at one stage. gives you an idea of the feeling going on here. it's the same story. people are looking for circuit breakers, looking for someone or something to happen to change this mindset of the moment of this just get out of this because we don't know what's going on with the two biggest global economies if you like, the u.s. and the euro zone. euro zone collectively is bigger than china still and it's bigger than the u.s. when you have it like that people are trying to find some sort of clarity somewhere. they're waiting for statements, waiting for some sort of action and until they do, it's a bit like trying to catch a falling knife. they don't want to have a part of it. >> the size of the euro zone in relation to the china and u.s. a humongous trading partner,

huge economic region, it's problems are very, very important here. talk about bank of america now, it is waking up this morning with quite the hangover. shares of america's largest bank fell a whopping 20% to their lowest point in two years. the bank was rocked by a $10 billion mortgage fraud lawsuit filed by aig. since the beginning of 2011, bank of america has lost nearly 49% of its value. >> while that wasn't most of it, it was something that started. it contributed to yesterday's sell-off here in u.s. markets. fears growing that nation is slipping into another recession, all eyes will be on the federal reserve today because it has a regular meeting. investors will be paying close attention to see if the fed says anything about the economy, they're likely to do that, but what they can do about it, whether the nation needs to adopt a new stimulus program right now. normally the fed can fiddle with the economy by adjusting interest rates up or down but they don't have that privilege any more. >> interest rates are effectively zero. >> would they buy back a bunch of bonds?

would they do another -- >> like in europe or a stimulus? >> we'll see. two different big stimulus programs the fed has, will they need a third? four days after downgrading america's credit rating standard & poor's may be the target of a senate investigation. senate banking committee collecting information about s&p and its decision. the committee's chairman, tim johnson, calling the downgrade irresponsible and a game of political punditry. the loss of the government's aaa rating has pitted the administration and the rating agency against each other. when asked if the senate might hold a hearing a committee aide said everything is on the table. i will tell you people in the markets, two seconds after the downgrade said, okay, when does everybody in congress call for hearings. >> they call for hearings for everything else. crippling debt and credit downgrade have the obama administration back pedalling and the critics are piling on. the president sounding a theme we may be hearing through the november election in 2012 insisting he inherited these

economic problems and they're being made worse by the debt crisis in europe. the president making those comments at a democratic fund-raiser yesterday with supporters paying $15,000 each for a photo with him. this morning's op-ed pages are not holding back either. "the washington times" says, quote, we always have been and always will be a aaa country if only we had a aaa leader. and from "the washington post," the most powerful man in the world seems strangely powerless and ir resolute as larger forces bring down the country and the presidency. ouch. "the wall street journal" was even worse. >> i know. but a couple people have said he didn't deserve his nobel prize and doesn't deserve the downgrade. too much praise in one hand and too much criticism on another. >> you remember back to 2008, beginning of 2008, when things were starting to turn south in the economy, and you'd see president bush come out, sometimes ben bernanke, and henry paulson. same thing would happen. they would come out the markets would tank. unless they've got something highly specific to say they might be talking to the american

people but when you're watching the stock market that's investors and they don't do well with this generalized conversation. >> if the message isn't inspiring to the american people either, maybe it's best just not to say anything. >> yeah. >> i don't know. >> i don't know. >> let's ask felicia taylor anything inspiring. i think futures are up. >> across the board we've got futures up and gold backing off a little bit. that's reassuring. only up $50. that's still a safe haven play. carol, i couldn't agree more. at this point in time don't get in front of a microphone when it's upsetting to the marketplace. an interesting op-ed piece in the "financial times" comparing the american government to charlie brown. when he used to walk up and try to kick the ball and lucy would put it out from underneath him so he would stumble that's not a good comparison. we don't want to see things like that. that's not funny anymore. we need to see the leaders of this country come back to the forefront. it's okay to deal with what is being called a great constrakkion. what people can't deal with is the loss of credibility on

behalf of policy makers. >> from our opinion research poll, cnn polls, people feel like in general they want to throw the bums out except for i think correct me if i'm wrong, they're less critical of their own congress people, but seriously, voters may just look at this whole period and say forget it. >> yeah. >> absolutely. they're fed up. they're tired. they're exhausted. seen this going on for a couple years and, you know, when is -- when are things going to start to change? when will see policymakers actually say something and do something as opposed to just fighting with one another. it's okay to have a difference of opinion whether you're republican or democrat, but come together and have some kind of consensus and make a difference in terms of the economy. create those jobs. we've been talking about this for two years. where are the jobs coming from? >> ben bernanke is going to speak today. we're all hoping he says something. >> it will be a statement. i don't think he's going to -- >> the fed meeting statement. >> what does that statement need to say to help things? >> well, he often says, points out, as you just pointed out,

jobs are the underlying issue here. >> right. >> the fed can do all sorts of things around the margins, they can't create jobs into they can't physically create jobs. that is one of their mandates is to fuel job creation, but what is it they're going to be able to do differently this time that's going to create those jobs? that really has to come from the administration. >> right. >> capital has to be freed up so corporations will be willing to hire and take a chance again. corporate america isn't convinced that we're on a road to recovery. therefore, they're not willing to put themselves on the line and use that cash that way. there's plenty of cash. do you know how frustrating it is to hear there's plenty of cash but we're not going to hire. that's very depressing. >> $2 trillion of the cash but you're totally right, the companies that are going to weather the storm right now, the best, are the ones who are keeping hold of their money. >> yelling at the last two weeks. >> exactly. >> step back from the economy because i think we need a break right now. and now is your chance to talk back on another big story of the day. you want to call it big. the question this morning, are republican women unfairly criticized because they're

women? we hear it a lot. there's a double standard when it comes to criticizing politicians who are women. republican and tea party favorite michele bachmann who has had a few missteps with historical facts says yes, she makes mistake, but she unlike liberal politicians, doesn't get a pass from the media. bachmann told david brodie it's something she, sarah palin and other conservative women have to deal with. >> she has been unfairly criticized and i think that we've seen that with other conservative women as well across the country, whether they are political commentators or whether they're in public service. >> this morning, conservatives are fuming over the latest "newsweek" cover that shows a startled looking bachmann with the title "queen of rage." one blogger saying can anyone say with a straight face the mainstream media is not biased against conservatives? bachmann's critics haven't been measured, commentators like mns's ed schulz called bachmann

a psycho talker and remember this from jay leno. he holds nothing back it when comes to the so-called mama grizzlies. >> republican congresswoman michele bachmann under fire for claiming the founding fathers eliminated slavery. and sarah palin, she is upset. sure. another female republican out there trying to steal the dumb vote oh! >> politics is rough for both women and men, but just how rough may depend on your gender. the talk back question today, are republican women unfairly criticized because they're women? facebook.com/americanmorning. facebook.com/americanmorning. we'll read your comments later this hour. very interesting stuff. still to come -- no child left behind, a lot of states are failing to meet these important requirements. and now, they may not have to. we'll tell you about it. >> the heat wave is not letting up in texas. the record no one wants to see broken is this weekend. we'll tell you what that is ahead. why lawmakers in washington are nervous about an election in

wisconsin today. you are watching "american morning." it is 11 minutes past the hour. have i got a surprise for you! a mouthwatering combination of ingredients... i know you're gonna love. [ barks ] yes, it's new beneful healthy fiesta. made with wholesome grains, real chicken, even accents of tomato and avocado. yeah! come on! [ barking ] gotta love the protein for muscles-- whoo-hoo! and omega-rich nutrition for that shiny coat. ever think healthy could taste so good? [ woman announcing ] new beneful healthy fiesta. another healthful, flavorful beneful.

the authentic, the rare, the hard to define. to those always searching for what's pure and what's real from we who believe we know just how you feel. haagen-dazs.

welcome back to "american morning." checking the cnn political ticker, texas governor rick perry may be ready to make a big announcement this weekend. cnn saturday -- on saturday, the texas governor plans to make stops in south carolina and new hampshire, two early primary states. why would he be going there? hoping to steal the spotlight from other gop candidates in the ames straw poll in iowa. perry supporters hoping to hear an official announcement or strong hint of one that he's running for president. states can now opt out of the no child left behind. president obama agreeing to grant waivers for states that are failing to meet the law standards. montana, minnesota, kentucky, wisconsin, virginia, georgia, have announced plans to apply. big day in wisconsin, wisconsin voters are heading to the polls today deciding whether

to recall six republican state senators. if the gop loses just three of those seats, democrats regain control of the senate and that would be a real setback for republican governor scott walker. it was his decision to strip public workers of their right to collective bargaining. that triggered a big backlash that has deeply divided the state. joining us live from milwaukee this morning, amy cramer, chairman of the tea party express. their bus has been touring wisconsin, working to keep the republican majority. and diane palmer has been working to kick those republicans out of office. she's the president of the service employees international union, health care wisconsin and also a public health care nurse. welcome to both of you. >> thanks for having us. >> thanks for being here. we appreciate it. amy, start with you, governor walker, the republican governor who pushed this anti-union legislation, he's not exactly well loved in wisconsin. just 37% approve of his performance. just 37%. and 55% oppose his tax and

spending plan. aren't you fighting for something most people in wisconsin don't even want? >> actually, carol, we're fighting for what is good for the state of wisconsin and what most people in wisconsin do want, and since governor walker has taken office and they have passed this legislation earlier this year, they're turning wisconsin's economy back around and wisconsin is now the fifth leading state in the nation for job growth in the month of june, they created 9500 jobs and i believe there were only 18,000 across the nation created. so, this, you know, they're putting -- >> california just last month created 29,000 jobs. that's a hard figure to pin down. but just in going back, if -- >> well -- >> if public opinion show they don't like this republican governor's policies aren't you fighting for what most of wisconsin doesn't want? >> it's hard to -- the media's not telling the story of the job growth and the money that's being saved by school districts

across the country. this is about putting the government back in the hands of the taxpayers instead of the unions. the taxpayers want a balanced budget and for -- to be represented by their elected officials and right now, i mean, the past has been that they've been beholden to these union bosses and that's simply not right. >> but let me ask diane this question. diane, the latest recall polling shows neck and neck races. if the democrats get back the state senate, will you feel vindicated? >> well, we will feel partially vindicated. there's a lot more work that needs to happen in wisconsin, and i disagree that the wisconsinite do not want the policies that governor scott walker is putting forward. he's dividing our state and our state is more divisive than it's been since the vietnam war. >> and amy, going back to you. it's just amazing the amount of money that's been spent in wisconsin from out of wisconsin. of the total 33 million spent on

this recall election, 28 million has been spent by outside groups. that's according to the wisconsin democracy campaign. this is very much a national fight. you say amy, this is ground zero for the 2012 campaign. if this recall is successful for democrats, is that a blow to the tea party? >> i wouldn't say it's a blow to the tea party. i mean we're working very hard to support these conservatives that did their jobs. the thing is, politicians are usually recalled for not doing their jobs. these republicans and governor walker have done what they were sent to do. there was a -- the people spoke loud and clear last november that they wanted to reign in spending, balance the budgets. washington should take a lesson from what's going on here in wisconsin, because wisconsin is leading the way in turning the economy around and creating jobs again. that's what everybody's focused on, not only here in wisconsin, but across the country. and so instead of punishing and

targeting these republicans, everybody should be supporting them and actually encouraging president obama and our leaders in washington to do the same. >> diane, does amy have a point? governor walker was elected and he did what he said he was going to do. so, is this recall election fair? >> well, recalls don't just happen. the citizens actually have to step up and say they want a recall. it just doesn't magically happen. if what she's saying is right there will not be a recall. nobody should take example after wisconsin. we took a state that was very settled and disrupted it. we caused a lot of havoc in the state because of what the republicans have done. and so, i would disagree. washington should not take example after wisconsin. this is a grassroots effort. wisconsin folks are saying this is not what they want. governor walker is not giving what he told the people he would give. he said he would give 250,000

jobs over the next four years and, in fact, he's disrupted jobs and caused people to lose jobs. he's given tax breaks to the wealthy and basically turned its back on the working folks. >> i wish we could continue this debate. all eyes will be -- >> that's not the case. >> we have to wrap it up but we'll be watching wisconsin slowly. diane palmer and amy cramer thank you so much for joining us this morning. >> thank you. >> you're very welcome. good discussion, one playing out, you know, around the country, in different ways. wisconsin just happens to be this microcosm where they have this recall going on. this challenge between conservatives, in power, doing what they said they were going to do and the frustration that has resulted from it, is a nationwide issue. >> i think it also illustrates the lack of compromise many say in wisconsin, like that's really what did it. nobody could come to a compromise and that's where -- >> everyone's passionate in their belief and sticking right to their -- >> i don't think diane or amy were going to agree at all.

>> almost 22 minutes after the hour. time for rob marciano and the weather center. >> rob, compromise with us on the weather, will you? >> can you make it a little less rainy in new york. >> and a little less hot -- >> folks complaining about the heat want compromise, that's for sure. not getting it much in texas. for july the fourth warmest in the u.s., especially for texas. 77 degrees, that's the record, and 2.7 degrees above average. oklahoma and texas, the warmest months ever in recorded history. we are beginning to shrink the number of counties and states under the heat advisories but the sore spot is north central texas where once again today it will be over 100 degrees easily and probably for the fex several days. if we hit 43 days in a row that breaks a record of 100 degree plus days. also, the drought monitor, this dark red that you see here, this is the largest footprint of

exceptional drought we've ever seen since keeping this drought monitor for the past 12 years. that is an indication of the folks in north central texas know all too well. your severe thunderstorms that have the potential for rocking across the eastern third of the country today. starting to see a line developing across the allegheny, the great lakes and this will prop pe gait eastward and cause travel delays i think for the new york metropolitan airports around noon time. boston as well might see some late in the day and through the evening. that's the best i can do as far as a compromise. you'll see a little bit of rain but a lot of folks would take that. i wouldn't complain so much. >> thank you, sir. you talk about the farming situation. that drought has been going on for a long time. longer than this. so for all of it texas's economy doing well the farmers and ranchers over there are having a difficult time. >> that's true. >> you were saying they've moved some of the crops to cotton. >> cotton all-time high for cotton prices and farmers looking at the drought saying i should be switching from one thing to cotton which is a more drought resistant but this is

quite a drought. >> still to come on "american morning," we're minding your business after this huge sell-off in u.s. markets yesterday. how much money did investors lose, at least on paper, a pretty big number. >> britain's worst rioting spreading beyond london to three other cities. we're live in london just ahead. it's 24 minutes after the hour. [ man ] this is my robot butler.

say i'm missing england. i type in e-n-g... and he gives me a variety of options. would you like to have a look at a map, my lad? ah, why not? shall we check on the status of your knighthood? yes. again? yes, again, please! thank you. with my digital manservant, i'll never be homesick again.

would you like me to put the kettle on, sir? no, i'd like you to get rid of that ostrich. it's been here a month. [ male announcer ] think, type, go. with just type. only on the new hp touchpad with webos. two of the most important are energy security and economic growth. north america actually has one of the largest oil reserves in the world. a large part of that is oil sands. this resource has the ability to create hundreds of thousands of jobs. at our kearl project in canada, we'll be able to produce these oil sands with the same emissions as many other oils and that's a huge breakthrough. that's good for our country's energy security and our economy.

27 minutes after the hour. minding your business this morning. u.s. stocks took a beating yesterday uncertainty took ahold of wall street and woochbts let it go. the dow lost 5.5%, the nasdaq dropping nearly 7%, the s&p 500 was down about 6.5% to start the week. on paper investors lost a trillion dollars in the markets in yesterday's trading according to the wilshire 500, the broadest index of u.s. stocks. stocks down about 15% in just a couple weeks. here's perspective, the s&p 500, probably the best indicator of your portfolio and your 401(k), it's up 64% since the markets hit its low in march of 2009. economic concerns worldwide have pushed oil prices down more than $10 a barrel in the last week. light sweet crude settled $83 a barrel yesterday. investors saw a big drop in asian stock markets overnight following the sell-off on wall street, european markets are taking a hit so far this

morning. investors are on edge over both debt concerns in europe as well as the fallout from yesterday's plunge in u.s. markets. lots of volatility in premarket trading of u.s. stock futures this morning. right now the dow, nasdaq and s&p 500 are up strongly ahead of the opening bell. investors are waiting for a decision, however, on interest rates today from the federal reserve in washington. that comes out at 2:15 eastern. economists surveyed by briefing.com expect rates to remain unchanged at 0 to a quarter of a percent. fed chief ben bernanke is not expected to give a press conference after that announcement. don't forget for the latest news about your money check out the all new cnnmoney.com. "american morning" back right after this break. tor told me cam is best absorbed in small continuous amounts. only one calcium supplement does that in one daily dose. new citracal slow release... continuously releases calcium plus d for the efficient absorption my body needs. citracal. a farewell long awaited. goodnight, stuffy.

goodnight, outdated. goodnight old luxury and all of your wares. goodnight bygones everywhere. [ engine turns over ] good morning, illumination. good morning, innovation. good morning unequaled inspiration. [ male announcer ] the audi a8, chosen by car & driver as the best luxury sedan in a recent comparison test. thankfully, there's new crest pro-health clinical gum protection toothpaste.

it helps eliminate plaque at the gumline, helping prevent gingivitis. it's even clinically proven to help reverse it in just 4 weeks. new crest pro-health clinical toothpaste. life opens up when you do. youth gone wild. london is burning, riots spreading, even police saying chaos has taken over in some areas. we are live in the u.k. on this "american morning."

good morning. it's tuesday, august 9th. welcome to "american morning." this tuesday morning. >> it's a busy one. we have a lot going on right now. here are the top stories. the worldwide sell-off continues, gloom over america's s&p downgrade lingering. stocks in asia and europe taking a sharp turn down after wall street's worst day in more than 2 1/2 years. the remains of 30 americans who died in a chopper crash in afghanistan will arrive in the u.s. today. it was a single deadliest blow to u.s. forces in the ten-year war. many of the vibes were u.s. navy s.e.a.l.s. going in to save special forces troops. she was almost halfway there. diana nyad's attempt to swim from cuba to the florida keys is over. the 61-year-old called it quits this morning after 29 hours in the water. she was trying to become the first person to make the 103-mile swim without a cage. >> but she gave it a go. >> certainly did. happening right now, riots in britain spreading beyond

london to three other citys. david cameron is condemning the scenes of violence, vowing to bring the rioters to justice. atika shubert live for us in the london suburb of ealing and prime minister cameron came back from vacation to attend to this. some say he should have done that a couple days ago. >> that's what a lot of residents are asking, why did it take three nights of consecutive rioting and looting before both the prime minister, the home secretary, and the mayor of london decided to cancel their holidays and come back. now, however, prime minister cameron says, he will be putting more police on to the streets, 16,000 cops will be on the streets tonight and he is promising that any looters will feel the full force of the law. here's what he said earlier. >> let me first of all completely condemn the scenes that we have seen on our television screens and people have witnessed in their communities.

these are sickening scenes. scenes of people looting, vandalizing, thieving, robbing, scenes of people attacking police officers and even attacking fire crews as they're trying to put out fires. this is criminality, pure and simple, and it has to be confronted and defeated. >> reporter: now, he's promising more cops on the street but people are asking is that enough? cameron had also said there would be more robust measures taken, a lot of residents i'm talking to are asking if their curfews should be imposed in some areas, maybe water cannons, tear gas, even some are saying rubber bullets, whatever force it takes to get these looting and rioting under control so it does not go on for a fourth consecutive night. >> atika, i know the rioting started with the police incident but it's grown beyond that now, hasn't it? >> it definitely has.

you're right, it did start with the shooting incident of a young man in north london and his family and friends were very upset but they had a peaceful protest and the family has come out to say, they condemn this violence. they don't want this violence to be associated with their struggle for justice. but it does seem to have triggered some sort of deep, well-spring of anger, particularly among the younger generation here in london, but apparently also other cities. i'm in ealing, which is a pretty residential suburb. it's known more for its lovely houses here than it is for violence. look, we've got smashed in windows here and a fire brigade is up there checking the integrity of the building up there because a grocery store was set on fire last night. and again, this is an area right near by houses. a lot of houses were put in danger. several cars were set on fire. i spoke to one woman who had a narrow escape as she tried to drive away and kids set upon her

car. it's a frightening situation for people here and they want it to get under control. >> what are these rioters angry about? where is the anger coming from? >> you know, i have a'asked a lot of young kids this. they say it's a complete breakdown of communications and trust between the police, between the younger generation, but also anger about the fact they feel they have no opportunities, unemploys is high, benefits have been slashed and cut. many of the means they were able to get by aren't there any more. they feel ignored. when they vote for a party, they're almost the same thing, whether it's labor or conservative. there's a lot of deep frustration there building for a long time. >> atika shubert live near london this morning, thank you. it's like going from a shade of indigo to navy blue. that's what standard & poor's told investors on a conference call trying to explain its

downgrade of america's debt to aa+ for the first time from aaa. of the 126 governments that are rated by s&p, 18 are left in the aaa club. the u.s. is the world's largest economy but not in there. it has the second strongest rating, you can see aa+, belgium is like that, so is the united states, on par at least with those sort of countries, but an important point, the downgrade has not sent the u.s. falling into the cup company of european countries with serious debt problems like portugal, ireland, italy, greece and spain. those here, the bluer the country the lower its credit rating. debt problems in europe have been playiguing markets for wee. countries can regain aaa status. five countries have done it. canada, australia, finland, sweden and denmark and it has taken nine to 18 years to do so. a long time to stabilize their debt, but it can be done. ali? >> all right. the downgrade of the united

states is overwhelming any optimism that might have remained in these markets and there was some. joining me jim awad, the managing director of zephyr management. so good at making this clear. jim, first of all before this happened, before last thursday when we saw the leg down in the market because of some things that happened in europe. where was your sense of the economy and where it was going? >> the evidence was it was slowing decisively and decidedly. all the numbers show we are ratcheting down to a 1% to 2% kind of growth rate. some of the weakness in stocks is reflective of that fact and lowering of earnings estimates and gnp estimates. >> 1% to 2% growth rate is not a recession. there's a lot of talk about a double-dip recession. do you think that's likely. >> the risk is all the news with the downgrade, the debt ceiling, with the problems in europe, over the weekend, and continuing into this week, that consumers and businesses retrench and we tip from 1% to 2% growth into a

renewed recession. we don't know that yet. we'll know in a month or so. but the risk is that all of these headlines make businesses and consumers conserve assets rather than spend and invest. >> is that what they should do? what should somebody doing right now? >> as an investor i think you position yourself for a couple scenarios. the first is there is risk we have further economic deceleration on the downside that's not priced into stocks so you should have some cash. on the other hand, stocks are down a lot. large cap stocks have good dividends, are not expensive. the s&p is at about ten times earnings. you could gradually buy. >> let me slow you, s&p at ten times earnings the value of the collective -- the value of the stocks on the s&p, it's priced at ten times what these companies are going to make. >> right. and the long-term average -- >> that's low historically. >> the long-term average is somewhat higher than that. some estimate it should be 13, some estimate it should be 15

based on what time period you use. >> if there's one way of looking at this market to say it is under priced. it's a value. >> right. there are good dividend yields on many of these large cap dominant companies that have global franchises, good balance sheets and leveraged to the long-term growth in some of the faster growing economies like asia and latin america. so you can gradually buy some of those every day that the market is down. third, you have to say with all the debt in europe, with all the debt in the united states, the debasement of the currencies and people like the chinese and the indians wanting an alternative to euros and dollars you want to continue to own gold. it can have -- >> even at these levels? >> if you're long term. not to say it can't have a correction if the fed this afternoon comes out with a bullish statement and the markets rally gold may go down. the big picture is gold is assuming its position as a reserve currency along with the dollar and the euro. >> because money goes between these kinds of asset classes, right? if you feel you don't want to take risk on stock markets, people put their money into

treasuries and bonds and gold. where do bonds come into your -- >> in the short term they are a safe haven. you have to say in the long term, if a 2.5% yield on a ten-year treasury turns out to be a good return, then the world economies are in tough shape. so when i say keep some cash in case things are bad, i'd rather own some corporate bonds actually than treasuries but you can put some treasuries in there and hope that that's not your best performing asset over the long term. >> final question, if my viewers are in a diversified portfolio in their 401(k) and really nervous, should they sell anything? >> no stay put. think long term. it never pays to react to a short-term crisis like this. have your financial goals rebalance at the end of september as you should quarterly, see what's gone up, down, add to what's gone down, take a little money off the table of what's gone up and keep your eye on the long-term goal and diversification. >> you're not panicking about

this. >> you should never panic during periods like this. >> thanks so much. >> jim awad the managing director at zephyr management. still to come this morning, scenes of utter desperation from the famine in somalia. children among the most vulnerable. dr. sanjay gupta just across the border in kenya with one family's story. you're watching "american morning." it's 40 minutes past the hour. booking a flight by itself is an uh-oh. see if we can "stitch" together a better deal. that's a hint, antoine. ooh! see what anandra did? booking your flight and hotel at the same time gets you prices hotels and airlines won't let expedia show separately. book it. major wow factor! where you book matters. expedia.

it's schwab at your fingertips wherever, whenever you want. one log in lets you monitor all of your balances and transfer between accounts, so your money can move as fast as you do. check out your portfolio, track the market with live updates. and execute trades anywhere and anytime the inspiration hits you. even deposit checks right from your phone. just take a picture, hit deposit and you're done. open an account today and put schwab mobile to work for you.

43 minutes past the hour. welcome back to "american morning." the horn of africa is in the grip of a historic drought and famine this morning. the desperate situation in somalia has driven nearly half a million somalis across the border into kenya. it's made the dodd refugee camp the largest on the planet. i am not kidding. how big is it? you could actually see it from space in a satellite image. children as always are among the most vulnerable here. dr. sanjay gupta is live at that refugee camp with a report you will only see on cnn. good morning, sanjay. >> good morning, carol. you know, these children that you're talking about, they're so resilient as well. how do you take care of so many people in these sorts of

conditions, 400,000 people the number expected to go up in the middle of drought, in the middle of war and poverty. we're going to show you how. a story of a father's love for his boys. >> reporter: what you're looking at may best be described as the most desperate place on earth. vulnerab vulnerable, thick with misery. >> the other thing you can tell right away, when you see a baby here, you take a look here, the baby's fontinel so sunken in. this is what happens since the baby has had no food no water, dehydrated. basic, basic necessities, so hard to come by. dust and starvation, nearly everywhere you look. this is also what happens when you're at the world's largest refugee camp. all these folks waiting to see one doctor over here. [ speaking foreign language ]

as you look at these images consider this simple fact -- these are the lucky ones. lucky because they made it here at all. this family of five made it out of somalia just yesterday. came out here to the middle of the deserts to give you an idea of what the family went through. they walked for 30 days and nights, primarily at night because it was cooler carrying the three kids, carrying a kid, going back and getting another kid, in the deserts. 30 nights worth. they crossed the border and get robbed. bandits take what little possessions they have. but the bandits isn't take this father's dream. and his drive to keep his kids alive. it's not going to be easy. this is another thing you see here quite a bit. this child now, mohammed, 3 months old, looking listless, not active at all.

look at the breathing specifically. breathing with his abdomen, not so much with his chest. this is something that's very tiring for a baby, he also has whooping cough, pertussis because the child was never vaccinated either. he will need a hospital, oxygen, antibiotics, and yes, food and water. all of it may come too late. so painful to realize every one of his ailments could have been prevented. unfortunately, though, that hardly ever happens in the most desperate places on earth. 2,000 patients, people a day, at least, carol, predicting coming into these refugee camps. i don't think there's a hospital system in the world that can handle that volume. there are signs of improvement. you're starting to see more structures to the camp, getting more resources, but the key carol, talking to people on the ground, to be able to get the resources, just, you know, the basics, the food, the water, closer into somalia where these

people live as opposed to them making these incredibly long treks. they come here so incredibly famished. that's part of the problem. >> so horrifying. sanjay gupta live in kenya this morning, thanks. you can help. to find out how, go to cnn.com/impact. go there. you'll find out how you can help and get food and water to people in need in somalia. "american morning" will be back after a break. it's 47 minutes past the hour. every day, all around the world,

energy is being produced to power our lives. while energy developement comes with some risk, north america's natural gas producers are committed to safely and responsibly providing decades of cleaner burning energy for our country, drilling thousands of feet below fresh water sources within self contained well systems and using state of the art monitoring technologies, rigorous practices help ensure our operations are safe

and clean for our communities and the environment we are america's natural gas. a lot going on this morning. here is what you need to know to start your day. u.s. markets set to open in 90 minutes and could see a rebound after several days of pain. futures way up in all three major indices suggesting a higher open. after downgrading america's credit rating, standard & poor's may be the target of a senate banking decision. they may schedule a hearing into it. a occur can few in effect in philadelphia following several flash mob attacks in the city during the week kids under 13 will have to stay off streets by 10:00 p.m. and teenagers have a midnight curfew. it's an hour earlier on some hours on the weekend.

the mayor of philadelphia, michael nutter, will join us live the next hour to explain. a ♪ hungry eyes

one look at you ♪

♪ >> all righty. now is your turn to talk back on one of the big stories of the day. we ask you this question, are republican women unfairly criticized because you're women? the responses are literally pouring in. john says, of course, republican women are unfairly criticized.

it's not politically correct for women on this side of the liberal feminist movement to identify with traditional views because everything they do is scrutinized far more than even their conservative male counterparts. no, republican women are not unfairly discriminated against when they make an error. women do not get away with what men get away with. women have to be far more careful than men in their statements. unfortunately, the republican women you have mentioned aren't very careful or apparently very knowledgeable about our country, the constitution and history and nancy says if they can't handle the heat, pick up your apron and get out of the political kitchen. keep those comments coming. >> speaking of the heat. >> a town in texas turns off the water during the hottest time in the summer.

tempers are flaring. >> you're watching "american morning." 55 minutes after the hour. [ kimberly ] when i was 19, i found myself alone with two children and no way to support them. people told me i wasn't going to do anything. and i just decided i have more to offer than that. i put myself through nursing school, and then i decided to go get a doctorate degree. university of phoenix gave me the knowledge to make a difference in people's lives. my name is dr. kimberly horton. i manage a network of over a thousand nurses, and i am a phoenix. [ male announcer ] find your program at phoenix.edu.

that's not going to satisfy you. it's time for a better snack. here, try this. it's yoplait greek. it has two times the protein of regular yogurt. you'll feel satisfied. [ female announcer ] yoplait greek. it is so good. it's pretty good! ♪ fear knocking down markets

across the world. i'm christine romans. the orders to sell overseas coming in fast after wall street's worst day since 2008. so what can stop this stock slide and will it trigger another revegs. criminalality pure and simple. i'm carol costello. british prime minister david cameron condemning the riots and vowing rioters will be finished. >> i'm ali velshi. three solar blasts heading toward edge to mess with your gadgets. power companies being warned to brace for impact on this "american morning." ♪ good morning, everyone. it is tuesday, august 9th. maybe the solar flares can mess with the cell orders. >> futures in the u.s. might be breaking the cycle we have seen the last few days. >> a little ray of sunshine. woo-hoo.

>> in europe and asia, the selling that started last week keeps on going. >> follows the worst day on wall street in more than two years. dow down more than 635 points. steep declines as well in the nasdaq and s&p 500 add it up the market lost a trillion in value yesterday. this morning, like i say, we could be in for a bit of relief. right now, stock futures are trading decidedly higher be with you all know better than to make assumptions. >> stop! >> 90 minutes left to go before the markets open. >> richard equiquest, oil falli below 80 signaling some say very weak economies around the world. gold abover $1,700. stocks and interest rates falling in the united states. what are the markets telling us about what people think is happening in the world? >> fear, worry, and concern. that well-known firm of bed fellows are all rising strongly and exactly what this is. all of those things make perfect

sense when you look at the underlying economic numbers. a weakening manufacturing numbers in the u.s., the uk and in europe. you have weakening -- you have rising unemployment in many cases. you have large deficits in many countries. all of those, that combination of factors is absolutely toxic to investments and that is what you're seeing in the numbers. >> with all that happened in the last few days, people are starting to talk about the fall of 2008 when we saw difficult numbers. but let's just draw the distinction. you were down at the stock exchange yesterday talking to traders. back in the fall of 2008, credit froze up around the world. governments couldn't lend and banks wouldn't lend to each other overnight. we don't have that right now. >> you don't have it yet and i'm not sort of forecasting it but that credit seizing up followed on the other events so a

consequence that led to a much greater drop. you haven't got that yet and i don't think we will see that. keep your eye on the underlying numbers. the economies are weak and getting weaker. not the growth there to bring down unemployment and that is what is driving this -- >> i keep asking the same question. what do our leaders need to do, need to say today, tomorrow, to stop the slide? >> probably keep quiet would help. that would be the best thing. >> i agree, actually. >> the truth of the matter is, nothing they can say. this is a confidence question. this is going to take time. we came out of 2008 with the having the most rigorous brutal surgery, a leg cut off, an arm cut off. this was enormous surgery. it's going to take several years to get over it. it took japan several years. they made some bad decisions. many who believe that the united states is in its own lost

decade. >> we will hear from the federal reserve, the world's central bank. we don't expect them to change -- what can the feds say or should the feds say or do? >> let's put the blame where the blame lies. what can the fed do to not do what you guys did in europe. i won't say you guys, because you're british. but what they did to create the sell-off. >> refusing to actually engage in more easing. >> cost a lot of panic. >> enough of the blame game. really does. >> they worked here in the united states! >> what the fed can and probably will do today is hint at slight and greater easing, move things around. highly technical easing on the margins. the sort of stuff that will be buried in the statement, but that will tell the markets, that will tell the markets that the fed stands ready to offer whatever liquidity is necessary

and -- and -- and at least not do anything to make things worse. for instance the reinvestment of investments and longer dated maturities will ease the wheels of the market. >> we look for that at 2:15 in the afternoon. in general, we talk about what our leaders can do, carol. those on wall street who say, quite frankly, washington has too high hopes for how much control it has over markets. they think that markets live and die -- >> why blame washington for our credit problems? >> what you say? isn't that what we do around here, we blame? >> yeah. >> ladies and gentlemen, you see the blame game in full swing! >> no, it's tough. richard quest, thank you so much. >> thank you. coming home. the bodies of 30 american troops killed in a weekend helicopter crash in afghanistan are scheduled to arrive at dover air force base today. many are gathered for a private ceremony. the chopper was reportedly shot

down by insurgents. it is the worse single day loss of life for u.s. troops since the afghan war began. 10-year-old braden nichols wants america to remember his fallen hero. his father was piloting the chinook helicopter that was shot down in afghanistan. he sent us a photo of his dad, brian nichols. that is brian all the way to the left there. braden says he couldn't understand why navy s.e.a.l.s who perished on the chopper were getting attention but not his own dad. brian nichols was scheduled to come home on leave in just nine days. >> wow. the rioting that has locked london three straight nights has spread to three other cities. david cameron is condemning the violence calls it criminal it's and says those response for it will be punished. cameron cut short his vacation to deal with the unrest. he says 16,000 police officers will be on the streets of london by tonight.

philly teens are warned to stay off the streets at night after a string of youth mob attacks. the mayor michael nutter laid out a curfew already on the books but now saying it will be enforced. children under 13 home by 10:00 p.m. and teens 13 and 18, home by midnight. tougher on weekends. everyone under 18 has got to be at home by 9:00. anybody not at home by 9:00 is going to face a fine. he warned parents to hold up their end of the bargain. he used blunt language to warn the black youth of the city. >> damage you damage yourself, you damage another person, you damage your peers and, quite honestly, you damage your own race. >> strong words from philly mayor michael nutter. he will be with us at 8:40 eastern on "american morning." another person who competed in the new york city triathlon has died. the race director says the 40-year-old woman from illinois died after having difficulty swimming. it's believed that she went into cardiac arrest twice after the

swim on sunday. this is the second death from the competition. both triggered during the swimming leg of that race. diana yyad's attempt to swim from cuba for the florida keys is over. she called it quits early this morning after 29 hours in the in the morning. she was suffering from severe shoulder pain and asthma. nyad was trying to make the swim without a shark cage and be the first person and almost made it halfway. >> which is pretty incredible to get that far. >> i would say. a mysterious orange goo washes ashore in an alaskan village. scientists say they cracked the case. tell you on the other side. legendary penn state coach joe paterno taken to the hospital after a receiver ran into him during practice. >> he is one tough guy. >> he really is. michele bachmann is brushing off her so-called wide-eyed cover on "newsweek" but did they

go too far? >> a series of solar blasts slam into the earth and it could disrupt your gadget. lots of news ahead. it is 8 minutes after the hour. ♪ [ woman ] jogging stroller. you've been stuck in the garage while i took refuge from the pollen that made me sneeze. but with 24-hour zyrtec®, i get prescription strength relief from my worst allergy symptoms. so lily and i are back on the road again. with zyrtec® i can love the air®.

it's schwab at your fingertips wherever, whenever you want. one log in lets you monitor all of your balances and transfer between accounts, so your money can move as fast as you do. check out your portfolio, track the market with live updates. and execute trades anywhere and anytime the inspiration hits you. even deposit checks right from your phone. just take a picture, hit deposit and you're done. open an account today and put schwab mobile to work for you.

♪ today i don't feel like doing anything ♪ ♪ i just want to lay in my bed ♪ >> my theme song for today. i want the markets to be fine. >> how many straight days have you been working? 17? >> ali just wants to go home and take a nap. >> i'm going to sleep with this on my ipad. >> awesome! welcome back to "american morning." it is official. the hottest summer ever in texas and oklahoma. noaa says the average temperature near 90 for may, june and july and for the entire day! in the middle of this historic heat wave, one texas town has turned off the water, leaving residents boiling mad! >> you tell them that this old

woman is hot down here! and not just because of the heat! 107 degrees and my blood because you people and those people down there will not get off their did you have and fix this stuff! >> sister. city officials in camp made an emergency decision to shut off the town's supply on sunday. the city says underground pipes haven't been updated since 1930 have been rupturing in the intense heat. they are giving bottles water to residents at city hall. >> you talk about ways to like get things moving, could you have some sort of infrastructure program to get stuff like that fixed? >> it reminds us when we are seeing the jobs being done and we are being diverted for it, that these things have to be done. by the way, just going to put it in there for all of that stimulus everybody says didn't work, it did do a lot of that

kind of stuff. >> not in kemp, apparently. >> not in komp. a warning that a solar storm will mess with your gadgets. noaa is alerting power companies that a solar storm is coming after three large explosions from the sun in the past few days. it could affect communications and gps satellites and all i know about that. >> rob marciano is in the extreme weather center where he knows everything about solar flares. >> we saw lights over the weekend because of that flare. that is the bonus of that kind of stuff. it can mess with satellites. i think the danger from that particular solar storm is over but as we get toward the solar maximum the next couple of years could see it more frequently. be prepared and we will let you know when it's coming. told you about the drought. this is a footprint in the drought monitor. the deep, deep red is the largest footprint we have seen for exceptional drought since we have been keeping track of this

stuff 12 years now. it looks like, what, big foot is big. big footprint for sure. it's ridiculous. looking at heat that continues to evaporate water out of that soil, more heat advisories and heat warnings out for the southern plains. notely, dallas. 108 expected again today. we really don't expect much of a cool off the next several days. i thought it would break down but it is on the east coast as a couple of fronts pushes off the east but hangs tough in south texas and the desert southwest. storms across parts of the allegheny and into delaware and philadelphia and new york city here over the next couple of hours and they will intensify as we get heat ahead of the storms and cause travel delays. atlanta will have delays and new york metros this afternoon heavy rain with the thunderstorms and delays up and over an hour or two. let you know when the next batch

of northern lights is coming. a sight to see, especially up there in new york and further north. >> love the northern lights. excellent, by the way, if we are getting heavy rains in new york. as we heard from the song when we came in here, today, i don't feel like doing anything, so i'm happy to sit there and watch the rain. >> you deserve it. >> rob, you said something that i didn't understand. >> solar maximum? >> what is that? >> it's a cycle of -- 11-year cycle. so we were at the low end a couple of years ago and now coming out of that. as we get towards the higher end, the sun becomes more active and see more sun spots and we will see those increasingly the next few years. >> you lay that over and you have your buy and sell signals. >> is there anything with you people that is not connected with markets? >> we can make everything business. we could have a business story about orange goop. >> maybe it is, in the long run.

who knows. they have to clean it up and use money from the economy. anyway, talk about the mist riff of the orange goop because it has now been solved. a mysterious orange substance was washing up alaskan village last week. no one knew what it was. noaa says it's millions of eggs possibly those of a small crusttation. they are trying to figure out if the species of the eggs are toxic. the mystery of the orange goo is solved. >> seems like a lot of mystery still in there. will it hatch and millions running around? >> sounds horrible! lady, your motor is chirping. firefighters are a strange challenge yesterday. they had to free a parrot stuck inside the grille of a car! a woman came to the fire station

saying she hit a bird and assumed it was still in the road and then she heard chirping. firefighters took apart of the front of her car to rescue the bird and it was taken to a nature center for a physical and turns out it was okay. it must not have been hit. maybe it landed and got itself stuck in her grille. >> it was protected by the grille. maybe a good thing in the end. >> i'm glad it turned out all right. we need more bubble bath. she is called a bather and cleaned in a hamburg, germany lake. the sculpture is 6 1/2 feet tall. she will be taken up by a crane after she gets a bath. moving alone. let's talk about soccer. >> real madrid, one of the

greatest soccer clubs in the entire country has gone to grade school to look for a new talent. the team signed a 7-year-old prodigy out of argentina. how good is this kid? he already goes by one name. leo. espn says the kid will begin training with real madrid in september and if all goes well, he should be ready to see action between seven and ten years from now. >> no word on how good he is at his multiplication tables. >> a little weird. i assume he is getting an education for all of these years instead of kicking the ball around to ten years. >> who needs an education? legendary football coach joe paterno was hospitalized after being blindsided at practice. he is doing fine and conducted his morning coaching meeting from his hospital bed. paterno has been the head coach at penn state since 1966.

now is your chance to talk back on one of the stories of the day. are republican women unfairly criticized because they are women? we hear it a lot. a double standard when it comes to criticizing politicians who are women. michele bachmann who has had a few missteps with historical facts says yes, she makes mistake but unlike liberal politicians she does not get a pass from the media. she said it is something he and other conservative women like sarah palin have to deal with. >> she has been unfairly criticized and i think that we have seen that with other conservative women as well. across the country, whether they are political commentators or whether they are in public service. >> this morning, conservatives are fuming over the latest "newsweek" cover that shows a startled looking bachmann with the title "the convene of rage." one blogger says can anyone say what the main street media is biased against conservatives?

bachmann critics haven't been measured. remember this from jay leno? he holds nothing back when it comes to the so-called mama grizzlies. >> michele bachmann is under fire claiming the founding fathers eliminated slavery. sarah palin is upset. another female republican trying to steal the dumb ass vote? >> politics is tough for both women and men. the talkback question today is are republican women unfairly criticized because they are women? respond to us at the following web addresses and we will read back some of your comments next hour. we are "minding your business" next. we will tell you how it looks like markets will be opening in about an hour. 20 minutes after the hour. a lot of times, things are right underneath our feet,

and all we need to do is change the way we're thinking about them. a couple decades ago, we didn't even realize just how much natural gas was trapped in rocks thousands of feet below us. technology has made it possible to safely unlock this cleanly burning natural gas. this deposits can provide us with fuel for a hundred years, providing energy security and economic growth all across this country. it just takes somebody having the idea, and that's where the discovery comes from.

you have arrived. sweet belt. e-reader for textbooks. gps. video camera for lectures. game pad. have you considered this ? it's got all that and more than 200,000 apps. technology to learn and play on-the-go. only at verizon. android powered. playstation certified. the xperia play by sony ericsson. only $99.99.

24 minutes after the hour. "minding your business" this morning. u.s. stocks took a beating yesterday and uncertainty continues today and volatility in premarket trading for u.s. stock futures this morning. right now dow, nasdaq, s&p 500 futures are trading higher ahead of the opening bell. as you know, they are down sharply the past few weeks. gold prices another record high overnight. investors rushing to the security of that precious metal amid the economic uncertainty right now. gold up $40 to $1,754 an ounce. that is almost 3% spike. economic concerns worldwide have pushed oil prices down more than $10 a barrel in the past week. just two weeks ago, it was up near $100 a barrel. they settle $83 yesterday. that could mean lower gas prices for you ahead but it signals concern about the global economy. investors waiting for a decision on interest rates today from the federal reserve in washington.

after its meeting, they will make a statement at 2:15 p.m. eastern time. economists surveyed by briefing.com expect rates remain unchanged. no surprise 0% is what ben bernanke says in a statement that is important. all right. up next, president obama's numbers continue to tumble and should politic and religion mix on the campaign trail? "american morning" will be back after the break. ♪ i've been waiting ♪ for a snack like you

♪ to come into my life [ female announcer ] lean cuisine has snacks! like creamy cheesy spinach artichoke dip with warm pita. new from lean cuisine®. the eagle flies at dawn.

the monkey eats custard. price-line ne-go-ti-a-tor. so, you've been double crossed by other travel sites and now you want to try the real deal. yes, is it true that name your own price... ...got even easier? affirmative. we'll show you other people's winning hotel bids. so i'll know how much to bid... ...and save up to 60% i'm in i know the lady in leather travels on three wheels. wait, is that code? that's my secret weapon... ...naomi pryce see winning hotel bids now at priceline. a network of possibilities. in here, the planned combination of at&t and t-mobile would deliver our next generation mobile broadband experience to 55 million more americans, many in small towns and rural communities,

giving them a new choice. we'll deliver better service, with thousands of new cell sites... for greater access to all the things you want, whenever you want them. it's the at&t network... and what's possible in here is almost impossible to say. ♪ don't you know? it's going to be stormy in washington this morning. actually, later today. right now, it's 81 degrees but thunderstorms later! i'm not kidding! >> going to be 95 later. markets taking a beating the debt crisis lingering the president is trying to reassure

americans he's on the case and soundsing a theme we probably will hear through november 2012 insisting he inherited these economic problems and made worse by the debt crisis in europe. here is what he said. >> i intend to present my own recommendations over the coming weeks on how we should proceed. and that committee will have this administration's full cooperation. and i assure you, we will stay on it until we get the job done. >> right now, a lot of americans don't approve of how the president is getting the job done. president obama's approval rating stands now at 44% in the latest cnn poll. >> 54% of americans disapprove of the job he is doing. >> rick perry made it clear he is running for president this weekend. on saturday, the governor of texas made stops in south carolina and new hampshire, neither of of which are in texas. hhmm. both early primary states. >> his supporters are hoping to

hear an official announcement or at least they want a strong hint he is running for the white house. earlier on "american morning," erick ericsson said a perry candidacy could spell trouble for front-runner mitt romney. >> if perry comes in, the field probably starts to consolidate behind a guy like rick perry and he will probably be able to get into a position to make it a one-on-one race with mitt room know in much case mitt romney doesn't stay as competitive as he has been. >> on saturday, perry will be in new hampshire and south carolina at the same time other gop candidates are battling it out in the ames straw poll in iowa. politicians like rick perry and michele bachmann have been taking a lot of heat in blurring the line between religion and politics. are they going too far? joining us from baton rouge, louisiana is tony perkins and

organizer of last weekend's prayer vigil hosted by rick perry and jonathan merit is also with us, from cross point church in georgia. welcome to you both. >> good morning. >> good morning. >> tony, let's start with you. your organization is supporting a values voter bus tour. on board, republican candidates santorum and pawlenty and maybe bachmann. with the state our country is in how much should religion play into politics at this particular time? >> well, i think it guys a lot of what especially social conservatives and evangelicals do with their vote. nearly 40% of primary voters are evangelicals. a survey showed that over the last 20 years, their value set has changed very little. while concerned about the economy they view it through the

lenss of the family and the teaching of the church and they understand that when marriage fails, families fracture, government grows, and taxpayers pick up the tab. so they are concerned about the economy, but they know that the family is important when you talk about the economy. >> jonathan, you're uncomfortable with this values voter bus tour. why? >> you know, i'm uncomfortable because of exactly what you heard right there. we have a long list of christian organizations who have -- around election year time, they have been gathering up christian voters and they give candidates access to them and then the candidates begin to sort of use religious language to reassure us that they are one of us, that we can trust them, and what is unfortunate is it allows the christian community to be reduced to nothing more than a voting block. you heard the statistics he was quoting, that sort of speak to that sentiment, and i think, as christians, we should be treated

with more respect than that. we are not just a voting block. >> tony, i don't think you and jonathan will agree but let me ask you this. >> well, no, i actually do aagree. >> then go ahead. >> i do agree with him. we are actually more than a voting block. we are a group of people, a very large group of people that do vote that view government from a much broader perspective than election time. when you go back to the debate over health care and back back over many of the debates, even the debate issue that was just debated social conservatives were very much involved in that because they understand the impact it has, not only on their family, but on the future of this country. so that conversation begins at election time but it continues. i mean, michele bachmann is a great example. >> tony, what we have to recognize, there is a rich history here. this is a history that goes back especially prominent in the last few decades of politicians, presidents, and senators using

carefully crafted religious language in a way that doesn't always resonate. i remember when i was a college student and i picked up a copy of george w. bush "charge to keep." all of my nonchristian friends thought, what a great title. but i knew it was more than that, because it was a line borrowed from an old wesleyham. as a christian, before i even opened the first page, george bush was telling me i could trust him! he was one of us. i think christians, especially in my generation, we just want to be respected a little bit more than that. >> let's move on to a different topic. tony, i don't think jonathan is going to change your mind and vice versa. evangelicals have not been entirely successful in attaining their agenda. they feel like they are losing influence and easy to see why. abortion is still legal and don't ask don't tell is almost history. as you size up this presidential field, who do you think will not just talk the talk, but walk the walk?

>> well, first, let me go back, because i don't agree completely. we have made great progress over the last 20 years on moving america toward a more pro life nation. in the educational process on the value of marriage and the importance of the family is ongoing. so you don't see any white flags going up here. but i think what you actually see in the election process, and, you know, i agree with jonathan. you got to be careful, because some simply use the language, but increasingly, you're seeing candidates not just using the language, but people who share that world view. i think you see rick santorum, i think tim paw leapty, michele bachmann, they have that world view and they govern from that world view and they do care about the broader society. >> who would be your candidate? >> well, you know, i'm going to have them all on the bus so i'm not going to pick anybody just yet. we do have a straw poll at our summit in october and i'm not making any moves until after that. i will tell you i'm pleased with the number of candidates that are out there that are speaking

to a broad range of issues, including the economy, including the family, including the value of human life, and so i think we are making great progress. and i'm very optimistic about this election cycle and i think you're going to see more people coming out of the churches to vote because of the concern they have over the direction of this country. >> jonathan, i just want you to have the last word here. as a christian, in your mind, who is the most sincere candidate when it comes to religion? >> you know, that, for me, i think, everybody can make up their mind. this is not really a question that i'd like to answer, but i would like to go back to something he said earlier, because we disagree on this -- the christian community, right now, is in something of a crisis and if you do look at the opinion polls, it all points in one direction. people do feel that christians are too political, when we continue to conflate religion and politics it hurts us and is contributing to a sharp decline in church attendance in america and we are losing influence. any way that you look at it, any

measurement you use, the goals that were set out by the religious rite three decades ago have not been aplisheds and i think that is call to us who bear the name jesus christ to say maybe we should reconsider our tack tickets and our tone. >> interesting conversation. thank you for both of you being with us. >> riveting conversation. more interesting conversation. i'd love to hear more from these guys. coming up next, very interesting story. police officers are scrambling to deal with flash mobs of rampaging teenagers in philadelphia. a teen curfew that is on the books is going into effect. we will speak to the mayor of philadelphia about why and what he has got to say about it after this break. from that to london riots. police verse gangs in great britain. the violence intensifies and spreads. 37 minutes after the hour. air a whole new life! with aveeno nourish plus moisturize. active naturals wheat formulas target and help repair damage in just 3 washes.

for softer, stronger... ... hair with life. [ female announcer ] nourish plus. only from aveeno.

new video just in to cnn showing some of the burned out buildings in london after a third straight night of street violence and looting. police say last night's unrest was the worst in recent memory. riots are now spreading beyond london to three other major cities. this is really -- >> these are major cities! major cities. >> it's a whole housing block there. >> british prime minister david cameron calling it criminality, pure and simple and promising to crack down on riots. >> let me first of all, completely condemn the scenes we have seen on our television screens and people have

witnessed in their communities. these are sickening scenes, scenes of people looting, vandalizing, thieving, robbing. scenes of people attacking police officers and even attacking fire crews as they are trying to put out fires. this is criminality, pure and simple. and it has to be confronted and defeated. >> cram ron says 16,000 police officers will be patrolling the streets of london tonight. as the streets of london erupted and violence for a third straight night, journalists and photographers came under attack too. cnn's dan rivers was one of them. >> we are going to hold our line behind us here. we are going to have to move. thrown out. if you can still here me, a few bottles thrown at us there. we're okay, though, we're okay.

yeah, that's the danger. you know? as soon as people stray down this road, it erupts in violence. >> wow. >> he was outfitted in a helmet, body armor as he was covering that rioting. one of the scariest things to cover is hurricanes and rioting. >> because they both have an uncontrolled element to them. >> exactly. it is inpredictable and incredibly dangerous. >> i was surprised cameron was on vacation when this was happening and took him three days to come back and confront this mess. this is serious stuff. >> i saw it the first night. it seemed isolated. second night, whoa, what is going on? that is when he made the decision to come back. >> i think he also called parliament back too, right? so they are working on the problem. >> legislators you're saying should come back from their recesses to deal with issues that might be -- >> carol thinks -- >> carol thinks there is a message in there. >> 43 minutes past the hour. we will be right back!

uncertainty running rampant on wall street. right now, futures for the dow, nasdaq and s&p 500 trading higher ahead of the opening bell. the federal reserve meets this afternoon' investors paying close attention to see if it has anything to say about the economy and whether the nation needs to adopt a new stimulus program right now. a somber day at dover air force base in delaware. 30 u.s. troops sent home after

their hospital was shot down over the weekend. the ceremony will be private and for the families. texas governor rick perry could officially announce he is running for president this weekend. he will be be making appearances saturday in havenew hampshire, south carolina. two critical early primary states. forecasters say may, june, and july the warmest months in history in texas and oklahoma. dallas could set a nationwide record on saturday with 43 state days of triple digit heat. flares could disrupt power and gps and cell phone signals with a solar storm. diana nyad called it quits earlier this morning after 29 hours in the water. she was trying to become the first person to make the 103-mile swim without a shark cage. you're caught up on today's headlines. "american morning" will be back after the break.

. ♪ [ male announcer ] you've reached the age where you don't back down from a challenge. this is the age of knowing how to make things happen.

so, why would you let something like erectile dysfunction get in your way? isn't it time you talked to ? 20 million men already have. with every age comes respons. ask your doctor if your heart. do not take viagra if you tak, as it may cause an unsafe dro. side effects may include headache, flushing, upset stomach, and abnormal vision. to avoid long-term injury, seek immediate medical help for an erection lasting more than four hours. stop taking viagra and call your doctor right away if you experience a sudden decrease or loss in vision or hearing. this is the age of tak. viagra. talk to . see if america's most prescribed ed treatment is right for you.

♪ ♪ my heart is fried i just can't get you off my mind ♪ ♪ because you're love >> thunderstorms later in new york city and 85 later. >> i don't mind! i'm betting i don't have to work. all right. no surprise kids are spending more time on facebook but it may not be a healthy habit. this sounds like old people story. >> yeah. >> until it gets, you kids, stay off the facebook! new study finds teens and young adults who check the site once in a 15-minute period are more likely to get lower grades and tend more narcissistic.

>> get them off facebook because it could become more of a gnar is a cystic. >> it makes stuff more central to you than without facebook. >> i show the other analyses kids have poor self-esteem seeing people doing great things and a study is a study is a study, right? >> i heard people our age is on facebook now more than kids. what does that say about us? >> i don't know what you want to do carol. >> you want to fall asleep. >> you give me advice? >> forget about counting sheep. the trick may be soothing sounds of monkeys. >> what? >> monkeys. you heard me right. a british poll found 1 in 5 people prefer listening to the sounds of a rain forest when trying to fall asleep. one reason officials say is the sounds of birds and monkeys tend

to stop intrusive thoughts that can keep you awake. tonight, today, when you go home and try to go to sleep -- the sound of monkeys is not like the sounds of the ocean that you can get. >> they are saying the rain forest which tends to be one of those things they include on those little machines. maybe i didn't realize it was monkeys i was listening to. >> exactly! the little screeching sounds! >> we like the monkey sounds. one man got a serious wake-up call after a much-needed physical. he walked out of his doctor's office with medications for high cholesterol and high blood pressure and at that moment he decided to become a part of the cnn's "fit nation" challenge sto story. >> reporter: you're a doctor. you're on the front line of a childhood obesity academic that people talk about quite a bit. you decided you wanted to not only preach about this but to practice it as well, is that right? >> yeah, yeah. >> reporter: tell me what inspired that. how did you decide to do a

triathlon? >> i just decided to do something. it just happened to be a triathlon. but, you know, as i was talking to my patients who are overweight, i realized that, you know, i needed to listen to what i was telling them, and, you know, i needed to set a goal for myself. something in the future to inspire me to do that. >> reporter: a year ago, could you have imagined yourself doing this? >> no way. >> reporter: what changed? and what is the lesson for other people out there who say no way, i'm never going to do that? >> for me, it was just to start, to just make that first drive to the club and get on a treadmill and start walking and then do it the next day, the next day and just build on that. the key really for me was to just start. >> reporter: your body changed significantly. how much weight did you lose? when is the last time you weighed that much? >> i've lost about 60 pounds. i'm under 200 pounds for the first time in 20, 30 years. i'm not even sure the last time i weighed under 200 pounds. physically, i've changed.

>> reporter: you're also off all of your medications. as a doctor, this is important because a lot of people get the cholesterol medication and blood pressure medications. you don't always need them if you diet and exercise. >> if you diet and exercise, you can get off them and i was able to do that. i talked to my vooed, my family history was kind of against me and i realized the genetics was against me but not my family history. you can change your family history by diet and exercise. >> reporter: a remarkable thing. dr., thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> back to you. >> snirsal story. thanks, sanjay. teens in philadelphia warned to stay off streets at night. mayor michael nutter says he is enforcing a curfew after a string of violent and random attacks by flash bombs. here to you talk about the curfew is philadelphia mayor michael nutter. mayor, thank you for being with us. >> ali, thank you. >> i want to talk to you not just about the curfew, you're

doing it from two ways. you're getting tough. you're saying you're going to get tough on kids who are out there rampaging. you have another message for parents and these kids that you delivered at your church this saturday. i just want to play that for our viewers. >> you damage yourself, you damage another person, you damage your peers and, quite honestly, you damage your own race. >> i've heard you talk tough before. that was pretty tough. how did that go over? >> well, actually it went over very, very well. that was at my church at mt. caramel baptist church in philadelphia and been a member there 25 years and i was married there and i have long history with the pastor, reverend campbell. but, ali, it was also a very balanced message and i think the folks at church and since then have really gotten it. that teens need to make better decisions. parents need to step up and take care of their children. we, as a government, cannot

raise people's children. you want to have children? you have to take care of them. we can help you. we provide services, support, all kinds of stuff, but we are not going to tolerate this kind of senseless, stupid, ignorant, violent acts, even he sepisodic as they may occur in our city. we are a growing international city and offered positive things to young people. like extending the hours of operation for about 20 recreation cities centers across the city and community members are stepping up and participating with us in our i pledge campaign and volunteering their time especially on the weekends to make sure the people are safe. >> on july 29th, this is probably one of the most serious one, a flash most be or -- i don't know who they were but they beat some strangers up. >> random group of young people. >> 11-year-old boy was arrested. how do you combat that?

you got the policing to do that? have you got the technology, the methodology to know where these kids are going and how to intervene? >> well, certainly, i mean, i won't say on tv here, but we certainly are trying to be more anticipatory about things and not just reactive, so we engage in the social media, facebook, twitter and other ways that young people are communicating and getting much more information. this is really about personal responsibility. again, young people making better decisions, being more engaged in positive activities which we are trying to provide as a city, but, ultimately, this is about what is going on at home. what are parents doing with their children? do you know where your child is? i mean, we have a thing, you know, when i was a kid that was on tv, i brought that back. you know, it's 10:00 at night. do you know where your children are? that is really something that people need to think about and deal with and if you, again, need help, our department of human services, our community behavioral health services and

other social service providers, we can provide help and support for parents. look. it's tough to raise kids. i have two kids. one is a teenager right now. i have an understanding of what of our parents are facing but others are in very challenging situations and i appreciate that and understand that, but there is no excuse for young people being out so late at night by themselves and then making bad decisions and literally assaulting other citizens. i will not tolerate that and that is what we are doing. it's tough love. there are some stick, but there is a whole lot of carrots that go with this. if young people get themselves together we will have a positive summer and safe summer and less than a month all will be back in school and things will be better for them but we are not tolerating any nonsense. that's over. >> mayor nutter, as you know, i'm one of those people who like walking around center city, philadelphia. >> i know you do. we want it to be safe for you and everybody else. i haven't seen you in philly lately. you need to get back here. >> i'm on my way back. mayor michael nutter, thank you. >> thank you. >> 57 minutes after the hour.

yoo-hoo. hello. it's water from the drinking fountain at the mall. [ male announcer ] great tasting tap water can now come from any faucet anywhere. introducing the brita bottle with the filter inside.

♪ ♪ i'm back in the saddle again ♪ ♪ out where a friend is a friend ♪ [ gulps ] ♪ where the longhorn cattle feed ♪ ♪ on the lowly gypsum weed ♪ back in the saddle again see how affordable an rv vacation can be. visit gorving.com and watch a free video. go affordably. go rving.