now. this is cnn breaking news. >> well, everybody, right to that breaking news coming to us from indonesia this morning. 8.6 earthquake hitting off the coast of the indonesian island of sumatra. the video just in to cnn shows the powerful quake being felt in banda aceh. you'll remember that's the capital of the aceh province which was devastated back in 2004 in the tsunami that hit around christmastime. people evacuating to higher ground. tsunami watch issued for much of the indian ocean area. many residents have been ordered to leave those low-lying areas. right to kathy quiano. what are you hearing and seeing from regions most at risk? >> we heard that the very strong quake, a magnitude 8.1 according to officials just hit the area. now, it's not clear this is an aftershock. the area has been experiencing

those after the first quake hit. some residents were told -- went back to their homes and shopped but again moving to safer ground after this very, very strong aftershock. authorities also say they're not lifting a tsunami watch or warning yet and still telling people to stay away from the coastline if possible and higher ground. there are no reports that a tsunami watch was from the first quake but still watching and monitoring and telling people not to return to areas near the coastline so maybe their homes and their shops. >> kathy, how long before they know? because we can remind folks about the 2004 earthquake and subsequent tsunami. that was a 9.3 magnitude earthquake, so we're talking about the first earthquake in indonesia today at 8.6. you just talked about an 8.1 potential aftershock. back in 2004, 9.3 ultimately

something like 230,000 people were killed. the damage was spread across to 14 countries. the waves were described in some areas as high as 98 feet and banda aceh sustained some of the worst damage. how long before they know if a killer wave and that's no exaggeration is coming that direction once again? >> well, earlier officials told us that they were going to wake about an hour and a half to two hours after the first quake hit. that's calculations based on the distance of the epicenter from the coastline saying a tsunami would have hit certain arias of the coast already but so far as i said again there have been no reports of that happening. so they were saying that about this time actually at about 6:00 local time they were going to lift the warning but with this new aftershock or earthquake

that just hit a few minutes ago that might change and we just expect the agency and officials here to keep the tsunami watch on for a bit longer. >> all right, kathy quiano joining us from jakarta. let's introduce our panel, john fugelsang and will cain and whenever i see pictures of this like banda aceh, i spent a lot of time covering that earthquake and the subsequent tsunami that came in. i was based in thailand and the damage was not to be believed. the water line, especially in phuket was just devastating doesn't even come close to it. so i'm always surprised it's an inexact science when the tsunami could hit. they're sort of waiting to see when they can clear people. >> for something with such devastation. unfathomable. your experience is

untranslatable to the three of us. i certainly didn't. the number, 230,000. that's just -- >> 14 countries. >> impossible for me to wrap my mind around. >> the weirder thing, even in the japanese earthquake, planes would buzz by and say, tsunami warning, tsunami coming, tsunami coming and that could be, you know, six inches or could be multiple feet. you just don't know. it doesn't look like anything. we would sit there and try to decide, do we run or do we stay with our live shot because often the warnings were don't turn out to be anything. crazy. >> in the case of phuket people had no way of knowing. my manager was on the beach in phuket and the folks on the beach had no idea it was coming. knew the earthquake was coming but it receded out so far people began running down to it, running to the waves just before it happened and he saved one child and was an able to save another child. those of us in the first world have no idea the effect of that earthquake, the photos on tv did no justice to it. >> devastation i think is often like that you sit there and you

could spend the entire time reporting it saying, the pictures you're seeing are not close at all to how bad this is. it's incredible. >> for the best here. >> we'll keep watching and tell everybody as we follow. it'll be interesting to see if the 8.1 that kathy was reporting after the 8.6 original report was a new earthquake or was that an aftershock. we'll keep watching it for you. other story we're watching, of course, is the latest in what is happening in george zimmerman/trayvon martin case. big question today, where is he? george zimmerman, everybody wants to know. his attorneys had this bombshell announcement that they're dropping the case. i spoke to them a few minutes ago. they said against their advice, zimmerman had reached out to talk to the special prosecutor angela corey. they said they were not revealing a confidence in telling us that because that's the advice they will give to any client, anything has to go through them. in the middle of negotiating these conversations with the special prosecutor when the special prosecutor called them and said, you know your client

called us. they hadn't been able to reach him at all so apparently he was reaching out to some news organization, as well. >> yeah, well, they might not have broken a privilege or confidence in relaying that information to you or ashleigh or zoraida. they might have have when they talked about his mental state. speculating on his mental state. everything we're hearing this morning, i think we're going to have a conversation later with jose baez, this is really walking the line on attorney/client privilege, speculating on his mental state. >> you've never met in person. >> calling these guys his lawyers is questionable at this point. i mean -- >> i say ex. >> even though -- >> they left the window open. they said if he wanted to come back, they would represent him yet again. >> here's a little bit of the interview i did and we'll talk on the other side. take a look. >> ethically the prosecutor said we can't talk to you, we know you have representation so we can't talk to you which was the right thing to do. they tipped us off, so it was

all done aboveboard and, you know, just so that we remain aboveboard we couldn't go on doing interviews and talking about the case as though we were representing george zimmerman when sometime around -- sometime on sunday, something changed. as of saturday, everything -- you know, the relationship i had with george zimmerman that we had with george zimmerman was good. we were proceeding, we were going on the shows and speaking out on his behalf and we were going to continue to represent him whichever direction the case went in the legal forum and that stopped and he failed to return phone call, failed to return texts. >> any clue -- >> i'll call you after 9:00. >> any clue as to what happened from saturday to sunday or anything that happened on saturday that tipped you off to what happened on sunday? >> no, nothing that i can tell, only, you know, that there was a website set up where he started collecting money and, you know,

he started contacting people outside. he was trying to call the prosecutor. all these things, i mean, him setting up his own website was fine because that makes sure -- i don't have any -- i never touch his money and that's good for me. the contacts with other people, probably would have been better if he waited a little while before he was making contacts but when he -- when he wanted to make his statement to the prosecutor's office, i didn't have a problem with him doing that either. there was just a process to go through. why, you know, and what happened over that period of time, i've been in contact with family and so on, i don't haveny answers as to what's going on. >> let us make it also clear, the website that we set up that we set up in conjunction with his father so that any money collected through that website would go directly to an account that we didn't have the ability to touch or do anything with was a family funding website, as well. >> so how often were you talking to him before you lost contact obviously between saturday and sunday? were you talking to him a couple

times a day, five types a day? >> it would depend on the day. sometimes it would be a couple times. sometimes it would be more than that. sometimes it would be just one time a day. but just to keep contact of what we were doing with the case, what we were doing as far as going on the different program, doing the interviews and trying to raise the public perception to trying to encourage the public to look at the evidence instead of jumping on the bandwagon to just, you know, sentence george zimmerman to prison or whatever else they wanted to do. to hear the facts of what happened and show that, you know, he really was agoing in self-defense that night. >> have you heard from george zimmerman ever since you've held that press conference? >> no. >> it's interesting. so you talked -- >> no times two. >> i gathered. you have talked about at the press conference that you believe that he seemed distraught to you. are you worried about his emotional state and his physical safety right now? >> yes, i'm still concerned

about george and his mental state and his physical safety. he was -- he is a good man, something -- a very tragic situation happened. it's been very distressful to him. i believe in his innocence. i believe that he was in this whole thing, that he was the victim and he -- of this, you know, when he was attacked and defended himself and now he's become the victim of basically the media has put an improper spin on this case and, you know, my concern is for him. and if he would want us to come back and represent him, we'd be glad to represent him but at this point he's making that impossible for us to ethically come out and say we represent george zimmerman then the next question is when was the last time you talked to him? we haven't talked to him and had communication in nearly three days now and we're left with no other -- nothing ethically we could do except remove ourselves from the case. >> so when you say you're worried about him, are you

worried that someone could injure him? are you worried that he could harm himself? >> i'm worried that someone is going to injure him. i don't have any indication he's going to harm himself. >> you said that you -- >> there have been -- you know what, there have been a lot of people, a lot of folks in the blogosphere and so forth who made statements way beyond responsible saying if no one else does we'll get justice for trayvon. those sorts of statements are troubling. we don't know, of course, from any one of them whether they're just a lot of talk or whether there's someone who has that kind of intent but if i were george zimmerman i'd be very concerned about it. >> do you know who he's been getting advice from? we've had an opportunity to talk to some of his neighbors and his friends who clearly were in some kind of contact with him and then they would come on the air and talk to us. who is he talking to? if he's not talking to you? >> i don't know. i would just be speculating if i did because he's cut off contact

with us, and, you know, if he wanted to -- i would have appreciated if he would have said, i think i'll listen to this person and not you and i don't want you to represent me anymore. that would have made it easier. instead it was, just, i'll call you at 9:00, then 9:00 comes and goes and there's no phone call, no text, no e-mail and because we have never met face to face, it was all communication through the telephone and text messages and e-mail and that's just been stopped at this point. >> have you talked to his father and i know his brother, as well, have been vocal in the media and sort of asked them, hey, you know, what's going on? where is he? >> yes, i spoke -- well, i've never spoken with the brother, but i've had regular contact with his father and they didn't have any information to share with me on that of why he's not calling me back either. >> you said something interesting yesterday, mr mr. uhrig, you said for those who think you'll find him he's far away from florida, of course, that meant for many

trying to decide was he on the run? was he hiding for his safety in the united states? has he left the united states? can you elaborate on that for me? >> sure, a lot of people are quick to jump to conclusions and usually the conclusions that they had before they heard the facts, all i was trying to represent is for those people who might be thinking about staking out family members' hopes or friends' homes and either endangering them or causing them any distress, no point in doing that. he hasn't left the country. he's not going to flee. he wouldn't have called the prosecutor's office and asked to come in and tell his side of the story if he was fleeing, clearly he is represented to us, routinely that if he is charged, he will turn himself in. we have no doubt, no reason to believe he's changed his mind about that. but the fact that he's hiding for his own safety shouldn't be interpreted to be that he's hiding from the authorities or planning to flee. >> you said you have seen evidence that could change the course of public opinion and i know you don't want to get into the specifics, but can you categorize it for me?

what can you say about that evidence? is it physical evidence from that night that the police are holding on to. is it someone's version of the stories as an eyewitness that might come forward and say something? what are you talking about? >> there's a lot of evidence that hasn't been released yet. i think once everyone sees that, if they'll even look at it because, quite frankly, there's evidence out there and no one is paying -- is looking at all the evidence. they're taking bits and pieces and drawing the conclusion that there was a murder and there wasn't. mr. george zimmerman acted in self-defense but when all the evidence is brought out by the police and everyone sees the whole picture they'll see that george zimmerman acted in self-defense and there are things we know that we've agreed not to disclose and i'm not going to disclose that now either. >> attorneys hal uhrig and craig sonner, they used to represent george zimmerman telling us today they no longer represent him. they haven't talked to him since saturday. haven't had a conversation that was scheduled for sunday and they are dropping him as a client. but as you said, john, it's

always open so that could change. still ahead on "starting point," lesson number 98, why you shouldn't walk and text because there could be a big giant black bear in front of you. this is the bear. yeah, that one right there. that's glendale, california. it's our get real this morning. plus rick santorum bows out. says the work, though, isn't over. does that mean he'll jump on mitt romney's bandwagon to unite the party. we'll talk to the santorum campaign about the next step. heading out to work you don't need to miss the rest of the show, check it out at c cnn.com/startingpoint. do you love the sun? i do. director: [ sighs ] cut! sorry to interrupt. when's the show? well, if we don't find an audience, all we'll ever do is rehearse. mae you should try every door direct mail. just select the zip codes where you want your message to be seen, print it yourself, or we'll help you find a local partner and you find the customers that matter most. brilliant. clifton, show us overjoyed. no, too much. jennessa. ah!

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"i'm with scottrade." ♪ [music] many republicans didn't feel that santorum could win the general election and that coming out against birth control lost them the female vote and coming out against internet porn lost them the male vote. it's hard to win when you lose both the male and the female votes. those two blocs are pretty strong, yeah. yeah. >> jay leno. so much fodder when it comes to

the election year. santorum called his bid for the presidency a miracle after miracle. but this morning, the former senator is out of the presidential race. here's what he said. >> we made the decision to get into this race at our kitchen table, against all the odds and we made a decision over the weekend that while this presidential race for us is over for me and we will suspend our campaign effective today, we are not done fighting. >> big question now is can you go from saying mitt romney is the worst republican in the country to take on president obama to then saying everyone should go vote for mitt romney? alice stewart is the national press secretary of senator rick santorum's 2012 presidential campaign and joins us this morning. thanks for talking to us. we heard senator santorum say last night he's not done fighting. what literally does that mean? not done fighting. >> well, he has a lot of work

yet to do. he had a nice conversation with governor romney yesterday and vowed to do what he could to help, help coalesce conservatives, both social and fiscal conservatives, to rally behind the presumption tiff nominee that's more than likely appears to be governor romney because job number one is to defeat barack obama in his big government ways. just as important as defeating barack obama, we also need to help elect republicans up and down the ballot. we need to elect conservatives in the house and senate because it's critical that we have not just in the president -- the white house, but throughout congress we need conservative voices and we need conservative causes pushed and because we don't need to further agendas like obama care and the buffett rule. these are not the direction we need to be going in and rick will fight to make sure we have a conservative voice in washington. >> saying there's opportunities for help on a lot of fronts. will he stand up and endorse the former governor, mitt romney, who was at one point sort of an

archenemy, i guess. he didn't say that in his remarks yesterday. >> well, certainly they were competitors over the past several months and what you do is you show the contrast but what he assured governor romney yesterday is that they'll have conversations in the next few days and weeks to come and he has vowed to do whatever it is that governor romney needs to help him defeat barack obama in november because that's important, and whatever he needs him to do, whether it's speaking, acting as surrogate work but rick has made a great name for himself and set himself up to do great things for the conservative cause in this country and he can go out and reach out to conservatives both the evangelicals and social and fiscal conservatives and bring them together because that's truly what we need, the obama re-election campaign is going to be a tremendous force. they've got a great amount of money and not to mention the fact he's got the power of the incumbency behind him so we need to rally behind the conservative cause and republicans need to get together to take on barack

obama. >> so when you look at analysis of how the race went and you pointed out sort of looking back what people say about senator santorum, others say he elevated social issues on the campaign and in some ways, pushed the governor romney to the right on these issues all on the record and that, in fact, governor romney could pay the price for that later. do you think that's a fair assessment. >> rick ran his own race and what he did, he stood up for the views and values he stood for and showed the contrast, you know, how that affected governor romney will, you know, remains to be seen. what he did, he showed that rick was a consistent conservative on these issues and at the end of the day what it boils down to is that mitt romney has more of the popular vote. he certainly has more of the delegates and he's in a good space to get the magic number of 1144 sooner rather than later and he has earned the spot where he is and earned the support of the republican party and it's incumbent upon the rest of us to

rally behind him to work together as a team to beat barack obama. >> how do you undo some of the things said? i'll play a little chuck. kind of a best of or worst of depending on how you look at it and answer on the other side. >> i'd love to get one-on-one with governor romney and expose the record that would be the weakest record we could possibly up up against barack obama. governor romney can on the same page as president obama. he didn't tell the truth about what he did. do you really believe this country wants to elect a wall street financier as a president of the united states. >> he is the worst republican in the country to put up against barack obama. >> he was talking about health care, as you know, on that last one but those are going to be, one, tough to take back, two, certainly going to appear in ads that the obama campaign is running, i would guess. >> as you know, soledad. that's in the heat of a primary and the job of all the candidates is to show the contrast where rick defers from

governor romney. that's exactly what he was doing. but as we stand now, the most important thing we can do is to put up the strongest republican to beat the president and that's exactly -- >> but he's not going to say none of those things were true. he said governor romney is on the same page as barack obama on these issues. he didn't tell the truth. do you really want to elect a wall street financier? he can't get up and say, you know, those weren't true, right? >> the fact moving forward is that what rick is going to do is he doesn't have to go back and retrace his steps. the job now is to look forward. what we can do to empower mitt romney to coalesce and bring conservatives together because he has said now he wants to repeal and replace obama care and that's important as we're hearing with the supreme court arguments that hopefully the supreme court will strike down the individual mandate because that's important and mitt romney has vowed that he is going to do what he can to repeal and replace obama care. that's going to be an important

step and he is certainly and the polling indicates people trust him more to handle the debt and deficit in this country and that's what people are concerned about as we traveled across the country. people talked about jobs and the economy and repealing obama care and mitt romney already has the support of people across this country that he can do a better job than barack obama in these key critical issues that people want to see a change in washington. >> but it sounds to me, alice, what happens now when you move out of sort of the primary, you reset, you know, and that's kind of an etch a kesketch thing, th same point the governor's people were making when they talked about etch a sketch, that was then this, is now. we hit the reset. we shake the etch a sketch and we start again talking to different audiences. is that what you're saying to me? >> no, what i'm saying is the people have spoken. as we said, we've said yesterday in his speech that he made the decision to spend the campaign based on personal issues but also political reasons. looking at the delegate map it

didn't appear the numbers would add up and the people have spoken and decide that mitt romney is -- >> i hear you on that. >> it's incumbent on us to do what we can to empower him and bring continued support behind him in whatever is necessary to take on the president. >> how do you say someone's the worst on something then turn around and say i embrace him and now he's the best on something. >> as you said, what rick was referring to in that particular sound bite was on obama care. >> i'll read a different one. let's pick a different one. governor romney is on the same page as barack obama on all these issues. the weakest record we could put up against barack obama is governor romney. how do you say that one day and the next day turn around and say, yeah, you know, i'm resetting? that wasn't true. >> the key is looking forward. the key is doing what we can to rally behind mitt romney. as i said, i'll repeat it again, the people have spoken. they made it quite clear they trust governor romney to take on barack obama and we need to do

everything we can to rally behind him and give him the support he needs and polling has indicated people trust that he is better suited and has the ideas to take on the debt and deficit than the president and that's what people are concerned. they want someone in there not who is going to impose the buffett rule and tax the wealthy creating jobs or want someone that will force health care on them but will create jobs and turn the economy around and not force big government on them and they have seen that mitt romney is the best person to do that and rick will do everything he can to make sure that he can get that job done. >> alice stewart is with the santorum campaign. thanks for talking with us. we appreciate your time. still ahead on "starting point," an oblivious texter wanders right into a bear. you're going to want to stick around as we get real this morning. we leave you with will's playlist. robert earl king feeling good again. you're watching "starting point." [ male announcer ] this is the at&t network.

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morning, welcome back, everybody. breaking news to start w a massive 8.6 magnitude earthquake has struck off the coast of indonesia. some new video coming in to cnn shows the impact of the quake in banda aceh. if that name sounds familiar that's, of course, the scene of that catastrophic earthquake and tsunami back in 2004. so today people in the low-lying areas are being evacuated to higher ground. the quake triggered a tsunami alert for much of the indian social and there are reports that there's been at least one powerful aftershock, a magnitude

8.2 earthquake. the president of indonesia says there's no reports of casualties so far in the aceh province and you'll remember back in 2004 that earthquake was a 9.3 magnitude quake and the swells of water in some places of the 14 country as teched back in 2004 were as high as 98 feet. going to update you throughout the stories and the headlines and christine romans has that for us. >> other stories we're watching. new developments from north korea. the communist country has begun fueling a long-range rocket for a planned launch time this week. pyongyang insists this rocket is designed to put a satellite in orbit and not as the u.s. and south korea believe to test a missile that could carry a nuclear warhead as far as hawaii and alaska. u.s. officials say north korea's launch would violate a u.n. resolution and have threatened to take appropriate action.

the race to save nine trapped mine workers in peru. rescue crews scrambling to get these miners out. peru's president is at the mine right now leading the rescue operation and told the miners they could be free in hours. they've been stuck underground for seven days after a collapse at that mine. the men are reportedly in good health. they do have access to oxygen, food and water. but they have been trapped now for seven days. dozens of wildfires raining all along the east coast this morning. scorching thousands of acres. officials say close to 100 fires are still burning just in florida. firefighters also put out a fire on eastern long island on the grounds of the brook haven national laboratory, a nuclear physics facility. several homes were damaged in that area, as well. new york governor andrew cuomo declaring a state of emergency there. the gsa is canceling an upcoming conference in las vegas in the wake of its spending scandal. the gka now under investigation

for spending more than 800,000 taxpayer dollars at a prior conference in vegas in 2010. eight gsa workers have been removed. the now acting administrator says the gsa is working to restore trust. >> we're committed to doing all that we can to make this situation right and to restore trust with our client agencies and with the nation. >> the gsa is also suspending an awards program. employees of the agency were given ipods, digital cameras, other electronics. that violates the employee gift limit. soledad? >> all right. well, i'm not surprised. they're canceling that conference. >> me either. >> i'm surprised they're announcing it now as opposed to last week. christine, thank you. the timing of rick santorum's exit from the republican race comes just as the president hits the road to sell his plan for the economy and taxes. two issues which could very likely define the 2012 presidential rails.

the obama camp on the attack against mitt romney and the head of the president's re-election team jim messina says this while calling himself the ideal candidate for the tea party he promised to return to the same policies that created the economic crisis and has alienated women, middle class families and hispanic americans. we have the deputy communications director. thanks for being here. when you see jim messina says, should we take this as a sign of where the president is going to attack mitt romney? appeal to women, appeal to middle class voters, appeal to hispanics? is that it in a nutshell. >> i'll say rick santorum ran a formidable campaign on a shoestring budget and it really speaks to the strength of his candidacy, but also the weakness of mitt romney's as his inability to connect with people across the country that the primary went this long. what you saw from what jim messina's comments and from the president is laying out the choice that the american people

will have in november. who are you fighting for? what are you going to do to help the middle class continue to prosper and that's what this campaign is going to be focused on for the next eight months we have to go here. >> a few minutes ago from ail cyst stewart from the santorum campaign and polling supports which she says is the focus is going to be economy, economy, jobs, economy. when you look at polls and here's an abc news poll about the economy and people are asked who do you trust on the economy, it's mitt romney who leads. 47%. to president obama who is at 43%. if, in fact, that's the focus, people aren't polling saying women's issue, not saying middle class issues specifically. they're not saying latino issues, isn't this a big problem for the president? >> well, look, the president inherited the worst economic crisis in a generation and millions more people are working today because of the bold steps that he took. another interesting number in that poll was mitt romney is -- has a double-digit deficit on his inability to connect with the challenges people are

facing. people don't think he has empathy. don't think he understands the challenges that middle class families are dealing with every single day. and that's a real problem for him as he looks ahead to the next few months. >> hey, will cain. he pointed out the president's strategy will be to appeal to hispanic and women in part. but also one of the things we know now one of the strategies is going to be talk about the buffett rule and fair share, paying your fair share in taxes. would you please define what "fair" mean. >> we could talk about that all morning. i will say that the buffett rule, you saw the president talk about this yesterday. tax law is complicated. this is really simple. there's no reason that my mother-in-law who has been a teacher in cincinnati for more than 30 years should be paying twice the rate of mitt romney. this is not his full solution for tax reform. he wants to do a lot more. but this is a down payment. it would save $47 billion which is small, but, you know, it's nothing to sneeze about and it also instills fairness.

what it means is everybody paying their fair share. everybody contributing. >> you just repeated fair. i think this is the problem. fair seems to be a highly subjective word. you said it means paying your fair share. that doesn't define what it means in an objective sense. >> here's what we know is not fair. mitt romney is paying a 14% tax rate. middle class families are paying a 30% tax rate. that's not fair. >> so when you talk to somebody like -- >> define fair pretty easily. >> let me before our panel gets into it and i have to break it up, let me ask about what orrin hatch said about the tough buffett rule. it was designed for no other reason than politics. i hope he will stop the class warfare and put out real proposals to reform our broken tax code. >> well, here's an area where they agree. president obama absolutely wants to reform the tax code. he has called for that. he has announced a number of

steps he wants to take. this, there's no reason why millionaires should be paying a lower tax rate than middle class families. that's the question i would pose back to senator hatch. why is that fair? why is that a rule we should keep in place in the tax law. >> the problem a lot of progressives have is he ran in 2008 promising to make the rich pay their fair share and the americans signed on to that and it didn't happen. why does this president never bring up the fact that the american people in 2008 voted for exactly what he's campaigning on right now? >> well, i think putting in place the largest tax cuts, middle class families, 160 million families benefitted. >> not talking about that but increasing revenue and letting the bush tax cuts inspire. at the end of this, this is bush's tax increase. they were designed to expire in 2010. >> when they expire in january it will be $160 billion in revenue. that's something he is committed to making sure happens. >> okay, but he doesn't bring up the fact that the american people signed on for this and

makes a lot of people question whether he's committed to it. >> let me add to that. what yon is getting to is that where there is some frustration among people who for years ago were obama supporters and for vent obama supporters who look at a track record of saying some of these things weren't done. how do you deal with those voters if you look at the actual polling the president has chipped away at some of these. >> if you look at the speech the president gave when he won the iowa -- the nomination or not the nomination but won the iowa caucuses he has delivered on every single one of those promise, mutting affordable health care in place, adding the war in iraq. there's more work that needs to be done. that's why he needs to have another four years in office. he has done a number of things to make this country better, make this country better for middle class familiars. >> jen, it's ryan with "the new yorker." going back to what you said about inheriting the economy from bush, do you think at a certain point that argument just loses its salience?

almost 3 1/2 years into the obama administration. at what point do the american people just say, you know what, we don't care what he inherited? we want to know what he did himself and do you start to use that argument? >> the thrust of what the president talks about on the campaign trail and when he's out doing official events is about the steps he has taken since he came into office, the difference they've made and what we still need to do moving forward. what i meant when i said inherited, he came into office as we know and history tells us when the economy was in the worst state it had been about in in a generation. that's just the facts. i don't think it never has been, i don't think it will be his focus to talk about what happened during the bush administration. he's going to talk about the steps he has put in place and what it meant for workers and why people need top keep him in office. >> jen psaki, thanks for talking to us. >> have ia good day. >> we'll take you inside that

massacre inside afghanistan that happened at the hands of american soldiers. the first western reporter to go in and visit the villagers and talk to the children there who were witnesses. we'll many do that next. [ scott ] i grew up playing with little toy trains and now i build them. i am a bigger is better kind of guy. i absolutely love building locomotives. i knew i wanted to design locomotives from when i was very young. [ jahmil ] from the outside it looks like such a simple device. when you actually get down into the bare bones of it, there's so much technology that's submerged.

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it makes us proud. when we got married. i had three kids. and she became the full time mother of three. it was soccer, and ballet, and cheerleading, and baseball. those years were crazy. so, as we go into this next phase, you know, a big part of it for us is that there isn't anything on the schedule.

our get real this morning. the pit falls of texting while walking. people don't do it. who could forget the woman texting not paying attention and fell into the fountain. remember that poor woman? there she is. awful. right? then there was a woman we talked to on the show texting and fell into -- off a pier and had to have people jump in and rescue her. >> explains all of this, by the way. >> then there was this, a guy walking down a driveway. take a look. going the other way, if you will. yeah, yeah. that would be a black bear. >> they caught this on video. >> i had no idea.

>> there's been a black bear in glendale, california, and suddenly realizes this bear is heading down -- the bear loves meatballs and digging into people's garages. >> a friendly bear. >> what they said he was a bear digging into people's garbages. they were able to catch him and they -- >> you know what's good about it, this guy was telling his boss he was late for work. if that boss did not trust him, he trusts him now. >> that was me. that was me. there was a bear in my house. the funny thing, have you read the tweets from the bear? so someone has set up -- tweeting for the bear. and his name is glen bearian, need a spokesbear? i look cute on tv. i can sell more than just delicious meatballs. they eventually shot him three types with a tranquilizer gun and hauled him deep into the angeles national forest and he tweeted maybe they took a wrong

turn and ended up in my foress. vote glen bearian. read my lips, grr, grr. you don't think these jokes are good, john. >> no, i don't. no, i don't. >> i think this is hysterical. >> charming. i feel bad for the bear. glendale, the schools are fantastic. so hard for a bear to move into that neighborhood. >> i thought it's great and now, of course, he's safe. people really worried about the bear, he's fine. >> animal control was called to the scene. he's been there for awhile seeing him for quite a while. i'm afraid we'll see a lot more in this country. >> they knew his appetite. >> he knew the schedule of the dumpster trucks. they could tell he knew what homes to hit on what days because of the schedule. a smart bear. >> bears have calendar apps. >> i can bearly get enough of these techs. >> i'm out of here. >> still ahead on "starting point" -- we'll take you inside the afghanistan massacre that happened allegedly at the hands of an american soldier. the first western reporter to

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we've been talking about the breaking news happening off the coast of indonesia. people are worried about a potential tsunami possibly hitting some of the countries off the indian ocean. 8.6 quake rattling banda aceh and there are fears there could be another tsunami like the one that banda aceh experienced back in 2004. erin burnett has been vacationing in the maldese. what did you feel? >> we didn't feel anything here. i talked to some people that could feel it in india and other places. there was obviously immediate concern about tsunami. sometime in the next three or four minutes they anticipate a small wave to hit the capital of the maldives. this country was devastated by

the tsunami in 2004. what strikes me is the lack of a warning system and national participation. i spent the past hour in the command center where i'm staying and seen how they are preparing and it's actually been pretty amazing to see how it is so self-sufficient because there isn't a warning system. >> interesting to see that everyone is standing around waiting to see if there will in fact be a wave and how big that wave could be. back in 2004, the wave was as high as 98 feet in some places. do they have any sense what kind of wave you could look at? what does small mean? >> they actually don't. they are looking back. in 2004 here on the island, the wave was about four feet which completely in this country where the islands are only a couple feet above sea level had wiped out everything. they don't know and what they actually coupled together. i went in the command center where they were trying to figure things out with the general

manager of the resort where i am staying. they had cnn on which is an important source for them which is amazing. they were talking about cnn is the place they turn to. they also have an alert that they get immediately from the usgs. the usgs is clearly the number one source. the other sources whether it be australia, india, the capital of the maldives is not something they could look at. some areas have evacuated because they're not sure how big the wave is. they felt from the information they had that they didn't need to evacuate us here. this is based off talking to source these have and all this information that they pull together rather than a scientific knowledge. >> everybody is watching this. erin burnett stopping her vacation in order to fill us in on what's happening in the maldives where she is. thank you for the update. we appreciate it. still ahead this morning on "starting point," the special prosecutor in the trayvon martin

has a big announcement within 72 hours she's going to tell us what she will be doing. we talk to george zimmerman's attorneys this morning and what they said and s.o.b. as in soledad o'brien award. a woman fakes cancer so she can get the dress of her dreams. really? got to hear this story. that's straight ahead. short break. back in a moment. [ wind howling ]

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made with only milk... cream... a touch of sugar... and pure natural flavors. coffee-mate natural bliss. from nestle. add your flavor naturally. there are fears that a tsunami is coming. 8.6 magnitude quake hit off the coast of indonesia. people are headed for higher ground. it was the region hit hard back in 2004. george zimmerman's legal team has quit when the special prosecutor says she has an

important announcement to make within 72 hours. the lawyers say george left them no choice. listen. >> we haven't talked to him or had communication in nearly three days now. we are left with nothing ethically we could do except remove ourselves from the case. >> lots of news this morning as rick santorum drops out of the race. listen. >> while this presidential race for us is over for me and we'll suspend our campaign effective today. >> today is game on as mitt romney focuses his campaign and his cash on president obama. it is wednesday, april 11th. "starting point" begins right now. our starting point is this massive earthquake that's hit off the coast of indonesia. the earthquake was 8.6 magnitude quake rattled nerves in banda aceh and triggered fears of another tsunami like the one that devastated bo ed the area

2004. people are being evacuated to 2004 and there's been a second earthquake or aftershock, 8.2 been reported. the president of indonesia says at this point there are no reports of death or even destruction. a tsunami alert has been issued for much of the indian ocean area. a small tsunami hit the coast of thailand. maybe just inches in height. we're continuing to monitor this breaking story. we'll bring you the latest as it comes in. back to our panel this morning. we're joined by jon fugelsang. will cain is back with us. nice to have you deviguys talk us. big story. lots of news to get to. george zimmerman's attorney with a big announcement. a shocker as they said very publicly we're out. lots of questions raised by that of course. >> right. what does it mean? is he changing lawyers? is he a flight risk? why is he calling prosecutors on

his own? >> did he hurt the case by talking about inside information. >> right. >> if you are in legal trouble, do not call the team of sonner and uhrig. they did not make themselves look very professional yesterday. whatever you think of zimmerman to have your ex-lawyers go out there and reveal this personal information about yourself, i thought they were five minutes away from giving out the guy's cell phone in that press conference. >> do it as a press conference was odd. you can tell people were not representing him. >> it's made very clear that these are two attorneys addicted to camera time. i think you'll see them get on cameras as often as they can proven by the fact they concluded their press conference by saying they would be happy to represent the guy again. >> they are trying to figure out why they haven't heard from him. we talked to the two attorneys. they say that george zimmerman is not a flight risk. they also say when all of the evidence is out that they have access to that they are not releasing it will show that in fact george zimmerman was just

defending himself. listen. >> all i was trying to represent is for those people who might be thinking about staking out family member's homes or friend's homes and causing them distress, there's no point in doing that. he hasn't left the country. he isn't go to flee. he wouldn't have called the prosecutor's office if he was going to flee. >> when the evidence is brought out by the police and see the whole picture, they'll see that george zimmerman acted in self-defense. >> we could find out how important all of that forensic evidence is going to be. yesterday angela corey, a special prosecutor investigating the case, announced she'll hold a news conference by end of day on friday. brings us all to dr. lawrence who is a forensic scientist. it's nice to see you. thanks for talking to us. we have a lot to get to in terms of forensic evidence. you heard some evidence and a

lot is not by anybody presenting it but attorneys talking around it and about it. what's the big piece of forensic evidence that you think is critical that you would like to see? >> the missing piece here is the physical evidence and this is obviously a ballistics case. we heard very little about this pf-9 handgun used in this case. we need to know a lot about the gun. >> like what? >> very importantly, what is the pressure required to pull the trigger. it's designed for five pounds of pressure. that means this gun won't go off if you drop it or if your finger is on the trigger. it's going to go off when you pull hard. >> it wouldn't be a scuffle and accidentally went off? >> scuffles can happen and there can be two people on the trigger. it requires severe pressure, hard pressure. >> will they look at this gun and take prints off of it and

see direction of the prints and say listen, at the time the shot was fired, somebody's hand was here and somebody else's hand was here and this is clearly paint the picture of that last minute where nobody knows fully what happened? >> it's a good point. unfortunately you seldom get usable fingerprints off of handguns. you can get dna. if they do swab the gun down assuming there was no contamination the way it was initially handled, if they do dna they may find a single source. there may be a mixture of dna. there may be trayvon martin's dna on the trigger. all we heard is about eyewitness testimony and we know how unreliable that is. it's the physical evidence that is critical here. >> professor, george zimmerman's attorneys, his former attorneys, have suggested quite openly they have some evidence, something that when it comes out they say it will change this case. would you guess what they're talking about is something like you're talking about that has to do with the gun?

>> it's not clear. the evidence in this case is the autopsy. and we also have zimmerman's claim he was assaulted. >> let's talk about two those things. autopsy first. what would you look for? >> the autopsy is going to reveal the trajectory of the bullet and cause of death. cause of death is medical explanation. aorta was perforated. something serious of that sort. in terms of the tragejectory it would be upwards or left to right. distance is crucial. how close was the muzzle to the target. was there is contact? was it an inch? two inches. four feet? the struggle doesn't come into play. we're trying to use this evidence to either corroborate the story that zimmerman is telling or to disprove it. >> then we of course all saw the video of george zimmerman in the police station. we talked that it didn't look like he had any major gashes in

his head. you could see some kind of a -- there's some kind of cut or something on his head. clearly he hadn't been bandaged. >> let's remember that ems was called to the scene. they may have cleaned him up. you know, you really need to have an investigation, not a grainy tape, to decide whether he was hit or not. i think that's very crucial. whether you have forensics or not, we can't get into his mind. we don't know what was in zimmerman's mind. if he thought he was under attack and he's claiming that is true, what is the evidence to support it? if it turns out that he was assaulted and there was a broken nose and injury to the back of the head, it supports his story but we just don't know. >> you mention it's difficult to retrieve prints off a gun. if that's the case would zimmerman's father claim that martin was grabbing for the gun

not be provable? >> usually the prints are smudged or partial. dna on the other hand should tell us if there was a struggle and trayvon martin actually handled the gun. there are cells that sluff off the fingertips and i've seen it many times in small amounts. you can bring that up. it's a crucial piece of evidence. they should have taken the gun immediately. they should have taken the clothing immediately. even if they weren't going to arrest him, that's physical evidence at the scene. it should have been done. it hasn't been done. we don't know if it's contaminated. lots of questions. >> let me ask you a question about ptsd. the former attorneys in their press conference talked about how george zimmerman seemed to them to be suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. let me play first what they said. >> george zimmerman in our opinion and from information made available to us is not doing well emotionally. probably suffering from

post-traumatic stress syndrome. we understand from others he may have lost a lot of weight. our concern is that for him to do this when we has a couple professionals out there working as hard as we were for his benefit to handle it this way suggests that he may not be in complete control of what's going on. we're concerned for his emotional and physical safety. >> he may not be in complete control of what's going on. they're not shrinks or psy psychiatris psychiatrists. are they out of line? >> the attorneys need to stay away from cameras. the attorneys work is in the courtroom and in counseling their clients and not on tv. so the more they say, the worse it is for their client. zimmerman may not be as bad off as people think. he may actually be making some kind of deal with some high profile attorney that may handle his case pro bono. who knows. >> you never know what's going on behind the scenes. >> on the gun legally, when zimmerman left with that gun, could he have done anything he

wanted with that gun? >> he could have cleaned it off. he could have cleaned the barrel out. lots of things you can do to to ruin evidence. that's why we take that evidence. we package it. we preserve it and document it and that becomes a piece of evidence to come to court with. now it is compromised. >> nice to have you. we could talk to you for another two hours straight and dig into this case. thank you. we appreciate your time. let's get to christine. other headlines to get to. we're following more breaking news for you right now. the rescue under way workers are scrambling to get those trapped miners out in peru. you're looking at pictures that happened just minutes ago. peru's president is at the mine right now. he's leading the rescue operation. he told the miners this morning they could be free in hours. they've been stuck under ground for seven days after a collapse at that mine. the men are reportedly in good health with access to oxygen, food and water.

we are told that rescue is now under way. getting those guys out of there. a defiant north korea has begun fueling a long-range rocket it plans to launch in coming days. it says it will put a satellite in orbit at an appropriate time. the planned launch has ratcheted up tensions in the region. the u.s. believes it's a coverup for ballistic missile test. scary moments for 150 passengers on a jumbo jet that had to make an emergency landing after a bomb threat. they were en route from vancouver to seoul, south korea. the plane was diverted to a canadian air force base. the call came into a call center in los angeles. no explosives were found onboard. markets lear for the last

five days. investors are concerned about growth in europe and in china. a fresh survey from career cast out this morning ranking the best and worst jobs of the year. news reporter turns out to be one of the worst. but not the very worst at least. lumberjack, dairy farmer and enlist eed military soldier on e list. topping this year's list, software engineer, actuary and human resource manager make over 80 grand a year. they require a degree or some sort of advanced training. this is the latest ammunition in that college worth it fight. >> i knew where you were going with that. got to study now that the days of doing fine with a high school degree are truly over and that report sort of nails the nail in the coffin as they say.

thanks. appreciate it. ahead this morning on "starting point," the first western journalist to visit villages where an american soldier allegedly went on a shooting spree in afghanistan. you can hear from the children in that village about what happened. that's coming up. george w. bush making headlines by saying he wishes the bush tax cuts weren't named the bush tax cuts. we'll tell you what happened there. a special screening of the movie "bully." it was a screening for educators looking at the video from that movie. we'll tell you what teachers are learning from this movie coming up. short break. back in a moment. [ male announcer ] if you have yet to master the quiet sneeze...

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the army putting together a sanity board to look into what happened when a u.s. soldier allegedly went on a deadly killing spree in afghanistan. the sergeant's name is robert bails. he's charged with murdering 17 afghan villagers including nine children happening in the middle of the night a month ago.

the first western journalist that visited the villages and spoke to survivors who described in detail what happened. >>. >> reporter: as she watched her parents trying to defend off the intruder, he turned his gun on her and shot her in the leg. >> we're joined this morning by that reporter. how difficult was it for you to negotiate to get into the villages and then even sort of have the opportunity to ask questions of the villagers. >> well, i was initially denied access by both the u.s. military and the afghan army. as you can imagine, this was an extremely dangerous area to

travel into. after the attack the taliban was starting to use the area as a battlefield and they laid out booby traps and mines around the village and crime scene. it was difficult to convince the afghan army to allow me to go in. it wasn't until we requested that hamid karzai intervene and at that point we were given military access and support by the afghan national police who escorted us into the village. of course because i speak the local languages, i was able to gain the trust of the local people, the witnesses who opened up and gave me very heartfelt accounts of what happened on that horrific night. >> those accounts are heartbreaking. i want to play a couple different pieces and i want you to talk to me about them. the first one from a child that you interviewed. i will play what he said to you

and ask you on the other side about this child. go ahead. >> it's heartbreaking. when my father came out, he meaning the soldier, shot my father. then he entered our room. he shot us in that room is what he is saying there. what was it like to interview that child who literally has almost no emotion on his face when he's talking to you. >> absolutely. i mean there were some disparities between the story. a little girl said she saw numerous americans in her home and that young boy told me there was one american inside his

house killing his family members. it was difficult it listen to the traumatic stories and the trauma the children had suffered. sleeping in their homes and someone entered their house and began killing their family members. it was an extremely difficult story to listen to. >> here is another child. i'll tell everyone what this child is saying. he shot my father's dog first and then shot my father in the foot and dragged my mother by the hair. he held a gun to her. my father said leave her alone and he shot my father right there. let's play a little bit of what this child has to say. >> how many children did you

have an opportunity to interview and were their stories consistent outside of the number of soldiers issue? >> it was conflicted. i spoke to four witnesses in total. three of who were children. of course it's always difficult to know whether a child actually saw what they did. i spoke to one adult who told me about how her husband was shot in head and how she dragged him back into the house and his brains were in her hands. she told me that 15 to 20 americans were out in her yard. when she went outside to find out what had happened, they told her to go back inside or she would be killed too. that's the claim that she made. and like i said, there were some disparities in the story. there were several americans in her house said one young girl. it was only because i was able to speak the language and i was

a woman that i was able to get access to her. she told me there were several americans in her yard. of course the two young boys i spoke to, the other two witnesses, said only one american soldier entered their house and began to shoot at them. >> is it possible this could be a crime scene of any use? we know now that american authorities have gone in and swept the area a fair amount of time passed before they were able to get access. one would imagine even when you just sort of look at the circumstances and videotape that you have shot that the crime scene has been damaged in the sense of how do you gain physical evidence from it at this point? >> absolutely. the unfortunate thing is that because of islamic rituals, they bury the dead immediately. when i went into the villages, the scene looked different than the initial few days where images came out of those homes and villages. the blood stains had been

removed and washed away. the chief investigator appointed by president hamid karzai told me the whole area had been disturbed and so many people entered those houses since the crime itself it was difficult to know whose boot prints were whose and there were a number of american soldiers that entered the area or if it was one, it was difficult to know because the whole area had been disturbed by the time the investigators had gone in. >> yalda hakim, thank you for your reporting. and thank you for joining us this morning. we certainly appreciate it. >> thank you. still ahead this morning on "starting point," a special screening of the documentary "bully." it was held last night for educators. the president of the american federation of teachers joins us to talk about why he thinks it's crucial for teachers to take a look at this film.

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from behind closed doors in washington. you know what's exciting, graduation. when i look up into my student's faces, i see pride. you know, i have done something worthwhile. when i earned my doctorate through university of phoenix, that pride, that was on my face. i am jocelyn taylor, i am committed to making a difference

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>> come on. >> no. ow! >> that's a scene from a pretty potent and provocative movie

called "bully." it's a documentary and we've had an opportunity to speak to the director over the last couple weeks and that young man you see in the shot. his name is alex. we talked to alex and his parents last week. they did a special screening for teachers and policy makers and others because they wanted to see how they would be able to change culture in the school. you are president of the american federation of teachers. tell me about who was in the audience and what was goal of bringing the screening together? >> we wanted to do the screening in advance of friday's opening. it was opening in 45 cities. we need to drive people to see this movie. teachers, parents, kids. and then to talk about it because that's the way you change culture. so in the audience yesterday were teachers, parents, policy makers, kids and a whole group of organizations sponsored it

principally the teachers union to say that we must address this issue. >> why is it so critical for you? people might say that you're educators. let people work on the bullying issue. you do the education issue. >> kids deserve a safe and secure environment in school, at home, as they walk to and from school in their communities. kids are both resilient and fragile. and when kids get bullied, when they get taunted, when they have those kind of attacks at the age of this great fragility, they drop out. they get inward. they get depressed. and you see the human toll on children. and so people will say you can't teach kids if they're bullied. it's more than that.

it's our obligation to make sure people know this is not a right of passage and we have to turn this around. >> we talked to the kid that's the subject of a lot of bullying in the film. alex and his mom joined us on the set. i want to play what alex's mom said when she went to see the assistant principal who was no help whatsoever. >> i said many times before that i was embarrassed that i was getting bullied and so first thing to do would be to tell someone about it. if nothing gets done, then if it comes to the point where you had to stand up for yourself, do it. but unless -- try to get other people involved first to stop it. >> it's absolutely not acceptable. they are stabbing him with pencils and choking him. >> buses are bad places for lots

of kids. you know, i wish i could say i could make it stop on that. i'm not going to lie to you. >> if you think about it, it's an on thing. buses are notoriously bad places for kids. it's not prison. it's a school bus. >> we just honored one of our members, a school bus driver who was originally from west virginia. he saw it. he stopped it. like our little wristbands say. see a bully, stop a bully. >> was he authorized? >> no. he could have gotten in trouble. what he saw -- look, you have to use common sense. >> what's the goal with these? what do you do? you tell people, okay, one obviously awareness is part of it. what else? >> the goal of these wristbands and our campaign, everyone is doing a different campaign. the "bully" movie is a good piece of awareness. the goal is for all of us to own a piece of this.

if you're a school teacher, if you're a bus driver, if you wear a band like this, a wristband and kids see it and know it, they know that you are safe. they know you are a person they can go talk to and awareness by saying see a bully, stop a bully. if we all actually start acting like this is no longer a right of passage and unacceptable conduct, we'll stop it and change it. >> it's a pleasure to talk about this. i really own a piece of this. when i was a kid when i would go to administrators, i reached a point in junior high school where i stopped taking any teacher seriously if they used the word bully. one of the biggest problems we face is that bully is an outdated term that does not do justice to the kind of peer abuse and persecution these kids get. are there any schools with zero tolerance policies against this and why can't schools crackdown much, much harder on an institutional federally mandated level to make this happen? >> this is what's so -- it's not

complicated but this is what's so hard. sometimes -- take this movie. the kids getting bullied ended up being the ones who were penalized the most. like alex getting off the bus. we have to actually do three things. there has to be awareness. there has to be a lot of education about this is no longer a right of as package. awareness that stories are told so people know the human toll. the third is intervention strategies have to be about making sure there's a climate of safety in schools. both for the kids who have been taunted but also for the kids who are bulliers. there's a big red flag there saying i need some help too. >> sure. mo the movie opens on friday. thanks to talking to us. ahead on "starting point," breaking news. the earthquake off the coast of indonesia same region hit hard in 2004, there are several reports of tsunami waves now hitting land. just into cnn we'll bring you

those developing details. rick santorum is out of the race. after calling mitt romney the worst a bunch of times, is he going to hit the campaign trail with him? he'll talk to national campaign co-chair and governor of minnesota, tim pawlenty. his tim pawlenty's playlist. you're watching "starting point." back in a moment. can make a bi. like how a little oil from here can be such a big thing in an old friend's life. purina one discovered that by blending enhanced botanical oils into our food, we can help brighten an old dog's mind so he's up to his old tricks. with this kind of thinking going into our food, imagine all the goodness that can come out of it. just one way we're making the world a better place... one pet at a time. vibrant maturity. from purina one smartblend. how math and science kind of makes the world work.

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welcome back. we're following breaking news from indonesia. 8.6 magnitude earthquake has triggered fears of another devastating tsunami. people are running for higher ground in the same region hit by a deadly tsunami in 2004. walter is a spokesperson for the u.s. embassy in thailand and joins us by phone. good morning. thanks for talking to us. can you tell me the status of

the folks in thailand right now, sir? >> as always our biggest priority is the safety and security of american citizens overseas. immediately in the wake of the earthquake that happened earlier this afternoon, we sent a message out to americans living or playing in thailand. at this point we've had no reports of u.s. citizen casualties, which is a good thing. we're waiting to hear more from thai authorities. >> can you tell me exactly what the strategy is and what information you are being able to give people? are people all being moved to higher land or are you just watching the situation unfold? what do you know about the tsunami watches? >> well, a tsunami warning had been issued by the thai authorities for the indian ocean side of thailand's southwestern coast. that includes phuket and other areas popular with tourist. we urge all citizens who may be traveling or living in thailand to pay careful attention to local authorities and to monitor reliable media reports.

this is the sort of thing that may vary widely from one region to the next. >> phuket is where i was stationed during the 2004 tsunami and of course the aftermath of that earthquake there and it was absolutely devastating. i have to imagine you have terrified tourists coming to you and others who are trying to get information. what are you able to tell them this time around in comparison to back in 2004? >> well thankfully we haven't seen the kind of devastation that we saw in 2004. sadly we did learn a lot of lessons from that natural disaster and one of the biggest ones is people should keep in touch with their embassy. encourage everyone to go online to travel.state.gov and let us know when you are traveling and where you are traveling and we'll send information localized information to you. the american embassy in indonesia and american embassy in thailand have robust

presences online. check us out on twitter or facebook or our website, you can get a lot of information as well. >> all right. thanks for the update. we appreciate it. updating tourist and americans and everyone in that area in thailand. thank you. let's get to headlines with christine. good morning. >> good morning. more breaking news for you now. nine trapped miners rescued. just minutes ago in peru. this is new video from just moments ago. peru's president led the rescue mission. miners have been stuck under ground for seven days after a collapse at the mine. the men are reportedly in good health. seven days under ground. 24 states and washington, d.c. posting red flag warnings this morning. dozens of wildfires raging along the east coast. they are scorching thousands of acres. nearly 100 fires burning in florida alone. firefighters put out a fire on eastern long island on the grounds of the brook haven national lab. it's a nuclear physics facility.

andrew cuomo declaring a state of emergency there. george w. bush defending his tax cuts at an economic conference hosted by his presidential foundation. he says raising taxes on the rich would deplete the economic capital on those that create jobs. he said he wishes the bush tax cuts did not bear his name. >> i wish they weren't called the bush tax cuts. they are probably less likely to be raised if they were called by someone else. if you raise taxes, you are taking money out of pockets of consumers. it's important for policy makers to recognize that all the doubt about taxes causes capital to stay on the sidelines. >> bush also saying he would not publicly criticize president obama. the gsa is canceling an upcoming conference in las vegas in wake of overspending at a

conference in las vegas. the gsa is under investigation for spending $800,000 at a prior conference in 2010. the acting administrator says gsa is working to restore trust with the public. we initiated a complete agency-wide review of all conferences and events. we're evaluating the way in which we use our resources and identifying ways to be more efficient and effective stewards of taxpayer dollars. >> employees were given ipods, digital cameras and other electronics. congressional investigators say it violates the employee gift limit. >> and common sense completely. game on for mitt romney as rick santorum drops out. we will talk to tim pawlenty joining us live. stay with us. all energy development comes with some risk,

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politically speaking and then there were three. rick santorum is the only candidate close to mitt romney in the delegate count and he suspended his campaign. listen. >> we made the decision to get into this race at our kitchen table against all of the odds and we made a decision over the weekend that while this presidential race for us is over for me and we will suspend our campaign effective today, we are not done fighting. >> the question now is he going to put his support behind mitt romney? a candidate that he's repeatedly and pretty viciously attacked during the campaign. the former republican governor of minnesota is tim pawlenty and joins us this morning. he's mitt romney's national campaign co-chair.

nice to see you. thanks for talking to us once again. this morning i was talking to alice stewart of the santorum campaign and this is what she had to say about how it went down between rick santorum and governor romney's conversation yesterday. >> he vowed to do what he could to help to help coalesce conservatives, social and fiscal conservatives, to rally behind the presumptive nominee which more than likely appears to be governor romney. job number one is to defeat barack obama and his big government ways. >> what do you see as a role for rick santorum in the mitt romney campaign, sir? >> well, soledad, rick ran a hard fought campaign. he was an effective competitor. we want him and need him to be part of the conservative coalition and the effort by mitt romney to become the next president of the united states and highlight the flaws of president obama's time in office including this awful obama economy. we would welcome his support and

his endorsement and we anticipate and hope that he'll be onboard fully and i believe he will be. >> you have the whole track record, the videotape and transcript of the last number of months where he's been attacking and undermining governor romney. i'll play a clip of a small number of things that he said. >> i would love to get one-on-one with governor romney and expose the record that would be the weakest record we could possibly be put up against barack obama. governor romney is on the same page as barack obama on all of these issues. not only did he recommend the wrong policy for the country, then he didn't tell the truth about what he did. do you really believe this country wants to elect a wall street financier as president of the united states? he's the worst republican in the country to put up against barack obama. >> he's talking about health care on the last part. there are 200 more clips that we

could have run and how now is senator santorum face of the campaign for mitt romney? isn't that problematic? >> the face of the campaign for mitt romney is going to be mitt romney. the republican and conservative coalition is a coalition. we need all of the pieces to come together to make this a successful campaign. there's a grand tradition of people competing hard for party nominations. you look at hillary clinton and obama going after each other all of the way into june and then of course they become colleagues and work close together in the current administration successfully i might add. so people understand that you're going to have a competition. there will be some differences within a party nomination process. when you compare that to the awful record of president obama, the high unemployment, the terrible gas prices, his weakness in foreign policy, his misdirection and misguided approach to health care, rick santorum and all conservatives should enthusiastically get behind mitt romney as the most important goal here to defeat barack obama and get mitt romney to be the next president and get

this country headed in a better direction. >> governor pawlenty, one question on bringing the party together. would you recommend to mitt romney that he seriously consider making rick santorum his running mate? would you put him on that list of top contenders for that? >> well, i think there's going to be a big list of people to consider for vice president. there's going to be a lot of great people to pick from and governor romney i'm sure will make a great choice. it would be premature to say anybody should be excluded from that list and i'm sure in many people's minds rick santorum will be on the list whether he would be ultimately selected or not, who knows. a lot of people would say he's somebody who should be considered. i know governor romney hasn't started to put a list like that together in any formal way. it would be premature to speculate about it. >> good morning, senator. president bush was here speaking in new york yesterday. can you tell me one or two ways that mitt romney's economic

agenda is any way different than president bush's aside medicare part b and not invading iraq. >> if you look at governor romney's many, many chapter proposal on economic reform and enhancement. for example, look at his reforms for entitlements. what he wants to do to try to make medicaid and medicare more solvent and more viable going forward. those are significantly different than president obabus and have a lot to do with the economy. mitt romney has spoken strongly and directly about confronting china as a currency manipulator potentially as well as bringing more sanctions of the united states government in trade relations and export and inport relati relations with china. he has a significant tax policy to reduce corporate tax to take a 20% reduction off all of the income tax brackets. he's also got a more forward

leaning labor policy. so there's directionally it's a conservative direction but there's a lot of note worthy differences between president bush policies and governor romney's policies. >> thanks to talking to us. still ahead, today's s.o.b. as in soledad o'brien award goes to the bride who allegedly accepted donations because people thought she had a month to live. got wedding of her dreams and then it all fell apart. we leave you with will's playlist. "starting point" is back in a moment. what is? now, in every box of general mills big g cereal, there's more whole grain than any other ingredient. that's why it's listed first. get more whole grain than any other ingredient... just look for the white check. since ameriprise financial was founded back in 1894, they've been committed to putting clients first.

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welcome back. today's s.o.b., soledad o'brien. she was arrested for allegedly claiming she had cancer to get donations to pay for a fabulous dress. that was her dress for her wedding. her honeymoon. fake cancer scheme that lasted six months and then got thousands of dollars including an all-expense paid trip to aruba. she said she wanted to marry the

father of her young daughter before she died which would be in a month. the father was duped as well. once he realized several months in that she had lied, he filed for divorce and then helped the attorney general investigate her. she faces 24 years behind bars if convicted on all of the counts. the nicest thing is one of the women who really helped her with the dress and money and gave her cash sometimes and was a true supporter said i would do it again. even though she was duped. >> think about the emotional u-turn that husband went through. married the woman of his dreams -- >> read more of the story. they got back together and had another kid. >> i'll say it has a happy ending. >> i would only ever fake illness to get out of a wedding and not to have one. >> end point with our panel is up next. we're back in a moment. you ready? we wanna be our brother's keeper. what's number two we wanna do? bring it up to 90 decatherms.

how bout ya, joe? let's go ahead and bring it online. attention on site, attention on site. now starting unit nine. some of the world's cleanest gas turbines are now powering some of america's biggest cities. siemens. answers.

40 seconds left until the end of the show. who has end point for me?

ryan, do you want to start? >> santorum out of the race, talk about how mitt romney has trouble on the right. i don't buy it. his issues are in the middle and not on the right. >> you can't tell the untruth and millionaires pay less than secretaries. effective learn effective tax rate of millionaires is 18%. middle class it's 7%. >> every time george w. bush says his tax cuts created jobs an angel whispers in asia. >> i have 30 seconds left. >> i thought for sure we went over. >> they were very deep. i'm stopping you there. okay. we're moving on. thank you. i appreciate it to our panel. "cnn newsroom" with carol costello begins right now. see everybody else back here at 7:00 tomorrow morning. have a great day. good morning. >> that was deep. hi, soleda