top of the hour. i'm suzanne malveaux. want to get you up to speed. for the first time we read what osama bin laden was thinking. letters written by him were posted online by the combatting terrorism center at west point. they're among thousands of documents seized by the navy s.e.a.l.s who killed bin laden last year in pakistan. well, they show that he worked until his death to organize another major terrorist attack in the united states. he is probably the most famous guy in china today and the biggest headache for the chinese government. chen guangcheng remains in a beijing hospital. he now says he desperately wants america's help to get out of china and he wants to go to the united states where he believes he's going to be safer. chen is an anti-government human rights activist. chinese officials promise to leave him alone but chen doesn't believe them. he made a personal plea to president obama.

>> translator: i would like to say to him, please do everything you can to get our whole family out. i'm very disappointed with the u.s. government. cnn is continuing to seek comment from u.s. officials about chen's claim that he was mistreated and threatened by the chinese government. white house briefing is going under way now. let's listen in. they're actually talking about this activist. >> -- every time he has meetings with chinese officials, he says that broadly, but now we're dealing with actually one specific case. i'm wondering if this is a case where he's willing to, you know, risk perhaps damaging the broader relationship with china to take on this case or, you know, possibly face questions about whether he's putting geopolitical concerns, economic concerns ahead of human rights. >> two things to that. first of all, you're correct that from the president on down when we have this government, this administration has meetings

with chinese officials, as part of their discussions, issues of economic issues, security issues, regional issues, and issues of human rights are always raised. you may remember that president obama talked expansively about the issue of human rights in shanghai on chinese soil when he gave a speech there. so that is always part of our very broad and multifaceted agenda when we speak with the chinese. all aspects of that agenda that we have and the relationship that we have with china will continue to move forward as we deal with this specific issue. i would note on the matter of human rights that not just -- we do not just speak broadly about human rights but we have raised specific cases of human rights issues with the chinese on occasion. >> is the president concerned at all that this case could open him up to criticism though from

republicans? some republicans are saying now the president of the u.s. has a responsibility for chen's safety. >> i can assure you that the president is not concerned about political back and forth on this issue. he is focused on the need to advance u.s. interests in our broad-based relationship with china, very important economic, diplomatic relationship with china. he has and will continue to make it a priority in that relationship or part of that relationship, an open and frank discussion of our concerns about human rights, and that's his focus. it is absolutely in our national interest for us to pursue that kind of broad-based agenda with the chinese. >> one more question on that topic. why release the documents now? is this timed to the anniversary of his death? >> this morning west points combatting terrorism center

released 17 al qaeda geororigin documents. the documents were recovered from the compound where osama bin laden resided prior to his death. this has been a process of reviewing the documents. the u.s. government declassified them and provided them to west point for analysis and public release. it's the appropriate place to do that because the ctc has experience analyzing and releasing captured battlefield documents and has a strong reputation for its scholarly work on terrorism issues. the process of identifying them, declassifying them, reviewing and analyzing them require considerable time. it is also the case that because of the renewed interest in -- on this anniversary in the mission that led to bin laden's demise that this was deemed an appropriate time to release

them. yes, jeff. >> jay, has mr. chen and/or his family officially requested asylum from the united states? >> i can tell you as you have seen in media reports that it certainly appears mr. chen and his wife have changed their views about what's best for him and his family. i think as the state department has made clear in the discussions that mr. chen had with officials, state department officials at the embassy, he reiterated his firm desire to stay in china, to reunify with his family in china, to be relocated and our efforts on his behalf were in accordance with those wishes, to try to achieve those goals for him in our consultations with chinese officials. his views have changed as you have seen reported, but i can't comment on the ongoing discussions that he and his wife are having with state department officials or those officials are having with chinese officials. >> the united states is speaking

with chen and his family right now and presumably he's had the opportunity to -- >> again, these are ongoing discussions and i can't comment on them. state department because this is a state department issue, the nature of it, might have more details for you, although because these are ongoing i'm not -- it would be inappropriate to give a play-by-play of those conversations and consultations. >> can you comment on what the nature of the assurances were from the chinese government that he would be safe before he was released from the u.s. embassy? >> the state department will have more details for you on that. i can tell you that mr. chen repeatedly made clear that his desire was to say in china, to reunify with his family, and to relocate. as part of that we on his behalf had discussions with chinese officials. our u.s. state department officials in beijing had conversations with beijing officials to receive assurances and did receive assurances that

he would not be harassed upon release, and we made clear we would continue to monitor his case and be in touch with him as time moved on so that we could raise concerns if there were concerns that needed to be raised. beyond that i would refer you to the state department. >> is the president concerned that this particular issue could have a wider impact on overall u.s./china relations? >> as i said to julie, we have a broad-based relationship with china that is multifaceted that has an economic trade component, security component, a regional component, as well as a human rights aspect, and it goes beyond that even, and we are pursuing that relationship across the board, and we will continue to do so. this is obviously a case that's gotten a lot of attention, fairly high-profile, fairly

exceptional, and we are working on that issue, but even as we do, we, of course, have a very broad relationship with the chinese that we are continuing to pursue. >> mr. shannon has made it clear that he wants to in many interviews with reporters that he wants to leave china with secretary of state hillary clinton. is the united states willing to take him? >> as i said previously, there are ongoing conversations happening, both with mr. chen, his wife, with chinese officials. those conversations are being conducted by state department officials in beijing. i simply can't give you updates on the nature of those consultations. >> i'm just -- >> or what the outcome might be. >> is there a willingness? >> for questions about hypothetically seeking of political asylum, you would have to go to the state department. we are not at the white house, that is not an issue that we handle here.

that is a state department issue. and questions about political asylum and how it can be requested would be appropriately addressed there at the state department. we are in conversations now, not we, the state department, folks in beijing, and i simply can't give you a moment-by-moment update on that, but as we have more information or as the state department has more information, they will make it available. >> what is the response of the white house to allies of chen, human rights activists, who say that it appears that the u.s. has left him behind, abandoned him? >> well, ambassador locke spoke about this as well as toria newland at the state department. it's simply not the case. mr. chen made clear with his conversations in officials in beijing that he wanted to stay in china, was very clear about that. that he wanted to reunite with

his family in china and to relocate in china, and acting on those -- that expression of his wishes, state department officials negotiated with, consulted with chinese officials and reached the agreement that was reached. >> is it not true that before chen had this change of heart that the u.s. had thought there had been some sort of meeting of the minds, the chinese government had assured the u.s. that he would be able to relocate, that he would be safe, and then domestically within china, the chinese government put out a statement that suggested no such thing. that the united states was acting in a way that was inappropriate. so even before he had this change of heart, there was already reason to question whether -- >> you're listen to jay carney talking about the fate of the chinese dissident, mr. chen, who has been really a focal point around the world now. this is a blind lawyer who was

imprisoned in china for quite some time and under house arrest who recently escaped. he's been fighting the forced sterilization policy of women in china and again a lot of questions over whether or not the united states will be able to help him and what type of role the state department, including secretary of state hillary clinton, will be able in helping him. the secretary is actually over there in china along with the treasury secretary, both of them there, and again questions remain in terms of how they will be able to help this chinese dissident and make sure that he and his family are safe. we are getting more information throughout the hour from the state department. we'll bring you those details as soon as we get them. want to go to another story we're following. john edwards' fight to say out of prison. today, he is watching another ex-staffer take the stand in his campaign fraud trial. edwards' daughter left in tears during wednesday's testimony. diane dimond is a special correspondent for "newsweek" and

the daily beast and she's joining us live from greensboro, north carolina. first of all, we're going to talk about that testimony, that painful testimony that sent edwards' daughter out of the courtroom, but first i want to talk a little bit about what you are seeing today. >> reporter: well, the latest is three more staffers from the john edwards for president campaign have been on the stand. it was matthew nelson, john davis, and a very young man named jeff harris. to me it was john davis who was the most interesting. this was edwards body man. he went everywhere with him during the campaign. he told of watching fights with mr. and mrs. edwards where mrs. edwards was very upset that rielle hunter was anywhere around the campaign. he talked about thinking that she was gone from the campaign, yet several weeks later running into her in a hotel in detroit. saw her at the elevator bank, went up to his room. they said hello, just quickly. he went up to his room and she knocked on the door and came in

and said, look, i want you to know john edwards and i love each other very, very much. we are having an affair. he's very upset that you saw me here, and so please don't tell anybody that was the gist of it. the next day when he saw his boss, john edwards, edwards said to him this woman is crazy. you have got to keep her away from me. if she wants to see me, she has to go through either you or andrew young. she came up here to tell me she was going to go on television, q access hollywood or inside edition to talk about her job on the campaign. he wasn't asked but he pre-emptively said and i'm not having an affair with her. cut to the chase. there came a time later in new hampshire later in 2007 when the candidate had taken his body man's telephone and he went back up to the room to get the phone back. he needed to do some business on this phone. john davis said he was outside the door. he heard john edwards inside on

the telephone speaking loudly and saying to someone, he assumed it was rielle hunter, "are you showing yet?" which, of course, goes to clearly indicate he knew that this woman not only he was having an affair with her but that she was pregnant. not long after that he gave john davis is sealed envelope, a sealed fed ex envelope, and he said keep this for me. now, that had a telephone in it and apparently he was trying to hide the phone records between he and rielle hunter on that telephone. >> that's incredible detail just describing these conversations that are overheard and what edwards is alleged to have said. do we know what was so upsetting when edwards' daughter actually went running out of the courtroom? what happened there? >> reporter: you know, it was interesting because i was sitting right behind them. she rose, said something to her father, and he said, cate, cate,

cate, three times, but she ran out of the room. i couldn't see her face but others said she was wiping tears. she did not want to hear the sordid story that was about to be told about her mother and the story was this. on the tarmac in raleigh durham, north carolina, the two husband and wife met one day. they're going to go on campaign trips, separate campaign trips, with all their staff gathered around. elizabeth edwards was very upset and she said something like, you just don't see me anymore. whereupon she tore open her blouse, threw it off, threw off her bra on the tarmac in front of this gaggle of people as if to command her husband's attention. it was a really painful bit of testimony. john edwards hid his head with his hands. after his hands went down he kept looking down. the judge called a break right after that. it was a little early for a break, but we took a break and when he came back in the room, he was still angry about it. he said to his aides -- or to

his lawyers at the table, that was so wrong. this is supposed to be about a campaign financing case. so it was upsetting but i noted that the daughter was back today. >> i have never heard that story before, diane. is that something that just came out in this kind of salacious story and unfolded there in the courtroom? >> reporter: well, it came through a very dear friend of elizabeth's, and so cate i'm sure had heard it before from this very good friend and campaign staffer, christina reynolds. but if my memory serves me right, suzanne, that was written about in andrew young's book "the politician." >> how did the jury respond to that story? >> reporter: well, you know, as i wrote in the daily beast in a piece overnight, it was one of those moments in a courtroom, and i spend a lot of time in courtrooms, where nobody wanted to look at each other. you know. it was like the ugliness of the testimony was just settling in

like a cloud, and i looked at the jury, and they were -- they were like shocked and stunned. no one was taking notes. they were just -- a couple of them had their mouths hanging open. to imagine this breast cancer survivor, this woman, this confidant of this presidential hopeful being so anguished she would literally strip herself naked from the waist up in front of people, it was just heartbreaking. it was really heartbreaking to hear. >> it's an extraordinary story. diane, thank you very much for just bringing those details to us. it's just some of the things that really people, the jurors and many others, have not heard before. thank you, diane. here is a rundown of some of the stories we're covering over the next hour. mitt romney surging in vital swing states. we will hear the candidate live from virginia. and the barack obama you didn't know about. the president's half sister talking to cnn about the first time she realized she had a brother. >> i got this letter.

it was -- there was an address written on it with my name and the handwriting was very similar, very familiar. and i turned the letter over, and it had the name barack obama on it. and that was the name of my father. and he is suddenly the most recognizable man in china. more on the activist who tried to take on the country's one child policy.

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america's beverage companies are delivering. i tell you what i can spend. i do my best to make it work. i'm back on the road safely. and i saved you money on brakes. that's personal pricing. mitt romney's campaign getting a boost in virginia. this hour the event in portsmouth, virginia, expected to begin any minute. we'll take you there live. michele bachmann is going to endorse him now. romney is going to be campaigning with virginia governor bob mcdonald, one of

the people mentioned as a possible running mate. we'll wait for the romney event to get under way. i want to bring in jim acosta to talk about first of all bachmann's endorsement and what it means for the romney campaign. you have seen bachmann, she has a lot of strong support among tea party conservatives. do we think this is really going to help romney with the conservative voters? >> well, i tell you, suzanne, there are a few things going on today with this event down in virginia. i mean, romney is trying to shore up his support among social conservatives. they have been reluctant, some of them, to run to his candidacy now that he is the presumptive gop nominee. and michele bachmann will help with that. you will recall earlier this week there was this controversy over the resignation of a foreign policy adviser on the romney campaign, richard grenell, who happened to be homosexual. there were a lot of social conservatives out there who did not want him to be part of that campaign. he stepp epe eped aside he said personal reasons. you have mitt romney appearing

with michele bachmann at this event in virginia that will certainly send another signal to social conservatives that he's trying to be one of them. you will also recall, suzanne, that bob mcdonald, the governor of ji who virginia, also signed recently that required women in the state of virginia to undergo ultrasound procedures before having an abortion. so, you know, this is certainly a signal, a message being sent to social conservatives, that romney is coming for their vote, coming for their support. he wants them to be a part of this campaign. >> so despite that, jim, we saw that bachmann had some pretty harsh criticism of romney during the primary campaign, especially when it came to health care. i want to play this for our viewers. >> romney care is the blueprint, if you will, for obama care. in fact, mitt romney's advisers went into the white house in 2009 and sat down with barack obama's team as they were designing obama care. this is the seminal issue of

barack obama's presidency, and this is the chief liability that mitt romney has going into the presidential race. consider, he is the only governor in the history of the united states that is has put into place socialized medicine in his state. and that's going to be our nominee to stand up against president obama? >> so, jim, that was then. this is now. how does the romney campaign deal with that kind of very specific targeted attacks against him when it comes to his health care policy? >> well, they're saying look at michele bachmann now. she's on the stage or she's going to be on the stage with him in a few moments. this sort of thing happens in a political campaign, suzanne. you will recall just yesterday the obama re-election campaign was putting out a web video, an ad, that showed newt gingrich calling mitt romney a liar. you saw newt gingrich yesterday dropping out of the race saying that he's going to support mitt romney, an endorsement from the

former speaker is expected at some point. this endorsement process was going on for some time. michele bachmann said in her statement about her endorsement that she was personally involved in the endorsement process. i don't know how you could not be involved in your own endorsement process, but michele bachmann said in her statement that that was what was going on. so i think that's also a signal that she, you know, was trying to, you know, deal with this as well and, again, another signal to social conservatives that, hey, if i can get here, so can you. >> jim, we want everybody to know we're going to bring that to you live as soon as it happens. mitt romney and michele bachmann together on stage, her giving him that coveted endorsement. thank you. why is everybody suddenly talking about a blind chinese activist? because every year 13 million abortions are performed in china, and a lot of times it happens against the mother's will. and that is exactly what this man is trying to stop. what it's for. isn't aspirin like a vague pain reliever?

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one of the most prominent human rights activists in china wants to get out and he wants help from the united states. chen guangcheng believes he and his family are not safe in china. that is after years of prison and house arrest and charges he led protests against the government. the u.s. embassy prek protected for several days but chen says that is not enough. stan grant spoke to him by phone. >> reporter: it's a small voice on the end of a phone line, but with an explosive story to tell. 3:00 a.m. thursday in beijing and chen guangcheng answers our call. the blind dissident the world wants to hear from now tells cnn he fears for his life.

he says he wants to get out of china and is appealing to president obama himself. i would like to say to him, please do everything you can to get our whole family out, he pleads. he wants to go to the united states, a country that just hours earlier drove him to a chinese hospital and, he says, left him there. chen had been holed up for six days in the u.s. embassy. he'd sought refuge there after fleeing 18 months of what he called brutal house arrest. after backroom negotiations the u.s. and china seemed to have struck a deal. chen could leave freely and safely. a smalling chen guangcheng is seen her leaving the embassy for treatment at the hospital, but between leaving the u.s. grounds and speaking to us, everything changed. i'm very disappointed with the u.s. government, he says. chen now claims he was urged to leave and then deserted. the embassy kept lobbying me to

leave, he says, and promised to be with me at the hospital, but this afternoon soon after we got here, they were all gone. inside the embassy walls, chen says, he was cut off from the outside world. and now doesn't think he knew enough to make such a critical decision. >> stan grant joins us live from beijing. stan, first of all, where is mr. chen now? >> reporter: he's still in the hospital, suzanne. he's getting treatment there for a variety of illnesses that he's suffering. he was denied a lot of medical treatment while he was held under house arrest. we've heard from him in the past where he said during that period of house arrest he was constantly beaten by the guards as well. that is a contributing factor to him not wanting to stay in china. what's really interesting here is that he did leave the embassy of his own volition. the ambassador who i spoke to today, gary lockee, sa, said hed him many times do you want to go, do you want to go? yes, i do.

he's now changed his mind. he realizes the threat is very real and very high and he doesn't feel safe in china. >> you said you spoke to the u.s. ambassador in china, gary loc locke, did he make clear that the united states is going to try to help chen get out of the united states. >> reporter: he doesn't want to go that far. he doesn't want to make promises they can't keep. they're going to keep the conversation going and try to decide exactly what chen wants to do. he did point out that he rejects the claims that chen feels he was neglected there or that he was somehow encouraged or forced to leave the embassy. he said this was always chen's choice, always his decision. he said that they are going to continue this discussion. the difficulty here now is that to actually seek asylum, he would need to be on american soil. that includes the embassy. guess what? the place that chen walked away from. suzanne? >> all right. stan grant, thank you, stan.

this is really about freedom, the freedom of to protest, the freedom of speech. today is also press freedom day declared by the united nations general assembly. i want to show you something we did for this special occasion. cnn held a video contest, opened it up to university students all across the country. the assign am, create a psa that addresses the question why should we care about freedom of information? the grand prize, we play the video right here on the air. now, there were a ton of entries, but we did pick a winner. two sophomores from western michigan university. here is their video. >> a fight for freedom. >> of information. >> why should we be deprived? >> the story is one-sided. >> countries are struggling, suffering. >> killing. >> prison. >> so far in 2012 11 reporters have been killed. >> and over 150 have been imprisoned. >> you tell me. >> is it worth fighting for?

>> reality is not optional. >> it's your life. >> your people. >> your world. >> keep them safe. >> congratulations to those students for highlighting the importance after free press. in my own experience i have seen how censorship works firsthand. reporting in cairo egypt for an independent outlet, all my reports censors by the egyptian government. and in china when i traveled with president bush, the chinese government blocked any live coverage of our events to the chinese people themselves couldn't even see what was going on in their own country. and we are reminded every day when we see those pictures snuggled out of syria and the journalists who lost their lives trying to cover the carnage coming out of that movement. so thank you students of western michigan university for putting a spotlight on this today.

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so, where to next? ♪ want to go straight to virginia. a live event taking place. mitt romney, michele bachmann offering her endorsement. let's take a listen. >> when you have parents of five children, we spend a lot of time thinking about the future. here in the state of virginia, this is a state that has a wealth of resources right offshore. it's called energy. energy resources that are our future. i just returned from afghanistan visiting our brave men and women who are fighting on our behalf. and when i returned, i went to the cities of dubai and doha. doha has the largest gas lick

which fication facility in the world and quite literally you almost think the streets are lined with gold. there are more working cranes and more skyscrapers that are being built, and i thought to myself, this could be the united states if we would only legalize american energy. we know -- we know what barack obama's formula is for american energy. it's so bottle it up. to give checks for billions of dollars to other countries and telling them to go and be prosperous. not so of president mitt romney. mitt romney's future for america would be a legalization of american energy, a legalization of millions of high-paying jobs. that's our future in america. that's something to get excited about. it's why we must elect mitt

romney as the next president of the united states. [ cheers and applause ] and your wonderful governor, bob mcdonald, is doing everything within his power in the state of virginia to make sure that virginia becomes an energy producing state, a state that stands strong on national defense and governor bob mcdonald deserves every bit of applause and appreciation we can give him today. please welcome your governor, bob mcdonald. >> thank you! [ cheers and applause ] >> thank you, congresswoman bachmann. thank you. good afternoon hampton roads. for those of you not from here, welcome to the most friendly state in america, the

commonwealth of virginia. welcome to the state with the lowest unemployment rate in the southeast. as good as that is, imagine how much better off we're going to be with president mitt romney in office. [ cheers and applause ] well, let me just say congresswoman bachmann, thank you so much for all the leadership and energy you brought on the campaign trail and for your endorsement of mitt romney today. it's going to mean a tremendous amount for his campaign and we appreciate your leadership for the united states of america. thank you. >> happy to do it. thank you. >> and thank you to our great entrepreneurs and job creators from krofton industries for hosting us here today, making the great maritime industry here in hampton roads even that much stronger and creating lots of new jobs, and we're so glad to be here. so good to see our senator wagner and senator mcwaters and

the first commonwealth attorney in 100 years in portsmouth, earl. thank you, earl, for coming. and i want to say especially i see so many of you wearing those patriotic hats, certainly having served in the navy or the naevy the marine corps, the coast guard. virginia has more veterans than any other state in the country. thank you for your service and thank you for supporting mitt romney for president. the reason they're here supporting you is because of that sign. you believe in america. they do, too. they understand like you do that freedom isn't free, it's been purchased at a price. for 200 years by the blood, sweat, and tears of american men and women in uniform. we understand that in hampton roads. we understand that this president has not always taken care of veterans, has not always made the best decisions for the united states of america's military. has cut our investments in defense.

you're going to see a sea change in our support for the military and veterans with president mitt romney, i can assure you of that. [ cheers and applause ] remember 3 1/2 years ago we heard that tune about hope and change? and now what do we have? we have recession and division and malaise. it's time for a change, don't you think? >> yes, sir! >> this really is a historic election. everybody said it, everybody believes it, and everybody is here today i think because you want to fight for it. we have a difference in vision. the vision of mitt romney versus the record of a barack obama, which is a record of broken promises and not doing what he promised 3 1/2 years ago. we were promised that we were going to see a reduction in job

losses and new energy resources, all of the above, and all of these things, and you know what? we haven't got it. look at the record. we have unemployment now at 8.2% for 38 consecutive months. governor romney said it best, that may be the best barack obama can do, but that's not the best america can do, don't you think? >> governor of virginia there endorsing mitt romney as well as michele bachmann. as soon as mitt romney speaks, we'll take a listen and see what he's got to say. we're getting an inside peek into osama bin laden's head through newly declassified documents. 17 draft letter s total i 197 pages posted online today. there are among more than 6,000 documents seized by u.s. navy s.e.a.l.s during last year's raid that killed bin laden at his compound in pakistan. peter bergen joins us from new york. you got early access to ll lle e

material while researching for your book. give us a sense of what the most interesting things are that you learned about bin laden. >> well, suzanne, you know, one that leaps out is bin laden was constantly trying to incite young muslim men to join his holy war, but when it came to his own 20-year-old son, hamza, he was advocating that this guy leave pakistan's tribal regions if he was in that area and go to the prosperous and peaceful sort of switzerland of the middle east. i mean, one of the things, of course, is bin laden's sort of hypocrisy when it came to the safety of his own family versus what he was saying publicly. he was very concerned about the drone program in pakistan's tribal regions, very concerned about the effects it was having on his group. he was telling them they should move to perhaps the eastern province of afghanistan, very row motor, heavily wooded,

mountainous area where they would be able to be sort of avoiding the all-seeing eye of america's satellites and drones. go ahead. >> peter, you say as well these documents show bin laden to be a delusional leader, a micromanager. how so? >> well, delusional in the sense that he was sort of pressing to kill president obama and general david petraeus. well, you know, that's pretty hard to do, and senior administration officials i have talked to say that there was push back from some subordinates saying, get real. it's easier to attack american civilians in afghanistan than to do the things you're suggesting. micromanagement, you know, he was advising his yemeni affiliate, the members of that group, to make sure they had a big meal and gassed up their cars before they went on the road so they wouldn't encounter government spies at restaurants or gas stations. he was getting in the weeds of personnel decisions, asking for reports on particular leaders of his group. he was trying to retain control, but it's hard to retain control when the only way you can

communicate is via courier. sometimes responses would take two or three months. >> he sounds kind of paranoid, too. what's really fascinating is you were really one of the only journalists to walk through bin laden's compound. can you give us a sense of what that was like? >> yeah. really the only outside observer to be allowed to go in by the pakistani military. two weeks later they demolished the place. i expected it to be like hitler's bunker. i had been studying this guy for 15 years and it was like visiting a very squalid suburban compounds. you're seeing pictures. this was one of the kitchens. they were not living large. they are growing their own venlablven vegetables, they had honeybees, rabbits. it was to some degree self-sufficient. each wife, he had three, had her own kitchen and toy let. it was a pretty squalid

environment. when i visited, of course, you could see -- as you can see with these pictures, there was a tremendously ferocious s.e.a.l. assault on this, and there's broken glass everywhere. the kinds of things that you see scattered around in these pictures. and, you know, there were 24 people living on this compound even though it was fairly large, so they were living -- the beds they slept on were made by plywood. these pictures were taken by pakistani security officials and then sold to news organizations. here is the vegeible garden whe where they were growing cucumbers. he would take a daily walk but did so with a tarp over his head. >> and, peter, do we know how they were living inside of the house? were the three wives getting along? was there a sense of unity in

that home? >> it wasn't the real wives of abadabad. they knew they were marrying the guy involved in these activities. this is the youngest wife, the 29-year-old. there were two other wives, a 64-year-old and a 54-year-old wife, and, you know, i think that essentially there have been reports they were sort of at loggerheads. i don't think that's true. they were used to this arrangement. a similar arrangement happened in afghanistan and sudan. >> peter bergen, thank you so much. the details are fascinating. thank you once again. attention, parents, grandparents. high school football brain injuries are up. what to look for if your child is showing symptoms of a concussion. cap a day helps defend against digestive issues with three strains of good bacteria. hit me! [ female announcer ] live the regular life. phillips'.

apparent suicide of legendary player junior seau is raising more concerns about the impact of head injuries and football. he didn't have any documented concussions but the former linebacker was known for fearless and aggressive tackles. in a recent interview with "sports illustrated" writer he weighed in on the new safety rulsz in the nfl and said this about people who oppose them. i am pretty sure if anybody had to wake up with their dad not knowing his name, not knowing his kids' name, not being able to function at a normal rate after football, they would understand that the game needs

to change. so, a warning for all parents whose children play football, the stats, pretty sobering. take a look at this. millions of children across the u.s. play tackle football every year. emergency room doctors treat more than 55,000 brain injuries. the number is on the rise. joining me now from birmingham, alabama, reed estes, a pediatric orthopedicist and essentially tell us what can parents do to protect their children from getting these kinds of concussions? >> i think recognition is really the biggest key in regards to recognize or figuring out these injuries and i think that the way that the new laws are set in that the coaches, the athletic trainers, parents themselves are a lot more aware in regards to picking up these injuries and knowing the signs and things to watch for on the sidelines and particularly at home after the child leaves the game and football tends to be one of our biggest culprits in regards to this just being it is a high-pace and had heavy contact injury sport and recognizing these injuries early on by

knowing the appropriate signs to watch for. >> doctor, i want to you watch this and our viewers as well. this is a video. these are really small kids, just going at it on the football field, and you can just see the kinds of hits that they are taking there. when you see that video, what kind of damage do you think that is causing long-term? >> i think it is hard to know for sure. there is a lot of research looking at the potential permanent neurologic damage that's related to all of these traumatic very significant blows to the head, whether it be a full pledged concussion where a child has a full loss of consciousness that's recognized on the field or whether it is something where they continue to play with it and actually develop more of a second hit and further concussion down the road. >> does it matter here that the kids, their brains are still developing and how does this play into the impact of concussions, developing these kinds of concussions? >> i think it definitely plays a significant role. i think the younger children as you mentioned are developing quite rapidly.

they have areas of very ten ous blood flow to the pran and susceptible to injury. i think early on they're not really recognized early enough and there is much potential for further injury on down the road. >> doctor, bottom line, if you're a grand parent, a parent, watching this now, and you want to know how to protect your child, what would you say to them? >> i think it is a matter of keeping a close eye. i think it is important that children play sports and i am actually encourage it but same token, i think it is important to be cognizant when a child is complaining of fatigue, neurologic symptoms, disorientation and if they do have loss of consciousness or times of apple nearby a those are important things to watch out for and be aware to seek a health care professional. >> doctor, thank you so much. really appreciate your insights. a pop quiz for the parents out there. so if you're at the zoo and a lion is trying to get his paws on your kid, do you pull him

away from the glass or pull out your camera? more of the video. you won't believe this. [ female announcer ] did you know the average person smiles more than 50 times a day? so brighten your smile a healthy way with listerine® whitening plus restoring rinse. it's the only rinse that makes your teeth two shades whiter and two times stronger. ♪ listerine® whitening... power to your mouth. # would you mind if to be i go ahead of you?omer. instead we had someone go ahead of him and win fifty thousand dollars. congratulations you are our one millionth customer. people don't like to miss out on money that should have been theirs. that's why at ally we have the raise your rate 2-year cd.

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pnchts friendly advice. take a kid to the zoo, don't dress him like a zebra. this is lion might mistake him for an afternoon snack. lion at the zoo in portland, all caught on tape. he is clawing at this little kid who is obviously safe on the other side of this thick glass. the lion looks really frustrated.

the kid, hey, totally unfaized. don't even notice. the unemployment rate has been slowly dropping. there is one problem. doesn't factor in the 86 million so-called invisible unemployed in this country, people not looking for work. i want to bring in allison from the new york stock exchange. any idea why these folks are not trying to get into the workforce, not trying to find a job? >> if you think about it this way, if you ever looked for a job as i have after you have been out of work for a long time, it is really, really frustratin frustrating. in this case they give up. here is what's interesting. when they gain their confidence back and start to look for a job, then they're counted as unemployed. what you get there, it would be the unemployment rate going up again. in the meantime, though, there are 86 million people who are considered right now the invisible unemployed. most are over the age of 65 and that's normal because they're of retirement age.

another big chunk are folks under the age of 24. they're in school or having a hard time finding their first job and actually, susan, it is young people having a big, big hard time finding work right now. >> is this a new problem for the economy? >> it is not a new problem. even in good times some people don't want to work. think about it, parents staying home to raise their his and going back to school and the disabled that can't work and look how it has been over the past 15 years. it changed, how the number of people in the labor force changed and back in 2000 it peaked at 67% meaning 67% of americans were working or were looking for work. it has been falling ever since then, of course, a big factor is the recession and simply aren't enough jobs out there. well, now, the labor force is actually the smallest since the 1980s with 64% and the problem with the low participation in the labor force is that it hits tax revenue and makes it harder to fund social security, ultimately hitting economic growth and hurting the economy in the long run. >> allison, real quick here. what can folks do to find a job

and become a part of the workforce? >> you know what, it is all about getting skills, more education, more education you have the more likely it is that you have a job and in fact the unemployment rate with folks who only have a high school diploma is much higher than if you have a bachelor's degree, so you really want to do what you can to expand your skills and in fact today and earlier i did a story about how harvard and mit announced they're offering free online classes. great way to really hone your skills for free. >> great advice as always. thank you. good to see you. newsroom continues right now with brooke baldwin. >> thank you so much. hello to all of you. the newsroom is buzzing. get right to it beginning with news just into us. word of an incident inside a high school in memphis. the school district telling cnn a quote, unquote, mailbox bomb went off in the hallway and it appears to be a student prank. the pressurized device contained drain owe cleaner.

thankfully no one is hurt except for an assistant principal that went to the hospital after inhaling smoke. everyone seems to be okay. we'll keep you updated. life and death after the nfl. the shocking apparent suicide of junior seau and the hard truth really reveals about our heroes. seau will be the third retired player in the last 15 months to shoot himself to death. he was found inside his home in ocean side, california yesterday morning with a gunshots wound to the chest. no note. no explanation. so many people dream about the glory and the add reconciliation that is the nfl. one day the time comes to take off the pads and hang up your cleats and then what? billy joins me by phone. i want to thank you for calling in. junior seau's last season, 2009. was he at all having trouble at

all, a tough time adjusting to life post superstar nfl league? >> i don't know. i wouldn't say that that stuff will eventually come out, i am sure, as we delve and try to figure out just what happened, but i know that there is a circle of friends that junior had, real hard core long time friends in san diego that i talked to the last day and they were emphatic that up until 48 hours ago junior was his normal telephone, and they were making plans for this weekend and if you know junior, and people that know junior, they know what a passion first of all for the nfl he had and also for life and living and having a good time and that's what makes this thing so surreal. he is the type of person junior is or junior was. >> i was talking to someone just

yesterday after the news broke that woke with him closely on a tv show called sports jobs with junior seau and he described how he talked about his time at the league as a longing, a longing for the career. would you say do you corroborate that? >> oh, yeah. you know what, junior probably took it to the ump tooent degree because of his competitive nature, but to get to this level, to get to be an nfl player, sure, you have to have a certain hunger and certain desire and competitiveness and a love for the game and these guys that play, sure, there is a lot of money involved. we know that and a lot of hurts and whatnot. >> prestige. >> players know the risk and they're still -- every one of them in this game today love what they're doing. understanding what the risks are and junior was certainly one of the guys and like i said he had a love for the game of football

or the nfl that i have never seen before. >> billy, you talked about this tight circle of friends. were they at all worried about him? did they express any of that? >> yeah. you know, we talked about that, certainly not to this degree, worried about him because they loved the guy and they wanted to see what his next step was, what he was going to be involved in. he was heavily involved in the foundation and loved doing that and a lot of charity work and still trying to figure out, okay, 43 years old, what's the next step going to be, and that was the only concern, what direction he was going to go, but certainly not any kind of concern that something like this would happen. >> let me get to this. i am sure you have seen it, his mother, just such raw emotion at the house just yesterday. take a listen. >> junior, you never telling me and i pray to god, take me, take

me, leave my son alone. >> it is tough to watch and listen to. it really shows a mother's love for her son and you mentioned how his ties with his foundation i think he was playing a golf tournament for philanthropy the day before this happened. what was he like off the field, billy? >> oh, man, like i said, he loved life. we had down years in san diego. we drafted junior. we weren't very good. he made us and helped get us to the super bowl and i think four years and lean years again and this is a guy that showed up for work every day and didn't matter if we had one win, two wins we end of the year and he practiced and played like it was a playoff game all the time and away from the field it was the same way, like he had a smile on his face and always made everybody else feel better, whether you are a football player, whether you are a surfer, no matter what element, junior had a knack, i

mean, have you seen his picture with presidents, with other superstars, but the thing with junior, he was a san diego kid. he was most home in a pair of shorts and flip-flops and everybody in california loved the guy. >> and he loves the waves and palgd boarding and surfing. i am sorry for the loss of your friend. i do want to say that there is no proof right now that seau was suffering affects from concussions on the field, but many want to find out for sure. seau's death comes as more than 100 former nfl players filed another lawsuit against the league, names like jamal anderson, jesse tuggle, chris doleman. they join more than 1,500 other players who claim the nfl hid the dangers of concussions from them. rapid fire, roll it. no get out of jail card for one of 13 suspects in the hazing

death of the florida a&m university band member, robert champion. clay caleb jackson made his appearance via monitor this morning. his fiance and mother of his three-year-old son pleaded with the judge. >> i just want to say that he has been walking a straight path. that's our only source of income right now is him working. without him being able to work, my bills aren't being paid and i need him home. >> jackson was already on probation in a separate battery case so the judge said no bail for him. blind human rights active tis cheng guangcheng has u.s. support every step of the way according to the u.s. ambassador to china. they took extraordinary steps to bring chen into the embassy after the escape from house arrest and chen then left the embassy, changed his mind, says he wants to come to the united states, putting a real strain on relations between the u.s. and china and we're going to hear

more later this hour. the reverend billy graham gives his support to a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage in north carolina. the 93-year-old graham says the bible is clear, god's definition of marriage is between a man and a woman. , end quote. the proposed amendment is on the may 8th primary ballot. it would also ban civil unions and domestic partnerships. former republican presidential candidate michelle bachman tossing her support behind mitt romney. >> you see, i think for all of america this is a very simple proposition, this november. president barack obama, president mitt romney, you decide. very easy. >> bachman endorsed romney about half an our ago as they appeared at a campaign event in virginia. now to this one. look at this. look at this.

a family of six in wind miles an hour, florida, forced out of their home by this, a massive sink hole. it appeared in the backyard over night. it is so huge it swallowed four trees. folks, i am talking 100 feet in diameter, 50 feet deep. this thing is still growing, and neighbors have been warned it could threaten their homes as well. a lot more for you in the next two hours. watch this. a teenaged girl walks up to the headquarters of 17 magazine and demands stop the air brushing. i will speak with her live in a cnn exclusive. i am brooke baldwin. the news is now. inside the mind of the world's most wanted terrorist, we're now seeing the paranoid diaries of osama bin laden and why his followers began to ignore him. >> not many people would do that. >> a woman's attacked in a wal-mart parking lot and suddenly an iraq war veteran comes out of nowhere.

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i tell you what i can spend. i do my best to make it work. i'm back on the road safely. and i saved you money on brakes. that's personal pricing. osama bin laden wanted the u.s. president dead, letters released today confirm it was near the top of his wish list, kill barack obama. blauds believed his best chance would be to shoot the president out of the sky on a trip to afghanistan. yes, afghanistan. the president was just there this week flying under the cover of darkness. at this hour we continue to scour the flewly released documents captured by the team that swept in and killed osama bin laden one year ago tuesday. after they killed him they combed the compound in pakistan

and found a treasure drove of intel, a traction of what we're looking at today. the documents show osama bin laden also had it in for general david petraeus and he referred to himmes "the man", and on the other hand he deemed the vice president and i am quoting utterly unprepared for leadership, and he hoped that killing mr. obama would elevate biden and put the united states in a crisis. take a look at this with me. i am talking 197 pages. here they are. 197 pages. they're letters to and from bin laden and his top lieutenants. the timeframe we're talking about is between 2006 and into april of 2011. that was just days before his death. now, a lot of this stuff in this packet is really inside and the biggest impression we can glean is that of osama bin laden as a frustrated boss, trying in vain

to manage a far flung crew of terrorists and protect his hide and that of his family. with me from new york is national security analyst peter bergen and fwh going through this and working with our teams as we have sorted through the pages, it seems like osama bin laden was out there, in public, trying to rally his troops to jihad but the documents here, these documents show that he was telling his own family get the heck off the battlefield, go somewhere safe, and sounds cowardly to me. >> sure. yeah. publicly recruiting young man about the age of his 20-year-old son he was saying that hamsa should get out of the region if he was there which was likely and move to the tiny prosperous gulf state of gutter, perhaps the richest country in the world and the switzerland of the middle east and so i think he was very solicitus on of his own family and that comes through in the documents. >> also in these documents a

prominent name that you will recognize of adam ga dan, born adam perlman, raised in oregon, an american, but somehow he has risen up through the ranks within al qaeda. peter, what do the documents say specifically about adam and his current role within al qaeda leadership? >> well, adam wrote towards the tenth anniversary of 9/11 he wrote osama bin laden a long memo responding to osama bin laden's request for like let's have a plan for the tenth an verse have i of 9/11 and they obviously saw it as a good moment and propaganda moment and ga dan talks about a number of american journalists including brian ross of abc news of somebody they will try to reach out to and i describes the fox news network as they were not fans of fox news, and he says disparaging things about cnn and msnbc and gives osama bin laden a whole tour of the america news

environment and also other outlets in britain. so that al qaeda can start planning its plans for the 9/11 anniversary. just that osama bin laden would record a high definition video and sort of put that out to the various networks and try to get some interest in that. >> it is stunning to think of osama bin laden sitting there and combing through the papers and watching all of the news following us follow him, and also with bin laden there is a contradiction. sounds like from some of these letters that you have on the one hand playing the role of a technicrat and then you have him telling the troops get out there and get president obama, kill david petraeus. sounds like a little mixed message coming from high up top. >> yeah. easy to say let's kill president obama and it is actually quite difficult to do obviously and similarly with david petraeus,

these plans he had, none of them, no evidence that they were ever implemented and he was talking about trying to attack the president when he visited bagram air force base as he did this last week, so a lot of i think gets to his somewhat delusional views about the organization's own ability and yet on the other hand he did have a real sense of how much pressure the organization was under with the american drone strikes in pakistan and urging his team to move to eastern afghanistan to a remote province there and he did have some understanding that the al qaeda brand was in great trouble and suggesting to al qaeda affiliated groups don't use the name al qaeda. he was very concerned about what al qaeda had done in iraq. he was recommending to his yemen affiliate don't make the same mistakes they did in iraq essentially killing a lot of local tribal leaders, so there is a -- it is not that he was delusional about what was happening to the organization. it was a little delusional about the abilities to attack the united states. >> and sounds like a little as you point out worried and paranoid as well, peter bergen. we appreciate you. thank you so much.

>> thank you. >> thank you going through these pages and pages of these documents. at the top of the hour we'll speak live with former cia operative bob bear about a new weapon of terror, wildfires, wildfires, and america is the apparent target. more on that. a woman is robbed at knife point by another woman who grabs her purse, starts to run and suddenly there is video out of nowhere and an iraq war vet storms into the picture. i will speak live with the man who was stabbed in the neck and the leg. zap technology.

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fire fighter matt long has no choice and must hop on his bike to get across the city to the fire academy. >> you needed to, this waept just training, you needed to get somewhere. >> i needed to get to work and made four blocks. >> four blocks. then disaster. a bus that crossed multiple lanes of traffic made a right turn. in the process slammed directly into matt long. >> he didn't see me, didn't know i was there, whatever, and took me right off. >> in an instant the self described fitness junkie had gone from dominating race courses to barely surviving.

>> every bone, compound fracture, right side of my pelvis and open fracture as well and right shoulder crushed. the worst part was the bike and i became one and it severed my abdominal wall and severed my femoral artery. i basically was bleeding out. >> long stayed in the hospital for six months. he eventually underwent 40 operations. he survived physically and mentally battling crippling depression. >> right on the table i said i am glad you prayed for me to live and i wish you prayed for me to die. i captain do this. >> learning how to live in his new body was the biggest challenge. >> i didn't think about things i couldn't have. i didn't think how i would no longer run as fast and i started thinking about saying i will, i will get back on the bike, back out on the course and live my life the best i can. >> now retired he coaches and

regularly shares his story to motivate others to transform themselves. sanjay gupta, cnn, new york. >>

have you heard about this, a woman in florida 65 years young, loading her car in the wal-mart parking lot and another woman walks over, says she has a knife and says give me your purse. there is video. watch closely with me. will you see the murs snatcher in a moment run away. there she goes. out of nowhere comes this iraq war vet. see him running in, boom, takes the purse snatcher down and looks like brian making a tackle. it is sean cox. he is with me on the phone. i hear that she took that knife and got you in the neck and leg. howl are you, first of all? >> i am feeling a lot better

today. things have slowed down for me a little bit. taking time to ingest it all and i feel a little bit better. >> i am glad you're feeling better. what a scene. take me back frchlt what i understand you're offloading groceries in another car nearby and what do you see? >> i didn't really see anything at first. i just heard the woman yelling, and it is wal-mart, so that happens and all of a sudden i seen the woman start running by. i figured i could catch her off on the path and took off and you said brian euro lacquer. i was trying to be more like ray lewis. >> a apologize. you're a ravens fan. >> i didn't think twice about it. i just went off and i got her. didn't realize she had a knife at that point. >> was she a small woman, a large woman? obviously she got you a little bit. >> she got me pretty good. i guess my adrenaline was pumping and i didn't feel the pain. i just saw the blood and then people started running after me and i figured i better go take

care of this, so i just got up and she was already gone at that point. >> she ran out of there. you don't have the purse. you have a little respect from this 65-year-old, i imagine. >> i did. i actually got to speak to her yesterday. she did thank me for what i did. i said, you know, i wish i could have got the purse for you, but she did get away, but i did try my best, i guess. >> and it was just as you said, just boom and instinct kicked in and you just went after her. >> exactly. i didn't think about just anything at that point. it just kicked in and i saw her and the tunnel vision just went right after her and took her down, and she got the best of me and got away. police are doing their jobs. >> at least everyone is okay sans the purse. we appreciate you taking the moment and calling us. thank you. >> my pleasure. thank you. >> he may be a republican, but

he cannot beat president obama. the harsh words coming from congresswoman michelle bachman about whom, you ask, the man she is now endorsing for president. you're about to hear all the words that may come back to haunt bachman and mitt romney. at bank of america, we're lending and investing in communities across the country. from helping to revitalize a neighborhood in brooklyn...

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now another former enemy, now an ally for mitt romney, talking about congresswoman michelle bachman who endorsed romney at a campaign event last hour. she had her own presidential ambition that is peaked when she became the first woman to win the aims, iowa, straw poll in august. fast forward to january. she finished next to last in the iowa caucuses and dropped out the very next day.

now, bachman says it is time for republicans to unite behind mitt romney. >> mitt romney's future for america would be legalization of american energy, legalization of millions of high paying jobs. that's our future in america. that's something to get excited about. it is why we must elect mitt romney as the next president of the united states. >> now, that's not what bachman was saying when she was running against romney. she took shot after shot after shot at him leading up to the iowa caucuses. >> mitt romney is a known moderate in this race. >> on issue after issue after issue governor romney has been on both sides and mitt romney's case he is the only governor in the united states history to put into place socialized medicine. >> he gave planned parenthood a saet at the table on romney care. >> romney care is the blueprint if you will for obama care.

>> mitt romney, can he beat obama. >> no, he can't beat obama. >> something must have changed in her mind in the last four months. a student is locked up and forgotten inside a cell for five whole days. it was so bad he even tried to kill himself. you're about to hear from the young man and just into us house republicans one step closer to holding attorney general eric holder in contempt.

a california man says he had to drink his own urine to survive his imprisonment last month, but daniel chung wasn't respect trapped in a canyon or a foreign guerilla camp. he was in the custody of the dea, the law enforcement agency admits, yes, they forgot about chung in one of its own cells in san diego for five days. his attorney says the college student was hand kufred, had no food, no water, and chung talked

to our affiliate after three days he says he broke his glasses and tried to use a shard of glass to kill himself. >> pitch black, and trying to write sorry, mom, and i couldn't aim. i gave up on that one. >> he screamed hundreds of times for help. >> he began to big into the walls thinking he could get water. >> i had to do what i had to do to survive. >> the dea detained chung and eight others after a raid on april 21st at a home that allegedly had 189 ecstasy pills and guns and ammo and mushrooms and agents never charged the engineering student who is suing for $20 million. the head of the dea in the office issued a statement. i will quote here, i extend my deepest apologies to the young man. i have personally ordered an extensive review of our policies

and procedures, end quote. house republicans one step closer to holding attorney general eric holder in contempt. this is over the so-called operation fast and furious scandal in which the u.s. governmental loud weapons to enter mexico in hopes of tracking them and instead wound up in the hands of drug gangs. go to dana bash live for us in washington. dana, what is behind the move here by house republicans? >> first and foremost, brooke, the house oversight chairman drafted this contempt resolution and he says they are withholding documents and information and ignoring subpoenas explaining to congress why at first they defended this gunn gun tracking program and ten months later came back and re can'ted saying the program was fundamentally flawed. it is also a question of who knew what when. republicans say the justice department is refusing to hand over documents explaining what senior officials knew about the

program, brooke. >> how is the department of justice responding? >> well, they're saying that the department has already turned over 7,600 pages of documents, 46 separate times, and they noted the attorney generals testified before congress seven times on this issue. they also say, probably the most important, there are legitimate disagreements over producing what they call sensitive material and that they say could jeopardize or politicize criminal investigations and prosecutions. it breaks down this way, republicans question whether the obama justice department is engaging in a cover up and democrats say it is a witch hunt. >> if we say here one step closer to holding holder in contempt, what is the timeframe? >> congress is in recess this week. they will come back next week. it is really tb d. the goal ultimately if you talk to republicans is to not to go forward with this. they hope racheting up the pressure and putting the threat for contempt of congress for the attorney general will result in

them getting the information they're looking for without having to hold the attorney general in contempt of congress. >> dana bash, thank you. the u.s. ambassador to china speaks with cnn about why a blind chinese dissident left u.s. protection and now apparently asking for it back. what the heck prompted this change of heart? first, just like the movies, iron man, terminator, new technology may soon give fire fighters bionic vision. >> raging flames, rooms full of smoke, working conditions of fire fighters. >> you can't see anything. you can only hear things, but it is still very confusing, complete blackout. >> it is hazardous situations like this that they train for and thanks to new technology fire fighters will be able to see the world at an entirely new way, this new high tech mask

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now to the diplomatic crisis developing between the u.s. and china. you have secretary of state hillary clinton in bejing talking trade and all the interest is focused on this blind chinese activist who is now begging clinton to take him and his family out of china. the polite plight of this man exploded over the news over the weekend after he escaped house arrest, made his way to bejing, found refuge in the u.s. embassy. yesterday he left the confines of the embassy, taken to a

hospital where he was reunited with his family and into the arms of chinese officials. that's the straight line of the story. now for the twists and turns. just hours after chen left the u.s. embassy, he says the u.s. broker deal was not the humanitarian victory portrayed by the obama administration. in fact, chen is now suggesting the u.s. failed to protect him, failed to protect his family, and i want you to listen here. this is the translated film conversation with cnn. >> i would like to say to him, please do everything you can to get our whole family out. i am very disappointed with the u.s. government. the embassy kept lobbying me to leave, he says, and promised to be with me at the hospital. this afternoon soon after we got here they were all gone. >> but cheng is now changing that story. cnn producer just got off the phone with him and he says he now believes the u.s. is trying to help him and declined to elaborate and just a couple of hours ago stan grant talked with

the u.s. ambassador to china about cheng's plight and the confusion really that surrounds it all. >> did you make a mistake in putting too much trust in the chinese negotiators, the chinese government, the same government that had locked him up, held him under house arrest, according to him beaten him, beaten his wife, his mother, and threatening to kill the family and you trust the these people? >> again, this was his decision and he indicated to us what he wanted as conditions before he would leave the embassy. he had the option of staying in the embassy for years if necessary, and he indicated that he was prepared to do that unless the chinese government met his conditions. what were those conditions? he wanted to be reunified with his family. he wanted an opportunity to pursue legal studies and in fact the chinese government offered him a full scholarship at one of seven universities of his choosing with housing and living expenses for him and his entire family. >> this comes back to an issue of trust. at the same time he says his

wife told him that the same government, the authorities were saying if your husband doesn't leave the embassy we're going to have people waiting with weapons inside your house and you're going to be beaten to death. >> first of all, he had a conversation with his wife without outside the presence of the chinese government. it was his decision in fact to go back and ask us to approach the chinese government after he said no, after he said he was prepared to stay in the em bas sigh for years because he said he didn't trust the chinese government. he asked us to tell the chinese government that they needed to take a first step as an indication of good faith and what was his request? he said that he wanted the chinese government to bring the family up to bejing, remove them from the village where they had suffered so much abuse, and have them in the hospital, and then he would have a conversation with his wife and make a final decision as to whether or not he would leave. >> that was stan grant conducting the interview.

we'll talk to him live in bejing next hour about his perspective. he has been covering this really since the beginning, his perspective on how all of this has gone down. young girls seeing the beautiful models, thin, perfect complexion, and is this the image young women or young men really need to be looking at? one teenager says no. not only did she start a petition, she marched right up we'll speak live in an exclusive next. ]h(éq# ok! who gets occasional constipation, diarrhea, gas or bloating? get ahead of it! one phillips' colon health probiotic cap a day helps defend against digestive issues with three strains of good bacteria. hit me! [ female announcer ] live the regular life. phillips'. but if i grow this out a little bit, i look too much like an english country gent...

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what is trending today? this is what's trending, an

eighth grader that wants the fashion industry to get real about beauty and end the use of air brushed photos. take a look at this youtube clip that shows how much difference touch ups can make making the skin flawless, waists teeny tiny and much more. you can look at the pictures and see for yourself. the american medical association says the images give young people unrealistic expectations of what their bodies should look like and so 14-year-old julia blum says she has seen it first hand and what did she do? at age 14 she put up this petition challenging 17 magazine to feature at least one unaltered photo spread a month, so, yesterday julia and her friends protested outside 17 magazine's offices in new york and took some 20,000 signatures straight up to the editor who agreed to see her. no cameras were allowed and we're about to get the scoop because julia is joining me live from new york. nice to meet you.

>> thank you. >> first take me back. when did you first get this idea? were you flipping through pages of 17 magazine? talk to me about this from the beginning. >> well, i am a blogger and i learned at spark how much these photo shopped images in the media can really hurt girls and give them an unrealistic idea of beauty, and so i know how it affects girls and like my friends and i wantedes to do something to help. >> be specific. do you get these magazines? are you sitting with your girlfriends and looking at somebody's waist and thinking that doesn't look right? >> yeah. a bunch of my friends and i read 17 magazine, and we can recognize that they're photo shopped and at the same time that's what's considered beautiful, and we don't realize it times sometimes when we're looking at the magazine and having fun and it can lower your

self-esteem. >> it can. so you're in new york because yesterday as we mentioned you were in midtown manhattan and i saw the umbrellas with these girls, with a message. what was your message to 17 magazine? >> well, we were doing the mock photo shoot to show 17 that we love ourselves, just the way we are and we don't need photo shop to fix us. >> so not only are you doing this mock photo shoot but you at 14 years of age get this meeting with the head of 17 magazine and how did it go and let me also ask you this. i know you want to have at least one spread per month unaltered. did she agree to that? >> well, we presented her with our big box full of petition signatures and she accepted it and it was a really positive meeting. we talked about the importance of having real authentic girls in magazine pictures to show girls that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, and i gave her

my e-mail address and we're going to stay in contact and see what happens from there. >> so you're going to stay in contact. she didn't give you a straight up yes or no, she just said keep in touch. >> we're going to keep in touch and work with them in the future. i am happy with it and i think it has been really great. >> let me read because we reached out to 17 as well. here is what they told us. quote, they had a great discussion and we believe that julia left understanding that 17 celebrates girls for being their authentic selves and that's how we present them. we feature real girls in our pages and there is no other magazine that highlights such a diversity of size, shape, skin tone and ethnicity. here is really my last question for you and this is the kind of question i throw at anyone. i will throw it at awe. i know a lot of magazines alter images and not just of women but men, too, and people would say, look, we recognize they do this. you can just opt not to buy the magazine. what do you say to those people? >> well, you know, a lot of girls love 17 magazine and i

love 17 magazine and i am going to keep reading it and i am going to keep enjoying it, but also a big part of my petition was to educate girls about how these pictures are photo shopped and i think that's an important thing, if we educate girls they're photo shopped, girls will learn that they don't have to compare themselves to the images that are photo shopped. >> well, julia, you said your mom is just sitting right off camera, right? >> yep. >> tell your mom she did good. all right? >> okay. >> julia blum, thank you. good luck. >> thank you. >> we'll see what 17 does. >> okay. >> no bombs, no planes, but al qaeda's new way of hitting america, wildfires. i will speak with bob bear about the threat and i promised you, it is a story will you never forget, the reaction still on twitter and it is still pouring in, a six-year-old is dead and his body found with a sea of scars, and he could have been saved. forget the nonsense out there, the talking heads, blah, blah, blah, this is a story america needs to hear. [ female announcer ] the sun powers life.

and now it powers our latest innovation in more efficient cooling and heating. introducing the world's only solar-powered home energy system, which can cut your heating and cooling bills in half. call now to get up to 1,375 dollars in rebates. or zero percent financing for 18 months. plus download our free lennox mobile app with an energy-savings calculator to show how much you'll save... with lennox. innovation never felt so good. i want to take a moment and focus on a case that makes me so angry and i know it makes a lot of you angry as well i know because i tweet through my show and my twitter account absolutely exploded right around this time yesterday with the reaction to the story of this death of this six-year-old boy, and he could have been saved if

someone had been paying attention. he weighed less than 30 pounds. his extremeliy mace ated body was covered in too many scars to count. social workers visited the home multiple times and no one seemed to notice the battered and tiny little boy. the day kalil died he slipped on the wet bathroom floor and according to his mother's confession to police, kalil didn't get up fast enough and she smacked him in the back of the head. it was 13 hours before his parents finally took kalil to the hospital, too late to save him. his death ended months of horror no child should ever have to endure. i want you to listen here. this is mike newell, the philadelphia inquirer reporter who dug deeper into the little boy's story. >> in the final let's say eight months of kalil's life i want you to describe in detail the abuse he endured. >> like you said, it is tough stuff. his parents and their confession said they beat him almost daily

with extension cords, belts, and as you said he had so many bruises on his scars and on his body that the medical examiner said there was too many to put a count on. in the last year of his life he had some type of stomach issue and would throw up sometimes two to three times a day, and his biological parents thought he was doing this on purpose and would lock him in his bedroom and if he got sick during the night they would beat him for it in the morning. >> you mentioned around thanksgiving they hammered a lock on his door so he couldn't leave the bedroom. i want to incident positive out life was not always a nightmare for this little boy because he was with foster parents who it sounds like loved him. if you can, just juxtapose the experience in those years with those, that man and woman, versus his biological parents. >> that's what's so striking about this. for the first three years of his life he lived with a relative,

alicia nixon, who was his foster parent and trying to adopt him, and he lived a happy little life of a toddler. he was healthy. he was getting medical treatments. the only five days that he spent with his biological parents before he was returned he wund up in the hospital dirty, soiled, and with asthma attack, and i think at the heart of this case is the tension at the heart of every child welfare system which is the desire on dhs to want to reunify families and also protect children, and time and time again in this boy's life it seemed in moving towards reunion fiscal they missed opportunities that could help him. i think there are teachable moments good and bad in this. the moments we're looking at are when they decided to reunion fie the parents or the child with the parents who had seven children removed, was the bar high enough, and i don't think anyone agrees it was. secondly, for the eight months, the last eight months of this

boy's life, social workers and dhs staff had their eyes on him and he was a boy in grave danger and it was visibly so according to those who knew him and according to the medical examiner, and was this systemic thing? was it individual workers? we just want to try to find out exactly what happened. >> want to let you know we called philadelphia's department of human services. couldn't talk specifically but they tell us they are reviewing policies and the response to kalil's case and they will make changes necessary to protect children like kalil and we will be watching. again, my tremendous thanks to mike newell of the philadelphia inquirer for the reporting and reminder to all of us we can do better. top of the hour here. welcome back. i am brooke baldwin. before we begin, new details on the incident inside a high school in memphis here. we have this video, this school district selling cnn a mailbox bomb went off in the