brian: a woman who likes sarah palin so much she is paying nearly $64,000 to have dinner with her. we will hear that story. fox presents the news with such great ease we're glad to have "fox & friends" like these. [captioning made possible by fox news channel] captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- steve: live from studio e in the heart of midtown manhattan, welcome to the number one cable news show on the planet, "fox & friends." brian: mitt romney, dana perino and a 90-year-old man with a gun. gretchen: top story of the day. here are your other headlines. we begin with an urgent and confidential report just released on the war in afghanistan. it is a desperate plea for more troops from the top commander on the ground there. general stanley mccrystal says

if we don't deploy more forces we are going to lose this war. president obama yesterday though still not sure what he is going to do. >> do what's required to keep people safe. >> you don't make decisions about resources before you have the strategy right. gretchen: the assessment of afghanistan now being reviewed by president obama and his national security team. another fox news alert now out of washington state. a killer who escaped during that field trip to a county fair now back in custody this morning. philip paul was on the run for three days after he slipped away from the staff of a mental institution. he was found 1 0 miles away late last night. paul was on medication to control skits friend i can't. he says voices in his head told him to murder an elderly woman more than 20 years ago. coming up, we will have a debate about why convicted killers like this on r. -- are on field trips to begin with raymond clark allegedly broke the bones of

yale grad student annie le before hiding her body behind a wall. according to the "new york post," clark also tripped a fire alarm evacuating the building trying to cover his tracks. he was jealous over ley's success. friends describe her as a brilliant researcher on the fast track. body in california where her family will hold a private funeral. it v's best hit hit the carpet. neil patrick harsz struck a high note ♪ blip that switch ♪ stars got emmys votes ♪ don't hit the. gretchen: he got rave refutes from jeff probst, winner of best reality tv host. >> thank you very much, neal pack tris harris, this is how you host the emmys, nice job.

gretchen: baldwin took best actor in 30 rocket. tina fey and justin spots on "saturday night live." >> justin woods still be very famous and very rich, but i would not be here so thank you lauren michael. gretchen: this year's show only ran over by 4 minutes. brian: did you watch it? steve: not one second. gretchen: i watched a couple second but at the moment it's escaping me as to which part i watched. it was that good. brian: i heard alec baldwin one again that's good for massapequa. steve: the "new york times" have outdone themselves. usually it's just one adoring photograph of the president of the united states today it's 5 as the president of the united states did five sunday morning talk shows. is he also going to be on letterman tonight for the whole hour. yesterday though he did, he pretty much had the same message

from interview to interview to interview except that darn george stephanopoulos over at abc. what does he do? he points out, remember, he used to work with the administration that defined the definition of is. well now they are talking about the definition of taxes. brian: it's interesting because george stephanopoulos, we know he calls rahm emanuel and paul begala and james carville, they talk two or three times a week about what's the inner workings of the administration. perhaps george stephanopoulos caught the president by surprise when he was very direct and he had some moments like this very direct about his plan. a few of these plans and why they are, indeed, an increase in tax. he came to arm, gretchen, with the dictionary. gretchen: hats off to george stephanopoulos for challenging the president on, and it seemed as if the president was caught a little bit off guard that he actually would get some challenging questions. listen. >> under this mandate the government is forcing people to

spend money, finding you if you don't. how is that not a tax? >> for us to say that you have got to take a sonsability to get health insurance, is absolutely not a tax increase. what it is saying is that we are not going to have other people carrying your burdens for you. >> i don't think i'm making it up. meriam webster's dictionary tax money imposed on by authority for public purposes. >> the fact that you looked up meriam dictionary indicates that you are stretching right now. otherwise you wouldn't have gone to the dictionary to check the definition. what you are saying is. >> i want to check for yourself your critics say it is a tax increase. >> my critics say everything is a tax increase. brian: the dictionary is not a reach. steve: if it is a fine, essentially, it is a tax. it all comes down to this. what is called the individual mandate contained in the matt

baucus bill. >> the "wall street journal" writes the not a tax if he thinks the tax is for your own good. gretchen: that was the highlighted statement that came out to me as well. we are talking about what matt baucus's plan talks about you will be fined as a small business owner if you do not provide health insurance for your employees. now, it's come down significantly. steve: it's a tax. gretchen: it was 8%. enough to it's down to 50 bucks a head or something like that. but i think this was an amazing exchange between stephanopoulos and the president, because you could see that the president was notably irritated with what he thought was going to be a friendly interview. brian: the president has a habit of doing. this you pick it up because bill o'reilly was the first one who have him on his heels. i still contend the best one for the president and bill o'reilly was that interview. he says woe woe woe woe woe. i'm kind of losing control about. this i'm not allowed to talk so much. george stephanopoulos had him on that and kept his cool.

the thing that bothers me about the whole thing, you should say there is going to be a fee. splitting the definition between fee and tax. don't pretend that money isn't money. gretchen: no president wants to admit that going to cost anything. that's what it boils down to the president's speech to the nation a couple wednesdays ago left out who is going to pay for it. what is the cost going to be. he had to face that question. no president wants to answer hey, we're going to tax you. steve: let's just call it a fee. a family could face this fee of up to $3,800. which, given the fact that the president said he is not going to raise anybody's taxes or he is not going to raise anybody's federal fee fees up to quarter of a million dollars. that changes everything. brian: talk about town halls. you watched them here slowly but surely got to watch them everywhere. you saw people get emotional. some people said wow, these people are passionate about how

upset they are about the direction the country is going. the president had a different take on the passion that he saw. listen. >> i do think part of what's different today, is that the 24-hour news cycle and cable television and blogs and all of this, they focus on the most extreme elements on both sides. they can't get enough of conflict. it's cat nip to the media right now. the easiest ways to get 15 minutes of fame is to be rude to somebody. in that environment, i think it makes it more difficult to solve the problems that the american people sent us here to solve. gretchen: so in other words there would be better off so there wouldn't were no cable operations so the american people wouldn't hear the full story. that's what that echoed with me is darn the fact that we have 24 hours new cable operation that get the story out. steve: what i was thinking, gretchen, along the same line this, barack obama was elected by the media here he is complaining about the media if

you want to be on tv, you have got to make a lot of noise. isn't that how he got elected? brian: greatest comment to his great credit was about race a lot of people voted for me because of my race and a lot of people voted against me because of my race. gretchen: forced to answer that question because of carter's comments last week. brian: blamed it on the media used that term cat nip again. wait a second, it was the former president of the united states that made everyone take notice. can i say i don't enjoy anyone who likes talking about racism. he believes we love talking about racism in the media i believe it's the just opposite. gretchen: president carter or president obama. >> president obama says it's cat nip. steve: the problem for the president the whole thing carter has started has knocked him completely off message. however, yesterday on the talk shows michael steele was out there. and, in fact, the rnc, the republican national committee sent out a press release that talked about if it is sunday,

it's, what was it, it's misleading the press. however, here is michael steele responding to obama or taxes or if you want to call them fees. >> we want to do it in a step-by-step, common sense approach. bottom-up, patient-doctor centered. focus on approach tort reform. i don't need to overhaul the whole system to do the things i just said. this administration is bent on reforming the entire system. whether you are talking the baucus bill house bill 3200 or whatever bill the administration finally settles on taxes are going to go up for the middle class because that's the only way you pay for this. steve: fees, michael. gretchen: mitt romney will be here to talk about the health plan he implemented in the state of massachusetts and whether the country could do better if we

looked that plan. suspects arrested in a plot to bomb new york city are due in federal court today. new details in the investigation showing what kind of attack may have been in the works. catherine craig from wnyw joins us from the courthouse in brooklyn, new york, with the very latest. huge story over the weekend, catherine. what's the latest for this morning. >> that's right. as you know this terror investigation stretches far and wide from new york city to colorado to overseas. so far three men have been arrested in this terror investigation. they have been charged so far with lying to authorities. two of the men are from colorado. one of the men ahmed al zazi is from queens. he will be at the federal courthouse in downtown brooklyn. for a while, and everyone can agree with this, from the feds to his attorney. he had been cooperating with federal investigators giving them information on anything they wanted to know.

he was. [no audio] brian: i think we lost transmission from catherine craig. the imam we thought was working with the fbi and tracking and able to find out where this guy za zi why he went to new york turns out the imam was a double agent. he was talking to the fbi but then calling up za zi and saying they are coming after you, what about this went a car, you and your dad. now he is arrested. the imam. now zazi is arrested and his dad is arrested. they have don't know if they stopped the plot. gretchen: what do you mean? brian: they don't if the plot was going happen don't want to talk about the u haul that they tried to rent that didn't work. backpacks, ammonia and bomb-making material. they don't know if they stopped the plot when they don't know if they have all the guys that were involved. steve: keep you posted on that throughout the day right here on fox. president obama does not seem to think acorn is worth talking

about. >> this is not the biggest issue facing the country. not something i'm paying a lot of attention to. steve: really? what the president is paying attention to may surprise you. gretchen: a woman who likes sarah palin so much, she is paying $64,000 to have a simple dinner with her. we talk to her. steve: i hope it includes desert.

>> frankly, it's not something i followed closely, i didn't know that acorn was getting a whole lot of federal money. >> the senate in the house voted to cut it off. >> what i know is what i saw on that video was certainly inappropriate and deserves to be. >> you are not committing to cutting off the federal funding. >> george, this is not the biggest issue facing the country. not something i'm paying attention to.

brian: president obama claiming he does not know much about the scandal involving acorn. i'm joined to talk about that and much more from hunter. former campaign advisor bar enstein and gentleman neon. karen refresh your recollection surprised the president did not want to talk about the acorn. >> i'm not surprised at all it is not the most important issue in our country. we have economy in the toilet. health care it wasn't a crisis now it is. there are so many problems that we have. acorn is not on the top of the list. it might not be even in the top ten. brian: mortgage problems, election fraud, $53 million in federal funds didn't make his radar. >> i think that he was being disingenuous. there is no way this president who has been affiliated with acorn for a long time. brian: how? >> he trained acorn employees in the 1990s, represented acorn in a lawsuit. frankly, acorn played a huge role getting this president

elected because they bust people from illinois to -- bused people from illinois to ohio to vote for this president to. say that he doesn't pay attention is simply untrue. brian: janine, george stephanopoulos. >> this is beyond outrageous. i wonder if this is obama's affirmative action. they don't want to investigate the black panthers accused of voter intimidation at the polls in philadelphia. acorn gets billions of dollars in taxpayer money to commit criminal activity and intimidation. is ridiculous. he knows all about it. >> is this the most important issue facing this country? is it the one of the most important issues facing this country? come on? let's be realistic here. >> one of the most important issues facing the country? yes. why is it the most important? because we need to know where our money is going that. >> i agree with that goes for a lot of different things. acorn is not at the top of that

list. brian: take a look what the president has said 'about acorn. put it on full screen. is. brian: he appreciates, knows about it, and seems to be oblivious. >> i think we are missing the issue. the issue is acorn corrupt? yes. does it need fixing? absolutely. >> should we not get money? >> maybe. i actually agree with that i'm not willing to throw out the baby with the bath water. the amount of work that acorn has done for example for increasing awareness with the cops. >> teaching people how to cheat on taxes. >> something i think you guys would agree on. >> there is some good and some bad. brian: you are saying it is very important. >> it needs to be looked at and fixed. let's fix it. brian: discuss it in the break

especially after the show show break. we will keep you around for two more hours. >> two more hours? brian: only kidding. seven urging president obama to decision reconsider. another bailouts in the works in where your hard earned tax dollars would be going next. i guess with the newspapers.

brian: seven former cia directors issued warning to president obama to stop investigating tactics used during the bush administration. will this put our national security at risk? will the president budge? not according to what he said yesterday. back with our political panel. let's start with you, seven

heads with democratic presidents including george tenet who did both said stop reinvestigating. why won't the president stop? >> i agree with the seven former directors. they should not be conducting this investigation. they already did. so it seems to me meow bama is coming off soft about this issue on terrorism. they already called in a gentleman a couple days ago targeting big landmarks like the giants stadium and i think grand central. this is ridiculous. brian: and fashion week. >> again, they should be focusing on acorn and investigating and not our men and women trying to keep our country safe. brian: attorney general holder and president obama evidently there is a wall between them because he says i really can't stop it. it was not my idea. i have got to let the process go. karen, the whole thing reinvestigating is what has these directors freaked out. >> i could get it i could agree with you except we are going to hold people accountable or we are not. brian: they did. >> if there is one corrupt person, then that undermines all

of the great people who are doing the great work to keep us safe. >> that's not what's going on here. what is going on here this undermines the people who work each and every day to keep us safe. one, am i going to killed killed by terrorists bringing our country down or be investigated for trying to keep our country safe. there is another point here too. this president is being short-sighted. he might be winning the press day by going into the cia. is he not looking down the road when he is ex-president. what happens when the next administration thinks about you know if obama investigating the people before them. why can't we do that against barack obama. >> that's a double standard. they have are going to be looking over their shoulder thinking that eric holder is going to be looking over their shoulder. brian: the cia has been asked to fan out through afghanistan and gather intelligence about our enemy. how motivated do you think they would be now that they have been

secured and defamed to this degree. does it concern you. >> if you are doing your job and doing it at a high level you have nothing to worry about. that's the problem, you want them to hold some people accountable but then when we want to hold other people accountable it's a problem. either we are. >> comparing people to acorn and people who keep us safe that is a wrong comparison. people in the cia who did this work thought they were doing the right thing and knew they were doing the right thing and being investigated in a political witch-hunt. >> a waste of tax dollars by opening this investigation. >> is it a wrong thing to try to keep los angeles from a terrorist attack and new york as well? no. the answer the bottom line is both. >> i think we can do both. keep us and safe and hold people accountable. brian: good debate a lot of passion. when i talk about passion think about steve and gretchen. steve: run to the coffee pot. gretchen: we could hardly get here quick enough.

what carrie prejean said that's coming up next. steve: take a look at this video. a customer attack as would be robber and the whole thing caught on camera. somebody's birthday today. you know who? faith hill. she is 42 today. happy birthday, faith. ♪ don't you know how much it hurts ♪ when we don't talk ♪ when we don't touch

steve: take a look at your shot of the morning. here is twinkle toes tom delay. music is not what sedansing to. former majority leader makes his debut tonight on the hit competition. gretchen: he is stretching his ham stringeght i heard he had an injury. steve: we heard a foot problem. perhaps a stretch fracture or something like that in his foot. he says i will dance until my foot breaks off. brian: i have so much respect for anybody that goes on that competition that would be my biggest nightmare. steve: you have to be an athlete to do the stuff that they do. brian: not in the early rounds. steve: you are talking about tucker carlson last year? i thought he did a fine job. brian: i don't remember as well. i just would say early on it's really you have guys like done any osmond who did this their whole life and go into the finals and michael irvin clearly

going to excel and then everybody else. gretchen: i think the pressure is more on somebody like that doneny osmond who everyone expects to do so well. tom delay could win the whole thing. >> you are predicting tom delay walk out with the whole crown that's incredible. gretchen: why not? maybe he would have found himself at the values voter summit he had not found himself becoming twinkle toes. they did a straw pole of conservative candidates who would win if the election were today. check out, this our open guy here mike huckabee, 28% of the voters at this summit said they would like to see him, 12% liked mitt romney. surprisingly only 12 hers liked sarah palin. maybe that was because she was invited to attend this summit and chose not to. steve: keep in mind, it's unscientific. pulse check on the socially conservative wing of the g.o.p. right now, according to this unscientific straw poll they like huck.

brian: also said sometimes politicians are rusty and clearly governor huckaby is not had rusty. might it be because is he on fox news at least three days a week. >> we know measure america has always endured a chorus of critics. people who claim that every ill, every failure in the world is america's fault. but it's never before had a president that was conducting that chorus. when government is trying to take over health care, buy car companies, bailout banks and giving half the white house staff the title of czar. we have every good reason to be alarmed and speak to speak our mind. [ applause ] steve: there you have the former governor blasting barack obama. he says he is steering the

country towards bankruptcy he also said since the stimulus passed millions have lost their jobs. yet, not one job, new job has been created. brian: meanwhile the person many people thought -- there is a lot of the preu.s.a. show talk was all about carrie prejean last year. steve: miss u.s.a. brian: lot of the talk she was going to win. gretchen and i were talking about this a lot in the breaks. then the controversy happened when she was asked that question about marriage and she thought it should be between a man and a woman. she was asked to recount that she was at the values summit. she got kind of emotional. much. >> even though i didn't win the crown that night, i know that the lord has so much of a bigger crown in heaven for me. [ applause ] steve: she is very busy these

days. she is writing a book called "still standing." very popular on the inspirational speakers circuit. gretchen: rifqa bary, you remember that teen. she ran away from home over fears she would be killed for converting to christianity is heading back to court today. this is really important. the juvenile court judge will decide whether to send her back to her muslim family in ohio. she has been staying with a foster family in orlando. that report said there was no evidence she was in danger. steve: meanwhile newspapers may be on the receiving end of the next big government bailout. i said newspapers. in an interview with the pittsburgh post gazette president obama says he is, quote, happy to look at bills before congress to help struggling news organizations. the so-called newspaper revitalization act would offer tax breaks to outlets willing to restructure as nonprofit

businesses there is a problem. because the newspapers want to be for profit. unless they want the money from the government. brian: that's a handful. maybe you might owe someone a favor to ho bailed you out. this man, 20-year-old richard mccrosky now facing 1st degree murder charges. one of the victims was a pastor at a presbyterian church in west virginia. he was an aspiring rapper. sending violent lyrics to hip hop beats. he was arrested at the richmond airport. sleeping in the baggage area while waiting for a flight to california. gretch? gretchen: the irs is now extending this wednesday's deadline for international tax dodgers to apply for amnesty program. no jail time and reduce penalties for cheats who come forward. hiding assets overseas already applied for the program. brian? brian: take a look at this surveillance video. shows a would-be robber getting slammed to the ground. 54-year-old good samaritan who

might be a part time linebacker. he says he was no hero. he was trying to protect his wife who was in line waiting for a cashier. the suspect nursing wounds this morning from behind bars and facing charges of attempted armed robbery. look at that. >> he needs a cape. steve: real quickly, take a look at the weather. as you can see we have got a possibility of some severe weather today all the way from north central portions of texas right up through the mid missouri valley as well. temperatures will be seasonal. by the way tomorrow is the equinox. there you have got thunderstorms moving through. brian, over to you. how did the cowboys do with their new 1.5 billion-dollar stadium? brian: i think they are going to turn it in because they lost. i think they will be forced to evacuate it sorry dallas fans it didn't work out. they open up 1.5 billion-dollar stadium for first home game against the giants.

100,000 plus there president george w. bush and wife laura at mid field with the coin toss it came up tails. then they played the game. off the back of his heel, right? and then picked up by kenny phillips. now because the referees were even faked out they blew it dead there they wouldn't count the touchdown it would be a turnover. score would make it 21-it 20 in the fourth. jones scored that touchdown you thought they would have a victory. in the end it would be 31-30. game winning field goal twice. once they called time out right before and they did it again. giants win. jake cutler trying to win over fans. pick up the action. ties the game. cutler 236 yards, two touchdowns, no turnovers. late in the fourth josh reed tried to get pittsburgh the lead. he misses.

second kick of the quarter, too. and then the winner, robbie, same opportunity. wouldn't make it bears win. bears win 17-14. here is why joel is wearing his mark sanchez t-shirt today. he didn't go for the jersey. tried to walk the talk after talking the talk against the pats. yes, patriots. and then sanchez there to justin in the end zone for the lead. the jets defense did the rest. tom brady used to be really good. 23 of 47 for 216 yards. he had a pick. jets win. yet to give up a touchdown this season. don't forget to watch brian the and the judge radio show. see us online. see what we do. gretchen: also giants beat detroit, thank you. brian: 100. we will show you adrian peterson next hour. gretchen: he only got a gazillion yards rushing. brian: he looks unbelievable. steve: we have been doing this

show for 13, 14 years. this is the first time we have ever done a story where we can start out by telling you we know that 91-year-old robert tompson sleeps in the nude. brian: fine. gretchen: that's our question of the day. how many of you sleep in the nude? steve: ok. carlson@foxnews.com. brian: twitter that. steve: that's why i gave it apparently this guy, robert thompson was asleep in his house in fort worth -- down in lake worth, florida. and his dog right there, the rottweiler heard something and started growling. what does he do? he jumps out of bed naked and discovers somebody in his house. brian: takes action. gretchen: good thing he was arnold not with underwear but with a gun. he was able to fire off a few shots. let's hear what he thought about the whole thing. >> i think the guy was scared to death. he was screaming. if anybody violates my home,

they better be careful, you know. that's all i got to say. steve: so the world war ii veteran held the man who -- 26-year-old man who has now been charged with burglary. held him until the cops could arrive. gretchen: i wonder if he put on the boxers before the cop got there? i hope. steve: i don't know. he looks like he is in great shape. brian: yeah, he does. for 91 fan as it particular. another reason why you should go to bed with something on. steve: you never know. brian: sarah palin is no cheap date. a woman paying $64,000 to dine with the former governor for a great cause. gretchen: two of america's biggest enemies will be visiting new york. should mahmoud ahmadinejad and moammar kadafi be allowed on u.s. soil? they already got their voice sass. we will talk to john bolton about this whole mess coming up.

brian: alzheimer's case the numbers of alzheimer's cases are rising at this hour. new report finds more than 35 million people in the world suffer from the disease. and other forms of ghen sexual harassment that number is up 10% from 2005. more news. with chicago in the running to host the plirps. the white -- olympics. sending advance team. the olympic committee will be choosing a host city for the 2016 summer olympics next month. on a different note. gretchen: thank you, brian. how much would you pay to have one dinner with former governor of alaska sarah palin? well, how about $63,500? steve: that's a lot of dinner. that's how much cathy maples

dished out. she joins us from birmingham, alabama. cathy, good morning to you. >> good morning. steve: $63,000 to have lunch, a four hour lunch, up to four hours with governor sarah palin. why is it worth so much to you to do that? >> it's an expensive dinner, isn't it? steve: it is. >> not just to me. of course, there is still some of us americans that are conservatives that love sarah palin. but this also benefits ride to recovery, which helps our wounded warriors. steve: it sure does. gretchen: one of the other reasons that i believe you felt compelled to bid so high you had heard somebody else was bidding high in a way to possibly defame the former governor? what do you know about that? >> i had heard that it was rumored, i didn't know how true it was, but i thought that was very unfair and i don't like things like that. and i was willing to go higher just so she wouldn't have to go

through with that. the news has already been so biased towards her anyway. steve: well, you just touched on it right there. you know, she has had a rough road ever since she was picked by john mccain to be his running mate. over lunch, what are you going to talk about? >> well, i would like to see her run for president. i would love to see her run for president. steve: all right. so are you trying to talk her into it or just want to find out whether or not she is going to do it? >> well, i would like to ask her that question. of course, it's something she may not want to answer right now. but i would love to see her run. you know, we need somebody with ethics. gretchen: you have set up the dinner date yet, cathy? when and where? >> we have not set that up yet. those details are forth coming. she will be in hong kong, i think wednesday. so it's going to take a few days to get all that situated.

steve: you don't have to go up to alaska for dinner, do you. >> i don't know yet. i have been three times and i love alaska. gretchen: i would lobby for that. >> take my grandchildren. gretchen: do it in the summer time and take a cruise, too. thanks for being our guest this morning. >> you are welcome. steve: i wonder if you have to leave a tip on 63,000. gretchen: 10% would be pretty hefty. 15%, 20%. steve: president obama and foreign policy, our next guest, former ambassador to the u.n. giving the president a grade of, quote, absent. john bolton after the break. gretchen: field trips for convicted killers? a murderer escapes last week during one of those. are these field trips really a good idea? a fair and balanced debate in just 15 minutes.

gretchen: president obama getting ready to deliver first speech to the u.n. general assembly that will happen on wednesday. so with leaders from iran and libya there, what does his message need to be? brian: with us right now to talk about that, a man who has done this before. u.s. ambassador to the u.n. and fox news contributor. no longer doing that but he is with us. ambassador john bolton, welcome back. >> good morning. great to be here. brian: this is great for the president. evidence wants to talk to ahmadinejad. he wants to be here and wants to talk to all the bad guys. let's go have a bad guys summit. >> the secretary general gives a lunch every year for heads of state that president obama will sit right next to the secretary general. so ahmadinejad will know where to find him on wednesday if he wants to talk to him. steve: who is going to be standing between ahmadinejad and the president? >> well, the secret service may stand between them but this is a lunch with a lot of cameras.

it's going to be very interesting. plus, don't forget. you have moammar kadafi the next day at the security council meeting that the president is going to chair, come up, give him a copy of his book, give him a big hug like hugo chavez. this is going to be an interesting week. gretchen: what i want to know is whether or not the news will shift to cover international foreign policy this week with the president. because so much of the news has been about his domestic health care reform plan. >> i think the president has been neglects national security. i think he has been so focused on restructuring our healthcare system that he has ignored challenges around the world. and the decisions he has made like last week on missile defense have been very negative for our safety. so i think this is a good chance for people to look at what his policies are and make their judgments. brian: ambassador, you are wrong. it's going to get them a standing owe christian. the only people upset by this evidently is eastern europe. >> i think in the united nations he will get a rapture russ welcome. unlike president obama who used to call it his annual trip to the wax museum. the general assembly -- it won't

matter what he says. they will give him a standing ovation after standing ovation. i think the american people should listen very carefully what he says on these security questions. because, again, going back to the missile defense decision, i don't think he fully understands the challenges that we face in the world from proliferation and terrorism. so, this will be an opportunity that he himself has picked to focus on these issues. steve: what has changed, ambassador,as soon as you were at the united nations representing the united states? i mean, the bad guys coming to town every year. but this year it's different because people are trying to get them thrown out of the holts they are staying at. they say they can't stay at compounds out in new jersey and stuff like that. what's different this year than last year? >> i think a lot of people are beginning to understand the negative implications of the president's foreign policy. the idea if you simply reach your hand out to the dictators, our adversaries around the world that relation also improve and we'll be more secure. ahmadinejad has proved he is perfectly capable of oppressing the iranian people.

is he not going to give hup his nuclear weapons program. the north koreas are not going to give up their nuclear weapons program. the people are beginning to get concerned that the president doesn't real solid a grip on foreign policy. gretchen: what will he say in his speech then, ambassador, because on one hand he said he would sit down with ahmadinejad with no preconditions. a lot of people are looking to the united nations to the asian united nations to tighten the sanctions. >> good luck with tightening sanctions. that won't happen. this will be a speech that will demonstrate that obama is what i call a post american president. is he really above all that patriotism stuff. you will recall evan thomas said in normed did i speech. is he before all the country. sort of like god. i think the image the white house wants is the president speaking to the general assembly chairing the security council, really not just the american president but as he said himself a citizen of the world. brian: right now, this is the

statement from hillary clinton. says we're going to show the world that the u.n. does not have to be a diplomatic talk shop. we are not going to be as confrontational as george bush. steve: and guys like you. brian: talking but. >> my view was that the united states should not be a well-bred door mat at the u.n. you can stand up for american interests and not be unpleasant. the idea if we simply acquiesce in the repeated criticism that the u.s. gets that somehow it will advance our interests i think isn't going anywhere. i think we are beginning to see it. gretchen: time will tell. we will be able to see if nicey nice really works. >> we have the president trying to put together a progress in the middle east. it's more photo opportunity than substance. i think that will be the key to this whole week a lot of glitz and glamour but no substantive change. steve: dormant and also wax museum. thanks for bringing your a-game. >> nice to be here. gretchen: president obama hit five sunday morning talk shows

who push health care reform. he also found time to point fingers at fox news and all those people who attended town halls. were you one of them? white house press secretary deign that -- dana perino here with her take. brian: why is president obama dragging his feet? "fox & friends" back in three minutes.

gretchen: september 21, 2009. thank you for sharing your time with us today. president obama hits the airwaves with five interviews in just one day. did he actually accomplish what he set out to? former white house press secretary dana perino here with her take on it. >> i told realtor to take a hike. meet the rae who told kadafi to take a hike. steve: field trips for convicted killers? a murderer escaped last week during one. are these really a good idea? we have a fair and balanced debate coming up straight ahead.

james from fort meyers florida. america is cured for the monday morning blues. "fox & friends" with fair and balanced news. thanks, jane. [captioning made possible by fox news channel] captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- brian: sorry it's monday. it's not our fault. we are happy to be here and explain why you should up and really shower. take off the p.j.'s, jump in the shower. repeat on the shampoo because you didn't hit the snooze alarm and enjoy the show. gretchen: listen for the headlines on a monday morning. desperate attempt to hide his climb accused killer raymond clark this is scary stuff. he allegedly broke the bones of yale grad student annie le before hiding her body behind a wall. accord to the "new york post" clark also tripped a fire alarm. evacuating the building to try to cover his tracks. experts also revealing a possible motive now. he was jealous over le's success in the lab. friends describe her as a brilliant researcher on the fast

track. her body now back in california where her family will hold a private funeral. police now searching for this man, meseck domis wanted in the killing of his wife and five children. the sheriff says it's the most horrific crime that community has ever seen. he is believed to have fled to haiti where he has family. he and his wife had a history of domestic violence. iran supreme leader now says the u.s. is suffering from iran phobia when it comes to his country's nuclear program and the threat iran's missiles oppose. ayatollah khomeini always maintained the nuclear program is purely peaceful. claim -- hillary clinton will visit the new york stock exchange and ring the opening bell as well. mrs. clinton is in new york to attend the 64th session of the u.n. general assembly.

100 world leaders including president obama and china's president are scheduled to meet at the u.n. this week. all right, steve. let's take a quick look at the weather picture. is this the first look at fall? steve: yes, as you can see widely scattered showers from the great lakes down through the ohio and tennessee valley a little on the chilly side. out in the northern plains down through the southern plains rainy as well. dry throughout the new england states where, believe me, the leaves are falling. i'm going up to boston this weekend and get an eye full. caribou maine, 40. 50 in new york. sifts and 60's and 70's northern plains. today it is going to be chilly out in the rockies. temperatures in the 40's and the 50's. it's going to be nice. 70's and 80's throughout the east. as you can see 90's down south. if you are in phoenix, it's going to be 106 today out at the airport. and that's a look at your fox travelcast. i do believe date of birth that perino is going to be -- i do

believe dana perino is going to be joining us. >> we got the green memo. >> i thought oh shoot i wore green, too. gretchen: i like it very colored coordinated. brian: i always bring two color changes. steve: there you have them side by side. [ laughter ] gretchen: i will trade you the black shirt for the green necklace. >> ok. brian: too bad it's two cities, gretchen. steve: let's make a clothes deal. what did you think of the president of the united states doing five shows. of course he didn't do fox. was it a mistake for him not to show up on fox? >> well, i think a couple of things. i don't think that he moved any -- at all yesterday. they initially announced they were going to do the five shows in the wake of the health care pitches that they were trying to do after his speech, after doing 60 minutes and then the topper of the week sort of made the sandwich was going to be the five sunday shows. he didn't have anything new to say. so he didn't have any news on that.

the only thing new was on afghanistan. missile defense. and he did answer the questions about racism, which i think he does better than just about anybody. but, as far as achieving the goal of what they wanted to do yesterday, i think they didn't make it i do think it's unfortunate they didn't do fox. gretchen: they didn't do fox, dana, because they knew they might get tough questions it this f. they ended up doing fox. he ended up getting tough questions at abc. >> sure. gretchen: take a look at what the house spokesperson said about not doing fox. gretchen: i know i have a couple of comments about that inside response. >> here is the thing for me. if they made a decision not to do fox which i would have disagreed with, i think they could have done a good interview with chris wallace and talked to people watching fox because the ratings are very high. and trying to reach out to a lot of people. if they think they are punishing fox i think that's a mistake.

that doesn't work. that hurts them worse. in addition, comments like that are not presidential. it doesn't represent him well. if they decided not to do fox, fine. take the high road and smile and say thank you we are going to take a pass this time. appreciate your interest and move on. instead they don't act like they won. you know, they won the election fair and square and they should act like it. gretchen: and the reason we should point out the reason they had that so you think you can dance phrase in there is because they are angry that fox network did not run obama's health care speech a couple weeks ago so they ran so you think can you dance. >> am i wrong but didn't fox news channel have the highest ratings for the number of people watching the speech? >> i think it's the highest rating. i don't understand the complaint. that's misplaced anger. steve: it was carried on the news channel it wasn't carried on the broadcast channel. besides, obama is all about choice. fox gave people news. do you want to watch obama on

the news or watch the entertainment channel with dancing. >> after do you five sunday shows and 60 minutes and joint session and letterman, i mean really what's left. >> you might have to cut in on tom delay he can get more prime time coverage. brian: that's a good point. so he he is going to be doing letterman for an hour and also did univision. >> smart to do that i think we should have done more of that why not talk to people who are more skeptical of your plan. partly because that could have been he had nothing new to say. brian: question of the day. >> let's talk about what the president is going to do about afghanistan, can we? because he has asked his general mcchrystal he put his eye who is universally respected to come out with a strategy and

recommendations for a way forward in afghanistan. the general has come up with a strategy there is a report that the administration asked them to delay the release of this from four to six weeks. and will include a troop increase. how do we know that? because what came out this morning to bob woodward in "the washington post" is that that's what he is asking for. mischris call it coming forward with this. he sounds desperate. and the president doesn't seem in a rush. what am i missing, dana? >> well, sometimes you get the push from the military because they really want to have more troops or they want something. so you always have a little bit of a push and a pull between the defense department and the white house, no matter who is in power. sometimes you have it going the other way. when president bush was in office, he was the one trying to get them to commit to more troops in iraq and he had to help bring them along. i'm curious about the four to six week delay. i'm sure there is probably a good reason for it without them commenting on the reason, people are left to image maybe because they want to finish the health care debate.

brian: people are dying. gretchen: that's the first thing that comes to mind. more importantly to me, dana, this is now president obama's war in afghanistan. he is -- to me, this is obviously a critical decision. but it's a huge political decision for him. because he is going to anger the people on the left if he sends more troops and if he doesn't send more troops, this whole thing may blow up in smoke. so what is the answer? >> i think he has to absolutely set aside political considerations. forget it. this is not just obama's war. this is america's war. there was -- seemingly unrelated incident this weekend with the arrests of those terrorist suspects in denver, colorado and new york. we have to think very carefully about what would happen if we left afghanistan, if we don't finish of the job there, and then we end up with more attacks on this country. this is america's war. i would love to talk to you about this sometime. where are the women's groups on

afghanistan? gretchen: exactly. >> what do you think is going to happen to those women? and more women should come out and support president obama and say if you think we need more troops there to make this work, then we should be able to commit to it. steve: sure. now, and with this "the washington post" item, the extraordinary thing is general mcchrystal said that unless he gets more troops, they will face mission failure over there, which is absolutely extraordinary. but you just touched on, you know, what's going on with this -- it looks like they cracked an al qaeda cell here in new york and also in colorado. the first since 9/11. brian: first with links overseas, direct links overseas. steve: yeah. we were over there, we went to a training camp. but there are parts of the patriot act that apparently -- and that's the guy who was arrested along with his dad and also imam over the weekend. parts of the provisions -- several provisions in the patriotic act that are

exexpiring. the worry is they will make us more vulnerable if they water this thing down, dana. >> so, remember back when we passed the patriotic act right after september 11th because we had to more -- modernize our laws to fight terrorism. several years later fight over civil liberties we were able to get the patriotic act. allow these provisions to be sun set and re-examined. i was heartened to see that president obama supports the provisions. the woman interviewed yesterday, i'm sorry, i can't remember her name, said that there was scant evidence that there was any civil liberty abuses. and so i think it's good to have this debate but we should not water down these laws at all, especially because if you just look at what happened this weekend, the fbi and intelligence used several different tools in order to bring the suspects to the core so that they could prevent them from per pe 'trading an attack on our country.

gretchen: one would assume because of the patriotic act they were able to stymie that plan. dana, if you will stick around. >> probably parts of the patriotic act, sure. gretchen: seven former cia directors want president obama to end the criminal investigation into the agency. he has said no. dana, didn't he say he didn't want a witch-hunt? she will answer that after the break. brian: real estate broker refusing to rent to the leader of libya when is he on american soil this week. meet the man who cold kadafi to take a hike.

steve: this is a fox news alert. look at these pictures. a bus and tractor-trailer have collided on the new jersey turnpike. as you can see right there it's a greyhound bus. new jersey state police have closed the southbound lane of 95. the crash happened just a few moments ago a number of people apparently were injured. but the extent of their injuries sun known. officials expect major delays on

both sides of '95. the main artery along the eastern seaboard in the united states. all right. meanwhile, a group of seven nonpartisan former cia chiefs are asking president obama to stop the investigation into terror tactics used during the bush administration. but it looks like the president is not budging. so is that putting our country at risk? brian: dana perino is the former press secretary for george w. bush. she is still with us. dana, first off, are you surprised democrat -- cia directors for democrat administration, republican administration all believe this is really troublesome? >> i'm not surprised given what i know about from my experience and also having talked to general hayden about this situation. i'm not surprised that they came to an agreement. it's a little surprising that they all would agree to sign a public letter to the president of the united states. i don't know whether they asked for a private meeting with him and then did the letter or just

went ahead with the letter. i think that it would behoove president obama to listen to them. sounded like yesterday on the shows that he probably wasn't going to do so. what i found astounding in the "the washington post" article on saturday was that the attorney general, eric holder, had not even read the report that the career prosecutors had done in 2005. in which they declined to prosecute except for the one prosecution which ended up putting somebody behind bars. can you imagine if somebody in our administration had overruled career prosecutors without even roogd their memo? there would have been an outrage steve. brian: let's listen to the president yesterday on that very question. >> i said before i want to look forward and not backwards on their. on the other hand, i have also said nobody is above the law. and i don't want to start getting into the business of squelching investigations that are being conducted. now, it's not a criminal

investigation as yet, my understanding. i have made clear both publicly and privately that i have no interest in witch hunts. but, ultimately, the law is the law. steve: so he has got no interest in witch hunts. he has also said i want to look forward but not back backward. ok. who is runs the administration? is it the president of the united states, not am witch-hunt or eric holder who said wait a minute, let's take a look in the rear view mirror what they did during the bush administration? >> the role of the attorney general is, you know, one in which he has to go ahead and make decisions if he has found evidence that there is reason for more prosecutions. but i find that hard to believe. he didn't each read the memos. in addition to that,president obama could lien on him and say let's not do. this what i found trouble something one of the democratic-leaning analysts yesterday said that the best political outcome for president obama would be for the investigation to sort of go along and then for them not to find anything and for it to all

just go away. that way they appease the left. what price the our intelligence community? if you are in the government and career prosecutors look to see whether or not you committed some crime within your agency, and then there is a new administration and then that new administration decides to investigate it again, where does it ever end? i think president obama could exert some leadership here. brian: dana, so much going on, because the cia and fbi have to work together to unearth and deacon structure this plot that could have taken place last week. and if they don't feel motivated, the cia, we are all in danger because of what's happened? >> if they don't feel motivated or feel distracted if they feel they have to be covering their rears or buying insurance against trial lawyers or whatever it might be, we need them focused on their jobs, they do incredible great work this week secretary of defense of that thank goodness. brian: thanks so much for joining us and we will talk again. steve: mondays. field trips for killers.

a murderer escaped last week during a prison outing. are they really a good idea? they there are two sides to this story. we have both of them after the break. brian: new information about illegal aliens getting homes. apparently the government knows all about it. >> not really a prostitute. xxx

gretchen: breaking news to tell you about right now. a massive manhunt for an insane killer in "the washington post" now finally over. philip paul is back in custody after being on the run for three days. he had managed to slip away from the staff of a mental institution while on a field trip to the state fair. but why would he be allowed out in the first place? joining me now is former warden and forensic psychologist and ph.d. good morning to both of you.

>> good morning. >> good morning. gretchen: dock doctor, i'm wondering why somebody who has killed somebody and diagnosed as schizophrenic and escaped before by the way would be allowed to go on a field trip. >> what i think we have to think about is this is a hospital. this is not a prison. the idea of a hospital is that you are readying this person for discharge. and probably the most sensible way of doing that is to do it gradually. let them out a little bit at a time and see what they do. you don't want a court order to release this person and they haven't been off the hospital grounds in 20 years and been in the world. if that's done correctly, you have cif privileges. if that doesn't work can you pull it back and give a little more privileges. you can pull it back. can you even conditionally release them which happens with many, many of this type of person in this country. gretchen: one thing that i thought amazingly so when i read this story last week that they were on a field trip. i was reading the news headline

and i caught myself. why are they allowed on a field trip. what are your thoughts? >> well, the idea of the doctor's is correct. we do transition people out from hospitals and prisons. but we transition people out that are going to get out. mr. paul should never be out. as we just need to look at his record. and the fact that he was turned down for release september the 5th or the 4th indicates that somebody dropped the ball at the hospital. i mean, significantly dropped the ball. i'm a huge supporter of transition in the u.s.a. and our policies and procedure believe in it but this has set us all back. i have talked with officials at the department of health and social services just this morning and secretary dreyfus is conducting a comprehensive research of all of the policies of the three hospitals and they have found already that all are different.

so we're hoping, thank god we think no one was hurt. this may turn out to be a wonderful, wonderful thing for "the washington post" washington state. gretchen: it could be. but let's keep in mind this guy murdered an elderly woman and diagnosed as a schizophrenic. dr., i will ask you again that if he was never going to be released, what was the point of the field trip? >> but, why do we think he is never going to be released? insanity laws are rather clear that there is supposed to be somebody ready for discharge. look at the record presented on the media on this man he has already been placed on cble release once. he was living in an apartment. he was point back for nonviolent act or we would have heard about it to-to-say he is never going to be released. people lick this are placed on conditional release all the time. gretchen: that's a scary reality for a lot of to us take in this

morning. >> that is scary and a problem. gretchen: as we look at prison funding and what is happening in the state of california, maybe we should all pay a little bit more attention to this. >> no question. >> mr. cowly and dr. con roy, thank you for joining me this morning. >> thank you. gretchen: steve and brian, what you got cooking in the green room. steve: we have shown you the shocking video of acorn workers behaving very, very badly. now there is even more. acorn helping illegal aliens getting home loans. apparently the american government is on board with it. brian: forcing the governor of new york out of the office by the white house? why does the administration care about a local politician? steve: good question. brian: from the same party.

steve: chilly new details terror plot with links from new york all the way to denver and back to pakistan. right now three suspects are behind bars headed to court this morning. joining us live from federal court in brooklyn new york our own david lee. what are the three guys going to be charged with? >> that's the most interesting part of this case right now. all three of these defendants, steve, are being charged with lying to investigators.

thereof are no terror-specific charges at this time. so, what you ask did they lie about? one of the defendants, the one who really is the center of the case here, zazi in denver lied to authorities about a computer that the fbi says they found in his car. on that computer the fbi says they found nine pages of handwritten notes on the hard drive of that computer. he was questioned by the fbi and he denied having any knowledge of it. later saying maybe accidentally he downloaded these bomb-making instructions as part of religious material. now, as for the other two defendants. one of them is zazi's father. another one is an imam here in queens, new york will be behind me in just a few hours. they are charged with telling the fbi they didn't have certain conversations over the telephone, that the fbi was monitoring and the fbi says that is a criminal offense. all three of these defendants, steve, could face eight years in

prison for lying to authorities. will there be more charges? many believe that there will be. possibly an indictment later on that could spell out the specifics of this case. gretchen: any other physical evidence that authorities now have in their possession? >> the court documents talked about that computer that was found in the car. also, the authorities found here in queens in the one of the apartments that zazi was staying when he came to queens from denver. they said they found a battery operated scale and found double a batteries. found cell phones and backpacks. all of this may not sound disturbing or alarming but when you sort of connect the dots here, it raises concern that these could be, could be the components that could construct some type of bomb or explosive device. brian: so you think about it, the backpacks were found. you think about the things you just mentioned. and then where does this come in? the attempted rental, in queens,

of a u-haul truck? thankfully none of these guys that tried to rent it had valid credit cards. they wanted to pay in cash. they didn't get it where does that fit in? >> right now, that is not spelled out in the court papers. that's another part of this case that is still developing. you know, what the court papers actually say, brian, and i read them in detail this morning ask that they were planning to detonate. they spell out what the guys were trying to do. perhaps the authorities are not even sure of that right now. i'm reasonably confident that the authorities are aware of this. this investigation unfolded the same time that the president of the united states was in new york city and it continues to unfold this week when the u.n. general assembly is meeting. so, authorities, of course, very sensitive to the facts some very influential important people were going to be in new york and

there was the danger in their minds anyway that there could be some type of plot for a major explosion. back to you. steve: david lee miller with the very latest on this. let's talk about. this it sounds as if the white house has picked the next governor of the great state of new york. extraordinarily, the story yesterday in the "new york times" was that the political people at the administration had asked governor david paterson, who is currently the governor of new york, look, you are pulling below acorn. have you got to step aside. presumably andrew cuomo who has connections. if rudy runs, you are the only guy who wins. if rudy mounts, he could mount a challenge to barack obama. gretchen: you mean that the obama administration would be looking ahead to 2012 tore a

governor's race? when you put the name rudy giuliani in the mix. you within der that's exactly what they are worried about. if in fact rudy giuliani decides to run against governor david paterson he probably would win at this point and then that would launch potentially another presidential bid by rudy giuliani. here is the interesting thick is that jon corzine, who is in the next state right over here in new jersey, who is the governor of that state is also pulling low just like governor paterson. so far we haven't heard any request from the obama administration for jon corzine not to run again or for that matter any other democratic governor who is polling low right now. this is interesting. these two guys are going to need each other. brian: paterson, the govern of new york said i think all the attention the president is getting is racially motivated. the white house said we don't want any part of it. we think it's not true. they didn't appreciate taking eye all the ball. governor paterson is embarrassed

that this leaked out. because of that, is the reason he was marching in the parade yesterday and telling everyone i'm not going anywhere, i'm sticking it out. steve: for now. brian: one of the key obama figures is the chief of staff election committee he just hired that guy. there is a bit of a riff perhaps. i wonder during the big picture if acorn is not important enough for him to get involved with, why was it important enough for him to get involved with a governor's race in new york? steve: so there you have have got it as gretch mentioned, the president is going to be there with the current governor of new york later today up in troy new york. is he going to be really juicy. here is michael steele, the head of the rnc talking about obama and paterson. >> i found that to be stunning. that the white house would send word to only one of two black governors in the country not to run for reelection. i t. just raised a curious. it will be curious to see what

the what it would be i will be waiting to hear the responses. gretchen: charlie rangel has weighed in. he said don't give this press at all. there is no big news involved at all. it seems it's being deflected. steve: they have essentially picked the next governor of new york the white house has. brian: i like the fact that the administration didn't care what color of his skin. i like the fact they didn't bring race into it i can't believe they would tell someone like steve israel out in suffolk county don't run for senate in new york or carol malone i don't want you running either. they probably aren't happy that joe sestak in running for the senate seat in pennsylvania. he said the heck with that i'm running anyway. then they do. this the fact that he is a black governor and the administration doesn't care about that i actually like that.

steve: showing they are running the federal government and states as well. gretchen: headline force a monday. urgent and confidential report just released this morning on the war in afghanistan. it is a desperate plea for more troops from the top commander on the ground there general stanley mcchrystal says if we don't deploy more forces, we will lose this war. president obama though still not sure what his take is on this. >> we will do what's required to keep people safe. you don't make decisions about resources before you have the strategy right. gretchen: the assessment of afghanistan now being reviewed by the president and his national security team. steve? steve: the federal reserve now expected to keep emergency programs that encourage both spending and borrowing when it comes to buying homes. the fed is likely to consider ways to reign in programs dined to keep mortgage rates down as well as to get banks to lend

more freely. about film. the fed shoved exeep interest rate at lows. brian: extending deadline for international tax dodgers to apply for the amnesty program. they promise no jail time and tax cheats to come forward on their own. more than 3,000 americans hiding assets overseas already applied for the program. gretchen: television hit the red carpet for emmy awards in l.a. actor neil patrick harris. >> seen there. gretchen: he is? steve: just kidding. gretchen: glen close and alec baldwin they won. kneel patrick harris got great reviews. as for the winners? >> and the emmy goes to. cherry jones, 24.

gretchen: jones picked up best supporting actress in a drama for 24. 30 rock grabbed multiple statues. and john won best supporting actor on a comedy for two and a half men. >> i used to think that awards were just shallow tokens of momentary popularity but now. [ laughter ] >> i realize they are the only true measure of a person's real worth as a human being. gretchen: this year's show only ran long by four minutes. we should point out that kristin chenoweth won as well. steve: she also was on our christmas special. new information about acorn, giving home loans to illegal aliens. apparently the government knows about it. why isn't anything being done to

stop it. brian: coming up a real estate broker who refused to rent to him. he told hem get loss and all your money. gretchen: adon'ted daughter of legendary soul singer. probably bent known for cybil life. be the first to email us at friends@foxnews.com. we will send you a copy of steve's book.

steve: these undercover videos showing acorn's shameless corruption have gotten a lot of corruption from so-called community group has been involved in a lot of shady dealings and now there is more. involving illegal aliens and home loans.

john fund from the "wall street journal" joins us live to talk about this. all right. so john, we have heard about the fact that one of the things acorn is supposed to do is supposed to help people in poor communities, voter registration, help them put through mortgage applications and stuff like that. of course, we assumed they were american citizens. not so fast. >> no. i think for the last few years and at least seven cities, including new york, acorn has been helping illegal aliens get housing. and real houses. now, of course, illegal aliens don't have social security numbers so they provide them with a taxpayer identification numbers. these loans no, down payment loans because these are also pour people in many occasions. the problem is this kind of lending was exactly what helped fuel the subprime mortgage crisis that led to the collapse of the housing bubble that has led to a lot of our financial difficulties.

it's a small part of but it's an outrageous part because these are illegal aliens that should not be getting the benefits of the government programs. steve: do you think? i know it's hard to quantify. but you have got to figure if these people came in and asked for the applications and then acorn helped them get these home mortgages and they have since defaulted that adds millions, perhaps, and millions of dollars to the big of red ink. >> it's symbolic of the whole subprime mess. acorn was actively lobbying banks, lend more money to people. lower your interest rates. if you don't, we are going to picket you, we are going to demonstrate in front of your offices and demand the federal government not let you expand your operations or america with other -- merge with other banks. steve: clearly the federal government had an idea this was going on and yet they did nothing. >> under the bush administration and the obama administration there has been this incredible desire to pump out loans to

raise home ownership. we have not learned the who esca

state fair in washington state is back in prison. he was found 180 miles away last night. paul was on medication to control schizophrenia and said the voices in his head told him to murder an elderly woman 20 years ago. earlier we were asking why he was allowed to be held in the first place. david hasselhof was rushed to

the hospital last night. one of his daughters was staying with him. he has a history of battling of holism and was hospitalized for a alcohol poisoning last spring. $63,500, the amount one woman is having -- pain to have dinner with sarah palin. she told us earlier she planned on asking the former governor, will you run for president, governor palin? >> i would like to ask her that question. it might not be something she would like to enter, but i would like to see her run. we need someone with ethics. gretchen: amazingly, she said

she would be happy to go to alaska for the dinner. steve: baked alaska is one of my favorite desserts. let's take a look at the weather. it is a rainy start to the day across the central plains. dry throughout the northeast. nice and dry in texas, and out west as well. 67 degrees in kansas city. it looks like 47 right now in caribou, maine. it will be a beautiful day, a lot of temperatures in the 70's. 80's in the mid-atlantic. 90 in dallas/forth worth. brian: there was a boater's convention, and guess who was there?

-- voters convention, and guess who was there? gretchen: mitt romney, thank you for being back. i know that you gave this big speech at the valued voeterters summit. he took on the president in a pretty big way. your basic thought was? >> the president is taking the country in a direction that the country does not want to go. it is wrong to believe that we can raise taxes on people and raised the scale of government, and at the same time, shrinking our military budget. i think the president needs to take a different course. brian: don't worry, we will also get rid of the missile shield. there is something else that had been brought up, the mood of the

country. never before, arguably, has the nation been more involved in the political process. here is what the president interpreted, referring to the town halls. >> the 24 armored news cycle, cable television, blogs, they focus on the most extreme elements on both sides. they cannot get enough conflict. is catnip to the media. the easiest way to get fame right now is to be rude to someone. in that environment, it makes it more difficult to solve the problems that the american people want us to solve. steve: when he was running for president, in of these town halls, but now they are speaking count and saying they do not like the policies he is proposing, and he does not like it.

>> people are standing up and shoving, not for the reasons he suggested, but because his stimulus plan did not create jobs. they see a health care plan where the government would ultimately be able to take over health care. now this missile defense decision which basically kicks sand in the face of our friends in poland and the czech republic. the american people are not happy. gretchen: this week in new york is a big week in foreign policy. the united nations general assembly will be gathering here. the president will be having a chance to speak to some countries where we have pre- existing condition with, like iran. will he have talked with mahmoud ahmadinejad? >> president obama has signalled

clearly to the world that his intent is left to be a defender of freedom and more of a neutral arbiter in the affairs of the world. you see him in on doors not siding with the democracy movement. in iran, the election was clearly fraud. the czech republic and poland being told, to bed. of course, their newspapers say, we have been sold to russia. brian: everyone will be talking about health care. what do you say to people who say that what you did in massachusetts was a bad example of what we should do in the country? >> actually, it is working pretty good. an independent study said that the massachusetts plan is within

its budget and it only costs the state 1% of the budget. 98% of the population is insured. president obama wants a public option. we do not have that as part of our plan. he wants to break the bank with his plan, costing $1 trillion obviously, ours was a very different magnitude. steve: the president is heading to the david letterman show tonight. our question of the day. did president obama's media blitz help is push for health care reform? friends@foxnews.com. we will continue on the other side of the break.

gretchen: we will ask the governor how he feels about jimmy carter after his comments about race. brian: and this guy sneaks up on the robber and tackles him. why he says he had to do it.

>> you never dreamed he would see jimmy carter as the good old days. gretchen: that with mitt romney at the value voters summit taking a swipe at president carter. >> president obama has

unemployment at 10%, adding onto the deficit. and his power grab in health care is something that probably would have made jimmy carter blush. this president is going eager igoing even further in the wrong direction. gretchen: last week, president carter was race baiting by saying that people who do not like president obama are racist. >> i think it's just president carter is losing touch. it was an unfortunate statement. it did not help the president. state and to suggest that people would disagree with the policies of president obama is anything other than what is laid out to be is not right. gretchen: president obama, all of the school and he went to,

needs to break out the calculator. listen to this exchange. >> under this mandate, the government is forcing people to spend money, finding you if you do not. >> for us to say that you have to take the responsibility to get health insurance is not a tax increase. it says we are not going to have other people carry your burdens. gretchen: but is it a tax, governor romney? >> i am not going to try to be an encyclopedia here, the democrat provisions talk about higher income individuals for health care. there are taxes on businesses that are being applied. one of the more extraordinary taxes described last week was the cap and trade bill costing $1,761 per family.

gretchen: but that was the report that we were not supposed to see. let me ask you about your own presidential aspirations. over the weekend they did this straw poll, so let's show them to everyone. gov. huckabee was on top you are in second with the governor palin. are you going to run again? >> i am working right now to get bob macdonald elected in virginia. canning some conservative voices and on capitol hill --etting some conservative voices on capitol hill. gretchen: it sounds like you might be in the running by taking swipes at the other side. >> we are going to make sure we keep that up. [laughter] gretchen: coming up, harassing phone calls from debt collectors killed him.

that is what one woman is claiming after her husband suffered a heart attack. and she called employees like these stupid, and she is their boss. the ceo of acorn sound off, but does not apologize.

steve: a florida widow is found in suit against a debt collector, claiming their constant calls and messaging killed her husband. >> this is the legal department.

brian: that last message mont the helicopter ride that saved his life. joining me now is the attorney representing dianne mcleod. first, billy, how do you define "harassing?" >> jack nicholson said it best, you have to ask me nicely. if a bill collector is collecting, they cannot do anything that is considered harassing. steve: in this case, stanley had to quit his job at sears because

he had a heart attack. then he started getting these calls from the collection agency. how many were there? home means did they get -- how mean did they get? >> you can hear on the telephone. these are mafia-like tactics that tony soprano would blush over. this is about as bad as it gets. brian: so who are you suing? >> and green tree, the mortgage company. it is time for people to stand up against these bali banks and mortgage companies. steve: the reason you are suing is after all of these phone calls, stanley's heart would start pumping, and eventually he died.

she is claiming that these calls and eventually killed her husband. >> he told them at the beginning of the day, i cannot pay. for them to repeatedly called back 10 times in one day is clearly intended to arrest him. that is a common tactic that we see across the country. unless they think that he hit the lottery in the morning, there is no reason to call him back at night because they know he does not have the money. brian: so you are suing the mortgage company on behalf of the window. we will see where that goes. -- behalf of the widow. do you know when this begin? >> we do not have a trial date, but we hope to bring it before a

jury by the end of this year. steve: if you are getting harassing phone calls, he suggests doing what they did, take them. brian: straight ahead, it is the photograph in every photo album, usually pulled out to embarrass you before your girlfriend or boyfriend. but this one turned into a lawsuit. steve: apparently, killing 3000 americans is fun and games, according to these conspirators. the last time they were in court, they acted like school children, the rolling paper airplanes.

gretchen: welcome back. the last time in 9/11 conspirators were in court, they made a paper airplane. what will happen this time? from guantanamo bay, catherine herridge. airplanes and laughing. what kind of the corn is that for a court? >> the main headline from here is that we had a briefing with the chief prosecutor and he said no matter what by november 16, this administration would make a decision on the to keep the

conspirators in military commisons or transfer them to federal court. three hours from now we will be in a court room with some, if not all, of the 9/11 conspirators, including three who are representing themselves. my experience is it is not so much of legal arguments that make news in these court appearances, but what they do themselves. the last time, one of the conspirators, made a paper airplane similar to this one and through it one of the co- defendants. i saw him pick up the airplane and look what was inside. then both men started laughing inside. inside, written, and were either the flight numbers for the 9/11 airplanes, or the tag numbers themselves.

it was clearly very sinister, because of the symbolism of making a paper airplane in a military court room, almost making a mockery of the entire system. it is these events that give you a window inside of the souls of these three. steve: they are back in court. she will have live reports throughout the day. gretchen: that is unbelievable. then they are just released. brian: you wonder as a resource, weekend listen to -- we can listen to the evidence that we have now and corroborate it with them. steve: and the big story of the week. acorn -- it hit the fan.

a film maker posed as a pimp with a prostitute. there is hannah giles. we found out a lot of people at acorn were helping them break the law. the head of acorn was on our network over the weekend. >> they were immediately terminated. what did i also do? i made sure we had an independent review, made sure we suspended any of those kinds of activities. we are continuing to make sure that if any of our employees are too stupid to understand they are not -- professional standards, we terminate them. gretchen: she also said that they would have an independent

investigation into the accusations, but they have not been named. in the meantime, the president was asked about his thoughts about this story last week, by george stephanopoulos. it was his response. >> how about the funding for acorn? >> it is not something that i really follow. i did not even realize they are getting significant funding. what i saw on the video is certainly inappropriate. >> are you willing to cut off federal funding? >> george, this is not the biggest issue right now. brian: the most telling thing that my son, darrell issa asked, will you create a fire wall between your union funding in your charity work? he said he did not know.

steve: keep in mind, president obama gave some money to be the torque -- attorney of acorn in 2007. this is what he said in 2007. gretchen: so he knew about the organization and and donated money to them in the campaign. i think it is misguided to think that you are not paying attention to the story as president of the united states. most of us are taxpayers and our funding organization like acorn. if there is this type of illegal activity going on in a taxpayer- funded organization, as

president, you should not say that you do not care. steve, so he was not following this story, but he was watching kanye west and derek jeter? brian: that was all in the same interview. gretchen: remember this teenager, rifqa bary? q accused bashir would be the victim of an honor killing if she returned back home to ohio. her parents' attorney wants the case dismissed. she has been staying with a foster family in orlando. but a recent report could change everything. the report said they have found no evidence that she is actually in danger. steve: muammar al-qaddafi was shown the door in new jersey.

then when he tried to rent a townhouse in manhattan, the broker told him to get lost. he was with us earlier. >> they said to me, there must be some way to get the whole building. i said, send al-megradhi back to scotland. they hung up. steve: british prime minister gordon brown will accrete muammar al-qaddafi on thursday in their first meeting since the release of the lockerbie bomber. brian, there are three children taken away because they took pictures of their kids in the bathtub and then took them to wal-rt to be developed. now they are suing wal-mart and the state after the employee call, protective services.

>> trying to be strong for your children when you are -- they are being whisked away from you, and you cannot make sense of it. when they ask you, where am i going, and you do not even know -- brian: awful. it took them one month to get custody back. gretchen: surveillance video showing a would-be bank robber getting slammed to the ground. the tackle courtesy of a 54- year-old good samaritan. he said he was just trying to protect his wife who was next in line. the suspect facing charges of armed robbery. steve: meanwhile, the stars hit the red carpet for the emmy awards and the scandalous. neil patrick harris took a high

note as the host. he can carry a tune. the sitcoms are getting rave reviews for his hosting job. the big winners are. >> the emmy goes to cherry jones, "24." steve, she picked up the best supporting actress. in the comedy category, "30 rock" won best series. this year's emmy telecast was only four minutes longer than it was supposed to be. that is amazing. brian: i n in awe of any show that is on time. now it is time to put my ego in focus.

the best of sunday's games. cowboys vs. giants. nine need changes. -- lead changes. the giants get the road victory. next, best catch of the day. andre johnson of the texans. a one-handed grab for a touchdown. houston pulled off the upset against the team that used to play in houston. best run of the day. still me. [laughter] we have a competition between frank gore and frank gore. they continue to roll. best player.

this one is easy. chris johnson of the tennessee titans. look how fast he is. we did not speed that up. there you go. steve: you are pointing in the picture. you look like you are choosing someone out. e-mail us now. brian: you have photographs of me, could you donate one of the better ones to the show? gretchen: i was thinking about this next story. it captured my thoughts. there is this guy, robert

johnson. a burglar came to his house, and he had nothing but a gun, and a dog. >> he was scared to death. if anyone tries to violate my home, they better be careful. steve: he took matters into his own hands. just like the guy in the bank. apparently, police found the burglar drunk and on the back porch, trembling. brian: when you are surprised by a 91-year-old, or a rottweiler, i do not know what you should be more scared of. from pakistan to new york to denver. terror plot to foiled right here in the country.

they are in custody and now they are facing the judge. steve: president obama making big claims about medicare. but do they make sense? peter johnson jr. checks the facts.

steve: there have been a lot of talk about medicare advantage, the health care plan that covers one of the five seniors. could the program be cut under the president's plan? >> i understand change is hard. what you are saying is people currently signed up for medicare advantage are going to have medicare and the same level of benefits but they may not have their insurer get a 14% premium, and that those

insurance companies could squawk about it, that is correct. steve: it does not add up. >> the president has said $177 billion will be cut over the next 10 years. about 23% of the pool. talking about this.he tweets we have a great choice of doctors. if you look at medicare advantage, depending on the state you are in, you have a choice of doctor, coordination of care, preventive medicine. sometimes even eyeglasses, depending on the range of choices. steve: interesting. a number of democrats describe

it as a bonanza for private insurers. >> the president is the test with profits. he does not seem to understand them in terms of cost. he had a problem with george stephanopoulos on the mandate -- on the notion of mandating people is a new tax. then there was a problem with cbs on the issue of passing costs down. more costs on insurers, more taxes, won't that be passed along to taxpayers, like you and me? steve: you have a long history in politics. the president has made it clear, he is not going to raise middle- class taxes but to call this the a tax, politically, would be a

mistake. >> it would be public policy fatality. steve, but it is a tax -- steve: but it is a tax! >> people are going to lose coverage under this proposal. we know that there was a september 1 study by john hopkins university that found medicare advantage is not only cheaper for the system, a revolt -- results in less american to room admissions, and fewer dollars than fee for services on medicare. a lot of people like it, but under the president's plan, 10 million people, could lose it. it is interesting. steve: thank you for coming in here. thanks for filling in on friday.

terror suspect due in court this morning as new details are coming aout about a new terror plot. a live report from the courthouse. and imagine outsourcing your life for one month. even hiring someone to argue with your spouse. our next guest did that, along with other life experiments. megyn kelly is also with us. megyn: i would never hire someone to argue with my spells. i do not think they can do as good of a job as i can. coming up, acorn could lose its federal funding, but you will lose a lawmaker who want them to lose more than that. and rifqa bary ran away from

home, fearing an honor killing. she learned her fate. and the super snake gone wild. .

is to. the fifth in four years sifting for a one .