captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> brown: after four weeks of shelling by government forces, syrian rebels retreated from a besieged neighborhood in homs and the red cross was allowed in. good evening, i'm jeffrey brown. >> suarez: and i'm ray suarez. on the "newshour" tonight, we hear from a leader of the opposition in exile, and get the latest on the siege and the humanitarian situation. >> brown: then we take up online privacy, as google introduces a new policy that could allow the company to dig deeper into the lives and habits of its billion plus users. >> suarez: spencer michels

reports on the push in california to construct a high speed rail system despite the state's troubled economy. >> >> it's a model for high speed rail. there's no backing off. >> our state budget is collapsing and yet they hold on to this pipe dream of funding high speed rail. >> brown: plus, we focus on two key states in play on super tuesday: tennessee and georgia. >> suarez: and we close with another in our "daily download" series. tonight, we look at how candidates use photos on social media. >> brown: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: and the william and flora hewlett foundation, working to solve social and environmental problems at home and around the world. and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting.

and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> suarez: rebels fighting the syrian military were forced to give way today, in the face of an unrelenting siege. fighters in the heavily damaged city of homs said they were pulling back from the district of baba amr. some 100,000 people once lived there, but that was before a month-long bombardment by president assad's army. we have a report narrated by jonathan rugman of "independent television news." >> reporter: after 26 days and government firepower like this, the siege of homs' most rebellious district appears to be ending. yesterday one activist filmed syrian troops apparently withdrawing from babr amr. but today they have reportedly advanced. and the ultimate symbol of syria's resistance can resist no

longer. and this is the appalling aftermath broadcast by state television. part winter snow scene part, apocalyptic vision. entire streets seemingly pounded into submission. shattered and shelled buildings everywhere the camera looks. residents were shown blaming militants for destroying houses and terrorizing civilians but one activist told me government forces continued attacking. as he and other civilians escaped from babr amr this morning >> the regime army, or assad militias as we call them, they're trying to kill us. not escort us, to secure us, they were killing us. they were bombing us. it was, you know, an extremely dangerous journey, because the bombardment was still going on. >> reporter: more tanks have been filmed heading into the

babr amr area from the damascus highway. and it's no wonder the free syrian army has withdrawn from the district for now. in a statement on facebook, the fighters said it was a tactical retreat on behalf of about 4,000 residents lacking food medicine, electricity and water. and running water iso short that residents have been melting snow to drink that instead. "we have no one to support us other than allah," they sing. though tomorrow that could change. the syrian red crescent and international committee of the red cross say the government's given them permission to enter. babr amr on friday, taking in humanitarian aid and evacuating civilians. yet, in the surrounding countryside this conflict isn't over. and the fear is that as the regime advances against these fighters, it will exact brutal revenge.

"look at me daddy, answer me daddy," these sons are filmed telling their dead father. it's an activist video. and even if journalists can't safely report on the full horror of what happened here those who have suffered are still trying. >> brown: in washington, assistant secretary of state jeffrey feltman predicted the syrian people will not give in, despite their suffering. he spoke at a senate hearing. >> large numbers of syrians are living every day under siege, deprived of basic necessities including food, clean water and medical supplies. women and children are wounded and dying for lack of treatment. innocent people are detained and tortured, and their families left to fear the worst. yet, despite the regime's brutality, the people of syria demonstrate enormous courage.

their determination to continue protesting for their rights, mostly still peaceful protests, is an inspiration and a testimony to the human spirit. for de. >> reporter: earlier today i met with haitham maleh. we spoke to him from istanbul where he's helping to lead the syrian national council. i began by asking him if the sireian opposition was united and able to speak with one voice >> all the opposition in syria has only one view for future. they want to finish this regime. they want to build democracy regime. they want to build a regime ruled by law, by... by power

parliament, ministers, justice and all the people must be equal >> so a lot of the opposition groups have been talking about getting weapons into into syria. into the hands of the free syrian army. are there people who are ready to help pay for those weapons? and how do you get them into the country? >> lots of people need to send weapons to free because those people, the national people, the civilian people, surely they are right to do it and a lot of people around syria maybe from jordan, a lot of people know how they can take... they can take the weapons through the border. >> suarez: you mentioned that president assad has tanks and

ships, heavy weapons. can you ever get enough weapons into the hands of the free syrian army to be able to fight back against an army of 300,000 men? >> we need to support the free syrian army by... because we cannot bring tanks and something like this or helicopter or something like this. but if we give them medium weapons they can finish this regime and i think the free syrian army will take the step to finish this regime and to protect the civilians. the people. >> suarez: haitham maleh with the syrian natinal council, thanks souch for joining us. >> thank you, too, good-bye. >> suarez: i also spoke with rania abouzeid who's been covering the conflict in syria for "time" magazine. she's in beirut.

rania, welcome back to the program. given the context of everything that's happened in the last couple of weeks, is the free syrian army's retreat from homs a big victory for bashar al-assad? >> well, that remains to be seen. the free syrian army based in the baba amr neighborhood of homes issued a statement online saying they were making a tactical retreat to try and ease the suffering, basically, of the 4,000 civilians who have been under constant bombardment for weeks now. they said that they basically don't have the weapons to defend these civilians and that's one of the reasons they were pulling out. now based on these developments, the syrian government appears to have given permission for the syrian arab red crescent as well as the international committee of the red cross to enter baba amr tomorrow. and according to the syrian national news agency they said that the u.n... the humanitarian chief, valerie amos, is welcome in syria but that her earlier

request to visit the besieged cities and towns in that country was rejected because it was an "inappropriate time" for the syrian government. >> suarez: homs is a pretty big place, about a million people before all this started. has word been getting out on the condition of civilian there is? >> well, certainly red cross in both the arab red crescent and the i.c.r.c. are expected to evacuate many of the wounded who have been receiving quite rudimentary medical treatment if we are to see all of these amateur videos that have been posted on youtube. some of the doctors who are still in the cities say that they are... have been cleaning, washing and cutting up sacks of flour, basically, and using the fabric as bandages to try and tend to some of the wounds of these civilians and defectives who have come under constant bombardment now. they say for many of the wounded

they can't do anything fothem and athey're just treating them as well as they can given the circumstances and that they're running shorts on all sorts of supplies. >> suarez: just a short time ago i spoke with a leader of the syrian opposition in istanbul and he was very critical for the rest of the world for standing by and letting this happen to the people of syria. is there any help on the way? >> apart from the red cross that's going in there tomorrow, that's a question that a lot of the syrians both inside the country and outside the country want answered. toward that tend syrian national council which is the de facto polical opposition group, how the press conference... held a press conference in paris yesterday and it wants to offer all of its support to the free syrian army which is the loose band of defectors and armed civilian which is have been protecting these protesters and many of these civilians from the loyalist forces. the syrian national council said it basically wants to organize,

unify and arm the free syrian army. the problem is it doesn't seem like the free syrian army knows because just hours later the head of the movement was on al jazeera and he said this decision to set up a military bureau to oversee the free syrian army wasn't coordinated with his group and that they wouldn't be participating in this military advisory bureau. so, you know, while the people of syria are suffering, it would seem to be quite a... quite dire humanitarian circumstances the political opposition as well as the military opposition in exile continues to bicker. and that's a source of much frustration for many of the syrians because while the world is looking for somebody, they're looking for a partner and, you know, the united states has said this repeatedly as well as other western states, they need the syrian opposition to unify and to step up so that any money,

for example, any funds, any weapons that are going to be funneled into the country need to go through a unified body. >> suarez: quickly before we go, you gave us an example of the divisions inside the opposition, what's keeping them apart? is it the approach? >> is it the eventl syria they want to see? tactics in the short term? what what are they arguing about? >> all of the above. you know, it's a strategic division within the syrian national council, for example, between islamists and seculars. you can't discount egos, you can't discount personalities. there are divisions between members of the syrian opposition those who were in exile for many years who remain in the country between the youth activists and members of the military even within the free syrian army. this is a very loose band. theommanders are localized, in most cases they don't take their orders from the colonel in turkey. they sometimes inform them of operations after the fact so the

divisions are varied and they're many. >> suarez: rania abouzeid of "time" magazine joined us from beirut. rania, nice to talk to you. >> thank you. >> brown: still to come on the "newshour": the new google privacy rules; california's high speed rail; super tuesday in the south and political candidates use of social media. but first, the other news of the day. here's ri sreenivasan. >> sreenivasan: three afghans turned their weapons on nato troops in southern afghanistan today killing two u.s. soldiers. that makes six american troops killed by afghan attackers in a spasm of violence since korans were burned at a u.s. base. u.s. and afghan officials said two of today's shooters were dressed as afghan soldiers. the other was a civilian. democrats in the u.s. senate have defeated a bid to roll back president obama's policy on birth control coverage. republicans wanted to let employers and health insurers refuse to pay for contraceptive or other health services on religious or moral grounds. utah senat orrin hatch said it was a matter of protecting fundamental rights. >> it's the religious

commitments of our nation that has made it the greatest nation in the world and i've got to tell you those of you who vote against this amendment are playing with fire, those of you who vote against this amendment are ignoring the constitution. those of you who vote against this amendment are wrong. >> sreenivasan: democrats rejected that argument. instead, they said the measure was an assault on women's rights. california democrat barbara boxer argued it would open the door to denying access to a host of health services. >> they would no longer have to offer breast cancer screening, cervical cancer screenings. all they have to do is say, "oh, i'm really sorry. we believe prayer is the answer, we don't believe in chemotherapy. we believe that if someone is heavy or obese and they get diabetes, we have a moral objection to helping them

because you know what, they didn't lead a clean life." >> sreenivasan: ithe end, the republican proposal was defeated, 51 to 48. in economic news, small cars were the sales winners last month. a number of automakers reported today they had double-digit increases for february. among the detroit big three, chrysler saw sales jump 40% or better, and ford was up 14% with smaller, gas-efficient models leading the way. general motors eked out a 1% gain. there were other encouraging signs today. applications for first-time jobless benefits hit a four-year low last week. and major retailers reported strong february sales. on wall street, the dow jes industrial average gained 28 points to close at 12,980. the nasdaq rose 22 points to close just under 2,989. seven americans left egypt today, easing a crisis in u.s.- egyptian relations. the seven work for pro-democracy groups. they had been accused of funding and promoting egyptian protests against military rule. sam lahood, the son of transportation secretary ray

lahood, was among those who had been detained. nine other americans left egypt before they could be charged. those are some of the day's major stories. now, back to jeff. >> brown: and we turn to a big change for one of the tech industry's giants in the debate over online privacy. in recent weeks, google has been alerting its more than one billion users around the world that, beginning today, the company is consolidating some 60 privacy policies of its different services into one and more closely coordinating those services into one large database. here's part of how the company explains it: >> instead of over 60 policies for google products and feures, we're itroducing just one th fewerwor, simpler explanations and less legal goop to wade through. does that mean when you use google-- from gmail and search and youtube and calendar, you can count on one policy that explain ours privacy commitment to you. >> brown: google says the move will also allow it to better

serve customers by pulling together personalized information across a variety of different sites. but not everyone agrees. 32 state attorneys general recently wrote a letter to google c.e.o. larry page calling the new policy an invasion of privacy. and some regulatory agencies in the european unn warned that the new poly mighbe a violation of the e.u.'s data- protection rules. we debate the merits of the policy and the broader issue with markham erickson, executive director of the open internet coalition, representing more than 50 of the largest internet companies in the country, including google. but he does not represent or speak for google for this specific policy. and lori andrews is professor at the illinois institute of technology chicago-kent college of law and author of the new book: "i know who you are and i saw what you did: socl networks and the death of privacy." for the record, we invited google to join us but the company declined.

laurie andrews as the title of your book suggests, you've raised concerns about privacy online. what concerns do you have about what google is doings? >> well,ing into at heart is an advertising platform. it makes 96% of its money, or $36 billion a year, by targeting ads. so this new policy allows them to target ads across platforms. so if i send an e-mail over gmail to a divorce lawyer and then i do a google search for depression, if i then am watching a youtube video with my... a young son, ads will pop up related to divorce and mental health which might trouble him. this private information of mine will become visible. anding intoed as erred in the past. in 2010 when young people went on google chat rooms to say "i'm thinking of committing suicide with x chemical" a google ad would pop up immediately saying

"dial 1-800-blah blah, get that chemical two for one." so the algorithms may push us toward harmful behaviors. >> brown: well, markham erickson google would say this is a transparent system and a service to its customers. what's the best argument? >> frankly, the criticisms you just heard i think are way overblown and more akin to fear-mongering about not google but an attack on the commercial internet itself. for over 20 years america has led the way in creating new products and innovative services many of which, if not most of which, are free for consumers. things like mapping services and e-mail services, video services and those services are provideed for free because the companies that provide those services are age to collect information about your browsing habits, they don't sell that personal, any personal information to third parties, it's internal. because of that, they're able to

sell advertisements to tir users that target the interest that their users have when they browse the internet. so that kind of tradeoff has been part of the commercial internet since the beginning. >> brown: you're saying consumers should know that's the economic model and therefore in exchange for the free service they are giving away person data for use by advertisers? >> well, they're not.... >> brown: first let markham erickson answer that. >> they're not giving personal data to advertisers not at all. they collect data that is nob personally identifiable and allow advertisers to target ads of interest to users without disclosing any personal information and users would rather see ads that they're interested in than ads that aren't relevant to them. so that tradeoff has made the internetwork for over 20 years.

>> brown: lori andrews, you want to jump in? >> it's not fear-mongering when people are losing their jobs or benefits as a result of this. google's collecting this information, including things that people say they don't want. surveys of consumers suggest they'd rather not be tracked over the internet and things happen such as if you do a google search about a health condition and you might be doing it for your mother or someone else, then if you go to a health insurance site or a life insurance site that's thought to represent you. they don't need my name to have my data and use it against me. plus google announced its policy saying one benefit is we're going to track you so if your google caldar says you're supposed to be at an appointment and we can tell from your g.p.s. you're far away, we'll send you a google map to get you there faster. well, the problem is google does nothing to prevent third parties from using that information. in fact, 93% of the time when

the government asks for information, private searches, g.p.s. data, it turns it over. employers now are asking for your private passwords so the employer might use that same information that google is touting as a benefit to say oh, your g.p.s. location shows you were at a competitor or at your lover's house. we're already seeing people losing jobs. one-third of employers say that they won't hire someone if on their social network page there's a picture of them with wine in their hands. 75% of employers now have a policy. >> brown: well let me ask... >> if google cared, they'd work to prevent third parties from requiring access. >> brown: respond that, mr. erickson. why not have a system... one qustion is where consers would have to opt in rather than being allowed to opt out in some cases. >> >> consumers do have to opt in order for google to track a

user's activities across the various google products and services. again, these criticisms aren't particular to google. they're criticisms of the internet itself, of social networks and search engines and of free internet products and services. those products and services won't with b free anymore if we do'tallow the companies to offer those kinds of services. and, again with full foj from the consumers of the tradeoff they're making. the reason google has spent five weeks educating consumers about what's happening is because they're not trying to do anything in tse celt. in fact, google and most of the large internet companies that i work with support baseline federal privacy legislation to deal with some of the problems that have been raised. >> brown: just very briefly, mr. erickson, are you worried about stronger regulation? you hear it from the a.g.s, you he it om the european union. >> i think the criticisms you've

heard here tonight are not in the mainstream of what serious policymakers are considering. we support what the white house called for last week, which was baseline privacy legislation and we think that a light touch legislative structure, statutory structure with enforcement by the federal trade commission to go after bad actors that are are abusing the system, that are selling informationithout users' permission, those should be gone after but that's not what's happening here. >> brown: briefly, lori andrews, you'dike to see it stronger? ry briefly, please. >> he says serious policymakers but we have a variety of people in congress, very concerned about this. it doesn't reflect what the public wants, you're asking people to give up a very important right. we wouldn't allow companies to say, oh, the only way you'll get your services is if you give up your right to vote or have children. privacy is a fundamental right. those surveys of what consumers want is much different and we're seeing pushback. a lot of class actions that

consumers have... a company in california actually put hardware on internet service providers and collected for 400,000 people in california every e-mail, every skype call, every google search. that information is being traded on and you don't have a choice. google's saying if you want to use our services, this is the way it is, take your business elsewhere if you don't agree with it. >> brown: i'm afraid we have to leave it there. lori andrews and markham erickson. thank you both very much. >> suarez: next, a big battle in california over the future of high-speed rail and whether a huge project now underway will ever be worth the cost. "newshour" correspondent spencer michels reports. the story was produced in association with kqed and the documentary "train wars." >> reporter: this is what the future will look like, if

california governor jerry brown has his way: bullet trains speeding at 220 miles an hour between los angeles, san francisco, san jose, san diego and sacramento. the san francisco-l.a. trip will take two and a half hours, which compared to an hour's flight, plus airport time, or a five or six hour drive. using this animation, the boosters of high speed rail have touted their vision of fast trains for years, and convinced voters to okay the 800 mile-long system, a plan which is still on the books. supporters argue that fast trains will help unclog crowded highways, will reduce air pollution and cut transportation costs, while creating thousands of construction and manufacturing jobs. in his state of the state address this year, governor brown spend a lot of time boosting rail. >> those who believe california is in decline will naturally

shrink back from such a strenuous undertaking. i understand that feeling, but i don't share it, because i know this state and the spirit of the people who choose to live here. >> reporter: convinced, among other things, that current rail service is inadequate, california voters appved bon to finance high speed rail in 2008. but a recent field poll shows that two-thirds of those voters want to vote again, and most would vote no this time. some legislators of both parties -- who supported it in the past -- are losing their enthusiasm as well. in fact, one republican state senator, doug lamalfa of rural northern california is trying to put the issue on the ballot again as a way of getting rid of a plan he considers a deception because its projected costs have doubled up since the vote, and now are estimated at around $100 billion. >> our state budget is

collapsing all around us here. we're having to make drastic cuts of things we don't want to have to. and yet they still hold onto this pipe dream of funding high speed rail with money that isn't coming from the private sector, or likely any more from the federal government. >> reporter: as part of the stimulus package, the federal government gave california $3.5 billion with the state having to raise the rest. lamalfa and others contend california is foolishly cking a national trend. republican governors in florida, wisconsin and ohio have turned down federal stimulus money for rail projects approved by a democratic congress in 2009. and president obama, who strongly supported high speed rail, failed to mention it in his recent state of the union address. still, his transportaton secretary, ray lahood came to california to meet with governor brown recently. he assured the governor and legislators that the administration is as committed as ever.

>> california is going to become the model for high speed rail. >> it sounds as though the obama administration has backed off a little bit on this? >> we are a thousand percent committed to high speed rail in america. this is the president's vision. this is the president's big view of the next generation of transportation, which is high speed inner city rail. there's no backing off. we're a thousand percent behin d it. that's why i'm spending three days here. >> reporter: for his part, brown has said he will bring the cost down, and help pay for high speed rail through fees charged greenhouse gas producers, under the states cap and trade laws. construction has already begun on a $4 billion transit center in san francisco, a grand central station of the west. but the question of how to pay for the whole project is still unclear. the bond money, plus federal

stimulus funds won't be nearly enough. in a move designed to revitalize the project and answer th question, brown has appointed longtime advisor dan richard as chairman of the high speed rail authority. >> we anticipate we will see very strong private sector involvement. the private sector, whether it's individual companies or companies associated with countries like japan, korea and others. the private sector comes in and buys the right to operate the system, to collect the revenues, to put up the trains and they make money from that. >> reporter: richards says tickets will cost just 83% of normal airfare. but senator lamalfa doubts that and says private capital will not want to invest because the train won't be very popular and will be too expensive. >> the cost to ride the rail will be much more, so people economically are not going to ride the rail. and then for many commuters, it doesn't work to ride the rail a short distance with all you have to do to get on and off it. they're still going to use their automobiles. >> reporter: lamalfa and others

find it disturbing that the state says it will start laying building tracks in the center of the state-- a thinly populated agricultural area with little need for fast trains. it would seem that if you'r going to start anywhere, you might start where there's the high numbers of people that would utilize it, so maybe you'd do it in an urban area. the reason that we're starting in the central valley is because high speed rail in california needs to connect our great cities and to do that we're going to have very high speed trains. we're going to test those trains at up to 250 miles an hour. they're intended to run at 220. the only place we can do that is in the central valley, we can't do it between san francisco and san jose, or anaheim and los angeles. >> reporter: most high speed rail systems, experts sa build the link to cities last. in central valley, the fast train has split the population. the farming community of hanford, population 53,000 is halfway between los angeles and san francisco.

it's where tomato farmer brad johns has his house and ranch. >> we're standing where the tracks are going to be right now, i've been told, more or less. that's the angle it's taking out across my property. >> reporter: johns believes that even though the tracks will run through his property the benefits will outigh the hassle. >> i am going to have them pick up the house and relocate it to another location on the ranch, drill the well, put in the septic, hook up the power, they're willing to pay for that. and i'm out of pocket for nothing. >> reporter: johns even hopes to put up solar panels and sell power for the train. >> i envision, when this train is finally built, that most of the folks here in town will get up on a friday, decide that i would really like to go up to san francisco for a bowl of clam chowder. and then they will decid you know what, there's a really nice show playing in las vegas for dinner, get back on the train and be home by midnight to sleep

in their own bed. >> reporter: but many in the central valley don't agree. the house belonging to ross and phyllis browning may be demolished by the project. the brownings fought the route in public hearings, even though they like the concept of high speed rail. >> we bought this place with the idea that we were going to retire, spend the rest of our lives here. i see that all going up in smoke. >> reporter: and steve gaspar, a dairy farmer, is convinced that the roar of a 200 mile per hour train will terrorize his cows, and they won't produce milk. >> as you can tell, cows are calm creatures. they don't like to be bothered. it's very peaceful and quiet out here. >> reporter: but advocates say the cows will adapt, just as they have in france where the high speed train zooms past ranches regularly. still, with all the opposition in the state, in sacramento and in washington, the question remains: why keep pushing forward?

many observers say it's governor brown's way of leaving a legacy, the way his father, governor pat brown, who build the states water, highway and university systems, did. >> it's hard to tell if it's legacy building, or an environmental resume or what have you. but it really doesn't make a lot of sense. >> reporter: while local concerns, a state budget deficit, and the uncertainty of national support for high speed rail may derail california's plans, supporters have an answer. they say that the golden gate bridge, hoover dam a evn the tnscontinental railroad were built in hard times. so they're sticking to their plan, which includes fast trains between san francisco and l.a. in 20 years. if it doesn't work out, this vision for the grand central station ofhe west may end up as the critics call it: a very expensive bus stop.

>> suarez: much of the talk was about energy and gas prices, in the presidential campaign today. "newshour" correspondent kwame holman reports on the day's events, in the run-up to super tuesday. >> reporter: mitt romney started his campaign day in energy-rich north dakota hammering president obama over the surging price of gasoline. >> he should be hanging his head and taking a little bit of the blame for what's going on today. >> reporter: gas prices have pushed their way onto the campaign agenda, rising 45 cents a gallon since the first of the year. but in a blog post today, the white house again highlighted figures showing u.s. reliae on oil imports falling in each of the three years of the obama presidency. back in fargo, romney argued it would be down even more, if not for the president's policies, including his veto of a plan to speed up the keystone oil pipeline project. >> when someone says do you want to bring in a pipeline that's going to create tens of thousands of jobs to bring oil in from canada how in the world

can you say no? but he did. this is a president that does not understand energy. he is the problem not the solution. >> reporter: the president counterpunched in nashua, new hampshire, rejecting republican plans he says focus mainly on more drilling. >> if there's one thing i know about new hampshire, it's that your political bull detector is pretty sharp. you know we can't just drill our way to lower gas prices. as long as i'm president, i will not walk away from the promise of clean energy. i will not cede the wind or solar or battery industry to china or germany because some politicians in washington refused to make the same commitment here in america. >> reporter: one of romney's rival newt gingrich joined the debate, in woodstock, georgia. he said the president is taking his eye off americans' pain at

the pump. >> i'm for science, i'm for developing the future. but i think one of the lessons of the obama waste of over a half-billion dollars on solyndra, is that you shouldn't confuse the future with the present. in the present, the american people drive cars and trucks. but the fact is most americans, the fact is that is a major expense if gasoline hits $5 a gallon this summer that will dramatically impact the economy because people won't have any extra money. >> reporter: meanwhile, gop contender rick santorum went after romney for first opposing limits on insurance coverage of birth control, then reversing himself. in atlanta, santorum said it showed romney's not conservative at the core. >> what's a winning formula is having better ideas. motivating the base of the republican party. being authentic. hang the character to go out there and talk about core convictions in america and attracting people who are looking for trustworthiness and

authenticity. someone of course they may not agree with on everything, who does? but someone at least they know, what you say you believe you actually do believe. >> reporter: the fourth republican hopeful ron paul held no public events today. >> suarez: late today the michigan republican party voted to award romney both of the state's at-large delegates from his victory there tuesday-- a backtrack on the party's previously announced rules to split delegates proportionally. that means instead of 15 delegates each between romney and santorum, romney will net 16 and santorum will get 14. the santorum campaign complained of backroom dealing. the next contests will come on super tuesday, which will be the candidates' first real test in the south. georgia and tennessee will be among the biggest prizes of the 10 primaries and caucuses awarding more than 400 delegates next week. for mo on at idriving th contests in those states, we are

joined by charles bullock, professor of political science at the university of georgia. and in tennessee, john geer is a professor of political science and co-director of the vanderbilt poll at vanderbilt university. professor bullock, super tuesday has in past cycles been a very southern primary but a look at the map shows you that it's sort of all over the place this time around. it's still important for the four men vying to becme the republican candidate to show their strength in the south. why? >> well, the south has now become the heartland for the republican party and this is the base they build out from. so it's taken the same kind of role for the g.o.p. that it did for decades for the democratic party. moreover gingrich has been saying he needs to get back to the south and the south will redeem him. looks like maybe now he's going to narrow a definition of where

what what he can do in the south and maybe only georgia. >> professor geer, can you give us a ick tourf tennessee so we know what we're looking at politically? >> >> well, tennessee is a state that's more moderate, for example, than alabama and mississippi, it's a state that has moderate leadership at the g.o.p. level but it's still very much a red state. it should be a state that someone like newt gingrich does well in but as xhuk bullock just said, he's not doing very well here in the state and right now santorum at least has the lead for the moment and we'll see how it goes forward but it's tough going for the former speaker. >> suarez: from tip to tip tennessee is a pretty long skinny state. does it break down regionally in political terms? >> absolutely. in some ways tennessee is three states. the eastern part of the state has been republican even before the civil war then you move more towards the mid-where will nashville is it become mrs. moderate, more democratic and then you move to the west and it's very democratic, partly

because of memphis and its population. so it's a very diverse state politically and has really three core regions. >> suarez: professor bullock, you teach southern poliics. tell us about geoia, o of the biggest prizes in tuesday's balloting. >> well, most of georgia's voters live in the atlanta metro area which i believe is still the largest metro area in the nation. about 28 counties. you have some very, very conservative voters in that area. what you're going to see in the electorate that turns out next tuesday will be an electorate that is roughly two-thirds identifiers as evangelicals or born-again. there are a number of tea party groups which are fairly active in the state and you're going to find some support and indeed it ooksike santorum is gaining ground in georgia. if we go back to four years ago romney fought to a three-way tie in georgia. he got 30% of the vote here. he'll do well if he can repeat that this year. he's been polling more below 25%

so it will be... the interesting in georgia may be who will come in second, will it be santorum or romney? >> suarez: professor gere tze there regional particularism at play this time around or are the issues animating voters in tennessee the same ones animating voters everywhere, like the economy? >> oh, i think economy cleay dominates here tennessee is doing okay, better than average but definitely the economy. social issues matter because a lot of voters are, in fact, evangelical voters, especially the remember primary but at the end of the day it's the economy and it's going to be santorum's responsibility and romney to connect to voters here to see if they can get additional support. >> suarez: how is tennessee faring economicly. >> it's doing better than the avere. our umployment rate i around 8% and there are job growth. the housing market didn't take quite a big a hit as other parts of the country.

there is extra money to spent. >> suarez: georgia, how has it fared in this economic downturn? >> georgia has been hammered, our unemployment rate is above the national average for months and months and months. construction was important in georgia, both residential and commercial expansion. the housing prices in atlanta we saw a drop back to the level they were 14 years ago and that assumes you can sell your house which many people can't so georgia is still in the doldrums when it comes to tonight's economy. >> reporter: georgia has been one of the big magnets in the south for latino immigrant which is doesn't change the voting population in the republican primary very much but does it affect the issues people are worried about? >> well, the publan partys

still playing exclusively to a white base and so the republicans in the state legislature continued to push anti-immigration legislation, it was a very tough anti-immigration bill passed last year. this year the legislature is looking at tightening up access to higher education for children who are not american citizens. so although the future is going to be quite important in terms of which party can appeal to these this growing latino population so far the republicans don't seem to have got than message and they are forfeiting that to the democrats. >> professor geer has tennessee been an immigrant magnet in the same way as georgia >> i don't think so. in fact, in general, the african american population is significantly less here than it is, for example, in georgia. there's been some tough anti-immigration legislation that's taken place and partly because it can do so because of the smaller population here. it's growing but it's still not

a sizable chunk yet. >> suarez: if you' watchg teessetuesy night,hat oulwe be looking for quickly from the results? >> well, what you should be looking for is does santorum get out to a big lead right away. if, in fact, it looks like it's close maybe some of the recent support romney got in michigan and arizona is turning the tide like we see in the national poll i suspect it's tightening up because the national trend is towards romney. i doubt tennessee is going to be dramatically opposite of that trend so i suspect a close race. >> suarez: professor bullock, what stat will you be looking at for tuesday's results for georgia? >> i think the real issue how much of the vote can gingrich get. it's not going to get a majority. will he get close to 40%? i think he will be lead t leading candidate but he may see santorum creeping up on him and if gingrich can't do well in georgia then i don't think there's any article for him.

i think this will be the last of his nine lives. >> suarez: gentlemen, thank you both. ray s. >> brown: finally we continue our look at the campaign as it plays out in social media and on the web. we're joined from two journalists from the web site daily download. lauren ashburn is formerly "u.s.a. today" and howard kurtz is host of reliable sources. i wanted to start be news today and unfortunately in the form of an obituary, the conservative media activist andrew breitbart was found dead, aged 4. natural causes, we're still waing to learn more. howie, this was a major figure in the world that you guys look at? social media and political activist? >> andrew breitbart was a

passionate fighter of conservative causes he was able to broadcast people online and bypass the mainstream media. but breitbart delighted in going too far. he was the one who put out the undercover video in the sting in against the community group acorn which turned outto have been edited and the infamous deceptively. >> ed: edited video for shirley sherrod when it looked like she was making a racist statement. he didn't apologize for that. >> he had a lot of detractors and supporters. he had 73,000 twitter followsers. the size of a small city but a lot of them didn't like him even media matters, a lberal watchdog group came out and said we praise his passion and his commitment to his craft. >> so an influential if devices

figure in this world. >> when senator kennedy died just hours after that he was writing some pretty harsh things about him. >> today there were two, michigan and arizona. and one very interesting event of the week happened in michigan. it was mitt romney a mitt romney event at ford field. howie, tell us about that. >> this was billed as a major economic speech by romney's campaign and yet it became about one thing-- the setting and the horrible optics and the reporters there, "washington post" journalist phillip rutger is an example. he used his twitter account to send out a picture of ford field and, of course, the event had been moved there and he wrote "i'm not sure there are enough seats for romney's econ speech q. sots the substance of what he had to say was overshadowed by the pictures of a stadium that was largely empty. >> brown: so an example where the campaign is trying for one

thing but it gets out of their control. >> and i think it shows how influential pictures have become in social media. one of the things that we've also noticed is the web site instagram which is a very popular picture-sharing site. it has five million users and more than 150 million pictures. i'll show you some of the examples. here's president obama, a picture taken and put up on instagram, the campaign just decided to join instagram several weeks ago so that they can get their pictures out without having to, as howie said before, go through the instream media. >> brown: when they said say "getting it out" who are they trying to reach? >> here's another one. >> well, these are purported to be behind-the-scenes pictures and they're trying to reach people who are not only looking at pictures on instagram but you can edit them yourself, share them, send them around. so basically playing to the online community which is increasingly a large segment of potential voters. >> you also have an example from again, mitt romney, right?

but these are not ones that he put out. >> he didn't. unfortunately, jeff. i don't understand why they wouldn't put theseut. look at this one picture here. doesn't romney look just like the... you know, happy grandfather, his hair is disheveled and he's smiling, obviously, at some event. >> let me take a second to explain how we're seeing this picture and some other you're about to put up. that is while the romney campaign might have put up these kinds of family man pictures, instead it was a site called buzzfeed which is an off beat site that deals with pop culture stuff. today buzzfeed has pictures of 30 cats lounging in shoes. and they put this up under the headline "25 photos that make mitt mn look human." in other words, this is not the candidate we see on the stage looking stiff everyday. >> brown: it's been an issue for him. >> and it attracted a lot of attention and, yes, buzz. >> it has. look at this picture, though. what does this say to you? this says regular guy playing a backyard game with his family in

a normal middle-class neighborhood. and this one, how many times have we all been here with our families seated around the kitchen table. there he is in the middle, the patriarch of the family and those yellow cups that everybody uses so kids don't spill things. >> and you know where these pictures came from was a blog called the mormon mommy blog maintained by a daughter-in-law of mitt romney and so this is how it made its way on to buzzfeed. once this was publicized the blog was shut down. why the campaign.... >> brown: shut down? so once the campaign see feeds these out which you're saying make him look pretty good, natural, their reaction was to... negative? >> i guess they felt that this was private. but when you're running for president part of what you're doi is yore running your family. as the family who lived in the white house. his handsome five sons and it's hard for me to understand why it took a web site that put out

picture that this campaign should pay money because it makes him look like a good guy. >> his big criticism is that he is very stiff, not a hair out of place, very calculated at the debate, not going too high, not going too low. and here this softens him but it doesn't seem like the romney campaign got that. >> it's interesting because the running theme in what we've looked at today and other things we've talked about is the campaign's trying to use these different technologies but not being able to control what comes out. >> and the same thing is happening with video as well. pictures are something that we are all able to grasp on to but you don't know where they go once you put them up on to the worldwide web and you don't know how they're manipulate as swollen to that could be one of the reasons the campaign has been so reticent to use it. >> the se change is whether you're talking about a video announcement or just these nice pictures of behind the scenes playing with your grandchildren.

you used to have to rely on television programs like this one to put those out. now campaigns can do this themselves. some are more adept than others but they understand images create lasting impediatricians the way words cannot. >> brown: and others can put it out as well. andrew breitbart and many others. howard kurtz, lauren ashburn, thanks again. >> suarez: again, the major developments of the day: syrian rebels retreated from a besieged neighborhood in the city of homs after four weeks of shelling by government forces. two more u.s. troops in afghanistan were shot dead at the hands of afghan soldiers. and in the presidential campaign, republicans charged president obama's policies helped fuel the surge in gas prices. the president fired back that it's time to get rid of tax breaks for oil companies. and to hari sreenivasan, for what's on the "newshour" online. hari? >> sreenivasan: coral sex just got a little more interesting. for science thursday, we have a story and colorful slideshow on the reproduction habits of reef- building coral.

that's on our science page. paul solman reported yesterday on benefit corporations, which try to do good as well as make money. we look at some of their workplaces, green buildings. check them out on our "making sense" page. on our health page, find five more common misperceptions about cardiac problems. all that and more is on our web site: newshour.pbs.org. ray? >> suarez: and that's the "newshour" for tonight. i'm ray suarez. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. we'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening with mark shields and david brooks, among others. thank you and good night. major funding for the pbs ewshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪

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