a solemn moment at the oklahoma city national memorial, site of the deadliest terror attack on u.s. soil before 9/11. 168 people were killed, including 19 children when timothy mcveigh and terry nichols flew up the alfred p. murrah federal building. a moment of silence is being observed on this 17th anniversary of the terror bombing. good morning, i'm chris jansing. a couple of new polls out that should be of concern for the president, because while people like him, both of those polls show that voters think mitt romney is stronger on the economy. okay, overall numbers. look at the head-to-head matchups. a quinnipiac poll shows the president up four points on mitt romney. "the new york times" poll shows the candidates locked in a dead heat. >> remember what we said in the last campaign. i said this was going to be hard. change takes time. it takes more than a year,

sometimes it takes more than a single term, it takes more than a single president. >> we're a trusting people. we're a hopeful people. but we're not dumb. and we're not going to fall for the same liengz from the same person just because it's in a different place. >> i want to bring in carl bernstein and the "washington post" dana milbank. good morning, gentlemen. i guess we could say this is the first full week of the full-on campaign that we've known for sure mitt romney is going to be the nominee. should we be surprised these polls are tightening, carl? >> no, i've thought all along this is going to be a very close race barring some surprises, probably within 1% the winner will get. we're in a bad economic situation. we're pulling out of it. we've got a very controverted president who is himself the issue with great numbers of voters. we've got a republican candidate who's got an awful lot of personal baggage, who's got big problems with women. this is a snapshot of the moment.

it's going to change as we go through this process. but i suspect it's going to stay pretty close through the process. one of the big things to look for is the citizens united decision by the supreme court, which is going to result in this unprecedented flood of negative campaigning, advertising, paid on television. the real job of the press in this election is going to be extraordinary, which is to sort through this crap that we are going to be just overwhelmed by through the pacs. let's see who these two candidates are, what their real records are. so the press is going to be a really deciding factor. >> and you wrote this incredible piece about investigative journalism from when you were winning a pulitzer prize and now there's so much out there. it's hard sometimes for people to differentiate what's real and what's not. >> it's not only hard to differentiate, but i think a difference between, say, 40 years ago and now is that people

wanted to differentiate. i think we have an overwhelming number of people online and also watching on the air who unfortunately are looking for information to confirm belief that say they already hold. their political ideologies, their prejudices, their preconceived notion of the truth, rather than being open-minded to real, hard information. and that's going to be the job of the press here. and whether we and you can get through this noise is going to be an unprecedented test. i think it's going to be the deciding factor in the election. >> dana, let me ask you about another poll number. i call this the american dream statistic. we're predicated as americans on this idea that our kids can do better than we can. but when "the new york times" asked them about the future of the next generation, only a quarter thought that they would be better half. thought thought that they would be worse off. how bad is that potentially for the president? >> well, it depends on where we

are six months from now. it's a snapshot of what americans are thinking now. some of this is some of the long-term angst about american decline, but a lot more is where the economy is now and whether people think we're on the right track or the wrong track. things had been improving for the president, slipped back a bit. it's -- we still don't know where it will be then. but these numbers, when the economy picks up, when the jobs numbers pick up, those numbers pick up as well. indeed, it is not surprising for the race to be within a few percentage points. you've got to remember in a presidential race you win by four percentage points, it's a landslide. >> when you talk about good reporting and investigative reporting and getting the facts out there, carl, isn't it difficult sometimes when you're talking about the economy, first of all, economists will disagree. you put forward a plan and ask two brilliant economists, they may have different opinions on it. is it ultimately the american people, do they feel like they have got money in their pocket?

do they feel like they have to wince when they fill up their gas tank? >> i think that the answer is that the reporting needs to be on obama and his record and romney and his record and what they have done and said in their governorships, in their presidencies and whether they have viewed with the truth and dealt with the economic situation on their watches as they claim they have. i think that we're going to see some real differences, particularly in romney's record, in terms of what he said and what he's done. i think romney has got a lot more baggage than the president in many ways because there is this extensive record of him saying one thing and having done another. whether it has to do with his health care, which is a model for the so-called obama care program when he was the governor in massachusetts. there's a vulnerability that he

has that the president does not on these questions of past statements, i think. at the same time the president in many ways is the issue. his presidency is really vehemently disliked by many people in this country, particularly in so-called red states, and so it's going to be a barn burner. >> to the point that you make, i want to bring in iowa governor terry bran stead who last week endorsed mitt romney. governor, good morning. >> good morning. great to be with you. >> good to be with you. i'm sure you were able to hear what carl just had to say that, there are a lot of people out there and the polls show this, they are uncomfortable, they feel that mitt romney has changed positions, he's not doing well with women and this new poll shows that president obama leads by ten points in the enthusiasm gap. only a third of republican voters say they will enthusiastically support him in

november. how does he overcome those obstacles? >> i think he's going to be able to do that because he has a proven record of accomplishing things in the private sector. he rescued the winter olympics in salt lake city. he was governor of a liberal state, which is not an easy thing to accomplish. what's really tragic is the way obama as the incumbent is running a campaign. instead of running on his record and what he's accomplished, he's spending all his time attacking romney. i've been an incumbent, and i tell you if you're in that kind of position, you're in deep, deep trouble because basically the country is going the wrong direction. under obama we've got an unaffordable, unsustainable health care system that's going to have to be dramatically changed or repealed. and we have the national debt going over -- going up more than a trillion dollars every year, the most in the history of this country. we don't want to be the next greece. >> can i ask the governor a question. >> sure. >> governor, is it really what we're seeing here less about a

particular record of obama than more of two different parties at this point with two hugely different philosophies. >> yes. >> and tailoring the election to those philosophies and seeing if you can bring people to the center? >> i think you're right. first of all, there's a whole lot of new republican governors who were elected in 2009 and 2010 with the idea that we've got too much government, we're spending too much, we've got too much debt. those governors are seeing progress in creating jobs, reducing tax and regulatory burden. obama wants to raise taxes on the very people we need to create jobs. we have the highest corporate tax in the country. he's failed to provide the leadership to bring america out of this economic recession and his answer is always more spending, more government, and that's the wrong direction. that's the reason why i think republicans will unite behind romney. i think he'll attract the

independents and democrats needed to win just as republicans won a lot of these governorships in these key swing states in 2010. i'm one of them. we launched bomb in iowa. we want to sink him this time. i think we're one of the swing states that's going to do that. >> do you really think that working class people in your state, when they go into that ballot box, that they're not going to be concerned about giving tax cuts to rich people? >> well, first of all, we're not talking about tax cuts. what they're talking about is raising taxes on the very people that we're asking to invest and create jobs. what i found in iowa, instead of being victims of this envy campaign, that iowans want us to reduce the tax and regulatory burden and create more jobs. that's what i'm doing as governor. we've brought the unemployment rate down from over 6% to 5.3%.

iowa is going in the right direction. the country is going the wrong direction. we want a president that's in tune with me and other republican governor that say will bring our country back on track. restore the american dream. people don't want to spend their time envying those that are successful. they instead want to become successful themselves. >> governor terry branstead, i want to thunderstorm watch for being with us today. to carl's point, which is really about these two economic plans, and there are very divergent ideas out there about how to move this country forward, both in terms of the specifics of what they're proposing and also in the perception of the 99%, the 1%. let me play a clip of the president yesterday. >> somebody gave me an education. i wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth. michelle wasn't. but somebody gave us a chance. >> dana, let's talk a little about perception and how

important you think this whole issue of mitt romney's wealth is going to be. >> well, look, i mean the governor there just laid out essentially all of romney's talking points. those points will indeed be effective if people continue to feel that the economy is headed in the wrong direction and has not turned around. they'll lose effect if indeed that does change. now, so far the obama side has had a great deal of success with this populist issue, sort of turning the populist energy that benefited the tea party in 2010 the governor was talking about to helping the democratic side here and presenting mitt romney as something of a plutocrat, which romney has made particularly easy to do. in all of this we have to step back and say this election will be decided based on the facts of the economy as we get to them in october. the best we can do is try to say which side is spouting nonsense

at which point. >> one idea about nonsense, i'm not sure it's nonsense, but the governor gave the figure of his state has gone from 6% unemployment to 5.3 or 5.4. i'm not sure that's much greater than the rest of the country has done. dana, do you think it is? my guess is that that's in line with what's happened with the overall economy. and this is what we've got to do. i might be off base but let's look at why did iowa's unemployment rate go down? my guess is, off the top of my head, this is speculation, it doesn't have too much to do with those policies he's talking about as part of a national trend. >> let me switch gears a little bit, gentlemen, because i really want to talk about what's going on with the secret service right now. three agents involved in the scandal are out. one was allowed to retire, another was fired, a third resigned. one of the women involved is talking about what happened that night. that woman talked to "the new york times" saying one of the agents tried to pay her $30. he was owed $800.

is this going to get worse before it gets better, carl? you've been around a few secret service agents in your time. what happened here? >> a terrible breakdown of discipline and order and command and control. some people ought to be frog marched out of the secret service. i don't think it's of national import beyond the safety issues concerned that have been raised by this. i don't think it's a political issue. i don't think it has anything to do with the white house or even with the management of the treasury department which runs the secret service. but i think it's a horrible thing for a really important part of our government that has had a serious breakdown of procedure and character. >> and an awful lot of secret service agents are understandably furious about it and embarrassed by it. dana, the other thing that's going on is apparently one of the agents that is fired is apparently going to sue. >> well, that's the great

american tradition. >> he didn't get his money's worth? what in the world? >> i don't think he's suing the prostitute, carl. i'm pretty sure he's suing the government. >> what? >> you know what, mitt romney said -- and i think this has been the kind of thing that has been largely apolitical. everybody wants the secret service -- they're protecting mitt romney the same way they're protecting barack obama, but mitt romney did say in an interview yesterday that he would clean house, regardless of fault. do you think that's what people want to see here? >> absolutely. the secret service needs to do that for its own sake. i mean now you have the secret service saying they're going to interview ted nugent, as well they should for the remarks he made. then you have somebody like mike huckabee saying no, no, the secret service has enough of its own problems. we've got to get beyond that so people take this agency very seriously because of the hugely important work that they do. so it's in the institution's own interest to make as dramatic a purge as they possibly can. >> all right. dana milbank, always great to

see you. carl bernstein, thank you for coming in. wherever you live, whatever your political views, chances are dick clark impacted your life, ringing in the new year with you since 1972. he was responsible for more than 7500 hours, just over 312 full days of television programming in his life. his greatest legacy, surely "american bandstand" which helped launch the careers of everyone from chubby checker to the supremes, michael jackson to madonna. you've probably heard by now dick clark died of a heart attack yesterday at 82. but he will always be known as america's oldest teenager. >> i know that he's in a better place saying, hey, let's get on with the show, okay? you got it, boss. >> i think when he put me on tv, that did it. we know if we got on television, that's all they had to do. just give me a chance to go on tv with the twist and the rest would be history.

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this week both the dnc and rnc are launching major programs to reach hispanic voters, 11 million of them expected at the polls this year. the obama camp just announced its new group latinas for obama

and released new ads in colorado, nevada and florida. [ speaking in spanish ] >> well, republicans are targeting six states, including florida, colorado and nevada. joining me now, nbc latino.com's elisia menendez, co-host of "power play" and news anchor and host of the sunday morning show, jose diaz-balart. >> good morning, chris. >> there was a conference call yesterday that included senator bob menendez of new jersey and san antonio mayor julian castro. what's the strategy, do you think, behind this campaign, jose? >> the strategy is to get the millions of latino voters that are expected to come out to vote next november the 6th to indeed come out and vote, because i

think what the democrats and specific ate the white house needs to do is to make sure that the latinos come out to vote in november because the latest polls show that he is getting an overwhelming majority of the support among latino voters. it's just whether they will have the incentive to come out and vote for him next november. >> yeah, and what's going to get them fired up on the other side. florida senator marco rubio is putting together a bill that will allow young illegal immigrants to remain in the united states but denies them citizenship. he calls it a conservative alternative to the dream act. can it help? >> when you talk about immigrant rights activists they are so thrilled to have a republican coming to the table on this issue, especially in the senate where there's been a real dearth of republican leadership. at the same time, i think when hispanic voters look at it, there are two different problems with this legislation. from what we're hearing about it, as you said, it doesn't offer a path to citizenship, which is potentially problematic.

it can create a second class of americans. and the timing of this is a little suspect. why is it now that republicans are coming to the table, at the same time that you hear mitt romney saying that he knows he has a latino problem. you have kris kobach saying he doesn't think romney will support this dream act. there's no support for it in the house. i'm not sure what rubio can accomplish at this moment. >> poll after poll shows marco rubio a favorite in the gop veep stakes. i think the latest set of polls show him coming in right after chris christie. i don't know, you know him, you've seen him campaign. what do you think, jose, could he make a difference for the republicans? >> he's a very strong campaigner, he speaks spanish perfectly, which is a lot to say. he also is very charming. he's very young. and he's only been in the senate a couple of years. he's been in the national limelight only a couple of

years. so is that going to be enough to get someone like romney points? i think he's very popular in florida. but on the dream act issue, if i could disagree a little bit with my friend, alicia, who by the way has a tremendous radio program in the mornings, marco rubio's proposal, as i understand it now, would indeed give young people the possibility of one day reaching residency and then later citizenship. it's not an automatic residency, an automatic citizenship, but when we're talking about the republican party, to quote bob dylan, when you've got nothing, you've got nothing to lose and right now they're not doing very well among hispanic voters nationwide. >> let's look at some of the numbers. 2008 hispanics voted for president obama over john mccain by a margin of over two to one, 67 to 31%. the number i saw, alicia, you

may know it better than i, is that for a republican to win the presidency, they have to get at least 40% of the hispanic vote. is that a crazy number? >> in this election it is. when you have someone like george bush whose team really understood how to speak in value terms to the latino community, you saw the hispanic vote rise for republicans. right now the rnc has an incredibly heavy lift. they have to clarify all of mitt romney's statements on everything from the dream act to self-deportation. they need to distance themselves from people like kris kobach who are extreme anti-immigrant advocates and then they have to find a very positive message for romney to deliver to the community. if they can do those things, perhaps 40% is not out of reach. right now there's a long way to go. >> all right. it's always great to see you, alicia. >> the only thing that the -- >> go ahead. >> you know, i'll never cut you off, jose. >> the 1.2 million deportations. thank you so much. the thing that the republicans

may be able to make a difference on is the 1.2 million deportations that the obama administration has had, 55% of whom they say are criminals, 45% who are not. that's nearly half a million families that have been divided who have committed no crime other than coming into this country. but alicia is correct, i think the mountain is very, very steep for the republicans this next november. >> alicia, jose, my friends, always great to have you here. thank you so much. >> thanks, chris. >> and we'll be right back with "politics now." are you still sleeping? just wanted to check and make sure that we were on schedule. the first technology of its kind... mom and dad, i have great news. is now providing answers families need.

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neosporin® plus pain relief. for a two dollar coupon, visit neosporin.com. to "politics now" where ted nugent will meet with the secret service today. the rocker and gun enthusiast sparked a controversy when he said he would be dead or in jail if president obama got re-elected. the house passed a bill

yesterday funding a pipeline and a bunch of highway projects. 69 democrats joined a giant republican majority to pass the bill, including congressman jim clyburn and jim larson. now the bill heads to the senate where republicans hope a deal can be worked out in conference. a small town illinois controller is accused of stealing $30 million from the city of dixon, illinois. rita crundwell has worked since the '80s. someone filling in with her found a secret bank get. she had a $2 million motor home and giant horse farm. some of her purchases included a $259,000 horse trailer and nearly $300,000 for three trucks. to some good news, where the university of alabama football team crimson tide rolls to the white house. the president will honor the team's 14th championship today. and everyone, of course, is talking about the economy. the "washington post's" e.j.

deion has a fascinating look at how working americans are getti getting by. it's my must read. we also have fun behind-the-scenes photos up there too. departure. hertz gold plus rewards also offers ereturn-- our fastest way to return your car. just note your mileage and zap ! you're outta there ! we'll e-mail your receipt in a flash, too. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz.

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>> that behavior that was depicted in those photos absolutely violates both our regulations and, more importantly, our core values. this is not who we are. >> the paper's editor said in a web chat yesterday, quote, our job is to publish information that our readers need to make informed decisions. we have a particular duty to report vigorously and impartially on all aspects of the american mission in afghanistan, end quote. adding to the uproar, a new scandal a month. in january, alleged video surfacing of u.s. soldiers urinating on taliban members. the pentagon quickly condemning those pictures. then in february effigies of president obama were in flames over korans being burnt at an army base. then in march, a u.s. army sergeant allegedly killed 17 afghans in a rampage. collectively these incidents have overshadowed nato's mission there. >> there are people who would

destroy afghanistan's long-term future in order to restrict the rights of women and girls. human rights protection for religious and ethnic minorities are also still fragile. >> the u.s. hopes to build on hard-fought progress, including elements of a democratic government, schools where children have access to education and human rights. a symbol of that, chris, the first presidential candidate to come forward is a woman. >> and no one would have thought that possible, not so long ago. thank you so much, richard lui. i'm joined by retired army general wesley clark and adviser for the obama campaign and by joe conson, editor and chief of nationalmemo.com. gentlemen, good morning. general, let me start with you. how do these high-profile incendiary incidents complicate the withdrawal plan in your view? >> anything like this that gets out and inflames opinion among

opinion leaders or common people in afghanistan obviously makes it difficult for us to continue to focus on the mission and make the hard compromises and choices that are required in afghanistan. but the united states has a mission there. we've got to withdraw smoothly, we've got to leave behind stability. we've got to follow through on our obligations that we undertook to train the security forces and do as much as we can to enavailable hamid karzai's government able to meet the needs of the state. so we're going to continue to press forward with that as best we can. >> joe, in a recent column you wrote, and i'm quoting, the question is today how is what was once a righteous mission neend in anything but ruin. is it that bleak? >> well, it's beyond the scandals that were mention leading up to this discussion. there's a concern that the progress that we hear about in

afghanistan is much less than we have been told or what the administration has been told. so that's one big problem. the other big problem is the karzai government is corrupt, it lacks support among the afghan people to a greater extent than anybody would have wanted after all these years and there's a question of what we are propping up there and what will happen when we inevitably leave. those are real sort of core questions beyond today's sgla s scandal. >> gentlemen, hold on. congressman, good morning. >> good morning. >> let me ask you about something your colleague, jim moran said. he said the mission is no longer worth the cost. it's time to get out. what do you think? >> first of all, let me say i agree with both gentlemen on the program, that this undermines us, it undermines our credibility, it doesn't help us to win the hearts and minds and

that there's a separate issue of the military and the political, economical, are we even winning anyway. as you probably know, i have been one of those who have said that it's time that we have left afghanistan. i started saying that about two or three years ago. this certainly doesn't help. having said that, i just want to say that the majority, i mean 99% of our military are working hard. they're doing what their country is asking of them and it's very sad to see this undermining of that mission when we have a few people who are doing the wrong thing, who don't know any better or maybe who have gone over so much they have lost track of what the real world is about. >> but when you hear different reports, for example, what we were just told by richard lui, the first presidential candidate to come forward is a woman, if you talk to people involved in women's rights in afghanistan, they will tell you that great strides have been made. and to the general's point that there was a commitment that was

made, what do you see as a reasonable end date, as a reasonable out, congresswoman? >> well, i would have said that once we got osama bin laden we should have certainly decided to end this war. but, you know, now we have to figure out what is the right way to get out of this. and we have to work through our other allies who are also putting their troops in there, their reconstruction troops in there, et cetera. certainly, you know, i'm one for women's rights. i'm for educating young women, but you have to have a good partner left there. and honestly in my opinion karzai is not a good partner. he is corrupt. his government is corrupt. he won a second election, i believe, in an illegal way. and we need to find better partners there if we're going to stay there. >> congresswoman, if you can hold on, this is also, obviously, raising huge issues for the military. i'm wondering, general, if you

can tell me what you think is going on here. do you think some of these soldiers given this string of incidents, are cracking under the strain? do you think it's bad leadership, bad training or, you know, i don't know, this is a situation where it's always been going on but with new technology like cell phone cameras we're just seeing it and hearing about it a lot more than we used to? >> chris, thanks for that question because it's a very important question for the united states and all the men and women they serve. i think the armed forces have done a remarkable job. i commend the military's leadership. we never expected a volunteer force when it was created, and i was a captain who helped work on the creation of the program in 1971 in the pentagon, we never expected it to handle a ten-year war like this without return to the draft. it was never designed for that. we've asked our leadership to go back three and four and some five times to these war zones. it's been incredibly stressful, and they have done it incredibly well. as for the specifics here, i imagine some of this has always

gone on and maybe there are more cell phones and maybe now everybody is more attuned to it and they're looking for these things and some soldier decided to send something like this in. secretary panetta said it very well, it's inconsistent with our core values. it's against regulations. we know we're not allowed to do this. and i think the united states armed forces is just as strong and capable as it's ever been in terms of leadership and more capable in terms of its combat experience at this stage. >> but if you're looking at the underlying problems that the general addressed, congresswoman, things like these multiple deployments and obviously the number of problems that we've had and, you know, you can even go into the problems that they're having post-deployment with posttraumatic stress and so on, is the armed services committee looking ahead? do you feel the pentagon is doing what it needs to do to see post iraq, post afghanistan what the u.s. military really needs to look at?

>> chris, just in the last -- in this week alone, i've had meetings with secretary panetta, i've had meetings with the commandant of the marines, i've spoken to general odierno. we are looking at not only how do we infuse our military with the honor of being in the military so these types of things don't happen, how do we reinforce that. certainly as we've been moving around troops, as they have been deployed over and over, as their first concern is staying alive, maybe some of this has not been as in the forefront as so we've actually been talking about how we get that done and, you know, then when we see -- we see them come back and they have got major problems, we're also working on that. and of course we're in budget constrained years so we're trying to figure out how do we retool our military so that it's correct for the future conflicts we'll see and how do we take care of our men and women that

are coming back with some disorders. >> very complicated issues obviously, joe. if we're looking at a deadline of 2014, if indeed that is what happens in afghanistan, if we see for the most part u.s. forces out of afghanistan, where do you see the military going? do you think that there is a clear vision? or is it impossible to know, frankly, in an election year? >> well, i think they're trying to find a way to stand up the afghan military so that they actually can at least fight the taliban and have a successful negotiation with whatever elements of the taliban are willing to talk. that is the -- right now we're involved in trying to complete a negotiation with the taliban. and that has in my view been the way out of this for a long time now. there are parts of the taliban that wanted to talk. there are other parts that don't. some people say if you set a deadline, that encourages them to keep fighting. but you have to build up as strong a force in afghanistan so we can leave, because our military needs to recuperate

from this misadventure. >> joe conason always good to see you. general wesley clark, thank you, sir. always a pleasure to have you on the program. loretta sanchez had to run and vote, it is what people who serve in congress are actually paid to do among other things, so we thank her for her time slipping in between votes as well. thank you so much to all of you. now, the department of veterans affairs is expected to announce today plans to hire about 1600 additional psychiatrists, psychologists and other mental health professionals. they are trying to reduce the long wait times for services. the va has strained under the demands of so many new veterans who served in iraq and afghanistan, as well as aging veterans needing more care. i love cash back.

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weight loss fad? you shouldn't be. according to results from a study involving over 4,000 obese adults, patients who exercised and ate less lost significantly more weight than those who tried fad diets. liquid diets and weight loss pills included. hi, everybody. i'm thomas roberts. the agenda next hour, forced retirements and firings for certain agents after the secret service sex scandal and now one of the colombian escorts allegedly involved is speaking out. how being secretly serviced is the talk of washington. another new side-by-side poll puts the president and mitt romney in a dead heat. and remember the tv legend dick clark. his friend, little richard, will join me. >> i'm going to pretend you didn't even say that. thank you so much, thomas roberts. green is universal and it was a hunch that proved to be worth a lot of green for one man, $10 billion to be exact. public radio is looking at the

risks and rewards of oil exploration in a new documentary exploration called "the hunt for oil." it includes the story of utah's covenant oil field, the largest onshore oil discovery in 30 years. joining me for a preview of "hunt for oil" is alex chadwick. good to see you. good morning. >> hello, chris. thanks for inviting me. >> you know, none of us is immune to this talk of oil now. all of us have to put gas in our panics and just got through the home heating season. tell us a little bit about what the whole idea was behind this, doing this series. >> well, it's just that energy is such a central part of our lives today and the economy. it just drives so much. and when you add kind of the carbon consequences of what we're doing now and what will happen in 20, 30 years, it just seems like a topic and a subject that we need to explore more and we need to know more about.

so that's the idea behind this new public radio series, burn. and this show that's airing over the next week on various public stations around the country is about petroleum which is really, really central to the question of how we are going to solve this. >> it started out as a $160,000 hunch. it ended up being worth $10 billion. how does that happen? >> right. this is just the way the oil business operates. this is a place in central utah, a town called richfield, which is a couple of hours south of salt lake city. and, you know, the oil companies buy everything. they buy leases everywhere and test here and test there and are always looking for the best bet that they can find. so these leases were owned by chevron back in the late '60s, early '70s. they tried several different wells. they never hit anything so just kind of put this in their pocket

and held on to it but didn't explore anymore. they spent a lot of money and didn't find anything. so about 2000, they decide, i guess that, they're going to clear their books and they're going to dump these leases. and they call a local guy who's drilling there for something else, but they saw his sign up, you know, 30 miles away and said, well, he's interested in the region. so they call him. the company is wolverine gas and oil. they look around everywhere to try to find energy. they decided to take a gamble on this partly because one person at wolverine used to work at chevron and knew this area and knew there was interesting gee laumgic features there. so they bought it, held it for a couple of years of research. their first well that they drilled, they hit this -- you know, the biggest find onshore in the u.s. in 30 years. but that's just the business. i mean you can -- >> and that's just one of the many fascinating stories --

yeah, one of the many fascinating stories that you cover in this series. people can check their local pbs listings to see when and where they can hear this and pr, i'm sorry. >> it's better to check public radio listings. >> pr, sorry. >> yes. or come to our website, burn an energy journal.com. we've got station listings for where you can hear things locally across the country. >> alex chadwick, good to have you, thanks. >> thank you, chris. since news broke of the death of dick clark, the memories have been pouring in, especially on twitter. mariah carey tweeted this photo, saying your memory will live on eternally as an incredible legend. and brad paisley tweeted what a life. thank you for all you did and your friendship. now go get the music rockin' in heaven. [ ce llph one rings ] [ female announcer ] with secret outlast, conquer your busy day.

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the list of hip-hop artists most wealthy, 50 cent has a cool $110 million. brian williams fourth, dr. dre third, $270 million. beyonce's hubby, jay-z is worth about $460 million. and, yes, sean "diddy" combs tops the list with more than half a billion dollars. that wraps up this hour of "jansing & company." thomas roberts is up next. i'll see you back here tomorrow. one golden crown. come on frank how long have we known each other? go to e-trade. they got killer tools man. they'll help you nail a retirement plan that's fierce. two golden crowns. you realize the odds of winning are the same as being mauled by a polar bear and a regular bear in the same day?

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