thank you to the panel. you have a smile on your face which is appropriate. thank you for being with us. if you're out shopping get a new book 'n' tipping the gipper" it will make you feel happier for this holiday. see you sunday night at 7:00 eastern for more "hardball." xxxx tech experts working over the holiday weekend to make sure the site gets fixed. the president is outraged over a drone strike that killed a child and could put the security deal between the two countries at risk. shoppers out in full force on one of the most important days. from the retailer, malls, this morning. millions of bargain hunters

making the dash into the stores today. the chaos actually got kicked off last night. yes, thanksgiving day, with a dozen retailers from macy's to target opening their doors on the actual thanksgiving day holiday. thousands lined up. would you believe not everybody happy about it. >> i think it's unfair. i think these people have a chance to be at home with their families and they are being cheated. >> they should all be closed on thanksgiving. it's thanksgiving. >> according to the national labor federation about 97 million americans are expected to hit the stores today. we've got your black friday frenzy covered from every angle. msnbc julia boorstin live at a target in los angeles. jay gray at the mall of america in bloomington, minnesota. we'll start with you, jay. we've been talking to you all morning. how is it looking now? >> t.j., i'm the king of shopping. i'm looking down on my subjects and i say spend, spend everyone. maybe it's getting to me. i have been here for a while. look, people are spending.

things are going really well at this mall and across the country apparently. we see people not only shopping but they are carrying bags. not one or two but several. the news looks good on that account. a lot of retailers are very concerned because they have six less days in shopping season between thanksgiving and christmas this year. it falls late in the year. but statistics show and analysts believe that this weekend the average family will spend around $650, that's up 11% from last year black friday weekend. so vitally important for retailers. what happens between thanksgiving and christmas makes up between 20 and 40% of their entire yearly intake. that's according to the national retail federation. on the other side of the ledger, all the shoppers we talked to and, boy, we've talked to a ton, t.j., they say they are finding deals. they are being lured into these

shops because the retailers are offering bargains, and we're talking 50 to 60% off of a lot of the merchandise here. a good deal but you've got to search for it. people are doing that, t.j. i throw it back to you. >> all right. jay gray who has been on duty there since early this morning. thank you so much. we turn now to california, cnbc's julia boorstin, she's live in l.a. when i talked to you earlier you talked about waves of people. we got you at a lull earlier. have you been seeing that, coming in waves? >> it's definitely been picking up this morning. the mall this target is located in opened up at 8:00 a.m. we've definitely seen traffic pick up since then of the real crush of people was last night. there are over 1,000 people lined up waiting to get into this store when the doors opened at 8:00 p.m. on thanksgiving day. that's the earliest ever for a target. they are rushing in for limited door buster deals including

$239, 50 inch flat screen tv that sold out quickly. it quieted down until about 7:00 or 8:00 a.m. this morning. it was not just that flat screen tv, which is sold out. tvs are always popular on black friday. this year a lot of popularity for ipad air and other apple products like apple tv. people are coming in for beatz by dre' headphones. >> i bought a tablet for my son so he could download apps and music. he uses my cell phone. it's his. >> the sales, the deals. >> we get her the beatz and my husband got his bluetooth for his ipod. my son got himself his ipod and a game.

>> one big trend this year doing research online on smart phones to save money. folks we talked to researching product reviews on youtube, comparing prices on amazon and using cart wheel app for additional discounts. all that online research is translateing to a lot more online purchases. target online has seen record traffic. the company says they have twice as many sales in the morning hours especially for the door buster. >> julia boorstin keeping an eye in los angeles. thank you so much. black friday is known for the biggest shopping day of the year. retailers roll out discounts. as you've seen they have bringing crowds to take advantage of sales on just about everything imaginable. >> big screen tvs, laptops, tablets. >> i want to get shoes. >> a keurig. i'm really, really excited about it. >> where can you find the best

deals, the best steals? retail analyst is here with the answers. good to see you. >> good to see you, too. >> once again, you were out last night. first of all why in really? you just wanted to check it out or see what's happening? >> i'm a retail analyst, it's part of my job to channel check and see what products are out there. >> and -- >> it's exactly what julia was saying, it's busy. especially last night when door busters happened at walmart. a lot of deals at 6:00 p.m. and then at 8:00 p.m. and then at 12:00 p.m. same thing at target. they were releasing deals throughout the night. i'm functioning a little bit -- not very much sleep but i was there covering it for everyone. >> did this pay off for them opening on thanksgiving day? you mentioned walmart. what kind of numbers did they do? >> they released numbers, they were saying about 5 million people coming through the stores at of 7:15 this morning. just to give you an idea they sold about 2 million tvs.

they sold 1.4 million tablets and around a million towels. >> towels. who is getting towels? >> i had to throw that in there. yes, people are buying towels. you're seeing a lot of volume in here. same thing with target. julia was saying ipad sold out. zoom the robot dog sold out as well. >> we're talking about going to the store. some people don't want that some people waiting until cyber monday. some want to sit home and do that thing. are you better off going to the store in terms of the deals? are they about the same? >> here is what i'm telling everyone. this holiday is about staying home, spending time with family. if you have your heart set on something you really want, might as well go out if you want to get some interaction with the shoppers. what retailers do is they want to make sure sales are sustained through the weekend. pretty much better deals as the weekend goes along and into the

holiday. >> it's okay to do it online. i shouldn't feel like i'm missing out on something if i don't get out there. >> national retail association said people will spend $603 billion over black friday weekend and most of that is online. yes, you're not the only one if you want to stay at home and logon to the computer. cyber monday is expected to be the biggest this year in history. >> we talk so much about going out and people opening early, retailers opening early. explain from a business standpoint really for the country and the economy why this day and this weekend really is such a big deal. >> the shopping season is actually shorter this year. as you know thanksgiving was yesterday. that gave us six days less we can go out and buy holiday gifts. retailers knowing that are trying to jam pack those promotions in. i think we heard before 20% of the annual revenues for most of the retailers are made with black friday weekend.

the sooner they spend money, the sooner they make that revenue. >> give us an idea. this is something happening the past several years. people expect such a deep discount they will hold off, hold back and have an expectation from that retailer to give them 30, 40. what's reasonable now? you're out there shopping you see 25, should you hold off for 30? >> it's the new normal. it happened during the recession when retailers were discounting a lot. the reason why they want to make sure they get rid of the inventory. the magic number is 30%. futures a discount of 30% or more you're doing pretty good. >> it's good to see you. >> you, too. >> you're doing well given what you went through last night with the chaos. you look great. >> thank you very much. >> always good to see you. thank you very much. up next the clock is ticking on the president's website. healthcare.gov, the president said the website will be up and running by november 30th. we'll see if that deadline will be met. stay here.

you can fill that box and pay one flat rate. how naughty was he? oh boy... [ male announcer ] fedex one rate. simple, flat rate shipping with the reliability of fedex. still running in the morning? yeah. getting your vegetables every day? when i can. [ bop ] [ male announcer ] could've had a v8. two full servings of vegetables for only 50 delicious calories.

video in to show you. this is of president obama. you see him there. there he is there in the center of the screen. he and the first lady back to the white house after visiting a group on the national mall fasting for immigration reform. several other top white house officials including the vice president have visited fast for families in recent weeks. the white house is taking a new step to fix the disastrous rollout including by the president's account it was disastrous, rollout of healthcare.gov. they are working on an easy app, help people figure out subsidies before buying health care. one said, quote, we are working on additional consumer oriented

tools to improve consumer experience and help them shop. let me bring in kristen welker. good morning to you. what are the expectations now. atmosphere vague deadline. i say vague by saying it should work by the end of the month for the vast majority. what does that mean? >> that is the big question. you're absolutely right to point that out, t.j. the administration has kept this deadline a little bit vague. the vast majority at this point they want to have the website operating and able to sustain 50,000 visitors at one time. they say they are on track to meet that goal by the november 30th deadline. but i have to tell you they are also managing expectations, t.j. you have one cms official coming out and saying, look, this is not a magical date. this is not a relaunch of the website. there will still be some problems with the website after

november 30th. so they are making that point. interestingly just today, hhs secretary kathleen sebelius post add blog, some shopping tips, if you will, for folks who want to purchase health insurance. the first tip is shop healthcare.gov during off peak hours during mornings, nights, weekends. she goes on to say have your in come and tax information ready when you log on. if you need to talk to someone, use the call center. they provide the number there. usualing people to logon on off peak hours really underscores the point this is still a work in progress. they say tech experts working 24/7 to have this site functioning smoothly by this weekend. i've been speaking to some folks, tech experts who say, look, it's not just about being able to support 50,000 people at one time, it's making sure those people can enroll quickly and without experiencing too many error messages. what would success look like for

the administration ? well, by monday i hope officials hope stories will come out of people getting on and able to enroll and aren't met with a number of antidotes about people experiencing more error messages. a lot of question marks about what will happen. we will pay close attention. we don't expect to get a briefing today. of course it is still the holiday weekend. but we do expect to get some type of an update tomorrow in terms of how things are going, t.j. >> kristen welker from the white house. always good to see you. lets turn to "the washington post" alex buyers. i want to pick up on a point she made talking about what the white house is putting out. alex i'll turned to you, dro said, quote, november 30 does not represent a relaunch of healthcare.gov. it is not a magical date. there will be times after the 30th when the site, like any

website, does not optimally perform. so what are we to make of tomorrow. they are the ones, alex, who put it out there. what should people even expect? it's not like they are getting a switch and all of a sudden tomorrow will look rosey. >> it's their deadline. i think they expect to see a few improvements. the white house has been talking about us a little more, the president was out in california tuesday. he told people to check out the website. they wouldn't do that if they didn't have a good feeling. at the same time as kristen was talking about there will be people with glitches for a while. that's the deal with any website. the big question is what outweighs the other. >> how big a deal is this on the deadline? are they, are we putting too much emphasis on the date. you heard deadline, you have expectations. >> whenever you put a date on something like this that started so poorly, i think it is a big

deal. i think republicans particularly are going to make it a big deal if the website isn't working in a way that satisfies consumers. also looking at the back end of this website is a problem. insurers getting duplicative reports when people get through the website system. there's still a lot of work here. the white house has every reason to have their fingers crossed right now. this works tomorrow. >> alex, i'm about to talk to a democratic congresswoman here in a moment. what can the administration say and what may they be saying right now to give these democratic candidates some kind of confidence in something they can go back and sell to their individual districts? >> sure. that's the big question. the white house certainly can't declare mission accomplished here. we've seen that movie before especially as jack pointed out with people crossing their fingers and really not sure what we're going to see tomorrow. they also can't say nothing because they have got

congressional democrats and frankly on the hook for this as well. they need to boast about something to constituents. that's a fine line to walk between they fixed everything and there's a way to go. >> even if this thing starts working like a charm and nobody anticipates it will. over the next several months, can it still -- the gop, they are not going to let this go is what i'm saying. even if it works beautifully, they are bringing up during the midterms it was a disaster when they rolled it out? >> absolutely. that's still going to happen. what needs to happen for democrats, they need to have a comeback. right now they don't. right now they have a broken website that isn't working up to satisfaction. as long as the white house provides them with something to say they will counter attacks that will come either way. >> both of you, what potentially is going to change the momentum, counter stories, disaster stories of individuals with positive stories. you kind of get that ball rolling seeing more stories like that.

the president's approval rate have gone down by 10% so far this year. alex, is it going to take time? >> it's a messaging battle. how does a person know how well the website is working? it worked for them or it doesn't. the white house needs stories how it worked well continuing pushing the law overall, not just talking about a website. they would like to talk about what the affordable care act will do for society not just whether the website will work or not. >> i'll leave it there. thank you both for being there. like i mentioned i was going to bring in democratic congresswoman. let me bring her in, serves on house budget and financial services committee. thank you so much for being here. are you getting any feedback yet, any inside information you can give or pass along to us, give any indication of what the website will look like and if they are, in fact, going to keep that promise that this website should work for the vast

majority by tomorrow? >> t.j., i don't have any inside track or technical knowledge about how the launch -- it's not a launch, how the website will happen tomorrow. this is a bad story. i can tell you the storms and rain and republican agitating because of it really sort of obscures the rainbow at the other end of the spectrum. the good news story clearly is that there have been 13 million people who have gotten rebates from insurance companies, because insurance companies overcharged. 17 million children received coverage and can no longer be denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions of of

course that's going to be expanded to 100 million americans when this thing is really put in place. people need to keep their eye on the doughnut and not the doughnut hole. speaking of the doughnut hole, t. t.j., there have been $8.3 billion senior citizens saved by closing the doughnut hole. that's the good news. >> i don't think anyone would deny some of those things. those are positives. i think as we try to like you say republicans are out there talking about what is going poorly and democrats are trying to remind people of what's going well. you don't deny the experience for a great number of americans has not been a pleasant one in trying to sign up for the website. that's what right now a lot of people are experiencing versus i guess paying attention to some of the numbers that you're giving to them. >> well, t.j., the worst story

is not the people frustrated trying to get online, the worst news is that time and money and effort that could have been spent doing outreach to the young people we need to sign up has not occurred. i just spent thanksgiving day and ran into at least two people who are under 34 years old, working full time, have no health insurance, one of them exhibiting signs of anemia, another exhibiting signs of high blood pressure who not only have not tried to get on the website but really need to be educated about the benefits of the affordable care act. >> who is not educating them, congresswoman? who is not doing a good enough job educating them? >> we're spending all of our time talking about the catastrophic rollout. instead of spending this money, this time, this effort, this media opportunity to let people

know that, first of all, very many americans will benefit from the medicaid expansion that's occurred in many states. unfortunately that's not the case in my state here in wisconsin. but many people will be shocked to find that they are eligible for medicaid who previously have not been eligible for medicaid. 360,000 small businesses have already taken advantage of the tax credits available to them under the affordable care act and many people will find they will get insurance coverage for less than they have been paying, less than $100. this is the good news story that's not getting out there. >> there's another part of this, political story. i do want to bring up something written in "politico," democrats on capitol hill have their own nightmare scenario. the white house gives them nothing to brag about, no evidence the website is working

better just as some of the most vulnerable democrats are getting ready to blast the administration if they are not convinced it's fixed. now, everybody is up for re-election next year. are you excited to run on obama care because you know this is what republicans are going to be talking about? >> well, you know, i have to admit, t.j., my constituents will disproportionately benefit from the affordable care act in our state where we have had a higher than average unemployment rate in our district. people are really needing the services. i feel for those vulnerable democrats. it's always the right time to do the right thing. i think these democrats should stand on their vote for the affordable care act. once again, there are 40 million americans who have no access to health care. we do know that the mortality and morbidity rates are much

greater among people who have no preventive care services. the affordable care act will provide $100 million americans with preventive care services with no co-pays or additional cost. that's something worth fighting for. that's something worth bragging about. >> congresswoman gwenn moore, good to see you. thanks for taking time with us on the holiday weekend. i hope to see you again. >> t.j., let me say about the fast for families, lets remember those families that didn't have anything to eat. we should pray for food stamp resolution. >> yes, ma'am. it's a good point to make. we were talking about that again just a moment ago. congresswoman thank you again so, so much. it is the day before thanksgiving, that day was a travel mess for a lot of americans. is it going to be a tough trip home as well? give you a weekend weather travel forecast. stay with us.

you get your coffee here. you get your hair cut here. you find that certain thing you were looking for here, but actually you get so much more. when you shop at these small local businesses, you support all the things that make your community great. the money you spend here, stays here. in this place you call your neighborhood. tomorrow is small business saturday. get out and shop small.

we have some developing news for washington, illinois, sad news. one more person, an 82-year-old woman, has died from injuries sustained from last week's tornado. eight other people killed in that ef-4 twister that destroyed up to 500 homes. meanwhile some missouri families east of kansas city had to evacuate their homes last night after a natural gas pipeline explosion sent flames shooting into the sky. take a look at this video of the pipeline explosion. this is in pettis county, pipeline eastern power company turned the pipeline off and the fire was out in an hour and a half. nobody was injured. they aren't sure what caused the rupture. china launched planes to track u.s. to do training over controversial island claim by both china and japan. last week they claimed it maritime zone, notify china before entering the no-fly zone.

the u.s. has ignored those requests. the u.s. is apologizing for a nato drone strike in southern afghanistan that killed a child and injured two women. in response afghan president hamid karzai said he won't sign a long-term security deal with the u.s. if similar attacks continue. the long-term deal would keep up troops in afghanistan to train and help the military. it's time to get anything done in washington? that time is running short. congress has just four, four joint working days left until the end of the year. a lot of the president's political capital is getting used to dealing with the health care situation. president obama took the time yesterday to wish the nation and u.s. troops a happy thanksgiving. but holiday cheer likely won't be enough to boost his sagging approval ratings. can he turn things around in the remainder of his second term? let me bring in democratic

strategist and former republican campaign manager. gentlemen, thank you for being here. we have a website. we keep talking about a deadline. is it really a deadline, chip in what should we expect tomorrow? >> it's a deadline to start another deadline because it's not going to be working again tomorrow like it should be. >> have some faith. >> going to have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to fix a broken website. this is the gift that keeps giving as we go into the holiday season. >> this is a pr disaster versus a law disaster or health care law disaster or no? >> it's going to be a season of reflection for democrats and republicans frankly. i think the president, his approval ratings have hid -- republicans hit a low, almost nixonian-like numbers. essentially this political battle we see play out in

washington was a football game, it would be an ugly game. both teams keep turning it over. democrats get small gains along the way over the last year and a half simply because the republicans have thrown more interceptions. i think from the president's administration i would think over the next month or two, we'll see retooling from the mechanics of government retooling in terms of their message. we've heard talk of retooling in terms of his team. >> chip, feel free to continue the football analogy if you would like to on this question. is it going to be possible to pivot? republicans suggest the president wants to talk about immigration reform, anything to divert attention away from the affordable care act. so can anything else -- can the immigration reform bill, a comprehensive bill or piecemeal bills get done? >> i think the president will try to talk anything about trying to get the message off health care reform and the website right now. you're going to see they may

have have 45 days to get this as best patched up as they can. they are going to see a complete retooling starting with the state of the union, with the president laying down his second term message of he's got about 90 days from there before it comes about the midterm elections. after that the republicans will get control of senate in 2014. he becomes that lame duck where the next conversion is about who replaces him as president and he travels the world on a good-bye tour. >> what do you think, immigration reform? >> chip and his republican friends should be careful what they wish for. their party is coming apart at the seams. a debate over immigration is going to do nothing but pit pro business establishment republican wing against anti-everything tea party wing of the party. so listen, the president and democrats have a lot of work to do in terms of messaging and the operations of government. i think the republican party is coming apart at the seams right now. so i think there's a lot of reflection and prayer that probably both parties need over

this holiday season. >> chip, it sounds like you shouldn't be smiling. i'm listening to john here and he says you guys are just a mess right now? >> you know, he's trying to talk about anything except obama because he's the leader of the democratic party and it's in complete disarray. look, republicans want to talk about immigration reform, securing the border. they want the border secure first then talk about immigration reform. you can do anything you want with immigration. until you secure the borders, nothing matters, you'll still have influx of millions of illegal immigrants coming across the border. we have to fix that. >> that sounds like once again we're going to be at another impasse. yes, the president signaled he would do piecemeal on immigration reform. i don't know how much of a starter it will be to say we'll secure the border. a lot of people think that's the first thing you should do. >> both parties agree on securing the border. it is hard to imagine anything getting done right now where you've got a war win the

republican party. i think the other challenge, all spin aside, the president, challenge he has right now, we've got to get operations of health care reform going on the government side of things. he's going to continue to multi-task with foreign policy. the iran deal, though popular in polls, he's not going to achieve a lot of credit for that domestically, politically. we'll have challenges with syria, egypt, iran, our relationship with israel. looking ahead into the new year and next term, it's going to be very challenging. it's like we've got a multi-front war. foreign policy challenges -- the war on the republican party which i'm going to enjoy watching play out and then we also have the battle, partisan battle in washington. >> i'm curious to see if everybody is going to be on board and want to start with security at the border. if they are goinged to it piecemeal, if that's the first piece. i'm curious, john, chip, you guys are great. good to see you. thanks for being here on your holiday weekend. >> have a great one.

>> all right, folks. up next, the thanksgiving weekend sport that has nothing to do with fk. and ah, so you can see like right here i can just... you know, check my policy here, add a car, ah speak to customer service, check on a claim...you know, all with the ah, tap of my geico app. oh, that's so cool. well, i would disagree with you but, ah, that would make me a liar. no dude, you're on the jumbotron! whoa. ah...yeah, pretty much walked into that one. geico anywhere anytime. just a tap away on the geico app.

female announcer: sunday's your last chance sunday's your last chance to save big during sleep train's triple choice sale. through sunday, thanksgiving weekend, save hundreds on beautyrest and posturepedic. or choose $300 in free gifts with sleep train's most popular tempur-pedic mattresses. you can even choose 48 months interest-free financing on the new tempur-choice with head-to-toe customization. the triple choice sale ends sunday, thanksgiving weekend. ♪ sleep train ♪ your ticket to a better night's sleep ♪

[ male announcer ] this december, experience the gift of unsurpassed craftsmanship at the lexus december to remember sales event.

some of the best offers of the year. this is the pursuit of perfection. 15,000 people lined up to get in at macy's flagship store in new york city. how have the crowds been around the country this year? at the mall in loan tree, colorado. you've got some carolers there as well. have you got shoppers there as well? >> that's right. t.j., the mall opened last night at 8:00. the crowds have been coming in waves throughout the night and this morning as retailers staggered their opening times. this mall, like many malls in america, is doing everything they can to try to entypes shoppers early today between 4:00 and 6:00 a.m. they had a free pancake breakfast. 1500 people showed up. carolers, like the ones behind me, have been roaming the mall

and trying to get people into the holiday spirit. hopefully the spirit to buy. this is one of the busiest shopping weekends of the year. for many retailers it may matter more than usual because there are six fewer days between thanksgiving and christmas to shop. for lot of people they say this is not only about shopping and deals but a chance to be with friends and family. >> i'll never forts it. my best friends. it was so much. i'll never forget it. we're going to make a tradition out of it. >> fun, tradition, also, again, extremely important for retailers. the national retail federation says between 20 and 40% of sales could happen on this holiday weekend. t.j. >> all right. leanne gregg, nice backdrop with the carolers. thank you for that. shoppers in a lot of places this

morning, cold in a lot of places. young fellow, how are you doing? >> good, t.j. good to see you. you mentioned earlier the storm that happened, at loaf people trying to get away. right now still seeing cold air across new england and a few vestiges, snow showers, maybe a dusting that's about it. as you mentioned we are bundled up, not so much black friday but blue friday because it's so cold out there. temperatures are slowly warming up as we head into next week, although we do not expect rain or snow to hamper our trip home as we head to sunday and monday. meanwhile the west coast, california, southern california, some rain showers in here. this is not a huge storm system for you right now. maybe scattered showers through this evening. that tapers off for the weekend. northwest, different story. light and scattered, rain and snow. we have a much bigger system

plaguing us over the next i'd say three, maybe even four days if not five. this is the area of the country impacted for travel home or through this area as you head to sunday and monday. again, sunday, rain showers seattle and portland, plenty of mountain snow as well. also a look at drier weather in salt lake city sunday. the system means business. in seattle and portland, can't rule out snow as low as seattle. especially hills around town. that could impact travels, also rush hour morning and evening as you head to monday. same thing, snow on the hills, 47 degrees and plenty of mountain snow coming through here. the rest of the day relatively quiet. eventually this will push across the country. not until the middle and latter part of next week. the rest of the area should be good for sunday and monday travel. >> good to see you. thank you so much.

a lot of people hate the lines at the malls. you have a lot of other options out there. also they really want your business. small businesses want your business. stay with us.

of course a lot of black friday shoppers taking to the malls, major retailers today. many of the country's smaller businesses are hoping they won't get ignored. small business saturday, first started in 2002, started by american express. it's an effort to get some of those big shopping dollars into the hands of small businesses. let me bring in host of "your business" j.j. ramberg. thank you for being here. it's been around, how successful has it been? >> it's been around, as small businesses have learned about it over the last four years they have taken advantage around small business saturday to take advantage of deals. they know what's on people's minds, they are reeling them in after people are thinking about

it and aware of it. >> we often talk about big retailers, how big a season it is for them, bring in 20 to 40% of their revenue over the year. what about for small businesses? is this weekend just as important to them? >> oh, yeah, absolutely. when you talk to small retailers, this could be 50% of their business from now until the end of christmas shopping. so it is absolutely important for small businesses. that's why it's so important for people to think when they are going out shopping, don't just go to the big box stores, support that small store in your neighborhood, which is there really keeping your own community vibrant. >> we've been talking small business the past few days because something else came up affecting small business. the announcement the online enrollment period for small businesses to buy insurance is going to be delayed a year. what is the real impact. how are small business owners reacting to that news? >> this is for companies who are less than 50 people who wanted to buy insurance on the exchange. this the second delay.

earlier this year we heard they were going to have a choice of different insurance plans, now there's only one option. keep in mind this is online enrollment. if there's a company that wants to take advantage of this they can fill out a paper application. it's at this point it's going to take another year for it to be online. >> j.j. ramberg, good to have the information and see you here on this holiday weekend. >> see you soon. >> christmas tradition at 1600 pennsylvania avenue. on the table by not choosing the right medicare d plan. no one could have left this much money here. whoo-hoo-hoo! yet many seniors who compare medicare d plans realize they can save hundreds of dollars. cvs/pharmacy wants to help you save on medicare expenses. talk to your cvs pharmacist, call, or go to cvs.com/compare to get your free, personalized plan comparison today. call, go online, or visit your local store today.

a live look just outside the window here, rockefeller plaza, you see folks doing what they do. it's cold here and people out enjoying black friday. this is the day that retailers really hoping people come out and spend money, when they make so much of that money. look at that. times square, new york, going to be a busy place. i'll see you down there in eight minutes. >> black friday protests at

walmart are taking place. a group called our walmart is calling on them to improve working conditions, including a minimum salary that would net them $25,000 a year. at the protest in chicago, at least ten arrests including two walmart employees. in a statement walmart vice president says, we're proud of the hard work our associates have put into making this a great black friday for our customers and we're pleased we can provide them with holiday payee squall to an additional day's work as well as a 25% discount on an entire basket of goods for the extraordinary efforts. bill simon was on the "today" show earlier. >> we have the largest -- one of the largest percentages of full time workforce in retail and pay in the top half of retail. our industry is a good industry, great way for people to start. you can enter our company at any level at any age from 16 to 66

and we have a lot of opportunity for people to work their way and progress as you move forward. >> meanwhile, a suspected shoplifter was shot by police last night outside of a kohl's department store in illinois outside chicago, a harrowing ordeal. the chicago tribune reports the suspects tried to run away and gave chase and got close when the suspect shut a car door on one of the officers catching just his arm and dragging him through the parking lot. that's when the officer fired shots. suspects were arrested and the officer is going to be okay. and a good news story here for a pizza hut manager. this is in indiana, he was fired. why? he refused to open his door on thanksgiving. now, pizza hut has issued a couple of statements but one of them saying it respects employee's right not to work on the holiday and the owner has agreed to hire the manager back.

>> the tradition at the white house, first lady michelle obama you see her there and first daughters, welcome the arrival of the white house christmas tree, 18.5 feet tall. it's a douglas fir and born in new jersey. >> that's it for me, alex witt will be up next and she has an incredible story you may never have heard about. why justice may finally be coming in this case. stay with us here on msnbc. hi honey, did you get the toaster cozy? yep. got all the cozies. [ grandma ] with new fedex one rate, i could fill a box and ship it for one flat rate. so i knit until it was full. you'd be crazy not to. is that nana? [ male announcer ] fedex one rate. simple, flat rate shipping with the reliability of fedex.

♪ hark how the bells, sweet silver bells ♪ ♪ all seem to say throw care away ♪ ♪ from everywhere, filling the air ♪ [ female announcer ] chex party mix. easy 15-minute homemade recipes you just pop in a microwave. like caramel chocolate drizzles. happier holidays. chex party mix. they're off, it's black friday. is the shopping holiday really what it used to be? thanksgiving got pretty hairy for a few families in missouri. he was the youngest person ever to be executed in america

in the 20th century, why justice may now finally come to the case of george sten. >> we are just over 24 hours until the self-imposed deadline to fix the troubled healthcare.gov website. they are working overtime to remove glitches and officials say they have made progress but the big question, will it be ready for tomorrow? kristen welker is live at the white house for us. are they trying to low expectations or saying anything at all? >> reporter: i think they are trying to manage expectations. the administration saying look it is not going to be a relaunch. it's not a magical date. there are still going to be problems with healthcare.gov after this weekend. at the same time, they say that the website will be vastly improved, vast majority of americans will be able to get on and enroll, we'll have a pretty smooth experience doing so. what does the vast majority

think? the latest figure we're getting from the administration is that it will be able to support as many as 50,000 users at the same time. now, i've been talking to tech experts who say, look, it's not that simple, not just about making sure the website can support them but making sure they can get through the process quickly and that they aren't experiencing glitches along the way. that's going to be one of the questions that we're watching for over the next 24 to 48 hours. i can tell you about an hour ago, the white house put out a tweet encouraging young healthy people to sign up. of course, they are so vital to making sure that the website and this health care law works. the tweet reading quote, nothing says i love you like helping someone get covered. it then links to a video which shows parents encouraging their young adult son to sign up. so the administration knows that's really going to be a vital proof in the glitches. the concern is may dissuade that

age group and other age groups from signing up. we should also point out that hhs secretary kathleen sebelius put out a blog, shopping tips for folks. interestingly her first tip is shop healthcare.gov during off-peak hours. still sort of suggesting that healthcare.gov continues to be a work in progress. >> oh, yeah, just anecdotally speaking, jimmy williams on msnbc, i was talking with him on wednesday. he was online tuesday trying to log on and get done. he could not. he took to trying to make phone calls so this is not a unique situation. you have to wonder with what, like 29, 30 hours to go, maybe a little more than that. there's talk about this act they want to use to try to develop that which i guess siphoned some of the users away from the actual website to that app. do you know what the status is on that? >> the administration won't

confirm that app but i have spoken to the insurance industry to say they are aware that the administration is looking into that possibility, basically it would allow people to go on the website, figure out their subsidies in an easier, faster fashion and then therefore to enroll in an easier way. it would really be sort of a workaround, they won't be going on to healthcare.gov. one of the concerns is that that process would be somewhat imprecise. i'm cautioned though that that is still a work in progress, that they are still trying to figure out how that would work. the overall idea would be to make healthcare.gov more user friendly, easier for folks to figure out what the subsidies would look like. >> all right, kristen welker, thanks so much for that. >> let's go to move of the implications on the deadline on health care law. let's bring in karen bass, a democrat from california who joins us from los angeles there. it's nice to see you.

i'm curious if you're nervous in what you're anticipating for the healthcare.gov website tomorrow. >> actually, i'm optimistic. one thing i think was corrected is that it was probably never a good idea to have the expectations be so high to begin with. this is such a massive change and i'm certainly hopeful that the website will be working much better tomorrow. you know, in california, of course, we have our own website and things are going pretty well in california. so there's a lot of successes and obviously a lot of challenges around the country. >> a lot of state exchanges are doing very well, the fed is a far larger reach and bigger thing to put together. but are you concerned about selling this to your constituents because of the botched rollout? >> well, no, not my constituents at all, as a matter of fact, a couple of weeks ago we had a town hall in which we had over 400 people come. we had people enrollment counselors that worked with

folks and things went very smoothly. one of the sad things about the rollout has been the 36 governors that have refused to participate. so if there were more state exchanges, i think things would have been much better. then, my republican colleagues who spent hundreds and millions of dollars in a disinformation campaign has created all kinds of confusion. you even have people in california who thought that they needed to sign up on the federal website and didn't realize that cover california was actually health care reform. i think there has been a lot at play that has made a rollout much more difficult than it should have been. >> but is this at all becoming d divisive within the republican party, they broke ranks and voted to support that, but how concerned are you about the splitting up the democratic party on this? >> i'll tell you because many of

those 39 folks are my colleagues and personal friends. i will tell you, they are anguished by their vote. they did not make their vote because they didn't support health care reform or because they were mad at the rollout. they made that vote for the simple reason that they knew if they didn't there would be hundreds and thousands of dollars of ads that would run in the district the next day. that's part and parcel of the dis information, misinformation campaign that's been waged. and so, i will tell you that my colleagues that are from swing states and swing districts, they are very concerned. they were nervous and disappointed by the rollout. but i do think that things are getting better. and i hope when i go back next week to find out that things are smoother in their states. >> apart from the website overall, what do you think needs to be done to implement this program successfully, have it be success in the coming months and years so maybe 48 months from now if not sooner, we're thinking what was that hull ba

loo about what we're talking about now. >> i think that's going to be the case but number one has to be public education. you know, alex, there's already a lot of health care reform being implemented smoothly that we don't even talk about anymore. in a prior career i worked in the emergency room and i know when you have provisions of the affordable care act that will not deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions, caps on the amount of coverage you can have, those two initiatives alone literally save people's lives. i think the democrats and everybody need to do a much better job at educating the public about provisions that are already in place and then encouraging people to get coverage. >> no wonder you're so good on your feet. you worked in an e.r. >> i did. >> thank you very much. let's bring in two ladies sitting with me, politico's deputy white house editor. i'm glad to have you both here.

elise, what do you think is going to be happening tomorrow? do you think it will be functioning smoothly or big order? >> variable depending on where you are as a user and where you are in the progress. the white house is very concerned because they spent so much weeks lowering expectations and tech experts said there are serious problems that remain with the system. and only a massive volume on the website is really going to discover those flaws and allow them to be fixed. i think some people aren't going to have a much easier time. i certainly had an easier time as i tested the website but that won't be the case for everyone. >> rebecca what's interesting your colleagues wrote, obama's goal, avoid mission accomplished moment. do you expect them to say anything in the coming days relative to the website or do you think they'll be silent and -- >> we'll hear from the white house. it's a delicate balancing acts

here. on the one hand they do want to avoid mission accomplished moment, not least because they are plaus and expecting things to pop up in the days ahead. in the other hand there are a lot of nervous democrats that feel as though something significant as shifted as the deadline arrives. you've seen administration officials pointing to reduce error rates and load times but on the other hand, a function of that nervousness is, we've heard they've spoken to partners and insurance industry and elsewhere pushing people to go to the site and said maybe don't push quite right away. maybe you want to stagger the rollouts and marketing campaigns to reach individual users not plug the website all at once as people expect the shift after the deadline. >> elise, if it works, do you think this is going to give democrats something to campaign on or do you think as i was asking representative bass earlier, if people will just forget all of this or keep it forefront in their mind?

>> i think this will be debated for years how this rolled out we they are hoping to run on it in next term's midterm elections. that's assuming the website gets fixed. really it's going to be a moment where the administration has to put their cards on the table and say, listen, yes, democrats we have this ready and have it ready the way we promised it would be on october 1st. without that it's going to be difficult for vulnerable democrats in red states in particular to say obama care is a good thing because frankly it's not going to look that way to a lot of people who might not know about the law and merely logging on and hoping to look at options. if they can't do that, it will be hard to defend on the campaign trail. >> do you think the gop really takes things at risk by trying to campaign on what's happened here? not only will this eventually get fixed and we're all confident. at some point it's going to work properly. you think what they are campaigning on, it's basically to not let people have health insurance that they desperately

need. >> it's a gamble on both sides. democrats are gambling if this is going to get fixed and everyone expect at some point down the line there will be a certain baseline of functionality and maybe reached for a variety majority of users and clearly not for everyone. the republican party has shifted its approach as well. we've heard them of course dramatically change their message over the past few weeks, focusing on oversight. if there's a feeling after this deadline, if the same sorts of major significant glitches, not small hurdles but significant krach crashes or outages happen, we may see democrats who peel off what you saw with the upton bill and the administration oversight hearings or that's what they've been telling their reporters. >> can they afford to anything else on the agenda? >> we've seen the white house try again and again to pivot to the economy, for example, they haven't been able to do that successfully because people are still asking this key question,

if president obama, if this is his signature domestic achievement they need to get it right. if they are not going to do that in the next couple of months, put in place delays that will ease up users who are trying to get health care coverage. we petty those people and so does the administration. >> good to see you both. thanks so much. after break, how mad has the madness this black friday and is this the best time for the best deals? g. really. i get bonuses even working part-time. where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day. healthcare starting under $40 a month. i got education benefits. i work at walmart. i'm a pharmacist. sales associate. i manage produce. i work in logistics. there's more to walmart than you think. vo: opportunity. that's the real walmart. it's not the "fumbling around with rotating categories" card.

it's not the "getting blindsided by limits" card. it's the no-game-playing, no-earning-limit-having, deep-bomb-throwing, give-me-the-ball-and-i'll-take- it-to-the-house, cash back card. this is the quicksilver cash card from capital one. unlimited 1.5% cash back on every purchase, everywhere, every single day. so let me ask you... what's in your wallet? that isn't the least bit over the top. it's thoughtful, considerate, well-planned. ♪ it's one of a kind. it's completely unexpected. ♪ it's the best gift ever. nothing says "happy holidays" like the photos you love. create your personalized photo gifts on shutterfly.com and save up to 50%. is what makes us different.

we take the time to get to know you and your unique health needs. then we help create a personalized healthcare experience that works for you. and you. and you. with 50 years of know-how, and a dedicated network of doctors, health coaches, and wellness experts, we're a partner you can rely on -- today, and tomorrow. we're going beyond insurance to become your partner in health. humana.

i got my credit card, i'm going to rack it up, do what i can. damage is done. >> black friday is here and back with a vengeance as millions of bargain hunters hit the stores from coast to coast.

>> it's crazy. they're nuts. they're nuts. they're nuts. the lines are crazy. >> we did wonderful. we have done wonderful. we did very good today. >> okay, according to the national labor federation, 97 million americans are expected to hit the stores today in search of infamous deep discounts, we have the black friday madness covered from every angle. jay gray is at the mall of america in bloomington, minnesota. what is it like there, jay? >> reporter: alex, i'm living every 14-year-old's girl's dream, all day and all night and i can tell you the shoppers coming through here in waves right now. it's been busy. in fact it's on pace to beat last year's crowd which was 217,000 in the nation's largest mall last year. well ahead of that pace. and a lot of the reason is that many of the shops opened earlier, many opening up on thanksgiving. what some are calling gray

thursday and doing a smashing business. that's great news. look, analysts say this is going to be a good shopping season and important for retailers because there are six less days this year. thanksgiving falling later in the year, six less days in the shopping season. but, the estimate is families will this weekend spend close to around $650. that's up 11% from last year. so not only shopping but they are spending and we see a lot of people with bags and boxes and talked to a lot of people coming in. they'll shop in the late evening, take a nap and come back. they will shop today and take a nap and come back. it's going to continue all weekend. alex, let me know and i'll pick something up for you. >> i'm concerned about the 14-year-old girl you tried to channel there. just saying. >> reporter: it's been a long day. >> it's okay. >> thank you very much. let's go to colorado and nbc's leanne gregg. she's at the denver suburb of

lone tree. what's happening out there? >> reporter: the stores have been open throughout the night and this morning. right now you can see the mall is park and so are the parking lots outside. park meadows like many malls across america are trying to do everything they can to entice customers between 4:00 and 6:00 a.m., they threw a pancake breakfast. free pancakes for customers, 1500 people showed up. also, carollers have been rooming the mall helping to get people in a festive holiday state of mind. this is the busiest shopping weekend of the year. there are six fewer shopping days between thanksgiving and christmas. a lot of people say black friday is not only about shopping at deals but a tradition. >> we've been here since 2:45. and this is just a tradition for us to come in.

we're a big family so we shop for everyone. >> i came to get the j.c. penneys, here by 5:00. >> here with my dad, hanging out, black friday. >> reporter: black friday, fun, tradition, also extremely important for retailers and national retail federation says that between 20 and 40% of sales for a retailer may account from the weekend may be 20 to 40% of the entire year of sales. finally got that out. it has been a long morning. >> it's been a long morning but we get it. it's clearly a big day and big weekend. leanne gregg in colorado. >> crucial for the retailers but the national retail federation says 140 million people are expected to brave the crowds to shop online over the long thanksgiving weekend. the professioner of economics at the university of maryland, welcome to you, peter, we know the retailers are bringing in

about 20% of the annual revenues on this day. what can we learn today on how the rest of the year is looking for retail? new clues for that? >> the big issue is going to be the margins. a lot of stuff comes in from china and if $100 tv gets marked up a penny, the gains in the u.s. economy is only a penny. it cost more to sell the stuff. if it is the normal marketup, more sales mean more jobs and better outlook. >> but retail, black friday, is that specifically a good indicator for the rest of the year? can you really extrapolate the numbers you need to to make a wise impression on that? >> i don't think you can, especially this year. it's a shortened shopping season. a little bit more can be compressed into black friday. it doesn't translate into a appreciatably better year. the retailers were telling us coming into this weekend, a couple of percentage points in real terms better than last year

but nothing dramatic. and that would be consistent with the pattern of spending we've seen month after month in 2013. >> $13.6 billion, almost 4% up compared to last year. do you think that's going to hold true? >> i do. because remember, up by 4%, if you factor in 2% inflation, is about right, 2% real growth which is the rate at which the economy has been rocking along. we're hopeful the next year will be much better. and what we really would like to see is something like a 6% gain with 2% inflation so the economy is moving at 4% rate in real terms. >> at least it's not going the other direction. >> that's right. >> we have to have a silver lining. >> with the healthcare rollout not up to par, can the president get anything done when it comes to foreign policy? s are always . at first, we were protecting networks. then, we were protecting the transfer of data.

and today it's evolved to infrastructure... ♪ ...finance... and military missions. we're constantly innovating to advance the front line in the cyber battle, wherever it takes us. that's the value of performance. northrop grumman. that's the value of performance. on the table by not choosing the right medicare d plan. no one could have left this much money here. whoo-hoo-hoo! yet many seniors who compare medicare d plans realize they can save hundreds of dollars. cvs/pharmacy wants to help you save on medicare expenses. talk to your cvs pharmacist, call, or go to cvs.com/compare to get your free, personalized plan comparison today. call, go online, or visit your local store today.

china has launched war planes over a controversial island chain claimed by china and japan. requiring countries to notify china before entering and the u.s. ignored those requests. startling news about the youngest refugees, a growing number are primary caregivers for her country. 2 million have fled and many of them children, as young as 7 helping tort the families. u.s. is apologizing for a nato drone strike that killed a child and injured two women. in response karzai said he won't sign a long-term deal with the u.s. if it continues. a long-term deal would keep troops in afghanistan to train

their military. a natural gas pipeline explosion sent flames shooting in the sky. the panhandle eastern pipeline company turned off the gas and put the fire out in about hour and a half. no one was injured but investigating aren't sure what caused that rupture. it's been a long time coming, but justice could be just around the corner in the small south carolina town. the story you need to hear ahead. what if? but what if the most important question is the one you're not asking? what if the underlying cause of your symptoms is damaging inflammation? for help getting the answers you need, talk to your doctor and visit crohnsandcolitisinfo.com to get your complimentary q&a book, with information from experts on your condition.

guys... [ female announcer ] pillsbury cinnamon rolls, with cinnabon cinnamon, are an irresistible sunday morning idea. nothing calls them to the table faster. make breakfast pop! the nuclear deal to iran with a stalled security deal with afghanistan, the obama administration has its hands full. joining me the foreign affair columnist for reuters and director of policy and government owe fa government affairs. i'll start with iran, you have a temporary deal to freeze iran's nuclear program. how critical are these next six

months, the entire terms of this temporary deal? what can we expect to see as we move forward in the hopes of a more permanent agreement? >> good afternoon. this is a good deal and kind of deal americans like and will continue to like. it essentially takes the most dangerous elements of the iranian nuclear program. they are 20% enriched uranium off the table, pauses their program, gets inspectors in and really gives an opportunity for the international community to test iran's sanctions. this is going to be a hard negotiation, comprehensive deal on the books potentially all of the sides have agreed the contours of that. when the notions go forward we'll see whether the u.s. and iran and international community can get their hands around this program and ensure it doesn't get to a bond and certainly this is a good first step. >> here's part of the problem. this is a hard deal to negotiate even at home. you have plenty of people on capitol hill saying we need to keep the option of sanctions on

the table and we can certainly go forward with them on congress if we want to. what kind of challenge is this for the president and secretary kerry? >> it's a big challenge for the white house. the key thing is actually democrats in congress that are very pro israel two key players chuck schumer from new york and robert menendez, a democrat from new jersey. they are very suspicious of iran and sort of closer to the israeli position of this maybe isn't a great deal. it freezes things but it doesn't deal with the core issue, the iranians want some kind of nuclear program for energy purposes in their country. they said they will not agree to a larger deal unless they have the bottom line. iran and democrats in congress are saying, no enrichment, no program. >> this is only six months and we are being allowed to have weapons inspectors from the iaea, they are heading in a week from monday to start looking at everything on a daily basis. do you think congress will give the six-month leeway its due?

>> they will and what happens at the end of the six months? >> there will be a landmark deal. the iranians may try to negotiate another six-month deal. what does the president do then? there will be a lot of pressure for military action or very crushing sanctions. so it's a good deal, good six months the real challenge comes at the end of it. >> i want to start with afghanistan, there are certain reports that hamid karzai facing pressure to sign this bit lateral security agreement, he is standing firm saying he is not going to sign this pact if similar things continue. how much of this is posturing on karzai's part. it's hard to determine karzai's pure motivation, he goes back and forth in his negotiations with the americans but he's playing a real close to the edge game which is if there's no

deal, if there's no agreement, the u.s. will leave and the international community support will dry up. and that's got to be a concern not only for him but clearly it is for afghans. the leaders from across the country together, recently endorsed an agreement with the americans, karzai is becoming more and more isolated but this agreement also does need to address these type of strikes as we just saw and to ensure the rules of the road are clear. that's what it does aim to do. it does seem very counter productive to not have an agreement, certainly for afghans. >> we now know that susan rice was there on a surprise visit to hamid karzai in afghanistan. didn't come away with what she had hoped. what kind of challenges are there and implications if karzai does not sign the pact. >> the u.s. will take a hard line on this and it could lead for a period where the u.s. may announce we are withdrawing all

forces. he is wrong in that the vast majority of civilian casualties are caused by the taliban, not by u.s. and nato forces. most afghans want the security agreement. the white house has to take a hard line here and not bow to this endless negotiation. >> but the white house says if we don't know by the end of this year, we'll get the ball rolling to get troops out by 2014. can't they stop that. let's see a deal comes through, they can halt, cease and desift. >> that's what i'm thinking and this is a chance to isolate karzai politically ib side afghanistan. he was a fairly good ally but the last several years more and more difficult to work with and problems with corruption. i think this is an opportunity to look towards the next leader of afghanistan. there are presidential elections there and most afghans want this pact. let's not be beholden to karzai. maybe we can start saying we're going to withdraw then make a new agreement with a new government there. >> joel, in syria this civil war

continues. do you think both sides will truly end up coming to the table and will assad be willing to give up any power? >> the diplomatic process is not moving quickly enough for the underground situation, certainly with nearly 10 million people affected in the country, the displacement and refugees suffering, this is very significant to the country and the region. but there is a process that is moving forward nonetheless. and that's our best hope. there's going to have to be a political solution to this. it does mean including regional partners and iran, the saudis and russia will have to be engaged. assad is looking at 2014 as an election year. some talked about him moving out in that instance. but certainly the process of pulling all of those affected directly by this together as

we're going to see in the beginning of next year is a key step in the way forward because right now syria and meltdown -- it doesn't seem to be clear how this is going to end. >> joel ruben and david, thank you so much for being with me. >> the youngest person to be executed in the united states in the past 100 years. in 1944 when making the decision to send george sten ky to his death, they jury deliberated ten minutes. they are on their way to clear him of a crime advocates say he did not commit. mark, it is an unbelievable story. so share it with viewers who aren't familiar with it. >> this is a tough case. not only is there the horror of a 14-year-old boy who weighs 95 pounds be strapped into the electric chair to die, there is also a feeling that the trial itself was a travesty of justice. it lasted two hours, no defense

and no appeal. now some attorneys, historian and film maker are trying to clear steny's name. >> the events leading to the execution of 14-year-old george steny jr. began in the tiny milltown of south carolina. in march of 1944, two white girls ages 11 and 17 were beaten to death while picking wild flowers along the railroad tracks separating the white and black sections of town. historian george fryerson. >> bodies were found in a creek bed in this general area. they had been brutally murdered. >> reporter: shortly afterward they arrested george steny jr. and claimed he gave an oral confession. his family was run out of town and he was tried for murder in this courthouse packed with whites only. ray brown, who is producing a movie about the case, says the real killer got away and the trial was a sham. >> it was a situation where he clearly was railroaded, there

was no evidence, nobody could find anything. >> the trial lasted just two hours. the jury took only ten minutes to convict and steny was sentenced to die. during the trial here, steny was represented by a court appointed lawyer, who never put on his own case. never attacked a state's case and never filed an appeal, which would have delayed the execution by a year. just 83 days after his arrest, steny, weighing only 95 pounds was strapped in the electric chair and put to death. >> george sten why did not do it. >> but now a south carolina law firm has filed a motion seeking a new trial, which if granted could clear steny's name. >> it would have been difficult if not implausible for george steny jr. to have done what the government said he did. >> the motion claims there is no physical evidence, no written record of the confession and no witnesses and no trial transcript. steny's brother and sister both

still alive say he was with his family at the time of the killings. >> you had a virtual mob outside the courthouse putting the pressure on this jury because they weren't there to see george steny acquitted. they were there to see george steny convicted. >> advocates say the time has come right a historic wrong. >> i wanten apology from the state of north carolina for putting one of these citizens to death. >> steny's body rests in an unmarked grave in this baptist church cemetery. they hope by the end of the year he'll get a new day in court. we can't forget there's also the tragedy that two little girls were murdered and the real possibility that the real killer got away. we tried to reach the south carolina goofer's office for a comment on the idea of a state apology and so far gotten no response. >> mark, what is the next step? when might something happen from a legal perspective to try to

clear the name? >> there's talk that the hearing could be held sometime before christmas. they are going to ask for a new trial. if that were to be granted, of course there could never be a trial. the defendant is dead and witnesses are gone. there was no physical evidence, no record of the trial. likely the charges would be thrown out and that would be tanamount to an exxonati race. and they want a pardon from the state. >> for more on this i'm joined by todd johnson of thegrio.com. you listened to all of the things that can't happen because of passage of time and the victim is deceased here. what is the significance of clearing his name, george steny's? >> you're exactly right. this is a story of extreme importance and significance to our audience at thegrio.com. justice delayed is justice

denied so 70 years later, it won't bring steny back and an apology is not going to bring him back or change the fact he died in this way, but it might bring a sense of closure not just for the family but the state of south carolina, like other southern states, racially divided, jim crow was the law of the land. this was a step. just a step in a way to kind of not only clear the case from the state record but to have some type of closure for this entire situation. >> but his family -- i know you've talked with them. what are they saying? >> i spoke to his brother, charles, who lives in brooklyn. and he is still very much affected by the loss of george. someone whom he was very close with and whom he shared all of the times growing up with your brothers together, you play, you laugh and he misses those days. and even though he provided a

sworn statement for this new motion that was filed that says george was with his family at the time and couldn't have possibly committed this murder, even though he gave that statement, he still does not believe that even if this exonneration happens, it's not going to fill the void in his heart. we've been following this for the duration of the two years when it bunl bubbled up. >> this image of a 95-pound and 14-year-old set to the execution chair on which he had to set on books. you talk about states operating under jim crow, situations like this aren't necessarily unique. >> it wasn't. it's scary to think this wasn't uncommon, him being so young and executed on the states book was uncommon, but he had -- there

was trouble by the guards to even strap him in on the chair. they struggled to get the straps around his arms and legs, after they lowered the mask over his mouth before he was electrocuted. it's a shocking thing to think about today. if 70 years later some form of justice can be brought to the surface, that's what they want. in the last week, the xots borrow case, horrible case in the 1930s in alabama, nine black boys accused of raping two white girls, they were finally pardoned, the last of the three boys were finally pardoned by the alabama board of paroles and pardons, that was 80 years old. they don't want him pardoned but exoneration. >> you can log onto thegrio.com. >> a florida mother serving a 20 year sentence in a stand your ground case is out of jail with her family. she was convicted after firing

what she described as a warning shot during an argument. no one was injured. a judge overturned that conviction in september and already served three years in jail. i started part-time, now i'm a manager.n. my employer matches my charitable giving. really. i get bonuses even working part-time. where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day. healthcare starting under $40 a month. i got education benefits. i work at walmart. i'm a pharmacist. sales associate. i manage produce. i work in logistics. there's more to walmart than you think. vo: opportunity. that's the real walmart.

we know we're not the center of your life, but we'll do our best to help you connect to what is. at the box office this holiday weekend it's "frozen" versus "fire." the latest in the hunger games trillionology. frozen has been able to bring insofar respectable. in search of the hottest gadget of the year can be a tough choice to figure out which new tech toy will bring your loved ones the most joy. here is managing editor of end gadget dana wolman.

>> thanks for having me. >> we'll talk tablets, the ipad mini, microsoft is making a big push with this, what is this the surface 2. >> it's the surface 2, second generation surface tablet from microsoft. it came out about a month ago. >> how does it stack up against the ipad? >> it's a unique choice, great choice for people who want not just a tablet but something that can occasionally be used as a laptop. it has a built in kick stands, easier to use in your lap. typing in the lap should be more comfortable as you can see there are optional key board covers for when you want to type. and i'll swipe through here actually. >> no problem. >> as you can see on a pc, you can multitask and view different apps side by side and if you want you can have it take up the whole screen which is something you can't do on an ipad and also, you'll see here that it has microsoft word installed. so it has microsoft word and

power point and excel, this is a real good option for people who want to get work done on the go and -- >> can this replace a laptop, do you think? >> primary machine, but if you're traveling, you might be able to get away with traveling with this and leave your bulkier laptop at home. >> a big year for new gaming systems, microsoft has xbox one. how are these doing? >> it's going to be a tough choice for gamers between the xbox 1 and ps4. together they cost $900 and not even including games. most gamers will have to make a choice. and for most people we recommend the ps4. it costs -- >> it is better console for gaming itself. so sony went back to the roots with the play station 4, back to the play station 1 and 2. the games have never looked

better than they do now on playstation 4. the gaming experience is going to be better. once you exclude the bells and whistles and it costs 400 instead of $500 which a lot of people approach. >> the google chrome cast, how does that compare? >> it's a lot less expensive, $35 and any modern tv has the hdmi port. you can stream content from either your laptop or tablet or phone and it works with all sorts of popular services like netflix, hulu plus, it's a great way to get the content off the small screen device on the big screen tv, it's great for people who don't have apple tv. >> it's only $35. >> 35 bucks. >> that's a very good one. >> when it koxz to e readers and amazon kindle, does that still

leave the way? >> the kindle has long lived the market. for the past year the paperwhite has been a favorite new reader and amazon just updated it. it's a subtle change but the screen is brighter and more pleasant to look at. and it's great because you can look at it any any lighting conditions. when it first came out, you could only read it in a well lit room but now you can read it in your bed with the light off and it won't annoy the person in bed next to you because it's not as overwhelming screen as say an ipad. >> that's thoughtful. you have to think about that. >> finally, technology allows you to sit in front of the tv and play video games but some technology is out there and it's helping to get into shape. what's that about? >> there's an overwhelming selection of fitness trackers, most of them are wearables and most if not clip on to your person -- >> like fit bit is one. fit bit and jaw bone have new

trackers and they do similar things. they track your sleep patterns and activity and tell how many steps you've taken and tell how many flights of stairs you've climbed each day. they both have options for logging your food intake so you can keep an eye on your dietary habits as well. >> it's all good. thank you so much. >> thank you for having me. >> dana wolman. what do you get when you add jimmy fallon plus rasheed da jones and carrie underwood?

here's a quick check on the headlines, black friday protest at walmart. a group called our walmart is calling on the nation's largest retail to improve labor standards including providing workers with full-time work and $25,000 a year. at the protests there have been ten arrests including two walmart employees. in a statement, a walmart veep says we're proud of the hard

work our associates have put into making this a great black friday and providing them with holiday payee squall to an additional day's work. here's bill simon on the "today" show earlier. >> we have the largest -- one of the largest percentages of full-time workforce in retail and pay in the top half of retail. our industry is a good industry, great way for people to start. you can enter at any level, any age from 16 to 66. we have a lot of opportunity for people to work their way and progress as you move forward. >> good news for pizza hut manager in elk hart, indiana, originally fired for refusing to open on thanksgiving. it respects the employees' right not to work on the holiday and they have agreed to retire the manager. in you spent the thanksgiving weekend eating and shopping and relaxing, not these lady, trying to break the world

record for the all female jump, 41 skydiving and in case when you were wondering, they can reach speeds close to 170 miles per hour. niks and good luck, girls. on that note, that does it for me. thomas roberts is up next. before we go, here's a little holiday cheer or chuckles from the folks at late night with jimny fallon. enjoy. ♪ i've got this turkey on thanksgiving and it was raw ♪ ♪ i let it thaw ♪ i stuffed the bread crumbs in ♪ ♪ i don't care ♪ i stuffed it i stuffed it ♪ i don't care

♪ black friday ♪ i hate these long lines ♪ outside the walmart ♪ ♪ [ female announcer ] with five perfectly sweetened whole grains... you can't help but see the good. medicare open enrollment. of year again. whole grains... time to compare plans and costs. you don't have to make changes. but it never hurts to see if you can find better coverage, save money, or both. and check out the preventive benefits you get after the health care law. open enrollment ends december 7th. so now's the time. visit medicare.gov or call 1-800-medicare

to share with family.

[ woman 2 ] to carry on traditions. [ woman 3 ] to come together even when we're apart. [ male announcer ] in stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy and more, swanson makes holiday dishes delicious. the mad dash, door busting deals started early this year but that didn't quiet the crowds at retailers across the country. >> if you're not first, you're last. i just came out. >> some decided to keep calm and go shopping but for others the drive for deals turned violent. in north carolina, shoppers fought over discounted televisions. and near chicago, a suspected shoplifter was shot while trying to flee a kohl's department store. today is only the kickoff, why there could be more deals worth waiting for during the holiday season as shoppers scramble, we checked in in washington, d.c.

where the white house is scrambling to meet its deadline, just over 24 hours, they will have to reappear with healthcare.gov in a fixed website. will it be the cure for the democrats woes come 2014? i'm thomas roberts and tis the season to do shopping. black friday is here. looking to take advantage of these door busting bargains. the shopping frenzy got started earlier than ever with more than a dozen big retailers opening their doors on thanksgiving day, that includes macy's, which was open on thanksgiving for first time in its 155 year history. this hour we have reporters from coast to coast covering today's black friday frenzy. we start with leanne gregg joining us live from park meadows mall in lone tree, colorado. it sounds like a lonely place but doesn't look lonely behind you. >> reporter: no, no, thomas it is hugely popular today, not

lonely at all. take a look around. the mall is full and so are parking lots. this opened at 8:00 last night and more than 40 other stores inside the mall opened as well this morning. and throughout the night, they have had staggered openings. they are doing everything they can to entice customer today through a pancake breakfast this morning. free pancakes for 1500 people. carollers have been on site roaming through the mall. this is the busiest shopping weekend of the year and this year may matter more than most. there are six fewer shopping days between thanksgiving and christmas. a lot of people say they've come out today for black friday shopping not only for the deals but that it's become a family tradition. they come with family and friends and make a day out of it. it's incredibly important as we've mentioned for retailers, the national retail association says this weekend will account

for 20 to 40% for retailers annual sales. take a look around, you can see a lot of people with their arms full of bags so that has to be making the retailers happy. thomas? >> looking at that video of the pancakes, i would eat that and need a nap. wouldn't make it to go shopping. >> reporter: i've seen a few people sleeping on the bench this year. >> that would be me, the sleeping guy on the bench. leanne, thanks so much. we go to dayton, ohio and cnbc's courtney reagan among the crowds. courtney. >> reporter: good afternoon, in dayton, ohio, some of these shoppers are going on hour 18. if the shoppers aren't, the stores are. this mall opened at 8:00 p.m. on thanksgiving. analysts believe the traffic flow started at the big box retailers, that's the walmarts and targets and best buy and nabbing those electronic deals on the door busters. then we saw a lull.

folks went home to rest and the traffic is increasing here at the mall. believe it or not the cold weather believed to be helping sales of the cold weather goods, we're talking, coats, socks hats, why we're seeing macy's one of the winners and strong doorbuster sales with good brand names. walmart had one hour guarantees and door busters throughout the night last night and more specials throughout the weekend. that is thought to have atracked a lot of shoppers. early indications for online sales for ibm, online sales up 20% on thanksgiving day, a big boost for department store sales up 60% over last year. we'll get numbers about this weekend. once they expect 140 million shoppers go back home and rest, we'll know what the tally was sometime late sunday night. for now, it's back to you. >> courtney reagan, thanks so much.

julia bore sten spent the morning at the target. >> reporter: it's been a record holiday for target.com with higher traffic than ever before. twice the sales in the wee hours as last year. what's driving people to the stores are special deals on televisions and cameras and tablets. >> i bought a new tablet for my son so he can be able to download apps and music and he usually uses my cell phone to do it. >> for the deals. >> my husband got himself his blue tooth for his ipod. my son got himself his ipod and a game. >> it has been raining here in los angeles. we'll have to see if the weather along with the online options encourage people to stay home and shop from the comfort of their couch rather than driving to target here in the mall. >> julia, thanks. just a few hours ago the president and first lady paid a

visit to the national mall to support immigration activists participating in a fast for families protest to encourage republicans to support comprehensive immigration reform. meanwhile the white house says the team of experts shall working around the clock ahead of self-imposed deadline to make sure the healthcare.gov website is working for a majority of users. we're joined by kristen welker. what is the white house saying about the website? this is a self-imposed deadline and trying to get a second shot at making a good first impression. >> they say tech experts are 24/7 to try to make sure the vast majority -- by the end of tomorrow. what is that actually -- they say they hope the website will be able to support 50,000 users simultaneously. but at the same time, they are downplaying expectations, thomas, just today hhs secretary

kathleen sebelius logging about shopping tips for going on to healthcare.gov and her first tip on the list is to logon during off-peak hours. if you talk to tech experts about that, they say it's not exactly a vote of confidence. the administration also saying look, november 30th is not a magical date. problems will continue after november 30th. i think what the administration is hoping for though is that the majority of users will start logging on this weekend that their experiences will be better. what would success look like? one analyst telling me it basically would mean come monday you would have stories people say look, this has been a better experience but the flip to that is if you have a number of people coming forward and saying that they have a tough time logging on, that they encountered more glitches, that could spell a real problem for this administration. the other deadline to look for is december 23rd. that is the deadline folks need

to sign up in order to get coverage by january 1st and the website will undoubtedly get a lot of folks going on towards that end deadline. thomas. >> kristen welker, great to see you, thanks so much. >> you too. take care. >> the president and top advisers have inisted by tomorrow most of the website problems will be fixed. take a listen. >> in terms of what happens on november 30th or december 1st, i think it's fair to say that the improvement will be marketed and noticeable. >> we're definitely on track to have a significantly different user experience by the end of this month. >> all right, what will the political consequences be if they are wrong? i'm join by msnbc.com writer suze khimm. let me start with you, we're coming off the heels there of kristen's report. the administration saying its goal for the website to accommodate 50,000 people, secretary sebelius saying go at

off times. is there a strategy of under promise and over deliver and that's the way they are going to make a success story out of this relaunch? >> basically i think all together they are trying to increase the public's confidence and overall impression of going on the site to encourage more people to sign up. at the same time, i do believe they are trying to hedge their promises a little bit, they don't want to run into the same problem they this on october 1st and overwhelm the site with visitors, a couple of weeks ago they were tolling partners to encourage planned parenthood organizations to encourage people to slowly go on the site. but the real question is, really only administration itself will know whether they've succeeded or not through anecdotes. the trouble is we have no way of knowing whether this is a cherry picked anecdote from someone -- >> meanwhile we'll have an idea

whether people get access and stort to give opinions of it. the latest cnn poll shows president at 41% in the approval rating, 56% disapproval. how bad is it for the president if the website is not functioning and not just tomorrow, but as we get closer to that date of december 23rd? and through the month of december, this has been a real stumble out of the gate and one that's hard to recover from in terms of positive attention to what the aca really means. the website was a mistake, it's a law that is what should -- should be focused on. and what it means to our social contract in the country. >> you're right about that. we did put forth a new social contract in this country that said there was going to be expanded quality health care to more americans and that we were going to do this in a number of ways. we've been highly successful on a number of fronts, including the idea that people can be --

not get coverage because of preexisting condition. there were a number of pieces of this law that came to the forward without a lot of hiccup that people were able to see those benefits immediately. this website is another part of this product. as in any product marketing launch, there were hiccups here and big ones. the president and his team promised to fix those and put those on -- at least individual enrollments, i think we're hearing more and more success stories. but i don't think it's over. when it is and at some point whether it be tomorrow or the next couple of months, we're going to see a very robust site come and go, where people come on and enroll and get quality affordable health care more in line and it expands of risk and lowers for the cost of care for so many around this country. i think that's going to happen. then we're going to shift this conversation to something else because this congress who by the

way has a single digit approval rating will find something else to hit this president on. >> as we look at product marketing and that's a great point about this. this law itself is a marathon and not a sprint. suze suzy, people getting new coverage don't get attention and those paying higher premiums all over the media and those who are not have not. what do you think could have been done in the construct of messaging that would have hit more of a home run? >> i think part of the issue, there's so much focus on website and exchanges, part of the individual insurance market with the folks whose plans are being canceled and shopping for insurance represent 5% of the population in terms of those reports seeking insurance. that's a very small fraction. it's very important to the overall functioning of obama care but it's worth keeping in mind. at the same time there are other

pieces of obama care both some of which succeed and others right before thanksgiving, the obama administration said they would delay the ability for small businesses to sign up through the exchanges. that's another setback. obviously, hoping it would slip under the radar, it's true there are lots of different moving pieces in here. >> i want to get this in. the supreme court agreed to take up another challenge of the law concerning contraception and while the church does support universal coverage, it has a problem with that particular requirement. ladies, i want to play a clip and get your reaction on the other side. >> said, wait a minute, we catholics are kind of among the pros with health care, do it because of religious conviction. so that's what we had to worry and draw back. you're really kind of -- you're really kind of pushing aside

some of your greatest supporters here. >> let me give you the last word on this one. what do you make of reaction that dollan is representing? >> a non-profit or for profit organization that is an entity from yourself, i think it's going to be problematic by the time it hits the supreme court. at the end of the day you do not lose protections because you work for a certain employer and that you cannot enjoy the corporate shield yet let all of the individual rights flow through the shield. i think cardinal dollan is wrong about this. >> great to have you on, thanks, ladies. >> the fifth grade teacher who sent a complaint e-mail to the president over health care and received a personal handwritten note in return. what the president had to say may surprise you. stay with us, you're watching msnbc after this. he next 40 yeas

the united states population is going to grow by over 90 million people, and almost all that growth is going to be in cities. what's the healthiest and best way for them to grow so that they really become cauldrons of prosperity and cities of opportunity? what we have found is that if that family is moved into safe, clean affordable housing, places that have access to great school systems, access to jobs and multiple transportation modes then the neighborhood begins to thrive and then really really take off. the oxygen of community redevelopment is financing. and all this rebuilding that happened could not have happened without organizations like citi. citi has formed a partnership with our company so that we can take all the lessons from the revitalization of urban america to other cities. so we are now working in chicago and in washington, dc and newark. it's amazing how important safe, affordable housing is to the future of our society.

the holidays can be an especially difficult time. everything's different now. sometimes i feel all alone. christmas used to be my favorite. i just don't expect anything. what if santa can't find me? to help, sleep train is holding a secret santa toy drive. bring your gift to any sleep train, and help keep the spirit of the holidays alive. not everyone can be a foster parent, but anyone can help a foster child.

never expected a nons when he wrote an e-mail to president obama explainicomplaining about affordable care act. he got a two-page handwritten note which he says he now plans to put up for auction. i'm pleased to welcome mr. riter to the program. great to have you here. >> great to be here. >> what prompted you to write to the president? >> well, i've been following the health care plan and watching the news and flipping from channel to channel. i saw how dif advisive and it got really toxic. i didn't like how the senate had to make every move, harry reid was making moves left and right

to try to get it passed. health care is important to everybody. i wanted us all to kind of pause and reflect. >> one of the things you bring up again about the divisiveness, the president wrote while he believ believ believes health care reform is the right thing for the country, it certainly wasn't the smart political thing and i hope in the months to come you'll keep an open mind and evaluate it based not on the plik attacks but what it does to improve people's lives. >> well, the first thing was just shock. i mean, you send a letter, my wife said, nobody is going to read it. and here it comes. i'm looking at every word and i saw where he edited out and replaced a word. and so i got immediately flipped

open the new win dough to look for the auto graphs. i was skeptical but also honored. my dad used to tell me, you can write presidents. your voice counts too. i was keeping that a little bit of the tradition alive too. >> in this, your voice certainly does count obviously in this letter the president said we need to talk to be able to talk to the other side. do you feel that the other side in washington is trying to find common ground when it comes to improving this law? it is a law now. >> well, and, i do agree with part of that. i think after this rollout happened and after such the things that were starting to find out even when nancy pelosi said you have to pass it to read what's in it. now we're starting to see some problems and this is -- i know your earlier person talked about it's only 5% of the population. that's a huge number and that's independent people. wait until the businesses jump

in and have to go and meet this requirement of the aca. and you know, then we might have other problems. i want us to take our red hats off or blue hats off, red states or blue states and put the american hats on, what can we do to fix some of the things we're talking about but not gut the whole thing. that was my thing. and that's why i wrote it and when i looked at it i went and bragged to people at school. i teach, look, i've got a response back and i thought it was pretty awesome. looking at it now it was pretty tough. >> you say it was awesome that you were honored and living proof what this needs for the country in upgraeding the social contract. it's a tough birthing process but people wouldn't be surprised to hear you're going to put this letter up or it is up for auction right now. why did you want to auction it off and explain where the bidding is right now? >> i contacted -- i had seen --

not an advertisement, but seen another -- lady received a letter and i saw that moments in time and got a hold of gary and he's been a great guy. hit it off right away and we just started talking about the letter and -- but my thing was the meaning of the words in it. to me lost some meaning. they lost some meaning when you look at how the president, you know, some said he lied and some said he misled us. we don't know if he knew it all. which was scary if he knew it and told us then that's a lie. if he didn't know it, whose not informing him of this? so people weren't promised what the president adamantly said. that is kind -- it took the wind out of the excitement of this letter. i thought, you know, i think i'm going to at least see if there's any options that i can do, money is tight and i'm working two jobs. my wife is working two jobs.

we don't have it made by any means. i thought maybe this was the time to do it. didn't know it would take off like this. >> what's the bidding at? >> 24 -- i don't know, i really don't. i contacted -- we haven't had any thoughts. it was at 24,000 where we were looking at it but, you know, a part from that, i really -- the take i want people to get, can we stop for a second and look at this thing? because if this thing gets too far down the road, you know, the tent cals, you won't be able to pull it out. we had a pretty good health care system, not perfect. there were people hurting. let's isolate and fix that like the president said. let's no go in -- let's not go in with a chain saw and -- but we're gutting the whole system and pretty soon it will be government run health care and that's scary. >> thomas, we have to leave it there. >> thanks for joining us today. i appreciate your time. >> now for a few christmas foods that might make folks feel more

foul than festive. >> a mins pie flavored crisps and here in america, pringles is pushing interesting flavors, you can try the pecan pie flavor or cinnamon and sugar variety. but this might top all of the odd holiday offerings, a turkey cake packed with mashed potatoes and pinch of nutmeg. difficulty level listed medium and we're not sure if that refers to how hard it is to make or eat it. tion. staying active can actually ease arthritis symptoms. but if you have arthritis, staying active can be difficult. prescription celebrex can help relieve arthritis pain so your body can stay in motion. because just one 200mg celebrex a day can provide 24 hour relief for many with arthritis pain and inflammation.

plus, in clinical studies, celebrex is proven to improve daily physical function so moving is easier. celebrex can be taken with or without food. and it's not a narcotic. you and your doctor should balance the benefits with the risks. all prescription nsaids, like celebrex, ibuprofen, naproxen and meloxicam have the same cardiovascular warning. they all may increase the chance of heart attack or stroke, which can lead to death. this chance increases if you have heart disease or risk factors such as high blood pressure or when nsaids are taken for long periods. nsaids, like celebrex, increase the chance of serious skin or allergic reactions or stomach and intestine problems, such as bleeding and ulcers, which can occur without warning and may cause death. patients also taking aspirin and the elderly are at increased risk for stomach bleeding and ulcers. don't take celebrex if you have bleeding in the stomach or intestine, or had an asthma attack, hives, other allergies to aspirin, nsaids or sulfonamides. get help right away if you have swelling of the face or throat, or trouble breathing. tell your doctor your medical history. and find an arthritis treatment for you. visit celebrex.com and ask your doctor about celebrex.

for a body in motion.

visit celebrex.com and ask your doctor about celebrex. i started part-time, now i'm a manager.n. my employer matches my charitable giving. really. i get bonuses even working part-time. where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day. healthcare starting under $40 a month. i got education benefits. i work at walmart. i'm a pharmacist. sales associate. i manage produce. i work in logistics. there's more to walmart than you think. vo: opportunity. that's the real walmart. thanksgiving may have come and gone but christmas and new year's and travel are right around the corner. with the long lines and delays and confusion over electronic gadget that we love to carry and

welcome time to get away from work and spend time with family and find good deals. tom parsons, it's great to have you here. things may be looking better weatherwise. a couple of days ago it was a different story where travel was a real nightmare. what should you do if you were one of those people who had travel plans disrupted either through delays or cancellations. >> right now you start over if your flight was canceled, you're entitled to 100% of your money back. remember that. and you decide you couldn't get there and just wanted to stay home. but coming up in the next two weeks or so, we have grate airfares coming back. when we were looking at coast to coast airfares, when i look at truly coast to coast from los angeles to west palm beach, next weekend, if that's where you want to go, 190 some dollars roundtrip, l.a. to newark and do

christmas shopping, because i like newark airport a lot. you take the train downtown if you want to do that. you're looking at $224 and probably the cheapest airfare in america today is long beach to las vegas and you can go over there not only now but even for christmas and get it for as little as $78 roundtrip. that's all taxes included. >> you'll lose all of your christmas money over there in vegas. >> you might win it too. >> there you go. i like that. >> half glassful. i like that attitude. >> there's a lot of confusion when it comes to flyers and electronics and what they can and can't use. most people know what the rule changes mean for them. what is the new in flight etiquette when it comes to gadget or phones? >> well, if it's an ipad or laptop, luckily now you can keep it on during the whole flight and most of the airlines too, you might want to look under

your seat and see if you have a charger under your seat, you might luck out there. but overall, if it's a laptop or ipad, there's probably a 90% chance you'll be able to use it from the minute you get on the plane and sit down and won't have to turn it off until you have to pack it up. they may make you put it still away because if it's sitting on your lap, they are not going to let it float around in the airport. they still may have -- you might have to put it away for a few seconds. when it comes to telephones, that's a different issue. we'll have to see what comes out of that and when it comes to texting, i have no problems with texting but if they do do the telephone, i used -- remember the old telephones on the old planes, you could sit there and pay $15,000 a minute. well, you got the wi-fis there but if they do it smartly, i don't mind having a phone where i can acty vat it in the air but

there has to be a limit of five minutes max, maybe two times during the flight or technologies there, they know your cell phone number or ip number. don't let somebody sit there for two and a half or three hours talking. >> if they put limits on it -- >> it's a pandora's box. >> great to have you on, we have to run, sir. >> thank you. >> if you haven't shopped until you drop on this black friday, have no fear, there could be more deals worth waiting for. we'll get you ready for small business saturday and cyber monday. keep it locked in here to home shopping network, i mean msnbc. , i could fill a box and ship it for one flat rate. so i knit until it was full. you'd be crazy not to. is that nana? [ male announcer ] fedex one rate. simple, flat rate shipping with the reliability of fedex.

[ male announcer ] this december, experience the gift of exacting precision and some of the best offers of the year [ ding! ] at the lexus december to remember sales event. this is the pursuit of perfection.

at the lexus december to remember sales event. across the country has brought me to the lovely city of boston. cheers. and seeing as it's such a historic city, i'm sure they'll appreciate that geico's been saving people money for over 75 years. oh... dear, i've dropped my tea into the boston harbor. huhh... i guess this party's over. geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. tomorrow is small business saturday, the annual initiative to get people to shop local at independent businesses. host of nbc's your business has been covering small business saturday since it started in 2010. like the mother of small

business saturday. she joins me now live from burbank to talk about this. great to see you again. talk about how branding small business saturday is actually helped draw attention to the little guy. >> it's helped so much. the big box stores had today black friday, the online stores had cyber monday and that gives them something to rally people around and have base beingally a marketing peg. now small businesses have this tomorrow. >> this is the fourth year for small business saturday. explain how it's grown or at least tried to reinvent itself and expand each year. >> ask around. if you asked around four years ago you might have found some people who heard about it before. ask about it now, everyone you talk to will have heard of it and small businesses are doing more to promote it. if you miss some deals today you'll get some tomorrow at small businesses in your community. >> even the last couple of years, president obama participated shopping in a local book store with his daughters, sasha and malia. is this more a marketing thing?

to get people to remember not just on small business saturday, but all throughout the year, to remember the local guy. >> yeah, that's exactly what it is. it is a chance to tell people look, if you don't shop at your local stores at that boutique and toy store, whatever it is, it's going to go away. now we're all opening up our pocketbooks to buy stuff, spend some money at those small businesses. >> great to see you, thank you. >> you too. >> be sure to catch her show, "your business" every sunday at 7:30 a.m. eastern time. after small business saturday comes cyber monday. record breaking sales predicted this year. more people are expected to shop online monday than visit stores today on black friday. joining me now to help navigate the best deals, mark la kas stroe of dealnews.com. as we talk about what to do to avoid the long lines, shopping at home is a big way to do that. what is the best deal come

monday? how can we get advanced knowledge of where to go? >> there are amazing deals coming off for scyber monday. a lot of retailers linked them to deal sites and amazon released a no brand name mentioned touch screen laptop for $200. but they don't tell you the brand the size or model and that's a marketing tactic they use to spur interest and get your curiosity. >> they get you on the hook. talk about where shoppers can find best deals. i love googling discount codes and trying to find discount codes and that steers me in the right direction. where should people look? >> all major retailers will have some type of cyber monday sales going on. whether it be a general sitewide sale or product specific sale. and the research at deal news, we found out the best deals don't happen on cyber monday, they happen the day before on

cyber sunday. >> so it's a sneaky sunday thing. >> just -- just like black friday, retailers kind of release deals a day earlier. the cyber monday deals we're seeing earlier on sunday. >> is there anything that people should avoid buying online? if we go and see tech products we really like and find that good deal online that makes sense but what would you suggest people avoid doing? >> come cyber monday, a lot of tech deals do significantly decrease in volume but it is going to be your last chance to get anything good regarding tech. we found that last year on cyber monday itself, nearly 33% of deals listed on deal news were editor's choice, the best of the best. but cyber monday is the undefeated champion when it comes to clothing and shoe deals. the sheer volume and quality of deals are the highest on cyber monday versus thanksgiving or black friday. >> you don't have to deal with people. it's the best. >> great to see you, mark.

>> what if your goal right now is to find work, either permanent or part-time for the holiday season? joining me now is the executive vrpt of the chicago based national job placement firm. it's good to have you here. what are you finding about holiday work for this season and those out there that might think it's too late. is it? are stores and other businesses still hiring? >> absolutely. there's two things you've got going on. seasonal hiring and unlike previous years, seasonal hiring for the holiday, actually we expect half of that will turn into full-time opportunities. then on top of that -- >> go ahead. >> full-time opportunities. so explain how that can get pushed. >> so what happens is a lot of companies have held back on hiring for years and years because they really are uncomfortable with the uncertainty of both global and locally in the economy. what happens is when you do hire, your seasonal hiring, it's an opportunity to bring people on board and look at them from a long-term talent perspective

with the idea if they work out you can keep them and if not they are part of the normal churn you have in the seasonal environment. you're adding staff when you were a legitimate way to find out if they're good. >> besides holiday stores looking, people trying to buff up for holiday season, who else is hiring? it is the end of the year. is it all about -- >> sure, what happens is most businesses are on a calendar fiscal year. it's fourth quarter for them and they've already implemented and succeeded or failed on their plan for the year. they are looking at their business and saying, do we keep this business? do we change this, change the personnel? probably going to make hiring decisions at the beginning of the year. if you're in the market now, there's a couple of things happening, one, you have no competition because almost everyone else has left the job market thinking i'm not going to try to look from thanksgiving to new year's and you have no competition. the other part is that the people you want to speak with,

the decision makers are far more likely to be available in that fourth quarter to first quarter because they are home. they don't travel during the holidays and you kf a meeting with them. hiring happens in january but the interview process starts now and this is the best time to be in the market. >> the nation's unemployment rate, i want to tell everybody now, 7.3%, ticked up a tenth of a percent. nearly 11.3 million americans out of work. we'll get the jobs report next friday. what do we expect? >> it's still sort of this langishing recovery. when we looked at the layoff data, we went over 1.2 billion and bounced down to this spongy bottom where we're seeing 500,000 layoffs on an annual basis, 500,000 and 600,000. that's reflective of a relatively healthy economy. if you don't have a job, that doesn't mean anything to you. what we're saying, we've flattened out and now we'll have

a slow climb back out. >> rick, great to see you, happy holidays to you. >> thank you, you too. >> the white house official christmas tree arriving just a few hours ago, the first lady both girls and dogs coming out to thank the tree's groer. staffers will decorate a half dozen throughout the white house but it goes in a coveted spot in the blue room. 18.5 foot douglas fir was grown in eastern pennsylvania. 's alwa- who gets the allstate safe driving bonus check. rock beats scissors! [ chuckles ] wife beats rock. and with two checks a year, everyone wins. [ female announcer ] switch today and get two safe driving bonus checks a year for driving safely. only from allstate. call 866-906-8500 now. [ dennis ] zach really loves his new camera. problem is...this isn't zach. it's a friend of a friend who was at zach's party and stole his camera. but zach's got it covered... with allstate renters insurance. [ female announcer ] protect your valuables for as low as $4 a month when you add renters insurance to your allstate auto policy. call 866-906-8500 now.

what are you doing? we're switching car insurance. why? because these guys are the cheapest. why? good question. because a cut-rate price could mean cut-rate protection. you should listen to this guy. [ female announcer ] with allstate you get great protection and a great price, plus an agent! drivers who switched saved an average of $498 a year. call now and see how much you can save. just a few more ways allstate is changing car insurance for good. [ female announcer ] call an allstate agent and get a quote now. a man who doesn't stand still. but jim has afib, atrial fibrillation -- an irregular heartbeat, not caused by a heart valve problem. that puts jim at a greater risk of stroke. for years, jim's medicine tied him to a monthly trip to the clinic to get his blood tested. but now, with once-a-day xarelto®, jim's on the move. jim's doctor recommended xarelto®. like warfarin, xarelto® is proven effective to reduce afib-related stroke risk. but xarelto® is the first and only once-a-day prescription blood thinner for patients with afib

not caused by a heart valve problem. that doesn't require routine blood monitoring. so jim's not tied to that monitoring routine. [ gps ] proceed to the designated route. not today. [ male announcer ] for patients currently well managed on warfarin, there is limited information on how xarelto® and warfarin compare in reducing the risk of stroke. xarelto® is just one pill a day taken with the evening meal. plus, with no known dietary restrictions, jim can eat the healthy foods he likes. do not stop taking xarelto®, rivaroxaban, without talking to the doctor who prescribes it as this may increase the risk of having a stroke. get help right away if you develop any symptoms like bleeding, unusual bruising, or tingling. you may have a higher risk of bleeding if you take xarelto® with aspirin products, nsaids or blood thinners. talk to your doctor before taking xarelto® if you have abnormal bleeding. xarelto® can cause bleeding, which can be serious, and rarely may lead to death. you are likely to bruise more easily on xarelto® and it may take longer for bleeding to stop. tell your doctors you are taking xarelto® before any planned medical or dental procedures.

before starting xarelto®, tell your doctor about any conditions such as kidney, liver, or bleeding problems. xarelto® is not for patients with artificial heart valves. jim changed his routine. ask your doctor about xarelto®. once a day xarelto® means no regular blood monitoring -- no known dietary restrictions. for more information and savings options, call 1-888-xarelto or visit goxarelto.com. another day of explosive testimony. the sisters are in some serious trouble accused of ripping off their former employers to finance a lavish lifestyle complete with eye popping shopping sprees. michelle kaczyns zis live from >> reporter: the purchases they allegedly made for themselves on

nigella's husband's credit cards. when they say she let them spend in exchange for keeping her daily cocaine habit a secret. >> her husband, the alleged victim here is expected to testify. he has said he believes the sisters and got a speedy private divorce after pictures surfaced last summer showing them physically arguing at the london restaurant. in a written statement, the famous chef's alleged drug abuse was quote confirmed to me by other people in and around the household. she lived rent free, earning salaries much more than $40,000. prosecutors say they racked up in five years, more than a million dollars in personal items on their boss's credit cards. one month francesca hit up

designer boutiques in one day, staying at the rits in paris on personal trips on her boss's dime. ringing up more than $100,000. yes, in just that month. prosecutors allege the sisters in one year withdrew nearly $100,000 just in cash for themselves and say they admitted to at least some of it, and wanted to pay it back. when presented with a plan to dock their pay slightly, angrily explained they were treated worse than slaves. but they had an agreement with nigella that they would keep secret her daily cocaine use and prescription drugs. >> they were a golden couple and we're learning things about them, only allegations ats this stage which i dare say they were rather not brought out into the cold light of day. >> this has been an extraordinary look into the

finances of a wealthy family. what was spent amounted to well over $1.5 million every year. the finance director said they were never scrutinized because they didn't have time for what they considered to be trivial matters. back to you. >> the florida mother convicted in the controversial stand your ground case is free on bail. she was sentenced to 20 years for firing what she called a warning shot during a fight with her husband. no one was hurt and alexander tried to use the stand your ground defense. she spent three years in jail. an appeals court has overturned the conviction and she was out on bail under the new trial that begins next year. was it a spilled soda or a sneaky strategy? either way it will cost the brooklyn nets head coach $50,000 for supposedly telling a player to hit him when it came off the floor. hit spilled the soda that the

coach was holding in his hand. and it bought kidd a few more seconds to draw up a last minute play. the nets ended up losing to the lakers, 99-94. sneaky, but didn't work. the new movie -- a new movie, catching fire, grossed in $14.9 million yesterday, beats toy story 2's record of $2 million and frozen grossed $11 million on thanksgiving day. they are on pace to set sales records this weekend as well. who's going to rule the next holiday box office? we have the details. stay with us. >> do the thing that god put ron burgundy on this earth to do. ♪ ♪ [ female announcer ] with five perfectly sweetened whole grains... you can't help but see the good.

so besides turkey, parades, football, shopping, this is also a big weekend at the movies. one of the most anticipated films of the holiday season premiered just today, "mandela, long walk to freedom" tells the story of south african president, nelson mandela.

>> nelson mandela, do you plead guilty or not guilty? >> my lord, it is not i, but the government that should be put in the dark. i plead not guilty. >> joining me now is kim sayer finish, senior editor at "in touch weekly" magazine. this is said to be, quote, a familiar story, but one worth experiencing again. and we say familiar story, because a lot of us know the public social justice history of nelson mandela. this also takes a look at his personal life and maybe some of his dahl yenss with women. >> and based on his autobiography. really the reason to see this is the lead, such a strong performer. and we do know the story. we know how it ends, what an inspiring story it is. but to see him portray mandela. and, again, it's about his whole life. and they have to condense it

into two hours and twenty minutes. >> people might recognize him from "homeland." >> i think they'll know him from "the wire." probably most recognized for. >> the biggest movie by far was "catching fire," hunger games, the second, which is jennifer lawrence, now an oscar winner, comes on the heels of a successful first picture. but this one really has great buzz to capture on this whole epic book series that will be made in the film. >> yeah. i've read the books and big fan of the books. but "catching fire," the movie is probably better than the first one. the movie is probably better than the book, and, of course, already broke some records. broke the november record but on track to break the best thanksgiving -- best thanksgiving weekend ever. it will probably make another 100 million by the end of this weekend. over $400 million already worldwide, this has made. and jennifer lawrence, you mentioned her. she is just the it girl, last year's it girl. this year again. she carries this movie. she is so great in it.

she acts in it. she is -- just watching her, she can carry off those couture dresses and also have a bow and arrow and look great. >> and you believe all of it. >> you believe all of it. >> for the kids, disney has a new movie coming out, "frozen." i want to show a sneak peek to everybody. take a look. >> i said enough! >> sorcery. >> i would love to be able to do that. >> that was pretty good right there. >> i know. i would love to be able to have some type of powers like that and freeze everybody at one time. so kids are going to love this. a herowin. >> one turns the land into a never-ending winter, the other sister changing things back. something kids will like, adults will like. and again, another movie that will break some records this weekend, on track to be the best

opening thanksgiving weekend ever. two huge movies to see. >> lots of new disney songs, too. all the kids will be singing. >> very broadway like. really good. and, you know, a little bit of a contemporary twist on the disney princess. so not just a princess waiting for the prince to save her from everything. >> jazz hands with magic. >> yes, of course. >> but the oscars not out until march. but i want to get your take on who might be nominated. because this is -- it's like they're political campaigns that happen in hollywood. >> a lot of movies have opened. still have some movies yet to open. right now what people are talking about, sandra bullock in "gravity," best picture. sandra bullock, this is going to be her second oscar. i think everyone is just looking at her -- as soon as this movie opened, not only is she fantastic in it, but just the money that it's made. normally you see oscar movies, people say what was that movie? who was in it? and this is a movie that was an audience favorite but also critical favorite and oscar favorite. >> she is so well-liked. >> and tom hanks, captain

phillips. i think we could see the two of them dominating oscar season. >> everybody loves tom hanks. kim, great to see you. that's going to do it for this special edition of msnbc live for this friday. i'm thomas roberts. stay with msnbc for news updates throughout the night and a especially edition of "hardball," next. lovely read susan. but isn't it time to turn the page on your cup of joe? gevalia, or a cup of johan, is like losing yourself in a great book. may i read something? yes, please. of course. a rich, never bitter taste cup after cup. net weight 340 grams. [ sighs ] [ chuckles ] [ announcer ] always rich, never bitter. gevalia.

[ announcer ] always rich, never bitter. i started part-time, now i'm a manager.n. my employer matches my charitable giving. really. i get bonuses even working part-time. where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day.

healthcare starting under $40 a month. i got education benefits. i work at walmart. i'm a pharmacist. sales associate. i manage produce. i work in logistics. there's more to walmart than you think. vo: opportunity. that's the real walmart. the right wing delivers a crazy third team. let's play "hardball." hello, i'm chris matthews in washington. politicians on the right have done some disturbing and destructive things this year. they derailed every major legislative item they could, including legislation on gun control, immigration, the budget, ask even workplace discrimination. when they did take up legislation, it looked like this. more than 45 separate votes to kill the affordable care act. abortion laws cooked up by the