that there's only one place you can get it. when you get to the democratic headquarters or inside the democratic organization somehow. >> presumably the 18-minute gap on the tape is the last big one to be decided. is it conceivable that something about this is on that 18-minute gap or -- >> it's possible. there's no doubt -- there's a mystery as to what's in that 18 1/2 minute gap. there's no mystery to me as to why we have an 18 1/2 minute gap. there's only one guy -- >> you can see it, right? >> that would take eight, nine times to get that machine to erase. it wasn't steve bull, who had access, it was a man who could barely get the on top of his medicine bottle where you had to push it down and turn it. >> play, record, play, record. i'm sorry to laugh. this is extraordinary stuff and kind of you to share it with us. this will be in the revised version of the book, right? >> it is in the revised pergs. >> the rerelease of "blind ambition" starts hitting bookstores tomorrow. i can't wait.

john dean, great thanks as lz always. that's "countdown" since the previous day declared mission accomplished in iraq. i'm keith olbermann, play and record, play and record. now to discuss the discourt between the state who senators are the states with the worst health care reform, here is rachel maddow. good evening. >> thank you for that. thank you at home for staying with us for the next hour. during which we will report some stop you in your tracks news about something very wrong in the state of south carolina. it is something that you will not hear anywhere else. until every other news story takes our story and runs with it. george bush's cabinet member is under formal investigation for corruption. we'll tell you who it is and how damming that case is. all ahead. we begin tonight with an

unexpected and dramatic appeal today from the most powerful figure on capitol hill. just days after a republican member of congress screamed at the president while he addressed congress, and thousands of conservative protesters descended on d.c. on the occasion of the anniversary of 9/11, some threatening to return with weapons, speaker of the house nancy pelosi, who ordinarily present an iron-lady facade, today emotionally ernlged her fellow politico to tone down the rhetoric. >> i think we all have to take responsibility for our actions and our words. we are a free country and this balance between freedom and safety is one that we have to carefully balance. i have concerns about some of the language that is -- that is being used because i saw -- i

saw this myself in the late '70s in san francisco, this kind of rhetoric. it was very frightening. it created a climate in which we -- violence took place. so i wish that we would all, again, curb our enthusiasm in some of the statement that are made so understanding that some of the people -- the ears that are ---le the falling on are not as balanced as the person making the statement might assume. >> speaker pelosi's office confirmed today that the violence to which she was referring there were the assassinations that rocked california and her home district of san francisco in 1978. on the morning of november 28th that year san francisco mayor george moscone and harvey milk were murdered. harvey milk was the first openly

gay man to be elected to office in california and mascony were running mates. they were shot by a man named dan white. senator dyan feinstein who found harvey milk dead on the ground and had to deliver the shocking news to the city. >> both mayor moscony and supervisor harvey milk have been shot and killed. >> the suspect is supervisor dan ryan. >> as a person who gray up in the bay area, whose earliest memories include that statement by dianne feinstein and the news reports of rioting that followed white's sentencing, i personally can tell you that it is rare and

striking for a california politician who lived through that era to bring up that violence today. it's especially striking to hear it brought up this way, the speaker of the house, a politician who rarely shows that type of emotion. it was her response from the republican party john boehner. >> a little while ago speaker pelosi pretty emotional describing how our political climate is growing hostile, especially the rhetoric. do you believe our political climate has grown hostile? what's your opinion on that? >> i do believe we're in the middle of a modern day political rebellion. the american people are saying enough is enough. they're scared to death that the country they grew up in is not going to be the country that their kids and grand kids get to grow up in. >> modern day political rebellion. americans are rightly scared for their country. i guess that means that

congressman boehner doesn't agree that political leaders should try to not escalate the situation toward those sorts of things. it wasn't just congressman boehner, the top republican in the house today. it was also the chairman of the national republican congressional committee, pete sessions of texas, who responding to speaker pelosi's plea of de-escalation by saying, quote, speaker pelosi is right the american people are upset but it's her own words that continue to fuel voter frustration in america. voters are justifiably frustrated with washington. when politics becomes what it has recently, protesters are regularly brandishing guns at appearances by the president, politicians have a choice, they can use their influence and mega phone of their stature to further escalate the rhetoric? to try to stoke it further to see what just might happen? or they can use that influence, that mega phone, to try to

de-escalate, to try to get the threats of force out of our political debate. to use leadership to ask everyone to take a deep breath before someone gets hurt. who's doing that right now on the american right? is anyone who is influential on the conservative side of american politics going to step up to do that? what are they waiting for? joining us now is cleave jones, a great friend and colleague of harvey milk, one of the first to discover milk's body in city hall, now a with hotel workers unite here. thank you for joining us. >> my pleasure. >> do you think it was appropriate for speaker apelosi to raise the spectre of those murders in the context of extremism in today's politics? >> i certainly do. i certainly understand the speaker's emotions on the issue as one who was there that day and saw what those bullets did. it's hard not to hear the

residents, again, in the words and the action and signs we're seeing all over the place right now, and it's important for people who understand this kind of rhetoric, many times in the past, in our country, has led to violence. so i was particularly disturbed by representative boehner's response, which seemed to me to be a passive endorsement of the kind of things you described as you led into this, the carrying of firearms to town hall meetings. when did this become a legitimate part of political discourse in our country? >> do you think that there's a cavalier attitude about the risks of political violence today? i mean, it feels like there's two ways to think about this. either it doesn't seem like a real threat to people and so it's okay to sort of flift with it or the a real threat and people are still soaking this use of violence rhetoric knowing that real possibility is there? what do you think it is? >> i think it's a very

frightening, cynical, deliberate attempt to manipulate the fears of many people in our country. and u you know, i'm certain that representative boehner is old enough to remember, as i remember, how it felt to be an american following the assassination of president kennedy, how it felt to be an american following the assassination of dr. marlin luther king. i remember as a child when the cities burned. i remember tanks going down the street in front of my school. is that the kind of america that these people want to lead us into? it is, i think, becoming inevitable we're going to see political violence. that is a terrible thing for everyone in this country, regardless of your position on these issues. >> cleave, i know you've been an activist for decades, worked at the grassroots level, still do, worked with a lot of different politicians. is the situation now where political leadership could

really make a difference? could someone influential on the right use their leadership to calm things down right now or is this a self-propelled thing? >> i would hope the republican leadership would take a deep breath and look clearly at what's happening. i don't see any sign of it. what i do see is every single day now, in the mainstream media and blogosphere, the fanning of these flames, the deliberate use of words like kill and death. this does not bode well for our country. and, you know, i am a protester. i have a long history of marching and protesting and confronting politicians. i'm going to be marching in washington on october 11th. i certainly won't be bringing a gun and i certainly won't be bringing racist overtly hateful placards and signs every time these tea baggers get together. and what are not genuine grass roots movements by any means.

they're well-financed and orchestrated by consulting firms with clear ties to the republican party that you on this show have done a good job of demonstrating. >> cleve jones, activist, great friend of harvey milk. nice to have your insight. in some states are conservative politicians cutting off their noses to spite their faces by opposing health reform? there is some appalling news today about some of the red state, which shows that if reform doesn't pass, those states are going to want their proverbial noses back. that's next. without energy. without energy. we have all this energy here in the u.s. we have wind. we have solar, obviously. we have lots of oil. i think natural gas is part of the energy mix of the future. i think we have the can-do. we have the capability. we have the technology. the solutions are here. we just need to find them here.

[ thunder rumbles ] what is the sign of a good decision? in the world of personal finance, it's massmutual. find strength and stability in a company that's owned by its policyholders. ask your advisor or visit massmutual.com. occasionally you come across something reading the news that can't be improved upon. so here without comment is from today's wall street journal. quote, protesters who attended saturday's tea party rally in washington are unhappy with the level of service provided by the subway system. reven congressman kevin brady

asked for an explanation as to why the government-run subway system didn't in his view adequately prepare for the rally to protest government spending and government services. seriously? that's not me saying seriously. that's in "the wall street journal." quote, the texas republican released a letter he sent to washington's metro system complaining the taxpayer funded subway system was unable to properly transport protest ez to the rally to protest government spending. i said i wouldn't comment, but if you're wondering how mr. complain about the metro congressman voted on the last metro funding request. he voted no. i'm not commenting. i'm just saying.

♪ ♪ i got troubles, oh ♪ but not today ♪ 'cause they're gonna wash away ♪ ♪ this old heart ♪ gonna take them away

time forea for a magic map trick. here are the three states with the highest number of people getting vaccinated for hpv. three out of every four women will get hpv, the leading cause of cervical cancer. unlike other types of cancer, cervical cancer can largely be prevented by this vaccine. these three state are doing the best in the country at administering that vaccine on a relatively wide basis. they're koog a good job with that part of health care. good. here are the three states doing the worst. the lowest proportion of teenage girls are getting vaccinated for hpv. one very effective form of health care is lacking. when that data about those states got us to thinking, we

wondered what other states are sort of blowing it on women's reproductive health care. turns out, here's the teenage pregnancy stats. here are the states with the most teenagers who are now also moms. in these states, more than 15% of babies are born prematurely. and here are the states where the babies are born with the lowest birth weight. if you want to map the infant mortality rate, here are the nation's worst three state. now, magic map trick. if you put all of this data into a big computing machine, which states are offenders in all the above categories? which states are the worst of all of these worlds? they are, mississippi and south carolina. south carolina, the palmetto state, also home of lawmakers who perhaps more than in any other state have staked their reason for being on preventing health reform.

>> the reason you're not going to have a government-run health care pass the senate is because it would be devastating for this country. >> if we're able to stop obama on this, it will be his water o waterloo. it will break him. >> i will not be muzzled. i will speak out and speak loudly against this risky plan. >> more than 20% of south carolinaens don't have health shurngs. teen pregnancy rates are among the highest in the country, among the worst at getting young women vaccinated for a nearly preventable cancer. infant mortality, among the highest in the country. if anyone might want to get a little help with the disaster that is health care in their states, you would think it would be these guys. but they're the ones fighting hardest against it. we're going to -- we're supposed to be joinled right now by donald fouler, former chairman of the dnc, a great south carolinan, we're going to be joined right after this. national car rental knows i'm picky.

so, at national, i go right past the counter... and you get to choose any car in the aisle. choose any car? you cannot be serious! okay. seriously, you choose. go national. go like a pro.

you should know, bayer aspirin is one of most studied, most trusted, anti-fever, anti-inflammatory, and anti-pain medications in the world. from pain killer to life saver, bayer aspirin is the wonder drug that works wonders. from pain killer to life saver, heard about him from all the other girls. we were working at the same company. and she was something else. announcer: take care of each other, and your health. with nature made cholestoff. cholestoff helps lower ldl cholesterol, the bad kind, naturally, by using the same types of phytonutrients found in nuts, grains, fruits, and vegetables. he makes me laugh. he still does, but it's nice. announcer: learn how to lower your cholesterol, naturally, at cholestoff.com. nature made. fuel your greatness.

if you've been wrong on on as many national security issue as joe lieberman has, it takes a special something to call the president a woos because you didn't listen to you and instead took the unanimous advice of the joint chiefs of staff. joe lieberman and mitt romney are going after the president on defense. that's next. plus, kent jones has a

shocking report that involves a anchorman and a defenseless chicken. first, time for a couple of holy mackerel stories. >> i've always said one of the options in the insurance exchange should be a public insurance option. >> wild applause! president obama gave a raised high speech at the university of maryland today before a huge crowd of students who packed the school's 1,000 seat basketball arena to see him. the crowd is very enthusiastic. the president repeated his most crowd-pleasing, crowd-rousing rhetoric on health care. it all went about how you would expect it to. a very positive rah, rah experience until, a surprise moment. listen to this. >> four out of five committees in congress have completed their work. yesterday the finance committee on the leadership of max baucus put out it's own bill. each bill has it's strengths and there are a lot of similarities

between them. >> okay, two things. one, american college kids right now are really psyched about the minutia of health policy. they cheered the public option. two, american college students now know enough about the minutia of health policy to boo when they hear the name of the chairman of the senate finance committee. they booed when he said max baucus. kids today with their rap music and baggy pants and their hatred fort chairman's mark to the finance committee's health care. kids today. get off my lawn! i have a college degree in health policy and i have to say my college experience was not like that. wank on, university of maryland. the wank on. the geeks of america shall inherit the earth. shall can ken salazar. when president obama appointed him secretary of the interior. yesterday, as we reported,'

nounsed he would shut down the interior office department, known during the bush administration as the place where department staffers snorted meth off toaster ovens. the inspector general reported that in addition to the toaster oven meth-snorting, employees of one middle management office had sex with, did drugs with and took embarrassingly small bribes from people in the oil and gas industry they were supposed to be regulating. the secretary of the interior during the time of the toaster oven, meth-snorting, what's known as the department's orgy area was a woman named gale norton. during her time she aworded shell oil a bunch of extremely lucrative leases to squeeze some oil out of federal lands. two months after the big present for shell oil was announced, gale norton quit the department of the interior. where did she go to work after that? you guessed it. shell oil.

dear, miss norton, thank you for submitting your resume. then-secretary talked to them about taking a job with them she will have broken the law. the los angeles times reports today that it has now been turned over to the justice department in a formal criminal referral. that makes gale norton the first bush cabinet secretary to be the subject of a formal corruption investigation. she, of course, is also the first to have multiple results show up when you goggle her name along with the words meth, toaster oven and snorting. finally, one last story in "the rachel maddow show" crime blogger. in hinton west virginia a man has been charged with inimportant naturing a public officer and forging a public document. he has not been poorly

impersonating a public official and doing a speck attackly inept job of forging documents but he may be guilty of those. with the help of a man he met online the suspect allegedly sent out letters posing as a law enforcement of offering job with the state of west virginia. in order to apply folks had to hand over their social security number, birth certificates and some form of i.d. if you're afraid you might have been a victim of this scheme, here's how you can tell your job offer letter is a fake. it does have the signature of the governor of west virginia, joe mansion on it. but it's missing the governor's seal. also, the text of the letter makes the last text message you received from an 8-year-old look like tolstoy. the letter, it's nice to have you as an employee of west virginia. your super boss matt talk a lot of thangs about you.

i hope you stay with us a long time. if you got? please ask matt. love governor of west virginia. we're trying to find copies of these extraordinarily forged letters. if we're successful, we'll let you know.

you must be looking for motorcycle insurance. you're good. thanks. so is our bike insurance. all the coverage you need at a great price. hold on, cowboy. cool. i'm not done -- for less than a dollar a month, you also get 24/7 roadside assistance. ght on. yeah, vroom-vroom! sounds like you ran a 500. more like a 900 v-twin. excuse me. well, you're excused. the right insurance for your ride. w, that's progressive. call or click today. i'm just a skeptic so i don't necessarily believe that anything is going to work but i was like, hey, this actually works. (announcer) only rogaine foam is shown to regrow hair in 85% of guys. i'll check it out and i'm like, nice. (announcer) rogain foam. stop losing. start gaining.

you can learn to switch off hungry and lose weight. right now weight watchers is offering a whole month free. join and get a month of unlimited meetings and online tools. so all you'll need is 45 minutes a week to take control, turn hungry off... ...and turn weight loss on. the free month offer's only available for a limited time so join today. hurry registration's free too. weight watchers. stop dieting. start living.

president obama today made worldwide headlines by dropping president bush's planned fantasy missile defense plans for europe in favor of a new plan that actually might work. now, missile defense is one of those buzz terms that's widely known but not widely understood, that's because not everyone saw this episode of "the west wing". >> you know what you are? you are the charlie brown of missile defense. >> i'm not familiar with the reference. >> peanuts, charlie brown. >> i've heard of him. >> why? . >> i never read the comics. >> leo, were you born at the age

of 55? >> i know there's a dog. >> charlie brown wanted to hold a football and lucy would hold it but she would pull it a at the last minute and charlie brown would fall on his butt. >> that's funny? >> no. but each time she would find a way to convince charlie brown that this time she wouldn't pull the ball away and they would and charlie brown would fall on his butt. >> that's funny? >> no, it's satirical. >> there you go. >> four, three, two, one. >> is that silence a pretty good sign? >> no. >> negative intercept. >> we've had sensor readings. >> no. >> itover shot its targ get. >> it was enthusiastic. >> by how much? >> colonel. >> 137. >> we missed it by 137 feet.

>> miles. >> we missed it by 137 miles? >> when you consider the size of outer space, leo, that's not so bad. >> sir -- >> the word you're looking for are, oh, good grief. >> that was the best pretend president in tv history, explaining that as neat as it sounds, missile defense doesn't actually work. it sound like a magical force field that missiles bounce off but it's more like trying to shoot down a bullet from the other guy's gun using a bullet of your own. report out this week from the government accountability office is highly critical of the missile defense department over the last eight years. president obama said he's planning to put ten missile intercepts in poland and one in the czech republic that was widely opposed by the czech people. bush plan is being dropped in favor of another system more likely to work and which happens to target the kind of missiles that iran actually has.

not the ones the old fantasy system targeted. nixing the plan was a bold move but not a surprise. senator obama campaigned on the fact that he was going to do this. now, you can guess what the republican response was to it. you got. they all basically said what former mass pass governor and '08 republican mitt romney also said, which s quote, president obama has made a dangerous and alarming decision to shelve our missile defense system in europe. the pentagon's missile defense agency has worked long and hard to secure a site for the system to thwart a potential a ran yan strike. his decision is wrong in every day. mitt romney's foreign policy experience consists of having been a missionary in france during the vietnam war. and he owned a house in new hampshire when he was governor of massachusetts. that's kind of foreign. we do appreciate his analysis. joining us is president of the plow shares fund and author of

"bomb scare: the history and future of nuclear weapons." thank you for being here. >> my pleasure. >> i'm sure mitt romney is a nice man. to the extent you have any interactions with him, i want you to know that you had nothing to do with me making that crack against him, fair? >> that's absolutely right. fair. >> let me ask you why it is the joint chiefs of staff and the secretary of defense made a unanimous recommendation to president obama to drop the bush missile defense plan? >> because the military has always been skeptical of missile defense. it's a huge money sink. we spent about $240 billion over the last 50 years trying to create a missile defense that works. we're very, very short of that goal. we do know have a missile defense system that can protect the united states from a batiste lick missile attack. the joint chiefs would rather put that money for systems that actually do work. and now they've recommended to the president that we scrap this plan to spend $5 billion to

place ten interpreters in poland in faf of a plan that, for half that amount, can put hundreds of interceptors right up against the iranian coast to counter the actual threat that iran represents with a short-range missiles. >> the idea of the bush plan was that they would target long-range missile -- long-range nuclear missiles iran doesn't have. the obama plan is to target the type of missiles that iran already has but has successfully tested. >> exactly. president bush was promoting a technology that doesn't work against a threat that doesn't exist. obama is replacing nothing with something. instead of building indefinitely for a system that might defend against a system that the iranians might field 10 or 15 years from now, he'll put more hardware on target, defending more countries in europe than the bush plan would have.

>> in addition to mitt romney coming out about this, calling it dangerous and alarming today, and then later in his statement calling it alarming and dangerous, which i thought was a big he can lagescalation, a lot neoconservatives came out complaining like joe lieberman, john mccain, certainly taking the neo-kon line on this. why this very been on whetted to the idea of the bush system? >> two reasons. they have a deep distrust of arms control agreements. they think these are paper agreements that sacrifice u.s. security. they don't want to give up any american military system. even if the other side's giving up theirs. two, therefore, they think the only way to protect against a missile threat is not to eliminate the missiles, eliminate the weapons, but to build up a technological shield. and 50, 60 years of experience in failing to do that hasn't dissuaded them at all.

but the third reason i think this is really what motivates them most is that it's politically useful. will is a conservative hate machine out there that takes any defense issue now and turns it into an attack on president obama. they want to portray him as weak. as an apiecer, unconcerned about american natural security, maybe not even an american. any defense issue that comes up now, whether it's missile defense, iran, nuclear policy or north korea or relations with russia, it will also be used to try to portray obama as an appeaser, as weak, and missile defense is that -- in order to make that, they have to make up facts. they make up, as you say, this myth, this fantasy system that it can work. they exaggerate the iranian threat. they use words like ominous. you would think having these people so wrong for so long, they would have little

credibility. they still find tv stations and newspapers that will give them time. >> what about the allegation that this is somehow going to appease russia? this is something russia didn't want. russia will be happy this isn't there. somehow this will embolden them at a time when russia has been so aggressive internationally. >> one, the russians are pleased with this. they see this as a return to rationality. they never thought this system made much sense. they did see it as a threat to russia. the system did have some capability against rush sa. they are pleased, no question about it. and there will be some politicians in russia that will crow about it. some are concerned about the obama plan. my friend in college is complaining -- is warning about this plan in an article in "the washington post" website tonight saying that this system, if it proceeds the way obama wants, to could be a bigger threat to russia than the bush plan. the reason is simple.

bush -- as long as it's a few interceptor missiles on cruisers and destroyers off the coast of iran, not much of a threat. if it multiplies the way secretary gates and general cartright laid out, you could have dozens of interceptors on ships with capable systems that could threaten u.s. strategic positions. so the russians are not just going to give obama a free pass on this. >> of course, if that happens, then the conservatives will attack obama as needlessly provoking russia as our great ally, right? >> that's exactly right. any issue will be used to portray obama as weak, over-reaching, as vacillating. the facts don't matter here. just like in the health care debate. the conservatives and the neoconservatives do not care about the facts. in this vitriolic attack they're doing more harm to national security than anything they could hope to gain. as you pointed out in the

beginning of the show, this is the great curse we now have in washington. this vicious, vicious fight that sacrifices domestic issues or international issues on this partisan altar of hate and vi e vitri vitriol. >> thanks very much for joining us and helping us work this out tonight. >> my pleasure. thank you. a quick programming note. nbc's ann curry interviewed iranian president ahmadinejad today after president obama's announcement on the missile defense. her interview will air in part tomorrow on the "today" show and in its entirety sunday at 1:00 p.m. eastern. coming up on "countdown" the late senator ted kennedy's son, teddy kennedy jr. will be joining keith to discuss the health care debate. coming up, the one issue in

today's news that deserves everyone's attention. boy: is that your new car? uh...yeah. boy: cool. thanks. i knew i wanted the new subaru legacy. i went back and forth on the hood scoop. but i'm glad i went for it. the all-new subaru legacy. feel the love. the all-new subaru legacy. how to get rich, by america's health insurance companies. raise health insurance premiums 4 times faster than wages. pay your ceo twenty four million dollars a year. deny payment for 1 out of every 5 treatments doctors prescribe. if the insurance companies win, you lose. tell congress to rewrite the story. we want good health care we can afford with the choice of a public health insurance option.

minnesota republican tim pawlenty has landed a stunning political blow against a completely imaginary enemy. the good governor has been trying to raise his national profile in advance of a widely expected run for the presidency in 2012. to that end, he has now jumped on the anti-a.c.o.r.n. conservative bang wag. he's issued a statement -- a statewide directive to the minnesota management and budget office that directs all agencies to, quote, stop all state funding of a.c.o.r.n. oh, tough move! except the state doesn't actually give any money to a.c.o.r.n. but rest assured, conservatives, every dime that the state of minnesota doesn't give to a.c.o.r.n. is going to be cut off. right now. their imaginary state budget, we're imaginary slashing it. it doesn't get imaginary tougher than that.

many conservatives who governor pawlenty is hope willing to woo with the imaginary tough guy act will be convening in d.c. tomorrow for the start of the fourth annual voter summit tore the low price of $99 you can sign up to listen to speakers that include representative michele bachmann, actor stephen baldwin and former miss california carrie prejean. if there's not enough, there's more. you can sit in on breakout sessions like obama care, rationing your life away. or, global warming hysteria, the new face of the pro-death again that. how about thugocracy: fighting the left wing conspiracy. i'm not making up these titles. this is really what they're doing. here's my personal favorite, true tolerance cloe:countering homosexual agenda in public school. this is a pregame warm-up to the black tie gala with the james

dobson leadership award. see you there. i'll be announced as a proceed promiscuity zell outby the pro-abortion catholic people. product do women think is best? according to a study presented by better homes and gardens, definity color recapture. it corrects the look of wrinkles and discoloration.

call or click now.

my other deeds challenge each american to ask this question, what can we do to be better citizens? what can we do to be worthy of such service and such sacrifice? >> out of all the stories in the news today, if you only hear e one, if you only pay attention to one, this is the one. our country did something today that we do very, very, very rarely. and this is the story. >> june 21, 2006 in the remotest northeast of afghanistan. near the border of pakistan. sergeant monte was a team lead other a 16-man patrol. they'd been on the move for three days. down dirt roads, sloshing through rivers, hiking up steep mountain trails, their heavy

gear on their backs. moving at night and in the early morning to avoid the scorching 100-degree heat. their mission, to keep watch on the valley down below in advance of an operation to clear the area of militants. those who were there remember that evening on the mountain. iraqi ridge, not much bigger than this room. some were standing guard, knowing they had been spotted by a man in the valley. some were passing out mres and water. there was talk of home and plans for leave. jarod was overheard remembering his time serving in korea. just before dark there was a shuffle of feet in woods and that's when the tree line exploded in a wall of fire. one member of the patrol said it was like thousands of rifles crackling. bullets and heavy mn gunfire ricochetting across the rocks. rocket-propelled grenades firing down. fire so intense that weapons

were shot right out of their hands. within minutes, one soldier was killed, another was wounded. everyone dove for cover. behind a tree, a rock, a stone wall. this patrol of 16 men was facing a force of some 50 fighters. outnumbered, the risk was real. they might be overrun, they might not make it out alive. that's when jarod monday ty did what he was trained to do. with the enemy coming, he got on his radio and started calling in artillery. when the enemy tried to flank them, he grabbed a gun and drove them back. and had they came back again, he tossed a grenade and drove them back again. and when these american soldiers saw one of their own wounded, lying in the open some 20 yards away, exposed to the approaching enemy, jarod monte did something no amount of training can will. his patrol leader said he'd go

but jarod said, no, he is my soldier, i'm going to get him. it was written long ago the bravest are surely those who are the clearest vision of what is before them. glory and danger alike. and yet notwithstanding go out to meet it. yet notwithstanding and meet it. jared monty saw the danger before him and he went out to meet it. he handed off his radio, tightened his chin strap and with his men providing cover, he rose and started to run into all those incoming bullets and rockets. the enemy in the woods unleashed a firestorm. he moved low and fast, yard after yard, then dove behind the stone wall. a moment later, he rose again. and again they fired everything they had at home, forcing him back. maced with overwhelming enemy fire, he could have stayed where

he was behind that wall. but that's not the kind of soldier jarrett merod monty was. i will always put the mission first, i will never quit, i will never leave a fallen comrade. and so for a third time he rose. for a third time he ran toward his fallen comrade. said his patrol leader, it was the bravest ever i had ever seen a soldier do. they say it was a rocket propelled grenade that made it within a few yards of his wounded soldier. his final words were of his faith and of his family. i have made peace with god. tell my family that i love them. and then as the artillery that jared called in came down, the enemy fire slowed then stopped.

the patrol defeated the attack. they held on, but not without a price. by the end of the night jared and three others, including the soldier he died trying to save had given their lives. >> sergeant jar ed c. monty of massachusetts today was awarded the medal of honor and it is the highest honor that we give in this country. while sergeant monty's parents received his medal today in washington, in afghanistan, u.s. soldiers there renamed a combat outpost in his honor. only five medals of honor have been given thus far. and since vietnam, no medal of honor has been awarded to a soldier, a sailor, airmen or marine who has survived the fight for which he was honored. now your card comes with a way to plan for what matters to you. introducing blueprint. blueprint is free and only for chase customers. it lets you choose what purchases you want to pay in full to avoid interest...with full pay.

and those you split... you decide how to pay over time. if having a plan matters. chase what matters. create your own blueprint at chase.com/blueprint. as the decades have past, the promise of medicare has always been there. and aarp has fought to guarantee none of the benefits you earned were ever taken away. today we're continuing that fight

by protecting your freedom to choose the doctors and treatments you need. and to have your tax dollars go towards your care-- not insurance company subsidies. you've done your work. and we'll keep doing ours. learn more at aarp.org. with cialis for daily use... a clinically proven, low-dose tablet for erectile dysfunction you take every day so you can be ready anytime the moment is right. tell your doctor about your medical condition and all medications and ask if you're healthy enough for sexual activity. don't take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, as this may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. don't drink alcohol in excess with cialis. side effects may include headache, upset stomach, delayed backache or muscle ache. to avoid long term injury seek immediate medical help for an erection lasting more than 4 hours. if you have any sudden decrease or loss in hearing or vision

stop taking cialis and call your doctor right away. (announcer) 36-hour cialis. or cialis for daily use. ask your doctor about cialis today, so when the moment is right, you can be ready. sfwhen you own a business,g saving sounds good. so hear this: regions makes it simple to save money and time with lifegreen checking and savings for business, free convenient e-services and regions quick deposit, so you can deposit checks right from your desk. so switch to regions and start saving. plus, get a business financial review through a regions cashcor analysis. it's how business gets into the rhythm of saving. regions - it's time to expect more.

earlier in the show, we showed you which states have the worst rates of teen pregnancy, and young women who are given the vaccine for hpv. and who's at or near the bottom of all those lists? the states of mississippi and south carolina. and who represents south carolina in the health reform debate? that would be waterloo senator jim demint and "you lie" congressman joe wilson, both hellbent that we will have no health care reform. it's a one thing to be against health reform and it's another thing to be against health care reform when you have the most disastrous health care in the country. we were to be joined by proud south carolinian don fowler who was going to be joining us from

columbia, south carolina. what else was in columbia, south carolina, tonight? really, really bad weather. houston thunderstorms, which interfered with our satellite feed and cost us the chance to hear from mr. fowler. what can you do? we apologize to mr. fowler and to you. we think it's a story worth talking about when we're hoping to do that just as soon as it stops raining in south carolina. we turn now to our unplanned media event correspondent kent jones. >> t is an inexact science. we prooued that this evening. sometimes things go wrong and sometimes things go terribly, terrib terribly, terribly rong. this is one of those. the filter between private thoughtings and public declarations can be perilously thin. case in point, here in new york, a local news anchor is exchanging pleasantries with the weather man on last night's

forecast. >> it takes a tough man to make a tender forecast, nick. keep [ bleep ] that chicken. >> okay, i'll do that. >> excuse me? based on the reaction of his co-anchor, yes, he really did say that. clearly the word plucking is was in his head but the word right next to it came out. what a difference a couple of con stan pennants can make especially when a chicken is involved. >> sask energy is talking about proposing to [ bleep ] the cost of energy. >> texas rat snakes are going to be one of the largest snakes you find in the metro plex area. >> climbed the highest mountain in the world, mt. everest. but he's gay -- i mean, he's -- i mean, excuse me, he's blind.