but how about maybe some graphic pictures to go along with the warning? it is today's "news nation" gut check. i'm tamron hall. we're following breaking news in one of the largest school districts in this nation. 230,000 students are no longer on lockdown in broward county, florida, after police say a woman called a radio station and said her husband might go to a school and start shooting. ari is live for us in pembrook pines. what is happening now? tell us about this so-called credible threat. >> well, much of this is still cloaked in mystery, tamron, because police just gave us a briefing here at the police department and said that what was a credible threat this morning had now diminished. the credibility of the threat they said had diminished through their investigation. but they won't tell us any specifics. they won't say if they've contacted the actual man who made the threat or not. they just said that through

their investigation and speaking to a lot of people they didn't think it was a credible threat anymore. therefore, they felt safe in lifting the lockdown. they put that lockdown in place in the first place just acting through an abundance of caution because they thought let's not take any chances. let's make sure nobody gets in or not of the public schools here in broward county. that's 230,000 students we're talking about. there was perhaps some frightening moments for parents not knowing what was going on, but it's important to emphasize that there was not a single event at any school here related to this threat. nobody walked into a school with a gun or anything like that. this was just a threat to a radio station and an e-mail followed that. and they took it from there. that's how they acted. and now we're happy to say the lockdown is over and school should be dismissed as normal. >> we're talking about one of the nation's largest public school districts. a lot of students. i can imagine at one point in time there had to be quite a bit of confusion. parents at home, parents at work hearing about this massive lockdown.

>> oh, yeah. this has happened to me as a parent before. my kid's school was on lockdown. you get this call from the school and you get a little moment of panic as a parent. that happened all over the area today with 230,000 students we're talking about. that's a lot of parents who have a lot of worrying to do, but there wasn't a lot of confusion as far as parents showing up at school. this is the middle of the day. parents wouldn't be going to the school at that hour anyway. now that we're getting near dismissal time, things should be pretty much normal since the lockdown is lifted. hopefully they'll determine what was at the bottom of this threat and make sure there's no copycats coming up after this. >> all right, ari. thank you for the live report out of florida. and the long and arduous task of getting more than 4,000 people stranded at sea to dry land could take at least another day if you can believe that. tug boats are now towing the carnival splendor to san diego, but by no means is this a fast process. the ship is being towed at about

four miles an hour. meaning the earliest passengers will see dry land is sometime tomorrow afternoon. there are plenty of supplies on board sprefresh from the u.s. n. we spoke to a passenger about the conditions on that ship. >> it's very tolerable. i mean, it's not critical, but it's very tolerable. some people don't, some -- a lot of people spend time on the deck. >> miguel joins us live from san diego. michelle, four miles an hour. they're not getting there until tomorrow. people are wondering if this is the fastest way to get these people to land. >> yeah, tamron. carnival has kept all of their options open, saying that ensen odda, which was the first port of entry they were going to try to come into, was their first option, but then they said that san diego was a better feasible option for their passengers because all of their passengers are americans that would bring them back here on to american soil and they could much easier get home from san diego.

so they say ensenada is still an option, but they're going to san diego. they're only going four miles an hour. they say right now they have favorable conditions so that's good news for those passengers. tharve been out on this ship since sunday. it left long beach on sunday, was headed for a week-long cruise. on monday just hours after it left sunday, there was a fire in one of the engine rooms. that led to an evacuation of the lower decks, sending all the passengers up high. they had to wait up there for several hours before they were able to return back to their rooms. even when they did return back to their rooms, they were not able to use the toilets for several hours. they have not had hot water or hot food for several days. now they're making that slow journey back here to san diego, tamron. they are looking forward to getting off that ship. >> that they are. migu miguel, thank you. president obama is now in south korea for the g-20 economic summit. it is the third stop on his ten-day asia tour. the president may find himself

on the defensive because of plans by the federal reserve to buy $600 million in long-term government bonds to boost this economy. now, some nations complain it will give american goods an unfair advantage. in a letter to g-20 leaders, the president defended the steps his administration has taken to help the united states economy. he said the u.s. will do its part to restore strong growth and reduce economic imbalances. the battle seems to be getter more intense over who the democratic leadership in the house will be when the new congress convenes in january. today nancy pelosi made one of her first public appearances since announcing just last week that she wants to be the minority leader. it was at a veteran's event in washington. right now, pelosi is running unopposed for the minority leader. her decision, though, has created a contentious battle between congressman steny hoyer and jim clyburn for majority

whip. let's talk about people aligning themselves, if you will, with steny hoyer or jim clyburn. what are we hearing as the forces try to, i guess, get support here? >> well, you know, it's still anybody's race at this point, but really you're down to a very small number of undecided votes at this point. but nobody has outright declared i have the votes. both sides are saying they're confident that they do have them, but this is something the democratic caucus is hoping that it can avoid. you know, democratic members are -- they're just in denial that there's any way that they could go into this next congress and not have either steny hoyer or jim clyburn in leadership. if you lose steny hoyer, the man most associated with the blue dogs isn't in there. if you lose jim clyburn, the congressional black caucus has no seat at the table. and it's just unimaginable that house democrats could have no, you know, black leadership

represented. >> well, obviously this problem is presented because nancy pelosi wants to be the minority leader of the house. anthony winer was on yesterday on "hardball" and chris asked, listen, is nancy pelosi staying in this spot because she knows there will be great opposition to steny hoyer being the minority leader by a lot of moderate democrats? >> right. that is a concern that a lot of progressive democrats have -- have said. you know, that they're worried that the party would drift a little bit too far to the right and the thinking was that maybe steny hoyer wouldn't have the votes because there are enough progressive votes, you know, because they lost, what, 26, 27 blue dogs, it's a more liberal caucus and you could maybe get a more liberal member. there's also no reason to believe that jim clyburn is actually that much more liberal than steny hoyer. >> so -- but moving ahead here,

this is the last thing, of course, the democrats need is to have some kind of battle or back and forth between its leadership at a time when you have the american people -- at least the liberals and the progressives out there asking what the democrats will do in this next stage of the game. >> right. i mean, this is the last thing that they want right now. and the hoyer camp is pushing hard to have a deal struck where everybody would remain in the same position that they were in last time with pelosi at number one, hoyer at two and clyburn at three. but the position that hoyer and clyburn are fighting for is whip. and in the last congress, the whip was the number two spot. but when you have less power, you have fewer leadership seats. so, you know, clyburn is showing no indication yet that he's willing to back down. everybody assumes there will be a deal worked out, but that's just an assumption and there's no reason to believe that at this point. >> thank you, ryan. >> thanks for having me. alaska's republican senate

nominee joe miller is challenging write-in ballots in the still-undecided race in that state. the hand count is happening right now. it actually started about an hour ago. but miller is already suing. in fact, his legal team arguing that votes don't count unless an oval next to write-in is completely filled in. miller's team also says, and this is a big one, that the candidate's name must be spelled correctly. kristen welker is following this story live from juneau for us. what is murkowski's camp saying about this lawsuit filed by miller? >> well, murkowski is essentially saying what officials with the voter of -- division of elections are saying, which is that they want to look at voter intent here. they think that the ballots should be judged based on voter intent. if one letter, two letters are incorrect in mauurkowski's last

name, they should be counted. miller's camp thinks the name has to be spelled correctly. look at the counting that's going on right now. 15 tables of two counting these ballots. there are observers oversees this process. one from miller's camp and one from murkowski's camp. what you're seeing happen right now at this table is essentially some ballots that have been contested. they're trying to determine exactly what to do with these ba ballots, whether to count them or not count them. the head of divisions of elections is the person who's going to make that ultimate decision. seems like that is going to be unfolding throughout the afternoon here in this warehouse in juneau. now, again, tamron, this comes on the heels of the vote total narrowing. joe miller trailing by 11,000 votes to the total write-in ballot count. that's as compared to 13,000 yesterday. they counted a few absentee ballots. he is catching up. a lot of drama here in juneau. >> thank you, kristen. up next, chaos overseas.

violent protests break out in london. tens of thousands of students involved in this. we'll tell you what all of this is about. plus, new details on that mystery in the sky off the coast of california. hear what the pentagon is now saying. a development in this story over the past hour. i always get there faster. see, expedia lets me mix and match airlines. so i can take one airline out... and another home. so with more flight options, i can find the combination that gets me there and back quickest. with a little help from expedia, my friends will think i can be everywhere at once. where you book matters. expedia. but basically, i'm a runner. last year. (oof). i had a bum knee that needed surgery. but it got complicated, because i had an old injury. so i wanted a doctor who had done this before.

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anger erupts overseas. tens of thousands of students storm the streets of london, smashing windows and setting fires. >> people like my brother who just started out at university have to pay ridiculous amounts. it's ridiculous. >> the violent face-off with police now on "news nation." that uprising stems from a plan to triple university tuition costs. university students would have to pay $14,000 a year for their

educati education. the proposal is part of a government initiative to slash $128 billion from the budget over the next four years. stephanie gosk joins me live from london. let's get the latest on the confrontation. is it under control at this point? >> yeah, it is, but it's taken the police a long time to get it under control. they've got about two dozen students corralled. they're trying to figure out who was behind this violence that erupted today. this protest really took police by surprise today. the size of it and the intensity of it. the pictures took place at the conservative party headquarters. that's british prime minister david cameron's political party. thousands descended upon that building in front of it. violence erupted. students started smashing windows, throwing projectiles at police. the police that were there initially didn't have riot gear or shields. they had very little protection. students sort of overran them at

one point, running into the building, going up on to the roof. they're angry because the government is proposing tripling their tuition to go to universities. this is part of the british government's larger austerity plan that they say is necessary to keep this country from going into bankruptcy, but that argument isn't really working when it comes to the students. fueling their anger is that the politicians pushing this through basically went to universities themselves for free. tamron? >> stephanie, this is the proposal at this point. what are the indications out there that they are prepared to go through with this tuition hike, especially in the wake of this violent reaction? >> it's probably going to go through, tamron. what the government is saying is that there are two reasons why they have to do this. one because of the current economic climate. they have to cut down on public sector spending. that's part of it. the second one, the university system as it is right now is unsustainable. >> stephanie gosk, thank you.

a new report from federal health officials reveals some data that just might make you sick. nearly 59 million people went without health care coverage for a part of this year in this country. but with republicans vowing to roll back president obama's health care initiative and democrats vowing to dig in their heels even deeper, what sort of brain surgery f you will, is needed to remedy the problem that exists with uninsured people? i'm joined by democratic strategist karen finny and political analyst joe watkins. joe, you see the numbers here. 59 million people. the republican party, many of which are vowing that health care rill be changed. it will repeal. what do you make of this when you reconcile it with the number of people that don't have health care in this country? >> 59 million people is far too many. what happens to 59 million americans affects all of us.

so we've got to make sure that people have a shot at getting decent coverage. i think democratic senator bennett from colorado made a great point when he said that no matter what happens, we've got to consider cost conit tainment. they didn't take a good look at cost containment. there are big numbers of people that want to see the bill repealed, the health care bill repealed. there are lots of others who want to see changes made to it. even among those people who want it to be repealed, they still agree that you need to have a prohibition for insurance companies, denying people with preexisting conditions. they believe that the poorest americans and middle-class americans who have trouble getting health care deserve a financial subsidy to buy it. as a matter of how you refashion this thing, it works for everybody. >> karen, what do you make of that argument? many republicans have said, listen, we can make this better. the health care reform. and that it does not deal with cost containment, that public option that so many on the left wanted to see and did not in the

end. >> well, i think first of all, it's a shame that they didn't bring forward more of these ideas when we were dealing with this over the course of the last 18 months. perhaps we could have prevented more of the 59 million, which was up 4 million from the previous year, from actually being in this situation of not having health insurance. i think what the report shows, though, obviously is the dire situation that we're in and the urgency of really dealing with this problem in a serious way and sort of not letting the politics of the repeal and replace message, which i don't think anybody believes that republicans truly have the votes to repeal the measure. again, i think even on the replacement side, you know, one of the things that the kaiser poll showed this week is that this was about a number four voting issue and that what did increase is people's lack of understanding and confusion about what's really in the bill. when you ask people specifically things like -- as joe pointed out, coverage if you have a preexisting condition or coverage for children, people agree with that. the republicans will be in the position of going back to their

constituents and saying we're going to take something away from you. that's going to be a lot harder than they think it's going to be, particularly because the other thing the reports showed was that the shift in the uninsured is really more towards middle class working americans. >> yeah. a lot of people -- go ahead, joe. >> sure. the idea is how do you cut costs and how do you contain costs? there's a new bill for massive new bureaucracy. and the legislators on both sides of the isle will have to figure out how to cut the costs and keep the elements that people need. >> that's the discussion that we've been having and we haven't heard a credible plan from the republicans. one of the things that the affordable health care act does do, it reduces the deficit, it does pay for itself. if we're going to try to make changes, republicans are going to have to come forward with real ideas on how to do that. at the same time, they want to extend the bush tax cuts and say that they really want to reduce the deficit. i just don't see how it's possible. >> karen, joe, we appreciate the

conversation. thank you both. we'll be talking about this more. thank you. a new report reveals the startling achievement gap divide between black and white students, particularly black male students. wait until you see the numbers. shocking. plus, the government's new push to get smokers to kick the habit. how about a really disturbing graphic image of what your lung looks like when you smoke? back in the 80's, it was really tough for me and my family. i was living on welfare and supporting a family of four. after i got the job at walmart, things started changing immediately. then i wrote a letter to the food stamp office. "thank you very much, i don't need your help any more." you know now, i can actually say i bought my home.

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to help reduce head injuries on the football field. so, you know, i can feel a bit better about my son playing football. [ male announcer ] how would you use toyota technology to make a better world? learn how to share your ideas at toyota.com/ideasforgood. welcome back to "news nation." a national catastrophe. that is what a new report is calling the achievement gap

between african-american and white students. for example, look at these numbers. in the 4th grade, 12% of black boys do well in reading compared to 38% of white boys. by 8th grade, only 12% of black boys are proficient in math compared to 44% of their white peers. as for higher education, black men accounted for just 5% of the college population in 2008. joining me now to talk about this is executive director of the council of the straight city schools, a council that conducted this study. michael, thanks there jo s for >> thank you very much. >> we have been doing this education initiative here at nbc and msnbc, exploring the problems out there. we found things that actually have worked. in chicago, for example, in newark, new jersey. why aren't the things that have been successful particularly focused on young black boys being spread out through the country? >> well, i think in part because we don't have a firm handle yet on all of the dimensions of the issues.

it was very clear from the numbers despite the fact that it could be very discouraging and troubling that many big-city school districts and many others around the country are making substantial progress on this. but it was also clear that we still have a long way to go and that the gaps in many ways are wider than we had originally thought. i think part of what we need is a broader national strategy to deal with the issues that are able to coordinate all of the actors at the local level who are working sometimes in very separate ways to address the issues. >> so basically it sounds like you need to get everyone on the same page. and that sounds to me -- should not be that difficult. we know that this crisis exists and it's proven in this new report from you. >> i think that's right. this is eminently doable. there is no reason to think we

can't solve this problem. it's just that we haven't marshalled the public will yet in order to do so. but there's lot of people who are profoundly interested and troubled by all of this. including the schools, the -- the families, social service agencies, the faith-based community, and lots of other folks who are often working not necessarily at cross purposes, but in very disparate, disconnected ways that don't address the -- the issue as comprehensively as it really warrants. >> we often say things are eye-opening, but this report, yet again, is. michael, thank you very much for your time. >> thank you. for continuing coverage on education issues facing our country, logon to educationnation.msnbc.com. up next, it is the hand shake that's making headlines around the world. find out why an indonesian authority said it was not his

shake to michelle obama's hand. then former president bush responds to kanye west after the singing says he regrets his comments saying that the former president does not care about black people. we'll hear their back and forth coming up. [ man ] ♪ trouble ♪ trouble, trouble trouble, trouble ♪ ♪ trouble been doggin' my soul ♪ since the day i was born ♪ worry

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concerned about this problem. and for the third day, elizabeth smart is reliving what she calls her nine months of hell. smart is now 23 years old. she cause kidnwas kidnapped in . she described a missed opportunity at being rescued. smart said, quote, i felt like hope was walking out the door. i was mad at myself for not taking the chance that i just felt like it was so close and i was just so -- i felt terrible. janet shamlian joins us live from salt lake city, utah. in that moment, elizabeth smart talked about a police officer who came so close to perhaps discovering her identity. >> yeah, you're right. it was a homicide detective. it was during a visit elizabeth smart took to the library. the defendant had taken her there. they were researching other places to move to. and during this library visit, the detective came up to them and said i'm looking for elizabeth smart. can you take that veil off that

young woman's face? and the defendant said, no, only her future husband can see her without the veil. and that's when the detective walked away and elizabeth made that quote that you just referenced. i saw hope walk out the door. how heart-breaking was that? she also blamed herself saying i should have done something. i should have done something. it was just gripping testimony from this young woman. keep in mind she was 14 years old that time. now 23, talking very calmly about repeated sexual assaults, being forced to drink alcohol and view pornography and being raped day after day after day for the better part of the year while her mother and father sat there listening to her every word. i will tell you, tamron, she has wrapped up her testimony here. they'll move on to the police officers and the others who are involved in this case eight years ago. but it was such gripping testimony to hear her talk so calmly about this as she tries to send her alleged abductor to jail. tamron? >> thank you, janet. there is late word from the

pentagon on what exactly was streaked through the skies of los angeles on monday. jim miklaszewski joins us now. this is hot topic on the blogs. people have conspiracy theories. but we have word from the pentagon. what is it? >> you could call this better lateen t than never. d.o.d., the pentagon announced that they've gone through every possibility, talked to every federal agency that has any kind of missile program, and they're satisfied that this was not any kind of missile. certainly launched by the u.s. government. in fact, they say that they're pretty well satisfied that it appears likely that this was a plane. i mean, they can't say definitively because they can't specifically identify which particular plane this may have been that left this kind of contrail. but missile experts have been saying now for a day or so that this does, in fact, appear to be

the contrail from an airplane because it's not going nearly as fast as a missile would. it changes course at one point, which is what an airplane would do and not a missile. nevertheless, d.o.d. officials are really frustrated because they -- they got this word out more than 36 hours after the fact. more than 36 hours after you indicated the blogs have actually been inundated with all kinds of conspiracy theories. so they think here that they're never going to catch up. if nothing else, they've lost the communications battle. >> wow. all right. thank you. >> okay. british police now say the package bomb intercepted at a british airport october 29th could have exploded over the u.s. east coast. today, police say forensic evidence shows that device originally sent from yemen could have been activated over the eastern seaboard, had it not been removed from the cargo plane in the uk. the flight was bound for philadelphia. then on to chicago. and two powerful bombs were found inside packages being

shipped to addresses in chicago. the other was discovered at a cargo facility in dubai. one of the most talked-about topics coming out of former president bush's new book is this incident with kanye west after hurricane katrina. west said, quote, george bush does not care about black people. in his new book, mr. bush said that that was one of the worst moments of his presidency. yesterday, kanye west told matt lo lauer he regretted his words. then matt played the tape for the president on this morning's "today" show. >> i would tell george bush in my moment of frustration i didn't have the grounds to call him a racist. but i believe that in a situation of high emotion like that, we as human beings don't always choose the right words. >> he seems to have regret. what is your reaction? >> well, i appreciate that. i -- it wasn't just kanye west who is talking like that during

katrina. i cited him as an example. i cited others as well. >> right. >> and, you know, i appreciate that. >> but you called his comment a low point. one of the things you and i have spoken a lot about over these past couple of weeks is your faith. does your faith allow you to forgive kanye west? >> oh, absolutely. of course it does. i'm not a hater. i didn't hate kanye west, but i was talking about an environment in which people were willing to say things that hurt. >> well, you can watch more of president bush's first interview since leaving office and read an excerpt from the book on msnbc.com. the hunt for more suspects in that brutal death of a georgia teenager tops our look at stories around the "news nation" today. prosecutors in georgia say they are searching for more suspects in the murder of 18-year-old bobby tillman. tillman died after being beaten to death. the job market may be

showing signs of life. the labor department reports claims for unemployment dropped last week to almost the lowest level of the year at 435,000 claims. this is the third drop in four weeks. and in hawaii, some residents got quite a show for a couple of minutes from dust devils. dust forms when the ground gets hotter than the air above, pushing the warmer air upwards, bringing the dust with it. pretty cool. and it apparently pays to work at google. google has announced it will give all of its 23,000 employees a 10% raise and a $1,000 holiday cash bonus. you can buy something with that. the company also has been losing employees to facebook and other employers, so google wants to make sure that employees feel rewarded for their hard work. coming up, a super model bears her baby bump. as you can see, she reveals a whole lot more. we've got it coming up in "the

scoop." here are some things we thought you should know. mrs. obama's hand shake with indonesia's information minister is sparking some controversy. the conservative muslim minister makes a point of avoiding contact with women who are not related to him. he's seen, though, shaking hands with the first lady during a welcoming ceremony in indonesia and now he's blaming her. in a twitter post he said he tried to prevent the hand shake, but mrs. obama, quote, held her hands too far toward me so we touched. and there's a lot of talk of sarah palin's presidential run. she's doing very little to quiet the rumors. last night she spoke to a group of pennsylvania students and listen to what she says after a student performs this song. ♪ to the oceans white with foam ♪ >> daniel, that singing absolutely beautiful. daniel, would you like to sing at an inauguration. not necessarily mine.

he should though at somebody's. right? and john boehner says he will continue to fly commercial planes to his home district each week once he is speaker of the house. speaker nancy pelosi was criticized for her use of military account. boehner's aides said he may use military planes for other trips, but he'll stick to commercial for his weekly trips home. those are the things we thought you should know. trust me. trust me. ya i like that. trust me. bankers are known to be a little bit in love with themselves. are we going up? we can get the next one.

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a programming note for you. tomorrow night on rachel maddow, jon stewart joins rachel. that's tomorrow night right here on msnbc. the humanities are taking a hit and members of universities a are scrambling to revive these departments. students wanting to take up majors like art history and

literature are making the jump to more specialized fields like business and economics. and it is getting worse. look at this. in 2007, just 8% of bachelor s degrees were given to disciplines in the humanities. i'm joined by harvard university's president. thank you for joining us. >> thank you. it's a pleasure to be with you. >> well, you know, a lot of people have made the argument, and you've done so as well, that this is really about the economy. when you think about how much students pay for college and the expense of just life once you get out of school, you want a job that you can hit the ground with making money and perhaps an occupation as an art historian won't pay the bills. >> well, i think that the issue of jobs is sometimes misunderstood by students. we have many harvard graduates who did major, as we say at harvard, concentrate in the humanities who've gone on to be very prosperous and to be very successful in fields like

business and a wide range of professional fields. what you study as an undergraduate is not necessarily the path that you will follow professionally once you leave school. and, in fact, humanities majors, a wide range of liberal arts majors, prepare you very well for a variety of different fields. i think students need to understand that as they make their choices as undergraduates. >> how are you and others trying to make these students understand that this is about critical thinking, imagination and things certainly as you point out can be applied to whatever career you choose to pursue? >> one of the points i try to make is that so much of what we want to see in our society, in our economy, is innovation. when you think about what innovation entails, it entails imagination. as you said, creativity. and it entails thinking that the world can be different from the way the world is now. and i would argue that it's hard to think that the world can be different unless you know that it has been different. unless you see that different

parts of the world are different now. so i think that a wide range of understanding across humanistic fields can give students and citizens, indeed, an understanding of the world and a way to see its contingency and how to improve it. >> let me ask you, do you find that you have to perhaps persuade parents? you have a lot of parents out there, if their child were to come home and say, mom, i think i'm going to major in art history or philosophy, they may interpret their child slacker, if i can be so casual here. >> parents are concerned about their children's future. and so i think that the case that i was just making to you is one that we need to make more broadly across society. that choices of undergraduate majors are not necessarily determinative of a life path. in fact, they can instill values and perspectives and habits of mind that will enable students to thrive in whatever field they may later choose.

>> it is an interesting conversation. you make certainly a great case for understanding and why we need to appreciate humanities and have people pursue this option. thank you very much it's a pleasure having you on. >> thank you so much. >> absolutely. conspiracy rumors as bristol palin survives another round of "dancing with the stars." and a 15-year-old youtube sensation. and tongues are wagging over a model in the buff. she's pregnant. let's get the scoop from courtney hazlett. >> i'm a philosophy major, i might add. yes, conspiracy theories are abounding as bristol palin has managed to stay on "dancing with the stars" for yet another week. we have our last four now. it's brandi, bristol palin, jennifer gray and kyle massey. people are saying now is when bristol will go because her huge fan base can't compete theoretically with these people who are actually very, very talented dancers. >> don't they know who her mom

is? >> exactly. they're well aware of who her mom is. at this stage of reality voting in the competition, you tend to get away from having such numbers of people who are just voting because they really like someone. we will see. we'll keep you posted. keenan cahill has got a new viral video. he might look familiar. this 15-year-old has a huge video of him lip syncing to katy perry's "teenage dream." take a look. ♪ >> admit it, you can't take your eyes away from that video. he should clean up first, but that video got more than 15 million hits on youtube. now he's lip syncing another song called "down on me." it features 50 cent.

the cool thing is, though, 50 cent himself makes an appearance. check it out. ♪ >> i could look at this all day. >> it's so much fun to watch. he still doesn't clean up his room, not even for 50 cent. >> so 50 cent to this kid's house? >> it's fantastic publicity for 50 cent. when you talk about a kid whose other youtube video featuring nobody famous except for the song gets 15 million hits, free advertising. >> he's a cute kid. he grew his hair out for the new video. >> absolutely. finally, an amazing new picture of orlando bloom's new wife, miranda kerr. the family issue of "w" magazine. there are no black stripes in the real issue, but just another in the string of women who look so good and then they're pregnant. they just pose nude in international magazines. >> look how slim her arms are.

it's amazing. >> it's amazing. 27 years old. >> god bless her. that's the latest entertainment news. log on to msnbc.com for more news. we'll be right back. - i volunteered. - i was drafted. - i enlisted. - i was nervous. - and there i was in asia. - europe. - the gulf. - and i saw things. - incredible things. - and people you never forget. - i did my job. - for my country. - my buddies. - for total strangers. - and i was proud. - so grateful. - for my family. - my freedom. for all who served and all who serve, we can never thank them enough. all your important legal matters in just minutes. now it's quicker and easier for you to start your business... protect your family... and launch your dreams. at legalzoom.com, we put the law on your side.

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welcome back. it is time now for the "news nation" gut check. but before we get to that, you saw our e-mail addresses up there. you can e-mail me or tweet me or reach out to us on facebook. this is what we're talking about. i know you'll want to reach out. imagine for a moment that every time you reach for a pack of cigarettes, you're greeted by pictures of corpses, cancer patients and diseased lungs. would that scare you into kicking the habit for good? the fda is hoping thatlaw.

congress passed the smoking prevention and tobacco control act back in 2009, and it actually requires us to put in place graphic warning labels with new text messages -- textual messages about the risks of smoking. so we're starting a process to select the graphic images that will go with those warning messages to help people understand the serious health consequences of smoking. and hopefully to help them stop smoking or never take it up in the first place. >> is there any research that proves this would be more effective than the warnings that are already on cigarettes or

even the commercials and ads that we see often that show real-life people who are battling for their lives as a result of smoking? >> well, as you know, the consequences of smoking are horrendous. it's the leading cause of preventable death in this country. almost 500,000 people a year die from smoking-related deaths. it costs our health care system about $100 billion. it's a serious, serious problem. we need to take a range of actions to address it and graphic health warnings is one. and we know that it does have an effect, but it's part of a constellation of approaches that need to be taken. >> that's very interesting. thank you very much, dr. hamburg, for coming on and explaining the process behind this and how we got here. we're asking the "news nation" what does your gut tell you? go to msnbc.com to vote as to whether or not this is appropriate. is it the right way to keep people from smoking?

look at what the "news nation" is saying about yesterday's question. should an employee be fired for criticizing their supervisor on facebook? people are saying no. 28% of you said yes. 72% of you said no. that does it for this wednesday's edition of "news nation." i'm tamron hall. you can catch "news nation" every day here on msnbc. jake picks up the coverage right after a quick break. [ male announcer ] the next big thing from lexus is not a car.

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hello, everyone. some have charged me with being a progressive, a heavy charge to be sure. today you'll see some of my conservative side. hmm. we'll talk about the death penalty and fundamentalist islam. tell your friends, tell your neighbors, the show starts right now. look, it could be 1t 95 all over again.