world. working with yemen, and our other allies and partners, we will be determined, we will be deliberate, we will be relentless, we will be resolute in our commitment to destroy terrorist networks that aim to kill americans. >> nbc's jim miklaszewski live at the pentagon this afternoon. jim, how did they track down this guy? >> well, you know, quite frankly, u.s. intelligence has been on his trail pretty hot and heavy since the killing of osama bin laden, there was a missile strike launched in his direction within a week after osama bin laden was killed. but that missile went awry, slammed into a cliff, and never got anywhere close to anwar al awlaki according to sources we're talking to. one of the other reasons is that the yemeni military has been so aggressive in going after al qaedas aa whole there, in yemen, that the fact is that, some u.s. officials think that, quite frankly, awlaki was probably, you know, not on his best of

game, and he let his guard down. which allowed u.s. officials to track him better. >> what do we know about the number of plots that he was behind in this country? the number of attacks that he had been involved in? >> well, you know, the president talked about how significant the killing of awlaki is. and it's for two reasons. one, unlike osama bin laden, awlaki was actually operational. bin laden was holed up there in pakistan for so long, and he had all these aspirations, but he couldn't pull it off. he couldn't put anything to the. awlaki, on the other hand, his intent, all the time, was to attack americans in the united states, and he had a couple of plots, like you said, the underwear bomber on christmas day and the attempt to either blow up airliners over the atlantic, with explosives that were packed in ink cartridges. but there's also another side of him -- to him, too, and the fact that he was american-born and raised. he knew how to communicate with the american muslim community,

and know way that al qaeda in pakistan or anywhere else in the world could. so that made him good potential recruiter for possible foot soldiers for the al qaeda war against the united states right here in america. >> jim mick mick from the pentagon this afternoon, thanks, mick. >> you bet, craig. >> joined in the studio by nbc news terrorism analyst. let's start with what mik just said. here we have a guy who is american born, went to colorado state, san diego state, born in new mexico. the fact that he was american-born, did that make him any more dangerous? >> yeah, definitely. he speaks english or he spoke english with a flat american accent. he's charismatic. he doesn't have the veneer of a foreigner. he speaks as an american. and he has had a tremendous, tremendous influence in almost every single case of alleged home-grown terrorism here in the united states. there is either a direct or indirect tie to anwar al awlaki. i was just testifying in a trial

this week down in north carolina, involving recordings of anwar al awlaki. >> he didn't have to use subtitles on his videos on the internet. >> no. they're all in english. that's the other thing. this is a guy who is taking al qaeda training manuals from saudi arabia, from yemen, and was translating them into english and making them available to an american audience. an audience that's not a large audience, but that went after this material with great gusto. >> bin laden gone, awlaki gone, abdul rahman, al qaeda's second in command killed in august. at this point, who's left in al qaeda? i mean, who's left? and who's the most dangerous of those left? >> well, here's an important part to emphasize about the death of al awlaki. al awlaki didn't have an official position in aqap, al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. he was an adviser, but he wasn'ted leader, he wasn't the deputy commander. we have to understand this is not going to have a direct

military impact in terms of what their capabilities are. aqap today, right now, is just as capability of launching an international terrorist attack as they were 24 hours ago. that's something we have to understand. al awlaki's importance was the symbol, as a recruiter, as a motivator. he wasn't a military figure, per se. >> al awlaki, tidbits about his private life have also started to emerge over the past few hours. he was at one point cleric in this country, but it looks like he may not have been as devout as some of his brethren. >> yeah. i mean, look, there are rumors that he was arrested for prostitution here in this country, for soliciting prostitution, i should say. al awlaki was somebody whose philosophy was, you do whatever is necessary to achieve your goals. it's a very simple ideology. but especially for home-grown extremists who are not very familiar with the ins and outs of this ideology, very easy. look, whatever you need to do, do it. killing large numbers of people,

do it. as long as it's for the right aim. and that made his philosophy very attractive, it made his audio recordings very attractive. >> yes. >> this is a guy who really was the godfather of home-grown terrorism. he is a very important figure. and he remains so. that's the problem, is that he is almost as much trouble dead as he is alive. >> just moments ago, we found out that there was an article that was scheduled to be in this week's edition of "inspire" magazine written by awlaki himself. how disturbing is that? >> yeah -- >> and why? >> i mean, that's the idea. is that al qaeda has been using al awlaki in this english language magazine, their official english language magazine, deliberately to reach out to people here in the u.s. this is a magazine full of articles which are addressed to people living inside the u.s., who want to join al qaeda. and the ideas range for things like trying to blow up somebody by building a bomb, quote/unquote, in the kitchen of your mom.

it also included plots to drive vehicles into cafes in washington, d.c., and kill innocent people. this is somebody who is very dangerous, because he was trying to recruit a small, but very, very extreme minority of people here in the u.s., who don't have ties to al qaeda, who don't have direct ties, but would like to be part of al qaeda. would like to see themselves as part of al qaeda's aegis. and he was drawing them in. he was saying do it. don't wait for us to issue orders, do it. >> another high profile case here of a would-be -- of a terrorist, born in this country, born on american soil, are we doing something wrong in this country in terms of the way we approach handling people like this? >> well, look. i mean al awlaki, there's a lot of things we botched about this. for a long time people thought he was a moderate. he got written up in the washington as being a great moderate leader which obviously he's not. and then worse, still, when mr. al awlaki, when he was over in yemen started communicating with americans, nobody was

taking those communications seriously. when this is an individual who was communicating with nadal hassan, the individual allegedly behind fort hood, those communications went unnoticed. so, yeah, there were mistakes made. there's no doubt about that. >> nbc news terrorism analyst evan kohlmann. thank you very much. >> we are expecting to hear more from president obama, expecting to get more reaction to the killing of the terror leader later this afternoon. radio talk show host michael smercanish will interview the president live on the air. msnbc will be carrying that interview live. some breaking political news now. florida has set its presidential primary election for january 31st. defying national republican party leaders, the four states authorized by the party to go first in the nominating process were iowa, new hampshire, nevada and south carolina. those states are expected, expected to respond by moving their caucuses and primaries to early january.

to the latest now in dr. conrad murray's involuntary manslaughter trial. we're expecting to hear testimony from the two paramedics who responded to the 911 call from michael jackson's mansion the day he died. right now, though, on the stand there inside that los angeles courtroom, robert johnson, who works for a medical device company. johnson, we are told, is testifying about fingertip pulse monitors like the one that was found next to jackson. in preliminary hearings, the two paramedics, the two paramedics testified that dr. murray never said anything about giving jackson the powerful anesthetic propofol. they also testified that they thought that jackson was already dead, but murray insisted that he be taken to a hospital nonetheless. nbc's george lewis is live outside the courthouse. george, what can we expect in addition to the testimony from the paramedics? what else can we expect to hear today? >> well, i think when we finish with this expert from the

medical monitoring company, we're going to hear those two paramedics talk about what happened when they arrived at jackson's bedroom. their frantic efforts to try to revive him. what dr. murray was doing. and i think you're going to hear from the paramedics that dr. murray was rounding up vials of medication and putting them in a bag. they're trying to establish a case against murray thatwas ability acting like a guilty man. the paramedics will testify, as they did in the preliminary hearing that murray never mentioned giving jackson the powerful anesthetic propofol. yesterday we heard from one of jackson's assistant, alberto alvarez, who talked about putting some of those medications in a bag. let's listen to that. >> in my personal experience, i believe that dr. conrad murray had the best intentions for mr. jackson. so, i -- i didn't question his authority at the time. i knew it was a medical

emergency, so i proceeded to follow mr. conrad murray's instructions. >> alberto alvarez's testimony was very dramatic at times. he talked about jackson's daughter paris coming into the bedroom, seeing the lifeless body of her father and yelling out, daddy! and he was almost tearful as he was recounting that incident. later on in the testimony yesterday the defense tried to poke holes in alvarez's story saying that he barely knew dr. murray and why would dr. murray try to enlist alvarez in a cover-up. but the prosecution is going to continue that cover-up today with those paramedics. >> george lewis in los angeles this morning. out there this afternoon here. george, thank you. legal analyst ricky kleeman, former sex crimes prosecutor. joining me again here live this afternoon. thanks so much for being here. again, expected to hear from the paramedics today on the stand. what will the defense strategy be and what will they say? >> well, what the defense is

trying to do here, and they need to do it better, they need to do it more, is to show that any of the actions done by dr. conrad murray were not part of his cover-up. but were part of covering up for michael jackson. michael jackson lived in jackson's world. this was a world of intense privacy. where everyone who surrounded michael jackson knew that they were there to protect his privacy. and that's the only thrust that the defense can give us. because otherwise it does look like a cover-up by conrad murray. we talked about security guard al verto alvarez gathering up the drugs, and he testified about doing 14 different things which prompted the defense to question whether that was even possible. this morning a member of the defense team appeared on the "today" show. let's take a listen to what he said. >> dr. murray was attempting from june 22nd to wean him off

propofol. so therefore, do you immediately pull an addict away? or do you try to wean them off? >> it seemed odd to me that he would be trotting out his defense outside the courtroom this morning. is that unusual? is that unprecedented? >> i don't think it's unusual. when a lawyer is just trying to get his story out there, at the worst time for him, which is during the prosecution's case. but the judge has now said, no more of this stuff. the judge was angry about it yesterday. the judge is not going to tolerate the defense or the prosecution, prosecution has not been doing this, but no one is going to go out there and try their case in the public. they're going to try their case in that los angeles courtroom. >> who had the better day yesterday? >> the prosecution. there's no question about it. but remember, as i always say, it's early. >> it's early. rikki, stick around, we're going to keep monitoring the trial throughout the hour. something should happen we will

come back to you. coming up, the money game. all eyes are on rick perry as estimates for his first fund-raising numbers come out today. will he get the boost that he needs to compete financially with mitt romney? we'll talk about that. plus, it's going to cost you more. just to spend your own money. if you bank with bank of america. that bank now charging customers to use their debit cards, more banks could follow their lead. we'll talk about that. first, though, a quick look at what's happening on wall street right now. the dow, s&p, nasdaq, all down. we're america's natural gas and here's what we did today: supported nearly 3 million steady jobs across our country... ... scientists, technicians, engineers, machinists... ... adding nearly 400 billion dollars to our economy... we're at work providing power to almost a quarter of our homes and businesses... ... and giving us cleaner rides to work and school... and tomorrow, we could do even more. cleaner, domestic, abundant and creating jobs now. we're america's natural gas. the smarter power, today.

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you got to pay to play in this world, and nowhere is that truer than the world of politics. presidential candidates today are reporting how much cash they have on hand, how much they've raised this past quarter.

here are some of the estimates. mitt romney, $11 million to $13 million. rick perry about $10 million. ron paul, about $5 million. again these are estimates. the deadline is midnight tomorrow. joining us to talk about the cash and the candidates, ed rendell, former governor of pennsylvania and nbc news political analyst. matt lewis, senior reporter of the daily call. >> thank you. >> this isn't just about money. these are also bragging rights, essentialpy. governor, matt, these candidates are required to report these numbers. i'm going to put the same way to the both of you. who's going to have the most to brag about this weekend? i'll start with you, governor. >> well, i would have thought under normal circumstances rick perry. because in a short period of time he's going to report a fairly good hunk of cash that he's raised. but his debate performances have taken the bloom off that, and the key for the perry camp is in the next quarter, with his somethinging fortunes in the

polls, and with those lousy debate performances will he be able to sustain this level of fund-raising? i think he normally would have been rick perry, but i think the debate performance has put a downer on it. >> matt, who wins this round of fund-raising? >> well, we'll see. look, rick perry is right. the governor had a really bad week. it's just been the last week. he raised a lot of money when he first got into the race. they might be low-balling it. perry's people are saying around $10 million. but if he could raise 15 and i've even heard some people say 20, that's a lot of money. but all of a sudden that becomes the news. so there's two reasons to raise money. obviously you need money to get your message out. but there's also the pr battle. if rick perry has a really good quarter, all of a sudden the bad debate stuff is old news. >> except if i were to put a spin on it if i were the romney people, i'd look at where he raised that money. and if that money raising sort of fell off a cliff after the debate, if it did, then i'd try to spin that story.

perry fund-raising machine stalled. >> by the way, there's another interesting factor here. >> go ahead. >> rick perry is -- there are new s.e.c. rules that prohibit a sitting governor from raising money from financial service employees. governor perry is the only person who that rule applies to. he'sed onlier governor. that actually could be a couple million dollars. >> we talk about the fund raiding that these candidates are conducting. what they are not talking about is the super pac money that is going to -- that we've already seen have a major impact. how much additional money do you think we'll see from these super pacs, governor? >> no one will ever know because of the reporting requirement. my guess is the superpacs in the coming election cycle will spend over a billion dollars. >> a billion? >> yep. i think what the security unleashed in citizens united is unholy, ungodly, and just incredible to think of. i mean, there are no bars now.

there are no bars. you can give as much as you want and not be disclosed. so a lot of people who have got big stakes in the venture are going to weigh in heavily, and we'll never know about it. >> we can't have a political discussion these days without talking about chris christie. so let's get our christy conversation out of the way here. matt, let's say he does get in, monday perhaps. he's apparently rethinking the decision now. if he gets in doesn't he start millions of dollars behind the other candidates? and will he be able to make up the difference quickly? >> i think he could. i think that chris christie gets in it will be just like when perry got in, a huge splash. it will be a major deal that the entire race, everything changes. and i think christi could still be okay. but he has to do it soon. i mean, if this thing goes a couple more weeks we're already seeing windows close. and the logistical challenges of getting on the ballots begins to creep up on you. >> i'd say there's even one more challenge. and the challenge is that chris

christie has been saying for the last six months, he's not in the race because he thinks he's not ready. now it's different from saying i'm not in the race because my family didn't want me to. you can always stand up and say, you know what, guys, my family changed their mind. >> so governor, do you think he gets in? >> i don't. because we slaughter him with those quotes from himself saying he's not ready to be president. >> matt, you think he gets in? >> 50/50, but i'm leaning no. last week, it was 99% no. so, he's starting to persuade me. >> he's starting to persuade you. okay. all right. thank you, gentlemen. governor, matt, always appreciate your time. one person will sneeze and another person behind you will say bless you, bless you, bless you, and then you hear thank you and everybody's like you're welcome, you're welcome. >> a teach your under fire for penalizing students who say god bless you in class. he says the students are being disruptive. some parents say his rule is anti-religious. also, what part of the day makes

most people happy? researchers say the answer, just like about everything else these days, can be found on twitter. details on that next. your business entrepreneur of the week. michelle barton was an inmate at the coffee creek correctional facility in oregon. while incarcerated she participated in a course called lifelong information for entrepreneurs. learning how to start and run a company. now, out of prison, she started forget me not cards and prints. for more watch your business sunday morning at 7:30 on msnbc.

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give your family the security it needs at a price you can afford. call this number or go to selectquote dot com. selectquote. we shop. you save. incredible story out of california this afternoon. a 67-year-old man whose car plunged off the side of a 200 foot ravine a week ago has been found alive by his children. last friday, david was headed home when he crashed near los angeles. his family joined the search effort, and after six days, they found him late last night. his children spoke on the "today" show. >> we were aware of certain things with text messages that we were able to zero in, and ping his towers of the satellite towers of the cell phone towers to actually be able to narrow down actually exactly where my father was.

>> he was trapped because he couldn't climb back up the cliff. he told his children that he stayed alive by eating leaves and bugs. and drinking water from a nearby river. now he's recovering at a hospital from dehydration and some broken bones. a california farm is recalling lettuce after it tested positive for a bacteria. company officials say the cases were sent to a food distributor in oregon who may have shipped them to washington and idaho. also in california, some parents outraged at a high school teacher because he took points off students scores for saying god bless you after sneezing in class. some upset parents say the whole thing is anti-religious. here's how one student described what happened. >> one person would sneeze, and the other person behind him would say bless you. and then other people would hear it and be like bless you, bless you, bless you, and then they'd be like thank you, and everybody would be like you're welcome, you're welcome. >> the teacher says he has

nothing against saying god bless you, but that the way it was being done was disrespectful and wasting valuable class time. he also says he'll no longer disrupt points for the disruption, but he will continue to control his classroom. coming up here on this friday, another update on our top story, the significant new blow to al qaeda. what the white house is saying about the takedown of al qaeda leader anwar al awlaki. and as the 2012 campaign season kicks into high gear we're going to hear from some of the wimps of republican candidates. find out why mitt romney's wife calls herself a, quote, she-lion. with new extra-strength bayer advanced aspirin. it has microparticles, enters the bloodstream faster and rushes relief to the site of pain. it's clinically proven to relieve pain twice as fast. new bayer advanced aspirin. listen to this. three out of four americans don't get enough vegetables. so here's five bucks to help you buy v8 juice. five bucks. that's a lot of green.

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major blow to al qaeda in yemen. nbc's kristen welker live at the white house for us this morning. any other reaction in d.c. today? >> hi there, craig. by all accounts this is really a major foreign policy success for the obama administration. we are starting to get some reaction from folks, including congressman peter king. and i think we have a graphic of what he said. he came out earlier this morning and i'm quoting him, the killing of awlaki is a tremendous tribute to president obama, and the men and women of hour intelligence community. i also spoke with house speaker john boehner's office, who said that they would only underscore these comments that were made by peter king earlier today. look, we'll also likely see the public react favorably to this. if you remember, after osama bin laden was killed, the president got a brief bump in his poll numbers. it's possible we might see a brief, and i want to understand the word brief, bump in his poll

numbers in this instance. of course awlaki is not as big as osama bin laden. but what this really does, craig, is it makes it really tough for republican candidates to hit president obama on his foreign policy credentials. at this point, he has the killing of osama bin laden, now this. also, of course, the ouster of gadhafi. in just a few minutes we are waiting for white house press secretary jay carney to address us to discuss this issue with us, and we're hoping to learn more about where president obama was when all of this happened and what his handling of this. >> kristen welker from the white house. thank you. to our other big story today, we continue to follow developments inside a los angeles courtroom. it is day four of dr. conrad murray's involuntary manslaughter trial. on the stand right now, robert russell, a heart patient who consulted with dr. murray during a visit to an emergency room in a las vegas hospital. this is one of dr. murray's previous patients. earlier today, we heard some testimony about fingertip pulse

monitors. similar to the ones found next to michael jackson. we are still waiting to hear from the two paramedics who responded to the 911 call the day michael jackson died. bank of america is going to start charging customers who use its debit cards. the largest bank in this country will charge $5 a month starting sometime next year. bank of america is not the first bank to charge this fee. and customers at banks like chase and wells fargo may one day have to pay the same fee. the reason for the new fee, and others like it, profits. or lack thereof. banks are still suffering the effects of writing too many bad mortgages. also some new rules have clamped down on previous sources of revenue like overdraft fees, as well. bank of america saying in a statement, if you don't use it, you don't get charged. the numbers haven't looked good for president obama lately.

unemployment stuck above 9%. the approval rating now below 40%. there's another set of numbers that are decisively in his favor. it's the 2012 electoral map. joined now by washington executive editor for "the wall street journal." and jerry, we saw this piece a couple of days ago in the "journal." we wanted to bring you on to talk about it. because it's very fascinating. you point out something that's very interesting, that a lot of folks may not actually think about. this race is all about 270. explain. >> 270 electoral votes, craig. that's what you need to win the election. not 50% or 50.1% of the popular vote. the question is what combination of states puts you over that 270 number. one of the advantages president obama has is there's a block of 18 states that have voted democrat in each of the last five elections. those states give you 242 electoral votes which gets you 90% of the way there. republicans, by contrast, have only 13 states that have been red the last five elections in a row and those only get the republicans to 102 electoral

votes. that doesn't guarantee you anything this year, obviously, but it means democrats start in a pretty good position on the electoral map if president obama can hold that blue line. >> let's take a look at the electoral map you just mentioned. we've got the red here, obviously that's republican. we've got dark blue, and we've got light blue. explain the difference here between light blue and dark blue on the map for us. >> the lighter blue states are ones that have gone democrat in either three or four out of the last five elections. not all five. the dark blue are the ones that have been reliably democrat for five straight elections. you put all those states together and you're well over 270 votes, you're about 10 or 15 votes over 270 votes if you put the light blue and dark blue together. here's where it gets interesting. the light blue states include, for example, ohio. that's going to be a tough one for the president to win. he's fading among white working-class voters in states like that. also includes states like new hampshire, where he's not done quite as well or iowa where his numbers are down. so there are some states in that

light blue category in particular and even a couple in the dark blue category, wisconsin and michigan, that he can't count on for sure. >> let's talk about the reliably red states now. obviously these are the republican states. reliably red. tell me about these states and what they'll have in common. >> there are a lot of them. but there just aren't as many people in those reliably red states. they tend to run right down the middle of the country, a little bit in the mountain west and obviously into the south. those are all reliably red states and they be reliably red this year because states like utah are really red, they're not going to go anywhere this year. the playing field, what that map tells you, the combination of the red and the blue states, tells you that the 16 6 to 10 states where this election will probably be decided. it will be in states like colorado, which president obama won for the democrats last year, but that is not a reliably democratic state. can he do that again? can he pull it off in north carolina, for example, and in virginia, states again, not reliable democratic states but states he won. he probably will need a couple

of those to offset breaks in that blue line. he's not going to get all those blue states. he's going to need some of the others, as well. >> jerry steed, "wall street journal." thank you so much. appreciate your time this friday. >> thanks, craig. >> twitter, not just a social networking site. it's apparently a high-tech mood ring. there's a new study of twitter being released by cornell university, says that people around the world are happiest in the morning. joins me now scott golder, a graduate researcher at cornell university's department of sociolo sociology. dot, first of all, tell me about the study and how you determined that people who are, in fact, happiest in the morning? >> hi. we -- thanks very much for having me. we examined a very large archive of tweets. we had half a billion messages that we collected over a period of a couple of weeks, and we did something very simple. we took a well-known set of keywords that are rated as positive words and negative words. >> keywords like what? >> i'll give you an example.

an example of negative words include things like fear or fury or vulnerable. whereas positive words included things like delight, or happy. those sorts of things. >> so, people happiest in the morning. when were people most unhappy? >> people were most unhappy or expressing the most negative mood expressions late at night. the negative moods were lowest in the morning, but slowly building over the course of the day. this suggested to us that people were refreshed by sleep. >> huh. there's the -- we've got the graph here on the screen. tell us what we're looking at here. >> we're looking at the time of day, and the day of the week when people are talking the most about breakfast. when we first started this work we were actually more interested in activities, everyday activities, so when are people eating breakfast? when are people stuck in traffic? when are people doing homework, those sorts of things. and very quickly we realized that we could look not only at behaviors or activities, also at

moods, as well. the website that you're showing right now is publicly available. so anybody who is at a web browser can go to this. >> it's true. >> and explore keywords of their own choosing. this is a sort of public engagement piece that goes along with our research. because as much as we as researchers are interested in using this data for social science research. we think everybody is frommed in their social worlds, and curious about what other people's lives are like. and by using this tool we hope that this will give everyone a little bit of sight into how other people are spending -- >> are there implications here for the public at large from this study? >> yes, absolutely. i would suggest that -- well more for social scientists, really. i think for social scientists this is opening up a whole new world of way to study people. even though people are going about their everyday lives, tweeting, and updating their facebooks, or buying and selling things on sites like amazon and ebay, these are mundane

activities that everyone has done for generations. for the first time, we as social scientists are able to use the digital phrases of those mundane, everyday, otherwise forgettable activities in order to do science. >> scott golder. fascinating -- who paid for this, by the way? i'm always curious? >> my professor, the co-author of the study, was funded by the national science foundation. so in a sense, everybody pays to study everybody. >> scott golder, thank you, scott. appreciate that. >> thanks for having me. >> just because you live in the white house doesn't mean you don't have to slip out to target for an err roond or two from time to time. this is what one ap photographer discovered when he took pictures of michelle obama at a d.c. area target. and i think that may be the target that i used to go to down there in columbia heights. whether this was a photo-op to show off the obamas are just like everyone else is up to you to decide. nevertheless what the photos do show is that the first lady apparently waits in line like everybody else.

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a new study finds that among obese people with hypertension, two servings of potatoes a day reduced their blood pressure as much as oatmeal, without causing weight gain. but french fries won't do it, researchers had the study participants eat purple potatoes with skins, cooked without oil in the microwave. well, it's not just mitt romney, rick perry and herman king running for president right now, it's ann romney, anita perry and gloria kaine running for president. joining us to talk about the number one of adviser to any

president, kathy. good afternoon to you. between now and february, you and the rest of iowa going to get to know a lot of would-be presidents and that means getting to know the whole family. right now ann romney is in south carolina. i want to play for you what she said about her husband mitt. take a listen. >> knowing how defensive i am about my husband, i am a she-lion when it comes to anyone attacking him. you better look out. i get very, very upset if -- at his being misrepresented. >> the days of presidential spouses as shy wallflowers, long gone now, isn't it? they're all she-lions, huh? >> yeah. well, they really have to be really out there, and engaged on the campaign trail. their husbands can't be everywhere or their spouses can't be anywhere. >> strategically, though, what's the thinking by the campaigns here to have the potential first ladies out there front and center? >> well, i think that it's a different scenario for different campaigns. right now, for example, we've

had anita perry traveling around iowa for her husband rick perry. he is giving sort of a late start in the campaign. he needs to be meeting as many voters in iowa as possible. and so having this hur gatt in iowa right now and his wife is the number one surrogate, the best surrogate, it really has an opportunity for him, through her, to get to know voters in iowa. >> it's been interesting to hear anita perry specifically talk about her husband because she is sort of apologized for some of his debate performances as well, has she not? >> well, she -- i don't know if she's apologized. but shes aacknowledged that he's not the best debater. and i think this is sort of an effective way for her to say, look, you know, she's one who can actually acknowledge some of his flaws, and say, you know, but you should like him anyway, because. it's the kind of thing that nobody paid staff in the campaign is not going to do for a candidate.

they're not going to say, yeah, he kind of screwed up in this debate but he's going to be better. she, as his wife, can actually do that kind of thing and really sound a lot more credible sometimes than other surrogates. >> can spouses be liabilities, as well, on the campaign trail? >> absolutely. i mean, you know, if they dive off message, they can certainly cause problems, and you know, one thing that political spouse does not want to do is be out there with positions that are radically different from her husband's on any kind of issue. i haven't seen that so far with any of the political spouses in this race. >> one of the things, you know, you haven't seen a lot of, and i guess that's naturally because we haven't seen as many female candidates for president, you don't see a lot of the male spouses out there. i haven't seen mr. bachmann a great deal. >> no, we haven't seen mr. bachmann a great deal. and i think that that, you know, may be in part a preference of the spouse. it might be also a purpose of the campaign. of course, he has been the subject of some criticism for

some of the things that have happened in their business. it's possible that they don't want him to be a distraction. >> kathie, thank you. >> all right. thanks, craig. >> up next, education nation, i'll talk to a philanthropist who has made it his mission for the past 24 years to help students who need financial help. he sees them to very prestigious boarding schools. now he's looking to expand his work. we're going to talk to him.

there's no other way to describe our next guest, but kind of a real-life daddy warbucks. he takes kids from the poorest of conditions in newark, new jersey, and he pays for them to go to boarding school. that way they don't just have a chance in life. they have the best chance. and now, now he's trying to expand his foundation. joining us right now to talk about it is philanthropist russell white jr. good day to you, sir.

>> good day to you, craig. >> russell, you wanted to help folks in your community. why this? why not, say, college scholarships? >> too late. you want to get the kids early. as early as you can possibly intervene in their lives the more you'll be able to change them. >> so you gave these kids in the seventh grade, correct? >> well, we're minding right down into the sixth grade right now. >> sixth grade. >> and they start -- yes, and then they start with us in the summer after their seventh grade year. >> and how do you -- how do you find them? >> we work hard. we go into the schools in the newark area. we go to the churches. we go anywhere we can. we actually have our signs on buses in newark. come on in and apply to our foundation. >> and how did this come about? >> i, about 25 years ago, i was watching a show on public

service television in new york and it depicted young, black boys growing up in the newark area. and it was pretty depressing. and it just showed how difficult it was for these kids, and i thought that if you could send them away, into a protective, nurturing environment, where they could learn, and mature, that many of them would benefit from this experience >> why boarding schools? why not just private schools? what's the perceived inherent advantage of a boarding school? >> the boarding school, they get out of newark. and they are able to do exactly what i said. to be able to grow, and nurture in a protective environment, of the boarding school. the day schools they have to go back into the city themselves and they still have to deal with the problems in the street. >> russell, there will be those, and i'm sure there are those who say your efforts, while noble, takes away the best talent from cities or from a city like

newark where they desperately probably could use that talent in one of the public school settings. what do you say to those folks? >> we hear that argument. we respect it. on the other hand, the -- even the best of the new work schools and the best of the surrounding schools cannot offer these young men and women the opportunities they can get in the prep schools. >> i understand you're looking to expand beyond new work. >> we're trying to duplicate what we've been doing in newark and other cities. >> which cities? >> we're willing to lend our expertise and some of our money and we're looking for individuals that are interested in doing this in similar-type cities past newark. >> have you identified those cities yet or are you still sort of in the early part of that process? >> we're welcome to any benefactor that would love to come in and talk to us. >> you guys, i've read, have gotten some pretty amazing success stories, as well. talk to me about a few of those.

>> 83% of our graduates go away to the most competitive colleges in america. what the kids do is just phenomenal. they go away to these prep schools which are very strange environments, they don't just do okay, they excel in these schools. many, many of them are presidents of the schools, captains of the teams. >> russell wight jr., thank you so much. it's good work. we certainly hope that you are able to -- to extend it, and please keep us posted. we'd love to have you back when you've got more success stories to share. >> thanks, craig. >> thanks for joining us. i'm craig melvin. we'll be back here money, noon eastern. 9:00 a.m. out west. up next, "andrea mitchell reports." >> thanks, craig. and up next on "andrea mitchell reports," what will the death of anwar awlaki mean for al qaeda? and what will the political impact be for president obama.

plus, is chris christie warming up to a presidential run after all? we'll cover all of this, plus radio talk show host michael interview the president live. we'll bring that to you live. it's game day, buddy, and, boy, are we in for a doozy. oh, man. mr. clean is dominating the competition! mr. clean is tackling mess like some sort of mess tackler. oh, and what's this? [ sniffs ] that's the scent of gain original fresh. that counts as a performance enhancer. i am complaining to the cleaning products athletics board.

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