shouldn't have made it rain. good day. i'm craig melvin. penn state child sexual abuse scandal has reached beyond pennsylvania borders. texas authorities are looking into the football team's trip to the san antonio alamo bowl back in 1999. jerry sandusky took one of his

eight alleged victims to the game and threatened to send the boy home when he resisted his sexual advances. the campus gears up for the senior game tomorrow without head coach joe paterno who was fired and without assistant coach mike mcqueary who has been side lined. >> you can't really please everyone. >> mike mcqueary will not be at bevary stadium. the university says u.s. because he's gotten so many threats. according to the indictment it was mcqueary who saw former assistant jerry sandusky rape a young boy in a campus shower back in 2002. mcqueary told joe paterno but did not call police. >> a lot of people probably think he should have done more. >> mcqueary, allegedly saw is only one of multiple charges against sandusky dating back to

1996. that's when he touched a young boy in a shower. two years later he took a different boy in the shower. that boy's mother confronted sandusky with campus police listening in. he admitted to what happened but didn't agree to stop. a detective later testified that sandusky told the mother i understand, i was wrong, i wish i could get forgiveness. i know i won't get it from you. the case was closed. no criminal charges filed. following year sandusky retired. >> he was very upset after the meeting he had with joe paterno saying it's time for to you retire and he told victim four not to tell anybody about that. >> the campus is quieter now. a far cry from wednesday night when protests over paterno's firing turned violent. >> we need to identify these victims of sexual abuse. we need to find them, we need to

help them, they are children. >> let's get straight to penn state now where ron mott is standing by. has anything significant come out of that meeting so far? >> reporter: yes. they have announced that they are going to form a special committee to take a look into all the things that went wrong potentially here on campus with respect to these alleged sexual encounters that took place on campus allegedly involving a former employee, assistant coach jerry sandusky who has been arrested and charged with sexually abusing eight young men who were dirnl at the time. what they've told us by the board ken fraser, a member of the board will head the charge here, looking at what went wrong potentially on this campus. later this afternoon they are going release the names of the other members of that special

committee which will include a couple of other additional trustee board members as well as student representatives as well as faculty representatives. penn state looking at a comprehensive look in the mirror to see how they can fix and prevent from what happening here. we're hearing for the first time from the new big man on campus, if you will, the new president, the interim president who was provost at the time and he is going to announce that there are going to be some changes potentially in the culture. he wants to bring back and restore confidence that people had in this institution before sunday. here's a little bit of what he had to say before this board meeting this morning. >> i accept this new leadership role under circumstances that i never could have imagined. my heartaches for the victims and their families and my mind searches for answers like millions of others across the nation.

>> reporter: now, president ericson says this investigation will be extensive. we don't have a timetable just yet before that special committee comes back with any reports or recommendations. but there's going to be a lot of people who will have to answer a lot of questions including some of the perhaps members who are no longer employed here and that would include joe paterno. back to you. >> one quick question. have you found out anything more about the threats against mcqueary? >> reporter: we have not heard any specific details. it was a very short statement that was released late last night from the university saying in the interest of everyone here who is going to be on campus tomorrow for that game between penn state and nebraska it would be best for mcqueary not to be here at the facility. earlier in the day, though, it sounded as if he was going to, in fact coach this game. tom bradley said it was going to be a game time decision where to physically place him.

whether he was upstairs in the booth or downtown field and they came to the decision he shouldn't be here at the stadium at all. >> ron mott, thank you. second mile, jerry sandusky's charity is holding a meeting tonight. the organization gave sandusky access to young boys. guidance counselors at schools around penn state have stopped referring students to that group and now the governor wants the charity investigated. nbc news national investigative correspondent michael isikoff joins us by telephone. michael, the allegations date back to 1996. that is close to 20 years after sandusky started the charity. is it possible that there are more victims from before who have yet to dpormd? >> reporter: certainly. that's what state police are looking at. they have asked for victims to come forward or anybody who has any information that might be

relevant to this investigation. the state police says they've received multiple reports of information that's relevant to this investigation. and the investigation is active, open and continuing. >> at this point do we know whether anyone in the second mile charity knew about these charges? >> reporter: actually, if you read the grand jury report, there are indications that top charity executives did, in fact, know something about these allegations. there's a reference that the general counsel of the charity who is also the general counsel of the university was informed about that 1998 investigation into the charity. it led to no charges but it was -- you know, sort of preceded the later, the later abuse allegations. then you have in 2002 the executive director of the

charity is informed about the allegations of sandusky in the shower with the young boy. and the charity takes no actions, sandusky continues to participate in the charity programs and one of the stunning revelations in that grand jury report is that all of sandusky's alleged victims, he met through charity programs. that's how he met his victims, that's how he lured them and so the question here is did charity executives fail to act, fail to stop what could have been further abuse? >> mike, really quickly we got to get out of here but i want to ask you really fast. i understand coach paterno has contacted a high-profile attorney in d.c. what do we know about that? >> reporter: he's reached out. although he's not been facing any charges, he's not described as a target, just a cooperating witness, there's going ongoing legal proceedings for which

he'll need legal representation and beyond the criminal case it's also important to remember a lot of concern about what is the very real likelihood of massive civil lawsuits here in which coach paterno as is everybody else in this investigation will need representation. >> michael isikoff, national investigative correspondent. mike, thanks for your time. turning now to 2012, two gop presidential candidates are in damage control mode. they are handle their missteps quite differently. here's rick perry last night on david letterman. take a look. >> here tonight to present tonight's top ten list, please welcome rick perry. rick perry excuses. number ten. >> actually there were three reasons i messed up last night. one, was the nerves. and two was the headache. and three -- um, um --

[ laughter ] >> and then there's herman cain happen his response to a question about anita hill. take a look at this. >> have you heard the latest news today? anita hillis going to come. >> joining me now talk about it, senior politics editor for "politico". charles, good day to you, sir. first of all, who has got the bigger mess to clean up here, rick perry or herman cain? >> i think when you look at the gravity of it, the allegations against herman cain he has the bigger problem. what perry is dealing with is a gaffe problem. he has a gaffe control issue. it was pretty bad, pretty awkward. but they were very aggressive out in front of this and you see they followed the bill clinton strategy from way back when on

getting on the late night shows and making fun of himself. the cain campaign on the other hand probably would be said by most political professionals handling at any time opposite way which is sort of obfuscating and letting this thing drag on. >> there's a new poll that shows a tightening race at the top. but that same poll shows a rob for herman cain, specifically now among female voters. his support there dropped 13%. can he fix this? >> the good sign for herman cain is you haven't seen tremendous eroger in his numbers since the allegations came out. this has been in the news and headlines for two weeks a hinted him. on the other hand, you have to expect when you have serious allegations like this and making light of issues like anita hill and things like that that will cause a problem with certain constituencies. when you pour through the cross tabs herman cain is having some problems with republican women.

>> rick perry has created quite the narrative for himself over the past few debates, the narrative he started the campaign late, the narrative he's come in unprepared. can he change that this saturday? there's a debate in south carolina. there's that national security debate. how crucial is this debate for rick perry? >> well, i think by now he set the bar so low for his performance in a sense he does get to benefit from the expectation he won't even do well at all. at the same time there's a certain threshold. we're talking about the presidency and he needs to be able to articulate a vision in some coherent way which he hasn't been able to do so far. he does need to present something that's a little bit better and a little gaffe-free. >> gaffe-free. charles, thank you. >> thank you, craig. the outrage this veterans day over the scandal at dover

air force base. we're going hear from the father of an air force pilot why some of his son's remains may be missing. first, though. gaining momentum. the president getting part of his jobs bill through the senate. new signs that the white house is now starting to gain some traction with the economy. and speaking of the economy, here's a quick look at the boards right now. the dow up about 270 points on this friday. s&p, nasdaq also up slightly. no problem. you want to save money on rv insurance? no problem. you want to save money on motorcycle insurance? no problem. you want to find a place to park all these things? fuggedaboud it. this is new york. hey little guy, wake up! aw, come off it mate! geico. saving people money on more than just car insurance.

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got some breaking news we're following. we just learned moments ago that mf global have terminated their entire workforce. that's 1066 employees. this following the bankruptcy

that mf global declared several days ago now. of course, former new jersey governor jon corzine involved in all of this. we're still gathering more information. mf global has laid off their entire workforce, more than 1,000 people. we'll gather more information and pass it along just as soon as we get more information. we want to turn to the white house where officials say the president has regained, has regained some traction now. regaining momentum, the upper hand on economic issues. he did get one portion of his jobs bill through the senate and has been issuing one executive order after another including one cutting government spending. >> we haven't seen as much action out of congress as we like and that's why we launched on our own initiative the campaign to cut waste. not just to cut spending but to make government work better for the american people. >> but the latest msnbc/"wall

street journal" poll indicate 57% disapprove of the president's handseling of the economy. >> reporter: senior officials tell us, senior administration officials tell it, they are on the right side of history and the issues and the right side of the polls now. so many people concerned about inequality in the economy, the rich getting richer, the middle class running in place. republicans are on thin ice as they see it and it's incomprehensible to them that republicans are pushing for tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires as they phrase it and they go so far to say, craig, that when the super committee -- if the super committee fails to come up with a product to cut government spending it will be on the heads of republicans because they have refused to cut taxes, wanting to balance the budget on the backs of the middle class in favor of protecting millionaires and billionaires and have them pay more, have them pay their fair share.

having said all that, craig, they will say in the next breath this next election year will be tough. they laud the president's communication strategy. since labor day when he gave that speech on jobs before congress and now we can't wait. the president is leaving town and be gone for nine days and be far away. he starts in hawaii, going to australia, indonesia. they will have a hard time with the time change and everything else staying on top of the news cycle. that super committee is working. president won't be back until four days before the 23rd of this month. >> let me talk tobu that super committee. some in gop have argued the president may secretly be rooting for them to fail so that he can then continue to run against this so-called do nothing congress. are your getting that sense at all from the white house? >> reporter: no. as a matter of fact the communications director here tweeted about an hour ago. he said that headline is suitable for the onion, the

newspaper that you might be familiar with. the story is not written on the super committee thing. a lot of this is pre-positioning, going into crunch time. that deadline of november 23rd for the super committee to couple with a product or those triggers, dramatic cuts to defense and medicare kick in. one catch they don't kick in until 2013. a lot of people say this deadline is not really a deadline. >> thank you so much. appreciate that. the long legal road ahead at penn state what lies ahead for the many witnesses who could have called police but did not. and the children frantically testing their parents as their bus driver swerving and falling aleap at the wheel. we'll follow this breaking news we just told you about, mf global holdings terminated their 1066 workforce. we'll update that breaking news right after this. hard for a bet.

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more now on the breaking news we've been following. mf global laying off more than 1,000 people. we got kayla on the phone from cnbc. how did this come about? >> mf went bankrupt almost two weeks ago and it was appointed to a trustee as in any bankruptcy case to wind down the company. we got word today that about 1066 employees were laid off from the broker dealer unit. they are keeping on about 150 or 200 employees to help wind down those assets. but moving from mf's headquarters in mid-town manhattan to somewhere cheaper and smaller so they are not paying that huge lease on that building as they are bankrupt. there's another division and that's the future commission merchant. that's where the 50,000 commodities accounts were transferred from the likes of the cme group and ice, two other

brokerage houses. only the paper work was transferred not any money. these clients are enraged because they can't trade and they have hundreds of million was dollars tied up in these accounts. the reason is there's this $600 million customer fund short fall that the refwu late jobs accountant, trustees are on a big hunt for. it's been two weeks and still can't find it. they are searching high and low to find without that money is. they say we don't want to return any cash to any investors until we know exactly what is where and they are trying to give the customers their full money back but not give a prorated portion if that $600 million is still missing. you can imagine clients are up in arms. it made the commodity market, gold, oil, silver, metals, futures, things for corn and soy beans has been out of whack as 50,000 accounts can't trade. imagine how many market participants are left out of the market. we haven't seen jon corzine in

over a week. he's another casualty of this but one that a lot of people are pointing fingers too. >> are these employees going to get a severance package? >> no severance. health care until the end of november. that's about it. california police are investigating a fatal shooting outside of the occupy oakland encampment. fire killed one man and may have been the result of a fight between two groups. investigators say at this point they don't know if the men were associated with the occupy oakland. cops arrest ad pennsylvania bus driver suspected of dui after taking school koinds a harrowing ride home. children on that bus sent be text messages and called their parents saying they thought the bus driver was drunk tuesday

afternoon. here's how one. student described it. >> the bus was swerving around. she almost hit a jogger. >> after receiving text messages and calls from their kids parents contacted the cool who in turn contacted the police. the driver has been charged with dui and endangering more than two dozen kids. we'll be right bac

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welcome back to msnbc. i'm craig melvin. the penn state child sexual abuse has resulted in criminal charges. could civil charges come. katherine cryer is a former judge. how significant do you think it is that paterno has gone out and talked to a prominent attorney in washington, d.c. >> it's very significant. he may be talking but i bet he's already hired because he has said publicly he's sorry he wished he had done more. there are already admissions

that his lawyer would love to able to take back. >> public admissions. >> public admissions that would certainly stand up in a court of law. >> could penn state itself be legally held liable? >> of course. >> how much we talking about >> you're talking about, depending of course how many victims eventually come forward and if the allegations are proved to be true, you could well be talking into multiple millions. >> wendy, let me bring you into the conversation here because i saw you on last night and i heard what you had to say and it really raised a lot of important issues. anyone who has read that 23-page indictment has to be struck by the number of folks who heard or had to have suspected something was going on. what do you think happened to all those people? >> well, you know, i wish i could say i'm shocked. i'm very angry. but i have to say it's not unusual. i've been doing this work for more than 20 years to have an

institution whether a public school or a university or the catholic church engaging intentional cover-up activity, because they don't want the scandal. they don't want to be known as the school where children are being anally raped in the locker room. they create this chain of command reporting. in an institutional environment you're only allowed to tell your superior and then you hope and expect they will do the right thing. but too often and it's really very common and an outrage across the country that that superior who then tells the boss and all the way up the line usually to the general counsel's office let's sweep this one the rug, we don't want the scandal. >> up think there was pressure placed on folks that prevented them from coming forward years ago? >> not only pressure, it is often a matter of employment policy in institutional settings

that you may not call outside law enforcement or child protective service agencies and if you do you'll get fired. there will be employment sanctions. those are policies in a lot of institutional environments. i'm not saying that's true of penn state but that's what they did. >> wendy is right on the money. we've known each other for years. this story is not a new story, it's an old story. that's why there's a federal statute that was created because you got get universities to be obligated now under federal law for these reporting requirements. this sort of behavior whether in the sports world or university world or the reason many s.e.c. guys didn't rat on madoff, why whistle blowers are suppressed within agencies that are supposed to be supporting them, this is rampant throughout our institutional systems and this is just one horrific example. until we require not only compliance with law but the

moral and ethical obligations. >> the second mile charity that sandusky founded back in the late '70s, here's a charity where it essentially gave him access to hundreds of young boys, vulnerable young boys over the years. how likely do you think it is at this point that we'll start hearing from lots more boys who were part of this charity? >> extremely likely. in fact, if i were a betting woman, there would only be one side to gamble on this one pinpoint will come out there were a lot more victims. it's not unusual for a predatory sex offender to set up some mechanism by which he not only gains access to kids but access to vulnerable kids, grooms them and then uses that charity as a

barrier to suspicion. in other words, who would believe a child over a man who runs a charity to help troubled kids and that's why some of them don't tell. they really don't expect to be believed. look what happened in 1998? sandusky admits showering naked and touching two little boys. >> and no charges. >> it gets reported to the d.a. and no charges and it's a crime, it's a felony in pennsylvania, child sexual exploitation. prosecutors are often conspiring with big universities who are very influential, can help them yuan their re-elections. they conspire to sweep these things under the rug. >> that's so wore. governmental immunity if we can show gross misconduct even governmental immunity should be waived in these matters and we got to go right to the core of the problem. >> wendy, thanks so much from out west. and katherine you're the author of a new book "patriot acts what

americans must do to save the republic." thank you. defense secretary leon panetta ordered the air force to review its handseling of a major scandal involving the remain of american soldiers at dover air force base. for the latest we turn to nbc news chief, pentagon correspondent. good afternoon. >> reporter: good afternoon. i'm sure air force officials thought they had put this scandal behind them. they had one investigation and reprimanded the top three leaders out there at dover air force base mortuary. when there were reports that partial remains being buried at a landfill and two whistle blowers were fired after coming forward to talk about the remains at dover, yesterday at a briefing here at the pentagon, leon panetta said not so fast. the solemn return of america's war dead to dover is one of the u.s. military's most sacred

ceremonies. >> let us pray. >> reporter: iconic images preserved forever in film. but a series of recent scandals has shattered the dignity of dover. the partial remain of some service members have been cremated then dumped into this virginia landfill. defense secretary leon panetta declared that's unacceptable. >> we have to send a clear signal to the american people that these kinds of actions that took place there cannot happen again. fwroipt problems at dover don't stop there. partial remains of other service members have been lost. in one case a technician sawed off the mutilated arm of a deceased marine so his uniform would fit for burial. stan mcdowell's son was killed in afghanistan. parts of his remains may be missing. he now wonders about the rest. >> maybe there are some things that's not what i think they should be.

but i'll never know. >> carolyn learner hosts the office of special counsel. >> we're talking about people who gave their lives for our country. and who are due the highest level of reverence and respect. >> secretary panetta order additional investigations into dover. even though the top three leaders at dover have been reprimanded nobody has been fired but secretary panetta said he'll look into that too. >> the father you just saw in that story, stan mcdowell joining me live. stan, good day to you. >> good afternoon, craig. >> when were you first made aware that there were some -- there were remains that were missing? >> it was last saturday morning. my liaison todd rose and his superior and a chaplain called me on the phone saturday morning

and gave me the information. >> and what did they say? how did they say it? >> well, first of all, they were very respectful, and they pretty much told me the facts that they knew that there was a bag of remains that at one time had some remains in it, and when it was moved from one location to another someone noticed that the remains were missing. and they went through -- they told me they've gone through an investigation for a year and a half now, and what came out of that is they really don't know what happened to those remains. >> do you think that any officials in the air force tried to couch their mistakes? >> well, my understanding is -- i don't know that they tried to cover it up. i think the real issue here is that it was obvious that the remains were missing, and when,

when an authority was notified of that, they did some research but i think the issue is they did not do due diligence as far as enough research or enough search, searching around to find out if, in fact, the remains were actually missing. >> stan, what are they telling you about the possibility that these remains could be found in the future? >> oh, they say as far as i'm concerned the investigation is over with and the remains cannot be located. and they do not -- do not know whether they were actually buried with my son mark or whether they were buried with his weapons officer thomas or whether they were in the group burial or whether they ended up somewhere else. the understanding i have is they don't know at this time. there will not be any further investigation. >> stan, anthony veterans day i

think it's only appropriate for you to tell us a little bit about your son. >> sure. mark, the most important thing i can tell you about my son is he was a christian. and he lived his lives as a christian and his personality, exuberant katrina attitude and everybody saw that in mark. he had a contagious smile. and whether he was in a stressful situation or a nonstressful situation, he had this joy in his life and people saw that and they knew he was getting that joy from the holy spirit within him. and that's the most important thing i can say about him. he was a loving son. in fact, when he first went over to afghanistan, it was around mother's daytime, and he was over there fighting for our country and he still had enough thoughtfulness to send flowers to his mother. >> stan mcdowell, thank you so much for your time and thank you

for sharing a little bit more about your son as well. >> thank you. >> we will be right back. on november 26th you can make a huge impact by shopping small on small business saturday. one purchase. one purchase is all it takes. so, pick your favorite local business... and join the movement. i pledge to shop small at big top candy shop. allen's boots... at juno baby store. make the pledge to shop small. please. shop small on small business saturday.

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strategist karen finny and joe watkins. good day to both of you. karen the most famous comment about foreign policy so far in this contest also the most infamous. take a listen. >> i'm ready for the gotcha questions and they are already starting to come. and when they ask me who is the president of ubeki, ubeki oil say i don't know. do you? how will that create one job. >> those debates trip up many presidential candidates. who do you think will come under the most scrutiny come saturday night? >> rick perry given his brain freeze earlier this week. and frankly as well as herman cain. not just because of the uzbeki answer but the response about china and nuclear weapons particularly over the last

couple of weeks as we've been hearing more about iran's nuclear program which poses a significant threat to the united states and our national security. those two once again are at the top of the okay, what are they going to say now? >> joe, to whose strengths does this foreign policy/national security play? >> mitt romney will do well. newt gingrich will do well. he has a good sense of foreign policy, what's happening not only in europe and the middle east but also in china and then jon huntsman who hasn't done really well in the polls but clearly as ambassador to china and is the only candidate who speaks fluent mandarin chinese reallyunderstands some of our foreign policy interests is going forward. >> do you think american voters, do you think they care about foreign policy issues as much as we would like to believe that they do? >> you know what? i think they should care and here's the argument i would make. remember in 2006 when we started to change our opinion about the wars in iraq and afghanistan,

part of what people were expressing and what they are still expressing today is the cost of those wars. if we don't have a smart savvy foreign policy and the way we engage around the world to both protect our national security interests and make sure we don't get mired down and in terms of loss of blood and treasure we're not paying too high of a price that does matter. having a president who knows how to manage these things that matters. >> not just the wars. you have to understand, craig, now we live in a global economy and if you consider what's been happening in greece and italy and the fears there and the problems there with those economies affecting us we need a commander in chief who understands how we intersect and how those economies affect the u.s. economy. so, there's clearly an impact on jobs at home with what happens abroad. >> joe watkins -- >> also as the united states, as a leader in the world, having the gravitas to lead those

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tuesday marked a new era in voting. in oregon it was the first time that voters could use an ipad to select candidates. joining me now to talk about it lauri steele, ceo of everyone counts. and kate brown, oregon's secretary of state. ladies, good afternoon to you. >> good afternoon, craig. >> understand this was a special primary election to fill congressman wu state. this was not district wide. you focused on a select group of

people for trial run? >> that's correct. there were five counties involved in the first congressional district. >> five counties. how did it go? >> it went really well. it was very smooth. we had 89 voters in oregon use the ipad to mark their ballots. >> and no problems? >> absolutely no problems. the voters that used it thought it was wonderful. and they look forward to using it again in the special election in january. >> lauri, what are the advantages? what are the advantages to having folks use i pads to vote? >> well, the key advantage is that we're talking about a software based election platform versus an antiquated and very expensive hardware based platform. with the software base platform the end voter device is voters can use what they are comfortable with, an i paid.

it gives choice to the voters and government. >> kate, what are the fears that a lot of folks have expressed about electronic voting? is the lack of a paper trail. how do you settle those fears that human error or even vote rigging won't help steal an election. >> the joy for us in using the ipads is that we had a paper trail. the voter used the ipad to mark their ballot. the signal was sent to the printer and there was a paper trail. i'm a firm believer in make being sure we have a paper trail. i won my first race by seven votes. i want to make sure oregonians can watch a recount. >> how long before many more americans see electronic devices used and considering economy will cost be an issue as well? >> yes, actually. you'll see many, many more

voters using this platform immediately. we're working currently in colorado, washington and oregon, and countries throughout the world and in some cases voters are using a paper trail and the paper ballot is what is marked and in other cases it's fully electronic. the cost for using a software based platform is about half that of using the scanner types or the voting machines. >> kate brown, lauri steele, ladies thank you so much. appreciate your time. i'm craig melvin. thank you so much for watching. have a fantastic weekend. folks be sure to watch noon monday for the premier of "now with alex wagoner." up next, though, "andrea mitchell reports". [ crying ] [ applause ] [ laughs ] [ tires screech ] [ male announcer ] your life will have to flash by even faster.

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