welcome back to weekends wi"wee alex witt". it's time for the big three. me now, washington post reporter, anne kornblut, and armstrong williams and msnbc analyst, former dnc communications director, karen finney. welcome to all of you. >> good morning. >> guys, first we'll go to the tale of two pictures. look at this. arizona governor jan brewer infamous finger pointing in the face of president obama on wednesday. a few days later, president obama sitting in the oval office with former president george h.w. bush and his son, former governor, jeb bush. armstrong, don't the two pictures illustrate the current split in the republican party? what's your take in. >> i could not imagine that, alex. listen, on governor brewer, she was expressing herself to the p. the president felt she was not cordial to him in her book. it's a way of her expressing herself. she is a governor who is a woman, can get away at wagging her finger. something that can happen. if it would have been a guy, it's a different story. if it was body language, she was making her point and she

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welcome to "weekends with alex wi witt." with just three days to go to the new hampshire primary, a crucial 24 hours ahead for the gop presidential candidates with two debates back-to-back. we'll go right to manchester, new hampshire, ron mott is standing by with us. a good saturday morning to you, these candidates are squeezing in a wee bit campaign time before back-to-back debates, right? >> reporter: good morning to you. just south of manchester in derry. you can see mitt romney's bus behind me. he's well ahead in the polls here but as he's speaking to this crowd here, he's reminding them polls are polls, elections are elections. he's trying to get people out on tuesday. meantime, it's a full speed race to the finish. breakfast in south carolina. spaghetti dinner in new hampshire. mitt romney is feasting on promising poll numbers in both states, hammering president obama friday even as the nation's unemployment rate fell to a near three-year low. >> i'm sure the president wants to take credit for it, for any improvement.

you're watching weekends alex witt. we'll be right back. wake up!e style. hmmm. for half the calories plus veggie nutrition. could've had a v8. >>> we are following this breaking news this morning. penn state college football coach joe paterno has died. paterno died this morning after suffering a series of complications related to treatment for lung cancer. nbc's michelle franzen has the latest from state college. michelle, with a good sunday morning to you. what's the reaction to this news around the campus? >> certainly, as soon as the news, alex, came around in the last few days that joe paterno's health was deteriorating, many of the students gathered around that statue at the stadium of joe paterno leaving flowers and certainly praying in that area. tonight they're expected to hold a vigil in that very spot. of course, joe paternos, the heart and soul of penn state. many say the most important part of the paterno family according to their family's statement this morning releasing a statement saying it is with great sadness that we announce that

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>> welcome to "weekends with alex witt." we are going to size up the candidates ahead of the new hampshire primary. the attacks started early with them wasting no time at all going after mitt romney, questioning whether he could beat obama in the election. >> a bold reagan conservative with a very strong economic plan is a lot more likely to succeed in that campaign than a relatively massachusetts moderate. >> if you didn't want to stand before the people of massachusetts -- >> i went to massachusetts to make a difference. i didn't go there for a political rcareer, running time and time again. it would be about me. i was trying to get the help in the state the best way that i could. you have the opportunity to use the experience that i have. >> still, it's my time, and are you going to tell people you are not -- >> rick? rick? it's still my time. >> i am just asking. >> former u.s. ambassador to china, jon huntsman made comments. >> he criticized me while he was out raising money for serving my country, yes, under a democrat

i'm alex witt.ingrich and the latest poll. romney leads gingrich 42-27%. rick santorum third with 16%. ron paul is in last place now with 11%. rough waters suspended the search effort and plans to remove fuel from the submerged costa concordia ship. officials say there is no risk of it sinking. i'm alex witt. more news coming up. >>> in november 2001 when american airlines flight 587 crashes into a queens residential area, the scars from 911 are still very raw. >> the industry was recovering. traffic was down. people were apprehensive. it was a period of time after 40 years of being in the industry that i have never seen before or since. >> i see the plane. elgin fall down. >> two months after the attack, another plane is down. and at first, an act of terrorism is feared. >> we have put the city on high alert. we have closed certain things down just to make sure we find out what this is all about. >> former inspector general followed the investigation. >> that was everybody's first thought. there we

i'm alex witt.he gop presidential contenders are all in new hampshire today ahead of tuesday's primary. they'll go head to head twice in the next 24 hours in two separate debates, including sunday morning's "meet the press" debate which can be seen right here on msnbc. >>> and drama on the high seas came to an end when a u.s. navy destroyer helped free iranian fishermen who were being held by pirates. i'm alex witt. see you in an hour. >>> in march 2003, a "dateline" team is in the middle of an undercover operation with a human rights group, the international justice mission, which is trying to rescue these child sex slaves. the pimps believe the investigators are organizing a sex party and have agreed to take the kids outside the village to a house where the party is supposed to be held. what they don't know is the cambodian police will be waiting for them. >> you're my girl. okay. >> at first, everything seems on track. >> i've got five now. >> then suddenly, the pimps change their mind and won't

i'm alex witt with.e news in an hour. >>> timothy wicks, a 48-year-old house painter and part-time drummer left mill walk ney 2001 telling friends he was headed to canada for a full-time nighttime gig. when nobody heard from wicks police opened a missing persons case. soon they discovered another man was living under timothy wicks' name in fargo, north dakota and that man was wanted for embezzlement. the problem is police couldn't find him either. back in wisconsin, detective ben schoonover had a hunch. the fargo embezzler pretending to be tim wicks is really dennis gaede. a search of wicks' apartment turns up a tax return that is signed at the bottom by the preparer, dennis gaede. >> my gut is telling me that tim is dead, but we can't prove it, we don't have a body, we don't know. >> then the police tell it, wrapped out the details of a grisly discovery on the side of the road. on the upper michigan side, the detective had a feeling. gene maxwell and jeff paridon, who knew dennis gaede as tim wicks, men

we're talking about that next here on weekend with alex witt. folks who gets heartburn and then treats day after day... well that's like checking on your burgers after they're burnt! [ male announcer ] treat your frequent heartburn by blocking the acid with prilosec otc. and don't get heartburn in the first place! [ male announcer ] one pill a day. 24 hours. zero heartburn. >>> president obama's pushing for a new tax on the richest americans. in his state of the union, the president said the so-called buffett tax is about fairness. >> when americans talk about folks like me paying their fair share of taxes, it's not because they envy the rich. you can call this class warfare all you want, but asking a billionaire to pay at least as much his secretary in taxes, most americans would call that common sense. >> joining me from washington, annie lowry. >> thanks for having me, alex. >> i know you wrote this this week, the president's idea to tax the rich more faces tough realities. >> so, essentially, we found despite the fact that democrats very muc

coming up next is "weekends with alex witt".s "up" will only be on for an hour. we'll have lin-manual miranda. you can get more information on twitter. see you tomorrow. ut without my . are you crazy? i want to look natural, not naked! but all you need is 3. lashblast for volume, outlast -- for kissing... simply ageless to help you look easy breezy beautiful covergirl. [ slap! ] [ slap! slap! slap! slap! ] ow, ow! [ male announcer ] your favorite foods fighting you? fight back fast with tums. calcium rich tums goes to work in seconds. nothing works faster. ♪ tum ta tum tum tums ♪

coming up next is "weekends with alex witt."have new york attorney general iraq schneiderman and representative steve cohen and mikeaisey. really special show in store tomorrow. find out even more about tomorrow's program at msnbc.com. thank you so much and thanks for getting up. [ male announcer ] feeling like a shadow of your former self? c'mon, michael! get in the game! [ male announcer ] don't have the hops for hoops with your buddies? lost your appetite for romance? and your mood is on its way down. you might not just be getting older. you might have a treatable condition called low testosterone or low t. millions of men, forty-five or older, may have low t. so talk to your doctor about low t. hey, michael! [ male announcer ] and step out of the shadows. hi! how are you? [ male announcer ] learn more at isitlowt.com. [ laughs ] hey! mid gradere you? dark roast forest fresh full tank brain freeze cake donettes rolling hot dogs bag of ice anti-freeze wash and dry diesel self-serve fix a flat jumper cables 5% cashback right no

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coming up next is "weekends with alex witt."carolina republican presidential primary. join us tomorrow sunday morning at 8:00 for full analysis of the results. melissa harris-perry will be back and joined by eliot spitzer and david stockman. we have a great show coming up tomorrow. you can find more info online tow following website. see you tomorrow. thanks for getting up! this is an rc robotic claw. my high school science teacher made me what i am today. our science teacher helped us build it. ♪ now i'm a geologist at chevron, and i get to help science teachers. it has four servo motors and a wireless microcontroller. over the last three years we've put nearly 100 million dollars into american education. that's thousands of kids learning to love science. ♪ isn't that cool? and that's pretty cool. ♪ the calcium they take because they don't take it with food. switch to citracal maximum plus d. it's the only calcium supplement that can be taken with or without food. that's why my doctor recommends citracal maximum. it's all about

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. >>> i'm alex witt.oll numbers show mitt romney opening up some daylight in the sunshine state and the poll shows the former governor leading newt gingrich 42-27%. rick is an tore sum thiantorum third. iran maintains nuclear interests are only for power and medical research. i will see you in one hour with more news. >>> when any structural element of an airplane fails, the result can be fatal. a 747 has a cargo door blown out in mid flight. the decompression is so powerful it sucks two rows of seats and nine passengers out of the plane in a split second. >> this was taken from row 17 aisle seat. >> this video shot by bruce lambert two weeks after the fatal accident documents the aftermath of united airlines flight 811. investigators immediately know the problem centers on the cargo door. they can tell from the gaping hole where it used to be. the key question, why did it explode open, plummeting to the pacific ocean below? but the key piece investigators would like to examine, the cargo door itself, is

i'm alex witt and we will have more news later. >>> helen brach, heir to the brach candy fortune, maydown by her suitor, richard bailey, an admitted swindler, serving a 30-year sentence for conspiring to kill her. >> this is a misuse of the justice system. this is wrong. >> one of the lawyers who appealed his sentence is joanne wolfson with a reputation of taking on lost causes. the appeal was denied. but she says stephen miller is no sherlock holmes. she said bailey was an easy target. >> he didn't solve anything. there's no solution here. no, there isn't. he said i pick you. you are a bad man. you're a bad man, you're a bad man times ten. therefore, you killed. >> did you kill helen brach? >> definitely not. >> meet richard bailey. do you know who did? >> no. >> the man stephen miller called a truly evil man and a master criminal. >> stephen miller is out to get you, whether you are innocent or guilty makes no difference whatsoever. i mean, he wants to go to the top of the totem pole and put an extra notch in his belt. >> getting you is a feather in the cap? >> right. i'm the only o

i'm alex witt. a new poll shows mitt romney has a lead among hispanic republicans in florida. news poll shows 35% would vote for romney. 21% would say gingrich is their choice. santorum received % and ron paul received 6%. they make up 10% of the republicans likely to vote in tuesday's primary. for all of this and our political coverage, but for now we'll take you to the d documentary mystery "double lives." >>> for a year and a half medical city hospital in dallas, texas, has been home to conjoined twins ahmed and mohamed. it's june 2002 when they arrive from cairo with a dedicated medical team. here in dallas doctors not only question how to separate the twins without sacrificing one for the other, but they also must face the ethical question. should they? is it really the right thing to do? >> we are dealing with something unprecedented. >> in the fall of 2002 the doctors and family decide it is the right thing to do, there will be an operation, they will do it. but now the task, and it is immense. in ahmed and mohamed's case there is some good news. though the boys' brains

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i'm alex witt. 70 people are missing after an italian crews ship ran ashore off the coast of tuscany.belly of the ship. three bodies have been recovered. >>> a federal judge has refused to add candidates to the gop primary ballot. only mitt romney and ron paul will appear on that ballot in march for that primary. >>> now back to the "mystery at pictured rocks." and i'll see you in an hour. ♪ >>> nearly two years had passed since juanita richardson's mysterious fatal plunge from that wind-swept cliff at pictured rocks. two years of questions. did she fall? could she have committed suicide? or did her husband tom somehow force her off that cliff 140 feet to the rocky shore below? what terrible thing happened at their honeymoon spot? >> all rise. >> now tom's trial would begin, and each side in the courtroom thought they knew the answers. on one side, tom and juanita's three kids firmly convinced their dad didn't kill their mom. on the other side, juanita's parents and sister, equally certain of tom's guilt. with no eyewitnesses, prosecutor karen barhmann's case would have to focus on to

welcome to "weekend with alex witt." it is noon in the east and 9:00 in the west. football coach joe paterno has died. the gridiron legend lost his battle with lung cancer earlier this morning. he was ve correspondent michael isikoff joining from us washington bureau. another good morning to you, michael. good day rather. >> good morning. good afternoon. >> so tell me, you spent so much time there on that campus investigating everything, the investigation following all the allegations of child sex abuse from members of his football staff. talk to me about the joe paterno you uncovered and the reaction of students and people on that campus. >> well, first of all, one of the really striking things having been there throughout the whole jerry sandusky scandal is just how much support and irreverence there was fordown and among the students and faculty. many of whom were so stunned by the clis closures in the scandal because it didn't match with the joe paterno they knew, somebody that had high academic standards and cared about the institution of penn state as well as

i'm alex witt.people may be missing from a sinking cruise ship off the coast of tuscany. crew members search the inner cabins fearing that all of the unaccounted for may have been trapped inside. crews have recovered three body ps. a hole was ripped in the ship's hull when it unexpectedly ran aground. the cost of that incident is under investigation. i'll have more news in one hour. >>> again, because it sounds bad doesn't mean it is bad. it's a classic situation of kind of lightning striking twice. >> ken creamer's defense attorney had a problem. the story was just so improbable. a man shoots the love of his life with a crossbow twice and claims each time it was nothing more than a freak accident. true, it's up to the state to prove guilt, but as everybody knows, lightning hardly ever strikes twice. could any defense pass the laugh test? well, maybe. for one thing, said the defense, it would demonstrate in court that the firearm's expert was wrong, that the creamer's weapon could fire by accident.

i'm alex witt. a fast and furious weekend in the race for the republican presidential nomination.emaining candidates stumping hard in new hampshire ahead of tuesday's primary. they'll have a chance to go head to head in two separate debates. and president obama touted the drop in unemployment in his radio address. he said there are a lot of people that are still hurting but we are starting to rebound. more news later. we'll see you in an hour. >>> i've never seen violence like this. >> the detective had found the missing tara grant. but only a part of her. just the woman's torso in a plastic storage bin inside the garage of the home she shared with her husband and two children. alicia, tara's sister, returned to her home in ohio by the time the awful discovery was made. >> my phone rang about 11:00 p.m. and it was sheriff hackel. he said, alicia, do you feel like steve would ever harm you? >> the sheriff didn't tell alicia that they found her sister, but he was concerned for her well-being because grant was on the loose. he insisted she come back to michigan immediately. >> i said

here's thomas robert in for alex witt. next tuesday and of course next weekend here on "up." this was the gulf's best tourism season in years. all because so many people wanted to visit us... in louisiana. they came to see us in florida... nice try, they came to hang out with us in alabama... once folks heard mississippi had the welcome sign out, they couldn't wait to get here. this year was great but next year's gonna be even better. and anyone who knows the gulf knows that winter is primetime fun time. the sun's out and the water's beautiful. you can go deep sea fishing for amberjack, grouper and mackerel. our golf courses are open. our bed and breakfast have special rates. and migrating waterfowl from all over make this a bird watcher's paradise. so if you missed it earlier this year, come on down. if you've already been here come on back... to mississippi... florida... louisiana... alabama. the gulf's america's get-a-way spot no matter where you go. so come on down and help make 2012 an even better year for tourism on

our coverage continues in a moment with alex witt. [ male announcer ] the more you lose, the more youn help you lose one more by blocking some of the fat you eat. let's fight fat with alli. ♪ let's fight fat with alli. when bp made a commitment to the gulf, we knew it would take time, but we were determined to see it through. today, while our work continues, i want to update you on the progress: bp has set aside 20 billion dollars to fund economic and environmental recovery. we're paying for all spill- related clean-up costs. and we've established a 500 million dollar fund so independent scientists can study the gulf's wildlife and environment for ten years. thousands of environmental samples from across the gulf have been analyzed by independent labs under the direction of the us coast guard. i'm glad to report all beaches and waters are open for everyone to enjoy. and the economy is showing progress with many areas on the gulf coast having their best tourism seasons in years. i was born here, i'm still here and so is bp. we're committed to the gulf for everyone who loves it, and eve

coming up next is weekends with alex witt. join us tomorrow morning.olitics and his record. what he did and whether he was held account and whether he can find redemption or ask for forgiveness. until then, stay up-to-date with us at facebook and up with chris. see you tomorrow. thanks for getting up. i had enough of feeling embarrassed about my skin. [ designer ] enough of just covering up my moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. i decided enough is enough. ♪ [ spa lady ] i started enbrel. it's clinically proven to provide clearer skin. [ rv guy ] enbrel may not work for everyone -- and may not clear you completely, but for many, it gets skin clearer fast, within 2 months, and keeps it clearer up to 9 months. [ male announcer ] because enbrel suppresses your immune system, it may lower your ability to fight infections. serious, sometimes fatal, events including infections, tuberculosis, lymphoma, other cancers, . before starting enbrel, your doctor should test you for tuberculosis and discuss whether you've been to a region where certain fungal infecti