nobody bought anything today. >> so he gets in here -- >> another of augusto's employees who goes by the name of jay was being pistol whipped at the front door. now things are about to go from bad to worse. >> if jay didn't put up a fight, that guy would be standing right here with the guns, sooner or later they would have subdued jay. coldn't have -- i couldn't have done anything. >> because he left, you got to the gun? >> that's right. he made a mistake. >> a mistake that would cost him his life. left alone while the first robber went to help subdue jay, augusto reached for a gun he bought 20 years ago after he had been robbed at gun point. >> i mean, the kids have gun, oh, christ, they didn't fire, bye-bye gus. they were going to shoot me. >> what gus did next would change his life forever and the lives of four young men who would also make national headlines. a conflict between values that he wouldn't even time to reflect on, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not kill. >> i couldn't let them keep pistol whipping this kid down there, so i stepped out in the aisle and i watched jay

augusto is adamant he never wanted any trouble. a firm believer in a citizen's right to bear arms. >> the laws are too strict. all these people understand is brute force. they're not afraid of the police, they're not afraid of the law. on brute force. >> reporter: but despite his tough talk, augusto says he struggles every day with what he did. >> i'd do it again under the same circumstances but i feel lousy. it very hard to kill somebody. >> reporter: even, he says, someone who may have been trying to kill you. augusto says his son committed suicide several years ago and that he feels for the dead men's families. >> they got to feel lousy, i know that. it's very painful to lose a son. but i'll tell you, the pain i felt when my son died doesn't compare to the pain i felt when i had to kill those two boys. because my son, i didn't do it to him. here i had to do it to them. that feels worse. and until you do it, you're never going to know that. >> reporter: letters of support have come in for gus from all over and a local newspaper h

. >> and housing starts and permits rising in augusto their highest level since november. >> and good morning, everyone. i'm erin burnett. 30 minutes away from the opening bell. futures off of their highs. doesn't look like we have enough hiring. i want to emphasize the jobless claim are 130,000 off of their highs. >> yeah. >> you can't go from that many job losses to just job gains. at slow process. the bulls are going to try to keep that at the top of the agenda today to get their momentum back. dow is 200 points and change, 10,000. mark, do you remember the day we had the hats for 14? >> oh, yeah. >> yeah. >> i remember the hats for six. >> ten. >> seven, eight. interest right now as erin mentioned, a little weak. down the 210. call 2 1/2 below fair value. not a biggie. >> let's get to all the data. housing starts and the jobs numbers. steve liesman has more. steve? >> yeah, erin, i call it more gradual improvement on both fronts. jobless claims front and the housing front. we're going to look really in debt to some of these numbers but look at the overall numbers. claims were down

we saw the unemployment level take up in augusto 9.7%. we're getting color on where that happened. the number of states above that level remain steady at 16. we are seeing worsening trend. particularly out west. and michigan once again has the highest unemployment rate in the country. inching up to 15.2% with a loss of 22,000 jobs compared to a gain of 38,000 in july. the good news is that unemployment is stable. but at 15% for three months now, the state hasn't experienced that kind of level of unemployment since 1982 for that long a period. detroit's unemployment now above 17%. take out the unusual auto restructuring and state officials say august job losses were closer to 10,000. july's gains were skewed because of the cash for clunkers seeing a lot of auto workers called back to work. from april through august, michigan lost 34,000 manufacturing jobs, compared to 9,000 last year. minnesota saw its unemployment drop a tenth to 8% in august. but after seeing its first job gains in july, it gave back those 10,000 plus jobs last month. 8 out of 11 employment sectors saw losses. the

we have removed american combat brigades from iraqi cities and set a deadline of next augusto remove all our combat brigading from iraqi territory. and i have made clear that we will help iraqis transition to full responsibility for their future and keep our commitment to remove all american troops by the end of to 2011. i have outlined a comprehensive agenda to seek the goal of worlds without nuclear weapons. in moscow, the united states and russia announced that we would pursue substantial reductions in our strategic warheads and launchers. at the conference on disarmament we agreed on a work plan to negotiate an end to production of materials for nuclear weapons. and this week, my secretary of state will become the first senior american representative to the annual members conference of the comp p comprehensive test band treaty. i appointed a special envoy to middle east peace. america has worked to advance the cause of two states, israel and palastine where their rights are respected, to con front climate change we have invested $80 billion in clean energy, we have substantially