when icomes to the recession and america'debt levels, do we have too much or not eugh? night's "two ways to play" says it depends on how y see it. here'sevin depew of minyville, and minyanville's kevin depew. >> evewhere we turn these days, we're bombardewith the same message-- namy, that there's o much debt. there are entire telision shows devod to this theme, and even seminars that, ironical, chge you an arm and a leg to explain exacy why you have too much debt. that's theonventional wisdom. but if we look at e u.s. debt load in a global ctext, where the u.s. is only aut a quarter of g.d.p., were acally under- leveged. keep in mind our return on assets is highour interest rates very low, and our ability to borrow d service bt is much greater than current levels if anything, we don't haveoo much debt; we ve too little. >> i disagree. wh is important is lending for productive reasons for example, if someone we to invent airaculously cheap way to produce energ but it needed a vastmount of financing to implemen in the long run, it could be worth the irease in debt because

the dolphins at the clearwater marin aquarium, they don't shy ay from a challenge, even when icomes to painting. th use their teeth to clutch this brush and nod their head to draw. it's not just the hangup isome gallery. it's alsooing to a good cause. creatns are sold to raise money forids with cancer. that is pretty cool. >> paint brush looks like a stick of dynate. >> well, i haven't checked my art supply store lately to see if they have any dolphin adapters for paint brushes. >> anything for fish. >> i'm dan kloeffler, and this is "earlytoday," just you first stop of the day tod >>> our time right now is 4:54 on this september 11th, 2009. 63 degrees here in the nation's capital. looks like cloudy skies. actually some rain around the region. getting a little drizzle right here in northwest washington. good morning. welcome to "news 4 today." i'm joe krebs. >> and i'm eun yang in for barbara harrison today. it is, again, 4:55 a.m., 63 degrees. meteorologist tom kierein's in the studio with us and he'll give us an update on the forecast. going to have rain all day? >> it's the thing th

national, 86 degrees and dulles, 88 again and bp -- bwi, and till isn't 80s and have a weak front that icominghrough and eventually, that will drop the temperatures down and that front will be moving later tonight and keep the clouds around. it will drop our temperatures into the 60s in the district and it will be around 68 degrees. tomorrow, very little sunshine. breaks of sun here and there and not like today. a cooler day, spotty showers, 74 degrees because of the northeast wind that will be kicking in. the max hd satellite and radar, we have not seen much in terps of showers. there are one or two things and a lot more rain to see through the ohio valley and then we get into the lower mississippi valley, some of the areas. atlanta's not one of them. atlanta is getting a little bit of light rain and may get had some heavier rain into saturday and thankfully the flood waters have know receding. the max hd future cast shows us the clouds earn. we go through friday, mostly dry and notice at 6:00, i'm pausing this. some showers through central and southwestern virginia, most of saturday starts o

>> now, here's another one that now is covered in sports pages and, in fact, after "carson daly," icomesafter dark." if you go to the nbc sports website, there's poker news alongside the baetball andhe seba andhe football. >> jimmy: is that a sport? >> edently. and i'maying to myself, "bottom of the ninth, game seven of the world sies. fourth and goal, last minute of thsuper bow some sketchy guy in a members ly jacket trying to complete a flush in a game of texas hold 'em. which o is it?" [ lauger ] >> jiy: i got to go with the members only jacket guy. >> you ever see these guys, about 3:00 in the morning? >> jimmy: the costumes are just getting ridiculous. looks li an elton john concert. [ laughter ] there's like a guy dressed as donald duc-- and it is bizarre but, i mean, you're such a lege. do peoe recognize you all the time and go, "oh, my god, it is bob costas." when you talk? >> well, sometimes. sometimes, people will say, "i didn't recognize you until you began to speak." and then, sometimes, you get these very strge circumstances. and i swear to you, i ear on my life, this actual

whole idea whi is one thi about jewish histo is people s ll, the guy in times square says the world icomingto an end and jews realize the world has come to an end many, many times before and t problem is the world after it ends kps gog and you have to figure out how to live in it. >> rose: israel is real, an obsessive... you cho that word too? >> ielt like writing the bk was obsessive and i felt it was like a little bit of gonzo history of israel. >> rose: "on obsessive quest to understand the jewishation d its history." rich cohen, thank you. >> thank you. >> rose: thank you for joining us. see you next time. ptioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by mediaccess group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

presidentbama's victy over john mccain was substantial wh it came to the ectoral college and substantial when icomes to the stanrds of modern presidencies but itas 53%, 54% of the vote. it was not a clobbering 60/40 landslide like rald reagan had. thnation is essentially, they say, a 45/45 nation with 10% between and things are going t stay tt way for a whe. i think that ey do take comfort in the fact that they have had bad days befo, whher it's the reverend wright episode or wh they were losg to john mccain after... or it appeared likthey could lose to john mccain. ether it was two years before where we are now, where it loed like everybody was saying you know, rack obama, that was all pe, he certaly hasn't come alive on theampaign trail, he's inhird place in iowa. they loo back atog ds sand say "we've been here before, we can turn this around now, of course, turning things around as a candidate to win 100,000votes in iowa is... comparedo the task hand small because, of cour, now theye trying to remake one-sixth of the economy in a way by revamping and reforming the nation's health care system. but