while the president takes to the road to ensure that creating jobs is job number one the i'm john dickerson sitting in for gwen ifill tonight the >> there is no doubt in my mind we are the team that can't be beat for 2012! john: the big winner from the iowa straw poll and the loser the >> i'm going to be ending my campaign for president. john: and the new face in the race hits the campaign trail with a bang. >> it's time for america to believe again. time to believe that the promise of our future is far greater than even ore -- our best days behind us the john: plus the president takes his case to the people. >> i'll be putting forward a very specific plan to boost the economy and create jobs. john: but with trust in the ability of the administration to create jobs, will it make a difference? covering the issues this week, jeff zeleny of the "new york times," karen tumulty of the "washington post," alexis simendinger of realclearpolitics.com, and david wessel of "the wall street journal." >> covering -- award-winning reporting and analysis, covering history as it happens. live from our nati

for more insight let's go to washington and john dickerson. good evening. >> good evening. >> mitchell: politically speaking how tonight important is this speech president obama is set to make next month. >> it is important that the white house and government have to get on track. they have had a rough couple of weeks but the president has given a lot of speeches, what is more important that he maybe get

. >> reporter: john dickerson and norah o'donnell are on the campaign. texting incites mobs from london to san francisco. john blackstone reports on whether the cops should be allowed to cut off your cell phone service. and celia hatton on what happens when a billion chinese start eating like americans. captioning sponsored by cbs this is the "cbs evening news" with scott pelley. >> pelley: good evening. when the head of the world's largest retail chain sends up a caution flag, well, it certainly got our attention today. wal-mart stores account for more than 11% of this country's retail sales, but c.e.o. mike dukes says that his customers are stretched, struggling, and worried about jobs. it shows in wal-mart's second- quarter sales, down nine-tenths of one percent-- their ninth straight quarterly drop. and add the that another report out today that says sales at u.s. chain stores overall fell 1.5% last week, the third straight weekly decline. we asked jim axelrod to find out how a cutback in consumer spending is threatening the recovery. >> reporter: fro

for more analysis of the iowa straw poll and rick perry's announcement, we're joined by john dickerson who is also in ames. good evening. >> hey, russ. >> mitchell: what do you think this victory does for michele bachmann and who else should be celebrating tonight? >> what it does for bachmann is it shows she's a contender, not just that she's popular, that she can organize voters, get them to do what she needs them to do and that's an important second step but it also shows she can survive after taking a pretty strong set of hits from tim pawlenty. now she has to turn and show she can play in other states. >> mitchell: as you look at the board tonight, who should not be happy about these results? >> it was a bad night for tim pawlenty. his argument to the people he needs to write checks to keep his campaign going was that "i can focus on the voters in iowa, make the connection with them. if i can connect in iowa, i'll be able to connect in the country." he wasn't able to do that. it was a disappointing third-place finish. it will be hard for him to raise money now. >> mitchell: rick p

joining me now from iowa is cbs news political analyst john dickerson. and, john, we're given to understand from the white house that the president is going to have a lot to say after labor day. i wonder what you're hearing about that. >> well, the president is going to speak and he's going to make two pitches. he's going to offer an economic plan for the short term and the long term. in the short term it will be a set of specific proposals aimed at getting the economy going quickly. we've heard of some of the details in that proposal before. he's going to call for an extension of unemployment benefits. he's going to call for an extension of the payroll tax cut, and he's also going to offer some new things the white house says we haven't heard about before. >> pelley: john, we were just talking about the president's poll ratings with regard to leadership. i wonder if the white house is worried about that and if so, what they intend to do about it. >> they're very worried about that. they want to show the president is engaged with the number one issue that

for more insight let's go to washington and john dickerson. good evening. >> good evening. >> mitchell: politically speaking how tonight important is this speech president obama is set to make next month. >> it is important that the white house and government have to get on track. they have had a rough couple of weeks but the president has given a lot of speeches, what is more important that he maybe get results, that people are disappointed with his performance on the economy and start to feel something but with the economy the way it is now that might be very hard. the best the president can hope for with these new plans he's offering is to maybe have some kind of argue he can press in the november elections. >> mitchell: as we just heard, the republicans continue to hammer president obama on the economy. let me ask you, have any hopefuls come up with any specific economic plans as of yet? >> reporter: the republican contenders are mostly just offering broad theories. they don't have to get too specific. they want to keep their energy traine

. >> pelley: john dickerson is in iowa, he is our cbs news political analyst. john, i wonder, can rick perry do the kind of retail politics necessary to go forward? >> reporter: he seemed to be engaged in a marathon effort to prove just that today, slapping backs and reaching out to any voter who even looked at him. in a state that loves retail politics, this was a major show. and the texas security detail that surrounds him the ear pieces and the walkie-talkies make him look like he's already the nominee. this entourage is very good at working a room. if they saw a senior citizen or a veteran they would radio back to the governor and he would be directed to that voter so he could meet the voter but also so he could be seen meeting the voter by the media mob that's been following him. he was charming iowa voters today. in the coming weeks, he'll try to charm people into giving him money to build a national fund- raising organization. he's expected to be very good at doing that. >> pelley: john, how is he challenging bachmann and romney at this point? >> reporter

from ames, iowa, seen of last night's debate and tomorrow's straw poll are norah o'donnell and john dickersonith us. welcome back norah. >> good morning. >> i want to begin, norah, with the fact that rick perry is in and will be officially in as of this weekend. how big of a shadow did that last on last night's debate? >> well, i think it overshadows many of the candidates who were gathered here in iowa because rick perry is going to announce on saturday in south carolina, then he's going to travel to new hampshire, then he'll come here to iowa on sunday. and rick perry has a following with social conservatives who maybe have not found their candidate in this race, although many of them like michele bachmann. he has a fiscal record in terms of jobs in texas, and there are a lot of republican fund-raisers out there, money men and money women, who are looking for a candidate to get behind and rick perry may be that candidate. his entrance no doubt will shake up this race. >> john, what's your take in. >> i think norah's exactly right. he's also a powerful and dynamic candidate. republicans have