plus, analysis from ruth marcus and william kristol. >> woodruff: then, we examine the obama administration's record on climate change as former vice president al gore criticizes the president's failure to take bold action on global warming. >> ifill: from rhode island, paul solman reports on the risk to retirees and taxpayers alike when billions of dollars from state pension funds are tied up in the stock market. >> we'd be asking people, do you want to pay higher taxes in order to avoid taking the risk in the stock market? i think most people would say no to that. >> woodruff: and we continue our collaboration with "the economist" magazine to highlight the art of filmmaking. tonight, jeffrey brown talks to "my perestroika" director robin hessman about children growing up as the soviet union fell apart. >> for every individual, it was a complicated process and still is today. there are many conflicting feelings on the changes and the effects of those changes on their everyday lives. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by

we're joined by the "washington post's" ruth marcus who is a lawyer and plays one. >> that's about all do these days. >> ruth, you wrote and got a lot of people sort of raising eyebrows because you wrote memorably that edwards may be pond scum -- >> that's a technical legal term. >> right. pond scum, but that doesn't mean he's guilty of violating campaign -- you're saying basically this may not -- it is not just that it may not be winnable, it may not be a smart case. why? >> well, a few things. the campaign finance laws are very complicated. and if you run afoul of them, usually the remedy is the federal election commission brings a civil case against you and it finds your campaign and you might have to pay a lot of money from your campaign. if you've done something really, really bad, federal prosecutors can step in and they can bring a criminal case against you. but they have to prove that you acted knowingly and willfully. so that's why you saw john edwards saying, i never, ever thought i was breaking the law. and he's got a pretty good basis in my view for saying that. because thi

. >> brown: for more, we now turn to "washington post" columnist ruth marcus. i said a bizarre story. he was under pressure for a week here denying what led to today's confession. >> there's a conservative blogger named andrew brightbar. we've discussed him before in the context of the campaign season last year. he posted early today some additional photos, not the photo that anthony weiner was just talking about there which he fully admit to sending last week but different photos with a different woman, explicit photos bare chested that were emailed out to somebody. what's also happening, jeff, today is that some of the women who were on the receiving end of these messages started coming forward to start talking publicly about this. it was kind of crashing around him. his lie about not sending these messages or his account being hacked wasn't holding up anymore so he felt compelled to come out. >> brown: he decided this was only going to get worse. >> he had to come clean. >> brown: that was quite a queen. 45 minutes or so of many questions he stood there answ

that's what ruth marcus asked in "the washington post." what is it?e some connection between power, intriguement of women and anonymous sex. rachel maddow did the chart on the number of politicians. i mean, that to me is a story most people i know are really focusing on. >> radar's editor told me they didn't pay a dime for those messages. but, you know, since you brought up breitbart, let me play a clip of him on the "today" show talking about this one picture that he did not release, and we'll pick it up on the other side. >> you have also said that you have another image. and you've described it as x-rated. under no circumstance will you release that, in other words, let's say anthony weiner supporters talk to you. >> if anthony weiner decides to make this a jihad against me for his interpretation of putting me into this situation, you know what? i'll take that as, you know, you said an insurance policy. >> does that sound like a threat to you, amy holmes? >> well, certainly it was a challenge to anthony weiner. and let's not forget that the congres