that's a huge -- you know, thomas friedman visited cairo in the midst of the debate. we call it aura. he came in the office. an hour later he sweating and he said in a broken arabic -- [ speaking foreign language ] i think the guy was right. so these are the kinds of things we're facing in the short term. there are two conditions. and that's my final remark. there are two conditions for this program to work. and we're not kidding ourselves about it and we're not being naive. this is the kind of program that will not succeed because the party -- is it time to go? >> no. >> there are two conditions. the first condition is one of ownership. if we cannot get very significant segments of the egyptian institutions and egyptian society to own this this is why is we're appealing to the private sector to look at the situation favorably. to come and shoulder the enormous task because this is not the enormous task of the party. this is the enormous task of the revolution, the people. so on the one hand, we want partnership -- i mean ownership. on the other hand, we need a lot of

we'll talk with pulitzer prize winning author thomas friedman. >>> i'm gayle king. democratic pundit apologizes under pressure for saying that mitt romney's wife, a mother of five, never worked a day in her life. into the ongoing war for the women's vote. >>> and i'm erica hill. rushing into a burning home to save his neighbor. it happened last night. this morning he's out of the hospital and here to talk to us. >>> first as we do every morning, we begin with a look at today's eye-opener. your world in 90 seconds. >>> this has been a tragedy in the state of new hampshire this evening. >> a sleepy new england town is rocked after a standoff turns deadly. >> the city's police chief killed, four other officers injured. two in intensive care. >> he's eight days away from retirement. it's just not fair. >> it is no sputnik. >> north korea's long-range missile test ends in failure. >> moments after launch the missile crashed into the yellow sea. >> this is the new leader, by the way, of north korea. the future potentially rests in the hands of korean chaz bono. >>> and hi

so that can have an impact. >> well, that goes to thomas friedman's op-ed. >> "the new york times." man writes. after his mayoral term is over in 2013, bloomberg apparently will spend more time running his foundation. that's commendable. but the single greatest act of philanthropy he could do for the country is right now, run for president as an independent. at least long enough to participate in all the debates. if he doesn't, and this turns into a presidential race to the bottom, he could donate every dollar he has to fix things in america and they'd be wasted or more accurately overwhelmed by our mounting problems. the most patriotic thing bloomberg could do is become an unpaid lobbyist for the country and for the next generation of americans. >> well, there's time for him to get in still. the americans elect ticket. and i think that's a great idea. >> zero chance. >> why is that? >> because mike bloomberg, like most people who have made that amount of money, only wants to run for president if they think they can win. bloomberg has looked at this race in two consecutive races. his

columnist thomas friedman is here to talk about the impact of the country's embarrassing rocket failurewe'll also tackle a little politics with him. one of america's most famous mayors rushes into a burning building late last night to help rescue a woman from flames. this morning he is out of the hospital and is on his way to studio 57. he's going to tell us what happened. >> and gilt group changing the way people shop. the women behind the invitation only sales will be with us when we see you at 7:00. i love a good deal. i'm from new england. i'm kind of frugal. >> i'm guilty, too, erica. >> to show you that -- i never heard of it. i never heard of it. >> we should friend him on that one. >> i think we should. your world is about to change, mike. get ready. >> happy friday,er came. con-- erica. congratulations. more people are tuning in like we. >> reporter: we love to see you. thanks to you guys for helping make that happen. >>> maryland lawmakers couldn't come up with a budget deal before the end of the legislative session. now students in the state could wind up paying a good bit mo

they took thomas friedman's "from beirut to jerusalem" and so they bought a chapter from us and we thought "well, terrific, that is just wonderful, that is the best thing that could possibly happen for the book." then, within a few weeks they told us "guess what, we want it to be on the cover," and that was really stupendous. and we were surprised and delighted. i hope i'm not talking out of school to say this, i don't think i am, we had somewhat of a disagreement about the cover. the editor of the magazine, a very talented man named jimmy greenfield, had decided, having read this chapter, he wanted with the cartoon cutouts of president reagan that you see on the streets of washington. you still see reagan ones, now you see bush ones, you see jesse jackson, they were all over -- but we remember when they were new? he wanted me to pose on the street between a reagan and a bush cutout. and i thought "oh gee, that doesn't sound good. i don't think so." so we sort of tussled around a little bit. and we kind of thought we weren't going to be on the cover anymore after we said we didn't like tha

we'll talk now to thomas friedman, bestselling author, pulitzer prize winning author for "the new york times." you watch american politics closely. how do you size up what this is and what it says about the campaign and the way american politics work? >> this is the latest example of oh, my god, what did hilary rosen say today about women? i think what you see here is not that it wasn't an important point but when you have a close race like this that is so close, you need every vote particularly if you are in romney's case, 19 points behind on women. you're going to seize on anything. i think everyone knows the point hilary rosen was trying to make. this was a chance to jump on it. use it as a wedge issue. get more votes. it will be like this every day. >> you see this as an important race but a close race. >> hugely important but it's the way it's being fought. both guys are looking for 50.0001%. nobody is going big here. this is about the little issues unfortunately. >> let me turn to north korea. so what does north korea do now first of all and secondly, is the united states forced

that's a huge, you know, thomas friedman visited cairo in the midst of the debate whether we call it, and he came in the office an hour later. he sweating and he said in a broken arabic, said, [speaking in native tongue] i think the guy was right. so, the kinds of things we're facing in the short term. there are two conditions and that is my final remark. there are two conditions for this program to work. and we're not kidding ourselves about it and we're not being naive. this is, this is the kind of program that will not succeed because the party --. [laughing] is it time to go? >> no. >> there are two conditions. the first condition is one of ownership. if we can not get very significant segments of the egyptian institutions, institutions and egyptian society to own this plan, it will never work. it will never work. if we don't get very significant parts of the government bureaucracy to accept that. the private sector, this is why we're appealing to the private sector to look at the situation favorably. to come and shoulder the enormous task because this is not the enormous task of

i'm joined by tom friedman, "new york times" columnist, contributor to "time" magazine and author of the forthcoming biography thomas, jon meacham, harold ford and "new york times" columnist david brooks. welcome to all. tom friedman, let's begin with you. you just returned from new zealand. my first question should be why did you just return from new zealand? i would still be there but you have a good column out. let's read it. you talk about elephants down under, the days when there were liberal republicans and conservative democrats. we don't have compulsory voting, special interest money is out of control and we lack any credible third party that could capture enough of the senate to force democrats and raynes to compete for votes there. we've lost our abidiuy to do big, hard things together yet everything we have to do, tax reform, fiscal reform, health care reform, energy policy is big and hard and can only be done together. tom, you described this as dysfunctional. didn't this the past week where the president's key legislation appears to be on the verge to being overturned, doesn't this make us look even mor