have to be married, have children, get a college degree, own a home -- those have all gone by the wayside. now it's much more meaning over materialism, instead of financial success it's about having a financial safety net. and instead of a nuclear family, it's about broader social relationships. >> interesting. >> i think also, it's really a new do it yourself american dream. >> but it is an american dream. >> oh, t is. it's alive and well and it's important to americans of all ages. >> what do you think of beth's answer? >> i think beth is fascinating and i agree with her. it's interesting i think -- it's become a cliche to talk about the internet, but it has brought about more individualism and more individual abilities. to me the american dream in one word is opportunity. that's what has kept most people want to go get into this country, than wanting to leave. and like pat said, it's not a question of you having guaranteed results but you have the opportunity to succeed if you work hard and get ahead. much of our politics is shaped by whether or not that dream is really alive for peopl

. >> perry fall bine the wayside bachmann running by the wayside. christie is not running. the only one that could go against obama is christie. >> i think that 55 percent, i hope that actually translates as a conservative. it reflects widespread discontentment and disappointment. economic policies haven't worked it took a bad situation and made it worse. i also think that this reflects the state of the economy. a year is an eternity in politics. they can be an teernity. >> i don't buy that. i disagree with you on you'll that. with all of the primaries we are really on the train here. it's roaring down the track. the reason christie didn't run. number one he didn't want to lie to constituents to say what do i have to commit suicide? people told him i have inside information. you can't set up your organization state by state. >> you can't. >> what i am saying is does the situation go internally domestically in the united states. whether it's the economy or something else it's an external event that could turn around eat con me. >> given the oppressive suffocating economic po

. >> as gingrich's pledge fell by the wayside. >> all i would say, mitt, if you want to run a negative campaign and you want to attack people, at least be man enough to own it. that's your staff and that's your organization. those are your millionaire friends paying for it let's be clear. i'm willing to fight for real job creation, with a real reagan camp style job creation program. you are a moderate massachusetts republican, who, in fact, is very timid about job creation. let's get it on together and let's compare our two plans. >> gingrich also went after ron paul when asked about paul's attack ads against gingrich, he questioned his credibility slamming him for the racist news letters sent under his name in the 1990s. >> you look at ron paul's total record of systemic avoidance of reality, you look att ethe ads >> if you were to get the republican nomination -- >> he won't. >> if he were, could you vote for him? >> no. if someone says i don't care if israel is destroyed, i don't care if the iranians get a nuclear weapon? it's difficult to see how you would engage in dealing with ro

the rhetoric about whether it is good about falls by the wayside because we just don't have the money to keep them maintained in the way they should be. ha ha turf fields do not suffer the problem. i travel all over the united states, everywhere in this country, cities, counties, school districts, colleges, they are turning their fields over to synthetic surface. because it has been proven to them that it works. it saves money in the problems down the line. the estimate of eight to 10 years for a replacement for a field is not true. haven't gotten to the limit yet of how long these fields will last. portland, oregon has one of the most synthetic surface fields put in. the university of their plays their, and that is over 15 years old. i can guarantee you is not in as bad a shape and it is not ready to be replaced. >> i am a resident of the marina and a part of an endangered species. in-native san franciscan. my wife is native end of my kids are natives. we have decided to stay here. we all about the exodus of families and there are two things that are sort of the main drivers behind t

they just fall to the wayside. >> reporter: hope's bandmates on this day include tenor sax fred staten who at 96 was born before the jazz age. the jazz foundation doesn't only pay for play. it helps musicians with just about anything from rent to groceries to arranging free medical care, crucial support for a group often paid little over the years with no safety net as they aged. >> the jazz foundation is like the rescuer, like the fire department. >> reporter: funding comes from private donations. >> this is repayment. this is the one charity i know where you're giving back to people who made the world beautiful. ♪ >> reporter: giving musicians a new life and keeping an american art form alive. mara schiavocampo, nbc news, new york. >> very nice. that's "nbc nightly news" for this saturday. i'm lester holt reporting from new york. i'll see you tomorrow morning on "today" and right back here tomorrow evening. we leave you tonight with a live look at the rockefeller center christmas tree. lots of crowds packed into the plaza to see it all lit up. we hope you have a good night, everyone.

many months now, and we have seen the other alternatives to romney hit their peak cent fall by the wayside. still, a large chunk of voters do not know who they will vote for. >> there we talk about herman cain and his problems? more the issue, the private life affect public life, or should it? >> should it is the real question. it is an issue of judgment. that is what we all have to consider. >> i grew up in a time when all sorts of shenanigans were going on. everybody knew about them but no one thought to write about them. you would not publish them, you would not have gotten them any more stories than you had. the editor of "the washington post," ben bradley, a truly remarkable man, clearly, because he was tso close to jack kennedy, would have known about jack kennedy's central proclivity -- sexual proclivity. >> it is not a very good story. it seems to now be a question of when he might be done. >> there is a serious question that arises. if we have, and it is we in the media who largely apply this bulletproof scrutiny to private lives, do we deny the nation a lot of talent and leadersh

pakistan's border foreign policy on this one of them thinks america is planning to leave pakistan by the wayside. i think what's happened is that the united states has made some decisions about its strategy in the region both in central asia and in the south in south asia that essentially is going to cut pakistan out of the formula and i don't think united states cure is very much what's going to happen after withdraws its troops in two thousand and fourteen and i think they would rather not do withdraw their troops which is the nub of the problem because just on november second russia china iran and pakistan had a meeting in istanbul which they all agree that they would pressure the united states not to leave troops in afghanistan and i find it very difficult to imagine if this fallout in relations between pakistan and the united states is not somehow try to that position another area of u.s. interest is also facing increasing diplomatic isolation iran is warning against new washington back sanctions over its nuclear program with a target on exports and says they may more than double fuel price

but along the way, somehow, product safety, product quality has fallen by the wayside, and that can only happen because of a culture, a culture that starts at the very, very top under weldon, that i think is damaging the brand. >> tom: professor you can say at least those three companies remain in business. john corzine was the c.e.o. of m.f. global. that company had a spectacular collapse around halloween. lots of mistakes to go along with there. in fact, prosecutors are still sorting it out here. but this guy was a public policy leader as a senator former governor and also a business leader, at least up until the last couple of months. >> he created, past tense, a culture that was very heavily focused on risk taking. the irony is that despite that, in a post-2008 financial crisis world you have to expect the regulators to kick the tires more than they did a few years ago and they did and corzine should have been smart enough to know that was a very high-probability event that would happen. >> tom: a list of mistakes, some spectacular, some forgettable and regrettable. sydney finkelstei

gasp efforts to try to keep a failing system afloat and of course a lot of people are falling by the wayside people are getting fired those people who are newly fired nearly let go of these banks and bankers brokerages where they end up do they join the picket line historically what happens is when the middle class starts to rise up that's when you have fertile ground for every change we saw this throughout history the the poorer classes the lower classes they don't necessarily have what it takes to overthrow a government but when the middle class is thrown to the street they have what it takes to overthrow a government and quite frankly i mean that what i see in the united states is just that i think this is a turning what i saw the entire white house surrounded recently by environmental activists you know that's a pretty strong statement and this is only getting more. intense not max is that why you're not in the u.s. dare i ask i mean you do your show how to have parents i believe. well stacy herbert we do or shows that our films and we go where the action is you know when we started maki

bargaining chip between everything else that both parties want to get done and gets thrown by the wayside and you get these ridiculous inane conversations we just have this conversation about are we going to start down the government can we extend the payroll tax cut in so for a few months ago and all that happened when it was punted down the road whereas yes when you look at a tarp bill you get agreement within a period of days and as you just pointed out it's no secret that congressmen spend a great deal of time raising money because that is where they get their campaign funds from these big donors so how does this system influence the priorities of our elected leaders and with this essentially who do they really represent. so those are they represent the money rather than the votes and the way they look at is the corporate contributors who pay them the money to raise in their campaign situations are supposed to be about getting votes about getting their messages heard that's why else would you be raising money technically for a campaign but that isn't what happened what the money gets

position for a long time are we going to end up with a situation where when they all fall by the wayside mitt romney will simply say to the koch brothers. i'll take your money i'll take your crazy positions and he'll be their guy i mean i think he would like to be certainly i don't know if they'll take him is the question why are they not i mean he seems like only to change his mind on the drop ahead he did today i think they still don't that's how he got on the payroll tax he switched i think they still like most of the a lot of republican voters they still just don't trust him they don't know who he is there's a poll out today from pew asking republican voters who would be most acceptable to them and gingrich this you know crazy polarizing figure was more acceptable than romney to republican voters so i actually think gingrich has a really good shot of the nomination right now absolutely alex thanks so much for being with us thanks for me great to have you with us i say let trump moderate his own debate but i don't think it should be in iowa i know perfectly ok sure first of all just c

almost all of them have gone by the wayside. i have a friend named tom juno, one of the best magazine writers in america, worked for esquire, and we were talking recently about a couple of story ideas and i said, gee, that might be in egypt -- in interesting thing for me to do for esquire. and he said they are not hiring in the house side writers. -- any outside writers. it is all produced by the staff. what if i had a story that i wanted to tell that the magazine is not going to want to -- the magazines are not there anymore. alas magazine story i wrote was about sarah palin's nonexistent natural gas pipeline. it was in her next-to-last issue. i did not quite close it up but i came close. i spent three weeks in alaska researching that story. without padding, my expenses came to $12,000. most magazines will not even pay the fee of $12,000 anymore. what is a writer to do? this is where i look at the gentleman to my right and i look at "the atavist" and i say this as my savior. this is where we can still do the kind of work i like

going out and finding these stories that are immensely significant but they have either fallen by the wayside, never made it to the headline of our core shove under the rug. maybe i sound paranoid but but i found i love the notion of the stories and some of them are so fabulous that you could hardly come up with fiction to out do this. we will find out if i did it just is. but if i have come a you will agree that it is so beautiful and astounding fact justin the way it has unfolded that to have fictionalize this would be to diminish it. i also found that in a great way, there we're irked several dozen of the political assassinations taking place and i only write about one because this have been in a magical way at the end of the five years >> to see significant cooperation but the family of those. [inaudible] >> a friend of mine who is a writer and journalist read the earlier version of the manuscript and said she was touched and deeply moved of the quality of the interviews and information i have gathered. i could say yes, it they would only open up to me. but, in truth because the story had

. >> it seems to me, a lot of the rancor has fallen to the wayside. >> i'm a lover, not a fighter, tom> reporter: good nature aside, she is harsh herself on the need to blow up old ways of teaching that drives some modern day students away from education. >> these kids come with a different set of sensibilities, a different set of things that engage them. we have to blow up school. nowhere in our lives do we sit down and have a rotating cast of characters stand and talk to us for 45 minutes. >> reporter: the renewed schools are investing in technology to reach those students. >> they come alive. they are in it. they are competing against themselves or against other students and learning. learning. >> reporter: under new national stand ards in place, they are focusing on literacy, the ability to read. >> it's primary focus is on literacy. kindergarten through 12th grade, we are doubling down on teaching reading, exposing our children to literature, fiction and nonfiction. one of the most exciting things about technology is that it opens up a world of exposure to our kids. >> going into

. >> a train operators saw someone in the wayside by the tracks. we suspected that they were attempting to steal some metal. an inspection revealed that something was missing. >>catherine: in this city of a vallejo, thieves have been targeting street and traffic lights. it has gotten so bad the city has been posting these signs at signal lights, the price to fix the damage done by thieves have is cost the city more than two of a thousand dollars. >>maureen: here is a city worker replacing copper wire at one of the city lights. it is a tough time for police to solve. >> it is difficult to prosecute unless he can catch someone actually stealing it. once it is in someone else's hands, they would just deny the fact that the ticket. >> the city has tried a variety of ways to keep the wire from being struck. a utility box with a layer of concrete, that does not always work. >> that these will take several days to break through the concrete. once there through it, they will still with the next night. >>maureen: to ways awareness, police have reported thes

newt gingrich's campaign was clearly disorganized and the other would be front runners fell by the wayside, he has an inability to pull away from the pack and struggling to close the deal in iowa and we have seen the poll numbers not exactly growing in the other states as well. it is kind of entertaining, but the prohibitive front-runner has not been able to seal the deal with republican caucus goers and primary voters may be the most interesting part. >> in iowa specifically. doing well in new hampshire. let's stick with them more time. iowans, they are saying they haven't had much face time this cycle. they are used to face-to-face whether it's town hall or bus visits. because they feel they haven't had the face time and they could make a difference in the last final seven days? >> two things right off the bat. the first is that iowans have gotten boiled to the point where they expect personal visits. it's a bit of a problem because they are used to this attention in' 08. they not only got attention from one party, but both. both were running hard and said that mitt romney stumbles have

one by one, the trade programs fell by the wayside until today one last program remains. stateville industries program produces office furniture, including desks, bookcases and tables. the only men who work here are long-time model prisoners. one of those men is william earl basset. basset has been incarcerated since 1963 and in stateville since 1966. originally he was serving a maximum of ten years for burglary and forgery at another illinois penitentiary called menard. >> i had a short parole coming but a guy was messing with my food in the dining room and i just -- i went off, tried to get him and got involved in a prison riot down there. there was three prison guards got killed down there at the time. they give me the electric chair for one of them murders. they said everybody stabbed this one lieutenant. >> in 1972 the u.s. supreme court abolished capital punishment. basset's sentence was commuted to 150 years with the opportunity for parole every year. though he's been repeatedly turned down for parole, he remains one of stateville's model prisoners. he's worked in

it, of course, making sure that holiday decorations aren't among the things that just fall by the wayside just because logistically it's a problem. this is the brainchild of two local businessmen, both of them were in the landscaping business. they hooked up with the american legion post 130 to find veterans who can benefit and of course they're always looking for volunteers and they also adopt deployed servicemen and women and there's an effort to see that bases overseas get the christmas treatment as well. today we're at the home of joe trombeau, a korean war veteran and they've been doing work on this house now. joining me now is jeff jones with decorate a vet and first of all, jeff, this is a great effort you're doing. tell me how this came about. >> well, i do as you mentioned own a landscaping company in the city, and part of that is being in and around a lot of the streets and the homes and so part of that just noticing some disheveled homes and homes that need a little bit of repair, combine that with the fact that i come from a military family and we married the two and started d

i didn't want to let such an important issue be cast off to the wayside and not speak up.ver happened has happened. yes, it's been difficult. but i believe it's been worth it. >> piers, these are legitimate issues. the fact that the cain campaign says that some of these issues involve privacy is patently absurd, honesty and character will always be an issue for anyone who strive to be president of the united states. all of the issues raised by these women are issues that the cain campaign should have answered and been mort forthright in their responses. >> okay. gloria allred and sharon bialek, thank you very much. >> thank you. >>> when we come back, everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does it with quite the panache of my next question, the legendary al roker. so who ordered the cereal that can help lower cholesterol and who ordered the yummy cereal? yummy. [ woman ] lower cholesterol. [ man 2 ] yummy. i got that wrong didn't i? [ male announcer ] want great taste and whole grain oats that can help lower cholesterol? honey nut cheerios. [ buzzer ] saving $50 on

, not the wayside but clearly isn't as as facebook or twitter or google.out .do you ever think about what would have happened if you would have stayed?ac >> well i thought about it. was in technology, it mean we just a accomplished some amazing things and bill wasof an amazingly well certainly in the years right after i left. i think it has more challenges and will probably talk about that in a few minutes. but yeah, you know, just think how -- in retrospect, how lucky was i to have a partner capable of delegates generally work shoulder to shoulder writing the initial code and i brought my ideas to the table. so yeah, of course i like to think if i stayed there i kind of affect the course of things. but when i left, i really wasn't planning on staying. i wanted to start a new chapter in my life. i actually tried to retire at age 30, which lasted about 18 months. >> what did you do? >> you know, i kicked back on the riviera and traveled. i wanted to see europe. i traveled a lot. i tried to relax. if you're a creative person, technologists, it only lasts for so l

going out and finding these stories that are immensely significant, but have either fallen by the wayside, never made it to the headlines, or were dismissed or shoved under the rug, perhaps -- i mean, i might sound paranoid here, but perhaps -- who knows. i found i love the notion of finding these stories and some of them, at least in this case, are so fabulous that you could hardly come up with fiction that can outdo this. i mean, we'll find out if i did itity. -- did it justice. if i have, you'll agree with me it's so beautiful and so astounding, just in the way it unfolded, hat to have fictionalized this would have been to diminish it. i also found that in some great ways, you know, there were several dozen of these political assassinations that had taken place, and i only write about one, and that's because this one happened quite in a magical way in a way, at the end of the five years. >> did you receive significant cooperation from the survivors' families and from the families of those that did not survive the incident? >> a friend of mine, who is also a writer and journalist hersel

through my notes and -- if it's the 20-year rule, maybe some of the things will have gone by the wayside. >> someone picked up on the quote about great artists steal, and said, he said that, yet he reseptember bill gated and google and many others for stealing from apple as he saw itful how did his zen self recognize this. >> steve was not an expert at reconciling conflicting things. anderson and many others have great quotes about people having conflicting thoughts at the same time. steve was totally ballistic first at bill gates and microsoft for ripping off, as he put it, the mac -- macintosh, and then how he felt android and google had ripped off the apple mobile operating system. did he -- no. he didn't try to reconcile that. but i will say he didn't rip off xerox. there was a final deal. xerox invested a million dollars in apple there was an exchange of technology. i think -- he has some right to feel that he came up -- or apple came up with the beautiful macintorn operating system and pretty much copied by windows, and likewise, the mobile operating system. you can argue, as for t

when we come back, i want to talk to you about your defense of many celebrities who fall by the waysideesting. >> yes. really, head & shoulders is for more than dandruff? yeah, it does seven great things like giving me a healthy scalp and great looking hair. you should make that eight things. dude, why don't you just use the stuff? [ male announcer ] head & shoulders: seven benefits. every bottle. >>> one of the more surprising things about you, whoopi, is you're quite happy to slap a politician around for bad behavior. but when it comes to celebrities -- >> who have i slapped around? >> if a politician is behaving in your view wrongly or if a right-winged cable host, someone like a bill o'reilly or glenn beck, it's like, whack, whack, whack. or somebody like -- well, let's play a clip. give you a little idea of what i'm talking about. >> see that picture? well, that picture, it looks like a racist to me. >> he said he was joking sfwl. >> he doesn't look like racist. he looks like an idiot. i know mel and i know he's not a racist. drunks say stupid stuff to people all the time. all the