the guards go off-duty because their service protect being the head of the catholic church will be over, at least for the time being. this is going to play out now and over the next three hours as we watch the images come in. martha: there are few places more beautiful than vatican city in the sunlight. 5:00 in the evening over this place is absolutely spectacular at this point. what a simple sort of action to watch him walk out of vatican into the car and have monumental implications for him and the future of the catholic church as well. bill: father morris referred to this. in the speech he gave earlier today at one point he said, among you is also the future pope whom i promise my unconditional refe reverence and obedience. now he will remain hidden from the world. martha: remarkable. thanks for being with us, everybody. we will see you right back here now. "happening now" carries on this coverage of the pope as he leaves the vatican today. jon: bill and martha, thank you. pope benedict the xvi officially resigning today. it's about three hours away. good morning i'm jon scott. jenna: hi, everybody i'm jenna lee live in our admonition's capitol today witnessing history right now along with you. we are glad that you're with us. the pontiff leading the vatican for the last time as pope today. he's about to fly by helicopter to cas castle began r-frplt he will bless the well wishers gathering there awaiting his arrival. the pope's retirement taking effect in a few hours. before leaving the vatican he delivered his tphaoeupbl greetings to the cardinals urging them to work in unity and promising unconditional reverence and obedience to his successor. all of this very new to everyone. the last time a pope resigned 1415, jon. when we say we are actually witnessing history, a history that few have experienced before, the facts all point to that. jon: nobody has ever seen, nobody alive now has seen what we are seeing now, the resignation of a pope. it is a historic day at the vatican and really for the one billion catholics all around the world. our amy kellogg is watching this history be made along with father jonathan morris, both are in rome. father morris let me begin with you. this is a man you worked with prior to his becoming pope, he was cardinal ra ratzinger. tell us your thoughts now that he is stepping down. >> my thoughts go back to a time when i brought some college students, i used to do it every year. the last time i brought a group of college students to him to ask him questions, kind of students with an academic. young people with a cardinal with a prince of the church. i went up to him and said, your immanence would you like me to give you the questions ahead of time that the students want to ask? and he looked at me kind of like, oh, no, son, don't worry, i don't need that type of preparation, but thank you very much. and then he spent the next hour with these young people, and he was so at home in that environment. but then very shortly afterwards he was put on to the world stage and he was given a tough hand of cards, beginning with the sexual abuse scandal that was ripe at the time in 2005, but then many other struggles within the church, and globally as well. he went to regensberg and gave that talk about islam and the relationship with natural law and moral truth and he got so much backlash, people even died over it. one thing after another, and he says that weighed on him. and the fact that he's now going off into the sunset not to give up, but rather as he said to serve the church in a different way, it's moving for me, as someone who knew him, not as a best friend but certainly as one who admired him and had the honor of spending time with him. jon: let's watch as the pope boards the papal helicopter, presumably for the last time and heads to castle gandolfo the pope's summer residence a few miles from rome. you can see the banners of the well wishers there. the pope has spent the previously eight summers at castle began r-frplt it will be a temporary residence for him for the next few months while a residence that is being prepared for him in the vatican is under renovations. one presumes that 600 years ago the last time a pope resigned it took probably months, years, for the word to get around the world. this is being beamed around the world instantaneously on television and via the internet. 5:04pm in vatican city, as they will fire up the turbin and kronk those rote tars to carry the pontiff to castle gandolfo a few miles away. a little less than three hours from now his resignation as pope officially becomes -- well becomes enforceable. amy kellogg again is watching as we see the rote tars beginning trotars beginning to turn. amy what is the reaction, it was such a shock when this pope announced he would be resigning office rather than dying in office. have the people there in rome and the vatican begun to process this? >> it's been an emotional roller coaster from what i can glean, jon. i think a lot of people were shocked, a lot of people felt this isn't an ordinary job u don't retire from the paper pa papacy. as people follow pope benedict the xvi possibly closer than ever before i think they've come to appreciate a great humility in someone who is clearly not seek being out the limelight who probably feels that someone else could do the job better with more vigor right now, who has possibly been deeply wounded by the scandals and troubles that have been in the catholic church and who didn't really want this job in the first place, jon. i was reading an interview with him that was done somewhere towards the beginning of his pontificate when he said he asked the lord, what have you done to me? i can't do this. i need your help. he had wanted to retire at that point. and yesterday at his last public audience he said that he never felt alone, though there had been ups and downs and there had been times when he felt that god was sleeping, but had never abandoned him. so, i think it has been a difficult road for a very sensitive machine, it turns out. in speaking to a lot of the brass of the catholic church over the last new days i've understood that pope benedict the xvi, joseph ratzinger, soon to be pope emeritus is incredibly sensitive and kurt tee just an courteous. people have come to appreciate and feel for him maybe more than they had during the years of his pontificate, jon. jon: as the helicopter prepares to liftoff let's listen to the peeling of the church bells as this pope prepares to say goodbye. [bells ringing ] jon: what a view, when the last pope resigned 600 years ago he didn't depart by helicopter as bill herm pointed out. we have air to air shots covering every move of the current pope east spends his last couple of hours in office heading to a temporary retirement in castle gandolfo a few miles from rome and eventually back to the vatican at well a convent apartment that is being renovated for him now. jenna: the ride itself, the helicopter trip between the vatican and castle gandolfo is supposed to take 15 minutes or so. what a trip it is, by the images we have of the land of rome, quite moving images whether you're watching it from this point of view or in side the helicopter as well. we have a senior fellow. steven white is from the catholic studies program at the ethics policy center. welcome to you both. you have an interesting vantage point on this as well. you've been to the community where castle gandolfo is. what can you tell us about where he is heading. >> it's a very small college perched on the rim of and i ancient sroe sroel cano, sroel cavolcano known for its white wine and porquitto. it has a beautiful view over the lake and also towards ro*efplt you can look down own a clear day you can see the dome of st. peters tour erring over the city of rome and beyond that the mediterranean sea. it's a peaceful place, it's not a bad place to start your life away from the world. world. jenna: we hear it's larger than the vatican itself the place he'll be residing for the time being. >> the vatican itself isn't terribly big to begin with. there are beautiful gardens at the summer residence. there is a pool up there, i don't think he'll be using it this time of year. there was a pool installed by pope john the ii. sort of reluctantly. they said you need exercise. it's a nice place. it's not exactly a five-star luxury wh hotel but it's a beautiful place to be and i'm sure he'll be studying a life of pray threr i prayer there in a peaceful setting. jenna: you mentioned the historic significance over the coliseum now, take a look at this shot. makes you think about the history not only of the city of rome but also the history of the church. what is the significance of this resignation? >> i think there are -- the fundamental issue here is that this is an old man who, like he said has grown tired an doesn't feel that he's coppable of keepincapable of keeping up with the ministry. it's easy to forget in this day and age with the modern medicine we have people tend to live longer, that goes for popes too. he's already one of the oldest men ever to be a pope. i think there has only been one pope in roughly 2,000 years that has lived past the age of 90. most bishops are required to resign by cannon law at the age of 75. as you problem below heard when it comes to voting for the next pope no one over the age of 80 is allowed to vote. at 86 he's like you said, he's reached an age where he says he physically, and mentally and spiritually can't keep up with the rapid pace of being pope in this modern world. i think that by stepping down he's indicating that the office is bigger than him e. was given that office to serve the church and that office, the office of pope, bishop of rome exists to serve the church, to serve the mission of the church. the mission of the church is to spread the gospel, to preach christ to the world. i think that his resignation as we pointed out is dramatic and in many ways unprecedented. in 14, 15 the last time a pope row signed that was under duress. before that the last person to resign was 1294 and he basically ended up being impressioned by his successor locked away in a tower somewhere, died of the damp something like that. this idea that i'm going to step away from the papacy, hasn't happened in hundreds of years but the way he's doing it is completely unprecedented. >> we'll refer to him as the pope, then he'll be called his holiness benedict. he said to love the church also means having the courage to make difficult decisions bearing always in mind the good of the church and not one's self. what do you make of this transition and the next chapter ahead for the church? >> absolutely. i think one of the last things that he said to the cardinals was, it's in service that we find our joy. and i think this decision undoubtedly had to be difficult for him, because he had to have known that he would have to endure another round of just media onslaught. he has so many critics and they've just come right after him, and it was truly a great act of humility, what he's done, knowing what he'd have to endure, so i think that his entire papacy has been marked by humility. he didn't want the job in the first place. he was hoping to spend the last years of his life as a librarian working with books, studying, in prayer, and so even accepting the role was an act of humility and a act of service to the church, and then stepping down when he felt he could no longer humble man he was ands what a what he'll be remembered for. jenna: steven what do you think his league gas see will be as we reflect on that now and move ahead and wonder who will be the next hope. >> there are two aspects to it. first this precedent he's set nothing a way of stepping away from the papacy when you feel you can no longer fulfill. jenna: do you think that we'll see more of this. >> i suspect. i hope it doesn't become a habitual thing. there is a lot to be said for -- as someone put it, i think -- a cardinal who is the secretary of pope john paul ii is now the archbishop of poland. they said, why didn't he resign when he was old in sick, he said, he continue come down off the cross. there is a lot to be said forbearing one's burden to the end. but i do think that it's been hundreds of years since the last pope resigned. i wouldn't be surprised if we saw it happen again in the next hundred years. his resignation i think in service of the church has actually said this is an act of humility. people talk about how can one give up such a big and important and powerful position, i think there is also another way that this is humble, it's not lost upon the pope that in stepping down it may be perceived that this is an act of weakness or abandonment and i think that probably in many ways for this man, being sort of the kind, gentleman he is was probably more difficult for him than walking away from all the trappings of the papacy. jenna: your quick thoughts on the legacy he leaves behind. >> there are two things he'll be remembered for. one it's bringing the message of love. he surprised the world. here was a man who was known as god's rottweiler and his first papal encyleabe is god is love. he wrote three books about the life of jesus. i believe he will be remembered for that, bringing that message to the secular riced west. he will be remembered for reform. this is a man who took some of the difficult issues the church was facing by the horns, faced them in a way that was very courageous, he apologized to the victims of the sexual abuse crisis. he met with victims which was something that had never happened before, and he's put mechanisms in place that has made the catholic church the safest place on earth for children and actually looked to as a model for how to deal with things like this. jenna: he certainly has been in this position during a time of great transition, jon, for the church and certainly a lot of different dynamics at play for whoever will be the next pope. jon, you could probably stare us through this stage, the pilot as you are, we see the helicopter slightly lore and maybe rising again. it appears that the journey to castle gandolfo may be soon coming to an end. jon: interesting to over fly the run race like that they've clearly closed off some of the air space. i wonder what is the significance of having the pope fly over what appears to be the rome airport. could be another outlying airport, but that's what they have chosen to do. at any rate, he is on his way, again, to castle gandolfo, the summer residence of the pope, where he has spent about the last eight sum *ers. w summers. we understand we will be there for about the next eight months as his permanent residence inside the vatican is being repaired. let's go back to father jonathan morris. father morris we understand that most of the cardinals have already gathered in rome, they are to begin meeting tomorrow for several days of getting to know each other, and discussing the procedures ahead, and then the conclave that is going to elect a new pope is expected to begin when, march 7th? >> you know, jon it's not known. it's hard to believe those of us who are in this world of media will not actually know when the conclave will begin or when it will end, but we don't know. what we know is that the cardinals will begin meeting on monday, this coming monday and it's one of their first orders of business will be to determine when the conclave starts. before the conclave starts they will have meetings what they call con congratulationses in which they are discussing the big issues of the church. but they are also informally getting together, having meals, talking to each other about one another, trying to find the right person for the job. now in these last few days it's been very quiet about the next pope. why? because just as when john paul ii was sick and dying nobody was talking about the next pope, but now we just saw the helicopter leave the vatican. that was pope benedict's way of saying, now i'm out of the picture, now you do your jobs. if you wer he were still in the vatican or behind the vatican walls in some other apartment that they would be a little bit cautious in talking about in straight talk what is needed for the church. that is about to begin. jon: the helicopter on its way to castle gandolfo. we understand that the pope willee ph*erpblg, hwill emerge. he will make some statements or issue a greeting to the people of castle gandolfo, which is also the name of the village there. he will -- >> that's right. jon: from a window there in the quarters at the summer residence he will issue some kind of a greeting to the people of castle gandolfo. then at exactly 8:00pm, which is 2:00pm eastern time in this country, 11:00am on the west coast a bell will ring and a sergeant of the swiss guard will order the guard on-duty to leave his po*erbgs and a post and at that point the massive doors of the castle are going to swing shut and begin the period they call [speaking italian ] am i pronouncing that correctly, father morris? that's right. that is perfectly said, jon. i used to tell, i still do tell visitors to rome who come during the summertime, don't go and wait and see the pope, john paul ii or pope benedict the xvi here in the vatican. go out to castle gandolfo. you'll be able to be in a very intimate setting. we'll see this little castle in the hills outside of rome with room for about 3 or 400 people in this inner square instead of 150,000 people here in st. peters square. and they will look up at this window and pope benedict the xvi for the last time will speak to the world. then he will go in, the guards will leave and he at 8:00pm will no longer be pope. jenna: as father jonathan was just speaking there our guests on set steven white nodding along. steven as father jonathan was taking a little bit about castle gandolfo that seemed to very much resonate with you about the community that is going to be surrounding the pope and what one can learn from the catholic church from this one area of the world. >> it's interesting, you know, i think it was yesterday and the day before talking about the crowds that were coming to see him and the out pouring of love and the letters he received. the pope made several comments about in these days we've seen what the church ream i is, it's not sort of an organizational chart or a series of political structures. what the church is is a community of believers gathered around their love of god and jesus christ and that is something that is palpable. as father said the square at castle gandolfo is a much more intimate setting and a great place to be much closer up than surrounded by 150,000 people. >> as we watch the helicopter come in for landing here the "associated press" has interesting color to what transpired over the last 20 minutes saying as pope benedict the xvi left the vatican for the last time one of his closes aides wept by his side as he bade farewell to the vatican. certainly there is a lot of emotion around this other than just, steven as you just mentioned sort of what they need to follow as part of policy, almost, as we see -- as we see the transition of the church. do you happen to know where this held bad is? does this look familiar to you at all this area. >> i believe it's inside the ground of castle gandolfo. there is an ancient rome man road that runs past castle gandolfo. that is the road that the apostle, including st. peter would have taken in the ancient days to come into rome. popes have been travelling this path for a very longtime. jenna: just seeing the landing at castle gandolfo. 5:24 local time in italy. 11:24 here on the east coast and this is just for right now a temporary retirement site for the pope. he's he's going to be returning to the vatican we believe around april when the renovations for a small monastery that he will remain in will be done, then he'll be able to go become to the vatican. for right now this will be his home for the next several mont months. jon: the passengers on board we know that his personal secretary, george guesswein -- gonswein, excuse me is on board with him. we are not absolutely certain of the other people chosen to make this flight with the pope. george gonswein is on board. we understand that the secretary will remain with him at castle gandolfo as the pope begins his retirement there. [bells ringing ] ] bells ringing ] jon: in announcing his intention to retire pope benedict simply said that the burdens of the office need to be born by a younger and more vigorous man, and you can see in the way he alights from the helicopter and even in his stance, that this pope well into his 80s is somewhat frail. the primary reason he says for his retirement, and for the meeting of the college of cardinals, who will elect his successor, some time we expect in the next couple of weeks. jenna: one of the things that you might notice is that the pope is still wearing what he will traditionally wear as a pope, you see the cape that goes down to his elbow, also the ring is still on his finger, that ring that will be taken from him a little later today, we'll talk to father jonathan in a moment about that. he's also still wearing the red shoes. winds he will no longer wear the red shoes. the red shoes signify blood of martyrs in the church, that's why they are red. that's part of the significance. father jonathan, tell us a little bit -- this is a big change, obviously. we will see his last address to the world as pope, we will see it all live together, when does the next stage happen, the changing of the shoes, the changing of the dress? when does that all take place? >> well, you can bet that he'll be very happy to get out of those shoes as any one of us would be, and, you know, he's not attached to the trappings. i know him, not to say that on some priests and bishops their popes might be attached to those things, it can happen, everyone is different. but pope benedict the xvi, that's not his style. his style is very much low key. but he recognizes that symbols matter, that they do mean something, and for example, the ring that you brought up, jenna, that ring is called the fisherman's ring, right, remember jesus who called st. peter and the disciples no longer to be fishermen but to be fisher of men. that ring that symbolizes his authority and his responsibility as pope, that will be taken from him, it will be smashed, in other words, it is no longer symbolizing authority because he does not have that authority any more. and the authority will be given over to the college of cardinals during this time between papacies. so you can get that pope benedict the xvi at 8:00pm will probably go and have a very simple dinner east usually does at that time, and then he will begin a new phase of his life. things will be very quiet. the secretary will also be relieved. he's had a long eight years as well by his side, and they will begin a new phase of study, of prayer, and also of communication, of writing and communicating with the other cardinals and other people but in a very, very private way. way. jenna: a beautiful day in italy for this type of an event. we keep on mentioning that there is more than a billion catholics worldwide. there is more than 5 million catholics in the united states and obviously the pope is the leader of the catholic church but ashley is back on set with us as well, senior fellow with the catholic association. ashley, your thoughts not only what it means for the catholic church but this is a religious leader recognized by such by many who are not catholic. i'm curious your thoughts what this transition means and what someone can take away from this moment if they're not catholic? >> sure, absolutely. a big part of the role that the pope plays is very ecumenical reaching out to different religions. i was reading in commentary magazine they were praising the efforts the eppope has done to reach out to the jewish community. i think he plays a very important role in that respect. one of the important things that pope benedict has done a wonderful job with, promoting religious freedom, not just for catholics but people of all faiths around the world. we live in a time where religious persecution is huge problem, not just for catholics but people of faith everywhere. he has done a real excellent job of spotlighting that issue. i think that it is important, that a big part of the role of the pope is to promote, to use his position of authority and re -- respect with some people around the world to promote different causes of human rights and human dignity and that is what he has done an excellent job in doing. >> steven, your thoughts? >> i agree. to underline all that, the catholic church and pope don't promote just a set of policy initiatives or preferred issues and serious of rules and regulations. to underline all that is what ashley mentioned before. what we've seen in pope benedict and pay close attention, this man is tremendously in love with jesus christ and the church. all of what he does and all the what the pope does flows from that. i think one of the things this pope has done particularly well, this would be another part of his leg today -- legacy. he diagnosed part of the cultural and spiritual malaise that bee sets the west. i think that is big part of his teaching. i think that is something he will be remembered for. jenna: this is one stage as we continue to watch the pope now. unfortunately we don't have a bigger view exactly which building he is entering here. it almost looks, steven, like a side entrance if you will into castel gandolfo. this goes back to the 1200s. it was built from a family in genoa. it was built to the protect against marauders on the countryside. it is very interesting history. if we could, let's listen to the bells. you can see the crowd, i believe right there, in the center of this town. let's just watch for a moment. steven, tell us, where are these people standing? >> there are in most italian small hill towns there is a small piazza, at one end of the town is the papal castle and residence around the town. and things you find in a small italian towns. a couple church a matter of a few meters or yards down the road. the see the dome. you see the dome of the papal observatoris. you can see how narrow and thin the town is. on the left, i believe you can see the shores of lake albano. like i said, it is the rim of an ancient volcano. it is a peculiar shape of the town. there is a long high ground that falls off steeply and you see great views from all around. you see the papal flag, the vatican flag. there is the balcony where the pope will come out to address the crowds gathered in the square. jenna: i believe the camera will pan over to see how close he is really is. one of the perceptions of the church and we can all understand it, the church and the vatican is often away from the people because you see on the television, st. peter's square and how grand some of that is in the area of the vatican in rome and it is remarkable, steven, to see how close he is is to the people town. >> right before we mentioned if you want a close up, more intimate setting to the see the holy father the castell gandolfo is the place to do it. most rome man known to see the city, to go out you side the city. the pope does the same. when he needs a break he will go to castell gandolfo. not unusual when the time of transition, when the papacy ends in a few minutes, or three hours now, 2 1/2 hours, that he chose castell gandolfo to come to be away from the city. though he will be able to see the vat -- vatican from his window. jenna: in the limited italian i have, you can see the signs saying thank you to the pope. obviously a crowd that is ready to welcome him and bear witness to his final wave to the world as pope. as we mentioned a little while ago. we are referring to him as pope benedict because he is still pope at this time n a few hours, there was much debate what he would be called but he will be called his holiness benedict as he owners it this next stage which is really unchartered territory as we haven't seen a pope do this in hundreds and hundreds of years. jon: fascinating to see the change in the topography and the botany are with you the president -- where the pope will spend the next couple months of his retirement. rome, although it is a beautiful city, it is an old city and in many ways a polluted city. it has been cleaned up significantly over the last few years but, you know, diesel, smoke, smudged on many of the walls of some of those grand old buildings in rome. castel gandolfo you can see just from the looks of it is a much more pristine environment. i was struck as we watched the motorcade climbing the hill up to the hilltop next to the lake there that the beauty of the trees and the greenerry all around there must certainly be, well, just would give one a sense of peace and serenity. it looks like an absolutely beautiful location, that little hilltop village where he will spend the next couple months of his retirement. jenna: ashley, as someone that is catholic we talked about what this means in general for the world and its many religions out there but as a catholic where do you draw your faith from today and how is it drawn from the church or from a figure like the pope? >> sure absolutely. i think, you know, catholics, catholicism has a very rich tradition in a very rich intellectual tradition and that's certainly a big part what brought me into the faith was reading a lot. in fact pope benedict he is known for his intellectual prowess, and it was reading his speech at reagansburg and his bold defense of reason an reality in a world where those things are not appreciated anymore. i think most lay catholics, they get a lot of their faith more at the local level from their parish priest, just from their interactions with all the different aspects of the catholic church. you know the catholic church has so much to offer to the world in terms of its charitable contributions. so, in many different ways. jenna: let's listen for a moment here as the pope turns the corner. we believe he will come out on that balcony. this is what he sees we're seeing. [cheers and applause] [cheers and applause] >> [inaudible]. [cheers and applause] [speaking italian] [cheers and applause] >> [speaking italian] [cheers and applause] [speaking italian] [cheers and applause] [speaking italian] [cheers and applause] jon: and that apparently will be the last time that benedict is seen in public as pope. he will hold that office for about another two hours and 20 minutes. and then officially resign at 8:00 p.m. this evening rome time. that is 2:00 p.m. on the east coast. 11:00 a.m. on the west coast of the united states. you saw the crowds waving the vatican flag flags. i saw some italian flags. i saw signs written in german, his native tongue. father jonathan morris is able to translate a little bit what we heard from the pope there. father jonathan? >> jon, i'm moved personally. you know he just walked out without any papers, without any written documents, without anything that had to be passed by the secretary of state or any other department of the vatican to make sure it was all okay. here it was. joseph ratzinger, pope benedict xvi, coming out to the balcony, and perhaps saying the last public words we will ever hear from him. what did he say? he said, i love you. he said i feel your support. he said, thank you for being here. and then in a very simple way, maybe the last words we'll hear from him, he said, [speaking italian] he said good night, good evening. he turned around and walked in. one of the beautiful signs written there in italian, that i saw in the crowd said, it said, benedict, your humility has made you bigger. and that was humility. there is no more pope benedict xvi speaking to us from balconies or around the world. he is now living as a monk. jenna: father jonathan, even though i'm not able to see you here from washington, d.c., we're still taking in the sights of this square there. we can feel in your voice how moved you are by what has transpired over the last hour. just talk us through a little bit what you're feeling and the emotions that come to mind. >> well, maybe it's better that you don't see me in that, you know, all of us i think, who have known him, all of us who have taken on his dregs, recognize that -- his direction, as a father we would like him to continue. we would like him to continue to be 100% well. we would like him to be what he has been for us. i'm not speaking of him as a god or as some perfect person. you know, we don't believe he is infallable in terms of all of his decisions. in fact he hasn't even made any public infallable statement that is a real misconception about a pope's infallability is all about. he is a man who is weak. i believe he is a holy man. he is a kind man. he is a man who made mistakes. he is a man who also felt the real pains of leadership. you know, can you imagine taking over an organization of 1.2 billion people, not having been trained as a manager. not having been trained as, you know, from wharton school of business, no. this was an academic, a man who dedicated his life to teaching and really as a pastor. and so here he has told us the best thing for the church right now is for us to put it into the hands of another person. if we have time, and if we don't, please tell me, but just one very personal and a very personal thing right now that is going through my mind. you remember in 2005 when the sex abuse scandal was so strong, i was part of a religious order who was being led by a man who turned out to be a sociopath. it was a very famous case of father macio, who i knew personally as well. he has since passed but pope benedict xvi as head of the department that the oversaw all these abuse cases knew that because john paul the 2nd was very sick, he was not able to act. when pope benedict became pope within a month he publicly disciplined and removed this priest from public ministry. i bet pope benedict the 16th recognized in these times in the church we need a man who is able to be of sound body and mind who needs to be able to act quickly. i'm grateful to him for having made this act and was able to allow me to move on and be a part of archdiocese of new york right now. because after man of courage, we have people's lives truly affected in a very personal way. he knows it is time for him to step down for the good of the church. jenna: and, father jonathan, quickly if we could now, is your feeling, your emotion, from watching the end of this pope's position, is it met with equal optimism and joy for who's next? who is next to come to fill this position? how do you, how do you feel about that? >> you know, i can't say i'm really joyful, i can't wait for the next one because i don't know who it is. there is some trepidation. what i believe we need a person that speaks clearly about the love of god and preaches the gospel unabashedly. i'm not sure who we're going to get. it could be just somebody reading off a script, not that reading off scripts is all bad. we need someone who will take a new step and to say, now is the time to speak with valor and with courage, unafraid and to do it in a way that people can understand. not that everybody has to become catholic but, rather to speak the truth as an invitation and to allow people to respond to that each and everyone, according to their own conscience and their own path. jenna: father jonathan, great to have your invaluable insight and your experience as we take in this moment of history. still, jon, back in our studios in new york. we still have two hours where pope benedict is pope benedict before the final transition is made. jon: dusk is falling there on st. peter's square in the vatican as well as on castel gandolfo, the residence of the pope. the man who will be pope for another two hours and 15 minutes or some then the bells at the castel will chime. the doors will slam shut and he will have resigned the papacy effective 8:00 p.m. tonight rome time. as dusk falls and the curtain falls on the papacy of benedict xvi we'll continue to watch any developments. we expect the pope will not be seen again in public today, not, really not anymore into his retirement. but we will con into keep an -- continue to keep an eye on all the developments from rome and castel gandolfo. 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[♪...] jenna: welcome back, everyone. new next hour, some disturbing and graphic testimony from jodi arias as she takes the stand in her own murder trial. the prosecution is taking an aggressive approach in trying to counter her claims that she acted in self-defense but have they gone too far with their questioning? our legal panel weighs in on that. the chairman of the house homeland security committee is demanding the answer on the release of hundreds of illegal immigrants. we hear the numbers are in the hundreds. he asked to find out how many we're talking about. texas republican michael mccaul will join us on set next hour. tourists are flocking to southwest florida to get a look at some of their favorite baseball players. that's right, red sox spring training is underway. can you tell we have someone from boston working on our team? the red sox, right. we'll look at the billion dollar preseason industry and some towns that hope to cash in. jon? jon: it is crunch time there on capitol hill in washington where jenna is as democrats and republicans try to stop a looming sequester. if no deal is reached, $85 billion in government spending cuts begin to take effect tomorrow. chief congressional correspondent mike emanuel live from the russell rotunda in the capitol building. the senate, mike, is going to vote on a couple of plans today to i guess, change the nature of the sequester. does either one of them have a prayer of passing? >> reporter: short answer, no, jon. the democratic plan, according to the congressional budget office would raise the deficit by more than $7 billion. so that is not expected to go anywhere. the republican plan would give different government agencies more flexibility to administer the reductions. here's the reid reared on that. -- senate majority leader on that. >> republicans call the plan flexibility. call it what it is, punt. they're punting. as president obama said yesterday it would simply raise the question, quote, do i end funding that helps disabled children or poor children? do i close this naval shipyard or that one? it is not a solution. and even members of the senate republican caucus have questioned the wisdom of this proposal. >> reporter: to further explain what he is saying there, there are republicans who don't love this proposal because they don't like the idea of giving the executive branch more power to move around money. jon? jon: yeah, so, we've got, what a few hours these cuts are ked scheduled to take effect. what are the republicans saying? >> republicans are saying essentially a lot of american families have to cut 2.4% of their personal budgets throughout the recession. so they feel like the, essentially this is not going to be a big deal. it is not going to be the end of the world. the number two senate republican predicts that these reductions will not crush our economy. >> let me repeat that in case people weren't listening. even when the spending cuts mandated by this sequestration, $85 billion in cuts, this administration will still have more money to spend this year than they did last year. hard to see how that would wreak devastation. >> reporter: so we expect midnight to come and go and then these spending reductions will start to gradually kick in. as we've been talking about of course the president will have top four congressional leaders at the white house tomorrow. at this point it sound like that will be mostly an informational meeting. we're not expecting a huge break through at this meeting, jon. jon: or fisticuffs, we're not expecting fisticuffs to break out that one either, are we, mike? >> reporter: no but harry reid is boxer so you never know. jon: that is interesting. mike emanuel on capitol hill. jenna. jenna: there is a little name-calling as we've been covering, what was it weak sauce from harry reid and john boehner using other colorful language so. when they get together --. jon: get off of its mule? jenna: well-put, jon. just for our younger viewers. we'll continue to follow what is going on with sequestration. as mike was just mentioning, time is really ticking by. you have billions of spending cuts set to go into effect tomorrow. there will be some of that happening right away but some of it delayed. the sequester deadline is hours away though today. what to expect now that we're in the final county down. also new testimony from the woman who claims she brutally killed her boyfriend in self-defense. the latest from the jodi arias murder trial next. searing for a bank designed for investors like you? tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 schwab bank was built with all e value and convenience tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 investors want. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 like no atm fees, worldwide. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and no nuisance fees. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 plus deposit ches with mobile deposit. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and manage your cash and investments tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 with schwab's mobile app. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 no wonder schwab bank has grown to over 70 billion in assets. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 so if you're looking for a bank that's in your corner, tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 not just on the corner... tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 call, click or visit to start banking with schwab bank today. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 [ male announcer ] when you wear dentures you may not know it, but your mouth is under attack. food particles infiltrate and bacteria proliferate. ♪ protect your mouth, with fixodent. the adhesive helps create a food seal defense for a clean mouth and kills bacteria for fresh breath. ♪ fixodent, and forget it. it's a challenge to balance work and family. ♪ that's why i love adt. i can see what's happening at my business from anywhere. ♪ [ male announcer ] now manage and help protect your small business remotely with adt. arm and disarm your alarm, watch secure video in real time, and even adjust your lights and thermostat wherever you are. with adt, you get 24/7 protection through our exclusive fast response monitoring. you can be confident that adt islways there for you. hey, lisa. is that the delivery we've been waiting for? 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[ male announcer ] call today to get adt installed starting at just $99. hurry. this sale ends march 9th. adt. always there. and every day since, two years ago, the people of bp made a commitment to the gulf. we've worked hard to keep it. bp has paid over twenty-three billion dollars to help people and businesses who were affected, and to cover cleanup costs. today, the beaches and gulf are open for everyone to enjoy -- and many areas are reporting their best tourism seasons in years. we've shared what we've learned with governments and across the industry so we can all produce energy more safely. i want you to know, there's another commitment bp takes just as seriously: our commitment to america. bp supports nearly two-hundred-fifty thousand jobs in communities across the country. we hired three thousand people just last year. bp invests more in america than in any other country. in fact, over the last five years, no other energy company has invested more in the us than bp. we're working to fuel america for generations to come. today, our commitment to the gulf, and to america, has never been stronger. jenna: brand new stories for you, brand new hour of "happening now." time is running out, and it's looking more and more like those spending cuts we've been talking so much about will kick in. what exactly will it mean for you on day one of the so-called sequester, and who will be the political winners and losers, if any? karl rove is here with his take. also, graphic and disturbing testimony from jodi arias. some legal experts now say the prosecutor's questioning might just be too aggressive to be effective. our legal panel weighs in as the teal resumes this hour. also, a dramatic story we told you about yesterday. remember this 81-year-old store jewelly owner? what was he thinking when he chased them down. we're going to hear from him. it's all "happening now." ♪ jenna: well, it is the final countdown, they say. the sequester deadline just 12 hours away as we're at 12 noon here on the east coast. without a last second deal, those automatic spending cuts will start kicking in. some say maybe it won't be that bad. others think differently. welcome to a brand new hour of "happening now," i'm jenna lee. jon: i'm jon scott. the white house now seems to be backing away from those dramatic predictions of doom and room in about the immediate effects of the sequester. this after days of dire warnings from a parade of cabinet secretaries telling us about long airport lines, reduced law enforcement and pink slips for teachers. but the strategy to blame congressional republicans for any and all consequences seems to be firmly in place. "the new york times" today saying, quote: white house strategists say they believe that a constant drip of bad news will emerge in congressional districts across the country in the weeks ahead generating negative headlines and, they hope, putting republicans on the defensive for their refusal to raise taxes. and here's white house spokesman jay carney yesterday. >> we remain hopeful that congressional leaders, republicans, will understand the need to come together and support balance. again, the choice that republicans would be making if they don't agree to that is a choice between up to 750,000 people losing their jobs on the one hand and asking that some special interest tax loopholes be closed on the other. i don't think that's a choice that seems like a hard one to most americans. unfortunately, it seems like a difficult one for republicans. jon: well, as for the republican strategy, they are hitting the president for what they call a long campaign to scare americans. here's the speaker of the house, john boehner. >> the administration's trying to play games, play games with the american people, scare the american people. this is not, this is not leadership. >> you just accused the white house of fear mongering. >> listen, they're out there making a lot of noise. what they really ought to be doing is coming up to the hill and working with the senate democrats to pass a bill that can replace the sequester and begin to deal with our long-term spending problem. jon: let's bring in karl rove, former senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to president george w. bush, also a fox news contributor and a very good number cruncher. we just heard jay carney saying that the president wants balance. in his view, what is balance, karlsome. >> good question, because he's never laid out a plan. i thought it was interesting last sunday the administration sent out spokesmen who repeated the same talking points that the president presented a precise, specific, detailed plan to solve the sequester problem in a balanced fashion. but the president has never laid out such a measure. so we really don't know. i think the president has been content to this point in raising these concerns about the impact of the sequester. he was happy to have secretary of transportation ray lahood go out and say 5,000 air traffic controllers are going to have to be furloughed. the interior secretary salazar says i'm going to have to close all the national park campgrounds. the homeland security secretary, janet napolitano, says i'm going to have to furlough 5,000 border patrol agents. so they've been happy to this point to say that, but there are two problems with this. the first one is that that the sequester is absolutely, is a small percentage, $85 billion, out of a nearly $3.6 trillion budget. after the sequester, the federal budget -- according to the cbo -- will be roughly 3.553, $3,553,000,000,000. that's more than last year which was $3,538,000,000,000. so the federal government's still going to be spending more money this fiscal year than the previous fiscal year. and you can't tell the ordinary american that spending more money year than we did last year means the country is going to be materially less protected at the border, that our campgrounds need to be closed, we need to furlough all those air traffic controllers. the other thing that's problematic is this: we're wasting a lot of money. there was a poll in january by reason magazine, they said to the americans, give us a number. how much out of every federal dollar do you think is wasted, and the average was 50 cents out of every dollar that washington spends was wasted. now, if president obama does go cut muscle, things that are important, voters are going to be looking at him saying, mr. president, you could have cut fat. what about those travel budgets? what about the programs that don't work? what about the scandal-ridden or fraud-ridden programs? why aren't you doing that rather than cutting the muscle? jon: but clearly the white house gambling or believing that when all is said and done, the american people are going to blame congress for any ill effects that come from the sequester cuts. >> right. but it's a big bet. and it could turn out badly. i think the republicans ought to take an affirmative step and call the president's bluff. the house republicans ought to, in my opinion, pass legislation that makes clear the president has the authority inside these agencies not to cut every activity across the board, but to cut less essential programs more and important programs less. and they ought to give this flexibility to the president and then use the power under article i, section 9 of the constitution, the power of the purse it's called, and call up cabinet secretaries who are playing funny games. if you have secretary of transportation lahood furloughing 5,000 air traffic controllers, summon him before the house transportation committee and say, wait a minute, why didn't you start with the $72 million in subsidies you're giving to sight-seeing trains in alaska or the $22 million to purchase trolleys for a resort in missouri or the $1.1 million you spent in sidewalks to nowhere in florida? if the interior secretary says we're closing all the campgrounds, say why don't you make some more money by taking those hundreds of thousands of acres of shale gas that you've declared off limits for development in the rocky mountain west and put them up for auction and get the money to cover the bill for the campgrounds? so the power of the purse, the oversight for congress could be a powerful tool to help point out you had alternatives to cut muscle. you could have cut fat. jon: and that appears to be why republicans have decided to just let these sequester cuts go ahead. karl rove, always good to hear from you. thank you. >> thank you, jon. jenna: for days now we've heard white house cabinet secretaries making dire predictions about what will happen if cuts kick in; flight cancellations, school days canceled, teachers furloughed or laid off potentially. but the administration now appears to be backing off any implication that much of that will happen right away. so what's the deal with these cuts? peter barnes at the fox business network joins us now. peter? >> reporter: hey, jenna. the white house is carefully wording some of these dire warnings. it says in its sequester fact sheet, in fact, that, for example, the jobs of 10,000 teachers would be put at risk by a sequester. 7200 special education teachers and aides and staff could be cut. no one really knows for sure until tomorrow when the president has to order more detailed spending reductions. yesterday reporters pressed the education secretary for when teacher pink slips will actually start to fly and how bad it will really get. >> hasn't happened yet, it really has to do with union notification. so most of that stuff will start to happen in, over the course of march and april. um, there are a couple of -- one i know of in west virginia that has actually already issued notices just because they have an earlier notification date. >> reporter: but "the washington post" is reporting this morning that, in fact, that school district in west virginia is sending transfer notices to about a hundred teachers in response to that change in -- a change in federal spending that is unrelated to the sequester. arne duncan adding yesterday, quote: whether it's all sequester related, i don't know. one research shop, isi group, says today of the overall sequester cuts, quote: many ordinary americans will not notice a difference at all, and many won't notice a difference for months. jenna? jenna: all right. peter barnes, thank you. jon: turning our attention to a big trial underway, the state's cross-examination set to resume for a fifth day in the jodi arias murder case. she claims self-defense in the stabbing and shooting death of her boyfriend, travis alexander. lead prosecutor juan martinez has been hammering away at arias' many different versions of whatyesterday picking apart e glaring contradictions in how arias has described her relationship with alexander. listen. >> you were talking in very fond terms about that experience in this clip that we just played, weren't you? >> yes. >> and it was because it was fun, right? >> yes. >> and it was something that you enjoyed, right? >> yes. >> so when you tell us that you felt like a prostitute, it really does, it seems to be contradicted by what's on exhibit 490, right? >> not if you understand why i said that. jon: adam houseley is life from our los angeles -- live from our los angeles newsroom with more on this case. adam? >> reporter: yeah, jon, for anybody who has interest in court cases, this is one that just captivates you. we started out yesterday with testimony that's too risque for television, then it went to more tedious testimony and ended up with kind of some fascinating interaction between the prosecutor and jodi arias. thirteen days, here momentarily will be the 13th day he's on the stand. finally at the end of the day yesterday, they got into the day that jodi jodi arias killed tras alexander. the prosecutor is trying to show premeditation and trying to suggest that arias stole a gun from her grandparents and took it to arizona to kill him. however, arias says he -- [inaudible] >> got on the phone, and you said, no, mr. alexander didn't have any weapons or any guns. you said that specifically, right? >> yes. >> and now you come in and you tell us that, yes, he does have guns. right? >> at least one that i -- yeah. >> reporter: yeah, once again the prosecutor trying to show that she may have brought a weapon there and, again, she inist is thes that he had a gun in his possession in his closet even though she had said for a number of interviews and even on television interviews that he had never had a weapon as far as she knew, and all of his friends said he had never owned a gun. it's very simple, jon. she says, jodi arias, in all the stories she's given over the course of a couple of years whether it be on television or her own journal are basically all lies, and now in front of this courtroom she's telling the truth. the prosecutor's once genre minding of that and, i have to tell you that, it is extremely aggressive at times. the prosecutor goes after her consistently on every single answer, basically picking apart every one of her answers showing that she's lied before, so why now is she all of a sudden telling the truth? jon? jon: but the question is, is it too aggressive? we'll get into that with our legal panel a little later on. >> reporter: right. jon: adam houseley, thank you. >> reporter: all right. jenna: well, a new debate over welfare to work. seventeen years after president clinton signed the bill into law, critics arguing that waivers will increase government dependency. is that the case? we're going to report, you can decide. also, growing outrage after a decision to release thousands of illegal immigrants from detention centers across this country. today there's some new calls for answers. texas republican michael mccall joins us live. when you have diabetes... your doctor will say get smart about your weight. i tried weight loss plans... but their shakes aren't always made for people with diabetes. that's why there's glucerna hunger smart shakes. they have carb steady, with carbs that digest slowly to help minimize blood sugar spikes. and they have six grams of sugars. with fifteen grams of protein to help manage hunger... look who's getting smart about her weight. 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[ female announcer ] with 40 delicious progresso soups at 100 calories or less, there are plenty of reasons people are saying "progress-oh!" share your progress-oh! story on facebook. jenna: a hearing today in our nation's capital on the administration's proposed waiver of work requirements for welfare recipients. critics now concerned if the waivers are approved, it would result in less work and more government dependence. but will it really? doug mckelway's live in washington with more. doug? >> reporter: hi, jenna. people disagree with the idea that welfare reform passed in 1996 by the republican-controlled congress and signed by president clinton was a huge success. the number of people on welfare dropped from 12.2 million to 4.5 million in a did. president clinton wrote an op-ed in "the new york times" back then. it said, quote: >> r eporter: but on july 2th last summer, the obama administration's department of health and human services dropped the cornerstone of that reform, the requirement that welfare recipients seek work. hhs did so without the required approval of congress. >> this is a major expansion of executive authority. if it's legal, it's because of quite a loophole -- it's the teensiest little loophole that they are driving a truck through. >> reporter: why did the administration do it? one of the nation's leading scholars on welfare says it boils down to an argument between two schools of thought; those who think that welfare recipients should seek work versus those who lost that 19 t 6 battle, the ones who think welfare recipients should get job training. again, listen. >> the people who are on the losing end of that argument are, in large measure, in the administration. >> reporter: and does job training work for those on welfare? one witness at today's hearing offered this anecdote. >> i believe it's the case that before you became commissioner in new york one-half of the women at the city college were on welfare. >> yes, that's actually true, and beyond that they didn't graduate. >> reporter: last september the house passed a resolution to repeal that work waiver, but the senate did not act on it, so both bodies are trying to resurrect the appeal in this present congress. jenna? jenna: more on that story as we get it, doug. thank you. jon: we've told you about this controversy, immigration officials releasing hundreds of illegal immigrants ahead of the looming budget cuts. congressman michael mccall joins us live. also, baseball players taking the field in sunny florida for a little preseason action. that looks fun, doesn't it? why towns are spending millions to bring teams to their little slice of paradise. hello? the words are going this way-there's no way. oh, the lights came on. isn't technology supposed to make life easier? at chase we're pioneering innovations that make banking simple. deposit a check with a photo. pay someone with an email. and bank seamlessly with our award-winning mobile app. take a step forward... and chase what matters. >> hi, how are you? >> reporter: a billion dollar a year industry with fans coming to florida from across the nation. >> great park, by the way. >> reporter: paying for something not easy to find today, intimacy in professional sports. >> dad took us when we were young, and i'm bringing him now. >> reporter: lee county is home to the boston red sox and the minnesota twins. government studies estimate fans spend $50 million a year in the local economy. >> souvenir programs! >> reporter: no surprise, there is a wider competition for towns hoping to host a major league team. >> there are more communities that want to host spring training than there are major league baseball teams. the teams can ask for the moon, and there's going to be a community that gives it to them. >> reporter: the battle goes beyond florida. in recent years arizona has poached away 15 teams. now florida's governor says the state needs a new strategy to prevent further losses. jon, back to you. jon: all right. steve harrigan, watch out. don't get hit by a foul ball there with your back to the home plate, okay? thank you, steve. jenna: always caring about our correspondents, jon. i know they appreciate that very much. you know, growing outrage is happening over a controversial decision apparently by the administration, actually, it's not by the administration. that's an important point. it's actually by the department of homeland security to start releasing detained illegal immigrants. the move said to be in anticipation of looming federal budget cuts, more than 300 illegals in arizona have already been let go, and governor jan brewer there is not happy. >> this is just unexplainable, unbelievable, and it's appalling. the bottom line is that what about the respect for the law-abiding citizens, and who is running this country? you know, it's blame this person, blame that person, duck, cover. the american people, neil, are fed up. jenna: well, meanwhile, the chair of the house homeland security committee is asking why this is happening and wants answers on it. texas republican michael mccall is the author of a letter that he wrote to i.c.e. and chair of the house homeland security committee. congressman, nice to have you in person -- >> thanks for having me, jenna. jenna: we've heard different numbers. we've heard hundreds have been released, thousands have been released, what are we talking about here? how many? >> we really don't know. we know hundreds have been releaseed. i sent a letter to director morton demanding answers in terms of how many people have been released, what is the background, what is this policy that you're doing that you didn't notify congress about and, you know, what is the criminal backgrounds? we're hearing that some of these people released have violent criminal backgrounds. jenna: we're hearing from the white house -- jay carney spoke about this yesterday -- saying that the white house has no input on this plan, this is up to the department to make that decision. what do you think about that? >> it's very interesting how napolitano announces this at the white house, tries to tie it to sequestration, a scare tactic that they've been doing all week long -- jenna: you don't think it's tied to sequestration? >> i think that she's tried to. i think this whole thing backfired on the white house, and then you saw them running for cover, and they throw the secretary under the bus and say, oh, we had nothing to do with this, this is all i.c.e. and the secretary of dhs. jenna: what would be their motivation to really saying people if it's not due to budget cuts from sequestration? >> well, i think, you know, for the past year they have had this plan to start releasing these detainees, in their view, to save money. but i think it's a weak immigration policy is what it is. and they're using sequestration as sort of a guise, if you will, an excuse to do this, to effectuate that policy. we kind of caught them red-handed on it. i sent my director to -- my letter to director morton, and then he saw them all running for cover. jenna: so you don't have a response to to the letter so fa, but do you have evidence this is their plan? you say this is your gut feeling, but any evidence you can point to? >> we know they had a director looking at doing this as far as a year ago. so it's ironic that napolitano tries to tie this to sequestration. again, the sky's falling. now we're going to have to release illegal aliens. then again i think that strategy totally backfired on them. we called them out on it, and it's a dangerous and reckless policy to release potentially violent criminal offenders into the general population. jenna: we need more information on this, obviously, how many, who exactly is being released. we had karl rove join us at the top of the hour, and he said something that republicans should consider doing is giving the power to the president in sequestration to have some ownership to the cuts and how they're made. right now as we just talked about the white house says, well, we don't have any ownership of these cuts because it the departments. what do you think about that? should that be something you all consider so that the president has a role in what cuts are being made and how? >> look, we want smarter cuts, but let's be honest, this is the president's idea. he came out with this idea. and you can't balance a budget if all you're going to talk about are discretionary spending. that's one-quarter of the budget. we need to talk about the three-quarters of the budget, which is entitlement reform. and without that adult conversation in the room, we're never going to get this thing done. and if the president won't even come to the congress and talk to us, he's running around on a road show politicking rather than governing. jenna: let me ask you this though. a lot of our viewers are hearing about their meat not being inspected, long lines at the airport, teachers being laid off, illegal immigrants being let out. at the same time, what we're hearing is that lawmakers are going home tonight, tomorrow, and we don't know what to think. what's really going on here? is this just an opportunity for politicians to be political in sequester, or do you think that the sequestration cuts are really going to have this effect that we're all hearing about? >> i don't think this thing's probably going to go forward. i know leadership's meeting with the white house tomorrow. i'm not optimistic about that. but the sky's not going to fall. the cuts will probably take place. we're going to be okay. it's a lot of hype by the administration, scare tactics to blame house republicans -- jenna: and you don't think that the house republicans should take any action from this point on to try to prevent this or make some sort of compromise? >> well, you know, we have. we passed two bills to replace sequestration. the senate has done nothing, the president didn't respond to it, the boehner tried to negotiate something with the president of the united states. but, again, he won't talk about entitlement reform. you can't get this done unless you have cuts in discretionary but also mandatory spending cuts x. that's where -- and that's where, i think, quite honestly boehner will tell you he got rolled by the president and the white house. he's not going to do it again. jenna: will you let us know when you get a letter about the specifics -- >> i sure will. and i plan to sit down and meet with director morton personally, and i think the american people deserve answer toss what i think is a return to the catch and release policy that we ended many years ago. jenna: a pleasure to have you on with us. thank you for being on today. jon: a salute for a true american hero. the final good-bye for general norman schwarzkopf. the man who led american troops to victory in the first gulf war and so much more. we will take you live to west point. plus, jodi arias testifying in her own defense at her capital murder trial. with the prosecutor hammering away at her stories, why his style is coming under scrutiny. is it working? our legal panel debates. none of us would want to be told we can't marry the pern we love. as americanswe believe in freedom. that's what i fought for as a marine, and that's what we believe in as republicans. freedom means freedom for everyone. i didn't use to understand the importance of same-sex marriage, but after learning my brother was gay i wanted the same rights for him. he was the best man at my wedding and i want to be the best man at his. it's only fair that calvin should have the freedom to marry the person he loves, too. it's time for marriage. jon: the state's cross-examination of jodi arias set to the resume for a fifth day in her murder trial. the lead prosecutor, juan martinez, known for a take no prisoners style, has been hammering away at arias's many different versions what happened. could his tough approach backfire before the jury? take a look at the snippet. >> you say you're not lying here, that what you're telling us is the truth, right? >> yes. >> but you are telling us when you spoke with the detective, this that wasn't true, correct, whatever you did say you told him? >> anything, some things were not true. most things. >> most things, were true, is that what you're saying. >> some things were not true. >> did you lie to the detective yes or no? >> yes. >> did you lie to him on two occasions? >> more than two, yes. >> to date, lie to them today? >> yes. >> did you lie to 48 hours? >> yes. >> did you lie to people of utah? >> yes. >> did you lie to daniel freeman? >> yes. to everyone. >> you lied to a lot of people, but saying because you're sitting here in this courtroom there has been for lack of a better term a conversion and you're now telling the truth, right? >> for lack of a better term, yes. jon: that is how it's been going. the testimony is back underway now. susan constantine is a jury consultant. esther spanish is a frred tecce, former criminal prosecutor. welcome to each of you. this is mostly male jury. how do you think this tile of mr. martinez is going to fly with those members of the jury? >> well, overall we're looking at seven, or 11 male jurors and then the remaining are females. four of those are alternates. it is really more how those jurors except and take in information. even if they were males, if they tend to be more kenistic, most men are not as feeling. type-a personalities absolutely. then again this overall, bombardment over time, i think can be very ineffective if it is used consistent tlult without creating rythym and pace in his delivery. jon: esther, i noted even just that exchange he had with her a moment ago we played is a little more sedate than he was in the early goinging. >> that was the --. jon: this is for esther. >> go ahead. >> thank you. they're arguing over semantics, most, some, a few, numerous. the clip you played was pretty sedate. but i have heard examples and it's enough already. you don't have to make the point 100 times. she admitted she lied. move onto something else. you don't have to argue that she lied numerous times or a few times. it means the same thing. it seems like mr. martinez is trying to make sure she says puppy, instead of small dog. in the end does it really matter? he made his point. i think it is coming off as he is trying to bully her. if you find anybody, any jurors who have sympathy for her being beaten down by him, that only helps her. it helps her case. she is looking at the death penalty. if she can establish some type of rapport, even if she can, elicit some sympathy from a juror, to her predictment right there, then it does not help the prosecution, even though the prosecution has all the facts on their side. they don't need to beat her up. >> you know what? esther, you're not going to get sympathy for a woman who slice ad guy 27 times, shot him in the head and darn near decapitated him and repeatedly lied about it. i think what martinez is doing, he is going toe-to-toe. in closing argument, he which say ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this woman's entire defense which turns solely on her testimony that she butcher canned this man because he made her do things she didn't want to do. you saw her stand with me, toe-to-toe, day in, day out, question by question, by question. your jury consultant, is right, jon, people filter information differently. my experience they filter information predicate the on predisposition and life experience. my example you go to chinese restaurant and get a foreign cookie. that says you go away for a long time. if you're positive person you go to tahiti and drink from coconuts. if you're negative, you will go to prison. they will filter information not who they are not martin's style. we love to talk about it and jurors take the oath very seriously and that's how they filter information. jon: fred brought up the fact that he has been telling the jury the victim coerced her into all the sex acts and she wasn't really comfortable with them. and yet martinez did get her to admit she enjoyed the rainchy sex that they shared. that has got to work against a lot of her arguments. >> i agree. he is just going too far. he has been effective to get her to say that she lied. frankly she is readily admitted she lied to everyone and expects the jury to believe that now she is telling the truth? i don't think anyone believes she is telling the truth. the problem by constantly attacking her, the jurors might feel some level of sympathy. i agree. she did, i don't know. if she did it or not but i believe the facts are --, it is the prosecutor's case to lose, not jodi arias's case to win. >> i agreed. she needs to be careful. jon: susan, you're our jury expert here. talk about fred's point. fred is saying essentially the two are boxers in a ring. the prosecutor is going after her hard and she is punching right back. how does that play with the jury? >> it is showing jodi arias can stand on her own. i think it is very effective there. he has opinion bushing her and pushing her and she is not the little wall flower she is describing herself. instead of going to the beginning to end, jody remembers everything and taking cognitive report going backwards to forward and jumping around and scrambling her mind up. this is where we're starting to see the attitude with jodi arias been tremendously has been beneficial for the state. jon: go ahead, fred. >> it's been very effective she testified on direct she remembered nothing about killing him. he caught her slipping up, very subtle but i saw it. when you pulled her, pulled his body in the shower, right. that's where i pulled it. she said she had forgotten about it. when you deal with people that are pathologic you have to jump around. i understand about this guy, in closing argument he will pull all this together. jon: there is also the fact of the gun. his friends say he didn't keep a gun at his house. she says it was in the closet. her grandparents had a gun of the same caliber that was stolen from them just in the weeks ahead of this killing. a lot of questions here. esther, one last crack at how it is all going to come together. >> well, you know, i think he just, march teends already made his case. i just don't know why he needs to keep going at it. he has gotten the facts to use in closing argument. i think longer she stays on the stand the more likely for one juror to feel bad for her. jon: that is all it takes. >> he does need to end it. he needs to end it. jon: with 11 men on the jury i'm not sure that anybody will be feeling particularly bad for her but we'll see. a lot of testimony and closing arguments to come. thanks to each of you for joining us today. >> thanks for having me. >> thank you. jon: all right. jenna: believe it or not there is some new talk about bridging the gap between both parties as the clock ticks towards this automatic spending cuts that are said to kick in by midnight. alaska senator mark begich joins us in three minutes. he has actually written a letter that takes on republicans, democrats and the president all together. we'll ask him who he thinks should step up to the plate. also a store owner in his 80s taking on two hammer-wielding robbers. we'll hear from him next. anyone have occasional constipation, diarrhea, gas, bloating? 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can you make this bridge happen, a compromise between both sides? >> i don't know if i can be the one but i'll tell you there are folks like myself and i think that article really laid it out, the new guys don't look at past traditions or who said what to who 10 years ago or 15 years ago and still holding grudges we're about trying to get stuff done. there is lot of chatter behind the scenes with folks on both sides. obviously a group of us moderate democrats trying to figure out there is an avenue here. jenna: tell us about that, senator. hearing some chatter in the background we like to hear more about that. what does that, what shape is that taking? >> well, first off, people come to the conclusion that friday we'll have the automatic budget cuts that will start slowly unraveling. by god, monday, it is all going to cave in, that's not what is going to happen. it will be a slow unraveling that gives some air as we get to the end of the month to deal with the continuing resolution. i think there is some discussion, i think there is not a bad discussion, to take the appropriations that have been done already for 2013, tighten them up a little bit more. bring those forward and another continuing resolution, make that part of the closer for the 2013 budget. get that off the table because as you know, we do a cr, a continuing resolution we'll be funding things we shouldn't be funding like the shuttle program that doesn't exist anymore. so there's a lot of discussion saying let's try at that. jenna: so, senator, that is interesting to hear there are some discussions still ongoing. you recently wrote a letter that criticized not only your fellow democrats -- >> everybody. jenna: and republicans and the president. you really got everybody all in there. you missed the media. we'll take blame where we should. in a compromise situation though, somebody has to be the first one to come forward. you know the first one to make that offering. >> right. jenna: gerry seib said it is moderate democrats like yourself. who do you think who needs for lack of a better term, blink first on this? >> well it's a good question because everyone wants to point at everybody, basically. my view is, i'm happy as a individual senator to step out. i said all along, it has to be a three-pronged approach on the budget. i have to cut the budget. i will give you a shopping list of areas. we have to deal with revenues. tax reform is great revenue. the third is, we have to still invest in this country and education, infrastructure. i keep saying this and keep telling folks, let's sit down, put it on the table and you know what, it will be a tough battle. because guess what, we have to make some decisions and it will not be comfortable. and i'm okay --. jenna: sorry to interrupt. we'll have to run in a second but why isn't that working? a lot of viewers might be thinking well, that sound pretty good so why isn't it working? >> what you're seeing a slow transition. a few new people like myself are not afraid of votes. if i take the vote i will be tortured in the next election. you know what? they will say it any way and let's get on the show and figure this out. a lot of us are trying to push that up. i do believe at the end of the day for example, we'll have a budget on the floor before we go on the next spring break period at end. march. we'll deal with that. that will be the battleground that will start this discussion. i've been one of those encouraging the leadership, let's just get the budget on the floor. let's debate it. it will be tough but we will get it done and we'll have a course and some certainty. i think you will see, 2 1/2 weeks, that may be the pivot point, we'll have the budget on the floor and everyone will throw their ideas. we'll have a tug-of-war. at end of the day you folks in the media will have great opportunity to cover us for all kind of things. jenna: it takes some courage to do that. we look forward to talking to you over the next several weeks as it comes together. that is the indication. a next couple weeks that is where the real big battle is. nice to see you. thanks for joining us. >> thank you very much. jon: well the sequestration, senator begich was talking about is hours away now. famed journalist bob woodward finds himself in the middle of this battle with his claim that the white house threatened him over his reporting on the cuts. the latest on that controversy. a final sendoff for an american hero, retired general norman schwarzkopf. the military legend who led u.s. troops in operation desert storm, a live report from west point coming up. 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[ female announcer ] ensure clear. nine grams protein. zero fat. in blueberry/pomegranate and peach. jon: right now a memorial is underway for an american hero. the leader of "operation desert storm", general norman schwarzkopf. the decorated veteran passed away in december. today loved ones and admirers are remembering the man known as storm inch norman. he was known for dedication to his country. we have more from the military academy at woes point, new york. rick? >> reporter: a number of friend and family and dignitaries are in the cadet chapel where the life of general norman schwarzkopf is being remembered this hour. the dignitaries include former vice president dick cheney the second of tear of defense during the war. colin powell, retired four-star general chairman. joint chiefs a and his daughter and wife. who remember norman tough, no-nonsense, frank speaking leader who is described as john wayne swagger and growl like a grizzly. he led troops during the invasion of gred made today and command the operation desert storm and ended ground war in iraq in four days. he spoke powerfully at root evironment ceremony in 1991. >> no matter how eloquent the orator, no matter how prolific the poet, the no matter how lyrical the songwriter, no words can ever capture the emotions that go through a person's heart when he stands for the last time and hear's the national anthem and salutes the american flag representing the country that he has gladly, proudly, served for the last 35 years. >> reporter: there will be a smaller ceremony here in the west point cemetery this afternoon. the general's grave, very close to his father's who was also a west point graduate. jon? jon: gone at 78. gone too soon. rick leventhal, thank you. and we'll be right back.
we're hearing about a hero behind a jewelry heist. 81-year-old who took on two robbers by himself. it shows the thieves smashing jewelry cases and that's when chuck sprang into action. what was going through your head? >> nothing (laughter) just stop them. and fear didn't come into me, it just happened. i just tried to protect what belongs to me. >> he did not hesitate. fortunately, the owner was not hurt, but the thieves did manage to get away with a couple of watches. hopefully they get caught, jon and hopefully bad karma. >> got the good video and hope they get those guys. chuck deserves our help. thank you for joining us today. "america live" starts right n n now. >> fox news alert on a busy afternoon and a new twist in an increasingly ugly war between the white house and veteran washington post reporter bob woodward. welcome to "america live" i'm megyn kelly. let's get you up to speed quickly. this fight started when mr. woodward appeared on fox news sunday two weeks ago challenging the administration's narrative on the budget negotiations to head off the automatic spending changes, you know, they're going to decrease the amount of increased spending we're going to have and this caused consternation in washington. while the white house repeatedly insisted the republicans were to blame for that plan entirely mr. woodward pointed out that this idea in fact originated with the president and his team and president obama said specifically in a debate with mitt romney that the republicans came up with this. woodward came out and said, that's absolutely false. when i was researching my book, my book months ago, all access pass to the white house, it was confirmed by many sources that this is the white house's brainchild. and now, jay carney, white house spokesman admitted that-- despite at that reporting the administration continues the charge against woodward. and issued dire warnings that the toll that all of this sequestration as its known will take on our economy and blaming the republicans every step of the way. they voted for it, too, by the way. yesterday, bob woodward again called the president's decision not to deploy an aircraft carrier due to the so-called cuts, a kind of madness. this is woodward criticizing the white house again. hours later, more fuel on the fire when mr. woodward accused of white house of threatening him for challenging the president's version of events. here he is on cnn. >> well, they're not happy at all and some people kind of, you know, said look, we don't see eye to eye on this. they never said though, that this is factually wrong and that this is said to me in an e-mail by a top-- >> and it was, it was said very clearly, you will regret doing this. and it makes me very uncomfortable to have the white house telling reporters, you're going to regret doing something that you believe in. >> megyn: well, the white house says, it denies that any threat was ever made, arguing woodward misinterpreted that e-mail and on and on it goes. chris stirewalt is our fox news digital editor, and host of power play dot-com com live. we know who bob woodward says, gene sperling. the head of the economic advisors and out front and center for the president during this whole fight automatic decrease to the automatic increase to spending. >> megyn: and the white house says woodward was threatened releases the entire e-mail, i don't know if it's the entire, but releases the e-mail in which the alleged threat is made so now we have it and it's amazing to see the folks rushing to defend the white house and by the folks, i mean the press rushing to defend the white house, but i will say this is, this is what, how the letter reads in part the e-mail from gene sperling to boob woodward february 22. politicalco. i advise for raising my voice in our conversation today you may not believe this, but as a friend i think you will regret staking out that claim suggesting that the president has moved the goal post in this whole negotiation, not to argue on, he said, but my sincere advice. it's your call, my apologies again about raising my voice, do feel bad about that. >> megyn: and woodward writes back in the white house's defense woodward says you do not ever have to apologize to me, you get wound up because you're making your points and you believe in them and goes on to say, i welcome your listening. ce. so, they are ticked off at the white house that he went out and he says they threatened him. he and others who have covered the white house seem to believe though that this is a pattern of behavior by those at the white house. >> oh, my gosh. well, yes, of course it is. there's a news channel, you may have heard, the fox news channel. >> megyn: oh, yeah. >> a pretty big deal, early in the president's administration they tried to read us out of the press corps, they went on a deliberate explicit campaign that the president keeps up to this day to try to cull us from the press herd and make sure that we are delegitimized in some way. they have done this to reporters from the washington examiner, they have done this to reporters from san francisco chronicle, boston herald, this is a pattern that this white house is engaged in. now, mr. woodward, who has been sort of the billy graham of washington journalists, a counsel to each president since gerald ford since she took down richard nixon, ever president has granted him access. >> megyn: better to have him on your side. >> right, better to have him on your side. so when he considers a threat after getting a lot of kid glove treatment for 30 years is probably different, i would feel bad for him if he saw what was in the inboxes of some white house reporters, that was far less gentle in its reproof than mr. sperling offered. >> megyn: he in the wake of all this, lanny davis, a fox news contributor sometimes writes for the washington times, says i have been threatened to the white house, too, and i called up the white house and tell them you better not let this happen again, it's inappropriate. and ronnie offer the journal and was the chief and now back to daily reporting, saying he's been abused by the white house, intimidation abbitactics vulgarity, abusive language and virtually the fame phrases that woodward says were used to him, you're going to regret this, badgering and got to the point just now he cut off his own senior white house administration official source because he said, i just disapprove of the way they deal with reporters and i'm a seasoned reporter, but a younger reporter might be intimidated by them and on principle i'm shutting that down. >> the president's operation is notoriously a boys' club and that locker room attitude, the bullying way that they have, my gosh, david plouffe, a very high ranking official, senior advise to the president, my gosh, out basically taunting woodward, calling him old, more or less, and saying he is like an old baseball player can't hit the pitchers of today. >> megyn: let's put it up so you know what. and david plouffe. batching woodward is like watching my idol. >> a philadelphia philly who is very good. >> megyn: facing live pitching again, perfection in game one is rarely repeated. go ahead. >> mean, just mean. and this is something that people aren't used to. certainly bob woodward is not used to that kind of treatment and people in the white house press corps to that treatment, but guess what? team obama doesn't care. woodward and company believe that the president wants to do a deal or wants to have good relationship with the press. he does not seem to want to do a deal with republicans on spending and does not seem to want a good relationship with the press and they're going to have to lump it like we've been doing for the last five years. >> megyn: welcome to our world. >> exactly, welcome aboard. >> megyn: all right, chris, thank you. >> you bet. >> megyn: while the white house denies any attempt to silence woodward administration media allies on the left have spent the last 24 hours beatings up on a man who helped to inspire journalism careers. the huffington post, drama king, woodward cries foul, runs to hannity and the reason they have that up there is because bob woodward, prior to any of the events that happened yesterday, had agreed to an interview with our own sean hannity and he's been on cnn, sat down with politico. make it sound like he's running to a conservative guy for an interview. and this is long scheduled and he sat down with several media outlets, in any event. let's move on and going to be on tonight. tune in at 9 p.m. and headline, woodward goes wing-nut. and from legend to laughingstock. bob woodward cites bogus threats, calls obama knicks own i-- nixonen and between obama and former president richard nixon, and the relationship with the media. and the national journal, the reason that senior white house source gave him such a hard time and used the vulgar language so on so forth to the point where the reporter cut off his own relationship with the white house, sick of the abuse, he says. in our next hour, we will have former president george w. bush's former white house secretary, a woman you know by the name of dana perino about what is going on between the white house and its relationship with the press and whether they have gone too far, whether this has been taken a step too far. don't miss that. developing right now, deepening suspicions of foul play in the mysterious death of a rising political star in mississippi. the body of democratic mayoral candidate near a levee on the mississippi river. looking into whether this suspected crime was personal or political. trace gallagher has the story from our breaking news desk. >> reporter: by all accounts 34-year-old was becoming influential, and ebony magazine named him as one of up and comers. truly the first gay man for a viable public office in mississippi history. the whole thing began when his car involved in a two car crash. the problem was, he was not in the car and a search began and 30 miles from where his car was found, deputies found his body in the woods near the banks of the mississippi river. police will not release anything about the cause of death, saying that an autopsy is underway. but they are ruling this homicide, but they're not ruling it a hate crime. listen to police. >> the sheriff's office does have a person of interest in custody in relation to the case. due to the fact that it is an ongoing investigation, any information in regard to the individual's name will be released at a later time. >> also, will not say the man driving the car was a person of interest. and mississippi well-known to blues fan where robert johnson is said to have sold his soul to the devil for guitar skills. and right now, they're releasing zero about that man. >> megyn: all right. trace, thanks. after days of warnings about a budget move that could weaken america's economy, hurt our military readiness, leave thousands of teachers without a job, could leave you without a firefighter to come put your fire out at your house, president obama last night seemed to be striking a very different message on the expected impact of this so-called sequester of these decreases to the increase in spending we're going to see this year. we're going to debate why he did that. and at 2 p.m. eastern, one of the most popular religions on the planet will be without a leader for a time. we'll go live to the vatican as we begin seeing the next step in the process of picking a new pope, a historic day. and president clinton's welfare reform was considered one of his most successful pieces of legislation. today we'll debate why our current administration is trying to repeal part of the plan in part, this is how the critics phrased it, that requires work for the benefits. now, the administration has a different story on this, lou dobbs is going to update us and we'll walk through it next. ♪ that's the way you do ♪ ♪ dad, i'd put that down. ah. 4g, huh? verizon 4g lte. 700 megahertz spectrum, end-to-end, pure lte build. the most consistent speeds indoors or out. and, obviously, astonishing throughput. obviously... you know how fast our home wifi is? yeah. this is basically just asast. oh. and verizon's got more fast lte coverage than all other networks combined. it's better. yes. oh, why didn't you just say that? huh-- what is he doing? all right that's a fifth-floor probleok.. not in my house! ha ha ha! ha ha ha! no no no! not today! ha ha ha! ha ha ha! jimmy how happy are folks who save hundreds of dollars switching to geico? happier than dikembe mutumbo blocking a shot. get happy. get geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more. >> well, new concerns today that the obama administration will reverse part of the welfare reform law that was a cornerstone of president clinton's efforts in the 1990's, a house committee holding a hearing on the push to waive the work requirement for some welfare recipients, there's more to that story so we'll get into it in a second. last summer the obama administration did so in part and it became a big deal in the presidential campaign. and it's in dispute. lou dobbs is the host of the lou dobbs show. the republicans made a big deal about it and the administration pushed back we're just allowing states the flexibility they are asking us to give them to decide what qualifies as work or doesn't. if a mother wants to go back and get an advanced degree that would help her job prospects, it may qualify or-- >> the compassion and the leadership of the obama administration, the problem is it's against the law. the republicans went to the general accountability office and asked for a ruling on this, whether or not this is a regulation and therefore subject to the oversight of the united states congress. >> megyn: did they have to come to us, the folks in the house, and get per manipulation. >> absolutely, the little thing like the law and said so, republicans sent off a note to hhs, kathleen sebelius and the secretary says explain what in the world to say why do you think you would have unilateral authority to change the law, and never heard and since september and now they think it's probably time to bring this to a conclusion and resolution and why there are the hearings. i don't for the life of me understand how there could be a question. can i read you the heading of section 407 of the law? because it's pretty straight forward. i'll read you the title, if i may, megyn. >> megyn: okay. >> it's called mandatory work requirements. i don't often see in any statute or law a straight forward statement of intent and the effect of the law. >> megyn: in other words, mandatory work requirements. >> there isn't any wiggle room in that whatsoever. >> megyn: i will tell you this, when this debate came up over the summer we had the guy who used to run new york's program on the show and this guy, if memory serves is a liberal democrat and he said they are-- >> odds are pretty good. >> megyn: he said they are gutting the program and taking the work requirement out and that's a fair charge by the republicans. he doesn't think that the flexibility will really amount to real work and that people are going to game the system and others have said this, that people are going to game the system under the new flexible rules to get welfare without working. >> the patience of the republican party and the national liberal media, by the way, they're nothing more than lap dogs now than watch dogs. this should have been a subject that was absolutely, front and center in the campaign. mitt romney chose not to do so. >> megyn: well, he tried or the rnc tried, one of them did. >> well, they also lost so the republicans need something besides losers, and to let this go on, to fester this long without a statement, without a declaration and an appeal, a campaign, if you will, to the american people on the importance of the constitution, because this administration has made a clear, it will work around as the president is fond of saying, the congress, the ogres that they are, and he will take his enlightenment and his intent and make it so, independently, unilaterally and without sanction by the congress or the constitution. it's got to stop. this is one of those instances, like refusal to enforce the immigration code, he didn't like it, if we don't like it, change it, but do not behave as if this is some sort of a third world country in which whoever survives the most recent contest is the leader, the dear leader because it's not the way that an american president should be acting, nor the loyal opposition for that matter. >> megyn: a couple of issues, number one, the president in your view flouting the law and criticized for criticizing the defense of marriage act which you're supposed to do, and the federal government is supposed to-- we're going to talk about that in the next block. i want to say this, the other thing about welfare quickly hook at this graph, it shows what president clinton did and this congress, bipartisan effort, works. look at this, the number of people getting welfare up near 16 million prior to when we passed the welfare reform act and look how dramatically it dropped and how relatively low it's stayed since. there are stakes involved substantively in doing this. >> getting a program that works. the aid to dependent families with dependent children did not work. it was and they replaced it in 2006 and replaced it with assistance to needy families. it works, leave them alone. there's principle involved, ideology involved, but it returns people to a productive role in society. >> megyn: they're claiming they're not messing with it that much and giving the states what-- >> would you like me to get you a list. >> megyn: you're lucky i let you read the header. it's over, thanks, lou. check out lou on first base network. and what freedom means, a man trying to live like early americans and runs into modern day regulations. why this north carolina mountain man says the government is trying to change the way he lives on his own land. >> this is supposed to be the land of the free and government is supposed to help people, but take their individual liberties and freedom? that's not what's happening here, so i'm thinking, my gosh, this is the country that i pledge allegiance to every day? . e they don't take it with food. switch to citracal maximum plus d. it's the only calcium supplement that can be taken with or without food. my doctor recommends citracal maximum. it's all about absorption. 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[ male announcer ] sounds good. it's amazing what soup can do. >> well, a new effort underway by dozens of prominent conservatives to throw support behind marriage equality. gay marriage. four members and a top presidential advisor all signing on to agree at the supreme court. justice for justices hear a same sex marriage cause out of california. and nicole wallace, and a-- great to see you here. >> thanks for having me. >> megyn: meg whitman and a national security advisor, ileana ros-lehtinen and you, people don't normally social gay marriage as a republican-backed issue, why did you and other top republican sign on for it. >> i think we've been quiet about it, but the truly conservative position is that families create the most stable building blocks for neighborhoods and societies and that any family, think two people who love each other and who are raising children, who are married, improve and benefit society by being able to do so. that's the more conservative view here. >> the argument against it in part. legally they say, look, you don't change tconstitution to fit evolving standards in the country. if the founding fathers thought this is what the conservatives argue, we need to protect abortion, that would have been in there, we need to protect gay marriage and would have been in there and you can't develop, find new rights over the course of history. >> you're right and you're the lawyer here so i'm not going to outlawyer you on this one. >> megyn: that's not my position, i'm not saying-- >> you've argued, too, that a lot of the freedoms that we now enjoy were not written in the constitution, women didn't get to vote until an embarrassingly recent point in history. and interracial marriages were not allowed. and freedoms take longer sometimes to emerge from our interpretation of the constitution. >> and that's a more left-leaning point of view. >> not left-leaning. >> megyn: living, breathing constitution. >> and ted olson is a conservative legal scholar and there are a lot of republican legal minds who signed our names on this brief and 14 times the supreme court has held marriage as a fundamental right, it's the view that will prevail legally when the courts look at it. >> megyn: they were the once that were required to get involved. it used to be illegal for a black person to marry a white person in this and judicial intervention to get past that point. >> and the principle concern being-- and ties it together and shows that the pursuit of freedom and the explicit right to freedom and access to freedom is in that constitutional document. >> ted olson, by the way, the former solicitor general under president bush and lost his wife in 9/11 and he's leading the charge in this california case. and quickly let me ask you politically, that's your legal. >> right. >> megyn: politics you know. do you think that this will help the republican party win back some voters that they've been struggling to get? >> i think it will help people see us as a party, you talk about things that are living and breathing and evolving, our party is that and i think this process of evolving is an important one, a healthy one and i think to see republicans debating and i think we're having a pretty intellectual debate about this issue, it's not an emotional or a nasty one, we're debating different theories and i think that's very good for the party, it's good for the country to see our party hashing our way, even if it's messy at points through some of the complicated issues. >> megyn: great to see you. >> thanks for having me. >> megyn: thanks for being here. we could see a major shift in the president's warnings about the spending changes that are supposed to kick in tomorrow. here is just a little bit of what we have been hearing. >> sequester will weaken america's economic recovery. it will weaken our military readiness. >> air traffic contollers and airport security will see cutbacks. tens of thousands of parents will scramble to find health care for their kids. >> megyn: last night the president gave a group of business leaders a different sounding assessment. why did he do that? that's next. and at 2 p.m. eastern, the catholic church will be technically without a leader for a time. we'll go live to the vatican as we begin seeing the next step in the process of picking a new pope. history happens in 30 minutes, folks. and a major lotto win being contested by a bevy of beauticians. look the at these ladies. they aone of their co-workers is trying to style herself as the sole winner even though they were supposed to have split the winnings. they say it's a group ticket. bring your best hair and pull up a chair because the scissors come out today in kelly's court. ♪ that's why there's glucerna hunger smart shakes. they have carb steady, with carbs that digest slowly to help minimize blood sugar spikes. [ male announcer ] glucerna hunger smart. a smart way to help manage hunger and diabetes. i'm up next, but now i'm sging the heartburn blues. hold on, prilosec isn't for fast relief. cue up alka-seltzer. it stops heartburn fast. ♪ oh what a relief it is! >> will weaken america's economic recovery. it will weaken our military readiness. air traffic contollers, airport security will see cutbacks and that could cause delays at airports across the country. tens of thousands of parents will have to scramble to find child care for their kids. emergency responders like the ones who are here today. their ability to help communities respond to and recover from disasters will be degraded. federal prosecutors will have to close cases and let criminals go. thousands of teachers and educators will be laid off. >>. >> megyn: that's a sample of some of what we've heard from president obama these days and putting out a long list of warnings what he says will be the impact of these spending changes that are due to begin tomorrow. they take mace ovplace over the course of five years, but begin tomorrow. the last night's speech to the business council, the president seemed to be sounding a different message. take a listen. >> i should point out and i'm heard you've he heard from a number of experts and economists that this is not a cliff, but it is a tumble downward. >> megyn: joining me now simon rosenburg, president and founder of a think tank and a former campaign advisor to president clinton and marc thiessen, the enterprise, and former speech writer for president george w. bush. it's not a contrast, but a different sounding mental from t from-- message from one he had been giving. it will not happen overnight, but to be real. he seems to be trying to prepare folks for what, marc? >> the fact that the the sequester isn't quite what he made it out to be. reason he's changing his tone, what he was saying was not true. and like the boy who cried wolf, obama is calling sequester. they got caught and said that 40,000 teachers will lose their jobs and arne duncan said the layoff notices were going out as we speak and they couldn't find a single school district in the country where layoff notices, pink slips were going out because of the sequester. they went out and side they had to release hundreds of illegal immigrants facing deportation from immigration jails because of the sequester. it isn't costs $164 to keep an immigrant in immigration jail and nothing to do with the sequester and that official, by the way, has suddenly retired. you've got saying 70,000 kids are going to lose head start and hhs spokesman said to politico, not to take the figures literally. they've been fear mongering and the problem with crying wolf is eventually it comes back to haunt you and people won't believe you next time you warn there's a pending disaster. >> megyn: simon. >> listen, i don't think there's been a change in tone or a big backtrack. we're entering a different stage in this debate. i mean, republicans have been arguing for years that cuts are a virtues thing that we need to cut government in order to bring our deficit under control and the truth is that when you cut government, real things happen, right? seniors get less good health care. teachers get laid off. our readiness for our military get degraded and that's happening as we're hitting the reality phase of this conversation about what to do about our fiscal future. and i think that the republicans are continue actually trying to deny when you cut government there are real world consequences to it it. and this is where you can call it fear mongering or whatever marc is going to say, but republicans have been equally misleading about the fact that there isn't real world consequences when you cut the government. >> megyn: and what do you think of it, marc? we're going to see and some people are going to lose their jobs and president obama, the clip change in tone, i will grant simon was not the best and there was more, limited time. there was more where he went on to stay unless you live in an area where you have military folks there and so on, you may not feel the effects of this. but that's -- that does sound different from what he's been saying before, that the growth of the entire economy is it going to be put in jeopardy. damage our national security, kids kicked off head start disabled disabled kids less help and firefighters and eviscerate job creating. and just a couple of days ago, it was like oh, my god. >> yeah. >> a couple of days ago, it was armageddon and now all of a sudden we're on a downward tumble, a difference between armageddon and tumble. the problem with sequester isn't the amount of cuts, honestly we're not cutting 85 billion dollars this year, there's only 44 billion dollars in outlays, that's little over 1% of the federal budget, that is not armageddon, the problem is that they're indiscriminate. they're across the board cuts and i pointed out last week, there's a simple solution to that, which republicans are voting, hopefully they're going to vote on it in the senate today, is a bill to give the president the authority to have the discretion, to choose which programs get cut, to protect head start if he wants, to protect the military programs if he doesn't want. >> megyn: he stole that idea from you. you said it on the show and now they're actually doing it, but they say that's not going to pass, marc, i'm sorry to tell you, but say it's not going to pass, maybe i'm wrong. >> let them reject it. >> megyn: simon, there's a belief in some circles that are some, in the white house or on the left, who want to see these devastating cuts, not because they want to hurt people, but because they want to make the point that spending cuts and these aren't spending cuts, they're decreases to the increases in spending, hurt, that they hurt, and that you shouldn't be behind them. and they sort of think there's a conflicting motive by some on the left. your thoughts on that? >> well, look, i think that as i said, i think we're hitting the reality phase of this debate. i think that the suspects are not against cutting government, they're not against reducing spending, but i think the point, this is where i agree with mark, if we're going to do it we've got to do it right and smart. >> megyn: so optimistic. >> no, no, and the programs that don't make any sense are antiquated and where i agree with mark, the problem with na is not the aggregate amount of money that being cut, but indiscriminate, aim going to mimic marc now, the indiscriminate way they're falling, falling on defense workers and teachers and other people and i think if marc and i could cut down and cut 82 billion we might do it in a different way that would go for antiquated government programs or things that are not essential, day-to-day operations of the country. but i do think as we move forward in in economic debate, the truth is when you cut government, there is pain. and we're going to be feeling that as a country and it means that we can't be indiscriminate about this, we've got to be senator about it. >> megyn: too late. we already with. by the way you two look adorable in your matching outfits today. (laughter) >> thank you, megyn. >> a wellssed man. >> following your lead, marc, following your lead. >> megyn: aren't they charming? want to tell you the members of the audience they mentioned arne duncan in this debate, the secretary of education who made all of these comments about all the bad things, teachers laid off already. well, that turned out not to be true and boy, did the white house take a beating on that at the white house press conference. we'll show you what happened when jay carney was on the hot seat about arne duncan getting caught in a bet of a stretch. we'll report and let you decide coming up. plus the white house fired a new round moments ago as well. in its war of words with bob woodward. here we go again. the veteran journalist says he was quote, threatened, after the narrative on the automatic spending changes due to quick in tomorrow. former white house secretary dana perino is here to weigh in, boy does she have interesting thoughts. wait until you hear from here today. a must-see segment. and this country, this self-styled mountain man says local officials just changed the rules about the way he has lived on his own land for the last 26 years right after this break. . >> i've never had anybody hurt by bun of the buildings. we've never had any health issues here, and so, hike after 26 years, that's a pretty strong statement. >> not for the government. here is our illegal bridge. >> it only has one rail. >> basically about everything we do out here is illegal. >> and he believes that the counties are only looking for ways to tell him no. which is why he has little confidence that this is a battle he can win. >> i'm not confident i can win it, i'm confident i ought to win it, i'm confident it shouldn't be happening, but at this point basically what the government told me today is you can't operate. [ female announcer ] from tracking the bus. ♪ to tracking field conditions. ♪ wireless is limitless. [ female announcer ] from more efficient payments. ♪ to more efficient pick-ups. ♪ wiress is limitless. >> epic struggle over one man's freedom versus the power of government. a north carolina outdoorsman finds himself in a struggle with his straight over his chosen way of life on his private land. usef conway best known as a mountain man to some, opened a too school to teach people to live like our ancestors, blacksmithing and the like. >> he was 17 years old when he took henry thorough's advice and bought wilderness turtle island and turned it into a school and camp teaches how to live with nature. it wasn't built by architect, home depot, it was built with the materials at hand which is now the problem. county officials say that the compound violates building codes, safety regulations and ordered him to shut it down. >> this is supposed to be the land of the free, the government is supposed to help people protect their individual liberties and freedoms, that's not what's happening here, so, i'm thinking, my gosh, this is the country that i pledge of allegiance to every day? >> so critics wonder why now after 26 years is the local government pressuring him? conway says he fully passed the county investigation ten years ago and many believe after he appeared on the history channel mountain man channel that the county officials want to take a closer look. the county officials say that's not true, that it's safety and fairness and everybody has to pass an inspection, saying, quoting here, the primary concern of the counties that the visitors are in and out of the building neither permitted nor inspected with the code. and he says his back is pretty much against the wall. >> i'm not confident i can win it, i'm confident i ought to win it. i'm confident it it shouldn't be happening, but at this point, basically what the government told me today is, all right, you can't operate. this is something that i spent this much of my life on, i don't know that much left. if i have to die for this, i don't mind. >> reporter: but he's the not dead yet and he has some help to fight this thing, several lawyers and engineers are now working on his behalf and 10,000 people now signed a petition asking the county for a building code change, kind of a quintessential fight for rights. we'll let you know how this thing progresses. right now the camp is not exist tent. >> megyn: thanks to bob buckley in greensboro, a great report and long and interesting and posting it on our website, foxnews.com/-- and judge andrew napolitano says i'm trying to live like our ancestors and it defeats the point to have the building regulators and inspectors coming in, has to be to cold. get out of my business. >> right, you know, megyn, how i yearn to be the judge in this case, that's not the case, regrettably ingl think, te trend is conformity. if there is he' no pigeon hole to put him in shut him down and the courts will probably go along with it. when you think about it, the essence of private property is to do what you want, your ability to do what you want on your own property as long as you don't hurt anyone, and your ability to exclude anyone from private property that you want to exclude, even the government. the textbook definition. >> even those who don't want to live like our ancestors, have to comply with getting permits if we want to build a deck and add a certain kind of window or whatever it is, you can't paint your door a certain color. and we all have to live with this to some extent. why shouldn't he? >> he has a 26 year record of living like folks in america lived 175 years ago. he has a 26 year record of training people who want to know how to do this and doing it flawlessly. he takes he very little money to run the school. he does it using old-fashioned means and they leave and follow the means where they live. suddenly the history channel tells about this wonderful pioneer-like patriot, and the government goes after him. why not give him an exemption, a variance from the local zoning codes and let him be. >> megyn: i haven't heard of reports somebody got hurt. they're concerned somebody might, from the county. we noticed several buildings existed that we didn't know about, no permits were sought for, over 20 in fact. his residence, sleeping quarters for interns, cabin record. maintenance facility. blacksmith building and lots of visitors come and many of whom are children, and rules apply. final thoughts. >> it's their obligation, but also their obligation to use common sense. nobody stumbles into it accidentally, it's 500 acres and 500 acres most recent to our friends in carolina, the purpose is to see to what the life is like untouched by government. >> megyn: he doesn't use electricity, and uses water from the stream. pa would be proud of him. >> i'm proud of him. >> megyn: we'll post the full report foxnews.com/america live. we're ten minutes away from the vatican. i was okay, but after lunch my knee started to hurt again. and now i've got to take more pills. ♪ yup. another pill stop. can i get my aleve back yet? ♪ for my pain, i want my aleve. ♪ [ male announcer ] look for the easy-open red arthritis cap. >> new information now on one of the most important indicators on the u.s. economy, despite a initin initi gross domestic product report showed that the u.s. economy shank in the fourth quarter of last year, a revised report find the economy grew .1%. analysts say that the slight boost respects exports and business assessments, however, the weakest performance we've seen in nearly two years. >> fox news alert, as we witness a historic moment for the catholic church, not seen in 600 years. in justice moments, pope benedict xvi will step down officially as head of the roman catholic church and right now he is spending his final moments as pope at the castle gandolfo outside of rome. air looking at live pictures of the castle, the swiss guard, they have protected the pope for five centuries, different popes for five centuries, think of it, standing outside the door. at 2 p.m. eastern time, pope's resignation will take effect. the bells will chime, the doors will shut, and the swiss guards will walk off duty one of the few signs that pope benedict is no longer the pope and a new leader. fox contributor, father jonathan morris joins us live from rome. good to see you. put it in perspective what we're seeing and what's about to happen. >> sure, in just a few minutes as you said, megyn, the catholic church, 1.2 billion members will not have a pope. this is a period called the interragnum one pope usually dies or one resigns and the cardinals meet to elect a new pope and that won't begin for several days now. what we're seeing is just not something that hasn't happened in 600 years. really, as it happened today it's never happened that a reigning pope would choose, because of his own health, mind and body as he says, would pass on the authority to somebody else for the good of the church. he says in these times, this is what is needed. in my opinion, a remarkable, not only historical, but from a spiritual perspective, a remarkable act of humility and these are important times, we need a pope to handle the tough situation. >> megyn: what will happen, as a practical matter what does it mean for this time beginning in three minutes, the catholic church will be without a pope? >> well, the college of cardinals will be taking care of the ordinary business of the church in these days and if there was an urgent matter, certainly, they would come together and make a decision about that. but certainly speaking, that the church is very local and you have the parish priest, you have a local bishop and you don't need the pope to be making urgent decisions all the time. and so, during this time, there will be no major decisions made internationally, and wait for a new pope. i stood up here, megyn, on this platform looking over here at st. peter's basilica and watched that helicopter take off, to think that this man had chosen to give up that power and that authority and go off into the sunset like that, i think it was a call to all of us, catholic or not, are we seeking the good of another person or rather, are we holding on to power position and fame? and this man, obviously, is going to be taking off those red shoes and going inside there and living a very, very different life than he's been living the last eight years. >> megyn: yeah, giving up huge power and acknowledging the frailty of the human condition and admitting that he physically no longer felt up to the responsibilities of being pope which is an admission of a different sort, one at that requires great humility, father jonathan. >> i think so, megyn. and the fact is that the pope knows that in these times, communication travelquickly, ri i know that during the life of john paul ii, towards the end while he certainly gave us an example of endurance and perserverance, pope benedict xvi was watching those last years of his life and seeing important work of the church not get done and he said, i don't think, at least in these times, that the best thing for the church is to have me go through the same thing. if other people manage or mismanage what needs to be taken care of quickly and well. >> megyn: as we watch the castle, what we understand is going to happen at 2 p.m. eastern time the swiss guard is going to walk away, just walk away, signaling that we no longer have a pope because they're the ones charged with protecting our pope and have been for 500 years, is that what is going to happen? >> that is true. and very colorful, i can't see the images right now, but if you're seeing the swiss guard who protect the pope, those uniforms were made by michelangelo, a great tradition and they said, not only do we protect the pope, but eonly protect the pope, therefore if this ere's no pope we're leaving. and the fisherman's ring will be taken off and smashed. in other words, at this point there is nobody who is pope, and as an examination, again, that it's not about one person leading the church. the person who leads the church is jesus christ, at least that's our belief, but the pope, as his vicar is the one who stands in and represents for us the leadership of the church and we're saying he's no longer that and he's going to go now and live like a monk, in a couple of months he'll come back to the vatican behind me and live in the monastery and not giving out any communiques or conferences, a very different life. >> megyn: father morris, if i can ask you to stand by as we listen and watch. >> sure thing. [bell ringing]. [applause] (applause) >> (applause). >> . >> wow. and the catholic church is now officially without a pope and pope benedict xvi is officially in retirement now. you heard father jonathan talk about what he will do and what that means. the swiss guard, you can see, so dignified, handling the moment, none of them has ever done this before. this hasn't happened in 600 years. you heard shouts from the crowd viva el papa. live the pope. these, this group, the swiss guard has been protecting this pope for 500 years, you have to be catholic, you have to be male, you have to be between the ages and 19 and 30, and have completed your mandatory swiss military service and you sign up for a minimum of two years for that duty. let's watch again. this now is vatican security and they will now be charged with protecting the pope, the former pope in his retirement. that's the changing of the guard that we're witnessing. let's watch again. and father jonathan, it was simple, but it was moving in its simplicity and the seriousness with which all involve take their responsibilities when it comes to protecting the pope. >> most definitely. and you know that that the simplicity that is there, that's also beautiful, right? is representing not a need for show or power, but rather, that this person in the pope represents for us someone much more important and that is god himself. and that's why the catholic church takes it it very seriously. and at the same time, pope benedict xvi said now what? it's not because i'm so important, in fact, i'm out of here, right? because i think that this is' another person who god is calling to do the task done, that i was doing for the church and so, there you have that, that unbelievable contrast between all that solemnity and someone who says, you know what? now i'm going to live a life of quiet, prayer, and of service and of a different way to the cluthurch. i find it fascinating and inspiring. >> megyn: and now the duties of the swiss guard will resume when they pick the new pope. do we know, father jonathan, when that's going to happen. >> we know, megyn, monday the cardinals will be be called officially to meet together. most of them are already here if not all of them, but beginning on monday they will be officially called to conclave and then on tuesday begins what we call the congregations or basically big meetings, official meetings in which the cardinals begin to talk about the real issues. church. and they also get to know each other in that way and even now, the cardinals have a long weekend tomorrow, they have a day off, but it will be a day off of getting to know each other more and talking to each other and discussing real human things like do you know him well. what would he be like? what has he written? what has he said? and then on tuesday, most likely, the date for the conclave will be set. after these congregations are over. my five, six, seven days after that first meeting on tuesday, so we're talking about the end of next week or the beginning of the following. >> megyn: and i know that the former pope will now be known as bishop emeritus of rome and he's in the building and guarded by the vatican police no longer the swiss guard and i want to ask you about a moment we saw here this morning where we saw the pope leaving vatican city before he got into the helicopter and there is his driver. there is his driver of the car, kissing his papal ring and in tears. you can see tears in his eyes. and you think about this man, not so much the pope who we can necessarily, he we might not necessarily be able to relate to, but the driver of the car, so moved, just to be near this man. just to be driving him and have the privilege of spending that time with him and now that ring that he kissed you mentioned will be taken off and smashed and explain the reason for that and the significance of that and the significance of the pope to everyday catholics. >> sure. well, the ring, the significance of the ring, it's a fisherman's ring and remember when jesus said to st. peter you will now be a fisher of men, in other words, you'll now be a pastor now you won't just be doing things for yourself, but you'll be involved in the salvation of souls and when pope benedict gives that up recognize no longer the person in charge. he made a remarkable statement to the cardinals today in this regard, among you will be-- among you most likely to be the next pope and i offer to him my sincere reverence and obedience. 's he saying i'm going to be someone who is not the pope and there's somebody else in charge and i think that must be very moving for that man who had the pleasure of driving him and living close to him, in these days because just to watch somebody do that it's like our father, it's like someone, or grandfather, is doing an act of humility like that, we would all be moved. and i was moved it tears when i was watching the helicopter fly over the platform tonight. this man did it and now it's our turn. >> megyn: bishop emeritus of rome. thank you for being here. >> thank you, megyn. >> megyn: coming up in the next two minutes, back to washington d.c. because we've got some breaking news today from the white house, as the media challenges this administration on whether it has been completely honest about the fallout from these spending changes taking effect tomorrow. the education secretary may have stepped in it a bit and jay carney had his hands full moments ago, we'll he show you the exchange. and plus life in the fast lane couldened up costing you in one state. and ticket slow drivers who decide to muddle along in the passing lane. a bevy of beauticians, claiming they went in on a lotto claim, but that the gal who bought it stole to for herself. and saying that i didn't win it off the group ticket. look at the ladies. are they likely to win in their hair-raising case? kelly's court. ♪ >> fox news alert in the fight over the automatic spending changes that are due to kick in tomorrow. and new questions from the media about whether the administration has been straight with the american people on this issue. welcome back, everybody, i'm megyn kelly, for the last few weeks we've heard a series of warnings from the administration about what will happen when this-- these automatic spending changes, again, if we're going to decrease the amount of increase we will see in spending this year. we'll see more spending than last year, not as much. warnings how these changes, you know, this reduction in the increase is going to weaken our economy. it's going to hurt our military readiness and leave thousands of teachers without job. in fact, education secretary arne duncan suggested this past sunday the first pink slips were already going out in school districts across the country. >> and there are literally teachers getting pink slips, notices that can't come back this fall. >> that was sunday. three days later the white house briefing the media challenged mr. duncan's claims and we heard that story, here is that exchange. >> and teachers are already getting pink slips as you said-- >> yeah, and just 'cause they have an earlier notification, so, in west virginia, but not the vast majority will be rolling out over the next two months. >> chris. >> and clear it's title 1 teachers and (inaudible) whether it's sequester related i don't know, these were teachers given pink slips. >> megyn: that's the point, is it sequester related or isn't it. that's the context in which he offered the original remarks. ap then the washington post came out and gave arne duncan's original claim four pinochios, they weren't layoffs, they were transfer notices and weren't to the sequester. and moments ago the president's team questioned we will he get into it momentarily. boy, this is not going well for arne duncan or the administration. i want to show you and the viewers what just happened today on this very same issue, marriage garre major garrett formerly of fox news. >> and didn't prove to be true about the immediacy of pink slips for teachers, mentioned specifically a school district in west virginia, they're not sequester related at all. he made some sort of mild suggestion they might not be, they're clearly not. how confident are you, jay, how confident is this administration the things it's saying and portrait it's presenting to the country is not only accurate, but will withstand the vut any of times once the cuts begin? >> we're very confident. and a fact a-- >> if you want to present another example i'll take them, but-- >> can't explain the-- and in place-- >> i don't know that the secretary of transportation was giving you an absolute minute target for how much the delays are going to be, there are going to be delays in reduction of man hours and personnel among our air traffic contollers, that's a fact. and i hope you keep that in mind he when you're on your next commercial night and you're delayed, if that does in fact come into effect the sequester, i would refer you to the department of education and superintendent of schools in the district that you mentioned for specifics about that, i'm certainly not familiar with it. i can tell you that the impacts of sequester are real and to diminish them-- to diminish-- >> that was given-- of the example i would defer you to the department of education and the superintendent of the school district for more information, i don't have it. >> megyn: steve hays? you know, they were all, they were all too happy to put out arne duncan on the sunday talk shows and now it's huh, who, what? try to get him on the phone. talk to some local guy. >> right. well, it's interesting, i mean shall "the washington post" already did that work and interviewed administrators said flat-out without qualification that what arne duncan said was not true that this was not related to sequester, there were transfer notices, but they were not firings and not related to the sequester. that answer was given and arne duncan was demonstrably wrong on that. >> megyn: and this is "the washington post" article, i don't know if you can see, it four pinochios for arne duncan as false claims for pink slips for teachers. washington post reporting and as you point out there'll be at probably five or six jobs and it's going to happen regardless of sequester. why don't they just come out and say, i misspoke, i said something that wasn't right, it happens, i was confused, and let me clarify what the truth is. you get more credibility when you acknowledge your mistakes. >> i think that would have been wise to do that in this case, it appears to be so black and white because the reporting has been done. i think if you're in the white house and sitening the communication strategy room the reason you don't acknowledge what seems sob such an obvious mistake, you don't want to encourage sort after pile-on effect and reporters go and check other things, and other things, and then can demonstrate a pattern once you acknowledge it's wrong. i'm thinking-- i'm guessing talking over there, that it's probably easier to try to skate around it by not acknowledging it was a mistake. i wouldn't have done it that way. i would own the mistake, we screwed it up. we'll do it better next time. >> megyn: this ties into a debate we had marc thiessen and rosenburg, how president obama had arguably a shift in tone about the tire consequences of these spending changes. it had been sort of armageddon before yesterday and yesterday, it was more like, well, it's not going to a cliff, it's going to be a tumble and might not feel it if you're not the firefighting or the military community and there's a question whether the wheels are coming off the bus on that message from arne duncan or whatever else president obama knows to cause that slight shift. >> yeah, i think it's an unmistakable shift. if you go back and play the president's remarks from a little over a week ago, i think it was, where he basically described something that looks like chaos spreading through the united states and then contrast them with the sort of slight tumble down effect that he described last night in his remarks, there's no question that he's making a different kind of case and i think it's almost certain that that's because they've been called on this, i mean, i think that reporters are, you know, in substance, finally doing their jobs. and asking these questions, doing the kind of fact checking that we saw them do vigorously during the campaign, mitt romney's campaign and that we've seen reporters do in the past. they're just asking questions, trying to verify what actually is being said and as major garrett mentioned in his questioning of jay carney, there are now questions raised about an f.a.a. administrator who couldn't back up the administration claims it would be 90 minute flight delays, i think we're going to see more of this. >> megyn: and is this because that that messaging, you know, the armageddon messaging, was meant to scare the republicans on capital hill into doing something differentlily and coming to the bargaining table, you know, with president obama and that didn't work. and so now, it looks like we're going to have the spending changes and now we have got to get real. >> yeah, i think the white house took a calculated, but very significant risk when they made that over the top case. i mean, whatever we see, it's not likely to resemble thinking that the president described he when he did that appearance in front of the first responders where he suggests, yeah, basically hinting that people's lives were going to be in danger across the country. it was so 0 over the top that i think that reporters sitting watching the president's performance had to say really, that's what we are atalking about and started them asking questions, and the real risk if we don't see them or see them in a more graduated way which is more likely the president was going to look like he was crying wolf which is a prospect the new york times even raised in an article yesterday. so i think it's a real risk for the white house and threatens the broader case that president obama has made throughout his presidency on behalf of activist government. that's what he says, we can't even survive these 40 billion dollars in cuts on the domestic discretionary side in the context of a budget that's 3.6 trillion dollars, these small cuts will imperil the country. thing that people are wake up and saying, that doesn't strike me as true. >> megyn: even "the washington post," sequester spin gets ahead of reality and write the description of the post sequester landscape from the obama administration have been alarming, hyped, thank you. and war of words with boob woodward under attack again after challenging the administration's narrative on these budget changes, and the negotiations. dana perino has an interesting perspective on this. she's here live. also, what do you think of people who drive slowly in the fast lane? but way too many aren't. why? because selling their funds makes them more money. which makes you wonder -- isn't that a conflict? >> there are way too many and they spend more money and not one of them has our name on it. we're in the business of finding the right investments for you. e-trade. less for us. more for you. the fund's prospectus contains its investment objectives, risks, charges, expenses, and other important information and should be read and considered carefully before investing. for a current prospectus, visit etrade.com/mutualfunds. >> and now to west point where memorial services are about to begin right now for general norman schwarzkopschwar and that's one one in a long list of accomplishments. rick leventhal live with more at west point. rick. >> reporter: and megyn, the general being laid to rest here at west point cemetery in a few minutes and a lot of dignataries arrived along with family members here at the cemetery, including former vice-president dick cheney and in the chapel as the general's daughter spoke about her father and laughing and crying as she talked about his booming voice and life style, how he would listen to pavarotti and sing on stage with johnny cash the next day ar treadmill the next day listening to abba's greatest hit. he was retired in 1991 and asked to run for political office and he declined and here is her story. >> after much soul searching dad politely declined the notion of political office and wouldn't be good at it it anyway, sorry about that, mr. vice-president. i wrote that before i knew you were coming so i hope you won't hold it against me. >> a lighter moment in the chapel. of course, norman schwarzkopf served two tours of duty in vietnam ap received three silver stars and led troops during the invasion of granada and led operation desert storm ending that ground war in iraq in 1991 in just four days and had some choice words for the former iraqi leader. >> as far as saddam hussein being a great military strategist, he is neither a strategist nor is he schooled in the operational arts, for is he a tactician, nor is he a general, nor is he a soldier. other than that he's a great military man, i want you to know that. (laughter) . >> reporter: general schwarzkopf also is being remembered here by his wife brenda. he has two daughters and a son and is being laid to rest, megyn, very close to his father's grave. his father was also a west point graduate. >> megyn: what a man. recognizance -- rick, new. and there were intense moments in the white house press room. and there was another allegation an official threatening reporter bob woodward because he challenged the president's narrative for suggesting who is responsible for the budget changes scheduled to kick in. the president obama has be been railing against these and saying the republicans came up with them. woodward says that the president came up with them and he's moving the goal posts and claiming the republicans has to raise taxes if there's going to be a deal. the white house not happy with that reporting and now woodward chams they threatened him. former white house press secretary dana perino had some fascinating insights on what's really hang heppening here. she was the press secretary under president bush and wait until you hear her explanation how things work in an office. a salon full of stylists fighting a million dollar lottery winner, saying that their co-worker tries to cut them out of it even though they were in on the ticket. >> they're disappointed that it came to this and they're much more disappointed than they are angry. it's not a candy bar. 130 calories 7 grams of protein the new fiber one caramel nut protein bar. . >> sperling told bob woodward he might regret what was-- >> and the responsible thing to ask that question in the context of the full e-mail since we know what the full e-mail said. in keeping with the what i've been access to, mr. woodward was his friend and apologized for raising his voice. i think you cannot read those e-mails and come away with the impression that gene was threatening anybody. >> megyn: and yet, that's the impression that bob woodward walked away with. that was jay carney the white house press secretary moments ago facing tough questions from the press corps about the escalating battle, escalating weird battle between the washington post reporter bob woodward and the white house. mr. woodward who used to be loved by the folks at the white house now clauims he received a thereiniy think e-ma from gene sperling, and sperling upset over mr. woodward's reporting on the big budget fight happening in d.c., and who is to blame for these automatic spending changes, the president's been railing against for weeks. da dana perino former press secretary for president george w. bush and a co-house of "the five" here on fnc. it's a bit after train wreck, a man who was the darling of the mainstream media, i mean, the darling of the meainstream media and the white house liked him just fine prior to this. >> and bob woodward is an exceedingly polite person, even if you know you're on t the-- you can't help, but like the guy. and i understand when reading the e-mail, it's not that bob woodward thought someone was going to kill his poodle, that's not the threat. the threat is what turned out to happen, which is you have many on the left attacking anyone who has said, well, wait a second, those reporters in the briefing room, all of them are asking a little tongue in cheek to jay carney today, because it's not news. this is-- it is a way to operate a press, which is to threaten access. access is really your only weapon. earlier jay carney says nobody really thinks that gene sperling could hurt anybody and i could even probably beat him in arm wrestling, but they do have access and they're unhappy with him. and i think bob woodward is the reason that most of those people are in the briefing room anyway. >> megyn: right. >> you learn about-- >> many of us saw-- >> and inspired. >> megyn: and saw bob woodward, i mean, robert redford who played bob woodward in the movie, amazing what a career to have. this is the beef with woodward. so he's breaking the story, he says the white house moved the goal posts and says he's being unfair to the republicans. and he says i'm going to run the story and they have a shouting match and sperling admits he laced into woodward. and this guy admits in the e-mail he raised his voice and they had a shouting match. and then he follows up by sending bob woodward this e-mail, that says i apologize for raising my voice, i think you should rethink your comment saying that the president moved the-- moved the goal posts, i know you may not believe it, but as a friend you may regret staking that claim. baba bah. and woodward says there should be more to this issue and welcome your personal advice and they think that woodward is disingenuous saying that woodward is coming out saying that he was threatened. >> i think that bob last night when he did that interview he should have given fuller context about it and made it clear he didn't think he was going to be personally threatened. but what's interesting, the root of this is the question of does it matter whose idea it was to have the sequester? does that matter at all in this debate and i would say that it does. because the white house and all of the other debates this is the republicans fault, this is their idea, this is their problem and in in case, you have a crisis of their own making at the white house, and yet, they're trying to blame republicans and now, blaming a reporter who's basically beloved on all sides. >> megyn: directly contrary to what president obama said during the presidential debate. said this is from the republicans, their idea. >> and i tried to tangle with bob woodward once and discredit his third book calm o came out and the bush administration, and tried to put distance between us and woodward and it failed miserably. everybody defended bob woodward and not us. >> megyn: the media. >> not so today. >> now they treat him like they treat the oldest elephant in the herd. >> megyn: not just the mainstream media. and the tweet put out-- and let's talk about what happened to bob woodward after he was told you're going to regret in. first, jay carney came out and accused him of being willfully wrong, that implies intent that you're intentionally also misleading the american people. that takes a shot at your integrity and then woodward goes out and says, look, i'm telling you this is what happened. i talked to the white house and now, now, we see david plouffe come out from the white house and look what he treated out. watching woodward the last two days is like imagining my idol mike schmidt, face live pitching again, perfection gained once is rarely repeated. i mean, is this beneath the dignity of the white house to be going after bob woodward like that, like he's old, he's-- >> i don't think that it represents the president in the best light. i understand defending a president, but i also think that at some point, as a press person in the administration or in a position of leadership like david plouffe, you can say look, we did come up with the sequester idea and we've been trying to fix it republicans haven't met up with us halfway, and instead of basically going after him a scorched earth campaign that burns everything town and including trying to burn down his reputation and you see that so many people are only too happy to pile on. we did headlines in the last hour of many on the blogs, in particular the left leaning ones just ripping woodward. >> yeah. >> megyn: suggesting he's lost his mind. >> oh, this is what we're going to start to see. start to see he's old, past his prime. boy, he hasn't done any good work in a long time. if you go to breitbart.com, find a list of other reporters in the past four years says this is not that unusual. look at local reporters in 2008 campaign in different cities shut out of covering the obama team, there is favorism and that's the way that-- >> we don't have to look quite that far at fox news. fox news they tried to kick us out of a pool interview and the rest of the pool said no you don't get to kick out including our sister newspaper. and went off cheryl at kinson because of reporting of fast and furious, and head of the white house press corps stood up and said that the press corps was angry how abusive they were-- >> they're kidding themselves if they think there isn't a feeling of bullying by the white house press office. the last four years, i talk to a lot of those guys and protect their anonymity they're not happy with the way they're being treated and don't understand why then don't do better reporting then and ask harder questions. benghazi was a horrific example of letting something go and talk about willfully misleading the american people. >> megyn: they need access, in their defense they need access and this white house has a history of shutting it down if they don't get the reporting they like. now we're in a situation where you have he' got to respect a journalist whose career is taking hits by the day because he has so many people piling on and treating him like a rookie reporter who doesn't know when he's threatened. of course bob woodward had that e-mail by gene sperling and read the whole thing and when wrote back, the question is whether he believed it was a threat he when he received it he told cnn yes, i believe it was a threat to me. and we're supposed be to be too immature as a reporter to know what's a threat and not an athlea threat given the history. >> and one of the thing that fru frustrates reporters, would not talk to the press and go through me and my office and provide access as well as we could. gene sperling has a long relationship with bob woodward going back to the clinton day, they know each other very well and they have communication like this and probably a conversation over coffee anytime that they want. but the problem with, i think, going that route is that as press secretary, you can't stop something from happening or say, oh, i don't think you should say, threat, even if i know what you mean. it could be taken the wrong way when it gets out into the public. so, there are good rules to follow and i do know an anchor who said that he's covered the clinton administration, started covering the obama administration and the first week of the obama administration got an f-word-laced phone call from rahm emanuel. we all know, that's his schtick the way he operated and i don't think it represents president obama very well. >> megyn: there's an interesting article in the national journal today by ron fournier, he cut off his relationship with an unnamed senior white house official because of the abuse he had suffered over his reporting and just found them to be-- they had attempted to intimidate him and shut him down whenever he ran with something they didn't like. >> and another example of a legacy reporter with a sterling reputation and i think what he wrote today possibly the most important piece out of all of this, mini scandal in washington d.c. >> megyn: wow, wow. dana perino great to have your thoughts on it. see you tonight on "the five" the smash hit "the five" it airs at five conveniently, ease toy remember. and i love it. oh, coming up next, something very important. a hair dresser accused of trimming her co-workers right out of the office pool. that's next. [ male announcer ] julia child became a famous chef at age 51. picasso painted one of his master works at 56. doris taerbaum finished her first marathon at 50. not everyone peaks in their twenties. throughout their lives. passion keeps them realizing possibilities. an ally for real possibilities. aarp. find tools and support at aarp.org/possibilities. dad: you excited for youyeah.st day? ♪ dad: you'll be fine, ok? girl: ok. dad: you look so pretty. ♪ i'm overprotective. that's why i got a subaru. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. >> kelly's court is back in session. on the docket today. a bevy of beauties as a salon, the woman who bought the tickets from the office pool styling herself as the winner as one part she bought by her lonesome not part of the pool. >> and randy and mark, mark, whose side are you on. >> are you kidding me, the only side, the pool. megyn, how many stories can we do about the lottery pools? either that or-- >> it's happening. and that's the old days of kelly's court. the stripper lawsuit and the platform shoes. >> that's true. >> this woman is acting with no moral compass whatsoever, my six-year-old pulls stuff like that. the idea well, we won, but not with your money, it was with my money and so, that's it. they had an oral agreement. they didn't donate the money to her, there was a reason why they relinquished hard earned dollars to her that was the agreement. have a discussion upfront whether you're going to purchase personal tickets as well and megyn, they did. they said don't buy anything personal and she went ahead and did so at her own peril, pay up. >> megyn: randy, who also misses the day of the strippers in kelly's court. is it, is it plausible as the group of beauticians now claim, that they did sit down and say, now, don't ever buy one for yourself individually he at the same time you buy one for the pool. >> how convenient. i would love to see that written somewhere on a napkin. on a piece of paper, on the back of a snickers bar. you know what i love about the cases, i wonder if the same woman came back and said, oh, you know, we each owe a million dollars, if suddenly the same people would say, hey, that ain't my ticket, that's not the pool's ticket, that's your ticket. whether you are in court suing over a broken window or apple and samsung, you have to bring evidence. show me proof of it. i'll show you. >> show me proof of an agreement. wait, wait. >> show me proof. >> ail he give it to you. >> megyn: wait a minute, i want to hear the proof. >> i'll bring it. listen it's not a written agreement. >> how convenient. >> three people not part of this pool who used to be a part of the pool who have nothing to do with this will testify on top of the seven, so a total of ten people to say that they all had an understanding that you don't buy personal tickets, when you-- >> you want to say bet that the three people hung out with the seven and not the one. >> good luck cross examining all of them. >> bring it on. >> megyn: how is it, when they get to court how do they convince the judge and jury that their side has the facts on their side? >> that's such a wonderful question, but unfortunately in this country we're no longer an adversarial system. everything settles because a restraining order is a great equalizer because you've got eight people staring at 9 1/2 million dollars saying, i want that money. and they can't have it. until somebody wins or settles and they don't want to give it all to the lawyers so unfortunately they will cave. it will settle. we move on. >> megyn: in the meantime, and created styles all, but shut down and the women are worried whether they'll get their share after 9 million jackpot. >> i would tell them. let it go, it will work out and she'll get her 8th. >> megyn: and that's not bad. a hot of change, but randy wants the lawyer's commission. >> do you think that they'll do my hair or what's left testify. >> megyn: i don't think that's going to help lou's business. thanks, up next, should you get in trouble for driving too slowly in the fast lane? isn't it so irritating and yet, sometimes we're scared. why should we be punished for it? that's next. the calcium they e as well as they could because they don't take it with food. switch to citracal maximum plus d. it's the only calcium supplement that can be taken with or without food. my doctor recommends citracal maximum. it's all about absorption. 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[ male announcer ] glucerna hunger smart. a smart way to help manage hunger and diabetes. ♪ life is a highway i want to ride it all night long ♪ >> a new push in one state to put a stop to drivers who lurk in the left lane. in georgia lawmakers are considering legislation that would make it illegal to drive slower than the speed limit when you're in the fast lane. trace gallagher at our west coast bureau with more on that. >> reporter: do not tell me megyn kelly, it doesn't drive you crazy. and someone is in front of you driving 45 miles an hour, never looks in the rear view mirror and creeping along. in georgia you might get help. drivers have a new law that the cops are about to enforce in they're excited. here is one driver, listen. >> makes you wish you could ticket somebody and send them to the right lane. >> and i don't know, it's very frustrating. >> yeah, the proposed law says if you can't keep up get out of the way or at least get out of the fast lane. you can get ticketed now, if this law passes in georgia driving too slowly. they haven't said exactly what that speed lower limit will be. the bill was introduced by a state representative a former state trooper, listen to him. >> i always say it's a matter your mama should talk to you, somebody pulls up behind you move to the right. if you're not driving the speed limit you have a duty to get out of the way. >> reporter: yeah, by the way, a few years ago, the georgia legislature shall the house also passed a similar bill with you stuck in the senate and never signed by the governor. they think this is going to pass, pretty strongly, megyn and if it does it will take effect july 1st of this year, and california, are you listening to this? 'cause, come on. >> megyn: you're the speedster. >> and pass in the right lane. >> megyn: i'm the lady going too slowly in the passing lane, you move over there, there's a huge semi in the middle lane and you move over to the left lane trying to pass it, it speeds up doesn't like you passing it and i'm scared trying to get away from you, i'm not going to do a contest with you, can't get past it so big and spitting snow and rain on you, some guy behind you is flashing his lights and flashing his lights. i'm scared i'll move when i can. and every one of the guys are the mean guy behind me. >> reporter: it's you, it's you know in front of all of us, oh, my. >> megyn: i get afraid, tell the semi to go slower and let the lady pass, when he sees her, let her pass we're afraid and the truckers know what they're doing and sometimes we don't. see you, trace. >> reporter: and don't is start crying. >> megyn: that's actually what i do. we'll be back.
A light drizzle fell over West Point Cemetery in Norfolk Saturday as community members gathered to honor Black Civil War soldiers for Military Appreciation Month.
Bill Foley, owner of Vegas Golden Knights and 1967 graduate of West Point brought his NHL championship team, and the Stanley Cup to the US Military Academy for a visit.