happening. and the big jobs report for december is coming out today. christine romans calling it the big granddaddy of them all. it's probably good news for the democrats and she'll share details. and there's this thing that climbers like to do. seven peaks, it's a big deal for anybody. but if you're 15 years old. it's a huge deal. we'll tell you about this kid. who happened to just globe-trot the world and climb the seven highest peaks. >> and we're going to add in an eighth one. >> which one's that? >> you'll see. >> quite a little wonder that we're going to see this morning i'm looking forward to it. >> learn something every day. we begin this morning with the critical endorsement in the battle for new hampshire. for jon huntsman. the "boston globe" has it as a banner headline, they say former utah governor offers the republican party an opportunity to renew itself. the "boston globe" editor spoke to our own erin burnett last night. >> huntsman is bold anywhere the campaign. you have a sense of where he would take the country, he's engaged on the issues in a much more forceful way than romney has. >> this endorsement comes at a crucial time for huntsman. he is polling in the single digits. and he's banking his entire campaign on new hampshire. he believes the voters in the granite state are independent thinkers. >> the establishment is teeing up mr. romney as the choice for the republican party. and i say -- the people of new hampshire will not be told for whom to vote. >> democratic strategist kiki mclean live from washington and conservative commentator live from jacksonville, florida. and cnn political editor, paul stein hauser live from manchester new hampshire, thank you for joining us. >> let's look at line from that endorsement, the ""globe"" said this -- while romney proceeds cautiously, strategically trying to appease enough constituencies to get himself the nomination. huntsman has been bold. rather than merely sketch policies, he articulates goals and ideals. and just a reminder, that "the wall street journal" came out strongly in favor of huntsman's economic plan, so he's getting a lot of good press here. but he is still in the single digits as he's leading into new hampshire. he's in fourth place there. he's tied with gingrich. do you think press like this is going to help him. will it catapult him? >> this is a very good thing for jon huntsman and it's a very bad thing for mitt romney. one of the criticisms that the romney campaign has had towards the rest of the field is that the anti-romney vote, some of it may have been on anti-mormonism, some of it could have been on anti-moderatism. now you have a moderate candidate, that's a former governor and that is also a mormon. getting a huge endorsement from the "boston globe" in the state of massachusetts. this only solidifies the ceiling that mitt romney has. it's a big problem within the establishment of the republican party, that would like to see mitt romney be the nominee. this is an indictment of this candidate. and i think it's going to give huntsman a big bounce if he can do well in the detats. this weekend you will see him shoot out of the single digits and be a player on tuesday. >> let's switch gears here. ki ki, let's talk about rick santorum, it was a very rough day for him in new hampshire. he got into a pretty tense back and forth i'm sure you saw it. it was a forum that was open it all students, let's listen and then we'll talk. >> if your point is, people should be allowed to do whatever makes them happy. right? is that what you just said? >> as long as they don't harm other people. >> so if they're not harming other people. who determines whether they're harming people or not? >> anybody can understand that. >> if there's, so everybody can understand it. oh. everybody can we're not going to have courts. >> there's morals. >> so there is some, there is some objective standard. >> two men to have two rights as the same rights as a man and woman. >> what about three men? stop! >> it's kind of welcome to new hampshire, you are not in iowa any more. kiki, do you think he's going to be able to handle all of this increased scrutiny now? >> this is a big issue, right. the scrutiny comes in two ways. number one, it's the scrutiny of the media and the analysts going through his record. the fact that is a guy who did get creamed in his own re-election in 2006. you bounce it against the fact that he did get re-elected to the united states senate from a big state and it's about the back and forth. he's not going to be in rooms full of people who agree with him now. this is about how do you persuade and bring people and personality has a lot to do with that. we've been watching in my office, what happens in social media. what kind of conversation is going on. and yesterday we noticed in that, in that brief window, that the negative comments online increased double-fold on rick santorum. debates around what you just saw him do. so it's two things. number one, it's the substance, and number two, it's how do you handle it. he would have been lot better off saying, look, i think you and i just disagree and let me tell you what i agree, rather than the patronizing, picking on her when she tried to challenge hi him. and when you look at the kind of conversations going on. in iowa, it's parallel to what you found in the polling and it's kind of an interesting validation, when you see the movement go forward and come up and down, and where in the sentiment of the conversation goes. that wasn't a good sign for rick santorum yesterday. >> i don't want to leave paul out. i want to talk about the mccain/romney show. it was a bit awkward and yesterday it was very awkward. yesterday in south carolina. let's listen and you can give me your perspective on it. >> i am confident with the leadership and the backing of the american people, president obama will turn this country around. we believe in america. we believe that our best days are ahead of us. >> excuse me, president romney. president romney. paul, how do you make a mistake like that and how does this affect mitt romney? >> oops, i guess you could say, sorry, senator mccain, get the name right. listen, there was a lot of talk when mccain endorsed romney the other day, about the bad blood between the two men. but four years ago after romney dropped out of the race, he became a major surrogate for mccain in his drive against obama. mccain beat romney here in new hampshire four years ago and mccain also won south carolina. so i think mccain helps romney in a lot of ways. what mccain doesn't help romney with, is where he needs help, with tea party supporters and social conservatives. >> all right. thank you all very much. and for the best political coverage on television, make sure to keep it here on cnn, we've got it all, the massive machine, the election center, 7:00 a.m. on starting point. eric fehrnstrom will join us and then the "boston globe" editor, peter canellos will talk about the big endorsement and what it means. and every morning here, we give you an early start to your day by alerting you to the news that's happening and the stories that are starting now and you'll be talking about them tonight. today, a brand new poll of the race in south carolina comes out. the first poll of the state since early december when newt gingrich had the big lead. mitt romney is holding a rally at a peanut warehouse in the state, happening in about three hours. >> and four days to go until new hampshire and rick santorum, jon huntsman, newt gingrich going to be there, trying to chip away at the massive lead that romney holds in that state. and today, joran van der sloot goes on trial for the murder of a young won in peru. joran van der sloot's murder said he admits to killing stephanie flores, but says it was not premeditated. he was twice arrested in the disappearance of natalee holloway in aruba, he was never charged. an update for you on the really bizarre story out of texas, the teenager who ran away and then, oops, got caught by the police, gave them a fake name, got mistakenly deported to columbia, because the name she gave was somebody who might have been up for deportation. now she's going to be coming home. i guess they've corrected the big wrong. the colombian government is going to hand over the 15-year-old girl, her name is jaquadrian turner, she's coming back home today. she was a run-away for a year and a half in texas. her grandmother, who managed to track the girl down in south america says she is relieved. >> well it was worth it. all the wrinkles under my eyes, i've aged, look like i'm 80 now, but that's all right. it's okay. i'm not mad at her. i love her. and children make mistakes. >> man, oh, man, cnn's ed lavendera joins us from one of my favorite cities. let me ask you about this. think a lot of people were confused at how a 15-year-old girl could just end up on a charter plane, in a foreign country where she has no relatives, does not speak the language and somehow, either wouldn't or couldn't speak up for herself. where did something drop here? >> well there's so many different levels and even though the news here this morning is that jakadrien is in the process of being brought home, there's a great deal of questions unanswered as to how all of this could have happened. she was arrested in april of last year with no identification on her. simply told authorities, local houston police after she was arrested for shoplifting that her name was tika cortez, she told them she was 21 years old. gave them a false birthday as well. that set off this long string of situation here, that it's baffling to be quite honest. i mean essentially she fooled local police, the local court system there. who believed throughout her guilty plea and serving some short time in jail and then being handed over to immigration agents. and the court system there, through the whole deportation process. and then even the colombian government ha had to have met with her and given her the necessary paperwork to be sent to colombia, there's a long line of people who fell for the story. >> here's why i don't get that. i understand that teenagers will lie sometimes, but i also understand that the united states government is pretty meticulous on its paperwork. having been an immigrant myself. so why wasn't there some fingerprinting done? the way i get it, you have to get fingerprints to match an i.d., you can't just say you're tika cortez who i think was of age, 21 years old and get away with it. someone's going to check it out. >> this is what i've been told by immigration officials. is that she was foimped on the local level. she was fingerprinted again when she was passed over to i.c.e. but nothing matched anyone that was in the system. so it was essentially in the words of one person i spoke to, it was like a clean slate. this person was in their view, brand-new, brand-new to them. obviously this is still very early. all of this will change. there were some initial reports that she had matched somebody in the system. they say that's simply not the case. >> ed, will you do me a favor, will you watch when she gets home and find out if they're going to consider charges of lying to authorities, i know she's a jufie, but that could be down the pike. thank you for all that. you got it. coming up at 8:00 eastern on starting point, our soledad o'brien will talk with jakandrien's mom. >> the colombian government put her in a work training program. she was living there on her facebook page, her grandmother saw all of these facebook pages of her living in colombia. >> can you imagine as a parent not being able to do anything about it? >> having your child run away, not have control of her and have this entire international -- >> what's weird is she doesn't sound too scared. >> she seems like she's a tough one here. let's switch gears, we have good news expected today on the jobs front. i got a little confused, i was reading the report from yesterday and the numbers were enormous. >> that was a private payroll survey from adp. yesterday they said they expect big job gains in december. we're going to know for sure at 8:30 eastern when the government gives as you told you, zoraida, the granddaddy of all economic reports. this is my super bowl. >> she's like bouncing off the ground. >> i ask one question she lit up. >> i'm going to show you on the magic wall what the charts look like and you can see why folks are getting so excited about the jobs numbers. because the numbers are starting to show that things getting a little bit better. i'm not saying we're out of the woods and i'm not saying it's great. so don't email me about that. this shows you what it's like this year. you see it started out tepid and we had couple of big spikes earlier in the year. we got nervous in the spring and summer, it remember, people were talking with a double-dip recession and then things started to pick up steam. with 120,000 jobs created in november and then we're looking for 150,000 for december. now a lot of these jobs we're seeing anecdotally, we're seeing from small businesses and the service sector. so keep in mind, some of these jobs being created might be temporary jobs or might be retail or restaurant-related jobs in december. and we always watch this time of year for all kinds of, you know, weather-related. now this is really a political story to you guys. you know that all of the candidates already have a press release ready to go about whatever the job is going to say at 8:30. i want to show you the real fact-check of what has happened with the job situation since the president took office, this is when president obama took office, we were losing 700,000 jobs every single month, january, february, march, april, may, look at all of these jobs losses, this was a really horrible, horrible time for the american economy. and for the american people. and then, you've got stimulus here, you've got some census hiring and now you look, this is what economists are focusing in on, the slow, but steady one after another, improvements, slowly but surely in the labor market. so there you go. you guys, i mean it's not really enough to dig too deeply into the unemployment rate. but it is this slow healing in the labor market that economists are watching. we'll know for sure at 8:30. i was seriously watching it like this. >> it's good, right? >> excellent. that's a lot of work. >> we're up for good news. it is now 16 minutes past the hour. wake up, already, you're going to be late for work. but if you're not yet, here are the stories that are going to make headlines for you today. he may barely have a pulse in the gop race, but jon huntsman has a big endorsement, the "boston globe" has thrown its support behind huntsman days before the new hampshire primary. that's the boston paper -- remember, mitt romney was the governor of that state. he says that huntsman gives the republican party an opportunity to renew itself. and the air force is charging three cadets with sexual miscountry, including one that is say cuesed of rape. all three eye tended the air force academy in colorado springs, but were reportedly involved in separate incidents over the last 15 months. we could learn later on today, if penn state has a brand new head football coach to succeed joe paterno. "the new york times" is reporting that the new england patriots offensive coordinator bill o'brien interviewed with penn state. fills say they're going to keep an eye on that one. apparently it all happened yesterday. still ahead, new casey anthony video, she never mentioned her daughter. mark lipman weighs in, and so does ashley banfield. >> i spent time with lipman in a courtroom in orlando. he's going to talk about this and what it means and why there may not be as much to the story as you think there is. and if you're in the french quarter in new orleans, and it's after 8:00 at night, there's a curfew. why are some people saying it's racist? you're watching early start. glucerna hunger smart shakes.w they have carb steady, with carbs that digest slowly to help minimize blood sugar spikes. 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[ male announcer ] want great taste and whole grain oats that can help lower cholesterol? honey nut cheerios. that music will wake you up if you're not awake at 21 minutes past 5:00 on the east coast. >> it keeths me awake. >> or you're disco bouncing. this is early or very late start, wherever you are. i want to get you caught up on some local news. i know when you're watching a national show, you don't think you should be listening to local news, but some local papers have some good national headlines as well. >> and some local communities as well. so you're watching us. >> our morning papers, we'll start with one in new orleans. the "times-picayune" in new orleans is talking about the french quarter being in place to a kid who is 15 years old after 8:00 at night. they're deciding in a sweeping decision, 6-0 in the city council to put a curfew on those kids and make sure that they are not out after dark. here's the weird thing -- most parents would say, good idea, i think that is great. that isn't a good place for young kids to be. but the african-american leaders are saying no way, this is a racist employ so police can profile african-american young males. weirdly, about five seconds late anywhere the same breath they're saying, we should make it a city-wide curfew. they don't like it in the quarter for some reason. >> this happened where i'm from in chicago and they have attached a fine to it as well. so if your kid is caught out after the curfew, they will fine the parents for it. and you know, folks thought, great idea, right? parents should be responsible, that's right. >> once you start talking money, they'll get the kids back into the house. >> so, do you have a dog? >> i've had four at one point and i am down to two. >> a dog is like a family member, right? listen to this story it comes from the billings-gazette. a guy who was killed by an avalanche while skiing with his wife. the dog was with him, he was buried with him and presumed dead. they say if he was, that he actually was able to pull himself, dig his way out and then you know what he did? he walked four miles on his stubby legs back to cook city in temperatures that dipped into the teens that night. he went back to the hotel where they were originally staying. they're calling this nothing short of a miracle. the dog is a corgi. >> the queen has corgis. >> i didn't know. >> she loves corgis. >> they're not large dogs. they were not bred to do this kind of thing. they have short legs and they were being -- they herd livestock. on average the males stand a foot and a half tall and weigh about 27 pounds. >> this little guy -- >> that must have been amazing for his wife to have that at least -- >> his whole family says, we needed this. we really needed this. >> i've been in an avalanche. >> have you? >> i skied in a avalanche, and i skied out of it. it wasn't big, but you don't know the power of snow until you've done that. >> this may be the only debate in which the candidates want you to laugh at them and it's not really a debate. it's kind of a takeoff on debate. >> our own larry king did moderate this funny or die yahoo spoof debate. it airs this morning. we've got an exclusive preview just for you that you will not see anywhere else. check it out. >> we have reached a very important part of the debate. the reagan speed round. now you know how this works? we give the candidates seven seconds and whoever can mention ronald reagan's name