to watch the president of the government give up on leading and governing and spend full time campaigning. >> but the president dares the republicans to say no. >> if congress does something then i can't run against a do-nothing congress. if congress does nothing, then it's not a matter of me running against them. i think the american people will run them out of town. >> democratic political strategist jamal simmons is here along with karen hand ready and john avlon here with me. jamal, has the president found a way to get the jobs bill with a tax increase? >> he does have it right. he's lining up for the republicans, either you're for the middle class or against the middle class. i think that's going to be something for republicans to have to wrestle with. i'm not sure i would be on the side of defending wall street and millionaires in this kind of electoral environment. >> it was interesting, a cnn reporter ran into susan collins, moderate republican in the halls of congress today. she said she didn't like this either, which was interesting because she's moderate. will the republicans make this fail or is jamal right, to make it fail would be tantamount to not getting reelected? >> the president knows this jobs bill is going nowhere, even with this new tax. there are a number of democrats who would still refuse and will be on the record in the next 24 hours still refusing to vote for a bill simply because they think it spends too much money, regardless of the tax increase. don't forget, there are a lot of democrats who are up for reelection in very moderate to conservative states who don't want anything to do with the president, don't want to be associated with supporting a spending bill that the president's name is on. >> john, can you break the tie here? >> i will. i'm on jamal's side in this case. i think democrats are realize if you tax folks who make over $1 million, that's a very different political proposition. 75% of all voters support taxing millionaires more. i think republicans are going to throw what karen just said. they're going to throw the class warfare rhetoric around. they might box themselves into a corner. >> karen? >> the bill is not going to pass, i can assure you of that. >> washington insider. >> it won't. i'm quite confident of that, that it won't pass and it won't -- i'll be surprised if it even comes up for a vote, quite frankly. it's better politics on the part of the democrats. and if president obama had gone out there to start with with the tax truly on millionaires and not the $250,000 range which chuck schumer balked at, he would have been better to start with. he had to engage in this constant finger-pointing and finger-wagging. >> i want to move on to herman cain. but, jamal, if this does not pass, is that it for the president with the jobs bills? is it go into campaign mode or does he keep trying? >> no, absolutely it isn't. if it isn't, that's a problem for the president. he's got to keep pushing this jobs bill. if they vote it down, he's got to break it up into pieces and come back every week, keep pushing it. what we haven't heard from karen and from the speaker or from mitch mcconnell is what the republican jobs plan is. they've now been in office for ten months and we haven't heard a jobs plan from them. >> sure you have. >> it to get rid of epa and dodd/frank? that's not a jobs plan as much as it is a payoff to the republican donors. >> i want to talk about more of the jobs plan another time. but i want to ask you all about herman cain, especially since we're talking about the middle class. and herman cain is surging in the polls despite saying some things that in the current political climate you would think don't make sense. he said something yesterday, i was surprised. then he basically said the same thing today. listen to it. >> if you are envious of somebody that happens to be rich that you call a fat cat, go and get rich instead of expecting them to walk outside of their office and write you a check. that's not the way america works. work for it! >> you know, i think it will play well in the republican primary. there's a reason for this. he'll come across as insensitive and not empathizing with people who are having a tough time in this economy. we passed welfare reform 15 years ago. candidates still run against it. >> jamal, what do you think? are you surprised that he's saying those things repeatedly, passionately and consistently and rising in the polls? >> i hate to disagree with a fell fellow mrhouse alum like herman cain but he's in the wrong place. 14 million people unemployed and another 6 million or 7 million people underimmroid, americans would love to go out and get a job and get rich but they can't get a job. they can't start a business because they can't get the financing. he's got to come up with a plan for helping to solve that. i think people would absolutely agree with him. >> karen, do you think that herman cain is -- really could get the nomination here or is it still mitt romney's? >> i don't think it's mitt romney's. i'm not sure who's said it's mitt romney's nomination. it's going to be a great race. i think it was michelle obama in her speech who said, america, we're a people who pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. and herman cain is right. we are a country that does that. that's why we're such a great company. we have people like steve jobs who create and invent and they're not handed their inventions, their ideas and their wealth. we earn it in america. i think that message resonates with a lot more people even outside the gop primary. >> karen, when you've got computer programmers waiting tables and people who have advanced degrees driving taxis, i don't think this is that kind of economy. people are having trouble because they can't even get back in the door for a job to be able to make their own way. >> let's not forget that darpa helped create the internet. >> thank you all. >> and herman cain made his own money, self-made man. >> thank you all three. as we try to talk about who are the leaders that really will bring this country forward as everyone's looking for leadership, we wanted to talk to one. this is the mayor of san antonio, a rising star in the democratic party, one of the youngest mayors in the country. i had the honor of meeting you, mayor castro, down the san antonio not long ago. appreciate your taking the time to come on with us tonight. we know there's not a lot being done in washington. this big debate going on about the jobs bill. but the campaign season seems to be the key issue for many there. but just a few days ago, he referred to himself as the underdog. do you think he's still the underdog? >> it really does seem like president obama is the underdog right now. the conventional wisdom is that an incumbent president has a lot of advantages. i'm sure that's true. but i'm sure that he recognizes as well that with the economy the way that it is, that it's going to be a tough sledding ahead. unfortunate fortunately, i think that he is working very hard and he has a lot of time between now and next november. so i do believe that he's the underdog. but i also believe that he's working hard at doing what america needs done and that he has time to make up the ground. >> mayor castro, you're a democrat in a red state. so you work with republicans. you have to do it whether you want to do it and you do do it. i'm wondering if you were in washington right now, what is the one thing that you would change to end the paralysis and the toxicity? >> well, the one thing that i would do you can't do. one of the things that mayors have an advantage on is that they work in a mostly nonpartisan environment. we don't run as democrats or republicans. of course i am a democrat. but you don't have to distinguish yourself as that on the ballot or on the dioc. that's not going to happen in d.c. what you can do is we can return to the civility that existed just 10, 15 years ago, a generation ago in washington. i believe that this republican congress has been the most partisan, the most obstructive that we've seen in the united states in a long time. and it's hard to get anything done when folks are talking path each other. if we could change one thing, obviously would be that. >> and one final thing i wanted too ask you about, your governor, rick perry, he's getting a lot of attention around the country and being painted by his republican rivals as much too pro-immigration, supports guest workers for the dream act, paying for illegal immigrants getting instate tuition rates. but this summer, you came out, it seemed, against governor perry on immigration. here you are. >> we have seen in this legislative session easily the most anti-latino agenda in more than a generation. >> so you obviously disagree. >> i do. those words were carefully chosen. governor perry sat over a legislative session that included what he called a sanctuary cities legislation that ultimately didn't pass. there was legislation introduced that was english-only legislation, what was called voter id, even though there's been absolutely no evidence of voter fraud, and a redistricting scheme in the state of texas that even though minorities represented 90% of the growth during this last decade, there was only one minority opportunity district that was created out of four new congressional seats for texas. so, absolutely, governor perry has, i think, a track record that leaves a lot to be desired when you talk about the interests of the hispanic community. there's no question in my mind about that. >> thank you so much, mayor castro. appreciate it. >> thank you. out front next, today at the michael jackson trial, the defense accuses the prosecution of sloppy investigating. it was a big development. and amanda knox back in america, her father talks to us out front about how she's adjusting to her freedom. and tonight, i'll take you inside a women's jail in pakistan. our guest, supermodel christy turlington will be with us as well. ♪ [ cellphone rings ] cut! 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[ male announcer ] write your story with the new citi simplicity card. no late fees. no penalty rate. no worries. get started at citisimplicity.com. two of the most important are energy security and economic growth. north america actually has one of the largest oil reserves in the world. a large part of that is oil sands. this resource has the ability to create hundreds of thousands of jobs. at our kearl project in canada, we'll be able to produce these oil sands with the same emissions as many other oils and that's a huge breakthrough. that's good for our country's energy security and our economy. that's good for our country's energy security ♪ ♪ ♪ when your chain of supply ♪ goes from here to shanghai, that's logistics. ♪ ♪ chips from here, boards from there ♪ ♪ track it all through the air, that's logistics. ♪ ♪ clearing customs like that ♪ hurry up no time flat that's logistics. ♪ ♪ all new technology ups brings to me, ♪ ♪ that's logistics. ♪ the number tonight, 1. that was steve jobs' salary at apple, $1 a year. in 2001, steve jobs gave a speech to stanford grads. in the speech, steve jobs spoke about how he dropped out of college back in 1972 because he felt it was costing his family too much. in 1972, it cost $4,020 a year to attend reed. today, it's one of the more expensive colleges in the country. it costs $53,850. he stayed in a dorm. reed college sent us a picture of steve with reed professor richard crandall, on apple distinguished scientist. over the past 24 hours, we've all heard about how steve jobs developed the mac, the ipod, the ipad, the iphone, hard to believe it all came from the mind of one man but it did. wow, what a 1. day eight in the conrad murray trial. the defense went on the attack charging an investigator with sloppiness. >> ms. fleak, would you agree with me that you made a substantial number of mistakes in your investigation of this case? >> no. >> ed rollins was in the courtroom and has the latest. it was a pretty big day for the defense today, ted. >> reporter: yeah, absolutely. they were able to poke holes in those early days when they were collecting evidence in this case. two years later, things that are important at the time didn't seem important so they didn't document them. bottom line, the defense used it to their advantage and they will use it at a later day when trying to create reasonable doubt. it was a good day for them. >> when you're talking about how the jury is reacting, i'm curious. it plays from not being in the courtroom sort of csi style. >> reporter: yeah, and the problem is it's not as exciting as "csi." we're in the that monotonous phase of the case. by and large, the jury is sitting through it. it's tough stuff because there's a lot of science and they are following along. the defense is going to try to prove this unscience. >> what's on tap for tomorrow? >> reporter: tomorrow, we expect to finish up with the toxicology part of the case. then we may hear a two-hour audio tape of murray talking to investigators two days after jackson died. this is probably the only time murray will get to tell his side of the story. >> ted rowlands, we'll talk to you tomorrow. thanks again, as always. let's talk about what this cross-examination meant. as ted said, pretty significant. sunny hostin joins me now here in new york. great to see you. >> good to see you. >> big day. >> huge day for the defense. they really needed it because yesterday there was this dramatic show-and-tell in the courtroom where the prosecutor was sort of putting out in front of the jury all of the evidence that was recovered from michael jackson's bedroom. and we're talking about a mini drugstore. vial upon vial upon vial of drugs. how do they rebut that? they use the sloppy evidence collection defense. we've seen it work. it worked in the amanda knox case. it was the downfall of the o.j. simpson case. they did that and did it very effectively, in my view. when i was watching it, i saw seven mistakes that she made and she declined to admit to that. i really think i saw shades of o.j. simpson and it was extremely, extremely effective. >> so is it -- first of all, seven, is that a lot? and the whole issue of destroying her notes, is that the norm or could you read something into that? >> when i was a prosecutor, i always told my investigators, don't you dare throw anything away because people want the underlying notes. they don't want that smell of a cover-up. they don't want that. and obviously they didn't do that in this case. and she did destroy her notes. i thought that was very damaging. she made a lot of mistakes in terms of the evidence collection. her own fingerprint was found on one of the syringes. she was mistaken in terms of some of the pictures of the propofol. i feel like the tide changed in the courtroom. you don't want that as a prosecutor. it should be in your favor in your case in chief. we heard by tweet today, if the bag is in the milky, my client is not guilty. it really has shades of that, if the gloves don't fit, you must acquit. people are really tweeting and facebooking and they feel the tide has changed in that courtroom. >> how much longer until this is done and then into a verdict? >> there's a way to go. i always tell people, trials are marathons, not sprints. this is the first week, eight days. we've got about three to four more weeks to go. but it's not looking great for the prosecution. big, big win for the defense today. huge. >> thank you very much, sunny. we appreciate it. ted rowlands covering that for us. still out front, republican candidate mitt romney takes a page out of the democratic playbook. this was pretty neat. amanda knox's father is going to be here to talk about her first 48 hours in the united states. and russian prime minister vladimir putin's fake jugs, seriously. ws like clockwork. ♪ for all the different things our customers planned for. like a college education. or, the perfect wedding. ♪ ♪ i love ya, tomorrow! [ male announcer ] we're making them a better financial future. what can we make with you? transamerica. transform tomorrow. montgomery and abigail higgins had... ...a tree that bore the most rare and magical fruit. which provided for their every financial need. and then, in one blinding blink of an eye, their tree had given its last. but with their raymond james financial advisor, they had prepared for even the unthinkable. and they danced. see what a raymond james advisor can do for you. we do a lot of serious stories on this show. in august, while visiting a greek town, russian prime minister vladimir putin found two ancient artifacts while scuba diving. he had this to say -- the boys and i found them during the dives jugs, they date back to the 6th century b.c. it seemed pretty incredible but pretty straightforward. why is this a story that makes us say, seriously? because it's fake. putin's press secretary has now admitted the whole thing was a set-up. the jugs were actually found by archaeologists during an expedition several weeks or days earlier and placed in six feet of water just so the prime minister would find them. all i can say is, how about putin on a shirt? seriously. remembering steve jobs, what he meant to america and the world. and we talk to amanda knox's father about his daughter's return to the united states. and christy turlington is our special guest tonight. 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[ male announcer ] get up to 795 miles per tank confidence. available in color. depend for women is now peach. looks and fits like underwear. same great protection. depend. good morning. great day. we start the second half of our show with stories we care about where we focus on our own reporting, we make the calls and find the out front five. president obama held a news conference today with one of the big topics, problems in europe. >> the problems europe is having today could have a very real effect on our economy at a time when it's already fragile. >> we spoke to the chief economist at i.h.s. global told us that europe will muddle through but won't avoid a mild recession and that it would affect the u.s. but probably not send us back into a recession. more optimistic than what you may have heard out there. but it mirrors what our strike team say, 70% say a recession is not inevitable right now. for more on our strike team, go to their web page. you see it right there. number two, tomorrow morning, the jobs report for september will be