let's begin with the latest in the political plate underway in iowa. right now, dramatic, huge developments unfolding. looks like a three-man race if you believe some of these cent polls. newt gingrich, mitt romney and ron paul all basically within a margin. we're watching all this unfold. jim akcosta is standing by. he's on the scene for us. gloria borker is joining us. newt gingrich, he's trying to project the positive image he is above the fray, but is he making a mistake by not -- through all these attacks from mitt romney, ron paul and these other republican presidential candidates? >> you know, wolf, i think he's able to have it all ways. it's a smart strategy. don't forget, gingrich came into politics and was known as the bombastic speaker of the house when he was the one in charge of those house republicans and one republican control of the house by waging a relentlessly negative campaign against democrats. so now, he's able to play against type. that really works for him. you've got lots of other republicans attackinging romney. he said said if i'm attacked on the issues, i will respond. there will be a debate this evening. he'll be able to defend himself there. yet he can give the voters a christmas card and say look at all these terrible things these people are saying about me. i want to witch you a merry christmas and that could work for him. >> how enthusiastic are the voters, about newt beginnigingr? >> overall, if you look at the polls, republican enthusiasm for their candidate has really been dampened throughout this process and the problem that romney and gingrich share is that only about a third of their supporters are very enthusiastic about voting for them. and both romney and gingrich have problems of their own. take a look at this problem for romney through this new "wall street journal" nbc poll. they asked republican primary voters object who they view as a conservative. romney, 29%. it's not good to be viewed as someone who's not conservative when you're talking about republican base voters in primaries. but gingrich has another problem. again from the nbc wall street poll. and this is something they asked of all registered voters in a general election match-up. they see that gingrich is 11 points behind barack obama, so he is clearly view ed as less electable, wolf, and that's a problem for him because in those same polls, romney is neck and neck with the president. >> a lot of republicans, understandably, they want someone they're more confident that could beat president obama in his re-election campaign. last week, when i interviewed texas governor rick perry, he said he was going to make a major push during the last three weeks. he's going all out and he's got several million dollars. >> he doesn't have a lot of time for a comeback, so he's trying to come back in iowa. these debates have not been good for him as you point out. he's on this two-week bus tour and he's trying to portray himself as the real conservative in this race. he's trying to appeal to those evangelical voters in iowa. take a listen to one of his new campaign ads. >> newt gingrich supported increwsing the federal debt ceiling. mitt romney raised business taxes 20% in massachusetts. gingrich and romney, insiders. rick perriry plans to create jobs and overhaul washington with a part time congress make him the outside political insiders fear most. >> so, he is on that bus tour that's going around the state and he has seen his numbers increase. he is spending millions of dollars in the state of iowa. he's still in fourth place, wolf, at about 13%, but about a month ago, he was 5%. so that's a petty big increase. >> we'll see how he does in the remaining two weeks. thanks very much. as our viewers know, negative ads are so entrenched in modern presidential campaigns, that a candidate can make headlines simply by avoiding the negative ads. that's the case for now in iowa where gingrich and romney are trying to forego the kind of mud slinging in their ads they were engaged in the past couple of days. gingrich so far, he's quoted as saying this is an experiment as far as he's concerned. jim acosta is on the campaign trail for us in iowa. looks like both gingrich and m romney trying to stay positive in their ads. not necessarily in all their public comments. >> that's right, wolf. we're about five hours away from this latest republican debate. perhaps the last one before the iowa caucuses where we see all of the candidates on stage and one of the big questions for the debate tonight is will newt gingrich, will the candidates continue to attack gingrich? consistently said he is going to stay positive and consider this one moment that happened at this event just a few hours ago. encouraged gingrich to stay positive, don't go on the attack. gingrich responded. take a listen. >> thank you for keeping your -- >> i got a little tempted for a day. >> don't let -- >> >> now, gingrich came out with an ad today saying it's the other candidates who are focused on negative attacks. he's going to be focused on positive solutions. that was essentially a slight aimed at mitt romney who yesterday told "the new york times" that newt gingrich is zany. romney by the way has come out with his own positive ad today essentially saying the budget deficit and tackling the deficit is more a responsibility. you were saying a few moments ago that the candidates in their ads were trying to stay positive, but consider this. this mailer just posted online on the des moines register. this is going into mailboxes across the state of iowa. it is from the romney campaign and it is attacking newt gingrich. at the top, it says with allies like this, who needs the left? and it shows that infamous ad of newt gingrich and nancy pelosi sitting on the couch together talking about climate change. it's not all positive out here in iowa. >> mitt romney, in his interviews, is really going after newt gingrich. remember monday, had that interview with politico, fox. tuesday with "the washington post." wednesday with "the new york times." he's hammering and hammering and for the most part, newt gingrich is turning the ore cheek. it seems to be making a difference. all those paid advertisements. he's on the receiving end, it looks like his earlier lead in iowa is beginning to diminish. >> that's right. people can say all they want they don't like negative attacks. they don't like attack ads, but as we know, they do sometimes work. consider a gallup daily tracking pole that came out today shows gingrich's support really cratering on a national level. showing gingrich at 29%. rom lny at 24%. ron paul at 10%, but consider where gingrich was in the same poll ten days ago. he was at 37%. 15 points ahead of romney. that is a sign right there that what the gingrich campaign likes to say on its twitter account, it appears to be fading. >> that's a national poll and we see a similar decline for gingrich in iowa and new hampshire and some of these other states as well, so he's losing maybe a point a day. i'm sure his strategists are very worried about it. he knows a lot about this kind of stuff. thanks very much. lot more coming up on the race in iowa. the presidential contest, but there's really important news unfolding now here in washington. the clock is ticking toward a possible government shutdown. lawmakers have until midnight tomorrow to agree on continued funding. if they don't, some 600,000 federal government workers will be furloughed. be out of a job starting saturday. no pay. more than half of them at the u.s. defense department. our congressional correspondent kate bolduan is following the wrangle. after you broke the story last night, the democrats concession on a separate piece of legislation, is there any progress on any of these fronts you're seeing today? >> i'll tell you, wolf, there has been a marked shift in tone today. congressional leaders appearing much more upbeat, dare i say even optimistic on the prospects they'll be able to avoid a government shutdown by reaching an agreement on improving a massive government funding bill as well as coming around to extend the payroll tax cut. just listen here. >> i think everyone just needs to step back and take a deep breath. i think there's a easy way to untangle all of this. >> we hope that we can come up with something that would get us out of here at a reasonable time in the next few days. >> we're confident and optimistic we'll be able to revolve both on a bipartisan basis. >> just show you that bit of maybe optimism, if you will. i want to give a heavy dose of caution here. while we were told the two sides are finally talking, they have not reached an agreement today yet on how to extend the payroll tax cut. at the same time, the government will run out of money tomorrow night if congress does not sign off on a spending bill and we were told there are still outstanding issues to deal with on both fronts. >> the spending bill, the government shutdown, they could pass what's called a continuing resolution. that would at least keep the government open without having a big, formal spending bill. is there talk of that? >> there is, but both sides seem still focused on bridging the the gap on this big bill. one hang up i would want to note is while they are negotiating and the key negotiators say they are very close to reaching an agreement, house republicans say they're taking steps to move ahead an possibly go at it alone. vote on their own spending measure, bill. send it over to the senate and if senate then be able to lay blame on senate democrats if they don't pass the same bill and then the government would shut down. on the payroll tax, there are separate issues. democrats came forward with this concession on dropping the millionaire's surtax, but republicans, including john boehner and other top republicans today, they're just missing that concession by democrats saying it's not a real concession at all. as they say, the democrats didn't have the votes to pass it in the first place and at the same time, wolf, republicans are insisting that the provision having to do with the keystone oil pipeline, they're insisting that be part of any final deal. so there are some issues they need to riiron out. we know they're talking, but behind closed doors. >> i have the memorandum sent out yesterday. get ready, starting saturday, you may not have a job. thanks very much. if anything happens, come right back to us. he's given up on the oval office, but there's another o fis herman cain has his eye on. you're going to find out which job he would like in the next republican administration. plus, the cia spying on suspected uranium sites. suit dance wear bolo snakeskin boots sequin costume under things stiletto heels skinny jeans houndstooth snuggie pork pie hat oshkosh socks 5% cash back. right now get 5% cash back at department stores. jack? >> fewer americans are getting married than ever before. a new survey shows barely half of the adults in this country, 51%, are married. that's a 5% drop in just the year before and down a rather staggering bunch from 72% in 1960. marriage rate has gone down among all age groups, but most democratically, young americans. compared with almost 60% in 1960. the survey shows americans are getting married at older ages. for women, the average age of the first marriage, 26.5 years. researchers say it's unclear if people are simply delaying marriage or abandoning marriage. and experts say the drop shortly in marriages from 2009 to 2010 may be quote not related to the -- may not be related to the sour economy. they point out marriage has been on the decline the last 50 years. also, this drop in marriages reflects an increase in other kinds of living arrangements. couples living together without getting married and single parenting. for example, around 40% of people say marriage is becoming obsole obsolete. as one sociologist told "the washington post," in the 1950s, if you weren't married, people thought you were mentally ill. here's the question. do you think marriage is becoming obsolete? post a comment on my blog or go to our facebook page. >> thank you. so, how could he be in the dark about his company losing more than a billion, billion dollars? that's the question put forward to jon corzine. also, former governor and he's a former senator from new jersey, corzine has been testifying before a senate hearing investigating this huge loss. lisa sylvester has been digging into the story from day one. >> we know that money was taken out of customer accounts. we know the money is now missing and lawmakers expressed skepticism that jon corzine, who was very involved in the day-to-day operations of the company, knew nothing about the account transfers. jon corzine wore many hats at mf global. he was the ceo, chairman of the board and also one of the principle traders, but corzine insists that he did not know that millions of dollars were being transferred out. among the transactions the former new jersey governor was questioned about was $175 million loan advance with customer money to the u.k. office in the final days of the company. corzine said he had no knowledge of that transfer. >> i did not in any way know about the use of customer funds on any loan or transfer. >> your lack of recollection is somewhat puzzling to a lot of us because you had to know that things were not going well and that these positions were unraveling and that the all of a sudden, you all of a sudden just find out that there's money missing from customer's accounts. >> regulators with the training commission and s.e.c. are trying find out what happened to some 38,000 customer accounts. $1.2 billion is missing. the cftc says it traced the money out of the accounts and is now following the trail to where it ended up. according to testimony from the chicago mercantile change, some of the money may be in european accounts. john row is with the commodity customer coalition working to return the money to mf global's former customers. >> they transferred money out of segregati segregation. right now, we're just determining which method. >> keeping customer funds segregated or separate from company money has been thought to be a bedrock of the financial industry. but in fact, under the rules mf global was operating under, there are conditions where a company can take cash out of customer accounts if it can provide collateral equal to the amount. congressman ckapp says there isa major flaw. >> if it happened to you and you did nothing wrong, then it could happen to anyone tomorrow and maybe up until this point, they're not doing anything wrong and this is the problem. >> the cftc just this month changed the rules to try to close this loophole that adds more restrictions on companies using customer funds. it will bar the investment in customer money in risky or sovereign debt, but those changes do not take effect until next year. >> meanwhile, $1.2 billion missing. >> that's the big question. there are so many people impacted and these are every day people on main street. farmers. families. and it's -- it hurts, it really does. >> it does. just to hear about it. thanks very much. nancy pelosi and newt gingrich together again in a new e-mail from romney's campaign. we're going to talk about that and more in our strategy session. also, a sheriff accused by the justice department here in washington of systemically des criminating against latinos. in fact, i'm already seeing your best friend, justin. ♪ i would have appreciated a proactive update on the status of our relationship. who do you think i am, tim? quicken loans? at quicken loans, we provide you with proactive updates on the status of your home loan. and our innovative online tools ensure that you're always in the loop. one more way quicken loans is engineered to amaze. and video chat with up to 9 of your friends with the galaxy nexus by samsung, or get the samsung stratosphere, and for a limited time, get twice the data for the same low price. verizon. long-lasting, too. yeah, i could really use this silverado. deer. fish. fantastic. ♪ this holiday, chevy's giving more. now qualified buyers can get 0% apr for 72 months on a 2011 chevy silverado. or 0% apr financing for 60 months plus no monthly payments until spring. ♪ lisa sylvester is monitoring some of the other top stories. we're learning that americans who have those big, big, corner offices, they're going okay. >> they are doing quite well, wolf. after a brief lean period where the economy caused executives to take lower pay packages, the nation's ceos are raking in 36.5% more than last year. the most lucrative industry for spay health care. that includes three of the top nine paid executives and drinking moon shine has killed 133 people and sicken eed hundrs more. the death toll could rise as many of the hospitalized are in critical conditions. authorities arrested four suspects accused of serving the illegal cheap liquor to mostly poor villagers. and the former french president was found guilty today on corruption charges and given a two-year suspended sentence while mayor of paris, he has denied any wrong doing. he has not said whether he will appeal. and howard stern, he is going to be bringing his unique take on entertainment to "america's got talent." today, the radio shock jock was officially announced as a new judge on the show. piers morgan tweeted that he will be hilarious, dangerous and brilliant. >> howard stern is replaising piers? if it's live p. they'll have a delay. thanks for that. a "new york times" columnist caught up in a democratic uprises gassed and detained by police. it's all caught on video. nick chris top is here to talk about what's happening. plus, what herman cain said that left barbara walter rs shocked. details of the new job he would like. "the new york times" columnist nicholas kristof has been covering the protests in bahrain and found himself caught up in the violence on a visit in recent days. >> this is nicholas kristof and i'm back in bahrain. i was last year ten months ago when this family-run dictatorship opened fire. it is an american ally, but it crushed the hopes of an arab spring here more decisively than any other country, but today, a continued protest movement still gurgles along ir repressively. nearly every night, teens and young adults protest in their villages. it's as ritualized as homework. >> that will land with riot police. some may get hurt. so, what does it achieve? when the police arrive, protesters in the front raise their hands to show they're unarmed, but a young man in the back hurls a rock. that's a common act that hugely undermines their cause. tear gas, rubber bullets, sound bombs. that's the voice of adam ellic, a "new york times" video journalist traveling with me. >> broke this part of my camera. >> they dragged him into a police car. now, if that's what riot police do to a foreign journalist, you can only imagine what they do when they catch a local kid. the police then detained me as well. >> and nick kristof is joining us from new york. pick up the story. it's a dramatic story you can read on "the new york times" website. what happened when you were arrested briefly? you were caught up in the tear gas. >> i must say that the police, they stuffed me into a police car. a different one that adam was, but they treated me very professionally, and i feel a little awkward about the fuss over me because bahrainis are being beaten up. i talked to a distinguished surgeon. his ribs are broken, he endured attempted rape. it's part of the torture. it's really just for us journalists, normally, we're treated to fine dinners by bahrain foreign ministry officials. this time, got a little detention. >> what about adam? >> he's okay. they treated -- initially, he got roughed up and they did break the camera, but he was very composed and k