trayvon martin shooting. we'll learn what lies ahead. >> and north coia says its rocket is now ready to go. that launch could come literally any minute now. with neighboring countries on alert, we're monooring the launchpad in real time. i'm wolf blitzer. you're in "the situation room." -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com out of nowhere, seemingly, a huge political controversy erupts over women, work and wealth. it began with the democratic activist's sarcastic comment here on cnn about mitt romney's wife and republicans now vote it will help romney cut into barack obama's big lead among female voters. democratic strategist and cnn contributor hilary rosen is here to explain her comment and she's standing by live. let's get background from our senior correspondent joe johns. joe, tell us how this political storm erupted. >> well, wolf, it is certainly a great debate overworking moms versus stay-at-home moms. no matter what side you come down on, the speed with which this controversy took on a life of its own with all of the players weighing in on social media says a lot about how this can be a campaign like none other. 8:43 p.m. eastern time cnn contributor, hilary rosen, a prominent democratic strategist on "anderson cooper 360" goes after mitt romney's wife. >> what you have is mitt romney running around the country saying my wife tells me that my wife tells me that women care about economic issues. guess what? his wife has never worked a day in her life. she's never dealt with the kinds of economic issues that a majority of the women in this country are facing in terms of how do we feed our kids? how do we send them to school and how we worry about their future. yes, it's about these positions and, yes, i think there will be a war of words about the positions. >> reporter: twitter lights up almost immediately and at 10:07 the rm me campaign springs into action. incorrectly labeling rosen an adviser a new kill ann strategy and in the process insulting working moms. now like it or not, rosen is a campaign issue. tweets are flying about the 35 times she visited the white house. the firm she worked with that's linked to other prominent democrats. >> my point is that he, romney, should stop saying she is his guide to women's economic problems. at 10:18, ann romney herself weighs in. her twitter account was set up some time ago according to the campaign, but this was her first tweet directed at hilary rosen's comments. i made a choice to stay home and raise five boys. believe me, it was hard work. the manager of the obama re-election team tweets, distancing himself and his organization from rosen. i could not disagree with hilary rosen any more strongly. her comments were strong and family should be off limits. she should apologize. at 10:58, aplease, i admire you but your husband shouldn't say you are his expert on women and the economy. josh romney, one of their five sons cuts in the act tweeting his mom is one of the smaefrt, hard-working women i know, and could have done anything with her life and chose to raise me. thursday morning hilary rosen under fire was back on cnn still not backing down from her original point. >> this isn't about ann romney or i or other women of some means can afford to make a choice to stay home and raise kids. most women in america, let's face it, don't have that choice. they have to be working moms and home moms and that's the piece that i am not hearing from the romney camp. instead everybody is attacking me. that's fine. attack me, but it does not erase his woefull record on this issue. >> reporter: at 10:42 in the morning ann romney went on fox news and in just 12 hours the controversy had gone full circle from cable news to social media and re-emerged on tv with new power. >> my career choice was to be a morgue, and i think all of us need to know that we need to respect choices that women make. other women make other choices to have a career and raise family which i think hilary rosen has actually done herself. i respect that. that's wonderful, but, you know, there are other people that have a choice. we have to respect women and all of the choizes that they make. >> reporter: at 12:00 michelle obama says every woman works hard and every woman should be respected. the on-camera white house briefing kicks off with a comment from the press secretary. >> we can all agree, democrats and republicans, that raising children is an extremely difficult job. >> reporter: of course, hilary rosen did apologize and you'll have more on that in a minute, wolf, but checking with twitter, this controversy appears to have gotten up to 250 tweets a minute at its peak when you consider that ann romney wasn't even active on twitter until last night. she also got thousands of followers very quickly. it's pretty remarkable. >> it's an amazing story when you think about how it unfolded. thanks very much and hilary rosen is here in the situation room right now. thanks for coming in. i see you smiling a little bit, but i don't know why you're smiling. >> i'm smiling at how crazy this all is because, first of all, i have been a stay-at-home mom. this is not a debate about stay-at-home moms versus working moms. i said it this afternoon and i said it actually last night that what i meant was had nothing to do on an attack on stay-at-home moms. what i meant was that mitt romney is using his wife as an economic surrogate. he himself said it, and i just thought that that was off base. he needed more, and i think that we are all sort of falling victim to this amazing crashing political machine in this campaign to move away from the real issues which as i see it and saw it last night and still see it, does mitt romney really understand the struggles of women economically who are supporting their families, who are struggling in their jobs, who don't have a job, who have been thrown off unemployment insurance. whose kids' day care funding has been threatened to cut off if the romney-ryan budget passes. those are the issues we should be talking about. >> but you said, hilary, that ann romney, quote, never worked a day in her life. >> yes. i'm a mother, right? anybody who knows me knows that that's not what i meant, and i preface the comment by an economic comment. i respect women and moms all of the time. i've fought my whole life for women, to make choices, to have the choices that ann romney talked about. i'm impressed that she defends them nicely. i like that her kids are out there. that's not what this is about. this is not a debate between working moms and stay-at-home moms. >> how should you have phrased what you wanted to say because this was an awful way of saying it because she's not only a hard-working woman, you know, raising five boys is not easy especially someone who has m.s., has breast cancer. this is a wonderful woman and so how should you, if you could do a do over. >> if i had a do over what i would be saying is that mitt romney should not be on the campaign trail saying to women my wife tells me how it is for women out there because people of wealth sometimes take for granted some of the nice tees that they have in life and the romneys are people of wealth. >> so look into the camera. if ann romney is watching you right now, talk to her. >> well, i said a few things this afternoon, but i'll say it again. mrs. romney, i applaud your decision to stay home and raise what are obviously five wonderful boys. this is not about stay-at-home moms versus working moms. i think your husband needs to stand up for women's economic struggles and so far we have not seen how he's going to do that on the campaign trail. it hasn't come out of his mouth and maybe it will at some point, but this is a distraction that his campaign is forcing on the american people to avoid his record on the issues. >> i didn't hear an apology. >> oh, i sent out an apology this afternoon. >> well, i assume that mrs. romney saw my apology this afternoon, but if not, i apologize. working moms, stay-at-home moms, they're both extremely hard jobs. i know, i've shared them both, and i'm sorry if that orc feffe you. >> we heard a little bit of what you said on fox earlier. and i'll play this little clip right now. >> if i get a chance i want to tell you what women are telling me and hilary needs to know this because i've been on the campaign trail for one year, and guess what women are talking about, and i don't care if they're stay-at-home moms or they're working mothers or they're grandmothers, guess what they're all talking about? they're talking about jobs, and they're talking about the legacy of debt that we're leaving our children. that's what i'm hearing. that's what we're talking about here. >> she makes a fair point. >> she does make a fair point. i do think that's what women care about and when mitt romney was governor of massachusetts. let's go back further. when he ran bane capital his record of hiring women was terrible. fewer than 10% of the senior executives were women. and he actually went on the record and said i just couldn't find qualified women to serve in these positions. no woman alive believes that. >> here's what i don't understand. you're an excellent and very astute political strategist. all of those points you're making are fine, but why bring ann romney into this conversation? why did you have to -- you hated it when conservatives right-wingers used to go after michelle obama or wife of any of the democratic candidates. why bring her into the conversation. >> wolf, you know, i should not have chosen words that seemed to attack ann romney's choice in life, and i apologize for that, but ann romney and mitt romney brought themselves into this conversation. when he goes on the campaign trail and says she is his economic surrogate, when she goes throughout and makes these points i'm not bringing them into this. come on, that's a little too much. we know that they have brought themselves into this. >> when michelle obama and speaks on behalf of her husband, should conservative go after. >> you don't think that the republicans will hold michelle obama for every single thing that comes out of her mouth? >> is that appropriate? >> when it ins to the family? no, but when it comes to defending your husband's record and when it comes to what you do in your life, those are things that end up happening and that's the political world. she will pay the price and to believe that the republicans lay off of her, they're naive. >> the democrats are quickly throwing you under the bus, hilary. the first lady of the united states, me michelle obama says y woman works hard and every woman deserves to be respected. >> there's no doubt that raising children is work. and vice president joe biden just gave an interview to msnbc in which he said and they've been tweeting it. my response to that is that's an outrageous assertion. and you saw what david axelrod and jim mess ina from the campaign, the obama campaign. >> that's okay. >> how do you feel that the fellow democrats are going after you like that. >> i felt with what the first lady said about women, what she said is fine. what the rest of them said is politics. the republicans slammed and came at this pretty quickly. people who know me, know that i didn't intend that and my words were not very good. if they want to play politics with it, that's fine. it doesn't change the issues and it doesn't change the fact that i still believe barack obama has the best record to run on that supports women. >> have any of these people or others in the white house or the dnc or the obama campaign contacted you and spoken to you about any of this today? >> i've had several supportive calls. >> supportive. what are they saying? >> well, people know me. they know that i wouldn't attack a stay-at-home mom and that's not what i think this debate is about. so i'm comfortable with that, and people who know me i think are comfortable with it, too. >> you heard in joe johns' report that jay carney, the white house press secretary right out of the box he's asked about you and your comments and apparently your name hilary rosen's name comes up 35 times in this obama white house. listen to what carney says. >> first of all, i haven't seen the records. i don't know hilary rosen, i know three personally, women named hilary rosen and i'm not sure that those represent the person we're talking about necessarily, so i really can't comment on a number of those and i'm not sure that's accurate. >> it sounded a little insulting, don't you think? >> i don't know any other hilary rosens, but jay must. so -- you know, it's politics. it is what it is. >> it's politics one thing for the republicans to be slamming you. obviously that's politics, but for all these democrats that you worked so closely with them over the years to quickly -- >> you know, i think that the modern-day campaign and the swiftness of the charges and the countercharges and the intensity of it is enormously frightening for a campaign professionals and for consultants and candidates alike. you know, everybody's words are parsed so carefully, and you know, i've clearly been on the other side where i've jumped on people's misstatements. so i'm not claiming victim here. so i -- when people go for the corner and their respective corners, i understand it. it's not personal. i hope mrs. romney knows that i didn't mean it personally. i was trying to talk about the economic issues, but you know, this is going to be an ugly campaign season and if this ends up being a start to it, so be it, but actually i don't think it is. >> you'll probably be happy about this, if they could organize face-to-face time between you and ann romney to talk about this in person, that would be helpful. >> we don't have a beer summit. she doesn't have to answer to me. her husband is the one running for president and he's got to make his case to american women that he's got a vision for them and that he understands us and whether we want to be stay-at-home moms and whether we are struggling with two jobs to feed our families while he wants to give his rich friends a tax cut. >> hilary rosen, thanks very much for coming in. >> okay, wolf. >> good luck. >> thanks. we'll have more on this political storm coming up in our strategy session. maria cardona and bayh buchanon are standing by. a controversy for a government agency accused of wasting taxpayer money. now expect more than $300,000 to relocate one employee. and mccarthyism on capitol hill. a republican lawmaker accusing dozens of his democratic cleggs in the house of representatives of being communists. what is congressman alan west talking about? stand by. i went to a small high school. the teacher that comes to mind for me is my high school math teacher, dr. gilmore. i mean he could teach. he was there for us, even if we needed him in college. you could call him, you had his phone number. he was just focused on making sure we were gonna be successful. he would never give up on any of us. handle more than 165 billion letters and packages a year. that's about 34 million pounds of mail every day. ever wonder what this costs you as a taxpayer? millions? tens of millions? hundreds of millions? not a single cent. the united states postal service doesn't run on your tax dollars. it's funded solely by stamps and postage. brought to you by the men and women of the american postal workers union. ♪ >> jack cafferty is here with "the cafferty file." in case you weren't worried about your retirement, it's getting more and more expensive to get old. people are living three years longer on average than expected and that's increasing the costs of aging by 50%. governments and pension funds aren't red for it. reuters reports the 'em study shows the longevity is a bigger risk than previously thought. researchers say if everybody in 2050 lived two years longer than expected, society would need extra resources that equaled 1% to 2% of global gdp per year. in the u.s. alone the extra three years of life would add 9% to private pension plan liabilities and that's assuming there are any private pension plans left by 2050. life expectancy in the u.s. is approximately 78.5 years right now. according to the fact book the united states ranks 50th worldwide. top of the list, monaco where people live an average of 09 years followed by macao, japan and singapore. as medicine improves and standards of living go up in some of the developed countries, people simply continue to live longer. the question is can they afford it? government options are fairly limit individual this. they can raise the retirement age, raise taxes to fund public pension plans and lower benefits. a lot of countries were already considering all of these things just attack on existing, crippling national debts. governments can educate people how to better prepare for retirement like save a little more money. here's the question. can you afford to get old? go to cnn.com/caffertyfile and post a comment on my blog or go to my post on "the situation room's" facebook page. >> first, there were images of government employees living up in las vegas. the taxpayer expense now. look at this. more information is coming out about activities on gs-8, the general sers administration workers. our senior congressional correspondent dana bash has been investigating the story for us. what else are you learning? it's republicans on capitol hill and the house committees that are looking into this. they have been digging through reams and reams of documents, combing through them and preparing for next week's hearings. the gsa is an agency that's supposed to make the government more efficient and save taxpayer dollars, but we obtained a document that showed the agency spent an eye-popping amount on just conferences. we've seen the videos mocking wasted abuse. ♪ ♪ >> reporter: weave seen evidence of the lavish 2010 gsa convention in las vegas costing taxpayers more than $800,000. >> i am wearing all armani. >> reporter: now new information exposing what appears to be excess spending beyond all that. what one gsa official calls millions of taxpayer dollars spent in a two-year period to relocate gsa employees. in one move alone relocating an employee from denver to hawaii it looks like the gsa spent $330,000. that comes from a transcript of an interview conducted by a gsa inspector general investigator with an unnamed gsa event planner charged with relocating employees. the transcript was provided to cnn by republicans on the house oversight committee. in it, the planner said it, quote, blew me away how much it costs to relocate somebody. it's crazy and astronomical. hundreds of thousands of dollars, going on to say, quote, i mean, it's outrageous. among the relocation costs generally picked up by the gsa, a house hunting trip, temporary quarters for up to 90 days, one vehicle shipped groceries and laundry. beyond that, the event planner said the government would pay closing costs on a home purchase if the person relocating can't sell their house, we have a guarantee that we'll buy it, then sell it off. as to how much the gsa has spent in two years, oh, millions replied the gsa event planner. how many employees are we talking about the investigator later asked. i'd say right now, probably 15 files on my desk said the gsa event planner. the investigator simply replied, that's amazing. we should note it's unclear from the transcript whether the government was reimbursed for any of that $330,000 relocation to thhawaii. it also sets the parameters for relocation costs for a government wide which is another reason why this is so stunning, and i talked to a gsa official who didn't have a direct response to this report or this transcript, but did kind of indicate that they understand the problems because they've set up pilot programs around the government to bring down costs for relocating governm