Transcripts For WRC Today 20100602 : vimarsana.com

were. good morning. welcome to today on a wednesday morning. i m matt lauer. i m meredith vieira. this morning we are seeing what appears to be a larger mixture of oil and sand spewing from that underwater pipe following the start of the so-called cut and cap method. the video you re looking at right now was from 8:24 about that time last night as giant sheers sliced through the pipe clearing the way for another cap that would allow a cap to be placed on top and hopefully capture some of the oil. but it is a delicate task that has the potential to make this situation even worse. two other big developments this morning. both criminal and civil investigations have been launched into the spill. hollywood heavyweight james cameron joined a brainstorming session on how to stop the leak because of his expertise in underwater filming. we ll get the latest on all of this from nbc s brian williams who is live on the gulf coast just ahead. also ahead, for the first time, sarah ferguson has now watched herself try to sell access to her ex-husband to an undercover reporter as she opened up to oprah winfrey about that sting, why she asked for money in the first place, and how prince andrew is reacting to this situation. we ll hear from the duchess of york coming up. we ll begin with day 44 in the disaster in the gulf. brian williams is in grand isle, louisiana with the latest. reporter: good morning. think about this it s been 40 days now. with all these attempts to fix it, our hearts rise, and then sink, and they all have interesting, unusual names like top hat and top kill and junk shot, and now the latest and it has a new name all its own, and all the while the gulf behind us here fills with oil. a mile below the ocean s surface, bp s latest attempt to control the oil spill is now under way. robots cut the leaking pipe and that s the first step in the slice-and-cap effort. it is a temporary fix though. the long-term hope remains those relief wells which won t be ready until august. the environmental catastrophe in the gulf, the worst in u.s. history, is now the focus of the justice department. confirming on tuesday, both criminal and civil investigations into the oil rig explosion and the spill that now taints this entire coastline. we will prosecute to the fullest extent of the law anyone who has violated the law. reporter: tough talk again from the president in washington, standing with the two men who will lead the presidential commission looking into this disaster. president obama urged them to follow the facts wherever they lead. we owe all those who have been harmed, as well as future generations, a full and vigorous accounting of the events that led to what has now become the worst oil spill in u.s. history. reporter: last night, traveling to grand isle with a local charter fishing boat captain, we came upon some of the shrimp boats that have been hired by bp to put out the oil boom. an eerie sight at nightfall not a single vessel is being used to harvest shrimp. in venice, the coast guard and bp continue to scramble to combat this growing crisis. from deploying those local fishermen, to drawing up strategies to defend the marshes in the gulf, it s taken a while but there is now a team effort to protect plaquemines parish from the oil. we re going to be proactive in cleaning up this oil and also protecting the marsh lands and sensitive areas. reporter: and workers will stay in floating hotels near the trouble spots in order to respond faster. we can rotate folks when they re resting, we can have additional resources then to get a full day s work, if you will. reporter: everyone s aware there isn t a moment to waste, as signs of just how long this disaster could last are now everywhere. and booms are everywhere in this region, too, trying to contain or soak up that oil. 44 days of waiting. this is just the latest fix, of course all of it may come down to these wells on either side to relieve the pressure. in the meantime, about a third of the gulf water is now closed off to fishing. matt and meredith? brian, you mentioned those wells. how confident are officials that those wells will do the trick? reporter: well, that s a real hole shot. it s got to be exact. they drill these two holes down. they ve already made the turn now going back toward the stricken well. they ve got to hit it exactly, but that is the way to relieve the pressure on this. we won t know it s done very exactly with gps and other technologies. we won t know until they bore through. meanwhile, among other things, you have been talking to some of the families who make their living out there on the gulf. there is a lot of frustration, a lot of anger. how badly are they hurting at this point? reporter: well, the way they put it around here is this after katrina, the ocean waters were roiled, the gulf waters were upset, but there were still shrimp out there in the bottom. if you had a boat and some skill you can go out there and get them and make a living. they ve done nothing wrong in this instance, but their right to make a living has gone away. they can t work no matter how good their boat, no matter how skilled they are. this is frustrating and there s no money coming in to these households. that s terrible. meanwhile, james cameron, the movie director, has been called in to help. do you know what role he is expected to play? reporter: well, you know, we checked into this yesterday. 31,600 people have called bp s hotline with ideas of their own. m.i.t. scientists, princeton scientists. there is a former navy admiral down here who has an idea of his own. 8,000 people have filled out forms. a committee at bp goes through them. so cameron gets in line with everyone else who thinks, good naturedly, and hoping it will work, thinks they have a solution no one else has thought of here. you never know, maybe one of them will. brian williams, thank you so much. brian will have much more from the gulf tonight on nightly news. 7:07. for more, here s matt. thank you. a physics professor at the city university of new york and host of sci-fi science on the science channel joins us. professor, nice to have you back. cut-and-cap. you ve described it as a science experiment, taking place a mile below the surface. we are the guinea pigs. but is it feasible? we re looking at these giant sheers. we re looking at this diamond-cutter, all being operated remotely, robotically. is it feasible? it s feasible. at 200 feet, all these methods work. all seven methods that they ve tried actually work at about 200 feet. but we are 5,000 feet below the surface. so think of a fire hydrant that is open blowing, blowing oil in one direction. that s what we re up against. bob dudley, who s one of the chief officials at bp, said to me he s optimistic, more optimistic about this than he was of the top kill. but this procedure they re performing right now is not to seal the well, it s to capture the oil that s coming out of the well. and it s deja vu all over again. last month we did a very similar procedure but then methane ice crystals got in the way and slogged the siphon pimump. this time they re pumping hot water and hot liquid to desolve this ice. now he told me that once they used this diamond-edged tool to cut what they hope will be a clean cut around this pipe, they have four different caps standing by and based on the cut, what they see, they ll determine which cap to put on. what if none of those caps works? well, none of these caps is going to give you a perfect seal but they want a seal good enough to siphon off most of the oil. that s the whole trick. that s why they re using diamond wire cutters, to try to get it as smooth as you can so they can cap it and minimize the overflow, minimize the amount that s going to be gushing out from the side. the fact is, once they ve made this cut they already made one last night we now have more oil seeping out. if those caps don t work we magnify the problem. that s right. up to 20% more oil we think because we re slicing off slicing off the pipe. remember the broken pipe was bent and prevented some of the oil from escaping. now it is going to escape unimpeded. let s move forward to the worse case scenario. say the kucut-and-cup does not work, now we re in the waiting game. it has been described as trying to hit a dinner plate under the surface in the bedrock from about a mile away. what s your level of confidence in terms of that procedure? you would have to win the lottery to get on the first try an exact, an exact meeting at the bottom of the well in order to pump cement to shut it off. now so if you don t win the lottery, you have to keep trying and redirecting that drill? you have to make the drill go backwards, pump cement to seal what you just did, then redrill it and you have to do this over and over again until you get it just right. it takes many tries. so august is optimistic. so this could be spewing oil for months. could it last for a year? it could last for years, plural. okay? if everything fails and all these different kinds of relief wells don t work, it could be spewing stuff into the gulf until we have dead zone, entire dead zones in the gulf. for years. professor of, thank you. appreciate your time this morning. now to that surprising announcement from former vice president al gore and his wife, tipper. after four decades of marriage they have decided to separate. nbc s norah o donnell is in washington with more on the story. norah, good morning. reporter: good morning, meredith. this was a huge surprise. everyone thought it was the perfect marriage. but the gores say they came to this through a mutual decision, and friends say that they grew apart and there was no affair, it s just that their lives have gotten more and more separated. who could ever forget that kiss? the gores locking lips in a long embrace on center stage at the 2000 democratic convention. it was a way in which people could relate to al gore, not as the robotic figure they were seeing on the campaign trail, but as a real human being with real passion. reporter: but after four decades of marriage, and four children, and three grandchildren, the gores announced they are calling it quits. a shock to friends. we never want to hear news like that for a friend and somebody you care about. but i think that they ve made very clear that they re good friends, that this is a decision they ve come to together. reporter: the gores just last october paid nearly $9 million for a mansion in montecito, california. down the street from oprah winfrey s estate. their 40th wedding anniversary was just two weeks ago, and their separation marks the saddened to a storybook love affair. we met at a party after the prom and, wow. it was just that sudden. reporter: friends called it the perfect union. she was just as fun as he was formal. he at one point told me that their marriage was the classic case of opposites attracting. reporter: but their marriage was tested. tipper admitted she suffered from depression after her son, albert iii, was almost killed by a car when he was just 6 years old. it did scare me, yes. you hate that you have to depend on medication. reporter: there were other trials, like go losing the bitterly disputed 2000 presidential election. but after that tough time, gore went on to win an oscar and a nobel prize. plus he banked millions as a businessman and as a board member for apple and as an advisor to google. i do think in recent years in particular she was very, very much in the background. reporter: i talked to some of their friends who say they were really stunned about this. if you were going to bet on a political marriage that would fail, the gores would be the last one you would pick. married 40 years. now they re asking for privacy and saying that they will have no further comment. norah o donnell, thank you very much. people magazine s washington correspondent is with us, good morning. you ve been around washington. were you as shocked as everyone else? i was. i covered the gores in 2000. tipper at one point was reading me suggestive e-mails that they exchanged, they seemed very much in love, very openly affectionate. everybody is wondering why now. they just celebrated their 340th anniversary. why split up at this point? about a dozen of the friends we talked to yesterday said they didn t see it coming but if they thought of it more, they probably should have. the two had been living increasingly separate lives and separate schedules. tipper would be at their home in arlington photographing great falls while al was down in nashville working on his book. there was never any acrimony that the friends could see so they just took it as scheduling conflicts but say they ve just grown apart. their projects had taken them in different directions. tipper loves life, wanted to have fun, and al remained a very driven man with a lot of projects and irons in the fire. people speculated yesterday, could there be another man or another woman involved if all of this. but friends have basically said, absolutely not. reporte with the epidemic of infidelity lately, that was the very first question. friends closest to them at first really wanted to respect their privacy and not go any further than the statement the couple put out. once they realized it was the gaping question everybody was asking, they did go back and say, there s never been a whiff of that. they firmly believe there is no thard party involved here. these are just two people who very amicably drifted apart. they said it was a mutual decision that they made together following a process of long and careful consideration. it s surprising then, at least at first glance, they would have purchased a home just a few months ago in california. again, they have the home in virginia, the home in nashville and tipper has been spending time in california. she has i think 3 of the 4 children live in california. so it can be a sort of home base for one of them, both of them when they re traveling there. they were just on spring break with all of the kids and grandkids. talk about the kids. four kids, three daughters and a son, then the three grandchildren. what impact do you think it will have on their kids? you know, family has already been living very private lives. one of the daughters already has gone through a painful divorce. we don t know much about the gore children because they have kept a very low profile. i d be surprised if that doesn t continue. and you mentioned al gore obviously very busy with his business ventures and environmental work and she s been serving a lot of time with her family. where do they go from here? you know, he has a very literally, he goes to china. he s got another climate change training session in nashville at the end of the month. his calendar is already packed. she s been very active in her photography. i m told that they ll expect their lives will still be very intertwined around their family but they re just going to make it official now that their projects have taken them in separate directions. that s still sad news. sondra, thank you so much. now let s get a check of the rest of the morning s top stories from ann curry at the news desk. good morning, everybody. also in the news this morning, today israel began deporting pro palestinian activists they took into custody monday in the mediterranean but the firestorm over the raid has not ended. tom aspell is in ashdod, israel with more. good morning. reporter: good morning, ann. pressure is mounting on israel to end its three-year blockade of the gaza strip after a military operation to stop ships delivering palestini ining pale palestinians went terribly wrong. dozens of pro-palestinian activists detained in israel s raid on a flotilla bound for gaza were deported to neighboring jordan this morning. activists were captured by israeli commandos who stormed six ships in international waters off the gaza coast on monday. nine activists were killed and dozens wounded in the operation which prompted anti-israeli protested in the middle east, in australia, in europe, and in the united states which backed a u.n. call for a full inquiry. we support, in the strongest terms, the security council s call for a prompt, impartial, credible, and transparent investigation. reporter: one of the main casualties of the operation has been israel s relationship with turkey, its most important ally in the muslim world. turkey has recalled its ambassador from tel aviv and this morning, the depends of israeli diplomats in arrange corp ankara were ordered home. more ships are heading this way. israel has said they will not be allowed to proceed to gaza. a conference about peace in afghanistan today was disrupted by gunfire and at least one suicide bombing. the attack began minutes after president karzai started speaking. he was not wounded but two attackers were killed and the taliban has claimed responsibility. former president bill clinton returned to haiti on tuesday to get a progress report on its recovery from january s devastating earthquake. overseas markets are mostly down again this morning. cnbc s erin burnett is at the new york stock exchange. erin, what s the focus there today? two things, ann. first, warren buffett, america s richest man, is going to be testifying in front of the commission in charge of finding out what went wrong during the financial crisis. everybody is going to be listening to every word he says later this morning. second, the ceo of nissan tells the financial times we ll have a record year for call sales around the world. most of that coming from emerging marketplaces china and braz brazil, not the u.s. u.s. car companies have big operations there so it is good news for them. finally now, police in france are looking for suspects in a fiery heist in marseilles. they used explosives to blow off the doors of an armored cars in broad daylight and made off with more than $1 million. the good news is that no one was hurt. 7:19. back to matt, meredith and al. i couldn t help but notice that mr. buffett is in our studio this morning. before he goes down to washington. not that he had anything to do with that heist. no, not at all! because you good morning. lower humidity in place on this wednesday morning and temperatures in the 60s in the suburbs and rural areas. low 70 no, sir washington and near the bay. highs in the upper 80s with sunshine, but with stagnant air, we have code orange for poor kwarity. reduce your activity this afternoon. tomorrow partly sunny and hot and humid around 90. i small chance of afternoon storms friday and saturday. that s your latest weather. still ahead, more from sarah ferguson s emotional first interview since being caught trying to sell access to her ex-husband. was she really doing it all to help a friend? how did prince andrew react? but first, this is today on nbc. just ahead, what is it like to be the son of one of the world s richest men? we ll have peter buffett and warren buffett. free access to a certified diabetes educator. so i can ask about diet and the insulin i use. i got a free meter. and test strip discounts. so i can spend more on what i really want. i count on the freestyle promise® program. make it count for you! only the freestyle program gives you discounts, support, and more. enroll today. time to face the pollen that used to make me sneeze. my eyes water. but now zyrtec®, the fastest 24-hour allergy relief, comes in a new liquid gel. new zyrtec® liquid gels work fast, so i can love the air®. comes in a new liquid gel. sticking to a plan matters. especially when it comes to your finances. that s why chase cards come with blueprint, free and only for chase customers. with finish it, you can take your balance and decide your monthly payment. or how many months you want to take to pay it off. the faster you pay it off, the more you ll save, and the more progress you ll see every month from your plan. chase what matters. i have my blueprint, do you? 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[music, talking, laughing] what makes hershey s s mores special? hershey s chocolate goodness that brings people together. pure hershey s. we got a 24-pack of your favorite sodas for $5 each. no other store can beat that price. $5. how much? $5. i m darrell, and i save people money so they can live better. $5. so they can live better. have you tried honey bunches of oats with real strawberries? wow. it s seriously strawberry. they re everywhere. it s in the bunches, on the flakes, even real strawberries in the mix. can i have some more? honey bunches of oats with real strawberries. it s delicious. nobody does it quite like us. a car they can count on. a car that keeps going, when others might quit. a car that stands strong. when you need it most. and expects to handle the unexpected. at chevrolet, we created a team of red x engineers who are obsessed with quality. red x torture tests every car down to the smallest detail. because everyone deserves excellence. good morning. it s 7:26, wednesday,ed the second day of june, 2010. right now crews are working to patch a water main break near new york and montana avenues. it broke around 3:30 this morning and they are worried about the integrity of the roadway. it s disrupting traffic and could be an issue for the evening rush hours. we are going to take a break and look at the weather and our we have lower humidity and a light normal breeze and lots of sunshine. in the low 70s in washington and suck thes in the rural areas. poor air quality this afternoon. storms likely tomorrow. how is the traffic? we have delays around the region. northbound will be slow from the prince william parkway towards the beltway. the beltway will be jammed as you leave springfield and along 270, you have company. local lanes will be congested. back to you. you can now get the news earlier than ever before. the 7:30 now on this wednesday morning, june 2nd, 2010. and the crowd gathering outside on window on the world in rockefeller plaza to wave hello to family and friends. instid studio 1a, i m meredith vieira alongside matt lauer. just ahead, a startling accusation made against the man who falsely confessed to killing jonbenet ramsey. the former fiance of john mark carr, who is apparently now living as a woman, claims he is also trying to create a cult made up of little girls. we ll hear from him exclusively in a moment. what is it like to have one of the world s richest men for a father? peter buffett knows, the son of billionaire marijuana bust. we ll talk to them in just a little while. on our special series it s all about the hair, a touchy topic for a lot of women, gray hair. should you try to cover it up or just let it flow? let s begin with an apologetic sarah ferguson opening up for the first time about that sting where she tried to sell access to her former husband, prince andrew. nbc s peter alexander has more. reporter: the duchess of york has been very public since the scandal first exploded but we hadn t heard her side of the story until now. she chose to do it on television with oprah winfrey. she blamed self-hatred and alcohol. she says she will beg for forgiveness. in her words, i ve got to go forward. i haven t faced the devil in the face. reporter: there she was, britain s disgraced butch chess alongside america s queen of talk watching for the first time in its entirety, ferg gi claimed, that hidden camera video of her trying to sell access to her ex-husband, prince andrew. i feel really sorry. reporter: referring to herself in the third person at times, fergie said she had been drinking that night, that she agreed to the meeting to help a friend who needed $38,000 before deciding to ask for even more money for herself. 500,000 pounds when you can, to me, open doors. i think i was so out of control with desperation, with a point where i d reached no return. reporter: the emotionally fragile 50-year-old called her behavior an act of gross stupidity, acknowledging after 25 years of living beyond her means, trying to be the duchess of york. she wasn t just deep in debt. she was morally and spiritually bankrupt, too. i believe that from this it s almost like i ve freed sarah from the treadmill of her life really, of her long life of trying to be perfect. reporter: so how will this televised explanation play for one of britain s most famous faces? the sexiest story in the world is taking somebody down. the next sexy story is bringing them back up. so for her the story has yet to be written when we take her back up. but there will be something in it for her. reporter: fergie denied claims she accepted monoin the past for access to prince andrew and wouldn t confirm how much she received in their divorce settlement reported to be only around $20,000 a year. i chose friendship with the family and i wanted friendship with the boss. reporter: the boss, being the queen, her former mother-in-law. what did andrew say? he reached out with understanding, which makes it much worse for me. reporter: as for her daughters with andrew, princesses beatrice and eugenie, fergie says they told their mom the scandal could finally give her a clean start. i think i ll come back from this. i think it will be a long time. i m going to give it a good shot. reporter: fergie s now back in britain. as for the $40,000 she says, it is now back in the hands of the newspaper that first organized this undercover sting. let us get a check of the weather now good morning. sunny and mild and morning fog is dissipating. temperatures in the upper 60s and low 70s and hitting 80s by mid-afternoon and lots of sun. we have poor air quality code orange for this afternoon. if you have outdoor activities, plan to be inside. hot and humid and up around 90. partly cloudy and highs in the 80s friday and saturday and don t forget, check your weather any time of the day or night on weather channel on cable or weather.com online. now to shocking allegations against john mark carr, the man who falsely confessed to the murder of 6-year-old beauty queen, jonbenet ramsey. nbc s jeff rossen has the latest. good morning. accusations are creepy, and they come from john mark carr s exfiance. she says right now he s living as a woman out west trying to form a kiddie sex cult, recruiting little girls across the country. this morning, police in the west are trying to find him, but they have no clue where he is. from his love of little girls to violence against them, john mark carr has admitted to it. in 2006 he confessed to killing jonbenet ramsey, graphic detail how he did it, why he did it. federal agents arrested carr in thailand and flew him back to the u.s. but there was a problem. his dna didn t match dna at the crime scene. police say he made it up, a kook hungry for attention so they let him go. no one believes you. well, you know, that doesn t really matter to me. i know what the truth is. doesn t matter if i m believed. reporter: now a stunning new accusation. what s his mission now? his mission is to create a cult that he wants to call the immaculates of little girls that would have sexual relationships with him and do whatever he wanted and just be his little minions. reporter: samantha spiegel, now 19, met carr when he was 9 years old. he was a teacher s aid in her california school. after carr s confession in 2006 she reached out to him and they began a relationship online. why would you want to contact somebody like that? i think i was just thinking that he was misunderstood, that he was a victim of his childhood, of his family, of everybody. and that he needed to be saved in some sort of way. and you were going to save him. yeah. he proposed to you. yes. what did you say? i said yes. reporter: that s when she says carr dropped a bombshell. he typically likes 5 and 6 year-olds. reporter: asking for help with his kiddie cult. what did he tell you? he told me to go out there and recruit children and if i knew anybody that i could recruit, go ahead and do that. reporter: did you consider doing it? um-hmm. and i started. reporter: what did you do? when i was on the street, i would kind of size up children, girls. i thought about him meeting my niece or other friends that i had that had young children. reporter: didn t alarm bells go off in your head saying a, this is criminal, and, b, this is just sick? no. why not? i think because the feeling of having a family and because i didn t think there was anything wrong with him having sexual relationships with children. it just seemed like it was healthy for him. like why keep him from doing what he loves in some very sick way? do you look back at it now and say, what was i thinking? um-hmm. every day. reporter: samantha admits she was on drugs at the time and claims carr brainwashed her. that s when she says she went to rehab and everything changed. i was able to see through everything that he was telling me and that he was doing and i just stood up for myself more than i had ever done before. reporter: she says carr became so obsessed with the cult, he sent her hundreds of messages a week. i always get crazy when i m falling for a girl, he wrote. when she finally told him i can t help you anymore, he allegedly made death threats if you cost me my little girls, i will hunt you down and kill you. i only kill the girls i love the most. in april, a judge in san francisco granted samantha a temporary restraining order against carr. problem is, police can t find him. investigators say he may be here in california. but then again, there are other reports that have him hiding out in seattle. he is propelled by an obsession to be with young girls. reporter: writer diane dimond has done extensive reporting on the case. he s crafty enough to elude police charges. they ve been looking at him since 2001. no charges, no placement on a sex registry, and he s still out there and he could prey on your children or my child. reporter: carr has been married several times. twice to teenage girls. still, he s never been convicted of a crime involving children. now, carr reportedly wants a sex change. today, he s living as a woman going by the name alexis wright. does it scare you that he s on the run right now? he can t help himself. he s going to act upon his impulses. samantha told me she s speaking out today to help other potential victims out there. police in san francisco and seattle, meredith, are searching for carr, but finding him won t be easy. he reportedly has followers who give him money, and shelter. jeff rossen, thank you very much. samantha spiegel will join us for an exclusive live interview later this morning. but up next, words of wisdom on the economy and making the most out of life from the oracle of omaha, warren buffett and his son right after this. i m taking the right steps to manage my diabetes and my budget. extracare advantage for diabetes is a new program that helps me save money and earn double bucks on over 100 items, so we can stay a step ahead of. all: our diabetes! join extracare advantage for diabetes today and receive a free gift when you enroll. only at cvs/pharmacy. (announcer) right now, all over the country, discover customers are getting five percent cashback bonus at restaurants. it pays to get more, it pays to discover. yeah, this trip is way overdue. i just can t wait to see all those crunchy flakes in action. i hope i get a chance to put two scoops!™ of raisins in some boxes. you know what will really get us in the spirit? 99 boxes of raisin bran crunch if you re nice to me i ll share some with you you take one down ( and pass it around ) 98 boxes of raisin bran crunch three tasty ingredients, one great combination. raisin bran crunch! from kellogg! new positively nourishing. fragrant moisturizers from aveeno, the naturals brand dermatologists trust most. active naturals formula s shown to lock in 24-hour moisture. new positively nourishing. only from aveeno. when he forgot to make the morning coffee. so world s best mom was more than happy to make a cup of delicious starbucks via. she got to the office just in time to save best friend forever from the office coffee. best friend forever bravely shared starbucks via with don t talk to me until my second cup before he even had his first. he shared it with i hate mondays who had three cups because it was, after all, monday. premium starbucks via ready brew. now available wherever you buy groceries. you might think having billionaire investor warren buffett as a father would lead to a life of endless privilege and leisure. his youngest son, peter, learned quickly even if you re fortunate enough to come from a wealthy family, nothing can keep you from achieving your own successes. he is an emmy award winning musician, and now author of life is what you make it. peter and warren buffett, nice to see you both. i understand people after they meet you, just a short time after they meet you, they say something to the effect of, you re so normal, for the son of a billionaire. how do you treat that? it is a compliment at first, then it is sort of a sad commentary. they expect you to exhale dollar bills or something like that. yeah, right. exactly. pick your cliche or your expression. you swam in the lucky gene pool. you won the ovarian lottery. we ve heard them all. did you sit down as a when he was a young man and talk to him about the impact your money would have on his life? not as a young man, no. the kids really grew up really not knowing i had any money. you weren t a millionaire when they were born, by the way. that s for sure. and we lived in the same house now i ve been there 52 years. they went to the same school as people in a neighborhood where in today s terms, the average income might have been $40,000 or $50,000 a year or something like that. so no discussions? what was your first realization, peter, what do you remember was the first thought in your mind when you said, my god, my dad s a billionaire? that was when we were all out of the house, and it was sort of funny, to tell you the truth. you walk in the same house you saw in 1964 or 1975 or whatever. it was actually this sort of strange thing that we had no real relationship to, at all. when you write in the book about charting your own course and creating your own identity, a lot of children of wealthy individuals have said that, but it s harder to it s easier said than done. a lot of them end up walking back knocking on the door of the folks house and saying, i need some help. how did you finally decide, i m not going back there? well, actions do speak louder than words. when you grow up in a house where you see your father loving what he does every day and doing it passionately, and you have both parents saying, find your unique potential, do what you love, that s the most important thing, and again, you see it, then you do it. it actually came very naturally. did you learn also from the lessons of watching the offspring of other wealthy and famous people and reading some of the headlines that we ve all read over the years of their failures? as i got older, i recognized how lucky i was, for sure. i realized the definition of success and privilege and all those things were very different in our house. and again, it kind of led to the book because i m thinking, this is important to put out there. three children, right? three children. at 19 they were all given a certain amount of berkshire hathaway stock. that s right. did you tell them, this is it, you re not getting more after this? i don t remember specifically saying that, but they got no, we knew it. he didn t give it to us, it was from our grandfather. it was a gift actually from your grandfather. you decided to sell yours pretty early on to sell your music career. i think you cashed it in for about $90,000. you do the math, warren. what would that be worth if you hung on to it today. maybe $60 million or $70 million. you ever wake up in the middle of the night and go well, that s the fun of it. as i tell that story when i talk about the book, it really is the sort of your money or your life. i choose the life for sure. i would much rather have my own success than live off his, frankly. even though it would have been a pile of money. in a sense that s all it would have been. you did give each of your children about $1 billion so they could then go off and give that money to charity. yeah. do you think they understood when you gave it to them what an awesome responsibility that was? yeah. the first stage i think was like maybe i don t know i think $10 million. that was probably 15 years ago. right. so they were phased into it. but my wife and i had total confidence in the fact that they d use it wisely. i ve felt good ever since. that s why more money was added later on. is there one lesson you think, peter, that you would pass on to children not only of wealthy people but of anyone? well, it almost sounds cliche but it really is do what you love. find the thing that s really right for you. because the money and the happiness and everything else follows that. it s simple but i m here to tell you it works. i got you in the seat. two quick questions. you ll talk later to officials and try and sort out for them and give them your opinion as to what happened in the economic meltdown. what are you going to list as the number one culprit? well, the real estate bubble. everybody in the country virtually grew to believe that house prices couldn t go down. and when you get the largest asset class in the united states and people borrowing heavily against it and believing that it can do nothing but go up, when that bubble pops it is going to be a big one. so greed? well, i don t know whether the fellow that gives next door to me, he wants to buy a house, maybe next year but he thinks i ll buy it this year because it will cost more next year, it is sort of the american dream but it got carried to extremes. i give you $1,000 right now to invest in something, where would you put that money and why? i d buy an index equity fund and hold it for 20 years. there you go. i don t have it on me. but if i did you d be the guy i d give it to. that s why i brought you copies of this book. buy the book. warren buffett, peter buffett, what a pleasure. nice to see you. the book is life is what you make it. just ahead, the silly bands. the craze among kids and why more schools are trying to put an end to that craze. but first, these messages. well, are you going to pick it or not? it s not ready yet. 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( gasps ) what s in your wallet? wait up! ay, yay, yay, yay ay, yay, yay, yay baby, baby, baby, baby. uh-oh good morning. it s 7:56 and 74 degrees. i m joe krebs. we should find out today when school teachers accepted a new union contract. they had until midnight to vote. they boost salaries, but it needs to be signed by the d.c. counsel. the recovery effort will continue for the bodies of a mother and daughter swept into the potomac river. they got ought in strong currents near difficult run creek. rescue crews were 7ing, but have been unable to find any sign of the two missing people. we will come back and look a so, verizon fios includes cool widgets like facebook, twitter, even access to youtube right on your tv, instead of crowding around your computer. hey have you seen the walking ham? walking. the ham s got boots on. i m not sure i have. or the soapy monkey? oh, my husband s on youtube. oh, honey, we really don t. oh come on. it s so funny. the man s busy. you re daddy on little girl s bike? no, i m not. let s cue it up. [ male announcer ] introducing youtube, straight to your tv. only on verizon fios. this is beyond cable. this is fios. call the verizon center for customers with disabilities at 800-974-6006 tty/v. sun s up and a clear blue sky. we will hit the 80s by mid-afternoon. stagnant air and code orange for poor air quality this afternoon. do what you can to say inside. afternoon storms likely. how s the traffic? stacking up left and right out of springfield. both the fly over and the continue on to 395 are very slow. the outer loop is solid towards are now and 395 is congested towards shirling and slow from the pentagon to the 14. coming up on midday at 8:00 now on a wednesday morning, the 2nd day of june, 2010. this is a gorgeous day here in midtown manhattan, kind after carbon copy of yesterday. we hope tomorrow is a carbon copy of today because we have a big summer concert here on the plaza tomorrow. lee dewyze and crystal bowersox, the american idol winner and runner-up performing live on our show tomorrow morning right here on the plaza. out on said plaza this morning, i m matt lauer, along with meredith vieira and al roker. and? coming up, the idol s are going to tune up. friday s concert is one of the hottest tickets in town actually. 16-year-old justin bieber will be here. the plaza will be absolutely packed. why do you have your mouth open here? you could stay there until friday. a good place to be. also coming up, we ll have more on this news that s taken a lot of people by surprise. former vice president al gore and his wife, tipper, separating after 40 years of marriage. so what happens in a relationship that has lasted so long to make it dissolve? we ll be talking about that. of course it is all speculation. we don t know. nor should we know. more of our special series, it s all about the hair. yeah, thank you. this morning, about going gray, why so many women go to great length actually men, too to cover up those silver streaks. plus, tomorrow on today, the evolution of al. this al. al opens up about his struggles with weight, how it s affected his life and what s now working for him and obviously working extremely well. you look at that video, there are still times you walk in the studio these days and i think, who is that? i m not kidding. it is a complete transformation. in a very healthy way, too. you look phenomenal and strong. like bull! well said. stop it some more! ann curry has a check of the morning s headlines. that s right, thanks. we re all proud of al. in the news this morning, bp is under growing pressure today even as it moves ahead with another effort to control the flow of oil into the gulf of mexico. it involves undersea robots trying to capture most of the oil through a cut-and-cap separation with a pipe leading from the blown-out well. meanwhile, attorney general eric holder has announced new legal action. we ve begun both a criminal as well as a civil investigation, as is our obligation under the law. our environmental laws are very clear, and we have a responsibility to enforce them and we will do so. oil washes ashore in alabama on tuesday and an oil sheen was spotted just miles from florida s pensacola beach. israel says hundreds of activists still in custody since monday s deadly raid on gaza relief ships are being deported today. the pro-palestinian activists were seized and nine were killed when some of them allegedly fought israeli commandos who boarded their ship. the flotilla organizers say two more aid ships will now try to break israel s gaza blockade. the army psychiatrist charged with fatally shooting 13 people and wounding 32 others at ft. hood, texas in november made his first court appearance on tuesday. major nadal hassan was granted a delay in his case. he wore his army uniform and sat in a wheelchair paralyzed since he was shot by officers at ft. hood. former alas today governor sarah palin is speaking out about comments made by author joe mcginniss on this broadcast on tuesday. he has claimed he s received death threats and he s complained about what he called the power palin has to incite hatred. on her facebook page, palin claims that the left has been inciting hatred against her for the last two years. referring to mcginniss, she tells nbc news, he has a right to pursue his subject, i suppose, and certainly has a right to live wherever he wants, but my family also has a right to expect prifly and hopefully enjoy peace this summer. the media sensationalizes the recent mcginniss tactic so the public will tune in to whatever the latest episode is. in russia, testing human limits. a six-man crew will enter a simulated space capsule tomorrow and try to stay locked inside for 520 days. that is the estimated time for a round trip to mars. earlier experiments have shown that books are one of the best ways to help pass the time. and i would concur. 8:04. let s go back outside to good morning. we re heating up and less humid this morning, but it climbed into the mid 70s after 8:00 in the morning. 76 in washington. low to mid-70s elsewhere and hitting the upper 80s by mid-afternoon. lots of sunshine and not as humid as yesterday. unfortunately code orange for poor air quality. hot and humid and near 90. scattered storms likely and a like these shirts. what s the deal? arnold s furniture. nice. it worked out well. i don t know what that means, but there you go. coming up, the latest kids craze silly bands, and why more teachers are now banning them from the classroom. but up next, the gore s surprising decision to separate. but first these messages. 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[ male announcer ] welcome to the pepsi refresh project. this year, we re giving over $20 million to fund your ideas to make the world a better place. here s how it works. you submit ideas. you vote for ideas, that you like the best. and each month, the ideas with the most votes get a pepsi refresh grant. the pepsi refresh project. it s happening now at refresheverything.com your hair mixes with pollen and dust in the air. i get congested. my eyes itch. i have to banish you to the garden. but now with zyrtec-d®, i have the proven allergy relief of zyrtec®, plus a powerful decongestant. i can breathe freer with zyrtec-d®. so, i ll race you to our favorite chair. i might even let you win. zyrtec-d® lets me breathe easier, so i can love the air™. zyrtec-d®. behind the pharmacy counter. no prescription needed. starting at just $5.99. like the rojo burger, with smoky hickory sauce, the new avocado burger, the perfect burger with fries, starting at just $5.99. right now, only at chili s. we re back now at 8:09. this morning on today s relationships, the surprising separation of al and tipper gore after four decades of marriage. the question a lot of people are asking is why. here s nbc s lee cowan. reporter: it s their inconvenient truth. though let s face it, a lot less inconvenient for the gores than if it was announced right after this. when al gore ran for president ten years ago, he and tipper looked great together. high school sweet hearts who grew into a matched pair of book ends holding up a picture-perfect family. a love story, just like the movie. at least according to al gore. there he is, al gore. reporter: so why after 40 years did the gores call it quits now? who really knows. all we can say for sure is that they say that it was mutual and after 40 years of marriage, they probably know what each other wants. but for many long-term marriages experts say that is can be as much a blessing as a curse. there s a real intensity to late-stage marriage, which is the wonderful thing about it, that you have grown to really trust each other, you can completely confide in one another. you can be each other s support and understanding. but at the same time, if that s not happening, it s intense. reporter: then there s time. it isn t only cruel to the body, it can be tough on the mind, too. that ticking sound of mortality can make one a bit selfish. as you age, the feeling that time is moving faster and that your time on this earth is shorter and that, therefore, every day counts and you want to do with it what you want to do with it, that is what happens to people as they age. reporter: and then, there s fate. when we re saying our vows, none of us can really predict just what will be down the road. if we re lucky, we grow old together. but sometimes, we don t. you wake up in your 50s and your 60s and say, gosh, this person i married, you know, in my 20s is not the person i would marry today. reporter: the gores split may have sparked a conversation about love and marriage, and divorce. but there s one thing to remember. i would say that a 40-year union is not a failure. reporter: not forever, perhaps, but pretty close. for today, lee cowan, nbc news, los angeles. a psychologist and relationship consultant, june, welcome back. a lot of people are talking about this. people are interested in why this sort of thing happens. troubling. it s troubling because we believe the narrative that you could meet at 16 and basically live happily ever after. that was their romantic story and we re invested in that story. except lee mentions in the piece they were bookends holding together the picture-perfect family. i always hear that and i say, there is no such thing as a picture-perfect family. doesn t mean we don t wish it were the case. and also, we like to believe that you come to some point where some things are forever. i ve been with you 30 years, i m going to be with you in the home. we have that hope, and this is a disappointment to all of us. now we don t know why this happened. and i don t think we should care. i don t think we should butt our noses in here. but people are going to speculate. one of the things you hear is that they have lived separate lives. i don t mean that they have different interests. some say that s a good thing in a relationship. in this case, maybe not. two things have to happen for a long marriage to collapse. first, it is like the lifeblood ends out of it. separate lives can do that. we re separated but we re together and talking about them but we re excited about them. there s energy between us. if he s in the den and i m in the kitchen and day after day goes by where he s on the road in this case and i m not, there s not much happening between us and that might go on for years. but chances are after 40 years it s not about the little things. you would have to assume that 40-year union does not dissolve over the toilet seat being left up. right. right. it s because now i m 60, i m looking at the rest of my life and i m saying not only is there not much between us, but maybe i have a chance of happiness elsewhere. maybe someone i think that s important point so let s turn that on its ear for a second. instead of saying this is sad, what if you attach i m probably going to get letters and e-mails on this what if you say this is brave? i think it s both. it s sad that we can t go on forever. it s courageous to say, at this point, my kids are grown, my public life is complete, i am stepping on to the stage myself and i ve made a choice to let go of the hand i ve been holding for 40 years and stand on my own. and really to face the uncertain, which can be really scary when you re in your late 50s or 60s or even beyond. sure. exactly. i m going to now be single, which in this either neither of these people ever was, and i m going to open myself up to the possibility of what life has to offer. no one makes this decision and surely neither of them did, without believing not only is there not much between us, but somewhere i can be happier or more at peace without you. you had a reaction at the end of that piece that we used to set up this spot. i believe it was gail saltz voice, where she said perhaps the end of a 40-year marriage should not be looked at as a failure. the fact they were together 40 years is a success. absolutely. the fact that we judge marriages as a success or failure by divorce seems false to me. the truth is, you have many marriages in that 40 years. you can have a 25-year that are beautiful, and the end of it simply the life goes out of it. then you make a different decision. and that we judge it by failure or success like a football game. that s probably not right. when kids are young, when you have children and they re young you spend a lot of time worrying about the impact of the divorce on those kids. their children are grown now. but the impact of the divorce will still be significant. for sure. because your parents take care of each other. who s going to take care of dad or mom now? it s a huge change for those kids. judith, nice talking to you. i appreciate it. 16 minutes after the hour. up next, more of our special series it s all about the hair. why a lot of women are so afraid to go gray. talk about that right after this. ueprint. blueprint s free and exclusively for chase customers. for a big purchase, there s split. it lets you decide how much. or how many months you want to pay. so you can be comfortable managing all of your large purchases. if having a plan matters, chase what matters. design your plan at 866 blueprint. that s why neutrogena® created new spectrum plus with helioplex 360. for the most best lotion protection against skin burning, aging, and deeper damage called oxidative damage. spectrum plus. neutrogena®. [ children shouting ] and deeper damage called oxidative damage. come on, kiddo, let s go. [ laughs ] hold on a second. come on up here where your brothers sit. [ birds chirping ] wow! did i ever tell you what it was like growing up with four sisters? that sounds fun. yeah.fun for them! [ male announcer ] chevy traverse. a consumers digest best buy. with a 100,000 mile powertrain warranty. it seats eight comfortably not that it always has to. woman: i just joined extracare advantage for diabetes at cvs/pharmacy. i m taking the right steps to manage my diabetes and my budget. extracare advantage for diabetes is a new program that helps me save money and earn double bucks on over 100 items, so we can stay a step ahead of. all: our diabetes! join extracare advantage for diabetes today and receive a free gift when you enroll. only at cvs/pharmacy. back at 8:19. with more of our special series it s all about the hair. at some point everyone will have that first agonizing moment when you find your first gray hair. this morning we re asking the question is it okay to go gray? it started in the 1950s, when triese e advertisers encouraged women not to grow gray. that trend continues today. when they advertise hair coloring for men, it is all about getting a date or getting a job. honey, i think i m going to need more time. the hair color ads for women don t present any incentives. they just say i noticed i was going gray, i better color it. reporter: in fact, it is not easy to find many examples of women with gray hair. of the 93 women in congress, only five had showing they are gray. of the fortune 500 female ceos, not one of the 15 women has gray hair. even on the silver screen, there are very few roles with gray hair. there s pressure for celebrities to always look their best. some people might see gray as a sign of them letting themselves go. reporter: while some younger celebrities like kate moss and lady gaga have recently made gray a trend, there is still pressure for women to cover up the gray. nicole kidman and jennifer lopez are not known for their gray hair. when you see that little strand peeking through, it throws you off a little bit. reporter: in a consumer reports poll, half of the women in the survey said they color their hair. people want to look young so they re given roles, they re given opportunities, they re given jobs, they re not thought of as on the verge of retirement. reporter: but one group of women are proud to be gray. we sat down with the founder of the silver sisters club at rare bar and grill in new york city to discuss the silver dilemma. i stopped coloring my hair about a year-and-a-half ago. i ve been gray now for almost two years. i stopped coloring my hair about a year-and-a-half ago. i ve been going gray now for about eight years and i m happy about it. i think it is the freedom of not dealing with the roots and the every three, four weeks of having to color it. i like feeling a little bit different. are we rebels because we re going gray? the response is so unbelievable. there is a part of rebelliousness about it. then also finding kind of a personal strength that you can present yourself as you are and that feels really good. i like it because i really, really for the first time i love my hair. i love the color, i love the texture, i love everything about it. and that is 40 years in the making. to the silver sisters! yea! genevieve is the beauty editor of more magazine, ann kramer is the author of going gray, harriett cole is the creative director of eboni magazine. are they rebels for going gray? at this point in time, yes, they are rebels. but i think going forward we ll see more and more women daring to go gray. it is the most popular topic on the more.com website right now in the forum section. it is the number one most discussed topic. ann, you were 48 when you decided you looked at a picture of yourself with your 16-year-old daughter and said it s not working, i m going gray. in the process you conducted a very interesting social experiment. you went on match.com. yeah. it was match.com. you put a pick pu picture off with your hair dyed and with it gray. what pd is it. three times as many men in new york, chicago and los angeles were more interested in dating me with my hair gray than they were with my hair dyed. why do you think that was? people would automatically assume the other. my husband suggests maybe i looked more desperate. it was just i am what i am, you re getting what you see and that would make it less daunting for a date. why do you think so many women are afraid to go gray? are we afraid to age? we live in a society that says women are supposed to stay 25. we know that s true. very few women have the beautiful gray hair that you have. my hair isn t naturally this color and i choose it dye it. but like my mother, she has had white hair since she was 30. she used to dye her hair all the time. back then color wasn t as good as it is today, so it turned green, it turned orange. finally she said, forget about it, i m going to let it go white. she s 80. it s been beautiful for how many years. her hair is white. just like yours is gray. if mine were spectacular i might consider going gray. i think what s happening is that women want to be viable for a long time. they want to look like when you did the no-makeup, how daring is that to unmask yourself with whatever your natural color hair is. i think it is a real challenge in our culture where women are still we want women to appear young. we re getting mixed signals. there is the lady gaga and they think that s fine when she does it. i think that s an act of rebellion. that s a different phenomenon and not really related to what we re talking about. i think it is demonstrating gray is a color in and of itself. it is not the absence of anything. it s just a different color. is there a right way to go gray now? i think so. i think like any color, it requires some maintenance. ann has a great hair color. but you still you run the risk of it becoming sort of yellow or dusty looking. you still have to use certain products. you need a great haircut. you can t just do one thing. you have to think of the whole image. if you re going to do it, think about your color palate, think about the close you wear. i used to camouflage, the weight i gain. you have to sort of look at the whole package. embrace you, whatever it is. for you it s not going gray yet. not yet! ladies, thank you so much. tomorrow, curly versus straight hair. but first your local news. . 76 degrees and another hot day in the nation s capital. tom will have the forecast. in the news, crews are working to patch a water main break near new york avenue and montana avenue. it broke around throw:30 this morning and now there concerns about the integrity of the road and it s disrupting traffic. it could be an issue for the evening rush. they are working on that. let s take a at this hour we have temperatures that are climbing into the 70s and lower humidity at 76 in washington. by this afternoon it should into the upper 80s. with the stagnant air and increased pollution, we will have a code orange for poor air quality. let s check traffic. how is it looking? we are dealing with an issue along independence avenue on 17th. all drivers are forced on to 17th. behind the lincoln memorial it is causing delays. thank you. coming up this morning, planning a wed something how to use flowers in > 8:30 now on this wednesday morning, june 2nd, 2010. you are looking at a sea of happy faces with us here on rockefeller plaza. we expect an even bigger crowd tomorrow morning when the new american idol, lee dewyze and runner-up crystal bowersox take to our summer concert stage. then on friday, bieber fever will be on the plaza when teen sensation justin bieber stops by for a live concert. these are the silly bands. if you have kids in the age range al, what would you say? 4 or 5? to 12, 13, yeah. they may be wearing these around their wrist. they can be traded, they can be swapped, they can be status symbols. but a lot of schools don t like them and they re actually trying to ban them. we ll tell you more about that. very clever. your daughter wears them. she s 17. but some of the girls i think this can do some damage. maybe that s why they re banning them? exactly why. because ann is using it as a weapon. how much meat do you think it takes to feed a family of four for dinner? is. three, four pounds? pound and a half. mark bittman says a half-pound. he s going to show you how to take a half-pound and feed a family of four. that s probably a healthier way to go anyway. mrs., we ll do our money 911 questions. we ll answer some of those this morning about your financial situation. before we go any further, mr. roker rig good morning. we have bright sun and a blue sky and lower humidity on a light normal breeze. climbing into the 70s and 76 in washington and highs into the upper 80s. with the stagnant air, we have code orange for poor air quality. if you have a heart or respiratory ailment, stay inside. around 90 and scattered storms and a small chance friday and saturday. that s your latest weather. check your weather any time of the day or night, weather channel on cable or weather.com online. and willard.com down in ft. meyers, florida. how are you, uncle willie? you re in washington! you re back in d.c. i moved north to be with my people. yeah! you say dinner, meat for a family of four? mark bittman will show you how to feed a family of four. four what? four very small people. i was going to say. there was a cook we had called dinner for four or roy. happy birthday from smucker s, how sweet it is, we love it. we have geraldine tally, 111 years old. inkster, michigan. delivers her longevity to the good lord s blessings. enjoys cooking for family and friends. happy birthday. dorothy newman. mission viejo, california fame. 102. getting older all the time. known for being the life of the party like our crew here. wake them up, will you? tell them the show is almost over. we love them. thank you.ces schumpert from burlington, north carolina. the proud aunt of nbc s pat collins. our boy right here in washington. a handso somsome lady she is. henry ballman of years old. we had a weather lady that did the weather was 100. i think she s passed on. mistaken for john dillinger when he was a teenager. i don t know why if he wasn t knocking off bank. he had a car that looked just like it. virginia bailey, richmond, kentucky, 103. third time they ve tried to get on the show. independent and has never taken medicine. not even an aspirin. leonard and selma saxe. i know these people. ran a wonderful deli here in the 50s and 60s. 76th wedding anniversary. i think he s 102, she s 92. attribute their longevity and beautiful marriage to always saying i love you. who doesn t love meredith? willard, i love you back. why a growing number of willard, i love you back. why a growing number of sc-sure.s for coming back out. i think you might have hooked it up wrong, though. yea, we re getting way too many channels. no, no. that s that s standard. fios also comes with 11,000 free movies and shows on demand per month. ah, standard. gotcha. a certain somebody says thank you. tell him he s welcome, but it s still standard. he s happy to be back with his friends. is he? [ male announcer ] call now and get fios tv, internet, and phone for just $99.99 a month guaranteed for two years! this is beyond cable. this is fios. call the verizon center for customers with disabilities at 800-974-6006 tty/v. this is beyond cable. this is fios. we re back now at 8:37 with silly bands, those silicone bracelets that seem to be all the rage now. they come in a variety of shapes and colors and they catch the eyes of kids. now they re also getting the attention of some school administrators. today s national correspondent amy robach has more on that. hi, amy. these are huge hit in my house. if you have a tween, chances are you ve seen these bracelets. but what you may not know is that these stretchy bands are causing quite a stir in classrooms. some teachers are fed up leaving schools no choice but to ban them. call them silly, but they re all the rage. how many do you have? reporter: silly bands are the latest elementary school fad and the trend is catching on quickly. my friend has like there s like so many. reporter: kids are buying them faster than stores can supply them. you can see also they re flying off the shelf. reporter: but at some schools silly bands are getting a failing grade. now that you can t have silly bands in school, what do you think about that? very upsetting. reporter: in fact, schools all over the country are banning the bands. principal karen white of guaardn gardendale, alabama was the first. they became a very big distraction. you were supposed to be taking a test. reporter: the bands has become a craze itself. i said hallelujah. they re more attentive, not distracted by what everybody else has on. reporter: bands or no bands, this silly trend is here to stay. you might wonder why all the frenzy? the creator attributes it in part to the economy. at just $5 for a pack of 24, silly bands are pretty guy booed for cost-conscious parents. amy, thank you. dr. taylor is a kleclinical psychologist. to ban them or not to ban them. the thing is, are they a distraction or dangerous? they re clearly not dangerous unless you re under 3. the question is recreational versus educational. as parents we want our kids to go to school with something educational and leave the recreation at home. they re fun zblu under those guidelines, wouldn t you have to ban a lot of other things as well? clearly the focus is probably misguided. if they re a distraction, let the parents decide how many they have and talk to kids about focusing at school but don t ban them in general. mary, you don t think they should be banned. right? i don t. as a parent of four, i have a high school student, middle school, elementary school and preschool. they all wear and love them. they are inexpensive. they re fun. do we need to suck all the fun out of childhood? really. i guess if the classroom is filled with kids trading them while they re supposed to be learning algebra, that s one thing. but that s a teacher s responsibility to instill a little order in the classroom. it s a parent s responsibility to send your kids to school ready to learn and not trade silly bands. right. it is a time to get prepared. talk to kids about wearing them and not shooting them across the room and clearly to be able to focus. but just like mary gave mees these, you can share with them, it is just something simple but you have to understand time for school and time for play. i usually worry about the status element of these things. but these are so affordable. they re really only a few pennies a piece so that seems to be the problem where there are the haves and have-nots. the kids share with the kids that don t have them. i ve seen it a ton. my daughter who is 7, i asked her about coming here, what do you like about silly bands? she said they re fun and people like to trade them. i ve seen kids who have tons of them share them with other kids. that s neat, too. if there is one thing we can all agree on here, someone s making a fortune. a rubber band bracelet. it probably costs a penny to make an they re selling 24 for $5. maybe there is an economic lesson. don t let your kids sleep in them at night. watch them if you have young kids under 3. if you notice your kid s arms are turning colors because they have 100 on, as parents we have to watch that. for schools i think it is easy to turn it into creative thing. they can do math, they come in letters of the alphabet. when you ban something, you tend to make them more popular than less. if you don t do anything they ll probably fade away and the next trend will be ushered in. 8:42. up next, mark bittman shows you how to feed a family of four with only a half-pound of meat. only mark can d so, verizon fios includes cool widgets like facebook, twitter, even access to youtube right on your tv, instead of crowding around your computer. hey have you seen the walking ham? walking. the ham s got boots on. i m not sure i have. or the soapy monkey? oh, my husband s on youtube. oh, honey, we really don t. oh come on. it s so funny. the man s busy. you re daddy on little girl s bike? no, i m not. let s cue it up. [ male announcer ] introducing youtube, straight to your tv. only on verizon fios. this is beyond cable. this is fios. call the verizon center for customers with disabilities at 800-974-6006 tty/v. back at 8:44. this morning on how to cook everything today, using just a half-pound of meat yes, you heard me right! half-pound of meat to feed a family of four. mark bittman is a new york times columnist and author of food matters, a guide to conscious eating with more than 75 recipes. mark, good morning. it doesn t sound like it would work. a half a pound for four people? but of course it does. meat is something we love to eat, it gives us flavor, protein, but we don t need a half a pound per person which is sort of what when i used to write recipes, i d say, a pound, pound and a half, two pounds. but you don t neat that. these are great recipes to show you how much you can do with half a pound of meat. this is ground chicken. you need to you need to cook it until the pinkness is gone pretty much which we re just about there. people are very nervous about chicken if you don t cook it all the way through. one thing about ground meat, any ground meat, is that it cooks through very quickly. we have some precooked vegetabl vegetables. mushrooms, carrots, scallions. cook them separately. chicken. turkey. whatever you want. and stir that up. add a pinch of sugar if you like. some soy sauce. some chicken stock. this is really a kind of classic stir fry. you know, stir fries were sort of the original less-meat kind of main course. but instead of serving this over rice, you would normally do. put in these cute little lettuce cups. you see this a lot at restaurants now, too. it is easy and nice. if you don t make a mess of it, it looks pretty good. that could probably feed more than a family of four. you ll eat three or four of these. that s one. moving on to the next one. this is pasta with broccoli rabe and sweet italian sausage? this is like everybody s favorite dish, brockry rob and sausage. the broccoli is sweet. crumble it, get it nice and brown. cook broccoli rabe first, par boil it, chop it up. put that in there. why do you have to par boil it first? because if you just try to come it in with the sausage it is not going to get tend er. little bit of chilies. i want a little more olive oil in here. then we toss that with some pasta. you want the pasta quite wet for this because why? we ve got more pasta than we need. look at mess you make. well this is cooking! cooking makes a mess! no, the pan is not big enough. we re going to throw it in a bowl over here. in fact, wait, don t turn your back to the camera. there. beautiful. that s nicer. that s lovely. so that s that one. all right. again, if this doesn t serve a family of four here. you want some? sure. while i m eating this, do the last one. the last one is an unusual dish, quite middle eastern actually. bulgur and vermicelli pasta. when you brown this pasta first, it is so delicious because it gets this extra sort of crispness and flavors develop more. ground beef, mushrooms, again some onions, and little bit of parsley. really. okay. so. my mike is not working. how did you do that? essentially the same way you did the other one? this one we brown the noodles first, then with some onions and mushrooms. then the bulgur and some stock, again some parsley at the end. you re right, half a pound of meat you can serve a family of four, or maybe even six. mark bittman, thank you so much. always a pleasure. i thought this was going to be a lot of bull but apparently it wasn t. back in a moment, this is today on nbc. [ male announcer ] progress. progress is saving tax payers millions of dollars, with the help of visa digital currency. which lets troy reiners, manager of nebraska s child support payment center, put money into pre-paid visa accounts for just a penny. instead of mailing out checks for 59 cents each. now that s progress. visa. currency of progress. back now at 8:51. the giant tortoise is the most recognized symbol of the galapagos islands. sadly, their numbers are dwindling. nbc s george lewis has an exclusive look at what scientists are trying to do to change that. reporter: he s the world s most famous tortoise, seen by hundreds of thousands of galapagos visitors. lonesome george, so named because when he was rescued from this island in 1972, there were no more tortoises here. none. blame man for the extinction. over a century, sailors and pirates hauled tortoises away to eat them. more recently, humans introduced goats to the galapagos as another source of food. on some of the islands, the goats multiplied like crazy and devoured the same plants tortoises eat. jack nelson, a long-time galapagos resident, remembers what it was like on the island. there must have been at least 100,000, 200,000 goats on the island. reporter: until the galapagos national park eradicated the goats, slaughtering them. which paves the way for this, what a team of galapagos park officials and american scientists call the re-tortoising of pinta. 39 of the creatures fit with radio tracking devices were bout by boat to the santa cruz island. two dozen park rangers carried the tortoises weighing as much as 200 pounds a piece up a steep rock-strewn hillside to their new home. by returning tortoises to pinta, we re-establish a population of habitat engineers, the natural habitat engineers of the galapagos. reporter: the ideas is the tortoises will restore the balance of nature by controlling the vegetation without destroying it. a team of students from the state university of new york college of environment, science and forestry in syracuse will camp out with the tortoises for ten weeks, monitoring their movement. it is a very special experience. we all feel very lucky to be here at all and to spend so much time here, it s a real gift. reporter: back at the breeding center, efforts to get george to father more pinta tortoises have not worked, as he s turned out to be more of a dud than a stud. plan b is to create a colony on pinta with tortoises genetically similar to george. so the 39 non-native tortoises transplanted there so far have been sterilized to prevent cross-breeding. the scientific team hopes these tortoises will have a long-term impact here because they live to the age of 150 or 200. think in tortoise years, i m still a teenager. their work of restoring the island will take centuries. but, as we all learn from the fable of the tortoise and the hare, slow and steady wins the race. george lewis, pinta island, galapagos. that looks like you in the morning. are you talk the about because of the hair? no, no! they re impressive. in the galapagos they are so enormous you re stunned by them. thank goodness they re slow moving. what s the difference between the tortoise and turtle? one goes on land and one that is a good question. one s larger. we have a lot of box turtles at my house in the woods. really? that s interesting. mark and i were down in the s saichelles where in the world series. unfortunately, it had a habit of relieving itself on the beach. if you weren t watching where you were walking and you were barefoot the thing about tortoises, don t they live hundreds of years? yes, he said that. over 100 years. there you go. much more coming up after this. per. 8 time time 55 is the time. we will have a hot day. tom has the forecast after the news. we should find out today if d.c. teachers voted to accept a new union yon contract. they until midnight to vote. it boosts salaries by more than 20% and still needs to be signed by the d.c. council. a recovery effort for a mother and daughter who were swept into the potomac river. 35-year-old olga and her daughter emily got caught in strong currents on monday. they have been searching since monday night and have not been able to find anything. stay with us. navigating today s real estate market is complicated. you ve seen the signs. that s why having the right real estate agent is more important than ever. at remax.com, you can find experts in short sales or bank-owned properties or commercial real estate, agents who can help speed up the process, no matter how intricate. and that s good news, whether you re trying to sell or hoping to buy. because the only sign you really want to see is sold. nobody sells more real estate than re/max. visit remax.com today. mid-morning with bright sunshine and humidity a little bit lower with highs reaching the upper 80s. how s the traffic in. new accident out of springfield on 95 headed northbound. partially blocking the access to the beltway as you can see. drivers are squeezing by for the far left to get by. very, very slow leaving the wood bridge stretch towards springfield. coming up this morning at 11 critic a.m., we re back now with more of today on a wednesday morning, the 2nd day of june, 2010. it s a bright, sunny morning here in new york city and a bright sunny crowd gathering as well. we re happy they re sticking around. we thank them for that. on the plaza, i m matt lauer along with natalie morales and al roker. in this half-hour, we ll talk more about this story involving sarah ferguson, the duchess of york. she faced the scandal she s involved in head-on with an interview with oprah. she took a look at the tape of her apparently trying to sell access to her former husband for money. we ll talk about how she did in that interview, what s next for her. can she re-emerge, put this scandal behind her. we hope so. nice lady. a lovely person. a little bit later on, on today he today s money 911, when you travel you have to worry about your cash and your money. we ll tell you the best way to carry whn when you travel, what fees to look out for when you travel overseas and whether paying off your mortgage faster is better than saving for retirement. our crack team is here with the answers. also a story i think a lot of people are taking about came as a surprise to many as they heard the news yesterday that al and tipper gore are splitting up. a lot of us know they were high school sweet hearts and have been married they just celebrated their 40th anniversary a couple of months ago. they announced yesterday they re going their separate ways. people are asking the question why the split. we ll have more. i have to say i like gail saltz comments on that, after 40 years, you can t call that a failure. let s go inside. ann curry has a check of all the headlines. thanks, matt. good morning, everybody. undersea robots are working to cut away pipes so bp can try to cover that leaking oil well in the gulf of mexico and begin to curb the leak. on tuesday attorney general eric holder was in louisiana to announce that criminal and civil investigations are now under way into the spill and the oil rig explosion that caused it. a fourth state is now being threatened by the oil with a sheen now spotted just miles from pensacola, florida. pope benedict said today that he is worried that israel s raid on gaza could have on gaza aid ships which left nine civilians dead will have dramatic consequences for middle east peace. he urges officials to provide better living conditions for palestinians in gaza. hundreds of activists seized monday are being deported today. a conference about peace in afghanistan today was disrupted by gunfire and at least one suicide bombing. the attack began minutes after president karzai started speaking. he was not wounded but two workers were killed and the taliban has claimed responsibility. former president bill clinton returned to haiti on tuesday to get a report on the progress from the recovery of tuesday s rather of january s devastating earthquake as co-chairman of a committee overseeing international aid, the former president indicated he s not happy with the pace of recovery but hopes conditions will start to improve more quickly. today president obama travels to carnegie mellon university in pittsburgh to give an update on the nation s economy. a russian capsule is back on earth this morning along with three astronauts from the international space station. americans timical icallothy kreo others have been in space for five months. it is a bird, it is a plane, no it is a giant iguana. the 1,600 pound statue has been flown to its new home at the ft. worth zoo. you don t see a leaping lizard like that every day. three minutes past the good morning. bright sun and a clear blue sky on this wednesday. lower humidity moving in and a light normal breeze. temperatures in the upper 70s to near 80. 79 in washington and highs today in the 80s to near 90. lots of sunshine. we will have poor air quality by mid-afternoon with the stagnant air and the pollution. if you have a heart or respiratory ailment, stay inside. near 90 and afternoon scattered storms likely. that s your latest weather. ann? al, thanks. now to the scandal surrounding sarah ferguson, the duchess of york is opening up for the first time after being caught on tape accepting money for access to her former husband, prince andrew. she says she did it, in part, to help a friend. nbc s peter alexander now joins us with more. good morning. the duchess of york has been so public since the scandal exploded but we really hadn t heard her side of the story. at least not until now. interestingly, she chose to do it on american television, with oprah winfrey. and fergie blames several things, including self-hatred and alcohol, saying she will now beg for forgiveness. her inn her words, i ve got to go forward. i haven t faced the devil in the face. reporter: there she was, britain s disgraced duchess, alongside america s queen of talk, watching for the first time in its entirety, fergie claims, that hidden camera video of her trying to sell access to her ex-husband, prince andrew. i feel sorry for her. i feel really sorry. reporter: referring to herself in the third person at times, fergie said she s been drinking that night, that she agreed to the meeting to help a friend who needed $38,000. before deciding to ask for even more money for herself. 500,000 pounds when you can, to me, open doors. i think i was so out of control with desperation, with a point where i d reached no return. reporter: the emotionally fragile 50-year-old called her behavior an act of gross stupidity, acknowledging after 25 years of living beyond her means, trying to be the duchess of york, she wasn t just deep in debt, she was morally and spiritually bankrupt, too. i believe that from this it s almost like i ve freed sarah from the treadmill of her life really, of her long life of trying to be perfect. reporter: how will this televised explanation play for one of britain s most famous faces? the sexiest story in the world is taking somebody down. the next sexiest story is bringing somebody back up. you for her the story has yet to be written when we take her back up but there will be something in it for her. reporter: fergie denied claims she accepted money in the past for access to prince andrew and wouldn t reveal how much she received in the divorce settlement, reported to be only about $20,000 a year. i chose friendship with the family and i wanted friendship with the boss. reporter: the boss being the queen, her former mother-in-law. what did andrew say? he reached out with understanding, which makes it much worse for me. reporter: as for princesses beatrice and eugenie, they told their mom the scandal could finally give her a clean start. i think i ll come back from this. it could take a long time. but i think i m authentic to myself by being here right now and i m going to give it a good shot. reporter: fergie is now back in britain and the $40,000 she says are back in the hands of the newspaper and that organized that undercover sting in the first place. peter alexander, pretty sad. thanks so much. next, the man who falsely claimed to have killed jonbenet ramsey claims he s t next, advice to get you on the right financial path in our money 911 after this. have you tried honey bunches of oats with real strawberries? wow. it s seriously strawberry. they re everywhere. it s in the bunches, on the flakes, even real strawberries in the mix. can i have some more? honey bunches of oats with real strawberries. it s delicious. nobody does it quite like us. we get double miles with every purchase. so we earned a tropical vacation in half the time. we earn double miles every time we use our card. ( shouts ) double miles add up fast so we can bring the whole gang. ( grunting ) awesome! it s hard to beat double miles. everyone knows two is better than one. introducing the venture card from capital one. with double miles on every purchase every day. go to capitalone.com. ( gasps ) what s in your wallet? wait up! now with nutriummoisture. adding nourishment to freshness. so you can revitalize your mind and nourish your skin. dove go fresh with nutriummoisture. fresh at its best. if the intense scent didn t work. nothing would. [ sighs ] that s the power of pine-sol, baby. time to face the pollen that used to make me sneeze. my eyes water. but now zyrtec®, the fastest 24-hour allergy relief, comes in a new liquid gel. new zyrtec® liquid gels work fast, so i can love the air®. this morning on today s money 911, from protecting your money and identity when you re on summer vacation to saving for a down payment on the home, jean chatzky, today s financial editor and author of money 911, david bach, and sharon pepper son, good morning all. i like the way you did that. thomas from omaha, nebraska, let s check it out. my wife and i are taking a trip this summer. i ve saved some money for the trip. my question is, what s the best way to carry money for the trip? i know carrying large amounts of cash is not the right thing to do and i think travelers checks are probably a thing of the past. is using a visa check card or debit card from my bank account safe considering the risk of identity theft. yeah, it is safe. it s a good way to go. you have zero liability protection with that debit card just like you do with a credit card and because it is your own money you know that you won t have any large bills rolling in. if you are going overseas, i d say to look for either a capital one credit card or there is a travel card from american express actually that don t have the sort of foreign exchange fees that you need to worry about abroad. since you re in america, debit all the way. let s go to the phone now. patricia is calling in from bristol, virginia. good morning, patricia. how are you? fine, how are you. great. what s your question? my husband and i are trying to come up with a home down payment of $10,000 but are having a hard time saving money. should we take the student loan refund money we will get or should we empty out our 401(k)? i think i already know the answer to that. david? first, you said the magic words trying to find money. if you re going to buy a home, look, i m a big proponent of buying homes. i think it is the best investment. but you have to save money for a down payment. it will take you probably a year to a year-and-a-half to get that saved. you ll need at least 5% to 10% down to buy a home. it is not just a down payment. you need mortgage payments set aside. i recommend at least six months of mortgage payments, not just that, taxes and all the costs of actually running that home for six months. it is not just a down payment. don t use a student loan refund. i especially don t want you using a 401(k) plan! you can borrow money take money out of i.r.a. accounts, up to $10,000. no, no i m not saying you should do this. the ladies turned on you pretty quickly. but here s the thing. he is worried that the days of good home prices are going to go away and we know that that s not true. some markets, home prices could continue to come down, another 8% to 10%. david is absolutely right. a bargain is not a bargain if you can t afford it. that s the bottom line. you need to be able to afford this home. we also witnessed a steel cage match there. patricia, we hope that helps. to a viewer e-mail from kathy in alaska my husband and i turn 50 this year and are feely fairly financial fit. we are thinking of refinancing our current mortgage so it will be paid off in 15 years hopefully just in time for retirement. how should we determine if a refinance is the best choice for us. sharon? i love the idea of not having any debt in retirement but i don t want them to sacrifice the retirement savings they have, tax advantage accounts they have access to now just to pay off that mortgage. the first thing i think they should do is make sure they re maximizing the 401(k) before 57 plans they have access to and a roth i.r.a. if they have access to that. if they re 50 or over they can have catch-up contributions, $22,000 each into a 401(k), a 457 plan. then also $6,000 is the max for each into a roth i.r.a. once they ve done that, then they can think about the refinancing. if they are able to save 1% or so in the refinancing, that s great. but if they want to pay off in 15 years, they can still do that. i want to try to get to as many in here. laura is on the phone in the bronx. good morning. hi. how are you? great. i am trying to get a mortgage now. even though i have a good credit score i don t have a lot of blind credit because i ve never taken out credit cards or anything. i ve been to a number of different brokers and can t seem to find one to get me a loan without me having to put down like 20% on the co-op. this is not an unusual problem. i would say talk to credit unions in your area, talk to local smaller community banks. sometimes they ll be able to help you. this is why we tell people to go out and get pre-approved, get pre-qualified so you know if advance if you qualify. if you run up against a hard stop, you may want to look at borrowing money from a relative or friend rather than coming out of that contract. let s get another e-mail, from rema in baltimore, maryland. i m a recent college graduate, starting medical school this fall. the apr is now an astounding 26.99%. i would ideally like to get it paid off before starting medical school. should i cancel this card because of its high apr? if so, should i pay it off completely first, then cancel and finish paying? i wouldn t cancel the card. that could lower your credit score. you need to keep building your credit score. i d actually call the credit card company up. i d google the credit card that you have first. what you ll s find out is they are offering new customers right now about 14% and charging old customers like you, you ve been a great customers, 26.99%. call them up and say, look, guys, i ve been on time for four years, can you lower my rate at all? on average my experience is they ll lower the rate 2% or 3% just by making the phone call. go to creditcard.com or credit.com. see what other cards are out there and look into switching cards. but once you pay that card down, go back to the credit card company and ask them to lower your interest rate again. there is a good website called negligentmyrate where you can actually see the other experience people are having getting their rates lowered. that might just help inform what you re doing. skype, lisa from memphis, tennessee, good morning. what s your question? due to the significant drop in rental income on a resort investment property and the drop in income due to lack of work, we accumulated a modest credit card debt while trying to make our monthly mortgage payments. now collectors for the credit card company are suggesting that we use our retirement 401(k) money to settle on the debt. can they force us to use this 401(k) money or is it somehow protected? sharon? they definitely cannot force you to use your 401(k) money. it sounds like since you aren t working and you re facing foreclosure, it may be even bankruptcy an option to consider in this case. of course i don t usually like to suggest that but that may be something to consider because it is actually for situations like this when you want to get off to a fresh start. the great thing when you file for bankruptcy, they have something called an automatic stay which means that they cannot then collect this money from you for a certain period of time while this bankruptcy is in process. talk to a bankruptcy attorney. also find a bankruptcy attorney, findlegalhelp.org, great website sponsored by the american bar association. they can try to help you find someone, give you a reefl for an attorney, half-hour session for $50 or even legal aid or pro bono attorney that you can talk to. i d start by asking them about your situation. also if you go through bankruptcy you have to go through counseling through a non-profit credit counselors. they can also help you in selecting a bankruptcy attorney. lisa, best of luck. jean chatzky, david bachmann and sharon epperson, thank you so much. after four decades together, hard to believe they re parting ways. we ll find out more about al and tipper gore s story. details light after this. self-injectable ra medicine ring tt you take just once a month. it s simponi™, and taken with methotrexate, it helps relieve the pain, stiffness, and swelling of ra with one dose a month. visit 4simponi.com to see if you qualify for a full year of cost support. simponi™ can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious and sometimes fatal events can occur, such as infections, cancer in children and adults, heart failure, nervous system disorders, liver or blood problems, and allergic reactions. before starting simponi™, your doctor should test you for tb and assess your risk of infections, including fungal infections and hepatitis b. ask your doctor if you ve been to a region where certain fungal infections are common. tell your doctor if you re prone to infections, or develop symptoms such as fever, fatigue, cough, or sores. you should not start simponi™ if you have an infection. [ female announcer ] ask your rheumatologist about simponi™. just one dose, once a month. [ female announcer ] ask your rheumatologist about simponi™. have you tried honey bunches of oats with real strawberries? wow. it s seriously strawberry. they re everywhere. it s in the bunches, on the flakes, even real strawberries in the mix. can i have some more? honey bunches of oats with real strawberries. it s delicious. nobody does it quite like us. why do women like you love activia light? sometimes i have no choice but to eat heavy greasy food that s hard on my diet. and my digestive system. so i eat activia light every day. it helps me feel good and look good too! activia! that means we ve got juicy rollbacks, plump rollbacks, and delicious rollbacks. walmart s getting it here faster, so it s fresher. and that s guaranteed. you can almost smell that rollback pie. my name is darrell, and i save people money so they can live better. what do you guys want to do? both: make rice krispie® treats! how many cups is it? six. oh, that s not six yet. whoa. where s the pan? both: over there. ( laughter ) push it down. push it down. thank you for helping. it s amazing what you can make out of a rainy day. childhood is calling. now to that surprising announcement from al and tipper gore. after 40 years of marriage, they announced they are separating. so what happened? nbc s norah o donnell has the details. norah, good morning. reporter: good morning, natalie. this was a huge surprise. everyone thought it was the perfect marriage but the gores say they did this out of a mutual decision. friends say essentially they grew apart, that there was no infidelity. it is just that their lives have gotten more and more separated. who could ever forget that kiss? the gores locking lips in a long embrace on stage at the democratic convention. it was a way in which people could relate to al gore not as the robotic figure they were seeing on the campaign trail but as a real human being with real passion. reporter: but after four decades of marriage, and four children, and three grandchildren, the gores announced they are calling it quits. a shock to friends. we never want to hear news like that for our friend. somebody you care about. but i think that they ve made very clear that they re good friends, that this is a decision they ve come to together. reporter: the gores just last october paid nearly $9 million for a mansion in montecito, california, down the street from oprah winfrey s estate. their 40th wedding anniversary was just two weeks ago and their separation marks the saddened to a storybook love affair. we met at a party after the prom, and, wow, it was just that sudden. reporter: friends called it the perfect union. she was just as fun as he was formal. he at one point told me that their marriage was the classic case of opposites attracting. reporter: but their marriage was tested. tipper admitted she suffered from depression after her son, albert iii, was almost killed by a car when he was just 6 years old. it did scare me, yes. you kind of hate the thought you have to depend on medication. reporter: there were other trials, like gore losing the bitterly dus p lly disputed 200t tension election. but after that tough time gore went ton win an oscar and nobel prize, plus banked millions as a businessman and as a board member for apple and an adviser to google. i think his recent years in particular, she was very, very much in the background. this news has truly stunned many of their friends i talked to. if you were going to bet on a political marriage that would fall apart, the gores would be the last one you would pick. the gores are now asking for some privacy and saying they will not comment further. norah o donnell, thank you very much. a lot of people were talking about it yesterday. they say they re going to maintain their friendship. that s right. next in today s kitchen, heavenly desserts. older your system gets more sluggish. i m a skeptic. however, this stuff tastes pretty good. really good. yeah, i like the way i feel. it s not a gimmick. it really, truly works. i would highly recommend it to anyone else to take this challenge. help regulate your digestive system. take the activia challenge. it wks or it s free. your hair mixes with pollen and dust in the air. i get congested. my eyes itch. i have to banish you to the garden. but now with zyrtec-d®, i have the proven allergy relief of zyrtec®, plus a powerful decongestant. i can breathe freer with zyrtec-d®. so, i ll race you to our favorite chair. i might even let you win. zyrtec-d® lets me breathe easier, so i can love the air™. zyrtec-d®. behind the pharmacy counter. no prescription needed. 9:26 is the time and a warm day. will the humidity go down? tom will have the forecast after the news. crews are working to patch a water main break at new york and montana avenues. that main broke around 3:30 this morning and there concerns about the integrity of the road. it s disrupting traffic in the southbound lanes and could be an issue later. the break also knocked out power. we will take a break and bright sun and a blue sky. upper 80 wise poor air quality. the stagnant air with building pollution. if you have a heart or respiratory ail mt, stay in. afternoon storms likely. should be hot again up into the 80s and humid and a smaller chance of passing storms. as we get into sunday, a slight chance of a storm and otherwise mostly cloudy in the 80s and we should cool down and dry out into monday and tuesday next week. how s the traffic? pretty bad. live at springfield and northbound 95 on the ramp to go to the inner loop of the beltway. only allowing two lanes to get by, but very heavy and low there. back to you. thank you. coming up this morning on midday. planning a wedding? how to use flowers in a creative how to use flowers in a creative way with[ static ]ng the plug and play. now understanding my diabetes is that simple. 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[ static ] was having trouble walking. clothes didn t fit that well. i think i was in a size 60 suit. i was morbidly obese. al roker talking about amazing transformation that al, a lot of my friends have asked me about over the years. over the years you have embraced working out in a way that is really phenomenal and you ve lost a tremendous amount of weight. so tomorrow here on today you ll talk about your evolution and even do a live weigh-in here tomorrow. i think it will answer a lot of questions because people have been curious. a lot of people want to change their lives as well. it is a continuum. it is a lifestyle. some days are better than others. we ll talk about that tomorrow. you ve been heading in the right direction. you ve really changed your lifestyle, getting up first thing in the morning not just to come in here, you work out. which is unfathomable for most of us. the evolution of al will be tomorrow here on today. coming up in this half-hour, police in two states are searching for a man named john mark carr. he s the man that falsely confessed to the murder of 6-year-old jonbenet ramsey many years ago. now a woman who met him when she was 9 and was once engaged to him is claiming that he s trying to lure young girls into a cult. we ll find out what she has to say in this exclusive interview just ahead. okay. then switching subjects good morning. we re heating up on wednesday around 80 degrees. the humidity is lower than yesterday and as a result of the drier air and the stagnant afternoon air with high pressure on top of us, we have a poor air quality alert for the afternoon. if you have a heart or respiratory ailment, stay inside. humidity returns tonight into tomorrow. highs near 90 tomorrow. scattered storms likely on thursday. and that s your latest weather. thank you. coming up next, an exclusive interview of the former fiance of john mark carr, the man who falsely confessed to killing jonbenet ramsey. her shocking claims coming up right after this. 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[ female announcer ] kids who don t eat breakfast may not be getting the nutrition they need to keep their bodies strong. a nutritious start to the day is essential. that s why carnation instant breakfast essentials supplies the nutrients of a balanced breakfast. so kids get the protein and calcium they need to help build strong muscles and healthy bones. carnation instant breakfast essentials. good nutrition from the start. more now on new disturbing accusations surrounding john mark carr, the man who police have called a kook hungry for attention after he falsely confessed to killing jonbenet ramsey. well, this morning a woman who was once engaged to him claims he is a danger to children. samantha spiegel first met carr ten years ago when she was 9 and he was a teacher s aid. she says she reached out to carr after seeing him on the news following the jonbenet ramsey confession. samantha then claims carr gained so much power over her that in recent months he convinced her to recruit girls as young as 4 to join a cult he calls the immaculates. police in san francisco and seattle are actively trying to find carr who they say is now living as a woman. samant samantha now joins us with her attorney, robin sachs. what is your evidence, sam, that this man is a threat to children? from personal experience, talking with him. i mean he s disclosed some pretty sick desires and impulses to me. i know towards other people. and that s one of the big pieces of evidence that i have. just what he has said to you? yes. have you seen him stalk, abuse, girls, young girls? have i seen him? do you have evidence that he has done it? i have evidence that he s been pretty obsessive towards certain people that he s had relationships with. yes. why just to get this on the table, why is it that you are now speaking out today bringing these accusations out publicly? i think this is something i would have liked someone to do for me when i was in his grip but no one was there to do o that. i think it is important for people to have awareness about what a person like john is capable of. when you say in his grip, are you suggesting that you might have been abused? yes. i think i m a victim of his. you mean as a child you suspect he abused you? as a teenager under the age of 18. so recently. i m 19 now but it wasn t that long ago. i see. yeah. what you re trying to do is help prevent other people from being hurt. you re saying you were. yeah. you also acknowledge in an interview you actually at one point helped this man, as you put it, you say that you helped recruit young girls, i would kind of size up children, girls. i thought about him meeting my niece or other friends that had young children. did you actually bring children to him? not in person. it was something i started thinking about and looking around for but not in person. how do you explain that you were thinking about it? i mean it was just it seemed like a good idea at the time. why? because he was so persuasive. he was very manipulative. it was a family that he had wanted and i didn t want to get in the way of something he wanted. what do we understand about these so-called immaculates? based on everything you know, what are you accusing him of attempting to create? in other words, does this so-called cult exist? is it something he s trying to make happen? and for what purpose? i think this cult could happen. it hasn t happened yet. it hasn t happened yet but i was starting to make it happen. you think there are others involved. it hasn t happened for you, but other people we have evidence to show that are already actively engaged in the cult. sam being requested to join as a member and seek other people didn t actually come to fruition, but the other people have come to fruition. i see. for what purpose? essentially to have sex with young girls because that s what he wants. that s what he needs, apparently. his writings, when you speak of the evidence in this case, really tell so much about his behavior as a sex crimes prosecutor for many, many years, someone does not write for his desire to be with children and just merely write about it starting back in 2001 when we saw the evidence in sonoma taken from his computer and all the evidence gathered there. it is overwhelming from 2001 until now. and his own manuscript, his own writing he puts in there that he has actually submitted to literary agents to try to get published over and over again with his actual words of desire to be with children. that brings up a question. you know, as i mentioned earlier, police have called him a kook seeking attention. how do we know that these acquisitions aren t part of an effort to give him the attention that he failed to really get to fruition with his statement that he was actually the person who was responsible for jonbenet ramsey s disappearance? i think that s a good question that people raise. i think though it is wrong to assume i am the type of person that would be willing to give him attention for the sake of getting attention. i m not interested in that. i am interested in my own well being and the well being of others, and i think this time around, compared to 2006, the media is necessary to bring in i think this attention it frightening him. i think it is going to smoke him out. i think it is needed. it sounds as though you re really attempting to get publicity about this. even as you said earlier, just because you have a restraining order against him. he s gotten away with fa are too much. someone seeking attention doesn t do it just in terms of spe seeking out little kids, putting kids in danger and actively pursuing kids and having child pornography on their computer. we want to reiterate that police in san francisco and in seattle, the seattle area, are looking for this man. thanks for your time. we ll be back with much more thanks for your time. we ll be back with much more right after this. nee go fresh now with nutriummoisture. adding nourishment to freshness. [ bird chirps, woman sighs ] [ female announcer ] go fresh. it s dove s way to revitalize your mind and nourish your skin. dove go fresh with nutriummoisture. fresh at its best. go fresh is also available as a bar in three revitalizing scents. or 100 calories? with yoplait delights, now you can finally have both. two indulgently rich layers of chocolate and raspberry yogurt. and only 100 calories. women preferred the softness and scent of concentrated snuggle blue sparkle to the leading brand. and snuggle costs less, too. so go on, buy snuggle today. that means we ve got juicy rollbacks, plump rollbacks, and delicious rollbacks. walmart s getting it here faster, so it s fresher. and that s guaranteed. you can almost smell that rollback pie. my name is darrell, and i save people money so they can live better. explorers, great thinkers. they re the future of america, so let s bring them up right and give them our cheese. kraft singles. the american cheese. your hair mixes with pollen and dust in the air. i get congested. my eyes itch. i have to banish you to the garden. but now with zyrtec-d®, i have the proven allergy relief of zyrtec®, plus a powerful decongestant. i can breathe freer with zyrtec-d®. so, i ll race you to our favorite chair. i might even let you win. zyrtec-d® lets me breathe easier, so i can love the air™. zyrtec-d®. behind the pharmacy counter. no prescription needed. we asked real people to film themselves taking the activia 14-day challenge. hi. i m emily ilic. i m going to start the activia 14-day challenge today. problems that i have are, you know, irregularity. i do have some doubts if it works. i think it s really good. um. i like the flavors. i think from being a skeptic in the beginning i do think that activia actually works. help regulate your digestive system. take the activia challenge. it works or it s free. activia know it all made a cup of premium starbucks via. know it all shared it with single and loving it! who made a cup the next morning for ladies man as he was rushing out the back door. he shared it with blondes have more fun and fiery redhead, who, after finding out about each other, shared starbucks via with their new boyfriends, firemen keep it hot and drummers rock, who called his friend know it all, who said he already knew about it. premium starbucks via ready brew. now available wherever you buy groceries. this morning on if the today s home, e-decorating, a new trend in home design where you can hire a professional online to help decorate every room, all the while helping you avoid costly mistakes and stay on a budget. betsy burnham is creator of infant space. janice lieberman is a consumer correspondent for reader s digest. betsy, i absolutely love this idea. what is the overall concept and how did you come about with the idea? well, i came about the idea because so many people now are so design savvy that they want a professional to help them with their house, they may be on a budget or may only want to do one room at a time. i found that in order to keep these people as clients, and i wanted to work with all of them, i created something that simplified the process and was a flat fee. janice, this is an idea that goes hand in hand with what s happening online with people purchasing furniture and bigger ticket items. right? i think people don t have the time and they want deals. you can actually comparison shop when things are online instead of going from store to store. it makes sense. what are the benefits of doing something like this? you mentioned being on a budget. right. you get a flat fee usually. you get to work with a professional. you can be anywhere in the country because it is all done online. you get to execute the design at your own pace. you don t have to do everything at once. you can do room to room. or one room only. say i have an entryway space. i take a photo of the area. you measure your space. send me all the dimensions and you send me as much information about yourself as you can, anything that inspires you so that i get to know your taste. i can then shop for you. filter it through my aesthetic and come up with hopefully a good design for your room. then you actually come up with like the i draw everything. a nice presentation here. draw everything to scale. detail it, give you an idea of where you re going to buy everything, specific prices, specific furniture pieces. we make it almost no-fail. i mean it is a master plan to the design of your room. tables, furniture to fill this space. you give them different price points of furniture as well. you can buy a crate & barrel table or find something high-end. i always tell clients it is about a mix. i ask them to invest in a piece, splurge, buy something vintage, nak a little more interesting. for an entry you have to think about how it is going to function. i wanted to give them a little vignette that actually worked, put your keys down, put your mail down. i consider everything about the space they re sending me. if they sign up with you at instant space, they get this box with great presentation. then they can take their own time filling it from suggestions. janice, there are things to keep in mind when you purchase furniture and some things online. what are things that you suggest people keep in mind? i think when you do it yourself or go through a designer, you need to ask for a sample, see a swatch of the fab bilk and a piece of the finish. what looks like something online may not look like that in reality. you need to touch and feel it. can you sit on this all day? if it is going to be hardwood or pressed wood. cardboard. also feel the fabric, is it durable. do you have children? is it goi to wash easy. that s something you want to feel for yourself. also check about assembly. we ve ordered stuff from ikea or other places where you can spend a lot of time or hire someone to put it all together for you. is it worth the price of assembly. return policy very important. is there a restocking fee? is it worth it to you? find out if you don t like it how do you ship it back. do you have to pay for shipping. furniture is heavy and it is going to cost a lot. it s a great idea though. somebody with no time to decorate, that s the way to go. thank you both so much. next, angel food cake five different wa boss:hey, glad i caught you. i was on my way to present ideas about all the discounts we re offering. i ve got some catchphrases that ll make these savings even more memorable. gecko: all right. gecko: good driver discounts. now that s the stuff.? boss: how bout this? gecko: .they re the bee s knees? boss: or this? gecko: sir, how bout just fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. boss: ha, yeah, good luck with that catching on! anncr: geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. this morning-on-in today s kitchen, angel food cake. delicious on its own but our hot chef hays five easy ways to step it up and keep it relatively low-cal. if you buy cake, saves time right off the bat. the one thing can you count on buying anywhere at any grocery store, angel food cake. no fat, healthy. delicious. it is impressive in its height. all we are doing is taking a few things to step it up just a tiny bit so you put your own flavor into your angel food cake. start with raspberry-lime angel food cake. here we ve already taken one layer. just cut it horizontally. when you cut angel food cake, always, always use a serrated knife. the only thing that will get through it. separate it out. just take away some of the little pieces. then what we re going to do is just add a layer of raspberry preserves on the bottom. then we re going to take we took puddle, store-bought packaged pudding like the mix, added sour cream and milk to it. you ll spread that on top, add raspberries. take your next layer, put that on top. put some of the cream, see how easy? my kids could do this in like two seconds. me a little longer. then you will you a just add your raspberries. then go ahead. we re doing the really fast version. put your next layer. then we took a glaze of lime juice and confectioner s sugar. pour that over the top. let it drip down the sides. kind of cover the top. the drips are really pretty. if you want you can garnish it with some raspberries on the top. the next one, all we did, a fill this with orange sherbet like that, stick it in the freezer. freeze up. cover it with saran wrap. a few days before even. top with whipped cream, then garnish were candied orange rind. faster! please taste. here is the sherbet one and if you want to try that, this is a chocolate mousse. that is my favorite, that is coconut cream dream. that s good. it s whipped cream and big flakes of coconut. this one is honey with peaches and sugared pistachios. all right. thank you so much. we ve got kathie lee and 9:56 is your time. in the news for today, police have an arrest warrant out for a murder suspect and need your help finding him. they are looking for henry chavez who killed a man theory his home on georgia avenue. they are not saying what led to the murder. he does not have a known address, but frequents silver spring and wheat on. he is 3 foot 11 and weighs 85 pounds. we have the latest on a hot day. humidity dropped a bit, but another hot afternoon and up around 90. lots of sunshine and with the stagnant air and pollution, we will likely have unhealthy quality. best idea is to stay medicine. the humidity returns and hot around 90 and a likelihood of scattered storms. smul chance of friday and monday. how is the traffic? very slow. a live look with traffic move away from you on the inner loop towards an accident. take you to a map now. the southbound washington parkway is closed after 450 with an accident. hey, everybody. it is winesday. we made it to the middle of the week. it s the 2nd of june. i want to wish my little niece 32 years old, today. happy birthday. there s lots going on in the world. first of all, if hoda looks a bit bloated today, it s because she is. you want to tell them why? we ve all had these days. who hasn t. i got home to my apartment and i was starving. i don t usually put have all kind of junk food in my place. because you know you re weak. yes. so i had this is in one sitting. a half a tub of ben and jerry s. gone. the kettle one chips barbecue jumbo bag, gone. when i was disgusted, i wasn t done. i went to the kitchen where my mom got these brownies from super giant. if you need baked goods, go to super giant. opened the foil with the three brownies. what s the size of those brownies, hoda? they re huge. with icing. did the whole all like that. i couldn t stop. i was so disgusted. i couldn t stop. it was gross. what was i doing? she s texting me, telling me all this stuff she s eating. i had to confess. it was like tweeting your food. i felt terrible. i feel terrible right now. you had to confess. then you got up extra early this morning and tried to run it off. literally, i couldn t pick it up. i was just trying to i was out there to punish myself. it was so good. but it made me sick. what was i doing? what would joe bauer say about that behavior? that had to have been a good 3,000 to 4,000 calories. right then. literally, like that. you ve never done that? you don t do it? anywho, we all know about the big problem down in the gulf. we send our love and prayers to everybody down there. people s livelihoods, futures, everything at stake. it s just i can t even think about it gushing. even now. just more and more and more. did you see the picture of the dolphin that it s just a carcass of a dolphin. it s spewing oil. it s got nothing but oil inside it. i think when you think of the people who are in the parishes, all these parishes where they were devastated by katrina and now this is happening. it s one thing to rebuild a home. that can happen. it s another thing when your livelihood is stripped away. and ecosomystems that will n come back for decades. it seems so cliche, but we can put a man on the moon but cannot plug that whole. it s so frustrating to watch. now they re asking james cameron from the titanic and avatar, he s had so much experience being at deaths with water, i guess he was in washington yesterday with scientific experts yesterday. anybody that s got any idea. kevin costner s invested more than $24 million. there was something in our paper. there s a 21-year-old professor who had a solution. do we have a picture of it? are we going to show it? use a deflated car tire, right, insert that into the leaking you have to see the picture. obviously there s the tube that everything s coming out. a smaller tube goes out with deflated tires around it. then you inflate the tires more and more and more and more and more. i like that. that s smart. that s a smart idea. all these trucks get stuck under underpasses. the way to get them out is to take the air out of their tires and then they move them away. it s the opposite idea. is there anything to sort of slow it? it feels like there s not when they were putting golf balls in there and that junk, that didn t make any sense to me. hoda had the best idea of all. i have a theory. i m only saying it because the reason i binged, the nand you l know why i binge because we all have it once a month. except kathie lee, she s done. i was going to say it because it seems like it s a good idea. if you got a gigantic, huge tampon. but just think about the abso absorbanc absorbancy. if women were in charge, we would have already thought of that. it would have already been happening. it would have already been happening. we re going from that to al and tipper gore breaking up. that was a surprise to hear. after 40 years. they just celebrated their 40th anniversary two weeks ago. they both say there was not another person who was in the marriage. it just was one of those that kiss was boy, that went on and on. remember that? yeah. he got a lot of flak for that as well, though. yeah. i mean, i wonder i wonder after 40 years if who knows what goes on in anyone s home. they came out. they said it. apparently they re going to have separate homes now, obviously. they have many homes to begin with. i don t know. i guess more details will emerge as they always do. they just grew apart, friends say. they re both they re 62. they re relatively young. i wonder if there s a point in your life where you say, you know what, i want something else. i want to explore other things, and i still have the years to do it and i d like to do it. what if it s as simple as that. they met at the prom in high school. they were kids. they d been together a long, long time. did you know many, many older people are getting divorced? i wonder if it s because now women have choices. i think some people probably stayed in marriages that weren t terrific for a long, long time because there were no options. right. i think it s viagra. you do? mm-hmm. is that a verdict? yeah. all these women are exhausted. they paid their dues in the board room, the bedroom, the pta club, everything else. they want a little rest in their life. all of a sudden these guys have viagra, cialis, vigitalis, everything. everything for the man. nothing for the woman. the woman, at this point she s see you. she s gone. i got to say hats off. there s a guy who s running for congress. a republican candidate for congress in missouri. u.s. senate. he s always worn a toupee. he just decided he s getting rid of it. he looks so much better without it. thank god. let s give a message to the men out there. first of all, he s got some hair. first of all, toupees are obvious. don t wear those. you re so much sexier without them. there s a story. there s a story, and apparently it s true. i won t name the name. there s a guy who would not do anything without his hair. his girlfriend out in the hamptons was drowning. he s on the beach. he doesn t go in the water because of the hair. she s drowning like this. he s going somebody else had to go out and rescue her. that s terrible. yes. that s vanity. this is a person who might end of going to jail. you know what his first fear is? they do not allow toupees in jail. we were talking about it in the make-up room earlier. i m terrified of prison. she doesn t care if she does something wrong. she just doesn t want to go to prison. and the reason is? if i have to go to prison i know when my hair grows out, it grows out gray and it grows out kinky. i dot want to be seen like that. i ll look like a criminal, because that s what happens. when you re in prison that crazy hair growing out gray. you look guilty even if you didn t do anything. i would take the roots. if they took away my tweezers i would have to end it all. honestly. to live is to tweeze. we re doing a thing on the show today. is it okay for women to go gray. everyone s going, it s great. hoda and i are like, never. gray hair grows out wiry. it s not beautiful and flowy like your mom s. your mom s is great. my hair gray is crazy no. why are you picturing it? stop looking at me. i m still picturing you eating all that stuff. i couldn t stop. it wasn t all that great. that s the other thing. when you re done with it, you so regret doing it. in the middle it seems like a good idea. you know who never bloats and she s sitting over there and looks so drop dead gorgeous. kara dioguardi is here. she never bloats. that s not true. first the other one who never bloats. our sara. oh, no. i do. i can relate to you, hoda. christine wrote in i ate my way through last thursday. i m with you, girl. denise wrote in, been there, done that. michael wrote in i think you look exceptionally amazing. maybe the junk food was a good choice for you. while you were tweeting us i was waiting to go into a book signing last night at barnes and noble out in beautiful princeton. thanks to all the nice people who came out. christine and i were eating something we were eating artichoke and spinach dip with chips. i was with you. this book has been out since april. you packed the room in princeton like that? let me see that picture one more time. that s a lot of books and very few people. you know her as the tough and honest there it is on sale now. comes with a free cd in the back. all right. car reikara, we re going to t what she s like without that table. she s just here with us. right after this. 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[ female announcer ] kellogg s fiber plus bars. you couldn t wish for more. we re all striving for it. purina cat chow helps you nurture it in your cat with a full family of excellent nutrition and helpful resources. purina cat chow. share a better life. purina cat chow. [music, talking, laughing] what makes hershey s s mores special? hershey s chocolate goodness that brings people together. pure hershey s. that s why neutrogena® created new spectrum plus with helioplex 360. for the most best lotion protection against skin burning, aging, and deeper damage called oxidative damage. spectrum plus. neutrogena®. the multitalented kara dioguardi just wrapped her second season up offering advice to american idols wan nabewan. check out her awards for cowriting the most performed songs on the radio. which ones are those, kara? oh, let s see. i wrote ain t no other man with christina. the new carrie underwood song. that s a great song. where does your inspiration come from? it really depends. sometimes the songs are based on my life. early on in my career i probably based them more on break-ups. i wrote that song walk away with kelly clarkson about a boyfriend that kind of went wrong. bet that he s sorry now. maybe. i don t know for sure. he doesn t know i wrote it about him. i don t really tell them who it s about. you understand the carly simon thing about you re so vain. exactly. although i love that. that s a great song. american idol. there was the big thing with lee and crystal. a lot of people wrote in on our facebook page, it should have been crystal, shouldn t have been lee. do you think people voted for the right one? there s two was ys to judge finale. you can look at it like this is the night. i m going to vote for the person who s done the best. or the person who s grown the most. when i look at lee, he s somebody who really had no understanding of his talent. he was in a paint store. probably never sang too much. he really grew a lot over the season. crystal was, you know, sort of at the forefront from the beginning. she kind of knew who she was. she d been gigging around town. i m not sure. i think america thought this is what the show is really about. doesn t simon say that? this is what it s supposed to be, finding that person like kelly clarkson was,carrie. she was in the middle of a small town. had no idea she was that great. who s going to take simon s place? they said bret michaels. he was the last person they discussed. i think there s a lot of names being thrown around. i would be the last person they would tell. i show up and go, all right, where do i sit. i have no knowledge of anything. i kind of like it that way. leave it to the producers. they know what s best. i think it s got to be someone who really has an understanding of music. that s what simon said as well. it s important, as terrific as ellen is, she has no musical experience in a sense. no. but i do think she has opinions and she definitely knows what she likes and what she doesn t like. i do think, though, that for that seat, if it s going to be that fourth seat, it sort of has to be someone who can say, look, i worked with this person, this person, this person, this is what you re not doing right. this is what you re doing right. like a baby face or someone like that. or even an artist. you ve got this contest going for this jingle. what s the jingle again? you sing. you remember. the best part of waking up is folgers in your cup you re looking for an updated version. updated. they win 25 grand. it s too late? you would have been great at it. you d have to rewrite it, though. give me five minutes. 25 grand. you could do it, right? that s right. it s a good chunk of change. got to keep her in doughnuts. happy anniversary to you. your husband a general contractor. yes. you ve got it all, ms. kara dioguardi. i m lucky. i m very blessed. great to see you. so nice to meet you guys. tell that you binged a little bit last night. i did. when i got to the hotel they had three eclairs and three cheesecakes. i definitely had three of them. the other three i made them look like i ate them. i didn t want to offend anyone. she s italian. yes. thank you. a live performance even you would enjoy. these guys are unbelievable. they re from million dollar quartet on broadway. you ve got to stick around. if those grays are starting to bug you, rejoice. at least that s what they say upstairs. and i do it so i can do this. 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[ female announcer ] splenda®. to help your skin get healthy and clear. fast forward a few years. .and now that your problem is wrinkles we still have the solution dermatologists recommend most. neutrogena anti wrinkle moisturizer with pure retinol sa. in just 1 month it s clinically proven to smooth even the deepest wrinkles. so all you neutrogena girls it s time to become neutrogena women. neutrogena recommended most by dermatologists. if you re a woman, you know this. it is all about the hair. if you spotted your first gray, you know the emotions that kick in. there s good news. not only is gray okay, but get this. apparently it s highly hip, baby. linda wells is allure magazine s editor. nice to have you back. thank you. is that really the case? is gray hair hip? it is now. we saw it on the runway at chanel and dior. kate moss has gray. kate moss has gray? a little streak at a time. it s a trend of rebellion. people think it s old. with these young women havingm e submersive. when my gray grows in, it grows in not wiry, like a different texture. it is a different texture. it s hard to manage. it s course and it isn t shiny. you have to deal with a whole new set of issues. and use different products. correct. different products. what are we going to discuss today? do we have ladies? hold on. they say this is important, though. they say 86% of men i don t buy the stat. 86% of men preferred gray hair to died hair. correct. in the uk. that s what they forgot to add. i m going. i don t think in jersey they feel that way. i m like really? maybe their wives are holding a gun to their head. also, maybe it s the fact that died hair sounds like so bad. i don t think men know. they have no idea what we do to ourselves. they have no idea. they think we re all natural and we are. let s talk about the other famous gray women. janet napolitano is one we ve seen and heard a lot about. ann richards was legendary with her gray hair. hers is like my mom s. carly fiorino. she had therapy. her hair came back short and gray. jamie lee curtis. we see her in all the commercials. she s let her hair go, too, right? it s pretty salt and pepper hair. there s examples. there s an attitude that comes with it, it seems like, linda. this is who i am. you have to own it. you have to own it. i know it s gray. i want it to be gray. one lady, one time i went up to her. she had this huge long hair on the side of her face. i went to wipe it off. she goes, it s supposed to be there. i like it. that s just gross. why did you bring that up? i think if dying your hair is making you stressed out and miserable, making you feel fake, going gray and feeling good about it is the key thing. i also don t want to feel like we have the stigma of dying your hair being a bad thing. that was so big in the 60s. if you want to dye your hair this is a whitening shampoo. sometimes what happens with gray hair, it absorbs smoke and pollutants and minerals. it turns yellow. this is a brightening shampoo that stops that from happening. then clairol makes a product called shine happy. it can be used on any colored hair. it s a clear graze. it makes your hair shiny because sometimes gray hair gets dull. nadine is here. her hair looks nice and soft. nadine let her hair grow out. now it s gorgeous and gray and salt and peppery. nadine and i were talking before, her kids weren t very happy about her gray hair. they love it now. what did they say at first? well, they re teenagers. i thought she had a mike on. there was a little issue about mom growing her hair out. but i think what s great is you ve got full hair. it s beautiful. the make-up is really important to. you have to pop the lips and stuff. and you ve got darkened eyebrows, defined eyes. and dark lips. linda, thank you. cassie says to me, do your roots, mom. border chipotle sauce with red and green peppers, onion, and crisp corn. a bold new taste. i know. but i want people to think i m a great cook. so hide. delicious! can i have your recipe? your secret is safe with me. hello. new bush s black bean fiesta. and try new texas ranchero, along with our other grillin beans flavors. to create thermocontrol. designed with the comfort of athletic fabrics in mind, stayfree® with thermocontrol quickly wicks moisture away for exceptional dryness. thermocontrol only from stayfree®. for exceptional dryness. [ ryan ] ahh! fresh. minty. ready! hi. oooh, minty. [ sniffs ] so what do you think? fresh. [ female announcer ] for a fresh breath feeling that lasts up to 5 times longer, there s new scope outlast. . the coast guard released new information to stop the leak in the gulf. the problem delaying the operations. also coming up, wedding week from the bouquet to the centerpieces. flowers are the key to any wedding. we will sit down with sandy we re back on this wednesday with today s beauty and a quick lesson in applying make-up in the heat of summer. she finished off the faces of celebrities like beyonce, jennifer lopez. it s tough in the summer. because it s hot. so much moisture. there s a lot going on. really at the end of the day, less is more. you really want to keep your skin feeling and looking good with a little bit of definition. so when you re going for a day face, what you really want to do is do a great moisturizer with a little spf in it, of course. a little light maybe foundation. definitely concealer to cover up what you need to cover up. i love the idea of a great sort of lip and cheek stain. something that s going to really give you a beautiful, healthy flush but not be too much. then you ve got to blend that well or you look like a clown. yes, mama. that s what it s about. it s all about blending. a lot of people like to put like a powder to finish. but in the summertime that never seems to work out that well. thank you. it smears. can i tell you guys, in the summer and all the time, powder is our enemy. what do you mean, all the time? honey, powder makes us look older. it gets in the creases. you have to have it on television. exactly. in real life, i have to tell you as we proved a couple of weeks ago. an oil blotting paper will take some away. this is the face defender. the first ever clear powder. yes, honey mama. this is a secret. what you want to do is take this. it literally does everything that powder does except make you look old. why doesn t everyone have that? you know, because you just designed it? are you leaving two for your best friends? how did you know? as you can see, it s taking away the shine. it s setting her make-up just like powder does. except it doesn t make her look old. hello. what about lips for daytime? what should you use? a little light stuff. because a very super glossy lip kind of like the one i m wearing right now is a little too much. it will sort of get stuck in your hair when you re moving around. something really soft and pretty. that s good. we need to move on. nighttime. okay. as you know, we re going to keep it nice and soft and light for the day. but a great tip is eye liner. especially at night. it s really going to make your eyes pop. close for me, honey. it s really going to make your eyes pop and take it to the next level. doing a great line on top, of course. but another little secret in the inner room is certainly going to take it from day tonight. when you go from the edge to the edge, do you make the line thicker? i do. depending on the eye. everyone s different. if the eye needs a little lift, make it a little thicker on the end. you don t want to look like cleopatra. exactly. softer is better. a great thing, too, is color. color is fun. especially now. everyone always goes for black. definitely color will give you a little summer loving. in the rooms do something? and the inner rims. what do you do? take it. i m going to use a great plum right in there in the inner rooms. i call this instant fierceness. it turns you into a little sex kitten immediately. darkens the eyes. see that? hello. thank you. a little luminizer is a great trick also to make the skin look dewey. she s got gorgeous skin. she s 10 years old. she s 11. come on, kathie. at any age putting a little soft shimmer on the cheekbone lifts up the face. now the body. it s all about the body. this is interesting. ways to contour your body to make it look better with make-up? you got it. you know, at the end of the day, remember, we always want to make the skin look healthy and glowing. a great little luminizer is definitely going to do that. see how gorgeous? it gives a beautiful, healthy shimmer. always on the tips. i have a little secret i have to tell you. oftentimes many women will take shimmer and slather it all over their bodies. she does that. be careful. here s a little secret. the secret is this. you want to highlight the highest points of your body. if you think about it, when you put something shimmer on you, you want it to really stand out. so do you want to take the fattest part of your arm and put a lot of shimmer on it? what are you saying? not yours. i m saying you got a problem with that? that s right. put it all over. where do you put it? where s the right place? on the highest point where your bones would stick out. right over here on the fronts of your arms. i don t have any bones that stick out anymore. i m not going there. of course you want to talk a little bit about the boobage. adding a little bit of bronzer. something a little deeper sort of in here. i don t know if we should be doing this in daytime television. that s going to make it sort of recede. taking that shimmer and putting it right on the tops of the breasts, if you will. the biggest thing, you don t have to smear. you look so gorgeous a guy grabs you and it s all over his white shirt. you got to think about that. up next, the new movement called men for women now. learn all about it. then we have the fabulous million dollar quartet. [ female announcer ] there s a place called hidden valley. where kids not only eat their vegetables, they can t get enough. hidden valley ranch, makes vegetables delectable. discover four new ways to make vegetables delectable with farmhouse originals from hidden valley. ay, yay, yay, yay ay, yay, yay, yay baby, baby, baby, baby. uh-oh [ woman ] nine iron, it s almost tee-time. time for new zyrtec® liquid gels. they work fast. so i can get relief from the pollen that used to make me sneeze, my eyes water. with new zyrtec® liquid gels, i get allergy relief at liquid speed. that s the fast, powerful relief of zyrtec®, now in a liquid gel. zyrtec® is the fastest 24-hour allergy medicine. it works on my worst symptoms so i m ready by the time we get to the first hole. new zyrtec® liquid gels work fast, so i can love the air®. it s all that people notice. i didn t even think that was possible. [ woman ] i know, but there it is. [ sniffing ] febreze you plug in to the wall. [ male announcer ] when you plug in a febreze noticeables, it s all that people notice. [ man ] wow. that is amazing. i know. imagine. [ sniffing ] febreze you plug in to the wall. [ chuckles ] [ male announcer ] from febreze comes noticeables. freshness you ll notice or your money back. - knock, knock. - who s there? interrupting cheese. interrupt - cheese! - i should have seen that one coming. you should ve, cause that was i even told you i was gonna be interrupting you. ( snickering, laughing ) morning sir. beautiful day, isn t it? we take the time for our cheese to mature. before we bake it into every delicious cracker. because at cheez-it, real cheese matters. so i got my nephew to build a website. i hired someone to make my website. five months ago. we are building a website by ourselves. announcer: there s an easier way. create your own small-business site with intuit websites. just choose a style that fits your business and customize, publish and get found in three easy steps. sweet. all from just $4.99 a month, get a 30-day free trial at intuit.com. this sunday is national cancer survivor day. there s a special part of the campaign called men for women now. famous leading men are helping to raise awareness oen the importance of early detention and screening for women. take a look at this. all us guys, dudes and bros are getting off our lazy butts and making appointments for our beloved ladies to meet with this bad boy. mammogram machine. or as i like to call it, the boob saver 5k. you see it? no big deal. nothing to be afraid of. but that is so great! i hadn t seen that before. welcome, well woman. the women behind this campaign are breast cancer survivors themselves. norine frazier and michelle mcbride. you look beautiful. what a genius idea, norine. that was so smart to get the guys involved. tell us about that. first of all, when i was diagnosed with cancer the first time, i only had a 4% chance of it comes back. two years later it came back in my bone. all of a sudden it went from stage one to stage four. now it s metastatic and i have it forever. i had a 10-year-old daughter at the time. i thought, oh, my god. i cannot do this to madeleine. i decided to figure out a way to raise money for cancer research. i always believed that comedy is a healer. i said i m doing comedy. i want to laugh. that s the way we re going to heal ourselves. men, i thought, too, no one is including men when they talk about breast cancer. you re kind of the culture is to think that women can only help women. but men want to be involved. they go through it with their woman. we talk about this a lot, we put other people before us all the time. we don t get checked. we ask everyone else if they re getting taken care of. i didn t have a mammogram. i was 42 when i was diagnosed. i didn t go. i had a health show. i talked to people about it. i asked people about it. in your case, you weren t diagnosed with cancer. later explain your story. my story is different than the traditional cancer diagnosis story. so i had a strong family history of cancer. my mother passed away at 39. her mother in her early 40s. her sister. her niece. i decided to go get tested for the breast cancer gene. i was getting tested regularly because i knew i was at high risk because of my family. mammograms, mris, ultra sounds, you name it. i had it done. i decided i got tested for the breast cancer gene and i tested positive for it. which meant i had a greatly increased chance of getting breast and ovarian. 87%. very high. i decided i never wanted to face a cancer diagnosis. i never wanted to hear those words you ve got cancer. so i underwent first a prophylactic hysterectomy and then a double mastectomy. a week after my mastectomy, my pathology report came back. turns out i did have cancer that had gone undetected. the surgery got it all. i didn t need any other treatment. you look beautiful. thank you. you did stand up for cancer, too. that was such a home run. it raised so much awareness. i mean, i don t know what you re going to do next. first of all, you did that. she had to put up with her husband, woodiewoody. when i found out i had stage four incurable, i had five years to live, i said, no. woody is not raising my children. party on. there would be no supervision. so using men has been really successful. because every comedian i have asked to do bits for me has done it. they want to get involved. they want to let women know that early detection is the only thing we have right now. and so we do have a cure. so you ve got to get your mammogram. you ve got to get your pap smear. and cancer is not for sissies. so we ve got to buck up, ladies, do what you ve got to do. thank you so much. really appreciate it. beautiful, beautiful women. we re going to be right back. we ve got music that you do not want to miss. this is the broadway show you re going to take your guy to, okay? pop-tarts®! i ll have a frosted strawberry. as an ice cream sandwich. chocolate fudge. on a stick please! 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[ clucks ] [ male announcer ] perdue. extra inspections. extraordinary chicken. there s a whole lot of shaking going on on broadway gl that s why the cast of the tony nominated musical million dollar quartet. they once united for one legendary jam session. today they re going to recreate it right here. so great to have you guys here. we raved. it s not just because eric schafer, the theater director, is one of my good, good friends. the show is fanfantastic. it s rare there s a show you can take your husband or your boyfriend. or your mother. or your grandmother. were you surprised by the great success? absolutely. i think a lot of us have been with the show for a long time. we ve watched it unfold to be this thing we re so proud of now. it started in chicago. it s still running in chicago to full houses. when this one plays the piano, his fingers bleed. he has bandages all over his fingers because jerry lee lewis was a wild man. yes, he was. you are like a clone of him. you were tony nominated for your performance. yes, yeah. congratulations. and the rest of you, this is fascinating to me. every one of you are making your broadway debuts. every one of you is a musician, not an actor before you came to broadway. that s right. you had to learn the acting thing. i think the producers were wise in casting around the musicianship more than the acting because you get a unique kind of perspective of actual musicians playing the music live and then telling a story within that as characters. who the heck are these guys? what s going on with this one over here? you got to go see the show to find out. it s awesome. you guys are going to take it away? here they are, million dollar quartet. one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready, well go cat go don t you step on my blue suede shoes, you can do anything but stay off of my blue suede shoes you knock me down, slap my face, spread my name all over the place do anything you want to do, now honey lay off of my shoes don t you step on my blue suede shoes, you can do anything, but lay off of my blue suede shoes do anything that you want to do, don t you step on my blue suede shoes well do anything, but lay off of my blue suede shoes well i say my baby walking, with another guy, well i asked her what she meant, and this is all i heard her say see you later alligator, after while crocodile can t you see i m going my own way now, don t you know you cramp my style see you later alligator, after while crocodile, see you later alligator, after while crocodile so long, farewell, and good-bye million dollar quartet . awesome! go see this show. good luck. know the species, know the stain. lanolin-free coat, i know it s an alpaca. walks in here, looks says hey look, it s a llama! cleaning the stain like he would a llama stain. time he s wasting. call 1-800-steemer we decided we wanted to close out with a little music. yes, we want to party! take it away, boys. some people want to rock, some people want to roll, let s have a party have a party tonight, baby paint your lips, and regulate your wink, and bring along let s have a party, let s have a party, let s have a party, let s have a party tonight