Transcripts For FOXNEWSW Happening Now 20111222

they go up. the president getting ready to address this controversy next hour but a short while ago we had the house speaker john boehner weighing in explaining why a one-year payroll tax bill is a necessity. >> i told the president there is one big reason why we need to do a full year and that's jobs. one-year bill, like the president requested and like the house produced is simply better for jobs and better for the economy. jenna: chief congressional correspondent mike emanuel has a front row seat live on capitol hill. whether or not he is happy with the front row seat is another story completely. mike, interesting times down there where are we? what is the latest as far as seeing any sort of agreement reached over this payroll tax holiday? >> reporter: jenna, i think the biggest development in the standoff in probably ever happened just moments ago. a paper statement from senate republican leader mitch mcconnell who has been pretty quiet since the senate left town last saturday. he says the house democrats want a short-term extension. the house republicans want a year-long extension. those two ideas are not mutually exclusive. he is saying, harry reid, the senate majority leader, should appoint conferees to hammer out a year-long extension. in the meanwhile he is calling on house republicans to pass an extension. that seems to be a way to break forward to move forward where both sides can save face and say, we did the right thing for our beliefs, if you will. a short time ago we got more from the speaker who was asked about the political impact of the standoff. take a listen to him. >> if you do the right thing for the right reasons the right things will happen. everybody's already agreed that the best policy is a one-year extension of these policies. all we're fighting for what everybody already agreed to. let's sit down and resolve the differences. >> reporter: so essentially the speaker continuing a call for democrats to appoint conferees. they still have got their potential negotiators here on the house republican side. he is saying senator reid send some conferees. nancy pelosi send some conferees and let's hammer out a long term deal. the conference may be a break-through we've been waiting for, jenna. jenna: let's walk through this a little bit. you have senator mcconnell saying to the house, go ahead and try to pass a full-year extension of the payroll tax, so that is on the table? that is on the board. but then -- >> he is saying, go ahead. jenna: please, mike, go ahead. you're the one that knows. >> reporter: he is saying a short-term extension so there is no uncertainty for taxpayers going into the new year. people are not worried about taxes going up celebrating christmas and hanukkah. he is saying also let's make it formal. let's set up negotiations to do a year-long deal, and so, speaker boehner has appointed conferees from his side. he had news conferences with those conferees. he has been calling on senator reid to do the same. senator reid has held off doing so. so senator mcconnell saying let's compromise. pass the shorled-term deal the democrats are asking for but let's also seriously nail down a year-long extension which the house republicans have wanted. jenna: how quickly would the conferees have to go back to d.c.? or would they have to return to d.c.? that is tough request right now. we're up against the holiday. everyone doesn't want to be in d.c. do they have to physically come back to d.c. and do the negotiations for full-year potential extension before the end of the year or do it in january or when they're back to work? >> reporter: i think you're hitting on a key point which obviously still to be nailed down and would have to be discussed is how quickly do we need to get back to the drawing board on that. one would expect that perhaps they would go home for christmas and perhaps after christmas or just after the new year, if everybody agreed to this, potentially they could do that but that is just the first hint of something from somebody who has been pretty quiet since last saturday, the senate republican leader saying, okay, senator reid, appoint conferees. republicans in the house, pass an extension. let's get this done. jenna: all right. we'll see if that is really the breakthrough. some interesting news, mike. thank you so much for helping us work through it. a lot of technicalities for that. i mean plus time and space. if you have to get on a plane, i don't know. jon: how about internet voting. we have the nation that invented internet. how about congress voting by internet. jenna: like "american idol". jon: tweet your answers and tweet your votes to. jenna: in time of austerity you're right. paying all the money last minute tickets to get back and forth, back and forth again. you wonder if there is easier way to do it. i'm sure there is easier way to do it. this is the way we're watching. it will be interesting two hours here. jon: fasten your seatbelts. we're awaiting reaction from president obama. he is expected to make remarks about this deadlock on the payroll tax cut extension in the next hour. our chief white house correspondent ed henry live at that building with more. sound like neither side is really giving in at this point, ed. >> reporter: they are not. to under what mike ayman all is reporting with his excellent reporting there why senator mcconnell the republican leader in the senate is getting involved, he is hanging out on a him here. remember on saturday, 39 senate republicans, including mitch mcconnell voted for the compromise senate democrats put together. that is giving the president a lot of cover to say look, it is house republicans out of the mainstream here. senate republicans worked with the white house and senate democrats to move forward. that's why president, yesterday, picture presenting picking up pizza, taking his dog to petsmart, doing holiday shopping for girls at best buy. he is projecting image, what me worry? that's why jay carney at podium basically said it is house republicans who have to compromise here. take a listen here. >> the ball is in the house's court. there is compromise available. an avenue out of this blind alley if you will they have driven themselves into and it is the senate bill. vote on it, pass it. >> reporter: and so for perhaps the first time in this entire debate over the last few days we've seen this entire jobs debate, the american jobs act pass this bill and all that. the president had maybe been on the defensive for other parts of the debate. he feels like he is in the driver's seat now. that's why after the noon hour, 12:15 eastern we'll see him come out here at white house promote again, they have a hashtag on twitter, $40, that is what the average american family would get. they're really pushing that. that has been trending on twitter. the white house basically feels that shows that americans are rallying behind their position, jon. jon: i suppose the president also wants to be seen as engaged in the battle so fully that he is delaying his hawaiian vacation. when is he going to leave? any word on that? >> reporter: that is big question. he may not go at all. critics were saying he will have 17-day vacation in hawaii. that is what they were marked off if they have been able to get out of the town. obviously they haven't been able to get out of town. his wife and daughters are there. i floated one scenario to white house aides, they haven't confirmed or shot it down. is it possible the president goes for the weekend to be with his family. the president has the upper hand. if he jets off to hawaii, does this give republicans opening. look, he gone to the beach. we're here in washington ready to work. they're nervous about that in the democratic party. there is the possibility that the president doesn't go at all. jon: if the president jets off to hawaii, doesn't you jet off with him? >> reporter: this year i'm staying behind. if i went out i would have rebooked ticket six times. the change fees would have too expensive. i'm trying to save us a few bucks. jon: to say nothing about the baggage fees. ed henry, frugality reins. jenna: a good team player. ed henry, taking one for the team. we're hitting the homestretch in iowa. 12 days away the latest polls showing the hawkeye state still up for grabs. with half of voters still undecided. chief washington correspondent james rosen in washington watching all of this for us. >> reporter: it is always entertaining. if the gingrich campaign worried about their candidate's slide in the polls the newest data offs solace to him and the other candidate. in latest survey of likely caucus-goers, "rasmussen poll" find out mitt romney held on to his portion. electorate with ron paul trailing by five points and newt gingrich in third. many iowa republicans have wandering eyes. half of caucusgoers say they may change their mind and another 8% say they haven't made a first choice. this points to an intense period of campaign coming up between christmas and new year's. diving deep into the numbers, voters who haven't made up their mind evenly split between romney, gingrich and texas governor rick perry who may be getting the second look from voters he thought. santorum and paul and bachmann retain we might concur the procast nation vote. responding to romney's suggestion that he might be wilting from the heat generated by super pac attack ads, gingrich challenged romney to a 90-minute debate with no moderator. >> we'll bring all of his negative ads show them for free and he can explain them. [laughter] we'll find out tomorrow how he likes the heat and whether he can't to come in the kitchen or whether in fact he is just another normal, national politician with clever consultants and a lot of money but no willingness to stand up and tell the truth. >> reporter: visiting the littleton elks lodge in bethlehem, new hampshire romney confessed to buzzing on sugar high, on breakfast consisted, i'm reporting frosted flakes, toast with honey and chocolate milk. last night while touring metal works in hand cover, romney offered specific examples where he cut the national enbudget, national undoughment for arts and pbs. he was quick to ad i'm not going to make big bird go away. jenna: frosted flakes and chocolate milk defense. i have not heard that one. we'll put that in the file. you have to be careful. you are what you eat. jon: whatever happened to the balanced breakfast idea? hey, a college student trapped for 10 days. now her family was fearing the worst as you can imagine. what happened and how this young woman survived. her amazing story. jenna: we'll take an amazing story every day. plus brand new numbers on the economy today from the job market to retail sales. also gas prices. we're taking a good look what it all means for your bottom line coming up. jon: where is rick? he at the web wall first. >> first of all i like a little chocolate milk in the morning. don't be talking bad about chocolate milk. the economy is coming up we want to ask you and you can weigh in during the break. are these recent numbers that look pretty good sign of a turnaround or just a little blip? you can vote. we'll have your results and more. "happening now" and maybe some chocolate milk when we come right back. this was the gulf's best tourism season in years. all because so many people came to louisiana... they came to see us in florida... make that alabama... make that miissippi. the best part of the gulf is wherever you choose... and now is a great time to discover it. this year millions of people did. we set all kinds of records. next year we're out to do even better. so come on down to louisiana... florida... alabama... mississippi. we can't wait to see you. brought to you by bp and all of us who call the gulf home. jon: one of those stories all you can say is wow! an arizona state university student missing for 10 days has been found. she is safe and sound. rick folbaum has details on this amazing story. rick? >> jon, can you imagine having to survive for week and a half on a couple of candy bars and melted snow? lauren weinberg made a big mistake when she set out driving in the middle of a major winter storm but it was another decision, the one to stay in her snow bound car that experts say saved her life. the arizona state university senior venturing along a remote forest road in arizona's remote country in own december 12th. when her car got stuck she decided to wait it out. she had two candy bars and bottled water and waited it out. she said set the snow on the roof of the car so it would melt and drink this and she did i had for 10 days. yesterday just before noon she was found. she is in good condition. u.s. forest service employees were actually out on snowmobiles. they were doing safety checks when they found her. the hospital where she was taken put out a statement from her. it says, i am so thankful to be alive and warm. thank you everyone for your thoughts and prayers because they worked. there were times i was afraid but mostly i had faith i would be found. thankfully she was. i mentioned she is a college senior, jon. while she was stranded she missed her final exams. let's hope her professors cut her slack and take them after the break, right? jon: she passed her winter survival exam. >> she certainly did. jon: rick folbaum, great story. rick, thank you. and a texas family also found alive after they were buried in a snowdrift for two days. take a look at their suv under four feet of snow in new mexico. david higgins and his wife and 5-year-old daughter were stuck in a blizzard while on vacation. they were able to use their cell phones to call for help. it was hard to find them. rescuers finally struck the top of their suv with a poll. they had to dig a tunnel to reach them. both parents have pneumonia but their daughter is fine. >> incredible story. when you start a story that way you don't know how it will finish. we have a "fox business alert" for you. markets are slightly up today. we have mixed news on the economy. fewer americans filed for unemployment in the latest week but economy grew slower than we thought back over in the summer. mixed data. the it comes as we get signs the economy is improving. when we look at retail sales or gas prices the job market even, we're seeing some better signs but we want to be cautious about this as we move into 2012 and work through some of this with steve moore, senior economics writer for "the wall street journal" steve, let's take this bit by bit, stocks, jobs and could be my. stock market is up today. been a pretty good week. is this your typical santa claus rally where stocks look cheap and people go shopping before the end of the year? >> jenna, three days before christmas i will be totally positive what is going on with the economy. it is not hard. the numbers are looking pretty good. the stock market has had a great rally the last few days. these new unemployment numbers that came out today suggesting unemployment insurance claims have fallen for the most amount since at least three or four months. that's a very good sign. and, jenna, what that is suggesting to us when the new unemployment rate numbers come out in about a week and a half, i think we may see another decline which would be a super, super, you know, new year's present to get. so yeah, this economy looks like it has shifted out of the kind of low gear and moved into a middle gear of growth which is very positive starting 2012. jenna: when the associated press asked economist in the middle of summer in august if they thought a recession was coming one out of four said they thought that was a possibility. now the associated press said when they talk to economists they don't necessarily feel as negative. that said, steve, when we look at the jobs market for example, where is the job growth exactly? where are we actually seeing the improvements in the economy? >> north dakota, north dakota has the lowest unemployment rate in the country because they have so many oil and gas jobs there. you do have a lot of states in the midwest like nebraska that has low unemployment rate. what is really hurting still, jenna, is the construction industry because of the housing recession. it just won't end. manufacturing is kind of treading water. we're not seeing much job growth there. where we've seen over last couple years the biggest increase in job growth has been in education and health care. those two industries keep adding jobs. what we need to see is a manufacturing recovery i think to really call this a robust recovery. jenna: do you think at this point, steve, that we're cycling outout of a economic downturn? we're naturally come out of a downswing? or do you think there were some policies put in place or some solution by business owners that actually solved the problem that caused the recession in the first place? >> it's a great question, jenna. my feeling is look, anytime the economy gets as sick as it was in 2008 and 2009 you're going to get a natural recovery. in most cases what we see as economist overs last six or seven recessions usually a deep recession you get a big boom. you make up for that lost ground very quickly. this has been kind of anemic recovery with fits and starts. i don't have a great answer for your question, jenna. whether this is nice bullish run or this is a sucker's rally. in 1970s we saw this all the time it would get better and fall back again. it would get better and fall back again. 2012 is looking kind of a so 10-year. what is going on with a lot of businessmen and women i talk to they're concerned what will happen with this election. i think a lot of the investment capital used for business expansion is sort of on the sideline until investors have a better feel for what's going to happen in november of 2012. jenna: it will be, well, another interesting year to watch. we've had some false starts. we'll see if this is something we can really dig into. in the meantime are you done with your christmas shopping? are you all finished? >> a few more to go. i still have 48 hours or something like that. i'm off to chicago. so that's a great place to spend christmas. i will be on the miracle mile with all those shopping, there is no shortage of things to buy. jenna: i could see you a as a shopper economic stimulus to come. merry christmas to you and your family. always nice to talk to you. >> stimulating the economy, that is my job. jenna: that is my excuse. jon: you had to bring it up, the christmas shopping. >> are you done with your shopping? jon: no, no, no. anyway, holiday hoax so big it took an international effort to uncover. what investigators found that is worth about $80 million. plus casey anthony making headlines again. the new legal battle for the woman acquitted of murdering her daughter caylee. geraldo is here with the inside story. everyone believes in keeping their omises once a year. but we believe in helping people take steps to keep them every single day. that's why every day we help people across the country get into their first homes. prepare for a comfortable retirement and protect the people and things that matter most. at genworth we believe every day is the right day to take a step toward tomorrow. 8% every 10 years.age 40, we can start losing muscle -- wow. wow. but you can help fight muscle loss with exercise and ensure muscle health. i've got revigor. what's revigor? 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[ major nutrition ] ensure. nutrition in charge! jon: new information now on some crime stories we're keeping an eye on. closing arguments underway in the wikileaks hearing. private first class bradley manning accused providing military secrets posted on that web site. still could be weeks before he learns whether he will be court-martialed. former producer of the tv show "survivor", bruce barris feared redmond will return to mexico to face charges. a federal judge upholding extradition saying there is compelling evidence that he killed his wife. he maintains his innocence. operation holiday hoax netting more than $80 million. the u.s. and mexico have seized hundreds of thousands of counterfeit and pirated goods to be sold this holiday season. jenna: new information involving casey anthony, the woman of course acquitted of murdering her daughter caylee, now facing a brand new lawsuit. this time from the man who found caylee's remains. geraldo rivera, host of "geraldo at large", covered this story extensively. it was one of the biggest stories of the year. >> it was no doubt. jenna: what do you think, is there a case here? >> it is difficult. ray kronk was the meter man who found the remains and he is a shadowy character and he had a checkered past filled with domestic violence and other things. jose baez saw him as a weak link in the prosecution case because he is a such a funky individual. he found the remains and he called or they didn't come and they didn't find them. months later he called them again. there was a lot about his activities that could be painted with a, kind of a number of suspicion and the defense in the casey anthony case cleverly or die billion i canly depending diabolically depending on your point of view helped fuel reasonable doubt they were heaping on the procution case. remembering they didn't have a time of death, a cause of death, a place of death. this is one more element that allowed jose baez and the defense team to make the state's case against casey anthony appear weaker than perhaps it was. jenna: so do you think it goes forward? >> well, you know, casey anthony doesn't have a penny to her name. she is still living in seclusion in florida, the now 25-year-old florida mom, accused of killing her toddler. she is already been sued by zenaida gonzalez, remember the nanny who allegedly abducted her child. there was really a zenaida gonzalez. texas he can waa search is suing. casey anthony said her baby drowned. why didn't casey anthony tell texas he can waa search that the he can waa search that she was dead. jenna: this will be endless whirlpool of lawsuits for the rest of her life? >> i believe what they're all hoping for is that the most reviled woman in america, at least she was after the acquittal, gets some money from a producer or a movie or a book deal so she then is flush and has enough cash to pay off these various lawsuits. so i think you will continue to see the lawsuits as long as there is even a remote prospect that she will have money to pay. jenna: what do you think? thinking back to this court event that was one of the biggest stories of the year, what do you think they takeaway watching this story evolve? you were there from the beginning? what is the takeaway? >> that is an interesting question. what really came to me to be the most graphic and compelling the amount of domestic violence in this country, the number of children killed by their parents every single day in this country. it is something like 1,000 a year. so you've got like three kids every day being killed by their parents. just the sheer enormity of the cruelty inside of a family. usually it is a stepdad or a mother's boyfriend. it is unusual, if the state's case was true, that a would do it to get her freedom so she could party although susan smith of south carolina famously did that by strapping her two children into the back of the car and driving into the lake where they were drowned so she could be free to be with a new boyfriend. in her case she was convicted. life sentence. casey anthony's case she has to live with this scarlet letter. jenna: these allegations. >> i think that most people still believe that she got away with murder, no doubt about it. jenna: they may believe that. you get to the end of the year and interesting to take time to look back at these stories you wonder what to really make of them. they don't necessarily go away when we get of off the air and for our viewers when our show is over. >> she is fascinating interview. i would love to talk to her but i won't pay for it. jenna: geraldo we'll be with you next hour for another big story of the you jon, over to you. jon: the payroll tax cut, jenna something that affects tens of millions of americans. there is no deal yet. while most lawmakers are taking a break for the holidays there are members about of the house sticking around to hammer out some sort of a compromise. we'll talk with one of them live. you wonder what santa's helpers might look like? here's an idea as ups employees go into overdrive with their brown trucks racing to get your packages delivered in time for christmas. that's next. jenna: we have some new details now on the nato airstrike that killed 24 pakistani troops last month and sparked outrage across that country. according to centcom, central command, the u.s. bears much of the responsibility they say for the lack of communication that led to those deaths. a complicated story indeed. jennifer griffin live at the pentagon with more on this. >> reporter: jenna, the media not received a copy of that report and pakistanis have not been briefed from the report but we got a reedout from the brigadeer general who was in charge. you're right. the u.s. military has taken responsibility for some of the communication errors that occurred on november 26th that left 24 pakistani troops dead. according to the brigadeer general, steven clark, put in charge of the u.s. investigation, 120 u.s. and afghan special operators on a ridge in afghanistan about a mile from the pakistan border began receiving fire from heavy machine fwuns on the pakistan side of the border. they called in a show of force from the ac-130 and apache helicopters flying overwatch. which then fired flares. the shooting from the pakistan side didn't stop according to the brigadeer general. meanwhile while u.s. commander checks with a pakistani general in a border coordination center in pack. >> he received from higher headquarters that there is no pakistani military in the area. this is actually the first point where we found a series of miscommunications to have occurred. >> reporter: the problem is that the nato operator working at the coordination center doesn't give the pakistani colonel the longitude and latitude coordinates of the firing. he has been told not to do so by his commanders because the pakistanis have misused that information in the past according to u.s. officials. so he gives the pakistani colonel a general description of where the fire something occurring. one problem. the nato or isaf operator had misconfigured his overlay maps and the spot he described was nine miles north of the actual incident, which leads to all sorts of confusion. >> the one person on the isaf side receives the exact coordinates. he inputs it into his machine which brings up the map. he has his machine configured incorrectly but he thought it was the regional border. he had been told not to pass the coordinates but to only give a general location. >> reporter: in fact in the past when those coordinates have been given to the pakistanis, u.s. military commanders say those coordinates were misused and in fact the general described an october 6 incident where u.s. troops getting on a helicopter were fired upon by the pakistanis. so all of this leads to the tension and suspicion, suspicious atmosphere that was the background to this unfortunate incident. jenna: very important reminder about that though, that they felt uncomfortable about giving that information to the pakistanis for a reason, not just, just because. it will be an interesting story to see how we watch it develop further. jennifer, thank you very much. we'll continue to watch it today. jon? jon: well the politicians on capitol hill, jenna, may be ready to break for the holidays but at least two members of the house say they are sticking around until the payroll tax extension issue is resolved. republicans nan hayworth and tom reed are urging americans not to take the short-term extension, the two-month extension essentially offered by the senate lying down. representative nan hayworth joins us live now from the russell rotunda. that may be your opinion, congresswoman but, you know, you've got some pretty heavy ammo allied against you. the president apparently called speaker boehner this morning, i should say the speaker called the president this morning and we're told in a readout from that from one of our washington people that the president essentially said the only option going forward is for the house to pass that two-month extension bill that the senate passed. the president says, after that, let's talk about a year extension. we all want that. your take? >> well, jon, we're here to serve the american people. we're not here to heed any specific directive from a particular figure. we're here to cooperate, work together, with our senate colleagues and get a far better solution for the american people. common sense tells us that one year of payroll tax holiday is far better than two months. the president himself said so not long ago that we shouldn't leave washington until that job is done. well we're still here. we're also here to make sure we provide our medicare seniors and doctors with two years of assurance that they're not going to face devastating cuts. very hard to plan out a schedule for your office visits, for treatments, for surgery if you know that two months from now you may be facing a very difficult reimbursement cut. we provided for 13 months of unemployment insurance benefits for those who rely on a federal contribution. we're here doing the work of the american people and we're determined to get the best solution we can for them before the end of the year. jon: you're there in part because speaker boehner appointed you to the conference committee that is supposed to resolve some problems or resolve, you know, the issue between you and the senate. the senate hasn't appointed anybody have they? has speaker pelosi appointed anybody from the democratic side in the house? >> well, to my knowledge they have not but we're on the job so it's a matter of, again being completely available. we're going to do all we can. we're not going to let americans wake up on january 1st with unpleasant news. we want to make sure they get the best news they can and we passed a great bill through the house of representatives, with democratic votes on december 13th. and that's the bill that we need to work together with, with the senate so that we can come up with a far better solution than the one they have proposed. jon: less than two hours ago your majority leader eric cantor said the two sides are not that far apart. i want to play that for you and then ask you a question on the other side. >> sure. >> it is not a big difference between our positions. it all comes down to the pay-force, impact, budgetary impact of the extension of the tax holiday. so i saw the president out yesterday doing his christmas shopping. saw he brought his dog with him. you know, we're here. he could bring his dog up here. we are pet-friendly. and you know, again, it will not take a long time. we could probably resolve the differences within an hour. jon: resolve the differences within an hour. "the wall street journal" in an op-ed piece yesterday said you republicans in the house are winning a battle but losing the war. it is said you might have the better argument but you're losing the public relations battle. how do you respond? >> well, again, the american people know and they are smart and sensible and we have been getting a lot of calls saying that people understand what we're talking about and they're glad we're fighting for them. and there have been a number of organizations, particularly representing small businesses that have published statements in support of what we're doing including the national federation of independent businesses, the associated building contractors, the associated general contractors, roofers, payroll administrators. one of the little-known facts about the senate amendment is that it actually puts a ceiling on the income that can be qualified for that payroll tax relief. and that is kind of a big deal. they set a ceiling. if people, for some reason earn more than $18,350 in the first two months of the year, even if they will not exceed the threshold during the rest of the year, they will not be able to get the full payroll tax relief whatever they earn beyond that. that is why it is so complicated. jon: if politics is the art of the possible though, why not just do what the president says he wants to do, what the senate obviously wanted to do because they voted it in and left town, why not just take the two months for now and then argue about the details in two months? >> everybody we're working with, particularly the senate should think about what is possible to do within the remaining days of this year. millions of americans across the country are working through the holidays so that they can put food on the table and take care of their families in very difficult economic times. i'm a doctor and i work through the holidays for years. so i'm here, ready to work. there is no reason for us not to work and get this resolved so that we could get the best possible solution for the american people. that's what makes sense and that's why we're here, working for them. jon: we hope all sides can come together and come up with some kind after solution. nan hayworth, republican from new york. congresswoman, thank you. >> thank you. jenna: we expect to hear from the president around 12:15 eastern time. we add that to the mix and see if we can't cook something up by the end of the show. jon: will he bring bo to the news conference? that is the question. jenna: everyone is pet friendly and we welcome bo as well. another reason, jon, if you didn't have enough to leave the tacky holiday sweaters in the drawer. why wearing one of these eye grabbers can get you unwanted attention at the airport. jon: uh-oh. jon: take a look now at some stories we're watching across the u.s. and world the world from inside our control room. at least 60 people are dead in a wave of violence across baghdad. the attacks come days after the last american troops left that country. wal-mart pulls a batch of baby formula from the shelves after a newborn in missouri died. the recall affects infamil powder with lot number zp 1 j 7 g. add the tsa to those who really don't like those holiday sweaters. is this crowds were enough, they say metalized material and lights on some sweaters are setting off security scanners. that is gumming up the works at airports all across the country. big no, no. jenna: reminder. no lights on sweaters. just don't do it. we have a "fox business alert" for you right now. ups is in the middle of the biggest shipping day of entire year as last minute online orders can still get to someone's home by christmas. adam shapiro is live from a ups processing center in new jersey with an interesting look for how it all works. hi, adam? >> reporter: that's right, jenna. fedex had their busiest day on the 12th of december. united states postal service, their busiest delivery day was actually on the 19th. ups? today, 26 million packages. take a look what is happening on the conveyor belt as they unload right now because this is the peak for them. it's a good bet that steve will deliver a few of the 25 million packages that ups delivers daily. that's daily, just before christmas. >> any and everything from honestly few years ago we had a five-foot alligator someone decided to ship up through ups and broke open in our facility. five-foot alligator. >> what can brown do for you? i'm going to show you. >> stay physical. you will work all day. won't hanging around a lot of days for those type of things are gone for a lot of people. you will move all day long. >> reporter: and move they do. 450,000 ups employees worldwide moving 120 million packages during the last week before christmas. ups hires 55,000 seasonal employees to help carry the load. >> you have to be a people person for this job. that's the bottom line. i don't think you last long if you will be miserable all the time. it is hu and bye type of thing. minute here. 30 seconds there. jerry, how are you? i have two for you. >> reporter: this is workforce of the operation? >> this is it tell all. my time in. punch in and punch out. >> reporter: gps. >> tells them everything. thank you very much. see you next week. >> reporter: do we get any cookies or anything? i'm the tv guy. >> next week. >> reporter: so as we come back live here at the processing center, the hub in par sip any, new jersey. jenna i had to wear the uniform to ride in the truck. it is requirement for us to have shot the story. it is very active. 26 million packages just today. it is an impressive operation. jenna: you wore that uniform well, adam, just for the record. >> reporter: thank you. jenna: i see one of ply packages just went by. i might be a little late this year with the christmas shopping. adam, thanks very much. an interesting look. there is lot of people work that make christmas happen, right? jon: a lot of the part-time jobs that ups and other shipping companies kick in are very welcome. jenna: don't ship the five-foot alligator, ups? really? jon: not a good idea. a truck packed with 50,000 dollars worth of, let's say a slippery substance is stolen. the truck was found. all that missing is the suspect and stuff inside. rick has details on this christmas heist next. jon: there's new information now on the link between iran and syria. fox news jerusalem learning exclusively what tehran is doing now to help syria's leader assad embattled regime. all of this comes as the arab league arrives in damascus to prepare for monitoring the mission there. leland vittert with all the late-breaking details live from our jerusalem bureau. >> reporter: hi, jon. this may be a case of syrian government trying to kill as many people as they can before the arab league actually as observers there on the ground. latest numbers say 200 dead just this week. and the syrians are getting a lot of help from the iranians. that in of itself is not all that surprising but we've learned from western intelligence source that is the iranians are sending weapons, ammunition and also men on commercial airliners with passengers on board and they're doing that to try to get around some international sanctions to keeped assad in power. sear syria's powerful air force and army are among the most well-equipped in the middle east with russian fighter jets, attack helicopters and tanks. president assad is prepared to use them all against his own people to stay in power. fox news has learned iran and its revolutionarily guard are going to great lengths to help. >> you can identify iranian involvement in negative manner in any conflict. not in almost any conflict but in any conflict. >> reporter: israeli minister for strategic affairs says iranians are desperately trying to keep assad in power because he provides a crucial link to hamas and hezbollah. as assad plows through weapons and ammunition supplies during thinks eight-month massacre of pro-democracy demonstrators, intelligence says he is running out of critcat items, hence the ammunition air bridge, loading planes from tehran international airport and flying with unsuspecting passengers to damascus where planes taxi to a military facility for unloading. it is a last-ditch effort by the iranians to cover their tracks as turkey recently intercepted a number of arms shipments using iranian cargo planes and since banned it from its airspace. there are about seven of these flights a week that head from tehran into damascus. we can tell you, jon, it is not just a couple of crates of ammunition they are offloading. from first-hand accounts passed to us by these intelligence sources we are now learning it is taking an hour and a half to two hours for them to unload these planes of all the weapons coming in there to syria. jon, back to you. jon: iran helping prop up bashar assad's regime? leland vitter thank you. >> reporter: exactly. >> this is a tough term but story so wacky we need to tell it to you straight. someone made off with $50,000 worth of margarine. rick, want to explain that? >> this time of year, jenna we like to give everyone benist of the doubt. maybe instead of calling him a thief but a heart healthy advocate trying to spread no cholesterol holiday cheer. the butter substitute was loaded in a truck headed to cedar falls, iowa, when it was stolen from a truck stop earlier this month. the margarine, by the way, street value of $50,000. think of number of english muffins you could top with that amount of margarine. the truck was found in michigan of all places, 500 miles away. the police opened the trailer to their amazement the margarine was gone, all of it. whoever the guy was he wanted the soft cream any spread. we can imagine what he is doing with it all. health experts say not all margarines are created equal. some are worse for you than butter. stick with the tubs instead of the sticks. if you live in cedar falls, iowa, i don't know what to tell you. jenna: we'll be right back. 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[ male announcer ] osteo bi-flex. the #1 doctor and pharmacist recommended brand. the #1 doctor and pharmacist this was the gulf's best tourism season in years. all because so many people came to louisiana... they came to see us in florida... make that alabama... make that miissippi. the best part of the gulf is wherever you choose... and now is a great time to discover it. this year millions of people did. we set all kinds of records. next year we're out to do even better. so come on down to louisiana... florida... alabama... mississippi. we can't wait to see you. brought to you by bp and all of us who call the gulf home. jenna: fox news alert for you now, will the tax holiday you're getting continue past the holiday season? that is the big question today on this thursday. we are glad you are with us, everybody, i'm jenna lee. jon: i'm jon scott. the battle on that is not settled. the president plans to weigh in later this hour, his remarks coming a i few hours after the house democrats and republicans had their say. no one wants to give on this question, and nine days from now if they don't agree your paycheck will get smaller. what can we expect from the president? he's going to be speaking as i said a little bit later this hour, right? >> reporter: you're absolutely right. things are changing moment by moment as you would expect with the ongoing fight that seems impossible to resolve at this point. a short time ago the president had a phone call with house speaker john boehner here is what an aid to the speaker told us about what went down in that phone call. he said the speaker continued to push for a one-year deal and asked for the president to send members of his economic team over to congress so they could negotiate with that, and what the president originally wanted a one-year deal. here is what the house tells us about the phone call. president told the speaker the only viable option at this point is to pass the two-month deal that was passed by the senate. he also said he would be begin working immediately, that was the house's word on a one-year deal once the house passes that two-month measure. they seem at loggerheads there. the white house has beeness phaeugt it would cosbeen estimating that it would cost about $40 per paycheck. they wanted people to write in and tell about how it would affect them. tens of thousands of responses have come in. jon: for the president it means $41 worth of dog treats. that's what he spent on bo yesterday. anything that shows they are going to bulge. >> reporter: we got something that mitch mcconnell, the top republican. he sent tkout a statemen sent out a statement, he wants to do the keystone pipeline project. putting a freeze on medicaid to doctors. senate democrats want more time to negotiate the terms. these goals are not mutually exclusive. we can and should do both. the sounds at this point that mcconnell is giving the gop cover. he also called on mitch mcconnell did the senate majority leader harry weed saying, now we are asking you to appoint conferees like the house republicans have done, folks that can come to the table and begin immediately negotiating the one-year deal. it sounds a whole lot like mitch mcconnell is proposing exactly what the president wants as well. jon: when we hear from the president we should expect to hear some of the stories about what $40 means. >> reporter: the white house talked about some of them yesterday, jay carney in the briefing. the president likes to share stories, especially those that will resonate with people this holiday season, about just how much trouble people were having paying their bills. we won't be surprised if he doesn't talk about that. jenna: you can do a lot of damage with $40, speaking from experience. leave that alone. jon: does your husband know, that's the question. jenna: he knows everything, unfortunately. shannon did a great job of catching us up on what happened over the last two years. earlier today there were some things that happened that we want to share with you. john boehner phoned the president urging the white house to negotiate a long-term agreement, lasting a full year, take a listen. >> the president asked us to extend these policies for a year. leader pelosi, the whip, mr. hoyer. senator reid, senator durbin, senator schumer, we need to extend these poll he's fo policies for a year. to kick the can down the road because it's near christmas is not the right thing for the american people. jenna: it calls for a two month extension instead. >> this is not about politics. it's not even about policy. it's about trying to make sure that bad things don't happen to good people ten days from now. jenna: just a reminder, this is not major tax reform, so we joke a little bit $40 here, $40 there, what you can keep in your pay check. this was a tax holiday that was temporary. we will bring you comments coming from the president live when they do happen. jon: well, the latest gallop poll has congressional approval at an all time low of just 13%. with numbers like these many of us would expect that incumbents would be shown the door come november. many of them were last time around, but some political experts say, do not hold your breath. they point to what is called the anti-incumbent election myth, one of those experts larry back stow, director of the center of politics at the university of virginia. the old saying goes, larry that people hate congress but love their particular member of congress, is that what you're seeing this year? >> reporter: it is true. i will say this it's becoming less true. i think the incumbent members of the house and senate need to be concerned about this. the institution is so low that eventually it is going to affect the individual members if it continues, but the election is nearly a year o. year off. i would bet today that the whole saw remains in effect until november 2012. people will be angry at congress, but if only they were all like my congressman or women, you know, john doe, mary doe, and of course they may all be like john doe or mary doe but that is not how the average voter looks at it. jon: some perceive that there is an anti-incumbent mood out there we could see a triple flip. we could see the house go democratic, we could see the senate go republican and the white house go republican. >> reporter: i would bet anybody, not $10,000, that is not my game. maybe a hundred dollars that it's not going to happen. i'd say one-half of one percent chance that something like that would occur. by the way it's never happened in american history. you've never had a triple flip like that, at least since the senate what's elected popular lee beginning at the start of the 20th century. the odds are enormously against it. we live in a partisan, polarized age when peace moment at the top of the ballot vote republican, they continued voting republican to the bottom of the ballot. the same with democrats. jon: president obama's raeupbgts arratings are below $50. the popularity rating of the congress are far, far lower. is that why president obama is winning the battle on the payroll tax extension? he seems to be getting his way. >> eyes absolutelit's actually true. you can be unpopular, but if you choose at your enemy an institution or a group of people that are far less popular you're going to look better, which frankly is one reason why republicans in congress should try to steer away from too many direct confrontations with the president during the election year. it may be wise on pin pin, but principle, but it'. jon: they say the republicans might have the better argument but they are losing the political pr battle. >> many people have lost many races being right on principle, jon. the wall street courage had it exactly right. jon: larry sabato from the university of virginia center for politics. when do you turn out the lights there, larry? are you working through christmas? >> we don't, believe it or not my great loyal staff here at the center for politics, right through christmas, right through new years, no alcohol on new year's eve, all the way to the iowa caucus. jon: larry we want to wish you the very best and keep all those loyal associates happy. you have a lot to cover, thanks. >> merry christmas. jenna: fox news alert we are getting new information on some deadly blasts that rocked baghdad today. at least 50 people are now confirmed dead after a series of coordinated attacks in the capitol. iraqi security forces say there were more than ten explosions across the city and over 200 people have been injured. coming up we're going to caulk to geraldo rivera who was just in that part of the world. he'll tell us what is going on in baghdad and the timing of it all. that is apparently going to get some headlinesment south korea is keeping aware reeye across the northern border as north korean as mourn the death of their long-time leader kim jong-il. south korea's armed forces are on high alert and security is tight on both sides of the border. in the regs where we have thousands of troops as well. greg palkot is streaming live from seoul, south korea with more. >> reporter: relations between north and south corey arshaky at the best of times. now with a power transition happening in the north the fears here are is that they could get worse. we went up to the border between the two countries to find out what was going on there. take a look. you're looking at north korea, a country in turmoil following the death of its long-time dictator kim jong-il. now you're looking at the dmz, a two and a half mile wide strip separating the north and south about 160 miles long. were any trouble were to break out it could happen here. it has so often in the past. according to u.s. militaryee figureses wmilitary officials, while tensions are high, all is calm for now. south korean troops are apparently on high alert. we can confirm they are at the very least on message as our their adversaries, which are also on high alert. north of the border none-sto*p public emotional grieving continues all played out on state television, as does the image, the stature of the late north korean dictator kim jong-il. it was declared in state media today that in fact when he died the storms brewed, the mountain tops turned red, and sheets of ice cracked. as for kim jong-il's son and herbg heir apparent, kim jong un. it was declared that he was an outstanding leader. the funeral for kim jong-il is next wednesday. we'll hear a lot more in the days to come. jenna: just amazing to see that public grieving and to see it go on for day after day after day, something -- well, we don't see here. it's an interesting look into the country. thank you so much for your great reporting as always. jon: forced public grieving you might call it. jenna: you might call it that for sure. never seen anything like it. jon: yeah, yeah. makes you appreciate this country. at any rate, lots of back and forth in washington today, between republicans and democrats on the payroll tax cut extension. the president is expected to speak on this ongoing standoff less than an hour from now. we'll bring it to you live as soon as it happens. plus an arizona sheriff's office slapped with a lawsuit and facing serious accusations from the feds. ahead while sheriff joe arpaio's officers are turning in their badges. >> they kicked us out, putting bub safety at risk. 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[ louder ] hello? but we still need your signature. right now during sign then drive, it's never been easier to get the allew passat, the 2012 motor trend car of the year, for practically just your signature. that's the power of german engineering. visit vwdealer.com. 60 are dead in baghdad in the first major violence since u.s. troops left the country over the weekend. whether or not those two things are actually tied together is another question. we'll be talking to geraldo about it in a moment. there were a series of coordinated bombings across the capitol suggesting a disconcerting level of organization. i should say the city of baghdad. geraldo rivera, host of geraldo at large joins me. you actually saw the troops leave the country. a lot will make a major issue out of the fact that the troops just left and now we are seeing the violence happen. are the two connected? >> reporter: i think it is inescapable that they are connected. i was honored to be allowed to ride the last combat out of iraq with the last u.s. fighting unit in that country. the only american personnel left are in the embassy in baghdad now. it is clear with this coordinated attack that this was weeks in the making. s u.n. ni a fill kwrapbts, with al-qaida planned these events against largely shiite targets and timed it for the day after we were out of the country. jenna: the target wasn't the united states though. >> reporter: the target was to prove that everything the united states has done over the long and bloody war 8 years and 9 months has been for now. we put the summi on top. now we put the shiite's on top. jenna: this is one day of violence. do you think it erases what has been achieved in iraq by our troops there. >> reporter: i'm not exactly what was achieved. it cost a trillion dollars. i saw as i was leaving, fields are vehicles, acres of vehicles, suburbans, and tahoes, and ford f150 pickup trucks, just leaving them behind because it's more expensive to take them home than to leave them behind. many trucks and humvees being junked there. and you look at it and 4,487 dead. how it disrupted the country, it added a trillion dollars to the deficit. what have we got as a result. jenna: this is also your observation, you've been watching this war. >> reporter: i was there eleven times. jenna: what did the troops say about this. >> reporter: they are wonderful, wonderful people, and they are, you know, many of them young people. what they are mostly feeling is a sigh of relief. they are going to be home for christmas. they don't think in the geo political sense very often. jenna: i have to take issue with that because obviously my husband is military. a lot of them think in the geo political sense. they are not just on the ground firing order. >> reporter: i didn't mean to suggest that they aren't thinking people, i think that -- you asked me what the leaving troops felt. they felt the same thing i felt, oh, my god, i didn't die in iraq. that's what i felt. but when you look at the country i would challenge anyone to tell me that things are better now. if we had had a drone strike and we had killed saddam hussein who was the architect of the first gulf war because invaded cue wait. he was the one who directed the attack against bush one. we wanted moammar qaddafi out the same way we wanted osama bin laden out. the whole notion that we could built a nation there. we went in looking for weapons of mass destruction, there was not. we wanted to build a tkepl kraeua tkepl democracy where there is not. the shiite president nouri al-maliki is looking to arrest another president saying he led a a death squad. in south africa you had years of apartheid, hatred and terror between blacks and white. it was horrible the crimes committed one against the other. the wopbl wa only way they could go further in the new world would be to give a mass amnesty, a reconciliation, where crimes are for begin. the sh ii te is going after the underdog. jenna: the battling continues, and the war has been for more than a thousand years. >> reporter: what does america ge get out of it? that's the question. jenna: what does it mean to us? if we had done anything if troops were still on the ground and bombs were going off in baghdad. does it matter to us here right now. >> reporter: of course it matters. let's take the biggest bombing of the 63 at least that are dead now. the biggest bombing was a suicide bomber in an ambulance. he was stopped by the check-point the driver in the ambulance and he said i've got wounded people i have to get to the hospital. there was a road block there, the security was there, they believed him, it was a driver in an ambulance, he had wounded people, he's going to the hospital but really it wasn't a driver in an ambulance, he was a driver driving an ambulance filled with explosives, he was going to blow him receive up. even if we had the seal team there, the road block worked. jenna: because bad people will still exist there. >> reporter: exactly right. as long as hillary clinton says it is impossible to stop someone who is willing to blow themselves up from causing harm against innocent civilians you can't stop that, that will always be and that's why good riddens to iraq. jenna: if that is the point to end on. >> reporter: i don't mean in any way. i think our heroism of our troops and the sacrifices that we made, the pain they endured, the service family, the risks like your husband took we honor forever. iraq doesn't fall on their shoulders, it belongs to the political leaders that kept us in that fight. joe biden said it will probably end up with a shiite country, a s u.n. ni country and kurdih country, and they will say what the hell did we spend a trillion dollars on. jenna: as you mention with -d troops sometimes it's good to engage them in conversation. i find we caulk around them and we seldom talk with them. >> reporter: that is probably true. i always say i'm a private, i'd lick to talk to the enlisted officers. the nco's run the military. the generals once in a while have some insight but i'd take a master sergeant any day. jenna: you said eleven times there. >> reporter: eleven saoeupls iraq. jenna: we'll see where the story goes. >> reporter: i hope that is my last time. i'm not going to go touring in the biblical city of babylon any time soon. jenna: that's what he says now. we'll save the tape. thank you. jon: a brand-new poll out and a new gop presidential candidate leads in the key election state of iowa. who is at the top of the pack now? 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[ male announcer ] take the fixodent 12 hour hold challenge. fixodent denture adhesive challenges you to a 12 hour hold test. ♪ thanks to its time released formula, you apply fixodent once, and it holds all day. ♪ take the fixodent 12 hour hold challenge. guaranteed, or your money back. ♪ and for guaranteed freshness try fixodent cleanser, plus scope ingredients. jon: well the poll numbers in iowa changing from poll to poll and day-to-day. one new one out today has a new top spot, a new person i should say in the top spot. the iowa state university gazette, kcrg poll, shows congressman ron paul with about 27% of the iowa vote. newt gingrich comes in second with 25%, mitt romney, 17% and rick perry at 11%. compare that with the real clear politics average of iowa. it shows paul leading the pack with romney in second. followed by gingrich and then perry. so what are we to make of these numbers? michael barone is the senior political analyst for the "washington examiner" and a fox news contributor. he has been watching elections and polling for a long time. a surprise to you? do we believe these numbers, michael? >> i think we take the iowa state university poll with a couple of grains of salt. one reason, jon, it's difficult to get a good sample of iowa caucus-goers. you had just 119,000 people in a state of three million voting in the republican caucuses last time. so you're looking for something like 6% of the adult population. needles in a haystack. and the second thing is this poll had a small sample, just 333 likely voters and it was conducted over a ten-day period in which other polls showed sharply declining numbers for newt gingrich. so i look at all polls with some respect but i take this one with a little more grains of 1589 than some of the others. jon: plus or margin 5% of error. meaning top contenders could all swap places according to even the scientific analysis. >> that's right. that's right. that's what you get when you get a many is a pell of 334 people. by way of comparison, scott rasmussen's poll which showed mitt romney in the lead had 750 interviews and public policy polling at 597 interviews. there is a smaller error margin in those. but what we're seeing among all these candidates or a number of them they're bunched when you take the real clear politics average within the error margin of just about any poll. and we know that they can change opinion quickly. newt gingrich is the latest candidate to go up and down. republican voters say they believe in traditional marriage but they have been quick to divorce a candidate. jon: all right. well, roughly half of the, at least according to that "rasmussen reports poll" because we had it on yesterday, roughly half the caucus-goers or people who say they will be going and voting in the caucuses they haven't absolutely made up their mind yet. they say they're still open to persuasion. i guess hence the attack ads on newt gingrich and maybe some of the other candidates. >> yes. i suppose we're even going to get christmas twitter feeds by some of the candidates or groups supporting them. there is not very much time left of nonholiday variety between today and january 3rd, the evening when the caucuses will take place but i think this picture is fluid and i think in iowa you take the polling a little less seriously or with a little more skepticism than you do in other states because you're trying to sample what turns out to be an electorate that is a very small percentage of the population. jon: we mentioned it before though. ron paul's supporters are very fervent and pretty well-organized. he has got a great internet operation. what if ron paul wins the iowa caucuses? >> well, if he wins the iowa caucuses he will get a big boomlet of attention. it is my own view there is a ceiling on ron paul's support. while in a multicandidate race he might be able to win with a percentage in the 20s, he is unlikely to beat, prevail in a within one within one race against any of the other candidates prevailing, that are running in this field. jon: so in your view it's likely going to be a romney victory in iowa? >> i don't know that any victory is likely in iowa at this point. i think that none of the candidates has a chance that approaches 50%. far less. you've got michele bachmann on her 99-county tour. you've got rick santorum with an endorsement by an influential christian conservative. you've got rick perry running lots of ads. so you've got a lot of competition there. going on and as you pointed out, jon, those voters told pollster scott rasmussen that they haven't really firmly made up their mind yet and we've been watching republican primary voters throughout the year and they seem to change their minds a lot. jon: and that may be why newt gingrich is calling the race there a real mess. that's his quote. >> it is a real mess for newt gingrich. his numbers are going down. jon: that may be why he calls it that. michael barone, thank you. jenna: there is a growing debate over online bloggers who want to call themselves journalists and if any is difference between a blogger and journalist? are they one in the same? dan springer live in seattle. this is something we all encounter whether we work in a newsroom or not. >> reporter: the line glean blogger and journalist is blurred with so many people doing both. there is also a rise in conflicts where wlogers want to be -- bloggers wanted to be treated like the press but are not. l.a.p.d. decide to move uncredential reporters at the occupy protest before throwing out the protesters. bloggers and citizen journalists threw a fit saying because they can't get credentialals they have less access to knew events and first amendment rights are out the window. the l.a.p.d. is now reviewing its policy. there is case after blogger, critical cox. she was sued for defamation. during a trial she claimed she was be journalist and had protections under the shield law. a federal judge disagreed and that she didn't have any training and journalistic fact-checking. >> we're in the business of criticizing people. at that that's what journalists, that's what bloggers do. we have an obligation to at least be accurate with that criticism. >> reporter: crystal cox accused attorney kevin padric among other things of tax fraud. the courts ruled it was completely false. the jury awarded him $2.5 million. he says even more important whether cox was acting as a journalist the power the internet has to destroy reputations. >> false allegations can be made against somebody and they will have to live with those false allegations for the rest of their life. >> reporter: and liable judgments against bloggers are skyrocketing. the dollar almost is up $47 million. 30 million in just the last two years. jenna. jenna: that's what happens when you have an industry, career where you don't have a license to practice. your accuracy is your code. so it will be interesting to see. >> reporter: that's right. jenna: so accessible with so many different bloggers. more journalists the better too. dan, interesting story. really appreciate it. >> reporter: sure. jon: there is new word the obama administration is dramatically cutting back the number of national guard troops patrolling our southern border. so what impact will that have on the nation's security? the department of homeland security's new plan. we'll talk with the former chief of staff for u.s customs & border protection next. >> i have actually put more money under my administration into border security than any other administration previously. we've got more security resources at the border, more national guard, more border guards, you name it, than the previous administration. jon: a fox news alert. and it is an ominous one or maybe sad one out of waterville, maine. we're told within the last hour authorities have put up crime scene tape around the home of little ail i can't reynolds. she was reported missing six days ago ago by her father. there has been a widespread search all over that part of maine but no signs of the little girl. police are still saying there are no arrests and they have no comment on whether there are any suspects but we understand from local reporting and, several reports, that police crime scene technicians have put up crime scene tape around the home where little ayla reynolds was reported missing six days ago. we'll try to stay on top of the breaking developments but it appears that the chances of finding that little girl alive are slim to none at this point. we'll continue to update you as best we can when we get new information. jenna: the national guard will be changing its mission along our southern border after the obama administration sharply cut its number by 75%. starting in the new year remaining troops will focus on aerial surveillance missions using helicopters and airplanes. >> we have deployed unprecedented infrastructure, unprecedented technology, manpower, particularly along the southwest border. jenna: he was chief of staff of u.s customs & border protection. he is principle of command consulting group. tha. did, put this in a little context. we heard from the secretary janet napolitano talking about the plan at the border and it is my understanding that the troops were there, elevated number of troops at the border so that the technology could catch up to what we need. and once the technology was there we would remove the troops. so is this, is this part of a broader plan that has been in place for several years now or is this something, of a surprise? >> this really is part of a plan that really started back in the bush administration in 2006 when i was there at customs and border protection in the department of homeland security, partnered at that time with the department of defense and national guard under what we called operation jump-start that initially deployed 6,000 national guard troops to the border during a time period when we were building fence, ramping up not only technology but doubling the size of the border patrol workforce. it was always a stopgap plan to provide that capability in the interim while we built up the cbp and dhs resources on the border. this was drawn down. jenna: sorry, you said, chp and dhs, department of homeland security. >> customs and border protection. the border patrol. jenna: i needed a little translation there for those of us on the outside. again, you put more troops there and catch everybody else with the technology we can put in the skies. what we're seeing right now is that we have 1200 national guard troops a the border. that will be reduced to 300. when you hear that, when i'm walking around streets of new york i like to see police around. makes you feel safer. is the same true along the border? do we actually need boots on the ground there or is there a better, more efficient way to patrol the boredder? >> sure. i think it's important to keep it in perspective that again, we're talking about reduction from 1200 to 200 national guardsmen during a time we built up the border patrol force on the southwest border by eight to 10,000 more than when the national guard troops first started being deployed. so we're at the right time for a little bit of a shift strategically where the boots on the ground and it's important people realize, the national guardsmen weren't out there making apprehen shuns and arrests. they were in mission support roles for the border patrol. time to look at less boots on the ground and type of technology and aerial assets dod can bring which are coming back from theater in iraq and afghanistan and can support that dhs-cbp mission. jenna: that is interesting. you think this is a move that will actually make us safer? >> i do long term. i don't think the reduction of, you know, 800 or 900 national guardsmen is really a huge impact across that southwest border right now, not when we doubled size of the border patrol and you have a lot more fence and a lot more technology. i am concerned long term, even the air assets are just a stopgap measures. those dod air assets can go away to other missions. they may not be the best fit for the job in some cases so long term what members of congress and the members of the administration ought to be concerned about is making sure that dhs, cbp, border patrol, air and marine units have the resources for the future. jenna: expand on that. >> sure. jenna: we hear about that but what specifically do we need to be 100% or pretty close to it confident that the border is secure? what exactly is it that we need? >> sure. i'll give one example. you know, cbp air marine may have to retire as many as 50 aging aircraft over the next year. these this are helicopter, fixed-wing aircraft that support the border security mission. this dod surge of some helicopters and fixed-wing assets can help fill the gap but long term you need things like sustaining the budget for that agency to provide the air support to border patrol. you also need to increase the technology budget. we spent a lot of money over the last five, six years, doubling the size of manpower and building actual physical infrastructure like fences and vehicle barriers. we spent comparatively little on technology. that technology budget has continued to take a hit in the most recent budget cycle. i would like to see that come back up. jenna: it is interesting hearing acronyms, dod, department of defense, dhs, department much homeland security and also, i have the customs and border protection, just how many people are involved in trying to keep the border safe. that is challenge as well, getting all of that coordinated. thank you again. we always appreciate your expertise? >> sure. thanks, jenna, you know you have wondered is there really a santa claus? find out why the answer is yes. ♪ [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus presents: the cold truth. i habe a cohd. and i toog nyguil bud i'm stild stubbed up. 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[ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus liquid gels. ♪ oh what a relief it is! ♪ my high school science teacher made me what i am today. r science teacher helped us build it. ♪ now i'm a geologist at chevron, and i get to help science teachers. it has four servo motors and a wireless microcontroller. over the last three y we've put nearly 100 million dollars into american education. that's thousands of kids learning to love ience. ♪ isn't that cool? and that's pretty cool. ♪ jon: ask me this question just about every day. is there really a santa claus? jenna: you're right. jon: turns out the answer is yes. the spirit of christmas and the spirit of santa claus isn't just rooted in the hearts and minds of children who believe. turns out saint nicklaus lived around 300 ad as bishop in the byzantine empire, now modern day turkey. >> known as giver of gifts but gave them secretly. he redeemed people from slavery secretly. he gave dowries to women secretly. he helped the poor secretly. never to embarass anyone or never to glorify himself but to glorfy god. jon: the version of santa claus we know today took shape in the 1820 helped by clark moore's 1923 poem a visit from saint nicklaus. better known as the night before christmas. jenna: ever played santa claus at family party. jon: i think once or twice. i have the ho, h or. ho i will demonstrate after the show. jenna: i tried. we'll see if we get a little christmas spirit down in d.c. looking for a compromise here from well, anyone, maybe. the president is about to talk and this battle on capitol hill over extending the payroll tax holiday is really what's in focus. you have leaders in the house asking the president to help hammer out a long-term solution. we'll see what happens. take a listen. >> i saw the president out yesterday doing his christmas shopping. saw he brought his dog with him. you know, we're here. he can bring his dog up here. we are pet-friendly jenna: did you know that our production team said they have a gift for us, a surprise? jon: oh, really? jenna: yeah. you have something? ♪ ♪ jenna: you're pretty quick on your feet there. this reminds me, i didn't do any of my baking yet. i have a long list of things to do. jon: that is the best dancing i've ever done. [laughter] jenna: thanks for joining us, even. jon: "america live" starts right now. rick: we begin with a fox news alert on the epic year-end battle that's playing out an capitol hill, and we are waiting for remarks on president obama on new developments in the fight to renew the payroll tax cut before it expires just eight days from now. this is "america live." glad you're with us, everybody, i'm rick folbaum. heather: and i'm heather childers. we're both in for megyn kelly today. thanks for joining us. that sight, one of -- that fight, one of the ugliest we have seen this year. back and forth once again earlier today arguing over what should happen next. >> the stakes are too high to be arguing about politics and process. the republicans' contention that the two month compromise is somehow unworkable is simply untrue. if it were, we wouldn'tse

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