[ gunfire ] happening in the newsroom, the big push won t be an easy sell. president obama out to convince congress and you this week that the u.s. should strike syria. who s buying it, though? where s the hard proof? syria s president speaking out, denying his government used chemical weapons. he s got a warning for mr. obama. the worm returns with some huge news. so what s dennis rodman dying to tell us after his trip to north korea? we ll find out soon. she s jumping for joy and who can blame her? serena williams now a champion for the history books. the second hour of newsroom starts now.
president needs to present a united front. if america s going to lead in this efforts. you know, there are a lot of polls out now, brand new cnn poll showing, that as you referenced earlier, that americans are overwhelmingly opposed to this intervention. but there are problems sometimes putting issues of war and peace to a. poll. that s worth keeping in minds. the real question is going to be when the president makes his national address tuesday nights whether he s able to move those polls and the telephone calls to members of congress. if there were polls taken at various critical moments in american history, the civil war, world war ii, there would have been moments when continuing to do what we believe is the right thing wouldn t have been popular. that s part of the of the responsibility of leadership and part of the risk of bringing a vote like this to the house of representatives. all right. john avalon, thank you very much for joining me. we have breaking news to tell you
wolf blitzer, thanks for joining me today. i appreciate it. thank you. so while the president makes his case on syria, a lot of people are hoping to hear some hard evidence that president bashar al assad was, in fact, responsible, for those haunting chemical attacks. there s little doubt a chemical attack did take place, americans are really only hearing circumstantial evidence about who is to blame. cnn pentagon correspondent chris lawrence is at the pent gone to tell us more about that side of the story. good morning, chris. that s right, exactly, carol. u.s. intelligence officials say they don t have a smoking gun that says they have a phone call or some interceptances bashar al assad directly ordered this attack but they say their evidence is more than circumstantial. one of the things they ve been showing senators behind closed doors are the videos of what happened after the attack. it s not our job to tell you how you should react to seeing this video but we should warn you
well aware of the internal debate going on here now. i like i don t know if i liked it, but it was interesting that he said social media because most of the evidence coming out of syria s from youtube videos, right? that s right. i mean, it was an aside. it was saying, look, if you re saying you have all this evidence and it s something even those of us in the media have said can there be a way in which you don t compromise your intelligence sources but yet present more evidence to the american people, a lot of those congressmen who have had intelligence briefings have come out and said, look, we think the evidence is there, but the problem is that evidence isn t really being presented publicly. bashar al assad knows this. he knows this, and he sort of uses that to sort of drive this message home saying, look, if you ve got this evidence against me, show it. chris lawrence reporting live from the pentagon today. thank you very much. still to come in the newsroom, the presid
first on the agenda, of course whether to intervene in syria. more than half of the senate still undecided. in the house, the challenge to sell a strike against syria is even greater for president obama. at least 148 lawmakers are expected to vote no, while just 25 support the president s plan. at least a dozen children were injured after a connecticut carnival ride malfunctioned on sunday. officials say a swing lost power, throwing riders from their seats and then slamming them into the ground. the ride s owner says state inspectors checked the ride two days before the accident. the incident remains under investigation. a 30-year-old man has died after falling from an elevated platform to a sidewalk at san francisco s candlestick park. police say the man was walking with his brother and appeared to be intoxicated. in august, a georgia man died after falling from an upper deck at atlanta s turner field. on sunday, a thai airways flight skidded off the runway