could be smuggled in undetected. i m wolf blitzer. you re in the situation room. it s one of the more mundane documents americans have to deal with, but for president obama, the tax return is politically charged in this, an election year. the white house released his 2011 files today along with that of the vice president, joe biden and there are some surprises in both documents. as lisa sylvester has been carefully going after these tax returns, what do you see? first off, the obamas, like the romneys, gave generously to charities. the president s income, which was $1.7 million in 2010 was down significantly as sales of his book dropped off, but the focus was on taxes and more specifically, rates. there are some surprises there. who was taxed at a higher rate? the president, mitt romney or the president s secretary? it might surprise you, but it s actually the president s secretary. she makes $95,000 a year. the obama administration confirms her rate is is higher than t
through indianapolis on august 13th as the country duo sugar land was about to perform. seven people died. dozens were injured and today s report should tell us who and what is to blame for that rigging to give way. we re also going to hear from the country stars. they will finally answer questions about that fateful day. we ll have a live report later in the hour. trayvon martin s mom is now calling what happened to her son an accident. listen to what she said on the today show. one of the things that i still believe in a person should apologize when they are actually remorseful for what they ve done. i believe it was an accident. i believe that it just got out of control and he couldn t turn the clock back. and in just a couple of hour, george zimmerman will face a judge for killing trayvon martin, charged now with second degree murder. he turned himself in yesterday. after his first two lawyers quit, it s now up to this man. i did think that that was the certainl
that it s krun f time? and we re digging deeper into ron paul s writings and finding sexual harassment victims. i m wolf blitzer. you re in the situation room. we re here in the new cnn election center counting down to the final few days and hours before the first contest of 2012. the new iowa poll out today reenforcing mitt romney s place at the top of the pack, running neck and neck with ron paul. it drives home the bombshell findings of our poll this week, sh showing rick santorum has surged to third place in iowa, while newt gingrich has faded. it s put iting more and more pressure on romney to go for broke in iowa, to try to pull off a win tuesday night. jim acosta is joining us from des moines with more. t mitt romney has the big mo and the question heading into this weekend is whether he will win the iowa caucuses without breaking a sweat. no wonder mitt romney appears to be going all in in iowa. he just might be holding a winning hand. a sign just days before
he s going to have some time to relax with his family. this is a good time for him to reflect in hawaii. it is not just where he grew up. let s not forget he was born, t.j., in hawaii. even though there was a controversy, a at least maybe some people still believe he wasn t born in hawaii. but he was born in hawaii. he s got a lot of old friends there. he deserves some time off. he s got a lot going on. but even as he s on vacation, every president is never completely on vacation. he ll have national security advisors with him. right now there s a crisis. there are plenty of international crises under way. north korea arguably one of the most dangerous spots on earth rye now with the death of the so-called dear leader, kim jong-il, the succession of his young untested son in his late 20s, kim jung un. tension on the korean peninsula very, very real right now. tension in iraq. we saw a wave of terrorist activities going on yesterday. tension in syria. pakistan. afghanistan. we
north korea. i m wolf blitzer. you re in the situation room. the showdown over the payroll tax cut lasted for weeks, but the stalemate ended in a matter of minutes today after house republican leaders bowed to overwhelming pressure and gave into the democrats. today, the house approved the bill that got almost 90% of support in the senate. president obama signed it into law and the threat of a new year s day tax hire for 160 working americans is over. let s go straight to dana bash who s watching this on capitol hill. must be pretty empty. it was exciting for a few minutes today. a few minutes, underline the word minutes. look, there is a lot of relief that this battle that consumed congress in these final days is over. especially for house republicans. the house will be in order. it was john boehner s decision to back down and he backed it up by presiding over passage of a short-term tax cut that many call a gimmick. hr 3765. a bill to extend the payroll tax holida