with a few friends in london. [ male announcer ] the citi thankyou visa card. redeem the points you ve earned to travel with no restrictions. rewarding you, every step of the way. rush limbaugh says mitt romney was building america while barack obama was in college, but what was mitt romney doing during his college years? the answer to that is what mitt romney has in common with rush limbaugh and that is in tonight s rewrite. and later, mitt romney is still a very, very big investor in bain and a town in illinois wants to know if mitt can stop bain from moving their jobs to china. that s coming up. ? [ john ] no. were you just. no. are you supposed to be driving that in here? no! did mom say we could eat all that? [ john ] yes. [ male announcer ] it s nice to finally say yes. new oscar mayer selects. it s yes food.
as the drum beat grows louder, will romney change his mind and release more tax returns? up next, romney press secretary andrea saul. plus chris christie s prime time gig in tampa. [ man ] ever year, sophia and i use the points we earn with our citi thankyou card for a relaxing vacation. sometimes, we go for a ride in the park. maybe do a little sightseeing. or, get some fresh air. but this summer, we used our thank youpoints to just hang out with a few friends in london. [ male announcer ] the citi thankyou visa card. redeem the points you ve earned to travel with no restrictions. rewarding you, every step of the way. but they haven t experienced extra strength bayer advanced aspirin. in fact, in a recent survey, 95% of people who tried it agreed that it relieved their headache fast. visit fastreliefchallenge.com today for a special trial offer. vare so amazingly good,ge.com
that. that is very bold. very bold. can t wait to share the ending with you. good morning. welcome to early start. i m zoraida sambolin. i m john berman. this morning mitt romney is in ohio. so is bobby jindal and jeb bush. parade? coincidence? it is sort of a parade. all about the veepstakes. also the key state of ohio. more coming up. also nelson mandela s 94th birthday. we ll hear from former president clinton who just visited with the icon in a cnn exclusive. that s coming up. first, zoraidzoraida, the b story affecting so much of the country, the weather and the devastating drought conditions that have turned half of the u.s. into a disaster zone. the department of agriculture is declaring natural disasters in 1,000 counties across 26 states. blistering temperatures are making conditions even worse. across the midwest temperatures have topped more than 100 degrees. and heat advisories are reaching up into the mid-atlantic regions. the bone dry conditions
counties across 26 states. the bone dry conditions are destroying farm crops and one analyst estimates that 75% of the corn crop in the drought region is now wiped out. that could drive up food and fuel prices across the entire country and brings us to rob marciano live in bu. we have corn that should be taller than it is right now because of the drought and because of the heat. this stalk should be well up and over my head. there s a couple of examples of ears of corn. this was tough to find, a decent one, what you would typically see in a healthy environment but this is what we ve been seeing, ears of corn not even close to developing and not even pollinated. not only here in indiana but across the corn belt as far north as the canadian board enand across the southern plains. this part of this particular field is pretty healthy, we re right at the edge, the corner, it gets more circulation and runoff from the road. i want to bring in bob smok, another local farmer. you ha
along with 25 others across the country. look at this map. you can see how widespread the bone dry conditions are. last time it was this bad, 1956. rob marciano is in the middle of the hardest hit area in indiana. the corn crop is hit especially hard. yeah. the corn belt getting hit with not only drought but heat. obviously the heat exacerbates the drought a little bit. you get the string of 100-plus days like they have had in the past month it makes things so much worse. just yesterday, indianapolis hit 101. yet another record. the last 46 days, the driest on record in indianapolis. less than a tenth of an inch. where we are, an hour and a half north of there we got a quick shot of rain two hours ago. but probably less than half an inch. just enough to raise the humidity levels. it s steamy out here today. spring was perfect to sow corn. they started growing well and then the heat and drought hit. boom, you have stalks that are waist and if not chest high that should be up