>> and now it's time to talk about jobs. >> all right. let talk about jobs. here's one, neil bowlen's job with the faa new on furlough. >> i have a hard time understanding their partisan bickering and rhetoric. we're reaching into our investments, savings, signed up for unemployment, and that's barely going to make the electric bill, much less the water and mortgage, so, yeah, we're incredibly disappointed. >> he says congress could have prevented his ordeal with just a day's work. here's why they failed to. it's a little complex but worth knowing. since 2007 the faa has been running on short-term funding bills that routinely pass through congress, almost like the debt limit until now. this time politics have intruded with republicans inserting language about rural airports and faa unionization into the process, neither of which democrats support. you can decide for yourself if you're for subsidizing rural airports or whether the faa should unionize. i'm not taking a position. that's not my job. that's for you to decide. keeping them honest, couldn't find any other instance, either party, democrats or republicans, attaching any controversial additions to one of these temporary funding bills, and there's been almost 20 of these over the years, and not once has this happened. so the bottom line. no vote, despite repeated calls from the white house and transportation secretary ray lahood to get to work, to get to some kind of agreement so people don't lose their jobs. >> don't put the livehoods of thousands of people at risk. don't put projects at risk, and don't let $1 billion at a time when we're scrambling for every dollar we can get left on the table because congress did not act. >> congress is on vacation. what i'm asking congrs to do is come back from their vacation, pass a clean bill, which they have done on 20 other occasions, so that the faa people did not have to go without paychecks and thousands of construction workers, right in the middle of the construction season are out of work. now, i've heard of a lot of speeches around here about doing jobs, getting jobs, helping to get jobs. well, this -- what i want members of congress to do is not only talk the talk about jobs, walk the walk. vote to extend the faa and put thousands of people back to work. come back from your vacation, pass a bill, the way you've done on 20 other occasions. this is not fair to average, ordinary citizens who are out of work. >> again, they are taking five weeks off. again, it's not like they are lacking for vacation time. that's five weeks out of 23 weeks on the 2011 calendar at beginning of the year. so while they are taking it easy, talking in their districts or fund-raising, as many as 74,000 others run able to work at all. joining us now is congressional correspondent kate balduan, democratic strategist paul becla and republican strategist alex castellanos. >> is this just a fight over a couple of small town airports, kate? >> yes, at least in part, ostensibly, sorry, anderson. this is what's going , two things going on. it has to do with the union issue that you mentioned. republicans put -- put changed union rules and how the federal rules kind of apply to airlines and unionizing there. they want to change the rules. democrats clearly are balking at this and are opposed to it. that's the long-term funding bill. then in the short-term extension, democrats are calling for a clean extension that would just extend it as they have in the past. republicans are opposing that, and so they are pushing their own extension that has to do with these subsidies for rural airports that democrats are balking at again and opposing and republicans say they are opposing wasteful ending so the fingerpointing we're seeing in the debt debate is just extending into this. every side is saying the other side is holding up the process when the faa employees are becoming the victims here. i think a little bit of what's going on here is following the debt debate there's serious bruised egos and resentment on both side so they are really, really digging in here. >> paul begala, why not either pass this short-term extension, even if it's not perfect or, you know, have some leadership and actually come up a compromise or come up with some sort of a deal? >> i have no idea, anderson. if i had hair, it would be on fire. this is the kind of thing that makes you crazy, but i have to say, the president did a disservice today to this story, and i think sometimes we in the in media do when he said both parties are equally at fault. the president said, and i'm quoting him, this is another washington-inflicted wound on america. no, sir, with all d respect. it's a republican-inflicted wound on america, and not even all republicans. a lot think this is ridiculous. kay bailey hutchison has said it's not honorable what the house is doing so i don't want to paint all republicans with a brush. there's a new way of doing business for some in the republican party. it's not the regular order. even the most mundane issues like whether we should subsidize air in eli, nevada, it's shutting down the faa and putting 74,000 people out of work. >> $1 billion is not being collected, $1 billion, isn't that something that should get people in congress who cares about the defit to try to come up with some sort of solution with you? >> you would think. kind of want to put them all in an airplane that can't land until they fix this. but you know, we've just had a big spending debate for it seemed like eternity here in washington on this debt ceiling, and one thing i think democrats and republicans can all agree is if we can stop wasting money that we don't have, we ought to do that. how much should one of these airplane tickets cost from eli, nevada, to the closest hub? turns out we're subsidizing each of these tickets from $1,000 to $3,700, each ticket. that seems to be a place we could save some bucks. could you hire a limo, fill it with champagne and drive each one of these passengers and save money, and we can't even agree on saving that kind of money? republicans put a bill that would do that on the table. democrats said no, and you know what harry reid did? he did the honorable thing. he said, look, i urge my colleagues to vote for this. it's -- sometimes you have to think about what's best for your country and rockefell and the other senators said no. they are holding harry reid hostage on this. >> paul, i mean, alex sees it a completely different way. >> senator reid, alex is right, the senate majority leader, his small town in his state of eli, nevada, is one -- his town has been singled out for this. sent a letter to speaker boehner today where heays i will be willing to compromise on the essential air services issue during negotiations on the final bill in order to pass a clean extension. reid is doing everything he can do but just like the debt ceiling, h doesn't have a partner to negotiate w.this is what bothers me. it's more about process. the founding fathers gave us a regular order for resolving these disputes. my goodness, this is not slavery, not civil rights. this is whether we should subsidize air travelers in eli, nevada. alex may be right, the republicans may be right but not worth putting 74,000 people out of a week. it's a process. extend it for a couple of weeks or months and you come back to a conference committee. >> alex, what about not taking your vacation until this gets done? >> right. >> i'm not taking a side of whether the republicans are right or the democrats, i don't know, but i do know that for government to work people have to make decisions and whether it's a compromise or one side wins or the other, that's how things get done and right now nothing is getting done. >> you know, if you -- and i think some folks at home are looking at this and are so disgusted with what they are seeing in washington that next election we could see i think one of the biggest rejection of incumbents that we've seen in a long time. it could be vote them all out. last election we saw some survey numbers that said if you could vote everybody from both parties out and start over, would you, and i think it was over 60%. i think it could be higher this time. but on this specific issue, anderson, you said you couldn't find anything going back 20 years where anybody had tied something like this a spending reduction to a -- to a routine bill, yes, and that's the problem. we never cut spending, on anything. we always push it back to tomorrow, and tomorrow never comes, so we're in a crisis situation where one of these days our kids are going to be empty of tears because they are going to sweat their whole lives to pay debts that we, our parents, are leaving them. >> now still pushing it back. now pushing it back five weeks so that they can take their vacation. i'm just -- it's the vacation thing, that you know, i -- i get that this is how washington works and what debates are about. i don't get why they get to adjourn -- >> i think in the short term, this could be fixed pretty quickly. they would just need to come to an agreement. they don't even need to pull all the senators and members of congress back to washington necessarily. they have to come to an agreement. both the house and the senate have procedural ways to pull this off. >> kate, president obama said that might happen this week. is that likely? >> likely, i would not go that far. i would say speaker boehner issued a statement today, and it did not seem like he was so inclined to try to make this agreement, and it's not unheard of for the house speaker to call them all back in. nancy pelosi did that last year when she was -- last summer when she was speaker of the house. it doesn't seem like anyone is ready to blink and make that move at this moment. the idea of the vacation is frustrating for many people, but they can do this work while they are still on vacation and still going to their constituency events or whatever. they can get this done and can get it done quickly. >> right. >> they just don't want to at the moment. >> kate, paul, alex, thanks very much. follow me on facebook and twitter, already talking to folks on twitter about that. a lot of anger about thi this, @andersoncooper. an egyptian leader on a gurney in cage. he says he's not responsible, but how can he not be responsible in keeping you honest and taking back to the moments when terrorists try to threaten his regime. >> and jurors heard warren jeffs having sex with an underage victim. the most disturbing thing they have heard. more after this. 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[ whirring and beeping ] [ ding! ] and we give you a discount on both. sort of like two in one. how did you guys think of that? it just came to us. what? bundling and saving made easy. now, that's progressive. call or click today. egypt's former dictator went on trial today, and the images were extraordinary. tens of millions of egyptians watched on tv, the man who ruled them for decade lying on a medical gurney inside an iron cage. in there with him his two sons trying to block the cameras. his former interior minister and six cops. mubarak is charged with corruption and complicity in killings during the uprising that drove him from power. today when he was asked by the judge he said, quote, i deny them completely about the charges. keeping them honest, is that even remotely possible or plausible? mubarak ruled a police state for 30 years with a massive internal security machine that was able to put violent and often deadly mobs on the streets at will. he oversaw a secret police infamous for their use of brutality and torture. not responsible? remember, you saw it when pro-mubarak thugs suddenly turned up en masse to attack reporters and demonstrators starting the night of february 1st and we were on the air when the first thugs starts to arrive. >> behind us we have basically a rent a mob of pro-mubarak supporters who have been mobilized at this late hour to chant, you know, that the press are traitors and agents, and this is very much -- >> do you think these guys are paid to do this? >> i don't think there's any doubt about it. i've seen demonstrations like this in egypt for years. there are people who have such a stake in this regime that they are coming out like this. they are being paid perhaps to come out like this to show support for the mubarak regime. this is typical, for instance, of egyptian elections. oftentimes they come out in favor of mubarak, and it turns out that they have been paid 20 pounds apiece to do it. >> they started throwing rocks that night. the next day before full-on warfare against protesters, government thugs attacked reporters in the streets. my crew and i were attacked by thugs in kay re's liberation square. short time later more attackers, this time on camel-backs ramp age beating blooding anyone in their path. security forces and military surrounded liberation square. no one got in unless they were allowed in by the government. hard to see how stick-wielding mounted thugs could do what they did without government say so in a place like egypt and the mubarak propaganda machine was blaming the violence on foreigners and autoside agita agitators like al jazeera and israel and formenting new violence. that night we practically broadcast undercover from the floor. this is not how we planned to bring you tonight's program but the situation changes here minute by minute, in cairo especially today. given what we've seen today, this is just yet another development just in the last minute we've heard heavy fire in liberation square. we've got video that was taken just a short time ago, heavy caliber fire heard in the square. we'll talk to our ivan watson there in just a minute. i want to tell you we're broadcasting from a location that we thought was pretty safe up until about half an hour ago and after that heavy fire, we got a report that pro-mubarak forces have left the area around liberation square and have now fanned out into some other neighborhoods, and the security situation where we are has changed somewhat from the last 30 minutes or so. we've been advised to actually turn off our lights, get down on the floor and try to barricade ourselves in the area that we're in, so that's -- that's why we're doing this program like this tonight. it's not going to look very good over the next hour but i hope you bear with us because what has happened today in egypt on these streets has been nothing short of extraordinary. the entire situation has changed here in the last 12 hours. people have died who did not need to die. people will die tonight who do not need to die, and there were many people wounded today. we don't have actual numbers for you, but what we have seen has been nothing short of a pitched battle for the future of this country on the streets of this country outside the egyptian museum and inside and all around liberation square. literally barricaded with sofas and chairs inside an office at that point. that's just a small slice of what we could seek shelter from, but many egyptians weren't so lucky. amnesty international estimates 840 people were killed in the uprising. tens of millions of egyptians spent weeks in sheer terror, and many more spent their entire lives in fear of an absolute dictatorship. mubarak says he's not responsible. the former dictator claiming he wasn't responsible for the brutality and not responsible and shouldn't be held accountable. talked about it earlier with david kirkpatrick of the "new york times" and fareed zakaria, host of "fareed zakaria gps." to hear mubarak say he wasn't responsible for anything and didn't order attacks on protesters. when you're a dictator of a country for many, many years it seems ridiculous for someone to claim no responsibility for what was happening. >> the complicating factor here, anderson, he's almost certainly guilty of the charges that have been laid against him, but it still has the feeling of, i don't want to say a show trial, but a trial that is not fair. i wish that the egyptian government realized that this is really a very important moment for them. they need to get this right. >> david, that image of this once all powerful dictator reduced to a sickly man inside a cage has got to be an incredibly powerful image for the people of egypt. >> yeah, it's absolutely breathtaking. you've got to remember this is a country where there's never been a living ex-president much less a president or ex-president brought before the law. it's something that i think most egyptians -- i know most egyptians truly could not believe. >> fareed, how do you think the trial will play in other places where dictators are no doubt watching this very closely? >> it's not just in places where dictators are in trouble. this is a phenomenon across the arab world. everyone is watching it, and that's one of the reasons why i think it's so important that the egyptians do it in a way that makes it clear that this is an impartial process, that there is real due process, but there's no question that everyone around the arab world is watching now. it is having the effect of making a moammar gadhafi feel like why the hell should i leave? i'm going to end up in jail and get tried, but that's always one of the downsides of this kind of thing when you -- when you punish one of these dictators. >> david, leading up to the trial, there were all sorts of questions about whether mubarak was sick or how sick he was, maybe his doctors and defense team were exaggerated. do you think those questions were put to rest today, or do you think it remains a question of whether he's faking it? >> on the one hand for sure his defense team was exaggerating. they said he had cancer, had a stroke, was in a coma. none of those things are true. at the same time, it's just not plausible that somebody like mubarak, with his pride, his military, carried into a courtroom on a stretcher to compete for sympathy. there's no way that was staged and to a second to what fareed was staying, at every step the military tribunal running the country right now seems to be responding to political pressure from the street. yeah, there's nothing about this that seems particularly fair or well thought out. i don't think that botherses the egyptian people right now. >> do you think in fact, david, that this gives legitimacy in eyes of the egyptian people, legitimacy to the military government? >> i think very much so. i think a lot of egyptians, you know, last week were thinking these guys will never put their former boss on trial, and yet here it is, and it may be that they were forced into it by street demonstrations and a fear of continued unrest, but i think to most egyptians, the popular will has that kind of power. it's closer than they have ever been to the rule of law. >> you know, anderson, revolutions are very big phenomena, and they sometimes can take on a life of their own. >> right. >> and what's happening here in egypt is it's taken on a life of its own. public appetites have to be fed, and there is a public rage, an understandable public rage because of 30 or 40 or 50 years of dictatorship, and mubarak has come to symbolize it. this is something that they can do, feed the masses. >> we've also seen huge protests in which the military has cracked down on protesters, tortured protesters, done virginity checks on women. there's been a lot of outrag