Im Brooke Baldwin at the cnn headquarters in atlanta. Check out my blog for all of the latest interviews. Now we send you to washington. Cnns the situation room with wolf start right now. Brooke, thanks. President obama as the president s inner circle. Also, the fierce spread of the flu across the United States and now a shortage of a critical medicine used to treat it. Plus, prominent voices lending support to an unlikely idea of a trillion dollar coin. Im wolf blitzer. Youre in the situation room. Judgment, integrity, and friendship all cited by president obama as he nominated his chief of staff, jack lew, to be the next treasury secretary but the announcement is drawing attention to the makeup of the president s secondterm cabinet. Its on track to be dominated by men. Our White House CorrespondentBrianna Keilar is joining us from the white house. What is the white house saying about all of this . Reporter wolf, the white house has been asked about this quite a bit. White House Press Secretary jay carney has said that the president believes diversity is important and hes highlighted that there are a number of women serving in the white house and in the administration and indeed there are, wolf, and theres lack of topics in his cabinet. President obama choose a trusted insider to replace Timothy Geithner as treasury secretary. Under president clinton, he presided over three budget surpluses in a row. So for all of the talk out there about deficit reduction, making sure our books are balanced, this is the guy who did it three times. Reporter jack lew, obamas chief of staff and former budget director, has been by the president s side through bruising budget negotiations. But lew is not a darling of wall street. Speaker john boehner said he told the president , please dont send jack lew. During the franl jill debt ceiling negotiations of 2011. It was unbelievable, boehner said. At one point i told the president , keep him out of here. I dont need somebody who just knows how to say no. With the lew pick, all of the president s top four cabinet posts state, defendants, cia, and treasury will be white men. At every briefing this week, reporters have pepper pressed jay carney about what some have dubbed obamas white guy problem. This is a couple of appointments. I think it would be useful to wait and make judgments about this issue after the president has made the totality of the appointments that he will make in transition to a second term. Reporter of obamas 16 cabinet positions, only two are women. Kathleen sebelius and Homeland Security, janet napolitano. The labor and commerce are open and more will likely become so. Its an usual that can catch fire as we saw during the president ial campaign. I went to a number of womens groups and said can can you help us find folks and they brought us binders full of women. Reporter the white house is sensitive to this but there are other issues with the new cabinet in the east room as the president spoke glowingly of lew, he noted one exception. Lews signature which will appear on dollar bills. When this was highlighted yesterday in the press, i considered resending by offer to appoint him. Jack assured me hes going to make one letter legible in order not to debase our currency should he be confirmed as secretary of the treasury. Reporter by far the funniest moment of that ceremony today, wolf. But on the topic of diversity in the president s cabinet, there are a number of women whose names are being discussed as possibilities for positions that are now open or may become open, which includes Facebook Cheryl sandberg and former michigan governor jennifer granholm. But as of right now, those names are just speculation. Those names are just names as of now. All right. Well see what happens. Brianna, thank you. Lets go to our chief correspondent gloria borrow injury and ruth. Everyone is talking about your column titled, obama needs binders full of women. Among the headlines you did write this, to be clear, ive got nothing against white guys. Some of my best husbands are white guys. White guys get to be secretary of state, too, and john kerry will be the first in 16 years. But to look at the most important jobs in the government in 2013 and see such lack of diversity is just so drearily disappointing. How disapointing is it . Maybe there will be a bunch of women in these other openings . Not only will there be a whole bunch of women, i know this will be. But the reason its fair rather than waiting to see who gets commerce or who the next head of the Small Business administration is, is that these are, and pardon my language, the big boy jobs. These are the four jobs that really, really count and to have no women in them, as i said, its not outrageous. Im not accusing the president of being sexist or not value women but it really is disappointing now in 2013. And its disappointing for you, in particular, because what a difference four years makes. We went back and got a clip. This is what you said on the pbs news hour in november 2008. One of the other things that strikes me is you look at the effortless diversity thats being created. At that time, you were pretty impressed. I was on the team. Yeah, you were im really glad you found that clip because one of the things that i was excited about back then was the effortless part of the diversity, that we werent scrounging for women. We werent scrounging for africanamericans. The pipeline had come up 20 years ago, president bill clinton when he was president elect had a famous eruption of his temper at the bean counters who were complaining about lack of women in little rock. But its been 20 years. Theres been a generation since then. And it ought to have been easy. In fact, it would have been easy to find women. Imagine what the stories would look like now if susan rice had been nominated to be secretary of state and michelle florinoi was the First Defense secretary. Im told that they are looking for a woman for commerce. Im sure they are all very qualified. And then you say, oh, they needed a woman and they are putting that woman in a job because shes a woman. Well, thats not a good storyline for them. Or for people like you and me. Right. Exactly. And then the other question i have is, how much does the president , the top people listen to the women who are there . Is it a question of numbers of women or is it a question of influence of women . I mean, you could argue that valley jarrett is the closest person on the senior staff to the president , long time friend close to the president and close to the first lady but how much do the two of the three deputies chief of staff are women. Whats their impact . I cant tell you, ruth, how many Democratic Women have whispered, said to me and they are pretty upset about this why does the president decide to fight for chuck hagel to be the secretary of defense . Why did he decide to fight for jack lew to be secretary of treasury. He didnt fight for susan rice to be the secretary of state. Thats a good question and i have been stunned to your point and glorias question about the number of Democratic Women inside and outside the administration at very high levels that ive heard from today basically saying, you go girl, thank you for writing that column. I think valley jarrett clearly is, if not the most influential, one of the most influential women in the administration. At the same time, there is definitely a sense that this is that its a boys club, that the president is the head of. And women do feel excluded. They did release another picture today. A very different picture showing the staff. Lets show our viewers. The picture they released today because it shows a lot of women in that picture the other day in the New York Times picture. We saw a whole bunch of guys. Where the girls are. Right there in the oval office. Of course they drk wolf. The other picture that they had with all men, besides Valerie Jarretts leg was a problem of optics for them. I think theyve corey owe graphed this whole rollout of the cabinet in a way that is less than optimal and that could be because they are in the middle of the fiscal cliff but i think one of the reasons that we saw jack lew alone today is because if you had the whole National Economic team, you would have had the same problem. This is a picture that they released. I dont know who at the white house made that decision. Maybe ruth, youre an excellent reporter. Who made the decision . Im an opinion columnist now. But the thing thats really striking is i had an email from administration officials, that was predictable. Excuse me, if that was predictable, why didnt you guys insulated yourselves a little bit . They did. They put out a fact sheet. After the fact. 50 of the people in the staff are women, you know, on and on. Roll it out with as i use the word tablo when you have more people to name. Ruth, thanks very much. Im going to make one prediction. Yeah. There will be more women. I hope there will be. Its not only good for the president but its good for the country as well. Thanks very much. This afternoon, Vice President joe biden met with the National Rifle association as well as other gun owner and sporting groups. The nra released a statement, we were disappointed with how little this meeting had to do with keeping our children safe and attached to the Second Amendment. They said that its unfortunate that the administration continues to push on failed solutions to our nations most pressing problems. Biden says his task force on gun violence will send it is recommendations to president obama by next tuesday. While the Vice President says he hasnt come to any specific conclusions yet, he sees an emerging consensus on certain ideas. There is a surprising so far, a surprising recurrence of suggestions that we have universal background checks, not just closed to gun show loophole but total universal background checks, including private sales. Assault weapons are another possible target for new gun restrictions. Cnn crime and justice correspondent joe johns visited a gun store today and will join us in a little bit to discover what turns an ordinary gun into an assault weapon and the changes that may be coming. An unlikely idea is gaining momentum. Minting a trillion dollar coin to avert a debt ceiling crisis. Plus, a shortage of the medicine used to treat some of the most vulnerable flu victims. 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A fierce flu season and now a trum belg shortage of a medicine used to treat some of the most vulnerable victims. Tamaflu which helps alleviate symptoms as demand picks up dramatically. Tomorrow the centers for Disease Control and prevention will release new numbers on the out brake. The most recent report is that the flu is widespread in 42 states up from 31 states the week before with more than 2,000 people hospitalized. The situation is so severe in boston that the mayor has declared a Public Health emergency. Dr. Anthony fauci of the National Institute of health told me the flu came on early, towards the end of november, and spread a steep trajectory unseen since the flu season of 2003. Joining us now is cnns chief medical correspondent dr. Sanjay gupta. Put this flu in surge cases in a proper perspective for us. In other words, how serious is it compared with last year . Well, last year was a pretty mild year. If you take boston as an example that you were just giving, wolf, at this time last year they had about 70 documented cases and now they have 700. In that one city its literally ten times worse and its just more significant all around the country. Id also say because of what dr. Fauci was mentioning, when you have a surge in flu cases early on, other viruses are circulating as well. Norovirus, something known as isv. All of these different viruses at the same time affecting the country and that can make the problem even worse. Typically flu peaks in february. The question now, wolf, is is this peaking and then going to taper off as well, which would be good news, or are the numbers going up or going to stay high for a while through the flu season . I cant tell you how many people tell me all the time, im not getting a flu shot because i think it will give me the flu or will make me sick. Whats the response to these folks . Thats not true. Thats the response. Thats a myth. And, you know, i feel like you have to state it almost that candidly. Look, the flu shot itself contains a dead virus. And you know me, wolf, i dont take a lot of medications or encoura encourage them but the flu shot is a good way at protecting yourself against the flu. Its a dead virus. You cant get the flu from a flu shot. A couple things to keep in mind. It takes two weeks for the protection to become complete. So youre not going to get protection right away. Also, its about 60 effective. So there are people who will get the flu shot and then still get the flu but they are not getting it from the flu shot. And finally, when you get the flu shot, wolf, the whole point of the flu shot is to sort of teach your immune system to treat that virus as foreign. The next time it sees it, it can attack it. You might feel cruddy after a day or two. You might get soreness around the arm and not feel well. Its not the flu but your bodys own immune system. Finally, even if you get the flu having had the flu shot, your symptoms may be milder than they otherwise would be. So youre still getting the flu but youre getting some benefit as a result of having that shot. There are some people, sanjay, who should not get a flu shot, right . Absolutely. We talk about people, for example, children under the age of 6 months. Certainly people who have had reaction in some way to the flu shot in the past. If you have a fever right now or are sick, now is not the time to get a flu shot. Eggs the medium that they make these flu shots in is eggs. If you have an allergy to chicken eggs you should not get the flu shot. Again, you are your own best judge. If youve had a specific reaction to a flu shot in the past, that would be a reason not to get it as well. The centers for device control in atlanta expect up to 50,000 deaths from this flu season. 50,000 people could die. Thats a very scary number. How does a person go from having fevers and aches to actually dying . Well, theres a few specific things and when you think about the vast majority of people who get the flu, its going to be a if you bad days. They should stay at home, get plenty of rest and fluids. There are certain swayings that are going to prompt at least a call to the dock did for, if not a visit. People should not do this without thinking about it. If you have a sudden onset of dizziness, for example difficulty bretting, pressure in the chest area. Wolf, this last one, which is the return of a fever, i think its really important. The reason is, wolf, lets say you had the flu, you get over it and then a couple days later your fever returns. What that means to doctors typically is that during the time that person had the flu, the immune system was somewhat weakened and now they got set up for a bacterial infection. Often times a staff caulk committees infection in the lungs. Thats a red flag and needs to be treated. What i just described there is the most common way that young people die from this, by getting the secondary infection, wolf. Dr. Sanjay gupta, thank you very much. You got it. Anytime. A disappointing end to Bill Richardsons trip to north korea. The latest on what he and one of the men who run google have to say about their trip. Find thousands of big deals now. At officemax. But since ive been on alli, am i on this one . Nope. Am i on this one . No, no, no, no, no. I am on this one. [ male announcer ] for every 2 pounds you lose through diet and exercise alli can help you lose one more by blocking some of the fat you eat. Simple. Effective. Beltfriendly. Lets fight fat with alli. Learn more, lose more at letsfightfat. Com. Learn more, lose more isurprise. Its eating less. To losing weight. Im hungry just thinking about it. Thank goodness for new slimful. One delicious, 90calorie slimful and a glass of water, like before dinner, helps keep me satisfied for hours. So instead of this much, i only need this much. And slimful tastso good. I dont even miss dessert. Slimful and a glass of water. Eating less is a beautiful thing. Googles executive chairman eric schmidt wraps up its controversial visit to north korea today. He complained the trip was illplanned and not helpful. Schmidt defended his actions after arriving in china. Googles chief eric schmidt is certainly the highest profile businessman weve seen visit north korea since kim jongun took over. Mr. Schmidt said he he went to north korea to talk about and push for a free and fair internet, a concept completely alien to pyongyang. Their decision to be virtually isolated is very much going to affect their physical world and so forth. And it will make it harder for them to catch up economically. We made that alternative very, very clear. Schmidt has shown the computer while in pyongyang. Currently there are just a lucky few who have access to a computer can only connect to an internal internet. Only the handful of the elite can Access International websites. Bill richardson was also on the trip and said it was productive, although the u. S. State department characterized the trip as illtimed, coming a month after north korea launched a rocket to international condemnation. Richardson, though, said he