from the shooting site. this is a tragedy that has sent shock waves through this entire community. officer ramos was a 14-year member of this church, he was an usher, he was well known, and he was loved. preparations now underway for the wake that will begin at 2:00. off in the distance out of camera frame, a large screen television monitor is being set up, and floral arrangements have already started to arrive. at 7:00 this evening a memorial service is slated to take place, and then tomorrow at this very same location there will be the funeral. yesterday a member of officer ramos' family visited the makeshift memorial there. they talked to some of the officers who have been standing vigil. officer ramos leaves behind a wife and two children. it is expected that as many as 25,000 police officers from around the country and canada are going to attend services. one of them is detective jason, which riparti from texas. >> to stand up with all the new york city officers and officers from around the country and to show our support. >> reporter: this is a time of not only mourning for the nypd, but also caution. threats against police continue. not far from where i am standing, police a short time ago searched a home, and in it they found weapons and bulletproof vests. they were following up a tip that a man was overheard on a telephone making threats against police. 38-year-old elvin -- [inaudible] has now been charged with felony weapons possession as well as aggravated harassment. he is now being held in lieu of half a million dollars' bail. and lastly, leland, no word yet on the funeral for the other fallen officer, wenjian liu. his relatives will be arriving from china, and some of the logistics have delayed making those arrangements. leland: tragic all around. david lee miller live in queens, we'll check back. molly: president obama marking the end of more than a decade of combat operations in afghanistan with a christmas visit to marines at a base in hawaii thanking them for their sacrifices. peter doocy joins us live from washington. >> reporter: this is the last time many more than servicemen and women will be deployed to afghanistan and away from their families during the holidays because once 2015 gets here, the pentagon is leaving behind just north of 10,000 u.s. troops, and they are not sticking around more combat missions. their job will be to get the afghan security forces up to speed so they can protect their own turf. >> this is an important year. we've been in continuous war now for almost 13 years, over 13 years, and next week we will be ending our combat mission. afghanistan has a chance to rebuild its own country. we are safer. it's not going to be a source of terrorist attacks again. >> reporter: the president's remarks were very well received. in fact, the christmas day crowd at that marine base in hawaii erupted with a lot hooah when he was all done. and while christmas provided a cheerful reaction, there's still a lot the american military has to consider. there's isis in syria and iraq, kidnapping and beheading westerners and trying to inspire lone wolves, and the taliban is still active. in fact, just two weeks ago taliban militants in pakistan assaulted a school there killing more than 100 young students. the president wasn't the only one sharing christmas with service members. the vice president, joe biden, was actually just outside d.c. at walter reed where he greeted injured american heros and the doctors and nurses treating them senator john mccain was in kabul where he met with americans stationed in afghanistan. he also held meetings with key afghan officials. molly? >> the peter. thank you. >> we oh our troops a debt of grad taughted thank you very much. >> jeb bush is putting making moves to put his 2016 presidential campaign in order. he cut ties with businesses including a company that profited from obamacare. carl cameron is live with washington what is next. carl? >> reporter: hi, leland. jeb bush accelerated campaign cycle for everybody. into the only cut his ties with tenet healthcare, a big hospital concern with 80 hospitals in 14 states and urgent claire clinics but cut his contacts with barclays, the big brittish bank. he has done a number of things to get things going. he is making it very clear he is seriously considering he is making a run for president. he announced a exploratory committee. that put tremendous pressure on all his potential rivals. they will compete for money jeb bush can create. the bush donor base has been in making best part of last 20 years with three presidencies. his father had one term. george w. bush of course had two. there are number of things he is doing to make a claim for that, making his correspondence as governor of florida transparent. he will release 250,000 emails. that will give lots of people tremendous amounts of material to scrutinize. including emails from voters who suggested when he was governor he was not conservative enough. by touting his transparency like this what mr. bush does is put a lot of pressure on chris christie who is governor of new jersey. had great year as republican governor association. has been enboing up on foreign policy, building a big presidential portfolio. still waiting for feds to end investigation of so-called george washington "bridgegate" scandal. when you combine mr. bush and christie, establishment candidates with rest of former and current governors. there are a record nine of them who are looking at running for governor. that is astonishing number. it raises questions about all the speculation about mitt romney getting in. with this many current and former governors in the race, there is very real possibility that mitt romney, who leads most of the polls will ultimately decide not to get n he said he wouldn't. but he hasn't exactly closed-door. his advisors are pushing hard for him as you know, leland. for governors, jeb bush and chris christie is making a lot of noise. chris christie will go to a cattle call for presidential candidates in iowa. what it is called the freedom forum. christie accepted along with ted cruz, rick perry, mike huckabee and rick santorum. in less than a month we'll have a first gathering of would-be presidents for 2016 leland. >> the chess match begins. carl cameron in washington covering it all. thanks, carl. >> as usual the presidential race expected to come down to a battle for key swing states. shift in voter demographics could shake things up. jonah goldberg, senior editor at "national review" and fox news contributor. lynn sweet, washington bureau chief for the "chicago sun-times." thanks for joining us. >> thank you. >> we heard a great interview with carl cameron. he went through a is are of all candidates we'll possibly seeing. people start to jump in the next six months or so once 2015 gets here. who do you think will jump in? when they do, who has the best chance at this point in time, lynn? >> i think mitt romney is one who will not jump in. i know what carl just said and i agree with him. to the degree that mitt romney implied he will get in if the field is cleared and you saw those names. no one will back down just to give somebody a free shot. so i think the ones who are maybe marginal are not even going to be dissuaded because, as we all know. running for president gives you a platform that you otherwise would not have. leah: >> absolutely, jonah your thoughts? >> agree with lynn. i think mitt romney will not get n jeb makes much more difficult for him to get in. he will soak up a lot of establishment donor money. a fresher face than mitt romney which is the best thing you can say about jeb in terms of the fresh face department. ted cruz is obviously going to get in. i think, what could be happening we'll actually see, what you sort of standard model for a lost presidential elections on the republican side, a lot of the sort of conservative base guys dividing up the base o the establishment guy, basically having a much clearer path. so we'll see jeb soak up a lot of that money. probably chasing marco rubio out. chasing out mitt romney who i didn't think would really get in anyway. maybe chris christie will be less, less able to keep going because he will not have the money. jeb might actually take this thing. and that will cause real dismay and talk of a revolt on the republican right. >> no matter who actually jumps into this race they will gather a team around them and that team will look at the map and where they can pick up all the votes they need. shifting demographics in this country, that is one of the big things we've been following. which side, the democrats or the republicans, stand to gain from shifting demographics. where is it the most challenging, lynn? >> i think most challenging remains florida because you have, you have a very diverse hispanic population. it is, it has many political aspects to it along, the i-4 corridor in the middle of state that runs from the gulf to the ocean. it is a wonderfully complex, polly ethnic state. i think that is always the place to watch. while demographics may shift they're always shifting in a way sometimes makes for it less predictable. having said that, i think the remarkable thing is that the swing states in 2016 looks like they will be pretty much the swing states that we've had in the last three elections. >> jonah, your thoughts on the map? >> yeah. it is true if the republicans don't win florida, and the democrats hold the same states they have held since 1992, republicans lose. republicans have to win florida or steal some other states from the democratic coalition. the demographics thing has been a little overdone. one of the most interesting things that came out of the 2014 midterms that barack obama has overseen massive flight of the white working class away from the democratic party. and if the democrats can't win a sufficient chunk of the white working class, in 2016, it doesn't matter if they win large numbers of hispanics and large numbers of african-americans. this is still a largely white electorate in this country and if you don't have the white working class in the democratic column to significant extent, there are a lot of states you just can't win. be interesting to see come 2016 if obama is still unpopular, if people don't feel like the economy is going great, you could see the election go to republicans just on those ground alone. >> thank you so much. jonah goldberg, lynn sweet for joining us here today. we appreciate your insight. >> thank you. >> court documents are shedding new light on the veterans affairs scandal. now, claims that senior officials in washington new year's ago about major issues at the phoenix va hospital. plus this. [shouting] >> city leaders are begging for calm after a fatal police shooting sparked new riots just miles from ferguson, missouri, as well as other parts of the country. the mayor of berkeley, missouri, joins us with his message. molly: we call it the day after christmas. much of the rest of the world call it boxing day where shoppers hit the stores in herds. retailers bring in millions in boxing day frenzies in u.k. and australia. they are hoping to score that major post-christmas bargain. in prague, dozens of swimmers celebrating the day braving freezing waters. >> of course you feel cold. everybody but, you can live it and afterwards, say 30 minutes after you get out of the water, the blood begins to circulate in the body and it is very positive feeling. >> well, you know, some swimmers they're racing for nearly a thousand feet in that water. they train ad year long for this competition. i don't know, you do what you want the day after christmas i suppose. leland: new and disturbing developments are coming in about the crisis at the department of veterans affairs about who knew what when. court documents show senior officials found out as early as 2009 about dangerous delays in treatment and even falsified waiting lists at the phoenix va hospital. doug mckelway live in washington with new information. what it means, doug. >> leland, what makes it so significant, it contradicts the narrative that people at highest levels of the va were unaware of the waiting list problems before they surfaced in the press. also suggests that the problems at troubled phoenix va hospital predated the tenure of director sharon hellman. she was dismissed from her job last month and is now suing to get it back. "the new york times" cites sworn statements of susan bowers who oversaw dozens of va facilities in the western u.s. she said even before sharon hellman was appointed to her job as director in phoenix an audit showed that they did not put patients on electronic waiting list and was there for out of compliance. bowers said there was no such list in phoenix even while hellman's predecessor certified the hospital was in compliance. according to the times bowers's sworn statement said she was pressured by her bosses in washington to report the hospital was in compliance after she report it was not. bowers statement also said she briefed va secretary eric shinseki often about the patient backlog but the problems went unaddressed because she was told to there was no money to lease more space to handle the back locks. the times also reports that an administrative law judge found this week, it was quote, more likely than not at least some senior agency leaders were aware or should have been of nationwide problems getting veterans scheduled for timely appointments. in a partial vindication of hellman, the judge, his name is steven mish found that the va didn't provide enough evidence that hellman should have been fired over conditions at phoenix. the judge upheld her firing anyway on the ground she received favors from a health care industry consultant. leland, back to you. >> stunning as this continues to develop. doug mckelway live in washington. thanks, doug. >> another possible hack attack on christmas morning stopping kid from playing their brand new pray stations and xboxs. we have a report on this. dangers journalists face in war zones. what one new report is revealing. leland: new report shows journal system becoming increasingly dangerous overseas especially in the middle east. according to a media advocacy group at least 60 journalists have been killed this year alone, including americans james foley, steven sotloff. isis terrorists beheaded both of them and put them online. joining us judith miller, pulitzer-prize-winning investigative author and fox news contributor. and. judith, i want to start with you, in the sense that for so long, journalists were considered independent observers. both sides of any conflict more or less agreed that journalists were off limits. if something bad happened that was the risk but they weren't targeted. when did journalists came from being off limits and independent to being fair game in the sides of the conflict. >> that began with the rise of islamic fundamentalism in the middle east. when we saw the beheading of danny pearl. i've been covering it for about three decades, the rule was, terrorists wanted a lot of people watching and not a lot of people dead and that journalists were useful because as you pointed out, we delivered the message. both of those assumptions and rules of the game changed after danny pearl. after nine eleven, think i once you were working in an area where there were taliban or us lame mick militants you had to assume they would consider a picture of you being behead ad far more persuasive warning to americans in the west than anything that you might write. so the landscape has totally changed. it is so much more dangerous now for journalists. in some countries they should be considered no-go zones for americans like syria. leland: concept of denied environments. peter, i i want to talk to you. you spent so much time in the middle east reporting on these issues taking a lot of personal risks get in there. when you hear judith talk about denied environments, places like syria, the only place journalists turn to is youtube, activities on the ground to report messages. no way to vet the information, that kind of thing. tell me about challenges for getting the story right when you can't be there. >> i certainly would say that journalists do use youtube or social media to report on these kind of no-go zones. i think that can lead to a lot of potential inaccuracy or mistakes because you can't verify the information. so if you're covering a story like syria today you're limited to the border regions in the cities where you can contact refugees or activists, people coming in or out but certainly does create a substantial amount of difficulty because you're not there to able to go in and verify. so you do have opportunities to talk to people first-hand and kind of cross-check with what they're saying. if you can't get into the actual country you're reporting on, it imposes considerable limitations on the quality and caliber of reporting you can do. i don't think that means things will be inaccurate. you just might not be able to go as in depth as you would, were you there, actually witnessing the events that you're trying to report on. >> judith, you witnessed such a sea change in journalism when you talked about 30 years ago at your time with some news organizations. is cost cutting to blame for this? no longer companies have bureaus in the countries? there is not damascus bureau of "the new york times" or with sj. there is so much reliance on freelancers and stringers who save money. james foley was saving money. at an internet cafe, rather than his own uplink, those kind of things? >> absolutely. this also plays a factor. terrorist insurance and body armor and protection if you're buying it yourself. journalist, especially young journalists always want to get the story and always want to be the first. that leads them, especially those less experienced to take risks no one should be taking anymore in these areas. i think, leland for me, there is a question that is raised on part of the news organizations that send meese people out or use their material. and that is, are we encouraging kind of reckless behavior? because at this point if you're operating and trying to report from a place like syria, you're taking a real, real risk and, i know that we've talked about how difficult it toys verify the stories that you're getting but there comes a point where you just have to say it is not safe and not only won't i go, i won't use material that puts fellow journalists in danger. we had one quarter of journalists killed were international reporters. and a lot of them were young -- leland: excellent point. to your point, only has to be one mistake, one wrong move and that's it. the stakes have become so high. two people who know that well, judith miller and also tom peter. appreciate you both joining us. thanks. >> thank you, leland. leland: molly? molly: another black teenager shot by police in a missouri town a few miles from ferguson, but the mayor of berkeley berke, missouri says the case of is not like the shooting of michael brown. we'll talk to him next. twitter in the sights of sony. why the entertainment giant is threatening to sue the social media site. two weeks later. look, credit karma-- are you talking to websites again? this website says "free credit scores." oh, credit karma! yeah it's actually free. look, you don't have to put in your credit card information. whew! credit karma. really. free. molly: right now a quick look what's still to come in this hour of "happening now." long lines this weekend as sony pictures decide to release the interview despite threats from north korea. sony is taking twitter to task. we'll tell you why. this is 10th anniversary of at tsunami that killed a quarter of a million people. how they are honoring them today. leland. leland: well, santa c