captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> woodruff: good evening. i'm judy woodruff. retailers and bargain hunters kicked off the holiday shopping season today. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. on the newshour tonight, we talk to economics writer daniel gross about consumer spending and the prospects for a broader rebound. >> woodruff: and as cyber monday approaches, we tell the story of one of the largest internet hijackings ever, when web traffic was routed through china. >> if i was a large enterprise or a large organization involved in critical infrastructure, if i was a government, i would be sweating bullets currently. >> brown: then, from port-au- prince, npr's jason beaubien

previews sunday's presidential election in haiti, as the country struggles to recover from the earthquake and a cholera epidemic. >> woodruff: mark shields and david brooks offer their analysis of the week's news. >> brown: and on the day after thanksgiving, ray suarez talks to david beckmann, winner of this year's world food prize about feeding the hungry at home and abroad. >> what we need to finished job, to overcome hunger andç poverty is moreç organized give a damn. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's newshour. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by:

and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. çç >> brown: retailers hoped to capitalize today on what's expected to be a more profitable holiday shopping season than last year's. but the big holiday push comes amid continuing jitters over the direction of the economy. as much a thanksgiving tradition as travel and leftovers, the day-after shopping blitz called "black friday"-- based on retailers' hopes their yearly balance sheets will go into the black-- pushed shoppers across the nation out the door this morning. >> we are going to leave here, and then kohl's opens at 3:00, and a couple of other stores open at 5:00, and then the mall

opens at 7:00, and then just go all day. >> brown: lines wrapped around stores as diehard bargain hunters camped out for early- morning deals, especially on toys and consumer electronics. >> i do run track and field, so i know where the tvs are and i know how many steps it takes to get there. >> we opened at 5:00 am. my first people lined up wednesday night at 10:00 pm. so, they were in line all day thursday and here until friday morning. >> brown: despite an unemployment rate that remainsç stuck at 9.6%, analystsç anticipate one of the most heavily trafficked fridays after thanksgiving in years. the national retail federation forecast that up to 138 million people could hit stores this weekend, and predicted a 2% increase in sales over last year. hoping to offset 2009's disappointing numbers, retailers are trying everything to get customers dollars, offering a rash of sales and door-buster specials. some stores went further and

started on thanksgiving day itself, including sears, which opened its doors on the holiday for the first time in its 123- year history. shoppers' willingness to line up and spend is a closely watched benchmark for the economy as a whole. >> retail and restaurants represent one in five jobs in america, so if we do well, we grow. then, we're going to be the ones that will start to lead us into a recovery.çç >> brown: according to new data, consumer confidence rates also ticked up in october. spending may be picking up, but not yet to pre-recession levels. many of the customers we met today reflected that. >> it's made us more aware of what we're buying. we can't just go out and buying anything frivolously. you have to plan on buying larger purchases. >> you can't do as much, so that's why black friday is so important. the prices are just great. >> well, i think i am shopping a little bit smarter. other days, other years, i would just shop till i drop, but now. it's a little bit smarter.

>> thankfully, we're in a pretty good position right now. we've been in the same place pretty much the last couple of years. so my budget hasn't changed very much, but i do need to stick to the budget. >> brown: for online retailers, thanksgiving proved to be a banner day, with sales up 33% over the same day last year.ç even more consumers are expected to join the virtual rush next week on #syber monday" deals. >> but most of the shopping i do will be online this year. probably in the next week or so, i'll pick up my shopping pace and purchase more things. >> brown: but today's start to the shopping season did little to help the markets today focused on the global economy. the dow jones industrial average dropped 95 points to end the day at 11,092, and the nasdaq slipped more than eight points to close at 2,534. for the week, the dow lost 1%, but the nasdaq gained more than half a percent. and for more on the spending season and the larger economy, i talked a short time ago to

daniel gross, economics editor and columnist at yahoo finance. >> brown: daniel gross, welcome to you. so the predictions this year have been fairly positive. what's the record, tell us about such predictions. >> well, in the last few years at a time when the economy is changing gears, these predictions have actually been quite poor. in 80ee they projected things would be okay. and there was quite a sharp drop in sales. last year they predicted that, you know, there would just be maybe more of a shrinkage and there was actually some growth. so just as with marketó @v forecasts andç with overall forecasts of gdp growth, the forecasters tend to get behind the curve in these numbers. >> now, we all talk and i guess i'll use the word hype black friday every year, year after year. how much of it does it really matter to the retail season and to the larger economy? >> you know, i think matters more to the media than it does to the retailers overall. i think what we want to keep

our eyes on is really the trends. how are sales in september and october, november, in the months and weeks leading up to that. that tends to focus and point the way as to how thing goes in september. if you had a bad few months in the economy and retail sales in the fall, you're to the going to get a good christmas season regardless of what happens on black friday. and if things are looking up in september, october, november, again regardless of what happens on black friday, you're probably going to get a good overall christmas shopping season. >> brown: and what retail sectors are you looking to as the key to tell you about months for the economy? >> sure, well, one of the big trends is that the rich continue to do very well in this economy. they pulled back their spending in 80ee and '09 so you saw stores like saks or neiman marcus having big reductions in holiday sales. and all indications is the high end is back. wall street is paying bonuses again, the markets are buoying so people think

their wealth has grown. so i would expect to see good results from the tiffanies of its world and nordstrom and those that cater to the middle, i would say that they will, do better than they did last year but they will not be reporting fantastic results as they did in '05 and '06 when everybody felt richer due to the housing market and stock market. >> brown: i think you referred in your last column to this as the 207 heavy economy. you still see that happening out there? -- top heavy economy. >> very much so, but with the caveat that you know, the people in the middle are doing, i think,ç marginallyç better than they were a year ago there are a million more people who have payroll jobs in november 2010 than did in november 2009. and some other signs of financial distress, credit card delinquencies, are just signs that outside of housing, that financial stress while still at a very high level by historical measures, is lower than it was last year and has been coming down over the course of this year. and that tends to support a

higher level of consumer spending. >> brown: now pars the numbers on-line for us. that is something we all of course have been looking at year over year here as it goes up. where are we now? >> well, this is another reason that i think it's possible to make too much of black friday. with every passing year more of the retail activity takes place on-line. whether it's on cybermonday as they call go it or generally throughout the year. e-commerce today is about 8% of total retail sales. but that figure is growing. so regular overall vatailç sales may grow 3% a year but on-line sales are growing 10 and 11% a year so with each passing year basically what you see in the stores on black friday while still the overwhelming amount of activity is kind of less and less as a percentage. so a lot of growth. a lot of the real activity will be taking place on-line. >> brown: and again when you look at the big picture.

we always talk about consumer spending as being the most important driver to the u.s. economy, there has been some talk in recent times about whether that is still true or whether it might be less true in coming years. where do you see that? how important is it? >> well, the rule of thumb that economists say is that consumer activity is 70% of the u.s. economy which is a very high level that is one of the reasons that we had such a sharp drop in overall economic growth in late '08 and early '09 because the consumers just stopped spending. the economy is changing shape. we are at the margins gettinging a little more from things like energy,çç from agriculture, a little bit more from manufacturing, from exports than we were a couple of years ago and a little bit less from consumer spending but it's not a dramatic change. in other words, maybe instead of 70% it's only 69 or 68 percent. it would take many years of this type of activity, of consumers kind of holding back and of other sectors

rising to the foreto get a substantial change in the shape of our economy. >> brown: daniel gross, thanks for joining us. enjoy the rest of the holiday. >> thank you. >> we turn from on-line >> woodruff: coming up, we turn from online shopping to online security, and the case of a cyber hijacking. plus haiti's upcoming elections; shields and brooks; and the winner of the world food prize. but first, the other news of the day. here's hari sreenivasan in our newsroom. >> sreenivasan: new rounds of artillery fire rang out inside north korea today, but none reached the south. at the same time, north korean state media warned u.s. and south korean plans for joint military exercises are pushing the region to the "brink of war". we have a report from john sparks of independent television news.çç

>> reporter: america's top general in the region he had come to yungpong island to see and be seen. in full fatigues, general walter sharp made his inspection, three days after the north korean bombardment their long distance guns took the lives of four and leveled many of the islands buildings. >> we and the united nations command will investigate this completely, and will call on north korea to stop any future attacks. >> reporter: his investigation was brief. north korea was in breach of a peace treaty signed 57 years ago, he said. this, exactly what his south korean hosts wanted to hear. yet their enemy to the north would not be silenced. a few minutes after the general's departure, north korea fired several rounds from an artillery gun. a few puffs of smoke, seen on the horizon, was enough to send south korean troops scrambling back into position. the attack on yunpyong island has unsettled many here in the south. north korea's leader, kim jong- il, is certainly enemy number one, but these protestors in seoul are also frustrated with

their own political leaders, who are accused of weakness. that view is shared by manyç are accused of weakness. that view is shared by manyç north koreans who have escaped we met one such defector called kim young-il this morning. he's now got a job in seoul, but a few years ago, he didn't have enough to eat. he says north korean leader kim jong-il and his son and likely successor, kim jong-un, are influenced by and dependent on the military. the south koreans must risk an escalation of hostilities and respond more forcefully, he says. >> ( translated ): the south korean president was hesitant and it makes people anxious. it doesn't make any sense, they're letting north korean get away with it again. >> reporter: temporary shrines have been set-up honoring the south korean servicemen who lost their lives on the island, and many worry there could be more when the military holds joint exercises with the americans in two days time.

>> sreenivasan: a pentagon spokesman today defended the upcoming exercises against criticism from china, saying they are aimed at deterring north korea. the portuguese parliament approved its budget for next year with a host of tough spending cuts. portugal is trying to avoid a bailout from the european union, like the ones greece and ireland have already accepted.ç portugal's deficit reached 9.3% last year, the fourth highest oç the eurozone nations. after today's vote, prime minister jose socrates said portugal had no choice but to tighten its belt. >> there is no room to take measures that aren't tough. politicians that only have the best interests of the country at heart should understand that these measures are absolutely necessary. of course some politicians only think of their own interests and the interests of their parties but this is not the moment to think about that. this is the moment to think about the country. this budget defends our country. >> sreenivasan: banks in ireland were hit with downgrades today, one all the way to junk bond

status. standard and poor's credit ratings agency lowered their status in the wake of the $113 billion rescue by the e.u. and i.m.f. scientists estimate more than 600,000 people worldwide are killed by secondhand smoking every year. that's according to the first- ever study looking at the impact across 192 countries. it was published in the british medical journal "lancet". the numbers include deaths from heart and respiratory diseases and lung cancer. the study found that the highest numbers of people exposed to secondhand smoke are in europe and asia. three teenage boys who survived 50 days lost in the south pacific on a small aluminum boaç returned home today. the trio arrived undernourished, severely dehydrated, and badly sunburned. they told rescuers they stayed alive by drinking rainwater and eating coconuts, raw fish, and a seagull. the teenagers set off from their home island north of samoa on october 5. a fishing trawler rescued them wednesday hundreds of miles away.

president obama was injured during a pickup basketball game today. he received 12 stitches in his lip after an opposing player accidentally elbowed him in the face. the president was seen leaving fort mcnair dabbing his lip with gauze. he'd been playing at the military post in washington with friends and family. late today, the white house identified the person who hit the president as rey decerega, who works for the congressional hispanic caucus institute. those are some of the day's major stories. now, back to judy. >> woodruff: as holiday shoppers flock to the web to make purchases, new questions about internet security are surfacing. last week, a congressionally chartered commission released a report about what china's rise means for the u.s. economy and security. included in the findings were the details of a little-known incident involving the hijacking of online data by a firm owned by the chinese government. ray suarez tells the story. >> suarez: at a communications company outside washington, d.c., computer network engineers monitor internet traffic.

normally, the internet works by swiftly finding the shortest, most efficient trip between two computers anywhere on earth. electronic routers direct the traffic flow, insuring the shortest path, like these greenç lines here. but back in april, electronic communication looking for the shortest route was sent through china. watch the red line. for 18 minutes, the traffic on 35,000 to 50,000 computer networks elsewhere in the world began flowing toward china, before getting routed to its final destination. china telecom had created a massive detour. but traffic didn't stop. the affected computer connections took just a tiny fraction of a second longer. whether someone was logging into check a bank balance, sending a child's photo to grandma, or shopping online, the net still worked. however, at the computer operations center outside washington, d.c., engineers

noticed this internet routing phenomenon immediately. their computer screens lit up with red alerts. >> we noticed the sudden change. during the period, there were alarms that went off. >> suarez: one of the architects of the modern internet, rodney joffe, said this diversion was a very big deal. he says it was caused when computer routers in china belonging to china telecom began signaling to other computer routers on the internet that they could provide the quickest path between different computers. >> they, all of a sudden, began announcing the fact that they were an optimal path to about 15% of the destinations on the internet.çç that, in fact, they were a way to get to a large number of destinations on the internet, when, in fact, they were not. we've never seen that on this scale before, ever. >> suarez: joffe is senior vice- president and senior technologist at neustar, a

global technology and communications company. he's also a computer security expert who consults for the u.s. government and industry. >> in the grand scheme of things, this was a seminal event. so this wasn't a minor security event, this wasn't a hiccup. 99.9% of the world didn't even think this could be done. engineers didn't even think about it. every one of them is now thinking about it day and night, what the effects would be on their networks and how they might use it, depending on whether they wear a white hat or a black hat. >> suarez: last week, the u.s.- china economic and security review commission, a congressionally chartered panel, issued a stinging report. its conclusion-- that "a state- owned chinese communications firm"-- china telecom-- "hijacked massive volumes of internet traffic." the chinese government and china telecom deny this. a foreign ministry spokesman said, "this report ignores the facts and is full of cold war

thinking and political bias. when all the communications and tens of thousand of computer networks were routed to china, ak#q!e department of defense-- d "dot-gov"-- those are u.s. governments departments. the u.s. senate and nasa also had all their traffic diverted. companies like dell, yahoo, microsoft and ibm had their data diverted by china telecom, too. on that day in april, officers logging into a pentagon website ended up looking at an image that came to the screen via china. it's not clear what china did with the internet traffic routed through its computers, and it's not clear if the data that passed through china was saved to be examined later. but larry wortzel, a commissioner on the commission that investigated the incident, is worried.

>> the real concern is that it was intentional and these communications were recorded, and that they will be exploited over time to create either penetrations or to create networked malicious viruses. once traffic goes through chinese-- not servers, but in fact chinese routers or switchers, chinese devices-- it's possible for the traffic itself to be manipulated. it could either just be filtered and dropped or, in fact, it can be read so that a log can be made of the content of the traffic, or changes could be made. so, for example, i could substitute one word for another or one email for another, andç n both ends would have no idea that this had occurred. >> suarez: rodney joffe says hijacking internet traffic is consistent with previous chinese activities. >> the chinese government has made it clear, as early as six or seven years ago publicly, that they can see that one of

the next frontiers for conflict is going to be settled in cyberspace. this would seem to be something along the same lines. >> suarez: larry wortzel came to the u.s.-china commission after a career in army intelligence. he served as a us military attacheé in china. >> i think its important to understand you can do an awful lot with 18 minutes of traffic. a good intelligence officer, for instance, could get 18 minutes of traffic from the whole department of defense, and get the internet address, let's say, to the military assistant or executive officer to the joint chiefs of staff, and every one he communicates with on certain issues and their internet addresses. and then, you could socially engineer an email. make it look like it came from one of those individuals in the network to all the others, and

insert an attachment that contained a very malicious virus. >> suarez: wortzel says he's been the subject of these types of computer attacks.çç >> about eight months ago, i got an email that looked like it came from the naval warfare systems command that invited me to a meeting on a particular missile system, and asked me to open the attachment to get the agenda for the meeting. well, i knew very well i had not communicated with anyone in the navy for quite a long time on that issue. i actually called the person who was purported to have sent the email, and she said, "i didn't send you an email." so we had the attachment checked and it was a very malicious virus. it would have done exactly that. it would have permitted somebody to take over the computer. >> suarez: even with no evidence

of mischief, tampering, or theft, rodney joffe says governments and business have to harden their security systems, have to make sure this so-called hijack is made harder in the future. and just to be safe, assume this was not an accident. >> if, in fact, the traffic was being examined and your traffic passed through the network in china, your user i.d.s and passwords may have been compromised. if i was a large enterprise or a large organization involved in cbi,%l infrastructure, if iç was in government, i would be sweating bullets currently. >> suarez: and joffe says the mere example of this hijacking taking place has served as an inspiration to cyber criminals around the world. >> we know that the criminals already have been discussing this. we've seen this in the last five or six months. it was a great event for them, because its given them a vector that many of them have never thought of. >> suarez: joffe and wortzel agree that the internet has exploded into worldwide daily use, in part, because its daily

operation is based on trust. lose that trust, and home users, businesses, and governments will start to stay away, and begin the unraveling of a modern marvel. >> brown: now to haiti, as it prepares to hold a presidential election sunday, less than a year after the devastating earthquake and a month into a continuing cholera epidemic. the campaigning, at times, has been boisterous and the crowds large. billboards and posters compete for attention, as citizens have lined up to receive their voter identification cards. some 18 candidates are running to replace president reneçç preval, who cannot seek re-election. widely seen as the three leading contenders-- the ruling party's nominee, jude celestine;

a former first lady, mirlande manigat; and a popular musician, michel martelly. they and the others are vying to take office, even as the presidential palace in port-au- prince remains in ruin and the nation seeks a way out of its vast troubles. late this afternoon, i talked to reporter jason beaubien of national public radio in port- au-prince. >> brown: jason beaubien thanks for joining us. i know you had nicy march ago duals, set the eave for us on the election. >> it very clear that this campaign is coming to an end there have been large rallies, sort of trucks goinging through the streets with big loudspeakers urging people to come out and support one candidate or another. you have got 18 presidential candidates running, also people running for lower offices. so it has been somewhat festive. the city is sort of decorated with campaign posters everywhere you go. are you seeing campaign¿ posters at the mome=t.

it's clear this campaign is coming to an end and people are going to go to the polls on sunday. >> we named the three leading candidates. you can give us a sense of who they are appealing to you and how they are doing it. >> michelle martelli, the popular haitian musician is very much appeal together young people he is having rallies. sedansing, he is singing. and he's also calling on them to support his campaign as a campaign of change he's trying to get the young people behind him. the head of the national construction company is also trying to get the young people behind him. and in part this is because haiti is a very young country. the majority of the people are young here. and people are really trying to pull them in. the former first lady is very much the sort of serious candidate saying that he is 70 years old, the

dean of a university. and saying that she would be the responsible one, the one who can guideç haiti throughç this incredibly tough period that is going to be coming as they really try to getgoing on the recovery from this earthquake with all the problems and now particularly the cholera situation, i know there have been some talk or some calls for delaying this election. but i ger officials there including the international community decided it was better to go ahead? >> yes, there have been calls by some of the presidential candidates themselves have called for this election to be postponed. but the international community has said no, they're saying that this is the time to do it. that postponing it would open it up to people thinking that maybe that is a politically motivated move, that they are trying to do that to push some candidates out. some candidates that have momentum right now. the u.n. chief here said if we don't do it now, who knows what kind of problems haiti might be facing in six months or a year and it's better to get this transition and move on to a

new administration that can tackle the incredibly hugeç task ofç rebuilding this country and give us an update on the cholera situation. how do you see it playing out. how fearful are people and does it have an impact on the election results. >> it's amazing. when you talk to people, i was talking to people in some of the camps just today, very afraid of this disease it is something they haven't had here before. people know that it can kill them it can kill them quickly so there is a lot of terror out there. at the same time the international community and aid groups are attempting to get out and set up cholera treatment facilities around the country, so that people can actually get treatment. i went to a camp just this afternoon. they were saying that the numbers of people coming continues to grow every day it was 10 at first, then was 20. now up to 50 people a day coming in seeking treatment. so it is clear that the situation is getting worse and experts are saying they

expect it to get worse before it gets better. >> and finally just back to the election. i gather if nobody gets a majority of 50% or more, then there is a runoff, right? is that the expectation at >> that's very muchç the expectation at this point. as i said, you have got 18 people in this race. nobody has sort of emerged as the clear leader in this field. so there is expected to be a runoff. that would happen on january 16th. again the problem with that is that it will just drag this out even longer. >> jason beaubien of npr port-au-prince haiti, thanks so much. >> you're welcome. >> woodruff: and to the analysis of shields and brooks-- syndicated columnist mark shields and "new york times" columnist david brooks, who joins us tonight from philadelphia. gentlemen, thank you. hope you both had a wonderful thanksgiving. >> did, thank you. >> woodruff: mark, to you first. north korea, a direct attack

on the south, just a few days ago. they're still making war-like noise. is there any option for the west, for the united states? what is-- what can the u.s. do? >> i don't know what the u.s. can do, judy. i think it's important to remember this is the first time in 57 years since the armistice, the end of korean war that the north korean has fired on south korean civilians that is how about what happened last march with the sinking fing the boat, the exact circumstances. but there is little argument about this. and virtually every major country in the world has condemned what north korea has done including the united states. the one exception is china. which has the most influence over north korea, provides food and fuel. and it has been mute, passive. and i think that to stand by while this kind of bullying

goes on, and that's exactly what it is, the only reason anybody is interested in north korea beyond occasional humanitarian interests and the people who are suffering there is the fact that they have noç faar weapons. i think that's how serious the situation is and the options are limited. >> woodruff: but david s the west helpless? >> yes. you know, once a rogue nation gets nuclear weapons, there's really not a lot you can do. because you never know how they're going to react. and you really can't challenge them because they might use one of the things. and the lesson here partly goes to iran how important it is to keep rogue nations from having nuclear weapons. and secondly, it goes to the fact that we have much less control over some of these secret programs than we thought we did. the other thing that happened in north korea is the discovery 6 an enrichment process that was far, far more sophisticated than we thought that they had. that is a sign that the regime to control some of this stuff has some holes in t even in a very closed economy. but i think the core lesson

is don't let rogue nations get nuclear weapons because if they do they can do what they want. >> does it make sense, do we just wait for china to see if they lean on the north. >> i think we can do diplomatically we can friday and bring pressure on china. buáhwe are borrowingç 41 cents of every dollar we spend at this point. so we're probably not in the strongest bargaining position. but i think that china has to acknowledge that it has become the last few years a dominant player in the world. and with commensurate responsibilities. it's got to meet those responsibilities. and it does have a special relationship with north korea. and we'll find out. i mean if they abdicate i don't know what we can do but if they abdicate the world has to know they have abdicatedz. >> woodruff: david, another international issue connected to nuclear issues but different and that is the new start nuclear weapons treaty that the u.s., the obama administration would like to get ratified with russia.

now the one republican senate, the administration has been lobbying, still holding that up. but is there any sign that john kyl the republican senator from arizona could turn out to be helpful on this? >> well, from the administration's perspective,ç what's interesting toç watch is the administration, their behavior toward kyl. which, they have been pretty confrontationol on the issue as a wol but not towards john kyl. they have been careful to say he has the best interests at heart, he is trying to keep the country safe. so they are not picking a fight with him. and his line has been we don't have time. and it's always been a question how much of it is a question of timing, gettinging this within the lame duck session of congress and how much is it a negotiation over what he really cares about which is modernizing the current nuclear facilities we have now. and the administration is not ideaologicallically opposed to t they are just trying to strike a deal where kyl gets what he wants and then maybe kyl will step

back on ratification on the treaty. the process of this negotiation at least from the outside has been very slow. i wouldn't put my money on its ratification this year. >> mark, how much does it matter whether this treaty is ratified. >> i think does matter, judy. i think it certainly matters. it matters on the fact that 95% of all the nuclear weapons in the world,ç we just tadkdd about nuclear weapons are held by the united states and russia. but it has come down to one man. we can talk about the advice that gets senate to the-- advice and consent-of-one senator. the republicans have deferred to him as their spokesman, not dick lugar who is the recognized authority on this but john kyl, the fuft most conservative man in the united states senate. and david's right. the administration has been quite circumspect about expressing anything criticism of him publicly. but yet he publicly states that he questions, even though the administration has given him everything he wants on the modernization of nuclear weapons, he questions the sincerity and

honesty of the administration on their commitment. so he is saying they need two weeks to debate it which would be three times as long as we've taken for the last three nuclear-- . >> woodruff: three times as longs with as we've taken for the last three combined. >> woodruff: while we are talking about one man, one woman, david, sarah palin. she has not only has a new reality show out, she has a new book out. she is going to iowa, i guess this weekend and then :important state for the presidential election. what are we to make of where she is in the political, in the middle of all this. >> let's not forget dancing with the stars and bristol's strong run there, impressive, i guess. you know, the question with palin has always been is she on the government track or the media track, where is her career going. and in the last six months she's headed a little more towards the governing track, suggested a little more that she wants to run for. i still fundamentally think she's on the media track.

wants to be a major media/political activist player but will not run and will certainly not get the nomination. i base that on the fact that to run for office you actually have to care about government and those people don't quit the governorship in the middle of your first term. second she couldn't even be a write in candidate in her own state. she couldn't beat lisa murkowski. that doesn't suggest she has political legs even in her home state. when you look at here statements, the tweets, theç palin, it has to do with the media, slashing back at the media for this or that insult. not some of about the government. so i still think she is mostly a media player. >> woodruff: more of a media track. >> she certainly is a dominant figure. i mean make no mistake about it. you mention the media reality show but she is a best selling author. she is a dominant-- dominates the debate. i think it's fair to say in the campaign of 2010. she was a major, major force in selecting and backing candidates. its embarrassment in her

home state. but she really is the dominant female politician in the country. and perhaps in the country's recent history. i mean as a serious political presidential candidate. she is right by republicans. the problem that she faces is that when asked just before the election in the abc news "washington post" poll do you think sarah palin irrespective of how you feel toward her is qualified to be president, only 27% of voters said yes. and vi 7% said no. and most importantly of all, among independents, the swing group which they determined this in the last two elections, 23% thought she was qualiild,ç 70% didn't. that is what she has to address. that seriousness of purpose and sort of a mastery of the issues. >> woodruff: and david, when she told barbara walters i guess this week that she thought she could beat president obama two years from now, he was asked about that. and he said i don't pay much attention to her. he was pretty low key. but he said he respects her

political skills. does it matter how much, how he handles her right now? >> well, he of course would love it if she got the republican nomination. i assume republican primary voters can read the polls that mark referenced. and even if she did run, i still think even among republican primary voters, they would say we like her but we don't think she can win so we are not going to vote for her. but i think obama, the best thing for him is to have her trundle along there and maybe if not win the nomination, control the republican nomination because as mark says and as we saw in delaware and nevada and various other state, the sort of candidates she sponsors is not the kind that win over independents. >> woodruff: when it comes to the president, the news out of the white house is they are moving in david plout without who,ç david axelrod, seniorç advisor. are you seeing some strategy from the white house at this point? >> well, i mean obviously david axelrod is going back to chicago. i don't think he is thrilled

and happy to be here from washington and david plouf is coming to wash tochb. i don't see strategy. it is a little early in the campaign to talk bay strategy. you have to have a strategy that develops from reality. you can't at this point run on peace and prosperity and morning and america if in fact we are still in a hot war in afghanistan and unemployment is flirting with 10%. i mean so the strategy will evolve and i think the first will get it in the state of the union but if i'm not mistaken it's the first time i can recall a candidate for re-election, a sitting president taking his campaign back to his home state. i mean bill clinton ran as a challenger from little rock. ronald reagan ran as a challenger from los angeles. george bush ran as a challenger from austin. but when they ran their re-election campaigns there was a recognition that as incumbent president, so much of the campaign was really determined by their policy and decisions as a president, that they kept them close together.ç this is a chinfe. >> woodruff: david, one other person i want to raise,

and that is tom delay, the former house majority leader who was riding high just a few years ago. and then this week found guilty by a texas jury of money laundering, funneling corporate monies through political committee to state candidates in texas. quite a story. a rise and a fall for this man. >> yeah, he was, his career was what it was, i never thought he had much principlesed reason to be in government but he was interested in power with. he was interested in building the republican majority. and he would do whatever he could to try to build that majority including spending a lot of federal money to try to buy seats. and also i guess manipulating the campaign-finance laws. and so i can't say i have a lot of sympathy with him. i do have a few concerns about calling, breaking the campaign-finance laws which i guess he did. calling it money laundering, that seems a little iffy to me. and second i have to confess something which w i'm not a big fan of tom delay but i think whatç charlieç wrangel

did is worsend he is going to get to sit in the u.s. congress and delay is facing life in prison. somehow it is a little unjust that those two crimes are back-to-back, at least the way things stand right now. >> woodruff: we will wait and see what the sentence is. >> i don't-- i i will defend charlie racquel against tom delay any day of the week. charlie rangel did things that were wrong and broke the ethics of congress and the question of not reporting full income on his taxes. but tom delay did take $190,000 in corporate contributions. a jury of 12 men good and true and travis county texas found after listening to three weeks of testimony. in violation of the texas law that had been on the books for a 100 years. brought it up to washington and miraculously within a matter of hours, 190,000 showed up in texas state legislative races, that enabled the republicans to win the state house. so i mean, tom delay was an

influential figure. he was responsible forç dennyç being specter of the house. tom delay backed whim when gingrich left. john baynee was always opposed to tom delay so it is kind of an interesting moment,a little irony. >> woodruff: things come full circle. all right. we, neither one of you is our opponent. we are on your side. are you on our side, mark shields, david brooks. thank you both. >> brown: finally tonight, even as families have gathered for the annual thanksgiving feast this week, many continue to go without this holiday season. one man trying to do something about hunger here and abroad got special recognition this week. we turn again to ray suarez for the story. >> how are you today. >> suarez: even in arlington, virginia, one the wealthiest counties in one of mark's

wealthiest metropolitan areas more and more people rely on food banks to get enough to eat. nearly 17 millionç families in america,ç about 15% of all households had trouble putting nufing food on the table last year. and while the economy has shown some signs of recovery, the number of americans going hungry this season is increasing. as high unemployment persists, poverty is up, and wages are flat. in arlington, each day people line up for a weekly raise at the arlington food assistance center. demand has grown by 50% in the last two years. volunteers drop off food items and serve more than 3300 people a week giving out some 26 tons of food every month. i spoke to the reverend david beckmann, president of the faith-based advocacy organization bread for the world earlier this week. he's the swinner of the 2010

world food prize and author of the new book "exodus from hunger" >> suarez: what swt world food prize and why did they recognize you and bread for the world? >> well, it's-- once a year they give a prize for somebody who has helped reduce hunger. and in my case, it's a prize to breadç for the world. we have a networkç of people and churches across the country who push congress to do some specific things to help reduce hunger. in this country, and around the world. and the world food prize this year recognizes that bread for the world has helped a lot of hungry people. >> suarez: has there been any change in who is hungry. as people have lost income, lost their jobs, has the population of the hungry changed? >> well w the big increase in hunger is because of unemployment. so much more than before, it's young people with children, people who have lost their jobs, people who maybe can't get a full-time job. they're working a few hours,

20 hours a we can but they can't feed their kids. that's the big surge. >> suarez: so we're seeing a lot of new people in that population, people who haven't had this problem before and now are downwardly mobile? >> right, there are lots of cases where people five years ago were contributing to food banks.ç and nowç they have to go into food pantries to complement what they afford to buy at a grocery store for their children. >> suarez: are more americans hungry today than a year ago at this time? >> well w the news is bad but it could be worse. it's one in four kids in our country that lives in a household that sometimes runs out of food. it hasn't gotten worse over the past year. that is what is striking. >> suarez: what has increased demand meant for the emergency system? have places like this food pantry that we're in, how have they cope mad? >> there has been a big increase over the last couple of years in the food that is being provided to

people in through charitable channels. it is really heartening that most americans have taken a hit. and in fact contributions to food banks, food charities have gone up. churches and synagogues are doing morning. so there's been an increase in the hip available but notç nearçly as much of an increase as has been needed. the increase in need far outpasses what we've been able to do through charitable means. that's why it's so important that we do things like provide tax credits for the working pooring. so if somebody's got an $8 an hour job, that they can get a little bit of extra income that they can use to get their car fixed or maybe enroll in a program as a dental hygienist. food banks can provide that kind of assistance. they can provide a couple bags of groceries. and in fact people who are struggling with unemployment

and the current economy need also to have the supports that we can provide them through our government. some people are talking like you know, the way to improve our economy is to cut programs for poor people. this is budget. first we need to help people who are struggling get a leg up. that's good for the economy, for everybody. and the programs that help poor people are tiny in relationship to the federal budget. so we need to strengthen those programs, make them work. just as effectively as we can for poor people at this time of real crisis for many families.çç >> suarez: let's look outside the u.s. to the rest of the world. how are we doing with hunger broadly speaking? and is it the same factors that are pushing people into hunger? >> well, we've seen is the same surge in hunger over the last few years. we had several decades of gradual decline in world hunger.

so this is a fixable problem. but then with the economy being what it is, there are a couple million more people who are hungry today than three or four years ago. and in developing countries we're talking about the kind of hunger that outright kills children. also in developing countries though there are things that we can do. in fact, the u.s. government is leading a global effort to increase investments in poor farmers, in poor countries so that they can produce more food themselves, for themselves and for their countries it is really a great initiative. what i like best about it is that the u.s. isn't doing it all ourselves. what we have weigh done is to provide leadership to get everybody around the world to invest more in productivity of poor farmers in poor countries. it's the best way we could respond to thiqç increase inç world hunger. >> suarez: it's long been said that the world already

produces enough food to feed every man, woman and child on the planet. is that so? and if it is, how come there are so many hungry people? >> it is so. and in fact i'm profoundly encouraged that over the last two or three decades the world's made more progress against hunger, poverty and disease than at any time in human history. i'm a preacher. you know, i see this as god moving in our time. and also asking us to get with the program. and basically what we need to finish the job, to overcome hunger and poverty is more organized give a damn. you know, we need to food bank. we need to help people individually but we also need to insist on changes in laws and structures that will provide opportunity to struggling people on a very large scale. >> suarez: david beckmann of bread for the world. thank you for being with us. >> thank you, ray. >> woodruff: again, the major developments of the day:

early signs pointed to larger crowds at stores across the country as the traditional start to the holiday shopping season began. north korean state media warned u.s. and south korean plans for joint military exercises are pushing the region to the "brink of war." aot president obama needed 12ç stitches in his lip after he was accidentally elbowed during a pickup basketball game. and to hari sreenivasan in our newsroom for what's on the newshour online. hari. >> sreenivasan: you can pose questions about the internet hijacking incident to experts rodney joffe and larry wortzel. we'll post answers on "the rundown" blog next week. find out what retailers in your community expect this holiday season and what that means for the economy-- that's on our "patchwork nation" page. all that and more is on our web site, newshour.pbs.org. >> brown: and again, to our honor roll of american service personnel killed in the iraq and afghanistan conflicts. we add them as their deaths are

made official and photographs become available. here, in silence, are ten more.

>> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. on monday, we'll look at the start of the next round of international climate talks in cancun, mexico. i'm judy woodruff. >> brown: and i'm jeffrey brown. "washington week" can be seen later this evening on most pbs stations. we'll see you online, and again here monday evening. enjoy the rest of the holiday weekend. thank you and good night. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by:

and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org