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Italian Prosecutor May Appeal Ship Captain's House Arrest; Dangerous Waters for Rescue Divers; Why You Can't Get On Wikipedia; Drunk Mom Left Kids In Cold; Obesity Rates Plateau; Romney's Taxes Still A Secret; White House To Oppose Oil Pipeline

Aired January 18, 2012 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

Let's get you caught up on everything making news this hour, "Rapid Fire."

Let's go, beginning with protests.

It has already drawn protests just like this, but a proposed pipeline to carry crude oil al the way from Canada to the Texas Gulf Coast is about to hit a big hurdle. That being the White House.

The Obama administration is expected to announce its opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline as early as today. That is according to a Democratic source who has been briefed on the issue.

Now, opponents, they're very concerned about the potential effects on the environment, but proponents say this would create jobs, thousands of jobs.

Obviously, we'll keep an eye on the story as it develops through the rest of the afternoon.

Also, the search for missing cruise ship passengers off the coast of Italy is called off. The Costa Concordia has shifted slightly, and rescuers are concerned about the safety of the search crews.

Also today, this. An Italian prosecutor says he may appeal a judge's decision to release the ship's captain from jail to house arrest. We're going to take you live to Italy on much more on the captain's story and what's happening today in the waters in a couple of minutes.

Also right now, a blackout is happening online. Sites like this one here, Wikipedia, and Reddit have shut down their pages in protest of anti-piracy bills making their way through both the House and the Senate, leaving a lot of folks including former senator Chris Dodd asking themselves, why?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS DODD, CHAIRMAN, MOTION PICTURE ASSOCIATION: If Wikipedia really believes we ought to be shutting down illegal sites offshore that are jeopardizing jobs and content, then why in the world at this very hour are they going black? (END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: That's the question. What's the answer? We're going to let Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales tell you himself. He's going to join me live this hour. And then Senator Dodd will join me next hour.

Also, a gruesome story out of Los Angeles today. A human head was found by two women just walking their dogs on the trail just below the famous Hollywood sign.

Police say the dogs started playing with something they found in a bag. The women took a closer look and discovered it was a severed head. According to the "L.A. Times," police believe the head belongs to an Armenian-American man in his 40s.

An apparent smoke bomb tossed over the fence at the White House. More than 1,000 Occupy protesters were holding a rally right around the same time. President Obama was not at home. He and the first lady were at a restaurant though just a couple blocks away celebrating her 48th birthday.

And Defense Secretary Leon Panetta just announced new reforms to help victims of sexual assault in the military. The moves include more funding for investigators, better training, and unifying criminal data system. Panetta says last year there were more than 3,000 reports of sexual assaults in the military.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEON PANETTA, DEFENSE SECRETARY: And the most important thing I think we can do here is to try to train leaders at the command level to make clear that they're aware of this issue and that everyone, both enlisted and officer alike, are able to say, when they see the possibility of these situations either developing or beginning to occur, that they take steps to stop it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Secretary Panetta believes sex assault is underreported, and it's likely the actual number of cases in the military last year was close to 19,000.

And if we need another sign that folks are hurting still in this economy, here's the example. The average age of cars and light trucks on the road increased again last year. It's now at a record 10.8 years, to be very precise for you. Who is benefiting from this? Your local auto repair shop and makers of repair parts. That's who.

And snow day for those of you in the Pacific Northwest. Take a look at these pictures.

It's a region that rarely actually gets snow, but the latest snowstorm has already brought just about 10 inches to some areas. The snow started falling in the early morning hours, and it just keeps on coming.

Look at that. Homes, businesses -- this is live -- there we go, live pictures. Thank you to KING.

Seattle, Washington, schools, as a result of this scene, shut down. In multiple cities, flights delayed across the region. So check ahead of time if you're trying to get out of there -- or head there, I should say.

More troubles for O.J. Simpson. The former football and movie star is facing foreclosure on his south Florida home. A source says Simpson stopped making payments back in 2010. Simpson bought the house after being acquitted of murdering his ex-wife Nicole and her friend Ronald Goodman. He's currently serving time for armed robbery and kidnapping in Nevada.

And got a lot more to cover for you in the next two hours, including this -- watch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: It's a fight that could forever impact what you share online and how you surf the Web. I'll speak live with the guy behind Wikipedia about why his site and several others today are going black.

I'm Brooke Baldwin. The news is now.

(voice-over): The search for survivors in that cruise ship wreck comes to a sudden halt.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One second, everything is clear.

BALDWIN: A behind-the-scenes look at the challenges crews face under water.

A little girl is brutally murdered, and we're now hearing the disturbing details of how this monster lured her in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And he found one of her skates.

MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's probably closer to the 15 percent rate.

BALDWIN: Plus, Mitt Romney reveals his tax rate but not his income. Now one of his biggest supporters gives the front-runner some very public advice.

And Jay-Z's and Beyonce's daughter hasn't even been in the world two weeks, but already someone is apparently trying to cash in and trademark her name. But wait until you hear how.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: A lot has been happening today with that cruise that's wrecked off the coast of Italy. So here's what we have.

Rescuers, they have stopped searching for survivors because the cruise ship has actually now shifted there in the water.

Also, more survivors are speaking out, they're sharing their stories, including this woman. She's from Kentucky.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAUREN MOORE, CRUISE SHIP SURVIVOR: People were trying to jump on when they were full already and overcrowded. And the crew was having to hold people back, and people were screaming at other passengers to stay off. And the pulley system going down -- and we were dropping suddenly, and it was a surreal experience sitting on that boat.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Also, this development today. See the guy in the middle of that? That's the captain of that cruise ship.

An Italian prosecutor wants to know why he's under house arrest and why he's not in jail instead. Prosecutors say he is to blame for the death of at least 11 people. At last count, more than 20 are still missing.

CNN's Matthew Chance is now in Naples, Italy.

And Matthew, why? Why is that, the judge's reasoning to let this captain go home, be under house arrest instead of sitting in jail? And what can prosecutors do about that?

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the judge said that the reason she said house arrest was that there is no flight risk, first of all, that it was unlikely that the captain -- or impossible that the captain would repeat the crime, nor was it likely that he would tamper with any of the evidence. And so she thought that the best option would to be put him under house arrest.

But, of course, this is a figure who is pretty much despised now across many parts of Italy, although here, in his home town of Meta, which is a short distance away from Naples, there's a lot of sympathy for him. But prosecutors have sort of given boost to that outrage, and they've said that they're considering appealing against it and they want him back behind bars.

BALDWIN: As we watch this video sort of looping over of him being escorted into the back of this patrol car, I'm curious if you even know, Matthew, what people were shouting at him? And also, I understand you went looking for the captain today at his house. Did you find him?

CHANCE: Yes. No, unfortunately, I don't know what they were shouting at him. I wasn't there. And I haven't seen the actual video because I've been traveling to get here.

But, yes, we have been here, in Meta, for the course of the past several hours. We found the house of the captain. It's not difficult to find. It's up one of the winding back streets in the middle of this town which is on the coast and overlooks a beautiful panoramic view of the Mediterranean Sea.

I rang on the bell. It's got his name on it. "Captain Schettino" it says, "Francesco Schettino." But there was no answer.

We undersigned from his neighbors that he's there with his wife, other family members as well. A local official appeared at some point during the way with police and cleared reporters out of the way. And when that official came out, he made a comment to the reporters, saying, "This guy is a hero." He said he's been misjudged by the media and that he actually saved the lives of more than 4,000 people.

And so that's just an illustration of how much loyalty and how much sympathy there is here in Meta, the home town for Captain Schettino.

BALDWIN: Matthew, final question, 30 seconds. Is there a law that makes a captain go down with a ship, makes a captain stay on board?

CHANCE: Well, international law is clear that there's not any necessity for him to do that, but there's a moral code. You know, it's passengers first, then crew, then the captain. In Italy, there's an actual law, though, and it appears that the captain may have broken it by abandoning his ship.

BALDWIN: Matthew Chance for us in Naples.

Matthew.

And we've shown you a lot of pictures over the course of the last couple of days of this stricken cruise ship, but I want to share a picture that is very much so different from the rest. You're going to see why here in a minute.

Look at this. This image is taken from space, and it shows just how close the wreckage of the Costa Concordia is to the shore.

You see the ship on its side, you see the land. I mean, the detail is stunning.

And now I want you to listen to an expert in underwater recovery as he explains what it's been like for all these naval divers to try to search under water within this vessel.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WALT BUTCH HENDRICK, PRESIDENT, LIFEGUARD SYSTEMS: You start tying a line off on the outside of the vessel. Then that will be run with me, attached to me, into the first compartment we're going to enter. And every time I make a turn, I'm going to do a tie-off. So what ends up happening is, at no point do I compromise my safety line that's going to take me back out.

Right now what we've done, if you will, is that I came in straight into -- from the tie-off point outside. I'm not going to make a complete 90-degree left turn to go further up into the wreck. To do that, I can't just let my line, my tracer, I can't allow it to make turns around pillars where it can get caught. So what we've done is we've gone directly interior, straight, tied off, and now I make a perfect left-angle turn at 90 to go straight into the next compartment.

Looking at the most recent pictures from CNN on TV, the visibility right now inside the ship in Italy is really quite nice. They have good visibility until they really get deeper in, where they lose all their light.

I'm sure they're getting ready -- as the real commercial crews get in there, they'll start setting this. Anybody who is going into a compartment or down companion ways that they cannot see outside the ship, we've silted this out on purpose just so you get an opportunity to see how fast one second everything is clear and, in a matter of seconds, where the physical motion of the whole place is silting out.

And the depth that the cruise ship is in, some of that is probably going to be done in 15, 20 feet of water. So, if they take their time and relax, they could easily be in there for an hour or so. And if they're on surface supply, they can be in there for two or three hours in those depths.

And it might be, I've got to go into the bathroom section, I've got to go into the bedroom section. They might have had a sitting room section. I mean, usually you think about coming in right, working right, coming out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: And again, those divers suspended the search today because that ship had shifted.

Massive snowstorms in the United States, blankets of snow covering everything, headaches there on the roads. Let's take a live look again. Here you go, this is a live camera, downtown Seattle.

It doesn't snow there, people.

Coming up next, we have the latest track of the storm from Chad Myers.

Plus, Mississippi's former governor granted clemency and pardons to more than 200 people right before his term ended, including several murders. We've covered that story.

But coming up next, find out how he is now defending his actions. And this one, it's going to surprise you.

Stay here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(WEATHER REPORT)

BALDWIN: Haley Barbour says he was only following the tradition of his state's governors when he granted pardons or clemency to those 200 inmates as he was leaving office. And among those the former Mississippi governor pardoned were four murderers, which, as you know, has created all kinds of outrage and uproar not only among those in Mississippi, but among the families of those victims. Barbour also defended the use of murderers as trustees at the governor's mansion.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HALEY BARBOUR (R), FMR. MISSISSIPPI GOVERNOR: In my town, all but one of them had been murderers, because the experts say that those are the people who are the least likely to commit another crime, and that they are the ones who will serve the best. I have found that to be the case.

These people that have been -- that are at issue here -- you're talking about David Gatlin -- these guys have served on average 20 years in the penitentiary. David Gatlin, in 20 years, never had one citation for any infraction or violation of the rules.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: David Gatlin, he mentioned, he was convicted of killing his estranged wife in 1993. Barbour's successor, Governor Phil Bryant, says he will not be following the tradition of pardoning mansion trustees.

Tom Cruise, he did it in "Mission Impossible." Keanu Reeves did it in "Speed." Wesley Snipes did it in "Money Train."

What am I talking about? I'm talking about people on the tops of moving commuter trains. And this is happening in real life.

Up next, how one country is using these concrete balls to help fight the problem.

And we're talking about a 25-pound emerald. Enough said. We'll show it to you in two minutes.

Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Just into us, we told you at the top of the hour the Obama administration is expected to announce it's opposed to that controversial pipeline, that project all the way from Canada through Texas. We are also now just learning that Republican leaders in the House, they will come forward and speak. That will happen in just about an hour, a little less than an hour from now, at 3:15 Eastern Time.

As for the administration, we now know what their line will be here, as we had just heard from Jay Carney, spokesperson at the White House. Here he is speaking moments ago in the briefing room.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAY CARNEY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: When, in the case of Keystone, the pipeline, concerns were raised about the environmental impacts, on the air and water quality in Nebraska, by, among others, the governor of Nebraska, a Republican, a decision was made that an alternate route be sought, and that, therefore, the process had to be delayed so that an adequate review could be undertaken following the same standards that have always been in place, that were in place in the beginning of this process for this particular pipeline, and that have been in place for these kinds of projects for many years.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: So, again, that was Jay Carney speaking at the White House, part of the briefing today. And we will be hearing from the Republican leadership in the House next hour, and we will bring that to you live.

Voting is also now under way on Capitol Hill on a resolution that would deny President Obama the authority to raise the nation's debt ceiling. And one of those voting in favor of the measure is Texas Representative Ron Paul.

The GOP presidential hopeful is taking the day off from campaigning to cast his vote. And this is a symbolic vote. It was part of a deal struck last year. It's expected to sail through the Republican- controlled House but then die in the Senate.

And people riding on the tops of commuter trains. This is Indonesia.

Look at this. There, this happens every day -- until now.

The country is using these concrete balls that are going to be suspended just above the passing trains to, as they're hoping, thwart illegal train surfers. The first one was actually installed there just this week. And officials say passengers climb to the top of the carriages just to beat rush hour crowds or, for others, just the thrill of the ride.

These thrill rides account for one or two deaths a month. And if these new measures work, more of the frames will be going up in the near future, they say.

And a 57,000-carat gemstone. My goodness. Perhaps your dream ring? I don't know.

Here's the thing, though, as you can guess. It's 25 pounds. It's too heavy to be made into jewelry.

It was mined in Brazil. It's called the "Teodora," or "Gift of God." It's the world's largest cut emerald and valued at more than $1 million. The giant stone will be auctioned off in Canada later this month.

SOPA, it is the Stop Online Piracy Act. It is all over the news today because thousands of Web sites shut down temporarily today in protest of the legislation. But this is not just a story here about Web sites, folks. This is a story about what you'll be able to get access to online.

Coming up next, how the legislation directly impacts you. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Let's say you need to know what the capital of South Dakota is or what year a Beatles "Abbey Road" came out or when your state's presidential primary will happen. I know a lot of you go to sites like Wikipedia for the answers, but today you can't do that.

Here is what you will see if you go to Wikipedia right now. The site you can see it's blacked out in protest because of these two different bills that are in Congress, the Stop Online Piracy Act or SOPA for short, that's in the House, and the Protect Intellectual Property Act or PIPA in the Senate.

So this is Wikipedia today. I'm sure many of you have been Googling as we have, right, so you better Google for answers. You'll see this. This is the blackout logo. When you actually click on that with your cursor, you are then sent to a petition page to stop both of those bills we just talked about.

And these are just two of the sites out of many taking part in a day of protest today on the internet. Here's another example for you, Craigslist. Craigslist as we know certainly doesn't look like this, but Craigslist are putting up a slate that users have to click through just to get to their site.

And one more example for you, this is Reddit. This is Reddit totally blacked out as well. They say today we fight back. The conflict really boils down to Hollywood versus Silicon Valley.

Content providers, like movie studios, want to stop piracy on foreign web sites, foreign web sites, but many tech companies fear the laws could lead to widespread censorship in the United States.

In the past day or two, the legislation started losing backers. Florida Senator Marco Rubio who co-sponsored PIPA actually has now pulled -- pulled his support in the Senate.

Also Arizona Congressman Ben Quail, Nebraska Congressman Terry Lee no longer backs SOPA in the House. We do have to be transparent. We just have to point out to you today that CNN's parent company Time Warner does support these anti-piracy acts.

But really, the question is, what does all of this mean to you, the user? I want to bring in Dan Simon to explain all of this. Dan, roll with me here. We're going to go through an example.

I'm going to scroll through. Let's say maybe you've seen this movie. I don't know. The number one movie in America right now, this is "Contraband." Let's say I don't want to go to the theatre, but I want to watch this on my computer.

My first question to you is if SOPA actually goes through, becomes law, could the user potentially face charges?

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This isn't aimed at the user, Brooke. First of all, let me say at the outset, I think SOPA at this point is pretty much on life support. You mentioned these legislators that have pulled their support, the White House is opposed.

What's happening online is making a huge impact. So I think SOPA as we know it is going to go away. But let's look at the legislation in its current form. It does not target users, it targets these overseas web sites and that's where the piracy comes into play.

There is a site called thepiratebay.org. It's a very popular site that downloads illegal content. That's actually in Sweden. So what this bill aims to do is it aims to stop internet providers in the U.S. for actually having that site.

In other words, you would type out anti-pirate bill.org and what you would get, you get nothing. So that's why the internet collective powers if you will are oppose. They don't want to be told by Washington what you can click on and what you can't click on.

BALDWIN: And let me just show people, you know, we actually pulled up -- this is an example of the site you were just talking about out of Sweden. This is the Pirate Bay, and I know that these are some of the sites the legislation is actually looking to target.

But here, Dan Simon, here is where it gets tricky because if you type in Google, watch "Contraband" online, and you get 27,000 million results link after link. So this is illegal content. So under SOPA, my next question, what would happen to Google for displaying all these illegal links?

SIMON: Well, they would actually get a list from the U.S. government, from the Justice Department, a so-called black list saying these are the pirated sites that we don't want you to advertise.

If you type in "Contraband," in other words, these wouldn't pop up. Now if they violate that law, they could found in contempt at court and face damages. But let's face it, Google wants to comply with the law. They just want a better law on the book, and that's what this is all about, Brooke.

BALDWIN: But aren't some of these sites, Dan, like Google and Wikipedia and the reason, you know, they have black tape or they're protesting today on the internet is because they're worried that this will ultimately become a catalyst on clamping down on the sharing, a widespread sharing of information online.

SIMON: It all comes down to who should be in control of what you view on the internet. Should the government be in control or should the end user have the option of clicking on these sites?

Look, the bottom line is nobody wants piracy. The question is, how you go about it. I've talked to a lot of Silicon Valley executives about this, and what they tell me is what Hollywood should do is they should innovate.

They look at what happened in the music industry back in 1999 and 2000. Pretty much everybody you knew back then was downloading music illegally through Napster.

Then all of a sudden came iTunes with Apple and suddenly people started paying music. So the arguments I hear is they should make their content available for people to buy and that would cut down on piracy.

Now whether or not that's going to happen, we don't know, but they believe this charged the problem today versus a few years ago, is that you have larger hard drives in order to store this content, so that's why you've seen an explosion of people downloading movies and TV shows from sites called the Pirate Bay.

BALDWIN: I had no idea that you could get, you know, 27 million different links to see this one movie illegally. Dan Simon, thank you. Pushing hard on the story and one guy fighting hard to squash this legislation is Wikipedia's founder, Jimmy Wales. He's going to join me live with his point of view in just a couple of minutes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Every once in a while, a grown up does something so egregious to impact a life of the child, but I am compelled to tell you about it on this show. This is really just a reminder to all of us that as a society, we can do better.

If you're with me on this, I want you to use the phrase, kind of a hash tag on Twitter that I know I use just like we have here right at the bottom of the screen. Hash tag we can do better. OK. Here's the story.

Sacramento, California, so it's a 40-degree night, pretty chilly. A homeless man crosses the street and notices two children huddled together in the bushes. He continues on his way to McDonald's.

But on his second pass, he notices the kids are still sitting there in the cold and they're shivering. So what does he do? Flags down police. Listen to his story. This is what they told our affiliate, KCRA.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID HERNANDEZ, EYEWITNESS: I came back and they were still there. I said, are you kids OK? They say, yes, we were waiting for my mom. I was concerned because they might be waiting there for a long period of time. I'm a father of my own. I have a daughter who is going to be 12 this year, and the son is going to be 9 and being a parent, you know, it's disgusting to see things like this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Well, the mother of those kids did eventually show up with a big bag of hamburgers. She had been in that McDonald's as well. Police say she was drunk.

And by the time officers had already seated her kids in the back of their warm police cruiser, here she is, the mother, Farris Martin. She was arrested. She was charged with child endangerment and the judge placed a bail of $60,000.

Social Services in the meantime place these kids have been placed with another family member at least for now. We wanted to hear from Martin to see if she would tell us what happened, but she doesn't appear to have a lawyer, and from what we understand, she's homeless.

So just like the man who discovered her kids huddled in the bushes. Luckily, he did the right thing. A reminder to us all, we can do better.

A reminder about one of our top stories today. We are expected to hear from the Republican leaders in the House. We're talking about Speaker John Boehner, Eric Canter.

In 40 minutes from now we're estimating they will be speaking about the news. We are hearing from the White House today that the Obama administration will reject the Keystone excel pipeline project going from Alberta, Canada all the way down to Texas in the gulf. This is a developing story. We're going to keep an eye on it for you.

Also, this normally, when we tell you a story about obesity, it's typically bad news. Hallelujah, today we've got some good news for you coming up.

Brand new information about how exercise can help fight Alzheimer's. But first, take a look at this with me. Quote of the day. Think on this one. Here's the quote, "Thinking of getting into the leg-breaking business so I can profitably sell crutches later. Who said it? Think about it. What's been in the news this week? Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Who said this? Look at the tweet once again, thinking of getting into the leg-breaking business, so I can profitably sell crutches later. Chef turned TV personality Anthony Bourdain.

In case you haven't been following this war of words with Paula Deen, Deen just announced she has type 2 diabetes and an endorsement deal with a diabetes drug maker this week.

Bourdain failed to comment further, but in the past she has called Paula Deen the most dangerous chef in America for all her butter-heavy recipes.

Speaking of your health, news on two health fronts both Alzheimer's and obesity. First obesity, the latest findings about one out of three American adults are obese. Yes, that's bad, but it's not worse.

It seems America's weight problem is actually stabilizing. CNN senior medical correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen, I was saying earlier sort of joking like alleluia finally some good news when it comes to obesity.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: It's a sad day when we say only 36 percent of Americans are obese.

BALDWIN: But it's true.

COHEN: But it's true, 36 percent of Americans are obese. Not just overweight, but obese. So I know a lot of people say, well, what exactly does that mean so I've got some numbers that can help explain that.

So if you're 5'4" and you weigh 145 pounds, you're considered overweight. If you're over 174 pounds, you're considered obese. If you're 5'10", over 174 pounds is overweight, and over 209 pounds is obese.

BALDWIN: So now we understand what obese means. We mention the rate, 35 percent of Americans we're told are obese. Can't sustain that in that percentage?

COHEN: You know, we can't sustain it because if this continues in the next couple of decades 40 percent of us are going to have heart disease. I mean, this is unsustainable. It's going to be costing a lot money. You're going to be seeing even more deaths.

You'll see children who don't live as long as their parents live. I mean, this is a serious problem, which I mean, to relate this to the Paula Deen story, I think that's why so many people get so angry because it's like, wow.

She is sitting here teaching people how to become obese. That's how a lot of people see it, and that's why she's gotten the kind of emotional outcry that she's gotten.

BALDWIN: I want to ask you about just the second health story jumped out me. I had a great-grandmother. She had Alzheimer's, and I saw this article in the paper sort of potentially linking if you're exercising, it might lessen your likelihood.

COHEN: It might. It's a little complicated, but I'm going to try to break it down so about 20 percent of us have a gene that makes us more likely to get Alzheimer's. When researchers looked at those folks, they found that the ones who exercise are less likely to have brain plaques, and brain plaques are associated with Alzheimer's disease.

There is some evidence here that Alzheimer's can help prevent Alzheimer's. When I hear stories like this, I think, well, that's great, but it's yet another reason to exercise. We ought to be exercising.

We all ought to be eating well and there is not an option anymore. These are things we have to do. If you go to cnn.com/empowerpatient, you can see other things to try to prevent Alzheimer's.

BALDWIN: Helps the brain, helps the soul. Elizabeth Cohen, thank you so much.

Mitt Romney now says he will release his tax returns in April so we can all see exactly how much he pays in taxes. He says he probably paid, this came out yesterday. He probably paid at a rate of 15 percent.

Fellow Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich has an idea for him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NEWT GINGRICH, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The 21st Century contract of America at newt.org has an optional 15 percent flat rate for every American. So my goal is not to -- my goal is not to raise Mitt Romney's taxes, it's to let everybody pay Mitt Romney's rate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Coming up next, how Romney's race for the White House. How will it be influenced by all of this? Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: I think you know this, just how much Mitt Romney pays in taxes has been big, big chatter this week on the political trail, and he's been feeling the pressure now to release his records.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICK PERRY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: My income tax have been out every year, and Newt, I think you're going to let your income tax come out Thursday. And Mitt, we need for you to release your income tax.

NEWT GINGRICH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: They can dodge. They can dance. They can do whatever they want to. It's very simple question. Is he prepared to release his taxes?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Chief political analyst Gloria Borger joins me from beautiful Charleston, South Carolina. We've heard the different sound bite, Gloria.

The question is talking about dodging and dancing, all Republicans backing Mitt Romney into a corner to release his tax information.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, I think they are backing him into a corner. I mean, you heard him at the debate the other night. He said sort of around April.

In talking to sources involved with the campaign, it's very clear to me that there is an internal discussion going on now about whether, in fact, Mitt Romney can wait until April.

I was told by one source that there are a couple things going on here internally. First of all, Mitt Romney is a little sensitive about how wealthy he is. I don't think it's something he likes to broadcast.

And secondly, I think there was a feeling that when you see his tax returns, you're going to see that he's given quite substantial amounts of money to the Mormon Church. And the question was, how would that play in the southern primaries, particularly with Evangelicals in a state like this, South Carolina.

When you see that Romney has given away millions of dollars to the Mormon Church? So I think it was something they wanted to put off. But now that you have Newt Gingrich out there saying, you know, I'm releasing my tax returns maybe tomorrow.

I pay the 31 percent rate. I think Romney has really no choice because, honestly, he says he's paid around a 15 percent rate. There really isn't anything left to hide.

BALDWIN: I know you're talking, though, Gloria, to potential primary voters. We're talking about the Republican primary race, so does the issue of releasing tax records really even resonate among these folks?

BORGER: Well, I think -- you know, there's always a sense, first of all, if you don't release something, what are you hiding, okay? So there's that question. But you're right, Brooke, in a Republican primary, everyone wants lower tax rates.

So if you discover that Mitt Romney, who doesn't earn income anymore, but rather gets investment income and pays a lower rate as a result, if you say, well, he's paid 15 percent rate because he doesn't really work anymore.

He's a wealthy man. I think in a Republican primary, that's probably not going to be as big a deal as it would be in a general election.

But again, I think that the question of where he gives his money, how much does he give to the Mormon church, for example, could become an issue for Evangelical voters with whom, by the way, he's been doing pretty well so far. But at this point, I think it's kind hard to hold it back.

BALDWIN: Well, you point in your column, when it comes to Romney that experience matters, right. That you said in your column that when it comes to Romney that experience matters, right?

That he learned from his failure to launch four years ago, you quote, in his Bain-ish way, Romney looked at his failure in 2008 deconstructed it and decided one important thing to control the debate. He would look forward, not backward. What do you mean by that?

BORGER: Well, I think what he has done pretty well is that he said, you know what, I'm not going to relive all those flip-flopping things from 2008 campaigns. When I get asked about that, I'm going to say essentially asked and answered.

He's done that with Mormonism. For example, he gave a speech about his religion in the last campaign. He didn't feel it was necessary to do it in this one. Really one important issue here, Brooke, though is health care.

He decided he wasn't going to change his opinion on health care, even though his Massachusetts plan contains mandates, the same mandates that Barack Obama had. He was going to say, you know what, I'm explaining it.

It's good for Massachusetts, not good for the entire country, repeal President Obama's health care plan. Guess what? In our own poll late last week, who did Republicans rate as the best able to handle health care in their field? Mitt Romney so go figure. So he's handled that issue pretty well so far, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Republicans put their family feud on display. Read it and somehow connect it to the polls story. Only you, Gloria Borger, cnn.com/opinion. Thank you very, very much.

And now want to take you to Washington as the White House, we've been reporting all day, they are expected to announce opposition to the controversial Keystone pipeline.

To set this up, we're bringing in chief White House correspondent Jessica Yellin. Just to set this up, this is the proposed pipeline that was scheduled to be something like 1700 miles in length and would be carrying this crude shale oil from Canada all the way south.

Cutting across the United States mid section of the country and ultimately ending up at the Texas gulf coast. Opposition protests as we know have been held up all across the country, including multiple times at the White House. Jessica Yellin, what have you learned today? When should we be hearing an announcement?

JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: What a great setup, Brooke. You have all the details there. So we expect that there will be an announcement coming out of the State Department, not the White House because this has been a State Department issue.

They're the place that's supposed to oversee this issue. We expect this afternoon -- there was some reports that it would happen around 3:00, so we're waiting to see if that does come in just about a little over two minutes.

The logic, when we do get this, it won't be surprising to hear them saying no because the White House has made clear for some time now that they don't believe -- let me rephrase that. The president does not have the time in this 60-day allotment to approve this.

That in their estimation, the administration's estimation, this is not an acceptable time frame because, one, there is not a clear route for Nebraska, that the company itself has not laid out their routes and couldn't possibly approve it.

And two, they don't know the environmental impacts yet and they won't have their hand forced by politics. That is the White House's logic. As you know, this is also part of the larger fight over the payroll tax cut because it was put into the payroll tax cut bill at the end of last year before Congress went on the break.

So this has become a political football and they're trying to get this sort of dealt with before the state of the union address next week so they can move on to other issues afterwards -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: And we heard not too long ago from White House Spokesman Jay Carney. It was interesting how he specifically pointed out how Nebraska's governor there, who has been pretty out spoken, that this would go through a reservoir or aquifer and there is concern there in Nebraska.

Do me a favor Jessica Yellin, just standby I want to bring in another chief, chief business correspondent, Ali Velshi. You know, Ali, our show has covered this. On side of it, you have the environment folks and they say this is bad news.

It could leak. It could seep, but the other issue is and we talked to TransCanada and they said this would create -- I remember the guy. He came on my show and said this will create 20,000 jobs.

ALI VELSHI, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Right and as Jessica has pointed out, those numbers are in some dispute. The State Department doesn't call it 20,000 jobs. Some people say it could be as few as 2,500 direct jobs.

The bottom line is we don't question that there will be some direct jobs in building this. The issue is indirect jobs. What happens when you pump -- you know, you go from the current capacity, which is about 60,000 barrels a day, coming in from Canada to 1,300,000 barrels a day.

The bigger issue, though, is not the jobs, it's the oil capacity. The fact that we get most our oil from Canada in the United States and that oil is going to go somewhere. Everybody wants that Canadian oil and the Chinese in particular want that Canadian oil. So, if that pipeline extension doesn't end up going down south through the United States, the Chinese will be very happy to build one, so you will still get about 600,000 barrels of Canadian oil coming into that pipeline through the course of the day, each day.

But you will also from the top of that pipeline which starts in Alberta, you can see it, imagine going right west to British Columbia and on to ships that go to China. So the issue is as much the oil as it is the jobs, and of course, as you and Jessica talked about, obviously the environmental concerns.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: And, Jessica, just to be clear, and perhaps we don't even know the answer to this yet, is this a done deal in terms of an out-and-out rejection of this Keystone XL pipeline from the administration, from the State Department, who has been really been taking the lead on this, or is this a -- quote, unquote -- "a delay"?

YELLIN: No. The administration has been clear that they don't necessarily object to the pipeline, they object to the time frame in which they have been forced to make a decision. They have said given more time, they could come -- given more time, this is something that potentially could be approved.

But the bottom line is that there have been -- they feel they have been forced to make a decision in an unrealistic time period, and they're not going to do it because of the potential fallout.

Now, Brooke, it's not necessarily done because Congress still has proposed other work-arounds, and Republicans in Congress could still play different cards and try to force a decision in other ways, or they could try to make this happen in other ways, and we will see how that gets played out. As I say, it's become a political football.

BALDWIN: Ali, you want in? What's your reaction?

VELSHI: That's exactly right. Both sides have dug in with unreasonable claims, the number of jobs being created vs. the remarkable danger of any oil spilling out of a pipeline.

We have made remarkable technological advances in how to transport oil and how to clean it up, especially you and I covered since the Gulf oil spill. So there is this middle ground in here which would be better for everybody to get involved in, but the bottom line is as we know with most issues that become political, everybody vacates the middle ground.

The fact is, on balance, this is probably something that should happen and they have a great deal of time too look at it. This does become the Obama administration -- even if they say want more time -- kicking something down the road that could get a whole lot of independents who get tired of paying a lot of money to switch their votes come Election Day.

BALDWIN: Speaking of issues becoming political, what do we have? We have a bunch of candidates on the trail in South Carolina, right? We have got a lot of cameras near there. We're already now hearing from the former speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich.

Here's what he said on this Keystone XL pipeline decision.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NEWT GINGRICH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The president has apparently vetoed the Keystone pipeline.

(BOOING)

GINGRICH: Now, this is a stunningly -- I tried to edit myself. It's too hard. Look, let me be honest. This is a stunningly stupid thing to do.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

GINGRICH: Obama's decision is stupid on three grounds. There is no better word for it.

These people are so out of touch with reality, it's as though they were governing Mars. Stupidity number one, we need the jobs. Maybe when they're unemployed in November, they will figure out jobs matter.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: We should point out that was Newt Gingrich pretty recently this afternoon speaking on the campaign trail in South Carolina soon after Jessica Yellin really broke the news we will be hearing the administration that they will be rejecting this Keystone XL pipeline.

Both Jessica Yellin and Ali Velshi, please do me a favor. Stand by as we're anticipating that news out of the White House, or actually, specifically out of the State Department today, and as we mentioned, we will be hearing from the Republican House leadership at 3:15 Eastern. So stay tuned for that.