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When Will the Markets Rebound?; Did the Final Debate Sway Swing Voters?; Gov. Palin Stumps in Maine; AIDS Scare in Midwest High School

Aired October 16, 2008 - 10:00   ET

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

HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Big board watching. Most people just can't help themselves that recession fears shove stocks into a big slide. Are we bouncing back today?
And debate as game changer, did last night's presidential face- off influence voters? We hear from the pundits and more importantly we hear from you.

It's Thursday, October 16th. I'm Heidi Collins. You're in the CNN NEWSROOM.

The morning after the final debate. It's a race to the finish. Barack Obama starts off in New Hampshire. John McCain is Pennsylvania. Then both head for New York today. Obama's running mate, Joe Biden, is in Los Angeles, having appearances with Jay Leno and Ellen DeGeneres. Governor Sarah Palin getting ready to speak any minute now at a rally in Bangor, Maine. You could call the final debates feisty. Senator John McCain was on the attack from the world go. Senator Obama holding his ground and firing back. Jessica Yellin was there for it all, every sparing moment.

Your observations this morning now, Jessica. Good morning.

JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Heidi.

You know, it was the last debate. It was also the most aggressive and engaged. It gave voters the best opportunity to see what these men are like when they go face to face, when they really have a chance to probe one another. And they're very different men. That's what came across.

Barack Obama went into last night wanting to keep a cool, steady demeanor. John McCain went into last night wanting to show people what Barack Obama is promising and how McCain thinks it's not good enough for America's problems right now. And both of them achieved their goals. Barack Obama kept steady and even through it all. I was in the room and I could watch his body language, even things that weren't on TV. He would just, his entire body remained relaxed even under he was fierce attack by John McCain.

McCain was frequently leaning in, writing notes, moving around in his own away, in his chair. Obviously bubbling over trying to make his message connect. And the message John McCain was delivering was that, one, Barack Obama is not a man America knows well enough and, two, he's a man who John McCain believes has a wrong economic prescriptions for these times, especially he argues that Barack Obama would raise taxes. And he brought up this guy, Joe the plumber, someone Barack Obama met in Ohio, a plumber who makes over $250,000 a year, but has a small business. And the guy said to Barack Obama on a receiving line, look you're going to raise my taxes. Barack Obama said, I need to help spread the wealth. And John McCain took that on last night. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'll keep your taxes low and I'll provide available and affordable health care for you and your employees, and I will not have -- I will not stand for a tax increase on small business income. 50 percent of small business income taxes are paid by small businesses. That's 16 million jobs in America. And what you want to do to Joe the plumber, and millions more like him, is have their taxes increased and not be able to realize the American dream.

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The conversation I had with Joe the plumber, what I essentially said to him was five years ago when you were in the position to buy your business, you needed a tax cut then. And what I want to do is make sure that the plumber, the nurse, the firefighter, the teacher, the young entrepreneur who doesn't yet have money, I want to give them a tax break now. And that requires us to make some important choices.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

YELLIN: So Heidi, the bottom line is both men achieved some success. But the question remains, did it work? Was it enough for John McCain? This morning our poll shows that most viewers thought that Barack Obama came out ahead. But again, most viewers were Democrats. So we'll have to see how this shakes out in the next couple of days, Heidi.

COLLINS: All right. CNN's Jessica Yellin. Thank you for that, Jessica.

And more now on Joe the plumber. Just an average Joe until a chance encounter with Senator Obama. Now, as you heard, he is a talking point. Joe Wurzelbacher says no one is more surprised than he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE WURZELBACHER, "JOE THE PLUMBER": Like I said, it's just, you know, surreal to hear my name on national TV. Like I said before, I'm just glad I could be used to get some points across, you know, hopefully it makes other Americans go out and look into the issues and find out for themselves.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: We asked you to tell us what you thought of the debates. Here is what we heard from some of our i-Reporters. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Unfortunately now we have Joe the plumber. If I hear one more time the word and phrase "Joe the plumber," I'm not going to vote for either one and I'm going to write "Joe the plumber" in on my ballot as a write in vote.

Both Senator Obama and John McCain did extremely well tonight. John McCain did much better than I expected, and -- but Barack Obama did address the hard issues that Americans are facing. While John McCain just kind of sat back and kept a smug smirk on his face.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: CNN i-Reporters also are voicing their opinions of the debates. We'll be showcasing some of them. You can still contribute, in fact. Just go to ireport.com and send us your take on the final debate.

New debate numbers as well. Senior political analyst Bill Schneider will be along at the bottom of the hour to take us through the post-debate polls and to tell us what they really mean heading into the last two weeks before the election.

Hey, let's get a look at this, issue #1, your money. Well, now the Dow Jones industrial averages are to the negative by double digits. You see them there. And question number one though always seems to be will you lose even more of your money today? As you can see, we were to the positive for a little while here, in fact, triple digits to the positive. But the Dow trying to recover from yesterday's huge loss of more than 700 points. That, in fact, turns out to be eight percent of its value.

Fear knows no bounds and national boundaries, this hour markets around the world from Asia to Europe following Wall Street slide. Japan's stock market dropping a breathtaking 11 percent overnight. It's the Nikkei's biggest one-day drop since the stock market crash of October 1987. Also in the red this hour, markets in England, Germany, France and Australia. Fears of a global recession seem to be getting worse.

So what now? Let's take -- nice setup, right, Christine?

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: What now?

COLLINS: When people look at all of this though, what should they be trying to concentrate on? I know I've asked it before but certainly worth repeating.

ROMANS: You know, I ask every single economist and personal finance expert and the people that we talk to every day. I say what can our viewers do? What can they take away from this incredible volatility, from the fact that every day it seems as if there's history being made either on the policy fronts or on the markets, these huge, huge moves in stocks. And they tell me there's two things you can control, your job and your spending. You're seeing evidence of concerns about your job in the spending. We saw you know, retail sales down much more than expected last month.

COLLINS: Yes.

ROMANS: They'll probably be down again this month. So, I mean, what people can take away when they watch all these headlines, is this is the time to be making sure you know what you're doing in your job. You know, keep in mind, I mean, everybody with head count in America who is a boss probably has the top 20 percent and the bottom 20 percent identified, you know, in the back of their head in case they have to have job cuts. Make sure you're on the right side of that. And that's what all of these experts keep saying over and over again.

So there's a lot of news. I mean, we know manufacturing jobs have been lost. Today, we learned from a federal report that factories had their worst drop in manufacturing output in 34 years. We know that jobless claims are still running about 450, 460,000 every week. That's almost half a million people lining up for jobless benefits every week. You know, we know a lot of different things about the economy. And all of them are looking pretty grim at the moment. So the two things you can control, your jobs and your spending, Heidi.

COLLINS: Yes. A little bit of good news though today --

ROMANS: That's right.

COLLINS: Is there not? Social Security, jobless claims, consumer prices, what are we liking the most?

ROMANS: It's nice to know. The most -- the thing that we like the most is that 55 million Americans next year who are retirees, who are getting their Social Security benefits are going to get 5.8 percent more in their check next year. That on average comes out to about $63 a paycheck. $63 is going to go -- this is going to go fill up the tank. This is going to go to heat the home. This is going to go pay for higher food prices. But a $63 on average increase in their checks next year for 55 million Americans.

I think that that's going to be a little bit -- it comes at a very important time I think for a lot of seniors who are facing falling home prices and also, you know, just you know, if they have any stock exposure, they're seeing their retirement savings down.

CPI was flat. That's the consumer price index. So it didn't spike wildly. We've seen gas prices come down. We've seen oil prices come down sharply. That's as a result, of course, of the weak economy. But at least, at least the weak economy has that silver lining of the weaker energy prices. Gas prices have come down pretty sharply and jobless claims, while I set still historically at kind of you know, recessionary levels, that new filings were down 16,000 from the week before. So you still have 451,000 people lining up for first-time unemployment benefits. But people thought it could have been actually worse.

COLLINS: OK. All right. Well, thanks for giving us the big picture. ROMANS: Sure.

COLLINS: We sure do appreciate it. Christine Romans from New York this morning.

Hurricane Omar now a Category 3 storm, but weakening slightly as it moves through the Caribbean. Residents brace for the storm in Puerto Rico, shuttering windows and taking cover. In Venezuela, Omar brought heavy rains and severe flooding yesterday. Today forecasters are urging people in the Virgin and Northern Leeward Islands to rush to "protect life and property." When you hear that, that is a little scary. Reynolds Wolf standing by in the weather center to tell us more.

Good morning to you, Reynolds.

REYNOLDS WOLF, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Good morning. You're right. This is a tremendous storm.

In fact, it's one of the strongest ones we have. Just to give you a bearings, give you an idea of where the storm is located, this happens to be the Caribbean Sea here, the Dominican Republic, you got Puerto Rico, San Juan. And then back over here. Well, this is Tampa and Miami. Miami, we currently have a live image out of Miami at this hour, showing you the conditions.

And things in Miami not too bad, looking down from Biscayne Bay. That's fantastic. A few clouds in there. Expecting a nice day there compared to what's happening in the Caribbean and in parts of the Atlantic. No question it's going to be a much better time in Florida. This storm, thankfully, will be pulling away from the Leeward Islands. And the latest path we have from the National Hurricane Center brings the storm farther to the north, the northeast and out into the middle of the Atlantic out of harm's way. Certainly no threat to the United states as you make your way into Friday, Saturday and Sunday and even into Monday and Tuesday, this storm moving into cooler water. As it moves into cooler water, it will begin to die out.

Meanwhile, back in the U.S., what we're going to be seeing today along the eastern seaboard is a chance of scattered showers in the northeast. But back out to the west we take you where dry conditions prevail. We still have breezy conditions across parts of central and southern California.

The red flag warnings still in effect. That's where you have areas that may be threatened by wildfires. Already we've been talking about those fires near Los Angeles. You've got the possibility of seeing the dry conditions from say San Diego. northward to Santa Clarita, back into San Luis Obispo and even into Santa Barbara county and Ventura county too, for that matter.

So for much of the coastal range, we got that dry, dry, very dry conditions as you got the shapero (ph), you got the grasses up there that will continue to dry out with this low humidity. And keep in mind also, the wind will be dying down a little bit which is certainly some good news for any fires that do begin to pop up. It should not spread as quickly, very, very quickly.

You'll take a look at some of these plumes, smoke plumes taken on Monday and the strong offshore flow. You'll notice them moving out over the channel islands. Today not quite that significant. Certainly, it wasn't that significant yesterday. You'll notice barely visible as yesterday afternoon. All right. That is the way things are looking. Let's send it right back to you, Heidi.

COLLINS: All right. Very good, Reynolds. Appreciate that.

WOLF: You bet.

COLLINS: Meanwhile, firefighters with the upper hand on those wildfires near Los Angeles this morning, now allowing thousands of people to go home. Strong Santa Ana winds are dying down. The worst of the fires now 50 percent contained. Fire officials expect to have that fire fully under control by the weekend.

Quickly I want to show you what we are waiting to see in a little while, Sarah Palin obviously, the vice presidential candidate for the Republican side of things and Senator John McCain's running mate will be taking to that podium. Bangor, Maine. We will certainly bring it to you happening shortly in just a few minutes.

Breaking down the final debate, what we learned from the candidates last night. Party people will be here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: We are now looking at a deficit of well over half a trillion dollars. So one of the things that I think that we have to recognize is pursuing the same kinds of policies we pursued over the last eight years is not going to bring down the deficit. And frankly, Senator McCain voted for four of five of President Bush's budgets.

MCCAIN: Senator Obama, I'm not President Bush. Do you want to run against President Bush? You should have run three years ago. I'm going to give a new direction to this economy and this country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: Post debate polls for you now with a look at how independent voters saw the debate. 57 percent thought Barack Obama did the best job, while 31 percent thought John McCain was better. We'll have more of these new numbers coming up next half hour.

First off, we want to look at the candidates' strategies. Who was right on the money? Who fell flat? Two of our regulars are joining me now, from Washington Republican strategist Cheri Jacobus.

Hello to you.

CHERI JACOBUS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Good morning. COLLINS: And in New York for the Democrats, former Clinton White House aide Keith Boykin.

Hi there to you, Keith, as well.

OK. So let's just start at the top here. Who did better? And I'm not going to predict what either one of you will say? Cheri, you go first.

JACOBUS: I think on style Barack Obama did better than John McCain. I think on substance, and honesty and being direct with the American people, far and away it was John McCain --

COLLINS: Hey, Cheri, forgive me for cutting you off, like almost the second I toss you. But we have been waiting for Governor Sarah Palin to arrive and get to the podium at Bangor, Maine. So if you guys will stick around, we want to take you now to Sarah Palin.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

GOV. SARAH PALIN (R), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: ... according to his priorities and a true reformer who wants to lower taxes and create jobs and get this economy back on track. It's the choice between a candidate who will raise your taxes, and that threatens our future, and a leader who is going to Washington to work for Joe the plumber and people like my sister's family, my sister who owns a service station, and millions of you small business owners, millions of Americans struggling to sustain a small business. These are the differences.

You know, we want to cut taxes because we think like Joe or Jane the plumber thinks. Our opponents want to raise taxes because they think like that other Joe, that six-term senator from Delaware whom I'm running against. In this election it's the choice of a candidate who won't disavow a group committing voter fraud and a leader who will not tolerate the voter fraud. Maine, it's the difference on November 4th between just inspiring words and inspiring and trustworthy deeds.

Maine, soon the choice will be yours to make. I'm sure that you all remember the saying that, as Maine goes, so goes the nation. Yes.

(APPLAUSE)

So I am here to ask you, are you ready to help us carry the state of Maine to victory? Are you ready to make John McCain the next president of the United States? Are you ready to send us there to shake things up in Washington. You know, for a campaign that says that it's all about the future, our opponents sure do like to talk a lot about the past and point fingers backwards. They look to the past because that's where you find blame. We are joining you in looking to the future because that's where you find solutions.

They look to the past because they'd rather run against the current administration, it sounds like. And that strategy, though, thankfully is really starting to wear very, very thin. As John McCain reminded Barack Obama last night, if he wanted to run against George Bush, he had his chance four years ago.

PALIN: This year the name of the ballot is John McCain, and America knows that John McCain is his own man. He is the maverick. From an enemy prison camp to the halls of Congress, John McCain has always, always put his country first. He's the only man in this race who talks about the wars that America is fighting, and he isn't afraid to use the word victory. If you notice, our opponent gives speech after speech about the wars America is fighting in. It sure would be nice if just once Barack Obama would say that he wants America to win.

John served our nation proudly in uniform for 22 years. He spent 5 1/2 years as a P.O.W.. He's met great adversity in his own life and in the service of his country, and he knows how tough challenges are overcome. He knows how to win a war. And as the mother of one of the troops serving in Iraq today, he's exactly the kind of man I want as commander in chief.

PALIN: Thank you, guys.

COLLINS: Just a little bit of flavor coming to us today from Bangor, Maine, Governor Sarah Palin there. This is taking place at an airport there, a rally. And we just wanted to give you a little bit of an idea of what was happening there.

There's a lot of activity today with all of the candidates. So want to get back to last night, if we could, for just a moment. We have with us share Cheri Jacobus and Keith Boykin. And is started off, Sherry, I'm so sorry I had to interrupt you. I wanted to go back to what you were saying and have you guys tell me who you thought won last night. Go ahead, Cheri.

JACOBUS: I think John McCain on substance as I said and Barack Obama on style. And I think that initially people are impressed on that style. I think he bordered on slick, you know, we heard slick really with regard to Bill Clinton and you know, tricky Dick with regard to Richard Nixon. I think that Barack Obama is bordering on that because of his aloofness and his arrogance coming in and he's overconfident.

When I saw Candy Crowley here on CNN did a report earlier today talking about the danger of that. We saw in the Democratic primary when Obama did that, he made that comment to Hillary Clinton. She was asked about her likability, without even looking up, he was looking down to the side and he wasn't even asked and he said, that's OK, Hillary, you're likable enough. Instantly the polls started turning in her direction.

I think because of his lack of experience, because he has no record of cutting taxes, he has no record of cutting spending, he does just the opposite, he really runs the risk of people not trusting what he's saying. So the short term aspect of this is people were impressed by his performance. I suspect, however, that the Joe plumbers of the world as the hours and days go by are going to be taking a closer look at John McCain. They asked for John McCain need to make some inroads and I think he probably did.

COLLINS: All right. Keith, equal time?

KEITH BOYKIN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, I think Cheri has been spending too much time reading Republican talking points. I agree with the American people. The American people thought Barack Obama won the debate. I thought Barack Obama won the debate. This wasn't really a choice, it wasn't really a contest. Barack Obama was presidential, cool and poised.

John McCain was angry last night. He seems like he's so upset and frustrated by his campaign's failures, he wants to throw out every attack he can possibly throw out. I didn't think it really helped him. You know, his best line last night about you know I'm not President Bush, you should have run against President Bush. That's a cute line you could say. But John McCain has voted with President Bush 95 percent of the time.

The American people can't tell the difference. And the reality is the party in power, the Republicans have been responsible for the economic collapse. The stock market is in the tank, the jobs are being lost. Who else are we going to blame? You know --

JACOBUS: We're going to blame Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. They've been in charge of the Democratic run Congress for the past two years and you notice that Barack Obama does not appear with the two of them. He does not want to be seen in the same picture as those two failed leaders of Congress. So I think that's something that I find very interesting about this campaign cycle.

BOYKIN: I just think it's amusing, though, that the people who have been running the Congress, one branch of the three branches of government for less than two years are going to share the entire burden for eight years of failed Republican trickle down administration policies. I mean --

JACOBUS: Look, Keith, if you don't want to make it about -- if you don't want to make it about that of who has been in charge or who has been where, you know, the fact that Barack Obama has not been in the Senate that long. He spent most of his time running for president, everything he said last night, and I saw this on one of the blogs, he doesn't have any real experience to point to. He merely talks about earlier pronouncements. He had to spend an awful lot of time last night really with a tortured response to his vote for partial birth abortion in the Illinois senate. That's a pretty up or down straight-up question.

BOYKIN: Cheri.

JACOBUS: And that is something that I think he should be questioned on by the mainstream media and he hasn't. I think last night he was coasting. He thought it was a cake walk. In the short term, I've actually seen a lot of different polls that show the John McCain tied --

COLLINS: Let's get Keith in here. All right, Keith.

BOYKIN: And Cheri, i think it's kind of pathetic and desperate that the Republicans are throwing up everything they possibly can against to try to stick against Barack Obama. This guy has been vetted for the course of a two-year campaign. He's offering change. The Republicans are offering not only more of the same in terms of economic policies, but more of the same in terms of the nasty negative attacks.

The polls last night show that John McCain spent most of his time talking about attacking Barack Obama. He didn't spend enough time attacking the issues. Quite frankly, the American public are tired of that politics as usual. They're tired of what you're saying, Cheri. They're tired of what John McCain and Sarah Palin just said. We don't want four more years or eight more years of that negativity. They want change.

JACOBUS: Keith, to say that the American people are tired and we have a final three weeks to go here, I've seen the different focus groups. I saw one this morning of independent, undecided voters that the majority of them went for John McCain last night. There is a political poll that says -- politico.com --

BOYKIN: Did you see the CNN poll?

JACOBUS: That says they're tied. What I'm telling you is there are different polls out there. And to be honest about this, you have to look at the real response of the American people. There's no question that the American people think that in all three debates that Barack Obama was more eloquent. He performed better. He's better on TV.

BOYKIN: And that he addressed the issues and he was not negative.

COLLINS: We're out of time, guys. Cheri, finish your point and Keith you'll get the final word.

JACOBUS: If you look at who they say won the debate, and then you look at where the poll numbers are, they're not going for Barack Obama in that regard. People are looking at substance rather than just style. We have three weeks to go and I think it matters.

COLLINS: OK. All right. Quickly, Keith, last line.

BOYKIN: Wishful thinking on Cheri's part. Barack Obama did an excellent job last night. I think he's doing well in the polls because the American people understand what I saw last night, as a candidate who was presidential and poised not a candidate who is angry and erratic.

COLLINS: All right. Next time I'm going to bring my stop watch and clock you guys. Thanks for making my job easy though. Good discussion, guys. Appreciate it.

BOYKIN: Thank you.

JACOBUS: Thank you.

COLLINS: Cheri Jacobus and Keith Boykin.

New debate numbers to talk to you about. Senior political analyst Bill Schneider will be along at the bottom of the hour to take us through the post debate polls and tell us what they really mean heading into the last two weeks before Election Day.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Nineteen days to go and no more debates. The final face-off last night between Barack Obama and John McCain. Here is a bit of the action now. The candidates talking about taxes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Senator McCain, the centerpiece of his economic proposal, is to provide $200 billion in additional tax breaks to some of the wealthiest corporations in America, ExxonMobil and other oil companies would get an additional $4 billion in tax breaks.

What I've said is I want to provide a tax cut for 95 percent of working Americans, 95 percent. If you make more less than a quarter million dollars a year, then you will not see your income tax go up, your capital gains tax go up, your payroll tax go up, not one dime.

MCCAIN: The whole premise behind Senator's Obama's plan are class warfare, let's spread the wealth around. I want small businesses -- by the way, the small businesses that we're talking about would receive an increase in their taxes.

Right -- Why would you want to increase anybody's taxes right now? Why would you want to do that, anyone, anyone in America when we have such a tough time? When these small business people like Joe the Plumber are going to create jobs, unless you take that money from him and spread the wealth around.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: So what did voters think of the final debate? We have some new numbers to show you this morning. CNN's political analyst Bill Schneider is joining us from the debate site in Hempstead, New York. Good morning to you, Bill.

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: Good morning, Heidi.

Well, the voters watched it and they saw two very different contenders. One, John McCain, was scrappy and feisty and Barack Obama was Joe Cool. They had to make a judgment. We asked them who do you think did the better job in the debate?

And the answer was pretty clear-cut, by nearly two to one, 58 to 31 percent, the viewers of the debate, now, this is not all voters, but those who watched the debate which were a little more Democratic than the voters as a whole, they did think that Barack Obama did the better job in the debate, as I say, by almost two to one, 58 to 31 percent. Well, why? For one thing, they thought that John McCain who was pretty tough spent a lot more time attacking his opponent. When we asked who spent more time on the attack, there was overwhelmingly John McCain. Eighty percent said McCain. Only seven percent said Barack Obama.

In the end, this was a debate with one central issue, the crisis facing the country, the economy. Who did the viewers think would do a better job handling the economy? That, too, was Obama. That was the key to his victory. Fifty nine percent said Obama. Thirty five percent said McCain. So apparently Obama's cool and collected and very well-prepared answers counted for more than McCain's more aggressive attacks on Barack Obama.

And finally, have the voters had enough? They may be ready to vote. We asked would you like to see more debates? And by two to one the voters said nope, we've seen about enough. We're ready to vote now.

COLLINS: That's interesting. I think I like that one the best.

SCHNEIDER: Good.

COLLINS: Bill Schneider, sure do appreciate that outside of the debate site last night.

With the campaign in the homestretch now, Americans aren't the only ones taking notes. Our correspondents in New Delhi and Moscow have been gathering reaction. First we want to go to India.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Sara Sidner in New Delhi where in the retail markets there's certainly concerns about what is happening in the financial markets. Are Indians watching the U.S. elections? They are. They're paying close attention to the U.S. election. They can name all the candidates for the most part. Those who watch and are interested in news.

However, as to whether Barack Obama or John McCain can take care of this financial crisis, Indians don't think one man alone can do the job. What they do believe is that Indian politicians in and of themselves need to take care of what is happening in this country. And they believe India will weather the storm better than most.

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN INT'L CORRESPONDENT: I'm Matthew Chance in Moscow, the race for the white house is being closely watched by at least 35 percent of the Russian population. That's the finding of a Russian opinion poll conducted by the Independent Latava (ph) Center here in the Russian capital.

Carried out before the last presidential debate, the poll also suggests that 35 percent of Russians with a preference say that Barack Obama, only 14 percent want to see John McCain as the next U.S. president.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: In case you've lost track, there are only 19 more days until Election Day.

And in those 19 days your money will likely still be issue number one. Let's take stock at this hour. It's been one hour, in fact, since Wall Street opened, a live look now at the big board shows a little different picture than what we saw straight out of the gate that's for sure. We're down nearly 200 points, Dow Jones Industrial Averages.

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, a closer look at the nation's credit crisis. It is at the center of our economic troubles. What happened and who is to blame. The Senate Banking Committee is taking a look, a silver lining of the struggling economy, though, a big drop in oil prices. Today it's at its lowest level in more than a year. That means gas prices are also sliding.

So certainly a lot of ground to cover on the economy. And we've got a panel to get it all together and keep us together. Helping us break it all down. CNN's Christine Romans is there in New York with some of our guests.

Hi there, Christine.

ROMANS: Hi, Heidi.

We're here with Jeanne Sahadi, Paul La Monica, Poppy Harlow and we're going to try to figure out which candidate has the best crisis management for the economy. Both of them have been encouraged to come out with more specificity, and in the past days have.

There's some similarities between the two of them. Where are these two candidates similar on how they want to fix what's going on here?

JEANNE SAHADI, SR. WRITER, CNNMONEY.COM: Both of them are in favor of not making seniors take minimum required distributions from 401(k)s and IRAs. That's something you have to do when you're 70.5, for the next two years because the market is down so much, they don't want to hurt the nest egg too terribly.

They also want to tax unemployment benefits. Jobless rates are expected to go up. It is going to be, I think the McCain campaign estimated about a 10 percent boost in the pocket savings for jobless workers.

ROMANS: Right now it seems politically a good move to appeal to senior citizens and people who are losing their jobs or know people who are losing their jobs, politically both of those seem to be policy choices that are going to resonate in another 18 or 19 days. Beyond that, where are the big differences? Is it still the tax and spending.

SAHADI: Yes. McCain has proposed a lot of investment breaks. He wants to cut the capital gains rate in half. He wants to increase the capital loss writeoff from $3,000 to $15,000. Obama wants to allow people to make penalty-free withdrawals from their IRAs and 401(k) if they do it before 59.5.

What experts say is that you spoke to one that said this is more tinkering around the margins in terms of helping people. But it could encourage people to sell where they might not have otherwise. I don't know how helpful that will be in terms of the crisis. But they both are going in that direction, but just in different ways.

PAUL LA MONICA, EDITOR-AT-LARGE, CNNMONEY.COM: They also seem to have some similarities on the need for helping homeowners that are facing foreclosure. But even there, there are obviously some key differences. It seems that John McCain, he specifically mentioned a Great Depression era program to buy up more mortgages from banks and try and refinance them. Obama seems to favor that as well. It seems the difference is, how much do you spend? Obama tried to make the point that McCain would buy them at full value.

ROMANS: Obama has this moratorium on foreclosures. One of the experts we talked to said the $300 billion of plan of buying home loans that is McCain's plan, he called that not a gimmick, but a Hail Mary, that that would be something that would be a bold plan that would try to get him some bang for the buck.

Come on, we're so close to election and we have this historic crisis happening at the same time. You can't hardly believe it. There are incredible numbers that reflect what's happening in the economy.

POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: Yes. Those retail sales numbers yesterday, a huge decline there. Today we got the manufacturing numbers, it's the worst we've seen in 35 years, and that is one of the four indicators that the National Bureau of Economic Research uses to determine if we're in a recession or not. It was down 2.8 percent. Our company is not making things, Americans not buying as much.

ROMANS: Thanks so much. Jeanne Sahadi, Poppy Harlow and Paul La Monica -- Heidi.

COLLINS: All right, Christine. Guests, thanks so much for that. It was certainly an ugly Wednesday on Wall Street. Will you make some money back today? We have a market update in just a moment.

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COLLINS: Well, here we go again. Stocks are sliding. We want to check in with CNN's Susan Lisovicz on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange now. Already we're seeing this volatility again within just -- what is it -- hour and 15 minutes since the trading day began.

SUSAN LISOVICZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We've grown accustomed to letting things happen until the final hours.

COLLINS: Nothing matters until that last bell.

LISOVICZ: Or in the case yesterday, it was really the final 20 minutes where really things started to get interesting, Heidi. Interesting is the biggest euphemism I've uttered this year. Yes, we're not getting reassurances from investors today. You would think that with some encouraging news on the inflation front that we would have a bounce. The bounce is fleeting. Right now the blue chips are lower by more than 200 points and perhaps more tellingly we're below Friday's close.

Friday was an interesting day. A lot of veterans thought that could have been a bottom, temporary bottom. If you really want to get technical about it, what we want to see is Friday's low being tested. We're not there yet, but we are below Friday's closing price. Of course, this coming after the second biggest point drop for the Dow, the second biggest percentage loss for the Dow, and the S&P 500 since October of '87.

And we did get good news on consumer prices. In August prices dropped for the first time in a few years, for the first time in nearly two years. And the number we got today showed it remaining flat which was better than expected. This is the silver lining here, Heidi, that the slowing economy is moderating inflation. And one dramatic way to look at that is oil prices. Oil right now down another $1.50. It is below $73 a barrel.

Remember in July, just three months ago, approaching $150 a barrel. And that definitely is trickling down. AAA has been reporting every day that gas prices are coming down. So it really is trickling into our pockets.

COLLINS: All right. Well we'll take that silver lining, we'll take it anyway we can get it. Susan Lisovicz, we sure do appreciate that. Thank you.

LISOVICZ: You're welcome.

COLLINS: Students tested not for what they know, but what they might have.

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COLLINS: An AIDS scare at a Midwestern high school. Now health officials in St. Louis want to test students for HIV, the virus that causes the disease.

They're setting up a testing center at Normandy High School. The reason people are worried? The Health Department said someone tested positive for HIV and they have exposed others. Health officials aren't saying who that person is or how he or she may have exposed others.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. DOLORES GUNN, DIR. ST. LOUIS CO. HEALTH DEPT.: This is not necessarily confined to Normandy School District. Again, this is very early in the investigation process for us. Right now the investigation has led to Normandy School District and the community surrounding Normandy School District. (END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: HIV of course still a serious problem in the United States, particularly for kids under the age of 18. CNN medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joining us now to talk more about this.

An upsetting story certainly. You wonder, is it just in that area?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Oh, no. This is not nearly as unusual as you might think. A lot of people don't know that in this country among people who have HIV, one out of four of them got it when they were a teenager. So this is not all that unusual. What that means is that nearly 5,000 young people are diagnosed every year with HIV. So this is not all that unusual. Scary headline, but not all that unusual.

COLLINS: Just to reiterate, under the age of 18. What we're talking about here, I guess it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this out. We're talking about kids having unprotected sex.

COHEN: That's right. It shouldn't be news to anybody. Kids have sex, they tend not to use condoms. A lot of people who have HIV don't even know it. So they have it, they don't know it, they don't know they're spreading it.

What's this school -- I want to ask you what everybody should be doing about it? Is but we are focusing on this particular school district.

COHEN: This school district has really tackled this head on, they set up a center for testing kids. They are giving out education, but what they're not doing, which is interesting, is they are not giving out condoms. Some people would criticize them for that. They are taking it head-on. In the days of Ryan White back in the '80s when they wanted to close their eyes to everything, that's not happening in this school district. They are educating and testing.

COLLINS: Yes. If they handed out the condoms, there would be a similarly large group saying they shouldn't do that either.

COHEN: That's right. They would get criticism either way. That's true.

COLLINS: Thanks for bringing it to light here. CNN medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen. Thanks, Elizabeth.

Family members keep collecting a woman's retirement checks long after she dies. But that's not the horrifying part of this story.

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COLLINS: A very disturbing story of alleged elderly abuse in Northern California, the burned remains of an 84-year-old woman found in a backyard barbecue pit. Now, the woman's daughter and grandson are under arrest in a series of charges. Here is Mike Dello Stritto of Sacramento affiliate KOVR.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MIKE DELLO STRITTO, KOVR TV CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): What cops say happened here sounds like a Halloween horror movie. But even for Hollywood, this would be a stretch.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's not something you could make up.

DELLO STRITTO: Grandmother Ramona Alman (ph) dies. Cops say her daughter and grandson find the body on the bedroom floor and leave it there for a week.

Then the mother and son are accused of dragging the decomposing corpse to the backyard barbecue pit, cremating the lady's body for 17 hours.

CAPT. PAUL HOSLER, TEHAMA COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: This was a makeshift barbecue they used two weeks prior to cook their Thanksgiving turkey.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A real shock.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This sounds like a joke, but it ain't a joke.

DELLO STRITTO: Then what could be the most startling discovery, not all of grandma turned to ash. This picture of Kathleen Almond (ph) shows a home made necklace. The ring in the middle is a piece of her mother's skull. The picture posted on her MySpace page.

HOSLER: You combine everything and add the necklace to it, it's just off the charts.

DELLO STRITTO (on camera): So the question here. Why would anyone do this to a loved one? Cops think it could have been for cash. They say the daughter and grandson cashed all of her retirement checks until they were caught 10 months later.

HOSLER: Unbelievable, what motivates people to do what they do.

DELLO STRITTO (voice-over): Mom and son Tony Ray are accused of pocketing up to $35,000 in checks from December until just this month. But there are things they won't be charged with.

Is there a crime involved to use a piece of your loved one as an accessory?

HOSLER: Not that I'm aware of.

DELLO STRITTO: Cops don't think the death was foul play, but any evidence of what killed Ramona Almond is most likely burned away with her body.

(on camera): Without these things even being crimes on the books, cops say they're left to arrest the daughter and grandson for embezzlement, conspiracy and elder abuse. (END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: The two are being held on $30,000 bail with an arraignment that is scheduled for today.

Federal investigators at the scene now of a deadly medical helicopter crash in Aurora, Illinois. Four people including a 13- month-old girl were killed. The helicopter was headed for Children's Memorial Hospital in Chicago when it went down just before midnight last night. Fire officials say the helicopter may have hit a radio tower wire before it crashed. It is at least the ninth fatal crash involving medical helicopters in the last year.

Just last month, the National Transportation Safety Board called for a public hearing to look into the recent increase in medical evacuation crashes.

A farmer takes a long range view of the presidential race. Candidates not fielding questions, but in a field. We'll take a closer look.

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COLLINS: The candidates cut into a cornfield. This video sent to us by I-Reporter Greg Hughes in Oregon. You can see the giant heads with the message "Vote" underneath them. It's just one of the many corn fields cut especially for the candidates.

You can see others on ireport.com.

I'm Heidi Collins. Join me again tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m. Eastern.

For now CNN NEWSROOM continues with Tony Harris.