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CNN Sunday Morning
Protests in Thailand; Black Friday in the Black; Mumbai Situation
Aired November 30, 2008 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: From the CNN Center in Atlanta, this is CNN SUNDAY MORNING. It is Sunday, November 30th -- the last day of November.
T.J. HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: It's Christmas.
NGUYEN: Can you believe it already around the corner?
HOLMES: Yes.
NGUYEN: Good morning, everybody. I'm Betty Nguyen.
HOLMES: And hello to you all. I'm T.J. Holmes.
A lot of developments to tell you about this morning out of Mumbai, those terror attacks, including a hotel official who -- listen to this -- says they were warned that an attack could happen.
NGUYEN: Also, looking for the official word tomorrow from President- elect Obama as he prepares to nominate Senator Hillary Clinton as secretary of state.
HOLMES: Also, we have some numbers trickling in and it appears that Black Friday was in fact black. Retailers got some good news here. That's certainly good to hear.
NGUYEN: Absolutely, because they were talking about how the economy was not going to be so good and people weren't going to shop. Well, apparently, they did. And the Thanksgiving weekend, unfortunately, is winding down. So, a lot of you headed home today, which is why we have the holiday travel forecast up there for you.
HOLMES: Yes. It's going to be on the right side of the screen for you this entire morning. A lot of weather situations going on out there that could affect your travel. Some airport delays maybe. We'll get into that but we'll leave it up on the screen for you.
First, an Indian official is taking responsibility for the Mumbai terror attacks and has submitted his resignation. He's name is Shivraj Patil. You see him there. He is India's top security minister, the equivalent of the U.S. Homeland Security secretary, if you will. Patil says he is taking, quote, "moral responsibility for those attacks that left 183 people dead and paralyzed, of course, India's largest city. No word yet, however, whether his resignation has been accepted by his higher ups.
(CROWD CHANTING)
HOLMES: And what you're seeing here and hearing are protests over the attacks. These are marchers accusing India's politicians and security forces of incompetence in preventing those attacks. The marchers walked passed the Gateway of India, that's on the city's waterfront, really, a main monument there. Investigators say the terrorists entered the city from that water.
Meanwhile, India's army commandos say the terrorists knew the Taj Mahal Hotel layout so well they could have navigated the halls in pitch black darkness.
NGUYEN: That is just so astounding. And just one aspect of this investigation, here's what we know. The death toll revised slightly. It's now at 183 dead with 273 injured. Among the dead, five Americans. The chairman of the company that owns the hotel says the hotel had been warned about the possibility of a terrorist attack.
And CNN does have correspondent all over this story for you from Mumbai, where we have five of our people to Islamabad, Jerusalem, and London, plus, our correspondents who are at the White House and in Chicago where the Barack Obama camp is following development.
So, let's get more on the broad investigation into this. Our Liz Neisloss is in Mumbai.
And, Liz, the chairman of the company that owns the Taj Mahal Hotel says that they were warned. What is this with the forewarning? What do you know about that?
LIZ NEISLOSS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it is very interesting, Betty. This is a major icon in India. A major symbol of India's strength, it's wealth and history. And it would be a suspected terrorist attack or a suspected to be on several lists. But this was confirmed by the chairman of the group, the Tata Group, which owns this hotel and it's very interesting. When asked if there had been prior suspicions, if they had any knowledge, here's what he had to say, he told CNN.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, FROM CNN'S FAREED ZAKARIA GPS)
RATAN TATA, CHAIRMAN, TATA GROUP: We did have such a warning and we did have some measures to, you know, where people couldn't park their cars in the portico where you have to go through a metal detector. But if I look at what we had, which all of us complained about, it could not have stopped what took place.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEISLOSS: And he did provide some other information to us to CNN. So, Ratan Tata told us that these suspects, which attacked the hotel, had taken rooms prior to the attack, that they knew the hotel, that they had intricate plans, and that they were well trained -- Betty?
NGUYEN: Liz, that hotel behind you, the Taj, we were understanding at this point yesterday that there were sweeps going on in the hotel. What do you know about the investigation as of this morning? NEISLOSS: Well, as far as the investigation goes, there may be one suspect, maybe more. We never truly really know until they make a final announcement that could be under questioning at this point.
As far as the sweeping of the hotel location, that could also be under way. This is more than 550 rooms. There were many suspicions about booby traps yesterday as we stood here. There were grenades being detonated and explosions going off even after the scene had been said to have been cleared.
So, even while all these terrorists sites that were attacked are said to be secure and safe now, Betty, there are still many questions that remain and now even as the funerals begin, there is a lot of finger- pointing and anger in India.
NGUYEN: Absolutely. All right. CNN's Liz Neisloss is joining us from Mumbai today. Thank you for that.
Well, Ratan Tata, the chairman of the company that owns the Taj Hotel, appears today on "FAREED ZAKARIA'S GPS," right here on CNN. You can hear more about the security issue this afternoon at 1:00 Eastern.
HOLMES: And we have been hearing the past couple of days a lot of survivor stories about how they got out of so many of those locations, nine all together that were attacked. We'll have another here (ph) by a Chicago couple that made it through the attacks, and they were at the Taj Mahal Hotel.
NGUYEN: Actually, they didn't wait to be rescued. They, in fact, got out on their own. And Randi Belisomo of our affiliate CLTV has their amaze story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOE ERNSTEEN, ATTACK SURVIVOR: We heard what we thought was firecrackers and explosions and stuff like that. That was about 11:00 o'clock at night. We were planning to have our luggage picked up at 4:00 in the morning to catch a flight two days ago.
RANDI BELISOMO, CLTV REPORTER (voice-over): But a series of terrorist attacks in Mumbai, responsible now for the death of at least 181 people, interrupted Joe and Marilyn Ernsteen's exit from India. The joy-filled (ph) couple reunited with family today that ended their three-week tour that had to be extended by three days.
MARILYN ERNSTEEN, ATTACK SURVIVOR: They turned off the TVs and they shut off the phones. So, we didn't know what was going on. Had we known they were terrorists, I would have been horrified.
BELISOMO: The Ernsteens thought the commotion outside the Taj Mahal Hotel was simply a reaction to a local fire. They didn't feel anything and thought a phone call they received asking them to stay in their rooms with the lights off was just overboard.
J. ERNSTEEN: I'm an optimist. So, I got up and showered any way and got dressed. And I was ready to leave and it was really very quiet at that stage of the game.
M. ERNSTEEN: It had been several hours and there's no gunfire and it was very quiet. And Joe said if it gets to be 9:00 o'clock in the morning and nothing is happening, I'm going to go out in the hall although we were told not to.
BELISOMO: That's exactly what Joe did, eventually convincing Marilyn to join him.
J. ERNSTEEN: I decided that it was more interesting taking pictures of the smoke-filled floors and then came past and got my wife and said I found the staircase. We went down the staircase, exited onto a kind of a rooftop, and then took a fire escape down.
BELISOMO: Though Joe and Marilyn appeared nonchalant, their family back home is anything but grateful. They have them back, especially considering their first assumptions upon hearing the tragic news from afar.
BURT SCHMARAK, MARILYN'S BROTHER: That they were dead. Yes. That was the starting point. Anything from there was good.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN: Well, the death toll in India has gone up since that report was filed. As we said just a little bit earlier, at least 183 people died in the attacks. And as for the Ernsteens, they're now heading to their winter home in Florida and say they're looking for a little peace and quiet.
HOLMES: All right. Well, everybody is looking now to take action against these terrorists, and Pakistan says it will go after the terrorists if it turns out that they were from Pakistan, as some in India have already accused them of being. We'll be live in Islamabad with that part of the story, that's coming your way in about half an hour.
NGUYEN: Well, this is something that you're going to be dealing with today. One of the busiest travel weekends of the entire year. So, delays. Where are they? Hopefully, there aren't too many of them.
Meteorologist Karen Maginnis has been watching it for us. She's in for Reynolds Wolf.
Karen, break it down.
KAREN MAGINNIS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: OK.
NGUYEN: Oh, look at those planes in the air behind you. My goodness.
MAGINNIS: There are about 1,600 flights in the air. Volume is building across the east. In the west, not so much just yet but you can see some of those across the Pacific flights that are coming in into Southern California, also, San Francisco, and a couple right around Seattle. But as far as delays go, we are not seeing any. But I anticipate that probably within the next 45 minutes to an hour, we may see some minor delays out of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport because it's been so drizzly, so rainy, the visibility has been so bad.
Here's the frontal system we were looking at yesterday, marching towards the east slowly but it's been a big rain producer, and in some cases, we're looking at an inch or more in some areas. All right. Here is Georgia right here. Here's Atlanta. You can see we're kind of in the green shaded area. I'm showing you this to set up what we're going to talk about coming up in about 20 minutes, and that is what could or should happen at the Kennedy Space Center about 1:19 this afternoon.
Take a look at the Great lakes, another problematic area with Chicago expecting maybe four to six inches of snowfall. We're looking at a deepening area of low pressure right across the Tennessee Valley into the lower Great Lakes region. That's going to be developing over the next 24 hours.
All right. Here's the big picture. As we go into this afternoon, it is going to be windy across the High Plains. High pressure across the west. But the messiest, T.J. and Betty, for travelers is going to be in the east with a stubborn area of low pressure.
We'll have another update coming up.
NGUYEN: OK. Thank you. We do appreciate that.
HOLMES: All right. Black Friday, did you make it to the mall on Friday?
NGUYEN: I was there bright and early Friday morning -- in line.
HOLMES: What did you get me?
NGUYEN: I can't tell you.
HOLMES: OK. Did you get me anything?
NGUYEN: No.
HOLMES: OK. All right.
(LAUGHTER)
HOLMES: Well, if you didn't make it Friday, we'll show you where you can find more deals, maybe even better ones beginning tomorrow, actually.
NGUYEN: Actually, and this, though -- take a look at this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We barricaded ourselves in there and put a bed against it to absorb any blasts coming out. And we just waited there for like 30 to 34 hours or something like that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NGUYEN: Survivors try to make sense of the violence in Mumbai and so does the world. What Pakistani officials are saying this morning as accusations continue to fly.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NGUYEN: Well, another story that we are sharing this morning with you, aside from the Mumbai attacks. Of course, here in the U.S., we're dealing with sales figures from Black Friday. Forget about the doom and gloom with the predictions, how is this for a silver lining for you? Earlier reports show Black Friday sales up almost 3 percent over last year. Now, Americans spend about $10.6 billion shopping on Friday.
And tomorrow, it's expected to be a big day as well. It is Cyber Monday: The online equivalent to Black Friday. So, plenty of people, though, did show up for door-buster deals but are bargain hunters enough to jump-start the sluggish economy?
Here with some answers is Ylan Mui, a business reporter from the "Washington Post." She joins us live from Pentagon City Mall in Arlington, Virginia.
It looks nice and festive behind you. So, Ylan, let me ask you this, we were really bracing ourselves for Black Friday. A lot of people were saying, you know, don't get too excited because people aren't going to out there shopping. Looks like sales were up 3 percent. Are you surprised by that?
YLAN MUI, WASHINGTON POST: You know, I think there's a lot of panic demand (ph) in the American consumers and people have been cutting back. They've been hearing a lot of really bad news about the economy, about joblessness, and, you know, what they said was, "Maybe, for Black Friday, what we're going to do is we're going to go shopping." Retailers really pulled out all of the stops and made sure they offered aggressive discounts. And so, that really helped draw consumers for Black Friday.
NGUYEN: So, what are people buying? And what do they stand in line for? Are we talking still as in years past, the big electronics?
MUI: That's exactly right. You know, some of the biggest deals this holiday season were on flat panel TVs. Wal-Mart had one going for $600, a 42-inch flat panel TV. And Circuit City was discounting flat panel TVs. So, that was one of the really hot items. Another thing that people were looking for were Blu-ray, anything electronics, DVD players, that sort of thing. And that's what got people standing in those lines early in the morning.
NGUYEN: All right. But if you're buying big flat screen television, you're spending that kind of money, granted that the deals are fantastic out there, what does that say about the economy? Is it truly as bad as we say it is, or do people just looking at the deals going, you know -- I don't know if I'll see it this cheap again? MUI: Well, you know, I think people are thinking a couple of things. They're thinking, we want to get the deals while they're out there and maybe they won't back later on on the holiday season. And they're also saying -- you know what? I'm going get one big thing for my family, I'm going to say, this year as a family gift, we're going to get a big TV. But maybe, they're not going to buy the additional accessories. Maybe they're not going to buy as many movies to go along with that.
So, we're finding that people are really making sure that they get something for the family and maybe cutting out little things for themselves.
NGUYEN: We're looking at some video now of people just storming the stores. We see it every year, as soon as those stores open, people just come running in for those deals. But, you know, this time of year, what, it's Sunday now, if you missed those deals, they may be gone for good. Any chance any of these deep discounts are still around today and tomorrow?
MUI: Well, you know -- Betty, you know what I think is that retailers are really being aggressive this year and they are making sure that they continue to battle it out all of the way through Christmas. You know, no one is going to be resting after Sunday.
NGUYEN: Really? OK, and tomorrow is a big day. We got Cyber Monday, those online discounts. I spoke with an expert earlier this week or last week, I should say, and she was saying that at Monday and Tuesday before Christmas, we're going to see some really deep discounts. Do you agree with that?
MUI: Well, you know what? The weekend after Thanksgiving tends to be the busiest for traffic, but the biggest sales days always come before Christmas. The Saturday before Christmas. Maybe that Monday before Christmas this year. And the reason is because people procrastinate here.
NGUYEN: Right.
MUI: You know, people will go out and will see what these deals are during the Thanksgiving weekend, but they won't maybe make that purchase until right before the Christmas season.
NGUYEN: I got to tell you, I'm a procrastinator. I'm right there with them.
OK. For those who are cutting back. You said you're cutting back. I'm cutting back this year. What are some of creative gift-giving ideas that are still out there that's really not going to cause you to break your bank?
MUI: Well, we're seeing people do a lot of different things in order to be able to afford the things that maybe last year, they didn't think twice about paying for. So, one thing that I've been seeing is that layaway, you know, which maybe your mom, your grandma, used to use. It's coming back this year. Sears has brought it back in their stores. After nearly 20 years of discontinuing the service, they brought it back.
I, you know, hung out with people at Kmart waiting this line for layaway and I can tell you that the lines are very, very long. So, you know, folks are looking for any ways they can in order to afford the gifts for their family this year.
NGUYEN: What about charities? Are people deciding just to make, you know, donations to charities instead this year?
MUI: Yes, you know, I talked to someone who runs a nonprofit called Global Giving and what they did this year was they said, "Instead of going to the mall, why don't you come to our Web site and buy a gift certificate that can be used at the charity of your choice." They said that there's been a lot of interest in that this year because, you know, with the economy and the way that it is, people are really thinking about ways to express what's important to them, and sometimes, that is a natural object, sometimes, it's giving to a charity or to a nonprofit instead.
NGUYEN: Absolutely, a meaningful gift. Ylan Mui with "Washington Post," thanks so much for speaking with us today. We appreciate it.
MUI: Thank you, Betty.
NGUYEN: T.J.?
HOLMES: All right, Betty. We met the economic team last week, now it's time to meet Barack Obama's national security team. He's going to be unveiling his picks. Up next, we'll tell who's likely to be on that national security squad. Stay here.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: And tomorrow, President-elect Barack Obama is expected to nominate three people who will have major roles on his national security team. It's a pretty important announcement here coming on the heels of the terror attacks in Mumbai, India.
I want to head now to our deputy political director, Paul Steinhauser, and friend of our show here on CNN SUNDAY MORNING.
It's always good to see you, Paul. Tell us who these folks are. And you might want to just tell us first, you know, everybody was thinking about the U.S. economy there for a while, so everyone was paying attention to that economic team. Well, now, you know, homeland security, national security, and terror is back on people's minds, and they're going to be looking at these picks pretty closely.
PAUL STEINHAUSER, CNN DEPUTY POLITICAL DIRECTOR: They sure are. You know, these picks were in the works even before the attacks in India this week. But tomorrow in Chicago, sources are telling us, Democratic officials telling us to expect Barack Obama to nominate Hillary Clinton as his secretary of state. No surprise there.
We've been talking about this for quite some time, though it's an interesting pick because they were such bitter rivals in that long Democratic primary process. But the senator from New York is expected to be secretary or nominated as secretary of state. They definitely didn't see eye to eye on some top international issues during the primaries, but since then, they really kind of, you know, the daylight between the two has definitely closed. And expect her to be named as secretary of state.
As for secretary of defense, this is another very interesting one. Expect a carryover here. The current Defense Secretary Robert Gates, been under President Bush for two years now, expect Barack Obama to ask Gates to continue on for at least a year in his role as defense secretary.
HOLMES: And right there, Paul. Let me ask you: What's been the buzz out there about him making this move? This is a man who has been in charge of serving a president who started the war in Iraq and now going to have to serve a president who has promised to end it?
STEINHAUSER: Yes, this may be not the happiest news for some on the left. But remember, when Gates was brought in two years ago, he replaced a very, very unpopular Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
HOLMES: Yes.
STEINHAUSER: And I think there has been a general acknowledgement by all sides that there has been progress in Iraq now and there has been a slight reduction in U.S. troops. So, I think you, maybe Barack Obama likes the idea of keeping Gates in there and stays the course and, of course, it gets a Republican on the cabinet.
And then finally, national security advisor. We expect Barack Obama -- sources are telling us -- he's going to name General Jim Jones, retired Marine General Jim Jones as his national security advisor. This guy was in the marines for 40 years.
HOLMES: Yes.
STEINHAUSER: A four-star general, he's done a lot.
HOLMES: A very respected guy there in the very important post, National Security Advisor. So, the team is coming together it appears.
Let me throw one more thing here at you that, you know, we're not done with her just yet, Sarah Palin.
STEINHAUSER: Yes.
HOLMES: She is coming to town. She's actually coming here to Georgia. Why?
STEINHAUSER: T.J., come on, you have to be happy about that, right?
(LAUGHTER)
STEINHAUSER: Yes, the Alaska governor and former vice presidential nominee under John McCain coming your way tomorrow. She's going to be campaigning with Saxby Chambliss tomorrow. Remember, Saxby Chambliss is the freshman Republican senator from Georgia. He didn't win a majority of the vote. He only won a plurality in the vote in the election on November 4th.
There is a runoff election on Tuesday. Tomorrow, he will be with Sarah Palin four stops across the state. It's a way for her to stay in the limelight. He likes having a big name surrogate there. This is a crucial Senate race and the election is Tuesday.
HOLMES: A crucial Senate race, and just quickly here, is this turning out to be -- will this be viewed as a loss for Barack Obama? This is kind of an early test, if you will, of his chops and maybe some of his capital, if you will, as far as the voters go. So, is this -- will this be seen as a loss if Chambliss pulls this thing off?
STEINHAUSER: Yes and no. Remember -- Barack Obama is campaigning for Jim Martin, the Democratic challenger. He's in a radio ad but he is not personally going down there to campaign on the ground. So, you know, if Chambliss does pull it out, it's not considered a huge loss for Barack Obama.
HOLMES: A huge loss for -- all right. And I know we're going to be talking about Obama again a little later this morning, talking about his thoughts on India. So, we will see you here in a little bit. Good to see you, buddy.
STEINHAUSER: You got it.
HOLMES: All right. Betty?
NGUYEN: They are called the "sandwich generation." They are called the "sandwich generation." And Americans with kids and parents who depend on them which means they are making tough some really financial choices. Christine Romans has advice in this week's "Right on Your Money."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): America's elderly population is booming. The Census Bureau estimates nearly 20 percent of Americans will be 65 or older by the year 2030. "Money" magazine's Janice Revell says families are feeling stretched.
JANICE REVELL, SR. WRITER, MONEY MAGAZINE: These days being in a so- called sandwich situation where you've got your kids to take care of, your got your own retirement to fund, and you've got parents who are ageing and may need your help. It's becoming increasingly common.
ROMANS: Among those stuck in the middle, too many make the mistakes of putting themselves last.
REVELL: You can't lose track of your own retirement goals because in the end, if you're not prepared for retirement, and all you're going to do is shift the burden on to your kids.
ROMANS: Revell suggests adult children help their parents plan for healthcare expenses.
REVELL: It's very common for elderly people to have far too much of their investments tied up in really, really low-yielding saving accounts and checking accounts.
ROMANS: And talk about finances early before an accident or illness occurs.
REVELL: Don't wait until a crisis hits because when that happens, that's when you run into all kinds of bad situations where people are putting, you know, $20,000, $30,000, $40,000 on their credit cards. It happens all the time, to help out their parents in case of medical emergency.
ROMANS: Christine Romans, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN: Well, they are still searching for evidence and pushing for answers.
HOLMES: The investigators are saying they're finding crucial clues about those terror attacks in India. Our Nic Robertson is on this case (ph).
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN, ANCHOR: Good morning everybody and welcome back. I'm Betty Nguyen.
T.J. HOLMES, CNN, ANCHOR: Hello. I'm T.J. Holmes. Here's what we have going on this morning. India's top security official says he's quitting after the deadly terror attacks. He said he turned in his resignation to the country's prime minister. He said he was taking more responsibility for the attacks. No word yet on whether his resignation is being accepted.
NGUYEN: Well FBI agents, they are headed to Mumbai to help with the investigation. For now though just one team is going while the bureau may send a second group if they're needed. And the investigation is broad and they are also very difficult. There are nine different attack sites.
HOLMES: CNN's Nic Robertson join investigators looking into those different site.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NIC ROBERSTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From a distance, police investigators can be seen sifting through the remains of the Rabbi Holtzberg's house. They are under pressure to find out who killed him and his wife.
There's a misunderstanding. We don't want to go inside.
We are trying to figure out who would launch a brazen attack. A policeman relents and tells us what he can.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (inaudible) crucial evidence inside the building
ROBERTSON: Have you found anything important yet inside the building?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. But at this point in time nothing can be disclosed to the press.
ROBERTSON: More than 180 people killed in the most audacious terror attack here ever. A handful of gunman shut down the country's financial capital for days and now everyone wants to know who they were and who was behind them. How long do you think the investigation will take here?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It will take a long time.
ROBERTSON: A long time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A long time.
ROBERTSON: We're looking for answers now and go next door.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (inaudible) hiding.
ROBERTSON: Yes.
PRASANT RATHI, WITNESS: People gathered over here.
ROBERTSON: Prashant Rathi's tiny apartment overlooks the rabbi's house. From what he saw he said the gunman never planned to negotiate. They killed the Rabbi Holtzberg soon after storming into his house and then rigged his body with explosives.
The rabbi who was in here they body trapped his body with a bomb.
RATHI: Yes with a bomb.
ROBERTSON: On the rabbi's body?
RATHI: Yes. Because I was here.
ROBERTSON: His neighbor Sanjay says he was there too. Close enough to hear the gunman talking in a north Indian Hindi dialect.
SANJAY BHASME, WITNESS: (inaudible) Pakistan
ROBERTSON: He blames Pakistanis for the attack.
BHASME: They are the Pakistani people.
ROBERTSON: You think the Pakistanis are behind this?
BHASME: Yes. Everyone knows. This is a Indian-Pakistan always get fight and this terrorism is obviously comes from that way. ROBERTSON: India's foreign minister said the same. The two nuclear nations have long held grievances over Kashmir, a disputed province in the north. Pakistani officials categorically deny any involvement and so far India has offered no proof of a government role. Another top Indian official says one of the gunman captured is a Pakistani national and government investigators are offering up more evidence. A mobile phone belonging to one of the gunman detailing investigators say calls made to Pakistan during the attack also a global positioning device tracking a sea route. Increasingly investigators according to our sister network CNN IBM believe at least some of the gunmen came by boat and have shown a captain killed on his fishing vessel they say the gunmen hijacked.
ROBERTSON (on-camera): The fishermen say they saw one group of gunmen land their boat here and come up the causeway and then get off into the busy traffic in the city that Wednesday night.
ROBERTSON (voice-over): In the few photographs taken of the gunmen that night, they all look young. The complexity of their attack points to sophistication and training. The claim of responsibility by the almost unknown group Decan Mujahadin group is taken by officials to be intentionally misleading.
When the gunmen got into the city, investigators are indicating they split up into teams of two. When they arrived at the hotels like the Oberoi here and began asking for British and American passport holders they gave the strongest clue to their motivations, buying into part of the anti-western Al Qaeda message.
Until now, terror attacks in India have claimed close to 4,000 lives in the past four years have been blamed on homegrown radicals, sometimes with Pakistani or Bangladeshi support. The vast majority have targeted Indians. The last big attack in Mumbai, a sophisticated multiple bombing of the rail network in 2006 killing more than 180 people was blamed on Lashkar-e-Toiba, a Pakistani Kashmiri terror group allied with Al Qaeda and the Indian Mujahadin group. The last significant attack by gunmen was on India's parliament in 2001. Indian officials blamed that too on Lashkar-e-Toiba and another Al Qaeda ally Kashmiri group, Jaish-e-Mohammed.
In these past attacks LeT and JeM haven't' claimed responsibility however that's unlikely to stop investigators here looking in their direction again. It's going to take investigators weeks to pull together all of the evidence. Months to follow up on all of the their leads. But if after all of that responsibility does seem to lie with Pakistan it would seem almost inevitable that tensions between these two nuclear armed neighbors will rise. Nic Robertson, CNN, Mumbai, India.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: Well we have heard some witnesses say and we certainly heard some Indian officials say that they believe that there is some kind of Pakistani connection to these terrorists. We want to get more on that. CNN's Reza Sayah is in Islamabad for us. Reza, hello to you. And tell us here, you know sometimes you see these attacks and we see them and it's going to be the usual suspects, automatically fingers are going to be pointed toward Pakistan. Pakistan is saying what this time?
REZA SAYAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Pakistan is saying show us the evidence but so far no evidence has come forward. The truth is the partnership between these nuclear neighbors is hinging heavily on how they approach this regional crisis, the security situation. And frankly, they both have got often to a bit of a shaky start. From India we have seen mounting pressure and lots of accusations from senior security and government officials without hard evidence and that's certainly escalating tensions. Pakistan has made some missteps too. Initially you had that flip-flop when it came to agreeing to send their spy chief to India. First they said yes but then they pulled off that proposal.
But Pakistan has now regrouped it seems for the past 48 hours. It has held a lot of high level government meetings. They made a very public stance. They've held a number of news conferences saying we express our sympathy, we condemn these attacks, and we will help but show us the evidence first. The foreign minister of Pakistan also spoke he said we're not going to send a spy chief but you have the help of our intelligence agency. Here's what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SHAH MAHMOOD QURESHI, FOREIGN MINISTER OF PAKISTAN: The government of Pakistan has said that the premiere intelligence agency of Pakistan will cooperate. Our hands are clean. We have nothing to hide. We have nothing to be ashamed of. Because it is common sense that good neighborly relations with India are in the interest of Pakistan.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SAYAH: In that press conference the foreign minister also said something very note worthy. He reminded everyone that India's government is not pointing the finger to Pakistan's government. That's significant because in the past India's government has accused Pakistan's intelligence agencies of having a hand in some militant attacks in India. This time the foreign minister says that's not the case. Again, an effort on his part to diffuse the situation. But T.J. despite that, the tensions are still high.
HOLMES: And Reza, give us a little insight into you know, a lot of this I'm not sure how much cooperation is actually going on between - how much trust is there between India and Pakistan but how much of this has to be a PR campaign as well on India's part and Pakistan's part to save face with their own people and also save face with other countries around the world?
SAYAH: Well a lot of it is. The fact of the matter is that people we're seeing on TV, the leaders of these two countries, their politicians. And They're looking out for their political careers. A lot of analysts say across the border in India it's an election year. The reason that they're pointing the finger at Pakistan is they are very much concerned about their political careers. You already have the Interior Minister resigned today. Some say more of that is to come. So certainly a lot of politicians exercising a PR campaign looking out for their self-interest according to some analysts.
HOLMES: Yes, Reza, you're saying that the politicians are doing what they do, politicking. Reza Sayah for us in Islamabad. Thank you so much.
NGUYEN: So we are hearing those promises of cooperation as the investigation of the attacks moves forward but one of our i-reporters says India and Pakistan they have to work together. I want you to take a listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
IREPORT BY JIMMY DEOL: ... report and come up with some kind of a game plan and here's my two cents that the Indian government needs to reach out to the Pakistani government and seek cooperation on this matter. And on a bilateral basis in the future have more economic and political cooperation. Harmony is possible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NGUYEN: Send us your i-reports at ireport.com.
HOLMES: All right. We have a travel warning this morning for Americans heading to India. This may sound like a lot of common sense here almost even but if you're traveling to India or are already there, the State Department has a warning saying U.S. citizens need to be watchful, need to keep a low profile and avoid crowds and demonstrations. The government sys the terror attacks show that security even at the upscale hotels as we saw, isn't a match for terrorists who are determined to do what they want to do.
NGUYEN: An speaking of these attacks, do you know it was a siege with selected targets.
HOLMES: Yes, among those targets of course, a Jewish community center in Mumbai. So how is America's Jewish community responding? Josh Levs will be into that. Josh.
JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, there. Good morning to you guys.
We're going to be speaking with two rabbis this morning who are counseling their congregations in the wake of these attacks. They'll be telling us if what happened in Mumbai - there they are. We'll be talking to us if what happened in Mumbai makes them feel less safe.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: All right. Here's sharing with you some of the pictures taken during the terrorist assault in Mumbai. Just look at some of these here with me as we watch them. We have seen a number of images come in. There are a couple of really quite frightening and chilling pictures of the gunmen. Again, they are saying they are in their 20s. You can see them armed there. Here's another picture of someone maybe one of the hotels looking out a window. But really a terrifying experience with all of those involved. Some of the many pictures we can share with you as they continue to come into us about the siege on Mumbai.
LEVS: Well as we've been reporting when the terrorist attack hit Mumbai, one of the places they targeted was Chabad House, it's a Jewish community center. And the bodies of five hostages were found there, including two American rabbis. So how does this terror impact the Jewish community? We're getting answers this morning in a very special "Faces of Faith."
I would like to introduce you to two very well know rabbis. First, Yossi Lew joining us here. Chabad rabbi actually from (Beth Tefillah) here in Atlanta. Thanks for being here. And also we have Rabbi Robert Levine joining us from New York reformed congregation Rodeph Sholom. There he is. And you're author of the book "What god can do for you now," right.
RABBI ROBERT LEVINE, CONGREGATION RODEPH SHOLOM: Correct.
LEVS: Thanks so much both of you for being here. Rabbi Yossi Lew, let me start with you because this is a Chabad House inside Mumbai that was attacked. You had your Sabbath services yesterday. What did you tell your congregates about this act of terror that is clearly meant to cause fear?
RABBI YOSSI LEW, CHABAD OF GEORGIA: Basically if a few dozen people can sit and plan for so many years something as evil and murderous and as terrible and as terrifying as what they did, then if we could all band together, a few dozen, a few hundred, a thousand, million of us and plan to do something good to take over the world with goodness, I think that would be the perfect answer. Of course, the immediate response would have to be beefed up security and protection but we really need to figure out a way to respond and to answer this question by flooding the world with goodness.
LEVS: And that would make the world better. All right. Taking this terrible situation. Rabbi Levine, let me bring you in on this as well. You have a reform congregation, a bit of a different situation. Are you finding that your congregants also feel fear because terror is designed to scare people. Is that fear kind of affecting your congregation as well? What are you saying to your congregants?
LEVINE: Well, it's a terrible tragedy, Josh. And we mourn with all of those who died including Rabbi Holtzberg and his family. Our feeling is that particularly since 9/11, security has been a fact of life. We can have no soft targets here in the united states. But we really have to arm our people with something else and that is that the values of justice. Terrorists hate stability. They hate attempts at reconciliation. So the terrorists cannot allow India and Pakistan to be defeated and their efforts of reconciliation is real and the Palestinians have to continue to work together. And that's really the point that we have seen this many times before. The Jewish people and all humanity have not been defeated by terrorism and we can't begin now.
LEVS: You know the effort it is Rabbi Levine asked you this is for the Chabad House that was attacked. Do you feel less safe especially if you were traveling overseas and you can be recognized as Jewish based on appearance or your involvement in Chabad activity, do you personally worry more about your safety when you see this kind of terror?
LEW: Of course initially you feel somewhat worried and concerned but ultimately we are very focused. There are some 4,000 families, Chabad families that would mean 8,000 people across the globe in every single corner and our mission and our goal is to bring light and humanitarian efforts for Jewish people and for all humanity. It's a global effort to introduce things into this world, to more light into the world even into the darkest corners and especially to the darkest corners. And so we will eventually overcome anything that is worrying us right now and I know we will focus and intensify our efforts to somehow turn this world into a better place and that's what we really want to do.
LEVS: And it's really interesting to get both your spiritual perspectives this morning. And you know this just happened and your Sabbath services would have been yesterday. Rabbi Levine, talk to me about this. I know that you wrote about "What God can do for you now." When people talk to you about how does god lets horrible things happen, how do you handle that?
LEVINE: In my book Josh I make a point that God has entered into a relationship with us. God is not with the terrorists. God is with commandos fighting terrorism. God is with Sandra Samuel who ran into rescue. Little Mosiah. That God expects us to have a partnership. God will do God's part. We have to do ours. Let me make one point.
LEVS: Sure.
LEVINE: You asked what happened at the services. I'm not going to talk about what I said but we had a college service, Josh, and one of our students was trained at Rodeth Sholom and is president of the (inaudible) at Cornell. And one of their chief project is Jewish- Muslim dialogue. And she says that the congregation everybody tells us this is impossible. Everybody else us that there are too many obstacles and they refuse to be deterred. That dialogue goes on. That we cannot be deterred from that kind of dialogue. We have to get to know each other and to band together against terrorists. That's how terrorism will defeated.
LEVS: I think what that reflects is that really hit home. You know these terrorist attacks are clearly designed to scare people in India, scare tourists. Also a terrorist attack on a Jewish person anywhere can scare Jews anywhere. And you can see it having effects anywhere. You were starting to tell Rabbi Lew, you have a story as well about a baby who was named in your synagogue yesterday named after a victim. Tell us about that.
LEW: One of our congregants had a baby girl on Friday and the parents decided to name that baby after the murdered victim. This is Rivka Holtzberg and we feel that that begins the process of regrowth. To continue what the rabbi was saying about acts of reconciliation. The truth is that most people are not engaged in that. And around the world, if somebody - if everyone who is listening can take a part to do some kind of act of goodness, reach out, call your grandmother.
LEVS: Let's leave it at that.
LEW: Do something good.
LEVS: Thank you both so much for joining us this morning. Very interesting having this discussion. We would love to talk with you both again under happier circumstances and we look forward to doing that. Thank you very much. T.J., over to you - or, Betty.
NGUYEN: That's all right.
Well tackling a crisis before taking office. Barack Obama's challenge and how he's going to handle it.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: Well, back to earth today for the space shuttle "Endeavour", after a final inspection of the shuttle's exterior, NASA says it's OK to land. With no visible defects comprising the shuttle's re-entry, NASA now has its eye on the weather. The backup site is going to be in California. It's being prepared in case the shuttle won't be able to land at Florida's Kennedy Space Center. They don't like to land in California. It costs them a lot more money. They have to haul that stuff back across the entire U.S. and back to Florida.
NGUYEN: At least gas prices are down a little bit. So there is a bit of a silver lining.
HOLMES: Oh, wow.
NGUYEN: Trying to keep it positive around here.
And you know speaking of positivity, we're hoping that the weather in Florida will cooperate with this landing. Meteorologist Karen Maginnis is in for Reynolds Wolf today. How's it looking, Karen?
KAREN MAGINNIS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Not good at all. It tends to be down on the forecast, I would say it would probably not happen at that 1:19 or the 2:54, the two opportunities that they have at Kennedy Space Center. Frontal center draped all across the southeast. You can see lots of moisture associated with this. And consequently, we're picking up just a few stray showers within 30 nautical miles of the Kennedy Space Center, which is located right here.
Well, now we've got another parameters, not just the overcast skies that we're seeing right now, not the threat of thunderstorms, not the chance of rain, but it looks like the winds are really going to be starting to pick up here between 25 and about 35 miles an hour at Kennedy Space Center as we go to the afternoon.
Speaking of the afternoon, our temperatures not warming up terribly much for travelers, especially in Chicago. Looks like O'Hare's airport could collect maybe an inch or two of snowfall over the next 12 to 24 hours. Then as we head into Monday, a fine day in southern California, but even colder temperatures wrapped around the Great Lakes. Even a few northern suburbs of northern Georgia could expect maybe a flurry or two. Some novelty snowflakes, interesting, nonetheless. Betty, T.J..
NGUYEN: Absolutely.
HOLMES: A novelty.
MAGINNIES: Yes.
HOLMES: Thank you, Karen.
NGUYEN: Well there was a warning - listen to this, before terrorists attacked in India. We're tracking down that part of the investigation.
HOLMES: Also, the finger-pointing accusations are flying. Clues, not being found as quickly as the accusations right now, however. We'll be live in Mumbai.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: What in -- no, this story had us talking yesterday, about Walmart.
NGUYEN: Absolutely.
HOLMES: This is upsetting. We see these things every year and I don't know if the media is part of perpetuating these issues with the cameras. We wanted to see everybody rushing.
NGUYEN: It's an outrage story on top of that.
HOLMES: It's an outrage.
NGUYEN: OK. Here it is. The latest now. The police continue to investigate the trampling incident that killed a seasonal Walmart employee. He was just getting a job for the holidays. Well now they're looking at the surveillance tape to find the shoppers that actually ran over Jdimytai Damour, when the store opened early Friday morning.
HOLMES: It's a situation where police say, they may not be able to track down, identify exactly who on that surveillance tape was the one who maybe delivered the fatal blow to this man. Damour was just 34 years old. His family still struggling to figure out what in the world happened.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OGERA CHARLES, VICTIM'S FATHER: He was a good boy. He's dead, he's gone.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: Well, a union that represents retail workers says Walmart failed to protect its employees from those black Friday crowds. A Walmart spokesman declined to respond, but a company statement says the store did ad security staff for the day, also to put barricades but obviously that was not enough.
Again, we see these over and again, and they seem to be funny sometimes. We see people pushing and shoving and whatnot and it's supposed to be this funfest of thing, and people get a little tense but this was a little too much here. So, we will see what happens there.
We will turn now to where eight people were killed in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, eight people here. This is an area that's plagued by drug violence and what happened here -- masked gunmen barged into a restaurant and just opened fire on a group of diners. Police say they are searching for at least a dozen suspects involved in the shooting which happened Friday night. So far, no arrests have been made.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everybody. From the CNN Center, this is CNN SUNDAY MORNING, November 30th. Can you believe it? Last day of hurricane season. December is just right around the corner, Cyber Monday, in fact, tomorrow.
HOLMES: Oh, that's right. That's a new concept.
NGUYEN: Get ready all you shoppers, yes.
HOLMES: Yes.
NGUYEN: If you missed out on those Friday deals.
Hello. From the CNN headquarters in Atlanta, it's 7:00 a.m. here in the Heartland. I'm Betty Nguyen.
HOLMES: And hello to you all. I'm T.J. Holmes. Glad you could be with us.
We've got new details coming into us about those attacks in Mumbai. We have a hotel official that's delivering a chilling revelation.
NGUYEN: Also, some of the numbers -- they're being released and it appears holiday shoppers, they have pushed retailers into the black. You know, the holiday weekend is coming to a close, with many folks heading back home this morning.
HOLMES: Yes. That's why we're going to be showcasing what you're seeing up on your screen. We've got the weather for you, we've got some of those conditions over there on that map. It's going to be, maybe, a tough travel day for some folks...
NGUYEN: Yes.
HOLMES: ... in particular parts of the country, trying to get back home.
NGUYEN: Make sure your patient today as you wait in those lines. OK. Well, we do start with breaking news out of Afghanistan. Two people are dead after a suicide bomber on a bicycle set off his explosion today. That bombing is next to a car from the German embassy in Kabul. Now, no one was in the car at the time and no one was hurt there, but it's not clear if the German ambassador was injured. In addition to those two deaths, though, the bomb injured three others.
Let's get you more now on the investigations of those terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India.
HOLMES: Investigators there want to know how the heavily-armed terrorists got into the country and hit nine different locations. Here is what we know now: 183 people were killed in those attacks that began on Wednesday night. At least 273 injured.
NGUYEN: Among the dead, five Americans, including two rabbis, and a father and daughter from Virginia. Also, the chairman of the company that owns the Taj Mahal Hotel says the hotel had been warned about the possibility of a terrorist attack.
HOLMES: All right. More now on that part of the story. It's fascinating to hear now that there was a warning. Liz Neisloss is in Mumbai for us.
Liz, what do we know about this warning? Was it a warning that should have been taken a little more seriously, more security should have been added?
LIZ NEISLOSS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, T.J., certainly now, looking back, everyone would say that more security should have been added, but it's very interesting. The hotel that we're talking about, the Taj Hotel, which is behind me, which was attacked, is a very famous landmark here in Mumbai and all over India -- an icon, really. The head of the group that owns that hotel said that he was warned it was on a list of terrorists.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, FROM CNN'S FAREED ZAKARIA GPS)
RATAN TATA, TATA GROUP CHAIRMAN: We did have such a warning and we did have some measures to, you know, where people couldn't park their cars in the portico, where you had to go through a metal detector. But if I look at what we had, which all of us complained about, it could have not stopped what took place.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEISLOSS: Meanwhile, Sir Ratan Tata also says that the head of the commando operations that was inside the hotel said the suspects probably checked in several nights before, had time to prepare, knew the hotel extensively, knew where to stash their supplies. He also had some sharp words of criticism for the security forces, saying that when they arrived here, they didn't even ask for a plan of the hotel -- T.J.?
HOLMES: And, Liz, what is the very latest here now? I know that this investigation has a lot of moving parts and a lot of work to be done, but what is the latest we know? Any updates? Are they planning on making any arrests? Are they looking at any particular areas? Just give us the very latest of what you know.
NEISLOSS: Well, the very latest is we don't know about more arrests. We know that there's at least one suspect. There may be more. The Indian police, India security is very secretive when it comes to who they are questioning and how many suspects they do have.
We know that a lot more will surface in the days to come, even as, for example, this hotel behind us was said to be secured and the siege was over. Security forces were still going through room by room, more than 550 rooms, looking for possible booby traps, exploding ammunitions. They will find many more clues in the days ahead -- T.J.?
HOLMES: All right. Liz Neisloss for us in Mumbai -- Liz, thank you so much.
NGUYEN: Well, we are still hearing from people who lived through the fear and the chaos of those attacks. Here's one survivor's story.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMIE BENSON, ATTACK SURVIVOR: The lifts were out, so I decided to walk down the stairs, and I got to the 14th floor and there was blood everywhere, all over the stairway. And so, I immediately realized something was really wrong, I'm sure (ph) it was a terrorist actually. We barricaded ourselves in there, put a bed against to absorb any blasts coming out, and we just waited there for like 30, 34 hours or something like that.
All of the Trident Hotel was all just smashed in, there was blood splattered everywhere. The four (ph) security guards, the doorman really nice, they've been shot (ph), I heard and found out. All the front of the glass just shattered.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NGUYEN: And take a look at this. Here are some photos sent to us from iReporter Melody George. She's a 25-year-old student from Alabama and she just checked into a hotel Wednesday night around 10:00 p.m. and then heard a big boom and assumed it was fireworks. Well, obviously, that was not the case.
These are photos from the hotel room -- well, not right there, but we'll get to them -- also on their way back to the airport. She says the streets were deserted except for military personnel checking their passports and I.D.s.
HOLMES: So, we will turn to -- back here now and some weather. We've been keeping this up on the screen for a reason here. A lot of people are trying to get back home after the holiday weekend. I think this is one of the busiest travel holidays of the year.
NGUYEN: Absolutely is. And I think the key word there is "trying" to get back.
HOLMES: Yes.
NGUYEN: Meteorologist Karen Maginnis is in for Reynolds Wolf today.
And (INAUDIBLE) we're seeing some delays already?
KAREN MAGINNIS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes, we are. And I'll spill this out for you. It looks like this may actually be increasing as we go through the rest of the morning. These volumes start to build. Already, we've got just under 2,400 flights in the air on our flight explorer.
Let's take a look at the delays we do have now. Officially, Atlanta and Philadelphia, a ground stop -- meaning the weather in these locations is gone. And for Atlanta, it's been this way since yesterday -- overcast, drizzle, reduced visibility, the wind is starting to pick up. Same for Philadelphia.
So, until 9:45, at each airport, if you are sitting on the ground, watching us from an airport and trying to get to either Atlanta -- everybody goes through Atlanta -- or Philadelphia, you're going to be stuck there until some of this lifts just a little bit. Is it going to lift anytime soon? No. We're stuck.
We've got this area of low pressure. This is going to try to pull away, but look at how much rain we're expecting in this orange-shaded area, according to our amounts or precipitation totals here, two to three inches in some areas. It doesn't look well for this afternoon for the landing of the space shuttle Endeavour that's been up for the past 16 days.
Into the Great Lakes, a different story here. Chicago could be problematic later on. I think Philly will continue. And then we've got a whole host of frigid temperatures due for Monday. So, travelers, not good right now. Back to you.
NGUYEN: All right, Karen. And maybe it will improve. We'll stay positive.
MAGINNIS: Yes.
NGUYEN: And see how that goes. OK.
HOLMES: Thanks, Karen.
NGUYEN: Well, another story that is sharing the headlines this morning, of course, those sales figures from Black Friday. Did you go out shopping? A whole lot of people did. Forget about the doom and gloom and all those predictions. How's this for a silver lining?
Early reports show Black Friday sales up by almost 3 percent over last year. Americans spent about $10.6 billion shopping on Friday. Now, tomorrow, another big day, supposed to be Cyber Monday, as they call it, which is the online equivalent to Black Friday. Almost 84 percent of online retailers are expected to offer some kind of discount and/or promotion tomorrow. So, get those computers fired up.
OK. So, what about the deals out there today? That's what I want to know about. It's been quiet, you know, around here. Friday's the big day, Saturday, you think you're maybe getting some of the leftovers. What about today for those bargain hunters?
HOLMES: What about today. Well, our Brianna Keilar, which we know, normally we ask Brianna to work for us on a weekend morning, we can't get her to work.
NGUYEN: Yes. So this morning?
HOLMES: But we told her she gets to go to a mall, and she said, "Sure, guys, I'll sign up for that assignment." Brianna, what's going on this morning?
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, let's see. I think there's a deal on some shoes and some coats for Betty...
NGUYEN: Oh, I like that.
KEILAR: But, T.J., I don't think you don't get any deals today, no.
NGUYEN: Oh, too bad.
(LAUGHTER)
KEILAR: Yes, you talked about those numbers, those Black Friday numbers. I should tell you, if you notice, there are not that many people around me. It's because we're actually waiting for people to come in the mall here at Fashion Centre at Pentagon City right across the river from Washington, D.C. The stores haven't opened yet, but when they do, we're expecting a whole lot of people here continuing on this busy holiday weekend.
And yes, those Black Friday sales prediction numbers, up 3 percent. Some experts say it definitely could have been a whole lot worse. There are some people predicting that those sales numbers could have decreased. So Black Friday retailers may have dodged a bullet there, but there's still four more weeks in the holiday shopping season and retailers really keeping an eye on that there.
A lot of speculation this holiday season about how shoppers may be changing some of their spending habits. And no matter what they're buying, the consensus among experts who have been talking to shoppers is that they're going for things not only that are discounted, but also just being more pragmatic in their choices.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ELLEN DAVIS, V.P., NAT'L RETAIL FEDERATION: Many people are shopping in the same categories this year, but what they're buying in those categories is very different. We're seeing a lot of focus this year on both gifts that are practical and personal, things that can be worn or used every day, and gifts that have a little bit of an emotional connection or proved that the person put some thought into what they were buying.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEILAR: So, some people putting more thought into what they're buying and some people actually doing this by deciding to make their gifts, to have homemade gifts. In fact, one survey, Betty and T.J., said that more than 50 percent more people than last year have decided to incorporate homemade gifts into what they're giving to people as a way to not only save money, but when they're trying to save money, at least show people that they're doing something that's really meaningful.
NGUYEN: All right. So, I mean, what are we talking about? Crocheting, knitting -- those kinds of gifts? If I could made you something...
HOLMES: Betty, if you make me a quilt...
(LAUGHTER)
NGUYEN: I mean...
KEILAR: Yes, we're talking those things.
(LAUGHTER)
KEILAR: We're talking...
NGUYEN: We sound really convinced there.
KEILAR: That's what I do, as you guys know.
NGUYEN: Is it really?
KEILAR: No, no. Actually, I do. I've made scarves before. That's something I've done...
NGUYEN: Order us up one then.
HOLMES: That's what I need.
KEILAR: (INAUDIBLE) you know, cut back on my holiday spending.
HOLMES: Oh, well.
NGUYEN: We'll take it.
KEILAR: You know, a lot of people are going even to craft stores, like Michael's. They're seeing an increase in people who are coming to workshops to put things together, homemade Christmas cards. People doing things even like trying to save money on gift wrapping, using yarn instead of ribbons, using butcher paper instead of wrapping paper.
HOLMES: Wow.
NGUYEN: Yes.
KEILAR: Really, just trying to get creative in ways that you may not even think about. When you're sending out those holiday Christmas cards, sending out postcards to save money, for instance, on postage.
But, you know, a few other ways that people are talking about saving money in terms of purchasing, buying refurbished items, T.J. This is something where you can save about 10 percent, actually, if you're, say, buying golf clubs and maybe they're not used, but they've been purchased by someone, they've been returned. Note of warning, note of caution for some people out there that, you know, you've got to know where it's coming from because if you're buying it from an online auction site, you don't know if perhaps it was stolen from a store.
NGUYEN: Oh. Yes.
KEILAR: You've got to be careful. A couple other things, layaway...
NGUYEN: Right.
KEILAR: ... making a huge comeback. Sears is doing it for the first time since 1989. And also, another way that you can save is simply to ask when you're in a store, because a lot of people don't ask if you can get a discount, ask if you can get free shipping, ask if you can get on their friends and family list. This is actually one way that I saved $150 recently on my purchase just by asking.
NGUYEN: Get out of here. Really?
KEILAR: Yes, just by asking if I can get a discount.
NGUYEN: Well, I'm going to have you do all of my shopping then. You can ask a way.
KEILAR: Yes.
NGUYEN: Well, thank you. Thanks for the great ideas.
KEILAR: You never know (INAUDIBLE).
NGUYEN: Yes.
KEILAR: Yes.
NGUYEN: Thanks, Brianna. We're running out of time here.
HOLMES: I'm going to knit you a sweater.
NGUYEN: I can't wait to see that one.
HOLMES: Well, we have a president in waiting right now and the crisis that's playing out right now as well.
NGUYEN: Barack Obama and the India terror attacks, what's his role at this hour?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NGUYEN: The international crisis in Mumbai unfolds as one U.S. presidency winds down and another waits in the wings. So, here's the question this morning: What role can Barack Obama and his transition team play?
Well, Paul Steinhauser is CNN's deputy political director. He's in Washington.
So, Paul, we've been thinking about this, talking about it. How is the Obama team handling this decision and what can they really do at this point?
PAUL STEINHAUSER, CNN DEPUTY POLITICAL DIRECTOR: It is kind of an awkward situation for him, Betty, because, yes, he is president-elect, he's not president. So, during this whole crisis, he has to kind of take a backseat to the current president, George W. Bush. You know, he can't really prove himself yet.
This is the top story around the world right now, yet he is taking a backseat. He has been touched, he's talked to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Barack Obama is also getting updates daily from his own national security team, but he has stayed kind of quiet overall during this crisis. It's been the Thanksgiving holiday here on the U.S.
He did speak to the Indian prime minister. He offered him condolences, but he told the Indian prime minister and he told the American public in a statement the other day that there is only one president at a time. That is George W. Bush. And you heard George W. Bush yesterday when he made comments, upon arriving back to the White House, he said that he is also updating Barack Obama. He made a point of saying that.
NGUYEN: Yes. And then, you know, when we're -- I thought you were going to a piece of sound right there, Paul.
STEINHAUSER: That's OK.
NGUYEN: But when we watch this play out, at the same time, Americans -- well, we understand -- there's only one president at a time, Barack Obama has said that several times, the American public also wants to know that the next president will hit the ground running and will be able to fight this thing head on once he takes office. So, what is he doing to prepare for that?
STEINHAUSER: Yes, exactly. And, you know, this crisis will continue on, it will still be around come January 20th. So, he will have to deal with it.
But, Betty, take a look back at the election. This was interesting. Barack Obama's major issue was not terrorism, of course, it was the economy. Our exit polls from November 4th, from Election Day, show that the vast majority of people who said that the terrorism was their number one issue, they voted for John McCain, 86 percent to 13 percent. So, by a vast majority, they voted for John McCain. But those people were only one in 10 Americans. The economy was the big issue.
Right after the election, we polled nationally, CNN and Opinion Research Corporation, and we found 2/3 of Americans, 67 percent, said that they expect Barack Obama will make the U.S. safer from terrorism. This poll was after the election, but, of course, before the terrorist attacks in India. So, he's got -- you know, the eyes of the world are on him now and he had -- he was going to name his national security team before this happened. But there will be a lot more eyeballs on his naming of his team this week in Chicago.
NGUYEN: Yes. I understand that's going to be tomorrow, correct?
STEINHAUSER: Yes, tomorrow in Chicago. Expect Hillary Clinton for secretary of state, Robert Gates for defense, and retired marine general, Jim Jones, for national security adviser.
NGUYEN: Paul Steinhauser, always good information for us -- thank you, Paul.
STEINHAUSER: Thank you.
HOLMES: All right, Betty. We've got one president getting ready to enter the White House, another one about to leave.
What's in place right now to make sure the country continues to stay safe during this transition from cyber-hackers, where Joe Hagin knows all about cyber-hackers and what they're up to and what they're trying to do. He spent years in Washington, served in the Reagan administration, the Bush Sr. White House. He just resigned as White House deputy chief of staff in July, working now for corporate America.
Here today to talk about this cybersecurity -- sir, good to see you. If you can, just kind of quickly and sum up for people, just to kind of get our heads around, how monumental of a task is it to try to keep White House administration and communication safe when you've got a lot of high-ranking individuals running around with cell phones, BlackBerries, e-mail, and they're having confidential and sometimes classified types of communications -- how monumental of a task is that?
JOE HAGIN, FMR. W.H. DEP. CHIEF OF STAFF: Well, T.J., it's a big task. The threat is very real. We took it very seriously over the last few years and there are new products that are coming on the market that are making it a little bit easier. But you're really -- you're looking at both a security, a legal, and a political challenge for the new administration, as they decide how the president-elect could actually use one of these smartphone devices.
SMobile Corporation which has got the leading software package to protect against this sort of intrusion on a smartphone or a BlackBerry has identified already over 400 pieces of malware that can be used to attack smartphones.
HOLMES: So, is that the big trick there? It's these mobile devices. Not so much the security at the White House, as far as an e-mail that may be sitting at somebody's desk inside a White House on a secure server or something like that, it's everybody running around with these cell phones, and these smartphones, and these blackberries and whatnot?
HAGIN: The portable device is just easier to attack. I mean, all of the technology at the White House is a challenge. You know, it's been in the news quite a bit recently, about the intrusions into government systems. A lot of that has been state-sponsored, which I won't go into in much detail, OK?
HOLMES: Yes.
HAGIN: But on the BlackBerry side, and I don't want to pick on BlackBerry, it's really the smartphones in general.
HOLMES: Yes.
HAGIN: They're so vulnerable because they use over-the-air technology and...
HOLMES: And you talked about how those are getting better, new things and new technology, making it easier to protect them, but, of course, if that technology gets smarter, you've got hackers and everybody out there getting smarter as well. So, as fast as the new technology and the protection that's being put in place, you're having new challenges arise because those who want to do harm are getting smarter as well.
HAGIN: Right. It's the same challenge that faced the PC industry years ago. That has been pretty effectively dealt with. There's software available to protect your PC at home. Everybody has that software. It comes packaged on devices these days. And that's where the smartphone industry's going to have to go. The carriers that provide the service and the manufacturers are going to have to step up and again, SMobile has a great package.
What you don't want to see in government is you don't want to see policies put in place where you have key officials who are denied access to these devices.
HOLMES: Yes.
HAGIN: Because as we all know in our daily lives, they really do increase productivity. And right now within the government, you have sort of a combination of people starting to implement security software, the SMobile products going on defense...
HOLMES: Yes.
HAGIN: ... and civilian agencies, but also on the -- you have agencies that just say you just can't use this thing (ph)
HOLMES: Just can't -- and like you said, people become dependent on these things and you don't want to limit people's ability to communicate. And just yes or no, would you recommend that the new president have a BlackBerry? You've been in that White House, people are saying he might have to give his up. But would you recommend the new president have one?
HAGIN: I would recommend that he probably not have one.
HOLMES: Yes, he probably...
HAGIN: I know that's a tough prescription.
HOLMES: All right. Joe Hagin, I appreciate you spending some time with us. This is stuff you know inside and out, spending so much in the White House and dealing with this very issue. We appreciate you. We will see if...
HAGIN: Thanks, T.J.
HOLMES: ... if we see the president running around with a smartphone. Thanks so much.
HAGIN: I'd enjoy being with you. Thank you.
HOLMES: All right.
NGUYEN: I know there are times around here where we wish we didn't have a BlackBerry.
HOLMES: We wished it often.
NGUYEN: And it goes off like crazy.
Speaking of this story, we've been talking about a little bit, not getting as much of the spotlight.
HOLMES: Yes.
NGUYEN: Explosions in Bangkok as Thailand's political crisis just drags on there.
HOLMES: Yes. Dozens have been hurt. We'll tell you who was targeted and what the attackers want exactly.
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NGUYEN: There is more violence in Thailand. Dozens of people hurt after a couple of explosions rocked the capital this weekend.
HOLMES: Yes. Thousands of protesters took control of the airports this past week, stopping commercial air traffic -- nobody getting in, nobody getting out of that city. Our Dan Rivers has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAN RIVERS, CNN BANGKOK CORRESPONDENT: You join me on the main road to the airport and you're looking at the first checkpoint that the protesters have erected blocking this road.
If you look back behind me, there's another one here. And you can see both checkpoints are very heavily fortified. There's razor wire. They've even got some police riot shields that they've taken from the police during a previous clash. And they've put up all these sharpened, wooden sticks. They've even got cans of fuel back here, as if to make Molotov cocktails. So, they're very well-prepared here.
There have been a few incidents overnight at different locations, the government house, at about midnight, there was an attack, some sort of bomb attack in which 49 people were injured, three of them seriously. And then again at 4:00 a.m., there was another attack at a different airport, in which two passersby were injured slightly by some sort of grenade attack.
Here, so far, there haven't been any of those bomb blasts. But as you can see, there are very well-prepared to try and repel the police, to try to repel the other protest group, the pro-government protest group that does not want the government to resign, and they're saying they're not going to leave this airport, which they've occupied since last Tuesday until the prime minister steps down.
Dan Rivers, CNN, Bangkok.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NGUYEN: Here's a question for you. Was there a warning before terrorists attacked in India? We're tracking that part of the investigation.
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