New Details Emerge about Petraeus Resignation; Interview with General James Marks; Razor Thin Lead Gets Thinner; Preventing The Fiscal Cliff
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Welcome, everybody. Our "Starting Point" this morning, the scandal grows. Questions and some mystery, too, surrounding the affair that led Gen. David Petraeus to resign as the head of the CIA. Was there a threat to national security that caused him to step down? Let's take a look. As we get closer to the fiscal cliff, some new signs of compromise. We'll tell you what that could mean for your tax dollars. And homes literally blown away in the middle of the night. An investigation now. We'll take a look at just what caused that deadly explosion to rip through an Indiana neighborhood. A packed two hours for you this morning. Former New York Giants player, Tiki Barber, is with us. General James "Spider" Marks joins us. Grover Norquist is the president of the Americans for Tax Reform, he's with us. Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt joins us. Mogul Russell Simmons is with us and actress Gloria Reuben, star of the new movie "Lincoln," all with us this morning. It's Monday, November 12th, and STARTING POINT begins right now. Good morning. Welcome, everybody. Our STARTING POINT this morning: demand for answers in the David Petraeus sex scandal. House and Senate leaders want to know why they were never given the heads up on the investigation that led Petraeus to resign as a CIA director over an extramarital affair. With that resignation, Petraeus might not have to testify this week at a Congressional hearing on the Benghazi consulate attack. CNN's Barbara Starr is following that story for us this morning from the Pentagon. Hey, Barbara. Good morning.</s>BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Soledad. Well, look, at least at this point, there's no indication publicly of a national security breach. But that doesn't mean the questions aren't growing.</s>STARR: Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are questioning the timing behind the revelation. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said an FBI employee told him in October about the Petraeus affair. By that time an FBI investigation was already under way. The FBI told the director of national intelligence James clapper on election night, according to a senior U.S. intelligence official. The White House says it was notified the day after the election and the president the following day. That doesn't make sense to House homeland security chairman Peter King.</s>REP. PETER KING, (R) NEW YORK: This seems to have been going on for several months yet now it appears they're saying that the FBI didn't realize until Election Day that general Petraeus was involved. It just doesn't add up.</s>STARR: "The New York Times" reports the FBI actually started its investigation late this summer. The House and Senate intelligence committees were also caught by surprise.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you going to investigate why the FBI didn't notify you before?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, absolutely. I mean, this is something that could have had an effect on national security. I think we should have been told.</s>STARR: The FBI was investigating harassing e-mails from Petraeus' biographer. The trail led to Paula Broadwell, who co-wrote "All In," a biography of Petraeus. Broadwell described her extraordinary access to the general earlier this year on</s>CNN. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: At some point I think he realized I was taking this research very seriously. I was sharing hardship with the troops and risk and so forth, and decided to open up a little bit more access. But we had a relationship before I went there, as far as this dissertation was concerned, so it just took it to another level.</s>STARR: The end result was a flattering biography, summed up this way when she appeared on the daily show to promote it.</s>JON STEWART, HOST, "THE DAILY SHOW": The real controversy is here is, is he awesome, or incredibly awesome?</s>STARR: Broadwell is a married mother of two. She's an honors graduate of West Point, a retired army research major who served for 15 years. Petraeus resigned Friday, admitting to cheating on his wife of 38 years, Holly, and citing, quote, "extremely poor judgment." A U.S. official says Petraeus was never the target of the investigation and his communications were never compromised.</s>STARR: Now as you said, Soledad, Petraeus was supposed to testify on Capitol Hill this week about those attacks against the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. Very controversial, what did he know and when did he know it about those attacks? Now it will be his deputy, and there are some questions still, will Congress issue a subpoena that would compel him to appear?</s>O'BRIEN: That's very interesting. Barbara Starr this morning, thank you. Ahead this morning we're going to talk to retired General James "Spider" Marks. He knows both General Petraeus and also Paula Broadwell. We'll ask him some questions about that relationship. And it's 50 days till the fiscal cliff, 50 days. New signs this morning that we could be seeing a deal possibly soon. President Obama wants to let the Bush tax cuts expire for Americans making more than $250,000, said he's not wedded to every detail of his plan. House speaker, John Boehner, wants to keep all the Bush tax cuts in place. He's starting to talk about closing up tax loopholes. Conservative pundit and weekly standard editor Bill Kristol said it's time for Republicans to come so some sort of compromise.</s>BILL KRISTOL, EDITOR, "THE WEEKLY STANDARD": The leadership of the Conservative movement has to pull back, let people float new ideas, let's have a serious debate. Don't scream and yell when one person says it won't kill the country if we raise taxes a little bit on millionaires. It really won't, I don't think. I don't understand why Republicans don't take Obama's offer.</s>O'BRIEN: CNN's senior congressional correspondent Dana Bash is live for us in Washington, D.C. Hey, Dana, what do you make of his comments?</s>DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Soledad, look, Bill Kristol is not an elected official. He doesn't get a vote. But he is a very influential GOP voice here in Washington and around the country. And for him to tell Republicans it wouldn't kill to them to agree to tax increases for millionaires. It's a big deal. And we heard some similar talk from Republicans who do have a vote like Senator Bob Corker. Listen to this.</s>SEN. BOB CORKER, (R) TENNESSEE: I think there is a deal, once the yin and yang, we know there has to be revenues. Look, I haven't met a wealthy Republican or Democrat in Tennessee that's not willing to contribute more as long as they know we solve the problem.</s>BASH: And, Soledad, now for the "but." The "but" is that sounds conciliatory, and it is, but the two sides are still not close on how to cut a deal on any tax increases. For the most part Republicans are still opposed to raising tax rates for the wealthiest Americans, and Democrats, led by the president, said this over and over in the campaign, said it's exactly what they want to do. They want to return the highest tax rates, 35 percent to 39.6 percent, pre-Bush era levels. Listen to Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer.</s>SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER, (D) NEW YORK: The only way mathematically I've seen to do it is go from that 39.6 percent rate. If someone can show snore plan that doesn't do that, we could look at it but no one's shown one because I think it's mathematically impossible.</s>BASH: So where is the compromise? Raising taxes for the wealthy, in some other way closing a slew of loopholes, or as Democrats like to say, perhaps redefining wealth so that tax rates are raised for those making half a million or a million dollars a year. Soledad, this will be all the talk in the halls of the happen when Congress returns tomorrow and the president is going to have a very important meeting with congressional leaders on Friday.</s>O'BRIEN: At least they sound conciliatory on both sides.</s>BASH: It's a nice change.</s>O'BRIEN: It doesn't sound like, forget it, everybody holding press conferences but not talking to each other. Dana Bash, thanks. Just ahead this morning we're going to be talking to Grover Norquist. He's the president of Americans for Tax Reform. It is his pledge that elected officials often sign, saying no taxes, tax increases. We'll see what he has to say about this conciliatory tone. Alina Cho has some of the rest of the stories making news today. Hey, Alina.</s>ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. We start with something that seemingly came out of nowhere. An Indianapolis neighborhood resembles a warzone this morning after a weekend explosion that leveled homes and killed two people. Authorities still don't know what caused the blast, which rendered whole blocks uninhabitable. America will never forget the service of its military heroes. President Obama delivering that message on Veterans Day at a wreath laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.</s>BARACK OBAMA, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: On this day we thank all of our veterans from all of our wars, not just for your service to this country, but for reminding us why America and always will be the greatest nation on earth.</s>CHO: The president also noting this is the first veteran's day in a decade with no American troops serving in Iraq. Investigators want to know why a 64-year-old man walked into a Detroit area police station and opened fire. He shot a 50-year-old sergeant in the shoulder yesterday before officers returned fire and killed him. That sounded sergeant is expected to make a full recovery. Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano gets a firsthand look at Sandy's aftermath. She surveyed the devastation in Staten Island, yesterday. She also took stock of relief and recovery efforts there. Sandy is blamed for at least 113 deaths across various states, 43 in New York alone. Thousands are still without power. Sunday night football action, bears and Texans in Chicago, a big night for Houston's Ariane Foster. He rushed for 102 yards on 29 carries and scored the game's only touchdown. Texans defense was all over Jay Cutler. They nabbed two interceptions before knocking him out of the game with a concussion. Final score Houston 13, Chicago, six.</s>O'BRIEN: You follow Roland Martin. He was going crazy this weekend. Good weekend for Roland. Another big headline is sports. L.A. Lakers making surprising announcement for their head coach position. Sources tell the "Los Angeles Times" that former New York Knicks head coach Mike D'Antoni is going to take over after the sudden firing of mike brown after just five games. Tiki Barber is the New York Giants all-time leader rusher and also the author of "Tiki, My Life in the Game and Beyond." It's nice to have you.</s>TIKI BARBER, FORMER NFL PLAYER: Good to be here.</s>O'BRIEN: Let's start with that. Everyone's talking Phil Jackson. I saw a little wire that said new coach and I was like oh, Phil Jackson.</s>BARBER: Phil Jackson retired for a reason a few years ago for the Los Angeles Lakers. He's 70 years old. He's burnt out. He probably doesn't want to be on the bench any longer dealing with a lot of personalities that they have in Los Angeles, obviously Kobe Bryant.</s>O'BRIEN: What? Kobe Bryant has a big ego?</s>BARBER: Personality.</s>O'BRIEN: Sorry, that was my editorializing.</s>BARBER: Exactly. I think mike D'Antoni is the right coach for the Los Angeles Lakers right now. He's looking to get back in to a high profile position. The Lakers are going to give him that opportunity after being unceremoniously dismissed by the Knicks last year, also, because of, let's call it high personality. So I think it's a good place for him to restart and it will be good for the Los Angeles Lakers because they need somebody who is going to come in and put in an offense that fits their players. I think that was Mike Brown's problem with the Lakers. He had these guys running and gunning like Princeton used to, but the average age is 32 years old.</s>O'BRIEN: Out in the blink of an eye.</s>BARBER: Bad look of an eye.</s>O'BRIEN: Yes, exactly. We saw a couple of those bad looks, because they moved those right out. Let's talk about Alabama losing. Again as I said Roland Martin completely insane on twitter. He was so excited because Texas A&M; won.</s>BARBER: Johnny Manzel had a big day going out to a big lead against Alabama. This makes it very interesting BCS, bowl championship series last couple of weeks. Obviously Alabama can't control their destiny any longer, the defending national champions. They have to win out. And more importantly they have to beat Georgia in the title game. There's three undefeateds now, Notre Dame, Kansas State and Oregon State. Oregon State has a little bit of a challenge to get there. They have Stanford and a couple other teams and play in the SEC. The easiest team to get there because they don't have a title game is Kansas State. They've got a couple games to win out and they should be number one or number two in the country. Again, this all goes away in 2014 because they institute a playoff like every other division in college football.</s>O'BRIEN: Which clearly you wanted.</s>BARBER: I think everybody wanted.</s>O'BRIEN: Quick question, Johnny Manzel, he's trying to trade mark Johnny football.</s>BARBER: How many Johnnies are there? Great quarterbacks or great running backs, that's not going to happen. It's smart.</s>O'BRIEN: Nice to see you, Tiki. Let's talk business news. Alison Kosik is in for Christine romans with the latest your business news.</s>ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Minding your business this morning, U.S. stock futures are up indicating markets will open higher this morning. But of course there's a lot of volatility in the markets right now, mostly because of the fiscal cliff. The S&P; 500, that's the best indicator for the stocks in your 401(k). It's fallen about 2.5 percent since Election Day. This week we're going to get several reports on the manufacturing sector. Hopefully those will give us an update on how the economy is doing. Maybe even draw attention away from the gridlock that we are seeing in Washington over the fiscal cliff. OK, add one more to the list. Toys "R" Us announcing it's opening early on Thanksgiving night at 8:00 p.m. eastern. It's an hour earlier than last year. The retailer says it's focusing on electronics sales including its own tablet devices for kids. Target and Wal-Mart are following suit, opening earlier on thanksgiving night this year, as well. Black Friday, Soledad, oh, so yesterday. It's Thursday now.</s>O'BRIEN: What is that brown Thursday? Crazy.</s>O'BRIEN: I would never do that. Tiki, I'm going to ask you about the giants this weekend. We've got to move on. Still ahead this morning on STARTING POINT, was national security ever put at risk because of general Petraeus' affair. Up next we'll talk with retired General "Spider" Marks who's known general Petraeus since high school. And Jeff Gordon did you see this brawl? Completely out of control. You know, he is throwing punches, which, I have to say he's kind of a mellow guy.</s>CHO: Not exciting enough.</s>O'BRIEN: Out of the vehicle. We'll tell you exactly what happened behind this big fight. That's straight ahead.