Perry Blows a Kiss to Romney; James Murdoch "Likely" Re- Questioned
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: OK. It's also top of the hour. And we are on the road to the White House. The President is in the Midwest promising jobs and fighting to keep his. And here are some of the Republicans trying to wrestle it away. They're hitting key battleground states today. Mitt Romney is in New Hampshire, Michele Bachmann is in South Carolina and Rick Perry, he's in Iowa. Now to that straight-shooting Texas who is dominating the headlines on just his second day of campaigning. Rick Perry raising his profile and also more than a few eyebrows. And one person who actually wound up in his crosshairs, Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve.</s>GOV. RICK PERRY (R-TEX), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Printing more money to play politics at this particular time in America's history is almost treacherous -- treasonous, in my opinion.</s>PERRY: Apparently he's blowing kisses, too, not to Shannon Travis but to his competitors. Shannon?</s>SHANNON TRAVIS, CNN POLITICAL PRODUCER: Hi, there, Kyra. Yes, I mean, Rick Perry, listen, it remains to be seen whether he is just -- you know, this is just his natural way, this Texas swagger, this bravado that he has or if Rick Perry is trying to make a splash because he has a lot of kind of campaigning to do. Catching up to do to some of the other competitors because he just got into the race or if this was a serious misstep. I mean, you have a presidential candidate basically saying that we treat the chairman of the Federal Reserve pretty ugly down in Texas. You can imagine some Democrats and liberal critics are saying, you know, what owe is he inciting violence, was he calling for violence against Ben Bernanke? So this may have been a misstep or this may have been an intentional comment from Rick Perry to drum up some excitement and drum up some buzz about his campaign.</s>KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Drumming up buzz, drumming up excitement, there you were with the mic making your way through the crowd and you got this little gem.</s>TRAVIS: Romney took a swipe at you today saying that he has private sector experience and that makes him better qualified to create jobs.</s>RICK PERRY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Give him my love.</s>TRAVIS: What do you think about that though, sir that he has --</s>PERRY: I think oranges and apples. Running a state is different than running a business.</s>TRAVIS: That he will make that a center piece of his campaign.</s>PERRY: What I would say is go take a look at his record when he was governor and look at my record when I'm governor. Then you've got apples to apples.</s>PHILLIPS: Apples to apples, Shannon.</s>TRAVIS: Apples to apples, a little message there, Kyra, from Rick Perry to Mitt Romney, sealed with a little kiss. I mean, Mitte Romney yesterday for context basically said I'm the only one in the race who has private sector experience and government experience. It was a little bit of a dig at Rick Perry. So I wanted to ask Rick Perry about that, and that's what he responded with. So Rick Perry is coming out pretty hard-charging against some of his critics. Also later talked about criticism from the Michele Bachmann campaign, saying you weren't in the Iowa straw poll, you weren't in Ames. He dismissed that also and said, look, I'm here.</s>PHILLIPS: Shannon Travis, great job. We will be talking more. Perry also made a comment about printing more money. Why don't we talk to Alison Kosik about that? She's at the New York Stock Exchange. Kind of a cartoonish image, but it's actually a real option, right?</s>ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: It is a real option because what the fed, Kyra, calls it is quantitative easing. Actually the fed wrapped up a second round of it known as QE-2 here on Wall Street. Wrapped up this program in June where it pumped $600 billion of brand spanking newly printed money right into the economy. One of the goals in doing this was to actually lower the unemployment rate. So the question is, did it work? Well, during that time, the jobless rate fell from 9.8 percent to 9.2 percent. So in that respect, you know, it was well received on Wall Street as well because what it also did is create a wealth effect. We saw it in our 401(k)s, makes everybody feel wealthier. We want to go out and shop. The S&P; 500 was up. Even the Dow jumped 10.9 percent during the six months QE2 was in effect. Despite what we've seen over the last couple of weeks, it's really held on to most of those gains. But beyond lowering the unemployment rate, it is really questioning whether pouring money into the economy actually works because what it winds up doing is devaluing the dollar. More dollars out there, the less each is worth and that can lead to inflation. The rate of inflation actually rose from 1.1 percent to 3.6 percent while QE-2 was in place. And the fed said that was on target partly because of other factors like the impact of the Japanese tsunami. Now what Rick Perry and other opponents of QE-2 or QE-3 in this case, if that comes about, what they're worried about is whether or not this would even work. You know, he really bashes Bernanke because he questions whether or not putting more money into the economy would really grow the economy or just put a band-aid on problems. So lots of questions. The fed hinted to the possibility of a QE-3, but definitely did not put its money on it yet. Kyra --</s>PHILLIPS: All right, Alison, thanks. Let's shift gears to the Obama bus tour, which is rolling through the Midwest right now. He's going to meet with farmers and small business owners in Iowa. The White House bills the tour as an opportunity to talk about the economy and hear what's on rural America's mind. As the president continues his tour, he sits down with Wolf Blitzer, the Obama interview with our Wolf Blitzer today, 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time. British lawmakers say it's likely that James Murdoch will be called again to testify before parliament. Lawmakers are trying to determine if the younger Murdoch mislead them last month about phone hacking at the now closed "News of the World." Zain Verjee, what do we know?</s>ZAIN VERJEE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: What MPs are saying is that he is likely to be recalled maybe sometime around October to face more questions from a parliamentary committee looking into the phone hacking scandal at "News of the World." At the heart of this is who knew what and when about the phone hacking and were they aware? Was James Murdoch aware of the extent of what was going on? They want to ask him more questions. One MP says this it, his evidence has been contradicted by evidence, which we have had from others. So it could continue to escalate here at the heart this also, they're talking about e-mails where James Murdoch has said in one instance that he wasn't aware this was going on, but there are others that are proving there is other documentation and e-mails that contradict what he says. And a whole bunch of other things. So that will come to light if he shows up again in October.</s>PHILLIPS: OK, so, if indeed, he has misled folks, what happens, Zain?</s>VERJEE: Well, in this country, it's considered a pretty serious thing to do that in parliament. Parliament would hold him in contempt. But the fact of the matter is, it's not like he'll get thrown into jail. There's no incarceration for something like that. In this country, when you're talking to a parliamentary committee, you would be publicly shamed, some MPs are pushing for something a lot tougher than that. As of right now, that's how it stands, slap on the wrist, publicly shamed, contempt.</s>PHILLIPS: All right, Zain Verjee from London. Zain, thanks. More than a dozen teens get together to rob a 7-11 all at the same time. It's actually being called a flash mob robbery. The search for these suspects has moved to the worldwide web. Plus, we're mixing things up with this week's 30-second pitches. Our focus? Our vets. Don served and was wounded in Iraq. We're going to see if we can't get her some business and some work, coming up next.