Emma Lacey-Bordeaux
CNN Researcher

As the holidays approach I've been thinking about communication. Working at CNN as a researcher, my communication is dominated by the written and spoken word for nine hours straight. On a slow day I will work on 10 scripts and go through 100 emails. When I’m not reading and writing, I’m speaking – to our reporters in every corner of the world. At the end of the day my voice is tired from talking and my fingers from typing. Only a tiny percentage of my communication at CNN is non-verbal.

During the holiday season I have to re-adjust my own thinking on communication because of the symbolic, tangible and non-verbal holiday communication. At my family's Thanksgiving for example we communicate affection, connection and community through carefully prepared food eaten together. For me the significance and power of this communication was heightened this year when, for the first time, my boyfriend's family and my family dined together. Stefan's aunt's sweet potatoes were joyfully scarfed down alongside my father's Turkish zucchini and my first-ever attempt at a turkey. That which divides us was left unspoken and our togetherness communicated by a bountiful table, full stomachs and smiling faces.

While still digesting Thanksgiving dinner I received emailed photos of an art installation created by a dear friend of mine, studying in Ireland. As usual I was blown away by the emotion contained in her work. Vanessa's work has long forced my brain to slow down. Through rich visual detail, great emotion is communicated. I understand more from spending a silent hour with her work than an hour conversing. Vanessa understands better than most that words don't often convey or communicate everything we have to say.

In a few days I will travel to visit my grandfather in an Alzheimer’s ward, where verbal communication will almost certainly fail. My grandfather, a retired professor of Mathematics, was once a master of verbal communication. A man who started his adult life selling bibles door to door, my grandfather could, and did, charm everyone he met. A routine 10-minute errand to the bank, would consume half an hour as the employees gathered around lavishing upon my grandfather rapt attention. He held court almost everywhere.

I am told my grandfather, like most Alzheimer's patients, can no longer recall names and only occasionally remembers relationships; I don't expect much of the old verbal magic that we once had. But by traveling to visit my grandfather I will communicate, in a way words never could, love and support to my family.

Reporter's Note: President Obama’s team continues to take heat over how those party crashers made it into the White House. And I continue to write letters.

Tom Foreman | BIO
AC360° Correspondent

Dear Mr. President,

It is fully possible that in your headlong rush to the White House that you have never spent much time thinking about Musk Oxen. But not being burdened with that whole “Leader of the Free World” responsibility, this is a subject I have considered at some length, and I want to tell you a bit about them.

Musk Oxen live in the north. Farther north than the Green Bay Packers. On the arctic tundra. They look like very shaggy, sturdy, long-haired cattle, with impressively stout, and pointy horns. They weigh up to eight hundred pounds and if one were standing in front of you right now your head would be just barely above the hump of his shoulders. (Not for long, of course. They can be rather ill-tempered, and I suspect you would be on the run faster than you can yell, “Hey, Biden, is this your dog in the Oval Office?”)

What is most impressive about the Musk Ox, however, is its sense of society. When threatened by wolves or dogs, the calves and cows quickly form a knot, and all the bulls back up hard against it, forming a defensive ring, so that any predator from any side meets nothing but lowered heads and sharp horns. Individual bulls charge out to strike their tormentors, and then just as rapidly back up into their fortress of fur and horns.

Individually, a Musk Ox is as vulnerable as any other large herbivore. Sure, he’s all business up front, but attacked from all sides by a pack of canines, no matter how quickly he spins, eventually his exposed flanks will be savaged and he will be lost. But as a community, standing together and working together through good and bad, Musk Oxen are virtually indestructible.

I mention all this, because (and sorry to bring up a sore point) I remain disappointed in your staff’s response to the whole White House party crashers story. The Secret Service has admitted its culpability in what happened, but I was surprised to hear Press Secretary Gibbs so glibly put not merely a lion’s share, but essentially all of the blame on the backs of the agents. To hear him tell it, everyone else on your staff is utterly blameless in allowing two people from the street to get into the White House and walk right up to you, the Vice President, and all your other guests.

Great president are not islands; they are made by great teams. And great teams share at all times equal measures of success and failure, and they readily face their faults so that they can make things better. When the going gets tough, they don’t point to a teammate who slipped and shout, “It’s all his fault!” To the contrary, they ask themselves to what degree they are all to blame. Because a weakness left un-admitted and unrepaired can endanger the whole herd. Even Musk Oxen know that.

Give me a call if you want to chew this over a bit more. And btw, we’re having a holiday party at the office. If you’d like to come by, I’m pretty sure I can get you in. Uh…but be sure to bring an I.D. Security, you know…

Regards,

Tom

Follow Tom on Twitter @tomforemancnn.

Find more of the Foreman Letters here.

Anderson Cooper goes beyond the headlines to tell stories from many points of view, so you can make up your own mind about the news. Weeknights, 10 ET

JOIN: LIVE BLOG Weeknights 10p ET

Who dropped the ball in the Maurice Clemmons case? He's the man who shot and killed four cops in Washington State over the weekend. There is new evidence tonight that Washington state tried to keep Clemmons behind bars. But they ran into resistance from Arkansas. We're keeping them honest.

Want to know what else we're covering? Read EVENING BUZZ

Scroll down to join the live chat during the program. It's your chance to share your thoughts on tonight's headlines. Keep in mind, you have a better chance of having your comment get past our moderators if you follow our rules.

Here are some of them:

1) Keep it short (we don't have time to read a "book")
2) Don't write in ALL CAPS (there's no need to yell)
3) Use your real name (first name only is fine)
4) No links
5) Watch your language (keep it G-rated; PG at worst - and that includes $#&*)

CNN

Drew Griffin | BIO
CNN Investigative Correspondent

AC360°

Amanda Knox's high-profile case is coming to an end. After two years in prison, her verdict is expected to be delivered this Friday. If  found guilty, she could spent the next thirty years behind bars. Her defense in the trial for the gory 2007 sex-murder of her British housemate Meredith Kercher rejected the charges that she and former boyfriend Raffaele Sollecitothe killed Kercher in a drug-fuelled sexual misadventure.

Here is a photo gallery overview of the Knox case.

This file picture taken on September 16, 2008 at a court hearing in Perugia shows Amanda Knox being escorted by police. The first audience of Amanda Knox' trial, took place on January 16, 2009 in Perugia. Amanda Knox, from Seattle, Washington, has been held awaiting trial since a few days after British exchange student Meredith Kercher, aged 22, was found dead semi-nude in her bedroom with her throat slit on November 2, 2007.

One of the three suspects in the murder of British student Meredith Kercher, Rudy Guede, 21, from the Ivory Coast (C), of the United States, leaves at a court hearing in Perugia on September 27, 2008.
He was found guilty and is currently serving a 30 year prison sentence.

The third suspect in the murder of British student Meredith Kercher, Italian Raffaele Sollecito, Knox's former boyfriend, leaves a court hearing in Perugia on September 27, 2008.

British student Meredith Kercher.

The lawyer of the family of slain British student Meredith Kercher, Francesco Maresca, leaves the courthouse in the central Italian city of Perugia on October 28, 2008.

Amanda Knox testifies at the sitting of the Meredith Kercher murder trial at the Perugia courthouse on June 13, 2009 in Perugia, Italy.

Curt Knox (L) and Edda Mellas, the parents of US student Amanda Knox speak to journalists prior to the trial session of their daughter Amanda on November 28, 2009 at Perugia's courthouse.

Amanda Knox is comforted by her lawyer Carlo Dalla Vedova during her trial on December 3, 2009 at the courthouse in Perugia. American Amanda Knox asked a jury not to put the 'killer's mask' on her as she and her boyfriend made emotional final appeals denying the murder of British student Meredith Kercher.

According to her parents, Amanda was an easy child to raise. She, amongst other things, excelled at soccer, where she inherited the nick name "Foxy Knoxy". The name was later used by the prosecutor and taken out of context.

A knife found in Raffaele Sollecito's house which has the DNA of Amanda Knox on the handle and victim Meredith Kerecher on the blade, is suggested by the prosecutor to be the murder weapon. But the defense argues that the knife does not match the shape and size of wounds on Kercher's body or an outline of the knife left on the bed.

Maureen Miller
AC360° Writer

The White House is coming under fire for not having its social planner testify at a congressional hearing today on the state dinner security breach.

The ranking Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee, New York Rep. Peter King, addressed the panel's Democratic Chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson.

"This was a bipartisan request, Mr. Chairman. A bipartisan request to the White House which prides itself in being open, which prides itself on cooperation – but in this instance they are stonewalling. And for our committee to work with the White House there has to be an element of trust. They have breached that trust, " King said.

Do you agree? Should White House Social Secretary Desiree Rogers have been at the hearing?

Thompson said he didn't think Rogers had to testify, since the hearing focused on security issues.

Rogers wasn't the only no-show. Tareq and Michaele Salahi who are accused of crashing the state dinner last month also stayed away.

"Maybe they didn't show because they were on the guest list," joked Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Arizona.

But Thompson isn't laughing over the Salahis skipping the Q-and-A session. He said they will subpoena the couple to try to get them to testify on another date.

The one person who did show up on Capitol Hill was Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan.

"In this case, I fully acknowledge that proper procedures were not followed and human error occurred in the execution of our duties. This flaw has not changed our agency standard which is to be right 100-percent of the time," Sullivan said.

That was met by some anger from another Republican on the committee, who wanted to hear from the White House Social Secretary.

"I am very impressed by your willingness to take responsibility for this incident. But, you know, I never, ever expected, you know, we always expect the Secret Service to take a bullet for the president. We don't expect the Secret Service to take a bullet for the president's staff," said Rep. Charles Dent of Pennsylvania.

We'll have the latest on this story, including new insight on Mrs. Salahi's claim she was a Washington Redskins cheerleader.

Join us at 10 p.m. ET on CNN. See you then!

Congressman Peter King accuses the White House of 'stonewalling'

CNN

The ranking Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee accused the White House of "stonewalling" Thursday by blocking its top social planner from testifying at a hearing on a security breach.

New York Rep. Peter King was angered by the administration's refusal to let Social Secretary Desiree Rogers speak at a hearing examining how a Virginia couple was able to enter the White House for a state dinner last week, even though they were not on the guest list.

Rogers' office planned the dinner.

Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan testified Thursday that there was a lone agent at the initial checkpoint where Tareq and Michaele Salahi entered the White House grounds. He acknowledged that if someone from the social secretary's office had been there, the couple may have been stopped.

Keep Reading...

Editor's Note: We take a look tonight at the case of Maurice Clemmons and the legal provision called Interstate Compact Supervision that allows offenders across state lines amidst pending charges. Jeffrey Toobin joins us tonight on AC360° at 10pm ET.

Interstate Commission for Adult Offender Supervision

(Image courtesy of The Stranger)

AC360°

There are still unsolved questions surrounding the case of Maurice Clemmons. Questions that prompt us to take a deeper look at the legal system and why Clemmons had been released from jail just last week despite pending felony charges and a lengthy criminal history.

According to a document posted by the Seattle newspaper, The Stranger, Clemmons had posted bail on his recent charges allowing him to walk free after being charged with assualt and child rape. The bail had been set at $190,000 but records indicate that he had only paid $15,000.

These charges were separate from those which were commuted in 2000 by then-Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. Clemmons had received a 95-year prison sentence in Arkansas in 1989 for a host of charges, including robberies, burglaries, thefts and bringing a gun to school.

Take a look at Maurice Clemmons bail receipt...

Ready for today's Beat 360°? Everyday we post a picture – and you provide the caption and our staff will join in too. Tune in tonight at 10pm to see if you are our favorite! Here is the 'Beat 360°' pic:

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks during a hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee December 3, 2009 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. The hearing was to examine President Obama's plan to send more troops to Afghanistan.

Have fun with it. We're looking forward to your captions! Make sure to include your name, city, state (or country) so we can post your comment.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Bank of America said late Wednesday it planned to return the entire $45 billion in bailout money it received from the government over the past year.

Andrew Torgan
CNN Financial News Producer

President Obama called on business leaders this afternoon to help his administration kick-start hiring as policymakers contend with rising unemployment that’s weighing down the economy.

Some 130 executives, economists, small business owners and non-profit officials are gathering for the jobs summit at the White House on the eve of the government's November unemployment report. The nation is expected to have lost another 114,000 jobs, with unemployment remaining at 10.2%, the highest in 26 years, according to an economists' survey.

"I'm not interested in taking a wait and see approach when it comes to creating jobs," Obama said.

The employment picture is certainly grim. Nearly 16 million Americans are out of work, one-third of whom have been unemployed for more than six months. There are now six workers competing for every job vacancy.

The jobs picture remains front and center amid the deluge of both private and government reports this week.

This morning, the Labor Dept. says first-time claims for unemployment benefits fell unexpectedly last week by 5,000 to 457,000 - a near 15-month low.

That's the lowest level since the week ended Sept. 6, 2008, but part of decline is being attributed to government offices being closed for Thanksgiving.

In addition, continuing claims edged up by 28,000 to 5.5 million.

Meanwhile, people who are employed are working even harder.

Worker productivity increased more than 8% the third quarter. That’s the largest amount in six years. Aggressive cost cutting by businesses has pushed productivity sharply higher over the past months.

Unit labor costs, a gauge of inflation and profit pressures closely watched by the Federal Reserve, fell 2.5%. While that does signal inflation is under control, it also means workers are feeling a tight squeeze on their wages.

Elsewhere in Washington, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke got a rough going over from both his supporters and detractors at his Senate confirmation hearing today.

Even those who praised his actions during the financial troubles of the last two years, such as Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, balanced that support with arguments that the central bank should be stripped of some of its bank regulation powers due to its past failures of oversight.

While many Democrats on the banking panel joined Dodd in saying they would vote for another four-year term for Bernanke, some of the Republicans questioned whether they could support the chairman who was first appointed by President George W. Bush.

One long-time Bernanke critic, Jim Bunning (R-KY), said he was ready to do everything he could to block or delay the confirmation, joining a similar threat made late Wednesday by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who is among the 60 members of the Democratic caucus.

The threat of a filibuster by Sanders and Bunning, two lawmakers with diametrically opposed views on most issues, shows the breadth of anger faced by Bernanke sparked by the Wall Street bailouts. A filibuster would mean that Bernanke would need to get at least 60 votes, rather than the simple majority of 51, in order to be confirmed.

Turning to news making waves on Wall Street, Bank of America said late Wednesday it planned to return the entire $45 billion in bailout money it received from the government over the past year.

The move would allow Bank of America, the nation's largest lender, to break free from a variety of government restrictions it has had to abide by, including pay caps for its top executives.

It could also smooth what has been a difficult search for a new chief executive.

Outgoing CEO Ken Lewis is scheduled to depart by year end. Bank of America's board of directors originally hoped to select a successor by Thanksgiving.

And General Electric and Comcast announced a joint venture this morning worth a combined $37.25 billion that will give the cable company eventual control of NBC Universal.

In the complex deal, NBC Universal will borrow $9.1 billion from third-party lenders to distribute to parent company General Electric. GE will use that money to buy Vivendi SA's 20% stake in NBCU for $5.8 billion, clearing a major hurdle in the company's path to sell control of the entertainment giant to Comcast.

Comcast will pay GE $6.5 billion in cash for the conglomerate's media unit and will contribute programming and other businesses valued at $7.25 billion, including E!, the Style Network and several cable sports stations. The sale values NBC Universal at $30 billion.

Comcast will take a controlling 51% stake in the joint venture, and GE will control 49%.

Follow the money… on Twitter: @AndrewTorganCNN

Amanda Knox has been on trial in Italy for two years

Candace Dempsey
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Doug Preston is only too familiar with Judge Giuliano Mignini, the pubblico ministero (public prosecutor) holding UW honor student Amanda Knox, her boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito and Rudy Guede as suspects in the Nov. 1 murder of foreign exchange student Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy.

Preston is a journalist as well as a New York Times best-selling novelist and "student of crime."

His newest work, The Monster of Florence, is a nonfiction tale about the infamous serial killer who plagued Florence during the 1970s and 1980s. Preston's book about this killer, who was never caught, will hit stores in June.

Preston first encountered Mignini, one of the prosecutors in the Monster case, when he started researching the crime. Mignini didn't appreciate Preston and his writing partner, Mario Spezi, poking into the facts. He had Spezi arrested and thrown into Capanne prison, where the three Meredith suspects are also housed, and accused him of being the Monster of Florence himself. Spezi has since been freed.

Read More...

Fareed Zakaria says that the United States may in fact be scaling down the goals of the military operation

Fareed Zakaria | BIO
CNN Anchor

When President Obama announced plans Tuesday to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan, it appeared to be a major escalation of the war in that country. But, foreign affairs analyst Fareed Zakaria says that the United States may in fact be "scaling down" the goals of the military operation.

In an interview with CNN, Zakaria gave the new plan a good chance of succeeding in achieving its more limited objectives. But he said Obama's idea of setting a target date for starting to draw down U.S. troops was a strategic mistake - though he suggested the president may have needed to do so for political reasons.

Zakaria, author and host of CNN's "Fareed Zakaria: GPS," spoke to CNN Wednesday.

CNN: The president outlined an intensive but short-term boost of the military resources in Afghanistan. He didn't call it a surge but is this effectively the same as the Iraq surge?

Fareed Zakaria: Actually I think this is a different surge than the Iraq surge. And not enough people have noticed that - because the president did increase the number of troops and in fact, in many ways the number of troops that he has increased in percentage terms is much larger than the Iraq surge.

Keep Reading...

Jury deliberations are expected to begin Friday in the murder case against Amanda Knox in her roommate’s death. Anderson Cooper has the latest developments in the case. Tonight, 10 p.m. ET.

JOIN: LIVE BLOG Weeknights 10p ET

Fawaz A. Gerges
Special to CNN

President Obama's decision to deploy an additional 30,000 soldiers and Marines to Afghanistan by early 2010 was not a surprise. In Obama's War Cabinet meetings, the question was not whether to send more troops but how many.

Obama's second major military escalation of the conflict this year, the largest single U.S. deployment since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, will bring the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan to almost 100,000. There are also 50,000 NATO troops stationed in the country.

Notably, there will be as many troops in Afghanistan as in Iraq at the height of the war between 2003 and 2008.

In his televised speech Tuesday, Obama stressed the limits of the American presence in Afghanistan and set a goal of starting to bring forces home after only 18 months.

Keep Reading...

John W. Rowe M.D.
Special to CNN

The new recommendations for breast cancer screening - and the public debate surrounding them - underscore the need to distinguish between rationing and establishing science-based standards of health care. That distinction will be crucial as we strive for better and more affordable care in the United States.

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, which made the recommendations, reviewed new scientific studies and concluded that for women in their 40s, when the likelihood of breast cancer is very low, routine screening is not necessary and that, thereafter, mammography at two-year intervals provides essentially the same benefit as annual tests.

These recommendations have been greeted with understandable skepticism and claims of "rationing."

After all, in the midst of the current health care reform debate it is easy to question the motives of a group seen by some as "government-sponsored," and new science-based recommendations for less, rather than more, care often meet populist resistance.

Keep Reading...

40,460 American women, according to the American Cancer Society, are expected to lose their breast cancer battle this year.

Susan Scanlan
Special to CNN

I've been digesting the recommendations of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force for two weeks now. And I'm still swallowing hard.

How else to react to the cockamamie recommendations to discontinue routine breast self-exams, along with mammograms, for 40-something women?

Let's take one giant leap backward for women's health! These task forcers have devalued the only tool available to women for fighting what is practically a health scourge in our country.

I know from scourges. The granddaughter and daughter of breast cancer victims, my time in the barrel came in 2005. Four years and a double mastectomy later, I'm still kicking.

Keep Reading...