[Ashleigh Banfield, Cnn:] Hello everyone. I'm Ashleigh Banfield. It is November 29th. And welcome to "legal view." and it a very happy Black Friday to you. That's the sound, isn't it? Were you in that little number out late Thanksgiving night last night, or maybe even well before the dawn waking up this morning and hunting down all those rock bottom deals? The holiday shopping season now officially upon us and today is the craziest if not the busiest shopping day of the year, and, my friends, that has been rather obvious. Sounds like a concert, new kids on the block, shows my age. According to the National Retail Federation, about 97 million of us Americans are expected to shop in stores and online today, and for many, this Black Friday tradition actually ended up kicking off yesterday. A bit weird, I get it. More and more stores, though, decided to open their doors on Thanksgiving Day, though, instead of the day after. And for some, the competition for those door-buster deals got pretty ugly. Oh, makes you proud to be an American, doesn't it? Our Kyung Lah outside a Walmart store in Los Angeles for us right now. I'm trying to peek into the middle of that melee to see if you were actually among them, but I think you were smart enough to stay outside and watch it all through the windows. Kyung, did it get any better?
[Kyung Lah, Cnn Correspondent:] Well, it's actually pretty calm here at this Walmart. Things have been very, very steady. What I was surprised to see is when we got here at 3:00 a.m. local time in Los Angeles, there were people actually shopping, so the shopping did definitely start Thursday. If you look at Walmart's figures, it's certainly paying off for them. They're estimating 22 million customers in America were in their stores last night.
[Banfield:] I have to interrupt you. I'm so sorry. Do you know why I have to interrupt you? And only for the White House would I cut you off. The official Christmas tree is just rolling up to the White House right now. It's so pretty. It's on this Kyung, if you can see a monitor, it's on a lovely horse-drawn cart. And there's the dog at the back of the Christmas tree. Be at the top of the Christmas tree for anyone looking. I love the fact that the first lady and her daughters have come out to greet the tree. By the way, this is kind of a cool tree this year. It's a little not in keeping with tradition. Typically, the tree that goes in the Blue Room at the White House is the winner of a big contest. I don't know if you know the contest. It's actually the National Christmas Tree Association contest, but this year, it is not that tree. Let me just listen for a bit.
[Michele Obama, First Lady Of The United States:] We are honored to have it. This is the best part of the holiday season when our tree comes. Check it out. What do you think? Come look on the other side.
[Unidentified Female:] It's big.
[Obama:] It's big? [Inaudible]. What do you think of that?
[Unidentified Male:] It looks beautiful.
[Obama:] So what do you think?
[Unidentified Female:] Love it.
[Obama:] All right.
[Unidentified Male:] We'll keep it.
[Obama:] We will keep it.
[Unidentified Female:] OK.
[Unidentified Male:] Thank you very much.
[Obama:] All right, you guys. We will see you a lot over the next week.
[Banfield:] I think that's Bo. I can't tell the difference between their puppy dogs, but maybe there's both there. I have a very small monitor and I'm trying to make out which of the first pets yeah, there they are. They're both there. Sunny and Bo accompanying the first daughters and the first lady as they greet the official Christmas tree that's going to be in the Blue Room at the White House. And like I said, this is a bit weird this year, because that is not the winner of the official contest. Turns out the winner of the cop test wasn't 18.5 feet high. And if you think that's stickler-y, detail stuff, it has to be, because the power source in the blue room is in the ceiling. So if the tree isn't high enough, it can't get to the electricity. So, instead, this is another tree that's coming to us courtesy of the Boteach family. Very nice, it's beautiful, and I'm sure by the time the Obamas have finished the decorating, it will be even more so. Kyung Lah, I would never interrupt you for anything other than something that really special. And, you know, it's such a great moment for everybody in America to watch the first family getting ready for the holidays. Go ahead. Finish your fabulous report now.
[Lah:] Yeah, and Christmas is arriving now, right? Christmas is arriving now. You really want to go out and shop, right? Maybe not. But a lot of people certainly were out there trying to shop. Walmart, as I was saying, is actually was very it paid off for them to open up last night. In the first four hours, they had some 10 million transactions. So, if you thought the people who went out shopping on Thanksgiving were absolutely mad to do it, well, for at least this big box retailer, it's certainly paying off. They're predicting record sales for the Black Friday weekend, Ashleigh.
[Banfield:] Oh, man. Well, I hope everybody is in a little bit better spirits, and maybe the spirit of the holiday is today, now that they're over the initial push to get through the front doors. But methinks maybe now. Anyway, Kyung, be careful. Keep your Kevlar handy in case you have to go back inside. And a happy holiday to you as well, this Thanksgiving weekend, Kyung Lah, live for us in Los Angeles, looking very festive, yourself. I'm sorry to bring this to you, but I just have to, because this is the real deal, folks. Those holiday deals breed mayhem. This is at a North Carolina Walmart. This video is going viral, because the hash tag is "brawlmart." It looks like a football game, for heaven's sake. The man who videotaped this scene spoke earlier to my colleague, Carol Costello. Have a listen.
[Brian Spain, Videotaped Walmart Thanksgiving Brawl:] ... makes you feel kind of helpless. And then when you look and you see like there's two officers off to the side that are just kind of like standing there, watching all of this happen, and there's nothing going on, I'm like, I thought they would be there to help, to make sure this kind of stuff didn't happen. But they just kind of watch it happen.
[Baldwin:] Yeah, there, Brian Spain, I agree. That's just obnoxious to see that stuff going on. I'm not sure I could see any little kids in the middle of that. But Walmart's CEO, for his part, says that the company has taken steps to try to stave off that kind of business, that kind of clashing. And he spoke this morning on "NEW DAY." Have a listen.
[Bill Simon, President And Ceo, Walmart:] By and large, our events have changed over the years, and we implemented a couple of protocols and programs. We had a one-hour guarantee. We took the 21 hottest items and we bought them in deep enough quantities so that there wasn't that frenzy to try to get one. Anybody who was in our building during that timeframe was guaranteed to get one of those items. And if we ran out, we'll fulfill them through Walmart.com in the coming days, so they'll have the item for their Christmas or holiday celebration. So that calmed things down in our stores quite a bit from where they had been many, many years ago.
[Banfield:] Well, dang. If they had only known that before they went out and slept in the line to get through those doors their fellow Americans. Some retailers have been taking heat for kicking off Black Friday a whole day early. Last night, in fact, Macy's opened on Thanksgiving for the first time ever. The CEO of Macy's, Terry Lundgren, defended that decision this morning on "NEW DAY." Have a listen.
[Terry Lundgren, President And Ceo, Macy's:] In our case, we just want to do what our customers want and what our associates want, and so we're being responsive in that way. I think the fact that 15,000 people versus 11,000 who were here last year at midnight is an indication that people wanted to be here when we opened our doors.
[Banfield:] So that's all the shopping craziness. I had a moment of reprieve from that craziness to tell you about the lovely moment at the White House where the Christmas tree just arrived just minutes ago, the Obama family coming out with puppy dogs to greet the trees. And despite the pomp and circumstance around the tree and the trimmings and the decorations at the White House and Thanksgiving, there's still something going on there. President Obama is facing a tough reality check tomorrow. Check your calendar, because it's the self-imposed deadline for the ObamaCare Web site, healthcare.gov. They said it would work for the vast majority of people in America in a smooth and consistent way, so it's going to be a Saturday on a holiday weekend. Will it? Will we see a repeat of any of the debacle moments when the site launched last month? Our Jill Dougherty, also not taking the day off, working hard at the White House for us to follow everything that's happening. I almost wondered if this wasn't a blessing for President Obama that the tree is arriving, the Thanksgiving turkeys are pardoned and everybody is catatonic from so much turkey that they may not pay attention to this big deadline tomorrow. What's the White House doing?
[Jill Dougherty, Cnn Correspondent:] Well, actually, that's an interesting point, because some Republicans have said that was deliberate. This was all kind of rolled out, this artificial deadline, around the holidays so that nobody would pay attention. But, obviously, we are paying attention, and as far as we know, we are on track to do what their goal is. But remember, their goal is to get it working to the point that they can get 50,000 people online at the same time. And if it goes over that, that's where the issues could come up. Remember, back in October, they had over like 200,000 people. They couldn't get on. So what they've done is they've created this kind of virtual waiting list or waiting line where people would register and just get their names in there and then be contacted later to sign up. They also say, Ashleigh, they've increased the speed. Because the pages were loading just every six seconds, which is really slow. They say they have that down now to one second. And, also, the error rate is below 1 percent. It used to be 6 percent. These are all details. So we'll have to see what happens tomorrow, the deadline on Saturday, and as we've been telling you all along, they do have a tech team and they're working around the clock, hopefully getting this to where they want this to be.
[Banfield:] Yeah. But you know, it's like breaking a big story on a Friday night. It doesn't get nearly the angst that it does during the weekdays. Happy holidays to you, Jill. You look warm and cozy out there in the cold, crisp air. It's nice to see you.
[Dougherty:] Thank you.
[Banfield:] All right, so you've probably done a little online shopping at some point in your life, right? You get that bad service, or it just doesn't go right. And you see those comment columns and you want to get in there and write a bad review. Take a very deep breath before you do that. The nasty-gram can come back to haunt you, even if it's true. I want to introduce you to a couple who says their credit rating has been ruined because they just wrote a bad review online. And you need to know your rights, and what rights they have, those retailers, what you give up to them when you shop online. A cautionary tale coming up right before Cyber Monday.