Powell Not Ready To Endorse Obama; Booker Fires Back At Romney, GOP
BANFIELD: Just want to get you up to speed on some breaking news that CNN has been following. We have confirmation from U.S. Airways that flight number 787 that was on its way from Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris to Charlotte here in the United States did not make its intended destination. It was diverted. The airline is telling us the reason, quote, "a security issue." Now we're told by the TSA that that large capacity Boeing 767 jetliner has actually landed in Bangor, Maine and it has been met by law enforcement officials. That is the kind of plane we're looking at on your screen, it's not the plane, but it is the kind of plane, the 767. Again, large- capacity plane, but we don't know how many people on board. We also don't know exactly what the security issue was. But we do know this from the TSA. Apparently, a passenger was exhibiting some suspicious behavior. I can't tell you anything more than that because the TSA is not telling us anything more than that. Hopefully, law enforcement will be able to get to the bottom of that. We will continue to collect details and bring you that, as well. In the meantime, a lot of people coming in, political gut check today. This is your late breaking injection of the political news driving tomorrow's headlines. Our political director, Mark Preston, is joining me live now from Washington. Colin Powell getting into things kind of, I think we can say. He's got a book, making the talk show rounds, and not saying the things that he said back in 2008. I'm talking about an endorsement. Why?</s>MARK PRESTON, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, you know, remember, Ashleigh, back just a few weeks before the November election in 2008, Colin Powell made big news when he came out and endorsed Barack Obama for president. Colin Powell, the Republican, you know, and still is, endorsing the Democrat. That was very big news. But today he wasn't so willing to get right behind President Obama. In fact, let's listen to what he said on the "Today" show.</s>COLIN POWELL, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: I always keep my powder dry, as we say in the military. I listen to what the president says and what he's doing, but I also have to listen to the other guy. I've known Mitt Romney for many years, a good man. It's not just a matter of whether you support Obama or Romney. It's who they have coming in with them.</s>PRESTON: Then you have Colin Powell just a few hours ago on the "Today" show saying that he's not ready to make an endorsement for the presidential race. I went back and I listened to the interview he did with "Meet the Press" when he made that endorsement. A couple things struck me at that time. First of all, he said that the Republican Party was going too far to the right at the time and that brought him a lot of concern. He also didn't like the fact that John McCain chose Sarah Palin, who he said wasn't ready for the job. And also at the time, he described President Obama, then Senator Obama as a transformational figure. So now you have to ask yourself, does he no longer think that President Obama is transformational? And is he really looking to see if Mitt Romney can take the Republican Party and keep it more in the center instead of having it go a little bit to the right? It will be interesting to see what Colin Powell does over the next couple months -- Ashleigh.</s>BANFIELD: Right, or, Mark, maybe he's waiting to find out who Mitt Romney is going to choose as his VP candidate before he decides to weigh in on that since it made such reverberations last time.</s>PRESTON: Yes, no doubt. I mean, certainly going to have some kind of role in who he decides to pick.</s>BANFIELD: OK, let's move on to Cory Booker, the now very famous Newark, New Jersey, mayor who some say stepped in it and others say was telling it like it is when he criticized both not only the Obama campaign, but Mitt Romney's campaign for getting -- I'll just throw the word in there -- too dirty. He was not happy about it. I don't know. The dominos seemed to keep falling. Is this thing over? Is it going to go away or are we going to continue to see more ads using bits and pieces of what people say on "Meet the Press"?</s>PRESTON: Well, we're going to certainly continue to see Cory Booker in the news. This is something that we wrote about yesterday, which it's really bad for a candidate when one of his top surrogates goes out and becomes the news of the day. And that's what Cory Booker has been now for a couple days since he went out and criticized really the negative tone of the campaign, not only being directed by the "Super PACs," which is the independent expenditures, but also the candidates themselves. By doing that, the Republicans immediately seized upon that and they said that, look, even Cory Booker says that Mitt Romney's campaign should not be going after the whole of private equity and investment in America. Now we are going to continue to see this. We already saw just an hour ago. We saw the Romney campaign doing another conference call with reporters to try and hammer home this message that President Obama is not good for business and is not good for creating jobs. And then, look, look what happened less than 24 hours ago at the NATO Summit. President Obama is up there trying to talk about international issues and he's being forced to talk about this campaign specifically about Cory Booker's comments. It's not very good for a candidate to have to do that. You know what, Ashleigh, it's not going away anytime soon.</s>BANFIELD: Boy, it feels like aeons ago we were talking about social issues and same-sex marriage, but now it seems to be all about the economy and of course, Bain, and the fallout from Booker. I want to talk about the new poll that's come out that shows there's an absolute split between these two candidates when it comes to who Americans think is more likely to be able to fix the economy. That's a dead heat, folks, 47 percent to 47 percent. President Obama and Mitt Romney coming in dead even. So I guess the question is, is this a philosophical debate now for Americans between, you know, the government intervention and free market capitalism or is it who's campaigning better about those issues?</s>PRESTON: I think it's both. And, look, it's something that has been talked about for the last year or so. We just haven't heard Mitt Romney being able to come above the fray, so to speak. He's been engaged in the Republican primary trying to fight back the attacks on his right from his primary opponents at the same time, fighting back the attacks from his left from President Obama. So what we're seeing now is a whole discussion about how can you turn the economy around. That "Washington Post" poll, which was just out this morning, really hits it home. The fact of the matter is we've known, Ashleigh, all along this is issue number one. The fact of the matter is people are out of work, they're losing their homes, and they want to know how it's going to be turned around. I got to tell you. The most fascinating number that came out of this "Washington Post" poll is that 17 percent of Americans in their poll now said that the economy was either excellent or very good. I have to ask you, who do you think these 17 percent is? You know, who are these people that think we're doing very well right now with our economic conditions?</s>BANFIELD: Always great to talk to you. Just a wealth of knowledge. We have to have coffee sometime.</s>PRESTON: Absolutely.</s>BANFIELD: On me. Mark Preston, nice to see you. Thanks very much. Also want to let you know, if there's breaking political news you'll hear about it first on CNN's "Political Gut Check." You can get the information straight to your inbox every afternoon. Just e-mail mark at gutcheck@cnn.com. He reads all your e-mails and responds, I'm told. Are you having a hard time getting those creative juices flowing? We'll talk with "The New York Times" best-selling author whose new book aims to put the power of creativity right into your hands.</s>POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM CORRESPONDENT: Good to see you. Well, here on the "Help Desk" today, we are talking about retirement planning that matters for people at any age. With me some great experts, Ryan Mack is president of Optimum Capital Management, Stacey Francis is a financial adviser and president of Francis Financial. We've got an e-mail from Dennis in Virginia. He's 64 years old. He'll retire in two years. He said my wife and I have around $1.3 million in savings. How should we divide the money in terms of stocks, bonds, et cetera so obviously a little more risk averse at that age.</s>STACY FRANCIS, FINANCIAL ADVISER: A little bit more risk averse and often it will start off with a 60-40 allocation, 60 percent stocks, 40 percent bonds, and then it deviates based on your goals, risk tolerance and when you need the money. They may not need to touch the money immediately. If they need the money immediately then we want to take a year's worth of their living expenses they'll pull from their portfolio. Keep it in a high interest savings account and take the rest for the longer-term savings and diversify.</s>HARLOW: What do you think the best time, Ryan, to start planning? Really when you get your first job.</s>RYAN MACK, PRESIDENT, OPTIMUM CAPITAL MANAGEMENT: Right out of college. Everybody goes through different stages of live. You have your accumulation phase, conservation phase and distribution phase. Accumulation, you're starting your job. Learn and read as much as possible. Get that 401 k. Read the benefits package. You'd be surprised how few people know what is in their funds. Make sure you're having a good analysis of your financial adviser if you choose to have one.</s>HARLOW: Absolutely. There's so much free online as well. Thanks, guys. If you have a question, send us an e-mail anytime to CNN "Help Desk" at cnn.com. Back to you.