>> welcome to al jazeera america. i'm richelle carey. here are the stories we're following for you. >> cyclone phailin makes landfall in india. it's nearly twice the size of super storm sandy. no deal, no negotiations with the white house. that's the word from house republicans this morning on the government shutdown. and round three of security talks in afghanistan. at issue: how many u.s. troops will stay after next year.

>> deal or no deal, congress is working on doing deals aimed at ending the government shutdown and averting default. speaker john boehner has reportedly stopped talking to the white house. >> reporter: on the house side it's over for the day. so we're going to come back to the house in a minute. we have more on the senate. we have comments from harry reid, the majority leader, saying the negotiations in the house on the issue of raising the debt ceilings, i'm talking about raising the debt ceiling. harry reid said the negotiations on that front are over. he said the republicans were talking to the president, but that has now stopped, and so basically it's all eyes on the senate. it's all down to the senate. the republican caucus in the

house seem to acknowledge these comments and they also, according to unnamed sources, you can guess who they are, all the usual candidates, basically there are no negotiations going on and the republicans in the senate should stand firm on their principles. of course, it's not that they want to see the debt ceiling not raised or that there is a potentially economic crisis coming. but they have their principle. they don't want to see more government spending. in the senate there is a vote taking place right now on raising the debt ceiling. they need 60 votes, and here is dick durban, the democrat from illinois who doesn't any a single republican is going to join the democrats. >> today at noon on the floor of the united states senate there is going to be a vote on this major as to whether or not we proceed with the debate over

paying our bills. sadly we're told not a single republican senator will join us in just allowing the debate on paying our bills. >> so dick durbin saying not a single republican is going to join the debate, let alone the vote, and harry reid saying the same thing earlier. >> who is all this for? who is this theater, this posturing for? >> reporter: well, there was a lot of posturing on the house side, an incredible amount of posturing because what happened was the democrats who are in the majority of the house, as you know, have limited amount of tools in their toolbox if they want to agitate on an issue like this. they brought two of them out earlier today. the first one calling the presiding speaker for an unanimous vote on a clean continuing resolution. the way they did this was to approach the presiding speaker one by one only to be rejected

one by one by the presiding speaker on the grounds that they didn't have appropriate clearance. we would like you to have a look at this. >> this is rep nydia velasquez. >> to end this republican government shoutdown. >> that request cannot be entertained as inappropriate clearance. >> reporter: that went on and on in the house this morning. that was one tool. the other was the discharge petition where you basically move to reopen the government and lift the debt ceiling but without going through committee, and not necessarily without any leadership consent. now that is rarely used. it rarely workers. it was used back in 1986 and again in 2002, but democrats

tried it and so far failed. >> unbelievable. two weeks of a government shutdown. unbelievable. john terrett stay close. as a way to recoupe the enormous loss of revenue some states reopening the state parks on the state's dime which is really on the taxpayer dime. based on an agreement with the house states are laying out cash to pay for the daily cost of running the parks. we have more with the mayor, mayoofestes park in colorado. it's a pretty day. the kind of day that someone would want to go to a national park. >> boy, it is a beautiful day, we're northwest of denver and right here on the edge of the rocky mountains. right on the edge of rocky

mountain national park, but that has been closed down to everyone. this town has really been hit with an one-two punch. we have devastating flooding and that shut off some of the main roads coming in to the parks. it's so important to get the park open today and get trail ridge road open so tourists can come into this park and spend some money. we have the mayor of he is keys park. we just wanted to ask you a quick question of how important this has to be for the people especially the business here in your town today. >> this is incredibly important us to because a month ago this area was under two to four feet of water. the businesses were closed down. they got their businesses closed up, water reseated, and it turned out that the main street was in great shape, the river walk, but then we got a sucker-punch when the federal government shut down the national park.

the national park gets 3 million visitors a year, and most of them come through estes park. so it's vital to our businesses. this is one of their critical times for the town that's when the local businesses generally make their money. it's a beautiful time because of the elk and the color, the fall colors in the mountains, as you can see, are spectacular. >> that's a good way to describe it, a sucker punk, the one, two punch. some people faced closure of their businesses. >> that's true. some of the businesses closed up for the wintertime and said they were out of here. but other businesses, they rely on the tourists so they had to let help go, and they are running on a shoestring. the news of the opening of the park is fabulous news and we're looking forward to a lot of folks coming into town.

>> good news for everyone in estes park. >> great news for estes park. >> mayor of estes park. the state of colorado will be spending 40,000 a day, richelle, to get the park opened once again pay for the works, and pay for the plowing of that rode. it goes 10,000, 11,000 feet so there is a lot of snow right now. the park is set to open at noontime today. >> i'm sure there will be crowds, quite a beautiful picture behind you. thank you so much in estes park. the monday store storm known as phailin is bearing down on india's coast. it is about to make landfall over the area where 42,000 people live and hundreds of thousand was people have been taken to government shelters. tourists are having a hard time to get out of the region because the flights are canceled. for the next 18 hours is the region's highest risk.

phailin is the size of france, four times the size of hurricane katrina. what is going on right now? >> reporter: phailin is still making landfall as we speak, and it's expected to take up a wards of an hour. yesterday when the storm was at its peek we saw well-defined eye here. but as the storm weakens we'll start to lose the imagery so we're seeing the rain and wind making its way onshore. so all the way into sunday evening we'll still feel those high winds, destructive website, and a lot of rainfall. some areas have already seen several inches of rain. and as the storm continues to move inland we'll see it weakening some. it is a severe system so we're talking about upwards of two feet of rain. it is going to be a complete mess in some locations, and even catastrophic damage is expected with this as it continues to move in. our wind speeds have topped 160

mph. at one time it was a category 5. as it continues to move inland we will see weakening over the next 24 hours. that means that those winds will only die down to less than a 120 miles per hour as we get into the early part of the day on saturday. weakening is expected. that is good news as it continues to move further inland. elsewhere we're watching a typhoon make its way west of the philippines now making its way towards vietnam. as this system continues to move off to the west we'll see the conditions go down hill around vietnam. and at home we're looking at a cold front stretching from the southern plains. we have rain and storms that we'll track throughout the day. >> for more on phailin, we're live from the coast to the south side center of the storm. tell us where you are right now.

>> well, the area that i'm in now, the storm has shifted. that we're now in the center of the storm itself. it's shifting south wards a few miles since we last spoke. now what we're find something about lots of rainfall down around here. the winds are getting quite intense. there is no electricity at all in this area. we've been running a generating which is the only reason we've been able to broadcast to you. the storm is becoming much more serious than people thought. people have had a more casual attitude about it before but now that it's hitting landfall it's getting people's attention that this might be quite big. >> is that because they were getting mixed messages from officials there about what to expect from the storm? >> well, as our meteorologist was just saying and in other countries this is a

serious--this is a serious cyclone and this did have devastating potential. but the indian meteorological department was on the defense saying it was weaker than people were saying. they said they weren't undereth mating iunderestimating it, butt countries like the u.s. are overestimating it, and we should keep that in mind. >> reporter: is it easy from where you are now to see people are evacuating? >> people have evacuated to shelters, some inland. but one shelter we went to just a few hours ago was right next to the coast, and the people had been evacuated to a shelter. it was right next to the coast. it was a two-story stone school and could accommodate 200 people at best. if the storm hits that area

people there will be in serious trouble. it's looking like what the government said on paper is happening and what is happening on the ground is in stark contrast. >> it will be several hours before we know how much damage is done. the bay of bengal the location of the cyclone phailin, and 1999 was india's most destructive storm in decades. 10,000 people had died. and $4.5 billion in damage. secretary of state john kerry and hamid karzai have extended their talks in kabul. the afghani president wants guarantees against further military intervention by the u.s. we're joined now in kabul.

these talks have gone on for some time. that could be a good sign that they're making progress or it could be that they're not getting anywhere. tell what's the sticking points are. >> reporter: well, you know, we think they're making progress. we heard from secretary kerry between meetings saying that things were good, and from the president spokes people saying that progress is being made, and they're coming very close. there are a couple of sticking points that we know when secretary kerry arrived yesterday were holding up this agreement. negotiations have been going on for 11 months. one sticking point was whether u.s. forces would be allowed to carry out operations on their own inside afghanistan after 2014. that's when the n.a.t.o. mission ends and that's what this agreement is all about. president karzai is opposed to operating on afghan soil. he said it's a violation of a began sovereignty.

and the united states has balked as president karzai's request that the u.s. guarantee security in the event it has problems with its neighbors. that puts the u.s. in delicate situation with pakistan. pakistan and afghanistan have had a difficult relationship. they've exchanged words, bombs across the board, and the united states does not want to get involved in that relationship. those are the two main sticking points. >> such a defecate balance in that part of the world. what specifically is on the line for hamid karzai in his country? >> reporter: well, right now president karzai is looking at his legacy. by constitutional mandate he has to step down in april. that's when new presidential elections will be held. even if president karzai and secretary kerry do hammer out

the final details of this security deal, president karzai has said he's calling a national assembly of leaders from all over the country in the next few weeks. probably in the beginning of november to ratify such an agreement so that he will have the backing of the afghan people so he can say, look, i made this agreement with the backing of the afghan people. so that's what we're looking at in the next couple of weeks if an agreement is agreed upon tonight. it still will depend on the approval of the afghan people. >> reporting live there from kabul, afghanistan. thank you so much. shake up at the pentagon coming up, the air force take action against the two-star general in charge of america's nuclear missiles. news stories? >> they share it on the stream. >> social media isn't an after-thought, it drives discussion across america. >> al jazeera america's social

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>> more than 200 survivors have been airlifted to the southern island the italian island of lampedusa has a boat of hundreds

of migrants capsized near malta. malta. the journey across the medicine tormediterranean is treacherous. a high ranking u.s. air force member has been fired. >> reporter: it was an abrupt announcement made late on friday at the pentagon. in an audio only press conference it announced u.s. major general michael kerry has been relieved of his command as a result of loss of trust and confidence in his ability. he was in charge of making sure 450 long-range missiles remained

operational and secure. but an investigation concluded kerry showed a lapse in you judgment while on a temporary assignment. >> it is not related to operational readiness nor to sexual misconduct. it is not related to operational readiness nor is it related to sexual misconduct. >> reporter: he was in charge of almost 10,000 people at three military bases. >> when you're dealing with nuclear weapons there is no room for air. if one goes off or gets into the wrong hands the consequences are devastating. you have to really hold these people to the highest of standards. >> reporter: the statement on kerry's firing lieutenant general james kowalski said. >> it's the second time in a

week in a a senior u.s. commander jovaing the nation's nuclear weapons has been stripped of his command. on weapons the u.s. navy announced that an advice admiral had been reassigned due t to allegations of illegal gambling. >> reporter: and they insist the u.s. arsenal has never been compromised. >> muslims make the annual pilgrimage, the renovation of the holy city of mecca. that's coming up.

>> in washington there is still no end to the shutdown or to raise the debt ceiling. no end in site. it doesn't appear that they're making progress. and senator john kerry and

afghan president hamid karzai have extended their talks in kabul. the two are trying to come to an agreement regarding troops remaining in afghan next year. the storpeople are at risk e storm phailin makes landfall. it is the size of france. that's four times the size of katrina. >> meteorologist: and i am continuing to track phailin as it continues to make landfall, strong winds in excess of 130 mph. it is a category 4 hurricane. we'll continue to see those

strong winds as well as heavy rainfall over the next 24 hours. now, as you can see here it is moving into a very highly populated area, at least 40 million people. you think of the state of california. that's the entire population of that entire state. so we will continue to watch over the next 24 hours rain and wind and storm serge will cause flooding. the good news with this is that it will continue to weaken. early on sunday morning we'll see that system coming down to a tropical storm status. it will continue to weaken because it will have that land to interact with. but unfortunately it's very massive and we'll continue to see the conditions going down hill over the next 24 hours. the atlantic has been fairly quiet. we still have a lot of season left to go officially the season doesn't end here in the atlanta until november 30s. now there is an area of concern. we'll be watching over the next

few days as a medium chance of this possibly developing into a tropical storm over the next 48 hours. we'll continue to watch it. right now it's not looking all that impressive: right now closer to home things are fairly quiet as far as the tropics are concerned. >> 3 million people have gathered in a saudi arabian city mecca for the pilgrimage as people come together. some are upset with upgrades that have been made to the holy site. many wonder if style is getting in the way of sanctity. >> reporter: walking to the holy mosque, the most secret site in had islam, and this is what you see from above. the skyline of the hottest city of mecca is filled with grains. the multi million dollar

development project is underway. saudi officials say mecca would have state of the art infrastructure and one of the best transport systems in the world. this 3-d an mace shows how mecca would look like in 2020. tall buildings, shopping malls and travel rail. it would ease overcrowding during peak seasons. it is out of necessity to accommodate the growing number of pill grams but many are worried sky scrapers and sprawling shopper centers might be at the expense of the city's identity and traditional architecture. they all agree mecca with modernize but should still retain it's authenticity.

>> unfortunately, the whole area has been invaded by tall buildings. i understand the need to build places for pilgrims but one cannot bulldoze monuments. >> the whole terrain has been changed. the mountains are actually being leveled. and that's sad. one of the--these are the same mountains that the prophet mohammed used to herd goats on, which was his training for prophet hood. >> reporter: the mayor of mecca, he shows me the oldest picture of the city. it was taken 130 years ago. all the buildings neighboring the area has been knocked done since. >> people are seeing huge infrastructure projects and they're asking questions. they have to understand that we're laying down the foundations, building roads, modernizing electricity and water pipelines, but at the same

time we're committed to preserve the cultural and spiritual identify of mecca preserving mecca will continue to be a huge challenge. this building was built where a fortress once stood. it might be demolished in future expansions as it is too close to the holy mosque. >> the pilgrimage comes as there is continued unrest in the middle east. and protests raising political signs will be dealt with harshly. google wants to be more like facebook. looking to make money by selling user tat tax names, photos, product reviews. and in fact, would be used in facebook. the change goes into affect next month. i'm richelle carey. "the stream" is next. do keep it here. thank you for your time.