for adults. >> on that rate, thank you for a great time. thank you for all of our guests. see you online. >> hello, and welcome to aljazeera america. i'm tony harris in new york city, studying the agenda from income equality to same-sex marriage, to the tomorrow's state of the union speech. leaky phone apps reports that spy agencies are accessing spy data. popular smart phone apps like angry birds. this the northeast, bracing for windchills of 40 below.

unrest in the ukraine, the parliament is striking down laws that have caused recent violent protests. and a school with no walls. forget recess. some seattle area kindergartners are spending their entire school day learning in the great outdoors. and we begin tonight with the american agenda. tomorrow night, president obama will be outlining his hopes and expectations for the year ahead. his opponents will be doing the same. according to the poll, the president's approval numbers are up from november, but his lowest approval rating ever going into a state of the union address. couple that with defiant house republicans, and president obama

can expect an uphill battle. mike mccarren is with us, and what do we know tonight about what the president will be saying tomorrow. >> the window is closing and this could be the president's last best chance to really set the agenda, and the fact of the matter is, he walks into the house chamber tomorrow a lame duck. everything from last year's state of the union has been lost and squandered in the healthcare.gov fiasco. when they attempted to roll out the website. he recovered somewhat. but he's not going to be running for re-election, he has run his last campaign, but he needs democrats behind him to enact what he wants to enact. the top of those is immigration. the democrats are concerned themself busy re-election, and

the republicans need six seats, and the republicans are defending a lot of seats won by mitt romney. if the democrats start to see a weak president, they get shaky and don't stand behind him. and the president gets very little done. it's going to be income despairing, and he's going to ask for a an extension of the unemployment benefits. but the top ticket items, there will be a laundry list, and we expect it to be more dramatic than past speeches. >> and after the speech, the president will hit the road? >> he will hit the road. he's going to out for two days, it's the state of the union speech, and he's going to go out to suburban maryland to a costco wednesday morning, and then it's to pittsburgh, pennsylvania for a midday event this, and then off to milwaukee, wisconsin. and he'll have an event there

thursday morning in nashville, tennessee, before heading back here to the white house. >> i understand that the white house is going to announce who will attend tomorrow's speech with the first lady. >> this is a tradition that was begun by ronald reagan, as you're well aware. the air florida crash here in the 1980s into the potomac river, and this gentleman jumping into the frigid waters to help save people. president will have a nod to some of the heroes of those we have seen in the past year. beginning with the boston marathon, this is the pair, an indelible image, the gentleman in the white cowboy hat running to help jeff bauman, who will be with him, and gary bird, he was in the oklahoma tornado last

year, and jason collins, the first openly gay athlete in any major professional sport in this country. he'll be a guest of the first lady. >> mike mckara at the white house tonight. and we'll bring you special coverage of the state of the union here. our expanded message from the president begins at 9:00 eastern time. on the eve of the president's speech, more spy scandal revelations. tonight, new reports on how they're able to collect information from smart phones. leaky apps, like angry birds, are being exploited by the nsa. that's according to edward snowden. let's go live to jake ward, of

as soon as and technology, and good to see you again. exactly what kind of information are spy agencies reportedly getting? >> tony, it's becoming increasingly fear that in order to avoid the nsa, you have to live in a forest and never touch your phone. to collect a certain amount of date a. anything you give them turn ys into a leaky app. it's collecting photos, and names of your contacts. when you put the app, it's putting in data. >> what are these apps that we're talking about. we mentioned google maps. are those the kinds of maps that we're talking about? >> google maps is definitely mentioned specifically in these documents. in interstate, we talked about how the british counterpart is able to scoop up all kinds of

information from google maps, because it's an incredibly precise location system. it can tell within a couple of feet where you're standing in the world. there are apps not mentioned in the documents, bah they're the kind of things that the nsa would love to peek in on. to see people in your geographic region with interests on facebook. so anything that you can think of, the nsa is trying to get in there and scoop out of those apps. >> in geneva, switzerland, the syria peace talks have had a roadblock. the opposition wants president bashar al-assad to hand over power. look at this, we caught up with president assad's top adviser. >> there are many people who

don't want him as the leader now. >> i accept that the syrian people should go to the ballot box and vote for whoever they want to vote for. >> there's a problem with that. you talk about the ballot box, no independent observer was declared the elections free and fair for 40 years. >> in gaza, the western world refused to acknowledge the election. it's not about fairness. it's about -- that's what it's all about. >> we're talking about syria right now. why doesn't president assad, for the good of his nation and the good of his people, step aside and let someone else take power. >> excuse me, you know what is good for the nation and the people know, we're 10,000 years old and we know what's good for us. let the syrian people decide what's good for them. >> okay, aljazeera's nick

schiffrin is there, and that change teaches you everything that you need to know about the assad position. how did someone describe to you the difference between the two sides in these talks? >> a chasm, tony. these two sides are nowhere near each other. they're fighting to the death in syria. this is one of the world's worst humanitarian disasters. we need to remember them, which room they're in. 130,000 dead. and 9 million refugees. you come here and both sides are absolutely entrenched. they're dug in, and absolutely unwilling to think of the other one as legitimate or even willing to negotiate at all. so what the u.n. has tried to do is talk on two different paths. one on political transition. one on what james was pushing the assad adviser on. and the governments without

assad that would have all power in syria to move syria forward. on the other side, humanitarian access, trying to alleviate the suffering of all of those people. the people have had no food, no water, no medicine for eight months. so the government is saying, we heard from the spokesman in the syrian national coalition, and he said that in four days, there is been no sign that the government is willing to alleviate or even talk about the transition. >> listen to this. >> what the assad regime would like it to have political solution. really, you're not serious about any critical solution, you are locked on the political solution that's very bloody and destructive. >> tony, that gives you the sense, we heard from the syrian

government side and the opposition, and these guys are nowhere near each other. there's no sign that any talks have crete gains right now want. >> and we heard the adviser talk about the ballot box, the idea of free and fair elections. >> what the coalition and the u.s. will say, in 40 years, you've had an assad on the ballot box who has never gotten less than 90% of the vote. and that's not a free and fair election. what russia will say and the syrians say, look, the syrian people know what they want and they should be given the access and the ability to vote for who they want. and in reality, that's not what happens in these elections. the u.s. is trying to point out behind the scenes and publicly, there are members of the government who don't support

assad. they're slightly thinking about, okay, assad might not make it, and how can i find an alternative? how can i find an out from the assad family? it's very difficult. anyone who sticks their neck out, the neck is chopped off. so the u.s. is trying to deal with a coalition, and if it can be internationally ready, the u.s. can bring in russia and the international community, and people inside of syria that there might be an at tev. until that exists, and until they steal from all sides, russia, iran and the u.s., there's no sign that he will give up the violence and unfortunately, that means that the violence will continue. >> nick schiffrin for us in geneva, switzerland. thank you. let's look at the situation with

our homes. >> more about homes. it was the first city to face a military crackdown after the protest in syria three years ago, and let's look at satellite minimalminimals. you can see the heavy traffic. and there were 20,000 people living in the city. and once the civil war broke out, those cars were replaced by tanks, and this is what it looks like now. the pictures show the town demolished, and it's impossible to show how many people are actually left living there. a syrian american who was born and raised in hom, she founded a relief organization, with humanitarian relief on the ground, she joins us from washington, and we so appreciate your time. let's talk about the talks in geneva going on sense this weekend. and there was a big breakdown today just over the issue of

getting humanitarian to relieve into the city of hom. did it ever seem like an option to you that the women and girls would leave and the men would stay? >> absolutely not. you're talking about, these are sisters, wives, family members of the men that the government was asking them to write down, and where are these women and children going to go? even if they leave the area, and even if they were to agree to write down the names of their male relatives, where are they going to go without a breadwinner? it was completely unrealistic from the start. >> do you see is it as a stall tactic? >> i think that most syrians believe it's a stall tactic on behalf of the syrian government. >> if you thought that the talks were going to end and bring peace to syria, but short of

that, is there anything that you would see as a success coming out of these talks? >> well, at this point, unfortunately not yet. i don't think syrians expected any peaceful resolution to the conflict coming out of geneva, but the most optimistic people expected at least some confidence building measures on behalf of the government and the opposition to take steps to look forward in the future. that's the most optimistic syrian will tell you that that's the most they expected. but unfortunately, what they really wanted was some humanitarian relief. allowing the red cross and allowing medical relief. there were 2,000 people in need of amputations alone in the past year that had to be operated on without anesthesia, for example, and as far as the

previous -- yes, absolutely, eating grass. you have very many instances of tuberculosis, and you have many folks who said that they have not been able to have access to food for months. my own aunt still lives in hom, and she said, we have not seen bread for months. they don't have access to fuel or to diesel or anything that can help them to heat their homes. this is been one of the coldest winters, not just in the united states, but one of the first places that saw snow in 100 years. it was a very cold winter. and they had nothing to heat themselves with. >> this is extremely personal for you. you found out that your childhood home no longer exists. >> yes, it was bombed with tanks and many of our relative's homes nearby, their homes were shelled as well. >> you have an important story to tell and an important work that you're trying to do.

we appreciate your time. syrian relief and development. >> thank you. >> absolutely. >> egypt's military council said it has cleared the way for the army chief sisi to run for president. he ran the coup. and since morsy was removed, sisi has not announced his cabinet, but he is expected to win. egypt's presidential elections will be held in late april. >> demonstrators in the ukraine have clashed with the police today, trying to destroy a government building. protesters have demanded a change in the country's government. they met with

president yanokovych for another round of talks. the meeting took three hours, and it ended with the president scrapping the controversial laws set in place this month. spoke to the reporters after the meeting. >> reporter: the negotiations are long and difficult, and i would like to point out a couple of key issues that are being discussed. and i think that tomorrow we'll have a chance to do that in detail. they are releasing the arrested, offering amnesty to the arrested and this issue was reviewed and the other thing, the cancellation of the anti-protest allows adopted into the constitution. >> jennifer glass has been covering this from kiev, and jennifer, let's be clear here. what exactly has president yanokovych agreed to, and once we set that out, it's clear the

parliament has to have its say in all of this, correct? >> >> reporter: that went, tony. the president has said that he will scrap the very very unpopular protest laws that were passed last week. the parliament will actually do that in an emergency session tomorrow. it's unclear if it will be scrapped altogether, or if pieces of the law will be kept. the justice minister said that parts of the law that the opposition didn't find objectionable could be passed into allow immediately. so we're looking for this emergency session of parliament tomorrow morning to see exactly what that concession will be, if the entire law is scrapped altogether. because that's just one of the many concessions that the opposition leaders wanted. but tony, it's certainly a big stem forward. certainly nothing that we would have expected a week ago when

president yanokovych was refusing to meet with the opposition. >> what impact could this have on the unrest there? >> >> reporter: well, we know that there has been a lot of -- in addition to the internal pressure on the president from the protesters spreading around the country, there has been a lot of external influence as well. we know that today the president got a call from the u.n., and he also got a call from vice president biden. and he urged yanokovych not to declare a state of emergency and to repeal the laws that restrict freedom of speech and freedom of movement. in large, a representative arrived in kiev tonight. and he'll be talking between the two sides. the opposition welcomed him on friday.

and they said they need a good moderator and good negotiator to help deal with president yanokovych. the problem is lack of trust, so when the opposition leaders came out of their marathon meeting with the president on saturday, they said do we trust him? no, we do not. he has promised us things before, and he failed to griff them. and everybody is watching to see if president yanokovych gives them what they want. the extraordinary parliament meeting on tuesday morning. >> local time there. just after 3:20 in the morning. and you can see the streets behind jennifer are fairly quiet for a change in ki effect. kiev. back in this country, the big chill has returned to the midwest. it's dangerously cold in some states, and there are subzero reads in minneapolis. it could feel like -43 this

evening, and chicago could be spending the next 48 hours below 0. this latest arctic blast is moving south to traditionally warmer states like texas with snow and ice. and the eastern carolinas, the severe weather will likely cause delays and power outages. rebecca stevens is here, and we're wondering, how long does this round of cold weather last. >> the arctic air, tony, is still working its way to the southeast. and the temperatures in florida still on the mild side. but you head up to georgia and birmingham, it has already dropped to 33. colder than that in memphis, where it feels like it's only 4. so we have windchill factors close to 0 in parts of the southern states. if you look at the temperatures, dropping to 4°. and if you look at the windchills, they will be way below 0. overnight through the day tomorrow, not just for

tennessee, but northern florida, you can see the dark blue of a winter storm warning along with an ice storm warning that's impacting parts of the south. right in the georgia coast up to south carolina. dangerous ice is going to be going on for the southeast. and the temperatures are going to be cool enough to keep the snow coming down. the heaviest amounts from augusta to the northeast. >> thank you. bitcoin, sold on the black market

>> 22 deaths in two weeks in pennsylvania. they are blaming heroin. it's found in bags with the words theraflu, bud ice and income tax. they have been found all over counties in pittsburgh. and the health officials are concerned that this lethal drug is spreading to other areas. >> . >> the cofounder of bitcoin was arrested early this morning. he and an accomplice were charged with money laundering. >> bitcoins can be sent through the internet. >> bitcoin may be a new form of currency, but the charges against a ceo in one company are quite old-fashioned, money laundering. the u.s. prosecutors arrested charlie schramm, prior to his

charge. and the other, the two conspired to sell over $1 million in bitcoins to the users of the silk road, since shut down. it was an underground website, which allowed users to buy and sell illegal drugs anonymously, making it difficult to track them. the u.s. attorney said that those who break the law can't hide behind their computers. >> they don't need to resort to old-fashioned law breaking, and when they're used to launder and fuel critical activity, we have no choice but to act. >> in october, he was arrested on charges of drug dealing, money laundry and computer hack and go for higher. it's value dropped on the global market. some investors have faith in this new currency, but monday's

arrest is another sign of growing concern. that the privacy bitcoin offers makes it a haven for those who want to break the law. >> it could be one of the most important moments of the obama administration. >> the president of the united states. >> . >> in winchester, virginia. coming up,

>> and welcome back everyone, to aljazeera america. i'm tony harris in new york city, and let's get a quick update on the headlines. >> your smart phone, tony, not as secure as you think. listen to this, according to documents from former nsa contractor, edward snowden, u.s.

spy agencies can tap into your personal data stored in your cellphone. intelligence agents are taking it from things like games and social networking apps and using it for their own purposes. the syrian peace talks hit a roadblock. the opposition wants to know how president al ash-ha ash-har qurl hand over the power. all the way to the carolinas, severe weather will likely cause widespread travel delays. and power outages. >> it's an old song at this point, and warn out by t. >> a little dangerous. >> yeah, it is dangerous. and as we have been saying, president obama is just a day away from giving his fifth state of the union address and income and the economy are at the top

of his agenda. listen closely. >> reporter: a historic civil war battlefield town of winchester, virginia, has a population of roughly 25,000. and right now, many of its people are struggling, due to the fallout of the stagnant u.s. economy. in a winchester tavern, frustration is evident. >> people are leaving. >> barbara craig is her husband both have jobs, but they worry about their children's prospects. now in college, but just coming out of college, it's difficult as young adults. with the economy the way it is, it's even tougher on them. >> and you're really worried about that? >> i'm extremely worried about that. >> with good reason. many plants here in winchester used to offer young people

opportunity. and in recent years, many have closed down, taking hundreds of jobs with them. when it comes to unemployment, winchester has been hit hard. 20 years ago, 10% of the jobs in this town came from manufacturing, and today it's less than half that. >> the president of the united states. >> that's why so many here like in other parts of the united states will be looking for president obama for answers. they're hoping for a plan to get them back to work. despite the bleak numbers, some are thriving. >> the wealthy are doing quite well. >> the free trade agreement, associate planning for the future, they have largely favored america's rich at the expense of middle class jobs. >> some of these trade agreements, and these fast track agreements that basically take

jobs abroad. they have reached the point where there's a divisiveness in wealth. that divides us. we need to bridge that some way. >> it's not clear if president obama's state of the union will contain a detailed job plan some in winchester are looking for. with the sputter u.s. economy, the patience of many is wearing thin, as is the hope that they see in america. aljazeera, winchester, virginia. >> and tomorrow's state of the union speech can be seen here on aljazeera america. it's 3:pacific time. and you can watch us live at 9:00 eastern time. the issue of tenure for teachers has gone on trial in california. and the students are leading the charge on this. >> okay, so today was day one of the trial challenging the rule

that essentially makes it harder to fire teachers who have been in the school for a number of years. tenure is supposed to protect educators from frivolous complaints. but they say this is not fair to the students. kiko, tell us more about the lawsuit and today's testimony. >> well, rochelle. this is a case that could have broad implications nationally and change the way this teachers are evaluated across the board. the students say that they have a constitutional right to quality education, and the laws with teno tenure and seniority t allow for that. they argue that the school system gives too much protection to ineffective teachers, making it all but impossible to fire them. of the 25,000 teachers, less

than 10 are dismissed every year. the new teachers are often the most effective. one of the students today talked about her frustrations in the classroom and says it has not always been the case. >> unfortunately, i've also had a totally different experience with a teacher. instead of learning our subject, we sat in class coloring and watching youtube videos. it was extremely frustrating showing up to class every day thing to learn and a teacher who didn't want to teach. it wasn't right. >> the teachers union said there are processes in place to fire ineffective teachers, and they claim that the lawsuit does nothing and that it has absolutely no merritt. >> this is about creating an atmosphere, and fillfying teachers. part of a national agenda that makes public sector teachers as the enemy and i think that's bogus.

>> they said that they want to get rid of ineffective teachers. now, with this movement, and youia ramirez joins us live from philadelphia, the founder of the foundation for parent empowerment, an education reform. and thank you for your time, what fact do you think teacher tenure has on education. >> well, the way it is in california, it has

education but it would be wrong to say that it's the school's fault. that's a victim notion. and this lawsuit, pure and simple, is about making sure that we have good teachers, great teachers, and the avenue and the laws in place to ensure that we get them. >> gloria ram era with the foundation for parent

empowerment, thank you for your time tonight. >> all right, rochelle, thank you, and let's head to washington d.c. and joie chen is standing by to tell us what's coming up on america tonight at the top of the hour. >> reporter: good evening, tony, tonight on our program, we concentrate once again on the fight for chicago. the hometown of president obama on the eve of his state of the union address. and we'll recall a tragic story, a boy attending the presidential inauguration and gunned down in chicago a week later. did the historians fire real change? we'll get the view from her and her neighborhood. >> i think it should be all about violence prevention. and jobs. >> and jobs. >> i'm pretty sure that they wouldn't be selling stuff on the corner if they had a 9:00 to

5:00 job. >> see what difference it makes with christoph. and we'll have a look back at the report card of the president's promises for a better tomorrow. those stories coming up at the top of the hour on "america tonight," tony. >> for most kindergartners, recess is the only chance to go outside, but a school district in wash state is changing that. the officials are experimenting with a popular european program where the entire school day is spent outdoors. more from seattle. >> reporter: deep in the woods on an island just outside of seattle, it's the start of a new day at the cedar song nature school. where mother nature sets the curriculum. >> the kids are outdoors, 100% of the time, no matter what the season. >> there's no such thing as a snow day here.

the students work this is our compost toilet. and we have a designated place where they're allowed to pee outdoors. >> seven years, they started the first united states school of the forest on five acres of land. a popular european program founded in germany. the motto, kids can't bounce off the walls if there are no walls. >> most children naturally gravitate to wanting to play outdoors and get muddy and messy is can play in a hands-on way. >> no gadgets here. instead, the kids use sticks, mud, trees, bugs and plants to learn about the world around them. it's a chance, kinney says, for children to power down from our technology obsessed world the.

>> what's missing from their life is free play. >> there are no text books or teaching of abcs here. which begs the question. are these kids on par with other students once they enter traditional schools? she said absolutely. >> before kindergarten, they retain their desire to learn. >> there have been no impact studies, but it's catching on. in the last five years, a handful of similar schools around the country have also opened. >> for me, it's a perfect fit. they don't have a lot of curriculum based things, it's just exploration based. >> this year, kinney has been tracking her former student's success. she said during the first few years of life, nature offers a better lesson than a textbook ever coo. >> pretty cool, huh? and so the president obama is a

lot more than just football. many of you will be focused on the commercials, but just how effective are those multimillion-dollar ads? mark morgan joins us with that side of the story. >> i remember one last year. was it last year with the dog, with the tennis shoes, and it moonwalked? >> i'm playing along. >> i'm telling you, it was a good commercial. and we all obviously have seen commercials in the super bowl, and they are often talked about more the next day than the game itself. and companies try to get exposure from the big game. remember this spot last year, go daddy presented this commercial. with the kind of attractive woman. remember this dude? go daddy spent 7 and a half millions on two commercials, and this one and another aired during the super bowl. this is allocated and go daddy only made half a million dollars

off of new consumers. so 7 and a half in, and only half a mill out. so the new studies back that up, only one in five super bowl ads actually sells products. i'm joined by al, and he's a ceo of optimist. so you have an advertising background and what's surprising about this study that shows that only one in five commercials makes it happen? >> go daddy has sales of $1.3 billion. so spending $7 million for a commercial is a small amount of money for them. what surprises me good the study is that it really folks on strictly from the commercials on the super bowl on the day of the super bowl. when most of the larger marketers really think about that commercial as part of an overall strategy that goes on before the super bowl and well through the rest of the year. so the top marketers see it as a key point of their integrated

strategy but they don't put as much emphasis on that one commercial. >> only one in five commercials really delivers, and the cost of these commercials is running upwards of $4 million. and that's an increase from last year. why advertise with the super bowl at all. >> mark, the audience for the super bowl is 110 million viewers, and there's no other event where 110 million viewers come together at the same time for the demographic for the advertisers, the soda companies, and the beer companies are all looking to reach that audience, and also, this is one of those events where people are actually preconditioned to watch commercials. so i know in the places where i watch the game, when the commercials come on, the entire room freezes. so there's an incredible amount of engage. possible on these ads that make them very very relevant to the

audience. >> thank you, we appreciate it. and enjoy super bowl week. >> thank you. >> all right, so there you have it again. everybody is going to be watching the commercials. >> that was a wonderful commercial with the super model. i can't shake that. well done. appreciate that. thank you. and parts of the country, bundling up tonight. windchill conditions and bundling up, and the extreme temperatures force you to stay indoors and stay at home. but that's not an option for everybody. >> for essential services like fighting fire, there are no days off. just an added challenge. across the country, scenes like this one in new jersey, show how much more difficult it is to douse blazes with criminal freezing water. a day after a fire ripped through a restaurant on chicago's north side, the structure is literally frozen.

>> it can be challenging in these extreme cold frigid temperatures. >> barry list, with the fire department in chicago, without heaters or antifreeze, the biggest concern is the use of water. >> probably the most critical element when we're faced with this kind of weather, the cold temperatures, and the water quickly freezes. when you're using water as an extinguishing agent, it's important to keep it moving. >> there are pumps turning the water to keep it from freezing. fighting fire in extreme temperatures has become a multiagency effort. to bring in salt and traffic. >> the fact that the structure is getting an enormous amount of water and ultimately will freeze, that we can't do anything about. but what we can do is make the scene safe for our operation. >> as for the gear, it's the

same, the bunker pants and the jacket and the earflaps, and nomad hood to protect them from the fire. >> the equipment we give them is the safety gear that the firefighters wear, is the same whether it's today, 15 below 0 or 110° fahrenheit in a heatwave. >> it the idea is to rotate crews more often than normal, and set up a rehab unit where firefighters can take refuge from the cold. hot beverages like coffee or hot cocoa can go a long way. >> cutting the cord to cable tv. the new trend in the television industry. low cost alternatives. and in the game. the nightly super bowl light show. that's next.

>> very cold weather once again coming into the midwest. we have a little snow, and the windchills dropping back down. 50 below in some spots, and in some areas, you're having the coldest winter on record. chicago, very harsh winter. and here's the arctic air. blasting into the south-southeast. and we're going to start feeling the chill in the air from atlanta over to mobile, alabama. and we're going to start getting

rain and snow mixed in for parts of the southeast. the hazards are the biggest concern overnight, the wells, advisories from the midwest to the plains and the great lakes and the northeast. and even parts of new york and pennsylvania and maryland, you're included in the concern for the temperatures. it's just so cold that the wind comes through and removes the heat from your skin. so frostbite can happen quickly. the forecast today, we have good news, rain headed in from the west. and much-needed help from the drought. and the snow in the northeast parts of the state. changing to an icy mix, and down to rain for southern florida. we have more of your current weather and also headlines.

>> cutting a cord. that's what a growing number of television viewers are doing. they're canceling their cable subscriptions and relying on cheaper sources of tv.

>> reporter: the television is still there in the living room. it works, but not the way it used to. they took a hard look at the cable bill and decided to cut the cord. >> i needed to save money and felt like i could cut the costs. >> they still watch, and they depend on the roaku to watch streaming services on demand. cord cutters are a growing class of watchers. >> based on the subscription, we can stream the latest shows, and we can see everything went right this. and at a fraction of the price. i think we're paying $8 a month for that. >> the neilson ratings company said that people from 8:00 to 49 are watching an hour less of traditional television a week than they did a year ago. but at the same time, they're watching more video entertainment, like the sweats, they can watch on a variety of

devices. like a tablet at the kitchen table. television has come a long way from the rabbit eared antenna. >> the audience is no longer interested in showing up at 8:00 to watch a piece of television, and if that's true, more and more content will be offered on servers and be offered up to you on whatever device you want. >> the television audience is appearing to undergo a major shift. roughly 5 million cable and satellite subscribers have disappeared within the last five years. a new york research firm says that television subscriptions have dropped and escaping services have grown by 4%. americans are abandoning their lynnian television for streaming services for netflix and

youtube. a yog number of younger viewers have never paid for satellite service service and they never will. >> they come out of college, and they get their first home and they don't need cable and satellite serves. they don't want to pay $120 a month. >> for him, it's the news, and otherwise, there's a wide world of watching and clever ways to look it up. he only cut the cord. he didn't throw away the remote. aljazeera, los angeles. >> super bowl week, getting underway in new york city, with style along the skyline. the empire state building is a canvas. every night this week, verizon is posting a question on twitter with the hashtag, who is going to win? the iconic high-rise. jess, look at the pictures there. the orange means denver is taking the edge tonight.

and coming up, an all-new aljazeera america. hillary clinton's biggest regret. what she wishes she could do over as secretary of state. and plus, getting syria. no laughing for dan akroid. and one more image caught our eye tonight. it is an avalanche in valdez, alaska. 4,000 people are cut off for at least a week after an avalanche blocked the only road leading into the city. the ice and snow is actuals 40 feet deep in some spots. but the airport and ferries are still operating, and the town officials say there's more than enough gas and fuel for the town. today's headlines coming up in just a moment.

>> and welcome to aljazeera america. i'm tony harris, and here are the top stories. president obama will address the nation tomorrow night in his fifth state of the union. income and economy are expected to be at the top of the agenda. the president's approval ratings

are at the lowest ever going into a state of the union address. spyings are able to collect personal data on cellphones. that's from edward snowden. the leak shows intelligence agents are able to get information from certain games and social network being apps. authorities in pennsylvania say a new type of heroin is blamed for 22 deaths. a mix of heroin and fentinol. it's found in bags and counties throughout pittsburgh labeled with the word, theraflu, bud ice and income tax. a deep chill has returned to the south. and forecasted from texas to carolina, there's concern that severe weather will cause widespread power delays and

power outages. those are the headlines. i'm tony harris. if you would like more on the stories on our website, go to aljazeera.com. "america tonight" with joie chen is next. >> on america tonight, promises, promises. as the president prepares for his biggest annual address, a remindish of how things went after the last one. >> it says a lot about the president's effectiveness. when people look back at history, they look at what they actually accomplished. >> also tonight, the fight for chicago. one year after the president highlighted her story to galvanize america, what has and hasn't changed.