sentenced to five years probation and 6 months home detention. 30 were killed after an outbreak. >> "america tonight" is next, you can get the latest news online at aljazeera.com. >> america tonight's team of reporters breaks it down. >> so let's get immigration reform done this year. >> michael oku on immigration. >> adam play on jobs and the economy. >> that's what health reform is all about. the peace of mind that if misfortune strikes you don't have to lose everything. >> lori jane

gliha on health care. and sheila macvicar on what mr. obama said and didn't say on problems. and on the night of problems, this is reality. >> i feel like 24 hours, at the restaurant five days a week every night i drive taxi. >> what it's like to work so hard and still fall short. >> and good evening, thanks for joining us. i'm joie chen. we can't exactly say it's a comment from the heavens. but on washington's biggest night of the year just as president obama finished his state of the union address, a very

severe, very rare storm , down in the beltway. beginning with the chaos down south. upper north you may not understand this but this is jackson, mississippi and this is when that part of the country gets snow and those vicious, vicious temperatures, it feels as cold as minus 30 with the wind chill not bad for a mid westerner, but this is beyond comprehension cold. in atlanta, the traffic came to a standstill. stand-still. meteorologists say it happens once every ten years. i think they would say it's been longer than that. state of pln louisiana declared a state of emergency

. a accu-weather jim dicky. this is crazy. >> you move this up the coast to northeast new england not a big deal, a nuisance event. down south you don't have the resources, the salt trucks, the snow plows. throughout the day on tuesday still seeing the ice at this hour. the heaviest of that snow, event, norfolk up to four inches of snowfall with more to come in this way. we're expecting six to ten inches, storm total snow fall. in these areas the snow thankfully has come to an end. cold being driven down by a strong high pressure system, not much time for this to melt, especially in the morning hours, the morning commute kill still be a mess. look at the highs across the region today.

many spots above the freezing point, 34 in columbia, especially this morning it is going to stay icy. from here, the storm moves north and eastward. interior of the northeasterly, cape cod, a couple of inches, three to six inches in cape cod in fact just a coating in eastern maine. still minus 1 in syracuse, into droit, we'll detroit we'll keep it cold as we head throughout the day. >> you're right jim all weather is relative. accuweather meteorologist jim dicky. thanks for joings us. in his 5th state of the union address, president obama drew a line in the sand: if you don't want to work with me, i'll go it alone.

defiant or dead on arrival? we begin with mike viqueria. mike, it takes what, an hour and six minutes to deliver about a minute's worth of applause. >> that's right. the president did have some applause lines. he went for humor at some points. he came with an olive branch in one hand and a a fist in the other. we are heading into an election year, the clock is ticking. the president walked into that chamber as more or less a lame duck, joie. it stands the possibility of going into republican chrome, on the house side it is going to stay republican in all likelihood. extension of minimum wage, big ticket items, immigration, earlier in the year before politics schools everything.

but he -- consumes everything. he says he's willing to go around washington. budget and spending bill even the farm bill give everybody hope in his view that the year doesn't have to be a partisan one. let's listen. >> as president i'm committed to makingashington work better and rebuilding the trust of the people who sent us here. and i believe most of you are too. last month, thanks to e work of democrats and republicans, congress finally produced a budget that undoes some of last year's severe cuts to education. not everybody got everything they wanted and we can still do more to invest in this country's future while bringing down our deficit in a balanced way. but the budget compromise should leave us freer to focus on creating new jobs not creating new crises. and in the coming months -- [applause] >> in the coming months let's

see where else we can make progress together. >> and so the president has these initiatives and he wants to work with congress but he made it clear the olive branch will turn into a fist, if congress won't go along. it is an inherent limitation, small balls in all ways, he would need congressional approval to enact anything significant. what the president had to say next: >> what i offered tonight is a set of concrete practical proposals to speed up growth strengthen the middle class and build ladders of opportunity into the middle class. some require congressional action and i'm eager to work with all of you but america does not standstill, neither will i. so wherever and whenever can i take steps without legislation to extend opportunity for more american families that's what

i'm going odo. [applause] >> well, the president was already rattling that saber earlier. when the congress said they would raise minimum wage for contractors athat worked government. it is only for new contracts that would affect a relatively small number of people but the president from here on out joie hid the hits the road, pittsburgh, milwaukee, nashville, each component for each city, to talk about the things he wants to do joie. >> almost a campaign in and of itself. stick around for a minute. roland martin, mike viqueria just told us it was either an olive branch or a big stick. >> it actually was one, the president said i need you to do

your job but american people are depending upon us to do the job but he made perfectly clear, i'm going to lead. republicans are complaining about his threat of executive order. well, he's actually granted the fewest number of executive orders in the last five presidents. so i'm trying to figure out exactly what the complaint is. so democrats and republicans have used executive order in the so he has that right. what i think the president has to do is, you saw it when it came to the minimum wage, for federal contractors, raise it to $10.10. actually do it. you can keep on threatening all you want to but you have to do it, and that's called leading. i'm going olead, either you catch up and do what's right for american people or i will do it for you. >> did you have that sense of frustration that i think a lot of those government workers are going to have? because look he said i'm going to do this, and as mike viqueria

told us, it's only affecting a limited number of people, a half a million folks which might be a lot to some but there are an awful lot of people. >> first of all that's part of the problem, you're taking the action right now. for instance it was president truman who used the scuff order to integrate the armed services. it's now moving forward as opposed to going backwards. probably this president said man i wished i had done that a few years ago instead of waiting for now. it was interesting when he basicall to y saidngress look, it's time for you to get to work. he made it perfectly clear, let's make progress together, action. if you look at what took place last year, the congress worked on a normal job they would have gotten fired for lack of productivity. >> mike

viqueria, roland brings up folks might have from you traition, that this -- frustration, this didn't go far on the minimum wage. it was as far as the white house felt they could go at this point. >> and the white house told us earlier today that that proposal that was put forward to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 as the president wants to do for the rest of the country but now only doing for federal contract workers is as far as they can do legally in the white house estimation. part of that joe i joie is theyt to put pressure on congress. if that's about scoring political points, that's great. the average of the polls want to see a hike in the minimum wage but the ways and means committee controlled by the republicans and th the house of representatives, yes, by definition some of what the president is talking about is

small-ball because he is going to need the congress to go along if it's really going ohave a significant -- to have a significant impact across the spectrum, joie. >> they say you can't make law that's a delicate balancing act for the president. >> mike viqueria warehouse correspondent on the hill for us tonight. we're going osee you later. thanks very much mike. i want to turn in and bring in i know roland you are the master of social media but one of our digital producers is also a maven -- you guys are doing double duty. arizon azmat khan.i've gotten the e-mae last couple of days. did they carry out a full designate full court press?

>> they said this would be the most interactive state of the union address to date and they delivered. they had portal launch where you could watch links of information for things to coming. then today they had the live screen, state of the union, and info graphics that the obama administration wanted to share. while he was talking, they had charts and graphs and other points that he wanted the citizens to take home. >> why is this so important to the administration? why would they put that much effort into that? >> it amplifies their message.. there were points that he wanted to make, pithy sound bites. everything they thought might go

viral they put out for users. they maids it -- made it more accessible. >> so it works roland? you have a big following online. it works? >> some consumers are saying, i want more information, where do i go? if i can go to a place i can find the information i can have my questions answered. what they're also doing is saying look, we're not going to leave it up to mainstream and cable networks and websites to provide the information. because people are in that mode. literally my sister tweeted me earlier, they watched it with the family, they had to keep rewinding it because their kids had questions. >> they want to own the message. they want to say dig deeper, check that. >> control the message. >> it isn't just the administration, republicans have responded as well. >> they have. what was fascinating was

competing live streams. joarjohn boehner many shared his live stream also. every time president obama mentioned something or didn't mention something that was high on the gop leadership agenda they would put out an infoe info graphic. there was information about the keystone pipeline or benghazi that president obama wasn't necessarily talking about. >> he didn't talk about the keystone pipeline at all. >> he didn't. >> it was really like being at a bar, hearing people shout, fight fight fight! it was like that. obama's website had the total, here is how many billions, lost,

and that back and forth really played out in very aggressive ways. >> i got to wonder about the kind of bars that azmat is hanging out at. >> no one knows, but there was one hashtag, that one republican leader put out, obama, the the lies that you tell. they could be pretty tough but they were quieter than normal. for example if you think back to president obama's speech ahead of pos tbli taking congressional authorization on syria republican leaders were prolific that night. some of the republican leaders that were well-known for being digitally savvy, he didn't tweet or facebook anything. they were hiding out to some extent. >> conversation does continue online as it dogs for us here on america tonight. azmat we appreciate you coming in with all that. and when we return, we'll get america back to work in our time of recovery. the

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>> let me be clear. if this congress sends me a new

war. >> and part of that has been the detainees at guantanamo bay. >> close guantanamo. he says the war in afghanistan is coming to an end. as part of closing that chapter, it is time we figure out what to do with the remaining detainees and close it. >> sheila macvicar following up on the international issues that the president addressed. now, on to immigration reform. it was president obama's top priorities just a year ago. just this year, the president devoted only a few lines.

michael oku, what's happened there? >> as joie you know, there are more than 10 million immigrants in the state of california. people here have been anxious to hear what the president was going to say about immigration reform tonight. it may not seem a surprise that people we spoke to were surprised that the president spent all of, wait for it, 53 seconds speak about it. here is part of what he said. >> i know that members of both parties of the house want to do the same. independent economists say immigration reform will grow our economy by almost 3 billion in the next decades. they make our country a more

attractive place for people to locate and create more jobs for everybody. so let's get immigration reform done this year. >> we have been speaking to immigrant rights groups, to hear the president declare that he's fighting for a path to legal status if not citizenship for nation's estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, that he plans to use his executive powers to halt deportations, especially since the administration is on pace to deport a record 2 million undocumented immigrants. and to give a reprieve to undocumented immigrants allowing them to come out from under the shadows and illegally seek work as they await comprehensive reform, joie. >> michael we were just talking

a moment ago about this not being just an issue that the president took on but republicans as well, we understand are going to be addressing this at thair their g retreat. what can you tell us about that? >> that speaker boehner is expected to produce a list that we understand will probably fall short of the bipartisan senate bibbill that was passed earlier this year, that will essentially include a path not for citizenship which is what the senate bill did but that it will actually include some roadway, a pathway for undocumented immigrants essentially to become legal in the united states. so we know that that's going to be happening at some point in the next couple days, specifically in the eastern shore of maryland. but we also understand, joie,

that there is some discussion among the leadership in the republican party, particularly conservatives, who say that they don't want to push immigration reform just right now. they want to push it until after the mid term election, so as to not you know foment any kind of fracture within the republican party. so the president was very aware of that. he's treading i have careful tonight. he didn't want to get in the way of any progress that is being made. so in terms of the issue of immigration at least tonight for the president, we are talking carrot, not stick. >> all right, indeed. "america tonight"'s michael oku. thanks very much for being with us. when we come back, we're back on the money, did the president discussion recovering from the financial crisis?

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a thought about the people not focused on washington's grand visions, lofty rhetoric or its petty political battles but the people who truly are parked just on the edge of making it and sometimes slipping right over the brink. people that understand that sometimes a minimum wage is not enough to get by or the leap of faith trying to make it on your own and your own ll enterprise little enterprise is sometimes a dream left dump in the heap. the other america, we leave you tonight with someone who is living it. >> i was always you know interested in karate or those kind of martial arts. i liked it. so when i was kid, when i saw a movie, rocky first time, i was so inspired by that movie. i started boxing in high school. i joined the

team. my boxing life started. i got a scholarship from the university in japan. and i joined them, started focusing on going to olympic games. but i couldn't be a national champion in japan. i started thinking so now what am i going to do? inspire people like movie rocky did to me. i thought it's my turn to inspire others. i'm dreaming about you know come to united states to be an actor. and also, i thought you know, movies, hollywood, it's california, maybe i can start from there. i decided to come to los angeles. when i came here, i was 27. of course, you know, i was nobody.

and i needed to have another job. you know started looking for a japanese classified paper. and i found one company, one gentleman, he had his own hat company. before then, i didn't know anything aut hats. but i learned. we adjusted height of the crown, lower, higher, and left of the brim. >> we were looking for some assistant for exporting company. i liked fashion so that's how i looked up with the hat business, the fashion. and two years later i opened up, you know, a business. my company started growing. and i started, you know, exhibiting at the big convention trade show. and then first customer i got

was the big nationwide chain store they really liked our hat. i see people on the street working and wearing our hats. and i feel like oh, that's great. just -- we made it. they started you know sending me orders and we started working closer. volume of order started getting bigger and bigger. i did like, yeah, over 1 million annual sales. and there were five employees. but you know, recession hit. everywhere. i was trying my best. i pushed myself to the edge. my buying prices getting hiefer getting higher but my selling prices getting lower. my margin

shrinking. shrinking. shrinking. we were forced to close the company. i had to file bankruptcy. ordinary people work 40 hours a week. me, now, you know i have two job, daytime at restaurant in the evening driving taxi. so like 85 to 90 hours a week. work at the japanese sushi restaurant. i feel like i'm just flip a new page of my life. this page is over now. but next page. i'm opening my next page of my life. >> sushi bar recommendations please. >> okay. >> working for restaurant, next big benefit is, we get free meal. free lunch.

so i can save, you know, lunch money. came back home around 4:00, take a short break, maybe you know, have a cup of tea or something. and go to next work. driving taxi. ftc so now wso now we are ready. go get some passengers. okay now we are on melrose avenue. i had a customer on this street selling products, showing samples. and urban outfitters. i sometimes, sales, it was fun talking to customers, and selling products. i don't want to see, like, my old customers, when i drive a taxi.

that's kind of like -- kind of weird. and of course, you know, they -- they going to -- ah, maybe not ask but they going osay, oh, why he's driving taxi? and this is where i was hanging out, on every weekend. my dinner, or i don't even remember now, when was the last time i went there? i walk by there, you know, like a lot. or, you know, driving by. but haven't been inside of the restaurant for a long time. i mean, i started tracing this financial difficulty, well, one day i'm going to be a customer again, i go back there. but not now. okay.

i have to figure out this paperwork. i almost feel like i was 24. i mean, at the restaurant, five days a week, and taxi every day! every night i drive taxi! monthly, usually i make from restaurant about $900, and from driving taxicab , $4367. but rent, 780. utility bills, $50. car loan, $250. medical insurance, $200. home phone and cell phone, internet, $220. my taxi lease is -- cost $2080 a month.

wire money to japan, supporting my parents. like $500 a month. after deduct all those expense, only $120 left. $120 divided four weeks, $30 a week. $30 a week divided by 7, $4.29 a day. for in the morning, and exhausted and ready to go to bed bed. outs there there are so many people, they are facing financial difficulties. i can, you know, have compassion for them. and

yes, makes me better person. >> and that's in the other america. that's it for us here on "america tonight". please remember if you want to comment on any of the stories we have on, or just want to comment on anything, log on to aljazeera.com/americatonight. we'll have more tomorrow. >> al jazeera america is a straight-forward news channel. >> its the most exciting thing to happen to american journalism in decades. >> we believe in digging deep. >> its unbiased, fact-based, checks unbiased, fact-based, check

> hello from doha. this is the newshour on al jazeera. the african president, her government and hundreds of millions of missing public money. we are live at malawi's corruption court case. protesters in ukraine dig in as parliament debates whether to release gaoled activists. >> separatist rebels - we report. >> and underan