whether you're traveling, going to school, commuting to work, you want to hear about this. two powerful winter snowstorms targeting the northeast. they could bring several cities to a standstill by the weekend. rob marciano is in the extreme "weather center" tracking a pair of systems that's packing an enormous one-two punch. 18% of private workers have a pension plan. when it comes to congress, almost every lawmaker has a pretty nice little pension plan and you're footing the bill. is the system broken? if so how do we fix it? we'll get some answers as part of our broken government series. >> it's time for mr. toyoda to talk. his chief of sales sat and listened to a woman relive her runaway ride in a lexus yesterday. >> i placed both feet on the brake after i firmly engaged the emergency brake and nothing

slows the car. i figured the car was going to go its maximum speed and i was going to have to put the car into the upcoming guardrail to prevent killing anyone else and i prayed for god to help me. >> compelling testimony yesterday. what's on tap for today? >> reporter: be an exciting day. yesterday builds towards today. congress taking the ceo of the company to task. this is a kind of environment that's commonplace. these congressional hearings are almost like a contact sport. in japan, pointed questions like the ones that mr. toyoda will get today are considered disrespectful. when toyoda goes before the congress he'll face a tough crowd. here's what happened to the last guy. >> you gave lame excuses then.

>> it stinks to the high heaven what happened here. >> reporter: they don't call it the hot seat for nothing. lawmakers want answers and promises. >> what do you want to hear from akio toyoda? >> reporter: i want to hear one a commitment to change. >> reporter: the top republican on the committee says toyota needs to be held accountable. as a former helped of an electronics manufacturer he's familiar with japanese culture. >> congress is famous for rude questions so i expect there will be some rude questions. >> reporter: he worries some lawmakers might go too far. you sound a little worried how are you committee will behave? >> i don't want to be embarrassed on behalf of the american people by us not focusing to the important part, did government do its job, did industry do its job and if they didn't are they going to do it going forward?

>> reporter: if mr. toyoda is skewered by the committee or performs poorly, japan-u.s. relations to be strained. >> if you have a situation in which these hearings go extremely poorly and it gets splashed across the front pages of major newspapers and media in the united states and japan, i think you could have something that leads to a little bit of a difficult, uncomfortable relationship between the two countries. >> reporter: so maybe some uncomfortable situations today, but mr. toyoda did receive his mba studying here in the u.s. so he's going to be walking the line between the cultures. he's fluent in english but will insist on speaking in japanese and have it translated. >> reporter: it's because, quite frankly, he doesn't want to mess up. so this will give him a chance

to hear the question twice. once in english, once in japanese. but it's also going to put, i think, a damper on some of those sharp exchanges because the translator will serve as a buffer there. one of the things talking to lawmakers, this could draw out the amount of time this takes and one lawmaker wonder out loud if it won't annoy some of the people on the panel. >> if you have an english question translated into japanese, there's a potential for something to get lost in the translation. >> reporter: that's part of the concern. thanks. later on this morning, we're going to talk with rhonda smith. you saw her testifying. we got her stopping by at 7:30 eastern right here on "american morning." the northeast bracing for back-to-back winter storm that could leave some cities paralyzed -- we've seen this movie before.

more on that in a moment. take a look at abilene, texas. they are digging out from nearly four inches of snow. it's a lot for that part of the country. most of the lone star state getting a dusting with over 100 flights cancelled yesterday at dallas-ft. worth. all eyes are on the northeast right now where they are preparing for a serious pounding over the next couple of days. rob marciano in the extreme "weather center" for us. we have a lot of flight delays this morning because of the rain and wind we've been experiencing and now two back-to-back snow events. how bad will it be? >> depends where you live because a difference of 50 miles will make a difference. one of those deals where we got three things coming together and the timing out to explode pretty much right off the new england coast line. this being so strong, those it will bring in a fair amount of warm air. so that means that the rain/snow line is critical especially for the larger cities. let's talk about today first. heavy rain across parts of the

south-northeast and heavy snow across the northern part of northeast. winter storm warnings are in effect for upstate but tomorrow we're looking at winter storm watches that are in effect from washington, d.c. up to new york city and i think the hardest hit areas are going to be in upstate new york, especially west of the hudson. every where east of that warm air will wraparound and be engulfed in this thing and limit the amount of snow folks get. anywhere from eastern pennsylvania to upstate new york could see one to two feet of snow. new york, d.c. and philly will see five to ten inches of snow. one thing most everybody will get is a lot of pinned. power outages and flight delays to say the least over the next 48 hours. we'll have more details in 30 minutes. >> looking at your map a-lot of white over pennsylvania and new jersey but a nice little bit of green over long island,

connecticut and a lot of eastern massachusetts. does that mean that they are likely not going to get any snow >> i wouldn't say not get any snow. this is a computer model. new york will get four to eight inches of snow. it will be a wet snow after it changes over from rain. one of these things where it goes from rain over to snow, so the amount of snow is a difficult forecast and one that shouldn't be focused on. the impacts of this storm and that's wind an likely power outages in a widespread area. >> my goodness looks like allentown is expecting a lot. the military contract orformerly known as blackwater under fire from congress, accused of playing fast and loose with rules in afghanistan and almost with no government oversight. at a senate committee hearing in a few hours, company executives will be called to answer allegations about weapons signed out by a character from south park. chris lawrence is following this story for us.

>> reporter: private mercenaries running around afghanistan without any accountability. taking weapons, shooting civilians, that's a picture being painted by a congressional investigation. >> what you need is oversight. and hopefully this hearing will lead to dramatically better oversight. >> reporter: last spring cnn brought you and exclusive interview with one of the contractors now charged with murdering two afghan civilians. >> when i got out of the vehicle i had no weapon in my hands. >> reporter: this investigation alleges a series of problems that nobody caught led up to that shooting. it goes back more than two years, it involves blackwater, which now calls itself xe to get work in afghanistan. congressional investigators said a blackwater employee took more than 300 ak-47s from a storage bunker, guns set aside tore afghan police.

the company and defense department admit there's no paper work to document it. 300 assault rifles, no receipt. when a new rule required afghan officers to sign for any weapons, blackwater takes another 200 rifles out of the bunker. who signs for it? eric hartman. there's a south park character by that name but blackwater told investigators foyeric harman ever worked for the company. blackwater admits contractors should not have been armed without the proper approvals. later that year, one contractor accidentally shoots another trainer in the head. partially paralyzing him. the company reports it to the military as the reckless use of an unauthorized weapon. but senator levin says the right people never read it. >> if that shooting back in december of '08 had been investigated, it would have been

discovered that personnel were using weapons unsafely, improperly, inadequate supervisi supervision. >> reporter: flash forward to may have last year. in kabul black with your contractors with unauthorized weapons opened fire on afghan civilians they saw as a threat. the incident cost the u.s. military goodwill among some afghans and sparked a diplomatic incident. >> reckless behavior by cara van contractors helped set the stage. government oversight failed. and thirdly, blackwater broke the rules relating to weapons. >> reporter: even the military's investigating officer admits the contractors were poor lly supervised in this incident. but who is supposed to supervise these contractors? a new proposal would create one central agency that would sort of oversee them all.

christine? >> thanks so much for that report. new this morning a student in littleton, colorado is in critical condition after being shot outside of his middle school. it happened just three miles from columbine high school. police say a man shot two students yesterday with a high powered rifle. a math teacher tackled the suspect as he was trying to chamber another round. the suspect is scheduled to be in court later on today. the first of 150 new full body scanners will be installed at boston's logan airport. a homeland security firm technology the associated press the rest of the machines should be in place in airports across the country before july. it's all part of new security protocols put in place after the attempted christmas day bombing. critics call the machines invasive. former vice president dick cheney still recovering in a washington hospital this morning. techts show the former vice

president did have a mild heart attack on monday. that would make it his fifth heart attack since 1978. cheney spokesman said he's feeling fine. still ahead, we're continuing our series on broken government. this morning millions of americans seeing their retirement savings disappear but lawmakers in congress are sitting pretty. i've been getting, um, headaches

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basic package. good choice. only meineke lets you choose your service, choose your savings. like an oil change for just $19.95. meineke. 14 and a half minutes after the hour. welcome back to "the most news in the morning." many americans are wondering how

they will retire in this recession. members of congress don't have those same worries. they will be collecting fat pensions. >> as part of our week long series broken government we're taking a hard look at the congressional pension system and the fix congress would have to cut their own benefits. here's lisa sylvester. >> reporter: this man worked for more than 35 years in the auto industry. he was promised a pension when he retired. but after his company went bankrupt he found out his pension taken over by the federal pension guarantee corporation was being cut by 30%. >> i felt betrayed. i felt betrayed mostly because i put 37 years in with a company, following the rules, doing everything i should, and then all of a sudden, i found out that for the rest of my life, things would be changed. >> reporter: like many

americans, he's worried about how is he going to cover his bills in retirement. but one group doesn't have any worries. and that's members of congress. they can draw on their pension beginning at age 50. depending on the years of service they can get as much as 80% of their final salary. there are costs of living adjustments added on and they are still eligible to receive social security. according to an analysis by the national taxpayers union, senator chris dodd will have a starting pension of $125,500 every year starting next year when he retires. senator byron dorgan stands to get more than $116,000. senator gregg an average of $63,000. senators bond and bunning taking away $58,900 in annual pensions. >> the federal congressional pension system is simply a direct line into the taxpayer's

wallet. no investments that need to be made, no fund balances that get worried about, whatever the liability is for a given year, taxpayers cough up the money for it. >> reporter: we called the senators to get a response but our calls were not returned. the congressional retirement system was reformed in 1984 to make the system less generous and more in line with that of other federal workers. still representative howard kobel says the system is broken. >> it's too lavish, too generous when you compare it with pensions across the country. i elected to refuse the pension on the ground that taxpayers are subsidizing my salary now. i figure when i leave they've taken good care of me to do the left they can after i leave in the service in the congress has been accomplished. >> reporter: up until recently even if a congressional member

commit ad crime they still could get their pension. but a law in 2007 barred members convicted of felonies to receive their pensions. but william jefferson, his corruption offenses took place before that year and still receive a pension paid for by the taxpayer. lisa sylvester, cnn, washington. >> that's how it works, folks. tomorrow on "american morning" president obama says he wants to double u.s. exports in the next five years. what's the plan and how can america even compete with cheap foreign labor? >> particularly when we have offshore so much of our manufacturing and so much of our jobs. coming up tonight at 8:00 a number of president obama's nominees are being held up by congress. are these vacancies contributing to our broken government? >> toyota has a lot of high powered friends in congress. can that impact the investigations? consumer confidence is down,

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21 and a half minutes after the hour. time for minding your business.

christine romans is minding your business. you're doing double duty today. >> i am. >> you'll be with ali velshi later today. >> a lot of great stuff. >> ben bernanke will testify on the hill today. >> we'll get his prescription or a forecast on what will happen with the overall economy. a lot of questions. when will this economy be back to normal and what is normal? that means your job, home and bank. let's take a look at where we stand. the national association of business economics predicts job growth is on its way, forecasting 140,000 jobs per month will be added in 2010. in the new normal, no thing is ever as it seems. yesterday we found out mass layoffs rose last month for the first time since august. more than 180,000 folks fell victim to mass layoffs in january. we saw consumer confidence tumble. consumers are still very

nervous. how about your house? your biggest asset most likely or what was once your biggest asset. one out of every four mortgages is under water. it means you owe more than the house is worth. foreclosure will continue. speaking of lenders, banks still in trouble. one out of 11 banks is at risk of going under. that's the problem bank lift, 140 banks were shut down last year and the number of bank failures is expected to grow again in 2010. one area where a come back is in full effect, wall street. bonuses up 17% in 2009. more than $20 billion as a result of the rebound. >> you almost choked on that happen came real close. >> so where do we stand? the recovery, choppy at best. lots of questions for bernanke as he discusses the economy in front of congress.

larry summers said it's a statistical recovery but a human recession. that pretty much writes off 2010. >> we talk a lot too about residential home foreclosure but we haven't talked much about commercial property foreclosure. >> tick, tick, tick. a lot of people say that's a time bomb. we know the volume of banks preparing for what the commercial real estate problems will likely see later this year and next year. >> let's hope the new normal doesn't last too long. coming up, forced to resign under a cloud of controversy, president obama's former green jobs czar now being honored by the naacp. suzanne malveaux talks about the new controversy that this is bound to create. geico says 15 minutes could save you money.

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♪ welcome back to "the most news in the morning." van jones is back in the spotlight. he was president obama's green jobs czar, not for very long. he resign under pres b he's abo headlines yet again. let's go to suzanne malveaux who is live at the white house with a cnn exclusive. what is this all about? >> reporter: well, john, van jones may have left the white house under a cloud but the naacp is saying that's not his

whole story. they consider him to be a pioneer when it comes to civil rights, to the environment, so much so that they are honoring him one of their most prestigious awards, an naacp image award happening tomorrow. i had a chance to talk to the president of the naacp who says look, he understands this may cause controversy and debate but it's something that they are ready for. it was just last september van jones resigned under a firestorm of criticism. saying he was the victim of a vicious smear campaign based on lies and distortions. the naacp agrees. that's why its president is giving jones one of the civil rights organizations highest honors, an naacp image award. out of a host of african-americans who are very well accomplished with stellar images, why pick van jones? >> van jones is one of the few new voices out there with new ideas for jobs. he's done more in the past several years to change the way

we think about job creation than anybody that we could find. >> reporter: you know this is going to make some people go nuts. do you care? >> not really. what should be controversy is we pushed one of the greatest minds off to the side in this country when we needed his ideas the most. >> reporter: the controversy came less than six months into his stint has president obama's green jobs czar. republicans and conservative commentators pointed to a vulgar phrase he used to describe the gop before he came to the white house at an event captured on youtube. >> the answer to that is they are a-holes. >> reporter: than petition jones signed in 2004 questioning whether bush administration officials may, indeed have deliberately allowed 911 to happen perhaps as a pretext for war. jones said that petition never reflected his views but the damage had been done. jones resigned under a cloud that the naacp wants lifted. >> we have a young black guy

born in rural tennessee, who before the age of 40 has been named one of the 100 best minds by "time" magazine, in the entire world. >> reporter: are you picking him in part because he's controversial, because he'll create attention, create debate? >> this country has a shameful history of taking people who have done great things, casting, creating distractions, discrediting them from things deep in their past and not letting the country realize their full value in the present. >> reporter: that's what the naacp is hoping to do realize van jones' value moving forward. some of the other people who have gotten image awards in the past include jesse jackson, condoleezza rice, bill clinton. if you want to learn more about the reasoning behind the naacp's decision there's an op ed at cnn.com. go to that to get more information, more details t-back story of this story.

>> suzanne malveaux, thank so much. it's 30 minutes after the hour. that means it's time for this morning's top stories. toyota's chief facing tough questions on capitol hill. he's expected to admit his company veered off from its safety first philosophy. we'll speak to the woman who relived her runaway ride in a lexus. yesterday on the hill she told lawmakers about it. she called it a near death experience. before you head to work and get the kids off to school this morning two powerful winter storm are bearing down on the northeast right now. the first one targeting parts of new york and new england today. by friday blizzard conditions could paralyze much of the region. rob marciano tracking both systems for you in the extreme "weather center" and what it means for your morning commute. we're taking a look at your taxpayer dollars at work as part of our week long series broken government. this morning we're breaking down how earmarks get passed and eventually funds lawmakers pet

projects. a controversial billboard campaign that sparked a debate over abortion and race. it pictures a black instant saying black children are an endanged species. the groups say abortion clinics target black women and threaten the african-american population. katherine davis is the director of minority outreach at georgia right to life which co-sponsored the billboards and from shreveport, louisiana -- let's start with you katherine. why did you see the need for this campaign? >> the numbers of abortions that are happening in georgia and around the country startling. absolutely stunning. in 2008 the most recent figures that we have from the state of georgia, over 18,901 of the

32,000 abortions that were done were done on black women. we want to awaken the community to the devastating impact that abortion is having on our community. >> those figures you cite from 2008 are in line with the centers for disease control finding that found 57.4% abortions in georgia were performed on black women. dr. cash, your reaction to this? >> well, first of all, i thank you for having me and then also let me say this that at a time when we have such a great woman in the white house, a mother as well as a grandmother and then a family, for this organization that this young lady works for, for this organization to demoralize and criminalize the african-american female is just uncalled for. at the national action network

we tend to go to try to solve the problem. the problem is character. reverend sharpton has tried d diligenly to bring character back into our communities. if you look at the numbers on the reverse side we see that there are so many children that are being born out of wedlock and that number is staggering. so, i don't know how this group can come in and now change our agenda when we have an agenda, our agenda is that double digit unemployment that exists in the black community. >> let me have miss davis respond. you are criminalizing black women, miss davis, and as well this is a matter more of character than anything. it's true what dr. cash says too

is that in the black community, across the country, according to centers for disease control, 71.6% of births are to unmarried women. >> well, that is getting away from the topic, i think. the question is, is abortion having an adverse impact on the black community and if it is, why? and those -- i mean i understand there are social justice issues that need to be addressed, but we're not demonizing black women. what we're saying is that the abortion industry has targeted specifically the black community. it is a racial agenda, and i'm not sure what agenda mr. cash is referring to, but if we are being undermine from a racial perspective, should we not do something about it? is there any truth to what we are saying that the black community is being targeted by the abortion industry? i think so. that is the issue that we are

addressing. >> what do you say about that dr. cash? have you seen any evidence that the black community is being targeted by abortion providers and is there a racial agenda at work here? >> yes, it is. i'm just shocked that this young lady would even allow herself to be used in this manner, because here we are, we're changing road to rowina and now we're trying to change the face of abortion and trying to make the black female feel like they have really sunk down to a level that is intolerable. i want you to know that there are so many young mothers in our church and other places that are going and having children, they are not aborting babies. that's not a major theme in churches. i don't know where this lady came up with this kind of logic from. her numbers are skewed.

>> those are not my numbers. those are the state of georgia's numbers. and in no way am i attacking my sisters. i am black. my people are dying. our people are dying. why can't you see that rather than buying into this racist agenda that is controlling the birth rate of the black community. don't you realize that over 18,870,000 black babies have died by abortion. we would be stronger if we had those 18 million. yet your organization or any of the other organizations are not pointing the finger where it belongs. we are creating a social justice agenda of failure. it's failing. it begins with sanctity of life in the womb. >> dr. cash f-i read your last answer correctly, you believe the black community is being targeted by abortion providers. does that not require some sort

of response, some sort of action? >> what happens is this, john, and i don't know -- i guess we are on two different pages. but you have to understand that our agenda is that we're going to build character. reverend sharpton has constantly been going around the country in different chapters saying we need to be of character. if our social economic situation has changed don't you realize young lady there won't be abortion. the only reason abortion comes about in our community is because of the blight that exists in our community. we're not aborters of babies. in fact, don't you think it's interesting at one time they had us on birth control and putting sisters on birth control trying to make sure they wouldn't have babies. now we come up with a new agenda and this agenda, like i said, i find it so interesting we get an african-american president and now we throw a black baby on the front of a billboard and we as

black people don't like our laundry aired that way and not put up in the air so people can take a look at it. this sister been black a long time and she know that. >> one more response from miss davis if i could because we're just about out of time. what do you say about the idea t-criticism that you're going about the problem completely backwards, what you need to do is address the lack of education, the poverty among the black community. other issues like that and that abortion is really an end product of all that. >> abortion, to say that the answer to our social justice issues is to kill the baby is just intellectually, politically and socially insulting. we are being targeted by the abortion industry and if we don't protect the baby in the womb then there is no protection to those that are born. a dead child doesn't need education. a dead child can't rise

politically because its dead. a dead child can't rise economically because it's dead. if we don't stop aborting our children and killing them before they have life we won't be here to worry about it. we need to address the issue. >> maybe we're saying the same thing. >> we real appreciate you both being with us. we'll keep following this story. very important one. we thank you for wk us this morning. 40 minutes after the hour. increase in 6 months. pete, back it up! ( marker squeaking ) when business travel leaves you drained, re-charge with comfort suites. spacious rooms, free hi-speed internet, and free hot breakfast. comfort suites. power up. now stay two separate times with comfort suites... or any choice hotel and earn a free night. book at choicehotels.com. all this week we're taking a

look at what many call is our broken government, whether you call them earmarks or just plain pork or maybe you want to call them bacon, they are the life blood of politics in washington. the pet projects that fund millions to constituents back home. >> ali velshi is manning the earmarks desk. he'll break down how these armies actually get passed. >> good morning, john and christine. i've been you've been up all night wondering how earmarks works. it starts with an idea in a local district, maybe it's an interest group, maybe it's

another politician. somebody wants a congressman or a senator to fund something. so they ask this person to sponsor this earmark. the congressman then submit as request, a written request for money. i have to tell you, we've seen these requests. they are not remarkably detailed. what happens is it goes -- this request goes to a committee. the committee then assigns it to a sub committee. as you know there's lots of committee, sub committee. the sub committee decides whether or not to go ahead with this request. sometimes they say yes, sometimes they say no and sometimes they only honor part of the request. it goes in for a million dollars and only a quarter million gets funded. the earmarks aren't in the bill. they are in a explanatory statement. its not the most transparent process. then there's a house bill it

gets voted on. let's say it gets passed. that earmark is there. than senate bill may have similar earmarks may have other ones. they come together in committee. it's a unifying of the two bills. that is how an earmark becomes the law. john, christine? >> ali velshi for us this morning. the wizard of the earmark desk. >> he's not saying whether they are good or bad but this is how earmarks happen and sometimes you don't know -- you don't know if your congressman or senator has supported something or traded for something else. >> that's thing with earmarks one person's pet project, one person's waste is another one's essential project back home. like the bridge to nowhere. >> yeah. there's a few examples that you really came up with. >> some things that some people think is outrageous others say

no we need this. >> tomorrow morning president obama says he wants to double u.s. exports in the next five years. that's a really tall order. what's the plan and how comerica even compete with chief foreign labor. a number of president obama's nominees are being held up by congress. are these vacancies contributing to our broken america? >> and toyota has a lot of high powered friends in washington and cnn looks how that might impact the toyota investigations. >> i thought about an earmark. it had some i want to be. remember the odor mitigation feed lots in iowa. >> these were these big pork places in iowa. i was saying this is like environmental poison, basically and it was really important for people who live in iowa. >> so many people were laughing at that. >> i was pounding on the desk, wait. >> it depends on your perspective. one-two punch taking aim at the northeast. rob will have that and this morning's travel forecast after

the break. >> jeanne moos and the complaints about toll takers on the new jersey turnpike. you're not going to believe this story. stick around. 46 minutes after the hour.

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45 degrees. then start to go down again and some snow moving in. rob marciano has the details for us. let's get a quick check of this morning's weather headlines. >> good morning. this is an interesting scenario setting up. we had three major snowstorms so far this winter and this is the fourth one. it's different setting up wise. we have one, two, and three things coming together and looks like they will do so over the new york metropolitan area. the timing of this will be the key and how these guys get along is the extent of the party. meanwhile today if you're traveling with the leftover snow and rain storm from yesterday we have problems in new york and d.c. and atlanta and in chicago as well. look at the snowfall amounts in texas. some of these record breaking waco seeing 3.1 inches of snow. southern part of the snow active. mixed precipitation down in the deep south. meridian, mississippi reporting

snow. we don't expect a ton of accumulation. not a whole lot of advisories out that gets into the carolinas. probably begin to see a couple of inches of snow. this is the upper level part, the low of the storm that will eject energy over the delmarva peninsula and that will develop the surface low that will crank up. this is the old one that bumping up quite a bit of snow upstate new york and new england. that will wind down tonight and tomorrow. tomorrow we expect to see five to ten inches across d.c. and new york corridor, ten to 20 upstate and inland. wind will be a huge issue with this. we could see hurricane force winds. the amount of snow that d.c. and new york gets the confidence is fairly low because it will start as rain, go over to snow. how long that warm air sticks around is a huge question. the wind and how this thing winds up is certainly going to be impressive. batten down the hatches tomorrow night and into friday. using my powers of deduction, i'm detecting a

pattern in our weather. how long is this expected to last >> as far as the winter weather is concerned? >> until spring. >> this storm after storm after storm. >> i don't see a huge ends in sight. it has to do with the el nino. and also what's going on out in the atlantic. probably will continue for the next week, week and a half. >> i hope we get stuff to sled in not just junk. then it's just hard work. >> thanks. 52 minutes after the hour. stay with us.

time now for "the most news in the morning" pap lot can go wrong on your drive to work and back home especially if you hit a toll booth along the way. >> sometimes it's the toll booth

worker or the person behind the wheel. why don't more people get the ez pass. here's our jeanne moos. >> reporter: the next time you go through a toll imagine getting your change back plus saliva. >> patron claimed he spit on his fingers before counting his change. >> reporter: the smoking gun website has obtained 550 complaints about toll takers on the new jersey turnpike. like this one. >> patron dropped a dime. >> reporter: these are from motorists so mad they called in their complaints, sometimes mundane. >> said they got the wrong change because he was busy on his cell phone ordering a pizza with extra pepperoni. the collector sprayed him. >> reporter: one female motorist, interesting chat about driving while sleeping. >> i have a way of keeping women awake, you know, if you're tired

if you're interested and offers to flash her. >> reporter: some people complain about being asked out on dates. >> the eyes. >> reporter: couples who met then married. this trucker used to ask his fellow truckers for help to find out his favorite toll taker. >> as for the wrong thing to do. >> pennies are like the worst thing you can do to a toll collector. >> reporter: drivers paying in pennies found them being thrown back to them. >> one comedian paid a 75 cent toll in pennies. >> reporter: the toll taker took it well. then there's the driver who pays with $100 bill. >> the toll collector decides they will give them all the bills in singles. >> reporter: we'll pay with a nice crisp $100 bill.

pay at the queens midtown tunnel. we have no attitude. >> i can have three 20s, a 10 and some singles. >> sure. >> reporter: the director of new jersey's department of transportation had this to say about the complaints. >> if i find out it happens and be corroborated i'll rip the toll taker out of the lane. >> reporter: we know one guy who used to drive the jersey turnpike. better not try throwing pennies at him. jeanne moos, cnn. >> would you take a postage stamp? >> reporter: new york. nd put it. they rate its fit and finish and the amenities inside. they factor in purchase price and operating costs. fuel economy and resale value. in short, they do what you do to test its quality. now get a low mileage lease on this 2010 malibu for around $199 a month for 39 months.

call for details. see your local chevy dealer.

welcome back to "the most news in the morning" on this wednesday, the 24 of the of february. i'm john roberts. >> i'm christine romans. >> here are the big stories we're telling you about in the next 15 minutes. from the driver's seat to the hot seat t-chief of toyota will talk to congress about when the company knew its cars could take off without warning. we're not in japan any more. we have a look at why these questions could be different than any questions he's ever faced at home. the one rhode island high cool a failing grade for the teachers. all 88 of them fired at once. is this lesson in layoffs enough

to save the school? we dig deeper. our week long focus on broken government. the big gamble some states are taking to close their budget deficits. they are betting on casinos. first this hour time for mr. toyoda, the namesake of the car company to talk. in just a few hours the top man will face a grilling on capitol hill. we're almost assured that there will be fireworks. yesterday his chief of sales in the united states was grilled about whether the fix for 8 million recalled vehicles is really just a cover. >> do you believe that the recall on the carpet changes and the recall on the sticky pedal will solve the problem of sudden unintended acceleration? >> not totally. >> what do you need to do? >> we need to continue to be vigilante and continue to investigate all of the complaints that we get from consumers that we have done a

relatively poor job of doing in the past. >> we have a look on what's ahead for toyota's top guy today. if the grilling that the u.s. president got is any indication, it could be firing up the barbecue there on the hill this morning. >> reporter: i think that's about right, john. this is what we're used to. congress taking the ceo of a big company to task. this is the kind of environment that's commonplace here in the u.s. in these congressional hearings are almost a contact sport. contrast that with japan where even pointed questions like certainly the ones mr. toyoda will get today are considered down right disrespectful. when akio toyoda goes before the house oversight committee he'll face a tough crowd. this is what happened to the last guy who testified. treasury secretary tim geithner. >> you gave lame excuses then. >> it stinks to the high heaven what happened here. i don't like it.

>> they don't call it the hot seat for nothing. lawmakers want answers and promises. what do you want to hear from akio toyoda? >> i want to hear one, a commitment to change. >> reporter: the top republican on the committee says toyota must be held accountable, but as former head of an electronics manufacturer he's familiar with japanese business culture where diplomacy and defer rens are paramount, the exact opposite of a congress hearing. >> congress is famous for rude questions. i expect there will be some rude questions. >> reporter: he worries some lawmakers might go too far. >> you sound worried how are you committee will behave? >> i don't want to be embarrassed on behalf of the american people by not focusing to the important part. did government and industry do their job? if they didn't will they do it going forward? >> reporter: if mr. toyoda is

skewered by the committee, u.s.-japanese relations could be strained. >> if you have a situation in which these hearings go extremely poorly and gets splashed across the front pages of major newspapers and media in the united states and japan, i think you could have something that leads to a little bit of a difficult, uncomfortable relationship between the two countries. >> reporter: now one other factor that may add some sensitivity in how these lawmakers question mr. toyoda, american jobs supplied by toyota plants and dealerships here in the u.s. many in congress are actually toyota customers. listen to what they said at yesterday's hearing. >> toyota makes good cars. i've driven one. pleasurably and safely for years. >> drive a toyota. a camry hybrid who thus far has not been recalled. >> i was excited to get one of the very first camry hybrids. >> when it was time to replace

my 12-year-old car i went in search of a hybrid. i went in search of a camry. >> my two children who are now adults actually drive toyotas. >> reporter: outside of the capitol where there's a parking lot for members of congress we sometimes joke because there's so many priuses in the role. this is a personal issue. >> my son drives a camry hybrid which so far isn't involved. we'll see if that remains the case. thanks so much. coming up in 15 minutes time we're on the toyota money trail. many lawmakers who questioned toyota executives in the coming weeks has a big investment in a success. later we'll talk with a woman who relived her experience. she said the car tried to start itself after the whole horrible idea. now to a developing story. this morning 88 teachers in rhode island waking up to the

news they won't have a job next year. last night city trustees approved pink slips for every single teacher at a central false high school. the superintendent's attempt to fix the school where the teachers collect up to $78,000 a year while less than half the students graduate. here's randy kay with the latest. >> reporter: at central falls high school in rhode island where the poorest students in the state go to school, 75% of the district lives in poverty. a good education may be their only shot at a brighter future. so to give these students a better chance, central falls superintendent this week did something so radical, so unheard of, it's captured the nation's attention. she cleaned house. fired dozens of teachers because the district says they refused to spend more time with students to improve test scores. >> we have a serious problem where you have a 48% graduation

rate. we're losing more children than we graduate. >> reporter: central falls is one of the lowest performing schools in the state. of the 800 students, 65% are hispanic. for most english is a second language. half are failing every subject. just 55% are skilled in reading. only 7% proficient in math. meanwhile the majority of their teachers are earning between 72,000 and $78,000 a year. well above the national average. and the district says that teachers want even more money, as much as $90 an hour more for the extra time spent with students. this in a community where the latest census figures show the median income is 22,000. based on federal guidelines the superintendent propose teachers work a longer school day, seven hours. tutor students weekly for one hour outside of school time. have lunch with students often. meet for 90 minutes every week to discuss education.

and set aside two weeks during summer break for paid professional development. a spokesman for the school district told me the teacher's union wanted to negotiate the changes. so the superintendent felt she had no choice but to fire all 88 teachers for the next school year. >> i'm disheartened. i feel like after 20 years i can see some progress beginning to be made. and i'm sad that we're not going to be around to follow that through to push that forward. >> reporter: a spokesman for the eacher's union called the firings drastic and told me in the last two years, reading scores have gone up 21%, math scores have gone up 3%. the spokesman said the teachers agreed to most of the changes but wanted to discuss compensation for the extra hours of work. >> so was firing all 88 teachers the best way to solve this problem? sound off now on cnn.com. >> there's a snowstorm coming. grab the snow boots before you

leave for work. the east coast is about to get a double whammy from hudson valley to western new england. rain, sleet and snow. a foot of snow in some places. so, eight minutes after the hour let's get a quick check of this morning's weather headlines. >> keeping us in business. take a look at the radar. this is the storm that's affecting you today and will come to an end later this afternoon. heavy snow still, especially north of say poughkeepsie into albany. that's greeting number one. greeting number two is the upler level low spinning around chicago. that's drifting slowly to the east and will kind of get stuck there. item number three is the snow that was in texas yesterday, blowing across mississippi, alabama. that energy will be getting into the atlantic ocean and start to take shape as a pretty good snowstorm, very good one, actually as we go through the next 48 hours. who gets the snow, who gets the

rain is the tough call. the major cities will definitely start out as rain. then change over to snow. one thing is for sure is, a big wind will come around with this. we'll see blizzard conditions at least in upstate new york and northern new england. will that make it all the way down to big cities? that's the big question we have to tackle here over the next 12 hours. more details in 30 minutes. new york will see five to ten inches of snow. better bet is north and west of the city as always. >> all right. we'll get our red parka and snow boots out ready to go here in new york. thanks. lawless in afghanistan, not taliban insurgents, military contractors, reckless behavior included using the name of a south park character to sign out high powered weapons. chest tube, $1100. needle $800. cost of saving your life? astronomy cal.

dr. sanjay gupta breaks down the price tag for a trip to the operating room. alec baldwin, got an emmy for "30 rock." why is he telling cnn he's ready to give it all up? ten minutes past the hour. [ lighting a match ] ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] you've wanted to quit smoking so many times, but those days came and went and the cigarettes remained. ♪

today's a new day. talk to your doctor about prescription treatment options and support. and this time, make it your time.

♪ welcome back to "the most news in the morning." a senate investigation is slamming the military contractor formerly known as blackwater. senator carl levin head of the armed services committee says the company operated in afghanistan with no regard for rules and no government oversight. one contract skbroernl signed out hundreds of high powered weapons by using the name eric hartman from the south park cartoon. our pentagon correspondent chris lawrence is following the story for us this morning. >> reporter: private mercenari search running around afghanistan with no accountability, taking weapons, shooting civilians. that's the picture being painted by a congressional investigation. >> what you need is oversight

and hopefully this hearing is going to lead to dramatically better oversight. >> reporter: last spring cnn brought you and interview with one of the contractors now charged with murdering two afghan civilians. >> when i got out of the vehicle i had no weapon in my hands. >> reporter: this investigation alleges a series of problems that nobody caught led up to that shooting. it goes back more than two years and involves blackwater which now calls itself xe and the company it created to get work in afghanistan called caravan. congressional investigators say a blackwater employee took 300 ak-47s from a storage bunker, guns set aside for afghan police. both the company and the defense department admit there's no paper work to document it. 300 assault rifles, no receipt. when a new rule required afghan officers to sign for any weapons, blackwater takes

another 200 rifles out of the bunker. who signs for it? eric hartman. there's a south park character by that name. but blackwater told investigators for eric hartman ever worked for the company. and blackwater admits quote, contractors should not have been armed without the proper approvals. later that year, one contractor accidentally shoots another trainer in the head, partially paralyzing him. the company reports to it the military as the reckless use of an unauthorized weapon. senator carl levin said the right people never read it. >> if that shooting back in december of '08 had been investigated it would have been discovered personnel were using weapons unsafely, improperly, inadequate supervision. >> reporter: flash forward to may of last year. on a dark, dusty road in kabul,

blackwater contract skrors with unauthorized weapons opened fire on afghan civilians they saw as a threat. the incident cost the u.s. military goodwill among some afghans and sparked a diplomatic incident. >> reckless behavior by caravan contractors helped set the stage, government oversight failed and thirdly blackwater broke the rules relating to weapons. >> reporter: teen military's investigating officer admits that contractors in that incident were poorly supervised and the army has got to take some responsibility for that. but there's a real confusion over exactly who is supposed to hold these contractors accountable. a new proposal would create one central agency to sort of oversee them all. john? >> interesting that we had all of these questions about this organization back in iraq and now hearing the same things under a new name in afghanistan.

chris lawrence for us this morning. thanks so much. next up the toyota money trail. we'll poll the cash for you. not the cash that you pay out of your pocket for the toyota car, we'll follow the cash from the car company to capitol hill and see just what all of that money buys, especially now that its safety is in question and the company is under fire in the u.s. that's coming up next.

♪ good morning to the folks in washington this morning. they will be seeing the head honcho from toyota later on today. car companies have a lot of problems. no question about that. the company also has a lot of friends in washington. high powered, high priced friends. christine is finding out who they are. what they get from toyota and how far toyota's influence reaches. >> as the hearing takes place later we want to give you and in

depth look on toyota's ties to congress. first the money. in the last five years toyota spent $25 million lobbying congress in comparison fellow japanese imports honda and nissan spent only $1 million more than toyota combined. toyota also has 31 registered lobbyists, eight of whom are former officials from congress and the executive branch. toyota also has ties to three of the richest members of congress, to the congressman who called these hearings. congresswoman jane harmon sits on one of the congressional committees. she reports she held tens of thousands of dollars stock in toyota. she's announcing she will recuse herself and won't participate in the investigation of this company. other members with connections to toyota are staying in the game like senator j. rockefeller of west virginia, toyota

sponsored and paid for in part a dinner where rockefeller was honored last year and toyota runs a plant in rockefeller's home state that created 1500 jobs and close to a billion dollars in investment. his staff says he'll stay with the investigation and be tough on toyota if he thinks they deserve it. but, john, let's be honest here. this is the way it works in every industry. they have a lot of ties to that revolving door of lobbyists. >> exactly. they are the ones who know how things work and have the access and connections. >> the toyota situation is not that unique in that it has such great deep ties to congress. >> let's go to the defense contractors. here's a little salt in toyota's wounds this morning. "consumer reports" has named japanese rival honda and subaru the best all around cars for american drivers. that's four straight years that honda earned top marks.

ford earned the highest domestic marks and chrysler got the lowest grades. one thing we should point out a lot of people say say toyota but the ceo's name is toyoda. here's the way the legend goes. seems to be the correct thing. when you write the tame toyoda with a d, it takes ten strokes of a brush to write the japanese characters. a couple of hash marks. toyota only takes eight. eight is a lucky number in many asian cultures. somewhere along the lines toyoda changed to toyota. >> the logo was streamlined when they were doing this little thing for marketing that's what they did. >> so the legend goes. 23 minutes after the hour. stay with us.

welcome back to "the most news in the morning." the u.s. may be more than $12 trillion in the red. but it's moving forward this morning on plans for a new $1 billion, yes $1 billion embassy in london. it's quite fancy. it will sit along the river and protected by a manmade moat. a waste of money? u.s. officials say the cost is needed to ensure the building's security. >> if they were looking for swoeg a m om-- something with a couldn't they look for an old castle. all this week we're focusing on broken government. what's broken? today we're looking a look at state budgets. dozens of them facing staggering

short falls. what's the fix? in places like pennsylvania they are betting on casinos to close budget gaps. carol costello spent weeks traveling the country to find out what americans are facing. some people thinking banking on casinos is another example of broken government. >> thank you. >> reporter: life can be sweet at the rivers casino. most come here for fun. but others come for cash. >> winning. >> actually it helps some people in a recession if they get lucky enough to win. >> hard. i'm down here most of the time to try to get some money. the most i ever won? $82. >> reporter: he didn't have to travel all the way to vegas to win it. rivers casino is in his backyard, pittsburgh. actually there are lots of casinos now or soon to be in the nation's backyard.

39 out of the 50 states to be exact. but not everybody is feeling lucky. in philadelphia some say the proliferation of casinos is a clear sign government is broken. with seven casinos already up and running in pennsylvania, problems remain. >> housing still is broken. joblessness, still is too high. government has failed and our politicians continue to fail us. >> reporter: reverend jesse brown and a dozen others were thrown into jail, protesting the construction of two more casinos on philadelphia's waterfront. they accused politicians of partnering with casino owners to convince voters ga errs gamblin only way out of a bad economy. >> it's teaming up with a predatory industry. >> along this whole river bank here -- >> reporter: stan gilbert owns the cleveland cavaliers. he and his partners spent $50

million to convince recession weary ohioans to allow casino gambling. >> critics say that ohio's economy is so bad and people are so down trodden right now that it's easy to exploit them at this particular time to push through something they may not want in the future. >> it's happening anywhere. ohio voters are leaving the state every sing of them. thousands driving to detroit or west virginia or indiana. we really see this thing as a revitalization or a piece of a revitalization of the urban cores of the cities in ohio that we're going to be in. >> reporter: casinos are money makers. >> january was our best month ever. the numbers will get better and better. >> reporter: that's a god send for pennsylvania's governor. he says casino gambling produced $2 billion in tax revenue and 8,000 jobs. >> there are some people who don't like gaming but the overwhelming population in the state would prefer gaming

producing tax revenue than an increase in taxes that they pay. >> reporter: in fact, at the rivers casino, some think the governor is right. >> i don't think it's a problem at all. i don't think it detracts from anything. i hope this helps with our property taxes in the long run. >> reporter: as i told you, 39 states have or will have some form of casino gambling but 48 states have some form of gambling like a lottery or horse racing. can we reach 50? you tell me. like to know what you think of this. can we gamble our way out of a recession. send your comments to my blog, cnn.com/amfix. want to know what you think about that this morning. john >> so carole some states are saying like pennsylvania brings in a tremendous amount of revenue. there's also the argument if they go outside of the state to gamble might as well have gambling in-state. what that other fellow said about how we hoped in the long run it helps with our property

taxes, is there any indication that would happen? >> reporter: governor rendell says it does pay for some property taxes and it does relieve the tax burden. the problem is so many states have casino gambling now that you only get revitalization like around those casinos. but it doesn't like, you know, it doesn't like go all over the state, for example. that's what gambling experts tell me anyway. >> so they are actually thinking it could lower property taxes with these revenues? >> reporter: that's what governor rendell says. a lot of people say why not invest the money, mr. casino owner in a manufacturing plant or in small businesses and something else besides gambling that does prey on a tiny percentage of americans that have a problem with gambling. >> fascinating story. thanks. checking our top stories as we cross the half hour chilling details coming out this morning about the attacks police say zazi was planning for new york city. ray kelly says zazi and two

other men wanted to blow up bombs during the rush hour on the new york subway. he's pleaded guilty to three terror related charges. former vice president dick cheney still recovering this morning in a d.c. hospital. tests show the former vice president had a mild heart attack on monday. his fifth since 1978. cheney spokesman said he's feeling fine and could be sent home as early as today. grab your boots as you leave for work today. back-to-back winter storm are bearing down on the northeast. rob marciano says most of the snow from the one-two punch will fall upstate of new york east of the hudson river. winter storm watches are in effect for new york city, fifrl and washington, d.c. in just a few hours toyota's ceo will answer questions on capitol hill. there's accusations the company has been arrow began and way too late with its response to response of runaway cars. yesterday his chief of sales in the u.s. sat and listened to a woman relive her runaway ride in a lexus.

>> i wanted to hear his voice. after six miles god intervened as the car came very slowly to a stop. >> joining us now live from washington is rhonda smith and her husband. an emotional story you told, a terrifying six miles. your car operating without you having any control here. you told this story with such incredible poise. i want you to tell our viewers again what led up to these moments and what happened here in this car, a lexus es 350, rhonda? >> well, as i said before, i was traveling, i had just entered the interstate, and i had

accelerated into the traffic. and i took -- i was going to decelerate as i took my foot off the accelerator and the cruise light came on, and the car continued to accelerate, and i thought it was something to do with the cruise. so i took off the cruise and the car continued to accelerate. >> it got up to 100 miles per hour. the last time you could look down and see how fast you were going you were going 100 miles an hour. >> yes. >> speeding ahead. at one point you finally decided, you're on your blue tooth, you called your husband. you felt like you just needed to hear his voice. you thought this was the end. >> yeah, ma'am. >> eddie, what did you think when you heard your wife and what she was telling you. this terrifying 911 call to your husband. honey i'm going 100 miles per hour and i don't think i'll make it. >> i really felt like it was probably the last time i was going to talk to her in a just

waited to hear the crash. and hoped to be able to talk to her, probably would not have been. what i was hearing going on. >> rhonda, why did the car stop? when did it stop and what did you do then? >> well, the car didn't stop until -- i think what was left of the brakes finally took hold whenever -- it finally decelerated to the point where the brakes took hold and i pull it over to the side of the road. then i know it got down to like 35 miles per hour and i had the ignition pushed but it did not cut off until 33 miles per hour. at that point, though, the radio still played and the interior lights were still on. >> must have been terrified when you pulled that car over and tried to get out. tell me about toyota and the response from toyota. you immediately began corresponding with this company to say something was wrong with your car. what happened and how was there

interaction with you? >> there wasn't much interaction. we started calling toyota and kept getting the response that they would call us back and we would call again and they said they would call us back that day or the next day and they wouldn't call us back. and so we emailed and we didn't get response from them so finally we called the dealership and asked them if they had heard from toyota. and they had said that they would send a technician out to the dealership, for no one to touch the car at the dealership. they did send a technician out. the technician inspected whatever that means, inspected the car, and they told us that nothing was wrong the car, that the car was fine. >> this was your fault? the implication is that somehow this was a driver error or a wandering floor mat or maybe. in your heart you have always said this is some sort of electronic problem in my car. c

pulled over the engine was racing ahead. you think this is something electronic in this car? >> yes. well the car even tried to start itself. when my husband put it on neutral to put it up on the wrecker. he put it in neutral which you shouldn't be able to do without starting the car. whenever he moved the gear shift into neutral the car tried to start. it rolled over about twice and tried to start by itself. so, the floor mats had nothing to do with it. >> what do you need to hear from the toyota president, the top voice, a man who says his name is on every one of these cars and quality and safety are his top concern. what do you want to hear from him today? what could he say to you that would erase these past months and years of questions four in >> nothing can erase it. i just want toyota to -- i want to know that they will take

their money and spend it wiser, and that -- i want them to be able to ensure increased quality control and try to start doing a better job with our cars and to quit lying to the public teen admit their sins and to try to correct the problems that they have out on the roads today, to make it safer for people in the future, and to try to do something for all those people in the past who have been injured. and to admit what they have done wrong in the past and to also admit that there is a problem with the electronics because the car that i drove, there was something wrong with the electronics to make it do all the things that it did. >> all right, rhonda smith, you experienced sudden acceleration and testified yesterday and her husband eddie smith who was on the phone with her who thought

she was driving her last miles in that lexus. thank you both for joining us. it's 37 minutes after the hour. theirs for up to 100,000 miles. which makes it pretty clear whose standing out front. a consumers digest "best buy" two years running. chevy malibu. compare it to anyone and may the best car win. now, get a low mileage lease on this 2010 malibu for around $199 a month for 39 months. call for details. see your local chevy dealer. we are building a website by ourselves. announcer: there's an easier way. create your own business site with intuit websites. just choose a style, then customize, publish and get found. sweet. get a 30-day free trial at intuit.com.

♪

welcome back to "the most news in the morning." actor alec baldwin who is a regular viewer of "american morning." he should be feeling, you should be feeling pretty good about your career because he just won an emmy and in less than two weeks he'll co-host the oscars. >> he's been on a roll lately. he talked with our alina cho who gets all the tough assignments. >> this one was really tough. he does watch "american morning." alec baldwin's star count be brighter. lead in a hit movie "it's complicated" and lady in "30 rock." but the actor has a bit of a complicated life an we recently sat down to talk about it. he's the politically incorrect boss on "30 rock." >> watching your lefty homo propaganda hour, yes.

>> let's it hang all out in "it's complicated." he's riding high. on the big and small screen. >> four screen actor guilds, two emmys -- did you ever think? >> no. no. no. but now that i have that -- >> now that he has that -- the 51-year-old actor is doing this. >> if you could do it over again what advice would you give yourself >> how many people here sing? everybody but you. all right. that's important. >> baldwin recently donated $1 million to his alma mater, tisch school of the arts to provide scholarships to students who love the craft and demonstrate financial need. >> i want to sit in on some of the auditions and they said to me we think it's a little

distracting. i said o-that's funny i never thought of it that way. >> baldwin is passionate about giving back. in the same way he's passionate about classical music. so much so he signed on to be the radio announcer for the new york philaharmonic. >> i wish i had done that with my life. to conduct. what could be better than that? >> maybe this. baldwin is rehearsing for his next gig. he and his co-star from "it's complicated" steve martin are co-hosting the oscars. are you nervous? >> oh very. >> what makes you nervous about. >> it's >> the show is not about us. you're like a waiter. you're not the show. you're not the meal. we're there to bring out the people that are the nominees. >> more dignified than funny but humor he says will play a role.

just like it does in the movies. >> can we talk a bit about the laptop scene? >> if you want to. cost me a lot but go right ahead. we'll do it if you must. if you need to satisfy some need you have. shave the hair. spray tan. i look like a gigantic lobster up there. >> it worked. "it's complicated" has grossed $200 million worldwide. >> will do you it? >> i don't know. i'm not an actor. >> baldwin a tabloid fixture says acting has taken its toll. he plans to quit once his contract with "30 rock" expires in 2012. >> as much as i like acting i know that i would love to have a different life. a private life. yeah. i think that doing this now for a living has become really, really hard. it's really hard.

and i would rather go do other things and have whatever amount of time i have left in my life have more of a normal life. >> that possible? you're already famous? >> i want to find out how close can i get. >> interesting. you know, so what exactly would alec baldwin do if he quit acting? politic ss a possibility. he's politically active. that's right. radio talk show host, remember he's the radio announcer for the new york philharmonic. conducting. he said it's the one thing he wished he had done with his life. he plans to take a year off. remember he has a few years left on his contract with "30 rock." he wants to mull over his option. >> he has an incredible voice. i love to listen to these nature shows and i swear i hear his voice. >> you like to untwined these

nature shows? >> some of them. nice shows about birds. sorry. >> thanks. he's a very, very funny guy. >> very talented. >> he and steve martin together should be great. >> 4r5 minutes past the hour. big snowstorm brewing up the east coast. rob will stop by with his travel forecast right after the break. >> another nature show right here on "american morning." my eyes water. but with new zyrtec® liquid gels, i get allergy relief at liquid speed. that's the fast, powerful relief of zyrtec®, now in a liquid gel. zyrtec® is the fastest 24-hour allergy medicine. it works on my worst symptoms so i'm ready by the time we get to the first hole. and that's good because the competition's steep today. new zyrtec® liquid gels work fast, so i can love the air.™

♪ good morning st. louis where it's cloudy and 20 degrees right now. later on today sunny and 31. >> sunny in st. louis, but snowy on the eastern seaboard. rob marciano will give us his travel and getting the kiddies ready for school forecast for the next couple of days. >> it's already snowed quite a bit north of the city. check out some of these snow totals. massachusetts 12 inches, goshen, vermont nine inches and killington 7.5 inches. four to eight additionally on top of what has already fallen, winter storm warning still in effect for upstate new york and parts of northern new england. winter storm watches have been posted for upstate new york the western side at least and parts of the delaware valley into jersey and washington, d.c. at this point 10 to 20, upstate

new york and eastern p.a. five to ten along the major city corridors. the precipitation forecast is touchy because we have a number of things coming together. item number one, some of this energy from today's storm will linger, team up with this guy which is an low, spinning with light snow across parts of chicago. snows across texas yesterday streaming into the south now, mississippi, alabama seeing scattered snow showers today. shouldn't amount to a whole lot but that energy will get across florida, across the delmarva and really bomb out into a very intense storm. it will start out as rain, wrap a lot of warm air into this thing, then change over to snow. again the 10 to 20-inch mark inland in the northeast and strong winds i think are going to be the bigger issue with this. the track of it and how long it sticks around is going to be the main thing. some of our computer models, john and christine, actually kind of retrograde it, move it back into the new york harbor as kind of almost like a land

falling storm of some sort. interesting to see if that pans out. either way, it is going to be a doozy. much different than the last one that brought two to three feet of snow. lighter snow but heavy winds for sure. >> that will at least temporarily cause just as much problem as the snow will. rob marciano for us, thanks. we'll be right back. whwhwhwh

after a year of fighting on capitol hill over health care, if the cost of a biopsy needing

is still $800, you might say something's definitely broken. this week we're tracking instances of "broken government." medical billing. how the hospital comes up with those numbers, why they're so high and how much you actually have to pay. it can all leave your head spinning. how to fix it? unfortunately, no clear answer. at least not yet. but we have our chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta taking a closer look today at what you can expect to pay on your next trip to the hospital. >> reporter: one of the questions that comes up all the time is what about these hospital bills. how exactly do they break down, how do you make sense of it? no question it leaves a lot of people scratching their heads. i want to take you inside this operating room. this is the hospital where i work, i am a neurosurgeon. just having an operation performed in a room like this costs about $3,000 an hour. for starters. come on in. give you a couple of quick examples. if you look at a hospital bill you might see an iv bag charge. about $280 just for the iv bag.

a stapler. this is often used in surgery. something like this? costs about $1,200. this is a chest tube. if someone has compression of one of their lungs they might need a chest tube like this. this costs about $1,100. you'll find examples like that all over a room like this. suture, something used in just about every operating room in the world, this type of suture costs about $200. even devices like -- this is a needle that's used for biopsy. if there is a concern that someone has a tumor, they would use a needle like this. this is going to cost about $800. if you ask the manufacturers of a device like this, why so much money? they'll say, well, it took years to develop something like this. the research and development costs are significant. also, the guaranteeing a certain level of effectiveness of this needle. that costs money as well. but something maybe you didn't know. a hospital bill is not just the cost of the supplies. there are also administrative costs built in. there is the cost of covering

people who simply don't have insurance or can't pay. that's built into these costs as well. finally, keep in mind that what is charged and what's ultimately paid are two very different numbers. >> the typical hospital collects about 4% of every $1 that they -- about 4 cents of every $1 that they bill. so it's not coming out in massive profits. it's coming out as a result of underpayment from the government. >> reporter: i'll tell you, the cost breakdown like i just gave you on lots of these different supplies, a lot of people simply never see. what we have found is a lot of people don't care as well. if you're insured, some people may not even open the hospital bill. but there are about 50 million people uninsured out there and they care very much about hospital bills like this. what you can do is you can call the hospital and get a detailed breakdown. while you're on the phone with the hospital, if the costs seem still too high or just hard to understand, you might be able to negotiate some of these prices down. if you dig a little bit deeper,

talk to the hospitals themselves, for example, they'll say, look, we're not seeing the massive profits that you might expect. in fact, about 50% of hospitals operating in the red, in part, because reimbursements i just outlined there, john. but makers of a lot of these products, a makers of a lot of these devices, at least some of them seem to be doing okay. 3m for example makes adhesives, stethoscopes, about $935 million in profits last recorded. medtronic, a company that makes a lot of other devices, including defibrillators, made around $831 million. so you get a little bit of an idea of where the money is going and how that all works as far as your bill goes, john. >> you can understand, as you pointed out in the o.r. there, biopsy needing, $8 $800. did take some development. but $200 for stitches? where does that come from? >> i know. a lot of it is the same thing. you are investing in a little bit of the quality, reliability of this. this is something that's going to be used in someone's body

obviously. you pay, in part, for that. but you're right, when you look at these numbers sort of on first blush, you think, well, how could it possibly be so high? one thing that's worth pointing out, again, when it comes to the big insurance companies, they're going to negotiate prices with these hospitals to try and bring it down. you heard 4 cents on the $1 for some of these places. if you're under insured or uninsured you have the ability to negotiate for yourself, even ask to pay what some of the biggest insurance companies are paying at your hospital. one website, smartmedicalconsumer.com. you can take your hospital bill, upload it to this site, they'll break it down and tell you where you can actually save money. >> that actually works? a hospital will listen to you? you have some negotiating power? >> you do. insurance companies negotiate because they have large numbers. that's how they negotiate with a hospital. but the way things stand is often people are underinsured or uninsured or even have just high

deductibles. they can negotiate as well, even ask, "make my prices the same as what the largest provider is paying to the hospital." medicare or maybe a big insurance company. >> i'll try that next time. sanjay gupta this morning, doc, thanks so much. we've got your top stories coming your way in 90 seconds. is he in? he's in copenhagen. oh, well, that's nice. but you can still see him! you just said he was in... copenhagen. come on! that's pretty far. doc, look who's in town. ellen! copenhagen? cool, right? vacation. but still seeing patients. oh. [ whispering ] workaholic. i heard that. she said it. i... [ female announcer ] the new office. see it. live it. share it. on the human network. cisco. [ engine revs ] [ indistinct conversations ] [ engine revs ] [ indistinct conversations ] [ tires squeal ] [ indistinct conversations ] [ engine revs ] [ glass shattering ]

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good morning. thanks for being with us on the most news in the morning on this wednesday, the 24th of february. i'm john roberts. >> i'm christine romans in for kiran chetry this morning. 8:00 on the nose on the east coast. toyota's chief facing questions on capitol hill today. he is expected to say he's deeply sorry to his customers and admit his companies veered off from its safety-first philosophy. brianna keilar is live in the hearing room. a pair of powerful winter storms bearing down on the northeast. some cities could be paralyzed by blizzard conditions come friday. rob marciano's in the extreme weather center for us tracking both systems and snowfall totals that could be on the ground by the weekend. broken governments taking a big gamble. states like pennsylvania betting on casinos to close their budget shortfalls.

not everyone thinks it is a risk worth taking. >> it's a quick fix. it is a scheme, frankly. it is teaming up with a predatory industry. >> there are some people who don't like gaming, but the overwhelming population in the state would prefer gaming producing tax revenue than an increase in taxes that they pay. >> casino gambling a sound idea in a severe recession or another example of broken government at work? a special report straight ahead. but first, it's time for mr. toyota to talk. in just a few hours, the namesake, the company's top man comes to washington and will face a traditional capitol hill grilling. lawmakers, dealers and millions of drivers hoping they get answers. they got something they didn't want to hear yesterday when a top executive said repairs made during the current recall won't guarantee an end to those sudden acceleration problems. toyota executives also heard from a woman who shared her horror story with her run-away

lexus. >> i placed both feet on the brake after i firmly engaged the emergency brake and nothing slows the car. i figure the car was going to go its maximum speed and i was going to have to put the car in the upcoming guardrail in order to prevent killing anyone else. and i prayed for god to help me. >> we spoke to rhonda smith earlier. she's sharply critical of this company, called for toyota to "quit lying to the public." we literally have this story covered around the globe. brianna keilar is on capitol hill inside the hearing room with a preview of what to expect. and live from tokyo, on why mr. toyoda's expected apology. briana, to you first. what's it look like there? >> this is the hearing room of the house oversight committee that's having this hearing today. and this is going to be where mr. toyoda will sit and face this committee. he's on the second panel so once this hearing gets under way at

about 11:00 eastern, it is probably going to be an hour or so before we hear from him. then these are where the tough questions are going to come from, like the chairman of the committee, ed towns. this is where congressman elijah cummings from maryland will be sitting. yesterday he told me he wants to know what toyota knew, what they knew it and mr. cummings is in, i guess, tv parlance what you would say, pretty good for a sound bite. he tends to really engage witnesses so we're wondering if he's going to do that as well. then over here you have congressman john mika, a republican from florida. in the last hearing it was treasury secretary tim geithner who was up and he actually accused him of having lame excuses. this is a contact sport in general, a congressional hearing. but this is going to be the type of questioning mr. toyoda is not

used to getting. >> certainly a culture clash. this is not something a japanese executive would ever face on their home territory. we understand mr. toyoda will get a little special treatment as he heads to the hearing. >> yeah, i'll take you outside the hearing room so you can see the media is already lining up. the special treatment he's going to get if it's unlocked -- that's horrible. that's just what you don't want on television. can we unlock it here we go. all right. so this is what even just three hours ahead of the hearing, this is over here, you can see members of the public are starting to line up. this is the route that mr. toyoda will take. this is where the japanese media will get. the special treatment that he's getting, all of us members of the press are essentially going to be penned up. normally when a witness comes they would walk down the hall and honestly we almost crush

them in a scrum trying to get a question in. yesterday the head of toyota u.s. was buffered by police. but we'll have to be yelling questions at him from afar because we won't be able to sidle up to him as we did yesterday with the head of toyota u.s. >> but we will be yelling questions from afar. i'm sure you will, too. >> as briana said, mr. toyoda will not be used to the treatment he's about to get in morning. more on the man and his plans for today. good morning. >> reporter: good morning, john. we did get a preview of his testimony, what he is expected to say. we are expecting early on that he will apologize on behalf of his multi-national company. he will say, "i am deeply sorry for any accidents that toyota drivers have experienced." we're also expecting that he will admit that toyota just grew

too quickly and as a result we saw some of these recalls. but something else i do want to point out, i want to steal a couple of words from briana. she mentioned in d.c. she'll see a bit of a contact sport in that hearing. that's something that just doesn't exist here. it is so foreign a concept. this is something that is going to be completely new for akio toyoda in his own mind, but also for people watching here in japan. the language itself in japan is not a direct language so everything about this is going to be very foreign. we are going to be watching this very closely because we are expecting that there may be a number of gaps. we are also looking to see what kind of issues are going to be with translation that could benefit him because he will have time to think about some of these answers. but japanese being an indirect language, lawmakers in the united states may read that as being evasive. john? >> so, it might slow things down so you won't get that rapidfire

back-and-forth. but if have you a question that's then translated, and an answer that's then translated back, could that potentially work against him, something that, to quote the movie, gets lost in translation? >> absolutely. and when you hear japanese translated, there is no subject in a sentence. so nothing about the language is very direct so it could potentially be very frustrating for lawmakers who, in english, we fully say, "i" "you" "we" and speak very directly. that's not the case in japanese. it could be very interesting. . >> thanks. cnn is the place to be for the hearing. see it live starting at 11:00 eastern on cnn and if you can't get to a television set you can watch it on your computer. just don't let the boss see do you it at work, cnn.com/live. we are tracking a big winter storm system moving up the east coast. i feel like i have said this before. last week? the week before? >> maybe.

going all the way back to the week before christmas. >> i know. rob marciano's tracking this one for us. looks like it will bring some precip, as you say. >> different kinds of precip for different people. this is the fourth major storm of the season. this one at least for a lot of folks will start out as rain. a lot of things coming together. we have to get you this what's left over of today's storm or yesterday's storm and that's in the form of snow across parts of northern new england and upstate new york. the rains will be coming to an end at least for the time being across the new york city area. out to the west, chicago some snow wrapping around thisversin east -- the root structure of it, if you will. this piece of energy which brought snow to texas bringing some scattered light snow showers across the deep south once again. can't believe this is not shocking anymore. this energy is going to ride up the eastern seaboard and bomb out really explode in intensity. wind will be a huge issue with this. wrapping in warm air, rain to start, then turning to snow.

that will limit snow in major cities. at least 10 to 20 inches of snow in the forecast. more details about this beast in about 30 minutes. john and christine, back to you. >> looking forward to it. can never get enough information about weather when bad stuff is moving in. the undertaker may have cheated death the other way. the popular wrestler whose real name is mark callaway is recovering from minor burns to his chest. he was entering the ring if st. louis last weekend. watch that there -- whoops. he had his usual exploding fireballs there. little timing problem with the pyrotechnics causes his jacket to catch fire. he took off the jacket, tossed it aside. got checked out by a ringside doctor. then went ahead and went on with the match. >> that's why we put the pyrotechnics for american mornings out of the question. just too risky. >> i know a couple of people in rock bands who have had pyrotechnics go off at the wrong time. >> michael jackson had the very famous injury in the '90s i think for that pepsi commercial. coming up, toyota still on

this story. incredibly important to millions of you out there who drive one or know somebody who does drive a toyota. fueling more questions about broken government. national highway traffic safety administration. problems there? solutions there? is the government part of this problem with toyota? we'll collection it out. when you want a bank that travels with you. with you when you're ready for the next move. [ male announcer ] now that wells fargo and wachovia have come together, what's in it for you? unprecedented strength, the stability of the leading community bank in the nation and with 12,000 atms and thousands of branches, we're with you in more ways and places than ever before. with you when you want the most from your bank. [ male announcer ] wells fargo. together we'll go far.

witpacific life can help...most fretirement,nk. using 401k savings, life insurance, and annuities to provide a dependable income for the rest of your life. with more than 140 years of experience, pacific life can help you achieve your vision of the future. ask your financial professional about pacific life... the power to help you succeed. news in the morning. toyota executives aren't the only ones taking some heat over the safety of toyota cars. national highway traffic safety administration's also under fire. agency is supposed to investigate potential safety defects. many say it is just another example of broken government. overworked and underfunded.

allen camm retired in 2000, now the director of the highway traffic safety associates in washington this morning. you were there a quarter of a century. some today are saying wait a minute, why did this agency -- why didn't this agency come out sooner with these problems? tell me what this agency is made of and why maybe it might not be up to the task. >> well, it's a relatively small agency. i think it's understaffed and underfunded relative to its mission and vehicles have become a whole lot more complex in recent years with electronic componentry and software and the agency staff has not grown to keep up with the complexity of the mission. >> like ray lahood who runs this agency now, he says it is their urging, their own investigation that helped prod this company into instigating some of its own actions on the recall.

doesn't that show an agency that's being proactive right now? >> well, in the last few weeks, certainly the secretary has been outspoken and i think set the priority for the agency and its staff to focus in on toyota. but the last few weeks doesn't make up for several years when sudden acceleration was not a high priority. >> why wasn't it -- why wasn't sudden acceleration a high priority? rhonda smith said her lexus was just barreling forward. she says that she -- its investigator basically said she was, you know, lying, that they didn't believe her. is there an internal bias against some of these claims? >> historically, yes. at least up until the last few weeks. about 20 years ago, in 1989, nhtsa commissioned a study done by the transportation research center in cambridge, massachusetts which then look at sudden acceleration and could find no cause for it so they

concluded that it must be pedal misapplication which is to say that the vehicle operator was erroneously stepping on the gas pedal when they thought they were stepping on the brake. and it became sort of a institutional bias or culture among defect investigators at nhtsa to say sudden acceleration means pedal misapplication and that consumers who claim sudden acceleration were mistaken, that they just erroneously stepped on the gas pedal. >> in some cases, these are consumers who have been driving their whole life who have said to toyota which this was not me misapplying my footing. you hear that again and again from people. let me ask you about the internal sort of expertise then, i guess, on these very complex cars. i heard an analyst say they are the equivalent of four high-end pcs in every one of these cars.

really incredible complexity of the electronics. even if toyota says that maybe it grew too quickly to keep up with its own safety, that it got so complicated and so big to keep up with the safety, is nhtsa keeping up then if the company itself can't keep up? >> the mission is very daunting for the agency and the agency's staff hasn't been increased sufficiently to keep up with these complexities, particularly in the electronics area. i heard yesterday's congressional hearing, there seemed to be some misunderstanding that the agency staff had told the congressional staff they had no electronic -- no electrical engineers and the secretary thought, well, the agency may have two electrical engineers. they don't necessarily work in the office of defects investigation. realistically, whether there is zero or two, it is insufficient given the amount of electronic componentry on vehicles today.

>> the faa has senz of thousates of employees. allan kam, thanks so much. we continue our look at broken government in a few minutes. this time around, national security. is it broken and as a result is america at risk? and what do you do when your coach tells to you change lanes? you give up a gold medal. wait until you see this. wait until you see this. 18 minutes after the hour. ♪

welcome back to the most news in the morning. 20 minutes after the hour. it's time for "minding your business." the british government has granted protective status to the historic recording studios in london, made famous by the

beatles. reports last week indicated the studio's owner was planning to sell the building. now with its protected status it will be more difficult for any owner to make changes to that facility. with fewer people eating out, many upscale restaurants here are trying to lure you in with cheaper booze and discounted appetizers. placed like the cheat caesecake factory, had offering to try to fill tables. >> mid level restaurants like that hurting, but high-end restaurants you can't get a table. they say breaking up is hard do. that may explain why so many people are getting out of relationships these days using a technique called digital dumping. it is a cheapening of society. in a survey of 2,000 people, 47% admitted to breaking up with

someone, either by sending them an e-mail or changing their relationship status on facebook without telling their partner. the electronic version of the "dear john" letter. >> that's just wrong. >> show a little respect! even if you don't want to be in a relationship anymore, go there, break up in person. come on! >> break up in person! be a man. break up in person! >> come on! man up! woman up! break up with somebody, do it in person. at the vancouver games, no medal and a lot of heartache for dutch skater sven kramer. >> he was doing fantastically. the coach says, hey! you're in the wrong lane! move over! following his coach's advice, kramer skated the final eight laps but he had been in the right lane. completely disqualified from the 10,000 meter contest. south korea took the gold instead. the coach is like, whoops, my fault. he didn't even want to acknowledge that the coach exirsed. can you imagine how terrible you

would feel? four years to get to that point! you've skated about 8,000 meters, then he says, oh, hey, move over. >> the pressure and intensity of that moment, too. >> now there's a person you break up with in person. boom! >> john! >> couldn't do that in an e-mail. broken government. can we gamble our way out of the recession? carol costello will that have broken government report next.

25 minutes after the hour. that means it's time for an "am original," something you'll see only on "american morning." this week we're focusing on "broken government," today zeroing in on broken state budget. dozens facing staggering sho ii shortfalls. >> what's the fix? places in pennsylvania, carol, what did you find out? sl can we gamble our way out after budget crisis? casinos are popping up all over the place and paying enormous state taxes. this money in turn pays for all sorts of things for the state like education, property tax, fire departments. but some say it is an easy way out. because our politicians can't think of anything better.

>> thank you! yay! >> reporter: life can be sweet at the rivers casino. most come here for fun. but others come for cash. >> winning. >> i won $250. >> it actually helps the people in the recession if they get lucky enough to win. >> kind of hard. that's why i'm down here most of the time, to try to get some money. the most i ever won? $82. >> reporter: he didn't have to travel all the way to vegas to win it. rivers casino is in his backyard -- pittsburgh. actually, there are lots of casinos now, or soon to be in the nation's backyard. 39 out of the 50 states, to be exact. but not everybody's feeling lucky. >> no casinos, no way! >> reporter: in philadelphia, some say the proliferation of casinos is a clear sign government is broken. with seven casinos already up and running in pennsylvania, problems remain. >> housing still is broken. joblessness, still is too high.

government has failed and now politicians continue to fail us. >> reporter: reverend jesse brown and a dozen others were cuffed and thrown into jail protesting the construction of two more casinos on philadelphia's waterfront. they accuse politicians of partnering wi inin ining with co convince voters gambling is the only way out. >> it is a scheme, frankly, teaming up with a predatory industry. >> where will the casino be? >> along this whole riverbank -- >> dan cleveland owns the cleveland car leaves. he and his partner spent $50 million to convince recession-weary ohioans to allow gambling. >> they would say ohio's economy is so bad, it is easy to exploit them at this particular time to push through something they may not want in the future. >> it is happening anyway.

ohio voters are leaving the state every day, thousands of them, driving to detroit or west virginia, driving to indiana. we rarely see this thing as a revitalization or a piece of a revitalization of the urban cores of the cities in ohio that we'll be in. >> reporter: clearly casinos are money makers. >> january was our best month ever. the numbers are just going to get better and better. >> reporter: that's a godsend for pennsylvania's governor. he says casino gambling has produced $2 billion in tax revenue and 8,000 jobs. >> there are some people who don't like gaming but the overwhelming population in the state would prefer gaming producing tax revenue than an increase in taxes that they pay. >> reporter: in fact, at the rivers casino, some bet the governor's right. >> i don't think it is a problem at all. i don't think it detracts from anything. i hope this helps us with our property taxes in the long run. >> as i told you, 39 states have or will have some form of casino

gambling, but 48 states have some form of gambling like a lottery or horse racing. can we reach 50? you tell me. i've been asking you to send in your comments to my blog this morning and john and christine, they've been flying in. >> what you got? >> i was wondering if you were going to ask me what people were saying. i'm going to tell you right now. this is from mark. he says, oklahoma, the buckle of the bible belt has nearly as many casinos as churches. we offer our citizens many retirement plans, the wheel of luck, powerbell and the hot lotto. this from mel, oh, no, my blackberry is malfunctioning and i can't read the one from mel. wait. i'll go back into to this t. meantime, cnn.com/amfix. mel says, alabama's one of those states that could benefit from legal gambling and/or a lottery. everyone in my area goes regularly to mississippi to

gamble or tennessee or georgia to buy lottery tickets. why not have it so alabama benefits? so people are split on this issue. >> all right. carol costello on the blackberry this morning. hopefully she won't get one of those break-up e-mails. >> i hope not. that would be really bad. >> thanks, carol. president obama wants to double u.s. exports over the next five years. that is a tall order by any stretch of the imagination. but can his plan level the playing field, fix america's trade deficit and help american workers and companies compete with cheap foreign labor? that's "broken government" tomorrow right here on "american morning." crossing the half-hour. that means it is time for this morning's top stories. toyota's chief facing questions on capitol hill today. he is expected to admit his company veered off from its safety-first philosophy which led to a recall of more than 8 million vehicles. it may not be long before women will be allowed to serve on u.s. navy subs. defense secretary robert gates has notified congress he is

ready to end a policy that bans them. that means changes would have to be made like adding his and hers quarters to the submarine fleet. female cadets who graduate from the naval academy this year could be among the first assigned to submarine posts. a billboard campaign in atlanta has sparked a debate over abortion and race. the message clearly meant to shock says black children an endangered species. people behind the billboard say abortion is devastating the black community. critics say the ads distract from more important issues facing african-americans. earlier on "american morning" we heard from both sides. >> these numbers depict a high rate of abortions in the atlanta area. but now if you look at the numbers on the reverse side, we see that there are so many children that are being born out of wedlock, and that number is staggering. so i don't know how this group can come in and now change our

agenda. >> i understand that there are social justice issues that need to be addressed, but we are not demonizing black women. what we are saying that the abortion industry has targeted specifically the black community. >> according to the centers for disease control, georgia ranks third in the country in the number of reported abortions performed on black women behind new york and texas. all this week cnn is digging deeper on signs of broken government. our focus right now -- national security. recently a new study funded by congress found the nation's main counterterrorism center is struggling because of tensions between different agencies. so how flawed is our national security system and what can be done to fix it? joining me now from washington, former cia analyst paul pillar and cnn national security contributor fran townsend. fran, this new study of the national counterterrorism center was conducted before the christmas day bombing attempt but it did find that it is

struggling from flawed staffing and internal cultural clashes. how broken is national security and the national intelligence community? >> you know, john, from the very inception of the national counterterrorism center one of its challenges was, most of its staff is what's called detailed from other federal agencies. what that means is, their core staff, hundreds of people, come from the fbi, justice department, other pieces of the federal government and they are assigned there temporarily, maybe for 12 to 24 months. then they go back to their home agencies. while it is a good thing to put people in those inner agencies sort of environments, what it means is it doesn't have a core staff that owns the mission, owns the success of the organization, and they don't shed their loyalties to their home agencies. after all the home agencies are the people who evaluate and pay them. >> paul, you've seen the cia from the inside. how big are challenges facing intelligence officials now and if you were to end this detailing process that fran townsend just talked about at

the national counterterrorism center, would that go some distance to fixing the problems there? >> well, i think that report about the nctc, the national counterterrorism center, shows us that changing the wiring diagram, reorganizing, redrawing the lines and boxes on the organization chart really isn't a solution. the nctc was set up as part of the re-organization that the 9/11 commission came up with five years ago. basically we're faced with trade-offs here and no perfect solution. fran's quite right about the disadvantages of detailing. but if we had a permanent core in nctc there would be an offsetting disadvantage. this would be another separate organization and we'd probably hear more in the future after the next terrorist attack about how that core of people in that agency didn't communicate with other agencies. >> okay. what's the solution? >> there isn't "a" solution. main problem is the lack of understanding with the inherent challenges of the business. we'll re-organize, continue to

re-organize. by the way, each time we do that there is a cost in disruption. inherent challenge of trying to find terrorist needles in a huge haystack of non-terrorists will always be a challenge. >> fran, i guess before 9/11 the problem was we used too much technology to try to gather intelligence. human quotient was way down. they were trying to repair that post-9/11. has that made a difference? what would you do to fix it if you were in charge? >> part of the issue we struggled with post-9/11 was rebuilding the human intelligence capability at the cia which in the years of the peace dividend after the end of the cold war had been depleted. we're seeing benefits of increased intelligence gathering in things like the increased predator shots against al qaeda and taliban leadership. those things are all to the better. i disagree i think with paul. the think the nctc was an important innovation and in the sense of bringing together all the different points. but we need -- it needs to have

the majority of its staff be a core staff and then bring others in around it to share information, bring their expertise, then take that back to their home agenagencies. we need to change the balance to ensure the expertise but the information sharing. >> homeland security secretary janet napolitano said the other day domestic terrorism is as great a threat to this country as foreign terrorism is. paul, are we adequately prepared to respond? najibullah zazi was a domestic plot but at the same time the army misread flagged leading up to the major nadal hasan shooting at ft. hood. >> i think there are a lot of additional challenges and vulnerabilities with regard to what the secretary was talking about. our whole system of border controls and visa controls and that sort of thing clearly is irrelevant when we talk about home-grown terrorists. and the needle in haystack problem in a sense becomes even greater because we are talking about people who are already established in, already blended in to our own society in a way that even the most adept foreign

terrorist will less be able to do. so i agree with the secretary, that is a greater challenge. >> fran, i want to challenge you on one thing here. we had you on talking about the cyber shock simulation last week, what an interesting exercise that was. but you said that the government is woefully unprepared to address cyber terrorism in this country. but you were homeland security advisor for 3 1/2 years. why weren't things fixed back when you were in charge? >> you know, john, in january of '08, the last thing i did before i left the government was put on the president's desk a classified executive order that began the process of building the capability. that was january of '08. the new administration came in. they did these comprehensive national cyber review. they adopted the initial document and the initial effort. they built on it, they've added more money to it, but it is going to take time to build that capability. i think we're on the right path. but what that cyber shock exercise showed is how woefully inadequate what we've done so far is and how important it is that we build the capability

even more quickly than we've done. >> all right. always kind of troubling to talk to you folks about national security. i'm sorry to say. fran townsend, paul pillar, thanks this morning. our "broken government" series continues tonight at 8:00 eastern. a number of president obama's nominees are still being held up by congress. are these vacancies contributing to our "broken government"? toyota has a lot of high-powered friends in washington. how could that impact toyota investigations. some people have found opportunity in hard times. it's in texas. tom foreman is on the cnn express. we've been looking at these economic numbers for a long time. there's something happening in parts of texas. tom foreman went there. a texas woman who starts over with her family's lumber company is coming up next.

today's building up america. a woman who literally had to

rebuild her industry from the ashes. >> tom foreman is in austin, texas this morning, a stop along the cnn express. still haven't seen the barbecue yet, tom. we are looking forward to that. tell us about the story this morning. >> reporter: well, here's the thing. one of the things about recessions and hard times, you may notice in your own life, is that the rest of life doesn't wait just because you're having a hard time. and one of the things we've seen all around this area -- not just in austin but in outlying areas area areas -- many people doing well not only face the adversity of the recession but other problems on top of it that made them say let me put this all aside and simply work on a solution. in all of central texas, there may be no one who knows more about rebuilding than the woman who runs this lumber company out on the edge of austin. because for the past few years, that's all her life has been about.

>> hey there. what you got for me? >> reporter: a dozen years back, laura cullen took over her dad's business. even as a single mother, she was making a go of it, until new year's eve 2005. so then calamity strikes. what happened? >> a massive fire. everything that laura owned burned to the ground. >> reporter: $1 million worth of buildings, equipment and inventory -- gone. laura had no insurance, little savings, but she did have conviction. this would not defeat her. so laura moved into a house on the edge of the property and day by day started to rebuild. now, remember, while this was happening, the entire construction industry in this country took a nose dive so she didn't have to just rebuild, she had to remake her entire business plan. this is cotton insulation. >> this is made out of recycled

blue jeans. >> reporter: to cash in on new construction trends, she began stocking more green products, recycled plastics, sustainable woods. by selling things like this, sustainable lumber, you're able to get a niche in the market that really nobody was serving quite that way. >> yeah. nobody. >> reporter: she tapped into a government program that pays young people to learn trades augmenting her small staff. >> you'll be working in the hardware store, learning retail sales. >> reporter: you're also now renting out property. >> yes. >> reporter: she cut down on the space she uses making some available to other struggling small businesses. >> what i'm doing right now is virtually impossible which is a one-man shop. >> reporter: and she joined a business group and meets every few weeks with a mentor, john brown, who owns a much bigger construction company. so the basic idea is it's better for the whole business community if more established businesses help out those that are just coming along. >> yes. you should always be willing to

grow the next generation. >> reporter: laura knows the economy is bad but she's not afraid. do you think you have fully recovered at this point? >> no. no. but i am on the way up. >> reporter: because each time she winds down from another day of building up her corner of america, laura knows she'll be right back at it tomorrow. >> we are going to survive. >> reporter: you can see all the different elements that she brought together to overcome these problems. that's another thing we're seeing in this building up america search out here, is that many of the people who are successful are leveraging all of their assets. they're not just focusing on one part of it. john, christine? >> all right, what are you working for on for us tomorrow? >> we're going to have a town hall meeting tonight. we'll talk to some people about the big picture from government, from business, from individuals about how they make it work. and we're also going to visit a very interesting place today. we're going to meet some kids who are involved in a program to make sure that people who are

really having the hardest time in this economy, those who may not have completed high school, those who may have other difficulties in their life, stay on track and make things work. i want to mention something to you john, as a guitar player. you may have noticed the guy in the guitar shop there? that's ed schaefer who makes the much-renowned schaefer arch top guitars. he's doing it right there because is he a small business. >> there is also another guitar manufacturer there in austin, the name of which escapes me. but it's also supposed to be terrific as well. >> well, they make some wonderful ones down here. you know what else they make down here that's wonderful? >> barbecue. >> has the barbecue shown up yet? i've grown a little tired, i've had so much barbecue. last night i had a nice big plate there. john, christine, you should have been there! it was great! >> all about the food. thanks, tom. >> you can have barbecue for breakfast for us. we're on the storm watch this morning and a double whammy

about to hit the northeast. two storms will batter the area, causing extensive travel delays, school closings. terrible, terrible commutes. you know it's in store. >> sledding. >> you will get to be able to sled, yes. that's one of the benefits. rob marciano's got the travel forecast in a moment. 47 minutes after the mourp hour. .

new york city where it's cloudy and 36 degrees right now. later on today, drizzle with a high of 40. then the bad stuff starts coming in. we've already got some flight delays this morning. nothing compared to what we'll see in the next couple of days. rob's tracking the travel forecast, with us from atlanta. >> good morning, guys. let's run down what we expect as far as travel delays. first off today, then the next couple of days. boston, new york and atlanta, charlotte, low clouds and rain in this area. little bit of snow in chicago, might see some delays there. some rain and wind across parts of san francisco. check out some of the snow totals across texas. five inches in baird, waco seeing 3.1. blandford, massachusetts, seeing a foot of snow. this is just round one. still snowing heavily across parts of massachusetts and northern new england. rain is about to come to an end for parts of new york but winter storm watches have already been

posted from new york city all the way down to d.c. then back up through northwestern new york. they kind of blanketed this. right now we are guessing 5 to 10 inches of wet snow from philly up to new york. could be more. could be less. more sure bet is 10 to 20 inches and maybe more than that across parts of northwestern new york. couple things coming together. this upper-level low spinning light snows across parts of chicago. that's going to combine with the energy coming out of texas, now spreading light snows across parts of the south. that will get into the atlantic ocean, tap some of the energy from the gulfstream and with cold air coming in behind it, we'll see this thing bomb out and just become an immense storm system. but so strong that it is going to really wrap in some warm air. it will start as rain in some of the major cities, then turn over to snow. so it will be a wet snow piling up whereas once the cold air starts to come in, the snow will be blowing around for sure. strong winds will be the case. we may see power outages with this. the next three days really travel is just going to be ugly if you're going anywhere in or out of the northeast.

we'll try to pinpoint this forecast a little bit more but it is a tough one to gauge. certainly going to be an incredible storm either way. john and christine, back up to you. >> all right, rob. thanks so much. by the way, i remembered the name of the guitar manufacturer -- cullings guitar. renowned in austin. compare a well equipped lexus es, to a well-equipped buick lacrosse. get inside each. and see what you find. if perfection is what you pursue,

this just might change your course. meet the new class of world class. the twenty-ten lacrosse, from buick. may the best car win.

welcome back to the most news in the morning. former vice president dick cheney still recovering in a

d.c. hospital this morning. tests show the former vp had a mild heart attack on monday. it's his fifth heart attack since 1978. cheney's spokesman says he's feeling fine and he could be sent home as early as today. with that we kick off your "am house call" this morning. we've followed a very brave 12-year-old girl who survived the earthquake in haiti. her name is kimberly. she suffered a massive brain injury. dr. sanjay gupta was called in to perform a life saving operation. >> kimberly has since been re-united with her father. she just learned her mother and sister died in the quake but now a bit of good news. dr. sanjay gupta joins us from atlanta to tell us more about the continuing story of kimberly and her family. hi, sanjay. >> reporter: good morning. there is some good news here. i tell you, a lot of people obviously touched by the story of kimberly. i simply could not stop thinking about her after i left. it was so hard to leave her trying to recover from this

operation out there in that situation, john and christine. as you saw there. what happened was there was an organization called can do. they had watched the coverage and eventually came to cnn, came to us and started to help. they immediately took lots of supplies to this particular neighborhood which hadn't seen hardly any supplies. this was almost a month after the earthquake. they brought tents, they brought water. lots of water. and started trying to help this particular neighborhood. and then even better news, you see the smile there which we didn't think we were going to see again. they were able to create -- actually get kimberly and her family and several others into housing as well. there are houses they started to make available, cleaned up. made safe and they started taking families like kimberly's into homes. again, a bit of good news there. obviously kimberly is one of thousands in this situation. it is just nice to see that smile. >> you were there, thankfully, sanjay, able to help kimberly. i'm sure there are plenty of

other kimberlies out there, people who don't have access to the same aid, waiting for basics like water, tents. what's the hold-up in haiti? we've seen so much aid going into the country. >> let me paint a picture for you that you might find interesting. a lot of these big tent cities you saw in the coverage for some time are the places most people knew about. that's where a lot of people congregated. but what also happened, what we learned, is that there were people congregating in neighborhoods that might be just ten minutes away from those big tent cities. problem was they didn't know those big tent cities even existed. there's been hardly any communication so they didn't know that the supplies or more resources were available just a short distance away. also a lot of aid workers didn't know where these neighborhoods specifically were located where people were still waiting. it was just difficult to communicate. but this organization called "can do," they have two organizations within haiti now. this is sort of what they've been charged with doing. they're going into a lot of these neighborhoods. they've taken over 30,000 gallons of water as you can see there into some of these

neighborhoods. their strategy, interestingly enough, get a lot of the neighborhood citizens who lost their homes to help in these distribution efforts. instead of the aid workers doing this all on their own, they enlist the help of the people who have been displaced, and they're getting a lot of stuff done there, this particular organization. >> some good news there. sanjay, great to see you. 57 minutes after the hour. stay with us.

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these pictures just in to cnn. president of toyota, akio toyoda has arrived on capitol hill, he'll be testifying before the