>> thanks, excellent story. we've got breaking news. you've been following it too. i'm ali velshi. following big breaking developments in the last 30 minutes that could affect your health care. a federal judge in virginia has ruled that part of the obama administration's health care law is unconstitutional. and it's a koe part. i'm joined here by cnn's senior medical correspondent elizabeth cohen. we've got jeffrey toobin on the phone. at issue, the provision to make people pay for health care has been deemed illegal right now. kelly, we got jeff on the phone right now? we'll get to jeff in a second. let's start with elizabeth. this is central. the judge, the last line of this ruling, which i know you've been reading and i've got here 42-page ruling actually says this is section 1501 they're talking about and says in the final analysis, the court will grant the plaintiff's notion for summary judgment and deny the motion. the court will sever section 1501 from the balance of the act and deny the plaintiff's request

for injunctive relief. it's gone. so the part that says you have to buy insurance is gone. >> let me back up for a minute. because i think, you know, this is very complicated stuff. an expert i talked to said, elizabeth, imagine the three-legged stool and you chopped off one of the legs, falls over. that's what's going to happen to health care reform if this decision stands. >> because this is how it became practical to pay for it, that everybody had to buy insurance. >> exactly. again, to back up again, health care reform does this wonderful thing of getting insurance to people with pre-existing conditions. which is in this huge problem in this country. it's extremely expensive to insure someone who has cancer or heart disease or something like that. how do you pay for it? well, the way you pay for it is you tell healthy people who don't have insurance because they don't want insurance. you tell them, hey, buddy, you've got to get insurance. you've got to fork over the money for insurance or else we're going to tax you or penalize you financially. and once you say, no, you can't do that, once you say no, you can't make those healthy people get insurance, you have no way

to pay for those sick people. >> right. right. and this was what this case hinged on, whether this was a tax, which the government would be able to impose under the constitution, or whether it is a penalty for not buying the insurance. and the attorney general, the state of virginia, and other states argued that it's a penalty. and the judge bought that. >> the judge bought that. it's a penalty. now, what's interesting is that the penalty or tax depending upon whichever you want to use that you would pay if you don't get insurance is actually cheaper than insuring you, which is -- >> you make a good point. this is what would happen if you didn't buy insurance. it's not that you can't impose the insurance, it's you can't impose the penalty for not doing it. >> you can't say, hey, you young, healthy guy, you've got to get insurance. this decision says you can't do that. and once you can't do that, you can't pay for the whole thing. >> let me read a quote from henry hudson who is the district court judge who said despite the intentions of congress in enacting a health care regime,

the legislative process must still operate within constitutional bound. when he says enumerated powers, he means enumerated under the constitution. let's take the judge at his word. let's assume that the u.s. government is going to appeal this. but at the moment, how does this affect what was going to happen with health care? >> right. very few provisions of health care reform have already gone into effect. let me talk about the two big ones. right now if your child has pre-existing conditions, which, unfortunately, a lot of children do. the insurance companies have to insure them. that's new and different. the second thing is, if your child has graduated from college and is 24, 25, your insurance can't quick them off. he or she should be able to stay on their parents' insurance. andrew reuben says it's his understanding that those two things stands. this does not cancel those. if you got insurance for your sick child last month, you're okay for the time being. >> for the time being. but as you said the three-legged

stool with two stools, everything gets affected by this some way or the other. >> you have to pay for it. >> some insurance company says i can't pay for it now. so i can't do this on this side. this complicates everything. >> it does. >> but at this moment -- i'm thinking of the people who are saying, oh, i just got my kid insured. it stays the way it is at this moment. >> the thing that has been severed as the judge says, that section 1501 hasn't gone into effect and isn't going to. >> the requirement where they said to every american, hey, you have to get insurance whether you like it or not, that wasn't going to happen until 2014 anyhow. you and i may be talking in a couple of years and some court may reverse it. it's absolutely possible. >> for the moment, if you have been struggling on how to handle insurance. for the moment, nothing changes because nothing was going to change. this provision that's been struck down was not going to come into effect. so if you're at work or trying to decide on your coverage, you

should do everything the same for now? >> right, for now you should do everything the same. i would say the people have come to me and asked me for advice. hey, my wife has this illness and i know starting in 2014 -- if you're planning for the future, it's going to be tough. >> but if you're planning for a future you thought involved coverage, you may now have to go back to where you might have been earlier this year. >> let's say you have coverage for your sick wife because you work at a company that gives insurance. and you were thinking maybe i'll quit my job and work for some little company -- >> because the provision was going to come. >> because the federal government. because president obama has made sure my wife will be covered. you may not want to move so quickly. >> if you have a situation where there's a pre-existing condition or coverage from an employer and you were going to make a decision based on this new coverage coming in, you might want to hold off on that. you might want to reconsider that. >> you might want to realize the future is perhaps murky than we thought it was several months ago. >> okay. so what remains to be seen now

is whether the chopping off of this leg as andrew rubin said. whether there's an appeal, which we think there might be, and whether there's reworking of this. and i don't want to think of how complicated that can be. but some reworking of this penalty or tax that says if you do not get insurance somehow the government forces you to. >> right. it would have to be -- look at how long it took them to come up with this solution. you and i were doing segments ongoing for years. it certainly felt that way for months. to figure out another way, a different way to pay for this besides this tax, that's going to be incredibly hard. >> let's go to nancy depaul at the white house handling health care. let's talk to her. nancy, thank you for joining us so quickly. elizabeth and i have been sort of guessing as to what this means to people who were counting on the idea that by

2012 everybody -- most people, would have to be insured in some fashion and that was going to pay for everybody else who had pre-existing conditions or expensive insurance costs. what's your early analysis on this right now? what does this mean for people watching us who thought, wow, in 2012 something's going to change for me? >> reporter: first, let me put it in context. today's ruling is one of -- there's about 20 court cases in the federal district courts around the country challenging the constitutionality of the law. this someone of those 20. and we've already prevailed on two others. in other words, two other federal district courts have held that this provision is constitutional. it's important to keep that in mind. secondly, the way you've been talking about as i've heard is the tax that will raise money to pay for the health reform. that isn't exactly right. the provision just says that if people can afford it, then they need to have health insurance. and if they need help with that, they'll get tax credits or subsidies to help them afford

it. so why is that in there? well, that's in there because we need to be able to ban this insurance company practice of saying that people can't get coverage because they have pre-existing conditions. and that happens right now all over the country. and you can't ban pre-existing conditions unless you -- pre-existing conditions exclusions unless you get everybody into the system. and that's why we need to get everybody in the system and that's what this requirement is all about. >> that's an interesting distinction. you're saying whether it's a tax or penalty as the court has ruled, the issue is that's not the money that has used to pay for the coverage, it's the money used to ensure that lots of lots of people are covered so the insurance company can spread that risk and insure people who had pre-existing conditions? >> reporter: right. it's not about raising money. it's about whether or not you can require everyone to be in the system. that's the core of the issue. >> except that the ruling -- >> reporter: you have to do that. >> the ruling in its 42 pages here does speak very

specifically to the distinction between whether or not this is a tax, which the government would be allowed to levee, or it's a penalty which according to the court, the government wouldn't be allowed to levee. so if it's not about the money, how else can you get people -- can you compel people to get insurance so that the risk is spread in a way that everybody can get insurance? >> well, we believe the law is constitutional. we believe that it is constitutional to say that everybody needs to be in the system, everybody needs to be -- to have health insurance if they can afford it. and if they can't, they get help doing it. and as i said, there are 20 federal district courts looking at this issue. two have already ruled the same way i just said that it is constitutional. today we had one that ruled the other way. >> what is the -- what action are you discussing taking at this point? >> well, the lawyers at the justice department are the lawyers who are handling this and they'll be making decisions and analyzing it and making a

recommendation as to how we move forward. >> so if we had these other cases that move forward and you're confident at this point that rulings may go in your favor. as elizabeth and i were discussing, what should our viewers think? if you were making plans now, and i said 2012, i meant 2014. if you're making plans and thinking about the future and how you are likely to have a different basket of options for your health insurance post work or in your future life, what are you supposed to think as a result of this sort of ruling? what would you recommend that our viewers do in terms of their planning? >> reporter: well, first, there are a lot of benefits in this law already. if your viewers are small businesses, take advantage of the small business tax credits that are available. if you're medicare beneficiari s beneficiaries, take advantage of the fact that the donut hole for you is going to be closed next year. you know, for children with pre-existing conditions. this law already provides a benefit. for people who have children who are up to age 26, the law now

says that your health plan has to let you keep your children on your health plan. so there are already a lot of benefits for people who are at risk of losing their coverage or have issues about their coverage like some of the scenarios you talked about. that's my first message. and my second message is don't worry, there's plenty of time to get this resolved between now and 2014. this only comes into play in 2014. >> the last line, page 41 of this judgment says the court will sever section 1501 from the balance of the act and deny plaintiff's request. severing 1501, that's the requirement to insure. can the rest of this health care reform exist if that stays severed? in other words if you don't succeed on appeal, if some of the other court case don't go your way, this analogy that somebody, elizabeth who was just talking to used the example this was a three-legged stool with one of the legs chopped off.

can you go forward if you can't get the 1501 to stay? >> reporter: there are a number of laws we're implementing. a number of the provisions can go forward and i think that's what the judge is alluding to. i think the issue here, though, there's a critical provision of this law that bans insurance companies from excludeing people based on the fact that they've been sick in the past or they're likely to get sick in the future. the ban on pre-existing condition exclusion. and the issue is, can that still go forward? can we still have a ban on pre-existing condition exclusions? i think that's the issue. >> that is the issue. and we look forward to having more of a discussion on this for you to figure out how we resolve that. nancy, thank you very much for joini ining us. again, interesting distinction she makes. she said the tax and/or penalty depending on how you want to look at it, it's not about paying for it, it's about

getting everybody into the system. >> everyone agrees that this country needs to take care of people with pre-existing conditions. it's not fair and it's not good for anyone that if you've had breast cancer no one will insure you. everyone agrees that's bad. so you want to get those people insurance, that's really expensive. how are you going to pay for that? by bringing everyone into the system. the millions of americans who say i'm healthy, what do i need health insurance for? you bring them in, and their premiums help fund care for those people with pre-existing conditions. if you can't bring everyone in, if you can't order them to get insurance, you're kind of stuck. it's a problem. >> all right. we will continue to study this. i know you're reading through it. by the way, the ruling is interesting. it does discuss a lot of these issues. so to check out the complete ruling, head to my blog cnn.com/ali, i will link you to it. one of the other stories today. half the country knows this already. crazy weather across the country. we're going to tell you, break it down, tell you how long it's going to last on the other side of this break. ♪

[ female announcer ] yoplait's real fruit and the goodness of dairy gives you a little slice of happy. and happiness comes in 25 delicious flavors. yoplait. it is so good.

okay. another big story we're covering today. it is bitter cold. the wind cuts like a knife and it is blowing snow.

and that's here in atlanta. up north, eight full days before the official start of winter. it is crazy cold in the wake of a weekend blizzard. as we speak, a cnn crew is making its way across northwest indiana where dozens of cars have been trapped in snow drifts for hours, in some cases all night. state police there say they've rescued more than 60 people so far, but tow trucks are getting stuck too. and this area could get 10 more inches of snow today. it's not alone. check out the big map. there's snow on the ground all over the country. even if you're in the clear, you may be affected by an air traffic logjam that could take days to clear up. lots of cancellations. take a look on the right side, the northeast part of the map there. and even that's not the whole weather story. train travel in the pacific northwest on hold because of flooding and mud slides. we've got people and cameras all over the country, of course, our coverage begins in the upper midwest. cnn all platform journalist chris welsh is inside the minneapolis metrodome. if you have not seen this, you

should. the metrodome is not supposed to be an open-air facility. >> reporter: well, the blizzards moved out of minnesota, but not without leaving its mark. and you can see quite vividly that mark. yesterday morning, folks woke up around the country basically reading news online, seeing it on twitter, facebook, the reports of the metrodome collapsing. crews will be on scene to assess the damage of these panels. basically all came crashing down. but the facilities director says it looks worse than it is. they expect to be able to fix it in a matter of days, make weeks. the vikings have another home game december 20th. we'll see if it's up and running before then. >> the good part is they can repair that structure. it's happened before, never like this. over the super saturated pacific northwest. cnn all-platform journalist patrick oppmann. >> the skies began clearing monday morning after several days of near non-stop rain.

the region is no stranger to wet weather. but hasn't experienced this in quite some time. in about nine different counties, rivers topped their banks causing widespread flooding. several hundred people had to be evacuated from their homes. some of them plucked by hovercrafts. this is nicknamed the pineapple express. there's nothing tropical about it as for several days the rain just -- apparently didn't seem to stop. >> okay. that was the weekend. remarkable weekend for weather. now we want to talk about the present and the future. part of the problem with the past is it killed a lot of air travel. >> absolutely. >> and we're still catching up and there's still cancellations. >> and we're not catching up like we should. we should have about 6,000 planes in the air but there's only 5,200 planes there. that means 800 planes that should be in the air, they're digging them out, shoveling them out, deicing them. they're on a slight delay today. temperatures are cold. could you imagine being the

worker that has to load the bag on the planes at 16 in cleveland. that's not the story, it's the wind. it feels like 3 below zero in chicago. and that is the high of the day so far. i've seen minus 17 for a while there this afternoon. so it has been cold. the snow is still east of chicago. we expect those streamers to remain there. this is a lake effect event because the lakes are still unfrozen. do you ever go on to a lake and it's nice? it's in the morning and you're having your coffee and it looks like there's steam coming off? well, you know the lake's not 100 degrees -- >> just warmer -- >> warmer than the air. this is warmer than the air, the steam comes up, snow comes down. >> as opposed to being a weather pattern, a weather system, this is weather being generated by the immediate circumstances. >> compared to what collapsed the superdome or the metrodome. >> right. when are we looking at an improvement? >> april. >> it's not winter yet, it's still several days before winter. we'll keep an eye on travel and weather for you. boy, we have a lot of news

today. we've got this, the health care, also another big deal later on today. we're counting down to today's senate showdown on tax cuts when all the wheeling and dealing ends, what is it going to cost you? important answers next in your money. [ male announcer ] at&t introduces a new windows phone with an irresistible full key...

oh, too much? now get an lg quantum™ for $199.99, and get one free. only from at&t. rethink possible.

in just under two hours, the senate is going to take up a test vote on the president's tax cut deal with the republicans. test votes mean if it fails, it doesn't mean the bill's failed, it means they can or can't get enough votes. suddenly it looks like last week's opposition won't stop it from eventually passing. so today on "your money," let's talk about exactly that. your money. this is how much it's going to cost the government, us, to foot the bill for the deal.

when you combine everything together, the cuts amount to $801 billion. but if you recall, in a deal to get the cuts, the government wanted to extend unemployment benefits for those people for whom it was expiring. the benefits extension costs about $57 billion. so you add it together, you've got $858 billion. that's a pretty hefty bill. and you're probably wondering what we're getting for our money. let me tell you. it's going to cost $544 billion for the two-year extension of the cuts themselves. that's the big one. but then you start adding on the payroll tax holiday. that's going to cost $11 billion. another $8 billion for tax breaks for low and middle-income earners, which includes credits for kids and their college costs. doesn't stop there. there's also business tax breaks, including those for research and some energy credits, even a measure that will allow businesses to write off 100% of their expenses in

2011. and one of the hottest political potatoes has been that one, the estate tax. some call it a death tax. if you don't like it, you call it a death tax. if you do, it's an estate tax. you don't pay it on the first $5 million of your estate as opposed to $1 million. how much is that going to cost us? $68 billion. as i said, whether you're buying a tv or giving tax breaks, the only way to do it right now is to borrow money. doesn't matter whether you put it on your visa or amex or the government borrows it from china, europe, or you. it doesn't. what matters is that the government is borrowing to pay for these things. for the government, there are only two ways to do that. either you print your own money -- if the government needs money, it can either issue bonds, it sells these bonds, gets money, and pays interest. anybody can buy those, china can buy it, you can buy it, other governments can buy it. and when you start making money

again, when the economy's doing well, you buy those bonds back from whoever owns them. that's it. or you can print money, which the government knows -- we know that the government is doing right now. by the way, the reason people buy our bonds is because there's interest on them and they think they're going to get paid. so that's how you continue to get more money. maybe you offer more interest on your bonds or people think american bonds are more stable than other countries. that's why we can borrow money. there's plenty more on that on "your money," 1:00 p.m. saturdays, sundays at 3:00. let me bring you up to speed on our top stories. president obama's health care reform law is in jeopardy. a federal judge in virginia has ruled that a key provision is unconstitutional. henry hudson says the government has no right to force individuals to buy health insurance. the obama administration is expecting to challenge the ruling and the fight is likely to end up in the supreme court. the huge pre-winter storm that dumped snow from minneapolis to chicago over the weekend is moving east today

leaving travelers stranded on highways and airports. cleveland could see 9 inches of snow before it's all over. behind the storm, dangerously cold temperatures. minneapolis public schools called off classes today. minneapolis, they're used to weather up there. five people are confirmed dead, 17 more feared dead after this south korean fishing boat sank in the icy water off the coast of antarctica. 20 people were rescued, but authorities are scaling back the search. they say the water is so cold, it's unlikely any of them could've survived for more than ten minutes. president obama signed the child nutrition bill into law today. it'll provide more money to subsidize free meals for low-income children. as we've been reporting, a federal judge in virginia has just ruled against part of the health care law. ed henry at the white house. we'll hear reaction from the white house when we get back. ♪

oh, my gosh. oh, my gosh. ♪ [ male announcer ] you know her. we know diamonds. together we'll make her holiday. that's why only zales is the diamond store. where you can get up to $1,000 off now through sunday.

try cortizone 10 intensive healing. the strongest itch relief medicine now has three vitamins and seven moisturizers. feel the heal. a federal judge has struck down part of the health care reform law. ed henry at the white house with the latest on this. we just spoke to nancy at the white house. she down played this, ed. she said it's -- they've already won two of these, there are many

more. they think it's constitutional regardless of what this judge -- federal judge in virginia said. he was pretty clear. he said, it's not constitutional to impose a penalty on people for not buying health care. >> reporter: right. basically and that it exceeds constitutional powers. and that's what it's going to come down to. does it -- you know is it constitutional or not? and as soon as nancy was finished with you, she spoke with dan lothian and telling him she's going to be on the phone with the justice department this afternoon and trying to figure out their next step here. it's not a surprise to the administration that this ruling was coming out. they knew it was coming, knew it was likely to head this way, but it should be noted there have been other rulings on this very provision that have gone the administration's way. so what i think the bottom line here is from a political standpoint for this white house, they know it's very likely to go to the u.s. support and be decided there. in the short-term, nobody knows what kind of impact it will have on consumers. the real question will be what kind of long-term impact will it have on consumers?

because as you know and have been reporting, there's a lot of time between now and 2014 when this provision and others are going to kick in. but i think in the short-term politically, there's no doubt that it gives republicans a lot of clout as they're about to take over the house of representatives. there are about to pick up the number of seats they have and shrink the democratic majority in the senate. you have eric kantcanadia cantot a statement sayi ining they're g to pass legislation to just flat out repeal the obama health care reform. now, harry reid in the senate is not about to take that up. that's not about to repeal things. but symbolically the republicans will have the wind at their backs with this court case and if there are other court rulings in the future. >> and ultimately if this doesn't go the administration's way, they're going to have to find some work around, while it is just one piece, it is the central piece. because it's the piece that spreads it to everybody so you

can insure people who are otherwise uninsured. >> reporter: it's like that string you keep pulling and pulling and all of a sudden there's a big hole in your jacket. this is not just one provision, this is the key term that people have to be covered. if that part winds up being unconstitutional, they're going to have to, you know, dramatically reshape the obama health care reform. or they're going to have to scrap it altogether. we're a long, long way from that. but this shows you what kind of stakes are involved. >> ed, let me ask you, a little while from now, there's going to be a test vote in the senate about this tax deal that the president cut with the republicans that some many democrats are not in favor of. what's likely to happen? >> well, it seems like that the president's going to have the votes to clear this procedural hurdle. one of the best vote counters we have is dana bash. she seems to think it's headed that way. i think that's important for the president because not just then

does it clear the procedural hurdle in the senate, but it puts pressure on the house democrats to fall into line. and i think what was most noteworthy. if you were to take one thing out of the sunday talk shows. after last week, the house democrats say they don't want to bring it up for a vote. and now democrats are saying, we don't like it, but it's going to come up for a vote. the it's likely to pass. it's a lot different from where we were last week. he's very likely to get this tax deal. it's not done, but likely he'll get it. >> i suspect we'll be talking later this show. too bad we got breaking news. i cou excellent job. you've done a nice job. we'll check into that. we're continuing to follow this breaking news. a fraederal ruling declaring pa of the health care law is unconstitutional. it's a key part. elizabeth cohen has been reading through the judge's ruling. stay with us.

happening now. a federal judge in virginia has ruled part of the sweeping health care reform led by president obama is unconstitutional. this is the first federal court to strike the law down contradicting other recent rulings that said the law was permissible. the key issue here is the individual mandate requirement that most americans must purchase health insurance by 2014. meanwhile, in about 90 minutes, the senate's scheduled to hold a cloture vote on the tax compromise deal between president obama and gop leaders. this is the deal to extend the bush-era tax cuts.

basically this is a procedural thing, a test to see if there's enough support to move it forward as ed henry was telling me, there likely is. and it is bitter cold throughout much of the country. in northwest indiana, dozens of cars have been trapped in snow drifts for hours, in some cases all night. and this area could get 10 more inches of snow today. a federal judge in virginia has ruled part of the obama administration's health care law unconstitutional. but it's an important part. cnn senior medical correspondent elizabeth cohen joins me now. elizabeth, it's not that it's unconstitutional for the government to tell everybody to insure themselves. it's unconstitutional to penalize them if they don't. >> right, because obviously you don't want to tell everyone to insure themselves. there's got to be some consequence, or else everybody's going to say, forget it. here's the big picture of what's happening. one of the main goals of health care reform was to help people with pre-existing conditions. because right now if you have a pre-existing condition, have cancer, heart disease, asthma,

or anything, and you want to buy your own insurance, good luck. you'll be told no or be charged a zillion dollars. the government said, wait a minute, here's a way to pay for it. there's this huge group, tens of millions of healthy americans are sitting around without insurance. that's tens of millions of people who could be paying premiums into the system. and wouldn't that be great because that would help fund all these sick people who need insurance. well, requiring those healthy people to get insurance, this judge in virginia said no, you can't do that. unconstitutional, specifically violates the commerce clause of the constitution. >> which would allow the government to collect a tax, but does not allow them to impose a penalty. and basically this judge is saying this amounts to penalty. >> right because what the government said with health care reform was, you've got to buy health care insurance, which means you're forking over premiums, or if you don't, you've got to pay this tax. some call it a penalty, some call it a tax. legally speaking, i guess that's an important distinction. the bottom line is if you didn't do it, there would be a

financial penalty. >> we spoke to nancy from the white house earlier, and she said we had two ruling in our favor and there are many more to come. they felt confident this would go in the government's favor over time. and these are provisions that aren't going into effect until 2014. >> and maybe that's why these aren't going into effect until 2014 because they knew there was going to be these lawsuits and they would need time to adjudicate it. i can't see how this won't go to the supreme court. >> what does this look like right now? you know better than anyone that there are some things that have taken place already and there are some that won't. >> what's gone into effect already are a couple of provisions. here are two of the key ones. when someone has a kid like 25 years old, you want to keep them on your insurance, you can keep them on your insurance until they're 26. that's a huge change from before. also, you have a child with a pre-existing condition, you should -- you can now get them insurance. now, i've been told that those provisions stay. this decision here said it is those provisions that stay, we're not getting rid of those.

but the question is long-term how do you keep up these expensive provisions if you don't have that funding source? >> we'll stay on top of the story. thank you so much. elizabeth cohen. 30,000, that's the number of people killed in mexico since the drug war started four years ago. 30,000. and by the way, that's not even the most dangerous country in the region. we'll find out which country is even worse after the break. [ female announcer ] it's red lobster's ultimate surf and turf event.

with three seafood-and-steak combinations, all under $20! like succulent lobster and wood-grilled sirloin, or new chardonnay shrimp and sirloin. ends soon at red lobster.

time now for globe trekking. stockholm, sweden, we've learned that u.s. federal agents are on route to stockholm to assist in this weekend's suicide bombing. we also know more about the man blamed for the attack. two explosions happened on

saturday in an area full of christmas shoppers. a car exploded ahead of a second blast which killed the suspected bomber. authorities now think the second bomb went off early before the bomber made it to a more crowded area. a swedish news agency tells cnn they received an e-mail threat ten minutes earlier from the man they believed was behind the attack, but have not yet carried out dna testing. he was the only person killed. this was sweden's first suicide bombing. now to mexico, with tell you about an awful lot of murders tied to the drug war. it might surprise you to know that it is not the most dangerous latin american country. >> reporter: it's a country at war. after four years of a government offensive against drug cartels, more than 30,000 people have died in mexico. some call it the most dangerous country in the world, but is it true that the u.s. neighbor to the south has one of the highest murder rates on the planet? >> not even close. not even close. >> reporter: kevin from the brookings institution says mexico's murder rate is not even

among the top ten in latin america. >> pales in significance when you compare to guatemala, honduras, el salvador, even colombia that has seen its murder rate gone down quite significantly, it's even much lower than the murder rate in brazil. >> reporter: on a per capita basis, el salvador with 71 me e murders for 100,000 people, all have murder rates higher than mexico's 14. in the united states, the murder rate is fewer than six per 100,000. mexico's violence is highly concentrated. 60% of all homicides have happened in four states. >> if chi wit was a country, itd have a high murder rate.

>> these drug cartels are now showing more and more indices of insurgency. you know, all of a sudden car bombs show up, which weren't there before. so it's becoming -- it's looking more and more like colombia looked 20 years ago. >> but mexico is not fighting a guerrilla movement, nor are cartels shown any interest in controlling the government. >> they want certain decisions made in ways that favor their elicit activities, but that's a different matter. >> and what about president calderon's argument that homicides have increased because the cartels are lashing out made desperate by the barrage of government attacks? >> the cartels in mexico in a slightly strange way resembles a lot what's happening in afghanistan. you know, it's -- it is to some

extent a war that has to be fought but nobody really knows in a clear way why, how, and until when. >> mexico will end this year with almost 100,000 drug-related executions. only three years ago, there were about 3,000 per year -- it tripled in the last three years. >> interesting the point that the gentleman you were interviewing made. this isn't political. they only want to influence the political process in so far as it allows them to conduct the commerce they want -- it's not an ideological war as in colombia. >> it's all about the money, really. and the reason we see violence concentrating in the two states we saw south of texas is because that's the most popular drug route in the entire country. and that's where cartels are trying to fight for territories. it's a turf war and that's where the violence comes from. >> i was quite surprised by that. rafael, thank you.

>> thanks. a new way to stop a disease in its tracks before it becomes an epidemic. today's big eye is is about putting prevention on the fast track. at green giant, we pick vegetables only when they're perfect. then freeze them fast so they're are as nutritious as fresh. [ green giant ] ho ho ho. ♪ green giant ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] print from any mobile device so your ideas can be there even when you're not. introducing the new web-connected printers with eprint from hp. ♪ my country ♪ 'tis of thee ♪ sweet land ♪ of liberty ♪ of thee i sing [ laughs ]

♪ oh, land ♪ where my fathers died ♪ land of the pilgrims' pride ♪ from every mountainside ♪ let freedom ring ♪

no one ever wished for a smaller holiday gift. it's the lexus december to remember sales event, and for a limited time, we're celebrating some of our greatest offers of the year. see your lexus dealer. it's all about big new ideas and innovations. today's big i. is about saving lives in a big way. before we talk about that, let's talk about the cholera epidemic in haiti. so far, 2,000 people have died from the outbreak, more than 100,000 people have become sick from cholera. and finding the source of the

cholera could keep it from infecting other people. well, scientists at pacific biosciences have done just that. and they developed the new dna technology to figure out where these diseases come from faster. let me tell you exactly why this matters to you. this technology will help track diseases very quickly, help prevent an outbreak, and better treat those who are infected. joining us now is the chief scientific officer for pacific biosciences. eric, good to see you. we're monitoring the white house press briefing. i may have to interrupt you to find out about the white house's reaction to this health care ruling. but let's talk about this. you have figured out very quickly that the cholera in haiti came from south asia. tell me about that. >> right. the pacific biosciences sequencing technology, we took samples from haiti for cholera, samples from latin america, and samples from south asia. completely sequenced the dna of those different bugs, and then

could unambiguously resolve exactly where that haitian's strain was derived from. and we've pinpointed it to a south asian strain. >> some people say what difference does it make where it came from? what has to happen here -- why is it important to know where it came from? >> it's not just important to know where it came from, but what's the structure of the bug. what are the types of mutations it carries that could affect treatment? you want to be more aggressive in how you treat it. and not only treating it and how to prevent the spread. it's not about laying blame but getting the best treatment and preventing spread that we can. you know if you are sick and step on an airplane you can be on another continent within a day giving that sickness to others. the same sort of thing could have happened with the south asian-derived strain in haiti. could have been someone from south asia going to west africa

and then there to haiti. the aim is how to best treat it. >> you don't have patient zero yet. we talked a year ago almost when this earthquake happened about the fear of cholera. normally we associate it with brackish water or water which is not clean and that is used communally. but in this case if it came from south asia, then it lends to the hypothesis that somebody brought it over, it came on a plane. >> that's exactly right. and if somebody brought it over from our plane to haiti, then the same type of -- then it could spread from haiti to other areas. so one of the main aims and one of the main things proposed is should we be aggressively vaccinating people in haiti to prevent it from spreading throughout latin america or their neighbors. >> what's the advance in the technology you used because one of the things that struck me as a nonscientist was it was very fast. >> that's right. so the two things that matter most in this type of problem for infectious diseases are the

speed. the speed with which you can generate data ina the speed with which you can analyze and interpret the data. with the technology provides for the first time is take the entire genome of a bacteria same day and in a matter of hours get to the genetic sequence and not only generate it quickly but easy to analyze. these are like putting puzzles together these problems we're trying to solve. and if you have very big puzzle pieces, then that problem is much easier to solve. not only does the pac biotechnology generate it quickly but big pieces but not tiny pieces difficult to assemble. >> eric schott with pacific biosciences. to check out more head to my blog. right to the white house briefing. robert gibbs. >> i picked the umbrella and i'll leave the crickets alone. go ahead. >> two topics on the health care

ruling. the passage here in which the judge says that the unchecked expansion of federal power suggested by the coverage provision would provide unbridled government powers but about the individual's right to choo to participate. doesn't this validate skeptics that despite intentions you can't require people to participate in a law like this? >> i think a couple of important things for perspective. first and foremost the administration argued on the other side of this case and disagrees with the ruling. i do think it is important to keep some perspective about the fact that there are now 20 or so cases making their way through federal courts. a -- the court -- this was the eastern district of virginia. 115 miles away, the western district court of virginia ruled

november 30th to uphold the same provision that the eastern district and its judge had ruled against. so i think the other court -- the eastern district of michigan on october 7th ruled in favor of the law as it was passed. so i -- again, we disagree with the ruling. obviously, the individual responsibility portions of the affordable care act are the basis and the foundation for examining and doing away with insurance company discrimination on the -- on behalf of preexisting conditions. obviously, without an individual responsibility portion in the

law, you could not -- you could not find yourself dealing with preexisting conditions because the only people that would likely get involved in purchasing health care would be the very sick. and obviously, that would be enormously expensive. >> so given that it is so fundamental to the -- to the whole law and you have these different court rulings, is it clear to you that this is going to go to the supreme court? and if so -- >> i am not a legal scholar. i think it's safe to say because there are several other cases in the pipeline and because of -- again, you have district court rulings 115 miles away that the bill will continue to have its day in court. i do think it is important that even this judge ruled that the bill continues to move forward in terms of its implementation and obviously the individual responsibility aspects of this

legislation weren't to go into effect until 014, so there's some time to work this through. >> just to round it up. what give the white house can have -- confidence it will ultimately prevail? >> i think -- and i'm certainly not a lawyer in terms of the legal arguments that underpinned each of the briefs. but i would say challenges like this are nothing new in terms of laws that have come before the courts in the past in which our position has prevailed. we're confident that it is constitutional. and quite frankly, of the three courts that have rendered decisions on this question, two have ruled in our favor. >> real quick question on the tax deal. democrats in the house are talking of targeting the estate tax provision that they're unhappy with and may be dealing with that in an amendment or

legislatively trying to chag change the language. is the white house urging them not to do that? >> i will say this. obviously, the senate is going to vote on -- have a procedural vote a little bit later on this afternoon. i think the president is encouraged by what we hear in the senate and believe that the legislation will pass that hurdle and be one important step closer to passage. in terms of -- i'm not going to get involved in sort of what the amendment process might be in the house at this point. i think you have seen, whether it was in here on friday with former president clinton or whether you have seen just this morning that this is something that is -- has broad bipartisan support in the public. it's an excellent -- that's a good agreement. it's an excellent agreement on

behalf of millions of americans who won't see their taxes go up. those that are impacted in having lost a job in this recession will have the security of knowing that their unemployment benefits won't fall victim to politics. and the middle class will enjoy a significant tax cut in the payroll tax portions of this bill. so we are encouraged that we get closer and closer each day to having this agreement become law. >> can you talk about the initial reaction to the health care ruling? were you surprised by it? >> no. >> and how concerned are you about the fact that there are a lot of other lawsuits out there? >> again, i -- this is the third federal -- this is the third federal court that's rendered a decision on this portion of the affordable care act. and two of those courts have

upheld it. so i think we are confident that the affordable care act is -- will be upheld. >> so what's the next step for you? >> well, i -- you know, the department of justice obviously is going to have to make some decisions about appealing this particular case. my sense is that that appeal decision is something they'll likely make. but i would point you over to them. >> okay. and just a question. larry summers gave a farewell speech today at a think tank and i'm just wondering how the decision-making is going on his replacement. do you hope to do ha before the end of the year? >> i will say that it is -- i'm not sure if that's going to get done by the end of the year. obviously, a whole host of legislative -- lots of legislative work around the lame duck with the budget, taxes,

s.t.a.r.t., "don't ask, don't tell," the dream act. there are a whole host of things that have taken up a bunch of bandwidth and a bunch of time and it's unclear to me whether that will get done before the end of the year, no. jake. >> it appears that one of the main reasons -- >> okay. that's white house press secretary robert gibbs responding to questions about the ruling that has declared a very key portion of the obama health care reform unconstitutional. we're going to continue to report on this. as we have told you already, a virginia judge -- federal judge in virginia today struck down a requirement which was due to start in 2014 that virtually every american buy health insurance if they didn't have it through their employer. other federal judges have ruled the opposite way, which means it's almost guaranteed that the supreme court will have a say in this matter. joining me to parse the politics are senior cnn political analyst gloria borger and elizabeth

cohen and senior fellow in constitutional studies. you have heard the arguments both sides. what do you make of the ruling today? >> i think it's a victory for those who think there are limits to congress's power and federal power generally, and the idea that even the outer bounds of congressional power don't extend to regulating inactivity. it is something that has to be active -- >> clear that up for our viewers? this is an interesting point. the ruling didn't argue that the government can't make everybody get insured. it argued that it can't penalize somebody for not being insured. >> well, the crux of this issue is congress telling people that they have to go into the private marketplace and buy a health insurance policy. what the judge here found is in all of the precedent -- even the most expansive commerce clause regulations under the new deal

did not go so far as to require somebody to go out and do something like that. and so the bounds of congress's power over regulating local activity is to actually have the activity and not just a decision not to do something. >> gloria borger, you have followed this really from the beginning. this is obviously not the view that robert gibbs just took. it's not the view that the white house is taking. in fact, they've made the argument there have been two federal rulings in their favor so far. and there are many more federal rulings to come on this thing before this key provision was to take effect in 2014. >> reporter: there's no denying it, though, that this give some oxygen to their political opponents. democrats will tell you that this is a judge who is known to side with republicans and that this is not something that they didn't expect. but this does give some oxygen to folks who say, you know what, this mandate went too far. because if you don't buy health

insurance, then you get a tax penalty, right? and there were people in congress, republicans who argued that that was unconstitutional all along. the white house and the justice department clearly felt that they were on solid ground. but eric cantor, who is a member of the house republican leadership, today asked for an expedited review of this case by the supreme court. so it's very clear that republicans who oppose these mandates are going to jump on this. as you know, ali -- and you've been talking about -- without the mandates, things like insuring preexisting conditions might not be able to be funded because you need a larger pool full of healthy people in order to do that. so lots of people see this as the beginning of the unraveling. however, you do have to caution this is early. this is one judge's ruling. two others went the other way. and many more to come.

>> elizabeth, some people think it went too far. the problem is this particular provision where the ruling has said he's going to sever that provision from the rest of the health care reform bill, as gloria suggests, can it exist without this provision? >> you know what, i don't know how you pay for the entire thing without insuring these healthy people. there's tens of millions of healthy americans that don't have insurance and they are like a cash cow. they're just sitting there. >> this is a mirror of many other countries, northern european countries for instance that have some degree of universal insurance. the point is everybody has to be insured? >> right. this is sort of universal insurance. i think what they were trying to do, the obama administration is sensitive about socialized me medicine so they didn't do it quite the same was as europe but said you've got to have insurance. you can choose it but you have to have it. if you choose not to have it we're going to penalize you with this tax. that's a huge amount of money either from the tax or from the

premium. so all of these tens of millions that don't pay premiums and don't have insurance, if you make them get insurance you have incredible benefits. one, they're forking over money and two probably not use the system much. it spreads the risk and includes the low-risk people. when you are healthy and pay premiums for insurance and don't use and go see the doctor that's great from a financial point of view. >> can this thing go forward at the moment without this? >> i think when health care reform was being built and you and i were covering it, when i would ask the question of the obama administration or anyone else how are you going to pay for this? they would say everyone will have insurance and those premiums will be much of the cash that we need to pay for this. so without it, i don't know how you pay for this. >> all right. we're going to continue -- >> reporter: and ali. >> yeah, gloria. >> reporter: the states have to start setting up laytheir insure exchanges now. they have to continue doing this. otherwise by 2013 they will be

penalized. they have to proceed as if everything is going to proceed until it doesn't, right? >> and what we know right now is this is probably -- the justice department is probably looking sat this right now. we can probably expect an appeal. thanks to gloria and ilya and elizabeth. to check out the complete ruling head to my blog cnn.com/ali. i've also linked you have to it on twitter and my facebook page. it's 42 pages long but, boy, will you know a lot about health insurance after that. other big stories. bitter cold, biting wind, blowing snow. and that is just here in atlanta. up north eight full days before the official start of winter it is crazy cold in the wake of a weekend blizzard. in northwest indiana, dozens of cars have been trapped in snowdrifts for hours. and in some cases all night. state police say that they have rescued more than 60 people so far but tow trucks are getting stuck too. and this area could get ten more inches of snow. it's not alone by the way. check out my big map. there's snow on the ground --

you can see it in the northeast quadrant of the country. even if you're in the clear you may be affected by an air travel logjam that could take days to clear up. that is not the whole story. train travel in the pacific northwest is being affected because of flooding and mud slides. let's take a look at all of this with our good man chad myers who is monitoring the weather and the air traffic, all of which is affected right now. >> i also love the i-reports we've been getting too. if you want to go to cnn.com/i-report, you can see what other people's misery looks like. >> they closed schools in minneapolis. they don't close them for anything. that's the cold. >> they close schools in atlanta because it was 23. so it's all relative. it's where do you buy your gloves, because gloves up north are significantly better than the ones you can buy here for $2. snowing in cleveland and buffalo but the big snow along the i-80/90 corridor farther to the west towards chicago.

we had snow flurries today in atlanta. those flurries were in fact picked up by the cold air off of lake michigan and dragged all the way down. we had a lake-effect snow event -- >> no way. not to diss anybody here but i was thinking is this really snow? it wasn't the big chunky snowflake. >> did you see people freaking out? is there any bread left on the shelves. >> >> i also saw ice. >> what happens too when it gets this cold here. pipes freeze under the streets. the water comes up. and then all of a sudden -- >> i saw a lot of that. >> the streets are a sheet of ice. here are the streamers off of chicago. gary, indiana and points eastward. >> you were saying this and this and this is lake-effect. >> we're done with this. it is because of all of this cold air. it's 1 right now in chicago. that's the air temperature. >> wow. >> that's 31 degrees below freezing just out there -- that's without the wind. and temperatures are going to be cold like that all night long

tonight. so once you get cold or once your house gets cold then all of a sudden it's tough to get back -- check on the elderly and make sure the pets are okay. and south florida, even west miami-dade may get down to 30 degrees tonight. >> no way. >> that's going to kill a lot of things if you don't cover them up. tomato plants don't survive in 30. we're counting down the days to today's senate showdown on tax cuts when all the wheeling and dealing ends. what is it going to cost you? i'll give you important answers to that on the other side.

we fill them with extraordinary craftsmanship. we fill them with amazing technology. and we fill them with inspired design. and now your chevy dealer wants to fill them with as much good will as we can. come see how chevy is giving more. right now, get no monthly payments till spring plus 0% apr financing and fifteen hundred dollars holiday allowance on most chevy models. see how your dealer is giving at facebook.com/chevrolet. [ laughs ] that's so dumb. [ laughter ] nice. [ male announcer ] don't be left behind. get it first with at&t. the nation's fastest mobile broadband network. period. rethink possible.

put labels aside. do what is best for america. that's what a new political group says it wants to do to kick start progress and civil discourse in washington. no labels formally launches in new york. who better to deal with that than our correspondent you can't put a label on it although we'll call her national political correspondent jessica yellin. i was reading about this. i have to say some things sound gimmicky. this sounds kind of neat if it could work. >> reporter: it sounds like it could appeal to a lot of people with that big if, if it works. they want to organize the kind

of grassroots movement you see from moveon.org on the left or tea party on the right but to support centrist positions so if an elected official wants to take a position where they compromise with the other party there will be online movement, people sending petitions to back that person up because they're getting deluged right now from what they call the extremes, hyperpartisans on the left and the right. they're trying to organize this. here's one of the founders mark mckinnon, a republican best known for working with john mccain on the principle of this group. >> the established interest general reflex to be cynical about what we're doing here. and they make their profit and their attention through conflict. so the only thing that changes that is if we really show them numbers. so we need you to go out and organize in your communities and raise a voice out here. what we're really hoping for you

to do is go out there and create a ruckus. >> reporter: create a ruckus -- he says he wants to create a ruckus around the middle. there are some ironies. how do you have a radical center which they promise. also, they say it will be a grassroots bottom up organization but launched in new york city out of an ivy league university with political elites. that raises questions. bloomberg, mayor bloomberg is speaking on the stage now, the man who just said he won't run as president as an independent. this could be a good group to back him if he were to change his mind but he says that's not on the table. >> he does exemplify that sort of thing though. he's hard to put a label onto. i'm eager to see what develops out of this. in the next hour the senate takes up a test vote we call it on the president's tax cut deal with republicans. let me tell you a little bit about this. now it lacks like last week's opposition of the deal won't stop it from eventually passing but it wasn't as much in the

senate as it was in the house. i want to talk about your money. this is how much it will cost the government to foot the bill. the extension of the tax cuts and everything else that was included in this bill is going to amount to $801 billion. the extension of the benefits which is what the democrats wanted will add another $57 billion so the total cost will be $858 billion. it's a pretty hefty bill. if you're wondering what you get for your money i'll break it down. it costs $5 $544 billion for th two-year extension tax cuts but add the payroll holiday, the social security tax break going from 6.2% of what you earned to 4.2%. then another $8 billion in tax breaks for low and middle income earners. those are individual tax credits. that includes a child tax credit and another one for college costs. one of the hottest political

potatoes estate tax, what some people call the death tax. if the deal goes through as is, we can expect that to be lower. that means people who used to have a million dollar tax exemption on their estate -- i guess you can't pay taxes if you died. but the exemption on your estate will go up to $5 million. everything below $5 million you don't pay taxes on if you have pass it to your heirs. the top will be 35% instead of 55%. that will cost $68 billion. doesn't stop there. there's a raft of business tax breaks as well including those for research, some for energy, even a measure that allows businesses to write off 100% of expenses next year. who pays for that? whether you're buying a tv or giving tax breaks, if you're using credit, the only way to do it is to borrow. so it doesn't matter whether you put it on visa or amex. who is it borrowing it from?

generally when it needs money issues bonds. anybody can buy the bonds. china, europe, regular people or could be banks. for the government, there are only two ways to raise that money. either make your bonds or you print money. we also know that the government has been printing money. now, once you start making money again, once the economy is doing well and we're not running deficits or getting smaller, the government can buy the bonds back from whoever owns them and pay them back the money. the reason people buy bonds is because they pay interest and the u.s. government is thought of as a safe bet compared to other places in the world. a lot of people will tell you that's changing but the bottom line is that's why we're able to sell bonds and raise money. who is keeping track of every single website that you visit and is there anything you can do to stop them? 50 that i didn't even understand -- i was so naive. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 i mean, i still need help. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 but not from some guy that's just going to sell me stuff. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 i need somebody who works with me, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 speaks a language i understand, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 and basically helps me make better decisions.

tdd# 1-800-345-2550 maybe i'm still being naive? tdd# 1-800-345-2550 [ male announcer ] no hard sell. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 no attitude. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 no broker-speak. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 it's different when you talk to chuck. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 ♪ no one ever wished for a smaller holiday gift. it's the lexus december to remember sales event, and for a limited time, we're celebrating some of our greatest offers of the year. see your lexus dealer.

♪ someone out there is tracking every website you visit. sounds daunting, right? isn't too daunting to me. this is a web survey from december of this year. they track the number of websites from 1995 when you can see they were basically zero until today. around 1998, '99 picked up around 25 million and look at this all of a sudden. for some reason there was a drop in websites in 2009. but now we're skyrocketing to a point where we're at 256 million websites or so. so that's where we are now.

256 million websites. let's bring in chad myers. he has more information on this. every website you visit becomes part of your digital fingerprint. chad has an explanation of it. >> reporter: did you know that companies you have never heard of track every website you visit and keep a record of everything you do online? that's right, everybody who visits the internet has a digital fingerprint, a unique profile built by these specialized companies. >> we actually don't know who the clients are. so they may be selling this technology to banks. they may be selling it to online advertising companies. and that's the bigger concern. >> reporter: peter eckersley is a technologist with the electronic frontier organization, a digital civil liberties group that defends people's right on the internet. he says digital fingerprinting is a violation of every aspect of your privacy. >> you should have the right to read what you want in private without someone looking over your shoulder reading along with

you without -- as you pick up a magazine to read it, you don't want the magazine to be reading you. >> reporter: recently the ftc weighed in calling for a do not track system like a do not call system but eckersley says the technology is already there to put this button on your browser but won't happen until congress creates a whole new set of rules. >> people don't understand what's out there about them personally linked to their online digital fingerprint. >> reporter: this man tsays it' using for customized political messaging and advertising but there's a danger they will be used with malicious intent. what if i'm at a wireless place like this and people are everywhere. can that guy right there be track snd. >> absolutely. he is being tracked right now. everything you do online, if you use a public website or any kind

of online service they track everything you do. >> reporter: can people get something incorrect and is it a big deal? >> yes. so your fingerprint can be manipulated by criminals. that's just one way it can be wrong. another way is that it's been cross-linked. there's really no mechanism to correct that. you can't remove the information. there's currently no channel, no way to file a complaint. >> reporter: security experts are concerned right now there is no practical way to stop companies from using this technology and that as scary as that is, the best defense is to be aware that everything you do online is being watched. >> keep your anti-virus up to date. keep your computer up to date. but for the most part, one the information leaves your computer, at least one person -- that's the website that you're visiting -- can track it. >> all right. >> big brother. >> right. but remember some of the big brother is the big brother that gives you free stuff on the internet because somebody is getting all your information. that's why facebook can offer everything it can for free

because they've got data on you. where does it go from here? >> it goes to the point where you should be scared. if someone is collecting this data and will use it against you maybe for a job search, a job offer, whatever it is. if they can get in there and say back in there you googled bomb search, what were you doing there? >> that's worrisome. if someone can hack into information that's otherwise there. but the internet has created such a thirst for curiosity, we search things that we wouldn't want associated with us. what do you do? >> you log off your -- this is a shared computer. someone logged on there. you make sure you log off when you're done because someone else could come in later tonight and start doing anything on that computer. i went over here a little bit ago and i searched two men in a truck. pretty irrelevant company. but look, i clicked on a couple more websites, pair of guys movers popped up. do you think that was random? really? really? did that advertisement for a moving company just randomly get there?

maybe. do you believe in coincidences. >> someone thinks you're looking for something. but that's not necessarily bad. >> not a bad thing. >> the issue is whether someone with nefarious intent gets their hands on -- >> i search the websites all the time. all of a sudden $69 to the mirage. i'll take it. so they do make offers. it's a way of advertising. they're also going to be big political campaigns around this because they know why you're searching. >> it always freaks me out when i'm on amazon and it pops up with things that i like. it's fantastic most of the time. some days it's creepy. breaking developments in our top stories. president obama's health care reform law is in legal jeopardy. a federal judge in virginia has ruled that a key provision of the bill is unconstitutional. judge henry hudson says the government has no right to force individuals to buy health insurance. white house press secretary robert gibbs said moments ago the administration disagrees

with the ruling and stands behind the constitutionality of the law. a big test coming up in less than an hour for the compromise plan to extend bush-era tax cuts. the senate is expected to vote on a motion that would cut off debate, setting a stage on the vote for a compromise. many democrats and some republicans oppose the plan. it would extend tax cuts for all americans including the wealthy for another two years. fedex expects today to not only be the busiest day of the year but the busiest day in its entire history. the shipping company expects to handle 16 million packages today. that's double what it handles on an average day. we'll take you live inside a fedex distribution center to see all of those packages being sorted in about 20 minutes. first brutally cold temperatures across the u.s. getting colder. how long will this carry on? chad is here. we're going over to the weather center to find out. >> let's go outside the fedex facility, see what that's like putting those boxes in. the annual enrollment period ends december 31st. don't miss your opportunity to enroll in a plan

that could give you the benefits and stability you're looking for, an aarp medicarecomplete plan from securehorizons. this plan combines medicare parts a and b with prescription drug coverage, and more... all in one simple plan that may cost you nothing more than what you already pay for part b. this plan offers you annual preventive screenings and immunizations for just a $0 copay. you also have the flexibility to change doctors from a network of providers dedicated to helping you stay healthy. and it could offer you more, like vision and hearing coverage and prescription drug coverage that's accepted at pharmacies nationwide. annual enrollment is only open until december 31st. now is the time to look at your options. start getting the benefits of an aarp medicarecomplete plan from securehorizons. call now.

we're tracking heavy weather across the country. what a weekend of snow in the midwest in many parts of the country, including here in atlanta. >> and the metrodome. big story there. >> that was unbelievable. >> a lot of that is held up by air pressure. you can't just open the door because you don't want the air

gushing out. there's upper pressure by the air inside. that's why it's so repairable so quickly. they'll have it done in a week. go on to i-report and take a look at some of these out there. they are brutally cold. and i guess misery loves company. how about this. >> what's that? >> that is the band shell at daytona. i've listened to a free concert there. >> nobody out there. >> don't see any umbrellas out there. no umbrella drinks and no boat drinks. shot six holes in my freezer according to jimmy buffett. miami will get down to nearly 30 degrees. especially west dade. you get away toward the everglades especially up north. we are going to see temperatures cold enough to maybe hurt some crops. i hate to say that, right, because all of a sudden the price of strawberries and tomatoes just on the speculation but certainly a potential. the last time we had this much cold, you know what got hurt the

most? corn. it didn't get killed but stung a little bit. so all of a sudden now the corn -- things are -- we don't need more problems with our corn crop. we're using too much of it. i used to have a corn crop in nebraska. $1.60 a bush el. now $5 a bushel. that's the light snow coming down off of the lakes. this is not the snow that we had over the weekend that did collapse the metrodome. that is now gone. cold in new york. 40 degrees right now in the city. doesn't feel like it because the wind is blowing but temperatures will get in the teens. down here in atlanta it could be ten. they will probably post a little thing on your apartment that says, please drip the water tonight because the insulation is only this thick in atlanta where in new york city it's this thick. pipes do a lot better. >> another cold one tonight. i turned my heat on for the first time last night. i kind of like it a little cold. but i turned it on.

30,000, the number of people killed in mexico since the drug wars started four years ago. guess what? that doesn't even make mexico the most dangerous country in the region. we'll find out which country is worse after the break. we fill them with amazing technology. and we fill them with inspired design. and now your chevy dealer wants to fill them with as much good will as we can. come see how chevy is giving more. right now, get no monthly payments till spring plus 0% apr financing and fifteen hundred dollars holiday allowance on most chevy models. see how your dealer is giving at facebook.com/chevrolet.

happening now. a federal judge in virginia has ruled part of the sweeping health care reform effort led by president obama to be unconstitutional. but the white house says it stands behind the law. this is the first federal court to strike down the law, contradicting other recent rulings that the law was permissible. the key issue here was the individual mandate requirement that most americans must purchase health insurance by 2014. in about 30 minutes, the senate is scheduled to hold a cloture vote on the tax

compromise between president obama and the gop leaders. basically, this is a procedural thing, a test to see if there is enough support to move it forward. bitter cold through much of the country. northwest indiana dozens of cars are trapped in snowdrifts for hours, in some cases all night. this area could get ten more inches of snow today. time now for "globetrekking." first stop stockholm, sweden. federal agents are en route to stock holt am to assist in the investigation with this weekend's suicide bombings. we also know more about the man blamed for the attacks. the two explosions happened within minutes of each other in an area full of christmas shoppers. a car exploded ahead of a second blast that killed the suspected bomber. they now think it went off early before the bomber made it to a more crowded area. the authorities said they received an e-mail threat ten minutes before the attacks. he was the only person killed and this is sweden's first suicide bombing. we'll continue to bring you the

latest developments on this story. we tell you an awful lot about murders in mexico tied to drugs and violence. it might surprise you to know that mexico is not the most dangerous latin american country. here is cnn's rafael romo. >> reporter: it's a country at war. after four years of a government offensive against drug cartels, more than 30,000 people have died in mexico. some call it the most dangerous country in the world. but is it true that the u.s. neighbor to the south has one of the highest murder rates on the planet? >> not even close. >> reporter: this man from the brookings institution says mexico's murder rate is not even among the top ten in latin america. >> pales in significance when you compare to the murder rate in places like quatd malla and honduras and el salvador, even colombia that has seen its murder rate gone down quite significantly. it's even much lower than the murder rate in brazil. >> reporter: on a per capita

basis el salvador with 71 murders per 100,000 people, honduras with 67 and venezuela with 49 all have murder rates higher than mexico furn. in the united states it's fewer than 6 per 1 hundred,000. the study by the brookings institute finds it highly concentrated. 60% of all homicides happened in four states including two which share a border with texas. >> if chihuahua was a country it would have the highest murder rate in the world at this point. >> reporter: the secretary of state compared colombia to mexico in september. >> these drug cartels are now showing more and more indices of insurgency. all of a sudden car bombs show up which weren't there before. so it's becoming -- it's looking more and more like colombia looked 20 years ago. >> reporter: but mexico is not

fighting a guerrilla movement, nor have cartels shown any intentions of toppling the government. >> they want to control certain decisions made by the mexican government in ways that favor their illicit activities but that's a different matter. >> reporter: what about president calderon's argument that homicides have increased because the cartels are lashing out, made desperate by the barrage of government attacks? >> the situation in mexico in a slightly strange way resembles a lot what's happening in afghanistan. you know, it's to some extent a war that has to be fought but nobody really knows in a clear way why, how and until when. >> mexico will end 2010 with more than 11,000 drug-related executions, which is quite extraordinary considering that only three years ago there were less than 3,000 per year.

this has security experts are urging the government of president felipe calderon to change his strategy. rafael romo, cnn, atlanta. an internal split among the wikileaks folk has spawned a rival whistle-blower website. it says julian assange weakened his organization by releasing too much too soon and focusing a lot of the attention on himself. meantime assange's attorney says a secret grand jury has been convened in virginia to consider criminal charges in wikileaks' recent document dump and he learned that situation from swedish authorities. when a highly regarded plan to fix massachusetts schools fell short, teachers at one school came up with their own plan. and guess what. it worked. we'll tell you how in "fix our schools." [ male announcer ] breathe, socket. just breathe. we know it's intimidating. instant torque. top speed of 100 miles an hour. that's one serious machine. but you can do this. any socket can.

the volt only needs about a buck fifty worth of charge a day, and for longer trips, it can use gas. so get psyched. this is a big step up from the leafblower. the 2011 chevrolet volt. it's more car than electric.

hey tough guy, that cold needs alka seltzer plus! it has the cold-fighting power of an effervescent packed in a liquid-gel for all over relief! hiyah! dude!

i want to just dip into this. this is the strength and fitness coach for the new york jets. apparently there was video that indicated he might have tripped dolphins rookie on the weekend. there you go. there's the video right there. he's speaking about it. >> that's the problem. nothing went through my head. i wasn't thinking. had i been thinking, i would have taken a step back instead of leaning forward. >> what did you think when he went down? >> i felt terrible. my heart went into my chest, up into my throat, you know. >> did you go over and talk to him? >> i talked to him last night, yes. >> why didn't you go over afterwards? >> during the game, i felt as if -- let cooler heads prevail. those guys were upset and

rightfully so. immediately thought go into the locker room, get my head together and figure out what the next step would be. >> since then, will you tell us who you talked to? have you been in contact with the league? >> i have not been in contact with the league. i know our management here has today. but i have not. >> have you been told there's disciplinary action? >> not yet, no. as i stated yesterday whatever the disciplinary actions are, i'm willing to accept them and move forward from there. >> are you concerned about your job security now? >> we'll keep an eye on that for you. jets strength and conditioning coach saying he didn't mean to trip the dolphins player as you saw there. time now for "fix our schools." like other states massachusetts has been searching for ways to improve public education for years. in 1993 the legislature passed a law requiring tough new requirements and standardized tests but promised funding.

it became a national model but things have not turned out as planned. a new report finds that massachusetts student/teacher ratios got worse between 2000 and 2007. spending on school books fell 50% and teacher training fell 25%. the state did keep a promise to increase school funding but school costs rose even faster. between 2000 and 2007, you can see the state aid increase. that's the orange line on the bottom. look at the cost -- the increase in health care costs for schools, health benefits for school employees rose by a billion dollars. see the difference between the $700 million and a billion. despite the shortfall some are making progress. a case in point brockton high school large urban public high school south of boston reacting to the standardized test. several brockton teachers met to see ways to improve the scores. today the high school principal and brockton is outperforming

90% of the other high schools. she joins us from brookline, massachusetts. thank you very much for joining us. tell us what you did. you saw the evidence that things were bad. what did you and these other teachers get together and do? >> well, we had to do something, because we had over -- in massachusetts it's a high stakes exam. so if these kids don't pass the test, they don't graduate. it doesn't matter about funding and all the laws. the bottom line is we want them to get a diploma. so here's what we did. we first took a look at the test and realized we can't outguess a test. education is more than a test. we instituted a literacy initiative. we focused our school on four areas -- writing, reading, speaking and reasoning. and that means focus. intense. all classes, all subjects, every day, no exceptions. >> how does that help on math and science? >> well, one of the literacy

skills we focus on is reasoning. and that really is thinking out problems. >> okay. >> and besides that, writing is thinking. and, you know, when you think about what we as adults do in the world all the time, it isn't about necessarily passing a test and studying for the next event. it is about learning those skills that you need, like you have to read something and you must have to do it all the time. you don't know db you -- you're getting it cold. how do you process it? how do you prepare for that reading? how do you write about it. >> you moved away -- you didn't even really go toward preparing students better for the test. you wanted them to learn bet are i..er. is this scalable? first of all you have 4200 kids in the school. >> that's right, that's right. >> which is big. can this -- it seems simple. can this be replicated? can we use this to fix our schools? >> that's a great question. and of course it can be replicated. here's -- it's a magic secret. first of all, hard work, hard work, hard work, and focus. here's what we did.

it started with a team of teachers. it wasn't about any one person or any one program. it was an empowered team of teachers that said, is this the best we can be? and the answer is, no. and then secondly, we focused ourselves. not on anything that was trendy or something you purchased. it was about reading, writing, speaking and reasoning. then we implemented with fidelity. i mean, every day, all the time. and then the last part is, i think, where sometimes schools fall apart. we believe what gets monitored is what gets done. and we focus on that. we collect student work. we are in classrooms all the time. and we make sure what we say is happening is really happening. because it doesn't matter what we say. what matters is what the kids are learning. >> what a great outcome. thanks so much for sharing that with us. we wish you have continued good luck. congratulations to your students and teachers. the principal of the brockton high school in massachusetts. breaking developments in our top stories. president obama's health care reform law is in legal jeopardy.

a federal judge in virginia has ruled that a key provision is unconstitutional. judge henry hudson says government has no right to force individuals to buy health insurance. white house press secretary robert gibbs said minutes ago the administration disagrees with the ruling and stands behind the constitutionality of the law. president obama signed a law that helps pay for more and healthier school lunches and gives washington power to set standards for what's in a school vending machine. in a few minutes the senate will cast a pivotal vote in the tax cut debate. at issue whether to proceed to a final vote on a compromise plan to keep the bush tax rates for everybody for two more years. it's a crazy day at fedex. maybe the craziest in history. we'll show you what's going on live when we come back.

today is expected to be the busiest day of the year for fedex. not just of the year but the busiest in its entire history. it expects to handle 16 million packages today, double on an average day. david massingttingly at a fedex facility in georgia. what's going on? >> reporter: there's a lot of activity going on throughout the fedex system worldwide. that figure you're talking about, that 16 million is worldwide. it is the biggest in the company history. but it's also the biggest for the company here today on the busiest shipping week of the year. all the shipping companies are reporting shipping up this holiday season. u.p.s., united states postal service. all of them saying that more people are shipping more packages this year. that's not so much an indication of the economy as it is buying

habits. and we're told that it has a lot to do with the internet. >> a lot of it is people are moving more to ecommerce and ordering stuff online. cyber monday was very big and it's continued on. that and ordering from catalogs and those sort of things is really what's driving the increase. >> reporter: and just here at this facility this morning, we saw thousands of packages being sorted and we were told that anywhere from three to four out of every ten packages that we saw was purchased on the internet. and that is a big increase over what they've been seeing in recent years, ali. >> david, interesting point, because in my traditional business training, we associate an increase in packages with an increase in the economy. but we know that we haven't seen that surge in the economy. interesting that the pattern of switching over to online buying by more people is helping out these companies like fedex. >> reporter: that's right.

they ever be this year the increase is dramatic because they had this big weekend in which people were possibly doing some of that shopping and everything online. and now all of that flooding into this monday, this busiest shipping week that they have. so it might have been a little bit of timing about that as well. but everything we saw today, a lot of stuff we saw from online retaile retailers, a lot of amazon.com going through. so it's going to be a big christmas for somebody and it's going to be showing up in these very well packed cardboard boxes this christmas. >> thanks very much. good to see you. david mattingly at a fedex facility in marietta, georgia. the latest in today's big breaking story. a federal judge in virginia has struck down parts of the health care reform law. now one senior republican says he wants the case to go straight to the supreme court. that's a. the afternoon tour begins with more pain and more pills. the evening guests arrive. back to sore knees. back to more pills.

the day is done but hang on... her doctor recommended aleve. just 2 pills can keep arthritis pain away all day with fewer pills than tylenol. this is lara who chose 2 aleve and fewer pills for a day free of pain. and get the all day pain relief of aleve in liquid gels. then you may need help finding the right plan for your needs. call now to find out how a medicare plan from unitedhealthcare medicare solutions may have the coverage you're looking for.

i'm looking for help paying for my prescriptions. [ male announcer ] that's a part d prescription drug plan. tell us about your prescriptions and we can help you select the right plan. is there a single plan that combines medicare parts a & b with medical and drug coverage? [ male announcer ] absolutely. a medicare advantage plan can give you doctor, hospital and prescription drug coverage for nothing more than what you already pay for medicare part b. now that's easy and affordable. are you reconsidering your medicare coverage? now is the time to take action. you only have until december 31st to make sure you have the coverage you need. call unitedhealthcare to learn about medicare plans that may be right for you. with some plans, you can enroll right over the phone. don't wait. call now. try cortizone 10 intensive healing. the strongest itch relief medicine now has three vitamins and seven moisturizers.

feel the heal. as we've been reporting, a federal judge has struck down parts of the health care law. now we're hearing a senior republican in the house wants this to go straight to the supreme court. senior political producer peter hamby joins us with our political update. there's about 20 court cases going on right now. we've seen three resolved. might serve a lot of people to go right to the supreme court. >> eric cantor said this should go directly to the supreme court because the health care is implemented in realtime and if it is unconstitutional, the supreme court needs to do something about that. whether president obama and attorney general eric holder listen to eric cantor probably a different matter. also on the political ticker today i want to point this out. sharron angle, certainly a lot

of republican insiders wants to forget her. but she was the candidate who lost nearly to harry reid this year in that senate race. she announced she's planning to start a national tea party organization that's going to operate in 15 states in 2012. so i'm sure there are democrats who would love to see sharron angle very polarizing front and center in the presidential race 2012. finally on the ticker today, everyone in washington is waiting to see what's going to happen tonight with republican national committee chairman michael steele. he is holding a conference call at 7:30 p.m. tonight with members of the rnc in which he's widely expected to anoun his plan plans whether or not he'll seek a second term at the rnc. he's expected not to announce a second term. looks like we'll have a new republican national committee chairman. a lot of republicans think that's a good time given the problems of fund-raising and messaging during the last sickle. we won't know tonight but have

it as soon as it happens. back to you. >> peter hamby in washington. we'll have another political update from the best political team on television in about one hour. we've got some excellent monday "odds & ends" next for you including the very sad tale of the worst robbers ever. what makes peter, peter ? well, i'm an avid catamaran sailor. i can my own homemade jam, apricot. and i really love my bank's raise your rate cd. i'm sorry, did you say you'd love a pay raise asap ? uh, actually, i said i love my bank's raise your rate cd. you spent 8 days lost at sea ? no, uh... you love watching your neighbors watch tv ? at ally, you'll love our raise your rate cd that offers a one-time rate increase if our current rates go up. ally. do you love your bank ? with listerine® whitening plus restoring rinse. it's the only listerine® that gets teeth two shades whiter. and makes tooth enamel two times stronger. get dual action listerine® whitening® rinse. building whiter, stronger teeth.

with three seafood-and-steak combinations, all under $20! like succulent lobster and wood-grilled sirloin, or new chardonnay shrimp and sirloin. ends soon at red lobster. [ male announcer ] you know her. we know diamonds. together we'll make her holiday. that's why only zales is the diamond store. where you can get up to $1,000 off now through sunday.

lots more coverage of two pieces of breaking news coming up in just three minutes. one of them is the decision by a federal court judge to have strike down a key provision of the obama administration health care legislation, one that might jeopardize the whole act. so we'll talk about that. brooke will have that for you. and an expected vote in the senate, a test vote to see how much support there is for the president's deal with republicans on extending the tax cuts. but before that, it's time now for today's "odds & ends." we start on matter of states. all 50 states adopted various symbols, state birds and fruits. but every now and then unusual proposals come down the pike. wisconsin for example the first

state to have an official microbe early earlier this year. now utah could have a state firearm. member of its legislature former police officer says he'll promote the honor for the browning m-1911. it was designed by a utahn, john moses browning. it became the standard military sidearm in 1911 and still used today by some military and police. moving to canada where most carry nine millimeters. an unusual robbery leaves the intended victim almost speechless. >> what we didn't had i anybody was stupid enough to do somebody did. somebody broke into the free store through this door. can't really get a good look at the guy because he's hammered out of his tree right now. but, yeah, here's a picture we never thought we'd see. a police car outside of the free store.