hey, good morning. i'm natasha curry in for robin meade today. more bodies have been found in the home of a convicted ohio rapist. the story keeps getting grimmer. authorities don't know what else they might find. has the republican losing streak come to an end? after giving up the congress and the white house, their party made a big comeback in local elections. plus, a florida gators linebacker appeared to be trying to gouge another player's eye. now the victim is saying that he shouldn't be suspended. a convicted rapist is now accused of keeping at least ten bodies in his basement, his backyard and living room. police in cleveland, ohio, found four more corpses and a skull at

his home yesterday. the bodies were found there last week. firefighters today will search the walls and floors of the home. police spoke with nancy grace about the investigation. >> well, we're working right now with the coroner's office to identify the victim. >> stacho is sowell didn't havee right to go into his house but would stop by to make sure he was up there. >> if the offender answers the door, says, yes, the sex offender does live here, he does reside here, he does sleep here, that's all that we are allowed to do by law. >> we didn't know anything. i've been here all my life. >> police first searched

sowell's house thursday. the bodies have not been identified yet. republicans may be feeling a bit better about their party's future right now. they're expected to sweep yesterday's tied gubernatorial races. they suspect bob mcdonacdonnell be the first since 2002. obama was the first democrat to win there in more than four decades. in new jersey incumbent jon corzine lost to chris christi. here's ari fleischer on what this might mean for the obama administration and democrats. >> the first year of any presidential election or midterm right after a presidential party in power, almost always suffers big losses. that's what you can anticipate if history is any guide. here's the killer statistic if i'm a democrat. in virginia in 2008 when barack

obama took virginia, people under 30 were 21% of the electorate. today they were 10%. the black vote was 20% of all virginia votes last year. today it was 15%. the very coalition that put barack obama over the top is not showing up. >> but democrats still may make election history. correspondent richard lui will take a look at a new york congressional race in a few minutes and more on the wider implications of these elections. more infants and young people are hospitalized for swine flu but in california older people are more likely to die from it. a study says the fatality rate from h1n1 in california is around 11%, but for people over 50, the fatality rate is as high as 20%. the study only looked at california cases from april to august. on the 30th anniversary of the iranian hostage crisis, president obama said he wants to move beyond the past and build a relationship with iran based on

mutual interests and mutual respect. u.s./iran relations have been hostile since the day islamic students stormed the embassy and held hostages for days. >> we certainly didn't expect it to last that long. they have said they didn't expect it to last that long but what they did, in effect, was to create a climate of lawlessness and mob rule that they and their compatriots are today. >> they hold a rally to celebrate the event. today there's something different. anti-government protesters are also on the streets and we are getting reports of clashes with police. no word yet, though, about any injuries. three missing north dakota softball players were found dead tuesday in a jeep in a pond.

rafer weigel has more on this story. rafer? yeah, natasha, authorities had been looking for these three women since late sunday night. they are kyrstin gemar, afton williamson and ashley neufeld. investigators say they were found inside their jeep in a 12-foot-deep pond on a farm near dickinson state university. authorities think the women made two calls to friends for help. authorities do not suspect any foul play at this point. just a sad story. natas natasha? >> it really is. we'll talk to you more about it later on in the show. let's go to meteorologist bob van dillen and find out if the forecast is cooperating today. hey, bob. >> good morning to you, natasha. so far so good. we have one weak clipper type system rolling out of the great lakes and the midwest. on the big picture with the satellite because other than this there's not much going on with the exception of southern parts of florida.

we'll zoom on into trouble spots. it's around chicago, some extremely light rainfall moving away from the city. we'll zoom on into the radar coming out of columbus. most of the rain showers to the north and west. in to the indianapolis area, the indy radar picking up heavier rain off towards your north around munsey and bloomington, too, zipping over to the east. half of that not even reaching the ground. up to wisconsin, a shot of rain south of madison that will rotate into chicago later today. light showers possible. and then we look down to the south of florida and you do have that frontal boundary around the southern part of that state zeroing in towards miami and you're going to get the big thunderstorms arriving later today. so far offshore from west palm beach that does move on in so we're watching this area for the possibility of some heavier rain. we'll get a little bit more on that in a half hour. a good day to travel. i will tell you about the air traffic delay in a bit. >> a good day to travel. all right. can't wait to hear more about

it. thousands of people across the country suddenly lost their cell phone service yesterday. how frustrating. now the service provider is trying to do some explaining. and four people with guns report reportedly tried to rob a jewelry store. how an 84-year-old man stopped them all by himself.

morning, sunshine. i'm robin meade. time for today's "salute to the troops." join me here. this is from marty kdy collins her husband james jack collins. she wants him to know that she and the entire family are pray ing for him and that their two dogs miss him so much. >> my name is marti collins from erieville, new york. i would like to salute my husband. i miss you so much. you're the best husband anyone

could hope for and my best friend. mom and dad and willie and i and everyone are praying for you. we can't wait until you're home with us. >> if you have somebody be in the service and you want to salute them, we'd like to help you. go to cnn.com/robin. it is nine past the hour. republicans may be on the comeback trail. the gop is expected to sweep two key gubernatorial elections. in new jersey cnn projects chris chris chris christie defeated. looking at the wider implications of last night's election results here. richard, what's the latest? good morning to you, natasha. it may not be a direct reflection on president obama's entire presidency but it's a punch, at least a bit of a bruise. the president came up short after personally campaigning hard for democrats in new jersey and virginia. and it may signal trouble for

democrats in 2010 during the midterm elections, all those congressional seats that might be up for election. exit polls show a majority of voters in both states saying president obama's job performance was not a factor in the vote. the virginia loss may sting the most for the obama cam company as cnn is projecting bob mcdonnell trounced his opponent 59% to 41% there. last year president obama was the first democrat to carry virginia in more than four decades. they're watching that one carefully, of course. he won over independent voters there. mcdonnell won independents by more than 20 points in that race. >> okay. so, richard, the republican victories, they may be tempered by the big loss of a congressional seat in upstate new york. tell us what happened there? >> well, in a tanatasha, the ra turned into a vicious internal battle between gop conservatives and moderates. bill owens is projected to beat doug hoffman. former alaska governor sarah

palin chimed in on this race. they had big problems with hoffman's republican opponent dede scozzafava and her views on same sex marriage. she withdrew from the race saturday. the gop held the congressional seat since the civil war, 1872. >> wow. all right, richard, something else. we'll talk to you more later. so a florida man was ready to celebrate winning $166 million on a slot machine from the seminal hard rock casino. they said it was a mistake, the machine spun out of control. its top prize was supposed to be $99,000 and since it was broken they won't even pay him that amount. >> they make you think you won and everybody around you that you won and an hour after it, oh, wow, we have to investigate this and it's probably a malfunction. >> gaming commissioners and the slot machine's programmers are trying to figure out why the machine malfunctioned. the would-be winner is talk iin

to a lawyer. two people are accused of stealing up to 1,000 pieces of luggage from a baggage claim carousels. new for you how police first caught on to the case. the number of people getting sick from e. coli is growing after an outbreak of the bacteria in ground beef. jennifer westhoven is looking out for you. jen, hundreds of thousands of pounds have been recalled already. >> i think a lot of times in the recall you go, well, i don't have that kind so i'm not going to worry about it. listen to this because it was sold as store brand meat so you might have this in your freezer and it's something to be really careful of. two people have died. 28 have been sickened by e. coli. three of them have kidney failure, all according to the cdc. again, store brand meats. you want to check your freezer to make sure you don't have any of this meat. we have this picture here of

fairbank farms but you're not going to see that on the label so don't even think about fairbank farms. what you have to think about is the stores where it came from. i'm going to give you a partial list, b.j.'s, giant, price chopper, shaw's. there are a lot of stores, too. it was originally sold in the northeast, but they sold it from there on. they send it out to their other stores. so people have gotten sick in south dakota, minnesota, and california. so, again, it seems like this is pretty serious when it comes to the meat. to check the details, get the codes, make sure everything is fine go to cnn.com/robin. we have everything there for you. your phone just wonked out yesterday, you were probably, yeah, part of a big service failure that happened at t-mobile. more than a million customers including one of our producers had problems with calls and texts for about eight hours. t-mobile not saying what caused the problem but that is two black eyes for t-mobile. last month a lot of people got all their data, contacts,

everything wiped out from their sidekicks. >> that is right. i almost forgot about that. jen, thanks so much. talk to you soon. to be a fly on the wall in this classroom may not be safe. a student ate a dead fly on a dare from his algebra teach er. and wait until you hear why he says he did it. >> he said if anybody eats this fly then i will give them an "a" on the test. >> you didn't get any sense he was just joking? >> i didn't think he was joking. >> his teacher did keep his word and give him an "a." how did he still manage to fail?

♪ everybody look at me ♪ i walk in the door now we just told you about a student in california who learned never take the easy way out. well, he thought he made a deal with his algebra teacher to eat a dead fly in exchange for an "a" on his test but he actually failed that test.

however, his teacher kept his word and gave him an "a," sort of. >> he said that i told you i'd give you an 56 on your test so here is your "a." but it's not going in your grade book. >> what did he say was going in the grade book? >> the principal says he's looking into this and says the teacher could not comment. controlling high cholesterol may prevent prostate cancer in men. a new study for cancer research found men with healthy cholesterol levels had less than half the risk. a second study found that men with plenty of good cholesterol were less likely to develop prostate cancer. the football player getting criticized for trying to gouge the eyes of another player is getting support from someone you would not expect. rafer weigel here to explain. who, rafer? natasha, of all the people rallying to support brandon

spikes, the man whose eyes he tried to gouge out has come to his defense. now spikes was suspended for half a game for being caught on camera sticking his fingers in the facemask of georgia's ealey. ealey said tuesday he doesn't think spikes should have been suspended at all. ealey seemed surprised the play is getting so much attention and said they were just out there playing football and these kinds of incidents happen all the time. all right. shut my mouth. roger goodell asked for help from the federal government -- is asking for help -- to eliminate steroids arguing sports leagues drug programs could be totally gutted if they weren't protected by state laws. two minnesota players were suspended for taking a bad substance but reinstated after they sued and won in a state court. one congressional leader warned goodell involving congress could open up a pandora's box. and former dallas cowboys

star michael irvin got the boot off "dancing with the stars" last night. the man they call the playmaker is not going to play on despite the fact that he posted his highest score of the season on monday night. >> what? >> yes. he wasn't able to garner enough football spoet. 49ers receiver jerry rice and his former teammate emmitt smith have done well. smith won the competition. >> yeah. the guns would have done it for me. come on. >> you should have voted. >> the arms, you know. >> i knew what you were talking about. >> all right. making sure. thanks so much, rafer. talk to you soon. voters in maine appear to have repealed the state law that approved gay marriage. gay marriage has lost in every state where it went to a popular vote. a total of 31 states. now five states have legalized it through legislation or the courts. in maine with most precincts in opponents of gay marriage won by 6% margin. the vote overturned a state law enacted last spring. all right, bob, teasing us

earlier saying travel was looking good. did you mean air travel or road travel? >> really both. one system out there is a quick moving clipper type. i'll show you what it looks like on the safer flight explorer. rain around indiana through ohio stretches in to michigan and illinois, too, wisconsin, a little bit of light rain. we may see a delay or two because of the low clouds associated with it. so far nothing. chicago, cleveland, half hour delay. detroit, same thing. light showers a possibility. and then down south miami. we do have a front up to the north. some thunderstorms just offshore right now. they will build back inland today. your high 86, 87. watch for showers and thunderstorms in and out for most of the afternoon. 30-minute to one-hour delays a possibility as you dodge the storms. los angeles another morning with dense fog. yesterday visibility was about 1/16th of a mile. right now two miles. more in a bit. natasha? thanks so much, bob. so the government changes its

mind about who to give flu shots at guantanamo bay. and the folks at the miss usa pageant wanted to get reimbursed for making miss california look good in a bikini.

firefighters today plan on tearing into the walls and floors of a house here where ten bodies have been found. police in cleveland, ohio, found four more corpses and a skull at the home of convicted rapest anthony sowell expected to be arraigned in about two hours. a justice of the peace who refused to marry an interracial couple has resigned. that's the word from state officials. he has said he does not regret his decision but told wvrz he was advised to step down after the couple filed a discrimination lawsuit against him. traditionally liberal organizations have a blunt message for moderate democrats

like senate majority leader harry reid. support a public option and health care reform or don't expect any help from us in your re-election campaign. the infighting among democrats could help candidates in the 2010 congressional elections. and those are some of the headlines we are following for you this wednesday morning. welcome back. i'm natasha curry in for robin meade. now to some election results. in new york city michael bloomberg will serve a third term as mayor. so the third term as mayor, setting a record for personal campaign spending with more than $100 million. but cnn projects that he still only won by five percentage points. in atlanta a racially charged battle for mayor is going to a run-off. a city council woman who would be the first white mayor in nearly four decades, will face an african-american state senator. houston is heading for a run-off, too, if the front-runner there wins she would be the city's first openly gay mayor. now some other important

elections may be big victories for republicans. the gop is expected to sweep two key gubernatorial races. in new jersey cnn projects republican christiane amanpou c. richard lui is looking at the wider implications of last night's election results. so a lot of surprises to some people anyway. certainly as we look at those results and the incoming data, here's a key to the gop wins you were describing. weak voter turnout among young people. remember in 2008 young folks turned out in large numbers for president obama but that didn't happen last night. in new jersey's race, for instance, young folks aged 18 to 29 made up just 9% of the vote down from 17% in 2008. in virginia 10% of the electorate was aged 18 to 29. >> hmm. okay, so, richard, how might these republican wins affect

president obama? >> the losses may have a big impact on the policy agenda as he tries to push through a massive health care bill in recent months. a climate change bill looming on the horizon, the president may have more challenges rallying democrats along the way. david gergen looked at that. >> it may give pause to some moderate and conservative democrats in the house of representatives whom the president is counting on with regard to health care, environmental legislation and a whole host of other things. they may be running more scared tonight than they were this morning. >> that could cause trouble for the health care bill, pushing it into next year before they come up with a draft that is approved by both sides. >> all right, richard. thanks so much for that input. appreciate it. so police have arrested a seventh person in connection with a gang rape at a california high school. this is video of the suspect being taken into custody yesterday. police say as many as ten people

attacked the 15-year-old girl outside her homecoming dance. ten more watched without calling 911. >> with this arrest i believe that we have people who played the most significant role in this sexual assault, and now the focus will be on those individuals who were there and their involvement was unknown. ♪ we are the children ♪ we are the ones who make a brighter day ♪ ♪ so let's start giving >> at a vigil outside the high school yesterday, a family spokesman read the first public statement from the victim. it urged people to channel their anger about the attack into positive change in the community. okay 0, so take a look at this. that blast you just heard is part of a series of explosions being used to remove large boulders left hanging from a rock slide in north carolina.

the 500,000-ton slide closed a major interstate in late october. the highway department says it will take at least four months to get the i-40 opened. a denver man is accused of stabbing himself just to get out of work. police say he told his boss in a video store that he was attacked by three men dressed in black but when five police agencies showed up to investigate, they say he admitted it was a lie. he is charged with false reporting and obstructing an officer. stab yourself because you don't want to go to work? you must hate your job. >> that's above and beyond. it must have been inventory day. what would have been a crazy excuse two years ago? >> what's that? >> swine flu. got swine flu. people would have looked at you like, what? >> today it's not. >> today it's all over. let me show you what's happening. one clipper storm we're watching move on through the great lakes and the ohio valley has a lot of

moisture wrapped up in the cloud but most of it is not hitting the ground as rain which is good news. you don't need any more rain here but a shot of that action across the middle part of ohio, stretching back to indiana and really originating around illinois right now. that indianapolis radar, you can see the sweep as it moves on through picking up extremely light rain. it's a quick mover into western pennsylvania by later this morning, western new york state later today, too. look at chicago, you see you're dry. the milwaukee radar picking up rain. southern parts of wisconsin and northern illinois and that is rushing out ahead of the storm. we will see some decent rain, heavier downpours across southern parts of florida. here is the miami radar. most of the action offshore. some of the stuff back in to alligator alley. more rain today. yesterday you broke a record high in miami, 89. today 87, 86. more on that in a bit. >> not bad for denver. thanks so much, job. robbers had to run for their

lives. he pulled out his gun when four people tried to rob his jewelry store. one of the robbers shot at him first and this is what happened next. >> when i saw the flash of his gun, i drew my gun. i had it in my pocket and i fired five times. and as i was firing, everybody exited real quick. >> his store was robbed twice before, too. in one attack he was tied up and the robbers took everything. i guess he was ready to go, wasn't he? a defect that could cause millions of cars to suddenly accelerate may be deeper than the carmaker actually thought. federal safety investigators are now looking.

the exact cause of the sudden acceleration problem involving some toyota and lexus models remains a deadly mystery and now the government has more to say about it. jennifer westhoven is looking out for you. this is creepy, suddenly your car speeds up. >> yeah. and it can go more than 100 miles an hour, really scary stuff. so we're following this one for you because transportation officials say the problem could go beyond those floor mats. there have been a lot of reports about the car suddenly speeding up including a fiery crash that killed a california highway patrol officer and his family. their lexus sped up to more than 120. they couldn't get it to stop. now at first the blame was just on the mats. they thought that the mats were kind of sneaking up and jamming the gas pedal to the floor. about 4 million of them were recalled. but there may be more to it. this morning's "new york times" says the government is still investigating and that it's looking at gas pedal design and

the floor plan of the cars that are involved so there may be more on that one. if you have one of the cars involved, be very careful. they say you can secure the mats but maybe better to just take it out. some workers could stay home from work and still get paid if there are fears about the h1n1 swine flu. the government, of course, has asked people to stay home. what if you don't get paid and you're not sure you're sick and can't afford to stay home? congressman george miller, his bill, he says it could help the 50 million people who don't get paid leave. keep in mind you can't just call in sick and say i think i have h1n1, your boss has to say, your company has to say, hey, we're worried about the h1n1 swine flu, stay home n. that case they'd still be paid. most businesses that already offer sick leave would be exempt. it's only companies that don't offer paid leave -- paid sick leave. tough times for the auto industry, of course.

there's a company around detroit with a passion for motorcycles that is stepping on the gas. stephanie elam is going long for this "small business success." >> reporter: dave and james kay have always been motor heads, but the road it to owning their custom motorcycle business had some bumps. dave was working on the options exchange in chicago and james was at a customs cycle shop in california. >> i wasn't very happy and my brother wasn't happy in his job so he called me and came up with the name detroit brothers. i thought it was such a great name and such a great concept. >> reporter: so the siblings moved back home in 2002 and started making custom parts in their parents' garage. their business moved into the fast lane after they got a call from the discovery channel asking them to appear on "biker buildoff." >> at that point we decided we couldn't have them film out of our parents' garage so we needed to get a shop. >> reporter: today detroit brothers makes parts, services bikes, and designs and builds

custom motorcycles 0. currently the guys are hosting a new tv show called "motor city motors." >> it's an amazing opportunity for us to get another level of exposure for our business. >> show it off it says. maybe you have a small business and you think, hey, i have a cool name, a great story, well, take a video of it. take an i-report and upload it to us cnn.com/robin. put your tips. you could be on the show. who knows? police say they found stacks and stacks of stolen luggage at somebody's house. how an officer cracked what looks like a huge suitcase scam.

♪ hello, hello

i'm rafer weigel with sports. folks in an ohio school district appear to have proved a measure that would bring back high school sports. the southwestern city school district facing a steep budget crisis cut all sports as well as d drama and transportation. while an increase was voted down narrowly. an increase was narrowly approved this time by a few hundred votes. it would charge owners of a $100,000 home an additional $227 a year. the increase has been a fiery topic and has resulted in threats and shouting matches. cops had to break up demonstrations mon be day. coming to the rescue of american speed skating stephen colbert. on his show monday night the hilarious host asked viewers to pay for the team. go to his website

colbertnation.com so the team can skate in vancouver. seven bikes ridden by lance armstrong fetched $1.3 million at an auction to raise money for his cancer foundation. now the bikes with frames designed by artists including the uk's damion hurst. he beat cancer and said parting with the bikes was not easy since he likes to keep the bikes he races. tom brady's wife may be only a month away from giving birth but that hasn't stopped her from trying to get a license to fly a helicopt helicopter. the supermodel could fly back and forth from new york to boston to see him play. "people" magazine says she passed the written test but still needs to pass the flying test. flying a helicopter pregnant, natasha, she is due -- and he said within a month. i'm within one month and i'm not supposed to be flying. >> are you having trouble driving a car? >> not a car but -- well, a

little bit. >> i was saying, i'm impressed. >> but a helicopter, come on. that takes a little more coordination, i think. thanks, rafer. to be continued. overhauling your health care may take a bit longer than expected. yesterday senate majority leader harry reid was asked if his health care bill would pass this year, well, he said woe not give a timetable. democrats say the congressional budget office blew its deadline for analyzing the costs. the senate can't vote until they're finished. it may mean reid is having trouble getting enough votes. well, if you have lost your luggage, there is a chance it might be in phoenix. two people are charged with stealing more than 1,000 suitcases at sky harbor international airport. yeah, it started when an airport officer saw a guy take a piece of luggage and drive away. police followed him and found so many suitcases at his house they couldn't even count them all.

former miss california usa carrie prejean settled her legal battle over breast implants and her firing. this is popular on cnn.com right now. both sides dropped lawsuits here. the pageant demanded she repay the money she borrowed for implants, breast implants, right? well, she said by confirming that she had them the pageant violated her privacy. she also said that she was being -- she was fired for being against same sex marriage. the pageant said she violated her contract. really? couldn't tell. >> she looked apaysing. good morning, bob. >> what's happening? we do have a quick moving storl. it's a clipper on the way through the ohio valley. some low cloud out with that, t too. light rain as well. calling for a delay, not any

right now, but some will pop up in cleveland. they should be short, 30 minutes to maybe an hour. and then chicago and detroit. detroit first, probably get the clouds coming in, and then later this morning l.a.x. with fog. more on that in a bit. all that our money expert clark howard served in the georgia state guard? and this weekend you'll see him serving our troops, too. clark and robin teamed up to help shoulderiers and you save more, spend less and avoid getting ripped off. >> brooke might be your fair person here today. she said what's the best way to be debt free before retirement. when will you be retire something. >> two years from the army reserve and two to five from the full reserve. >> so the question is what kind of debts do you have that you're trying to get your arms around. >> i want to get around to paying off the house and having just house and utilities by the time i retire. >> well, paying off your home mortgage is not always a priority. the big priority is paying off any unsecured debt.

personal loans, credit cards. then next would be car loans. but home mortgage debt is not a high priority with me. it's more important that you beef up your savings than it is to be mortgage debt free. it's psychological for people to want to be mortgage debt free on the day they retire. i'm not that much into that. because your house isn't requesting to going to feed your money. you're going to feed yourself from the money that you save. >> what about i've heard other financial analysts who aren't half as good as you, when they say, yeah, that you're paying off your mortgage should an priority because it that way you're never homeless. >> well, that is a good point, but i'm more concerned about people who retire, don't have enough money, don't have enough cash to pay if every day things, and it's an empty victory that they own their house free and clear. >> watch operation clark smart this weekend at 6:00 a.m., noon,

and 4:00 p.m. eastern here on "hln." >>. if you want to know how to dress for the weather where you're live, just ask president obama. a new website gives and you personal forecast from the commander in chief.