okay. good morning. so a lot of you are trucking into a shortened workweek. i'm robin meade. morning, sunshine. let's jump right into the stories here. hollywood is stunned by the death of actress brittany murphy. the mystery of how the 32-year-old "clueless" star died could be solved as soon as today. those of you in the northeast are digging out from a monster snowstorm and the morning commute could be a doozie. plus -- >> i've been ever since because every time i look at it i remember what happened. >> a jewelry store played santa claus by planting shiny gold boxes all over the place. for one woman, her find was extra special.

great story. first, while you were sleeping, democrats scored a huge victory on their health care push, and we're diving into what it could mean for you. just after 1:00 eastern a.m., the senate ended debate on its controversial bill without a single vote to spare. the 60-40 tally followed party lines. why the late-night vote? democrats want a bill passed before the holidays, and the republicans want to slow it down. >> a year after the debate started, few people would have imagined that this is how it would end. with a couple of cheap deals, a couple of cheap deals, and a rushed vote at 1:00 in the morning. >> this is not about partisanship or about procedure. and everyone knows we're here at 1:00 in the morning because of my friends on the other side of the aisle.

>> wow. okay. now, under the senate plan, you would be required to buy health insurance or face a fine. some poor americans would be exempt. and you could not be denied health insurance for your preexisting condition. now, senate democrats are on track to pass the bill late on christmas eve, but it still would have to be merged with the house bill. so it's not like something's going to be headed to the president's desk any time soon. there was a lot of wheeling and dealing to get this on step. in the next half hour, we'll tell you what initiatives got booted from the senate health care bill. an autopsy for brittany murphy could take place today. the coroner's office says that the actress died yesterday in l.a. from what appears to be natural causes. it says that murphy apparently collapsed in the bathroom and that there is no sign of foul play or trauma. police are investigating, though. celebrities have been reacting and sending their condolences through twitter and facebook. >> before you commit to a location. >> murphy was known for her work

in the movie "clueless" which you see here and "eight mile." she also did a lot of voice work for cartoons including lu ann platter. millions of people who got blasted by a deadly weekend snowstorm are digging out this morning. check out the video from all along the east coast. schools are closed in roanoke, baltimore and philadelphia. the power's still out in parts of north carolina. d.c.'s mayor says it may be wednesday before all the roads are clear. you know, it's not any better if you're trying to fly. airports are facing a major backlog after 1200 canceled flights. delta is offering refunds to some passengers. most major carriers will let you reschedule for free. >> there were long lines, actually. customer service, it was out of control. poor flights and people were delayed at the airport. you could tell there were a lot of tired people there that just

couldn't make it out. >> i'll get home for christmas. just a little later than i wanted to. >> yeah. okay. we want to check in with meteorologist chris smith now for a look at today's travel weather. and things are looking better, but it's the wind now that's the problem, yeah? >> yeah, we'll be seeing windy weather across the northeast, boston towards new york city. those wind gusts could be up to 30 miles an hour. basically what that means, put a little more space between that backlog of aircraft because they have all the people normally flying out plus all the people stuck from the weekend. right now up into boston things are clear for now. temperatures, though, very cold, into the teens to lower 20s as you make it from boston to connecticut towards new york city where things continue to dry out there. snow showers across the central parts of pennsylvania. but the big story across the northeast going to be that windy weather, going to slow air travel down throughout the day. another check on weather across the country in just a few minutes. >> that doesn't make for fun landings when it's that windy. thank you pinchts the big storm kept many of you at home and

away. that is not good news for retailers. jennifer westhoven is here. they were hoping to soak up some of our dough. >> oh, yeah. this was terrible timing for them, robin. another reason to stay home, right and think, maybe i'll save money instead of spending it all. it's a big problem for the retailers. east coast is 25% of their sales. some analysts are saying maybe it's not all that bad because a lot of people who stayed inside over the weekend bundled up. probably are going to still finish up at the stores this week and a lot of people hit the internet. a big spike in online shopping. it was especially helped since some of the retailers said, ah! we're desperate. we'll still give you the free shipping and get your gift to where it's going on time. just shop here. >> you know what i found? because i did a whole lot of ordering online over the weekend. that the free shipping still wasn't guaranteed to get there by christmas. i still had to do the expedited service. >> yeah. >> which is my fault for waiting so long, right? >> and here we are talking about

shopping. to me, the one store you've got to go to for christmas shopping in new york is macy's. >> yeah. >> you'll have a story about that coming up. >> oh. yeah. >> i couldn't believe it. oh! >> the same store that you see every year on the parade, exactly. more on that. it will be about 20 minutes, so stay tuned. first, though, the man accused of killing yale grad student annie le is due in court today. you may recall the story got national attention after her body was found behind a wall the day she was supposed to get married. technician raymond clark worked in the same research building. his attorney says that clark plans to plead not guilty. a cargo ship is plowing through stormy seas to make an urgent rescue. it is trying to reach 28 people stranded on a disabled freighter more than 500 miles from alaska. the ship is adrift in 30-foot seas with no cargo on board to keep it stable, and the weather's getting worse. right now the coast guard is sending a second plane to deliver supplies. "avatar's" number one at the

box office. jen just wants to put in that she loved it. loved it! the new james cameron film brought in 73 million bucks this weekend in the united states plus jen's 20 and 159 million around the world. it cost about 400 million bucks to make. what did you like about it so much? >> it was so visually beautiful. like you felt like you were there. you felt like you were jumping on that beast along with them. >> you know what? she's going to wear blue makeup, i know it. number two was disney's "the princess & the frog," earning more than $12 million followed by "the blind side." everyone who is a fan, they're putting on this blue makeup now and dressing up as the avatars, i guess. no? seven minutes past the hour. police let us have better, you know, forecast than we've had over the weekend. meteorologist chris smith. you're zeroing right in on the snow again. >> exactly. only this time the good news is we're measuring it in inches as

opposed to feet like over the weekend. we have the possibility for an inch or two of snowfall across west virginia, back up towards parkersburg down towards the charleston area continuing to see snowfall there. you see the snowfall continuing to make its way not over towards chicago but across southern parts of ohio stretching down through west virginia back up into pennsylvania. pittsburgh seeing a little bit of snowfall today. you may be about an inch of snowfall. some lake-effect snow showers towards erie back up towards the buffalo area continuing to see snowfall this morning. back up towards syracuse. there still are snowy spots. we're just not going to be seeing the big amounts of snowfall. if you live in the south the big story is freeze warning. finally a freeze close to the coastline. freezing temperatures expected southern georgia back down into the panhandle of florida where temperatures right now about 32 degrees as you make your way across the florida panhandle. meanwhile, we continue to watch across parts of big sky country snowfall and ice today. we'll have more details on that for you in just a little bit, robin. >> hey, thank you. a new jersey dad battling to get his son back from brazil is

still hanging on to hopes -- hanging on hopes on one person. and he may find out today whether he'll get his child back in time for christmas. and airlines are settling slashing air fares to fill the empty seats, and you may want to cash in at the last minute.

good morning. let's salute our troops today. tech sergeant brian boos stationed in afghanistan, but when he's home, he is a volunteer firefighter with the ray city fire department. so the shout-out is from his coworkers there. >> good morning, robin. this is rick from the ray city fire department, and all us firefighters would love to give a huge shout-out to tech sergeant brian booze currently in afghanistan. brian, we haven't forgot about you. we miss and you we really can't wait till you get back.

>> that's really sweet. if you have somebody in the service you want to salute them, we want to help you. cnn.com/robin. well, a new jersey dad hopes to find out today if he's going to get his son from brazil in time for the holidays. brazil's chief justice will decide whether to lift a stay on a lower court's ruling. that court gave david goldman. he's been battling his ex-wife's brazilian family who took custody after his mom died. why would somebody bring a gun to a snowball fight? that is what people in a d.c. neighborhood want to know. police are looking into one of their own. that's new in about 20 minutes. you know, you can save big money on air fares if you're looking for last-minute travel plans for the holidays. our money expert, jennifer westhoven, is here. this is a nice gift. at least for people who are flying. >> yeah. i mean, and usually fares go up at the last minute and they know they've kind of got you. at the last minute there. exactly.

>> a good description. i knew exactly what you were thinking. >> you knew exactly where i was going, but yeah. all right. but i know you're eating your breakfast. but airlines put up the cheap fares, basically look, they had all these empty seats, it's holiday season. they want to just get people in them. that's good news in a bad economy if you're flying for the holidays and you ended up having to go somewhere in at the last minute. united, american, airtran all had amazing fares if you booked into new year's. i say amazing because it's not that it's the cheapest, it's just compared to what you would pay if you bought at the last minute, you were basically paying the same normal fare if you booked weeks in advance. here's an example from "usa today." new york to dallas round trip. instead of going for $1,800 which is what it would cost you if you had to book now, it's going for about $400, a more reasonable fare. the shipping rush, it's on, right? u.p.s., today is their peak day. about 22 million packages they

expect to deliver. and overall they say they think that business for the year, a little better than last year. so that squares, you know, not just with the u.p.s. picture but with pretty much everybody's picture for how hole say sales will go. this is the last day for you to ship at reasonable rates. first class and priority mail, but not the, you know, the kind of fedex rates. >> hey, i'm digging your hair today. >> thanks. i'm thinking i've got to go comb it. >> i like it. it's big. it's good. a former reality tv star's latest venture is about breathing new life into an old accessory. stephanie elam ties one on in this "small business success." >> reporter: kwame jackson hasn't worked on wall street since the first season on "the apprentice" a few years ago. these days you might find him at macy's, one of the retailers

that carries crimson by kwame, his brand of neck ties. kwame and his business partner, corwin thomas, launched crimson in 2006. >> our market is that young, aspiring professional moving up the corporate ladder. >> reporter: to attract those buyers and the women who love them, crimson ties have a distinct look and size. >> the ties are 60 inches versus 56 inches long which is the standard length of most ties. they're 3 1/2 inches versus 3 inches wide. >> reporter: kwame leveraged his popularity to create media buzz. krimson gained momentum and deals with national retailers followed. now kwame says there's more to come. >> krimson is going to be a luxury global lifestyle brand, neckwear to pocket squairs to cuff links to fragrance to really build out the acu accoutrements of a professional man. so if you're a small

business owner, we'd like to see your success story. go to cnn.com/robin. upload a video i-report and you might be featured here on "morning express." senate democrats got a green light on health care, and it happened right in the middle of the night, last night. wait till you hear what got booted to close the deal. plus this. santa proposed to an nfl cheerleader.

okay. let's hope that the travel for our air travelers today is a lot better than it has been over the weekend. here's chris smith with more on that. >> thank you very much, robin. it will be better, but we still have some problems out there expected today because of windy weather. flight explorer shows us across the country we have about 1,000 flights in the air. as far as where we're expecting to see delays because of the wind back up across the northeast. also you're going to have to deal with de-icing up in those big airports up across the northeast. that's going to slow things down as well. boston, new york, you have that wind. half hour to hour delays. a little snow in cleveland and pittsburgh back up into buffalo. that will slow your commute down a half hour to an hour. meanwhile on the west coast, we're dealing with rainfall for seattle, portland and towards san francisco. of course, we'll talk more about that northeast weather for you

coming up in about 15 minutes, robin. >> thank you. what a tough day for the bengals yesterday. they were playing with a heavy heart. and they had to take the field just three days after their teammate, chris henry, had died. and here's rafer weigel with more on the story. i was watching this game and just reading the faces, you know, of the teammates, and it wasn't a great outcome either. >> and that was the other thing. they had a heartbreaking loss as well. they said having to take the field after henry's tragic death was, quote, almost surreal. receiver chad ochocinco, here he is breaking down before the game. he was very close with henry. he said henry was like a brother to him. now, the entire team wore henry's number 15 on their helmets. and then later ochocinco scores. now, he's known for his touchdown celebrations. well, he just simply net to the ground and looked up at the sky and touched his heart. that was moved what ocho did. he said the game had an empty feeling and unfortunately for the bengals they lost with a

last-second field goal. their next challenge will be burying henry on tuesday. the other big story sunday was the weather and how it would affect sunday's games. well, in washington, they shovelled out an estimated 25 million pounds of snow. that is what i said. from fedex field for tonight's game against the giants. other games were postponed because of the snow. we'll have more on that a little later. nfl games postponed by snow? that is insane. and this was insane. a dramatic finish for the super bowl champion steelers edged the pack by one point on the last play of the game. there's no time left on the clock when ben roethlisberger hits mike wallace in the corner of the end zone. so mike wallace catches the game winner in the 60th minute. wallace, 60 minutes. big ben set a record for most yards ever thrown in a game. impressive since the team has been around since 1933. speaking of records, the browns had a wild win over kansas city. josh cribbs set an nfl record for kick returns in one season when he ran this back 100 yards for a score. there's nothing harder to do in

the game than return a kick for a score. then he breaks his own record later in the game. >> the same game. >> the same game with a 103-yard return for a score. the browns would win it. their up-and-down year. we win. a baltimore cheerleader gets a football with a marriage proposal from santa. wait, you're not santa. you're my boyfriend. she pulls back the beard and there he is. check this out. look at the size of the rock that santa got her. my goodness, your job pays well up there at the north pole. >> santa, what do you do for a living? >> what does mrs. claus think? >> that was well planned, wasn't it? >> in baltimore with the weather. speak of weather, a snowball fight got ugly. why a cop showed up with his weapon drawn. plus -- well, his weapon out, anyway. look at this high-speed chase.

it took this violent crash to force the driver finally to stop. 

all right. senate democrats took a leap, a big leap, in the middle of the night on health care reform. just after 1:00 a.m. eastern, they won a vote ending debate on the senate bill. not a single republican voted in favor. the senate is on track to pass the bill by christmas eve. hollywood is stunned by the death of actress brittany murphy. she was only 32. the coroner's office in l.a. says that murphy died yesterday of natural causes. police are following up with an investigation, though. an autopsy could take place today or tomorrow. 12 more detainees at the guantanamo bay prison have been sent back to their home countries. they're from afghanistan, yemen

and somalia. the department of justice detainees were sent home after a review of the potential threat they pose as well as a legal review. a memorial service is scheduled for this afternoon to remember evangelist oral roberts who died last week at 91. the service will be held in tulsa, oklahoma, at the school that he started, oral roberts university. good morning. you might be up early because you're going to be digging out of the snow that fell over the weekend. wow! did it ever fall. good morning, i'm robin meade. it is the first official day of winter. and honey, it sure looks like it. many of you face an icy commute today. even amtrak is canceling some of its train service today. so you know it's got to be rough. so be careful if you do have to drive, at least five people were killed in traffic accidents over the weekend. in massachusetts, just getting on the road can be a nightmare. >> this guy got stuck. and he wanted me to back up. so i backed up a little bit. i ended up getting stuck over here.

then he pulled down and he got stuck right there. >> i'm trying to dig this car out. it's heavy. it's real heavy. and it's a shoot of ice underneath. >> oh, yeah. i keep slipping everywhere. everybody keeps getting stuck on this hill. it's ridiculous. >> we already helped, like, five people up. >> wow. one of your fellow viewers sent an i-report of the buried cars in new york city. let me show you here. she says that the weather has been so bitter and cold, but believe it or not, she says she enjoys it. >> yeah, i like it. it's crazy. we never see snow like this. >> almost no snow. >> where are you from? >> we're from taiwan. >> taiwan. this is your first snowfall? >> yeah. >> well, enjoy it. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> well, the wintry weather brought out neighbors in washington, d.c., for a planned massive snowball fight. but you know what? witnesses say the fun was cut

short when an off-duty police officer pulled a gun during the snow fight. more on that in a couple of minutes. and by the way, let's talk, too, about how your travels will be today especially if you were flying. it was a nightmare all weekend. after months of wrangling, senate democrats took controversial initiatives off the table to close a deal overnight. they ditched the government-run public option that liberal democrats had pushed hard for. and they dumped a plan to expand medicare to people as young as 55. last night's vote ended debate, and the senate is on track to pass its bill on christmas eve. the husband of a missing utah woman showed up at a vigil for her yesterday. josh powell reportedly hugged his wife, susan's, sister but did not speak with her parents. police have called him a person of interest in her disappearance three weeks ago. well, powell has the couple's two young sons. his attorney denies police allegations that he's been uncooperative. a cargo ship is plowing through stormy seas now to make an urgent rescue. it is trying to reach 28 people

stranded on a disabled freighter. more than 500 miles from alaska. now, the ship is adrift in 30-foot seas with no cargo on board to keep it stable. the weather is getting worse. and now the coast guard is sending a second plane to deliver supplies. this looks like an innocent snowball fight until you see a uniformed police officer with his weapon out responding to reports of somebody with a gun. so there he is, the weapon is out. during a snowball fight. well, let's see. go back up, guys. d.c. police tell our affiliate, wjla, that the officer holstered his weapon when he found out that it was an off-duty plainclothesed officer. police are looking into whether he drew his gun. witnesses say he did after his car was hit by snowballs. >> no one meant any harm. no one meant anything by just having fun. so it's highly unfortunate. we just are washingtonians and

we like to play in the blizzard. >> wjla reports that about 200 people had showed up for that big snowball fight. police say that there is no evidence that officers pointed their weapons at the crowd or anybody. shiny gold boxes with christmas presents are popping up across northern wisconsin. a jewelry store is playing santa to remind people to smile this holiday season. the store planted more than 1,000 boxes filled with jewelry in places like parking lots, hospitals, even the sidewalk. >> we share happy moments with our customers all the time. this is a way to give happy moments back to people that maybe haven't been in here before. >> well, a woman battling cancer found the gift while waiting for treatment. she said this really lifted her spirits. let me show you something that's happening right now. come here, look at these live pictures. it's a four-alarm fire that's happening this morning in the bronx in the new york area, the bronx. now, it looks like several buildings appear to be involved. it looks like maybe one big,

long strip mall, you know, buildings right next door to each other. and it looks to me like this fire has really eaton through the roof of a couple of those businesses. a commercial area. we're going to keep you updated. but right now you can see that fire crews have responded, and they're trying to pour water on this thing. did you notice that the smoke was kind of moving away from the fire? chris smith is in for bob today. he's saying that the wind is a major problem, too, for people who are going to be out and about whether you're fighting a fire or just trying to walk to work in that area. good morning. >> yeah, between the windchill or the fact that those flames are pushed around or the fact that they'll have to put extra space between the aircraft today all going to be an issue because of the windy weather. no more snow as far as the big cities from new york city back up into the boston area. snowfall totals up across parts of connecticut and rhode island, you can see, almost two feet of snowfall in places. boston logan, you ended up with about ten inches of snowfall. as a matter of fact, let me go ahead and take you there. where we are seeing -- well, let's go ahead and show you the

snowfall up there, boston logan. you can see folks just kind of sitting around waiting and waiting because all those flights canceled after ten inches of snowfall. now, the problem today is going to be the fact that over the weekend we have all those people to get out of the airports plus all the people flying today. plus we have to de-ice all those aircraft. so a lot of issues going up in the boston area. temperatures, 18, 19 degrees up in boston. 24 degrees as you make your way towards new york city. meanwhile down towards philadelphia, d.c., you're right around the upper 20s. snowfall across parts of state college, pennsylvania, another inch of snowfall going to be possible across parts of west virginia stretching back up almost towards the pittsburgh area where you are going to see snowfall this morning up into pittsburgh. and that snowfall, lake-effect snowfall continuing towards buffalo. so although we're notasuring it in feet, several inches possible across parts. in the south, not snowfall but freezing temperatures expected. coming up in just a little bit, robin, we'll talk a little about

west coast weather. rainfall across san francisco, seattle and portland. >> what a weather weekend. >> crazy. and today is the first day of winter. >> it is, ironically. >> thank you. the nfl is asking some of its players for an unusual donation. they want their brains. also, you're going to need to hear the latest on what you're going to get back on your home remodeling project.

all right. let's look at the morning papers for you. you don't have to go out -- look there's my hair spray. "the washington post" has a great shot of what the weather has done to parts of the capital and other spots on the east coast. now, "the wall street journal" introduces you to one man who's

hit it big thanks to the economy. david's hedge fund firm has tallied a $7 billion profit this year. the fund made a big bet that bank stocks would rebound. from usa today," cities are finding the fast lane is paying off more ways than one. express lanes that have been reserved for vehicles that carry more than one passenger are now being opened for a price to solo drivers. brilliant. that's a check of the morning papers. okay. if you're thinking about fixing up your home, you might want to put your money toward the outside, the exterior of your home. our money expert, jennifer westhoven, is here to explain. but a lot of us think about the inside. oh, let's paint the walls. new drapes. >> yeah. and all the talk is about insulation and, you know, you'll get that back in your electric bill, but those days where you could upgrade a lot in your house and then charge a lot more for your home, they're over. realtors say that it is all about curb appeal these days. so if you're trying to sell, they say you're going to get the best return for your money if

you improve the outside like fixing the roof, putting on a new door, a new paint job. by the way -- >> really? >> yes, by the way, paint. gerri willis, our other sister finance expert, says pale, sunny yellow is the best color to sell your home. >> it makes your home look bigger, i do know that, and it's happy. >> i just know that it's got results. those homes sell the fastest. >> huh. >> yeah. but inside renovation jobs haven't been adding much for about four years in a row. you want to think about that if you're thinking ooh, i want to do a big project that will increase the value. not so much these days. over the weekend seven more banks failed including two big ones in california. first federal, imperial capital. so the total count for the year, 140 banks failed this year. the most since the s&l crisis in 1992. as you know, if you bank with one of these, the fdic, they usually do it on fridays so they can smoothly handle your money. it will all be in a new bank by monday morning and you won't

know the difference. your debit card will keep working. saab, might be the end of the line? maybe not. a little beep, beep on the monitor again. gm had said it would discontinue the brand after two of its offers fell through. but now the dutch automaker speicher, they're trying to renew the bid, but they are putting the pressure on gm saying we want an answer by the end of the day. we'll see. gm says it's looking. >> wow. okay. >> i think a lot of people who love design, people who love apple, were really sad to see this because saab has such an interesting design. >> it's unique, that's for sure. thanks. a state law maker in maine wants a mandatory warning on cell phones in her state saying that they can cause brain cancer. now, there's no consensus among scientists on whether that is true. and the cell phone industry says it is not. but in some countries, cell phones already carry those warnings. right now no u.s. states require them. a similar measure has been introduced in san francisco. a 13-year-old boy paralyzed by a stray bullet spent saturday

helping the homeless in fresno, california. andrew mitchell and members of his church handed out clothes, sleeping bags and a holiday meal. he's been paralyzed from the chest down since 2002 when he was shot during a drive-by shooting. millions of people are starting their workweek dealing with snow. but it's not all a big headache. >> awesome! >> how's the sledding going? >> good.

you know what? let me show you again, if you're just tuning in, we've been watching a fire that's happening in the bronx this morning. these are live pictures. come here and check this out here. it's a four-alarmer. that means a lot of rescue crews are on the scene. and it looks like several buildings. you know, these buildings are right next door to each other. no space in between. so you've got one on fire, and inevitably it's going to spread to the other one. so it appears that a couple here are involved at least. but i do see some improvement in terms of the amount of flames that we're seeing coming out of the building. so that's good. we are not hearing anything about any injuries. so here's a tape from earlier. you can see how much of an upper hand they've gotten on this fire

already this morning. we're going to keep you updated and keep visiting that. sure, all the snow is causing headaches for a lot of folks with any holiday travel plans. but charree johnson also found people who are making the best of it. >> reporter: while the roads may be tough to maneuver, some folks don't mind the snow. the kids took full advantage of it by enjoying a little sledding. what do you think about all this snow? >> awesome! >> reporter: how's the sledding going? >> good. it's fun coming down but it's really hard walking up. >> i like sledding. i like when it all gets in my face. it's really, really fun. >> reporter: and then others got a jump start on digging out. from shoveling to brushing off your car, this heavy snowfall kept folks pretty busy. everyone had their own method of digging out of the snow. >> we've got a shovel, so might as well be big and fluffy and pretty than slushy and nasty. >> i just figured i'd do a

shoveling round. i love it. as long as you've got the clothes, it's fun. it's like being a kid. we'll shovel now and later and maybe i'll get my lazy daughters to shovel one round. that's one idea. >> reporter: then there were others who had to be out in the snow like rick, a letter carrier. neither rain, sleet nor snow could keep him from delivering mail to his customers. what do you think about all this snow? does it make your job even more difficult? >> it makes it quite a bit more difficult, yes. we're doing the best we can. >> reporter: so while mother nature dumped a huge helping of snow on the area, everyone had their own way of dealing with it. >> it's great. it's great on saturday where we can all enjoy it where i don't have to go to work or anything like that, so we're having fun. >> the little one riding with his dad there or somebody, anyway. thanks again to charree johnson of affiliate wmar for that report. let it snow let it snow let it snow ♪ >> now, that's the sunny side of things. a reality is, it has been a huge pain.

one of our friends who works with us here tried to fly out friday, didn't happen. tried to fly out saturday. finally happened. but then when she tried to fly back to new york, you know, she got delayed again last night. so all the way around, her visit was, like, that long. >> yeah. that's just the way it's going to be. now one of the issues is people getting to the airports. the airports are now open, but the roads to get there are not very good. air travel, obviously, going to be an issue. no more snowfall in boston and new york. that's good news. but the problem is, it's remaining windy. so expect that windy weather both in boston and new york. now, we are seeing some snowfall back over towards pittsburgh. they're also de-icing planes in pittsburgh and philadelphia. so that's going to slow things down. meanwhile, out on the west coast, we have a winter storm system moving in. that's going to mean rainfall in seattle back down to portland and san francisco. that's going to slow you down about half hour to hour delays, robin. >> all right. thank you. okay. so there was snow where they were playing football. so sometimes it was good on the field. sometimes that was not. some of the games even had to be rescheduled, huh? >> something i cannot imagine.

a football game having to be rescheduled because of snow. i was very impressed with how these workers whipped into action because in three nfl cities, snow fell in record or near record amounts. check out this amounts. check out this individuvideo. 700 workers had to dig out. flights were canceled in and out. the bears, their flight was canceled coming in. they didn't get in until hours before the game. one of the reasons why they lost badly to the ravens. in philly, snow forced them to postpone their game in san francisco by three hours until they could clear the snow out. philly would win that to get into the playoffs. >> if you can't see the stripes it's going to be hard it to play. >> wait until you see the after. emotions high in the bengals/chargers game. chad ochocinco broke down during team introductions playing three days after their teammate chris henry, number 15, died. ochocinco known for his touchdown celebrations, honored chris henry when he scored this

touchdown, fell to his knees and pointed to the sky. he said henry was like a brother to him. heart-breaking loss for cincy, lost on a last second field goal. tensions high between brett favre and his coach, vikings pounded by carolina, coach wanted to pull favre out, they had nothing to play for. favre didn't like that. and he said they got into a heated discussion on the sidelines. cameras did not catch it, but favre said, yeah, we were arguing. >> he kind of has the work ethic of i'm not the princess, put me in. >> panthers would win the game. >> the nfl is partnering with one of its critics to reduce concussions and brain trauma in players. players are being encouraged it to donate their brains when they die to boston university. researchers -- boston university researchers, bu has in the past been critical of the league stance on concussions. the nfl says it will donate a million dollars to bu's research center. all new sports in the next half hour. >> i don't know how i would feel about that, saying yes, you can

have my brain later on. all right. folks are digging out from a brutal, just maddening snowstorm that buried the northeast and one headache that million storm victims are facing today. more on that. a new cell phone service making you less distracted on the road.           

good morning. okay. . maybe you're up early because you're like i have to go shovle out my car. it's the case for a lot of viewers today. good morning, sunshine. i'm robin meade. hollywood is stunned by the death of actress brittany murphy. the mystery of how the 32-year-old "clueless" star it died could be solved as soon as today. those of you in the northeast digging out from a monster snowstorm, the morning commute could be a doozy. and you can still fly high on bargain basement air fares. the airlines are slashing prices, so what's in it for them? all right. first, though, while you were

sleeping the democrats scored a huge victory on their health care push and we're diving into what that can mean for you. just after 1:00 a.m. eastern the senate ended debate on its controversial bill without a single vote to spare. the 60-40 tally followed along party lines. why the late-night vote? the dems wanted a bill passed before the holidays and republicans wanted to slow it down. >> the year after the debate started, it few people would have imagined that this is how it would end. with a couple of cheap deals, a couple of cheap deals, and a rush vote at 1:00 in the morning. >> this is not about partisanship or about procedure, and everyone knows we're here at 1:00 in the morning because of my friends on the other side of the aisles. >> under the senate plan, some people could get government help to pay for insurance, including a family of four earning up to

about $88,000 a year. now also, you could not be denied insurance for preexisting conditions. plus insurance companies could not charge you higher premiums based on your gender or your medical history. so now, there was a lot of wheeling and dealing to get to this step. in the next half hour, we're going to tell you what initiatives got booted from the senate health care bill. an autopsy for brittany murphy could take place today. the coroner's office says that 32-year-old actress died yesterday in l.a. from what appears to be natural causes. it says that murphy apparently collapsed in the bathroom and that there is no sign of foul play or trauma. but police are investigating. celebrities have been reacting and sending their condolences through twitter and facebook. >> this is raging. >> let's do a lap. >> murphy was known for her work in the movie "clueless" and "8 mile" and did voice to work for

cartoons including the character on "king of the hill." millions of people maybe you too are digging out after getting blasted bay deadly snowstorm over the weekend. it nearly covered the map on the east coast. some of the worst hit areas are boston and d.c. in the nation's capital, it's so bad that all of the federal agencies are closed for the day. in cape cod, massachusetts, drivers explain how bad the conditions there are. >> it was just white everything. you couldn't see ten feet in front of you. >> usually turns to rain. anything we get turns to slush. this time the people -- we're spoiled in the cape. we don't have to do this a lot. >> it's not any better if you're trying to fly. the airports are facing a major backlog after thousands of flights were canceled this weekend. delta and continental are offering refunds to some passengers and most major carriers will let you reschedule for free. >> so yeah, we're hoping we're crossing our fingers and hopefully make it.

>> i'm going to be here tomorrow until 6:00 in the morning for our flights. >> it's frustrating, but what we can do? it's weather. >> what are you going to do? let's check in with chris smith in for bob today. the good news is, the snow has moved on. but here comes the wind to kick up the snow that's there. >> one of the issues just getting to the airport. once you get there you have to deal with windy weather and deicing is going to slow things down, but the snowfall is now done for boston back towards new york city. the snow blowing around thanks to wind gusts, 15 to 30 miles an hour. you see right now there's boston that's clear, it's cold. only 19 in boston. make your way down towards new york city, still talking low to middle 20s. back towards baltimore and into washington, d.c., you are clear right now. snowfall across the central parts of pennsylvania. we're going to continue to watch the situation across the northeast and give you the very latest. let's go ahead. i want to take you out to boston. this is what it looks like from boston logan airport. this was yesterday where snowfall forced cancellations

and delays. well, your gaeg to see them probably today as well because of the windy weather as well as the deicing. we're continue to monitor the situation across the northeast. even though it's not snowing there it is snowing in some places and let you know in just a few minutes. >> thank you. the big storm kept many of you at home over the weekend. that means you were away from the malls on the last weekend before christmas. that is terrible news for retailers. jennifer westhovan is here with what the outcome of that has been. >> we've been talking so much this year about how the retailers are in trouble after a year of recession and now, another reason for people to stay home with the big snowstorm. so the east coast about 25% of sales for many stores, so this is a big deal for them. some analysts say, well, maybe it's not that bad because a lot of the people who were inside this weekend probably still go out for the rest of the week and finish up their lists and a lot of people seemed to go on-line. a big spike in on-line shopping. some retailers like sachs and amazon extended the deadline so

you could still get free shipping or items delivered by christmas. but one thing i'll say is that you know we kind of think of ourselves as consumers all the time, may be good for us for sales but we're also workers and it's not necessarily great for the retailers in terms of some of their hiring outlooks for the rest of the year. >> very good point. thank you. the coast guard is trying to figure out what caused one of its boats to collide with a 24-foot boat yesterday. it happened at the san diego christmas water parade. an 8-year-old boy on board the smaller boat was killed. five people have major injuries. now, a witness says that she saw a boat heading toward the shore and suddenly turn and then she heard a crash. "avatar" is number one at the box office. those are pretty pictures. the new james cameron film brought in $73 million this weekend in the united states. and $159 million around the

world. it cost about $400 million to make that thing. number two was disney's "the princess and the frog" earned more than $12 million, followed by "the blind side" still hanging in there. so, if wind is the problem today, in the northeast, where else do we see some snow problems? chris is in for bob. good morning. >> good morning, robin. across parts of west virginia we could see another inch of snowfall down there, from parkers burg towards the charleston area, another inch of snowfall going to be possible. seeing snowfall around the pittsburgh area, back towards erie, pennsylvania, buffalo, new york, all seeing snowfall today. the lake-effect snow machine starting to crank up on the back side of this storm system. you don't have to worry about the snowfall making its way into the big cities, but traveling on the new york state thruway you are going to have to deal with that. on the west coast if you're going to be traveling to seattle expect to see some delays out there because we have wet weather across parts of the pacific northwest that stretches down towards portland where

you're going to be dealing with rainfall today. snow will be an issue across the coastal range back to the cascades, about 5 to 8 inches of snowfall above 1,000 feet. that stretches down towards the sierra nevada where we're going to see about 8 to 14 inches of snowfall, above about 7,000 feet. so, obviously, just because the snow is ending across the northeast, still plenty of snow to go around the rest of the country. of course we'll have complete details on how this is going to affect air travel coming up in just a little bit. robin? >> thank you. a new jersey dad battling to get his son back from brazil is pinning his hopes on one person. and he may find out today whether he's going to get his child back in time for christmas. airlines are suddenly slashing the air fares. okay. you might want to cash in.

all right. let's look again at this fire we've been covering this morning. this is happening in the bronx. this is the first time we can see this since the sun came up. now we can see the -- fire fighters have been on the scene and i think that they're letting the camera float there. there you go. can you see that, looks like a number of shops in this kind of commercial strip mall have been catching on fire this morning. and the smoke is still spilling out and the smoke is kind of moving away from the fire indicating a bit of a wind. at least i'm not seeing flames right now. so to me, it looks like they've gotten a better hand on it because look at what it appeared to be earlier this morning with the flames leaping out of the roof it appears this morning. this is in the bronx. this was a four-alarm fire. we have not heard of anyone being injured. that's good. all right. we always salute the troops. let's do that now. today's salute is for sergeant brian booth stationed in afghanistan. but when he's home, he's a volunteer firefighter with the

ray city fire department and the shout out is from his co-workers there. >> good morning, robin. this is rick from the ray city fire department and all the fire fighters would like to give a huge shout out to tech sergeant brian booth from moody air force base currently stationed in afghanistan. we haven't forget about you, miss you and we can't wait until you get back. >> all right. very nice message from your co-workers. if you have somebody in the service and you want to salute them we would like to help, cnn.com/robin. the man accused of killing yale grad student annie le is due in court today. this story got national attention after her body was found behind a wall the day she was supposed to get married. technician raymond clark worked in the same animal research building. his attorney says that clark plans to plead not guilty. the death of michael jackson, the struggling economy, and the swine flu could all qualify as some of the biggest stories this year. but which is considered the biggest? new for you in 30 minutes, we're

going to reveal the top five stories of 2009. stick to see if you can guess them. you know what, right now f you're starting to feel a little guilty because you didn't plan to go home to see your parents for the holidays, you could save big-time money on the air fares right now. here's money expert jennifer westhovan. good morning. >> good morning. thanks robin. this is a surprise. usually you can say sorry, mom, you know, it's thousands of dollars for me to fly home, but usually, you know, the way that fare goss up at the last minute, airlines have dropped the 14, 21 and 30-day advanced purchase requirements and that is meaning some very cheap fares at the last minute. that's good news in a bad economy. american, delta, united, air tran, all had some pretty amazing fares if you booked through new year's that normally, you know, would cost you thousands of dollars. here's an example from "usa today." round trip ticket, dallas to new york, normally $1800. now it's going for a much more

reasonable fare, about $400. the kind of fare you would see if you had booked in advance. the trouble with all this, analysts say there's only one reason they're doing this, it means that the flights are -- they're not filling up enough seats. the holiday shipping rush reaches its peak for ups. it's going to deliver about 22 million packages and expects business to be a little better than last year. that squares with the overall outlook for holiday sales. all right. we were talking ate some travel stuff. what are if you are traveling this morning. how are you going to deal with all that snow out there? good morning. it's getting better but we are by no means problem free across the u.s. where windy weather and deicing is going to be causing some problems. saber flight explorer at least shows we have some flights in the air, about 1700 flights in the air. as far as where those delays are going to be, up across the northeast, boston into new york city, it's going to be very windy today. they're going to have to put a little extra space in between the aircraft, plus they're going to be deicing all of those planes.

they're deicing planes in pittsburgh back to cleveland. you have to deal with a little snowfall, not a whole lot, about an inch could show things down. probably the same story back into buffalo. out as we make our way to the west coast it's going to be rainfall that's the story for seattle, back up towards portland and san francisco. you're going to be having to deal with the rain showers. that may slow things about a half hour to hour delays. no snowfall for the city ts in the pacific northwest. we, obviously, have the snowfall in the east coast and some people might have called it a snowy mess and to others, it was a winter wonderland. one woman says there's an upside to all this snow. plus, check this out -- santa claus, proposed to an nfl cheerleader. oh, my goodness. mrs. klaus.

♪ new york always looks pretty, right, when the snow first comes down. but then check out the aftermath of a massive snowstorm yesterday. these people had to dig out their cars. that's always fun. one i-reporter says it wasn't that bad. whatever! >> but people were out and about running errands, going to eat, going to the grocery store, going to the bank, walking their dog, and generally the people that were out were enjoying it. >> whatever! the storm dumped up to 2 feet of snow in some areas.

and here's some live pictures right now, is that central park i'm looking at here? so looks like they have some of the paths dug out so people can get their morning jog in. that is pretty until you're really close up. or you're standing by as the taxicab drives by and slashes the slush on you. a cargo ship is plowing through stormy seas to make an urgent rescue, trying to reach 28 people stranded on a disabled fighter more than 500 miles from alaska. the ship is adrift in 30 foot seas with no cargo on board to keep it stable. the coast guard says it has not taken on any water, but the weather is getting worse. can you imagine, the cincinnati bengals had to take the it field only three days after their teammate chris henry died and here's rafer weigel with more on the story. this is the team that has, you know, chad ochocinco on it. >> right. >> always known for -- >> flam buoyancies. >> exactly. >> so you wondered how this was going to impact their on-field

performance. >> they usually play with this sort of -- i cannot imagine what it was like for these guys to have to take the field. for receiver chad ochocinco this picture says it all. he was very close with henry. you can see him breaking down. he said henry was like a brother to him. the team wore number 15 on their helmets. ochocinco, i mean he's known for his tv el celebrations. he catches this one, in honor of henry simply knelt down, touched his heart and pointed to the skyp. he said the game had, quote, an empty feeling and i was moved by what ochocinco did. unfortunately for them they lost on a last second field goal and the next challenge burying henry on tuesday. the other big story, the weather how was it going to affect sunday's game? this is some of the video we got. in washington they shoveled out an estimated 25 million pounds of snow from fedex field for tonight's game. other games were postponed because of the snow. more on that a little later in the show. first a dramatic finish for

the super bowl champions the steelers edged the packers by one point on the last play of the game. look at the clock. there's no more time left. ben roethlisberger hits mike wallace in the corner of the end zone, so mike wallace catches the game winner in the 60th minute and big ben set a steelers record for the most yards ever thrown in a game. impressive since the team since has been around since 1933. the cleveland browns in a wild win over kansas city. josh cribs set the nfl record for kick returns, four scores in a season when he ran this one back 100 yards for a td. well, then he broke his own record, when he ran -- in the same game when he ran another one back for 103 yards for a touchdown. >> see. >> the browns -- >> game. >> same game. they've had an up and down year, won 41-34. the bears/ravens game a baltimore cheerleader gets a football with a marriage proposal on it from san it ta clause. who is that? that's not really santa, that's my boyfriend, she was moved by it. look at the size of the rock.

oh, my, santa. >> santa has got game. >> some elves working for him, i guess. ravens won. all new sports in the next half hour. >> congrats to them. a new jersey dad hoping to find out today whether he gets his son home from brazil in time for the holidays. brazil's chief justice will decide whether to lift a stay on a lower court's ruling. that court gave david goldman custody of his young son. >> it's my hope that we'll have christmas at home for the holidays and new year's and a very long happy, healed life as father and son, at home. the first step is for sean and i to reunite, come home, be with our family, and be i will not do to them what they have done to sean and me. >> goldman has been battling his ex-wife's brazilian family who took custody of the boy after his mom died. a snowball fight got ugly. why a cop showed up with his

weapon out. plus, look at a high-speed chase that was caught on police dash cam. it took a violent crash to force the driver to finally stop.

senate democrats took a big leap in the middle of the night on your health care reform. just after 1:00 a.m. eastern, they won a vote ending debate on the senate bill. now the senate's on track to pass the bill by christmas eve. it would extend coverage to 30 million americans who do not have it now. hollywood is stunned by the death of actress brittany murphy. she was just 32 years old. the coroner's office in l.a. says that murphy died yesterday of natural causes. police are following up with an investigation. an autopsy could take place today or tomorrow. the coast guard is investigating a deadly crash between one of its boats and another boat yesterday. the san diego union tribune says that the coast guard vessel was

responding to an emergency call when it struck a smaller boat. an 8-year-old boy was killed and five others on that boat have major injuries. those are some of the headlines that we're following this morning. time check, 30 minutes past the hour. hope you're on time. i'm robin meade. good morning, sunshine. so, officially it's the first day of winter, but honey y our getting the weather long before that. take a look here at some of the icy commutes some of you are facing. amtrak is canceling some of its train service today. be careful if you're going to be driving. at least five people were killed in accidents over the weekend. in massachusetts, just getting on the road, that could be a nightmare. >> this guy got stuck and he wanted know back up. i backed up a little bit and ended up getting stuck over here. he pulled down and got stuck right there. >> i'm trying to dig this car out. it it's heavy. >> it's a lot. >> it's real heavy and a sheet of ice underneath. >> i keep slipping everywhere.

everybody keeps getting stuck on this hill. it's ridiculous. >> already helped like five people up. >> yeah. well one of our fellow viewers, your fellow viewer, sent an i-report of the buried cars in new york city. she admits it's cold, but then she says she loves the snow. she even found some exchange students who were seeing snow for the first time. >> yeah. i like it. it's crazy. it's too heavy to work. >> we came from like a tropical island so we never see snow like this. >> almost no snow. >> where are you from? >> taiwan. >> taiwan. >> china. >> this is your first snowfall? >> yeah. >> well enjoy it. >> yeah. >> thank you. >> you know what, we like it to see what the weather is like in your town. go to cnn.com/robin for details on how to be an i-reporter. after months of wrangling the senate democrats took some controversial health care initiatives off the table to close a deal overnight while you were sleeping.

they ditched the government run public ops and they dumped a plan to expand medicare to people as young as 55. the senate is on track to pass its bill on christmas eve but it's unclear still when president obama may get a final bill. the husband of a missing utah woman showed up at a vigil for her yesterday. josh powell reportedly hugged his wife's sister, but did not speak to her parents. now police have called him a person of interest in her disappearance three weeks ago. powell has two young sons. he dies into allegations he's been uncooperative. if you're up early because you have to get your gifts shipped out, here's the run down for you. today is the last day to send first class and priority mail to arrive by christmas. otherwise you're going to have to use the express mail which you know costs more. the u.s. post office's calendar says the cutoff for express mail is wednesday. it expects to handle $830 million parcels today, 30% more than a normal day.

maine could be the first state to require cancer warnings on cell phones. a state lawmaker wants a message on the packaging that says that the radiation from cell phones can cause brain cancer. the cell phone industry says it's not true and there is no consensus among scientists. a similar measure has been introduced in san francisco. so the snow has largely kind of gone away, except what's on the ground, right? here comes the wind to kick what's on the ground around and chris is in for bob. >> thank you very much, robin. and this weather appropriately brought to you by our friends at tylenol, making you hopefully feel better. because there is going to be plenty of travel headaches as we go throughout the day particularly across the northeast. not from the fact that you're going to see any more snow but the fact that it's windy, winds gusting to 30 miles an hour, so that's going to mean they have to put a little more extra space between those aircraft and that will slow things down. we have a whole lot more

aircraft because all the people from the weekend still have to fly. temperatures in boston to boot very cold, 20 degrees, stretching down towards new york city where you're looking at temperatures into the middle 20s. meanwhile across west virginia you're not done with the snow yet. you have another inch of snowfall going to be possible. winter weather advisory in effect for you that's going to continue up towards the philadelphia -- up towards cleveland, pittsburgh, up towards the buffalo area going to be dealing with snowfall, probably maybe about an inch of accumulation, not going to be a major deal. you're going to see snowfall through syracuse, back towards buffalo. keep that in mind if you're doing a little traveling. head out toward the west as we talk about big sky country, the sky is full of a lot of snowfall out there. take a look at snowfall from great falls stretching across much of montana, dealing with icy conditions particularly around the great falls area where you could up with maybe as much as an inch of ice possible there. snow showers otherwise going to be expected across the northern part of the country. out on the west coast, the story is wet wet weather from seat toll portland towards san francisco, going to be dealing

with rainfall today. of course in the higher elevations of the mountain, dealing with snowfall. coming up in a bit, we'll talk about what's going on with all that air travel. what kind of delays are we seeing. we have some deicing that's going on. i'll tell you where that is in a few minutes. >> thank you. what do you think is the top story of 2009? well, it's kind of a no-brainer, all about your job and your wallet and your mortgage. stick around, though, for the rest of the top stories of 2009. you're going to need to hear the lates ohome remodeling project.

♪ ♪ the weather outside is frightful but the fires is so delightful ♪ >> when life gives you lemons make lemonade. kids in virginia took advantage of as much as 2 feet of snow to go sledding. they're going to have a chance to do it again today because at least a dozen school districts and colleges are closed in virginia. we're going to share your i-reports from the wintry storm throughout the morning. if you want to get them in, hurry up, go to cnn.com/robin. take a look at some of the headlines in the papers. snow is covering the front page of many editions today for good reason. "the washington post" has a great shot of what the weather has done to parts of the capital and other spots on the east coast. "the wall street journal" introduces you to a guy who hit it big thanks to the economy. david's hedge fun has a $7

billion profit this year. the fund made a bet that bank stocks could rebound. from "usa today" some cities are finding the fast lane is paying off. express lanes that had been reserved for car pools, are now being opened to solo drivers for a price. you got to pay, baby! that's a look at some of the papers. i think that's brilliant. a 13-year-old boy paralyzed by a stray bullet spent saturday helping the homeless in fresno, california. andrew mitchell and members of his church handed out clothes, sleeping bags and a holiday meal. he's been paralyzed from the chest down since 2002 when he was shot during a drive-by shooting. this is new, if you're thinking about fixing up your home, the good money is to put your money toward the outside of the home. our money expert jennifer westhovan. it used to be put some granite in here, redo the floors, there make it look pretty. >> hot tub. >> yeah. not so much.

>> not anymore. your home is your biggest asset a and a lot of people want to move, having a hard time trying to sell their home, it's about curb appeal, getting to people to look at the outside of your house and going maybe that's the one to come and visit. they say you're going to get the best return on your money fixing the outside, maybe a roof, new door, paint job. some experts say that homes that sell the fastest, are a pale, sunny yellow. that can make a big difference. who knew. just the paint on the outside. the days are over when you could upgrade the inside and think, i'm going to charge more. inside jobs in your home haven't added much to the value for about four years now. unless, you know, it's so gross that it would turn people off. >> take down the fly paper. so over the weekend, though, seven move more banks failed. first federal, imperial capital. if you bank there, you know it's still safe. we'll get to that in a second. the total count this year, 140

banks. now if your bank fails, right, the fdic transfers all the accounts to a new bank over the weekend so it's generally very smooth, your atm card still works and everything, as long as you're under those limits which are roughly a quarter of a million dollars per account. and a last minute offer maybe is the saab brand going to live? maybe we'll know by the end of the day. gm said it's losing too much money they were going to kill the quirky automobile business. it's based in sweden. the swedish government tried to come up with a rescue, that didn't work. now it's a dutch automaker called spyker, i wonder if it's spyker, a dutch word -- >> i don't know. >> giving gm a last chance to sell the business. we'll see. the deadline is the end of today. back to you. >> thanks for the head's up on that. police in washington, d.c., are investigatie whether an off duty police officer pulled a gun

at a snowball fight. the officers dressed in civilian clothes was angry when somebody threw snowballs at his car. somebody called 911 and a uniformed officer responded with his is weapon out. he holstered the weapon when he found out the other guy was an officer. the snowball fighters say they were having fun, people. >> no one meant any harm, no one meant anything by -- >> just fun. >> just having fun. so it's highly unfortunate, we just aren't washingtonians and we like to play in a blizzard. >> wjla reports 200 showed up for that snowball fight. police say there's no evidence that officers pointed their weapons at the crowd. police have found the sign that was stolen from the auschwitz concentration camp. the 16-foot sign stood at the camp's entrance. five suspects were arrested. the motive is still unclear. police in poland say that sign which says "work sets you free" in german was cut into three

pieces near one suspect's home. what do you think the top story of 2009 was? well, apparently it was all about your job, your wallet, your mortgage, but stick around for the rest of the list, the top stories of '09.

♪ all right. you do need a calendar to find out that winter is officially here. one of our i-reporters hit the streets of new york in the middle of a record-setting snowstorm this weekend. >> we haven't had a snowfall like this in years, and to have it this close to christmas i think is especially thrilling to people. most people that i saw last night were enjoying it. >> yeah, if they were walking, right. almost 11 inches of snow they were recorded in central park. central park got 11 inches. so the weather also did a doozy on sunday's nfl games even causing a few of them to be rescheduled.

good morning. >> good morning. and you know what, there's two parts to the story. wait until you see how people whip into action to make sure the nfl goes on schedule. the before and the after video here is incredible. first in baltimore, record snowfall there, forced their game against the bears to be pushed three hours, hundreds of workers dug out the stadium. the bears couldn't get a flight in until hours before the game which the ravens won easy. there it is. no sign of snow. >> nicely done. >> clean, right. then in philadelphia, near record snow forced them to postpone that game almost three hours so they could clean it up. that's lincoln financial field. no sign of any snow. philly would win that one to get in the playoffs. they should get these guys out to the airports. get all the planes out on time. emotions ran very high in the bengals/chargers game. chad ochocinco broke down during team introduces, he was close to chris henry who died three days before this game. ocho honored henry when he scored this touchdown. afterwards just simply no

sombreros, no funny stuff, fell to his knees and pointed to the sky. it was basically a heart-breaking loss for cincy but this was heartbreaking for me to see ochocinco be that candid. other games, tensions high between brett favre and his coach brad chill dress. minnesota was getting pounded by carolina. they already won their division, had nothing to play for. favre is getting knocked around. head coach said, i want to take you out of this game. favre said no, i'm not coming out of this game. acknowledged afterwards they had a, quote, heated discussion about it. >> who got their way? >> favre got his way. >> he got his way over his boss? >> yeah. >> you know really who's the fwhos minnesota it is brett fav favre. the nfl is partnering with one of its critics to help reduce concussions and brain trauma in players. players are now being encouraged by the league to donate their brains when they die to boston university researchers who study concussions. it's significant because bu has been very critical of the league stance on concussions in the past. for the nfl, to now say okay we'll partner with you and also

going to donate a million dollars to bu's research center. >> i think the question is, have ne players signed up to donate their brains? nobody ever really wants to think about that. >> yeah. >> thank you. so, what do you think the big stories of the year were? the h1n1 flu fell short of becoming the number one story of the year. it is number five, though. the auto industry's troubles, so a lot of headlines, it is number four. health care was big enough to get the number three spot. so number one? what about number two? that's coming up in a few minutes. a new mobile program is shutting down cell phones. hln money expert clark howard tells you how you can pay attention on the road without any mobile distractions. >> state after state around the country has added these restrictions that require that you go hands free when you're using a cell phone. you have to have some kind of a

bluetooth thing or a wire so the phone is not in your hands. but so far, the research has shown that there's no safety advantage to hands free. the real problem is how distracted, how much go into a zone when we are on the cell phone. well, if this is something that you know and you are worried about maybe you are going to cause an accident, who knows what because you get distracted by a cell phone. but you can't seem to stop yourself from getting on that call or answering one. there's a website called zoomsafer.com. if you go to zoomsafer, you voluntarily put your cell phone into jail while you are driving. it automatically sends senses your cell phone is moving and shuts down to keep you safe. i'm clark howard. for more ways to keep your wallet safe, go to cnn.com/clarkhoward. teach to you save more, spend less and avoid getting

ripped off. good reasons to catch him at noon eastern and 4:00 p.m. eastern on saturdays and sundays on hln. a lot of people probably got frustrated at the airports may be trying to give it a go this morning. let's find out how it is going. chris? >> good morning, robin. things are better but we are by far -- far and away not clear. we still have problems into boston, new york city. we are expecting to see windy weather. we are going to see delays because of de-icing. new york city, boston, half hour to hour delays because of the windy weather. pittsburgh seeing snowfall. we are also going to have to see de-icing going on in cincinnati, pittsburgh, back up into cleveland. out on the west coast, it is rainfall that could slow you down from half hour to hour delays from seattle to portland. even the possibility of rainfall down into san francisco. we will talk more about weather for the week ahead across the northeast. is there more snow? i will have it for you coming up in just a bit. >> please say no. thank you. a minute ago we asked you what do you think the top story

of the year was. president obama's inauguration was big. but it fell short of the number one spot. the slumping economy is the top story of '09. the 117 ballots cast by u.s. news directors and editors, it got 61 first place votes.

all righty. so it is 8:00 eastern on what's probably a shortened workweek for you. i'm robin meade. that's a good way to head into monday. we could learn as soon as today what caused actress brittany murphy's sudden death. the "clueless" star was only 32. even if you can find your carp under the snow the commute could be dicey. what you face on the roads after a big storm over the weekend. and -- >> i have been -- ever since. every time i look eight i remember what happened. >> a julie store plays santa

cla claus. for one woman her find was extra special. all righty. morning, shine. president obama may be on the verge for claiming victory on his top domestic priority, health care. while you were sleeping the democrats scored a huge victory. just after 1:00 eastern, the senate ended debate on its bill and the 60-40 vote followed party lines. why the late night vote? the dems wanted a bill passed before the holidays. republicans wanted to slow it down. >> the other side says fear. we say hope. the other side says no. we say yes. we say yes to progress. yes to people. yes to health care. as an inalienable right of every american citizen. >> we will not do this. we will not commit generational theft on future generations of americans. we won't give them another $2.5

trillion in debt. we won't give them an unfair policy where deals are done in back rooms. we have just begun to fight. >> many political observers say that president obama may get a final health care bill that closely resembles the senate plan. it would extend health coverage to 30 million uninsured americans. you would be required to buy health insurance or face a fine. some poorer americans would be exempt and you cannot be denied health insurance for your preexisting conditions. senate democrats are on track to pass the bill christmas eve. there was a lot of wheeling and dealing to get to this step. in the next half hour we will talk about what initiatives got booted from the senate health care bill. millions of people may be digging out after a blast of deadly weekend snowstorms. it is so bad in washington, d.c., all federal agencies are closed for today. the mayor says it could be wednesday before the roads are all cleared. the snow shut down schools and

providence, rhode island, as well as baltimore and philadelphia. and connecticut, some people cannot believe how deep they are buried. >> we don't usually get this much in this little corner. we usually get the sleet and the rain or, you know, the wind. and an ice storm usually. we don't get this much snow. >> it is not any better if you are flying. the airports are facing major backlog. delta and continental are offering refunds. most major carriers will let you reschedule for free. >> sadly, they just told us after 2 1/2 hours waiting in line they can't give us any kind of seat. it really is pathetic. >> when is your flatd? >> canceled. we have to find another one. >> are you hopeful? >> poor thing. we do want to check in right now with meteorologist chris who is

in for bob. we will tell you about today's weather. if you are traveling things are a little better. right. >> yeah. they are better but we still have issues out there. especially when you factor in we have all these planes from over the weekend still trying to get out today. this is what it is looking like now. windy weather. 15 to 30 miles per hour winds. that's going to continue to blow all the snow around across the area. temperatures cold as well. up into boston, stretching down towards new york city. i'ms today in boston going to struggle to reach 30 degrees. let's take you to boston logan air important. yesterday the snow forced many cancellations and delays and a lot of folks at airport yesterday still sitting there today hoping to be able to get out. good news is the airports are doing better. the problem is going to be getting to the airports for folks trying to fly out as you go throughout the day today. down to new york city, things are much, much better as well. we are continuing to see conditions begin to improve. it is going to be windy there. we will talk more about prices where the weather isn't so nice. >> so still having rough stuff.

>> yes, we are. an autopsy for brittany murphy could take place today. she was 32 years old. the coroner's office says the actress died yesterday in l.a. from what appears to be natural causes. it says murphy apparently collapsed in a bath room and there's no sign of foul play or trauma. police are investigating. celebrities are reacting and sending their condolences through twitter and facebook. murphy was known for her work in "clueless" and "8 mile." she once said a co-star thought that she was like her character in the movie kwp uptown girls." >> we both have a way of being artfully chaotic. artful chaos we embody. i don't know because it is me. that's her observation. i think it is probably a better one. we love life. neither one of us intend malice upon anyone or discriminate on anyone, no matter their position in life or anything. >> ashton kutcher, who was her former boyfriend, and co-star of

the movie "just married," says the world lost a piece of sunshine. the husband after missing utah woman showed up at a vigil for her yesterday. josh powell hugged his wife's sister but did not speak with her parents. police called him a person of interest in her disappearance three weeks ago. powell has the couple's two young sons. his attorney denies police allegations that he has been uncooperative. if you are planning to get your gifts shipped out today maybe that's why you are up early, today is the last day to send your first class and priority mail to arrive by christmas. otherwise you are going to have to use the option of express mail yet that will cost you more. the u.s. post office's calendar says cutoff for express mail is wednesday. expects to handle 830 million parcels today. 30% more than a normal day. ♪ makes you feel good six minutes past the hour. okay. maybe you go outside and dig out your car today.

the good news is that there won't be more snow to cover it in most places. here's chris in for bob. >> yes, good morning, robin. you will have to deal with the bitterly cold temperatures which won't make it above phrafreezin. mother nature is not going to help you. more snow across parts of west virginia as you go throughout the day today. that will be up towards pittsburgh, cleveland, up into buffalo as well. you can see where the snow showers are. they aren't going to make their way down into new york city, boston, down towards d.c. you are going to be okay. no more snowfall for you. but still the snowfall going to be falling on the new york state thruway, syracuse back on over towards buffalo, new york. not major accumulations expected but still up towards boston, you are going to be dealing with windy weather throughout the day today. temperatures are struggling to make their way up to about 30 degrees. now as we go throughout the day today, what you are going to be noticing out there, you will see temperatures struggling to reach 30 and later on into the week you will see the possibility for rain. not snowfall. we make our way into christmas day and then the day after

christmas. rainfall on the way for you. back up across parts of the northeast. not going to see more winter weather this time around. across parts of the deep south, freezing temperatures across coastal sections of georgia, back down into the florida panhandle. temperatures right now are 33 degrees in tallahassee. 33 degrees back up into wade cross. flirting with the freezing mark. freezing fog is an issue across parts of the south. you make your way from indiana, stretching on down into tennessee, parts of arkansas also dealing with freezing fog. visibility, you are going to get some of that precipitation on your windshield that will freeze solid. also dealing with frozen precipitation back up into montana where you could see accumulations near great falls of up to an inch of ice. a lot more wintry weather out there across the country. monitoring the situation. we will talk about the air travel delays just because it is not snowing in new york does p mean there aren't problems. let's take you to new york city. here you go. this is central park. look at all that snow out there.

absolutely gorgeous. of course, once you have to start getting out and about, that's when the snow goes from fun to maybe not as much fun. temperatures in new york today around 32 degrees. no snow mel for you. but no more snowfall as we go throughout the day. >> thank you. sky high air fares the only thing keeping you from your family this holiday? we have good news in a bad economy. especially if you are a procrastinator. somebody dropped a spare bling into one of the salvation army kettles.

it is time to salute our troops. today's salute is for tech sergeant ryan booz. when he is home he is a volunteer firefighter with the ray city fire department. so the shoutout is for him.

>> good morning, robin. this is rick from the ray city fire department. all the firefighters would love to give you a huge shoutout to brian from moody air force base who is stationed in afghanistan. we haven't forgotten about about you. we miss and you can't wait for to you get back. >> thank you. if you have somebody in the service you go to cnn.com/robin. the coast guard is trying to figure out how one of its boats ended up in a deadly collision with another boat yesterday. it happened at the san diego christmas water parade. the san diego union tribune says the coast guard vessel was responding to an emergency call when it hit a smaller boat. and an 8-year-old boy on that boat was killed. five others have serious injuries. you know, if you are feeling guilty about not going home for the holidays the closer it gets, you are in luck when it comes to the air fares. our money expert jennifer westhoven will tell you suddenly they are slashing the fares.

what's up with that? >> come up with another reason if you don't want to go see mom. i mean, really, it depends on the day but this is pretty wild. last-minute fares usually, i mean, they are usually so high. they are just out of the question. but many airlines have dropped those advanced purchase rules. meaning very reasonable prices. that's good news in a bad economy. american, delta, united dropped some of the requirements on holiday travel. think about a round-trip ticket. dallas to new york. normally about $400. try to buy it now for the holidays. normally $1800. >> wow. >> yeah. mine, some of the holiday fares can be atrocious. not this year. "usa today" says it dropped back to a far more reasonable level. about $400. there are a lot of examples where it would cost you normally $1,000 if you booked right now or more. instead it is more like the regular fare. >> okay. this is a story that if you

have been a stockholder, if you have owned any kind of stocks for your retirement, you already know this but here's the validation. it has been a very tough ten years to own stocks. stocks that traded on the new york stock exchange on average lost a half percent every year this decade. worst calendar year important stocks going back to the 1820s. >> that's sobering. >> ready to stick my finger down my throat. "wall street journal" says here's a -- for by way of comparison. if had you bonds or gold, did you a lot better. over the past enten years. >> it is hard to discount some of hose commercials about gold. okay. >> yeah. i mean, it is always one of those how would you know? it used to be everybody said if you hold stocks they will work out in the long run. >> if you follow the swing, every time. now everybody go over here. exactly. thank you.

a new jersey dad is hoping for a holiday reunion with his son after a five-year court battle. he may find out today whether he can bring his son home from brazil. plus, check out the santa for posing to an nfl cheer -- proposing to an nfl cheerleader. santa, you dog, you.

did you see this movie over the weekend? a ton of people did. "avatar skwts number one at the box office. the new james cameron film brought in $73 million this weekend. that's just in the united states. it was $159 million around the world. it cost about $400 to make, though. and at number two, disney's "the princess and the frog." followed by "the blindside" hanging in there. a new jersey dad hopes to find out whether he gets to have his son home from brazil in time for the holidays. brazil's chief justice will decide whether to lift a stay on an earlier ruling allowing david goldman to keep his son. goldman says he will let his

son's brazilian relatives visit if he wants if he wins. >> the first step is for sean and i to reunited, come home, be with our family, and i will not do to them what they have done to sean and me. i have five years of love to give him. he will get an extraordinary amount and he's got grandparents and cousins. and he has familiar habitat that he was once in. and with love and patience, we will heal. >> goldman has been in a custody battle for five years. can you imagine, the sin bengals had to take the field only days after one of their teammates, chris henry, died. here's rafer with more on that story. good morning. >> good morning. you said you watched the game. >> i did watch the game. i wonder what is ochocinco going to do. he was fine a week before. crazy antic.

>> for doing something stupid and ends up doing something very sentimental will likely not get fined for what robin is talking about. ochocinco was very close with henry and said henry was, quote, like a brother to him. he broke down during introductions. there he is there. and the team wore henry's number 15 on their helmets. when ocho scored, like robin said, there was no sombrero, no poncho, no funniness. he simply knelt down and touched his heart and looked to the sky. he said the game had an empty feeling. unfortunately for cincinnati they lost on a last-second field goal. henry's funeral is on tuesday. the other big story of the week of the nfl, how the weather would affect games in washington. get this. about 1,200 workers shoveled out an estimated 25 million pounds of snow from fedexfield for tonight's game against the giants. wasn't their airport closed? now we know where everybody was. other games were postponed because of the snow. we will have more on that later. their airport was closed.

dramatic finish for super bowl champions. steelers edged the packers by one point on the last play of the game. oh, my goodness. no time on the clock. down by six. big ben hits mike wallace in the corner of the end zone as timex pyres to win it. and roethlisberger set a record for the most yards ever thrown in a game by a steeler. that's impressive. the team has been around since 1933. speaking of records and impressive, the cleveland browns set one in a wild win over kansas city. this guy, josh cribs, set the record for the most kick returns for scores in a season when he ran this back 100 yards for td. then he broke his own record a little later on. when he ran another one back 103 yards for a touchdown. >> same game. >> same game. browns would win it 41-34. and lastly, the bears/ravens game. a balance more cheerleader gets a football from santa. it is not santa. that's her boyfriend and down on one knee. and santa has the ring.

and she said yes. and -- >> santa has some bling. >> santa definitely has bl. >> my goodness. ravens won that game, by the way. >> all right. thank you. 20 minutes past the hour. travelers, my fingers are crossed for you that your day will be way better than it was for the flyers over the weekend. hi, chris. >> good morning. yeah. it can only get better out there. we will see an improvement today. still some travel troubles. one of the reasons why we have seen all the problem, obviously the snowfall. let me show you washington, d.c. let me take you to the capitol building. look at that snow out there. look at the streets in front of the capitol. they managed to clean those up after nearly two feet of snowfall across parts of the mid atlantic. we have 2700 flights in the air across the country. and especially across northeast, flights beginning to get going. you will see delays, boston, new

york city because of the fact that it is windy. you will see wind gusts up to 30 miles an hour. there are also de-icing planes in pittsburgh, cleveland, as well as the fact that you are seeing snowfall. so that will slow you down upwards of an hour. rainfall on the west coast. half hour to hour delays expected there.

president obama made may be close to revamping your health care system. just after 1:00 a.m. eastern. yeah. overnight, democrats won a vote ending debate on the senate bill. it would extend coverage to 30 million americans who don't have it now. the senate is on track to pass the bill by christmas eve. hollywood is stunned by the death of actress brittany murphy. she was just 32 years old. the coroner's office in l.a. says murphy died yesterday of natural causes. police are following up with an investigation. 12 more detainees at the guantanamo bay prison have been sent back to their home

countries. the department of justice says that detainees are sent home after a review of the potential threat they pose as well as illegal rereview. those are the headlines. good morning. 30 minutes past the hour. hey, shine. how's that coffee? i'm robin meade. it is the official day of winter. many of you are facing an icy commute during your first official day of winter. amtrak is cancel something of its train service today even. be careful if you have to drive. at least five people were killed in traffic accidents over the weekend. in massachusetts, just getting to the road can be a nightmare. >> this guy got stuck. he wanted me to back up. i backed up a little bit. i got stuck over here. he pulled down. he got stuck there. >> i'm trying to dig this car out. it is heavy. it is real heavy. there's a sheet of ice underneath. >> oh, yeah. i keep slipping everywhere. everybody keeps getting stuck on the hill. ridiculous. >> already helped five people

up. >> well, one of our fellow viewers here admits it is cold but she says she loves the snow. some people she interviewed inside of a diner did not feel the same way, though. >> i don't mind it. >> i left all my proper snow gear at home. tough walking around. i urge every american not to go outglide we would love to see what the weather is like in your hometown right now. go to tee.com/robin to learn how to become an i-reporter. thank you. after months of wrangling senate democrats took controversial health care initiatives off the table to close a deal overnight. they ditched the government-run public option and they dumped plan to expand medicare to people as young as the age of 55. the house bill includes the public option. bills from both of the chambers will have to be merged and approved before a final bill would even get to the president's desk.

the big storm kept many of you at home over the weekend and away from the malls on the last shopping weekend before christmas. jennifer westhoven is here now with more on how that terrible news for the retailers. >> yeah. it really is hard for them. they count so much on this time offier for a lot of their profits. but for a lot of the americans that are already trying to guard their wallets having all that snow is another reason to stay home and save. the east coast, 25% sales for many of the stores. some analysts say it may not all be just loss that a lot of people who stayed in this weekend, if they still have people on their list, they will go out and finish the list at stores and many people seem to go online. big spike in online shopping. amazon tried to extend deadlines. things like free shipping. they were still trying to get it to you by christmas. we will see. i don't know. i stayed snugged up. i went online and bought stuff that wasn't tickets, you know what i mean? >> you did pretty well. >> tickets for something.

so then -- you know what i mean? so you don't have to worry whether that will get delivered on time. >> very good. when you do something like that online, can you just print out a receipt and give it to somebody and say here you go? >> exactly. then have you something to give, put it in a nice card. i'm thinking a lot of people did stuff like that. they got creative this weekend about gifts so they didn't have go out in the snow. >> you have to do that wednesday or thursday and you go i've got nothing! thank you. washington, d.c., police are investigating whether an off-duty officer pulled a gun at a snow fight. wjla reports that the officer dressed in civilian clothes was angry when snowballs hit his car. someone called 911 and here you see a uniformed officer responding with his weapon out. well, he then holstered the weapon when he found out that the other guy was a police officer. the snowball fighters say they were just having fun. police. >> no one meant any harm. no one meant anything by just -- just having fun.

so it is -- highly unfortunate. we just are washingtonians and like to play in a blizzard. >> well, wjla reports that about 200 people turned up for that snowball fight. police say that there's no evidence that officers pointed their weapons at the crowd. ♪ i will be the prince ♪ say yes >> look at you, taylor swift. she has been declared the entertainer of the year. she was picked by newspaper editors and broadcast producers in an associated press survey. and the 20-year-old country singer has been all over the place this year. she won five american music awards and including artist of the year. >> 35 minutes past the hour. okay. if maybe you stayed bundled up all weekend because of the weather and now you have to get out and brave the roads. good news is that for the most part, the snowfall super bowl

done. hi, chris. >> yes, good morning, robin. that's the good news. across the northeast, snowfall for the most part done. we have lake-effect snow showers towards buffalo and back up towards the syracuse area. new york, boston, philadelphia, d.c., no more snowfall for you. story today, windy weather, 15 to 30 miles per hour winds expected across the northeastern u.s. storm system continues to move away. so it is awfully cold this morning. back up towards water bury and boston where right now it is only 21 degrees. you will warm up today to maybe only 30 degrees. let me go ahead and take you live right now to boston, massachusetts. roy it is a frosty start. look at that. there's a plane. that's a good sign. planes beginning to take off there. ten inches of snowfall is what you ended up with when it was all said and done. today's high temperature only about 30 degrees. let's go ahead and go someplace warmer. how about the exact opposite of that? miami, florida, where you have partly to mostly cloudy skies now. the temperature today going to warm up to 67 degrees.

now to make you feel better in the northeast, windchill will be 66 in miami. you can feel a little bit of the pain. now by christmas day in miami, you can expect to see temperatures near 80 degree was a chance of showers. now as far as the forecast up across west virginia, you can see about another inch of snowfall possible this morning. and ace said lake-effect snow showers continuing back up towards into west virginia but into pittsburgh. seeing snow showers. back up into buffalo and syracuse area. through the new york state thruway. you are continuing to see snow showers as we go throughout the day today. meanwhile the story this morning, freezing fog is an issue. southern parts of illinois, indiana, back down through kentucky and missouri, and into even parts of arkansas so across parts of the south, dealing with freezing fog this morning. let's go all the way out to the west coast or almost to the west coast. we will go to the northern plains up into great fall, montana, dealing with freezing fog. as well as freezing drizzle. you can end up seeing maybe an inch of accumulation of ice as a result of this winter storm system.

robin, we will talk about the northeast in just a few minutes and let you know what air travel delays we are see thing morning. >> okay. thank you. hopefully a lot better than we had over the weekend. how awful was that. imagine finding a box full of jewelry in a parking lot or maybe maybe on the sidewalk and it was left there for you to find. and keep. plus, look at this high-speed chase caught on police dash cam. it took this violent crash to force the driver to finally stop.

i know you are tired but come here. you don't have to lift a finger. snow is covering the front page of many of the morning editions today. "the washington post" has a great shot of what the weather has done to parts of the capital

and other spots on the east coast. "the wall street journal" introduces you to a guy that has seen big things to the economy. david peppers hedge fund firm, $7 billion profit this year. the fund made a big bet that bank stocks would rebound. from "usa today," some cities are finding the fast lane is paying off. express lanes that have been reserved for car pools and are now being opened to solo drivers for a price. you have to bu it. and it is yours. shiny box with presents inside are popping up in northern wisconsin. a jewelry store planted more than a thousand boxes with jewelry inside. places like parking lots and hospitals and even on the sidewalk. >> we share happy moments with our customers all the time. and this is a way to give happy moments back to people that haven't been in here before. >> the woman battling cancer found a gift waiting while -- she was waiting for treatment. she said that that lifted her spirits. fire broke out in a macy's

store you see every year in the thanksgiving day parade. macy's spokeswoman says it started in an escalator at the flagship store in new york yesterday. this is one of the busiest shopping days of the year. so the customers had to rush out and thankfully nobody was seriously injured. the store reopened about two hours later. you know the movie "miracle on 34th street," that's what they mean. that macy's. that one. yeah. i wonder how could you stop the merchandise from smelling like smoke p they were able to contain it. that's good. if you are thinking about fixing up your home, put the money towards the outside. the exterior. our money expert jennifer westhoven is here to explain. >> that goes against what we have been doing the past few years. it used to be the rage, granite here, hot tub. some evidence that you shouldn't doing it like that anymore. relevanttors are saying it is

all about curb appeal. getting people to come and see your house so they will look inside. but a lot of times it is making them just look at it and they say you are going to get the best return on your money if you fix the outside. roof, new door, new pain job, they say can make a huge difference. you should know that experts say the homes that sell the fastest, a pale sunny yellow. those days when could you do more inside are over. inside renovations haven't added p to your home's value for about four years. of course, that doesn't crew if your kitchen is really, really old. if it is standard just upgrading isn't going to do the trick. >> if the brady bunch looks like they live there you might want to update the inside. over the weekend, more bank failures to tell you about. seven of them. two big ones in california. first federal and imperial capital. total this year now 140 banks failed. the sign the economy is doing or not doing, we should say.

if you are at a bank that fails you should know most of your money is protected. the fdic transfers your money to a new bank so you won't notice until it is all over. your card will still work and your checks won't bounce. maybe you heard the story about how the quirky iconic car that people loved it, how the saab would die. gm said it would kill the quirky car because the business is losing too much money. the swedish government tried on rescue it. that didn't work. now a dutch automaker is trying to give it another last chance but say they want an answer from gm by the end of the day. i read something that said they were cutting out the russian bankers because gm didn't trust them. sometimes there's a whole financial soap opera going on in the background. >> sounds like it. some people call it a snowy mess. for others, it is their winter wonderland. one woman says there is an upside to the huge amounts of snow we saw on the east coast over the weekend.

there's a new push for a new warning laubl on some cell phones. ♪

good morning. quarter to the hour. i know you don't need a calendar to tell you that winter is officially here. one of our i-reporters hit the streets of new york in the middle of a record-setting snowstorm over the weekend and to see what people were feeling being it. >> we haven't had a snowfall like this in years. and to have it in close to christmas, i think it is especially thrilling to people. most people were that i saw last night were enjoying it. >> yeah. that's if they were in a car. almost 11 inches of snow were recorded in central park. maine could be the first state to require cancer warnings on cell phones. a state lawmaker there wants a message to phones and packaging that says the radiation from the cell phones can cause brain cancer. the cell phone industry says

that that is not true. and that there's no consensus among scientists. a similar measure has been introduced in san francisco. a man took kansas police on a wild chase that ended with a dramatic crash. cops say that they clocked him going more than 100 miles an hour. he slammed into a pickup truck at a light. police never seen got close to the speeder until the reck. >> the officer did have his lights and siren on. that was mainly to alert other people but also trying to get him stop. >> the drivers of both vehicles had minor injuries. speeding suspect was taken into custody. no only was the weather over the weekend a big pain for your travel plans. it was also a pain for football players and football fans in the nfl. here's rafer with more on the before and the after. >> the video is amazing. for people who are having trouble traveling take solace because some teams also had trouble traveling to and after the game or to the game

beforehand. in baltimore, you had record snowfall. that forced their game against the bears to be pushed three hours while hundreds of workers dug out the stadium. the bears couldn't get a flight in to baltimore until hours before and there's the after. look at the stadium. that's completely spotless. no sign of snow. in philadelphia, you had near record snowfall. that forced them to postpone the became. also, three hours, lincoln financial field. no sign of any snow. philly would win that to get into the playoffs. those guys should have been at the airports helping out. emotions ran high in the bengals/chargers game. chad ochocinco broke down during team introductions. they were playing three days after their teammate chris henry, number 15, had died. and then ochocinco, who said henry was like a brother to him, honored him when he scored this touchdown afterwards. pointing to the sky and falling to his knees. there was also a heartbreaking loss for cincinnati. they lost on a last-second field goal. henry's funeral is on tuesday. tensions ran high between

brett favre and his coach. really? these guy love each other. apparently as minnesota was getting pounded by carolina, they already won their i did sxrigs had nothing to play for. brett was getting knocked around. brad childress said coach childress said, brett, i'm benching you and he said, no, you're not. brett eventually got his way and he stayed in the game. >> telling his boss, no, you're not. >> he can do that. nfl is partnering with one of its biggest critics. players are being encouraged to donate their brains when they die to boston university researchers that study concussions. bu has been very critical of the league's stance of concussions in the past. they will donate 1 million bucks, before this announcement, 50 athletes have already agreed to donate their brains to science. happy birthday to joe paterno who turns 83 years young

today. he will coach his 36th bowl game when the nittany lions play new year's day. one of the best coaches in the game at 83 years young. >> still working. >> still really working hard. i think today is going to be catch up day and i don't mean as opposed to mustard, i mean let's catch up because we had delayed or canceled flights over the weekend because of the winter weather. >> thank you, robin. a whole lot of catching up as we get going throughout the day today. mother nature cooperating somewhat. dealing with windy weather and that means more space between the aircraft and that will slow things down a little bit and also deal with deicing delays back into pittsburgh, cincinnati, cleveland and also in pittsburgh dealing with a little bit of snowfall. out on the west coast, another storm system moving in up towards seattle and down towards

the portland area and san francisco dealing with rainfall later on today. the west coast dealing with the rainfall. >> thank you. some holiday billboards are stirring up controversy. they're encouraging people to question their faith.     

oh, i'll tell you right now i'm tired. it's my job to wake you up. let's do that together. good morning, sunshine. i'm robin meade. we can learn as soon as today what caused actress britney murphy's sudden death. we have reaction from one of her co-stars. even if you can find your car underneath the snow, your commute could be pretty dicy. what you could face on the roads and at the airports after a big, wintry mess. and this -- >> every time i look at it, i remember what happened. >> a jewelry store played santa claus by planting shiny boxes

all over the place and for one woman, her find was extra special. all right, president obama may be on the verge of claiming victory on his top domestic priority, your health care. while you were sleeping democrats scored a huge victory just after 1:00 a.m. eastern, the senate and the debate on its bill. the 60 to 40 vote followed party lines. why the late-night vote? the dems want a bill passed before the holidays and the republicans want to slow it down. >> the other side says fear, we say hope. the other side says no, we say yes. we say yes to progress. yes to people. yes to health care as in an alienable right to every american citizen. >> we will not do this. we will not commit generational theft on future generations of

americans. we will not give them another $2.5 trillion of debt. we won't give them an unfair policy where deals are done in back rooms. we have just begun to fight. >> many political observers say president obama may get a final health care bill that closely resembles the senate plan. you will be required to buy health insurance or face a fine. some poorer americans would be exempt and you could not be denied health insurance for a pre-existing condition. senate dems are on track to pass the bill on christmas eve. a lot of wheeling and dealing, though. in the next half hour, we'll talk about what initiatives got booted from the senate version of the health care bill. nearly 200,000 people are waking up with no power after a deadly weekend storm. the outages are mostly in virginia, west virginia and north carolina. many schools along the east coast are closed. now, if you have to get to work today, the roads are still a mess and drivers in cape cod

explain how bad the conditions were for them. >> it was just white everything. you couldn't see ten feet in front of you. >> usually turns to rain and turn to slush but this time for people, we don't really have to do this a lot. >> it's not any better if you're trying to fly. airports are facing a major backlog after thousands of flights were canceled over the weekend. delta and continental are offering refunds to some people and most carriers will let you reschedule for free right now. >> good to keep things in perspective. we're healthy, we're safe. everyone else is safe. any time you want to feel bad for yourself, you just realize you're one of many other people. >> misery has company. we want to check in with meteorologist chris smith for what today's weather looks like, especially for our fliers. chris. >> good morning, robin. it's looking better, but not without problems for the northeast.

more space between the plains and go through deicing and temperatures very, very cold and only 22 degrees in boston and 24 degrees as you make your way to new york city. a cold start to the day. let me take you to boston. yesterday where you saw many delays and cancellations and visibility was just absolutely terrible and you can barely see the aircraft right there. snow plows were working overtime and the snow has come to an end and we should make some progress getting folks off the ground today playing a little bit of catch up as folks were doing a whole lot of sitting and waiting out there. back towards philadelphia, improving conditions today as well as the snowfall moving on out. you know, it's just getting better out there. of course, one area of the country is getting ready to be socked with another winter storm system i'll let you know where in just a few minutes, robin. fans of britney murphy this morning are in shock over her

death. the actress was only 32 years old and the coroner's office said she died from what appears to be natural causes. murphy collapsed in the bathroom and no sign of foul play or trauma. police are investigating. celebrities are reacting and sending their condolences. she was known for her work in "clueless" and "8 mile." and ashton kucher said the world lost a piece of sunshine. the big storm kept many of you away from the malls on the last weekend before christmas and the retailers were hoping you were going to come in. here's jennifer westhoven with more on that. good morning. >> good morning, robin. i think we all think of ourselves as consumers and shoppers and we make good deals because of this but we also make ourselves workers. the major snow storm another

reason for so many americans to stay home trying to keep to their budget. the east coast is 25% of sales, that is a big deal to the business of these stores. some analysts say maybe they haven't lost as much as we think because people who stayed indoors will wind up finishing their shopping whether they go out after work this week or handling it online. we did see a big spike in online shopping and some stores offering free shipping even if it couldn't get there guaranteed by christmas. you may still be able to get something that way, but it may cost you a pretty penny and you'll have to take a risk, when you see pictures like this, maybe it's not going to quite get there on time. i wonder if you didn't get to do your shopping this weekend because of the snow, what did you do? >> i'd love to read what people did. i ordered your gifts weeks and weeks and weeks ago and it's still not here. i'm not joking, i'm not making this up.

>> everyone who's watching, can i tell you how great this place is. everyone gives each other gifts. >> it's usually something very small and very like has a meaning like something you did this year. >> all right. the husband of a missing utah woman showed up at a vigil for her yesterday. josh powell reportedly hugged his wife susan's sister, but did not speak with her parents. police have called him a person of interest in her disappearance three weeks ago. powell has the couple's two young sons and his attorney denies police allegations that he's been uncooperative. singer taylor swift has been declared the entertainer of the year. she was picked in an associated pres survey.

the 20-year-old singer has been all over the place this year. she won five american music awards including artist of the year. honey, that's just the tip of the iceberg. yes, now i am going to have to go get you something else because it's not in. i ordered it weeks ago! i'll give you a hint -- it was a commercial that runs all the time. i'm talking about jennifer. yeah, exactly. christmas shopping maybe you have to get it done on your lunch break today. well, let's talk about a new system, another weather system that is coming in to bother us. chris is in for bob. >> thank you very much, robin. folks in the plain states might need to break out their snugies to stay inside and stay warm because we're dealing from seven inches to maybe 14 inches of snowfall starting tomorrow night and as we head into the day on wednesday. this is a major storm system across much of the east coast rainfall as we head through

christmas eve and christmas day and the day after. it could produce severe weather across parlts of the lower mississippi valley. right now we're talking about an inch of snowfall across parts of west virginia and lake-effect snow back up towards pennsylvania stretching on down towards pittsburgh, buffalo and also back up towards syracuse we're continuing to look at snowfall up there. we'll continue to watch the situation, although we're expecting an inch or two inches of osnowfall and rough travel on the new york state freeway there. meanwhile, let me take you to new york city. let's go to new york city where we're looking at right now a much better day, although you can still see plenty of snow on the ground and plains beginning to take off, that is good news. no major delays up across the new york area and we'll start to see some folks get off the ground and into the air to their destinations. meanwhile, freezing fog an issue across parts of the mississippi valley and that is winter weather issues that you'll have to deal with if you're traveling

today. robin? >> thank you. a new jersey dad battling to get his son back from brazil is pinning his hopes on one person and he might find out today whether he will get his child back in time for the holidays. airlines are suddenly slashing the airfares to fill the empty seats and you may want to cash in.

we always salute the troops. today's salute is for brian booze stationed in afghanistan. when he's home he's a volunteer firefighter so this shout out is from the ray city fire department. >> good morning, robin. this is rick pent and all the firefighters would like to give a huge shout out to tech sergeant brian booze who is currently stationed in afghanistan. we haven't forgot about you, we miss you and we can't wait for you to get back. >> if you have somebody in the service, salute them. go to cnn.com/robin. 10 million hiv patients

could be left without any treatment. doctors without borders said that's because wealthy countries are giving less money for treatments. the group has put that on their new list of the ten worst humanitarian problems and other problems include government blocking access to aid and medical care. okay, the closer the holidays get, the worse i feel that i didn't get an airfare to go home to ohio. our money expert jennifer westhoven is here. >> i mean, normally you can get away with it, not that you would. but i'm just saying. mom, i can't spend $1,500 on a ticket, that's crazy and that's usually the way it is. they're just out of the question. this year many airlines dropped those advance purchase rules so that means very reasonable prices and that's good news in a bad economy.

united, delta, airtrandropping advance purchase requirement for holiday travel. you know why, right? one reason they would do that, there are empty seats and they want to fill them. but it means a round trip ticket. we looked at usa today. going from dallas to new york, that would normally cost 400 bucks if you bought it early and did all your planning and you didn't and you tried to buy at the last minute, $1,800. no, it's more like $400, just like if you did all that planning. that's a good story, we kind of buttered you up with that one to take you to this one. this doesn't make you feel real good if you followed all the rules and salted away all this money like you were supposed to. in the last decade, every year on average they lost 0.5%. that makes the last ten years the worst calendar decade for stocks going all the way back to the 1820s. ouch. "wall street journal" says in

the last ten years you did better if you bought bonds or gold. that's what happened not what's the future. the holiday shipping rush will reach its peak today for u.p.s. 22 million packages, that's just u.p.s. not fedex and the post office. it expects business to be better than last year and that squares with the overall picture that we're seeing. little more than last year. if you're traveling today, wow, you had a bearable weekend and maybe you couldn't get anywhere over the weekend and you're catching up today. hey, chris, how is it looking? >> we're far from problem free across the country because we have deicing delays and wind delays as we go throughout the day today. saber flight explorer, 3,000 flights in the air across the country. let's show you where those delays will be. boston and new york big-time snow delays and today wind delays out there and pittsburgh, cleveland half hour to hour delays and same story back up to

buffalo and meanwhile out on the west coast rain delays for seattle, portland and san francisco. it's raining in san francisco because there you see wet pavement and bay bridge in the distance. temperature 64 degrees high and sunshine as we head into tomorrow. a guy put in disguise and shocked his girlfriend. santa proposed to an nfl cheerleader. he's two timing.

good morning. 18 minutes past the hour. a new jersey father hopes to find out today if he'll get his son from brazil in time for the holidays. brazil's chief justice will decide whether to lift a stay on a lower court's ruling and that court gave david goldmine custody of his young son. goldman has been battling his ex-wife's brazilian family who took custody of the boy after the mom died. i cannot imagine how tough this had to be, the cincinnati bengals had to take the field

just three days after one of their teammates died. chris henry. and here's rafer with more on how they did. >> i think a lot of people were cincinnati bengal fans this weekend. chris henry, for all of his past was a guy who was well liked in his locker room and especially well liked by chad ochocinco. i am sure you have known of that guy. he broke down during introductions and the team honored henry by wearing number 15 on their helmets and then ocho, everyone wondered what he would do after he scored a touchdown. knelt to the ground and looked to the sky. the game had an empty feeling with henry gone and cincinnati lost on a last-second field goal and there's ocho there breaking down on the sidelines. the other big story was how the weather was going to affect sunday's games. in washington, 1,200 workers

shoveled out an estimated 25 million pounds of snow. >> look how they have a snow chute. >> that's for tonight's game against the giants. other games postponed because of the snow, more on that later on. the big finish, i mean, talk about drama. the super bowl champion steelers on the last play of the game, no time left, they beat the packers by one point on this one. ben roethlisberger hits mike wallaces in the corner of the end zone as time expires. he scores it in the 60th minute. >> oh, listen to you. >> big ben also set a team record with his performance. speaking of record breaking performances. the cleveland browns set a few in a wild win over kansas city. on this 100 yard return he set the record for most returns for tds in a season. that's the record, he has it. then, breaks his own record a few minutes later on. >> in the same game. >> in the same game when he runs

one back 103 yards for a score. the browns have had this up and down season. it it's been like a soap opera. the bears/ravens games and a cheerleader gets a football with a marriage proposal from santa. you're not santa, i know you. that's her boyfriend and santa, just say santa does very well. nice bling. >> did you see that ring? whoa, santa. all new sports in the next 30. >> thank you. >> thank you. people in new york central park took advantage of the big snow storm that we had over the weekend and had some fun. >> sledding, running with people. >> just loved it. all white and right now way too many people. but my son is 3 years old and we sledded down this hill. >> we got out here early and it

got faster and faster and faster and more crowded. >> central park got nearly 11 inches of snow yesterday. some train passengers got stuck for hours miles underground and now the train operators have an idea of what needs to be fixed so that doesn't ever happen again.

the new york stock exchange is open for business today. guess what, the christmas week may be off to a good start, thanks to things that happened in washington, d.c. you're going to get the low down when we go live to the new york stock exchange, again. it's about six minutes away. first, though, hollywood is stunned by the death of actress britney murphy. she was only 32 years old and the coroner's office in l.a. said murphy died yesterday of natural causes and police are following up with an investigation. 12 more detainees at the guantanamo bay prison are sent back to their home prisons. the department of justice says

that detainees are sent home after a review of the potential threat that they pose as well as illegal review. the man accused of killing yale grad opportunity le. the story got national attention after her body was found behind a wall the day she was supposed to get married. raymond clark worked in the same animal research building. clark plans to plead not guilty. those are some of our top stories. well, good morning, probably a shortened workweek for most of you. good for you. i'm robin meade. president obama may be very close to revamping your health care system. just after 1:00 a.m. eastern democrats won a vote on the senate bill. they dumped a plan to expand medicare to people as young as the age of 55, but the house bill includes the public option. now, bills from both chambers would have to be merged and approved before any final bill would go to the president's desk. it is the first official day of winter.

you say you've had winter for a while now and it's going to be an icy commute for the peoplen the west coast. a weakened snow storm buried places like boston and d.c. in washington, d.c., it's so bad that the federal agencies are closed for today. now, farther up the coast in providence, rhode island, people say the snow shoveling seems to never end. >> once you finish, all of a sudden, a truck shows up and blows it back again and covers your entire driveway. you have to do it again. >> well, one of your fellow viewers sent us an i-report of the cars buried in new york city from the snow. she admits it's cold, i'll say. but she says she loves the snow and she found some exchange students who are seeing snow for the first time. >> i like it. it's too crazy. it's too heavy to hold. >> we came from a tropical island, so we have never seen snow like this.

>> where are you from? >> taiwan. >> yeah. and this is your first snowfall? >> yeah. >> well, enjoy it? >> thank you. >> we'd love to see what the weather is like in your town. learn to be an ireporter. maine could be the first state to require cancer warnings on your cell phone. a state lawmaker there wants a message on phones and the packaging that says the radiation from cell phones can cause brain cancer. the cell phone industry says that's not true and there's no consensus among scientists. a similar measure has been introduced in san francisco. the coast guard is trying to figure out how one of its boats ended up in a deadly collision with another boat yesterday. it happened at the san diego christmas water parade. the san diego union tribune said the coast guard vessel was responding to an emergency call when it hit a smaller boat. an 8-year-old boy on that smaller boat was killed. five other people have serious injuries. a mom in brooklyn said she

got the most wonderful christmas gift, her sight. a rare disease left cass y rivea blind after the birth of her daughter two years ago. her sight was restored after a risky two-hour surgery. doctors told her she had a 50/50 chance of seeing again and then it was time for the bandages to come off. >> i was hesitating because i was so scared and i opened my eyes and i said, i can see you. >> can you imagine? she said the best part is being able to see her kids, especially her youngest whom she's seeing for the first time. here comes another storm system. first, let me ask chris smith what part of the country we're talking about here. >> we're talking about out across the plain states and impacting the northeast. now, it doesn't look like it will bring snowfall but rather rainfall as we head into christmas day and the day after. 15 to 30-mile-per-hour wind

expected today across the northeast and that will kind of blow some of that snow around and cold to boot as you're out there trying to shovel and clear things out. temperatures in the lower 20s and climb up to 30 degrees today. the only place we'll see melting is d.c. and temperature may climb to the upper 30s. next storm system robin was talking about. expect 7 to 14 inches of snowfall. the southern part of the storm system across the lower mississippi valley will bring you the threat of possibility of severe weather and then makes its way up the east coast and brings rainfall to all the big cities as we head into christmas day and the weekend after christmas. another inch of snowfall back up across west virginia and lake-effect snow showers continuing and back up towards buffalo, syracuse and all getting in on the snowfall throughout the day today and making its way maybe down to the poconos and that is about it and will not make its way into any of the big cities.

you'll be snow free. freezing fog that is the issue this morning across parts of the ohio river valley stretching on down towards the mississippi river valley this morning. different types of weather going on out there and snow into the higher elevations of the pacific northwest and they are dealing with rainfall today in seattle. let me go ahead and take you live to seattle right now where we're looking at cloudy skies and rain showers will become likely, especially as we head throughout the day today into tonight. you can expect maybe an inch of rainfall and as far as the temperatures today, your high temperature in seattle should be right around 48 degrees and that rain will begin to taper off as we head into tomorrow. storm systems one exiting the east coast and now another one on the west coast and, robin, that next storm system across the middle part of the country, that could mean business, as well. about a foot of snowfall. >> thank you. more where that came from, huh? thank you. so, you probably have a short week work and so do they on wall street.

for a look at what investors are expected to do before they break for the holidays, let's go to susan lisovicz. up 100 in the first few minutes of trading. >> one of the reasons why, robin, we have some upbeat earnings from two well-known companies. walgreen's and conagra foods. people rushing out to get their flu shots and conagra sored 50%, what are people eating from conagra. banquet frozen foods and that kind of thing. the company is boosting its guidance for the new year and that trend will continue. good news for general motors. friday we told you its saab brand would ride off into the sunset and now revised its offer for saab. gm has until 5:00 to accept it. different story for broadcasting the third largest radio group filed for protection and not a

complete surprise because of the high debt levels but this is a big company. you know this company has 200 stations in 25 states and it says it will try to exit bankruptcy as fast as possible. finally, robin, you may have heard that there was some snow on the east coast over the weekend. yeah, that affected business because the saturday before christmas is typically the single busiest day, but not to worry, not to worry. there is enough of us procrastinators that many analysts say they expect the remaining days to be frantic and to make up for what may not have happened on saturday and also there were a lot of us in our pjs clicking on the mouse over the weekend. we'll have hard numbers tomorrow. robin some. >> and, you know the theory is everything looks better on christmas eve. i have no choice, that looks really good. >> so what it's ripped and it's a color i hate and it doesn't fit the person i'll give it to, i'll take it. >> what choice do we have?

thank you. >> you're welcome. the nfl is asking some of its players for an unusual donation. they want their brains. also ahead, a snowball fight got ugly. why a cop showed up with his weapon out.

police found a sign stolen from the auschwitz concentration camp. the 15-foot sign stood at the entrance and five suspects arrested and their motive is unclear. police in poland said the sign that says work sets you free in german was cut into three pieces near one suspect's home. it was stolen on friday. a 13-year-old boy paralyzed by a stray bullet spent saturday

helping the homeless in fresno, california. handed out clothes, sleeping bags and a holiday meal. he's been paralyzed from the chest down since 2002 when he was shot during a drive-by shooting. this looks like an innocent snowball fight until you see a uniformed officer with his weapon out responding to reports with somebody with a gun. d.c. police tell our affiliate that the officer holstered his weapon when he found out it was an off-duty, plain-clothed officer. now police are looking into whether that officer ever drew his gun because witnesses are saying that he did after his car was hit by snowballs. >> no one meant any harm and no one meant anything by just, just having fun. so, it's highly unfortunate and we just like to play in a blizzard. >> wjla reports that about 200 people showed up for that snowball fight. police say that there is no evidence that officers pointed

their weapons at the crowd. which politician had the biggest whopper of a year? new for you in the next half hour. which lawmaker told the public the biggest fib of them all? all right, taking a look at some of the papers today. snow is covering the front page of many editions because it's covering your front lawn. "the washington post" has a great shot of what the weather has done to parts of the capital and other spots on the east coast. "the wall street journal" introduces you to a man who hit it big. it has tallied a $7 billion profit this year. the fund made a big bet that the bank stocks would rebound. from "usa today" some cities are finding the fast lane are paying off. fast lanes reserved for car pools are being sold now for solo drivers. what i mean is, you can drive on it if you're a solely driver but you pay a price. the attack on silvio

berlusconi may be helping him politically. his approval rating went up 7 points since last month. before being hit with a souvenir statue at a rally, berlusconi was battling a sex scandal and legal troubles and he's recovering at home from a broken nose and teeth. what were the biggest stories of 2009? editors and news directors voting in the associated press annual poll say it was the economy, number two president obama's inauguration and then health care and trouble in the auto industry. for the first time, there was also a separate poll from facebook users. your answers were different, though, than the newsroom folks. that is next.

we were talking about the biggest stories of 2009 and what you told the news experts and what the news experts thought. no, no, we want to know your

take. this is the list of the top stories voted on by more than 1,400 facebook users. president obama's inauguration was the top story, number two the economy and number three michael jackson's death and number four, the miracle landing on the hudson river. afghanistan's president is promising to turn a new page when it comes to alleged corruption in his government. president karzai announced his new cabinet on saturday and said that they will be accountable to the afghan people but he has been under international pressure to clean up corruption. many legislatures said his newly appointed ministers are likely to keep the same game going. what do you do when you have an nfl game skenlualed in just an hour or so and your field is covered with snow? rafer is going to show you. good morning. >> good morning, robin. a lot of people are like, why weren't these guys out at the airports, they work for the teams and not for the city. nfl teams have more money than

the cities do, i hate to say it. first and after is incredibly impressive. record snowfall that pushed their game to be pushed three hours while 700 workers dugout the stadiums. the bears couldn't even get a flight in. clean as a whistle, no sign of any snow. and then philadelphia, near record snow forced them to postpone the game against san francisco almost three hours while they dug it out. lincoln financial field, no sign of nothing. philly would win that one to get into the playoffs. emotions were high in the bengals/chargeers game. especially for chad ochocinoco. they were playing just days after their teammate chris henry died. ochocinco honored henry when he scored this touchdown. heartbreaking moment and heartbreaking loss for cincinnati thap pilost on a last second field goal.

tensions ran high between brett favre and his coach. well, minnesota was getting pounded and so was brett by the panthers. they already won their division and nothing to play for. and brett did not like that. he acknowledged afterwards he and childress had a heated discussion and brett won, he got to stay in the game. probably shouldn't have. all right, the nfl is partnering with one of its biggest critics to help reduce concussions and brain trauma in players. the league is now encouraging players to donate their brains when they die to boston university researchers when they study concussions. bu in the past has been very critical and the nfl will donate $1 million to be the research center. lastly, happy birthday to one of the greats. penn state head coach joe paterno turns 83 today and he will be coaching in his 36th bowl game when his nittany lions play lsu on new year's day.

83 years young and some could argue, robin, the past five years of his career could be his best. unbelievable and that's sports. istrong. unbelievable. and that's sports. i marvel at him. >> something else. 83 and still working. appreciate it. okay. let's hope that today is way better than a lot of you experienced at the airports over the weekend. chris is in for bob. morning. >> good morning, robin. a lot better but by far and away it is not perfect out there. we are still dealing with delays expected today because of windy weather across the northeast. no, it's not snowing but blowing snow around is an issue. boston, new york city, you are dealing with windy weather, slowing you down to a half hour to possibly hour delays. pittsburgh, you're dealing with snowfall, cleveland and buffalo also. seattle, you are dealing with rainfall, the case as you make your way through port lachbd and san francisco.

that will slow you down a half hour to an hour. >> thank you. lots of signs in las vegas, fight for your attention, but these might get it. a nevada man donated $3,000 to the national freedom from religion foundation to sponsor these pro-atheism. >> i believe in god and i didn't appreciate it. >> there are an awful lot more that are religious intent than ours. so, to me, it's tit for tat. >> that man just paid for the signs and he said people should keep an open mind. when life gives you lemons, let's make lemonade. kids in roanoke took advantage of the two feet of snow. they'll be able to do it again today. at least a dozen schools and colleges are closed in virginia. senate democrats took a

giant step on health care in the middle of the night last night. you're going to want to know how their plan could affect you. and what insurance companies would be banned from doing.