on our broadcast tonight, defending himself. the congressman who wants to look into american muslims tonight is being asked about his own past. flood zone, the northeast under a massive flood watch with melting snow, heavy rain and rising rivers and the new violent storm on the way. >> stealing your signal. what happened to this guy could happen to you. his computer service was hijacked for something awful. and new edition. the bible gets a rewrite. tonight, what has changed about the good book. also tonight, a new way of looking at diabetes. "nightly news" begins now. captions paid for by nbc-universal television

good evening. peter king is a republican congressman from new york who tomorrow is going to begin hearings looking into muslims in america. he says he's trying to find fanatics, trying to root out terrorism, but he has stirred a lot of people up. while he admits he's obsessed with 9/11 and while he runs the house homeland security committee, tonight he is defending himself and his own past association with a terrorist organization of another kind in another time. nbc news capitol hill correspondent, kelly o'donnell, has our report, starts us off tonight. kelly, good evening. >> reporter: good evening, brian. king says there has been a vicious overreaction to what he plans to do at tomorrow's hearing. he says the public needs to know how big a problem it is that a small number of american muslims are being turned against the u.s. he's under pressure and having to answer for his own past ties to a controversial and even

violent group. known for being accessible and media friendly during 18 years in congress, tonight peter king says he's caught by surprise. >> i'm not overly modest or shy but i really do not expect to become the center of attention on this. >> reporter: chairman of the house homeland security committee, king says he is trying to expose islamic extremism inside the u.s. >> homegrown radicalization is a growing threat and one we cannot ignore. >> reporter: his own history is getting another look. >> i think people should be giving me medals. >> reporter: years ago king was a major advocate for the irish republican army, which the u.s. and british governments had labeled a terrorist organization. >> those who saw your i.r.a. past look at this and say you're a hypocrite. >> right. people who say that are uninformed. first of all, the i.r.a. never attacked the united states. let's start with that. >> reporter: the i.r.a.'s attacks did kill thousands of civilians during an armed rebellion against british rule in northern ireland from the 1970s to late '90s.

king stood by i.r.a. leader linked to violence who later became elected officials. >> you can't have every case is the same. i didn't agree with everything they did, but they were a force that was there. >> reporter: tomorrow king will examine what the obama administration calls a growing threat, al qaeda recruiting american muslims. many muslim groups call king's hearing a witch hunt. >> the way he has been singling out and stigmatizing the american muslim community raises a lot of concern. >> reporter: king denies any anti-muslim intent and claims his i.r.a. past makes him more credible on terrorism. >> barack obama offered me ambassador to ireland. would he have done that if i had a background the u.s. government had to worry about? >> reporter: the white house is not commenting whether congressman king was granted that offer. he of course did not take that job. he said after tomorrow's hearing the focus will be off him and back on muslim extremism.

kelly o'donnell our capitol hill correspondent starting us off tonight. kelly, thanks. now to another major story tonight, the weather. severe weather hit today over a multi-state area in the south, including severe localized damage from tornados, and it now sets up the possibility of another day of severe weather torrow. it is a massive system, as you see stretching from louisiana north to new york, and by the time it's over and blows north and east and out to sea, 100 million americans will have been affected by this storm. it includes lots of rain and in areas already flooded, now things can get a bit desperate. we start our coverage tonight at the weather channel with meteorologist chris warren. hey, chris, good evening. >> reporter: good evening to you, brian. here's another look at that storm. the south in here, this is where we have that severe weather threat. the heart of the storm up here is moving into the mid-atlantic and into the northeast. this is a slow-moving storm, so it's going to spend more time over any given area, which means it's going to have the ability

to dump more rain over any given spot. keep in mind here when you look at these numbers, the forecast for the next couple of days, we only need about an inch, some cases less than an inch to see more flooding. the forecast in some cases here calling for up to and even more than 3 inches of rain. brian, it looks like the worst of this is going to be happening during the day thursday, including the evening commute and into friday for the friday morning commute. >> all right, chris warren at the weather channel. chris, thanks for that. one of the places already dealing with too much water where it's about to get worse, little falls, new jersey. that's where nbc's ron allen is standing by tonight. ron, good evening. >> reporter: good evening, brian. this is a playing field on the edge of a playground here in little falls, but it's covered by part of the passaic river. the river is about five feet higher than it normally would be this time of year and it's already threatening quite a few homes in this community, as you can see. there is more rain in the forecast and just about everyone

here expects this river to rise much higher. the passaic river roared through this neighborhood after drenching rains over the weekend, forcing dozens of families to evacuate to higher ground. les and kelly mcdaniel moved into the house at the end of forest avenue with the river view just six days ago. now they use a swimming pool float and a big stick to navigate their way to dry land. >> they're saying it's supposed to rain all weekend, so it's probably going to come inside the house then. what are you going to do, you know. you can't fight with mother nature. >> reporter: emergency crews had to rescue some in several counties who didn't get out in time. today brian valente used a rowboat to get down the road to his house, a prespring ritual after heavy rain and melting snow that he says is all too familiar. >> i grew up here, i'm 33. so it happens. >> 33 times? >> not quite that many, but yeah. >> reporter: with rain forecast

tonight through thursday and into friday, it's all hands on deck. even the inmates from the county jail pitched in with guards watching, making sandbags to go. at this strip mall, they know what a few inches of rain can do. >> last year around the same time, we got about 4 inches and it actually flooded out this entire area. >> reporter: local business owners like joe solari who runs an oil tank service company was busy moving tons of expensive equipment to higher ground. in a struggling economy, he says lost work days because of flooding is the last thing he needs. >> right now we lost about four days and then we're going to lose another four days coming up, so it's frustrating for everybody. >> reporter: local officials are warning residents to be prepared. there have been dark clouds building in the skies all day. more rain and more flooding certainly seem headed this way. brian. >> all right, ron allen in little falls, new jersey, tonight. ron, thanks. overseas now to the violence

and high drama of those battles playing out in libya, where rebels trying to overthrow gadhafi are finding the dictator and his military are a lot more resilient than anybody bargained for when this all started about three weeks ago. nbc's stephanie gosk is in benghazi again for us tonight. stephanie, good evening. >> reporter: good evening, brian. well, the opposition tells us that they are sending former military units that switched to the rebels' side down to the front line to lead the fight there against gadhafi's forces, but they have been stopped in their tracks. there was a new casualty in the fighting today, the oil facility at ras lanuf. two storage tanks and a pipeline were hit. right now it's unclear what caused the explosions, but both sides are blaming each other. gadhafi appeared on tv again today and he warned the west not to impose a no-fly zone. but there are indications that the defiant leader might actually be more open to dialogue than he appears.

today he sent a number of emissaries from tripoli to reach out to international leaders, including a general that made a surprise visit to cairo and a number of officials to brussels to take part in conversations there with nato over the next couple of days. brian. >> nbc's stephanie gosk in benghazi, libya, tonight. stephanie, thanks. a conservative activist whose undercover gorilla film-making project led to the downfall of the community group a.c.o.r.n. has a new casualty tonight. the head of national public radio is out of her job after another sting operation, and this one could have even wider implications. here's nbc's lisa myers. >> i want to begin by -- >> reporter: npr's top executive, vivian schiller, the latest casualty of conservative undercover filmmaker james o'keefe. we last saw o'keefe wearing a fur coat and playing a pimp when he managed to take down the liberal group a.c.o.r.n.

this time the target was npr. with men posing as potential donors, o'keefe captured an npr fund-raiser making disparaging remarks about republicans and the tea party. >> they believe that white middle america gun-toting -- i mean it's scary. they're serious. >> reporter: it's the second time npr has been in trouble recently, accused of liberal bias. this time costing the fund-raiser and the ceo their jobs. the timing could not be worse. the house just voted to stop all funding of public broadcasting, $430 million this year. >> what kind of mission does the corporation for public broadcasting serve in these very tough economic times? >> reporter: npr says it gets only 2% of its budget from taxpayers. most of the federal money, 71%, goes to local public tv and radio stations. losing that would hurt. >> i think we would survive without the money.

would we do as good a job as we do now? absolutely not. >> reporter: officials say some stations would go under. also at risk, programming like sesame street. >> we have studies that prove our programs get these children ready for school, ready to learn. >> reporter: with american children already falling behind, public broadcasting supporters fear bert and ernie could become a casualty of the political wars. lisa myers, nbc news, washington. chilling story out of florida tonight. an estimated 200 million of us have wireless internet in the home, but often the signal isn't password protected, it's in the air out there in the wild blue for anyone to grab it and use it for whatever they want. this is at the crux of this bad case of mistaken identity in florida. a bizarre case that's a lesson for everybody. the story tonight from nbc's kerry sanders in sarasota. >> reporter: malcolm ridell said he was just too busy.

fluent in chinese, a harvard business graduate, a former spy with the cia. >> i heard a pounding on the door. >> reporter: who was recently accused by a dozen armed fbi agents standing in his living room of -- >> child pornography. i said huh? i was speechless. i just didn't know what to say. >> reporter: malcolm lives on the 12th floor of this condominium and way, way, way over there on a boat in the marina, two city blocks from his house, the fbi eventually figured out someone had locked on to his wireless internet signal that he had forgotten to protect with a password. agents eventually arrested 52-year-old mark brown for allegedly distributing from his library of more than 10 million child pornography photographs, but how could anyone steal a weak wireless signal from so far away? >> a pringle's can. >> reporter: with that pringles cantenna wired into his laptop in just 30 minutes, fbi agent

locked on to 381 unprotected wireless signals. >> it's really not hard to do, especially today where we are today. we're picking up plenty of open networks. you're not going to see it. you're not going to notice any unusual activity on your computer. it's going to be very hard for you to detect. >> reporter: which brings us back to malcolm, an unwitting accomplice not charged with a crime. >> it's a sense of regret. even if i'd forced him to go to another router or to find another way, i could have at least curtailed what was going on for a little bit. >> reporter: the fbi estimates 50 million american homes have yet to lock that open internet door with a password. kerry sanders, nbc news, sarasota, florida. when we come back here tonight, our education nation series continues with the man who wrote the book on school reform and is in the fight every day. and later, how do you make the good book even better? a new bible in your local bookstores as of tonight.

. 28 years ago, native new yorker and harvard educated teacher, geoffrey canada, saw a need to educate new york city school kids and he launched a huge effort to fill that need. it is called the harlem children's zone. it encompasses 97 city blocks. they have educated upwards of 10,000 kids from inside and outside the neighborhood. he has risen since to national prominence. he's featured in the documentary "waiting for superman" and at least one american express commercial that we can think of. but he has vowed to stay in harlem, stay in the fight, and the need is about to get more dire. so as part of our education nation coverage, tonight we welcome back to our studios, geoffrey canada. welcome. >> thank you. thank you. thrilled to be here. >> i wanted to talk to you again because last time we spoke, you

spoke with passion and urgency. in your words, the poor are about to get hammered and inner city students are about to get hammered. how badly and why? >> well, you know, this is to me a real national disaster that i don't think anybody is paying attention to. you know, when a bunch of us saw katrina heading towards new orleans, we wondered how come those people aren't reacting. i see the same thing happening in poor communities. we're raising the standards. we're making it clear that if you don't have a great education, you will not get a job in the future. and we're cutting education budgets and all the supports for poor people all at the same time. and so when you ask people, okay, how does this work that kids that are already struggling and failing, we're cutting supports, and now we expect them to do better. no one has an answer. people just say, well, what else can we do. and i think that's a recipe for disaster. this country needs to recognize this is a crisis, and we need to take immediate and urgent action or we're going to lose a whole

generation of americans. >> do you worry about the current union conversation, this big fight, this big debate that's going on in terms of attracting high-quality teachers? >> well, i think that what people are wondering is do we value teachers in america. and i think the answer to that is absolutely yes. and what we have to say to, i think, people who are wondering about coming into this field, we value teachers. we want the best teacher possible in front of these children, because we know the teacher is the number one ingredient in driving performance in schools. but we've got some rules right now that will not keep the best teachers in front of students. as we have to make tough choices in america, things like the last in, the first out, we have to get rid of these kinds of issues. get rid of teachers based on seniority and not based on teacher effectiveness. we simply don't have enough money to keep ineffective teachers in classrooms. >> in the moments we have left, final question. why do you think it is after

money gets tight after all this hubbub and building up spirit about education, education is often the first thing to get cut. >> i am stunned. be they republicans or be they democrats, they will not talk about really the major parts of the budget. when you begin to look at issues of social security, everybody says it has to be reformed, no one is touching it. when you talk about major pension reform, no one is doing anything about that. they simply look at the issues of education, programs like promise neighborhoods and they say all of that stuff has to go. i think that they are simply picking on the weakest parts of our society. this should be shared suffering. this suffering should be shared by the old and by the young. we are just targeting our young people in this country, and that's a disgrace. >> geoffrey canada, it's always a pleasure. thank you, sir, for coming by again. geoffrey canada, harlem children's zone. we're back with more after this.

we've heard of the rust belt and the bible belt but there's a new one about to enter our lexicon being put out by a branch of our federal government, the centers for disease control, identifying something called the diabetes belt. cdc says it's made up of 664 counties in 15 states, most of them in the southeast. the diagnosed rate of type 2 diabetes was almost 12% in those counties compared with 8.5% of the total u.s. population. risk factors in these areas tend

to be higher as well. they include, you know them, obesity, lack of exercise, fewer people with higher education. pulitzer prize-winning columnist david broder has died. he was a washington fixture for most of his life, a reporter for the "washington post" and regarded by so many as the very best in the business. a proud product of illinois, he entered the university of chicago at age 15. he had the bearing of a professor. he was equal parts luddite and pack rat. he thrived on deadlines and he thrived on facts. he was a great mentioner of future presidential candidates. a great traveler who refused to be trapped in washington. and when he felt his own writing veering into the conventional wisdom, he would take himself to task in print. broder was a sunday morning fixture as well. he held the record among reporters on "meet the press," appearing over 400 times. he loved politics, but he hated

what had become of our politics in recent years. david broder was 81 years old. up next, it's been a best seller for a couple of hundred years. now we'll meet the people who say they just made the good book even better.

the newest best seller to hit the bookstores and the ereaders tonight is a rewrite of the most widely read book of all time, the bible. two new translations, brand new editions that are supposed to be more readable, more up to date. as you might imagine, it's a job not taken lightly by any of the scholars and theologians who took on this daunting task. here is nbc's lee cowan. >> reporter: for those seeking the word of god, you need a pretty big bookshelf. ever since gutenberg printed his first bible back in the 1400s, there have been so many revisions, it's almost biblical. the latest are these, the new american bible and the new international version of the bible, released just as christians were celebrating the beginning of lent, ash wednesday. >> it's like reading the bible in high definition. it's the same stories that you know, it's the same text that

you know. >> reporter: in the new american bible, popular with catholics, the old testament doesn't sound quite so old. in leviticus instead of the faithful being instructed to bring a cereal offering, it's now a grain offering. isaiah doesn't speak of booty anymore, it's spoils. >> it's not rewriting, it's retranslating. >> reporter: even evangelicals prefer the international version where scholars work to make it less gender specific. man is now mankind. forefathers are now ancestors, and in john, the cravings of a sinful man have been changed to simply the lust of the flesh. >> we don't want to change the word of god easily or quickly, that's why we on the committee take our jobs so seriously. >> reporter: it is tricky business. critics would say we're not supposed to change the bible to fit our lives, we're supposed to change our lives to fit the bible, but scholars insist it's only the language that's changing, not the content. >> i think the reason there's controversy is we have people who care so deeply about the

bible as god's word. in a sense that's a very good thing. >> reporter: no matter your beliefs, the bible is a classic that has survived more translations than any other work in history. and yet still remains a best seller. lee cowan, nbc news, los angeles. and that's our broadcast on a wednesday night. thanks for being here with us. i'm brian williams. we hope to see you right back here tomorrow evening. one day later, dozens more cases have been dropped. criminals could be set free. the alleged misconduct scandal rocking sfpd. >> her death has become a rallying cry. the community learns if the man will face jail time. >> the san bruno explosion, a look at the community still trying to rebuild.