[ cheers and applause ] this morning on "early today" -- still in it. embattled presidential candidate herman cain wants to speak in person with his wife before deciding what to do. buying frenzy. what's behind wall street's biggest single session gain since 2009? and scare tactic. why an indian snake charmer unleashed his wrath on a local tax office. captions paid for by nbc-universal television hello and good morning. welcome to our viewers across the nation, including the pacific time zone. i'm lynn berry. today we begin with a decision

in days. lashing out against so-called character attacks designed to force him out of the race, herman cain has put off a final call on the future of his presidential campaign until next week. cain says he needs to talk to his wife in person before making any final decisions. nbc's steve handelsman has more. >> reporter: even though herman cain said he will decide by next week whether to continue, he implied the answer will be yes. in an interview on fox. >> politics as usual is that once it gets rough and gets rocky and they start trying to attack your character, politics is usually drop out of the race. well, that's just not me. >> reporter: the pressure, cain said, is taking a toll on his wife gloria, but he says she told him she loved him. >> we want cain! >> reporter: with much of his support intact, cain can wait until january when voters in iowa decide about the alleged 13-year affair, the charges of

sexual harassment and cain's foreign policy flubs. if cain drops out, the reuters poll finds the field wouldn't shuffle much. romney would get cain voters. he denied flip-flopping. >> it's not accurate. >> reporter: newt gingrich would get cain voters. he vowed if he's the nominee and barack obama won't debate him seven times, gingrich will shadow him. >> wherever the president goes, i will show up four hours later and take apart his speech. >> reporter: but the former front-runner is not done yet. >> if i raise $1 billion and the american people are going to raise some cain in 2012. >> reporter: i'm steve handelsman, nbc news. a battle is being waged between lawmakers on capitol hill over how to pay for a payroll tax cut set to expire at the end of the month.

while in pennsylvania yesterday, president obama warned a lapse in the tax break could be a, quote, serious blow to the economy. nbc's tracie potts joins us from washington with those details. good morning. >> reporter: lynn, good morning. you may not have noticed, maybe you did, but you got an extra $1,000 this year because of the 2% payroll tax. president obama wants to extend that as he talked about that at a rally in scranton, pennsylvania, yesterday. this could be a massive blow to the economy to see payroll taxes go up 2% come january 1st. the issue here on capitol hill is democrats and republicans are at odds over how to pay for this extension. democrats want a permanent 3% tax on millionaires, republicans won't let that happen. there's a vote up this week. they are expecting to block it. instead, republicans say let's freeze the pay of all federal workers, cut 200,000 government

jobs, make the rich pay more in medicare premiums and make sure they don't get unemployment and food stamps. they will be working on this very likely for the next couple of weeks until the very end. that extension runs out december 31st. lynn? >> tracie potts for us in washington. thank you. elsewhere, a new accuser in the penn state sexual child abuse scandal has filed the first civil lawsuit against former football coach jerry sandusky, his charity and the university. in the suit the 29-year-old claims sandusky sexually abused him more than 100 times over the course of four years. and threatened to harm his family if he told anyone. he says he chose to come forward now because of the bravery of other victims and the pain he feels about those who may have been abused after him. sandusky has admitted to showering with boys but denying he is a pedophile. now, here's a look at some other stories making news early today in america. california federal agents have derailed what's being called the most sophisticated underground drug trafficking tunnel ever

discovered. equipped with electricity and ventilation it stretched six football fields from san diego to tijuana, mexico. the major bust netted 32 tons of marijuana. one of the largest seizures in u.s. history. a thanksgiving fishing trip off the coast of north carolina looks more like a scene from the movie "jaws." a group of friends had a close encounter with one great white shark that was way too close for comfort. the massive fish nudged the boat and circled for 20 minutes before swimming away. an arizona gun club is under heavy fire for this holiday picture. members can pose for christmas card photos with st. nick holding high-powered weapons. at least one state lawmaker has voiced outrage over the mix of christmas and machine guns. finally, a new appliance is offering a chance for customers to make sure they see images on their morning toast.

what do you think that looks like? it is called the jesus toaster that burns the image of jesus and other religious symbols into your slice. according to the creator, he's selling 50 to 100 of these things a day. now for a look at your national and regional weather here's meteorologist todd santos with your forecast. >> it is multi-denominational, so it works. >> something for everyone. a lot going on there on the west coast. >> a lot going on. especially weatherwise from the rockies westward. we'll take a look at the big picture. stepping back, you can see the activity racing through the great lakes. most of the snowflakes are now moving off to the south and east, but remove the cloud cover from there and you can see the real snow in the country developing outside of casper extending down to casper. some through the western edge of nebraska. that's one of the better areas for some actual accumulation. the rest of us from this region back to the southwest are dealing with really gusty winds. taking you to denver itself, you

can see that snow overspreading the area with the heavier showers off to the east at this home. 5 to 8 inches www.of snow in denver itself, keep that in mind. there's the winter weather advisories and the winter storm warnings in the pink color. some to the southeast side of denver. denver is under the advisory and a blizzard warning in wyoming. winds specifically here, some of the bigger numbers down to the sierra extending to the southwest, we'll talk about the high wind64 degrees there. looking for snow in arizona, flagstaff is your spot. it will be much colder there. some snow and wind into the end of the week. >> thank you so much, todd. also coming up, a stunning

move by the world's financial powers sends stocks skyrocketing. your early morning business headlines are straight ahead. plus, hell hath no fury like a 6'9" nba free agent scorned. kris strikes back at kim. coming up, two of the best go head to head in college hoops and a catch you have to see to believe. you're watching "early today."

good morning and welcome back to "early today." i'm lynn berry and here are some of your top headlines this morning. the fda is considering tightening restrictions on the amount of arsenic allowed in apple juice after consumer groups pushed for the crackdown. just yesterday consumer reports released a study finding 10% of apple juices and grape juices have higher arsenic levels than are allowed in drinking water. well, this is a little gross. horses could soon be slaughtered in the u.s. for human consumption after congress

quietly lifted a five-year ban on using federal funds for horse meat inspection. the legislation was part of an ominous spending bill signed by president obama in mid-november to keep the government afloat. a former colorado sheriff for whom a detention center is named now finds himself an inmate at that very jail. 68-year-old patrick sullivan is accused of offering methamphetamine in exchange for sex from a male acquaintance. commander jane lovell's checklist used to guide damaged "apollo 13" spacecraft home after the explosion that led to the famous "houston we have a problem" call sold at auction for just under $388,000. and here's someone you don't want to mess with. a snake charmer in india angered by alleged bribery demands by local officials released dozens of poisonous snakes inside a tax office. fortunately, no one was hurt. definitely don't want to mess with him.

here's an early look at wall street kicking off the day. the dow opens at 12,045 after it shot up 490 points yesterday. s&p surged 50 points. the nasdaq spiked 104. overseas trading this morning, in tokyo the nikkei climbed 162 points while in hong kong the hang seng skyrocketed 1,012. a bold move by the world's largest financial institution sent a surge of optimism through wall street wednesday sending stocks soaring. an extraordinary coordinated effort, federal reserve, european central bank and other central banks stepped in to make cheaper loans for struggling european banks, easing rising funding pressures threatening to clog the world's entire financial system. the dow reacted with its best day in over two years. the move touched off a financial buying frenzy. morgan stanley spiked 11%. citigroup almost 9%.

jpmorgan chase, 8%. bank of america, 7%. all those gains came in spite of standard & poor's cutting credit ratings on several major u.s. banks late tuesday. copper and oil rose sharply as energy, materials and industrial sectors dependent on economic strength roared. u.s. steel shot up 15%. ak steel 13%. alpha natural resources rose 15%. and peabodie energy soared 14%. further boosting investor spirits, data showing clear signs of economic recovery. the private sector added the most jobs in nearly a year in november. november midwest business activity grew faster than expected. october contracts to buy homes jumped to a high for the year. november was the best month for auto sales in more than two years. elsewhere, reports say private equity firms blackstone and baincapital have teamed up to bid for yahoo. the salvation army's red kettle has gone high tech. a holiday donation tradition

since 1891, now you can host your own red kettle online raising donations from family and friends. making it a little easier for you. coming up, the red wings light the red light. a scary moment in cheerleading. and a top ten college basketball battle. plus, you can argue about whether frisbee is a sport but no arguing this is a major league grab. your early morning sports headlines are straight ahead. that is pretty incredible. hey, it's the almost end of the week. it's thursday. we'll talk about your friday forecast and get you set for the weekend. you're watching "early today."

good morning. if you're just waking up, this is "early today." in sports, toppled last week from their top national ranking. the tar heels of north carolina showed plenty of fight last night against the badgers of wisconsin. here's nbc's fred roggin with an early look at all your sports headlines. good morning. by the end of this week we'll know just how good north carolina's basketball team is. the fifth ranked tar heels have a pair of games against top ten teams. first up, seventh ranked wisconsin. chapel hill, tough place to play no matter how good you are. ben burst with the steal and the bucket was counted at the break.

they hung around until five minutes left when barnes took over, scored 10 of 20 down the stretch. north carolina won 60-57. they have kentucky on saturday. scary moment during the michigan state/florida state game. spartan cheerleader taylor young took a terrible fall. the cheerleader next to young lost herbal lance and it triggered a reaction. she was on the court for about ten minutes, wheeled off on a stretcher but gave the crowd a smile and a thumbs up on her way out of the arena. thankfully she'll be okay. hockey. the boston bruins have had a november to remember. they beat the maple leafs to finish 12-0-1. lucic scored a pair of goals. bruins won 6-3. red wings have got a little streak going as well winning six in a row. holmstrom scored the game winner in the third. jimmy howard great in the final period robbed the lightning's gilroy in the breakaway. detroit won it 4-2. we played frisbee before but i don't think any of us have played it quite like this.

australian frisbee champ brody smith, apparently there are frisbee champions out there, but anyway, he launched a disk off a bridge. as it flew over the water, a boat ran under it, a passenger jumped off and made a speedy grab. they say you should never jump off a moving boat. we'll let this one slide. this catch takes ultimate frisbee to a whole new level. that's your early look at sports on "early today." i'm fred roggin. >> for the record, i guarantee you bill karins would say that's not real. coming up, who says she's helping lindsay lohan keep on the straight and narrow. your early morning entertainment headlines are straight ahead. plus, white house decorators and the first lady have a holiday treat for those who serve and their families. you're watching "early today."

welcome back to"early today." we have highway warnings and wind advisories extending down to california. a good portion of the southwest, i show you this to appeal the fire safety. you can see down to los angeles the wind could be around 40 miles an hour. there's a look at temperatures, 48 in vegas with showers this afternoon. denver with the snow. again, that's really the high temperature occurring early this morning. if you are watching us on nbc 11 in california's bay area, in nearby berkeley explore the journey of buddism across

several centuries at himalayan pilgrima pilgrimage. >> thank you. here's an early look at this morning's headlines in entertainment. just when you thought kim kardashian marriage fiasco quieted, it hasn't. the jilted exhas come screeching back. the chicago "sun-times" says egged on by his lawyers, family and friends, kris humphries will seek an annulment rather than divorce claiming victim to fraudulent divorce and claiming he's due big bucks. kardashian claims she did not marry humphries for her tv show that she was truly in love. kanye west came away with seven grammy nominations last nights in los angeles. adele with six, including record, album and song of the year. the grammys will be awarded in february.

finally, file this under -- whatever. possibilities are endless. courtney love is claiming to be lindsay lohan's sobriety coach. the notorious 47-year-old singer told "details" magazine, quote, i've taken up lohan because nobody else will. no comment yet from lohan. we'll wait for that one. that will be good. this comes to us from washington, d.c., where the halls of the white house are decked out in elaborate display of holiday pageantry. tis the season at 1600 pennsylvania avenue. military families joined the first lady for a first look at holiday decorations. amid 37 christmas trees and ornaments resembling the obama's dog, bo. this holiday theme reflects a tribute to the nation's military. the first family's way of thanking troops and their e.milies for the sacrifices they've made. i'm lynn berry and this is "early today," just your first stop of the day today on your nbc station. ly

well, it was surf's up for sydney locals and their gnarly gear. a group of 17 surfers put on their wetsuits with colorful neon tube that is glow in the dark and took to the waves at night using custom-made boards with neon wire inlay. looks pretty cool. the evening ride was organized to welcome the arrival of summer in australia which officially begins today. in germany, artists hit the ice to create frozen masterpieces. several award-winning ice sculptures carved 400 tons of ice into chilling displays. among pieces were horses, warriors and even a motorcycle. the works won't be around forever, though. the exhibit hall has to be kept at a cool 19 degrees just to

keep them from turning into puddles. finally, a 48-year-old farmer in china thinks he bears a striking resemblance to vladimir putin, but you have to decide for yourself. we are not so sure. the so-called look-alike is still single and he hopes his appearance will help him find a soul mate. look closely with familiar eyes and thinning hair, local residents call him putin instead of his real name. todd, any thoughts on that? >> a little bit. he's smiling too much. that's a problem. >> exactly. he doesn't have that angry, mean man look. i don't know. i don't think it looks anything like vladimir putin but if the guy thinks it will help him score a lady, god bless him. >> whatever works. time for an early look at the stories we'll follow throughout the day here on nbc. it is world aids day supporting those living with and succumbed to the virus. president obama will be joined

by former presidents george w. bush and bill clinton for a discussion marking the day. bush is currently in africa to raise cancer awareness, an event he calls, quote, a natural extension of an aids relief program started during his presidency. the navy celebrates 100 years of naval aviation with a wreath-laying and black tie gala paying tribute to legacy of those who have served over the past century. and woody allen turns 76. all day long you can stay on top of the very latest developments in those stories and others as they break on msnbc. and tonight be sure to watch brian williams with "nbc nightly news." and here's a look at what's coming up later this morning on the "today" show. ann curry is in iraq with an exclusive interview with vice president joe biden on the pending u.s. troop withdrawal. and a live tour of a new exhibit showcasing elizabeth taylor's dazzling jewels and over the top wedding dresses. now keep it on this channel for continuing local news, weather, sports and more. i'm lynn berry. thanks for watching "early today." just your first stop of the day today on your nbc station. have a good one.

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