diplomatic issue. it should be a security issue. that's something else we should talk about when revamping all of these procedures. >> i agree with you that visas should be re-examined but it is very hard to get into this country. >> eleanor clift, karen hunter, sabrina schaeffer, thank you. we'll be joined by terrorism analyst evan kohlmann. also ahead, the big chill. when will mother nature release her icy grip on the mid-atlantic region and the northeast? you're watching msnbc sunday.

right now on msnbc, break news. the u.s. embassy in yemen has been shut down after ongoing fears of an al qaeda attack in the region. weather warning. a record cold snap in parts of the country. the weather channel forecast is ahead. new pictures as an unhappy elephant runs into a crowd.

we'll tell what you may have set him off, whether anybody was injured. also, how hollywood plans to top a monster year at the box office. good morning, everybody. i'm david chuter in today for alex witt. we'll have all those stories. plus, the big changes coming to your credit card account. first up, this sunday morning we're following breaking news. an active threat by al qaeda has forced a closure of the u.s. embassy in yemen. the suspect in the christmas day plane bombing attempts as he got his marching orders from al qaeda in yemen. an emerging front in the war on terror. all 500 u.s. embassy employees in yemen have been instructed to stay away from their job until further notice and to remain inside their homes as much as possible. >> there are indications that al qaeda's planning to carry out an attack in the capital of yemen. >> we know they're tarpthing our embassy personnel and we want to safeguard our diplomats and others down there. it was the prudent step to take.

>> nbc's mike viqueira joins us now live from the white house. mike, fill in some of the gaps about what the administration is saying. >> reporter: david, it was the president himself who yesterday in his weekly internet and radio address who confirmed what many suspected and that it was al qaeda that was behind that aborted christmas day attack in the skies over detroit. al qaeda in the arabian peninsula, a new strong hold for an old enemy in the country of yemen, a country wracked by poverty and civil strife. it's said al qaeda can find a strong hold there because the government is weak, controlling a very relatively small amount of the territory of that country. as the united states an others make inroads routing out terrorists from afghanistan and elsewhere, they are finding a safe haven in yemen. john brennan, that individual you just saw there on "meet the press," he is the advisor here at the white house on homeland security. he had more to say about that incident and the larger terror threat this morning on "meet the press." >> clearly the system didn't

work on that day because abdulmutallab should never have gotten on that plane with those explosives. every other day the system worked so far this year. we've thwarted attempts. but clearly the president wants to make sure we strengthen the system. it is not that the system is broken but clearly there are ways to improve and strengthen the system to make sure we put together various bits and pieces of information in a way that allows us to stop every single terrorist out there. >> reporter: david, the point has been made on some of these morning shows, "meet the press" principally, that in this case we're talking about the failure of the intelligence agency to share information. well, the information was out there. it's just data points were not connected. the dots were not connected. therefore, this man was allowed to board that plane in amsterdam when many people feel as though he shouldn't, including the president of the united states. >> the underlying theme is the intelligence capability is there, it's just there's something that's not working in

terms of the analysis of it all. >> that's right. there have to be improvements in the system. it is an evolving system, and an evolving threat, david. general mclaughlin, the former head of the central intelligence agency, as well as the national security agency, was on "meet the press." he served under republican administrations, but he says the threat is constantly evolving. the terrorists are trying to stay ahead of law enforcement capabilities, of intelligence capabilities, of surveillance capabilities, and therefore a u.s. intelligence has to stay with them and develop their technologies and their human resources as well. to that end, david, the president has called a big face-to-face meeting upon his return from his hawaiian vacation. he is expected to leave tonight. tuesday here just behind me in the west wing of the white house in the situation room he'll meet with the heads of all relevant agencies trying to figure out what happened. that review is ongoing about not only the intelligence failures but also the security failures that allowed that man to get on that airplane, david. >> nbc's mike viqueira at the white house, thanks for the report. for more now on all of this

we are joined live by nbc news terrorism analyst evan kohlmann. evan, you're very familiar of course with yemen and the embassies there. what do you make of the decision to close the u.s. and the british embassy in yemen? >> let me run three ingredients in this recipe past you. first of all, we have repeated past efforts by al qaeda's network in yemen. al qaeda in the arabian peninsula, to strike at the united states embassy in sana. just a few months ago in september of 2008 al qaeda and yemen actually released a video documenting an attack that had taken place just a year before, about this suicide bombing attack on the u.s. embassy. number two, we just found out recently that the air strikes that we saw targeting al qaeda camps in yemen in the past month came as a result of the fact that u.s. intelligence learned that individuals were meeting in these locations and were planning imminent terrorist attacks against embassies -- western embassies in yemen. and the third ingredient is, al qaeda's in yemen's reaction to

those air strikes. after those air strikes took place, al qaeda in the arabian peninsula issued a statement saying, that's it, in response to this attack we're going after a new set of targets, including naval vessels in the persian gulf, western embassies. you look at those three ingredients right there and you understand exactly why it was a prudent step, if there is any intelligence information suggesting an imminent operation, that it might be targeted against a western embassy, particularly the u.s. and british embassies. >> it's always humiliating for a host country when another country closes their embassy in your country. on the timing of this, it is particularly intriguing given that general david petraeus met with yemen's president yesterday. what's the state of the relationship between the government of yemen and our government? >> the yemeni government at this point is opening its arms saying we want to help, we want money, we want equipment. the question is, is money and equipment enough? the yemeni government has a basic problem of credibility.

not just among al qaeda but among its own citizenry. even with the proper amount of money, even with the proper amount of weapons, are they able to defeat the tribes, confront the tribes who are providing cover for al qaeda in certain places? that's not clear. if you look at pakistan right now where we're dumping a ton of money and a ton of support and a ton of military equipment, have you a similar situation where the question is, given all that support, is the pakistani government capable of confronting the taliban. now it is the same situation in yemen. is money, missile strikes, is that going to be enough or do we need to get into some kind of negotiations with the tribes and try to bring them to the table and tell them as long as they give shelter and protection to al qaeda, we have no choice but to target them as well. >> in speaking of targeting, when you look at the amount of money that we're targeting for yemen in the year ahead, approximately $150 million by some reports, that's a drop in the bucket compared to the $10

billion that we're slated to spend this coming year in afghanistan where al qaeda was and where they trained for the attacks of 9/11. how did we get to this imbalance? >> well, look. a lot of people didn't see this coming. to be fair, it's something that's really only popped up in the last two years. we've seen suicide bombing attacks in yemen but the idea of yemen as a base for international terrorism, as a base for people to get trained, then leave and carry out terrorist attacks in the u.s., that's a recent realization and i think now we have to start shifting our priorities, recognizing that there are other zones like somalia, like yemen, that can equally serve as a base for individuals who want to come to western countries and carry out terrorist attacks. you don't need to go to pakistan. there are other alternatives. not that we should take away money from what's going on in afghanistan and pakistan but we do have to better balance our priorities and recognize there are a myriad of threats we have to deal with, not just one. >> evan, as far as -- two

questions. as far as saudi arabia and their help with the effort in yemen, what level that is. and again, how concerned should we be about the ability of al qaeda either through crossing the border from saudi arabia into yemen, then yemen itself to do the training and essentially perpetuate some sort of an attack here in the united states homeland beyond just trying to put some explosives on an airliner. >> the saudis have a very good reason to get involved in this. if you look, a lot of the guys pushing this movement forward are in fact saudi nationals, their most-wanted saudi ann curry members. the problem is is the assistance they're providing enough. the last few months there are indications that not only does al qaeda understand the level of support they are providing, but they are attempting to counter it. it looks like the precursor to abdulmutallab was a guy named abdullah asiri who carried a bomb inside of him and intended to assassinate one of the

princes in saudi arabia who was in charge of rehabilitation program, the program designed to bring al qaeda members back from -- back from the netherworld, back into the fold. they understood this and they nearly killed him. so there is evidence that the art therapy program that the saudis have been running, the rehabilitation program simply isn't enough. so the question is are the dau siz in a position to provide the military aid, military support or does that need to come from western countries like the united states, like the united kingdom. if you look at the plans that are various different allies have in the next few months to have a conference to deal with the situation in yemen i think you can say that it is pretty clear saudi arabia is not enough. there needs to be other people involved in this equation, there needs to be other governments, and probably more money. >> nbc news terrorism analyst evan kohlmann, thanks for the update this morning and for joining us. we appreciate it. >> thank you. for more on the investigation into the christmas day plot, including a look at how al qaeda has flourished in

yemen, head to msnbc.com. if you have questions for me, or even questions you want to hear from evan kohlmann, twitter me, twitter.com/dav twitter.com/davidschuster. now, to the latest on the cold snap across much of the country. temperatures are going to plunge from the plains to the northeast today. there will also be snow and lots of it. a foot of snow is already on the ground there in maine. take a look at those big waves. the storm stirred them up along the massachusetts coast on saturday. roads were flooded, a few homes were flooded as well. plus, 6 to 10 inches of snow blanketed the state. more snow is in the forecast for massachusetts and for parts of upstate new york, including buffalo. windchills in buffalo are expected to fall below zero. meteorologist alex ross joins us now from the weather channel in atlanta. alex, good morning. >> good morning do you, david. yes, indeed, you mentioned it, the snow across the northeast and the cold is really the story. bitter cold impacting a good

chunk of the u.s. here's the map from sunday. some snow showers we'll find across new england and portions of the great lakes. also back into the middle of the country a little disturbance bringing us a few snow showers out there. a lot of folks are trying to work their way back from their holiday destination so be on the lookout for that. again here's some of that cold we are dealing with. 32 for your high in boston. we head down towards atlanta. not so hot atlanta here for us. 34 for the high. chilly indeed. let's show you the radar what it's showing with some of the snow showers across the northeast. boston seeing snow, new york state as well. this area of snow working its way on off generally the southwest here for us. we'll keep some of the snow around across the region for the next couple of days through our sunday snow here coming in. we'll really see it piling on across portions of the great lakes as some of the cold air works in over lake erie and ontario. buffalo, monday temperatures around 20 degrees. even into tuesday we keep the

threat for snow going around. 22, warming up slightly for you. new york city some sunshine but 33 and cold. lot of folks will be bundling up and shoveling. >> rough time for a lot of folks. alex wallace, thanks for the update. still ahead, a big development in the case of a murdered florida family. a live report next from miami. also, the new rules for credit cards. will they really help consumers? we will tell you what you can expect in the coming weeks. plus, how the movie industry is hoping for another sequel to a banner year. you're watching msnbc sunday.se much for department store makeup when there's an amazing anti-aging makeup from covergirl and olay. simply ageless. this advanced formula with olay regenerist serum won't glob up in lines and wrinkles like the leading department store makeup can. get out of that department store! and into simply ageless. you'll look amazing and happy too. simply ageless, from olay and easy breezy beautiful covergirl. i'm a covergirl.

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major development this morning involving a florida fugitive on the run for more than five weeks following a thanksgiving day killing spree.

palmul mer meej merhige is accud of killing four family members including one who was just 6 years old. he was found in a hotel room. michelle kosinski is live in miami with the case. >> reporter: such a bizarre story. finally this family can rest knowing that one of their family members is behind bars. as much as they can, i guess. just having their family members gunned down during thanksgiving dinner. four of them died, including twin sisters and a 6-year-old cousin. police say after paul merhige did this, he took off in his car they say he had tuned up just for the occasion with guns he had just bought and money he had just taken out of the bank. they say that this, including the escape, was carefully planned but he was still driving that car when finally a citizen was watching "america's most wanted," recognized it and sent police to him, a motel room in the middle of the florida keys.

but for over five weeks he was able to escape and evade any kind of notice, even being in the same area where people and especially his family had lived in fear. >> i'm really happy that the monster's in a cage. we've been under 24-hour, seven-day-a-week protection and needless to say, we haven't been sleeping real well. so now we're -- we can begin the process of mourning and grieving the loss of my daughter and my wife's mother and the cousins. >> reporter: this family had described merhige as brilliant but unstable and that he was taking several medications, including antianxiety drugs. they said that during the shooting he announced that he had been waiting for 20 years to do that. now they, and people in this area -- because for so long no one knew where he was or what he

might be planning -- they can at least know that he is in police custody, david. >> nbc's michelle kosinski in miami, thanks for the report. taking a look now around the globe, hopes are fading in the search for survivors of brazil's worst mudslides. at least 64 people are dead, many of them killed in a slide that buried an upscale resort on new year's day. about 80 mudslides have been reported across brazil in recent days. the slides were triggered by heavy rain that has been falling since wednesday. hundreds of people have been forced from their homes in eastern australia after severe flooding. floodwaters are about 20 feet high. water level is expected to rise to more than 35 feet by tonight. in beijing, a blanket of snow is making travel difficult. many of the highways inned a around beijing are closed because of the slick roads. most of the flights out of the

beijing airport has been canceled. snow is expected to stop falling tomorrow. beijing which hasn't seen much snow during the past several winters has witnessed several snowstorms so far this season. still ahead, what led an elephant to run amok at a festival. we'll tell you whether anybody was hurt when the story continues on msnbc. this is mine, blitz. i can't do this job without him, and he can't do it without me. to keep him at his best, i only feed him eukanuba with prebiotics to promote strong defenses. you know he means the world to me for a lot of different reasons. he's more than a partner, he's family. [ female announcer ] ask an expert at your pet store which formula is best for your dog.

avoided getting trounced by a spooked elephant. only two minor injuries were reported in this solo stampede. it happened before a religious procession. the elephant was supposed to play a key role in the ceremony but onlookers said that the noise from the crowd frightened the animal and caused the animal to try and rush to escape. keepers nearby controlled the situation, calming the elephant

down and minimizing the damage. box offices brought in $10 billion in 2009. so what will hollywood do for an encore? nbc's george lewis looks at the heights of the box office -- the heights that the box office climbed and what moviegoers can expect this year. >> reporter: you might say it's been a transformative year for hollywood when a movie like "transformers, revenge of the fallen" took in $202 million at the domestic box office. >> i fell in love. >> reporter: and the current hit "avatar" is headed for the $300 million mark domestically after a little more than two weeks in theaters. >> it's been an incredible year at the box office in 2009. we're going to wind up with about $10.6 billion in revenue and the highest attendance in five years. >> reporter: so what about 2010? people in the movie game are

trying to figure out how to top 2009's box office numbers. a hard act to follow. >> we got to hope. we're out there every week just hoping we hit it out of the park. >> reporter: and the formula for hitting it out of the park is sequels. 2010 will bring the second "ironman" movie. >> sometimes you just have to get away with the girls. >> reporter: carrie and her friends are back for another installment of sex in the city. and the harry potter franchise will take moviegoers to hogwarts. the secret is -- sequels sell. >> audiences love the familiar and they love to go back to the movies over and over again. >> reporter: so don't be surprised if director james cameron and his studio, fox, announce in 2010 that an "avatar" 2 is in the works. >> you are not in kansas

anymore. you are on pandora. >> reporter: and, at a time when the recession has people cutting back on things like expensive vacations and fancy meals -- >> i am in so much pain right now. >> reporter: -- going to the movies remains a relatively inexpensive alternative. george lewis, nbc news, hollywood. still ahead -- more on the record cold temperatures hitting parts of the country. we will get a check again from the weather channel.

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hakeem, i understand that you can't get even within two kilometers of the embassy? >> yes. really it is only one kilometer to the embassy. government is putting out heavy security just in case the al qaeda threats are real. also the helicopters from the military are put on hold in case any attacks do happen so security is going to be tight near the u.s. and british embassy which are both closed for at least one day. >> hakeem, i wonder if you can describe how things have tightened up over the last couple days leading to this. >> the officials have been very tense not because of the fear of al qaeda, fear because of the u.s. may have other attacks inside yemen like you did last week. last week we saw that the u.s. attack killed over 70 civilians and only two, three al qaeda members. people here are fearing new attacks that could happen might not even harm al qaeda and only

harm the locals and innocent kids and children like what we see in afghanistan and iraq. now in pakistan. >> hakim, what's been the reaction on the streets there in sana. there is so much attention here in the states on the christmas day bombing attempt over detroit and all the information that's come out that the figure involved in that got key assistance from yemen. what's been the reaction there? >> the reaction here is not that he was here in yemen but that he was here in yemen illegally. that's what's making a bigger crisis now. his visa was only two weeks and he was here for over two months. government is trying to figure out where he was for two months and how he could stay here for over two months illegally without having a visa very easy and without being questioned by the authorities in yemen. the crisis here is not that he

was in yemen but how he was able to live in yemen illegally. >> describe the neighborhood where the u.s. and british embassies sit and what it looks like there and what it looks like now with these embassies closed. >> the embassy area is very -- has very high security right now. they're closed. security's very high, as usual. but today actual security there and helicopters are there in case attacks do happen. we do not expect al qaeda to have any attacks today or tomorrow. usually al qaeda attacks happen at times where the u.s. and government is not ready for the attacks. now the last attack on the u.s. embas embassy, al qaeda was able to reach the main door of the embassy. but the helicopters of the yemeni government were able to combat al qaeda while they were trying to attack the embassy and kill the people who were trying to commit the crime. the security's very tight, as

high as ever now. >> just the neighborhood itself, is it mostly residential, mostly office buildings? are the embassies essentially set back away from any of the other buildings? >> the u.s. embassy has picked a location where it is full of civilian houses and buildings. whereas the british embassy is one of the most concealed areas in the country where the major hotels and other big embassies surround it. so the u.s. embassy is near mostly civilian houses and not anywhere special. >> hakim, thanks for helping us out this morning from the "yemen post." joining us, clark kent irvin, a former inspector general for both the department of state and department of homeland security. he's now the director of the homeland security program at e the -- what do you make of the

decision to close down the embassy? >> i think it is entirely prudent. there is no question that the united states, britain, the west in general is under attack in yemen. yemen has become another ground zero place to launch an attack against the united states so it is very prudent. >> you wrote in the "new york times" that programs the biggest lesson for airline security from the resent incident is that we must overcome our tendency to be reactive, we always seem to be at least one step behind the terrorists. they find one security gap, carrying explosives on to a plane in their shoes, for instance and we close that one and wait for them to exploit another. why not identify all the vulnerabilities, then address each other one terrorists strike again. doesn't seem as if the key vulnerabilities right now doesn't have to do so much with intelligence gathering but just the analysis and problems in terms of that analysis within the current administration? >> well, exactly, david. it's deja vu all over again. what's heartbreaking here is again we have a failure to connect the dots. all these many years after 9/11,

after billions of dollars of expenditures and after the creation of at least four new government agencies. the umbrella department of homeland security, the tsa, which is a part of dhs. director of national intelligence and this national counterterrorism center. all of these agencies were supposed to prevent this failure to connect the dots and that's what we have here. the fact that the suspect, abdulmutallab's own father, not just anybody but a respected nigerian banker, former government official, went to our certainly i not once personally but twice, talked to not one government agent but two at least. state department and central intelligence agency, expressed concerns about his son's increasing radicalism, said that he might be in yemen, concerned about him. we know that yemen is a hotbed of terrorism. and yet the only thing that happened here was he was placed on the most general of terror watch lists, so general 500,000-plus names, as to be useless. at a minimum it seems to me, since we know al qaeda continues to be focused on aviation, the

suspect ought to have been placed on the selectee list, about 14,000 people, in which case at a minimum he'd have been subjected to greater scrutiny at the airport and presumably not allowed on the airplane prp i'd have placed him on the no-fly list. >> as far as airport security in the united states, right now the transportation security administration is without leadership because it's been block by republican senator demint from south carolina. how crucial is that leadership to the tee sa and how crucial is the tsa in terms of stopping this stuff? >> well, the leadership is absolutely crucial, david. i happen to know the tsa nominee, erroll southers, assistant chief of police at los angeles airport, 30-year career in law enforcement. he is also a counterterrorism policy expert and he is superbly qualified. and he is being held up over this issue of unionization. i happen to think giving union rights to tsa screeners is not

the right thing to do but that's not southers' position to be rethought. only when you have confirmed leadership do you make the game-changing changes in terms of technologies and procedures that obviously need to happen at tsa right now. >> what are you picking up from some of the line workers? i'm trying to think of the proper way to describe them but at the department of homeland security, people who don't get the head lines, they aren't in the upper echelons but whose sole job it is to collect this information and sift through it and communicate with each other. how upset are they over all of this? >> i think that's a good question, david. one of the things we have to understand is that our security and intelligence officials have to be right every single time, 24/7. terrorists have to succeed only once and there are hundreds of thousands of people in our government who are working overtime to prevent this kind of thing from happening. i'm sure they feel terrible about it. on the other hand, as i said at the very beginning, this is inexcusable that it should happen after 9/11. the president has said that people have got to be held

accountable for this and he is absolutely right. we have to find the people in the state department, in the central intelligence agency, in the rest of the restaurant community who didn't connect the dots and they've got to be held accountable. because ultimately that's the only way that this kind of thing doesn't happen yet again. >> finally, i have a lot of questions from people wanting to know why did yemen suddenly appear on the stage and why wasn't our government ahead of this. yemen is recently -- just the last couple of years yemen's become sort of a hotbed for al qaeda. right? >> well, no. yemen really has been an area of concern for our government for quite some time. we forget, for example, that yemen is the ancestral homeland of bin laden. his father came from yemen. yemen's very close to saudi arabia. there are two rebellions going on, one in the north and one in the south. it is a desperately poor country in the arab peninsula. for all these reasons this imam had connections to hasan, the ft. hood shooter. for all these reasons for a number of years yemen ought to

have been on radar screens of the american people. it's been on radar screens of the united states government for coo quite some time and that's question the another reason these dots ought to have been connected before this christmas day plot. >> thanks very much for joining us this morning. >> thank you, david. for more on the investigation into the christmas day plot, including more on how al qaeda has flourished in yemen, head to msnbc.com. if you have questions for myself or guests like clark, twitter them to me, twitter.com/davidschuster. now, to the economy and a look ahead to the week on wall street. on tuesday, we're going to see the final numbers on u.s. you a sew tal -- u.s. auto sales for december and the whole year. they'll be watching for the nation's retail chains report on thursday, reporting sales figures for the month. that's a good indicator of how things are going. on friday we'll see the december

employment report from the labor department. some analysts predict this could be the first report in a year that shows employers actually adding jobs. another set of credit card rules takes effect next month. the changes are expected to help many card holders but will the changes help or hurt those struggling to meet the minimum payment? cnbc's personal finance expert carmen wong ulrich joins us now from new york. carmen, good morning. what are we going to see happen here? >> good morning. we've already been experiencing huge changes to our credit cards and terms. we've seen our limits reduced and rates raised, all this in anticipation of the card act which goes into effect next month. between now and then it is very, very important to pay attention because there is not going to be a major release basically giving us all of the information on the card act. go to whitehouse.gov, search card act. it has all the terms there. but bank by bank they're going to make their own changes. here's the thing. fixed will mean fixed.

overdraft fees and overdraft protection you'll have to opt in. there are a lot of things can you do. there are a lot of things you need to pay attention to when it comes to your credit cards and statements between now an february. >> again, the credit card companies had several months to get ready for these changes. in the interim we saw some practices that a lot of people describe as dastardly. strange fees that would suddenly show up. are those strange fees suddenly over or are they just now encoded in the new rules? >> here's the thing. with the card act which seems that it covers quite a bit of our credit card agreements, there are a couple things it doesn't cover. for example, new fees. we are seeing some crazy new fees. if you're going to get a paper statement, some banks are going to charge you for that and for that privilege. you'll see fees for example if you keep a balance below a certain level. all of us that are using credit cards the right way which means just for rewards or points or basically convenience to pay it off in full every month, we're going to be paying more whereas before we weren't really paying

anything to keep our cards. >> i would imagine that members of congress are not pleased with how the credit card companies are handling this. any possible changes coming or is this just it that they dealt with the law last spring and it is going into effect and that's it. >> before the holidays, david, we saw a lot of push especially from representative barney frank to make sure we could put the card act into effect before february because it left too much of a time gap for credit card companies to react before the card act goes into effect. but now it is really a little bit too little, too late. we only have a couple weeks before the card act goes into effect. so make sure though when you get your mail that you open not just your statements, any plain white envelopes. that's where the credit card companies will send you new information, and after february your statements are going to look different because part of the card act requires that the credit card companies put more information in plain legible english about your agreement into your statements. you're going to see a lot more paper in your mailbox in february. >> carmen wong ulrich, thank you

for coming on. still ahead, it is the tallest building in the world and it opens tomorrow. we will take a closer look at this skyscraper for the ages. plus, in our next hour, did car sales make a surprise comeback at the end of the year? we'll have details in our next hour. you're watching msnbc. ♪ walgreens invites you to stay well this new year. ♪ with the centers for disease control and prevention saying... that vaccination is still your best protection,

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new developments in yemen today. al qaeda is said to have recruited and armed the so-called underwear bomber. the u.s. embassy is closed today because of an active threat from al qaeda. on "meet the press" this morning, the president's counterterrorism chief warned against turning the terror attempt into a political issue. >> i think we have to remember who the enemy here is. the enemy is al qaeda. as this finger pointing is going on in washington here, these partisan politics and agendas, quite frankly i find it very disappointing that people would use this issue, issue of tremendous import of national security and forget that it is

al qaeda that is killing our citizens. >> a.b. stoddard, associate editor and column nis with "the hill" newspaper. first, a.b., what do you make about the embassies being closed today in yemen and how that may play politically today and in the days ahead? >> well, obviously they must be on some high alert in their assessing very dangerous threats if they're closing a 500-person embassy there. it's been attacked before and i think that politically it's not going to have much of an effect. the obama administration has found itself a little bit on the offensive since their initial response, the very first announcement that system had worked and obviously obama worked quickly to mitigate the damage of that and has been out front very bold since. i don't think this has a political effect. i think it shows that the administration is covering all its bases and trying to keep everybody as safe as they can.

>> is there some political expectation though that maybe it is just not enough to have your top counterterrorism official on "meet the press," that maybe you need the president to issue even a written statement saying, "here's why we've done this." >> you know, that's a possibility. i think that they might look to describe -- to explain this further in the hours or days to come. i think that obviously when president obama returns from his vacation in hawaii he'll be further briefed. i think we can expect some sort of discussion, either at a white house briefing or the president himself addressing the american people about what's going on. but i think that they've taken steps in recent days since the beginning of last week to make sure that we know that they are covering -- they're connecting all these dots that might have not been connected before and that they're taking it very seriously. as far as messagewise, i think that once president obama is back in washington, we'll see

more presence and we'll have more stepped-up communication about these events than we had when he was vacationing. presidents do have a right to take vacations. things always happen when they are away. >> republicans last week, there was some within the republican party. i heard from a number of strategists who said maybe it wasn't such a good idea for dick cheney or congressman hoekstra to be as sort of sharp in their criticism of president obama given the country that is already upset that this happened and that there was this sort of lapse. it sort of gets to the old sort of axiom when somebody's shooting themselves in the foot if you are a political rival you simply get out of the way, you don't say anything. >> you know, that's an interesting criticism. i think that the democrats are in a very defensive crouch obviously on domestic matters, on the economy, on health care, and something like this which is so frightening and obviously exposed serious lapses in our security. then of course, as i mentioned before, this sort of initial

really bizarre response by the administration. it was a real opportunity for the republicans to pounce. they will make this issue a major matter in the 2010 elections. they want to make the case that the democrats have never governed in the age of terror until now and that they're doing a bad job. i don't think they're going to let up. the question of dick cheney pifking on a sittipifk i picking on a sitting president is another discussion entirely. >> one i think we're going to have eventually. thanks. in our next hour, from the stock market to the real estate sector, what can you expect from the economy this year. you're watching msnbc sunday. ( whooshing )

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a world's tallest building is set to open tomorrow in dubai. over 2,600 feet. the long-awaited tower will be seen from 59 miles away. the skyscraper's opening is expected to be watched by 2

billion people around the world, complete with fireworks. scott, just as an architect what do you make of what they're trying to do? >> i think these guys have made a really elegant building. i think it is pretty fantastic to have watched the project grow over the last eight years or so, between design and construction. i think it's an interesting symbol for the last ten or so years of building boom. i think it is a technological achievement. >> how safe is it when it's that tall? >> these buildings are ostensibly very safe. the team that designed and engineered the building is world renowned, world caliber. the peer review team that reviews documents and construction practices is also of the same caliber. the construction team is made up of south korean and belgium and emirates construction companies that have done similar

large-scale projects before. the quality will be there. the -- we've also learned a lot since 9/11 about safety in terms of the people inside the building and how to get people in and out of buildings safely. i think there is also a high level of protection for the kind of things that we're used to seeing in that part of the world. >> to put the tower in some perspective, 160 floors, the observation deck is at the 124th floor. the building itself, 50 floors taller than what a lot of people refer to as the sears tower in chicago. i mean when you're up that high, if you're in the building, you can just -- i mean can you see, it is just incredible especially given how clear the weather is over there. >> you can imagine when it is very clear there, they say you can see 50 miles to the sea, into the ocean. tankers can see the building. 60 miles away, the building can be seen from the desert.

it is an incredible thing. i think that the remarkableness of the last ten years or so of this building boom have really pushed the envelope in terms what have we can do technologically. the building is the tallest building, ever. it is going to be that way for a while but it is taught us a lot of things how to make big buildings, managing the construction, the kind of concrete design and technology. it will advance what we can do in the future so next time these big booms come around we can surpass this. >> we all hope some day the next time it is a record setting project that it is actually here in the united states. what a symbol that would be. scott glass, architect, thanks for coming on. still ahead, the frigid temperatures gripping much of the nation. plus, how even florida is feeling the chill. the forecast from the weather channel at the top of the hour.