sprinkle overnight, but that's all gone, and we should wind up with dry weather today. 67 degrees at b.w.i. at the top of the hour. it's going to be a little breezy through the day, but nice with the temperatures. highs will climb back into the upper 70's later on this afternoon with a mechanics tour of sunshine and a few clouds. when we come back, we'll check the forecast for the rest of the week and into the weekend. but first, good morning to sarah and see what's happening on the roads. >> good morning, everyone. not a whole lot at all, actually. we're looking at a smooth ride. checking our speeds on the j.f.x., we're at 53 miles per hour. looking good on the west side. 51 past 795. a smooth ride on 795 coming out of owings mills. rest of the area roads looking great so far this morning. in fact, we'll check drive times for you. five minutes from 895 down to the fort mchenry. about seven minutes on 895 south so the harbor tunnel. 11 minutes on the outer loop west side. we'll show you what's going on in our cameras at harford road. top side on the northeast

corner, very smooth so far in both loops. we'll switch over to a live view at liberty, where it looks pretty much the same so far. we'll enjoy a quiet ride for now. that's the latest on traffic pulse 11. >> sarah, thank you. our big story this morning -- president barack obama is taking his economic message right into your living room. >> hoping americans will tune in to his televised town hall meeting today, the focus, jobs. 11 news reporter kate amara joins us live from washington with the latest. good morning, kate. >> good morning, mindy. good morning, stan. just six weeks to go now till election day, and so president barack obama is hitting the campaign trail. today, that includes cable tv. >> hello! >> a black tie dinner at the height of campaign season. president barack obama continues to spread his economic message. >> it was about a plan to rescue our economy and rebuild it on a new foundation. >> the campaigner-in-chief hits the trail in earnest this week, rallying voters, raising money

for democratic candidates, and talking directly to americans today during a televised town hall-style meeting on jobs and the economy. >> i think the president has to -- like a razor blade -- go after the single issue upper most in the minds of the american people, and that's employment. >> the g.o.p. is pushing back, hoping to regain power on capitol hill in november, accusing democrats of spending too much. >> democrats' job-killing policies have left our small businesses tied up in uncertainty and our economy booked down by nearly 10% unemployment. >> today's town hall meeting airs on cnbc. the cable channel says the live studio audience of about 200 people will be a cross section of america, from college kids and union members to business owners and retirees. live in washington this morning, i'm kate amara, wbal-tv 11 news. mindy, back to you in baltimore. >> hey, kate, the president's town hall comes the same week

we're expecting to get some economic reports. what can we expect in those reports, any good news? >> that's what investors and regular people are hoping for, so there's reports due out in the housing market this week, including data on new and existing home sales. in the last few months, as you know, we have seen home sales fall to the lowest level that we've seen in decades. obviously a lot of people are watching and hoping that these reports will show the numbers have turned around. >> let's hope so. kate amara live in washington, thank you. >> meanwhile, maryland democratic senator ben cardin is weighing in on the controversial bush-era tax cuts. yesterday he joined our lisa robinson to talk about what will likely be a big issue at the ballot box in november. though the tax breaks were put into place in 2001 and 2003, they're set to expire in january unless congress extends them. republicans argue the breaks should apply to everyone, including democrats back president obama's proposal of only extending the cuts for families making less than

$250,000 a year and individuals who make less than $200,000 a year. >> the bottom line is, this is not the time for middle-income families to pay more in taxes. we're going to do everything we can to make sure that never happens. >> senator cardin says congress is also focusing on tax cuts for small businesses to help expand job growth. >> after yesterday may seem like the ravens have a long season ahead, in case you missed it, the ravens lost to the bengals 15-10. quarterback joe flacco is taking a lot of the blame. he threw four interceptions. some say this was his worst game as q.b. despite the seemingly all bad news, the ravens allowed no touchdowns. >> so it was a mixed bag for baltimore sports fans this weekend. the orioles won, the ravens lost. but either way, the games helped generate a lot of business. >> that's always good news. kim dacey live downtown this morning with the details. hi, kim. >> hi, mindy. the orioles played in town here at camden yards, so, of course, o's fans showed up, but so did fans for their opponent, the new york yankees.

local yankee fans came in by the bus load for the weekend series, and in the ravens game, televised from cincinnati, and it created big business for anybody selling anything downtown, from hotel suites to shirts to spirits. thousands of sports fans came downtown to watch the teams play. pickles pub across the street from camden yards says this weekend is the busiest they've had all season, with more than $10,000 in sales. so business owners are happy, and the sports fans say they had a good time, too, even sharing the town with fans from a rival team. >> you know, i really appreciate the yankee fans coming down. they're helping out the city, absolutely. i think we had a sellout, almost a sellout crowd last night and the night before. what i necessarily don't appreciate is just the actual fans themselves, the actual fans themselves. >> now, the way the o's are playing right now, downtown businesses are hoping that next year they won't have to rely on those yankee fans to help their

bottom line. keith mills will much more on the games later in sports. kim dacey, wbal-tv 11 news. >> kim, thank you. the parents of a 6-year-old say their daughter was dismissed from a cheering squad after they complained about what they considered to be inappropriate words in one of the cheers. jennifer tesch says she was shocked when her daughter kennedy came home from practice and demonstrated the routine. tesch says when they went to the coach and general manager to express her concern, she got the runaround. event we'll managers of the detroit-area cheerleading squad reportedly removed the girl from the squad, adding they were keeping the 20-year-old cheer. >> and the lyrics are, our backs ache, our skirts are too tight, we shake our booties from left to right. and at that point, i was just kind of in shock, and right away the next day i addressed it with the coach and the general manager of the wolverines. >> tesch says other cheerleading squads have offered to put kennedy on their team. that brings us to our water cooler question of the day.

do you think a detroit cheering squad's choice of cheers is too racy for 6-year-olds? you can email your response to watercooler@wbaltv.com. >> 66 degrees on tv hill at 5:07. coming up -- a father's accused of killing his children. >> 33 miners in chile still trapped underground after six weeks. we'll have an update on rescue efforts. >> here's a live look at traffic. this is 95 north of 195 in the catonsville area. looks ok right there. more on weather and traffic more on weather and traffic when we come back.

[ monkey cheeps ] [ male announcer ] a bath becomes even more pleasurable when you know that your water is being heated in an environmentally- conscious way while saving you hundreds of dollars on your water-heating energy bill. the geospring water heater from ge with advanced hybrid technology. heating the water in your home any other way is just going to seem primitive. [ monkey cheeps ] ♪ maryland residents can save up to $780 while funds last. >> welcome back. the time is nine minutes after 5:00. beautiful shot of the downtown area. it's 69 degrees at the maryland science center. it's just a little bit cooler in the suburbs. it's actually kind of mild with temperatures in the 60's, even up north. so maybe a light jacket. you won't need it certain later on today. the forecast is going to be a little breezy, but it should be nice as we head into this afternoon. a mechanics tour of sunshine

and a few clouds -- a mixture of sunshine and a few clouds, and there could have been a few sprinkles in some neighborhoods, but that's all gone now. the high temperature this afternoon around 78 degrees. when we come back, we'll check the forecast for the rest of the week and give you the latest on igor. for now, over to the news desk. >> covering the nation -- a texas man is accused of killing his own children. authorities say the man shot and killed his three children while they were sleeping in an apartment in houston. it's believed he then turned the gun on himself. however, he ended up surviving the gunshot wound to the head. authorities believe the shooting may have centered around a custody battle between the man and his ex-wife. meanwhile, the search for a small religious group feared to have committed suicide has ended on a good note. los angeles authorities found all 13 people in a park yesterday. the group's leader was then detained, but sent to a hospital for mental evaluation. she and 12 others, including eight children, disappeared saturday, leaving behind notes indicating they would soon see jesus.

deputies found no evidence of a planned mass suicide. >> the american woman who was recently released by iranian authorities is now speaking out, calling for the release of her fiance and a friend. sarah shourd spoke to a crowd in new york city yesterday. shourd spent more than 13 months in a prison with her fiance, shane beauer, and friend, josh fattal. the three were accused of spying. shourd denies the accusations, saying they were in iraq, never meant to cross into iran. it's reported that shourd was released over health concerns. >> this morning, chile hopes a new drill will help them rescue 33 trapped miners. the planned sea drill uses a larger drill bit and would only have to be drilled once compared twice for plans a and b. engineers say they'll be ready to begin digging a third shaft at the beginning of next week. plans a and bill drills have already started drilling. the men have been trapped for six weeks now, and it could

take until late november to finally get them out. trapped, claustrophobic. 5:11, 66 degrees on tv hill. coming up -- the day's business news. >> plus, toyota reaches a settlement in a lawsuit involving a faulty gas pedal that sparked last year's massive recall. details are next in this morning's consumer alert. >> and reports of our first accident coming in in anne arundel county. we'll let you know if it will impact your morning rush. - ( music playing ) - we know technology can make you more connected.

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>> new information just in, right? >> yeah, we have an accident in glen bernie, new travel in that

area. watch for a motorcycle crash that's being reported along crane highway right at oak manor drive. watch for police activity related to that and possible delays. meantime, pretty nice ride elsewhere. you can see we're at 53 miles per hour on our speed sensor there on southbound 95 approaching the beltway northeast. no problems to report on the j.f.x. at 54 just south of the beltway. 54 on the west side. the outer loop, right around 795, look good. 50 on southbound 83, coming down from the road, and we want to give you a bit of a heads up on northbound 295, want far from the airport, -- not far from the airport, we have debris in the road, so be extra careful on northbound 295. let's see what's going on here on the northeast corner. looks good on harford road in and out of 95. we'll switch over to a live view of the west side. no official delay yet to report. that's the latest on traffic pulse 11. now let's get the latest on the buses and trains. for that, we go to kurt kroncke

of the m.t.a. good morning, kurt. >> good morning, sarah. a few delays out there this morning. 5, 8, 10, 14, 19, 23, 51, 64, those buses running about 10 to 20 minutes late. diversions, 5 bus diverting at central. the 10 and 30 buses with a diversion at light and pratt. light rail metro subway both on schedule. marc trains looking very good this morning. no delays on the penn, camden and brunswick lines of marc. with the m.t.a. transit team, i'm kurt kroncke. now back to tony pann. good morning, tony. >> thank you, sir. good morning, everyone. so far, so good on this monday morning commute as far as the weather goes. a front last night produced a few sprinkles, but most of that has dissipated now. the temperatures are in the 60's. 62 in parkton. it's 67 degrees at the airport. 66 in rock hall. so relatively mild start for this time of the year. the temperatures have jumped into the upper 70's later on today, so it's going to be a nice one. here's the weather setup. we had this cold front go through, as i mentioned. it's now settled across the

central part of virginia, but there's no weather associated with this front. there's a nice area of high pressure coming in behind it, and it will produce a little bit of a breeze, but that's about it. as we head toward the middle of the week, we might see a little area of low pressure develop on wednesday, but for the next few days, it's going to be quiet. we did have the showers, as i mentioned before, but everything has dissipated now, and we expect a dry commute. we can see a little bit of cloud cover, especially in the southern suburb, but that's breaking up. we'll just call it a mix of sun and clouds. i'll show you the seven-day forecast in just a second. let me just give you the last update on igor. it passed over bermuda last night as a category one hurricane. it did produce some damage, but we're not seeing big reports of catastrophic conditions on the island. they got a big storm surge out of it, and now the storm is about 100 miles north of bermuda and pulling away into the open waters of the atlantic. so we can finally say goodbye to igor. mostly sunny, that's our forecast here at home. it will be breezy. you'll see a couple of clouds. the high temperatures this afternoon in the upper 70's.

overnight tonight, mostly clear and chilly. temperatures going to drop into the upper 40's in the cooler northwest suburbs. mid to upper 50's in the city. seven-day forecast stacks up like this, beautiful day tomorrow. we'll take it up to 80 after the cool start. a chance for a few scattered showers or thunderstorms wednesday, thursday, and friday. but it is going to get warmer. going to jump into the mid 80's by the time we hit the middle and end of the week. >> in this morning's consumer alert, many consumers use credit card balance transfers to consolidate accounts, but the move can be expensive, so how do you make it work for you? first check out the interest rate of the new card before you make the transfer. the transfer costs for each card as well. if the new card's offer a low introductory interest rate, know when that expires. lastly, concentrate auto eliminating your debt within that sbrkter to period, if possible. a report says toyota has reached a settlement in the lawsuit of a family killed in a high-speed crash last week --

last year, rather, which was caused by a faulty gas pedal. it's reported an agreement with the victims' relatives and will disclose it later today. in 2009, three family members were killed near san diego when the gas pedal in their lexus got stuck in a floor mat, causing the car to reach speeds of 120 miles per hour before crashing. the crash led to toyota's recall millions of vehicles to replace the accelerator. the automaker faces dozens of other lawsuits over the faulty gas pedal. >> there may be hope for many americans about to lose their homes, and bigger mass transit always be better when it comes to wal-mart. jane king jones us live with a look at the day's business news in the bloomberg business report. good morning to you, jane. happy monday to you. >> good morning tousm happy monday to you, too. we're going to start off things positively here on wall street today. back on friday, we had the higher day. better than expected earnings at the tech companies overshadowed an unexpected drop in consumer confidence. and some good news for struggling homeowners.

according to an internal document obtained by bloomberg, gmac mortgage is halting all foreclosh you're activity in 23 states, so this means no evictions, no lockouts. gmac, which rebranded itself as allied financial, it says may need to take what is calling corrective action on some foreclosures. in the meantime, wal-mart teaming one fedex to reach city shoppers. "wall street journal" says wal-mart now allowing customers to shop online and ship their purchases to urban fedex locations for free. the paper says wal-mart wants to expand into areas where it doesn't have any stores. at the same time, the "financial times" says wal-mart looking for scores of cities across the country to open smaller stores. the paper says instead of building new stores from the ground up, wal-mart's interested in moving into existing buildings. smaller wal-marts have been successful in latin america. finally, facebook denying internet rumors that it's secretly building a branded cell phone. the source of the chatter, techcrunch.com, which was one of the first places to report that google was making a phone,

they say, hey, this story's true. facebook currently working with hardware manufacturers to develop the facebook phone. facebook says no, it's want true. i guess we'll wait and see. at the new york stock exchange, i'm jane king, bloomberg news, reporting for wbal-tv 11 news. >> jane, thank you. see you back here at 6:15 for your next report. >> 5:21 at 66 degrees on tv hill. coming up -- another look at your morning commute with traffic and weather together. >> and tonight's the night many of us have been waiting for, the start of the fall season on nbc. up next, a sneak peek at the much anticipated show "the event." >> and don't forget to email us your answer to the watercooler@wbaltv.com. do you think a detroit cheerleading squad's choice of cheers is too racy for 6-year-olds? email your response to watercooler@wbaltv.com.

>> after a summer promotion, the new fall season finally gets underway tonight on nbc. >> including the debut of what's maybe the network's most anticipated new show, "the event." jason ritter, son of the late john ritter, stars in the serialized drama. marc barger gives us a sneak peek. >> i just wanted to bring you here and sort of freeze this moment in time. >> under normal circumstances, an island getaway might qualify as "the event." >> can't a guy just propose and have a beautiful life?

>> but normal circumstances don't apply on a show called "the event." >> it kind of gets shaken up and turned upside-down and everything goes in the wrong direction. >> jason ritter and sarah roemer get sucked into a global conspiracy. >> they're both involved in something much bigger than they ever could have thought. >> in ritter's case, he's jumping off a cliff, running from guards, pulling a gun on a plane, and if that weren't enough -- >> leyla, are you ok? >> it's so much fun to be able to play this character that has to do all these incredible things, but he's also a guy like me. >> but if hitter is playing the average guy, laura innes is playing the not so average gal. >> we have to protect ourselves. >> the leader of group of mysterious government detainees. >> can i count on you? >> my cashing is extremely enigmatic. she's a woman that you don't kind of know. is she good or is she bad? >> it's up to the president to figure that out. >> what you're about to see is

going to make a lot of americans nervous. >> it is a thriller, but it's also very -- a lot of times fiction, a lot of mystery going on. >> enough to pull an average guy on to a collision course with the president. >> we have to evacuate. what's going on? >> marc barger, nbc news. >> it does look like an exciting show, doesn't it? >> it does. no, it does. >> the actors say they have confidence the show's producers have learned from the mistakes of other failed serialized shows. they have at least two seasons of the show completely planned out already rather than kind of figuring it out as they go along. >> so wait at least two seasons to figure out what "the event" is, right? >> yeah. let me know when you figure it out. 5:26, 56 degrees on tv hill. coming up in the next half-hour of 11 news today -- >> the orioles won, the ravens lost, but all of the games are good for downtown businesses. i'm kim dacey. i've got that story next. >> and i'm tony pann. we have nice weather in the forecast to start the workweek,

but we have a little rain coming in later this week. we'll talk about that in the seven-day momentarily. >> we're also going to talk about an accident coming in in glen burnie t. does involve a motorcycle. tax on everything you buy? that's in andy harris' unfair tax plan. 23% sales tax. a 23% sales tax will cut my business in half. would be devastating. andy harris' 23% sales tax absolutely makes no sense. 23% sales tax would really make things unaffordable.

that's too high for the average american out here. i don't know how we would manage it really. don't like that idea. we can't afford andy harris' idea. i'm frank kratovil and i approve this message. bob ehrlich pretends to be for the working guy... but he's not on our side. i thought i knew bob ehrlich, but then i found out... he raised property taxes on every maryland family... and business. he increased college tuition... by 40%. 40%. and i thought i knew bob ehrlich. he was against raising the minimum wage. made $2.5 million... working for a lobbying firm. $2.5 million? he's not really on my side. with this tough economy, we really need a governor on our side.