started? >> that is my question. i can't imagine. >> that is it for us. "nightly news" is coming up next. on the broadcast tonight, winner take all. after a bruising fight, republican voters and the biggest prize of all among swing states. florida finally have their say with so much at stake. iran's threat. not just the nuclear program tonight, u.s. intelligence warns iran may be prepared to strike on american soil. more jfk tapes not heard until now. tonight, the conversation on air force one as the president's body was flown home on that awful day in dallas. and disappearing act. here's the picture a year ago. here's the picture now. it's been a january for the record books. we know we're tempting fate, but why is it happening? we know we're tempting fate, but why is it happening? "nightly news" begins now.

captions paid for by nbc-universal television good evening in florida, it's all over tonight, at least until the general elections. the advertisements will go dark, the candidates will move on then comes the tricky part for the gop presidential campaign. if the romney lead in the polls holds in the actual polls tonight, if he emerges from florida on top, what does that mean for newt gingrich? as the campaign starts to stretch out a little bit, as the nonstop debates stop for a while, will the field thin out, for example 1234? after the voters of the single most valuable swing state on the electoral mall have their say tonight. it's another important moment we're looking at in a campaign that's already had more than its share. our political team is in place to cover it all tonight from the field. and here with us in the studio,

we begin with nbc's peter alexander in tampa. pete erk good evening. >> reporter: brian, good evening to you. if he has a strong showing here tonight, romney's success may be due in large part to negative advertising. his campaign and supporters have spent more than $15 million. the romney campaign has aired just a single positive ad, and that was featuring romney's son in spanish. heavily favored tonight, romney made hisvoters in tampa, trying to shore up support in a state he lost four years ago. >> anne and christine, this is mitt romney calling. i'm sorry to have missed you, but it's actually me calling. >> on the campaign trail monday night -- ♪ oh beautiful for spacious skies for amber waves of grain ♪ >> reporter: romney led the crowd in singing "america the beautiful." ♪ america, america >> reporter: but despite strong

poll numbers, romney has yet to show that he can convince the party's conservative base that he's the best choice. romney says his surge here is the campaign's decision to aim a barrage of negative ads against newt gingrich. >> we stood back and spoke about president obama and suffered the consequence of that. >> reporter: still recent polls suggest romney's strategy is hurting his image with independents. the nasty tone of this race with negative ads accounting for more than 90% of those airing in the last week is wearing thin on republicans here, too. >> it was a tough choice between a bunch of people who are attacking each other, going after each other for, in my opinion, all the wrong reasons. >> reporter: romney is already setting his sights on february contests like nevada and colorado, where rick santorum and ron paul, both of who have ceded florida's winner-take-all primary have been campaigning for days. >> no matter what happens in

florida, this race is wide open. they all want to write the race is over, the nomination is sealed. baloney. >> reporter: peter alexander, nbc news, tampa. >> reporter: this is ron mott tracking newt gingrich in central florida, where today the former speaker found comfort in plant city. pressing ahead for votes, despite what appeared to be long odds for victory here. >> it doesn't look good for romney because of the absentees where he spent millions of dollars before we got here. but we'll see adds the evening goes on how it goes. >> reporter: the going has been particularly difficult going since his win ten days ago in south carolina. >> gingrich resigned from congress in disgrace. >> reporter: nonstop ads hit him around the clock. two less than stellar debate performances, and late this afternoon, confirmation that the campaign did robocall voters. >> romney thought $5 was too much to pay for our grandparents to eat kosher. still, gingrich managed to work

in a bit of comedy on the trail. >> how close is this to being over, mr. speaker? >> i would say probably six months. >> six months? >> unless romney drops out earlier. >> reporter: humor aside, february may not be all that much fun. the next round of states, colorado, nevada, michigan among them, are more favorable for romney, perhaps prompting gingrich to drop out of the race, though he has said repeatedly he's in it all the way to the republican convention. >> this is a long campaign. watch tonight. the conservatives are clearly going to help romney. there's no clear path for him to get to a majority. >> reporter: newt gingrich has planned campaign stops beginning tomorrow in nevada, which is holding its caucuses on saturday. mitt romney carried nevada four years ago with a majority of the vote, brian. >> ron mott, peter alexander before that, gentlemen, thank you both. we're joined now by more members or our nbc news politics team. tamron hall is with us.

our political director, chief white house correspondent chuck todd, and in our washington bureau, the moderator of "meet the press" david gregory. tamron, let's begin with you. we already know a few things looking at the exit poll data from florida. >> absolutely. a couple of things to note, 38% of people today over the age of 65, that's more older people than we've seen in any of the contests here. not a big surprise, we're talking about florida, a popular place for retirees. one other note, 15% are latino. that's the largest number of nonwhite voters that we've seen in these contests. but as things change, things stay the same. i'm pointing that out because of the top issue, the economy. we sue that in the three other contests. the top quality that voters are looking for is someone who can beat barack obama. electability, that number is 45%. the more things change, the more they honestly stay the same. >> absolutely. david gregory, before we get to the only real floridian in our discussion, mr. todd, a question to you about mr. romney. and again, if the polling we'

been reading for days holds true, let's say he emerges tonight victorious from this, what's the battle plan for that campaign? >> well, inevitability. he wants to go back to making that argument. that's why electability will be such a strong outcome tonight. if the numbers do hold up. we know it's very important. if he can have a big win tonight, and especially on that idea of who can beat president obama, i think that becomes very important. look, florida, if romney can win, is important, because he proved he can throw a punch. he was on the defensive, mostly out of his own doing, and he came back hard at gingrich and he may have proven that he's capable of neutralizing that threat. he may have driven up his negatives in the meantime, and he's still got to find a way to tear down the other guy but build the other guy up, particularly with the conservative base, that tea party base which is still looking and seeing a real reason to fight here because the way these delegates are allocated.

romney can survive a bruising contest, but they're all going to be watching whether a third party rears its head because of the continued dissatisfaction with the field, brian. >> now to you, mr. todd, as you watch results from home tonight, again, gingrich says it's going to be wild and woolly, says he's in it for the fall. any reason to doubt him? any reason to think we'll see one of those thinning moments? >> i'll be shocked if we see a thinning moment, simply because of what happened in newt gingrich the first time he's been pronounced dead. this will now be the third time he's been pronounced dead in this campaign. he's going to say watch, i can still come back. and why? he's going to learn tonight. when the results come in in the northern part of the state, if he does well there, even if he loses florida, but if he does well, that tells him, when super tuesday comes, there's a lot of southern states i can do well with. and if you look at the vote and it's mitt romney only doing well with more moderate republicans, semi conservative republicans, then he can make the case that the calendar sort of goes his way and he's got room to grow. but the real thing he should be

worried about if he gets trounced even in the northern part of the state. >> also going to be interesting to watch the sanatorium and paul numbers tonight. our thanks to the firm of paul, gregory and todd for their expertise this evening. moving on tonight, u.s. intelligence has a chilling new assessment about the scope of the threat from iran. officials today told the u.s. senate they believe iran, anticipating an attack by israel or the u.s. or even both on its nuclear facilities, is now more willing to attack the united states at home and abroad. we get more tonight from our chief foreign affairs correspondent andrea mitchell. >> reporter: intelligence officials told senators the first warning was last year's alleged plot to blow up the saudi ambassador at a washington restaurant. israeli officials say another attempt, a busted iranian plot in bangkok earlier this month, to blow up israel's embassy and a synagogue. >> a plot in october really did change, i think, the u.s. intelligence community's views as to what iran was willing to

do here in the homeland. >> reporter: why would iran take such a risk? it feels threatened. three weeks ago, a fifth iranian nuclear scientist was assassinated in the streets of tehran. economic sanctions are beginning to bite hard, and israeli's leaders are signalling they think time is running out this year to stop iran from getting a bomb. >> iran must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons, period. >> reporter: in fact, only days ago, the head of mossad, israel's top spy, secretly briefed congressional leaders and the head of the cia. >> israel does see this possibility as an existential threat to their country. >> obviously, this is a very sensitive issue right now. we're doing a lot with the israelis, working together with them. >> reporter: experts warn that the u.s. is even more vulnerable than israel if iran retaliates or launches a preemptive bomb plot.

>> israel is relatively small. getting at israel is hard to do. and it has very formidable defenses for it. america has assets and vulnerabilities around the world. >> reporter: soft u.s. targets like embassies throughout the persian gulf. and 90,000 american troops in afghanistan, next door to iran. still, intelligence officials told the senate today, they don't think iran has taken the final step, deciding to build a bomb. but israel does think iran has crossed that red line. and u.s. officials say if attacked, iran would not hesitate to retaliate against both israel and the u.s. andrea mitchell, nbc news, washington. in italy tonight, officials there say they have called off the search for missing people in the submerged portion of that costa concordia vessel because it's just become too dangerous for the divers on the job. they'll continue to search the portion above the water line and around the coastline. 16 people are still listed, remember, as officially missing.

that still includes the american couple from minnesota. back in this country, we learned today that among the ten people killed in that awful chain reaction wreck on the florida interstate, five members of the same georgia church, including the pastor, his wife, their 17-year-old daughter. another daughter survived. she is in critical condition. friends say they were driving to make sunday services the next morning. florida's governor has ordered an investigation into why the highway patrol reopened the road with a smoky brush fire burning nearby. big news in the business world tonight. our friends and colleagues over at cnbc have confirmed facebook will file initial paperwork tomorrow morning for a $5 billion initial public offering. the company is looking at a valuation worth of the firm of between $75 billion and $100 billion, which would vault it right into the ranks of the largest public companies on the planet. up next here as we continue tonight, another january day that looks and feels a lot more

like june to some folks. why has this winter been so warm in much of the country? and later, a man with a big heart, making a huge difference by getting people back on their feet. [ male announcer ] this is coach parker... whose non-stop day starts with back pain... and a choice. take advil now and maybe up to four in a day. or choose aleve and two pills for a day free of pain. way to go, coach. ♪

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common side effects include nausea, trouble sleeping and unusual dreams. it helps to have people around you... they say, you're much bigger than this. and you are. [ male announcer ] ask your doctor if chantix is right for you. what a difference a year makes. if you live anywhere from what a difference a year makes. if you live anywhere from boston to chicago or points in between and you walked out the door this mourning and turned right around to take out a few layers, who would blame you? some people did put their coats away here in new york today. it was so warm today across much of the country. as you know, they're calling it june-uary. it's got a lot of people wondering whatever happened to winter? again, realizing we're tempting fate, we get the story tonight from our chief environmental affairs correspondent, anne thompson. >> in new york city central park today, it might as well be spring. >> i heard it was so warm out, i had to come out and take a walk. >> reporter: this most unusual january ending on a remarkably mild note across the country.

today they hit the links in north platt, nebraska. took to skateboards in northern virginia and sported shorts in st. louis. >> i would much rather be walking on the hills than sledding down it. >> reporter: this is a january for the history books. 2,890 daily high temperature records broken or tied. more than four times the number of highs reached or exceeded last year. while today is certainly worthy of a walk in the park, it's also a good time to take a stroll down memory lane. a year ago, the nation braced for 2011's first billion dollar-plus weather event, the ground hog day snowstorm. it trapped this man on chicago's lakeshore drive. >> how long have you been in here? >> 7 1/2 hours. >> reporter: today it was a perfect day to get that same car washed. >> i have no jacket, i have no glove, i have no scrapener my hand, and i can see my car. >> reporter: the difference is the jet stream. last year, it followed a typical

la nina pattern, bringing warmer and drier temperatures to the south and colder and wetter conditions to the north. >> what happened this year is this pattern has shifted a little bit further to the north and so now almost all of the country is covered by this drier, la nina pattern. >> reporter: add warming because of climate change and it stacks the deck against a traditional winter. >> we just shift the odds towards a better chance of record warmth and a reduced chance of record cold. >> reporter: leaving much of america with a very early case of spring fever. anne thompson, nbc news, new york. and up next here tonight, for the first time, the voices of those still in shock aboard air force one after the jfk assassination. [ sue ] wow! i've been so looking forward to this. when my asthma symptoms returned, my doctor prescribed dulera to help prevent them. [ male announcer ] dulera is for patients 12 and older whose asthma is not well controlled on a long-term asthma control medicine,

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it was for a generation or more the darkest day anyone in america could imagine. our young president, john f. kennedy, had been assassinated in dallas. people wept in public.

they huddled around tvs and radio and a three-day vigil began. but thanks to new tapes found in a box of a former kennedy aide and never heard before, never part of the official assassination public record until now, we get to hear the machinery of government dealing with a shock to the system. as you hear the following portion between the president's physician on air force one and the surgeon general back in washington concerning the handling of jfk's body, remember this was happening in real time and all of it was unimaginable talk just hours earlier.

as it happened, because the president was a ny as it happened, because the president was a navy man, a decorated war hero, in fact, he was taken to bethesda naval hospital where the postmortem was conducted on the president's body with guards looking on. you can hear all the audio released in this -- this certain release by going to our website. we put links to it at nbcnightlynews.com. there is also news this week regarding the stretch of massachusetts coastline always referred to as the kennedy compound in hyannis port. americans who couldn't get enough of the kennedy period pored over the photos of their dashing lives and their touch football games on the beach. now the 21-room home where senator edward kennedy died will be devoted to charitable use as something of a conference center. the family will still own the other houses within the compound. and a big change is coming to the white house. the west wing is in for a big renovation and that includes the

oval office. so no matter who the occupant is after inauguration, the president will use a temporary office while the oval and all the other offices are redone. the president's office was last redone by fdr. this is all part of a massive multiyear modernization of the people's house. peyton manning is denying a report that he will never play football again. the son of archie manning, the brother of your new york giants starting super bowl quarterback eli manning, peyton manning, one of the greats in nfl history has been recovering, as you may know, from a neck injury. today, he told espn he's waiting to be cleared to get back in the game. we just don't know if he'll continue to play with the colts. he's been named mvp of the nfl four time, something no other player has done. up next, a doctor bringing hope to those who need it and making a difference in the process. they offer me one-on-one guidance to help me choose my investments.

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>> sfour final report tonight is about a doctor helping people get back on >> our final report tonight is about a doctor helping people get back on their feet again. they're in constant pain, but like many americans, they have fallen on tough times and they can't afford to pay for the care they need.

that's where one doctor and his doctor friends come in. they're making a difference in a lot of lives. we got the story from our chief medical editor, dr. nancy snyderman. >> reporter: orthopedic surgeon dr. larry drr does more than fix bones for a living. for years, operation walk, the charity he founded, has provided free surgeries for thousands of vulnerable people around the globe. now with tough economic times in this country, dr. dorr is bringing his charity home. during a recent two-day span, he and 60 other orthopedic surgeons operated on uninsured patients, replacing their bad hips and knees. >> these people all have lost their hope for their tomorrows. >> reporter: 85 people have regained the ability to walk for free in what would normally be a $30,000 to $50,000 operation. this recording artist needed both hips replaced. in the '90s, cherry had her own

band and hit song that climbed the charts. then came difficulty walking and pain. terry couldn't even stand up long enough to sing. >> feel like you're 100 years old, right? she gave private lessons instead to pay the bills. steven robertson's pain was so severe, he contemplated ending his life. >> when things narrow, you start feeling hopeless. >> reporter: with nowhere else to turn, he and others wrote to dr. dorr, pleading for help. >> you can almost see the patient leaning over the paper with their pen writing, tears falling on to the paper. ♪ lean on me. >> reporter: and dr. larry dorr is the man to lead on. for the price of a postage stamp, they got back on their feet. dr. nancy snyderman, nbc news, los angeles.

>> great story to end on for this tuesday night. thank you for being here with us. i'm brian williams. we hope to see you right back here tomorrow evening. good night.