and my application to cornell university, it was, like, dripping with the universe, because there's all... i had a telescope, i was in the club, i... you know. and so cornell accepted me, but then they want you to come if they accept you, right? but i hadn't decided yet. and they, little did i know, forwarded my application to carl sagan's office, and carl sagan wrote a personal letter to me. >> oh, my god. >> hand signed. >> hinojosa: you get it in the mail? >> in the mail. i said, "carl sagan? is that the same guy who's on the tonight show and the..." i said, "oh, couldn't be." and i looked, i rubbed my eyes, and there it was. and he invited me to cornell to help me decide whether i would ultimately attend there. and i said, "is he joking, is he serious?" and so i, you know, called to make arrangements, and yes, he met me out front of his building, out of his lab, invited me up, chatted about the universe. he reached back, pulled out one of his books. i thought that was the coolest thing. he didn't have to look. he pulled back the book, it was the book he wrote, signed it to me. and t

this ivy league graduate of cornell university, an affable life insurance salesman, came off cool, calm and collected enabling him to move undetected through an unsuspecting society. >> for some reason with me sexuality and violence have fused together. >> but his dark core would remain hidden and unexplained until after his capture. his two-year connecticut rampage started in january of 1982 driving along busy route 6 in danielson, connecticut. ross spotted a 17-year-old teenage girl walking to her boyfriend's house. michael malchik was a homicide detective with the connecticut state police. >> tammy williams was the first connecticut victim. >> i saw her walking along the side of the road. i followed her. i grabbed her and dragged her to the side of the pond. i raped her, and then i strangled her and put her -- threw her into the pond when i was done. >> debra taylor, his second victim, met her demise in the danielson town green. >> around midnight, debbie taylor had had a fight with her husband concerning a broken down vehicle they were in. and she was sitting here in the park, and m

otherwise they run and the pictures are blurred. >> cornell university's doctor is the lost ladybug director. he says in the late 70's and early 80's scientists began noticing that ladybug species were disappearing and that other species were taking over in some places. rosy says knowing why that's happening is important because ladybugs are predators that eat insects that attack food crops. >> without ladybugs out there doing their job, we could not grow the food and fiber that we need. they're absolutely essential for us to be able to practice agriculture in the way we do now. >> rosy says the decline was precipitous this ladybug hadn't been seen there in 15 years but they didn't have the manpower to find out why this was happening. >> there weren't enough scientists took out to all the different places where these ladybugs could be. and so we wanted to recruit people from all over the country to help us look. >> so they decided to use the citizen science approach, getting people to volunteer to collect information in the field. >> with all these young people and their parents out there lo

. >> the mother of a cornell university student who died in an alleged hazing incident is suing the university for $25 million. the student had a bright future ahead of him, planning to be a doctor. his life was cut short involving a drunken hazing incident with his fraternity. >> this lawsuit can be a powerful mechanism for communicating with other students and parents and fraternities and universities that dangerous behavior takes place under the auspices of good clean fun. >> the lawsuit claims the student was involved in a mock kidnapping. the claim says they bought his ankles and compelled him to consume him-- bound his ankles and compelled him to consume alcohol. the university says it has a zero tolerance policy. >> a tour bus crashed on marco island. >> an overnight explosion leveled a pennsylvania car wash. the blast destroyed the car wash in lancaster. the explosion involved propane tanks. fortunately, nobody was hurt. an explosion leveled a 5000 square foot home in georgia early this morning. three were seriously hurt in the blast, which happened around 5:30 a.m. because of the blas

we knew they were gross but now these researchers from cornell university are going to be on the hillling congress they could be a bigger health threat than we thought. we know they cause things like sleeplessness and stress. listen to this. they have been shown to cause anemia in kids and the elderly and the bites can leave us open to the infections like mrsa. so it's a big concern. also a growing problem here in the u.s. if you look at the past few years the number of bed bug infestations increased 500% over the hast few years, now found in every state. more than a third are in hotels and motels mostly because this is so much turnover. an exterminator can be up to 4,000 so you continue want this problem. according to bed bug registry, san francisco is the tenth most infested city in the u.s. on that site. more than 516 cases in california just people writing in the report. so with the number a lot more than that. zh thank you very much. you got a ht of emand at them this morning. it's 6:44. congress will vote today on whether to turn the lights off on the energy saving light bulbs.

a cornell university graduate the first electric unit in 1902. before that folks used fans and ice to keep cool. after perfecting the invention, he and other engineers left buffalo to start their own company, the carrier corporation, and, later, carrier which still makes cooling systems. our thanks to the greatest reporter today. look at that! steve brown in chicago sent us that story. i like it. it got harder to find a job if you can believe it. a new unemployment numbers. stay tuned. that is different. so freestyle lite test strips make testing... easy? easy. great. call or click-- we'll send you strips and a meter, free. free is good. freestyle lite test strips. call or click today. >>shepard: more bad news of the job market, the feds say the number of people filing for the first time for claims of unemployment benefits jumped again last week up 10,000 for the week prior to 418,000. context and perspective that is like everybody in omaha, member filing for the first unemployment check at once ashes sign the economy is having a hard time gettin

the mother of a cornell university sophomore who died of alcohol poisoning is now suing her son's fraternity for $25 million. coming up, she'll speak out in a live exclusive interview. >>> a little later on, on a much lighter note, it is like having four great concerts in one. we're going to get a jump on the fourth of july weekend with an amazing show. pitbull, who's at the top of the charts right now, is set to rock our plaza and those people filling the plaza -- with the help of marc anthony, t-pain, and ne-yo. that takes place in our 8:30 half-hour. >>> we begin this half-hour with the stunning new developments in the dominique strauss-khan sex assault case. jeff rossen has more. good morning. >> reporter: all along prosecutors in new york have been very clear the case against dominique strauss-khan was very strong, that the evidence was piling up and that they believed the victim. but this morning what appears to be a total reversal. law enforcement sources now tell nbc news the entire case may be falling apart because the victim lied about her past. he's been hauled in to court, charge

a study by cornell university estimates that it cost $4.50 to produce one gallon of ethanol. a gallon of pure ethanol has only about 2/3 the energy of a gallon of gasoline. yet, a lot of things we tend to do in -- like a lot of things we tend to do here in washington, the cost is too high and average americans are the ones paying for it. in 2010 the federal government spent nearly $8 billion to subsidize ethanol program. that number is probably closer you count ion when money from state and local governments. the bottom line is corn should be used to fuel our bodies, not our cars. i'd like to take a moment to tell but a friend of mine, harry. harry is the owner of his farm company. the family started this company in 1937 and is one of the great small business success stories in my district. however, in 2010, the sausage farm lost money for the first time. they are now losing money every month. they are not losing money because all of a sudden they are no longer a great company. they are losing money because the cost of raw materials is far too high. instead of paying 35 cents

the authors from the university of chicago, cornell and hebrew university found that participants republicanntions increase, despite the overwhelmingly belief that exposure to the flag would not influence their behavior. some of the effects even lasted eight months after the flag exposure, according to the study. it's a study that is similar to another recent harvard study we told you about in grapevine that found kids that attended at least one fourth of july event, parade for example and ended up leaning republican later in life. >>> casino mogul steve wynn blasted president obama's economic policies this week, during a conference call on the company quarterly earnings, wynn said, "this administration is the greatest wet blanket to business and progress and job creation in my lifetime." despite wynn complaints his company did very well in the second quarter. net revenues from his las vegas operations were up almost 23% compared to last year. that revenue that included worldwide properties were up 32%. last year his properties netted over $4 billion. wynn said he could be doing even more if

in the solar industry the number of new jobs is expected to increase 26% according to cornell university's 2010 solar jobs census. those are the kind of jobs that america wants. in a recent earnston young report predicts the cost of solar to decrease by as much as half, creating a strong solar option for american consumers and providing solar companies with the opportunity to expand. you know, investors know where to put their dollars and our nation knows that this -- or we should know that this is an emerging industry and cutting-edge research is fundamental to progress. the race to be the energy provider of the few fur is this general reaction -- future is this generation's space race and basic research is critical, it's fundamental, it is the fundamental ingredient to mr. that new future for our people. america has never shirked a major challenge. and we have a real finish line to go across as competitors are fierce from china, from germany from japan. new technology will provide a new power future for us. and we must position ourselves not to be second, not to be third, but to be the g

increase sgroibs 2% over the next year, in the solar industry, that number is 27%, according to cornell university. as costs go down and production capacity grose, solar energy becomes a viable alternative to imported energy sources. this is what our country needs right now a vibrant energy market that encourages economic growth here at home. some would argue with numbers like these, solar energy doesn't need anything, any additional funding, but i disagree. it is precisely because of our investment in this fledgling, cutting edge industry that is high tech that such successes are possible. we cannot allow america to be complacent. right now we are in competition to be the energy leader of the future in this sector. for years, we were the lead for the developing new technology but we've been falling behind. guess who has been right at our heels the whole time? china. china knows that our technology will power the future and they are setting themselves up to be the new global leaders in solar. i can verify that. as we sat back and patted ourselves here trying to exponentially increase their funding

taught at state university of new york, at sara lawrence college, city university of new york, brooklyn college. a year, a year at cornell. >> where did you get your undergraduate degree? >> undergraduate degree was from city college of new york. my m.a. was from brown university and my p.h.d. was from yale. >> what were all of those in? >> political science. >> where is your hometown originally? >> i am originally from new york. probably can hear it. >> from the city? >> new york city. yeah. >> manhattan? >> manhattan. that's right. >> what was your family like? >> my family was a blue collar italian american family. my grandparents were immigrants and very hard-working people, you know. and - doosh what did your father and mother do for a living? >> my mother worked in a dress shop and my father worked, well, we had a little italian bakery which he inthe inherited from hs uncle for a while. i have written storys about that. and he also for a while was a taxi driver. >> you don't know this, but for several years, some of our callers on our call-in shows have called up and admonished me or us. >> they want to know who th

cornell bumper sticker on my car. >> i'm sorry! >> no, it's good. boston college is fantastic. you guys play to a lot of college crowds, don't you? >> we do a lot of universitycall them albums even though you download them and hardly anybody buys -- you can't buy vinyl anymore. >> you can buy vinyl. people go out and buy c.d.'s but certainly, you know, digital, that's what a lot of people buy. >> it's so much faster. you can push a button and you get it in no time. it's $0.99. here comes eric bolling's ride. an hour from now, you'll perform a great new song, right? >> i believe so. >> you better. we have a whole bunch of folks that want to hear it. so augustana performs live for our summer concert series in the next hour. >> thank you very much. thanks for having us. >> dan, very nice to meet you. let's go inside. not going to boston. we're going to studio e. >> thank you, steve. tell the cops i'll be right out there. about another hour or so. >> all right. >> coming up -- >> yeah, casey anthony is dolled up and ready to walk. but where is she going to go? we asked the anthony family's attorney. >> and coming up at the top of the hour, congresswoman michelle