good morning to you. it is thursday, september 1st. can you believe it? this is your a.m. "wake-up call." this is carol costello joining you live from new york. it's a big day. the president's big speech on economy will be a week from tonight. he wanted to speak a day earlier but house speaker john boehner said there wouldn't be enough time to do a security sweep of the house chamber. others complained it was on the very night of the republican presidential debate. he could go head to head with drew breesz and aaron rofrmgers. the nfl opener is that night. they talked about what a big deal this speech is. >> this is a different kind of speech. it's not about talking the the american people as much as it is laying out. it's laying out for congress a clear plan, very specific, saying here is the -- here's my proposal from the white house. now it's your turn to act. and so they're taking it directly to congress. they're going there because it's his one shot of sort of delivering the message to koj and then it's up to congress to sort of take it, leave it, take pieces of it. it's really out of the president's hands beyond that. >> take a look at the cnn orc international poll. it shows only about one third of the americans approve of the way the president is handling the company and 65% think it's. congresswoman michele bachmann, what would she have done? would she have attended the big speech or got to the presidential debate in california? of course, it's not an issue now, but before the date was changed it was tasty campaign fodder. she said this in iowa. let me read it to you. either, a, the president wants to distrakt the american people so they don't watch him, or, b, he doesn't want the american people to hear what the next president of the united states is going to say. here's a quick update on the big story out of aruba. gary gee or dana will stay in custody for another 60 days while authorities work on their investigation. et it's been a month since rob bin gardner was last seen. he claims she was swept out to sea while they were snorkeling let's talk about two sections of the country with opposite problems. first, oklahoma. two fires are on the move in oklahoma city. one is being pushed toward a residential area. 700 people have been told to evacuate their homes. fire officials hope to stop the fire before it crosses interstate 44. fires this week have been moving so fast people barely have had time to react. >> you know, i've got about ten minutes, what do i grab. and the first thought was make sure the kids are safe and that they've got some clothing. >> and to the south in dry windy texas, a huge wildfire about an hour west of the dallas-ft. worth area has destroyed about 40 homes now. talk about i reen and the saturated northeast. nearly 2 million people from north carolina to maine still don't have electricity. flood advisories are in effect today for parts of five states. in new jersey the flood passaic river has settled back into its banks and should be below flood stage this morning. officials say the worst is over in vermont. crews managed to patch washed out roads and get supplies into isolated towns. it's going to take longer to repair bridges. one 93-year-old vermont man remembers the legendary flood of 1927 and the hurricane of 1938. he says irene was worse than both. >> this is worse. much worse. i can't believe that this happened. >> vermont is getting help, by the way, from a few of its friends. a black hawk crew from new hampshire brought over some supplies and nearly 100 members of the illinois national guard are helping too. the state has sent over eight of its helicopters to vermont. all of vermont's continues, where are they? they're still in iraq. now let's head to the weather center and rob marciano. okay, catykatia, i guess it developing into a hurricane. >> yeah. it is now a hurricane. 75 miles an hour. that hasn't changed. it's pretty big. there you see on the satellite picture. fairly well organized. and you know, all indications there's nothing much ahead of it in the near 500 miles to slow it down. so we will continue to see -- move off to the west at about 19 miles an hour. here's the forecast track for the national hurricane center. all right. off to category 2 status and major as we head toward the weekend. notice it's heading in the general direction of the united states. so, yes, it is of grave concern for the folks on the east coast as we have to wait for this thing to really make a northerly jog and peel off to sea which is a possibility but not a slam-dunk at the moment. of more immediate concern is this getting into the gulf of mexico. the red box versus the yellow box. the national hurricane center has upped this into a very good chance of becoming a tropical depression or storm here in the next two days. they have a hurricane hunter aircraft scheduled to fly into this thing and investigate it this afternoon. we'll know much more about this. some of our models take it anywhere from texas to the florida panhandle. anywhere from a weak tropical storm to potentially a hurricane. that would happen as soon as the weekend and as late as the beginning of next week. that one is closer to home. one more thing. i forgot to mention this. interesting news from science. we have developed or we found that coral -- there's an analogy on coral that produce as sunscreen that protects coral. fish eat that coral and maybe they get the sunscreen from this algae. et so, carol, there may come a time when ke can develop this algae in a pill to where you don't have to slather on the sun sauce. you pop a pill. wouldn't that be cool? >> really. that would be terrific snoom it's pretty far off but they have discussed this. >> it's quite interesting. thank you. it is issue number one. no matter where you look or turn, there's no escaping, talks about the economy or in this case jokes about the economy. here's your morning punch line. >> well, coming in today i found a quarter on the sidewalk. finally some change i can believe in. president obama has chosen princeton labor kmichlt al listen krueger as the new white house economist. he's considered an expert on unemployment. you know, these days a lot of people are experts on unemployment. how about getting a guy who's an expert on employment. economists are now saying hurricane irene will actually help the economy. the irony being people who saved their money during the recession will now use the money to buy things like windows and repair items. as you know the economy is in the best shape. when washington came up with this, they said, hey, about more hurricanes and tornadoes and earthquakes. that's what we need. >> still ahead, elements of this story may sound familiar. an apple employee goes into the bar and reportedly loses an iphone prototype. the full story on the other side of the break. but first check out the quote of the day. this is the quote. quote, some of them in congress right now of this tea party movement would love to see you and me hanging on a tree, end quote. find out who said this coming up in 90 seconds. it's eight minutes past the hour. there's another way to help eliminate litter box dust: purina tidy cats. our premium litters now work harder to help neutralize odors in multiple cat homes. purina tidy cats. keep your home smelling like home. with two children and no way to support them. people told me i wasn't going to do anything. and i just decided i have more to offer than that. i put myself through nursing school, and then i decided to go get a doctorate degree. university of phoenix gave me the knowledge to make a difference in people's lives. my name is dr. kimberly horton. i manage a network of over a thousand nurses, and i am a phoenix. [ male announcer ] find your program at phoenix.edu. it is ten minutes past the hour. this is your a.m. "wake-up call." now back to the quote of the day. quote, some of them in congress now of this tea party movement would love to see you and me hanging on a tree,ent quote. who said that? it was demg carat andre carson. he later clarified he was not talking about all but some members of the tea party. he says he stands by the remarks. he's a member of the congressional black caucus. now you know. we're talking iphone and facebook. kristie lu joins us from hong kong to bring us up to tech speed. so an apple employee walks into a bar and leaves an iphone proto-type behind. it's deja vu all over again. >> it sounds like a really bad joke. he appears to have lost a prototype in a bar. this is a report from cnn. they say late in july a prototype yet to be released went missing from a mexican bar and restaurant in san francisco. after it was sound it was apparently sold on craigslist. and, yes, you've heard this before. last year an apple employee lost and released an iphone prototype in a bar. there appears to be a connection between drinking and losing an apple. >> really. let's talk facebook now because is facebook really thinking about getting into the music game? >> that's right. it's been out there for such a long time but according to facebook they're planning to launch a music service next month. a source familiar with the plan said they would launch of september 21st. with partners like spot feed supplied the content. all the music labels have long hoped for facebook to build a music store and sell songs. as massive user base, 750 million strong and growing. up to you. >> i know you'll continue to keep your eye on things. thank you so much, kristie lu stout reporting live from hong kong. disagreement in washington, certainly nothing new. does it go too far when the white house and congress have a disagreement on something like a date. it's 12 minutes past the hour. 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[ crunching, sipping ] be happy. be healthy. can i try yours? as you probably know, former vice president dick cheney gave an exclusive interview about his memoir. here's something you've about never seen. >> here, now, is an exclusive nbc interview with dick cheney. take a look. >> should we still be waterboarding terror suspects. >> yes. >> secret prisons. >> yessing. >> wire tapping. >> yes. >> putting terror suspects into juicers and making them into terror smoothies. >> with the right of approval. >> are you becoming aroused? >> yes. >> i'm sorry. oh. that wu funny. it -- i don't know. it struck me as so funny. it's time for our political ticker with tim farley on sirius live from washington. good morning, tim. >> it wasn't real, was it? he didn't really say that, did he? come on. >> no, that wasn't real. let's talk about something that should not be real as well, this weird thing between the president and john boehner. >> that seems surreal, doesn't it? >> what? >> that seems surreal, doesn't it, the whole batter back and forth between the president and the speaker? >> oh, yeah. the president came out. actually he sent a letter to the house speaker saying, hey, i want to address a joint sex of congress on september 7th. you need to do some par lament hi. john boehner writes back to the president. it's not the best date because we can't get the security sweep needed -- we can't get the security sweep done to make that happen and then it moved on from there. take it away. >> and yesterday if you were to try to summarize the move in the white house press briefing as white house press secretary jay carney was explained there was no politics behind this decision, you'd have to sorts of imagine a face that went -- because everyone was trying to figure out exactly what the reasoning was behind the scheduling of this speech. it was the night of the gop debate. now, truth be told, it's the debate among several candidates. it's one of many. but on the other hand, the white house had to know it was that night. john bane boehner said we can't do it that night. we'll do it the next night and then we find out the president has moved it. what's going to happen out of all this? america once again sees dysfuncti dysfunctionality in d.c. frankly i think the president is going to lose out because people are going to be tuning in to see kid rock and antebellum for their premiere or first game of the season, packers and saints on thursday night and instead of the president they're going to be seeing the joint session of congress. >> you also have to wonder if the president is going to lose out. he's coming on saying i want to work with republicans. let's put aside this partisan sniping. yet his people schedule his speech on the same night as a republican debate. so i don't know how you -- >> this is pretty much -- to your point, carol, this is pretty much ak phenomenaled to be a political speech because unless the president comes out with amazing substance, this is going to be an opportunity to look presidential in front of the joint session of congress and maybe look past what is interpreted or expected to be something that's going to be less than spectacular. i don't mean to try to get ahead of the president, it's just that this has been seen as a political game and as you've said the president's tried to apoosh above that and yet they'll go ahead and schedule this on the same night of the debate? it doesn't seem to fit. >> i know. we'll see what happens. tim farley, thanks so much for joining us as usual. same-sex marriage, front and center on piers morgan. gop presidential candidate rick santorum defended his views. he asked santorum if his views bordered on bigotry. here's what santorum had to say. >> no, just because we disagree on public policy which is what the debate has been about, which is marriage, doesn't mean it's bigotry. >> i had piers morgan call me a bigot because i believe what the catholic church teaches. now i'm a bigget because now i believe what the bible teaches, what 2,000 years of teaching and moral theology is now big oted. in other news this morning prince harry heads to the united states not to hobnob witha-list we'll tell you about the unrested libya. to go i a loeng with that here's a tidbit for you. today is revolution ar day in libya. it celebrates the anniversary of moammar gadhafi coming into power that happened in 1969. it's 19 minutes past the hour. it is 212 minutes past the hour. this is your a.m. "wake-up call." here are three things to put on your radar. weekly jobs numbers will be released. president obama is expected to deliver his jobs plan before lawmakers one week from today. then at 3:30 eastern nasa updates us on the mars rover. it's called opportunity. it's said to be sending back amazing pictures from a marchand endeavor crater. it's set to be an interesting season considering some of the trouble teams like ohio state and miami are facing involving ncaa violations. we still don't know where moammar gadhafi is, but his four-decade grip on power in libya is slipping away and secretary of state hillary clinton is in paris for a high-powered meeting to talk about post gadhafi libya. let's head around the world with max foster. he's live in london. so what's this meeting about? >> well, it's a big test, really, i think, carol, for the ntc, which is running libya now. in the past the rebels had one thing in common, of course, and that was getting gadhafi out of power. this is a test to see how the ntc, how the rebels are organized as a body that can run a country. they ask for something like $7 billion worth of humanitarian aid really. it's something to deal with their emergency needs and they're going to have to convince the likes of secretary clinton. also dozens of other prime ministers and other heads of state around the world that they need the money and can get it now. they have started receiving money. the british government has released about billion dollars worth of libyan bank notes which are held in the uk while the war was continuing. they arrived going to the central bank in misrata -- been ga city as we speak. and also the french today have announced they're releasing $2 billion worth of assets they've been holding while this has been resolved. et it's starting to happen. a big test for the ntc, carol. also on another topic, prince harry is coming to the united states next month for some military training. tell us more. >> yeah. well, he's going to be there for two months. we weren't quite sure where he was going go. we now know he's going to california and in arizona. he's got two months of training over there in the u.s. it's the last part of his apache helicopter training. so once he completes that, he'll be a fully qualified apache helicopter pilot. and he's ready, really, to go to war but there aren't any wars for him to go to right now. he'll have a bit more training when he gets back to the uk and he'll be set to go. a major blackout. we won't hear about the training while he is there. there'll be footage when it returns. we'll not hear much more about it until it's over. >> bummer because we like a few harry sightings in the united states. thank you very much. if life is a highway, buckle up. there are a lot of bad drivers out there. but allstate is out with a new list of states with the best driving. chicago earned the number five spot. houston at number four and san antonio at number three. hear which city came out on top right after this. another good thing about geico is, they've got, like, real live people working there 24/7. so like say you need to report a claim, alright. a real person will be there to help you. then you can use geico.com to view photos of the damage, track your claim, print an estimate. you want an english muffin? 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[fans whirring] [ding] announcer: chill raw and prepared foods promptly. one in 6 americans will get sick from food poisoning this year. keep your family safer. check your steps at foodsafety.gov. good morning to you. it is thursday, september 1st. yes, it's already september 1st. and it's almost friday too. this is your a.m. "wake-up call." i'm carol costello. katia grew overnight, the winds clocked at about 75 miles per hour. could strengthen into a major hurricane in the next few days but it is way too early to tell if katia will hit land. there's another storm system to keep an eye on brewing in the gulf of mexico. no name yet but it could organize into a tropical storm by this weekend. president obama is traveling to new jersey this week and declaring a major disaster there in the wake of irene. the passaic river pushed past its limits in paterson, forcing the city to fight the highest floodwaters in 100 years. the president will be there on sunday scoping out recovery efforts. irene killed more than 40 people from florida to new england and nearly 2 million people still without power. president obama has agreed to reschedule his big jobs speech for thursday night. he originally wanted to do it on wednesday, but house speaker john boehner said that would not work. boehner blamed logistics. other republicans were furious, though, because there's a gop presidential debate on wednesday night, september 7th. but now that the date's been changed, it's been decided, the president does have his work cut out for him. check out this cn orc international poll. only a third of the americans approve of howl the president is handling the economy. a philadelphia police officer has been arrested accused of sexually assaulting a woman while on duty. she was waiting for a bus early one morning when she flagged down an officer for a ride. according to our affiliate, the officer forced her to perform a sex act. then dropped her at a bus terminal. he's facing several charges. philadelphia's police commissioner says he's committed to rooting out criminal cops. an injured stunt man from ""the hangover 2"" is suing warner brothers over a street scene gone wrong. he says he suffered permanent brain damage after a high-speed crash in bangkok. he was in a medically induced mode for months. warner brothers says it's working closely with the stunt man to resolve this. and for all of your nonstuntman types, the safest city to get behind the wheel is phoenix. san diego, san antonio,s houston and chicago round out the top five with cities with more than 1 million people. allstate released the data in terms of car crash frequency. those daily coupon deals that you get in your inbox every day, some ma be irresistible. for some consumers, it may be getting to be too much. first we're getting close to girl scout cookie season and in honor of some of the most addicted snacks on the planet, here's today's get smart question. you can probably guess this cook, thin mint. which comes in second, tagalongs, b, samoas, or c, dough see does. [ male announcer ] 95% of all americans aren't getting enough whole grain. but actually, it's never been easier to get the whole grain you want from your favorite big g cereals. from cheerios to lucky charms, there's whole grain in every box. make sure to look for the white check. exclusive to the military. and commitment is not limited to one's military oath. the same set of values that drive our nation's military are the ones we used to build usaa bank. from free checking to credit cards to loans, our commitment to the military, veterans, and their families is without equal. ♪ visit us online to learn what makes our bank so different. usaa. we know what it means to serve. hour. this is your a.m. "wake-up call." n now back to the day's get smart question. after thin mint which girl scout cookie sells the most? is it a, tag alongs, b, samoas, or c, do-si-dos. et it's b, samoas. check out the graphic to average out the percentage. thin maint came in first with the quarter of all sales. fifinget, tre foils. all the others make up 23% of all sales. for this morning's money news let's head to christine romans and talk about the at&t/t mobile merger that's not a merger just yet because the justice department has filed an antitrust lawsuit against at&t. what is this about? >> it's about competition and the ability for consumers to have low prices, good service, and choice. the justice department, also the fcc coming out very, very strongly and saying that this huge $39 billion merger would not be good for you, carol, it would not be good for me, it would not be good for anyone who carries a cell phone. . and consumer advocates have been saying this for a long time. they say when you take away competition in this very, very important arena, that it's going to mean less innovation, little companies that come up with new gadgets are going to have a harder time finding dmers for those and getting those innovations on the market, things that are good for us, and that they think that it's going to mean less quality of service and just less choice and higher prices overall. and, of course, the company's going to fight this. this could be -- this actually could be a pretty epic battle between a very big company, at&t and the u.s. government. so stay tuned there, carol. >> okay. let's talk about what's going on with things like groupons, because i think people have lost the groupon people now. >> it's deal fatigue. some of the folks that track this say that in recent weeks -- last week and the week before in particular, for the first time ever, you're seeing traffic start to decline on some of these deal websites. there's a lot of big wins. living social is another. i have never -- have you ever done it? i've never actually done one of these deals where they pop up in my inbox. >> you have? >> yes. >> oh, man. well, anyway, maybe people are feeling a little bit of deal fatigue. maybe in beginning people thought this is great, i'm e going to do this, save some money. but there seems to be something happening here. we'll see if it's seasonal, i don't know, some of the you forrial early on wearing off. it's important for investors because some of these companies, you know, are poised go public or have gone public. we'll see if the deal fatigue sets in. >> it could be a bust. christine romans, thank you. see you in a bit. washington cannot agree on a budget. why would we think they could agree on a date of a speech. that story is coming up in 90 seconds. et it's 36 minutes past the hour. i'm good about washing my. but sometimes i wonder... what's left behind? 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[ male announcer ] to get the flights you want, sign up for a venture card at capitalone.com. what's in your wallet? uh, it's okay. i've played a pilot before. 39 minutes past the hour. president obama will roll out his big jobs plan next thursday, not wednesday, as originally planned. the president rescheduled after republican house speaker john boehner basically said no. the president's speech would have taken place at the very same time as a republican debate that was going to be broadcast on msnbc. so let's bring in cnn contributcontribute er john avelon. this is rid dig lus. >> i know. did anyone think it wouldn't come to this. it's the latest low in washington. it's the first time in really recorded memory that the leaders of congress have said no. and so it's just the latest sign of just how bad the blood is in washington, d.c. >> do you think that the white house did this on purpose? >> well, clearly they couldn't help but notice that they were trying to get a joint session of congress right before a gop presidential debate. and so they may be guilty of being too clever by half in that, trying to remind people that president obama is president and the republican contenders are just that, contenders. that said, the following night is directly opposite the nfl season sort of opener, opening night matchups. so between the packers and the saints. i think most americans are going to be probably a little angry with the overlap of that game than the preempts of republican debate by one hour. >> i guess the obvious question, why does the president feel he has to give the speech before a joint session of congress? why doesn't he give the speech to the white house and we wouldn't have these arguments? >> right. that would have been the other obvious alternative. the president clearly wants to communicate to the american people that this is coming out of the summer, number one issue facing the country. he's promised to propose new ideas and it communicates the serio seriousness of the fiscal crisis and the needs for the paertds coming together to solve this problem. remember, we have a divided government. this does get things off on a bad foot, the fact that there's an unprecedented denial of the president's request to speak before a joint session. then the president says, fine, doing it one night later, ever closer to the shadow of the tenth anniversary of 9/11 as well. >> okay. well, we'll be talking a lot more about this on "american morning." you'll be joining us. john avlon, joining us live from new york. let's take a look at sports. wade belak was -- wrapped up a 14-year career in march. he was going to be a national sideline. toronto police do not suspect foul play. he was just 35 years old. still hard to believe that venus williams will be wanting to rest of the u.s. open and not compete. she pulled out yoed before her second round match. williams says she's been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that affecting her energy level and affects her joints. brian wilson, he's always fun with the giants. he's using his famously bushy beard to break a baseball bat. don't try this at home, okay? actually the bat was already open. his facial hair is impressive but it isn't that strong. that was enjoyable. all the details. if you should be concerned at all, just ahead. first on this day in history back in 1939, world war ii began when nazi germany invaded poland. it tess 42 minutes past the hour. good morning to you. it is thursday, september 1 std. this is your a.m. "wake-up call." i'm carol cause tell yeo joining you live from new york. wildfires are ripping through parts of texas and oklahoma, devouring loam, forcing ee vark united nations and closing highways and flames feed themselves on bone-dry conditions and high winds. jim spellman joins us from possum kingdom lake, texas. jim, is it any better at all this morning? >> right now, carol, it is calm and it's a little bit colder. it's probably in the mid-80s. yesterday the fire crews worked all day using helicopters dropping water and fire reta retarda retardants. the winds picked up and it just got away from them. we watched from a command center. they had been up as fire raced toward them and we were forced to pull back as embers were flying across this reservoir and started starting fires on our side. and they had to move the command center. it just got away from them. they lost 19 more homes, 39 total now. and they forced to evacuate more people here as it expands with the terrible drought conditions that are creating the ideal conditions for the fires to expand, carol. >> jim, you're in a little tiny town. where exactly are you? >> it's about 50 miles west of dallas. kind of a resort area. a lot of second homes, vacation homes. really lovely area. they have some serious challenges for the firefighters. it creates some limits options for the crews to get into these communities and for people to evacuate. they're trying to get people to evacuate. there's about 400 homes they consider in jeopardy today. but the drought condition, 90% of texas is under extreme drought conditions here, and if you add a little wind to that, it just takes a spark to start a fie. even if they hit this one under control, similar fires can break out anywhere. and you've already seen that in other parts of texas. and now as of yesterday in oklahoma city you've ebb seen that there. with these conditions it's going to keep happening for weeks to come until they get serious rain here to mitigate the drought conditions. carol? >> yeah. jim spellman reporting live from texas. 50 miles outside of dallas. thanks so much. all right. it's a date. the president's big speech on the economy will be a week from tonight. he wanted to speak before a joint session of congress a day earlier but republican house speaker john boehner said there wouldn't be enough time to do a security sweep of the house chamber. others complain the speech was on the very same night as the republican presidential debate. all of that move now, except the president could go head to head with drew brees and aaron rodgers. the nfl season opener is scheduled for september 8th. the same time as the president's job speech. cnn's correspondent jessica yellin talked about how big of a speech it is. >> this is a different kind of speech. it's a laying out. they want to get the message out but it's laying out for congress a clear plan, very specific saying here is the -- here's my proposal from the white house, now it's your turn to act. and so they're taking it directly to congress. they're going there because it's his one shot of delivering the message to congress and then it's up to congress to take it, leave it, take pieces of it. it's really out of the president's hands at that point it's an important speech. look at the cnn orc poll. it shows one third of the americans are approving of the way the president is handling the economy and 75% of the country is saying the economy is in bad shape. the speech is big. congresswoman michele bachmann if the speech was held on september 7th? would she have attended the big speech in d.c. or gone to the prez den schal debate in california? of course it's not an issue. before the date was changed it became tasty campaign fodder. bachmann said the president must be feeling a little insecure. she added, a, either he wants to distract the american people so they don't watch him or, b, he doesn't want the american people to hear what the next president of the united states is going to say. as i said it's moot now. libya's leaders will tell the world twha they need to do to make the transition to democracy. representatives from 60 countries will be there. hillary clinton is there from the united states. the old governor authorities, moammar gadhafi, reuters reports that he might be in the desert town of bonnie waleed, that's 100 miles from tripoli. we'll keep you posted. another human foot has turned up on the shore of vancouver. it was found inside a running shoe along with a leg bone. that makes it 11 feet that have washed up in british washington, british columbia since 2007. it remains a mystery. let's talk about irene and the saturated northeast. nearly 2 million people from north carolina to maine still don't have electricity. flood advisories are in effect for parts of five states. in new jersey the flood passaic river is settling back into its banks and should be we low flood stage. officials in vermont say the worst is ore there. crews managed to patch up washed out roads and get supply swoos isolated towns. vermont is getting help from its neighbors. a black hawk brought over supplies and nooerm 100 members of the illinois national guard is helping too. they've sent over 8 of its helicopters. all of vermont's helicopters, where are they? they're in iraq. let's head to the weather center, rob marciano. that's good news. the rivers are returning to their banks and things are getting a little better at least. >> the one thing with that part of the country is the rivers fall quickly. the other thing is they rise quickly. that's what we saw there, especially in vermont. clean-up efforts will continue to be ongoing. and whether eather is not so ba there. kat katia, let's talk about this. hurricane strength now. if you're just waking up, 75-mile-an-hour winds and movement is to the west at about 19 miles an hour. so this is certainly of consice. major hurricane status. notice a bit of a northerly turn. it's generally pointing toward the east coast of the u.s. i'm hoping that a strong cold front next week will take this baby out to sea, but no guarantee of that at the moment. of more medial concern, more pressing matters, gulf of mexico. this disturbance now in it. and a hurricane hunter aircraft expected to be in it later this afternoon. and we'll know much more about it. a good chance of it becoming a tropical depression or storm here in the next two days and quite honestly, we have no idea what it's going to be. steering currents in this part of the world are very, very weak. just to give you an idea of the confusion the computers are going through right now, loop deloops. take your bowl of spaghetti and throw it against the wall. you have no idea where it's going to end up. we'll just keep you posted. carol, i know you've about got friends out west. my surfing friends on the west coast, you may still be up, get to bed. surf's up. we've got a monster swell in california right now. a huge storm in new zealand has pr promulgated these waves. normally they get swells in the wintertime. so this is a fairly rare event and the water's a little bit warmer this time of year. so get out there, get on it. hang ten, baby. >> oh, that's beautiful. and don't go to bed until the end of this program, okay? >> exactly. >> thank you, rob. >> take care. let's take a look now at the word of the day. it's levamisol. find out what it means and why you need to know after this short break. it's 53 minutes past the hour. that works at the molecular level to help your engine run more smoothly by helping remove deposits and cleaning up intake valves. so when you fill up at an exxon or mobil station, you can rest assured we help your engine run more smoothly while leaving behind cleaner emissions. it's how we make gasoline work harder for you. exxon and mobil. the authentic, the rare, the hard to define. to those always searching for what's pure and what's real from we who believe we know just how you feel. haagen-dazs. from we who believe we know just how you feel. if something is simply the color of gold, is it really worth more? we don't think so. chase sapphire preferred is a card of a different color. unlike others, you get twice the points on travel, and twice the points on dining, and no foreign transaction fees. call now or apply at chasesapphire.com/preferred. okay, so who ordered the cereal that can help lower cholesterol and who ordered the yummy cereal? 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[ crunching, sipping ] be happy. be healthy. can i try yours? top of the hour. this is our a.m. "wake-up call." back to the word of the day. it's levamisol. south american drug lords are using it to stretch cocaine instead of using traditional fillers like baking soda. it can rot your skin, lower your white blood cell count. they say levamisole is found in three quarters of all cocaine bricks seized in the united states. now you know. we even got a special punch line for you. jay leno tells you how boring economic speeches can be but our own carter evans makes a special appearance. so check it out. >> even though the economy is still sputtering you'd never know it by ben bernanke. he was doing a speech, doing whatever he could to make it more upbait. take a look. >> this ahead, a speech of ben bernanke today. different from these what's so e about it. nice to be noticed, i guess, right? >> you are such a business nerd. so tell us how the markets are shaping up this morning. >> we've got the weekly unemployment numbers coming out, we do every thursday. a report on manufacturing, auto sales is and construction spending. our futures today on the downside,s take a look. down futures down about 58.