Woodruff those are just some of the stories were covering on tonights pbs newshour. Major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by moving our economy for 160 years. Bnsf, the engine that connects us. And by the alfred p. Sloan foundation. Supporting science, technology, and improved Economic Performance and Financial Literacy in the 21st century. And with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. And. This program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Woodruff the northeastern United States braced for a wallop of winter on this second day of 2014, as the midwest dug out and faced frigid temperatures. Kwame holman has our weather look. Reporter the first major snowstorm of the new year began shutting down cities across the midwest today. Arctic winds brought thick snow as much as 12 inches in some places with more to come in new england. Residents there started preparing yesterday for the storm, although the worst isnt expected to hit until later tonight. More than 22 states and about a hundred million americans are in the storms path. Weve been here before. Reporter at a News Conference today, boston mayor Thomas Menino said residents should take precautions. Im urging everyone to stay indoors, check on your elderly neighbors and homeless individuals, call police or emergency services. Reporter schools and state offices across boston were set to be closed tomorrow. And new york city awaited the storm with snow plows on hand, the first storm under new mayor bill de blasio. Residents in the midwest already have been hit by the winter weather. Streets blanketed with snow in cleveland created tough driving conditions with low visibility. And in the windy city, residents who deal with blizzard conditions regularly still found the foot of snow hard to deal with. Got to improvise. Its horrible. I guess its chicago weather. Reporter along with the snow, frigid temperatures struck several parts of the country. Earlier today, temperatures fell well below zero, reaching minus 20 in parts of north dakota and minus30 in northern minnesota. The cold extended east to maine and vermont, where snowfall is expected to top a foot, even more in massachusetts. Holiday travelers heading home were grounded after more than 1,800 flights were canceled. Officials also are concerned about Power Outages from heavy snow and winds, and flooding along the eastern coast of massachusetts, where the waves already are growing. Woodruff heavy snow is expected to continue through tonight and into tomorrow across new england. Tensions flared in iraq today as sunni militants linked to al qaeda battled for control of two key cities. The insurgents have ties to syria, more evidence the civil war there is crossing borders. Todays clashes centered around fallujah and ramadi. Thousands of antigovernment fighters stormed government buildings and police stations, and freed prisoners from jail. Elsewhere, a truck bomb north of baghdad killed at least 19 people and wounded dozens more. A blast also went off today in beirut, lebanon, killing at least five people. The bomb targeted a shiite hezbollah stronghold in the Southern Suburbs of the capital. The force of the explosion tore the front off of nearby buildings and littered the street with the smoldering wreckage of burnt cars. The Health Minister reported more than 66 people were wounded. Secretary of state john kerry said finding peace between israel and the palestinians is not mission impossible. He arrived in israel today to press leaders from both sides to make tough choices, and acknowledged there are challenges to overcome in the quest for twostate solution. The time is soon arriving where leaders are going to have to make difficult decisions. We are close to that time, if not at it, and i think we understand the circumstances within which we are working. Woodruff but today, israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu criticized the actions of palestinian president mahmoud abbas. He said it was an outrage that abbas glorified recently released palestinian prisoners by calling them heroes. Doctors in israel reported former Prime Minister ariel sharon is clinging to life after suffering from a critical malfunction of various organs. Sharon had a stroke while still in office in 2006 and has been in a coma ever since. Hes never regained full consciousness, but his family says that he occasionally blinks his eyes and moves his fingers. 52 passengers aboard a Russian Research ship stranded in the Antarctic Ice were finally rescued today. They had been stuck since christmas eve. We have a report narrated by Sangeeta Kandola of independent television news. Helicopters to take us home thanks, everyone its 5 30 on 2nd of january and weve just heard. That the that the helicopters are coming in just behind me. If all goes well well be off in an hours time. 52 passengers have been transport from the russian street which has been trapped by thick ice sheets since christmas eve. The crew have remained with the vessel while the team of scientists are now safely on the australian icebreaker the aurora. The task to free them from the frozen ice has been plagued by a number of problems. Three icebreakers were initially dispatched to try to crack their way through the thick ice surrounding the ship, but all failed. The rescued groups view has remained the same for days, until now. The australian vessel theyve boarded will take them on a scenic route to tasmania, arriving around midjanuary before they head home. Woodruff an undocumented mexican immigrant can now be licensed to practice law in california. The state Supreme Court made that unanimous ruling today in favor of sergio garcia. His case was seen as a test of the New California law that authorizes the court to let qualified applicants into the state bar regardless of their immigration status. Changes to the g. E. D. Exam rolled out today in the first overhaul to the High School Equivalency test in more than a decade. The revamped test now focuses more on the skills needed for college and the workplace, and it will only be offered on the computer. More than 700,000 people took the g. E. D. In 2012. The new year of trading on wall street got off to a sour start, with Technology Stocks slumping the most. The Dow Jones Industrial average lost 135 points to close at 16,441. The nasdaq fell 33 points to close at 4,143. Oil also plummeted by nearly 3 a barrel in new york trading as libya prepared to reopen a major oil field. Still to come on the newshour millions start Health Coverage under the Affordable Care act; the recent release of some Guantanamo Bay detainees; Silicon Valleys push toward robotics; the fight over veterans pensions; plus, the Obama Administrations new years resolutions. Woodruff january 1 marked the first day of coverage for Many Americans under the Affordable Care act. Jeffrey brown updates the Health Care Laws rollout. Earlier this week the Obama Administration released official enrollment figures showing at 1. 1 Million People have signed up for Health Insurance using the federal exchange, with more than 975,000 of those coming during the month of december. Another 900,000 people registered through the individual state exchanges for a total of 2. 1 million. A quick surge but short of an Early Administration estimate of 3. 3 Million People would sign up by the start of 2014. Julie appleby of Kaiser Health news joins me now for an update. Welcome back. Thank you. Brown first, after all thats happened its probably useful just to remind people what actually happened when this all kicked in . What were the important changes . This is a key date because it was a milestone in a way. A lot of the key provision of the Health Care Law kicked in so things like insurers can no longer reject people who have medical conditions. They can no longer charge men or women more than men. They can no longer set annual lifetime dollar limits on coverage. So a lot of these things went into effect. The other dee thing that went into effect yesterday was that starting this year americans who dont have coverage could face a penalty fine if they dont get that coverage by march 31z. Brown now the overall incomes that i just referred to, we saw this jump in the last month, last week, actually, how is all that being read . The administration had a press conference earlier this week and they touted the fact that 975,000 people signed up for coverage in december. And thats a big number. They say that shows that they resolved many of the problems that were plaguing their web suite since it started in october. But that number is still well short, you know, even when you add them all together you have 2 Million People between the federal exchange and state exchanges, when you add those together as you mentioned were still short of what the administration was estimating they would have by this time. And were still short of that 7 million that they are hoping to get by the end of this year. Brown what about the mix of people signing up . How much can we tell at this point, especially young people . Thats i key thing. We want to know how many young people are signing up because they will presumably offset the cost of older people. Reporters have asked the Administration Many times on the age, the Health Status of folks signing up, whether they had insurance before. We dont have that information. They havent given it to you us yet. Some states have posted this information. So in california, for example, in november they said about 22 of the people signing up were younger people, ages 18 to 34. And that tracks pretty closely with their share of the population in that state. But that was november. We dont knows whats happened since then. Many Health Policy experts are telling reporters that its not simply the age thats important. They want to get people insurancers and actuaries want to get people signed up who are healthy. They could be older Healthy People as well. But well just have to wait, i think, until the end of march to know a little bit more about the final number. Brown what about, there had been a belief, even a concern that there would be like a surge, a floods of appointments and people going to the doctors right away. What do you know about that . What do you know so far, i know its early so maybe a lot of this is anecdotal about things like that, things about surprises people may have found when they tried to use their insurance. This is the big concern. Whats going to happen in january, right. Will people show up at the doctor, the hospital, the pharmacy and find out theyre not enrolled. Will they be able to get an appointment. Brown thinking that they will. And a that forsome reason they arent. The white house is worried about this. Because if people dont pay their first month premium they are not official officially enrolled. Many people have until january 10th to pay that premium but not all cases. So the white house is sayings call your insurer, make sure are you enrolled. This is going to be a key thing. How will this play out in january. What is going to happen with folks, this will play into the narrative as we go forward this year year as to how well this law is working out. Brown i saw that there were some pharmacies offering extended supplies of prescription drugs to tide people over during this uncertain period s that it. Both walgreens and cvs say they will help some folks who perhaps dont have their permanent i. D. Card yet from their insurer or are still caught up in some of the technical difficulties in getting enrolled, with some transitional coverage of 15 to 30 day supply, in certain circumstances. So those two pharmacies say they will help some folks. Brown in the meantime one provision involving contraception has been it was put on hold really by the Supreme Court. Tell us about that. Right, right, under the law employers are required to cover contraceptive as Preventive Care without a copay for the enrollees. This is obviously been very controversial particularly among some catholic institutions. So some religiously affiliated employers were offered a compromise. And this compromise basically says that they dont directly have to pay for this contraceptive coverage. They can certify that this is opposed to their religious beliefs and the insurer will then cover that for their employees. A number of religious groups including this group of nuns that brought there case before the Supreme Court said that is an inadequate compromise. Because in effect it still requires them to say that, you know, we are authorizing contraceptive coverage so they brought this to the court. The court has said were going to temporarily stay this for this group of nuns and a few other groups. And theyve given the Obama Administration until tomorrow to respond. Brown and very briefly as you say, were going to watch, i mean this battle continues, right, with every side watching what happens right now, through january, certainly. Right. Were going to hear a lot. So this law is very broad and complex, so there are some people who have gotten coverage. Theyre paying less, some have gotten a subsidy, some have gotten coverage that never had it before because they had a medical condition. So we will hear those stories but we will also hear people are paying more, doctors not in their network. Are surprised by the amount of the deductible and they will be unhappy. So we will hear those stories as well. This will be a battle i think well hear the rest of the year particularly as we get closer to the november elections and well have to stay tuned. Brown a battle of health care stories. Julie appleby of Kaiser Health news, thanks so much. Okay, thank you. Woodruff the pentagon announced a significant milestone was reached this week in the long saga to close the prison in Guantanamo Bay. The last three ethnic uighers from china were released and sent to slovakia. A total of 22 uighers were captured after the u. S. Invaded afghanistan in 2001. They were found not to be a threat, and a judge ordered them freed in 2008, but the u. S. Struggled to find a place to send them. All told, nine detainees were transferred in december. So, just who has been released and under what conditions . And what will happen to the remaining 155 prisoners . For that, we turn to the state departments special envoy for guantanamo closure, cliff sloan. Thank you, happy to be here. Woodruff so there was a swamp in the release of prisons for a period of two years until you came in this summer. Just in the last month as we said, several released. Whats changed since youve been there . Well, judy, as you know in may the president gave a speech at the National Defense university. And he strongly reiterated and renewed his commitment to close guantanamo. And hes been very committed to closing it from the beginning. And in this speech he said we are going to move forward on transfers. Were going to move forward on closing the facility. He announced the appointment of special envoys at the state department and the Defense Department who would be focused and moving forward on closure. I started the beginning of july. Paul lewis, my counterpart at t Defense Department started in november. And so we are moving full speed ahead. And im also pleased that we are able to work with congress in the last few months to change the law in a way that remove some of the obstacles and restrictions that had lead to that slump that you referred to. And i think thats also going to be very helpful to us. Is that what made the difference. And how did you prioritize who was going to be released first among these. In terms of changing the law and the law will be different in 2014, i think that is going to help us very much in moving forward with the transfers. In terms of prioritizing the transfers, lets step back for a second and have an overview of the facility. 155 detainees are there right now. 76 now are approved for transfer. 79 are not approved for transfer. And when i say a trov approved for transfer, theres a very important point that i think people dont realize, which is that the executive branch in 2009 and 2010 undertook a very rigorous review by the National Security agencies and departments. And those who are approved for transfer were unanimously determined that they should be transferred, subject to appropriate security arrangements and humane treatment. Woodruff but they were no longer a threat. Well, that they should be transferred subject to appropriate security and humane treatment, assurances and agreements with other countries, that there was no need to continue to hold them. And so those are the priority. And we have been moving forward as aggressively and quickly as we can on those approved for transfer. Now let me just say. Woodruff can i just say, has the holdup then in finding the countries, the places that will take them . Well, its a its a complicated process which includes, as i said, the congressional restrictions which we