Weekend, but not before his weekend address. Time to finish the job by cutting the deficit 4 billion. You can make bigger cuts to education and job training and Social Security benefits. Senior citizens and working families to bear the burden of deficit reduction, while the wealthiest are asked to do nothing more. That wont work, we cant cut our way to prosperity. Republicans arent holding back, criticizing the president over the upcoming threat of sequestration, if nothing is done to avoid it, massive funding cuts to the federal government will be triggered march 1st. In his state of the union address, these cuts were a really bad idea. What the president failed to mention was that the sequester was his idea proposed by his administration, and the debt limit negotiations in 2011. And now we in the house on behalf of our constituents are calling on the president to join us in replacing the sequester with better, more responsible spending cuts. Meanwhile, a glimpse of the president s personal side in a rare moment, he discussed his own childhood while talking about family values in his adoptive hometown of chicago. We have single moms out here, heroic of what they are doing. We are so proud of them. But at the same time, i wish i had a father who was around and involved. Joining me now, nbc news correspondent kristen welker, good saturday morning to you, kristen. That was very revealing. Does the president see this as a particularly personal cause . I think he does see this as a personal problem this is part of his broader strategy. The president using more emotional appeal as he has argued for stiffer gun control laws. Thats an uphill battle, not just with congressional republicans, but a number of democrats. The president showing this other side of himself as he makes this case, not only for stiffer gun control laws, but really investing in inner cities like chicago. As you pointed out, chicago is his adoptive hometown. The city where the first lady grew up, they raised the first daughter there for a number of years before they were actually the first daughters and of course, the city gave birth to president obamas political career this is personal for him. Chicago, one of the cities at the epicenter of the gun violence debate because of the high rate of violence, and it witnessed the murder of hadiya penned heelton, chit teen who performed at president obamas inauguration and then gunned down in a random act of violence. Take a listen. There was something profound and uniquely hal are heart braking about a group of 6yearolds killed. But last year there were 443 murders with a firearm on the streets of this city. And 65 of those victims were 18 and under some of thats t that equivalent of a newtown every four months. Reporter alex, also unique about president obamas comments yesterday, he talked about the root of gun violence and said it was due to economic inequalities, broken homes and again, called for investing in these community as a way to try to prevent this violence. His fry speech came on the heels of a series of speeches he delivered this past week to sell the core message of the state of the union address. We timed it out, and fridays speech was the longest of all of them. Kristen, thank you very much for the live report. Well see you again. The president s call to raise minimum wage. Will that happen . Well talk about that coming up at the bottom of the hour. In russia, cleanup crews hard at work after the Meteor Strike yesterday. We are live with the very latest from london and good day to you, annabelle. New numbers on how big this was and the kind of damage it did. Pretty outstanding. Reporter thats right, alex. Good morning. A big cleanup going on in chelybinsk. The shock wave blew out windows in more than 4,000 buildings. This is a really cold area. Local officials promised they will get all the windows fixed within a week. Thats a long time to wait when your midday temperature there is about 10 fahrenheit. So lots of people out there today, busy blocking up the windows and the glazers will be extremely busy the next few days. 1,200 people injured, 200 children. 15 remain in the hospital, 1 in a coma. Most injuries caused by flying, breaking glass as you can see in the pictures. What happened, the meteor flew across the sky, everybody saw the strange light, ran to the windows and, boom, all the windows the huge blast and the glass shattered in those winos across this area. There were also reports that a chunk had fallen into a lake, a chunk of the meteor. Divers are busy looking for the large chunk under this icecrusted lake. So far, nothing found. We understand the meteor traveling at 19 miles a second and it was 50 feet in diameter, it broke apart about 20 miles above the earth. But there is some discrepancy between what russian scientists are estimating for the size and what american scientists are saying regarding the size. But no question, alex. This was a very, very big, cosmic event in russia. Well, you know, annabelle, looking at the pictures, just remarkable and you absolutely describe how people of course would you go to your window to try to see whats going on. Who knew glass would shatter like that. The asteroid misses us by 17,000 miles yesterday. Folks in san francisco, california, are saying they saw something streaking. It just so peculiar. Are scientists talking about anything unusual happening . They say this is just a huge and extraordinary coincidence. We get a hit the size of the one that took place in russia yesterday about once in 100 years. The fact that there was another asteroid spotted that missed earth on the same day is just a huge coincidence. Weve got nothing to be worried about, alex. Okay. Were going to take your word for it Annabelle Roberts from london. Thank you so much. Back in the u. S. , time for your weekend forecast. And we have nbc meteorologist dylan dreyer with that. Good morning, alex. Colder air working into the northeast and it comes with snow. Were seeing snow across the dakotas right now that will dip into nebraska and eventually into kansas later on today, cold air surging in from the north and creating lakeeffect snow on the great lakes. You can see the cold front stretching from new england to parse of flori parts of florida. Where were seeing most of our rainfall right now. The cold blast will surge in here. Belowaverage temperatures as we head into today and sunday. Thats when we see the coldest of the temperatures. But you can see where were even dealing with snow across portions of North Carolina into virginia, and its in that area where we have a winter storm advisory. It looks like well see 1 to 3 inches of snow in that area. Moving north, Winter Weather advisories, warnings and blizzard warnings across portions of eastern maine. There is the chance we could in Northern New England see another foot of snow. And, again, that would be in the northern extremes of maine, but were also looking at the potential for three to six inches across the eastern coast of massachusetts to rhode island. Dealing with light snow today and tomorrow in new england, elsewhere, also about the cold for today. Highs in minneapolis, 18 degrees, so belowaverage temperatures working back across the country. Alex. Dylan, thank you for that. One day passengers aboard an illfated Carnival Cruise line, one of them is filing a lawsuit. A woman from texas is suing carnival for negligence, fraud, and breach of contract which she claims led to the deplorable conditions on the ship. Reaction from some passengers thursday when they got back to dry land. We didnt have water, we didnt have showers for a while. We didnt have hot meals. It was literally liking being in a floating portapotty. Human waste everywhere. The crew, unbelievable. Those guys had worse conditions than we did, and they were serving us. Lets go to mark potter, in mobile, alabama. What a story, mark. Its wrapped up on one level, except now there is this lawsuit what do we know about that . Reporter a lot more to follow. That lawsuit was filed in miami, alex, by a passenger from texas seeking damages. She accuses Carnival Cruise lines of negligence and fraud and says she was quoting from the lawsuit, injured as a result of the unsatisfactoea wo unsafe conditions. Carnival cruiselines says it has not yet seen the lawsuit so cannot comment. The triumph has been moved to a shipyard for extensive cleanup and repairs. The investigation now under way. Since this ship is registered in bahamas, the bahamanian Maritime Authority is the lead investigative authority, but the coast guard and ntsb are also heavily involved. They are trying to determine how the fire broke out, how it was handled and ultimately trying to prevent Something Like this from ever happening again. Real kudos to the crew. Ive heard nothing but applause for their efforts under really what they were living in really deplorable conditions. Have you heard anything otherwise . No. Not really. Some of the passengers have complained about not being properly informed at the time of the fire, some of the people we talked to said that was the worst moment actually. When the fire broke out, they knew something was going on, but not getting enough information. That scared them. But they also said the ones we talked to, said the crew in the same conditions that they were in, but having to work on top of it, did a remarkable job and kudos all around, again, according to the people we spoke to. There is at least one silver lining. Mark potter, thank you very much, from mobile. The good, bad, and ugly surrounding chuck hagels nomination. Is it all personal . ] [ justin ] mulligan sir. Mulligan. Take a mulligan. I took something for my sinuses, but i still have this cough. [ male announcer ] truth is, a lot of sinus products dont treat cough. They dont . [ male announcer ] nope, but alka seltzer plus severe sinus does it treats your worst sinus symptoms, plus that annoying cough. [ angry gibberish ] [ fake coughs ] sorry that was my fault sir. [ male announcer ] alka seltzer plus severe sinus. [ breathes deeply ] oh, what a relief it is [ male announcer ] try alka seltzer plus severe sinus day and night for complete relief from your worst sinus symptoms. We all work remotely so this is a big deal, our first full Team Gathering i wanted to call on a few people. Ashley, ashley marshall. Here. Since were often all on the move, ashley suggested we use fedex office to hold packages for us. Great job. [ applause ] thank you. And on a protocol note, id like to talk to tim hill about his tendency to use all caps in emails. [ shouting ] oh im sorry guys. Ah sometimes the caps lock gets stuck on my keyboard. Hey do you wanna get a drink later . [ male announcer ] hold packages at any fedex office location. Can make any old day a special occasion. So she makes her new mini cream pies with real cream filling and milk chocolate on a cookiecrumb crust. Marie callenders. Its time to savor. And milk chocolate on a cookiecrumb crust. A hybrid . Most are just no fun to drive. Now, heres one that will make you feel alive. Meet the fivepassenger ford cmax hybrid. Cmax says ha. Cmax says wheeee. Which is what you get, dont you see . Cause cmax has lots more horsepower than prius v, a hybrid that cmax also bests in mpg. Say hi to the allnew 47 combined mpg cmax hybrid. Its shocking that my republican colleagues would leave the nation without a fully empowered secretary of defense for the sake of our national security, lets put aside this political theater and thats what it is. Its tragic that theyve died decided to filibuster this qualified nominee. Its really unfortunate. It gotting youly and really personal in the battle over the chuck hagel nominee for defense secretary. Joining me now, political reporter lauren fox and political reporter aaron blake. Thank you for joining me. Good morning. Lauren, well start with you. Whats the status of the whole thing . Where are we in the process . We dont have a secretary a new secretary of defense right now. What happened was republicans really wanted more questions answered when it came to the nominee, chuck hagel. They wanted to know nor information about what happened in benghazi and more information about chuck hagels financial records and some of the groups he had spoken in front of, but harry reid said they had enough time, this had gotten voted out of committee, and he was ready for the vote, even though they didnt have the 60vote threshold that republicans asked for. Right now, chuck hagel in limbo. Okay. Are you right to milwaukee a distinction, we dont have a new secretary of defense. Leon pan 80 is not going anywhere until this is over. No, no. Very active. And here is the reaction by harry reid to the filibuster. Lets listen. The filibuster of senator hag hagels nomination is unprecedenced. I repeat never in the history of our country has a secretary of defense nominee been filibustered. Never, ever. Has this ever happened before . Anything similar . Or are we talking about the details to secretary of defense nominees . It is unpress denned for a secretary of defense nominee. The closest example to a cabinetlevel position being filibustered or attempted to be filibustered is steven johnson, epa secretary under president bush. Some tried to filibuster him, they couldnt get enough votes. That wasnt technically a cabinetlevel position or an actual cabinet position this is actually the first time that a cabinet secretary has been filibustered, and republicans dont want to call it a filibuster, thats the practical effect of what we see here today. Lets take a listen to what senator john mccain said about the issues that republicans have about chuck hagel. To be honest with you, neil, it goes back to there is a lot of ill will toward senator hagel, because when he was a republican, he attacked president bush, mercilessly at one point said he was the worst president since herbert hoover, said that the surge was the worst blunder since the vietnam war, which is nonsense, and was very anti his own party and people. People dont forget that. You can disagree, but if you are disagreeab disagreeable, people dont forget that. What is the gop strategy here . They creating more bad pr for the people. Do people really think he wont be confirmed . Republicans are dragging their feet, not because they dont think he will be confirmed. They dont like his views on israel and iran. Many of them were not fond of him. Very critical of the Bush Administration and of the surge in iraq. One of the situations where he will eventually be confirmed. In the meantime, i dont know if its bad pr for the republicans, Many Americans not glued to the Television Watching this confirmation hearing unfold. We may see enough time between now and the next Congressional Election for republicans to make up for dragging their feet on this particular issue. Aaron, it sounds very personal from john mccain there. Is that the situation . Is this a personal i guess not attack, but you following up on that level . Yeah, i thought mccains comments were particularly interesting. You generally dont see somebody acknowledge that its that personal to them. I think this is very much personal, political, you know, and policy oriented. A lot not to like with chuck hagel as far as republicans go. Not that he just deserted the party and spoke ill of the iraq war strategy. A lot of the stuff he said about israel. A very important thing to republicans and the republican base. Even absent the personal stuff that mccain was talking about. I think republicans would find a lot not to like about his nomination. Very quickly before i let you both go, i want to ask you about sequester, a couple weeks away. What is conventional wisdom is it going to happen, lauren . Conventional wisdom is that the sequester train is rolling and nobody is trying to stop it. Republicans are divided within their own party, between the deficit hawks and defense hawks. They would like to see cuts rather than go with the president s plan, which involves freezing more revenues with the tax loophole system. What do you think, aaron . What happens toward the end of the debate, one side says were going over the cliff, going to the sequester, say were done negotiating, this is going to happen and what they are really saying, i want the other side to give me everything i want in order to avert this disaster. Thats where republicans are right now. They are more prepared to go over the life, so to speak, but i think its a negotiating tactic many. Thank you very much. I put out a twitter question today, here it is. Personal, politics or policy . Whats behind the delay in chuck hagels nomination for defense secretary . Ill read some of your tweets throughout the day. Is apple in trouble . Well tell you why it might be. A and reimagined nearly everything in it . Gave it greater horsepower and classleading 38 mpg highway. Advanced headlights. 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Charmin ultra strong helps keep you and your underwear clean. We all go. Why not enjoy the go with charmin ultra strong . [ woman ] too weak. Wears off. Been there. Tried that. Ladybug body milk . No thanks. [ female announcer ] stop searching and start repairing. Eucerin professional repair moisturizes while actually repairing very dry skin. Its so powerful you can skip a day. But light enough you wont want to. Dermatologist recommended eucerin. The end of trial and error has arrived. Try a free sample at eucerinus. Com. Now to the three big money headlines, no carnival for cruiseline passengers. The oracle of omaha see a future in ketchup and sour apple . The cruise turned in a real nightmare for those passengers. The boat adrift for four days. Can this Company Survive . Yes, actually. The analysts i was speaking to, said its pretty much a given it will be able to survive. Even though the stock price took a 3. 7 hit this week. The reason why, in addition to it being a complete pr nightmare this happened in the past