Mitt Romney may not be running for the White House any more, but he certainly came out swinging against President Obama in his first post-election interview with "Fox News Sunday," accusing the president of poisoning the negotiations over automatic spending cuts by "berating" Republicans.
"No one can think" that the fight over the sequester has "been a success for the president," last year's Republican presidential nominee said. "He didn't think the sequester would happen. It is happening, but to date, what we've seen is the president out campaigning to the American people, doing rallies around the country, flying around the country and berating Republicans. And blaming and pointing."
"Now what does that do?" He asked. "That causes the Republicans to retrench and then put up a wall and fight back. It's a very natural human emotion."
The former Massachusetts governor also criticized the recent release of several hundred illegal immigrants detained by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. The agency justified the release as a cost-saving measure forced on them by the across-the-board budget cuts, but Romney argued that the president should have prevented it. "I think if there are people who are incarcerated," he said, the president "should make sure that we're able to keep them in jail."
"Look, it's- again, it's politics," he said. "It's, 'OK, how do we do something that will get a headline that will make it look like those terrible Republicans aren't willing to come together?'"
In the interview, which airs Sunday, Romney also addressed the adjustment to life after the campaign trail. "We were on a roller coaster, exciting and thrilling, ups and downs," he said. "But the ride ends, and then you get off."
His wife Ann Romney, who also sat for the interview, agreed that it has been quite a change but added, "The good news is, fortunately, we like each other."
(CBS News) WASHINGTON - At his news conference Friday, President Obama was asked about his decision to get involved in the battle over same-sex marriage in California's ban on same-sex marriage. Late Thursday, the administration filed a brief with the Supreme Court, saying that California's ban on gays and lesbians marrying violates their constitutional rights.
"If the Supreme Court asks me or my attorney general or solicitor general, 'Do we think that meets constitutional muster?' -- I felt it was important for us to answer that question honestly. And the answer is no," said the president
CBS News chief legal correspondent Jan Crawford spoke with "Evening News" anchor Scott Pelley about the brief and its potential impact. A transcript of the conversation follows.
Obama: If I were on Supreme Court, I'd defend same-sex marriage Obama administration urges Supreme Court to overturn Calif. same-sex marriage ban Clint Eastwood signs pro-gay marriage brief
Scott Pelley: Jan, the court will hear arguments later this month that will impact all of this. I wonder what the president's comments today have to do with the case?
Jan Crawford: Well Scott, as the president said today,"I'm not a judge, I'm the president." His views carry no binding authority in the Supreme Court. Just because the administration is making this argument doesn't mean the court has to go along with it. The federal government is not directly involved in this case -- it's a challenge by same-sex couples in California to a California constitutional amendment that bans gay marriage. The administration chose to get involved to make a strong statement on gay rights that are reflected in his comments today. The brief in fact is more important politically and symbolically than legally.
Pelley: The case is centered on California. Could it have wider-ranging implications?
Crawford: Yes, it certainly could . Even though this case comes from California, it could have an enormous impact across the country. California is one of 30 states that has a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. The decision could affect all of those laws -- that's more than half the states in this country. And if the Supreme Court agrees with the president -- that amendments like California's are unconstitutional -- many or all of those laws banning gay marriage could be in jeopardy.
(CBS News) WASHINGTON - In a surprise Thursday, Army Pfc. Bradley Manning pleaded guilty to ten criminal counts in the biggest leak of classified material in U.S. history. Manning sent files to the website Wikileaks. He still faces trial on more serious charges.
Along with the guilty pleas, Manning gave his first detailed explanation of why he did it.
Reading from a 35-page statement, the Army private said he wanted the world to know the truth about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Depressed and frustrated by the wars, he used his job as a low-ranking intelligence analyst in Baghdad to download onto a CD hundreds of thousands of classified documents -- pus a few videos, one of which depict a helicopter gunship attack that killed two journalists in Iraq, which he found "troubling" because it showed "delightful bloodlust."
Judge accepts Manning's guilty pleas in WikiLeaks case Manning's sexual orientation discussed in court
Describing himself as a misfit in the military, Manning told the judge he first contacted The Washington Post but didn't think the reporter took him seriously; then called The New York Times' tip line but never heard back.
He was home on leave during a blizzard, which paralyzed Washington, and left him stranded at his aunt's house when he decided to send the material to WikiLeaks, the website which had a reputation for exposing secrets.
He included a brief note, ending with "Have a good day," and went back to Iraq with "a sense of relief" and "a clear conscience."
Despite pleading guilty to some of the charges, Manning still faces a court martial and possible life sentence for allegedly aiding the enemy.
Prosecution attorneys have said they intend to show that some of the leaked documents were found by Navy SEALs in their raid on Osama bin Laden's hideout. According to a military attorney, the prosecution does not have to prove Manning intended for the documents to end up in enemy hands -- only that he knew it might happen.
Manning testified that no one at WikiLeaks pressured him for more documents and that he knew what he did was wrong.
(CBS News) WASHINGTON -- The Voting Rights Act has been the law of the land for nearly half a century, helping to ensure that minorities are not denied the right to vote. On Wednesday, Shelby County, Ala., challenged the law at the Supreme Court.
The arguments sharply divided the justices: The court's conservative majority appeared poised to strike down at least part of the act and eliminate the current federal oversight of voting in the South.
At issue is a decades-old provision in the law that requires nine states, mostly in the South, to get approval from the federal government before changing voting laws or procedures.
Justice Antonin Scalia called it a "racial entitlement."
Chief Justice John Roberts asked if the government believed "the citizens in the South are more racist than citizens in the North." Roberts said current data on voter turnout revealed more problems in Massachusetts than in Mississippi.
Congress did not rely on current data when, in 2006, it reauthorized the Voting Rights Act. It continued to rely on rates of minority voter registration and turnout in the elections of 1964, 1968 and 1972.
Will the Voting Rights Act survive the Supreme Court? Proposed changes to Voting Rights Act stir controversy in Alabama
Alabama attorney Frank Ellis said Congress should look at the modern-day South.
Frank Ellis
/ CBS News
"We ask for some recognition that we and these other converted jurisdictions have made great strides over the last 48 years," Ellis said.
The liberal justices strongly defended the law, saying Congress had thousands of pages of evidence documenting discrimination.
"Discrimination is discrimination, and what Congress said is it continues," Justice Sonia Sotomayor said.
Justice Stephen Breyer said, "The disease is still there ... it's gotten a lot better, a lot better, but it's still there."
Debo Adegbile
/ CBS News
That's why civil rights attorney Debo Adegbile said the provision is as necessary today as a generation ago.
"The problems are much more serious, much more repetitive, there is a much greater continuity in certain places than others," Adegbile said.
The liberal justices -- and the Obama administration -- say the court should defer to Congress, which they say is was better situated to make judgments about discrimination in voting. But based on the arguments today, it does appear a majority of the conservative judges are ready to tell Congress it's going to have to make some changes in that law.
(CBS News) -- On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear a challenge to the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965. Both sides agree the south have changed in the past half-century. At issue is, has it changed enough?
In Shelby County, Alabama, the question is whether the state's racist past must forever define it.
(Watch: Voting Rights Act challengers take aim at "Section 5", below)
Fifty years ago, Alabama was the cradle of the civil rights movement, where protestors endured fire hoses, arrests and bombings in the fight for equality. One result was the Voting Rights Act.
One provision of the Act, Section 5, still requires all or part of 16 states, mostly in the south, to get approval from the Justice Department before changing voting procedures or electoral maps.
"Section five, which is what we are attacking, was never intended by congress to be permanent," said Frank Ellis, a Shelby County lawyer who is at the center of the battle to eliminate Section 5, and force the federal government to treat Alabama and other covered states like the rest of the country.
"They are still using the same criteria to determine whether these 16 states that are covered, they are still using the same test that they used in 1965," Ellis said.
"Things have changed in the South," he said. "This is a dynamic society."
But Ernest Montgomery says things have not changed enough. He was on the city council in Calera, Alabama when city officials, facing a population boom, redrew his district map. He lost the election to a white candidate. Under Section 5, the Justice Department ordered a new election and Montgomery won.
The minority representation in his district under the old map was about 67% African American, according to Montgomery. With the new map, that number dropped to about 28%.
Voting Rights Act faces Supreme Court challenge
Voting Rights Act Section 5 "not the only tool" to protect voting rights, Obama says
VIDEO: SCOTUS to hear challenge to Voting Rights Act
Shelby County Pastor Harry Jones calls it discrimination.
"I think it was designed to dilute the power of the minority community," Jones said. "It did just that."
Opponents like Ellis say they are not attacking the entire Voting Rights Act. If there's intentional discrimination, people can sue, just like they do in Michigan, Ohio and other states that aren't by Section Five.
(CBS News) NEW CANAAN, Conn. - "Zero Dark Thirty" took just one minor award at the Oscars last night. There was a lot of debate about the way the film depicted torture during the hunt for Osama bin Laden.
Turns out that wasn't the only controversy.
The film starts with actual voices of victims of September 11, recorded as they made their last phone calls. For Mary and Frank Fetchet, it brings back painful memories. One of those voices was their son Brad, who worked on the 89th floor of the World Trade Center's South Tower.
Mary Fetchet
/ CBS News
"When I arrived home I found Brad's message on our phone, and, of course, these were his last words in my view, because we never heard from him again," Mary said.
"Losing a loved one so horribly -- the ongoing anguish we've been going through -- it's a treasured remembrance, it's a treasured message. It's ours," Frank said.
They say that treasured remembrance was used in the film without their permission.
"My first thought was, 'isn't anything sacred anymore?'" Mary said.
The Fetchets used the recording in testimony for the September 11 Commission, and it has appeared in broadcast TV news reports. But the couple says this is different.
"I used it in situations where I wanted to convey Brad's story," Mary said. "None of those situations were used for promotional or professional or commercial endeavors."
Kathryn Bigelow defends "Zero Dark Thirty" torture scenes Sony exec: "Zero Dark Thirty" does not advocate torture Watch: "Zero Dark Thirty" director Kathryn Bigelow talks torture, art
The film has grossed more than $90 million worldwide. In a statement, the film distributor, Sony, and studio, Annapurna Pictures, say "Zero Dark Thirty" is a "tribute" to the victims of September 11 and "before the film's release, (they) initiated contact with a number of family members of the victims of the 9/11 attacks."
Frank said the statement wasn't enough. "To say they've reached out to families -- yeah, reached to say, 'come to the preview' after the film is already completed," he said.
Harry Ong
/ CBS News
Harry Ong's sister Betty was a flight attendant who was killed on American Airline Flight 11.
"We were never given any notification or asked for permission to use Betty's voice, unlike many documentary companies," Ong said.
"We're asking that they apologize and that they recognize that they used Betty's voice and Brad's and others at liberty."
After the film was released, the Fetchets and Ongs asked Sony and Annapurna for donations to their September 11 charities in exchange for the use of their loved ones' voices. But the filmmakers had already decided to donate to the national 9/11 Memorial Museum.
"The real driver in all of this is getting this record set straight. I'm incensed by it," Frank Fetchet said. "Others run the risk of going through the same thing, so I think this should put a line in the sand that says, 'it's not right.'"
The Fetchets hope that by speaking out, they'll prevent other victims of tragedies from experiencing similar surprises.
Ricky Stenhouse Jr., left, hugs his girlfriend Danica Patrick before her start in the NASCAR Nationwide Series auto race at Daytona International Speedway, Saturday, Feb. 23, 2013, in Daytona Beach, Fla. /AP Photo/Chris O'Meara
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.Danica Patrick made more history at Daytona International Speedway on Sunday.
She became the first woman to lead a lap and was the highest female finisher in the famed Daytona 500. She led five laps and finished eighth. Janet Guthrie had the previous best finish for a woman in the Daytona 500 — 11th in 1980.
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Danica Patrick
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Danica Patrick on making NASCAR history
"You spend a lot of time thinking about what to do when the time comes," Patrick said. "I kept asking up above what was working. You needed a hole, you needed people to help you out. I had a little bit of help today here and there, but I felt like if I was going to dive low, I had a feeling I was going to get freight-trained. ... At the end of the day, it was a solid day."
Patrick, the former IndyCar star and current Sprint Cup rookie, was in position to make a run at winner Jimmie Johnson in the final laps. But Patrick faded, dropping from third to eighth as more experienced drivers passed her.
"We stayed basically in the top 10 all day long," she said. "You can't really complain about that. It was nice."
Patrick stayed out of trouble in a 200-lap race that saw several top contenders knocked out early.
Patrick started the "Great American Race" on the pole after becoming the first woman to qualify in the top spot. She failed to lead the first lap, though, falling behind three-time race winner Jeff Gordon.
Danica Patrick crashes in Daytona qualifier
Daytona 500: Danica Patrick in spotlight
Nonetheless, it was a big moment for NASCAR and Patrick.
But Patrick got her chance to be out front near the midway point. Fans were on their feet as Patrick beat Michael Waltrip to the front of the field on a restart. She led laps 90 and 91 and three more later before making a pit stop.
Patrick also made history as an IndyCar driver. She led 19 laps as a rookie in the 2005 Indianapolis 500, becoming the first woman to lead open-wheel racing's premier event. She finished fourth.
(CBS News) As the automatic budget cuts known in Washington as the sequester draws closer, consider this: the federal government does $500 billion worth of business with private contractors, including as many as 120,000 small businesses.
That's everyone from the makers of nearly a million pairs of combat boots each year to the roughly 700 companies in 44 states that make parts for the Boeing C-17 military transport plane.
Jill Schlesinger, editor at large of CBS MoneyWatch, told "CBS Evening News" Saturday anchor Jim Axelrod that the blunt cuts come during a delicate time of the nation's economic recovery.
"Let's say that we're running a town, and we just had to make these across-the-board spending cuts," Schlesinger said. "What if we had to cut 20 firemen at the exact same we're going to cut 20 librarians? I mean, I love the library, but they are not equal, and what this sequestration does is it equalizes the pain across every single agency without a forethought, without saying, 'Wait a minute, what's important to safety? What's important to actually bringing money in the door?'"
The cuts would drag on the nation's economic growth, Schlesinger said.
"The economy is still fragile," she said. "Yes, we have been in recovery for a couple of years, and that's good, but this is not a robustic recovery. We're not growing at 3 or 3-and-a-half percent. We're only growing by 2 percent."
Still, the cuts aren't likely to have as negative of an effect on Wall Street because investors saw them coming, Schlesinger said.
"They've built it into their models," she said. "They've said, 'OK, we're going to give up a half a percent of growth, but we still believe that we will be able to grow enough so companies can make money.'"
A lot of the investors Schlesinger spoke to said that if things take a turn for the worse they suspect that Congress will come together and do something retroactively to potentially delay the cuts.
"No one," she said, "wants to be in office presiding over an economy that goes into a double-dip."
Watch Schlesinger's full conversation with Axelrod in the player above
YAKIMA, Wash. Six underground tanks that hold a brew of radioactive and toxic waste at the nation's most contaminated nuclear site are leaking, federal and state officials said Friday.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said the leaking material poses no immediate risk to public safety or the environment because it would take a while — perhaps years — to reach groundwater.
But the leaking tanks raise new concerns about delays for emptying them and strike another blow to federal efforts to clean up south-central Washington's Hanford nuclear reservation, where successes often are overshadowed by delays, budget overruns and technological challenges.
Department of Energy spokeswoman Lindsey Geisler said there was no immediate health risk and said federal officials would work with Washington state to address the matter.
Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee, right, is joined by Maia Bellon, director of the Department of Ecology, at a news conference to discuss a tank leak at Hanford Nuclear Reservation, on Friday, Feb. 15, 2013, in Olympia, Wash.
/ AP Photo/Rachel La Corte
State officials just last week announced that one of Hanford's 177 underground tanks was leaking 150 to 300 gallons a year, posing a risk to groundwater and rivers. So far, nearby monitoring wells haven't detected higher radioactivity levels.
Inslee traveled to Washington, D.C., this week to discuss the problem with federal officials. He said Friday that he learned in meetings that six tanks are leaking waste.
"We received very disturbing news today," the governor said. "I think that we are going to have a course of new action and that will be vigorously pursued in the next several weeks."
The federal government built the Hanford facility at the height of World War II as part of the Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb. The remote site produced plutonium for the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, and continued supporting the nation's nuclear weapons arsenal for years.
Today, it is the most contaminated nuclear site in the country, still surrounded by sagebrush but with Washington's Tri-Cities of Richland, Kennewick and Pasco several miles downriver.
Hanford's tanks hold some 53 million gallons of highly radioactive waste — enough to fill dozens of Olympic-size swimming pools — and many of those tanks are known to have leaked in the past. An estimated 1 million gallons of radioactive liquid already leaked there.
The tanks also are long past their intended 20-year life span — raising concerns that even more tanks could be leaking — though they were believed to have been stabilized in 2005.
Inslee said the falling waste levels in the six tanks were missed because only a narrow band of measurements was evaluated, rather than a wider band that would have shown the levels changing over time.
"It's like if you're trying to determine if climate change is happening, only looking at the data for today," he said. "Perhaps human error, the protocol did not call for it. But that's not the most important thing at the moment. The important thing now is to find and address the leakers."
There are legal, moral and ethical considerations to cleaning up the Hanford site at the national level, Inslee said, adding that he will continue to insist that the Energy Department completely clean up the site.
He also stressed the state would impose a "zero-tolerance" policy on radioactive waste leaking into the soil.
Cleanup is expected to last decades and cost billions of dollars.
The federal government already spends $2 billion each year on Hanford cleanup — one-third of its entire budget for nuclear cleanup nationally. The Energy Department has said it expects funding levels to remain the same for the foreseeable future, but a new Energy Department report released this week includes annual budgets of as much as $3.5 billion during some years of the cleanup effort.
Much of that money goes toward construction of a plant to convert the underground waste into glasslike logs for safe, secure storage. The plant, last estimated at more than $12.3 billion, is billions of dollars over budget and behind schedule. It isn't expected to being operating until at least 2019.
Given those delays, the federal government will have to show that there is adequate storage for the waste in the meantime, Inslee said.
"We are not convinced of this," he said. "There will be a robust exchange of information in the coming weeks to get to the bottom of this."
Inslee and Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber have championed building additional tanks to ensure safe storage of the waste until the plant is completed. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said earlier this week that he shares their concerns about the integrity of the tanks but he wants more scientific information to determine it's the correct way to spend scarce money.
Tom Carpenter of Hanford Challenge, a Hanford watchdog group, said Friday it's disappointing that the Energy Department is not further along on the waste treatment plant and that there aren't new tanks to transfer waste into.
"None of these tanks would be acceptable for use today. They are all beyond their design life. None of them should be in service," he said. "And yet, they're holding two-thirds of the nation's high-level nuclear waste."
Wyden noted the nation's most contaminated nuclear site — and the challenges associated with ridding it of its toxic legacy — will be a subject of upcoming hearings and a higher priority in Washington, D.C.
ST. LOUIS Powdery snow, up to a foot and a half in some places, bombarded much of the nation's midsection Thursday, impeding travel and shutting down airports, schools and state legislatures.
The widespread winter storm system swirled to the north and east Thursday night, its snow, sleet and freezing rain prompting winter storm warnings in Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri and Illinois.
Corey Mead, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., said the winter storm would be centered in the upper Midwest by Friday morning.
"Even across Kansas, the snowfall rates should continue to taper off through the evening," Mead said.
Chris Suchan, chief meteorologist at CBS affiliate KCTV Kansas City, told "CBS Evening News" anchor Scott Pelley Thursday that the worst is over with. "This morning we had widespread thundersnow from Levenworth, Kansas [and] Overland Park to Warrensburg, Missouri," Suchan said. "Snowfall rates of 2 to 3 inches per hour brought this area to its knees with our motoristsbridges were closed for a while.
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The sound and fury of "thundersnow"
"Now what we're anticipating is another round for this evening, perhaps another 2 to 4 inches of snowfall, some freezing drizzle right now, and wind chills in the single digits. The storm total for us is about 8 to 12-14 inches of snowfall for Kansas City."
The system left behind impressive snow accumulations, especially in western Kansas, where 17 inches fell in Hays.
Several accidents and two deaths were blamed on icy and slushy roadways; two people died in crashes Wednesday. Most schools in Kansas and Missouri, and many in neighboring states, were closed. Legislatures shut down in Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, Nebraska and Iowa.
National Weather Service meteorologist Scott Truett said the "thundersnow" that rumbled through Kansas and Missouri earlier Thursday was the result of an unstable air mass, much like a thunderstorm.
Chuck Carroll, center, uses a snowblower to clear the sidewalk in front of his business in downtown Salina, Kan., Feb. 21, 2013.
/ AP Photo/Salina Journal
"Instead of pouring rain, it's pouring snow," Truett said. And pouring was a sound description, with snow falling at a rate of 2 inches per hour or more in some spots.
Topeka got 3 inches of snow in one 30-minute period, leaving medical center worker Jennifer Carlock to dread the drive home.
"It came on fast," Carlock said as she shoveled around her car. "We're going to test out traction control on the way home."
Snow totals passed the foot mark in many places: Monarch Pass, Colo., had 17-and-a-half inches, the Kansas cities of Hutchinson, Macksville and Hanston all saw 14 inches, and Wichita, Kan., had 13 inches. A few places in far northern Oklahoma saw between 10 to 13-and-a-half inches of snow. Missouri's biggest snow total was 10 inches, shared by the Kansas City metropolitan area, Rockport in the northwest corner and Moberly in the central part of the state.
Transportation officials in affected states urged people to simply stay home.
"If you don't have to get out, just really, please, don't do it," Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback said.
Drivers were particularly warned away from the Kansas Turnpike, which had whiteout conditions. Interstate 70 was also snow-packed, and a 200-mile stretch was closed between Salina and Colby.
A firefighter places wheelblocks as he prepares to extinguish a vehicle fire in Lawrence, Kan., Feb. 21, 2013. The car caught on fire trying to make it up a snow covered hill.
/ AP Photo
Cases of wine and beer -- as well as bottles of scotch and whiskey -- were flying off the shelves at Ingersoll Wine and Spirits ahead of the storm's arrival in Des Moines, Iowa.
"A lot of people have been buying liquor to curl up by the fire," wine specialist Bjorn Carlson said.
NWS forecasts showed 3 to 9 inches of snow were expected in Iowa overnight, and Nebraska will see an additional 2 to 5 inches.
Heavy, blowing snow caused scores of businesses in Iowa and Nebraska to close early, including two malls in Omaha, Neb. Mardi Miller, manager of Dillard's department store in Oakview Mall, said most employees had been sent home by 4 p.m., and she believed "only two customers are in the entire store."
The storm brought some relief to a region that has been parched by the worst drought in decades.
Vance Ehmke, a wheat farmer near Healy, Kan., said the nearly foot of snow was "what we have been praying for." Climatologists say 12 inches of snow is equivalent to about 1 inch of rain, depending on the density of the snow.
"The big question is, `Is the drought broke?' " Ehmke asked.
Near Edwardsville, Ill., farmer Mike Campbell called the precipitation a blessing after a bone-dry growing season in 2012. He hopes it is a good omen for the spring.
"The corn was just a disaster," Campbell said of 2012.
In Colorado, the U.S. Forest Service planned to take advantage of the snow to burn piles of dead trees on federal land. Areas in the Texas Panhandle also had up to 8 inches of snow, and in south central Nebraska, Grand Island reported 10 inches of snow. And Arkansas saw a mix of precipitation -- a combination of hail, sleet and freezing rain in some place, 6 inches of snow in others.
Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency Thursday morning. All flights at Kansas City International Airport were canceled for Thursday night, and officials said they'd prepare to reopen Friday morning. More than 320 flights at Lambert Airport in St. Louis were canceled by Thursday afternoon. Traffic throughout the state was snarled by hundreds of accidents and vehicles in ditches.
(CBS News) CULPEPER, Va. -- Cameras and microphones are virtually everywhere these days, and it seems just about everything that happens is preserved forever on the internet.
Of course, it wasn't always that way. The Library of Congress has just reported that 80 percent of motion pictures filmed before 1930 -- and countless audio recordings from that era -- are gone. But the library has a plan to stop this bleeding of priceless history.
A 1936 Louis Armstrong recording is an artifact nearly lost to time. It's a nickel-plated disc widely used to record sound in the first half of the 20th century.
Patrick Loughney
/ CBS News
"It's the equivalent to an original camera negative for a motion picture," says Patrick Loughney, who is leading the effort to save these cultural relics for the Library of Congress.
"What goes on here is the archaeology of American popular audio-visual history," Loughney says.
When you think of the Library of Congress, you think of old documents and typewriter-smudged papers. Not here.
"It's quite remarkable that the library, very early on, got into the acquisition of sound recordings and then radio programs," Loughney says. "They were considered a cultural record."
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Cylinders invented by Thomas Edison in the 1800s were recently donated by a private collector. They are the first known devices to record sound.
"It was literally beeswax, so it could melt if you heated it up too high or dropped it would break," says Loughney.
One recording, now digitally restored, is an 1896 campaign song for William McKinley.
Watch: Library of Congress sports interviews go beyond wins and losses, below.
The library has 90 miles of shelves at its 45-acre conservation campus in Culpeper, Va. Here, specialists are preserving more than a million motion pictures, including an 1894 film called "Annabel Butterfly." It's one of the oldest known films ever restored -- each frame was originally colored by hand.
Technicians have digitized thousands of TV shows, including the only appearance of The Doors on "The Ed Sullivan Show." They've even restored color to a 1975 blues documentary.
"There is a growing amnesia about America past," Loughney says. "Our job is to try and bolster that American memory, try to save it for future generations who might find value in what we're preserving."
A mission to re-record America's cultural past and preserve it for a digital future.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. Kansas City police say it appears a car crashed into a gas main before a massive fire erupted in an upscale shopping and entertainment district.
Police spokeswoman Rhonda Flores said injuries were reported Tuesday but she didn't know how many or how severe. She says an initial call for three ambulances had been increased to 10.
CBS affiliate KCTV Kansas City reported witnesses seeing customers and workers running out of a restaurant covered in blood.
Flores said it appears a car crashed into a gas main near a restaurant in the area known as The Country Club Plaza about 6:03 p.m. She says the crash appeared to be accidental.
Dozens of firefighters and other emergency responders could be seen battling a massive blaze that appeared to have engulfed an entire block, with flames burning through building roofs.
Black smoke is swirling in the air and debris litters surrounding streets.
(CBS News) WASHINGTON -- Over the weekend, a partial White House plan for immigration reform leaked to the press and caused an uproar.
White House officials tell CBS News that what was leaked is real -- it's a partial draft of half a bill. What we know is the administration's current thinking about what to do about the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants living in the United States right now.
The administration wants a temporary four-year visa to provide legal status -- meaning no more deportations -- that could be renewed. After eight years, they can apply for what's known as permanent legal residency, or, more commonly, a Green Card.
(At left, watch White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough discuss the leaked immigration plan on "Face the Nation.")
There's also administration thinking on border security and an unspecified increase in border security, subject to negotiations with Congress. For workers who try to find jobs in the future and who might not have documents, the plan includes an E-Verify system to make sure undocumented workers aren't given jobs.
GOP: Leaked WH immigration plan "counterproductive" W.H. immigration plan circulating in case Congress talks "break down," McDonough says
What's missing is a section dealing with all future legal immigration issues: high-skilled workers, seasonal farm workers and workers who work in hotels or restaurants. Without that, this plan doesn't have much of a chance.
The plan is not likely to get through Congress without the section dealing with legal immigration. That's why Republicans were so critical this weekend.
Last year, Republicans criticized the president for being missing in action and failing to draft a bill. Now that he admits he is, Republicans say he's contaminating that process; they argue that if you don't have a comprehensive bill -- one that can pass Republicans and Democrats in both the House and Senate -- this is a futile effort.
The White House says Republicans are going to be dared to vote up or down eventually, and that they better get used to that.
BENGHAZI, Libya Col. Faraj el-Dersi, who defected to the rebel side from Muammar Qaddafi's police force, was gunned down late last year on the streets of Benghazi, and he bled to death in the arms of his teenage daughter.
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Elections in Libya
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The life of Muammar Qaddafi
As Libya on Sunday marked the second anniversary of the start of the uprising that toppled Qaddafi, the death of el-Dersi and nearly 40 other similar slayings are seen as evidence that some in the country are too impatient for a political system that has yet to deliver justice and national reconciliation.
Suspicion in many of the killings of senior security and military officials has fallen on Islamists who were brutally suppressed under Qaddafi. Now, they have become among the most powerful groups in the new Libya, particularly in the east, with heavily armed militias at their command.
And they are settling old scores themselves, rather than wait for transitional justice — the process of society punishing or forgiving the abuses of the old regime.
Mustafa al-Kufi, a 59-year-old former prisoner and political activist, said the various post-Qaddafi governments and the current parliament are all fearful that if they head down the path of transitional justice, many members of the ruling class would be among those punished for past wrongdoing.
"This is a very pressing issue and a core demand in the street," said al-Kufi, who spent 12 years in prison under Qaddafi.
"We need to know who did what and then ask families of the victims for forgiveness. But since this didn't take place, violence will continue because there is no justice.
Like other Arab countries that ousted authoritarian leaders, Libya is now mired in a chaotic and violent transition to a new society. It is plagued by unruly and heavily armed militias that have slowly come under a unified command but remain filled with hard-liners who were in the front line in the war against Qaddafi.
The transition is further complicated by an autonomy movement in the oil-rich east, a central government too weak to exert its authority across the vast desert nation, and heavily armed Islamic extremists who are pressing to fill a power vacuum.
The civil war swept Qaddafi from power, but the bitterness and rage lingers in a country where the authoritarian government imprisoned, tortured and killed its opponents.
Hana al-Gallal, a prominent Benghazi lawyer, said allowing old regime figures to be part of the new order will only fuel more violence.
"Those whose sons were killed, their dreams shattered by the Qaddafi regime, will seek revenge when they see them back in power," she said. "The result is assassinations."
Some of the anger is directed at those who were in the old government — from low-level police officials to ex-ministers who are now police chiefs and lawmakers. That has prompted a push to prevent those with ties to the former leadership from serving in positions of power.
Libya's parliament, the General National Congress, is debating a draft bill that would bar anyone deemed to have had ties to the former regime from state institutions for 10 years. A version of the draft law published on the GNC's website last week listed 36 reasons for excluding Libyans from political life.
They include those who participated in Qaddafi's coup in 1969; members of the notorious Revolutionary Guards, which were formed to hunt down the dictator's opponents; those who took part in reform efforts in the 2000s led by Qaddafi's son, Seif al-Islam; and those who worked for leading magazines, newspapers, news agencies or served as an ambassador under Qaddafi.
The bill's supporters say such sweeping measures are needed to allow the ministries and state institutions in the fledgling democracy to develop free of the toxic influence and corruption of the Qaddafi era and to stop the cycles of bloodshed like what happened in Benghazi.
CHELYABINSK, Russia A small army of workers set to work Saturday to replace acres of windows shattered by the enormous explosion from a meteor, while other residents contemplated the astonishing event with pride and humor.
The fireball that streaked into the sky over Chelyabinsk at about sunrise Friday was undeniably traumatic. Nearly 1,200 people were reported injured by the shock wave from the explosion, estimated to be as strong as 20 Hiroshima atomic bombs.
But it also brought a sense of cooperation and humor to a tough industrial city in a troubled region. Large numbers of volunteers came forward to help fix the damage caused by the explosion and many residents came together on the Internet — first to find out what happened and soon to make jokes about it.
One of the most popular jests: Residents of the meteor were terrified to see Chelyabinsk approaching.
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Meteorites fall from the sky in Russia
Chelyabinsk, nicknamed Tankograd because it produced the famed Soviet T-34 tanks, can be as grim as its backbone heavy industries. Long winters where temperatures routinely hit minus-30 Celsius (minus-4 Fahrenheit) add to a general dour mien, as do worries about dangerous facilities in the surrounding region.
In 1957, a waste tank at the Mayak nuclear weapons plant in the Chelyabinsk region exploded, contaminating 9,200 square miles and prompting authorities to evacuate 10,000 nearby residents. It is now Russia's main nuclear waste disposal facility. A vast plant for disposing of chemical weapons lies 50 miles east of the city.
"The city is a place where people always seem bitter with each other," said music teacher Ilya Shibanov. But the meteor "was one of the rare times when people started to live together through one event."
"For most people, it's a good excuse for a joke," he said.
It was also a reason for Shibanov to quickly concoct a rap video that got wide Internet attention, including the lines: ""Pow, pow, pow — everything flew and factory windows crumbled. This Friday the bars are going to be full, so be ready for the aftermath."
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Why did meteor do so much damage?
But for many, it's been a reason to roll up their sleeves and get to work repairing the more than 4,000 buildings in the city and region where windows were shattered, or to provide other services.
More than 24,000 people, including volunteers, have mobilized in the region to cover windows, gather warm clothes and food, and make other relief efforts, the regional governor's office said. Crews from glass companies in adjacent regions were being flown in.
Gov. Mikhail Yurevich on Saturday said that damage from the high-altitude explosion -believed to have been as powerful as 20 Hiroshima bombs — is estimated at 1 billion rubles ($33 million). He promised to have all the broken windows replaced within a week.
But that is a long wait in a frigid region. The midday temperature in Chelyabinsk was 10 F, and for many the immediate task was to put up plastic sheeting and boards on shattered residential windows.
Meanwhile, the search continued for major fragments of the meteor.
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Scientist: "Mother Nature has shown Hollywood who's boss"
In the town of Chebarkul, 50 miles west of Chelyabinsk city, divers explored the bottom of an ice-crusted lake looking for meteor fragments believed to have fallen there, leaving a 20-foot-wide hole. Emergency Ministry spokeswoman Irina Rossius told Russian news agencies the search hadn't found anything.
Police kept a small crowd of curious onlookers from venturing out onto the icy lake, where a tent was set up for the divers.
Many of them were still trying to process the memories of the strange day they'd lived through.
Valery Fomichov said he had been out for a run when the meteor streaked across the sky shortly after sunrise.
"I glanced up and saw a glowing dot in the west. And it got bigger and bigger, like a soccer ball, until it became blindingly white and I turned away," he said.
In a local church, clergyman Sexton Sergei sought to derive a larger lesson.
"Perhaps God was giving a kind of sign, so that people don't simply think about their own trifles on earth, but rather look to the heavens once in a while."
In Chelyabinsk, university student Ksenia Arslanova said she was pleased that people in the city of 1 million generally behaved well after the bewildering flash and explosions.
10 Photos
Meteorites crash into Russia
"People were kind of ironic about it. And that's a good thing, that people didn't run to the grocery store. Everyone was calm," the 19-year-old architecture student said. "I'm proud that our city didn't fall into depression."
Chelyabinsk residents weren't the only ones watching the skies, however.
Stargazers in the San Francisco Bay Area caught a glimpse of an apparent meteor shower Friday night. Social media users reported seeing the blue flash flying west around 8 p.m. and sightings were reported throughout the Bay Area, reports CBS San Francisco.
Based on reports, Jonathan Braidman, an astronomer with the Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland, said that it seems Friday night's fireball was what astronomers call a "sporadic meteor," an event that can happen several times a day but most of the time happens over the ocean, away from human eyes, and brings as much as 15,000 tons of space debris to Earth each year.
Meteors, hunks of rock and metal from space that fall to Earth, burn up as they go through Earth's atmosphere, which is what apparently caused Friday night's bright flash of light, Braidman said.
It was likely smaller than another meteor that landed in the Bay Area in October, which caused a loud sonic boom as it fell, breaking apart and spreading rocks, called meteorites, in the North Bay.
And Cuba apparently experienced a phenomenon similar to the meteorite that detonated over Russia this week, island media reported, with startled residents describing a bright light in the sky and a loud explosion that shook windows and walls.
There were no reports of any injuries or damage such as those caused by the Russia meteorite. In a video from a state TV newscast posted on the website CubaSi late Friday, unidentified residents of the central city of Rodas, near Cienfuegos, said the explosion was impressive.
"On Tuesday we left home to fish around five in the afternoon, and around 8:00 we saw a light in the heavens and then a big ball of fire, bigger than the sun," one local man said in the video.
"My home shook completely," said a woman. "I had never heard such a strange thing."
Marcos Rodriguez, whom the video identified as a specialist in anthropology, said all signs point to a meteorite.
A reporter said a similar phenomenon was observed in 1994 elsewhere in Cienfuegos province.
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Watch: Asteroid's close encounter with Earth
The video said Cuban authorities were looking for any fragments that may have fallen to the earth.
Friday's meteorite strike came shortly before Asteroid 2012 DA14 made the closest recorded pass of an asteroid to the Earth -- about 17,150 miles. But the European Space Agency in a tweet said its experts had determined there was no connection -- just cosmic coincidence. The asteroid passed Earth without incident at approximately 2:30 pm EST Friday.
Social media company Facebook announced Friday that it was hacked last month, which has led to an ongoing investigation.
Below is a statement issued by Facebook:
Last month, Facebook Security discovered that our systems had been targeted in a sophisticated attack. This attack occurred when a handful of employees visited a mobile developer website that was compromised. The compromised website hosted an exploit which then allowed malware to be installed on these employee laptops. The laptops were fully-patched and running up-to-date anti-virus software. As soon as we discovered the presence of the malware, we remediated all infected machines, informed law enforcement, and began a significant investigation that continues to this day. We have no evidence that Facebook user data was compromised in this attack.
(CBS News) BIG BEAR LAKE, Calif. - Remains of a man who was in a burned California cabin on Tuesday have been positively identified as belonging to that of Christopher Dorner, the former LAPD officer who was suspected of killing four people and was the subject of an intense manhunt, officials confirmed.
The San Bernardino County Coroner's office said the positive identification was made through dental records.
The final hours of the manhunt for Christopher Dorner began when Jim and Karen Reynolds opened the door of one of their rental condos.
Police fill in the blanks on Dorner's last day Carjacking victim: Christopher Dorner told me "I don't want to hurt you" Deputy slain in ex-cop shootout was new father
"We had come into the living room and he opened the door and came out at us," said Karen.
"He had the gun drawn," added Jim.
A man believed to be Dorner tied them up.
"He talked to us, trying to calm us down," said Karen, "and saying very frequently he would not kill us."
He then took their car. "We listened for probably a minute or two, wanted to make sure he was gone," said Jim, "sounded quiet. And then we started struggling trying to get loose."
They called 911, triggering a chain of events that ended with Tuesday's shootout in which two sheriffs deputies were shot. Thirty-five-year-old Jeremiah MacKay died from his wounds.
The firefight that we witnessed was intense and we were forced to take cover - however, we left his cell phone on. Early in the standoff you could hear officers suggesting burning the suspect out.
One officer can be heard saying, "Burn that ------ out , burn it down, ------ burn this mother-----"
Four more hours would pass before police used high-powered tear gas. The canisters are known to be a fire hazard.
"We did not intentionally burn down that cabin to get Mr. Dorner out," San Bernandino Sheriff John McMahon had said.
Dorner's body was found in the ashes. It's unclear if the cause of death was from the fire -- or a single shot we heard moments after the cabin ignited.
Meanwhile, investigators looking through a trash bin in Irvine, California, where the first two victims were killed, recovered Dorner's badge, a police uniform, and a high-capacity ammo magazine.
CBS News asked San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department about the audio we recorded, and they declined to comment.
(MoneyWatch) CBS News has learned that the boards of American Airlines and US Airways (LCC) have approved a merger that would create the world's biggest carrier.
Under the deal, which is expected to be unveiled Thursday if the timeline isn't moved up sooner and there are no last-minute snags, the combined airline would keep the "American" name. It would still require federal approval, although that is virtually ensured. US Air CEO Doug Parker is expected to lead the combined company.
A merger of US Air and American would surpass a 2010 tie-up between United Airlines (UAL) and Continental and a 2008 deal joining Delta (DAL) and Northwest. The merged American would be the largest carrier and sport a market valuation of roughly $10 billion.
Although airlines tout such consolidation as a way to cut costs and expand service amid intense competition, whether industry mergers raise fares is an open question. Many analysts say yes because reduced competition in any business often results in higher prices. One study found that ticket prices went up more than 20 percent between Detroit and Atlanta after Delta bought Northwest. Fares went up more than 30 percent on routes between Chicago and Houston, as well as Newark to San Francisco, after the United-Continental deal.
In seeking to run more efficiently, merging airlines also often cut capacity and eliminate routes.
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American close to merger with U.S. Airways
Other analysts are more optimistic about the potential benefits to travelers. They say the three largest U.S. airlines still must compete with discount carriers such as Southwest (LUV), which has flourished for years by offering low-cost flights and no-frills service.
The consolidation trend is largely blamed on the price of fuel. Oil now costs so much more per barrel than it did 10 years ago that one analyst says the margin of profit on many flights has shrunk to the value of a single seat. That means an airline can lose money if it flies with one single empty middle seat. The days of elbow room are over.
American Airlines has been operating under court supervision since declaring bankruptcy in November 2011.
When the curtain rises on President Obama's State of the Union speech tonight, the White House wants it viewed as "Act Two" - a follow-up to the national goals and policy objectives of which he spoke 22 days earlier on the West Front of the Capitol.
"The president has always viewed the two speeches, the inaugural address and the State of The Union, as two acts in the same play," said press secretary Jay Carney yesterday.
Though Mr. Obama has given more speeches this year on his proposals to stem gun violence and overhaul immigration policy, the "core emphasis" of his speech tonight is the economy.
"You'll hear from the president a very clear call for the need to take action to help our economy grow and help it create jobs," said Carney.
That includes the showdown with Congress over the mandatory spending cuts due to take effect starting March 1.
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Valerie Jarrett on SOTU: "An optimistic vision"
The president will urge Congress "not to shoot the economy in the foot," said Carney, by agreeing to his plan to avert the across-the-board spending cuts which the White House portrays as mindless and severe.
The president will again make it clear he wants a "balanced" plan that calls for additional tax revenue from America's top earners.
"My message to Congress is this: let's keep working together to solve this problem," the president said Saturday in his weekly address.
But Republican leaders say Mr. Obama already got his tax hikes as part of the "fiscal cliff" package, and now needs to focus exclusively on reductions in spending.
It'll be Mr. Obama's seventh appearance before a Joint Session of Congress and he'll be taking the rostrum aware that the national unemployment rate still hovers just under 8 percent and economic growth fell into negative territory at the end of 2012.
"The economy is not in a worse place than it was before," said Carney, pointing to the progress made since Mr. Obama's first State of the Union Address. "We were in economic freefall."
He said the president will make the case that "we are at a moment when the economy is poised to continue to grow...to build on the job creation that we've achieved -- over 6.1 million jobs created by our businesses over the past 35 or 36 months."
Carney added the president will propose further steps to grow the economy in a way that makes the middle class more secure and helps those trying to climb the ladder into the middle class.
"That is absolutely going to be his focus in the second term as it was in the first term," said Carney.
(CBS News) PENTAGON - President Barack Obama awarded the Medal of Honor to former Army Staff Sgt. Clinton Romesha on Monday.
In 2009, with U.S. forces in eastern Afghanistan under Taliban attack, a wounded Romesha ducked enemy fire to rescue other wounded soldiers and recover bodies of the fallen.
Army staff sergeant receives Medal of Honor for actions during Afghanistan war battle
You have to see Combat Outpost Keating to realize just how indefensible it was to an attack from Taliban fighters. Just 52 American soldiers were down there, as well as Staff Sgt. Romesha.
"We were taking everything from, you know, very precise sniper fire, automatic weapon fire from machine gun positions. We were taking mortar and indirect fire, RPG fire," Romesha said.
The soldier said fire was coming 360 degrees all around, from every high point.
"We had taken casualties from the first barrage of fire that came in and continued to take them throughout the remainder of the fire fight," he said.
A photo of Clinton Romesha
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A re-creation of the battle shows Romesha was everywhere that day, running across open ground to reinforce one weak point after another.
"At one point I witnessed three enemy fighters walk straight through our front gate like they owned the place," he said. "To see that, you know, it's just unreal for a second, but that's ours. We're not going to let them do that."
Although hit in the side by shrapnel from a rocket propelled grenade, Romesha was determined to do more than just survive.
"We weren't going to be beat that day and we were going to take it back," he said.
But they were up against 300 enemy fighters. Air strikes finally broke the enemy assault.
Afterwards, bullet-riddled Humvees and burned out buildings showed the kind of fire he and his men had braved.
Left: Raw video of the award ceremony
"We ended up losing eight, eight brave soldiers that day," Romesha said.
Three days later the Americans left Keating for good. Romesha said getting the medal was an emotional experience.
"It's hard to say. You win or lose, but to know, to know we had so many great soldiers there that stood proud and did their job. That's just an amazing thing to witness," he said.
What was gained that day? Nothing. What did Clint Romesha and his men achieve? Everything.
