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Rare October Snowstorm; Good Cop, Bad Cop; Americans Believed Killed in Kabul; Arrests at Occupy Denver Rally; It's Tough Being Rich

Aired October 29, 2011 - 19:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Top of the hour, thanks for joining us, everyone. I'm Don Lemon. You're in THE CNN NEWSROOM.

You know, the last weekend of October feels a lot like the depths of winter for millions of people tonight. So, you're lucky if you're at home and be out in it. Snow is falling from the Mid-Atlantic States through the Northeast. And the winter -- well, the winter-like blast, I should say, is causing all kinds of problems -- snarling air travel and knocking out power to thousands of people.

We're on top of all this for you. CNN reporters and anchors out in force. Our weather anchor Chad Myers is in York, Pennsylvania. Susan Candiotti is in New York. And meteorologist Jacqui Jeras standing by in the CNN severe weather center.

We'll get to Jacqui and to Susan in just moments. We want to start with our meteorologist out in the field, Chad Myers. He's in eastern Pennsylvania.

Chad, I spoke to you over -- about two hours ago. What's happening now? Is it -- is it still snowing?

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: It's still snowing, Don, and it's getting colder. It's noticeably colder now than it was with a couple hours ago. So, the slush that's on the ground right now is going to start to turn into ice.

And you may say, what are you in the parking lot for? What are all these cars doing here? We're in the parking lot where there is electricity. People are literally out driving around, looking for something with power, because their houses are without power.

There are so many houses without power in this area. They're getting cold and getting hungry. They're driving around looking for a restaurant that's open. This happens to be one that's open.

This is very heavy snow, Don. It is just a perfect snowman's snow.

The problem, there are still leaves on the trees everywhere here. So these trees are literally splitting in half, and especially the pears. They have no chance in this weather. And those trees and those power lines and those branches are all coming down all at once.

And the power is just about, I just saw lights go out right there. In fact over may shoulder. This is going to be the case for all of the Northeast. We have at least now a half a million people without power and almost 100,000 people in Pennsylvania alone. This is one of the hardest hit areas and we don't even have the wind that's coming up later tonight.

And Jacqui Jeras will tell you about that.

LEMON: But Jacqui will tell you, but don't go anywhere, Chad. Jacqui is here us well. We can show Jacqui. Jacqui is helping to operate the radar for you.

As we talk about this, let's continue to talk to Chad out there, because, Chad, I think you're standing there, it looks like a packing lot. And what people don't realize, sometimes we don't realize we're in the field. The viewer would like to know where we are.

So, tell us what you're seeing in this parking lot. You showed us the snow, but I would imagine this is indicative of the conditions that people are facing all over that area.

MYERS: Well, this is what we're seeing. I'll just walk around the area and I'll show you this slop. This is what's on the roadway. This is just slush at this point in time. But when temperatures get to 27, 28 degrees, that's not going to take very long for that to happen.

This is all going to freeze up. This is going to be one skating rink here, a sheet of ice coming up at least in the next hour. There are people that are driving here from York because they don't have any power.

They're coming here. They're seeing the lights on. And they're saying, hey, we can have dinner. Let's go ahead there. Let's watch the football game.

Well, they get inside and they have a great time and they have a couple cocktails. And then, all of a sudden, they're driving home on a sheet of ice. This is going to be kind of a wreck for some people. This is gong to be kind of difficult place to drive around, you know, with the power lines coming down for the rest of the day and the rest of the night.

People are still hearing cracks in the distance. All of a sudden, you hear a crack. The lights flash. The power goes out and the power companies are telling us, as soon as they get one power line up, literally, they're called to the next line because trees are coming down left and right, Don.

LEMON: All right. Chad Myers standing by. Thank you very much.

Jacqui, let's talk about this -- I just got noticed, the Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey, the neighboring state of Pennsylvania --

JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes.

LEMON: -- just declared a state of emergency for Saturday evening for the Garden State because of poor weather conditions and widespread power outages. Yes.

JERAS: You have 500,000, he just tweeted, in New Jersey alone. And Chad just mentioned 500,000 in Pennsylvania. So you add those numbers together, we're talking a million people. And I know that there are hundreds of thousands on top of that in places like Connecticut, into New York as well as into Maryland. So, this is a lot of people without power.

And I hate to say this, but Chad kind of alluded to it there. That those winds are really going to start picking up. The storm is still getting stronger as we speak. And so, we've got these limbs that are hanging by a thread right now, heavy snow. These limbs are covered with leaves still in many of the areas. So, once those winds continue to kick up, we're going to see more of this happening overnight tonight. So, it is a good idea, certainly, to stay home.

As you can see on the radar picture, Chad is over in this area. So, his snow is starting to taper off at this time. But look at this heavy snow out there. Upstate New York, down through Poughkeepsie into northern New Jersey, into western parts of Connecticut, into western parts of Massachusetts. This is we are we're seeing as much as two inches of snow per hour. So, those accumulations are really going to start kicking in.

And those winds, sustained now, about 20 plus miles per hour. And over here off long island, we're starting to see reports around 40. That's the sustained winds. That's the average three-minute wind speed. That doesn't even have to do anything with the gusts which could reach 50 to 60 miles per hour.

So, certainly very extensive with this thing.

Let's talk about the totals that we'll expect all together once this thing is said and done. Well over a foot in those areas. I-95, really, the big key corridor if you're west of there. Forget about it, definitely stay home tonight.

On the coast, this is mostly a rain event for you. And if you're right in that corridor, overall you can expect to see one to two inches. It's a fast-moving storm. That's the best thing I can tell you. By this time tomorrow, bye-bye, over and done with.

And the temperatures are going to warm up, too. Tomorrow, you're going to be in the upper 40s to 50s. So, a lot of melting will take place very, very quickly.

But if you're trying to travel, that could take a little longer. We have major delays.

CNN now confirming that all flights have been canceled out of Newark as of about 4:00, although the FAA is still reporting six hours delays here. JFK, five hours. Over two hours in Philadelphia. LaGuardia not reporting those delays.

But, Don, I'm going to guess that has a lot to do with cancellations because I know we were looking at 5-hour delays earlier today. So, it's just been a mess for travelers.

LEMON: Yes. We're trying to get in touch with our Richard Roth who is stuck in Newark, remember the ground delay there.

JERAS: He's been on the plane for hours. I think we're talking six hours maybe now in Connecticut.

LEMON: I'm sorry. Say it again -- where is he stuck? He's in Hartford.

JERAS: He's in Hartford, Connecticut, yes.

LEMON: So there we go. We say it and it comes up. Hartford.

JERAS: There is a tower cam, yes.

LEMON: Hartford -- courtesy of our affiliate WTIC. The camera is focusing. We don't have control of these cameras.

JERAS: People are still out there driving tonight, Don.

LEMON: Yes, still driving.

So, you know, you said forget about it. We talked about New Jersey, what the governor is doing. Chad Myers took us to Pennsylvania. Let's go to New York now, another neighboring state.

The cold, wet weather testing the resolve of the "Occupy Wall Street" protesters in New York. That's where we find our Susan Candiotti standing by for us tonight.

Susan, take us inside that park. Give us the conditions and tell us what people, how they're dealing with it.

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I think you can see by looking at the conditions and the rain blowing sideways, it is ugly. It is an ugly night out here and as you look over my shoulder here, you can see the tents in some cases are barely holding on. A lot of them have tacked them down as best they can. But we've seen more than one blow apart.

So it is miserable. They had heavy wet snow earlier on in the day. The only good thing if you can put it that way is that these trees here are relatively young.

And you can see that the snow, even if it had stuck to them, wouldn't weigh them down too much. So that branches would be breaking down and falling on top of people. Thank goodness that hasn't happened.

But we did have a chance earlier to talk to a lot of the protesters here and how they're roughing it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(CROWD CHANTING) CANDIOTTI: Despite the conditions, the chant is, "In the snow, in the street, occupy Wall Street." They're still marching in this sleet. It's rough out here.

You spend the night here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, I've been here 20 days.

CANDIOTTI: What was it like all night?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was freezing cold all night. Terrible.

CANDIOTTI: How did you manage to stay warm?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just huddled together and try to keep our body heat together and stay warm that way.

CANDIOTTI: The obvious question is, how can you bear this?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know. It's just for the cause, I suppose.

CANDIOTTI: How long do you think you can stand these conditions?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Until something gets resolved in Washington.

CANDIOTTI: But who knows when that's going to be?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's true.

CANDIOTTI: It could be a long know hard winter.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It could be a long, hard winter. That's correct.

CANDIOTTI: Walking through the park here, it is filled with tents. Over here, you've got the place that's always had everyone serving food. They've got -- some fresh fruit coming in here. You've got a shipment of bananas that just came in, to hand out to people.

Is this your tent?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

CANDIOTTI: Can you show us?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everything is folded up. You're more than welcome to come in.

You're prepared to stick this out through the winter.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

CANDIOTTI: Why?

UNIDENNTIFIED FEMALE: It's worth it. I'm so passionate. It's worth it. It's worth. I'm ready to see change.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CANDIOTTI: And I think the immediate change they would like to see now is certainly a change in the weather. That sleet is just hitting may face. So far they've taken away about ten people to be treated for hypothermia. We saw an ambulance hear a little while ago as well.

Don, back to you.

LEMON: Susan Candiotti in New York -- Susan, thank you very much.

We're seeing major air travel, as we mentioned, slowdowns across the region tonight.

New York and Philadelphia among hardest hit.

CNN's Richard Roth stranded aboard. He was at JetBlue flight in Hartford, Connecticut. I think he is off the plane now. He joins us by phone.

So, Richard, how is it going?

RICHARD ROTH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Don, after four hours and more trapped on this plane on the ground at Bradley International Airport, I'm off the plane. We're 100 passengers got off, not knowing if we will take off. There are several planes here. Many cancellations at Bradley International.

Our JetBlue flight from Syracuse to JFK, New York, almost made it in. But it was diverted at the last minute and the crew told the ground navigational gear may have broke and other planes are affected. So, it was basically impossible to land.

I mean, I always hear of these travel horror stories and you hope that one day that is not -- you're not one of those stories. And so, a flight that would normally take 45 minutes has taken so far seven hours. And we don't know yet if we'll be taking off.

A remarkably calm and good humored group of passengers. If it was a different set of people traveling from New York, I think perhaps, people would have lost more patience. There was at one point a call for a doctor on the plane and someone was administered oxygen.

Don, back to you.

LEMON: Yes, Richard. We're looking at a shot of you on the plane. It looks like you're surrounded by some very frustrated passengers.

One of the passengers on board your plane e-mailed us and described the situation as a nightmare. So, I guess you would concur as well.

Richard Roth, thank you. Best of luck to you.

We'll check back with Richard Roth a little bit later on on CNN.

In two minutes, something you don't see every day. A high-speed chase where the car being pursued is a police car and it's driven by a cop. And later this hour, do you ever get auto corrected? Ever get auto- corrected? Like when you meant to text Googled and instead it comes out something a little more risque? We'll look at some of the best oops texts coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: You're sitting at home on a Saturday night and you want to see this next video we're about to show you. So, the question is who wins between a police officer and a state trooper?

Well, this wasn't exactly a race that you're looking at, and lives were put in danger. On October 11th, this speeding police officer refused to pull over for a Florida trooper, leading her on chase in excess of -- get this -- 120 miles per hour. The officer's excuse when he was finally pulled over at gunpoint, no less, he was late for a second job.

Joining me now on the phone, retired detective, Lt. Steve Rogers, from Nutley, New Jersey.

Now, first, this story sounds crazy. I mean, have you heard anything like this before?

RET. DET./LET. STEVEN ROGERS, NUTLEY, NEW JERSEY POLICE DEPARTMENT: Don, it's not only crazy, it's very troubling. There's no excuse for anyone, let alone a police officer, to take another police officer on a 120-mile-an-hour chase. It troubles me, it bothers me because you've got a lot of good cops out there who work so hard to gain the trust of the public.

And one incident like this actually causes the public to question all of us. It's terrible.

LEMON: Yes. Many times, some police departments don't do high speed chases or pursuits because they're too dangerous. So -- and to see an officer doing it, you know? So, it sort of goes along with your sentiment.

Did the Florida highway officer, D.J. Watts, handle the chase and the arrest properly?

ROGERS: Don, a high-speed chase results in putting many lives in danger -- not only the person that is initiating the chase but also the officers who are chasing that person. And as you look at the video, look at all the traffic around. If that officer who was violating the law lost control of that car, we would be seeing a video with multiple injuries and perhaps death.

LEMON: The officer has been charged with second-degree reckless driving, a misdemeanor. Is this punishment correct? Is the punishment fit the crime?

ROGERS: Well, each state has different policies and procedures and laws. I can tell what you will happen here. The Florida, the police department, the Miami P.D. is awaiting the court case, which is the right thing to do. I'm sure there's going to be an internal affairs investigation.

I can bet may bottom dollar this officer is going to be suspended perhaps for a long time at the very least. So, and it's a serious crime. This is not careless driving. This is reckless driving. And it's just something that's troubling. This never should have happen. No excuse.

And I got to tell you. I have to hand it to that trooper. She did her job professionally and did it according to law. I hope that people look at her as a model more than the officer that committed this act.

LEMON: All right. We appreciate it.

Listen, you said would probably be suspended for a long time. Do you think he'll lose his job?

ROGERS: Well, there is a possibility, I can tell you that. In New Jersey, for example, if an officer lost his driver's license, he is in danger of losing his job. And this guy could very well lose his job.

LEMON: Thank you very much. Retired detective, Lt. Steven Rogers, in New Jersey for us tonight.

Coming up here on CNN, we're monitoring a developing story this hour out of Afghanistan. A suicide bomber takes aim at a military convoy and there are believed to be American casualties. The latest from Kabul in two minutes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: There was a suicide bombing in Kabul today. Americans are believed among 17 people killed in the attack on an armored personnel carrier. The strike was one of three across the country.

CNN's Nick Paton Walsh has more from Kabul tonight.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: A suicide bomber driving a vehicle laden with explosives ran into a NATO convoy near central Kabul, detonating this device and hitting an armored bus known as a Rhino.

Now, ISAF has finally clarified exactly the casualties in this. There are eight ISAF civilian personnel and five military. The nationality is not clear. A U.S. official is saying then all 13 of them Americans. But it now transpires, one of them according to Canadian military, was a Canadian soldier.

So, really this fluid situation perhaps a testament to the sheer scale of the blast here -- an enormous amount of explosive required to penetrate the armor of these Rhino buses used to ferry NATO personnel between hostile areas.

This is actually one of a number of incidents during the day. Another blast, a suicide bomber, age 25, we understand from Afghan officials there. Detonating a device hidden under her burqa outside the headquarters of the Afghan intelligence service in the province of Kunar.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: CNN's Nick Paton Walsh reporting for us tonight.

As deadly as this month has been for our troops, it still trails far behind August. Seventy-one Americans troops were killed that month. It was the deadliest for U.S. forces in Afghanistan since the campaign began. Thirty of those casualties came in a rocket-propelled grenade took down a Chinook helicopter in Wardak province, 17 of those victim were Navy SEALs.

In Syria, a deadly day as government forces pounded the western city of Homs.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

LEMON: Opposition groups say at least 70 people were killed -- 17 people were killed in the fighting nationwide. Today's violence follows anti-government protests on Friday in which opposition sources say 35 civilians lost their lives. Demonstrators have been calling for the U.N. to impose new flight zone over the country.

Taking a stand against teen bullying -- the rallying call coming from an interesting place, a teen rock band. That story is just ahead.

But, first, another effort to help struggling home opener. The Obama administration plan allows more people whose homes are worth less than their mortgages -- are worse less than their mortgages, I should say, to refinance at lower rates, as long as they're currently on the payments.

Well, CNN's Ali Velshi spoke to Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan in this week's "Mastering Your Money."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHAUN DONOVAN, HUD SECRETARY: We sat down. We attacked five major barrier to people refinancing. Many of those could help other families that don't have a Fannie and Freddie mortgage.

Just give you an example. We've now figured out a way to automatically re-subordinate second mortgages. You may ask: what does that mean to a homeowner?

Well, many folks who have an underwater first mortgage also have a second mortgage, and they're blocked from refinancing. That automatic re-subordination can help them refinance.

Another example is we've eliminated the need for an appraisal for many of these mortgages. That lowers fees and will allow other folks. So, if we can take these innovations and spread them more broadly to other parts of the market, we could have a much bigger impact. The second thing I would say --

ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: Go ahead

DONOVAN: -- the president was in Las Vegas on Monday to announce this.

VELSHI: Yes.

DONOVAN: And he said, look, this is an important step, but we also need Congress to do their job. We need them to pass the American Jobs Act.

And why? Because part of the jobs act is a Project Rebuild that would create 200,000 jobs, putting construction workers back to work, renovating and rehabilitating vacant and foreclosed homes.

VELSHI: Right.

DONOVAN: And what would that do? That helps to lift everybody's property values. If you live next door tour home that has been foreclosed on, even if you're paying your bills, you're doing everything right, your own home drops in values.

So, we need to take this step as well. We need Congress to act.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Here's an alarming number for you: six out of 10 teenagers see someone being bullied every day. That's according to the National Crime Prevention Council. Some ignore the bullying. Others join in. Few try to stop it.

But a teen rock band is encouraging more kids to stand up and do something. Education contributor and high school principal, Steve Perry, talks to them in tonight's Perry's principles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEVE PERRY, CNN EDUCATION CONTRIBUTOR (voice-over): Teen band, Radio Silence NYC, is making some noise about bullying with its first single "Renegade".

(on camera): When you're starting to write your own music, when the wheels stop spinning, how do you end up on bullying?

WYATT OFFIT, COLLEGE FRESHMAN: We had this idea. Let's make three lists: things we love; things that we kind of don't really care about; and things that we really don't like. And we all wrote the word "haters" on the list of dislikes.

PERRY: What's that? What's a hater?

OFFIT: Someone who makes fun of you for what you like, your style. And we're like, that's it -- that's the song we want to write about. It's something that has affected us in our lives.

PERRY: How?

DYLAN BRENNER, HIGH SCHOOL SENIOR: Well, we've all experienced it, but probably me the most, because I've always been on the shorter side.

So kids just like got a hoot out of either verbally picking on me or sometimes even physically.

PERRY: When I look at bands like the Ramones and others, they must have been outcasts. Tell me about that experience of being on some level by design outcasts.

ZACH ALLEN, HIGH SCHOOL JUNIOR: I guess you just have to try to learn that it's OK. And that even though people may not think you're the definition of cool maybe. It's really all right. You just have to be your own person and not care what other people think.

PERRY (voice-over): To spread that message the band teamed up with dosomething.org, a nonprofit that provides tools for young people to create social change. Together, they spoke out and rocked out at several high schools in New York and New Jersey this year.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's definitely more effective than just sitting down through a boring chitchat because kids can relate to it.

PERRY (on camera): What do you want kids to take from this?

TIM HOLMES, HIGH SCHOOL JUNIOR: The biggest thing about bullying I think is that when I saw kids at my old school, it was always the same kids bullying the same kids every day and nobody else would do something about it.

We're trying to get kids to, you know, like stand up and say something to the bully. You know, like "stop that". You know, "It's not cool."

PERRY: So these songs speak to your generation?

ALLEN: Yes. We actually have a song called "Future Generation" that tells people that we are the generation. It's our time to change and it's our time to make things better.

PERRY (voice-over): Steve Perry, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: All right, Steve.

Here's a tear jerker for you. One of Facebook's founders says it's tough being a millionaire. Wouldn't we all like to find that out? A billionaire. We'll explain after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: This just in to CNN. We want to show you some video that's from our affiliate. Denver police say they knew that there was going to be a protest there. This is Occupy Denver. Again, (INAUDIBLE) our affiliate KUSA. This is just coming in.

They wanted to keep this particular Occupy event peaceful so officers went inside the capitol they said which was illegal. Protesters, I should say, went inside the capitol and they said it was illegal. They started spraying pepper spray. Officers said they used nonlethal agents like pepper spray, like rubber bullets to subdue the crowd. Again, this is from Occupy Denver. A skirmish between police and protesters. Police say that the Occupy went inside city hall, inside the capitol. They should have not done that so they used non- lethal agents, pepper spray and rubber bullets to subdue them. And this is what happened. Let's listen to some people who were involved.

We will hear from him. They're washing the pepper spray out of the eye of some guy that's there. Let's listen to this guy.

(INAUDIBLE)

LEMON: This is Denver. Last week we know it was Oakland where sadly a member of the U.S. military was injured and in the hospital still. Occupy New York, Occupy Wall Street, they're still out there braving the cold. Just in from Denver. We're going to check in on this. Thanks to our affiliate KUSA for their pictures. We appreciate it. More details coming up.

Let's turn to this now. Facebook billionaire said it is tough being rich. Herman Cain's political ad that people first thought was a parody gets parodied. And real life politicians are just too scary for Halloween. So let's bring in Maureen O'Connor of Gawker.com to explain all of those stories, bizarre stories. Good to see you Maureen. So who is this billionaire and what's he complaining about?

MAUREEN O'CONNOR, GAWKER.COM: Well, Shawn Parker, the Facebook millionaire, notably portrayed by Justin Timberlake in "The Social Network" was tweeting about Occupy Wall Street the other day. And he said as a member of the one percent, he feels attacked. He said, "I have a whole new set of problems to deal with now. Security, extortion attempts, kidnapping threats, death threats, et cetera. Life better b4?" He's saying that people are being unfair to him. And that as a billionaire, things are actually pretty hard.

LEMON: OK. Enough said.

O'CONNOR: The magic of being a billionaire, if you don't want to be one, you can really don't have to be. A lot of people will take that off your hands, Shawn.

LEMON: Then people will think of a billion reasons why he shouldn't be complaining about it. Let's talk about the Herman Cain ad now. It's a parody. We've all seen the ad by now. Herman Cain's chief of staff talking about his boss and puffing on a cigarette. Now I hear Jon Huntsman's daughters are getting in on the act, Maureen.

O'CONNOR: Jon Huntsman's three daughters, Abby, L and Marian made their own ad, they donned fake mustaches and fake eyeglasses to parody the much parodied ad.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We need you to get involved to make sure our next president is based on substance, not sound bites.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Check out our dad and follow us on (INAUDIBLE) and follow us on Twitter at jon2012girls.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Any fallout from that, Maureen?

O'CONNOR: Not much. I mean Jon Huntsman is at the very bottom of the pack right now. He has about one percent of people want him to be the GOP nominee. So they're kind of scrambling to do anything to keep the momentum going but his campaign will see if it has any effect at all.

LEMON: All right. So scary masks. Always fun for Halloween and politicians always makes great choices. But you know, I hear that you're saying that this year political figures just aren't popular. Why is that?

O'CONNOR: A "Washington Post" report today noted that Halloween costume sellers are just saying that there isn't the same demand for political figures. They're saying part of it is that the political situation is pretty dire. People just aren't feeling the same level of levity and fun. But I would think also that the fact that there aren't many really iconic parodable people out there. You know, you have Palin, you could wear eyeglasses. If you want to be Michele Bachmann, what do you - you just look like a lady in a power suit.

"Newsweek" notably put something on their website encouraging people to use that famous cover of Michele Bachmann where her eyes were all wide and they're saying you should cut that out and make it into a mask but people apparently aren't into it this year.

LEMON: I'm sure people are going to - there are going to be some Herman Cain campaign manager masks. I'm sure or costumes after this ad. So we can look for that. Maureen O'Connor, always a pleasure. Have a great Saturday night and stay dry up there in New York.

Coming up, a new Facebook video is freaking people out. And for good reason. If you're on Facebook. It's a lesson you need to hear.

(COMMERCIAL BREA)

LEMON: Halloween. Two days away. It is the season to be scared and Facebook users are getting an early fright through a new viral video called "Take This Lollipop." Its point, how much do you reveal on your account and do you know who is reading it?" Take a look.

All right. We'll explain that. It's scary but there's a special reason why Facebook users are seriously freaking out. Here to explain is Scott Steinberg. He's he CEO of TechSavvy Global. So Scott, I want to emphasize that Facebook has no connection to this "Take this Lollipop" movie. So what's different about this viral video? Here's the thing. Explain to our viewers. We saw the scary movie, the guy looking in. And then we saw someone's Facebook page popping up. So explain to us why this is dangerous.

SCOTT STEINBERG, TECHSAVVY GLOBAL, CEO: You know, what's completely different about this one is it is like a saw movie in which you and your social network friends star. It actually includes your profile photo, takes your photos that you have in your albums, your wall, shows your location. It actually shows this psychopathic individual degenerating and appearing to come right after you with your face on the dashboard of his car when he gets out ready to do some damage. So definitely creepy. Definitely points to the need for more privacy on social networks.

LEMON: So does any of your personal information pop up there? Or will it be revealed if you participate in this?

STEINBERG: Well, it says it won't but you never know. It is a third party app. It has access to your account. So reminder that everybody needs to be aware of who can see what's on your public profile. And if you allow apps to have access, just how much information is out there in the public eye?

LEMON: All right. Let's move on and talk more about Facebook. So Facebook has introduced another feature for people who can't remember their passwords. Tell us about it.

STEINBERG: Yes, this is call Trusted Friends. And what happens is you can assign five or so guardians who actually will be your trusted friends. You'd better stay on their good side because if you lose your Facebook account access to it because hackers got it and then you don't have access to your e-mail questions, you can't answer security questions perhaps you lost your smart phone, you can actually have Facebook send them codes. And if you call them up and you can get three of the five codes, then you can regain access to your account.

LEMON: Yes. All right. Let's talk about tablets now. In the market of tablets, you say a game changer is about to enter the market. Something that could compete with the iPad. Really?

STEINBERG: Yes. The first real game changer is called the Kindle Fire. It's from Amazon.com, seven-inch colored touchscreens tablet. The key here it focuses on value and convenience. It will sell for $199. Coming out mid-November. And the beauty of this is it gets rid of some of the extraneous feature like video cams and calling. It's a wi-fi only unit but it offers most of what the iPad does for less than half the price. You get music, movies, games, apps. You can even stream TV shows, films, music on demand, cloud storage. So it looks like to be a major shift for the computer.

LEMON: Wow. Sounds interesting. All right. Scott Steinberg, CEO of TechSavvy Global. Appreciate it, sir.

You've heard of amazing stories like the film "Rudy," right? College athletes proving naysayers wrong and making a team without being recruited. Well, this is one walk-on story you won't soon forget.

Phyllis Reffo made the swim team at Pepperdine University after only picking up swimming six years ago. She is also a former model. And oh did I mention she is 49 years old? That's right. She is older than some of her teammates' mothers. But so calls herself one of the girls. Phyllis Reffo making a splash and making her mark. Congratulations to her.

Coming up, you've got to love Samuel L. Jackson's story. He didn't make it big until he was 46 years old. Now he is so big, he just made it into the Guinness Book of World Records. We'll explain straight ahead.

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LEMON: Adele's soulful voice has sold more than 2.5 million albums and you can hear why in her video for her hit. It's called "Rolling in the Deep."

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LEMON: Well, the smooth sounds of Adele's music has hit a sour note as of late. The 23-year-old Brit is canceling the rest of her tour this year. 16 concerts. Here to explain why, CNN entertainment reporter Shannon Cook. Shannon, in the studio, young people are here. When I read that, they went, huh? Adele's got some health issues, right?

SHANON COOK, CNN ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER: Yes, yes, she's had a really rough year actually. She's basically been battling laryngitis nearly the whole year. She's blogged about her voice just switching off like a light switch at times. Now her record label, Columbia, is saying that she's going to have to undergo surgery for a hemorrhage near her vocal cords. Columbia does say she is expected to make a full recovery but Don, overall, it has been a really bittersweet year for Adele. Her album, "21," has been the, so far the year's greatest selling album around the world. Yet for any singer, to have something go wrong your instrument is a complete nightmare.

LEMON: Yes. So rest, rest. Her voice is a treasure so let's hope she gets better and she has a better year. OK.

Samuel L. Jackson now just made the Guinness Book of Records. Tell us why.

COOK: Well, this is really cool. He is the highest growing movie star of all time. In total his films have grossed $7.4 billion. This is mainly because he is a movie-making machine. This guy just does not rest. He's been in more than 100 films. Last year he was in about six and sometimes he just has little bit parts but they're in blockbuster film like "Ironman 2." And you know, Don, this is quite a feat given that Jackson was in his mid 40s when he was in films like "Jurassic Park" and "Pulp Fiction" which put him on the path to superstardom.

LEMON: All right. So on - congratulations, by the way, that's quite an accomplishment.

Let's move to Charlie Sheen now. You know, cats have nine lives. If he was a cat, he would be on his 30th life by now. He has got a new gig.

COOK: Something like that. Maybe his 46th. It's astounding really, Don, how forgiving Hollywood is. And it seems that Sheen's bad behavior is being rewarded with a quick comeback. He's going to be in a new sitcom. It's going to be on the FX Network. And the sit-com it is based on the movie "Anger Management" which Adam Sandler and Jack Nicholson and Sheen is apparently going to play an anger management therapist. Interesting to see him playing any kind of therapist.

But apparently, his character has some serious anger issues himself. You know, love him or hate him. At the moment, Charlie Sheen - he is a good sitcom actor so I'm sure his fans will follow him to FX.

LEMON: Yes. If you follow the whole thing that happened with him on CBS, "Two and A Half Men," a lot of people did, they said he always did his job. It was just outside of work.

COOK: Yes.

LEMON: You know, what got him in trouble.

OK. I want to talk about this briefly, Shanon. London investigators have determined what killed Amy Winehouse. She died on July 23rd.

COOK: Her family was actually suggesting that maybe the cause of her death was withdrawal from alcohol and or maybe drugs. But it was ruled that her death was actually a result of alcohol poisoning. We've learned her blood alcohol level was five times the legal limit in the U.K. at the time of her death. Don.

LEMON: So sad. All right. Shanon Cook, appreciate it.

COOK: Sure.

LEMON: Just ahead, a website dedicated to how silly your smart phone makes you look. I can relate to this. Have you ever been burned by auto correct? It's happened to me on Facebook, on Twitter, when I text people, all the time. Also bone chilling Halloween fright night at the White House.

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LEMON: New traumatic video just in to CNN. So police in riot gear confront Occupy protesters with mace and pepper balls today outside the state capitol in Denver. The video is coming to us from our affiliate, KUSA. Look at it. You see them doing it. Denver Police say they took the aggressive action with protesters wanting to get inside the capitol. More than a dozen people were arrested. We'll keep an eye on that for you.

In other headlines right now, a cold wet snow is falling across the northeast knocking out power and snarling air traffic across the region. Connecticut's governor has signed a state of emergency order. He says one person has died in his state as a result of the storm. There won't be much accumulation overnight in New York, in Boston, but people living west of the i-95 corridor could see up to a foot of snow.

Americans are believed to be among the casualties of a bloody suicide attack in Kabul, Afghanistan. At least 17 people were killed when a bomber struck an armored personnel carrier. The Taliban has claimed responsibility for the attack. It was one of three today in Afghanistan.

Talk about sailing the high seas. Check out this video of the U.S. Coast Guard unloading seven tons, that's 15,000 pounds of cocaine that was seized off a submersible watercraft in Central America. That's worth roughly $180 million. To put the bust in perspective, this haul alone equals roughly one-third of all drug based land seizures in the U.S. for an entire year.

In other news, the White House is getting a jump start on Halloween. Today president and the first lady hosted trick or treaters from several schools in the Washington, D.C. area. Look how cute they are, the little kiddies all dressed up. We'll be seeing them soon in our neighborhood. They handed out goody bags filled with cookies dried fruits and M&Ms imprinted with the presidential seal.

The age-old tradition was a little different this year. It was snowing. Washington got about a half inch of snow from that early winter storm that's moving up the East Coast.

OK. So if you text and you have a smart phone, you've probably been burned by the 21st century phenomenon known as auto correct. That's when your smart phone tries to fix your texting mistakes. You get it. And sometimes it gets it so wrong, the only thing to do is laugh. Well, sometimes.

Here's CNN's Tina Kim.

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TINA KIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At first it's just a chuckle or a giggle. But then the snickers get longer and the laugh becomes so hard they literally take the breath away. I showed my colleagues this website called Damn You Auto Correct, which features text messages ruined by auto correction. That's the smart phone feature used to fix miss spellings.

But once in a while auto correct inserts words the phone user never intended. Website founder Jillian Madison chooses the most chuckle worthy from 400 to 500 submissions a day. Her business idea came to life after she was burned one too many times.

JILLIAN MADISON, FOUNDER, DAMNYOU AUDOTCORRECT.COM: Kind of the straw that broke the camel's back was I sent an e-mail to a friend of mine asking her if she had ever fondled herself. I meant to ask her if she had ever googled herself. KIM: That was one year ago this October. Now she said she gets 1.25 million page views a day and lots of doubters who stay the texts cannot be real.

MADISON: You know, again, just from the sheer volumes of submissions I get, I refuse to believe there are millions of people making up fake auto correct.

KIM: Madison explains, people can't replicate some auto corrections because the feature corrects differently for each user. Learning if what's commonly typed.

MADISON: That person has definitely typed that into their phone before. So that's kind of an insight into their psyche. You know, we're communicating, typing, talking so fast, we're not even saying, "Hey, let me look at what I'm sending before I'm hitting send.

KIM: Fast but not so fast to not take time to laugh at how stupid a smart phone makes us look.

Tina Kim, CNN.

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LEMON: Pretty funny. I think the first time I saw this was a link on read it.com. It's hilarious. We could show you only just a choice few of the auto corrects on that website. Madison, the website founder said 60 percent of the submissions she gets are x-rated.

I'm Don Lemon at the CNN headquarters in Atlanta. Be careful out there when it comes to texting and auto correct. I'll see you back hear at 10:00 p.m. Eastern from the merchandise branding of rockers Kiss to a shocking alleged hate crime in Mississippi "CNN PRESENTS" begins right now.