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CNN Saturday Morning News

Maine GOP Caucus; CPAC Meeting in D.C.; Pro-Democracy Demonstrations In Syria; Protests in Egypt; Book On Extreme Weather Survival Tips; Changes in Sea Levels; Syria Violence Spreads; Georgia's Glittering Past; Fast Lane for Frequent Flyers; Building a New World; A New Star in Sports

Aired February 11, 2012 - 08:00   ET

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

TED ROWLANDS, CNN ANCHOR: From CNN Center, this is CNN SATURDAY MORNING. It is February 11th, good morning. I'm Ted Rowlands. It's 8:00 here in Atlanta and 3:00 p.m. in Homs, Syria, where the gunshots, explosions and bloodshed continues in the streets. Hundreds of people have died in the ongoing revolt against the government.

And to D.C. where conservatives are gathering for critical meetings again today. Three of the four GOP presidential candidates took their turns trying to woo the crowd. Plus, Sarah Palin speaks today. Will she officially endorse anyone? But there may be more political intrigue in Maine, as well. We'll take you there, as well.

And Maine is where we'll start this morning. Maine's Republican voters are heading to the caucus sites this morning to choose their candidate for president. It's pretty much a two-man race for the state's 21 delegates. Ron Paul has a strong ground game in Maine, white Mitt Romney is making a last-minute push.

CNN's Shannon Travis joins us from a caucus site in the town of Sanford.

Shannon, good morning to you. Set the scene for us. People very excited up there in Maine and the country is watching.

SHANNON TRAVIS, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: You're right. The country is watching as these caucus goers are just getting started, you just had the pledge of allegiance and this program is about to get under way. This is no ordinary contest like we've seen in some of the others, not that those have been ordinary Ted. But this is a little different. For one, we're expecting Mitt Romney and Ron Paul to come here to this caucus site here in Sanford, Maine, around the same time. We expect them to be maybe about 45 minutes to an hour separated. They'll both be here talking to caucus goers, not when the actually caucusing starts, but beforehand.

Secondly, this is Mitt Romney's first time coming to a caucus site on voting day. He hasn't done this. He hasn't done that this entire election season. And in terms of another first, obviously, Ron Paul hopes to make this his first win. He's zero for eight right now in all of these contests. Another interesting thing, Ron Paul essentially had this state all to himself, right, Ted, while his other three opponents were in Florida a few weeks ago. Ron Paul was here. I was here with him. He was here campaigning for those delegates that you mentioned. But basically at the 11th hour, Mitt Romney's campaign said, you know what? We're going to go up there and campaign. So he came here for the first time this election season and campaigned last night in Portland. He'll be here today.

So there are a lot of firsts here. It's rather unique. It's a two-man contest just between Ron Paul and Mitt Romney, because Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich are not campaigning here -- Ted.

ROWLANDS: Why not, Shannon? Why did Newt Gingrich and Santorum both decide to forego Maine?

TRAVIS: They basically made a calculation, a delegate calculation, right, this is all about a race towards building up those delegates, they made a calculation that Maine was not in the cards for them. So that left it wide open for Ron Paul and Mitt Romney. Again, in terms of -- if you think about who might have the edge here, Ron Paul has a huge following, a lot of young people, a lot of Libertarians up here in Maine. But Mitt Romney is from a nearby state. He was the governor of Massachusetts, as you know. And he's been here campaigning in Republican circles for many, many years -- Ted.

ROWLANDS: All right. Shannon Travis getting ready for a busy day ahead in Maine, thanks Shannon.

CNN's coverage of the Maine caucuses begins at 6:00 p.m. with a special edition of "The Situation Room" with Wolf Blitzer followed by CNN's complete live coverage of the caucus results at 7:00.

The largest annual gathering of conservative leaders and activists concludes its 39th convention today. CPAC as it's called will end with a speech by Sarah Palin and by announcing the results of its presidential straw poll. Three of the four GOP candidates addressed the convention yesterday. Mitt Romney used his speech to try to convince conservatives he's one of them. Newt Gingrich took a swipe at the GOP establishment for lacking toughness and Rick Santorum focused mainly on attacking President Obama.

So what exactly is CPAC? One political activist calls CPAC the center of gravity for conservatives right now. CPAC stands for the conservative political action conference. It was focused -- or was founded in 1973 as a small gathering of dedicated conservatives. It's now an annual gathering of party activists and elected officials in the country has gone to thousands of attendees each year now. As we mentioned, the conference ends today with the highly anticipated straw poll and the results of the presidential candidates.

A rising Republican star Florida Governor Rick Scott addresses CPAC later today. We'll talk to him two hours from now, as well.

There is no end in sight to the bloodshed in Syria. Pro-democracy activists say 64 civilians are among 110 people killed in Syria on Friday. Syria's restrictions on journalists make it impossible to verify reports or video. This amateur video shows the total chaos in the northern city of Alappo. That's where a state media is blaming terrorists gangs for suicide bombings believed to have killed 28 people.

Ivan Watson joins us live from Istanbul where he's keeping track of the situation, the developing situation in Syria. Ivan, what are you hearing in terms of the latest as the day progresses in Syria?

IVAN WATSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Ted. We just got word from activists in the southern province in Derab (ph), which has been a real hot bed of protests from the very beginning 11 months ago against the (INAUDIBLE), the birth place of this revolution you can argue that five minute were killed in a village town called Mouseffa (ph) by Syrian army forces. Of course, we can't confirm this because we're not allowed in by the Syrian government.

Meanwhile, the siege-like conditions continue in the city of Homs, the third largest city in Syria, which has been shelled day after day by Syrian military, by tanks, by artillery, rockets and mortars with one resident making a desperate plea to us by phone to please help get the children out of that city with the Syrian military, saying not allowing for food or medicine in to help the beleaguered population of that city. In the meantime, the Syrian government has reported state news agencies that a senior military doctor who ran a hospital in Damascus was murdered outside his home. This is violence that is cropping up all across the country and does not bode well for the future of this country in the heart of the Middle East -- Ted.

ROWLANDS: Ivan, world leaders tried to pass a resolution denouncing Syria's violence, but it was shot down by Russia and China. Reports said that Saudi Arabia has drafted a new resolution for the U.N. General Assembly. We're going to see any difference here? Will there be a different outcome here and what can you tell us about that?

WATSON: Well, if this is proposed in the U.N. General Assembly rather than in the U.N. Security Council, which is what we saw last week, the General Assembly, nobody has a veto power. So there is much more chance of this going through. What we saw last week was Russia and China vetoing a resolution and that many have argued has allowed the Syrian government, given it a blank check to move forward and intensify its attacks on the opposition.

The Saudi proposal would also coincide with the U.N.'s high commissioner for human rights (INAUDIBLE) who is expected to address the general assembly on Monday. She has repeatedly accused the Syrian regime of committing crimes against humanity. But Ted, there are no angels in this diplomatic tug of war. While Saudi Arabia is criticizing Syria for its human rights abuses, it's not saying anything about Bahrain, its ally and a U.S. ally which has also committed numerous human rights abuses, according to human rights organizations and the anniversary of the Bahraini protest movement is a couple days away, a couple days away in Bahrain. No mention about the ongoing crackdown in that country -- Ted.

ROWLANDS: Ivan Watson, watching the situation for us from Turkey, a developing situation in Syria. Thanks, Ivan.

Homs, a city under siege. Tonight, CNN will air a special report on Syria's uprising. See and hear firsthand accounts of the government crackdown from those living and suffering through it. That is tonight at 10:30 p.m. Eastern here on CNN.

The CIA website is back up and run this morning after the computer hacking group known as anonymous allegedly took it down yesterday. The CIA wasn't the only target. Hackers linked to anonymous also claim they crashed the state of Alabama's website. Reports say that the hackers got access to the personal data of tens of thousands of people in Alabama, including Social Security numbers and criminal records.

Icy roads near Flint, Michigan, have caused a massive pileup. A local sheriff's office says it has reports of at least 100 accidents on local highways. The road is still open, though. Drivers are being told it may be best to go around. We have no reports of any serious injuries from any of these crashes.

Snow in the northeast in the Ohio Valley in the south is feeling a little chill, as well. Let's bring in meteorologist Reynolds Wolf. Reynolds, a lot of people here in Atlanta got up this morning and felt a little chill.

REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Of course. A lot of people here in Atlanta have been wondering when is winter going to get here? Winter is really thumping this morning all around parts of the southeast (INAUDIBLE). We've got the cold. We got a little colder in parts of the Midwest, then we have just bone chilling stuff, especially in parts of the northern plains into the upper Midwest. We're going to give you the whole deal coming up in just a few moments.

You're watching CNN SATURDAY MORNING. See you in a little bit.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROWLANDS: (INAUDIBLE) marks the momentous anniversary for Egypt. It's been one year since then President Hosni Mubarak stepped down after three decades of iron rule. But the country is still seeing political unrest and discontent and now, there are calls for a massive general strike.

CNN's Ben Wedeman joins us now from Cairo with more on the anniversary.

And Ben, it's a significant anniversary but clearly, there is still a tough road ahead.

BEN WEDEMAN, SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, many Egyptians will tell you that a year after Hosni Mubarak stepped down after that 18-day revolution that many of their dreams have not been realized. There's a feeling that the military council that took over a year ago from Hosni Mubarak is not sincere about its stated intentions of handing over government to a civilian power, to a civil body, even though presidential elections are scheduled for later this year.

Now, today, there's supposed to away a general strike, an open ended strike until the military council steps down. But by the looks of it, Congress seems pretty normal. It doesn't appear that with the exceptions of some universities and schools and other for instance workers' groups, that really many people have responded to that. Many Egyptians worry that with continual unrest, the economy is beginning to suffer. In fact, it is suffering severely and there is a consensus among the majority, you might say the silent majority of Egyptians that the country needs to just get back to work -- Ted.

ROWLANDS: And quickly, Ben, why is there a low turnout in your estimation?

WEDEMAN: I'm sorry, could you repeat the question?

ROWLANDS: You said that the scheduled strike today, there was anticipation that there would be a lot of folks coming out and you're saying not too many have come to the streets. Why is that, do you think?

WEDEMAN: It's really difficult to say. It might be simply a case of revolutionary exhaustion. Here in Cairo over the last year, we've seen almost every single Friday, large demonstrations in Tahrir Square. Parts of the city are now walled off to protect, for instance, the ministry of the interior, to protect the parliament from demonstrators. Normal life has really been severely disrupted over the last year and many Egyptians are simply weary of it. They're frustrated with some of the actions of the military rulers, their tendency to sort of blame revolutionaries for all the country troubles. But at the end of the day, I think people are simply tired of this turbulence -- Ted.

ROWLANDS: Ben Wedeman for us, live this morning in Cairo.

Well, winter returns to the northeast. Reynolds Wolf, up next, with your weekend forecast coming up. Plus CNN's Bonnie Schneider wrote a book about how to survive extreme weather conditions. She'll join us in a few minutes with some tips. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROWLANDS: A beautiful shot of Atlanta this morning. The sun comes up on a chilly morning in Atlanta. Good morning, everybody. It is 16 minutes past the hour. Welcome back to CNN SATURDAY MORNING. It is, yeah, just after 8:15 here. Time to check our weather with Reynolds Wolf and Reynolds, we have a messy winter storm on the move.

(WEATHER REPORT)

WOLF: Speaking of travel, I want to talk about a friend of mine who has been doing a bit of traveling, get that thing going. And that would be a friend of mine named Bonnie Schneider. Bonnie Schneider is here. She's a special guest, here to talk about her new book, the new book, you see the name right there, "Extreme Weather." She's here to basically give us a basically inside look to her survival guide.

Bonnie has always had this incredible ability of taking a very complex subject and making it understandable. Tell us about this new book.

BONNIE SCHNEIDER, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, yeah. This book I wrote really as a survival guide for everyone. They should have it at home because it gives tips on every type of extreme weather. You know, here at CNN, we cover every type of extreme weather nationally from tornados all the way to snowstorms wherever you are in the country. So I really wanted to write a book that everyone can use wherever they are in the country.

Each chapter begin with a real life survivors' story, a little bit about the science behind the phenomenon and then it gets into tips, what to do if you find yourself driving and the road floods or if you're stuck on foot in a snowstorm. I give practical bullet points, survivor tips on how to take care of yourself, your family and even your pet.

WOLF: Here they are. Take a look at some of these. So again, create a basic emergency supply kit. When you say emergency supply kit, what are you referring to?

SCHNEIDER: Food, water, things like that, but how much you should have per person per household and what you should also have for your pets, as well, basic supplies. And it's funny, a lot of people I interviewed that were caught in these dangerous situations didn't have these things at home. I know it says a lot of air, but it's important to make sure you have this, especially now that we're in the winter season because during a snowstorm we can lose power for days or even weeks at a time.

And you want to make sure you have a family disaster plan and that means practice what you would do in the event of a natural disaster in your home. Everybody should have a role and know what to do and how to execute their plan. So practicing that plan is so important. WOLF: So basically, you want the kids to know, if they hear tornado sirens, you want the kids to know instinctively take cover, where to go immediately.

SCHNEIDER: Right. And my book does give advice on where to go, because some families have basements, which is the ideal place you want to go when there's a tornado, underground. But, for example, here in the south, many people don't have basements. So I give other advice on what to do if you're in that situation. Or for the hurricane chapter, a lot of people in Florida live in even mobile homes or high rise condos. So I have specific advice for that as well.

And I want to point out something that seems very obvious, but be aware of the forecast, because some people find themselves in that mode where you're driving out for a vacation and you don't check the weather and you could be under the threat of flooding, for example, if you're out camping. So it's important to have that NOAA weather radio and be aware of the forecast and keep checking it throughout the weekend if you are away in case you are about to travel. That's very important.

WOLF: This is all about survival. I'm sure in the course of doing research for your book, you came across some pretty interesting survival stories. Do you have a favorite?

SCHNEIDER: Well, there were some really compelling stories that I got the chance to interview and talk to people from all over the country, all different types of weather disasters. And many of the stories in this book are exclusive to the book. You haven't seen or heard them before.

One of them was a landslide that occurred in La Conchita (ph), California in 2005 and I interviewed a young woman who was 18 years old at the time. She was in school at Santa Barbara and she found herself in a home that she thought she was about to undergo an earthquake. You can see picture of landslide there. But what happened was, the wall caved in. She felt dirt on her face and all of a sudden, the house collapsed on top of her.

WOLF: Unbelievable.

SCHNEIDER: Miraculously she survived and even more incredibly, a neighbor who was on their bicycle at the time, saw the landslide. He rushed to her rescue, heard her cries muffled through the dirt and literally clawed her out to safety. They had a reunion, actually, years later. So it was an incredible story that you'll read about in "Extreme Weather."

WOLF: If you don't have one of these books, you need to pick one up. Bonnie, thanks so much for your time.

SCHNEIDER: Thank you Reynolds.

WOLF: Unbelievable book. Congratulations for your success and folks, we're going to have more coming up. You're watching CNN SATURDAY MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROWLANDS: You're looking at a live picture of presidential hopeful Ron Paul at a caucus spot in Sanford, Maine. He just arrived there a few minutes ago. We're expecting that Mitt Romney will also be arriving at the same location in about an hour from now. This is turning out to be a two-candidate race in Maine where they are caucusing throughout the day. Ron Paul and Mitt Romney going head to head. We'll have more on this throughout the day. As you can see, Mr. Paul shaking hands, asking people for their support in Maine as they go to the polls.

A mystery in the waters off of San Francisco. Yes, take a look at this. It's a car in the water on the beach. The driver is in the hospital right now with unknown injuries. Firefighters came to his rescue, but they aren't sure or they're not saying how the car got there in the first place.

Oceans across the globe got a little smaller in the past year, even as heavy rain sparked flooding on several continents. What's behind the sea change? John Zarrella talked to scientists about the causes and the potential impact.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Standing on the shore looking out at the water, you see a difference? No, there's no way you'd notice it. Despite all that talk of rising sea level, scientists found that last year, it actually fell just an itsy bitsy bit, about 0.2 of an inch. Why? Just one of thoughts freak things. More water happened to fall on land.

JOSH WILLIS, NASA OCEANOGRAPHER: So about a trillion tops of extra water fell on land that normally would fall into the ocean.

ZARRELLA: The biggest recipients of all that extra water, Australia where it caused terrible flooding that's still going on and the northeastern part of South America.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We can see the rainy seasons and the dry seasons over the continent.

ZARRELLA: But it was just a hiccup in an otherwise steady rise in global sea level, which has been faster during the past 100 years. NASA scientists say that at any time during the past 2,000.

WILLIS: So what this paints is a picture of sea level rise that looks like a hockey stick. It's pretty stable for several thousand years. Then at the end, it goes up. That is us.

ZARRELLA: A new satellite study of the earth shows why. The blue shade indicates places where the land ice is being lost. Red is where it's gaining. Huge amounts of the planet's land ice, glaciers, Greenland, Antarctica and the ice caps are, the study indicates, melting annually and contributing to sea level rise. Some spots in the U.S., Alaska, Louisiana, could be hard hit. South Florida already is seeing it.

JENNIFER JURADO, BROWARD CO. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION: During these extreme high tide events, it will be completely inundated with water extending from one waterway to another.

ZARRELLA: Here is what it looked like two years ago. Jennifer Herrato is responsible for helping Broward County deal with rising water. The county is one of four from Palm Beach to the Keys, developing a regional climate action plan. Drainage improvements, roads elevated, well fields moved inland. It's hoped Federal dollars would cover much of it, but some improvements, like raising a sea wall --

JURADO: It may be that a community would need to come together and jointly agree to fund an improvement like that.

ZARRELLA: Studies indicate sea level rise in Florida from nine inches to two feet by 2060. Officials here say plans have to be enacted now or scenes like this will become far more widespread. John Zarrella, CNN, Ft. Lauderdale.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROWLANDS: So is the U.S. headed towards World War III? Iran's nuclear warning today could make keeping the peace even more difficult. "Time" magazine's foreign policy correspondent joins me live in just a few minutes and she says that Iran may be itching for war.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

***30

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROWLANDS: It is 31 minutes past the hour. Welcome back. I'm Ted Rowlands. Thanks for starting your day with us on CNN.

Let's check the top stories.

Maine's Republican voters wrap up their week long caucuses today. GOP front-runner Mitt Romney is hoping to close strongly against Ron Paul.

Paul has been on the ground in Maine more than his rivals and has well -- run a well-run campaign in the state. Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum have not recently campaigned in Maine at all.

Atlanta police this morning tell us they have now identified a third suspect in the videotape beating of a 20-year-old gay man. Authorities say the suspects could be heard yelling anti-gay slurs at the victim, Brandon White. The attack happened in broad daylight outside of an Atlanta area store.

A judge could rule Monday if Jerry Sandusky gets to visit his grandchildren. The former Penn State assistant coach is charged with sexually abusing young boys. As part of his bail he's under house arrest and isn't allowed to be around children. His trial is set for May.

In Saudi Arabia, one man was killed today when police clashed with protesters demanding social and political reform. This is a video posted by a political activist. CNN could not verify the authenticity of it. The state-run Saudi press calls the protests illegal.

Here is the latest now in Syria. Opposition activists say at least seven people were killed today by Syrian's military. Syria's restrictions on journalists make it impossible to verify reports or video. This amateur video shows the total chaos though, in one of the northern cities in Syria.

CNN's Belize DeSilva interviewed one Syrian resident from Homs. It has been the epicenter of the uprising and the main target for the government's guns. He says a large number of kids and women have been injured or killed. Take a listen.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

OMAR, OPPOSITION ACTIVIST: The most important things, that the kids has been injured. A lot of them, kids, women has been injured. There is a few -- there is a few women lost their babies. Pregnant women they lost their babies. We hope that Assad Army just give us safe passages so we can send just -- at least send women, the children out of the area.

But he's surrounding the area very strong. And he's preventing the ambulance car to come and take the -- we want -- just want from Assad to give us permission to move the injured babies. They are just the babies. They are not terrorists, they are not army, they don't have -- they have to leave the area for -- to have a good treatment.

He's doing -- this is horrible. He don't even let us safe on streets or injured babies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROWLANDS: "HOMS A CITY UNDER SIEGE", tonight CNN airs a special report on Syria's uprising. See and hear firsthand accounts of government crackdowns from those living and suffering through it. That is on CNN tonight at 10:30 p.m. Eastern.

Well it is revolutionary day in Iran kind of like our Fourth of July but the fireworks may be coming from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. At a rally today he said that within days, Iran would announce, quote, "Several major achievements in the nuclear domain."

Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta warns that Israel could strike Iran sometime this spring. Could this be the beginning of what could be a possible World War III scenario? "Time" magazine's foreign correspondent Jay Newton-Small is here. Jay, political analysts believe that war with Iran is very unlikely. You write, though, about four ways that the U.S. could end up going to Iran possibly by the end of this year and you also say that on some level Iran wants a war with the United States. Explain that.

JAY NEWTON-SMALL, TIME MAGAZINE FOREIGN POLICY CORRESPONDENT: Well, look, like in the United States, Iran has elections coming up. Theirs are in the beginning of March. And they're incredibly -- the government has got a lot of problems right now.

There are sanctions that are in place are incredibly painful. There's hyper inflation going on. They're increasingly isolated from the rest of the world.

And again, remember they were -- even before the Arab Spring started you had protests in Iran that the government is not that popular. So if you provoke a kind of skirmish with either Israel or the United States that would involve some sort of aerial bombing of these nuclear sites, you achieve two things.

First of all, you go from being the bad guy that everybody is really unhappy with right now to being sort of more sympathetic character, perhaps Russia and China might back off on some of these sanctions that have really been hurting Iran's economy. And then you also get the support of your people ahead of these big parliamentary elections.

ROWLANDS: Now, a war is not something that's going to be on the forefront of many people's mind in the U.S., specifically. What would be a trigger that could compel the United States into a situation where they have no choice but to engage Iran?

NEWTON-SMALL: Well, one of the triggers that the analysts that I spoke to, and most military analysts are most worried about is the Strait of Hormuz where you have all of this oil coming in and out, you have U.S. Naval ships, you has Iraqi naval ships, you have Iranian naval ships. And in the past -- I mean this is a very tight space for maneuvering -- and in the past, during the Iran/Iraq seven-year war there was a lot of accidental fire between all three of these militaries. And in one case, the USS Vincent (ph), actually shot down an Iranian commercial liner and killing near 300 passengers on board because they thought they were under attack.

So some trigger-happy person on any of these militaries could open fire and just sort of something, it could snowball from there and that could really become a flash point that could lead to a war in the region.

ROWLANDS: What -- what would a war look like between the U.S. and Iran? Obviously it's not going to be boots on the ground invasion style. What would you foresee?

NEWTON-SMALL: I mean, the straits -- the Strait of Hormuz is one place for being more of a naval war, but more likely if Iran were to provoke a war, a war, it's a flash point, it's a nuclear sort of program which Iran is suspected of having and developing nuclear weapon then that would be an aerial bombing more in which you would see probably a few weeks to a month of sustained bombings of these sites because many of them are very deep and you need to bomb them repeatedly in order to penetrate the ground.

So sustained bombings for a few weeks in order to delay or destroy as much as possible of those programs.

ROWLANDS: But to be clear, while you wrote four different scenarios where the U.S. could be sort of sucked into a war or a skirmish with Iran, it is not likely. That's not the likely scenario here.

NEWTON-SMALL: No. It's something that nobody really wants particularly politically. I mean, look, Americans are war weary. Do we really want another war with the Middle East? Can we really afford it when we're cutting billions and billions of dollars from the Pentagon budget? And it's really not something that I think a lot of people in the Middle East really want at this point.

It's just the kind of thing where it could get dragged in depending on these different scenarios where something could happen, like a misfiring in the straits of Hormuz or, you know, certain triggers that could happen where you could really get a war almost by accident.

ROWLANDS: All right, interesting stuff, thanks. Jay Newton-Small joining us, the "Time" magazine's foreign policy correspondent, joining us this morning in Washington -- thanks Jay.

NEWTON-SMALL: Thanks Ted.

ROWLANDS: Well, you hate those long airport lines. Who doesn't? Find identity what's in the works to get you on the plane a lot faster. That coming up next.

But before we get to that, it is time for "Travel Insider". As CNN reporters and producers, we often have the inside scoop on great places to go. Our Reynolds Wolf knows exactly where to go. He traveled about an hour north of Atlanta here where he found one of the oldest gold mines in the country.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST (voice-over): At first impression, you see this beautiful building here in the parking lot. But it's what's below ground that really captures the imagination.

(on camera): You know, this wasn't dug just yesterday. It's been around since 1898.

And this is "D" Harbert, the general manager of the mine. D, how long have people been digging for gold in this part of the world?

DATHAN "D" HARBERT, MANAGER CONSOLIDATE GOLD MINE: Well, gold was first discovered in 1828. And in just one year over 15,000 people showed up all looking for gold and it became the first major U.S. gold rush.

WOLF: Now what type of mining is this?

HARBERT: And this one here is hard rock gold mine.

WOLF: But there are other types too, right?

HARBERT: Oh absolutely. You want to grab a gold pan and head out for the rivers and streams.

WOLF: All right, D, show me how this is done.

HARBERT: Fill that with water and the heavy gold has fall into the bottom. If you do your job right, you sure find right there.

WOLF: Gold. Check it out. And I've got sand.

HARBERT: You better keep your day job.

WOLF: Unbelievable, D, thanks for your time.

HARBERT: Thanks for coming, come back.

WOLF: All right. We've got to hit the road.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROWLANDS: Welcome back. It is time for our "Entertainment Minute".

Beyonce and Jay-Z have released the first public photos of their new bundle of joy. Pictures of Blue Ivy Carter were posted to Jay-Z's Web site with a note that said "We welcome you to share our joy. Thank you for respecting our privacy during this beautiful time in our lives. The Carter family."

Singer Adele is ready for her comeback performance, Sunday at the Grammy's. She's opening up about her throat surgery. She says she used a SmartPhone app to help her speak.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: That's going to be hard.

ADELE, SINGER: Yes. It was really hard.

COOPER: I sense you like to talk.

ADELE: Yes. I like talking.

COOPER: So how did you communicate for five weeks?

ADELE: Well I've had -- I had an iPad and I always have an application on my phone and you tap the words into it and then it speaks it. But the great thing is I love to swear. Mostly you can't swear but I found this one app where you can swear.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROWLAND: Adele (INAUDIBLE) in person, in the spotlight tomorrow night. LL Cool J is hosting the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. He spoke to CNN about how he's handling the pressure.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LL COOL J, SINGER: You know what; I wouldn't say I'm nervous, but I'm not, you know, cocky like, I have this under control. It's done. I'm doing it, you know.

It's kind of one of those things where I realize this is a big responsibility and it's a large challenge, but I want to meet it. And I want to make sure that everyone who sees the show has a good time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROWLANDS: And a man who is convicted of stalking singer Madonna has escaped from a mental hospital. Authorities describe 54-year-old Robert Hoskins as highly psychotic and possibly violent without his medication. The Los Angeles Police say that Madonna has been notified. She was notified immediately after Hoskins escaped.

Well, the Transportation Security Administration is changing the way we go through airport security, thankfully. It could help thousands speed through lines, those long lines that we all dread.

Our very own, Nadia Bilchik is here and joins us with more. And you've gone through the new lines to experience this, yes.

NADIA BILCHIK, CNN EDITORIAL PRODUCER: I have. I have experienced it. And the first time was a surprise. But when I passed -- and got through and what was so nice is I did not have to take off my shoes or my jacket and did not have to put toiletries on the line or take out my laptop.

It is marvelous. It is called the TSA pre-check. It is now available at seven airports including LAX, Miami, Atlanta, Dallas, Detroit, Vegas and Minneapolis. And I am happy to tell you, it is coming to 28 more cities by 2012. Now, the current ones are in association with either American or Delta or sometimes both, but they're expanding their airline base.

ROWLANDS: Now, are there separate lines, then that are set up?

BILCHIK: Completely separate line. And when you go through the line, there's a wonderful sign that says, you don't have to take off your shoes, you busy traveler, you. And that is wonderful.

The only time you do have to take off your shoes is, for example, the boots I was wearing at the time had buckles and they did beep. And then you do have to take them off. And I will you they also use explosive trace swabs to check my ring and watch. So it's not completely exempt, but it's certainly so much easier. And already 350,000 people have gone through the TSA pre-check.

ROWLANDS: What begs the question is was this really a needed part of establishing security with the shoes and the laptop and the toiletries and why not just abolish it for everybody?

BILCHIK: Well, that's a very good point. But what they're doing is making sure that the people who have been pre-checked can go through at a very accelerated pace and that there's a way of qualifying for this. So two things can happen: you can either be opted in by your airline -- at this stage, it's Delta or American but it's going to expand; or you can pay $100 and go on to the Custom Board of Protections Trusted Traveler Program.

And you go on to globalentry.gov. And I'm going to repeat that. It is globalentry.gov and there's lots of information as well on tsa.gov for more information and in that way they will do a full background check, fingerprints and all and for $100 you can go through the pre- check. But John Pistole from TSA Administration says, "Let's face it, most people and most passengers do not pose a threat to security."

ROWLANDS: All right. Nadia, thank you, $100 and you're zooming through the airport.

BILCHIK: All free. I hope you get to opt in which I hope you do soon.

ROWLANDS: All right. Sounds good. Thanks, Nadia.

Forget Tim Tebow. There is a new sports star and you need to see what he pulled off last night. Don't go anywhere, this is a great story.

But first, the gaming world is buzzing about a video game that's won numerous awards and had record sales. But it didn't come from a giant company. It started with one man and a very simple idea. Reynolds Wolf has his story in this, "Start Small, Think Big".

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

REYNOLDS WOLF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Marcus Passion, also known as "Notch", had the itch to build something. MARCUS PASSION: I realized I wanted to do something on my own. So I left the job as a Web developer and started doing games in my spare time and "Minecraft" happened to be the first thing I did.

WOLF: Minecraft is not your typical video game. It has no story line or rules. No fancy cinematics or advanced graphics. Notch's idea was to build a world made of blocks where you create your own adventure.

PASSION: Early on, I figured out this was pretty fun; just being able to just have a simple component to build something out of it.

WOLF: Notch started to sell the game as soon as it was playable. And as the game developed, he released free updates, which created excitement in the gaming community.

PASSION: The biggest advantage to doing things for free, release early, you get people to pay. So you get people who are more invested in the game. They want to talk about the game.

WOLF: This strategy helped register more than 18 million players, making "Minecraft" a huge success before it was even finished. It was officially launched with his own convention in Las Vegas. The game is bigger than ever.

PASSION: It's very overwhelming. The reason I started working on "Minecraft" and kept working on it was because of people playing it. And now we have like 5,000 people here for a game for "Minecraft".

WOLF: If you build it, they will play. Reynolds Wolf, CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROWLANDS: Good morning, New York City, a shot of Columbus Circle at just before 9:00 on a Saturday morning, a chilly Saturday morning around a lot of the country. Welcome back and thanks for joining us here on CNN. I'm Ted Rowlands.

As we roll along on this Saturday morning, Tim Tebow who? There's a new superstar, sports fans. You need to start following, this guy is lighting it up.

And HLN Sports guy Joe Carter is here to give us the formal introduction. He just came out of nowhere and he's lighting it up.

JOE CARTER, HLN SPORTS: You said it. The Knicks Jeremy Lin is the name you have to know. And literally, like you said, came out of nowhere. This guy went from basically being on the bench one week to now being the talk of sports.

He has a great back story, didn't get drafted out of college; was actually dumped by two different teams earlier this season. The Knicks scooped him up. They put him on the roster but they were like, you know, we don't have a lot of room for him, so we're going to send him to the D League, which is basically the minor leagues of basketball, NBA basketball. Well, injuries, by default he was brought back to the Knicks and now this unknown Asian-American with a degree of all things in economics from Harvard is basically putting up Lebron James-like numbers. In four games, he's averaging 28.5 points. Last night he outplayed Kobe Bryant and the Lakers.

And the Knicks once struggling now have rattled off four straight wins. And it's essentially become Lin-sanity in New York. A rap song has been made after him. Knick tickets are flying off the shelf, the bestselling thing on Stub Hub this week.

He's taken over Twitter with creative nicknames like the Linning, the Linstigator and my favorited, Super Lintendo. And here's the kicker in it all, he's been living with his brother in New York City and sleeping on his couch because he didn't have a guaranteed contract. So he was making very little money.

And now the Knicks have given him a guaranteed contract on Wednesday, so he can actually start apartment shopping in New York City. So the Lin-sanity could continue in New York for the rest of the season.

ROWLANDS: Yes. And hopefully if he were to be at the all-star game, Will Ferrell could introduce him and come up with a good one, I think.

CARTER: Great segue. So earlier this week, Will Ferrell did the player introductions at the Bulls-Hornets game on Wednesday. If you haven't seen the clip, here it is. We'll talk about it after the clip.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILL FERRELL, COMEDIAN: At forward, 6'10 from Mexico. He doesn't speak a lick of English, but we still love him, Gustavo Ayon.

At center, 6'10 from Connecticut, where he majored in econ, but he minored in love, Omeka Ukabu (ph).

At guard, 6'5" from Italy. Ironically, he hates Italian food, Marco Belanelli (ph).

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARTER: All right. So it's absolutely hilarious. Now, fans want to hear more from him. They would like him to do the player intros at the upcoming all-star game which is February 26. They got a big group on Facebook pushing to do it, trying to get some support.

I think it's great for the NBA. It's something, obviously, sports has been missing, an entertaining, razzing, roasting-like player intros.

ROWLANDS: That's unbelievable. All right. Joe, thanks, appreciate it.

Courting conservatives in Washington -- Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich all did it. But who will get the seal of the approval in the most influential gathering of conservatives in the country? (COMMERCIAL BREAK)