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Haiti: Horror and Hope; Toddler Taken To Bank Robbery; Mom Trades Daughter For Gun; Tom Joyner Co-Hosts MSNBC Townhall On Race
- Tempers are growing short in Haiti, and more than 300 American soldiers are now there to help provide security and to get supplies to survivors amid reports of looting in Haiti's capital. There are only early estimates of the death toll from Tuesday's 7.0 magnitude earthquake, but authorities say it could reach 50,000.
- AP Correspondent Tony Winton describes a grim sight: "Someone in rubber gloves and a white and a blue coat with a wheelbarrow full of bodies, directing their burial. They are very shallow graves--just a foot or two, laid, a little bit of charcoal and then covered. It was really just a horrifying sight to see this tangled mass of bodies being trucked up this hill." CNN's Anderson Cooper describes seeing survivors opening old grave crypts, shoving as many bodies as they could fit into them, and then resealing them.
- Rush Limbaugh is urging his listeners not to donate to the relief efforts. He says he doesn't trust that donations made via the White House website will reach the victims, and that besides, he doesn't see the need because our tax money is being spent on quake relief anyway. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs responded, "It never ceases to amaze that in times of amazing human suffering, somebody says something that could be so utterly stupid."
- The Red Cross confirms they've raised at least $5 million in earthquake relief--through those singular $10 donation texts to 90999.
- A CDC worker from metro Atlanta and a Douglas, Georgia coed going to school in Florida are among the missing in this week's earthquake in Haiti. Management and program analyst Diane Caves, 31, had been working in Port-au-Prince; she's one of four CDC workers yet to be found. Courtney Hayes, 23, goes to Lynn University in South Florida; she was traveling with the aid group Food for the Poor.
- Governor Perdue has pledged that Georgia's National Guard is on standby for word on how they may be useful in Haiti. Perdue today unveils his state budget proposal, and it's not expected to be pretty. Tax collections have plummeted for 13 straight months. The governor says the state could balance the books without raising taxes, but hinted that it might be on the table. He's also backing a one-cent statewide sales tax for transportation improvements. He wants voters to decide in 2012.
- The economy hasn't turned around for people who work for Gwinnett County. The budget just approved by the county provides no pay raises for county employees--for the first time in 16 years.
- Former DeKalb CEO Vernon Jones announces he will run for the Congressional seat now held by Representative Hank Johnson. Johnson, who recently revealed his fight with Hepatitis C, plans to campaign for a third term.
- Tom Joyner co-hosts a townhall on race this King Day with the host of MSNBC's "Hardball," Chris Matthews. The two-hour special, airing Monday, January 18 at 10:00 p.m., will explore pressing, provocative issues connected to race relations in America. It's called "Obama's America: 2010 and Beyond."
"This is also an important story because it will give me and you a rare opportunity to participate in a much needed discussion about whether racism is still a relevant topic now that President Obama has been elected," says Joyner. "Of course, we know that it is. But now, we will get a chance to say why."
The special will air live from Texas Southern University in Houston. Issues on the table range from whether there is such a thing as generational colorblindness, to the "burdens of the first," and whether there are a unique set of expectations and challenges attached to being the first to break a racial barrier. - The criminal's version of Take Your Daughter To Work Day: a three-year-old girl rides along for her dad's bank robbery. Smyrna Police arrested 35-year-old Cornell Brumfeld after a stickup at a Regions Bank on Concord Road. The girl was turned over to her mom, but cops didn't know a second bank robber was hiding in the car trunk. Ronn Sterling, 35 (right), escaped when the Dodge Avenger was towed to the impound lot. He's still at large.
- Penske today reopens for business at the Kennesaw office that was the site of a shooting rampage that left three dead and two critically wounded. The 30-odd employees had the chance to talk with grief counselors. Sixty-year-old gunman Jesse James Warren, who lost his job as a Penske mechanic last year, is jailed without bond.
- Remember the 8-year-old boy who shot and killed his father and another man at their home in Arizona? Prosecutors have dropped murder charges for a plea deal which will send the now-10-year-old to an inpatient psychiatric center until he's 18. No motive has ever been explained, although the boy reportedly said he didn't want any more spankings.
- Democrats are reporting progress on efforts to hammer out a final deal on the health care overhaul. They've set today as an informal deadline to hammer out a compromise.
- It's the one year anniversary of the splashdown landing known as the Miracle on the Hudson. US Airways Captain Sullenberger, his crew and some passengers today revisit the site where he landed the jet after birds flew into its engines. Everyone aboard survived. At 3:31 this afternoon--the moment of impact--they'll raise glasses in a toast to life.
- An Arizona woman allegedly trades her two-year-old for a handgun. Tanya Nareau, 33, told sheriff's investigators that she did it for two reasons: one, because she thought the male relative would do a better job raising the girl than she could, and two, because she couldn't get a gun along legal channels because she's a convicted felon. No word why she wanted a gun so badly. Oh--and she hasn't actually gotten the firearm yet; the man didn't have a gun on him, so she gave the girl to him and settled for an IOU.
- The KISS 104.1 weather forecast: sunshine Friday, with a high 58; lows in the 30s overnight. Saturday, mostly cloudy with afternoon or evening rain likely, and a breezy high around 50.
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Current conditions for Atlanta
Last Updated on Jul 31 2010, 11:52 am EDT
Humidity: 53%
Wind: W 5.8
Pressure: 29.91
5-day forecast
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