good evening. tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of people from all over the country gathered at the foot of the lincoln memorial in washington today for a rally steeped in patriotism, rooted in the nation's cultural divide and greeted by suspicion. it was organized by provocative conservative talk show host glenn beck who was joined on stage by sarah palin. if that wasn't enough to trigger reaction from activists on the left, the timing and place of the rally certainly was. the anniversary of martin luther king, jr.'s "i have a dream" speech delivered from the same steps 47 years ago today. nbc's tom costello joins us now from washington with more. hello, tom. >> reporter: hi, lester. good evening to you. there is speculation these two might go on the attack today. in effect, they held their fire. this rally was about god and country. >> hello, america. >> reporter: on the steps of the lincoln memorial, glenn beck's rally at times had the look and feel of a christian revival. >> america today begins to turn back to god. >> let the church say amen! >> reporter: albeit with a heavy dose of beck-style patriotism. >> this day is a day that we can start the heart of america again. it has nothing to do with politics. it has everything to do with god. >> reporter: thousands came to hear the message. true to his word, beck steered clear of politics, even convincing sarah palin to do the same. >> i've been asked to speak as the mother of a soldier. >> reporter: instead, they honored the nation's servicemen and women, founding fathers and the man who made history on this very spot 47 years ago today. >> i have a dream today. >> i can relate to martin luther king probably the most because we haven't carved him in marble yet. he's still a man. >> reporter: beck stirred controversy by picking this day and place. he's on the record calling president obama a racist and labeling democrats marxists, socialists, communists and pinheads. holding their own, much smaller march and rally, civil rights activists were defiant. >> they want to disgrace this day. we're not giving them this day. this is our day and we ain't giving it away. >> reporter: much of beck's crowd was made up of tea party supporters. victoria came from new york. >> i believe in our constitution and this administration doesn't. >> reporter: bill from rhode island. >> we come here because we are really concerned about the welfare of our nation, the future of our nation. >> reporter: analysts warned this rally could carry a risk for republicans. >> republican party needs conservatives, needs the tea party activists, but the republican party does not want to be defined by tea partiers or glenn beck. >> reporter: in the end, beck the performer had the crowd in his hand. they came from all over the country for this rally, as far away as california. some in the crowd had anti-obama t-shirts or signs. for the most part it was a peaceful day and both rallies were peaceful. lester, back to you. >> tom costello, thank you. there is news on both u.s. warfronts in afghanistan. dozens of insurgents launched a daring attack against two bases manned by american and afghan troops along the pakistani border this morning. one of the bases was the site of a suicide attack that killed four cia officers last december. today's attack was beaten back. 21 insurgents were killed, others were captured. many said to be wearing american army uniforms, possibly purchased from shops in kabul and other afghan cities. in iraq there is chilling new warning about terrorist attacks in the days ahead as america's military forces turn security of iraq over to iraq. president obama spoke about the turning point today in his weekly address. mike viqueira is with the president on martha's vineyard. >> reporter: with three days to go before the u.s. combat mission in iraq formally ends, today president obama took credit for fulfilling a vow. >> as candidate for this office i pledged i would end this war. as president, that's what i'm doing. >> reporter: but as the tuesday milestone nears, a fresh wave of violence hit iraq. 56 dead over the past week with al qaeda in iraq claiming responsibility for the attacks. today in response, iraqi prime minister nuri al malaki put his nation on the highest alert and warned that terrorists plan more attacks before the end of u.s. combat operations the end of next week. despite the unrest, president obama left little doubt. for u.s. combat forces, there is no turning back. >> the war is ending. like any sovereign independent nation, iraq is free to chart its own course. >> reporter: experts say after seven years of war and billions invested in training police and security forces, iraq is ready to handle its own security. >> iraqi forces have been doing most of the work, taking most of the risks. that's been true for one to two years. >> reporter: and lester, as the president's ten days here on martha's vineyard winds down, he heads into a big week. he's got the iraqi speech tuesday. later in the week, he hosts those direct talks between israelis and palestinians. tomorrow he leaves directly for new orleans where he'll help commemorate the fifth anniversary of hurricane katrina. lester? >> mike viqueira, thanks. this reminder, brian williams will have an exclusive interview with president obama in new orleans tomorrow here on "nightly news." as we approach the fifth anniversary of hurricane katrina, we're keeping a close eye on three storms in the atlantic ocean. even if they don't make landfall, they could pose danger for many east coast beaches. for the latest, weather channel's mike seidel joins us from rehoboth beach in delaware. >> reporter: much of the east coast is dealing with dangerous rip currents caused by hurricane danielle. the hurricane is hundreds of miles away east of bermuda. today was the worst they've seen in many years in florida near melbourne, 30 rescues. in nearby ocean city, maryland, just south of here, over 200 rescues. expect more of the same tomorrow. from new york state all the way to florida. more rip currents. the best advice, swim on a guarded beach. there is that conga line of storms. take a look at this. danielle racing well east of beuda into the north atlantic. no more issues for the u.s. east coast after tomorrow. earl is on its heels. now a 60-mile-per-hour tropical storm speeding west, forecast to become a hurricane on sunday. behind earl is our next potential opical depression. it would be named fiona. tropical storm watches heading up to the u.s. virgin islands. the forecast, earl turns west/northwest, slows down and strengthens. by midweek, projected to be a category 3 hurricane, a major hurricane off the east coast. much closer than danielle. more rip currents, higher surf and this type around, beach erosion. but with the track not etched in stone, earl will have many on edge as we head towards labor day weekend. lester, the relatively calm surf behind me will turn much more dangerous as we head towards wednesday and thursday. back to you. >> i know you'll be watching it for us, mike seidel, thank you. on this night five years ago, hurricane katrina was intensifying over the gulf of mexico, hours away from making landfall in louisiana. three days earlier a weaker katrina slammed into southern florida causing 11 deaths. but what awaited the people of louisiana and mississippi and city of new orleans was much worse. the man who took the fall for the federal government's poor response former fema president returned to new orleans this week. and in the city's hardest-hit neighborhood, he spoke to me about how it all went so wrong. i think a lot of people would say, you've got a lot of nerve coming back to new orleans, and especially here in the ninth ward. to which you say? >> you know what? this is a significant portion of these people's lives, what happened to them, a significant portion of my life, too. i will always be a part of what happened here. i want to know what's going on and i want to comment about what's going on, or frankly, based on this, what's not going on. >> reporter: if you had to put your finger on one thing that you failed at, that somebody else failed at, that led to the horror show in this neighborhood, what would it be? >> the failure of, i think, both the federal government convincing people to do an evacuation and failure of the mayor to do an evacuation earlier. >> reporter: were you urging him earlier than that sunday to declare a mandatory evacuation? >> absolutely. we were doing it 72 hours in advance. i actually picked up the phone, called the president down in crawford and said i'm asking to you do a favor for me. i want you, the president of the united states, to call the mayor and use that bully pulpit to get him to evacuate. >> reporter: did the president make that call? >> he made the call. >> reporter: did the administration fail in its katrina response? >> yes. i think there was this attitude of it's a hurricane. brown and his team have handled hurricanes before, they can handle this one. there was not the sense of urgency this was the kind of catastrophic hurricane we had been warning and try to plan for. >> reporter: where did you fail along the way? >> the biggest mistake was not putting into context for the american public what was not working. i had gone back and looked at the talking points we give to guys like you at the briefings. they were factually correct. we are moving more ice water, meals, medical supplies than we ever moved before. what i didn't tell the people was it's not enough. we are having distribution problems with that stuff. we should have put it in better context. i failed to communicate how bad this was. >> browny, you're doing a heck of a job? >> reporter: how did you become the villain? how did you become the symbol of the administration's gross failure here? >> because i was the guy on the ground. you have to have somebody in charge in any disaster. ostensibly that was me. i'm the guy on the ground. i'm the face in front of the camera and low man on the totem hole. who do you think bush is going to fire? >> reporter: no matter what you do in life, you will always be the guy whose name is associated with what went wrong here. >> i joked with my family, i never wanted to be an expensive obituaries in "the new york times." now they will carry it. and you know what the headline will be, right? the guy bush said, "brownie, you're doing a heck of a job." >> reporter: and nobody calls you browny? >> no. >> michael brown is a private disaster recovery consultant. more from new orleans a bit later in this broadcast. first, when we come back, live from the sea floor, stunning new images from the deep. the wreckage of "titanic" almost a century after it went down. later, a woman who heard kids tell their stories about a terrifying time and realized she could make a difference. now to the world's most famous sea wreck, the "titanic." it sunk nearly a century ago. tonight we are live when the crew of an historic high-tech mission mapping every inch of the wreckage. nbc's kerry sanders is aboard the research vessel in the north atlantic where that difficult work is going on. kerry, good evening. >> reporter: lester, i'm down in the belly of the vessel right now where if i put on these 3-d glasses, i can see the images in 3-d. let me take you down there. you are now looking at it in 2-d because folks don't have 3-d televisions at home or the glasses. we are two miles down there. you're only seeing these 2-d images, but either way, it's a stunning view of what was once called the unsinkable "titanic." on an evening shrouded in fog much the way it was almost 100 years ago when "titanic" hit an iceberg here, crews launched the remotely operated vehicle into the deep. fixed with an array of cameras, it descends two miles down. billy lang was the first to spot the wreckage of the "titanic" 25 years ago. it was his idea to come back now with 3-d hd cameras. >> we are seeing things we haven't seen before and seeing things we've seen before in a different way. >> go as easy as you can. we're getting a lot of hits right now. >> reporter: the expedition team all wearing special 3-d glasses remains glued to the monitors, studying the bow, the railings, the anchor chains, still in position as if the ship left port yesterday. along the starboard side, port holes. some reflecting the camera's lights. glass is still in place 98 years after the ship sank. that's of special interest to underwater archaeologist jim delgado who noticed some port holes are open. >> it could be a number of people opened their port holes to take a look and that helped contribute to bringing "titanic" down a little faster. >> reporter: experts believe this front section of the ship crashed into the ocean floor at an angle, traveling upwards of 30 miles per hour. that's the mail room which exploded on impact. inside there is a ladder still visible. >> the ladder is still in place. you can see where these guys were scrambling as "titanic" started to fill with water. >> reporter: it's going to take the "rms titanic" and the team of assembled experts here months to get footage of the gathering. tonight there is a little bit of a glitch in the same way mother nature did in the "titanic" with an iceberg. mother nature is chasing researchers back to shore early, temporarily. hurricane danielle is headed right here. the rov will come out of the water later tonight. by late tonight, the ship will start steaming back to land about 400 miles to newfoundland. >> a remarkable view, kerry sanders. thanks for sharing it with us. when we come back, brian williams is in new orleans tonight with harry connick jr. back to new orleans today. when those days after katrina hit, brian williams sent time with a native son, singer and actor harry connick, jr. at the convention center, where the world saw so much of the horror unfolding in realtime. this weekend they revisited the convention center. >> last time you and i took a walk through this city it was the heart of darkness. it was the worst time in the world. this is your hometown. tell me how you reflect back on that time and tell me how you view new orleans today. >> well, being here in particular is difficult, brian, because this is where i saw most of that heart of darkness. there were tens of thousands of people told to come here and wait to be evacuated. they were essentially abandoned. the visions in my mind include malnourished people, other group of people that said, i have epilepsy and i need -- this guy needs help and he starts having a seizure. i'm thinking this is 2005 in one of the most beloved cities in the united states in the world. how can this be happening? it was very hard to comprehend. >> remember this plaza out here? the people who were happy to have the grass because they could sleep on it? dead bodies in front of these doors. people living on the pavement. it was unbelievable. >> it really was. the first dead body i saw was around the corner. this guy took me by the hand and said, you need to see this. he pulled the sheet back and there was an elderly woman sitting in a wheelchair. to see people that come from my town dead on the street like that -- to suffer that kind of indignity was totally mind-blowing to me. i don't have the answers. i've sort of tried to pattern my behavior on progress rather than pointing fingers. what i've always tried to do is, what can i do to make something happen, which is how the musicians village and all that got started. >> you chose an area, part of your hometown, and you said, we're going to build a new town here for musicians. >> i can take credit for thinking of it with my manager anne marie. we thought of it. none of the credit for anything after that is mine. it belongs to the people who built the houses themselves, whose sweat equity with habitat for humanity and countless volunteers that continued to come to do it. >> what does it mean to you? this is an extraordinary achievement. >> there was nothing here as we remember when we spoke to you. came back four months later and there were two houses and i cried. came back six months later and there were ten houses and i cried. i'm a crier. a year and a half into it, we were here. we were milling about and heard the ice cream truck. my kids said, ice cream truck. it was symbolic. there were people here. ♪ >> brian williams in new orleans tonight. brian will host a special edition of "meet the press" tomorrow. his guests include senator mary landrieu and her brother mitch landrieu, mayor of new orleans. up next, making a difference with the power of words. finally tonight, back to new orleans for the story of a woman who has found a way to make a difference, especially for young people, by helping them turn feelings into words. nbc's kate snow has our report. >> it's so good to see you. >> reporter: renee watson hasn't seen the salom kids since the summer after katrina, 2006, when the new york writer donated her time to come here as a guest artist at their summer camp. >> part of what i do with young people all over is helping them cope with trauma using the arts. >> reporter: renee asked the kids to write stories, poetry and plays, a kind of therapy after all the trauma they'd just been through. >> writing it down helps you deal with how you feel. >> i just realized their stories were staying with me. i was thinking about these children all the time and wanted to honor their stories. >> reporter: their words inspired renee to write a book about four friends. >> we're from new orleans, a place where hurricanes happen but that's only the bad side. >> reporter: renee has a page about cooking. >> jumbalaya cornbread and i get to help. >> the calm before the storm is what my granny calls it. the sky doesn't look gray at all. seems like the sun is going to shine forever. >> reporter: then the moment every child here remembers -- leaving home. >> i grabbed some of my favorite movies and i think i brought my pillow. i don't think i brought anything else. >> reporter: through the eyes of renee's students, the storm was terrifying. >> daddy tells us to get to the attic as fast as we can. i take jasmine's hand and i hold it tight like big brothers do. >> reporter: they didn't come back for six months. >> there was mold and destruction and wood all around the floor. the water was up to like 1 1/2 feet. >> reporter: a foot and a half of water in the house? >> our house was raised up. >> reporter: they rebuilt completely, went back to the same school and the other day renee dropped by to donate copies of the book. does it make you feel important to have a book? >> yeah. >> there is so much power in that, sharing your voice, letting your voice be heard. putting on record this is how i felt. >> we are from new orleans, a place where people are tough, tough because of things they've been through, the things they've seen. >> we are from new orleans, a place where hurricanes happen. but that's only the bad side. >> reporter: kate snow, nbc news, new orleans. and that's "nbc nightly news" for this saturday. brian williams anchors the broadcast live from new orleans tomorrow night. i'm lester holt reporting from new york. see you tomorrow morning on "today." see you tomorrow morning on "today." good night. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com