To break. Finally coming to an end. Soon. But not yet. Not a single state in the u. S. Escaping the brutal cold. Power grid looking to restore service to thousands of customers. Dangerous conditions and a woman skids off an icy overpass landing on a pond that was frozen solid. Amazingly, only a few minor injuries. An upcoming book by former defense secretary robert gates has criticism of the white house. He simply wanted to get out. Colorados vail mountain, an avalanche killing a 24yearold, the grandson of the ski resorts founder. During a satellite interview from north korea Dennis Rodman started screaming at a cnn reporter. I give a rats [ bleep ] what the hell you think. Look at these guys. There was an awkward moment when kim jong un said my god, this guy is a lunatic. [ laughter ] a Freight Train derails in canada last night near the border of two dozen homes in the area. Oh, that . Get ready for what some are calling the cheese apocalypse. Kraft says there may be a shortage of velveeta. The fieldgoal and the foul and lebron just kissed somebody over there. A kiss for grandma and all that matters. The vast majority of americans support the Unemployment Benefits. Larry reid who has become almost a dictator in the United States senate wont allow us any amendments. On cbs this morning. Winnipeg manitoba canada, it was actually colder than the surface of the planet mars. Now, that turns out mars has much more night life. [ laughter ] yeah, much more night life. This mornings eyeopener is presented by toyota. Lets go places. Welcome to cbs this morning. Gayle king is off. Good morning, nora. The weather is a big story. It is. And well be talking about secretary gates and his criticism of the Obama White House. As you wake up to pleasant conditions in the west much of the United States faces another day of miserable, dangerous cold. The frigid weather is blamed for 21 deaths. The polar vortex is hovering over the east and midwest. Dozens of cities all the way to the deep south set low temperature records, some colder than siberia. It was 16 below zero in chicago, breaking a 130yearold record, and thats where Dean Reynolds joins us this morning where its pretty cold out. Dean good morning to. Reporter good morning, charlie and norah. Forecasters are saying the end of this frigid cold spell is near but it was 3 degrees below zero at ohare today, and many places around the country will be 10 to 20 degrees below normal today. From the sky, its not hard to miss the thick layer of ice coating chicago. On the ground its causing spinouts like this one. For many in the midwest and across the country, the deep freeze cant end soon enough. It feels like ant ashlth ka. Ant ashlth ka. Antarctica. Reporter lakeeffect snows in upstate new york spawn add blizzard. White house conditions closed parts of the new york state throughway. Up and down the east coast, brutal temperatures made life miserable. This is ridiculous. Reporter new Jersey Transit officials blamed the cold after power lines fell onto a packed commuter train. 1,000 frustrated passengers were stranded for two hours without heat. I have a baby at home and ive been waiting to go back to see the baby. So its really frustrating for me. Reporter tuesdays plummeting temperatures shattered records from atlanta to new york city where residents experienced the coldest day in 118 years. Firefighters were forced to deice hydrants and joggers cut their runs short. I was shooting for five what my nike app to do but i said not today. Reporter in the south, folks in miami had to ditch their bathing suits for winter gear. And from North Carolina to texas,texas texas, the bitter blast turned landmarks into ice sculptures. It doesnt happen down here that often. Reporter back in chicago life is slowly returning to normal. Many kids will be heading back to school after an extended winter break. It is pretty cold. Reporter but you can handle it. Yeah, im tough. Reporter well, she may have to be very tough, because its still very cold around here. And a thaw this weekend would be very welcomed. Charlie, norah . Dean reynolds thanks. Airlines are digging out from under a mountain of coldrelated flight disruptions. So far, 600 of todays flights have been cancelled. That is far below the number from the past few days. Nearly 700 other flights are delayed this morning. Jeff is at Reagan National airport outside of washington. Good morning. Reporter good morning, charlie and norah. Springlike temperatures in l. A. And few delakes at l. A. X. But in the midwest and northeast, the deep freeze continues, and its something thats costing the airlines and the passengers. Some planes once again took to the skies on tuesday, a welcomed sight for passengers stranded in airports all across the country. Ive had seven flights cancelled. Ive been traveling since sunday. Reporter the airlines were trying to clean up the mess left by the blizzard when the polar vortex swooped in. The arctic blast endangered workers on the tarmac. New rules over the weekend limiting pilots time in the cockpit kicked in. Linda, a group that analyzes aviation data, says Airlines Lose money on cancelled flights. They still have to pay the crew. They still have to pay the ownership on the aircraft and then whatever airport theyre at, they have to pay the airport expenses. Reporter almost 100,000 flights have been delayed or cancelled since january 1st costing the airlines more than 400 million. For the nearly 9 million affected passenger, the price tag is even higher. Almost 1 billion. The passengers have expenses as far as lost productivity, other incidental expenses such as hotels and meals that are not covered by the airlines when its a weather expense. Reporter so another day in the deep freeze in the midwest and the east for the airlines. Some of the airlines have said it may be tomorrow before the logjam of cancellations and delays clear. Norah, charlie . Jeff, thank you. And because of the weather, demand for natural gas hit an alltime high yesterday. Meteorologist megan glareos of our chicago station wbbm looks at the warmup on the way. Charlie and norah, temperatures around the country still below average today, but a vast improvement over the last couple of days. Chicago today will hit 13. Minneapolis 3. Both cities above zero which is reason to celebrate, even orlando improving, up now to 68 degrees for todays high temperature. There are wind chill warnings and advisories across many of the northern states. Many of those expire later this morning, or into the noon hour. Wind chills still could be as low in minneapolis as 20 below. Even new york city to 5 below for your wind chills today. Polar vortex continues to lift to the north. A significant warming trend will occur and slowly but surely warm those temperatures to or above average by the end of the week for the eastern half of the country. But bitterly cold winds across the great lakes creating the lakeeffect event across parts of western new york. The plateau could pick up four feet in spots by tomorrow. Charlie, norah . Megan, thank you. A new memoir offers a devastating critique of president obama, his top aides, and congress. It comes from robert gates, a republican who served eight president s, also served as defense secretary in the obama and george w. Bush administrations. Jan crawford is in washington. Jan, good morning. Reporter well good morning, norah and charlie, good morning to you in the west. The book started to leak out yesterday. And what weve seen has sent off shock waves through washington. Its unlike anything i think weve seen from a top former senior official. Its hard to say what the headlines are, because theres just so many. But the president , the Vice President , the Foreign Policy team all of that in this book coming under some sharp criticism. In the fall 2009, after running a president ial campaign supporting the war in afghanistan, the president assured the American People it was the right thing. This is not a war of choice. This is a war of necessity. Reporter but despite authorizing a surge in troops the president was skeptical of the strategy and his former defense secretary says quickly lost faith in the effort. In his new book robert gates writes, the president doesnt believe in his own strategy. He doesnt consider the war to be his. For him, its all about getting out. Gates praises president obama as a man of personal integrity, and in a 2012 interview, gates talked with charlie rose about how the president makes decisions. I think president obama goes out of his way to make sure he hears from everybody. He will not only go around the table in the situation room. Hell go around the back bench to hear from the sort of second and thirdtier officials. Reporter but in the book gates says white house staff exerted too much power. Especially Top National Security aides, calling the most controlling i had seen since Richard Nixon and henry kissinger. Hes even tougher on Vice President joe biden. I think he has been wrong on nearly every major Foreign Policy and National Security issue over the past four decades. Gates has praise for thensecretary of state hillary clinton, who he describes as smart, idealistic but pragmatic, toughminded, funny. But gates also talks about how clinton, like the president , made decisions with politics in mind. He writes, hillary told the president that her opposition to the 2007 surge in iraq had been political, because she was facing him in the iowa primary. The president conceded, that the opposition in the iraq surge had been political. Gates goes on to say that hearing the two admitting this in front of me was as surprising as dismaying. But gates faced his sharpest criticism for congress. He calls the majority of members uncivil, incompetent, egoeg ego tis the administration taking this serious, and immediately released a statement defending the Vice President saying joe biden has been one of the leading statesmen of his time and has helped advance americas leadership in the world. And on the president s schedule which was released last night, the white house made a point of including biden in almost all of the president s meetings today, including lunch, and one that starts in just about half an hour. Thank you. During the last six months at the pentagon, bill daly was president obamas chief of staff. Well, i think its rather unfortunate, because in the year i spent with the president , i saw the exact opposite, to be very frank with you. I saw a president who was very committed, obviously to support the troops, to support the policy of trying to decimate al qaeda, which from afghanistan was their base to attack the United States, and that was the purpose of the surge, and that was the purpose of the action in afghanistan, was to try to destroy as best we could al qaeda. And weve done over the last number of years a heck of a job for that toward accomplishing that. I think its unfortunate that we continue this rush for people to run out and the secretary, who i have enormous respect for, is very clear in the book with his disgust with washington and whats become of it. And part of it is based upon a sense that theres too much grandstanding. And this rush to do books by people who leave an administration while the administration is ongoing, i think its unfortunate. Its one thing as historians look back on an administration but in the middle of it when youre pursuing a war at the same time, and one that is very controversial with the American People and very difficult to honor the military, i think its just a disservice to be frank with you. I understand why Everyone Wants to get out there and write a book and get on the circuit, i think its unfortunate. Let me make one quick mount point, because norah said this is a man much respected in washington, and calm and cordial in his style. But he makes the point, that the nsc and members of the nsc and members of the president s team were meddling far beyond their responsibility, and were dressing down fourstar generals. Well, i just i never experienced anyone dressing down a fourstar general. Obviously, the nsc made up of professionals deal with the pentagon deal with the state department and the intelligence agencies on behalf of the president and his policies. And theres a collaboration. I never sensed to be honest with you, in the 12 months that i was there, a conflict. There are strong disagreements and secretary gates is someone who doesnt hesitate nor did the fourstar generals hesitate to express their opinions, which the president wanted as secretary gates said. The president was very solicitous all the times was with the general, the intelligence agencies to get their opinions. He listened to his staff at the same time. But that sort of dialogue is healthy, i think. And thats what i saw. We should point out, rita braver will join us in a little while, that overall this book apparently though, is very complimentary of the Obama White House and the Bush White House where gates says he agrees with the president on a lot of the decisions he made. Right. Said he made the right decisions when it came to afghanistan. While he offers disappointments of obama in the book the Washington Post says it offers contempt for Vice President biden, and on the Point Charlie was making he says douglas luke, the Lieutenant General in the white house, they were aggressive suspicious sometimes condescending and insulting questions of our military leaders. Did that happen . Well i never saw such action in the 12 months i was there. Obviously, these are very difficult issues and theres a lot of tension around the discussions on policy decisions and whats going on in theater. But the people on the ground were the people who were listened to mostly obviously, because theyre the people who have the ultimate responsibility on the ground to act on behalf of protecting our troops and pursuing the policies. But theres there was healthy dialogue. I never detected any sort of disregard or contempt or outright so what are you saying about bob gates, then that he got it wrong . Well, thats his opinion. No. Look, if thats his opinion, hes an unbelievably respected, i have enormous respect for him. But i never heard him express those feelings to the president or to the situations that i was involved in and i think its unfortunate. Bill, thank you. Nice to see you. We should point out that gate also have more to say this weekend on cbss sunday morning in our correspondent rita braver, and rita will join us in the next hour. Four crew members are dead after a Helicopter Crash in eastern england. It happened last night in a remote nature reserve near the largest american air base in the country. Officials say the chopper was on a rescue training mission. The names of the airmen have not been released. Time to show you some of the mornings headlines. Politico says a bill to extend Unemployment Benefits advanced in the senate tuesday. Six republicans joined democrats in supporting the legislation. Now an agreement must be reached on how to pay for the extension. A final vote could come this week. The wall street journal says jpmorgan will pay 2. 6 billion in a settlement over the Bernie Madoff case. The Justice Department saying the bank ignored the signs of the ponzi scheme. Madoffs victims will get 2 billion in compensation. This morning, the New York Times features an opinion piece by gabrielle gifford. Today marks the third anniversary of the assassination attempt to killed six people. She and 12 others were wounded. And she called for patience on gun control reform. Giffords also says shes making progress in her rehabilitation but calls it endlessly repetitive. She learned to sign her name with her left hand. Britains daily mail says a tiny baby was rescued from the rubble of an air strike in syria. The attack was kurried out yesterday by forces loyal to the syrian government. People formed a human chain to rescue the young victims. Witnesses say barrel bombs were dropped on the damascus suburbs. Usa today says the federal trade commission is cracking down on deceptive weightloss products. The marketers of stensa a weightloss sprinkled on foods will pay a fine. Another one uses junk science to sell its product. And sena says yahoo s new mission is to entertain. Marisasa mayer was the keynote speaker, and she announced the launch of two dai when your windshield needs to be replaced, who can you trust . Safelite does things other factories dont. New york citys Police Commissioner says dozens of former officers disgraced themselves ahead of a scene that took advantage of 9 11. The news is back in a moment. Stay tuned for your local news. Announcer this portion of cbs this morning sponsored by walmart. Save money. Live better. [ grunts softly ] [ ding ] i sense youve overpacked, your stomach. Try pepto togo. Its peptobismol that fits in your pocket. Relief can be yours but your peanuts. Are mine. 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