Across the border a major assault in the key city of mosul. At many as 20,000 iraqi troops could be involved in the assault along with u. S. Air power and possibly u. S. Ground troops as well but its also several months away. So why Start Talking about it now . Richard engel is nbcs chief Foreign Correspondent in istanbul, turkey this morning. Richard, good morning. Reporter good morning. Its good to talk to you. First about that deal that has finally been put to paper between the United States and turkey to train a relatively small number of syrian rebels. They would get some training get some money. Radios. They would get some vehicles. Potentially pickup trucks with machine guns mounted on the back but a lot of analysts here in turkey say it is too little, too late and i think you hit on the key question in your introduction there. What are they really supposed to be doing . The United States wants them to be fighting against isis. Turkey wants them to be fighting against isis and bashar al assad. Bashar al assad wants to be fighting against isis and the rebels, so what exactly is their role and will they be Strong Enough to really make a difference . And many suggest they are not, insufficient numbers, to make a difference and nor have the kind of support to do much more than perhaps complicate the battlefield. Interesting. Richard, so many questions. First of all, how big a group is this . How do they filter out the people who are harming americas interests in the future . How many people . Who will they be and how effective can they be were Everybody Knows about this going across happening just miles across the border . Reporter well theyre talking about a few thousand. As many as 5,000. Perhaps even 10,000, but even if it was 5,000 or 10,000 this is a force that would have to be built up over several years, and the rebels have been quite compromised. They are working with other islamic groups. Some of them directly linked to al qaeda. And one of the reasons the United States is giving them such small weapons is that they dont want the weapons to be used against them or to be used against israel or misused. I think a lot of people saw what happened in the ukraine. You had russianbacked rebels, who then used a a ground to and antiaircraft missile to shoot down a passenger plane. So can you imagine what it could be like for the United States if its supporting a group of fairly unreliable rebels with sophisticated weaponry and didnt something similar . So the u. S. The administration, i should say, is trying to walk a very fine line here. Helping the rebels but not giving them enough weaponry that they can win the battle that exactly which battle it is is unclear. Or do tremendous harm should the rebels become a a radical group. Or uncontrollable group, i should say. Yeah. Richard, i want to ask you about a planned assault on mosul. Centcom said thursday u. S. Ground forces could be involved in this operation. Is this a shift from what weve heard in the past . Reporter i think it advances it. I dont know if its a shift. The u. S. Has been the administration has been, and the military have been slowly rolling out this idea with selective leaks to probably get the public accustomed to this idea that there might be some Ground Forces involved in battle, not just sitting on their bases as advisors but sitting in jeeps, in front line positions potentially with their rifles out doing, shooting and engaging the enemy. You asked, also a very good question. Why is the u. S. Broad casting this right now . Youre effectively telling isis that theres a plan in place to come to mosul and to dislodge it. There are strategic questions about why you would want to do that. I think the u. S. Is trying to show some progress in this fight against isis but there are many questions. Is the iraqi army ready . Does it have 20,000 troops that are combatready right now . Many people think they do not. The Kurdish Forces who are key to this plan dont get along with the iraqi forces. The people of mosul dont want the shiiteled and mostly shy lyshiite army to come into their city. Sounds good but there are enormous questions. Richard engel from istanbul. Thanks for being with me. Bringing in washington editor at large. Good to see you. Good morning. A question richard brought up. Why telegraph this attack on mosul . Can you explain that thinking . In part telegraph to show progress, like richard talked about, but also to signal to sunni tribal leaders in the region who largely aqua essed to isis the forces are about to change, the coalition. Hes right many in mosul dont want to see shiite militias come in. The only way i see it working part of the terrain, part of the power structure in Northern Iraq and around mosul turns against isis. So i think by telegraphing it theres been an obvious buildup of weapons in kuwait that can be brought into the conflict and of course straining stuff. 3,000 troops now advising and training and helping on the intel side inside iraq. Theyre showing that americas muscling up along with iraq and in part telegraphing it to get sunni support in the region. And just how much americans are going to be involved in this is probably key when weve seen in the past the iraqi army has not been exactly the strongest fighting force there is. The iraqi army collapsed. Unbelievable. You had senator john mccain, other members of the Armed Services committee essentially getting Intelligence Briefings when isis sort of moved. You just saw whole brigades collapsing and dissolving and of course saw mass executions and whatnot happen, and so when you look at the reality that we have spent not just tens of billions but probably hundreds of billions of dollars training various troops and forces in iraq and other places like afghanistan and isis has not spent hundreds of billions of dollars but with some degree of ease has synthesized foreign fighters foreign troops new terrain, under, you know saddams former generals an demonstrated a fighting capacity formidable. Steve clemons, thank you so much. Thank you. Now to the siberia express. The coldest morning of the season for the entire eastern half of the country. The recordshatters cold continues to dominate the weather pattern keeping temperatures 15 to 40 degrees below average. The recent Winter Weather linked to at least 15 deaths due to hypothermia and road accidents. Look at this. Dashcam video caught an out of control car in michigan tip oh, man just went right into that Police Officer assisting a stranded driver on the icy highway. Incredibly, the officer, not seriously hurt. And hows this for an ice sculpture. Warming up his jeep in North Carolina purled away to receive this icy imprint. Another ice sculpture. Dylan dreyer joins us. What exactly are you in front of . Well we are searching america for the iciest spots and i think we certainly found one. We are in the state park here in castille new york near genesee falls, new york and this is actually a manmade fountain that shoots about five stories up into the air. If we zoom in to the very very top of the fountain you can see the water is still spouting out the top and have some calling it a geyser some calling it an ice volcano. As the water streams down the sides, it freezes on contact. This happens every year but it was posted on social media and got wide you know renowned attention. So people are coming down here to take pictures of it now. Its just a good way to show you just how cold it is. I mean recordbreaking cold in bought mo bottomed out at 1 degree. The old record was set all the way back in the late 1800s. So were not just breaking you know, records that have stood for 20 years. I mean were talking about records that have stood for more than 100 years. Pittsburgh bottomed out at 8 degrees below zero. Even jacksonville, florida, 24 degrees. Old record, 28 degrees. We are crushing records. You know its bad when miami is under a windchill advisory. So i mean its just brutally cold across the eastern half of the country. Jose . It is indeed. Dylan dreyer thank you so very much 367 talking about an amazing video to show you. Look at niagara falls. Look at that. It looks like some i dont know siberian winter wonderland. Theyre on the right you see theres still water but a lot of it is just frozen over. Look at these shots. And nbc meteorologist bill karins, bill as we look at these just amazing shots, reporters around the country are using every gimmick in the book to show how cold it is. Here it is. Boiling water in the air. My favorites the frozen tshirt. The frozen tshirt trick. A frozen banana to nail something into the snow . I had not seen that one before. Yeah. Take the wet tshirt, put it outside. Five minutes before it will just freeze. Pretty cool. Jose id love to sit here and tell you how it will warm up well be all done with the snow and ice looks like the end of february will be just as brutal as the beginning of it. Start with the headline for today for the cold this morning. Now that were past the peak we are done. Turned the corner in a way i guess. Yeah negative 17 in cleveland, ohio. Coldest february temperature ever recorded there. Going all the way back to 1800s was the old record. So thats kind of like the poster child for how cold it was. Put the human aspect on this. People have to work outside today. Postal workers, construction workers, even crossing guards for all your kids going to school are out in the windchills in the negative 20 to negative 30 range and eastern windchills in North Carolina in the negative nushs. Whens it going to end . The fiveday arctic forecast. You dont want to be in the dark colors. Blue purple, worst of it. Sitting there spinning up into canada, shoots back down at all. Looks like another cold blast sunday into monday. Its not over is the bottom line. Big headline for the weekend, ice storm. Tennessee is going to get nailed again. They still have ice on the trees, jose, from the last storm earlier this week and could get a quarter inch to another half inch of ice on top of the ice already on the branches. Major concern about trees falling down and additional Power Outages plus so cold. You dont want to take your family in a cold house. Heres how its shaping up. The snowy areas in the white. Pink shows where the sleet and ice will be. And it starts today in areas of arkansas oklahoma and then tonight it spreads and by the time we get to sunday slowly exiting the northeast, but you get the gist of it this were were stuck in the muck. Havent had a wasnt pattern they say, like this and i wasnt alive for it since 1934. The last time weve seen this brutal of a stretch for this long across the country. Thank you, my friend good to see you. All the best. Just Getting Started on this friday edition of the rundown. A lot to talk about. Up next with meet the press moderator chtuck todd. The president had a busy week. A judge put a stop on hiS Immigration action plus isis terror and Rudy Giulianis comment as the president that have a lot of people talking. Thats all comes up were chuck joins me later. And a slowdown at west coast ports starting to affect the goods we buy in Assembly Lines, at our nations plants. Youre watching msnbc. Were going to be right back. 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Huh, fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. Everybody knows that. Well, did you know words really can hurt you . What. . Jesse dont go jesse. No im sorry daisy, but im a loner. And a loner gotta be alone. Heee yawww geico. Fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more. Jesse . This week started with a major blow to the white house policy on immigration. President obamas executive action was halted by a federal judge just one day before thousands of undocumented immigrants were set to start applying for the program that would allow them to stay and work legally in the u. S. For a period of time. Its ending with critics ramping up pressure to fight global terror. Republican sas the president is being too soft want looser restrictions on giving him the okay to use military force. Joining me from washington, nbc news political director and moderator of meet the press chuck todd. Good morning. Good morning, jose. Start with immigration and the federal court ruling. Does the white house feel its hand has been forced here . I think does and interesting to see how theyve decided to respond, which is essentially to back off. To not to say you know what . Well let the Court Process play out. Let the Legal Process play itself out. I wonder how much is about trying to calm the waters with congress, essentially make it so that all the answergst on the conservative side about Funding Department of Homeland Security beyond the end of this month essentially goes away because the white house is accepting the idea that the courts should rule on whether hes in the constitutional right or wrong on this. So that alone you would assume puts an end to this shortterm crisis about Homeland Security spending. Interesting, because its really in the political realm and then theres the issue of really thousands of people that were going to benefit from this that are seeing this their dreams cut for the time being . Let me tell you this. I think this is one of those cases where success in the court system is that going to be good politics for the Republican Party . Because. Right. When this happens, right, when the courts take it up it is lets say this ruling come the out in 16 sort of the the process how this could work i would be surprised if the Supreme Court could take it up this year meaning before the end of this session and in june and instead end up with it in their hands sometime in the fall, then would you get the ruling in the heat of the president ial primary campaign at a time when the Republican Party has to figure out thousand improve its standing with hispanic voters. I think its going to this only just adds to the complexity of what the political debates going to be like a year from now, in the president ial race but for the short term what this means, jose is this you know right now if republicans want to worry about the presidency if im jeb bush, scott walker i am begging john boehner and mcconnell to use this time that they have right now while the court battle happens to then do their own version of Immigration Reform. And chuck, the other big issue politically and really of vital importance is terrorism, and the president yesterday said the violent terrorism from groups like isis is not the fault of any religion. Its the fault of people. How is the white house handling this terrorist conversation now . Getting into an academic argument, feels like. The white house is digging in its heels every time theyre criticized for not using the frayed i laumic extremism or radical islam instet using extremism. It is, i kind of think the president is talking out of both sides of his mouth on this one. On one hand he says were not going to call it islamic extremism. Thats what isis wants. On the other hand he does name isis and gives isis legitimacy by seeking a military authorization. Essentially a resolution that declares war on isis. Whats the difference between declaring war on a group that calls itself the Islamic State and saying the phrase islamic extremism . Are we talking in circles and having a weird debate and not focused on the real issue with iies. Number one, which is western europe and its poor handling of muslim populations, frankly. The way theyve ghettoized muslim immigrants in many parts of western europe and also the inability to Talk Straight about the role for instance, that rich saudis and rich gulf state people have played in trying to sort of keep the extremism out of their country by quietly funding madrassas that only feed the extremism . It feel its like were having a we wasted 48 hours, and not focused on the real problem at hand which is to get rid of isis. Semantics, Rudy Giuliani getting a lot of attention during a private fundraiser saying president obama didnt love america. Any political implications to this for the republicans . I mean how do you what you say and what you dont say is maybe important now . Well it is and depends i think it will be interesting to see how other republicans who are running for president handle it. We saw scott walker sort of not wanting to denounce him, not wanting to support him. Trying to sort of have it you could argue, both ways. Look, theres a part of the Republican Party that watts fighting rhetoric that wants this sort of this hot rhetoric and if you denounce it that wing of the party will say, oh, youre caving to political correctness. Youre caving to the media. Youre caving to liberals things like that. And you know that balance the rhetoric seems silly. This is unfiltered rude any a way that hes potentially marginalizing himself and his ability to have influen