Gadhafi's Seige on Misrata; U.N.: Troops Blocking Aid; U.N.: More Carnage Ahead in Libya; Gas Prices Up 33 Cents in Two Weeks
KAYE: We have a story just in from the U.S. Supreme Court. Just minutes ago the majority of the justices ruled that a death row inmate has the right to demand that some of the evidence can undergo DNA testing for the very first time. The case, of course, has widespread implications so let's get the latest from CNN's Bill Mears. Bill, what can you tell us about this?</s>BILL MEARS, CNN SUPREME COURT PRODUCER (via telephone): It was a 6-3 vote by the justices. It was a pretty narrow ruling and the issue was whether capital inmates had a basic federal civil right to have this forensic evidence reviewed late in the process. The justices said on that narrow question, yes. So it does buy some more legal time for Henry Skinner who was convicted back in 1994 of murdering his girlfriend and her two adult sons. He's been claiming for years that he did not do this and says that if the DNA testing is done on other bits of evidence it will clear his name and if put to death an innocent man would be executed.</s>KAYE: There was also a ruling today on birthers, the question of whether or not President Obama was born here in the United States or not. That apparently is not going to be heard by the Supreme Court?</s>MEARS: Not heard for the second time. The justices in January had rejected a request for the court to consider the claims to examine the birth certificate of President Obama, that he is not a natural born citizen. While the petitioners who lost that case, they asked the court to reconsider it and the justices for a second time have said, no, we're not going to get into this issue at least not now.</s>KAYE: All right, Bill Mears, watching those developments for us. Thank you, Bill. It's 10:30 in the east now, 7:30 in the west. Right now, we're watching flooding across Indiana. The water in some areas could be at their highest levels this year with more rain on the way this week.> How much will gasoline go up today? Right now the national average is $3.51 per gallon, a 33 cent spike in two weeks, the second biggest price jump ever. And Defense Secretary Robert Gates making a surprise visit to U.S. troops at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan. All right, so imagine your boss is fired from his job and before he clears out his desk, he rushes through a big pay raise are for everyone. Well, that's what a new study suggests outgoing members of Congress did with your tax dollars. CNN's senior congressional correspondent Dana Bash on Capitol Hill here to explain, what is this all about, Dana?</s>DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This is an interesting story in "The Wall Street Journal" where they compiled facts and figures from the watchdog group and what they found is that 96 lawmakers at the end of last year paid their employees a total of $6.7 million in the fourth quarter, that's important to note. That was a 31 percent increase over the first three quarters of the year. That's about twice as much as the fourth quarter of last year. Now the reason for that salary spike, it seems, is that people, members of Congress, who were defeated or who retired decided to give bonuses to the people who were losing jobs. Some staffers in their offices. Now, we should point out that this is not illegal. This is something that has been done by members of Congress in both parties, and it's also interesting to note that members of Congress, Randi, they get budgets. They get budgets averaging from about $1.5 million to $2 million. They can spend it any way they want. They can use it on paper clips, they can use it on toner, and they can use it to pay staffers if they choose to hire. So, this is up to them, at their discretion, how they use their money even if it is at the end of a year. But it also is noteworthy many members of Congress who are defeated or are retiring, they choose to give that money back to the Treasury, especially in times like these.</s>KAYE: So, even though it has a lot of people shaking their heads, you're saying that it's not so unusual. But a lot of members, do they look at this as a way to reward staffers who could be making more money in the private sector?</s>BASH: They do seem to look at that. Let me show you some numbers in terms of how much people up here make. The average House staffer makes between - salaries range, I should say - between $20,000 and $168,411 annually. The average is about $60,000. Now let's be honest, a lot of people out there watching saying, wow, that looks like a pretty good salary to me, and it certainly is not a bad salary at all. But what members of Congress tend to think, some of them, is there are people working for them literally round the clock, especially those who were running for reelection. Some of their aides took vacation and really went to work on their campaigns, and this is potentially a way to reward those staffers. And let me show you one other statistic, and that is that there is a rule that says members of Congress' staff cannot make any more than $14,034 per month. So, that a means that this so-called bonus, if a member of Congress chooses to go this route with their aides, it's really capped, so there's only so much they can give their aides, especially those making the highest -- at the higher end of the salary range. But it certainly is a very interesting practice and an interesting statistics that we got here from, again, 'The Wall Street Journal," by way of Legistorm, which is a very, very interesting watchdog group that keeps track of what people get paid and what people do up here on Capitol Hill.</s>KAYE: Always interesting. All right. Dana Bash helping us all make sense of that, thank you.</s>BASH: Thanks, Randi.</s>KAYE: All right. Let's quickly get updated on what's happening where in Libya today. Here's the country. Most cities and most of the people live on the Mediterranean coast. The capital, Tripoli, far to the northwest. And the oil-rich city of Benghazi to the east, not far from the Egyptian border. When we talk who is in control, we mean whether the city is firmly occupied by either anti-government rebels or officials taking orders from Moammar Gadhafi. Benghazi in rebel control. In fact, that's where budding government seems to be taking seed. Tripoli has not seen much street fighting, relatively speaking, still under government control. Now here is where it gets a whole lot less certain. The cities of Bin Jawad, Misrata and Zawiya, all scenes of clashes and battles over the past few days. Rebels say that they're in control there. People in Tripoli say not true. CNN, has no way, of course, of verifying either account. So, Misrata is not definite. Zawiya not definite. Bin Jawad, also not definite. We have unconfirmed reports of fighting there and in Misrata, where more than 40 people were reported dead just yesterday. And I have to tell you that we are getting this information from witnesses. CNN does not have independent confirmation of the fighting or of those casualties there. We're doing our best to confirm what we can on the ground. The unrest in Libya translates to higher gas prices here in the U.S. So, we thought we'd spend some time on the things we do to get better gas mileage and maybe save money. Of course, there are a whole lot of suggestions out there. Some are good ideas, others just plain crazy. Here to help us separate the facts from the myths, Robert Sinclair, Jr. of the New York AAA. Good to see you, Robert. Let's talk first about what are some things you can advise right off the top here to get better gas mileage?</s>ROBERT SINCLAIR, JR., NEW YORK STATE AAA: Well, vehicle maintenance is very important. We don't do tune-ups, per se, these days, but whatever you have to do to a modern vehicle to make sure that it's in optimum running condition, you should do that. Take it to the technician and let him do those things. Some things that motorists can do themselves include checking tire pressure. It's very critical that your tires be properly inflated. The government study found fully a third of us driving around on under-inflated tires. And for every pound per square inch that your tires are under-inflated you lose one percent of your gas mileage per tire. So, you want to check the little tag inside the driver's door jam and make sure your tires are properly inflated. The other thing is to change the air filter. If you imagine, a dirty air filter is like a marathon runner trying to breathe through a straw. The engine is going to use more power trying to pull that air past the dirty air filter. So, you should make sure it's clean. Some things like very simply taking the excess weight out of the trunk. A lot of people have the so-called "junk in the trunk" syndrome. And all that extra weight we are carrying around, extraneous weight, makes the engine work harder, makes you use more gasoline.</s>KAYE: Got it. So let's put some of the facts and the myths to a test here if you will. So, just humorous here. A lot of people probably think that they should put their transmission into neutral and maybe coast going down the hill. Is that a myth or a fact that that's going to save on gasoline?</s>SINCLAIR: That's -- well, it will save you gasoline, but an infinitely small amount. What's really more important is the predicament it puts you in. Driving around in neutral isn't good. It might become an emergency situation where you have to accelerate, and that extra second or two that it might take to put the vehicle in neutral is going to be perhaps a second or two that winds you getting in a crash rather than avoiding it.</s>KAYE: All right. So, mark that one down as a myth. What about cutting through gas stations to avoid red lights? Is that going to save anything?</s>SINCLAIR: yes, well, so-called hyper milers back in 2008 when they were coming up with all sorts of different things to do to try to advance your gas mileage came up with that idea. It's dangerous, number 1. It might hit pedestrians or other vehicles that are moving through a gas station. It probably is illegal in many municipalities where avoiding a red light is something that you can be cited for. So, sitting at a red light burning gasoline is not good, but the alternatives are worse.</s>KAYE: All right. What about driving without air conditioning? A lot of folks I know who do this. Is that going to save anything? Myth or fact?</s>SINCLAIR: Well, six on the one hand, half a dozen on the other, driving without air conditioning. But then you'll have the windows open and that creates extra aerodynamic drag. With vehicle manufacturers build their vehicles, they design them to run with the windows closed, and that is a way that many manufacturers are getting better fuel economy these days by making the vehicles more slippery aerodynamically. So, if you drive with the windows closed but the air conditioning is on, the extra strain on the engine using the air conditioner uses more gasoline. But driving with the windows open creates extra aerodynamic drag. So, toss the dice, take a pick, whatever you want to do. Either one.</s>KAYE: All right. Well, I know you touched on this already, but it is worth repeating because it is important. Keeping your tires properly inflated. Myth or fact that that's going to help you out?</s>SINCLAIR: Oh, that without a doubt is going to help you. If you've ever ridden a bicycle that had low tire pressure, and remember how difficult it was, and then you go to the gas station and pump the tires up and you go whizzing along, gliding along. It's so much easier. It's very important for gas mileage but also very important for safety. Your tires have be to be properly inflated so that they don't fold over in turns and that kind of thing. Very dangerous having underinflated tires. They can also blow out at high speeds, which is very dangerous.</s>RAYE: And what about planning your route? Myth or fact that that's going to help you?</s>SINCLAIR: That will definitely help you, especially with GPS devices these days. When you are plugging in your destination, they offer you the option of, say, the fastest route, the shortest route, the shortest time, those sort of things. Generally the shortest distance -- like we say, the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. So, pick the shortest distance if you're programming a destination with your GPS device. And that should cut down on the distance that you're traveling and thus the miles that you're going to travel.</s>KAYE: All right. Well, those are great tips. I'm glad we busted some of those myths wide open, and now we got the facts down. Robert Sinclair, Jr., thank you so much. So, what if I told you there was a group of people traveling the country right now warning that the end of days was just a few months away?</s>KAYE: Well, that's what some Christians are doing, and we tagged along on a leg of their trip to ask them why. So that got us thinking: the end of the world has been anticipated many times, of course. They've all come and gone. But we wanted to take a look at some of the most memorable. The book of Genesis in the Bible tells that God unleashed a massive flood that wiped out almost all life on earth. But humankind was saved by a man named Noah who built that ark that carried his family and two of every living creature to safety. In the 1830s Baptist preacher William Miller predicted the end of the world would occur between March 21, 1843 and March 21,1844. Well, when that didn't happen, the date was recalculated to October 22, 1844. Of course, we know that didn't happen either. So what are some other apocalyptic predictions from the past? I'll tell you in just two minutes.