After watching all the videos about skyrim that I could find, it seems to me like items will not need repairing anymore. There is no stat in the inventories for weapon and armor damage status and the description of smithing only talks about creating and improving weapons (not repairing). So has there been any confirmation of this that I possibly missed or is it still up in the air?

It's most likely in...

maybe u have to look at how badly damaged it is with the new inspect button

Unknown. There has been no news one way or the other.

Todd has already declared that the current UI is not what it will look like in the end. There will be more information about weapons, etc., and the ability to compare weapons, showing stats of which is stronger, heavier, etc. etc.

Maybe there will be repair hammers to make temporary fixes, but I would think smithing is where the repairs--and improvements--will be made.

On a side note, I also think Skyrim will have VISIBLE armor degradation, and this assumption is based entirely on the dragon priests cloak being singed by the fire ball and holes were put in it. There's obviously cloth degradation in the game, so one can hope there will be visible armor damage. This might also help explain why they combined greaves and cuirass to allow for visible damage.