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American Morning

Relationship Between Vice President Dick Cheney, Supreme Court Justice Scalia; 'Paging Dr. Gupta'

Aired March 23, 2004 - 08:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back, everybody. 8:30 here in New York. In a few moments, we'll have a look at the relationship between the Vice President Dick Cheney and Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Could it influence a case before the high court? Just how much hobnobbing in D.C. is appropriate for the justices?
Kamber and May weigh in on the hobnob issue in a few moments here. So stay tuned.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Also this morning, Sanjay Gupta's report on antidepressants and suicide. What's the link that caught the eye of government health officials? And should people who are taking these drugs be concerned? He'll update us on that.

HEMMER: All right, top stories at the half hour. A military spokesman says four U.S. soldiers have been wounded in Baghdad. Sweeps for the insurgency continue there. Meanwhile, reports of injuries during a protest in Ramadi. At 70 miles west of Baghdad, some demonstrators have come out to protest Israel's a killing of a Hamas leader earlier this week.

Same-sex marriage, the focus of a U.S. Senate hearing yesterday sponsors of a constitutional ban of same-sex marriage changed the wording of a proposed amendment. President Bush called on Congress to approve a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage last month.

The health risks of smoking are well known, but now there's news that smoke may speed up brain damage in the elderly. A new study suggesting older smokers suffer mental decline at a rate five times higher than people who never smoked. That's according to European researchers who also found kicking the habit slowed the decline.

Want some fries with your tunes? McDonald's and Sony reportedly working on a partnership that would allow customers to download free songs when they buy certain menu items. The deal's expected to be announced later this week, all according to "The New York Times." Neither company would comment on that.

Fries and tunes to go. I like it.

O'BRIEN: That's odd, but I guess it could work. Why not?

(WEATHER REPORT)

O'BRIEN: The 9/11 commission hearings will begin coming in the hour, next hour. The panelists are preparing a report on the events surrounding the terror attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. First up, before the independent panel, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Current Secretary of State Colin Powell will also testify this morning. Clinton administration Defense Secretary William Cohen is scheduled this afternoon, and current Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld will finish out the day. We're going to take you live to the hearings as soon as they begin.

Tomorrow, the 9/11 commission will hear from Richard Clarke. He is the former counterterrorism chief for President Bush. Clarke's new book, accusing the president of ignore the al Qaeda threat and fixating on Iraq after 9/11, has put him in the eye of a political firestorm.

Joining us this morning to weigh-in on the fallout from Washington D.C., Democratic consultant Victor Kamber of the Kamber Group.

Good morning.

VICTOR KAMBER, DEMOCRATIC CONSULTANT: Good morning, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: And also former RNC communications director Cliff May. He is now with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

Good morning to you, Cliff. How are you?

CLIFF MAY, FMR. RNC. COMM. DIR.: Good morning, Soledad. I'm well.

O'BRIEN: Wonderful. Let's begin with you in fact, Cliff.

Richard Clarke, who is a very credible figure within the administration, quits his job, writes a book in which he says that the president did a terrible job on terrorism, both before 9/11 and after 9/11. How seriously do you think people, not people in the administration, but people in general should be taking his charge?

MAY: Well, they should take it seriously, and they should take it seriously enough that they look at the whole context of this and understand what's going on. This is not going to make me popular, but I would argue that nobody took terrorism seriously enough prior to 9/11 -- not the Bush administration during its eight months in office, not the Clinton administration during the eight years in office, not the first Bush administration, or the Reagan administration. And I go back to the Reagan administration because it was in 1983 really that this war began, when Hezbollah suicide terrorists bombed our embassy barracks in Beirut. And instead of fighting, we fled from that, and we continued with the pattern until 9/11, when we suddenly began to really fight back seriously.

I think it's also important to ask yourself about Mr. Clarke. I think he is a serious man, and I think he worked very hard, but he is among those who did not succeed in understanding this threat. I would like to know exactly what he counseled President Clinton during those eight years when we had the first World Trade Center attack, and the bombings of our embassies, and the USS Cole and the barracks in Saudi Arabia? Did he tell President Clinton let's get rid of the terrorist training camps in Afghanistan? Did he tell him, let's penetrate al Qaeda, whatever it takes? Did he tell him at least we need to reinforce cockpit doors in the planes, because we know that al Qaeda is looking at flying lessons, and we know that an Egyptian Islamist pilot has crashed a plane into the sea.

I think a lot of people made mistakes, and I think it's destructive of us to be going around finger pointing, rather than coming up with solutions for the future, which has really got to be our top priority.

O'BRIEN: Some people, Victor, say that this is really just truly all partisan, and that, in fact, Richard Clarke is closely linked to Rand Beers, who of course is working on Kerry's campaign, and the administration has also said, hey, if there's ever a guy who should have red flagged this for the administration, that was actually Richard Clarke's job. How do you respond to those charges that the White House makes?

KAMBER: Well, the partisan charges of the White House are just that, partisan. Here is a Reagan appointee who served under eight years of Ronald Reagan, and four years of George Bush Senior, and eight months, nine months of George Bush Jr., and yes, he also served through the Clinton administration. I have no problem with what Cliff just said, and maybe in books two, or three and four of Clarke, he can talk about other administrations.

Book one is focused on this president and this war that he called upon the United States to participate in, and according to Clarke, called upon this war without the packs, without the information that was necessary. I find him totally credible. You know, I don't know anything about him as his background other than what you all have exposed.

The fact, as I say is, he's a Republican. He was a Republican appointee. I know of no ties to John Kerry. Kerry will be the beneficiary of his comments.

O'BRIEN: But, Victor, forgive me for jumping in on this, but certainly when you have allegations that are of, I think it's fair to argue, of tremendous importance to a nation, and very, very serious allegations against an administration, kind of weird timing, to make sure they come out when your book's coming out, as opposed to revealing them, you know, two and a half years earlier.

KAMBER: Soledad, obviously, we are a capitalistic society. I understand where the publisher, and maybe even the author can think they make money coming out of a certain time. I'm not defending the fact that he may be a capitalist and want to make money out of this deal by publishing it a certain time, but to ascribe any kind of partisanship and blame Democrats for his book is a ludicrous concept.

MAY: No one is blaming Democrats.

KAMBER: Or Kerry or anything else. The bottom line is he wrote a book that happens to find the shortcomings of this administration and their actions in the war. It's published at this time.

O'BRIEN: Cliff.

MAY: One other things, there are some things he's saying that really don't strike me as credible. I don't even think they'll strike Vic as credible. For example, he says that when he briefed Condoleezza Rice about al Qaeda, it appeared she had never heard of al Qaeda before. I just think that's very strange and a peculiar thing to suggest.

KAMBER: You hope it is. You hope it is.

MAY: Well, Condoleezza Rice, she's a very smart lady with a very -- I mean, she's got a doctorate. She's been studying this stuff. What do you think, she's a housewife from Fresno, California?

O'BRIEN: OK, you know what, before we get into more as Condi Rice as a housewife, Fresno, California thing, let's move and talk a little bit about Antonin Scalia. He wrote a memo defending his ability to be impartial in a case that involves his friend, the vice president, Dick Cheney. The two of them went duck hunting in Louisiana not long ago.

Cliff, and we don't have tons of time, so I want you to just both weigh in quickly on this. Where's the harm in just saying, we know what, we do have a close friendship, I'm out of this case?

MAY: Because anybody who you ever have a friendship with who is involved in a case, which is going to happen all the time, you always have to recuse yourself.

I think, on the contrary, what we have to understand here is that people who are Supreme Court justices, of course they're going to have friendships with vice presidents from time to time. That doesn't mean they can not weigh in and doing in an objective and fair way. Just knowing somebody doesn't mean you agree with somebody. I know Vic. I don't necessarily agree with Vic. We can go duck hunting, I still wouldn't agree with him.

KAMBER: The very fact that he voted for the presidential election, that it was 5 to 4, and Scalia was on the side of voting for the president. For the mere appearance of impropriety, it's a court that is tainted. Why keep it tainted? Mr. Scalia offers nothing special in terms of this Cheney decision, that he brings a great expertise. He can step aside, the case can go on. No one suffers anymore except Scalia's ego, and that happens to be too big right now anyway. He thinks he's the only one who has an answer.

O'BRIEN: And that is the final word this morning, although I've got to tell you, the visual of the two of you duck hunting together, I've got to think about that for a while. You guys, as always, thanks a lot. We'll check in with you later -- Bill.

HEMMER: A couple of mallards on the pond. I like it.

In a moment here on AMERICAN MORNING, there are a number of specially tailored mortgage plans out there. In a moment, we'll help you figure out which one fits you for the booming housing market that has not abated.

O'BRIEN: Also, the reason why the government's decided to call for stronger warnings on popular antidepressants. We'll explain ahead, as AMERICAN MORNING continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HEMMER: The FDA wants doctors who prescribe some popular antidepressants to monitor patients for signs of suicidal behavior. The agency is also asking for drugmakers to make stronger suicide warnings on its label.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, covering this for us today on assignment in Jupiter, Florida.

Sanjay, good morning there. What gives on this story?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Bill.

Big story, certainly talking about antidepressants, 10 of them, the most popular ones. The FDA is asking for stronger warnings on those. Concerns about both adults and children, and suicide when someone starts these medications.

Obviously, a controversial issue, Bill. Is it the medications themselves that could actually suicide, or is it just the natural history of the disease? That issue is not solved yet, but still, the FDA says stronger warnings, bolder warnings, more prominent warnings are going to be necessary now.

Specifically looking for these sorts of symptoms: when someone starts an antidepressant or changes the dosage, if they start develop symptoms of anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, you can read the list there, those sorts of things need to be monitored closely. Obviously depression a big issue out there. Lots of different medications. Here are the ones that are most in question here. Here is the ones that the FDA has specifically talked about. You can see the list, Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Effexor, Celexa. The list goes on and on.

Bill, this is a very big story. Depression an important disease, a stigmatized disease. Everyone saying this should not further stigmatize the disease, but instead, on the labels, on these warning labels for these medications, the warnings should be bolder, they should be more prominent, and the FDA is asking these manufacturers to do this now -- Bill.

HEMMER: Sanjay, why now then? Why did the government come out with this at this point?

GUPTA: Well, you know, it's interesting, we've been following this story along on AMERICAN MORNING for some time. In February, an advisory committee did hear some testimony, they looked at some studies. The most sort of appealing was they heard some testimony from some parents of some particularly tragic cases of kids who started antidepressants. One such case, Terri Williams, had this to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TERRI WILLIAMS, SON COMMITTED SUICIDE: After four weeks of treatment, he began to show signs of agitation which we were not aware that was the potential side effect. And after seven weeks of treatment, he hung himself.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA: Terrible stories like that were certainly what the FDA heard. A lot of the doctors on this particular committee, interestingly, we've been following this story, they said, you know, we didn't ourselves know to look for some of these signs and symptoms when someone starts an antidepressant. If we, the doctors, on the advisory committee didn't know, the public probably doesn't know, and we need to make this a little bit more clear, and there are added warnings coming out now -- Bill.

HEMMER: And quickly, Sanjay, you mentioned some of the conditions in your first answer there. What should doctors do if they start to see this behavior?

GUPTA: This is going to be an interesting issue because, again, I think the important point is no one wants to stigmatize this disease any further than it's already been stigmatized. What I think doctors will do, is if they start to see these symptoms, they're going to know to look for it now, because they may change the medication, perhaps it's a particular medication causing these problems, or they may change the dosage.

Most importantly, though, on a particular patient who is taking this antidepressant, will be monitored closely for any signs that might eventually lead to either suicide or suicidal thoughts -- Bill.

HEMMER: Very interesting and important issue. Thanks for shaking it down for us, Sanjay. I know you're in Florida working on a piece for this weekend on weekend warriors. We'll talk about that a bit later.

GUPTA: That's right. We'll be back next hour.

HEMMER: All right -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Well, some good news for anybody who's looking for a home loan. Bankers are competing for your business. So how can you take some advantage? Gerri Willis is here in for Andy Serwer, and she's Minding Your Business this morning.

Hello.

GERRI WILLIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, good to see you.

O'BRIEN: A zillion mortgage options out there. Everybody wants you to get a mortgage, so it's sort of a good time. WILLIS: Oh, it is a good time. And you know, the industry is incredibly competitive. They're coming out with all these ideas. We're going to look at four new mortgages out there you might have heard of, interest-only mortgages. The first one, you can pay interest only for an initial period, say five years, instead of paying principal, too. The downside -- this is not one of the ones I like. The downside here is after that initial period, say five years, your payment goes way up, through the roof, and that's because suddenly you're paying all of that mortgage in a shorter period of time.

Second kind, miss a payment, another one I'm not too thrilled about. Sure can miss a payment, but you're going to have to pay their 200 bucks each time for the privilege. And at end of the day, guess what, you're still paying the whole mortgage. You just add that payment on at the back end.

O'BRIEN: So you're basically just buying a little time.

WILLIS: Right, exactly, and there are two I like, two new innovations. The piggyback mortgage. It's actually two mortgages that help you get out of paying private mortgage insurance. This is money that you pay if you can't afford to put 20 percent down. But a piggyback gets you out of this. You pay the home equity line of credit. You'll pay a little bit more for that home equity line of credit in terms of interest rate, but it can make a lot of sense.

And finally, the fixer upper, you can actually get a mortgage, one single loan for your new house and money to fix it up if you have a lot of work to do on it. You'll spend a lot of time with your banker, but it makes a lot of sense.

O'BRIEN: Why do you have to spend a lot of time with the banker?

WILLIS: They have to vet your contractor, everything you're doing to that house. So you'll be working hand in hand with that banker for months to come.

O'BRIEN: So you've got to really make sure that the value you're upping your loan by is actually the value that's going to go into the fixer-upper part of the loan.

WILLIS: And you're banker will help you do that, believe me. They don't want to make a mistake.

O'BRIEN: How do the rates look right now?

WILLIS: They are wonderful. They're closing in on 45-year lows. Check this out, 30-year fixed at 5.38 percent. It's wonderful. You've rally got to take a look at these, because they are cruising at near 45-year lows.

O'BRIEN: Your adjustable looks great, but who wants that? That sounds a little crazy.

Gerri Willis, as always, thanks so much. We'll check in on the markets a little bit later this morning -- Bill. HEMMER: All right, still to come here, a little knowledge can go a whole long way if you'd like to pull the switch on your current cell phone service, tips you need to know with an old friend of ours, Clark Howard. Back in a moment on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: So you want to switch your cell phone service, but you don't want to pay to keep the same phone? Well, here's something that your provider does not want you ton. You actually can take that with you. Consumer advocate Clark Howard is the author of Clark's "Big Book of Bargains," and he joins us with the CNN Center with more on the mobile mystery.

Hey, Clark, good morning to you.

CLARK HOWARD, CONSUMER ADVOCATE: Good morning. How are you doing?

O'BRIEN: I'm doing just great.

I've got to tell you, though, I find this very complicated, so we'll going to walk through it in a very simple way. So you like your carrier, but of course you want to hang on to your phone, because you paid for it. Who has the option to actually keep the phone, change the phone, ditch the carrier?

HOWARD: Great carrier. If you're with T Mobile, many AT&T customers and also Cingular, you can take your phone, take it from one company to another.

I want to show you something. I have in my hand a T Mobile phone right here. In the back of this phone is a little chip. I don't know if you can see it right here, but this chip allows you to take your phone from one carrier to another. You just take the chip out and put the chip in for who you want to go to.

But there's a secret.

O'BRIEN: Start with the secret, and then we'll get back into the chip replacement thing, which sounds sort of complicated to me. What's the secret?

HOWARD: It's actually very easy to change the chip.

The secret is the cell phone companies don't want you to do this, so what they do is they put a secret code on your phone that keeps you from being able to take your phone from one company to another, but all you need is a little number. They call it an unlock code, and believe it or not, the unlock codes are available all over the Internet. So it's not that hard actually to do this.

O'BRIEN: OK, so give me some of the Web sites where I can get this unlock code, and then we'll go back to talking about how you change the chip. HOWARD: OK, so simple. One of the easiest is for travelinsider.info., not dot.com, dot.info. You go there, you pay them five bucks, and they give you the code to unlock your phone. The other thing you can do is go to goggle, and just type in as a search "cell phone code," if you're tech oriented, you'll see all kinds of sites that will give you info for free, plus others where you'll pay them, oh, maybe five bucks in other to have the unlock codes. You can go from AT&T to Cingular to T Mobile, or however you want to switch them, you are able to switch out and go somewhere else. And it's also really neat for Europe.

O'BRIEN: Interesting.

All right, but once I get my code and I've unlocked my phone, now I can remove the chip. What do I do with the phone? I take it to the place where I want to actually get the new service and they'll replace the chip for me, or do I go out and buy a chip somewhere?

HOWARD: You actually do buy a chip. You can buy it from a cell phone store, and this is especially great for people who travel, because you can walk into a cell phone store just about anywhere in the world and your phone instantly will work wherever you are at really cheap prices, because all you do is you put in the new chip. And to change out the chip is easier than changing the light bulb. There's nothing to changing this thing at all.

O'BRIEN: I think that's Clark's way of saying even I could do it. Clark Howard, really great advice. And Scott, even if the downside is the five bucks, that sounds pretty good.

HOWARD: Pretty cheap.

O'BRIEN: Yes, pretty cheap.

Thanks a lot. Nice see you.

HOWARD: Good to see you.

HEMMER: He knows so much. I'd love to see that video of people driving down the highway at 60 miles an hour with the cell phone up to their ear.

O'BRIEN: Can't be safe.

HEMMER: No thanks.

JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: They just had a picture of it there.

How about the fruit stand? Do you want to see that?

Later in the show, we're going to show you a hot dog cart.

O'BRIEN: Can we see Mr. Softie?

And if you stay all the way until 10:00, we'll have the picture of a cross town New York City bus. HEMMER: There it is.

CAFFERTY: There's the bus. We have garbage trucks here. I mean, it's amazing.

HEMMER: Look at that, the sign of spring, Granny Smith Greens.

CAFFERTY: Those mutants are out there year round. It's not a sign of spring. They sell that stuff there in the middle of the winter, too.

HEMMER: We have not seen that in months, Jack, and you know it.

CAFFERTY: You go there and get you an apple with a worm in it.

O'BRIEN: Do you have a file you want to talk about?

CAFFERTY: I do have a file. There's a T-shirt for sale on Abercrombie & Fitch's Web site. It shows a map of West Virginia, and it says, it's all relative in West Virginia. The governor of West Virginia is mucho steamed about this, says the shirt plays to the stereotype of the state as a haven for incest. He sent a letter to the company's chairman, demanding they stop selling the search and destroy the entire stock. Abercrombie says they may. Everybody likes the shirt. They're popular, and they have no plans to stop selling it.

O'BRIEN: I bet they've made it more popular by the governor weighing in on it.

CAFFERTY: We probably just sold a few right now.

O'BRIEN: Exactly.

CAFFERTY: Memorizing your personal identification number, or PIN number, in reverse could save your life. True story. It's called a reverse pin system. The idea is that if you're held up at an ATM, you type your pin in backward. The police are automatically notified of your location, and the machine still kicks out the cash. So the guy doing the holding up isn't suspicious. A Kansas lawmaker wants to require the system at all banks, but don't you know, the banking industry is opposed because they say it would be too expensive.

O'BRIEN: That is a cool idea.

CAFFERTY: Isn't that pretty cool?

O'BRIEN: Yes, that's neat.

CAFFERTY: Couch potatoes will like this. LG Electronics has come out with a new TV/refrigerator that allows you to watch AMERICAN MORNING while stuffing your face with all kind of good things.

It's going to be in stores in June. It costs you about $3200, but, hey, we're worth it. It includes a 13 1/2 inch color TV and an optional DVD player. It also has FM radio, two speakers and an LCD screen to control the temperature inside the refrigerator.

O'BRIEN: That's brilliant.

CAFFERTY: Well, stupid actually. Are you going to sit in your kitchen and stare at your refrigerator.

O'BRIEN: You Just go buy a TV.

CAFFERTY: But I do like the West Virginia T-shirt.

O'BRIEN: Very good file today, Jack. Loving it.

CAFFERTY: Not bad. Want to see those apples again?

O'BRIEN: No, please. I beg of you, no.

Still to come this morning, former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke coming under some criticism for his allegations about the war on terror. We're going to hear from Clarke himself, just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

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Aired March 23, 2004 - 08:30   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back, everybody. 8:30 here in New York. In a few moments, we'll have a look at the relationship between the Vice President Dick Cheney and Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Could it influence a case before the high court? Just how much hobnobbing in D.C. is appropriate for the justices?
Kamber and May weigh in on the hobnob issue in a few moments here. So stay tuned.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Also this morning, Sanjay Gupta's report on antidepressants and suicide. What's the link that caught the eye of government health officials? And should people who are taking these drugs be concerned? He'll update us on that.

HEMMER: All right, top stories at the half hour. A military spokesman says four U.S. soldiers have been wounded in Baghdad. Sweeps for the insurgency continue there. Meanwhile, reports of injuries during a protest in Ramadi. At 70 miles west of Baghdad, some demonstrators have come out to protest Israel's a killing of a Hamas leader earlier this week.

Same-sex marriage, the focus of a U.S. Senate hearing yesterday sponsors of a constitutional ban of same-sex marriage changed the wording of a proposed amendment. President Bush called on Congress to approve a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage last month.

The health risks of smoking are well known, but now there's news that smoke may speed up brain damage in the elderly. A new study suggesting older smokers suffer mental decline at a rate five times higher than people who never smoked. That's according to European researchers who also found kicking the habit slowed the decline.

Want some fries with your tunes? McDonald's and Sony reportedly working on a partnership that would allow customers to download free songs when they buy certain menu items. The deal's expected to be announced later this week, all according to "The New York Times." Neither company would comment on that.

Fries and tunes to go. I like it.

O'BRIEN: That's odd, but I guess it could work. Why not?

(WEATHER REPORT)

O'BRIEN: The 9/11 commission hearings will begin coming in the hour, next hour. The panelists are preparing a report on the events surrounding the terror attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. First up, before the independent panel, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Current Secretary of State Colin Powell will also testify this morning. Clinton administration Defense Secretary William Cohen is scheduled this afternoon, and current Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld will finish out the day. We're going to take you live to the hearings as soon as they begin.

Tomorrow, the 9/11 commission will hear from Richard Clarke. He is the former counterterrorism chief for President Bush. Clarke's new book, accusing the president of ignore the al Qaeda threat and fixating on Iraq after 9/11, has put him in the eye of a political firestorm.

Joining us this morning to weigh-in on the fallout from Washington D.C., Democratic consultant Victor Kamber of the Kamber Group.

Good morning.

VICTOR KAMBER, DEMOCRATIC CONSULTANT: Good morning, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: And also former RNC communications director Cliff May. He is now with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

Good morning to you, Cliff. How are you?

CLIFF MAY, FMR. RNC. COMM. DIR.: Good morning, Soledad. I'm well.

O'BRIEN: Wonderful. Let's begin with you in fact, Cliff.

Richard Clarke, who is a very credible figure within the administration, quits his job, writes a book in which he says that the president did a terrible job on terrorism, both before 9/11 and after 9/11. How seriously do you think people, not people in the administration, but people in general should be taking his charge?

MAY: Well, they should take it seriously, and they should take it seriously enough that they look at the whole context of this and understand what's going on. This is not going to make me popular, but I would argue that nobody took terrorism seriously enough prior to 9/11 -- not the Bush administration during its eight months in office, not the Clinton administration during the eight years in office, not the first Bush administration, or the Reagan administration. And I go back to the Reagan administration because it was in 1983 really that this war began, when Hezbollah suicide terrorists bombed our embassy barracks in Beirut. And instead of fighting, we fled from that, and we continued with the pattern until 9/11, when we suddenly began to really fight back seriously.

I think it's also important to ask yourself about Mr. Clarke. I think he is a serious man, and I think he worked very hard, but he is among those who did not succeed in understanding this threat. I would like to know exactly what he counseled President Clinton during those eight years when we had the first World Trade Center attack, and the bombings of our embassies, and the USS Cole and the barracks in Saudi Arabia? Did he tell President Clinton let's get rid of the terrorist training camps in Afghanistan? Did he tell him, let's penetrate al Qaeda, whatever it takes? Did he tell him at least we need to reinforce cockpit doors in the planes, because we know that al Qaeda is looking at flying lessons, and we know that an Egyptian Islamist pilot has crashed a plane into the sea.

I think a lot of people made mistakes, and I think it's destructive of us to be going around finger pointing, rather than coming up with solutions for the future, which has really got to be our top priority.

O'BRIEN: Some people, Victor, say that this is really just truly all partisan, and that, in fact, Richard Clarke is closely linked to Rand Beers, who of course is working on Kerry's campaign, and the administration has also said, hey, if there's ever a guy who should have red flagged this for the administration, that was actually Richard Clarke's job. How do you respond to those charges that the White House makes?

KAMBER: Well, the partisan charges of the White House are just that, partisan. Here is a Reagan appointee who served under eight years of Ronald Reagan, and four years of George Bush Senior, and eight months, nine months of George Bush Jr., and yes, he also served through the Clinton administration. I have no problem with what Cliff just said, and maybe in books two, or three and four of Clarke, he can talk about other administrations.

Book one is focused on this president and this war that he called upon the United States to participate in, and according to Clarke, called upon this war without the packs, without the information that was necessary. I find him totally credible. You know, I don't know anything about him as his background other than what you all have exposed.

The fact, as I say is, he's a Republican. He was a Republican appointee. I know of no ties to John Kerry. Kerry will be the beneficiary of his comments.

O'BRIEN: But, Victor, forgive me for jumping in on this, but certainly when you have allegations that are of, I think it's fair to argue, of tremendous importance to a nation, and very, very serious allegations against an administration, kind of weird timing, to make sure they come out when your book's coming out, as opposed to revealing them, you know, two and a half years earlier.

KAMBER: Soledad, obviously, we are a capitalistic society. I understand where the publisher, and maybe even the author can think they make money coming out of a certain time. I'm not defending the fact that he may be a capitalist and want to make money out of this deal by publishing it a certain time, but to ascribe any kind of partisanship and blame Democrats for his book is a ludicrous concept.

MAY: No one is blaming Democrats.

KAMBER: Or Kerry or anything else. The bottom line is he wrote a book that happens to find the shortcomings of this administration and their actions in the war. It's published at this time.

O'BRIEN: Cliff.

MAY: One other things, there are some things he's saying that really don't strike me as credible. I don't even think they'll strike Vic as credible. For example, he says that when he briefed Condoleezza Rice about al Qaeda, it appeared she had never heard of al Qaeda before. I just think that's very strange and a peculiar thing to suggest.

KAMBER: You hope it is. You hope it is.

MAY: Well, Condoleezza Rice, she's a very smart lady with a very -- I mean, she's got a doctorate. She's been studying this stuff. What do you think, she's a housewife from Fresno, California?

O'BRIEN: OK, you know what, before we get into more as Condi Rice as a housewife, Fresno, California thing, let's move and talk a little bit about Antonin Scalia. He wrote a memo defending his ability to be impartial in a case that involves his friend, the vice president, Dick Cheney. The two of them went duck hunting in Louisiana not long ago.

Cliff, and we don't have tons of time, so I want you to just both weigh in quickly on this. Where's the harm in just saying, we know what, we do have a close friendship, I'm out of this case?

MAY: Because anybody who you ever have a friendship with who is involved in a case, which is going to happen all the time, you always have to recuse yourself.

I think, on the contrary, what we have to understand here is that people who are Supreme Court justices, of course they're going to have friendships with vice presidents from time to time. That doesn't mean they can not weigh in and doing in an objective and fair way. Just knowing somebody doesn't mean you agree with somebody. I know Vic. I don't necessarily agree with Vic. We can go duck hunting, I still wouldn't agree with him.

KAMBER: The very fact that he voted for the presidential election, that it was 5 to 4, and Scalia was on the side of voting for the president. For the mere appearance of impropriety, it's a court that is tainted. Why keep it tainted? Mr. Scalia offers nothing special in terms of this Cheney decision, that he brings a great expertise. He can step aside, the case can go on. No one suffers anymore except Scalia's ego, and that happens to be too big right now anyway. He thinks he's the only one who has an answer.

O'BRIEN: And that is the final word this morning, although I've got to tell you, the visual of the two of you duck hunting together, I've got to think about that for a while. You guys, as always, thanks a lot. We'll check in with you later -- Bill.

HEMMER: A couple of mallards on the pond. I like it.

In a moment here on AMERICAN MORNING, there are a number of specially tailored mortgage plans out there. In a moment, we'll help you figure out which one fits you for the booming housing market that has not abated.

O'BRIEN: Also, the reason why the government's decided to call for stronger warnings on popular antidepressants. We'll explain ahead, as AMERICAN MORNING continues.

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HEMMER: The FDA wants doctors who prescribe some popular antidepressants to monitor patients for signs of suicidal behavior. The agency is also asking for drugmakers to make stronger suicide warnings on its label.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, covering this for us today on assignment in Jupiter, Florida.

Sanjay, good morning there. What gives on this story?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Bill.

Big story, certainly talking about antidepressants, 10 of them, the most popular ones. The FDA is asking for stronger warnings on those. Concerns about both adults and children, and suicide when someone starts these medications.

Obviously, a controversial issue, Bill. Is it the medications themselves that could actually suicide, or is it just the natural history of the disease? That issue is not solved yet, but still, the FDA says stronger warnings, bolder warnings, more prominent warnings are going to be necessary now.

Specifically looking for these sorts of symptoms: when someone starts an antidepressant or changes the dosage, if they start develop symptoms of anxiety, agitation, panic attacks, you can read the list there, those sorts of things need to be monitored closely. Obviously depression a big issue out there. Lots of different medications. Here are the ones that are most in question here. Here is the ones that the FDA has specifically talked about. You can see the list, Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Effexor, Celexa. The list goes on and on.

Bill, this is a very big story. Depression an important disease, a stigmatized disease. Everyone saying this should not further stigmatize the disease, but instead, on the labels, on these warning labels for these medications, the warnings should be bolder, they should be more prominent, and the FDA is asking these manufacturers to do this now -- Bill.

HEMMER: Sanjay, why now then? Why did the government come out with this at this point?

GUPTA: Well, you know, it's interesting, we've been following this story along on AMERICAN MORNING for some time. In February, an advisory committee did hear some testimony, they looked at some studies. The most sort of appealing was they heard some testimony from some parents of some particularly tragic cases of kids who started antidepressants. One such case, Terri Williams, had this to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TERRI WILLIAMS, SON COMMITTED SUICIDE: After four weeks of treatment, he began to show signs of agitation which we were not aware that was the potential side effect. And after seven weeks of treatment, he hung himself.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA: Terrible stories like that were certainly what the FDA heard. A lot of the doctors on this particular committee, interestingly, we've been following this story, they said, you know, we didn't ourselves know to look for some of these signs and symptoms when someone starts an antidepressant. If we, the doctors, on the advisory committee didn't know, the public probably doesn't know, and we need to make this a little bit more clear, and there are added warnings coming out now -- Bill.

HEMMER: And quickly, Sanjay, you mentioned some of the conditions in your first answer there. What should doctors do if they start to see this behavior?

GUPTA: This is going to be an interesting issue because, again, I think the important point is no one wants to stigmatize this disease any further than it's already been stigmatized. What I think doctors will do, is if they start to see these symptoms, they're going to know to look for it now, because they may change the medication, perhaps it's a particular medication causing these problems, or they may change the dosage.

Most importantly, though, on a particular patient who is taking this antidepressant, will be monitored closely for any signs that might eventually lead to either suicide or suicidal thoughts -- Bill.

HEMMER: Very interesting and important issue. Thanks for shaking it down for us, Sanjay. I know you're in Florida working on a piece for this weekend on weekend warriors. We'll talk about that a bit later.

GUPTA: That's right. We'll be back next hour.

HEMMER: All right -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Well, some good news for anybody who's looking for a home loan. Bankers are competing for your business. So how can you take some advantage? Gerri Willis is here in for Andy Serwer, and she's Minding Your Business this morning.

Hello.

GERRI WILLIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, good to see you.

O'BRIEN: A zillion mortgage options out there. Everybody wants you to get a mortgage, so it's sort of a good time. WILLIS: Oh, it is a good time. And you know, the industry is incredibly competitive. They're coming out with all these ideas. We're going to look at four new mortgages out there you might have heard of, interest-only mortgages. The first one, you can pay interest only for an initial period, say five years, instead of paying principal, too. The downside -- this is not one of the ones I like. The downside here is after that initial period, say five years, your payment goes way up, through the roof, and that's because suddenly you're paying all of that mortgage in a shorter period of time.

Second kind, miss a payment, another one I'm not too thrilled about. Sure can miss a payment, but you're going to have to pay their 200 bucks each time for the privilege. And at end of the day, guess what, you're still paying the whole mortgage. You just add that payment on at the back end.

O'BRIEN: So you're basically just buying a little time.

WILLIS: Right, exactly, and there are two I like, two new innovations. The piggyback mortgage. It's actually two mortgages that help you get out of paying private mortgage insurance. This is money that you pay if you can't afford to put 20 percent down. But a piggyback gets you out of this. You pay the home equity line of credit. You'll pay a little bit more for that home equity line of credit in terms of interest rate, but it can make a lot of sense.

And finally, the fixer upper, you can actually get a mortgage, one single loan for your new house and money to fix it up if you have a lot of work to do on it. You'll spend a lot of time with your banker, but it makes a lot of sense.

O'BRIEN: Why do you have to spend a lot of time with the banker?

WILLIS: They have to vet your contractor, everything you're doing to that house. So you'll be working hand in hand with that banker for months to come.

O'BRIEN: So you've got to really make sure that the value you're upping your loan by is actually the value that's going to go into the fixer-upper part of the loan.

WILLIS: And you're banker will help you do that, believe me. They don't want to make a mistake.

O'BRIEN: How do the rates look right now?

WILLIS: They are wonderful. They're closing in on 45-year lows. Check this out, 30-year fixed at 5.38 percent. It's wonderful. You've rally got to take a look at these, because they are cruising at near 45-year lows.

O'BRIEN: Your adjustable looks great, but who wants that? That sounds a little crazy.

Gerri Willis, as always, thanks so much. We'll check in on the markets a little bit later this morning -- Bill. HEMMER: All right, still to come here, a little knowledge can go a whole long way if you'd like to pull the switch on your current cell phone service, tips you need to know with an old friend of ours, Clark Howard. Back in a moment on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: So you want to switch your cell phone service, but you don't want to pay to keep the same phone? Well, here's something that your provider does not want you ton. You actually can take that with you. Consumer advocate Clark Howard is the author of Clark's "Big Book of Bargains," and he joins us with the CNN Center with more on the mobile mystery.

Hey, Clark, good morning to you.

CLARK HOWARD, CONSUMER ADVOCATE: Good morning. How are you doing?

O'BRIEN: I'm doing just great.

I've got to tell you, though, I find this very complicated, so we'll going to walk through it in a very simple way. So you like your carrier, but of course you want to hang on to your phone, because you paid for it. Who has the option to actually keep the phone, change the phone, ditch the carrier?

HOWARD: Great carrier. If you're with T Mobile, many AT&T customers and also Cingular, you can take your phone, take it from one company to another.

I want to show you something. I have in my hand a T Mobile phone right here. In the back of this phone is a little chip. I don't know if you can see it right here, but this chip allows you to take your phone from one carrier to another. You just take the chip out and put the chip in for who you want to go to.

But there's a secret.

O'BRIEN: Start with the secret, and then we'll get back into the chip replacement thing, which sounds sort of complicated to me. What's the secret?

HOWARD: It's actually very easy to change the chip.

The secret is the cell phone companies don't want you to do this, so what they do is they put a secret code on your phone that keeps you from being able to take your phone from one company to another, but all you need is a little number. They call it an unlock code, and believe it or not, the unlock codes are available all over the Internet. So it's not that hard actually to do this.

O'BRIEN: OK, so give me some of the Web sites where I can get this unlock code, and then we'll go back to talking about how you change the chip. HOWARD: OK, so simple. One of the easiest is for travelinsider.info., not dot.com, dot.info. You go there, you pay them five bucks, and they give you the code to unlock your phone. The other thing you can do is go to goggle, and just type in as a search "cell phone code," if you're tech oriented, you'll see all kinds of sites that will give you info for free, plus others where you'll pay them, oh, maybe five bucks in other to have the unlock codes. You can go from AT&T to Cingular to T Mobile, or however you want to switch them, you are able to switch out and go somewhere else. And it's also really neat for Europe.

O'BRIEN: Interesting.

All right, but once I get my code and I've unlocked my phone, now I can remove the chip. What do I do with the phone? I take it to the place where I want to actually get the new service and they'll replace the chip for me, or do I go out and buy a chip somewhere?

HOWARD: You actually do buy a chip. You can buy it from a cell phone store, and this is especially great for people who travel, because you can walk into a cell phone store just about anywhere in the world and your phone instantly will work wherever you are at really cheap prices, because all you do is you put in the new chip. And to change out the chip is easier than changing the light bulb. There's nothing to changing this thing at all.

O'BRIEN: I think that's Clark's way of saying even I could do it. Clark Howard, really great advice. And Scott, even if the downside is the five bucks, that sounds pretty good.

HOWARD: Pretty cheap.

O'BRIEN: Yes, pretty cheap.

Thanks a lot. Nice see you.

HOWARD: Good to see you.

HEMMER: He knows so much. I'd love to see that video of people driving down the highway at 60 miles an hour with the cell phone up to their ear.

O'BRIEN: Can't be safe.

HEMMER: No thanks.

JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: They just had a picture of it there.

How about the fruit stand? Do you want to see that?

Later in the show, we're going to show you a hot dog cart.

O'BRIEN: Can we see Mr. Softie?

And if you stay all the way until 10:00, we'll have the picture of a cross town New York City bus. HEMMER: There it is.

CAFFERTY: There's the bus. We have garbage trucks here. I mean, it's amazing.

HEMMER: Look at that, the sign of spring, Granny Smith Greens.

CAFFERTY: Those mutants are out there year round. It's not a sign of spring. They sell that stuff there in the middle of the winter, too.

HEMMER: We have not seen that in months, Jack, and you know it.

CAFFERTY: You go there and get you an apple with a worm in it.

O'BRIEN: Do you have a file you want to talk about?

CAFFERTY: I do have a file. There's a T-shirt for sale on Abercrombie & Fitch's Web site. It shows a map of West Virginia, and it says, it's all relative in West Virginia. The governor of West Virginia is mucho steamed about this, says the shirt plays to the stereotype of the state as a haven for incest. He sent a letter to the company's chairman, demanding they stop selling the search and destroy the entire stock. Abercrombie says they may. Everybody likes the shirt. They're popular, and they have no plans to stop selling it.

O'BRIEN: I bet they've made it more popular by the governor weighing in on it.

CAFFERTY: We probably just sold a few right now.

O'BRIEN: Exactly.

CAFFERTY: Memorizing your personal identification number, or PIN number, in reverse could save your life. True story. It's called a reverse pin system. The idea is that if you're held up at an ATM, you type your pin in backward. The police are automatically notified of your location, and the machine still kicks out the cash. So the guy doing the holding up isn't suspicious. A Kansas lawmaker wants to require the system at all banks, but don't you know, the banking industry is opposed because they say it would be too expensive.

O'BRIEN: That is a cool idea.

CAFFERTY: Isn't that pretty cool?

O'BRIEN: Yes, that's neat.

CAFFERTY: Couch potatoes will like this. LG Electronics has come out with a new TV/refrigerator that allows you to watch AMERICAN MORNING while stuffing your face with all kind of good things.

It's going to be in stores in June. It costs you about $3200, but, hey, we're worth it. It includes a 13 1/2 inch color TV and an optional DVD player. It also has FM radio, two speakers and an LCD screen to control the temperature inside the refrigerator.

O'BRIEN: That's brilliant.

CAFFERTY: Well, stupid actually. Are you going to sit in your kitchen and stare at your refrigerator.

O'BRIEN: You Just go buy a TV.

CAFFERTY: But I do like the West Virginia T-shirt.

O'BRIEN: Very good file today, Jack. Loving it.

CAFFERTY: Not bad. Want to see those apples again?

O'BRIEN: No, please. I beg of you, no.

Still to come this morning, former White House counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke coming under some criticism for his allegations about the war on terror. We're going to hear from Clarke himself, just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

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