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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees

Kerry Picks Edwards as Running Mate; Hassoun's Brother Says He Received Sign Marine Is Alive; Zarqawi's Video Diary

Aired July 06, 2004 - 19:00   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.


HEIDI COLLINS, GUEST HOST: Good evening, everybody. I'm Heidi Collins, in for Anderson Cooper.
Kerry has a number two, and the GOP goes on attack.

360 starts right now.

Kerry chooses John Edwards. Will his campaign get a bounce, or will the Republican response gain traction?

The brother of the Marine held captive says he's received a sign his brother has been released.

Zarqawi's video diary. A glimpse into Iraq's most-wanted terrorist minutes before an attack that killed four Americans.

Too Much, Too Soon, our special series. Tonight, are today's teens having sex too soon?

And exorcism gone wrong. An 8-year-old boy is dead, and a minister stands trial for his death.

ANNOUNCER: Live from New York, this is ANDERSON COOPER 360.

COLLINS: We begin tonight with John Kerry's decision to tap North Carolina Senator John Edwards as his running mate. Edwards, the first tarheel politician to join a major party ticket since 1852, came pretty close just a few months ago to having his own name at the top of the ticket. And many Democrats were rooting for him to be chosen.

Turns out the Republicans were waiting as well.

Here's CNN's senior political correspondent Candy Crowley.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): According to campaign lore, the first people John Kerry told were the guys who spent Monday night changing decals on the plane. A last secret mission in a stealth search for what was, in the light of day, a fairly predictable choice.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have chosen a man who understands and defends the values of America, a man who has shown courage and conviction as a champion for middle-class Americans, and for those struggling to reach the middle class.

CROWLEY: After four months looking, John Kerry settled on John Edwards, the vice presidential choice most Democrats wanted, well, four months ago. Edwards is smart, charming, articulate, and got raves for his sunny primary campaign. But mostly it boils down to this. He is what Kerry is not, and vice versa.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, KERRY-EDWARDS CAMPAIGN COMMERCIAL)

ANNOUNCER: One is a combat veteran with over 30 years of experience handling the toughest issues facing America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CROWLEY: Raised in a family of modest means, Edwards was the first to go to college. He eventually became a personal injury trial lawyer and a multimillionaire. A one-term senator, Edwards has little foreign policy or international experience, at least none that impressed Kerry six months ago.

KERRY: When I came back from Vietnam in 1969, ladies and gentlemen, I'm not sure if John Edwards was out of diapers then or not. I'm truly not sure, I don't know.

CROWLEY: But that's so January. This is July.

KERRY: He has honored the lessons of home and family that he learned in North Carolina, and he brings those values to shape a better America together with all of us. John Edwards is ready for this job.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CROWLEY: Kerry, whose campaign has operated largely outside the national headlines, intends to milk this spotlight. You will notice, Heidi, there were no pictures of the newly formed Democratic ticket today. They're saving that for tomorrow, and hopefully a second round of stories, Heidi.

COLLINS: I bet there will be. All right, Candy Crowley live from Pittsburgh tonight. Thanks, Candy.

The man Kerry is trying to replace weighed in with his reaction to the Edwards announcement. President Bush spoke in the Oval Office earlier today.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I welcome Senator Edwards on the ticket. The vice president called him early this morning to say, after the announcement was made, to say that he welcomes him to the race, and as do I. And I look forward to a good, spirited contest.

COLLINS: The president is scheduled to visit Senator Edwards' home state of North Carolina tomorrow, and we will have much more later on the lightning-fast Republican campaign against Edwards that was launched just minutes after his selection was announced. The mystery of the American Marine of Lebanese descent said once to have deserted, then listed as missing, then as having been captured by insurgents while absent without leave, still has not been solved, though today's news is more hopeful, that is, if the news is true.

CNN's Rusty Dornin now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Is he finally free? Corporal Wassef Hassoun's brother in Lebanon thinks so. Sami Hassoun claims someone came to the door of the family home in Tripoli with an assurance that left little doubt in his mind that his brother is alive. He spoke to CNN from Lebanon by telephone.

SAMI HASSOUN, BROTHER OF MISSING MARINE (on phone): We had a sign that he's alive and he's released. We have no idea where he is. But he's alive and he's released, and we are assured of the sign. That's all we can say. He's alive, we are sure of it, and he is released.

DORNIN: Corporal Hassoun's brother Mohammed, here in West Jordan, Utah, told CNN family members here heard the news from Lebanon, but still don't know who the messenger was in Tripoli and had no comment on the mysterious sign.

The Pentagon issued a statement it can't confirm Hassoun's release.

The group that claims to have kidnapped Hassoun says he was sent to a safe place after he announced his forgiveness and determination not to return to U.S. armed forces. The Pentagon has not commented on that, but says it is investigating the circumstances leading up to his capture.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DORNIN: Yet another twist in a story that has wound this family in knots. The latest news, yes, is encouraging. But unconfirmed reports have burned this family before. And the best confirmation people here could get about the fate of Corporal Wassef Hassoun is to see for themselves that he is alive and well, Heidi.

COLLINS: All right, Rusty Dornin, thanks so much, live from West Jordan, Utah, tonight.

It's come out already that some of what the CIA believed about Iraq and its weapons of mass destruction was wrong. But it seems now that in one area, the CIA had it right, but failed to pass on what they knew to the White House.

Here's CNN's national security correspondent David Ensor on that, and other revelations to be found in the Senate 9/11 commission's report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The report will criticize outgoing director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, according to knowledgeable sources, for relying too much on the work of this man, a CIA weapons expert who last year showed CNN gas centrifuge parts dug up from an Iraqi scientist's garden.

Knowledgeable sources say the report says the man, who CIA officials asked CNN not to identify, was biased, that he was convinced that aluminum tubes imported by Iraq were for uranium enrichment, as opposed to conventional rockets, as the Iraqis had claimed.

JOSEPH CIRINCIONE, CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT: The CIA seems to have picked an analyst who had the point of view that these tubes were for a nuclear weapons program.

ENSOR: George Tenet and other CIA officials continue to insist it is still not clear what the aluminum tubes were really for.

GEORGE TENET, CIA DIRECTOR: We have additional data to collect, and more sources to question.

ENSOR: Another fault found by the Senate Intelligence Committee report, sources say, is that the CIA interviewed some family members of Iraqi scientists who said there were no longer any weapons of mass destruction programs, but that the CIA never told the president.

CIRINCIONE: It's perfectly understandable that the CIA wouldn't believe family members of scientists who told them there were no programs. But they should have included it in their report. They should have revealed all the evidence, not just the evidence that fit their position.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ENSOR: CIA officials responded it was only a handful of scientists' relatives, who were simply repeating the party line from Iraq's leader, Saddam Hussein, Heidi.

COLLINS: David Ensor from Washington tonight, thanks, David.

U.S. fighter pilot found guilty. That tops our look at news cross-country tonight. New Orleans, Louisiana, a National Guard pilot who mistakenly bombed and killed four Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan has been found guilty of dereliction of duty. Major Harry Schmidt (ph) has been reprimanded and will lose more than $5,000 in pay. Schmidt blames the bombing on the fog of war.

Portland, Oregon, holy money troubles. The Portland archdiocese revealed today it will file for chapter 11 bankruptcy because of priest abuse lawsuits. The church says it cannot afford two pending cases, which seek a combined $155 million in damages.

Redwood City, California, affair denied. A polygraph expert testified today that Scott Peterson said his marriage was fine one day after his wife, Laci, disappeared. Peterson was, in fact, having an affair with massage therapist Amber Frey. Marlboro, Massachusetts, car in roof. No, you're not seeing things. The driver of this 1992 Ford Taurus accidentally hit the gas, instead of the brake while in an elevated parking garage. Next thing she knew, this. She ended up in an unwanted parking spot. Luckily, though, neither the driver nor anyone in the house was hurt.

That's a look at stories cross-country tonight.

360 next, video terrorism. Iraq's most-wanted man taunts his victims on tape. We'll take a closer look at this new strategy of warfare.

Plus, Too Much, Too Soon, the sex lives of teens. Are too many kids on the fast track? We'll take a closer look as part of our special week-long series.

And was it death by exorcism? Did a strip mall preacher kill an 8-year-old boy? A closer look at that as well.

But first, your picks, the most popular stories on CNN.com right now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: The videos released by terror groups have become key propaganda weapons. Now a new group of tapes has been released which show the remarkable degree to which those groups are documenting their deadly activities, including recent terror attacks.

CNN's Brent Sadler now on the man the insurgents seem to have chosen to be the conduit for their increasingly sophisticated tastes.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRENT SADLER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Where an Australian reporter working for "TIME" magazine is walking a professional knife edge, an unlikely go-between for anti-Western militants. He's viewing what purports to be the gruesome attack that killed four American security contractors in Fallujah some three months ago, when the bodies were dragged through the streets and hung from a bridge.

MICHAEL WARE, "TIME" MAGAZINE: This video is straight from the mujahadin. This is the Blackwater killings. They talk about planning it.

This is the seventh tape I've received in the last three or four days.

SADLER: Including the release of this tape. It illustrates how insurgent groups have developed the technique of using video to record attacks. A group called Unity and Jihad, led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the most-wanted terror suspect in Iraq, claims to have made this presentation.

WARE: They have reached a level of organization and sophistication that we have not seen previously. They've been incredibly savvy.

SADLER: What's claimed to be a Zarqawi camera captures this disturbing sequence of a suicide bomber bidding farewell to fighters and boarding a tanker wired to three and a half tons of explosives for start-to-finish coverage of the attack.

WARE: Something the last few months has now got them filming the most intimate, graphic attacks, like, up close and personal. They're trying to tell the Western public, This is what your boys are dying for, this is what they're up against. Terrorism is about instilling terror. That's a part of what this is doing.

SADLER: Ware denies he's being used by terror groups and says he filters what he learns, regardless of the source.

WARE: This is a war. It has two sides. I feel an obligation to discover as much as I can about both sides. I feel that's what we're here to do.

SADLER (on camera): Do you worry that you're getting too close to this, that one day they might shoot the messenger?

WARE: I worry about that every waking moment and every sleeping dream. And it terrifies me. It terrifies me on a personal level, and it terrifies me in terms of what we're up against.

SADLER (voice-over): And the danger involved.

Brent Sadler, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: A fast fact now. The Pentagon said today only 90 of the more than 5,700 people in custody in Iraq as security risks are foreign fighters. Critics say the Pentagon has overstated the figure. The Pentagon says that's not true.

HIV infections hit a record high. That tops our look at global stories. Here's the uplink now. At the United Nations, an annual report on AIDS shows almost 5 million people became infected with HIV last year. That's the largest increase in new infections since the disease was discovered in 1981.

London, England, strong words on Gitmo. British Prime Minister Tony Blair calls the U.S. prison for terror suspects in Guantanamo Bay an anomaly that at some point has to end. Blair says he's asked President Bush to release four remaining Brits still being held at the prison.

The Hague, the Netherlands, fit for trial. Judges in Slobodan Milosevic's war crimes trial say the case will go on. The former Yugoslav president may not be healthy enough to represent himself. The 62-year-old has been ordered to undergo a new round of heart examinations.

Back in London, Princess Diana memorial dedicated. Hundreds of people on hand in Hyde Park. Leading the dedication, Queen Elizabeth, trying to heal the rift with Diana's family. Also on hand, Princes William and Harry, as well as Prince Charles.

Johannesburg, South Africa. Legal uproar. Disney says it's not liable in a dispute over the copyright to the song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" in the hit movie and musical "The Lion King." South African lawyers are seeking $1.6 million in damages from Disney for using the song, written in 1936 by a Zulu migrant worker.

And that's tonight's uplink.

360 next. The sex lives of teens. Are kids going too far, too fast these days? Part of our special series, Too Much, Too Soon.

Also tonight, an autistic boy dies during what prosecutors say was an exorcism. Should the janitor-turned-preacher be sent to jail? We'll take a closer look.

And a little later, Bush versus Kerry at the ballot box. Will their wives make a difference in the hearts of the voters? Find out how Teresa and Laura stack up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Look, no offense, but you're talking about a post-high school long-distance relationship. And you and Kevin haven't even done it yet.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's not why we're going out.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What do you expect him to drive to Cornell for, milk and cookies?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're going to have sex, when he's ready and I'm ready. It's got to be completely perfect. I want the right time, the right moment, the right place.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Vicki, it's not a space shuttle launch, it's sex.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: No doubt about it, we live in a sexually charged society. You see it in teen flicks like "American Pie." But does that mean every teen in America is having sex? It depends on what you categorize as sex.

Tonight, in part two of our special series, Too Much, Too Soon, CNN's Jason Bellini reports on the sex lives of teens.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JASON BELLINI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's Heather Crigg's 14th birthday. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's right...

(CROSSTALK)

BELLINI: Heather and her girlfriends aren't shy around boys. Most are well past that stage. They talk openly about hooking up.

HEATHER CRIGG, 14-YEAR-OLD: As long as you like the person, if you don't have to be in a relationship with them. You just have to like them.

BELLINI (on camera): Can you be hooking up with more than one person at a time?

CRIGG: Yes.

BELLINI (voice-over): Heather defines "hooking up" as everything but intercourse.

CRIGG: Hooking up is, like, making out with him, and sex is, like, sex.

BELLINI (on camera): Sex.

CRIGG: Yes.

BELLINI (voice-over): Atoosa Rubenstein, editor of "Seventeen" magazine, hears from many teen girls who want to remain virgins. They view hooking up and making out as loopholes.

ATOOSA RUBENSTEIN, EDITOR, "SEVENTEEN" MAGAZINE: The number of virgins has gone up, but there's a lot of other things you can do and still maintain your virginity. You know, so kids are having oral sex. They are having anal sex.

BELLINI (on camera): It's a distinction that may help to explain why the teen pregnancy rate is down 30 percent from a decade ago. At the same time, the rate of sexually transmitted diseases among young people is going up.

(voice-over): People between ages 15 and 24 account for half of all new STDs in the U.S. The secret sex lives of today's teenagers also may be aided by easy access to the Internet. Preliminary findings of an Emory University study suggest that teens exposed to Internet porn may think it's normal to degrade their partner and to disassociate sex from intimacy.

CRIGG: They're always more, like, touchy-feely and stuff.

BELLINI (on camera): And the girls, do they do it because boys pressure them to, or because they want to?

CRIGG: I think both.

BELLINI (voice-over): It's called friends with benefits, the benefits being of the sexual variety. The boys benefit more than the girls.

RUBENSTEIN: They think, Well, maybe if we make out, maybe if we're physical, he'll see how special I am. But, instead, what's happening is, the boy is saying, OK, thank you, moving on to the next one.

BELLINI: Even if they are still virgins, the girls find themselves doing too much, too soon.

Jason Bellini, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Joining me from Los Angeles to talk more about teens and sex is Jessica Weiner, author of "A Very Hungry Girl: How I Filled Up on Life and How You Can Too."

Jessica, thanks for being here tonight.

You know, as we just saw in Jason Bellini's piece there, it seems that teens are moving away from these boyfriend-girlfriend traditional relationships and into the much more impersonal hookups. How is this leading them to become more sexually active?

JESSICA WEINER, AUTHOR, "A VERY HUNGRY GIRL": Well, you know, Heidi, we've lost all intimacy and sense of dating with teens right now. Because they hang out in groups, which is a fairly normal teen practice to do, they're also now encouraging sex within groups.

And so what we're seeing is that teens who are hanging out and becoming sexually active and talking about hooking up with their friends in large groups are losing the fact that they can date, that there's romance involved, and that there's a sense for them to have boundaries, when they create these physical and sexual relationships.

COLLINS: As we just heard the girl say in the piece, you know, you just have to like them. I mean, do they ever -- do they talk about love?

WEINER: Yes, you know, the teens that I work with talk about love as some far-off fantasy, because, let's face it, the images that they're seeing every day on television, on the Internet, and in their peer groups are not images of love. They're images of sex and sexuality.

And when we don't have parents at home, establishing a steady and casual relationship with their sons and daughters about sex, we're not learning about love. You're letting a 16-year-old educate your kid about sex and love and relationships.

COLLINS: Yes. Well, we know about the physical ramifications of sex and oral sex. But talk to us about the emotional side, the consequences of teens who experiment sexually with more than one partner.

WEINER: Well, you know, our teens are living in such a 2D society, a two-dimensional society, they're looking at sex at all hours of the day. They're seeing sexually provocative relationships in front of them.

And when you put a teen that is not schooled with how to set boundaries, that is not educated properly about sex, in a 3D environment, in a sexual behavioral experiment with somebody, or in a dating situation, they have no idea how to navigate through that. We haven't provided them the tools.

So the emotional consequences, you have a ton of teen girls and guys feeling shame about their sexuality, feeling stigmatized about their sexual behavior, and feeling isolated. They don't know who to talk to about this.

COLLINS: All right, so whose fault is it? I mean, we go back to parents, we go back to educators? What can everyone be doing better to get this message out?

WEINER: Well, you know, that's kind of the chicken and the egg question. I think that we each have to have a call to action. Parents need to make sure that they start a conversation about sex and sexuality with their kids. This is a normal, beautiful process for teens to experiment and to be tuned into their sexuality. We don't want to shame that.

So parents have to be less afraid of talking about it, and they have to be more realistic about what their kids are looking at, what they're listening to, and what they're experiencing when they go to school.

And for teens, the call to action is, they have to be willing to care enough about themselves, and do esteemable acts to raise their self-esteem, not try to find their self-esteem in relationships and in sexual behaviors.

I think teens essentially have to declare that they don't want to be sold these sexual advertisements anymore and that they want more out of life than to be a piece of meat.

COLLINS: Right, well, that brings up the point about this possible movement that might be going on about too much sexiness. People looking maybe to Jessica Simpson a little bit more now. Do you think there is a backlash happening against promiscuity? Quickly.

WEINER: I think that, you know, the teens that I work with feel that they want to be valued for more than their bodies. But advertisers, the media, the marketers, the music, the magazines -- we have to stop selling sex to our teens, and parents and teens alike have to have a call to action to do something more.

I think the backlash is in existence, and I hope that we see a change with it soon.

COLLINS: Jessica Weiner tonight, thanks so much for your time.

WEINER: You're welcome. Thank you. COLLINS: And tomorrow night we do continue our series Too Much, Too Soon, with the look at the teen obsession over having the perfect body and the dangers of striving to be too thin or too buff. Thursday, inside the lives of the young and rich. Teens with green, they seem to have it all, except limits. And Friday, developing too fast. Puberty at the age of 7? Experts are trying to figure out why some children are becoming adults too fast.

Exorcism gone wrong. An 8-year-old boy is dead, and the minister stands trial for his death.

And Laura, Lynne, Teresa, and Elizabeth, a close and personal look into the wives of the campaign hopefuls.

360 continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Welcome back to 360.

A look now at some of the day's top stories in tonight's reset.

Presidential candidate John Kerry made it official today. He's offered the number two slot on the Democratic ticket to fellow senator John Edwards of North Carolina. The two men are scheduled to begin campaigning together tomorrow in Ohio.

In New York, though, editors at "The New York Post" were convinced Congressman Dick Gephardt was going to be Kerry's man, so convinced that their late edition this morning carried the news, billed as an exclusive story, even as Kerry was announcing he had chosen Edwards.

Perhaps the "Post" and the rest of us in the media, for that matter, should have checked out this Web site. By 9:45 last night, USAviation.com had the story, thanks to a posting, that the Kerry campaign plane had been spotted -- you can see it there -- in a hangar at the Pittsburgh airport being repainted to add the Edwards name.

Some might call it the ultimate Horatio Alger story. Six years ago, he had never held public office. Now, he's near the pinnacle of American politics. CNN's Adaora Udoji reports on the meteoric rise of Senator John Edwards.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ADAORA UDOJI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's been a meteoric rise for Senator John Edwards.

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS (D-NC): In the America you and build together ...

UDOJI: A freshman senator of just months, in 1999 he was appointed a key role in defending President Clinton during impeachment proceedings. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's got a real sense of social equity, wants to get everybody a fair shake, and it's very real, and people respond to that.

EDWARDS: I come from a family of hard-working people.

UDOJI: The son of a North Carolina textile worker, he was the first to college in his family. A wildly successful law practice, representing children and families against corporations followed. Politics was a second career, one he had thought of briefly in law school. He turned to it after his 16-year-old son, Wade, was killed in a car accident in mid 1990s. He wanted to make a difference on a larger scale.

Democrats seized on his smarts, good looks and optimism.

DONNA BRAZILE, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: John Edwards can really not only talk the talk, but he knows the walk.

UDOJI: Barely two years in the Senate, he made the short list for the vice presidential spot on the 2000 Al Gore ticket. He built a reputation for working with senators across the aisle, sending a patients' bill of rights proposal with Republican John McCain.

As his name spread across the country, was featured in magazines like "Vanity Fair," some North Carolina constituents worried he was really setting up a run for president. By September, 2003, Edwards announced he would run.

EDWARDS: Nice to meet you. I'm running for president. I'm a Democrat running for president.

UDOJI: He hung in there through March, winning South Carolina's primary, and Iowa and Wisconsin coming in second.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think the history of John Edwards is that you meet John Edwards, you like John Edwards.

UDOJI: In six years, he's come a long way, testament, say those who know him, of a drive that should not be underestimated.

Adaora Udoji, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Well, as you know, it never takes long for the pundits to weigh in on a day like today. What are they saying about the Edwards pick?

I checked in a little earlier with Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala from the CROSSFIRE gang to get their spin on the day's developments.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: All right, Paul Begala, I'd like to begin with you. Why John Edwards? What is it that he brings to the ticket that Congressman Gephardt or Governor Vilsack do not?

PAUL BEGALA, CO-HOST, CROSSFIRE: Well, excitement. John Kerry has a lot going for him, but he's not the most charismatic, exciting guy you've ever seen on the stump. John Edwards is. A whole lot of people are already comparing him to Bill Clinton, who was really the candidate of a lifetime. So anytime you get that kind of star quality in your party and you promote him like this, it's just terrific.

I think that what Edwards brings is optimism, it's exuberance. It's change, a sense of energy, all of which I think matches up quite favorably with what's increasingly looking like a sort of stodgy and stuck-in-the-mud Republican administration.

COLLINS: All right. But, Tucker, there are certainly some liabilities I think that the Republicans do see. What areas do you think they will attack him on?

TUCKER CARLSON, CO-HOST, CROSSFIRE: In choosing Senator Edwards, the Kerry campaign has made a pretty clear statement that they don't intend -- or certainly don't want to fight this campaign out on national security matters, on the war in Iraq and on terrorism. And I think that's a shame for the American people, because I think we deserve a debate on both of those. And I also think that strategically it's probably an error. I mean, those are the Bush campaign's strengths, but they're also potentially its weaknesses.

And Kerry, so far, has been unwilling to hit them head on and say here's my alternative vision for what we ought to do in Iraq, say. He hasn't. He's co-opted a vision very much like Bush's, and this is evidence I think he's going to continue to say things like that.

COLLINS: Also, I've got to ask you, Paul. There is a list, I'm sure you know about this, the five criteria that John Kerry came up with for the person that he wanted to see as his vice presidential nominee.

You say that with the lack of experience on foreign policy, he's just the vice president. But number five on that list clearly states, fifth, and most important, the candidate had to be ready at any moment to assume the awesome responsibility of president.

BEGALA: I think there's no doubt about it. In fact, there's hundreds of thousands of Americans who already voted for John Edwards to be the president, and so he definitely crosses that threshold. Again, he brings much more experience on foreign policy than Bill Clinton did at this stage of his career, or than Ronald Reagan.

I mean, most of our recent presidents have been governors before they became president, including our current president, George W. Bush. And again, what he brings, in addition to that, is I think probably what the Republicans don't like, all of this optimism and light and exuberance and this future focus that I think is really -- I just can't wait to see the optics of this match up.

Let's watch tomorrow, see how these two guys relate, and then we'll go and watch Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney, who look like the remake of "Grumpy Old Men."

CARLSON: Well, I guess I just don't see that at all, having sat through a lot of Edwards' speeches, a lot, enough to be called an expert, I think, on Edwards' speeches.

I don't see them as optimistic at all. In fact, the message seems to be, I rose from these humble beginnings. His father is a mill worker -- don't know if you caught that, Heidi. He's a mill worker.

COLLINS: I did catch that.

CARLSON: Yes, he says it quite a bit. And I became rich as an attorney. But the implication of the speech is, you can't do the same, because the cards are stacked against you. The system is fundamentally unfair.

COLLINS: All right, I've got to ask you a little bit more about this personality issue real quickly. Paul, you know, we've known for a long time that a V.P. really isn't supposed to overshadow a president, and there's been quite a bit of discussion about Kerry and his lack of charisma -- by critics of Kerry's, obviously.

Do you think he's right about that at all with Edwards, who really did shine, when we saw him during the caucuses and so forth, as a great stump speaker, if you could?

BEGALA: It shows a remarkable amount of self confidence. When Ronald Reagan turned first to Gerald Ford, who did not accept, and then George Bush, Sr., it showed a lot of strength. When Bill Clinton turned to Al Gore, it showed a lot of strength.

When George W. Bush rejected John McCain, for fear that he'd be overshadowed, rejected Rudy Giuliani, for fear he'd be overshadowed, and took the most dull, drab and unassuming person -- really on the face of the earth, I think -- in Dick Cheney, it showed a lot about Mr. Bush's deep insecurities.

So the fact that John Kerry took somebody who obviously has a lot more talent on the stump shows you that Kerry's not worried about being overshadowed, and he won't be overshadowed. It just shows that the guy will have strong and capable people around him and won't have to be worried the way that Governor Bush was four years ago when he picked Dick Cheney.

CARLSON: Well, since we've become the Sigmund Freud hour here, Heidi, let me just say that in fact Dick Cheney has turned out to be the most assertive and the most powerful vice president in the modern era, maybe ever.

COLLINS: All right, guys. Thanks so much for your time tonight. Paul Begala, Tucker Carlson. Again, thank you.

BEGALA: Thanks.

CARLSON: Thank you, Heidi. (END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Picking his running mate is arguably the most important choice John Kerry will make. Countless factors go into the decision making process, including a person's readiness to step into the presidency at a moment's notice. But cold electoral calculations often win out in the end.

Why did John Kerry pick John Edwards? We may never know the real reason. But whatever it is, the reaction to the decision is raw politics.

At 7:30 this morning, the word leaked that John Kerry had picked John Edwards as his running mate. Twenty-one minutes later, the Republican response teams sent an e-mail to members of the media with this ad, called "First Choice."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: He deserves not only our support, but our admiration. That's why I am honored to introduce to you the president of the United States, George W. Bush.

COLLINS (voice-over): The message? John Edwards is not John Kerry's first pick. John McCain was. And all morning, Republicans picked up the theme.

GOV. MITT ROMNEY (R), MASSACHUSETTS: Well, it's not a bad choice for his second pick. His first choice, of course, was John McCain, but John McCain disappointed him by supporting the president.

COLLINS: It didn't take long, either, before the GOP used the L- word, calling Edwards a disingenuous, unaccomplished liberal, in a statement released by mid-morning. They inundated journalists with e- mails on Edwards' track record in the Senate, or what they called a lack of.

ED GILLESPIE, RNC CHAIRMAN: John Edwards is someone who had only four years experience in the United States Senate, who has no international experience, no foreign policy experience.

COLLINS: They also sprinkled some past comments from John Kerry, like this one.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: When I came back from Vietnam in 1969, ladies and gentlemen, I'm not sure if John Edwards was out of diapers then yet, or not, I'm truly not sure. I don't know.

COLLINS: And what about the Democrats? Well, they were busy, too, responding to the Republican responses. Early this afternoon, they put out this ad on the Web.

MCCAIN: There's not much question, once again, 38 percent of his tax cut to the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans. My friends -- my friends, I don't think Bill Gates needs a tax cut. COLLINS: Attack and counterattack. Not letting the other side have the last word is pure raw politics.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: A quick fast fact now. Fourteen of America's 46 vice presidents have gone on to become president. Of those, nine succeeded to the presidency on the death or resignation of the president, and only five were elected in their own rite -- John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, Richard Nixon and George Herbert Walker Bush.

Today's Buzz is this. Does John Edwards help John Kerry's chances of winning the White House? Log onto CNN.com/360 to vote. We'll have the results coming up at the end of the show.

Next, on 360 now, driving out the demons. A minister, on trial for what prosecutors say was a deadly exorcism. Also tonight, standing by their man, Laura Bush and Teresa Heinz. How they impact the race for the White House.

And, a little later, if your significant other isn't exactly perfect, maybe you need Mr. or Ms. Wonderful.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Prosecutors say the death of eight-year-old Terrance Cottrell in Milwaukee last summer was the result of an exorcism that went terribly wrong. The defendant in the case is a preacher, and he's facing a charge of felony child abuse, and five years in prison.

Here's CNN's Chris Lawrence for tonight's Justice Served.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS LAWRENCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Ray Hemphill sat silently Tuesday in a Milwaukee courtroom, where a jury will soon decide if he should be punished for performing an exorcism that left an eight-year-old autistic boy dead.

Last August, Terrance Cottrell's mother took him to this strip- mall church for a prayer session. A neighbor says Terrance's mother is a zealous convert who believed evil spirits spoke through her son.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She said he said kill me, take me, kill me. I was, like, are you serious? I couldn't really believe that.

LAWRENCE: Terrance's mother went to Hemphill for help, and he offered to pray for the boy to be healed. But Hemphill is no ordained minister. He's a school janitor who'd been moonlighting as a preacher.

By all accounts, this was an intense, two-hour session. Hemphill's shirt was soaked with sweat from lying on top of Terrance as the little boy was held down by other church members and his own mother. Hemphill's attorney says this was at least the ninth prayer service at this church, and nothing had gone wrong before. He'll argue that drugs contributed to Cottrell's death. A toxicology report shows Terrance's system had toxic blood levels of at least two drugs, an antihistamine and antipsychotic.

The medical examiner ruled the death homicide by suffocation, but the D.A. says he couldn't prove Hemphill knew what he was doing would kill the boy. So a jury will decide whether he's guilty of felony child abuse, which carries a maximum sentence of five years.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Covering the case now for us Court TV anchor Lisa Bloom.

Lisa, Terrance Cottrell, as we just heard in this story, was held down by his own mother, two other women. Why weren't they charged with a crime?

LISA BLOOM, COURT TV ANCHOR: That's a great question, and many people in Milwaukee are outraged about that. As the little boy struggled for over two hours, his face pushed down, a grown man on top of him, a 150-pound weight on top of him ...

COLLINS: We heard about the sweat on the tee-shirt of him.

BLOOM: Yes, and how could this be accomplished if not for a number of adults, including his own mother, holding him down. And yet they were not charged. Now, they still could be charged, depending on the outcome of this case. That's still a possibility. Maybe they will be.

COLLINS: All right, well, as we heard, the death was ruled a homicide, yet Hemphill was charged with only felony child abuse.

BLOOM: That's right.

COLLINS: More serious charges here?

BLOOM: Well, the other problem in this case, there's a little boy dead, and he's being treated as though he were only battered, and not killed. That's what child abuse statutes are designed to address.

Now, there's no manslaughter charge in Wisconsin. What that means is, if there's a homicide without specific intent, that's normally manslaughter. But there is a reckless homicide statute that would really address this nicely, I think, in Wisconsin. And that's when someone is killed with extreme indifference to human life. Even if the preacher didn't mean to kill him, he took actions that anyone should have known could have killed a child -- sitting on him for two hours, suffocating the little boy. I think higher charges should have been brought.

COLLINS: And that's what the D.A. said, though, that he really couldn't prove that Hemphill knew what he was doing was going to cause the death of the little boy.

BLOOM: Right. He didn't think that there was intent. But that's the same thing as waving a loaded gun around in a room, someone gets killed and you say, well, I didn't intend to do it. That's manslaughter, or reckless homicide, in this state. Higher charges were available, but they just were not pursued.

COLLINS: Do you think a jury is going to buy the possibility that the child died from the medication that he was on?

BLOOM: You know, isn't it a coincident that just after two hours of adults holding him down and suffocating him, that's when the medication killed him? That's what the defense is arguing, essentially, that he died of an overdose of the medication. I think the timing's going to be more helpful to the prosecution.

COLLINS: Yes, probably on that one. But there is this treatment through prayer statute in the state of Wisconsin. Will that have any effect in this case?

BLOOM: What that statute is designed to address is people like Christian Scientists who reject traditional medicine and instead choose just to pray. But this goes way beyond simple prayer. It goes way beyond even laying on of hands. This is an adult male, 150- pounds, actively physically harming a child. I don't think that statute's going to help the defense all that much.

COLLINS: All right. Court TV anchor Lisa Bloom. Thanks for your thoughts tonight.

Still to come, is your love life a little bland? Well, we've got a doll for you.

Plus, first ladies, could Laura Bush or Teresa Heinz play a decisive role in this year's campaign?

First, though, Today's Buzz, does John Edwards help John Kerry's chances of winning the White House? Log on to CNN.com/360 to vote right now. Results when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Sounds simple enough, huh? No question, the first lady is very much in the public eye, but does the candidate's wife actually matter when it comes to the election? Will Teresa Heinz or Laura Bush actually influence votes for their husbands?

We spoke earlier this evening in Los Angeles with Carl S. Anthony, who wrote the book on this subject. It's called "First Ladies."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Mr. Anthony, let me begin with this -- how important is a candidate's wife to his image? CARL ANTHONY, AUTHOR: Ultimately, very important. I think sometimes with voters it might be subconscious. I don't know if people necessarily vote for or against a candidate based on the spouse, but it absolutely affects the overall impression we have of them.

COLLINS: Let's talk about Laura Bush, if we could, just for a moment. Recently, she's been pretty active on the campaign trail, at least much more so than in 2000. Why is that?

ANTHONY: Both parties realize that the winner is going to have to pull from the big middle, that big, undetermined, independent or undecided vote, and you have a very interesting thing. In Laura Bush, you have someone who was years ago a former Democrat, who has on a few issues sort of suggested that she may not be 100 percent in accord with her husband.

COLLINS: And what about Teresa Heinz Kerry? What positives does she bring? I mean, she's a pretty compelling speaker.

ANTHONY: There's been all sorts of kind of press and things about her as if she's -- that she's so passionate, as if she's sort of wild, like some 21st century Mary Todd Lincoln or something. But, in fact, she's an extremely articulate and compassionate, yet very cogent, speaker. I would daresay when we see her at the convention, people might think she's a better speaker than her husband.

COLLINS: Talk to us a little bit about the vice presidential candidates' wives, then.

Lynne Cheney, a bit of a lightning rod in 2000. She's going to be more of a force this time around?

ANTHONY: I think she certainly plays to the choir, if you will, the base of the more conservative right wing Republicans, and certainly in terms of the work that she continues to do. In many ways, she's traditional in the sense of conservative political views.

I think Elizabeth Edwards is going to be very interesting, because, again, you have this curious dichotomy. She started out -- she and John Edwards were college sweethearts. She is also an attorney. Very intelligent, very involved, and willing to take on all of the issues. And yet, because she has some extremely young children -- I mean, these are some of the youngest children we've seen in this role since the Kennedy kids in 1960 ...

COLLINS: Yes.

ANTHONY: ... she also sort of suggests kind of a traditional role.

COLLINS: All right, well, it certainly will be very interesting to watch these four women as the campaign draws on.

All right, Carl Anthony, presidential historian. We appreciate your time tonight. ANTHONY: Thanks very much.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: It's time now for the Buzz. Earlier, we asked, does John Edwards help John Kerry's chances of winning the White House? Eighty-nine percent said yes, 11 percent voted no. Of course, not a scientific poll, but it is your Buzz.

Next, on 360, looking for Mr. or Ms. Wonderful? Well, we found them. Chances are, they're not quite like anything you expected.

Plus, tomorrow on 360, a look at the teen obsession over having the perfect body. It's part of our special series, Too Much, Too Soon.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: If your special someone has stopped giving you the special treatment, you may want to try to shop around for somebody new. But, if you're looking for the perfect person, you could be shopping for a long time, unless, of course, you don't mind someone who's really short, doesn't kiss well and is kind of motionless in the sack.

If you can deal with all that, well, Jeanne Moos may have the answer.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Compared to the average guy, he's a doll.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's just cuddle tonight.

MOOS: A doll who says all the right thing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You don't look at all fat in that dress.

MOOS: His name is Mr. Wonderful, and he's spawned Ms. Wonderful.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You don't need a glass. Just go ahead and drink right out of the carton.

MOOS: Coming soon, the Wonderful kids.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I grow up, I want to be just like you.

MOOS: An African American Mr. Wonderful.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, can't your momma stay another week?

MOOS: Sure, there are naysayers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This thing will never sell. It's not furry enough. MOOS: But over 2 million sold the first year. They're hoping for 5 million the next -- a doll phenomenon created by a former divorce attorney, herself divorced.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I had just come out the other side of a very tempestuous marriage. I guess I needed my own Mr. Wonderful.

MOOS: So she created him.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let me rub your feet.

MOOS: One gift shop manager told of a customer wanting one for his wife who just found out about his mistress.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Would this be an appropriate to give my wife now that she knows I have a girlfriend?

MOOS: And what did you say?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I said there's a jewelry store down the block. You need to get her a really big diamond.

MOOS: And they kind of do look like you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's really important that we talk about our relationship.

MOOS: You can even insert your own Mr. Wonderful into the My Mr. Wonderful picture frame.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, smoochy-poo (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's really important that we talk about our relationship.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is he gay?

MOOS: Imagine if Mr. Wonderful and Ms. Wonderful got married.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ah, can't your mother stay another week?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It really doesn't matter if you leave the toilet seat up. It makes it easier to clean.

MOOS: Jeanne Moos, CNN.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have I told you I loved you lately?

MOOS: New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Still take the diamond, thanks. And thank you for watching, everybody. For Anderson Cooper, I'm Heidi Collins. See you bright and early tomorrow on AMERICAN MORNING.

Coming up next, PAULA ZAHN NOW.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com


Aired July 6, 2004 - 19:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, GUEST HOST: Good evening, everybody. I'm Heidi Collins, in for Anderson Cooper.
Kerry has a number two, and the GOP goes on attack.

360 starts right now.

Kerry chooses John Edwards. Will his campaign get a bounce, or will the Republican response gain traction?

The brother of the Marine held captive says he's received a sign his brother has been released.

Zarqawi's video diary. A glimpse into Iraq's most-wanted terrorist minutes before an attack that killed four Americans.

Too Much, Too Soon, our special series. Tonight, are today's teens having sex too soon?

And exorcism gone wrong. An 8-year-old boy is dead, and a minister stands trial for his death.

ANNOUNCER: Live from New York, this is ANDERSON COOPER 360.

COLLINS: We begin tonight with John Kerry's decision to tap North Carolina Senator John Edwards as his running mate. Edwards, the first tarheel politician to join a major party ticket since 1852, came pretty close just a few months ago to having his own name at the top of the ticket. And many Democrats were rooting for him to be chosen.

Turns out the Republicans were waiting as well.

Here's CNN's senior political correspondent Candy Crowley.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): According to campaign lore, the first people John Kerry told were the guys who spent Monday night changing decals on the plane. A last secret mission in a stealth search for what was, in the light of day, a fairly predictable choice.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have chosen a man who understands and defends the values of America, a man who has shown courage and conviction as a champion for middle-class Americans, and for those struggling to reach the middle class.

CROWLEY: After four months looking, John Kerry settled on John Edwards, the vice presidential choice most Democrats wanted, well, four months ago. Edwards is smart, charming, articulate, and got raves for his sunny primary campaign. But mostly it boils down to this. He is what Kerry is not, and vice versa.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, KERRY-EDWARDS CAMPAIGN COMMERCIAL)

ANNOUNCER: One is a combat veteran with over 30 years of experience handling the toughest issues facing America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CROWLEY: Raised in a family of modest means, Edwards was the first to go to college. He eventually became a personal injury trial lawyer and a multimillionaire. A one-term senator, Edwards has little foreign policy or international experience, at least none that impressed Kerry six months ago.

KERRY: When I came back from Vietnam in 1969, ladies and gentlemen, I'm not sure if John Edwards was out of diapers then or not. I'm truly not sure, I don't know.

CROWLEY: But that's so January. This is July.

KERRY: He has honored the lessons of home and family that he learned in North Carolina, and he brings those values to shape a better America together with all of us. John Edwards is ready for this job.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CROWLEY: Kerry, whose campaign has operated largely outside the national headlines, intends to milk this spotlight. You will notice, Heidi, there were no pictures of the newly formed Democratic ticket today. They're saving that for tomorrow, and hopefully a second round of stories, Heidi.

COLLINS: I bet there will be. All right, Candy Crowley live from Pittsburgh tonight. Thanks, Candy.

The man Kerry is trying to replace weighed in with his reaction to the Edwards announcement. President Bush spoke in the Oval Office earlier today.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I welcome Senator Edwards on the ticket. The vice president called him early this morning to say, after the announcement was made, to say that he welcomes him to the race, and as do I. And I look forward to a good, spirited contest.

COLLINS: The president is scheduled to visit Senator Edwards' home state of North Carolina tomorrow, and we will have much more later on the lightning-fast Republican campaign against Edwards that was launched just minutes after his selection was announced. The mystery of the American Marine of Lebanese descent said once to have deserted, then listed as missing, then as having been captured by insurgents while absent without leave, still has not been solved, though today's news is more hopeful, that is, if the news is true.

CNN's Rusty Dornin now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Is he finally free? Corporal Wassef Hassoun's brother in Lebanon thinks so. Sami Hassoun claims someone came to the door of the family home in Tripoli with an assurance that left little doubt in his mind that his brother is alive. He spoke to CNN from Lebanon by telephone.

SAMI HASSOUN, BROTHER OF MISSING MARINE (on phone): We had a sign that he's alive and he's released. We have no idea where he is. But he's alive and he's released, and we are assured of the sign. That's all we can say. He's alive, we are sure of it, and he is released.

DORNIN: Corporal Hassoun's brother Mohammed, here in West Jordan, Utah, told CNN family members here heard the news from Lebanon, but still don't know who the messenger was in Tripoli and had no comment on the mysterious sign.

The Pentagon issued a statement it can't confirm Hassoun's release.

The group that claims to have kidnapped Hassoun says he was sent to a safe place after he announced his forgiveness and determination not to return to U.S. armed forces. The Pentagon has not commented on that, but says it is investigating the circumstances leading up to his capture.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DORNIN: Yet another twist in a story that has wound this family in knots. The latest news, yes, is encouraging. But unconfirmed reports have burned this family before. And the best confirmation people here could get about the fate of Corporal Wassef Hassoun is to see for themselves that he is alive and well, Heidi.

COLLINS: All right, Rusty Dornin, thanks so much, live from West Jordan, Utah, tonight.

It's come out already that some of what the CIA believed about Iraq and its weapons of mass destruction was wrong. But it seems now that in one area, the CIA had it right, but failed to pass on what they knew to the White House.

Here's CNN's national security correspondent David Ensor on that, and other revelations to be found in the Senate 9/11 commission's report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The report will criticize outgoing director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, according to knowledgeable sources, for relying too much on the work of this man, a CIA weapons expert who last year showed CNN gas centrifuge parts dug up from an Iraqi scientist's garden.

Knowledgeable sources say the report says the man, who CIA officials asked CNN not to identify, was biased, that he was convinced that aluminum tubes imported by Iraq were for uranium enrichment, as opposed to conventional rockets, as the Iraqis had claimed.

JOSEPH CIRINCIONE, CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT: The CIA seems to have picked an analyst who had the point of view that these tubes were for a nuclear weapons program.

ENSOR: George Tenet and other CIA officials continue to insist it is still not clear what the aluminum tubes were really for.

GEORGE TENET, CIA DIRECTOR: We have additional data to collect, and more sources to question.

ENSOR: Another fault found by the Senate Intelligence Committee report, sources say, is that the CIA interviewed some family members of Iraqi scientists who said there were no longer any weapons of mass destruction programs, but that the CIA never told the president.

CIRINCIONE: It's perfectly understandable that the CIA wouldn't believe family members of scientists who told them there were no programs. But they should have included it in their report. They should have revealed all the evidence, not just the evidence that fit their position.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ENSOR: CIA officials responded it was only a handful of scientists' relatives, who were simply repeating the party line from Iraq's leader, Saddam Hussein, Heidi.

COLLINS: David Ensor from Washington tonight, thanks, David.

U.S. fighter pilot found guilty. That tops our look at news cross-country tonight. New Orleans, Louisiana, a National Guard pilot who mistakenly bombed and killed four Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan has been found guilty of dereliction of duty. Major Harry Schmidt (ph) has been reprimanded and will lose more than $5,000 in pay. Schmidt blames the bombing on the fog of war.

Portland, Oregon, holy money troubles. The Portland archdiocese revealed today it will file for chapter 11 bankruptcy because of priest abuse lawsuits. The church says it cannot afford two pending cases, which seek a combined $155 million in damages.

Redwood City, California, affair denied. A polygraph expert testified today that Scott Peterson said his marriage was fine one day after his wife, Laci, disappeared. Peterson was, in fact, having an affair with massage therapist Amber Frey. Marlboro, Massachusetts, car in roof. No, you're not seeing things. The driver of this 1992 Ford Taurus accidentally hit the gas, instead of the brake while in an elevated parking garage. Next thing she knew, this. She ended up in an unwanted parking spot. Luckily, though, neither the driver nor anyone in the house was hurt.

That's a look at stories cross-country tonight.

360 next, video terrorism. Iraq's most-wanted man taunts his victims on tape. We'll take a closer look at this new strategy of warfare.

Plus, Too Much, Too Soon, the sex lives of teens. Are too many kids on the fast track? We'll take a closer look as part of our special week-long series.

And was it death by exorcism? Did a strip mall preacher kill an 8-year-old boy? A closer look at that as well.

But first, your picks, the most popular stories on CNN.com right now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: The videos released by terror groups have become key propaganda weapons. Now a new group of tapes has been released which show the remarkable degree to which those groups are documenting their deadly activities, including recent terror attacks.

CNN's Brent Sadler now on the man the insurgents seem to have chosen to be the conduit for their increasingly sophisticated tastes.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRENT SADLER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Where an Australian reporter working for "TIME" magazine is walking a professional knife edge, an unlikely go-between for anti-Western militants. He's viewing what purports to be the gruesome attack that killed four American security contractors in Fallujah some three months ago, when the bodies were dragged through the streets and hung from a bridge.

MICHAEL WARE, "TIME" MAGAZINE: This video is straight from the mujahadin. This is the Blackwater killings. They talk about planning it.

This is the seventh tape I've received in the last three or four days.

SADLER: Including the release of this tape. It illustrates how insurgent groups have developed the technique of using video to record attacks. A group called Unity and Jihad, led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the most-wanted terror suspect in Iraq, claims to have made this presentation.

WARE: They have reached a level of organization and sophistication that we have not seen previously. They've been incredibly savvy.

SADLER: What's claimed to be a Zarqawi camera captures this disturbing sequence of a suicide bomber bidding farewell to fighters and boarding a tanker wired to three and a half tons of explosives for start-to-finish coverage of the attack.

WARE: Something the last few months has now got them filming the most intimate, graphic attacks, like, up close and personal. They're trying to tell the Western public, This is what your boys are dying for, this is what they're up against. Terrorism is about instilling terror. That's a part of what this is doing.

SADLER: Ware denies he's being used by terror groups and says he filters what he learns, regardless of the source.

WARE: This is a war. It has two sides. I feel an obligation to discover as much as I can about both sides. I feel that's what we're here to do.

SADLER (on camera): Do you worry that you're getting too close to this, that one day they might shoot the messenger?

WARE: I worry about that every waking moment and every sleeping dream. And it terrifies me. It terrifies me on a personal level, and it terrifies me in terms of what we're up against.

SADLER (voice-over): And the danger involved.

Brent Sadler, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: A fast fact now. The Pentagon said today only 90 of the more than 5,700 people in custody in Iraq as security risks are foreign fighters. Critics say the Pentagon has overstated the figure. The Pentagon says that's not true.

HIV infections hit a record high. That tops our look at global stories. Here's the uplink now. At the United Nations, an annual report on AIDS shows almost 5 million people became infected with HIV last year. That's the largest increase in new infections since the disease was discovered in 1981.

London, England, strong words on Gitmo. British Prime Minister Tony Blair calls the U.S. prison for terror suspects in Guantanamo Bay an anomaly that at some point has to end. Blair says he's asked President Bush to release four remaining Brits still being held at the prison.

The Hague, the Netherlands, fit for trial. Judges in Slobodan Milosevic's war crimes trial say the case will go on. The former Yugoslav president may not be healthy enough to represent himself. The 62-year-old has been ordered to undergo a new round of heart examinations.

Back in London, Princess Diana memorial dedicated. Hundreds of people on hand in Hyde Park. Leading the dedication, Queen Elizabeth, trying to heal the rift with Diana's family. Also on hand, Princes William and Harry, as well as Prince Charles.

Johannesburg, South Africa. Legal uproar. Disney says it's not liable in a dispute over the copyright to the song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" in the hit movie and musical "The Lion King." South African lawyers are seeking $1.6 million in damages from Disney for using the song, written in 1936 by a Zulu migrant worker.

And that's tonight's uplink.

360 next. The sex lives of teens. Are kids going too far, too fast these days? Part of our special series, Too Much, Too Soon.

Also tonight, an autistic boy dies during what prosecutors say was an exorcism. Should the janitor-turned-preacher be sent to jail? We'll take a closer look.

And a little later, Bush versus Kerry at the ballot box. Will their wives make a difference in the hearts of the voters? Find out how Teresa and Laura stack up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Look, no offense, but you're talking about a post-high school long-distance relationship. And you and Kevin haven't even done it yet.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's not why we're going out.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What do you expect him to drive to Cornell for, milk and cookies?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're going to have sex, when he's ready and I'm ready. It's got to be completely perfect. I want the right time, the right moment, the right place.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Vicki, it's not a space shuttle launch, it's sex.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: No doubt about it, we live in a sexually charged society. You see it in teen flicks like "American Pie." But does that mean every teen in America is having sex? It depends on what you categorize as sex.

Tonight, in part two of our special series, Too Much, Too Soon, CNN's Jason Bellini reports on the sex lives of teens.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JASON BELLINI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's Heather Crigg's 14th birthday. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's right...

(CROSSTALK)

BELLINI: Heather and her girlfriends aren't shy around boys. Most are well past that stage. They talk openly about hooking up.

HEATHER CRIGG, 14-YEAR-OLD: As long as you like the person, if you don't have to be in a relationship with them. You just have to like them.

BELLINI (on camera): Can you be hooking up with more than one person at a time?

CRIGG: Yes.

BELLINI (voice-over): Heather defines "hooking up" as everything but intercourse.

CRIGG: Hooking up is, like, making out with him, and sex is, like, sex.

BELLINI (on camera): Sex.

CRIGG: Yes.

BELLINI (voice-over): Atoosa Rubenstein, editor of "Seventeen" magazine, hears from many teen girls who want to remain virgins. They view hooking up and making out as loopholes.

ATOOSA RUBENSTEIN, EDITOR, "SEVENTEEN" MAGAZINE: The number of virgins has gone up, but there's a lot of other things you can do and still maintain your virginity. You know, so kids are having oral sex. They are having anal sex.

BELLINI (on camera): It's a distinction that may help to explain why the teen pregnancy rate is down 30 percent from a decade ago. At the same time, the rate of sexually transmitted diseases among young people is going up.

(voice-over): People between ages 15 and 24 account for half of all new STDs in the U.S. The secret sex lives of today's teenagers also may be aided by easy access to the Internet. Preliminary findings of an Emory University study suggest that teens exposed to Internet porn may think it's normal to degrade their partner and to disassociate sex from intimacy.

CRIGG: They're always more, like, touchy-feely and stuff.

BELLINI (on camera): And the girls, do they do it because boys pressure them to, or because they want to?

CRIGG: I think both.

BELLINI (voice-over): It's called friends with benefits, the benefits being of the sexual variety. The boys benefit more than the girls.

RUBENSTEIN: They think, Well, maybe if we make out, maybe if we're physical, he'll see how special I am. But, instead, what's happening is, the boy is saying, OK, thank you, moving on to the next one.

BELLINI: Even if they are still virgins, the girls find themselves doing too much, too soon.

Jason Bellini, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Joining me from Los Angeles to talk more about teens and sex is Jessica Weiner, author of "A Very Hungry Girl: How I Filled Up on Life and How You Can Too."

Jessica, thanks for being here tonight.

You know, as we just saw in Jason Bellini's piece there, it seems that teens are moving away from these boyfriend-girlfriend traditional relationships and into the much more impersonal hookups. How is this leading them to become more sexually active?

JESSICA WEINER, AUTHOR, "A VERY HUNGRY GIRL": Well, you know, Heidi, we've lost all intimacy and sense of dating with teens right now. Because they hang out in groups, which is a fairly normal teen practice to do, they're also now encouraging sex within groups.

And so what we're seeing is that teens who are hanging out and becoming sexually active and talking about hooking up with their friends in large groups are losing the fact that they can date, that there's romance involved, and that there's a sense for them to have boundaries, when they create these physical and sexual relationships.

COLLINS: As we just heard the girl say in the piece, you know, you just have to like them. I mean, do they ever -- do they talk about love?

WEINER: Yes, you know, the teens that I work with talk about love as some far-off fantasy, because, let's face it, the images that they're seeing every day on television, on the Internet, and in their peer groups are not images of love. They're images of sex and sexuality.

And when we don't have parents at home, establishing a steady and casual relationship with their sons and daughters about sex, we're not learning about love. You're letting a 16-year-old educate your kid about sex and love and relationships.

COLLINS: Yes. Well, we know about the physical ramifications of sex and oral sex. But talk to us about the emotional side, the consequences of teens who experiment sexually with more than one partner.

WEINER: Well, you know, our teens are living in such a 2D society, a two-dimensional society, they're looking at sex at all hours of the day. They're seeing sexually provocative relationships in front of them.

And when you put a teen that is not schooled with how to set boundaries, that is not educated properly about sex, in a 3D environment, in a sexual behavioral experiment with somebody, or in a dating situation, they have no idea how to navigate through that. We haven't provided them the tools.

So the emotional consequences, you have a ton of teen girls and guys feeling shame about their sexuality, feeling stigmatized about their sexual behavior, and feeling isolated. They don't know who to talk to about this.

COLLINS: All right, so whose fault is it? I mean, we go back to parents, we go back to educators? What can everyone be doing better to get this message out?

WEINER: Well, you know, that's kind of the chicken and the egg question. I think that we each have to have a call to action. Parents need to make sure that they start a conversation about sex and sexuality with their kids. This is a normal, beautiful process for teens to experiment and to be tuned into their sexuality. We don't want to shame that.

So parents have to be less afraid of talking about it, and they have to be more realistic about what their kids are looking at, what they're listening to, and what they're experiencing when they go to school.

And for teens, the call to action is, they have to be willing to care enough about themselves, and do esteemable acts to raise their self-esteem, not try to find their self-esteem in relationships and in sexual behaviors.

I think teens essentially have to declare that they don't want to be sold these sexual advertisements anymore and that they want more out of life than to be a piece of meat.

COLLINS: Right, well, that brings up the point about this possible movement that might be going on about too much sexiness. People looking maybe to Jessica Simpson a little bit more now. Do you think there is a backlash happening against promiscuity? Quickly.

WEINER: I think that, you know, the teens that I work with feel that they want to be valued for more than their bodies. But advertisers, the media, the marketers, the music, the magazines -- we have to stop selling sex to our teens, and parents and teens alike have to have a call to action to do something more.

I think the backlash is in existence, and I hope that we see a change with it soon.

COLLINS: Jessica Weiner tonight, thanks so much for your time.

WEINER: You're welcome. Thank you. COLLINS: And tomorrow night we do continue our series Too Much, Too Soon, with the look at the teen obsession over having the perfect body and the dangers of striving to be too thin or too buff. Thursday, inside the lives of the young and rich. Teens with green, they seem to have it all, except limits. And Friday, developing too fast. Puberty at the age of 7? Experts are trying to figure out why some children are becoming adults too fast.

Exorcism gone wrong. An 8-year-old boy is dead, and the minister stands trial for his death.

And Laura, Lynne, Teresa, and Elizabeth, a close and personal look into the wives of the campaign hopefuls.

360 continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Welcome back to 360.

A look now at some of the day's top stories in tonight's reset.

Presidential candidate John Kerry made it official today. He's offered the number two slot on the Democratic ticket to fellow senator John Edwards of North Carolina. The two men are scheduled to begin campaigning together tomorrow in Ohio.

In New York, though, editors at "The New York Post" were convinced Congressman Dick Gephardt was going to be Kerry's man, so convinced that their late edition this morning carried the news, billed as an exclusive story, even as Kerry was announcing he had chosen Edwards.

Perhaps the "Post" and the rest of us in the media, for that matter, should have checked out this Web site. By 9:45 last night, USAviation.com had the story, thanks to a posting, that the Kerry campaign plane had been spotted -- you can see it there -- in a hangar at the Pittsburgh airport being repainted to add the Edwards name.

Some might call it the ultimate Horatio Alger story. Six years ago, he had never held public office. Now, he's near the pinnacle of American politics. CNN's Adaora Udoji reports on the meteoric rise of Senator John Edwards.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ADAORA UDOJI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's been a meteoric rise for Senator John Edwards.

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS (D-NC): In the America you and build together ...

UDOJI: A freshman senator of just months, in 1999 he was appointed a key role in defending President Clinton during impeachment proceedings. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's got a real sense of social equity, wants to get everybody a fair shake, and it's very real, and people respond to that.

EDWARDS: I come from a family of hard-working people.

UDOJI: The son of a North Carolina textile worker, he was the first to college in his family. A wildly successful law practice, representing children and families against corporations followed. Politics was a second career, one he had thought of briefly in law school. He turned to it after his 16-year-old son, Wade, was killed in a car accident in mid 1990s. He wanted to make a difference on a larger scale.

Democrats seized on his smarts, good looks and optimism.

DONNA BRAZILE, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: John Edwards can really not only talk the talk, but he knows the walk.

UDOJI: Barely two years in the Senate, he made the short list for the vice presidential spot on the 2000 Al Gore ticket. He built a reputation for working with senators across the aisle, sending a patients' bill of rights proposal with Republican John McCain.

As his name spread across the country, was featured in magazines like "Vanity Fair," some North Carolina constituents worried he was really setting up a run for president. By September, 2003, Edwards announced he would run.

EDWARDS: Nice to meet you. I'm running for president. I'm a Democrat running for president.

UDOJI: He hung in there through March, winning South Carolina's primary, and Iowa and Wisconsin coming in second.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think the history of John Edwards is that you meet John Edwards, you like John Edwards.

UDOJI: In six years, he's come a long way, testament, say those who know him, of a drive that should not be underestimated.

Adaora Udoji, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Well, as you know, it never takes long for the pundits to weigh in on a day like today. What are they saying about the Edwards pick?

I checked in a little earlier with Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala from the CROSSFIRE gang to get their spin on the day's developments.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: All right, Paul Begala, I'd like to begin with you. Why John Edwards? What is it that he brings to the ticket that Congressman Gephardt or Governor Vilsack do not?

PAUL BEGALA, CO-HOST, CROSSFIRE: Well, excitement. John Kerry has a lot going for him, but he's not the most charismatic, exciting guy you've ever seen on the stump. John Edwards is. A whole lot of people are already comparing him to Bill Clinton, who was really the candidate of a lifetime. So anytime you get that kind of star quality in your party and you promote him like this, it's just terrific.

I think that what Edwards brings is optimism, it's exuberance. It's change, a sense of energy, all of which I think matches up quite favorably with what's increasingly looking like a sort of stodgy and stuck-in-the-mud Republican administration.

COLLINS: All right. But, Tucker, there are certainly some liabilities I think that the Republicans do see. What areas do you think they will attack him on?

TUCKER CARLSON, CO-HOST, CROSSFIRE: In choosing Senator Edwards, the Kerry campaign has made a pretty clear statement that they don't intend -- or certainly don't want to fight this campaign out on national security matters, on the war in Iraq and on terrorism. And I think that's a shame for the American people, because I think we deserve a debate on both of those. And I also think that strategically it's probably an error. I mean, those are the Bush campaign's strengths, but they're also potentially its weaknesses.

And Kerry, so far, has been unwilling to hit them head on and say here's my alternative vision for what we ought to do in Iraq, say. He hasn't. He's co-opted a vision very much like Bush's, and this is evidence I think he's going to continue to say things like that.

COLLINS: Also, I've got to ask you, Paul. There is a list, I'm sure you know about this, the five criteria that John Kerry came up with for the person that he wanted to see as his vice presidential nominee.

You say that with the lack of experience on foreign policy, he's just the vice president. But number five on that list clearly states, fifth, and most important, the candidate had to be ready at any moment to assume the awesome responsibility of president.

BEGALA: I think there's no doubt about it. In fact, there's hundreds of thousands of Americans who already voted for John Edwards to be the president, and so he definitely crosses that threshold. Again, he brings much more experience on foreign policy than Bill Clinton did at this stage of his career, or than Ronald Reagan.

I mean, most of our recent presidents have been governors before they became president, including our current president, George W. Bush. And again, what he brings, in addition to that, is I think probably what the Republicans don't like, all of this optimism and light and exuberance and this future focus that I think is really -- I just can't wait to see the optics of this match up.

Let's watch tomorrow, see how these two guys relate, and then we'll go and watch Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney, who look like the remake of "Grumpy Old Men."

CARLSON: Well, I guess I just don't see that at all, having sat through a lot of Edwards' speeches, a lot, enough to be called an expert, I think, on Edwards' speeches.

I don't see them as optimistic at all. In fact, the message seems to be, I rose from these humble beginnings. His father is a mill worker -- don't know if you caught that, Heidi. He's a mill worker.

COLLINS: I did catch that.

CARLSON: Yes, he says it quite a bit. And I became rich as an attorney. But the implication of the speech is, you can't do the same, because the cards are stacked against you. The system is fundamentally unfair.

COLLINS: All right, I've got to ask you a little bit more about this personality issue real quickly. Paul, you know, we've known for a long time that a V.P. really isn't supposed to overshadow a president, and there's been quite a bit of discussion about Kerry and his lack of charisma -- by critics of Kerry's, obviously.

Do you think he's right about that at all with Edwards, who really did shine, when we saw him during the caucuses and so forth, as a great stump speaker, if you could?

BEGALA: It shows a remarkable amount of self confidence. When Ronald Reagan turned first to Gerald Ford, who did not accept, and then George Bush, Sr., it showed a lot of strength. When Bill Clinton turned to Al Gore, it showed a lot of strength.

When George W. Bush rejected John McCain, for fear that he'd be overshadowed, rejected Rudy Giuliani, for fear he'd be overshadowed, and took the most dull, drab and unassuming person -- really on the face of the earth, I think -- in Dick Cheney, it showed a lot about Mr. Bush's deep insecurities.

So the fact that John Kerry took somebody who obviously has a lot more talent on the stump shows you that Kerry's not worried about being overshadowed, and he won't be overshadowed. It just shows that the guy will have strong and capable people around him and won't have to be worried the way that Governor Bush was four years ago when he picked Dick Cheney.

CARLSON: Well, since we've become the Sigmund Freud hour here, Heidi, let me just say that in fact Dick Cheney has turned out to be the most assertive and the most powerful vice president in the modern era, maybe ever.

COLLINS: All right, guys. Thanks so much for your time tonight. Paul Begala, Tucker Carlson. Again, thank you.

BEGALA: Thanks.

CARLSON: Thank you, Heidi. (END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Picking his running mate is arguably the most important choice John Kerry will make. Countless factors go into the decision making process, including a person's readiness to step into the presidency at a moment's notice. But cold electoral calculations often win out in the end.

Why did John Kerry pick John Edwards? We may never know the real reason. But whatever it is, the reaction to the decision is raw politics.

At 7:30 this morning, the word leaked that John Kerry had picked John Edwards as his running mate. Twenty-one minutes later, the Republican response teams sent an e-mail to members of the media with this ad, called "First Choice."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: He deserves not only our support, but our admiration. That's why I am honored to introduce to you the president of the United States, George W. Bush.

COLLINS (voice-over): The message? John Edwards is not John Kerry's first pick. John McCain was. And all morning, Republicans picked up the theme.

GOV. MITT ROMNEY (R), MASSACHUSETTS: Well, it's not a bad choice for his second pick. His first choice, of course, was John McCain, but John McCain disappointed him by supporting the president.

COLLINS: It didn't take long, either, before the GOP used the L- word, calling Edwards a disingenuous, unaccomplished liberal, in a statement released by mid-morning. They inundated journalists with e- mails on Edwards' track record in the Senate, or what they called a lack of.

ED GILLESPIE, RNC CHAIRMAN: John Edwards is someone who had only four years experience in the United States Senate, who has no international experience, no foreign policy experience.

COLLINS: They also sprinkled some past comments from John Kerry, like this one.

SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: When I came back from Vietnam in 1969, ladies and gentlemen, I'm not sure if John Edwards was out of diapers then yet, or not, I'm truly not sure. I don't know.

COLLINS: And what about the Democrats? Well, they were busy, too, responding to the Republican responses. Early this afternoon, they put out this ad on the Web.

MCCAIN: There's not much question, once again, 38 percent of his tax cut to the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans. My friends -- my friends, I don't think Bill Gates needs a tax cut. COLLINS: Attack and counterattack. Not letting the other side have the last word is pure raw politics.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: A quick fast fact now. Fourteen of America's 46 vice presidents have gone on to become president. Of those, nine succeeded to the presidency on the death or resignation of the president, and only five were elected in their own rite -- John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, Richard Nixon and George Herbert Walker Bush.

Today's Buzz is this. Does John Edwards help John Kerry's chances of winning the White House? Log onto CNN.com/360 to vote. We'll have the results coming up at the end of the show.

Next, on 360 now, driving out the demons. A minister, on trial for what prosecutors say was a deadly exorcism. Also tonight, standing by their man, Laura Bush and Teresa Heinz. How they impact the race for the White House.

And, a little later, if your significant other isn't exactly perfect, maybe you need Mr. or Ms. Wonderful.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Prosecutors say the death of eight-year-old Terrance Cottrell in Milwaukee last summer was the result of an exorcism that went terribly wrong. The defendant in the case is a preacher, and he's facing a charge of felony child abuse, and five years in prison.

Here's CNN's Chris Lawrence for tonight's Justice Served.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS LAWRENCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Ray Hemphill sat silently Tuesday in a Milwaukee courtroom, where a jury will soon decide if he should be punished for performing an exorcism that left an eight-year-old autistic boy dead.

Last August, Terrance Cottrell's mother took him to this strip- mall church for a prayer session. A neighbor says Terrance's mother is a zealous convert who believed evil spirits spoke through her son.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She said he said kill me, take me, kill me. I was, like, are you serious? I couldn't really believe that.

LAWRENCE: Terrance's mother went to Hemphill for help, and he offered to pray for the boy to be healed. But Hemphill is no ordained minister. He's a school janitor who'd been moonlighting as a preacher.

By all accounts, this was an intense, two-hour session. Hemphill's shirt was soaked with sweat from lying on top of Terrance as the little boy was held down by other church members and his own mother. Hemphill's attorney says this was at least the ninth prayer service at this church, and nothing had gone wrong before. He'll argue that drugs contributed to Cottrell's death. A toxicology report shows Terrance's system had toxic blood levels of at least two drugs, an antihistamine and antipsychotic.

The medical examiner ruled the death homicide by suffocation, but the D.A. says he couldn't prove Hemphill knew what he was doing would kill the boy. So a jury will decide whether he's guilty of felony child abuse, which carries a maximum sentence of five years.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Covering the case now for us Court TV anchor Lisa Bloom.

Lisa, Terrance Cottrell, as we just heard in this story, was held down by his own mother, two other women. Why weren't they charged with a crime?

LISA BLOOM, COURT TV ANCHOR: That's a great question, and many people in Milwaukee are outraged about that. As the little boy struggled for over two hours, his face pushed down, a grown man on top of him, a 150-pound weight on top of him ...

COLLINS: We heard about the sweat on the tee-shirt of him.

BLOOM: Yes, and how could this be accomplished if not for a number of adults, including his own mother, holding him down. And yet they were not charged. Now, they still could be charged, depending on the outcome of this case. That's still a possibility. Maybe they will be.

COLLINS: All right, well, as we heard, the death was ruled a homicide, yet Hemphill was charged with only felony child abuse.

BLOOM: That's right.

COLLINS: More serious charges here?

BLOOM: Well, the other problem in this case, there's a little boy dead, and he's being treated as though he were only battered, and not killed. That's what child abuse statutes are designed to address.

Now, there's no manslaughter charge in Wisconsin. What that means is, if there's a homicide without specific intent, that's normally manslaughter. But there is a reckless homicide statute that would really address this nicely, I think, in Wisconsin. And that's when someone is killed with extreme indifference to human life. Even if the preacher didn't mean to kill him, he took actions that anyone should have known could have killed a child -- sitting on him for two hours, suffocating the little boy. I think higher charges should have been brought.

COLLINS: And that's what the D.A. said, though, that he really couldn't prove that Hemphill knew what he was doing was going to cause the death of the little boy.

BLOOM: Right. He didn't think that there was intent. But that's the same thing as waving a loaded gun around in a room, someone gets killed and you say, well, I didn't intend to do it. That's manslaughter, or reckless homicide, in this state. Higher charges were available, but they just were not pursued.

COLLINS: Do you think a jury is going to buy the possibility that the child died from the medication that he was on?

BLOOM: You know, isn't it a coincident that just after two hours of adults holding him down and suffocating him, that's when the medication killed him? That's what the defense is arguing, essentially, that he died of an overdose of the medication. I think the timing's going to be more helpful to the prosecution.

COLLINS: Yes, probably on that one. But there is this treatment through prayer statute in the state of Wisconsin. Will that have any effect in this case?

BLOOM: What that statute is designed to address is people like Christian Scientists who reject traditional medicine and instead choose just to pray. But this goes way beyond simple prayer. It goes way beyond even laying on of hands. This is an adult male, 150- pounds, actively physically harming a child. I don't think that statute's going to help the defense all that much.

COLLINS: All right. Court TV anchor Lisa Bloom. Thanks for your thoughts tonight.

Still to come, is your love life a little bland? Well, we've got a doll for you.

Plus, first ladies, could Laura Bush or Teresa Heinz play a decisive role in this year's campaign?

First, though, Today's Buzz, does John Edwards help John Kerry's chances of winning the White House? Log on to CNN.com/360 to vote right now. Results when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: Sounds simple enough, huh? No question, the first lady is very much in the public eye, but does the candidate's wife actually matter when it comes to the election? Will Teresa Heinz or Laura Bush actually influence votes for their husbands?

We spoke earlier this evening in Los Angeles with Carl S. Anthony, who wrote the book on this subject. It's called "First Ladies."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Mr. Anthony, let me begin with this -- how important is a candidate's wife to his image? CARL ANTHONY, AUTHOR: Ultimately, very important. I think sometimes with voters it might be subconscious. I don't know if people necessarily vote for or against a candidate based on the spouse, but it absolutely affects the overall impression we have of them.

COLLINS: Let's talk about Laura Bush, if we could, just for a moment. Recently, she's been pretty active on the campaign trail, at least much more so than in 2000. Why is that?

ANTHONY: Both parties realize that the winner is going to have to pull from the big middle, that big, undetermined, independent or undecided vote, and you have a very interesting thing. In Laura Bush, you have someone who was years ago a former Democrat, who has on a few issues sort of suggested that she may not be 100 percent in accord with her husband.

COLLINS: And what about Teresa Heinz Kerry? What positives does she bring? I mean, she's a pretty compelling speaker.

ANTHONY: There's been all sorts of kind of press and things about her as if she's -- that she's so passionate, as if she's sort of wild, like some 21st century Mary Todd Lincoln or something. But, in fact, she's an extremely articulate and compassionate, yet very cogent, speaker. I would daresay when we see her at the convention, people might think she's a better speaker than her husband.

COLLINS: Talk to us a little bit about the vice presidential candidates' wives, then.

Lynne Cheney, a bit of a lightning rod in 2000. She's going to be more of a force this time around?

ANTHONY: I think she certainly plays to the choir, if you will, the base of the more conservative right wing Republicans, and certainly in terms of the work that she continues to do. In many ways, she's traditional in the sense of conservative political views.

I think Elizabeth Edwards is going to be very interesting, because, again, you have this curious dichotomy. She started out -- she and John Edwards were college sweethearts. She is also an attorney. Very intelligent, very involved, and willing to take on all of the issues. And yet, because she has some extremely young children -- I mean, these are some of the youngest children we've seen in this role since the Kennedy kids in 1960 ...

COLLINS: Yes.

ANTHONY: ... she also sort of suggests kind of a traditional role.

COLLINS: All right, well, it certainly will be very interesting to watch these four women as the campaign draws on.

All right, Carl Anthony, presidential historian. We appreciate your time tonight. ANTHONY: Thanks very much.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: It's time now for the Buzz. Earlier, we asked, does John Edwards help John Kerry's chances of winning the White House? Eighty-nine percent said yes, 11 percent voted no. Of course, not a scientific poll, but it is your Buzz.

Next, on 360, looking for Mr. or Ms. Wonderful? Well, we found them. Chances are, they're not quite like anything you expected.

Plus, tomorrow on 360, a look at the teen obsession over having the perfect body. It's part of our special series, Too Much, Too Soon.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COLLINS: If your special someone has stopped giving you the special treatment, you may want to try to shop around for somebody new. But, if you're looking for the perfect person, you could be shopping for a long time, unless, of course, you don't mind someone who's really short, doesn't kiss well and is kind of motionless in the sack.

If you can deal with all that, well, Jeanne Moos may have the answer.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Compared to the average guy, he's a doll.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's just cuddle tonight.

MOOS: A doll who says all the right thing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You don't look at all fat in that dress.

MOOS: His name is Mr. Wonderful, and he's spawned Ms. Wonderful.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You don't need a glass. Just go ahead and drink right out of the carton.

MOOS: Coming soon, the Wonderful kids.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I grow up, I want to be just like you.

MOOS: An African American Mr. Wonderful.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, can't your momma stay another week?

MOOS: Sure, there are naysayers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This thing will never sell. It's not furry enough. MOOS: But over 2 million sold the first year. They're hoping for 5 million the next -- a doll phenomenon created by a former divorce attorney, herself divorced.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I had just come out the other side of a very tempestuous marriage. I guess I needed my own Mr. Wonderful.

MOOS: So she created him.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let me rub your feet.

MOOS: One gift shop manager told of a customer wanting one for his wife who just found out about his mistress.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Would this be an appropriate to give my wife now that she knows I have a girlfriend?

MOOS: And what did you say?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I said there's a jewelry store down the block. You need to get her a really big diamond.

MOOS: And they kind of do look like you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's really important that we talk about our relationship.

MOOS: You can even insert your own Mr. Wonderful into the My Mr. Wonderful picture frame.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, smoochy-poo (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's really important that we talk about our relationship.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is he gay?

MOOS: Imagine if Mr. Wonderful and Ms. Wonderful got married.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ah, can't your mother stay another week?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It really doesn't matter if you leave the toilet seat up. It makes it easier to clean.

MOOS: Jeanne Moos, CNN.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have I told you I loved you lately?

MOOS: New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Still take the diamond, thanks. And thank you for watching, everybody. For Anderson Cooper, I'm Heidi Collins. See you bright and early tomorrow on AMERICAN MORNING.

Coming up next, PAULA ZAHN NOW.

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