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CNN Live Sunday

Italian Journalist Disputes U.S. Account of Shooting; Wounded Marines Learn to Use Artificial Limbs

Aired March 06, 2005 - 11:00   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.


ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN ANCHOR: It is 11:00 in Washington and 5:00 in Rome, Italy. I'm Andrea Koppel at CNN's global headquarters. Ahead this hour, surfers coast into the record books. Just how many people did it take to break a world record? And...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NICK THIERIAULT, U.S. MARINE CORPS: You can either sit in your room and cry about it for the rest of your life or you can put a leg on look just like everybody else and go out there and live just like everybody else.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOPPEL: A positive outlook on life. These soldiers learn to walk and even run with their new legs.

Plus, from cars to beer bottles, one man makes life-size models of our favorite things, but their purpose might surprise you. First, top headlines now in the news.

As suspected BTK serial killer Dennis Rader prepares for his upcoming preliminary hearing, an article in "Time" magazine by reporter Jeff Chu sheds more light on Rader and his actions while police were trying to solve the case. Chu spoke earlier with CNN's Tony Harris.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEFF CHU, "TIME" MAGAZINE: The crimes extend from 1974 until 1991. So during that time, he was taking his kids camping and fishing, he was active at church. He was spending a lot of time, you know, being a normal family man.

TONY HARRIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, has his family spoken to him or seen him?

CHU: His lawyers tell us that he has not spoken to his family and they have not spoken to him, but he asks after them all the time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOPPEL: Rader is charged with 10 counts of first degree murder.

In the Middle East, tensions are still high over the issue of Syrian troops in Lebanon. Tomorrow Syrian President Bashar al Assad plans to meet with Lebanon's president to discuss a two-phased withdrawal plan. It involves moving all Syrian troops in Lebanon to the Bekaa Valley, then pulling them across the border into Syria.

First up today, an Italian journalist describes a rain of fire and bullets hitting her car as it raced toward the Baghdad airport. Giuliana Sgrena is recovering from wounds suffered after being freed by Iraqi insurgents, only to be fired on by American troops. With the very latest on Sgrena's story, CNN Rome bureau chief Alessio Vinci is live now from Rome. So she wrote an article I guess while she was still in the hospital, Alessio.

ALESSIO VINCI, CNN ROME BUREAU CHIEF: Absolutely. Probably she dictated it to somebody, since she is still recovering from the wound to her left shoulder, Andrea. And let me show you the newspaper "Il Manifesto," for which she writes with her own account of what has happened on Friday in Baghdad. Her account titled "La Mia Verita." That is in Italian, in English "My Truth." Of course, Giuliana Sgrena disputing several points of what the initial reconstruction of what has happened on Friday in Baghdad.

She first of all dispute the fact that as the Americans are saying, that the car was speeding towards the checkpoint and then did not stop, a repeated warning for slowing down. Giuliana Sgrena is writing that the car was actually driving slowly and she calls the shooting unjustified. She also says that she remembers as you said, a hail of bullets. And then she offers her own account of the last few words of the intelligence agent who had only moments before secured her release and negotiated her release.

His name was Nicola Calipari. And she writes, "the driver started yelling," the driver was another intelligence agent in the car with them. The driver started yelling that we were Italians, we were Italians, we are Italians, we are Italians. Nicola Calipari threw himself on me to protect me and immediately, she says, immediately, I repeat, I heard his last breath as he was dying on me. So this is the account of the last few words according to what Sgrena remembers happening under those hail of bullets.

Now, Nicola Calipari was an experienced agent in Baghdad. His casket returned last night at Rome's Ciampino Airport, which was there. There at the airport the Italian president Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, as well as Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi. His body now is laying in state at the tomb of the unknown soldier in downtown Rome, where thousands of people today went there to pay their last respects. And finally, Andrea, the autopsy today reveals that Calipari was killed by a single shot wound to his head. Andrea?

KOPPEL: Obviously, a very tragic and traumatic experience for Sgrena. But Alessio, do we have any idea whether or not the Italian government notified the U.S. military that Sgrena and her convoy was going to be heading towards the airport on that road?

VINCI: Well, Sgrena writes that Calipari just moments before dying was on the phone and she writes she was on the phone with both the Italian embassy as well as the government. There is no mention whether or not he was talking to some Americans. However, there is an account citing intelligence sources in a different newspaper here in Rome today suggesting that Calipari made one of those calls in English saying we're almost there. We're going to be there in five minutes. So at least according to what this account reveals, that the Italians must have at least alerted somebody in the American military system in Baghdad. There is also another element here, and that is that the Italians are saying that for the Italian intelligence officers to come to Baghdad, to arrive at the airport, to carry weapons in Baghdad, they must have clearance, if you want, from the U.S. military, who distributes badges, who distributes the authority to actually give, just (UNINTELLIGIBLE) carry weapons in Baghdad, and that is why the Italians believe that somewhere the Americans had been warned. Andrea?

KOPPEL: Alessio, we all remember the video of Sgrena, the tearful video in which she was pleading for her life. Did she talk at all in her article about what it was like for her during the month that she was held by insurgents?

VINCI: Yes, briefly, she tells -- she writes, basically, how the captors used her family, if you want, in coercing her to record that video. She says, you know, you must ask help to your husband. And she gives also some rare insights about her moments with the captors. She says they treated her well, even inviting her once to watch television while she was there in captivity, watching television while television was actually playing a story on her captivity. And she also recalls how there was a woman among the kidnappers that was taking care of her. So bits and moments here about her life while, during those 30 days in Baghdad kidnapped by those Iraqi insurgents. Andrea?

KOPPEL: Alessio, thanks. Alessio Vinci for us in Rome.

Iraq's 275-seat national assembly will hold its first meeting March 16th and will begin forming a transitional government. That date is especially significant because it marks the anniversary of Saddam Hussein's 1988 poison gas attack on the Kurds in a town in northern Iraq. CNN's senior international correspondent Nic Robertson joins us live from Baghdad. So Nic, any idea yet who the prime minister, who the president and the other members of the Iraqi government will be?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Andrea, that is still not clear. And it's quite possible, we're being advised here by politicians involved in that process of trying to negotiate the president and prime minister positions, that even when the assembly sits, those decisions won't actually have been made. What seems to be happening here and what the political parties are saying is that now it's been a month since the election results were announced, a month and a half since the elections took place. They want to keep the political, the democratic process going. They want to show the Iraqi people that politics here is working. And even though they're still negotiating, sort of horse trading over these top political jobs, that they want the assembly to sit. They want to show the people that the political process is working. So the trading for those positions is still going on and by no means is it over indeed. It's only really, we're told, in the last few days, that it's actually begun to get down to any kind of detailed bartering, Andrea.

KOPPEL: Nic Robertson in Baghdad. Thank you.

For U.S. troops, courage is not limited to the battlefield. Those severely wounded deal with a whole new set of challenges as they face life without a limb. Many of them are on a remarkably fast track to recovery, and they shared their story with CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Call it running 101, a class for those who've lost a leg. Many soldiers and Marines like 22-year-old Jeff Sanders, injured six months ago by a roadside bomb near Baghdad.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You the man, baby! Yeah.

KOCH: He's had a new prosthetic leg for just a week and never expected to learn how to run this soon.

JEFF SANDERS, U.S. MARINE CORPS: It felt good. I mean, it's so hard to deal with all the losses of things you take for granted. And to get one of those things back. And it's not like it's one of those little things. It's about as big as it gets.

KOCH: 22-year-old Nick Thieriault decided to join the class at Adventist rehabilitation hospital in Rockville, Maryland. He's a Marine, too, and have served in Afghanistan until a roadside bomb blew apart his left foot. Nick wants advice on improving the use of this leg designed especially for running.

NICK THIERIAULT, U.S. MARINE CORPS: It pulls, and it pushes me back and it sends one hip forward and it's a lot of muscle control.

KOCH: This program is not just about instructing, but motivating amputees, many whose losses were very recent.

DR. TERRENCE SHEEHAN, ADVENTIST REHAB HOSP. OF MD: Often they come in demoralized, feeling that this loss is so devastating that they will not achieve.

DENNIS OEHLER, INSTRUCTOR, PARALYMPIAN RUNNER: This isn't no pain no gain. Pain is not good.

KOCH: Seeing others succeed, say those teaching and supporting them, can make all the difference.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, if he can do it, I can do it.

OEHLER: Especially for amputees that have come that just lost their leg, they get to see what the future is, you know. They get to see the possibilities.

KOCH: Nick, who went turkey hunting on crutches just months after his injury, is motivated. He says the other key to moving ahead is acceptance. THIERIAULT: It's what you got. I mean, you don't have a choice. You can either, you know, sit in your room and cry about it for the rest of your life or you can put a leg on and look just like everybody else and go out there and live just like everybody else.

KOCH: Kathleen Koch, CNN, Rockville, Maryland.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL: Coming up, babies' teeth as possible Geiger counters? A controversial study up next.

And would you like your final resting place to be a giant fish, a lion? How about a luxury car or a beer bottle?

And surf's up. A record-breaking day on the waves off Australia.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KOPPEL: A new medical study involving children and their baby teeth is stirring controversy. The study focused on young cancer patients who live near nuclear plants. But its findings are prompting outrage from some health experts and the nuclear industry. The story from CNN's Claire Leka.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CLAIRE LEKA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Scientist Joe Mangano heads up the radiation and public health project and he has been painstakingly collecting baby teeth for seven years. He uses them like little Geiger counters.

JOE MANGANO, RADIATION & PUBLIC HEALTH PROJECT: What our baby tooth study is doing is collecting teeth from children with cancer and testing them for a particular chemical, strontium 90, only found in nuclear weapons and nuclear reactors, and seeing whether or not kids with cancer have higher levels than healthy kids.

LEKA: It's called the tooth fairy project, and to say it's controversial would be an understatement. His latest study completed in November of 2004, was based on 52 baby teeth from New Jersey. It found higher levels of strontium 90 in children's teeth with cancer who lived in counties closest to nuclear plants. But 52 baby teeth is not an adequate sample size according to medical scientists. Mangano is collecting more teeth for further studies.

JOSHUA LIPSMAN, WESTCHESTER CO. HEALTH COMM: The problem with the study is that it's junk science, that they are jumping to conclusions, the way they measure things, they don't tell us how they're doing it. It's not scientifically valid.

LEKA: Mangano study stems from the original one done back in 1959 by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, using a sample size of 85,000 baby teeth. The researchers determined that from 1945 to 1965, strontium 90 levels had risen 50 fold, a finding used in the successful push for a nuclear test ban. The nuclear industry flatly denounces Mangano's findings, saying there is no evidence linking higher levels of strontium 90 and nuclear power plants.

ANGIE HOWARD, NUCLEAR ENERGY INSTITUTE: The way that this program has gone forward, they cherry pick data, they use extraordinarily small samples, and there's no statistical evidence to prove that.

LEKA: Howard also points to numerous studies including a National Cancer Institute study from the 1990s, which found no general increased risk of death from cancer for people living near nuclear reactors. Mangano's previous work has been published in just a handful of peer reviewed journals including "Archives of Environmental Health." Mangano was asked to deliver his project new findings before an already skeptical New Jersey radiation protection commission hearing last month. For now, Mangano waits for the commission's recommendations and hopes that will translate into more state funding for his research. Claire Leka, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL: We've all heard of hanging 10. But how about hanging more than 400? These surfers catch a wave at the same time. How and why when we return.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KOPPEL: There is a new world record in the surf down under. More than 40 people rode a giant surfboard yesterday off the Australian beach. The previous record was set by an English team of 14 surfers. The giant board in Australia was 40 feet long and 10 feet wide. More than 20 people had to carry it in the water. Looks like fun.

And let's find out what's coming up at the bottom of the hour on a live edition of RELIABLE SOURCES. Howard Kurtz is in Washington with a preview. Hi, Howard.

HOWARD KURTZ, CNN ANCHOR, RELIABLE SOURCES: Hi, Andrea. Thanks very much. Coming up, the media go haywire over Martha Stewart's release. She's serving cappuccino. She's petting her horses. How did going to jail become a good career move anyway?

And the Michael Jackson trial. Do journalists have the stomach to report all the graphic allegations?

Plus, veteran CBS correspondent Tom Fenton on why his old network doesn't cover the world the way it used to. And Dan Rather's late night comments on his biggest scandal. That's all ahead on RELIABLE SOURCES.

KOPPEL: Wednesday's his last day. Thanks, Howard, look forward to it.

And for more on what's happening in weather across the country, Jacqui Jeras joins us from the weather center and I guess for once there isn't a lot of big weather, Jacqui.

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: I know. We've been searching for the weather stories today. They're out there. They're kind of minor but they're out there today, Andrea. We've got some wet weather to talk about across the Lone Star state. It's been heaviest between Corpus Christi and Houston. We've seen just in the past hour about a half of an inch to an inch in some of these stronger areas of showers and some thunderstorms.

We are going to be seeing some lightning with this and chance of rain all across the state of Texas throughout the day for today. We've got an upper level area of low pressure that's been sitting there and spinning in the southwest the last couple of days, and that's going to continue to bring wet weather from Phoenix over to Albuquerque, but the good news is that's finally going to pulling out and you'll watch for some dryer weather as you head into tomorrow.

Couple of other nuisance weather systems across the upper Midwest, great lakes and into the northeast. We've had these series of clipper type systems moving on through. We'll have a new one move through the northeast for today and that's eventually going to bring in some rain and snow mix likely into Boston and also into New York City later on for tonight. But temperature wise, not a ton to complain about. You're at about the average into the northeast, well above average, check out Minneapolis and Chicago, 57 degrees in the mile-high city coming in this afternoon with a high of 63. Andrea, back to you.

KOPPEL: OK. I think we're ready for spring. Thanks, Jacqui.

And here's a quick check of other stories making news across America. In Bedford, New York, all the comforts of home arrest. In a video provided by her company, Martha Stewart is shown inside her home on her 153-acre estate. Stewart tells reporters that it feels good to be home after five months in prison. She must still serve five months of her sentence at home, followed by two years of probation.

In Morrow, Ohio there was a candlelight vigil for a missing Florida girl. Jessica Marie Lunsford disappeared from her home near Tampa over a week ago. Her mother lives in Ohio. There is a reward out there still pending for $115,000 for information on her whereabouts.

And in Selma, Alabama, 40 years after a landmark civil voting rights march, veteran marchers and survivors returned to the Edmund Pettus bridge. The 1965 march was called bloody Sunday after troopers and sheriff's deputies attacked the crowd with clubs, driving them back across the bridge into Selma.

Granting a final wish for those who want to go out in style and we do mean style. CNN LIVE SUNDAY continues in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KOPPEL: We end today with a story about a craftsman who sees his mission as helping people go out in style. Jeff Koinange found him in Ghana and has his story.

JEFF KOINANGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: (voice-over): From across the street, it looks like a giant wooden toy store. Up close, though, it's clear this is no ordinary carpentry shop and owner Pa Joe is no ordinary carpenter. For the 59-year-old is a custom coffin designer and these are what he calls his masterpieces. From chickens to snakes to luxury cars and even this, a giant beer bottle, a bier in the shape of a beer. So who will be buried in a beer bottle?

PA JOE: Two or three different people. Maybe you are bar owner.

KOINANGE: A bar owner.

PA JOE: Resident owner or you like the beer.

KOINANGE: In Ghana, like many parts of Africa, religion plays a critical role in everyday life and those who don't worship in churches or mosques instead idolize inanimate objects, choosing to be buried in coffins signifying their past professions. Like this airplane made for a pilot, this piece of military hardware for a soldier and this running shoe for an athlete. Pa Joe boasts that he's the best design coffin carpenter in the land and he insists there's simply no design that he can't reproduce. His motto -- if you can dream it, he can make it. And no order is too eccentric or bizarre. Like this giant phone ordered by a local cell phone employee. And it says there you can check your voice mail.

PA JOE: You can check it.

KOINANGE: Tourists flock to Pa Joe's.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is fascinating. I've never -- I've been to so many countries before but I've never seen anything similar to this. It's very beautiful, very colorful.

KOINANGE: The average completion time, depending of course on detail and complexity, anywhere from three to six weeks. And they're not cheap, either. Prices can set one back anywhere from $800 to $2,000, a year's wages for most here. Pa Joe says many Ghanians are dead serious about their mode of departure into the afterlife and some foreigners can see why.

GABRIELLE, ITALIAN TOURIST: I would like to be buried inside one of these.

KOINANGE: And while some would consider scenes like this a mockery of religion, Pa Joe sees it differently. He is, you might say, granting a final wish while at the same time continuing a tradition that dates back centuries. And just as he too was trained by a generation of carpenters, Pa Joe spends much of his time these days training the next group of aspiring custom coffin makers. It just seems such a shame that these carefully crafted caskets will last much longer aboveground than they will below. Jeff Koinange, CNN, Accra, Ghana.

(END VIDEOTAPE) KOPPEL: I guess mine would be a microphone or a TV -- it's kind of creepy. That it is for CNN LIVE SUNDAY. Up next, we've got a live RELIABLE SOURCES with Howard Kurtz. But first, a quick check of what's

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 March 6, 2005 - 11:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN ANCHOR: It is 11:00 in Washington and 5:00 in Rome, Italy. I'm Andrea Koppel at CNN's global headquarters. Ahead this hour, surfers coast into the record books. Just how many people did it take to break a world record? And...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NICK THIERIAULT, U.S. MARINE CORPS: You can either sit in your room and cry about it for the rest of your life or you can put a leg on look just like everybody else and go out there and live just like everybody else.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOPPEL: A positive outlook on life. These soldiers learn to walk and even run with their new legs.

Plus, from cars to beer bottles, one man makes life-size models of our favorite things, but their purpose might surprise you. First, top headlines now in the news.

As suspected BTK serial killer Dennis Rader prepares for his upcoming preliminary hearing, an article in "Time" magazine by reporter Jeff Chu sheds more light on Rader and his actions while police were trying to solve the case. Chu spoke earlier with CNN's Tony Harris.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEFF CHU, "TIME" MAGAZINE: The crimes extend from 1974 until 1991. So during that time, he was taking his kids camping and fishing, he was active at church. He was spending a lot of time, you know, being a normal family man.

TONY HARRIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, has his family spoken to him or seen him?

CHU: His lawyers tell us that he has not spoken to his family and they have not spoken to him, but he asks after them all the time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOPPEL: Rader is charged with 10 counts of first degree murder.

In the Middle East, tensions are still high over the issue of Syrian troops in Lebanon. Tomorrow Syrian President Bashar al Assad plans to meet with Lebanon's president to discuss a two-phased withdrawal plan. It involves moving all Syrian troops in Lebanon to the Bekaa Valley, then pulling them across the border into Syria.

First up today, an Italian journalist describes a rain of fire and bullets hitting her car as it raced toward the Baghdad airport. Giuliana Sgrena is recovering from wounds suffered after being freed by Iraqi insurgents, only to be fired on by American troops. With the very latest on Sgrena's story, CNN Rome bureau chief Alessio Vinci is live now from Rome. So she wrote an article I guess while she was still in the hospital, Alessio.

ALESSIO VINCI, CNN ROME BUREAU CHIEF: Absolutely. Probably she dictated it to somebody, since she is still recovering from the wound to her left shoulder, Andrea. And let me show you the newspaper "Il Manifesto," for which she writes with her own account of what has happened on Friday in Baghdad. Her account titled "La Mia Verita." That is in Italian, in English "My Truth." Of course, Giuliana Sgrena disputing several points of what the initial reconstruction of what has happened on Friday in Baghdad.

She first of all dispute the fact that as the Americans are saying, that the car was speeding towards the checkpoint and then did not stop, a repeated warning for slowing down. Giuliana Sgrena is writing that the car was actually driving slowly and she calls the shooting unjustified. She also says that she remembers as you said, a hail of bullets. And then she offers her own account of the last few words of the intelligence agent who had only moments before secured her release and negotiated her release.

His name was Nicola Calipari. And she writes, "the driver started yelling," the driver was another intelligence agent in the car with them. The driver started yelling that we were Italians, we were Italians, we are Italians, we are Italians. Nicola Calipari threw himself on me to protect me and immediately, she says, immediately, I repeat, I heard his last breath as he was dying on me. So this is the account of the last few words according to what Sgrena remembers happening under those hail of bullets.

Now, Nicola Calipari was an experienced agent in Baghdad. His casket returned last night at Rome's Ciampino Airport, which was there. There at the airport the Italian president Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, as well as Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi. His body now is laying in state at the tomb of the unknown soldier in downtown Rome, where thousands of people today went there to pay their last respects. And finally, Andrea, the autopsy today reveals that Calipari was killed by a single shot wound to his head. Andrea?

KOPPEL: Obviously, a very tragic and traumatic experience for Sgrena. But Alessio, do we have any idea whether or not the Italian government notified the U.S. military that Sgrena and her convoy was going to be heading towards the airport on that road?

VINCI: Well, Sgrena writes that Calipari just moments before dying was on the phone and she writes she was on the phone with both the Italian embassy as well as the government. There is no mention whether or not he was talking to some Americans. However, there is an account citing intelligence sources in a different newspaper here in Rome today suggesting that Calipari made one of those calls in English saying we're almost there. We're going to be there in five minutes. So at least according to what this account reveals, that the Italians must have at least alerted somebody in the American military system in Baghdad. There is also another element here, and that is that the Italians are saying that for the Italian intelligence officers to come to Baghdad, to arrive at the airport, to carry weapons in Baghdad, they must have clearance, if you want, from the U.S. military, who distributes badges, who distributes the authority to actually give, just (UNINTELLIGIBLE) carry weapons in Baghdad, and that is why the Italians believe that somewhere the Americans had been warned. Andrea?

KOPPEL: Alessio, we all remember the video of Sgrena, the tearful video in which she was pleading for her life. Did she talk at all in her article about what it was like for her during the month that she was held by insurgents?

VINCI: Yes, briefly, she tells -- she writes, basically, how the captors used her family, if you want, in coercing her to record that video. She says, you know, you must ask help to your husband. And she gives also some rare insights about her moments with the captors. She says they treated her well, even inviting her once to watch television while she was there in captivity, watching television while television was actually playing a story on her captivity. And she also recalls how there was a woman among the kidnappers that was taking care of her. So bits and moments here about her life while, during those 30 days in Baghdad kidnapped by those Iraqi insurgents. Andrea?

KOPPEL: Alessio, thanks. Alessio Vinci for us in Rome.

Iraq's 275-seat national assembly will hold its first meeting March 16th and will begin forming a transitional government. That date is especially significant because it marks the anniversary of Saddam Hussein's 1988 poison gas attack on the Kurds in a town in northern Iraq. CNN's senior international correspondent Nic Robertson joins us live from Baghdad. So Nic, any idea yet who the prime minister, who the president and the other members of the Iraqi government will be?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Andrea, that is still not clear. And it's quite possible, we're being advised here by politicians involved in that process of trying to negotiate the president and prime minister positions, that even when the assembly sits, those decisions won't actually have been made. What seems to be happening here and what the political parties are saying is that now it's been a month since the election results were announced, a month and a half since the elections took place. They want to keep the political, the democratic process going. They want to show the Iraqi people that politics here is working. And even though they're still negotiating, sort of horse trading over these top political jobs, that they want the assembly to sit. They want to show the people that the political process is working. So the trading for those positions is still going on and by no means is it over indeed. It's only really, we're told, in the last few days, that it's actually begun to get down to any kind of detailed bartering, Andrea.

KOPPEL: Nic Robertson in Baghdad. Thank you.

For U.S. troops, courage is not limited to the battlefield. Those severely wounded deal with a whole new set of challenges as they face life without a limb. Many of them are on a remarkably fast track to recovery, and they shared their story with CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Call it running 101, a class for those who've lost a leg. Many soldiers and Marines like 22-year-old Jeff Sanders, injured six months ago by a roadside bomb near Baghdad.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You the man, baby! Yeah.

KOCH: He's had a new prosthetic leg for just a week and never expected to learn how to run this soon.

JEFF SANDERS, U.S. MARINE CORPS: It felt good. I mean, it's so hard to deal with all the losses of things you take for granted. And to get one of those things back. And it's not like it's one of those little things. It's about as big as it gets.

KOCH: 22-year-old Nick Thieriault decided to join the class at Adventist rehabilitation hospital in Rockville, Maryland. He's a Marine, too, and have served in Afghanistan until a roadside bomb blew apart his left foot. Nick wants advice on improving the use of this leg designed especially for running.

NICK THIERIAULT, U.S. MARINE CORPS: It pulls, and it pushes me back and it sends one hip forward and it's a lot of muscle control.

KOCH: This program is not just about instructing, but motivating amputees, many whose losses were very recent.

DR. TERRENCE SHEEHAN, ADVENTIST REHAB HOSP. OF MD: Often they come in demoralized, feeling that this loss is so devastating that they will not achieve.

DENNIS OEHLER, INSTRUCTOR, PARALYMPIAN RUNNER: This isn't no pain no gain. Pain is not good.

KOCH: Seeing others succeed, say those teaching and supporting them, can make all the difference.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, if he can do it, I can do it.

OEHLER: Especially for amputees that have come that just lost their leg, they get to see what the future is, you know. They get to see the possibilities.

KOCH: Nick, who went turkey hunting on crutches just months after his injury, is motivated. He says the other key to moving ahead is acceptance. THIERIAULT: It's what you got. I mean, you don't have a choice. You can either, you know, sit in your room and cry about it for the rest of your life or you can put a leg on and look just like everybody else and go out there and live just like everybody else.

KOCH: Kathleen Koch, CNN, Rockville, Maryland.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL: Coming up, babies' teeth as possible Geiger counters? A controversial study up next.

And would you like your final resting place to be a giant fish, a lion? How about a luxury car or a beer bottle?

And surf's up. A record-breaking day on the waves off Australia.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KOPPEL: A new medical study involving children and their baby teeth is stirring controversy. The study focused on young cancer patients who live near nuclear plants. But its findings are prompting outrage from some health experts and the nuclear industry. The story from CNN's Claire Leka.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CLAIRE LEKA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Scientist Joe Mangano heads up the radiation and public health project and he has been painstakingly collecting baby teeth for seven years. He uses them like little Geiger counters.

JOE MANGANO, RADIATION & PUBLIC HEALTH PROJECT: What our baby tooth study is doing is collecting teeth from children with cancer and testing them for a particular chemical, strontium 90, only found in nuclear weapons and nuclear reactors, and seeing whether or not kids with cancer have higher levels than healthy kids.

LEKA: It's called the tooth fairy project, and to say it's controversial would be an understatement. His latest study completed in November of 2004, was based on 52 baby teeth from New Jersey. It found higher levels of strontium 90 in children's teeth with cancer who lived in counties closest to nuclear plants. But 52 baby teeth is not an adequate sample size according to medical scientists. Mangano is collecting more teeth for further studies.

JOSHUA LIPSMAN, WESTCHESTER CO. HEALTH COMM: The problem with the study is that it's junk science, that they are jumping to conclusions, the way they measure things, they don't tell us how they're doing it. It's not scientifically valid.

LEKA: Mangano study stems from the original one done back in 1959 by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, using a sample size of 85,000 baby teeth. The researchers determined that from 1945 to 1965, strontium 90 levels had risen 50 fold, a finding used in the successful push for a nuclear test ban. The nuclear industry flatly denounces Mangano's findings, saying there is no evidence linking higher levels of strontium 90 and nuclear power plants.

ANGIE HOWARD, NUCLEAR ENERGY INSTITUTE: The way that this program has gone forward, they cherry pick data, they use extraordinarily small samples, and there's no statistical evidence to prove that.

LEKA: Howard also points to numerous studies including a National Cancer Institute study from the 1990s, which found no general increased risk of death from cancer for people living near nuclear reactors. Mangano's previous work has been published in just a handful of peer reviewed journals including "Archives of Environmental Health." Mangano was asked to deliver his project new findings before an already skeptical New Jersey radiation protection commission hearing last month. For now, Mangano waits for the commission's recommendations and hopes that will translate into more state funding for his research. Claire Leka, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL: We've all heard of hanging 10. But how about hanging more than 400? These surfers catch a wave at the same time. How and why when we return.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KOPPEL: There is a new world record in the surf down under. More than 40 people rode a giant surfboard yesterday off the Australian beach. The previous record was set by an English team of 14 surfers. The giant board in Australia was 40 feet long and 10 feet wide. More than 20 people had to carry it in the water. Looks like fun.

And let's find out what's coming up at the bottom of the hour on a live edition of RELIABLE SOURCES. Howard Kurtz is in Washington with a preview. Hi, Howard.

HOWARD KURTZ, CNN ANCHOR, RELIABLE SOURCES: Hi, Andrea. Thanks very much. Coming up, the media go haywire over Martha Stewart's release. She's serving cappuccino. She's petting her horses. How did going to jail become a good career move anyway?

And the Michael Jackson trial. Do journalists have the stomach to report all the graphic allegations?

Plus, veteran CBS correspondent Tom Fenton on why his old network doesn't cover the world the way it used to. And Dan Rather's late night comments on his biggest scandal. That's all ahead on RELIABLE SOURCES.

KOPPEL: Wednesday's his last day. Thanks, Howard, look forward to it.

And for more on what's happening in weather across the country, Jacqui Jeras joins us from the weather center and I guess for once there isn't a lot of big weather, Jacqui.

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: I know. We've been searching for the weather stories today. They're out there. They're kind of minor but they're out there today, Andrea. We've got some wet weather to talk about across the Lone Star state. It's been heaviest between Corpus Christi and Houston. We've seen just in the past hour about a half of an inch to an inch in some of these stronger areas of showers and some thunderstorms.

We are going to be seeing some lightning with this and chance of rain all across the state of Texas throughout the day for today. We've got an upper level area of low pressure that's been sitting there and spinning in the southwest the last couple of days, and that's going to continue to bring wet weather from Phoenix over to Albuquerque, but the good news is that's finally going to pulling out and you'll watch for some dryer weather as you head into tomorrow.

Couple of other nuisance weather systems across the upper Midwest, great lakes and into the northeast. We've had these series of clipper type systems moving on through. We'll have a new one move through the northeast for today and that's eventually going to bring in some rain and snow mix likely into Boston and also into New York City later on for tonight. But temperature wise, not a ton to complain about. You're at about the average into the northeast, well above average, check out Minneapolis and Chicago, 57 degrees in the mile-high city coming in this afternoon with a high of 63. Andrea, back to you.

KOPPEL: OK. I think we're ready for spring. Thanks, Jacqui.

And here's a quick check of other stories making news across America. In Bedford, New York, all the comforts of home arrest. In a video provided by her company, Martha Stewart is shown inside her home on her 153-acre estate. Stewart tells reporters that it feels good to be home after five months in prison. She must still serve five months of her sentence at home, followed by two years of probation.

In Morrow, Ohio there was a candlelight vigil for a missing Florida girl. Jessica Marie Lunsford disappeared from her home near Tampa over a week ago. Her mother lives in Ohio. There is a reward out there still pending for $115,000 for information on her whereabouts.

And in Selma, Alabama, 40 years after a landmark civil voting rights march, veteran marchers and survivors returned to the Edmund Pettus bridge. The 1965 march was called bloody Sunday after troopers and sheriff's deputies attacked the crowd with clubs, driving them back across the bridge into Selma.

Granting a final wish for those who want to go out in style and we do mean style. CNN LIVE SUNDAY continues in a moment.

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KOPPEL: We end today with a story about a craftsman who sees his mission as helping people go out in style. Jeff Koinange found him in Ghana and has his story.

JEFF KOINANGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: (voice-over): From across the street, it looks like a giant wooden toy store. Up close, though, it's clear this is no ordinary carpentry shop and owner Pa Joe is no ordinary carpenter. For the 59-year-old is a custom coffin designer and these are what he calls his masterpieces. From chickens to snakes to luxury cars and even this, a giant beer bottle, a bier in the shape of a beer. So who will be buried in a beer bottle?

PA JOE: Two or three different people. Maybe you are bar owner.

KOINANGE: A bar owner.

PA JOE: Resident owner or you like the beer.

KOINANGE: In Ghana, like many parts of Africa, religion plays a critical role in everyday life and those who don't worship in churches or mosques instead idolize inanimate objects, choosing to be buried in coffins signifying their past professions. Like this airplane made for a pilot, this piece of military hardware for a soldier and this running shoe for an athlete. Pa Joe boasts that he's the best design coffin carpenter in the land and he insists there's simply no design that he can't reproduce. His motto -- if you can dream it, he can make it. And no order is too eccentric or bizarre. Like this giant phone ordered by a local cell phone employee. And it says there you can check your voice mail.

PA JOE: You can check it.

KOINANGE: Tourists flock to Pa Joe's.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is fascinating. I've never -- I've been to so many countries before but I've never seen anything similar to this. It's very beautiful, very colorful.

KOINANGE: The average completion time, depending of course on detail and complexity, anywhere from three to six weeks. And they're not cheap, either. Prices can set one back anywhere from $800 to $2,000, a year's wages for most here. Pa Joe says many Ghanians are dead serious about their mode of departure into the afterlife and some foreigners can see why.

GABRIELLE, ITALIAN TOURIST: I would like to be buried inside one of these.

KOINANGE: And while some would consider scenes like this a mockery of religion, Pa Joe sees it differently. He is, you might say, granting a final wish while at the same time continuing a tradition that dates back centuries. And just as he too was trained by a generation of carpenters, Pa Joe spends much of his time these days training the next group of aspiring custom coffin makers. It just seems such a shame that these carefully crafted caskets will last much longer aboveground than they will below. Jeff Koinange, CNN, Accra, Ghana.

(END VIDEOTAPE) KOPPEL: I guess mine would be a microphone or a TV -- it's kind of creepy. That it is for CNN LIVE SUNDAY. Up next, we've got a live RELIABLE SOURCES with Howard Kurtz. But first, a quick check of what's

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