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American Morning

Bush's Poll Numbers Down; Hussein's Prison Guards Speak Out

Aired June 21, 2005 - 09:30   ET

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

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back, everybody. It's just about half past the hour on this AMERICAN MORNING. Coming up, we're going to talk to two of the U.S. soldiers who may know Saddam Hussein better than any other Americans. They stood guard over him in prison.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: And they found out all kinds of interesting details, from Saddam's favorite snacks...

S. O'BRIEN: Doritos.

M. O'BRIEN: Doritos and formerly Cheetos, to his favorite U.S. president.

S. O'BRIEN: Reagan, right?

M. O'BRIEN: Reagan, yes, because Reagan gave him some weapons, you know.

S. O'BRIEN: Not so high on the Bushes, apparently.

M. O'BRIEN: No. We don't get that. Would be understandable/

S. O'BRIEN: For all kinds of reasons, one could imagine.

M. O'BRIEN: For some reason. Clinton, OK, he says. Well, anyway, we'll find out if they sort of discovered a strange friendship. I don't know if that's the right term, but there was a bond there. You know, they call it the Stockholm syndrome? You know, when captors and captives get together. I don't know.

S. O'BRIEN: But that's a whole different...

M. O'BRIEN: That's a whole different kind of thing, you're right. That is a little different. But there's something there, right?

S. O'BRIEN: And it's bizarre. I mean, what insight into the dictator. It's sort of an...

M. O'BRIEN: Well, when Saddam Hussein says to you, nice to meet you, what do you say back?

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Well, I know what I'd like to say back.

M. O'BRIEN: See?

S. O'BRIEN: It's a family show, Carol.

COSTELLO: I'm sorry.

S. O'BRIEN: Even though I feel the same way.

COSTELLO: I was just amazed at how young those two guys were, the two guards. They looked young.

M. O'BRIEN: And to have that responsibility.

COSTELLO: Yes.

S. O'BRIEN: All right.

M. O'BRIEN: Seriously.

COSTELLO: That was a good interview. I look forward to that again. Good morning, everyone.

Now in the news, this just in to CNN, a major highway in Arizona now partially closed because of a fire raging there. These are new pictures just into us. Take a look at that. The highway links the northern and southern part of the state. The fire has now scorched 1,200 acres. We'll keep you posted.

Investigators in Detroit are looking into what may have sparked a massive five-alarm blaze. Some 150 fire-fighters battled the flames throughout the night. The fire apparently under control, but it is still smoldering. Most of the four-story warehouse has been destroyed. At least two fire-fighters have been treated for minor injuries.

President Bush is meeting with the Vietnam's prime minister this hour. The prime minister arrived at the White House just a short time ago amid protests. It is the first visit by a top Vietnamese leader in more than three decades.

In the meantime, the White House is lashing out at some Senate Democrats, accusing them of playing politics by delaying an up or down vote on John Bolton's nomination to the United Nations.

And the jury in the trial of former Ku Klux Klan member Edgar Ray Killen's will try again to reach a verdict today. Deliberations getting underway in Philadelphia, Mississippi. The jury announced Monday they were divided 6-6. Killen, who is now 80 years old, is accused of killing three civil rights workers. The story was the inspiration for the 1988 film "Mississippi Burning." The three were killed exactly 41 years ago today.

And a final resting place for Terri Schiavo. Michael Schiavo buried the ashes of his late wife in a Florida cemetery on Monday, beneath a bronze grave marker that reads, quote, "I kept my promise.." It lists February 25, 1990 as the day of death. That's when Schiavo suffered brain damage. Schiavo's parents were not in attendance.

And remember, you can view CNN reports online. Just visit CNN.com and click onto watch. You can check out free video from our most popular stories. And it's a pretty cool feature. So please, try it out.

M. O'BRIEN: Well, it's a big screen. Did you notice that? It's not that teeny little boxes.

COSTELLO: Oh, no, Miles. It's the best.

M. O'BRIEN: It's nice.

COSTELLO: Yes.

S. O'BRIEN: Thanks, Carol.

COSTELLO: Sure.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, five months into President Bush's second term, more than half of Americans disapprove of the way that he's handling the presidency. That's according to a new CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll.

Additionally, a growing number of people are dissatisfied with the war on terror. Only 10 percent of the poll responded that they were very satisfied with the way things were going. That's falling from 19 percent back in February.

For a little presidential perspective, let's get right to presidential historian Allan Lichtman. Nice to see you, Allan. Thanks for talking with us.

When you look at the actual numbers, 47 percent is the approval rate that we're talking about. How concerned do you think the White House and the president himself should be with that number?

ALLAN LICHTMAN, PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: They should be very concerned. Those are danger zone numbers for an incumbent president, even a second-term president. They are historically very low numbers. And it reflects dwindling political capital. Remember, he talked about having all of this political capital.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, he said, when he -- actually, at the second election, he said it shows that I've got political capital and now I'm going to use it. Are you saying he never had it? It's -- he's losing it? What do you mean?

LICHTMAN: Number one, in the flush of victory, he overstated his political capital. His margin of victory was the lowest for any winning incumbent president in modern history. His party piled up some big gains in the Senate, but that came almost entirely from the South, reflecting the red state/blue state alignment, not the alignment of the country.

Now that political capital, overstated to begin with, has dwindled with problems on Social Security, problems in the war on Iraq, problems with nominations and now, as you poll shows, his rock of Gibraltar -- his standing on the war on terrorism -- has even begun to crack a little bit.

S. O'BRIEN: We certainly have seemed to have heard -- I guess would be the way I'd put it -- a change in tone, a little pushback. Not only from the Democrats, actually, but also some powerful and important Republicans, as well, where they are vocally contradicting the president's position on important issues.

LICHTMAN: Yes. Here's what's going on, Soledad. Congress is like Wall Street. It operates on fear and greed. And right now, with the president's approval rating in depressed territory, the Democrats don't fear him anymore. Instead, they've gotten greedy. They think they can beat him. And just yesterday, of course, they blocked, once again, as we saw, the nomination of John Bolton.

On the other hand, Republicans in Congress are getting fearful. Instead of trying to maintain the administration's ship, they're jumping ship. They're saving themselves because a lot of them, all the members of the House and a third of the Senate, are facing re- election in 2006.

S. O'BRIEN: When you take look at presidents who have had a second term -- if we can show that graphic there -- you see Bush at 47 percent, Clinton 55 percent, Reagan 58 percent, Nixon 44 percent, Johnson 65 percent, Eisenhower 63 percent. The lowest ratings, Nixon and then Bush.

LICHTMAN: Yes, Bush is almost in this Nixonian territory. And Nixon in '73 was already being entoiled in the Watergate scandal. And the problem for the president is that it's almost impossible to make a comeback in domestic policy. If you're going to strike, you got to strike early. That's going to get caught up in election politics.

Where you can make a comeback is in foreign policy. We saw that with Ronald Reagan with his breakthroughs in the Soviet Union. Franklin Roosevelt, who had a difficult second term, became the indispensable man after the outbreak of World War II in Europe.

S. O'BRIEN: Allan, before I let you go, two quick thoughts here. One is, you sort of are highlighting there, the numbers can change very quickly, depending on what happens overseas, obviously. And the president really is considered very strong in some areas. I mean, that's -- to some degree, those numbers reflect the fact that he's tackling the tough issues that other people historically have stayed away from because they're the tough issues.

LICHTMAN: That's right. This president is the hedgehog president. He moves ahead, regardless of distractions. And you got to give him a lot of credit for taking on the big issues, for dreaming big. And I got to tell you, Soledad, the graveyards in this town, as you know, are littered with the bodies of those who have underestimated George W. Bush.

S. O'BRIEN: Allan Lichtman, presidential historian, joining us his morning. Allan, nice to see you, as always.

LICHTMAN: Same here. S. O'BRIEN: Thanks -- Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: Suddenly, we know a whole lot more about Saddam Hussein. For instance, he loves Doritos, hates Froot Loops, and he's a clean freak who has to wash after he shakes hands. Saddam grows flowers and date palms, writes poetry on yellow legal pads and smokes Cuban cigars sent by his daughter. The man who insists he still -- president of Iraq -- admired Ronald Reagan, thinks President Clinton was OK. Says both President Bushes are no good. He also says he doesn't hold any hard feelings and would like to make friends with the current President Bush.

These are just a few of the details told to "G.Q." magazine by the people who have spent the most time with Saddam since his capture, his prison guards. Specialist Sean O'Shea and Corporal Jonathan Paco Reese spent nine months with the once-feared dictator and developed a personal relationship with him. Lisa DePaulo wrote their story for "G.Q." Earlier I asked the guards about moment they first saw Saddam.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SPEC. SEAN O'SHEA, GUARDED SADDAM HUSSEIN: When we met him, he just stepped right out of his cell and shook my hand, said nice to meet you. But like everything I've ever known about him, I never would have expected that.

M. O'BRIEN: So Saddam Hussein was actually a polite person. And when he says nice to meet you, of course what we would reflexively say would be nice to meet you. But is it nice to meet him?

CPL. JONATHAN REESE, GUARDED SADDAM HUSSEIN: Definitely not. When you first meet him, he comes off as a good guy, and in the back of your mind you're thinking that he's a total dictator, so...

M. O'BRIEN: So did you have a hard time squaring that? What you read and knew, all the atrocities, the genocide, all the things that he's done over the years, and then here's this guy who called you -- he said you were like sons to him.

O'SHEA: At first, it was difficult because, like I said, he was the reason why we were over there, and it was just hard to grasp like -- it's hard to want to be nice to him. But after a while of just getting used to each other and spending every day with him, and you know, we had a job to do, so we just pretty much did our job.

M. O'BRIEN: So you'd be nice to him, but that's sort of part of your job, I guess, to do that, right? I mean, if you're going to do your job, you want to maintain some kind of working relationship.

REESE: Yes, we're nice to him. He's nice to us. Everybody's good.

M. O'BRIEN: Was he moody? was he consistently nice to you? Did he get angry at any time or become sullen?

O'SHEA: He would always say hello every day. There would be days where he'd just say hello, and then that was it for the whole day. There were times where he'd talk all day long, and it was hard to get him to be quiet. So he had his good and bad days.

M. O'BRIEN: Let's talk a little bit about the day in the life of Saddam Hussein. We actually -- I think it was in your journal, that they sort of ticked off the day. He gets up in the morning. Let's go through it, if we could. We got a full screen, which kind of lays out that full day for him. All right, he wakes up, 0700, military term, right? Wake up -- that's 7:00 in the morning for civilians, right? Then 7:30 breakfast. Then after that, we go into little medical visit. He has some ailments with high-blood pressure and so forth, right?

O'SHEA: yes. Just the medics check him out every day, just in case something did -- were to happen.

REESE: Happened over the night or something.

M. O'BRIEN: Yes.

All right, then lunch is next. What's the typical lunch for Saddam Hussein?

O'SHEA: He pretty much -- he got whatever we got, but double portions. So he was he eating pretty well.

M. O'BRIEN: After lunch, he had some recreation time.

O'SHEA: Right.

M. O'BRIEN: And what kind of recreation typically would he do?

O'SHEA: He was just walk back and forth. He had a rec area where there was room for him to walk and exercise. He would sit, and he would pray, or write or smoke.

M. O'BRIEN: And on the day goes, 10:00 lights out.

Some people would look at that say, and that's pretty good treatment. That's not a bad day. In a sense, is he getting too light a time in prison?

O'SHEA: You take it.

M. O'BRIEN: Go ahead, Paco. You try that one.

REESE: Too light of a time? Let's see here. I don't know how to answer that question.

M. O'BRIEN: I mean, do you think it's appropriate given all the allegations?

O'SHEA: I think it's a really sensitive situation. So too light, I don't know. But if we were any heavier, maybe it would be worse. M. O'BRIEN: Now, Lisa, the way you hooked up on this story is you share a hometown, Scranton, and the word was kind of filtering around Scranton that these guys had some interesting duty over there. What was it like telling this story?

LISA DEPAULO, CORRESPONDENT, "GQ" MAGAZINE: It was fabulous. The insight they had into Saddam Hussein, I mean it was just amazing. We can never learn enough about someone like him. And I just thought it was great that these young men were able to connect with him and learn about him in a way that, you know, world leaders haven't.

M. O'BRIEN: I mean, on the one hand, you're kind of repulsed by Saddam Hussein, and yet by the same token, you become very curious about him, don't you?

REESE: I definitely became curious. It was tempting to ask him questions about him as a dictator and maybe some small personal things the world doesn't know about. But you know, you've just got to hold your composure and remember you have a job to do. We weren't supposed to talk to him at all, initiate conversation with him.

M. O'BRIEN: Don't take this the wrong way, but did you end up liking him?

O'SHEA: I wouldn't say liking Saddam Hussein, liking the person -- getting along with the person that he was in prison. We got along with him in prison. But that's as far as it went.

REESE: Yes.

DEPAULO: Sean said something great to me early on, which was he has to be charismatic and charming to have manipulated millions of people.

M. O'BRIEN: He's a manipulative person. And you must have felt at times you were being manipulated.

REESE: Oh, definitely, yes.

O'SHEA: You always had that on your mind. It was always a thought.

M. O'BRIEN: All right, gentlemen, thank you very much.

(CROSSTALK)

M. O'BRIEN: Appreciate it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN: Interesting guys. Interesting story, and you can read it all in its entirety in this month's issue of "GQ." It's on newsstands now. It's a great read. It's compelling all the way.

The Maytag man could be getting a new boss. Andy Serwer will explain in just a few moments, "Minding Your Business." S. O'BRIEN: Also, how to keep your kids from getting burned out on sports. Our special series "Surviving the Game" is coming up next on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: All right, this might surprise you, if you have kids. Three out of four kids drop out of organized sports by the age of 12. That's according to sports researchers. Why? Continuing our special series on AMERICAN MORNING, surviving the game, Kelly Wallace is here with me.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Miles.

There a lot of reasons for kids experiencing burnout. One of the reason, and we talked about this, kids are just doing too much; they are doing so much. So it's a big concern for a lot of families, like the Welences of Ridgewood, New Jersey. And they are keeping busy, while at the same time, keeping an eye out for burnout.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE (voice over): Consider a typical weekend for the Welences, 9-year-old Riley, 12-year-old Tyler, and their parents, Craig and Sarah.

CRAIG WELENCE, FATHER OF STUDENT ATHLETES: On Saturday, 9:00 a.m., Riley had an in-town rec baseball game. Tyler had a 10:00 a.m. lacrosse game in town.

WALLACE: Tyler then had a 2:30 baseball game with a recreation league, and both kids had games with their travel baseball teams at 6:00.

(on camera): I'm exhausted.

WELENCE: Now we're to Sunday.

WALLACE (voice over): Craig did the math for us. The family attended -- get this -- 118 games in the last year alone just for Tyler. And that doesn't include practices.

Last fall, when Tyler was playing on four different sports teams, Craig and Sarah said they saw signs of burnout, especially with soccer.

WELENCE: I think some excuses were cropping up now and then about going to practice.

WALLACE: So, Craig and Sarah asked Tyler not to play soccer this fall. How did they decide if the kids are overdoing it?

SARAH WELENCE, MOTHER OF STUDENT ATHLETES: When it completely overtakes the family, then it would be too much.

WALLACE: There are reasons for parents to be concerned. Listen to the experts.

AUGIE MENDOZA, ASSOC. SPORTS DIR., YMCA: Stats show that by 11 years of age, most kids have burned out of these sports because of the win-at-all-cost mentality in some organizations and pressure of the parents.

WALLACE: Mendoza also says kids are starting organized sports at younger ages, sometimes as young as 3, and says the leagues, especially the traveling teams, are growing more competitive and more demanding.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Strike three!

TYLER WELENCE, 12-YEAR-OLD ATHLETE: Last year, that was the worst time. Every sport was trying to get, like, everybody started to get players to want to commit more, so they started having more practices.

WALLACE: Here in Ridgewood, New Jersey, concern about burnout and driving kids too hard led community leaders to designate one Tuesday evening every March for a night of no extracurricular activity -- no games, no practice.

S. WELENCE: It was kind of nice to have, you know, a night without all of that.

WALLACE (on camera): Do you ever get tired and say, whoa, enough is enough?

RILEY WELENCE, 9-YEAR-OLD ATHLETE: Well, not really, because it's fun going to all of the practices and games, because your friends are there.

WALLACE (voice over): Craig and Sarah say as long as the kids are enjoying themselves, they are not concerned about how much they are doing. In fact, the family even misses it.

S. WELENCE: You get to the end of the season, and there's this incredible letdown because you're just, like -- and then you're, like, well, what do we do? And it's happened every year. And it's because you're just -- you know, you go, go, go, go, go. And then as soon as it's over, you're just -- you're kind of like at a loss for what to do.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE: So in those moments where the kids say, what are we going to do now? Well, you can do something to prevent burnout. Number one, forget wins and losses when your kids are young. Don't even talk about them. Focus instead on a different definition of winning, such as improving their performance.

Also, encourage your kids to take some time off. Relax. Pick up another hobby. Do something else besides sports. And this one, yes, Miles, beware of parental peer pressure, because -- some parents make decisions about what their kids should do, how early they should start playing, not based on their own kids, but based on other friends, other kids.

M. O'BRIEN: Some vicarious thrills there, huh?

WALLACE: Yes.

M. O'BRIEN: But that can really come back to haunt you, can't it?

WALLACE: It can, because you know, kids are different. What might be good for one person might not be right for another. And then you're putting them in a situation where they're facing pressure to do as well as the other kids, maybe they're not ready.

M. O'BRIEN: All right. What about tomorrow?

WALLACE: Tomorrow we talk more about pressure, the pressure to be great. We talk about top athletes, the pressures they face, but also, the pressures on parents. They want them to do well, they don't want to overdo it, either.

M. O'BRIEN: Kelly Wallace, we'll see you tomorrow.

WALLACE: You got it.

M. O'BRIEN: Thanks -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, "CNN LIVE TODAY" is coming up next and Tony Harris is in. He's filling in for Daryn this morning. Hey, Tony. What are you working on?

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Soledad. Without the jacket this morning as we make note of our guy Miles' big move to New York and sitting alongside you there every morning.

M. O'BRIEN: I put a jacket on.

HARRIS: I don't pull it off quite as well as you.

M. O'BRIEN: So wait a minute. What's -- I ought to take this thing off.

HARRIS: There you go. Well -- well, I win the bet. I win the bet, I guess. Wondering how long it would take. Good to see you, Miles. Good to see you, Soledad.

At the top of the hour, a must see for parents. Millions of kids surf the Internet. One in five will be solicited by an online predator. We'll tell you about a new effort to protect your children.

Plus, office germs. Ever wonder what is lurking on your computer keyboard, your telephone and in the break room? It's enough to make you sick. That and more, straight ahead on "CNN LIVE TODAY." Back to you, Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Tony, thanks a lot. It only took Miles two days. Two days in, he's stripping on the air. It's scary. Tony, thanks.

Still to come this morning, there is a bidding war for the services of the Maytag repairman. Andy will explain as he minds your business, just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Pro sports leagues are scrambling to hold their audiences. More fans would rather play video games than watch the real thing. With more on that, a check of Wall Street, too, Andy Serwer is "Minding Your Business." Good morning.

ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" COLUMNIST Good morning.

Let's talk about the markets first of all, Soledad, see what's going on down on Wall Street. There's the big board. We're down three points on the Dow. Looking for a little direction here this morning, because oil prices are lower. That's some good news there.

One stock moving to be upside is Maytag, the appliance giant. Remember we told you a couple weeks ago, a private firm here in New York City made a buyout offer for the company. Now it turns out two other companies have joined the bidding. A private firm here in New York, Blackstone (ph), as well as a Chinese appliance maker. That stock is up over six percent. So we could have a bidding war breaking out for Maytag here this morning.

I want to turn to this story about TV and video games. Tonight is game six in the NBA finals between the San Antonio Spurs and the Detroit Pistons. Here is game five, and it was a good one. Spurs won in overtime. Robert Horry scored a three pointer. But the ratings of these games, Soledad, has been down significantly, say from 2000.

And that's in part because video games have been so popular -- sales of video games, up 34 percent over the past five years. And that's a disturbing trend for NBA executives, as well as television executives. But what's even more disturbing is that advertising is going into the video games themselves. So not only are people not watching the game, but the advertising dollars are actually flowing in to the video games. What's going on is they're putting ads, actual ads, in to the games. So you might see...

S. O'BRIEN: Where the eyeballs are.

SERWER: That's right. And you might see a Coca-Cola banner along the side of the stadium or you might see a player reach down and tie their shoe and see the Nike swoosh right there. So interesting stuff to see. And David Stern and the other poobahs (ph) in the NBA -- it's something they're really paying attention to.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, I bet they sure are. Andy there, thank you very much.

SERWER: You're welcome.

S. O'BRIEN: And we are back in just a moment. Stay with us. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: We are out of time, so let's get right to Tony Harris. He's over at the CNN Center. He's going to take you through the next few hours. Tony, good morning to you.

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