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CNN Live At Daybreak

President Bush's Cabinet Members Face the Heat after the Hurricane; Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

Aired September 07, 2005 - 05:00   ET

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


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: It is Wednesday, September 7.
President Bush's cabinet members face the heat after the hurricane.

Fingers are pointing in the wake of Katrina and the name of the game is blame. Who is at fault?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When this thing happened, you got people shooting each other, stealing from each other. The only thing I trusted was my dog, so I'm not going to leave him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Oh no, he's not leaving his best friend behind, but a lot of other four-legged refugees aren't so lucky.

And reunited, a storm separation leads to a heart-warming reunion. (UNINTELLIGIBLE)

ANNOUNCER: From the Time Warner Center in New York, this is DAYBREAK with Carol Costello and Chad Myers.

COSTELLO: And good morning to you. We'll have more on the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in just a minute, but first, now in the news.

Iraq's president says Saddam Hussein is not just talking. He's confessing. Jalal Talabani says an investigating judge told him Saddam confessed to ordering the execution of thousands of Kurds in the late 1980's. Talabani calls it an important confession from the former dictator.

President Bush will speak at Chief Justice William Rehnquist's funeral service this afternoon. It's at Saint Matthew's Cathedral in Washington. It will be followed by a private burial at Arlington National Cemetery. Rehnquist's body now lies in repose at the Supreme Court.

Some tough questions are in store for the man President Bush has picked to replace Rehnquist. Senate confirmation hearings start Monday for Judge John Roberts. Democrats vow to take as long as they need to grill him.

Chad's in the Forecast Center watching another storm.

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes, Ophelia, Carol. We talked about it yesterday. It was probably going to be tropical depression 16, then it was. And now it is Tropical Storm Ophelia and the Hurricane Center has kind of done a 180 on this thing, really literally.

This thing does a loop in the Gulf Stream, which is a little bit of a concern when you sit -- a tropical storm over warm water for so very long. There it is right now. You can see the spin. You can see it was down here yesterday, kind of slid a little bit farther to the north this morning, but here's the story.

The story is the forecast track itself. Here's where we are today and tomorrow and look, it tried to make its way on shore. I even called my mom in Orlando, north of Orlando. I said it's probably going to be there by Friday afternoon. (UNINTELLIGIBLE) no, no, decided to make a right-hand turn. Now it's making a button loop, button (UNINTELLIGIBLE) here.

Looks like a play that maybe Jerry Rice would have played. And by Monday it's still sitting there. Right now 40 miles per hour, but by Monday that one in the middle means category one hurricane.

Here is the storm for Bermuda. This is Nate. There goes Rio (ph) off to the northeast and Nate is forecasted to be very close to Bermuda. Tropical storm watches only right now for Bermuda, but I suspect that they will upgrade those because that storm is forecast to be 80 knots, which is about 90 or so miles per hour and that will be obviously a hurricane when it gets very close to Bermuda.

Ninety today in St. Louis, 86 in Chicago, 82 in Atlanta. Weather in other cities, of course, even for tomorrow very pleasant all across the northeast.

Carol, back to you.

COSTELLO: So, when is hurricane season over?

MYERS: November 30 officially. The peak of hurricane is September 10. I am such a bearer of good news this morning, Carol.

COSTELLO: I know. I know, but you're trying. I know you can't help it. Thank you Chad.

MYERS: You're welcome.

COSTELLO: Mission critical. Here's the very latest on the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The Greyhound Bus Station in New Orleans has been turned into a makeshift jail. A scrawled cardboard sign on the front door reads "We are taking New Orleans back." The inmates include suspected rapists and dozens of suspected looters.

The floodwaters are turning into a toxic soup. Federal health officials say five people have died after getting infected by a water- born bacteria. Four of the deaths happened in Mississippi, one in Texas. In the meantime officials believe floodwaters in New Orleans are contaminated by E. coli.

Medical help is pouring in from across the nation. A Colorado ambulance company plans to send 30 ambulances to help evacuate survivors. The ambulances will be staffed with medical personnel.

They want to stay put. Authorities have delayed plans to take 4,000 Katrina evacuees from Houston's Astrodome to cruise ships off the Texas coast. Many of them say moving yet again would be too much too soon.

In New Orleans, broken levees have been patched up and floodwaters are slowly receding. Mayor Ray Nagin says 60 percent of the city though is still underwater, but that's a big improvement from last week.

Also, the mayor says residents must now leave the city. He's issued the evacuation order to police, the National Guard members, and the military. Nagin says people not involved in the cleanup need to go, whether they want to or not.

Joining me now is CNN Radio's Ed McCarthy. He's in New Orleans.

Ed, does the mayor have authority to do that?

VOICE OF ED MCCARTHY, CNN RADIO: Well he does and he's getting some help from the military. The military will be out in force today, telling people that they must leave. And also New Orleans police officers will be on the job and they'll be out telling people you better get out, becoming more and more dangerous as the days go on and especially with the health hazard.

COSTELLO: How will they force people to leave though? Will they forcibly now take them out of their homes and make them leave? I know they were saying that they were not going to offer any more fresh water, but that kind of has been rescinded now, hasn't it?

MCCARTHY: Yes, that is the threat. You know, they've been getting some supplies in. If they don't get the supplies, they want them out. So people have been simply working on the food that they have. I spoke with some evacuees at the airport here in New Orleans and one gentleman said he was evacuated.

He was taken out by helicopter, taken to the airport, and he was getting antibiotics. He said I just want my medical care and I'm going back. And I said why are you going back? The mayor doesn't want you to go back. He says it doesn't matter. He says we're going to go back.

People are just adamant about staying in their own homes, but this is just a terrible place right now and they're going to have to get out until they can get the health situation and everything else in order.

COSTELLO: Well again I ask the question, if it's a mandatory evacuation order now, will National Guard troops go into homes and forcibly take people out? MCCARTHY: Well that's what they're saying. They are promising and threatening to do that today. Today is the first day that they're really under these orders to get out and Mayor Nagin says that the evacuation orders will mean that the military will have the authority to do that. So they are planning to go in and take people out. I think they're going to try to at least convince them first, but if that doesn't happen, the last resort will be force to get them out. We'll just have to see how that plays out today, Carol.

COSTELLO: Yes we will. Ed McCarthy live in New Orleans this morning.

Schools in New Orleans may not again -- may not open again this year. The same goes for St. Bernard parish. The head of Louisiana school system says there was just too much damage. Nearly 200,000 children are affected by the closures. Other parishes may need up to three months to reopen their schools. Some of the displaced kids have already begun registering for schools in other cities.

The future of the Louisiana superdome is in question. A disaster official in the governor's office tells CNN that the damage was greater than expected and that the 30-year-old landmark might have to be torn down. But the stadium's operator says it's way too early for that kind of speculation.

Schools are closed. There's no running water, no power, very little in the way of city services and virtually no residents, so what do you think? Will New Orleans ever completely recover?

According to a CNN/"USA Today" Gallup poll, 56 percent of respondents don't believe it will. Forty-two percent say it will. Ask, should New Orleans be rebuilt? Sixty-three percent say yes. Thirty-four percent say no. House Speaker Dennis Hastert has reservations about rebuilding the crescent city. We told you about that.

In an interview with a suburban Chicago newspaper, he questioned whether it's wise to spend billions of dollars to rebuild a city under several feet of water. He said and I -- quote -- "Your heart goes out to the people but there are some real tough questions to ask. How do you go about rebuilding this city? What precautions do you take?"

And that brings us to our DAYBREAK e-mail question of the morning.

MYERS: And Carol, I tell you what, it's going to be a little bit of a heated one because you know, New Orleans was a beautiful city and it can be again. But what's the future of New Orleans? Is it going to look the same? Many of those houses, most of those houses that have been under water, salt water for so long will absolutely have to be demolished and start it all over. Would you want to rebuild again 25 feet or 20 feet below sea level or maybe just move a little farther up the river. What's going to happen? DAYBREAK@CNN.com.

COSTELLO: And all the polling on this, Chad, the people at Gallup ask respondents how President Bush is handling the crisis. More than four in 10 give the president a failing grade. And as you can imagine, in the politically charged Capitol, there are both supporters and detractors of the president.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. DENNIS HASTERT (R), HOUSE SPEAKER: There is going to be a lot of time to point fingers after we get through there. But we need to make sure that we don't have this situation again and that's what the investigation will be about. Thank you very much.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... what did the president...

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D), MINORITY LEADER: Well let me just say because my colleague said that I was pointing fingers. It's too soon. You're darn right. You're darn right. We've had -- we're a week behind where we should be in terms of responding to Katrina.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: The U.S. House met with some of the president's cabinet secretaries who have worked on this crisis. Our Ed Henry tells us about that very contentious gathering.

ED HENRY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Several of President Bush's cabinet secretaries faced three hours of grilling at a closed- door meeting of the entire House of Representatives as one Democrat and Republican after another pounded away at the secretaries for the administration's slow response to Hurricane Katrina. After Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and some of his colleagues gave rosy reports about how the government is turning the corner, one Republican stood up and teed off at the secretaries, saying they deserve failing grades for their performances.

Chertoff also raised eyebrows when he told the lawmakers that the situation at the Superdome was much better than it appeared, based on those television images. Fireworks also at an earlier White House meeting where House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi directly told President Bush she believes FEMA Director Michael Brown is incompetent and should be fired. Republicans know all of this is politically explosive.

They have to face the voters next year and they know that since Republicans run the entire government, the charge that they were slow to act could be politically potent next year. So House majority leader Tom DeLay is circling the wagons, trying to push back. In fact, he left this meeting with Mr. Chertoff to talk to reporters and say that in fact the blame should not lie with the federal government.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. TOM DELAY (R), MAJORITY LEADER: The Emergency Response System was set up to work from the bottom up. And it's the local officials trying to handle the problem. When they can't handle the problem , they go to the state and the state does what they can do. And if they need assistance from FEMA and the federal government, they ask for it and it's delivered.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HENRY: DeLay also rejected Democratic calls for an independent commission to be formed to investigate what went wrong. DeLay said the focus instead should be on the recovery and rescue efforts. But when CNN asked DeLay whether he still has confidence in Michael Brown at FEMA, he pointedly would not name Brown when he said that in general he still has confidence in the rescue efforts.

Ed Henry, CNN, Capitol Hill.

COSTELLO: Oh but FEMA is taking it on the chin for this. But the punching isn't near done yet. Listen to this. A South Carolina health official says FEMA called state officials and told them a plane with as many as 180 evacuees was headed to Charleston. The health official says FEMA said those on board would require medical assistance. Health officials scrambled, lining up buses and ambulances at the airport, but the plane never arrived. Well actually it did, but not in Charleston, South Carolina. It was sent to Charleston, West Virginia. FEMA is not commenting.

Imagine this decision. Stay behind with your sick child or protect the rest of your family by getting out of the path of Katrina. A mother's nightmare scenario is ahead.

Also you might never have heard of it and you might never hear of it again because it barely exists anymore. The desperate situation in St. Bernard's parish.

When Hurricane Dennis hit Cuba in July, Fidel Castro turned down a U.S. offer of aid, but now as you know, Castro is making an offer of aid to the United States. We'll take a look.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: International markets have been inched up just a bit. Tokyo's Nikkei and the London FTSE, both up eight points. The German DAX is up around 26.

And how about our oil prices? Well in future trading, light Swede crude is just a little more than $65 a barrel this morning and according to many papers across the land, gas prices are slowly going down.

Your news, money, weather and sports, it's 5:16 Eastern. Here's what's all new this morning.

Leave New Orleans whether you want to or not. That's the word from Mayor Ray Nagin. He's ordering police to get any remaining residents out of the flooded city for their own safety.

In Washington, funeral services are this afternoon for Chief Justice William Rehnquist. President Bush will speak. Burial follows at Arlington National Cemetery. Rehnquist's body now lies at repose at the Supreme Court. In money news, Hurricane Katrina didn't just slam the Gulf Coast. It's also slamming the U.S. economy. Treasury Secretary John Snow says surging fuel prices and damage to businesses could slow economic growth by a half percentage point this year.

In culture, pop culture I guess, want to get some celebrity snap shots and how about a good cause at the same time? You can bid on eBay for autographed photographs of Heidi Klum, Beyonce Knowles and other stars. Proceeds go to colon cancer research.

In sports, the NBA Players Association is boosting its pledge to hurricane victims by $1.5 million. The union initially pledged one million.

To the Forecast Center and Chad.

MYERS: Good for them. That's a nice little sum.

(UNINTELLIGIBLE) have here, I want you to see. This is Ophelia. This is what we're seeing now on the radar. I never like to see a hurricane or a tropical storm or even a tropical depression on radar because the means it's close enough to see it from land.

If I zoom you out a little bit, you can see actually three separate storms. There's one near the Florida coast, Nate just south of Bermuda and Maria that is moving away and will eventually completely move away. Ophelia making a little button hook off to the right. This is a different forecast even from last night. This storm getting close to the ocean, getting close to the coast, but then turning off to the right. We'll have to see how much that goes on.

And here's Bermuda here. Here's Tropical Storm Nate. That category one hurricane moving right over Bermuda late in the day on Thursday and early Friday morning -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Thank you Chad. That's a look at the latest headlines for you this morning.

There are a lot of stories about heartbreak involving Katrina and on occasion there are those stories that give you reason to smile, like a mother and child reunion.

Carol Lin has that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAROL LIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): By the time Hurricane Katrina slammed into Louisiana, Maureen Wells had already tearfully said good-bye to her baby.

MAUREEN WELLS, MOTHER: She was very sick. She was already in the hospital before the hurricane even was in the path.

LIN: Fourteen-month-old Joel (ph) suffers from a serious heart condition. Maureen had a choice, ride out the storm with her baby at Children's Hospital in New Orleans or flee to Atlanta and protect her four other children.

WELLS: It broke my heart. It broke my heart.

LIN: The hurricane raged on, cutting off communications. Yet Maureen Wells, 500 miles away, stayed in phone contact with the hospital, but the situation worsened.

WELLS: I was afraid of flooding. I heard on the news that they were experiencing looters.

LIN: The New Orleans hospital like so many others was already struggling on generator power. Now they were running out of water. A network of Children Hospitals got little Joel (ph) Wells out of New Orleans and back into her mother's arms. Finally, a plane carrying her precious cargo landed in Atlanta and mother and daughter were reunited.

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Mommy.

WELLS: Hey. Hey Joel (ph). You're a survivor.

LIN: A survivor who now not only has a mom watching her every move, but an entire team of medical professionals.

DR. KEVIN MAHER, PEDIATRICIAN: She's going to do fine I believe. She has a number of chronic health issues that need to be addressed, but I think she's received excellent care this far.

LIN: A feeling echoed by perhaps the biggest expert of all.

WELLS: Well I think her future is a good future for her. She's very optimistic. She's very happy. She looks great. Hey girly. Yes (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

LIN: Carol Lin, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Now that's a beautiful smile.

Our coverage on the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina continues, but as we go to break, from CNN's Victims and Relief Desk, some of the missing and their contact information.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MYERS: Zoe says New Orleans will be back. You mark my words. It'll be better than ever. You cannot turn our backs on this unique culture. It would be a disgrace to America if we don't rebuild it. But what's your idea? What's the future of New Orleans going to look like in a couple of years?

Go to DAYBREAK@CNN.com. Let us know what you think. A few polls out by "USA Today". Many of you don't think it's actually coming back the way it was -- Carol.

COSTELLO: A lot of people think that way. DAYBREAK@CNN.com.

It is believed that about 10,000 people remain in their homes in and around that city, New Orleans. Some say they want to stay, but others are just waiting for help.

CNN's Gary Tuchman went on one of the many rescue operations in St. Bernard Parish.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It sits in ruins. St. Bernard Parish, to the east and southeast of the city of New Orleans, got outside assistance even later than New Orleans. For the most part it was too late. People either got out or are dead.

(SOUNDS)

TUCHMAN: But there are a few exceptions. Eight days after Hurricane Katrina ripped through, a rescue takes place. A woman, her neighbor and her dog go through the flooded streets in an airboat. They were spotted frantically waving from the second floor of her flooded-out house by the men in a Georgia National Guard chopper.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've been flying over these houses, treetop level and stuff and a few people have just been sticking their hands out and waving to us.

TUCHMAN: Veronica Pedeax is in good condition despite her serious arthritis and not having water for the last two days.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've got some water for you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. I hope that tastes good.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) this is better than ice cream.

(LAUGHTER)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I bet you it is.

TUCHMAN: Many people in this parish are presumed dead. It is feared that many of the missing never evacuated from a nursing home that is now under water. Veronica Pedeax didn't realize until a couple of days ago how serious the situation is.

VERONICA PEDEAX, HURRICANE SURVIVOR: I didn't think that water was going to go up that high. We have enough stairs, but the water went up about 14 feet above the ceiling on the first floor.

TUCHMAN (on camera): The rescue and recovery efforts here are hampered by the fact that much of St. Bernard Parish is still under water. Emergency vehicles just can't go down most of these streets. You look under the water and you see schools of small fish in the streets, which is quite interesting considering the fact this isn't just water. This is also oil.

(voice-over): Oil covers virtually everything in St. Bernard, apparently leaking from a refinery. The odor is overwhelming. So is the burden for local law enforcement.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're the only Sheriff's Department in the state of Louisiana right now that's totally homeless. All deputies lost everything they had.

TUCHMAN: The cleanup is now underway, even as the rescues and the rescue attempts continue.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: That was CNN's Gary Tuchman.

Firefighters in St. Bernard Parish have been working around the clock for the past eight days, clearing roads and rescuing people. A parish fire chief says they had no outside help until a Canadian task force arrived four days after the hurricane.

What would make anyone want to stay in the path of a storm like Katrina and then stay in its wake? Would you imagine -- would the image of an animal you love in distress do it? Why so many people stayed behind to protect their pets. We're going to talk about that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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