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American Morning
Interview with HHS Secretary Michael Leavitt; 9/11 Commission Becomes 9/11 Public Discourse Project; 20 Years of Oprah
Aired November 15, 2005 - 08:30 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. Quite a nice day here in New York City. And they were talking about the inside voice with our restaurant owner a few minutes ago. Did you see this Dr. Ferber? For anyone who's parent, lived by Ferber -- he advocated letting your child cry it out. Put the baby down, let him cry and go to sleep.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Hard thing for a new parent to do.
S. O'BRIEN: Oh, it breaks you heart.
M. O'BRIEN: That first night or so. Ooh, brutal.
S. O'BRIEN: By your fourth kid, you're like, yes, whatever.
But Dr. Ferber now is backing away from Ferberizing.
M. O'BRIEN: Really?
S. O'BRIEN: Yes. He is -- he basically says that now letting children cry is not meant to be the way to treat all sleep problems. He's got a new book coming out where he kind of updates it and has other solutions.
M. O'BRIEN: Oh, he's just trying to sell a new book.
S. O'BRIEN: Well, yes, but I think people have really criticized Ferber for being very harsh. And if you've gone any of these like mom's chat, you know, Internet chat boards, wow, do people get nasty.
M. O'BRIEN: Controversial stuff there.
S. O'BRIEN: You say you Ferber-ized your kid, you might as well, you know, say you beat them with a stick. Because some people will just...
M. O'BRIEN: Well, so now have you we scarred our children by doing that?
S. O'BRIEN: Give them something to talk about in therapy.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Oh, come on, come on.
M. O'BRIEN: And can we sue the doctor for that now?
COSTELLO: No, don't say that! S. O'BRIEN: Please! Hey, my kids sleep through the night. That's all I have to say.
COSTELLO: Sometimes, you know, the way our parents raised us, how did we ever turn out to be semi-normal? I mean, if everything's now wrong, how did we ever grow up to be sane?
M. O'BRIEN: That's true, that's true.
(NEWSBREAK)
(WEATHER REPORT)
S. O'BRIEN: All right, Bonnie, thanks. Well, starting today, seniors can sign up for Medicare's new prescription drug benefit. However, some people say it's a little bit confusing.
Secretary of Health and Human Services Mike Leavitt has been touring the nation on a bus, trying to raise awareness for the program. And he joins us here this morning. It's nice to have you in person. Thanks for coming in to talk to us.
MICHAEL LEAVITT, HHS SECRETARY: Thank you. I'm glad to be here.
S. O'BRIEN: Well, thank you.
It is confusing in a lot of ways, especially when you're talking about a population of elderly people who may not know how to go online and may not always know the questions to ask, right?
LEAVITT: Well, healthcare is complicated. I've been actually going through this for my preparing to help my parents. And it's clear to me you can work through this and make a very good decision in an hour or so. And the average savings for a person is over $1,300. So for my parents, you're talking about $2,600. It's well worth working through it.
S. O'BRIEN: It's worth the time if you're willing to put in the time. At the same time, there are, in some states, 40 options for people to pick through. And because it's not a government program, it's really coming from the drug companies and the insurance companies and then the pharmacies have a different plan -- why not simplify it even more?
LEAVITT: Well, the good news is people can get what they want. Some people want a different kind of plan. Second piece of the good news is the competition is driving the cost down almost 15 percent lower than we expected it would be. And that's saving those who will participate billions of dollars over the next few years and it's saving the government billions of dollars.
S. O'BRIEN: Are you concerned, though, if you have a large percentage of elderly people who can't figure it out -- and I think something like 61 percent said that they don't get it. I mean, two- thirds say, even after all the touring across the nation, saying I don't really understand the program. If they don't buy in, isn't that kind of the whole problem behind the program in the first place?
LEAVITT: Well, that would be a disappointment, but I don't think that's going to happen. There's that old saying that one time doing is worth a hundred times hearing. And right how, everybody is just hearing about it. By my own experience, when you go on and actually try it, it's not that hard, and the savings are terrific and it keeps people healthy. It's a very good improvement to people's lives.
S. O'BRIEN: There are some concerns on behalf of low-income Medicare members who were previously covered by the state. There are worries that they might fall through the gap. And in fact, there's a lawsuit now on behalf of these people, sort of considered the most vulnerable. Because they could -- the theory goes --- at one point never be covered by anything. That the state benefits run out, they haven't signed up for new benefits and now they've gotten nothing. Are you worried about them?
LEAVITT: We have been worried about that. And we've taken a lot of measures to make sure it doesn't happen, including just saying if you don't sign up, we're going to pick a plan for you. Because on January 1st, we want to make sure that when you go to the drugstore, you've got coverage. And I think from talking to many of them that the plans are actually going to be improvement for them and we're going to work awfully hard to make certain that no one is dropped through the cracks.
S. O'BRIEN: Those people who filed lawsuits say why not extend the state benefits to make sure? A little safety net. That way, you know, they're covered until we make sure that there have no glitches, Even just a basic computer glitch in the system. Why not do that?
LEAVITT: What we're actually doing is what they want. We're doing it a slightly different way. We're just saying we're going to enroll everyone automatically. And everyone will be enrolled. I don't think we'll lose any of them. They were, I read -- they will miss 1 percent. I don't think we're going to miss any. If there are, we'll go back and work through those.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, because 1 percent is actually a huge number.
LEAVITT: It is a big number.
S. O'BRIEN: From what, 100 and some odd thousand people. Let's talk about bird flu for a moment. And you've been talking a lot about bird flu. Obviously, the president is touring Asia right now. What do you think he needs to get? What kind of a commitment, especially from nations like China, about staving off a potential for bird flu?
LEAVITT: The best that we can hope for is have transparency and cooperation among nations. That's the critical part of having surveillance. If you think of the world as a big forest that could break into flame, just a spark could start the pandemic. And we need to be there when it happens and help put it out.
S. O'BRIEN: Transparency in how the government runs is almost an oxymoron in China. I mean, that is not coming out on a limb to say that. is the government often will be dishonest. I mean, look the way they treated certain cases of HIV and AIDS. How do you get that?
LEAVITT: Well, we do our best. The truth is we need to be prepared if it comes here, and that's where we're spending most of our time is focusing on what we would do if the avian flu came to the United States.
S. O'BRIEN: The bus tour is over. Michael Leavitt is the Health and Human Services secretary. It was nice to have you, and it was nice chatting with you and getting updates while you were on that bus tour across the nation.
LEAVITT: Thank you.
S. O'BRIEN: Thank you for joining us -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: The 9/11 Commission, which looked into the policy and intelligence failures in the run-up to the terror attacks, is no more, but it has morphed into a lobbying group called the 9/11 Public Discourse Project, and it is still keeping score on how the government is responding or not to the commission recommendations. They're out with a new report card this morning. Tom Kean was the chair of the 9/11 Commission. He joins us now from Philadelphia.
Governor Kean, good to have you with us. Let's get right to the report cad. One of the first things you look at is the issue of nuclear nonproliferation. The recommendation from the commission was, "Make maximum effort to prevent terrorists from acquiring weapons of mass destruction. Your response to that is "insufficient progress." Tell us why.
THOMAS KEAN, 9/11 PUBLIC DISCOURSE PROJECT: Well, it's the most serious problem we have. The idea of someone with a nuclear weapon getting across our borders and (INAUDIBLE) in one of our cities would devastate the economy and be a catastrophic event for the United States. We believe that we've made some progress in conversation with Mr. Putin, but there are still a hundred sites out there with nuclear materials. A good part of them, or 50 percent in the ex-Soviet Union, are not still properly secured. Terrorists know what the most dangerous sites are. They're going in and trying to get those materials. And once they've gotten them, you can find out on the Internet how to make one of these devices.
So we have to secure these sites. And they're talking about 14 years to do this. We haven't got 14 years. We really haven't. And if we really made a maximum effort, we think we could do it in two or three years.
M. O'BRIEN: Well, it's amazing to me, because this has been a problem since the fall of the Soviet Union. We've been talking about this long before the 9/11 attacks, and this still remains an issue.
KEAN: Well, it has to be an issue, and it should be an issue, frankly, everyone's talking about. I want the president to focus on it. I want Congress to start talking about it. I want the media, shows like this, to start talking about it, because it is the single greatest danger facing the American people. M. O'BRIEN: All right, next item on the report card, the issue of formulating a coalition strategy against Islamist terrorism. Your grade on this one, minimal progress. Explain that one.
KEAN: Well, we're not actually getting everybody together, and we know that. (INAUDIBLE) newspapers. The United States is still not viewed in the world, as we hope it would be, as a leader against what is a terror against the world, and we've got to do this jointly. We cannot do it alone. We can't be the only country leading the way. We've got to get not only the European Union, but other nations behind us. And only when we're working together, we believe, that you're going to be able to really defeat Islamic terrorism. And we're not there yet. We're not even close to being there yet.
M. O'BRIEN: All right, this is a hot-button issue, this next one: Formulate coalition standards for terrorist detention. This comes at a time when there's all kinds of debate in Washington over whether the U.S. should wink and nod, and allow torture for people that the U.S. has captured in the war on terror. You say this is unfulfilled.
KEAN: Well, it is unfulfilled. The United States should not be talking about we're going to be the country who tortures people. That's not in line with American values at all.
What we have recommended is that you get a group of other nations together, of our allies, and friends and democracies, and decide what are the standards that people are going to use to get the information that we have to have to disrupt terrorist networks. We believe no one country alone should be deciding what methods to use, but we should be working with friends and allies, get some international standards, and hopefully we can work together on those.
M. O'BRIEN: Final item here that we have time for. On the issue of public diplomacy, define the U.S. message, almost a public- relations issue. And according to your group, minimal progress on this front. Have you seen much progress at all?
KEAN: Well, we like the appointment of Karen Hughes. The president knows this is a problem. We've got to let people know who we are and find out who they are. We've got to increase libraries, information services, student exchanges, any number of things, particularly in the Arab world. Because the long run way to defeat terrorism is to let people know who we are, get values changed, education established, and then hopefully we can start to win this war.
M. O'BRIEN: It's tough, though when we send out a mixed message when we're talking about torture.
KEAN: Yes, absolutely. And we cannot send out a mixed message. I mean, we've got to let them know who we are, and we've got to give these people hope. Bin Laden's message is one of fear, and despair terror. We've got to send out a message of hope, and that your families can have a be life better than it is now, and that the future can be brighter. The future is not death, as Bin Laden. The future should be life.
M. O'BRIEN: Tom Kean of the 9/11 Public Discourse Project. Thanks for your time.
KEAN: Thank you.
M. O'BRIEN: Coming up, you may not be able to live the life of a debonair spy like James Bond.
S. O'BRIEN: No, you may not. And no, you will not.
M. O'BRIEN: Oh, sorry. I had a little reverie there for a moment. Anyway...
S. O'BRIEN: The debonair life of an AMERICAN MORNING anchor.
M. O'BRIEN: I was thinking of the martinis and the Aston Martins.
S. O'BRIEN: No, no.
M. O'BRIEN: You can get the Aston Martin, though.
S. O'BRIEN: Really?
M. O'BRIEN: Details on a special used car for sale, "Minding Your Business."
S. O'BRIEN: And Oprah Winfrey celebrates her 20th anniversary, and she's going to share some of her favorite moments and her biggest mistake of the past two decades. That's ahead on AMERICAN MORNING. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: It is hard to believe it, but Oprah has been on the air for 20 years. She's celebrating her anniversary by looking back at some of her show's biggest and very best moments.
And Sibila Vargas has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
OPRAH WINFREY, TALK SHOW HOST: I've been doing this show for 20 years.
SIBILA VARGAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The anniversary show was full of little-known secrets and well-known highlights.
Remember in 1988 when she rolled out the fat?
WINFREY: I have lost, as of this morning, as of this morning, 67 pounds. This is what 67 pounds of fat looks like.
It was my biggest, fattest mistake. VARGAS: That mistake, and her battle of weight, made her a role model for women in America. Between the syndication rights of her show, her magazine, and her influence in the book world all have made her a multimedia billionaire.
She's still easily humbled. Who could forget one of Oprah's heroes, little Mattie Stepanek, who suffered from a rare form of muscular dystrophy. Oprah brought his poems to the nation.
MATTIE STEPANEK: I came so close to death, I saw angels coming to greet me into heaven.
VARGAS: And of course, there was Oprah's most nerve-wracking moment.
WINFREY: Dancing with Tina Turner, it was the most nervous I have ever been.
VARGAS: And over the top moments.
(SINGING)
VARGAS: And it's hard to forget the big surprise last season when the entire audience got brand new cars.
WINFREY: You get a car! You get a car!
VARGAS: Through Oprah's Wildest Dream Network, she surprised and helped so many people. She said she hates to be surprised herself.
But after reenacting a sketch of her hero, Mary Tyler Moore, the actress surprised Oprah on set.
VARGAS: Oprah highlighted some of her favorite interviews. Here she is with Lisa Marie Presley.
WINFREY: That marriage to Michael Jackson, that your marriage was for real. Was it a consummated marriage?
LISA MARIE PRESLEY, ENTERTAINER: Yep.
WINFREY: It was? OK. That's all.
VARGAS: And JFK, Jr.
WINFREY: Do you remember that desk and the picture under the desk?
JOHN F. KENNEDY, JR.: Yes, actually, you know, I believe President Clinton still has that desk.
VARGAS: And she finally revealed this year's biggest secret, what she was thinking after the headline making Tom Cruise interview.
WINFREY: Everybody's always asking me if that was planned. Was it planned? Let me just say, I was just as surprised as the rest of you because I've interviewed him, many times, spent time with him and I'd never seen him that way. So I was like, what has happened to you, boy?
VARGAS: But it was Oprah, in the end, who thanked her viewers.
WINFREY: I feel like a part of your lives and for that, I will be eternally grateful.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
S. O'BRIEN: Well, we love you very much.
M. O'BRIEN: Yes, we love you! Wow. Twenty years and she's still going strong.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, absolutely.
M. O'BRIEN: I mean, really amazing.
S. O'BRIEN: No, really, and changed the show, I think, to represent her spirituality. Really doing things for people, the Angel Network. You know, really the -- the magazine.
M. O'BRIEN: But she never went down that slippery Jerry Springer slope.
S. O'BRIEN: No, no, she...
M. O'BRIEN: She always stayed above the fray...
S. O'BRIEN: Well, that's what happens when you own it. You know, and she had an interesting comment in "Newsweek" when she on the cover a couple of weeks ago. And she said the only mistake was when she didn't listen to her heart. She said if I didn't listen to myself, that's when I made a mistake. I thought that was good advice. So I'm stealing it, Oprah. Thanks!
M. O'BRIEN: Coming up, the perfect gift for the wannabe secret agent in your family. In case you had one.
S. O'BRIEN: That would be you.
M. O'BRIEN: James Bond's car. Details on a used car auction that's for your eyes only. That's ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
M. O'BRIEN: I wish I had brought my Corgi toy in. The Aston Martin and it ejected the passenger and had the little thing that shredded the tires and it had the bullet-proof thing and the little license plates turned and stuff.
SERWER: I had one, too.
M. O'BRIEN: You can get the real thing now for a few bucks. SERWER: It going to be auctioned off, Miles, this January in Phoenix. RM (ph) Auctions Motor Sports or Motor Cars is going to be auctioning off three of the coolest cars in the worlds. Starting with James Bond's Aston Martin. Look at this.
M. O'BRIEN: Beautiful thing!
SERWER: Goldfinger -- Sean Connery sat here. Thirty caliber browning machine guns actually mounted. They don't fire but they are there. Tire slashing stuff, oil slick device, it's all there. They are not even saying what a base price is going to be on that but it's going to go for a lot.
M. O'BRIEN: Seven figures or eight?
SERWER: Seven.
M. O'BRIEN: Probably seven.
SERWER: Let's move on to the next one here. How about Al Capone's car? For real. This is a 1928 Cadillac.
M. O'BRIEN: Not the movie Al Capone. The real...
SERWER: No. This has a smoke screen device thing where you blow out smoke. The back window comes down for better Tommy Gun.
M. O'BRIEN: So you can shoot the guy. Right?
SERWER: Yes. It has police lights. It's the real deal. They think this is going to go for up to half a million dollars. And finally, I think this is the coolest one, Hank Williams 1968 -- '64 Pontiac. This thing is outfitted with 18 pistols, 547 silver dollars. All kinds of stuff in it.
M. O'BRIEN: Eighteen pistols?
SERWER: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: Just stashed away?
SERWER: Hank is a little different there later in his life. Now, who could afford these cars?
M. O'BRIEN: You've seen the longhorn?
SERWER: I did. He's got the saddle on them.
M. O'BRIEN: Quite nice. Who could afford them?
SERWER: How about college presidents?
M. O'BRIEN. There you go. Segue city.
SERWER: There is list out of the highest paid college presidents of the United States. Who knew you could go into academia to make money. Number one: Donald Ross, the president of little-known, I think it's fair to say, Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida. Five million in annual compensation!
M. O'BRIEN: What? He's not even the football coach.
SERWER: Very good. A little explanation. Four and a half million of that is deferred compensation. He has run it 34 years. It used to be bankrupt. Go on, we have some other guys from Wilmington College. Vanderbilt: Gordon Gee I get paid lots of money is the president of Vanderbilt. John Silber, he's been around for a while, getting paid a lot of money. And then Mary Sue Coleman at Michigan. University of Delaware, University of Texas, those schools, you can kind of understand. Texas got 50,000 students, $4.3 billion endowment. But some of those little schools where the guys get paid so much money is hard to fathom.
M. O'BRIEN: What is the enrollment at Wilmington College?
SERWER: I don't know off the top of my head.
M. O'BRIEN: Not a huge school.
SERWER: But it is in Delaware. Maybe there's some DuPont money kicking around.
M. O'BRIEN: Some kind of tax deferment deal.
SERWER: Probably.
M. O'BRIEN: Andy Serwer, thank you very much.
Coming up, you've got to drive through fast food? Drive through banks. How would you feel about drive through angioplasty? Dr. Sanjay Gupta looks at the newest outpatient procedure. I'm going to pass. But we're still going to check in on this. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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