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American Morning
New Orleans Gears Up for Mayoral Elections; "How to Rob a Bank"
Aired May 19, 2006 - 08:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back, everybody.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Soledad O'Brien.
(NEWSBREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: Voters in New Orleans head to the polls in less than 24 hours for what is likely the most important election in the city's history.
Gulf Coast correspondent Susan Roesgen, live for us in New Orleans this morning. Hey, Susan, good morning.
SUSAN ROESGEN, CNN GULF COAST CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Soledad, good morning to you. This could very well be the most important election in the city's history so far, because so much is at stake.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ROESGEN (voice-over): After Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest, you might think New Orleans is well on the way to recovery. Not really. While some areas are recovering from Katrina, 80 percent of the city was flooded, and many neighborhoods are still stuck in a time warp.
MAYOR RAY NAGIN, NEW ORLEANS: Hey. What's happening, man? How they treating you these days?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Feeling good, man.
ROESGEN: Mayor Ray Nagin is fighting to bring the city back from the brink, and fighting to stay in office.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Amen.
NAGIN: Amen!
ROESGEN: He got a round of amens from a black ministers' group when he told them he's the guy to stick with.
NAGIN: This city does not have the luxury of having someone new to come in...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
NAGIN: ... to try and learn all that is going on.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Exactly.
NAGIN: ... and try to figure out how to keep this momentum going.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right!
ROESGEN: Nagin says the city's recovery is on track. His challenger, Lieutenant Governor Mitch Landrieu, says it's not moving fast enough. Landrieu points to piles of trash and thousands of flooded and abandoned cars on the streets. And Landrieu likes to remind voters of the city's's problems before Katrina: poverty and crime.
LT. GOV. MITCH LANDRIEU, N.O. MAYORAL CANDIDATE: The past is thinking that it is our destiny to be second class citizens. Think about whether you want to go back to the past and have a place that's unsafe.
ROESGEN: Whoever wins faces a tough job right away: fixing a broken city while preparing for the next possible crisis, with the start of the new hurricane season just 12 days away.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROESGEN: And one of the big questions is what might happen to the city's new evacuation plan. If Landrieu is elected, Soledad, he could reject that plan or he could change it. If Mayor Nagin is re- elected, he still has to fill a lot of holes in that plan to make it work, and it's supposed to be tested next week with a hurricane drill just three days after the election.
S. O'BRIEN: Well, let's talk about race in this election. Obviously, Mayor Nagin black. There's been a lot of issues of race in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Lieutenant Governor Landrieu White. How are the numbers lining up? What do you think is going to happen here, race-wise?
ROESGEN: Well, Soledad, it would too easy, I think, to say all the white voters are going to vote for the white candidate and all the black voters are going to vote for the black candidate. In fact, Mayor Nagin did lose a lot of his white support in the primary election. He only got 6 percent of the white vote. But Mitch Landrieu got 25 percent of the black vote. And so, political analysts say he's sort of a crossover candidate. They expect that he is in the better position right now, Soledad, because he has strong support in both the black and white community.
S. O'BRIEN: I guess we're all going to just have to wait and see, won't we? Susan Roesgen for us this morning. Susan, thanks.
Miles?
M. O'BRIEN: When Willie Sutton (ph) was asked why he robbed banks, the famous thief had a simple answer. "Because that's where the money is," he said. Well, these days, the philosophy may be the same for crooks, but the tactics have become a lot more sophisticated. Here's Drew Griffin with an excerpt from this week's "CNN PRESENTS," entitled "How to Rob a Bank."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There we go. All right. There we go, sweetheart.
DREW GRIFFIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When Houston veterinarian Mike Jenay (ph) opened his clinic in 1999...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She's real tender down here around the abdomen.
GRIFFIN: He also opened a $90,000 line of credit with Bank One.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I still have the original first check from this account, check 1001.
GRIFFIN: Then why would he get a notice from Bank One two years later claiming he owed $85,000?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And I'm thinking to myself, how can this be? I've never even used this account.
GRIFFIN: Around the country, other Bank One customers were asking the same question, because they had the same problem.
(on camera): A Bank One fraud investigator described it as a "gusher," a problem so big the bank needed help from the Feds. What was eventually uncovered is a chilling example of employees stealing the private information we all entrust to our banks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is a whole new way to rob a bank.
MATTHEW BOYDEN, U.S. POSTAL INSPECTOR: It's a lot easier and a fairly sophisticated and common way to do it.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): How did they do it? Step one, getting account information. And what could be better than the customer service center, where the ringleaders recruited rogue employees to build an information pipeline? Name and address, mother's maiden name, date of birth, Social Security number and account number. Step two, take over the account.
Some of the juiciest targets were businesses.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get one of the boys to give you a hand with that.
GRIFFIN: Ronnie Sanders (ph) owns Triangle Metals. Unbeknownst to him, someone called Bank One and said Triangle Metals had a new address, moved from an industrial section of Meter Land, Texas, to this house in Houston, 100 miles away. When a batch of freshly printed checks arrived at the phony address, the heist went into overdrive: $37,000; $38,000; $39,000 checks -- fraud totalling $195,000.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's form of bank robbery. That's for sure.
GRIFFIN: Some of the largest checks were paid to the order of Floyd Turner (ph) and paid to the order of Ronald Humphrey (ph). Turner and Humphrey are former professional football players, teammates on a 1994 Indianapolis Colts.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is this for real? It's just really hard to believe.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
M. O'BRIEN: All right. Were you taking notes there? Now you know how to rob a bank, I guess. The full report, "CNN PRESENTS: How to Rob a Bank" airs this Saturday and Sunday night, 8:00 Eastern, right here on CNN.
(WEATHER REPORT)
S. O'BRIEN: Ahead this morning on "A.M. Pop," an interview with comedian Wanda Sykes. She is so funny. She tells us why she's thrilled with the her new role of a skunk.
First, though, Andy's "Minding Your Business." What do you got coming up?
ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: Soledad, one of the fastest growing and most upscale retailers in the world finally gets its rightful place on Fifth Avenue in New York. Can you guess which company it is? We'll tell you, coming up next on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: There is no music behind it. There we go, "30, 40, 50," that's our series. We continue today, our last day. That's marriage, and dating, and friendships and relationships in our special hour that we devote to the topic. "Elle" magazine advice columnist E. Jean Carroll, who is so funny. She's going to join us as well. Great advice. And "Maxim" magazine's John Devore, too.
M. S. O'BRIEN: Yes, dating, friendships, relationships, marriage, divorce. This is -- you know, these are important issues. And as a matter of fact, we have -- what happens when the 50s meet the 30s, let's say? That's one of the questions. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How do you maintain a relationship with people that are from more than one generation?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
S. O'BRIEN: There you go, spanning the generations. We will ask that question, among others today. Men don't have a hard time dating 20-year-olds, is what I've noticed. But that's me. Anywhere, here's what you want to do, you want to call us. In about 15 minutes, we're going to open up those phone lines. The number is 1-877-AM6-1300. You can e-mail us any time, AM@CNN.com. Love to hear from you with your questions.
M. O'BRIEN: Andy Serwer doing his Kenny G over there. Do your Kenny G.
(CROSSTALK)
(BUSINESS HEADLINES)
S. O'BRIEN: Ahead this morning on A.M. Pop, comedian Wanda Sykes joins us in the studio. We talk about her role in the new animated movie called "Over the Hedge." She says, it's the toughest gig she's ever got. We'll tell you why, ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The plan...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is remarkable.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This place is like a fortress wall, so high. How do we get in? You.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Me?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Her?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By using your feminine charms.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was that out loud?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
S. O'BRIEN: Wanda Sykes plays Stella the Skunk in the new animated movie. It's called "Over the Hedge," and it opens on Friday. In it, Stella and her cohorts plan to go over the hedge into a suburban community that's taken over the woodland. Stella disguises herself as a cat to charm a tiger, a house cat standing between Stella and the bounty of the food from the kitchen. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, no, no. Come no closer. I must not be so near a creature of the outdoor woods. Away with your filth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My filth? My filth?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ah, jeepers, here we go. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. That's it. I am sick and tired of everybody taking one look at me and running away because they think I'm filthy. Well, I got news for you. I didn't get all primped and primmed to have an overfed pompous puff ball tell me he's too good for me. I got makeup on my butt, dude. And you don't even want to know about the court.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stop! No one has ever spoken to me like that. It is bold. I like it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
S. O'BRIEN: I like it. And love is in the air. Wanda Sykes, nice to see you.
WANDA SYKES, "OVER THE HEDGE": Good to see you.
S. O'BRIEN: When your agent calls you and says "I have for you a role, you're going to play a skunk with low self-esteem who kind of comes back strong," what do you say that to that phone call? A skunk, huh?
SYKES: Well, see, this started, like, three years ago, so when my agent called and said you know, Dreamworks wants you to be in a movie, I didn't care, Skunk or anything, I was like, look, I just did "Pooty Tang," so let's just do it. I was just happy to be getting a call, anyway.
S. O'BRIEN: You -- you've been in other animated films.
SYKES: Uh-huh.
S. O'BRIEN: And my understanding is the way it works is you sort of do the stuff with the headphone and a microphone, and you're not like actually acting out with other actors. Is that right?
SYKES: Right, exactly right.
S. O'BRIEN: Is that weird?
SYKES: You know what, it's the hardest gig I've ever had to do.
S. O'BRIEN: Why? Really?
SYKES: Because it's just that. Everything that you use to be funny, they take all that away from you. You know, like, you don't have someone else to play-off of, you don't have the visuals or anything. You're just in there, like you said, with the mike and the director.
S. O'BRIEN: So who's reading back with you?
SYKES: No one. You're just in there. That's it.
S. O'BRIEN: That is so weird. And so is the first -- have you seen the movie yet? SYKES: Yes, yes. And I was just so blown away how it actually comes together and it sounds like we were all there, you know, playing off of each other.
S. O'BRIEN: I always thought you were all in the same -- maybe, you know, obviously, not in your little costumes, but...
SYKES: No, we got the whole skunk suit on.
S. O'BRIEN: Like "Cats."
SYKES: Yes, Yes. We had the whole suits and everything.
S. O'BRIEN: But I thought everybody would be there, you know -- who had a line together and would be there at the same time.
SYKES: No. And you get, you know, kind of, like, carried away. Because, you when I was watching it, I'm like, wow, this works -- really works. I'm like, wow, I have great chemistry with Bruce Willis. And then I'm like, you've never met the man. What are you talking...
S. O'BRIEN: You wouldn't know it.
SYKES: And then you think, oh, yes, Bruce and I, we should do another movie together, you know.
S. O'BRIEN: Hey, Bruce. It was great working with you!
SYKES: Hey, Bruce! Yes, right, right.
S. O'BRIEN: Maybe he would hit on you, too.
SYKES: Yes, yes, yes. The junket, I finally meet him. Hey, Bruce. "And you are?" Oh, never mind.
S. O'BRIEN: Your co-star!
SYKES: The skunk.
S. O'BRIEN: Don't you know? You've been busy.
SYKES: Very.
S. O'BRIEN: The DVD.
SYKES: DVD.
S. O'BRIEN: And you're heavily involved in that. It's not just Wanda's people working on the DVD.
SYKES: Right. No, yes. I, you know, wrote and performed all the stand-up and now all -- we're in the editing process so I've been extremely busy. It's like I'm in...
S. O'BRIEN: Doing some sitcoms. SYKES: Sitcoms, yes.
S. O'BRIEN: And movie's coming out.
SYKES: The movie's coming out.
S. O'BRIEN: You got your book, which, you know -- it's been out for a little bit.
SYKES: Book, yes. I'm really due for a nice little hospital stay. I really am.
S. O'BRIEN: Some people just want a vacation.
SYKES: Nothing serious. A vacation -- they still call you, they two-way you, they bug you. Hospital stay, people leave you alone.
S. O'BRIEN: Hospitalized. Especially something contagious?
SYKES: Yes!
S. O'BRIEN: No one will bug you.
SYKES: No one will bug me.
S. O'BRIEN: Good luck with all the projects.
SYKES: Thank you so much.
S. O'BRIEN: So great to have you come in and...
SYKES: Good to see you again.
S. O'BRIEN: Thank you very much.
SYKES: Thanks.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
M. O'BRIEN: In a moment, our top stories. Plus, our "30, 40, 50" series. Today, we're going to look at love and marriage and relationships and divorces for people in those age groups. Specific information, depending on your age group. We're going to talk to an "Elle" magazine advice columnist, E. Jean Carroll. "Maxim" magazine's John Davoe (sic) -- Devore, that is. And we'll also answer all of your questions.
Now is the time to start mashing the buttons on your phone. Give us a call: 877-AM6-1300. That's 266-1300. Or send us an e-mail, am@CNN.com. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: A Navy career took him around the world, but his post-military mission has him anchored in Southern California, getting homeless kids off the streets. CNN's Jennifer Westhoven has more in this edition of "Life After Work."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How you doing?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm OK. How are you?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm alive and well.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes? You working now, I hear?
JENNIFER WESTHOVEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Day and night, Rick Cocha (ph) and his team of volunteers have food, clothes, computers, and most importantly, compassion for street kids.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where have you been all my life, huh?
I traveled all over the world, 40-some foreign countries and saw homeless kids in other cities and other countries. But I never expected that they would be in mine. And I just saw them here and I was just so upset.
WESTHOVEN: So he did something about it. Sixteen years ago, the former Navy officer started Stand Up for Kids.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So how can we help you get back into the job force?
WESTHOVEN: Volunteers go out into the streets and find kids. Their mission: to care about them, and then at every point, prove it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How you doing, Rick?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm OK.
We're trying to be the family, the brother, the sister, the mom, the dad. Depending on who you are. That's the piece we're really trying to play for them, to be for them, because they don't have that. So almost 18 years now, I've been walking the streets, talking to homeless and street children and being, you know, involved in their lives. And I said to them, in all that time, I never really met a kid that wanted to be on the streets -- ever -- not one.
WESTHOVEN: Jennifer Westhoven, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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