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American Morning

Iraqi Insurgents Kidnap 150 Men From Research Institute In Baghdad

Aired November 14, 2006 - 07:00   ET

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

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR, AMERICAN MORNING: ....when you back up, a blind spot in your SUV could lead to tragedy. We'll tell you how to avoid it, ahead on this AMERICAN MORNING.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR, AMERICAN MORNING: Welcome back everybody. It's Tuesday November 14. I'm Soledad O'Brien.

M. O'BRIEN: I'm Miles O'Brien. We're glad you're with us this morning.

S. O'BRIEN: Let's get right to that developing story out of Baghdad; 150 people, as many as 150 people have been kidnapped from a research institute in Baghdad, by gunman who are apparently wearing police uniforms. Let's get right to CNN's Michael Ware, he is live for us in Baghdad.

Michael, good morning.

MICHAEL WARE, CNN CORRESPONDENT, AMERICAN MORNING: Good morning, Soledad.

Yes, we've just seen the Iraqi minister for higher education in a nationally televised address to parliament, outline what appears to be a mass kidnapping at an Iraqi Institute for Higher Education just five hours ago.

Now, according to what the minister told the parliament, as many as 80 gunmen wearing Iraqi security forces uniforms showed up at the institute here in the heart of the capital, Baghdad, in more than 20 cars. They sealed off streets and the complex.

Then they entered the four-story building. It sounds like they went through it fairly systematically, Soledad, segregating the men from the women. They corralled the women and left them behind in a locked room. As they left, with what the minister says, is between 100 and 150 hostages. Now local police put that number at somewhat lower.

Nonetheless, it is clear that a mass kidnapping from an Iraqi Institute for Higher Education has taken place here. If the fact stands, this could be one of the most breathtaking insurgent or militia operations of recent times, Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Is there any sense of why? It looks like this is a group that grants scholarships to Iraqi professors and students who want to study abroad. But why kidnap so many, in such an obviously coordinated and organized kind of procedure? WARE: Well, the grabbing itself is a statement alone, to be able to assemble that many men, to be able to coordinate an operation with so many moving parts. I mean, just think of the extraction, what it would require to remove even 100 men from a site, under siege, as you hold them hostage. The sheer logistics of this operation are a bold statement in itself.

Otherwise, attacking the universities, attacking the intelligentsia, both of today and tomorrow, the students, has been a feature of the ongoing violence here in Iraq, almost since the beginning. We've seen that reach fever pitch in the wake of what we now see as a civil war. There has been a massive brain drain from this country as professors and students have fled, and have not been attending classes since semester began, Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, with actions like that one can completely understand it. Michael Ware for us this morning in Baghdad. Thank you, Michael.

You can soon hear what the Pentagon thinks the next step in Iraq should be. The U.S. commander briefs Congress tomorrow while the generals meet for a top-level meeting later this week. CNN's Barbara Starr live at the Pentagon for us this morning with a little bit of a preview.

Good morning, Barbara.

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT, AMERICAN MORNING: Good morning, Soledad.

Well, senior U.S. military commanders have been behind closed doors secretly working on their own options for Iraq for weeks now even before the midterm elections, separate from that Iraq study group that we've been hearing so much about.

General Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and the chiefs, have been working on their ideas. They have been meeting for weeks with commanders just returning from Iraq asking them what's working, what's not.

The chiefs will meet again in the tank on Friday to begin to finalize their recommendations. General Pace expected to testify on Capitol Hill next month.

But, yes, on Wednesday this week, tomorrow, an early bellwether perhaps, of what is to come. General John Abizaid, the head of Central Command, will be before Congress testifying on what he thinks needs to be done in Iraq .

Now, to be clear, neither of these men are exactly tipping their hand yet. We don't know what specifically they're going to recommend. But what they're walking into on Capitol Hill, after the election, is really the two ends of that spectrum. Some saying more troops are needed to finish the job. Others, of course, like Senator Levin, the new Democratic leader of the Senate Armed Services Committee, saying he believes that there needs to be a phased withdrawal. What the commanders are likely to talk about is conditions on the ground -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: When we talked to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, on Friday, I asked him if he was going to stick around now that Rumsfeld is out. He says he serves at the pleasure of the president. How do you think Secretary Rumsfeld's departure is really going to affect the generals overall though?

STARR: Well, I think what most people will be watching is to see if the generals are now more candid that Secretary Rumsfeld is gone. And that would be very dangerous waters to tread in. Because the question that may be asked is if suddenly the generals do become more candid with Secretary Rumsfeld gone is where was that public candor in the weeks before the election?

Because the ultimate irony here, may be, Soledad, Secretary Rumsfeld was well aware of all of this work going on. He was working on some of these recommendations himself, when we say secretly, it was out of the public view. It was behind closed doors here in the Pentagon, but Rumsfeld and the generals were already going down this road. We'll have to wait and see if they decide to be more candid in public now that he's gone.

S. O'BRIEN: Barbara Starr at the Pentagon for us. Thank you, Barbara.

Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: Politics this morning, Rudy Giuliani is headed down the road toward a presidential bid. The former New York mayor, forming the Rudy Giuliani Presidential Exploratory Committee. Giuliani is popular, the top choice among Republican voters to be the party's nominee in 2008, just ahead of John McCain, in our recent CNN poll. Our Senior Analyst Bill Schneider with more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST, AMERICAN MORNING (voice over): Last week's midterm was the first primary of 2008, and it showed a big market for outsiders who can promise change. That's good news for Rudy Giuliani, who took a first step towards a presidential bid.

It's good news for any Republican who can speak the language of bipartisanship. Here's one:

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, (R-AZ): Are we doing the things organizationally and legally to prepare for it? Yes.

SCHNEIDER: His strong national security credentials are no small thing after a midterm where Iraq was a big issue. Neither Giuliani nor McCain is particularly trusted by conservatives. Giuliani, especially, because his positions are more out of line with those of conservatives, abortion rights, gun control and gay rights.

Do conservatives have a strong contender for 2008? Auditions are open. Senators George Allen and Rick Santorum were once talked about as hot prospects. No more. Bill Frist was badly tarnished as well after Republicans lost the Senate. Newt Gingrich is also mulling a bid. He has been out of the game long enough that he gets to say, I told you so. Mitt Romney's lieutenant governor lost the race to succeed him as governor, but not doing well in Massachusetts could be a plus to Republicans.

(On camera): It's all about the moment. The Democrats clearly had the moment in 2006. But that doesn't mean it will be there in 2008. In 1994 Republicans had the moment, President Clinton was toast. But two years later Clinton easily won re-election. The moment had changed. Bill Schneider, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN: Republicans nursing their political wounds and plotting their comeback this morning. And Trent Lott is casting his lot to be part of the GOP leadership once again. The Mississippi senator wants to be minority whip in the new Congress. That's the party's number two position. Lott, you will recall, quit as majority leader in 2002, after making racially insensitive marks at a birthday party for the late Senator Strom Thurman.

Of course, all the day's political news is available on the CNN news ticker. It's available any time day or night for you at cnn.com/ticker -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: With Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld out of the Pentagon, newly empowered Democrats may have set their sights on President Bush's man at the United Nations. Ambassador John Bolton was appointed during a congressional recess. The question now is, has he earned the right to stay?

Our Senior U.N. Correspondent Richard Roth is with us. We're going to look at the record.

Good morning.

RICHARD ROTH, CNN SR. U.N. CORRESPONDENT, AMERICAN MORNING: Good morning, Soledad.

White house officials, even yesterday, saying John Bolton, has proved his fitness for the post of U.N. ambassador. However, what's the story at the U.N.? A little reality check on Bolton.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROTH (voice over): U.S. Ambassador John Bolton cast the only veto in the Security Council Saturday, shooting down a resolution that would condemn Israel's offensive in Gaza.

JOHN BOLTON, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO U.N.: We are disturbed that there is not a single reference to terrorism in the proposed resolution.

ROTH: It was not the only time Bolton stood alone.

BOLTON: Contrary to my desire to work this weekend.

ROTH: Even President Bush, soon after his recess appointment of Bolton, without congressional approval, joked if Bolton had blown the place up yet. However, the U.N. and Bolton have survived.

I think people see two John Boltons, one who is very engaged in the Security Council and quite effective and one who seems to ignore much of the rest of the organization.

ROTH: On hot global emergencies like North Korea's nuclear ambitions, Bolton has appeared to be the Bush administration's attack dog.

BOLTON: The North Korean population has been loosing average height and weight over the years, and maybe this will be a little diet for Kim Jong-Il.

ROTH: Bolton does get some praise. Several U.N. diplomats highlight his legal skills for cobbling together U.N. resolutions, a drive for hard work, as well as what one diplomat called an encyclopedic knowledge on issues. But Bolton's style has bruised others. Even the top U.N. brass have felt his wrath.

BOLTON: I'm telling you this is the worst mistake by a senior U.N. official that I have seen in that entire time.

ROTH: Accusations like that have rankled (ph) U.S. Secretary- General Kofi Annan.

JAMES TRAUB, AUTHOR: There was one point when he and Bolton got into a real an argument, a real fight. And Annan said, to him, don't talk to me that way, or words to that effect. And I asked him later, have you ever spoken to any American ambassador as harshly as that, because Kofi Annan is a man who speaks harshly to no man. And he said, no.

ROTH: Bolton takes pride in his patience, noting he helped count chads in the lengthy 2000 Florida presidential stalemate. But now the votes may not be there for him in the U.S. Senate, for him to remain the country's U.N. ambassador.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROTH: Last night I talked to one Arab ambassador who said, look, Bolton is tough, but he'd rather deal with him, because it's black or white. You know what you're getting. He's just representing his government. Others, of course, who have felt the sting of Bolton, might disagree. The White House still has to decide if it wants to maneuver in other ways to try to get John Bolton back to the U.N.

S. O'BRIEN: Interesting to watch. Thank you. Richard Roth for us.

Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: Thanks, Soledad. Some serious worries this morning about Tamiflu, the popular anti-flu medicine, may be prompting some scary side effects.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN (voice over): It all started in Japan, where Tamiflu is prescribed about four times as often as here in the United States. Japanese officials reporting 103 cases of what they say is abnormal behavior in Tamiflu users, most of them children, hallucination, delirium, other psychiatric effects.

It's unclear if the drug is the cause, but health officials in the U.S. are not taking any chances. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is mandating a warning on the Tamiflu label that patients taking it need to be closely monitored.

Tamiflu's maker, the Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche, says there is no evidence the drug is behind the psychiatric effects and that the flu itself might be causing the symptoms.

Tamiflu usage in Japan is the highest in the world. Between 2001 and 2005, Tamiflu was prescribed more than 24 million times there. The 103 cases in question, in Japan occur between August of last year and this past July. In the first six years Tamiflu hit the market, starting in 1999, there were only 126 similar cases of these scary symptoms reported.

One of the main reasons health officials are reluctant to discourage patients from taking Tamiflu, it's effectiveness in treating bird flu, which researchers fear could turn into a pandemic should it mutate into a form that could easily be passed from human to human.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN: The cases in Japan, by the way, included three people who fell to their deaths after taking the drug, including a 14- year-old boy.

Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Another sort of startling medical story to tell you about. It appears that younger women who eat red meat regularly face an increased risk of breast cancer. A Harvard study of more than 90,000 women found that the more red meat that the women consume in their 20s and 30s and 40s, the greater the risk for breast cancer.

Those who consume the most red meat face nearly twice the risk of breast cancer of those who ate red meat less often. Dr. Sanjay Gupta will join us in the next half hour, not only about this breast cancer study, but also the Tamiflu warning as well. That's straight ahead.

And much more to come on the other stories that we're following for you this morning. If you own an SUV, you're not going to want to miss this one. A new study says that your chances of backing over somebody, especially a child, are higher than if you're in a different car. We'll talk about that.

And defining centuries of tradition. We'll tell you why some young Jews are looking the other way on their religion's tattoo taboo. Stay with us, we're back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: Some of the top stories we're following for you, President Bush meets with America's Big Three automakers today. They're looking for the president to pressure overseas car makers to help domestic car makers sell cars here at home.

Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani a step closer to running for president in 2008, filing paperwork for a presidential exploratory committee.

Heading out the door? Chad is exploring the weather for you, has a committee for that, as a matter of fact.

(WEATHER REPORT)

S. O'BRIEN: Well, it certainly wouldn't be the first time that young people are questioning their religion, but in this case, the defiance can be permanent. CNN's Faith and Values Correspondent Delia Gallagher has a report this morning on some young Jews who are defying their religion's taboo on tattoos.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DELIA GALLAGHER, CNN FAITH & VALUES CORRESPONDENT, AMERICAN MORNING (voice over): Wellesley College student Rachel Lando says she's committed to Judaism. She has visited Israel and teaches Jewish children about their heritage.

(On camera): Oh, wow!

(Voice over): As a way of expressing her Jewish identity, Rachel got a tattoo, in Hebrew.

RACHEL LANDO, WELLESLEY COLLEGE STUDENT: Some people wear Prada to say this is who I am, this is what I like, other people get tattoos.

GALLGHER: Tattoo studios say religious tattoos are surging in popularity. Sporting a religious tattoo is a badge of honor for some celebrities. But for a Jew, getting a tattoo violates the sacred law in the Torah, or Jewish Bible.

"You shall not make gashes in your flesh for the dead, or incise any marks on yourselves. I am the Lord." According to the Jewish law, the body is a gift on loan from God.

RABBI ALLAN LUCAS, TEMPLE BETH SHALOM, ROSYLN: We have a responsibility to take care of it, and to return it, when it will be called for, to return it in the best shape as possible. The tattoo is considered to be a destruction of that body. GALLAGHER: Tattooing has been so forbidden that many Jews believe having a tattoo prevents them from being buried in a Jewish cemetery. That popular notion is, well, simply an old wives tale.

LUCAS: I suspect that some Jewish mother, somewhere along the line, found it a very effective way to discourage her children from doing it. But it has no basis in Jewish tradition.

GALLAGHER: Rachel's mother cried when she first saw the tattoo on her daughter's back.

LANDO: She said, "Oh, my God, I don't know what I'm going to do. Didn't you want to be buried with me?" She was hysterical. It was horrible. I felt so awful.

GALLAGHER: Many in the Jewish faith see tattooing as a sign of disrespect to Holocaust survivors. Who suffered involuntary tattoos at the hands of the Nazis. Out of respect for her parents, Rachel is now getting her three tattoos removed, a painful and expensive process. But she does believe having tattoos helped her grow spiritually.

LANDO: Subconsciously, I was trying to reconnect to my Judaism. And I didn't know that, an instead I got this tattoo, to do so.

GALLAGHER: And it worked?

LANDO: Yeah, it did, I guess, because I'm now reconnected. And I study Hebrew and do all these things. So, I guess it did.

GALLAGHER: But now you're turning your back on the tattoo?

LANDO: Exactly.

GALLAGHER: Delia Gallagher, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

S. O'BRIEN: A scare at school. We'll tell you what four students, out of class in Colorado brought tears to their eyes, too. That's straight ahead this morning.

Also, also a study this morning on blind spots behind your SUV. Tell you what you can do to stop backing up, from turning into a tragedy.

The possible connection between red meat and breast cancer that you need to know about. We're paging Dr. Gupta. All those stories, straight ahead. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: Some of the top stories we're following for you. New warnings urged for the flu drug Tamiflu. Doctors in Japan say it might be causing people to act strangely, even hallucinate.

San Francisco dropping its bids to host the Summer Olympics in 2016, after plans for a new stadium got derailed by the 49er's move to Silicon Valley.

Happening in America now: In Colorado, a 90-minute school evacuation in Commerce City after reports of a chemical in the hallway. Turns out it was pepper spray or something like it. You can see the kids there kind of teary eyed as a result. Spokeswoman for the school says they'll figure out who did it.

In Florida, a school lockdown, during a police standoff, lasting nine hours. Homestead police surrounded a man who had barricaded himself in a house, apparently firing shots at officers. The man was found dead. Police would not say how he died.

In West Virginia, a dramatic end to a hostage taking there. Four hostages overtook their captor during a suicide attempt at a pharmacy. Suspect Jeffrey Harvey fired four shots, demanded drugs. The hostages took Harvey down after he took some painkillers and anti-anxiety drugs.

In Florida, the Space Shuttle Discovery crew prepping today for it's scheduled December 7 launch. The seven astronauts in dress rehearsals for their 12-day mission to the International Space Station. They'll do a simulated countdown and they'll practice an escape from the launch pad emergency.

Not seen there, that's a space walk practice. That's a practice they did, too. Just for the record.

S. O'BRIEN: Just practice, general practice.

M. O'BRIEN: Generally practicing, yeah.

S. O'BRIEN: Leaders of the struggling automakers are heading to Washington, D.C. They are going to meet with President Bush. Andrew Ross Sorkin, of "The New York Times" is "Minding Your Business".

Good morning.

ANDREW ROSS SORKIN, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": Good morning.

S. O'BRIEN: What's the main thing they're talking about?

SORKIN: Well, they're going to be talking about healthcare. You know, this is a very big meeting that's been on the agenda now since May. Hasn't been able to happen. The Democrats win so there is a little bit of political machinations about why the meeting now after the election.

Rick Wagoner is going to be there, the CEO of GM. Alan Mulally of Ford, Tom LaSorda of Chrysler, not the Dodgers.

M. O'BRIEN: Not that one.

SORKIN: Not that one.

S. O'BRIEN: Thank goodness. Not sure what he could add on that front. SORKIN: You know, what's happening here is the administration really wants to push for more fuel-efficient vehicles. The automakers want to push back and say you want more fuel-efficient vehicles, that's great, but you've got to help us on the healthcare front. You have to help us out on the trade imbalance with Japan.

S. O'BRIEN: Is it really going to be like a quid pro quo? Sort of like a, listen, we'll do this, if you do that, kind of deal?

SORKIN: I don't know if that's how you approach it. But I think, underlying the conversation, is really this issue. Which is, can the government really step in and help on prescription health costs? And that's what's killing these automakers.

As we talked about earlier, these automakers -- you know, a $1,000 for every car, that's the cost of healthcare to the American consumer these days. So that's really the issue on the table.

M. O'BRIEN: And add to that the cost of keeping those pensions going. They have huge, huge overhead.

SORKIN: You look at GM. They have 1.1 million employees and retirees and pensioners that they have to somehow pay for. That cost is coming out of your pocket and mine, when you go and buy a vehicle.

M. O'BRIEN: It's not likely they're going to come out with some sort of --

SORKIN: Oh, I doubt it. No, this is just laying the ground work.

S. O'BRIEN: That will be the first meeting that had really good tangible results from both sides.

SORKIN: Yes.

M. O'BRIEN: What you have next?

SORKIN: We have a fun one, actually. The YouTube phenomenon has actually come to Wall Street. Folks are now posting their resume, if you will, as a YouTube video as part of a special promotion that's going on at Morgan Stanley. We're going to take you to see some of these crazy videos, which are sort of fun.

M. O'BRIEN: All right, Andrew.

S. O'BRIEN: And they expect to get hired off of them?

SORKIN: We'll see.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Andrew. Thank you.

Hurricane Katrina forced them to move the first time. Ahead this morning, a story about how Hollywood is forcing some displaced New Orleanians to relocate yet again. That's ahead, stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(NEWSBREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: SUVs and kids, they go hand in hand. After all, it is families who most need the extra space, but they can also be a tragic mix.

Here's CNN's Greg Hunter.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GREG HUNTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): According to a new government report, more than 180 people are killed and around 7,000 injured when someone in a vehicle backs over them accidentally every year. The problem is an old one, people simply can't see what's behind them, especially in big SUVs. It can be particularly deadly for children.

SMITH PECK, FATHER OF VICTIM: They just get away from you quickly, and anyone with children knows that.

HUNTER: Smith Peck's 4-year-old son, Jackson, was accidentally backed over and killed by his grandmother in the family SUV two years ago, just before Christmas. The government looked at technology such as backup sensors, but say they are "typically poor, sporadic and limited in range."

Janette Fennell, an auto safety advocate, has been trying to bring attention to the back-over problem for several years.

JANETTE FENNELL, AUTO SAFETY ADVOCATE: You need to be able to see when you're going backwards. You can't just kind of close your eyes and hope there's nothing back there.

HUNTER: The government report also looked at review cameras. Some are add-ones. Others come as standard equipment. The report says rear-camera systems may have the greatest potential. But the report also says cameras have limits.

In short, there is no quick fix, and the government wants to do more research to find answers. One thing is for sure, without the aid of cameras or sensors, seeing what's behind your vehicle can be virtually impossible.

(on camera): Backing up in a big SUV can be deceiving. You can't see anything from that vantage point, can you? And when I check my mirrors, driver's side, passenger's side, rearview, it looks clear to me, too. But if I get out of the vehicle and walk behind it, we've got a little surprise for you.

Hello kids.

Twenty-nine school kids from East Hattam (ph) Elementary School in Connecticut, all hidden dangerously out of view.

HUNTER (voice-over): Industry groups say whatever technology that will take to fix the back-over problem should not be so expensive that consumers can't afford it.

FENNELL: Little children do not have to die this way. All of these incidents are not only predictable, they're 100 percent preventable.

HUNTER: Greg Hunter, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN: Janette Fennell, who we just saw in Greg's piece, is the founder of kids in cars. She joins us now from Kansas City.

Janette, good to have you with us.

Boy, Greg hunter's demonstration there is really very striking. I hope everybody who saw that takes that to heart.

Give us a sense of how big this problem is.

FENNELL: Well, actually no one knows how big the real problem is. Now, the government report that was just released is saying, you know, about 183 people are killed this way every year, and 6,000 to 7,000 are injured. But according to my data, I think we're going to find that those numbers are a gross understatement and that the real problem is much larger.

M. O'BRIEN: And the problem, of course, grows along with our appetite for SUVs, I assume.

FENNELL: Well, all vehicles have blind zones, and it does tend to be the larger, the wider, the longer the vehicle, the longer the blind spot, or the bigger the blind spot. But in general, every vehicle has one, and we need to be careful, because you can not see when you're backing up.

M. O'BRIEN: Well, let's talk about what we can do about this.

I've got to say, a few years ago I backed into the side of a car in my pickup truck, and it scared me to death, because I thought, you know, what if there had been a child there, and I looked into it, and I wanted to get one of those radar-type detectors. It was very expensive, very difficult to put it in. What can people do that's relatively easy to protect themselves against this kind of a problem?

FENNELL: Well, the first thing people need top understand, of course, you know, before you ever back up your vehicle is to make sure you walk all the way around the vehicle, to make sure there's no children or anything behind the vehicle. And then, of course, always ensure that all children are being properly supervised any time you move your vehicle. And if, you know, you're all alone, put your child in the vehicle, in the back seat, buckle them up and then move the vehicle, just to be sure that they don't dart out behind you at the very last minute.

But there are different technologies that are available. And the government study that was just released yesterday, you know, isn't real high on the lenses or the sensors, but cameras will take your blind zone from 20, 30, 40, 50 feet to zero.

And it's interesting, one thing they didn't study...

M. O'BRIEN: How much does it cost to put all these in, though? When I priced it; it was kind of expensive, on the order of $500 at least for the -- just for the radar system.

FENNELL: Oh, no, those prices have come down considerably.

M. O'BRIEN: They have?

FENNELL: Oh, yes.

In the study, they're quoting for radar between $41 and $100.

M. O'BRIEN: Installed? really?

FENNELL: Yes. And if we do this stuff before market, which is, you know, really everyone needs this type of technology, if they know it or not, then the prices come down dramatically.

M. O'BRIEN: Janette Fennell, founder of the group kids and cars. Thanks for being with us -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: And much more news on that connection between red meat and breast cancer. It is the result of a new and pretty startling study. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is going to pay us a House Call straight ahead.

And then first it was Katrina; now Hollywood is uprooting some residents in New Orleans. We've give you the latest on story as well.

We're back in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(NEWSBREAK)

(WEATHER REPORT)

S. O'BRIEN: Stories we're following for you this morning: hallucinations, delirium, is it from the flu or the drugs that you're taking for the flu? Dr. Sanjay Gupta will join us with some answers up next.

And then campaign 2008, Rudy Giuliani joins the fray, maybe. Who else is lining up for a shot at the White House? AMERICAN MORNING's back in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(NEWSBREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Let's start with the flu, though, first. Just in time for flu season, there's some new concerns about one of the most popular flu medicines. The FDA is now urging warning labels for Tamiflu. They're concerned about reports side effects in children, coming from Japan, apparently causing those kids to act strangely, even in some cases hallucinate. Not clear yet if the behavior is linked to the drug or the flu.

Also in today's House Call, new study about red meat and breast cancer. Let's get right to Sanjay Gupta, who, as we just saw, is getting ready. Big moment, Sanjay.

Let me ask you a question about this. This comes from that nurses study, which is a massive 90,000 people involved. What did they find this time around?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SR. MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: It's a huge study, which is one of its big strengths here. There's been a lot of studies looking at the association between red meat and cancer, specifically breast cancer in the past, usually in older women, usually inconsistent findings. But now with this large number of people, they're starting to find more evidence, specifically looking at over 90,000 women, going back and asking questions about their diet, and specifically finding out that those who had the highest red meat consumption, and that meant over a serving and a half a day, tended to be twice as likely to have what are called hormone receptor positive breast cancer. So those hormone receptors, either positive for estrogen or progesterone.

Now this is the strongest study to date. A couple of interesting things. It actually looked back at women who had breast cancer and then analyzed their dietary patterns. It would have been ideal to sort of do that perspectively, find out what they eat and figure out if they develop breast cancer. That's a bit of a weakness. Also as far as why this occurs, that's harder to figure out. There are some compounds in red meat that may be expressed when cooked. That could be a source. There's also the possibility that because cattle are sometimes given hormones themselves, that could lead to the likelihood, or increased likelihood, of hormone receptor positive breast cancer. Not sure about that. But like I said, the evidence is mounting.

S. O'BRIEN: OK, but one-and-a-half servings every day, that sounds like a lot, but what exactly is a serving of red meat.

GUPTA: Well, a serving is about the size of a deck of cards, usually three to four ounces.

S. O'BRIEN: So if you have a big burger, you could theoretically have three servings in a day for lunch.

GUPTA: Yes, right. I mean three servings could be six to seven ounces of red meat. And you could get that pretty quickly, no question about it.

S. O'BRIEN: Can I ask you a quick question about this Tamiflu story that we've been talking about as well?

GUPTA: Absolutely. S. O'BRIEN: What do they think is happening here? Do they think it's the Tamiflu itself? Is it the same Tamiflu here in the U.S. that kids in Japan were getting?

GUPTA: It is the same Tamiflu. There is a company that actually makes this, Roche out of Switzerland. So they distribute it around the world. So it is the same Tamiflu.

One sort of notable difference, though, is in Japan, it is much more widely used. Here in the United States, we're more likely to use the flu vaccine, although we're not as good about it as we should be. Tamiflu is an oral pill or suspension liquid that kids can take over the age of one year. They use it much more widely in Japan.

The reason I point that out is because these sort of side effects, a small number, 95 people in Japan overall, out of the many people who take that might be more widely expressed if large numbers of people are taking it, as they do in Japan. Only about five cases here in the United States, and three in other countries, specifically, as you mentioned, Soledad, talking about these behavioral disturbances, these sort of delirium. Whether it's caused by the Tamiflu, or whether it's caused just by having really bad flu symptoms, that's unclear, and we actually listen in from the FDA on that; they're just not sure about that.

S. O'BRIEN: All right. Dr. Sanjay Gupta for us this morning on two fronts. Appreciate it, Sanjay. Thank you -- Miles.

GUPTA: Thank you.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, you think the elections need a new plan for Iraq? well, what if we told you the generals have been secretly strategizing for months? We'll have the story ahead for you.

And homemade videos and your chances for landing a dream job. That's ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

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