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Protests In Iraq; Snowy Easter; Can A Woman Win?; Gerri's Top Tips; Drug Concerns; Iraqis Buying Prescription Drugs on Black Market; Bush to Give Speech on Border Security; Can Supplements Increase Life Expectancy?; Man Convicted of Rape Exonerated by DNA Evidence
Aired April 09, 2007 - 10:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Cameras on her house and has called the cops a few times, too. I'm not going to have this in my neighborhood.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: And on that note, top of the hour, top at morning to you. I'm Heidi Collins.
HARRIS: And I'm Tony Harris. Stay informed in the CNN NEWSROOM. Here's what's on the rundown for you this morning.
Is Iran raising the stakes in its nuclear standoff with the U.N.? Just in, word the country is launching industrial scaled uranium enrichment.
COLLINS: A people depressed. Iraqis seek relief from the pain of war and find their formula on the streets.
HARRIS: And looking for a longer life? Our Dr. Sanjay Gupta has some tips in a new book and series. This hour, what supplements can and can't do for you. It is Monday, April 9th. And you are in the NEWSROOM.
And at the top this hour, the fall of Baghdad four years later. Stepped up security is in place as that milestone is marked in the Iraqi capital. And south of Baghdad, a big anti-American demonstration in the holy city of Najaf. The protest called for by radial Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. To Baghdad now where CNN's Kyra Phillips is keeping track of the latest developments.
Great to see you, Kyra.
And so far at least it appears the demonstration is peaceful, correct?
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and that demonstration has been peaceful. And that's what's so interesting, Tony. If you are back there in the states, at home, an you see this video, you see thousands and thousands of people walking through the streets.
You see Iraqi flags. It looks like a form of solidarity. Iraqis are walking together. This is what it's all about. It's about freedom. It's about unity. It's about getting along.
But there's an interesting underlying message here. This rally was called to come together through Muqtada al-Sadr. He's anti-U.S. troops being in this country. He calls them the occupiers.
But this show what kind of power he has. This powerful cleric that could rally Iraqis and say, come together. Iraqi army, Iraqi police, join us. Be against the U.S. Of course, I can't confirm if indeed there are members of the Iraqi army and Iraqi police in this protest, but he has asked them to join all these Iraqis.
Now apparently he has fled to Iran and he is not in this country. So you can look at this, Tony, as a message to the prime minister of Iraq, Nuri al-Maliki, and also to the U.S. government and U.S. troops, nose up at them. Look how much power he has, whether he's in Iraq or he's in Iran.
HARRIS: Well, and, Kyra, today is the day four years ago when we watched the Saddam Hussein statue come down. Just curious, what's there in its place now?
PHILLIPS: Well, we'll never forget it, right?
HARRIS: Yes. Yes.
PHILLIPS: The statue of Saddam Hussein getting pulled down by U.S. marines and Iraqis together, chipping away at it. Everybody wanted a piece of it. Wanted to be there. We remember the cheering in Firdous Square. Well, now I was able to go by there. Actually it was one of the first places I went to when I got here a number of weeks ago. I had to take a double take because I thought that was the square and that nothing was there anymore. But these artists here in Iraq, they call themselves The Survivors, made this sculptor. And it's of a family, a man, a woman and child, holdings up the sun and the moon representing the new Iraq and the ancient Iraq. So people come, they visit it, they leave flowers, ribbons. It's interesting.
HARRIS: Yes, it is. CNN's Kyra Phillips for us in Baghdad.
Kyra, thank you.
COLLINS: Despite stepped up security across Iraq, more deadly violence today. In Baghdad, reports say a sniper killed a civilian and a police officer. And a mortar round killed one person and wounded two others. Both attacks in the southern part of the Iraqi capital.
Just north of Baghdad, police say clashes broke out between unknown gunmen and al Qaeda fighters. More than two dozen people were injured.
Popping pills. Iraqis stressed out by the ongoing violence look for relief. And they don't have to go too far to find it. We'll tell you about that coming up in the NEWSROOM.
HARRIS: Iran announcing this morning another bold step toward becoming a nuclear power. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says Iran has begun industrial-scale production of enriched uranium. Enriched uranium is the fuel necessary for operating nuclear reactors. This latest step comes despite U.N.-imposed sanctions on Iran. The U.S. and its allies fear Iran is moving toward building nuclear weapons. President Ahmadinejad says Iran has an undeniable right to nuclear energy. The U.N. Security Council has set a new deadline of late May for Iran to suspend its enrichment activity.
COLLINS: Forget the blooms, instead spring snows covered the upper Midwest. Parts of the East as well. And freezing temperatures making for some pretty interesting Easter egg hunts. CNN's Reggie Aqui is live in Chardon, Ohio. It's just a few miles southeast of Cleveland.
What is it there, the woolly bear, something-something, the maple something-something.
HARRIS: There you go, Heidi.
REGGIE AQUI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, the Maple Tree Festival had to be postponed, Heidi, because of the weather. Tony is very familiar with that Maple Tree Festival. And apparently the bathtub races that happen annually. But we'll get to that in just a second.
I want to tell you about an interesting conversation I had inside the coffee shop this morning. Certainly folks here are used to a lot of snow, but they're not used to it happening this late in the season. The woman behind the counter said to the man who came in, how did you like your holiday? And he said, Christmas? It was great. Certainly looks like Christmas and not Easter, doesn't it.
We're going to show you what it looks like this morning at the town square. Two and a half feet of snow now covering where they usually have their Easter egg hunt. So what did they have to do? Well, they had it anyway. We understand they had 150 kids out here on Easter trying to get these eggs and basically, if I can show you what that would look like. I mean, basically all they did was they took these plastic eggs and they just threw them into the snow and the kids went diving after it.
Want to show you the headlines today in "The Plain Dealer," Cleveland's paper. It says "Spring's Wild Pitch." It shows one of the Mariner players surrounded by snow. They had to cancel the home opener here. And the Indians still haven't played that home opener. Not Friday, not Saturday, not Sunday. They're going to try again for a doubleheader tonight at 4:00.
We understand that the commissioner of baseball, Bud Selig, he's even thinking today about moving the rest of this week's games, supposed to be against Los Angeles here in Cleveland, to L.A. to avoid this whether. Because I don't know if you can see it. It's very small. The flakes that are coming down. But it is still snowing here in this part of Northeast Ohio.
Certainly this section of the area got the most snow. But, Heidi, 12 inches of snow in Cleveland over the weekend was much more than they expected. And it kind of came out of nowhere. So a lot of folks are hoping that this is going to be the end of it. That the rest of spring is going to be easy going.
HARRIS: Yes.
COLLINS: Wow. I bet that's what they're hoping. And, you know, this just in, Reggie. We learned that Tony Harris was actually the king of the maple play -- what was it?
HARRIS: No, it's the Maple Tree Festival.
COLLINS: You were like the king of it, right? The banner, a sash and everything?
HARRIS: Well, I enjoy -- you tap those trees and you get that -- that's OK, Reggie.
COLLINS: Oh, we lost Reggie.
HARRIS: We moved on, Reggie.
COLLINS: We may have lost several others. I don't know.
HARRIS: Chad Myers. Chad, you know, you tap that tree.
CHAD MYERS, METEOROLOGIST: Yes.
HARRIS: You get that maple syrup flowing.
MYERS: Well, you get the sap flowing.
HARRIS: Well, you get the sap flowing, yes.
MYERS: Right.
HARRIS: And then what happens, you would just turn it around right out there, there's this whole set up, and you turn it around into syrup and you go right to the pancakes and some beautiful . . .
MYERS: No, it's not sweet enough. There's no way.
COLLINS: He wants to be back in Cleveland.
HARRIS: Yes. I'm telling you.
COLLINS: You've got to do all kinds of processing.
MYERS: You have to boil it down for like 50 hours.
HARRIS: There is a set-up there where all of this happens. Where it is all processed during the -- I'm telling you -- during the events of that weekend or that week. There are a couple different ones.
MYERS: Yes, but you know what, if you pour chocolate, sugar and a little cream on one side, you get a ho-ho out the other too, but that doesn't make it good for you.
HARRIS: Excellent point, as always, Chad.
COLLINS: Yikes.
HARRIS: As always.
COLLINS: Oh, boy, we have so gone down hill. It's only Monday.
MYERS: That's right.
HARRIS: And when we come back we'll talk about the woolly bears and the centipedes and everything else.
COLLINS: Good because that is what I really want to know about.
HARRIS: Well, there you go.
MYERS: And I do love maple syrup. I'm not taking anything away from that. But there is a long process and that's why maple syrup is so expensive.
HARRIS: There is a process.
MYERS: You just don't tap a tree and put it on your pancake. There's a lot of boiling going on there.
(WEATHER REPORT)
COLLINS: Coming up next, illegal immigration. The debate rages on in Washington and grows even more invasive in border states like Arizona. Phoenix police say smugglers are now preying on nondescript neighborhoods to set up so-called drop houses for illegal immigrants. Dozens of men, women and children crammed into a vacant home and seemingly abandoned.
This morning, President Bush is in Yuma, Arizona, to rally support for his immigration reform plan. The issue ignites bitter division in Washington and his fellow Republicans have offered some of the most fierce opposition. So the president will use the controversial border fence as the backdrop for his proposals. They include tougher security measures to guard against terrorism, while promising fair treatment for illegal workers already here.
HARRIS: Candidate on a mission. Bill Richardson is half a world away from the campaign trail and hoping to brings closure for a half- century old war. That is coming up in the NEWSROOM.
COLLINS: She called herself the Gazelle, but can this woman out- run six centuries of French prejudice to become a world leader? That's ahead in the NEWSROOM.
HARRIS: Live to be 100? Can dietary supplements help you get there? Good question. Dr. Sanjay Gupta begins his week long series called "Chasing Life." It is also the title of his new book. And we will tell you how to get an autographed copy absolutely free. You're in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: You're in the NEWSROOM. I'm Heidi Collins.
An anti-American rally in Iraq's holy city of Najaf, as protestors march, Baghdad marks the fourth anniversary of its fall to coalition troops. The latest in the NEWSROOM.
HARRIS: And I'm Tony Harris.
Driving on the grain side of the road. More car makers now showing off their environmentally friendly alternatives. We will take a closer look ahead in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson said he wasn't planning to talk nukes while in North Korea, but that's exactly what happened this morning. The top nuclear negotiator telling Richardson's delegations, North Korea would have a hard time shutting down its main nuclear reactor by Saturday's U.N.-imposed deadline. Richardson is there trying to secure the remains of U.S. soldiers missing since the Korean War ended. Today they were promised the remains of six servicemen. President Bush's top advisor on North Korea is also part of that delegations.
HARRIS: Can a woman win? It's a fair question for Senator Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. The same question is being posed right now in France. With the final two weeks of the presidential campaign underway, CNN's Robin Oakley has that story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ROBIN OAKLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): The lady certainly knows how to make an entrance. A 53-year-old mother of four, Segolene Royal is the chiquest thing in French politics. The freshest face in the race for the presidency. The white jackets, the white coats, the white scarves have become a trademark, a deliberate contrast with the gray suits of the male rivals she faced when winning the socialist party's nomination. The French call those male party chiefs the elephants, so she called herself a gazelle.
And in the pink this time, she was happy to mock the rival who inquired of her candidacy, who will look after the children? While they may admire her style, are the French ready to vote for is a woman president? The debate in the streets of Putia (ph) in Taron Pauto Sharant (ph) are is typical.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE, (through translator): For so many years it has been a man. It should be a woman. Other countries have a woman in charge, so why not France?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE, (through translator): I am scared that if she is elected it will divide people. It will divide men from women.
OAKLEY: The hero of the French chattering classes sums up Segolene Royal problem.
BERNARD-HENRY LEVY, PHILOSOPHER: Her weakness might be, first of all, the fact that she's a woman in a very machist (ph) country, very anti-feminist country. We are gulwa (ph), you know, a country of (INAUDIBLE). Bragging men and bragging -- we have also our rednecks, you know, our French rednecks.
OAKLEY: Those who work with her, though, insist that Segolene Royal combines her femininity with strength.
JEAN-FRANCOIS MACAIRE, POITOU-CHARENTES REGIONAL COUNCIL: She's a woman who wants to be very, very close from (ph) people and because the woman are right, equals the woman, that she's a very strong woman. She has the rare (ph) resolute woman.
OAKLEY: (INAUDIBLE) that, says one of her biographers, Sego is drive by anger.
DANIEL BERNARD, BIOGRAPHER: She didn't want so much power for power, but she wants revenge against the way a woman was seen in society. She felt in her youth that she wasn't seen aa good, as intelligent, as clever as she was.
OAKLEY: Segolene Royal has proved herself the battler, winning the socialist nomination against fierce opposition from her party's traditionalists. But the big question remains, is France ready for the feminine touch? This statue near the Louvre of Joan of Arc is a reminder that it's six centuries since the country last had a woman leader.
Robin Oakley, CNN, Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COLLINS: He served the time, though he never committed the crime.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I served the time they wanted and now it's just -- it's just follow the yellow brick road. Follow the yellow brick road.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GERRI WILLIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Gerri Willis.
Taxes and the Internet. Is it a recipe for disaster? We'll tell you how to keep yourself safe filing your taxes online. That's next in "Top Tips" in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: Hey, what you say another check of the big board. The New York Stock Exchange this morning about an hour into the trading day. And nothing going on, huh? The Dow, what, up two points. All right. Let's call that flat. The Nasdaq flat as well, up five points. Maybe we can get some M&A activity going today. Something to talk about business-wise with Susan L:isovicz coming up in just a couple of minutes right here in the NEWSROOM.
COLLINS: The IRS deadline just one week from today. If that's not enough to rattle your nerves, how about this? Security breaches at the agency may have compromised the personal information of some 2,000 taxpayers. How can you protect your most intimate financial info? Well, we have just the gal to help us with this. CNN personal finance editor Gerri Willis.
Good morning to you, Gerri. Lots of tips to talk about on this.
WILLIS: Hey, good morning, Heidi. You bet. You bet.
You know, tip number one here, you've got to secure your computer. Make sure you have updated anti-spyware, anti-virus and firewall programs. If you're not running these programs, you're putting your information at risk. Make sure you also have all the latest updates for your computer. If you're a Microsoft user, go to the Microsoft website on the second Tuesday of the month. This is when the company usually releases them.
COLLINS: Also want to make sure that you have a good password. But should you have like 50 different passwords or can we just stick with one?
WILLIS: No, you can't stick with one. Sorry about that, Heidi. Of course, we've all had password overload, but you do want to make sure you use different passwords for Internet sites you visit. You don't want to use the same password you use for your e-mail account as you would for your tax software. So consider using free password storage systems -- this is a shortcut -- that will hold all your various passwords. Go to handypassword.com or ivory.org/whisper.
Heidi.
COLLINS: And I love this next one about the e-mails from the IRS. We can just ignore those.
WILLIS: You know, they don't send you e-mails.
COLLINS: They knock on your door.
WILLIS: That's it. They come and they get you. They send you letters, but they don't send you e-mails. Don't respond to any e-mail that says it's from the IRS. To check the legitimacy of any kind of communication, there is a phone number for the IRS, 1-800-829-1040. And if you're looking to check the status of your e-filing, go directly to the website, irs.gov.
COLLINS: This next one is kind of a bummer, though, because everybody loves to go to the Internet cafes, have a little latte, do some work on your computer, but this is not the place to be doing your taxes.
WILLIS: No, no, no. Avoid the temptation of filing your taxes from an Internet cafe or even a public library. That's because it's becoming more common for hackers to put hardware in a computer that will record your key strokes. Get that. The hackers have been able to retrieve your passwords and other personal information. Look, even if it's a friend's computer, you don't know if the person before you was on a website that may have been compromised. Your best bet, stay home. Use a computer that you trust.
And if you have a question, send us an e-mail to toptips@cnn.com. We'll answer them right here every Friday. And we will have more later this week on taxes.
COLLINS: Only one week away. All right, Gerri.
WILLIS: That's right.
Good to see you, Heidi.
COLLINS: You too.
HARRIS: And still to come this morning in the NEWSROOM, popping pills. Iraqis stressed out by the ongoing violence look for relief. And they don't have to go far to find it. We'll have that story for you in the NEWSROOM.
COLLINS: Iran today moving closer to becoming a nuclear power and raising deep concerns among western powers. Details ahead coming up here in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: Coming up on the half hour. Welcome back, everyone, to the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Tony Harris.
COLLINS: And I'm Heidi Collins.
The fall of Baghdad four years later. Stepped up security is in place and that milestone is marked today in the Iraqi capital.
And south of Baghdad, big anti-American demonstration in the holy city of Najaf. The protests called for by radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. He's now calling for his followers to stop killing Iraqi forces and focus instead on driving U.S. troops out of Iraq. So far, no word of any violence during today's demonstration.
HARRIS: Iraqis, including police officers, searching for a way to cope with the violence and uncertainly that wracks their country. As CNN's Kyra Phillips reports, some of them are turning to a wide range of anti-depressant drugs to dull the pain.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): I have never seen anything like it. An armed national Iraqi policeman just walking into a pharmacy and buying this, Valium and cough syrup with codeine to get high. A combination pharmacist Osama Mohammed says Iraqis buy every day.
"The demand just keeps getting greater, Osama says, "as the security situation gets worse. I know what my clients want just by looking at their faces."
Ibrahim Abdul-Aziz comes here for antidepressants. He says they make him feel less nervous.
"I hear explosions while sitting in my house. We hear the bangs when we leave the house," Ibrahim tells me. "I just want relief from everything. Without them, I feel crazed."
Osama says the psychological effects of this war are overwhelming, so Iraqis pop pills, Valium and Prozac are favorites. Osama says the violence is destroying men's sex drives, too. Viagra is now his hottest seller.
"I sell more than ten packets of Viagra a day, plus tonics to activate an erection," Osama tells me. "The psychological effects of the explosions, killing and dead bodies are affecting everyone."
(on camera) Osama sis his customers come in here every day for Viagra and/or antidepressants, and he monitors every single one of them, because he's concerned about overdose. That's why the black market is booming.
(voice-over) Thirteen-year-old Hazim Saleem (ph) says he's not only top of his class but he's the top Viagra vendor in the neighborhood.
When asked who taught you about these medicines, Hazim (ph) says, "I taught myself."
Hazim (ph) sells a packet of Viagra for $1. It costs twice that in the pharmacy. Most of these venders tell me they get these medicines from smugglers.
You can find a pill for almost every ailment: diabetes, bone disease, stomach pain. There's antibiotics, painkillers, even vitamins. Strike a deal and you get your drug.
"We come here," this man tells me, "because we get things we can't get in a pharmacy. It's easier."
An easy fix for temporary moments of peace in a war zone.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HARRIS: Kyra Phillips joining us now from Baghdad.
And Kyra, you sat down with the Iraqi interior minister. And he heads up all Iraqi police. How did he respond to his officers buying drugs in the pharmacy?
PHILLIPS: Yes, actually, I had wanted to talk to him about Iran and the influence of Iran. And then I was working on this piece, Tony, and was pretty much shocked, as you can see by that piece, to see these armed men walk into these pharmacies.
HARRIS: Yes. PHILLIPS: And then when I saw the combination of what they were buying -- valium and cough syrup with codeine, clearly to get a high -- I asked him about that. I said, "Do you realize that your men in uniform with guns are walking into these pharmacies and buying these types of drugs?"
And he didn't beat around the bush at all. This is the response that he gave me.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAWAD AL-BOLANI, IRAQI INTERIOR MINISTER (through translator): We want to fight these activities. They're very dangerous materials which affect the health of the human, and when we get reports of our policemen using drugs we investigate. We're trying to find solutions to these problems and to the addiction.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: So of course, Tony, I asked him, do you do drug testing? Do any of your officers go through drug testing? And he started telling me, well, they go through physicals. They get their eyes checked and they get their heart checked.
And I stopped him and I said, "But I'm asking you, do you test for drugs?"
HARRIS: Yes.
PHILLIPS: "Are you concerned about drug use?"
And he said, "No, at this point we don't do that"
But it's also a situation where they're not up to the times. I mean, this is a new phenomenon. I mean, these -- anyone can go in and get these drugs and kind of come up with their own concoction.
So this is just one more things that the interior ministry is going to have to deal with. And this is the usage of these drug among Iraqis, among police to just get away from the chaos.
HARRIS: Yes. CNN's Kyra Phillips for us in Baghdad. Kyra, thank you.
Iran announcing this morning another bold step toward becoming a nuclear power. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says Iran has begun industrial scale production of enriched uranium. Enriched uranium is the fuel necessary for operating nuclear reactors.
This latest step comes despite U.N.-imposed sanction on Iran.
The U.S. and its allies fear Iran is moving toward building nuclear weapons. President Ahmadinejad says Iran has an undeniable right to nuclear injury. The U.N. Security Council has set a new deadline for late May for Iran to suspend its enrichment program. COLLINS: Immigration. The volatile issue divides Washington. And a controversial fence now rises along the U.S.-Mexican border. Today President Bush comes face to face with both. He'll use the border fence as a backdrop to a much-awaited speech pushing his immigration reform plan.
CNN White House correspondent Ed Henry takes a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: After spending the Easter weekend at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, the president on Monday heads to Yuma, Arizona, to deliver a speech on immigration reform.
The president will be meeting there with U.S. border officials, showing him the latest technology, the tools they use along the U.S.- Mexico border to track down illegal immigrants.
Then the president's speech will be focused on trying to get ahead of the U.S. Senate debate that's coming up in mid-May on the highly-charged emotional debate over immigration reform here in the United States.
Now, ironically, with Democrats now running Congress, the president's comprehensive immigration plan actually has a better chance. Because the president's plan is more in line with what the Democrats have been calling for.
Basically border security plus a guest worker program that will put illegal immigrants who are here in the United States, some 12 million of them, on a path to U.S. citizenship.
The problem for the president, the reason why this will be an uphill battle, is that many conservatives in his own party believe that that's amnesty. The president has denied it, but that is the rub. And, in fact, there may be some Republican senators planning a filibuster against the president's plan.
Ed Henry, CNN, with the president in Crawford, Texas.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HARRIS: Spring surprise to be sure. Record-setting lows putting the deep freeze on Easter weekend. In Ohio, more than a foot of snow fell in some places.
Just forget about opening day baseball in Cleveland. Can we get out of the driveway? The entire weekend was snowed out.
The cold spell also threatening produce farmers. In South Carolina, some of the peach trees look a bit dicey, a bit icy. Some of the state's biggest growers says that at least from this one case, he lost at least five percent of his crops. Strawberry and apple crops also taking a big hit.
COLLINS: Driving on the green side of the road. More carmakers now showing off their environmentally friendly alternatives. We'll take a closer look, ahead in the NEWSROOM.
HARRIS: Live to be 100? Can dietary supplements help you get there? Dr. Sanjay Gupta begins his weeklong series called "Chasing Life". It is also the title of his new book. Where does he find the time? We will tell you how to get an autographed copy absolutely free, coming up right here in the NEWSROOM.
SUSAN LISOVICZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Susan Lisovicz at the New York Stock Exchange. When NEWSROOM returns I'll tell you why that extra hour of daylight may be costing you more. Details next.
You're watching CNN, the most trusted name in news.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: OK. You already know to catch us weekday mornings 9 a.m. until noon Eastern right here in the NEWSROOM. Hey, but now you can take us anywhere on your iPod and make us a part of -- who is that walking in? Is that Saad (ph) walking around there? The CNN NEWSROOM podcast, available to you 24-7 right on your iPod. Join us.
COLLINS: Well, some good news in Washington. Little kids thought they were going to have to maybe really hunt for those Easter eggs on the annual White House Easter egg roll. But that wasn't the case. The South Lawn actually was just fine for all of that.
But want to show you a little bit of video here now. This is Laura Bush doing some of the reading to the children. Here's the book "Duck for President". Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAURA BUSH, FIRST LADY: On election day the voters filled out their ballots in booths all over the country. The vote was counted, and the results were announced on CNN. Decision America: Mr. President got 50 million 50,546,165. Duck got 50,546,170. Duck defeats president.
The president demanded a recount. Ten sticky ballots were found stuck in the bottom of the vice president. The new tally was, Decision America: Mr. President got 50,546,165. Duck got 50,546,180. The voters had spoken. Duck was officially in charge.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: So who is this duck guy anyway?
HARRIS: Yes.
COLLINS: All right. So there you have it. One of the readings being done by the first lady today at the annual Easter egg roll.
CNN, counting the vote. Best political team in television.
HARRIS: That's a reason to run that right there. All right.
COLLINS: I think that's why we may have done that.
HARRIS: I think that's it.
To business news now, drivers listen up. It is getting more expensive to fill up, and it doesn't look like there will be any relief any time soon.
Susan Lisovicz joins us now from the New York Stock Exchange with details.
Susan, good morning.
LISOVICZ: Good morning.
We've got some big numbers for you, too. Fortunately, they're not as big as the numbers that the first lady was just giving.
Gasoline prices are up 60 cents since late January. The Lundberg Survey says the national average for self serve reg jumped 16 cents alone over the past two weeks to $2.79 a gallon.
This year has again been a tough one for motorists. To put it in perspective, if you've got a 20-gallon tank, it now costs you about $56 to fill up, 12 bucks more than it did just in late January.
But keep in mind, we're still 24 cents below last August's record high.
So it depends on how you look at it, Tony. It's probably painful either way.
HARRIS: It is. Do we know what -- what's behind this year's run-up?
LISOVICZ: Some of them are things we hear about all too frequently, to be quite candid.
HARRIS: Yes.
LISOVICZ: Lundberg -- the Lundberg Survey says problems at several of the nation's biggest refineries have cut production at a time when demand is on the rise.
Why is demand on the rise? Well, people have been out and about in their cars, enjoying that extra hour of daylight provided by this year's early arrival of Daylight Savings Time, which is kind of ironic, since the whole point of moving Daylight Savings Time up was to save energy.
HARRIS: Right.
LISOVICZ: Keep in mind, we're less than two months away from the official start of the peak summer driving season. Fill her up now.
(STOCK REPORT)
LISOVICZ: Quick look at what's happening on Wall Street. That's a big number for you.
HARRIS: It is a big number.
LISOVICZ: Tony and Heidi, back to you.
HARRIS: All right, Susan, thank you. See you next hour.
COLLINS: Want to get you straight now to Michigan. Got a house explosion here. This is Detroit, Michigan. Our affiliate there, WDIV.
I don't know much about this time, except, of course, you can see all the crews that are responding to, again, an apparent house explosion. Apparently happened when the owner was doing some repair work on his house.
Boy, see some pretty darn big flames coming out of the roof there. That person or -- actually not sure which person, but one person is apparently injured in all of this.
If you're familiar with the area, it's apparently the New Center section of the city. So we're going to keep our eye on this house explosion, Detroit, Michigan, and watch it for you.
HARRIS: Live to be 100, can dietary supplements help you get there? Dr. Sanjay Gupta begins his weeklong series called "Chasing Life".
You are in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: Well, last week we told you of the Pentagon's plan to redeploy a number of National Guard units, some for the first time, actually, anywhere from 12,000 to 13,000.
We know the states where some of those units also be coming from: Oklahoma City in Oklahoma; Little Rock, Arkansas; Indianapolis, Indiana; and Columbus, Ohio.
The Pentagon adding that the units will be deploying to Iraq for the 2008 through 2010 rotation, some for the first time since the war began, and others are going back to Iraq for a second tour.
So we now know at least some of the states where the deployment is coming from. Again, we're talking about Oklahoma City; Little Rock, Arkansas; Indianapolis; and Columbus, Ohio.
COLLINS: Every day you make small but important decisions that could add or subtract years from your life. So, to help you make the right choices, we are launching a five-part series called "Chasing Life". It's the title of a new book by that handsome guy, our chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, joining us now live from New York.
No disrespect, of course. But congratulations on the book. This is very exciting.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thanks. Good morning.
And you know, one of the things we talk a lot about in the book is this whole idea of people wanting to live longer. Making some simple changes that, you say.
One of those changes they often make is in the form of supplements. Trying to decide what supplements to take, how many to take, what really works and what doesn't work. That's one of the pieces we've really focused on.
A couple that takes about 40 supplements a day. Here's what we found.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GUPTA (voice-over): Every morning Dr. Frank Pinto pops not one supplement, not two, not three, not even four, but 25 different pills, from alpha lipoic acid to zinc.
Dr. Pinto is a dermatologist in Tipton, Georgia. His wife, Rosemary, is a family therapist.
ROSEMARY PINTO, FAMILY THERAPIST: It's really important to me to stay young. I'm six years older than my husband, so I feel a responsibility to stay young physically, emotionally, mentally.
DR. FRANK PINTO, DERMATOLOGIST: There's no way to halt the aging process. It's going to happen. People like myself and rosemary that embark on a program like this, I think that we all -- we want to age gracefully.
GUPTA: They try to eat well. They exercise, and when afternoon rolls around, more pills. All told, the Pintos each swallow more than 40 different supplements every day.
You could say it's a leap of faith. The federal government says Americans spend several billion dollars a year on dietary supplements, and yet the National Institute on Aging doesn't specifically recommend any supplement.
Here are just two examples from the "Journal of the American Medical Association". Does gingko help memory? Probably not. Echinacea to fight colds? Doesn't work.
You've heard of anti-oxidants. People who eat lots of fruits and vegetables that are rich in antioxidants are less likely to get cancer, and they tend to live longer.
But one recent study found that taking antioxidants like vitamin A and E in pill form might actually be harmful. Studies have shown that a good diet, not pills, is the safest and best way to stay healthy.
Frank Pinto agrees. F. PINTO: If you don't eat properly and you don't get any exercise, you know, taking all the supplements is kind of a waste.
GUPTA: But he's not about to give up the pills.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COLLINS: That's a lot of pills, Sanjay.
GUPTA: Yes, you know, as we talk about it, it's a leap of faith for so many people. You know, just trying to take these pills instead of doing the right things for their body.
We're a short-cut society, Heidi.
COLLINS: Right.
GUPTA: And I think people for a long time, I think in part because there was sort of a backlash against conventional medicine. They say, "We want to take supplements and antioxidants and control our own health," which I can see the point of that.
But now we know what works. There's evidence to back up what works and what doesn't. It's not just this alternative sort of fringe medicine anymore. We can really put some science behind it.
COLLINS: It's fascinating. Tell me a little bit more about the book, though. Why was it so important for you to write?
GUPTA: Well, you know, I think we're at this interesting time in our medical history where people are able to live longer than ever before.
And we talk about things like stem cells and nanotechnology and the promise of the future. I mean, that's all going to happen.
But in the meantime, there are some pretty simple things now that aren't just guesswork. It's not just gambling with your health. We really know in terms of the specific types of exercise, the specific types of diet, the specific types of pills that you need to take to really, really control how long you live.
I mean, we get to the point one day where we can say, "I want to live X number of years of sound mind and sound body." We can start to make changes in our lives every day that can do that.
And as a doctor I wanted to make sure, you know, I could get that message out to people. Everything that's in the book and in the documentary, you can hang your hat on.
COLLINS: Love that. What part of "Chasing Life" are you going to be looking at tomorrow with us here?
GUPTA: You know, one of the things we talked a lot about is diet, but there's specifically a diet out there that actually has been proven to extend life. COLLINS: A gluten-free diet.
GUPTA: Well, gluten-free, as you well know, Heidi, is an important diet for people who have that allergy.
COLLINS: I knew you were going to say that.
GUPTA: I know. But there's a diet out there that actually can prolong life if done the right way. We're going to talk all about it and how to implement it into your life. That's going to come up tomorrow.
COLLINS: Excellent. Sanjay, thanks for being here.
GUPTA: Any time.
COLLINS: Good luck for the book. And we are going to continue to follow this all week long.
As a matter of fact, you can catch all of Sanjay's reports in an hour-long CNN special also called "Chasing Life". It will be coming up this Saturday and Sunday 8 p.m. Eastern right here on CNN.
Sanjay's book "Chasing Life" on sale now. For a free -- yes, autographed -- copy go to CNN.com/ChasingLife.
HARRIS: He served the crime, though he never committed the crime.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANTHONY CAPOZZI, EXONERATED THROUGH DNA: I served the time they wanted. And now it's just -- it's just -- follow the yellow brick road.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARRIS: One journey ends, another begins. Cleared after two decades, in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: Not angry and happy to be home on Easter for the first time in 22 years. That's how Anthony Capozzi describes himself. After more than two decades, in prison for two rapes he never committed. New DNA evidence cleared his name.
More now from Rich Newberg of affiliate WIVB.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
A. CAPOZZI: Cheers.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Cheers.
RICH NEWBERG, WIVB CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Anthony Capozzi toasted his family and tasted beer for the first time in more than two decades.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How's it taste?
A. CAPOZZI: Beer, like it did before.
NEWBERG: Before was a long time ago: before he was falsely convicted of raping two women, before he served almost 22 years behind bars. Now, DNA evidence has surfaced directly linking accused bike path killer Alternio Sanchez to those rapes.
When they were younger men, around the time the crimes were committed, they looked similar. Now, Capozzi has been exonerated.
A. CAPOZZI: It's all over now. It's all over now. I served the time they wanted, and now it's just -- it's just follow the yellow brick road.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's it.
A. CAPOZZI: Follow the yellow brick road.
NEWBERG: It has been a difficult road for Anthony Capozzi, having been diagnosed with schizophrenia, before being falsely accused of the crimes. He drew strength from his family, loved ones who visited him in prison, believed in him and knew that someday his name would be cleared.
A. CAPOZZI: I'm always dependent on my family, you know. Me, I says, I'm lost without my family.
PAM GUENTHER, SISTER: He knows that he has us. And he knows he has my mom and dad, and you can get through anything.
NEWBERG: The family says faith got them through it. They accompanied Anthony to church for Easter Sunday mass. His mother prayed for 22 years that this day would come.
MARY CAPOZZI, MOTHER: Oh, my God. I have dreamt of this day so many, many times.
A. CAPOZZI: My mom knows me very well. She knows I need help and care and attention. And I know she knows me.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HARRIS: And good morning, everyone, you're with CNN. You're informed. I'm Tony Harris.
COLLINS: And hi, everybody. I'm Heidi Collins.
HARRIS: The developments keep coming into the NEWSROOM on this Monday, April 9. Here's what's on the rundown.
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