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American Morning
Search for Missing Soldiers in Iraq; Crews Luring Whales to Pacific; Food Stamp Challenge
Aired May 17, 2007 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Crisis. A gallon this morning is more expensive than in the days after Hurricane Katrina.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That is an outrage. And consumers are rightly angry about it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: Congress turns up the heat on big oil, but will it save you money?
Plus, an incredible journey. How did a mother whale and her injured baby stray so far from home. The urgent race to save them on this AMERICAN MORNING.
And good morning to you. It's Thursday, May 17th. I'm Kiran Chetry here in New York.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm John Roberts here in Washington.
Good morning to you, Kiran.
CHETRY: Good to see you.
ROBERTS: Other stories "On Our Radar" this morning. Listen to this one.
A gun shop in southern Louisiana linked to violent crimes shut down. Twenty-three hundred weapons sold there were traced to crimes in the New Orleans area in a five-year period. Is this a turning point for the big easy? We'll find out a little bit later on.
CHETRY: Also, I don't know if you had a chance to see the local papers today. There's one of the tabloids. And it says, "Oh Lolita!." Well, Amy Fisher and Joey Buttafuoco apparently are reuniting. But is it love or is it for a reality show? You remember Amy Fisher, of course, when she was just a teenager and how that whole affair ended. Well, last night, they went out 15 years later to a dinner.
ROBERTS: Just what this world needs, those two back together again. Wow. We begin this morning with two new records. A record on Wall Street and, at the same time, the phenomenal rise in the price of a gallon of gas reaching record highs. The CNN gas gauge shows the average price of a gallon of unleaded at $3.11 now. Some places, like Chicago, are closing in on $4 a gallon. The House Judiciary Committee's anti-trust task force asked the Energy Department and analysts for big oil the same question on everybody's mind -- with oil companies making record profits, are they gouging us?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL SANKEY, DEUTSCHE BANK: No company that I cover, and I told you there's a big range of them, is stupid enough to try and make money by gouging the U.S. consumer. The simple fact is, they don't need to right now. Frankly, they're making so much money just by the nature of the market.
GUY CARUSO, ENERGY INFORMATION ADMIN. ADMINISTRATOR: Well, I'm sorry to have to say that it's probably likely that you'll see me here again next summer explaining why higher prices have again occurred for some reason, which we can't even determine now, whether it be hurricanes, industrial accidents or a robust global economy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: One consumer advocate thinks that they have the clue as to why gas prices are so high, saying the oil companies are purposely keeping supplies tight to keep prices up. If you think that you've got it bad, though, imagine making a living driving around. Do you have to charge a surcharge to your customers? A lot of people are trying to do that. Coming up, we'll check in with a cabby in Chicago who's doing just that.
Kiran.
CHETRY: All right. In the meantime, the markets, they don't necessarily seem to care about prices at the pump raising because they're actually racing to another high. And Ali Velshi is here to talk more about that.
First of all, do you think we may have hit the peak in terms of gas prices?
ALI VELSHI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We virtually never hit the peak in May. We're not even at Memorial Day yet. This is now when we might be.
Now you're hearing from all sides about whether gas prices will go higher or lower. The bottom line is, as you just heard that gentleman at Congress, this is not hurricanes, this is not industrial accidents, this is a bunch of refineries that are not working. It's a lot of people driving. More people are going to drive again this weekend. So there's no indication that our gas prices are going lower anytime soon. This is a problem.
CHETRY: And you said something interesting to me when we were talking that, what is the -- there really is no motivation for oil companies to get more refineries up and running because then they'll be able to charge less for their product.
VELSHI: Right. This is one of those things where their refineries go out of service. We've got about 800,000 barrels a day of oil not being refined into gas that should be right now because the refineries are out of service. But that happens.
So your refinery stops working and the product you're selling is in greater demand and the price goes up. And that's one of the arguments that was heard at Congress yesterday, that what's the impetus to actually get more refineries? The gas companies or oil companies say, every time they try and build refineries, they get held by back by the communities that don't want them, because they're filthy, by the environmental protection agency. We haven't had one in 30 years.
The oil companies also say, they've been adding on to their refineries. So they've increased refining capacity. Just because we haven't built brand new refineries doesn't mean we're not refining more gas.
The problem is, we're peaking out. Americans are driving so much and using so much gas that we're hitting a wall at how much we can actually refine. If all our refineries were working properly at full tilt, we still wouldn't have enough gas for everybody. So this is a big problem.
Now, why don't markets care? It's confusing, right? We've got housing problems. We've got gas problems. Why are markets still hitting records?
Yesterday, take a look at what happened. The Dow up more than 100 points to 13,487. The Nasdaq up 22 to 2,547. The S&P now within striking distance of its all-time high because if you don't know what's going on in the market, look to some of the richest, most successful people in the world and see what they're doing.
Warren Buffet has disclosed he's been buying Johnson & Johnson, Norfolk Southern, the railway, Union Pacific, the insurance company, WellPoint. Eddie Lampert, who owns Sears, has been buying Citigroup. George Soros has been buying stocks of Microsoft. And Karl Icahn has been buying stocks in Anadarko Petroleum.
So what people are saying is the rich guys are buying stocks, let's buy stocks, too.
CHETRY: All right. Good advice. Thanks, Ali.
ROBERTS: Wolfowitz is still president of the World Bank this morning, but sources say he's working on a way out. They say resignation talks hinge on Wolfowitz being cleared of wrongdoing for getting a pay raise for his girlfriend at the bank. The White House is also trying to get the bank to accept part of the blame.
Was it eight or was it 26? Just how many federal prosecutors did the Justice Department originally consider firing? This morning's "Washington Post" reports that it was 26, in contrast to what Attorney General Alberto Gonzales told the Senate Judiciary Committee last week. And Gonzales has lost the support of yet another Republican. Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska has joined the calls asking for him to resign.
CHETRY: Well, thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq are searching for three missing American soldiers. And so far, they've had no trace of them. The military is offering a $200,000 reward for information. The soldiers were captured in an ambush last Saturday. One of the four men killed that day has still not been identified.
And the Senate is expected today to clear the way for negotiations with the House, as well as the White House, on paying for the Iraq War. A vote to cut funding by next spring failed yesterday and senators appeared ready to settle on just benchmarks. It was the first time that all four Senate Democrats that are running for president supported cutting funds. The most symbolic vote, though, was symbolic mostly. It failed 29-67. The House has voted to fund the war in two-month installments.
ROBERTS: Britain's Prince Harry is "very disappointed" this morning. The 22-year-old prince, third in line to the British throne, won't be going to Iraq with his regimen. With more on the story, let's go live to CNN's Paula Newton. She's outside Buckingham Palace for us this morning.
Just to dangerous, Paula, for everyone involved?
PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, John, this has a lot more to do with the situation on the ground in Iraq than it has to do with any kind of a PR situation or PR spin here. There was a lot of bravado leading up to this, John. They had heard all the threats against Prince Harry. One, you know, saying that, look, we're going to return the body of Harry to his grandmother here at Buckingham Palace without his ears.
The army originally dismissed all that, John. But what changed was Sir Richard Dannett, who's the head of the army here, went for himself to have a look see in southern Iraq last week. What happened was, he got specific information about the threat to Harry.
Now it's not so much about his life. It is a lot more about the lives of the soldiers around them and whether or not he would be specifically targeted. But two major things going on in Iraq that are very disconcerting here right now. One is the influx of foreign fighters. Allegedly, the U.S. alleges and Britain alleges, with the help of Iran, getting to many more sophisticated, explosive devices.
You know, John, last month, in April was the deadliest month for British soldiers in Iraq. Two of the soldiers killed by a roadside bomb, doing the exact same job in the exact same place where Harry was to be deployed. Sir Richard Dannett decided that is just too much.
And at this point in time, beyond the issue with Harry, British soldiers are looking at the situation in southern Iraq and wondering how they're going to turn things around. They thought that they were able to turn over a lot of the security problems over to the Iraqi soldiers there in the region. That has not worked as well as they hoped and they do believe that they are going backwards in that region, at least for the time being.
John.
ROBERTS: Not good news for the effort there.
Paula Newton outside Buckingham Palace.
Paula, thanks.
CHETRY: It took more than 50 years, but now trains are moving between North and South Korea today. Two trains, going in opposite directions, made the test trip across the heavy fortified demilitarized zone. They're seeing this as a highly significant event. Possibly moving toward more reconciliation between Seoul and Pyongyang. About 150 people were on board for that historic trip. North Korea, though, has not announced whether or not it will allow regular service to be restored on the line.
ROBERTS: This morning, scientists will try to rescue two whales that are stranded in a river near Sacramento, California. They'll do it by playing humpback whale sounds underwater, hoping to lure the whales back toward San Francisco Bay, which is 90 miles away from where they are. Marine experts say the whales, believed to be a mother and her calf, appear to have been injured, perhaps by a ship's propeller.
CHETRY: And they were saying that if the wounds are only as deep as the bulbar and they can get back into saltwater, which is much more healing, they should be OK. So we'll see. A pretty unique thing that they're going to try to do with the music.
ROBERTS: It's very difficult to get a whale that is trying to strand itself back out in open water. You know, we see that all the time in Cape Cod, all those whales beaching themselves. And most of them die.
CHETRY: Well, we don't know if this is that case or if they may have gotten thrown off. I mean they operate on a sonar system, as well, of sorts and so maybe they just sort of took a wrong turn. But we'll see. We'll continue to follow this story.
In the meantime, coming up, extreme weather moving across the Northeast. In Connecticut, severe storms mean dangerous conditions. Thousands left without power this morning.
Also severe weather expert Chad Myers will break it down for us coming up.
And it's one of the south's largest and most notorious gun stores. The feds, though, have put it out of business and we will explain why and the impact on crime rates in the area. Plus, could you live on $21 worth of food a week? Some congressmen are trying to do it to prove a point, and we're going to show you more on why, coming up on AMERICAN MORNING. The most news in the morning here on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Well, unwelcome to some, a Godsend to others. Rain from damaging storms in the Northeast, but helping to fight against a huge wildfire in New Jersey. That fire tore through 14,000 acres in less than 24 hours, about 25 miles north of Atlantic City. And it's now expected to be under control by the end of the day. A flare from a fighter jet on a training mission is believed to have been the cause of that fire.
On the other side of those storms, it's very visible in Connecticut, the damage. High winds bringing trees and power lines down. Some 60,000 people were without power at the height of the storm yesterday afternoon.
And just north of New York City, in Chappaqua, the National Weather Service actually looking into reports of a funnel cloud.
Twelve minutes past the hour now and we're going to get a check on that with Chad.
Chad, I happened to be coming back from a news story yesterday in that area in Connecticut and, boy, it was coming down in sheets.
(WEATHER REPORT)
ROBERTS: It was one of the busiest gun shops in the United States, and the feds say a top seller of guns that were later used in crimes. A Louisiana weapons dealer is out of business this morning after a sweeping raid by federal agents. Will this help turn around a wave of violent crimes in New Orleans? AMERICAN MORNING's Sean Callebs is live in Jefferson Parish just outside New Orleans.
And just how big was this, Sean? How many guns did they seize? How many guns do they believe were used in crimes?
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, let me give you an idea on the number of guns that were seized. ATF agents were out here yesterday all day. They just came back, I'd say within the last 15 or 20 minutes. Throughout the day, they were taking out weapons, they were taking out ammunition, they were taking out supplies from this gun shop you see behind me. Elliott's. It may say open, but I can tell you, it is going to be closed.
Violent crime hasn't had an impact on the city in terms of rebuilding when we're talking about bricks and mortar. But if you talk about the psyche of the people here in this city, it has had a tremendous impact. The number of killings, drug related crimes.
Well, let me show you some numbers the ATF is telling us involved in guns at this shop. More than 2,300 gun that can be traced back to crimes in the New Orleans area over the past five years. Guns purchased at this shop. And 125 of those used in killings, 500 used in drug-related crimes. Simply staggering numbers.
Another thing authorities are talking about, a blatant disregard for not only law but safety in something called a straw purchase. I'll let the ATF explain that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID HARPER, ATF SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, NEW ORLEANS: We feel that a significant amount of the crime guns being recovered on the streets of New Orleans are being diverted into the illegal market through straw purchasing. Straw purchasing is a method by which a nonprohibited person fills out the paperwork and buys a firearm that's actually intended for a prohibited person.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CALLEBS: Well, John, that bears repeating. Think about it. Someone would can't buy a hand gun goes into a store with someone who legally can. The person who legally can, buys it. Simply hands it over or sells it to the person who is banned from buying weapons.
ROBERTS: Sean, this investigation was going on for 15 months. Why did they decide to move in now?
CALLEBS: You know, I'm sure a lot of people in this area are going to be asking that today considering the number of murders we've seen in this area over the past year. But the authorities said they needed that time to basically build their case. They had informants working for them. And say said that they went public at this time simply out of concern for safety for people in the New Orleans areas.
ROBERTS: Anybody expecting this to make a difference, a dent in crime in that area?
CALLEBS: It's tough to say. I mean the ATF certainly is saying by simply getting a staggering number of guns off the street, they hope it is going to have an impact there. I mean just look at the stats that they spewed out yesterday. And watching these ATF agents carry out arm loads of guns, certainly one hopes that it will. But if you think about it, the Glock is almost a weapons issue to thugs these days because of the power, the number of rounds it can hold in a clip. So certainly authorities are going to be very busy. Nothing's going to end here.
ROBERTS: Well, I think it's safe to say that the fewer number of illegal guns that are out there, the better we all are.
CALLEBS: Exactly.
ROBERTS: Sean, thanks very much.
CHETRY: And continuing with this, the latest troubling numbers on crime across the country showed that criminals are younger and more violent. The FBI is saying violent crimes up 3.7 percent across the country in the first half of last year. That's when they're doing the stats. The most startling increase, though, is in the city of Philadelphia. Here's CNN justice correspondent Kelli Arena.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KELLI ARENA, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): In Philadelphia, especially here in the Badlands, violence has claimed 150 lives this year.
OFFICER MICHAEL MOORE, PHILADELPHIA POLICE DEPARTMENT: In our 10 years of being on the police department, this is definitely the worst that it's ever been.
ARENA: Police Officer Michael Moore patrols the most dangerous streets where the criminals are often better armed than the cops.
COMM. SEYMOUR JOHNSON, PHILADELPHIA POLICE: Eighty-five percent of our homicides are by hand guns. We have the most lax gun laws in the entire country in Philadelphia. And I think that our legislatures have to take a very, very close look at that.
ARENA: Another casket, another grieving mother, memorial t- shirts and lots of tears. Crimativo Sanchez (ph) was 20-years-old. His friends called him Ganiko (ph). His mother says he was shot after an argument over his car.
EMILY RUIZ, VICTIM'S MOTHER: I thought they would, like, beat him up or fight with him or something or take his car. But not to kill him. He was innocent. My son was innocent.
ARENA: But today, in Philadelphia, grudges are settled with bullets, not fists.
Residents here say that there are a lot of reasons for the violence -- gangs, drugs, poverty. But every single person we talked to said the biggest reason by far is how easy it is to get a gun.
Now city officials are putting more cops on the streets. There's a curfew and surveillance cameras. And residents, too, are taking action. Many of these marchers are victims of violence.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Put down your guns.
ARENA: This is Greg Bucharoni (ph). He mentors young boys in crisis, like Alex Moreno.
ALEX MORENO, 9TH GRADER: He got me away from the streets in Lamore (ph) and he like -- he helped me realize that what I was doing was wrong.
ARENA: And where he could end up.
Kelli Arena, CNN, Philadelphia.
(END VIDEOTAPE) CHETRY: This week, the federal government announced a crackdown on crime. Agents going to target gangs. More federal money will also go to local law enforcement.
John.
ROBERTS: So how much are all of the 2008 presidential candidates worth combined? The presidential candidates have now reported their income for the last couple of years. We're going to our Internet desk next for the sky high numbers, particularly when it comes to Giuliani.
And speaking of money, is that what's really behind the reunion of Amy Fisher and Joey Buttafuoco? The world wants to know. The details behind their romantic dinner next. You're watching AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Well, maybe they are reunited, or maybe it's just all for money. But Amy and Joey are together again after 15 years. Amy Fisher, the so-called Long Island Lolita, there she is right before she was sentenced to prison. And there's Joey Buttafuoco. He denied he had anything to do with it. She claimed he encouraged her to kill his wife.
Well, you remember their torrid 1992 affair. Amy shot Joey's then wife Mary Jo in the head. She survived. Well, the two dined last night. They put all their troubles behind them at a swank Long Island steakhouse. Joey's current spouse and Amy's husband both recently served them with divorce papers, so they seem to have found comfort in the arms of one another. Was the date, though, for money or was it for love? Because a TV producer is reportedly shopping an Amy-Joey reality show.
ROBERTS: You know, there are some things you just don't need to see. A sausage being made is one and those two back together again is the other one.
CHETRY: Those are the top two for the morning. You're right, John.
ROBERTS: Yes, exactly.
Rudy Giuliani made millions of dollars giving speeches. John Edwards made millions from investments. That's just a sampling as the presidential candidates had to report their incomes. Jacki Schechner joins us now with more.
Who you going to start with here?
JACKI SCHECHNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I like these money stories because they remind me of where I am in life and then where they are.
ROBERTS: Yes, compared to everybody else.
SCHECHNER: We're going to start with Edwards first. He and his wife, Elizabeth Edwards, have reported a combined assets of $29.5 million. A lot of that money from investing in the Fortress Group and also for consulting services that Edwards did for this group. That comes out to about $500,000. Also his book royalties, about $333,000. He donated that to charity.
ROBERTS: Governor Mike Huckabee might say that that all adds up to a lot of trips from the salon.
SCHECHNER: That's very, very true. Good come back on that debate reference.
Let's go to Giuliani. His stuff is really interesting. A total of $13 to $45 million in assets. So a wide range there. We're not exactly sure of the numbers. But $16.1 million of income in speaking fees over 16 months. I thought this would be fun to page through. These are all the speeches that he gave.
ROBERTS: It averages about $100,000, right?
SCHECHNER: About $100,000.
ROBERTS: He's in Bill Clinton territory.
SCHECHNER: Yes, he gets a lot of -- I mean, this is pages and pages. The totals that he actually takes home is about $9 million.
ROBERTS: And Bill Clinton would make a lot more if he didn't donate about half of his speeches to charity.
SCHECHNER: Is that true? Yes.
ROBERTS: It's actually far more than half.
SCHECHNER: So that's the total there. He's also got Giuliani and Company, which brings in about $4 million. And then Bracewell. A law and lobbying firm that he's a part of, brings in about 1.2. He's got a book too, "Leadership," about his 9/11 experiences and that earned him about $146,000.
ROBERTS: So he's flush with cash?
SCHECHNER: Very much so. What's interesting is Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, report a significantly lower income when it comes to their personal assets.
ROBERTS: Pretty modest with them, isn't it?
SCHECHNER: Very much so. $457,000 up to $1.14 million. That's what the estimate. And then his book is really accounting for a lot of that. That's about $180,000 of assets for an advance and then for -- oh, I'm sorry, for royalties in advance of the $500,000.
ROBERTS: All right. So they, obviously, they've got a very modest property and the income that you get, too, when you're a senator is modest (INAUDIBLE).
SCHECHNER: In comparison, yes. But it would be interesting to see what speaking fees he might garner down the line.
ROBERTS: Oh, I'm sure it's going to be huge, particularly if he ever becomes president.
Jacki, thanks.
SCHECHNER: Sure.
ROBERTS: Appreciate it.
Kiran.
CHETRY: All right. Twenty-six past the hour right now and Ali Velshi is "Minding Your Business."
Hey, Ali.
VELSHI: Oh, my God, for everything that's going on yesterday, just before noon, this rumor comes up that the i-Phone is going to be delayed. It's not going to come out in June, it's going to come out in October. Oh, my God. Nothing makes Apple stock go down. This made Apple's stock go down. Unbelievable.
Apple stock doesn't go down when there are rumors of - not rumors, admissions of options backdating, of possible scandal. None of that affects this company. But the rumor that this i-Phone was going to be delayed sent the stock down $3. The stock's way over $100. So, you know, it doesn't really affect it. But, look at that, I mean, that's a bit of a dump on Apple stock.
CHETRY: What happened?
VELSHI: It turns out it was a rumor. It was an e-mail posted on Ngadget (ph), which is a well-known tech site, purportedly from Apple to employees saying it's going to be delayed. It and the new operating system are going to be delayed. Well, it turns out that someone -- Apple says someone faked that e-mail to its employees. It retracted the e-mail. They posted a clarification on the Web site. The sock went up. So it closed down a little bit. But can you imagine, that's the one thing.
CHETRY: So when's the i-Phone coming out?
VELSHI: Still coming out in June.
CHETRY: All right.
VELSHI: Don't you worry. You're going to get your i-Phones.
CHETRY: And it's somehow very cool, I take it?
VELSHI: It's very cool.
CHETRY: OK. Ali, thanks so much.
Well, our top stories are coming up next. CNN embedded with a military team that is on the hunt right now for the three missing soldiers. We have Arwa Damon there with the troops as they hunt door to door. Are they finding any clues? We're going to check in with her in a few minutes.
Plus, could you live on $21 worth of food a week? Many Americans do. We're going to find out what it's like. How much can you eat a day?
Plus, a mistaken jackpot.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If your numbers match, win that prize. My numbers matched.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: He thought he won a fortune playing lotto, the scratch offs, until a lot of people told him to go scratch. We're going to find out what happened next on AMERICAN MORNING. The most news in the morning here on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Live picture of the White House this morning. You can see the slash of sunrise coming across the north portico there, and you can see the screen that's also been set up for the official visit of Tony Blair. He has spent the night at the White House, as opposed to Blair House, across the street, which is where the queen stayed. And this will be his last official visit to Washington as the prime minister of Britain.
Welcome back. It's Thursday, May the 17th.
I'm John Roberts in Washington.
CHETRY: And I'm Kiran Chetry in New York.
(NEWSBREAK)
ROBERTS: Developments this morning in the search for three missing American soldiers in Iraq. There are reports that the military has captured people who took part in the ambush and might have recovered equipment belonging to the missing men.
CNN's Arwa Damon is on the ground with some of the 6,000 troops that are taking part in this massive manhunt. She just visited the site of the ambush.
Arwa, what's the latest on the search?
ARWA DAMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, the search most definitely is ongoing, and it's just as intense as it has ever been. The U.S. military going through here, trying to follow up on any sort of lead that they can possibly find. I am actually currently about a mile away from where the ambush took place at one of the outposts here that actually responded to the attacks. And I have to say, the troops here are really trying to keep up a tough front.
This is a very, very dangerous area. And going to the attack site, you could still see the burns on the ground where the Humvees had caught fire. And you also can see the thick vegetation that is around that attack site that allowed the insurgents that carried out the attack to take cover.
And that sort of vegetation actually exists throughout this entire area. It borders the Euphrates River and it provides the insurgents perfect opportunity to lay their roadside bombs, and just makes it increasingly difficult for the U.S. forces to try to find their missing men.
Just to give you an idea of this area, just about every single soldier I spoke to has some sort of story about either surviving a roadside bomb or being hit by a roadside bomb. In fact, before setting out a couple of hours ago on this patrol that we were on, we were briefed not to step on the soft terrain next to the paved roads, to run quickly off the road when exiting our vehicles.
They don't use natural bridges that exist across the canals here. Instead, they prefer to jump across and traverse across them in spots that the insurgents would not guess that they would cross them at. That is exactly how deadly this area is.
I spoke with a young medic who was actually one of the medics on scene after Saturday's attack, and he said that it was simply horrifying, that he was absolutely determined to keep going to find the missing soldiers, saying that for now he was going to -- he was trying to and was successful at, in fact, boxing up those memories of that trauma, that his concern was that when he went back home, those demons that he confronted out here would just come out to haunt him -- John.
ROBERTS: Yes, an incredibly dangerous area, which is why it has been named the Triangle of Death.
Arwa Damon for us with the latest.
Thanks, Arwa. We'll get back to you a little bit later on this morning.
Paul Wolfowitz is still president of the World Bank this morning, but sources say he is working on a way out. They say resignation talks hinge on Wolfowitz being cleared of any wrongdoing for getting a pay raise for his girlfriend at the bank. The White House is also trying to get the bank to accept part of the blame.
CHETRY: Well, Joe Cursio (ph) thought he won $500,000 in the lottery, but the Florida Lottery Commission says he actually didn't. Cursio (ph) says that he scratched off his ticket to reveal that he won a $500,000 prize. But the Florida Lottery Commission says the ticket was misprinted.
Don't they always say that? Well, they say the number one at the top should have actually been a 13, not a 1, and that's why the letters beneath it are "TH," not "ONE". Well, Cursio (ph) says, hey, that's not his fault, and he wants the money. A computer scan of the bar code came up saying, "No winner".
We'll see if they make good, because he did scratch off a 1.
Scientists in California this morning are trying to rescue two whales that were stranded in a river in California. Crews are planning to play whale sounds under water in hopes of getting the pair to follow them some 90 miles back into San Francisco Bay.
Joining us on the phone right now from Sacramento to talk more about the effort is Dr. Frances Gulland, with the Marine Mammal Center.
Thanks so much for joining us this morning.
DR. FRANCES GULLAND, MARINE MAMMAL CENTER: You're welcome.
CHETRY: So, Frances, tell us a little bit about what you saw when you had a chance to get a look at the whales. How are they doing?
GULLAND: Well, both whales are still swimming. They're not actually stranded ashore. They're swimming in open water. But both of them have some pretty serious injuries.
The female has a nasty two-foot-long about six-inches-deep gash across her back that's very typical of a propeller wound. And the young calf has a deeper wound on his side that we can't get a good look at because it's mostly under water, but it looks pretty severe.
CHETRY: And how did they get those?
GULLAND: The most likely cause is a propeller from a boat.
CHETRY: So when they came into the wrong waters, into the river area, they just got too close to some boats?
GULLAND: That's the most likely cause. It's possible they had the injuries before they came up the river, but because we've been watching them for the last few days, the wounds actually look fresh and don't look more than three or four days old. So...
CHETRY: How are you going to get them back to where they're supposed to be, in the saltwater, in the San Francisco Bay?
GULLAND: This is going to be extremely difficult. They are now about 70 miles from where they should be, and the river is quite torturous. There are a lot of mudflats opening off the river between here and the Golden Gate Bridge, so we are very concerned about the animals, and especially the young calf with his injury. At this point, we -- you know, we really hope everything goes well, but we are really concerned about their health, as well.
CHETRY: All right. So plan A is to try to lure them using those sounds and make sure they don't make a wrong turn as here heading back. If that doesn't work, can you physically move them, or is that just not practical?
GULLAND: It's not practical for an animal that size. And it would be extremely stressful on both animals.
So they really have to go of their own free will. So we really hope that they'll respond to these humpback calls, these noises of other animals. And clearly, they want to be on a feeding ground. The female is hungry. So we really do hope that she will follow these sounds.
CHETRY: All right.
Dr. Frances Gulland with the Marine Mammal Center, on the phone.
Thank you for joining us.
And by the way, John, this happened to another whale, hump-free, a little while back. It was 26 days when he was where he wasn't supposed to be and did make it back, despite the fact that he had an injury, also. So they could still make it.
ROBERTS: Yes. And the longer they stay there, as well, that exposure to fresh water does, you know, blister and peel their skin. So it's important to get them out as quickly as possible.
Hopefully, they'll be able to do that.
Coming up, could you live on $21 worth of food for a week? We'll tell you why a congressman is trying to do just that.
And what happens when a rabbit and a snake get into it? We'll show you. We've got the video.
You're watching AMERICAN MORNING. The most news in the morning is on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Well, what's it like to live off just $21 worth of food for a week? Four members of Congress are now trying to find out what that's like to spend a whole entire week on what they might normally spend on an appetizer. And they're taking what's called the food stamp challenge.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JIM MCGOVERN (D), MASSACHUSETTS: I am taking this food stamp challenge as a way of saying that, as Americans, we need to do more to eliminate hunger and poverty in this country.
CHETRY (voice over): Jim McGovern, along with three other members of Congress, decided to try to live on just $21 worth of food for entire week. That's the average amount for someone who lives on government-provided food stamps.
Congressman Tim Ryan spent $20.60 on food from Safeway and had to make tough choices.
REP. TIM RYAN (D), OHIO: You have $21, and you have to figure out how you're going to make it last, where you're going to get enough calories, enough to keep, you know, your stomach full over the course of seven days.
CHETRY: The Congress members want to get legislation passed that would add another $4 billion to the currently $33 billion annual federal food stamp budget. They say it's currently inadequate.
MCGOVERN: In the wealthiest country on earth, it is not about finding the resources. It is about mustering the political will.
CHETRY: The USDA, who administers the food stamp program, says that it would welcome Congress approving a higher budget, but also points out that food stamps are meant to be supplementary, not lived off exclusively.
Representative Jim McGovern says that food stamps don't take into account skyrocketing living costs or other factors.
MCGOVERN: We're the richest country in the world. I mean, it's immoral, in my opinion, that there are people in this country that are hungry.
CHETRY: Two days into the food stamp challenge, representatives McGovern, Jo Ann Emerson and Janice Schakowsky dined on lentils and leftover salad from Emerson's dinner the night before.
MCGOVERN: The rule is I get to live on basically $3 a day.
CHETRY: His staff worries about caffeine withdrawal.
MCGOVERN: I bought Safeway Select, like $1.50 worth of coffee. But I'm saving that for a moment when I can savor it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHETRY: Well, although $3 a day doesn't sound like much, it does add up to an extra $126 a month for an average low-income family of six. The USDA points out that only 60 percent of those eligible actually participate.
Coming up in our next hour, we're going to talk with Congressman Tim Ryan about the choices he had to make taking that food stamp challenge -- John.
ROBERTS: Got something interesting to show you know. Check out this video that we found on YouTube.
President Jimmy Carter once fought a killer rabbit, as did the cast of "Monty Python". Now this snake is doing the same thing.
Take a look at this. The rabbit comes up to the snake, the snake jumps, and look at the rabbit leap away. Eventually, the snake just gave up trying to scare the rabbit and slithered away. No animals, by the way, were harmed in the making of this video.
CHETRY: Yes, he just -- it was too much trouble for lunch, so he left to go find another lunch.
ROBERTS: I would imagine swallowing that rabbit would have been difficult.
CHETRY: Yes, well, they do it. It's pretty gross to see, because there is the snake and then there's this big swollen stomach, and then the rest of the snake.
Well, that's nature for you, though.
Coming up, with gas prices at record levels, we're going to talk to a cab driver struggling to make a living. He's calling for a dollar surcharge in the city of Chicago because he's saying it's not making any sense to even drive anymore because of the price of gas. We're going to talk to him coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Well, we've been talking about record gas prices. Now they're at $3.11 a gallon for regular unleaded. That's the national average. But in Chicago, they're paying closer to $4 a gallon, and every penny is another pinch in the wallet for Chicago's cabbies.
Ken Cooper is just coming off of the night shift. He's been driving the streets of Chicago for more than 30 years.
Hi, Ken. Thanks for being with us.
KEN COOPER, CAB DRIVER: How are you, Kiran? Welcome to Chicago.
CHETRY: Thanks. We can see the sign right over your shoulder there, $3.79 a gallon. Pretty high...
COOPER: And that's regular.
CHETRY: That's regular.
COOPER: My car takes premium. If I use regular, it starts to ping.
CHETRY: I got it.
COOPER: And that's self-service. Full-service is $4.49.9 a gallon.
CHETRY: It's unbelievable how high the prices have gone.
Now, how much are you and other cab drivers getting to take home in a day now, given the gas price is so high?
COOPER: Well, I'm an owner, so I see both sides. I own my own medallion, drive the cab myself, and I'm making about $80 a day after expenses. And that's working pretty hard.
CHETRY: All right. So it's turning out in some cases to just not be worth it for people. Cabbies are hanging it up?
COOPER: Not only that. The guys that rent their cabs pay about $95 a day, plus gas. Their break even point is $120.
A lot of them aren't making it. And they have no health insurance. And it's just a bad situation, so they're dropping out of the market. So there's a lot of cabs parked in garages, a lot of owners that own more than one medallion, like a 10-cab fleet, they can't get drivers.
But they still have to pay insurance and depreciation on the cars. So a lot of the owners are going bankrupt.
CHETRY: So your solution, or the one that you're proposing to city council, you would like at least $1 temporary surcharge for gas and also a $25 percent fare hike?
COOPER: They need immediate relieve. On the 8th, I paid $3.67.9. On the 11th, I paid $3.69.9. Today I'm paying $3.99.9 for gasoline a gallon. It's just going up to fast, we can't even catch up.
CHETRY: They did hear your plight in at least some way, shape or form. They gave you an 11 percent increase about three months ago. You want to add a dollar to that.
COOPER: No, no, that wasn't three months ago.
CHETRY: In May, right?
COOPER: That was over two years ago. Two years ago we had an 11 percent increase.
CHETRY: OK.
COOPER: And the reason we did that is to get it through quickly. And it still took almost a year for the city council to give that to us. We have a lot of cab drivers here...
(CROSSTALK)
CHETRY: Did that help, though? Did that help, that 11 percent hike?
COOPER: It hardly did anything. And a lot of the cab drivers here have green cards. They don't vote. The city council doesn't want to raise the meter on Chicago citizens and the conventions, so the cab drivers are caught in the middle.
CHETRY: Who do you blame for this?
COOPER: I blame the inaction of the City Council of Chicago. They don't want to even look at the figures. They're not that interested.
Most of the cab drivers, like I say, they don't vote. So -- and the cab drivers aren't unionized. So we're not organized. This would away ripe area for a good union to come in and organization the Chicago cab industry.
CHETRY: And do you think if you go up $1 and you get a 25 percent hike in fares, that you're going to turn customers away? They're going to say forget it, I'll try to walk, I'll do something else, I don't want to pay that much?
COOPER: A lot of the people in Chicago have sold their cars. It costs $250 a month to park their cars. They don't even know what gasoline costs.
I pick up people at O'Hare coming into Chicago. They're shocked that our prices are so low. In New York, you get into a cab, it's $2.50. Ours is $2.25, and then get -- from 4:00 to 8:00 they get $3.50 to get in -- or an extra $1.40. Four dollars to get in a cab.
And from 8:00 to 6:00 in the morning, they get an extra dollar. We don't. We get $2.25.
CHETRY: I got you, Ken.
COOPER: We don't get a surcharge. The surcharge is only good for 60 days.
CHETRY: And it sound like you guys definitely are between a rock and a hard place. I appreciate you talking to us this morning about it.
Good luck.
COOPER: Good talking to you, Kiran.
ROBERTS: "American Idol" proves that it can still be full of surprises. A shocker of an elimination narrows it down to the final two. That's coming up next.
And guess who is getting a break? Paris Hilton getting special treatment before she even sees the inside of a jail cell.
You're watching AMERICAN MORNING. The most news in the morning is on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Three minutes until the top of the hour now. Ali Velshi "Minding Your Business".
You had a chance to hear my interview with Ken, the cabby out of Chicago.
ALI VELSHI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. I thought he was really interesting.
CHETRY: Tough times for them.
VELSHI: Tough times, and I think he's right, there's very little political power base for cab drivers. In fact, what he described about Chicago is the case in many big cities.
Sometimes the cabbies are not voters. They've got -- they're not unionized. They've got a tough time about it.
Now, the average -- that's what a cab looks like in Chicago. They're different colors. It looks like a cab everywhere else.
It's a Ford Crown Victoria, which is one of the most popular cabs in the country. It gets 12 miles to the gallon of gas, so that's not great. And they drive around in the city a lot.
In Chicago, the average ride is about five miles and five minutes' waiting time, worth about $12 or $13 without a tip. So, take a look at how much -- you know, this is what these cab drivers cost, what they pay in a day.
I'm calculating they make about 40 trips a day.
CHETRY: And that's high.
VELSHI: And that's high. You have got to work hard to do that.
When you take in the least cost, the least of the medallion, the cab driver has to make at least 10 of these in a day, 10 of the average rides just to break even, just to pay for the gas and the lease.
That's not anything else to do with maintenance. If you own the car like big cities, like Boston and Chicago and San Francisco, the leases are very expensive, so many cabbies don't own them. So they are paying out of their pocket to do this.
Now, many other industries, like the FedEx and UPS and the airlines, as we say, have tacked on those increases. Hard to know whether it works for the cabbies, but it's worth thinking about the fact that they still have a tough time.
CHETRY: You're right. And when we saw this, the cab drivers, just one little snippet of the overall impact, because you see it with the florist and you see it with the food deliveries.
VELSHI: That's right. People do a lot of work in their cars.
CHETRY: All right. Thanks, Ali.
ROBERTS: A couple quick hits before the top of the hour here.
(NEWSBREAK)
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