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American Morning

Tahoe Fire: Advancing on Hundreds More Homes; GOP War Revolt; Wrestler Deaths: Was it Roid Rage?; Tony Blair's Last Day

Aired June 27, 2007 - 06:58   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): On the move. New fears high winds will refuel a devastating wildfire that's jumped one containment line and is advancing toward hundreds more homes.

Plus, a new round of storms down South. Destructive floods an daring rescues on this AMERICAN MORNING.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTS: And good morning to you and thanks for joining us.

It's Wednesday, the 27th of June.

I'm John Roberts, along with Kiran Chetry.

KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Good to see you this morning, John.

(NEWSBREAK)

ROBERTS: As if they haven't had enough rain, floodwaters are rising again in Texas. A band of thunderstorms swept through the state on Tuesday. As much as five inches of rain fell in some places. More storms are forecast today in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

And a massive flood across Oklahoma. Two teenage sisters were rescued after their car stalled in bumper-deep floodwaters. Local television news video showed a firefighter in a raft pulling the girls out of the back window one at a time. Both of them thankfully are fine.

CHETRY: And from flooding to fires, there is a do-or-die battle that's going on right now to save hundreds of homes from the Lake Tahoe fire. About 200-plus homes have already burned, and about a thousand buildings, including homes, are now in danger of burning. They are in the fire's path right now.

Firefighters are trying to get control of the wildfire before the winds pick up. That's expected to happen this afternoon.

AMERICAN MORNING'S Chris Lawrence is live for us again at South Lake Tahoe in Meyers, California, with an update.

Hi, Chris.

CHRIS LAWRENCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, good morning, Kiran.

Yes, now firefighters and neighbors know what this fire can do. Take a look behind me. You can see what it did here to this home. Nothing standing, except the fireplace.

I mean, it literally burned this home to the ground. Nothing but ash and debris left from what was a fairly large home, you know, just a few days ago.

It is amazing how much can change in a day. You had thousands of people who started the morning yesterday thinking they had escaped the worse, starting the day in their own homes. Now they've been evacuated, all because the winds shifted and sent that fire in a new direction.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LAWRENCE (voice over): Firefighters set backfires themselves to keep the main blaze from reaching more homes. But when one jumped across a highway, it sent 2,000 residents running from their homes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All residents, this is the California Highway Patrol. This is a mandatory evacuation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: CHP. Mandatory evacuation.

LAWRENCE: These families already saw what happened to their neighbors.

JULIE WOODS, RESIDENT: With the winds picking up, we just really -- you know, you just really don't know, you know, when you're in a wooded area like this.

LAWRENCE: First, smoke and ash engulfed the area, but when the fire changed direction, Joe Dahila ran home to rescue his dogs.

JOE DAHILA, RESIDENT: We have the door shut because of the smoke. We don't want them breathing in the smoke. So, if something happened they can't get out of the house. We don't have a dog door.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We'll save our water unless there's some active fire here.

LAWRENCE: Firefighters made tough calls and kept building the fire lines that can stop a fire while it's small.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you let it get too big out here and it catches a tree, we're in trouble.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LAWRENCE: One team of firefighters told me they had gone to plan B, falling back closer to the structures and trying to bring the resources in there.

Now, depending on how that wind blows later today, this could be a real indicator of what's going to happen next, whether this fire has done its worst or whether it will continue to rip through this mountain community -- Kiran.

CHETRY: Yes. They're still saying they hope to have it contained by Sunday. And when they take about these thousand homes in danger, is that just contingent on whether or not they can get to it in time, or is that really just having to do with the winds?

LAWRENCE: It has to do with how the wind blows. They've got about a 44 percent containment, last I heard yesterday. But again, at all depends on how hard and in which way these winds start blowing later today after around 1:00 or 2:00, when they start to whip up.

It is possible that they could an even better handle on it and Sunday could be really in the process of mopping it up. Or it could push that fire in a new direction and threaten some of those thousands of homes that people have evacuated.

CHETRY: Chris Lawrence, thank you. We'll check in with you in the next hour.

In the meantime, we're talking about fires, we're talking about flooding. It's certainly a busy morning. And a lot of it is contingent on the weather.

(WEATHER REPORT)

ROBERTS: President Bush lost two key Republican supporters this week. First, Senator Richard Lugar called for troop withdrawal from Iraq. That was on Monday. Then yesterday, it was another member of the Foreign Relations Committee, Senator George Voinovich of Ohio.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. GEORGE VOINOVICH (R), OHIO: We're running out of time. And I don't think it's fair to the next administration to say, hey, by the way, we're leaving this baby for you guys to figure out. And I don't think the American people are going to put up with it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Senior Political Correspondent Candy Crowley is live in Columbia, South Carolina, and joins us this morning.

You know, Candy, we've seen some more moderate Republicans and some of the fringe Republicans complaining about this war. But now you've got Lugar, Voinovich.

Is this the beginning of a wholesale revolt?

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SR. POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's certainly the beginning of something here, because Senator Lugar, as you know, Senator Warner, who has also expressed doubts, are heavy weights in the Senate in terms of foreign policy. So it gives cover to those who have been reluctant to go up against the president. Having said that, there are a couple of people, several, in fact, Republicans, that have said they want to wait until September when General Petraeus comes back with his report on how the surge is going before they say anything. But certainly this is not good news at the White House when you have people who have been longstanding supporters of the president, even though they had voiced some reservations before. This is a definite break and certainly could be the tip of the iceberg here as far as Republicans are concerned.

ROBERTS: And this really puts the Republican Party in a very strange place, because now Democrats are picking up on what Lugar and Voinovich said, to say, see, we've got Republican support for this. I mean, certainly you look at the polls, Candy, and the support is dwindling.

Our new CNN poll from Opinion Research Corporation shows support for the war now at 30 percent, its lowest ever. And President Bush's approval rating, take a look at that, 32 percent.

So, Candy, when you've got Democrats saying now the Republicans are walking in lockstep with us, what does that say about the whole political apparatus of the Republicans?

CROWLEY: Well, it says that the Republicans are beginning to walk away from this president. Certainly in advance of the '08 elections that are coming up.

Obviously, when you heard Voinovich in that sound bite that you ran, what they're concerned about is that they will get to the '08 election and still be in the midst of this war, which is something Republicans don't want to be, because it's really what caused that tsunami in 2006 that swept them out of office.

ROBERTS: Hey, let's talk quickly about the immigration bill. The Senate is taking up debate on it. It passed that first hurdle. But then the House put another roadblock in the way.

Does this have a chance of seeing the president's desk?

CROWLEY: Well, first they have to get it out of the Senate, and that's, by no means, certain here. Even though they voted to go ahead and bring it back up, they have other hurdles to go, not to mention a package of about 25 amendments that could change what they call that delicate balance. Any one of those amendments could cause people either to go for the bill or against the bill.

Then you go over to the House side, where the House Republican Conference has already said we don't like this bill. So they're definitely going to change it over there, if it gets that far.

So this is -- there are a lot of hurdles both in the Senate and the House. So whether or not it gets to the White House Oval Office at this point is really a huge question mark.

ROBERTS: Candy, thanks for your thoughts on that. Candy, by the way, is down in Columbia, South Carolina, because there's a big Fred Thompson political event down there. And we're going to get to her a little bit later to talk more about Fred's possible candidacy.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROBERTS: Fifteen minutes after the hour now here on AMERICAN MORNING.

We've been talking about the deaths of wrestler Chris Benoit, his wife and young son. And we're going to be doing that in just a second.

Sorry about that.

CHETRY: Oh, that's all right. We're just taking a quick look at parliament in London over there. And Tony Blair, it's his last day as prime minister.

And as is customary, and part of what they do, is he addressing parliament for the last time, speaking to them as well. And then he's going to be headed over to Buckingham Palace, where he speaks to the queen on his last day.

A lot of questions as to whether or not he will become the Middle East peace envoy and what his future looks like there.

But there he is. And for the last time he is addressing members of parliament.

ROBERTS: All right. Sorry about that. My fault.

We've been talking about the deaths of professional wrestler Chris Benoit and his wife and young son. Police say that Benoit murdered them before killing himself.

Anabolic steroids were found in the home. Toxicology reports are still being done, but the question this morning remains, was Benoit driven by roid rage?

Del Wilkes is a former pro wrestler who used steroids and knows the devastating effect that they can have. He joins us now from Columbia, South Carolina.

Del, when you first heard about the situation involving Benoit, what did you think?

DEL WILKES, FMR. PRO WRESTLER: Well, the first thing that, you know, my mind went to was, obviously, I wasn't inside that house. I don't know what happened there. But when I got up yesterday morning and looked at our local paper and saw the story, naturally the first thing I thought of, being a former pro wrestler and someone that has dealt with steroids and anabolic steroids, is I thought that it had something to do with steroid abuse, whether it be maybe him losing his temperature, going into a roid rage, or possibly be the other effect. I mean, a lot of guys suffer tremendous mood swings with steroid abuse and they go the other way and have great depression.

ROBERTS: Yes. Describe...

WILKES: So I figured it had to be one of the -- go ahead.

ROBERTS: Describe a little bit of that for us. You took steroids. You used anabolic steroids for 17 years. Describe for us this idea of rage or depression, anxiety.

WILKES: Well, your body is getting an extra source of testosterone, and that's what makes us men men. That's what makes us aggressive, that's what makes us big, strong.

As in an athlete, that is what you want. In a business like pro wrestling, where physique is so important, steroids play an important role in that physique.

So, therefore, as a result of extra steroids and extra testosterone that's being pumped into your body, you do experience moments of rage, uncontrollable rage. I mean, you know that it's a possibility. You can feel it coming on, but there's nothing you can do about it.

And the next thing you know, an argument -- a minor argument has gone into a full-fledged rage, where you've got your hands around somebody's neck, you're in a fight. You're doing things you wouldn't normally do. Or it can go the other way when guys are coming off steroids after they've been on it for a long period of time. A lot of guys develop -- or, you know, experience tremendous depression, and they go through just bottom-out depression.

ROBERTS: Well, let me ask you about that, because the WWE yesterday released a statement in which they said, "The WWE strongly suggests that it is entirely wrong for speculators to suggest that steroids had anything to do with these senseless acts, especially when the authorities plainly stated there is no evidence Benoit had steroids in his body..."

So are you suggesting that if it wasn't directly related to the steroids it could be sort of a side-effect here?

WILKES: Well, absolutely it could be a side-effect. I mean, like I said earlier, I don't know what went on inside that home. None of us know. Only the people that are investigating there hopefully will eventually find out what did happen, or the best they can find out what happened.

But knowing what I know, having a trained eye, as someone that's been around steroid abuse and steroid use and guys that have used steroids, obviously he was on steroids. You can just tell by the look, by the physique.

ROBERTS: Right. WILKES: I mean, I think a trained eye can tell that. And so, therefore, the side-effects that do go with long-term steroid abuse, and it could have been roid rage.

ROBERTS: You know, Del, we're just -- we're tracking the deaths now. In the last 15 years there's been at least 20 deaths of pro wrestlers associated with heart attacks, solicitor prescription drugs.

Do you expect that this is going to shine a new spotlight on steroid use in that particular business?

WILKES: I was thinking about that last night. You would like to think that it would, but it probably won't.

I mean, really, once this is over and done and we're six months down the road, and we've put this tragedy behind us, really, being realistic, I doubt anything will ever change. It's always going to be a part of that business, it's always going to be used.

I think it's always going to be accepted. And I doubt very seriously it will change anything. You would like to think that it would, but unfortunately I don't think it will.

ROBERTS: Del, we thank you very much for your time.

Del Wilkes joining us this morning.

Appreciate it, Del.

WILKES: Thank you.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: Welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING.

We've been watching British Prime Minister Tony Blair in his last moments in office this morning. There he is addressing parliament. He steps down after a decade in office.

There is a lot of speculation that he is going to become the envoy to the Middle East. And he did speak to that a little bit when asked what his priority would be if he took on the role on behalf of the quartet of Middle East mediators. He told parliament the absolute priority would be a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

What does his departure mean, though, for U.S. and British relations, especially as it relates to the war in Iraq?

Chief International Correspondent Christiane Amanpour is live in London for us with more on that.

Good to see you, Christiane.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Kiran.

CHETRY: What is the impact...

AMANPOUR: Prime minister Blair...

CHETRY: Go ahead.

AMANPOUR: You were asking about the impact. And I think that really the first thing to say is Britain's relationship with the United States is not going to change. It predated Prime Minister Blair and it will continue after he is gone.

Britain has staked out its position as Atlanticist, as a key ally of the United States. And it is its most important relationship.

Now, the style might change in terms of president -- rather the incoming prime minister, his successor, Gordon Brown, may not be as overtly, you know, sort of ceremoniously, you know, pro-United States at this precise time as Prime Minister Blair was. But the relationship will continue.

And as for his potential role as Middle East envoy, we're told by the spokes people at Downing Street that he has had some successful talks, good talks with the Russians today, with President Putin. The Russians were apparently, you know, the toughest on whether they would offer him this job, and apparently he's had good talks. So maybe this is going to be something that is announced just as he leaves.

He is due to leave being a prime minister and MP if he does take up this role. And that also will be a tough role because he really does have to be very tough, very honest and very proactive, and not just his own goodwill, but he has to pull in all the key characters, all the key players, notably the United States of America.

So here, Prime Minister Blair, former Prime Minister Blair as he will be, must really convince President Bush that this is an area that has to be worked on with the full cooperation and the full intervention of the United States -- Kiran.

CHETRY: Christiane, it's interesting because our president, President Bush, gave some comments about Tony Blair when he was asked in a question-and-answer session, and he sort of pooh-poohed the notion that Tony Blair was a poodle for the United States. And he said that, "He is a comrade in war not because I tell him to be, but because we analyze the enemy the same way and found each other in the same foxhole."

Is that not the prevalent thinking among people on the streets in London?

AMANPOUR: Well, it's not the prevalent thinking among the people on the streets, but it certainly is Prime Minister Blair's thinking. He has said over and over again and right up to the bitter, end and even today in Prime Minister's Questions, that he really believed it was about fighting this enemy, and that if we don't fight this enemy, then they will fight us, and the way to fight them is not to retreat. All of the lines and the visions that you've heard from Blair and Bush over the last several years since the Iraq war.

I believe strongly, having interviewed him several times, that Blair does believe that very strongly. The thing is the people are not with him on that, and the situation in Iraq, as you all know, has reached such a terrible decibel of death and bloodshed and violence on a daily level that people just cannot see past what Blair and Bush's vision was. And that is to fight the enemy. They think that they've created a new enemy.

CHETRY: Christiane Amanpour live for us in London today.

Thanks so much.

ROBERTS: What would lead a pro wrestler to kill his wife and young son, then himself? Some are already asking what may be an all too obvious question. Was it another case of roid rage brought on by steroid use?

Dr. Sanjay Gupta looks at the steroid connection. That's coming up next on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR, AMERICAN MORNING: They have their heads in the clouds in Miami today judging from that picture. What a beautiful sky though. Oftentimes that means a little bit of an afternoon thunderstorm there, right?

JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR, AMERICAN MORNING: Oh, yeah. Those storms pop up and there's no place better to have a thunderstorm than in southern Florida. They are of a unique brand.

CHETRY: You get sopping wet and then they're over, 78 degrees by the way right now in Miami shaping up to be 85.

ROBERTS: Typical day. Good morning to you. It's Wednesday, the 27th of June. I'm John Roberts along with Kiran Chetry. Good morning to you.

CHETRY: Glad you're with us, getting some stories on our radar. The immigration showdown coming back to Capitol Hill today. It's interesting because it's really parallel of course, as I mean the House overwhelmingly voting no to any type of legislation along that line calling it amnesty. The Senate saying let's give it a go ahead. Let's go with what the president said. We're going beyond Washington and get a little bit of perspective, actually heading to Arizona and talking to one border town sheriff. Does he think this bill in practical terms, can work?

ROBERTS: And of course, the fourth of July is just around the corner, just a week from now but before you break out the fireworks, do you know how to use them responsibly? Live safety demonstration from Washington coming up for you this morning.

CHETRY: It all depends on the wind today, just how much damage the Lake Tahoe fire will end up causing. You can see in this live picture we're about to show you that one of the more than 270 buildings that have burned in northern California, you can see how quickly this fire was able to just go through and destroy house after house. Now there are a thousand more in the path of this wildfire. Chad Myers tell us that the wind is likely to blow in their direction tomorrow so that firefighters will not have much time to stop it. Two firefighters were unable to get out of the way of one of the big flare-ups yesterday but thank goodness they had these special fire tents as they're called. They hunkered down in them. They carry them with them at all times to protect themselves. It took 45 minutes for the flames to pass by. The two were able to walk away uninjured.

Tony Blair has less than an hour left as prime minister and he's saying good-bye to his staff at 10 Downing Street right now. After that he turns his resignation in to the queen.

Protesting Iran this morning over a new government plan to ration gasoline. State radio reporting a tax on several gas stations in Tehran. Witnesses say that a group of kids set a car and some gas pumps on fire at a service station. There you see some of the captures of that. At another station there were long lines as drivers raced to fill up before this midnight deadline. Drivers in Iran are now limited to 26 gallons of gasoline a month.

ROBERTS: Flood waters are rising again in Texas. A band of thunderstorms swept through the state on Tuesday. As much as five inches of rain fell in some places. More storms are forecast for today in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. Flooding across Oklahoma led to this dramatic rescue scene. Take a look at it here. Teenage twin sisters pulled from their car that stalled in bumper-deep flood waters. Our CNN affiliate KWTV shot pictures of a fire fighter in a raft pulling the sister out of the back window one at a time. The car could have easily gone over that dam had the flood waters raised just a little bit. Both of those girls are fine this morning.

Fires, floods. The only thing missing pestilence and disease. Chad Myers at the weather center in Atlanta. Chad, it's one of those tough days isn't it?

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yeah, it really is. It's going to be a tough day for people across central Texas. I know we've been talking about how much rain is going to come up into Kansas but that rain has already fallen down here in Texas proper and this is going to be an ugly afternoon from Austin westward. Already a lot of flooding in the San Gabriel River to the west and northwest of Austin and this bubble of water washing out bridges as it goes will be in Georgetown in probably an hour or so. If you are north of Austin along the San Gabriel, you need to get out of the way of this flooding. It is big time flooding. It's happening now and it's on its way to you and there is more rain where it came from.

Some spots to the west of Leander, Texas, which is northwest of Austin, have picked up 10 inches of rain in the past 48 hours and now all that bubble of water is -- it's in the bed. It's in the river bed and that water is bubbling up and taking out bridges with it as it goes. 183 now has two feet of water. If you know what highway 183 looks like, northwest of Austin, you look down in that water, it has to be 40 or 50 feet down to get to the water on a good day. Today it's over the bridge. Guys, flooding is happening and it's going to get dangerous this afternoon.

ROBERTS: All right, Chad, thanks very much. We'll check back in with you in just a couple of minutes. Kiran.

CHETRY: Police are investigating the deaths of pro wrestler Chris Benoit and his family and they're wondering if steroid rage may have caused him to murder his wife and son before taking his own life. We're paging Dr. Gupta now with more on steroids and violence. Sanjay joins us from Atlanta. Good to see you this morning.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

CHETRY: Can you explain for us the link between these anabolic steroids and what causes these, what's known as 'roid rage?

GUPTA: It's been a pretty well-defined relationship for sometime. It's worth pointing out that even if these toxicology reports come back, we're still not going to -- may not know for sure whether or not this was the cause or a contributing factor here. But people take anabolic steroids which is a synthetic form of testosterone to build up muscle. And it builds up muscle and decreases your body fat percentage as well, which is why people like to get that certain cut, that certain physique. But it also has relationship with the brain and people have known for sometime that it actually causes things called 'roid rage as you refer to it. There is really three factors. There's psychosis. There's aggression and there's loss of impulse control. You get these sort of uncontrollable rages. It's loss of impulses is really a key feature there.

CHETRY: What seems interesting about this, when you think of rage, you think it's something you fly into momentarily and then come back down to earth, I guess. When you're doing the reading on this story, this seems to have taken place over a course of days. He was able to apparently send text messages to coworkers saying here is where the dogs are located. It just seems like there was a long time that transpired.

GUPTA: I think that's a very good point and I think that's something that people are going to look at as they investigate this from a criminal and medical standpoint. You're exactly right. With the 'roid rage in particular, it is characterized by uncontrollable fly off the handle sort of momentary rage and this does sound much more methodic and more drawn out, so I think that's an important factor for sure.

CHETRY: The other question that I have this morning is that people are prescribing these. I mean Chris Benoit was apparently - apparently they were prescriptions for some of these anabolic steroids.

GUPTA: Yeah.

CHETRY: Why would he be prescribed them other than he is a wrestler and wants to be big? GUPTA: Which isn't a legal reason to prescribe them as you know. There are very few legitimate reasons to prescribe anabolic steroids. One is that you may have low levels of certain steroids in your body and therefore treating a deficiency, so to speak. There's also a condition sometimes associated with wasting or anorexia. It's associated with some chronic diseases. Besides those, really there aren't many legitimate reasons to prescribe them for a normal healthy adult.

CHETRY: A lot of questions still to be answered. Sanjay, thanks for shining some light on that for us today.

ROBERTS: Thirty seven minutes now after the hour, an update to a story that we brought you last week. It tops our quick hits. A search team may be close to finding the remains of the Marine who shot this 16 millimeter footage of the flag raising at Iwo Jima. He died nine days later on Iwo Jima and his remains were never found but search teams think that they have got two possible leads.

Did Paris Hilton consider suicide? Sheriff Lee Baca who let Paris out of prison early says her mental state was deteriorating and he feared that she could harmer shelf. But things seemed to get easier for her the second time around. The "New York Post" says she spent $145 at the prison commissary on French vanilla coffee, chicken noodle soup, banana nut muffins and a jar of Vaseline.

The immigration reform fight is going full bore on Capitol Hill right now, but up next, you'll meet an Arizona sheriff who is on the frontlines of the battle against illegal immigration. His perspective ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROBERTS: Welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING. The most news in the morning is right here on CNN. It's coming up to 41 minutes after the hour. Yes. There we are. There is a train wreck.

CHETRY: You know what happened? This is two Union Pacific trains colliding near the town of Tama (ph), Iowa, leaving that mess behind. At least 10 cars jumped the tracks. While it did look ugly, thank goodness, there were no injuries reported in that situation.

ROBERTS: July the fourth may be at least a little quieter in New York City because police have confiscated 9,000 pounds of fireworks and $14,000 cash in a raid. It's illegal to have fireworks in the city of New York. Five people were arrested in that.

CHETRY: All right. And what is it going to be like for the fourth of July? We know it's going to be hot.

ROBERTS: It's a long way out. Do you think they can predict it accurately?

CHETRY: I don't know. I've never seen 10 day, Chad, but I bet (INAUDIBLE) We check in with Chad Myers right now in the weather center, yes or no. MYERS: I always go along with John. John, what would you say?

ROBERTS: Would I say?

MYERS: It's going to be hot.

ROBERTS: It depends on what part of the country you're in.

CHETRY: That's not really a stretch, Chad!

MYERS: Actually the showers at least will move out of Texas. They will slide across to the east and to the northeast. I described this storm in Texas yesterday like a leaf that's caught on the side of a river. The river is going in the middle. And the sticks are going down at 10 miles an hour! But this leaf is way over by the side behind a rock and it's just spinning around, not going anywhere. That's what this storm is. It's stuck out of the current. It's not in the jet stream. It's not in the middle of the river. So it's just sitting here spinning. This rain is going this way. That rain is going that way and this rain is going this way, just spinning around the central plains. When rain stays in one spot for any length of time, you're going to start piling up water. We're trying to get some pictures out of now our Austin affiliates because we know a lot of flooding is taking place just north of that town and into Georgetown itself. Georgetown is on I-35.

Eventually, this is the next 48 hours. We are going to get rains of possibly 10 inches or more north of Tulsa. There is Gage, Osage and back on up here into Wichita and east of there itself. That water has to run off somewhere and it's going to run off into the rivers, down the streams and then back up. We know that the San Gabriel River north of Austin is really going - it's picking up bridges as it goes today, this morning and over the top of highway 183 which is northwest of Austin. That's going to get down and across the I-35 and move down to the south from there. So this water is going to be out of its banks for a long time.

There's going to be some severe weather east of Denver across parts of northeastern, way upstate New York but the big story I think will be the wind that begins to come in to the Lake Tahoe area, probably 30 miles per hour today. That's right on the edge of a problematic gust. But, tomorrow, those gusts will be 40 as winds mix down out of the atmosphere. Out of the jet stream itself and blows into the fire and those sparks are going to jump and they're right in the direction of south Lake Tahoe City, not the lake.

CHETRY: All right, Chad Myers, thanks so much.

MYERS: Sure.

CHETRY: Fireworks are synonymous with the fourth of July, of course. But what many people don't know is just how dangerous they can be. Eleven people were killed last year from fireworks incidents or accidents, 9200 people were treated in emergency rooms for various injuries and they say the vast majority, 70 percent of these injuries and deaths related to fireworks all happen around the fourth of July. Joining us from from Washington is Julie Vallese. She is the director of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. Julie, thanks for being with us this morning.

JULIE VALLESE, DIR., U.S. CONSUMER PRODUCT SAFETY COMM: Good morning Kiran.

CHETRY: Sometimes we say things are dangerous, but you really have to see for yourself just how dangerous some of these products can be and that is what you're going to show us today.

VALLESE: The CPSC does really focus on the illegal use of fireworks and illegal fireworks. That is where we do see most consumers getting hurt, severe injuries and even sometime deaths.

So they're illegal but people are still obviously able to get their hands on them. Will you show us one of the ones that can be the most dangerous. It's known as the M-80, right. These are like the cherry bombs, they call them?

VALLESE: The first one we're going to show you is actually the M- 1,000. This is an M-1,000. It's illegal. This is what is legal in the United States. We've placed one of these M-1000s under a watermelon and you're going to see just how truly devastating and how much damage it can cause.

CHETRY: Wow. That pretty much says at all.

VALLESE: It sure does and the injuries that we really see are permanent injuries, amputations of fingers and even limbs when it comes to the illegal use of these illegal fireworks that have been banned for more than 40 years in the United States.

CHETRY: They're banned but they're still sold in the United States, is that what you're saying? People can still get their hands on them?

VALLESE: SURE. They're usually sold out the back of a car or out the back door. If it comes in brown paper wrapping, consumers can pretty much know that that's an illegal explosive an illegal firework.

CHETRY: It's the kids that love to play with fireworks and of course play with fire, unfortunately, in general. Those are the ones, the kids are the ones that usually end up in the emergency rooms with these types of injuries, right, Julie?

VALLESE: The majority of injuries are to children or young people under 20 years of age. The majority of those are younger than 15. Small children are often burned with sparklers so parents really do need to understand with sparklers. Kiran, you did mention the M-80. It is smaller than the M-1000 but we can show you as well how powerful that is and how it does take off fingers when it explodes.

CHETRY: Wow! I can't believe that people are still playing around with these things. One thing that is legal, Julie, the sparklers, right? They're allowed? VALLESE: Sparklers are legal. Actually, we really do recommend that people check their local laws. Firework use is a patch work of different laws so make sure it's legal in your area. Sparklers are legal, but they can burn at more than 2000 degrees which is hot enough to melt metal. So before parents allow children to touch these, they should really assess their child's ability to know how dangerous something is and to follow directions in using them safely.

CHETRY: Good advice. Just watch the fireworks the way the professionals do it and try to stay away from them, because illegal, but people still use them, unfortunately, and we see the results. Julie Vallese, head of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, thank you.

VALLESE: You bet.

ROBERTS: A bit of a reunion to share with you coming up. Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono, Olivia Harrison, the widow of the late George Harrison all on "Larry King Live" last night. We'll show you a little bit of that, let you listen to some of what happened too. AMERICAN MORNING will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROBERTS: Welcome back to the most news in the morning here on CNN. AMERICAN MORNING, 51 minutes after the hour. Of course, the immigration bill is all the talk on Capitol Hill. Last night, House Republicans voted to block it even as the Senate begins debate on the bill but where the rubber meets the road, how are they feeling about this immigration bill? Sheriff Ralph Ogden is the sheriff in Yuma, Arizona. He joins us now from the border. You can see that there are National Guard troops behind him there. Sheriff Ogden, where do you stand on the immigration bill?

RALPH OGDEN, BORDER SHERIFF: Well, I think the immigration bill as proposed is a good start. Our concern as sheriffs along the border is that it appears that Congress has thrown this bill together with a lot of work, but being realistic, we realize that there are tradeoffs. There are a lot of things in there that perhaps could be better and hopefully some of the amendments are going to be offered will fix that. They need something in place.

ROBERTS: If you were writing the bill, Sheriff Ogden, what would you have written?

OGDEN: Well, I think I would of divided the bill. I would had the immigration portion, I would have had the border security portion and try to join them together. The resources that are provided along the border are I guess you would say, adequate but they could be much better and we're hoping that --

ROBERTS: As I said, we see the National Guard troops behind you there. But does your department not also play a huge role in securing the border? Has this not been a burden for you folks as well?

OGDEN: Most definitely. We're spending our local county taxpayer dollars to respond to calls for service caused by people entering the country illegally. And of course we're also assisting border patrol in any way we can and apprehending people as they come across but it is a great cost not only to law enforcement but to health and everything else in county functions.

ROBERTS: Sheriff Ogden, the big complaint among many Republicans and opponents of this bill is in 1986, President Ronald Reagan granted amnesty to the illegals that were here under the premise that that was going to stop illegal immigration but the border wasn't secured and there was more and more illegal immigration to the point where we're now, it's up 12 to 20 million. The government is promising to secure the border in this bill. Do you believe that they will?

OGDEN: I believe they will get a good start on it. I think with the southern border initiative that's out there trying to put technology to work as other resources we will come closer to securing it. I think we're still a ways away from it. We're now seeing the effects of what the government has done with the National Guardsmen that are here with us out of Tennessee, moving in and out, plus the increased number of border patrolmen to be assigned to the area and the inclusion of some of the technology.

ROBERTS: Where do you come down, Sheriff Ogden on this idea of amnesty? Is granting status to illegal immigrants amnesty and do you, as critics of this bill believe, think that it will just encourage more illegal immigration, a race to get across the border?

OGDEN: Well, I would hope it wouldn't incur a race. The way I read the bill, you had to have been in the country by a certain date. I think, more importantly, though, I don't consider this amnesty. I consider this dealing with, as you say, the 12 to 20 million people that are in the United States and there has to be some way to deal with them and I don't believe in arresting them all, locking them all up and sending them back to their home nation is feasible or even workable.

ROBERTS: So just in closing here Sheriff, what would you say to the opponents of this bill?

OGDEN: I would say that we're coming up on election year and we need something done now and it needs to be done within the next few months. This is a good start. Listen to the amendments as they are brought forward and give us some tools to take care of our border.

ROBERTS: There you have it, solid opinion from the frontline. Sheriff Ralph Ogden in Yuma, Arizona joining us this morning. Sheriff, thanks you very much. Good luck to you and your deputies as well in trying to secure the border.

OGDEN: Thank you, sir.

CHETRY: Still ahead, there has been a dramatic increase in childhood chronic illness. Some alarming numbers that Sanjay Gupta is going to tell us about coming up in just a few minutes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) ROBERTS: A rare sit down with two musical legends, that's what CNN's Larry King treated viewers to last night. He talked to the surviving Beatles, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr about the first anniversary of Love. That's the Vegas show that's set to their music. Larry asked them about the night that John Lennon died.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LARRY KING, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John passed.

PAUL McCARTNEY: When John passed, I was at in Sussex, at my home in Sussex. That's where I was.

KING: Somebody call you?

McCARTNEY: Yeah. My manager at the time called me. And that was just the shock of all shock.

RINGO STARR: I was in the Bahamas. And the kids called and they said we've heard something like John has been hurt. I'm like what? And then we got a call that John had actually been seriously hurt and we just got a plane to New York, said hello to Yoko. You don't know what to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Last night, McCartney and Starr attended a special dedication ceremony at the Mirage in Las Vegas in honor of John Lennon and George Harrison. A reminder tonight, Larry King is going to have the first interview with Paris Hilton since her release from jail yesterday. It was yesterday. It was in the middle of the night. That's at 9:00 p.m. Eastern right here on CNN.

CHETRY: The next hour of AMERICAN MORNING starts right now.

ROBERTS: Staggering setback. Mandatory evacuation as strong winds breathe new life into the Tahoe wildfire.

Plus, high water and high drama, the rescues and the new threat for extreme weather on this AMERICAN MORNING. Good morning to you and thanks for joining us. It's Wednesday, the 27th of June. I'm John Roberts along with Kiran Chetry.

CHETRY: We're glad you're with us. We begin with breaking news and we talked about this earlier, the threat of flooding and the need for rescues because of the heavy rains that have been falling in many places, including places in Texas. Chad Myers joins us right now with more on what is going on. We understand people are being rescued both by air and boat this morning.

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