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Omaha Mall Back in Business; Oprah Campaigns for Obama; Brokaw's Book
Aired December 08, 2007 - 14:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Right now in the CNN NEWSROOM, back in business. Holiday shoppers returning to the Nebraska mall three days after a gunman went on a deadly rampage.
Also, in the O-zone. Oprah hits the campaign trail with presidential hopeful Barack Obama. We're live in Iowa with the story.
Plus --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOM BROKAW, AUTHOR: Boom, one minute it was Ike and the man in the gray flannel suit in the lonely crowd and the next minute it was time to turn on, tune in, drop out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Continuing my conversation and listening to him read with legendary news anchor Tom Brokaw about the '60s and the hippie generation, the focus of his new book.
Well, it was the same as before -- but somehow very, very different. Shoppers got back to the pre-holiday routine today as Omaha's West Roads Mall reopened for the first time since Wednesday's massacre. But along with the holiday decorations, there was a stepped up police presence. And Omaha's mayor was there, as well, to try to assure shoppers that they are safe.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE FAHEY, MAYOR, OMAHA: Thank you, welcome back. Thank you for coming here and your support. Several of the ladies who came in early on were saying, we didn't know what to do, how can we support the community because we love our community. I said the best thing to do is show up here and be part of this opening, which I thought was absolutely perfect.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: And despite the festive holiday decorations, the memories of what happened at the mall on Wednesday are still very vivid. CNN's Dam Simon reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The image of a killer, still photos of the surveillance video inside the Omaha shopping mall where 19-year-old Robert Hawkins killed eight people before turning the gun on himself.
The first picture shows the teen just after walking into the mall. He's wearing a T-shirt with a Jack Daniels logo. There are questions about why he chose this store, considered the most upscale in Omaha.
JANAE JONES, FRIEND OF HAWKINS: I think in Robbie's eyes, it was because the people at Von Maur, he probably thought they were better off than him because it's kind of - a lot of the stuff there is expensive and people who make more money than him would be shopping there. And I think that he just thought they were better off than he was and didn't want it to be that way.
SIMON: That doesn't square with the Robert Hawkins these three women call their close friend. They were enrolled in the same program for troubled teens.
(on camera): When you first learned it was Robbie who did this, what went through your mind?
SYDNEY GOODMAN, FRIEND OF HAWKINS: I didn't believe it until I saw the picture. You know, I said there was no way that could be Robbie, no way.
SARAH RAMMAHA, FRIEND OF HAWKINS: I couldn't believe it either. I really couldn't. I just was trying to imagine what was going through his head, if he thought it was a joke or I don't know.
SIMON: Hawkins, they say, had a good sense of humor, made a lot of friends, definitely not a loner - a quality often associated with teenage shooters. But there were some problems. Janae Jones says she left Hawkins live at her apartment when he needed a place to stay. But when he refused to chip in for rent, she told him to leave.
JONES: He never came back and got his stuff. We kept calling him and telling him, you know, you need to get your stuff and he just never came around and got it. But he still kept calling trying to ask my boyfriend to buy him alcohol all the time. And we told him no, you need to come get your stuff, we're not here for you to just get alcohol, you know. We thought we were being your friends.
SIMON: But it doesn't add up to the single worst shooting in Nebraska history.
GOODMAN: If more people would have genuinely cared about him like they should have, this would have never happened.
SIMON: The West Roads will be open this weekend as the mall and the community try to move on. Von Maur, however, will remain closed. Store managers say they are not sure when it will reopen.
The shooters' friends meanwhile ask themselves what would have happened had they come face to face with him inside of the store.
JONES: I kind of wonder, like, if any of us were there that day if he would have shot us too or not.
RAMMAHA: I wonder, too.
SIMON: Like nearly all the other questions in this case, there are no answers. Dan Simon, CNN, Omaha, Nebraska.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: The mall gunman left behind a three-page suicide note filled with swear words, frustration and contempt. Nineteen-year-old Robert Hawkins told his friends that they'd be better off without him, but also predicted that he would become famous.
In a page to his family, he addressed his parents as mommy and dad and told them he loved them. He apologized for quote, "what I've put you through." And he said he had snapped because of what he termed this meaningless existence.
A third page contained a will. Hawkins said he was giving his car back to his mother and he said his friends could have everything else.
Hawkins' victims including three men and five women. Funeral plans for some of them are now being announced. A wake for John McDonald of Council Bluffs, Iowa is scheduled for tomorrow. Janet Jorgensen was one of the eight killed. She was 67-years-old and an employee who worked at the store for 14 years, she is survived by three children and nine grandchildren. A grandson spoke about her devotion to her family.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RYAN HUSK, VICTIM'S GRANDSON: It's going it be really hard because grandma and grandpa were the definition of true love. They were the epitome of true love and they've been married for 50 years. And really showed and brought the family together and this situation is obviously going to bring us tighter. But one thing grandma and grandpa instilled in us is that family is the most important thing. We always had family get togethers and have taught us to never take anything for granted. Grandma knew that we loved her. It's just difficult obviously with the timing, graduations, weddings. And we're just going to miss everything about her because she was the most loving and caring person in our lives.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Well, a friend of the family says Jorgensen helped her husband through cancer and cared for her 94-year-old mother. Jorgensen's funeral is set for Monday in Omaha.
New fuel is growing or rather there is new fuel for growing controversy over the CIA's destruction of some sensitive videotapes. Sources say Harriet Miers, who held top posts at the White House was aware of the tapes and told the CIA not to destroy them. Another source says the CIA's top lawyer also warned against it, but was ignored. The tapes show the questioning of two terror suspects using controversial methods approved by President Bush. The CIA says the tapes were destroyed because they posed an intelligence risk. But congressional Democrats are demanding an investigation.
So, where is Osama bin Laden? Maybe not in Pakistan. At least that's what Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf says. Many intelligence experts think the al Qaeda chief is hiding out in Pakistan's lawless tribal areas. But in an exclusive interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Musharraf questioned that assumption.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PRES. PERVEZ MUSHARRAF, PAKISTAN: Give me the proof. What proof do they have? Nil, zero proof. They are just talking. It is just their guess. I don't want to make such wild guesses. It is their guess that they may be in the Fatah. They can be anywhere. Do they have any proof? Do they have any intelligence to substantiate whatever they are saying? No, sir, they don't. Let me challenge them. Give me their intelligence. What is your judgment based on? It is just based on the fact that there is al Qaeda in our mountains. Yes indeed they are there -- I've been saying it all along. But what is the confirmation that al-Zawahiri or Osama bin Laden are in Pakistan? If Mullah Omar can be in Afghanistan, why can't they be there?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: You can see much more of the exclusive interview with Pakistan's President Musharraf tomorrow on "LATE EDITION WITH WOLF BLITZER." That is 11:00 a.m. Eastern right here on CNN tomorrow.
Well, five years after he supposedly drowned, a week after he turned up very much alive, British police have charged John Darwin with life insurance fraud and lying to get a false passport. Darwin was declared legally dead in 2002 after he supposedly died in a canoe accident. Well investigators say the accident was a hoax as are Darwin's claims that he has been suffering from amnesia for the last five years. He is scheduled it appear in court Monday.
Lots of snow out west. They're digging out at Mammoth Mountain in California. The nearby ski area is reporting 20 inches of new powder and this latest storm is not over yet. But all is not fun with this storm, indeed. This is Denver where traffic is pretty snarled because of the heavy snow. Some areas have received nearly two feet since Thursday.
And then take a look at this, the roads near Sacramento. Parts of Interstate 80 crossing over the mountain business between California and Nevada were closed for a time to clear the accidents and now it is open, but chains are, indeed, needed.
Let's check in with Jacqui Jeras in the Weather Center. Boy, that's a lot of snow out there.
(WEATHER REPORT) WHITFIELD: All right well, in Florida a no go for the space shuttle Atlantis today. The planned launch has been put off until tomorrow at the earliest while engineers look over a problem with fuel tank sensors. Engineers will meet within the next few hours to decide if they do, indeed, need to push the launch back even further.
Onto the campaign trail. T.V. powerhouse Oprah Winfrey joining Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama in key states this weekend. Our senior political correspondent Candy Crowley is in Des Moines. So, Candy, how much impact is Oprah likely or how much of an impact could she possibly have in Iowa or New Hampshire?
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, let's face it. We have never seen a celebrity of the stature of Oprah Winfrey out on the campaign trail. So we may have to wait until the next polling.
But let me tell you, it is causing quite a bit of excitement. We are told by the campaign, so consider that, that they gave out 12,000 tickets to their precinct captains who then distributed them and they also gave out another 11,000 online. So, here we are in 100,000- square foot arena and they do believe or at least have given out tickets for 23,000 people.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CROWLEY (voice-over): They are calling it the Oprahbama.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oprah is a girl. She's a woman and Obama is a man.
CROWLEY: From Iowa to South Carolina to New Hampshire, presidential candidate Barack Obama will campaign this weekend with the woman of daytime TV. It's a programming trifecta that's selling out tickets in South Carolina and lighting up the gray winter of New Hampshire and Iowa.
JODI PLUMERT, UNIVERSITY OF IOWA: One of the secretaries was just so excited about the fact that Oprah was coming, and she said, who would have thought? Oprah coming to little old Iowa.
CROWLEY: Oprah speaks daily to almost nine million viewers, turns books into best-sellers, makes experts into household names. Can she boost Barack? Oh, how this campaign hopes so.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that having Oprah here on Saturday will definitely pull women out and I think it will just show that women in Iowa are Barack Obama supporters.
CROWLEY: Operative word, women, the crux the '08 election. Did we mention that Oprah's audience is 75 percent female; 44 percent make less than $40,000; a quarter have no more than a high school education; more than half are women over 50. It is a profile of the female Clinton voter and this is a direct pitch for that demographic. Linda Peterson from North liberty, Iowa, is leaning Obama.
LINDA PETERSON: I think it's going to help him with the women my age because she's very popular, very respected among my age group.
CROWLEY: While Oprah's support is unlikely to translate directly into a significant number of Obama votes, we are talking loads of free media and if they come to see her, they'll hear him.
SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If you stand up in this caucus for me, then I promise you that I will stand up for you.
CROWLEY: Like all Obama precinct captains in Iowa, Monique Washington got as many tickets as she wanted. She's dispensing them to supporters and waiverers.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When I make phone calls, a lot of people say they're undecided. And I say, would you like to come see Oprah and Obama and Michelle? They go, yeah, I want to come out.
CROWLEY: Obama workers also handed out tickets to anyone who volunteered four hours to the campaign or signed up for a caucus seminar.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CROWLEY: There were tickets for the public, as well. You could walk into a Barack Obama and if you gave them your name and address, you got a ticket. Fredricka?
WHITFIELD: Wow, that's easy. As long as there is room.
CROWLEY: Just a name and address, very valuable in the caucuses.
WHITFIELD: That is, indeed. All right, Candy Crowley, thank you so much.
CROWLEY: Thanks.
WHITFIELD: Well turn to CNN for live coverage of the Oprah/Obama appearance. We'll bring that to you at 4:30 Eastern, 1:30 Pacific time right here on CNN.
Well Barack Obama may have Oprah Winfrey at his side this weekend, but Hillary Clinton has added a decidedly family feel it her campaign. Husband and former President Bill Clinton joins her tomorrow in Iowa, just as he did earlier today in Charleston, South Carolina. Already at her side, her 88-year-old mother, Dorothy Rodham and daughter Chelsea also there. Clinton says her mom will be on the campaign trail with her throughout the next week.
Well, if Mike Huckabee's campaign staff seems a little giddy today, it could be because a new "Newsweek" poll. It shows that Huckabee has doubled his lead over Mitt Romney in Iowa among voters who say they are likely to attend the Republican caucus. But nearly every other poll such as this recent one by the American Research Group shows Huckabee and Romney are statistically tied in Iowa. Only future surveys will show if the "Newsweek" poll is a blip or a trend.
On Capitol Hill, why are words like sex and scandal being used to refer to congressional pages? The details straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Just a year ago, Congressman Mark Foley resigned in a scandal over sexual messages to congressional pages. Well now some pages are in a new scandal involving sexual activity among themselves. CNN congressional correspondent Jessica Yellin has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Representative Ginny Brown-Waite says inappropriate sexual activity has been going on in this dorm for congressional pages for months.
REP. GINNY BROWN-WAITE (R), FLORIDA: It wasn't kissing and hugging, let me put it that way.
YELLIN (on camera): It went beyond that?
BROWN-WAITE: It went -- it did go beyond that. And there were not only young male and female involved in the incident, but there also were observers and other page participants who were, let's say, enablers.
YELLIN: Brown-Waite says no members of Congress were involved and the two pages who engaged in the activity were expelled this week.
Still, she and Representative Shelley Capito -- the two Republican members of the Page Board -- resigned, saying the program suffers from mismanagement and lack of supervision and that Democrats who run it have not learned lessons of the Mark Foley scandal.
Brown-Waite contends that for too long the clerk of the House who oversees the program, and was appointed by Nancy Pelosi, was unaware of the public sexual activity going on between the pages.
BROWN-WAITE: This had been going on for months. Almost all of the pages knew about it.
YELLIN: Brown-Waite and Capito also say the clerks failed to notify the Republican board members when two pages were expelled for shoplifting earlier this year. The clerk, Lorraine Miller, insists that Democrats have made significant reforms to the page program, including expanded safety measures and a monitoring, and a zero- tolerance policy for pages who break the rules.
Still, Speaker Pelosi is calling for a review of the page program.
REP. STENY HOYER (D-MD), MAJORITY LEADER: We also need to make sure that there's oversight of the conduct of the pages, as well as the conduct of anybody that deals with the pages.
YELLIN: But Brown-Waite contends that response is too slow.
BROWN-WAITE: One parent dubbed it "kids gone wild." That's a shame.
YELLIN: According to Brown-Waite, new cameras are being installed to monitor the kids, but she says the program requires a new supervisor whose sole responsibility is to oversee the pages. Jessica Yellin, CNN, Capitol Hill.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: And more news from the Hill, a key Republican congressman, rather, is calling it quits. Louisiana's Jim McCrery says he won't run for re-election next year. McCrery is the top- ranking on influential House Ways and Means Committee. He is also the 19th House Republican leaving Congress at the end of their current terms.
The mortgage crisis has many of you worried about losing your home. What is the federal government really doing it help? We're keeping them honest, straight ahead in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Across America this hour. In Atlanta, federal agents say they have hobbled two Mexican drug cartels arresting 67 people seizing nearly 245 pounds of cocaine and millions in cash. Agents say the Atlanta area is a major pipeline for illegal drugs.
A horrible tragedy at a Christmas parade at Plant City, Florida. A 9-year-old boy was dragged under the wheels of a float and killed. Making it worse, people screamed for the driver to back up. So when he did, he ran over the boy a second time.
Also in Florida, these Christmas decorations -- the sad remains of a neighborhood feud that left the owner charged with attempted murder. Police say Matthew Lankford shot a neighbor who deliberately ran over the ornaments with his pickup truck. The driver is in stable condition.
And from Texas, this just released dash cam video. Watch closely. A high-speed police chase and then, whoa, right there. Yeah, that was a motorcycle slamming right into the patrol car head on. Pretty hard to believe the biker and his passenger actually survived. Police say the chase started after the biker just simply blew right through the red light.
Well, it is no secret, the U.S. mortgage market is in big trouble. This week the Bush administration stepped in with an offer that could provide some relief from foreclosure. Our own Josh Levs has been looking into the plan to try to keep them honest. So is it a good plan? Is it really going to work?
JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we have to find out.
WHITFIELD: That was a big sigh.
LEVS: Yeah, it was a big sigh, wasn't it? We've got to find out how many people it will work for and then how much it actually does for them. We're going to follow it, and what we've been learning in recent days is really that this issue is getting to the crux of the economy and in the end, this literally probably will affect every American.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Inflation is low.
LEVS: This was a staple of President Bush's 2004 re-election campaign.
BUSH: Homeownership is at the highest rate ever.
LEVS: Some of that came from a rising subprime lending, loans to borrowers with weaker credit. Now foreclosures are at a record high, an estimated 1.8 million filings so far this year. Some Democrats complain the White House failed to act.
HILLARY CLINTON, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The administration was asleep at the switch, but we can't wait until we have a new president.
LEVS: The White House says President Bush has taken steps, such as pushing legislation that could offer Americans lower down payments and more pricing flexibility through the Federal Housing Administration. Together with the private group help now, the president is pushing a plan to freeze some people's interest rates for five years.
BUSH: Hope now estimates there are up to 1.2 million American homeowners who could be eligible for this assistance.
LEVS: The Center for Responsible Lending says because of the plan's requirements, it will only help about 145,000 families. The Federal Reserve also plans to help by announcing stricter lending standards. Regulators have admitted they didn't do all they could.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Given what we know now, yes, we could have done more sooner.
LEVS: Also named in the blame game are lenders, brokers, borrowers, Wall Street, but everyone in America stands to lose. Foreclosures hurt property values for neighborhoods. Lost value next year could total...
DOUGLAS PALMER, PRES. CONFERENCE OF MAYORS: $1.2 trillion. That's trillion, with a "T." As a result, our economy will produce over 524,000 fewer jobs next year, and grow a full percentage point less in GDP.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEVS: And, so, as you're seeing, this doesn't just affect homeowners. It really affects the entire economy and we've also been learning more and more that people who might be interested in buying a home in the next couple years might have a harder time getting a loan even if they have good credit, Fred, because of the overall squeeze on the markets.
WHITFIELD: Wow. And so how do you find out if this plan is really working?
LEVS: Right, because some people want to know, does this work for me or does it not work for me? There is a phone number, 888-995- HOPE that we talked about. But what I want to encourage people to do is go to this Web site. We'll show it to you right now, 995hope.org. That has a lot of the information right there so you don't have to sit on hold if it's really crowded on those lines.
Also there's a button that you can press there. It says that you can do an online counseling session. So they should be able to give you a lot of information. It might save you a lot of time. And you see it on the screen, 995hope.org. Take a look at that site and see if it helps you determine whether you or someone you know can benefit from what has been offered now and also, if that doesn't go it, go ahead and make the phone call. And then, we'll follow this closely. We'll see how many people are helped, how many people choose to take advantage of this.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
LEVS: Yes.
WHITFIELD: You need to because this is scary for everyone.
LEVS: Everyone.
WHITFIELD: Like you said, whether you have good credit or bad. The whole housing market, frightening.
LEVS: Oh, the GDP is, as you're saying, going down, people losing jobs all over the country. Everybody now understands that whatever it took to get here, we need to find a way out of it.
WHITFIELD: Yes, hopefully.
LEVS: Yes.
WHITFIELD: All right, thanks so much, Josh.
LEVS: Thanks.
WHITFIELD: Well, a former cop's wife has been missing for weeks. You've heard about this one. Well, police want to check his cell phone records now and examine his car and our legal experts will examine the case.
I know you guys have some pretty provocative thoughts about all this, straight ahead in the NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Happening this hour, shoppers are returning to the Omaha mall where a gunman killed eight people and then killed himself Wednesday. Funeral services for some of the victims are planned for Monday.
And this from senior Bush administration officials. Former White House counsel Harriet Miers told the CIA not to destroy videotaped interrogations of some al Qeadad suspects. The CIA says the tapes were destroyed to protect the identities of its interrogators.
And a close call at the Newark Airport. A Continental jet that was landing came within 300 feet of a Continental Express plane that was getting ready to take off. The FAA says the plane on the ground acknowledged an instruction to hold short of the runway, but continued forward anyway.
Well, despite such incidents, the FAA says we're in the safest period in aviation history. But air traffic controllers say that as more of their colleagues retire, flying could get more dangerous.
CNN's Susan Roesgen reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUSAN ROESGEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Passengers on a plane flying towards Chicago recently never knew they had been seconds away from a disaster. On November 14th, an air traffic controller at a busy regional control center made a mistake sending a Midwest airlines jet into the path of a United Express jet. But on the Midwest jet, the computer alert system in the cockpit warned the pilot stopping a possible midair collision.
BOB RICHARDS, FORMER AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLER: It said pull up, pull up. Of course the aircraft pull up just before it could go to the altitude of the other aircraft.
ROESGEN: Bob Richards spent 22 years an air traffic controller at Chicago O'Hare's Airport before he retired this year. He's come out with a book called "Secrets from the Tower." His account of why air traffic controllers are fed up.
RICHARDS: Controllers have nothing to gain at this point but retirement.
ROESGEN: A record number of air traffic controllers, 828, retired last year. To fill the gaps, some air traffic controllers at the busiest airports like O'Hare, are working longer shifts and six- day weeks. Bryon Zilonis is a leader for the Air Traffic Controllers Union in the Great Lakes area. He says it takes years to train new controllers who can handle the high demands of the jobs.
BRYON ZILONIS, CONTROLLERS UNION: An air traffic controller is not hired on day one. It took me five years to become an air traffic controller from the day I walked into the control room to the day I became a full performance level controller. It was about 18 months before I was even allowed to talk to an airplane.
ROESGEN: The union says fewer controllers means potentially more close calls in the air. And they say, fewer eyes on the sky adds to the growing number of flight delays.
The federal aviation administration told CNN in e-mails that control tower staffing varies. But that "staffing today is determined by actual traffic and need." The FAA also says that 1,800 new controllers were hired last year. But only 40 are fully trained and actually working full time. Bob Richards says that's not enough controllers and it's only going to get worse with all the retirements.
RICHARDS: They don't need that stress anymore. They've had it enough.
ROESGEN: And when they leave, the fear is they'll leave too many planes flying too close for comfort.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: And the controllers want the FAA to negotiate a new contract. It would give them more time off and would raise the pay of new controllers.
Well, a search for evidence against Drew Peterson, the former cop whose wife disappeared six weeks ago, that's where we'll start in today's Legal Briefs.
Avery Friedman is a civil rights attorney and law professor. Good to see you.
AVERY FRIEDMAN, CIVIL RIGHTS ATTORNEY: Hi, Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: And Richard Herman is a New York criminal defense attorney and law professor. Good to see you, as well.
RICHARD HERMAN, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Hi, Fred.
WHITFIELD: All right, well, let's talk about this Mr. Peterson, now apparently there are new search warrants, they want to look at the GPS of his vehicle, some cell phone records, this doesn't look so good, Avery.
FRIEDMAN: Actually, I think it's looking better.
WHITFIELD: Really?
FRIEDMAN: Yes, let me tell you why ...
WHITFIELD: For whom?
FRIEDMAN: In addition -- in addition to law enforcement closing in step by step, this guy is making outrageous statements to local media saying, you know what, all this attention is really interfering with my love life, I'm going to have a hard time getting a date.
WHITFIELD: Oh, boy.
FRIEDMAN: Hey, his wife hasn't even been found yet. So, again, every week, we see developments. I'm telling you, sooner or later, Fredricka, we're going to get this guy.
WHITFIELD: Really, so Richard ... HERMAN: Hey, Fred?
WHITFIELD: Yes?
HERMAN: Complaining about his love life's not going to get him indicted in this case. And they already made a huge mistake to police.
WHITFIELD: What?
HERMAN: I spoke with Professor Novalleh (ph) from UC Berkeley who confirms to me there was a major fourth amendment violation. They had the right to view his vehicles. They didn't just view his vehicles, they took his vehicles. They took them and they impounded them to the police station and then went through them. That means that everything they found ...
WHITFIELD: Would have to be thrown out?
HERMAN: ...as a result of the violation ...
FRIEDMAN: Maybe, maybe not.
HERMAN: ...will be suppressed.
FRIEDMAN: I don't know about that, I don't know.
HERMAN: Thrown out, thrown out, Fred. It's going out. Huge blunder.
WHITFIELD: So Richard, am I hearing from you not just because of the blunder but do you feel like they're just being a little too hard on this guy, that it's too easy to assume or presume that he had something to do with his wife being missing just because he has odd behavior and just because one of his ex-wives also died mysteriously?
HERMAN: Four marriages, his third wife was found dead in the bathtub of their house, you know, he's cheated on all of his wives. I mean, he's obviously a target here, but, you know, they don't have anything on him. They have nothing. Without the body, there's no way they can prosecute this case.
WHITFIELD: OK, well, let's talk about Barry Bonds. What do they have on him to continue to pursue this perjury charge? He pleaded not guilty yesterday. Richard, do you see that he is going to be, you know, going, going, gone to jail?
HERMAN: He's not going, going, gone, it's San Francisco. At the worst case scenario, it's going to be a hung jury. They love -- he's revered in San Francisco, Fred. There's no way a jury's going to convict him up there and the only way he goes down is if his buddy from Balco testifies against him. He's not going ...
FRIEDMAN: Along with his ex-girlfriend, his trainer ...
HERMAN: Well, she's meaningless.
FRIEDMAN: ...his personal physician. This place ...
HERMAN: The one in "Playboy," the girlfriend in "Playboy."
FRIEDMAN: Well, so what? Oh, because she appears in "Playboy," that means she has no credibility? I mean, come on.
HERMAN: No, she sold her story, she sold her story.
FRIEDMAN: The prosecution's got a shot at this one. He's got a lot of problems with this case.
HERMAN: O.J. Simpson, come on, Phil Spector, Beretta (ph).
WHITFIELD: So, really, Avery, I mean, Avery ...
HERMAN: California.
FRIEDMAN: No.
WHITFIELD: So Avery, are you in agreement though with Richard that, you know, you see the courtroom is quite enamored with Barry Bonds and so, trying to pick a jury that doesn't feel the same way, just simply enamored by this super star walking into the courthouse and that might bode well for him.
FRIEDMAN: Well, you know what, the celebrity status, obviously, in the long run, as we've seen in the last couple years, Fredricka, has really paid off.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
FRIEDMAN: But it strikes me that it's going to turn on evidence, careful jury selection. Got a long way to go into the development of the case. But I think, I think Barry's in a little bit of trouble here.
WHITFIELD: All right, another superstar. This time, football, former quarterback for the Falcons. Michael Vick to be sentenced on Monday and, so, Richard, this is on the federal charges, are they really going to lay down the law on him?
HERMAN: Oh, Fred, I think this guy's going to get a wake-up call on Monday. You know, the co-defendants who work as rats in this case against him, their sentence range was 12 to 18 months and the judge increased it, gave him 18 to 21. The recommendation here for Vick is one year. That's what his agreement was with the prosecution with the government and this judge, in my opnion, is going to give him a minimum two years, Fred.
WHITFIELD: Oh wow. Avery, you see them throwing him to the dogs, too?
FRIEDMAN: U.S. -- oh, throwing him to the dogs, yes. U.S. district judge Henry Hudson, a former federal prosecutor, fair guy. Richard nailed it. We might be looking at two years. WHITFIELD: All right, agreement on the two of you. What a way to end the segment.
All right, Avery, Richard, thank you so much.
FRIEDMAN: See you soon.
HERMAN: Fred, have a great weekend.
WHITFIELD: We'll see you next weekend. You too, thank you.
All right, straight ahead, this man, you know his face, you know his name, Tom Brokaw. Well, he paid tribute to those who lived through World War II in his book "The Greatest Generation," series of books. Well, now, he is reliving his memories of the '60s with us. Find out what he has to say about his first visit to Hate Ashbury. You remember that place?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: All right, we're going to take you back. NBC newsman Tom Brokaw came up with a phrase "the greatest generation" to describe Americans who survived the Great Depression and won World War II. Well, now he is looking at the generation that followed: the Boomers, many of whom were once hippies. I talk with him about his new book, "Boom! Voices of the Sixties."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: So, a lot of these bits of material or lots of the material that's in your book is based on conversations you've had with people in, you know, recent times. But at the same time, it also looks like you've got a remarkable memory ...
TOM BROKAW, AUTHOR, "BOOM!": I do.
WHITFIELD: ...or did you also journal a lot, too?
BROKAW: No, I -- in my family, they call it the home movies of my mind. I tend to remember all the way back to when I was four and five-years-old, I can rember specific episodes with great clarity. But people said they liked what they were doing. I did keep a journal and I was also -- I have the advantage of reference. I could go to a newspaper or the Nexus files and see something and that would jog my memory.
WHITFIELD: Yes, but memory, for example, what the cab driver told you when he asked you ...
BROKAW: Right.
WHITFIELD: ...in Los Angeles, have you ever been to this neighborhood, which was kind of the hippy neighborhood. Janis Joplin lived there.
BROKAW: No, (INAUDIBLE) in San Francisco and he said, I was coming back from covering something and my journal was uniform and he took me to Hate Ashbury, first time in 1967. I even remember the young woman who came up to me on the street and said, hey, man, you want a tab of acid and I said, what's going on here? She said, it's the hate, man, I've slept with all the birds, which was a very popular rock 'n' roll group at the time.
Streets at midnight were teeming with kids pouring in from all over the country. Opened smoking of dope and hash was around and acid was around and bongo drums were playing in the background. They were living in communes, Janice Joplin in one corner, the Grateful Dead in another. And the free clinic was an overload for drug abuse and overdoses and for sexually transmitted diseases. That was the dark side.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
BROKAW: So, I did a story about it all today and they're saying something is going on here.
WHITFIELD: So, for those who lived through that, who survived it, how do you explain that they would eventually become the CEOs, the presidents, the doctors that we go to. All of these folks who are certainly wearing a different suit today ...
BROKAW: Right.
WHITFIELD: ...but they're products of that. So, how do you explain or can you explain that?
BROKAW: Well -- again, that's uneven and complicated. A lot of them say, can't believe we didn't stay active in the political arena. They went off and they -- there were unparalled opportunities for the boomers, as well. They were able to make more money than any generation had ever made before. There were really terrific new vistas being opened for them professionally and otherwise.
I think where many of them feel guilty now is that they only concentrated on accumulating things and didn't give back politically or emotionally in some fashion. Some did stay in the hunt.
My very favorite story's at the end of the book is Jack Wineberg, who was a student radical at Berkley and he was the first one to say, we don't trust anyone over 30. Well, he now is my age and he works for the United Nations as a facilitator for environmental conferences around the world, the most money he's ever made is $60,000 a year and he still commits his life to environmental and economic justice. He stayed in the hunt.
But a lot of people didn't, obviously. They went off to -- Lawrence Cast (ph) who directed and wrote "The Big Chill," which is a great film about the '60s said, we go to dinner on Saturday nights in Beverly Hills and rage against the war in Iraq, get in our big cars, drive to our big homes and worry about getting our kids into good schools.
(END VIDEOTAPE) WHITFIELD: A short break right now. When we come back, more of my conversation with Tom Brokaw. He talks about assassinations, the draft and Bobby Kennedy.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: I'm Jacqui Jeras with today's Cold and Flu Report. The number of cases of the flu across the country has been on the increase in the last week and four states are now reporting local activity, that's you here in Colorado, as well as Texas, Florida and Virginia.
Where you see the yellow, that means no activity reported. So, good news for you in Washington, places like New Mexico, Missouri and Arkansas and where you see the green, that means there are sporadic reports of the flue.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: The news just in to CNN. We have just learned that the Justice Department and the CIA are investigating why the CIA destroyed interrogation tapes of al Qaeda suspects. The review will determine whether a full investigation is warranted.
Senior Bush administration officials say Harriet Miers, who held top posts at the White House told the spy agency not to destroy the tapes. The CIA says the tapes were destroyed because they posed an intelligence risk. But Congressional Democrats are demanding an investigation. So, we're confirming that the U.S. Justice Department along with the CIA will be conducting an investigation now.
Well, back to our conversation earlier with Tom Brokaw and how he has witnessed history. In his new book, "Boom! Voices of the Sixties," he writes about more than just the baby boomers. I talked with him recently about the political assassinations that plagued that era.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: The idea and the perception of leaders then, very different from now. It's remarkable that when you talk to people who are eight and nine-years-old at the time who were seeing Bobby Kennedy, JFK, Martin Lutehr King die, their idea of a leader is someone who dies.
BROKAW: That's right.
WHITFIELD: Today ...
BROKAW: A number of them said that to me. A number of them said, you know, I came of age thinking, well, this is how we deal with political leaders in this country. They get killed at some point, or if you run for office, you run effectively under a death threat. Leaders were a little different than, too, because -- in Bobby Kennedy's case, classic example, that last campaign. You could see him change and grow before your eyes, and not be afraid to take risks and say things that you wouldn't expect him to say.
He had gone to a college campus where he was an idol and the kids would be completely wild with enthusiasm and he'd say how many of you have student deferment, you don't have to go to Vietnam. Every hand would go up and he'd say, that's wrong. And my son could get a student deferment and that's wrong because -- and watch, they're going to Vietnam or in Bellflower, which is a blue-collar white working class area, they're going to Vietnam and you can't seek sanctuary here without realizing what your other citizens are doing.
WHITFIELD: What do you want your grandkids to learn, to understand ...
BROKAW: From this book?
WHITFIELD: ...about, yes, the '60s?
BROKAW: I think what they'll learn is that there's still work to be done. That's what I hope they'll learn. It's interesting to me. When I left Nightly News, they did a retrospective of my career, Fredricka.
And my pretty sophisticated, little 10-year-old granddaughter watched it and was really unnerved because she saw racial violence for the first time. She had not seen that before. And she goes to a very diversified school and she has a lot of friends of color and she can't believe that at one point in our nation's history, not that long ago, during her grandfather's time, there was this kind of violence and institutionalized racism that we had. And it emotionally upset her for a while and my daughter had to have a long talk with her about it.
So, maybe for the next generation, what it will do is inspire them to take on the next vexing problem.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: And coming up in our 4:00 p.m. Eastern hour, more of my conversation with Tom Brokaw. We'll be talking about the parallels, as well as the differences between the election years of 1968 and 2008.
Well, Queen Latifah, the actress, Grammy award winning singer, well, she's got a new movie out and she dropped by the NEWSROOM recently to talk about it and we found out that she couldn't stop talking about CNN's Wolf Blitzer.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
QUEEN LATIFAH, ACTRESS: Wolf Blitzer ...
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, sexy, isn't it?
QUEEN LATIFAH: He's got a reindeer name ...
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Oh, God.
QUEEN LATIFAH: ...and one that, in a pack, would kill a reindeer. Let's go to Wolf. Wolf Blitzer. Donner and Cupid, you dig?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Oh, boy. Queen, you're in trouble. Queen Latifah also got pretty serious, however. She did have a message for the people of Jena, Louisiana. You can see more of her interview in the NEWSROOM on Monday afternoon.
Well, straight ahead at 4:00 p.m., twins separated at birth for a psychological study. Some found out, others have not.
A check of the day's headlines is coming up next as well, then CNN's "SPECIAL INVESTIGATION UNIT."
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