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American Morning
Bush Ignites a Firestorm After Appeasement Remarks; California Supreme Court Overturns State Bans on Same-Sex Marriage; Texas Invests in Turbines; China After the Earthquake Confronts Rescue Challenges; Senator Joe Biden Fights Back
Aired May 16, 2008 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Iran and the United States did engage through different parties but also side by side over Afghanistan during the post-9/11 invasion of Afghanistan, and Iran was considered to be helpful in the ultimate resolution of the invasion of Afghanistan and the creation of a pro- western government in Afghanistan. So the question is, what is the political will and what are the aims?
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, we're going to find out a lot come the presidential election and the turnout there. Christiane Amanpour, thank you so much -- John.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Just crossing the top of the hour now. President Bush heading to the next stop of his five-day Middle East visit. He left Tel Aviv early this morning, and as you can, there's live pictures of Air Force One on the ground in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where he's likely to talk about rising oil prices.
He's going to be greeted in just a couple minutes. You can see the red carpet in the lower left hand side by King Abdullah. President Bush is expected to ask his old ally to open the spigot a little bit more and produce more oil. But if history is any indication, King Abdullah will acknowledge that upping production is potentially not possible.
CNN's Ed Henry is traveling with the president, joins us now from Riyadh. Ed, good morning. So do you expect that President Bush might have any luck in getting Saudi Arabia to up their production?
ED HENRY, White House CORRESPONDENT: That's the big question, John. If history is any guide, it's very unlikely. I was here with the president in January, and as you mentioned then, he sort of gently nudged King Abdullah. It's a very interesting alliance.
As you know, the U.S. doesn't want to push the Saudis too hard. Mr. Bush sort of gently nudged the king back in January, urged him to have OPEC increase the supply of oil, try to deal with that heavy demand, bring oil prices down. It didn't work.
Basically Mr. Bush was rebuffed and if you look back in mid- January, oil was about $92 a barrel. Now, as you know, it's around $124 per barrel. Gasoline in the United States, national average was about $3.06 per gallon in mid-January. Now in mid-May, we've hit another record $3.77 for a national average per gallon across the United States.
So if anything since the last time Mr. Bush made this plea, the situation has gotten worse. And now, if King Abdullah rebuffs him once again, we're about to head into that heavy summer driving season, as you know, where gasoline prices traditionally in the United States go up, John.
ROBERTS: And Ed, what about the other story that's coming out the of the Middle East after the president's speech at the Knesset yesterday, what some believe was a veiled reference to Senator Barack Obama and his intentions to talk with the leaders of countries like Iran and Syria in his first year in office, what President Bush suggested was a policy of appeasement, similar to what the allies undertook prior to World War II.
HENRY: Well, the big surprise for the White House press corps traveling around the world with the president is the fact that he weighed in at all. As you know, he has repeatedly said he does not want to get engaged in the 2008 election. Meanwhile, he sort of jumped in in a major way yesterday.
And what's going on, you know, specifically is that by delivering these remarks at the Knesset in Israel, that could raise concerns among Jewish American voters about Barack Obama. You know those concerns were already stoked in recent weeks by John McCain when he suggested Obama was the favored candidate of Hamas. But more broadly beyond that, clearly Republicans are trying to show that Barack Obama does not have the national security credentials to be commander in chief. But as you know as well, Hillary Clinton has been trying to make that case for months and it doesn't look like it worked, John.
ROBERTS: Yes, and we should mention, too, that she leapt to Senator Obama's defense yesterday as well. Ed Henry for us this morning in Riyadh. Ed, thanks very much.
Senator Joe Biden meantime blasted President Bush for his comments at the Knesset yesterday calling them way out of line.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOE BIDEN (D), DELAWARE: This is bull (expletive). This is malarkey. This is outrageous.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Later Biden told Wolf Blitzer that with his first assessment of the president's words, he had gone a little bit too far.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOE BIDEN (D), DELAWARE: I shouldn't use that word. I came off the elevator and I was confronted with what had happened and I responded. I should have just said malarkey, but the essence of what I was saying is absolutely accurate. This is outrageous.
(END VIDEO CLIP) ROBERTS: Senator Biden is going to be our guest coming up in about 20 minutes' time, so make sure that you stay around for that.
And apparently, if we can go to the live picture here from Riyadh, they've got the door open, and there is the welcoming committee on the ground waiting for President Bush. He's supposed to depart Air Force One in just a couple of minutes.
He's spending, as Ed Henry was saying, time on the ground there speaking with King Abdullah, imploring him to open the spigot a little bit more. That's King Abdullah right up there up front, and he's there with the first lady as well. Condoleezza Rice there.
The president, as Ed Henry suggested, may not get what he's looking for in terms of an increase in oil production. Saudi Arabia suggesting it's not possible to increase production. And Kyra, at the price that they have for oil right now, not much incentive for these OPEC countries to increase production and lower that price because they're certainly making a tremendous amount of money off of it.
PHILLIPS: A trip and a new message to Israel this morning believed to be from terror leader Osama bin Laden. The voice on the audiotape refers to Israel's 60th anniversary and said the fight for the Palestinian cause was the most important factor driving al-Qaeda's war with the west, and it's what fueled the 9/11 attacks. The tape has yet to be authenticated.
And all California couples now have a basic civil right to marry. California Supreme Court struck down the state's ban on same-sex marriages. In a landmark ruling, California now becomes the second state to allow same-sex marriage marriages.
Ted Rowlands now has reactions from both sides of the issue.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TED ROWLANDS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): People cheered outside the San Francisco courthouse, jubilant over the 4-3 decision that paves the way for same-sex marriage in California.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're so excited. We're so excited.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't believe it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We won! We won!
And there is not a lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender person in this country that is not better off because we won.
ROWLANDS: The state Supreme Court rocked the national debate over same-sex marriage calling it a "basic civil right to all Californians whether gay or heterosexual, and to same sex couples as well as to opposite sex couples." The ruling sweeping reach surprised many as the court went well beyond the immediate question of near- limited civil unions, and not everyone is celebrating.
Same-sex marriage opponents are vowing to change the state's constitution, in effect overturning the court's ruling.
RANDY THOMASSON, PRES. CAMPAIGN FOR CHILDREN & FAMILIES: This is what the California Supreme Court has said. Children, you have a new role model. Homosexual marriage, aspire to it. This is a disaster.
ROWLANDS: Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has opposed same-sex marriage but today, he said in a statement, "I respect the court's decision and as governor, I will uphold its ruling. Also, as I have said in the past, I will not support an amendment to the constitution that would overturn the state Supreme Court ruling."
The ruling instructs state officials to take action and the mayors of Los Angeles and San Francisco say they are more than ready.
MAYOR ANTONIO VILLARAIGOSA, LOS ANGELES: Individual freedom and liberty defines us, who we are as Californians and Americans, and today that fundamental right has been extended to hundreds of thousands of gay and lesbian Californians.
MAYOR GAVIN NEWSOM (D), SAN FRANCISCO: As California goes, so goes the rest of the nation. It's inevitable. This door is wide open now. It's going to happen, whether you like it or not. This is the future and it's now.
ROWLANDS: A celebration for some, a call to arms for others, with many predicting a new debate over an issue that has already deeply divided the nation. Ted Rowlands, CNN, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: And just hours after that decision, talk show host Ellen DeGeneres announced her planned wedding to Australian actress Portia de Rossi. The announcement reportedly came during a taping of her show with her watching from behind the cameras. The audience gave the couple a standing ovation.
And here is your AM extra on same-sex marriages. Forty-five states have laws banning them; 26 of those have a constitutional amendment restricting marriage to a man and woman. The other 19 states have statutory laws barring the unions.
Four states allow civil unions, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New Jersey and Vermont. Massachusetts is the only state that currently allows same-sex marriage. It's been legal there since 2004, and more than 8,000 couples have tied the knot.
ROBERTS: It's almost nine minutes after the hour now. Some big headlines this morning in the fight against cancer.
A new study is bringing hope to women with late stage breast cancer. A combination of two cancer drugs Herceptin and Tykerb was shown to delay the time that it took for the cancer to worsen in women who had already stopped responding to other treatments.
And another study shows that a little sunlight might help fight breast cancer. A study found that women with low levels of vitamin D were much more likely to die from the disease or have it spread than women with more vitamin D. Skin makes vitamin D from ultra violet light. You can also get in the form of supplements as well.
PHILLIPS: And coming up, hit and run, a bus driver beat up behind the wheel. Yes, it's pretty compelling pictures. Imagine being the driver of that bus. We're going to tell you what happened.
ROBERTS: And the race to reach people trapped in China. We're live on the front lines of the fight to pull survivors out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN VAUSE, CNN BEIJING CORRESPONDENT: No one knows how many students are still buried beneath this rubble, how many are alive, and how many are dead. Some of the bodies were found embracing each other. Others were huddled underneath desks with their hands over their heads as if they're protecting themselves from the falling debris.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Aftershocks are rolling through the region again this morning. We got a live report from John Vause in China coming up.
PHILLIPS: And at least one death is blamed on heavy storms and possible tornadoes in Louisiana. Tracking extreme weather right here on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: Just moments ago, the president touching down in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, meeting with King Abdullah. Just coming from Jerusalem, he's going to be here in Saudi Arabia for less than 24 hours.
I'll be curious to see how this plays out after his controversial comments in the Knesset about certain presidential candidates appeasing terrorists. Purpose of being here, of course, is to talk about the oil, gas prices, and how they are going to try and negotiate some sort of deal to hopefully ease things for Americans here back in the states.
ROBERTS: Well, meantime, there are plenty of other people who are trying to ease the energy crisis by doing some interesting and innovative things. And Ali Velshi is here to tell us more about that as he has been all week.
Good morning to you.
ALI VELSHI, CNN SENIOR BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: yes, we're trying to talk about alternatives to gasoline from oil. We were talking about coal earlier in the week. One of the big deals, and this isn't for your car, but it's for electricity, is wind.
About one percent of our electricity in this country is generated by wind with turbines like you see there. You'll be familiar with them. Many of these in Texas and California.
Now, one of the biggest oil men in the country, T. Boone Pickens, has made a big, big investment in winds. He has announced that he is buying 667 of these turbines from General Electric to put them into a farm in Sweetwater, Texas, which is near Abilene, northwest Texas, about 2 1/2 hours from Dallas. He is going to put 667 of these turbines in and create the world's largest wind farm in a place called -- the project is going to be called the Pampa Wind Project.
It will be completed by 2014. It will be on 400,000 acres, and it will provide 4,000 megawatts of electricity, which is the equivalent of the power that would be used by 1.3 million homes. Now, in the United States, as I was saying, about one percent of our power, our electrical power is generated by wind. Most of it is generated by coal or natural gas.
The U.S. government said under the right conditions we could be generating 20 percent of our electricity from wind by the year 2030, and it could rival nuclear power. Wind energy is very, very clean, although I was talking to you guys about it earlier, neither of you think it's all that attractive, these wind farms. I thought they were quite pretty and romantic.
ROBERTS: I like single windmills. Those single windmills are an elegant piece of equipment.
VELSHI: They're not efficient though the one. You need like hundreds of them.
ROBERTS: That's true.
VELSHI: It doesn't work with one.
PHILLIPS: I wonder what --
VELSHI: It's like saying one truck is nice. But I don't like it when they clutter up the highway like that.
ROBERTS: But the Flying Js are your favorite place.
VELSHI: I like trucks. I like truck stops.
ROBERTS: A friend of mine likes the Flying Js as well. Texas for President Bush. He eats with the Flying Js.
VELSHI: Ali fits in real well with those truckers in his fancy, fancy suit.
VELSHI: By the way, T. Boone Pickens, the guy we're talking about who bought all these windmills, is going to be on "ISSUE #1" today at noon, if you'd like to know why he bought all those windmills and whether he thinks they're pretty.
ROBERTS: Fourteen minutes after the hour. Deadly storm damage in Louisiana to tell you about. Heavy rains and high winds spawning possible tornadoes. Rob Marciano is tracking the extreme weather for us. He's coming right up. Hey, Rob.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Hey, John. Yes, we've got more rough weather for southeast Louisiana, including New Orleans and some rain across the northeast. Records searing, record-breaking searing heat out in the west. Weather is coming up after the break. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MARCIANO: Big time damage yesterday across parts of Louisiana. At least one death reported. An elderly man was killed when high winds blew a tree on top of his camper. Heavy rain, golf ball-sized hail were also reported. Some 18,000 people lost power in Louisiana.
Welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING, everybody. I'm Rob Marciano. We're tracking some thunderstorms that are rolling actually through southeast Louisiana and through parts of New Orleans, and more rain moving into the I-10 corridor which got hit pretty hard yesterday.
Here you see it. Pretty big glob of moisture about to migrate its way to the north and east. So everywhere from Beaumont east towards Baton Rouge, we'll see some of these. But the heaviest amounts are southeast of New Orleans and along the Mississippi delta.
All right. Up to the northeast, you got some rainfall coming your way. Light to moderate stuff expected today, but if you think it's going to end anytime soon across the I-95 corridor, you're wrong because the rain shield is all the way back towards Pittsburgh. So you're pretty much socked in for a Friday afternoon. Wet time across the New York City metropolitan area, the Tristate area, Yonkers back through Edison, Levittown and Bridgeport, New Haven.
Fairfield County you're seeing some as well, and you'll kind of seeing that situation for a while. We've got a switch happening in the atmosphere where cool and wet weather will probably be prevailing across the East Coast, and big time heat across the West Coast.
We saw temperatures approach 100 in the San Francisco Bay Area yesterday. Won't be quite that hot in San Francisco today, but everybody will see temperatures that will be 20, 25 degrees above average right through the weekend.
And that will cause some issues not just because it's going to feel hot, but an incredible snow pack across the Cascades, the Siskiyou and through parts of Idaho and into the Rockies, and some of that snow pack is going to melt pretty rapidly. So we'll probably see some flooding issues, especially across parts of Idaho and eastern Washington. We've already seen that as a matter of fact.
John and Kyra, back up to you.
ROBERTS: Rob, thanks very much.
China's president is getting a firsthand look at the earthquake disaster zone today. And while time is growing more desperate, there are still remarkable stories of survival and rescue. A nurse was pulled to safety after spending 96 hours trapped in a collapsed clinic. Chinese officials are out again with even higher numbers of people believed to be killed in the quake saying that the toll could hit 50,000.
Our John Vause says that China is still feeling aftershocks this morning from the original quake. He has been traveling the disaster zone, a lot of it on foot for hours. He joins us now in Diyang (ph), China, with more stories from the quake aftermath. Hey, John.
JOHN VAUSE, CNN BEIJING CORRESPONDENT: Hey, John. You're looking at now just some people who are camping out here pretty much on the side of the road of Diyang because quite simply even now, five days after the earthquake, there is still just scared to go back to their homes. Their homes have been damaged, and this is just a private park on the side of a major highway.
Now, caring for these people long-term is one problem for the Chinese authorities. A more immediate problem for China's government is obviously getting relief to the areas where it needs it most. But also there is a shortage of gas right now. Electricity still has not been restored in many areas.
As you mentioned, aftershocks are still being felt and the death toll continues to rise in those worst affected areas.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE (voice-over): The city was once home to 20,000 people. Now, there is only utter devastation. It's not confirmed but word here is only 5,000 residents have survived. This man and his sister are looking for their mother.
QI BO, VICTIM'S SON (TRANSLATED BY VAUSE): The neighbors called out for her yesterday and she answered, he says. But today, there is only silence. So they sit there on the sidewalk.
VAUSE: At the end of their street, there's a pile of rubble three stories high, all that's left of an apartment block on one side and office building on the other. From a distance, the entire city looks as if the next aftershock might bring it all crashing down. Almost every building here has either been destroyed or is badly damaged.
The injured are stretchered out through the hills. No vehicles can make it in. When the quake hit, this woman was shopping.
WU CUIHUA, EARTHQUAKE SURVIVOR (TRANSLATED BY VAUSE): She says the ground started to shake. She ran and fell. That's all she remembers before being pulled from the rubble more than three days later.
VAUSE: And in the local middle school, there is a steady stream of tragedy. Parents wait, hoping each dead body is not their child. They're just teenagers on the stretchers. The frozen expression on their face is of pain and fear. Chen Ying has been here since the earthquake destroyed this five- story building. She watches and waits for her daughter.
CHEN YING, VICTIM'S MOTHER (TRANSLATED BY VAUSE): I just want to see her, she told me. If she's dead, I just want to see her body.
VAUSE (on camera): No one knows how many students are still buried beneath this rubble, how many are alive and how many are dead. Some of the bodies were found embracing each other. Others were huddled underneath desks with their hands over their heads as if they're protecting themselves from the falling debris.
VAUSE (voice-over): With each stretcher, the quake's death toll grows ever higher. Authorities believe it could reach 50,000. Fifty thousand times there will be anguish like this. She just saw her daughter's body being carried away.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Now, in Beichuan County, they continue to find survivors. About a dozen yesterday, but only two today -- John.
ROBERTS: John Vause for us this morning in Diyang in Sichuan province. John, thanks very much.
Terrible, terrible stories there. My goodness.
PHILLIPS: Take a look at these pictures. Caught on tape, a bus driver beaten down. This passenger jumps on, just starts swinging, and the driver just keeps on going. We're going to show you how it all ended.
Another wild video. A runway mix-up. One plane on top of another, even though the pilots were talking to each other. What went wrong?
And the stars came out in this debate, Cannes can can (ph). Well, we haven't come -- something else hasn't come out yet. We're going to catch up with Angelina Jolie and the news about her family straight ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Twenty-four minutes after the hour. He has mostly resisted the temptation to weigh in on the election campaign, but yesterday President Bush jumped in with both feet. In a speech to Israel's Knesset, he appeared to take a dramatic swipe at Barack Obama who said he would meet with the leaders of nations like Iran, Syria and Venezuela in his first year in office without precondition.
Well, President Bush likened that policy to the allies' attempts to appease Hitler prior to World War II, and brought a sharp response from the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We have an obligation to call this what it is, the false comfort of appeasement which has been repeatedly discredited by history.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOE BIDEN (D), DELAWARE: This is bull (expletive). This is malarkey. This is outrageous.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Senator Joe Biden joins me now live from Wilmington, Delaware. Senator, "BS," strong words. Why did it touch such a nerve with you?
SEN. JOSEPH BIDEN (D), DELAWARE: Well, because I find it so damaging for the United States. It's so rare for a president of the United States, as you know, John, to be abroad and use such a forum as a political forum. It makes us look foolish around the world, and it makes the rest of the world look at President Bush and realize what hypocrisy there is.
Here he is negotiating with North Korea. He negotiated with Libya, Ghadhafi, a terrorist. He, in fact, is engaged in a policy where Secretary Gates, his own secretary of state, says we have to sit down with Iran, as well as the secretary of state says we have to sit down with Iran, and he does such a cheap political shot, you know.
And then, in the Israeli Knesset, comparing by implication Barack Obama's policy to Neville Chamberlain and appeasement and Hitler and the tanks rolling across into Poland? I mean, it's outrageous.
ROBERTS: Now, you think it was malarkey. Senator John McCain -- Senator John McCain did not though. He immediately jumped on the president's comments. Let's listen to what he said about it yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R-AZ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It was a serious error on the part of Senator Obama. It shows naivete and inexperience and lack of judgment.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Senator, I know that you have great respect for Senator McCain.
BIDEN: I do.
ROBERTS: But what do you think of what he said yesterday?
BIDEN: I think there's an emerging pattern here of -- that they're going to try to have a rhetoric, a highly charged rhetoric masquerade as policy. This president's policy has made us much weaker in the Middle East. Israel is much more at risk than it was before he became president. Iran is closer to the bomb.
John himself as the "Washington Post" reports today has said two years ago at Davos the Republicans have to sit down with Hamas. That's John McCain.
This is raw, ugly politics. It makes it look like to the rest of the world that we may have a Republican president again and a present Republican president who doesn't understand the world, who they don't want to cooperate with.
It just undermines the United States' credibility, and it seems to be an emerging ugly pattern here. John said a week and a half ago, well, you know, the fact that Hamas -- I'm paraphrasing him. The fact that Hamas likes Obama and the fact that Danny Ortega likes him, well you judge for yourself. What kind of character assassination is that?
That's beneath John. It's not usually the way he is. I hope to lord this thing gets on a different track because this is just, just damaging to the United States of America.
ROBERTS: Senator Biden, let me just go into a little bit more detail about what you mentioned regarding Senator McCain and what's in the "Washington Post" today. It was Jamie Rubin, who is, you know, is the spokesperson for the State Department when Madeleine Albright was the secretary of state under President Clinton.
BIDEN: Right.
ROBERTS: He had a program on Sky TV when he was living over there in London in which he interviewed Senator McCain, and he talked to John McCain about the new Hamas government. And Senator McCain said, "They're the government. Sooner or later we are going to have to deal with them one way or another."
So there seems to be a suggestion there from Senator McCain that they were legitimately elected. At some point, the United States is going to have to, if not sit down at the table with these folks, at least have some sort of engagement with them.
BIDEN: Look, John, how do you get to the point where you change the behavior of Iran, which is not good behavior, bad behavior? Unless you actually sit across the table from them and lay out clearly what the alternatives are.
John Kennedy when he was president once said, we should never negotiate out of fear, but we should never fear to negotiate. I had a phone call several years ago from the White House and Condi Rice telling me Air Force Two was waiting for me at Andrews Air Force Base, would I please get in the plane and go meet with Moammar Ghadhafi in Libya, because the president wanted to cut a deal with him.
The president cut a deal. Well, he should have. He did the right thing. The president cut a deal with Moammar Ghadhafi, a known terrorist, a direct supporter of terrorists, a man responsible for blowing up a number of young people from my alma mater, Syracuse University in an aircraft, and he sat -- we sat down with him and negotiated an agreement.
The president of the United States of America just a month ago wrote a letter, dear Mr. Chairman, to Kim Jong-Il, the dictator in North Korea, possessing nuclear weapons, who has proliferated nuclear technology. If there's ever a terrorist group, if there's ever a terrorist government, it would have been Ghadhafi in Libya and Kim Jong-Il in North Korea. And this administration is out there doing the right thing, trying to change their conduct.
This is pure hypocrisy, but the worst part about it, John, is think how it falls on the ears in the capitals of Europe and the rest of the world and Tokyo, when the president of the United States says under no condition will we talk to anybody like that. And John McCain, the nominee for the Republican Party, who may very well be president of the United States, is saying the same thing.
The rest of the world goes, oh, my God, what are these guys going to do? There's only one other alternative if you don't talk. It's war. This is self-defeating, self-defeating.
I'm not worried about its impact on Barack. I'm worried about its impact on the United States of America over the next nine months.
ROBERTS: Senator, allow me if you would to change gears a little bit here and ...
BIDEN: Sure.
ROBERTS: ...delve in the purely political. We're running out of time a bit here as well. So, that maybe I can ask you in brief. What did you think of Senator Edwards' endorsement of Barack Obama and why have you kept your powder dry this long?
BIDEN: I think it's great for Barack that John endorsed him. John is a very, very popular figure in the Democratic Party, is a major contender. I think he's all good for Barack. The reason I haven't endorsed is the day after I pulled out of the race in Iowa, both Hillary and Barack contacted me. I made a commitment to both of them that I would be available to both of them but I would not endorse the other. And as long as this process is fair and is going forward, I think it should play out. I talk with each of them probably once every couple weeks. I have a good relationship with them. I give advice when they ask it --
ROBERTS: And how long --
BIDEN: But I'm going to let the people --
ROBERTS: How long do you think it should play out? When is a good end point for you?
BIDEN: Well, the good end point is when the primaries are over or shortly thereafter. And my guess is, although neither one has told me that, my guess is that's when it ends. And I'm not one of those doomsayers, John. I think this has been good for the Democratic Party, not bad for the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party will unite without any difficulty around whomever the nominee is.
ROBERTS: Senator Biden, it's always great to see you. Thanks for coming on this morning. Appreciate it.
BIDEN: Good to see you. Thanks for having me on.
ROBERTS: All right. Take care. Kyra.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Alina Cho here with other stories making news this morning. Good morning.
ALINA CHO, CNN, CORRESPONDENT: Hey there, Kyra. Good morning to you and good morning everybody. New this morning, it's one of the most popular stories at cnn.com right now. Federal prosecutors have charged a woman in Missouri in that MySpace hoax that may have led to a 13-year-old's suicide. Authorities say the teen was led to believe she was chatting online with a 16-year-old boy. He first professed his love for Megan Meier, but then told her the world would be better off if she didn't exist. On the day she received that message, Megan hanged herself. Her mother responded to the news of the charges.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VOICE OF TINA MEIER, MEGAN'S MOTHER: It's a bittersweet feeling, you know. I have the bitter part is obviously Megan will -- no matter what happens, will never come back, and that's something I can't change. The positive part is we have been waiting for a year and a half for this to happen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHO: Forty-nine-year-old Lori Drew denies creating the MySpace account and sending the messages. If convicted, she could face a maximum of 20 years in prison.
Caught on tape, a Milwaukee bus driver violently attacked. The suspect in the red sweatshirt there, as you just saw, runs onto the bus and immediately starts punching the driver left and right while the bus is in motion. Sheriff's deputies say the attacker even grabbed the steering wheel at one point and tried to commandeer the bus. That caused the bus to crash into a tree. The suspect hopped off and got away and is still at large. The driver was bruised but is expected to be OK.
And then there's this. The plane landing on another plane. Take a look at this. One small plane landed on top of another at an airport near Ft. Worth, Texas. It happened as one plane was landing. The other was taking off. Part of the problem may be this, the airport only has one runway and no control tower. Amazingly nobody was hurt, and get this, the pilots reportedly even know each other. They were talking on the radio. Each thought the other had agreed to yield. Apparently, they were wrong.
A Las Vegas casino is telling Charles Barkley to pay up. The NBA hall of famer admits he owes $400,000 in gambling fees to the Wynn Casino. Barkley says he's not broke. It was just a super bowl bet he let lapse. Four bets, 100 grand a piece. A Las Vegas prosecutor says Sir Charles could face criminal charges now. Barkley, by the way, is now an NBA analyst on TNT. That is owned by the parent company of this network.
And at the Cannes Film Festival, eating for three and still stunning. Angelina Jolie pregnant with twins in a gorgeous green dress, and her husband, Brad Pitt, showing off on the red carpet there. Entertainment correspondent Brooke Anderson has the tough job of covering the festival. She caught up with the stars.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BROOKE ANDERSON, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: It was a night of "Kung Fu Panda" and co-stars Angelina Jolie, Jack Black, and Dustin Hoffman here at the Cannes Film Festival. First, the animated comedy held its lavish premiere and grand screening. And following that, we all hit Panda's after party on the pier. Describe Cannes. Because a lot of people don't realize just how crazy it can be. You've been here numerous times now.
JACK BLACK, ACTOR/COMEDIAN: It's, you know, it's got all the artists of like Sundance Film Festival, but instead of the snow you got the beach. It's kind of like Miami Beach but a little more Vegas and kind of like the Oscars at the same time.
ANDERSON: All rolled into one.
BLACK: It's entertainment burrito.
ANDERSON: Before the party at a press conference promoting "Kung Fu Panda," Angelina revealed she's considering giving birth to her twins right here in France.
ANGELINA JOLIE, ACTRESS: I actually haven't completely decided but we are certainly thinking of France and I just -- it's the second language in our house. I'm still learning so I'm not going to attempt it here today. My rusty French. But our children are starting to speak French and so being here is very good for them for their language at this time.
ANDERSON: Angelina will also be promoting the film "Changeling" from Clint Eastwood, in which she stars as a mother whose son has been kidnapped. We're also anticipating the long awaited premiere of the fourth installment of "Indiana Jones." I'll be speaking with Harrison Ford and the filmmaker and we will bring that to you as well. Reporting from the 61st Cannes Film Festival, Brooke Anderson, CNN.
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CHO: Oh, Brooke, such a tough job. By the way, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie not officially married. Common law husband is what I meant to say, but both look great, huh? Looked like they dyed their hair.
PHILLIPS: I love how -- what were you going to say?
ROBERTS: The last thing I noticed.
PHILLIPS: No hair jokes.
ALI VELSHI, CNN, SENIOR BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: I was just telling whether it's Cannes or canned? And John said, it's either.
ROBERTS: In the city of Normandy, it's Cannes.
CHO: You know what it is, it's two weeks of debauchery is what it is.
VELSHI: Doesn't matter what you call it when you're down there.
PHILLIPS: Well, he's a memory master. We're not talking about John. He actually remembers --
(crosstalk)
PHILLIPS: We call him Google John, Wikipedia Roberts. Well, anyway this guy can remember everything that he sees and hears. You're going to meet this man whose special gift could be a saving grace to others but first Ali Velshi who for the most part remembers things if he's not out late the night before.
VELSHI: It really has to do with exactly how much sleep I got.
PHILLIPS: Almost.
VELSHI: But for the rest of the time I have little sheets like this to tell you what I'm going to tell you. But what I am going to do is give you a little bit of good news because that's what I'm all with these days. The bottom line is that the United Nations says that the world is not going to hell in a hand basket despite the economic troubles that we're seeing this year. I'm going to come back and tell you about that when AMERICAN MORNING continues. Stay with us.
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PHILLIPS: Ali Velshi "Minding all of our business."
VELSHI: With good news, you know, you're going to be talking to Jeffrey Sachs in just a few minutes. Really, a renowned economist and I don't know that everybody thinks that listening to an economist in the morning is an interesting thing, but he really is very smart. And he's got a remarkably -- it's really one of those things worth putting a cup of coffee down for a minute and listening to him. Because he's got a great perspective on the world.
I'm going to give you my little teaser perspective on the world. And that is that the United Nations says despite everything we hear about the economy it's not going to be all that bad worldwide. Now, take a look at the economic growth of the world over the last few years. You can see that in 2008 and they're in blue because 2008 and 2009 are projections. Clearly we've dropped a lot from the economic growth that we have seen. The United Nations is saying this year the world will grow by 1.8 percent. That's all the stuff we create and sell and buy will grow by 1.8 percent over last year.
Next year will be a little better at 2.1 percent. How does that break down? Well, the United States remains the economic engine of the world. So it's because the United States is doing poorly that we have brought down the world. Take a look comparing the different economies of the world. This is actually lower than some people in the United States are predicting, but we're thinking that the United States economy will shrink by just a bit, 0.2 percent. That 's not disastrous but the euro zone will be up by just over 1 percent. Latin America and the Caribbean will be up by 3 percent. Western Asia, up by 4 percent. Africa, look at the growth in Africa. Remember, you're coming from a lower base of production so they're gaining faster. But almost 5 percent growth in Africa. And East and South Asia, 6 percent growth. So what's happening out is when you balance it all out, the world doesn't look so bad.
What's that got to do with you if you live here in America? Well, your investment options are much better around the world than they have ever been before. 15 years ago if the rest of the world was doing well and America wasn't, it's got nothing to do with you. Today you can make investments in companies, in your stocks, in your 401ks that invest in countries like that. More than half the profitability of the S&P 500, the biggest companies in America, are made in overseas markets. So, when the rest of the world is growing, it does benefit the United States. So, that's just a good piece of information to keep in mind. It's not all that bad.
ROBERTS: Appreciate it.
Storm chasers have got a new weapon in their arsenal. It's a new truck designed specifically to drive into a tornado and it's not just for scientific purposes. We'll explain, coming up next.
First though, our Rob Marciano tracking the extreme weather for us today. Good morning, Rob.
ROB MARCIANO, CNN, METEOROLOGIST: Talk about pimp my ride. We'll talk about that car plus the weather that's going to affect the United States. Rain on the east coast. Heat on the west coast. Weather's coming up when AMERICAN MORNING comes right back.
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MARCIANO: Welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING. Check out this ride. It is a contraption that is called a tornado intercept vehicle. We like to call it the TIV in the weather nerd business. A Colorado scientist built it with the intention of driving well directly into a twister. He's been trying to do this for a couple of years now. This is the latest model. 16,500 pounds, special anchors to keep it on the ground. Outfitted with pods to collect data and a high-def camera to get video in the guts of a twister. A new documentary on severe weather hopefully coming out soon. That's, by the way, the first model, the basis of a Ford F-150. Nice. All right. Listen, you're going to go chasing, you might as well drive into one, right. That would be something to see. All right. I-10 Baton Rouge to New Orleans, we have seen some heavy weather yesterday. Damage for sure. Actually a couple of twisters touching down in southern Louisiana. Today. we don't expect that, but certainly heavier rain on top of that. It doesn't, you know, it kind of add insult to injury. Not so much heavy rain but certainly light to moderate rainfall all across parts of the northeast, just enough to create some problems if you're heading to the airport on this Friday. So, folks are doing just that. La Guardia, an hour now already. Philadelphia, you have had 35-minute delays. I think rain will be going on across much of the northeast all day long today. And there will be a chance of it intermittently over the weekend.
Boy, yesterday San Francisco touched 97 degrees. Upper 90s in Oakland as well, and up and down the west coast today we're looking at temperatures that will be plus 20, plus 25 degrees above average. And that will carry over into the weekend. We're already seeing some problems with snow melt and the huge snow pack they had built up this year melting rapidly in some of the rivers as that water tries to get to the ocean. Well, they're filling up rapidly.
John and Kyra, back over to you.
ROBERTS: So what's the sound system like in that tornado vehicle? Any idea?
MARCIANO: Oh, god, it's got, you know, it's got the Harmon Carmen speakers. 11 of them, beefed up base. Yes.
ROBERTS: An HD DVD, the whole nine yards. Thanks, Rob.
MARCIANO: See you, guys.
PHILLIPS: That best selling memoir went bust in front of Oprah and everybody. And now James Frey is picking up the pieces, or James Frey rather, of his career. Are the readers going to give him another chance?
And imagine being able to remember everything you have seen or heard, names, places, even events.
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DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: February 11th, 1990.
BRAD WILLIAMS, MEMORY MASTER: February 11th, 1990, I think that was the day Nelson Mandela was released from prison.
GUPTA: January 19th, 2004.
WILLIAMS: I think that was the Iowa caucuses. And especially the night that Howard Dean got a little carried away.
(END VIDEOTAPE) PHILLIPS: All right. Sanjay, you should have interviewed John Roberts. How many times have you told you, but instead he's going to introduce us to the memory master here and see how he might help others. Straight ahead on this AMERICAN MORNING.
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PHILLIPS: Well, this morning we can meet a man who can remember every day of his life. Down to the last details of the weather, even world affairs. CNN's chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta shows us why researchers are hoping that his memory power might help others.
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GUPTA: Imagine remembering almost every day of your life as though it happened yesterday.
WILLIAMS: 7:37 at WKTY. It is rainy in our area.
GUPTA: Brad Williams reports the days news on the radio in Lacrosse, Wisconsin. But he can also tell you exactly what happened a year ago today or ten years ago or 40. You'll be astonished at just how much Williams remembers. Something spectacular is happening in his brain.
WILLIAMS: Black hills in 1964. Right.
GUPTA: You're sitting there getting your picture taken. Do you know what day that was?
WILLIAMS: July 28th, a Tuesday. Going to Mt. Rushmore. It was a very hot day. It was a hot week all around. I know the temperature got up to 100.
GUPTA: You're talking about this like it was yesterday, but we're talking about 44 years ago.
WILLIAMS: Yes.
GUPTA: Obscure dates, Williams nails them. January 19th, 2004.
WILLIAMS: I think that was the Iowa caucuses, and especially the night that Howard Dean got a little carried away.
GUPTA: How about February 11th, 1990.
WILLIAMS: February 11th, 1990. I think that was the day Nelson Mandela was released from prison.
GUPTA: That was remarkable. More than remarkable, Williams' memory is a medical mystery and just maybe an opportunity for researchers. Can they learn enough about how the mind works to help other people whose memories are failing? Williams is one of only three people identified anywhere in the world with the amazing ability to retrieve distant memories in the blink of an eye. LARRY CAHILL, UC-IRVINE MEMORY RESEARCHER: The speed with which they do this is part of why I find it so amazing, because it seems to indicate that there's no or not much intentional calculation going on. It's boom, boom, boom. There's the answer.
GUPTA: Researchers are mapping the brains of Williams and the two other memory superstars in hopes of helping people whose memories have faded.
CAHILL: In their brains, there are some structures that are wildly different in size, and the more we study, the greater the likelihood that we're going to really figure out some fundamental new things about brain and memory that we would never have figured out without them.
GUPTA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Lacrosse, Wisconsin.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: And Williams says his memory helped him win the Wisconsin spelling bee. He came in second on "Jeopardy."
ROBERTS: He came second?
PHILLIPS: Second in "Jeopardy." I want to know who beat him. But he still has to be reminded to pay his bills every month. Imagine that. You can catch Dr. Gupta on his own show, "House Calls" Saturdays and Sunday mornings, 8:30 Eastern right here on CNN.
ROBERTS: Time to check in now to see how our "Quick Vote" question is faring this morning. We've asked you, is President Bush right, is it appeasement for the U.S. to talk to its enemies? Head to CNN.com/am to vote. Right now, let's take a look at the results, 23 percent of you say yes, it is appeasement. 77 percent say no.
PHILLIPS: And we've also been checking your e-mails. Cliff from Shelter Island, New York, wrote this about the President's remarks. "Senator Obama took it personally, but it was spoken in Israel on their anniversary and it resonated well there because they know from experience that we cannot change centuries old prejudices and religious fanaticism by sitting down to chat."
ROBERTS: James in Wheatland, Wyoming disagrees. He writes, "when did negotiation become our last resort? Negotiation is not a Democratic ploy. It is the road to solving problems for intelligent leaders."
PHILLIPS: And then Ed in South Carolina sent this, "there is nothing wrong with talking to your enemy, but talking to terrorists for whatever reason have made it obvious that they are immovable on their viewpoint and it's a horrid waste of time and effort. It's like pushing a boulder up a hill with a noodle." We're going to read more of your e-mails in the next hour.
ROBERTS: A life after Oprah. James Frey tries again after his best selling memoir went bust in a million little pieces. He talks with our Lola Ogunnaike about his comeback and what he says about Oprah now. That's coming up in our next hour.
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ROBERTS: 55 minutes now after the hour. And happening right now, new aftershocks causing more damage in China. Landslide near the epicenter is blocking roads and knocking out communications. Damage is estimated already at more than $20 billion. And overnight, more survivors were saved. A nurse was freed after spending 96 hours trapped in a collapsed clinic. As you see here, two students were also found alive in the crushed concrete that used to be their school. And two more frantic rescues overnight. A 5-year-old boy was rescued from a kindergarten in Beichuan and a 76-year-old man was also rescued from a collapsed home. The confirmed death toll from Monday's earthquake now nearly 20,000 but Chinese officials warn that it could easily rise to 50,000 or higher.
A military government in Myanmar says it will now punish anyone found hoarding or trading foreign aid meant for cyclone survivors. The warning comes amid reports that the government has been confiscating foreign aid and keeping it for itself. This morning, the death toll according to the government has topped more than 43,000. Now, the Red Cross puts that number much higher. The agency is also warning of lack of clean water that could be the biggest killer there in the coming days. Myanmar's government has denied diverting supplies that were meant for victims.
Joining me now is Jeffrey Sachs. He is a special adviser to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, also the director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. You have made global food production one of your -- in Myanmar how serious is the situation there and could it get even worse because much of the rice-producing area is buried under water.
JEFFREY SACHS, DIRECTOR, EARTH INSTITUTE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY: Well, it is obviously desperate in terms of the current victims and also they're about to lose the current planting season which will just add desperation extending into the next year. Add on top of it one of the world's most miserable regimes and we have a global scale disaster.
ROBERTS: Have you ever seen anything like this?
SACHS: Well, this combination of terrible natural disaster and terrible government is shocking to behold. We have seen it elsewhere. We see it in Zimbabwe right now, similar case of a horrible regime and a horrible set of natural circumstances and disease burden. Boy, that combination is devastating.
ROBERTS: Jeff, you recently came back from a trip to Africa, Kenya was among the countries that you were in. What did you say to leaders there in terms of how they cope with these rising food prices that have put the squeeze on so many people?
SACHS: Well, it's what they said to me. I met with the President Kikwete of Tanzania who is the chairman of the African union and then with the President Kabaki and Prime Minister Odinga of Kenya who share power. They both said we need to grow more food. We need to help the small farmers, those with an acre or two of land to get inputs, fertilizer and seed, so they can have a harvest that can keep their families alive, and that's what we're trying to do right now with the U.N.. We're going out to governments saying it's not enough to just send food aid. That's extremely expensive. There's not enough of it. We have to help the farmers to grow more food in the places they're living.
ROBERTS: How do you increase crop yields, particularly in places like Africa?
SACHS: In these African villages, the problem is that the farmers plant with last year's seed, not good seed, and with no fertilizer. So what they get in their harvest is about a third or fourth of what they could get if they get a little bit of improved input, a bag of fertilizer and better seed. Then they can triple or quadruple their output, and not years in the future, but just next growing season.
ROBERTS: There's also been a resistant to genetically modified crops there, too that are hard or more resistant --
SACHS: Well, you don't even need to genetically modify. You just need traditional hybrid seed. There's a lot of it that's been developed. In other words, good science, but poor farmers are just too poor to get it. That's the problem.
ROBERTS: Yes, we've got a looming problem here in this country. We've had drought in the southeast. There's drought in the southwest as well. It's been going on according to some accounts since the year 2000. We got this map and you can see yellow areas or places there hasn't been enough rain. The darker the are there, the worst the problem gets. And if you look at Lake Mead out there in Nevada, you know, back up behind the Hoover Dam, the level is going down at such a rate that people believe - some people believe that it could be dry by the year 2021. Do we have a looming crisis out there in the southwest which is an area, if you look at California, where a lot of our food is growing?
SACHS: John, this isn't an accident. It's not a coincidence. This is a long-term trend. This is part of global warming. All of the studies show and a lot of my colleagues, the scientists that studied this say that global warming will have this prolonged drought effect, mega drought in the American southwest. So, this is about us. This isn't just about poor people in different parts of the world. This is about us. This is about Australia. This is about high income countries as well as low-income countries. The whole world is in this together.
ROBERTS:. Jeff, it's always good to see you. Thanks for coming in this morning.
SACHS: It's a pleasure.
ROBERTS: Good to talk to you.
