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American Morning

Tropical Storm Fay Taking a Third Swing at Florida Today; "Twilight" Phenomenon; Unsolicited Advice from Ralph Nader to Barack Obama

Aired August 21, 2008 - 08:00   ET

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


KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: All right. And back to our breaking news this morning. Tropical Storm Fay taking a third swing at Florida today with devastating results. Already some cities have seen record rainfall. Rescuers are carrying residents from flooded homes and some neighborhoods are submerged in up to six feet of standing water.
AMERICAN MORNING's Sean Callebs is watching Fay from St. Augustine Beach. And Rob Marciano is tracking her path from the weather center in Atlanta.

We begin with Rob, and we say tracking the path that she really has been stationary for so long, and that's what's just devastating these communities.

ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes. The latest advisory at the National Hurricane Center is that it's pretty much stationary. Maybe nudged a little bit farther to the north. The cloud signature hasn't changed a whole lot. May have gotten a little bit weaker but still they're clocking the winds at about 60 miles an hour. But with this stationary movement or non-movement, the big deal has been the rains.

Anywhere up to two feet in Coco Beach. Good news is Melbourne, Fort Pierce, Port St. Louise, these are areas that are starting to see the rain begin to wind down. But the southern chunk of this really is where some of the heaviest rains have been. Orlando has seen some rain as well. And as these continue to spiral around, we'll continue to see heavy rain.

Right now this is where the center is. About 20 miles to the east of Daytona Beach, and much like would be in an eye of a well- developed hurricane. We're not seeing all that much rain within the center of the circulation. It's all around the circulation where we're seeing that rain.

Check out our forecast models for the next 48 hours. White, we rarely see that. That means ten plus inches and that it will swap across northern parts of Florida. And once the storm gets inland, we'll still have 12, 24 hours of heavy rainfall in that area until we start to see things wind down. So, as is much the case with tropical storms, inland flooding is the main problem with this one.

Kiran, back up to you.

CHETRY: All right, Rob, thanks. JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Back now to the "Most Politics in the Morning." When the Republicans gather in St. Paul next month, former vice presidential candidate will take the convention stage.

Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman will speak on opening night. Lieberman was Al Gore's running mate back in the 2000 election, you'll remember. But his appearance and rumors of a possible VP nod from McCain are angering the conservative base. CNN's Ed Henry joins us now live from Washington.

Ed, it's the second time that a Democrat has spoken, at least in the last, you know, couple of election cycles here to a Republican audience. They seem to be, for the most part, happy to see them. But with McCain -- with Lieberman, not so much perhaps because of this idea that maybe he'd pick him as the running mate when he holds some positions that are somewhat anathema to the Republican Party.

ED HENRY, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right. When Zell Miller spoke to the Republican convention in 2004, you'll remember, a lot of Republicans welcomed that to showcase some bipartisanship, if you will. But now there are some conservative's concern that if Lieberman is the VP, and since he supports abortion rights, that could be a big problem in splitting the party.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HENRY: John McCain's decision to put Joe Lieberman front and center at his convention has the unique distinction of unsettling both Democrats and Republicans.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R-AZ), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: What can I say about Joe Lieberman, my dear and beloved friend.

HENRY: Democrats are furious Lieberman is playing along with McCain's push for independent voters. But some Republicans are also anxious. Fearful this is one of many signs McCain may be opening the door to a running mate who supports abortion rights.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you going to pick a vice president that conservatives can actually rally around in the future or are you going to give us someone who will cause us to want to stay home perhaps?

HENRY: At a town hall in New Mexico, McCain was pressed on the matter twice and kept his cards close to the vest both times.

MCCAIN: I will nominate a person to be vice president, my running mate who shares my principals, my values and my priorities. And that's the best that I can tell you. I said on Saturday night that I have a proud pro-life record in Congress. And I am proud of that.

(APPLAUSE)

I respect the views of others.

HENRY: Saturday was the faith forum where McCain won raves from conservatives for speaking out forcefully against abortion. But the right is now bluntly warning McCain he will wipe out the goodwill from that forum if he selects someone who supports abortion rights, like Liebermann or Tom Ridge.

Veteran activist Richard Vigurie issued an open letter to McCain, Wednesday, declaring poke the base of the Republican Party the conservatives in the eye one more time by choosing a pro-abortion vice presidential candidate and conservatives will show you that two can play the maverick game.

There's chatter within the McCain camp that the Lieberman-Ridge trial balloon has really just been a smoke screen for Mitt Romney. According to this theory, if McCain picks Romney, he can address any conservative concerns by saying at least he's not rich.

KEN DUBERSTEIN, FORMER WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: He can nominate or try to nominate anybody he wants. He is, in fact, the leader of the party now, going forward. But it would be a very bumpy road.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HENRY: And picking a moderate certainly would be a road less traveled, but a lot of McCain friend say, look, the senator is very unpredictable. He could pick a moderate and that is why conservatives this morning are very much on edge, John.

ROBERTS: So, I mean, where is the money going here? Is it on him picking a moderate or liberal or is it these guys are head fakes just so that anybody's concerns about Mitt Romney changing his position on the issue of abortion looks better?

HENRY: The honest answer is anyone's guess is as good as yours or mine, because it's really coming down to what is in John McCain's gut. If he does go with his gut, the expectation among a lot of his friends and colleagues is that he might go the moderate route because it's his chance to remake the Republican Party. But if he wants to sit down and just look at it from the raw numbers, and listens to conservatives and look at the poll numbers, he may think that he's got to make a political calculation and go as a conservative. In that case, it's more likely to the Romney or Pawlenty -- John.

ROBERTS: All right. Well, we should find out a week and a day from now. Ed Henry for us this morning. Ed, thanks.

HENRY: Thank you.

CHETRY: Well, the man in charge of U.S. troops in Iraq, he's leaving the job. We're going to hear what he says about his frustrations and emotions, and what he's really leaving behind.

Also, Ralph Nader's message to Barack Obama. Find out why he says Hillary should be the next vice presidential nominee.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) ROBERTS: 11 minutes after the hour. Following issue number one for you this morning. The price to fill up, getting cheaper by the day. Isn't that a nice word to hear? AAA reports on average that a gallon of regular will now cost you $3.70. That's down more than a penny. But the price of oil is up this morning, now at $117 a barrel.

CHETRY: That must be old video then, because it said $4.15 a gallon.

ROBERTS: They we're talking a national average here.

CHETRY: It's down right cheap now.

ROBERTS: Not everybody pays the national average.

CHETRY: No. There's four states only left there that are above 4 bucks a gallon. Everyone else has gone back down to slightly more reasonable territory.

GERRI WILLIS, CNN PERSONAL FINANCE EDITOR: You know, that relationship can exist for forever, where, you know, oil prices are creeping back up, gas prices down. Eventually, they got to come together.

ROBERTS: Like two week lag, isn't it?

WILLIS: I believe that's right. Absolutely. Well, let's talk about what's happening as a result of these high oil prices, and what happen high gas prices. Amtrak has record business.

In fact, they say they don't have enough trains to service all the folks who want to use it. Let's look at ridership July over July up 14 percent. Just last month from the year before, and they expect ridership to double, double by 2018.

So, this is very big news. And Amtrak spokesman calling this a good problem to have. They just simply don't have enough cars at this point to serve the kinds of people they are expecting because of what's going on with gas prices. And, of course, by Thanksgiving, boy -- I tell you, we're going to have some problems out there as Amtrak gets loaded up and all the airlines have reduced capacity.

You might think this would be bad for airlines, but what's going on out there is that airlines are actually recovering and investors are piling in to airline stocks. As a matter of fact, jet fuel has come down a bit, a dollar a gallon from the peak. And now airlines are saving some $13 billion annually. What happen here -- well, you guys, no capacity cuts. They boosted every fee they can find. They're making more money. They're doing better. Wall Street likes all that action and this was an industry that you would have thought was done.

ROBERTS: Are they turning a profit yet?

WILLIS: That would be no.

ROBERTS: See, I can't figure out any of this transportation stuff. It's just --

WILLIS: It's all about sentiment on Wall Street and where things are going. Wall Street looks ahead to the profits down the road, not necessarily what's on the books right now.

CHETRY: I wish my bank did that.

ROBERTS: In terms of Amtrak, if they had a truly high-speed rail corridor between Boston and Washington and maybe even expanded it from there, I mean, they would get huge business. But it can only run near maximum speed far less than you can in Europe or Japan on those tracks.

WILLIS: Well, there's no doubt about it. A real solution to this gas crisis, energy crisis is critical, and that kind of thing that you're talking about would be a huge investment.

ROBERTS: I mean, yes, it cost billions and billions of dollars.

WILLIS: Right. Big payoff.

ROBERTS: Maybe for the long run.

(CROSSTALK)

CHETRY: Somebody follow T. Boone Pickens now.

WILLIS: Right.

CHETRY: Well, how about this. A Mormon mother of three got suck into the wildly successful vampire business. That's right. It's a worldwide phenomenon now, "Twilight." See what all the screaming is about.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please welcome, Stephenie Meyer.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: You're watching the "Most News in the Morning."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: Barack Obama will be talking to voters in Virginia today about the economy. Now, yesterday, the presumptive Democratic nominee was defending his position on Iraq, which has been attacked by rival John McCain. Here's Barack Obama in his own words.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D-IL), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I believe that it was a mistake to go into Iraq. But I believe, but I believe that we have an obligation to stabilize the situation there. We've got to be as careful getting out as we were careless getting in. So, what I've said is, what I've said is that let's put more of a burden on the Iraqis, their troops are getting trained, let's withdraw our troops at a pace of one to two brigades per month, at that pace we'd have our troops out, combat troops out in about 16 months.

We would retain a residual capacity to strike against any remnants of al Qaeda. We would still be training troops, we'd still protect our embassy, our diplomats, our civilians. And the fact is that at that pace, 16 months, that means that we wouldn't have all our combat troops out for another two years.

Now, when John McCain says this is precipitous and this is a recipe for failure, Obama just proposing this because of his presidential ambitions. I mean, think about it. We had been there five years. Five in of the time that we will have removed all our combat troops under my plan, we would have been there seven years.

We will have spent well over $1 trillion. We will have lost well over 4,000 lives. We are spending $10 billion a month in Iraq at the same time that the Iraqis have a surplus because the rise in oil prices, they've got $79 billion that they're parking in New York banks, getting interest while U.S. taxpayers are paying to rebuild Baghdad and our roads and our schools and our hospitals are being, are being neglected.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: So, there was Barack Obama. Coming up at 40 past the hour, we'll hear from John McCain. He has some words for Obama about what he claimed as his failed judgment on Iraq.

ROBERTS: It's 18 minutes after the hour. Unsolicited advice. Ralph Nader says Barack Obama should pick Hillary Clinton for vice president. He joins us live to tell us why.

The twilight zone.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was so cool to take this dream and make it into something that was real.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Meet the woman behind the biggest thing since Harry Potter.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's never going to be another J.K. Rowling.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: But she's getting close. You're watching the "Most News in the Morning."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) ROBERTS: It's being called the next Harry Potter. The worldwide phenomenon called Twilight. First book is now an upcoming movie. So how did a Mormon mother of three get sucked into the vampire business? Our Brooke Anderson is with the creator.

BROOKE ANDERSON, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: John and Kiran, move over Harry Potter. Blood-sucking vampires are fast becoming the new obsession of teenage readers, creating a frenzy rivaling the excitement you see for a rock star.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON (voice-over): Screaming fans. Sold-out appearances. Even a bodyguard for protection. Meet the literary world's newest rock star.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please welcome, Stephenie Meyer.

ANDERSON: Stephenie Meyer panned the vampire centric "Twilight" book series, and is being hailed by some as the next J.K. Rowling.

STEPHENIE MEYER, AUTHOR, "TWILIGHT": There's never going to be another J.K. Rowling. You know, I'm a huge fan of hers, and that's just a phenomenon that's not going to reoccur.

ANDERSON: Meyer, a Mormon mother of three was a 29-year-old housewife when she had a life-changing dream about vampires.

MEYERS: It was so cool to take this dream and make it into something that was real. They could revisit.

ANDERSON: That was five years ago. Today, her stories are a worldwide phenomenon. Four books in the series. The final just released. 15 million copies in print, published in 37 countries and a film set for November.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We brought a snack.

ANDERSON (on camera): A Mormon writing about blood-sucking vampires. That's an interesting dichotomy, isn't it?

NICOLE SPERLING, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: It is. And actually, until you get to the fourth book, it's actually rather chased. And while it is about passion and love, it's very innocent.

MEYER: My vampires break a lot of the rules. My vampires don't have fangs. They don't sleep at all. They glisten in the sunlight, which is why they can't go out in it. That doesn't hurt them. They're a lot more indestructible than your usual vampires. Stakes are not going to help you out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's that unparalleled senses, absolutely lethal.

ANDERSON (voice-over): Fans dub themselves twilight moms, twilighters, and twihards. Still, Meyer remains modest. MEYER: Sometimes it's funny. I have to remind myself that I'm not an imposture. Because they get a little panicky when they have these figures, they're really here to see me? That can't be right.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you afraid?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON: As for any conflict between her Mormon beliefs and her blood-thirsty writing, the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints recently wrote about Meyer on their Web site and said that many famous Mormons, quote, "find ways to stay true to their faith while seeking to excel in their chosen pursuits."

John?

Kiran?

CHETRY: Brook Anderson, thanks.

Well, would you take advice from your rival? That's not stopping Ralph Nader. He is here with some campaign advice for Barack Obama. He also says he knows who Obama's VP should be and know it's not him.

ROBERTS: And Fay is on a rampage. The deluge that just won't quit. We're tracking the storm that is causing catastrophic level flooding in Florida. You're watching the "Most News in the Morning."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: Welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING. Now to the VP guessing game. The polls are tightening dramatically between Barack Obama and John McCain of late. And independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader says that Obama may need Hillary Clinton now more than ever.

Ralph Nader joins us live this morning from Hartford, Connecticut.

Thanks for being with us. Great to see you.

RALPH NADER, INDEPENDENT PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you, Kiran.

So, you told politico.com, quote, "I don't think he's that dumb when commenting on whether Barack Obama would possibly choose either Senator Biden or Bayh or Governor Tim Kaine as his VP. You think the smart choice is Hillary Clinton. Why?

NADER: Well, Hillary Clinton is the only person on the vice presidential horizon who can get him more votes. She's not going to make him a better presidential candidate addressing the real concerns that trouble Americans every day. You know, pay is too low, price is too high, fuel, drugs, credit card gouging, how do they get out of Iraq? They're not addressing getting out of Iraq, and they're not addressing how they're going to rebuild America with more jobs using the money in the bloated, wasteful defense budget to upgrade and modernize schools, clinics, mass transit systems and other things that would make people's lives so much better.

CHETRY: Now, let's get back to Hillary just for a minute here. She, of course, had many supporters in the primary. She wasn't able to clinch the Democratic nomination so why is she going to make a difference in the general election if Obama picks her as a VP?

NADER: Because a quarter of her supporters are not on the Obama bandwagon yet. That's a lot of voters. A lot of these people are saying they may vote for McCain, they may vote for Nader-Gonzalez, green party, whatever. He has got to get those voters back. And if he's going to say one people, one nation, he can raise a banner of unity with her as the vice presidential running mate.

CHETRY: Now, you're still in it.

NADER: She can get him more votes.

CHETRY: Right. You're still in it. You're still campaigning. In fact, you're doing a push to open up the debates. Why are you giving Barack Obama advice?

NADER: Well, I always give people advice. I give corporations who rip people off advice. I give government to be more responsive advice. I even give the media, Kiran, advice on how to sponsor more debates and respond to the voters in this country who want more voices and choices on the ballot.

That's why we're having this super rally in Denver on August 27th, right in the middle of the Democratic National Convention at the University of Denver with Sean Penn and Mr. Kilmer and Cindy Sheehan and others are coming and not to necessarily endorse Nader-Gonzalez, but to put before the American people the need to have a lot more vigorous debates, not these parallel interviews and this little hunky debate commission that the Democrats and Republicans have cooked up over the years.

CHETRY: You know, and it is interesting because the race between Barack Obama and John McCain is narrowing. The latest polling showing that -- well, this was an L.A. Times-Bloomberg Poll that shows Barack Obama with 42 percent, McCain with 41 percent and you 4 percent. So, really, those votes that are going to you could make the difference either way. Is that a dangerous position to be in? Could you end up being a spoiler?

NADER: It's always the right thing to do. The right -- it's always the right time to do the right thing, Kiran. And we have got a lot of serious problems in this country that the two parties are turning their back on. They've turned the government over to large corporations.

CNN and other have reported that corporate crime fraud and abuse and the corruption and the contracting process in the Iraq war, Halliburton, all these companies. This huge taxpayer subsidy going to these big corporations, the crooks on Wall Street are being bailed out in Washington. That's just not right. And people know it's not right.

We don't have a moral, domestic and foreign policy in this country. That's why we got to provide the Nader-Gonzalez choice. And if people want to see exactly why the Nader-Gonzalez, check into our website, votenader.org. You'll see a whole series of proposals that are supported by a majority of the American people.

CHETRY: Just quickly though if you had to throw your support behind one of the two major party candidates, would it be John McCain or Barack Obama?

NADER: You think I'm going to answer that question? I think both flunk badly. I think that the American people deserve a choice. Ralph Nader-Matt Gonzalez are those choices.

CHETRY: Ralph Nader, always great to see you. Thanks for being with us.

NADER: Thank you, Kiran.

CHETRY: We want a program reminder right now, we want to give you a brief program reminder right now. It's live coverage of the Democratic National Convention, it's in Denver and it begins Monday. Also a live coverage of the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota. It also kicks off here on AMERICAN MORNING, September 1st.

ROBERTS: 31 minutes after the hour. Breaking this morning, Senator Barack Obama's choice of running mate could come this morning. I spoke with one of the top contenders, Virginia Governor Tim Kaine just a few minutes ago. I asked him if he thinks Obama needs to pick a vice president who could ease fears about his experience. Here's what he told me?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. TIM KAINE (D), VIRGINIA: The polls in Virginia are a dead heat and we're seeing tremendous enthusiasm for the Obama camp. I don't have any doubt that it's going to be close, I've always thought this race would be a very close one, but I think Senator Obama is going to do just fine. If he can take a state like Virginia, which has been noncompetitive for 44 years and put it in play and we feel like we got a great chance of winning here, I think he's going to be our next president.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: It's the storm that wouldn't leave. Tropical storm Fay stalled over Florida and dumped dangerous amounts of rain in the states. Some areas could see as much as 30 inches of rain from the storm. Florida Governor Charlie Crist says Fay is "a catastrophic flooding event." We've even heard reports of alligators and snakes in flooded neighborhood streets in Melbourne, Florida.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Baghdad at this hour, pressing Iraqi leaders on a security deal that outlines the withdrawal of U.S. forces. Rice arrived in the Iraqi capital just a few hours ago on an unannounced visit. She is hoping to iron out the remaining differences in a deal that will keep U.S. forces in Iraq after a U.N. mandate expires at the end of this year.

CNN's Arwa Damon sat down with the outgoing commander of the U.S. troops in Iraq, General David Petraeus, not too long ago. Arwa joins us now live from Baghdad.

Arwa, there are many people who are saying that thanks to General Petraeus' efforts now is the time to begin to wind down the Iraq war and focus attention on where it's really needed in Afghanistan. Where is the general on the progress that's been made there?

ARWA DAMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, he naturally is feeling quite optimistic about what has been done. I mean, Iraq is such a different place today than when it was when he first arrived here a year ago and thanks to him that a lot of the security gains have actually been made. But he leaves Iraq also with the knowledge that there is still so much to be done here and so much of the security we're seeing right now is very precarious and that victory has neither been achieved and nor is it guaranteed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS, CMDR., U.S. FORCES IN IRAQ: ...Iraq in the past and I'm sure it will be the same this time of left with mixed emotions. We've made no bones of saying we're not doing any dances in the end zone. We've pushed the champagne bottle to the back of the refrigerator and, again, we're realists and reality is hard.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DAMON: He said that his biggest fear in leaving was that because of the so many uncertain factors that do exist out there that the current gains might not be sustainable. But he is going to be handing overt Iraq, the details of it to General Odierno. He is going to be tackling a much greater task and speaking on the future of Iraq, that visit, Condoleezza Rice's visit here that you just mentioned there, we are hearing from the Iraqi side that an agreement has been reached. This has been an ongoing negotiation for months now between both sides. Secretary rice cautioning, though, it's still a very long way ahead. Both sides, though, do want to see some sort of resolution to the conflict here, John.

ROBERTS: Arwa, did you talk with the general at all about the size of the residual force he thought it might be prudent to leave there in Iraq, I mean, once overall operations have been wound down?

DAMON: Well, the nature of the operations here have changed significantly. If you look back to a year ago, the U.S. military was really much more of an offensive role and what they're really doing right now is just keeping the peace. They're very much keeping the peace between Iraq's various warring factions.

They're keeping the peace between the Iraqi security forces, the militias that still exist out there and that sort of a thing. And they are saying, look, there are some parts of Iraq where the U.S. military does have a very small footprint. But if anything has taught General Petraeus and the others that have been here for quite some time, is that there is nothing about Iraq that is predictable.

So any sort of draw down with U.S. troops has to have a plan "B" of what if we draw down the U.S. military here and all of a sudden Iraq goes back to the dark days when sectarian violence was at its worst.

ROBERTS: Arwa Damon for us this morning from Baghdad.

Arwa, good to see you, thanks so much.

CHETRY: We have an update now on tropical storm Fay, still churning along the Florida-Atlantic coast. Already this storm dumped record amounts of rain on the state in what Governor Charlie Crist is calling a "catastrophic flooding event." We're watching Fay's every move today. We have Sean Callebs, he's live in St. Augustine Beach for us. Also Rob Marciano tracking Fay's path from the weather center in Atlanta. First though, we're going to go to Sean with more on how it is looking out there. I can see the wind blowing you around and an incredible amount of water associated with this system.

SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Kiran, a couple things significant. One, the temperature has dropped somewhat significantly, I'd say in the last 15 minutes. And if you look up the shore there, the clouds are much, much, much more gray. So this storm that has just kind of been sitting out there, churning, waiting to make it's way here into the northeastern section of Florida, is apparently coming our way and walking along this boardwalk, we ran into somebody who used to work at the hurricane forecast center. He said, oh, yes, it is coming. It is going to rain. It's just a matter of when. You talked about the Florida governor and how concerned he is about this "catastrophic rain event." Well, the pass is a pretty good yard stick.

We want to take you with some pictures of Melbourne, Florida, flooding so bad here they had to use air boats to go door-to-door to rescue people who were stranded in flooding that happened overnight. And where we were, lightning, thunderstorm all throughout the evening and felt like the roof was being ripped off at one time. This will be the third time that Fay has slapped Florida, beginning first with the keys and then down in the southwestern section causing a very significant flooding down in Port St. Lucie area. There are hundreds if not thousands of homes that were simply swamped by flood waters there and the same thing down here. They have these airboats to save people.

We're standing out here in the surf for a reason. I want to show you real quickly, Kiran. This is low tide. High tide is not for hours. And you can see that the wind is pushing it right up and it's basically just these rocks and this sea wall here. So this is how you get beach erosion. So it's not just the flooding problem that's going to certainly haunt this state, but this erosion problem going all up and down, really, Fay has been a very slow-moving, very punishing storm certainly leaving its mark here on the so-called Sunshine state. Kiran, back to you.

CHETRY: Wow, dramatic pictures from your position out there, Sean. Thanks a lot. And again, the big problem with this storm is it really hasn't moved. It stayed stationary. It stayed in that one location and just continued to drop a lot of water. The wind is nothing to sneeze at either, it's still gusting 60 to 70 miles per hour. So, we'll continue to follow the latest for you throughout the morning.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHETRY (voice-over): The American all-star.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You love your country, you love basketball. It makes sense to have a dream of going to the Olympics.

CHETRY: But she won't be wearing the red, white and blue.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I knew my patriotism would definitely come under attack.

CHETRY: Why this Olympian changed sides and signed on with Russia and why she says it's no big deal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE; She's playing within the rules.

CHETRY: You're watching the most news in the morning.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROBERTS: John McCain has been launching some pretty effective attacks against Barack Obama on national security and foreign policy as of late. At a town hall meeting in New Mexico on Wednesday, McCain was at it, again. Pointing to his opponents, misjudgment on Iraq as he put it. Here's McCain in his own words.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Now, on Iraq, Senator Obama says he wants peace, but he's still opposes the surge that succeeded. He opposed the surge, he said that it wouldn't work. He announced his policy towards Iraq the day before he left for the first time in over 900 days to visit Iraq and then refuses to acknowledge that the surge has succeeded. Remarkable. Remarkable.

I mean, no rational observer could go to Iraq and see what we've succeeded in doing in the last two years and say that the surge hasn't succeeded. That's what this is all about, my friends. This is what it's all about. Securing our nation. Even in retrospect, with all we know today, he'd still choose the path of retreat and failure. You know yesterday Senator Obama got a little testy on this issue. He said, I'm questioning his patriotism. Let me be very clear. I am not questioning his patriotism. I am questioning his judgment. I am questioning his judgment. I said on Saturday night that I have a proud pro-life record in Congress and I am proud of that. I respect the views of others but I also happen to believe that the noblest words ever written in history were those that said, hold these truths to be self-evident that all of us are created equal and endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights among these are life. I think liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I believe that life applies to those that are not born, as well as those that are born.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: And that was, again, McCain in his own words. The borders are blurring this morning as an all-American athlete goes toe- to-toe with the U.S. Find out why this star player is suiting up for a former cold war enemy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHETRY (voice-over): Before he picks a vice president, Barack Obama needs to make sure he's not contagious.

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm all right.

CHETRY: A Jeanne Moos special. The candidate and the head cold. You're watching the most news in the morning.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: An all-American all-star playing for a former cold war enemy. Currently, on the outs with the U.S. We brought you the story of WNBA player Becky Hammon last month. Well, right now she's suiting up for Russia and taking on the undefeated Americans in Beijing. Here's CNN's Ed Lavandera with her story.

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ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Becky Hammon's family preached the values of god and country growing up in South Dakota during the last decade of the cold war.

BECKY HAMMON, WNBA PLAYER: You love your country, you love basketball. Well, it all makes sense of having a dream of going to the Olympics.

LAVANDERA: But this quintessential all-American girl and an all- star WNBA player isn't wearing the red, white and blue uniform in the Beijing Olympics. Becky Hammon is wearing the red of Team Russia, even though she doesn't speak Russian and has no Russian ancestry.

HAMMON: I knew my patriotism was definitely going to come under attack and that's OK. Like I said, I mean, I grew up in middle America, I know how people think because that's how I think.

LAVANDERA: Some fans are angered.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is that her country?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Then I wouldn't be for that.

LAVANDERA: And the head coach of the U.S. Women's national team Ann Donovan has called her unpatriotic but in recent months Team U.S.A. has toned down its criticism.

JIM TODLEY, EXEC. DIR., U.S.A. BASKETBALL: We look at this as an individual decision that Becky has made and, you know, she's in a position to feel free to do as she pleases in that regard. She's playing within the rules.

LAVANDERA: Hammon spends half the year playing in the United States and in the off-season plays for a professional team in Moscow, which provided her with Russian citizenship.

LAVANDERA (on-camera): Professional women's basketball didn't exist when Becky Hammond was growing up. So, playing in the Olympics was the pinnacle of a career. Today, Hammon is 31 and she feels it's her last chance to fulfill that dream.

LAVANDERA (voice-over): Despite being one of the most popular players in America.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm looking for a Russia jersey with Becky's name on it.

LAVANDERA: Hammon wasn't invited to try out for the U.S. team until she had already signed to play with the Russians.

It's the gold medal match, Team U.S.A. and Team Russia and you shoot the last-second shot and you make it, how do you feel?

HAMMON: Of course, I ran through all these scenarios in my head. Every scenario possible before I made this decision. So I had to be comfortable with it. This is a basketball game. You know, I still love my country.

LAVANDERA: Becky Hammon says she'll take the shot and hopefully make it. For her, the cold war ended long ago. Ed Lavandera, CNN, San Antonio.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHETRY: All right. Here's a look at the latest medal counts. The United States still holding on to the lead in total medals. Right now, the U.S. with 89 total to China's 82 and Russia's 51. No switching sides here. But China still far ahead in the gold medal count, 46 to the United States with 28 golds. ROBERTS: It's coming up now at 49 minutes after the hour. Ohio's first black congresswoman dies. Doctors say she had a brain hemorrhage. Up to 15 million people may run the same risk and most of them don't know a thing about it. We're "Paging Dr. Gupta" this morning.

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CHETRY: CNN NEWSROOM just minutes away now and Heidi Collins is at the CNN Center with a look at what's ahead. Good morning, Heidi.

HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Kiran. Flooding from Fay in the "NEWSROOM." Florida's governor calls the situation catastrophic. The zigzagging storm could bring 30 inches of rain to parts of the state. We'll watch that one for you.

And Barack Obama campaigning in Virginia today with Governor Tim Kaine. That is bringing VP speculation to a boil. We've got live coverage for you.

And baristas in bikinis attract a lewd coffee customer. The barely dressed man pulls up to the drive through window, three times and he finally gets a hot drink in the face. It's Thursday morning in the NEWSROOM, top of the hour, right here on CNN. Kiran.

CHETRY: Heidi, thanks.

ROBERTS: Eight minutes now to the top of the hour. Yesterday we got the tragic news that Stephanie Tubbs-Jones, congresswoman from Ohio died. The cause was a brain aneurysm. Our Sanjay Gupta, who is our resident neurosurgeon, is here now with more on this condition. And Sanjay, this is particularly disturbing because there are millions and millions of people in this country who are either susceptible to or living with a brain aneurysm and they don't necessarily know that they have it. Any there any symptoms for some people?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, oftentimes there's not. Sometimes, people may have some pretty devastating headaches leading up to a bleed, to an actual rupture of the aneurysm but oftentimes you don't know it. You are born with it, you live with it your entire life, until you have some problems. The good news is for most people, it will never rupture, so keep that in mind, as well. She is 58 years old. She was driving her car, apparently started to weave into a grassy area where police found her unconscious.

This is likely what happened, John. Take a look here. You have to understand. This is a C.A.T. scan of the brain. All this white stuff in here, in these areas, that's all blood. That's the amount of blood, a lot of it that ends up in someone who has had an aneurysm. Let me go to the next images here. The way doctors sort of figure this out. They get a scan that puts some artery in the dye, in the arteries and they see this artery over here. A little bubble, a little blister, if you will. Next image, sort of the same thing. Again, when you look at these, you see sort of the little, if you can make attention here, you see the blood vessel coming in here, coming over here, but over here there's this blister and this is the problem, this is the aneurysm and that's exactly what sometimes gets weak and ruptures.

ROBERTS: Yes. Some people will liken this to - I mean, people will remember this for being a kid, having a bicycle and sometimes you would get a little bubble on your intertube. Are these congenital defects or do they actually occur over someone's life because the artery wall begins to weaken?

GUPTA: The best evidence we have right now is you're probably born with it, but it gets worse over time. So maybe you're born with a small little blister or a small bubble as you put it but because of blood pressure problems, because of hypertension, that blister starts to expand and eventually can get to the point where it ruptures.

ROBERTS: And a dramatic amount of blood is then release into the brain.

GUPTA: Right. That's the real problem here is the aneurysm itself can be treated, but if it has already ruptured and the blood sort of sprays into these sponge of the brain, if you think about it that way. It's very hard to get that blood out.

ROBERTS: So what can people do? Other than everybody in America getting into C.A.T. scan -

GUPTA: Right.

ROBERTS: What can you do about it?

GUPTA: Well, you know, they've look at those screening things. There's really not much you can do from that standpoint because you're not going to scan everybody and the yield is going to be so low. If you have a family history, so for example, the congresswoman's son, I understand she has a son, he may want to get screen. It does appear to have some familial component to this. But as far as treating it, if somehow you detect it early, the way that they do this, they do an operation, remove some of the bone from the brain and they actually put a clip right across here. Let me show that in red. They put that right across that area here and it sort of keeps the blood from getting into that area.

ROBERTS: But once they burst, in many cases, not much they can do, right?

GUPTA: That's right. In her case, clearly not. People do survive aneurysm ruptures, but it is a difficult problem. For sure.

ROBERTS: Sanjay, thanks very much for walking us through that. Appreciate it.

GUPTA: Sure. Thanks, John.

ROBERTS: Kiran.

CHETRY: Still ahead, the candidate catches a cold, nothing to sneeze at when your nominating convention is only days away. We look at how Barack Obama is handling the sniffles.

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CHETRY: Well, his nominating convention is just a few days away and things have gone to Barack Obama's head, out on the campaign trail. Not his ego, it's a head cold.

ROBERTS: And as Jeanne Moos tells us, more than his message is contagious these days.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He's sniffling. He's sneezing --

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Everybody who's discharged. Excuse me.

MOOS: A candidate known for his cool, caught a cold. Wouldn't you know it, right before one of the biggest command performances of his career, the convention.

OBAMA: I'm all right. It's OK. That's why I got my handkerchief in.

MOOS (on-camera): Well, normally it's the candidate who travels around with a supply of hand sanitizer and worries about getting infected by well-wishers. But if you want to stay well, stay well away from him.

OBAMA: Wash your hands after you shake my hand afterwards.

MOOS: The threat of presidential candidate cooties didn't deter this crowd. Senator Obama said he caught the cold while vacationing in Hawaii with his kids.

OBAMA: They all got little germs. I love them, but they have germs.

MOOS: All that hand holding.

OBAMA: They're wiping each other, wiping noses.

MOOS: Now he's the one doing the wiping. Since he got back from vacation, think of all the germs he spread to those shaking his hand, doing his makeup. Grabbing his contaminated mike. He shook this little girl's hand and posed with her and then her fingers went straight to her mouth. As part of our continuing coverage of "Infection '08," we can only warn supporters to look, but don't touch. For instance, when the candidate dropped his water cap.

OBAMA: I lost my cap there for a second.

MOOS: Don't pick it up -

OBAMA: Thank you. Thank you very much. MOOS: Too late.

Months earlier in the campaign the senator blew his nose and it got a murmur of applause, sort of like when this panda started sneezing. As long as it's from a distance, sneezing can be crowd pleasing. Jeanne Moos, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTS: A lot of people these days know how he's feeling, including you.

CHETRY: Yes. But you have to do the sneeze into the elbow trick. You teach your kids so you don't spread germs. If you sneeze into your elbow and you shake hands with somebody, you still don't - no germy hands.

ROBERTS: You'd need to go to the cleaners an awful lot, wouldn't you.

CHETRY: That's the down side.

Well thanks so much for joining us on this AMERICAN MORNING. We'll see you back here tomorrow.

ROBERTS: All right. Right now here's CNN NEWSROOM with Heidi Collins.