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American Morning
Turkish Airlines 737 Crashes in Amsterdam, No Casualties Reported; Obama Sets RIght Tone With Speech; Did Wall Street Gain Confidence from Speech?; Economists, Facebook Reactions to Speech
Aired February 25, 2009 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WILSON LIVINGOOD, SERGEANT AT ARMS, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES: Madam Speaker, the President of the United States.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): State of our future.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The impact of this recession is real, and it is everywhere.
ROBERTS: President Obama speaks, having the audacity to hope, in one of America's toughest times.
OBAMA: We will rebuild. We will recover, and the United States of America will emerge stronger than before.
ROBERTS: This morning, the people respond.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's going to be a long, hard haul.
ROBERTS: Does an uncertain nation feel any better about their bills, their jobs, their struggles?
MARK HOOPRICH, PENSACOLA, FLORIDA: I thought it was just exactly what the country needed to hear.
ROBERTS: On this AMERICAN MORNING.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: And good morning. Thanks for being with us on this Wednesday, the 25th of February. Pretty interesting speech last night, wasn't it?
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: It sure was, about 52 minutes in length, not that much longer or shorter than some of his predecessors but interesting with how positively most Americans who viewed it responded.
ROBERTS: Yes. A lot of people likening it -- a lot of people likening it to Franklin Roosevelt. Some people saying that it was, you know, echoed memories of Ronald Reagan. For a first time out, by most people's opinion, he did a pretty good job.
CHETRY: That's right. So we're going to talk more about that. But we also have some breaking news.
ROBERTS: Oh, yes.
CHETRY: This happened within the past hour.
ROBERTS: Yes. If you've been watching CNNi for the last hour, you know, there was a plane crash overseas. It happened at Amsterdam's Schipol Airport. That's the city's main airport.
We've got brand new pictures coming in form people on the ground there. They show that Turkish Airlines 737 actually split into three pieces. Officials say the plane carrying about 135 passengers was attempting to land when it went down next to the runway at about 10:40 a.m. local time. Turkish media reporting that there are no dead in this accident.
That would be another, you know, incident similar to what happened here with the miracle on the Hudson. You know, obviously, there would be some injuries. A plane breaks into three pieces like that on the ground, some people are going to get hurt. But at this point we don't believe that there were any fatalities in this crash.
We're monitoring the situation on the ground there. We will bring you the very latest developments just as soon as we get them.
CHETRY: The other amazing thing of how times have changed. There's a lot of the updates that we were getting instantaneously from passengers were via twitter and other mobile communication.
ROBERTS: Yes. Some of those pictures came into us that way.
CHETRY: Exactly.
Well, turning to reaction to President Obama's first address of the joint session of Congress. The president trying to restore hope to a nation essentially beaten down by bailouts, layoffs and the harsh reality of a recession. Well, the president launched a new confident theme and a stirring call for unity and action.
This morning, it appears the president got that message across. We have a brand new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll showing that 68 percent of people had a very positive reaction to the president's speech. It was a tone echoed by our iReporters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ERIC BUXTON, CHIEFLAND, FLORIDA: Well, I've watched it. I heard it, and I've seen it. All I can say to everybody on the Republican side and the Democrat side, he's already done it.
Why not us all work together to benefit (ph)? I enjoyed it. Hey, for once, the pissed (ph) off Americans are actually smiling. Let's see where it goes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: There you go. We also want reaction, your reaction throughout the morning. So if you would like to post an iReport...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK HOOPRICH, PENSACOLA, FLORIDA: Given to date, very confident. He let out a very ambitious agenda with items that are going to be contained in his upcoming budget. He highlighted the three areas of education, health care and energy. And I think that the Republicans in Congress really are at a critical juncture, where they're going to have to decide do they want to continue to oppose this very popular president, who is probably going to be even more popular after tonight's speech.
MANNY DORADO, OXNARD, CALIFORNIA: Let me just say that speech was amazing. It was something that we didn't even hear on the campaign trail. It was a different Obama and I think what made it different that he stood up there with so much hope and looked us right in the eye and said do not be afraid.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: And again, we want to hear your reaction, throughout the morning. Go to our Web site CNN.com/am and send us an e-mail or an iReport.
ROBERTS: And this morning, our iReporters are part of a big team breaking down this critical address. Suzanne Malveaux is here with us in the studio dialing to her sources in Washington and the White House.
Christine Romans and the CNN money team here, and ready to go as well. We also have some of the best economic minds around up early and live in our studio this morning. There they are. We've got them full of coffee. They're raring to go here this morning. And for the very first time, we're also teaming up with Facebook to get the pulse of what Americans across the country thought about the president's address.
But first, President Obama wasting no time getting down to business last night. His address, a mix of policy, pep talk and progress on the economy. He described not only how the country got into this mess but how we're going to get out of it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: First, we are creating a new lending fund that represents the largest effort ever to help provide auto loans, college loans and small business loans to the consumers and entrepreneurs who keep this economy running. Second, we have launched a housing plan that will help responsible families facing the threat of foreclosure lower their monthly payments and refinance their mortgages.
It's a plan that won't help speculators or that neighbor down the street who bought a house he could never hope to afford. But it will help millions of Americans who are struggling with declining home values, Americans who will now be able to take advantage of the lower interest rates that this plan has already helped to bring about. In fact, the average family who refinances today can save nearly $2,000 per year on their mortgage.
Third, we will act with the full force of the federal government to ensure that the major banks that Americans depend on have enough confidence and enough money to lend even in more difficult times. And when we learn that a major bank has serious problems, we will hold accountable those responsible, force the necessary adjustments, provide the support to clean up their balance sheets, and assure the continuity of a strong, viable institution that can serve our people and our economy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: All right. That's just a few snippets of President Obama's speech last night. Joining us, Suzanne Malveaux and Christine Romans with reaction.
You know, a lot of people talked before the speech, Suzanne, about how the president had to strike that tone, realistic but also not too gloom and doom. Did he do it last night?
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Right. You know, and one of the things on the campaign he always talked, he inspired people. He motivated really a lot of people, a part of a movement here. And that's what they -- they went in thinking people like this guy. He's very popular, but we need to motivate people. We need to like come up with those kinds of details.
A lot of people complained in the campaign that it was a lot of hype, that it was very broad brush strokes. But you heard some of the details when he said look, I've accomplished in the last four weeks major things but also I am laying out for you what my agenda is. And I think that's what a lot of people were looking at especially the iReporter when he said this was amazing. This was like the campaign.
That's what they've been trying to do is get back to the campaign. What was it like? What was that feeling like for Americans during the campaign who voted for Barack Obama? There was a sense of inspiration and hope, and that's what they tried to deliver last night.
ROBERTS: A lot of critics say that it was short on details last night, but these speeches, you know, to Congress, whether they'd be actually called the State of the Union tended to be more like broad themes as opposed to specific details and we get those in policy papers in the days and weeks to follow. But do you think that Wall Street found any reason to be confident from the speech last night?
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: And confidence is the word because what he's trying to do is break this negative feedback loop that keeps, you know, feeding back on itself, which is the negativity and the lack of confidence.
ROBERTS: Which is what feedback loops do.
ROMANS: Right. Exactly. But, you know, he's trying to break that. He's trying to break that and restoring confidence is the most important thing.
I would say that there are actually talking and touching each of the plans, eight or nine of them, I think. Any one of these things would define the first part of someone's presidency if they could get them through and there's a whole bunch of them in here, so this is really kind of a soaring and ambitious agenda for a soaring problem.
I mean, yesterday just the news on the day that he delivered this speech was very, very dire news. You know, the value of your home in the fourth quarter declined by 18 percent, the largest asset for most Americans who are lucky enough to be homeowners. I mean, so he is delivering this news even as the housing crisis is worsening.
One thing I think that's interesting in here is he started, you know, talking about his plans of this new lending fund for college, auto, small business loans. That's something that is incredibly important to get that money moving again, to get the oxygen breathing in those markets again because that's the consumer, that really touches the consumer.
ROBERTS: Yes. Well, the Republicans weighed in on the president's speech last night and the official GOP response, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal called Obama's economic plan "irresponsible saddling future generations with debt."
CNN's Larry King got reactions from Arizona Senator John McCain on that point.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LARRY KING, HOST, "LARRY KING LIVE": The president said tonight that the weight of this economic crisis will not determine the nation's destiny and that the United States will emerge stronger than before. Do you agree?
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: He's absolutely right. Those are very important words and I'm sure that they provided some comfort to all Americans, especially those who are in difficulty and need today. This stimulus package began by the speaker saying, "We won, we write the bill." That's not the way you act in a bipartisan fashion. That's why I was disappointed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Let's bring Suzanne back in. So, obviously, John McCain is going to be the point person in the opposition for how long, we don't know. Yes.
MALVEAUX: Obviously, he's looking to punch holes in all of this. One of the things that the Obama administration is kind of disappointed, they really thought that they would be able to accomplish more when it comes to the bipartisanship, that just, you know, the Super Bowl parties and the governors at the White House, you know, Earth Wind and Fire playing, all of, you know, it's not like a big party, but --
CHETRY: It's not enough to bring people together.
MALVEAUX: It certainly is not. It's certainly not, and I don't need to downplay it by any means but they really did think that there was going to be a little bit more of a goodwill, if you will, between Republicans and Democrats and they're going to continue to try. But they also are banking on the fact that they think the Republicans are going to basically look like, you know, the party of no, that they're not on the right side of the issue here. They do not get it. That's the thing that you're going to hear the president and many of his aides say.
CHETRY: Well, four years ago we were saying this exact same thing after the State of the Union, but saying that the Democrats were the party of no. So, of course, it's changed and it was definitely a marked change that you saw with Joe Biden and, of course, Nancy Pelosi standing behind the president, and she jumped up many times in a standing ovation. We didn't see --
MALVEAUX: Sixty standing ovations.
CHETRY: We didn't see that a lot when she was sitting behind George W. Bush.
MALVEAUX: I just saw those kind of grimaces, those awkward moments, you know, with Cheney and everybody when they were behind the president, Bush.
ROBERTS: We want to point out too, by the way, that we're going to be talking with Senator John McCain coming up at our next hour. That will be at 7:25 Eastern time. And we got analysis throughout the morning, so make sure you keep it here on the Most News in the Morning.
CHETRY: All right. Well, still ahead, he knows that some of the medicine is going to be tough to swallow. President Obama, though, optimistic about America's economic future. Some of the sharpest financial minds are here to tell us what the president's plan means for you and your money.
It's 10 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: While our economy may be weakened, and our confidence shaken, though we are living through difficult and uncertain times, tonight I want every American to know this. We will rebuild. We will recover, and the United States of America will emerge stronger than before.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: President Obama there leaving no doubt about his resolve to fix what's wrong with the nation's economy. His speech to Congress and the nation was part policy, part pep talk. Let's get reaction now from our panel of experts. Economist Lakshman Achuthan, Wall Street trader Doreen Mogavero, and investment advisor Ryan Mack.
So you heard what the president said right there, Ryan. We will rebuild. We will recover. The United States of America will emerge stronger than ever before.
RYAN MACK, INVESTMENT ADVISOR: Yes.
ROBERTS: Was this the sort of optimism that people were calling on him to exude last night?
MACK: Well, absolutely. Consumer confidence is at record low, and he came out. He said the weight of this crisis will not determine the destiny of this nation. He said in our hands lies our ability to shape our world.
These are the type of words that inspire individuals to say you know what? I understand they're going to pass a legislation to help me out but I have to fill the gap. I have to fill the void.
He brought on personal examples, Ty'Sheoma Bethea (ph), the eighth grader who is, you know, basically in a school crumbling but still said that we want to be future doctors and lawyers in this nation. We are going to be the ones to essentially lead this nation and help out as well, even though we're in eighth grade.
ROBERTS: Yes.
MACK: So, that's a great confidence booster.
ROBERTS: We should point, by the way, Ryan, that Ty'Sheoma is going to be joining us live from Washington in about 40 minutes' time.
MACK: That's great. Wow, that's great.
ROBERTS: She was with us last week. What an amazing kid.
DOREEN MOGAVERO, FOUNDER, MOGAVERO, LEE & CO., INC.: Yes.
ROBERTS: Wrote this letter to Congress, went to her principal to get a stamp and ends up in the president's desk but in the State of the Union with her seated at the right hand of the first lady.
OK. So we talk about folks, you know, regular folks, regular investors out there, looking at this speech and saying that's why I needed to hear. What about the financial industry?
MOGAVERO: Well, I will tell you, I mean, we have been faced with obviously there is dire economic times. And every time President Obama has been on up until last night, he's used words like catastrophe and crisis and, you know, this is going to take a long time, markets have steadily eroded with every speech.
I think the fact that he was on the back of Ben Bernanke yesterday was a very good thing for all of us to hear him confident in this plan, whether we believe in it personally or not is very assuring I think and the end will be to the markets.
ROBERTS: Yes. But, you know, it's one thing to cry the sky is falling, the sky is falling when it's not...
LAKSHMAN ACHUTHAN, MANAGING EDITOR, ECRI FORECASTS: Right.
ROBERTS: ... but it was.
ACHUTHAN: It was.
ROBERTS: Wasn't he correct in describing it that way?
ACHUTHAN: Absolutely and that gains you some credibility but you don't want to go so far that everybody gets so depressed that they just run away and don't go out to the store anymore.
I think one of the key things that happened last night in straddling that was also connecting the dots between all of these different myriad programs that we've been hearing that the government's doing. You know, we're going to bail out the housing sector, the banking sector. We're doing the stimulus program. We're going to do energy.
How does all this fit? And so he showed here's the short term which is stimulus, banking, housing. Here's the longer term. If we want to own the century, we have to deal with energy, education, health, for example, and connecting those things.
Now, this is not easy. What he did, there was an extremely tall order. He just basically laid out all of the big issues. And one of the critical things is that it's not clear, you know, the stimulus is great, we passed it but it doesn't work unless the banks lend. The banks won't lend unless the housing sector stabilizes. So, it's -- this is much tougher than chewing gum and walking at the same time.
ROBERTS: You know, I was being twittered last night, on a number of different feeds and Newt Gingrich was -- he's a profuse twitter. And one of the observations he made last night was not -- he keyed in on President Obama saying he doesn't want to burden our children with debt. And Gingrich wrote, "Not wanting to burden our children with debt is an interesting pledge the week after passing a $787 billion bill in unfunded spending."
MOGAVERO: Yes.
ACHUTHAN: But all of this debt, all of this debt talk is all tied to where that deficit goes. You look at that deficit, it's a bunch of projections. It goes out ten years. It is all keyed to how fast the economy grows.
ROBERTS: But what about this, Ryan? I mean, we are going to be saddling our children and our children's children with massive amounts of debt. How are they supposed to feel good about this? MACK: Barack Obama said, you know, the cost of action will be great but the cost of inaction will be greater. This is essentially the thing that we have to do in order to get this economy running again. And I really like the fact of how Barack Obama, he made it, he put numbers on it, 3.5 million jobs will be created but I'm going to get more specific than that.
In Minnesota, right now, there are 57 more cops on the streets protecting your neighborhoods that now have a job because of the stimulus package. This is hitting homes. April 1st, these tax cuts will be in your pocket. This is what this additional debt is going to do. It's going to impact you immediately.
We have short term plans. We have long-term plans, and we're always -- it seems like every other week we're getting more and more details but I think that right now he's really trying to get them to say this is impacting your pocket.
ROBERTS: Keep those thoughts rolling around, folks, because we'll be back to talk more about all of this. Right now, let's go over to Kiran.
CHETRY: All right, John. Thanks.
Well, real time reaction of the president's speech last night from our online friends. Were they sold? What millions of Facebook users are saying this morning.
Also, we are following breaking news. A plane with 135 passengers crashes, actually splitting into three pieces. You can see it right here on the monitor. This is a Turkish Airways plane. Amazingly, though, reports right now are that everyone survived. We're going to bring you the breaking developments as they happen.
It's 18 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.
ROBERTS: And we're following breaking news this morning.
A Turkish airliner carrying 135 passengers and eight crew members has crashed at Amsterdam Schipol Airport. The accident happened about 10:40 in the morning local time. Officials say the plane was attempting to land when it crashed next to the runway and split into three pieces. Miraculously, though there were early reports that one person had been killed, Turkish media says everyone has survived.
So far, no word on what caused that crash. We'll tracking the latest developments. We'll bring them to you when we find out more. Could weather potentially have played a part in this crash as it's believed to have played a part in the crash of Continental Airlines 3407 a couple of weeks ago outside of Buffalo?
Let's bring our Rob Marciano who's tracking the weather there in Amsterdam.
Rob, what was it like at the time of the crash?
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Not ideal but certainly not a problem for a professional pilot. Visibility was at about two miles. As you saw in some of the video that we've been showing, there was a little bit of fog in the area, so that part of Europe certainly prone to low clouds and fog in that area.
So, there wasn't a monster storm. There weren't strong winds. Turbulence at least at that level shouldn't have been a problem.
I'm still trying to dig out some of the upper air data to see if there's any sort of directional wind shear, meaning that the winds changed dramatically in direction with height and that often will cause turbulence. And that's something that we've made vast improvements on at least here in the U.S. with Doppler radar to let pilots know if they're going to encounter that as they come in for a landing.
Again, still don't know if that was an issue. Forty-one degrees at the time Fahrenheit. There was some light drizzle reported at the airport, two-miles of visibility with overcast conditions. So certainly could have been a lot clearer, but it could have been a lot worse, that's for sure. So, I wouldn't think that weather would have a major impact on that.
As far as weather here in the U.S., if you are traveling, John, it shouldn't be a huge issue at the major airports on the East Coast. If you're going West Coast, San Francisco, Seattle, expect delays again. Back up to you.
ROBERTS: All right. Rob Marciano with a weather update for us there, but here at home and in Amsterdam and "Associated Press" just sending out an update now.
Apparently, 134 people on board that plane and again, the good news this morning is apparently all of them survived -- Kiran.
CHETRY: Maybe even more remarkable when you see the pictures of the plane, literally broken into thirds.
Well, we're spending a lot of time this morning digging into President Obama's address to Congress last night. Right now, though, we're going to fast forward to see what's on his plate in the coming days.
At 11:00 Eastern today, he will introduce his nomination for commerce secretary. It's widely expected to be former Washington State Governor Gary Locke.
This afternoon, the president has an Oval Office meeting with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner along with the chairman and ranking members of the Senate Banking and House Financial Services Committees. And the president releases his first budget tomorrow. White House officials say it will include expenditures for the Iraq war and the military buildup in Afghanistan. That's in contrast to the Bush administration's approach to keeping those costs hidden. It's in keeping with President Obama's campaign pledge for more transparency in the government.
Also, the president travels to North Carolina on Friday, and that's where he's expected to formally announce his plan to withdraw combat troops from Iraq by August 2010, three months later than he promised during the campaign.
Also this morning, we're teaming up with Facebook to see how millions of users reacted to President Obama's address last night.
Jason Carroll is here with that. We got a lot of responses from our iReporters.
JASON CARROLL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes.
CHETRY: And there were a lot of groups on Facebook sharing their opinions and ideas.
CARROLL: Facebook was buzzing last night with all of this activity. Facebook says the response to the collaboration between their social networking site and CNN last night was huge. This is according to what they said.
They said more than 100,000 users logged on to CNN.com and their Facebook profile to post a comment about the president's speech. Some of the top issues they wanted the president to address, job security, the housing crisis, health care, and the rising cost of education.
One of the president's goals -- convince the country and Congress his economic plan will pull the country out of a recession. Some Facebook users were sold on Obama's confidence.
Malcolm Dotson from East Bay, California wrote, "I've never seen a newly elected president so often, so soon, with answers."
Michael Finley from Dallas, Texas said, "I'm very optimistic. As I listen to this speech, he is hitting the nail on the head."
Some others in the Facebook community not so optimistic about the president's budget proposals. Kay Carpenter Basar wrote, "Instead of trickle down economics, this is trickle up poverty."
Facebook says the online discussion spread all over the world with more than 120,000 users logging on during the president's address.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RANDI ZUCKERBERG, FACEBOOK.COM: I absolutely think this is the wave of the future. I think that when people see how powerful it is to watch this incredible coverage and comment with their friends at the same time, I think that we're entering a generation where you can never watch content without it being social again.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARROLL: Well, Facebook also conducted a poll survey on some key issues. One of the questions asked, does the president's foreclosure plan reward irresponsible behavior?
Forty-five percent said yes, it does reward. Twenty-nine percent said it would help stabilize the economy, and 28 percent said it wouldn't do anything.
And when Facebook users were asked if they were concerned their children will have it worse, 59 percent said yes, 41 percent said no. Again, one of the president's goals last night was to help restore confidence. Facebook says they noticed that the number of people using the term "hopeful" on their Facebook page has increased over the past couple of months, so perhaps maybe that's a sign that maybe there's a shift in some of the confidence. Maybe some people starting to feel a little bit more hopeful.
CHETRY: And our Opinion Research polls sort of echo that as well.
CARROLL: Yes.
CHETRY: That most people had a very positive reaction, two- thirds of people, and feel a little bit more confident. But, you know, they are split pretty much 50/50 about the foreclosure, about the foreclosure.
CARROLL: Right. So it looks like the president has a little bit of work to do convincing people in that area.
CHETRY: Exactly. All right. Jason Carroll, good stuff.
CARROLL: All right.
CHETRY: Great to see you this morning. Thanks - John.
ROBERTS: Just updating the numbers now on that Turkish Airlines crash, as we continue to cover the breaking news.
A Turkish Airlines 737 crashed trying to land at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam. It broke into three pieces. The total number of people on board now has been adjusted to 134. That's 127 passengers and seven crew members and according to Turkish Airlines, all of the people on board that aircraft survived, somewhat miraculous when you look at the condition that the aircraft is in.
We're continuing to work the story. We'll have the very latest for you just as soon as we get it. A lot more to cover this morning as well.
We'll check in with two of the best political minds on television plus, reaction from Americans around the country on the president's address last night. It's coming up now on 28 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
And the sun coming up in the White House this morning, the morning after President Obama reached out to Americans and tried to offer hope to a nation short on confidence.
CHETRY: That's right. Looks like he may have really accomplished that according to our polling. People asked did you feel more optimistic after the president's speech last night, 85 percent said yes, 11 percent more pessimistic.
ROBERTS: You know, he made good on his reputation for soaring rhetoric last night. A lot of people said short on ideas, a lot of people questioned how he's going to pay for everything that he's talking about, but just in terms of the rhetoric, in terms of looking at these speeches to Congress and the overall context of history, it looked like he did his job.
CHETRY: Yes.
ROBERTS: Which is very important particularly one month into the presidency.
CHETRY: Yes, it's very interesting, our pollster Holland Keating pointed out that these numbers, 85 percent feeling optimistic, or getting a good feeling pretty much in line with George W. Bush's first speech, as well as Bill Clinton's first speech, but you could argue that they had less to prove because of the tough, tough times were in right now. A lot more people are feeling pessimistic.
ROBERTS: Yes. A lot of people say that he's got more on his plate than Abraham Lincoln did when he took over.
President Obama's message that the country will prevail and thrive resonating in the front pages of newspapers across the country. And in that brand new CNN Opinion Research Corporation that Kiran was pointing out, 68 percent said they had a very positive reaction to the president's message.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: Regulations were gutted for the sake of a quick profit at the expense of a healthy market. People bought homes they knew they couldn't afford, from banks and lenders who pushed those bad loans anyway. And all the while, critical debates and difficult decisions were put off for some other time on some other day. Well that day of reckoning has arrived and the time to take charge of our future is here.
I will not spend a single penny for the purpose of rewarding a single Wall Street executive, but I will do whatever it takes to help the small business that can't pay its workers or the family that has saved and still can't get a mortgage. That's what this is about. It's not about helping banks. It's about helping people.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: President Obama there last night in his address to Congress, what next year will be an official State of the Union Address.
And Kiran, a lot of people say a lot of what he was doing last night was trying to prevent a backlash for future bailouts, knowing that they are going to have to come and suggest in this idea that we're bailing out the banks but we're really bailing out you here.
CHETRY: Right.
ROBERTS: So don't be -- don't be too harsh on this.
CHETRY: And he said it a couple of times, I get it. I get that you're mad about this. I get that you're frustrated about this, but we need the banks and we need credit markets to loosen up.
So we're going to talk more about this right now. People are weighing in on the president's address and we want to hear what you have to say about it. You can go to our Web site cnn.com/am. Send us an e-mail or an iReport. Overnight, one of our iReporters sent us this video.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID P. KRONMILLER, BURBANK, CALIFORNIA: I really wish other people in that Congress, those who maybe were sitting down when other people in the room were applauding, would remember that there are people in this country who are hurting, and who need hope and inspiration, not just as rhetoric but as an actuality.
They need it in the form of unemployment insurance. They need it in the form of new jobs being created. They need it in the form of tax cuts. And he talked about all those things tonight.
I was inspired by Obama reminding all these politicians in this room that they are not just politicians that they are people who are in a job of service to this country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: All right, and joining us now with their analysis of the speech, John Avlon, a columnist for the "Daily Beast" and author of "Independent Nation." Also, Patricia Murphy, editor of citizenjanepolitics.com.
Welcome to both of you this morning. Good to see you.
JOHN AVLON, REGISTERED INDEPENDENT: Good morning.
PATRICIA MURPHY, EDITOR, CITIZENJANEPOLITICS.COM: Good morning. CHETRY: Initial reactions, John, that there was a lot of people who said that he had to strike this balance between being realistic and explaining why we were in these unprecedented times, but then also saying there is hope for the future. So how do you think he did?
AVLON: I think he did very well. In fact, I think it was maybe the best speech of his young presidency. He was realistic, he was optimistic, and he was ambitious. And in terms of reaching out to independents, that crucial voting block, he presented a vision of fiscal responsibility and finding common ground. That's what folks wanted to hear. Confident performance, a lot of details, and a bold agenda to move forward.
CHETRY: Interesting, though, because Patricia, you don't agree. You believe it was short on detail. What more do you want to hear from him last night?
MURPHY: Well, first of all, I think overall it was a very, very strong speech. I actually think it's the speech that he should have given at the inauguration. It was such an uplifting moment for the people, when we need a boost of confidence. I think that's exactly what he did. The problem in this speech, I think, is his promise to cut the deficit in half and layering on program after program after program, saying we'll pull the troops out of Iraq, but we'll increase the size of the military. Those numbers don't add up.
He'll need to give us some details. Further down the road, his budget tomorrow will be a big part of that.
CHETRY: And John, that's interesting, because he says he also talked about knowing how unpopular it is to be bailing out the banks. Seeming to keep the door open for the fact that we're going to probably have to pour billions more into financial institutions in the future to turn things around. He said "I get it" and he tried to explain how helping the banks also helps individuals.
Was he able to make that connection between the abstract and how it affects everyday people's lives?
AVLON: I think he did take the time to explain that. It almost harkened back to FDR's bank holiday speech. And there's no question, the Obama administration has been laboring under a lot of public cynicism toward the TARP money, towards all these taxpayer money being used and wasted on Wall Street executives with no accountability and transparency. It's one of the things that held back the stimulus debate, and he's trying to address that nip in the bud, because he's got to move past that.
And all of these folks on the left and the right who have been saying, look, give up on the bipartisanship, give up on the post partisanship, he declared independence from them as well, and that was important.
CHETRY: He did, though, make sure he pointed out and he did get some cheers and some clapping, "I inherited," "the deficit I inherited," he made sure to say that. But Patricia, I want to get -- make sure we get in the GOP response. Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal delivered the response and he hit hard against the stimulus package, which was not necessarily unexpected, but he also talked about saddling future generations. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. BOBBY JINDAL (R), LOUISIANA: Who amongst us would ask our children for a loan so we could spend money we do not have on things we do not need. That is precisely what the Democrats in Congress just did. It's irresponsible. And it's no way to strengthen our economy. Create jobs and build a prosperous future for our children.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: The GOP certainly had an uphill battle in general, because most people actually are supportive of the stimulus bill. What did you think of Governor Jindal's speech?
Patty?
MURPHY: I think that his response was a little bit weak. He didn't come out with any new ideas. He did talk about tax cuts and reigning in the size of federal spending, but those are the things that exactly what Republicans really did not achieve in their eight years of power, so I think he would have done a lot better to have some new ideas, ideas that we haven't heard from Republicans, ideas we haven't tried before that might possibly work.
Republicans as you mentioned, though, they did get to their feet about 33 times to support President Obama. I think they saw the poll numbers for Obama very strong. They've been hit for being too partisan for the last several weeks so they seem to be coming along at least on the floor last night.
CHETRY: All right. Well, we are going to have to leave it there, but it's always great to talk to both of you.
John Avlon, Patricia Murphy, thanks for being with us this morning.
MURPHY: Thanks.
CHETRY: John?
ROBERTS: And this morning, a lot of reaction to the president's address happening online. And right now, we're logging on and checking the pulse of Americans expressing their opinions on Twitter. We'll show you what they are saying.
It's 38 minutes now after the hour.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Shape- shifting material that can transform itself in real time, changing colors and shape on demand. It sounds like special effects you would see in a sci-fi movie, but this is no illusion. Researchers at Intel teamed up with the academic community to make what they call programmable matter.
ANDREW A. CHIEN, PH.D., V.P. AND DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH, INTEL: The basic idea is the notion that you could have a material that could change its shape or change its physical properties just by reconfiguring itself.
TUCHMAN: Forget about designing something in flat two dimensions. What about creating a 3-D prototype of anything, even a car?
CHIEN: Open the doors, kick the tires. You know, peek inside to see what it looks like, fit little dolls of, you know, people inside of it.
TUCHMAN: The space-age stuff is like putty in your hands. Programmable matter is still in the early developmental stages, but Intel's Andrew Chien says one day we may be able to morph objects on demand to fit our human needs.
CHIEN: So for example, you know, I have a Bluetooth earpiece and it fits me great, but then when I put on my sunglasses it doesn't fit anymore. Wouldn't it be nice if it could change its shape suddenly like to all of a sudden (INAUDIBLE). All of these things are possible with programmable matter. We are definitely on the edge of discovery with this one.
TUCHMAN: Gary Tuchman, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHARLES HODSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
I'm Charles Hodson in London where the city is reacting to President Obama's speech. The media coverage is strongly positive. One leading commentator calls it a speech that defines a new era. Investors like it, too. All of the leading European stock indices were up by more than 1 percent in morning trading. What Europe really likes is the idea that President Obama is asserting his confident leadership on a crisis that is global - John, Kiran?
ROBERTS: All right. There, the global resources of CNN, giving us a glimpse of the overseas reaction to the president's speech.
And this morning, we also want to give you a glimpse of all of the reaction happening online especially on Twitter. I mean, if you don't know what Twitter is, it's a facility by which in 140 characters or less, people all over the globe in any location, including inside the chamber last night, can give their thoughts in real time to people who are following them about what's going on. We got a lot of that last night. I mean, there was so much coming in over the transom.
Let's find out what Claire McCaskill, the senator from Missouri, was having to say last night. She said, "Just hailed -- this is President Obama -- just hailed the Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Senator Specter -- should have an "er" on the end of it -- was a lonely Republican when he stood to applaud." So, she was tweeting away there during the speech last night.
We also got a lot of tweets coming in over the transom from Newt Gingrich. He is one of the more prolific twitterers. Here's what he said, talking about that line when President Obama said that Vice President Joe Biden was going to have oversight over how the money in the stimulus bill was spent. He said, quote, "Nobody messes with Joe and the smiles and Nancy handshake resembled a Democratic pep rally, not a State of the Union address." It was, quote, "sophomoric and silly."
Newt Gingrich did have a lot of good things to say about the speech last night, though including this idea of energy investment, education investment being historic if indeed the president follows through on that.
One of the more, shall we say, snarky twitterers of the night was Congressman Earl Blumenauer, Democrat from Oregon. He said, quote, "One doesn't want to sound snarky, but it's nice not to see Cheney up there." Of course, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi was sitting up there, alongside Vice President Joe Biden, a couple of Democrats. So, obviously, it's going to make a Democrat happy.
And sneaking about Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana's response, he said, quote, "That response was -- weird." That's what Congressman Blumenauer said about that.
And following -- maybe you might think an unlikely twitterer who was watching the speech last night, Lance Armstrong, who just got through the Tour de California, said, "President Obama renewed the war against cancer tonight. As he said, the disease that touches us all. Time to focus and fight."
So that was going on, at least, a very, very small part of it on Twitter last night, Kiran. Everybody has embraced this technology and they're just tapping away during the speech. There were only a couple of congressmen, members of Congress who said, you know, they've been twittering up until the speech and then said, you know, for the sake of decorum, I'm going to put my BlackBerry and phone down or whatever, I'm going to listen to the speech. But all through the speech, Claire McCaskill is there like this and Blumenauer is there like this.
CHETRY: Yes, I know. I saw the BlackBerry. It's just amazing how things changed so much in four years. People doing on Facebook linked with cnn.com, responding in real time. I mean, you know, we have focus groups, of course, and the dial testing which was at the time really remarkable and it's still is a very useful tool, but...
ROBERTS: What is next?
CHETRY: Yes. So much has -- so much has changed. We're an instantaneous nation. That's for sure.
ROBERTS: Either that or a completely attention-deficit-disorder nation.
CHETRY: Yes.
ROBERTS: I'm not sure which.
CHETRY: Or both.
Anyway, still ahead, so how is the president's speech resonating on Main Street? We have real time reaction from a group of Democrats and Republicans. We're just talking about our dial testing. Well, we'll bring you some of the results. It's 46 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.
CHETRY: It's 49 minutes past the hour. And we're following breaking news now.
A plane crash overseas that happened at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport. The Turkish airline actually split into three pieces, as you can see from this video just in to CNN. We'll see it in a second there. We turn now to CNN correspondent Ivan Watson. He's joining from us Istanbul, Turkey, live via Skype for us.
And when you take a look and we will get a look in a second here of that plane, it really is amazing in that they're saying that everyone inside survived that crash, Ivan.
IVAN WATSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is remarkable, Kiran. And what we've heard from some of the survivors of the plane crash within hours of it occurring, two survivors describing actually stepping out of the plane between the pieces of the plane, just picking up, getting up from their seats and walking away from that horrific air crash.
And the survivors themselves, one of them describing passengers wounded being caught in between the seats of the plane, but some of them were actually able to walk away.
And Turkish government officials have since come out. They've indicated that at least 20 people were wounded in this crash. We have not been able to confirm whether or not there have been any fatalities yet.
CHETRY: You know, the other thing, do you know anything about the circumstances surrounding that crash landing? What they're saying about what the cause may have been?
WATSON: The head of Turkish Airlines, that's the flagship carrier here in Turkey, he said that Turkish Air Flight 1951 took off from Istanbul this morning. It was coming in for a landing at Amsterdam Airport and it crashed basically about 500 yards short of the landing strip, and one of the passengers described what felt like strong turbulence, then the pilot gunning the engines and then, bam, it hit the ground.
And then, again, this miraculous description of passengers being able to walk away from the crash itself, really an incredible moment. A lot of families here, certainly right now, waiting to hear what may have happened here about what happened to their loved ones aboard that flight, however, which had 127 passengers on board and seven crew members, Kiran.
CHETRY: They say the weather was slightly misty with a little bit of wind. Our own meteorologist Rob Marciano saying it didn't appear that it was, you know, anything too out of the ordinary when it comes to being able to safely land especially a big plane like that.
Ivan Watson continuing to follow details for us on this Turkish airline crash. Thanks so much. We'll check in with you throughout the morning.
ROBERTS: And we are continuing to follow reaction to the president's address to a joint session of Congress last night. What you thought about it and where the country is headed next.
Coming up now on 52 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: Here in Washington, we've all seen how quickly good intentions can turn into broken promises, wasteful spending. With a plan of this scale comes enormous responsibility to get it right. And that's why I've asked Vice President Biden to lead a tough, unprecedented oversight effort, because nobody messes with Joe.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: President Obama there counting on his number two to be the White House watch dog for the stimulus money. This morning, we're looking at how Main Street is responding to the president's big speech.
Our Jim Acosta watched the speech with a group of Democrats and Republicans and got real time reaction from our dial testing. And Jim joins us now live in Washington.
Jim, I love watching this dial testing because you can see in real time people's reaction to the speech whether they liked it, whether they didn't like it, or whether they were just kind of mezza mezza on the whole thing.
JIM ACOSTA, CNN GENERAL ASSIGNMENT CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it's a pretty interesting scientific experiment, and you know, one reaction that jumps out at me from our experience last night is Barack Obama is on a trial period. And that was from one of his supporters. So if that gives you any indication as to how people are feeling about this president and about this country right now, you know, we went to the polling firm (INAUDIBLE) for a little help to watch this focus group, about half Republican, half Democrat, as they rated the speech. And they turned up their dial testers as we know during parts they liked and down for moments they could live without.
When the president sounded hopeful laying out his agenda for the country, our group immediately responded. The meters spiked, when there was talk of sacrifice, personal responsibility. The dial testers nearly went off the charts when he slammed Wall Street CEOs.
And then the president got to the part about the deficit and how he inherited that deficit from the Bush administration. Republican meters in red plummeted. Democratic leaders in green shot up. Our group reflected a nation that remains deeply divided.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No details. I mean, there was -- it all sounded good, big picture, but when you got down how are you going to do it and what's it going to cost, I didn't hear any details.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was very impressed with his solution to the budget deficit. I thought that was so unrealistic at first and then when he started explaining all the government spending cuts, I was very much impressed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ACOSTA: So there is just a sample, and about 20 minutes, we will have much more including a near universal response to helping out homeowners and it may not be the reaction the president was hoping for, John.
ROBERTS: Looking forward to that, Jim, thanks so much.
ACOSTA: You bet.
ROBERTS: It's 56-1/2 minutes after the hour.
Day of reckoning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: That day of reckoning has arrived.
ROBERTS (voice-over): Morning of insight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Last night, it was just exactly what the country needed to hear.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: The people react, and a team of the best economic minds in America weigh in. Plus, the opposition. Senator John McCain fires back, live. You're watching the Most News in the Morning.
