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American Morning
Search Crews Find Tail of Air France Jetliner; Obama Administration Ramps Up Efforts to Reform Health Care; Families Urge North Korea to Show Compassion; Gulfstream Answers Allegations on Air Safety Concerns; Satriani Sues Coldplay; Lack of Sleep has Health Consequences
Aired June 09, 2009 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Well, coming up right here at the top of the hour. Welcome to AMERICAN MORNING. I'm Kiran Chetry.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you. I'm John Roberts. Here's what's on the agenda this morning. The big stories that we'll be breaking down for you in the next 15 minutes.
A huge chunk of the tail section of Air France Flight 447 has been recovered from the Atlantic Ocean. The discovery could be crucial for investigators who are hoping to learn why the jetliner crash killing all 228 people on board. We are closer than anyone else to the search. A live report from Brazil coming up in just a moment.
The Obama administration ramping up efforts to reform health care in this country. Nothing is final yet, but some lawmakers are considering a fine for any American who chooses not to buy the coverage they can afford. Jim Acosta ahead with a bitter House battle that has only just begun.
And Secretary of State Hillary Clinton calling on North Korea to free two American journalists who have been sentenced to 12 years of hard labor in a prison camp. Our Jason Carroll has reaction from the families of Euna Lee and Laura Ling. They're speaking out for the first time since their loved ones were convicted.
First, though, new developments this morning in the crash of Air France Flight 447. Brazilian search crews say they have now recovered eight more bodies along with a critical piece of evidence, a huge piece of the tail. The vertical stabilizer was found floating in the ocean yesterday. That could help investigators determine what caused the biggest commercial air accident since 2001.
CNN's Karl Penhaul is closer to the search than anyone else.
On the phone from the island of Fernando de Noronha in Brazil, Karl, this is eerily reminiscent of an American Airlines plane that went down in New York City where the tail almost intact, that vertical stabilizer was pulled from the waters just off of Kennedy airport. What are we learning from this big piece of debris that was found?
KARL PENHAUL, CNN VIDEO CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Before we go there, John, I just wanted to let you know that just seconds ago, two helicopters, a Black Hawk and a Super Puma helicopter left the district of Fernando de Noronha island. They're heading out into the Atlantic Ocean and they're heading to bring the first of the bodies back to dry land.
Also, one of the aims of this mission is to bring back that large piece, that vertical stabilizer you also saw along with other debris that is being collected over the last two and three days. And it has been when they start to bring it back that they'll have this painstaking task of putting it together.
You do mention that flight, TWA 800 flight that crashed off J.F. Kennedy airport. There are other parallels of a South African Airways flight that also crashed in very deep water off Mauritius in 1987. And one expert knows beforehand is that piecing together the clues and finding out exactly what happened to this flight is going to be a difficult if not near impossible task, John.
ROBERTS: They would certainly have a lot of help in doing that, Karl, if they can find the black boxes which are fully believed to be on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean in really rugged terrain in the ocean floor there, mountains and canyons. What's the latest on the search for them?
PENHAUL: That certainly is going to be a real challenge for the search teams. The latest on that is that by Thursday, a French nuclear submarine ship will be in the search area to help with that search and also two viable pieces of equipment being sent by the U.S. Navy acoustic devices (ph) that will be towed across the ocean surface to try and listen for the pinging from these voice and data recorders.
The only problem there, John, is that the ocean and -- where the search is going on is so deep that the ping may not even be heard. The ocean area is so deep that the black boxes at 20,000 feet deep, as some of the authorities here fear they could be, then that may be even too deep for the most sophisticated submarine to reach, John.
ROBERTS: Karl Penhaul for us this morning from the island of Fernando de Noronha. Thanks very much, Karl. We'll check back with you a little later on this morning.
Aviation expert Clive Irving thinks that it's time that we stop relying on those so-called black box devices for answers, and this is a perfect example of why. His surprising take on the Air France disaster ahead in about ten minutes' time here in the Most News in the Morning.
CARROLL: Well, to the most politics now, and President Obama telling Congress in no uncertain terms it's time to deliver on health care.
Democratic leaders in the House are expected to outline proposals for reform today. According to a draft circulating, here are some of the ideas on the table right now.
One includes hitting people with a fine if they refuse to purchase insurance. Also, a new tax on certain health insurance benefits to help pay for the uninsured. Also an option to purchase coverage on what's being called a health exchange and no applicant could be rejected or charged a higher premium for pre-existing conditions.
Well, there may not be a single Republican onboard with the plan. Some Democrats also saying they're on the fence.
Jim Acosta is live in Washington with the obstacles ahead and possible lessons from the past. As we know, this is a huge issue. It's an issue that many coming before this president have tried and failed.
JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Kiran. And the battle lines are being drawn. One of those battle lines over how to pay for those plan. The other battle line over whether there should be an option of a government-run health care plan.
And President Obama, like you said, Kiran, wants to take his own shot at what both Harry Truman and Hillary Clinton have tried before but failed to accomplish, national health care reform. Even one of Mr. Obama's most prominent supporters has his doubts this time around.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We can't afford to put this off.
ACOSTA (voice-over): If President Obama wants some advice on navigating the mine field of health care reform, he can talk to his secretary of state who as first lady pushed her own plan and got pushed back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. RICHARD ARMEY (R), TEXAS: I listened to the chairman's opening statement. I do share his intention to make the debate and the legislative process as exciting as possible.
HILLARY CLINTON, FIRST LADY OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm sure you will accept, Mr. Armey.
ARMEY: We'll do the best we can.
CLINTON: You and Dr. Kevorkian?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ACOSTA: You were there for the Clinton health care battle?
MICHAEL LUX, SERVED IN THE CLINTON HEALTH CARE WAR ROOM: I was there in the war room for the Clinton health care battle, have the scars to prove it.
ACOSTA: Michael Lux served in the Clinton health care war room. He believes the Obama White House has learned from the Clinton administration which tried to dictate a complicated health care plan to Congress.
LUX: You're going to have to mess (ph) with it. You're going to have a tough battle. It will probably come down to the last -- the last voter to...
OBAMA: It's time to deliver.
ACOSTA: This time around, the president is offering guidelines to Congress, letting lawmakers work out the details. But even that tactic has ruffled feathers.
Iowa Republican Charles Grassley said on his Twitter page, "When you're a hammer, you think everything is a nail. I'm no nail." Other GOP leaders are swinging away Mr. Obama's proposal offering Americans the option of joining a government health care plan.
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), SENATE MINORITY LEADER: We will deliver a so-called reform that destroys what people like about the care that they already have?
ACOSTA: Then there are the special interest groups.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We will not wait another moment to fix our broken health care system.
ACOSTA: Those who want a plan covering all Americans...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This government-run plan could crush all your other choices.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ACOSTA: ... and those who don't.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These elaborate plans are easily picked apart. With all the groups involved, some people invariably feel that they are giving too much and getting too little.
ACOSTA: The man first tapped then scrapped as Mr. Obama's health czar told the National Press Club he's nervous.
TOM DASCHLE, FORMER SENATOR: Well, I think there's really only a 50- 50 chance that something is going to pass. I'd like to think -- I honestly as deeply as I believe in this, I'd like to think it was better than that.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ACOSTA: Now, the White House says President Obama is going to spend the next few weeks putting some meat on his plans and he's planning to hold a town hall meeting on health care later this week.
And, Kiran, one comment that really sticks out with me for my interview yesterday with Mike Lux, that veteran from the Clinton health care war room, he says if Republicans don't get onboard, the Obama White House is going to have to roll these guys is how he put it.
CHETRY: All right. Well, we'll see how it goes. Big debate for sure. Jim Acosta this morning for us. Thanks.
ROBERTS: To North Korea now, and the focus, diplomatic effort to save two American journalists from 12 years of hard labor. The fate of Laura Ling and Euna Lee now likely to play out in back channels and out of sight.
Our Jason Carroll has been following the story. He's here with us now this morning.
Hi, Jason.
JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey. Do you know there's been a huge international outcry over this? And there is some hope still out there. Many believe the sentence will finally open the door for some sort of negotiations. But the pressing question this morning is when and how will those talks start.
For now, the families of Laura Ling and Euna Lee are staying away from the cameras. Understandably, they say they are devastated. In a written statement, they asked North Korea for compassion and clemency. In Washington, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says the U.S. government is working every possible angle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HILLARY CLINTON, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We're engaged in all possible ways to every possible channel to secure their release. And we once again urge North Korea to grant their immediate release on humanitarian grounds.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARROLL: Ling and Lee were sentenced to 12 years of hard labor. That would normally mean going to a place like this that you're looking at, the infamous Yodok (ph) prison camp. Being sent there is considered by many to be a death sentence. The few reports we have from inside paint a very grim picture, forced labor, torture, limited medical care, little or no food.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHUCK DOWNS, U.S. COMMITTEE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN NORTH KOREA: Life there is admittedly extremely miserable. People there, if they are lucky, eat rats.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARROLL: We should emphasize experts we talked to said they doubted the reporters would ever actually be sent to a prison camp. So far, they've been kept in a guest house.
As for their efforts to get them home, former Vice President Al Gore is said to be standing by and ready to broker a deal for their release. Experts we spoke to said that's probably how it will end with some sort of high-level negotiators such as Gore or even New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson going to North Korea to cut some sort of a deal.
Both have been in contact with the White House. Of course, Gore has a stake in all of this. Both Ling and Lee were reporting for Current TV when they were detained.
ROBERTS: And we talked to former Vice President Gore a couple three weeks back.
CARROLL: Right.
ROBERTS: And he seemed quite optimistic that he would or the government would be able to win their release, that show trial, make a point, then let them go. So we'll see what happens.
CARROLL: Right.
ROBERTS: All right. Jason, thanks so much.
CARROLL: You bet.
CHETRY: Also new this morning, the end may be near for "The Boston Globe." Union employees voting to reject the newspaper's final contract offer. The newspaper saying that it needs $20 million in union concessions or it would be forced out of business. The New York Times Company, which owns "The Globe," will now impose big salary cuts on the staff. That starts this week.
Gas prices shooting above $2.60 a gallon for the first time in nearly eight months. A gallon now of unleaded averaging $2.62 nationwide according to AAA. That's up a dime over the last week and up more than 50 percent on the year.
And a follow-up this morning to our investigation of Gulfstream International Airlines. Allegations that pilots went from the classroom to the cockpit in a hurry. Now the company is responding and this is the only place you'll hear what they have to say.
Twelve minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. More on our developing story this morning.
Twenty-four victims from Air France Flight 447 have been pulled from the sea so far. The number one priority according to the Brazilian military is to recover those bodies, but searchers also desperately looking for the flight data recorders, the so-called black boxes before time runs out.
And take a look at this. The area that they're concentrating on is about the size of Nebraska, almost 80,000 square miles.
Our guest this morning says the daunting task of finding the black boxes should be a wakeup call for doing away with this antiquated technology. Clive Irving is the editor of "Conde Nast Traveler" magazine, specializes in aviation reporting.
Clive, good to see you this morning. Thanks for coming in.
CLIVE IRVING, CONTRIBUTOR, THEDAILYBEAST.COM: Good morning.
ROBERTS: You know, we see the picture behind you there, the vertical stabilizer from Air France 447. It was found yesterday as eerily similar if you remember to American Airlines 587...
IRVING: Yes, American Airlines. Yes.
ROBERTS: ... where they pulled the entire vertical stabilizer out of Jamaica Bay.
IRVING: In fact, it looks just like a model -- a plastic model assembly kit where you clip the vertical stabilizer on the fuselage.
ROBERTS: Yes.
IRVING: And you pull it off. It's an extraordinarily clean break.
ROBERTS: And the fact that it is a clean break and it seems to be pretty much intact, does that give you some sort of thought as to how this plane might have come down?
IRVING: I think I'd be very wary to make a connection between the two things, except that, remember, this is a composite, not a metal vertical stabilizer. So the whole physics of the thing and how it shears (ph) off might be very different to the circumstances of an all metal plane.
ROBERTS: Yes. We remember with American Airlines 587, the pilots overcorrected.
IRVING: Yes, they did.
ROBERTS: They put too much pressure and it snapped right off.
IRVING: Yes.
ROBERTS: And we know that the weather was bad in the area that this aircraft was flying through.
IRVING: Yes. Well, yes, it was. It was very bad.
But I think the wakeup call here is the most significant thing, is that we had our eyes pointed to a completely new technology which we almost didn't realize was there because the only clues that we have so far since the crash came from this uploaded data, the 24 messages that were sent to the maintenance center at Air France. That's all we've got to go on at the moment. And...
ROBERTS: Because these flight data recorders are at the bottom of the ocean, it could be as deep as 15,000 to 20,000 feet. IRVING: We never had that to rely on before. This is the first time this kind of information has been available or invoked. Which points, I think, to the fact that there is a parallel technology waiting to be employed. The information highway is already there in the sky, the communication satellites that you upload this information to. All we need now is to improve the messenger, that's the system on the plane that collects all the data and sends it up.
ROBERTS: So you're suggesting is rather than relying on black boxes which are now those so-called black boxes -- they're actually orange but they're called black because you can't see inside them.
IRVING: Yes. Yes.
ROBERTS: They're there at the bottom of the ocean. Rather than using that technology to tell us what happened to this aircraft, you're talking about real time data streaming such as NASA uses with the shuttle.
IRVING: Yes, yes. When in fact this is a good example of something that works very well until it doesn't. These data recorders always work very well in the past. They're very efficient. They collect a lot of data. But then you get a situation where the black boxes are inaccessible and that wouldn't be a problem if you were able to upload all these information.
What we need to, it's like one step away from being able to make more sophisticated reading on the plane itself and transmit that stuff. The more information you can get about this and the faster you can get it, obviously, in any aircraft situation is very valuable. And to have that at speed, because we're all speculating now, the various theories about what might have happened, speculation is a very dangerous thing.
ROBERTS: So, instead of all of these parameters being recorded on this flight data recorder, if they were being actually uploaded and sent to the home base, you'd know what was going on with the aircraft at any given time.
IRVING: Yes. The standard now for the black boxes is 88 parameters. And in fact until seven years ago, it was only 29. So we've got 24 from this. That's a pretty short distance from 24 to 29.
And if we could get this digital system up to the same level -- in fact, I don't see why we couldn't have both. Leave the black boxes in there then add this. Also, put it in the areas of the world where it's most important like this.
ROBERTS: Yes.
IRVING: You then have to roll it out everywhere at once. Just dedicate satellites and the system so there's areas of the ocean where planes alighted (ph).
ROBERTS: A couple of issues though. What about the cockpit voice recording? Would you upload that as well? And if you got all these thousands of planes flying around, can you handle that amount of data?
IRVING: I think you can, yes. I mean, the thing is you can handle any amount of data. The cell phone system, it's very similar. We have the communications satellite now. Sometimes signals bouncing back and forth.
ROBERTS: Well, cell phones work well until you try to make a call here in New York City. I'll tell you that.
IRVING: That's right.
ROBERTS: Clive, it's great to see you this morning. Thanks so much. You know, I know a lot of people are talking about this. We'll see if there is some move in this direction. Congress has been holding it since 2005.
IRVING: So it's a wakeup call.
ROBERTS: All right. Clive, thanks so much. Good to see you this morning.
It's 18 1/2 minutes now after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: You know, I've been to Dallas a lot. And I don't know that they listen to music like this in Dallas.
(LAUGHTER)
Eighty degrees and overcast right now in Dallas. Sunny and high and 94 later on today. Give me some of that good country music, Brian, come on.
CHETRY: You're going to get so much hate mail from Dallas. I don't even want to be logged on.
Well, here is what's on the a.m. rundown. Stories coming up in the next few minutes.
At 7:30, Newt Gingrich was the keynote speaker last night at the big GOP fundraiser. He had a lot of interesting things to say about the inclusiveness of the GOP party. Sarah Palin also making an appearance. It was a big question would she show, would she not. We're going to be talking about with the pundits coming up.
7:38, you could YouTube. Well, could YouTube wind up being judge and jury the plagiarism case against the band Cold Play. Also, the latest on the lawsuit over a song that sounds like another song.
At 7:50, a new connection between diabetes and other risks like high blood pressure and how much sleep you get. We're paging Dr. Gupta for more on that. But first, we have Christine Romans for us. She is "Minding Your Business" today.
Good to see you, Christine. CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. A couple of points I want to make about this big Chrysler development you've been hearing about.
First of all, the Supreme Court is now involved in the Chrysler deal pushing the pause button on the sale of Chrysler's big major assets to Fiat. We know that this is a setback for the White House many say because this could be a big test from the Supreme Court of just how much power the president and the executive branch have in remaking the American economy in this really tough time.
So this is a big deal. And it brings me to the Romans' numeral today which is 69,444 -- to be precise.
CHETRY: Wow. This is a dollar figure?
ROMANS: It is. It is.
CHETRY: And it has to do with Chrysler.
ROMANS: It has to do with Chrysler. This is how much money Chrysler is losing every minute. And this is largely our money because we invested a lot of money and the United States government, of course, is financing Chrysler through the bankruptcy.
So, what this highlights really for you is that every minute, every second counts here. The Supreme Court has put the pause button on the final sale. We don't know how long it's going to last. We just want more time to evaluate all of the issues here most importantly, pension funds in Indiana who are concerned that they kind of got a raw deal on all of this. So we'll see.
But money has been lost every second here. So are jobs. So pretty critical. 69,444 is your "Romans' Numeral" today. How much money Chrysler is losing every minute if this drags on.
CHETRY: Sobering (ph) terms for sure.
ROMANS: Yes.
CHETRY: Christine...
ROBERTS: So, hate mail from Dallas?
CHETRY: Well, because she said yeehaw (ph)?
ROBERTS: Oh, yes.
ROMANS: Come on, Dallas. We're with it, like the cowboy capital of the world.
ROBERTS: Give me some of that country music.
CHETRY: No. I really want...
ROBERTS: Jack Ingram, "Great Divide," fabulous song about Texas. We'll get it tomorrow.
CHETRY: You'll get it tomorrow, which means shut up.
ROMANS: I stood by my yeehaw (ph). Seriously, Forth Worth is the capital of the world.
ROBERTS: There you go.
CHETRY: All right. All we need is Ali Velshi on a bull and everything is great.
ROMANS: There you go.
CHETRY: Twenty-four minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. Now a follow- up to a CNN exclusive, Allan Chernoff has been reporting on allegations of maintenance and crew schedule and violations at Gulfstream International Airlines, as well as concerns about inexperienced pilots sitting in the cockpits.
Gulfstream International operates continental connection flights in Florida. And Allan returned to Florida this week. He's with us.
Allan, we understand that Gulfstream agreed to speak with us on camera?
ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: That's right, John. Two weeks ago, the company would not appear on camera when CNN confronted Gulfstream with allegations of safety violations. We first became interested in this airline after learning that the pilot of the Buffalo crash that killed 50 people back in February had attended the Gulfstream Training Academy and had flown for the airline. Now the company is responding.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMES BYSTROM, GULFSTREAM TRAINING ACADEMY DIRECTOR: It's not the quality of time, it's the quality of training. And what we provide is a first-class opportunity for them to get the right type of training.
ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Students at Gulfstream Training Academy arrived with as little as 250 hours of flight experience. Yet after three months of training, they'll become first officers, co-pilots on commercial flights. They'll fly for the academy's parent company, Gulfstream International Airlines, to gain an extra 250 hours of experience.
Veteran pilots who say the hiring standard at major airlines is a minimum 1,500 flight hours believe that ticket to the cockpit was too quick.
PAT MOORE, COMMERCIAL PILOT: But I don't know how they can justify that. When I get on an airplane, I expect a fully qualified crew. CHERNOFF: Gulfstream differs.
(on camera): Do you think the passengers sitting in the back would be comfortable knowing that the first officer would just come out of school and has perhaps 250 hours of flight time?
BYSTROM: Right. Importantly enough, I think it's important for me to reiterate, they already have all their ratings. By the time they get here, they've already completed almost 90 days of flight training before they even step in behind the wheel.
CHERNOFF (voice-over): When they get behind the controls, the new pilots who have just paid $30,000 tuition will earn $8.00 an hour, 79 cents above Florida's minimum wage.
(on camera): The minimum wage here in Florida is $7.21. And you're saying co-pilots are paid $8 an hour? Is that really what a co-pilot should be earning?
DAVID HACKETT, GULFSTREAM INTL. AIRLINES PRESIDENT: Well, it's a career path. And this is the first step on their career. They earn a lot more money later on.
CHERNOFF (voice-over): Later on, if hired full time, the new pilots earn about $20 an hour.
(on camera): The FAA made its investigation. Current, former employees have made some allegations against the company. Are you just saying it's all a bum wrap?
HACKETT: I think there's a misunderstanding of a lot of these regulations.
CHERNOFF (voice-over): A recent FAA investigation found multiple cases of Gulfstream scheduling pilots beyond federal limits designed to prevent pilot fatigue. Gulfstream concedes there were discrepancies between pilot logbooks and the computerized system tracking pilot hours, but says, the FAA got it wrong. Only once, the company claims, was a pilot accidentally scheduled to illegally work eight days in a row.
HACKETT: When you don't understand how the proper crew paperwork was done, it appeared that each time that person flew, he might have been illegal when in fact he was perfectly legal.
CHERNOFF: Former and current Gulfstream employees claimed dispatchers would sometimes shave hours from computerized logs of prior flights so that pilots would appear to be legal to fly extra routes.
(on camera): But it is possible for somebody to go back into the system and change times, is it not?
HACKETT: It's theoretically possible. When this issue first came up, we pulled hundreds and hundreds of records to see if this was possible, and we found absolutely no discrepancies other than a few clerical errors which had nothing to do with making a pilot illegal who otherwise would have been legal.
CHERNOFF (voice-over): The FAA also charged Gulfstream maintenance with using automotive air conditioning compressors in its aircraft. The company counters it purchased the correct compressors. The only issue, Gulfstream says, is that the FAA had not approved the maintenance manual Gulfstream was using.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHERNOFF: Gulfstream denies charges from former employees that it tried to save money by doing maintenance on the cheap. The company is facing a proposed fine of $1.3 million from the FAA. It does have the right to challenge that fine. And it is challenging that fine.
The FAA says, "This issue will be resolved between Gulfstream's attorneys and our attorneys." And John, by the way, the FAA also is planning to beef up its inspections of the pilot training programs at regional airlines like Gulfstream -- John.
ROBERTS: Allan, terrific report this morning. Great series that you're doing, keeping us on top of this. Really appreciate it. Thanks so much. Allan Chernoff, this morning.
CHERNOFF: Thank you.
ROBERTS: Thirty-one and a half minutes after the hour, and here are this morning's top stories. CIA director Leon Panetta is asking a federal judge not to release Bush era documents detailing the agency's interrogation of terrorists. He says it will threaten our national secure, and endanger our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. And the ACLU is suing for the release of those documents.
The first Guantanamo Bay prisoner to be brought to America has arrived in New York to stand trial. CNN confirming the detainee is Ahmed Galani. Galani was indicted 11 years ago for the deadly Al Qaeda bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. This is an important test case for the administration's plan to close Guantanamo Bay.
And Madonna reportedly will be allowed to adopt again. The British newspaper reports that Madonna has won her appeal and can adopt a 3-year-old girl from the East African nation of Malawi. The reports says two of the three appellate judges hearing the case have already submitted papers approving the adoption of Mercy. The third judge said also could be in agreement. The formal announcement could come this weekend -- Kiran.
CHETRY: All right. Well now at the Most Politics in the Morning, President Obama announcing plans to speed up the pace of recovery saying we're going in the right direction. But there is a whole room of people who disagreed with that last night at the big GOP fundraising dinner. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was the keynote speaker but many eyes were also on Sarah Palin, Alaska's governor.
Joining me now for more on that is republican strategist and CNN senior political analyst Ed Rollins and also democratic strategist Lisa Caputo.
LISA CAPUTO, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Good morning.
ED ROLLINS, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Good morning.
CHETRY: Great to see both of you this morning.
So the big back and forth was that she was originally invited, Sarah Palin, to be the keynote speaker. Didn't get back to them. They invited Newt Gingrich, and then the big question was whether or nor she was going to show. What do you make of how everything turned out yesterday, Ed?
ROLLINS: Well, I think it turned out fine. I mean, the bottom line is this is a dinner. It's an insider's dinner. It's an annual dinner for the Senate and the House committees. Gingrich is their hero. I mean he basically led them out of the wilderness. Palin is the outsider. Palin is someone who basically has great appeal beyond the beltway. And I think to a certain extent, republicans in Washington have to realize she's going to be a player one way or the other. She can really raise money for the party or be a very significant voice in the foreseeable future. Once she gets past her problems back home, which are very significant. You know, if she wants to run for president, you got to treat her as a serious candidate.
CHETRY: And she's been made to be a laughingstock by some, especially on the left. Do you think she is being underestimated, Lisa?
CAPUTO: Oh, I think she's totally being underestimated. Make no mistake about it but I think as a Democrat, I'm certainly marveling at watching the Republicans struggling to find their chief spokesperson, the person they want to rally around. I think you see a struggle here between two people to replace Dick Cheney who's self-anointed, so to speak, as the Republican mouthpiece.
But I think Gingrich is a man of ideas. And that's not to be underestimated. And Palin is not. I don't think she has a lot of original ideas and she could probably learn from the master under the tutelage of Gingrich and so I think it will be interesting to watch it play out.
ROLLINS: The great thing about Gingrich is he has 25 ideas an hour, which is unique. 23 of them may not be as great as two. He doesn't always know the difference. And I think the key thing though is he's an articulate spokesperson. He obviously knows Washington, led us out of the wilderness once again, I mean, and now he's back in the game.
CHETRY: And here's what he discussed yesterday which was the GOP has a big enough tent for everyone. Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER: I am happy that Dick Cheney is Republican. I am also happy that Colin Powell is a Republican. A majority of the Republican Party will have lots of debates within the party. That's the nature of majorities.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: Sounds like he's hearing some of the criticism, and the GOP is as well, about being a regional party that's trying to push out everyone who disagrees. Is it smart or is he articulating that?
ROLLINS: Sure it is. First of all, we have 60 million votes. So it's not like we're only a Southern party. Certainly we have significant players in the south and that's what we carried electoral votes. But we are still 60 million votes. That was nine million less than Obama got, but still a significant number. We have to add every single day. And more important is the independents that now are a plurality of the votes in America. Democrats win when they get a majority of independent. We win, that's the battleground. It's not just Republicans and Democrats.
CAPUTO: (INAUDIBLE) Republicans can't afford to be a regional party. That is exactly right. It's all about the independents. We saw the focus that Obama had on the independents. We saw it happen in the primary with the Democrats between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama really going after those independents. And you know, really, the Republicans need to find those Obama independents if they want to try to make a go of it in four years.
CHETRY: I want to ask you about the president yesterday and the vice president, they were out trying to sort of refocus on the stimulus after he'd come back from his trip to Europe in the Middle East refuting some of the claims that this nearly $800 billion in the stimulus package has not yet really had much of an impact on job creation, which right now I think 9.4 percent unemployment. What is the biggest challenge, Lisa, right now, in making sure that people continue to believe that the stimulus is going to work.
CAPUTO: Well, I think first and foremost, people have to understand this is a slow burn. You're not going to fix the economy overnight, you're not going to create jobs overnight. He's already created 150,000 jobs in the first 100 days. He's looking for 600,000 jobs to be created or saved by the summer. I think the other thing we have to remember is the unemployment number was perhaps today higher than they original expected. So, they're retooling. But don't forget what's already happening which is highway projects are under way. They're rehabilitating airports. There's a lot of infrastructure happening. They're surveying the cabinet to find out what kind of projects the different agencies can get under way. So, again, I think, first and foremost, it is reminding the American public this is not an overnight fix but this will be a slow burn.
ROLLINS: This was a rush to get a bill out. It wasn't a jobs creating bill as it should have been. It was a redistribution of money and I think at the end of the day, what they're trying to do now is get money out there to create jobs which is very, very important. Unemployment is always a lagging indicator. And if two years from now, going to 18 months now, going to 2010. And we still have high unemployment somewhere near 10 percent, it's going to affect a lot of races in this country.
CHETRY: All right. Well, good to get both of your points of views this morning. Lisa Caputo as well as Ed Rollins, thanks.
CAPUTO: Nice seeing you.
CHETRY: John.
ROBERTS: The latest on the lawsuit over a Cold play song could the site, YouTube, wind up to being judge and jury in a plagiarism case against the band. We'll tackle that one, it's 38 minutes now after the hour.
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ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. The power of YouTube may help decide an alleged case of plagiarism. Guitarist Joe Satriani has filed a lawsuit claiming that the band Coldplay ripped him off with the Grammy-winning hit "Viva la Vida." Coldplay denies it. All you have to do is hit up Google to hear comparisons for yourself. So who needs experts anymore? Carol Costello joins us now live from Washington. So, people who go on the Google can find all these information for themselves on the internet.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Oh, man, visit YouTube. But I mean, you can see what a fascinating case this is at its core. Can you really feel someone's song? I know it's easy to say yes, but it's not so easy to prove. Consider this: "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star"? Did you ever realize that parts of that song sound exactly the same as the ABC song? You know, twinkle, twinkle little star...ABCDEFG. And what about bah, bah black sheep, have you any wool. Theft? Or inspiration? In the case of Cold play's "Viva la Vida," YouTubers on both sides of the issue have something to say.
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COSTELLO (voice-over): Coldplay's "Viva la Vida" is more than just their biggest hit. It's a phenomenon, selling a whopping 6.8 million copies and it's made Coldplay and it's lead singer Chris Martin a bundle. But it's also become a source of controversy for Martin and one complicated legal fight for a well-respected guitarist, Joe Satriani.
Satriani is famous himself in the world of rock, now plays in the band Chicken Foot with Sammy Hagar, who lays all the sarcasm in support of Satriani.
SAMMY HAGAR, MUSICIAN: Joe, he just took singing the lyrics and made an instrumental out of it.
JOE SATRIANI, MUSICIAN: And somehow I did it four years earlier.
COSTELLO: Satriani composed "If I could Fly" in 2004, a song he claims Coldplay simply ripped off.
Coldplay has denied the allegation, but the case has captured the imagination of YouTubers all over the world. Most of whom are more than eager to prove Satriani right. There's the Canadian guitar teacher.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The diatonic chord substitution.
COSTELLO: His video has gotten 700,000 hits so far. Then are the mashups where YouTubers put Coldplay's lyrics over Joe Satriani's guitar riff. Some of the stuff is so cleverly done, it's gotten the attention of Satriani's attorney.
HOWARD KING, JOE SATRIANI'S LAWYER: What is fascinating with YouTube is you get 1,000 good ideas as a lawyer that you could adopt and use in court.
COSTELLO: But musicologists like Prince Charles Alexander who produced records for Mary J. Blige and Usher say mashups could be deceiving.
PRINCE CHARLES ALEXANDER, MUSICOLOGIST: You don't pick up the guitar and invent music. You actually are inspired by someone else that play. So you as an outsider who are mashing these two records up saying, wow, look at how similar they are, are actually looking at a process that's been going on for a very long time.
COSTELLO: And Alexander said you could mash up many well known songs to make them sound the same. He took "Twist and Shout" and "La Bamba." As for what Coldplay thinks of the lawsuit, Martin writes on the band's Web site it was "initially a bit depressing but now it's inspiring." He says, "If everyone is trying to take away our best song, now we got more to prove than ever before."
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COSTELLO: Coldplay's lawyers said the band can't comment on pending litigation. And just to keep things a bit more interesting, Yusuf Islam, formerly known as Cat Stevens, he is jumping to the mix, John. He says Joe Satriani's song was inspired or copied from a melody he wrote a few years before. So far Islam is not suing. Satriani's lawyer denies there is any copying.
ROBERTS: You know, there are only so many chords that it's possible to play and so many progressions that it's possible to play as well, you know, particularly if you go to the 1-4-5 sort of thing which many songs are based on. You wonder too though, you know, if back in the day when George Harrison faced that plagiarism fight over "My Sweet Lord" from the Chiffon's "He's so Fine" they put it on YouTube. You know, some of these things are obvious and some of them not so obvious. I mean, we played "All Summer Long" earlier. I mean, let's run a little bit of that again.
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ROBERTS: I mean, that's a clear Kid Rock mashup of "Werewolves of London" and "Sweet Home Alabama." But you know, you give credit where credit is due.
COSTELLO: I think he did give credit to Alabama because Kid Rock has performed with Alabama.
ROBERTS: Yes.
COSTELLO: And of course, that happens a lot with rap music and hip-hop music. But now they give credit instead of saying they were just inspired by it.
ROBERTS: Well, it would be impossible for him not to say he was inspired by Lawrence von Lynyrd Skynyrd for that song. Carol, thank so much. Great to see you this morning. All right. It's 46 minutes after the hour.
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CHETRY: Forty-eight minutes past the hour. By the way, on our twitter.com/amfix, we're getting some good suggestions. We asked people, you know, last year our unofficial theme song for the summer was Kid Rock, summertime.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: That's a good one.
ROBERTS: "All Summer Long."
CHETRY: "All Summer Long" that John just played. So we're getting some ones, "Steal my Sunshine," "I feel good," "Mongo Jerry in the Summertime." What do you think? Anything?
MARCIANO: Any one of those. Let me think about that because...
CHETRY: Any one of those. Rob is really into this. Any one of them sounds great.
MARCIANO: Let me figure it out. I have limited time right here. We'll get into the music a little bit later. We got a little bit of a severe weather threat right across central Kansas today. Moderate risks, I think really primed up for seeing some tornadoes there. We had some tornadoes yesterday. Here are some video out of Illinois. Bellville, Illinois we're seeing quite a bit of damage. There were seven reports of tornadoes yesterday. About 14,000 people without power from some of the storm activity. A lot of trees down, obviously.
So, this is all moving a little further to the east. And because of that, check out some of those traffic delays we have as far as air travel is concern. Ground stop in Atlanta, Baltimore, Houston, New York, JFK, La Guardia, Newark, Philly, D.C., all because of these storms that are rolling in to the Big Apple here. So big line running right across the turnpike right now into the New York City metropolitan area. So be aware of that and I'll think about the music. I'll get back to you in about an hour.
CHETRY: Sounds good.
MARCIANO: Sorry for being not so creative on my feet right now.
CHETRY: That's all right. You know, you were under time constraints. It's my fault, not yours. All right. I'll see you in a few.
MARCIANO: All right. See you.
CHETRY: Fifty minutes past the hour.
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CHETRY: That's actually the perfect shot to show when we play the song "Running on Empty," all our poor guys and gals in the control room this morning. Fifty-three minutes past the hour. Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
Well, sleep is gas that a lot of people, a lot of us are running on empty. You know, functioning on just a few hours of sleep can leave you fuzzy-headed. Science, though, is now showing the connection it can be bad for your health, as well. CNN's chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta is here with the latest.
So, we talk about, you know, needing a good night's rest. We all know we should get it, many of us don't. But what are some of the health consequences of not sleeping enough?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, you're absolutely right. First of all, I love talking about sleep, especially on this show because you and John and everyone on your team is so sleep deprived all the time. This may make you feel a little bit better. A sleep study coming out showing that just about one percent of the people in the United States get the recommended eight hours of sleep. So hardly anybody is getting what they should be getting in terms of sleep. There are lots of different health consequences.
One of the ones that came out most recently really was looking at this link between sleep, lack of it, and diabetes. All sorts of different things happening in your body including the release of certain hormones. What they find is that people who are getting fewer than five hours of sleep on average really start to increase their likelihood of diabetes. In fact, less than five hours, you're going to increase your diabetes just by about three times. Now it doesn't mean by any means that if you haven't been getting a lot of sleep lately that you're going to get diabetes, but it's certainly something to consider.
Also overall, when you look at the cascade of changes that start to happen in your body, there are things that are more visible, your skin may start to wrinkle faster. Your hair starts to get darker. As I mentioned, I love -- that's me getting a sleep study not that long ago. That bandanna by the way is to keep all the electrodes in my head not because I was going to a rock concert. But I know that it can affect your memory, it can make you drive poorly, it can do all sorts of things both on the inside and outside. So it is remarkable these new studies...
CHETRY: I'm sorry, you look like Steve Van Zandt when you're sleeping. You know what I mean, and you may have been able to explain away the bandanna but what about that small little stuffed lamb next to you? Do you use that to sleep overnight? Is that one way you fall asleep faster?
GUPTA: Getting five hours and any trick that helps will work. Yes, absolutely. You know, but when you talk about sleep overall, there's lots of different things that you can do to try to help yourself. You're just going to keep showing that video over and over again, aren't you? You know, it's funny, we talk about trying to get more sleep. And I almost feel a little bit silly talking about it because all of the basics apply, you know, not having television in your room, try not to drink alcohol or exercise right before bedtime.
A couple of things that I find that seem to help is taking five or 10 minutes between signing off the laptop or turning off the television before going to bed to really unwind in some way. And if you're simply just lying there, checking your BlackBerry, doing something that's not sleeping, get up out of bed, go somewhere else, spend about 15 minutes out of the bed and then come back. Those are two tips that seem to work for a lot of people.
CHETRY: And quickly, do you recommend taking any of those over the counter sleeping aids? Or do you think that they don't really work?
GUPTA: In the short term, I don't think it's a bad idea. If somebody has exhausted everything else. Just not chronically, not staying on them for a long period of time.
CHETRY: All right. You look so cute when you're sleeping...
GUPTA: I'm going to wear the bandanna...
CHETRY: Especially with all of the electrodes and the bandanna on your head. Sanjay, thanks.
Fifty-six minutes past the hour.
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