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American Morning
President Weighs Afghanistan War Strategy; Biden at Odds with Gen. McChrystal; Undercover Investigation on Guns Highlights Illegal Sales; Is Afghanistan Another Vietnam?; Getting Stay-at-Home Moms Back into Workforce; "Toughest Sheriff VS. The Feds"; Uneasy Credit Card Payments
Aired October 08, 2009 - 05:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome. It's a minute before 6:00 here in New York.
(LAUGHTER)
Shocking. On this Thursday, October 8.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: It feels so much earlier, doesn't it?
CHETRY: It sure does.
Welcome to AMERICAN MORNING. I'm Kiran Chetry.
ROBERTS: Good morning to you. I'm John Roberts.
Thanks for being with us.
Here are the big stories that we'll be talking about for the next 15 minutes here on the Most News in the Morning.
A suicide car bomber kills 12 people in an embassy in Afghanistan's capital. While here at home, the president considers a written request from his top general to send in reinforcements.
Barbara Starr live at the Pentagon this morning with a possible change in the president's approach to developing a new war strategy.
CHETRY: Meanwhile a key player in this high-level war strategy huddle is Vice President Joe Biden. The vice president said to be pushing max strong against President Obama's top commander in Afghanistan. In a moment, what the vice president would like to see happen in the 8-year-old war.
ROBERTS: And gun show sting catches dealers selling weapons to buyers who admitted that they would fail a background check. We're digging deeper on the undercover operation in three states, and why New York City's mayor was behind it all.
CHETRY: Well, we begin this morning with breaking news at a massive overnight explosion in Afghanistan. We're getting some new pictures just in to us this morning. At least 12 people were killed after a suicide bombing. It happened outside of the Indian embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan. The attack, yet another grim reminder of the shaky security situation facing President Obama as he debates the next move for U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
And now that very debate is facing major new questions. This morning word that President Obama is reviewing his top general's request for thousands of additional troops. But why does that matter? Because the president said that he wouldn't even look at a troop build-up request until he finished that re-evaluation of the Afghan war that we've been hearing so much about in recent weeks.
Barbara Starr is live at the Pentagon this morning to help us put it into perspective today.
Hey, Barbara.
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Kiran.
You are absolutely right. The president had said that strategy before resources. He wanted to figure out what he wanted to do before he decided how many people to send from the military to go do it. Now all of that turned on its head. So the question, has the president already made up his mind before hearing from the Pentagon?
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
STARR: (voice-over): Suddenly, President Obama is looking at the request to send tens of thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan, even though he has not yet announced a decision about a new strategy for the war, which is exactly what the president said he would not do.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't want to put the resource question before the strategy question.
STARR: Last week, just before the president met in Copenhagen with his Afghanistan war commander, General Stanley McChrystal, the president asked for a copy of McChrystal's troop request, which is believed to call for as many as 40,000 additional forces. It's not how the military usually makes plans for war. The president hasn't yet heard troop recommendations from his top military advisers, who would normally be part of such a massive decision.
Are the top officers being shut out now?
GEOFF MORRELL, PENTAGON SPOKESMAN: I think I'm getting from your line of questioning that there's some concern that the chain of command is being cut out of this process. Well, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
STARR: But Morrell readily admitted that while the Pentagon is now working on its ideas for more troops, it may be meaningless.
MORRELL: I think things can work in parallel, in the sense that it can operate through the -- the chain of command for formal vetting and comment and so forth. But, ultimately, it means, frankly, nothing until there is a decision made about the way ahead.
STARR: One reason for all of this -- the Pentagon was worried the highly classified troop request, just like McChrystal's assessment report, would get out in public.
MORRELL: I think we wanted a -- we wanted to avoid any opportunity for leaking of this before the secretary -- before the president had an opportunity to see it himself.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
STARR: But despite all of this bureaucracy and all this back and forth, what's the real bottom line, Kiran, is what is the threat in Afghanistan that U.S. troops are going to fight?
Joe Biden on the side of fighting al Qaeda. Military commanders still privately and publicly adamantly believe that Taliban has to be one of the first orders of business along with al Qaeda because if you don't deal with the Taliban, al Qaeda will once again find an unfettered safe haven inside Afghanistan - Kiran.
CHETRY: Well, it's very interesting and timely that you mentioned that, Barbara, because we are just getting word that we spoke about and showed pictures of this massive overnight explosion. Well, now according to the Associated Press, the Taliban is claiming responsibility for that attack in Kabul, claiming that the target was, indeed, the Indian embassy. So again, highlighting the challenge there as we have word of yet another one of these attacks taking place in Afghanistan.
Barbara Starr for us at the Pentagon.
Thank you.
ROBERTS: We are also learning more about a key player in the closed-door, high-stakes war council meetings. Vice President Joe Biden said to be at odds with the president's top commander in Afghanistan over the addition of more troops.
Our Brian Todd is working that story for us from Washington.
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, John and Kiran.
Administration sources tell us the president's closest adviser all have the same goal, to defeat the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan. It's the strategy for getting there that's the subject of increasingly pointed debate inside the White House. And we are told Joe Biden is right in the middle of them.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TODD: (voice-over): Administration sources tell CNN of a forceful direct vice president in White House Situation Room meetings on Afghanistan. The sources say Joe Biden has pointedly challenged America's top commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, over McChrystal's proposal to send up to 40,000 more U.S. troops there. By all accounts, Biden vehemently opposes that plan.
Publicly, White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs downplayed the disputes in describing a recent meeting.
ROBERT GIBBS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Nobody raised their voice. Nobody -- there was just a sort of calm discussion about where we are.
TODD: But administration sources tell us in those meetings, Biden has intensely pushed his own proposal to keep U.S. troop levels where they are and to focus the mission more on rooting out Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters with Predator drones and Special Forces raids in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
CNN's senior political analyst, Gloria Borger, has also spoken with administration sources about the meetings.
(on camera): Has he changed the dynamics of this decision on Afghanistan?
GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Before you had the vice president weighing in, you had a lot of folks just assuming that whatever General McChrystal recommended was what the president was going to approve. After all, McChrystal is his guy.
Now, I think the conversation inside that room has really shifted, become a little bit more nuanced -- what do we need for counter-insurgency in different parts of Afghanistan?
TODD: (voice-over): Sources say Biden's gotten his own push back in the meetings from principals who said his ideas are problematic.
As a senator, Biden opposed the surge of troops in Iraq. But in the Balkans and elsewhere, he has favored the use of military force. Sources say with Afghanistan, Biden has become increasingly disillusioned with the government of President Hamid Karzai.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TOOD: We are told by administration sources that none of this is personal. It's not personal between bidden and Gen. McChrystal, and not personal between Biden and President Karzai. Our sources say that Biden simply had growing concerns about committing so many more troops to Afghanistan to support a government that has not adequately addressed issues of corruption and mismanagement.
John and Kiran, back to you.
ROBERTS: Brian Todd for us this morning.
Brian, thanks so much.
And stick with us here on the "Most News in the Morning." Because coming up at 6:30 Eastern, the headlines are everywhere, calling Afghanistan, President Obama's Vietnam. We'll get some insight when we talk to Peter Beinart. He's the senior political writer at The Daily Beast. He wrote an article called "Bury the Vietnam Analogy."
CHETRY: Meanwhile, here's a quick look at some of the other stories new this morning at 7:00 seven minutes past the hour.
The president's make or break push on health care getting a shot this morning after the numbers were crunched on Capitol Hill the cost of the Senate Finance Committee's proposed bill. That's known as the Baucus Plan. Came to $829 billion over the next ten years. It sounds like a lot. But a congressional budget office also says that this plan would actually cut the deficit by $81 billion while ensuring that about 94 percent of the country would be insured.
ROBERTS: As the first wave of swine flu vaccines arrive this month, an associate press poll finds more than a third of parents do not want their children vaccinated. 72 percent of those surveyed are concerned about possible side effects from the new vaccine. Federal health officials insists it's safe and effective, and they are urging Americans to get vaccinated against the H1N1 virus.
CHETRY: President Obama has bragged about having the best basketball cabinet. Well, in U.S. history. That may be put to the test tonight. Because the president is going to be shooting hoops with cabinet secretaries and members of Congress on the White House basketball court. The players include secretaries Tim Geithner, Arne Duncan, Ken Salazar, Shaun Donovan. Eleven House members are also scheduled to play. For the record, it's nine Democrats and two Republicans.
ROBERTS: Well, we've heard a lot over the years about the so- called Gun Show Loophole. Well, law enforcement agencies in three states put that to the test.
Can people who would not ordinarily pass a background check get weapons at gun shows? Mayor Bloomberg was behind the whole thing. And we will find out what it was all about, coming right up.
Nine minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Private eyes are watching you. Well, in some cases, they're not. But 11 minutes after the hour.
A undercover sting operation in three states appears to catch gun show dealers selling weapons to buyers who admit that they could not pass a background check.
ROBERTS: It was commissioned by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who says this so-called gun show loophole is making it easier for criminals to get their hands on weapons. The city has got no legal authority over the dealers, but a copy of that report is being sent to every member of Congress.
Our Allan Chernoff is following the story.
So, it looks like Mayor Bloomberg was out to prove something here, not necessarily clamp down on the law but just wake people up to say this is going on.
ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: He certainly is trying to prod Congress. No doubt about that. What the city is trying to do here is to get Congress to make it tougher for private dealers to sell guns illegally.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No background check, right?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, that's right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good, because I couldn't probably pass one.
(LAUGHTER)
CHERNOFF (voice over): It's illegal to sell a gun knowing the buyer may not pass a background check. But on hidden camera, gun shows in Ohio, Nevada and Tennessee, it happened 19 out of 30 times. The undercover buyers were hired by New York City.
MAYOR MICHAEL BLOOMBERG (I), NEW YORK: What you saw was willful disregard of the law and it happened again and again and again.
CHERNOFF: Firearm dealers are regulated. But at gun shows, people who make what the law calls occasional sales from their collections and sell without a license. And sometimes, as the investigation illustrates, they ignore the law.
BLOOMBERG: This is real. This translates into people getting killed, children, adults, police officers, civilians.
CHERNOFF: New York City conducted a gun show sting three years ago, and even brought a civil lawsuit against some gun sellers. Mayor Bloomberg has long called for a crackdown on illegal gun sales.
The National Rifle Association, though, says the mayor who is running for re-election should be helping enforce existing laws rather than holding news conferences. Bloomberg's priorities are clearly media first, said the NRA.
New York and 15 other states require buyers to have a background check before they can purchase a handgun at a gun show.
RAY KELLY, NYPD COMMISSIONER: There is simply no reason why there shouldn't be background checks at gun shows.
CHERNOFF: Now, city officials are hoping to prod Congress to act to close what it calls the gun show loophole.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHERNOFF: Congress has had bills to address this issue for over a decade, but that legislation has gotten nowhere.
ROBERTS: It is really fascinating what the mayor set up here. It's something that an investigative journalism show would typically do. You know, hidden cameras out at gun shows. Can you really do this?
CHERNOFF: It's not the first time.
ROBERTS: Not for law enforcement purposes but just demonstration purposes.
CHERNOFF: They did this three years ago. And they actually brought civil lawsuits against some of the gun dealers and put a couple of them out of business.
ROBERTS: Wow.
CHERNOFF: They're serious. I mean, the mayor is saying, look, this is our business because people bring those illegal guns to New York City and can use them. Just trying to make the streets safer.
ROBERTS: He did create a media empire. So, you can take the mayor out of media, but you can't take the media out of the mayor.
All right, Allan, great story. Thanks so much.
CHETRY: Thanks, Allan.
ROBERTS: Christine Romans is "Minding Your Business." She's got a Romans' Numeral for you this morning. She's also going to talk about how consumers are cutting their levels of borrowing. Are we changing our habits? We'll find out.
Fifteen minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. A new study shows that airport delays are twice as bad as they were two decades ago. Yesterday, we told you that the number of on-time flights actually got better over this past summer, but the point here, things are now a lot worse than they were 20 years ago. The Brookings Institution says the biggest problem: lots of quick flights between the country's biggest cities like New York, Chicago and Atlanta.
CHETRY: Not much surprise that it's worse than it was. I mean, more people are flying.
ROBERTS: Right. You know, they do make their on-time rates better because they extend the length of the flight, right?
CHETRY: Right.
ROBERTS: The average flight to, say, Atlanta now is scheduled for about three hours. CHETRY: Exactly. Well, the astronomy night at the White House went off last night with a pretty much success. President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama invited about 150 middle school students to go - starting - that's easy for me to say (ph) - stargazing.
About 20 telescopes were set up on the South Lawn. The kids got to check out pieces of moon rock and see a 3-D tour of the universe. The night also included some real-life stars like astronaut Buzz Aldrin - you just saw there (ph) - and Sally Ride, the first female astronaut.
ROBERTS: And Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick says he just wants people to get to know him as an individual. The "Los Angeles Times" reporting that Vick will star in an eight-part documentary set to run at BET early next year. Vick served 18 months in prison for animal cruelty charges involving dog fighting.
CHETRY: All right. Well, Christine Romans is here "Minding Your Business" at 19 minutes past the hour. You talked about habits changing, more difficult to get credit and when you do have credit you owe more because banks are jacking up the rates. Is it changing our habits?
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: It's changing, and for seven months in a row now we've seen Americans borrowing less. Consumer credit is measured by the Federal Reserve. Big number yesterday that showed for seven months in a row now it has been shrinking and it's expected to keep going. The last time we had seven months in a row of people cutting back on their borrowing was in 1991 and we've never had eight months in a row since they have been tracking these numbers since 1943. So total outstanding credit fell $12 billion, credit cards fell 13.1 percent, the amount of money on borrowing on auto and student loans fell 1.6 percent.
Why is that last number a little bit smaller? It's because of the Cash for Clunkers. Without the Cash for Clunkers you would have seen a big decline there. Why are people doing this? Credit is less available. We know that there was a big huge credit bubble for - what? Twenty years? And now the banks and the lenders, they're reeling that bubble in. It popped and it's still shrinking. The other reason is because you're concerned about the jobs market. You don't want to be caught in a position where you lose your you're your spouse loses their job, your partner does, and suddenly you're sitting there with a bunch of debt that you can't finance.
So look at what's happened over the same period, basically, that we're talking about, this consumer bubble shrinking. You've seen the unemployment crisis with the unemployment rate reaching 9.8 percent. So this is called the big credit squeeze, folks. On the one hand, it's harder to get the credit, on the other hand, we're worried about having too much of it with such an uncertain economy. It - it's not good for the economy overall, though. We're - we're an economy that's built on borrowing and spending money, and so this - this has a - it has not good implications for our economic (ph) recovery and how strong that is.
ROBERTS: Yes, but it's - it's good for personal finance to not be carrying this much debt (INAUDIBLE).
ROMANS: Yes. Absolutely right. And that's the paradox, you know? That's the real paradox there.
ROBERTS: Yet somehow I think that maybe your "Romans' Numeral" might be tied to all of this this morning?
ROMANS: It does. It's tied to why Washington is concerned about this is and they're talking about extending some of the stimulus measures. Four hundred thousand is the number of the "Romans' Numeral" today, and this is kind of - this is kind of a number that has really scared some people in Washington. That's why we're talking about more stimulus.
It's the number of people who ran out of their jobless benefits in September. Four hundred thousand people ran out of their jobless benefits, so, clearly, many of those people are struck with credit that they can't finance or they're not going to be taking on new credit, and so that's why we're talking about extending unemployment benefits. The Senate still working on that, folks. I know a lot of people have been e-mailing me about that. The Senate is still working on an extension again of unemployment benefits. I'll let you know as soon as that happens.
ROBERTS: Christine Romans, thanks. "Minding Your Business" this morning. Coming up next, Jim Acosta tackles the issue of health care costs. Is it reasonable - or are they reasonable or is it just pure greed on the part of both insurers and providers?
Twenty-two minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. In the make-or-break push on health care reform, there's one thing that most people can agree on. Whatever the fix, we have to make things cost less.
CHETRY: That's right. But why are insurance premiums and co- pays going up? Is it the soaring cost of care or insurance company greed or perhaps a little bit of both?
Our Jim Acosta is live in Washington this morning, tracking a case from Maine. Hey there, Jim.
JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Kiran and John. You're right. Advocates of health care reform are holding up this case as evidence the insurance companies will do just about anything, even in a recession. The attorney general in Maine calls it greed.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ACOSTA (voice-over): Elizabeth Beane is what the health insurance industry calls an individual policyholder. As a self- employed social worker, she has to buy her insurance on the open market. ELIZABETH BEANE, ANTHEM BLUE CROSS BLUE SHIELD CUSTOMER: It went up from $450 a month to $550 a month. Yes, $1,200 over the year.
ACOSTA: Which may explain why she's rooting against her insurance company, Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, in a high-profile legal fight with the State of Maine, a fight that's been dragged into the center of the nation's health care debate - a fight Maine's Attorney General Janet Mills says she'll win.
JANET MILLS, MAINE ATTORNEY GENERAL: We'll go after them. We wouldn't stand still for this.
ACOSTA: The fight boils down to this: earlier this year, Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield proposed a rate increase for its individual policy holders of 18.5 percent. The State of Maine, which has the power to regulate those rates said no, lowering that increase to 11 percent.
So what did Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield do? They took the State of Maine to court.
MILLS: That wasn't enough for them. They're going back for more and I just can't believe basically the greed of it in this context, in this economy.
ACOSTA: This is greed?
MILLS: In my view, yes.
ACOSTA: Mills says she was floored by Anthem's explanation that 18.5 percent increase was what the company needed to make a small 3 percent profit.
And it seems like the gist of what you're saying is the nerve of these guys.
MILLS: Yes! I mean, it's outrageous. Hello? It's a recession.
ACOSTA: Anthem is owned by WellPoint. One of the nation's largest insurance carriers, WellPoint made more than $2 billion in profits last year. In a statement to CNN, a company spokesperson said, "The level of our increase reflected the medical cost trends for our individual market members and included a modest pre-tax operating margin of 3 percent to cover profit and unanticipated risks." And the company repeated the industry's call for health care reform measures, now pending in Congress, that would require all Americans to get coverage.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If everyone is covered, we can make health care as affordable as possible.
ACOSTA: Anthem argues Maine's approved increase of 11 percent will result in no profit for the company, but Maine's Attorney General says, not so fast.
MILLS: In Maine alone they paid - they paid almost $1 million in bonuses to their Maine executives in one year alone, and that is an issue in this case.
ACOSTA: Elizabeth Beane says she's already spending a third of her income on health care, leaving her nothing for retirement.
BEANE: Where is my retirement account? CEOs of Anthem, I'm sure they have no worries about their retirements I'm funding it for them.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ACOSTA: There are 12,000 individual policy holders in Maine who will be affected by this decision, but the case has national implications as it's about the government's ability to control health care costs. The case goes to court next month, and, John and Kiran, no one is losing sight of the fact that Maine - that this is happening in the backyard of two very influential senators, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, whose votes will be pivotal on health care reform.
ROBERTS: Not being lost on anyone, that's for sure. Jim Acosta this morning. Jim, thanks so much.
Coming up to the bottom of the hour now, checking our top stories. House Democrats shutting down the latest effort by the GOP to oust New York Democrat Charlie Rangel as chairman of the powerful Ways and Means Committee that writes tax laws. Republicans are calling for Rangel to step down during an ongoing ethics investigation into his finances and activities. He's accused of not claiming assets worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
CHETRY: And a developing story out of Afghanistan right now. The Taliban reportedly claiming responsibility for an attack aimed at the Indian Embassy in Kabul. The car bomb exploded just as stores and offices were opening. At least 12 people were killed, including a police officer. More than 80 others were injured.
This is the second time that that embassy has come under attack - a similar attack last year killed 58 people.
ROBERTS: And back to the negotiating table, North Korea is apparently thinking about it. Kim Jong-Il reportedly telling China's prime ministers it is ready to renew nuclear talks if Pyongyang can go one on one with the United States. The White House has repeatedly said any talks need to be part of the six-nation process.
CHETRY: So, is Afghanistan another Vietnam? Critics of the war are quick to make the comparisons, and the headlines are hard to miss. Newspapers across the country examining the two conflicts and their similarities, like this report in "The Virginian Pilot." The headline reading, "Links to Vietnam are Undeniable" - there, you see it? And this one from Delaware's "News Journal" "Afghanistan Isn't Obama's Vietnam Yet." And from the "Miami Herald" "Another Vietnam?"
So, is it valid to compare the two wars? My next guest says no. Joining me now from Washington, Peter Beinart. He's the senior political writer of "The Daily Beast" and you just wrote an article, Peter, called "Bury the Vietnam Analogy" and clearly there has been a lot, as we've just shown, of analysts, columns and people who study war saying that there are comparisons to be made between Afghanistan now and Vietnam then. Why do you think that's off base?
PETER BEINART, SENIOR POLITICAL WRITER, THE DAILY BEAST: First of all, South Vietnam, the country we were trying to defend, was not a real country. It was an artificial country. It's created in 1954 by the French as they were leaving. The country was supposed to be reunited with North Vietnam in two years. The problem in Afghanistan may be that we have a government partner that's problematic. But Afghanistan is a real country that Afghans generally believe in. They have an Afghan national identity. That didn't exist in South Vietnam. That's why we might be able to do better in Afghanistan than Hamid Karzai. We could never have done better in South than them because South Vietnam itself was not a country that people felt loyalty to. That was one of the big differences.
There were other big differences. For instance, the fact that the Taliban is much, much less popular in Afghanistan than the Vietnam war in South Vietnam. In Vietnam, the communists essentially controlled the nationalist movement. They had the nationalist legitimacy. That's not true in the same way for the Taliban.
CHETRY: There's a couple of interesting ways that they are different. And one of the things, though, that people are comparing it to is this debate going on right now about what the next move is. As Afghanistan becomes at least according to the public polling, an increasingly unpopular war with the American public.
Then "The New York Times" recently columnist Frank Rich that while JFK was deciding about Vietnam, quote, "military leaders lobbied for their new mission by planting leaks in the press." Kennedy fired back by authorizing his own leaks which like Obama's indicated his reservations about whether American combat force could turn a counterinsurgency strategy into a winnable war.
When we take a look at what's happening now, it seems to be a bit of the case.
BEINART: Yes. But that was also true in Korea, where Harry Truman faced off against Gen. Douglas Macarthur in Bosnia, where Colin Powell very publicly as chairman of the Joint Chiefs opposed Clinton's efforts to try to get the U.S. more involved there. That's true of most wars that there are conflicts between military and civilian leaders. They play out in the press. It doesn't tell you anything about whether Vietnam on the ground is like Afghanistan.
CHETRY: And it's also interesting because at the end of the article, you write, "Let's not flatter ourselves with Vietnam comparisons. In Vietnam, we lost because the war was unwinnable from the start. In Afghanistan, we had a grateful population, an unpopular enemy, and a just cause and we frittered away. Afghanistan isn't Vietnam. It's worse."
So eight years out, and some say, you know, it seems as though we are starting back at square one.
How do you win? BEINART: I don't know if we can win. I think what's clear is that the resources that we put in Afghanistan have been absolutely minuscule compared to Vietnam, and also for that matter compared to Iraq.
In 1968, we had over 500,000 U.S. troops in South Vietnam. We had up until a couple of years ago only really about 20,000. We were fending 2.3 percent of GDP in South Vietnam. In Afghanistan, we are spending about 1/7 of that. So it was clear as though we haven't made anywhere near the kind of commitment to Afghanistan that we made to Vietnam. The question is, is it now too late.
CHETRY: Yes. And that's the thing. I mean, it seems to me when people compare Vietnam to any current conflict because we heard it with Iraq as well, the readers saying one of two things. We are fighting a losing battle, right? I mean, that's what oftentimes whenever that is the question that's asked, what you read below is that it's a losing battle. But the other thing is many people say is, can we learn from our mistakes. So what can be learned, if anything? What is the value of looking back on Vietnam and saying is there a way that we can learn from our mistakes in our current conflict?
BEINART: Well, I think the American military actually deserves a lot of credit from having to learn, and particularly from the experience in Iraq. I think the American military clearly has gotten a lot better at understanding how to do counterinsurgency, trying to reduce the number of civilian casualties, focussing on protecting people so that their loyalties will shift.
I think the American military has done actually a great job of learning. Afghanistan is a very, very challenging case. I think above all because there is a question of whether we really have a good partner in the Karzai government. But we should learn from Vietnam. We should also learn from lots of other complex. People invoked Vietnam because it's a synonym for failure. But there are other U.S. wars that have gone better, that also they have something to teach us. People said that Bosnia would be Vietnam. And it didn't turn out to be a Vietnam. So there are lots of historical analogies we can look to.
CHETRY: It's very, very interesting take. Peter Beinart this morning.
Thanks for joining us.
BEINART: Thank you.
ROBERTS: Well, some cases the children are getting older and other cases financial demands means time to bring in more money. Sometimes two of those things go hand in hand. But whatever the reasons, more and more moms are trying to re-enter the workplace after staying at home for so many years. But are there the jobs out there to be had?
Our Christine Romans is "Minding Your Business" this morning. She reports coming right up. Thirty-four and a half minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
We're thirty-seven minutes past the hour right now. And also right now the nation's unemployment rate is hovering just below 10 percent as we've been say. But it is expected to top double digits.
ROBERTS: And those jobless statistics do not include millions of stay-at-home moms. Some of whom are coming back into the workforce at a time when jobs are going away.
Our Christine Romans "Minding Your Business," and looking at some of the challenges they are now facing.
A lot of the stay-at-home moms literally being forced back in because of economic difficulties.
ROMANS: That's right. And think about it, they left the labor market because they wanted to raise their kids. They always do -- kindergarten, first grade, third grade. They were going to get back in and use their skills, get back into the workforce. Now they are trying to come in at a time when they need the money and there are millions of other people trying to get the same jobs. We have the story of one family.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ROMANS (voice-over): Meet Kathryn Gutowski, stay-at-home mother of four. Car pooling, laundry, homework, for 11 years she juggled it all.
KATHRYN GUTOWSKI, JOB SEEKER: I think anyone who's had four children under 7 knows a lot about juggling.
ROMANS: Before she was a mom, she was an attorney. And it's time, she says, to get back to work.
(on camera): One child in college and another going in college, and then two more a few years behind that. I mean, financially, it's probably important to have a job as well, right?
GUTOWSKI: Oh, it's very important. I mean, I think like most American families, you know the equity in our home, our college savings, our retirement savings have plummeted. And, you know, I've had the luxury of being home all these years and look to my kids, but that's not a luxury I'm going to continue to have.
ROMANS (voice-over): She knew this day was coming. She kept her skills polished, her license up-to-date. She volunteered.
GUTOWSKI: I started to respond to job postings on the Internet. And I would send out a resume and I would hear absolutely nothing.
ROMANS: She looked for a job for a year before she found a program that pays law school for lawyer moms like her.
AMY GEWIRTZ, DIRECTOR, PACE LAW NEW DIRECTIONS: There is a concern right now because they have been out of the workforce, how am I going to manage the family work-life balance. How am I going to do it? And this gives them a way to get toe in the water.
ROMANS: She landed an externship in a college law admissions office. Think of it as an internship primarily for stay-at-home moms. Companies as diverse as Goldman Sachs and Sarah Lee have similar programs called returnships. But while Kathryn is trying to get back in, many working moms have no choice. They cannot take off time to raise their kids.
SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT, ECONOMIST, CENTER FOR WORK-LIFE POLICY: There's been a tremendous decrease this year in the number of professional women taking that kind of time out because they feel under the gun on the earnings front.
ROMANS: Kathryn says she'd advised her daughters to keep one foot in the workforce when they have families.
GUTOWSKI: I would say do something, do something part-time, teach. Do something. But never find yourself in the position where you've been completely out for 10 years.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROMANS: And she says she sees another benefit of going back to work that's not financial. She thinks it's time for her kids to learn more self-reliance.
Don't we all think that the kids can do that? I'm a working mom. And I think they can learn some more self-reliance, too. But one thing about this story...
ROBERTS: (INAUDIBLE)
ROMANS: Well, yes, I know.
ROBERTS: How old?
ROMANS: Three.
(CROSSTALK)
ROBERTS: Self-reliance at three.
CHETRY: She's talking about the 18-month-old.
(CROSSTALK)
ROMANS: Come one, I want him mowing the lawn.
But one thing about this story that really surprised me is maybe two generations ago or a generation ago, you didn't have a choice. You had to stay at home and raise your kids. And then for a while, there was this period for women when they had a choice, they could go to work and be a mom and raise your kids, or you could stay home.
And now these studies are showing in the last couple of years that women feel like they can't make that choice anymore. Professional women feel -- because of the money, because of the money.
ROBERTS: And you are seeing lots of programs for moms.
(CROSSTALK)
ROMANS: And there are lots of -- I was surprised. There are a lot of programs and a lot of big companies. You can call and ask about externships or returnships. Call the recruiting offices of some of these big companies, because they have specific recruiting programs for women who are trying to get back in the workplace because they found that they are flexible about juggling, they have professional skills that just need to be polished up, and there are usually some good ways to get the seasoned workers who have been out for a few years back in.
CHETRY: Also, if you deal with 3-year-old running around and freaking out all day, the workforce is like relaxing.
ROMANS: Oh, yes. I can handle any boss around here. No problem.
ROBERTS: I just see you with your child. You are 3. You don't have a job yet? What's wrong with you!
ROMANS: Well, I don't mean because he's 3, I just meant as a mom, you know -- I get it, how you want your kids learn some self- reliance.
CHETRY: (INAUDIBLE)
ROBERTS: No, I just start it.
Rob Marciano tracking the extreme weather across the country today. Possibility of flooding in the plains. Rob will have the forecast coming right up. It's now 18 minutes to the top of the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Wow, a pretty shot this morning. That's a live look at Baltimore. Thanks to our friends at WBFF.
ROBERTS: Wow. It's an interesting color, isn't it?
CHETRY: Isn't it gorgeous?
ROBERTS: Magenta there.
CHETRY: Well, it's 48 degrees right now. So it's chilly there, going up to 71. And it should be mostly sunny today in Baltimore. Right now it's 45 minutes after the hour. Rob Marciano is at the weather center in Atlanta. He's back from his shark expedition. He was tugging sharks, and now you are back there in Atlanta. Hey, there, Rob.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes. Good to be off. We were in that boat for 12 hours the other day. And by hour ten -- ready to get home for sure. Yeah, definitely. We didn't get the largest sharks, but it's certainly is an interesting thing and even the smaller ones, a little bit frightening.
Heavy rain across the nation's midsection of - that is the highlight. The wind across the Northeast won't be nearly as bad today. And you'll see partly sunny skies. So it's not going to be too shy during the day. Flood watches and warnings are in effect. Look at this swath from San Antonio and Austin all the way through Dallas, through St. Louis, and just South of Chicago.
So a big area of real estate here in the nation's midsection of the country. We are going to see the rainfall. And we are seeing it right now. It's start to fill in from Kansas City back through St. Louis.
I think St. Louis is where most of the heavier rainfall is going to be today. And with that sort of rain over, an area that has had a decent amount, you get another five, four to six inches. That's possible. And we're starting to see that happen right now. That's where the most concern is, I think, over the next 24 to 48 hours. 84 degrees in Memphis, will be 68 degrees in New York City, and 80 degrees expected in Atlanta. John and Kiran, back at to you.
ROBERTS: Rob, thanks so much. Rob spends a lot of time on the road. But if anybody knows about life on the road, it's Carl Edwards, the NASCAR superstar gets paid to keep the pedal to the metal. And this morning, he's showing us how he keeps his cool while on the move with today's edition of "Road Warriors."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CARL EDWARDS, NASCAR DRIVER: My life on the road, sometimes feels like I'm just going around the circles.
I'm now on the road somewhere between 250 days a year. Other than my jet, I never leave home without a suit because I dress up or something. With the suit comes off, it needs to be replaced with a fire proof suit which is much better for racing. The same road just would go up quickly.
A couple of things to help you stay sound on the road, a good book that helps a lot, good food, and if you can, take the people you love with you. That's fun.
The only thing I really do before a race is I always try to take a minute and think about where it came from and what I'm trying to accomplish. It is really easy to get caught up and things that aren't important. Thanks for spending a weekend with me. Carl Edwards at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Whatever you're doing out there, have fun. Now get out of here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Always easy to take the loved ones with you when you got your own jet.
CHETRY: Exactly. He said if you can.
ROBERTS: Arizona's high flying sheriff, Joe Arpaio, had his wings clipped a little bit. Not flying quite so high. His argument with the feds over immigration arrests. He's going to be joining us in our 8:00 hour. But we will tell you what the story is all about coming up next. It's 48 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. He calls himself the toughest sheriff in America, known for cracking down on illegal immigrants his way.
CHETRY: That's right. But now Arizona's sheriff, Joe Arpaio, was in a power struggle with the feds after he says that they stripped him and his deputies with the power to go after and arrest illegal immigrants. So what prompted the feds to revoke their authority? Here's our Thelma Gutierrez
THELMA GUTIERREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John and Kiran, Sheriff Arpaio says he's furious because the federal government is meddling in his ability to enforce immigration laws in his state. The Immigrant Rights Organizations say this is a big win for their side.
He calls himself the toughest sheriff in America, tough on crime, tough on prisoners, top on illegal immigrants in Maricopa County, Arizona. Now he says, the feds are trying to cut his wings.
For two and a half years, Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his deputies have had the authority to act as federal immigration agents. Under what's called a 287-G agreement with the Department of Homeland Security to investigate, apprehend, transport and detain people who are living and working in the country without authorization.
Arpaio says that power was stripped away by the federal government. The Department of Homeland Security told us that's premature.
JANET NAPOLITANO, HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: That review is underway. No decisions pending that review have been made.
SHERIFF JOE ARPAIO, MARICOPA COUNTY, ARIZONA: This is all a conspiracy. It started two years ago.
GUTIERREZ: Arpaio says, he now becomes the poster boy of the emotionally charged immigration debate, and he lost his federal authority to go after illegal immigrants for political reasons. But his critics say, it's the other way around.
DAN POCHODA, ACLU ARIZONA: He has been going out solely to fuel his immigration base and anti-immigration base. GUTIERREZ: The ACLU of Arizona says Arpaio lost his 287-G status because of his abuse of power.
POCHODA: He has unconstitutionally acted to racially profile many persons in the community, persons who appear or are Latino.
GUTIERREZ: ACLU attorney, Densekota (ph) says, Arpaio's high profile crime suppression slips (ph) targets all Latinos, legal and illegal. The ACLU filed a class action lawsuit against him. The sheriff and his departments are currently at the center of an investigation by the Department of Justice into allegations of civil rights abuses.
ARPAIO: I got news for all of these critics, all of these politicians, whose ongoing to continue to do everything I've been doing.
GUTIERREZ: And the sheriff says he will continue to enforce immigration laws in his state. Immigrants rights groups say they will continue to fight him. John and Kiran--
ROBERTS: Thelma Gutierrez this morning. And you don't want to miss this, coming up at 8:30, Eastern here in the Most News in the Morning, we will be speaking live with sheriff Joe Arpaio. Why he is now fighting back against the federal government, and what he plans to do in the future in terms of going out there in the streets with these sweeps to pick up illegal immigrants.
CHETRY: Jessica Yellin sat down the other day with a family who has paid $300 amount in their minimum payment to their credit card. It ballooned up to $900 a month, and they were left wondering why did this happen to us. We paid on time. Apparently, some lawmakers saw our story and they are now reacting and what's their advice now for people getting hit with impossible minimum payments. It is 54 minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Four minutes down to the top of the hour. Coming up at 5 minutes time, is New York Congressman Charlie Rangel a deadbeat taxpayer? The man who chairs the powerful committee that writes tax laws under fire for allegedly playing fast and loose with his own taxes. Is it a cover-up and should he step down? We will have that story straight ahead. Kiran--
CHETRY: Thanks John. You know, you pay on time, you have you great credit, yet the credit card companies are now squeezing you for as much money as they can before the government cracks down. We first told you about this story, Tuesday. Now we're getting results after lawmakers saw Jessica Yellin's report. Here's Jessica again.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JESSICA YELLIN, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Members of Congress saw the report we did about an Ohio couple that is feeling squeezed by their credit card company. They were enraged by the facts; they say many of their own constituents are going through the same thing. Now these members of Congress are demanding banks do something about it.
This week, CNN told you about Chuck and Jean Lane. A couple that's played by the rules but their credit card company, like so many others, has jacked up their payments ahead of new regulations that go into effect next year.
CHUCK LANE, CREDIT CARD CUSTOMER: I'm calling to find out why my payment jumped from $370 to $911 this month.
YELLIN: Through no fault of their own, the Lanes' monthly minimum payment more than doubled. Now, they will have to decide whether to pay the card or get surgery G (ph) needs and support chuck's son in college.
Do you have a message you would want to give to Congress?
LANE: I would like congress to take a stand for the American people and stop credit card companies from making these kind of changes that do have major impacts in people's lives.
YELLIN: Guess what, Congress is listening. Freshman Congresswoman Betsy Markey saw the story on CNN.
REP. BETSY MARKEY (D), COLORADO: It gave awareness to people like me and other members of congress who saw that and were just outraged by the fact that credit card companies are just blatantly increasing rates solely because they know that once the law takes effect, theyre not going to be able to do this anymore.
YELLIN: She and 17 other members has since written the banks, calling on them to stop raising rates and changing policies ahead of the new credit card bill. Bank of America had already announced it's freezing its rates for now. But Chase, the company that holds the Lanes' credit card, tells CNN they have no plans to do the same. And Wells Fargo, they're raising their interest rate 3%. An industry representative says, the card companies are just trying to protect themselves in a rocky economy.
SCOTT TALBOTT, FINANCIAL SERVICES ROUNDTABLE: Industry is not making changes to interest rates or lines of credit in anticipation of the new law, and it's simply a reflection of the changing economic times.
YELLIN: Today in Congress, there will be a hearing about a bill that would actually move up the date when some of these consumer protections go into effect. But banks say that they need more time. They say that they have to update their computer programs for the new regulations and that will take months -- Kiran, John.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHETRY: Jessica Yellin for us this morning. Hey, at least they're listening. ROBERTS: Yes, I mean, that's the -- best of our efforts realized is when you can bring something to the attention of lawmakers who want to do something about it, that's correct.
