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Abortion Questionnaire; Big Storm Moving up East Coast; Wish Lists for Santa

Aired December 18, 2009 - 14:00   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Some of the stories that we're pushing forward this hour: Something is undecided in the state of Denmark. World leaders in Copenhagen talking climate have been scrambling for a deal to cut greenhouse gases. President Obama says no country will get everything it wants, but some action is better than none.

And back home, the climate is getting ready to clock Washington and much of the East. Take a look at D.C. right now, because this time tomorrow, it could be buried under a couple of feet of snow. Winter warnings in effect from eastern Kentucky up to the New York area.

And in Poland, someone stole the sign from the infamous Auschwitz death camp. "Arbeit macht frei," it means, "Work will make you free." Polish authorities are conducting random road stops to try and find it.

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Public interest or inquisition? We're pushing forward on a story that we brought you in October, a brand new law in Oklahoma requiring doctors who perform abortions to ask patients more than three dozen personal questions. The answers then can be posted on the Internet. The law hasn't taken effect. Whether it ever does will be the subject of a court hearing two hours from now.

Jennifer Mondino will be there. She's a staff attorney for the Center for Reproductive Rights, which says the is an outrageous invasion of privacy.

State Senator Todd Lamb helped draft that law. He says the goal is education, not humiliation.

Good to have you both.

Senator Lamb, I'm going to get right to it and read a number of these questions that's on this individual abortion form. Here's a few of them that women have to state their reason for seeking an abortion and answer these questions.

Number one, "Having a baby would dramatically change the life of the mother, would interfere with the education of the mother, would interfere with the job, employment, career of the mother."

Tell me what that information does that helps you in some way, shape or form, why you have to get personal like that.

TODD LAMB, OKLAHOMA STATE SENATE: Well, I appreciate the question.

First and foremost, I think it's important to note that nothing in the legislation, nothing in this bill will violate the identification or make the identification known of the mother- to-be or the woman seeking an abortion. There's been a lot of misinformation provided about this bill, and the fact that -- or the misinformation that identification would be made known is false and incorrect.

Why we drafted the legislation, the intent is to glean more hard- core facts and evidence. I'm a former federal agent. When I presented my case to the United States attorney as a Secret Service agent, I had to make sure I had hard-core evidence and not anecdotal, not only circumstantial, but hard-core evidence. In this debate...

PHILLIPS: But evidence, why do you say evidence? I mean, I thought this was research. I mean, this sounds like a crime scene. Why do you need evidence?

LAMB: Right. Well, I don't mean evidence by criminal definition, I mean hard-core facts. And thank you for making that point.

There's -- hard-core facts are what we're looking for. There's so much anecdotal comments in this debate, and we want to find out why women are pursuing the path of abortion so we can better provide information and better information, hard-core facts, to mental health professionals, counselors, the faith-based community, so they can better provide counseling to these women pursuing the path of abortion.

PHILLIPS: Jennifer, what do you think about this, hard-core facts all for the sake of research to try and what it sounds like, to prevent abortion, which sort of sounds like, Senator, you're trying to work your way around Roe versus Wade and what that stands for.

But Jennifer, I'll let you respond to what he said. And then we'll continue.

JENNIFER MONDINO, ATTORNEY, CENTER FOR REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS: Well, thank you. I appreciate that.

I think that the law is a very serious intrusion on women's right to privacy. We don't feel that it's appropriate for the government of the state of Oklahoma to be able to conduct basically a grand investigation, a grand inquisition, in the room where a woman is meeting with her doctor.

And also, I think that the real purpose of this law is just to chip away at women's ability to be able to access abortion services and make it more and more difficult for doctors to be able to provide those services. You know, this law provides really serious criminal and civil penalties for doctors that violate the law. So, if you can imagine, that just makes doctors all the more frightened to provide these services which are already, you know, very stigmatized in our country. Abortion providers are already subject to many different types of harassment, sometimes even physical violence. So a law like this makes it even more difficult for doctors to continue providing those safe and legal abortion services.

PHILLIPS: So, Jennifer, let me ask you, then, because the senator has said, look, we're not going to put the name out there, we're not going to put the address out there, but I did read some of the questions. I mean, it's talking about changing the life of the mother, education of the mother, job, employment, if they do have a baby. I mean, that's personal information right there.

There are questions, personal questions asking the woman about rape, incest, abuse, relationship problems, emotional problems. I mean, 37 questions.

I mean, details that could potentially identify a woman, Senator.

LAMB: No, that is incorrect. Nothing in these questions can possibly identify the mother or the woman seeking the abortion. That is false, that is inaccurate. I cannot stress that enough.

As a matter of fact, the current form in Oklahoma asks for residential information on the female seeking abortion. This, if anything, makes that more stringent. They are not asked their zip code, their area code, their address or their county of address. That is false, that is misinformation, and that is not accurate.

PHILLIPS: The senator, Jennifer, has said that this data is to prevent future unwanted pregnancies. Does that bother you?

MONDINO: Well, again, I think that the real purpose of this law is just to further chip away at women's right to access, abortion services, which is a constitutionally protected right in this country. Oklahoma has been a hotbed of anti-choice legislation in recent years. Year after year, their state legislature passes these restrictive laws just looking for new ways to be able to chip away at women's access to those services and, like I said, make doctors that are already providing those services reluctant to be able to continue to provide them, and make doctors that aren't yet providing those services reluctant to enter the field.

So, I really don't think that the 10 pages of questions that are proposed in this law are really designed to elicit any useful information. I think that it's just another way for legislators to push their anti-choice agendas.

PHILLIPS: Final comment, Senator?

LAMB: Well, I find it interesting that she cannot answer the question, the goal preventing fewer abortions, do you have a problem with that? She couldn't answer that question. That shows you how out of touch people outside Oklahoma are on the pro-life issue. We have a very conservative state in Oklahoma, we're a pro-life state in Oklahoma. And one interesting note that you don't hear the other side talk about, many of these question and much of this information that we are trying to glean from this statistical reporting was gleaned from the Guttmacher Institute study from, I think, in the early 2000s that they provided.

The Guttmacher Institute, former research arm of Planned Parenthood. So these questions have been asked for, these statistics have been gathered before. And much of what we're doing here -- or some of what we are doing here has been gleaned from the Guttmacher Institute, but you won't hear that side talk about that very much.

PHILLIPS: Less than two hours away. We'll follow and see what happens with this law.

State Senator Tom Lamb, Jennifer Mondino, appreciate both of you. Thank you.

MONDINO: Thank you.

LAMB: You're welcome.

PHILLIPS: Well, way back in 1969, four years before Roe versus Wade, the Centers for Disease Control laid out guidelines for collecting data on abortion. Most states follow them, more or less. And 14 states asked women why they want to end pregnancies. But no state asks women the kind of questions the Oklahoma law would mandate.

We'll keep you posted on that court fight.

Abortion is the last remaining obstacle now that we know of to getting 60 Senate votes for health care reform. The top Senate Democratic needs unanimous support from his caucus, and right now he's one vote short. The holdout is Ben Nelson, and he objects to abortions covered by insurance policies fraught with government subsidies.

Republicans, meantime, are vowing to use every rule and procedure in the book to drag and debate as long as possible.

It's big and it's bearing down on 50 million people. A major winter snowstorm is moving up the East Coast. Might as well get those shovels out right now. Chad Myers here to tell us all about it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Along the East Coast, time to run out and grab some milk and bread. A big snowstorm is coming, and Washington is one of the cities right there in the bull's eye.

More now from reporter Brianne Carter from our affiliate WJLA.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIANNE CARTER, REPORTER, WJLA: It's not just crews that have been out all morning. Residents have also been out getting to stores like this, trying to get their last-minute essentials before the storm hits.

(voice-over): The snow trucks are prepped. Shovels are flying off store shelves. The winter weather is on its way.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Like, 10 to 15 inches. That's what I heard.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think it's definitely coming.

CARTER: Around the D.C. area, forecasters are calling for up to a foot of snow, making this the first major winter storm of the season. Maryland State Highway trucks are loading up, ,ready to prepare the roads. In Virginia, VDOT crews began treating the highways yesterday and will continue today.

Meanwhile, residents are stocking up on items to get them through the weekend. At this Home Depot in Falls Church, residents are preparing for worst.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I meant to get a shovel last year, but never got around to it, so this is the time.

CARTER: Others are willing to take chances, planning to brave the elements if necessary.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm OK. And I'll get out in the snow if I need to get anything.

CARTER: And even though we are still days away from the official start of winter, this weekend it will feel like the season is in full swing.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm excited. I love the snow.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that snow is not a big deal, but, mostly, I just want to be able to get out on Monday.

CARTER (on camera): And like any other winter storm, officials are advising people not to be out on the roads. So if you don't have to be out, they are telling you just to stay home.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, we're talking about the bad weather impacting the holiday shopping. Well, the final countdown has begun. Christmas is actually only seven days away now. And if you're hitting the mall this weekend, well, you won't be alone.

Susan Lisovicz might be out there. But right now, she's at the New York Stock Exchange with some details.

(BUSINESS REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Well, while you're shopping for your loved ones, wait until you hear what some kids are asking Santa for. It's not your typical wish list.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Top stories now.

A plea from the mother of one of those three American hikers held in Iran. She is asking Iran's supreme leader to release her daughter and the two others. The plea, one week before Christmas. The hikers are accused of espionage. They were arrested after crossing into Iran from Iraq in late July.

A fifth Texas prison worker out of a job after a sex offender escaped last month with a smuggled pistol. The guard was fired after she admitted making phone calls to R.K. Comeaux' ex-wife at his request. Comeaux overpowered guards and escaped on foot, even though claiming to be wheelchair-bound. He was captured a week later.

The nation's capital one step closer to legalizing same-sex marriages. Washington's mayor has signed a bill to do that, but the measure now has to go to Congress, which has the final say over all the district's laws.

Nothing's immune to this struggling economy. Not even kids, not even their wish lists for Santa.

This story now from Alex Sanz with our Houston affiliate, KHOU.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARAH BROCK: I want a Pillow Pet Ladybug.

ALEX SANZ, REPORTER, KHOU (voice-over): Sarah Brock has a long list for Santa.

BROCK: A Big Top Cupcake...

SANZ: But the realities of Christmas during a recession means she won't find everything she is asking for under her Christmas tree.

JENNIFER BROCK, SARAH'S MOTHER: She understands that her Christmas list, Santa might not bring everything, but Santa is going to do his very best.

SANTA: You wanted a helicopter, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's electric.

SANTA: Electric helicopter.

SANZ: Santas in malls across the country say it's a reminder of the times.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tucker, one smile.

SANZ: Toys and video games still top every wish list, but this year they are hearing stories of children wanting something else. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want some black boots.

SANTA: Black boots?

SANZ: The basics.

SANTA: I have had a lot more of the little older kids asking for clothes this year than in times past, and that's probably because of the recession.

SANZ: Nine-year-old Jazmine Solis knows things are tough.

SANTA: What do you want for Christmas?

SANZ: She stopped by to visit Santa while on a school field trip with her mother and a group of classmates who are reminded every day of the challenges of Christmas during a recession.

JAZMINE SOLIS, 9 YEARS OLD: My dad lost his job in December, so he hasn't had a job now, but he is going to try to find one. And then we're going to try to find a new house.

ANNA FUENTES, JAZMINE'S MOTHER: We're making ends meet, but for the holidays it's very hard. Very hard. Very stressful and hard.

SANTA: I tell every kid the same thing -- I can't promise any of them anything. I just tell them, "I'll see what I can do."

SANZ: It is for so many a struggle balancing tradition with a new reality.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Now, you can help families who are hurting for the holidays. Just go to our Web site, CNN.com/impact. You'll find a list of charities there.

In Georgia, a moment that even got Santa Claus teary-eyed. Five- year-old Beau Bellinger got home from school on her birthday to find the man in the red suit in her house. Well, her dad, Staff Sergeant Tim Bellinger, has served in Iraq and Afghanistan off and on since his daughter was born.

Listen to her wish.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BEAU BELLINGER, 5 YEARS OLD: I want my daddy home for Christmas.

SANTA: Say it again. Say it again. Let me hear it again.

BELLINGER: I want my daddy home for Christmas.

SANTA: Christmas. OK.

STAFF SGT. TIM BELLINGER: Being able to be here for her birthday, on her birthday, you know, flying in this morning, was just incredible for me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Well, Santa says the reunion touched his heart beyond belief.

It's home video that we've never seen before and won't forget anytime soon, a hostage home video from Iraq, freedom seized from the jaws of captivity with the camera rolling.

Come watch it with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, as far as dramas go, the video we're about to show you and the story you are about to hear has Hollywood beat hands down, because it's real.

An American contractor, Roy Helms, kidnapped in Iraq in 2004, held hostage for nearly a year under horrible conditions. Video you will only see on CNN of Special Forces pulling him out of his personal hell.

CNN's Michael Ware had a chance to talk to Helms. Michael, of course, can empathize with him.

Notice how Roy the hostage and Roy today look like two totally different people.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHAEL WARE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Three months after Roy Hallums disappeared in Baghdad in 2004, this proof of life video appeared.

ROY HALLUMS, KIDNAPPING SURVIVOR: My name is Roy Hallums. I'm an American national. Please help me.

WARE: Hallums was an American contractor building mess halls and providing food to the U.S. military, and his kidnappers were demanding $12 million for his release.

HALLUMS: You're just basically in shock. And you're moving and you're walking, but it's almost like an out-of-body experience. You can see what's going on, but you don't believe it.

WARE: Before it was over, Hallums would be held nearly a full year by Iraqi insurgents, 311 days, something I know a little about having been taken by al Qaeda myself.

(on camera): When I was grabbed by al Qaeda and pulled from my car, I mean, they were just going to cut my head off. But it's like it was someone else. At that moment, it felt to me like it was happening to someone else even though I was completely or even hyperaware of the moment. HALLUMS: You're right. It's like it's almost third person, that I can sit there and tell the story, I can answer any question anybody has. It doesn't bother me, and what's for lunch?

WARE (voice-over): This is Hallums at the end of his ordeal. He had lost 40 pounds but says he never lost hope. For most of the time, his kidnappers kept him in a secret and cramped underground cell, the entrance sealed shut.

HALLUMS: And you could hear them trowelling this concrete over the door, and then they would shove a freezer over the top of that to hide where the door was. You're buried in there and if they decide, well, it's just too dangerous to go back to the house, and they never come back, then you're in your tomb.

WARE (on camera): Dead men tell no tales.

(voice-over): Eight months after his proof-of-life video had appeared, U.S. special forces received a crucial tip on his whereabouts. Worried Hallums would be moved, they instantly launched a daylight rescue. Four helicopters sweeping into a village south of Baghdad. This video shot on a soldier's helmet camera and beamed back live to headquarters.

The men smashed their way into the house. They knew to look under the freezer, under the rug, and then under the concrete.

HALLUMS: I heard special forces pounding on the little door in the room where I was and the guy jumps down in there and says, "are you Roy?" It's like, well, this can't really be happening, you know, because after all this time, they actually found where I was, you know, which was a miracle.

WARE: Two days after Roy Hallums was rescued, I joined a U.S. hostage team gathering information and I shot this video as they returned to the Iraqi farmhouse and Hallums' hell hole. It gave me a sense of what may have awaited me, or any of the other westerners kidnapped in Iraq. And now, talking with Hallums, it's forcing me to deal with things I'd rather forget.

My experience began here. I was grabbed in late 2004, not far from where you see this burning American Bradley fighting vehicle. This is Haifa Street in the center of Baghdad, and al Qaeda had just taken over the neighborhood.

Like Hallums, I was taken at the height of al Qaeda's campaign of their videotaped beheadings, like this one. The last images of contractor Nicholas Berg alive. I actually videotaped my own capture, my camera catching one of my abductors pulling the pin on a grenade before they pulled me from the car.

Unlike Hallums, for me, there was to be no imprisonment. This was al Qaeda and I was going to die. They readied me immediately for beheading, to be filmed with my own camera. I was only saved by Iraqi insurgents I knew who resented al Qaeda's takeover. HALLUMS: (INAUDIBLE) brother. WARE: Meeting Hallums, sharing our experiences, flushed up in me a mix of emotions. I can't even bear the thought of being held for months on end like he was.

HALLUMS: You're laying there in this little hole in the dark. You're tied up, hands and feet. And every little noise, every bump, it's, is this it, you know? Is this when they're going to do it?

WARE: And as with much in war, you get a new perspective on life. We both know nothing's ever going to be the same for us again.

(on camera): Is it the little things? Is it like, for me with, you know, all the conflict I've been in, it's the tiny things. It's a smell. Or it can be a sound. Or it can be a certain texture or color or word that triggers or evokes memory. What is it for you?

HALLUMS: Usually little things. I mean, I had those -- I had nylon zip ties on my wrists 24 hours a day for ten and a half months. The other day I was out walking and my dog and my neighbor had brought something home from the store and he was cutting the zip ties off of the bundle. And I looked down at his yard and there's these zip ties laying there and they'd been cut off and, you know, it's just one of those things you -- you remember you had a different relationship with that zip tie than he has.

WARE (voice-over): In the end, though, it's those who love us, waiting back home, often unknowing, who suffer the most. While survivors, like Hallums, barely able to walk or talk after not being able to do either for so many months, know just how lucky we are to be alive.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Oh, they look like average kids, but what they are going through is pretty incredible. We go to Gaza and meet them next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Teenagers with gender issues living basically in a war zone, talk about a triple whammy. CNN's Ivan Watson with an amazing story out of Gaza.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

IVAN WATSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Two Palestinian teenagers walk amid the rubble of last year's Israeli military offensive. Nadir and Ahmed are cousins and while they look like ordinary 16-year-olds, that I say they are not normal Palestinian boys.

"My haircut and clothing makes me look like a boy," Ahmed says, "but on the inside, I am a girl. To fix that," he adds, "I need a sex change operation."

WATSON: Nadir and Ahmed were born with a rare birth defect called male pseudohermaphrodism. Hormone deficiencies left their male reproductive organs deformed and buried deep within their abdomens.

At birth, doctors identified Nadir and Ahmed as girls because they appeared to have female genitalia. So they both spent the first 16 years of their lives dressing and acting like girls. Until last summer, Ahmed went by the female first name Ula (ph). But last June with the support of the families, both cousins transformed themselves into boys.

"Ahmed and Nadir transferred on the same day," says Nadir's father. "They cut their hair, changed their clothing and switched to a boy's school."

There are an unusually high number of male pseudohermaphrodite births in Gaza neighborhood of Jabalya in part, doctors say, because it is customary in this socially conservative society for cousins to marry each other. Dr. Jehad Abudaia says he has diagnosed nearly 80 cases like Ahmed and Nadir's in the last seven years.

DR. JEHAD ABUDAIA, UROLOGIST: A few of them will be discovered if they have intelligent doctor or nurse, will be discovered early. But some of them, unfortunately it will be discovered late when they are about more than 14 years, when they are living as a female and they don't have menstruation.

WATSON: Sex differentiation is a recurring disorder in Ahmed and Nadir's extended family.

(on camera): You all have the same condition?

(voice-over): Nadir's older brother, Midyam, and 32-year-old cousin, Ameen, were also born with the condition.

"When we first started the transfer, we were too afraid to leave the house," Nadir says. "Ameen taught us how to go out in the street and mingle with the other guys."

(on camera): The neighborhood where this family lives still bears the scars of last year's bombing campaign. These troubled Palestinian say that the war-torn Gaza Strip just doesn't have the medical facilities they need to treat their condition.

(voice-over): All four Palestinians want help to get sex change operations, complicated and expensive procedures which they say are not available in Gaza.

"Without the operation, we can't live normal lives," they say. "The government won't give us male identity cards allowing us to continue our education until we get the surgery."

Until Nadir and Ahmed says their genders and their identities will remain in conflict, much like the land around them.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Top stories now. Time is up in Copenhagen, but world leaders are still scrambling for a deal to cut greenhouse gases. President Obama says no country will get everything it wants, and when it comes to fighting climate change some action is better than none.

If you've got babies and you're traveling this holiday, you need to know this -- Dorel Company is recalling about 447,000 baby car seats because of the dozens complaints of the child restraint handle coming loose. If you want all the details, just go to our website CNN.com.

Get a good look at those Saabs on the road, because they won't be around much longer. General Motors is stopping production of the brand after a deal to keep it open fell through. GM has owned the Swedish carmaker for 20 years.

When his job as a truck driver hit the skids a few years back, a Georgia man didn't give up. He went in a totally different direction matter of fact, and now he's a music man. His story from CNN's chief business correspondent Ali Velshi.

ALI VELSHI, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, you know, yesterday while we were parked here in Savannah, we ran into a guy who was walking his puppy next to the bus and we got into a conversation with him about how we're collecting stories about how people have dealt with the economy. He told us how he was hit by the economy and what he's done about it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TORVIN PRISTELL, "DJ TAP": I go by DJ Tap. I got into deejaying about eight years ago and I was doing it on and off just as a hobby mostly, and now I do it full time because the trucking business didn't really work out for me.

The gas prices went so high and I remember everybody was paying $4 a gallon for regular, and everybody's complaining about that, but we're paying like $7 or $8 for diesel. I saw this guy at a fuel depot, and this guy was a full grown guy, a beard -- a guy's guy. And this guy was crying because he had to fill his tanks with this fuel that was like $6 or $7 a gallon.

What broke the camel's back for me was one of my semi's got on fire. I went from making maybe $1,000 a week to nothing. So all I had was a -- I had a bunch of DJ equipment so I was like, well, I'd get back into deejaying again. Since the economy was bad and people were needing to save money, they were booking deejays instead of booking a band, because they're going to save a couple of hundred dollars.

And that's really how I made a big comeback. And I'm excited about it. It's a new start for me and, you know, I think things are going pretty well for me.

(END VIDEO CLIP) VELSHI: Now, Kyra, he didn't have a gig last night, so we couldn't show you his handiwork, but he is loving deejaying so much that he says even when the economy comes back, he's still going to stick to his new gig -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Ali Velshi, thanks so much.

Well, I saw Jesus shooting Santa Claus. Nothing on Christmas like a double-barreled shotgun and a lifeless, red-suited effigy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: A lot of folks struggled to balance the secular and religious aspects of Christmas, but not one California man. His take on the holiday has absolutely blown his neighbors away. More now from Adam Racusin of our affiliate KCOY.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ADAM RACUSIN, KCOY REPORTER (voice-over): Staring down barrel of Jesus' shotgun, not your typical Christmas display. How about Santa depicted dead on the ground with Xs over his eyes? Or Rudolph run over by a pickup truck?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is morbid.

RACUSIN: Is it art and freedom of expression, or just a way to cause an uproar in the neighborhood?

RON LAKE, CREATED CHRISTMAS DISPLAY: It is an expression of my repressed creativity.

RACUSIN: In his display, Ron Lake believes Santa represents the commercialism of Christmas. A work of art open to interpretation.

LAKE: You can tell your kids and make it as though there is a Santa Claus and let them believe all that, but you can't explain this thing or ignore this thing? I don't get it.

RACUSIN: Neighbors don't feel the same. The controversial display went up Monday after multiple complaints to law enforcement and conversations with the artist, they are banding together to try to get it removed.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I know it is freedom of speech, but it's pretty disturbing and there are a lot of children and that's the main concern.

RACUSIN: Just outside of the chain-link fence that separates the display from the town's main roads is a school bus stop. Neighbors say children walking to the stop see the traditional nativity scene or Santa soaring through the skies and kicking back on a Harley. But then they stumble upon Jesus packing a double-barrel shotgun bearing down on the symbol of Christmas.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is private property and everybody has a right to it, but then I have a right to stand up and say I don't like it either.

LAKE: Christmas is not about Santa, but Jesus. Not the Jesus that is a killer with a shotgun, but come on, there's a little humor here, there's a little tragedy here.

RACUSIN: In Nipomo, Adam Racusin, your Central Coast News.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Jason Stahl probably wonders if he can ever get away from GITMO and the terror suspects he guarded. Just when he thought he could put them behind him and start over in rural Illinois, he hears about the new neighbors.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: As always, Team Sanchez is working hard on the next hour of NEWSROOM.

What you got, Rick?

RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: I am sitting here, listening to Chad and I'm thinking, OK, I'm in New York, I'm watching his maps and that stuff is coming my way. I have to do the 8:00 show tonight because Campbell Brown is off, maybe I can talk these guys into letting me do this show live from the airport so I can jump on a plane and getting the hell out of here as soon as it is over.

What do you think, Kyra?

PHILLIPS: I have no sympathy for you.

(LAUGHTER)

SANCHEZ: Well, thanks a lot.

PHILLIPS: You're welcome.

SANCHEZ: We will forge ahead. But my flight is at 11:00 or maybe even earlier, I'm not sure. I have to look at the itinerary. I will probably get out of here.

Look, here is a story that I'm really interested in because I have more questions than there are answers at this point. This situation with Cincinnati Bengals' football player Chris Henry that's being investigated now in North Carolina. Is this a homicide? Is his fiance being questioned by homicide investigators? Is this an accident? Was something else -- why don't we have answers in the case and what are the police doing at this time? I mean, that is what we want to know. Obviously there's potential manslaughter investigation going on with something like this. We're going to be talking to the beat writer for the Cincinnati Bengals, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Sounds good. Thanks. All right, this week we talked about tiny Thompson, Illinois, and how the feds will move about a hundred terror detainees to the prison there from GITMO. Many locals say, bring them on, we need the jobs. They don't seem to care that the stimulus package has that kind of baggage. But not everyone is on board the welcome wagon. CNN's Kara Finnstrom found out that Thompson is pretty torn.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KARA FINNSTROM, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): Jason Stahl just moved into a small horse farm in northwestern Illinois, and he's about to get new neighbors.

JASON STAHL, FORMER GUANTANAMO GUARD: It is very ironic.

FINNSTROM: Ironic, because just down the road at the Thomson Prison, the federal government now hopes to hold terror suspects. The same suspects Stahl guarded as one of the first MPs at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, after 9/11.

STAHL: We traveled 3,000 miles to Cuba to care for them there. And now they're flying 3,000 miles to sit in my backyard up here.

This is the inside of where we lived.

FINNSTROM: Stahl, who is now an Army reservist, guarded terror suspects in leg shackles, handcuffs and belly chains.

STAHL: Many times they would turn on you.

FINNSTROM: And Stahl says there was constant shouting and chanting.

STAHL: You had so much aggression, so much anger after what had happened in 9/11 and you didn't know how to act. You had to maintain your military bearing. There's rules and there's guidelines that we have to follow and it's our job down there to keep them safe.

FINNSTROM: Stahl strongly opposes bringing the detainees here. He believes the prison can safely guard them, but fears holding the prisoners here makes his community a more visible terrorism target.

STAHL: We've got the Rock Island Arsenal. We've got the nuclear plant in Cordova. We've got the Iowa munitions plant 100 miles south of us.

FINNSTROM: But Stahl knows his position isn't popular right now in the town surrounding the prison in Thomson.

FINNSTROM (on camera): Just a half mile away from the prison here on Thomson's main street, many are hoping for an economic boost. This town of 550 has been struggling with the stagnant economy and an unemployment rate of 12 percent.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Warm you up again? All righty. LUANN BRUCKNER (ph): It was a Norman Rockwell town type, you know? Everybody kind of cared for each other. It's gotten to the point where we're just desperate. Depressed and desperate. We need -- we need the jobs.

FINNSTROM (voice-over): Luann Bruckner's family helped found Thomson in the 1800s.

BRUCKNER: It's been -- it's been horrible. It's been horrible to watch it go.

FINNSTROM: Six generations later, she says the town is dying, dragged down by the nearly vacant $145 million prison that was built in 2001, offering the prospect of new jobs badly need even then. Bruckner banked her retirement on it, opening a motel and restaurant. But amid a political fight over operational funding, the prison sat empty for five years and now houses just 144 prisoners.

BRUCKNER: We were left with kind of a white elephant so to speak.

JOHN WHITNEY, NEWSPAPER PUBLISHER: I fully expected there to be a lot of anger and a lot of people against it. That hasn't happened.

FINNSTROM: John Whitney is publisher of Thomson's town paper and head of its chamber of commerce.

WHITNEY: They've been unhappy, I think, that the state's second largest capital expenditure, the state of Illinois ever made, is sitting out here unused. That's not criminal, but it's tragic, in a way.

STAHL: (INAUDIBLE), you want to take that over there and dump it out?

FINNSTROM: Jason Stahl says as a father, now supporting a family, he, too, wants his hometown to get an economic boost. But as a reservist, sworn to protect, he worries at what cost. STAHL: Why bring these detainees from Cuba onto American soil? I don't agree with that.

FINNSTROM: Kara Finnstrom for CNN, Thomson, Illinois.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: That is it for us. Rick Sanchez picks it up from here.