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American Morning
Relief Supplies in Haiti Caught in Logistical Bottlenecks; Senator-Elect Brown Goes to Capitol Hill
Aired January 22, 2010 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Haphazard homes made of canvas and cotton, no water, no security, no peace. Tent cities and families await word from the government this morning about a new survival plan. The big question, will Haiti be able to take care of its own?
Good morning, we're crossing the 7:00 hour here in the East Coast. Thanks for joining us on the Most News in the Morning in this Friday, the 22nd of January. I'm John Roberts.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Kiran Chetry. Glad you're with us.
We have several big stories that we're breaking down for you in the next 15 minutes. First, some signs that Haiti will be taking the first steps to rebuilding, and 400,000 homeless Haitians will soon be on the move. It's an ambitious plan to get them out of the destroyed capital, and it's in the works right now. We're going to have details live from Port-au-Prince.
ROBERTS: It's the U.S. Navy to the rescue in Haiti. The floating hospital ship USNS Comfort is anchored off of the coast and treating many of the most seriously injured earthquake victims. We'll talk with the Comfort's medical commander in just a few minutes.
CHETRY: And four storms in just a week triggering fears of mudslides in a rain soaked southern California, major freeways submerged and thousands of people have no power. In fact, five counties declared a state of emergency, and officials are warning they may not be able to rescue those who don't get out now.
We'll be checking in with Rob Marciano, who is live on the scene.
But first, happening right now in Haiti, anger over what some doctors are calling, quote, "stupid deaths," deaths that could have been prevented if aid actually got to people in time. It is now day ten, and so many life-saving supplies are still in a holding pattern.
The U.S. military says 120 international relief flights are landing in Port-au-Prince every day, but 1,400 flights want to get in and are on the waiting list. And as we've been talking about, there is only one runway at the airport.
ROBERTS: The most frustrating thing is that the supplies are there at the airport but they're not getting out to the streets. Our Dr. Sanjay Gupta just got tired of waiting for supplies to arrive. He went to the airport to see what the holdup was all about, and he joins us live from Port-au-Prince this morning. Doc, what did you find?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: We found exactly what we thought, that the supplies are there, and in many ways just sort of sitting there on the tarmac or in little warehouses off the tarmac.
And I really wanted to figure out who is in charge there as well and what the plan was going forward for distribution. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GUPTA (on camera): It's like everywhere we go, just walking through the airport, even outside the airport, people are saying we need supplies. How do we get them? We know they're in there, how do we get them out here? People just keep asking me that same question over and over again.
All right, so now we're going to go in the airport here and see if the next step of this works or not. Just take a look out here at all the people waiting. I can tell you a lot of these people are waiting because they're simply hoping some of these supplies make it outside the airport and to them.
OK. We're now in the airport. It took about five minutes to get in here. We're in the airport.
To give you an idea, I mean, obviously the airport itself is still very, very desolate inside. We're going to get to the air strip, that's where we're hearing so many of these supplies are.
Well, if you can hear me or not, when we talked about all these supplies sitting here, just take a look. I mean, boxes and boxes of supplies, all kinds of different formula in there, there's antibiotics, pain medications, all sorts of different things.
I just want to get some antibiotics.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'll walk you over there.
GUPTA: Should we check here first?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We'll walk around.
GUPTA: They seem very much like they want to help. Going in to see if we can get some antibiotics at least to try and take care of these kids, and we'll find out. There is a lot of supplies here, though.
We're able to basically walk in to a couple of these tents, tell people what we needed, and get lots of supplies here. Lots of antibiotics, pain medications, all sorts of things to try to treat some of the injuries we've seen.
These are medications people haven't had up until now. It took us about 15 minutes. We got a bunch of it, and we'll try to distribute this to the hospital. Basically just went into the airport and just tried to take as many of the things that we thought you guys would need based on what the twins (ph) were telling us. So some of this, broad spectrum antibiotics, lots of different pain medications. All that screaming this morning, hopefully you can...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It will take care of that.
GUPTA: Hopefully we can help.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sanjay, thanks. Thank you.
GUPTA: You're welcome.
So we came here today and we were able to pick up supplies ourselves. We just asked them and they gave it to us, and we took them to that hospital. We gave it to them because kids, adults as well, need this stuff today. Does that surprise you, what I just described to you?
COL. BEN MCMULLEN, U.S. AIR FORCE: There is stuff here waiting to be taken out. That's a true statement. Is it a lot? I can't speak to it. I will tell you the reason you probably got it is because everybody on this field, specifically U.S. government side, is dedicated to getting as much stuff outside as they can.
Does it totally surprise me that some are doing without? No, it doesn't, not totally. Do I hope it gets better? Without a doubt. We're doing our part to get things out there and certainly get things through the airport.
And it is -- it's a shame, because you would hope that everything would get out there within seconds. But that kind of infrastructure just isn't in place.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GUPTA: About 2,000 flights, according to that colonel, have landed over the last few days. They say 150 of them dedicated to security and the rest to medical, humanitarian relief.
So again, all that equipment, the supplies, the medications are getting to that air strip, as you saw. But there is no central distribution point as far as we can tell, no single person or no single organization that says, OK, this supply goes here, this supply goes here, and making that happen.
ROBERTS: So, help us out here, Sanjay, to understand this. You're a very dedicated person. You went there by yourself, took you about 20, 25 minutes to get to where you needed to be.
But if the tenacious and persuasive Dr. Sanjay Gupta is not out there retrieving these supplies, who is going in to get them, and how are they getting out? And why isn't somebody in charge of doing that?
GUPTA: Well, there should be someone in charge of doing that, some sort of central distribution point. I think most of the people we talked to were trying to do the right thing, agree on that point.
The way it's supposed to work, let's say Doctors without Borders, and you've ordered a bunch of supplies coming in. You have a certain lot number that's assigned to you. You walk in there with your credentials, you walk in there with a lot number, just go straight to where those supplies are and be able to take it out.
The problem is at some point during that process it seems to break down a bit. Either the supplies aren't where they're supposed to be, people aren't be allowed into the airport like we were. It's just -- there's a little bit of a -- or a significant lack of organization at several points along that step.
They probably need a central distribution point. I will tell you, John, based on the geography of the city as well, that distribution point may need to be outside the airport where people have more access to the supplies.
ROBERTS: You also have to wonder too, Sanjay, with all that stuff sitting there in the hot sun, is it at risk of spoiling?
GUPTA: Very good question. And that was another thing that comes up, Refrigeration. Some of these products, including some of the antibiotics made for I.V. formulation, do need to be refrigerated. The generator power is now being used to power up the tents and to get other things running. They haven't focused on refrigeration for medical or blood products or things like that. So that's probably the next step.
ROBERTS: Sanjay Gupta for us this morning. Great investigation there. Thanks, doc.
CHETRY: Everyone finally got to see it firsthand. We were all asking about what that bottleneck was all about. And he just sort of illustrated how disorganized it still is.
ROBERTS: Stuff is just sitting around.
CHETRY: Right, even though there's so many good people, hard working people that are there every second trying to do their best, it's still not happening as quickly as it needs to.
Well, still ahead we are going to look at some other stories new this morning, including Toyota now recalling 2.3 million vehicles to fix sticking accelerator pedals. The models affected include the Avalon, Camry, and Tundra.
And this is in addition to the 4.2 million Toyotas that were also recently recalled to correct a problem where the pedals would become stuck under a loose floor mat, causing uncontrollable acceleration.
ROBERTS: Vermont lawmakers are considering a bill that would roll back the state's drinking age to 18. Opponents of the idea said it would decrease binge drinking, but critics argue it would ultimately lead people to drink at a younger age. If Vermont changes the law, it risks losing federal highway funds. CHETRY: Air America is going off the air. The liberal talk radio station has stopped the live broadcasts. It says it will shut down Monday. The network launched in 2004 but says it cannot stay in business in this difficult economic environment and will file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
ROBERTS: And a state of emergency declared in five counties in southern California. More rain and wind in the forecast today. Some areas have already been hit with a foot of rain this week. Hundreds of families living in areas prone to mudslides have been forced to evacuate.
A quick correction on that drinking age story -- supporters of the bill say that it would decrease binge drinking, but critics say it would just cause people to drink at an earlier age.
CHETRY: Let's check in with Reynolds Wolf right now at nine minutes after the hour. He's been following the situation there, the very, very tenuous situation in southern California this morning.
The last thing they need is more rain, and it looks like there's another Pacific storm out there.
REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: John nailed it. He said they've had a foot of rainfall, but in the hills, several feet of snow. The Sierra Nevada, up to four and five feet, combined with winds in excess of 60 miles an hour. It's a mess.
(WEATHER BREAK)
ROBERTS: An identity crisis -- is the Democratic Party suffering from one, particularly after their loss in Massachusetts on Tuesday? Ed Rollins and Lanny Davis up next to talk about that more.
It's 11 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: It's 13 minutes after the hour, and that means it's time for a quick check of what's new this morning.
According to a British study, it's never too late to quit smoking. Researchers say even people diagnosed with early lung cancer who give up smoking could live twice as long as those who don't.
According to the study, survival rates improved to as much as 70 percent. Until now there has been little proof that quitting smoking after developing lung cancer makes any difference to survival.
CHETRY: You may soon need a prescription to buy cold medicine in Mississippi. Law enforcement officials are lobbying state lawmakers to make medicines containing psuedafed prescription only because it's a key ingredient meth amphetamine. It's in response to the state's growing drug problem.
Many states already require you show a photo I.D. to purchase the medicine, you can't just get it over the counter like you used to, and then your information is actually logged into a database.
ROBERTS: Now you can sit in the cockpit yourself and say, "brace for impact," mustache not included. The plane that Captain Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger safely landed in the Hudson River a year ago is on the auction block listed as, "as is, where is." You have to pick up the Airbus in a junkyard in Kearny, New Jersey.
People say, can I get it for a few hundred dollars? Similar aircraft have sold for $2 million.
CHETRY: And then all the history and the amazing history of what happened should make it worth more, even though it does not run.
ROBERTS: Maybe some aviation museum somewhere will buy it.
CHETRY: I think that's a good idea.
Well, Massachusetts Senator-elect Scott Brown is getting a feel for Capitol Hill. He got his rock-star welcome yesterday from the press and from fellow colleagues.
And now three days after capturing the late Ted Kennedy's Senate seat, the political world wants to know how big a role will he play in possibly sinking some of the administration's goal, like, of course, health care reform. Our senior congressional correspondent Dana Bash takes a look.
DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: John and Kiran, Scott Brown was here on Capitol Hill for only half a day making courtesy calls to his future colleagues. But his mere presence here and all of the hubbub that surrounded it is dramatic proof that one Senate race and one man changed things for the president and his fellow Democrats here overnight.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BASH (voice-over): Mr. Brown came to Washington.
SCOTT BROWN (R), MASSACHUSETTS SENATOR-ELECT: Hi, everybody.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Senator, how are you?
BROWN: Great.
BASH: And arrived to a frenzy, a crush of cameras at meeting --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, guys.
BASH: After meeting.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Guys, they're not going anywhere. Not going anywhere. Let's get everyone settled and...
BASH: Settled? Scott Brown knows the Capitol hasn't been settled since his election shook Democrats to their core. But they went out of their way to be warm and welcoming, from Ted Kennedy's son Patrick to the senior Massachusetts senator.
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: And Ted Kennedy wrote me. He said as Humphrey Bogart would have said, this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship. I look forward to working with Scott.
HARRY REID (D-NV), SENATE MAJORITY LEADER: You're going to enter the Senate at a time when the country's in deep trouble, as you know. That's a lot of what your campaign was about.
BASH: Questions like this didn't get answers.
(on camera): Senator Reid, how much has Senator-elect Brown blown your agenda?
Brown was happy to take questions making his rounds in and outside the Capitol but offered mostly vague answers, like on health care.
(on camera): If they are thinking about a smaller scaled-back health care bill, would you be willing to look at that?
BROWN: I look at every bill. I plan to look at every bill and make a rational decision.
BASH (voice-over): He stuck to the script that brought him here.
BROWN: People want good government. They want transparency. They want us here. You know, now that I'll be here soon, they want us to solve problems.
BASH: And try to hold on to his man of the people image, making a point of stopping to talk to Senate staff and security.
BROWN: How are you guys?
BASH: Taking a photo with students he bumped into. The president's former rival could hardly contain his glee.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Senator Brown represents, I think, the dreams and the hopes and the frustrations that Americans feel today.
BASH: But the understatement of the day goes to the rarely excitable Republican leader.
MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), SENATE MINORITY LEADER: We are really, really happy to have him here.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BASH: The Senate's balance of power will shift, and Republicans will have a lot more leverage as soon as Brown takes his seat. He told us he expects to be sworn in as soon as next week -- John and Kiran.
CHETRY: All right. Dana Bash for us, thank you.
ROBERTS: Ten days after that devastating earthquake, there are just the slimmest signs that in some places life is beginning to return back to, well, let's not say normal, but at least beginning to return.
Our Jason Carroll has got a report coming right up on that. You'll want to see this.
It's 18 minutes now after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Jay Leno just got himself another gig. He has been called to headline the White House Correspondence Association dinner this spring. He was booked for the annual bash before the NBC "Tonight Show" flap.
Conan O'Brien is going to host, by the way, his final show tonight. The network plans to air rerun episodes until March the 1st, when Jay Leno will take the helm once again.
Twenty-one minutes after the hour. That means it's time for "Minding Your Business" with Christine Romans and the Dow taking quite a beating yesterday.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Just quickly I want to tell you guys that the Dow got slammed two percent. A couple of really, really ugly days for the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
Look, and the reason is, everyone's blaming the president's big bank proposal to try to rein in the complexity of these banks, try to limit their size, restrict the scope of their trading, curb the big risk-taking that's been happening at some of those places. In fact going backwards almost 10 years to when Congress allowed some of these things to happen.
Things just got so complex and so big, so interconnected that the president wants to make sure, he says, that another crisis doesn't happen again. And he said, you guys, that this is a fight he is willing to have with the banking industry, that they've been fighting him on regulation of financial reform all year, and he's ready to fight back.
I wanted to just tell you quickly that this is one of the reasons why Wall Street's so concerned about this as they see this is the president being incredibly anti-business, and they say that this doesn't -- this doesn't mean banks won't lend anymore. In fact, they're going to have other concerns now. It doesn't necessarily mean there'll be more lending, and that's what they're concerned about.
ROBERTS: They're reminded of an old Daffy Duck cartoon. Of course, you know, this mean's war. All right.
ROMANS: It's war, all right. ROBERTS: Christine, thanks so much.
ROMANS: Sure.
CHETRY: All right. It is a medical oasis really off the coast of Haiti. It's a floating hospital with some 800 doctors and nurses and a thousand beds when it's up to full capacity. It's the U.S. Navy ship "Comfort," really heaven on earth for some of the most seriously injured in this earthquake.
And joining us on the phone right now is Captain James Ware. He's the commanding officer for the Comfort's medical treatment facility.
Captain Ware, thanks so much for being with us this morning.
CAPT. JAMES WARE, USNS COMFORT (via telephone): Good morning, Kiran. Yes, we're off the coast of Port-au-Prince presently and the USNS Comfort hospital ship is receiving patients over the last 36 hours. We've seen approximately 240 individuals. Most of those individuals are critical care types of injuries.
We're working very close with the ministry of health of Haiti, Dr. Larson, as well as the Pan American Health Organization, as well as the U.N. coordination for human affairs here in the country. USAID as well as Southern Command is putting together and developing, maturing the medical organization here, and the hospital ship USNS Comfort hopes to provide services to all international doctors at the direction of the Ministry of health of Haiti over the next coming days and week.
CHETRY: All right, so fill us in. I mean, you guys have been to the coast of Haiti actually a couple of times prior to this. Most recently you guys were there back in 2007 as well.
One of the things that we're wondering about is how patients are brought to you. You actually were there for a little while this past July as well. How are patients being brought to you? Meaning, what is the process of you guys determining who needs to be there, who have some of the gravest injuries and how they're actually brought to you?
WARE: Yes, Kiran. We have a fairly mature structure with that. The U.S. Navy is working in consort with the ministry of health of Haiti to focus on the movement of patients. Most of the patients, 95 percent presently are coming by air. We have about 30 helicopters here in the area that can support the hospital. And on a rotating basis during the daylight hours, about every 10 to 15 minutes we'll have a helicopter set down on our deck, and usually about two patients will come out.
But those patients have been stabilized at other hospitals, international hospitals, here in Haiti, whether it's the Russians or the Israelis, or the Canadians, the Italians, directed through the ministry of health from the hospitals that the Haitian doctors are also supporting. So the organization is developing as we speak over the last 36 hours. We've made those personal contacts which are so important.
CHETRY: You know, some of the injuries, and when you talk about what they're going through, I mean, people who have had amputations, people who have these crush injuries, as well as others, I mean, it requires long-term care. In some cases more than one surgery. You guys have a thousand beds. When you're talking about tens of thousands of people that possibly have these very serious injuries, how are they going to be treated, and I guess moved on from your facility to longer-term care?
WARE: That's a great question, and the powers to be are working those issues with the president of Haiti. Presently we have about 80 doctors aboard. We have about 140 nurses, and 24 of those doctors are surgeons.
Our crew put on the ship, I think when we're totally mature, which will be in the next two to three days, we believe that we'll be able to push 150 patients through to the ship and off the ship every day for surgical care, and the government of Haiti is giving us guidance exactly on where those patients will receive their follow on care.
Our hope is the international community and the U.N. will oversee that process. We have confidence that, as this area matures for medical health care...
CHETRY: Right.
WARE: ... that we will have a good plan in place through the U.N. and the guidance of the ministry of health care here in the country.
CHETRY: And as we said, you guys have been out on the front lines of so much humanitarian need, missions in 2007, 2005 in Iraq, and then also after September 11th. How does this rank on a personal level in terms of what it's like and how critical these patients are?
WARE: What I would say is, I'm extremely impressed on the teamwork. We have a little over a thousand medical support staff on board the ship, and we're also integrating with the doctors on ground. And the health care that is being provided to the individuals here is top notch, and everyone is working together and it's an incredible team of international doctors as well as Navy doctors in support of those teams on the shore.
CHETRY: You guys are certainly living up to your name for the thousands and thousands of Haitians that so badly need medical care. Captain James Ware, the commanding officer for the medical treatment facility "USNS Comfort," thanks so much for joining us this morning.
ROBERTS: We're at 27 1/2 minutes after the hour. Your top stories just a couple of minutes away now. But first an "A.M. Original," something that you'll see only on AMERICAN MORNING.
There is death and destruction everywhere in Haiti, but amid all the chaos, there are signs, however small, that life is trying to return to normal in Port-au-Prince. Our Jason Carroll has that part of the story from the Haitian capital.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Tense moments at a Unibank just outside the city of Carrefour, people who lined up and waited for hours to receive wire transfers for the first time since the earthquake pushed back by armed guards.
(on camera): We don't want Aster Napoleon (ph) to lose her spot in line, so we're just going to do our interview with her here because she's been waiting here since 7:00 a.m. for this bank to open. So I asked her, tell me what it's been like for you. This has been the first time you've been able to get access and get in here and get money, yes?
(voice-over): She says she's hopeless because she has nothing at home. No money and nothing to eat. Later Aster (ph) gets out of line and gives up.
Here at Unibank, just one sign of how some are trying to get Port-au-Prince back on its feet. The trouble there, showing just how difficult it's going to be to do that.
ANDERSON BELLEGARDE, WAITING TO RECEIVE WIRED MONEY: It is hard for me to get in, and it's crazy out here. The line is very -- there's a lot of people here, and things -- there's no law and order.
CARROLL: Larger established stores hiring private security guards to watch properties damaged in the quake, but most business taking place here is happening on a smaller level, out on the streets.
(on camera): As you can see here, this building has been destroyed, like so many here in Port-au-Prince. But right next to it they've set up a makeshift market. And we're seeing markets like this pop up all over the city, where people are coming out, starting to sell basic goods like vegetables, bread and sugar cane.
(voice-over): The problem? Some goods being sold are being done at inflated post-earthquake prices. That goes for gas too. It has tripled in price, $26 a gallon. But a haircut at this barbershop we found, still only $2 U.S. Now if the owner could only find customers with money to pay and gas to run his generator.
(on camera): Does it make you feel better opening up your door?
FRITZNEL VERMILUS, BARBER (through translator): Yes, because this is the only way we can preoccupy to a regular life, and without it, we cannot do anything more.
CARROLL (voice-over): The streets, a contrast of commerce. Someone gets a shoe shine. These men earning more money than ever trying to keep up demand for coffins.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CARROLL: I mean, that's definitely a sad reality here. You know, John, business leaders tell us that the banks that can reopen should all be reopening tomorrow. That's if things go as planned. And as you can imagine, it's going to be a great help for the people here who have money, who need to get access to it so they can buy goods, they can buy food, and try and survive. John.
ROBERTS: You know, any little thing that can help, I'm sure there is just so much demand for some sense of normalcy there. Jason Carroll for us this morning in Port-au-Prince. Jason, thanks.
CHETRY: Well, right now, it's 30 minutes past the hour. Time now for our top stories. Within a few days, 400,000 Haitians now homeless and living in tent cities in Port-au-Prince will be located just outside of the city. The Haitian government making that announcement yesterday. And the plan would let displaced Haitians help build their own new homes under a food for work scheme allowing them to stay close to the area where they had been making a living.
Well, customs officials are now admitting that they flagged another man aboard the Northwest Airlines flight on Detroit Christmas day. Two attorneys on that flight saw the man described as in his early 30s and of Indian descent handcuffed and questioned after a dog checked his luggage. Federal officials have now apologized for not releasing that information earlier.
Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell has been tapped to deliver the Republican response to the president's state of the union address. Party leaders say McDonnell understands Americans are more interested in shrinking unemployment than in expanding government. You can see it all here on Wednesday when our coverage starts 8:00 Eastern, the president's speech is at 9:00. John.
ROBERTS: Well, this morning Democrats are scrambling to save health care reform. Yesterday House Speaker Nancy Pelosi admitted that she lacks the votes to get the Senate's bill through the house. That was an option to save reform after losing their super majority. So what comes next?
CNN's senior political analyst Ed Rollins is here with me in New York. And in Washington, Lanny Davis, former White House counsel under President Clinton. Lanny, let's hear from you first. Is health care reform, at least, is going through Congress right now, dead?
LANNY DAVIS, FMR. CLINTON WHITE HOUSE COUNSEL: Only if the -- my fellow liberal Democrats still think that 100 percent is better than 25 percent. I think that sitting down with John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Orrin Hatch, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, Republicans that really want reform but didn't want to go as far as the Democrats is really what President Obama and moderate Democrats can do to construct an incremental health reform package that can get 75 votes in the Senate rather than a 60-40 partisan vote. That's what I think is still possible.
ROBERTS: Ed, you heard the word there that Lanny Davis said, incremental approach to health care reform. That has been a position that many have held throughout this whole thing, don't try to do it all at once, do it a little bit at a time. Do you think that there is in any way that they can have any kind of health care reform legislation on Capitol Hill that will attract bipartisan support?
ED ROLLINS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: If they follow my good friend's model there, you know, at the end of the day it has to be incremental. You can't have this massive overall -- they can't get either this bill through the Congress. The Senate bill won't pass the House, the House bill won't pass the Senate. So if you don't start anew and bring Republicans in from the bottom line to give them some voice at the table, then they have no vested interest.
ROBERTS: You know, Lanny, you had a really interesting commentary in "The Wall Street Journal" the other day. You know, I've known you for a long time since the days of the Clinton administration. You blame the left for a lot of the problems that the Democratic party has. You say, "the question is, will we stop listening to the strident purist base of our party who seem to prefer defeat to winning elections and no change at all if they don't get the change they want."
Obviously that reflects what you were just saying about health care reform but do you really believe that the left of the party is jeopardizing the fortunes of the party in general?
DAVIS: Well, I'll include myself in the mix of fault finding. You know, way back in June people like me who supported the public option, we lost Olympia Snowe. And that was the beginning. We should have had Lindsey Graham and John McCain in the room saying tell us the bill you can vote for.
Instead the purists, who I really think would prefer to have no bill at all and their people with health insurance, I've never heard someone without health insurance say I want no bill at all, caused this thing to be protracted over the public option, then the Medicare extension. Then the deal with the labor movement, then the deal with Senator Nelson and we got ourselves into December, and now January, and we lost it.
We could have had a deal if we invited conservatives in the room and started with 10 percent or 20 percent incrementally and listened to thoughtful Republicans, and Olympia Snow is one and we missed that opportunity. Yes, I think because of the left we did not do that and now it's too late.
ROBERTS: All right. All of this Ed, of course, a result of Tuesday's special election in Massachusetts. Scott Brown taking a seat held by the Kennedys...
ROLLINS: For a long time.
ROBERTS: Since 1953. I would not want to be Martha Coakley this week.
ROLLINS: I wouldn't want to be Martha Coakley. I would not want to be a Democrat strategist too.
ROBERTS: So, much is being made though of this win, is too much being made of its significance or is it really that significant? ROLLINS: Well, it's very significant in this sense, it helps Republicans go out and recruit some other people. When you say we can win in Massachusetts, there's a voter revolt out there, then places like Indiana, and Washington and Oregon that don't have the candidates yet that could beat those incumbents, people started coming forward today.
You're going to have eight or 10 Senate seats, democratic seats in play in this race. There are six or seven, including Harry Reid, you could end up losing the majority leader, you could lose the vice president seat, you could even end up losing the president's seat in this election.
ROBERTS: Lanny, is this going to be 1994 all over again?
DAVIS: Boy, it sure looks that way. And I think we'll know in October if the economy is bouncing back, and jobs are starting to be created. And I think it's really back to the it's economy, stupid. But my friend, Ed Rollins, who I always seem to agree with, we are looking at a '94 scenario. But remember, after '94 when Bill Clinton was counted out, John, you remember that Bill Clinton bounced back because he did a pivot.
ROBERTS: Yes.
DAVIS: He went back to the center, and that's where I think Barack Obama is headed as we speak.
ROBERTS: All right. Do you think Ed, as a result of what happened on Tuesday that Republicans are going to be emboldened here, anything that they think that the public is a little skittish with in terms of Democratic legislation, they are going to pounce on and just hammer home the point?
ROLLINS: I think they will but I would hope that they would have a little humility here. I think you win these things one at a time. And in the end sometimes you get a nationalized election like '94. Right now, their job is to go out and recruit good candidates, race resources, run good individual campaigns and basically continue to be the voice of opposition in a very constructive way.
ROBERTS: Well, you've got to sort of forgive them for being emboldened. They're three for three.
ROLLINS: Absolutely.
ROBERTS: Thanks. Ed Rollins, Lanny Davis, it's great to talk to you this morning.
DAVIS: Thanks for having me on.
ROBERTS: Kiran.
CHETRY: Well, still ahead, we have orphans that are arriving in Florida brought from Haiti. Soledad O'Brien was there as they traveled on the journey to Florida. We're going to have much more on the homecoming for some adoptive parents. 37 minutes past the hour.
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ROBERTS: Forty minutes after the hour. Welcome back to the most news in the morning. Dozens of Haitian orphans have already arrived in the United States. Many with families already waiting for them. Our Soledad O'Brien took the long, hot, frightening journey with one group of children.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For nine days after the earthquake, 135 children at the orphanage Maison (INAUDIBLE) sweltered in the Haitian heat.
Low on food and formula, running out of hope. Until their caretakers had enough. They loaded the babies into a van and wrote on their arms, FHG, for his glory, the Christian group that sponsors them and had come to the rescue.
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O'BRIEN: I squeezed on to the bus with the toddlers and older kids, and the entire orphanage heads for the U.S. embassy in pursuit of visas, their ticket out of this disaster. The situation for Haitian orphans is desperate. The State Department is allowing children with adoptions in process to get temporary visas so they can leave.
But officials will not accept children if they can't verify all their paperwork is in order. And children who still have a biological parent living in Haiti can only leave with that parent's permission.
It's hot on the bus, at least 90 degrees, and the children are sick, overcome by the heat.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't want to jeopardize the children but I want to do what's right for them.
O'BRIEN: We're almost there, just a few blocks away when the bus gets turned back.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We just got a phone call from some guys at the embassy, they said not to bring the kids right now.
O'BRIEN: A State Department spokesperson says, we don't turn people away. We ask people to come back at times.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The children do not want to go back to the orphanage. They want to go to America.
O'BRIEN: The embassy says they want to avoid kids being taken out of the country illegally. For these orphans, this is where the trip ends. Stuck in Haiti for now. But we get word that 22 children from other orphanages are having more luck. The U.S. agencies handling their adoptions get visas. Their paperwork is complete. And just like that, these children say good-bye to Haitian soil. On the other end, parents. A new country. Life in the U.S. begins to unfold.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, my baby!
O'BRIEN: A world away from an earthquake.
Soledad O'Brien, CNN, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHETRY: What a journey they had. Wow. There were more than 50,000 orphans in Haiti before the earthquake struck, and there were many weeks, even days away from being placed in new homes in America. Now in the aftermath of the disaster, a lot of these children can't be located.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says everything possible will be done to find them and to unite them with their U.S. families.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HILLARY CLINTON, SECRETARY OF STATE: When it comes to children, it is imperative that we closely coordinate with the Haitian government, the United Nations, and our other international partners such as NGOs and faith communities who are on the ground, who are working to ensure that aid reaches Haiti's orphanages and that the newly-orphaned children are accounted for and cared for.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: Jill Dougherty joins us live from Washington now. And Jill, despite the scope of this tragedy, the urgent need for adoption, the process obviously doesn't always move along quickly enough. In some cases that's intentional, though.
JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN FOREIGN AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, but really what they're trying to do is get this as organized as possible. And, you know, looking at those pictures, people's hearts really do go out to Haiti's orphans, and Secretary Clinton says the U.S. won't let red tape stand in the way of helping them. But it does have to follow international adoption procedures to protect those children. And those laws did not change as a result of this earthquake.
So, the State Department says before the earthquake, there were as many as 900 parents in the U.S. who had filed paperwork with the Department of Homeland Security saying that they intended to adopt from Haiti. Now, we're basically talking about three groups of orphans that the State Department is dealing with.
One would be orphans already in the process of being adopted. 50 of them have been given visas and most of them have been flown out of the country. The second group would be orphans in the early stages of adoption. Parents had been a identified. Those parents have gone through, you know, many of the U.S. and Haitian legal procedures. And the U.S. now has waived that paperwork and the children have been given what's called humanitarian parole.
So, several hundred of those have been flown to the United States to meet with those prospective parents and they can actually stay here in the US for two years while the parents complete all of this process.
And then the third group would be children who have not yet been matched with their adoptive parents and they will not be moved from Haiti, at least right now, unless they have a medical condition. The State Department says that it's working with orphanages to find protection for them -- Kiran.
CHETRY: So we saw the -- the journey that Soledad O'Brien was taping along the way of the orphanages, just saying, you know what? We've got to get them on buses and we got get over to the US Embassy there. How -- is there some type of organization in place to fly these orphans out of Haiti, the ones who are legal orphans and -- and have adopted homes?
DOUGHERTY: Well, there are a number of people who are helping. You have -- adoption agencies right on the ground are helping. Members of Congress are helping to pull this together. And then some orphanages are making arrangements.
But all of those flights have to be coordinated with US and Haitian governments, and you have to get official clearance.
CHETRY: All right. And then also families, and we've heard a couple of these stories, a handful of them who are just flying here, they're not waiting. They -- they've seen their children on TV or identified them in some way and say, I've got to get there and get my child. How is that happening?
DOUGHERTY: Yes. Homeland Security is saying don't do it. Right now, do not do that.
And, you know, Kiran, one of the saddest aspects of this are the children who are on their own after the earthquake. The organization Save the Children says that the vast majority of the children who are currently on their own in Haiti are actually not orphans. They're simply separated from their families, and relatives could be alive and desperate to find them. So they say taking children out of the country immediately would cause even more trauma. And another worry, it could allow traffickers to exploit these children.
CHETRY: Right.
DOUGHERTY: So, if you want to adopt, the State Department says it's best to wait until some of this chaos subsides. But you can get started by checking out their Web site, www.adoption.state.gov. And it's actually a very good Web site. I went on to it. They have a section devoted to Haiti, and there's a lot of information there -- Kiran. CHETRY: OK. Jill Dougherty, thanks for clearing up some of the confusion on -- on that front.
And also, we have another Web site as well, if you are adopting a child already, a Haitian child and you need help, you should send some detailed information to haitianadoptions@dhs.gov and they will match it with their information and help get that child out of Haiti.
Right now it's 48 minutes past the hour.
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CHETRY: There you go. A beautiful shot of Miami this morning, where it's cloudy right now, 75. Some afternoon thunder showers, but going up to a high of 81 today.
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. It's 15 minutes to the top of the hour.
People in Southern California are waking up to a wet, miserable mess. Four storms in a week have everyone on high alert for mudslides, and there is another system that's brewing off the coast.
Our Rob Marciano was live in what is mudslide zone these days. He's at the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. You're in an area that came down. I guess it was a major mudflow yesterday, Rob, and certainly the -- the water was running there.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes. It was running quite a bit. A lot of debris around this neighborhood. There are probably hundreds of -- of mudflows and -- and debris flows like the one I'm standing on here. The good news is that we haven't had a major slide that has taken out several homes.
This is the side yard of a resident who's been evacuated. This entire neighborhood evacuated. He kind of built this makeshift chute to kind of divert this -- what he's -- what he knew would be a flow eventually, away from his yard. He didn't get everything, but he got a decent chunk, about 3 or 4 feet of really compact soil and dirt and rock.
And this also did the job, these K-rails that were put in place, actually, right after the fires back in late August, because they knew when the rainy season came, there were going to be some spots that would slide, and that's what we saw here. These have protected homes for the most part, but you can't protect all the roadways.
We tried to get up the big Tujunga Canyon yesterday to get that -- to some folks that we -- we reported on during the fires in late August, and that road, for the most part, shut down in multiple spots, and I talked to our character, or the guy that I know out there, he said he did not evacuate and they're pretty much stuck. So folks who didn't evacuate in many spots are on their own until those roads are cleared, and folks who want to come back to their homes, well, they have not been given the all clear yet, not at least in this neighborhood, and probably wouldn't for some time because we still have some -- some more to go.
On the coastline, they're battling. They're beating back the waves. Twenty-footers in spots, heavy equipment in there across Seal Beach. There were a couple of tornadoes reported in Santa Barbara and Ventura. That is very rare for Southern California, even doing some damage, and up the road in (ph) Pacific, big waves taking out to the bluffs there and that apartment complex completely evacuated and they will not return. That is expected to go into the sea at some point.
All of this energy has moved into Arizona, and they got pounded yesterday and are getting pounded this morning with three feet of snow in the mountains and over 10 inches of rainfall down across parts of Southern Arizona. At one point, we had a blizzard warning and tornado watch in neighboring counties there in Arizona. Very, very unusual weather.
But as you mentioned, John and Kiran, we still have another weak system, the last to come through later on today. We could see another inch or so more of rain.
So far so good, but in any one point, geologists are saying there could be a trigger and we could see a major slide, but we're just keeping our fingers crossed in here. People are certainly not relaxing, at least until this weekend.
Back to you in New York.
ROBERTS: Thanks, Rob. Rob Marciano keeping a close eye on things there.
Seven minutes to the top of the hour. We'll be right back.
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CHETRY: Some breaking news right now out of Haiti.
It was just two days ago right here that we were talking about a major aftershock, sending people running into the streets. Well, we're getting word of yet another aftershock, probably a strong one, hitting Haiti.
Our Chris Lawrence is in Port-au-Prince. He's witnessing it all firsthand. Chris, you felt it?
CHRIS LAWRENCE, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Everybody here felt it, Kiran. You know, all of a sudden -- we're all sitting here and it just -- the entire building started shaking for a couple of seconds. Everybody jumped up and kind of backed away from the -- the ledge. People there kind of reacted for a second.
But now -- I just took a look behind me. The kids are still playing soccer down there. Everybody just kind of went back to normal. I think people are in some ways just kind of getting used to it. These aftershocks have been so frequent. You know, one thing, not only the aftershocks but all the other problems involved with getting a lot of that aid to the folks who need it the most. We got down to the port yesterday and saw what we think is some very, very good news, you know, the port partially reopening. It -- it's not perfect. Think of it like a -- a major highway reopening, but with only one lane of traffic. It's not going to be as fast as you would like, but it could, down the road, lead to some very, very good things in terms of getting aid out to the folks who need it.
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LAWRENCE (voice-over): Like thousands of others over the past week, the children at Heart for Haiti Charity had little food and its medical staff no supplies.
DR. SABINE CELIE, HEART FOR HAITI VOLUNTEER: Oh, there was almost nothing here. We had to treat people with what we have.
LAWRENCE: But now, US military dive teams have reopened part of Haiti's main port. Ships held back at sea for a week are now docking. And, more importantly, unloading life-saving food, water and medical supplies.
LT. CMDR. MARK GIBBS, US COAST GUARD: The very first vessel we had in here was the "Crimson Glory". Completely loaded 124 containers.
LAWRENCE: Lt. Cmdr. Mark Gibbs says it took all day to unload a ship they'd normally finish in six hours. That's because only the left side of the pier is strong enough to support weight.
GIBBS: I'm incredibly sensitive to it because if we lose this pier, that's it. We can't -- we can't bring anything else in here.
LAWRENCE: We saw the port 40 hours after the earthquake, when it was completely shut down.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAWRENCE (on camera): The earthquake has buckled the road almost as tall as I am. There's no way you're going to get a truck through there.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LAWRENCE: That was then, this is now. It's not pretty, but the concrete pile's been knocked down and enough gravel put in to get trucks rolling through here again.
LAWRENCE (voice-over): But we wanted to make sure supplies aren't just sitting here like they did at the airport.
ROBERT DEVRIES (ph), HEART FOR HAITI VOLUNTEER: This is all -- all milk and water.
LAWRENCE: We watched Robert Devries (ph) load up with food and medical supplies right from the Dutch (ph) ship, and we followed him back to his Heart for Haiti Charity. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (SPEAKING IN HAITIAN).
LAWRENCE: This mother says her child is running a high fever. That man has an infected head wound, untreatable without the medicine Devries (ph) and his team just picked up at the pier.
CELIE: Especially antibiotics., everything to keep cleaning wounds, gauzes and things like that.
LAWRENCE: It's a pattern that needs to be repeated, from ship, to shore, to survivors.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LAWRENCE: You know, the next step is the military expects to get its underwater construction teams in there to actually get in there and try to start fixing the pier, that way maybe open up more than one lane and push that aid out even faster -- Kiran.
CHETRY: That would certainly be -- be very, very vital at this point, and hopefully they'll be able to get it moving even faster in the coming days.
Chris Lawrence for us, also reporting on that aftershock. We have no news from the USGS, but we'll be tracking that just to see if they'd give us a read on how strong it was. Thanks so much.
ROBERTS: And the top stories coming your way in 90 seconds. Stay with us.
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