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What Davos Means for World Economics; Tracking Where the Stimulus Money Has Gone; Bin Laden's New Statement

Aired January 25, 2010 - 13:00   ET

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

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: CNN NEWSROOM continues right now with Ali Velshi.

ALI VELSHI, HOST: Tony, thank you very much.

Hello, everybody. I'm Ali Velshi, on the beat today from 1 to 3 p.m. Eastern and every day -- every weekday at this hour. For the next two hours, I'm going to take every important topic we cover, and I'm going to try and break it down for you.

I will try and give you a level of detail that's going to help you make important decisions about your voting, your spending, your safety and security. Maybe the next two hours will just help you understand the world around you a little better. And we have been getting your comments on Twitter at alivelshi, on Facebook, and on my blog, CNN.com/Ali -- slash Ali.

And we're changing the show to make it better for you. One of the things I'll be breaking down for you all week, this week, is the stimulus bill. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

A big part of the money that the government, which means you, the taxpayer, has put toward trying to save the economy.

You're looking at our stimulus desk right now. How has that money been distributed? Has the money worked? Has it saved the economy from getting even worse than it would have, or has it made things worse by getting us further into debt? How many jobs has it created? Should there be more stimulus?

Well, before we answer those questions, let's get a sense of what you think. In a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll, you have responded -- our respondents have said that 42 percent -- 42 percent favor the economic stimulus bill. Fifty-six percent oppose it right now. That's an issue. This is a year old, this bill. But right now, most people are opposing it.

Now, what do you think the money went to do? Tony Harris and I were just talking about this a couple minutes ago. Thirty-six percent of our respondents say that it benefited the economy. Sixty-three percent, almost 2/3, say it went toward political projects with no economic impact.

Now, this is one of the single biggest pots of money the United States has ever spent on anything. So it's bad news for the administration, and for Congress if people think this is all politics. And right now, the White House has been getting a lot of bad news.

Let's bring in -- bring in our senior political correspondent, Candy Crowley, to talk a little about voters venting their anger, about stimulus, about health care, about the way things are done in Washington in general.

Candy, thank you so much for being with us on the show today. You saw those numbers. The fact of the matter is, any way you measure the polls right now, they are trending away from the president, away from Congress. But generally speaking, away from government in general.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. What we're seeing is something that we have seen in years past, and that is that the public can sour pretty quickly on Washington. They have never had a huge love, particularly for Capitol Hill. It is not a wonder that the president's numbers were sustained longer, even though they have fallen, obviously, than those on Capitol Hill.

And clearly, if you take those stimulus numbers, you see, reflected in the political polling numbers, that disenchantment, and the disenchantment at this point certainly has hurt the Democrats more, and helped the Republicans. And we're seeing a more even look at the Democratic and Republican parties from the American people.

VELSHI: Let's look at that, because we have brand-new polling this hour about that. We've asked, has Democratic control of Congress been good for the country? It's a question we asked back in June. And back in June, 50 percent of people said yes. Democratic control of Congress was good for the country.

Now it's down to 45 percent, with 48 percent saying it's not.

I want to show you one other screen before I ask you to comment on this. The Democrats' loss -- loss of the 60-seat majority in the U.S. Senate. Seventy percent of our respondents say it is good for the country. What do we make of this?

CROWLEY: We make of this that the public has soured on the Democratic control, at least that sort of total control that 60 votes gives them.

Obviously, again, if you look at the stimulus numbers, they're unhappy with that package. Well, who passed that package? It passed largely with just Democratic votes.

So when you look at the polling and you see that people don't think -- they think the economy at least might have been stabilized, but there's still that huge jobless rate, there's still the feeling out there that economic recovery has not taken place, who's paying for that? Capitol Hill Democrats.

VELSHI: Interesting, though, because on the economy, the market has done well, aside from this last week. Mortgage rates are still low. The housing market shows some signs of at least starting to stabilize. But it is about jobs. The jobs numbers, while they started to improve, are still hurting.

Here's something that I found interesting in our polling. The Republicans really aren't yet in a position to celebrate all of these changes in the poll numbers, because we asked people who they're angry at. Forty-eight percent say they're angry at both parties. Eleven percent -- only 11 percent say they're angry at the Republicans. And only 9 percent say they're angry at just the Democrats.

CROWLEY: Yes. And what does this tell us? If you're an incumbent this year, someone who is currently holding a seat on Capitol Hill, and you're going to run for re-election, well, then, you're in trouble. This is an anti Washington feeling, more than a Democratic feeling.

Now, look, the Democrats have lost in the polls. They have gone down, and the Republicans have come up. But what we're seeing here is that people are angry at Washington in general, particularly at Capitol Hill.

Now, what happens, of course, is that, if you are in the majority, then you have more seats at risk. So this hurts Democrats more...

VELSHI: Right.

CROWLEY: ... or would hurt them at the polls more if those numbers are sustained.

VELSHI: Candy, I want to ask you, on Friday we saw a speech by the president which a lot of people say hearkened back to his days as a candidate in terms of his passion and how fiery he was and his rhetoric. We're going to see the State of the Union on Wednesday evening. What's that going to look like?

CROWLEY: It's going to look like a president who is trying to, A, re-explain.

One of the things they've said at the White House when they look at these poll numbers is, "We haven't done well in getting our message out." What does that mean? They believe the stimulus plan really did avert disaster, really did set the country on a path toward recovery. They think they haven't sold that well, as opposed to people being upset about policies.

Now, you can argue that. But that's how the White House views it.

You will see the president reaching out more and in a more populist tone. I think people believe, and we've seen in previous polls, that Wall Street, as you just mentioned, has profited from a lot of things. It's looking great. Main Street looking less great.

So you will see the president looking directly at Main Street, talking directly about Main Street and what he's going to do to help those people, particularly the jobless. Because frankly, it's been tough enough for the president to try to govern with a Democratic majority. If the Republicans pick up seats coming up, which everyone pretty much at this point expects they will do, it gets even tougher.

VELSHI: Candy, we'll, of course, have complete coverage of the State of the Union. You'll be involved in that. That's Wednesday at 8 p.m. Eastern. Candy, great to see you. Thank you for joining me today.

CROWLEY: Sure. Good to see you, Ali.

VELSHI: Candy Crowley, senior political correspondent.

We are going to get the latest news from Haiti when can he come back after a break. But most importantly, we're going to go inside some place that many of you will be surprised to see. This place was in bad shape, even before the earthquake. We're going to go inside Haiti's most dangerous slum. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Here at CNN, we've made a commitment to continue to bring you continuing coverage of the disaster and the rebuilding in Haiti. Here's the very latest that we have.

Haitian government officials say more than 150,000 people are dead. They say they've gathered 150,000 bodies so far, and that more than 200,000 people have already left Port-au-Prince.

Bodies are -- survivors are still being found. Look at this. On Saturday, a French rescue team pulled a 24-year-old man from the rubble of a hotel 11 days after the quake struck. Now, that's prompting families of missing Americans to push for a full-scale rescue efforts to resume. And there are teams that are still undertaking full-scale rescue. It's not just recovery now. They have started an online petition to try and get people to do that.

Today in Montreal, Canada, more than a dozen donor nations are meeting to lay out the groundwork for rebuilding Haiti. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is attending. Haiti's prime minister is there, as well. It's a one-day conference. It's the first step toward a larger reconstruction conference.

Now, Karl Penhaul is live in Haiti right now. He's in Port-au- Prince. And he's got a look at Cite Soleil, the city of sun, the city of the sun. And it is Haiti's most desperate slum. It was even before the earthquake. Karl, it only can be getting worse at this point.

KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, even in the best of times, Ali, that neighborhood city saw 500,000 people. They're the poorest of Haiti's poor. It really is the bottom of the barrel, most of them living on less than $1 a day.

The neighborhood has also got a fearsome reputation for gangland violence. So when peace keepers and soldiers rolled in there to give aid, there were way more guns than bags of aid.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PENHAUL: Sun up in the shantytown of Cite Soleil. Help rolls in aboard a heavily-armored convoy: Brazilian peacekeepers and American soldiers. If you want to eat, you'd better move quick. There's not enough to go around.

GEN. PURL KEEN, U.S. ARMY: You cannot feed every citizen every day.

PENHAUL: That's nothing new in Cite Soleil. This is Haiti's most desperate slum. Even before the quake, survival was hand to mouth.

United Nations and U.S. generals are putting on a joint show, apparently to dispel criticism about the often chaotic relief effort. They say they have a plan.

KEEN: Provide food for a percentage of them every day, so over a two-week period every citizen has sufficient food to last for that two weeks.

PENHAUL: Today, there's more trucks and blue helmets and U.S. soldiers than food.

Cite Soleil has a fearsome rap for violence. Brazilian peacekeepers have reigned some in gangs here over recent years, but some fear crime bosses may regroup in the slums after a prison break on the day of the quake. Not so, peacekeepers say.

GEN. FLORIANO PEIXOTO, U.N. PEACEKEEPER: The security situation is completely under control. The nature of the incidents we are aware of now here we used to have before the tragedy.

PENHAUL: Soldiers fix their sights on passing out bags of beans, rice and oil to the luckiest few, high-energy cookies or ready-to-eat meals to those further down the line.

Ancilia Josephat (ph) struggles home with her supplies.

"One of those white guys gave me a box for my things. Of course, it's good stuff. Otherwise they wouldn't be handing it out," she says.

(on camera) Now here's precisely one of the problems. For everyone that's been getting food today, thousands more will go home hungry. These people have been standing in line under a hot sun since early on. They've had their expectations raised, and now they're going to be frustrated.

(voice-over) Shattered hopes have become a way of life for Haiti's failed state. This time around, international donors are promising not to turn their backs and vowing to rebuild Haiti. A bold pledge for the future, but right now, kids scurry for any offer while it lasts. (END VIDEOTAPE)

PENHAUL: As you can -- as you can see, even the Haitian kids have learned to grab any handout while it is on offer, because Haiti has had such a long experience of the international community responding only to disasters, and then leaving the nation to its own fate, Ali.

VELSHI: You talked to that one -- one military official who said they're going to give rations out to a portion of people every day. How do they control that? The pictures we saw of were of people running toward that aid. How in a place of a half million people do you control who you give food to, and how do you control the frustration you talked about from those who didn't get it?

PENHAUL: Those really are tough decisions. And yesterday when we saw this, then, yes, those food lines were orderly, but the fear of aide groups is that over time, as people become more desperate, that the desperation sets in and if they see no signs of reconstruction, then people will get more desperate, and then you have a law and order problem, as well. And you could possibly even have the resurgence of the gangs.

And so this is why many people are saying, really, the key thing now is to really think how you are going to rebuild Haiti. It simply is not good enough to take it out of this disaster and restore the natural state of things...

VELSHI: Yes.

PENHAUL: ... which is abject poverty. The international community has to have a much bigger goal this time, Ali.

VELSHI: Well, Karl, it's reporting like yours and the rest our teams down there understand how serious and how important that rebuilding issue is, and how we don't have to go back to where we were before the earthquake, but further.

Karl Penhaul, great work down there. Stay safe. Thank you very much for joining us yet again.

PENHAUL: Now you wouldn't think that there would be such a thing as too many doctors in Haiti. But so many doctors have answered Haiti's call for help, the biggest hospital in Port-au-Prince is actually having trouble organizing them and finding good use for all of them. The hospital has nine operating rooms but a virtual platoon of volunteer surgeons, and that leaves doctors standing by for work.

Sanjay Gupta tells us that medical teams are starting to get organized. They're trying to farm doctors out to other parts of the quake-ravaged country.

Well, when we come back, we're going to continue our look into the stimulus bill, the recovery act, how it's working. Christine Romans is going to be with me to tell us how this compares to other things that we've spent that kind of money on in the past. And what parts of it may be working.

And as you can see right there, there's our stimulus desk. We're staying on top of this. Seventeen hours a day, we're making phone calls and following up on stimulus projects, tracking your tax dollars down, finding out where they're going and whether they're working.

Stay with us. We're coming right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: OK. All this week, we are tracking the stimulus dollars. The $787 billion that was put into the stimulus bill a year ago, I'm next to our screen where we're counting down the number of projects that our stimulus desk is actually working on. I'm going to ask Robert to just look over here.

This is our stimulus desk. We are staffing this all day, every day this week. We're making phone calls from some of these stimulus projects, and there are many, many binders of them. These are the books that we're looking at. These are all individual projects. We're making phone calls.

And as we track stories down, and find out how the money is being spent, we're tallying it here, so we are right now in the midst of tracing $1,760,507,000. That's what we're at right now, but we're working on it. That number is going to get a lot bigger all week.

Let's go to Christine Romans, my co-host on "YOUR $$$$$," business correspondent in New York.

Christine, $787 billion, that's not the sum of all the money that the government has put into this, but that's the stimulus bill. How does that compare to other big, massive chunks of money that U.S. taxpayers have funded in the past?

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's really the most aggressive outlay of taxpayer funds in such a short amount of time that we've ever seen, Ali.

I mean, when you look at the $787 billion -- and you're right, it's just part of it -- but that $787 billion when you stack that against the Iraq war, for example, it is more money than the war in Iraq.

Interestingly, if you put Iraq and of Afghanistan together, those two together would be bigger than the stimulus. But in two years, that $787 billion in stimulus is going to be just two years rolled out.

The New Deal, if you put it in inflation adjusted dollars, that would be about $500 billion. The Marshall Plan -- think of that -- at the time we spent, I think, $12.7 billion to rebuild Europe. That would be about, in today's dollars, $115.3 billion.

Think of that. That was to rebuild Europe. That was money that was spent that literally changed the middle classes of major western democracies. And that's how that money played out over many, many years. That just puts this $787 billion in perspective, Ali.

VELSHI: All right. Now, you know, a lot of people are wondering why it all hasn't been spent just yet. It was never the plan to spend it all right in the beginning. The administration did expect this to be deployed in phases.

ROMANS: That's right. And it was expected -- it's supposed to be time-released. The idea that the economy is starting to come back up, where it was at the bottom, and then you kick this money in, and it juices any kind of recovery and kind of piles on it. This is how it was meant to look.

The first phase was a rescue phase. Getting money immediately into paychecks by Food Stamps, to -- for Medicaid to fill budget gaps, so that teachers and firefighters and cops can stay on the job.

And then the second phase, which is really just getting started in earnest right now, this is the phase two, if you will. Job creation. Infrastructure. Construction. Research. Other projects, as well.

So you know, I will tell you, though, Ali, we've seen a few -- I mean, I personally have been to a few of these shovel-ready construction projects that are almost done. As soon as the coldest part of winter is done and it's springtime, you're going to be seeing some of these -- some of these projects are going to be finishing up. Some didn't start until June, so you just think of how quickly that money has been spent in the economy, even for phase two. It's pretty remarkable.

VELSHI: Christine, just that so our viewers understand, we are not only having the stimulus desk making phone calls, but we've got reporters who fanned out across the country. You alone, I'm just trying to think. I know you have been in North Carolina. I know you've been in Nebraska. You covered a lot of these -- these stimulus projects yourself.

ROMANS: Yes, Delaware and Iowa and other places, as well. You know, we have followed -- we have followed many different kinds of projects, too. I went down to Miami, you remember last summer, and met all these teachers, who I said, "How does it feel to be -- to be someone who's been saved by stimulus money?" They didn't even know it. They didn't know that they were on the job because of stimulus money.

And then we've been investigating a lot of places where it looks pretty silly, right frankly, or it looks look -- looks like fraud. So it's a very big, huge program with very -- I mean, each of these projects is almost like it's own fingerprint. But taken all together, the most massive undertaken of spending of American taxpayer dollars, I would say, in American history.

VELSHI: Christine, that's why we're going to stay on it all day, all week. We're going to be talking about stimulus as much as we can.

Tomorrow on "AMERICAN MORNING," we're going to show you some of the good news from the stimulus. One family has food on their table because of it.

Tonight, on "CAMPBELL BROWN" at 8 Eastern, find out why people in Montana think that their state has double-faulted their tax money.

And then on "AC 360," why are your tax dollars going to so many companies that have repeatedly broken the law?

We're going to stay on all of these stories. The stimulus project is about your money, your job, your community, all day, all this week, only on CNN.

All right. Let me give you a check of the headlines.

In Texas, a big oil spill means a big cleanup. An Exxon- chartered tanker collided with a towing vessel Saturday, spilling about 462,000 gallons off Port Arthur, Texas. The Coast Guard now says nearly half of the spill has dispersed or been recovered.

To Baghdad, where at least 36 people have been killed in a string of car bombings. All of the bombs went off near hotels that are popular with journalists and business people.

The blasts came shortly before state TV announced the execution of Chemical Ali, a cousin of Saddam Hussein.

And when we come back, we are going to talk to you about Katie Coleman. This is an astronaut mom who's preparing for a stay, a six- month stay on the International Space Station, and we're going to have an exclusive look at that, the preparations going into that, when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: All right. John Zarrella is in Miami for us. He's got an update on an exclusive look at astronaut mom Katie Coleman, who's training for a space mission. She's going to go live on the International Space Station for six months.

John, tell us more about this.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Ali, it's an exclusive to CNN, and we've really gone behind the scenes, looking at her life, her training, her family. And once a month, we're filing pieces for CNN on Katie Coleman as she prepares for a mission to the International Space Station. She'll be going on a Russian Soyuz rocket. That's the way she'll be getting there, because the shuttle program is being phased out.

Well, today she woke up; she's in Japan. Earlier this week, she was in Los Angeles. And last week, she was in Houston training. And you know, Ali, when she's not training, she still stays busy giving back.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ZARRELLA (voice-over): Flying twice on space shuttle missions. KATIE COLEMAN, NASA ASTRONAUT: The plants that we've grown on board here, we've kind of -- we're going to test them two different ways.

ZARRELLA: Training for a six-month stay on the International Space Station.

It's not lost on astronaut Katie Coleman that good fortune has smiled nicely upon her.

COLEMAN: It probably seems terrible to -- I mean, so many people would like to go to space. And to think, but I want to go again.

ZARRELLA: There's perhaps just a touch of guilt in her voice. It's quickly engulfed by a wave of passion that transcends to flying, a desire to give back, to make time to share the experience.

JOSH SIMPSON, COLEMAN'S HUSBAND: It's incredible how she's able to explain complicated stuff to people in a way that they can understand. But it's not just kids. It's also -- it's also college people and adults.

ZARRELLA: A little weightless levity never hurts, like eating gummy bears in space, purely for science. And if you believe that...

COLEMAN: Who was going to be the best, the gummy bears? The gummy worms? The gummy fish? The gummy dinosaurs? I did not know, and so we brought them all. We had auditions, and the bears were the best.

ZARRELLA: Sandwiched between training in Russia and Houston, a lecture at her alma mater, the University of Massachusetts. Autograph signings. An entire view with a local reporter. And demonstrating what doesn't work in weightlessness.

COLEMAN: And so swimming doesn't really help. And moving your legs doesn't really help very much either.

ZARRELLA: Somersaults are cake. The U. Mass visit came at the end of a day when Katie had already spent time at her son Jamie's elementary school.

COLEMAN: Here is two robotic arms, because sometimes we have things we want to pass from robotic arm to robotic arm.

ZARRELLA: You were paying attention, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

ZARRELLA: So when she asked -- when she told you how many robotic arms are on the space station, do you know?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, two.

ZARRELLA: Coleman, like many of NASA's women astronauts, believes their visibility can be an inspiration, in particular to young girls. Like one in Jamie's class. She drew a picture of a girl astronaut with a pink rocket ship.

COLEMAN: There are still a lot of mixed messages that girls growing up get, in that not all of them who are 6 and 7 years old even think that they might be able to do this, or that whatever their dream job is, that they could choose and do.

ZARRELLA: Cady's experience was similar, never thinking becoming an astronaut was possible until after attending a talk by America's first woman in space, Sally Ride.

COLEMAN: To me, it was a very pivotal moment where I just thought, I want that job.

Just like gravity...

ZARRELLA: And she got it.

COLEMAN: ... that forces the heavier objects to go to the outside of the bag.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ZARRELLA: You know, at that class, her son's class, and he raised his hand, Ali, to ask her a question, what he asked was, "Mom, when are you going to retire?". And she said to him, well, probably when I come back from my six months on the space station. She said probably.

You know, Ali, she is one of those rare, rare individuals. She has got a Ph.D in chemistry, but she can put it into English. Ali?

ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: It sounded like it. In listening to her talking to the kids, it sounds like she is not interested in impressing anybody with her depth of knowledge. She's interested in letting you learn what she knows.

Thank you for following that story. We'll follow it very closely right here on this show. John Zarrella, good to see you.

All right. Davos. This is the world economic forum. That's where they meet, in Davos, Switzerland. It is a fancy gathering of the richest and most powerful in the world. So surprise, surprise, CNN's Richard Quest is on the case.

When we come back, we're going to visit with Richard and find out what is going on there and whether anything being discussed there can actually change the way things are for us back home. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: You've heard about it before. The world economic forum. It's in Davos, Switzerland. Takes place in January every year. Let's tell you a little bit about it.

An independent, nonprofit, based in Switzerland. They have been meeting in Davos for 40 years. Some say because it's such a hard place to get to, it doesn't lend itself to a whole bunch of spectators. It's a ski resort. Twenty-five hundred world leaders, banking bigwigs, policy makers, academics, movie stars and singers -- everybody who wants to change the world gets together. They discuss ways to deal with social development and economic progress. And this year's mission statement, the title, improve the state of the world, rethink, redesign, rebuild. Hope they didn't spend too much money to work that out.

Richard Quest. Our man, Richard Quest, is on the case. Now, Richard, we were just talking to John Zarrella a moment ago. He was talking about Cady Coleman, the astronaut, and he said she's got a Ph.D in chemistry, and yet has this way of making these out of this world things understandable.

And that's why I come to you. Because really, I don't understand why these people are out there in Davos, what they could possibly be talking about, and how it could possibly effect my economic life here in the United States. So we have put you to the task. Do not fail us, Richard.

RICHARD QUEST, CNN INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: I have no intention of failing you in this rather important duty you have given me today.

Listen, the fact is, we all schlep up a mountainside every January here to Davis, because this is the one time in the year that everybody does have a chance to schmooze, to put forward ideas, and to perhaps think the unthinkable.

Now, no doubt this year, bankers will be lobbying against reform. CEOs will be looking to do what deals there may be in the future. And those government leaders who are still here will be working out what is acceptable to the various people. Because last year, Ali, we were putting out the fires. There was pretty much consensus.

This year, when you come to rebuild, redesign, rethink -- and if I hear that phrase again, I'll probably go bananas -- I decided that you really did have to get back to basics. And if I'm going to be up a mountainside in Switzerland, that means I have to rethink, redesign, and rebuild a snowman.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): It's a sorry sight. Meet Jeff, the snowman. Global economic fortune turned global economic failure.

But how can we turn Jeff back upright again? Make him proud once again to be master of all he surveys?

(on camera): Back to basics. Getting things started should be as easy as rolling a new snowball. Like the global economic system, this snow is not fit for the purpose of building a snowman. It won't roll.

Which is why here in Davos, the week is going to be spent rethinking how we make a new financial system. While the rebuilding goes on, some will undoubtedly take advantage, still scavenging over the wreckage, hoping to make a bonus.

We know there's plenty of snow. It's just a question of rethinking how to use it. And that's where rethinking the project comes into play.

Use a bucket. This should do it. Bigger is not always better. These days, if you need to do it, differently -- add a bit of water.

I'm making progress. It's slow-going. Thankfully, I'm not alone. Experts' help is appropriately named. What is your name?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hans.

QUEST: Hans!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.

QUEST: Ya! More Hans, the merrier, to get this snowman right. We need to salvage what we can from that which remains.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

QUEST: Davos is different this time. Paradigm shifts. Out-of- the-box thinking.

Jeff, the global economic fortune, is neither as big nor as beautiful as perhaps we would like. But it's taken a lot of effort to get us this far. We have had to rebuild, redesign and crucially rethink. And if it's not all it might be, well, hey, it's good enough for this year.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

QUEST: And the reality is, Ali, that it's fashionable to bash Davos, but the truth is, we would be all the much more sorrier if it didn't exist.

VELSHI: You brought up the word fashionable. I didn't. Did you lose a bet which made you wear that hat?

QUEST: That is a fine piece of head gear, I'll have you know. And I shall be selling it on eBay to the biggest offer.

VELSHI: Excellent. Good. Swag from Richard Quest in Davos. Richard, you get a ten out of ten on that one. I have to say. Very impressive. You have a show, "QUEST MEANS BUSINESS," which airs 2:00 Eastern time on CNN International. Can we work out something where you can be on the show more regularly, because those are the kind of explanations we need.

QUEST: We are going to work out something, and you will be hearing this sound...

(BELL RINGING) QUEST: ... a great deal more often. Watch and wait.

VELSHI: Richard Quest, always delivering and meeting the challenge presented to him. You have a good time in Davos. We'll check in with you all week.

I thought, by the way, that I had a remarkable description of the stimulus and all of the money going into it, which I'm going to present to you in a moment. But now that I realize it doesn't involve snow and ridiculous looking hats and buckets, I'm hoping you'll stick with me, anyway, because I think it's actually pretty good. It's a little more technologically advanced than Richard's. But I'll show it to you in a minute. Stimulus, as if it were a snowman.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Okay. All this week, we are following the stimulus money. This is the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The this is the $787 billion bill that was passed last year. I want to put this clipboard down, so I can show you all about what we're looking at.

Now, you can get this on CNNmoney.com. I want to show you what this number is. This is $4.7 trillion. This is actually all of your taxpayer money. This is government money that has gone into all sorts of different things that have helped this economy along. Or arguably, it helped this economy along. $3.9 trillion of it we're going to discuss later on in the week. Things that have happened. There is also a smaller second stimulus that we'll discuss.

But most of the time this week, we are focusing on this. The $787 billion stimulus bill that was passed last year. This is the one we're talking about. And it breaks down into different areas. Tax relief, green stimulus, education and science, other stimulus.

Health. This is a big one. Let's take a look, for instance. $129 billion of the $787 billion goes into health care. Just one of the projects in health care is Health IT, information technology. That's the automation of medical records, incentives for hospitals and doctors to automate medical records.

Here is one that we have been talking about a lot, and it is highways and transportation. $48 billion going into that. One example, for instance, is $27.5 billion going to highway construction. We talk about the shovel-ready projects, these are the type of things we're talking about.

And helping the vulnerable. $115.9 billion out of the $787 billion going to helping the vulnerable. Many of you will have experienced this, because $25.5 billion has gone to COBRA. A subsidy for those of you who have lost your jobs and lost your health coverage. Obviously, you know, COBRA is the way to continue your health coverage, but it is very expensive. Because of part of the stimulus bill, you're paying a little less for COBRA.

We're going to get into a lot more of these issues. We've got our Stimulus Desk over there. Robert is going to take a quick look at it, but there are some people working on some projects over there. That's what we're going to be doing all week, all day, and we're going to be looking at that. If you want to go back to this thing, just go to CNNmoney.com, and you'll see it right on the front page of CNNmoney.com.

Now, we want to tell you about something else, some other news we're covering. An apparent new message from Osama bin Laden. We'll tell you what it means and whether there's anything you need to be concerned about in it. Stay with us. You're watching CNN.

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VELSHI: A new statement purportedly by Osama bin Laden. Let's bring in CNN's national security analyst, Peter Bergen to tell us a little bit more about this.

Peter, this has just come in, it's the first time we have heard from Osama bin Laden, if it is Osama bin Laden, in over seven months. First of all, is this likely a message from Osama bin Laden?

PETER BERGEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: There's no doubt about it. You know, I have been listening to his voice since 1997, and he has a very recognizable voice. We have never had a fake tape. This is probably, I think the thirty-third tape since 9/11, and none of them have been fakes.

VELSHI: All right. One of the things he has done is he has endorsed this attempt of the -- to blow up the Northwest Airlines plane on Christmas Day. Was that a suggestion that he was behind it, or that his encouragement had led to it?

BERGEN: I think it's the latter. I mean, you know, in American military doctrine, there is something called commanders' intent. So when a four-star general doesn't have to constantly tell his soldiers did what the plan of the battle is -- similarly, bin Laden, he doesn't need to be constantly in communication with his affiliates. He has laid it out very clearly that attack the West, attack particularly the United States. Attack commercial aviation, American economic targets. This is very well-known. And al Qaeda's affiliate in the Arabian Peninsula followed through on that commander's intent.

VELSHI: What's your sense of him saying there are going to be further attacks like this?

BERGEN: I think that's just sort of, you know, a function key too, kind of boiler plate. The -- in a lot of bin Laden's statements he says this. If we believed every time he released a tape there was going to be an attack -- it just doesn't happen that way.

Before 9/11, he released relatively infrequently these kind of statements. And there was a very strong correlation between him releasing a tape and an actual attack. But since 9/11, he has released so many, are there is very little correlation.

VELSHI: You have written an article citing a major general, Michael Flynn, who has made the case that our intelligence is not up to speed on some of the matters dealing with terrorism and the fact that, in fact, there is strength -- there is -- they're gaining capacity and people to conduct terrorist attacks against western targets.

BERGEN: Well, major general Michael Flynn is the top American intelligence official in Afghanistan, and he prepared a briefing in December, which I think is pretty sobering reading, which we obtained here at CNN.

He talks about a serious threat from the Taliban, the Taliban basically increasing its ability to control or to operate in territory around Afghanistan. Violence went up 300 percent in 2007. Another 60 percent in 2008. Major General Flynn predicts that 2010 will probably be the most violent year of the insurgency.

And if you look at the charts in this document that he -- the briefing that he made, you will see that, you know, 2009 was just really a terrible year. You know, part of it is relatively speaking because in 2004, 2005, 2006, the Taliban were just beginning to kind of reform. Now they have reformed with a vengeance.

VELSHI: All right, Peter Bergen. Thank you very much for that. You can look at Peter's article on this. Peter Bergen is our CNN national security analyst joining us.

When we come back we're going to continue our look for the stimulus money. That's the tally of the dollars that we are reviewing here at CNN. We are up to $1,760,000,000. When I come back, I'll check in with Harvard Economist Ken Rogoff about whether the money has been spent the right way, whether it could have been spent better, and whether we would have been better off with or without it. When we come back.

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VELSHI: We're following all week, every day this week, the stimulus money. What happened to the $787 billion that went into the stimulus bill? Has it been spent? How has it been spent? Is it working?

We've also got a CNN/Opinion Research poll I want to show you where we asked whether you are in favor of or oppose the stimulus bill. Forty-two percent favor the bill. Fifty-six percent oppose. Now, that breaks down a lot of ways, and we'll talk about it a lot. Perhaps people don't know exactly what's in it. Perhaps they oppose it because they actually do know what's in it.

We also asked people how much money in the economic stimulus bill has been wasted. Twenty-one percent, 150 of you, say nearly all of it. A quarter of you say most of it. Twenty-nine percent say about half of it, and a quarter say little or none has been wasted.

Let's talk about this with Kenneth Rogoff, professor of public policy and economics at Harvard University. Ken, you have looked at this very, very carefully. I have to say, back when the stimulus bill was being discussed, most economists fell into the camp of timing and how much to spend. Very few said there is no need for an economic stimulus bill at all. Do you think this was a necessary thing to do a year ago?

KEN ROGOFF, PUBLIC POLICY/ECONOMICS PROFESSOR, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: Absolutely. Let's put it this way. Do we want to rewind the clock, go back to where the economy is on a precipice and it could have cost us more and try to cost us and try to do everything differently or not? We really don't know exactly what worked. I think the stimulus may have been the least important part of it, but it played a role in confidence. It was part of the picture. I don't think you can just say, forget it, we're better now, I don't want to pay for it.

VELSHI: All right. I want to show you what we're doing over here. I'm going to just ask Robert to bring the camera over here. We are looking through all of the stimulus projects. We have stacks and stacks of these books that list each one of these individual stimulus projects, and the people here on the Stimulus Desk are making calls, and we're trying to measure the success of it.

As an economist, Ken, how should we be measuring the success of stimulus? Is it the right time to be measuring it or is it not important that we measure it now? Tell me what you think about it.

ROGOFF: Well, I mean, watching government close up is not pleasant. When you try to scale it up this way, really fast. It is horrible. I don't think you can look at the money spent. You have to look at what we might have saved. The economy was at a precipice. There was a chance we would be in a second great depression.

You can say, well, it didn't happen. Well, sure, it didn't happen, but how do we know what was the critical piece? Sure, the $700 billion sounds like a lot of money, but it's only 5 percent of GDP. I mean, man, that's how much our economy fell and more. It could have gone twice that. So, really...

VELSHI: Let me ask you this. There are economists who say, we were headed for recession. Recessions are things that come in cycles, and we would have emerged from the recession. Should we have just let it go? Should we have let the economy go into recession? Take its normal course and come out?

ROGOFF: Well, normally I'd say yes, but normally we don't think we are facing a second Great Depression. This was a financial crisis. If you look at the history of financial crises, it meets all the criteria. It had all the signs. It's not your garden variety recession. It was the worst thing since the Great Depression. It was very dangerous. Our banking system was compromised. So, it was a very scary moment. It's really hard to play backseat driver here.

VELSHI: All right. Ken Rogoff, thanks for joining us to tell us a little bit about it. Ken Rogoff is a professor of public policy and economics at Harvard University. All day, all week we're following the stimulus money. We're tracking about $1.76 billion of it now. That's the stuff that our CNN journalists are working on, trying to get a sense of where that money is going and how it's been spent.

Now, when we come back, we're going to tell you about the jobs that are out there. We have been telling you so much about jobs that have been lost. Leigh Gallagher from "Fortune" magazine will join me. And if you look at "Fortune," they tell you the hundred best companies to work for. Some of them are even hiring. So, get out a pen and pencil. You're going to want to listen to this and take some notes as soon as we come back.

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