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American Morning
Chile Quake: The Aftermath; Democrats Debate on Nuclear Option; National Catastrophe in France; AIG Sells Asia Unit for $35.5B; Chicago's Gun Ban Battle; 911 None of Your Business?; Condolence Letters to Jackie; Peanut Allergies; Vaccines & Autism; Yelling Mom and Dad
Aired March 01, 2010 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Happy Monday. Thanks for being with us on AMERICAN MORNING. It is the 1st day of March, so hopefully we can leave some of winter behind. Fingers crossed.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: I know I still have 16 inches of snow in my front yard.
CHETRY: Yes. You've got a lot of shoveling this weekend. I'm Kiran Chetry. Thanks for being with us.
ROMANS: I'm Christine Romans. John Roberts is off today. Here are the big stories we'll be telling you about in the next 15 minutes.
An outbreak of looting this morning after one of the most powerful earthquakes on record slams Chile. The streets are littered with rubble and the death toll is climbing as rescuers desperately search for survivors. This morning we're live on the ground in Chile.
CHETRY: And whether you want it or not, Democrats could be on the verge of passing a trillion dollar health care bill without a single Republican on board. The minority party may not be able to do anything to stop. Jim Acosta explains the, quote, "nuclear option" that could come into play next.
ROMANS: And a deadly blast of winter weather hits Europe. In France, severe flooding has caused dozens of deaths leaving nearly a million people without power. The French prime minister calls the violent weather a national catastrophe. We'll have a live report ahead.
CHETRY: We begin this morning, though, with a country in chaos after two days of one of the strongest earthquakes ever hit that nation. The death toll in Chile now over 700 and it's likely to keep rising. More than 500,000 homes are said to be damaged. On the streets there are scenes of looting. The country now imposing a curfew to try to cut down on crime. Chile's president now calling for international help and today Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is on her way to the region.
This morning CNN is covering this story like no one else. We have Karl Penhaul. He's live in Concepcion, Chile. And, Karl, the big problem today appears to be looting. What's going on?
KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the authorities will be trying to keep a lid on that, Kiran, because yesterday there was looting in a supermarket not just far away from here and also at a flour mill. And then that scene was repeated in other cities here in South Central, Chile, and police had to step in using riot tactics, firing tear gas to stop, to stop looters looking not only for food, it has to be said, but also for some household goods, as well. And so, for that very reason, there was a dusk till dawn curfew imposed here in the city of Concepcion and that has just finished, Kiran.
CHETRY: Of course, Karl, we have the images of the devastation of Haiti's earthquake still fresh in our minds but as we understand that Chile, a country much better prepared for an earthquake, right?
PENHAUL: It is. And funny you should mention Haiti, I mean, of course, that situation is uppermost in people's minds looking for the comparisons here. A rescue crew, a five-fighter rescue crew working on this building here. A 15-story building that simply fell over on its side. That rescue crew had only recently returned from Haiti. Now, what the head of the firefighters there told me was that Chile has a longer culture, longer tradition of preparing for earthquakes. The building codes are much stronger and, of course, it is a much wealthier country.
Chile has one of the highest per capita incomes in South America, and so a lot of that is spent on building, building buildings that can withstand earthquakes. Also interestingly what the firefighter described, the head firefighter described to me is that when he was in Haiti, he realized that the earthquakes went in a kind of a wave he described. He says here it's much more straight forward shaking. And he says that that tends not to damage buildings so much, but he points it all to the strenuous building codes that have been put in place. Although obviously it must be said that didn't work for this 15-story building. This is a new building, in fact, and it simply fell on its side.
CHETRY: Unbelievable. Karl Penhaul for us this morning in Concepcion, Chile. Thank you.
ROMANS: So this morning the ground continues to shake in Chile making it dangerous for rescue workers and it's complicating relief efforts. Also a huge challenge for aide workers. Roads have been torn up or simply gone. Check this out. It was a bridge over the Claro River.
Our Soledad O'Brien is on the phone with us making her way to Concepcion. And, Soledad, how difficult this morning is it for you to travel?
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): It's been really, really difficult because as you point out, a lot of those bridges, big bridges, like the one you show, but also little bridges, every bridge and every little overpass is a problem to get across. We've been driving now for about 12 hours, and we stopped first in a town called Temuco, which was weirdly deserted because they had, it was described to us, a wave, a massive wave rolled through. So even though some of the businesses are operating and they have light, many people just packed up their stuff and left. They have the feel of a very weirdly deserted town.
Now in a little town called Los Angeles (ph), and we've seen some gas lines, but everything is pretty calm. It's just about 8:00 in the morning and, again, the same thing here. The roads have massive cracks, but still pretty difficult to get across any of these bridges.
Twenty minutes ago, there was a big aftershock here and it woke a lot of the folks up. People started getting up to get supplies and after that it got very calm again. They have called, though, from this town for ambulances after that aftershock to go into Concepcion where they had massive problems and massive damage as you've just seen from Karl Penhaul's report. Here less populated.
So, you have some damage to roofs and the military guarding some of those buildings to stave off any looting. But here because it's less populated, the damage is not quite so widespread. And also, remember, they had a quake in 1960, again, in 1985. Many of the people, we're told, took that as a sign to rebuild their homes or reinforce their homes. So many of the homes that have withstood the quake here are nearly new or reinforced and the ones that now this morning have police tape wrapped around them, they're homes that weren't reinforced or built before the last quake -- Christine.
ROMANS: All right. Certainly a lot of lessons from previous earthquakes. This is a scenario that certainly knows tremblers and how to deal with them. The engineering there much different that what we've seen obviously in Haiti. Soledad O'Brien, thank you so much, Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Great, got it.
CHETRY: And Saturday's earthquake sparked tsunami warnings across the Pacific. In Hawaii, the waves were actually much smaller than expected. But scientists defended sending out those warnings that forced thousands of people to seek higher ground. Officials say that after the 2004 Indonesian tsunami that killed hundreds of thousands of people, a failure to warn just was not an option.
ROMANS: And stay with us. Coming up, next, what does it mean to have two destructive earthquakes strike in just a short period of time? We'll ask Roger Bilham. He's a professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
CHETRY: Well, President Obama talking about health care reform in his weekend web address saying let's get this done. But it doesn't look like Thursday's summit did anything really to bring Congress closer to a compromise. So now Democrats are on the verge of taking a dramatic step, one that could leave Republicans powerless to stop the bill.
Our Jim Acosta is here to explain the process and the potential consequences from Washington this morning. Hey, Jim. JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Kiran. Just because the Democrats are talking about reconciliation doesn't mean both parties will join hands and sing kumbaya on Capitol Hill. One Republican is calling the measure a kamikaze mission.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ACOSTA (voice-over): With health care reform cleaning the life in Congress, Democrats are about to try a radical procedure to save the patient and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on CNN's "State of the Union: they'll do it with or without Republican support.
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D), HOUSE SPEAKER: They have had plenty of opportunity to make their voices heard.
ACOSTA: The likely path ahead would require some tricky legislative surgery. First, the House would vote to approve the Senate bill that's already passed. Then the Senate would use one of its little known rules called "reconciliation" to fix its original bill, removing portions that were unpopular like the last-minute sweetheart deal to Nebraska Democrat Ben Nelson.
SEN. ROBERT MENENDEZ (D), NEW JERSEY: I think Americans should know that when we hear the words about reconciliation, it is simply a majority vote.
ACOSTA: Under reconciliation, only 51 votes are required to pass a bill, no filibustering allowed. While the procedure was designed for budget matters, it's been used in the past to expand health care and then some. Reconciliation was used to pass welfare reform under President Clinton and a push through tax cuts under George W. Bush. When they were in the majority, Republicans also tried reconciliation to authorize new oil drilling in Alaska.
SEN. JUDD GREGG (R), NEW HAMPSHIRE: If you've got 51 votes, for your position, you win.
ACOSTA: Now in the minority, GOP leaders see it differently.
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R), MINORITY LEADER: Just because it's been used before for lesser issues, it doesn't mean it's appropriate for this issue.
ACOSTA: Republicans are waving this letter written by one of the creators of reconciliation, Senate Democrat Robert Byrd, who said last April using the procedure to pass health care reform would do serious injury to the constitutional role of the Senate.
SEN. TOM COBURN (R), OKLAHOMA: The danger of what's happening right now in terms of using reconciliation is the purpose of the Senate is going to be defeated, and that is to bring consensus to big issues in this country.
ACOSTA: But Democrats argue they tried bipartisanship by dropping the idea of a government insurance plan or public option from what's likely to be in the final bill. PELOSI: Let me say this. The bill can be bipartisan, even though the votes might not be bipartisan because they have made their imprint on this.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ACOSTA: There you go. If you look at the reconciliation scoreboard and there is one in this town, you'll find that Republicans have used it more when they've been in the majority, 16 times. Compare that to the number of times used under a Democratic majority, just six times. But, Kiran, Republicans argue this has not been used to restructure one-sixth of the economy. Democrats respond what's good for the goose is good for the gander -- Kiran.
CHETRY: Right. And you heard both of those talking points all day yesterday on the Sunday shows.
ACOSTA: That's it.
CHETRY: That they've never done it before for something this large but --
ACOSTA: If you think you heard talking points up until now, just buckle your seat belts.
CHETRY: Exactly. All right, well, we'll see. We'll follow the process and see how it goes. Thanks so much, Jim.
ACOSTA: You bet.
ROMANS: All right. Other stories new this morning. Vancouver says goodbye to the world. The Olympic torch was passed during last night's closing ceremonies to Sochi, Russia, site of the 2014 winter games. There were fireworks on the final day. Canada beat the U.S., of course, 3-2 in overtime to win the gold in hockey. God, that was a great game. The U.S. with 37 overall medals set a record for most medals won at any single winter games.
CHETRY: Congrats to them on that one.
ROMANS: Yes.
CHETRY: Would it have been better if (INAUDIBLE).
Well, doctors have declared that President Obama is in excellent health. He's fit for duty. He had his first physical yesterday since taking the oath of office. The president's doctors, though, seem to indicate that he still hasn't kicked smoking and that his cholesterol has crept up a bit to borderline high levels.
ROMANS: Millions of unemployed Americans could be losing a financial lifeline. Their extended federal jobless benefits begin to expire today. The Senate failed to pass an extension last week which means unemployed workers can no longer apply for assistance. Lawmakers will try again this week to temporarily extend the program for another 30 days. CHETRY: And more than 200,000 homes still without power in the northeast as the region braces for yet another major storm. Still trying to clean up and deal with last week's storm which dumped record amounts of snow across New York, Pennsylvania, New England. Maine is expected to get the brunt of the new storm front that's bringing in some cases another half foot of snow.
ROMANS: It's 10 minutes past the hour. That means it's time for a quick check of the morning's weather headlines. Jacqui Jeras in the extreme weather center.
Good morning, Jacqui. Certainly it has been -- feels like the Midwest out here. I got to tell you, we've been shoveling and shoveling for three weeks now.
JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: You should feel right at home there, Christine. Well, the good thing I can tell you about this storm, the one that continues to linger into the northeast is that it's going to be quick hit today and that is going to be pulling on out. But one of the biggest impacts we'll have with this storm is that the winds are going to just be brutal, once again. We could see 20 to 30-mile-per-hour sustained winds and gusts well beyond that.
Let's show you the radar picture and you can see that we're dealing with some snow in the interior but we've got rain really into many of the coastal areas. Boston 36 degrees and rain now in New York City. We think you'll get mostly just sprinkles with it. There you can see those wind speeds which are going to be increasing as we head into the afternoon.
As for the folks who still don't have any power, well, waking up to temps in the 30s. We'll see highs in the upper 30s to lower 40s today at best. So certainly very cold and you're going to need to figure out a way to keep yourself warm for today.
The other big storm we're watching, this upper level low across the southern plain states bringing in some heavy rain across Texas and then to lower Mississippi River Valley. Cold air wrapping around the back side of it. It means snow for some parts of the south, but we're not expecting a lot of that to be sticking around.
Airport delays will be abundant, once again. Mostly due to the winds into the northeast and that rain. We'll see in Dallas and Houston, maybe 30 to 60 minutes. So, continue to get these series of storms, guys. It's just track along the south and go into the northeast but at least this Texas one we don't think is going to quite turn into the nor'easter that the last few did.
CHETRY: Little bright spot there.
ROMANS: Jacqui Jeras. Thanks, Jacqui.
JERAS: I give you hope.
CHETRY: You know, people talk about how, you know, strenuous it is to shovel snow, of course. ROMANS: Sure.
CHETRY: Just for the heck, I put on my heart rate monitor to see what it was like.
ROMANS: Oh, really?
CHETRY: Really popping up to 170, 175 when I was shoveling the heavy, wet snow out there.
ROMANS: Yes, it really is. Use your legs, be careful, and if you have an elderly neighbor, as Rob Marciano says, do it for your neighbors.
CHETRY: I was thinking, I see the people that have their own little snow blower things that they push. Not a bad idea this winter.
ROMANS: I bet it was a brisk weekend at the Home Depot.
CHETRY: Sure, it was.
Well, we're not the only ones actually dealing with very, very extreme weather. A severe weather system slams Europe. This is just something they haven't seen in years. We have a live report coming up on the impact.
Thirteen minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROMANS: All right. It's 15 minutes past the hour. Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
A violent storm system has killed dozens of people across Western Europe, most of the victims in France, where hurricane force winds triggered huge waves that flooded coastal neighborhoods.
CHETRY: Yes. People drowned, many people caught off guard by the worst storm to hit the area in 10 years. The French prime minister calling it a national catastrophe.
CNN's Sasha Herriman is following the latest development. She joins us live in London, and explain for our audience as well how rare this type of extreme weather is, Sasha.
SASHA HERRIMAN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, as you touched on that (ph). I mean, it's basically the worst storm in a decade, certainly as far as the French are concerned. In Europe we don't often see this kind of extreme weather system.
It's been dubbed as Xynthia, and it stretched all the way from Portugal when it hit at the weekend, going all the way up to the Netherlands, so right across Europe. At least 58 people have died across Europe in those -- those extreme weather conditions we're talking about, floods, high winds and so on. This also affects us here in the U.K., not to the same extent as elsewhere in Europe, but up in the north of England, very, very severe winds.
A look at a few more details on exactly what the impact of the storm was.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HERRIMAN (voice-over): In the wake of Xynthia, a trail of devastation leaving dozens dead. Tearing across half a dozen countries in Europe, Xynthia's hurricane force winds took aim first at Portugal and Spain.
In Spain, both fire and flood, as gusts of 160 kilometers an hour battered the country. Power cuts affected more than 150,000 homes. In France, where most people were killed, more than a million homes lost power.
People were rescued from rooftops as the waters rose, and many expressed shock of what they've gone through.
Southwest France was worst hit. Many roads were impassable because of floods and fallen trees. Flights and trains were cancelled. It's their worst storm in a decade.
FRANCOIS FILLON, FRENCH PRIME MINISTER (through translator): It's a natural catastrophe. My first thoughts go to the victims and their families with whom I'm presenting condolences from the government and the nation.
Now, the priority is to bring all the people left homeless and those still threatened bythe rising waters to safety. All services are mobilized to reach that goal as soon as possible.
HERRIMAN: French president Nicolas Sarkozy is visiting the worst-affected areas.
A similar picture in Germany, the late winter storm brought driving rain and high winds. Rail services were disrupted.
As the Atlantic storm continues to cut its way across Europe, the number of dead is expected to rise, as many people are still missing.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HERRIMAN: So, as you can see, the -- the consequences of the storm are pretty dire. You've got those severe floods. You've got people dealing with the aftermath, trying to clear up.
And, of course, all that implies (ph) there's going to be a huge cost involved because of course all the national governments have had to get out their emergency services, put them on high alert. And also, in places like France, they've had to bring out the soldiers, mobilize the soldiers to actually help people, to rescue people.
So an awful lot to deal with in the aftermath of that pretty severe storm.
Back to you in the studio.
CHETRY: All right. Sasha Herriman for us this morning from London. Thanks.
So we're not the only ones dealing with that type of extreme, extreme weather that we really haven't seen in a while.
ROMANS: You know, and so rare there, too.
CHETRY: Well, coming up in the next block of our Most News in the Morning, a repair job at one of the nation's biggest airports. We're going to tell you how long it's going to take and the ripple effects that could be felt across the country if you're flying.
Nineteen minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Well -- did we miss this memo? Twenty-two minutes past the hour right now.
ROMANS: I know.
CHETRY: We're "Minding Your Business' this morning, and this will come as a shock to a lot of people who live around here.
The busiest runway at JFK in New York is closing today for repairs, and it will not see a single plane for four months. What that could mean for you is delays, if you travel, and even if you don't come anywhere near New York City.
It could also mean higher ticket prices at the airport since there will of course be fewer arrivals and departures at the largest city in the nation.
ROMANS: Also, Toyota's Japanese rivals, Honda and Nissan, could suffer collateral damage from the carmaker's recent troubles. Industry experts say it may damage the image of quality and dependability that Americans attribute to most Japanese car brands and they say when the dust settles, Ford, G.M. and Hyundai could benefit most from the Toyota fiasco.
CHETRY: Also just in to CNN, a big announcement from AIG this morning.
ROMANS: Yes. That -- it means a return of billions of dollars to the government's coffers. The -- the troubled insurance giant plans to sell its Asian life insurance business to Britain's Prudential. The price tag, $35.5 billion.
Why do you care? Because you, ladies and gentlemen, own AIG.
Here's what -- here's what the deal looks like. Prudential will put up $25 billion in cash, $10.5 billion in stock and other securities. The good news for U.S. taxpayers who own a majority of the company, the $25 billion cash component, Kiran, is slated to go right back to them.
This is one of the biggest chunks of AIG to be sold as part of this company's push to -- to pay back more than $181 billion in bailout money. That's your money.
Other sales over the past 14 months have brought in about $5.6 billion.
CHETRY: This also comes on the heels of us hearing about bad earnings news, right, for AIG? The losses in this past quarter.
ROMANS: Right. And they have been looking for buyers for big chunks of this company, you know, and they've been looking to try to figure out ways to get money back to the taxpayers, because $181 billion investment company, for you (ph), it's just not sustainable. It's something that they'd like to figure out how to unwind the flow of (INAUDIBLE).
CHETRY: And we heard a lot when this entire banking crisis was first happening, the notion of too big to fail, and they were saying that in the future they were going to try to make sure that wasn't the case. Is this part of that plan?
ROMANS: It's part of that plan, but AIG -- I've got to tell you, you know, when we talked to people in the administration and in the prior administrations, AIG is its own separate beast. I mean, the things that went wrong there are much different than what went wrong in the -- in the regular banking system.
I mean, this is an insurance company, for crying out loud. So, yes, the AIG is the -- is the epitome of too big to fail.
CHETRY: All right. Well, next on the Most News in the Morning, the Supreme Court is set to hear a pivotal case. It involves a handgun ban.
Now, those who are for it say it is saving lives. There are others who say, wait a minute, why should I have my gun taken away if I'm just trying to keep my family safe?
Twenty-five minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROMANS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. It's 27 minutes past the hour, and it's time for an "A.M. Original", a story you're -- you'll only see here on AMERICAN MORNING.
Chicago is the frontline for a historic gun battle that's now being waged before the Supreme Court. On one side, those who say their Second Amendment rights to keep and bear arms have been violated. On the other, parents and teachers who swear their city's handgun ban is saving lives on some very, very rough streets.
Kate Bolduan now from Chicago's South Side.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is one of the most important gun rights cases in our nation's history, and it's putting the spotlight squarely on Chicago.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): In one of Chicago's roughest South Side neighborhood, a rare safe haven for some of the city's most at-risk youth.
DIANE LATIKER, FOUNDER, KIDS OFF THE BLOCK: They walk looking backwards. If you -- if you would stay here two days, you'd realize our young people walk looking backwards in every (INAUDIBLE), because of drive-bys.
BOLDUAN: When Diane Latiker opened up her own home to start the non-profit Kids Off the Block seven years ago, she was fighting to stem the tide of gang activity in her neighborhood.
Now, Latiker says, she's just fighting to keep the kids alive, up against some of the worst gun violence the city has ever seen. And it has grabbed headlines.
According to city statistics, Chicago has the highest rate of youth homicide in the country, 36 killings in the last school year alone -- 36 reasons Latiker supports Chicago's handgun ban.
BOLDUAN (on camera): So why have the ban in place if people are going to get them anyway?
LATIKER: Because I'd rather something be in place than nothing be in place.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): That ban is now being challenged in a case that's made its way to the Supreme Court, a case brought by another Chicago community activist, 76-year-old Otis McDonald.
OTIS MCDONALD, OPPOSES CHICAGO HANDGUN BAN: We wouldn't want to go down to the right here.
BOLDUAN (on camera): Why is that?
MCDONALD: Because that's a hot area. (INAUDIBLE) like that.
BOLDUAN: Hot meaning dangerous a little bit?
MCDONALD: Yes. Well, where the drug dealing and stuff goes on.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): McDonald says like Latiker he, too, fears for the safety of the community, but argues it's his constitutional right to protect himself and his family from the violence. He wants the handgun ban lifted.
MCDONALD: That's all I want, is -- is just a fighting chance. Give me the opportunity to at least make somebody else think about something before they come in my house on me.
BOLDUAN (on camera): The Supreme Court almost two years ago struck down a similar ban in Washington, but because D.C. is a federal district, the court left largely unanswered how gun laws apply to states and cities.
When it comes down to it, why take on this ban?
MCDONALD: We're in a war, simply that. The innocent, law- abiding citizens against the drug dealers and gang-bangers. That's -- that's what it is. That's what it boils down to.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): But Diane Latiker fears making handguns legal again will only mean more guns on the streets, and more names she'll have to add to this memorial.
(on camera): How many are in there now?
DIANE LATIKER, CHICAGO RESIDENT: Two hundred and one.
BOLDUAN: And you said you're still five short?
LATIKER: We're always behind.
The court's ruling has the potential of overturning decades of gun control laws across the country and may finally answer the question: where does the power of the Second Amendment lie, with the individual or the government?
Kate Bolduan, CNN, Chicago.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROMANS: All right. It's 30 minutes past the hour and that means it's time for this morning's top stories.
Developing news from the disaster zone in Chile. The death toll is climbing in the wake of Saturday's devastating earthquake. Officials said more than 700 people were killed and that number is expected to rise as search and rescue efforts continue.
Today, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is expected to arrive in Chile to meet with the country's president.
CHETRY: Well, with both sides refusing to budge on health care reform, Democrats could go for it alone. There's now a talk of pushing through a bill without any Republican support. It's called a reconciliation vote. It only needs 51 to pass.
One Republican senator said it would be, quote, "political kamikaze mission" for the Democrats to try to jam it through.
ROMANS: And violent winter storms are triggering a natural disaster in France. Dozens of people drowned and huge waves that were kicked up by hurricane-force winds. French President Nicolas Sarkozy plans to visit the country's storm-battered Atlantic coast.
ROMANS: Nine-one-one calls can show us how lives were saved and sometimes how it could have been saved. But now, several states are considering laws that would actually keep the public from hearing those many times emotional recordings. Many celebrities have seen their calls spread like wildfire, like -- in fact, recently, the one that led police to Tiger Woods' home.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
911 OPERATOR: What happened? What's wrong?
UNIDENTIFIED CALLER: I have a neighbor, he hit the tree. We came out here just to see what is going on. I see him and he's laying down.
911 OPERATOR: He hit a tree? You mean it was an auto accident?
UNIDENTIFIED CALLER: Yes. There was an auto accident. Yes.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
CHETRY: And there's one example, of course. But does the caller's right to privacy trump the public's right to hear these calls?
Joining us from Tucson, Arizona, is David Cuillier. He's the chairman of the Society of Professional Journalists' Freedom of Information Committee. And we also have with us: Susan Howley, the spokesperson for the National Center for Victims of Crime.
Thanks for both of you for being with us.
SUSAN HOWLEY, NATIONAL CENTER FOR VICTIMS OF CRIME: Thank you.
DAVID CUILLIER, SOCIETY OF PROFESSIONAL JOURNALISTS' FREEDOM OF INFORMATION COMMITTEE: Thank you.
CHETRY: Susan, I'll start with you. Three states now, there's Alabama, Wisconsin and now, Ohio, that are working to ban the release of 911 audiotapes. They want them basically to be available only as transcripts.
Now, as an advocate for crime victims, why do you support this ban?
HOWLEY: We support it because when crime victims or family members call 911, they're doing so at a moment of profound grief, a moment of profound crisis. They shouldn't be required to pause and think: wait a minute, whatever I say here could be on the evening news. It could be heard by all my children's friends, by everyone I know, and by people that I've never met.
CHETRY: All right.
And, David, you say that these tapes, even those of a very emotional nature, can actually be a real public service. In fact, you're referring when we spoke to you earlier to the Toyota 911 call as the most recent example. Explain.
CUILLIER: Well, yes, I think you have to weigh the benefit, the public benefit with the drawbacks. And with the Toyota situation, that story was under the radar. People weren't covering that issue until a 911 tape was publicized, surfaced of a highway patrolman who was off duty driving his car which accelerator stuck. He had three in-laws in the car, including a 13-year-old girl, and they're going 120 miles per hour down the highway and going toward an intersection and a gorge.
And this phone call he was very calm, but you could tell it was a tense situation when you listen to it. You could Google it. You'll find it anywhere on the Internet.
CHETRY: Right.
CUILLIER: This private citizen, and they crashed and they all died. It was a terrible incident and it was tragic and it's heart- wrenching to listen to. But it took that 911 tape call to get public attention to this recall, which wasn't getting any before the tape surfaced.
CHETRY: Right.
CUILLIER: So, I think --
CHETRY: Susan, let's get your response to that argument about sometimes serving the greater good in cases where people can actually hear the emotion and can hear the fear of something like David's referring to, that accident that ended up being for the greater good in general by bringing an issue to the forefront.
HOWLEY: Yes. We don't argue that there can't be those rare cases where the public good in releasing the tape outweighs the privacy interests. But those should be rare and there should be a deliberate process to determine that the public good outweighs the victim or the caller's interest in privacy. And then, where that tape is released, it should be done sensitively -- by which I mean, crime victims should have advance warning that this tape is going to be released. And they should have an opportunity to hear it in advance.
You know, we have heard from victims and family members who have called our national crime victim help line that their outrage in hearing that tape broadcast is compounded by the fact that no one told them in advance that this was going to happen.
CHETRY: Right, I understand what you're saying, as well. And, you know, these were things that internally are discussed in newsrooms around the country, here at CNN as well, about when and where it's appropriate to release these tapes.
But, David, you even, in your organization, have guidelines for journalists, saying that only an overriding public need can justify intrusion into someone's privacy. In these cases, we're talking about these private citizens. But how do you weigh it?
You know, we can just -- we can think back to so many celebrity 911 calls that are just played over and over again. I mean, you can even remember the Alec Baldwin tape, it was not a 911 tape but it was a voicemail message that he made to his daughter that just get played over and over again simply because it's interesting or sensational, not because it's necessarily serving the public good.
CUILLIER: Right. And if you Google 911 tapes, you'll find a bunch of those celebrity 911 tapes online that, frankly, to me, are kind of a waste of time. I mean, they're not really serving a huge public good other than people's prurient interests. And you'll also find a lot of tapes for chilling 911 tapes, calls, and those are -- those are just horrific.
So, I agree with Susan that we have to look at the victims' rights and how it affects them and we have to weigh that in our decision over whether the public interest outweighs it. I think journalists do that. When they do that, now, some of them mess up. Some journalists will throw stuff out there that doesn't really serve a public interest and it hurts people and that's wrong.
And we have codes of ethics to try to self-regulate that sort of thing. If you're an unethical journalist, you're going to have a tough time in this business. But, more important, I think, viewers and listeners should be regulating and telling the station, that was bad. Don't do it again.
CHETRY: Well, David Cuillier and Susan Howley, great to get both of your points of view this morning. Thanks for being with us.
HOWLEY: Thank you.
CUILLIER: Thank you.
ROMANS: OK. Still ahead on the Most News in the Morning: a glimpse into a painful chapter in our nation's history. We're going to take a look at some of the thousands of letters written to Jackie Kennedy after her husband was assassinated.
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CHETRY: Forty minutes past the hour. Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
President John F. Kennedy's assassination back in 1973 has been revisited many times both on film and in television.
ROMANS: But there's a new book that takes a different look, an entirely different picture of how JFK's death brought this country together in grief.
Carol Costello with an "A.M. Original" that takes a very personal look back.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A file folder full of personal and national anguish.
ELLEN FITZPATRICK, AUTHOR, "LETTERS TO JACKIE": I loved this letter.
COSTELLO: Just one of the hundreds of thousands of letters Americans sent to First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy after the nation buried her husband.
NARRATOR: The old, the young, the aged, the children -- they became one in their grief, in a spontaneous outpouring that throws up an enduring memorial to the American spirit.
FITZPATRICK: This is a wonderful letter.
COSTELLO: Historian Ellen Fitzpatrick has, for the first time, cataloged that grief by combing through the archives of the JFK Library and selecting 250 nearly forgotten condolence letters. She's put them in a book "Letters to Jackie."
(on camera): Did it stun you, just the sheer number of letters that people wrote to Jackie Kennedy?
FITZPATRICK: Well, she actually received over -- somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.5 million letters.
COSTELLO (voice-over): One of them written by an 8-year-old boy named Kevin Radell. It says, "Dear Mrs. Kennedy, I'm sorry your husband got shot. I know you should forgive your enemies, but it is hard to forgive Lee Oswald."
KEVIN RADELL, LETTER WRITER: It is hard to forget that the president got shot.
COSTELLO: That little boy is all grown up now.
(on camera): Take me back to that time. What was it like?
RADELL: It was terrifying. It was terrifying and it was just convergence of emotions of fear because he was such a protector of the nation and such a leader. And we all loved him. He was a fatherly figure.
COSTELLO (voice-over): Fatherly figure. If there's a common theme in these letters, it's that.
FITZPATRICK: One woman compared the assassination of President Kennedy with the crucifixion. She said, "They killed our Lord and Father and now, they have killed our president and father."
COSTELLO: The flood of grief transcended racial and economic lines. "I am a colored lady, but he seemed close to me as my own. All the luck and to Caroline and Little Johnie, all the love I have. I am 74 years old and your father was my friend." The letter was written by Martha Ross, daughter of a slave with no formal education. Her great-grandson, Winston Lucky.
WINSTON LUCKY, LETTER WRITER'S GREAT-GRANDSON: You know, even those people who didn't like him, they loved him, he was a strong man. My grandmother, she always talked about, you know, that he was going to help to set this country right.
JACKIE KENNEDY, FMR. U.S. FIRST LADY: All of you who have written to me know how much we all loved him and that he returned that love.
COSTELLO: Mrs. Kennedy tried to show her appreciation. This little boy sent a photo and comfort of his own. He wrote, "Some mean man killed my daddy, too."
Fitzpatrick says these letters document how Americans responded to the murder of a president and captured the idealism of the times -- an idealism, that like its hero, may be just a memory.
Carol Costello, CNN, Boston.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHETRY: An amazing book, very interesting book.
ROMANS: An event that really touched -- you know, touched this nation and even, you know, I wasn't even born then. It's something that --
CHETRY: It's one of the first stories my mom told me when I was old enough to -- you know, to understand all that.
ROMANS: Yes. All right, it's 44 minutes after the hour. Jacqui Jeras will have this morning's travel forecast right after a quick break.
CHETRY: In 10 minutes, from highways to a farmer's field. Our Jeanne Moos takes a look at some of the wild places that planes have been forced to touch down.
Forty-four minutes after the hour.
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CHETRY: Good morning, New York. There's a shot of Columbia Circle throughout. It's moving along just quite a big departure from what it looked like on Friday morning covered with snow. Right now, it's 33 degrees, and a bit later, it's going up to 42 degrees. Only trouble will be a little bit windy here in the Big Apple, and welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. It's 47 minutes after the hour. It means It's time for your AM House Call, stories about your health.
Scientists say they may have discovered a way to curb peanut allergies in children. They've conducted two studies and in then they found that children were able to build up their tolerance by slowly eating more peanuts over a very long stretch of time, the course of five years. Doctor say the goal is to try to prevent severe reactions that can come from accidentally eating nuts or foods with nuts in them.
A new study finds that there're still a lot of fears about vaccines being linked to autism. One in four parents interviewed believe that some vaccines do cause autism in otherwise healthy kids. Most, though, follow their doctor's orders and continue to get their children vaccinated despite those concerns.
Some universities like Virginia Tech are hoping to deter underage drinking by notifying parents when their kids get caught. The school sends letters home for even minor violations like drinking a beer in a dorm room. Officials say that parents can be very useful in setting boundaries for students that are under the age of 21.
ROMANS: We know, Kiran, that underage binge drinking is a real problem on America's college campuses, and in terms of health care costs, they have done some work on this. It's incredible the amount of health care costs these kind of binge drinking can be charged. The privacy concerns, I think, especially kids or adults 18 years old, but at the same time, you know, mom and dad are paying for college, don't you want to know what they're doing.
CHETRY: We're going to see something far less which is my parents would have gotten so much mail on our dorm room. No, I'm kidding. It's great to have already gone through all of that before the age of cell phones and texting and photos, right? Facebook. Forget it. We had some privacy as young kids, right?
ROMANS: Yes, we did. I think we did.
It's 49 minutes past the hour. It's time for a check of the quick weather headlines.
CHETRY: Now I know I really messed her up.
ROMANS: Jacqui Jeras is in the Extreme Weather Center. Good morning, Jacqui. We will not talk about anything that happened at Iowa State.
CHETRY: Hey, you two went to college together.
JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes. This is why Christine is flustered, because she knows I have stories.
ROMANS: You think so?
JERAS: I am going to have to agree with you, thank goodness no cell phones or Facebook at that time, right? Anyway, you know, lots of nastiness, again, continuing across the northeast today weather wise. Our system here still holding strong in terms of bringing the wicked weather and wind continuing to be the big deal here. This is the same upper level pesky low that hit you late last week, and here we go, kicking off the workweek with more of it. You can see that a lot of the snow starting to transition over to some of this rainfall so do expect to see a little bit of a wintry mix.
Snowfall accumulations are going to be relatively light. You should be able to count the number of inches on one hand for pretty much everybody and then some of that is going to melt off, unfortunately, as that moves into some of that rain so a slushy mess, and you can see the winds continue to stay strong. We could have gusts up to 30 miles per hour, at least this afternoon and possibly beyond that, so that could cause some additional problems. Temperature wise, we're a bit nippy to start you off with this morning, but warming up into the 40s by this afternoon, so still uncomfortable for the hundreds of thousands of people still without power.
Our next weather maker here across the southern plain states bringing some rumbles of thunder across the DFW area, expect some heavy rain, looks like we got a good half of an inch plus out of that system. Many airport delays are expected today as a result of those two systems, but the rest of the country, overall, should be relatively quite tranquil. Today is March 1, by the way, guys, which is the official start of meteorological spring, so we will try and hit things off with a good note today, even though technically, it doesn't arrive on the calendar until about mid-month, but we consider it spring today, and we'll talk a little late on the show about what you can expect for March, April and May, temperature wise and precipitation wise.
CHETRY: All right. We'll take it even if it's just meteorological spring. Any type of springs sounds good to us at this point.
JERAS: I broke out the green today.
CHETRY: Good for you. Save it for St. Pat's, also okay, or you'll get pinched. Thanks, Jacqui.
This morning's top stories are just minutes away including a 25 minutes after the hour, 1,000 bucks for a toothbrush? $140 for one Tylenol tablet? Elizabeth Cohen shows us why health care costs are draining this country. It's an "A.M. Original" you don't want to miss.
ROMANS: At half past, why a smaller earthquake caused so much more destruction. We take a look at the scientific difference between the disasters in Haiti and Chile.
CHETRY: And at 55 minutes past the hour, he's back. It's Jay Leno's audience return to late night. Will his audience return too? Fifty-two minutes past the hour.
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ROMANS: This is serious, but it's 54 minutes past the hour and time for the Moost News in the Morning.
CHETRY: It's just getting geared up. The controlling just getting geared up for Jeanne Moos.
ROMANS: That's right, because she has some examples that might not measure up to sully Sullenberger's miracle land on the Hudson. CHETRY: Yes, but other memorable landings, anyway in a room right (ph) including one cockpit emergency that was caught on tape from the inside. Here's Jeanne Moos.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNE MOOS, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): You can bet it wasn't a pilot who said silence is golden. Not when it's your engine that is silent. You could copy in order to copy all its power use, perhaps landing in harvesting field simultaneously. When a Florida pilot's engine died --
UNKNOWN MALE: That field?
UNKNOWN MALE: I'm going to the road.
MOOS: Kyle Davis (ph) opted for setting it down on the road he normally drives to work on. He ended up parked in front of a closed furniture store.
UNKNOWN MALE: Our motto around the office now with Kyle is, if you don't like the way he flies, stay off the road.
MOOS: Watch the wings what this pilot in England should have done. Bring a forced landing in a pasture.
Did you see that? That plane clipped the cow.
Watch the pilot turn his head to see what he hit. According to the accident report, the plane was slightly damaged, but the cow was uninjured. As the pilot put it, I have to say it is the first cow I have ever hit in 22 years flying. The next best thing to putting your plane out to pasture, playing fields in Anchorage, Alaska. Watch the home plate umpire.
UNKNOWN MALE: There's a plane coming down on to the field, folks, right now. We have a crazy landing going on. Here it comes right onto the field, right behind the field.
MOOS: All four people aboard the plane lived to tell about it.
UNKNOWN MALE: Oh, boy.
MOOS: Oh, boy is right. Look at what the dash cam on a Wisconsin state patrol car captured.
UNKNOWN FEMALE: Yes, we had them landed on the highway. 911, are you calling about the airplane?
UNKNOWN FEMALE: Yes, I am.
UNKNOWN FEMALE: Okay, we got it in landed.
MOOS: License and registration, please. Sure, James Bond made it look easy. Landing and rolling right up to the closest gas pump. Now, this is something 007 would attempt. UNKNOWN MALE: Landing on the world's shortest runway.
MOOS: But don't try that on Interstate-70 near Indianapolis where this pilot was forced to land without so much as a turn signal.
UNKNOWN MALE: I skate slightly ahead of the car for a little bit just to give the driver an idea that I was about to touch down.
MOOS: Of course, there's the little matter of taking off, again. They had to close the Interstate, but watch your language when you land. (EXPLETIVE LANGUANGE)
Better make it holy cow.
Jeanne Moos, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROMANS: This is 911, press one if it's about the airplane and press two if it's another emergency.
CHETRY: You probably got so many calls. Are you calling about the airplane? Yes, we know. Thank you, sir.
All right. We're going to take a quick break. Your top story is 90 seconds away.
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