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American Morning
Flood Waters Continue to Devastate Pakistan; Villages Washed Away in Pakistan; China's Economy Rises; Unemployment Battle for National Guards; A Look at the NuVal Nutrition Food GPS; Pakistan Mass Devastation; President Enters Mosque Debate; Social Network Justice
Aired August 16, 2010 - 06:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you. Couple of minutes before the top of the hour on this Monday, August 16th. Glad you're with us on this AMERICAN MORNING. I'm Kiran Chetry.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you. I'm John Roberts. Thanks so much for being with us. A lot to talk about this morning, let's get right to it.
President Obama enters the red-hot debate over the building of an Islamic center and mosque near ground zero. Now, Republicans are making it clear they intend to make the president's apparent support for the project a ballot box issue. We're live at the White House this morning.
CHETRY: The FDA gives the okay to a new form of contraception. Unlike the morning-after pill, this new prescription pill works up to five days later to prevent pregnancy, but that's had been enough test to ensure that it's safe and what about some of the moral implications? We're going to be talking to a fertility specialist coming up.
ROBERTS: And a bizarre ending to the PGA championship in Wisconsin. Thanks to an epic blunder by golfer, Dustin Johnson. We'll tell you how a small patch of sound may have caused him a shot at a major title.
CHETRY: First though, President Obama stemming into the Gulf and into a political mine field at the same time. The president spent the weekend in the Florida panhandle hoping to promote tourism there.
ROBERTS: Yesterday, the first family was entertained by a porpoise during a boat trip. It was playing around in the water. The president and his daughter also spent part of the weekend swimming in calm bay waters.
CHETRY: But President Obama also created a storm this weekend that followed him all the way back to Washington. After weeks of avoiding comment about plans to build an Islamic center and mosque near ground zero, the president weighed in on the issue.
ROBERTS: And his remarks have intensified and already raging debate. Our Suzanne Malveaux is live for us at the White House this morning. And Suzanne, this has pretty much been a local issue up until this weekend. Now, it's raging on the national level.
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. And it's interesting, John and Kiran, because I had asked Robert Gibbs for weeks, pressing him on this, whether or not the White House was going to weigh in, why they didn't. They insisted it was a local issue.
Now White House aides are telling us, well, the president from early on wanted to weigh in on this controversy, that it was all about the timing, first making sure the local zoning board cleared the project, and secondly looking for the right event. That happened on Friday. The dinner celebrating, the Muslim's holy month of Ramadan, the dinner celebrating that at the White House at a dinner.
The president made it absolutely clear that he believes Muslims have the right to build this mosque near the ground zero site.
Now, there was a controversy and criticism that came from those comments after he made them on Friday. And 24 hours later the president gave a different statement to our own Ed Henry. I want you to take a listen first to what the president said on Friday, then what he said on Saturday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Muslims have the right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country.
(APPLAUSE)
And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan.
OBAMA: I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making a decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right that people have that dates back to our founding.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: So the White House is saying that the president is making a distinction here between the right for the Muslims to build that mosque at ground zero versus the efficacy or the wisdom to do so.
John and Kiran, some are calling this a clarification, a recalibration, a backing down of his original position. To me this seems classic Obama, making a point on the one hand this, one the one hand that, trying to cover all of these positions. It is much murkier and muddier for people to really understand what this all out.
CHETRY: Yet he was very clear on Friday night. Whatever transpired between Friday night where he appeared to be extremely supportive of the building of that mosque and cultural center into Saturday --
MALVEAUX: And what transpired overnight, as you know, is quite a bit of criticism coming from Republicans. We have a CNN poll that shows majority of Americans don't approve of building this mosque near ground zero, that this is not a popular position to take.
And so we see the White House really trying to make the point that they have the right to do so, but whether or not it is a good idea, well, that is something that he says he's not going to weigh into.
I think it's very clear that there is a political element to this. The Republicans are raising money on it. They want to make it an issue in midterm elections, and Democrats quite frankly are a little frustrated by that, because they say, look, the White House and the party is now off message.
CHETRY: I guess I'm just wondering with the polling didn't come out between Friday and Saturday. The White House had to have known that this was a controversial issue even before he made the comments Friday, right?
MALVEAUX: Absolutely. Which I think is why the timing of this is so important, because, again, we pushed and pushed. This is a very important issue, a controversial issue. They insisted that they were not going to weigh in on this.
And they -- if you believe what the White House aides say, they say that they went to the president and said we don't think that this is an issue that you can avoid, and at least aides said that the president came back and said it is an issue that we don't think we should avoid, that we should weigh in on this controversial matter, but we need to do it in a way that makes sense in terms of what local officials and how they're dealing with it, and then secondly some sort of appropriate venue.
I think you couldn't avoid meeting with Muslims and celebrating Ramadan and not bring up this very important issue because that's when he decided to do so. And it was a friendly audience as well, as you know.
ROBERTS: He certainly can't avoid the fallout now. Suzanne Malveaux at the White House, thanks.
President Obama's comments sparked strong reaction from both sides of the aisle. Here's what Democratic Congressman Jeremy Nadler and Republican Peter King told our Candy Crowley on "State of the Union."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If the president is going to get into this, he should have been much more clear, much more precise, and you can't be changing your position on day to day on an issue which goes to our constitution and also to extreme sensitivity. That's where I'm critical of the president on it, for not being clear.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The government has no right, no busy, to comment one way or the other on whether a church or synagogue or mosque should be anywhere so long as they meet the legal requirements.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Coming up in about 30 minutes, we'll break down whether president Obama's comments will hurt Democrats come November when we talk about Ben Smith, the senior political reporter for "Politico," and Michael Scherer, "TIME" magazine's White House correspondent.
CHETRY: Also new this morning at five minutes past the hour, an off-road race in southern California turns deadly, killing eight people over the weekend. One of the trucks crashed into a crowd of spectators before flipping upside down. You can see just how close spectators were standing right along the course.
The driver, identified as 28-year-old Brett Sloppy, was not hurt. On his Facebook page he says he's, quote, "devastated" about what happened. Police say he faces no charges. The race's governing body Mojave Desert Racing says it urges crowds to keep at least 100 feet from the course.
ROBERTS: An autopsy is scheduled for today on the accused Craigslist killer. Boston officials say former med student Philip Markoff was found dead in his jail cell on Saturday. He was reportedly discovered with a plastic bag over his head and a slashed artery, an apparent suicide.
Markoff was suspected of killing a masseuse who advertised on Craigslist.
CHETRY: The U.S. and South Korea kicked off their annual joint military exercises this morning. It is part of an 11-day drill designed to ensure the two nations are ready to respond to any potential provocations. On Sunday North Korea promised a, quote, "merciless count-blow" to the U.S. imperialists and called South Korea "traitors."
ROBERTS: A 13-year-old boy who survived the Alaskan plane crash that killed former Senator Ted Stevens has been released from the hospital. Willie Phillips is heading back home to Maryland with his mom. The young man's father bill Phillips was a former Stevens staffer who was also onboard the aircraft that crashed but he did not survive.
CHETRY: Two escaped zebras are now off the streets of Sacramento but made for a wild several hours after they broke out of their owner's home. City officials corralled one of them at an apartment complex on Saturday night after it had taken a dip in the pool.
A witness says the other zebra was actually injured by a car and had to be taken to the vet but was then OK and returned to the professional trainer who owns the animals.
ROBERTS: Excitement on the streets of Sacramento. Right now seven minutes after the hour.
(WEATHER BREAK) CHETRY: The White House party crashers, Tareq and Michaela Salahis, are grabbing headlines yet again. The couple is currently part of the cast of "The Real Housewives of D.C." and the most recent episode appears to show them getting an escort from the district's police department while heading back to a party in December.
ROBERTS: The reality show's production company though says incorrect editing led to the mix-up. It was actually the park police who provided the escort. Don't know why that would be any less outrageous than the metropolitan D.C. force doing it. CNN asked for and has received no comment at least at this point from the park police.
CHETRY: The whole thing is just --
ROBERTS: I guess they just can't go away.
CHETRY: Apparently not. The reality show waiting for you at the end of any train wreck.
Well, it's being called one of the worst natural disasters in human history, devastating flooding in Pakistan, 20 million people hungry, hurt or homeless. We'll be live in Islamabad for an update on the situation. It's ten minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: It's 12 minutes past the hour.
New this morning, word that the warden and security chief are out at the Arizona State prison where three inmates escaped last month. The nationwide search still continues this morning for one of those escapees, John McCluskey and his alleged accomplice, Casslyn Mae Welch.
Authorities have released new composite sketches of them based on information that they may have changed their appearance. It is believed McCluskey now has dark hair and a beard and Welch may have blonde hair and appears to be thinner.
ROBERTS: Police have dropped charges against a man who was arrested after Saturday's deadly shootings in Buffalo, New York. Four people were killed outside of a crowded restaurant, four others wounded. Police say they have new evidence that leads them to leads them to believe arrested the wrong person. The man still remains in jail though on unrelated parole violations.
CHETRY: And 20 million people in a dire situation and close to 1,500 dead from flooding in Pakistan, hundreds of thousands homeless. It's already one of the worst natural disasters ever and it may be getting worse this morning. The U.N. now says that six million people may not have access to shelter, food or clean water and that disease is now spreading.
Reza Sayah is live for us in Islamabad this morning. You just see the pictures of the devastation, Ban Ki-moon of the U.N. calling it the worst disaster he's ever seen with his own eyes. What's the latest this morning, Reza?
REZA SAYAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Things continue to get worse, Kiran. Here's what's most alarming about the situation here in Pakistan. These floods hit more than two weeks ago. And all indications are that things are not improving. They're actually deteriorating.
And that's why the U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon made a visit to Pakistan, to perhaps draw the world's attention to what is dire need here for help in Pakistan. A busy day for the U.N. chief -- he took an aerial tour of what's an enormous flood zone that extends from northwest Pakistan all the way to central Pakistan.
A fifth of this country, according to the U.N., is underwater. To put that in perspective for our U.S. audience, that's like the entire state of Florida underwater. And 20 million people affected, according to government officials.
Here's some more bleak figures. We spoke to the U.N. today. They tell us three and a half million children are at risk of deadly water-borne diseases. A big concern in cholera, which is an infectious disease caused by contaminated food or water.
The only way to address this dangerous situation is to get these flood victims clean water an medical attention. The U.N. is telling us they are nowhere near where they need to be, and that's because of a shortage of aid.
More bleak figures -- the U.N. says they've asked for $56 million in medical aid and have only received $6 million. They're asking for $110 million for clean water. They've only received $19 million. So Pakistan is hoping, Kiran, with the U.N. chief's visit that's going to change because this is certainly a dire situation for these flood victims.
CHETRY: No doubt. Reza Sayah for us this morning, thanks so much.
And people out there probably wondering is there anything I can do. Well, to find out how you can help provide relief to the flood victims in Pakistan, you can visit our "Impact Your World" page at CNN.com/impact.
ROBERTS: All right. We're 15 1/2 minutes after the hour. We're "Minding Your Business" now.
They're number two. China has overtaken Japan as the world's second-largest economy behind the United States. The news underscores China's emergence as a true economic power. CNN Money's Poppy Harlow following these new developments. She joins us now.
We should say that it's number two, way behind the United States.
POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: Way -- yes.
ROBERTS: But still, it's really significant to them. HARLOW: It's a great point. Let's take a look. I want to show you numbers because when you look at GDP, the projections for 2010, we'll get those at the end of the year. But here's what the projection is.
Look at the U.S., almost a $15 trillion economy. China just about a third of that, $5.4 trillion the projection there, just ahead of Japan. And, John and Kiran, this is making official on what we've already seen. Three decades of incredible growth for China. We knew this was coming. Overnight it became official.
I want to show people out there what we're looking at first of all in terms of exports. We all know we buy most of our clothing from China, but the big, big exporters when you look at electrical machinery and equipment, also power generation equipment and apparel. I should say, auto sales in China surpassed auto sales in the U.S. this year. Why is that? You have a booming middle class in China. You have more and more people able to afford luxuries, able to afford cars, able to afford things they haven't.
And one economist put it in a very interesting way. They said, look, for Japan and the U.S. to grow as an economy they have to innovate. For China to grow, it's just catching up. It has all of this catch-up growth. They have a fifth of the world's population so, of course, they're growing. We knew this was coming, but we're partaking in it.
Let's take a look at China's top trading partners. I think you can guess this one. The number one trading partner is us, the United States. Japan, and Hong Kong, its neighbors, right after that. So not only are they our biggest trading partners, they're the biggest trading partners to their own neighbors.
CHETRY: This is certainly a sign of the growing influence of China that we've known about. A lot of economic critics say listen, it's time to start talking to them about currency manipulation --
HARLOW: Yes.
CHETRY: -- trade imbalances, other things because they have such a huge impact on our economy.
HARLOW: Sure. They are going to float their currency. And what does that mean? That means that it's been closely tracking the dollar. They're saying they're going to sort of ease their monetary policy. They'll float their currency. The reason why we buy things from China is they have great export policies. We don't have big tariffs of Chinese products coming in to this country and they're cheap.
So, Japan's currency has been strong making what they export more expensive for us. But it's interesting. Look, we're a long ways off, as you said, John. It's expected by 2030. Some economists say China's economy could surpass the U.S. economy. A long ways off but a possibility.
ROBERTS: On a parallel track, too, with economic growth is their military growth.
HARLOW: Absolutely.
ROBERTS: When you look at Japan having the world's second largest economy, they've only got a self-defense force. Germany's strong economy but not a defensive army.
HARLOW: Right.
ROBERTS: Member of NATO as well. But China, you know, you combine the economic power with the military power, that can be very worrisome in years ahead.
HARLOW: Huge super power, yes.
ROBERTS: Poppy Harlow this morning, Poppy, thanks.
HARLOW: Thanks.
ROBERTS: By the way, be sure to check out the full story on CNNmoney.com.
Americans serving in the National Guard coming home from war only to encounter another battle. Unemployment. Find out why these soldiers are having such a hard time finding work. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Twenty-two minutes now after the hour. For many of the Americans serving in the National Guard, once the fight is over, another battle looms for them.
CHETRY: Yes. It's because a lot of these soldiers are struggling to find work dealing with unemployment after completing their enlistment. Here's Kate Bolduan.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RICHARD WILKS, UNEMPLOYED NATIONAL GUARD SOLDIER: I'm looking up security and law enforcement type jobs that they might be offering.
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): 45-year-old Richard Wilks has served with the Army National Guard for five years fighting eight months in Iraq, only to return home in 2008 to a new battle he never expected. The fight to find a job.
WILKS: I was putting out resume after resume. I'd have some interviews and you just -- I just didn't get hired.
BOLDUAN: Frustrated and running out of money, Wilks turned to the only place he knew would hire --
WILKS: I opted to go back overseas because I couldn't find work. I wanted -- I volunteered to go back to Iraq.
BOLDUAN: Employers are required by law to hold jobs for reservists called to duty and are banned from discriminating against a job applicant because of their military service. But soldiers like Wilks fear their guard service makes employers reluctant to take them on.
WILKS: They didn't want to take the time to hire someone and then have them deployed, then they have to rehire someone.
BOLDUAN (on camera): Wilks is back home once again and again facing the same transition to civilian life without work. He's not alone. The jobless rate among veterans who's served since 9/11 rose to 11.8 percent last month. Compare that to the national rate of 9.5 percent. The Army National Guard says this problem is especially troubling among their ranks.
CPT. BRIAN ZDUNOWSKI, ARMY NATIONAL GUARD: They have skills and they have training that should, in a good economy, give them an edge over their peers.
BOLDUAN: What's the reality of what you're seeing?
ZDUNOWSKI: The edge is gone because they're getting lost in the volume of people.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): Unemployment is such a big issue for the Army National Guard that some states are testing out programs to help their part-time soldiers. Captain Brian Zdunowski runs one program in Maryland.
ZDUNOWSKI: And the sea of employers that are out there, what I'm in essence doing is into the sea throwing a life ring for them and pulling out the life ring until one of these employers picks them up.
BOLDUAN: The help includes resume tips, interview coaching, also a database of military-friendly employers and job openings.
ZDUNOWSKI: They deserve the assistance because they have stepped forward for their country.
BOLDUAN: Richard Wilks continues his search. A tough economy, another tough battle ahead. Any regrets?
WILKINS: I don't have any regrets at all. I loved serving in the military and I loved serving my country.
BOLDUAN: Kate Bolduan, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHETRY: Well, coming up, nutrition by the numbers. There's a new food rating system out to help supermarket shoppers make healthy choices. Supposed to be easy to figure out what's good for you and what's not. Poppy Harlow joins us with an "A.M. Original" just ahead.
Twenty-five minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) CHETRY: Twenty-seven minutes past the hour. Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. Top stories just three minutes away. First though, an "A.M. Original," something you'll see only on AMERICAN MORNING.
Who needs the food police when there's a food GPS to help you cut through what's good for you and what's not?
ROBERTS: It's a new rating system. It's call NuVal. It ranks foods on a number scale to determine just how healthy they are. Poppy Harlow talked to the man behind it. She joins us now. On the surface (ph), it sounds very simple.
POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: It does sound simple but big food companies don't love it. You know, 64 percent of Americans say they're making changes to their diet, trying to eat more healthy. And you'll notice on junk food even, it says whole grain or reduced fat or low sodium. So food companies are pushing to make it seem like their food is healthier but this new system is trying to, as you say, Kiran, break through the fat. They say look, you have to go a lot deeper than just what the front of the package says. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HARLOW (voice-over): Food companies inundate us with healthy sounding slogans. Reduced fat. Whole grain. No sugar added. That means healthier, right? Not necessarily.
DR. DAVID KATZ, NUVAL FOUNDER: The packages all have claims. The claims are often misleading and deceptive.
HARLOW: Yale scientist Dr. David Katz created NuVal. It's a nutrition rating system he claims cuts through the food industry's marketing machine.
KATZ: The higher the number, the more nutritious the food. It's GPS for the food supply.
HARLOW: NuVal ranks food from 1 to 100 using a complex algorithm weighing unhealthy things like trans fat against nutrients like fiber.
KATZ: Almost everything in the produce aisle -- almost everything, will be above 90, between 90 and 100. We have reduced fat Jiff peanut butter. It gets a 7, and the regular Jiff peanut butter gets a 20.
HARLOW (on camera): So higher fat is actually better for you here according to NuVal.
KATZ: Well, no, not because it's higher fat. The reduced-fat version is considerably higher in sodium. It's also higher in sugar.
This is pretty good. Yes.
HARLOW: This is what I ate growing up.
KATZ: Sure. OK.
HARLOW: Twenty-six.
KATZ: Yes.
HARLOW: That's what this gets.
No way. Look at this. This Neapolitan ice cream says it's a 91.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To me that is the flaw of the system. Something such as the ice cream, which is all probably chemicals and all these additives, I don't think really adds to the diet and people shouldn't be getting their nutrients through that ice cream. And something like raisin bran, yes, the raisins may be sugar coated but at least it's a good source of fiber.
HARLOW (voice-over): Dr. Katz says the real value isn't to compare ice cream to cereal but to see how similar products stack up against one another.
KATZ: OK, so let's find Cheerios and Fruit Loops.
HARLOW: None of the major food companies we contacted would go on camera to discuss NuVal. But in a statement Pepsi told us, quote, "Consumers can make more informed choices through fact-based front of package labeling." General Mills said, quote, "Criteria for NuVal are not available to the public making any informed discussion of it very difficult."
(on camera): Why do you think it is that there seems to be this push-back from the big food manufacturers?
KATZ: Not everybody making and selling food really wants people to know the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. NuVal tells that truth.
HARLOW (on camera): Junk food is big business for these big American food companies. If the Nuval system is adopted all across the nation, will it be the end of salty, fatty snack food?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, I certainly hope it would be the end of junk food.
HARLOW: That's billions in revenue for these companies.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But it could be billions in revenues by making better investigations of these same foods.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HARLOW: And you know, about 70,000 items have been graded so far and about 750 grocery stores across the country. It is growing quickly and this, John and Kiran, could be a huge threat to a $26 billion a year snack industry in this country.
ROBERTS: I'm still trying to get my head around how Neapolitan ice cream has the same nutritional value as fruit.
HARLOW: I know. That was our question.
And you know what, the doctor spent a long time in that freezer looking at the ice cream, he says "even I invented this system, I'm not sure why this is the rating." Critics did say because you can add fiber, you can add all of these nutrients to anything but if the basis of it isn't healthy, clean food, then critics say this system doesn't work. So it could really shake up an industry but you got a lot of people who don't agree with it at all.
CHETRY: So what are some foods that are 100?
HARLOW: 100. Blueberries. A lot of anti-oxidants, Romaine lettuce, Iceberg lettuce is only an 82. And yet most of us eat iceberg lettuce. So anything that are clean, clean, bright fruits and vegetables that's going to get you 100. But pretty much nothing else.
ROBERTS: Well, if the guy that invented the system is confused, what's a consumer to do, right?
HARLOW: That's the question. That's the question. But it does guide you sort of in a better direction. I will say that.
ROBERTS: Poppy Harlow, great story this morning. Thanks.
HARLOW: You got it.
CHETRY: Well, we're crossing the half hour right now. Time for a look at our top stories this morning.
Worse than the tsunami in the Pakistani earthquake combined. U.N. Secretary general Ban Ki-Moon saying he has never seen anything that compares to the devastation from the flooding going on right now in Pakistan. Close to 1,500 people are dead. A fifth of the country is under water and some 20 million people are struggling to cope with the disaster.
ROBERTS: A live look right now of the space walk going on outside the International Space Station. NASA says the crew was trying for the third time to fix a faulty ammonia pump and bring the space lab's cooling system back to full capacity. It's been broken since the 21st of last month. It is the 150th ISS space walk since assembly started back in 1998.
CHETRY: President Obama hit the Gulf Coast this weekend to let the world know the water was clean and the beaches are open. During the brief visit, the president insisted that even though the oil is no longer flowing, the clean-up is far from over.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Today, the well is capped. Oil is no longer flowing into the gulf. It has not been flowing for a month. I'm here to tell you that our job is not finished and we are not going anywhere until it is. (END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: It was President Obama's fifth visit to the region since the April 20th explosion that sparked the gulf oil disaster.
ROBERTS: A 200-mile off-road race turned deadly over weekend in California's Mojave Desert. The state's highway patrol says eight people were killed, at least nine others injured in the chaos.
CHETRY: One of the drivers hit a jump, and lost control of his truck, plowed right into the crowd. Our April Williams is taking a closer look at this tragic accident.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
APRIL WILLIAMS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): What should have been a fun Saturday night out turned deadly when an off-road race truck lost control and plowed into a group of spectators in Southern California.
At least eight people were killed and several others were injured. Police say there were no safety barriers at the sanction's desert event and it's possible some people were standing too close to the race course.
JOAQUIN ZUBIETA, SPOKESMAN, CALIFORNIA HIGHWAY PATROL: We do have witness statements saying that there were supposed to be 150 feet off of the track but as you can see, there are no true delineations to where the track begins, to where the track ends at this point.
WILLIAMS: The race was being held in the rural Lucerne Valley area of San Bernardino County. Some of the injured were airlifted to local hospitals. Witnesses say the quick response of emergency personnel may have kept more lives from being lost. Still, fans say off-road racing is a safe, family-oriented spectator sport and that what happened was just an unfortunate accident.
RICK JOHNSON, SPECTATOR: In our racing, it's unfortunate. You know, it's an open area that we do get close to the course but it's very rare that situations like this happen.
WILLIAMS: Neither the driver of the truck, nor his passenger, were injured in the crash.
April Williams, reporting from Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROBERTS: It's coming up now. 35 minutes after the hour. President Obama weighs in on the Ground Zero mosque and the Republican Party pounces. How much political damage has been done and will this be an issue going into the November election? We'll find out, coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Thirty-eight minutes after the hour.
The White House has said the fight over whether to build an Islamic community center and mosque near Ground Zero is a local matter. Well, not anymore. President Obama joined the fight on Friday night when he said that Muslims had the right to build the mosque. But less than 24 hours later, the president clarified that statement.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making a decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right that people have that dates back to our founding.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Joining me now to talk more about this and the political fallout, Ben Smith. He is the senior political reporter for Politico. And from Washington, "Time" magazine White House correspondent Michael Scherer. Great to see both of you this morning.
Ben, let's start with you. This was a local issue for the most part. Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin had weighed in on it but, you know, in terms of active politicians, it was pretty much a local issue. We heard from Bloomberg and some others. Now the president has weighed in and some Democrats are not very happy about that.
BEN SMITH, SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER, POLITICO: Well, what the president did immediately turned it into a national issue. You saw Republicans in Florida, in Louisiana, instantly challenged their Democratic rivals to take a position. You saw Democrats basically ducking and hoping it goes away, hoping they could talk about something else.
ROBERTS: as he done himself some political damage here.
SMITH: Yes, I don't think this was a calculated, political move, a good political move from the start. And I think the way that he recalibrated it on Sunday managed to, whatever good had he done himself by cheering up parts of his base who like to see him behaving like the old Obama in a kind of reeled that back in.
ROBERTS: Mike, Ed Rollins rang in on this yesterday and Ed, while a Republican, is pretty measured in his comments about the president but kind of really let loose yesterday. Here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ED ROLLINS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Probably the dumbest thing that any president has said or a candidate has said since Michael Dukakis said it was OK to burn the flag. And it was very similar. This is an emotional issue. Intellectually the president may be right but this is an emotional issue. And people who lost kids, brothers, sisters, fathers, what have you do not want that mosque in New York and it is going to and big, big issue for Democrats across this country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: Now, other Republicans, Michael have really tried to make this a point. As Ed Rollins said, it's going to be a big issue across the country. Can they turn this into an election year issue?
MICHAEL SCHERER, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Well, it's not going to be an issue that people will go to the polls and vote on. It's not as if someone was going to vote for Democrats before and because of the mosque issue, there are a lot of people who are going to change their vote but it does hurt Democrats because it frames this election as a referendum on the president which is exactly what Democrats don't want to happen.
Democrats want this to be a choice. They want it to be about local issues and they want it to be about what Republicans are offering. They don't want it to be whether or not the president is out of touch with the concerns of regular which is why Republicans are going to hitting this issue as long as they can.
ROBERTS: Right. You know, CNN/opinion research corporation poll found 70 percent of independents don't agree with putting the mosque is. And this is typically, Michael, the time of year when people start to further up these preferences in terms of the midterm elections. So could this do you think turn some maybe at least independents?
SCHERER: Well, it is important to splice some of these polls. A certain percentage of Americans who don't believe the mosque should have the right to be there, they think the government should intervene, which is the position the president is opposing.
Then there's another percentage that you just don't want it there. I think it is in bad taste. I think the organizers should choose to take it somewhere else. The president hasn't taken a position on that. That's where Republicans are disagreeing with the president. They've taken a firm position. So even that poll number is different but like Ed said, this is an emotional issue. It is not going to be, you know, an issue that's decided on sort of these finer points.
ROBERTS: And you know, Ben, you have suggested that this is part of a turn by the GOP to toward deeper suspicion of the Islamic faith in a post-9/11 world. And it really sits in contrast with President Bush who tried to go a long way toward saying "hey, this is a legitimate religion, don't be afraid of it, terrorists might have been Muslim but they didn't represent the Islamic faith."
SMITH: Yes, by September 12, which was very worried because there might be reprisals against Muslims Americans. And that week, right after the attacks went out, due to the high profile of the Islamic center in Washington and then over the next couple of years, like people have forgotten that he waged this sort of civil war inside the Republican party, really saying -- I mean, the famous line that Ari Fleischer said is "the president believes Islam is a religion of peace." That was a review to the Southern Baptist Convention.
And he kind of kept that in check inside the Republican Party. Though you see these poll numbers that make it very attractive to pick these high profile issues and find conflict with Islam, that's now happening.
ROBERTS: So does the Republican Party potentially risk a backlash here? I've traveled with several presidential candidates who always like to stop in Dearborn, Michigan, which is seen by many people as being the heart of the Islamic faith in this country.
SMITH: You know, despite what Bush did domestically, he got no votes and McCain had no votes in those Muslim communities. So I think sore Republican political strategists think they had nothing to lose.
ROBERTS: And Michael, in terms of the president and his off the cover marks. Obviously, what happened on Friday night was scripted out. It was part of his speech at Eid ul-Fitr dinner marking the end of Ramadan. Then the next day he freelanced some remarks to our Ed Henry and he seemed to want to have it both ways, which was actually similar to his position on Prop 8, saying that he was against Prop 8 but he's still against day marriage. Is the president treading on dangerous ground when he talks off the cuff?
SCHERER: You know, one interesting things about Obama, even though everybody thinks of him as the sort of press' best friend, he doesn't like much talking to us when it is unscripted, much less than President Bush or Bill Clinton before him. There's not that kind of off-the-record or even informal joshing that happens. Last time I can remember the president doing this, he came to the back of his plane at the end of April and he made what was a big gaffe in saying that it was unlikely immigration reform was going to pass the Senate this year, effectively killing immigration reform, tanking his poll numbers among Hispanics and enraging a number of leaders in Congress.
So this is the second time basically in two off-the-cuff experiences that the president has essentially put his foot in his mouth. If he had just stuck with the Friday comments, this story wouldn't have -- the narrative would not have been is the president changing his mine on this, is he wavering. There would have been a Friday night story that wouldn't have the legs it has right now.
ROBERTS: Well, at least for those of you us who call ourselves White House reporters at one point in our careers or another, off- the-cuff remarks often give us some good material to talk about.
Michael Scherer, Ben Smith, great to see you this morning. Thanks for dropping by.
SCHERER: Thank you, John.
ROBERTS: Kiran.
CHETRY: All right. Thanks.
Well, still ahead, we're going to check in with Rob Marciano. He's talking about severe thunderstorms in some parts of the country and where we may see some relief from the heat in others.
It's 44 minutes past the hour. We'll be right back.
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CHETRY: Monday morning in New York. Today, it's a little cloudy, 73 degrees. A little bit later, we're looking at 88 for a high and some thunderstorms in the forecast.
ROBERTS: Better than the 100 degrees we had the last couple of weeks. But there's still some heat across the country and some severe storms as well to pay attention to.
Rob Marciano tracking the weather for us. He's in Atlanta this morning. Good morning, Rob.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Good morning, guys. We have this cool front that's trying to bring relief to folks who've been suffering from the heat the past couple of weeks and having some success doing that. But there's been some severe weather because of it.
Some video coming at us from Hayfield, Minnesota over the weekend, thunderstorms dropped a tornado in this part of the world. A little bit in the way of damage but no injuries. This thing spun up to be an EF-1, so winds up over 100 miles an hour there, just about an hour or so south of Minneapolis.
They are definitely more cool now and more comfortable. Here's the front itself, pushing some of that heat now to the south and east and as it does so some severe weather across Upstate New York. Right now, we have severe thunderstorm warning that's in effect just south of Syracuse as this line of storm rumbles across the Finger Lakes region, up towards Rome and Utica, New York. Some of these could have some gusty winds as high as 50 or 60 miles an hour so we might see some prelims (ph) down because of that.
Far into the south, looking at thunderstorms rolling south across I-10 near Atchafalaya Swamp. This is all rotation around what is left over of tropical depression number five, kind of the loop to loop back into the gulf, so we'll watch that for potential development.
And there's your heat across the Southern Plains and the Deep South, 100 to 105 degree heat indexes, but not nearly as many states involved in the heat warnings as what we saw last week, and that's good news.
John, Kiran, back up to you.
ROBERTS: That is an improvement, albeit a small one. Thanks, Rob.
MARCIANO: All right, guys.
ROBERTS: This morning's top stories just minutes away now, including in the shadow of Ground Zero but away from all the controversy, Susan Candiotti takes us to a mosque that's been in Lower Manhattan since before 9/11, even since before the Twin Towers were built.
CHETRY: And we know that a hospital stay can be pricey, but $1,000 for a toothbrush? $140 bucks for a single Tylenol pill? How are hospitals getting away with overcharging?
Some of the craziest rip-offs that our Elizabeth Cohen found in part one of the "A.M. Original" "Medical Waste".
ROBERTS: And do you like sushi? Pop-tarts? How about both at the same time? New flavors you could never imagine as we take you inside the new Times Square Pop-tart store.
Those stories and more at the top of the hour.
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CHETRY: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
A woman behind the wheel during a deadly DUI crash is scheduled to be sentenced in Las Vegas this morning. The victim's family worked tirelessly to get to this day. And with the help of a few thousand friends on the web, they just may get justice.
Ted Rowlands has their story.
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TED ROWLANDS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Paul Maidman was 28, a student up pulling an all-nighter. At 3:00 A.M. on a Friday, he went out to make copies and buy an energy drink. He was killed by a drunk driver.
DAWN BUIST, VICTIM'S SISTER: It's by far the worst day in all of our lives.
ROWLANDS: Paul's sister, Dawn, says her brother was a computer genius who served eight years in the Air Force, had a great job and was working on a degree because he wanted to run for political office.
BUIST: To get to that point that everybody wants to be at in life, to have it stolen from him in the middle of the night like that is so -- it's unbelievable. It's so unfair.
ROWLANDS: Paul Maidman left something behind. A few years ago, he created a website to keep up with friends. He called it Team Paul, and as a joke, he made a Team Paul t-shirt with his face on it. Now, his family is using Team Paul to fight for justice against the driver who killed him.
ROWLANDS (on camera): Maidman was sitting at this intersection waiting for the light to change when he was hit from behind. You can see the yellow lines in the road here showing how his car was pushed all the way across the road into this pole. His car came to rest over here where these yellow boxes represent the placement of the tires of the vehicle.
Maidman died on the way to the hospital. Police say the person that hit him was traveling at more than 80 miles per hour.
ROWLANDS (voice-over): The driver is 29-year-old Miranda Dalton. Police say she never used her brakes. Earlier, she'd been out drinking, $1 cocktails on ladies night at this Las Vegas country bar. On the bar's website, they actually have video of Dalton dancing from last year and she posed for this photo the night of the fatal crash.
According to the police report, at the accident scene, Dalton's speech was so slurred, an officer thought she had a foreign object in her mouth. Her blood alcohol level was over twice the legal limit and she had a prior DUI conviction in 2001.
On the day of Paul Maidman's wake, two things happened. Dalton was released on bail and Team Paul came back to life. The website and a new Facebook page became a rallying point to urge people to pressure the legal system not to go lightly on Dalton.
It also became a spontaneous surveillance network. Within weeks, people were starting to report on Dalton's whereabouts. Then on what would have been Paul's 29th birthday, his sister got a call.
ROWLANDS (on camera): The call came from this Las Vegas bar. The caller said that Miranda Dalton was inside partying.
ROWLANDS (voice-over): The court had ordered her not to drink. She was wearing an ankle device to detect alcohol.
BUIST: Something just came over me that said, Dawn, get in your car. Just go there. See for yourself if she is even actually there.
ROWLANDS (on camera): When she arrived, she found Dalton inside, got out her cell phone and started taking pictures.
ROWLANDS (voice-over): The photos showed Dalton with her hair dyed and wearing glasses. When a judge saw the photos and learned the ankle device might have been tampered with, she raised her bail to a half million dollars and Dalton was back in jail.
MIRANDA DALTON, SUSPECTED OF DRIVING UNDER THE INFLUENCE: Miranda Dalton.
ROWLANDS: Dalton pled guilty and is scheduled to be sentenced this month. Maidman's family attended this hearing wearing Team Paul t-shirts. Outside, Dalton's friend defended her.
MELISSA ALDERMAN, FRIEND: There's more to her than just an accident that happened that night. There's a lot more to her. She's a mother. She's a friend. She's a daughter. I mean, her choices were wrong, clearly, obviously. But to try to push for a harsher penalty, I don't think it's going to do more justice.
ROWLANDS: About 3,000 people are on the Team Paul Facebook page. They agree, it is about justice. BUIST: I can never be hard enough on her, ever, because she has done it before and she would do it again, and the next time, it could be my child or my neighbor's child.
ROWLANDS: Paul's family is hoping to grow Team Paul even bigger. They'd like to see it push for harsher drunk driving laws around the country so other families don't have to suffer like they are.
Ted Rowlands, CNN, Las Vegas.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHETRY: So sad.
ROBERTS: You can certainly understand what the family is going through.
CHETRY: Yes, absolutely.
Well, we'll have our top stories coming your way right after a quick break.
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