Return to Transcripts main page

American Morning

BP Blowout Preventer Recovered; Tea Party's Sharron Angle Angling for an Upset Over Reid; The Hate Cleric; Obama on the Road

Aired September 06, 2010 - 07:00   ET

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

KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Happy Labor Day to you. It is Monday. It's September 6th. Glad you're with us on this AMERICAN MORNING. I'm Kiran Chetry.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN GUEST ANCHOR: I'm Drew Griffin. John Roberts is off this morning. We have so much to talk about on this Monday morning.

The political season, whether you like it or not, is in full swing. Labor day bringing the unofficial end to summer to white shoes and a big push towards mid-term elections. Dozens of seats up for grabs in the Senate. All the house seats, hundreds of them, though, are being, you know, hotly contested. Critical governor races too coast to coast in the best political team on television kicking off the campaign coverage in high gear this morning.

CHETRY: Democrats are desperate to keep control of Congress. President Obama hits the road this week to focus on the economy and try to reassure voters. A new CNN poll suggests the president has his work cut out for him. Eight in ten Americans when polled said they believe the economy is in poor shape. We're live at the White House with Ed Henry just ahead.

GRIFFIN: A key piece to the puzzle now in the hands of federal investigators. The failed blowout preventer pulled from the Gulf over the weekend. FBI agents were onboard the boat. A new blowout preventer replacing it on BPs ruptured well which could soon be sealed for good soon.

CHETRY: Also this morning, the fall campaign in full swing, I guess you could say.

GRIFFIN: Balance of power up for grabs on Capitol Hill, consequences for you, your job, the taxes you pay, health care you receive and your family.

CHETRY: That's right. When you take a look at it in the Senate 37 seats up for grabs right now in November, in the House every single seat, 435 of them in the hands of voters. The chamber could soon look radically different.

Republicans are looking to take control, and there's a new CNN Research Corporation poll just released that backs up a poll earlier in the week that was pretty stunning from Gallup that says they have a major advantage, CNN's polling showing a generic Republican would win 52 percent against a generic Democrat 45 percent.

GRIFFIN: And no matter which party you are in or in favor of, the poll is finding that 81 percent of us believe the economy is in rough shape. You didn't need a poll to tell us. We have the best political team on television covering this all. Ed Henry is at the White House breaking down the president's new economic strategy.

First we're going to go T.J. Holmes with the CNN Election Express. He's in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania this morning, T.J. following one particular race there that could be a key to these mid- terms.

T.J. HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, guys. Welcome to a beautiful backdrop of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The sun starting to come up behind me over the Allegheny River. We're here because of a particular race that's happening here in western Pennsylvania.

We're talking about 435 seats up for grabs. Sure. But only a handful are really considered to be in contention. One of them in particular that Republicans are targeting that could help them take back the House is in the third district where there's a freshman Democrat who is trying to hold on to that seat, and she's trying to hold on in what's really a Republican district.

Let me hear from both of them, the two candidates, then we'll talk more about what the people want to hear about.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. KATHY DAHLKEMPER, (D) PENNSYLVANIA: I think the voters of the district should re-elect me because I'm working every day for them when I'm in this office. I'm a person of very high integrity. I'm honest. They know they can trust me.

MIKE KELLY, (R) PENNSYLVANIA CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: Why would you vote for me and not the current congresswoman? Everything I say I've done. Everything I say I mean. I think over the period now of the last 20 months we've seen a complete separation from where you came from as to where you are now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Quite frankly, you have heard a lot of that stuff before. You're going to hear more of it during the campaign season. Labor Day is the unofficial end of summer, but it is the official kickoff to the campaign season and this is a very important district.

That's how Republicans could possibly win not by just looking at the whole 435, but there are smaller races, maybe in some of your own neighborhoods, your own backyards that are taking place and are targeting these particular races and particular Democrats to try to take back the House.

They need to get around 40 seats to swap hands for Republicans to take over. That is certainly possible, don't know how likely, but it's certainly possible right now. CHETRY: And a lot of these local municipalities are talking about how it's getting increasingly nasty, that they haven't seen these races so nasty in awhile. There in Pittsburgh, what are the key issues that are going to send people to the polls or keep them home?

HOLMES: Key issues and polls, and we see polls that reflect this, Republicans are more fired up now than Democrats. That's a big part of the effort. Democrats will try to fire up their base even more so.

But you talk to people here like we did in Pittsburgh. You go to one of these big fairs you see over the Labor Day holiday, and you hear a wide range of things that they are concerned about.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When you get a poll that suggests that what 25 percent of people think that their president is a Muslim, obviously they are smart enough to know that's not true, and to me that just says that people are operating out of emotions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think totally out of touch in what's going on in rural America. I don't think they have a clue.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I wish people would be more patient because it does take time to come out of the bad recession that we were in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Then you start thinking pay cuts. How much money they make a year is ridiculous for what little work they do and for how much vacation they have in the summer. It's unfair.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think the whole Obama administration along with every member in Congress should be voted out.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've gone back and forth between Democrats and Republicans. At this point I'm up in the air. What they're talking about Washington is always going to be the same. It's going to be the same old politics.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, you hear a wide range there. I mean, even from the topic of Muslims, possibility of the president a Muslim. You'll hear about the economy. But you certainly hear the theme of being anti- Washington right now. People are sick and tired of Washington all together.

So, that's just a sample, just a start. We're going to be out on the road all week. We're starting here in Pennsylvania heading over to Ohio, then Indianapolis. Guys we are just getting started, our election coverage here on CNN we the Election Express bus. We are rolling on.

GRIFFIN: All right, T.J., thanks a lot. You are, indeed rolling on. Thanks. CHETRY: The White House has taken a lot of heat over the state of the economy. This week President Obama will go on the offensive, unveiling new plans to spur the economy and hopefully create more jobs.

GRIFFIN: It's the make-or-break issue for Democrats in the midterm elections and the president has a lot of work to do. Ed Henry is live at the White House. Ed, what can we expect from the president this week?

ED HENRY, SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. Today he's going to Milwaukee to celebrate labor day at aunt none event. Wednesday is the day to watch. He'll be in Cleveland, very hard hit city and in a state where Ohio that T.J. was talking, employment bad.

The president will use that venue then to layout sort avenue economic plan. I'm told by administration officials the centerpiece will be a permanent extension of the tax credit on research and development for businesses. That essentially is an effort to try to get them to hire more people n-vest more in their companies. And this all was previewed yesterday by the Democratic Party Chairman Tim Kaine who said this is an opportunity for the president to show he's all over the economy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TIM KAINE, DEMOCRATIC PARTY CHAIRMAN: This president his team will be focused on issue of jobs, but as we're adding private-sector jobs now every month, we just have to focus on things that will continue that. The Democratic strategy has been and it's going to be discussed in more detail later, let's target the tax credits to middle class folks and the small businesses.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HENRY: The challenge for the administration, of course, is people across the country have heard this before going back to the stimulus debate. Now I'm told by administration officials once again as part of the president's economic plan they are thinking about adding more infrastructure spending. That was talked about last year. Some of it has not panned out.

They are also talking about a payroll tax holiday for people, but the problem they are finding behind-the-scenes is how many workers is this going cover? The more you add the more the price tag goes up. One proposal floating around is a $300 billion tax cut. The problem for the White House, they don't have that kind of money right now since we're so deep in debt.

So the president's options even as he tries to roll out this plan pretty small right now, Drew.

CHETRY: It's interesting there were some criticism, John McCain on the Sunday shows called at it a "death bed conversion" about some of these new changes that the president was putting forth. Has some of this been in the works or is this audible as some have been saying about the new plan, the stimulus that's not being called a stimulus?

HENRY: I think it is a little bit of an audible because frankly they've tried a lot of other options and it hasn't panned out. Look at the stimulus. It was advertised as something that would provide a jolt to the economy.

This was billed as recovery summer by this White House, and that hasn't panned out. They were saying stimulus was going to pay off now. Look at our most recent poll. We asked about economic conditions today. Only 18 percent say it's good, and 81 pars, a whopping 81 percent say it's poor.

The other important poll question to take a look at is this one about current economic conditions compared to two years ago. As bad or worse 49 percent, better now but will get worse, 18 percent, better now and will stay that way 32 percent. You see that biggest number as bad or worse as it was two years ago, again, what's happened between then and now this massive stimulus plan that was supposed to change a lot of this American people by and large are not feeling a recovery. It hasn't trickled down to them.

And in terms of the president's new economic plan it's not even clear that fellow congressional Democrats on the hill for the president can really get this done. There is such a narrow window to@ pass this economic legislation because after a couple of weeks they will go right back to the campaign trail full time.

So a very narrow window to get this done, not clear whether there's any impact on what the president is talking about now between now and November.

GRIFFIN: And certainly no impact if it does pass that it will actually do anything in that short amount of time when you talk about research and development break.

HENRY: Exactly, because it takes time for these companies to put money into the pipeline if they were to get it. And so there again this administration's options are very limited at this late date.

GRIFFIN: Ed Henry live this morning. Thanks, Ed.

CHETRY: Also coming up in 20 minutes, here comes the Tea Party. Our Jim Acosta is kicking off a new report on the political movement, it's candidates, starting with the race between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Sharron Angle in Nevada.

We'll check in with Jim, some have been asking are Republicans having buyer's remorse by choosing her as candidate. Some of the polls are tied up.

GRIFFIN: Yes, that's going to be a good one. It's 10 after the hour now. We'll get a check on the morning's weather headlines.

(WEATHER BREAK) GRIFFIN: Next on the Most News in the Morning, the blow-out preventer that failed to stop the BP oil spill is now off the ocean floor. Could this hold the key to finding out what happened? We're going to talk to Professor Don Van Neiuwenhuise, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRIFFIN: BP could soon move ahead with the completion of its relief well in the Gulf of Mexico this week once and for all, sealing off that biggest oil spill in history. The failed blowout preventer sitting on top of that well has been recovered and is heading to a NASA facility in New Orleans.

CHETRY: That's right. Investigators there are going to try to answer one critical question, exactly how did it fail?

Don Van Nieuwenhuise joins us right now. He's a professor of petroleum geoscience at the University of Houston. He joins us this morning.

Thanks for being here, Don.

DON VAN NUEUWENHUISE, PROFESSOR OF PETROLEUM GEOSCIENCE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON: It's good to be here.

CHETRY: So we know that it's going to this NASA facility. They're going to be trying to do forensics on it, I guess. But just for the lay person, what will they be trying to figure out and how will the broken blowout preventer assist them in that?

NIEUWENHUISE: There's a number of key things that they'll be looking at. The annulars and the lower marine package part of the blowout preventer's stack will be one of the first things they'll be looking at because --

CHETRY: And what is that with safety (ph) annulars?

NIEUWENHUISE: The annulars were -- they're sort of like large doughnuts that grip the drill bit or the drill pipe when you're drilling. It's the way we control. It's called the annular preventers. They're used when we do normal drilling processes so that they can replace them if they wear out. And apparently they may have been worn out a little bit and during some of the critical tests when they were doing the cementing. So they'll probably want to look at that.

They'll also be looking at all the hydraulic lines, the accumulators that forced the rams closed and a lot of the mechanical parts of that nature. And then they'll be looking at the control panels in great detail. There's two control panels up in the lower marine riser package, the upper part of the blowout preventer.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN ANCHOR: You know, Don, the science is one thing trying to figure out what happened but the other part of the story is this thing is now in the possession of the Department of Justice. The FBI was on board that boat yesterday as it came up taking pictures. This is a criminal investigation. And from your expert point of view, is this going to have evidence that something deliberately went wrong or deliberately some safety mechanism was deliberately overridden by BP to force this thing to blow?

NIEUWENHUISE: It's always possible that something was overridden in part of the controls. I doubt any of the mechanical parts, but there may have been some control components that have been altered. But the main reason they're looking at it really closely is to make sure that no one tries to fix anything or change anything.

CHETRY: Right.

NIEUWENHUISE: And make sure that when they find out what did happen they know that it's in its natural or original state and not an altered state. And they're just being careful, I think. I mean I don't really think that anything of that nature happened. But if it did, you need to make sure that it's preserved and not altered between when you get it out of the water and when you inspect it.

CHETRY: Let's show animation right now so people can get an idea of what should happen when this blowout preventer is working properly, which is basically, you know, if it gets a signal of that high pressure, I guess they can either be manually turned off or there's something called, the so-called dead man switch, right? And here we see a functioning blowout preventer and if it's working properly, there you see the oil gushing through. And when as you described those annulars come in are able to choke off the flow of oil.

One of the questions being batted around, I guess, is whether or not it was something as simple as perhaps a battery either being low or dead from that, for that dead man switch which is supposed to be the last gasp, the last thing that works if all else fails and nothing is hit manually. If it comes down to that, isn't it quite shocking that they have all of this technology in place. It's such a complicated operation. It could come down to a dead battery?

NIEUWENHUISE: Yes, that would be a very unfortunate thing. And of course, they will be looking at the batteries. And I think they already know that the batteries were at least slow if not, in fact, dead. And the other thing is that the hydraulics have pressure accumulators and if they were leaking they wouldn't have had the pressure to force the rams to close on the pipe. And what you were showing was actually the blowout preventer part of the blowout preventer stack. It's the lower part of the stack, and what you saw at the bottom there was a pipe ram and then you had a blind sheer ram that cut the pipe. And those things are supposed to work. It takes a lot of pressure to do it. And of course, if the battery is weak and if the pressure and the accumulators that force these things close when the actuators go, then it's not going to work very well. And that may be what happened.

But before the blowout preventer failed they were having trouble in the annular preventers above that that are in the lower marine package that may have had something to do with why when they tested the negative test, tested to see if the cement was working, they didn't get the appropriate readings. GRIFFIN: Yes. All right. Don Nieuwenhuise, Van Nieuwenhuise, I think at the end of this, whether it's a criminal case or not, we are going to find out a lot of things going forward and what maybe could prevent this in the future. I guess that is the big hope of people like you who study the oil industry.

NIEUWENHUISE: Absolutely.

GRIFFIN: All right.

CHETRY: All right. Professor Van Nieuwenhuise, thanks so much for being with us this morning.

Coming up next on the Most News in the Morning, this earthquake that hit New Zealand. Some incredible pictures of just how powerful and just how much damage may have been done. We're going to have the latest coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRIFFIN: Also new this morning, you know, this would have been a major huge story if people were killed. But apparently New Zealand has done a pretty good job with earthquake preparedness. A state of emergency extended in Christchurch, New Zealand until Wednesday. A powerful quake, 7.2 struck there. Government officials report nearly 5,000 claims for property damages.

CHETRY: Yes. They say that the residents of the second largest city are being warned right now to boil their water. Schools are still closed. Authorities say there's a likelihood of some aftershocks possibly as powerful as 6.0. But this was the strongest earthquake, the most damaging one they've seen there in some 80 years. But they've been getting a nod to all of the retrofitting, the strength of the buildings. And a little bit of a miracle in some cases that people survived this.

GRIFFIN: Yes. Yes. Somebody was talking about this morning the earth moved 11 feet? That's what we hear.

CHETRY: Yes. And then there were literally fissures so wide right in the middle of the road. Kids are photographed standing, you know, in the middle of the split road. It's amazing to look at and to see that, you know, the earth was that powerful. But I guess man was able to conquer it in that case.

GRIFFIN: I guess. 7.2. Never forget that.

Coming up on the Most News in the Morning, speaking of women, she is taking on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Jim Acosta talks to Republican nominee, Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: Twenty-seven minutes past the hour. Your top stories just a couple minutes away. First though, an "A.M. Original," something you'll see only on AMERICAN MORNING. With Labor Day bringing the end of summer, well, today we're kicking off the fall political season with a new series "Make Room for the Tea Party."

GRIFFIN: The latest CNN Research Corporation poll shows voters are mixed on this political movement. Forty percent say they have a negative opinion. Thirty-six percent have a positive view of the Tea Party. Today, we're looking at a big gamble where else, Nevada. Jim Acosta is joining us live with that story. Jim, good morning.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Drew. Good morning, Kiran. And you know, there is no doubt the Tea Party is on a roll. Tea Party-backed candidates are racking up huge wins in Republican primaries all over the country. But there's one big question facing this new political movement and that is whether these Tea Party contenders are too conservative to beat their Democratic opponents. It is a question that has dogged the campaign of Nevada's Sharron Angle.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHARRON ANGLE (R), NEVADA SEN. CANDIDATE: We're going to take our government back.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA (voice-over): Sharron Angle just might be the Tea Party's biggest gamble yet. A conservative former state lawmaker in Nevada and grandmother who doesn't mind hopping on the back of a Harley, Angle also has a tendency to shoot from the lip.

ANGLE: He's been waterboarding our economy for over a year now.

ACOSTA: With rhetoric like that, Angle came out of nowhere and snatched up the endorsements of Tea Party leaders and won the Republican nomination in the race for U.S. Senate. Her next opponent, the GOP's prime target.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He doesn't seem to go away.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'd like to dump him.

ACOSTA: One of the most powerful Democrats in Washington, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

(on camera): Will you be a Tea Party senator in the Senate if you get in there?

ANGLE: I don't know exactly what that means. I'll be a mainstream senator. How's that?

ACOSTA (voice-over): But Democrats say Angle is far from mainstream, pointing to her past calls to dramatically reduce the size of the federal government by getting rid of the Departments of Education and Energy, the EPA and the IRS. She's also made some white hot comments on talk radio.

VOICE OF ANGLE: If this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment remedies. They're saying, my goodness, what can we do to turn this country around? And I'll tell you, the first thing we need to do is take Harry Reid out.

ACOSTA (on camera): What was all that about?

ANGLE: Those are not the issues that people are really concerned about. They're concerned about our homes, our economy, our jobs. That's what they're concerned about.

ACOSTA (voice-over): In another interview, she agreed there are domestic enemies in the government.

VOICE OF BILL MANDERS, "THE BILL MANDERS SHOW": We have home-born, homegrown enemies in our system. And I for one think we have some of those enemies in our own -- in the walls of the Senate and the Congress.

ANGLE: Yes, I think you're right, Bill.

ACOSTA (on camera): Do you feel there are domestic enemies in the Congress.

ANGLE: The larger focus of that conversation was what has happened domestically here in our country for the last 18 months.

ACOSTA: Do you feel that the president or Harry Reid are enemies of the state?

ANGLE: I don't think anybody mentioned any names during that -- during that conversation and, of course, those were my --

ACOSTA: Was there a policy that you're talking about?

ANGLE: Those weren't my words.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHARRON ANGLE (R), NEVADA SEN. CANDIDATE: We need to phase Medicare and social security out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA (voice-over): Angle's comments on social security now star in Reid's ads. She accuses Reid of taking her out of context.

ANGLE: As you speak, as per conversationally speaking, sometimes when you pick out words they're not the best words that you could have used.

ACOSTA: But many in her own party worry Angle is a risky bet. A recent poll found 71 percent of Nevada Republicans prefer a different candidate. Good thing for Angle says Las Vegas political columnist, Reid is just as unpopular. JON RALSTON, "LAS VEGAS SUN": Harry Reid is the most negatively viewed person in this state and there's a hardened opposition to him. I mean I think that Sharron Angle could be arrested on a felony tomorrow and she'd still get 40 percent of the vote.

ACOSTA: We also caught up with Senator Reid who stands by his ads that paint Angle as extreme.

(on camera): She says that a lot of what she said was taken out of context. What is your response to that?

SEN. HARRY REID (D), MAJORITY LEADER: It's a little hard to take out of context when somebody says they want to phase out social security, get rid of Medicare. Her words are what she is. My words is what I am. So I don't think you run from what you say and what you do.

ACOSTA (voice-over): A political wild card in the Tea Party's rise to power, Sharron Angle has two more months to convince voters to deal her in.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: Now Angle's campaign has spent the last couple of months trying to soften her image. They got her appearing in ads showing her support for social security and she's spending a lot of time these days meeting with veterans groups. But when you talk with the Harry Reid campaign, make no doubt about it, this is the Republican candidate they want to face this fall out of all the Republicans who are on the ballot in that primary race earlier this summer, Sharron Angle is the one they want to take on this November.

And there's lots of Tea Party candidates out there all across this country and a lot of these races are taking shape much in the same way as this one is.

CHETRY: So you have to ask yourself, I mean, you know, did the Tea Party do more harm than good for Republicans in the state. When you see that (INAUDIBLE) poll of 71 percent says that they would prefer another candidate. That's shocking.

ACOSTA: It is. And it's a question of buyer's remorse. And I asked Sharron Angle, and I said, you know, there's a lot of sentiment out there that perhaps you were not the best candidate on this ballot and are Republicans feeling buyer's remorse. She said, "no, no, no. It's not buyer's remorse, there's just a lot of anxiety out there and they are not happy with any of the candidates on the ballot.

And you know, just to be fair to Sharron Angle, when you look at that same poll Democrats are just as uncomfortable with Harry Reid. There are plenty of Democrats in Nevada who would like to see somebody else on the ballot besides Harry Reid. So it's kind of a wash for both.

GRIFFIN: Well, she's going to go after a pro who is used to taking down opponents. That's for sure. He's got that group together that's going to able to dodge and weave like I don't think she knows what's coming. ACOSTA: That's right. And one quick factoid. Harry Reid won his very first election by something like 435 votes. He said in his event that we were out watching in Nevada that he's an expert in close elections. So they feel like they got a game plan in place where they can eke out another one over Sharron Angle.

CHETRY: Interesting that the majority leader is in such a tight spot.

ACOSTA: Absolutely.

CHETRY: Jim, fascinating stuff. We're going to check in with you tomorrow as well. Part two of your series, we'll head to Utah and take a look at candidate Mike Lee. Lee isn't compromising in his conservative views. We're going to take a look at this race, the Tea Party's platform and what it all means for the fall elections.

GRIFFIN: 33 minutes now past the hour. This morning's top stories, President Obama is hitting the road again today, delivering a labor day speech. This one in Milwaukee. The White House will spend the week responding to what angry voters, including those in Nevada, especially those in swing states are demanding more presidential focus on the economy. The president is going to give a similar speech in Cleveland on Wednesday.

CHETRY: NATO is considering a plan to send in 2,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. Many of them will likely be Americans. General David Petraeus reportedly proposed the move to NATO officials. It calls for 750 military personnel just to train Afghan forces.

GRIFFIN: Thousands of Indonesians protesting peacefully this weekend outside of the U.S. embassy in Jakarta. Why? They are upset about a Florida church's plan to ban copies of the Koran on September 11th. They warned that it's only going to provoke Muslims that dub world outreach center in Gainesville organizing the event to mark the anniversary of the September 11th attacks.

CHETRY: Well, he's been called the hate cleric accused of inspiring high-profile terrorists like Richard Reid and underwear bomber Umar Abdulmutalab. There's a real danger surrounding Sheik Abdullah el- Faisal of Jamaica and his reach is on the internet as well.

GRIFFIN: Yes, this Muslim spiritual leader to some is preaching to a vast new audience. Last month I traveled to Jamaica to meet this guy at his request for an interview. I had no idea what I was about to encounter.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN (voice-over): We came to meet the radical Islamic preacher known as the "Jamaican" on his own turf. And up a winding road into the Jamaican hillside we climbed.

(on camera): So we think this is it.

(Voice-over): Where Sheik Abdullah el-Faisal invited us in an interview, he said, to clear his name from an awful past. (on camera): Hello.

(voice-over): But we quickly learned that Sheik el-Faisal had told us a lie.

(on camera): Is the sheik in?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

GRIFFIN (on camera): Can tell us where he is?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's not here yet.

GRIFFIN: Not here yet. Not back from Kingston?

(voice-over): Faisal turned out had lured CNN to his island as part of a shakedown. CNN does not pay for interviews. The sheik was asking for $15,000 just to talk.

(on camera): Why are you charging us so much money just to talk to you?

(voice-over): Most recently arrested in Kenya, authorities say this 46-year-old Jamaican was encouraging young Muslims to fight in Somalia. His arrests sparked riots leading to five dead and leading Kenya to deport el-Faisal back to his native Jamaica.

U.S. intelligence officials and Jamaica's justice ministry tells CNN they are carefully watching. The Caribbean and its poverty has long been thought a potential new home for a terrorist message. And the sheik has never stopped preaching through internet chat rooms and sending out tapes.

(on camera): The fear is that even isolated down that road in a home that this Islamic scholar, this preacher of radical Islam could have an effect on the population here, gather a following and perhaps influence others to follow the paths of the terrorists whose have followed him.

(voice-over): It's the reason we came to this island to interview el- Faisal. Invited by the sheik himself who promised he would explain himself once we arrived. When we did arrive his new agent explained to us there would be no interview unless we paid $15,000.

CNN does not pay for any interviews. During three telephone conversations, and one face to face meeting, the sheik did try to explain how he was misinterpreted. When he said Muslims should fight and kill Jews, Christians, Americans and Hindus. That was the old sheik, he told me. "I've reformed since then."

(on camera): I'm just asking you do you feel any guilt at all that these men listened to you and then went out and tried to kill people and some of them did kill people? They listened to many clerics. Do you feel any guilt that they listened to you? I'm asking you a question. So you will not answer that question right now. He just hung up. He says he won't do the interview. He won't do the interview unless he gets paid period. And he won't answer that question.

(voice-over): There may be good reason why the sheik needs to be paid. He's economically and socially isolated here. The vast majority of Jamaicans are Christian. A religion the sheik calls paganism. The Islamic Council will not allow the sheik to preach in any of Jamaica's dozen or so mosques until he denounces his radical teachings.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've not spoken to him, not even for a minute since his return to Jamaica.

GRIFFIN: But that has not stopped the sheik from preaching in homes around Jamaica, gathering followers and especially over the internet. Listen to this.

SHEIK ABDULLAH EL-FAISAL, RADICAL CLERIC: My God is not Obama, my dean is Islam and our Sharia. It will rule America.

GRIFFIN: It is the sheik in an internet forum at the end of July, titled the battle of Washington. He declares Sharia law will one day rule this country if Muslims make sacrifices.

EL-FAISAL: If we want that White House and we desire to conquer that White House we need to be people who suffer hardship. I believe it's a matter of time when we will see the emir established within the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: This is what's so troubling, Kiran, it's the interpretation of how these messages are released. Counter terrorism officials are worried - number one, that the sheik is really lying. That he is -

CHETRY: When he says he's reformed.

GRIFFIN: When he says he's reformed. But he won't say to it your face. He believes that he was misinterpreted. I mean he told people in England go out and kill Jews, go out and kill Hindus, go out and kill Christians and he says that somehow that was misinterpreted.

CHETRY: You talk about Jamaica and you talked about it being a very large Christian nation, majority Christian nation. How much support does he have? I mean, how many followers does he have in person?

GRIFFIN: Well, you know, it's very hard to tell because he just got back there in January. He clearly has a following, the Islamic Society or the Group of Mosques believe that they have seen some of their members fleeing to go to this guy, and to worship in various houses and places where he's free to meet other people.

So they are concerned about the fact that he may have some kind of influence on young, particularly young Muslims in Jamaica who are getting their news off the internet and maybe not getting a clear picture what Islam really is.

CHETRY: What was the rioting about? GRIFFIN: Well, the rioting was in Kenya. And that was the fact that he was, according to Kenya, he was telling people who were in Kenya to go out and fight for Muslims in Somalia when they kicked him out. Kenya basically kicked him out of the country. Rioting developed over his followers who were just upset about that.

CHETRY: So Kenya actually chartered a flight, as you said, to Jamaica.

GRIFFIN: Right.

CHETRY: No one -

GRIFFIN: No one would fly this guy.

CHETRY: He is pretty much land locked now.

GRIFFIN: Yes. He is land locked although he is free to travel if he can find anybody to fly him. Good luck with that.

CHETRY: Yes. Well, great piece, by the way. We're going to be talking more about this coming up as well.

GRIFFIN: This week kicks off two months sprint towards election day, a period of campaigning that's shaping up to be one of the most intense in years. How to overcome voter anxiety, anger and apathy.

CHETRY: We're going to talk to Leslie Sanchez and Kiki McLean about it. Coming up next. 40 minutes past the hour.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(MUSIC PLAYING)

GRIFFIN: A lot of us are thinking about barbecue, burgers, kicking back on this labor day. Politicians not so much. This is the start of the fall political season. New CNN poll numbers showing support for Democrats really falling off the map. So what's going happen to the balance of power on Capitol Hill and what does it mean for us, for our jobs, the economy, the health care. For more I'm joined by Republican strategist and author Leslie Sanchez, Democratic strategist Kiki McLean, both in Washington this morning. Guys, to be fair, I flipped a coin to decide who goes first. Kiki, you're it.

KIKI MCLEAN, PORTER NOVELLI: OK. I win.

GRIFFIN: All right.

MCLEAN: Happy labor day to you and all the working men and women in our country.

GRIFFIN: Yes and let's hope there's plenty more of them next labor day, right? No matter which party we're from.

MCLEAN: That's right. GRIFFIN: But, Kiki, we've been talking a lot about politics this morning and about the president and it does seem like the Democrats are just kind of making this up as they go, trying to deal with some very bad poll numbers and very bad economic numbers.

Can you honestly say that they are floundering at this point?

MCLEAN: No. I don't think they're floundering. I think we're swimming upstream

It's eight weeks tomorrow. Eight weeks between now and Election Day. A lot can happen in that window. But we're swimming upstream for a couple of reasons. Number one, the party in power, historically we all know the story, is more likely to lose seats.

Number two, the president and our political members of Congress have actually spent a lot of their political capital to make change happen around health care, around financial regulatory reform. It means it's really stirred up the dust. There are people engaged in that want debate.

Number three, let's be honest. We've got a recovery that's sluggish and slow and hard to recognize that it's evening happening. We've got too many people are out of work. But, what does that mean? I actually think this means these races are very individualized, very local.

Look at the story this morning about Sharron Angle and Harry Reid. When people begin to look at these races with two individuals and what they represent and what they want to do and what they say they're going to do, people are going to vote based on that. But, we're Democrats. We're swimming upstream and we're going to have to fight for every seat we can.

GRIFFIN: Leslie that does seem to be the strategy, make it local, pay no attention what we did in Washington for the last 19 months, right?

LESLIE SANCHEZ, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: As if we don't have a television or an internet, sure. No doubt about that.

I think the reality that we have to understand is that this is a highly charged but it's an amplified environment. That's what's unique. Yes, the party in power loses seats. In the spring we were talking about 30 seats, some big thinkers said 40 seats. You see the balance of power possibly shift to Republicans. Now it's a free for all. You're hearing numbers as high as 47.

The change is two things. One frustration with Washington. This is the year of the newcomer, Gallop pointed to that. That's why you're seeing the surgence (SIC) of a lot of very interesting candidates on the right; women, ethnic diversity, even the Tea Party candidates. The second part is the president's response to the economic crisis. Those economic numbers are driving this and people feel this is their first chance, post-2008 to actually get engaged, pull a lever and feel like they're part of something. GRIFFIN: We want to feel good about the direction of the country, where things are going, and Kiki, I don't think we're getting that yet. Eight weeks I don't think is not enough to turn that around.

MCLEAN: Right.

GRIFFIN: So when you're talking to people who are unemployed and looking for anybody with an answer, I don't think we're getting it from the Democrats or the Republicans.

MCLEAN: You know, you raise something interesting here. Is this an anti-Democratic wave? I don't think so. It anti-Obama. Your own poll shows it's really most voters are saying it's not really to send a message to the president.

What you're seeing is anti-incumbency. You're seeing people in Congress, people in elected office are not doing enough. I would suggest to you that probably the most endangered incumbent this year is going to be John Boehner as the leader of the Republican Party. Because when a new caucus is formed with new Republican members, you see, as Leslie points out, people who have not been involved in the Republican Party before now winning these primaries and if any of them win their seats when they come to Washington as the new caucus the last thing they're going to want is an establishment leader like John Boehner.

SANCHEZ: I would say this: very true. Republicans were the stewards of fiscal responsibility. A lot of Republicans, a lot of Independents were frustrated during the Bush years, with respect to that. I think you're seeing a lot of that now. Concerns about deficits, uncontrolled spending. They want fiscal restraint the same way families are doing at home, tightening their belts. They want to see Washington do the same.

GRIFFIN: Leslie, let me ask you this. The mandate, we're talking about possibly now in political circles that President Obama overreached his mandate. Maybe there wasn't really a mandate other than just don't be George Bush. Maybe we didn't want that health care reform. Maybe we didn't want this stimulus kind of stuff.

Do you think that there is a misinterpretation of the message here that Democrats are just now catching up to?

SANCHEZ: Absolutely. I think you've been hearing that for over a year in some very tight Democratic circles. There's no doubt about it.

Look at the situation September two years ago, the fall of the markets. It really drove the last part. Republicans never recovered from that. You're right it wasn't Republican administration. The benefit of the doubt on the economy went to the Democrats. It tends to go the Democrats. I think because now because of the lack of support --

GRIFFIN: Leslie, hold on. Kiki was shaking her head. Real quickly I'm going to let you respond to that because that was kind of a tough question.

Go ahead.

MCLEAN: I think what the polling shows in your own poll is that people aren't fighting Obama on this. But Obama has done what he said he'd do as a candidate.

What I think it demonstrates is a complete frustration with, as you pointed out, the joblessness that's going on. They want somebody to take control of this and move it forward. That's why I think these races become very localized. They want to hear from candidates. People are going to have a choice.

Do you want to elect somebody, perhaps and frequently a Republican, who will go back to policies that got us in the economic condition that's really kicked off Obama's presidency? It was really the Bush economy and the Republican-led economy. Or are you going to vote for somebody to fight for economic growth and opportunity?

I think that's where these positions become very localized.

GRIFFIN: All right. Kiki - no, Leslie, I got to - we'll have to back. You're looking great. Guys, thanks for joining us this morning. Labor Day, have a good day no matter which side of that aisle you're on.

MCLEAN: Thanks, Drew. Happy Labor Day.

GRIFFIN: Thanks, guys.

Of course CNN has complete coverage of the primaries as we get closer to November. On air, online, CNN.com/politics. We've got the best political team to break down the issues, races, analysis. That's CNN.com/politics.

CHETRY: Drew, thanks.

Hurricane Earl is gone, there's a new system developing in the Gulf. Our Reynolds Wolf is tracking all of it for us. We're going to get a tropical weather update, still ahead. 50 minutes past the hour.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Welcome back to CNN AMERICAN MORNING. I'm meteorologist Reynolds Wolf.

I'd like you to meet this tropical system. This is tropical storm Hermine with winds currently 45 miles per hour, gusts of up to 50. Pretty easy to see right here on enhanced satellite imagery and this thing is on the move.

Now, where it is going, according to the latest forecast path from the National Hurricane Center, it's going to travel to the north/northwest, eventually making landfall, according to this forecast somewhere between the U.S. border and possibly south right into Mexico, making landfall early on Tuesday. One thing the storm has, two things, actually, very warm water and minimal sheer, so it should strengthen. What it doesn't have is time. If it had more time out in the Gulf, it possibly could become a stronger system, maybe even a hurricane. But that shouldn't be in the cards.

(WEATHER REPORT)

WOLF: That's a wrap on your forecast. We'll have more coming up right here on CNN AMERICAN MORNING. We'll see you in a few.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. A couple minutes until the top of the hour right now. People love to make fun of McDonald's food.

GRIFFIN: In defense of McDonald's, it tastes good, it's easy, it's cheap.

CHETRY: That's right. It does taste delicious. But, would you eat it 143 days late her? A 12-year-old McDonald's hamburger - believe it or not -- pretty much looks the same as the one you bought.

GRIFFIN: According to some very unscientific research, McDonald's food doesn't seem to decay. One food expert attributes that to McDonald's burgers and fries being high in fat, which means they're low in moisture leaving less room for mold to grow. All that salt helps to preserve the food, too.

CHETRY: You know what it is like. You look behind your kid's car seat, you're like, wow, that was the French fry they had a month ago. That looks good.

GRIFFIN: If they could turn that into some kind of a beauty product, apply it to your face and never grow old.

CHETRY: You're preserved forever. Wow. Making me hungry.

One minute until the top of the hour. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)