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American Morning

Controller Asleep on the Job; Obama Lays Out Ambitious Deficit Plan; VP Biden Sleeps as President Speaks; Tracking a Serial Killer; Another Sleeping Controller; Catharine Zeta-Jones Treated For Bipolar Disorder

Aired April 14, 2011 - 06:00   ET

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


KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Ahead on AMERICAN MORNING, we've been here before. Another air traffic controller caught sleeping on the job, and this time someone's life could have hang in the balance. The incident took place while a medical flight with a sick passenger on board was desperately trying to land.

ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: We'll have more on that.

President Obama laying out his plan to cut $4 trillion of U.S. debt. He says he's counting on Joe Biden to sell it. But during last night's big speech, the vice president didn't appear to be listening.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Ooh. And heartbreak for the parents of a college football player who was shot and killed by a cop in suburban New York. That cop has just been named "Officer of the Year."

CHETRY: Kobe Bryant fined $100,000 for something he said to a referee. We also have a verdict in the Barry Bonds trial. All of that ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: A lot happening overnight. I'm Kiran Chetry. Want to get you caught up this morning.

More trouble in the tower. Another air traffic controller asleep on the job during an overnight shift forcing the FAA to take immediate action, they say, to protect the flying public.

VELSHI: I'm Ali Velshi. President Obama says he wants to save the country a trillion dollars over a dozen years, but it may cost you. We'll show you how his plan stacks up, again, to the Republican plan.

ROMANS: And I'm Christine Romans. Barry Bonds found guilty of obstructing justice. He was also facing perjury charges. We'll tell you why the jury couldn't reach a verdict on those counts on this AMERICAN MORNING.

CHETRY: Welcome to AMERICAN MORNING. It's Thursday, April 14th. The whole gang's back together. ROMANS: Yes.

VELSHI: Good to be back with you guys again. And boy, did we have a lot of news today. This budget stuff is something -- what do you often call news like this?

ROMANS: A boring but important --

VELSHI: Boring but important. We're going to make it interesting, not boring.

ROMANS: And I think everyone.

CHETRY: Apparently, also, being an air traffic controller is the most tiresome job in the entire world.

VELSHI: Maybe he was reading about the budget.

ROMANS: Maybe.

It's happened again. That's what Kiran is talking about. An air traffic controller asleep in the tower while on duty. The latest incident occurred early yesterday morning at the Reno-Tahoe International Airport. Officials say the controller was sleeping when a medical flight carrying a sick patient was trying to land. Here's some of the pilot's conversation with the FAA in Northern California.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PILOT: Yes, we're here.

TRACON: We -- you weren't able to get through to the tower?

PILOT: No.

TRACON: OK. We're going to call them on the phone line.

PILOT: All right. We'll circle some more.

TRACON: OK.

PILOT: We have a pretty sick patient. We may just have to land whether we have clearance or not.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: That plane had to circle for about 16 minutes. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood says enough is enough.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAY LAHOOD, SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION: This is ridiculous. It's outrageous. It's the kind of behavior that we will not stand for at the Department of Transportation. The controller has been suspended. We're conducting an investigation. And I have said that immediately there will be two controllers in 27 control towers around the country that control planes between 12:00 midnight and the early morning hours. That kind of directive has been given out today and will take place immediately.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: According to the FAA, this is the sixth incident already this year involving an air traffic controller sleeping on the job.

VELSHI: The search for a suspected serial killer on Long Island is going high tech. FBI planes and helicopters will be flying above the beaches where at least eight separate sets of human remains have been found. They'll be used to shoot high resolution aerial photos. Four of the victims have been identified as prostitutes who advertised their services on Craigslist.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COMMISSIONER RICHARD DORMER, SUFFOLK COUNTY POLICE: Form the four remains that were found and identified, the business that they were in, OK, indicated that whoever was targeting these individuals was doing it because of their business. And so that's why I said we don't have somebody running around Suffolk County with blood dripping from a knife.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELSHI: Police dogs are also searching the suburban New York beaches. Dive teams are already in the water looking for human remains.

In 25 minutes, we'll talk about the unique challenges that police are facing in this case. It's been all over the place.

ROMANS: Yes.

VELSHI: People almost stumbling upon these remains. We're joined in a few minutes by Lou Palumbo. He's a retired Nassau County Long Island police officer who knows those beaches well.

CHETRY: Incidentally, he was also a lifeguard at Jones Beach years and years and years ago.

VELSHI: Yes.

ROMANS: Oh, really?

CHETRY: He knows just how easy it is, how desolate it is to hide in the area that we're talking about.

Well, also, $4 trillion in cuts. President Obama laying out his ambitious plan to slash the massive national deficit. The numbers are staggering, but he says that we can't get lost in the numbers. Here's a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This debate over budgets and deficits is about more than just numbers on a page. It's about more than just cutting and spending. It's about the kind of future that we want.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: All right. Well, this reignited the debate over health care.

ROMANS: That's right.

CHETRY: Bush era tax cuts just as the 2012 campaign gets rolling again. Ed Henry is here in person live in the flesh to talk more about this.

VELSHI: How about that? Good to see you.

ED HENRY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good to see you. How's it going?

CHETRY: Big day yesterday in Washington.

HENRY: I don't see you in the afternoons any more. Now I know why.

VELSHI: This must be big news for you.

ROMANS: Yes, exactly.

CHETRY: A lot of people are wondering why now. He did speak out about this a few months back. Why again?

HENRY: Well, because the president has been criticized for basically not stepping into the fray. The Republicans and Paul Ryan, they've had a plan on the table. So the president deserves some credit for at least stepping up here now. And I think they saw some momentum coming out of late last week's budget deal to prevent the government from being shut down to say, look, now is the time to jump in.

And let's look at the four pillars of this plan, though, because the real question is going to be whether now he has the political guts to actually follow up on it. This is really just the first step.

He talked yesterday about keeping domestic spending low and that he's willing to cut some sacred cows in his own party. But then he talked about all kinds of new spending, in education and high speed Internet whatnot. So how will that score? Secondly, cuts into the defense budget, but then he said we're not sure exactly what we're going to do. We're going to do a review, a study and then come back and decide that. Will the Pentagon shoot some of those spending cuts down?

Then he talked about Medicare and Medicaid savings but painted himself as sort of a defender of senior citizens and really ripped into Paul Ryan's plan and said he'll end Medicare as we know it. That upset Republicans the way the president cast it. So are they really going to be able to work out a deal when the president is saying, look, I want to protect senior citizens? It doesn't sound like he really wants to cut Medicare.

And then, finally, he talked about repealing the Bush era tax cuts as you noted. But let's remember, in December, the president actually had a chance to do that.

VELSHI: Right.

HENRY: He did not in the lame duck session of Congress.

CHETRY: Right.

HENRY: Kept the Bush tax rates as they are right now. So right now, it's a lot of talk. We'll see whether it can be done.

ROMANS: And some budget hawks and people who score these sorts of things, people who really study the budget, they now call them the Bush/Obama tax cuts --

HENRY: Right.

ROMANS: -- because they feel like they were betrayed by the president when he did this the whole time.

CHETRY: Although, Ed, when we looked back to that, he couldn't have gotten those through, right? I mean, he was facing such resistance in the House.

HENRY: Absolutely. And now, actually, it's going to be hard for him to raise taxes even on the rich. When you look at the Senate, the Democrats lost seats. You've got a lot of conservative Democrats like Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Joe Manchin of West Virginia up for election in 2012. They don't want to raise taxes. So it's unclear that he's gotten anywhere close to 60 votes to cut off a filibuster and get some sort of tax increase through. This is why everyone is going to have to take a step back.

VELSHI: Yes.

HENRY: And do some things that they don't want to do. Republicans, conservative Democrats may have to raise some taxes they don't want to do.

VELSHI: Yes.

HENRY: Liberals who were screaming about spending cuts, they're going to have to step up. This is a unique opportunity for the commander in chief to step in and say, look, folks, we've got to do something that not everyone wants to --

VELSHI: Just as he has come around despite what happened the last election, despite the end of the year deals, despite his own debt commission and despite the shutdown, the president has come around. What's starting to happen is people who absolutely objected to ending those Bush era tax cuts on people earning more than $250,000 are also going to have to come around. The reality is you cannot -- you can't have both ways. Taxes are likely to go up in the country.

HENRY: And what's interesting is the president now deputized Vice President Biden to go out there early May, start meeting behind closed doors with Republicans and Democrats on the Hill. The president has set a deadline by the end of June to get a deal. That sounds really ambitious. I mean, you guys know they are far apart right now.

VELSHI: Yes.

HENRY: But look, they're going to need some sort of pressure. Just like last Friday, the pressure of a government shutdown finally forced everybody in the room to work out a deal.

CHETRY: Right.

HENRY: Maybe now a new deadline will force it a bit.

CHETRY: Yes.

HENRY: That's pretty ambitious.

CHETRY: It's like cramming for a final.

VELSHI: Yes.

HENRY: That's the way we always --

VELSHI: That's how we do it.

Ed, good to see you. You'll be around all morning. You've got this coverage and you've got a great story on Jackie Robinson coming along in the 8:00 Eastern hour.

HENRY: That's right. Good to see you.

ROMANS: Excellent. Thanks.

It's not what we were told but the Pentagon is now acknowledging that U.S. war planes are still bombing Libya. A military spokesman tells CNN that the U.S. has now flown 97 missions since the NATO handover. Most for support, refueling and signal jamming, but on at least three occasions, U.S. jets have fired on targets. That revelation comes as a brand new poll shows that most of the country wants the U.S. to take a backseat in the mission. Just 14 percent want the U.S. to lead in Libya. Eighty-two percent say they'd rather have the U.S. in a supporting role.

VELSHI: Well, it's a story that we've been following closely here on AMERICAN MORNING. The family of a Massachusetts college student who was shot and killed outside a bar in New York last fall is outraged this morning after the officer involved in the shooting was named "Officer of the Year" in his town. Aaron Hess is currently being investigated by the Justice Department for fatally shooting this man, D.J. Henry. He's a 20- year-old deejay. The Mount Pleasant New York police union confirms it voted unanimously to present the award to Hess. It did not mean to offend the Henry family. The Henry family plans to file a federal civil suit next week.

CHETRY: Well, baseball's all-time home run king convicted but only on one count of obstructing justice. After four days of deliberation, a San Francisco jury could not reach a verdict against Barry Bonds on three perjury charges related to allegations of steroid use. The judge declared a mistrial on those counts. Jurors said that Bonds was evasive when he testified before a federal grand jury about his steroid use, but it was not proven that he lied about it. A sentencing date on the obstruction conviction will be set for next month.

The NBA fining Kobe Bryant $100,000 for using a gay slur during a game Tuesday night. He was caught on camera yelling at a ref after he was called for a technical foul. Bryant released a statement saying that he said it out of frustration and that he didn't mean to offend anyone.

ROMANS: Wind and the heat fueling wild fires in west Texas. In all, 700 square miles have now gone up in flames over the past week. Dozens of homes and structures have been damaged or destroyed. Right now, there are more than 900 firefighters from 33 different states battling the fires.

VELSHI: And Reynolds Wolf is in the Extreme Weather center for us today covering that and other weather going on around the country.

Good morning, Reynolds.

REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Hey, guys. I wish I could say it was a great morning for part of west Texas where nearly over half a million acres have gone up in smoke. In today's forecast, not too favorable for the firefighters. Let's go right to it.

Check of the wind gusts possibly topping 20, 30 miles per hour into the afternoon hours. Very low humidity, too. So whatever fires you have out there, there are plenty. They can spread very easily. That is one big story we're following.

The second big one, take a look at this big bull's-eye we have in parts of the central plains and over into Arkansas. A small sliver of Missouri and even into Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. That is where we have a moderate risk of severe storms as we make our way into the afternoon hours.

For the time being, things look pretty innocent on the central plains. As we have the daytime heating, that moisture streaming up from the Gulf of Mexico and the daytime heating, yes, we could have some strong thunderstorms, possibly some tornadoes for the afternoon, evening and maybe into tomorrow.

Your complete forecast coming up in just a few moments. Again, it is rain on one side and fires on the other. Busy day, no question.

VELSHI: Too bad we couldn't combine them. All right. Reynolds, thanks very much. We'll stay in touch with you all morning with the national weather forecast.

CHETRY: You know, Joe Biden gets in trouble all the time, doesn't he? I mean --

VELSHI: Yes.

CHETRY: You know, it often seems that when there's a public event, something goes wrong. Well, this time it was not something he actually said, it was for him being a little too quiet. Take a look at the video.

Vice President Joe Biden seems to have been caught nodding off while the president was detailing his plan for the deficit. Look at the lady behind him.

VELSHI: Yes. Somebody behind him is really asleep.

ROMANS: Maybe Biden has heard this speech like 10 times. Maybe they had really worked on it together and he knew it.

VELSHI: Maybe he was concentrating.

ROMANS: Might have been. Well, maybe he was looking down.

CHETRY: When you concentrate like that, does your head slowly nod forward? Because that happens as well.

VELSHI: No, but you see, Ed says that the vice president's been really -- been charged with getting this deal done. Right? Getting the negotiations done. So he's really internalizing it right now, I think.

CHETRY: Well, I mean, some truth could be said that they have been working a lot. So maybe he's tired. I mean, and this was right after lunch. Maybe not the best time to schedule a big wonky speech on budget cuts.

VELSHI: There he is. He's back with us.

CHETRY: To make it worse, the president announced that the vice president had a new job during that speech, as we just heard from Ed Henry --

VELSHI: Yes.

CHETRY: -- that Biden would begin meeting with lawmakers from both parties next month to try to work out a bipartisan deficit reduction plan.

VELSHI: He's trying to be Zen about the whole thing. By the way, that budget -- I mean, Joe Biden's got a job cut out for him because the lines have been clearly -- ROMANS: Yes, I know.

VELSHI: -- clearly drawn in Washington, as if they weren't already. President Obama is now joining the fight to save this country trillions of dollars.

ROMANS: To at least spend trillions less.

VELSHI: OK. That's actually a good way to say it. Save or, what was -- he's talking about jobs? Save or --

CHETRY: Create or save.

VELSHI: Create or save. A GOP plan from Congressman Paul Ryan is already out there. Both of those plans include huge spending cuts and changes to Medicare. But the differences show just how far apart these two sides really are. We're going to lay them out for you specifically. A number of you have asked us to do that. We're going to do it after this break.

CHETRY: Also, reporter at the gates. We're going to talk to Voice of America Steve Herman. He's one of the first American journalists to actually gain access to the grounds of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. He's going to join us to tell us what he saw there.

ROMANS: And General Electric, the victim of an elaborate prank that fooled some of the biggest news organizations. What do they say GE did?

It's 13 minutes past the hour.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Well, the president laid out his plan for reducing the deficit yesterday. He took a few shots at the Republicans' plan as well. And we want to show you how those two plans stack up against each other and against a third plan, which is the president's Debt Commission from late last year.

Remember, the shared end goal here is to eventually slow the growth of the national debt, not even reduce it. We're not talking about reduction yet. And the way you do that is to -- is to reduce the annual deficits, the deficits are the shortfalls between what the government takes in and what it spends. Now, one way to reduce deficits or shortfalls is to cut down on non-security, non- discretionary spending. The president's debt commission is going to do that to the tune of $2.2 trillion.

The Republican plan put forth by Representative Paul Ryan plans to cut 2.7 trillion over 10 years. The president's plan cuts $1.1 trillion over 12 years. So you can see a major difference there.

Now, one of the major criticisms is that no party has been prepared to make some of the cuts necessary on things that we -- we spend on. The biggest thing we spend on like Medicare and Medicaid. So let me show you how that looks. On Medicare and Medicaid, Republicans go a lot further than the president. They are planning to cut $389 billion from Medicare, $735 billion from Medicaid. The president looking to cut $200 billion in Medicare, $100 billion from Medicaid. The debt commission called for more. And both of them, by the way, $400 billion from Medicare, $58 billion from Medicaid.

The other way to overcome deficits is by increasing revenue or taxes. Let me show you what the plans call for on that front. A core to fiscal conservative beliefs is that if you cut taxes, people spend more. So the Republican plan really takes it -- takes an ax to taxes, cutting them by $800 billion and, by the way, keeping those Bush-era tax cuts for people making $250,000 or more.

The president's plan would increase revenues by a trillion dollars by eliminating many deductions. And remember, this is an $800 billion cut, this is an increase of a trillion dollars in revenues by increasing income taxes on those who make $250,000 a year or more. Those Bush-era tax cuts.

And then there are corporate tax cuts. I want to show you these and how these -- these three plans stack up. Again, a lot of Republicans -- let me just get that out of the way. All right. It's going to be very small. A lot of Republicans want to cut corporate taxes. They currently stand at 35 percent. And as you know, some companies are crafty enough and the current loose tax laws allow them to do this, that they don't pay taxes, but basically 35 percent.

You can see in here, the president wants to increase them to about 39 percent. The Republicans want to decrease that for -- to 25 percent. And the president's debt commission splits the difference suggesting a 28 percent corporate tax return. I promise you if we do this one again, I will make sure that that graphic actually work on that one.

And finally, let's look at debt reduction -- let's look at debt reduction over here. All three plans claim that they will reduce the deficit by about $4 trillion. They disagree on how to get there. For the record, none of these plans would reduce the nation's staggering national debt because of the interest on the debt that we've already accumulated. The debt would actually continue to increase just at a slower rate -- Kiran.

ROMANS: All right, Ali.

You know, and it's complicated for a reason, because it's a huge economy and it's a huge amount of spending and a huge complicated system. And there's - inside there's so many ways for politics to make people see things differently. It's going to be really interesting. Thanks, Ali.

CHETRY: All right.

Well, we're switching gears right now and talking about the latest from Japan, where correspondents usually are the first, of course, to race to a disaster site or a combat zone. But when Japan was hit by that 9.0 magnitude quake and tsunami and part of that power plant were destroyed, very few reporters were able to reach the facility obviously.

Let's take a look at what we're talking about. The level of danger from the Fukushima Plant is now on par, experts say, with the Chernobyl disaster. And just this week, government officials called for evacuations even beyond what they'd already called for, an exclusion zone that's shown by the map in red.

ROMANS: Voice of America correspondent Steve Herman went where few others have dared to go or actually been allowed to go. He was one of the first western journalists to get an up close look at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, and he joins us now in Tokyo.

So you got in the car and made it as far as the front gate really. What drove you to go there and what happened?

STEVE HERMAN, VOICE OF AMERICA CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's where the story is, so that's why we wanted to go there. And we -- we didn't know if we'd be able to make it. We were able to talk to the police and get permission to go through the road blocks. It's not legally enforceable right now to stop anybody from going. That's about to change any day, according to the Japanese government.

So we thought this is perhaps the last chance to actually put our eyes on the Fukushima Number One Nuclear Power Plant. We did make it all the way to the front gate where we were greeted, maybe greeted is the wrong word, by a couple of security guards that were in full Hazmat outfits with yellow helmets and dual intake respirators who did not want to engage us in conversation. They made it very clear we were not welcome to proceed any further and sort of gave us the international signal for make a u-turn.

We circled around, took some photographs. And the dosimeter we were wearing was clicking away. And at a point when it got to about 15 microsieverts, which I think is still a very small amount of radiation, John Glionna from "The Los Angeles Times," myself and our driver and fixer, we decided that that was probably enough for one day, because we'd also been in the exclusion zone the previous day.

CHETRY: Right. And just -- because people are really interested --

HERMAN: Right.

CHETRY: -- what is it like there? I mean, does it look like -- it is a no man's land or are there a ton of people working? Does it look like a construction site? Sort of let us know what it seems -- what it seems is going on there.

HERMAN: Well, we were not able to actually see inside the reactor buildings or on the grounds where the spent fuel rods are. We weren't permitted to get that close, and from the outside we couldn't tell how many people were in there. We know that some people are being bused in and out every day. But we hardly saw any cars on the road. We saw a couple of police cars, policemen in full Hazmat outfits patrolling the town and a couple of other cars presumably carrying some people who work at the plant. And in these two communities of Fukaba and Okama (ph) there were no other cars on the road. It was like something out of a science fiction movie, "The Day After" where all the people have been vaporized. There was just no one around. People had left quickly due to the earthquake and tsunami and they haven't been back.

VELSHI: Steve, let me ask you this. What about the -- one of the things that you'd set out to do, was the stories on these towns around here, what -- what do you see in the towns? Are people there? Have they entirely evacuated? What does it look like?

HERMAN: We met the previous day before going to the gate of the plant in a town called (INAUDIBLE), there were a few cars that were coming through the town, people had gotten around the road blocks or talked their way through the roadblocks, pleading that they wanted to get back home just for a few minutes to grab valuable documents or other items that they wanted for their lives, which presumably may have to continue outside of their communities.

And those people, some of them didn't want to talk to us. They didn't want to stop. They acted like they were fugitives --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Right.

HERMAN: -- a few of them. And they just wanted to get in and out of there as quickly as possible but thought it was worth the risk after a month to try to get back home at least for a few minutes.

CHETRY: You also point to the irony of a sign that you saw, a Fukushima sign. Tell us about that.

HERMAN: Yes. There was a sign that, obviously, was put up before March 12th. It was from the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant Safety Committee. And it had this month's safety slogan, which is to prepare for any eventuality, do all of your risk assessments because we want to have a zero accident year.

CHETRY: And there's the sign, of course, in Japanese. Quite ironic after what happened at Fukushima that they're still dealing with.

ROMANS: Steve Herman, Voice of America. Thank you so much, Steve, for showing us your pictures --

HERMAN: You're welcome.

ROMANS: -- and telling your story of going to the front gate. And, of course, you know, the reason why people are acting as fugitives is because the government has an evacuation zone --

VELSHI: Right.

ROMANS: -- it could be dangerous. And while they're trying to solve this problem at the site, the last thing that they need or want are reporters who are not covered with gear, who have to be monitored and decontaminated and -- and residents coming back, too.

VELSHI: Right. Right.

CHETRY: And then you can understand how somebody just wants to get in there and get maybe a couple of documents. I mean, these people have to start over.

ROMANS: That's right.

VELSHI: All right. We'll have a lot more for you. We'll be back in just a few minutes.

It's 25 minutes after the hour.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHETRY: Twenty-eight minutes past the hour right now. Time for a check of your top stories this morning.

And effective immediately, the FAA is putting two air traffic controllers in 27 control towers across the country that previously had just one on the overnight shift. Why? Well, this comes after another controller fell asleep on the job. This time it happened in Reno, Nevada. An air ambulance carrying a sick patient got no response from the tower, was forced to circle for several minutes before making the decision, because of the -- the condition of the patient, to land on its own.

President Obama unveiling a plan to cut $4 trillion from the deficit. It includes changes to Medicare and erasing the Bush-era tax cuts for the highest bracket. Now, that's something Republicans are still insisting is off the table. So still a long way to go to come up with some agreement. The target is June.

Meantime, Barry Bonds convicted on only one count of obstructing justice. A San Francisco jury could not reach a verdict on three perjury charges against baseball's home run king, so the judge actually declared a mistrial on those counts. A sentencing date on the obstruction conviction will be set for next month.

VELSHI: Well, a number of cities including Washington, D.C., say those popular online travel Web sites owe them millions of dollars in back taxes. It's been ongoing discussion about online Web sites.

Stephanie Elam here "Minding Your Business" and telling us what this new fight is about.

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: You know, it seems like when it goes to like the whole tax thing, it's like --

VELSHI: Yes.

ELAM: -- when you look at your bill, you're like, wait, I don't know what that tax is for? ROMANS: How many taxes am I paying?

ELAM: Somebody decided to take a look at it, paid attention and figured out that somebody was not getting enough money to the cities and municipalities. That's what they're claiming.

And the story here basically is that sites like Travelocity, Orbitz, Expedia, these kinds of sties, they're saying -- let's say you got a room, you book it online, you're a consumer, $400. All right. Well, then the travel site takes their cut --

VELSHI: Right.

ELAM: -- which is $15. Well, they claim -- these municipalities are claiming that these online sites are only paying their taxes to these cities based on the 85 bucks not on the $100. So, they're saying, hello, this is costing us millions in dollars in back taxes that you guys owe us. So, we're talking about 200 suits around the country where people are trying to get this money -- or I should say that the cities are trying to get this money.

The other thing is, is that some of these suits claim that the travel sites are keeping this money and calling it a service fee and not really -- you know, just pocketing the money, basically.

VELSHI: Right.

ELAM: But the travel sites say that that is not the case. In fact, they've actually said that any of these moves would be counterproductive and self-defeating. The Interactive Travel Services Association is basically representing them and that's what they say.

VELSHI: I have a question. If you had -- if they were paying the taxes on the $85 as opposed to the $100, that would be one question, right? Is that fair? Should they be doing that?

The question is if they are charging you the tax the whole $100 and pocketing the difference, that's the egregious part.

ELAM: Right. And also, it also comes down to -- part of the issue is you got all these different cities and municipalities who have different rules on their book.

VELSHI: Right.

ELAM: And the other problem, and everyone agrees about this, all these rules about hotel tax fees were put in well before the Internet and they haven't been updated.

VELSHI: Yes. Right.

ELAM: And this is something they need to look at. But, obviously, they're trying to fight this. D.C. says this has cost them as much as $10 million a year.

VELSHI: I don't think it's cost them anything. It's just that they're not getting --

ELAM: Cost them in tax revenue, that's what I'm saying, yes. So, that's the way they see it. So, they're going after them.

VELSHI: What an interesting story.

ELAM: It is.

(CROSSTALK)

ROMANS: Everybody needs every penny these days. So, suddenly, they're finding --

VELSHI: Five years ago, nobody cared.

ELAM: And they're like, look, people are just now starting to go back and see these cities again, we don't want to lose the tax revenue, right?

CHETRY: Stephanie Elam -- thanks, Stephanie.

ELAM: Sure.

VELSHI: Great story. Thanks.

CHETRY: A Senate panel is now investigating the worst recession since the Great Depression, blasting Goldman Sachs for misleading investors and the government. The 600-page report singles out Goldman and Deutsche Bank as examples of firms that raked in huge profits by selling billions of dollars in high-risk mortgage-related investments while at the same time betting they would fail. Goldman says it disagrees with many of the report's conclusions. Last July, Goldman paid more than $500 million to settle a charge of securities fraud with the SEC.

ROMANS: It had all the makings of a front page story. General Electric announcing it would donate its entire 2010 tax refund, some $3.2 billion back to the Treasury to help create jobs and for the good of the country. Only problem, the story was a fake. Activists and pranksters called the Yes Men along with another group called U.S. Uncut say they put out the fake press release.

It looked really good, you guys. It looked exactly like a G.E. press release. They put it out to show that corporate America can do the right thing. Well, but, G.E. actually didn't receive a tax refund. The company, of course, had been under fire after "New York Times" reported last month it paid federal taxes in 2010.

And we reported here many times, G.E.'s tax department is the most admired in the world for its ability to keep its taxes low or zero.

CHETRY: So, I'm sure they're all tackling these corporate tax loopholes, right? That's part of this whole plan?

VELSHI: Definitely some part of the plan. That's something they can do. There are a lot of loopholes out there.

ROMANS: Low the tax rate for everyone. Get rid of all the tax rates.

VELSHI: Right. That's their thinking.

ROMANS: And then you get -- and then the president said in his speech yesterday, that your taxes are based on not what kind of attorney you can hire, accountant you can hire, but what your fair share is.

VELSHI: I'm also curious as to how Goldman Sachs denies that they did that. They did testify that, in fact, they were betting on both sides of the deal. The CEO testified that he doesn't think that's necessarily wrong, but there wasn't really an issue as to the facts of the case. So, interesting story.

All right. Coming up next, big story we've been following here -- searching for a serial killer in suburban New York. We're going to be joined by a former cop who says Long Island's beaches are a tough crime scene to crack.

It's 33 minutes after the hour.

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VELSHI: All right. Local, state and federal investigators are stepping up their search for a suspected serial killer on Long Island, New York. This is a story that's just got everybody shaking.

Starting tomorrow, the FBI will begin using helicopters and airplanes equipped with special cameras to take high resolution pictures of the shoreline where eight sets of human remains have been found since December. Earlier this week, two sets of remains, including a human skull, were discovered nearby.

Joining us now is retired Nassau County police officer Lou Palumbo.

Lou, thanks for being with us.

For people not from the area, give us a sense of what's difficult and complicated about this. It seems like it's a shoreline and a beach. Why shouldn't police be able to comb it once and see if there are more remains?

LOU PALUMBO, RETIRED NASSAU COUNTY POLICE OFFICER: A, it's not very heavily traveled, quite frankly, because there's not much out there. It's quite raw. The elements are extreme. You know, there's no one that knows (ph) how to explain from what the ocean is like and the tides changes.

ROMANS: And the drifts and the dunes, changing all times.

PALUMBO: It's magnificent landscape, rolling sand dunes, beach grass -- everything imaginable, shrubbery. It just does not lend itself to an exploration, so to speak.

ROMANS: The perfect place, you say, to dump a body.

PALUMBO: And they've been dumping them there for decades. This is not new.

CHETRY: And this is what I want to know about. I mean, this case, it seems like we just got such a slow start. You hear about one, you know, remains found, then more remains found. And it really is -- still this missing woman, Shannan Gilbert, I guess, that got the most attention -- she still has not been found. But now, today, they're talking about getting high res photos from planes. Why didn't this happen earlier on in this investigation?

PALUMBO: Because with the FBI -- and I've had some very positive interaction with them. And I've done the security for the Golden Globe Awards for 14 years. And post-9/11, for example, I actually went in and met with an assistant -- actually, a special agent charged with criminal aspect of the FBI in L.A. You have to ask them for help, number one.

They're not just going to insert themselves into your lives unless there are dynamics attached to a case like jurisdiction that goes outside state to state, for example.

VELSHI: So, unless the FBI wants to be involved, you got to ask them.

ROMANS: It wasn't clear until recently -- it really wasn't clear until recently that there maybe connection between some of these other bodies.

PALUMBO: Absolutely. And as we just mentioned, the interesting thing here is the young lady that we initially went looking for has not been found. But the by-product of that, by use of cadaver dogs, for example, is we found the remains already identified of four prostitutes. And then subsequent to that, another six people along this same strip of ocean or roadway. It's called Ocean Parkway. It's very desolate, especially in the wintertime. It's not heavily policed because there's no real need.

ROMANS: Let's talk about the evidentiary trail then. You know, it could be difficult. We don't know -- we've had other guests who suggested that maybe in -- and law enforcement folks who said that some of these people have been here a period of years, perhaps.

PALUMBO: Some of the bodies.

ROMANS: We just don't know. What does it mean in terms of gathering evidence and trying to find a link between all of these things? It's going to be difficult, isn't it?

PALUMBO: Extremely difficult. And primarily because there are no real forensics left here. To be candid with you, you know, your hairbrush carries your DNA, your toothbrush. I could have them on these bodies, and if these bodies were there a year or two, everything is gone.

VELSHI: Because of the landscape.

(CROSSTALK)

ROMANS: They just found something in the bag, though, a tide bag. You know, maybe there -- you start from there. I mean, if you're an investigator, that's where you begin.

PALUMBO: Well, you know, under the circumstances, the first thing I'd want to do unequivocally is identify who these poor victims were, "A." "B," identify their means of death. You know, we're trying to find common denominators through all of the victims to try to determine if in fact that's a serial killer. We're throwing that term around.

CHETRY: Yes.

PALUMBO: And there are certainly some indicators that could be the case, but not conclusive. And then you want to determine --

CHETRY: Speaking of the cause of death, I want to ask you about that, because all of the reading I've been doing, they're saying how difficult it is to find out why because of the, as you said, the lack of forensic evidence. One of the victim's families said on the death certificate of their daughter, it says strangulation.

Now, is that just -- are they just surmising that? Or would they -- or it says asphyxiation. How would they know she was strangled?

PALUMBO: They found a belt or something around the lady's neck. That's how that came about.

But the other dynamic that they can't identify is through exertion. For example, if there are channels in the body, thoracic cavity, multiple stab wounds, they're able to determine obviously the person was stabbed. If there are blunt trauma to the cranium, the skull, you know, they can determine through their gunshot wounds. They can determine how the people --

ROMANS: At least one of these bodies was dismembered.

PALUMBO: That's correct. You know, I have to say this -- I mean, after the body decomposes to the level that these bodies --

VELSHI: It dismembers itself.

PALUMBO: Exactly correct. There's nothing to hold it together, there's no fibers.

VELSHI: Lou, I know, as a former police officer, you're not going to -- you're not going to want to hear this. But did the police do less or more because these missing women were prostitutes?

PALUMBO: You're asking me to speculate now.

VELSHI: Yes.

PALUMBO: Son of a gun.

CHETRY: They're calling that all the time.

PALUMBO: I'm going to answer you truthfully. I think that, in general, our culture sometimes looks upon these women as being less than human with less rights. My attitude in life is: don't be judgmental. You don't know the path these poor girls have walked down that may have led them into this profession, abandonment, issues with family, disenfranchising. You know, you don't know.

That's why I'm very reluctant when you look at people today to make assessments.

CHETRY: Right. And that's why they're the easy target of a serial killer. I mean, think how long some of these people were missing before someone even reported them gone. That's the heartbreaking part.

PALUMBO: And some haven't been reported.

CHETRY: Right.

PALUMBO: That's part of being disenfranchised with your family. Other words like, you know, instinctively, if you've raised four children and one turns out to be a prostitute for whatever reason, you're like, oh, we're no going to really deal with her too much.

VELSHI: Not keep in touch, yes.

PALUMBO: And the other dynamic here is we're not sure geographically where all these people are from. We're assuming they're from Long Island. We're assuming they were murdered at the beach. I think it's highly unlikely they are murdered at the beach.

ROMANS: Maybe dumped at the beach.

PALUMBO: Probably murdered somewhere else and discarded at the beach.

(CROSSTALK)

ROMANS: You know, what do I -- and you're not a criminal profiler, but what is the mind of a person who does something like this? Is he taunting -- is he taunting the law enforcement right now? We know there was a call to the younger sister of one of these victims.

PALUMBO: I believe -- and again this isn't my area of expertise, but I think there's a cleansing process going on here. This is not first instance we've had in our country where prostitutes have been the victim of homicides with people who have solicited their services. It's an interesting mentality.

You know, we have behavioral scientists that can speak for this more intelligently than I can. But I would just say to you, part of the process is probably we're going to rid the culture of a less than desirable element.

VELSHI: Right.

ROMANS: Yes.

PALUMBO: And I wouldn't be surprised if that's a big tie to it. I don't think this is an issue of taunting, you know? And, you know, not to give all the cards, but there's a lot of ways they can follow up with this investigation once they identify the individual, determine the cause of death and the duration in which that body was discarded there. You know, you can find that these bodies have been there 10 years once they start to do the examination, the bone structure.

CHETRY: Lou Palumbo, thank you so much. Just a lot of great expertise on this area. Thank you.

We're going to be right back. It's 43 minutes past the hour.

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ROMANS: A lot going on this morning. Here's what you need to know to start your day.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS (voice-over): The FAA ordering 27 airports across the country to add a second air traffic controller on overnights. It comes after a sleeping controller forced a medical flight to land on its own in Reno, Nevada. It's the sixth report this year of controllers sleeping on the job.

The U.S. still bombing Libya. The Pentagon admits that U.S. war planes have been involved in strikes since NATO took over the mission there. Defense Secretary Gates told Congress that wouldn't happen.

Baseball slugger, Barry Bonds, has been found guilty of obstructing justice, but a San Francisco jury could not reach a verdict on three perjury charges, so the judge declared a mistrial on those counts.

The NBA fining Kobe Bryant $100,000 for calling a ref a gay slur. Bryant said he didn't mean to offend anyone.

Vice President Biden apparently nodding off during the president's speech about spending cuts. President Obama named Biden the point man on reaching the deal with Congress during his remarks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS (on-camera): You're caught up on the day's headlines. AMERICAN MORNING is back right after this. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Actress, Catherine Zeta-Jones ready to return to work after getting treatment for a bipolar disorder. Her publicist says Jones suffered from bipolar two disorder also known as manic depression. She checked herself into a mental health facility in Connecticut last week. The condition is brought on by the stress of watching her husband, Michael Douglas, fight throat cancer over the past year.

CHETRY: Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, says he is not running for another term in 2013.

(LAUGHTER)

ROMANS: Why are you laughing?

CHETRY: It'd actually be more news if he was given all of his legal headaches right now.

VELSHI: Right.

CHETRY: But he told reporters at a dinner earlier this week that he wants to amend Italy's judicial system and change its constitution before his current term ends, and then, he plans to step aside.

VELSHI: Should you be doing that if you're part of the system at the moment?

CHETRY: Part of the system, unfortunately, because of some lawsuits and some allegations here. In his latest high profile trial, he is accused of paying for sex with an underage prostitute.

ROMANS: He has weathered these sex scandals before, but this one is the mother of all sex scandals.

VELSHI: Yes, I bet you he does want to change the legal system.

ROMANS: Reynolds Wolf is in the Extreme Weather Center. Reynolds, I mean, I don't know how to make that hard turn from Silvio Berlusconi's --

REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: No way to do it.

(CROSSTALK)

ROMANS: His stormy legal troubles. Reynolds Wolf, over to you.

WOLF: So, yes, your forecast today.

(LAUGHTER)

WOLF: Let's talk about that just a little bit. Big story we have weather wise is we actually have two big ones we're following. First and foremost, the fire danger -- how about towards parts of the Four Corners, very, very little (ph) communities and strong winds, already some fires that are burning nearly a half million acres. We can see more of that go up in smoke today.

Unfortunately, the weather will not be cooperating with firefighters. Meanwhile, into the Southern Plains, the story is altogether different, not in terms of fire, but still, some strong winds possibly tornadoes in parts of the Southern and Central Plains, especially in the Kansas, Oklahoma, even in North Texas. Right along the Red River Valley, you may have temperatures that will sore into say just the mid to upper 80s, but that could mind with the high community.

And then moisture coming in from the Gulf of Mexico, coupled with this double barreled low that will be pulling to the east. That can give you the chance of some strong storms, possibly these tornadoes and large hail into the late afternoon hours and possibly into Thursday or rather Friday as well. Sorry, guys. The first story you led into me was a little bit disconcerting. So, the mind is kind of bouncing all over the place.

VELSHI: I hear you.

WOLF: Yes, yes. Toss it back to you guys.

VELSHI: You did what we needed you to do, my friend. Thank you for giving us an update on what's going on with the weather.

CHETRY: There you go.

WOLF: You bet, guys.

ROMANS: Thanks, Reynolds.

The morning's top stories are just minutes away. Also, it's LensCrafters versus Congresswoman Michele Bachmann. The one-stop shop for eye care says don't use our name against Planned Parenthood. It's 52 minutes after the hour.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Just follow the trail of powdered sugar, jellybeans, jelly, and Bavarian cream. This is a good story. A man outside Pittsburgh was caught on surveillance video stealing a late night doughnut delivery from outside of the store.

CHETRY: I'm surprised this doesn't happen more frequently.

VELSHI: I mean, this might have been the thing that made me a criminal. Police say it wasn't hard to find him. He is 21 years old, lives next door and is a regular customer. They say he tried to eat the evidence. It seemed pretty obvious. Six of the doughnuts were gone by the time they track them down. Eighteen were stored in stay- fresh containers.

(LAUGHTER)

ROMANS: This brought to you by Dunkin' Donuts.

(CROSSTALK)

VELSHI: In New York, often you pass by and there's a newspaper and there's like a situation where you're just supposed to leave money.

ROMANS: Yes.

VELSHI: Airports have it, sometimes. I would think that you can have an arrangement like that with doughnut. If you take a doughnut and it's not yours, just leave some money.

CHETRY: A quarter.

VELSHI: Yes. They're not a quarter any more, but, you know?

CHETRY: What did they go up to like a 35 cents?

VELSHI: No. Just close to a buck in most places.

CHETRY: All right. Sometimes, it just doesn't pay to get out of bed as for Rory McIlroy. I feel bad for him, actually. He's the golfer who shot an 80 in the final round of the Masters Sunday blowing a four-shot lead going into that final round, and it's been downhill from there. After his loss -- it's McIlroy, right? Sorry.

He had to share a plane with the man who beat him. That was Charl Schwartzel. They flew all the way to Malaysia with Charl Schwartzel wearing the green Masters jacket the entire time.

(LAUGHTER)

CHETRY: And they also lost McIlroy's luggage and his golf clubs.

ROMANS: They lost his four-shot load and then he had to sit on the plane next to the guy who won the jacket, and then, he lost his clubs.

CHETRY: Eighty points in the final round. That's apparently really bad in golf.

VELSHI: Ouch.

All right. Top stories coming your way after the break. It is 57 minutes after the hour.

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