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AC 360 Later
Christie Scandal; Shooting in Florida; French President Under Fire; Man Shot to Death Over Texting in Movie Theater; High-End Restaurant to Ban Babies?; Justin Bieber's Friend Arrested in Raid on Bieber's Mansion
Aired January 14, 2014 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, everyone. Welcome to "AC360 Later."
Tonight, gunfire at yet another school, so-called forced to live case goes to court. Chris Christie tries to get a handle on his scandal. A French leader is acting, well, kind of French. You can just ask his two girlfriends. And who is behaving worse, a restaurant full of babies or a mansion full of Bieber?
As always, you can join the conversation by tweeting with us. Use the hashtag #AC360later or weigh in an Facebook.com/AC360
We're going to show your comments at the bottom of the screen.
With us tonight, chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour, blogger and syndicated columnist Dan Savage, also political commentator and GOP consultant Margaret Hoover and former federal prosecutor Sunny Hostin. A lot to talk about on the table tonight.
But, first, some of the breaking news out of Roswell, New Mexico, scene of that shooting at the local middle school, the alleged gunman, a 12-year-old student in custody tonight. Two fellow students hospitalized with shotgun wounds.
Miguel Marquez is monitoring late developments and joins us now.
What do we know about this, Miguel?
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We know that the two victims, the girl, the 13-year-old girl who has been taken to Lubbock Trauma Center, she has been listed now in serious, moved up from critical condition. The 11-year-old boy, though, that was shot is still listed in critical condition.
There are reports that he was shot in the face, her in the arm, and police saying that it was a 12-year-old boy who walked into this gym with a shotgun. It was a cold morning in Roswell. People were waiting in the gym before classes started. Walked into the gym and opened fire.
COOPER: Is there any word on possible motive?
MARQUEZ: It is possible. We're hearing from people who knew the kids, and who witnessed the shooting, and that it may be a case of bullying.
Now, whether or not the kid, the child who had the shotgun shot the person who actually bullied him is unknown. Whether or not the girl was involved or not in this is unknown as well. But it is possible that bullying may be at the center of this -- Anderson.
COOPER: Also, do you know how he got hold of a shotgun?
MARQUEZ: We don't.
But, look, New Mexico and Roswell, shotguns are a fairly normal gun out in that part of the world. It may have been his. It may have been his parents. But certainly access to guns in New Mexico is something that a lot of kids do have access to, Anderson.
COOPER: All right, Miguel Marquez, I appreciate the update.
Now a court case that pits a grieving family against the taxes -- excuse me -- the Texas hospital that says it's bound by law to ignore their wishes. At the center of it is a woman named Marlise Munoz, a young mom pregnant with her second child. She was declared brain-dead after apparently suffering a blood clot in her lung.
When they learned that Munoz was brain-dead, her husband and her parents stating her wishes asked the hospital to remove her from life support. Now they're asking a judge to intervene.
Ed Lavandera joins us with the latest.
So where is this now in the courts?
ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the lawsuit and emergency motion were filed today, Anderson. It's not exactly clear when it will make it before a judge or just how quickly a judge will rule on this motion.
So we're hoping that in the next day or so, we will get a better understanding of that. But the family clearly wants this done rapidly. They want Marlise Munoz disconnected from the ventilators and her body turned back over to them for a proper burial, they say.
COOPER: All right, let's bring it to the table.
Sunny, you have been vocal on this. You actually say the hospital is doing the right thing.
SUNNY HOSTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I think so. I think the situation is really murky. And so I think the right thing is to turn to the courts for direction and clarification, which is what the courts are there to do.
But you know what I really want to say that I have been thinking? No one is talking about the elephant in the room. Even Ed, who has been reporting on this, he's saying the family wants her taken off life support. No one wants to talk about the baby that's on board. No one wants to talk about that. And I think, as a society, and certainly the state of Texas has, you know, the right and an interest to protect the life of that child. And I think it's curious that no one really wants to talk about that. Everyone is dancing around that issue, when I think that really is the issue.
COOPER: Dan?
DAN SAVAGE, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: I think that's really unfair to the grieving husband and the grieving father of one child to say that he hasn't given that thought, hasn't taken that into consideration.
I agree that it's a murky situation, which is why we need the courts and the law in Texas to butt out and let this family make their own decisions and handle this privately. This is a private medical decision and it should be left in the hands of this -- her husband to whom she had expressed her wishes about never being kept alive on life support.
MARGARET HOOVER, REPUBLICAN CONSULTANT: Except that in the state of Texas, if you are pregnant, even if you have a DNR, if you're pregnant, the DNR gets overridden. That is the law.
HOSTIN: That is the law.
HOOVER: Unfortunately, that's the law.
You may disagree with the law.
You may support the law.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Although it's not clear if that means if you are actually brain-dead or if you're in a persistent vegetative state or in a coma.
(CROSSTALK)
HOOVER: Two experts that the AP interviewed said that the law was not intended to cover technically dead individuals.
(CROSSTALK)
HOOVER: Right. But then what happens?
Our humanity, our compassion must go out to this family, as the courts, this withers its way slowly through the judicial system, as this fetus continues to develop and the family continues to suffer and this woman continues to be dead.
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The whole aspect of legality and life is really extreme obviously and so many people have so many passionate ideas about it. But, in Belgium, for instance, it's just become the first country where the senate has voted and passed the ability for minors to choose to be euthanized. It's the first country that's going to give minors that ability to decide whether they want to continue to live or not if they're in terminal cases, if they're in terrible pain.
These are incredibly different bioethical...
(CROSSTALK)
SAVAGE: Couldn't we tie this to the previous story? We will go to any length to protect children when they're in a woman's body in this culture and in our society, but that child is unborn, we will pull out no stops. Any legal measure will be taken to protect -- once they're out of the woman, welcome to America, 300 million guns on the streets, good luck, go into your middle school in Roswell, New Mexico.
Those children are unsafe because of the ease of access to guns and nobody in Texas or New Mexico seems to care.
(CROSSTALK)
HOOVER: Well, we should care about that as well.
(CROSSTALK)
AMANPOUR: Again, it always brings up, Anderson, all of us, it brings up the whole gun control issue.
And I know it's really fraught in this country. Again, Britain, Australia, others have had their massacres and they enacted sensible gun control and they haven't had any since. But, listen, I interviewed the Australian Prime Minister, former now, Julia Gillard, and she basically said that here's the difference.
First of all, it's about leadership when it comes to these gun issues and others. But the system is different. In Australia, voting and elections is compulsory. What does that mean? That means that everybody goes. It means that politics are in the mainstream and therefore sensible...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Let's not go down the gun control -- because...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: ... any arguments here.
But in terms of this woman, would it make a difference to you if -- the fact that she's brain-dead, does that not make a difference to you as opposed to being in a persistent vegetative state?
HOSTIN: It doesn't for me. It doesn't for me.
COOPER: She is dead. HOSTIN: Especially because I don't think the law is clear as to how it applies here.
And that's why I say, they're doing the right thing. They're going to court. The courts will clarify, will provide direction.
COOPER: Ed, but how quickly will the courts rule on this, do you know? Because there is a concern about the fetus developing, for those who believe she should be taken off life support. If the fetus reaches the age of viability, then that's a whole other argument.
LAVANDERA: Right.
We're still about a month away from the fetus to be viable on its own outside of the womb. That is clearly something probably doctors are taking a close look at as well. But it's not exactly clear just how long it will take the judge in the case to decide or the courts to decide.
It is an emergency motion that the family has filed today. But I'm not really sure at this point if that means they will do this in a matter of hours or it will take a couple of days or a couple of weeks.
SAVAGE: We also don't know what condition the fetus is in. The woman was unconscious for an hour. She was without oxygen, her brain was without oxygen for an hour. The fetus was not getting nutrients or oxygen itself for an hour.
Where is the state of Texas going to be in this child is brought to term? Are they just going to turn and potentially hand a severely disabled child over to this man, this grieving widower, who is already responsible for one other child? Who is going to pay for this child over its entire life if it's profoundly physically disabled?
HOSTIN: That's the issue that I think we're dealing with here.
I think it's a tragic situation and I think we're dealing with a father who is grieving, and who may not want the responsibility of two children, let alone a child that may be less than perfect.
SAVAGE: Profoundly disabled.
HOSTIN: Well, we don't know that, we don't know that.
(CROSSTALK)
HOSTIN: And there have been many cases where brain-dead women have given birth to healthy, viable children. There is precedent for that.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: But aren't you projecting your own opinion on to this father?
The father has spoken on this, who apparently you would think knows the wishes of his wife. They discussed this. They're both paramedics. They had these conversations. He's saying he wants -- the family is saying they want this woman taken off life support.
HOSTIN: Of course I have my own personal opinions. But the law is the law here. So, I am comfortable with the fact that Texas says that you cannot withdraw support from a pregnant patient.
Until the courts decide otherwise, I'm comfortable with that. But, Anderson, I do think that it is suspect, at best, to suggest that they had this conversation about an advance life directive within this context.
(CROSSTALK)
HOSTIN: I think most -- this was a wanted pregnancy, though. And my husband is a surgeon. We had similar conversations about, please don't put me on life support, but we never talked about if I'm pregnant take me off of life support.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: If at three or weeks of pregnancy, she had collapsed and been put on life support, would you say that she should be kept on life support for the entire rest of her pregnancy?
HOSTIN: Yes, that is the law in Texas, until further clarification.
And I don't think that they're going to be successful in Texas, because Texas recognizes the right of a fetus immediately. You can get charged with murder if you harm a pregnant woman, no matter if she's one week or 20 weeks pregnant. So, I think again, because we're in Texas, we have to let the law provide direction.
COOPER: All right, well, we will see. We will see what happens in the courts the next couple days.
Ed, appreciate the reporting.
Got to take a quick break. A big change of pace up next, the difference between a New Jersey political scandal and a French political scandal. See if you can guess which one involves transportation infrastructure and which one does not.
We will be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Hey. Welcome back.
Just days after spending nearly two hours talking about it, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie made the bridge scandal topic one today at his state of the state address. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GOV. CHRIS CHRISTIE (R), NEW JERSEY: The last week has certainly tested this administration. Mistakes were clearly made. And, as a result, we let down the people we're entrusted to serve.
I know our citizens deserve better, much better. Now, I'm the governor. And I'm ultimately responsible for all that happens on my watch, both good and bad. Now, without a doubt, we will cooperate with all appropriate inquiries to ensure that this breach of trust does not happen again.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Well, meantime, shortly before he spoke, "The Wall Street Journal" ran a photo casting down on the governor's claim -- that's the photo there -- of the claim last week that he had had no contact with his former classmate and Port Authority appointee David Wildstein in a long time.
This picture shows -- excuse me -- Wildstein, who ordered up the lane closures on the George Washington Bridge, and the governor at a 9/11 event in Manhattan right in the middle of the four-day traffic jam.
Back with the panel.
And in the fifth chair, "New York Times" op-ed columnist Frank Bruni is joining us. Also joining us by remote is legendary investigative reporter Carl Bernstein.
Carl, What do you think of this photo? Does it contradict what Christie said in that more-than-two-hour press conference, that he hadn't seen the guy until long before the election?
CARL BERNSTEIN, AUTHOR/JOURNALIST: Sure, it contradicts it. But let's not get too far down in the weeds right now.
I think there's something fundamental about this story that really needs to be considered, regardless of how involved and how directly Christie has participated in this terrible event. This is a human story of a grievous, terrible, virtually criminal act in which people's lives were endangered.
It is the most reckless kind of thing that public officials can do. It borders -- if it's not criminal negligence, it is one of the more awful things that we have witnessed by a government near the top level at the state level in a long time.
Now we're going to find out just how much Governor Christie knew about it, how much he had to do or did not have to do with the cover- up of it. We need to let the facts develop. But we also need to consider seriously this is no prank. This is a terrible thing in which people's lives, schoolchildren, emergency vehicles were engendered for rough-and-tumble, ugly politics that have no place at any level of our system.
COOPER: It's interesting, though. I talked to former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who said, look, this kind of stuff happens all the time, this kind of petty, vindictive...
(CROSSTALK)
BERNSTEIN: This isn't petty, Anderson. This is anything but petty.
COOPER: You say this goes beyond politics as usual?
(CROSSTALK)
BERNSTEIN: When emergency vehicles can't get through, when people can have heart attacks, when people lose their jobs because they don't show up on time, I have never witnessed anything like this. The idea of putting this into a prank category is rank and wrong. This is a grievous, terrible thing.
COOPER: Margaret?
HOOVER: Carl, you're such an icon for your reporting over the years.
And I wonder if sometimes people liken these problems to Watergate and I wonder if you feel that diminishes the legacy of Watergate. You say this is serious travesty, but it certainly doesn't compare to Watergate.
BERNSTEIN: Apples and oranges, as most comparisons are.
And they take place in different times. But what this is, is that officials at a very high level knowingly did something to endanger people's lives, citizens' lives. That's a terrible thing. That's different from Watergate actually. Watergate was a...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: We should point out that there is no evidence, nothing has emerged so far that shows that Governor Christie knew about it in advance, as you said, Carl.
BERNSTEIN: I prefaced...
COOPER: Right. I know.
BERNSTEIN: I prefaced it by saying we don't know what his role is.
But there is one aspect of this. When you read the transcripts, what you see is a kind of thuggery around the people who are somewhat close to Governor Christie that is very disappointing.
COOPER: Well, it is interesting.
(CROSSTALK)
BERNSTEIN: Look, he's been a terrific -- he's been a terrific governor in many, many respects, and I think that there are plenty of people rooting that he's not going to be tainted anymore by this.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: But, Carl, to your point, it is interesting when you read that Bridget Kelly e-mail to Wildstein saying -- it's almost in shorthand code, Frank, where she's saying, oh, we need a traffic issue, and he's like, got it, as if this is a second reference.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: They knew instantly.
FRANK BRUNI, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": They all seem to understand the language of intimidation that they're speaking.
And I think we're getting a little bit too hung up on what Chris Christie knew specifically about this.
BERNSTEIN: Exactly.
BRUNI: And this has been said, but it can't be said often enough. There was obviously a climate among the people who worked for him...
BERNSTEIN: Exactly.
BRUNI: ... that these two had a secret language and they understood what was permissible and not.
And I can't believe that this would happen if they had a sense that the Chris Christie they knew would be deeply offended. I think it's pretty clear they thought this was well within fair play, as interpreted by a Christie administration. I think that's almost as disturbing as whether he ordered it or not.
AMANPOUR: Do you think, as everybody parses and unpicks all this, Carl, you, guys, do you think that this speech that he did today, the couple of hours that he did the other day, will this lay this to rest? Will he emerge from this, or is stuff going to just keep piling on?
BRUNI: Well, I think he's got the great good fortune of timing.
When we ask if he will get beyond this, there was a poll recently about how many people were paying attention to this. And it's much, much fewer than we think. If this had happened much closer to the 2016 presidential election, it would be one matter. I think he's got plenty of time to get distance from this if his fingerprints aren't proven to be on it.
SAVAGE: There are shoes waiting to drop.
Wildstein went before -- was subpoenaed and he pleaded the Fifth. And his lawyer said, if the state and federal prosecutors -- given immunity by state and federal prosecutors, I have a lot of independent I could share. Whatever is in Wildstein's head or in his phone or in his computer is going to come out at some point down the road closer to 2016.
HOOVER: Look, I have been saying for a while, if he's going to get past this, he needs to be sort of less Tony Soprano and more Woodrow Wilson, another statesman from New Jersey, diplomacy, statesmanship.
And I think that's what you saw him do today. You noticed he talked about bipartisanship almost every other line. This is how we accomplished what we accomplished in New Jersey, through bipartisanship. He had a national audience, that in stark contrast -- working with Democrats, in stark contrast to what this controversy is about, about petty partisanship.
SAVAGE: Can we jump back to the Watergate apples and oranges thing for just a second?
(CROSSTALK)
BERNSTEIN: Pardon me. Yes.
I would think, incidentally, that getting past this depends on what the facts are. And we don't know the facts yet. There's a lot of reporting to be done by good reporters. There's subpoenas issued.
And one aspect of Watergate that there is some comparison to be made, and that is that the people around Richard Nixon understood what he wanted and the way he operated and what the aura was in that office, and it was a criminal one.
If that is the case around Christie, that is very, very significant and important. We don't know enough yet, and, at the same time, as Frank says, it's terrible that the people around the government think -- the governor think that they can talk this way. And obviously they have a familiarity with him that begs the question here.
And that's what we're going to find out more about. We have got a long way to go, and at the same time we need facts and not sensationalizing.
COOPER: Dan?
SAVAGE: But the apples and apples comparison is, it was an abuse of power. This was the power that they had in their hands to abuse at a state level.
The comparison to Watergate is, what powers would they abuse if they had been in the president -- in the White House? They would have had a lot more levers to press, to punch political enemies, which is what Richard Nixon did. That's the similarity to Watergate. They were abusing their power to punish their political enemies, possibly.
And if they had been in the White House and done the same thing, it would have been a Watergate-level crime.
COOPER: Carl, it's great to have you on the program again.
BERNSTEIN: Well, that's a leap.
But, again, this question of what does Christie expect of his aides, we need to know a lot more about that and we need to know more about how the governor's office was run. And we're going to find out.
COOPER: Yes, a lot more to find out.
Carl, great to have you on.
I want to move on to something that would be a scandal anywhere except in France, where it's actually happening, the French president, Francois Hollande, accused of cheating on his girlfriend there in the middle with his mistress, a famous French actress. She's the one on the right.
Some of the choicer tabloids are buzzing that the mistress might be pregnant and the girlfriend, who collapsed and hospitalized when she got the news, is miffed. And also in polling -- if that's the right word here -- shows that President Hollande actually gets a bump in popularity since all of this came out.
Where else than France would a president get a bump in popularity from this?
AMANPOUR: Well, this is France.
And there's a long tradition of French presidents leading their private lives as they want. Once they're found out, nothing seems to happen, except they seem to get more popular. And the French do the famous Gallic shrug.
This obviously...
(CROSSTALK)
(LAUGHTER)
AMANPOUR: How long were you waiting do that?
(LAUGHTER)
COOPER: This is what fascinates me about the French. They all do this Gallic shrug, and then none of them realize they're doing it. They all go like this. They all go -- they don't even know they're doing it. It's the weirdest thing.
(LAUGHTER)
AMANPOUR: Do you say that in a French accent?
(CROSSTALK)
SAVAGE: Is Bill Clinton the most popular U.S. politician? Did Bill Clinton not survive Monica?
(CROSSTALK)
AMANPOUR: By the way, this guy's ratings were 15 percent before this. And he has seriously difficult political problems, because the economy really is not doing well in France.
But, of course, this is not the like the Christie scandal. This is a personal scandal.
COOPER: Right.
BRUNI: But we need to remember two things. His bump in popularity went all the way up to 26.
AMANPOUR: Yes. Exactly.
(CROSSTALK)
BRUNI: And this is a -- every poll has a margin of error that is above 2 percent, which is the rise.
HOOVER: Which is the rise.
BRUNI: So he may have held steady, rather than gone up.
AMANPOUR: He may very well have done.
He's not a popular figure. You know, Sarkozy wasn't a popular figure. He divorced his wife in the middle of being a president, the presidency, Cecilia Sarkozy. Then he married Carla Bruni. His popularity actually sort of went up for a little while, but...
HOOVER: Still, 77 percent of the folks polled in France say that they just don't care, it's his private life. So if you have a scandal in your private life, it's really protected.
COOPER: Do you think that can happen in the United States? Do you see that happening...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: ... in the United States?
AMANPOUR: No. No.
HOOVER: Forget about it. Forget about it.
AMANPOUR: This table would pick everybody to bits.
(CROSSTALK)
BRUNI: I think it depends on the state. He wasn't married. He is not married. I think that's crucial.
And I think, in the Northeast, we have had politicians like Rudy Giuliani, who you mentioned before, who, until things got really sordid, kind of skated through their infidelities New Jersey broken marriages.
AMANPOUR: It does say a little bit about -- I mean, who am I to talk about somebody's character?
But he -- for years, he was unmarried Segolene Royal, who was the Socialist Party presidential candidate, who lost to Sarkozy, four children, dumped her, went off with Valerie. OK, that's fine. Went off with Valerie, who then dumped all over Segolene in a very public way.
He's actually had the sort of reputation of being very much controlled and a little bit cuckolded a little bit sort of -- you know, by all these women.
SAVAGE: But I think we will get there. Americans' private lives are messy. Fifty percent of marriages end in divorce. People have affairs. Look at the stats around infidelity and divorce.
(CROSSTALK)
AMANPOUR: ... so much more puritanical.
(CROSSTALK)
SAVAGE: But we are puritanical. But I think people -- like, now drugs used to -- admitting that you smoked marijuana once use to destroy a political career. Not anymore. Having an affair once used to. Not anymore. Soon.
BRUNI: I'll tell you, there are a lot of American politicians today who are thinking, shoot, I wish I had been a French politician. One has a surname that rhymes with cleaner, you know?
Might have gone better for him.
(CROSSTALK)
BRUNI: New York mayoral candidate.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: There's much more -- sorry. It took me a little while on that one. That seems like ages ago, doesn't it?
BRUNI: It's not
COOPER: The whole cleaner thing. Anyway...
AMANPOUR: And there's your answer. That was a destroyed career, mind you, a different aspect.
COOPER: When we come back, there's also Florida to talk about, where a retired cop is charged with second-degree after shooting a man in a movie theater who allegedly wouldn't stop texting. The suspect is arguing self-defense, stand your ground, perhaps, even.
We will talk about that ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Hey, welcome back. There's a shocking case out of Florida where an argument at a movie theater, allegedly over texting, led to a fatal shooting. A former police captain, no less, is in custody. He was denied bail. He's accused of killing a 43-year-old man and wounding the man's wife. They have a 3-year-old daughter, and according to police, the victim was texting his child's babysitter before the movie started, actually during the previews.
In court today, an attorney for the 71-year-old defendant tried to make the case that the dead man was actually the aggressor. Witnesses say they didn't see any punches thrown; only some popcorn was thrown.
Joining us is CNN legal analyst Mark O'Mara, who represented George Zimmerman, of course, at his murder trial.
Do you see any possibility that a stand-your-ground defense, self-defense, could be used by this guy?
MARK O'MARA, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, they may try it. I'm not sure there's any other defense for what happened that night. So what they may try and say is that he acted or reacted to what he perceived to be what we know as self-defense, imminent threat of great bodily injury.
But I don't know how he's going to prove that, because there -- all the witnesses say there really wasn't any threat going back and forth. And throwing anything, popcorn or anything else, even throwing a punch, doesn't get you to the point where you can use great bodily force like a firearm.
And quite honestly, I think an officer who is trained in the specter of force and when to use the most deadly force you can or a firearm, should know much better that it should never get to that point, unless he is truly in fear for immediate death or great bodily harm.
COOPER: It's also -- you're in a movie theater, you can get up and leave. It's not as if you are cornered, unable to run somewhere.
HOOVER: And he did. He got up and left and then came back in. Yes, he supposedly went to the manager.
No, this is -- look, you do have a commonality in all these. We don't know what his mental state was, but it clearly wasn't stable. There is something going on if you decide you're just going to be so aggressive as to shoot somebody without provocation. In all of these shootings, you have the common denominator of a man, who's unstable in some way...
COOPER: Well, how do you know he's unstable? BRUNI: You had a gun where you don't expect a gun to be. One of the witnesses said, why would somebody bring a gun into a movie theater? Why would a gun be in a movie theater? Guns are in every American setting. That's how many guns are out there. There's in bars. They're in elementary schools. They're everywhere.
O'MARA: The problem that we have is because we have such good and wide-open gun laws, we have to look at gun responsibility.
I don't know if it was -- I hate to indict my gender, but I don't know if it was a flush of testosterone or something. But for some reason, a guy who's got that brave experience as a law-enforcement officer decided it was fair game to take out a gun and shoot.
We are killing way too many people for way too little reasons. In this case, you know, from the cop who shot the kid with schizophrenia a couple days ago to the three or four people in the past six months who have approached a person's house, knocked on the door and ended up getting shot.
SAVAGE: This is George Zimmerman's lawyer we're talking to?
O'MARA: Yes, it is. Unless you have absolutely good reason to defend yourself with deadly force, you're not supposed to do it.
SAVAGE: George Zimmerman, who the 911 dispatcher said to leave Trayvon Martin alone and to leave the area and let police handle it, he had a right to shoot Trayvon Martin in the chest?
O'MARA: Trayvon Martin broke his nose -- broke his nose, put him on the floor, beat him up for 45 seconds. We can retrial the case if you want, but the reality is, the jury heard much more of the evidence and much less of a bias than you seem to have and decided he was not guilty.
Focusing on the case that we probably should be, which is whether or not this guy acted reasonable, tell me where the 45 seconds of beating is. Tell me where the smashing the head on the concrete is. It's not there.
This guy overreacted with deadly force. And though we have to wait till all the facts are out, we cannot make believe that it's OK to shoot somebody if you get thrown in the face with popcorn.
COOPER: I also was going to say that, I mean, having a former police officer, an off-duty police officer, with a gun, that's somebody I wouldn't mind having a gun on them. And frankly, in most scenarios, somebody who has well-trained -- you know, who has, you know, been trained in police reports.
AMANPOUR: Doesn't that put the lie to the, you know, gun lobby's thing that it's not guns that kill; it's people that kill. People that kill. Well, this was a so-called good person with a gun. You know, I mean, it just puts the whole darn thing on its head.
And can we go to Australia again? COOPER: Do whatever you want?
AMANPOUR: They have to vote there, which means everybody votes. They might just spoil their ballot, but everybody has to come out to vote. And this affects the whole body politic. It makes mainstream politics much more the dominant force and people want sensible laws. Even here, 99 percent of the people polled and said they wanted sensible gun control laws here. Why can't we just have that?
COOPER: But sensible? I mean, it all defines what you mean by sensible gun-control laws.
AMANPOUR: Very sensible. Sensible means not taking people's guns away, not taking the Second Amendment right, not taking away their right to bear arms. But you know, fine, mental illness, as well. But come on, give me a break.
BRUNI: There's huge disagreement here about what's sensible. That's where this all grinds to a halt. I think we probably agree on what is sensible. But there is huge disagreement out there in the country about what is sensible.
COOPER: Let's leave it there. Mark O'Mara, appreciate you being on the program.
Up next, a somewhat tamer question. Should babies be banned from high-end restaurants? A Chicago chef wants to know. We'll get our panel's take.
Plus, sheriff's deputies show up at Justin Bieber's mansion. What the surprise visit had to do with eggs and alleged cocaine. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Welcome back. Diners in q Chicago restaurant got an extra serving of whine, as in a whining baby. A couple showed up with their 8-month-old child on Saturday. The high-end eatery Lena, the chef who runs the place -- Linea, excuse me. The chef who runs the place was not happy and is asking on Twitter if babies should be banned from his restaurant.
He also posted this photo with the caption, 'Definitely not baby food." No high chairs, either. The uproar has a lot of people talking. It reminds us of the scene from the movie "Friends with Kids." That a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's great we're all here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, I know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you believe this? A hundred bucks a plate and they're bringing in toddlers?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are they even allowed in here?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People, it's Manhattan. We're here to live the dream. Live the kiddies at home.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're pregnant.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, my God.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Congratulations! Please disregard what I just said.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We hate them. These are awful people.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't hate them.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're never going to bring our kid to a restaurant like this.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Or any fancy place.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Or anywhere. We're going to keep them at home.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: So no babies in the restaurant?
HOOVER: So I'm a new mother, and I actually identify with the chef, who says keep your babies away from the restaurant. And the only reason I have a strong opinion about this is the fact I didn't do that.
A few weeks ago that my husband and I had a very nice reservation at a restaurant that will remain unnamed outside of town. We took our 4-month-old, because everybody wanted to see him, and we spent the entire meal switching off, having somebody else take the baby out while he cried or stuff.
New parents, don't take a baby to a restaurant. It's not good for the kids. We actually disturbed the atmosphere in the entire restaurant. The only saving grace is that the reservation was not under my name, and so nobody knows when I call to make a reservation to go back that we were the people who were bad.
SAVAGE: When my husband and I, when we were new parents, we took our infant to some nice restaurants. Because we knew he was not a crier, never a peep, was very calm and very peaceful baby. The one time there was one peep out of him, we were on our feet and out the door. And we paid for food; we left without eating it, because we weren't going to punish everyone else.
HOOVER: Well, we got up -- we got up and left. It's just the getting up and leaving actually destroyed the atmosphere in the restaurant.
COOPER: I do feel for, you know, new parents who are stuck with the kid all day long and are just dying to go out to get -- and they have to bring the child with them. Not everybody can get a babysitter.
AMANPOUR: No, they don't.
HOOVER: This is a very high-end restaurant they went to. It's like $200 a plate. They can afford to get child care.
COOPER: You used to do restaurant reviews.
BRUNI: Yes, but I actually think this is something that most people -- we don't need a ban on babies in restaurants, because most people are responsible.
I ate out seven nights a day for 5 1/2 years, in mostly really nice restaurants. Not as nice as Linea, although I've eaten there. But that wasn't the norm. And the number of times I encountered a toddler or baby in a restaurant, I can count on one hand. Most -- most parents self-regulate. They're sensitive. They run outside as soon as a baby or a toddler cries or as your party did.
So I don't think we need a ban, but I think we need everyone to be sensitive to each other.
COOPER: I went to "The Nutcracker," which is like a family tradition, which is meant to be for kids. And I've got to say I was very annoyed at the little girl behind me. I was turning around, and then realizing, you know what? This is "The Nutcracker." Kids are what this is all about. It's for kids.
AMANPOUR: Does anybody remember the other end of the spectrum? In Europe, you know, people in Denmark, for instance, park their children outside by the window so they can see them.
COOPER: They leave them on the street?
AMANPOUR: This happened in New York in 1997. Don't you remember?
COOPER: No.
AMANPOUR: A Danish woman and her U.S. resident partner went to a cafe in New York and parked the baby by the window outside in New York City. Social services came and took the baby away.
COOPER: Although I will say in France, there was that whole popular book about raising your kids like the French raise them. French kids are able to sit at the table at a very young age, and they're not, like, the center of attention. They just sit there quietly. It's kind of lovely.
SAVAGE: My son was like that. My son was like that by the time he was 5.
COOPER: Really?
SAVAGE: We could take him to a restaurant, use a knife and fork, was very calm and measured.
HOOVER: But babies. Babies can't do that. That's very different.
Parents are not shy about, you know, I mean, really, the children know that they have to behave.
SAVAGE: In Germany, the beer gardens in Munich was amazing. It would never happen in America. There were these endless tables everywhere, where people go to the main pavilions. They get their beer and food. And then every once in a while there's a clearing in the middle of the tables with no easy way out that has playground equipment. And this is the area where the parents go and park themselves.
COOPER: Get drunk on their beer while the kids are playing.
SAVAGE: Exactly.
COOPER: All right. Speaking of kids having tantrums and a foodie controversy, pop -- and this is Christiane Amanpour's biggest story of the day.
AMANPOUR: I'm not talking about this story.
COOPER: Pop music star Justin Bieber, shocker today, several Los Angeles County deputies raided his mansion with a search warrant. The first I heard about it was on Christiane's show.
AMANPOUR: Oh, Anderson. Rubbish.
COOPER: Biebs is facing -- and I can call him that. He's facing allegations he or someone he knew tossed a whole bunch of eggs at a neighbor's house, causing $20,000 in damage. Twenty thousand dollars. Investigators were hoping to get their hands on surveillance video showing the incident. No word on whether they did. They did end up arresting a house guest for alleged cocaine possession.
SAVAGE: I want to know what this house that they threw eggs on was made of that they could do $20,000 in damage. Was it blocks of tissue paper (ph)? Twenty thousand dollars' worth of damage?
COOPER: It's one of those McMansions in L.A., which you know, you can...
AMANPOUR: It's made of Faberge eggs.
HOOVER: They probably had an expensive sculpture.
Look, the fun thing about Los Angeles is that if you do over $950 worth of damage, it's considered a felony. So Bieber...
COOPER: Is it really?
HOOVER: ... is up against actually a felony for this. And the question is, is he on this downward spiral or is this just a 19-year-old acting out? I mean, he's had a lot of incidents over the last year. He had this thing in brazil. He has had -- speeding in his neighborhood. Maybe some drug encounters.
COOPER: This is a 19-year-old who has been in the public eye and pushed out on stage from a very young age. I...
HOOVER: Egging is kind of like 14 years old, really, not 19 years old.
COOPER: I used to light off fireworks in Central Park when I was a kid.
HOOVER: At 19?
COOPER: Well, no, not 19.
HOOVER: Fireworks are a lot more sophisticated than egging.
COOPER: I don't know. Probably more dangerous.
SAVAGE: He did have an adolescence, because he was already a- money making machine. And it's all what is happening to him now.
COOPER: You know, I feel bad for these people who are in the public eye from the time they're -- I mean, I don't feel that bad, he's making tons of money and this is clearly what he wants to do.
But at a certain point, I just sort of think you've got to give people a little bit of a break. Although he seems like he's being a jerk lately.
SAVAGE: No more eggs for him.
COOPER: No more eggs.
All right. Coming up, stories you might have missed. I'll ask the panel What's Your Story. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Time now for the "RidicuList." We would like to acknowledge the dedication that one of our reporters played. I'm speaking about Randi Kaye, who was last week in Colorado reporting on the business of recreational marijuana.
Now for starters, she showed us what an 1/8 of an ounce of pot looked like. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here it is right now. And h ere at the grove, this will cost you 60 bucks plus tax. So it comes out to about $73.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: All right. So that was last Monday. By Friday, Randi had gotten very comfortable a very thorough budgetation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAYE: This is considered a Sativa. So this is a very high- energy marijuana, which Coloradans apparently like because they're active people here in Colorado. But then there's another one here, called Indica, ad Anderson, Indica means sort of like in the couch.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: So here's what happened Friday. Randi was reporting on the new so-called ganja-preneurs, companies like Colorado Rocky Mountain High, which runs marijuana tours like wine tours in Napa, complete with a personal cannabis concierge and gourmet snacks.
Being a resourceful reporter, Randi of course, got in contact with some sources. She got in a lot of contact. Basically, she rode around in the limousine all day with the windows rolled up. I might add, visiting some dispensaries. And would you say after a while, the air quality in that limo was thick to say the least. I mean, just look at that. It smelled like Willie Nelson's bandanna in there, I'm sure.
At the end of the day or reporting, I asked Randi about her joint investigation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: So Randi, I've got to ask, how extensive was your research in the back of that limo?
KAYE: You know, Anderson, it was top notch. We did very extensive research, I have to tell you. I wasn't thinking right, I wouldn't remember even some of the questions I wanted to ask, which has never happened to me when I'm reporting in the field. And I found things to be really funny.
COOPER: But it was just a contact high. That's why I make that clear. Is that correct?
KAYE: Yes, it was just a contact high.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Randi then went on the prove live on the air that even a contact high can elicit a tinge of wonderment and perhaps a bit of hyperbole.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KAYE: If you saw those joints, I don't know if you see them through the video there, they were like the size of small cannons.
COOPER: Randi, did you say those joints were like smoking cannons? They were as big as small cannons?
KAYE: They are so big. When she would -- when Barbara whipped it out to light it up, nobody wanted to light it. Everybody was afraid to touch it, because it was so big. Nobody had seen such a big joint before.
COOPER: How much longer are you going to be there for, Randi? Are you moving there?
KAYE: I think I need to come home. I need to come home.
COOPER: Please come back to the East Coast. Yes, come back to the East Coast.
KAYE: Do you think they'll know?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAYE: Randi Kaye, giggling and talking about whipping out small cannons.
Just to be clear, I'm not taking potshots at Randi Kaye, just that many of us in the newsroom thought this was the greatest live hit that was ever on the program. A career highlight for someone who's always outstanding in her field.
So Randi, thank you very, very much.
I think she was high. I totally -- she was red in the face.
HOOVER: Secondhand smoke high?
COOPER: She was riding in that limo all day long.
HOOVER: It's powerful stuff. I mean, this is not the weed the '60s generation smoked.
COOPER: I wouldn't know about that.
SAVAGE: I would.
HOOVER: You're too young.
COOPER: Do you know about the '60s or...?
SAVAGE: No, I just know about pot.
COOPER: All right. So time for "What's Your Story." Christiane, what's your story?
AMANPOUR: It's a very hard turn. A very, very hard turn. Three years since the Arab Spring was launched. The first dictator, Tunisia, fled on this day in 2011.
And it's very sad, because the Arab Spring is losing. It's -- many Arabs now say, you know, disintegrating into warring tribes. And in Egypt, who are now, you know, voting right now on a referendum for a new constitution, under military rule. They're saying, you know, we live a nightmare right now. It's sad.
COOPER: Yes.
AMANPOUR: There are vast consequences for the U.S., too.
COOPER: And it's going to be going on for a long time. There's visible -- there's no end in sight to all of this. "What's Your Story," Margaret.
HOOVER: It's net neutrality. And I know you don't think that's sexy, but I'm going to tell you what you need to know about net neutrality.
COOPER: Explain to people what net neutrality is.
HOOVER: You need to know about -- it's about preserving open competition on the Internet. And if you believe that the government regulatory system should ensure that, we have a fair playing field in our markets, then net neutrality, which ensures that was dealt a blow today by the courts.
What it says is content providers and service providers have more ability to decide what consumers see on the Internet. And so they can basically weight their products against those small businesses who are trying to start up. They can make their access -- or your ability to access small businesses slower if they're trying to promote their clients or their customers. So bad day for open markets on the Internet.
COOPER: I was asleep through half of that.
HOOVER: I tried to make it interesting for you, Anderson.
COOPER: It all goes over my head. I don't understand it. I'm an idiot on this subject.
HOOVER: Open markets, when you have open franchises.
COOPER: I'll look it up. I'll do more research tonight -- Dan.
SAVAGE: I write a sex advice column. On February 15 every year, I get a million letters from people who went out for dinner on Valentine's Day to be romantic, and then they went home, they didn't have sex. They're very upset, and they want to know what this means about the relationship.
What it means is you went to have a really heavy meal, and you drank a bottle of wine. You wore comatose by the time you come home. So I have this campaign every year that starts in late January and February, which is hash tag blank first. Blank -- another "F" word. To stay home, have sex and then go out for dinner at 10 p.m. The restaurants are empty. People have their babies out.
COOPER: This is like "Annie Hall" when Woody Allen is like let's kiss before the meal. And that way we can digest our meal, and we will get over all the nervousness.
SAVAGE: Exactly. So blank first, then go out to dinner. Don't go to dinner and then be disappointed that you fell asleep when you got home.
COOPER: OK. Frank, what's your story?
BRUNI: It's a weird pivot out of that one. Mine is a sad story. It's also a happy story. Today a 79-year-old ex-Marine named Hal Faulkner died. And I had the privilege of meeting him ten days ago. Because he was haunted his whole life by the fact that in the '50s he'd been booted from the Marines for being gay. For no other reason.
COOPER: After being in the Marine Corps for, like, three years.
BRUNI: For three years. He gotten other than an honorable discharge. And this had haunted him his whole life.
With the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell" -- it's something that has been written about a lot, this aspect of it -- you can now appeal and get those discharges changed. The one thing he wanted to happen before he died was to get that changed to honorable. And ten days ago, ten days before his death, in Fort Lauderdale, in a little ceremony, he was given papers.
COOPER: Two Marines came to the ceremony. Which was so cool.
BRUNI: It was one of the most moving moments. I was there. I was there and I wrote about it. It was moving. And when I got the e- mail today from his family that he died, I was both very sad but also very happy, because he died in a...
COOPER: This made such a big difference in his life toward the end of his life.
BRUNI: He still -- he was, when I interviewed him, he was still crying about what happened in the '50s and the way it made him feel about himself. And you know, it's important to note: We still have a long way to go towards justice for everyone, but we've made some real progress. And this man died in a way different than he would have because of the strides we've made.
COOPER: I love the picture of these two Marines in their uniform shaking his hand and basically welcoming him back into the Corps.
Frank, it's great to have you here.
Dan Savage, as well.
Christiane Amanpour, Margaret, thank you so much.
That's it. Thanks for watching "AC 360 LATER." Thanks a lot. We'll see you tomorrow.
