Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Newsroom
NFL Accuses Patriots of Cheating; Obama on Offense in SOTU; Why Someone Becomes an Islamic Fundamentalist
Aired January 21, 2015 - 11:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Happening now, a major controversy brewing in the NFL as we head into the Super Bowl, the biggest sporting event of the year, of any year. New England Patriots, AFC champions, did they cheat on their way to the Super Bowl? The NFL, according to ESPN, found that 11 of the 12 footballs that the team used in Sunday's blowout win against the Colts, 11 out of 12, were underinflated. They did not have enough air. That's a violation of league rules. Why are two pounds per square inch of air missing from a football a big deal? Well, because a deflated ball is easier to throw. It's easier to catch. Easier to hold onto especially during rainy weather and it was pouring at times during Sunday's game in Boxborough. ESPN is reporting that the NFL is angry and distraught about this. Patriots coach, Bill Belichick, said he didn't know about balls being deflated and that the team is cooperating with the investigation.
I want to talk about all this, all the issues involved. Cory Wire played nine years in the NFL. He played defense against Tom Brady and the Patriots for much of his career, never an easy thing to do. Now a FOX sport analyst.
Coy, let's talk, first of all, what kind of advantage does a deflated ball give a team, a quarterback?
COY WIRE, FOX SPORTS ANALYST: Well, John, you hit it right on the head. The deflation allows the quarterback to grip it better and it allows the receivers to get a better grip on the ball. And the best way I can put it would be to liken it to catching a Nerf football opposed to a fully inflated leather football.
I talked to a couple of former Pro bowl receivers and elite receivers in this league that caught a lot of passes said it would make a bit of a difference, probably not as much as people would think it would.
Bottom line is that the Patriots and their head coach, Bill Belichick, once again involved in a scandal that involves cheating, bending the rules. This would be a blatant rule violation. It says right there, 12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch, like you said, John. To have them underinflated would be blatantly violating those rules.
BERMAN: Let's run down a couple of facts here. People have these questions. First of all, people say, well, if the balls didn't have enough air, the Colts would benefit from that too. Not so.
WIRE: That's right. Each team gets their own footballs, 12 of them that are submitted about two and a half hours before kickoff. The officials will then inspect them and weigh them and they'll remain under supervision until kickoff. At that point then, they do go into the equipment manager of that team's hands. So the thing here is did Belichick know about it? Was it a rogue equipment manager who knew that his team, his quarterbacks, his wide receivers, would have an advantage in the balls were slightly deflated. John, you'll remember, a couple of years ago, when Lane Kiffin was the head coach at USC, they were fine by the PAC 12 conference because they were found to deflate footballs to get a competitive advantage. Kiffin, in that situation, Lane Kiffin, the head coach, said he didn't know about it. The equipment manager did it under his own accord without Kiffin's consent. That could be the case here and the NFL is looking into exactly how this all came about.
But, John, to your point, 11 of the 12, doesn't seem like it was an accident. We'll see how this thing all comes out. The NFL likely won't make a decision until after the Super Bowl as far as any sort of fines or penalties that may happen.
BERMAN: Oh, I cannot imagine they will wait until then, Coy. They can't wait 10 more days to come up with some kind of statement, some kind of sanction, especially if it's found that anyone involved with Patriots organization did this deliberately.
Some people wonder whether weather could do it. If it's cold, for instance, will that take some of the pressure out of the balls? Neither you or I are scientists, but my sense is, yes, maybe a little bit, but 11 out of 12 and that much, unlikely.
WIRE: Yeah. It's a great point, John. We know it happens. In our car's tires, it can happen in cold weather. 11 of the 12 does seem like a stretch. Now, I will say that it is not uncommon for some footballs to be pulled during a game, whether from deflation or if it gets scuffed. It does happen. 11 of the 12 is a lot. It does seem like there was tampering here.
Now, the league's football operations manual says that if any person, and if applicable, the head coach is found responsible for under inflating the footballs, there's a fine. It's not limited to $25,000. Now, in this case, I think Goodell, with what happened with Spygate several years ago in 2007, they will be much more harsh.
BERMAN: Sure.
WIRE: Maybe even the loss of a draft pick -- John?
BERMAN: Draft pick. Some people some kind of suspensions for somebody here. It's also interesting, Coy, people wondering if it would have made a difference in the game. Score was 45-7. They scored most of the points early, a lot on the ground. What do you think?
WIRE: That's right. I think Colts would have put stick 'em on their hands and had a great advantage and it wouldn't have made a difference. Patriots were dominant. We'll watch them go up against a tough team in the Seahawks in the Super Bowl in a couple weeks in Arizona.
BERMAN: Whether it would have helped or not, cheating is wrong period. If it turns out someone did, the NFL will have to say something and soon.
Coy Wire, great to have you with us. Really appreciate it.
Coming up next, the question about the State of the Union address. In the State of the Union address, is taunting allowed?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I have no more campaigns to run. My only agenda --
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: I know, because I won both of them.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: President clearly on offense, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BERMAN: This morning marks the first day of the rest of Barack Obama's presidency. The tone from last night's State of the Union seems to signal something of a change of attitude. It was a lot like a victory lap. That's the message he seemed to be trying to send. The president basically saying he did what he promised in his 2009 inauguration speech.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and begin again the work of remaking America.
15 years into this new century, we have picked ourselves up, dusted ourselves off and begun again the work of remaking America. We've laid a new foundation. A brighter future is ours to write. Let's begin this new chapter together. Let's start the work right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: We picked ourselves up. We dusted ourselves off. So did we?
Let's bring in our political commentator, Democratic strategist, Donna Brazile; and we also have Doug Heye, a former communications director for the Republican National Committee, also with vast experience, Doug has, on Capitol Hill.
Donna, what did you make of that speech? He's not done yet. He said, look, we did it.
DONNA BRAZILE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Second to the last State of the Union address. What the president was saying, I believe, is that we have weathered a huge financial storm. A storm that many of us understood at the time that would cost jobs, foreclosures, it has really -- it was a very big storm we had to overcome. What the president said is now that the storm is passing, Wall Street is rebounding, banks are rebounding, it's time that main street, middle class Americans start to feel this recovery. That's the page the president referred to last night when he said that we've come a long way.
BERMAN: Doug, do Republicans think the president and the country have turned the page and is this the type of speech that Republicans on the hill were expecting from a president whose party just lost complete control of Congress?
DOUG HEYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Given how the president has behaved since the election with the Cuban announcement and immigration announcement, it's not a surprise to Republicans. We look at where household income was, $2,000 less than when the president took office. We look at the unemployment participation rate and how many Americans have left the workforce and this isn't just about numbers. It's about real people who have given up that word of hope. We know we're not there yet. This is exactly what we expected from the president. We talk so much about how Republicans have gotten more conservative and Democrats got more liberal. The president signaled for the next two years and for 2016, the Democratic Party is definitely moving left.
(CROSSTALK)
BERMAN: Is there a risk by saying we did it. Is there a risk when there are still people suffering and people still out there who have left the workforce?
BRAZILE: We know the top 1 percent is doing very, very well but the bottom 99 percent need help. What the president last night signaled is he has policies, that's right, policies, something that the Republicans are void of. It's not about the Democrats going left, right in the middle. We're going forward. Forward to make sure that we have an economy for the 21st century, that we have a skilled workforce, that we're able to help those who are still struggling, Doug, to look for jobs. 11 consecutive months of job growth over 200,000. The problem with Republicans is they can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. They want to continue to drop coals and block the progress the president is trying to make.
BERMAN: Doug, when you hear the president, toward the end of his speech, talking about the fact that he has no more elections to win, and then Republicans cheered, and he said, "Because I won them both," you know, is that a message that Republicans -- do you just laugh that off or do you take offense?
HEYE: It was obviously a great line by the president, set up by a couple of Republicans who probably shouldn't have been clapping. Ultimately, we also talked -- the president talked about how we need new politics. DNC, the president's campaign arm today, put out a press release saying, "WTF to Reince Priebus." I know a lot of people at the DNC. They're good people. They're smart people. They are better than this. They are smarter than this. John Boehner's office, Mitch McConnell's office, wouldn't put out personal attacks like that. We should focus on policy differences and where we come to agreement and there are areas that Republicans will work with the president.
(CROSSTALK)
BRAZILE, Doug, you are absolutely right. We should have put out OMG, oh my god, the official Republican response didn't include immigration reform. It should have been OMG. We need to stop politics of demeaning one another. We need to find areas where we agree whether cybersecurity, which is a very important issue, tax reform, very important issue. There are so many issues that we can find common ground. And I'm glad that Chairman Ryan, Paul Ryan said get rid of rhetoric. Let's look at substance and focus on substance and not just the superficial.
(CROSSTALK)
BERMAN: I have to say LOL to the both of you.
(LAUGHTER)
I have to wrap up or I'll get in trouble.
Thanks for being here. Appreciate it.
BRAZILE: Thank you.
HEYE: Thank you.
BERMAN: What makes a person decide to turn to Islamic fundamentalism? We'll hear from someone who knows firsthand. That's coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BERMAN: New questions about what drives some young men and, yes, some women to terror. Why does someone become a fundamentalist?
Ed Husain has been there and then left the fold. He's now a senior adviser to the Tony Blair Faith Foundation. Ed joins us from London.
Thanks so much for being with us.
You wrote a book, the title which is, "The Islamist, Why I Became an Islamic Fundamentalist, What I Sought and Why I Left," and, inside, you say, of thousands of young men and women, that "They believe their cause is worth dying for and they want to have that honor, confident in the reward they will get for their actions. They are disillusioned, not disenfranchised. Many are well-educated with a good family life but they seek a value that they can fight for, a cause for which they can die."
I think a lot of people will be surprised by that. There's this notion that it's people on the fringes of society who would be most attracted to fundamentalism.
ED HUSAIN, SENIOR ADVISOR, TONY BLAIR FAITH FOUNDATION & AUTHOR & FELLOW, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: That's a good question, John. I think that perception exists because we don't understand why people join Islamist extremist groups, whether it's Osama bin Laden who game from a multimillion-dollar construction industry in Saudi Arabia, whether it's Zawahiri, who came from a prestigious medical family, or al Baghdadi, who comes from a educated Arabic family. What we don't understand is this is not about madness or people who are crazy but people who are by and large very educated, very thoughtful and reflect on the state of the world. Now, on that reflection, i believe, they come to the wrong conclusions. So rather than believe in creating change through peaceful means, after all, Martin Luther King and Gandhi and Nelson Mandela were more successful than terrorists, in the case of Hamas, who have put up a wall between the peoples of Palestine and Israel. The conclusion comes through violence and force, that they're going to change the world. Now what we're seeing is that conclusion is invalid, whether it's the drone attacks coming down on them in Pakistan or whether it's the Taliban being forced out of power, that conclusion is invalid. But what's attractive is the belief that they can become important and relevant in the global media space by spilling more blood. And ISIS' calculation that by beheadings and by killings that they command the attention of the world is playing out. So, yes, we can criticize them for their extremism and terrorism and, sadly, what "bleeds leads" in the news stream, but onus on the rest of us is to understand the theological and the religious motivation for the extremists, the sense of isolation they feel, especially in European countries, less in American countries, but more so in the European countries, the exclusion from the wider social space that leads them to becoming vulnerable to meeting those who give them a sense of worth and value and belonging and identity and, as you say, purpose.
BERMAN: How do you get these people out? If they're making a theological decision, you would say a rational, educated decision -- and I mean that in a literal sense. I don't think it's rational or educated -- but they make that choice to get in. How do you convince someone to get out? You got out.
HUSAIN: By using the best of religion to defeat the worst of religion. I don't mean that as cliche. I mean it in the sincere and genuine sense that when I was involved with extremist organizations, my parents were opposed to me, my family members, wider family members, were opposed to me. My local mosque was opposed to me. The vast majority of Muslims that I met in Mecca and Medina were opposed to me. It's still the case today that extremists find they're supposed to be defending Islam and Muslims and standing up for ordinary folks around the world, but what's often the case is the very people they're supposed to be standing up for oppose them, dislike and disagree with them. That's where the strength lies. In other words, demanding the best of the Koran, the best of the prophet's like, to inject doubt in the mind of the extremists who has the totalitarian outlook that he or she believes that they are on the truth and dying for a pathway that leads to heaven. The message ought to come from Muslims and Muslim scholars and others that they are murderers and not martyrs and that they're going to hell, if anywhere, and not heaven. Until that message resonates strongly in the grassroots of young Muslim communities, we will not see them be doubtful and turn away from the violent pathway that they've chosen.
BERMAN: Ed Husain, I appreciate your perspective on this, hoping that message gets out everywhere around the world.
That's it for us today.
"LEGAL VIEW" with Ashleigh Banfield starts right after a quick break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
