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Epic Storm Spawns Tornadoes; Countdown to Election Day; Mom Armed Son Against Bullies; Charlie Sheen Arrested for Trashing Hotel Suite; Two Dozen Tornadoes Touch Down in Midwest; Study: Cancer Rare in Ancient Egypt; LeBron Hype Falls Flat
Aired October 27, 2010 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, guys. It's 9:00 a.m. on the east, 6:00 a.m. out west.
Have you looked out the window lately?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is pretty bad.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: Yes. It's pretty bad, all right. About 1200 miles and at least 10 tornadoes worth of bad. And then violent weather system that slammed state after state yesterday, it isn't finished. Got a lot to share with you on that front.
Plus Hurricane Charlie hits a swanky New York hotel. Charlie Sheen, that is. Lots of talk about the time in the hotel, a little later and then in the hospital. We're taking a closer look.
And a legal storm that's been going on for months in Mississippi might be over. A judge ordered a school district to pay more than $80,000 in legal fees and expenses. This is all part of that lawsuit that a lesbian student filed after she was told she'd be kicked out of her school prom if she brought her girlfriend.
Well, if you live in the eastern U.S. from Delaware to the Deep South, watch out. It could be another day of historically bad weather. The worse storm in decades pummeled the nation's mid section yesterday and spun off at least 24 possible tornadoes.
Surveillance cameras caught this twister wrecking havoc in Indiana. A small boat gets tossed and a nearby pole barn is just ripped apart. Weather experts say that this tornado may have been as strong as a Category 2 hurricane.
At least six tornadoes have been confirmed in Indiana and damage reports are coming in from several states.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TINA TRIPLETT, OHIO STORM SURVIVOR: It sounds just like a train, like they say it does. And it just -- as fast as it came, and as fast as it went. And when we came out, this is what we've seen.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Well, near Lima, Ohio, roofs peeled off homes as residents raced to take cover. At least three tornadoes already confirmed in Ohio.
Across the Midwest, as many as 200,000 homes and businesses lost power.
And in Jackson County, Michigan, a strong gust of wind strong enough to knock over the semi trailer on Interstate 94. Take a look at this. Wind gusts of more than 70 miles an hour reported across the span of that storm and it's overall length is staggering.
At one time, the powerful low-pressure system stretched an astounding 1200 miles from north to south.
Then in North Carolina, this is what remains of a mobile home that was scooped up and thrown across a roadway. Several homes destroyed across the strait. Cars overturned and some of the worst reports coming out of Lincoln County now. At least 11 people injured there. Possible tornado being blamed.
Let's get more now from Lincoln County, reporter Ken Ward is with our Charlotte affiliate WSOC standing by live in Valle -- Ken.
KEN WARD, WSOC REPORTER: Good morning, Kyra. I'm standing on the bricks stoop that used to lead to a mobile home. As you can see that mobile home is no longer here. I'm going to show you where it went.
Now taking a look over here, you can see a trailer that was blown on its side. A little bit to the left. There's a refrigerator. It's hard to make out what it is. But that gives you some idea of the strength of this storm.
Right here is a tree that's been completely snapped in half and a little bit lower to the left you can see an electric range here that's been thrown about like a toy.
Let's take a look at some video that was shot earlier. The sun coming up over Valle, North Carolina revealed a scene that looks a lot like the aftermath of a tornado. Weather officials will be on the scene here today to identify the type of storm that blew through here last night.
The storm snapped trees in half, destroyed five buildings and injured 11 people. One of them seriously.
Now residents describe a frightening scene. Many took shelter in basements as the storm blew through. One woman says her husband came across a family whose home was wrecked. They were left clinging to a tree.
Now you may be able to see it behind me here. There are a number of trees that have been snapped in half. There are also power lines that are down. Crews are out here right now working to restore power.
Back to you.
PHILLIPS: All right. Ken, thanks so much.
And that same system that triggered those ferocious storms yesterday is threatening more severe weather today. And that's where our Rob Marciano comes in.
What do you think, Rob?
(WEATHER REPORT)
PHILLIPS: OK. I'm trying to calculate that in my head but it looks huge.
MARCIANO: You know that's 955 millibars. You got that.
PHILLIPS: Exactly. I got it all down. Thanks, Rob.
MARCIANO: All right.
PHILLIPS: We'll be talking a lot in the next couple of hours.
All right, countdown to Election Day. Just six days until the vote that could change the balance of power in Congress.
CNN deputy political director Paul Steinhauser joining us from the CNNPolitics.com desk.
So, Paul, what's on your radar?
PAUL STEINHAUSER, DEPUTY POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Here's what's on my radar. With less than a week to go, Kyra, before the election, President Barack Obama making another pitch for younger voters. You've seen him headline some big rallies on college campuses the last couple of weeks.
Tonight he will be on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart." He tapes with Jon Stewart here in Washington later this afternoon. And the program runs tonight. That program is pretty popular with younger voters.
This is the first time a sitting president has been on that show. I'm going to ask Ron Helm (ph), our cameraman to -- it was up here. Well, we can't get it up right now. The computer went down. But it is on the CNN political ticker. I guarantee you that.
And remember this comes three days before -- Stewart holds a big rally, "Restore Sanity" rally, here on the mall in Washington, D.C.
You know talking about the president, there is a big battle going on right now for his old seat, his old Senate seat in Illinois, and tonight the last debate between Alexis Giannoulias, the state treasurer and Democratic nominee, and Congressman Mark Kirk, the Republican nominee. Republicans think here if they can win this seat back, and the polls indicate it's deadlock, they think they may have a decent shot at winning back the Senate. You'll see the president himself back in his hometown of Chicago on Saturday for a rally with Giannoulias and other Democrats -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. So tell us about this horseback congressional candidate.
STEINHAUSER: Yes, this is interesting. Not your average way to campaign but it's Montana we're talking about. And there's a Democratic congressional candidate out there, Dennis McDonald, and what is he doing? He's going around the district on his horse. And the horse's name is Row Boat.
He's also riding his mule. The mule's named is Justice. There'll be a quiz on this later. He says it's his way -- his way of saying that he's in touch with the average voter in Montana, a lot of whom have horses -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Justice, I'll remember that. Thanks, Paul.
All right. We're going to continue our national conversation about bullying. The mom who admits arming her son to fight off bullies and cell phone video that made us cringe. A teenage boy bullying his substitute teacher, a tiny nun.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: All right. We're heading cross country. Let's start in Colorado Springs and a very hungry basset hound who swallowed 31 nails and survived. The X-rays speak for themselves.
Sophie was apparently nosing around the backyard when she started snacking on the nails and rabies tag and some siding. She is recovering well after some quick surgery, but her munchies came with a $3500 vet bill.
On to Tampa, Florida where a man answered a late-night knock on the door to find an alligator on his doorstep. The reptile, seven feet long and obviously an unwelcomed visitor. The gator trapper had been called in to wrangle him out of there.
All right. Let's talk about bullies. Not just kids on kids. But take a look at this cell phone video. It captured a 16-year-old bully going after a substitute teacher, a nun filling in for the day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is this? What is this?
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Pretty appalling, isn't it? Authorities say the kid reached for a salt shaker, threw the salt in the nun's face. And listen to this. A new survey to add to our national conversation. It asked more than 43,000 high schoolers if they've been physically abused, teased or taunted in the past year to a degree that upset them. Forty-three percent said yes. And half of them admitted to being the bully. It also found that bullying is just as bad at both public and private schools.
Then there's this story out of Connecticut. A mom admits giving her 12-year-old son a BB gun and a knife to defend himself against bullies. Now she could go to jail and he could be kicked out of school.
Let's talk about all this with Steve Perry. He's education contributor.
Steve, let's go ahead and start with this mom arming her kid. What do you think?
STEVE PERRY, CNN EDUCATION CONTRIBUTOR: Desperate people do desperate things, and this sounds like a desperate parent. It's a bad decision. You just can't send your child to school with weapons. Because in the end when they come in to welcome to the principal's office, again, Kyra, you know you don't spend much time here, but it means that we are creating an unsafe environment not just for that child but for the other children. It's a really bad decision.
PHILLIPS: All right. Trust me, I spent plenty of time in the principal's office, just not for weapons. But let's have a reality check here, Steve. OK?
Talking with these kids, negotiating with these kids. It doesn't always work. We know that. And I'm not condoning this but if my child is contemplating suicide to the extreme that we're seeing kids taking their own lives now, I mean, we're watching it on a regular basis, you know what do you do?
You've got to give your kids some sort of confidence so your child doesn't do anything drastic.
PERRY: Well, bullying does start at home. There are a lot of times that you hear me lay in to teachers and principals, but bullying starts at home.
In fact, I would say at least 80 percent of the bullying incidents that we encounter, and we encounter them here, but we just -- we get into kids. They start in homes. Meaning, kids are e- mailing kids or they're texting, because there are a lot of text gangsters, a lot of e-mail gangsters. Not just in schools and corporations. People can feel real comfortable sending someone a blind e-mail and saying whatever kind of reckless things come to their mind.
This stuff does start at home, but you arm your child with self esteem, not with weapons. Because children are not killing themselves because of bullying, they're killing themselves because of low self esteem and, sometimes, there's some other mental illness. Because there are children that deal with bullying, and it's not good, but they don't kill themselves.
PHILLIPS: You've got to have intervention. All right. Not just kids on kids, but we see kids bullying teachers, as well. There's this cell phone video that I want to roll in just a second, Steve. Just to set it up, though, it's this El Paso nun, Sister Carmen Tirres, she was bullied by a 16-year-old student, Vincent Macias, at Mountain View High School. He's been charged with assault, but someone shot this on cell phone video. Let's take a look for just a second.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VINCENT MACIAS, STUDENT: What is this? This?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: He's up in her face taunting her. And he doesn't stop. He's making the first moves, he's throwing a salt shaker at her. And look at -- she looks like she's four feet tall. This kid's towering over here, and she obviously doesn't know what to do. This is appalling.
PERRY: It's disgusting. It's not just about throwing a book at this kid. You need to throw the entire library at him. If this happened here, which I cannot imagine, he'd be standing right there, because kids don't sit when they're in my office because they're not guests. And I would make sure that he understood in no uncertain terms, not only was that the last day that he spent at our school, but there's going to be some people who are going to meet him outside. Those are police officers. We're going to prosecute to every letter of the law.
In addition to that, every single child who participated in one way or another would also be arrested. Because we need everyone to understand that this is not a game. You don't get in people's faces, regardless of how tall she is or what does for a living. It doesn't matter. This is inappropriate behavior. Period.
PHILLIPS: Steve Perry, always appreciate your insight. Thanks so much, Steve.
PERRY: Thank you.
PHILLIPS: Well, Charlie Sheen allegedly trashes a hotel suite leaving a path of destruction at the Plaza Hotel. The cops say he was naked and intoxicated. So, what's next for the Hollywood bad boy now that he's out of the hospital?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: Charlie Sheen is out of a New York hospital bound for Los Angeles after police say they found him intoxicated and naked in a smashed-up hotel suite. His people blame an allergic reaction, but this is just the latest notch in a timeline of trouble for the infamous bad boy. And it makes this police station scene station from "Ferris Bueller" seem like looking into a crystal ball. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP - "Ferris Bueller's Day Off")
JEANIE: In a nutshell, I hate my brother. How's that?
BOY IN POLICE STATION: It's cool. Did you blow him away or something?
JEANIE: No. Not yet.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Well, that was 1986, and his character simply credited as "Boy in Police Station." As you know, his star rose fast, almost as fast as his reputation for chaos. And yet again, he's living up to that image.
So here's what police tell us about what went down in that suite at the Plaza Hotel. Officers showed up early Tuesday morning responding to a 911 call about an emotionally disturbed man. Sheen was voluntarily hospitalized for psychological evaluation. Sources tell us that he was with an unidentified woman at the time. She wasn't hurt.
Keep in mind, Sheen was not arrested, and his reps say this is all just the result of an adverse allergic reaction to medication.
Sheen's ex-wife Denise Richards was in a different room at the Plaza Hotel with the couple's two young children when it all went down. Here's what she had to say to Joy Behar.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOY BEHAR, CNN HOST, "THE JOY BEHAR SHOW": Police found Charlie drunk and naked in his room, tables and chairs were thrown around the room. $7,000 worth of damage to the room.
DENISE RICHARDS, CHARLIE SHEEN'S EX-WIFE: OK.
BEHAR: And he had been out partying and returned with a woman to the room. Those are the reports.
RICHARDS: OK.
BEHAR: So you don't know what exactly happened. Did you go to the hospital with him?
RICHARDS: I do know what happened. I would rather --
BEHAR: Oh, you do know, you just don't want to talk about it?
RICHARDS: I would rather --
(CROSSTALK)
BEHAR: OK. So, I'm just telling you what I read.
RICHARDS: And I did help him at the hospital.
BEHAR: You do go to the hospital with him?
RICHARDS: Yes.
BEHAR: So, how is he doing? Can you tell me that?
RICHARDS: I'll let you ask Charlie.
BEHAR: When's he coming on my show?
RICHARDS: Maybe we'll get him on tomorrow.
BEHAR: Do you think so?
RICHARDS: No, it's -- you know what? The thing is, it's very -- my daughters are five and six years old.
BEHAR: Yes.
RICHARDS: And they're at an age where they can start to understand. They have no idea what went on. And I'm -- a lot of our stuff happened when they were much younger, which I'm so grateful for. We're in an amazing place. We've been getting along great for the last year and a half. And we're doing our best. So, as far as that situation, I'm trying to protect the girls from it as much as possible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Got to feel sorry for those girls. Now, shall we point out Charlie Sheen is one of the highest-paid actors in TV? Reportedly pulling in about $2 million per episode of his show, seen here, "Two and a Half Men."
But the star has a long history of getting in trouble. 1990, just 24 years old, he checked into a rehab center for alcohol abuse. 1995, he was a witness in the trial of Hollywood Madame Heidi Fleiss, testifying about his $50,000 tab and his preference for the cheerleader type.
Then, a year later, he was put on a probation in an assault case. But in 1998, his dad turned him in for parole violation. And just last year, he was arrested for allegedly brandishing a knife at his current wife. Right now, he's just days from completing his probation in that case.
And can I just reiterate, Charlie Sheen is one of the highest- paid actors in TV? Pulling in about two million bucks per episode of "Two and a Half Men."
An epic storm hits the Midwest, and one brave kite surfer hits the waves. Big, pounding waves. And believe it or not, that's Lake Michigan, and this storm remains a threat as it heads east.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) PHILLIPS: The opening bell set to ring on Wall Street any minute now. We're expecting some selling at the open.
The problem? Investors are worried about what the Federal Reserve is going to do to help give the economy a boost. The widespread belief has been that the Fed will announce next week that it will buy up to a trillion dollars worth of US treasury and other bonds to help push interest rates down. But now "The Wall Street Journal" reporting that the Fed isn't coming -- or going, rather, to spend as much as expected. So stocks are set to fall. We're going to be following the numbers all day.
9:30 in the east, 6:30 in the west, and time now for some stories that got us talking. Some -- much of the nation, rather, abuzz over the massive storm system that just raked across the Midwest and the southeast yesterday. More than two dozen possible tornadoes touched down, including that twister that ripped apart a building in Indiana and, remarkably, there are no confirmed deaths.
Laura Healy of Montgomery, Illinois, captured these images of its approach. She says it was like a wall of wind and horizontal rain. Once the wind started swirling, tornado sirens went off, so she grabbed her pets and ran to the basement.
Those winds also kicked up towering waves on Lake Michigan. Weather experts say that some measured up to 16 feet tall. Boaters were told to stay off the water until storm warnings were lifted. Except for the one kite surfer that we saw, Rob, that's taking his own life into his hands.
(WEATHER REPORT)
PHILLIPS: Well here's a story that you parents of young athletes are definitely going to want to hear. "Sports Illustrated" is reporting on a new football that says a series of minor hits can actually do as much brain damage as a mayor concussion.
John Roberts here with our AM Extra. Something parents do need to hear, and at the same time, probably don't want to hear as they see their guys out there on the field.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR, "AMERICAN MORNING": Yes, of course, you know all of the news and all of the focus of attention, Kyra, on the massive hits, those devastating hits. We saw so many of them a couple of weeks ago in the NFL, where the helmets come together so hard that they actually give so much brain trauma that the player has a concussion.
But this new study was done at Perdue University, finds that just the minor little hits, the ones that you wouldn't even suspect, the ones from which the players don't seem to show any kind of effects, actually have a profound effect on the brain. When the researchers used what's called "functional MRI imaging," it looks at the brain in real-time to see what's going on, they found that these players, many of them line men who sustained these small hits over the course of a season, actually had impaired brain function compared to other players.
I talked with David Epstein from "Sports Illustrated," as well as Dr. Steven Flanagan from NYU Medical Center who had something to do with the research about the types of effects that they were seeing and how worried they were about these hits.
Here's what they told me.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
What were the effects that were seen in the testing? And was this frightening to you?
DR. STEVEN FLANAGAN, NYU SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: Yes, actually, it really was. So, not surprisingly, the kids who were concussions had these problems
ROBERTS: Sure.
FLANAGAN: -- with cognition, with their thinking.
ROBERTS: Yes. Your head gets smacked around, the brain kind of bounces around inside the skull.
FLANAGAN: What was surprising, though, was that these kids who took a lot of hits repeatedly over the season, they also had cognitive problems on these tests, and when we put them in the FMRI machine to see what areas of brain were active during these tests --
ROBERTS: We should just say FMRI is functional MRI. You look at the brain's operation in real time.
FLANAGAN: That's exactly right. Those abnormalities were similar to the kids who have concussions, as well. Yet, they were flying under the radar. No one knew that they had problems.
ROBERTS: So, they were never symptomatic.
FLANAGAN: No, they were not symptomatic that were detected by anybody.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: So John, are there certain players more susceptible to these hits?
ROBERTS: Yes. The people who are on the line, the ones who come together, you know, with that clunk right after the ball is snapped or they're involved in blocks as the play is under way using their hands and their head as the three points of contact; they're the ones who are particularly susceptible because the contact is with the front of the helmet.
And while these helmets are designed to protect against massive brain injuries, they're -- and really, really strong hits, they're not designed to protect against these minor little hits. So every time the brain jars like that, and sometime these G forces can get up to about 80 Gs, which are thought to cause concussions and don't, it just kind of chips away at the cognitive function of the brain. If they have maybe 150 of these hits over the course of a season, they approach close to the same level of impairment as somebody who has had a fairly substantial concussion.
PHILLIPS: Wow. Parents definitely got to listen up.
John, thanks.
ROBERTS: Definitely.
PHILLIPS: Well, Richard Heene, you remember him? How could we forget? Roll the video. Remember this? A little something to jog your memory. Yes, he was the man behind the balloon boy saga. He went away for a little while. But guess what? Mr. Heene's back. And he's got a brand new invention he wants to sell you.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(VIDEO CLIP, "THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH JAY LENO")
PHILLIPS: Well, the candidates sure don't have a chance to joke around right now. We are talking about six days until election time and our Don Lemon has been out checking out the pulse of young voters, and today he brings us this out of Bryan, Ohio.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Bryan, Ohio is the industrial and original agricultural heartland of our America. It's small-town America.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We make candy. We make Dum-Dum pops, safety pops, candy canes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are now the largest manufacturing employer in Bryan. And I'm not real happy about that.
I think it's almost like grieving. People feel this decline of manufacturing in the Midwest and it's totally changed their life and changed the way they think about things. And so when you're grieving, you know, fear, obviously, can be part of that and anger. People are clearly angry and in politics when you're angry, you take it out on the incumbents whether that's really fair or not doesn't matter.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think a lot of people are so disappointed that I don't know how many will want to go out and vote.
DEAN SPANGLER, SPANGLER CANDY: I'm looking for people that are going to help institute change and do the right thing. I think so many times they get focused on one party versus the other party and I think that what we need to do is get unified and solve some of the issues.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So the thing you should do to help you be clear when you vote is eat a Dum-Dum, it'll sharpen your mental skills.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Not only will Dum-Dums sharpen your mental skills or your agility, a whole lot of coffee, Kyra, is going to sharpen it, as well.
We're here at UT, the University of Toledo. And we are talking about what people are concerned about in this area in the Midwest all over the Midwest as they head into the voting booths come Tuesday. So that's what those folks are talking about in that little town. It's called Bryan, Ohio at the Spangler Candy Company because that employs a whole lot of people in this area.
We want to focus on young people as Kyra Phillips -- put Kyra up in the box, because Kyra we're going to order some coffee and I want to know, do you want a latte? Would you like Americano?
PHILLIPS: You pick. You have great taste.
LEMON: That's what I did before class.
PHILLIPS: I tell you what, they didn't have coffee houses when I was in college, Don.
LEMON: I'm here with Steve and Steve is getting his coffee.
Which class are you off to?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm off to Calculus -- Calc I.
LEMON: Calculus. Oh, my gosh. Do you remember that? So you're going to need a double espresso.
And I was talking to Rachael (ph) who's in line here. What are you going to have?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm going to have a marble mocha.
LEMON: A marble mocha. You've been paying close to the election. You said Tuesday you're definitely going out. Have you decided yet.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have decided on everyone I'm going to vote for. I think it's really important and I'm from Toledo so I'm just going to go back to my house and my area and go to my polling location and vote.
LEMON: The president has been focusing a lot on the young vote. He did it back in 2008. He's been doing it now. He had the MTV town hall. He's going on the "Daily Show" tonight.
Is that a good way to reach you guys, or are you paying attention to traditional news like CNN?
(LAUGHTER) UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well -- I mean. I think, yes, I think it's a good idea that he's doing that. I think he needs to reach out to all the news networks and all that. It is a good idea.
LEMON: OK. All right. Good. So, Kyra, I'm going to order your coffee and then have I'll have it shipped back really quickly. I'm not sure, maybe I can do it through the satellite truck here and get you coffee back.
I want to introduce you, real quickly here, to John (ph) and Emily. John is a young Democrat here -- young Republican. Ut-oh. Oh, my gosh. I committed a faux pas. And then Emily is with the Young Democrats. You guys are paying close attention, as well.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Definitely.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Definitely.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, yes.
LEMON: You're getting people fired up here at the campus?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're doing our, doing our best job.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. It's been a busy fall for everybody. But we're going to really do a big push this weekend for the get out the vote. It should be a busy weekend.
LEMON: Awesome.
So, Kyra, I'm not sure if you were all plugged into politics when you were in college. I kind of was a little bit. But, like that guy, I was focused on calculus and trig and political science and getting the basics out of the way so that we can get these great jobs that we have now. Right?
PHILLIPS: Yes, I was just worried about making my deadline for the paper. That's all I cared about.
Thanks, Don.
LEMON: And don't forget the hangover. Don't forget the hangover the night before. You had to take care of that and coffee always helps.
PHILLIPS: No. That was the teetotaler stage. I didn't get crazy until after college. Come on, Don, you know that. All right. We'll check in with you.
Don on the Election Express bus. All right. Thanks.
Well, it's amazing what you can learn from a mummy. Researchers in Egypt have learned more about the short lives of ancient Egyptians. The good news then, well, cancer was rare. The bad news, hippos and poisonous snakes weren't. But first, wit and comedy. A great combination for today's flashback. On this date in 1947, an American quiz show, "You Bet Your Life," starring Groucho Marx premiered on ABC Radio.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GROUCHO MARX, ABC RADIO: Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, go right ahead.
MARX: You don't know what the question is. It's not the question you think it is that I'm going to ask you. I'm just going to ask you how old you are.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm 30.
MARX: 30? You don't look it. You don't look a day over 25. You say you're married, huh?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's right.
MARX: What does your husband do for a living?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's a tread broker for Goodyear Tire Rubber Company.
MARX: He's a what?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A tread broker.
MARX: Well, give him my congratulations. What is a tread broker?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't know.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Now do you know who Groucho Marx was talking to? "You Bet Your Life" became a television show on NBC because that radio show was so successful.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I keep away from his tires.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: So if you think the TSA makes you jump through too many security hoops at the airport, you've got a friend in Martin Broton. He is the chairman of British Airways and he railed on some of the security measures that the U.S. demands. Broton says that things like taking off your shoes and taking your laptop out of your bag are redundant and unnecessary and that technology should take care of checks like that.
And he thinks that it's time for British carriers to stop caving in to American security demands. So what do you think? Is he right? Do you think taking off your shoes and taking out your laptop and so on are really important or maybe they're just in place to make you feel safer? CNN.com/Kyra. Let me know what you think.
And if you ever wondered what it was like to live like an ancient Egyptian back when the pyramids were new, researchers have some answers. One of the things that they learned, regular people loved their beer and garlic. Too bad there were no Tic Tacs in ancient times. Check out the story of now from CNN's Ben Wedeman in Cairo.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Lying in their glass cases at the Egyptian Museum, these mummies might not seem the picture of good health. You wouldn't look too good either after more than 3,000 years.
But according to a recent study by the University of Manchester, one affliction all too common today, cancer, was relatively rare in ancient times. The researchers examined nearly 1,000 mummies from Egypt and South America and found only one case of cancer.
(on camera): Cancer may have been a rarity, but then again so was longevity. Egyptologists say that ancient Egyptians were lucky if they reached the ripe old age of 40.
(voice-over): The upper crust of society was better off than the rest but even then the lifestyles of the rich and famous left a lot to be desired. According to leading Egyptologist Zahi Hawwas.
ZAHI HAWWAS, EGYPTIAN SUPREME COUNCIL OF ANTIQUES: If you were a pharaoh, you will get a lot of disease it's because you eat well, you eat meat all the time; it's fat food and you never took care of your health.
WEDEMAN: The common people on the other hand at least could drown their sorrows.
HAWWAS: It was a good time because they were eating bread and garlic and drinking beer and beer all the time.
WEDEMAN: But cancer or no cancer, the hazards of living, working, or just walking like an Egyptian in the time of the pharaohs far outweighed the benefits says American University in Cairo Egyptologist, Salima Ikram.
SALIMA IKRAM, EGYPTOLOGIST, AMERICAN UNIVERSITY IN CAIRO: If you are working in a tomb, for example, all that dust is going to get to you. As you grind down limestone as you carve statues, as you inhaled smoke from either cooking fires or, indeed, little lamps that help illuminate your work as you build temples or tombs or decorate them.
So all of these things were killers for the age of Egyptians. WEDEMAN: Parasites, plagues, and just simple illnesses ensured that the Grim Reaper came often and came early.
IKRAM: They had many more incidents of you know venomous animals that could attacked them, being savaged by a hippo as it trampled to the field, even all kinds of wild creatures could get you, poisonous snakes could get you.
WEDEMAN: Looking back across a gap of thousands of years there is a tendency to idealize life in the distant past long before industrialization, pollution and the like. Well, think again.
Ben Wedeman, CNN, Cairo.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: Well, there's much more ahead in the next hour. Let's check in with our reporters to see what they're working on. Let's start with meteorologist, Rob Marciano -- Rob.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, Kyra, the big story, of course, is this monster storm, a record-breaking storm rolling across well, Canada now, but the southern end of it is producing severe weather across the south. We'll break it done in the next hour.
STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: I'm Stephanie Elam in New York. And we're going to get into the battle of the sexes. Who would be first to ask for directions when lost while driving, will it be men or woman? Kyra, we're going to talk about it in the next hour.
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Deborah Feyerick, also in New York. PhD students hack into an Internet voting system legally. What they uncover will surprise you and raise serious questions about the security of Internet and electronic voting -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Thanks guys. Rob, you always ask for directions, don't you?
MARCIANO: Always.
PHILLIPS: Also straight ahead, a dog who bows his head to say grace. Sure, it's cute, but, folks, it goes a lot deeper than that. Coming up in the next hour of CNN NEWSROOM. We're going to talk to the former military man about his devout dog and the purpose behind the prayer.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: So you remember the so-called balloon boy dad, Richard Heene and that whole elaborate hoax involving his son, the helium balloon; gripped nation more than a year ago. Guess what? He's back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) RICHARD HEENE, BALLOON BOY'S DAD: This natural textured wood and all these tiny knots gives you a deep, deep penetrating scratch. Oh, man it feels good.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: I'm not kidding. He is selling a homemade $20 bear scratch back scratcher. Now, Tony, it just gets better. Consists of a 36-inch tree branch with holders that attach to a wall.
TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Oh, my.
PHILLIPS: what do you even say about somebody like this?
HARRIS: Is he trying to take over the role of the late, great Billy Mays. Remember the late great Billy Mays and how good he was at his stuff? He's looking for a gig, right? He's looking for a payday.
PHILLIPS: I'll tell you what. He needs to be looking for some redemption. This guy is just pathetic.
HARRIS: Yes.
PHILLIPS: Anyway, let's talk sports.
HARRIS: Well, the Heat; Miami Heat.
PHILLIPS: There you go.
Oh, wait, you have to do the entrance.
HARRIS: What's that?
PHILLIPS: Step out and step in.
Tony Harris, folks, with "Game, Set, Watch". This is Tony Harris.
HARRIS: I'm looking kind of fit these days. Look at that. Paunch is down a little bit.
PHILLIPS: That's what happen when you use slim fast.
HARRIS: That's it. That's good. Hold on. Can I breathe now? Back up so I can breathe.
PHILLIPS: Maybe you need to help out Mr. LeBron.
HARRIS: Yes. You talk about someone who needs a win. First game of the season, right?
PHILLIPS: A lot of hype.
HARRIS: A lot of hype.
PHILLIPS: All the smoke and the craziness and walking down the cat walk yesterday.
HARRIS: Can we remind everyone of that. Go back to the summer.
PHILLIPS: All hype, no action.
HARRIS: Super team -- there you go, Chris Bosh, there's the man, LeBron James, Dwyayne Wade, and they were going to set the world on fire.
Here's the reality. You ready? Ready?
PHILLIPS: The Irish clogged them right out of the game.
HARRIS: That's right, the leprechaun, right?
So take a look at this. This is the -- there they are, their first regular season game together. What would they look like as a team? Right off the foot. Oh, here we go, Dwyayne Wade, not so good. Are you ready for some LeBron? Bad pass, all right. A lot of turnovers. It was about as sloppy a performance --
PHILLIPS: It's like the Bad News Bears in basketball.
HARRIS: It's about as bad a performance as they are likely to turn in. Let's be honest about it. They are amazing, talented individually. They will work this out, but they looked horrible last night as a team.
PHILLIPS: It's the curse. It's got to be the curse.
HARRIS: Have you heard about the curse.
PHILLIPS: Yes, the radio D.J.
HARRIS: So you spent some time in Cleveland. You're familiar with the Powerhouse radio station there, WMMS -- rock and roll from the north coast of America, right. WMMS.
PHILLIPS: You've got it. You've got it.
HARRIS: So here's the deejay, his name is Rover. He hosts a syndicated radio station there at WMMS, and so he brought in a couple of witches. A witch and a witch's assistant.
PHILLIPS: Let's listen for a minute.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: we place the jar in first, is that what we're doing. So we're going to place the jar in right now, Rover.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They are doing this in the ground.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: By placing (INAUDIBLE) it will now taunt you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARRIS: So the idea here is to put a curse on LeBron James, right? So they used bones and DNA, blood, everything else for this curse, and what are they hoping for? Some kind of major injury for LeBron.
But, here's the thing. Cleveland fans need to understand there is a reason, possibly, why you haven't won a major sports championship since 1964.
PHILLIPS: And that is?
HARRIS: At some point you got to get over this, right? You just can't harbor -- this is not a good look.
1964. 2010 minus 1964. Let's just count the decades. It's the curse.
HARRIS: You're awesome, Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. See you tomorrow.
Tony Harris, ladies and gentlemen: "Game, Set, Watch".
HARRIS: How's that? Is that looking all right?
PHILLIPS: Yes. Now, give me the cool legs right there, Slim. Yes. Slim Shady.
HARRIS: Love you.
PHILLIPS: It's the top of the hour 10:00 Eastern, 7:00 Pacific.
