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CNN Live Saturday

President Bush's Numbers Are Up, at Least When it Comes to Iraq; Identity Theft Made Easy

Aired June 17, 2006 - 18:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to CNN LIVE SATURDAY.

A change of heart. A new CNN poll shows President Bush's numbers are up, at least when it comes to Iraq. The new numbers follow a week of presidential speeches on Iraq and even a surprise visit to Baghdad. We're going to get more now from CNN White House correspondent Ed Henry.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Bush is spending Father's Day weekend at his Texas ranch, getting some down time after crisscrossing the globe to praise the formation of a new Iraqi government. And then racing from the White House to Seattle and on to New Mexico to raise big money for vulnerable Republican lawmakers where he addressed Iraq head-on as a midterm election issue.

GEORGE W. BUSH, U.S. PRESIDENT: And the best way to protect the American people is to stay on the offense and bring the killers to justice so they don't hurt the American people again.

In need people in the United States Congress like Heather that understands that the war on terror is not just Iraq, but it's Afghanistan and it's places where people plan and plot their attacks on the United States of America.

HENRY: At a stop in Albuquerque for Congresswoman Heather Wilson, the president charged Democrats are trying to cut and run from Iraq. As the new CNN poll shows approval of the president's handling of the war has risen five points to 39 percent since last month.

BUSH: We face determined enemies who remain intent on killing the innocent and defeating these enemies will require more sacrifice and the continued patience of our country. But our efforts in Iraq are well worth it. The mission is necessary for the security of our country and we will succeed.

HENRY: But in her response to the president's weekly radio address, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi noted 2,500 American servicemen and women have now lost their lives.

REP. NANCY PELOSI, (D) CA: It is time for a new direction in Iraq. At the earliest practicable time the United States must begin the responsible redeployment of its troops and the Iraqis must assume the burden of defending their own country.

HENRY: While the president has consistently rejected it, the CNN poll now shows 53 percent of Americans want a timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HENRY (on camera): The CNN poll also shows the president's overall job rating has only increased one point in the last month. Leading Democrats to charge if this is a Bush bounce, Republicans have a lot of work to do between now and November.

LIN: So let's get perspective on whatever momentum the president might think he has. CNN's senior political analyst Bill Schneider joining us. Good to have you. You take a look at those numbers and what happened this week. I mean, the president and the administration won the debate, the House resolution passed. His numbers are up after a visit to Iraq. But give us some perspective.

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Let me start with the number you see in the lower left-hand corner, 54 percent of Americans, that's a majority, continue to disapprove of the president's policies in Iraq, the way he's handling the issue.

Yes, the numbers have gone up a bit. President Bush's job handling of Iraq went up as he went to Baghdad and showed solidarity with the troops. But the issue itself is still very unpopular and still a problem for Republicans. They would like to believe this is a turning point, that the elimination of Zarqawi means those numbers will continue to climb. All we know is that at one point a few days after the elimination of Zarqawi, the numbers went up a few points.

LIN: But the House floor fight and the passing of this resolution declaring that the U.S. was going to win the global war on terror, non-binding. But the president clearly took this as a win. So is it really reflective, though, of how the American people feel about this war?

SCHNEIDER: No. We saw the figure in Ed's report that 53 percent of Americans would like to see a timetable for American withdrawal from Iraq. But in the Congress, in the House of Representatives, only 37 percent voted for a timetable.

Democrats did reflect the views of most rank and file Democrats around the country. About three quarters supported a timetable. But what happened is you had party discipline on the Republican side. They were virtually unanimous in opposing a timetable and supporting the president. But Republicans out there in the country are not unanimous. Nearly a third of them say they do want to see a timetable. And those Republicans are increasingly unhappy with their own president.

LIN: Is it a struggle for the Republican Party to not seem out of people when it comes to the Iraq war?

SCHNEIDER: It is a struggle. The purpose of this vote was to expose the Democrats as more divided than the Republicans. In the House of Representatives they were. The Republicans were absolutely solid, 99 percent against the timetable. But out there in the country, Republicans are more divided about the war than Democrats are.

LIN: And even our own viewers for the last 30 minutes we've been soliciting questions from them. Frankly, I don't have any for you because people feel so strongly they already know the answer. We got a lot of e-mails we can't even repeat on the air. It gives you an idea how emotional and divisive this is.

SCHNEIDER: Whenever you mention the president or the Iraq war, people feel very intensely about it. And they feel very intensely about President Bush as well. Those feelings are not going to go away very, very quickly. The midterm is shaping up as a referendum on the president and, more than anything else, on the Iraq war.

Yes, there has been a slight improvement as a result of the elimination of Zarqawi, and the president's trip to Baghdad but the war remains unpopular and intensely controversial.

LIN: Bill, thank you so much. Apologies to our viewers. We respect your opinions. We just can't put them on the air.

From the masters to the minors. Tiger woods goes to his first tournament in two months and this time he is growling. A live report from the U.S. Open coming up.

First, your private information made public online. Can you do anything to stop it? Stay with CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: All right. This just in. We're following this story of two missing soldiers in Iraq after a firefight at a checkpoint. According to The New York Times right now, they are saying that witnesses actually saw the two captured soldiers alive and that there is some suggestion in this article of The New York Times that there was a trap for these soldiers.

They quote an eyewitness who was tending his date palms and his apple trees near the village of Paragol (ph) who said that he heard gunfire and explosions and when he walked out to the road he spotted an American Humvee as well as men shouting "God is great" and then saw that they had taken the Americans with them. The gunmen took them and drove the American soldiers away. Quoting from a New York Times article here. We're following this closely. Stay with CNN no this one.

In the meantime, B.J. Ostergren is called the Virginia watchdog. She tells people when their personal information is about to hit the Internet. In her eyes, the government is giving away your privacy. B.J. even found the Social Security number of Florida governor Jeb Bush on line. Drew Griffin has the rest of the story. It aired first on PAULA ZAHN NOW.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Upon searching further, we also found talk show host Kelly Ripa and her husband.

BJ OSTERGREN, THE VIRGINIA WATCHDOG: Yes, and with their home addresses. They own, apparently, two places.

GRIFFIN: Ostergren made exposing this electronic privacy gap her mission four years ago when a concerned stranger warned her that her personal information was about to go online. Now she wants everyone to be warned.

She has set up a Web site to lobby governments and financial institutions to stop posting this information and she now takes the time to call strangers herself and let them know the risks.

OSTERGREN: It infuriates me no end but what can I do? I think people should see what I'm showing you and people should see, you know, what -- you want to see Colin Powell's.

GRIFFIN: On a Virginia Web site, she found the former secretary of state's social security number, his wife's, their Virginia address and even signatures.

OSTERGREN: You can get that record and on the first page of that document, here it is right here, you see page one, with his home address here.

GRIFFIN: We decided to check for ourselves. Ostergren suggested we look at Phoenix, Arizona. Maricopa County. Per capita, it has the highest rate of identity theft fraud in the country. Sitting at a computer, in Atlanta, we were a bit taken back when we went to the Maricopa County Recorders Office Web site and found just about every document you could imagine and personal information that you would never want others to get.

(on camera): Social Security number right there.

(voice-over): So we physically went to the Maricopa County Recorders Office and ran into a local resident, Phyllis Montgomery, who was shocked when we showed her all of her personal information.

(voice-over): Little surprising?

PHYLLIS MONTGOMERY, MARICOPA COUNTY RESIDENT: Very surprising, very scary. Very scary because this is private information. Everybody should not have information dealing with exactly where to come and murder me or pick me up or --

LAWRENCE (voice-over): The recorder's office here posts a sign warning people their information will be made available on the Internet. But available where? And who is the warning for? Using the Internet we randomly looked up Michael Russo who lives in Phoenix. He has never used a computer. And doesn't remember ever being in the recorders office. MICHAEL RUSSO, MARICOPA COUNTY RESIDENT: Your privacy is your privacy. Up until they come out with these computers.

GRIFFIN: Michael Russo ripped up our copies of his personal documents right in front of us. But we can easily print out another copy right on the county Web site.

Recorder Helen Purcell says she is working with the state of Arizona to figure out how to cleanse the records, like blackening out Social Security numbers. But she admits that in their rush to post the information online, they did not realize how easy they were making it for criminals intent on committing fraud.

HELEN PURCELL, MARICOPA COUNTY RECORDER: Maybe at the outset of that all of these things weren't thought about.

GRIFFIN: BJ Ostergren, the Virginia watchdog --

OSTERGREN: There it is.

GRIFFIN: -- couldn't agree now. The question now she says what, if anything, is anyone going to do about it?

OSTERGREN: We're very stupid in this country. Very stupid. This is spoon feeding criminals.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: Well, you can see more of Drew Griffin's reporting week nights on PAULA ZAHN NOW at 8:00 p.m. eastern, 5:00 pacific. But we want to stay on the subject right now. I'll bring in attorney John Palfrey to talk about keeping your private information off the Internet.

John, it is actually shocking that Maricopa County can put a sign up that says your personal information is going to be on the Web. Is there any recourse for people to tell the government, no, I don't want you to put out there?

JOHN PALFREY, HARVARD LAW PROFESSOR: It's a really good question. I think there are some things individuals can do. Governor Jeb Bush went into the records and had them redacted, got those numbers taken out of the records. I think individuals should do effectively a credit check on themselves. Go to your local Web sites, figure out where information is and ask it to be removed.

But that's not the answer. We need larger reform in terms of what government agencies are putting online.

LIN: What would you like to see?

PALFREY: I think we do need some protection for individuals in terms of what companies and what government agencies can do with the most private of your information, things like Social Security numbers, things like bank account information. There should be some standard in terms of encryption or protection for those data, not having them on the open Internet.

LIN: In essence, you're saying there's really not much that the individual consumer can do. Because, frankly, if I lived in Maricopa County and went to the recorder's office, I bet they'd say no, it's too much trouble, we can't individually redact everybody's pieces of their personal files.

PALFREY: So I think there are some things we can affect and some we can't. I think if every single citizen went there something would change. There are lots of simple things we can do. I don't know many people who would send a postcard with their Social Security number or bank account information, but people every day send an e-mail with that information, which is just the same as a postcard, in terms of its protectiveness.

So there are really simple common sense things you can do. Talk to your kids about what they're putting on myspace or other public spaces.

LIN: We're showing a web site of hotels.com, for example, where you would put your marital status, credit card. They might ask for some identifying feature like your mother's maiden name. Who owns that information? Do we own our identity once we submit it to a government paper?

PALFREY: We should. That's something up for grabs in the United States law. There are a number of good companies, Microsoft, IBM, small companies and others who are pushing for user-centric privacy, making sure individuals own their information and control it.

The Virginia Watchdog, the Choicepointe story, a number of instances showed this is a very important thing, that individuals are able to own and control what people do with their data.

LIN: Wouldn't it be a great business strategy if companies announced we keep your information private? Ebay does it.

PALFREY: Absolutely. I really think there should be a market for companies that take your information seriously. Most people don't read those privacy policies online but most of the time they're empty, like Swiss cheese. I think we will see a market emerge for those companies. Ebay is a great example. That become trustworthy with your information and people do business there and not elsewhere.

LIN: Thank you so much.

Tiger misses his first major cut. The latest from the U.S. Open. First John Roberts previews "A Week at War."

JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Correspondents here in Washington and around the world examine the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the war of words in Congress. Plus, President Bush's surprise visit to Baghdad. The new security crackdown there and the successor to al Zarqawi, all coming up on "Iraq, a Week at War."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) LIN: Other news across America now. New Orleans, the most violent crime reported since Hurricane Katrina. Five teenagers shot to death. Police say the shootings may have been drug related.

Tennessee, authorities say a tour bus carrying Ricky Skaggs hit and killed a pedestrian last night. It happened near the Bonnaroo Music Festival where Skaggs had performed. It was unclear if the victim was a concert goer.

He became famous for marrying his former sixth grade teacher. Now Vili Fualaau has a criminal record. He was sentenced for a DUI conviction. Mary Kay Letourneau did time for her relationship with him when he was 12. They now have two kids.

When does a manhole cover make the news? When it does this. This is video from last night's severe storm that hit Minneapolis. The manhole cover popped because of water pressure in the sewer. That's how much it was raining.

Now, at The World Cup, bloodied but not beaten, Team USA held its own against Italy. The match ended in a tie, 1-1. It was an aggressive game. Take a look at these photos. That's U.S.'s Brian McBride bleeding after a tackle by Italy. Here two U.S. players challenge Italy's center for the ball. The U.S. can advance to the next round if it beats Ghana on Thursday.

It's a major miss for Tiger Woods. For the first time in a decade he didn't make the cut to play the final rounds of a major league championship. His cut from the U.S. Open has opened up the field for others. Our Larry Smith is in New York. Such a surprise and so disappointing.

LARRY SMITH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it really is shocking. As I was telling someone earlier it's like in the 1990s seeing the NBA finals without Michael Jordan and the Bulls. That's the kind of impact Tiger has had on golf.

No, he's not here. He's at home or somewhere else not a part of the field after he missed the cut, 12 over par in the first two rounds. First time as a professional that he's missed a major and Tiger does not get that Father's Day victory he was hoping for after his father passed away in early May. Instead it's the No. 2 ranked player in the world, Phil Mickelson, who is making his move.

What a phenomenal round he had today. One under par 69 for the day, he is at two over par for the tournament. Outstanding, very steady. Birdie putts all throughout the day.

Keep in mind Phil with a victory would make him just the third ever to win three professional majors in a row. Mickelson says he's just trying to win one.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PHIL MICKELSON, GOLFER: I'm just trying to focus in on this one tournament. It's nice that I'm in that position, but there's a lot of work ahead. I just don't have the energy to let my mind wander. I've got a lot of work to do these next few days.

I love the fact I have a chance heading into the final two rounds. It's exciting if I can put together a couple of good rounds. But a lot of work. This is a very penalizing golf course. And the scores are just going to keep getting worse.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SMITH: Well, that was Phil's comments after his round on Friday. He has not yet spoken just now. A round of 69 today, just the eighth sub par round of the tournament. That's how difficult this Winged Foot course is playing. Kenneth Parry, the Brit, is right now one over par, trying to hold on to the lead. No one is under par.

The last time a U.S. Open winner failed to shoot par or lower it was 1978. Andy North did it then. Everyone finding this course very difficult. Only eight golfers within four shots of the lead. Sizes up to be a very difficult Sunday final round as we wrap up the third round.

LIN: It's not going to be same without Tiger Woods. He wanted to do this for his dad who passed away. It's too bad he won't be part of this team or this round. Thanks very much.

We showed you this video earlier, Jimmy Kimmel trying to convince us that Wolf Blitzer is indeed his dad. Now the rest of the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIMMY KIMMELL, TALK SHOW HOST: Whoever wins this pop quiz gets to be my dad. So the stakes are very high. Our challenger, contestant No. 1, Wolf Blitzer, joins us from THE SITUATION ROOM In Washington. There he is.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hi, Jimmy. Glad to be here.

KIMMELL: Glad to have you, Wolf. And my birth father joins us now from his situation room in Phoenix, Arizona. Dad. There he is. You ready, dad?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm ready.

KIMMELL: All right. That's the only place he can concentrate. What nickname was I given after bringing a briefcase to junior high school. Dad?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it was Nerd Man.

BLITZER: I remember that. I remember that very vividly. Briefcase Joe.

KIMMELL: What is my personal record for Chicken McNuggets consumed in one sitting? Dad?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think 108.

KIMMELL: No, that's not correct. Wolf.

BLITZER: I was there when it happened. 75.

KIMMELL: 75. That's right. Congratulations to my new dad, Wolf Blitzer.

BLITZER: Jimmy, I just want you to know that I'm so proud to be your new dad. And send me a present.

KIMMELL: I will. I'm going to send you the present I planned to send to my imposter dad, didn't get one question right. We didn't set the part with my dad up. Former Dad, what did you have to say for yourself?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Party, robot party! Robot party!

KIMMELL: You don't want to interrupt him during one of his robot parties.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, huh?

If you haven't paid attention to Iraq this week check out "A Week at War" in three minutes. One question John Roberts and his team investigates, who is the new al Qaeda top man in Iraq?

And another special program at 8:00 p.m. eastern, "Dead Wrong: Inside an Intelligence Meltdown." CNN PRESENTS proves that the intelligence on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq was wrong.

And at 9:00, Larry King. Larry's guests Mary Kay Letourneau and her husband.

Part of our show later we'll go inside the wars, the sewers that illegal immigrants use to get into the United States. A check of the headlines next, then ON THE STORY.

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