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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Quake Survivor Found; Where is Haiti's Government?; GOP Wins U.S. Senate Race; 54 Haitian Orphans Taken to U.S.
Aired January 19, 2010 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening again from Port-au- Prince. What a day it has been, what a week. It is the one-week anniversary of this earthquake. The disaster still continues; a very mixed picture on the relief efforts tonight to tell you about. Downright grim picture when it comes to the human tragedy.
The death toll climbing; at least 72,000 bodies recovered according to the Haitian government -- what government remains. Many more are still unaccounted for, of course.
Additionally, American forces are on the ground, some landing at the presidential palace. The U.N. Security Council today approving 3,500 more troops and police officers to keep the peace. More aid arriving, but still far from what's needed.
Now, the U.N. is saying that -- or groups are saying that they have to have security for all food distribution, for all groups to be operating. That may slow down the effort.
A woman, though, was pulled from the rubble a couple of hours ago and we're going to show you that rescue in a moment. It was a struggle to find her adequate medical care, though, after she was rescued, incredibly. So that's a story, both good and bad and what kind of captures a lot of what's going on here for survivors.
First though, monumental political upset, Republican winning Ted Kennedy's old senate seat; Scott Brown defeating Democrat Martha Coakley. Huge implications, of course, for the White House, for the health care reform, for the Democrats. The best political team on television is reporting tonight.
You've got John King and Jessica Yellin on the Republican and Democratic candidates. Also, Dana Bash and what Democrats on Capitol Hill are going to do about health care now that they have lost their crucial 60th vote to block a filibuster. And Wolf Blitzer, of course, is in Washington with the panel. David Gergen, Paul Begala, Alex Castellanos, Gloria Borger and Joe Johns -- Wolf, we go to you.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Anderson. It's a very, very significant moment in political history. Right now, here in the nation's capital, there's going to be a United States Senator from the State of Massachusetts, Scott Brown. He decisively beat Martha Coakley 52 percent to 47 percent. They had nice turnout, more than two million people voted; 99 percent of the precincts now reporting.
Let's go to Scott Brown's campaign headquarters. Our own John King is over there. Lots of happy people John, tonight, over there.
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, with the balloon drop just a few moments ago, victory. You see what it looks like here in Massachusetts. Scott Brown, his wife and his daughters up on the stage, with supporters, the confetti and the balloons still falling here in this hall.
Scott Brown started off with a conciliatory speech. Saying he had spoken to President Obama and hoped to work with him. Said he had spoken to the late Senator Kennedy's wife and paid tribute to Senator Kennedy and said he hoped as a Senator in Washington people would view him as hard-working as they did Senator Kennedy.
But then in his remarks Scott Brown turned defiant. He said the Obama health care plan was a trillion dollar health care plan that would raise taxes and kill jobs and he vowed to fight it. He also said, as a senator, he would fight in the war on terror for taxpayer dollars to be used for weapons to defeat them, not lawyers to defend them.
Wolf, 46 years a Democrat, Ted Kennedy, a liberal Democrat held that seat. Scott Brown will be going to Washington. He said he will go very soon and he will go with a message.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KING (voice-over): The man at the wheel is the man of the moment, certain of his choice in a special election of enormous consequence.
SEN. SCOTT BROWN (R), MASSACHUSETTS: I'm going to vote for myself.
KING: On the way in, a sense of humor.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is the message to President Obama if you win tonight?
BROWN: I'm hoping I can go and show him my truck and play some basketball with him.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There we go.
KING: And on the way out, the Republican Party's new hero offered a warning of sorts on health care.
If they tried to have the House just pass the senate bill if you win, what kind of message would that be?
BROWN: I think that speaks for itself. I think people would be outraged and I think people would pay for it in 2010 and the next midterm election.
KING: So who is Scott Brown and why all the fuss?
BROWN: Ok, thanks, I'll see you tonight.
KING: Until now, any talk of Brown and national exposure centered around this racy spread 27 years ago. He was a model while attending law school and won "Cosmopolitan's" sexiest man contest. More recently, an obscure state representative, then state senator from Wrentham (ph), a small town of about 11,000 people 35 miles southwest of Boston.
But suddenly, Scott Brown is a national figure and the great Republican hope.
BROWN: I would be the 41st senator but it would make...
KING: Translation, before this vote, Democrats had a filibuster- proof 60-seat senate majority. If Brown wins, Democrats slip to 59 and Republicans have more power to influence or block health care and other key Obama priorities.
Where this message comes from makes it all the more stunning.
This race is for the seat held for nearly a half century by Teddy Kennedy, the late liberal icon whose dying wish was to pass health care reform.
BROWN: I want to be the person to go down there and send the health care back to its drawing board...
KING: But Brown calls it's a bad idea, too expensive and also says the president is spending too much money and creating too few jobs. And he appealed to independents by mocking Democrats for calling it Kennedy's seat.
Just 14 months ago, Massachusetts gave Obama a 25-point victory, but many of his supporters then have a message for the president now.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's talking out of both sides of his mouth right now.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's an arrogance in the party. There is an arrogance that emanates through him. Voting for change and not really seeing it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KING: Brown attributed his victory tonight to the, quote, "new independent majority". But, Wolf, the crowd also broke out in chants of 41, 41 -- translation there, Scott Brown, when he gets to Washington, will be the 41st Republican Senator. That gives Republicans far more leverage in the fight over health care, the president's budget, economic policy in the country and Scott Brown, importantly, said he wanted to go to Washington, quote, "without delay". Essentially challenging some Democrats who said maybe they would take some time to seat him in Washington. Scott Brown says he's ready to get in his pickup truck and go to Washington ASAP -- Wolf.
BLITZER: And he also said that Paul Kirk, the interim senator, John, it's over with for him. Realistically, when could he be sworn in as Massachusetts' Senator?
KING: It's a process they need to, of course, certify the ballot and then go through the paperwork. The Secretary of State here has said it could be done in as few as ten days.
So Scott Brown said he's ready to go. He's going to go to Washington we are told before those ten days for some meetings. But he -- the state officials had said unless there's any hanky-panky in the election -- there is no indication tonight that there was -- that he could be certified in about ten business days.
BLITZER: And we just got a statement in from Jim Webb, the Democratic Senator from Virginia saying, "The Democrats should not do anything in the senate until this new senator is sworn in. No more votes on health care reform."
John King is over at the Brown headquarters.
Let's go over to Martha Coakley's headquarters; a very, very different mood there. Jessica Yellin is standing by. She spoke out and said she received and she made phone calls.
JESSICA YELLIN, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Wolf. She heard from President Obama who said to her that you can't win them all. She had kept a stiff upper lip and folks in this room expressed disappointment, but also dismay.
One person I talked to said that the loss of this senate seat in such a blue state is not just astonishing, it's sinful. The implication is it just didn't have to happen and there is a real sense of shock among Democrats that this has actually come to pass. That Ted Kennedy's seat that he held for so long is no longer in the Democratic column.
As I reported earlier, there's an enormous amount of finger- pointing; many national Democrats accusing Coakley, of making key missteps.
For example: in this very Catholic state, taking on the issue of whether Catholic should be giving out emergency contraception or not in the emergency room. She made that a major issue in her campaign at a time when most people were very concerned about jobs, the economy, these larger issues. There is real frustration that she made this a campaign about these kinds of wedge cultural issues.
But beyond that, the Coakley campaign believes that they were confronted by a tidal wave of voter anger that they just didn't see coming and that bodes ill for Democrats across the nation. One of the key players in the Coakley campaign said what we need to learn from this, this is a quote, "We need to understand that angry voters are the ones who are turning out to vote. Our base is complacent. We need to do something about it."
And the message to Democrats from the Coakley campaign is that "Democrats nationally need to focus on jobs." That was the lesson they learned and need to get policy passed. Health care was a mixed issue in this state. They say jobs, the economy and recognize that there's a tidal wave of anger. That they better ride it or they'll get crushed by it -- Wolf.
BLITZER: No matter how you see it, another big loss tonight for the Democrats. Jessica Yellin reporting for us.
When we come back, we're going to have much more on the major implications of tonight's vote. We'll take a closer look at how the Democrats plan to pass health care reform if they still can, now that a candidate who promised to vote against it is heading to Washington.
Also, Anderson is in Haiti with the story of one woman's remarkable rescue.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: And in a little while, we're going to take you to a town of Leogane (ph) a town that hasn't gotten much attention over the last week. We'll show you the situation there. It's an extraordinary scene that we saw. We'll show you that ahead.
But first, let's go back to Wolf in Washington -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right Anderson. Thanks very much.
Is this a game-changing Republican victory? Scott Brown's win today cost Democrats their supermajority in the senate. That's a huge loss for President Obama.
Democrats needed Martha Coakley in Ted Kennedy's seat to keep the final stretch of the health care bill as smooth as possible. Scott Brown has vowed to oppose President Obama's health care reforms.
So where does this leave the Democrats right now? Dana Bash is joining us from Capitol Hill. Lots of options, none apparently very good -- Dana.
DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: None apparently very good at all. And that is what so many Democratic lawmakers and senior aides have told me all night, tonight, as they watched the returns come in and obviously, something that they were bracing for, especially today and yesterday.
But, look, one of the things that people have been talking most about over the past two or three days, options wise, is perhaps the House would just pass the senate bill and send it right to the president. That would be a way to avoid not having that 60-vote supermajority in the Senate. Well, talking to Democratic lawmakers, the most liberal and some of the most conservative tonight, they say that they don't think that's an option. There are just too many differences with the Senate bill, from their perspective. They don't think that they can vote for it.
And then bigger picture, you hear a lot of Democrats looking at what happened in Massachusetts, a lot of issues, but specific to health care and saying, "We need to change what we're doing here. We need to listen and not be tone deaf.
And that was actually a quote from Anthony Weiner, again, one of the most liberal Democrats in the Congress. He's from New York and he talked about what was going on in the Democratic caucus with some rather colorful language.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
REP. ANTHONY WEINER (D), NEW YORK: They're talking as if like what our deal is and what our negotiators are at the White House. And yes and if the last line is, "pigs fly out of my ass or something like that." I mean, it's just, it's just we've got to recognize that we're in an entirely different scenario.
When you have large numbers of citizens in the United States of America who believe this is going in the wrong direction, there's a limit to which you can keep saying, that ok, they just don't get it. If we just pass a bill, they'll get it. I don't know.
I mean, I think that we should maybe internalize that we're not doing things entirely correct here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: Now, that is something that we are hearing from a lot of Democrats here on Capitol Hill tonight, Wolf. One of the things that we are hearing from some rank and file members is maybe they should just scrap this big health care bill and just do some of the core issues, like banning pre-existing conditions, the discrimination against that. Things like that that everybody agrees on. Unclear if even that can happen.
And one last thing you mentioned that Senator Webb, Jim Webb of Virginia issued a pretty powerful statement tonight, saying that there should be no health care votes before Scott Brown is seated.
Well, Democrats already had ruled out, the ones that I've talked to, ruled out rushing a health care bill through because they already knew, that no matter what the outcome in Massachusetts, that the voter anger about the way things have been working in Washington, that was something that they could not deal with and had to answer, no matter what happened in Massachusetts.
BLITZER: Dana, stand by.
Let's bring in our panel: the best political team on television. And David Gergen is here. Joe Johns, Gloria Borger, Alex Castellanos, Paul Begala. You know a lot of folks over at the White House. You lived through this once before in '93 and '94 when Hillary care collapsed. So what do they do now?
PAUL BEGALA, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: What did Yogi Berra say, "deja vu all over again". That great Red Sox catcher, Yogi Berra, to paraphrase Miss Coakley who wrongly said, Kurt Schilling, the Red Sox here was a Yankee fan.
You know, this is -- there's no good news in this for the White House, right? There's none. The one thing I might counsel them, though, if I was still working there, would be, you know, you show your character in defeat sometimes a lot more than you do in victory. And this is a moment, I think, perhaps the president can show his character.
Does he really believe in this stuff, or does he just sort of folds his tent and go home? Watching him in the campaign, I think there's a lot more steel in that spine than perhaps Mr. Obama's critics think.
I saw senator-elect Brown saying he wants to play basketball with the president. The first thing I thought of it, yes, good, and let's see if the president can throw him an elbow under the hoop.
Barack Obama is going to have to shift into a much more tough- minded fighting mode there as a populist mode.
ALEX CASTELLANOS, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: No.
BEGALA: If he wants to sort of answer this very strident speech we saw...
(CROSSTALK)
CASTELLANOS: No, it's not that I would ever disagree with my friend Paul Begala on anything political, but I think he's asking the Democrats to embrace a "Thelma and Louise" strategy here.
He's asking -- the American people have just said three times, Washington is not doing what we want them to do -- in New Jersey, Virginia, and now in Massachusetts.
And guess what. Some Democrats want to say, no, we don't care what the American people think. We're going to just step on the gas and go hold hands and go over the cliff together. That's a mistake.
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: Paul said something very interesting earlier.
GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Really?
BLITZER: He said, this would be the equivalent -- the equivalent of Democrats winning in Utah or in Texas or in Wyoming. BORGER: Yes, you know, absolutely. I mean, this is look, this is stunning. This is a -- I've never seen anything like this. I mean, you look at a seat that hadn't been held by a Republican in more than three decades, held by Ted Kennedy for 46 years. And by the way, Barack Obama won the state of Massachusetts a little over a year ago by more than 25 points, right?
So this, you know, this is -- this is absolutely stunning. And I think what we're going to see -- the president, first, has to figure out what he's going to do about health care reform and he better figure that out pretty quickly. Then I think you're going to see...
CASTELLANOS: I just think he had to figure out what he's going to do about the economy.
BORGER: Then I -- well, and then you're going to see a pivot, exactly, to the economy; whether that's going to happen in the "State of the Union" address which after all, is coming up in a week. And he's going to say to people with some humility, that I have heard you, I understand your anger, I understand what you're feeling...
CASTELLANOS: But that's why this could be good news. And here, I again, take some...
BORGER: Right.
CASTELLANOS: ...it could be good news for the president. Because he may be lose from his one-party straight jacket right now. He may be able to say look, the one-party rule is effectively over...
BORGER: But what will Republicans Alex? What will Republicans do if he reaches across?
BEGALA: Well, because they've been so reasonable so far.
CASTELLANOS: Well, when you put -- when you go so far less and spend trillions we don't have, guess what? Even Republicans learn that Begala is right, the Republicans spent too much and they don't want ...
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: When are they going to make it? The late Senator Kennedy, as soon as George W. Bush, before he was inaugurated even, Senator Kennedy went to him to work with him on education reform. That's -- he believe that was his obligation...
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: Joe, you've covered Congress for a long time. And the ball is now clearly in Congress' court.
JOE JOHNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. Well, it's in their court, but there are people on Capitol Hill already saying, we've got to see what President Obama really wants to do here. Because, remember, two weeks ago, we were saying that if health care went down, the Democrats went with it.
So now all of a sudden we're saying, if they don't ditch health care, the Democrats are done. It's really funny when you look at the situation and Democrats actually say, I didn't see this coming because there are a lot of people who did see it coming. They saw that there was a very strident opposition out there that was angry about the government spending, suspicious of the government.
So, you know, it's a tough spot.
BLITZER: You know David I think you and I have had this conversation before. It's taken them so long, the Democrats and without any Republicans, to try to get some health care reform passed. The longer and longer it went on, the more difficult it would become.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: That's right, Wolf. And I think we're probably seeing the obituary written tonight for universal access on health care. And it's been a dream of Democrats now for 70-plus years. It's just very hard to see, under these circumstances.
So I think this vote is going to be a vote heard around the world because it's going to have enormous implications. I think health care is very unlikely to pass in its current form.
Cap and trade on energy environment, I think that now has -- it's extremely difficult to get that done in this Congress.
Immigration reform, I think, is probably dead this year.
Regulatory reform is going to be very watered down.
He could come back to jobs and the economy and perhaps get some something is done, but a lot depends on how they interrupt this at the White House. If they take Paul's view -- and I very much respect Paul on this. He says they're not fighting hard enough; they've got to be combative and go out and fight. If that's your message I think they're going to make a mistake.
BEGALA: People more than combativeness, they have shown conviction, do you actually believe in this sir?
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: Hold, hold on, hold your thoughts.
CASTELLANOS: The Democrats try to do and it's something the American people like.
BEGALA: Yes.
BLITZER: We are going to continue and going to have a lot more on this throughout the course of our coverage here on CNN and a lot more coming up.
Remember, the president will be delivering his "State of the Union" address before a joint session of the Congress next Wednesday January 27th. Our coverage will start that evening at 8:00 p.m. Eastern.
And we're going to have a lot more on the shake up in the senate. That's coming up this hour.
But let's go back to Haiti right now; dramatic developments happening today. Anderson Cooper is on the scene -- Anderson.
COOPER: Yes, Wolf, what a day.
Seven days after the earthquake, people still being found alive; a woman today being found beneath the rubble. Two little kids just a short time ago, according to New York City police department search- and-rescue team.
We're going to show you the rescue of this woman that we witnessed a little bit earlier today. An elderly woman pulled from the rubble. Her story is ahead.
And an American couple reunited with the little boy they are in the process of adopting. You've met them here on the program. They've been worried about little Alexander. We've been following their story for days now. Well, tonight he is in the United States and safe in their hands.
The story, ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, we just saw an amazing rescue today and we've gotten word now, two other rescues occurred earlier this evening, according to the New York City Police Department. How to explain, though, the rescue we saw this afternoon. I'm not exactly sure.
We're going to talk to Dr. Sanjay Gupta about it in a moment. Because you know, when we first got here, search-and-rescue people were saying 72 hours, give and take; it's kind the normal window for survival. More if you have some ventilation, more if you have access to food and water, depending what age of the victim is.
But at this point, seven days on, you wouldn't expect to see really any survivors at all and especially not somebody in their 70s. But we did. We saw that just today, just a few hours ago.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER (voice-over): In the rubble of the National Cathedral today, a reminder that faith can help someone survive. Three people are believed trapped in the rubble. One week after the quake, it's hard to believe, but there's proof they're alive.
(on camera): They have information that there was phone communication from one of the people inside the rubble last night. Today, they've had dogs go in three separate times. They've had three positive hits, dogs that indicate that there is life inside the rubble. They've also had tapping sounds.
So they are supremely confident that at least two people over here are alive and they are working against the clock to find them.
(voice-over): Search-and-rescue crews from Germany, Mexico and South Africa have been working since morning. Progress is slow and the danger is great. They have to move carefully, because the rubble is still shifting. They're risking their lives the deeper they dig.
(on camera): How long do you think this operation is going to take, to get to where they are?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't really know. I think about a minimum six to eight hours to get inside.
COOPER (voice-over): Just a few minutes later, however, on the other side of the rubble, Mexican and South African rescuers find the person they've been looking for, an elderly lady, weak, but alive.
The searchers applaud while she's gently lowered down. She's in pain and is dehydrated and needs medical attention, but she's also so happy to be out and alive.
"Thank God," she says, "thank God." Her name is Eni Zizi. No one can explain how she's lasted this long.
"Our brothers from Cancun helped us," this rescuer says, "our brothers from South Africa. Thanks to the teamwork, we were able to take this woman who prayed and prayed and I believe that her faith is so big, that was the thing that saved her."
Her family has been searching, she's been listed as missing and now we know she's been trapped here all this time. The team rushes her to a nearby park, where a makeshift clinic has just been set up. It turns out her femur is broken. She's badly dehydrated and she needs surgery right away.
The problem is they can't do it here. They don't have the equipment or the doctors. Without surgery soon, they say, there's not much more they can do for her.
So once again, Eni Zizi finds herself waiting. She sings to herself and still prays, "Help will come."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Well, one of the medical team who was there told us that they didn't know where to take her to get a surgeon. That they tried to call some places, they didn't get a response. We'd mentioned that on the air. One -- an aid organization stepped up, a health organization called Crudem (ph) said that they could take her at their hospital in a town which is nearby called Milot.
I think they contacted the Coast Guard or they sent a helicopter over to the presidential palace, which is the only place there was a helicopter, a helipad. They picked her up and brought her at to the "USS Batan" and from there we were told they're going to helicopter her to the hospital for her to get treatments. And that they couldn't do it tonight, because it's too dangerous to fly over the mountains in the darkness.
Basically, she is getting medical care right now, we are told. We're going to try to continue to follow-up on her story.
But it is, amazing, Ivan, that even now, seven days into this thing, there's no clear organization exactly where somebody should go, even someone like her, who's been just pulled out of the rubble for -- after seven days.
IVAN WATSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: No, a miraculous escape. And then I went to visit her this evening before she was medevacked and she was just laying on the ground there.
COOPER: Right.
WATSON: I couldn't believe it, then on top of that, so were all the other patients there...
COOPER: Right.
WATSON: ...just laying on the ground. And we are seven days into that. And we still don't really have a lot of medical care for these people.
COOPER: Yes and there were people having, I didn't see it myself, one of the people I'm working with said there was a person who had an amputation done in that park. I mean, that out in the park, they're doing amputations, because it's a race against the clock to save people's lives. You've got to take out the limb in order to stop an infection from spreading.
WATSON: Yes, the British medics I've talked to they said, they've done a lot of amputations at that very same location.
COOPER: And I was out at the MSF clinics the Doctors without Borders Clinic and they just -- they have two operation rooms going. They could open up more operating rooms, they have the medical personnel on hand, but they don't have the supplies. Their planes have been diverted to the Dominican Republic, they have to bring those supplies in overland and they're not able to get as many people treated as quickly as possible. And they said, "We've lost people because we're just not able to meet the demands."
WATSON: I think -- imagine what it would be like to have, in a developed city, a first-world city, perhaps 100,000 people seriously injured in a minute.
COOPER: Right.
WATSON: And what that would do to the medical infrastructure there...
COOPER: Right. WATSON: ...and then do that here...
COOPER: Yes.
WATSON: ...and damage the hospitals on top of it.
If there is one bright spot that I saw today, we drove past one clinic that I'd seen on Wednesday that we filmed that where there was a dead baby laying on the floor right outside the entrance, there were people with missing limbs laying there, there were 13 corpses there. It's been completely cleaned up.
COOPER: Yes.
WATSON: I didn't see anybody being operated on in the hallways there. There are some signs of improvement.
COOPER: Absolutely. And you notice it driving around today. And you know, when you've been in the place for a long time you start to just notice little tiny things. Just a couple of things that struck me, I saw people, government employees, sweeping the streets today. That's the first time I've seen that.
I saw, actually, a truck emptying out port-a-johns, which doesn't sound like a big deal, but when you have hundreds of people living in a park for a week using port-a-johns, it becomes a very big deal and very noticeable. And there was an actual truck there emptying them out, a sign that there is some sort of organization in place and it is slowly getting up to speed.
WATSON: Question, what is going to happen with the hundreds of thousands of homeless people, people like this sleeping out here? Are we going to see camps constructed for them?
COOPER: And for the doctors who are out there in the United States thinking about well, should I come down here or not, you know, I was talking to one surgeon today, he said the need -- the medical need here is going to last long beyond just this emergency situation we're in right now, because a lot of these amputations require follow- on care, weeks or months later.
It's not just one surgery, it's multiple surgeries in some cases. Now you're going to have a huge population of amputees that need follow-on care. They're going to need people over the next months and even, you know, years, perhaps, so there's going to be a big need for a long time to come.
Ivan, again, appreciate the reporting today.
Up next, how is it possible to survive in the rubble for so long, for seven days? We're going to talk with 360 MD Sanjay Gupta.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: So this 70-year-old lady, rescued today. I hear she has a son in the United States, who we talked to. Obviously, he's incredible excited. How does it happen?
SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, no matter how you cut it, it's extraordinary. I was talking to several doctors today, including one doctor, Dr. Ken Kamler (ph), who wrote a book about this very type of thing called "Surviving the Extremes". What's being described is really something that's not been described before in the world. He's written about the longest term survivors, about seven days, but in a healthy person who was not injured.
Elderly woman who had, I guess, a pelvis fracture, you said.
COOPER: A femur fracture, very dehydrated.
GUPTA: Very, very -- you know maybe she had some access to food and water at some point. Was she not injured immediately or did she go into the church a little bit later after Tuesday? Who knows? I know she was very disoriented when you were talking to her.
But typically the human body, three or four days, even in a healthy person without water, that's really pretty much it. You can go without food much longer and obviously without shelter even longer than that, but that's the order of things. That's really what determines things.
COOPER: The other tragedy, of course, is they thought there were two other people in there. They had positive responses from dogs, they had tapping. And then around 6:00 or so, they stopped getting any response, worked for several more hours and didn't get any response.
The idea that somebody -- you know, maybe it was just an ambient noise; there wasn't actually somebody there, although they said there was text messaging from there the night before.
The thought that somebody could die -- you know, could last that long and then die when hope -- when help and hope was just a few feet away.
GUPTA: I know. And you think about these rescue crews as well. I know you were talking about the fact that they obviously get very emotional as well. This is a big deal for them.
So to be able to hear noise and not find it and then the noise go away, I'm sure it's got to be very, very difficult...
COOPER: Can you imagine talking to someone who's trapped -- I mean, developing -- you know, the Mexican rescuers were saying, you know, they could hear her singing and praying and that they'd talked to each other, and then to have somebody expire is a...
GUPTA: It's unbelievable.
And then you also have to have a plan. So now that you've rescued them, that's just the first step, right? Now you have to have -- they are very sick. In fact, they are critically ill. A patient like the one you're describing, this elderly women, she would be in an intensive care unit by this time if she were in the states with these types of injuries.
COOPER: I read this "New York Times" article in which they interviewed someone at the airport who said that basically the priority for flights coming in is food, big equipment, and water and medical supplies is kind of low on the list.
That seems to me kind the reverse of in the immediate days after this, you would think medical supplies should be the top of the list.
GUPTA: No question about it. And with medical relief, and I think this is going to be one of those things that people write history books about in the future. Medical relief you measure in terms of minutes and hours. You have to get that there so quickly. Otherwise, after a while, it just doesn't make that big a difference.
The exponential impact that it can have right now is extraordinary.
COOPER: Yes. And there's so much attention on orphans -- and we're going to have a remarkable story about one of the stories that we've been following for the last several days. And everyone just cares about what happens to these orphans, totally understandable and, of course, we all do.
But there are kids out on these streets right now who are dying for lack of medical care. They have parents so people don't pay as much attention to them, but they're still dying.
And a lot of the orphans are being flown to the U.S., who totally deserve to be reunited and united with their parents. They're not -- I mean, most of them are in ok medical condition.
GUPTA: You would love to have endless resources, endless planes being able to come in and out, and we just don't, as you know. Tough decisions have to be made. And the reality is that within a week or two weeks from now, those decisions will change, because we missed the window on being able to save so many of these kids that you're describing.
The window is closing quickly. And, you know, treating an infection so it doesn't become a body-wide infection, amputating a leg because gangrene can spread throughout the body, that has to be done now.
COOPER: It's so interesting, people in the media, one focuses on stories and people care about orphans, and yet I was at this hospital today and looking at these little kids and thinking, "You know what? If you guys were orphans, you would probably be getting greater attention and people swooping in from other countries to help you." But, you know, you have parents, or a parent, and so you sit here and, you know, this little kid I saw, this girl who needed to have her leg amputated and she's waiting, she could die from that.
Anyway -- it's...
GUPTA: It doesn't make a lot of sense.
COOPER: Yes. It doesn't.
GUPTA: It's tough. And I think that -- I hope that you and I get a chance to talk about this, two, three, four weeks from now to reflect to see what made sense and what didn't then maybe even offer some lessons learned.
COOPER: Yes. Let's hope. We're going to have more from here ahead.
The question is where's the Haitian leadership in all of this? We've heard they're sort of at a bunker out of the airport. We'll try to find out about that ahead.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: We're going to talk to Gary Tuchman coming up. He went out to try to kind of find the Haitian government and talk to them about, well, what's their take on all of this and where are they. We'll have more of that from Port-au-Prince in a moment.
But first, let's go back to Wolf -- Wolf.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR, "SITUATION ROOM": Anderson, lots happening here. The election in Massachusetts: a huge, huge setback for the Democrats and health care reform. Will they be able to get it passed now that they no longer will have that 60 supermajority that could set back a filibuster if the Republicans want to go forward.
Health care reform right now, very much up in the air, because the Republican candidate in Massachusetts is now the senator-elect, Scott Brown. Martha Coakley loses, Scott Brown wins. The Democrats' and the president's agenda very much up in the air right now -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right Wolf. Thanks very much.
We saw those remarkable pictures of U.S. helicopters landing on the lawn of the presidential palace here. The palace is in ruins, so are numerous other government buildings. The question is, where is the government itself and what are they actually doing?
Gary Tuchman reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The ornate presidential palace, a symbol of the Haitian government for almost 90 years. A rundown police station: the temporary presidential palace as of this week. We went looking for the Haitian government and found the president in the hallways of the cramped police station. We also found the prime minister and the cabinet ministers.
There were 18 members of the cabinet before the earthquake. I asked the Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive...
(on camera): Are all the members of your cabinet alive?
JEAN-MAX BELLERIVE, PRIME MINISTER, HAITI: Yes.
TUCHMAN: Everyone survived?
BELLERIVE: Yes. All the members of the cabinet, but they lose people, minister of finance child. Minister of tourism lose his mother and his father.
TUCHMAN (voice-over): But the leaders are all here and want Haiti and the world to know, they are on the case.
(on camera): Is the government still in control?
BELLERIVE: Yes. The government is working.
TUCHMAN (voice-over): President Rene Preval says he went on his motor bike after the quake to round up his ministers.
RENE PREVAL, PRESIDENT OF HAITI: It's a catastrophe, but we are working with the help of the international community to rebuild the country.
TUCHMAN: The prime minister gave us disturbing news, the first solid casualty numbers.
BELLERIVE: Right now we collect more than 70,000.
TUCHMAN (on camera): 70? 7-0?
BELLERIVE: 70,000 dead -- cadavers. And I believe that it will be around the numbers that I gave you the first time.
TUCHMAN: Which is what?
BELLERIVE: 100,000.
TUCHMAN: The president, the prime minister, and the cabinet will continue to run the government from this police station indefinitely. A more comfortable setting is low on the priority list as the president and his translator make clear.
PREVAL (through translator): On the day of the earthquake, what happened in one minute could be compared to a campaign of bombing during many days in times of war.
TUCHMAN (voice-over): The Haitian people are looking for leadership. They can find it for good or for bad in a worn-down police station.
(END VIDEOTAPE) COOPER: You know, I mean, there's not a great history of leadership or democracy here in Haiti, or really a government that actually cares about its people and actually responds to the needs of its people.
You know, it's interesting, when you go to Haiti, when you go out to talk to people, they don't have a lot of confidence. They don't even really expect their government to actually be there to meet their basic needs.
They know -- the president and the prime minister -- the depths of this crisis. They know they have serious problems. But there's great relief among the government that they've had not much. There's been some, as you know, but not much civil unrest.
And also they're greatly relieved, and this is the land of the Duvaliers, Aristide, Raul Cedras, all kinds of political problems; they're glad right now they don't have political problems too.
COOPER: Yes. But are they -- do we know anything about the police force? Like, where is the police force? I've only seen, maybe in total now, maybe 10, 15 Haitian police officers. Most of them are guarding gas stations.
TUCHMAN: Right. There are not as many out there as there should be, but a lot of them are dead and a lot of them have relatives who are dead, but they say each day has gotten better with the police. Each day has gotten better, as we know, with the amount of dead bodies on the streets and they say the amount of homeless has gone down by about 50 percent since the first couple of days.
COOPER: Are they communicating with people because you don't see them driving around with megaphones and getting people's spirits up or anything. Are they communicating via radio?
TUCHMAN: What the president told us today is that they are doing daily interviews and daily speeches on Haitian radio. Is that true? I talked to a radio reporter who was at the new presidential palace today and he said, yes, indeed, his radio station is being used by the president and prime minister.
COOPER: Ok. Let's hope they're getting messages out to people because a lot of people don't seem to have much information right now when we're walking around out on the streets.
Coming up next, we're going back to the big political story of the night; GOP winning the U.S. Senate race held by Ted Kennedy. More insight ahead from David Gergen and what it may mean for the Democrats' fight for health care reform, coming up next on 360.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, it's been a full week now since the earthquake, a full week since the Haitian people have had to endure the unendurable and what a week it has been. We're going to have a lot more to report ahead. But first let's turn back to our breaking news in the United States out of Massachusetts, Republican Scott Brown has won Ted Kennedy's old Senate seat. Let's talk to senior political analyst and former presidential adviser David Gergen who joins us again for insight.
David if you're sitting in the White House tonight and you're president Obama's people, you've got to be, I don't know, scared is the right word but you have to be paying attention, I would think.
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: You sure do, Anderson. And there's been some indications I think this is simply a problem. They're not giving the message out well enough.
If that's the case, I think they're not hearing what the people of Massachusetts said today and what people in New Jersey and Virginia said a few months ago.
This is -- the White House, Anderson, I think it's going to be time to think about hitting a reset button for his presidency for how far left they've gone in governing and how much they're relying on government; whether they can move into a more bipartisan place.
Health care is now in peril. Immigration reform, cap and trade, regulatory reform, all these big, major initiatives are in bigger trouble tonight than they have been. It could be the obituary for major overhaul of the health care system of the kind that the president wanted.
It's his whole agenda that's now suddenly at stake. For him I think that means he has to do some serious reflection on how he's governing and what his agenda's going to be for the future and how he's going to get along with and work with these new populous forces.
This is going to send a ripple effect through Republican politics too, Anderson. The key party activists and the others who have been operating a little bit below the radar screen for many in the Main Street media -- and sometimes I miss them -- they've become a serious force in American politics and they fueled Scott Brown's victory tonight.
Very importantly when he stood up tonight, he didn't say this was a Republican victory. He said this is a victory for independence.
COOPER: Yes. And, I mean, if you are President Obama, where do you go from here? Besides rethinking things, if you're not trying to doing all those things, which we had all the discussions a year ago, was he trying to do too much, if you're not going for health care reform and things on the environment, what does he then try to focus on to kind of recalibrate and retool?
GERGEN: Well, he doesn't have much time, Anderson, because his State of the Union Address is, as you know, is next week on Wednesday night. I think he has to have his message and his agenda clear in his head and within his administration by then. I would think they would have some serious conversations now about, "Ok, we may have to shed some of these things and we're going to probably slim down health care reform. We can't slam this big bill through anymore. Let's sum it down to its essential. But very importantly, pivot off that in the jobs and the deficit and make this a year essentially about restoring the economic health of the country, especially for the middle class.
It's the way he's going to bring this populous anger and channel it in his favor as opposed to what's happening now as the populous anger is coming out and sort of overwhelming his agenda and making it very difficult for him to govern. He has to get more of that populist feeling behind his own administration.
COOPER: Interesting. Hey David Gergen, appreciate it. Thanks. Fascinating night.
GERGEN: Thank you Anderson. Good luck in Haiti.
COOPER: Thanks very much.
Fascinating political developments at home and so many developments here as well, amid the heart break a story of hope. An American couple -- a couple we've been following for a couple days now seeking to adopt the little boy here. They've been worried about him; weren't sure if -- what was going to be happening. We'll show you if their wish came true ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: All right. A number of other important stories we're following right now. Joe Johns has a "360 News and Business Bulletin" -- Joe.
JOE JOHNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, in Los Angeles the end may be near for hundreds of the city's pot clinics. The city council tentatively approved an ordinance capping the number of medical marijuana dispensaries at 70. A final vote is expected next week.
635,000 baby cribs made by Dorel Asia are being recalled. The Consumer Product Safety Commission says the drop side of the cribs can detach and trap a child. The cribs are blamed for at least one death. Similar cribs by different manufacturers were recalled last year.
And British chocolate and American macaroni and cheese will soon be under one corporate roof; the board of chocolate maker Cadbury has accepted a buyout offer from Kraft. Shareholders must still approve the nearly $22 billion deal, and that is a lot of chocolate -- Anderson.
COOPER: It sure is. Joe, thanks very much.
"360 Follow up" tonight, 53 Haitian orphans are now in the United States. They were taken from here in a military transport plane. One of the orphans is 17-month-old Alexander David. We first met him at a damaged orphanage last week. Tonight he's in a Pittsburgh hospital. A few hours ago his adoptive parents visited him there. You probably remember them. We talked with them last night. They were anxious, full of fear about what was going to happen. They weren't sure if he was on the plane.
Gary Tuchman joins me with the latest. He's been following the story.
TUCHMAN: It's an amazing saga. Ross Haskell, Jean Griffith fell in love with a little boy named Alexander when they came here to Haiti, decided they wanted to adopt him; the process takes a long time. They were in the middle of the process. They went home and then to their horror the earthquake hit.
They didn't know what happened to him. They were very scared he was dead. And then they were amazingly surprised when they were watching a CNN story -- a story that I did a few days ago at an orphanage here in Port-au-Prince and there was little 17-month-old Alexander.
So they were elated. He was alive; he looked great. And then they heard some amazing news that the governor of Pennsylvania, Ed Rendell was going to fly in an airplane and take as many children from that orphanage back to Pennsylvania.
The reason Rendell got involved is he also saw the CNN story and learned that the two women who run that orphanage are from Pennsylvania. So Rendell comes here on this airplane last night, he wants to take as many as 54 kids.
We go to the U.S. embassy last night, we see scores of kids. There are actually, probably 60 children walk out of the embassy and board a bus to go to the Port-au-Prince airport.
But as it turns out, not all those children had approval to go to the United States. So we weren't sure if none of the kids were going to go, if some of the kids were going to go, if all of the kids were going to go. The parents didn't know what was going on about their son.
Listen to the father, what he said then.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROSS HASKELL, ADOPTING HAITIAN BABY: Last night we received an e-mail that seemed to indicate that he would be coming here and that he was on the plane. We didn't actually -- no one ever told us that, you know, Alexander is on that plane. But we heard it from someone who we trusted so we said it looks like this is going to happen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TUCHMAN: Well, all of the children ended up getting approval except for one child didn't make it; 53 were the total number they brought back. They found that they were missing one who got approval; turns out that one little baby girl fell asleep on the bus, missed the plane -- they found her on the bus, got her on another plane so 54 children are now in Pittsburgh right now.
Alexander and his parents are together in Pennsylvania tonight having a very happy reunion. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HASKELL: I don't think I was able to say anything.
JEAN GRIFFITH, ADOPTING HAITIAN BABY: I don't think I said anything. I just kissed him and hugged him and checked him out and made sure for myself that he was ok.
HASKELL: Yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TUCHMAN: Ross and jean are new parents; they're in Pennsylvania. He's in a hospital tonight for observation. They fly back to Wichita, Kansas, their hometown tomorrow.
COOPER: That's great. That's great. Good for them. They're such nice parents. They're going to make great parents. They were waiting a long, long time for that.
That does it for this edition of 360. It's the end of yet another remarkable day here in Port-au-Prince. For all of us on the ground here and everyone back home, thank you very much for watching.
We will be here tomorrow night and the night after that and the night after that.
Let's turn it over now to a special late edition of "LARRY KING LIVE" -- Larry.
