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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown
Spanish Oil Slick Grows; Binalshibh Talks About Moussaoui
Aired November 20, 2002 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, again, everyone. First of all, I'd like to thank all of you who tuned in tonight, all three of you. Really, it's two people, plus my mom. I appreciate and applaud your independence and the courage of your decision to turn away from the tacky, tawdry spectacle being offered at this hour on that other network, you know the one that goes by the first three letters of the alphabet.
I mean, really, the very idea one blonde, brawny bachelor working his way through a field of willing women searching for a soul mate. Ha! What kind of beginning is that for a marriage? And with the whole country watching, except, of course, for you three viewers sticking with us at NEWSNIGHT.
Thanks for voting with your remote against such pandering and thank you, CBS, for scheduling your Victoria's Secret show earlier in the evening. Believe me, I appreciate it. If it was still on, I don't even think my mom would be watching me right now on NEWSNIGHT.
Never mind, though. The important thing is we are in this together. We agree with you that current affairs are far more important than romantic affairs, and we will do everything we can tonight to reward you for your high mindedness. Wait a minute. You don't have one of those gizmos, the picture in a picture, do you?
I suddenly feel somehow, well, minimized. Anyway, let's forget about that. We need to move on to the news of the day. And so we begin with The Whip and our top story tonight: the ecological disaster off the Spanish coast. Jim Bittermann is on that for us tonight. Jim, the headline, please.
JIM BITTERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, more oil continues to wash ashore along the Spanish coast here, polluting new areas along the coast. But it appears to be remnants of last week's oil and not the larger slick created when the oil tanker Prestige went down. That slick remains still out at sea -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right. Jim, back to you shortly.
On to the war on terror and new developments in the case of Zacarias Moussaoui. Kelli Arena is following that story -- Kelli, a headline.
KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Al Qaeda operative Ramzi Binalshibh had quite a bit to say about Moussaoui's alleged role in the September 11 attacks, according to our sources. And it's a matter of much debate whether the disclosures help or hurt the government's case against him -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right. Thanks, Kelli. The latest on Iraq now and the fate of the inspectors. Richard Roth is on that from the United Nations. Richard, a headline.
RICHARD ROTH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, Hans Blix and his weapons inspectors have set up a hot line in their cleaned up Baghdad base. A quick outlet to senior Iraqi officials. But with weapons inspectors due to start missions a week from today, just how hot is it going to get?
COOPER: All right. Richard, thanks very much. Back with all of you in a moment.
Also coming up tonight, the media's latest it boy, former Vice President Gore on a whirlwind press tour with, of course, the big question being, will he or won't he? We'll talk with Ron Brownstein from the "L.A. Times" who interviewed him today.
If this were "The Love Boat," it would be a Doc Bricker's (ph) nightmare episode. But it's not "The Love Boat," and real passengers have been getting very sick from a virus that seems to have infected an entire cruise ship. Susan Candiotti is on that tonight.
And the political wonderkind in the state of Alabama. The teenager who counted votes the old fashioned way on election night and helped decide the winner in the governor's race. We will talk with Candice Jones and her mom, Carmen, coming up.
That is all to come. We begin, however, with one of the headlines in a European paper today, "Time Bomb Under The Sea." An enormous oil stick slick has reached the shores of Spain and an even bigger one could be on the way after the sinking yesterday of the tanker Prestige.
There has been plenty of finger pointing back and forth across the continent as to who's to blame. But for the people who can see the disaster, who can literally smell it, blame isn't necessarily their top priority right now. They are too busy defending their shores. Once again Jim Bittermann.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BITTERMANN (voice-over): Against the wind and waves, volunteers worked furiously to scoop up oily sand before it congeals into something akin to asphalt. Naval cadets left their classes. A company in the mountains told its workers to go help on the beaches.
All seemed optimistic they could make a difference despite the fact a second large oil slick, released as the stricken oil tanker broke up, might still wash ashore, meaning they might have to do this all over again. The oil tanker, The Prestige, may have sunk but not without a trace. There are plenty of traces of thousands of tons of thick gummy fuel oil along nearly 200 miles of rugged and spectacular coastline.
One of the most beautiful in Europe. Rich with fish and wild life.
SIMON CRIPPS, WORLD WILDLIFE FEDERATION: You think what's happening out there underneath the waves. And the people, you think about the coastline and the people that rely on this area for their livelihoods.
BITTERMANN: "It's a disaster," said one old fisherman as he surveyed a coastline he knows intimately. And seeing the ecological destruction, you might be inclined to agree. But Spain's environmental minister announced it will be cleaned up in six months.
"The person to blame," said one volunteer, "is the owner of that ship."
(on camera): No accident should happen and this one really should not have. Because after a similar oil spill three years ago just a few hundred miles off the European coast, the European Union took action against what one leader called the "floating garbage cans carrying oil out at sea."
(voice-over): But the badly misnamed Prestige, like many other aging single-hauled oil tankers, benefited from relaxed application of the rules, which will permit them to stay at sea for another 12 years. That may change after this. The Prestige may be gone, but it will be some time before it's forgotten.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BITTERMANN: Anderson, it's about just after 4:00 in the morning here. And when dawn arrives, we expect the cleanup efforts here to again continue. But we also expect to continue the blame game over who exactly is responsible for yet another oil spill along Europe's coast -- Anderson.
COOPER: Well, Jim, I imagine there is a lot of anger there among people, especially among the fishermen whose lives and livelihoods will be effected. Who are they blaming at this point? I mean you mentioned -- you know, some people say it should be the ship owner. Is there blame toward the government, or exactly where is the finger being pointed?
BITTERMANN: Well, it's being pointed in a lot of directions. The government is taking some of the heat. In fact, there was a demonstration, a very small one last night here among people along the coast, from people along the coast who are upset of the way government handled this.
There is some thought that the government should have acted immediately at the first signs of the oil spill to tow this ship into port where the oil could have been off loaded. Instead, what they did was to try to tow it out, further out into sea, away from Spanish waters. There was an argument, that took up some time. An argument between the ship's captain and a government tugboat. That took up about 14 or 16 hours of precious time as the ship was being towed further and further out into very rough seas. And those rough seas eventually did The Prestige in. So there's a lot of blame being spread around. The Spanish have found a way to blame the British. They say that the British should have inspected the tanker better when it docked at Gibraltar sometime ago. And the British did not.
So everybody's pointing fingers in different directions. There are some people who said the European Union should have done more. I don't think we've heard the last of this.
COOPER: All right. No doubt. Jim Bittermann, thank you very much. Appreciate it.
Today, U.S. and British warplanes once again pounded targets in the southern no-fly zone around the south of Iraq. The Pentagon says air defense sites were targeted after the Iraqis fired surface-to-air missiles at aircraft patrolling that southern no-fly zone.
Now, meantime, at the NATO meeting in Prague, President Bush called for unity against Iraq, but that is hard to come by. So instead of trying to get a collective yes or no from the alliance on Iraq, which, at this point, would likely be no, the president is making his case one member country at a time. CNN's John King has that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: The president wants the new look NATO alliance to stand with him in confronting Iraq.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The deception this time will not be tolerated. Delay and defiance will invite the severest of consequences.
KING: Coalition building is a major U.S. goal at a NATO summit held amid extraordinary security. The Czech President, Vaclav Havel, among those backing Bush's tough talk on Iraq.
VACLAV HAVEL, CZECH PRESIDENT (through translator): If, however, the need to use force (UNINTELLIGIBLE) to arise, I believe NATO should give an honest and speedy consideration to its engagement as an alliance.
KING: NATO Secretary General Lloyd Robertson says the leaders will debate a formal alliance role in any military action in Iraq. But Mr. Bush is more concerned about targeted individual contributions from key NATO members.
BUSH: It's a decision that each country must decide as to if and when they want to participate and how they choose to participate.
KING: Britain says the Pentagon is already asking for specific troop commitments. And Mr. Bush promised Turkey's President Sezer U.S. economic and military aid to compensate for the use of its critical bases. The Bush administration says Iraq already is violating the new United Nations Security Council resolution by firing at U.S. and British warplanes patrolling the no-fly zones over Iraq. U.S. pilots have orders to retaliate if fired at, but, at least for now, the White House threshold for a full-scale military confrontation is interference with the weapons inspectors just setting up shop in Baghdad.
BUSH: Should he again deny that this arsenal exists, he will have entered his final stage with a lie.
KING: Mindful of European unease, Mr. Bush says war with Iraq is a last resort.
(on camera): But the president's urgent coalition building efforts here are yet another sign that military planning is accelerating. U.S. officials say some 50 countries are being consulted. Some about a direct role in any military confrontation, others, if it comes to war, about providing health with post-war peacekeeping and reconstruction.
John King, CNN, Prague.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: But that, of course, is down the road a bit. For now, the focus is on the U.N. inspectors. Their bosses wrapping up their first encounter with Iraqi officials. As CNN's Richard Roth reports, they left Baghdad with promises of full cooperation from the Iraqis, but they left with not much more than that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ROTH (voice-over): The leading international weapons inspectors returned to Cyprus after 48 hours in Iraq without resolving the main problems. Iraq did tell the inspectors it would respond with an accounting of any weapons of mass destruction by December 8.
HANS BLIX, CHIEF U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: We had good discussions with the representatives of the Iraqi government and assured that they will fully implement the resolution and cooperate with us.
ROTH: However, the level of Iraqi cooperation remains a mystery until teams of inspectors begin their rounds next week.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's the real test when we go back and start our initial inspection.
ROTH: The inspectors had no trouble refurbishing their old base, but what about locating weapons after a four-year break?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's most likely that what will happen is the inspectors will go into Iraq. They will be allowed to see whatever it is they like because the Iraqis will be very confident that they've hidden what they have so well that it is just extremely unlikely that the inspectors will ever get close to the stuff. ROTH: The inspectors' leader, Hans Blix, is now in London for talks. Getting into Iraq has not eased the pressure on Blix, the man who must report to the Security Council any serious violations.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that is, on the one hand, of course, hard for him because it raises an enormous amount of expectations. On the other hand, he knows that he has the support of the international community.
ROTH: Blix will brief the Security Council on his trip on Monday.
(END VIDEOTAPE
ROTH: It's not enough for Iraq to now accept the return of the weapons inspectors. If Baghdad continues to insist by December 8 that it has no weapons of mass destruction and the weapons inspectors find something, then all credibility, even with sympathetic United Nations members, will be lost -- Anderson.
COOPER: Richard, the inspectors have had a lot of time to think about this mission. They've been sitting around now for quite some time. Do they seem confident that their intelligence is up to date? Do they seem confident that they're holding some cards here that the Iraqis don't know about?
ROTH: Well, this is the favorite question they love to avoid answering. However, in Vienna over the weekend, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency told me with a big smile, we have information. But he would not go further.
But, definitely, there has been a lot of intelligence supplied by the U.S. and some other governments. And they have 100 favorite sites out of 800 that they plan to pursue.
COOPER: An enigmatic smile from a diplomat. What a surprise. Richard Roth, thanks very much. Appreciate it tonight.
Two developments today in the war on terror. First, a State Department warning to Americans living or traveling abroad. The alert stems in part from the Osama bin Laden message that aired last week on Al-Jazeera. The State Department warning the threat of terror attacks has not gone away, quite simple.
The second development concerns Zacarias Moussaoui. For months now, the government has been trying to build a case that Moussaoui was a member of the 9/11 hijacking conspiracy. But it has been reluctant or, perhaps, unable to say exactly how he fit in. Some skeptics have said the government's case against Moussaoui must be a weak one.
Today, a piece of the puzzle came to light, courtesy of an al Qaeda leader who is talking. And official sources who are leaking. CNN's Kelli Arena has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE ARENA (voice-over): Sources say accused terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui was originally meant to be part of the September 11 attacks according to senior al Qaeda operative Ramzi Binalshibh. But those sources say Binalshibh told interrogators the terror organization lost confidence in Moussaoui. One legal expert says the government through leaks is trying to establish a stronger link between Moussaoui and the attacks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's gotten in the press the idea that there is a connection, which is something that the government has not been able to establish and the working papers of the indictment did not establish.
ARENA: According to sources, Binalshibh, a self proclaimed organizer of the 9/11 attacks, who was arrested in September, told U.S. officials that Moussaoui met with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed back in the winter of 2000 in Afghanistan. Government sources say Mohammed is believed to be a mastermind of the attacks.
According to those sources, Binalshibh says Mohammed gave Moussaoui contact names in the United States and that Moussaoui was sent money at least twice. The news comes in the wake of public suggestions the government's case against Moussaoui is not very strong, and that the White House is considering a military tribunal rather than a civilian trial. A move justice officials are adamantly against.
JOHN ASHCROFT, ATTORNEY GENERAL: The Department of Justice is prepared to move forward with the prosecution.
ARENA: But sources also say Binalshibh told them that Mohammed thought Moussaoui was not discreet enough, and so it was decided not to use him in the September 11 attacks or provide him with any details, unless it was absolutely necessary. Some suggest that actually works in Moussaoui's favor by proving he was not intimately involved in the plot.
Moussaoui, who is representing himself, has requested access to Binalshibh. The government has objected in the name of national security.
JIM ROBINSON, FMR. ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: He's obviously provided useful information that allowed the government to anticipate and to interfere with other terrorist attacks. And that's the number one priority for the use of him at the moment.
(END VIDEOTAPE
ARENA: Moussaoui's standby council refused to comment on the developments, and it is unclear whether Moussaoui himself is even aware of what Binalshibh has said -- Anderson.
COOPER: Kelli, what are your sources telling you about what else Binalshibh has said? I mean, do we have any sense of how forthcoming he's been? I mean, I know we've heard in the past that he's talking. Has his information been reliable, do we know? ARENA: Well, sources have described the information that he's provided as useful. They haven't gotten into much detail. We do know that they have gone back to him, for example, with the Osama bin Laden tape to find out what his reaction to that audiotape was. Whether he thought it was a call to arms, whether he thought it was Osama bin Laden's voice.
So we know they've gone back to him to corroborate other information. But they haven't really gotten into great detail about the information that he has provided on his own or whether or not he's just backing up what someone else has said. I mean, obviously, this is a very delicate situation.
COOPER: Right. But he is in full U.S. custody but just at some undisclosed location.
ARENA: At a secret location, that's right.
COOPER: All right. Kelli Arena, thank you very much.
Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, is America ready or waiting for Al Gore's comeback? Then we'll meet the young woman who helped determine the outcome of the Alabama's governor race. And next, the story of the sick cruise ship.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: All right. So if you go to be the Web site of Holland America Cruise Lines, you get the same kind of pitch you see from most cruise lines, except no Kathie Lee Gifford. Laughing baby boomers gazing off into the great blue expanse, looking forward to that exotic escape.
Well it seems a few hundred Holland America Cruise goers did get something exotic; namely, a virus. It is not really exotic, though. It just sounds that way.
It's called a Norwalk (ph) virus. Something that's apparently invaded one of Holland America's cruise ships. How it got there and how they'll get rid of it, that story now from Susan Candiotti.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Five hundred sick passengers and crew, Holland America is anchoring the Amsterdam. Virginia Steinweg and her husband fell ill on the cruise that returned last week.
VIRGINIA STEINWEG, PASSENGER: You just sit in the bathroom for 12 hours. I mean you can't leave. And then the next day, you can't keep anything down. And then, you know, the third day, you're weak.
CANDIOTTI: The culprit, according to the Centers for Disease Control, is the common Norwalk (ph) virus. In this case, not believed to be transmitted by food or water.
ROSE ABELLO, HOLLAND AMERICA: It is our belief that an individual brought this virus on to the ship.
CANDIOTTI: No matter how it got there, despite sanitizing the ship, the virus kept attacking. Sick passengers were quarantined, suffering from diarrhea and vomiting.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nobody shook hands. You couldn't touch anything on the tables. There wasn't even salt or pepper on the tables. The buffet line, they all served you.
CANDIOTTI: Holland America paid for flights home from Caribbean ports of call for passengers who fell ill during cruises. However, some passengers said they did not learn about the repeated outbreaks until they boarded the ship.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They should have told us not 20 minutes before we boarded.
CANDIOTTI: Holland America defended its decision to keep sailing, insisting it was doing all it could to prevent further infections.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're cleaning every poker chip.
CANDIOTTI: On its current sailing, more than 70 passengers and crew caught the virus. Before leaving on that cruise, some passengers were not at all worried and joked about what they'd do to stay well.
PAUL ROSENFELD, PASSENGER: I'm not going to drink the water or breathe the air then.
CANDIOTTI (on camera): Holland America faces a class action lawsuit because of a viral outbreak on one of its other cruise ships last summer. In this case, the Amsterdam will dock in Fort Lauderdale Thursday morning. Passengers on future sailings will get refunds or be rebooked until this ship is back in service. Susan Candiotti, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Well, a few more items from around the world before we go to break. Starting in Pakistan. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's military dictator, today promising to hand the rings of government over to a civilian prime minister in the next day or two. Musharraf seized power there years ago in a coup, and he'll be keeping much of that power, staying on as president and chief of the armed forces.
A German doctor faces criminal charges in London tonight for, get this, conducting an autopsy in public. The first public autopsy in Britain since William IV sat on the thrown. That is more than 170 years ago.
About 500 people paid 12 pounds a head, no pun intended, to watch. Public autopsies were banned in Britain for just these reason. They've become a sideshow.
And from a sideshow to Michael Jackson, it seems appropriate. He apologized today for dangling his young son, Prince Michael II, from a balcony in Berlin. That was the dangle there. "I got caught up in the excitement of the moment," he said. "I would never intentionally endanger the life of my children."
Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, one of the sexiest men alive. Plus, the Alabama teenager who helped pick the new governor of her state.
And up next, are you really ready for more Gore?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, there's one couple that's really been making the rounds lately, yacking it up with Barbara, Katie, Larry, Letterman. And I'm not talking about Aaron and Helene or Aaron and Brooke. Although they have been talking a lot.
And I'm not talking about Liza Minnelli and her cherubic hubby, David Gest, who just wowed them on "LARRY KING" for the last hour. No, we're talking about Al and tipper Gore. They're talking and talking, and, well, they're talking some more. But still, the question of whether Mr. Gore will run again hasn't been answered.
Ron Brownstein of the "L.A. Times" interviewed the former vice president today and he joins us now. Thanks for being with us, Ron.
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Good evening, Anderson.
COOPER: You talked to him. What do you think? Do you think he's seriously considering running again or do you think he's made up his mind?
BROWNSTEIN: I don't think he's made up his mind. I think he's seriously considering it. He's actually begun to think about what a campaign might look like. He's advanced his ideas on what he might talk about. But on the actual decision of whether he'll take all this work on to the track, I think that really is still out there.
COOPER: There's been some pretty brutal stuff written about his sort of PR offensive in both "The Washington Post" -- well, just about everywhere, really. I mean, in a sense, what I got is that he's trying to refashion himself, yet again. What is the new Al Gore?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, I'm not sure about -- I don't know that I would go that far that he's trying to refashion himself. First of all, you know there is a sensible purpose for all of this, which is that he and Tipper Gore have written a book "Joined At The Heart," about changes in the American family and also have a book of photographs out about changes in the family.
So they are out on a book tour and they are out selling books. I mean last night he was in Century City here in L.A. and something like 500 people lined up, some of them for four hours and longer to get a book signed by him. So there's still an audience out there...
COOPER: Yes, but I think it was Howard Kurtz who wrote saying that, you know, that a book tour is kind of a safe way to kind of put your toe back in the water and test it without having to face the slings and hurdles of political.
BROWNSTEIN: I agree with that. I asked him directly today if the book tour was sort of a stalking horse for a presidential campaign. And he said, of course, no. But it does offer an opportunity to represent himself to the public and to the political class, to some extent, without having to directly say yes or no on the race. It does give him a gauge on how people are responding to him.
COOPER: And how are people responding? I mean I know you said a lot of people showed up at, you know, this book store to get his autograph and his book. Both among the general population and also among Democratic Party operatives. I mean how are people responding?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, the basic dynamic of what Gore would face I think is pretty apparent already. And it is very much of sort of (UNINTELLIGIBLE). The party insiders, the Democratic National Committee, the big fundraisers, organized labor, they are much cooler toward him running obviously than they were a few years ago.
I mean there's much less support for him. He would not have anywhere near the institutional support in 2004, if he runs, than he did in 2000. On the other hand, if you look at the polls, including the "TIMES"-CNN poll, that was done just a few days ago, and evidence like the kind of crowds that turn out to see him, he still has an audience in the rank and file of the party.
So he would be, if he just choose to run in this anomalous situation, where he would be the front runner, but without almost any of the practical assets in money and support and endorsements that a front runner usually has. It would be a little odd.
He might be an insurgent front runner. If you listen to him talk running more as an outsider than as the guy who has the biggest numbers in the polls.
COOPER: You just interviewed him today. What's your headline going to be tomorrow?
BROWNSTIEN: Well, my headline would be that if he, in fact, does run, that this will be more of an insurgent campaign than a typical front runner campaign. He's talking about running in an unconventional way, and he's ratcheting up his criticism of Bush and the boldness of his own ideas. One thing he's already talking about is a single payer national health care system, which goes way beyond not only anything he talked about in 2000, but even Hillary Clinton's plan that was rejected in 1993, '94 on the sense that it was too ambitious. This would be, I think, a different Al Gore if he does run.
COOPER: When some people hear that, they hear the word bold, the hear the word unconventional. And you've heard those words associated with Al Gore in the past, and yet they don't seem to come true. I mean...
BROWNSTIEN: I think it would be as much, Anderson, I think it will be as much by necessity as by design. I think he realizes that he cannot simply come back, and represent himself in the way that he ran in 2000. He realizes that he has to show people that he has -- he said several times today learn something from the experience. What he will try to show that he learned is that the conventional way of running for president is too confining, too limiting. In some ways, he's going to reverse the criticism of 2000.
I don't know if you remember when he was running against Bill Bradley. He often said that Bradley was proposing ideas that were unrealistic in the current division of power in Washington. Now he's saying that his role, if he does run, will be trying to put out ideas that would not be immediately viable but try to shift the debate to a different direction. It's a very different or odd even strategy, but one that would produce a campaign that would look very different in the end from what we saw in 2000.
COOPER: Just about 10, 20 seconds left.
Tipper Gore, I not sure if you talked to her today. Do you think we're going to see her running for office?
BROWNSTIEN: I did not talk to her, I don't know. They didn't rule it out yesterday on Larry King. I think the first decision will be whether he goes. He said he's going to give it to us by early next year. Decide for himself by the end of this year.
COOPER: All right, Ron Brownstien, appreciate you joining us, thanks you very much.
(CROSSTALK)
BROWNSTIEN: Thank you.
COOPER: As NEWSNIGHT continues we'll meet a girl and her mom who turned the tide in the election of the Alabama governor, quite a story.
And a look back at the devastation of America's worst oil spill.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT from the Prestige, the Exxon Valdez, we'll look back at our news then.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: It's been a day since the tanker Prestige went off the coast of Spain. We're waiting to see how bad the environmental damage will be. It is hard not to think back to march 24, 1989 when the Exxon Valdez oil tanker ran aground shortly after midnight in Prince William Sound in Alaska. Dumping 11 million gallons of crude oil into the water.
It was the largest oil spill in U.S. History, covering over 1,500 miles of coast line with a black slick. The Valdez had devastating effects on the government. Cost Exxon $900 million in a civil settlement, and millions more in damaged company image. But the full effect of the spill took a while to become evident. The day after that spill, this is what the coverage was like from CNN.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED CNN: it's the biggest oil spill in U.S. History and they're having a tough time cleaning it up.
PATRICK GREENLAW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello everyone and welcome. I am Patrick Greenlaw. CNN center in Atlanta. Here is the latest.
11,300,000 gallons of crude oil have spilled into the call waters of Prince William Sound off Alaska. An oil tanker trying to dodge huge chunks of ice, steered into a reef yesterday, about 25 miles outside the Alaskan port city of Valdez. So far the 270,000 barrel oil slick has stayed away from shore but officials have not been able to make much head way cleaning it up. Joining us live from Valdez, right now, to bring us up to date is Coast Guard Spokesman Lieutenant Ed Wieliczkiewicz, he is on the phone right now.
Lieutenant, Good morning to you. And the latest situation presume, the Valdez, Exxon Valdez is still leaking oil at this time?
LT. ED WIELICZKIEWICZ, COAST GUARD SPOKESMAN: No, sir. As far as I know the Valdez stopped leaking oil at approximately 4:30 Alaska standard time yesterday afternoon. At that point in time over 250,000 barrels of oil, or as you say approximately 11 million gallons, had gotten into the water.
GREENLAW: As far as you know, is it correct that the captain was trying to steer the ship away from some moving ice? Is that what did happen, how he ended up on the reef?
WIELICZKIEWICZ: Yes, sir. The reports that we have, when you go into and out of Valdez, you have a vessel traffic service, it's almost like a highway for tankers. The captain was originally in the south bound traffic lane. He had requested permission to switch lanes to go into the northbound traffic lane, and maneuver to avoid ice coming out of the Columbia Glazer.
There were no other vessels in the area, no other vessels scheduled to come in, so the vessel traffic service did give the permission to go from the south bound traffic lane and cross over into the northbound traffic lane. At this point in time, we are still unsure of why he wandered out of the northbound traffic lane and ended up going aground.
GREENLAW: As you probably well know, some state officials as well as environmentalists have been saying that the cleanup effort and the containment of the oil spill was slow at best, And that there may even be some sort of federal action that they will try to bring about. What's your response as far as from the Coast Guard's concern about that as far as cleaning?
WIELICZKIEWICZ: Well, sir, the Coast Guard is taking a look now at the activities that were taken by (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and Exxon. And we're not ready to put the voice of opinion one way or the other about their response to the cleanup activity. This is one of the things that will be done during the investigation.
GREENLAW: Okay, Coast Guard, Lt. Ed Wieliczkiewicz, thank you very much.
Talking to us from valdez. Of course we will have further updates on what is being called the largest oil spill in U.S. History. We will have further details as they become available from Alaska throughout the weekend on CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: A few stories from around the nation tonight beginning with a development in the sniper case, one we can be happy about, for a change.
The man shot outside Ponderosa last month has left the hospital after five operations. It's not clear whether he went home or moved to rehabilitation facility. The 37-year-old man lost 80 percent of his stomach but doctors say he should be able to lead a fairly normal life.
A second escaped convict was arrested today in Indiana after weeks on the run. Police are questioning Chadwick Fulls (ph) about the kidnapping of a woman in South Carolina, she's still missing. He and a man named Brandon Bashem (ph) escaped from a Kentucky jail. Police think they went on a crime spree across several states. Bashem (ph) was captured on Sunday.
The latest on the betting standard involving the Breeders Cup. A computer programmer said he was the inside man, and implicated his two co-defendants, old fraternity brothers. Chris Harn (ph) worked for a company that handles most of the nation's off-track betting. This story surfaced after one of Harn's friends beat incredible odds with a Pick Six bet, taking in millions of dollars.
And former CIA director Richard Helms was buried today with military honors at Arlington National Cemetery. He was remembered by the current director George Tenet as a man who knew the value of a stolen secret. Helms was 89.
And here are four words never before uttered on this program. Turning now to sports. All right, this isn't really a sports story, at least not one from today, but we couldn't resist taking a look back at what most agree is the greatest play in college football history. You may not agree with the assessments, neither does our executive producer. You see, he went to Stanford. But it doesn't really matter. We still think it's the greatest play ever, and it was by members of the band, not the football team.
Anyway, let's set the stage. It is November 20, 1982, 20 years ago today. The game -- Stanford versus Cal in the final moments of play. The yet to be famous John Elway led his Stanford team down the field to kick what looked to be the winning field goal. Looked to be -- until the Stanford kickoff to Cal with four seconds left on the clock.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There it is. That is -- Moan (ph), he pitches it out to Rodgers (ph). That's going to take care of the clock, so they have got to score here. This is Garner (ph). My goodness. Rodgers is still alive. Stanford players on the field. Oh, what is going on here? Markers down. This is incredible. Moan (ph) is going to score! They signal a touchdown!
That is a touchdown. Penalty markers on the Stanford players for going on to the football field.
This is the most incredible finish I have ever seen in a football game. California has won it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Twenty years ago.
Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, one of the sexiest men alive, plus the princess and the bachelor. Will he take the blonde or the brunette? Love truly is a many splendored (ph) thing. But first, you'll have to be pretty clever to keep up with these Joneses. Candice and Carmen -- their side of the 7,000 vote mishap when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Let's look at what's coming up on "AMERICAN MORNING WITH PAULA ZAHN" -- Paula.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Anderson. Tomorrow on "AMERICAN MORNING," the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee says that the A Team of international terrorists are living among us. He's not talking about al Qaeda. It's Hezbollah sleeper cells he's referring to. Where are they, and what's being done to track them down? That's tomorrow at 7:00 A.M. Eastern -- Anderson.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Thanks, Paula. Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, the election day snafu in Alabama. I'll talk with the mother-daughter duo that saved the day.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: That is right. Forget Brooke. Aaron already has. Apparently, they are not at the same point in their lives. But you can forget about Brooke and Helene anyway. We have our own vote for who has real girl power.
Too young to be any bachelorette, mind you, and probably too smart for Aaron, anyway -- Aaron the bachelor, not Aaron Brown, of course. In a word, Candice. Has a nice, doesn't it? Unlike the bachelorettes, Candice really has a last name. Candice Jones, and she's the intrepid teenager we told you about last night who helped decide the winner in the race for governor of Alabama after spotting an error while counting votes.
Candice and her mom, Carmen Jones, join us now from Pensacola, Florida. Thanks for being with us, both of you.
Candice, you took this job to earn Christmas money, is that right? What made you want to take this job?
CANDICE JONES, TEENAGER: It was just a job, and I needed money for Christmas.
COOPER: What were your responsibilities on election night?
CANDICE JONES: To call in the numbers after I totalled them up from every precinct, and call them in to Voter News Service.
COOPER: And Carmen, you were there just to help her, right?
CARMEN JONES, MOTHER OF CANDICE JONES: Because she's 14, she couldn't get there on her own. I had to drive her, and she's 14. She needed someone there as an adult to make sure she did what she needed to do. I mean, she's very capable, but you still are reporting to a national service.
COOPER: Yes, tell us exactly what she did. I know Carmen said that -- Candice said that her responsibilities were to report information that was sent to her. Where was she getting that information from?
CARMEN JONES: When we got to the administration building, they had people walking around, handing out photostat copies of each precinct, and this was a total that was already written down on a piece of paper, hand written down, and they passed them out to all of the reporters in the room, but then they were doing their own tallying of these numbers as they got them and put them on the wall, like on a spread sheet. So those numbers were changing all the time. And those numbers were cumulative, but you couldn't account for what precinct they were. It was confusing.
COOPER: And Candice, it was your job not to read the numbers off the wall, it was to calculate the numbers independently, is that correct?
CANDICE JONES: No. I could have took them off the wall, but I needed the numbers of the precincts, and that was what was on the sheets. So I had to sit there -- and my mom had to sit there, and she added all the numbers up.
COOPER: And when did you realize something wasn't going right?
CANDICE JONES: Right at the end, when one of the election officials came in there, and he noticed our numbers were different than the numbers on the screen.
COOPER: And Carmen, my understanding is the numbers on the screen, all the reporters and everyone else had been going by those numbers. They assumed that the election had gone one way when it really hadn't?
CARMEN JONES: Yes. When we were there, it was just so chaotic and crazy, and it was just loud and noisy, and so most of the reporters just gave up. They didn't try to total the numbers, and when that last precinct, I believe it was Daphne (ph), come in, they all took those numbers and ran. So they got that last number. They called, and they left. So it was just me, Candice and one election official left. Everyone else left because we were holding them up, and they let us know that we were holding them up, and they didn't want to be there.
COOPER: Yes, from what I read, it sounded like a pretty uncomfortable situation. Carmen, you felt some pressure?
CARMEN JONES: We were told more than once by reporters that we were going to be kicked out of the building. And at the end, we were told that one of the election officials would stay with us because it was a late night and everyone else needed to go home. And out of the courtesy, they would stay with us. And they shut down the phones to the building. So it was very, very obvious we were holding them up and they were inconvenienced. The last person staying with us was very polite, but we were made very aware that we were inconveniencing them.
COOPER: When did you realize what you had, in terms of the significance of what you had?
CARMEN JONES: Not until the very end, because we really -- I mean, I was steadfast entering all these numbers into a little tiny calculator because we weren't expecting this to go that way, so when they started getting these numbers on the wall and everyone left, At the very end when someone came in and she was calling the numbers in to Voter News Service and they asked us, Are you sure about those numbers? And my daughter looked at me and she said, Mom, are you sure about the numbers? I said, I double checked, Candice. I said, I don't know what to tell you. I double checked. This is what I got. And then the election official said that there had been a mistake and someone had times one of the precincts times four.
COOPER: Carmen, are you proud of your daughter?
CARMEN JONES: I couldn't be prouder.
COOPER: Candice, did you follow politics before? And if so, does this change the way you view politics?
CANDICE JONES: I didn't before then, but now yes, I will have an opinion in who I want and who I like.
COOPER: You want to get into politics now?
CANDICE JONES: No. I just want to follow around. I'll vote definitely.
COOPER: When you're legal age to vote. It's amazing that you're 14. CANDICE JONES: Yes, when I'm of legal age.
COOPER: Yes, legal age. Candice and Carmen, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Really appreciate it. Just an amazing story and just an amazing job both of you did. Appreciate you being with us and sharing your story. Thank you.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: All right, goodnight.
Still ahead on NEWSNIGHT, the sexiest man versus "The Bachelor."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well finally from us -- oh, guys. Come on. We got a show on. This is just pathetic. Listen, I'll move in myself. I'll work the camera myself.
Listen, I got to tell you. It has been -- it has been really hard getting anything done around here for the last couple hours. You would not believe how distracted the NEWSNIGHT staff has been. I mean, it's like they only have one eye on their work and their other eye on something else, or maybe both eyes on something else.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: And Brook put Aaron's love to the test in Hawaii.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How do you feel about me?
COOPER: Hey, could I get 10 copies of these?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALES: Sure.
COOPER: Thanks.
Hey, Jerry, I really need you to help me on this script.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Anderson, I'm taking notes, OK.
COOPER: This is ridiculous.
I got an e-mail from you. You said you wanted to ask me a question.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, bachelor: Brook or Helene? Because's Brook's only, I think, 22. Helene's a little older, more experienced. So I'm just -- I'm on the fence. I don't know quite what to think.
COOPER: All right. I'm sure they're not watching the bachelor down in Atlanta.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jenny, I'm putting all of my hard earned cash on Helen. Her and Aaron have been out kanoodaling (ph)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I told you, it's Helene, OK? Get it right. I mean, if you're a serious "Bachelor" watcher, it's Helene.
Hold on.
Hi, Anderson. Right, we're doing that research right now. I know our deadline. I know. OK. OK. You'll have the research. Don't worry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Helene. Right here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm going with Brook.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Money talks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm going with Brook.
COOPER: That's unbelievable. Isn't there anyone here who is not watching "The Bachelor?"
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're not watching the bachelor.
COOPER: Finally. Someone is doing some work. Thanks, guys. I appreciate it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh my god.
COOPER: Chris, I really need your help. No one downstairs is working at all. Can you come and help me?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Anderson, I'm in the middle of something.
COOPER: This is unbelievable.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: These women just don't understand him. He's got the Midwest -- I got to do under cover eye cover up here. I'm sorry. I picked up the lip stick by mistake.
COOPER: No one is paying attention to anything. Forget it. I'll do my own makeup.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Thanks for joining us.
Tomorrow, one of the sexiest men in America, according to "People" magazine anyway. See you tomorrow night.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired November 20, 2002 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, again, everyone. First of all, I'd like to thank all of you who tuned in tonight, all three of you. Really, it's two people, plus my mom. I appreciate and applaud your independence and the courage of your decision to turn away from the tacky, tawdry spectacle being offered at this hour on that other network, you know the one that goes by the first three letters of the alphabet.
I mean, really, the very idea one blonde, brawny bachelor working his way through a field of willing women searching for a soul mate. Ha! What kind of beginning is that for a marriage? And with the whole country watching, except, of course, for you three viewers sticking with us at NEWSNIGHT.
Thanks for voting with your remote against such pandering and thank you, CBS, for scheduling your Victoria's Secret show earlier in the evening. Believe me, I appreciate it. If it was still on, I don't even think my mom would be watching me right now on NEWSNIGHT.
Never mind, though. The important thing is we are in this together. We agree with you that current affairs are far more important than romantic affairs, and we will do everything we can tonight to reward you for your high mindedness. Wait a minute. You don't have one of those gizmos, the picture in a picture, do you?
I suddenly feel somehow, well, minimized. Anyway, let's forget about that. We need to move on to the news of the day. And so we begin with The Whip and our top story tonight: the ecological disaster off the Spanish coast. Jim Bittermann is on that for us tonight. Jim, the headline, please.
JIM BITTERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, more oil continues to wash ashore along the Spanish coast here, polluting new areas along the coast. But it appears to be remnants of last week's oil and not the larger slick created when the oil tanker Prestige went down. That slick remains still out at sea -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right. Jim, back to you shortly.
On to the war on terror and new developments in the case of Zacarias Moussaoui. Kelli Arena is following that story -- Kelli, a headline.
KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Al Qaeda operative Ramzi Binalshibh had quite a bit to say about Moussaoui's alleged role in the September 11 attacks, according to our sources. And it's a matter of much debate whether the disclosures help or hurt the government's case against him -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right. Thanks, Kelli. The latest on Iraq now and the fate of the inspectors. Richard Roth is on that from the United Nations. Richard, a headline.
RICHARD ROTH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, Hans Blix and his weapons inspectors have set up a hot line in their cleaned up Baghdad base. A quick outlet to senior Iraqi officials. But with weapons inspectors due to start missions a week from today, just how hot is it going to get?
COOPER: All right. Richard, thanks very much. Back with all of you in a moment.
Also coming up tonight, the media's latest it boy, former Vice President Gore on a whirlwind press tour with, of course, the big question being, will he or won't he? We'll talk with Ron Brownstein from the "L.A. Times" who interviewed him today.
If this were "The Love Boat," it would be a Doc Bricker's (ph) nightmare episode. But it's not "The Love Boat," and real passengers have been getting very sick from a virus that seems to have infected an entire cruise ship. Susan Candiotti is on that tonight.
And the political wonderkind in the state of Alabama. The teenager who counted votes the old fashioned way on election night and helped decide the winner in the governor's race. We will talk with Candice Jones and her mom, Carmen, coming up.
That is all to come. We begin, however, with one of the headlines in a European paper today, "Time Bomb Under The Sea." An enormous oil stick slick has reached the shores of Spain and an even bigger one could be on the way after the sinking yesterday of the tanker Prestige.
There has been plenty of finger pointing back and forth across the continent as to who's to blame. But for the people who can see the disaster, who can literally smell it, blame isn't necessarily their top priority right now. They are too busy defending their shores. Once again Jim Bittermann.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BITTERMANN (voice-over): Against the wind and waves, volunteers worked furiously to scoop up oily sand before it congeals into something akin to asphalt. Naval cadets left their classes. A company in the mountains told its workers to go help on the beaches.
All seemed optimistic they could make a difference despite the fact a second large oil slick, released as the stricken oil tanker broke up, might still wash ashore, meaning they might have to do this all over again. The oil tanker, The Prestige, may have sunk but not without a trace. There are plenty of traces of thousands of tons of thick gummy fuel oil along nearly 200 miles of rugged and spectacular coastline.
One of the most beautiful in Europe. Rich with fish and wild life.
SIMON CRIPPS, WORLD WILDLIFE FEDERATION: You think what's happening out there underneath the waves. And the people, you think about the coastline and the people that rely on this area for their livelihoods.
BITTERMANN: "It's a disaster," said one old fisherman as he surveyed a coastline he knows intimately. And seeing the ecological destruction, you might be inclined to agree. But Spain's environmental minister announced it will be cleaned up in six months.
"The person to blame," said one volunteer, "is the owner of that ship."
(on camera): No accident should happen and this one really should not have. Because after a similar oil spill three years ago just a few hundred miles off the European coast, the European Union took action against what one leader called the "floating garbage cans carrying oil out at sea."
(voice-over): But the badly misnamed Prestige, like many other aging single-hauled oil tankers, benefited from relaxed application of the rules, which will permit them to stay at sea for another 12 years. That may change after this. The Prestige may be gone, but it will be some time before it's forgotten.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BITTERMANN: Anderson, it's about just after 4:00 in the morning here. And when dawn arrives, we expect the cleanup efforts here to again continue. But we also expect to continue the blame game over who exactly is responsible for yet another oil spill along Europe's coast -- Anderson.
COOPER: Well, Jim, I imagine there is a lot of anger there among people, especially among the fishermen whose lives and livelihoods will be effected. Who are they blaming at this point? I mean you mentioned -- you know, some people say it should be the ship owner. Is there blame toward the government, or exactly where is the finger being pointed?
BITTERMANN: Well, it's being pointed in a lot of directions. The government is taking some of the heat. In fact, there was a demonstration, a very small one last night here among people along the coast, from people along the coast who are upset of the way government handled this.
There is some thought that the government should have acted immediately at the first signs of the oil spill to tow this ship into port where the oil could have been off loaded. Instead, what they did was to try to tow it out, further out into sea, away from Spanish waters. There was an argument, that took up some time. An argument between the ship's captain and a government tugboat. That took up about 14 or 16 hours of precious time as the ship was being towed further and further out into very rough seas. And those rough seas eventually did The Prestige in. So there's a lot of blame being spread around. The Spanish have found a way to blame the British. They say that the British should have inspected the tanker better when it docked at Gibraltar sometime ago. And the British did not.
So everybody's pointing fingers in different directions. There are some people who said the European Union should have done more. I don't think we've heard the last of this.
COOPER: All right. No doubt. Jim Bittermann, thank you very much. Appreciate it.
Today, U.S. and British warplanes once again pounded targets in the southern no-fly zone around the south of Iraq. The Pentagon says air defense sites were targeted after the Iraqis fired surface-to-air missiles at aircraft patrolling that southern no-fly zone.
Now, meantime, at the NATO meeting in Prague, President Bush called for unity against Iraq, but that is hard to come by. So instead of trying to get a collective yes or no from the alliance on Iraq, which, at this point, would likely be no, the president is making his case one member country at a time. CNN's John King has that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: The president wants the new look NATO alliance to stand with him in confronting Iraq.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The deception this time will not be tolerated. Delay and defiance will invite the severest of consequences.
KING: Coalition building is a major U.S. goal at a NATO summit held amid extraordinary security. The Czech President, Vaclav Havel, among those backing Bush's tough talk on Iraq.
VACLAV HAVEL, CZECH PRESIDENT (through translator): If, however, the need to use force (UNINTELLIGIBLE) to arise, I believe NATO should give an honest and speedy consideration to its engagement as an alliance.
KING: NATO Secretary General Lloyd Robertson says the leaders will debate a formal alliance role in any military action in Iraq. But Mr. Bush is more concerned about targeted individual contributions from key NATO members.
BUSH: It's a decision that each country must decide as to if and when they want to participate and how they choose to participate.
KING: Britain says the Pentagon is already asking for specific troop commitments. And Mr. Bush promised Turkey's President Sezer U.S. economic and military aid to compensate for the use of its critical bases. The Bush administration says Iraq already is violating the new United Nations Security Council resolution by firing at U.S. and British warplanes patrolling the no-fly zones over Iraq. U.S. pilots have orders to retaliate if fired at, but, at least for now, the White House threshold for a full-scale military confrontation is interference with the weapons inspectors just setting up shop in Baghdad.
BUSH: Should he again deny that this arsenal exists, he will have entered his final stage with a lie.
KING: Mindful of European unease, Mr. Bush says war with Iraq is a last resort.
(on camera): But the president's urgent coalition building efforts here are yet another sign that military planning is accelerating. U.S. officials say some 50 countries are being consulted. Some about a direct role in any military confrontation, others, if it comes to war, about providing health with post-war peacekeeping and reconstruction.
John King, CNN, Prague.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: But that, of course, is down the road a bit. For now, the focus is on the U.N. inspectors. Their bosses wrapping up their first encounter with Iraqi officials. As CNN's Richard Roth reports, they left Baghdad with promises of full cooperation from the Iraqis, but they left with not much more than that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ROTH (voice-over): The leading international weapons inspectors returned to Cyprus after 48 hours in Iraq without resolving the main problems. Iraq did tell the inspectors it would respond with an accounting of any weapons of mass destruction by December 8.
HANS BLIX, CHIEF U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: We had good discussions with the representatives of the Iraqi government and assured that they will fully implement the resolution and cooperate with us.
ROTH: However, the level of Iraqi cooperation remains a mystery until teams of inspectors begin their rounds next week.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's the real test when we go back and start our initial inspection.
ROTH: The inspectors had no trouble refurbishing their old base, but what about locating weapons after a four-year break?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's most likely that what will happen is the inspectors will go into Iraq. They will be allowed to see whatever it is they like because the Iraqis will be very confident that they've hidden what they have so well that it is just extremely unlikely that the inspectors will ever get close to the stuff. ROTH: The inspectors' leader, Hans Blix, is now in London for talks. Getting into Iraq has not eased the pressure on Blix, the man who must report to the Security Council any serious violations.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that is, on the one hand, of course, hard for him because it raises an enormous amount of expectations. On the other hand, he knows that he has the support of the international community.
ROTH: Blix will brief the Security Council on his trip on Monday.
(END VIDEOTAPE
ROTH: It's not enough for Iraq to now accept the return of the weapons inspectors. If Baghdad continues to insist by December 8 that it has no weapons of mass destruction and the weapons inspectors find something, then all credibility, even with sympathetic United Nations members, will be lost -- Anderson.
COOPER: Richard, the inspectors have had a lot of time to think about this mission. They've been sitting around now for quite some time. Do they seem confident that their intelligence is up to date? Do they seem confident that they're holding some cards here that the Iraqis don't know about?
ROTH: Well, this is the favorite question they love to avoid answering. However, in Vienna over the weekend, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency told me with a big smile, we have information. But he would not go further.
But, definitely, there has been a lot of intelligence supplied by the U.S. and some other governments. And they have 100 favorite sites out of 800 that they plan to pursue.
COOPER: An enigmatic smile from a diplomat. What a surprise. Richard Roth, thanks very much. Appreciate it tonight.
Two developments today in the war on terror. First, a State Department warning to Americans living or traveling abroad. The alert stems in part from the Osama bin Laden message that aired last week on Al-Jazeera. The State Department warning the threat of terror attacks has not gone away, quite simple.
The second development concerns Zacarias Moussaoui. For months now, the government has been trying to build a case that Moussaoui was a member of the 9/11 hijacking conspiracy. But it has been reluctant or, perhaps, unable to say exactly how he fit in. Some skeptics have said the government's case against Moussaoui must be a weak one.
Today, a piece of the puzzle came to light, courtesy of an al Qaeda leader who is talking. And official sources who are leaking. CNN's Kelli Arena has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE ARENA (voice-over): Sources say accused terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui was originally meant to be part of the September 11 attacks according to senior al Qaeda operative Ramzi Binalshibh. But those sources say Binalshibh told interrogators the terror organization lost confidence in Moussaoui. One legal expert says the government through leaks is trying to establish a stronger link between Moussaoui and the attacks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's gotten in the press the idea that there is a connection, which is something that the government has not been able to establish and the working papers of the indictment did not establish.
ARENA: According to sources, Binalshibh, a self proclaimed organizer of the 9/11 attacks, who was arrested in September, told U.S. officials that Moussaoui met with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed back in the winter of 2000 in Afghanistan. Government sources say Mohammed is believed to be a mastermind of the attacks.
According to those sources, Binalshibh says Mohammed gave Moussaoui contact names in the United States and that Moussaoui was sent money at least twice. The news comes in the wake of public suggestions the government's case against Moussaoui is not very strong, and that the White House is considering a military tribunal rather than a civilian trial. A move justice officials are adamantly against.
JOHN ASHCROFT, ATTORNEY GENERAL: The Department of Justice is prepared to move forward with the prosecution.
ARENA: But sources also say Binalshibh told them that Mohammed thought Moussaoui was not discreet enough, and so it was decided not to use him in the September 11 attacks or provide him with any details, unless it was absolutely necessary. Some suggest that actually works in Moussaoui's favor by proving he was not intimately involved in the plot.
Moussaoui, who is representing himself, has requested access to Binalshibh. The government has objected in the name of national security.
JIM ROBINSON, FMR. ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: He's obviously provided useful information that allowed the government to anticipate and to interfere with other terrorist attacks. And that's the number one priority for the use of him at the moment.
(END VIDEOTAPE
ARENA: Moussaoui's standby council refused to comment on the developments, and it is unclear whether Moussaoui himself is even aware of what Binalshibh has said -- Anderson.
COOPER: Kelli, what are your sources telling you about what else Binalshibh has said? I mean, do we have any sense of how forthcoming he's been? I mean, I know we've heard in the past that he's talking. Has his information been reliable, do we know? ARENA: Well, sources have described the information that he's provided as useful. They haven't gotten into much detail. We do know that they have gone back to him, for example, with the Osama bin Laden tape to find out what his reaction to that audiotape was. Whether he thought it was a call to arms, whether he thought it was Osama bin Laden's voice.
So we know they've gone back to him to corroborate other information. But they haven't really gotten into great detail about the information that he has provided on his own or whether or not he's just backing up what someone else has said. I mean, obviously, this is a very delicate situation.
COOPER: Right. But he is in full U.S. custody but just at some undisclosed location.
ARENA: At a secret location, that's right.
COOPER: All right. Kelli Arena, thank you very much.
Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, is America ready or waiting for Al Gore's comeback? Then we'll meet the young woman who helped determine the outcome of the Alabama's governor race. And next, the story of the sick cruise ship.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: All right. So if you go to be the Web site of Holland America Cruise Lines, you get the same kind of pitch you see from most cruise lines, except no Kathie Lee Gifford. Laughing baby boomers gazing off into the great blue expanse, looking forward to that exotic escape.
Well it seems a few hundred Holland America Cruise goers did get something exotic; namely, a virus. It is not really exotic, though. It just sounds that way.
It's called a Norwalk (ph) virus. Something that's apparently invaded one of Holland America's cruise ships. How it got there and how they'll get rid of it, that story now from Susan Candiotti.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Five hundred sick passengers and crew, Holland America is anchoring the Amsterdam. Virginia Steinweg and her husband fell ill on the cruise that returned last week.
VIRGINIA STEINWEG, PASSENGER: You just sit in the bathroom for 12 hours. I mean you can't leave. And then the next day, you can't keep anything down. And then, you know, the third day, you're weak.
CANDIOTTI: The culprit, according to the Centers for Disease Control, is the common Norwalk (ph) virus. In this case, not believed to be transmitted by food or water.
ROSE ABELLO, HOLLAND AMERICA: It is our belief that an individual brought this virus on to the ship.
CANDIOTTI: No matter how it got there, despite sanitizing the ship, the virus kept attacking. Sick passengers were quarantined, suffering from diarrhea and vomiting.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nobody shook hands. You couldn't touch anything on the tables. There wasn't even salt or pepper on the tables. The buffet line, they all served you.
CANDIOTTI: Holland America paid for flights home from Caribbean ports of call for passengers who fell ill during cruises. However, some passengers said they did not learn about the repeated outbreaks until they boarded the ship.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They should have told us not 20 minutes before we boarded.
CANDIOTTI: Holland America defended its decision to keep sailing, insisting it was doing all it could to prevent further infections.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're cleaning every poker chip.
CANDIOTTI: On its current sailing, more than 70 passengers and crew caught the virus. Before leaving on that cruise, some passengers were not at all worried and joked about what they'd do to stay well.
PAUL ROSENFELD, PASSENGER: I'm not going to drink the water or breathe the air then.
CANDIOTTI (on camera): Holland America faces a class action lawsuit because of a viral outbreak on one of its other cruise ships last summer. In this case, the Amsterdam will dock in Fort Lauderdale Thursday morning. Passengers on future sailings will get refunds or be rebooked until this ship is back in service. Susan Candiotti, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Well, a few more items from around the world before we go to break. Starting in Pakistan. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's military dictator, today promising to hand the rings of government over to a civilian prime minister in the next day or two. Musharraf seized power there years ago in a coup, and he'll be keeping much of that power, staying on as president and chief of the armed forces.
A German doctor faces criminal charges in London tonight for, get this, conducting an autopsy in public. The first public autopsy in Britain since William IV sat on the thrown. That is more than 170 years ago.
About 500 people paid 12 pounds a head, no pun intended, to watch. Public autopsies were banned in Britain for just these reason. They've become a sideshow.
And from a sideshow to Michael Jackson, it seems appropriate. He apologized today for dangling his young son, Prince Michael II, from a balcony in Berlin. That was the dangle there. "I got caught up in the excitement of the moment," he said. "I would never intentionally endanger the life of my children."
Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, one of the sexiest men alive. Plus, the Alabama teenager who helped pick the new governor of her state.
And up next, are you really ready for more Gore?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, there's one couple that's really been making the rounds lately, yacking it up with Barbara, Katie, Larry, Letterman. And I'm not talking about Aaron and Helene or Aaron and Brooke. Although they have been talking a lot.
And I'm not talking about Liza Minnelli and her cherubic hubby, David Gest, who just wowed them on "LARRY KING" for the last hour. No, we're talking about Al and tipper Gore. They're talking and talking, and, well, they're talking some more. But still, the question of whether Mr. Gore will run again hasn't been answered.
Ron Brownstein of the "L.A. Times" interviewed the former vice president today and he joins us now. Thanks for being with us, Ron.
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Good evening, Anderson.
COOPER: You talked to him. What do you think? Do you think he's seriously considering running again or do you think he's made up his mind?
BROWNSTEIN: I don't think he's made up his mind. I think he's seriously considering it. He's actually begun to think about what a campaign might look like. He's advanced his ideas on what he might talk about. But on the actual decision of whether he'll take all this work on to the track, I think that really is still out there.
COOPER: There's been some pretty brutal stuff written about his sort of PR offensive in both "The Washington Post" -- well, just about everywhere, really. I mean, in a sense, what I got is that he's trying to refashion himself, yet again. What is the new Al Gore?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, I'm not sure about -- I don't know that I would go that far that he's trying to refashion himself. First of all, you know there is a sensible purpose for all of this, which is that he and Tipper Gore have written a book "Joined At The Heart," about changes in the American family and also have a book of photographs out about changes in the family.
So they are out on a book tour and they are out selling books. I mean last night he was in Century City here in L.A. and something like 500 people lined up, some of them for four hours and longer to get a book signed by him. So there's still an audience out there...
COOPER: Yes, but I think it was Howard Kurtz who wrote saying that, you know, that a book tour is kind of a safe way to kind of put your toe back in the water and test it without having to face the slings and hurdles of political.
BROWNSTEIN: I agree with that. I asked him directly today if the book tour was sort of a stalking horse for a presidential campaign. And he said, of course, no. But it does offer an opportunity to represent himself to the public and to the political class, to some extent, without having to directly say yes or no on the race. It does give him a gauge on how people are responding to him.
COOPER: And how are people responding? I mean I know you said a lot of people showed up at, you know, this book store to get his autograph and his book. Both among the general population and also among Democratic Party operatives. I mean how are people responding?
BROWNSTEIN: Well, the basic dynamic of what Gore would face I think is pretty apparent already. And it is very much of sort of (UNINTELLIGIBLE). The party insiders, the Democratic National Committee, the big fundraisers, organized labor, they are much cooler toward him running obviously than they were a few years ago.
I mean there's much less support for him. He would not have anywhere near the institutional support in 2004, if he runs, than he did in 2000. On the other hand, if you look at the polls, including the "TIMES"-CNN poll, that was done just a few days ago, and evidence like the kind of crowds that turn out to see him, he still has an audience in the rank and file of the party.
So he would be, if he just choose to run in this anomalous situation, where he would be the front runner, but without almost any of the practical assets in money and support and endorsements that a front runner usually has. It would be a little odd.
He might be an insurgent front runner. If you listen to him talk running more as an outsider than as the guy who has the biggest numbers in the polls.
COOPER: You just interviewed him today. What's your headline going to be tomorrow?
BROWNSTIEN: Well, my headline would be that if he, in fact, does run, that this will be more of an insurgent campaign than a typical front runner campaign. He's talking about running in an unconventional way, and he's ratcheting up his criticism of Bush and the boldness of his own ideas. One thing he's already talking about is a single payer national health care system, which goes way beyond not only anything he talked about in 2000, but even Hillary Clinton's plan that was rejected in 1993, '94 on the sense that it was too ambitious. This would be, I think, a different Al Gore if he does run.
COOPER: When some people hear that, they hear the word bold, the hear the word unconventional. And you've heard those words associated with Al Gore in the past, and yet they don't seem to come true. I mean...
BROWNSTIEN: I think it would be as much, Anderson, I think it will be as much by necessity as by design. I think he realizes that he cannot simply come back, and represent himself in the way that he ran in 2000. He realizes that he has to show people that he has -- he said several times today learn something from the experience. What he will try to show that he learned is that the conventional way of running for president is too confining, too limiting. In some ways, he's going to reverse the criticism of 2000.
I don't know if you remember when he was running against Bill Bradley. He often said that Bradley was proposing ideas that were unrealistic in the current division of power in Washington. Now he's saying that his role, if he does run, will be trying to put out ideas that would not be immediately viable but try to shift the debate to a different direction. It's a very different or odd even strategy, but one that would produce a campaign that would look very different in the end from what we saw in 2000.
COOPER: Just about 10, 20 seconds left.
Tipper Gore, I not sure if you talked to her today. Do you think we're going to see her running for office?
BROWNSTIEN: I did not talk to her, I don't know. They didn't rule it out yesterday on Larry King. I think the first decision will be whether he goes. He said he's going to give it to us by early next year. Decide for himself by the end of this year.
COOPER: All right, Ron Brownstien, appreciate you joining us, thanks you very much.
(CROSSTALK)
BROWNSTIEN: Thank you.
COOPER: As NEWSNIGHT continues we'll meet a girl and her mom who turned the tide in the election of the Alabama governor, quite a story.
And a look back at the devastation of America's worst oil spill.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT from the Prestige, the Exxon Valdez, we'll look back at our news then.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: It's been a day since the tanker Prestige went off the coast of Spain. We're waiting to see how bad the environmental damage will be. It is hard not to think back to march 24, 1989 when the Exxon Valdez oil tanker ran aground shortly after midnight in Prince William Sound in Alaska. Dumping 11 million gallons of crude oil into the water.
It was the largest oil spill in U.S. History, covering over 1,500 miles of coast line with a black slick. The Valdez had devastating effects on the government. Cost Exxon $900 million in a civil settlement, and millions more in damaged company image. But the full effect of the spill took a while to become evident. The day after that spill, this is what the coverage was like from CNN.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED CNN: it's the biggest oil spill in U.S. History and they're having a tough time cleaning it up.
PATRICK GREENLAW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello everyone and welcome. I am Patrick Greenlaw. CNN center in Atlanta. Here is the latest.
11,300,000 gallons of crude oil have spilled into the call waters of Prince William Sound off Alaska. An oil tanker trying to dodge huge chunks of ice, steered into a reef yesterday, about 25 miles outside the Alaskan port city of Valdez. So far the 270,000 barrel oil slick has stayed away from shore but officials have not been able to make much head way cleaning it up. Joining us live from Valdez, right now, to bring us up to date is Coast Guard Spokesman Lieutenant Ed Wieliczkiewicz, he is on the phone right now.
Lieutenant, Good morning to you. And the latest situation presume, the Valdez, Exxon Valdez is still leaking oil at this time?
LT. ED WIELICZKIEWICZ, COAST GUARD SPOKESMAN: No, sir. As far as I know the Valdez stopped leaking oil at approximately 4:30 Alaska standard time yesterday afternoon. At that point in time over 250,000 barrels of oil, or as you say approximately 11 million gallons, had gotten into the water.
GREENLAW: As far as you know, is it correct that the captain was trying to steer the ship away from some moving ice? Is that what did happen, how he ended up on the reef?
WIELICZKIEWICZ: Yes, sir. The reports that we have, when you go into and out of Valdez, you have a vessel traffic service, it's almost like a highway for tankers. The captain was originally in the south bound traffic lane. He had requested permission to switch lanes to go into the northbound traffic lane, and maneuver to avoid ice coming out of the Columbia Glazer.
There were no other vessels in the area, no other vessels scheduled to come in, so the vessel traffic service did give the permission to go from the south bound traffic lane and cross over into the northbound traffic lane. At this point in time, we are still unsure of why he wandered out of the northbound traffic lane and ended up going aground.
GREENLAW: As you probably well know, some state officials as well as environmentalists have been saying that the cleanup effort and the containment of the oil spill was slow at best, And that there may even be some sort of federal action that they will try to bring about. What's your response as far as from the Coast Guard's concern about that as far as cleaning?
WIELICZKIEWICZ: Well, sir, the Coast Guard is taking a look now at the activities that were taken by (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and Exxon. And we're not ready to put the voice of opinion one way or the other about their response to the cleanup activity. This is one of the things that will be done during the investigation.
GREENLAW: Okay, Coast Guard, Lt. Ed Wieliczkiewicz, thank you very much.
Talking to us from valdez. Of course we will have further updates on what is being called the largest oil spill in U.S. History. We will have further details as they become available from Alaska throughout the weekend on CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: A few stories from around the nation tonight beginning with a development in the sniper case, one we can be happy about, for a change.
The man shot outside Ponderosa last month has left the hospital after five operations. It's not clear whether he went home or moved to rehabilitation facility. The 37-year-old man lost 80 percent of his stomach but doctors say he should be able to lead a fairly normal life.
A second escaped convict was arrested today in Indiana after weeks on the run. Police are questioning Chadwick Fulls (ph) about the kidnapping of a woman in South Carolina, she's still missing. He and a man named Brandon Bashem (ph) escaped from a Kentucky jail. Police think they went on a crime spree across several states. Bashem (ph) was captured on Sunday.
The latest on the betting standard involving the Breeders Cup. A computer programmer said he was the inside man, and implicated his two co-defendants, old fraternity brothers. Chris Harn (ph) worked for a company that handles most of the nation's off-track betting. This story surfaced after one of Harn's friends beat incredible odds with a Pick Six bet, taking in millions of dollars.
And former CIA director Richard Helms was buried today with military honors at Arlington National Cemetery. He was remembered by the current director George Tenet as a man who knew the value of a stolen secret. Helms was 89.
And here are four words never before uttered on this program. Turning now to sports. All right, this isn't really a sports story, at least not one from today, but we couldn't resist taking a look back at what most agree is the greatest play in college football history. You may not agree with the assessments, neither does our executive producer. You see, he went to Stanford. But it doesn't really matter. We still think it's the greatest play ever, and it was by members of the band, not the football team.
Anyway, let's set the stage. It is November 20, 1982, 20 years ago today. The game -- Stanford versus Cal in the final moments of play. The yet to be famous John Elway led his Stanford team down the field to kick what looked to be the winning field goal. Looked to be -- until the Stanford kickoff to Cal with four seconds left on the clock.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There it is. That is -- Moan (ph), he pitches it out to Rodgers (ph). That's going to take care of the clock, so they have got to score here. This is Garner (ph). My goodness. Rodgers is still alive. Stanford players on the field. Oh, what is going on here? Markers down. This is incredible. Moan (ph) is going to score! They signal a touchdown!
That is a touchdown. Penalty markers on the Stanford players for going on to the football field.
This is the most incredible finish I have ever seen in a football game. California has won it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Twenty years ago.
Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, one of the sexiest men alive, plus the princess and the bachelor. Will he take the blonde or the brunette? Love truly is a many splendored (ph) thing. But first, you'll have to be pretty clever to keep up with these Joneses. Candice and Carmen -- their side of the 7,000 vote mishap when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Let's look at what's coming up on "AMERICAN MORNING WITH PAULA ZAHN" -- Paula.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Anderson. Tomorrow on "AMERICAN MORNING," the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee says that the A Team of international terrorists are living among us. He's not talking about al Qaeda. It's Hezbollah sleeper cells he's referring to. Where are they, and what's being done to track them down? That's tomorrow at 7:00 A.M. Eastern -- Anderson.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Thanks, Paula. Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, the election day snafu in Alabama. I'll talk with the mother-daughter duo that saved the day.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: That is right. Forget Brooke. Aaron already has. Apparently, they are not at the same point in their lives. But you can forget about Brooke and Helene anyway. We have our own vote for who has real girl power.
Too young to be any bachelorette, mind you, and probably too smart for Aaron, anyway -- Aaron the bachelor, not Aaron Brown, of course. In a word, Candice. Has a nice, doesn't it? Unlike the bachelorettes, Candice really has a last name. Candice Jones, and she's the intrepid teenager we told you about last night who helped decide the winner in the race for governor of Alabama after spotting an error while counting votes.
Candice and her mom, Carmen Jones, join us now from Pensacola, Florida. Thanks for being with us, both of you.
Candice, you took this job to earn Christmas money, is that right? What made you want to take this job?
CANDICE JONES, TEENAGER: It was just a job, and I needed money for Christmas.
COOPER: What were your responsibilities on election night?
CANDICE JONES: To call in the numbers after I totalled them up from every precinct, and call them in to Voter News Service.
COOPER: And Carmen, you were there just to help her, right?
CARMEN JONES, MOTHER OF CANDICE JONES: Because she's 14, she couldn't get there on her own. I had to drive her, and she's 14. She needed someone there as an adult to make sure she did what she needed to do. I mean, she's very capable, but you still are reporting to a national service.
COOPER: Yes, tell us exactly what she did. I know Carmen said that -- Candice said that her responsibilities were to report information that was sent to her. Where was she getting that information from?
CARMEN JONES: When we got to the administration building, they had people walking around, handing out photostat copies of each precinct, and this was a total that was already written down on a piece of paper, hand written down, and they passed them out to all of the reporters in the room, but then they were doing their own tallying of these numbers as they got them and put them on the wall, like on a spread sheet. So those numbers were changing all the time. And those numbers were cumulative, but you couldn't account for what precinct they were. It was confusing.
COOPER: And Candice, it was your job not to read the numbers off the wall, it was to calculate the numbers independently, is that correct?
CANDICE JONES: No. I could have took them off the wall, but I needed the numbers of the precincts, and that was what was on the sheets. So I had to sit there -- and my mom had to sit there, and she added all the numbers up.
COOPER: And when did you realize something wasn't going right?
CANDICE JONES: Right at the end, when one of the election officials came in there, and he noticed our numbers were different than the numbers on the screen.
COOPER: And Carmen, my understanding is the numbers on the screen, all the reporters and everyone else had been going by those numbers. They assumed that the election had gone one way when it really hadn't?
CARMEN JONES: Yes. When we were there, it was just so chaotic and crazy, and it was just loud and noisy, and so most of the reporters just gave up. They didn't try to total the numbers, and when that last precinct, I believe it was Daphne (ph), come in, they all took those numbers and ran. So they got that last number. They called, and they left. So it was just me, Candice and one election official left. Everyone else left because we were holding them up, and they let us know that we were holding them up, and they didn't want to be there.
COOPER: Yes, from what I read, it sounded like a pretty uncomfortable situation. Carmen, you felt some pressure?
CARMEN JONES: We were told more than once by reporters that we were going to be kicked out of the building. And at the end, we were told that one of the election officials would stay with us because it was a late night and everyone else needed to go home. And out of the courtesy, they would stay with us. And they shut down the phones to the building. So it was very, very obvious we were holding them up and they were inconvenienced. The last person staying with us was very polite, but we were made very aware that we were inconveniencing them.
COOPER: When did you realize what you had, in terms of the significance of what you had?
CARMEN JONES: Not until the very end, because we really -- I mean, I was steadfast entering all these numbers into a little tiny calculator because we weren't expecting this to go that way, so when they started getting these numbers on the wall and everyone left, At the very end when someone came in and she was calling the numbers in to Voter News Service and they asked us, Are you sure about those numbers? And my daughter looked at me and she said, Mom, are you sure about the numbers? I said, I double checked, Candice. I said, I don't know what to tell you. I double checked. This is what I got. And then the election official said that there had been a mistake and someone had times one of the precincts times four.
COOPER: Carmen, are you proud of your daughter?
CARMEN JONES: I couldn't be prouder.
COOPER: Candice, did you follow politics before? And if so, does this change the way you view politics?
CANDICE JONES: I didn't before then, but now yes, I will have an opinion in who I want and who I like.
COOPER: You want to get into politics now?
CANDICE JONES: No. I just want to follow around. I'll vote definitely.
COOPER: When you're legal age to vote. It's amazing that you're 14. CANDICE JONES: Yes, when I'm of legal age.
COOPER: Yes, legal age. Candice and Carmen, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Really appreciate it. Just an amazing story and just an amazing job both of you did. Appreciate you being with us and sharing your story. Thank you.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: All right, goodnight.
Still ahead on NEWSNIGHT, the sexiest man versus "The Bachelor."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well finally from us -- oh, guys. Come on. We got a show on. This is just pathetic. Listen, I'll move in myself. I'll work the camera myself.
Listen, I got to tell you. It has been -- it has been really hard getting anything done around here for the last couple hours. You would not believe how distracted the NEWSNIGHT staff has been. I mean, it's like they only have one eye on their work and their other eye on something else, or maybe both eyes on something else.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: And Brook put Aaron's love to the test in Hawaii.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How do you feel about me?
COOPER: Hey, could I get 10 copies of these?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALES: Sure.
COOPER: Thanks.
Hey, Jerry, I really need you to help me on this script.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Anderson, I'm taking notes, OK.
COOPER: This is ridiculous.
I got an e-mail from you. You said you wanted to ask me a question.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, bachelor: Brook or Helene? Because's Brook's only, I think, 22. Helene's a little older, more experienced. So I'm just -- I'm on the fence. I don't know quite what to think.
COOPER: All right. I'm sure they're not watching the bachelor down in Atlanta.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jenny, I'm putting all of my hard earned cash on Helen. Her and Aaron have been out kanoodaling (ph)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I told you, it's Helene, OK? Get it right. I mean, if you're a serious "Bachelor" watcher, it's Helene.
Hold on.
Hi, Anderson. Right, we're doing that research right now. I know our deadline. I know. OK. OK. You'll have the research. Don't worry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Helene. Right here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm going with Brook.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Money talks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm going with Brook.
COOPER: That's unbelievable. Isn't there anyone here who is not watching "The Bachelor?"
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're not watching the bachelor.
COOPER: Finally. Someone is doing some work. Thanks, guys. I appreciate it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh my god.
COOPER: Chris, I really need your help. No one downstairs is working at all. Can you come and help me?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Anderson, I'm in the middle of something.
COOPER: This is unbelievable.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: These women just don't understand him. He's got the Midwest -- I got to do under cover eye cover up here. I'm sorry. I picked up the lip stick by mistake.
COOPER: No one is paying attention to anything. Forget it. I'll do my own makeup.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Thanks for joining us.
Tomorrow, one of the sexiest men in America, according to "People" magazine anyway. See you tomorrow night.
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