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Eleven Dead in Alabama Shooting Rampage; Mexico at War?
Aired March 11, 2009 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): His hate made him kill the president. You will see what may be the last picture taken before that act.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't have a tear left in me.
SANCHEZ: A sheriff's deputy comes home and finds his wife and a daughter gunned down. Now at least 11 people are dead. But why?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is -- this is horrific.
SANCHEZ: And another shooting, more than a dozen killed in Germany, many children.
And is Mexico really at war? Truth or media hype? We talked to those really in the know, and you.
Our national conversation begins right here, right now.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ: And hello again, everybody. I'm Rick Sanchez.
Again, we have got new information on the shootings in -- the massacres, really, in Alabama and in Germany. And we're going to bring you that in just a moment, as soon as we get a handle on it.
First, though, the market's been seesawing today. But after yesterday's big gains, some are wondering if confidence is coming back. And, right now, at least, many Americans have confidence in the president, but with the treasury secretary, well, maybe not so much. Take a look at this duet that we all watched from the Oval Office.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's very important to make sure that other countries are moving in the same direction, because the global economy is all tied together.
Tim, anything you want to add?
TIMOTHY GEITHNER, U.S. TREASURY SECRETARY: Mr. President, I travel to Europe tomorrow night to meet with the G-20 finance ministers and central bank governors. We need to bring the world together to put in place a very substantial and sustained program of support for recovery and growth.
And we want to bring together a new consensus, globally, on how to strengthen this global financial system so that a crisis like this never happens again.
There has been a lot of talk and a lot of ideas, over the last two years, in these areas. It's time now for us to move together and to begin to act to put in place a stronger framework of reforms.
A lot of good work's happened, but we need to now bring this together so that we're together as a world economy, working together. Everything we do in the United States will be more effective if we have the world moving with us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: That's Timothy Geithner, the treasury secretary, cozying up to the president of the United States.
Patricia Murphy is the editor of CitizenJanePolitics.com. She's following this for us.
Murph, thanks so much for being with us.
There's something about seeing Barack Obama standing next to Timothy Geithner. And the reason I ask this question is, is, the guy on the right is still very popular with Americans. The guy on the left, well, not so much. And can confidence be spread from one person to another? Because it seems to me that's what they're trying to do at the White House.
PATRICIA MURPHY, EDITOR, CITIZENJANEPOLITICS.COM: Yes, confidence can be spread from one person to another. And people can be made more comfortable with one person if another person gives them an endorsement.
And so that picture that you saw right there with Obama and Geithner, that is Obama saying, American people, you trust me. I trust him. You can trust him.
And that's why we're friends of friends of people. That's why you get a job through somebody you know. People are more comfortable with people they know. There was some polling out last week that was fascinating -- 68 percent of the American people think that Obama is doing a very positive job. They have a positive view of him.
For Tim Geithner, it's just 18 percent. A majority of Americans have no idea who he is. He cannot have confidence of the American people if they don't know who he is and know that the president trusts him.
SANCHEZ: You almost get a feeling as we watched that today, when I first saw this shot, you almost knew the White House wanted that two-shot to be seen. That's that shot in the Oval Office that's usually used by the president when he has foreign dignitaries come over here and the two men want to show just how much they like each other and how much confidence they have in their respective countries.
It's interesting to see the way that developed today.
Murph, thanks so much.
MURPHY: Thanks.
SANCHEZ: By the way, Republicans are also trying to say that, you can't spend your way out of this situation, President Obama, to which the president seems to be saying, why not?
Let's talk about something else now.
Joining us now is Nariman Behravesh. She's a chief economist for IHS Global Insight.
Nariman, thanks so much for being with us.
I want to show our viewers some pictures now. These are pictures of after World War II, or post-WWII, as we say, in England. This is a country that was battered, it was beaten and it was bankrupt. And the British response to all of this back then was to actually spend an awful lot of money.
If Barack Obama is or is not using this as a model, we don't know. But the question to you is, did it work? You understand British economics and their history.
NARIMAN BEHRAVESH, CHIEF ECONOMIST, IHS GLOBAL INSIGHT: The answer is, no, it did not.
Basically, after World War II, Britain took a sharp turn to the left. Basically, it became a socialist economy. And for a number of decades, it went through this awful period. It became more unionized. It became more inefficient, if you will, or less efficient. And it really wandered off into the wilderness.
This whole episode eventually sort of ground this economy to a halt. It had to go for panic borrowing from the International Monetary Fund.
(CROSSTALK)
SANCHEZ: But the British would say, look, it's because of that, that we decided to start spending on things like health care, and that's why people who live in this country can go to the doctor for free, and you suckers in the United States got 47,000 (sic) people who don't even have health care.
BEHRAVESH: Well, it's an interesting model, except there are huge problems with it.
If you can't afford private care, and a lot of rich people can, you have to wait a very long period of time for things like hip replacements, or fairly standard non-emergency surgeries. So, there's a cost. (CROSSTALK)
SANCHEZ: I'm not trying to take you into a discussion what's going on with health care and ours vis-a-vis to theirs.
What I'm trying to get you -- because you're an expert on this -- to narrow down for our viewers is, do you think then that Barack Obama is barking up the wrong tree by trying to spend our way out of this situation?
BEHRAVESH: No.
You have two problems here. One is that, for decades, Britain was a socialist economy. We are not. We have a mess on our hands, no question about it. The way to get out of it is through fiscal stimulus.
(CROSSTALK)
SANCHEZ: I'm just going to -- I hate to do this, but I'm going to stop you for just a minute. Aren't we in fact the antithesis of a socialist economy?
BEHRAVESH: Well, exactly, exactly.
SANCHEZ: OK.
BEHRAVESH: And that's point, is that I don't think we're going to go back down the same path as the United Kingdom, as Britain.
SANCHEZ: All right.
BEHRAVESH: I think we are going to increase spending to get ourselves out of this recession. But I suspect, after that, we will kind of scale back and try to get our budget back into balance again.
SANCHEZ: You have confidence it's going to be able to work, given what you have seen from the White House?
BEHRAVESH: Well, so far, so good.
There is a missing link. They have done a lot on fiscal stimulus. They have done a lot on the foreclosures. The missing link is still what you were talking about earlier, which is to say Geithner and company haven't done enough on cleaning up the banking system.
SANCHEZ: And look at the market today. It's actually up two. And two is better than negative one, right?
BEHRAVESH: Well, we at least didn't lose the ground we gained yesterday, right?
SANCHEZ: Hey, even is better than way down, as we have seen in the last couple of weeks. We will keep watching it. And we're so glad that we can rely on experts like you to take us through these conversations. We appreciate it. BEHRAVESH: Thank you.
SANCHEZ: Mexico at war, Mexico, a failed state, that's what we're hearing lately, headlines, news shows, radio shows. Is any of it true?
We just got some new information, by the way -- I mentioned this a little while ago -- new information within the hour that the Alabama shooting spree killer may have actually had a list, a list of targets that he wanted to kill. Can you imagine? CNN is at the scene, where 11 people are dead.
And you have heard stories of Mexican police pulling you over just so they can take a bribe from you, right? You have heard this, not just in Mexico, but in other parts of the world. Well, what if that started happening in the United States, in America? Guess what? There are several reports it already is happening in America. We will tell you where.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAY LENO, HOST, "THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH JAY LENO": Good news. The stock market went up 379 points.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
LENO: President Obama says he has no idea why, but he's asking all Americans to do the same thing tomorrow you did today. Eat the same breakfast. Wear the same clothes. Drive the same -- don't change anything.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: We welcome you back. I'm Rick Sanchez here in the world headquarters of CNN. There's some breaking news coming in.
We're now getting information. We have been following the situation in Alabama all night long. We're now getting information -- get this -- that the killer in the Alabama massacre actually had a hit lit, a list, a target list, if you will, of people who he wanted to kill for -- quote -- "people who had done him wrong" -- stop quote.
It's a shooting rampage that took place over a 24-mile stretch of southern Alabama. When it was over, 11 people were dead.
Brooke Baldwin has been following the story for us. She filed this report moments ago. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Alabama officials are calling the shooting one of the worst in state history. According to local law enforcement, in a single afternoon, Michael McLendon shot and killed at least 10 people, half of them family members.
Police say the shooting spree started in Coffee County. There, he killed his mother, Lisa McLendon, and her four dogs, before setting her home on fire. Next, according to authorities, McLendon moved on to the town of Samson, where he shot and killed his grandmother, grandfather, aunt and uncle, all as they sat on the porch.
A sheriff's deputy's wife and child who lived just across the street also died.
GREG WARD, GENEVA COUNTY SHERIFF: I have a young deputy that, you know, he just lost -- he's lost his family. And what's bad about this is, while we was in the gunfire at Reliable, he was there, and not knowing this had happened.
BALDWIN: McLendon was then back on the road, where he shot at and injured a trooper, before killing one person at Samson Pipe and Supply and another at a nearby service station.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He shot my van and shot the Perdue truck in front of me. And then he took off running.
BALDWIN: The shooting spree ended 12 miles from where it began at Reliable Metal Products, a manufacturing plant where authorities say McLendon once worked.
CORPORAL STEVE JARRETT, ALABAMA STATE POLICE: The law enforcement officers found him dead from what are believed to be self- inflicted gunshots.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ: We have had a couple of reporters working on this story. By the way, we're also told that Sean Callebs was able to work this story and get an interview. This is an exclusive interview you're about to hear.
If there's any good news in this story -- and, again, 11 people are dead -- it's that there was a child, a baby, who was rescued from a front porch. The mother had been shot, and one of the neighbors decided to take it upon herself to go in there and get the child, and get the child to the hospital. The child is injured.
Nonetheless, Sean Callebs got to the scene in time to talk to this neighbor, turned this interview around just moments ago. We want you to see it. It's a CNN exclusive.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ALINA KNOWLES, RESCUED SHOT CHILD: She was crying. And I'm glad she was crying, because I knew she was alive. She was still breathing when she was crying.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And she was bleeding from her leg? She had either shrapnel...
(CROSSTALK)
KNOWLES: There was blood everywhere. I couldn't tell where the bleeding was coming from, because she was -- her mother's blood was on her.
So, I couldn't really tell. When I got her cleaned up with the ambulance, that's when we found the wound. And they took her and rushed her to the hospital.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ: By the way, we have now learned as well the child is in a Pensacola hospital. The child will be undergoing surgery. We certainly wish the child well. We will be checking on his condition. And we will continue to report on this story throughout the course of this newscast.
We will be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: A couple of comments that are coming from you, as a matter of fact, one of them is about confidence.
"Wow," on MySpace. "The Dow is up two days in a row. Hey, America, confidence is back."
Well, barely back, maybe, 21 -- oh, look at that, up 20 now. It was up two a little while ago. We will keep watching that for you.
And then let's flip it around, if we can. Let's go to the Twitter board. And there on the Twitter board, we see that someone is correcting me, and rightfully so. I had said 47,000 people without health care in the United States. Boy, if it was 47,000, we wouldn't have a problem, would we? It's actually 47 million.
I stand corrected. And I always apologize when folks bring that up.
OK. I want to show you something now. This is about as remarkable as anything we have seen in a long time. First, an I- Report that we got from one of our viewers in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. You see that right there, that is a Saudi sandstorm. This is the video that he took from his office as he was watching this thing just consume the city.
You can hear some of the background noise there. But this isn't the only picture. Wait until you see what else I can share with you. You ready? Look at this still. This is what witnesses described as suddenly everything turning orange. And guess what? They're right. It is about everything turning orange.
Now, look at this one. This is another still. This one looks like -- I mean, just like a Will Smith movie. It's like the city is suddenly under attack. That's the city. That's that sandstorm as it comes into the city. These are things we don't usually see in this country.
I have got another one for you now. Look at this one. This is almost like suddenly the city starts to get consumed. You see it little by little. And, now, imagine having to drive in this. Take a look at this. Look at the traffic.
And, by the way, do they drive in this? No, they don't. As a matter of fact, when this happens, the city pretty much is at a standstill.
Hit the flare.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... all on the ground and then they started screaming, "There's a gunman." And some started yelling out for medical help. It was awful.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: Eyewitnesses are describing how events unfolded as a gunman invaded a school in Germany and then at another location and killed more than a dozen people. What happened and why?
And guess what? There's new information on this story as well. We have just learned how this 17-year-old young man got those weapons that he then used to kill 16 people. It is an amazing revelation. We will share it with you.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: All right, we told you there was some new information coming in. You're about too hear from the interior minister. This is the German interior minister describing a question that a lot of folks over there in Germany had been -- want answered all day long, after this 17-year-old went on a massacre and killed 16 people. He started in his school.
And the question has been, well, where did he get the guns? Here's the interior minister.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HERIBERT RECH, BADEN-WUERTTEMBERG INTERIOR MINISTER (through translator): It is a 17-year-old boy from (INAUDIBLE) We have already made this clear this morning.
His father is a member of a weapons (INAUDIBLE) He owned 15 weapons quite legally. Fourteen of them were in the security cabinet. One weapon was not. It was somewhere else, in the bedroom.
The young perpetrator, therefore, must have taken the weapon from the bedroom and having taken a large amount of munitions, we believe that there are three (INAUDIBLE) of bullets. Many cartridges have been found in both places. And we're still investigating this.
Whether the perpetrator was...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: What an amazing story.
And Jim Clancy's joining us now to take us through some of the information that began.
Now, think, a 17-year-old, we now learn gets the gun from his dad's cabinet, probably a lot of guns, right?
(CROSSTALK)
JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They were all locked up in the cabinet, but he left one in the bedroom. That's the one the kid got and took to his former school.
SANCHEZ: Now, he started at a school, right, but it didn't end at a school.
(CROSSTALK)
SANCHEZ: Yes.
CLANCY: No, no. Then he escaped from there. But there he took the lives of nine students and three teachers, all of them female, except one. One boy was killed.
SANCHEZ: We have got some pictures I think we can show, not only where it started, but then apparently it didn't end there. Where did he go next?
(CROSSTALK)
CLANCY: Well, he went to a psychiatric clinic nearby.
SANCHEZ: That's a school.
CLANCY: That's the school. That's the outside of the school.
SANCHEZ: Right.
CLANCY: It's a trade school. Then he went from there a short distance to a psychiatric clinic. Then he hijacked a car and he let go of the driver, but went some, oh, 20 miles to a nearby town, and he had a shoot-out with police there. It was believed that he was wounded and he turned his gun on himself.
SANCHEZ: You have lived over there. You covered this story. You were a correspondent overseas for many years. Is this going to be seen differently through the eyes of Germans and Europeans than it is through our eyes to hear that some young man got this gun from his dad's bedroom? Is there going to be more culpability there than we would probably treat it with here? (CROSSTALK)
CLANCY: In Europe -- when there's a shooting in the United States, people say, told you so. Look at America. Look at all the guns.
SANCHEZ: Cowboys, blah, blah, blah, right.
(CROSSTALK)
CLANCY: Germany has some of the tightest gun laws in the world, Rick. And the father, I'm sure, had to go through numerous police screenings in order to have those weapons. And they had to be locked up.
SANCHEZ: Is there a sense that, in Germany, something like this will resonate to the point where they will want something done? This is as big -- this is not a shooting.
CLANCY: This isn't the first one either.
SANCHEZ: This is a massacre.
CLANCY: Yes.
SANCHEZ: When 16 people are killed by somebody in several locations, this is a massacre.
CLANCY: And just less than seven years ago, there was another one in another school in Germany, and it killed, I believe, 17 or 18 people in that one, so not the first time Germany's had to deal with it. Finland's had to deal with it. And you know what, Rick? It's always in the small towns.
SANCHEZ: Let me ask you this, though. There are a lot of Americans watching right now, and some of them would say, yes, but you know why it took them so long to get this guy? Because too many of the police officers there don't even have weapons themselves.
CLANCY: Well, actually, the police in Germany do have weapons. And these cops did have weapons.
SANCHEZ: So, why did it take so long to find the guy? He went to not one, but two, almost a third location. Why did it take so long?
(CROSSTALK)
CLANCY: Well, because the police at the school, they had surrounded him in the school. They thought they had surrounded him and cornered him. As they took it easy, he bailed out a window, got a back exit or something. And he made it out from there. They thought he was in the school still.
SANCHEZ: Wow. What a story.
CLANCY: Yes.
SANCHEZ: Jim Clancy, thanks so much for taking us through it. We certainly appreciate it.
CLANCY: Good to be here, Rick.
SANCHEZ: Mexico killings, is the country at war? Is it "falling apart" -- quote, stop quote? We're separating truth from fiction on this story. That's what we do.
The man who helped found the religious right movement in America with his mother and his father is blasting the GOP. You will hear exactly what he says.
We will be back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CRAIG FERGUSON, HOST, "THE LATE LATE SHOW WITH CRAIG FERGUSON": Stocks went up today. Whew.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
FERGUSON: Four hundred points on the stock market. We're rich, I tells ya. We're rich. We're rich. Yay!
(LAUGHTER)
FERGUSON: Well, you're rich. I'm not rich. I still work at CBS. But you're rich!
(LAUGHTER)
FERGUSON: It is good to see the stocks rebounded. I haven't seen anything shoot up this fast since Amy Winehouse. And right there...
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Viewers commenting to our newscast, as they watch it, some of them creative.
Let's go over here to Facebook, if we can. Got to get the folks watching on Facebook, all 10,000 or 15,000 of them, involved in this.
This is about that story we did a little while ago on the sand, the deserts, the sandstorm. "The last one of the sand looks like the movie 'The Mummy.' Aha."
And we thank Terry down there, too. We love you, too, Terry. All right, all this week, we're focusing on Mexico and really trying to separate fact from hype. Now, this all began -- and you saw it in part on this newscast, when the Pentagon suggested that Mexico was in -- quote -- "rapid collapse," and then the CIA suggested that the biggest threats to our security are Iran, which we have known for years, but also Mexico.
And then came the headlines all over the country, on radio, on television, newspapers. These are some of the ones that we found just today, if you open up your newspapers. There's one, BBC. Police find severed heads in Mexico. "Los Angeles Times," dozens arrested in drug raids. "Dallas Morning News," morgues fill with Mexico war dead.
Live with me now is Miguel Perez Rocha, or, as we would say in the language I grew up in (SPEAKING SPANISH) Miguel Perez Rocha. He's an associate fellow with the Institute for Policy Studies.
Thanks so much for joining us, sir. We appreciate you being with us.
Hey, is Mexico -- and you would know, because this is a term that's being used -- a failed state?
MANUEL PEREZ ROCHA, CONTRIBUTOR, FOREIGN POLICY IN FOCUS: Thank you, Rick.
Just let me correct. My name is Manuel Perez Rocha, not Miguel. But, Anyway...
SANCHEZ: Thank you.
We will go with him on all of that.
PEREZ ROCHA: What we think the statement is that labeling as a failed state is a very false and dangerous distraction from many of the problems that Mexico is actually facing.
I'm not going to say that -- I'm not going to minimize problems in Mexico. But calling it a failed state is an error. Mexico is not Somalia. It's not Iraq. The country's not falling apart. So, there are very...
SANCHEZ: So -- so, are you Mexican?
PEREZ ROCHA: I'm Mexican.
(CROSSTALK)
SANCHEZ: So, when you hear -- when you hear people say, Mexico is in disarray, it's a failed state, it's about to collapse, what do you think?
PEREZ ROCHA: Well, I think that what we have to really understand and analyze is Mexico's real problems. Mexico has huge threats in security, in its economic future. But it's not in such a disarray that it might collapse. The country has... SANCHEZ: So how about the...
PEREZ ROCHA: ...to deal...
SANCHEZ: How about the fact that there's...
PEREZ ROCHA: Yes?
SANCHEZ: ...they're always using the word -- how about people using the word war -- it's the drug war and there's battles in the streets?
By the way, I've heard and read the statistics. And I'm just asking from a curiosity standpoint, I've seen the statistics -- 7,000 people have been killed in the last two years. But I haven't seen any pictures or any video that seems to illustrate that.
And I'm curious about that, because if that were going on in this country, we would be seeing a lot of documentation, wouldn't we?
PEREZ ROCHA: Well, yes. You (INAUDIBLE) and the narco violence has extended all over the country. Most of the violence happens at the states around the border with the United States. And what one sees is that one of the problems of this narco-violence and its huge eruption is also fueled by armaments from the United States and from consumption from the United States. So it's a problem that has to be solved by both countries.
SANCHEZ: Well...
PEREZ ROCHA: We need to collaborate about this problem.
SANCHEZ: Look, your dad and my dad probably told us -- and so did our mothers -- if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem in the United States.
PEREZ ROCHA: Of course.
SANCHEZ: Does that -- let me ask you something.
PEREZ ROCHA: Yes?
SANCHEZ: Does it bother you when you watch television newscasts in the United States and read headlines in newspapers and listen to radio shows that make this into an us versus them thing, as in look at those Mexicans out of control down there?
PEREZ ROCHA: It does bother me. And it bothers me -- it more than bothers me, it frightens me. Because what this -- this labeling of a failed state is actually provoking is probably an escalation of military -- U.S. military intervention in Mexico, which has -- I don't think you will have any success in actually curbing the powers of the narcos, you know?
SANCHEZ: We hear, as well -- and I've got to ask you this before I let you go. We hear, as well, that maybe we shouldn't go down there anymore, that we shouldn't go to Cancun and play golf, that we shouldn't go to Ixtapa and hang out on the beach because it's just too dangerous and horrible things will happen to us, not to mention our children who go down to spring break.
PEREZ ROCHA: Nothing is really happening there, Rick. This is violence -- I mean, in general, all of the country has problems. But the narco-violence is concentrated in some cities of the country and particularly, as I said, in the northern states of Mexico which border with the United States.
SANCHEZ: Well, we thank you, sir, for separating hype from fact, truth from fiction. We're glad you were here. We appreciate it, Manuel.
PEREZ ROCHA: Thank you, Rick.
SANCHEZ: You hear stories about highway robbery, right?
But I've got a twist for you.
How about cops as robbers?
That's right. That's what a federal lawsuit is now claiming. And we are looking into that for you.
And the scion (ph) -- one of the founding families of the religious right pounds the Republican Party. He is himself a conservative Republican -- has been for years. He will tell you why, in his own words.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Let's start with Twitter, if we can. So many folks watching. So many folks commenting. And we want to involve you in this newscast. That's what we do.
Gene Starwind is writing to us right after watching that conversation I just had with the Mexican official. He says -- he disagrees, by the way, I should say: "Rick, Mexico has been a failed state since 1811."
There you go.
By the way, let's go to MySpace, if we can. Now, on the conversation we had a little while ago about what's going on in Germany and what happened yesterday in Alabama -- I mean add it up -- 16 dead in Germany, 11 dead in Alabama: "Rick, my grandfather has a gun in his closet for 40 years now. It has not been fired at anybody -- meaning guns don't kill people, people kill people -- bottom line."
By the way, to be fair, we've heard a lot of folks on both of the social mediums indicating to us today that they disagree with that statement. So it's going both ways and we just want to be fair about that.
The man who, along with his mother and father, helped found the religious right -- who helped found the religious right in the United States -- is now tearing into the Republican Party. It is peculiar. Author, film director and former Republican, Frank Schaeffer, says the GOP has: "burned down our national home," referring to the Republican Party.
He's not blasting all conservatives, mind you -- rather, what he says the GOP has become. So he's separating conservatism from Republicanism, in this case.
Agree or disagree, it is fascinating to listen to this man's transformation from Republican to now a self-described Independent.
Here's Schaeffer talking with CNN's D.L. Hughley.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FRANK SCHAEFFER, AUTHOR AND FILM DIRECTOR: I'd say that the Republican leadership knows that that's who their base is. Now, there will be individuals, private citizens...
D.L. HUGHLEY, HOST, "D.L. HUGHLEY BREAKS THE NEWS": But you mean elected people (INAUDIBLE)?
SCHAEFFER: Yes. I'm talking about the leadership -- either fall into one of those two categories. Either they are pandering to the religious right -- I don't know what they believe, personally. I can't get in their head. But they're either pandering to the religious right or they're pandering to the neo-cons, to whom every war is a good war and there's very little room in between. And the people, for instance, like William F. Buckley, who was a friend of my dad's...
HUGHLEY: Right.
SCHAEFFER: ...Barry Goldwater, you could agree or disagree with them...
HUGHLEY: Yes.
SCHAEFFER: ...but these weren't crazy people.
HUGHLEY: Yes.
SCHAEFFER: These were not fruit loops.
HUGHLEY: They wanted a separation of church and state.
SCHAEFFER: Right. They wanted a separation of church and state. They were not using politics to beat people over the head with a moral crusade. They were not looking to start wars for no reason.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: By the way, after hearing that, the first thing we did is we reached out to GOP Chairman Michael Steele. We wanted to give him an opportunity to react to Schaeffer's statement about the GOP. He did not respond. But Patrick Royal in the RNC's communications division did respond to us today. Here's what he said: "We will have no comment. But if something changes, I will let you know in advance of the show."
Well, now we're well into the show and we'll still wait for your comment. If it comes in, we'll be happy to share it with our viewers.
Join in the conversation at CNN.com/ricksanchez and tell us what you think about Mr. Schaeffer's comments, by the way.
And also this -- highway robbery involving police officers. We've heard of things like this in other countries.
Could it be happening here -- police officers looking for bribes?
Or can we call it that?
You decide.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Cathycamp is watching us now. And she's on Twitter, as well. And she just sent us this e-mail. I want to share it with you. Cathycamp, right there in the middle, Robert. She says: "Too many Americans are anti-Mexican." And then she goes on to say, parenthetically: "The problem in corruption is Mexico's law enforcers."
And you know what?
Even people in Mexico would say, Cathy, you are absolutely right on that one.
Let's go to Glenda Umana.
She spent some time in Mexico. She spent some time all over Latin America. She anchors for CNN Espanol.
Speaking of Latin America, there's a couple of interesting developments that are going on now. This apparently broached by the United States in the form of the Obama administration -- maybe reaching out to Castro's Cuba. That's an interesting story.
But then there's this. It looks like for the first time ever in El Salvador, they might be electing a socialist president, right?
GLENDA UMANA, CNN EN ESPANOL: It's very interesting, Rick, as you said.
Do you remember in the '80s, Rick, El Salvador was one of the fronts in the Reagan administration's battle against the spread of communism?
SANCHEZ: I covered it. I was there. I covered that story. In fact, by the way, a little aside, I got malaria covering that story.
UMANA: Oh my god.
Well, this Sunday, around four million Salvadorans will decide between two presidential candidates. One is Rodrigo Avila, from the right-wing party. The other one is the leftist, Mauricio Funes. If he wins, he will be the first leftist president in El Salvador's history. That is why some analysts say this is perhaps one of the most important political moments for El Salvador since the signing of peace agreements 17 years ago.
This is...
SANCHEZ: And you're going to be watching it for us. It's interesting to see not just that country, but in places like Brazil and Argentina, Ecuador...
UMANA: Exactly.
SANCHEZ: ...that there does seem to be a leftist tilt in Latin America right now.
UMANA: Nicaragua.
SANCHEZ: Nicaragua, as well.
UMANA: Um-hmm.
SANCHEZ: Thanks so much.
Mucho gracias.
UMANA: Hasta luego.
SANCHEZ: Bueno. Manana.
UMANA: Esta manana.
SANCHEZ: Thanks.
UMANA: Chiao.
SANCHEZ: There are countless stories in Mexico and some other places around the world of police stopping vehicles just so they can extract bribes from people. You've heard them. You've seen them. Maybe you've even experienced it right?
Well, guess what?
Now there are reports that seem to indicate that possibly something similar to or akin to that is happening in a Texas town.
I want to fly you into this one, ready?
Let's fly you into this place called Tenaha, Texas. It's a back road that connects Shreveport's casinos, where people leave with lots of money, to Houston. And people leave the casinos, but police have allegedly stopped more than 140 of those people and threatened them with arrests under a search and seizure law. They're told, turn over your money to us -- whatever you have in the trunk of your car or maybe whatever you won in the casino or we will arrest you.
Now, here's a statement from the mayor. We called, of course. You'd expect we would. The mayor says this: "We are in the business of enforcing the law. We send our officers to school and train them well. All we've done is enforced the law."
But have they?
Joining me now is David Guillory.
He's a lawyer who's filing a class action lawsuit against this mayor -- against the city and all involved in this.
David, thanks so much for being with us.
Are you there?
DAVID GUILLORY, PLAINTIFFS' ATTORNEY: Yes, I'm here, Rick.
SANCHEZ: All right. Let's start with this.
What percentage of the people who've been arrested are African- American or Hispanic?
GUILLORY: Well, what we know of is that -- we don't know how many people they've stopped. We (INAUDIBLE) and there's no record kept of that. But we know that they have filed civil forfeiture actions. That is a civil lawsuit where they're taking their property away from them and in over 200 cases. In the 147 in which no criminal charges were filed, we believe that the vast majority -- in excess of 80 to 85 percent of them -- are African-American.
SANCHEZ: I'm reading a story here about a grandmother -- a grandmother who had $4,000 that was taken away from her. An elderly lady. There's another one. There's an interracial couple that apparently gave the police officers $6,000 after the police, they say, threatened to take their children away from them.
This sounds crazy. You k" this is the kind of story you hear and you go, come on, not in America.
GUILLORY: Well, maybe not in America. But it's happening in Tenaha, Texas. And -- and those are accurate stories. These people -- there was no evidence that they had engaged in any criminal activity. The police pulled them over without probable cause, searched their vehicle without permission or without a warrant, found things of value and said we want that. And (INAUDIBLE)...
SANCHEZ: How can they...
(CROSSTALK)
SANCHEZ: You k" it almost sounds like it's too unbelievable to be true. I don't want to believe it.
What could they possibly use as justification to stop people and take what they have away from them and threaten them with arrest?
GUILLORY: Well...
SANCHEZ: For what?
GUILLORY: I think it's illegal race profiling is what it is. There is a statute in Texas -- and many laws have -- many states have them -- that allow the proceeds of criminal activity or property used in the commission of a crime to be forfeited over to the state. This is an abuse of that law.
SANCHEZ: David, thanks so much for being with us.
I want to bring Ashleigh Banfield into this.
She's been looking into this story for us, as well.
Ashleigh, I don't get it. I don't know how you could do that.
Can you?
ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, ANCHOR, IN SESSION: Well, it sure sounds like extortion to me, I'll tell you. And David was right on the money. These asset forfeiture laws do exist on the books, for very good reason. They take the proceeds away from bad guys who've been doing bad things. And this corridor is known for a lot of drug trafficking.
The thing is, though, is you have to sort of look at the chicken or the egg situation, Rick.
SANCHEZ: Yes.
BANFIELD: There has to be a crime, which means you kind of have to have a charge. You can't just sort of hold somebody up and extort their money on the road and say I won't charge you if you just grease my palm.
SANCHEZ: Well, and you know...
BANFIELD: They could be in some big trouble.
SANCHEZ: You know what, if you're a little old lady and you're scared and you get pulled over and you see those lights and those police officers, I could see where people can be scared out of giving anything that police officers ask them to give.
BANFIELD: Oh, sure. And there's more to it than that.
How about you're going to have to hire a lawyer, you're going to have felony charges filed against you. You're going to have to return, if you're a tourist. You're going to have to come back here and go in and out of courtrooms several times.
SANCHEZ: So you're just saying, you know what, the heck with it, here, take the money, I'm out of here, right?
BANFIELD: I think a lot of them were sort of pushed toward that, not knowing what, A, their Constitutional rights were. And then B, how it works. They had no evidence against them. They would have beaten those raps had they actually gone through with it. But instead, they handed over their worldly possessions.
Here's the deal, though. It ain't over, Rick. When this lawsuit goes forward -- this federal lawsuit -- this could expose this police department to, A, some serious civil litigation...
SANCHEZ: Good. Good.
BANFIELD: They might have to return all of those goods to all the complainants. But, B, they might have to actually face down the potential of criminal lawsuits. But I don't think they can go that far. I don't think you can criminally hold these police departments responsible, because they're acting on the advice of their attorney, the D.A.
SANCHEZ: We'll see what happens.
Ashleigh Banfield, "In Session," you're the best.
BANFIELD: Love you.
SANCHEZ: All right.
BANFIELD: Buenos dias.
(LAUGHTER)
SANCHEZ: Look very, very closely -- that's the type of shots the paparazzi got during the Civil War. It may also be the last living photograph of our 16th president. That's right, Abraham Lincoln before he was assassinated.
And then TMZ, eat your heart out.
Where did this picture turn up?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: We welcome you back.
That conversation we had just a little while ago about that Tenaha -- that Texas town, man, it's got a bunch of you riled up.
Let's start with -- let's see what Facebook, if we can. And we go to Facebook. And Martha is watching. And Martha's riled up. She says: "The federal government needs to go into this town and investigate these charges."
And then Amir says: "I am sick and tired of the mayors who justify these racist acts. They themselves are probably underground racists." Well, there's a lot of comments coming in on Twitter, as well. We'll get to some of those in just a minute.
Let's hold off. Let's try and get to this other story that I did want to share with you. It's about a photograph. Take a look at this -- it's a photograph of Abraham Lincoln, " supposedly the very last picture that was ever taken of Abraham Lincoln. He's in there somewhere.
Michael, do you know where I'm supposed to be pointing to on this picture?
Oh, there's the red line right there, see?
Because he's 6'4" and they're showing us -- thanks, Chris -- exactly where the president is. Last picture taken.
Where did they find this?
An expert on Lincoln photography says the photograph found -- was found in General Ulysses S. Grant's family-owned album, showing the president in front of the White House. And they do suggest it was the last photo ever taken of the president before he was assassinated in 1865.
Isn't that something?
Let's go to Wolf Blitzer now.
I want to talk to him about a couple of things, including that -- speaking of pictures, there was a picture that we started our newscast with today. And you had the president of the United States on the right and you had Timothy Geithner on the left. There it is as you look at the screen. And you wonder if this president isn't trying to do everything he can to help his Treasury secretary, who's really in an uphill battle here, isn't he -- Wolf?
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: He certainly is. And it's obviously a lot easier for the president of the United States to be a great communicator -- and he is a great communicator -- delivering a speech or just talking, than Timothy Geithner, who may be a brilliant economist, a brilliant banker. He used to be the head of the New York Federal Reserve, but certainly has not been all that great in terms of communicating his strategy with the American public and the markets in New York, for that matter.
And what they want is specificity. And he hasn't succeeded yet. But he's beginning this week. We begin at the -- we are beginning to see him become a lot more visible. And I think he's going to be trying to become more visible. And you -- and it's important to remember, Rick, a Treasury secretary has to reassure the American public, the Congress and the business community.
Robert Rubin did it well when he was secretary of the Treasury during the Clinton administration. And even Henry Paulson, during the tail end of the Bush administration, was doing a pretty good job until things began to collapse all around him.
But there's no doubt that Timothy Geithner has a way to go.
SANCHEZ: You k" it's a tough task for him, I mean, let's face it. And it's almost like, you would think, that Barack Obama, given his last approval ratings were not bad. You said 61 to us yesterday. And a recent poll said that 82 percent of the American people say, look, he inherited this problem. So they're not being that difficult on him.
It's almost, Wolf, isn't it, as if Obama's trying to let some of his popularity or approval -- what you -- whatever it is you want to call it -- rub off on his -- on his secretary?
BLITZER: And you can't expect the president of the United States to do everything. That's why he has a cabinet. That's why he has a secretary of Treasury, a secretary of State, all the other cabinet posts. These people have to go out there and make the case. He can't just say, you k" the president has to do everything. Otherwise, he's simply going to be overwhelmed.
SANCHEZ: Wolf Blitzer hosts "THE SITUATION ROOM," the best political show on cable television. I recommended it highly. And, by the way, it's coming up in only six minutes.
Wolf, we'll look forward to it.
BLITZER: Thank you, Rick.
SANCHEZ: All right. By the way, when we come back, there's a lot of comments that continue to come in. I've been filtering through some of these. In just a moment, I told you about some of the ones coming in on Twitter. Especially riled up, you are, about that situation in Texas. Boy, we hit a nerve. I'll read some when we come back.
Stay right there.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: There are a bevy of comments coming in. And we want to close out this last minute of our newscast with some of your comments.
Let's go to MySpace, if we can, first: "Simply check the stats of other towns along that road and if one town has a lot higher seizures than the norm, case closed."
This again, is that town, Tenaha, in Texas we just told you about, where they're stopping people for a search and seizure and then confiscating whatever it is they have in their trunk. Oh, and, by the way, many of them are coming back from the casino with thousands of dollars. Wow!
Let's go to the top of our Twitter board, if we can, now: "Is anyone surprised this racial profiling is going on? We live in a racist country. Electing Obama did not fix that." Let's go below that, if we can, now: "Rick, probable cause is very vague sometimes. It looks like they're taking advantage of it in that small town."
You think?
Gene comes back to us with this: "Rick, Zero tolerance. Theft has been going on since the federal law took effect back in 1984. This is just legalized robbery."
And, finally: "Rick, you'd better believe it. These drug laws are promoting unjustified attacks for a profit by the police and it needs to stop."
All right, we did MySpace. We did Twitter. Now, let's go to Facebook. And there we start with Gady. She's watching. She says: "People expect so much from Obama. News flash, people -- the economy doesn't have a quick fix."
And then Ashley: "Rick, welcome to the dirty South. Police have been using that law in South Carolina for years against minorities. I see Texas is doing it, too. No one cares of minorities because they always fit the description. It's all about money. They thought no one would care if it were mostly African-Americans."
And there you have it -- some of the stories that we've been bringing you on this day and your responses to them, as well.
We'll look forward to seeing you again here tomorrow, the same time, 3:00 p.m.
We'll see you then.
Meantime, let's go over to Wolf Blitzer now.
He's watching things for us in Washington in "THE SITUATION ROOM" -- Wolf, take it away.
BLITZER: Thanks, Rick.
And to our viewers, You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
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