Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Obama to Meet with Professor, Policeman; Iranian Police Use Force against Graveside Rally; Obama's Former Doc Critiques Health Care Plan; Baby Cut from Womb Found Alive; Some Cities Shipping Homeless Overseas; Consumers Warned about Free Drug Samples; Frustrated Homeowner Sues Little League; Investigators to Search for Earhart's DNA on Remote Island

Aired July 30, 2009 - 13:00   ET

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


KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Tony, you got your beer?

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Hey, now.

PHILLIPS: Just a few beers in the backyard. What's the big deal, right? Well, the yard, for one thing, it's the White House lawn, folks. We're pushing forward to a beer summit with the president, a Massachusetts cop and the famous professor he arrested.

What a way to start a life. A preterm baby cut from the womb of her murdered mother is found alive. It's a horrific kidnapping that could have been doubly tragic.

And DNA could spell an answer and bring closure to a classic 20th century mystery. We're pushing forward on the never-ending search for Amelia Earhart. A new expedition to answer an enduring question.

Hello, everyone. I'm Kyra Phillips live at the CNN world headquarters in Atlanta. You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

Call it a White House beer summit. A multi-olive branch in a bottle. In just a few hours, President Obama, Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates and police Sergeant James Crowley meet up over some cold ones. Like three guys in a bar, if the bar were at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The topic? The national race controversy brewing since the white cop arrested the black scholar and the commander in chief weighed in.

Our Carol Costello will have more on the politics of beer in just a moment, and our Ed Henry joins us live from the White House.

Ed, let's go ahead and start with you. What do you think? Deep conversation or just a few brews?

ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Probably just a few brews. In fact, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs is really trying to downplay all of the media attention and the expectations and telling reporters a short while ago that the president is not going to be announcing any new policy initiatives. Not going to have any agenda tonight. Instead he's really going to try to make this a personal situation, sort of open a dialogue. And, in fact, the setting for this is ripe for that, perhaps. Because, No. 1, White House aides are revealing today that both Sergeant Crowley, as well as Professor Gates will be bringing their families, making it a little more personal.

And, secondly, it's going to be on the South Lawn of the White House at the picnic table next to the swing set that the president purchased for his two daughters a couple of months back. So, again, kind of a very casual setting, sort of a confab. You mentioned maybe a few guys sitting around a bar. Not quite that, I guess, when you're at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

But they want to sort of get beyond all of the tension and move forward and make this a conversation instead of any kind of a back- and-forth about what happened on that very tense night, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, and, Ed, now you've got this Boston police officer with his controversial comments.

HENRY: Yes.

PHILLIPS: And you've also got the lawyer for the 911 caller saying, "Hey, why wasn't she invited? Is this just a boys' club?" In many ways, OK, do you take these things seriously, or is this turning into sort of a circus act?

HENRY: I think circus is the right word, because what the White House wants, you know, more than anything is prevent a circus. And they want to try to make this a casual but serious conversation among the key players from that night: the president's friend, Professor Gates, and the man who arrested him. Obviously, the charges later dropped.

The president feels badly about sort of the way he weighed in, maybe added a little bit to the tension. But is still standing firm, according to Robert Gibbs, in believing that it was appropriate for him to step in, because race is such an important issue in this country. The president does not regret weighing in, just maybe the way that he did it.

And so I think other people are trying to get to the table, the picnic table, I guess, would maybe add to a circus atmosphere. The White House doesn't want that. They just want the key players with the president, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Now, I understand you've been exercising your investigative skills a bit here, and apparently, there's another controversy, a dilemma here about the suds.

HENRY: If there's anything I can investigate, it's probably beer. And what I'm picking up is that, specifically the folks at Sam Adams are a little bit upset, because the president and his aides have noted that the Blue Moon is the beer of choice for Sergeant Crowley, that Red Stripe is the beer of choice for Professor Gates, and the president wants Bud Light. Now, that was very politically correct when he was in Missouri for the baseball all-star game, but not so politically correct now, apparently, because it's owned by Inbev, the Belgium company. Not an American company anymore. So the folks at Sam Adams are saying, "Look, Mr. President, why -- why can't we get a seat at the picnic table?"

There's a little bit -- I think this proves more than anything that, even when the president of the United States is trying to forge harmony, bring people together, others are going to make controversy no matter what, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: And I was just thinking what could not have controversy? I guess even water could have controversy, because you'd have every bottled water company upset that someone was choosing a different type of bottled water. So, what's the next option? I mean, I'm trying to think. Do you play, you know, marbles?

HENRY: Funny you -- funny you say that, because a few moments ago there was a protest at Lafayette Park just across the way from where I'm standing, some protestors complaining that the president is even serving beer tonight at all, saying it sends the wrong message to America's young people.

PHILLIPS: Oh. Oy.

HENRY: So look, everyone is going to have their beef on this issue. I think, more than anything, when you peel all that back, race in America, very serious issue and conversation. So the president is trying to push out all these distractions, if you will, and say, "Let's just get these folks to sit down and sort of talk it out."

PHILLIPS: Which we hope is exactly what happens. Ed, thanks so much.

All right. Let's hold up on the politics for just a second and talk pilsner, OK? Should we really be surprised that President Obama offered to bring the brewskis in today? CNN's Carol Costello joins me from New York with that.

Carol, leave it to you. And I thought you were a vodka kind of girl. No, I guess you do throw back a few brews now and then, now that I think about it.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I must confess I do. I'm almost embarrassed to talk about this now, after what Ed Henry just said. But...

PHILLIPS: Exactly. Shame on us for even bringing this up again. But what the heck?

COSTELLO: I know. It's interesting, though, because you know, some say it's no accident that the president chose beer to serve at his shindig tonight, first of all, because as he has said in the past, you know, he never turns down a beer. And, secondly, beer has become quite the political tool, because it sort of levels the playing field, really.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: ... (UNINTELLIGIBLE) appearance.

COSTELLO (voice-over): It's a strategy that's spawned more than a few clever headlines, like this one in the "Huffington Post": "Obama Names Thursday Drink a Beer with Someone who Arrested You Day."

Or this one in "Politics Daily": "Beer and Loathing at the White House."

It's tough to say if Mr. Obama's beer diplomacy will heal the wounds, but some say, at the very least, his choice of beverage will level the playing field between president, professor, and police officer. It's a tried-and-true political tactic.

SARAH PALIN, FORMER VICE-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Let's commit ourselves, just everyday American people, Joe Six-Pack.

COSTELLO: Who can forget that? Supporters say Sarah Palin is a master at appealing to the commonsense average Joe. And she used a six-pack to do it.

During the Democratic primary, Hillary Clinton tried something harder, but mostly stuck with beer. And Barack Obama played to the beer-drinking crowd, too, enjoying a few brews on the campaign trail.

Perhaps the only misstep in the president's latest beer diplomacy strategy is not inviting all parties to his White House shindig. As in the woman who called 911 to report there was someone breaking into Professor Gates' house. This is her lawyer.

WENDY MURPHY, LAWYER FOR LUCIA WHALEN: So, the three highly- trained guys who reacted badly are getting together tomorrow for a beer at the White House, and that's a good thing. But the one person whose actions have been exemplary will be at work tomorrow here in Cambridge. I don't know. Maybe it's a guy thing. She doesn't like beer anyway.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: But as we know, Kyra, many women do like beer. And you know...

PHILLIPS: It's not just a guy thing. We well know.

COSTELLO: It's not just a guy thing. And you know, there's a reason people say, you know, "Hey, you know, let's throw back a cold one." They don't say, "Hey, let's go out and throw back a chardonnay."

PHILLIPS: That's true. That would seem -- well, no, that's metrosexual, though, right? That's the right thing to do. All right. We're getting sidetracked. You know, Ed was saying that Gibbs is downplaying this whole deal. Even Ed was saying this is not going to be any type of deep conversation. It's just going to be having a few cold ones and hopefully making this all go away. So, you know, why do you think this is so important when it's coming across to be such a lame event?

COSTELLO: Well, you know, it might seem silly, but settings are important, and if you want people to feel comfortable, maybe it's better to be outside at a picnic table, near a garden with a beer instead of inside the White House, you know, at a big formal table. I mean, that's -- that just kind of like lends itself to a very stilted conversation.

So, you know what? Settings are important, and maybe this will work. Maybe it will make people feel more comfortable and make them more able to talk frankly, and I'm sure that's what the president wants.

PHILLIPS: Next thing, live band, open forum, we can all join in. A perfect way to kick off the weekend.

COSTELLO: Yes.

PHILLIPS: All right. Carol Costello, thanks so much.

COSTELLO: Sure.

PHILLIPS: Well, we mentioned the development with the Boston police officer and his controversial comments in the Gates' case. Tonight on "LARRY KING LIVE" an exclusive with the suspended office officer, Justin Barrett. That's tonight on "LARRY KING LIVE," 9 p.m. Eastern, right here on CNN.

And the Gates arrest has set off a passionate discussion in the media over race relations in America. We want to hear from you. Have you been a victim of racial profiling? If you work in law enforcement, what challenges do you face policing diverse areas? Share your personal stories on video, and you could be featured on CNN.

And I'll take more than -- well, it will take more than beer to get the Republicans and many Democrats to swallow the president's health-care plan. Maybe they should all get together with a few brews.

Still two groups of lawmakers, one in each house, pushing forward before both houses break for a month-long recess. And in the House, the all-important energy and commerce committee is back at work after conservative Democrats suffered a bad case of sticker shock. The so- called blue dogs, won concessions from party leaders that broke the committee logjam, but deferred any floor votes until after the August break.

In the Senate now, the so-called Group of Six on the finance committee -- three Democrats, three Republicans -- are inching forward on the only plan in town that claims to be bipartisan. One of the Republicans says that there's no way that they'll be done before the recess. But another says, quote, "We're getting close." So, supposedly their plan would cover 95 percent of Americans and not add to the deficit.

Straight ahead, Iranians remember the symbol of their opposition and mark a special day with new clashes in the streets of Iran. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, some cities are trying a new program for the homeless: give them a one-way ticket and wave good-bye. Guess who will be footing the bill?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, in Iran, new clashes today as mourners gathered to remember that young girl as we remember -- as Neda. She was the young woman who was shot to death 40 days ago during protests over Iran's presidential election. Her death became a rallying cry for the opposition. And CNN's Reza Sayah is at our international desk, keeping track of what's happening right now.

REZA SAYAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Kyra, more drama, more violence in the streets of Tehran, and the Iran desk monitoring things.

First off, let's show you the newest video into the Iran desk. And there was clashes today, again, at a cemetery in southern Tehran. And there you see what appears to be one of the victims with a bloody head. The scene here, Behesht-e Zahra, Tehran's main cemetery, and this is where it is on the map. That's where about 3,000 people showed up this morning to commemorate the death of Neda Agha-Soltan.

If we can show some video from the gathering earlier today. Neda Agha-Soltan, along with several others, killed on June 20, eight days after the disputed vote in Iran. In Shia Islam, it's tradition to remember someone 40 days after they were killed.

The opposition had asked permission from the government to do this. The government denied permission. But the opposition came out anyway. And it got ugly. There you see security forces, charging at times protesters, dispersing them. This was 3:30 p.m. local time in Iran, about six hours ago.

After they dispersed from Behesht-e Zahra, that cemetery, according to witnesses and CNN sources, they moved up north.

And let's move on to video here at the Iran desk. Also coming in within the next couple of hours, that shows Valiasr Street near the major square, Banak (ph). And there you see the clashes continuing in this area. There you see a security officer just beating one of the protesters. And he's not going away. He remains defiant. There's a face-off. There you see others.

Now, you just heard right whether what appeared to be, what sounded like a gunshot. And pay close attention again. You're going to see something go through your scene. You're going to see here what appears to be another gunshot. Here it comes. There you see it.

Now, we're not sure what that was. It certainly sounded like a gunshot. And then you saw what seemed like gunfire going across the scene. But certainly, an indication of the clashes that have been going on throughout the day.

Based on what we saw today, the opposition movement, despite a seven-week, ferocious crackdown by the government, coming out, showing that they're still out there. They're not going away, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: And, you know, we continue to follow this story, Reza. Just last week you were following the hunger strike out in front of the U.N. And so many Iranians still coming out in full force here in the United States, protesting what's happening in that country. Are we seeing any impact at all?

SAYAH: Well, what we're seeing is, despite this crackdown, this opposition movement is not going anywhere. In fact, it appears that it's more united and cohesive than ever.

Today, the opposition leaders themselves, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the opposition candidate who lost the presidency, and Mehdi Karroubi, they came out in a rare appearance with their opposition supporters, despite the government telling them this week, "Do not come out."

At the same time you're seeing the hardliners, Iran's leadership, the supreme leader, Ahmadinejad, in what appears to be disarray. You had Ahmadinejad appointing that controversial vice president. The supreme leader, hardliners, conservative lawmakers, blasted him. They demanded him to -- to get rid of the vice president. He appeared to be defying -- defy them.

So, what you're seeing the hardliners divided and the opposition movement cohesive, as united as ever. Never in the 30-year history of the Islamic republic have we seen this leadership this fractured, this divided. Not sure where this is going, but certainly significant, historic developments we're seeing.

PHILLIPS: All right. We'll keep following it, of course. Reza Sayah, thank you so much.

And back in Washington, another GOP senator is breaking ranks to support Sonia Sotomayor. On Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee endorsed her nomination to the highest court in the land with only one Republican "yes" vote. When the full Senate votes next week, there won't be many more, but Tennessee's Lamar Alexander will be one of them. The third-ranking Senate Republican says on the basis of experience, temperament, character and intellect, Sotomayor is well qualified to serve.

The doctor is in. But he's not on board. We're going to hear what the president's former M.D. doesn't like about the president's health-care plan.

And what's not to like about this? Another healthy surge on Wall Street. Check out those blue chips. Right now, Dow Industrials, up 157 points.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: President Obama's campaign to make health insurance available to everybody has plenty of critics, but you already knew that. What you may not know is that one of those critics is his own doctor. Former doctor anyway. CNN's Jim Acosta has his story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. DAVID SCHEINER, PRESIDENT OBAMA'S FORMER DOCTOR: Yes, hi.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Chicago doctor David Scheiner has taken a hard look at President Obama's prescription for health-care reform, and sees bad medicine.

SCHEINER: This isn't that kind of health-care program that I think is going to work.

ACOSTA: What makes Dr. Scheiner so special? He was Barack Obama's personal physician for 22 years. He voted for Mr. Obama. But the doctor thinks the president's plan doesn't go far enough.

SCHEINER: If I had to say the single one thing which is the worst part of it, is that private insurance companies continue to be a part of the health scheme. Everybody keeps saying we don't want the government getting involved in health care. The government is involved in health care and Medicare, and it works.

ACOSTA: Scheiner would rather see the nation adopt a single- payer system like the ones in Canada and Europe. It's something an up-and-coming state senator Barack Obama talked about six years ago.

OBAMA: I happen to be a proponent of single-payer health insurance. But as you know, we may not get there immediately. Because first we've got to take back the White House and we've got to take back the Senate and we've got to take back the House.

ACOSTA: But during the campaign, that position evolved.

OBAMA: If I were designing a system from scratch, then I'd probably set up a single-payer system, but the problem is we're not starting from scratch.

This is about the future.

ACOSTA: Now the president favors giving Americans the option of joining a government-run plan that would compete with private insurers.

OBAMA: Nobody is talking about some government takeover of health care. I -- I -- I'm tired of hearing that.

ACOSTA: But Dr. Scheiner points out, nobody has seen the details of that option, making it a hard sell for the president. SCHEINER: We don't even know fully what the public option is going to be. If the public option is too good, patients who are sick will flock to it. And I'm not sure it will be able to support itself.

ACOSTA: Scheiner almost had a chance to confront the president with his concerns. He was invited to a recent televised town hall with Mr. Obama, but he says he was dropped from the program.

SCHEINER: I just hope we can convince Congress and the American public and the president will hear some of my words. We've got to do something better.

ACOSTA (on camera): Dr. Scheiner will finally get a chance to have his say here in Washington. He and other doctors who support a single-payer system are gathering at the Capitol to meet with lawmakers and rally with supporters. He may not be the president's doctor anymore, but Dr. Scheiner says he's trying to save the patient before it's too late.

Jim Acosta, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, it's another scorcher in parts of the Pacific Northwest, with all-time records falling in Seattle and several other places. Chad Myers, is Oregon still one of them?

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: All right. Thanks, Chad.

Some cities are trying a new program for the homeless: give them a one-way ticket and wave good-bye. But guess who's footing the bill?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: A baby girl cut from her mother's womb, her mother found dead in a closet. The woman you see believed responsible, suspected of passing off the baby as her own. She appeared in court just a couple hours ago in New Hampshire and is now held on $2 million bail.

When we first brought you this horrific story yesterday, everyone assumed the worse, until now. The baby is not only alive, but -- get this -- she's also said to be in good condition. She was found in Plymouth, New Hampshire. Her mother's body found in her Worcester, Massachusetts, apartment.

Todd Gazeskewic (ph) from Boston TV station WCBB brings us up to date.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TODD GAZESKEWIC, WCBB REPORTER (voice-over): Thirty-five-year- old Julie Corey of Worcester was taken into police custody last night in Plymouth, New Hampshire. Investigators were tipped off by friends, who became suspicious when Corey told them she had just given birth. They didn't even know she was pregnant.

SGT. KERRY HAZELHURST, WORCESTER, MASSACHUSETTS, POLICE: Some friends became a little concerned about how she got home so early after just giving birth.

GAZESKEWIC: Police believe the child is the daughter of Darlene Haynes, the Worcester mother of three other girls whose body was found Monday in a closet of her apartment. She was eight months pregnant. The baby was cut from her womb.

As of now, Julie Corey is only being charged with being a fugitive from justice on suspicion of kidnapping an infant.

LT. TERRY KINNEEN, NEW HAMPSHIRE STATE POLICE: She was with another male subject. We don't believe at this point he had anything to do with it. He was questioned and released.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Mourners have now been gathering outside Darlene Haynes' home, turning it into a makeshift memorial. Police believe that she had been dead for several days before her body was found.

The Associated Press reports the man and woman arrested in the case used to live in the same apartment building, but they had already moved out before Haynes moved in.

One child found, another missing nearly a week now. Eight-year- old Robert Manwill was last seen Friday near his mom's apartment in Boise, Idaho. Tomorrow police are planning the most extensive search yet, hoping 1,000 volunteers or more will turn out.

Today we're learning more about Robert's family. Citing court papers, "The Idaho Statesman" says that his mom is on probation for fracturing his infant half-brother's skull. "The Statesman" also says the mom's boyfriend has a criminal record, including burglary and battery.

But police say there's no evidence of foul play and the family is cooperating.

Caring for the homeless, it's an expensive problem for cities across the country. And in this recession, it's even worse. Now some cities are trying a new solution: giving the homeless a one-way ticket out of town.

CNN's Alina Cho reports from New York.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Free plane tickets to places like Paris, Puerto Rico, Casablanca. Train rides and bus tickets, too. The recipients: the homeless. And taxpayers are footing the bill.

MICHAEL STOOPS, NATIONAL COALITION FOR THE HOMELESS: We used to call it in a negative way, Greyhound therapy, but if it's done right, it is a very good program.

CHO: The National Coalition for the Homeless says cities across the country are using taxpayer money to get rid of homeless people, sending them to places where they can find a temporary home, mostly with relatives.

MAYOR MICHAEL BLOOMBERG, NEW YORK CITY: Given the cost of providing shelter for a family, this saves the taxpayers of New York an enormous amount of money.

CHO: New York City's Department of Homeless Services says, on average, it costs $218 per person for a one-way ticket. The cost of housing a family of three in a shelter: $36,000 a year.

Justin Little and Eugenia Martin owed back rent on their apartment in North Carolina. So, with their 5-month-old daughter, they came to New York last week for a fresh start. With no money, they went to a shelter. Then they got the help they needed from family members, so three days later the city paid to send them back on a Greyhound bus.

EUGENIA MARTIN, FORMER HOMELESS PERSON: They paid for our tickets. They gave us food on the bus, because we had no money. They even called to make sure we made it here and everything. So, we're big -- I'm grateful.

LINDA CONTEZ, ADVOCATE FOR HOMELESS RIGHTS: We felt pressured. I mean, we felt pressured that they wanted to get out of the system, to get out of the state, and to go somewhere else. But it was right from jump.

CHO: Linda Contez and her husband moved to New York after their Florida home went into foreclosure. She says as soon as the couple applied for shelter, instead of offering a bed, the city wanted to pay for tickets back to Florida.

Contez, who now works as an advocate for homeless rights, says it took social workers three months to convince social workers that returning was not an option.

CONTEZ: If they can go back to another city and they have housing, I mean, by all means. But really, in the long run, why were they here in the beginning? If they couldn't live where they were before, evidently they came here for a reason, you know, to get housing.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, it should be a surgeon's mantra: think twice, cut once. Or at least get a second opinion. A doc in trouble, but not out of a job after a serious second screw-up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Free drug samples from your doctor. Sounds like a good deal, right? We got your attention. Who doesn't love free stuff? But when it comes to treating your child for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD, it might be better to pass on the free medicine.

Senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen here with a new warning from "Consumer Reports."

So what exactly does it show?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: It looks like the kinds of medicines that get offered as a free sample. You know, you go see your doctor. They hand you a month's worth of samples.

Well, guess what? When your doctor is giving you free samples, there is an excellent chance, some would say a 99.99 percent chance, it's an expensive drug. Now, there are expensive drugs to treat ADHD and there are generics less expensive. When you take that sample, it's free for a month, but then you are going to have to end up paying for the drugs.

So what "Consumer Reports" is advising people is think twice before you accept -- accept that sample. Instead you might want to ask, "Gee, doctor, is there a less expensive drug that I should take?"

Now, we ran this by the pharmaceutical companies. We wanted to know what they think of free samples, since they're the ones who give them. And here's what they had to say: "Free samples have helped improve the quality of life for millions of Americans." They say it can help a doctor determine whether a drug works for a particular patient or not.

PHILLIPS: But there's also been a lot of controversy about these drugs and whether your kids should be on them or not.

COHEN: Right. Should be on them at all, free or not free. There's a lot of controversy over whether drugs are really the best approach for ADHD.

So, we talked to some child psychiatrists, and we said, "All right, when Mom and Dad take the child to the doctor and the doctor wants to give them a prescription, what are some questions they should ask before accepting that prescription?"

And first of all, here's the question you want to think about yourself, as well as asking the doctor: what is your child going to get out from -- of this drug? What are you expecting? Are you expecting better grades, a more popular child? You ought to get those expectations in order before you go on the drug.

Also, ask if there are any alternatives to drugs. Some kids do just great with counseling and behavior modification and study skills and those kind of things instead of drugs or sometimes in addition.

Also ask what are the downsides to this drug? That's an important question, because drugs can have side effects, such as more aggressive behavior, decreased appetite, that kind of thing. Now, all of these are questions -- these are big questions about whether or not you want to go on ADHD drugs or your child, rather. You can see all of the answers at CNNhealth.com. And if you go to CNNhealth.com, you'll see the column there.

And then if you e-mail me there, that's where you can ask me questions about anything. It doesn't have to be ADHD. If you want to know how to be a smarter, empowered patient, write to me at EmpoweredPatient@CNN.com.

PHILLIPS: And there's that whole other controversy about ADHD. It's, OK, if your kid is hyperactive, that means they've got a creative mind. Plug them into something else. Like my mom did.

COHEN: There you go.

PHILLIPS: Every minute of the day I was doing something, you know: musical instruments, sports, some type of activity.

COHEN: And that's because you were sort of a hyper child, I would imagine.

PHILLIPS: I'm still hyper.

COHEN: Knowing you as an adult, that's just my guess. And some parents say that that really has worked for them and they've taken other approaches, and they don't want to give their kids drugs.

PHILLIPS: Right.

COHEN: So tell your doctor if you want something other than drugs.

PHILLIPS: Yes. Activity all the way.

COHEN: There you go.

PHILLIPS: And it eventually goes away. I'm not nearly as bad as I was as a child.

COHEN: Really? Wow. I would have loved to have seen you as a child.

PHILLIPS: Oh, you would have been in trouble. Thanks, Elizabeth.

Well, the boys of summer benched? Why a balky neighbor's in a legal brawl with some Little Leaguers? That story. And we're going to also field some of your tweets, as well. See what you think about this controversy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Pushing forward to our next hour, private Facebook messages made public. Now a high scholar is trying to save face. Someone logged onto her Facebook account. Not a hacker, not a virus, but her teacher.

Plus, words to live by or die by. You've heard of the Ten Commandments. You've heard of the Magna Carta. Now how about the Taliban Code of Conduct?

All right, everybody makes mistakes. Despite all their training, even doctors aren't immune. But one surgeon in upstate New York, well, his record sticks out like a sore thumb.

Dr. Bruce Klein has just been reprimanded by the state health department for misconduct. It seems he operated on a patient's right knee instead of her left. A 50/50 shot, and he blew it.

But here's the capper. He'd done the exact same thing to another woman seven years earlier. You might think Dr. Klein would lose his license or something. Two strikes and you're out? Nope, he's still able to practice.

But you'll be happy to know that he's got to take a course on surgical time-out protocol. That's right: a refresher on how to stop, look, and double-check before you cut.

The crack of the bat, the cheering kids. Little League baseball is a charming summer pastime, except maybe if your house is next to home plate. A Pennsylvania man is trying to shut his neighborhood Little Leaguers down.

More now from Vince Sims of our affiliate WPXI.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VINCE SIMS, WPXI REPORTER (voice-over): This is Hammer Field, run by the Greenfield Baseball Association. The field has been here since 1960.

BARRY CARB, SUING LITTLE LEAGUE: It's my neighborhood.

SIMS: But a lawsuit filed by Barry Carb, that lives just on the other side of the fence, could pull the association's permit.

CARB: It's not that I'm after the little kids, but what's happened is this baseball association has grown this -- their league to such a size it doesn't fit this neighborhood anymore. Sometimes I can't leave my place. Sometimes I can't even get in. The traffic, the congestion is so horrific that it's like running a gauntlet.

SIMS: Carb also shows me milk crates full of baseballs that he says have come flying into his yard.

The Greenfield Baseball Association games run about five or six months during the summer.

SCOTT GORMLEY, GREENFIELD BASEBALL ASSOCIATION: I mean, you're talking a community field. The kids are up here. They're having a good time. We're keeping them from being -- doing bad things on the street. I mean, we're doing the right thing up here in Greenfield, we really are.

SIMS: Gormley, who played on the field himself 30 years ago, gets emotional at the idea of losing it.

GORMLEY: When he bought the house, the field was here. I mean, I'd -- it's -- I get really emotional when I talk about this because -- it's something you lose.

KIM STRATIFF, SON PLAYS IN LEAGUE: It's sad. Because I want to know when kids' baseball became a bad thing.

SIMS: Kim Stratiff's son plays in the league. She's collecting signatures, 400 so far, to save the field.

STRATIFF: I hope that when everybody sees our community involvement and the amount of people that we have going down to this hearing, they'll realize this is a home.

SIMS: So, do you want it closed down?

CARB: Well, I'd like to have it closed down, or what I'd like to have, I'd like to have it returned to the neighborhood. The neighborhood kids cannot play there.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: That's from our Vince Sims. Thanks so much.

Now, there's a court hearing on all of this August 6. So, what do you guys think? We put out a call for tweets on the story.

Here's what Michael70 says. He agrees with the quote from the story. "When you move next to a baseball field, what do you expect? Exactly. The baseball field has been there for 49 years!"

R2808N says, "I'm going to play the bad guy position. Pardon the pun. Yes, I think he has a right to sue. It's like any other neighbor issue."

And from Momvswild: "It comes with the territory. Just like wildlife. Baseball equals fans."

Well, if you want to weigh in, Twitter name is KyraCNN, and, of course, got to give a shout out to our team blog: CNN.com/Kyra.

Jimmy Hoffa, Michael Rockefeller, D.B. Cooper, Amelia Earhart, enduring 20th century mysteries. All members of the vanished-without- a-trace club. But now one of them might get kicked out.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, at the time that she disappeared, Amelia Earhart was one of the world's most famous women. In the 1920s and '30s, she was a pioneer for women pilots, breaking aviation records and having solo flights. She was an international celebrity and an editor for "Cosmopolitan" magazine. With her fame and endorsement deals, she was John Glenn and Tiger Woods all rolled into one.

Well, Earhart was out to make history in 1937, trying to become the first woman to fly around the world. During that flight, her plane mysteriously disappeared. She and her navigator, Fred Noonan, were never found. And one of the 20th Century's great mysteries was born.

But the key to the mystery might be found on a tiny island in the Pacific. That's where investigators have found artifacts that might have belonged to Earhart and where they plan to go back in search of her DNA.

Ric Gillespie is one of those investigators with The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, or TIGHAR for short. He joins me live from Philadelphia.

So Ric, I mean, this is fascinating. Hilary Swank is going to play Amelia Earhart coming up in October in a movie about her. Now you've got this new expedition that you're going to be a part of. Why is there still so much fascination with Earhart?

RIC GILLESPIE, INVESTIGATOR, TIGHAR: Well, Amelia Earhart disappeared at the height of her career, mysteriously. She was headline news for days after she disappeared. Everyone expected a happy ending when people were hearing radio distress calls from her. They expected the Navy or the Coast Guard to rescue her momentarily, and then, nothing.

And it was such a mysterious disappearance. It's a -- it's a formula for an enduring mystery.

PHILLIPS: Now, you even believed, and I did for a really long time, that she ran out of fuel and had to ditch her aircraft and that was it. But I've been reading more about these distress calls that were made. Have you been -- are you up on that? Can you tell us more about that and why you think that there actually may be something on this island, and that she may have been alive for a while?

GILLESPIE: The distress calls were heard for nearly a week after she disappeared. And at the time, the Coast Guard and the Navy believed they were genuine and believed they were coming from an island in this part of the Pacific, or radio bearings that crossed at this -- near this island.

But when the search failed to turn up any trace of her, the official word was, well, if the signals were genuine, the airplane had to be on land. And if we didn't see an airplane on any of the land that we looked at, the messages must have been bogus, hoaxes, misunderstandings, something.

But we looked at nearly at 200 reports of radio distress calls broadcast from Earhart, believed at the time to be from Earhart. Some of them are hoaxes, fairly transparent hoaxes. But others are almost undoubtedly genuine.

One of two things has to be true. Either Earhart was on land calling for help, or there was a hoaxer out there in the middle of the Pacific with the ability to mimic her voice, transmit on her frequency and who knew she was not going to arrive at Holland Island. That's hard to believe.

PHILLIPS: Then let's talk about the island, where exactly it is. And we're looking at pictures now of, actually, the dig that you did back in 2007. And you found a piece of a comp act, like a powder compact mirror, a zipper, a wallet. Tell me about what you found and why you believe these are -- these belonged to her?

GILLESPIE: Well, this is a location on the island that matches the description of the place where the bones, partial skeleton, of a castaway and some other artifacts were found by a British colonial administrator in 1940. Now, this is three years after she disappeared.

PHILLIPS: And those bones were lost, right? Weren't they sent to Fiji?

GILLESPIE: They were sent to Fiji, misidentified as being the bones of a short, stocky man. Based on that, the British never contacted the Americans about it. And the bones were stored at a medical school that then moved several times. We don't know what happened to them. We're trying to find them.

PHILLIPS: All right. So then, you recover this zipper and pieces of a wallet and also part of the compact mirror. Why do you believe that these belonged to her and possibly her navigator, Fred Noonan?

GILLESPIE: This is a location that's on an extremely remote island and on an extremely remote part of the remote island, way back in the bush, not the place where you would expect to find the remains of a woman's -- American woman's compact of the 1930s, an American zipper that was made between 1933 and 1936. We've been able to date it very precisely. A little bottle -- bottom of a bottle that was made by the Owens Wright (ph) glass company in Bridgeton, New Jersey, across the river from where we are here in Philadelphia, in 1933. Remnants on the inside of the bottle are lanolin and oil. It's bottled hand lotion.

These are not the things you'd expect to find back in the bush on this island. And they are things consistent with the personal effects of somebody like Amelia Earhart. And there's nobody else missing out there.

PHILLIPS: OK. So you're going to go back now, because there is a living relative connected to Amelia Earhart that is going to give a DNA sample. Why not use what you've already found? Why do you have to go back on another expedition to look for more to actually get a DNA sample?

GILLESPIE: We actually do have the reference sample from the Earhart family. That is now on file. We have to go back because when we were there the last time in 2007, we were under the impression -- and it was correct at the time -- that to get DNA, we would need an actual part of the body: a bone, a tooth, something. We didn't find anything like that.

But now the ability of scientists to extract DNA has advanced so quickly and so well that now we can extract DNA from objects that a person has touched. We didn't know that in 2007, because it wasn't true yet. And we touched the objects and contaminated them with our own DNA. This time, we'll be taking precautions, with very strict protocols, to make sure we preserve whatever DNA is there.

PHILLIPS: Well, we are very anxious to know what you find. So let us know how the expedition goes. Keep in touch with us, Ric. We'd love to stay on top of this story. It's fascinating.

Ric Gillespie with the TIGHAR group. That's The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery. Really looking forward to what you find out.

GILLESPIE: Thanks, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right. Thanks, Ric.

Well, new violence in the streets of Tehran. Security forces and protesters clashed as mourners gathered to remember a symbol of Iran's opposition movement: a young woman gunned down last month during a protest. CNN's Reza Sayah is at our international desk, keeping track of what's going on now -- Reza.

SAYAH: Kyra, busy, busy day here at the Iran desk. That's because it was a busy day for opposition supporters.

Three-thirty p.m. local time in Iran, about seven hours ago, they came out to commemorate the death of 26-year-old Neda. According to our sources, protesters are heading home. But even on their way home -- take a look at this video. (AUDIO GAP)

PHILLIPS: All right. Looks like Reza's microphone actually died out. That happens when you're doing live shots all day. You actually lose the battery in there. So we'll try and get that reconnected.

As we're looking at pictures here of the new clashes in Iran. You remember Neda, the young woman that really became the face of those protests back when there was allegations of corruption in the election there in Tehran. And Neda was the beautiful young girl that we found out about that was shot to death. You remember her. And it really sparked a lot of anger and massive protest after her death.

Reza Sayah, I understand we got your mike fixed up again, so go ahead and talk about what we've been seeing today on the anniversary of her death.

SAYAH: New video coming in to the Iran desk. These are the protesters that showed up to her grave site, heading home in a subway in a Tehran metro, chanting, "Death to Russia, death to China." China and Russia, of course, two countries that supported Iran's elections.

The protest happened this morning, 3:30 p.m. local time in Tehran. Let's take a look at video from Neda's grave site. It was 40 days ago that Neda, along with several other people, were shot and killed in Iran. In Shia Islam, it's tradition to commemorate someone 40 days after their -- they pass away.

Opposition leaders had asked permission from Iran's leadership to commemorate this day. They had been rejected. In defiance, Iran's opposition leaders, including that man right there, with the white turban, Mehdi Karroubi, showed up. So did about 3,000 opposition supporters.

That's where they were met with security forces carrying batons. They charged them. They tried to disperse them, firing their guns in the air, firing tear gas. For the next few hours, the crowds dispersed and they headed up north to parts of downtown Tehran, and we're going to show you some video of what happened at this location.

According to this video, this is the intercession of Valiasera (ph) near a major square in Vanak. And there you see a security officer just really beating up on a protester. But look at this protester. Defiant doesn't go away.

There's a face-off, and there you hear a gunshot, what sound like a gunshot. It's a crack. We should say it sounds like a gunshot. We certainly can't verify.

Now, play close attention. You're going to hear another crack very soon.

Hear that pop. Again, we cannot verify if this was a gunshot, but it certainly sounded like it from what our sources are telling us, from what witnesses are saying as crowds are dispersing.

Now, right now, a lot of traffic, honking, people with candles. A few interesting observations from today.

Security forces, according to our sources on the ground, videotaping protesters. Also, coverage from the English language state-run, government-funded Press TV. That's something very unusual we hadn't seen before.

And also, a very interesting chant: "Independence, freedom. The Iranian Republic!" This is a play off a chant that we heard 30 years ago before the revolution. Back then, it was the Islamic Republic. Now, you are hearing the Iranian Republic -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Real quickly, we didn't see what happened to that protester, because if that was a shot fired, we don't know if it hit him or not. Right, Reza?

SAYAH: No. We have from our sources that security forces were firing in the air. We just heard what sounded like a gunshot. We don't know what happened there -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: OK. Reza Sayah, appreciate it.