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Oil Slick Nears Shoreline; HP Releases Smart Phone; Happy Doctors, Satisfied Patients at Pared-Down Practice
Aired April 29, 2010 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
TONY HARRIS, ANCHOR: I'll tell you, a spill of national significance. That's what the White House is saying about the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Just minutes ago, President Obama finished speaking with the governors of five Gulf states impacted by the spill. The administration promised an all-out response where cabinet members will head to the region to oversee the cleanup in the Gulf.
We are following all the developments, and so is CNN's Ali Velshi. And he takes over from here.
ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: I wonder what those cabinet members are going to do to help up that spill. There's a lot of oil that has to be mopped up.
Have a great afternoon. We're going to continue on that story.
I'm Ali Velshi. I'll be with you for the next two hours today and every weekday. I'm going to take every important topic we cover down -- cover and break it down for you, including this oil spill, the stuff that's going on in Arizona. I'm going to give you a level of detail that's going to help you make some important decisions, in this case, about your environment, your money and your education and how you vote.
Let's get started. Here's what I've got on the rundown.
As Tony was saying, that oil spill -- wow -- in the Gulf of Mexico, it is now much worse than anyone thought. It's getting closer to shore, too. It's so big they might have to call in the troops to prevent an ecological nightmare.
Plus, we're going to hear live from President Obama this hour. He is not talking about financial reform or health care or immigration or the oil spill. He did talk about that earlier. He is talking about an English teacher from Iowa. Mrs. Wessling goes to Washington. You'll want to meet her.
And the smart phone market might just be getting even smarter. Hewlett-Packard, known more for computers and printers, is buying Palm. Our gadget, Shelly Palmer -- you know him -- he tells us what this means for you and for the industry.
All right. It's a fight against time in the Gulf Coast where a new third leak has been discovered at the scene of that massive oil spill and a lot more oil is now spewing into the water. The Coast Guard has upped its estimate -- get this -- to 5,000 barrels, or 210,000 gallons a day, leaking into the Gulf of Mexico. That is five times worse than they told us it was yesterday.
The president is getting involved. He's been briefed. He's offering military help. We're going to talk to Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr in just a moment about this. This is the president getting briefed on the situation.
Right now that slick is about the size of Jamaica. It's moving closer to the shore every minute. Let's get the latest from Chad Myers.
Hey, Chad.
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, Ali, we have the problem with the wind direction today. The winds are from the southeast, literally blowing from about Key West on up to New Orleans. And that direction is pushing the oil slick ever so quickly up into the land area.
Now, if the wind is moving 20 miles an hour, then the slick is not. The slick is rolling along with the waves at probably three to five knots. So slowly, but close enough, because it's only about 20 miles away in the first place. So you start to move this, and by the time Saturday morning rolls around, that brown slick...
VELSHI: Wow.
MYERS: ... that we've drawn there, very close to the edge of what would be the delta of the Mississippi River. Now, this isn't in New Orleans. New Orleans is way up here. I mean, it's way up here on the map.
VELSHI: Right. You're talking about Grand Isle, places like that?
MYERS: All -- remember were you during...
VELSHI: The hurricane. There in Augusta, yes.
MYERS: ... the hurricane, and we told you to get out?
VELSHI: Yes, that's right.
MYERS: That's where this oil slick is going.
VELSHI: Where people fish, by the way. So oil slicks have -- are a problem there. And there's wildlife. In fact, those wetlands in the Mississippi Delta are full of wildlife.
MYERS: Absolutely. And also mammals, as well.
VELSHI: Yes.
MYERS: And the dolphins and some whales are in real trouble here, because as the dolphins breach for air, there's not only sucking in the air but they're also sucking in the fumes from that oil, and it's toxic.
And so now that we have this thing literally the size of Delaware -- you said Jamaica, same idea -- we're almost talking 2,000 square miles. They did do that corral the oil...
VELSHI: Yes.
MYERS: ... and burn it off yesterday.
VELSHI: Yes.
MYERS: Remember you had the two glasses of oil? It worked. It was successful yesterday. The problem is right now the winds are 20 miles per hour, and that's too much.
VELSHI: Right. They've got a limit. You can't set that stuff on fire if the winds are above 20 miles an hour.
MYERS: Correct.
VELSHI: We also have this other problem where, if we're leaking five times the amount of oil we thought we were leaking, we've got to -- we've got to up the response.
MYERS: Yes, and I don't think BP agrees with that...
VELSHI: Yes.
MYERS: ... that number because there's an extra leak. And it's over near the blow-out preventer. And there's not that much oil between there. So they're saying even if there's another leak, we don't think this number is 5,000 barrels, which would be almost, what, 210,000...
VELSHI: Two hundred and ten thousand gallons.
MYERS: ... gallons of oil every day. They still think the number is lower than that. You know, it's he said/she said. It doesn't matter. They have to get it stopped.
VELSHI: Right.
MYERS: And now the military looks like they're going to get involved.
VELSHI: And you know, we were talking when it was 1,000 barrels a day, that there's a certain amount of microbes and enzymes in the ocean that can, you know, deal with some of that stuff. It will disperse and all that. Now we're talking if it is 5,000, we're talking about a lot more.
Chad, you're going to stay on this with me for the rest of the afternoon. Thank you for that. We do have to increase the response to this. Crews on the scene have tried method after method to battle the spread of oil. They've tried skimmers. They've tried these booms. They've set it on fire. They've used dispersements, sort of a soapy material that tries to disperse the oil. Officials are even experimenting with burning thicker areas of crude. They're building a dome to sort of capture the leaking oil underwater and gather it.
And now they're considering calling in the troops. Let's go right to Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr with the latest on that -- Barbara.
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ali, let's try and explain to people the scope of this and what it means when you call the U.S. military onto the scene to help with one of these disasters.
The military gets called in, Ali, when the scope of a disaster is beyond the capability of civilian agencies or private industry. Think Hurricane Katrina. Think earthquakes, tsunamis, things that we have seen happen around the world, manmade and natural disasters. The U.S. military gets called in when civilian agencies simply can't cope with the scope of it. So the fact that the military is even discussing this gives you a real heads up about what is going on here.
Overnight, military planners began looking at options. What could they offer the Coast Guard? What could they do to help? They are talking now about the military stepping in with more of those boomers, those skimmers, that collection and containment technology. Navy ships may be going to the area.
They are talking about aircraft that could be -- fly overhead and drop some of those dispersing chemicals. Think of it just like you see military C-130s get involved in dropping water and chemicals over forest fires out west.
All these types of things, even establishing a military base on the Gulf Coast for supplies, manpower, personnel, everything. All an indication, Ali, there's every expectation this is going to get worse...
VELSHI: Yes.
STARR: ... before it gets better, and it's going to take some time to deal with it -- Ali.
VELSHI: All right. And if as Chad said, BP doesn't agree that it's 5,000 gallons a day, at least if we respond to it as if it is 5,000 gallons a day, it turns out to be less, we can save this, because it's going to be a big problem when this gets to shore.
Barbara, please keep us posted when you hear any more specifics of what the military is planning to do as part of their response. Barbara Starr at the Pentagon.
We have already showed you -- we know oil and water don't mix well, but oil and land do not mix either for reasons Chad was explaining a few moments ago. If this slick makes landfall, and it is headed toward the Gulf Coast, it could trigger an ecological catastrophe. I'm going to speak to an expert about that, straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: I want to bring you this. It's just in. Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana has declared a state of emergency with respect to the oil leak. It is saying in the state of emergency that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, models show that the oil spill could reach parts of the Louisiana coastline today and proceed beyond that on Saturday -- by Saturday.
They're also talking about other areas, Louisiana's coastline. There are other areas there in Louisiana and Mississippi's coastline that are in the direct path of the oil plume and can be expected to have an impact. They've listed them in the state of emergency.
But what the state of emergency does is allow state agencies, emergency agencies to get involved now and try and protect life, wildlife, mammals, wetlands in the Mississippi River Delta.
We've got two big problems with this growing oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico. Today we found out that it could be substantially larger than we thought it was. More oil may be leaking than we thought.
And it is getting closer to the shoreline than we first thought, because the weather has shifted. This is something that Chad warned us about, that we had favorable winds that have now changed. This is now 16 miles away from the closest point of land, and it's headed in that direction at a few knots per -- a few knots.
We're talking about the possibility of hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil hitting the Gulf shore starting today. What happens when that oil gets to land?
I'm here with Dr. Greg Bossart. He is a chief veterinary officer with the Georgia Aquarium. He leads all the conservation and research programs and, by the way, has had specific involvement with oil slick and wildlife.
You've heard this news with me right now about this development. Tell me what's going through your mind.
GREG BOSSART, CHIEF VETERINARY OFFICER, GEORGIA AQUARIUM: Well, it's a repeat of what I saw in the Persian Gulf after the first war, potentially. This is devastating, potentially, to the wildlife, initially to the bird, the marine birds especially.
VELSHI: Right.
BOSSART: But down the road, ecologically, it has a potential for incredible devastation to the estuary ecosystem of Louisiana. This is literally the nursery ground for most of the fish species that live in the Gulf, as well as, commercially, shrimp, crab, oysters...
VELSHI: Right.
BOSSART: ... that will be impacted, as well.
Then we have the marine mammal issue. We know in this slick, which as you pointed out is huge, that we have a sperm whale population, one of the largest whales in the planet, and dolphin populations. The marine mammals, in particular, breathe at the air- water interface. They're breathing in the very toxic gasses that the oil releases, and it has potential to do damage to their lungs.
VELSHI: Greg, the -- the National Academy of Sciences was saying that, on a given day, somewhere between 1,500 and 2,000 barrels of oil naturally leak into the Gulf of Mexico. I don't know if that means it leaks from wells or pipes or from the ground. But there's a certain amount of oil that can be in the Gulf of Mexico and there are natural microorganisms that deal with that. We're now talking about a lot more oil than that.
BOSSART: Well, the problem is the amount. We're dealing with a huge amount. And we're dealing with an amount that's increasing as we speak.
VELSHI: Yes.
BOSSART: And we're dealing with an issue because of the weather that's pushing this massive spill towards land, towards -- towards ecosystems they haven't recovered yet from Hurricane Katrina.
VELSHI: Yes.
BOSSART: So it's a one-two whammy.
VELSHI: What happens? Tell me -- I know you know a lot about this, but when you say it first gets the birds. How?
BOSSART: Well...
VELSHI: Go into the water to get food?
BOSSART: Birds, they have to interact right at the surface where -- where the oil spill is. And what happens to a bird is that they preen themselves. They pick their feathers to keep themselves warm and clean. And when they do that, they ingest the oil. They're not able to keep warm. And they really are the first animals that are impacted. We did thousands of birds in the Persian Gulf after the first war.
VELSHI: And how do you deal with that? When guys like you, then, go in and these birds interact with the -- or whatever mammals, anyone else, interacts with this oil, what can you do?
BOSSART: Well, in the bird situation what's typically done by groups that are very specialized in this now, are they wash the birds. But this is an amazing process. And it's extremely stressful to these animals to be transported, to be literally washed with detergent to get this oil off, and then to be warmed up again. So it's massively labor intensive. But there are well-trained people that have been mobilized now to do this.
VELSHI: And you mentioned oysters, shrimp. These are commercial fisheries. There are fishermen who go and get the stuff and sell it on land. And that gets packaged and goes to the restaurants across the country that we eat at. At what point does that become a danger, that they might be exposed to this oil?
BOSSART: Well, if it gets into the estuary, they're exposed, you know, into the areas where they live, because they can't move out of it. And they're -- they're smothered by it and the toxic effects of the oil.
VELSHI: It kills them?
BOSSART: Kills them dead, yes.
VELSHI: All right. And the same thing with the birds and with the dolphins. What's the issue? When they ingest the oil, as well, this becomes a problem?
BOSSART: Well, typically in the Persian Gulf, for instance, most of the marine mammals moved out of the way. But this is so big you start to worry about maybe they can't move out of the way.
VELSHI: Yes.
BOSSART: And the main thing that you worry about is inhaling this. We know killer whales, for example, had some issues after Exxon Valdez after they inhaled the vapors.
VELSHI: All right. We're going to talk about that, too. Greg, thanks very much for being with -- Dr. Greg Bossart is the chief veterinary officer with the Georgia Aquarium just down the road from here.
All right. Another story that we're going to tell you about, a big story that might affect you. When you think of Hewlett-Packard, you probably think of computers -- you may have one of them -- or printers. You don't necessarily think of smart phones. Well, HP just did something that might make you change your mind, and I'm going to tell you about it, right ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: OK, BlackBerrys, Google phones, Droids, iPhones, a lot of buzz around smart phones these days. Everybody's got one of these things, and if you don't you're looking to know which one you can get.
Well, the buzz got a little louder with the news that Hewlett- Packard is shelling out $1.2 billion for its own smart phone. It's buying Palm.
Now, what does this mean for the smart phone industry? I've been sort of wracking my brain about this, and the fact is, I just don't know enough about it. But that's why we have Shelly Palmer. This guy knows all about this stuff. He joins me from New York. He's our guru.
Shelly, what does this mean to a guy like me? I'm sort of stuck with my BlackBerry, which I like just fine, but that's because I work for a company and this is what we use. What does this mean for folks who are saying, "I'm going to get a smart phone for the first time in the course of the next year or so"? Who are the players that we need to be thinking about?
SHELLY PALMER, MANAGING DIRECTOR, ADVANCED MEDIA VENTURES GROUP: To be honest, Ali, anybody who wants to have a smart phone should have a smart phone, and you shouldn't worry about what you buy from, oh, is it going to last? No, I'm not going to last.
We're in a 3G world right now from a network standpoint. In two years to two and a half years, we're going to be in a 4G world. So whatever you buy today will have a useful life of two years to three years maximally, mostly two years.
The HP issue has -- is really important on a much more future thinking scale. And that is that there are more mobile devices -- more mobile devices today than yesterday, and there's going to be a billion more of them tomorrow than there are today. Mobile is the future, and everybody knows that, including HP.
And this investment is in the intellectual property that the Palm organization has accumulated over its lifetime. Palm is a really -- has made great devices. They just weren't really great marketers.
VELSHI: Yes. What went wrong? Because they really -- I mean, these guys were cutting edge. They were there. They had neat devices. They were the little criticize -- some people had that you might like the Palm more than you like the BlackBerry or whatever it is. But ultimately, why is Palm being sold? Why is it not staying on as its own company?
PALMER: You know what? There's -- there's a lot of things that go into making a company successful, as you well know. There's the product itself, its feature. There's the marketing of the product and consumer acceptance.
What Palm does have to offer and what HP just bought is the intellectual property, the patent portfolio...
VELSHI: Right.
PALMER: ... the knowledge base that they've accumulated. And HP is looking to the future. They're coming out with slate computers.
VELSHI: Yes.
PALMER: They're coming out with touch screen computers.
VELSHI: Well, isn't it interesting -- it's not a name that we necessarily -- regular people associate with that sort of basic research into technology, but they're doing it. They've got their labs in California where they've got people who are just studying what's going on in the future.
PALMER: Absolutely. And that's the part that everybody needs to think about. This is a business-to-business situation. It has really no direct impact on you as a consumer today.
But what is having an impact is that we're becoming more and more a mobile society. There is wireless connectivity than ever before. That's not a trend that's going to stop. It's going to continue.
HP's properly positioning itself as a business to take advantage of that. And you as a consumer should just do what you need to do to enjoy the features of your iPhone or your Droid or BlackBerry. If they're working for you, have a good time, because 24 months out from right where, today, we're sitting...
VELSHI: Yes.
PALMER: ... it's going to be a completely different game.
VELSHI: But you talk about Droid. You talk about iPhone. You talk -- and I talk about BlackBerry which is sort of back in the game after, you know -- there were a couple of years where it didn't look like it was going to be there. Palm has been struggling to be named in that conversation. Do you feel like it's going to come back into that conversation?
PALMER: You know what, I don't know whether it will or won't. They do make a fabulous device. It just didn't capture the hearts and minds of the consumers. And you know, Ali, consumers vote with their checkbooks.
VELSHI: Yes.
PALMER: That's what they do. So whether it's a good -- you know, like, look, Sony makes a lot of things that have better features than their Apple equivalents, but Apple has an unbelievable marketing engine.
VELSHI: Yes.
PALMER: And there's apps, and there's all kinds of complex issues that make Apple a more compelling consumer value proposition. And that's what we have going on here. Palm doesn't make a bad product. They just didn't get it done from a consumer point of view.
VELSHI: Yes.
PALMER: But it doesn't mean that HP is not going to have a really -- very successful experience with this acquisition.
VELSHI: All right, Shelly. Good to see you, my friend, as always.
Shelly explains things very, very clearly. Shelly Palmer, our -- our expert on technology.
Hey, listen, you want to catch more about business and money- related stuff, watch my co-host Christine Romans and me, Saturdays at 1 p.m., Sundays at 3 p.m. Eastern, right here on CNN.
All right. Just in to CNN -- and I told you about this a couple minutes ago -- Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency today in preparation for the landfall of an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
It was expected to reach land Friday. Now his declaration says it is expected to reach land today. The spill is much larger than we thought. According to the U.S. Coast Guard, five times larger, 5,000 barrels a day, or 210,000 gallons leaking into the Gulf of Mexico on its way to the coast.
Foreclosures up 16 percent nationwide during the first quarter. But actually, things improved in some of the worst-hit areas of the country. Reality Track says filings dropped in 14 of the top 20 foreclosure cities compared to the same time last year. A lot of that improvement is linked to government-led foreclosure-prevention programs.
And President Obama -- Obama joined mourners today to remember the life of civil rights leader Dorothy Height. She died last week at 98. Dorothy Height was for many years the only woman among the nation's top civil rights leaders. She led the National Council of Negro Women for decades, and she marched with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Less than a week after Arizona's governor approved a tough new immigration law, Democratic senators in D.C. plan to unveil a new comprehensive bill later today. CNN has obtained a 26-page draft of the bill, which includes a process to legalize the almost 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States.
It also calls for concrete benchmarks to secure the border before those illegal immigrants can seek legal status.
All right. Fewer patients, happier doctors, instant access to medical records, and it doesn't bust your wallet. Is it possible? Elizabeth Cohen introduces you to one doctor who proves it, straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: Picture this: waiting rooms that aren't crammed and patients who actually like the medical care they're receiving. Our senior medical correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen. joins us now to talk about this.
Elizabeth, what is this about?
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: All right. Well, you and I spent, what, the better part of a year talking about health-care reform. VELSHI: Yes.
COHEN: And what we're all aiming for and what we're all trying to get and the Holy Grail was a place that delivered great care but that contains skyrocketing costs.
VELSHI: Right.
COHEN: And so what we have here is a clinic that appears to be doing just that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DR. ERIC SEAVER, GROUP HEALTH FACTORIA CLINIC: Good morning.
COHEN: Good morning, Dr. Seaver. Elizabeth. Hey, nice to meet you. This is not how most doctors come to work. Right? This is kind of unusual.
SEAVER: It's kind of nice.
COHEN: It is kind of nice. Well, this is not your usual practice. So can you come on in and show me what you do?
SEAVER: Very good. Let's go see our medical home.
COHEN: So the first thing you do every morning is sit down and answer patient e-mails?
SEAVER: Go through my inbox, answer e-mails. Patients love it. Patients love it. It's best thing in the world.
COHEN: Now, do you go see your patients in your biking clothes?
SEAVER: No. I get dressed.
COHEN: OK. So Doctor, the next part of your day?
SEAVER: See our first patient.
COHEN: OK. I'll see you when you get out.
SEAVER: OK. Very good.
Mr. Banks, good morning.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good morning.
COHEN: He's still in there with his patient. It's been almost half an hour.
So, Mr. Banks, what do you think, a 30-minute appointment, is that nice?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thirty-minute appointments are great.
COHEN: So how many patients do you see a day in a normal day?
SEAVER: Normal day, around 12, face to face.
COHEN: So 12 patients face to face. In other places where you worked, how many patients have you had to cram in a day?
SEAVER: Usually 20 to 24.
COHEN: Wow. And what kind of a difference does that make?
SEAVER: Well, it's a night and day difference. I'm able to get to know my patients. I'm able to provide more personal care to patients and be able to answer patients' questions and help them engage them in their health care.
COHEN: Thanks, Mr. Banks. Good bye. Good luck.
So Mr. Banks is going to go get his X-rays. And while he's getting his X-rays, can you show me his medical record?
SEAVER: Of course. We can pull up his chart.
COHEN: So you have 13 years' worth of data on Mr. Banks in here. Can you pull up like, let's say, I want to see his cholesterol from about three years ago.
SEAVER: Three years ago. It's right here.
COHEN: There it is. You just click, and it's there. Do you think you could do that out of this?
SEAVER: In a couple of days.
COHEN: That is my file from my obstetricians. I've had four children. How does my doctor find anything in there?
SEAVER: I have no idea.
COHEN: Now, I have to say, having spent the morning with you, electronic medical records, seeing fewer patients in a day, this all sounds expensive.
SEAVER: I think Group Health has found that it pays for itself. And patients and staff and physicians all think it's a win-win situation.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VELSHI: All right. So he's got -- he sees fewer patients, I presume, because he's got longer appointments. He's automated. And he's got tons of data. Not brand-new ideas, but fantastic to have them all in one place, because it creates a consumer experience which is just, I guess, that's part of problem. We don't think about the consumption of health care, generally, as a consumer experience like going shopping at the mall.
COHEN: Right.
VELSHI: It's not a -- there's no retail therapy involved. It's something you've got to do, and it's a bit annoying.
COHEN: No fun, exactly. Right. But I think a lot of people are trying to think of it in those terms.
VELSHI: Yes.
COHEN: That it should be -- you should be looking at the consumer, looking at the patient...
VELSHI: Right.
COHEN: ... seeing if they're happy. Too often analysts are just looking at the doctors...
VELSHI: Yes.
COHEN: ... and whether or not they're happy. Well, they're not really the point. The point is are the consumers happy. And I guess you could say, by making the doctors happy, you make the consumers happy. I mean, this guy is elated. He sees half as many patients as he used to.
VELSHI: Doesn't that make him make less money, though?
COHEN: It does, but here, let me show you what they did. When they did when they sort of redid Group Health years back is that they increased their number of staff, which makes sense.
VELSHI: Right, right.
COHEN: And that's how he can see fewer patients. So they increased their staff by 30 percent, , which is a lot, but what they found is that then in the months that followed, the emergency room visits went down by 29 percent because these patients were getting what they needed at the doctor's office.
VELSHI: Sure. By the way, that's one of the biggest costs in the health care system. If we can bring emergency room visits down for people who don't need to be in emergency rooms --
COHEN: Right. You save a ton of money. It costs more money to see someone in the emergency room than to have a half hour appointment with your doctor.
VELSHI: Generally less stressful because you can do the doctor on your schedule.
COHEN: Absolutely.
VELSHI: This is fantastic. Continually be so important to find the innovators and the people doing things well in the health care system so we can emulate that. Just to see that somebody can have that kind of appointment is going to make everybody crave that kind of appointment.
COHEN: Right. Exactly. That is right.
VELSHI: All right. Thanks, Elizabeth.
COHEN: Thanks.
VELSHI: Let's pop into Chad. He's following severe weather in the country, also following very closely the stuff that's going on off the coast of Louisiana and Mississippi with that oil spill where you know, Chad, the governor of Louisiana has declared a state of emergency.
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, we have some new numbers on all of that oil spill. Clean-up, as well. Not what it's costing but what they're actually doing, and how there are some positive numbers out there as well.
Remember yesterday, Ali, we covered up some flowers with snow?
VELSHI: Tulips with snow on them.
MYERS: Well, today we're covering up bushes with snow. Jeffersonville, Vermont, 24.3. This is the total snow total.
VELSHI: It's almost May.
MYERS: Not there. Mount Washington 22-and-a-half. And even Pleasant Valley, Vermont, at 20 inches total from this latest event. It is all part of the snowy low pressure rolling around up there. It's finally done right now. But it has had its day.
Warm weather across the entire eastern part of the country. The red zone you see from Minnesota down into Oklahoma, part of the severe weather. It's that southerly flows that hurting the oil spill, as well. The high has moved to the east. The rotation around the high goes like this. And it's pushing the oil spill back up into the bayous of Mississippi. Up into the ditches and up into the bayous and eventually probably by Sunday it will be all the way in to from Plaqunas (ph) Parish to St. Bernard Parish. Not getting to New Orleans, of course, but still, this is the problem.
So far -- there's the oil slick. There are even flood advisories because of the waves and the wind blowing water onshore. Can you imagine now it's going to be blowing waves, wind and oil. But 763,000 gallons of oil and water mixed have been skimmed from the water there. And that's some good news. At least they got almost three-quarters of a million gallons of that oil off the water. 98,000 gallons of that dispersant that we talked about that they've already used --
VELSHI: You warned us about this. The wind pattern would change if we didn't have the oil off the water in a few days, it was going to change direction. And that's exactly what it does. That's why I tell people to listen to you. I hope everybody is able to stay safe. This isn't like a hurricane, it doesn't matter if it doesn't get to populated areas because it's going to hit wildlife, mammals, animal, shrimp, oysters all before it gets there.
In fact, you remember, you were talking about this earlier. Remember when I was in Hurricane Gustav and I was on Grand Isle, I was staying at the home of the guy who buys a lot of shrimp with the shrimpers. I was on the phone with him, he said this could destroy the shrimp industry for a few years if this doesn't get stopped.
MYERS: Certainly, the shrimp will be closed. There will be no shrimping at all due to the fact that some of these shrimp are going to be contaminated, and you wouldn't want to eat them anyway.
VELSHI: Yes, that's right.
MYERS: That's going to be a very difficult time for those guys down there.
VELSHI: Stay on top of this for us. Thank you, Chad. We will be back with you shortly. Chad Myers at the Severe Weather Center. He's also taking care of our -- our weather guys are also helping us out with trying to understand the danger of this oil and the efforts to get it off the water.
Coming up straight ahead, another story. Staying in the same part of the country, a governor prepares to ditch the Grand Old Party in hopes of landing a big new job. I'll show you who and tell you why when we come back.
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VELSHI: We could be surprised, but when the governor of Florida holds a news conference in St. Petersburg this afternoon, he is fully expected to say this: that he is bolting the Republican party.
Charlie Crist is one of those moderate Republicans whose bipartisan instinct served him well for a long time. Those instincts right now may be his worst enemy, largely because, well, there are fewer people in that spot of the political spectrum that he occupies.
Crist was hoping to become Florida's next Republican senator, but a recent poll shows he wouldn't even win the August Republican primary. Only one in three Florida Republican voters would support him. Much more than half prefer his much, much more conservative opponent Marco Rubio.
Now, on the other hand, check this poll out. As a candidate with no party affiliation, an independent, Crist squeaks past Rubio and the likely Democratic candidate, Kendrick Meek. Now, Crist insists he has not made up his mind.
But while we wait, I want to bring in our senior political analyst Gloria Borger because this is not just about Florida, which is a particularly important and influential state in the United States. This is part of a much larger theme that is going on across this country with centrist Democrats and centrist Republicans. Moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans feeling squeezed out or getting squeezed out of the middle, Gloria. GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: It's really actually about incumbents, also. Just look back after the 2008 election. The Republican party needed to show it has a pulse, Ali, right? So, what did they do? They went out and recruited establishment Republican candidates like Charlie Crist, governor of Florida, very well respected, establishment Republican to run.
And by proving that these folks were willing to run as Republicans they would say, we're still alive. We're the Republican party.
Fast forward to now. What's happened? These establishment Republicans, time and time again, have been challenged in their primaries by folks who are anti-incumbent, very, very conservative and saying, you know what? We want to throw the bums out and that means you, which is why he was having such a problem with Marco Rubio. Hence, have him running potentially as an unaffiliated candidate in the Florida race.
VELSHI: Marco Rubio, by the way, has made ventures across that constantly shifting line between the Republican party and the Tea Party. He's appealed to those who sentiments would have appealed there. What do you think is at play in this particular development? Is it more that anti-incumbent thing or moderate thing?
BORGER: Couple of things. First of all, we remember that Governor Crist supported the president's stimulus package. Remember that?
VELSHI: Right.
BORGER: Every Republican in the Senate voted against it. Oops, okay? Second thing is, remember the hug.
VELSHI: The hug. Let's look at it right here. We've got it right here. This is when the president was in Florida. He introduces the president.
BORGER: There you go.
VELSHI: Can you believe that? That little man hug is going to ruin somebody's career?
BORGER: Little man hug. Remember, it hurt Joe Lieberman in Connecticut, too, when he hugged George W. Bush.
So, the hug is not a good visual, as you say, at -- and wasn't for Crist. So he had a great deal of difficulty. Spent some money on ads, threw them up against Marco Rubio, didn't move this numbers. And so he had a political decision to make.
Now, when you talk to establishment Republicans, Ali, they say to me what an opportunist he is. He's going to be a spoiler in this race. He could hand it to the Democrat Kendrick Meek.
On the other hand, you know, the Crist people are saying, look, if he runs as an unaffiliated candidate, that will appeal that those antincumbent folks out there. On the other hand, he is the governor of the state. So, it's a little tough.
VELSHI: It's very interesting. And it will play out. This is like one of those stories that it's not about the local story, it's going to play out in little ways possibly across the country between now and November.
Gloria, thanks so much. Good to see you.
BORGER: Sure. Florida, Florida, Florida. Always Florida.
VELSHI: Always ends up being about Florida.
All right. Before we leave this topic I want to -- I want to, you know -- our team and I got to thinking about famous party switchers. Some of them are obvious, and some of them may not come to mind immediately.
In the 1930s and '40s Ronald Reagan supported FDR and the New Deal. And later, he drifted to the right. By 1960, he had likened JFK to Karl Marx. He officially joined the Republican party in 1962. Strom Thurmond ran for president as a Dixiecrat, a Southern Democrat, in 1948. 1964, he became a Republican rather than join his fellow Democrats in supporting the civil rights movement.
And here's one you don't always think about. Who can forget Hillary Clinton? She was a Goldwater girl in the 1964 presidential race, and was president of the Wellesley Young Republicans her freshman year. Before the decade ended, however, she was a pro civil rights anti-Vietnam Democrat who supported you Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern for president. Very interesting. Party switching. Very interesting idea.
All right. It's a very big day in British politics. Third and final debate among the men who would be prime minister. One of them may already have said too much. We'll tell you about that when we come back.
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VELSHI: Okay. Let's check in on top stories this hour.
Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal has just declared a state of emergency as an oil slick 600 miles around creeps closer to the Gulf of Mexico -- to the shore of the Gulf of Mexico. Wildlife groups say hundreds of different species could be at risk. Booms are being put into place, those big things that try to contain the spill. Military planners are marshalling their resources to help out. We'll keep you posted on that.
Less than a week after Governor Jan Brewer signed it, Arizona's controversial immigration law has sparked protests, petition drives and lawsuits. Now, it's also spurred Congress to action. CNN has learned some top Senate Democrats will announce the outlines of legislation for federal immigration reform today. We, of course, will keep an eye on it.
Hundreds of mourners gathered to remember a woman of "quiet, dogged, dignified persistence." Those words part of President Obama's eulogy for civil rights pioneer Dorothy Height. Mrs. Height headed the National Council of Negro Women for more than 40 years. She worked alongside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. And died last week at the age of 98.
Just a couple of hours, we'll find out whether the beleaguered prime minister of Britain can talk his way out of a mumbled gaffe that he thought was private. With nasty headlines still flying off British newsstands, Gordon Brown will face his two main challengers in their third and final debate ahead of next month's elections. The headlines stem from Brown's encounter yesterday with an elderly supporter who wanted to discuss immigration. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You can't say anything about the immigrants because you are saying that -- all these Eastern Europeans are coming in.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: All right. So, she's talking about Eastern European immigrants in Great Britain. Didn't share the perspective that prime minister Gordon Brown shared. Gordon Brown leaves the conversation, gets into his car, doesn't take off his wireless microphone, which remains on.
So, listen carefully. Listen to what he says while his mike is on and he doesn't think anybody is listening.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GORDON BROWN, PRIME MINSITER OF GREAT BRITAIN: They will go with it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What did she say?
BROWN: Everything. She just sort of bigoted woman. She said she used to be Labour.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: Called her a "bigoted woman." Quicker than you can say "farewell, Downing Street," Brown returned to make a mends to the widow Duffy. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: I've just been -- I've just been talking to Jillian. I'm mortified by what's happened. I've given her by sincere apologies. I misunderstood what she said. And she has accepted that there was a misunderstanding, and she's accepted my apology.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: End of story? As they say in Britain, not bloody likely.
My colleague Paula Newton joins me now from London with the latest. What a story, Paula. What's happened since we last brought this to the news?
PAULA NEWTON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPODNENT: Oh, gosh, what hasn't happened on this story? The problem is now that this gaffe is basically taken over the entire news agenda. It is the story of Joe the Plumber now inserted here, and we have Jillian Duffy.
Gordon Brown -- it's going to be difficult for him to recover from this. Right now, Ali, we're on the campus of the University of Birmingham. We're having the last debate here tonight.
Before I get to that, I want you to listen to what Jillian Duffy said about Gordon Brown when she found out that he called -- after being so nice to her -- had called her a bigoted woman, and than I want you to hear what Gordon Brown said this morning to us to try and recover. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He described you as a very bigoted woman. What would you answer to that?
JILLIAN DUFFY, RESIDENT OF GREAT BRITAIN: Right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is your answer to that?
DUFFY: Why has he said that? He doesn't know me. I can't -- I can't understand that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You are a fan of the prime minister's, aren't you? You weren't?
DUFFY: Yes, I like Gordon Brown, yes. He just -- just absolutely shocks -- shocks everything down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who will you vote for now, Mrs. Duffy?
DUFFY: Nobody. Nobody.
BROWN: Also be talking about, I think where the wider (ph) issue for people is, where are the jobs coming from for the future of our country? And how can I make sure that young people in our country get the jobs that they want, the jobs that they need, and how can we train them up for the jobs of the future? This is one of the companies doing a wonderful job in training apprentices, and I believe perhaps by next year, 200,000 or more apprentices in this country is a really big thing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: Jillian Duffy going to be the thing that takes Gordon Brown down? There's a debate tonight.
NEWTON: We're not sure right now, but certainly the other leaders knew better than to really make a huge case out of this. They said the incident spoke for itself.
But people, voters have said to me, Ali, when you listen to this guy now how can you believe anything that he says. The contempt that he seems to show for voters behind the scenes is going to be tough to recover from.
Having said that Ali, a lot of people still believe. And that's including economists here in this country, say that he's the best man to lead this economy. So, debate night here is going to be really interesting.
VELSHI: Yes. Debate night in the UK are different from what we're used to in the U.S. First of all, this is new to them, the American-style televised debate but the concept of these party leaders and prime minister debating isn't new because they do this in Parliament all the time.
NEWTON: They do. And yet the politicians here really were reluctant to do this, Ali. They weren't sure it was going to be good for them. Surprising, it's been good for the voters. The voters are more interested. The ratings have been sky high. And out here talking to students. They are watching, Ali. And they're watching on substance. They talk a little bit about the style.
But as you can see from what happened to Gordon Brown, they want some insight into their politicians and they feel they can get it from the debate.
One of the challengers that no one had heard of before the debates are Nick Clegg from the liberal Democratic party. Keeping in mind, it was normally conservative and Labour here. Now you've got this new kid on the block. And he blows it out of the park every time he hits one of these debates. His supporters are waiting to see if he can repeat that.
And then you have David Cameron, the man who just a few months ago everyone said was a shoo-in for prime minister. He's really underperformed in these debates. And we've already talked about Gordon Brown. So, there's the set up for tonight.
VELSHI: David Cameron, as you said, thought to be the shoo-in. The conservative candidate. What's he got to do in order to become prime minister? How many seats do they have to win? Again, the system in a parliamentary democracy is he who wins the most seats becomes the prime minister.
NEWTON: Absolutely. Now, he needs 116 -- to give you an indication of how tough it's going to be for him, labor right now has 345. That's a majority. That means they can rule really in Parliament without having to take on any partners. They have 345 now. No hope that they're going to get that amount of seats again. Conservatives, 193. Liberal Democrat, who have 63, are really going to come up from behind.
Now, Ali, I've said for the majority, for the conservatives to basically do what they want in parliament, they need 116 seats. But it's worse than that. They need to swing the vote in terms of 11 percent. In terms of the polls, they haven't done it so far. And then you have the liberal Democratic party tied with the Labour party, somewhere about 30 percent.
Some polls have this basically as a three-way race. That's historic here, Ali, that's never happened before. And then just to see these politicians really --
VELSHI: Yes.
NEWTON: -- I have to laugh, Ali, because they were really polite during the first debate, with so much at stake for this third one, I think you just wait. It will probably look a lot nastier than the first one did.
VELSHI: All right, Paula, thank you as always. Good to see you. We'll continue to cover the very, very interesting election, which, by the way, it will have an impact for all of us.
Paula Newton joining us from London on the British debate.
Coming up, President Obama honors one very special lady. Who is she? Well, you'll have to wait a moment to find out.
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VELSHI: The city of Detroit known as the motor city, home to Motown, is now a shell of its former self. It was hit extremely hard by the recession. Parts of the city now look like a ghost town. Many homes have been left vacant and in decay, and now it's Detroit's mayor who has come up with a radical plan to save the city by shrinking it. CNN's Jim Acosta takes us on a tour.
JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORESPONDENT: Ali, the city of Detroit once had a population of two million people. Now it's about half of that.
Much has been said and written about Detroit's decline. The city is doing something about it. It's downsizing. Not its city workforce, but the whole city.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ACOSTA (voice-over): These images may look like postcards from the Great Recession, but, for Detroit, it's more like the great reckoning. After decades of decay, the city is doing something dramatic.
MAYOR DAVE BING (D), DETROIT: I am unveiling a plan to demolish 3,000 dangerous residential structures this year, and setting a goal of 10,000 by the end of this term.
ACOSTA: The goal of Detroit's grand demolition plan? Bulldoze one quarter of the city's neighborhoods.
The blue dots are slated for demolition.
ACOSTA (on camera): All right, Kurt. Let's take a drive.
KURT METZGER, DATA DRIVEN DETROIT: All right.
ACOSTA (voice-over): The plan wasn't pulled out of thin air. Kurt Metzger led a team of land surveyors that measured how much of the city's neighborhoods is vacant.
METZGER: Look at all the boarded up homes right here.
ACOSTA: Metzger's group found one-third of the city's residential areas are empty. That's roughly 45 square miles.
ACOSTA (on camera): This is going to require some of the folks in some of these neighborhoods to move.
METZGER: Exactly. I mean, what the -- what the idea is, and nobody's got the final plan, and certainly nobody's done it at this -- at this magnitude, but it's trying to come up with how do we start to densify the population.
ACOSTA (voice-over): Densify by moving residents out of failed neighborhoods that will be demolished and into healthier communities.
ACOSTA (on camera): The city wouldn't have much of a fight on its hands when it comes to leveling this house. It's obviously vacant and there's nobody home.
The problem is when there is somebody home and they don't want to go.
ACOSTA (voice-over): Brigitte Pearson doesn't want to leave--
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VELSHI: We need to interrupt that story. Here's the president of the United States at the White House.
