Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Fighting Oil With Berms; Heat & Oil on the Gulf Coast; Turning Trash Into Art

Aired June 10, 2010 - 14:00   ET

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

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: All right. As we told you earlier, Mexico and South Africa will be the first teams to face off when the World Cup begins tomorrow in South Africa. That's when it begins, tomorrow in South Africa.

Now we want to show you where they'll be playing. Here's a 3-D tour of Soccer Stadium, the Soccer Stadium in Johannesburg.

It is designed to look like the calabash, which is an African pot. The facility was completed in 1989, and it is home to the Kaizer Chiefs.

Soccer Stadium underwent a $310 million renovation in preparations for the world's biggest sporting event. It can accommodate -- get this -- nearly 90,000 fans. That's a whole lot of people.

And again, I certainly wish I was going. Don't you?

All right. It is a new "Rundown."

It is the top of the hour, and we start with this -- an uncontrolled oil spill would have no adverse effect on the Gulf Coast. It sounds like really, really, a ridiculous statement on the 52 days that we have been watching this oil disaster unfold.

Well, guess what? Those words were in BP's disaster response plan. Wait until you hear what else was in that plan.

Plus, we're just days away from the biggest sporting event in the world. The countdown is on to the World Cup.

Also, if you want to play the drums, you need two strong arms and two strong legs. Right? Nope. We'll introduce you to a different kind of drummer, one who is marching to his own unique beat.

But, first, let's get the very latest now on what's been going on down in the Gulf of Mexico, because we heard Admiral Thad Allen just a couple of hours ago give an update on all the oil that's being spilled. Still, it is flowing.

They're saying it's flowing. Up to 15,800 barrels a day they say they're able to capture since they've been able to put the cap on. It started back on June 4th, that they were able to put the cap on.

They said then they were able to get about 6,000 gallons. But up until today, they said they were able to get much, much more on that.

So far, they have gotten 42,000 damage claims. They've sent out some 20,000-plus checks totaling $53 million. BP agrees to speed up the claims and processing on all of that.

And also, we want to tell you the oil has started to reach the Alabama shoreline. An important wetland there has been shut down, and we're going to update you on that as well.

In the meantime, my colleague Brian Todd, he has been on the berm of a construction site in Louisiana, in the wetlands, and he has this report for you.

Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Brian Todd, just off East Grand Terre Island in Louisiana. This is one of the front lines of the effort to combat the oil spill and try to keep it from getting on to the main shoreline and on to some of the more sensitive sanctuaries along the coastline.

These are berms that they're constructing on East Grand Terre. A few miles of these have already been built.

The governor's gotten permission to build several more miles. He wants to build hundreds of miles of berms on these barrier islands to protect the coastline.

At their peak, these are going to be about six feet high off the sea line, and about 20 to 25 feet wide. You can see over there, a plume of sand being essentially pumped out of the seafloor over there, about a few miles back, and on to here, where these earthmovers are just going to move it into place and build these huge embankments of sand.

Now, environmentalists have said that there are some problems with this. It will take several months to build a lot of these, they say, and in the meantime the oil could still kind of escape past these islands and get to the shoreline.

It could tear up the sea bottom, to actually disrupt some of the oil and gas pipelines that are already there. It could actually change the flow of the water to affect the salinity and where the salinity goes, which could hurt fish.

But as one of the professors who advised the governor on this, an environmental professor at LSU, said these are things that you have to consider, but you've got to try something to stop the flow of oil from getting to the shoreline. And here, at East Grand Terre Island, is how they're trying to do that.

I'm Brian Todd, CNN, just off East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana.

(END VIDEOTAPE) LEMON: All right.

From Louisiana, where Brian Todd, is why don't we head to Orange Beach, Alabama? And that's where we'll find our meteorologist, Reynolds Wolf.

Really oppressive heat complicating all of this, and probably some humidity as well. How hot is it there?

REYNOLDS WOLF, CNN METEOROLOGIST: It's pretty brutal for the time being. In fact, hold on one second. I've got Jerry Thompson (ph). He's the guy behind the camera.

Jerry (ph), I'm going to reach in and pick this up so Don can see this and the rest of America can, too.

This thermometer shows the temperature is right above the century mark. It's dropping a little bit, as you can see, because it was sitting down on the beach. But that kind of proves the point of what we've been dealing with.

People out here, they're picking up, of course, the oil out of the sand. Many of those same people, if you happen to look behind me as these tents, well, they're getting a little bit of shade.

In the background, you can see them from here for this part of Orange Beach. On the other side, you've got Perdido Key, right across Perdido Pass. And their job has been to get the oil off the beach.

The thing is, though, they never expected to battle the elements.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WOLF (voice-over): Sun, surf, a hot, sunny day. Another beautiful day at the beach, unless, of course, you are one of these guys.

(on camera): Well, on this part of the Alabama coast, you can see things have been pretty busy this morning. A lot of bags as far as the eye can see, these bags filled up with sand, filled up with oil, and then stacked in big piles like this. It's a tall task, but then when you bring in the high heat and the high humidity, it makes a difficult job even tougher.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have 50 percent humidity, 107 degrees air temperature, 141 degrees is the heat index.

WOLF (voice-over): The thousands of men and women charged with cleaning the nearby coastline are fighting another battle -- keeping cool while still being productive.

BRIAN SIBLEY, JOINT INFORMATION CENTER: The workers are -- you know, they're wearing long pants, hard-soled shoes. The heat does affect them much more differently than it does the beachgoers.

WOLF: Brian Sibley, a spokesman for the Joint Information Center, says that the heat is just another danger to the workers that they have to take into consideration. Tents, fans, and lots and lots of water make up the first line of defense.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You've got to drink one bottle of water every break.

SIBLEY: The way we're supporting them in terms of keeping them safe from the heat is they work in very short shifts, usually 15 to 20 minutes. Then they get out of the sun and they get rehydrated, rested, and ready to go back out. Safety is the absolute first priority on all of these crews.

WOLF: But with this kind of extreme heat expected through the weekend, and with no end to the cleanup in sight, workers can expect a long, hot summer ahead.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WOLF: Well, I'll tell you one thing we're going to be expecting is a little bit of a break by the end of the weekend. In fact, as get into Sunday and into Monday, we should see a few more clouds here. And with that, possibly chances of scattered showers and maybe some cooler temperatures. With those highs expected in the 90s and 100s, and the high humidity making it feeling even warmer, they're ready for any break they can get.

Don, let's send it back to you in the NEWSROOM.

LEMON: Reynolds, I grew up there, and when they say it's not the heat, it's the humidity, that's what they really mean.

Thank you, Reynolds Wolf. We appreciate your reporting.

And BP oil's disaster plan for the Gulf of Mexico was revised just last year, but it's a disaster in itself, that plan. You won't believe what is in it, and we're going to show it to you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: We want to tell you about some news that is just in to CNN. And again, this is coming to us, we want to tell you -- I should say, to start off, it is coming from the British press and it involves the British prime minister. We're talking about David Cameron.

And as we have been telling you here on CNN, reporting that he is traveling to Afghanistan. He was in Helmand Province, again, according to the British press, flying towards a British base, when the local military intelligence picked up some snippets -- this is what they're saying -- from Taliban insurgents. And so, in order to keep him safe, they had to reroute the helicopter to go around that area.

One fragment suggested a plan to attack a NATO helicopter. It was pretty average stuff, they said, apparently there. But the second one said they referred to the fact that a very important person was in the area and could present a high-value target. So, they were concerned about the British prime minister, David Cameron, being attacked, a Taliban attack. They had to reroute him around this. He had been diverted. Not exactly sure where his next stop is, but they took him to his next stop instead of the planned stop.

This is all being reported by the British press, and we'll get you an update on it, find out exactly what's going on, on the ground there. According to the British press, David Cameron had to be rerouted because of a possible Taliban attack.

In the meantime, we want to tell you about BP's oil disaster plan -- flawed. It is huge what we are hearing now, and here's what we're hearing.

This leak, according to this report that came out just a couple of days ago, that BP was not ready for any type of leak like this. They had a plan that they put together back in 2009 for this. But guess what? They weren't ready for it.

The people were so upset by -- the governor down there is really upset by it. He is saying they weren't prepared and it shows that they were kind of, as we've been hearing, lackadaisical, for lack of a better word.

Here's what the report said. This report apparently made up for 10 times -- took a scenario in that was 10 times the oil that we're seeing on the ground there now. And what it found out, it says that fish, marine mammals and birds would escape serious harm. Beaches would be pristine, the water quality would only be a temporary issue.

This is for a disaster 10 times the one we're seeing. Are the beaches looking pristine? Aren't you seeing wildlife that are being affected by it? BP says it wouldn't in this report that came out recently.

All right, so, listen, the national wildlife expert they had, there was a doctor. His name was Dr. Peter Lutz. He's from the University of Miami.

Again, I told you the report was -- took -- happened in 2009. Dr. Lutz died in 2005. In 2005, years before the report en eventually came out.

They said that the animals in danger down there, the walruses, the sea otters and sea lions and seals -- none of those live in the Gulf -- those would be the mammals and animals that would be in danger. They don't live in the Gulf of Mexico.

A marine wildlife specialist said they had names and numbers of the specialist down in Louisiana and Florida. Guess what? Those names and numbers, you can't even get in touch with some of them.

Some of the names don't match up. Some of the phone numbers don't match up either. They said when people call, there's no such number. And here's the fourth flaw, the fourth and final flaw in this report. The risk to the Gulf Coast, BP says, uncontrolled spill would have no adverse effects on the Gulf Coast because the rig is located so far out at sea.

Again, 10 times the oil we're seeing here. That's what the report took an assessment of, 10 times the oil we're seeing here.

Do the beaches look pristine? Does it look like it's not affected because the rig is so far out at sea?

This is all wrong. And again, all this reporting, I want to tell you, this is coming from a very thorough report from The Associated Press.

We're going to continue to follow this story and we'll be on top of it for you.

In the meantime, one man's trash is another man's treasure, or in this case, another man's art.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Well, sometimes one simple thing is all it takes to improve the lives of thousands of people. Take one woman working for New York's Department of Cultural Affairs. She tried to get companies to donate their unused supplies so she can help struggling artists. Thirty years later, artists aren't the only ones benefiting.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MEREDITH FARRELL, CHILD LIFE SPECIALIST: Bratz. Oh, you like Bratz.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Nine-year-old Cynthia loves coloring, so art therapist Meredith Farrell makes sure she has lots of markers to use.

FARRELL: What color are you going to use next?

COOPER: Her job, easing the trauma of Cynthia's hospital stay.

FARRELL: Good choice.

COOPER: What Cynthia doesn't realize is how few choices there would be without the help of a place where Meredith can get supplies for free, materials for the arts.

FARRELL: The fact that it's here and does save us money allows for our budgets to do more programming for the children and do more; we get more bang for our buck.

HARRIET TAUB, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, MATERIALS FOR THE ARTS: We were green when green was just a color.

COOPER: Created in 1978, the New York City funded program allows companies like Kate, Spade and Coach to donate materials they no longer need and would other toss in the trash and give it to people who desperately need them: artists, public school teachers, cultural groups and non-profit organizations.

Melissa Boronkas, runs Girls' Quest, helping girls from underserved communities. Today, she's shopping for summer camp supplies.

MELISSA BORONKAS, GIRLS' QUEST: Being able to come here and get more art supplies and some of the office supplies that we need. That gives us more money in our food budget. It gives us more money in our maintenance budget. It gives us more money in our staff line so we can pay our staff a little bit more.

COOPER: One simple thing providing two outcomes.

TAUB: Lots and lots of the items that you find in our warehouse would go into the dump, in the land fill. And so our goal is two- fold: it's to prevent that from happening and also support arts and culture at the same time.

COOPER: For every dollar spent, $6 is given away, an afterthought for founder Angela Fremont who started with one donated refrigerator from the local zoo and now has 4,000 members.

ANGELA FREMONT, FOUNDER, MATERIALS FOR THE ARTS: We didn't think of it as a green thing. We thought of it as a thing for artists and arts organizations.

COOPER: Bringing out the creative touch.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The wide variety of art materials here that you bring back to the kids and just have them -- use their imaginations for many things can be a lot of fun.

COOPER: Even in budding artists like Cynthia.

Anderson Cooper, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: Want to check your top stories right now.

BP is pledging to streamline its claims process for businesses affected by the spill. The process has come under criticism from the government as being too slow. BP says they're expecting to pay out $84 million in claims through the end of this month.

Suspected Taliban militants in Afghanistan have reportedly executed a 7-year-old boy. He was accused of spying for the government. President Karzai is calling it a crime against humanity, but the government also says it is not the first time the Taliban have executed a child.

An Army investigation has found major mistakes at Arlington National Cemetery. Moments ago, the Army said their investigation found remains in mismarked or unmarked graves. They also found the remains of veterans in graves that were supposed to be empty. Cremated remains were also mishandled. Problems were found in at least 211 cases.

Playing at a high level at the World Cup. Literally, the world's best are gathering right now, but it may not be the rival players that are the biggest problem for the U.S. team. We're going to check it out for you.

(WEATHER REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: You know, time now to go to what we call "Globe Trekking."

We're going to Haiti, still suffering from that deadly and devastating earthquake in January. Our story is one of joyful relief, followed by the pains and anger triggered by empty stomachs.

National Correspondent Gary Tuchman joins me now with more on what happened and what, if anything, is being done to ease the suffering.

I talked a little bit about this story with you, and it just -- it seems like, what? Like, how did this happen?

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's exactly right.

A day after this earthquake, we were already hearing from officials in Haiti and outside of Haiti that what was needed was to move tens of thousands of people in Port-au-Prince, a city that was devastated, a city that was overcrowded, to areas outside of Port-au- Prince where it was rural, where there was space. So, they did that. They built a camp -- great idea. In April, they started moving people into this camp, so they have the shelter.

The big problem is, though, they don't have food.

LEMON: Oh. Let's take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TUCHMAN: (voice over): Just weeks ago it was a huge empty piece of rural land outside of Port-au-Prince. But now it's the home of city residents who lost everything during the earthquake. This is the first government-sponsored relocation area outside of the capital for quake survivors.

But something here in the town of Corai Haiti, has gone very wrong. The people that started moving here about six weeks ago are getting increasingly angry. (on-camera)

On paper, it's a great idea. Get the homeless people out of the virtually destroyed, massively overcrowded capital of Port-au-Prince, and bring them here to the countryside.

There are now about 4, 900 people here and about 1, 300 tents. Security-wise it's much safer. From a flooding stand point it's safer. The ground is flat. But here's the big problem. There's virtually no food and no where close by to get it. Are you hungry?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, I'm hungry.

(voice over)

TUCHMAN: The American refugee committee, Richard Poole, runs the camp which is ultimately expected to have over 20,000 people.

RICHARD POOLE, AMERICAN REFUGEE COMMITTEE: If this isn't solved in the next week or two, the whole scamp could explode, they're extremely angry.

TUCHMAN: For the first three weeks after this camp opened. Aid organizations first supplied food for everyone, but that's no longer happening. What's startling is that even the man who runs the camp isn't sure why donations have stopped coming.

POOLE: There's a disconnect somewhere. You know, there's so much goodwill around the world that come into this country, so many people want to help, and this a the blockage that shouldn't be happening.

TUCHMAN: The hope was that basic foods would be provided while agricultural and business opportunities would be established in this wide-open area.

But except for a few makeshift stores set up in the camp, the economy is not growing.

Milan Baptiste (ph) is the mother of two small children. Her husband is now hitching a ride back to Port-au-Prince to try to find work every day in order to get money to eat.

MILAN BAPTISTE, EARTHQUAKE SURVIVOR (PH) (through translator): We haven't eaten since yesterday. Only this bag of chips.

TUCHMAN: The sentiment is shared in this tent. Where Rene' Shordan's (ph) husband is also looking for piece-meal work.

RENE SHORDAN, EARTHQUAKE SURVIVOR (PH) (through translator): If my husband finds a day job in Port-au-Prince, we buy some food. If not, my son and us go to bed hungry.

TUCHMAN: At this tiny food stand in the camp, eggs cost the equivalent of a dollar. Pasta is $2. But --

UNIDENTIFIED FAMLE: Business is bad. Some days I put all this out, and nobody buys anything.

TUCHMAN: The camp manager is able to pay up to 60 camp residents $4.50 a day to do maintenance work at the tent city,

And that's part of why these people are upset.

They'd been told far more jobs would be available when they moved here.

POOLE: I think these people are desperate. They're hungry and they're desperate, yes.

TUCHMAN: They recognize they are lucky they survived the earthquake, but a daily struggle to eat in a strange place so far away from their homes is something they never imagined.

(on-camera)

I got some slightly good news just before the story aired, the man you saw in the story, Richard Poole, who runs the camp.

I just talked to him on the telephone, he told me because of the pressure that we've been giving and also there was a piece in "The New York Times" the other day.

The combination of those two stories has resulted in the government of Haiti saying, we're going to supply 15 days of temporary food to every single person inside this camp. In addition, more money is being given to the people in the camp to create more jobs. So, that is some slightly good news.

LEMON: Here's what I find interesting about this story, usually when we do stories on some sort of natural disaster like this, when this much time has passed, we're usually doing, "Oh, it's on the in end and things are getting better". We're not seeing those stories out of Haiti.

TUCHMAN: I think what's unique about this situation. I've now been there four times since the earthquake, this fourth visit I just made, the conditions were worse than I saw in the beginning.

Yes, the bodies have been taken away, which was a horrifying sight obviously the first time, but there are more homeless people and more desperate homeless people because they are realizing there are no plans for them to ever live in permanent housing.

A lot of these people think they're going be in tents for the rest of their lives.

LEMON: As we saw from the story there's no permanent plan and so then the people just sit and suffer? The government--does the government have any response to this when you ask them about it?

TUCHMAN: There's a lot of unhappiness with the government. We're not surprised about that. We expected it if the weather got hotter, as it got wetter, as the hurricane season came, people would get more frustrated and there's immense frustration with their government right now.

LEMON: And I'm sure you're going to be going back here. Do you any solution or any help, because so much money -- and let's not forget, remember we were doing the telethons here. Millions upon millions of dollars were given -- given to the people in Haiti. Where's all that money gone?

TUCHMAN: I think that's why this particular story is so important, because so many of our viewers gave money, And so many people have given so much money to the cause. And there's lots of food in the country, but this particular camp, where they wanted people to move, where they encouraged -- they said leave Port-au- Prince and your families leave your jobs.

This is a safe place, it's away from the city, they kind of forgot that there were no jobs for then to get up there. And even though people here and people throughout the world have given money food, none of that food found its way to the camp until now, at least for 15 more days now.

LEMON: I got to ask you this. You saw the tent cities going up, right? So when you go back do you see the same tent cities, but deteriorating, people in the same spots?

TUCHMAN: The same tent cities deteriorating and growing.

LEMON: Oh. National Correspondent, Gary Tuchman, Gary, thank you very much for that.

Paralyzed in an awful car wreck. His life as a musician, well, it took a rest. But after ten years, this drummer found a way to, really, stick with it. "Mission Possible", that is next.

But before we bring you that, a lot of people aren't going to the beaches in the Gulf this summer because of the oil spill.

But some of the beaches are doing OK and they need your business down there. Well, we put together a list of websites where you can find the latest status information. As we go to break, we want you to take a look. They need your business.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Want to check your top stories right now.

52 days out of the Gulf oil disaster, President Barack Obama is meeting with the families of the 11 workers killed when the BP oil rig exploded in April. He is offering condolences and asking for suggestions on how deep-water oil drilling can be made safer.

In Peru, police have moved Joran van der Sloot to a cell at the prosecutor's office. This comes as officials prepare to file charges following what they say was a complete confession in the beating death of a young woman.

In Iran, opposition leaders have canceled a mass rally planned for the first anniversary of last June's disputed presidential election. An opposition statement said hardliners were planning to crack down on the protesters.

The protests were scheduled for Saturday.

You know, there are tons of people out there doing great things, plugging away to help others. And we try to introduce you to some of them in "Mission Possible". the guy in today's segment just wanted to get back to what he loves, and what he came up, well, it rocked a lot of other people's worlds as well.

His story from CNN all-platform journalist, Chris Welch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JASON GERLING, MUSICIAN: I had a big dreams, huge dreams.

CHRIS WELCH, CNN ALL PLATFROM JOURNALIST(voice-over) : And 20 years ago, Jason Gerling was on his way to achieving that. But this performance in 1994 would be one of the last before the rhythm of Jason's life was thrown off for good.

GERLING: Fell asleep at the wheel. The car flipped over five to seven times. It was pretty ugly looking.

WELCH: His spine wasn't severed, nonetheless, he was a quadriplegic.

GERLING: I'm paralyzed I don't know what I'm going to do. My life is just-my life's kind of over I thought. They said you're probably never going to walk and you're probably never going to play the drums again.

WELCH: But Jason had no plan to give in to that word. This is Jason today -- but one problem, he's never regained the ability to walk. So, how does he play the bass drum and the high hat, both of which require a foot pedal?

GERLING: This is the revolutionary piece of equipment that changed my drumming forever.

WELCH: Using existing technology for people with limited use of their limbs, Jason created a special mouthpiece and drum set.

GERLING: You blow in or suck in, and it will give you different -- different function.

WELCH: He put sensors under his cymbals and those sensors simultaneously trigger a bass drum noise anytime he's sucking on the mouthpiece.

(on-camera)

Now, why don't you show me. And Jason says he's not getting a patent. GERLING: If people want to know how to build their own triggers, well by golly, they can just contact me and I'll just give them the information for free. I mean, encouragement shouldn't come at a price.

WELCH (voice-over): As word spreads of his equipment, Jason's getting encouragement of his own.

GERLING: Now that I don't have legs, I'm back playing rock 'n' roll using some of your techniques. Thanks for being my inspiration. Thanks for being my friend, thanks for being my brother and my drumstick. Thanks for your DVD.

I just want to show that if you are experiencing a trial, and if somebody says you can't do it or you're probably never going to do it, don't listen to that. You can find a way.

WELCH: Jason never listened, which is why he's onstage here at the famous Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. Playing along to music he composed himself, it's the world debut of his mouthpiece technology.

Chris Welch, CNN, Minneapolis.

(END VIDEOTPAE)

LEMON: Very nice. Very nice.

And our Ed henry is going to join us after the break.

He has more on the president's meeting with the families of the oil rig workers in that explosion, Ed.

Very sad, that story, but you've also got some other stuff? I also hear that you're causing trouble, always causing problems.

ED HENRY CNN, SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Oh, man.

LEMON: Why are you such a troublemaker Ed Henry?

HENRY: Oh, come on.

LEMON. Don't answer now. Shh, quiet.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: This is when we talk to our Ed Henry, our White House Correspondent. We usually have a little fun with him.

But a serious topic today because the president met with 11 families of those oil rig workers believed to be presumed dead from the Deep Horizon. Their bodies have not been found.

HENRY: That's right, my colleague, Suzanne Malveaux, spoke with some of the families. Obviously very tragic situation, we have to remember them because in all of our coverage, and I know Anderson and many others on the ground there in Louisiana have been doing that to make sure we are doing that.

Part of this story because is as important s story as the environmental impact, the impact on wildlife, as you say, 11 people lost their lives at the very beginning of this.

Interesting because the president-you know Robert Gibbs got a question at the briefing a few moments ago from a reporter about why the president didn't go to the memorial service for these 11 at the end of May

And Robert Gibbs kind of said well I got to find out whether there was a scheduling conflict. He didn't really have an answer for that. And so the president bringing them to the White House now, interesting angle beyond the mourning and the pain is the fact that some of the people, the relatives, two of the widows, in fact, testified at a hearing this week, saying that they want the president to lift the moratorium on the deep-water offshore drilling.

That they think that should go on, even though their spouses died because of this, they believe that the economic impact will be so heavy on Louisiana and that region if they don't get this drilling going. Very interesting, and they disagree with the president on it.

LEMON: I've got to tell you, just growing up, many of the families, my friends' families, my uncles, they were all offshore workers, and they did very well, beautiful homes, provided for their families sent them to college: And it was all because they worked offshore as they'd call it, they'd go to work late at night, and they would stay there days and then come home and spend a lot of time at home. In this part, that's how it works there.

HENRY: I've been in the region twice and, you know, last week I talked to someone down in there in Grand Isle, Louisiana, who was telling me.

Look if there's a plane crash in the United States, god forbid, we don't shut the aviation industry down for six months.

Right after I mentioned that in a live shot, a top White House aide e-mailed me and said yeah but the difference is when the plane lands it doesn't wreck the environment for an entire region maybe for years to come, and so that this is much different in the eyes of the White House than just one plane crash.

LEMON: And it is a catch-22 as we said, because they also depend on seafood, you know, and tourism industry food and all of that as well as oil. But it's interesting , that you're talking about oil and all of this, because the president is meeting with the leaders to talk energy within the next hour, right?

HENRY: He is about 3:30 and 3:45, and he is going be talking to energy executives about trying to get a broad-based energy reform bill going. Very hard, because obviously they're pretty entrenched on Capitol Hill now.

They just went through that bruising health care fight. Now they're fighting it out a little bit, though they're close to a final deal here on Wall Street reform.

It seems hard to kind of envision a scenario where you're going to get a bipartisan deal on energy reform, but the White House position is, look, this environmental disaster should remind everybody -- and the president has said this publicly -- about our dependence on oil.

And how we've got to find, you know, ways to sort of find alternative sources of energy, and he thinks now is the time to do it, so he's going to jump on it.

LEMON: All right, on to some fun matters now. One of them, and I don't know, were you making fun of Robert Gibbs, or were you noticing he looked very GQ?

HENRY: Oh it's a suit today I just send out a tweet about his suit saying that he looked like kind of a southern lawyer on a summer day. Robert's from Alabama, this was pretty bold. Whenever I've worn a suit like that I have to say, people accuse me of looking like the Good Humor man.

I don't think Robert Does, I think he looks good, I think he wears the pastels maybe better than I do. He looks good and he's flaunting it so why not?. You know Ali likes to dress up, you like to dress up, why not?

LEMON: You know I wear light suits and the boss sends an e-mail, going dark suits, dark suits. And I think you know now with high def you can wear a light suit.

HENRY: You got to shake it up sometimes but sometimes you're a little too daring and people think you went out too far on a limb.

LEMON: So I-you know I thought you were causing trouble because you may have gotten Robert Gibbs in trouble because he's supposed to be serious, Ed.

You, you know you've been known to cause a little trouble. This week I heard him mention you a couple times. One was with the, you know what word --

HENRY: With the a word I think.

LEMON:. Can we get Robert Gibbs back?

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: Let me know when we get the Robert Gibbs video but we'll talk about this. What was your problem with that word? What do you call a donkey? What's the a word for donkey. HENRY: Well look the president was asked by in fairness by Matt Lauer of "The Today Show" About whether he should be kicking more butt in the Gulf region and then the president responded by saying you know that he could kick some a.

I guess arse would be a good way of saying it. And there was a big internet debate whether the president should have used that word on a breakfast show.

LEMON: Arse. (laughing)

HENRY: Because kids are getting ready for school,. So I guess I said it , it's close enough, I guess. And so what I asked Robert Gibbs I asked him why the president hasn't called Tony Hayward on the phone

And can you really be kicking butt? But I just didn't want to use the a word, so I left it blank. And somebody later on asked another question and said why Robert was shying away from the word, did the president regret using that word.

And Robert said I'm not shying away from using the word, Ed was shying away from using the word. So I just wanted-I you know we've got a family show here. I wanted to keep it real.

LEMON: Yes.. All right I wanted to show the video because he looks like he should be going. "Let me tell y'all what the president has to say today!"

HENRY: There he is! He does he look--. You know Robert's from Alabama.

LEMON: Honey child

HENRY: He looks like a southern lawyer you know. He's making his case I guess.

LEMON: I have several like that, and I also have a seersucker, and a white straw hat by the way and white bucks. There you go. You can laugh at me later.

HENRY: I want to see you do it this weekend Don. It's going be a nice weekend I bet in Atlanta, rock the seersucker, I think people will like it.

LEMON: I surely will, and sit on veranda with a mint julep too. Thank you, Ed Henry.

HENRY: Thank you.

LEMON: You know pitching in to help, you get ready for the World Cup.

We're dedicating "Wordplay" to breaking it down in plain English, so you can enjoy some soccer. I mean, football. But, first, a lot of people aren't going to the beaches in the gulf this summer because of the oil spill, but some of the beaches are doing OK, and they really need your business down there. So, we have put together a list of websites where you can find the latest status information as we go to break. We want you to take a look.

LEMON: Wordplay now "Wordplay". and we're getting you ready for tomorrow's start of the World Cup with one word you'll be hearing a whole lot about. Pitch. It's a baseball term for throwing the ball to the batter, right? But in soccer, or football terms, it is the name for the field.

Pitches aren't all the same size like with American football fields. International rules say the pitch has to be between 110, 120 yards long, endline to endline.

And they could also be between 70 and 80 yards wide, from touchline to touchline. So, on some fields, you have a little more room to move the ball around. The pitches are also rated on physical characteristics, not just the grass surface. They're tested for their degree of roll, their degree of rebound, and shock absorption. Be sure to stay with us for all of your World Cup and nuggets terms, news and nuggets, throughout this championship. We'll have it for you right here on CNN.

And, next, I'm changing Ali's "XYZ" to Don's Who, What, When, Where and How. you'll see why, straight ahead.

Right now it's time for my "XYZ", and today I'm going to change the name to my four W's and an H, Who, What, When, Where and how.

First, the how, how the hell did we get to this point? 52 days after a massive explosion in the Gulf of Mexico that no one, certainly not BP, seemed to anticipate. 52 days in. And the oil still gushes.

Now BP says it is collecting more and more oil by the day, but the gusher still looks like it is going strong. Now, for the who in this. Who is in charge? BP, the government, the coast guard? There's been so much finger pointing and political outrage but no clear answers, and all of it's being debated ad nauseam, every single day, but, still, no real answer.

And the when in this one, when will it stop? Stopping the oil is of course, the priority, but when will the doublespeak, the blaming, the fake emotion and outrage and the stringing the people in the Gulf along stop? When?

Now to the what. What are the people in the Gulf going to do? Are they going to just sit there and watch their livelihoods and the coastline wither away? What do they do? The where in this is where do we all go from here?

Here's where we go, and as Americans we're used to doing this, we really should rally together, once again, to help the people down south get through this. Not only do we volunteer, we send money, send prayers, but we demand answers everyone is looking for from this oily, disgraceful mess.

So, while you're sitting there standing there watching or listening, to me, I want you to think about what you can do. Write a letter to your Congressman or Senator, or even the president. Call them up and tell them this is not just a regional problem, it's an American tragedy, and American want solutions. That's my four W's and an H.

And now here's Rick, take it away.