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Buffalo Paper Burned in Protest; Low-Cost Vaccine May Have Prevent Salmonella Outbreak; WWII Vet Becomes American Citizen at 90 Years Old

Aired August 25, 2010 - 09:59   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: You know, we've been talking about these 33 miners that are trapped in Chile. They're facing up to four months before they can even be rescued. Now, we know that, but here's the tough part. The Chileans are trying to figure out how they're going to tell the miners that.

Our Karl Penhaul has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KARL PENHAUL, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From the bowels of the earth, this message from a miner to his wife to say, against all of the odds, he was still alive.

"Dear Lila, I'm okay. Thanks to God. I hope to get out soon. Be patient. Have faith. God is great. We will make it out." He writes, "Give a lot of kisses to my daughters and my grandchildren. I love them. Stay calm and to you, with all my love. I love you so much, and we will be happy forever with our family. We will see one another again soon. Good-bye my darling. A kiss, Mario."

At 63, Mario Gomez is the most experienced of the 33 miners trapped in northern Chile. His note was almost shredded as it came to the surface taped to the probe rescuers were using to try and locate the missing men.

Authorities had feared the miners were surely dead. But Gomez's wife Lila built a small shrine near the collapsed mine and never gave up hope.

"Each man listed by name. I gave strength to the other relatives and told them, cry if you want to, but don't imagine the worst because our men are still alive," she says.

Gomez has been working in Chile's copper pits since he was 12. His father was a miner before him. But once he's finally rescued, his family is determined he'll never go underground again.

"I don't want to hear anything more about mining after this because he would have to choose between the mine or his wife," she says.

These were the first images of the survivors when a camera was lowered into the mine Sunday. When a microphone was sent down the next day, the miners sang the Chilean anthem.

But their ordeal is far from over. Rescue workers say it could take until Christmas to drill a hole 700 meters deep or 2,300 feet, deep and wide enough to pull the men free.

(on camera): Up on this barren hillside, relatives have planted a flag for each of the miners trapped under the ground, 32 Chilean flag, one Bolivian flag. And as long as it takes, the Chilean government is vowing to bring each one of them home alive.

(voice-over): As day fades, families stoke the fires in the camp where they have been living since the cave-in. And wave good-bye to some of the workers that have helped in the rescue effort. It may still take time, but they now seem sure they will get their happy ending.

Karl Penhaul, CNN, San Jose Mine in Northern Chile.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Whether you're writing a check for your mortgage or just paying for your groceries, you probably wonder when you'll feel better about the economy, right? Well, that's not probably going to happen today. Just minutes ago, we received a new measure of the housing market. And for the second time in 24 hours, the bottom line is pretty bleak.

Stephanie Elam in New York to give us the bad news, the bearer of bad news.

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: That's my job. I try to smile while I do it but it's true. We are just getting these numbers in. And this is a surprise here. We were actually expecting a slight uptick but what we're finding out is that the pace of new home sales in July actually dropped to 12.4 percent is what we're looking at here. This is a record low that we're seeing in July.

The June number revised lower. They're also saying that the July new home sales, the pace was 276,000 homes were sold and we were looking for a slight uptick to 338,000. This is news here. This is big news here, it's not the news that we wanted. It's going the other direction.

Also, inventories, they remain high. That does not help get houses moving. If there is a lot of houses out there this is showing there's glut and that doesn't help. If it was smaller, that would be a good thing. One thing I can point out to you though, Kyra, about this is that new home sales make up about 10 percent of the overall housing market. Existing home sales, they make up 90 percent.

Remember we got that number yesterday, a 27 percent drop there in July to its lowest level in 15 years. So all in all when you take a look at this, you can see that it is a very difficult situation in the housing market right now. These numbers coming out worse than expected. We'll keep our eyes on how this affects the market. Back to you, Kyra. PHILLIPS: All right. Stephanie, thanks.

Well, homes are losing value, Americans are losing their jobs, and all of us it seems are losing money in the stock market. We wanted to talk more about this with Jeffrey Rosenweig. He has taught both at M.I.T. and Yale. You've seen him, of course, a number of times on CNN. Today, he is the associate professor of international business and finance at Emory University's Goizueta School of Business. So first of all, what is your reaction to all these numbers?

PROFESSOR JEFFREY ROSENWEIG, GOIZUETA BUSINESS SCHOOL, EMORY UNIVERSITY: Well, they're bad. We can talk about this later but there is a certain probability that the economy goes back down in a double-dip recession. I have raised my probability that would go down just with the bad numbers in the last two days. Every number we've had in the last couple of weeks has been disappointing.

PHILLIPS: Well, is it because -- you know, we talk so much about consumer confidence, right? Is it a combination of the fact that folks are afraid when they hear all this bad news in addition to, I mean, they are out of jobs and broke?

ROSENWEIG: That's right. Kyra, you are absolutely right. It seems like we have a vicious circle going. You hear that home sales are going down. You think, I can't sell my home, I'm going to be stuck with my home. You hear that people can't get a job. You get depressed, you lose confidence. You don't go out and spend. You don't buy a house. House sales are going down and then people think, well, then I don't have money and don't get a job. We're at risk of a spiraling down. We're not there yet but it's a risk.

PHILLIPS: And we keep hearing now double-dip recession. I don't think a lot of people understand that and others were supposed to say, hey, we never got out of the first recession.

ROSENWEIG: That's right.

PHILLIPS: Put that in perspective. Put that in layman's terms for us.

ROSENWEIG: First of all, double-dip recession means the same thing as a W. If we trace the path of the economy over time, it was at a peak in about December, 2007, and then went down very steeply into what we call the great recession. It went down so much, and then most people think it's been coming up a little more than a year, and now we're at this precipice, which is why we are here today. You know, we are about to go down again, make it not a bit of a V, but a W, before we rise again.

And it's a very scary thing that we're right there, having suffered so much pain and with so many people underemployed. So that is the question ahead of us. I would have given it a 25 percent chance, but now it's at least a 35 percent chance that we're heading down again. PHILLIPS: Wow. And I think a lot of our viewers are saying, OK, I got the horrible news now. What do I do? How do I protect myself? Where do I even begin?

ROSENWEIG: Yes. Let's take the viewer in two ways. One is there are 15 million people officially unemployed as you know, but at least 25 million who are underemployed or just like people who maybe want to sell their house but they're not even listing it when they hear this kind of news. So there's actually more houses out there that will come on the market if things get better. So prices won't come up.

There's a lot of people just on the sidelines that are just not looking for work anymore. So it's 25 million or 30 million even, according to my calculations. So first thing, if you have a job, don't go making a lot of noise or giving up your day job thinking there's something out there. Just hold on for a while.

If you don't have a job, build your skills. You know, we still have a need for some people with specific skills. We don't have a need for unskilled workers right now. There's many ways to build your skills. Not even to come to an expensive university like mine but various evening programs, you just have to be very careful to make sure it's not these programs that's a rip-off. But what about for instance seniors that are watching this right now, has people been panicking recently about the stock market.

PHILLIPS: And they're watching all their money just go down the tank.

ROSENWEIG: Exactly.

PHILLIPS: And they may not have five years to wait for it to come around or 10 years.

ROSENWEIG: It's very scary but if they get worried and they take their money out of the stock market and they're putting it into some fixed income, for instance, maybe a short-term bond, the interest rates are collapsing, so there's no income that seniors can earn.

You know, you are not going to pay for a long retirement if you are earning one or two percent interest. So it's a very scary time for seniors and for all of us as investors. So my most important message is we have to do the most boring thing finance professors ever suggest, which is diversify, not to put all of our eggs in one basket.

I might come back a year from now and say I wish I didn't hurt people but they need to keep some money in the stock market because again you are not going to be able to fund your retirement earning one percent in the bank, but, of course, you don't want too much in the stock market because we are in the precipice of a potential problem.

And you know, the stock market is seen as a leading indicator. You know, often when the stock market starts to go down as it did in late 2007, well, a few months later, the economy started going down. Stock market started going up, finally, March 2009, last summer, maybe June 2009, the economy went up. So it's not good that the stock market has gone down 15 percent in recent months, but it still doesn't mean that you can put all of your money in the bank.

You just can't handle your retirement, so you've got to keep it spread out as widely as possible. It's no time to plunge into something like gold or Swiss francs. It may be a little bit of Swiss francs.

PHILLIPS: Right. It's a little bit of this and a little bit of that?

ROSENWEIG: Yes, so you are not desperately hurt. When the stock market did go down, it went down 56 percent, and it would kill a retirement but you know, when it turned up from the bottom, it went up 80 percent and no one ever knows where the bottom is.

You know, it's come down, people are pessimistic. What if we do get some good news? And we could. It's still only about 35 percent chance that the economy will really come down. People would feel terrible if they stayed into a certain extent and the stock market continues to go down but people really feel like an idiot if they completely jump out, put their money under the mattress, and the stock market maybe over some time begins to rebuild and rise again.

PHILLIPS: Well, that's what we're waiting for, we're waiting for the good news. Meanwhile, as we talked, the Dow Jones industrial average down almost 48 or 47. We'll keep tracking it. Jeffrey, thanks so much.

ROSENWEIG: Kyra, I'm going to go back and tell my boss how good he looks because I just want to hang onto my day job.

PHILLIPS: Yes, I think all of us feel that way right now.

Thanks, Jeffrey.

ROSENWEIG: Thank you.

PHILLIPS: All throughout the week, we're going to be getting other measures of the economy. This morning we actually saw a tiny increase in orders for durable goods. Ali Velshi told us about that this morning. Those are the items that last more than three years, everything from appliances to cars. That's a little bit of good news.

Now, tomorrow, we're going to learn more about the jobs market when the government posts its weekly unemployment claims and then on Friday, we finish the week with the gross domestic product. Economists will also tune in to public comments from Federal Reserve chair Ben Bernanke.

When times are bad, there is one thing that you can always count on in Washington. The blame game. The first to point fingers for the dismal economy, of course, the top Republican in the House.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R), HOUSE MINORITY LEADER: President Obama should ask for and accept the resignations of the remaining members of his economic team, starting with Secretary Geithner and Larry Summers, the head of the National Economic Council.

Now, this is no substitute for a referendum on the president's job-killing agenda. That question will be put before the American people in due time.

JOE BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Very constructive advice, and we thank the leader for that. But let's take a look at the rest of his advice.

First, let's review a little bit of history here. For eight years before we arrived in the West Wing, Mr. Boehner and his economy ran the middle class literally into the ground.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Vice president Biden says that despite the latest bad news, the economy continues in "the right direction."

Well, 69 days to the November elections and new battle lines are drawn this morning after voters in key states headed to the polls. First up, Arizona, Senator John McCain crushed former congressman J.D. Hayworth. He won by a pretty big margin but the victory came with a big price tag for the incumbent, $21 million.

In Florida's race for governor, Rick Scott, an outsider with deep pockets slipped past GOP favorite, Bill McCollum. In Florida's Senate race, Marco Rubio easily won the Republican nomination for Senate. He probably couldn't have done it without the tea party although he never mentioned them once Tuesday night.

In Alaska, votes still being counted in a neck and neck Republican Senate race. Right now, tea party favorite, Joe Miller, is a few thousand votes ahead of the incumbent, Lisa Murkowski. You may remember that Sarah Palin who beat Murkowski's dad in '06 for governor campaigned hard for Joe Miller but it could be days before we know the results as absentee ballots are tallied.

We're staying on top of all the latest developments from these primaries and looking ahead to the big November vote, you can track it all at cnn.com/politics.

Deaths at memorial hospital, one of Hurricane Katrina's unsolved mysteries.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I still feel it was premeditated murder because they planned it. They got medicine together, mixed the cocktail, put it in the syringes and gave it to the patients.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Families want justice five years after hospital staff administered a fatal injection to their loved ones.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: It's one of the most sensational enduring mysteries of Hurricane Katrina. Nine elderly or frail patients in one hospital all die the same day and in the same way, given pain killers and sedatives. The country's leading forensic experts all concluded it was homicide. To this day no one was held accountable. Drew Griffin continues to investigate. Five years later, those families want justice.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS UNIT (voice-over): There is no mystery for Lou Ann Jacobs. She knows what happened to her 90-year-old mother, Rose Savoy on the 7th floor of the New Orleans Memorial Hospital.

LOU ANN JACOBS, MOTHER DIED: She was definitely murdered.

GRIFFIN: Her mother, one of nine patients found dead in the hospital that were part of an extensive attorney general investigation concluding they were literally sedated to death by the last remaining hospital staff and a doctor named Anna Pou.

JACOBS: I still feel that it was premeditated murder because they planned it. They got medicine together, mixed the cocktail, put it in the syringes and gave it to the patients.

GRIFFIN: It's not just Jacobs' feelings that point to premeditation. CNN was the first to obtain this report from the Louisiana State Attorney General's investigation revealing on September 1st, the day the hospital was to be evacuated, Dr. Anna Pou told staff lethal doses were going to be administered to the nine patients who could not be evacuated.

The pharmacists told investigators he was instructed to bring morphine and others told investigators they witnessed Dr. Pou administering drugs through IVs and a tray of syringes and within just a few hours every single one of the nine patients died.

One patient awake and alert when given the lethal dose openly complained. Jacobs said that patient was her mom.

JACOBS: But I know in my heart that woman that got the shot that said, wow, that burned, that was my mom.

GRIFFIN (on camera): Is that no killing a person? That is homicide.

ART CAPLAN, BIOETHICIST: That is homicide.

GRIFFIN (voice-over): Art Caplan is director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania. He is also one of five forensic and ethical experts consulted on the memorial hospital deaths by New Orleans coroner. All five concluded the hospital staff euthanized the nine patients.

(on camera): Is this the case where doctors did their best and failed?

CAPLAN: We don't know whether doctors did their best in the field. All I can say in reading the record is that I think they assisted the death involuntarily of these patients. They didn't ask them. They didn't talk about it. They just said we better put these people to sleep.

GRIFFIN (voice-over): A grand jury was convened to investigate but neither Caplan nor the other four experts were asked to testify. That grand jury failed to indict anyone.

Five years later, despite all of the evidence, the New Orleans coroner still classifies the deaths as unknown.

JACOBS: I want justice.

GRIFFIN (on camera): Relatives of these victims have good reason to be frustrated with the law enforcement community here in New Orleans. Their cases, the cases of their loved ones remain unsolved homicides, and guess what else, nobody seems to want to solve them, including the district attorney. In open court last month, Leon Cannizzaro, the new district attorney of New Orleans called what happened at Memorial Hospital a homicide.

"I do believe human beings were killed as a result of actions of doctors." That's what he said in court, and then he went on to say that he has no intention of pursuing the case unless new evidence shows up at his door.

(voice-over): Like the coroner, Cannizzaro said in court, he "just doesn't feel he has enough evidence,"

(on camera): And get this, the new district attorney Leon Cannizzaro, he won't even come out and tell us why.

(voice-over): After weeks of asking and one day of waiting, the district attorney we were told slipped out a side door. Through her attorney, Dr. Anna Pou has consistently refused requests for interviews with CNN but she has told other media outlets that while she did inject some patients with the potent drug combination, it was for palliative care, comfort, not murder.

In the ensuing years, the state, which employs Dr. Pou, has paid out hundreds of thousands in legal fees.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: Kyra, CNN has been involved in an extensive lawsuit trying to get the investigative records in this case opened up. We've been blocked by the hospital, by the hospital staff, workers themselves, and the district attorney. If he can just prove to a judge or try to convince a judge there could be an investigation in the future, that could potentially keep these records sealed forever. The patients' families want them opened up. We want them opened up so we can determine once and for all what did really happen at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina. Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Drew Griffin, thanks.

And this program note, promises were made, but were they kept? CNN's Anderson Cooper returns to New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. See what he finds "In Katrina's Wake Building Up America," an "AC 360" special. Tune in for that special tomorrow 10:00 p.m. Eastern.

Eyes on the chalkboard, not on the cell phone. Seems like it should be easy for schools to police until you meet kids like this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Open it up, put the phone in there and I was like I'm looking for something and send a text message.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: One school already has confiscated 200 phones this year. So instead of fighting it, some classrooms are jumping on board.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: All right. Let's check the top stories.

Key primary election results starting in Arizona. Senator John McCain wins the state's Republican primary. In Florida, political newcomer and wealthy businessman, Rick Scott, an upset victory in the Republican primary for governor, edging out GOP favorite, Bill McCollum. In Florida Senate race, former House Speaker Mark Rubio takes the GOP nomination. He'll face off with Democratic Congressman Kendrick Meek and Governor Charlie Crist.

And former President Jimmy Carter has arrived in North Korea. He's on a mission to secure the release of an American sentenced to eight years of hard labor for illegally crossing North Korea's border with China.

33 miners in Chile trapped for 20 days may not be rescued until December. Chilean officials are asking NASA and it's Navy for help now that one advice on how to help those men cope mentally while crews starts drilling an escape shaft.

Just because kids are in class doesn't necessarily mean that they have turned off that cell phone. Parents and teachers can back up what surveys tells us, that kids keep their eyes glued to cell phone screens, thumbs flying across he keyboard at all hours of the day.

Some schools are punishing kids for that obsession. Others capitalizing on it. Here's Deb Feyerick.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Seventh grader Cayleb Coyne has texting in class down to a science.

CAYLEB COYNE, 7TH GRADE STUDENT: Open it up, put the phone in there and act like I'm looking for something, instead I'm sending a text message.

FEYERICK: Hallways are also good.

COYNE: It's harder to get caught in the hallways than in class.

FEYERICK (on camera): Because you're moving, like a shark, always moving.

COYNE: Yes.

FEYERICK (voice-over): Coyne says his phone has been confiscated six times in six months, and he's not the only one. Despite constant reminders from its principal at (INAUDIBLE) Middle School.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Your cell phones are supposed to be where? Yes, in your locker, not in class.

FEYERICK: But class is where they end up. According to the Pugh Research Center, even in schools that ban cell phone use nearly 60 percent of all students admit texting during class, a growing problem in schools across the country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, why are you so addicted to this technology?

FEYERICK: At Bay side high school in Florida, students risk being suspended if their phone is confiscated more than once. So far this year, 200 kids had had their phones taken away.

ROBIN NOVELLI, PRINCIPAL, BAYSIDE HIGH SCHOOL: Students need to be fully, 100 percent authentically engaged in the classroom and pulling out a cell phone and teaching their friends about whatever it is they might be talking about is not the learning environment that I as a principal want to promote.

FEYERICK: And despite that zero tolerance policy --

NOVELLI: We still daily collect cell phones from students that have them out when they're supposed to be learning in the classroom.

DR. MICHAEL RICH, DIRECTOR, CENTER ON MEDIA AND CHILD HEALTH: I don't think we're going to stop the tsunami.

FEYERICK: But pediatrician and media expert Michael Rich says the reality is kids use more than seven hours of media a day. Depriving them of it could back fire.

RICH: Pandora's box is open here. The technologies are here. What we need to do is to take control of them instead of letting them control us. AVIS COLLIER SHELBY, PRINCIPAL, HAVERSTRAW MIDDLE SCHOOL: You can't but the genie back in the bottle. The cell phones are here.

FEYERICK: At Haverstraw Middle School --

RONALD ROYSTER, 5TH GRADE TEACHER: All right. Turn on your Mods again, please.

FEYERICK: Teachers (INAUDIBLE) has decided if you can't beat them, join them.

ROYSTER: It's not really a phone. It's their commuter for class.

FEYERICK: The school handed out 75 cell phones to fifth graders as part of a unique pilot program.

ROYSTER: It's like on Ellis Island.

FEYERICK: Texting and calls features are disabled. Internet sites are filtered. Phones are used for things like note-taking and research. For 11-year-olds, Kiara, Ryan and Naya (ph) learning is different now. When did you make a movie? Did you make a movie during homeroom?

RYAN GUZINSKI, 5TH GRADE STUDENT: No, this was actually in math, it is about decimals.

You can sync it which means the teachers will get it and they can grade you on it.

ROYSTER: So it is helping reinforce the lessons?

GUZINSKI: Yes, because we're like memorizing things so much easier.

NAYA RIVERA, 5TH GRADE STUDENT: It's almost like you want to look at the TV. It's almost like a mini-TV like you want to look at it. You don't want to look at a piece of paper.

FEYERICK: The district superintendent says dollar for dollar, buying phones is more efficient than new computers.

(on camera): There are some educators who just say these should not be in school. What is your response to them?

ILEANA ECKERT, HAVENSTRAW STONY POINT CENTRAL SCHOOL DIST.: I think we're in the middle of a new revolution. It's part of who they are today. And why not use something in a positive way that they're bringing with them?

FEYERICK: As for these 5t graders --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I actually started texting less when I had this. RIVERA: Now that I have this, it's kind of more fun to go on the internet on this and experiment with it while at home, instead of sitting there, texting all day and like doing nothing.

GUZINSKI: It's like bye, phone.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Deb, how many times do you wish that your kids would say bye phone?

FEYERICK: Are you kidding? Their main question is where's your phone, where's your phone, where's your phone?

PHILLIPS: So, I mean, these kids that are so addicted to these devices. I'm assuming it impacts their grades and attention span.

FEYERICK: You know, here's what's so different, Kyra, is that they are wired very differently from the way I think you and I are wired because this technology is as familiar to them as breathing, as watching television.

So what they're doing is they're using it in a different way. And I thought what was really interesting, you hear that little boy and he says, you know, he made a movie about decimals. Think about just how powerful and how creative that is.

Also, the little girl said she doesn't feel the need to text as much. So what this school is doing, and what's so interesting is that they're saying, OK, this device gives you the power, in fact, to learn, to go on the internet, to research, and what they're doing is they're trying to find a constructive way to have these kids use these devices that are so prevalent, and so it's very different.

If you teach a child a constructive way to use them, then it becomes a very different dynamic. That's what this particular school is trying to do.

PHILLIPS: But, bottom line, isn't the addiction the fact that kids just want to talk to each other? I mean, how many types were we busted in class when we were kids, for whispering or passing notes or you know, talking in the back of class? It's the same type of desire.

FEYERICK: That's exactly right. You know, you're right. It's that constant communication, that need to be in touch, to talk. The teens don't see it as a big deal, but the teachers obviously do because it's such a big interruption. The interesting thing about this is that superintendent that we interviewed, she said she would rather have the ability to buy more of these mobile learning devices, the restricted use cell phones to use in the classroom because they're much more economical than computers in labs which cost a lot, which have limited access.

The little mobile devices that the kids carry around, sort of like a BlackBerry, goes wherever it is they go. There was one question, okay, well, who is the voice of the person who played Jiminy Cricket. They were able to go to Google and just basically Google that and find out that information.

So, they have these tidbits that they can access, but yes, the administrators are trying to figure out, my God, what do we do with this? How do we control it, because it is an interruption. And that is the greater issue overall.

PHILLIPS: The voice of Jiminy Cricket. I'm looking it up now. Do you remember?

(LAUGHTER)

FEYERICK: I don't! I don't! The kids were able to do it in a second.

PHILLIPS: Cliff Edwards! Cliff Edwards.

(LAUGHTER)

PHILLIPS: There you go, the power of the device right there at your hands. Thanks, deb.

We're going to talk about why some people in Buffalo actually burned the city's newspaper in protest. The paper actually printed criminal pasts of shooting victims. We're going to ask the editor why the paper did it. Why that's was relevant. We're also going to talk to a pastor who says it was an offensive move in his community.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Hi. Let's talk about what the Buffalo newspaper did recently. We're having a conversation about whether the paper did the right thing.

Here's the back story. Someone shot eight people a couple of weeks ago outside a Buffalo restaurant. Four of them died. One of the victims critically wounded. Detectives haven't charged anyone with the crime so far.

Now, here's the issue. The paper printed the criminal records of all of the victims. All but one, by the way, had rap sheets. And five were convicted felons. It was a move that had some people actually burning the paper in protest. They're asking why does that matter? How could you do this to grieving families, and are you saying the victims somehow had it coming? The paper stands by the decision, and says it's an important if not painful part of the story.

So, let's talk about. Reverend Kinzer Pointer is pastor of Agape Fellowship Baptist Church in Buffalo. He knows at least one of the victims, and is upset with the paper's decision. We've also got Margaret Sullivan on the phone with us. She's the editor and vice president "The Buffalo News." She's actually on vacation. She's calling in to be a part of this discussion. We appreciate that, Miss Sullivan. But Reverend, let's go ahead and start with you. Why are you so upset by the fact that the paper ran these rap sheets, and how is it impacting the families that have either lost someone or had the information printed in the paper?

REV. KINZER POINTER, AGAPE FELLOWSHIP BAPTIST CHURCH: Well, I think I'm upset because families are upset and hurt, and people across this community are upset that the news chose this time to be so irresponsible. If we're going to frame our conversation around what happened and why it happened, there certainly should have been a different conversation and a different time and place. The morning after a family buries a loved one, I thought was wholly inappropriate and in bad taste.

PHILLIPS: Now, Miss Sullivan, why did you feel comfortable in running the rap sheets on these shooting victims?

MARGARET SULLIVAN, EDITOR & VP, "THE BUFFALO NEWS": What we're trying to do is examine every part of what happened. This was the worst carnage that Buffalo has had in 30 years. It's a very big story for us, and a very troubling one. We feel a great deal of compassion for the victims and their families and their friends. It's a horrible tragedy, and we're really trying to get to the bottom of it in every way we can, and so we're looking at all aspects of it. As we find the facts out, we're publishing them.

PHILLIPS: Miss Sullivan, let me ask you, before you decided to print this information, I'm sure there was a major discussion there at the paper. We always have these types of major discussions before we go with something that could be controversial. Did you discuss the fact with your staff that these were all African-Americans and that this could be perceived possibly as racial stereotyping?

SULLIVAN: Of course, we were aware from the beginning that all of the victims were African-American. I don't think that has to do with racial stereotyping. We are looking at an incident in which there was a private party, and as it turns out, many of the people at this party were -- had had significant experiences with the criminal justice system. And that seemed highly relevant to us.

PHILLIPS: And, Reverend, you I was reading through a number of crime Web sites and looking back at data. And it's a fact that when someone is convicted of a crime or been involved in a felony, that they are more likely to become a victim of a crime at some point. Isn't that important information to know because by learning all of the information about these victims, you definitely got a better understanding of that connection?

POINTER: I don't decry that. It's important information.

My concern is, again, is we are in Buffalo suffering from a real sense of being under siege. This is the worst single incidence that resulted in the death of people in the history of the city that any of us alive can remember. And we live in a city that is really quite cosmopolitan, is really quite a decent place to live. And so when this happened, we all felt like we were assaulted on Saturday morning. And "The Buffalo News" was, we thought -- I think, completely irresponsible in the manner in which they presented this information, and the timing could not have been worse.

PHILLIPS: Well, how should they have done it differently? I mean, we're talking about of the eight victims, seven of them had violent felony arrests. Convictions. We're talking about shootings, weapons, drugs. And if the wrong picture of these individuals is being portrayed, by all means, tell if they were charitable individuals or church goers or had never been involved in any type of crime. This is definitely the opportunity for you to tell us.

POINTER: I think what we seem to forget often is whoever people are or they become or are becoming, they're human beings. And the flagrant disregard for the families of those persons is an affront to every human being on this planet. And we are also talking about a crime that no one has been taken into custody for, in spite of the fact that later Saturday morning, there was an assault down the street from where I live -- the Buffalo police picked up the wrong guy, held a national news conference to say, we got the guy, and later on that evening, we all knew he wasn't the guy.

So, we still have this person out there in this community or having fled this community to some other community and a serious danger to the welfare of the rest of this society. That was the discussion that should have been had on the front page of "The Buffalo News" this past Sunday. Not the smack in the face to the families who, as late as Saturday, just buried the last of the victims. And we still have a young man lying critically wounded in the medical center.

PHILLIPS: Miss Sullivan, go ahead and respond to the points that the reverend just made, and also, too, I'm curious to know if by printing the rap sheets, did it push the story forward in any way? Is it helping with regards to leads, to arrests and impacting this case?

SULLIVAN: Well, we have been running stories every day on our front page since this occurred, as you said, nearly two weeks ago. And we've had all sorts of stories about the possible suspects. We've had stories about the victims and their families, which I think has been sympathetic, fortunate.

And as I say, I know I feel and my staff feels a great deal of compassion towards the families and the friends and what's happened here. It's not coming from a place of disdain or disrespect or insensitivity. We are really just trying to get at the truth, all aspects of it, and this was one story that we did among many.

PHILLIPS: Margaret Sullivan, editor and vice president "The Buffalo News." Reverend Kinzer Pointer, pastor of Agape Fellowship Baptist Church. Thank you both, appreciate it.

Got some breaking news now. A new tropical depression has formed. Jacqui Jeras, what do you have?

JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, Kyra. This just in from the National Hurricane Center. Tropical Depression 7 developed just to the south and east of Hurricane Danielle, and this will likely strengthen and could be Tropical Storm Earl before all is said and done. We'll have the latest forecast coming up in the next hour in the NEWSROOM.

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PHILLIPS: Checking our top stories real quickly here.

Bad news on the U.S. economic front. New home sales dropped nearly 13 percent last month. That's the lowest level on record, and the number is down a whopping 32 percent from a year ago.

Federal investigators say a key emergency signal dislodged during the plane crash that killed former Alaskan Senator Ted Stevens - the NTSB issued a preliminary report today on that crash. Four other people died when the plane slammed into a hillside near Dillingham, Alaska.

Some of the last U.S. combat troops to leave Iraq are back home. Members of the Fourth Stryker Brigade Combat Team arrived this morning back at the Louis-McCord joint base near Seattle. They deployed to Iraq last August.

Half a billion eggs recalled in 23 states. Hundreds of sick Americans. Now we're learning that a low-cost vaccine for hens may have helped prevent this kind of salmonella outbreak, and American regulations decided against mandating the vaccinations. Senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joining to tell us more about the vaccine. What do we know?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, what we know is they have been using this vaccine since around 1997 vaccinating chicks - or hens, rather. And here are the numbers, and they're pretty dramatic.

Before they started this vaccination program in 1990, they had 18,143 cases of salmonella enteritidis in British eggs. That's the same type of salmonella we're seeing. And then, in 2009, once the program was in full swing, 3,825 cases. So we asked the FDA, why don't you mandate this vaccine here? And here's what they said. They said that the "FDA found that the data was insufficient to support a mandatory vaccination requirement. The FDA says they encourage egg producers to voluntarily vaccinate their hens." And, in fact, more than half of U.S. farmers do vaccinate their hens against this type of salmonella, But Kyra, of course that means that a big chunk are not vaccinating against salmonella.

PHILLIPS: But the numbers are pretty convincing, so how could this be insufficient data?

COHEN: Right. On the face of it, it doesn't really seem to make sense and sort of gets back to the philosophy of how food production is regulated in this country.

In this country, the government tells farmers and food producers, look, we want you to have a certain level of salmonella. And how you get there, basically, is your business. You use whatever legal means possible to get your salmonella levels down. The government doesn't spell it out for them how to do it.

And some people think that this is a big mistake and that this outbreak is proof that this approach is a big mistake and that they should be mandating these kinds of things.

PHILLIPS: Well, the vaccine, the way to get rid of salmonella?

COHEN: It's not. There is some much more lower-cost and actually easier - well, maybe not easier but sort of lower-tech ways to get rid of it. For example, in Georgia, egg producers here use what's called the five-star program. They have very specific measures to keep rats out of the hen house because rats have rat droppings. And rat droppings can lead to salmonella. They check new chicks before a chick can come into the hen house. That chick has to have papers that say, "hey, I'm salmonella-free." And by doing that, they've actually, I'm told, have gotten salmonella in Georgia. They say we don't see - or not gotten rid of it, but you don't see the kind of outbreaks that you see in other parts of the country.

So, those steps really do work. Again, the question is, why don't they mandate stuff like that? They have started to do more of this. There were new regulations that you talked about on your show yesterday.

PHILLIPS: New FDA guidelines.

COHEN: Righ. Exactly. New FDA guidelines. So, they're starting to do more of that, but basically the philosophy has been, "Farmers, producers, you do what you need to do to get things down to a certain level."

PHILLIPS: Got it. Thanks, Elizabeth.

COHEN: Thanks.

PHILLIPS: Well, congrats to a new citizen of the United States. You're looking at what he calls the happiest day in all of his 90 years. Thing is, he thought he was already an American. Heck, he fought under Eisenhower and voted for Roosevelt.

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PHILLIPS: So, how the heck do we fix our troubled schools? We're going to tackle that question all next week, and we want you to be a part of the conversation. Do you have questions about your child --well -- or your child's school or anything to do with education of your kids? You're going to be able to ask Principal Perry at CNN.com/kyra. He's our education contributor. Steve Perry is actually going to join us starting Monday to answer some of your toughest questions. So, send them in.

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(MUSIC PLAYING) PHILLIPS: Well, this is the special time of our newscast where we lift up a service member who made the ultimate sacrifice in Iraq or Afghanistan. We call it "Home and Away." We'll let you know how can you be a part of the project in just a minute.

First, we want to lift up Staff Sergeant Kyle Andrew Eggers from Uless, Texas. He was killed in a roadside bomb attack in Iraq in December of 2004. His mother-in-law, Susan Whitman, said that she hopes that Sergeant Eggers is remembered for his sense of humor and his children. Susan actually sent us a picture of the kids and a note from them to their dad. It says, quote, "This week you would have celebrated your 33rd birthday. We had tacos, ice cream cake and sang happy birthday to you, Daddy. We miss you much." Teagan, Caden, Zane, and Noah.

Well, we want more of your pictures, your words, letters, all of that, to honor your hero. Just go to CNN.com/homeandaway. Type in your service member's name in the upper right-hand search field, pull up the profile, post your memories, and we promise to preserve all of our heroes.

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PHILLIPS: Here's a war hero's story that you won't hear everyday. Frank Lenartowicz was on the beaches of Normandy in 1944. He got wounded in Germany, received four Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart, voted for FDR absentee, and came home to his wife in Michigan. Married, by the way, for 67 years.

Well, Frank has lived the life of the Greatest Generation. You can't get much more American than that. There he is standing proudly under Old Glory, the flag that he fought for.

But guess what? All of that time, Frank wasn't an American at all. He was actually a Canadian citizen until Monday when he took the oath of citizenship in Detroit. You see, his father emigrated from Canada and got his citizenship in 1935. Assumed the family was all included, but they weren't. Had a chance to talk with Frank about it last hour.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FRANK LENARTOWICZ, WWII VET, NEW AMERICAN CITIZEN: Anything I ever did, I -- would show my father's citizenship papers and crossing the border, going to work, whatever it may be. And nobody ever mentioned that I was not a citizen. And -- and my father actually when he became a citizen, he told us that we are citizens. And I followed that suit right on through.

PHILLIPS: Unbelievable. All right, so then in your 80s you go to apply for your driver's license. And you find out ok, I'm not a citizen. But I want to become one. What did you have to go through in order to become a citizen? Did they fast track you, Frank? Or did it take a while? LENARTOWICZ: Well, it took -- it took a while. But actually, you went through a number of agencies and didn't receive the -- the -- the opportunity that I thought I should get. And eventually I got what the immigration office that I'm working with right now, and -- and it was a pleasure for them to take interest in me. And I followed suit on everything that I was -- had to do, and from that point on, well, it came to this, and my becoming a citizen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Isn't it -- but, Tony, here's the other part of the "What the?" OK?

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: I love it, yes.

PHILLIPS: He's been married for 67 years. And I said, "Frank, what is the key?" Because obviously you and I could use some advice.

HARRIS: Hello?

PHILLIPS: You, a couple times more than I.

But you know what he said? He said, "When you argue, you just don't say, 'I'm sorry.' You just move on."

HARRIS: Yes, you've got to disagree, but you just move on. Yes. The bureaucracy makes you crazy, doesn't it?

PHILLIPS: I like how you bypassed the issue of marriage.

HARRIS: Because it's fraught with danger for me, obviously.

(LAUGHTER)

HARRIS: Why don't you have a good day, Kyra?

PHILLIPS: All right. I'll never argue with you, Tony.

HARRIS: I'm cutting checks every doggoned month.