Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

End of the Recession; 'Chalk Talk'; The Black Wealth Gap; Rumsfeld's New Book

Aired September 20, 2010 - 14:00   ET

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

ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: All right. It's a new hour. I've got a new "Rundown." If you thought "An Inconvenient Truth" was controversial, you haven't seen anything yet. Davis Guggenheim is out with a new film that pulls no punches when it comes to America's broken schools. And we've got a preview of it.

Plus, Chris Rock said it best. There is a difference between being rich and being wealthy. It's not easy building wealth in America, and the numbers say it's especially hard for black families. We'll look at building up families, building up wealth, and "Building Up America."

And Tea Party-backed candidate Christine O'Donnell is the inspiration for our "Word Play" this hour. We're going to stir the pot a little with this one, or maybe I should say we're going to stir the caldron a little bit.

But right now, let's start with this: The recession is over. Queue the cake and the balloons and the party. The National Bureau of Economic Research says it was over, by the way, in June of 2009, last year, making it, by the way, the longest recession since World War II.

Now, this organization, the NBER, is considered by many to be the arbiter of recessions in this country. You might remember back in May they declined to put an official date on the end of the recession.

So why are they doing it now? Well, simply put, there's more information out. They saw more data on things like GDP and personal income, some of the things that we lost in this recession.

I'm going to talk to Lakshman Achuthan now about this, because this information is stuff that he was talking to me about, that since the recession, since the beginning of the recession, we've made up 50 percent of the GDP that we've lost. We've made up about 50 percent of industrial production. That's a measure of everything that we make, stuff that's made in factories, 50 percent of the country's income, 40 percent of sales that were lost.

But look at that bottom line, Lakshman, nine percent of the jobs that we've lost. This is what you're telling me have come back.

LAKSHMAN ACHUTHAN, ECONOMIC CYCLE RESEARCH INSTITUTE: Yes.

VELSHI: That, jobs, are where the rubber hits the road for most Americans. Lakshman, by the way, is the managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute. Like the NBER, they're in the business of watching recessions. They have forecasts.

Studying recessions and recoveries, but we forecast them, too. So that's a little different.

ACHUTHAN: One little factoid there on the GDP list, that's -- we've recovered 70 percent of GDP lost during --

VELSHI: I'm sorry, 70 percent. OK.

ACHUTHAN: -- lost during the recession. But it makes the disparity all the greater when you look at what kind of jobs we've recovered. We've only recovered nine percent of the jobs lost during the recession.

(CROSSTALK)

VELSHI: So, in other words, if jobs were not your touch point to the economy, if jobs were not your biggest concern and you just looked at this economy, you would say sure, we're out of this recession.

ACHUTHAN: Yes.

VELSHI: The bottom line is jobs are our touch point, and when you don't have jobs, it means you lose houses and you have foreclosures and things like that happen.

ACHUTHAN: And it's really important. You see the national bureau and the process that they're going through, which we also do in dating recessions and recoveries globally, is very objective. And they are giving a decent weight to jobs here. They're not giving it short shrift.

The fact is we have recovered nine percent of the jobs since -- that were lost during the recession. The reason it doesn't feel good is because you have got 91 percent left to recover.

VELSHI: Right.

ACHUTHAN: And we've made it into -- the economy made it into the recovery room by the summer of '09. But just because you're in the recovery room, you don't feel good. You still have a lot of healing to do.

We're continuing to do that healing. And so that is where we are here.

The important other element here, it's a little technical, but it's important to note. We've moved from this nasty part of the business cycle, which is the vicious part, where everybody is firing, and you fire and then sales go down and production goes down and then firings go down. We've moved away from that, and we were losing 750 million (sic) jobs a month in the heat of that.

VELSHI: Right, 750,000, yes.

ACHUTHAN: Seven hundred and fifty thousand, right. And now we're in the virtuous part of the business cycle. It doesn't feel like it yet because the jobs aren't there, but they're starting to come back.

We've got 750,000 jobs this year. It's in private sector jobs growth. We've had eight months. It is, to be sure, way too slow, and we are already slowing down again, which is a big problem.

VELSHI: Right. And look at this. I mean, the bottom line is, while you and I both discussed that the unemployment rate is not something to get fixated on because we really want to see job creation and job loss numbers, the fact is the unemployment rate is higher today than it was when this recession ended.

ACHUTHAN: Today, yes. It peaked out at 10.1 percent last fall, in October.

VELSHI: Yes. So it went up after the end of this recession.

ACHUTHAN: Exactly.

VELSHI: And it's come down a bit.

ACHUTHAN: And we've seen that happen. We've had -- in these last three cycles, these last three recoveries, we've had the so- called jobless recovery where GDP starts clearly kind of going up, but in the early '90s we didn't have --

VELSHI: How do you account for that? That work is done by somebody. So you're increasing output, you're increasing sales, you're increasing economic activity, and yet you're not hiring the people --

(CROSSTALK)

ACHUTHAN: There's a whole -- each cycle is slightly different, but there are some general themes -- productivity gains, which --

VELSHI: Right. Which means we all work a little longer, we're all a little scared for our jobs. So when the boss says you work longer, you carry the BlackBerry around with you.

ACHUTHAN: Yes, the guy next to you or the lady next to you gets fired, and you work twice as hard. That's a productivity gain. That's what that is.

VELSHI: Right. Less money for more work.

ACHUTHAN: You know, your co-worker gets fired and you do more work. That is a productivity gain. That's what it means in econo speak. OK?

VELSHI: Right. ACHUTHAN: The other thing you do is you ship a lot of manufacturing jobs abroad. And those don't come back. And so we've seen that happen. So these are so-called structural changes.

In the current cycle, a big structural issue is that we had a housing bubble prior to the recession. It employed a lot of people -- building houses, financing houses, doing all kinds of funny things with derivatives, paper and all these things. And they are all out of a job.

VELSHI: Right.

ACHUTHAN: And now that we're in a recovery, this recovery, this economy isn't demanding that kind of work. And so they are long-term unemployed.

VELSHI: So if I'm trying to get ahead of this trend, if I don't want to hear it from guys like me that it's over and this is happening --

ACHUTHAN: Leading indicators.

VELSHI: OK. Tell me what -- because we focus a lot on lagging indicators, history, things that have happened in the past. So you look at unemployment from last month, that's done, that's happened.

Tell me the leading indicators. What does it tell you about where this economy is going and how I position myself not to get run over by a truck, but actually to prosper.

ACHUTHAN: Yes. Well, you know, the moment was at the beginning of the year where the growth rate in these leading indicators started to turn down, anticipating a slowing of the economy now.

VELSHI: OK. So let me just be clear on that. Growth rate means it's growing.

ACHUTHAN: Correct.

VELSHI: But it's growing more slowly.

ACHUTHAN: And this is -- what you said is crystal clear. However, it is lost on half of the professional economists in this country. OK? Because this is a debate I've been having behind closed doors all the time.

There's a difference between a growth rate throttling back and the level of something falling. And right now every single --

VELSHI: And the difference is going slowly because you're in traffic versus putting the car in reverse. We're moving forward. We're just slow.

ACHUTHAN: Yes. And it may be slow and steady wins the race. I mean, you know the old turtle and the hare. And there -- we had concerns about double-dip recessions in the beginning of the '90s. It turned out to be the longest expansion in our history. OK?

There was a lot of angst at the beginning of the '90s about double-dip recessions. There was a lot of angst about double-dip recessions in the early 2000s. Consumer confidence in both cases was very, very jumpy. However, we slowly pulled it together and were able to put together decent expansions in both cases in terms of duration.

VELSHI: To be fair so that I don't get -- because they're going to start blogging any minute now about how I'm talking up this economy and ignoring all the signs and that things are really bad --

ACHUTHAN: Yes. I'm not rose-coloring it.

VELSHI: -- there is a possibility -- we're not out of the woods.

ACHUTHAN: Now I'll get you the other side before you get blogged to death.

VELSHI: Right.

ACHUTHAN: OK. Every time you have a slowdown, half of the time you go into a recession. That's a fact.

So if you look over the last half a century, slowdowns in this country, half of them turn into recessions. That is the reason why you have to take this current situation and slowdown extremely seriously. But you can't forecast by analogy. That doesn't work at all.

You look at leading indicators. And leading indicators are saying it's premature to say that we have a new recession. And we have to stay tuned. You can't predict the predictors.

VELSHI: OK. Lakshman is the guy to talk about this.

You've studied this. You get it right all the time.

Lakshman, thanks very much for being with us.

ACHUTHAN: Thank you.

VELSHI: Lakshman is the managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute. I've been saying it for so many years, I can't believe last hour I forgot what it was.

All right. Listen, this is an interesting story.

It started on a Utah National Guard shooting range and was blown off base by high winds. The so-called machine gunfire has destroyed at least four homes and forced folks out of nearly 2,000 more.

Now, the flames were apparently sparked by ammunition fired during a training exercise. A matter-of-fact military spokesman and an emotional evacuee giving two sides of this developing story in today's "Sound Effect."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LT. COL. HANK MCINTYRE, UTAH NATIONAL GUARD: These fires are an occurrence that happen occasionally during training. That's why we have on-site equipment in order to fight the fire with pumper (ph) trucks, dipping tanks, Black Hawk helicopters as needed. And the fire initially behaved like any other fire that we would put out internally without having to call outside authorities to assist.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JACKIE BURNS, HERRIMAN RESIDENT: Every year for years they set that mountain on fire, and it's never coming that close to Herriman. But there have been so many times over 34 years that we have watched and just waited to see fire coming over the ridge and thought we'd get out. And it finally happened.

I can't believe it's finally did it. And for them to say they checked the weather conditions is baloney, because it was a hot, dry wind last night. It has blown all week out here. It was blowing this morning. So they are full of baloney when they said they checked the wind conditions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELSHI: Hundreds of firefighters are battling this thing on the ground and from the sky. The last update we heard from authorities, the fire has burned about 10,000 acres in less than 24 hours. Utah's governor says firefighters are making progress, however, against those flames.

All right. Are we waiting for a hero to save our schools? What if the answer is a bit more grounded? A new film sets out to turn our education system around. We're going to give you a preview of it when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: In "Chalk Talk" today, a new documentary coming out Friday takes a controversial look at how some parents struggle to get their kids into charter schools. It's called "Waiting for Superman." It's directed by Davis Guggenheim, who is no stranger to controversy. He's the same guy who directed "An Inconvenient Truth."

CNN's Kareen Wynter has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you think that most of the kids here are getting a crappy education right now?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, I don't think they are. I know they are.

KAREEN WYNTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Documentary filmmaker Davis Guggenheim has a message for America.

DAVIS GUGGENHEM, DIRECTOR, "WAITING FOR SUPERMAN": If we don't fix our public schools for everybody, we're in trouble.

WYNTER: The 46-year-old director knows how to get his message across. His last film earned $50 million at the box office, won an Oscar, and sparked an international debate over global warming. If lightning strikes twice, his new film, "Waiting for Superman" would do the same thing for public education. CNN caught up with Guggenheim at the Sundance Film Festival where his movie was first acquired by a major studio.

GUGGENHEIM: The system we've built works really well for the adults, like the unions and bureaucracy and even the parents. But it's not working for the kids.

WYNTER: The film follows the lives of five children as they wait for their number to be called in a Lottery, a bingo-style drum (ph) determine which kids get into the best schools. An eye-opening movement for Guggenheim.

GUGGENHEIM: I drive past three public schools on the way to take my kid to a private school. And when I drive by those schools it haunts me. We're not doing enough for every kid.

WYNTER: Education reformer Geoffrey Canada and billionaire Bill Gates tells CNN they participated in the film because of their concerns.

GEOFFREY CANADA, EDUCATION REFORMER: We have a school day that's too short, year that's too short, and we've got lots of teachers who should not be teaching children.

WYNTER: And to offer solutions for the future.

BILL GATES, PHILANTHROPIST: Today the Internet gives you the opportunity to watch the best lectures in the world. They're out there for free. If you take advantage of those resources, you can be broader and deeper than any of the kids in my generation were.

ANNOUNCER: Among 30 developed countries, we rank 25th in math and 21st in science. In almost every category, we have fallen behind.

JAY FERNANDEZ, "THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER": When I'm watching these things, you have to have skepticism.

WYNTER: Weary of one-sided documentaries, Jay Fernandez from the "Hollywood Reporter" says "Superman" has more to do with inspiring change than assigning blame.

FERNANDEZ: The filmmakers and the studio are hoping that this doesn't just spark a public debate but actually spark some reform.

WYNTER: Fernandez, a father himself says his greatest concern is that moviegoers' guilt might actually keep them from buying a ticket. FERNANDEZ: It's almost like, I know this is out there but do I really want to go and stick my face in it because I then either have to do something or I'm a total schmuck.

WYNTER: Hoping to avoid this problem, the film has struck deals with corporate sponsors to donate hundreds of thousands of dollars in books and school supplies for every 10,000 people who see the film. This way everyday people can be the superheroes public schools are waiting for.

GATES: It takes good examples to say, yes, we can do this.

WYNTER: Kareen Wynter, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VELSHI: OK. Are you too busy surviving to save? We're hearing that in way too many African-American households these days.

Stephanie Elam has some news about that and some solutions coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: All right. "Almighty Debt" is a "BLACK IN AMERICA" special that we're airing on CNN. And one of the things that we're looking at is the fact that if you are struggling just to pay your bills and get by in life, you are not establishing wealth for another generation. You're really not establishing wealth at all.

And that is an issue facing many Americans these days, and it is statistically even a bigger issue for black families. The numbers show that it is exceedingly difficult to grow that kind of wealth.

Stephanie, my good friend, is here.

You've been studying this. Tell me a bit about it.

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes. It's been something we've been looking at, Ali, and it's something I know about because I happen to be a business correspondent and I happen to be black. So I'm aware of both sides of it.

VELSHI: Right.

ELAM: But really, when you take a look at it, it's a huge problem. Blacks are not doing what they need to, to make sure that we're putting away for retirement and also for our kids. But we went and found one family that's really doing their part to make sure that they are leaving for their kids, and it's something that we can all learn from for sure.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELAM (voice-over): Chris Rock has joked about black people and their money. CHRIS ROCK, COMEDIAN/ACTOR: Shaq is rich. The white man that signs his check is wealthy. Wealth is passed down from generation to generation.

ELAM: There's a sad truth in his humor. Studies show black people tend to chronically make less, save less and pass less money on to the next generation than their white counterparts. And if you don't have assets, you can't pass them on.

FAMILY: God bless lord our daily bread, Amen.

ELAM: Marvin and Kathy Dickerson are making sure their family doesn't follow the same pattern.

KATHY DICKERSON, PLANNING FINANCES: One or two bad moves and it's going to follow you.

ELAM: Married for nine years the couple started planning their finances well before welcoming 6-year-old Kaylin and 3-year-old Miles.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And how is this a fair fight?

MARVIN DICKERSON, IT CONSULTANT: We knew we had to invest because we knew one day we were going to have kids. And we wanted our kids to have more than what we have.

ELAM: The Dickersons developed a budget, paid off their debt, began investing and set up a will, a trust and 529 Plans to pay for their kids' college educations.

M. DICKERSON: We can pass that wealth or those assets on to our kids with a $1.5 million tax exemption.

ELAM: But this family is the exception. According to the Brookings Institution, the median net worth of black Americans is about $28,000 compare that to $140,000 for the median household nationwide.

ELAM (on camera): What were your parents saying to you to make sure that it was so important that you knew it?

K. DICKERSON: You work, you save.

ELAM: While Marvin is a spender, Kathy is a saver so the couple makes all big financial decisions together.

M. DICKERSON: Kathy had this guiding principle. If she spent $100 she got a headache. As we got married and had more resources you can add another zero. It was like a few thousand dollars.

Valerie Coleman Morris who focuses on financial literacy for women, young people and people of color points to a couple of reasons black Americans are so behind in creating wealth and passing it on.

VALERIE COLEMAN MORRIS, AUTHOR, "MIND OVER MONEY MATTERS": Money is still a very much off limits topic in the average family. But in African-American families it's almost taboo. The second thing is 401(k). We are not participating. When we do participate, we're contributing far less than most other people.

But in addition to that, there is this overwhelming need for becoming more financially literate. And we aren't.

ROCK: I'm not talking about rich, I'm talking about wealth.

ELAM: But it's more than just talk for the Dickersons. It's a way of life.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ELAM: And you really have to love Chris Rock, because he always just says it a simple way and so truthful.

VELSHI: No, but it's very true.

ELAM: And it's truthful for a lot of people.

VELSHI: And it's very hard to understand that in a place where you're struggling. In other words, if you're dealing with your day- to-day expenses, thinking about wealth for the next generation is interesting. But this family you talked to, interesting.

The will is something -- this isn't a black thing. There are many Americans without a will.

ELAM: Yes. Half do it.

VELSHI: Most people don't have a trust. And the idea of a 529, I mean, it sounds like they've just taken some simple steps. This isn't high science.

ELAM: No, it's not high science. They also went out and found a financial adviser, and they were realizing they had more assets that they needed to take care of.

And being proactive is really what needs to happen. And part of the reason why this is such a problem, Ali, is the fact that you've got blacks at recessionary levels of unemployment.

VELSHI: Right.

ELAM: You were talking to Lakshman earlier. No matter if we're in a recession or not, blacks are living under recessionary level unemployment, 50 percent higher unemployment rates for black people versus white people.

VELSHI: Right, always. And usually that's been the trend, yes.

ELAM: And regardless of your education level. So that's part of the issue there, too.

You also take a look that there's more part-time work and there's also less access to 401(k)s. And when we do have access to 401(k)s we're not using them as well.

VELSHI: Right.

ELAM: So, therefore, we're not putting away. But on my Facebook page I've had a lot of people coming with comments about this story. And one of my classmates who also is a business journalist, is saying, you know what? This is so great, that we need to talk about saving.

But it's so hard for so many black families when they're thinking about, I've got this debt. So it's a matter of learning how to budget.

VELSHI: Yes. Right. And debt elimination is really the starting point.

All right. A great discussion.

ELAM: And you know -- and I have to say Valerie has one good thing. She said you can either talk about it now or you can fight about it later. And that's for everybody.

VELSHI: Yes, good advice.

Thanks. Good to see you, Stephanie.

ELAM: Good to see you, too.

VELSHI: All right. Black churches, by the way, have historically fought for civil and human rights. We know that, but now it's waging a war on debt. So watch the special that Stephanie is involved in, "Almighty Debt," "A Black in America Special," coming Thursday, October 21st, 9:00 p.m. Eastern, right here on CNN.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(WEATHER REPORT)

VELSHI: All right. Let's go "Off the Radar."

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: All right.

VELSHI: I heard something about finding a new planet that's like Earth next year.

MYERS: Do you want to try to find one?

VELSHI: Yes, let's do that.

MYERS: Well, they're trying. Obviously, the Kepler guys, we talked about these guys a little bit ago.

There's a new study out that says, look, look at the number of planets that we're finding that are called extra solar planets outside our solar system. And there are many. VELSHI: Right.

MYERS: In fact, there are now hundreds, 200 to 300, as a matter of fact. When do we finally find a planet like Earth 2.0?

Well, they started looking in 1990. Not too many candidates. Then finally, by '99, starting to see a few candidates here.

2003, 2004 and 2005, and now, look, all the way through '09, especially now because we have a bunch of new data coming in, in February, those new planets may be -- have to be big enough or, for this matter, small enough -- it's easy to find big planets, right? Because they're big, you can see them.

VELSHI: Right.

MYERS: But Earth isn't big compared to some of the bigger planets. You want it to be small. You want it to be warm enough to make water, but you don't want it be hot enough to make all that water steam.

VELSHI: Right.

MYERS: The water has to be liquid.

So, they're finding these planets as we go and they predict there's a 50/50 chance all the way down there. That would be May of 2011 -- 50/50 chance by May of 2011 that we find a planet close enough to Earth that it could support life as we know it --

VELSHI: What did they call it Star Trek? An M-Clash planet? Isn't that what they used to say?

(LAUGHTER)

MYERS: I think that's it.

VELSHI: An M-Class planet is where you can sustain life. It was similar enough to what humans were used to that it could sustain life.

MYERS: Right. And then on the other ones lost in space, they just went on. They didn't care where they were. They were there.

VELSHI: We need to go to a Star Trek convention.

MYERS: They have them here in Atlanta.

Seventy-five percent chance of finding that planet by 2020, and 95 percent by the year 2264. So, they think but they're not confident if they think it could take another 200 years, Ali.

VELSHI: It's always a probability. In the meantime, I'm going to practice my best "We come in peace."

Chad, good to see you my friend. All right. The clock is ticking on the ambitious millennium development goals. Will they be accomplished by the deadline? What are they? We'll check them out in "Globe Trekking," coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Time for "Globe Trekking" now. Today's issue is global poverty and the United Nations' campaign to reduce it as never before in history. Ten years ago, a U.N. summit laid down eight very ambitious steps aimed at making the world better place to live. For everybody, not just the middle class or the super-rich.

Today, world leaders are back at the U.N. for a summit on what is called the Millennium Development Goals, looking at progress that's been made and assessing the setbacks. It's an urgent time, because the self-imposed deadline to reach the goals is only five years away. Here is how U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon put it at the opening of today's session.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BAN KI-MOON, U.N. SECRETARY GENERAL: We have led you to the river. So, what are we asking of you today? To stay true, true to our identity as an international community built on a foundation of solidarity, true to our commitment to end the dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELSHI: Well, it's not hard to find critics of the United Nations, but most observers agree that it is making progress toward the eight Millennium Development Goals. They including eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, achieving universal primary education, promoting gender equality and empowering women, reducing child mortality. Number five is improving maternal health; combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases; and ensuring environmental sustainability. Number eight is developing global partnerships for development.

The U.N. points to progress in several areas, saying for instance that reducing poverty by half is actually within reach. Also, 1.6 billion people now have access to clean water. And the effort to expand malaria prevention is making significant strides.

However, the secretary general stressed that much work remains, particularly in overcoming setbacks suffered including millions of children still not getting enough food and who are seriously underweight as a result. There's been liittle overall progress in sub-Saharan Africa and specifically the goal to cut by half the proportion of people living on just over a dollar a day is very unlikely to be met by the deadline. There's been little progress in reducing the deaths of mothers and infants in birth.

The summit runs through Wednesday and will be followed by the annual meeting of the U.N. general assembly. All right. Turning now to France and the flap involving two first ladies. CNN's Hala Gorani today had a exclusive interview conversation with Carla Bruni Sarkozy, the somewhat controversial first lady of France. Now, you may recall in an unauthorized biography, she was apparently quoted as saying that Michelle Obama told her that life in the White House was hell. Here's what the first lady of France had to say about the quote.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARLA BRUNI, FRENCH FIRST LADY: Of course, Michelle Obama never said such a thing. I'm happy to tell you very frankly that this is not an authorized book. No one -- not only one book that came out about me was authorized. I never read the book. I never knew about the book. But I do live in France, and France is a free country where anyone can you know, fantasize and print it.

So, of course, I could do something legal, but first of all it gives a lot of publicity to all of those books and second of all, it's not in my principle, you know? I'm a Democrat. I believe that everyone is allowed to say and write and say what they want. But I'm happy to disassociate myself.

HALA GORANI, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Disassociate.

BRUNI: Disassociate myself. Not only from that book, from all books. And, of course, Mrs. Obama never said such a thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELSHI: Now, for the record, the spokeswoman for Mrs. Obama said she never told Carla Bruni Sarkozy that life in the White House is hell.

OK. More than 400,000 babies are born with HIV every year. Some folks think actually we can get that down near zero in five years. They're going to tell us how in today's "Mission Possible." That's coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: All right. We know how to keep expectant moms from passing HIV to their babies. We know how to do that. Still more than a thousand newborns a day enter the world with the virus surging through them. Anti-poverty group One thinks that the world can do better, and in fact has set an ambitious deadline. And there's no time to wait, because the clock has started ticking on the campaign "No child Born with HIV by 2015."

That is today's "Mission Possible." Here to fill us in is Sheila Nix. She is the U.S. executive director of "One." And Fortunada Kasege, an activist for HIV/AIDS awareness. And her daughter, Florida Casegey, who is maybe a budding activist herself. I'm sorry we couldn't all fit you here. They're in New York with me. They're just in another studio. Fortunata, you have a remarkable story. You came here to the United States from Tanzania and found out you were HIV positive when you were pregnant with Florida. Florida is not HIV positive.

FORTUNADA KASEGE, HIV/AIDS AWARENESS ACTIVIST: No, she's not. Thank God, she's not HIV positive.

VELSHI: So you are out there trying to get that message out that this is preventable. What's the message you're trying to get to people? What are you telling them?

FORTUNADA KASEGE: Well, I was just very lucky. I was one of the few lucky moms who -- this is the most horrible thing that can happen. And for my case, it was just that I happened to be in the right country at the right time, or at the right place, if you like, at the right time.

I received the bad news that I was positive. I was devastated. But then I received a very good news that I could get some treatment, and my child's life would be spared. So, she was born HIV-free.

And the message that I want to give to people is that while there is treatment that could prevent thousands or millions, if you like, of children to contract this disease from their moms during childbirth. So, the message I want to give is to the world leaders to please, fund -- fund write these programs that would protect the mother-to-child AIDS transmission.

VELSHI: OK. Perfect time for the message. We just talked about the Millennium Development Goals. Ten years in, the U.N. leaders are meeting about that. And one has a campaign. Let's listen to one of the ads that's being broadcast.

Oh, I'm sorry. We don't have that. If we can get it, we'll try to find it.

I want to talk to Sheila, who is with me here next to me. You're the executive director of "One." Tell me what that message is. So, Fortunata has told us there are ways to prevent this transmission. What do mothers need to know? First of all, mothers need to know if they're HIV-positive.

SHELIA NIX, U.S. EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ONE: Right. Mothers need to know if they're HIV-positive, and if they are, they can get treatment that prevents the transmission to their babies. The good news is we know exactly what to do, and it works. It's a problem that can be solved easily. We have made a lot of progress, but we still have 1,000 babies a day that are born HIV-positive.

VELSHI: This is worldwide?

NIX: Worldwide, yes.

VELSHI: Let's listen to that clip. We've got it now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ANNOUNCER: Over 1,000 babies are born every day with HIV, and half will die before their second birthday. But the plain truth is, this can all be prevented. We now have the medicine and the treatment to stop the spread of HIV from mother to child.

We can reach the goal of no child born with HIV by 2015. But it won't happen without you. Go to one.org and join the movement. Add your voice to the two million ONE members around the world. Together, we can stop the spread of HIV from mother to child so no mother has to worry about this again. We're not asking for your money. We're asking for your voice. Go to one.org and join us today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELSHI: Wow. What a powerful ad.

I want to talk to Florida Kasege. She's 13 years old, not HIV- positive. Florida, you may be one of the most important parts of this campaign, because you're the proof. This isn't just a conversation. You're the proof. You're 13 years old. You're healthy. What have you got to say about this whole thing?

FLORIDA KASEGE, BORN HIV-FREE: Well, I'm blessed. I'm very blessed to have a mother that cares and to have a treatment for this, because so many people around the world have HIV and who are pregnant. And so they don't know about the treatment, and so I feel very blessed to be basically proof that you can get treatment if you are pregnant and have HIV, and you can save your child. So, I feel very blessed.

VELSHI: You're blessed, and you're a blessing to us. Sheila, what is the treatment? What do you do?

NIX: You basically take ARV, so it's just a -

FLORIDA KASEGE, HIV-NEGATIVE: Well, I'm blessed. I'm very blessed to have a mother that cares and to have a treatment for this, because so many people around the world have HIV and who are pregnant. And so, they don't know about the treatment.

ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: Yes.

KASEGE: And -- so I feel very blessed to be basically proof that you can get treatment if you are pregnant and have HIV and you can save your child. So I feel very blessed.

VELSHI: You're blessed and you're a blessing to us.

Sheila, what is the treatment? What do you do?

SHIELA NIX, U.S. EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ONE: You basically take ARV. So, it's just --

VELSHI: Antiretroviral.

NIX: Yes. And you take it at certain points of the pregnancy and then when you go into the labor and stuff like that.

VELSHI: And it works.

NIX: It works. Yes, we know it works. And the good news is there's ways to get it out there. The Global Fund, we're asking world leaders to support that.

VELSHI: Right.

NIX: It's a very effective way. It's made a lot of progress in the fight against HIV, T.B. and malaria. But we believe we can do more. And we really believe that with proper funding, no child has to be born with HIV between -- by 2015. And it's really possible to do.

VELSHI: Wow.

NIX: Yes.

VELSHI: It's great to know that there -- we know the way to do it.

NIX: Right.

VELSHI: We just have to get the word out. That's what we're trying to do here.

Fortunata and Florida, hard to believe you're mother and daughter. You look like sisters. But thank you for being with us. We wish you all the best. And thanks for the great message that you put out here.

Listen, for more information on the -- on ONE's 2015 campaign, it's a great campaign. We've linked to their site. Just go to my Web site, CNN.com/Ali.

Listen, former defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, ready to release his memoirs. Is he going to tell all? Our "CNN Equals Politics" update coming u next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Time for a "CNN Equals Politics" update right now. CNN deputy political editor Paul Steinhauser and senior political editor Mark Preston at our D.C. political desk.

Gentlemen, you got that fancy camera thing going on again. What is going on right now, Paul?

PAUL STEINHAUSER, CNN DEPUTY POLITICAL EDITOR: Ali, I got something brand new for you. You know, it's not even on the Political Ticker yet. You get it first.

Let's talk about West Virginia and the Senate race there. This was the seat long held by the -- Robert Byrd, who died earlier this year. He had the seat since the 1950s.

FreedomWorks, Ali, it's a conservative group, a grassroots organization, that has provided a lot of the organization behind the Tea Party movement. Well, I spoke to a couple of the people at FreedomWorks today. They're going to get involved in the race. They're going to help with get-out-the-vote efforts in West Virginia. They think this is a seat that they may be grab back in the special election come November from the Democrats.

That's what I got. Mark Preston has got a lot more -- Mark.

MARK PRESTON, CNN SR. POLITICAL EDITOR: Well, you know, Ali, there's a lot of talk about the midterm elections. Was the White House engaged in the elections, were they not engaged in the elections?

Well, clearly, the president and the vice president is this week. In fact, President Obama is in Philadelphia. He is raising money for Democrats today. Vice President Biden is in Ohio.

On Wednesday, President Obama goes to New York City for the U.N. General Assembly, but he'll also be raising money for House and Senate Democrats. Meanwhile, let me tick this off, Biden will be in Massachusetts, Maryland and Florida over the next few days, all raising money for Democrats.

Moving on, let's talk about the past administration very quickly. Donald Rumsfeld, the former defense secretary, has a new book out. Our own Alex Mooney who's behind me has this story on CNNPolitics.com. He has it up. The book is going to be called "Known and Unknown." It's supposed to hit book stores on January 25th.

This is what the book is supposed to be about. It will be filled with previously undisclosed details and insights about the Bush administration, 9/11, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. In television, we call that a tease. In the book world, we call that a tease. Now, I'll tell you what? It's got me a little bit interested in what he's going to write.

And let's just take a quick look, Ali, at this really fantastic picture of the USS Ronald Reagan. They are memorializing the late president. In fact, those are all sailors right there, Ali, who spell out the initials R.R. --

VELSHI: Wow.

PRESTON: -- and the number 100, to recognize his 100th birthday which will take place early next year. Very cool stuff on CNNPolitics.com -- Ali.

VELSHI: I didn't know until you pointed out those are actually sailors out there. That is a fantastic.

Guys, what a pleasure to see you both -- Mark Preston and Paul Steinhauser.

We'll be giving you more political updates as the day goes on.

Listen, our "Wordplay" taking a wicked turn. We're going to conjure it up for you -- straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: The topic of today's "Wordplay," you've seen it on TV, on the big screen and now, in politics. It's subject to all kinds of stereotypes. I'm talking about witchcraft.

The dictionary defines witchcraft as an act or instance of employing sorcery, especially with malevolent intent. In a television appearance 11 years ago, Christine O'Donnell said once that she once dabbled in witchcraft. Now that she's a Republican candidate for senator, that admission has come back to haunt her, so to speak.

Republican strategist Karl Rove, a critic of O'Donnell, says churchgoing people are going to want an explanation.

Now, supporters of witchcraft say it's a peaceful religion based on the worship of nature, but some Christians equated with Satanism. During the Salem witch trials in the 17th century, 20 people were put to death in Massachusetts for allegedly practicing witchcraft. But today, many consider witchcraft a harmless fantasy. Countless children go trick or treating as witches or warlocks every holiday, and millions of readers and moviegoers have enjoyed fictional witchcraft of Harry Potter.

O'Donnell, for her part, is trying to defuse the issue with humor. She says if she were still involved with witchcraft, she would have turned Karl Rove into a supporter.

And, of course, there are many practitioners of the Wiccan religion, which a lot of people associate with witchcraft. The holidays are recognized by many employers and authorities as a valid religion.

It's the largest known oil deposit in the world. Want a hint? Nowhere near the Middle East. You might not have heard of it, but it could be a major player in any future energy debate. I'll tell you more about in my "XYZ" after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: Time now for the "XYZ" of it.

Last week, I got a chance to return to Canada's oil sand fields. Never heard of them? The oil sands in Canada's Alberta province contain the largest known oil deposit in the world, even bigger than Saudi Arabia, which makes our friendly neighbor to the north America's biggest supplier of imported oil today. The U.S. imports at least 1.5 million barrels of crude oil per day from the oil sand fields. That number is growing.

U.S. lawmakers are taking notice of it. While I was in Alberta last week, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and two other senators, a Democrat and a Republican, were giving a tour of the fields by the Alberta premier. It's equivalent of a governor.

Graham was so enthralled by what he saw, he told Canadian media outlets that the oil sands are, quote, "a natural treasure for Canada and the United States." He also said that they are a clear win/win. "We've got shared values but we've also got shared needs," end quote.

Not everyone shares that view. The oil is mixed in the sand. It takes a lot of energy and water just to make it into the equivalent of crude oil, and that extra processing that it takes to refine oil from the oil sand releases more carbon emission into the atmosphere than traditional drilling. Because of that, oil sand emissions are going to reach 8 percent of Canada's total output, which, by the way, is still minuscule compared to the huge amount of coal-induced carbon emissions that are put out by the United States or china today.

But as worldwide demand for oil grows and the search for new cleaner sources of energy -- well, it's still in its infancy, it's not clear whether concerns about environmental damage will overcome America's desire to buy more oil from friendly stable countries like Canada. But as long as we have this huge source of energy right at our doorstep, the oil sands needs to be a part of the debate over America's energy security.

That's it for me. Time now for "RICK'S LIST" with Brooke Baldwin filling in for Rick Sanchez -- Brooke.