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Bishop Long: "I'm Going to Fight"; Building Ban Running Out; Prospect for Mideast Peace; What College Freshmen Need to Know; The President's Week Ahead

Aired September 26, 2010 - 17:00   ET

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

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: But meantime, the big concern is about this levee failure in Portage, Wisconsin. Jacqui Jeras from the Severe Weather Center now. Jacqui, what more do we know about exactly where this took place in Portage?

JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes. This is on the south side. This is near the Blackhawk Park Area. They're asking people to evacuate immediately. They say that the dam here, this is the Caledonia Levee, south of Highway 33 is failing at this time. So emergency vehicles, police, fire are all trying to get in there. They say they're not going to be able to reach residents if they don't get out now. Hopefully most of those people have already done that.

Here's the area we're talking about. I zoomed in very closely. This is Highway 33 right along here. This is the Wisconsin River, and my guess is right in this area is right where that dam is - the levee, rather, the Caledonia Levee.

So this is really all the information that we have at this time. The river did crest, according to the National Weather Service, earlier this morning. That was just a couple of hours ago. And that's still a lot of pressure from this rushing water. All the gates have been opened trying to get that water downstream.

But the flooding situation, as you know, has just been extreme across parts of Wisconsin and Minnesota as well. We've got a number of warnings which remain in effect. You can see all of those green boxes, anywhere between four and 11 inches of rain fell earlier in the week. And, of course, all of that water runs off and takes its time before it crests and makes its way downstream.

So we'll continue to monitor the situation, a very dangerous situation unfolding now as that levee is beginning to fail. Fredricka?

WHITFIELD: All right. Jacqui, thanks so much. Going to follow up on that with Kathy Johnson, I think she's the Deputy Director at the Emergency Management of Columbia County.

So give me an idea of how you're able to get these evacuations under way. Mandatory or is it voluntary at this point?

KATHY JOHNSON, DEP. DIR., EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT, WISCONSIN (via telephone): All the - all evacuations are voluntary. We cannot force anyone to come out if they choose not to. We are just encouraging that people do because of the situation where the access going in to this area will not be passable. Which means that police, fire, EMS will not be able to get into these residents, if need be.

WHITFIELD: And how many people are we talking in this area?

JOHNSON: I'm not really sure how many people there are.

WHITFIELD: Is it pretty significant? You know, is that a community -

JOHNSON: The whole area - the whole area -

WHITFIELD: -- or is this very rural?

JOHNSON: -- the whole area is about 150 homes. Some of the homes are higher than others. But it all goes in and out through one road, so.

WHITFIELD: And what does Emergency Management need right now to help out people?

JOHNSON: We need people to listen to the fact that we are asking them to leave because we have residents that are saying, I'm high and dry. Don't want to leave, and I don't think they understand the - the emergency part of it if someone needs to get in to them. So that is where our concern is.

At 4:00 today, which is two minutes ago, they were putting a hard closure, which means that the road into the Blackhawk Park Area is being closed. So anyone that is in there right now basically will not be able to come out if they don't come out immediately.

WHITFIELD: Are you concerned that ultimately boats or perhaps even helicopters would have to be used to help out some of the people who are refusing to leave now because they might be in danger later?

JOHNSON: Correct.

WHITFIELD: All right. Kathy Johnson with the Emergency Management of Columbia County. Thanks so much for your time. Appreciate that.

JOHNSON: You're welcome.

WHITFIELD: All the best.

JOHNSON: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: Meantime, another top story of the day. We continue to follow David versus Goliath, a biblical battle that Pastor Eddie Long says he identifies with as he fights sexual abuse allegations.

In lawsuits filed last week, four men claim Long coerced them into sexual relationships while they were in their late teens. Bishop Long addressed the scandal today during a sermon to his Atlanta-area congregation. Without specifically mentioning the lawsuits, Long insisted that he is under attack and, quote, "not the man that's been portrayed on television".

You're seeing him in images right there with his wife earlier. Well, after the service, he talked to reporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BISHOP EDDIE LONG, NEWBIRTH MISSIONARY BAPTIST CHURCH: I just want to take this moment and to address you again, as I - as the advice of counsel, I am not going to address the allegations and the attack that's been levied upon me at this moment because, again, as I stated earlier in the service, you know, I want this to be dealt in the court of justice and not by public opinion.

I will say that I am going to fight, fight very vigorously against these charges. And I've been at this church for 23 years. I - this is the first time I realize that we are as important as we are to get this much attention. And we're going to continue as a church to do the things that we do to touch the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: So many people, including members of Long's church, were anxiously awaiting to see what the pastor would say this morning specifically about the allegations. CNN's Martin Savidge has been covering this story all weekend long and was at the church.

So, overwhelmingly, do people - were they pleased at what the pastor has to say and how he handled this?

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's interesting. We got there at 5:30 in the morning, and there were already people in the parking lot waiting for the church to open so they could go inside for a service that would not begin until 8:00 in the morning. So that was quite remarkable and it showed you the anticipation because this was the first time that the bishop was going to speak publicly.

Yes, we've heard from his attorneys, we've heard from his spokespeople, but this was him facing his family, as he put it.

And so as we watched people go in, a great mixture of emotions. You know, some people were playing the music, and they were feeling the spirit very much. Others were going in and they didn't want to talk to the media. I even saw a few people who were in tears as they were just fearful of what they might hear.

But once it began, once it was quite clear that the bishop was defiant in his stance, well, as we talked to people when they came out, most of them were highly supportive of the bishop. Only a few did we find skeptical. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think he made his membership feel comfortable, but by saying that that just is not who - who he is, that's not who he is. It's not who any of us believe he is. And - but he's not perfect. He's not perfect. None of us are.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He really didn't say anything. He seemed like he avoided the subject. He just said what he wanted to say and what he wanted to get at. I don't think he said anything.

SAVIDGE: OK.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I know no more now than I did when I came here.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SAVIDGE: And that's one aspect here is that there were some parishioners who wanted to hear him say, "I am innocent" and wanted to hear him defiantly say, "This did not happen."

WHITFIELD: But instead his language was, "I will fight this."

SAVIDGE: Right. And his language was, of course, quoting scripture and in - in some ways people thought that perhaps he was speaking more to the fact that he might be deposed and asked legal questions or asked on the stand later about what he said. And therefore he didn't speak -

In other words, he left himself some wiggle room. But, again, we could be parsing too much of this. One thing I should point out is that we were told we were going to have a news conference afterwards. Instead, Bishop Long came out. His attorney said, there will be no questions, you will know that which was a total surprise. We've been brought in to the room believing we could ask questions. We were not allowed to ask. You know, we did anyway, but it did no good. The bishop left immediately after making his statement.

WHITFIELD: The attorneys answered the questions?

SAVIDGE: No, no. We were surprised because we thought at least perhaps the attorneys would take some of our questions. No one did.

WHITFIELD: So then what's next now for the pastor as it pertains to Newbirth? Will he carry on as scheduled, or is there any reason to believe that perhaps he's spoken, an associate, you know, pastor may speak at the church from here on out for a while, that he's going to be quiet and hidden away or -- ?

SAVIDGE: I think he can go - there was a lot of people, many of us in the media and those of us who follow religion, had thought perhaps he would step down temporarily, and that might have been the announcement that he was going to make at today's service. But we knew the moment he said, I have been here and I will be here next week, that that certainly wasn't going to happen.

So he is going to continue to be very much in the public. He's going to continue his leadership role. I think what we wonder is what evidence may come next. Could there be further young men who come forward with stories similar to the ones that have already been told?

WHITFIELD: That so far four.

SAVIDGE: Right.

WHITFIELD: (INAUDIBLE). SAVIDGE: So far we have four, there could be more suits. It remains to be seen what happens next. Or do we just wait until all of this gets into a courtroom? One thing we do know is that the gauntlet's been thrown down and Bishop Eddie Long says that he is going to fight.

WHITFIELD: All right. Martin Savidge, thanks so much for reporting on all of this all weekend long and we'll be hearing more from you throughout the week. Thanks so much.

All right. Also, an Israeli moratorium on building settlements in the West Bank officially runs out in less than an hour. What this means for peace talks?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: An Israeli moratorium on building settlements in the West Bank officially runs out in about 45 minutes. It's a major sticking point in peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians.

But as our Paula Newton (sic) reports from the West Bank, some settlers aren't waiting for the official end.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Settlers this Sunday are putting on a show for the media and for the world. It's a show of victory that as far as they're concerned, the freeze is over. And it's business as usual when it comes to building settlements in the West Bank.

Now, in the settlements of Kiryat Netafim, settlers had a groundbreaking ceremony, a symbolic gesture. They're pouring concrete for the cameras, but also with a message that as soon as Monday, that is what they intend to be doing in the West Bank - across the West Bank for the next days, weeks, months and years.

But there is a worry among many settlers that even though the freeze has not been extended officially, they may see a silent extension. And they may find it more difficult to have their building permits approved by the powers that be.

DANNY DANON, LIKUD PARTY: We would have to fight the bureaucracy. We would have to fight the Defense Minister, Ehud Barak. We're not supporting the settlement. It is the beginning of the process.

But if you look at the (INAUDIBLE), it was always the forces (ph) and we have to fight for the existence of the Jewish people.

HANCOCKS: A countdown on Sunday. More than a thousand settlers in the Revava Settlement came to what they see as a new building season followed by 2,000 balloons that they released to symbolize 2,000 new buildings ready to go here.

But he now says that 13,000 buildings which have already been approved and they could actually start building on those on Monday. Now, there was a Peace Now rally in Jerusalem just outside the prime minister's residence, and it's turned pretty hairy and pretty frustrated at one point. We had (INAUDIBLE), one of the leaders of Peace Now making a speech. A right-wing member of the public obviously did not appreciate what he was saying, and it did get pretty heated.

But the fact is the U.S., the U.N., the European Union and the Palestinians have all asked Israel to extend this settlement freeze. As we know, there has been no official announcement. We weren't expecting an official announcement, but Peace Now is with all those countries saying the settlements must stop.

YARIV OPPENHEIMER, DIRECTOR, PEACE NOW: Unfortunately, along the years, especially in the last decades, the number of settlers has doubled. And we see today that there are over 300,000 settlers living around the West Bank.

HANCOCKS: So settlers here are celebrating what they say as a green light to keep building settlements across the West Bank. It's really not certain when it comes to the Israeli government whether or not they will have those permits approved.

Paula Hancocks, CNN, in the Revava Settlement in the West Bank.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Palestinian Leader Mahmoud Abbas says peace talks will be a, quote, "waste of time", unquote, if settlement construction resumes. There was talk of a possible compromise earlier in the week.

So joining me now is CNN Senior State Department Producer, Elise Labott, who is in our New York Bureau. So, Elise, what are you hearing right now as to what really is happening?

ELISE LABOTT, CNN SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT PRODUCER: Well, Fredericka, there are a lot of intense negotiations going on up till the very last minute. Officials from all sides are telling us that Secretary of State Clinton, Peace Envoy George Mitchell and those Israeli and Palestinian negotiating teams really trying to come up with a formula that will allow the Israelis to appear not to have caved but to also keep Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas at those talks.

Now, there's a tremendous amount of frustration on the point of the U.S., Fredericka, because they've really put a lot of political capital into getting these peace talks on, wanting to see them continue or kind of telling the parties, don't let this opportunity pass you by. But as the clock ticks down, we're waiting to see what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is going to do.

WHITFIELD: So roughly 44 minutes ago. What happens tomorrow if no deal?

LABOTT: Well, we're really not expecting any grand announcements tonight, as Paula has said. Anything that the Israelis are going to come up seem to be kind of ambiguous and vague and could be interpreted in many different ways.

And so what U.S. officials expect is there's going to be no extension of the deadline, the moratorium will expire, but then there will be some kind of caveats about restraint, about reviewing settlement policy, as Paula had said, maybe those permits would take a little bit longer, and that would buy the parties a few more months to get those peace talks going.

So it looks as if there's not going to be any precipitous announcements on the part of the Israelis or the Palestinians. Of course, we can't deny that they're going to be some kind of settlers or politicians that are going to be making some noise, trying to interrupt that process.

But we think that what's going to happen is the deadline is going to expire. They're going to keep on talking for the next few days. We understand that the Arab states are going to be meeting next week.

WHITFIELD: Yes.

LABOTT: They're not going to be making any announcements about walking out of the talks right away. They're going to meet next week perhaps in Cairo to discuss what the Arabs should do. Possibly allow prime - Palestinian President Abbas to walk out of those talks. But it's really unclear what he'll do without some kind of serious gesture from the Israelis. All right, Fred.

WHITFIELD: State Department Producer, Elise Labott, thanks so much, joining us from New York. Appreciate it.

All right. What would cause the Pentagon to torch nearly 10,000 books? What an army intelligence officer's new memoir reveals about the war in Afghanistan right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: So the new college year has started and millions of freshmen are facing life on their own for the very first time and some still call home for advice. But these days many kids just look things up on the internet.

So what are they looking for? What kinds of instructions? How-tos? Heather Cabot is Yahoo!'s Web Life Editor. She's joining us right now from New York. Good to see you.

HEATHER CABOT, YAHOO!'S WEB LIFE EDITOR: Thank you. Good to see you, too.

WHITFIELD: This made - this made me start thinking, like, what were some of the things that I wanted to know that freshmen year? I think I probably just didn't know how to grocery shop.

CABOT: Right.

WHITFIELD: But it came down to like, you know, feeding myself. I didn't know what to get at the store. So you have done a study to find out what they're searching for online to find out, you know, what are the top how-tos, and what did you find that topped the list?

CABOT: So what we did at Yahoo! is we looked at the top how-to queries among 18 to 22-year-olds. And the top one - how to do laundry. So I'm sure for you, that was probably a big question. I know it was for me. I'm sure there are a lot of college freshmen walking around right now with the -

WHITFIELD: Yes.

CABOT: -- pink socks and underwear because they didn't know to separate, right?

WHITFIELD: And that was me, too.

CABOT: Yes. But the thing is, and what really is a sign of the times, I mean, in the old days you might call mom up and sheepishly tell her that you've made this mistake. Now you don't have to do that anymore.

WHITFIELD: Right.

CABOT: You just go online and ask the question and find out. So how to do laundry is - is a really big one right now. Also how to cope with stress.

WHITFIELD: (INAUDIBLE).

CABOT: Searches for how to cope with stress, up 189 percent just this week. We're also seeing searches for how to deal with long-distance relationships. People looking for tips on that. Those are up 40 percent.

WHITFIELD: That's a big number.

CABOT: So a lot of people, you know, high school sweethearts trying to figure out how to navigate the long-distance relationship.

WHITFIELD: Yes. They get over that after the first year they realize, forget it. Why do that?

CABOT: (INAUDIBLE).

WHITFIELD: OK. And then they want to know about their textbooks. They kind of need some help navigating how to - what, how to find the best deal on these textbooks or what they really need out of them?

CABOT: I am so sorry, but I completely lost you. But what I can tell you is that people are very interested in what constitutes plagiarism. We've seen a lot of searches for that as well as how to cite a textbook and how to cite a website. And literally, this is what kids are typing into search engines. Kids between the ages of 18 to 22 on Yahoo!. WHITFIELD: OK. And how to cite a website was another, how to cite a textbook. And then they want to know how to cook. Once they've realized that they're on their own, mom's not there to cook for them anymore, they want to know how to make spaghetti. Are you able to hear me on that one?

CABOT: I am so sorry, Fredericka. I think our connection dropped out.

WHITFIELD: Oh, no.

CABOT: I cannot hear your question. But I - I can tell you that we also saw a lot of cooking questions which you referenced in the beginning. Searches for how to cook spaghetti are up 600 percent over the last month.

And also a big one, how to hard boil an egg. And we took a look at Yahoo! to see how many results actually come up when you type that in. If you want to find out how to hard boil an egg, you can find more than nine million results on Yahoo!.

A lot of them were videos, actually, and that's really a trend today, too, is that it's very big right now on the internet for people to upload how-to videos. Obviously, there are professional cooking sites and things like that and some terrific resources, but also, if you look on YouTube, there are all kinds of how-tos that are there. And I think college students are very savvy and they know they can turn to the web and get all kinds of advice.

WHITFIELD: Oh, fantastic. Heather Cabot with Yahoo!'s Web Life - or she's the Web Life Editor of Yahoo!. Thanks for hanging in there. She lost our audio there so she shouldered on anyway and got us through all those how-tos. Thanks so much.

All right. The politics of health care hot-button issue in the Midterms. We'll take a closer look next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All right. We're keeping a close watch on Portage, Wisconsin, because we understand that there has been a levee that's been compromised there after all that flooding that's taken place. And officials are telling people who live in the Blackhawk Park Area, that it's time to leave voluntary evac - voluntary evacuations are under way.

All that rain has certainly caused a lot of problems. Jacqui Jeras has been telling us a lot about what's been taking place in that area. Many rivers have crested and in Wisconsin and in Minnesota, and possibly there might be activity tomorrow as well. Today's Minnesota Governor has even been touring some of the damaged areas, right, Jacqui?

JERAS: Yes. And it's really bad. You know, even though some of these rivers have crested, Fredericka, keep in mind that they're still in flood. So this is going to be a problem for a couple days and many of these rivers are all going to be dumping into the Mississippi River which then in turn will rise up and we'll see some flooding there may be in Lacrosse and into the Winona Area later in the week.

Now, the big concern at this hour is in Columbia County. And this is the Portage Area that we're talking about. And to put it in perspective for you, we'll put this on Google Earth, this is in central parts of Wisconsin, and this is right along the Wisconsin River. And what's happened is that that river has crested early this morning at the second highest crest on record. And this is a very old levee system.

What we're learning now from the Wisconsin DNR is that this is a 14- mile-long levee system, and it's basically made out of sand. So it's kind of like a dike. It's not a bridge or anything like that. And there have been efforts to try and patch the levee. And unfortunately, they've been unsuccessful.

About 300 residences are being threatened in this area. They're not sure how many of those people remain. And this levee is in the process of being compromised. And so if this completely fails, the road is going to be washed out and then law enforcement officials wouldn't be able to get in to rescue any people.

This is hydrological map here that shows you the river gauges here at Portage and there you can see that big crest earlier this morning. So it's going to slowly start to fall off the next couple of days. And this was literally, what, a tenth of a foot shy of that record. So just a tremendous amount of power from this water and a tremendous amount of pressure on a very old levee system. On the Wisconsin DNR website, it says basically the only reason why this levee hasn't been compromised in the past is because it hasn't had this much pressure before. It just hasn't seen a major flood like this. So dangerous moments and a scary situation unfolding right now in central Wisconsin.

WHITFIELD: Yeah, it's come in a very big way. All right, thank you, Jacqui.

Increased scrutiny for the Pentagon after about 10,000 copies of an army intelligence officer's memoir were burned. Defense Department officials say the book threatened national security. It's called, the book is, "Operation Dark Heart." And last hour I spoke with the author, Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, about what it was like having to re-edit the book for the second printing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTHONY SHAFFER, AUTHOR: I sat through the process of going through the redactions. The army directed me after -- Department of Defense, primarily defense intelligence agency had problems with the manuscript, so I worked with the Department of Defense for two weeks going through the entire book again. The whole process was one where two different standards were used. The standard I used with the army and the standard of the D.O.D. applied were vastly different. And I think that's why you see the drama which unfolded and the interest of D.O.D. to come in and change things the way they did. And, you know, I can't argue against D.O.D. D.O.D. has a prerogative to do this. However, I've said several times that I thought the way they looked at it was inappropriate by the fact that they didn't bother to check with the sourcing of my research assistant and everything that she did to make sure that everything was found in the open public sector in some form or the other people -- the individuals who had worked with me in the army to actually go through item by item. They had tons of questions I had to answer relating to sourcing.

WHITFIELD: Were you worried while compiling the facts, while recalling your memories of your missions while you were crafting this book? Were you worried at all or thinking about national security first and foremost?

SCHAFFER: Absolutely.

WHITFIELD: Or were you thinking mostly about, you know, I want to tell my story regardless of how this might impact national security?

SCHAFFER: That's a great question. Let me answer it in two parts. First, we made sure that nothing in the way of technical information relating to frequencies, technology or anything that could actually give the enemy an advantage that was completely off limits. Nothing was ever discussed.

Secondly, specific techniques which have never been exposed publicly in any regard were completely left off the table. There's a number of things which we did I can't get into.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: So we did reach out to the Defense Department about why the Pentagon burned 10,000 copies of this book. No one was available for comment today. But earlier we got the following statement from Lieutenant General Ronald Burgess with the Defense Intelligence Agency, saying this, quote, "The DIA's investigation identified significant classified information, the release of which I have determined could reasonably be expected to cause serious damage to national security." It goes on to say, quote, "The manuscript contains secret activities of the U.S. special operations command, CIA and National Security Agency," end quote.

On to politics now and a rare situation in California. "The San Francisco Chronicle" newspaper says it will not endorse anyone in the hotly contested California Senate race. Former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina is battling incumbent Democrat Barbara Boxer in what has sometimes become a rather nasty race. The paper says Californians are left with a deeply unsatisfying choice.

And President Barack Obama is hitting the road again this week to push his economic message. Ahead are stops in backyards in Des Moines as well as Albuquerque. Joining me right now from Washington is Jonathan Allen, political reporter for Politico.com. Good to see you.

JONATHAN ALLEN, POLITICO.COM: Good evening.

WHITFIELD: So Jonathan, let's talk about the president's schedule and why he is campaigning for the most part for his policy.

ALLEN: Well, I think there's a deep desire not only among Democrats but among Americans, in general, to hear a little bit more from the president about what he's doing to rescue the economy. You know, we've heard him say that he was going to focus like a laser on the economy. But since then there's been a lot of talk about his health care agenda. There's been a lot of talk about Middle East peace.

And I think, you know, in the run-up to the election, I think you're going to hear him talk a lot more specifically about the economy and the benefits of the health care package and how those relate to the economy for individuals. We've seen some of those benefits, the six-month period benefits starting to come into effect now. So I think there's a feeling that there's been an inability of the president to communicate effectively on what he's done for the American people and what would have happened had he not stepped in. And that's very important, obviously, to his party in the upcoming midterm election.

WHITFIELD: And when on Tuesday he's in Albuquerque, he's kind of returning to a format he's been very comfortable. And we saw him doing it when he was campaigning for presidency, these town hall meetings. In this case in Albuquerque, he'll be meeting face to face with a number of families talking about the economy. Hearing from them directly, what they need, what they want changed. And he's going to give kind of back-and-forth dialogue on what is really going to be feasible or possible?

ALLEN: Well, it's really a good opportunity for the president to appear to be addressing the concerns of the people in the audience. Of course, the White House is able to control those audiences, who comes in, who asks questions. I think not only President Obama but a lot of candidates in recent years have decided that those were a good opportunity to show them as competent on the issues, as understanding what people are going through, on being able to respond to specific questions. So it is a good format, generally speaking. It's not like these town hall members of Congress have though where they get asked hostile questions or run into people who simply have come to shout them down.

WHITFIELD: On Wednesday, he'll be heading to Des Moines. He'll be doing something similar, talking to families there. But along the way when he stops in Madison, Wisconsin, he will be talking politics. He'll be attending a DNC rally. We are talking about midterm elections. What is the greatest worry for the president in terms of what message he needs to hit home to try and save Democrats who are up for office?

ALLEN: I think what you're hearing more and more from Democrats right now and Bill Clinton certainly gave this advice recently is that they have to make the argument that they deserve a couple more years to let their program move forward for the American people, that things would have been a lot worse. You're going to hear the president hit that. As far as the worst fear goes for them, obviously the president's agenda will run into a roadblock if Republicans take control of the House. And it will be severely hampered even if there are major gains for Republicans. You see a diminished Democratic majority in the House and also in the Senate. So this is really high-stakes time for the president's agenda and for his supporters if they want to see that agenda move forward.

WHITFIELD: And Jonathan, I wonder too if his agenda is in trouble or in anything is in peril as we're hearing rumors about some key members of his cabinet, his support base who may be thinking about leaving, who have left most recently. I'm talking about Rahm Emanuel. He's considering the Chicago mayoral run. And then there's also word that David Axelrod may also be thinking about departing the White House. What would this do to the president's agenda? Or does this mean pressing a real restart button for him?

ALLEN: It is a little bit about pressing a restart button. It shouldn't be surprising that Rahm Emanuel leave after a couple of years as chief of staff even if he wasn't interested in running for mayor of Chicago. The career expectancy of a White House chief of staff is about that of a rodeo clown or NFL running back. These guys don't stick around very long.

WHITFIELD: Maybe he wouldn't mind the analogy with a running back, but I don't know, rodeo clown.

ALLEN: Well, I mean, it's a dangerous job and everybody's out for you. You get speared pretty quickly in that job.

WHITFIELD: OK.

ALLEN: But there should probably be other departures after the election, too, maybe some cabinet secretaries to look for on the horizon.

WHITFIELD: All right, Jonathan Allen, although I do love a rodeo clown when I go to the rodeo, but you know, I don't know what David Axelrod and Rahm Emanuel would think about that.

ALLEN: It's not their first rodeos.

WHITFIELD: OK, very good. Jonathan Allen, thanks so much. Good to see you.

ALLEN: Take care.

WHITFIELD: All right, several key provisions of the health care reform law which took effect this past week. Preventative care like mammograms and immunizations now must be covered. Children can stay on their parents' policies until the age of 26. And lifetime coverage limits are gone. But some of these changes may only be temporary if Republicans have their way. Many say repealing the new health care law will be first item on the agenda if the GOP gains a congressional majority after the midterm elections.

So I talked about that with health care expert Andrew Rubin.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANDREW RUBIN, HEALTH CARE EXPERT: As someone who works in the health care industry and understands it pretty well. Health care reform does not work if you start picking apart pieces of this. And what Republicans are talking about doing is they're latching on to public opinion polls which say a good chunk of Americans don't support health care reform. But what they want to do is they want to, quote, "fix it" and take provisions out of the bill that was turned into law. And quite frankly, it just won't work because health care is so interconnected. And it's so complicated, as we all know. So to start picking up our pieces of it, the whole thing will collapse. I don't know what's going to happen. I got to tell you, if they do start picking apart pieces of this and they actually succeed in the political circles, then health care reform basically would have to start all over because it won't work.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Andrew Rubin is their health expert, so for more information on the health care law and Republicans efforts to repeal it potentially, go to CNN.com.

All right, Josh Levs is coming up with a special edition of "Viral Videos." What do you have going for us?

JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, we're going to liven things up for a few minutes, Fred. You know, some viral videos take months to create like this. All that work might be rewarded in a whole new way. This video by a Swedish band that's on a short list in a competition by YouTube and the Guggenheim, their search for the most creative videos in the world. Plus, some videos on the short list that you have seen that made it. I'm going to show you them right after this.

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WHITFIELD: A look at our top stories right now, U.S. negotiators are scrambling to keep Middle East peace talks from collapsing this weekend as a ban on Jewish settlement building is set to expire. Palestinian leaders say if construction resumes, that's enough of a reason to walk away from the table. But so far Israel has refused to extend the ban on building in the West Bank.

And Hyundai is planning to recall thousands of brand-new sedans because of potential steering problems. We're talking about nearly 140,000 Sonatas, all of them 2011 models built in Alabama. They say it's possible joints in the steering column were not put together correctly. And that could cause a complete loss of steering. They will officially start the recall in October.

And Lindsay Lohan is voluntarily checking herself into a substance abuse rehab program in the next few days. That's what a source close to the actress told CNN today. Her decision comes two days after a judge ordered her to jail without bail because she failed a drug test. She was later released on $300,000 bond.

Ooh, this is a special edition of "Viral Videos" today, Josh Levs with us now.

LEVS: I told you a little bit about it yesterday. This is wild. What they're doing, YouTube and the Guggenheim have gotten together, let's show this video, and they have this basically search for the world's most creative and innovative videos out there. And they had more than 23,000 submissions for this. People out there who have made these videos, groups submitted all these. They've had people actually go through all of them.

And after this long search, they have chosen 125 as the short list right now. What they're going to be doing, you can look at these all online right now. They're ultimately going to be putting up 20 and announcing the 20 most creative, most innovative videos in October. And you can see these videos at the Guggenheim kiosks around the world. It will be a lot of prestige that goes along with it. What we've done yesterday and today --

WHITFIELD: The Guggenheim name behind it.

LEVS: You and I talked about this, a lot of videos are modern art, right? It's like a new form of expression. People put a lot of work into these. That's why we're going to start with an example of one that took eight months to create. Eight months from a Swedish band. I can't pronounce the name of this band. No one can. It's going to be on your screen, though. I mean, very few people in this country. There you go. Right after youtube.com, that's it.

WHITFIELD: Will it stay there for eight months?

LEVS: Look at all those Legos. So we can practice? Look at all those Legos. It took about 1,500 hours to make the Lego animations that you're seeing and that's just part of the video. Then they go into sort of other celebrations of kid games and retro stuff but really amazing work.

WHITFIELD: It is amazing.

LEVS: Yeah.

WHITFIELD: Now it looks like a birthday cake.

LEVS: It does. I think that's what they're going for. In a similar vein, the U.S. group OK, Go. They keep doing funky videos. We've seen them before. This is one that's also on the short list. Take a look. This is from "This Too Shall Pass." Their giant machine.

WHITFIELD: I think I remember this one.

LEVS: You remember this one.

WHITFIELD: Yeah, I do. LEVS: This made the short list for among the most innovative ever. It was this massive, actually put it into second place too. Just to remind you how huge it is, what happens in this video, stuff falls all over the place, everything explodes. And ultimately it was all one shot.

WHITFIELD: That's the thing. I was going to say, was this one take?

LEVS: One shot. It was one shot. I think it was maybe the second take. But all the time to set this up.

WHITFIELD: Oh, my gosh.

LEVS: Modern art on YouTube. Managed all over the world, here's one from Brancos Bardo (ph), I think I'm saying that right. He's a film student in the National University of Arts in Bucharest. This film, "Life Buoy" was a project that he did for his degree. He set up these shots. He's basically lying there, but he tells a story in all these pixels, more than 5,400 photographs were shot using a mix of stop-animation techniques. When you watch it, I'm looking at it. He's got a bike.

WHITFIELD: That's very cool. I was having a hard time figuring out what I was seeing before, the imagery. This I get.

LEVS: See? It's cool. And just the time they spend on this. Now, this is a whole different one. We're going to watch this that also made the short list. This is called the "Mother of all Funk." Ophir Kutiel, professionally known as Kutiman, he's a musician, composer, producer and animator from Israel. He created this online video project through you, and "Time" last year named it one of the best, 50 best inventions. What he does is he takes all this footage out there of amateur musicians, and he turns it into what "Time" calls this incredibly funky music sound. So we're just seeing random --

WHITFIELD: A mix of everybody.

LEVS: Bring it in full for a second so we can hear it. Unrelated music. She's, like, mm-hmm.

WHITFIELD: It's funky. No, no. It's funky. I'm acknowledging the funk.

LEVS: It's got a little funk to it. When you're in the mood. All right. Now, here's another one that's a whole different kind of funky.

WHITFIELD: Yeah.

LEVS: There's this new phenom going on. And the short list has pretty much the pioneer of this, all right? Let's go to it. Known as the pioneer of what's called tilt shift time lapse technique. This is actual video of people in Australia, in Sydney. But there's this photographer who basically figured out that if he used a combination of time lapse and stop motion, it looks like miniature. WHITFIELD: Yeah, it does. I'm like, these are really people?

LEVS: This is Keith Lotite (ph) who just does really impressive work. And we're hearing this song "Clementine" by "Washington."

WHITFIELD: How long did it take to do this?

LEVS: And, in a way, this is doubling as your relaxation video. Feeling it?

WHITFIELD: Whatever there's water, that usually makes me relax. Yes.

LEVS: Let's get the water.

WHITFIELD: I love the coast. Anybody's coast. Did the guy just fall in the water?

LEVS: No, he actually -- I saw that at first, too. People jump in and dive, they get in the water. Because it's stop motion sometimes, you only see bits.

WHITFIELD: Making like a little bob. There he is, he's swimming now. Whew!

LEVS: He's OK. He was saved.

WHITFIELD: Throw him a life raft. OK.

LEVS: So you all can check out all 125. I've posted the links on Facebook and Twitter. You can see my pages right here. And as always, that's the place to send me your favorite virals including a relaxation video for Fred. Tweet, we'll be back on Saturday.

WHITFIELD: OK, we can't wait. Always good stuff.

Hey, going back, did you always like your school lunches?

LEVS: Did I always like my school lunches?

WHITFIELD: Did you ever like them at all? I mean, it was kind of fun because it meant socializing but do you remember the food? Did you get into the food?

LEVS: I think it was pretty gross a lot of the time, but I was so young, I didn't care. I would eat the pizza, I would eat the burgers. Did you?

WHITFIELD: I have fond memories with the food.

LEVS: Associated with it.

WHITFIELD: I think I really loved the tater tots and the pizza at the time but of course now that I know --

LEVS: The chocolate milk, every day, chocolate milk. WHITFIELD: I wasn't into chocolate milk. Just plain old milk. We're going to talk about school lunches. It's eatocracy week. We're going to be talking about that. And there are some very inventive ways that folks are trying to get kids to like good, healthy stuff, food.

LEVS: Wow, I've got to take notes.

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WHITFIELD: My favorite topic, let's talk food, the kind that's good for you and it tastes good. School lunches are getting an overhaul from a celebrity chef on a mission. Chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta has more on this edition of "Eatocracy."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Chef Ann Cooper is on a mission, to revolutionize the national school lunch program that feeds more than 30 million children a day.

CHEF ANN COOPER, "RENEGADE LUNCH LADY": School lunch in America is chicken nuggets, Tater Tots, chocolate milk with high fructose corn syrup.

GUPTA: This celebrity chef who has turned into a Renegade Lunch Lady, has already brought her school lunch revolution from cafeterias in Harlem, New York to Berkley, California and Boulder, Colorado and she tells us she isn't stopping there.

COOPER: It's really - I mean, not easy to change but really changeable. I mean, you can change those chicken nuggets to roast chicken, the Tater Tots to roast potatoes. You can add salad bars.

GUPTA: Parents who came to hear her Cooper speak at an elementary school in Atlanta, Georgia, experienced school lunch, Chef Ann style. According to the CDC, one in three children born in the United States will develop diabetes, one in three and 30 percent of them are overweight. The cost to treat diabetes, $174 billion every year.

COOPER: We're going to pay now or we're going to pay later. We're going to pay for healthy foods and healthy kids or we're going to pay later with an obesity and diabetes crisis.

GUPTA: Cooper has launched a free web site called the lunchbox.org with 80 recipes to spread the healthy lunch revolution to schools all across the country.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And all week long, we'll be looking at food's lasting imprint. Catch our series, "Eatocracy: Mind, Body and Wallet." I'm Fredricka Whitfield, thanks so much for joining us. Don Lemon is coming up next with more in the NEWSROOM. There he is waving. He's ready to roll. One of his top stories o course will be about Bishop Eddie Long and that sex scandal and the bishop taking to the pulpit today. Don Lemon, coming up next in the NEWSROOM. I'm Fredricka Whitfield, have a great day.

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