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Pres. Karzai Cries During Speech; Emanuel to Leave White House; U.S. Soldiers Accused of Killing for Sport; Former Air Force Officers Claim Aliens Visited Nuclear Facilities in 60s; Boos for Bristol Palin's Dancing; Pew Research Poll: Atheists and Agnostics Know More About Religion; In Search of Healthy Food
Aired September 28, 2010 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR, "AMERICAN MORNING": Meantime, the news continue on CNN with Kyra Phillips in the CNN NEWSROOM.
Good morning, Kyra.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Are you saying there's no E.T.?
ROBERTS: No. I'm not saying that. Just getting myself in trouble again here. I just don't think E.T. has visited earth yet.
CHETRY: And he doesn't know if he likes M&Ms.
ROBERTS: And you could stop e-mailing me.
(LAUGHTER)
PHILLIPS: Well, Kiran and I love M&Ms. That's for sure. We're not putting those away. All right, guys. Have a great day.
Good morning, everybody. Here's what we're working on this morning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CPL. JEREMY MORLOCK, U.S. ARMY: He pulled out one of his grenades, American grenade, you know, popped it, throws the grenade, and then tells me (EXPLETIVE DELETED), all right, dude. You know wax this guy. Kill this guy, kill this guy.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Targeting civilians in a combat zone. American soldiers, our own, accused of killing unarmed Afghans just for the fun of it then covering up the crime.
Organic. Natural. You see those buzz words on food labels. You think you're eating well. Well, we've got a reality check for you.
And surprising results on a religion IQ test. Atheists and agnostics actually score higher than Christians.
It's 9:00 a.m. on the East Coast, 6:00 a.m. out west. I'm Kyra Phillips. You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I tell you what, we begin with a pretty disheartening story out of Iraq that is still developing at this hour. One of our own, sworn to protect and serve this country, Specialist Neftaly Platero suspected of fatally shooting two military comrades and wounding another fellow trooper.
He's now being held in a pretrial detention for the shooting deaths of Specialist John Carrillo of Stockton, California and Private 1st Class Gebrah Noonan of Watertown, Connecticut.
It happened last Thursday but details are just now being released. As soon as we get more information, we'll bring it to you.
And new developments involving Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The president broke down in tears making a very emotional comment during a speech that just wrapped up a short time ago.
CNN's Ivan Watson joining us now from Kabul.
Ivan, bring us up to speed.
IVAN WATSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Kyra. Hamid Karzai, he was at this ceremony that was supposed to be celebrating achievements in Afghan literacy and education for International Literacy Day in Afghanistan.
Instead, in front of an audience of hundreds of people, including government ministers, foreign ambassadors, and boy and girl scouts, he broke down in tears when lamenting the fact that there are more than 10 million illiterate Afghans and after also making an appeal to the Taliban to stop their war with the Afghan government.
Take a listen to what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PRES. HAMID KARZAI, AFGHANISTAN (Through translator): I have pain in my heart. Please understand me.
(APPLAUSE)
KARZAI (Through translator): I'm afraid, my countrymen. Please understand me. I'm afraid my son, my own son, would become a refugee one day. Please. I don't want my son and your son to be a foreign citizen.
I want him to grow up here and I want him to go to school here. I want him to be taught --
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
WATSON: Now, Kyra, this leader is under immense pressure. The Taliban violence continues to spread. A deputy governor killed by a bomb in Gasni Province that also killed five other people this morning and also Hamid Karzai's family coming under pressure. According to reports in "The Wall Street Journal" and "The New York Times" his brother, Mahmoud, a prominent Afghan-American businessman, is now being investigated not only by the National Security Agency but by federal prosecutors in New York on charges of possible tax evasion charges. He has denied in a phone call with us earlier today -- Kyra?
PHILLIPS: Now, you know, the -- one of the most shocking things that came forward yesterday was the fact that the Taliban wants to meet with Hamid Karzai. That they actually want to create this peace council.
So was that part of what got him so emotional? Or was he just specifically emotional about the fact that education system and the terrorism is affecting everyone including his children?
WATSON: Not entirely clear. He told a long story about a Russian doctor coming 130 years ago to Afghanistan and treating the son of an Afghan king who then died. And I guess he drew a comparison to today and the fact that he sends his own son to foreign doctors and that Afghanistan doesn't have the right specialists to treat its own people.
There has been a development in the Afghan government in the process of what some people hope could be a step towards reconciliation with what the government -- refers to as the armed opposition here.
A high peace council that the government announced was formed today with 68 members. Human rights groups are already coming out criticizing some of the members appointed to this high peace council because several of them are warlords from the civil war period of the '90s accused of all sorts of war crimes and atrocities.
This group is mandated by the Afghan government to try to work out some kind of a peace deal with the Taliban but as the government spokesman here says -- the presidential spokesman -- those normal negotiations have not even begun yet. It's just the formation of the council -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Definitely the headline of the Taliban and Hamid Karzai working together catches your attention. We'll follow it.
Ivan Watson, thanks so much.
He's the president's right-hand man, his closest adviser, and he's known for corralling Congress for his boss' agenda and definitely not afraid to drop a few F-bombs along the way.
But now Rahm Emanuel trading in the post for the shot of the biggest job in his hometown. Sources telling us now that Emanuel will announce on Friday that he's running for mayor of Chicago.
CNN's Suzanne Malveaux on the road with the president who's in Albuquerque this morning.
So what do you think of this news, Suzanne? And I know you're laughing because we all know he's been caught saying the F-bomb plenty of times. People run scared of him.
(LAUGHTER)
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: The president once joked at a dinner, he said, you know, the toughest holiday for Rahm Emanuel is Mother's Day because he just couldn't imagine putting the word day after mother. Now that's the president's joke. Not my own.
But yes, he is known for his colorful language. He's a huge character in the White House. Obviously, some people called him Rahm-bo. Others have said look, he's part of the Chicago mafia, the inside group there.
He is going to be missed. Several sources, multiple sources saying that it is all but sure that he's going to go ahead and make a bid for the mayor's race there in Chicago. We heard from the president just yesterday kind of giving him a tough time, pushing him along a little saying look, you've got to make a decision quickly here.
We expect that announcement to come as early as Friday, and, Kyra, he has a lot on his plate. He's got a lot to handle there. Obviously he's got to collect more than about 12,000 signatures by November 22nd for the February 22nd primary.
There's a lot of paperwork. A lot of people jockeying for this position. The one thing that the president has to figure out is who can replace Rahm Emanuel. A lot of people say he is irreplaceable but one as the a favorite at least in the interim is the deputy chief of staff Pete Rous. That has been one name that has been floated out there.
But clearly this is a job that Rahm Emanuel has been talking about for quite some time. The dream job, if you will. Looks like he's going to make a bid for it -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Very interesting. Do we have any idea how those in Chicago -- we know how Chicago politics, how that plays out. I mean, it's -- you know, it's no easy task as we know.
Do we know how it's playing out in Chicago yet? I mean you're just now getting all this information but --
MALVEAUX: Sure, sure. Well, it's very widely expected. It's actually not a surprise. Many people expected that he would jump into this just a matter of time. When he would make that formal announcement.
We know that he's been talking with his family, his wife, his young children about the possibility of really moving forward in this kind of thing. You know, I mean, he's an experienced politician. A congressman. You know?
I mean, he served before so this is something that is not completely out of the picture in a lot of people thinking, oh boy. This is going to add a whole another layer, a whole another level of the color and the commentary that we've seen out of the White House. Expect a lot of that in Chicago.
(LAUGHTER)
PHILLIPS: Yes. Like we don't have enough of that already in Chicago and the White House. It'll be interesting to follow.
Suzanne, thanks.
Well, it's definitely an ugly part of any war. Soldiers taking the lives of unarmed civilians.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MORLOCK: He pulled out one of his grenades, American grenade, you know, popped it, throwing the grenade and tells me (EXPLETIVE DELETED), all right, dude, wax this guy. Kill this guy, kill this guy.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Was it killing for sport? Cold-blooded murder? CNN special investigation next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: Well, the military is painting a pretty ugly picture of a band of rogue U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. Smoking hash, bored, and carrying out murders of Afghan civilians for sport.
Five of them now face murder charges. Interrogation tapes obtained by CNN describe gruesome scenes of what appears to just be cold-blooded murder carried out under the influence of illegal drugs.
The Army alleges three civilians were killed. All of the accused are from the 5th Stryker Brigade. Army documents show that one man kept fingers and leg bones as souvenirs.
Investigative correspondent Drew Griffin has been looking into this.
And, you know, you hear these accusations and as an American citizen, that is heart-wrenching to hear.
DREW GRIFFIN, CNN SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS UNIT CORRESPONDENT: It's tough to report on but the fact of the matter is the information which is so troubling is coming from the soldiers themselves who are telling the story of how they smoked hash at night, killed by day. And in some cases actually took pictures like trophies of the people they killed.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GRIFFIN (voice-over): In the tapes obtained by CNN, the soldiers accused in their own words are not denying anything. But trying to explain how highly trained soldiers could become a band of killers.
MORLOCK: And so we identified a guy, and, you know, Gibbs, Gibbs makes a comment like, hey, do you guys want to wax this guy or what? And, you know, he'd set it up. He grabbed the dude.
GRIFFIN: Corporal Jeremy Morlock, accused of killing three Afghan civilian men, two by shooting, the third which is described to a military investigator, was literally a set-up, he says, by his platoon leader, Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So what did he do? Explain everything.
MORLOCK: We had this guy by the compound. And so Gibbs, you know, walked him out and set him in place, like, hey, stand here.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was he fully cooperating?
MORLOCK: I mean, yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was he armed?
MORLOCK: No. Not that we were aware of.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where did he stand him? Next to a wall?
MORLOCK: Yes, it was kind of next to a wall. It was where Gibbs could get, like, behind cover after the grenade went off and then he kind of placed me and (EXPLETIVE DELETED) off over here and clean line of sight for this guy.
And, you know -- he pulled out one of his grenades, American grenades. You know, popped it. Throws the grenade and then, you know, tells me (EXPLETIVE DELETED), all right, dude. You know, wax this guy. You know, kill this guy, kill this guy.
GRIFFIN: Morlock goes on to describe two more killings, unarmed Afghan civilians picked out, stood up, shot and then blown up with a grenade.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you see him present any weapons or did he -- was he aggressive to you at all? Did he --
MORLOCK: No. Not at all. Nothing. He wasn't a threat.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): Michael Waddington is Corporal Jeremy Morlock's civilian attorney.
GRIFFIN (on camera): I want you to tell me that this didn't happen. That this isn't true. Can you?
MICHAEL WADDINGTON, ATTORNEY FOR CORPORAL JEREMY MORLOCK: That three people were not killed?
GRIFFIN: That members of the US military didn't go out, and three Afghan civilians were killed for sport.
(LONG PAUSE)
WADDINGTON: You have the -- you have the -- from what I understand, the case file. You know what the witnesses of that file say. And what they say in their videos. But I -- that's what it sounds like.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): To defend the client, Mike Waddington will try to prove Corporal Morlock, already injured in two separate IED attacks, was suffering from brain damage. And instead of treating him, Waddington says the army drugged him.
GRIFFIN (on camera): So your defense is that your client was mentally incapacitated, that the army either knew it or should have known it --
WADDINGTON: Well, the army --
GRIFFIN: Should not have been put in that position.
WADDINGTON: The army knew it, because they were prescribing drugs to him to try to treat his symptoms. His symptoms involved nausea, vomiting, inability to sleep. These are injuries that are common in traumatic brain injury. The army knew that he had been blown up in two IED attacks. The army then chose, rather than to treat him, to take his weapon, give it back to him, because -- for whatever reason, and then load him up on drugs.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): The drugs, shown here distributed in plastic baggies, included Ambien and Amitriptyline, both of which carry FDA warnings about producing suicidal thoughts. The trouble began, Morlock says, in November of 2009, when the Stryker Brigade got a new squad leader, Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs.
WADDINGTON: When Gibbs showed up at this unit, he bragged to the young soldiers underneath him, including my client, about killing innocent people in Iraq.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): Staff Sergeant Gibbs is charged in all three killings. And witnesses stated it was this new commander who orchestrated, coerced, and threatened the Stryker Brigade to both kill Afghan civilians and cover up their murders. And there is something else. The US Army accuses Staff Sergeant Gibbs of collecting teeth, leg bones, and fingers as souvenirs.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRIFFIN: We have reached out to the attorney for Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs several times and, Kyra, we have yet to get a call back from him.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Here's my question. You look at these young kids. Were these punks that got in the military just have no sense about them, or were they influenced somehow? Is it PTSD, is it too many tours?
GRIFFIN: It could be all of the above.
PHILLIPS: Right.
GRIFFIN: Quite frankly, what we're seeing through the documents, through these tapes, I won't call them confession tapes. These interrogation tapes. All pointing the finger at this new commander, this Staff Sergeant Gibbs, who came from Iraq, apparently bragging, according to the attorney that you had there, about doing this same thing in Iraq.
So what the defense attorneys are trying to find out is, was there a history in Iraq? Was this man investigated in Iraq? Was he moved from Iraq to Afghanistan for some kind of a disciplinary reason?
But you also have drugs. You have soldiers that have been injured in IEDs and are being treated with prescription meds from the army, so there's a whole cluster of things going on. But what is not in dispute, apparently, among the soldiers themselves is they did this.
PHILLIPS: Yes. And they're right there, where the drugs are all around them.
GRIFFIN: Right.
PHILLIPS: We're going to keep following it. Drew, thanks.
GRIFFIN: You bet.
PHILLIPS: All right. Well, apparently they're here. And according to seven former members of the Air Force, well, they're not very happy with us. A lot of jaws dropped yesterday at the Washington Press Club. A group of Air Force veterans, six of them former officers, talking about UFO sightings through the '60s, '70s and '80s. They're actually convinced that extraterrestrials have been visiting our nuclear facilities and even, well, deactivated some missiles at a base in Montana in 1967.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERT HASTINGS, UFO RESEARCHER: I believe, these gentlemen believe, that this planet is being visited by beings from another world. Who, for whatever reason, have taken an interest in the nuclear arms race which began at the end of the World War II.
Regarding the missile shutdown incidents, my opinion, their opinion, is that whoever are aboard the craft are sending a signal to both Washington and Moscow, among others, that we are playing with fire. That the possession and threatened use of nuclear weapons potentially threatens the human race and the integrity of the planetary environment.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Well, if they do make a public appearance on this planet, the UN apparently wants to be prepared, so they're set to appoint Mazlan Othman, an astrophysicist from Malaysia, to coordinate mankind's response when they arrive. Now, Rob Marciano is also monitoring the NASA video coordination pictures.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: I'm happy to know that --
PHILLIPS: I just want to know, are you ready for this, as well? Have you spotted any evidence of this, Rob?
MARCIANO: No. I haven't. But I'm always on the lookout for green men, especially little ones that might help us out. I'm glad that they were actually on kind of a peace mission, they want us to get rid of the nukes.
PHILLIPS: Maybe that's the way we deal with Kim Jong-Il.
MARCIANO: Not a bad call.
PHILLIPS: Yes. OK.
MARCIANO: Just, you know, if you're listening, next visit, drop us off a couple new radars. That's always helpful in the weather department. And I mention this because there's a radar indicated tornado. Not spotted on the ground but radar indicated, so I do want to switch to a more serious tone here.
Caroline County in eastern -- parts of Maryland, on the other side of the Chesapeake. This is moving to the north at about 45 miles per hour. Centreville and Easton, those two cities, fairly populated, are in this, so just be aware of that. Stay indoors for the next 20 minutes or so, because this is a radar indicated, potentially a tornado. I've got no reports of it actually being spotted. And those aliens, if you could bring me a new magic wall, that would be fantastic.
All right. Looking at this. This is our next tropical action. This is may very well be Nicole before the day is done, or at least tomorrow. Eighty percent chance that this becoming a tropical depression or tropical storm here in the next 48 hours. And the forecast for this is to develop and then head this way. OK?
So, now, you can't say for sure whether or not it'll become a hurricane, but unlikely. What it's going to definitely do is bring a lot more rain into an area that has already been just slammed with rainfall. Look at Wilmington. 10.33 inches. That's in a 24-hour period. Typically, you need a hurricane to do that. Well, they might get a tropical storm here before the week is done, too. So serious flooding threat across eastern parts of the Carolinas as this system begins to roll its way up the Eastern seaboard.
So, we're watching that and also the record-breaking heat out west and across parts of southern California. Roll the beautiful umbrella footage. If you're not using an umbrella in South Carolina -- in North Carolina, you're using it to shade yourself across Los Angeles. Sure, why not?
When the temperatures are 113 degrees, as measured in the shade, you need all you can get. They all headed to the beach after really one of the coolest summers on record. Fall is starting out like a scorcher.
And today we might see similar numbers, 113 was the high temperature yesterday, Kyra, measured at 12:15. And then at 1:00, that thermometer actually broke. I'm not kidding about that. It stopped working. So, it may have been higher than that. The good news is it was relatively low as far as humidity goes, and so the 113 only felt like 113 and it didn't feel like 120.
That's a latest we have for you on what's going on both East and West Coast.
PHILLIPS: Got you.
MARCIANO: Back to you and your alien friends.
PHILLIPS: Exactly. I've been sending out tweets to ET hoping to get some sort of response. Talk to you later.
MARCIANO: All right, see you.
PHILLIPS: All right. What you do and don't know about a hospital could be the difference between life and death. Our Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen is teaching you how to become an empowered patient next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: Becoming an empowered patient. Our Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen learned firsthand just how important that is. In fact, it's the title of her new book and a CNN special report this weekend. She joins us with the second of several lessons that could save lives. And just the fact that your book keeps getting printed more and more shows how much people really want to know how to do this.
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: They do want to know, Kyra, because they have learned that a hospital is not a hospital is not a hospital. In other words, there are differences between hospitals, and you need to learn which to go to and which are the ones you want to stay away from. I have a story of a man who likely would have died or become paralyzed if he'd gone to the wrong hospital. With the help of Turner Animation Studios, here's his story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE0
COHEN (voice-over): Fair Valley, California, is a mountain paradise. Gorgeous skiing and loads of snowmobilers. After skiing down the slopes one morning, Chuck Toenskoetter stopped in at the local snowmobile center. And while he was inside, all of a sudden, he fell down.
CHUCH TOENSKOETTER, STROKE SURVIVOR: You could draw a line down the center of my body. And everything was disconnected on the right- hand side.
COHEN (voice-over): Chuck had just had a massive stroke in the middle of nowhere. Fair Valley nurse Kathy Snyder raced Chuck to the edge of town to wait for a helicopter ambulance.
TOENSKOETTER: I just remember the rotors turning and the snow flying. And just waiting to go.
COHEN (voice-over): Time is of the essence, and this helicopter doesn't move. Why were precious minutes being wasted? The flight nurse wanted to take Chuck to the nearest hospital, which was a small hospital.
KATHY SNYDER, NURSE: He had a cardiac problem. He had a stroke problem. He needed to go to a hospital where there were specialists standing by, and these small hospitals don't offer that.
COHEN (on camera): You argued hard.
SNYDER: I did argue hard. Kind of got like this in each other's face.
COHEN (voice-over): Kathy convinced the helicopter team to fly to a hospital that was much further away. The flight took an extra 15 minutes. Dr. Christopher Markus took one look at Chuck's CT scan and knew he had a drug that could reverse the stroke.
CHRISTOPHER MARKUS, DOCTOR, SUTTER ROSEVILLE MEDICAL CENTER: And we have three hours to give it. So we had to get the drug in in the next ten minutes.
COHEN (on camera): Talk about under the wire.
You must think back and think, "Wow, what if Kathy hadn't argued with them?"
TOENSKOETTER: I am convinced it was a very, very high probability I would have been in a wheelchair.
COHEN: Can anyone do this? I mean, if you feel like a bad decision is about to be made with your health care, can you put your foot down?
SNYDER: You can change hospitals. Everybody has that ability. And they should be aware of it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COHEN: Now, what you need to know is, of course, not everybody has a Kathy Snyder waiting for them to help them get to the right hospital. But there is something you can do.
You can go to various web sites and research hospitals, it only takes a few minutes. For example, go to U.S. News & World Report, that's one such web site. If you look here, you can put in -- let's say I want heart surgery and I live here in the 303 area code, which is here Atlanta, Georgia. Find hospitals and they will tell you the one that has the best survival rating. It's easy to do. It takes few minutes. Kyra, people think this stuff is hard. It really isn't.
PHILLIPS: OK. But what if it's an emergency and you don't have time to do online research for? What do you do then? COHEN: Right. What you do then is you start thinking about an emergency before it happens. So obviously, I know where I live. I know where I spend most of my time. You can go to web sites and find out who has the best success rates, in general, among the hospitals in your area. Who has the fewest medical errors? Who has the highest nurse ratio? So what you can do is if you go to CNN.com/thechart, I have all the links you need to check out the hospitals in your area.
PHILLIPS: Great. Elizabeth, thanks so much.
Of course, we want to remind everybody once again about your special, Taking Control of Your Health Care. Elizabeth Cohen, she put it all together. It airs this Saturday and Sunday, CNN 7:00 p.m. Eastern, right here on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: All right. On Wall Street, new economic reports are rolling in and one of them looks at the value of your biggest asset -- your house. Home prices have been edging higher the past few months. So is the trend continuing?
Alison Kosik is at the New York Stock Exchange with the details on that -- Alison.
ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Hi Kyra. We found out that home prices are still rising but the pace of growth is slowing.
The latest S&P/Case Shiller Report says prices in the 20 biggest cities rose by just over half a percent in July, compared to June. One analyst is saying, if you're looking for home prices to return to where they were before the recession, you're in for a disappointment. The good news is, is likely we'll see stability in prices.
As for stock prices, they're kind of standing still right now. The Dow Industrial up about 1. The Nasdaq up about 2.
Finally, Kyra, we've got some job opening news for you. Toys 'R Us says its hiring 35,000 seasonal workers this year. This is on top of the 10,000 hires that we told you about earlier this month for new stores that is opening. Either managerial positions, sales positions and stock workers. They're temp jobs. But sometimes, you know how it is, that's what you need to get your foot in the door, show them what you got and hopefully they'll notice and hire you for good -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: OK. Alison, thanks so much.
You may consider yourself a person of faith, but do you really know God? The Pew Research Center actually found that most Americans failed a quiz asking some of the most basic questions about religion. And get this, Atheists and Agnostics did better than Catholics and Evangelicals.
John Roberts actually had a chance to talk to the senior research with the Pew Center that worked on this, and also religion professor at Boston University. Now, there were a lot of surprises within this study, John, but the one that really caught our attention is the fact that Atheists and Agnostics know more than the rest of us.
JOHN ROBERTS, CNN ANCHOR: Isn't that kind of a kicker? Know more than Jews, know more than Mormons, know more than Catholic, know more than Protestants.
The argument for that is that if you're Agnostic or Atheist, you have to make an argument for why you don't believe in God and so you actually have to read the material to formulate your argument and that way you can debate with people and have some facts at hand. So that is the reason Pew Researchers believe that Atheists and Agnostics do better. But it's interesting, too, that the next highest scoring group are Jewish people, Mormons after that, and then trips down the line.
Here's some of the questions. There was a series of 32 questions that were on this. Atheists, Agnostics got almost 21 right. Down at the bottom end of the scale Catholics and Protestants, about 13 to 14. Questions like, "What is the religion of Maimonides?" "What religion do people in Indonesia consider themselves to be?" Here's another question. "According to rulings by the Supreme Court, are public schoolteachers permitted to read from the Bible as literature?"
Eight percent of people correctly answered the first question. There's about 25 percent to 27 percent got the other two questions.
Let's -- are you ready for this?
PHILLIPS: Yes, let's get the answers.
ROBERTS: Give you the answers. All right.
PHILLIPS: There you go.
ROBERTS: Maimonides was Jewish. In Indonesia, most people consider themselves to be Muslim. According to rulings by the Supreme Court, are public school teachers permitted to read from the Bible as literature? The answer is, yes, they are.
PHILLIPS: OK. So, a lot of people got these questions wrong. So, what did our guests have to say about that?
ROBERTS: Well, it's the idea that for many people, particularly Christians, religion is sort of a feel-it-from-the-heart type of thing as opposed to think-it-with-the head type of thing. And it may be that you don't really need to know Jesus to love him.
Here's what they said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PROF. STEPHEN PROTEHRO, DEPT. OF RELIGION AT BOSTON UNIVERSITY: Those are relatively difficult questions but there's a lot of really easy questions on the quiz, for example, we didn't ask, is the Pope Catholic, but we came pretty close when we asked, is the Dali Lama Buddhist? And most Americans don't get that question right.
ROBERTS: Wow.
PROTHERO: I think in terms of faith and knowledge here, I think we have a gap, clearly, between faith and knowledge. And what's going on is American religion, particularly on the Christianity side, has gravitated toward this evangelical religion of the heart where it's really all about feeling and loving Jesus and having a relationship with him, rather than knowing something about the tradition. I think that's one piece of it and another is doing a poor job in our public schools of teaching kids about the religions of the world.
ROBERTS: Do you think that's correct, Greg? That you don't need to know Jesus to love him?
GREG SMITH, PEW RESEARCH CENTER'S FORUM ON RELIGION: Well I certainly can't speak to whether or not it's correct, that knowing about these things is a prerequisite for having strong faith. We know that the United States is a very religious country. It's a nation of believers. But as the survey shows, it's also true that there are major elements of religion, major elements of people's own faiths that they're not aware of. There's no question about that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Interesting. So, it kind of leaves you wondering, what's more important? Knowledge or faith.? That could be a whole other debate. That could be a whole other study.
ROBERTS: I guess if you need to argue your position, then knowledge is probably an important tool to have at your disposal. But if you just want to be spiritual, or you just want to have faith, you might not need to know facts. But does speak to the idea that people who are in the Christian faith are not spending a lot of time reading about their religion or other religions either if they're failing this quiz.
PHILLIPS: OK.
ROBERTS: By the way --
PHILLIPS: Yes?
ROBERTS: We should point out, if you want to, go to the front page of CNN.com.
PHILLIPS: OK.
ROBERTS: There is a story there, it says one nation under god. American's --
PHILLIPS: Can you take the quiz?
ROBERTS: You can take 10 questions. 10 of the 32 questions are there.
PHILLIPS: OK.
ROBERTS: I got 10 out of 10.
PHILLIPS: Oh, of course.
ROBERTS: So let's challenge you to see how well you do.
PHILLIPS: We already know you're the smarter one in the relationship. So I'll move on from there.
ROBERTS: No, I didn't say that.
PHILLIPS: Even though religion is my thing, I'll take you on it a debate any day.
PHILLIPS: Oh, yes. Well answering questions is not a debate. There's no question about that.
PHILLIPS: That's true. All right.
Thanks, John.
ROBERTS: I lose hands down to you in a debate any day.
PHILLIPS: Depends on the subject. Talk to you later.
And we are going to dive deeper into this conversation about faith. It is something especially my team and I are interested in and we want to talk more about religious knowledge and faith. And so in the next hour of CNN NEWSROOM at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time, religious leaders, spiritual leaders from across the board are going to join us to hash out what this all means. Deepak Chopra's joining us. Also Mary Anne Williamson, and also the Reverend Art Cribs. Join me live at the top of the hour. It's going to be a great discussion.
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PHILLIPS: Bristol Palin taking the stage with "Dancing With the Stars" while her politician mom leads the cheers from the audience, of course. But, there were more than cheers in the show. Unfortunately, there were a number of boos.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BROOKE BURKE, HOSTESS, "DANCING WITH THE STARS": And you need to support them right now. Call, text and log on to ABC.com. There's booing in the ballroom. We don't know why.
JENNIFER GRAY, "DANCING WITH THE STARS": Why is there booing?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Well, there's some speculation that booing was about putting Sarah Palin on camera for an interview. The show's executive producer tells "The Washington Post" the boos were the judges' scores for Jennifer Gray. You decide. All right, time now for a little more serious political news. Deputy political director, Paul Steinhauser at the bureau there in Washington; what's crossing the wires, Paul?
PAUL STEINHAUSER, CNN DEPUTY POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Kyra, let's talk about the economy, by far as always the top issue with Americans. You know what, take a look at this, a brand new CNN Opinion Research Corporation National poll and we asked who's more to blame for the economy? And more people say the Republicans than Democrats.
But this is interesting we asked -- which party would do a better job fixing the economy? And Americans by a little bit say, yes, the Republicans over the Democrats, 47 percent say Republicans in Congress would have a better prescription, 41 percent say Democrats.
The president today is going to be in New Mexico talking about the economy and then, Kyra, later today the president is going back to school. Yes, that's right. He's going to be at the University of Wisconsin.
And you know what? The vice president is going to be at the Penn State University in Pennsylvania. And this is part of a -- a plan for the Democratic Party to get the top two guys in the White House out to try to energize those so-called surge voter, those first-time voters in 2008.
A lot of the -- younger voters who you would find on college campuses, a lot of those people voted of course for Barack Obama in 2008 and the whole idea here for the Democrats is to try to get those people out to motivate them to vote in the midterm elections.
One other thing I want to show you and this is brand new on the Political Ticker this morning, happening right around now, a brand poll new in Connecticut. Listen, if the Republicans take back the Senate one of the places they'll do it is in Connecticut. A brand new Quinnipiac University survey says that the Republican nominee for the Senate in Connecticut, Linda McMahon, and we know her because she is the former pro-wrestling executive at WWE.
Well, the poll indicates that she has basically tied it up almost a dead heat now in Connecticut with Richard Blumenthal, the state attorney general and the Democratic nominee. This is a seat the Democrats are trying to hold on to. It's Chris Dodd's seat. He's been in the Senate for a long time and decided this year not to run for re-election.
So we're going to keep a close eye on that race and a bunch of others.
Kyra -- back to you.
PHILLIPS: Oh you -- all right, Paul, thanks.
We're going to have your next political update in just about and a reminder for all the latest political news, just go to our Web site, CNNPolitics.com. All right. Let's head cross country this morning first to Nashville with the Grand Ole Opry House reopens tonight for the first time since flood waters nearly destroyed it five months ago. About a dozen artists scheduled to perform, including Martina McBride, Keith Urban and Trace Adkins.
In Wisconsin, floodwaters peaking again this morning, the governor has declared a state of emergency in Columbia County, where the Wisconsin River is at an all-time high. Officials say at least 100 homes are in danger.
And in California, Pacific Gas and Electric, PG&E, that operator of the San Bruno Pipeline that exploded earlier this month, has it -- reported rather, that gas leaks, six times -- reported gas leaks six times the national average, rather. That's according to the "L.A. Times". PG&E actually reported dozens of leaks in transmission lines near highly populated or environmentally sensitive areas since 2004.
Well, the makers of a sweet treat haven't been playing pretty fair with us. Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream isn't all natural like we all thought. We're going to read the fine print for you.
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PHILLIPS: Oh Ben & Jerry's shame on you. You guys haven't been honest with us. The ice cream maker dropping the phrase "all natural" now from some of its labels on a request from the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
Look at what we found when we checked out a newsroom favorite, chunky monkey. This is one example. Alkalized Cocoa and high fructose corn syrup, that's not all natural. Other flavors have synthetic vanilla flavors and hydrogenated oil. Delicious, yes -- all natural, no.
So for all of you who think that you've been making smarter purchases, here's a reality check for you. Unfortunately healthy sounding labels don't translate to healthy foods. You actually have to read between the lines.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ELLIE KRIEGER, REGISTERED DIETITIAN: High fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, dextrose, glucose. All of these are sort of code words for sugar.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: All right, well, it's not just hidden sugar, though. Here's some more of those code words that might trip you up at the grocery store. Zero trans-fat doesn't mean zero. Food makers can actually make that claim as long as the product has less than half a gram per serving.
Also beware of those immunity boosting labels. In some cases food companies don't need the FDA's permission to slap that on a product. But the FTC just filed a complaint against Pom Wonderful pomegranate juice actually saying it's making false claims about health benefits.
So pay attention.
And going light may seem like a good idea. But sometimes you're cutting out more than just calories. Take light juices for example, manufacturers often mixed calories by replacing juice with water, artificial sweeteners and fillers. So buyer beware, just because you think something is natural or organic, it's not. We can all be duped very easily.
All right. Here's what we're working on for the next hour of CNN NEWSROOM.
Americans of faith flunk the religious quiz. But atheists well, they top the charts. Whether it's naming Mother Theresa's religion or knowing about Ramadan. The facts are fuzzy for a lot of us. We're talking about why coming up at the top of the hour.
Religious leaders Deepak Chopra, Marianne Williamson and then the Reverend Art Cribbs weighing in.
On the new safety warning about Lasik surgery from a former FDA official who actually helped to prove it. He wants the surgery stopped. We're debating with him. And the man who performed the first Lasik surgery in the U.S. joins us. That's coming up at the top of the hour.
So do you think Lasik is safe and effective? I want to hear your thoughts. Go to my blog, cnn.com/kyra, or go to my Twitter page @kyracnn. I look forward to reading some of your comments in the next hour of the CNN newsroom.
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