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How A Deal Becomes A Law; Mom Plunges Van Into Hudson River; FAA Air Traffic Boss Resigns; Foreclosures Fall; Kobe Bryant Fines $100K; Searching For A Serial Killer; Budget Battle Lines; Signing Jackie Robinson; Obama Starts Fundraising

Aired April 14, 2011 - 12:59   ET

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

RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR: Hi there, Suzanne. Thank you.

There may be a deal, but it's still not a done deal. That happens today if enough lawmakers vote for the six month federal budget that House and Senate leaders and President Obama agreed to late last Friday. At the time, all we knew was the bottom line, more than $38 billion supposedly cut from what's left of the fiscal year. Later came the details and growing opposition from conservatives who want deeper cuts and liberals who want fewer. The plan takes almost $3 billion from President Obama's high speed rail project, another 3 billion from highway construction. The women infants and children nutrition program would lose more than $50 million, and payments to the United Nations would drop by almost 400 million. The pentagon and veterans affairs would actually see increases of almost $6 billion in total.

I could go on and on, but I want to preview the voting with our Senior Congressional Correspondent Dana Bash. Dana, is there really a chance that this plan won't pass?

DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Randi, Republican leaders insist that they believe it will pass. So, one of the questions is how many Republican defections there are going to be? We already knew that there were a number of Republicans who said they wouldn't vote for this because of the fact that the number simply isn't high enough, they're not cutting $61 billion.

But there's another growing concern that people actually think that they might be getting hood winked inside the Republican rank and file, and here's why. The Congressional budget office just issued a report that says that the bill does cut $38 billion, but only a fraction of those savings will be realized this year, $352 million dollars, million with an 'm'. And the discrepancy centers around a (inaudible) difference between spending, which is money going out the door this year, and the spending authority.

Here's what the house speaker said about this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JOHN BOEHNER (R), HOUSE SPEAKER: Certainly, this has caused some confusion. Now, let's understand that we're cutting $38.5 billion of money that has already been authorized and appropriated. And anybody who doesn't believe this money wouldn't be spent if we don't act is kidding themselves.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: And, Randi, Republican leaders are getting so many questions from concerned ranktified (ph) Republicans that they just organized a briefing from this former congressional budget office directive to try to walk them through, but I got to tell you, according to one senior Republican source that there is concern that House Republicans feel like they've been, quote, "sold a lemon," and they are trying desperately to make sure that they don't lose votes because of this confusion that we're hearing about.

KAYE: Dana, this is remarkable because this was touted as the largest one-year spending cut. Meanwhile, you look at that difference and a lot of this had to do with future spending authority, it's amazing.

BASH: It is amazing and you know, technically, it is the biggest spending cut, there's no change in that, but the question is how much real spending is going to actually happen this year, and that's where it really is just that fraction -- fraction of the number.

And walking the halls here with our Congressional team, hearing from some -- even -- especially some of the freshmen Republicans, Randi, that they're looking at this and scratching their heads saying, huh?

KAYE: And so if -- if this doesn't happen, are we right back where we started with a possible government shutdown?

BASH: Could be but, again, I think it's important to underscore that Republican leaders who are whipping the vote, meaning that they're actually going around and trying to see how many votes they have, they still feel confident this will pass. Part of the reason is because, like the last time, two times ago, I should say, the Congress voted for a stopgap spending bill in the House. They relied on Democratic votes, I think that's probably going to be the case this time.

KAYE: All right. Dana Bash there with the story for us. Amazing, amazing information. Thank you.

We're learning more about what may have led a New York mother to drive her mini-van into the Hudson River with her four young children in tow. Twenty-five-year-old Lashandra Armstrong drowned along with three of her kids ranging from five years old to 11 months old.

Armstrong's 10-year-old son, Lashaun, managed to escape from the van by rolling the window down as it filled with water and then he swam to shore.

According to "The New York Times," Lashaun was spotted by a woman driving near the Hudson River waving his hands and crying for help shortly after his mom's van went under. The woman, Maeve Ryan, picked the boy up and took him to a nearby fire station.

Lashaun then told Ryan, and later police, what happened before his mother drove into the river. He says his mom had an argument with his step-father and that she gathered all the kids into the van and drove into the river.

The "Times" also says Lashaun mentioned that his mom tried to stop the tragedy, saying she, quote, "made a mistake," and tried to put the van in reverse but the car was too far into the water to go back. Lashaun is now staying with his aunt while police continue this investigation.

A day after another air traffic controller was caught sleeping on the job, a top FAA official has resigned. Hank Krakowski who heads the FAA's traffic control organization stepped down this morning after meeting with the FAA's chief, Randy Babbitt. Babbitt issued this statement saying, we are all responsible and accountable for safety, from senior FAA leadership to the controller in the tower.

Krakowski's resignation comes in a growing controversy over napping air traffic controllers. The latest occurred Wednesday morning at Nevada's Reno-Tahoe airport when a medical jet was attempting to land with a sick patient. It is the sixth reported incident this year of a sleeping air traffic controller. The FAA is reviewing its policies and announced it would immediately begin adding extra controllers on the midnight shift.

On the housing front, the number of foreclosure notices fell 27 percent during the first three months of this year compared to the first quarter last year. About one in every 191 homes is facing foreclosure, but the drop in foreclosures paints a different picture compared to the other recent housing numbers that shows sales of new and existing homes are still sliding. Experts say the foreclosure improvement is artificial with banks cutting back on filings in light of the robo (ph) signing scandal.

The NBA has slapped Kobe Bryant with a $100,000 fine. The L.A. Lakers star yelled an expletive and an anti-gay slur at a referee Tuesday night in a game against the San Antonio Spurs, you may have heard a little bit about this. Well, just moments before, Bryant had received a technical foul. Bryant expressed his regret over his comment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KOBE BRYANT, L.A. LAKERS: The comment that I made, even though it was not meant as, you know, what it's perceived to be, is nonetheless wrong.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: But the NBA says Bryant's comment was offensive and inexcusable. So, we are asking you what you think. Was the fine enough? Join the conversation on our blog, CNN.com/Ali, and you can post on either Ali's or my Facebook Twitter pages. Let us know what you think about that. Searching for a possible serial killer on Long Island. We'll take you to the scene and talk to a forensic scientist and a former police officer about ways to crack this case. Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: The search for suspected serial killer on Long Island is getting a high tech boost. FBI helicopters and planes equipped with special cameras will take high-resolution pictures of the shoreline where at least eight sets of human remains have been found since December.

CNN's Allan Chernoff is live in Jones Beach, New York, and Allan, please do bring us up to date on the search efforts so far today.

ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Randi, they've been going for about three hours now. A helicopter has been hovering overhead checking what police say are 15 to 20 sites that have been identified two days ago. They're having a close look now.

They say they're halfway done and so far the results all negative. No evidence, no human remains found thus far. They're continuing to search though and if they do find something from the air that they want to examined close-up, what's going to happen is that officers will go in, they'd -- they actually have chainsaws because they will need to cut through the brush. This is an area that's very difficult to get to. In fact, the canine dogs, the cadaver dogs, they don't even want to go there, the police have told me, because they get scratched up by all the brush -- Randi.

KAYE: And where are the remains, Allan? Where are they being taken to and what is the status in terms of examining them? Have they gotten anywhere with that?

CHERNOFF: The remains are actually in New York, they are at the chief medical examiner's office in New York. That is the largest such facility, government-owned facility, in the country.

The remains that were found here in Nassau County, and that would be a skull and some bones, they actually arrived at the medical examiner's office last night. So, they've only just started to look at those remains.

The remains that had come from Suffolk County, and remember, there are four additional sets there, well they arrived at the beginning of this week and also late last week.

So, first they're doing what they call an anthropological analysis, that's the first look. Basically, they determine the sex, they determine the race, the age, that sort of thing. Then they'll go on to doing a DNA analysis, they'll try to extract DNA and then try to match it up against databases. That hasn't happened just yet, so it's going to be a little while.

KAYE: All right, Allan Chernoff at Jones Beach. Allan, thank you.

We want to continue the discussion on this. As we mentioned so far, eight sets of human remains have been found along a New York coastline. The question now, who is responsible?

So, let's dig a little deeper in this case with retired Nassau County police officer Lou Palumbo and forensics' scientist Larry Kobilinsky. Thank you, both, for joining us.

Larry, let's start with you. I want to talk about the science behind this investigation. I've been to your lab in New York City, and we've talked quite a bit over the years about DNA. In a case like this where victims may have been killed years ago, how much DNA really might be left to help put the pieces together? I mean, how long does DNA last?

LAWRENCE KOBILINSKY, FORENSIC SCIENTIST: That's a tough question, Randi. Basically, you do your testing and what you see is what you got. When you have evidence exposed to environment -- the environment, whether it's humidity, or adverse temperatures, or bacteria, or other organisms that can degrade DNA, after a period of time, you will not find any DNA, or you'll find DNA that's been very degraded. So, it may not be revealing of any information.

The good news here is that we're good at obtaining DNA from bone. You grind up the bone, you extract the DNA, and you can do the typical procedures that we do that we use for human identification.

KAYE: And Lou, let me bring you in here. Aviation teams are flying over the area with these high resolution cameras. What might they be looking for? I mean, what do you need in terms of forensics and evidence to try and figure out if there's a link between all of the remains?

LOU PALUMBO, FORMER NYPD INVESTIGATOR: Well, the reason they're using the high resolution aircraft provided by the FBI is to try to identify irregularities in this particular type of terrain. And as we know from prior informations already volunteered, they've identified such irregularities, number one. Now, it's just an exercise in determining whether or not there's any relevancy to those and the fact that we have people that are deceased.

The one thing I do want to mention to you, and not only was I a law enforcement there, but I worked as a lifeguard at Jones Beach for 14 years. And this problem or this practice of discarding bodies along this strip of roadway, Ocean Parkway, is not uncommon, this has been going on for quite some time.

As you can tell by looking into the background of the shots with Allan Chernoff as well as information volunteered by law enforcement, it's very, very difficult terrain to traverse. And the interesting thing here that people are probably not aware of is you wouldn't necessarily have to use the roadway, stop a vehicle to discard a body, you can access that beach with a four-wheel drive vehicle in any number of locations and more significantly, it is completely unpatrolled and unsupervised.

You know, what they're doing now is attempting to locate in a more expeditious fashion through the use of helicopters --

KAYE: Right.

PALUMBO: -- and high resolution cameras, thermal imaging, if there are any indications of additional bodies.

KAYE: And I want to ask Larry about what they found already, I mean, what does it tell you that the recent bones that were found Monday were wrapped in black plastic, some of the other remains in burlap, does it sound to you like this is all connected?

KOBILINSKY: At first, I thought there was one killer at work here, I think there are more than one killer, the way they work independently. I thought there was a clear pattern with the first four bodies, the burlap bags, the age of the victims, the connection with Craigslist.

This -- these new bodies are completely different. They're much older. The last two sets of remains are much older. I understand there's -- one of the victims is a male, one of the victims is a child, one of the victims was dismembered. There are to many breaks to the pattern. So now I'm thinking that there are at least two killers here.

And as you heard Mr. Palumbo indicate, this may be a dumping ground from many years before. I know Joel Riffkin (ph) was convicted of murdering the -- he confessed to 17 victims. Three were never found. And perhaps these last two are part of that situation.

KAYE: Right.

And, Lou, just quickly, in piecing this together, besides physical evidence, what would investigators use to help determine if this is one killer or possibly more? What are they looking for?

PALUMBO: Well, they're looking for commonality right now. They want to see how many common traits are, how would you say, pertaining to all of these bodies. For example, when you identify that four of these young ladies are prostitutes, that's one commonality. They're looking for types of wounds. They're looking for durations or periods of time that these bodies may have been disposed of there. There's a number of different criteria in attempting to tie these together.

The other thing that's very, very relevant here is, not only just how they met their demise, but how long those bodies have been sitting there. And the gentleman sitting across from me, who spoke a moment ago, is far more -- better versed in speaking to this, but we could find out that these bodies have been there for a decade. That's not out of the question.

KAYE: Right.

PALUMBO: And one thing people don't realize is how ferocious the ocean environment really is between the wind and the sand and the tide changes and storm surges.

KAYE: But you'd still be able to tell if they were strangled or if they'd been shot?

PALUMBO: You can in some instances depending on how far the decomposition has gone. You know, if they were fortunate enough to find someone who is -- had been discarded there say within a week or so and the body isn't too badly decomposed, there's going to be more evidence there. But the longer these bodies sit there, or these skeletal remains sit there, the more they deteriorate in a rather harsh environment. So it's going to be that much harder to elicit information for them going forward.

KAYE: Right.

But there is still method -- there's a method in place after they identify who they are, how long they've been missing and the means or manner in which they met their demise. There are other, how would you say, methods to investigate this.

KAYE: Methods to find it (ph).

PALUMBO: And some of them involve technology.

KAYE: OK. All right, Lou Palumbo, Larry Kobilinsky, we'll have to leave it there. Thank you both for that discussion. Appreciate it.

KOBILINSKY: Thank you.

KAYE: President Obama has laid out his plan to save us trillions. And just like the Republican plan, it includes spending cuts and changes to Medicare. But big battle lines between the two sides have been drawn. Ali Velshi will break down the two plans in "Your Money" next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Ali Velshi isn't in this anchor chair today, but he's still keeping busy. Today in "Your Money," Ali breaks down the differences between the Democratic and the Republican plans for reducing the deficit.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALI VELSHI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: One way to reduce deficits or shortfalls is to cut non-security, non-discretionary spending. That's the stuff that isn't the Medicaid, the Medicare, and Social Security. The president's debt commission wants to cut it by $2.2 trillion. The Republican, or Ryan Plan, wants to cut $2.7 trillion over 10 years. The president's plan, which he announced, wants to cuts $1.1 trillion over 12 years.

Now, one of the major criticisms is that no party has been prepared to make the cuts to some of the biggest things we spend on, like Medicare and Medicaid. So let me give you a sense of what the two parties -- or what the three plans want to do with Medicare and Medicaid.

First of all, the Republicans go a lot further than the president does. They want to cut $389 billion from Medicare, $735 billion from Medicaid. The president's plan calls for -- and, by the way, that's over 10 years. The president's plan calls for a $200 billion cut to Medicare over 12 years, and $100 billion over 10 years.

Now, the other way to overcome deficits and shortfalls, as opposed to cutting spending, is to increase revenues or what you will know as taxes. Let me give you a comparison of the plans in terms of what they do for taxes.

The core to a conservative view of taxes is that if you cut them, people spend more. So the Republican plan actually takes an axe to taxes, cutting them by $800 billion and keeping that Bush-era tax cut for people making $250,000 or more.

Take a look at this. This is a big difference. The president actually calls for an increase of a trillion dollars in what he calls revenues by deducting a lot of loopholes and increasing income taxes on those who make more than $250,000 a year. For every $3 that the president wants to cut in his proposal, he wants a dollar in increased revenue.

And there's another area I want to talk to you about, and it's corporate taxes. We're getting a lot of talk about that this year with a number of companies that aren't paying them. Currently, the corporate tax rate stands at about 35 percent, although, as you know, some companies are very crafty and the current tax laws are loose enough to allow some companies not to pay any taxes at all. Now, this is a big difference between what the two groups want.

Representative Paul Ryan and the Republicans are planning to bring the corporate tax from 35 percent to 25 percent. The president's plan would increase it from 35 percent to 39 percent. And the president's debt commission splits the difference, bringing it down to 28 percent.

Now, the commonality with all of these three plans is that they claim that they will reduce the deficit by about -- I'll show you, the numbers are roughly the same -- about $4 trillion. They just disagree on how to get there. For the record, none of these plans would actually reduce the nation's staggering national debt because of the interest that we've already accumulated, it's actually going to continue to increase. It would just increase at a lower rate.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAYE: Thanks, Ali.

And if Congress would have just asked any American, we could have told them that it's the interest that gets you.

Be sure to join Christine Romans for "Your Bottom Line" each Saturday morning at 9:30 Eastern. And don't miss "Your Money" with Ali Velshi Saturdays at 1:00 p.m. Eastern, Sundays at 3:00. Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color barrier 64 years ago. Up next, Ed Henry brings us the fascinating back story of his signing and newly revealed details that even his family never knew. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Sixty-four years ago this week, Brooklyn Dodgers GM Branch Rickey stepped up to the plate. He broke baseball's color barrier by signing one of the greatest athletes in American history, Jackie Robinson. New details are just now emerging about what proceeded this important more in American history. Ed Henry has that for us.

ED HENRY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Randi, after Barry Bonds' conviction on obstruction, there are many who say that the steroids era is the worst scandal in baseball history. But actually the biggest stain on the game was when they didn't let African-Americans play. All of that changed 64 years ago this week when Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier. And for all these years, we've never known how much of a role faith in God played in shaping that historic moment until now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HENRY (voice-over): Branch Rickey's decision to hire Jackie Robinson as the first African-American baseball player opened doors that changed sports and politics forever. And the details are etched in the memory of Ken Burns who did the definitive 18 and a half hour PBS documentary on baseball.

KEN BURNS, DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKER: One of the finest moments in all of American history, not just sports history, but American history, when on April 15, 1947, a black man, wearing the number 42, trotted out to first base at Ebbets Field.

HENRY: But we've learned a detail about this historic decision that, until now, was not known by Jackie Robinson's widow, Branch Rickey's grandson, or even Ken Burns.

HENRY (on camera): You've never heard this story?

BURNS: I haven't.

HENRY: This is new?

BURNS: This is totally new to me.

HENRY (voice-over): It turns out, just before signing the contract, Rickey secretly slipped into this Brooklyn church. The executive huddled with the pastor, Dr. Wendell Fifield, whose daughter-in-law is speaking with us about it for the first time.

DONNA SHOR, DAUGHTER-IN-LAW OF REV. FIFIELD: He started pacing and he wore a groove in the carpet. He went around and around the room for 45 minutes. HENRY: Branch Rickey III, now a minor league baseball executive in Texas, says his grandfather was deeply religious and determined to end discrimination, but also fretted about taking on the institution of baseball.

BRANCH RICKEY III, PRESIDENT, PACIFIC COAST LEAGUE: If Jackie became something that was not acceptable, I think my grandfather's reputation could have very quickly gone down the drain.

HENRY: That weighed on the Brooklyn Dodgers' executive as he paced this room for nearly an hour, finally shrieking, "I got it," and slumping down in a chair.

SHOR: Branch Rickey wiped tears from his eyes and said, Wendell, this was a decision so complex, so far reaching, fraught with so many pitfalls, and -- but still filled with so much good. If it was right, I had to work it out in this room and with you and I had to ask God about it.

HENRY: To protect Rickey's privacy, the pastor told only his wife, who wrote a five page essay that we recently found in an archive. The pastor's wife said she wrote the essay which appeared in the church bulletin with little notice after Rickey's death in 1965 so that Robinson would know how much Rickey struggled with it. But Robinson died young in 1972. And his widow, Rachel, told us the story never made it to her family, until now, and she praised Rickey's courage.

RACHEL ROBINSON, WIDOW OF JACKIE ROBINSON: He needed all the strength he could summon up, you know, to be able to take this step.

HENRY: Burns is now planning to use this story in a film about Robinson's life, slated to come out in 2015.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HENRY: Now, I had a chance to privately tell President Obama that I was going to be interviewing Rachel Robinson, and he told me very directly, "I want you to tell her something." The president said, "I see a direct line from what Jackie did to me being elected, the first African-American president." So, I told Rachel Robinson that when I got a chance to sit down with her in the offices of the Jackie Robinson Foundation, and she just beamed. And she told me that she loves hearing that the progress America made in another period of history is now linked to another. Randi?

KAYE: Great story, Ed. The number that Jackie Robinson wore, by the way, number 42, is retired by every team in Major League baseball.

The numbers in recent weeks told us that companies were hiring, but last week's unemployment numbers paint a different picture. That story is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Welcome back. Let's get you caught up on some stories you might have missed. All that negotiating and political fighting over this year's budget may be finally coming to an end. The House is scheduled to vote on nearly $40 million of budget cuts.

Lawmakers are making speeches on the House floor right now. Assuming it passes, the budget deal reached late last Friday, will then head to the Senate for approval before being sent to the president for his signature. But that only takes care of this fiscal year. Congress is also expected to start reviewing next year's budget proposal laid out by the House budget chairman, Paul Ryan.

The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits for the first time spiked last week despite weeks of dropping. Initial claims rose to 412,000. That's 27,000 more than the week before. The figure was the highest in two months and surprised economists. They say it's a sign the job market's recovery does still remain bumpy.

On New York's Long Island, police and FBI agents say they are searching spots of interest today, looking for evidence in the serial killer investigation. Aviation teams are flying over the area. Police say they have found a significant number of items that aren't natural, as they say, for the area. More remains, including a human skull, were uncovered Monday. Forensic experts are still working to identify those latest remains. Since December, investigators have uncovered at least eight bodies, four of them prostitutes.

Egypt's state TV says its ousted President Hosni Mubarak and his two sons have been summoned to appear before a Cairo court. Mubarak is still under investigation, but officials say no court date has been set. All three were detained by prosecutors for more than two weeks ago over corruption charges in connection with the killing of protesters. In the meantime, Egyptians celebrated the news.

Just take a look at these robots, if you will. Of course, they look pretty cool, right, going down the steps, doing all kinds of things. But what's even cooler is how they're helping out the people of Japan right now. I'll be back in a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: It's National Robotics Week, which usually showcases the coolest new robots. However, the recent disaster in Japan is giving us a glimpse as to how robot technology can also help in disasters. Here's Deborah Feyerick with today's Edge of Discovery.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The nuclear crisis in Japan is raising safety concerns around the world. Information from inside the Fukushima Daiichi plant is needed, but radiation pose a risk to human lives. So, they're turning to robots for help.

HENRIK CHRISTENSEN, GEORGIA TECH: They're using them for the inside right now. We can send in these robots and get a good initial assessment of what is the situation. Is it safe for people to go in.

FEYERICK: Two different robots have been sent to Japan. One travels by air. One by land. They're equipped with cameras, sensors and the Pak-Bot (ph) even has a moveable arm.

CHRISTENSEN: They're sending back radiation levels. They're sending back what is the oxygen levels and they are sending back are any toxic gases in there.

FEYERICK: The Georgia Tech robotics lab helps research and develop these robots. They believe when disasters strike, these robots can be an essential tool, whether it's looking for survivors or helping first responders.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's very motivating. It has a clear humanitarian value. We are helping people. The fact that we can help them be a little bit safer, making sure they come home at night.

FEYERICK: Artificial intelligence. Thinking about humans first.

Deborah Feyerick, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAYE: Drone attacks and CIA spies. Key weapons in the U.S. war against the Taliban inside Pakistan. Why both are driving a sharp wedge between allies. That's up next in "Globetrekking."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Pakistan is strongly condemning a U.S. drone missile attack which killed six suspected militants yesterday in the tribal region south Waziristan. Pakistan says the drone attacks have become a core irritant in the counterterrorism campaign. It was the first such attack in a month and came after Pakistan's top spy chief met with CIA director Leon Panetta at CIA headquarters on Monday. The focus of that meeting was another sore point between the two allies. Covert CIA agents in Pakistan. Pakistan demands a head count, information the U.S. is refusing to give.

Tensions came to a head earlier this year when a CIA contractor, Raymond Davis, shot dead two men in Pakistan. He claimed they tried to rob him. Well, Davis was held on murder charges for weeks before he was released. And then he left the country. Both the drone attacks and CIA agents have stoked fierce anti-American demonstrations across Pakistan.

Turning now to modern-day slavery and how those devices known as apps may help in the fight to eradicate a plaque that exists virtually everywhere in the world. Kristie Lu Stout's report is part of a year- long effort by CNN to help bring about an end to slavery.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: According to estimates by activists, scholars and policymakers, the number of modern-day slaves ranges from about 10 million to 30 million people. With a problem that widespread, it is easy to feel that individuals like you and I can't do anything to stop it. But we can, and the right apps can go a long way to help. Say you want to make sure the products you buy are not the product of slave labor. I'm talking about both the materials used to make them and their manufacturer.

That is where this app comes in. It is called Free to Work. It was developed by the Not for Sale Initiative. It's a handy guide to help consumers make ethical choices. And the app shows how companies around the world rate according to the labor practices. As you can see, there's a whole list of companies to choose from. For example, you can bring up Adidas. It scores an A minus for its code of conduct. Or we can bring up the chocolate maker Godiva, which gets a D minus because it has no known policies or practices with respect to child labor.

Now, tap into one of these. As you can see, you can get in depth rating on the company. There's also information about what the company does or does not do to cut slave labor out of a supply chain.

Now, what if you want to do this? You want to call on the company to take action. Well, the next app allows you to do that. That is called Call and Response. As you can see from the home page, you can check in with the latest news on the initiative and check out videos.

But what's really cool is this. It's something called Demand the Brand. You can basically call in your favorite companies to go slave free. And this is how you do it. You take a picture of a product, for example, I'm just taking a picture of a globe we have in the studio. Then you can apply the Slave Free Labor logo on top and then upload that onto the Internet. You can even see where other people from around the world are sending in their Demand the Brand call by bringing up what is called the Impact Map.

You can download these from the app store. To find more at the campaign Web site call NotforSaleCampaign.org or CallandResponse.com.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAYE: And for much more on the CNN Freedom Project, be sure check our Web page, CNN.com/freedom.

Time right now, 43 minutes past the hour. And that means its time to update to our stories.

Only a small majority polled in a new national survey favor the country's military involvement in Libya. The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation polls showed 53 percent of Americans approve of how President Obama has handled the situation in Libya. But only 14 percent would like to see the U.S. take a lead role in the military efforts in the African country.

Syria now has a new government. Syria's news agency says its president, Bashar Al Assad announced the formation today. The announcement comes as Syria is overwhelmed by anti-regime protests and clashes between demonstrators and security forces. A day after another air traffic controller was caught sleeping on the job, a top FAA official has resigned. Hank Krakowski, who heads the FAA's traffic control organization, stepped down after meeting with the FAA's chief, Randy Babbitt. Krakowski's resignation comes amid growing controversy over napping air traffic controllers.

In today's "Big I," we're focusing on airplanes in the future. These images show how planes could look just a few years down the road. The idea is to make aircraft that are more environmentally- friendly and are built with a self-healing magic skin that would make flying safer.

Well, NASA is throwing its weight behind the research.

I'm joined now by NASA engineer Ruben Del Rosario. He's live in Washington.

Hi, Ruben. Tell us what this magic skin is and how would it work and how will it make air travel safer?

RUBEN DEL ROSARIO, NASA ENGINEER: Hi, Randi. It is really a pleasure to be here with you today. As you -- as you well said, the primary objective is to try to find solutions that will allow airplane to burn significantly less fuel. One of the aspects that you need to consider to be able to do that is making those airplanes really light -- really light in weight. The way that we do that is by bringing significant use of composite structure that are really materials that are built from very light fibers and very light -- very strong fibers.

KAYE: And I -- sorry. Go on.

DEL ROSARIO: Yes, go ahead.

KAYE: I was going to say, I know that you've awarded Cessna nearly $2 million contract to study this protective skin. But as I understand it, they won't be studying the self-healing part of the airplane. That's what your group is doing. So, I'm curious in what situation might an airplane need self-healing as it's called?

DEL ROSARIO: One of the -- one of the limitation of composite structure is really the damage that they can be susceptible to if they are by chance to hot or too humid or hit by hail, for example. This protective skin and the self-healing skins, what they do is try to prevent that damage by, for example, incorporated micro capsules, that if the structure is broken, this micro capsule will release a resin that will be inside to actually heal those ruptures before it propagates to the rest of the aircraft.

KAYE: And so, when -- if there's a puncture or damage or anything, these capsules -- they release and then the resin, what, hardens and fills that in so that would make the plane safer?

DEL ROSARIO: Absolutely. The number one challenge is that these fatigues failure, they start really small. And what we're trying to prevent is to fix them before they become larger and they start really propagating and becoming a lot more serious.

KAYE: This is great news for air travelers. The question is: how soon before we might see this concept actually put into practice?

DEL ROSARIO: Well, this is -- this is very fundamental research. It's going to take quite a bit of time before we can see these in the different airplanes. Our emphasis within NASA is to find those airplanes that will burn significantly less fuel. And we're targeting 20 to 25 years from now. This is how long it's going to take to investigate that technology in small laboratories and then bring them through all the process that they need to go through before they are actually regulated and accepted as final products.

KAYE: Well, better late than never, right? That's what I say. So, thank you, Ruben Del Rosario.

DEL ROSARIO: Absolutely.

KAYE: We appreciate all your work on trying to make airplanes safer for all of us. Thank you.

To learn more about the future of air travel and to see what NASA is doing, head to our blog, CNN.com/Ali. You can find all the information you want right there.

What do Rahm Emanuel, Ernie Banks and Chicago Bull's Derrick Rose have in common? It has something to do with money and the president. Political news, next.

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KAYE: Welcome back. It is time now for a CNN political update.

CNN's senior political editor, Mark Preston, joins me now from Washington.

And, Mark, the president is headed home to his hometown.

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL EDITOR: He is. It's always nice to go home, especially when you're going to thereby for fundraisers.

You know, Randi, they're saying that President Obama might have to spend upwards of $1 billion to win re-election in 2012. And the only way he's go doing that is if he starts asking for money. And we'll see that tonight.

He'll be out in Chicago for three fundraisers. Two of those fundraisers will be smaller. There's a couple of hundred people. And then, there'll be a larger event with about 2,000 people that will be attending. Now, the ticket prices to attend these events range anywhere from $100 all the way up to $35,800.

And, look, it is really just the beginning because in the next couple of weeks, Randi, we'll see President Obama head out to California to San Francisco, and Los Angeles. And then back east to New York to continue to raise money.

Again, this is all for 2012. If it's going to be $ 1 billion, he needs to raise a lot of money -- Randi.

KAYE: And where is some of that money going to come from? Because I understand some of it comes from small donations mainly.

PRESTON: Yes. You know, he really did a great job in 2007- 2008 of cobbling together both a great support from small dollar donors, people who will give $25, $50, $100, as well as these big, huge donors who can give upwards to $35,800 at a whack. So, President Obama is reaching out to young people, where he hopes to get the small dollar donors, as well as some of these really deep-pocketed donors. And when you go to New York and Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, all really gold mines for Democrats when they're raising money -- a lot of money in those cities -- Randi.

KAYE: All right. Thank you, Mark. Great to see you.

Your next update from "The Best Political Team on Television" is just one hour away.

Actress Catharine Zeta-Jones seeks treatment for a bipolar disorder. A closer look at what that is and how exactly it can be treated. That's next.

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KAYE: Actress Catherine Zeta-Jones is being treated for bipolar disorder. The mental illness affects millions of Americans.

And I'm joined now by our senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen.

So, what should we know, Elizabeth, about this? We know that it's getting so much attention. What should we know about bipolar?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, let's talk about what it is because there might be some confusion about what bipolar disorder is. So, bipolar disorder is kind of what it sounds like -- you have ups, you know, you're at one pole, and then you have way downs and you cycle. So, you're not staying at one. You're cycling from one to the other.

KAYE: And, I mean, this is bipolar II, from what I understand --

COHEN: Right.

KAYE: -- which a lot of folks, at least a lot of us hadn't heard of. What is the difference? Is it less severe or --

COHEN: Yes, it is less severe. Bipolar I is where your poles are way up and way down. And bipolar II -- that's bipolar I -- bipolar II is sort of more like this, but still problematic. So, you're still going up and down. Now, the bipolar I, with the extremes, that's what psychiatrists thought Charlie Sheen had when they saw him, sort of, have those episodes on television.

KAYE: But it still has sort of the same -- that same side -- what, you feel anxious, you feel moody?

COHEN: Well, you feel -- you feel -- when you're up, you feel like you can do anything. You feel energetic. You feel like you can take on the world. Someone with the less form might take on two full- time jobs. You know, they might think I can do it.

Someone with a more severe full time job, when they're manic, they might go around and by four cars in a week, or they might have sex with strangers. You know, just sort of this really extreme kinds of behaviors. And then when they go down to the other end, it's an extreme depression.

KAYE: So, can you hold a job? Can -- I mean, obviously, people live with this, right?

COHEN: Absolutely. People live with this. So, some people live untreated with this, although if it starts to get too severe then you really can't live with it and you really do need treatment. So, there are certainly probably people walking around undiagnosed manic depression, more likely is the less severe kind. But there are probably people walking around with it, just, you know, living every day, experiencing these difficulties.

KAYE: And if you can get treatment, what's out there for people?

COHEN: Well, when people do get treatment, it's often because that depressive episode has kind of taken over because -- it's interesting, it's bipolar but it's not 50/50. So, the depressive episodes get longer, let's say even a year, and the manic episodes are just a matter of months and that's often when people end up seeking help. And so, you can take mood stabilizers, which is a type of drug, lithium, sometimes for the depressive part of it, and treatment.

And I think it's interesting that part of the treatment, Randi, is to advise the person, here are the signs that you're manic, here are the signs you need help. And the signs that you also kind of need to get out of the public eye, like when you have these episodes you don't want to be out there where people can see you.

KAYE: So, you can only imagine how difficult it must have been for her. She's always in the public eye.

COHEN: So, sure. Exactly. Absolutely.

KAYE: All right. Thank you for shedding some light on that. Appreciate it. Thank you.