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House to Vote on Repealing Obamacare; Romney Booed at NAACP Convention
Aired July 11, 2012 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's roll it, top of the next hour.
Hour number two. Welcome back. I'm Brooke Baldwin.
Here we go, blue skies over Capitol Hill. Here's the thing, though. House Republicans, they are forcing another vote on the president's health care reforms. This is attempt number 33 to kill Obamacare. In the words of a House Democrat, this is their boil the bunny moment.
The Democrat says the Republicans need to move on and stop channeling what he calls their inner Glenn Close.
Dana Bash, no points for the movie reference either. But let's get to a question here of why. Why another vote to repeal Obamacare when, A., the Supreme Court has spoken and, B., we know any repeal the House would pass here is an instant death in the Senate, not going anywhere, so why do this?
DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Why?
You just have to look at the calendar to answer the question why, Brooke. And we talk about it so much now that so much of what they do particularly here in Congress at this point is because of politics.
If you look at the polls, it shows that this country has been really split along party lines since the inception of this legislation. That has not changed. So when we're just a few months away from Election Day, what Republicans and particularly Democrats too want to do is to get out the vote and get out the base and to explain to them how important this is. I want you to listen to some of the debate we have heard on both sides during this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. ROSA DELAURO (D), CONNECTICUT: Welcome to Groundhog Day in the House of Representatives. This majority needs to stop working to put American families at risk, start working to make our economy healthy.
REP. JEB HENSARLING (R), TEXAS: The American people don't want it. The longer people have to know this bill, the more intense they are in wanting to see it repealed.
REP. STENY HOYER (D-MD), HOUSE MINORITY WHIP: It is time for Republicans to end their relentless obsession with taking away health care benefits from millions of Americans. REP. PETER ROSKAM (R), ILLINOIS: We should take away this albatross in the country and we should repeal it. We should replace it. And here's the good news. The voters get the last word in November.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: No truer words have been said. The voters do get the last word in November and that really is what this debate for the 33rd time since the health care law was passed, this repeal vote is all about.
BALDWIN: To your point about that and November, we heard Republican the congressman say this debate will be decided then. When it comes down to it, that is really the Republicans' prescription for killing Obamacare. Right? It's the ballot box.
BASH: That is exactly right. Let's just look at what it means and more specifically how the Republicans could actually put their money where their mouth is and repeal this law.
It won't be easy. It is possible. But it won't be easy. What they would have to do is keep control of the House, get control of the Senate at least 51 votes and they would have to get control of the White House. Mitt Romney would have to win. They would have to have a clean sweep in November in order to overturn the health care law.
If you listen to the debate and if you watch the press releases and you see what they are trying to tell the people home, I think that is why Republicans are doing this to try to make the base understand how important it is that they can't stay home and they have got to get out there. Then there's the question of independent voters.
And you know what? It doesn't look according to our polling and others like they are going to be swayed very much by this debate. They look at it as others do, which is Congress spinning its wheels saying the same thing over and over again when they know it's not going to get far.
I just want to make one important point, though. It is not just Republicans who do this. When Democrats were in control of the House, they had vote after vote after vote on things like bringing the troops home from the Iraq war. They knew that wasn't going to happen. Again it was politics then, just like this is now.
BALDWIN: Politics at play. Dana Bash, Dana, we appreciate for us in Washington.
And speaking of Obamacare, Mitt Romney usually gets cheers for saying he wants to repeal it, but not today in front of a very different kind of audience that he usually draws, black voters at the annual NAACP convention in Houston.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'm going to eliminate every nonessential expensive program I can find. That includes Obamacare and I'm going to work to reform and save... (BOOING)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: Jim Acosta was in the room for that.
I don't know how loud the boos quite reverberated. But to be fair, he got certainly some moments of applause at several points of this speech, but it was ugly in there. How is camp Romney responding?
JIM ACOSTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It was very interesting to watch.
You played the boos that came after Mitt Romney talked about repealing the president's health care law. That booing went on for 15 seconds. If I'm not mistaken -- and I have asked a lot of the other reporters who covered the campaign now for about a year -- that is the longest, that is the most prolonged negative response Mitt Romney has gotten to one of the lines in his speech that we have seen so far in this campaign.
It was a pretty severe response at that point. But he also did receive applause at other points during his speech. He talked about defending what he called traditional marriage. It was sort of a hint at his opposition to gay marriage. And at that point, he got some cheers in the audience.
That is an issue that has divided the NAACP at times. He did get some cheers from evangelical leaders in the NAACP crowd that was here today. But make no mistake. This was not the best reaction that the Romney campaign probably wanted.
They did talk about it afterwards. Reporters went up to Tara Wall, who is head of outreach to the African-American community for the Romney campaign. She said there were boos, but there was also applause. We counted more moments of applause than boos and she also noted there was a standing ovation at the end.
Truth be told, Brooke, it was about half the audience that was sort of standing at the end giving what was a standing ovation to Mitt Romney. But it was a very mixed reaction and at times a very negative reaction to what he had to say.
BALDWIN: OK. I want to bring up kind of an interesting point. This is a tweet we saw from CNN contributor David Frum. I just want to read this.
He is a former speechwriter for George W. Bush. He tweeted this today. "If I were a political cynic, I would wonder whether the Romney campaign wanted to be booed at the NAACP."
That whole line about repealing Obamacare, Jim, could he maybe have been aiming at his own base with that one?
ACOSTA: I asked the Romney campaign that very question when we had a chance to talk to them after this event was over. They did not respond to that question, but at the same time they were being peppered with so many questions I think they were having maybe some trouble answering all of them. They didn't have time to answer all of them.
But I will say that Mitt Romney did get a lot of conservative props on Twitter and social media for coming to this group and sticking to his principles and sticking to his policy positions. He did not come in here and tailor his speech to what was a much more liberal audience than he's accustomed to.
He came in here and said he would repeal the president's signature legislative achievement, that is the health care law, and ticked off a number of other times that did not go over well with this audience. And so even the leadership of the NAACP that I talked to after this event, they were saying Mitt Romney showed a lot of courage in coming here today.
BALDWIN: Speaking of props, you mentioned this. You alluded to this point he made in his speech a little earlier. I just want to play this.
This is something in which Romney certainly got a much better response. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROMNEY: Any policy that lifts up and honors the family is going to be good for the country and that must be our goal. As president, I will promote strong families and I will defend traditional marriage.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: He tapped into this strain of religious conservatism in the black community, a much better tactic, it sounds like.
ACOSTA: Right. That's right. And keep in mind, Brooke, this worked for George W. Bush back in 2004.
George W. Bush carried 11 percent of the African-American vote back in 2004. That hurt John Kerry. That may have hurt him in places like Ohio where there is a large evangelical African-American community. Down in Florida, it may have hurt John Kerry among evangelical black voters.
You will recall at the time President Bush was very much going after those voters trying to appeal to those voters to try to carve off or peel off a sliver here and there of the African-American vote. And it helped him in the end in 2004.
No idea whether or not that was the determining factor in that race, but it certainly helped him. And Mitt Romney may be doing some of that by going after some of these issues. He talked about saving traditional marriage, as he called it, Brooke. But he also talked about school choice which is another issue that appeals to some members of the NAACP. And they responded to that favorably as well, Brooke.
BALDWIN: Yes. He also talked a lot talk about education when he was at that inner-city school in Philadelphia not too long ago.
Jim Acosta, thank you very much.
ACOSTA: That's right.
BALDWIN: Hey, we have just gotten some live pictures in. Let's look at this together here, thanks to our affiliate WDIV.
So what are you looking at? You are looking at a live rescue that is under way here. And here's what we know. There is the -- there is a construction worker stuck -- and I'm looking at this here right along with you. I don't know if we can quite see him. But this is a trench you are looking at. There is someone stuck in this trench trapped about five feet underground.
If you know the area, this is Detroit's west side. This has been going on for the better part of the last hour, hour and some change. We are told, according to our affiliate, he was doing some sewer work and the dirt just collapsed on him. So that is why he is stuck. We are told he is alert. He is talking. You see a number of these guys on the scene obviously working to get him out. Time is not on their side. But he has been talking to these emergency crews.
And we are told at one point you can see him with the shovel -- look at this -- going the old-fashioned way getting the dirt out that way. I don't know if that is quite him in that white tank top. Guys, we are not sure? OK. We're not sure which one he is, if we can even see him in this live picture. But at one point, he was up to his neck in dirt and cement.
So let's keep watching and see if we can tell which guy he is. I'm looking at a bunch of people on the screen, rescue crews hoping to get this construction worker freed. We will keep an eye on it. As soon as we start seeing him rescued, we will bring it to you.
A lot more unfolding this hour. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BALDWIN: A crisis is unfolding as the economy is unraveling in Europe. Parents who can't feed their kids are leaving them in baby hatches. I'm Brooke Baldwin. The news is now.
(voice-over): A scare in the air.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I thought we were going to die.
BALDWIN: Just before landing, an American flight takes a frightening turn.
Plus, where is Jesse Jackson Jr.? He disappeared for personal reasons. But some are demanding answers. And new revelations involving the man who apparently killed himself in court just moments after hearing his fate. Now we are not only hearing of a secret e-mail, but a discovery inside his car.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BALDWIN: He is the son of one of the richest men in the world, heir to a Swedish milk carton fortune. She was born in America, daughter of a very, very affluent family. And now she has been found dead inside this couple's London mansion and he has now been arrested for questioning.
Atika Shubert is piecing together this mystery of Hans and Eva Rausing in London.
Atika, first, how was Eva Rausing's body even found?
ATIKA SHUBERT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, basically, Hans Rausing was pulled over for driving erratically yesterday afternoon. Police arrested him for suspension of drug possession.
When they went to go search their home, a six-story home in one of the wealthiest parts of London, they found the body of Eva Rausing in an upstairs bedroom. Now, police say they do not know the cause of death and they do not know how long the body had been there.
They then arrested Hans Rausing for questioning in connection with the murder -- excuse me -- it is not a murder at all. At this point her death is simply unexplained. What they have done now is send her body in for an autopsy to try and determine the cause of death and they are looking to see whether or not they can have a definitive answer in the next few days.
BALDWIN: Yes, they don't know at all. But what we do know is that they come from -- both of them come from quite, quite wealthy backgrounds. But tell me if this is fair to qualify this as sketchy backgrounds. Tell me about that.
SHUBERT: Yes. Yes. They are both known as devoted philanthropists, but they also had a reputation for hard-core drug use. They both met in rehab. When they got married, they set up a life care.
But even in 2008, both were arrested on possession of heroin and crack cocaine. And they were only found out when Eva Rausing attempted to enter a party in the U.S. Embassy and trying to smuggle in drugs. This was a couple notorious for its drug use.
BALDWIN: Wow. Did they fight? Were there any kind of domestic problems?
SHUBERT: No. In fact, the couple was known to be devoted to each other, but many of their friends and family worried that they were basically enabling each other in their addiction. And so the fear is that perhaps Eva Rausing lost her battle with drug addiction. And Hans Rausing appears for whatever reason to be involved in his own battles with addiction and was found wandering the streets of London, essentially.
BALDWIN: We will wait to see what the coroner sees. Atika Shubert in London for us, Atika, thank you so much.
Dozens of children dying for mysterious reasons. It has baffled doctors until now. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is there. He's breaking the news. The mystery has been solved.
And part of the reason involves what doctors gave those children. Don't miss Sanjay's reporting from Cambodia.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BALDWIN: We now know what caused more than 60 children to die of this mysterious illness in Cambodia. No new cases of the illness have been confirmed since last Saturday and our Dr. Sanjay Gupta is in Cambodia covering the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The only thing the doctors knew for sure was when the children arrived at the hospital, they were dying and fast, a fever, convulsion, and encephalitis, and then the lungs completely destroyed.
Since the end of April, doctors in Cambodia struggled with a medical mystery.
(on camera): And that mystery was ultimately solved right over here. Blood samples from those sick and dying children were eventually brought to this laboratory, analyzed -- as you see right over there -- and eventually they concluded that there were several different pathogens. There was Enterovirus 71. There was streptococcus suis and also dengue.
And all of those infections were made worse by the use of steroids.
(voice-over): To crack this case, the lab had to work backward. First, eliminate known viruses like avian flu, SARS, and Nipah.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The first thing that goes through your head is to try and determine whether this is one of the usual suspects that you haven't detected before. If it is, has it mutated or changed in such a way that it causes more severe disease, or is it something completely new?
GUPTA: Epidemiologist Dr. Arnaud Tarantola and virologist Dr. Phillipe Buchy, two French doctors living in Cambodia, solved the mystery.
(on camera): One of the things that we have heard several times now from the World Health Organization is no steroids should be used. They seem to say that steroids made this problem worse.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When you have a dying child, you try to use what you have at hand. And they were right to try that. Now, whether or not it helps remains to be determined.
GUPTA: I don't want to belabor this point, but they really seem to indicate that it hurt, that these infections a lot of times they can be a problem, but they are not particularly dangerous, but something pushes them over the top. And they thought that the steroids seemed to be a common denominator.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: From the cases that we reviewed, almost all of the children died and almost all of them had steroids.
GUPTA (voice-over): Steroids can be a potent antiinflammatory, but when given to children with aggressive infections, steroids can also suppress the body's own immune system, allowing the infection to become even worse, as was the case with Enterovirus 71, also called EV-71.
(on camera): You hear about a lot of different viruses, avian flu, Nipah virus. EV-71, as far as they could tell, really had not been in Cambodia before for sure. Why does it suddenly appear like this and why does it appear with such a vengeance?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It looks like this has emerged strongly probably because it had not circulated to the same -- with the same intensity in the past years.
GUPTA (voice-over): It is believed that a slight variation in the EV- 71 made the virus stronger. And the steroids made the body's resistance even weaker.
(on camera): So, case closed. It sounds like the case is closed from your standpoint?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. I think we can close the case.
GUPTA (voice-over): Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BALDWIN: Sanjay, thank you.
House Republicans, they are minutes away from voting to repeal the health care law. We are keeping a close eye on that.
Also, a NASA probe is sending back some pretty fascinating pictures of a vortex in outer space. It takes nine hours just to fully rotate one time. Chad is all over it.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BALDWIN: Violent turbulence rocks this one airplane. Passengers, they say they went flying out of their seats. And a NASA probe is sending back these fascinating photos of a vortex in outer space. Time to play "Reporter Roulette."
Want to go to John Zarrella in Miami with more on this very frightening plane ride.
Talk to me a little bit about the turbulence they experienced. And did they get any warning to buckle up?
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN MIAMI BUREAU CHIEF: Yes, Brooke, the plane was about 30 minutes outside of Miami coming in from Aruba late yesterday afternoon.
The seat belt sign was on. The passengers were supposed to be in their seats. They were on the initial approach into Miami, the initial descent into Miami. And it was literally a grab the armrest moment. Out of nowhere, they hit severe turbulence. This is what some of the passengers had to say when they got on the ground.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It felt like a huge drop. I was watching the movie and heads just popped up, the entire plane.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I thought we were going to die. It was scary.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Of course, I was sure that I was going to die.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZARRELLA: Initially, about a dozen people were reported injured, some minor bumps and scrapes. Two flight attendants and one passenger were transported to one of the local hospitals and they were treated and released.
BALDWIN: What about American Airlines? Did the pilots say? Was there anything on the radar to give them a heads-up, hey, there's something ahead?
ZARRELLA: No. The radar was clear. There was nothing there.
But I talked today with the National Weather Service here in Miami and they were saying, you know what? That's not necessarily surprising. There were thunderstorms in and around Miami late yesterday, but you get some of these really huge thunderstorms and you can have turbulence 10 to 20 miles away from where the thunderstorm is, so you wouldn't even know that the turbulence was there when you hit it. And that a lot of times, Brooke, is when we hear that term clear-air turbulence.
BALDWIN: Aha. And there you have it. I would have been totally white-knuckled on that flight. I do not do well with turbulence.
ZARRELLA: Yes.
BALDWIN: John Zarrella, thank you very much for us in Miami.
Next here on "Reporter Roulette," we have Chad Myers. It's a good day. Any day I can talk about turning moons and vortices, nerd alert.
I enjoy it.
CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: You just like space.
BALDWIN: Talk to me.
MYERS: I asked you yesterday, I said, what did you want to be when you grew up?
BALDWIN: I said an astronaut. That was in ninth-grade intro physics.
MYERS: That's right.
BALDWIN: I did really well in math, but physics, not so much.
MYERS: Yes, I didn't do real well on physics three. Those electrons were going different ways and capacitors and stuff.
(CROSSTALK)
BALDWIN: Saturn, talk to me.
MYERS: Let me show you what this looks like. This is so darn cool
It is a vortex on the south pole of Titan, Titan, a moon up here of Saturn. There it is. That's what it looks like. Everybody at my weather office said it kind of looks like there's a baby. That looks like a baby.
(CROSSTALK)
MYERS: It looks like one of those grams you take...
(CROSSTALK)
MYERS: This whole thing now spinning around. It take nine days to spin around. What is it doing there? We really don't know. There is the spin right there. It's going around the south pole.
We believe though -- the scientists do believe at NASA that the south pole is now getting to be in its wintertime and this could be a winter storm just circulating around the pole itself. You see the sweep. There is the south pole. Here is the polar vortex. There was one on the north pole earlier when the north pole had its winter.
Now the south pole is getting its winter. So the now south pole is getting this vortex. They just found it because this is really cool. This thing is going around and looking at this, at Titan, was going around the equator the entire time and didn't see it.
(CROSSTALK)
MYERS: And then they just changed the orbit of it and so it was going this way instead and they went, hey, look down, what is that? They could see the poles looking straight down, rather than at such an acute angle. They couldn't see it. They just found this a couple of days ago.
BALDWIN: I just love these photos. I just have such awe for everything else that is out there. Chad, thank you.
MYERS: You're welcome.
BALDWIN: And that's your "Reporter Roulette."
The question now, where is Jesse Jackson Jr.? The answer, no one knows. The congressman basically calls out sick almost a month ago and disappears. Some of his fellow lawmakers, including Democrats, they want to know what the heck is going on.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BALDWIN: So we just wanted to dip in and show you some more of these live pictures. Chad Myers is going to join me here because he has been watching this, too.
This is this trench rescue. A construction worker has been stuck under some dirt for the better part of an hour and a half now and so we've been watching them. They're now taking buckets.
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: It's almost like the bucket brigade when you take water and put a fire out. They're taking empty buckets down there, filling them up with dirt and taking the dirt out.
There was a block-and-tackle attached to this guy. They were really trying to yank him out of there, but obviously he was stuck down in there just too much.
There were three in the hole, according to WDIV. There were three. Two got out immediately. This is the only guy they have not go out yet, but when they realized they couldn't yank him out of there, now, they're in there literally with their hands putting dirt by hand in a bucket and throwing the dirt away to try to get this guy free.
BALDWIN: Bucket by bucket, we are going to watch this. Chad Myers, don't go too far. WDIV, thank you. Keep giving us those live pictures.
Meantime, let's move on. "Rapid Fire," let's go.
For the 33rd time -- who's counting -- here, House Republicans forcing a lengthy debate and vote on healthcare reform. Any moment now, the House is certain to pass this bill to repeal ObamaCare. The bill is DOA in the Senate, dead on arrival.
So, what we're watching here is really election year politics play out. We're going to let you know what that final vote tally is as soon as we get it in a matter of minutes.
Also, fellow Democrats are getting impatient with Illinois Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. He has been on this mysterious medical leave now for a month with barely any explanation. The calls are now beginning to mount for Congressman Jackson to reveal more about his absence. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPRESENTATIVE STENY HOYER (R), MINORITY WHIP: I think Congressman Jackson and his office and his family would be well advised to advise the constituents of his condition.
He's obviously facing a health problem. People get sick and when people get sick they miss work. Everybody in America understands that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: And in Ohio today, look at these pictures. This train derailed. A mile-wide section of Columbus was evacuated after this train caught fire and the explosion absolutely rocked the area.
As you can see, the tankers there just burning. Part of the reason they are burning, they were hauling thousands of gallons of ethanol and people miles away actually reported hearing that explosion.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was like -- I don't know how to describe it. It was just a big boom. Like it, was loud.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So we ran outside and everything was just on fire. I was nervous. I thought I was going to die.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I heard a big boom and then I looked up and then I just saw orange and I started freaking out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: N serious injuries were reported, but some people are still waiting to return to their homes because of this.
A car bomb explodes outside a police academy. This is the capital of Yemen. At least 10 people killed, 19 others wounded. Police say the suicide bomber saw a group of cadets leaving this main gate today and the set off the blast. The attack is believed to be the work of al Qaeda.
A plan to save Spain from financial meltdown not going over very well in Madrid. Look at this.
You can hear some of these rubber bullets being fired by this police squad, also using batons on these demonstrators today, including coal miners for help just to keep their industry afloat.
And amid all these protests on the streets, Spain's prime minister announced he will be cutting union subsidies, he will be raising Spain's value-added sales tax to 21 percent and he will suspend Christmas bonuses for public workers.
Take a look at this high-speed chase. This is playing out here in California. You see him flipping around. He is not done yet. Keep your eyes on the truck because they are stopping.
He was a suicidal P.E. teacher, by the way, accused of sexual abusing a 14-year-old girl, but here it goes. It resumes until he goes careening off the highway and slams into a tree. So, he goes through the guardrail and ultimately ends in the tree and they get him.
A first for the U.S. Olympic team that will be headed to London in a couple of weeks. It turns out women will be outnumbering men, 269 to 261. Olympic CEO Scott Blackman calls this, quote, "a true testament to the impact of Title IX," the gender equality law.
New revelations involving the man who apparently killed himself in court just moments after hearing of his fate. We are not only hearing of his secret e-mail, but a discovery inside his car.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BALDWIN: He climbed the highest mountains, but it was his lowest point that was witnessed by millions. I'm talking about an adventurer, former Wall Street trader who apparently put a little something in his mouth as he was being convicted of burning his own mansion to collect insurance money.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Does the offense involves the discharge, use or threatening use of fire, a deadly weapon or dangerous instrument? Yes. (INAUDIBLE) by the court person.
Is this your true verdict, so say you one and all?
UNDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: Did you see that? His hand slip? What he did? Minutes later, Michael Marin collapsed in court and he died after being taken to the hospital.
Authorities have been piecing together what exactly happened ever since and, "On the Case" for us today, criminal defense attorney Drew Findling. And welcome, by the way.
DREW FINDLING, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Good to be here.
BALDWIN: So we know that the coroner has not yet ruled on the cause of death, but it sounds like it will be ruled suicide by cyanide. What an image, what he is doing there? Have you ever seen that before?
FINDLING: Well, no, I have not seen that before, but let me tell you, since 2008 and the recession, we have seen so many domestic violence cases where husbands and wives dealing with debt are in violent relationships, but we've also seen these arson cases.
This is not the first nor will it be the last where somebody has so much indebtedness they think the best way to get through it is to burn their business or their home down.
BALDWIN: But cyanide?
FINDLING: Well, you know what was happening is he was found guilty and he knew through his very good lawyers that the jury was getting ready to move into the sentencing phase, that is, they were going to hear evidence that would determine how much -- not if he'd go to jail, but for how long he would go to jail.
And, apparently, if it was suicide, we know that in 2011 he had ordered and received the cyanide. It was clearly part of his master plan and he followed through with it.
BALDWIN: Drew, do you think that in cases like this where it is someone from, you know, affluent means, do you think it is more difficult for people like that in this situation to take it a little harder or for them to fall?
FINDLING: You know, it's interesting that you say that because we all think of Madoff and he has embraced his incarceration and seems to be thriving in the setting because there are some that realistically that, if they commit a crime of this magnitude, are so narcissistic they think they can survive anything.
This person, you know, what we learned about Mr. Marin and his personality, the climbing of mountains, the buying of the best artwork in the work, apparently he just didn't see himself in this basic lifestyle of imprisonment and chose to go the other direction.
BALDWIN: He couldn't take it.
Case number two, this is a horrible story. This one's out of West Virginia. Authorities say this next case amounts to slavery and torture.
So it's about this man. This is Peter Lizon. He's accused of chaining his wife, beating her, mutilating her. This allegedly went on for ten years until the wife finally went to a women's crisis center for help.
I mean, the details are horrendous and I'll get into more of them in a moment, including beating her with a hot frying pan.
FINDLING: Yeah, just crazy.
BALDWIN: Crazy.
FINDLING: Absolutely crazy and, you know, what you are going to see in this case is you're going to see descending on this case two types of experts. First, you are going to see cultural experts.
Apparently, these folks are of Czechoslovakian or now the Czech Republic dissent. So you are going to will see experts on both sides look into, is this possible that someone would endure this type of violence and inflict this violence based on some cultural disposition. The second thing you're going to see is the psychologists or psychiatrists with the issue of the cycle of abuse. We think of the cycle of abuse when somebody stays in a relationship even though they are subjected to violence because there is the explosion, which is the violence, there is the loving stage, the contrite stage, and then, of course, there is the forgiveness and the talking the way through it. And that's going to be where we are going to see this case look.
BALDWIN: For us looking on the outside in, I can't imagine. You know, someone does this to you, you leave, right? But in this case, she is standing by him.
FINDLING: Yeah, and I think you are going to see the combination of the two issues. Was cultural and was it that psychological dependence that we see? We hear all the time -- maybe not so much in a modern era -- but we have heard of so many cases and seen so many cases where a woman will generally stand by her man.
It could go both ways, but let's be honest with one another. It is mostly the woman that is subjected to the violence that stands by her man.
BALDWIN: Battered women's syndrome.
FINDLING: Battered woman's syndrome. And where the cases generally get the most publicity is where the woman strikes back, does something to injure her husband or her boyfriend or her lover in self defense. That's what gets the publicity.
What makes this so truly unique is we've discovered her in the midst of the abuse.
BALDWIN: Chained her up, allegedly, even while she was giving birth, as I mentioned, beating her with a hot frying pan and mutilating her feet with a piece of big farm equipment.
FINDLING: Brooke, I think the tell-tale signs is going to be she has reported that she gave birth to what we call a stillborn and that it was buried. Clearly, if they find that stillborn, it's going to be game, set and match, as far as this case is concerned because that's clearly going to prove that the allegations that she has told this third party at the shelter were true.
BALDWIN: Yeah, we'll watch for it in West Virginia. Drew Findling, thank you.
FINDLING: Brooke, thanks so much.
BALDWIN: "On the Case" with us today.
The economy forcing some parents to give up their children and, in some cases, choose which of their children to keep. You are about to hear why parents are abandoning their babies and why this is an unfolding, growing crisis.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BALDWIN: I know we have been all been keeping an eye on Europe, on the desperate financial measure to keep the continent's most fragile economies from imploding.
In fact just today in Madrid, police and protesters clashed over these newly announced tax hikes and big cuts to social problems, but I just wanted to take the next couple of minutes to really focus on some of the stories that aren't always grabbing headlines, the less obvious casualties, if you will, of the tough times gripping countries like Spain, like Italy, like Greece.
Babies are being abandoned in ever greater numbers by parents who just simply can't afford to take care of them. And many of them are left in what is called baby hatches. It's a system a lot like the American safe haven laws where mothers can leave unwanted newborns at a hospital, at a fire station.
And, if you have never heard of a baby hatch, here is how it works. This is a CNN report. We were at a Rome hospital in 2007.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's accessible only from the outside, allowing the mother to drop the baby in a heated crib monitored by a camera filming only her hands.
Within seconds, censors detect movement and set off alarms in the emergency room from where doctors intervene in less than one minute.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: That's a baby hatch. This is Barbie Nadeau. She dug deeper into the abandoned baby crisis in Europe. She's the Rome bureau chief for "Newsweek" and "The Daily Beast" and, Barbie, welcome.
You know, I read your piece first thing this morning and I just thought, my goodness. Because I know baby hatches is not something new in Europe. They are operated in 11 countries, but what is new, what you write about, is this dramatic increase in the number of children dropped off. Tell me about the increase.
BARBIE NADEAU, ROME BUREAU CHIEF, "NEWSWEEK" AND "THE DAILY BEAST": That's right. It is really shocking, the increase. And you know, some of the hospitals and facilities that are attached to the baby hatches don't give public information about just how many babies are being dropped.
But you've got a 20 percent increase right now of babies who are up for adoption in countries like Italy and Greece, especially, and what these babies are, the source of these babies, are generally these abandoned children.
It's a very tragic situation because these people, these mothers, especially, feel very obviously desperate. They can't take care of their child. They are going to give their child, put them in the equivalent is what is basically like a dumb waiter. They put the baby in there and close the hatch and walk away because they just can't do it.
In Greece, especially, we have also seen a higher number of older children, which is even more tragic on some level, being abandoned at daycare centers and daycare providers and schools because the parents cannot feed the children.
In the spring, there was a daycare center in Athens that had four children in the course of one week that were left and one girl named Natasha had a note pinned to her vest that said I am not going to be picking up this girl today because I can't afford to feed her.
BALDWIN: Wow. Yeah, we have had CNN crews in Greece recently. We've told the stories of these older kids being adopted, but it's just something totally different when you have this itty-bitty baby they're dropping off in this hatch.
And you mentioned, Barbie -- you mentioned Italy and Greece. Are those the two countries that really have the highest numbers in terms of these abandoned babies, would you say?
NADEAU: Well, in terms of the numbers of the abandoned babies, yes. Italy and Greece far outweigh the other countries, but there are baby hatches in countries even like Germany which are doing well in this economic crisis, certainly doing better.
So you've got a situation where people can't handle the baby, can't handle the idea that they'll have an infant to feed, another mouth to feed. In Italy, especially, the church, the Catholic Church, is very involved in the care and the facilitation of some of these babies and the adoption and things like that, but it's growing in numbers and it's worrying.
And to such an extent that there's an organization here in Rome and in Italy that want to put a baby hatch in every city across the country. And that's very telling. That shows that there are requests and questions from mothers, expectant mothers, from people who can't afford to feed their babies. They want a place to be able to leave them.
BALDWIN: Talk about desperate times. And in reading your piece, I wondered about the legality. And so this is what you write, quote, "Abandoning a child in the E.U. is punishable by prison time and hefty fines, but many countries overlook the crimes if the child is given up for economic reasons and left in a safer place."
So if I'm reading this correctly, this is illegal, these parents dropping off these babies, but it sounds like these churches and hospitals are just kind of turning a blind eye, is that right?
NADEAU: They are turning a blind eye because what is the alternative? The alternative is infanticide, killing a baby or putting a baby in a dumpster, some far more horrific than leaving a baby in a place that they know is safe.
They also have in Italy and in Greece a situation where you can have a baby, you can give birth to a baby and conceal your identity, which doesn't exist in other parts of Europe.
But in these two countries, you can go in as a pregnant woman to the hospital and say, I don't want you to know who I am. I'm going to leave my baby. I can't afford it. I can't take care of it, so I don't have any responsibility and they will help you provide a facility to birth your baby and you just walk away. And then you really have no connection to the baby at all.
The big problem with it, of course, is that -- we know the medical histories of the baby. There's no history to these children. Nobody knows anything about them in those cases.
BALDWIN: But I have to ask and this is my final question for you. I mean, what are the governments doing? They have to know this is going on at a shocking increase. What do they do about it?
NADEAU: Well, what they're doing is building more baby hatches, allowing for more opportunities to safely give up the child. In these cases, it's much better than leaving a child on a doorstep or, worse, killing the child, which is really a desperate measure, by providing baby hatches and more opportunities to leave a baby safely and securely and assume for the mother and some sort of, I'm sure was a terrible moment of her life, some comfort that the baby will be taken care of. She can do that. She can walk away and that's what we're seeing governments here doing, allowing that to happen.
BALDWIN: Barbie Nadeau, Rome bureau chief, "Newsweek" and "Daily Beast." Barbie, thank you.
And let's go live -- let's go live to the House floor. Here you have it, the vote to repeal President Obama's health care law underway. We're going to take you there live, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BALDWIN: All right, we know the U.S. House of Representatives has now gaveled this. We know the vote is over in terms of repealing. They've been attempting this -- what is this time, number 33 -- to repeal Obama's health care law?
Let me bring in Dana Bash and Wolf Blitzer together.
Dana, first to you, can you give me the final vote tally?
DANA BASH, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: 244 to 185. Wasn't even close. We didn't expect it to be since Republicans have such a big majority in the house. So they did once again show that there are the votes in the House of Representatives to repeal the healthcare law.
But as we have been saying all day, really yesterday as well, yes, they have the votes, but this was a political exercise and Republicans admit that readily because the next body, the Senate, there's not the votes there. The Democrats run it and the votes are simply not there to repeal the healthcare law.
So Republicans will be able to go back and go out to the campaign trail and make the case, particularly to the Republican base, that they are doing what the Republican base wants them to do.
And also going to make the case that, you know, you have these votes, give us more Republicans in the Senate, give us a Republican in the White House, then we can make this repeal happen.
BALDWIN: Dana, thank you.
Wolf Blitzer, to you. Look, we know this isn't going anywhere. Dana just made the point. You know that. I know that, in terms of majority Democrats majority control the Senate.
Do you think, though, come November, this will really galvanize some of the conservatives to go out and vote? Really the power is at the ballot box/
WOLF BLITZER, HOST, "THE SITUATION ROOM": Yes. This will definitely energize a lot of those conservatives out there, Republicans, tea party supporters.
They hate the president's healthcare law and they certainly have been energized by the U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding ObamaCare, so these kinds of votes will certainly energize them.
The Republicans think it's a winning issue. At the same time, a lot of Democrats think this is a winning issue because there are some popular elements in the new law that are just now beginning to take effect. No pre-conditions, for example. Kids can stay on their parents' health insurance programs until they're 26 years old.
There's some popular stuff out there, so it will be a debate. Healthcare will certainly be a debate, but the biggest debate will of course be the state of the economy, the creation of jobs.
Is the country moving in the right direction or wrong direction? On that, this election will certainly be determined. We're going to have extensive coverage of that coming up in "The Situation Room."
BALDWIN: OK, Wolf Blitzer, see you in exactly two minutes.
Dana, I want to go back to you. What have you been hearing? I know you've been talking to folks both on the Republican side, on the Democrat side. What have you been hearing?
BASH: Well, actually just one other piece of information about where this vote went down.
BALDWIN: Yes?
BASH: Obviously, the vast majority of Republicans voted for this, but also five Democrats, five Democrats voted for it. And that I believe is sort of the high-water mark when it comes to Democrats voting to repeal the president's signature law, the healthcare law.
Not very much, but interesting clearly those are Democrats who come from districts where this is highly, highly unpopular. And these Democrats either -- some are retiring, but some want to come back next year and feel voting to repeal this law is the best way to do that.
BALDWIN: Why, though, Dana -- I asked you this, I'm going to ask you again. We heard the matchup earlier from both sides saying, oh, this is Groundhog Day. And we have a right to do this. And you made the point the last time we talked, but absolutely Democrats have done the exact same thing.
BASH: Oh, yes.
BALDWIN: So why do this again? Remind us.
BASH: Because for them, it's the beauty of having majority. You know, the president has the bully pulpit and, when Republicans run the House or the Senate, they have the ability to set the agenda, as well.
So that's what Republicans are doing. They're setting the agenda. They're setting the agenda for discussion. What are we talking about today? We're talking about the healthcare law.
That discussion may have ended in Washington two weeks ago with the Supreme Court decision, but it didn't because Republicans are able to use the power of the majority to set the agenda -- rhetorical agenda, if not the legislative agenda.
BALDWIN: OK. Dana, we appreciate you. Take a deep breath. I'm sure they're going to take a pretty it quickly here at the top of "The Situation Room." We appreciate you being with me.
I'm Brooke Baldwin here at the CNN World Headquarters in Atlanta.
Now, back to Wolf Blitzer in Washington. Your "SITUATION ROOM" begins right now.
