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The Battle For Aleppo, Opening Statements In Peterson Trial; Real Time Versus Tape Delay; Romney Heaps Praise On Poland; Innovations Give Athletes Competitive Edge; Multi-cultural Swedish Band Climbs the Charts; Drought Could Effect Nuclear Power; Airfare Prices Expected to Drop; 1st Time Multiple African-American Heritage Swimmers on Team USA
Aired July 31, 2012 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Suzanne Malveaux. This hour in the CNN NEWSROOM, we're focusing on the Olympics as well as Mitt Romney's trip overseas and relief from soaring airline prices. I want to get right to it.
The U.N. estimates 200,000 people in and around Aleppo fled their homes over the weekend. The fighting is taking incredible toll.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE.)
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MALVEAUX: We are now talking about Syria. Rebels say they are making some gains. They claim that this video shows a police station that they actually took over. CNN cannot independently verify the authenticity of this video, however.
Opening statements got underway today in the Drew Peterson trial. Now, he is the former Chicago area police officer accused of murdering his third wife, she was found dead in the bathtub in 2004. Her death was treated as an accident. But Peterson came under scrutiny when his fourth wife, Stacy, disappeared. The trial is expected to last about a month.
Now, to what's going on in the Olympics. OK. We got a spoiler alert, though, so put your T.V. on mute if you don't want to know who the winner is. But the U.S. women's gymnastics team now in first place in the finals after the first rotation. They just did the vault. Now, if the U.S. wins, it's going to be their first team gold since 1996. I'm going to watch this one and keep you posted. Now, in swimming, the women's 200 meter freestyle happens in about two hours. Seventeen-year-old American Missy Franklin takes on the world record holder Federica Peallegrini of Italy.
In men's swimming, Michael Phelps could win two medals today. First up is the 200 meter butterfly. If he pulls it off, he jumps back in the pool for his four by 200 freestyle relay. If he wins both, he'll have a record 19 Olympic gold medals. In men's gymnastics, whole different story. After Saturday's preliminaries team was in first place, but last night, they finished in fifth. A couple of moments of defeat like a fall off the pommel horse. Former team member says a lot of it is nerves.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN ROETHLISBERGER: It is a weird animal once you get out there. There is Olympic rings on the equipment, it's all over the venue, and all of a sudden, the reality of where you are and what you're doing hits you and sometimes it can be a little overwhelming.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: Something else a little embarrassing for NBC, the home of the Olympics. They aired a promo last night giving away that 17- year-old U.S. swimmer Missy Franklin had won a gold medal in the 100 meter backstroke. They showed it before the tape delayed event was shown on T.V. That was enough for Stephen Colbert to jump all over it. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHEN COLBERT, HOST, "THE COLBERT REPORT": The London Olympics are finally under way. I tell you, there is nothing like the thrill of seeing team USA triumph in an Internet headline and then waiting to see it confirmed on NBC seven hours later. I mean, the suspense, did the cameras capture what happened? Did my cable go out?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: All right. So, real time versus tape delayed time. You know, it's a pretty big issue for some this time around in the Olympics. With stuff like Twitter, Facebook, hard not to know, actually what's going on in real time. Alina Cho, she's got the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): One of the most talked about upsets of the Olympics so far may be Michael Phelps' loss to rival Ryan Lochte in the 400 individual medley. It happened Saturday just before 3:00 p.m. Eastern, but NBC didn't broadcast the race until six and a half hours later, primetime in the U.S.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEFF JARVIS, BUZZMACHINE.COM: I understand the old time business rational for that but in the Internet, it's outmoded. For one thing, we could all talk about these things on Twitter and Twitter becomes a giant spoiler machine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHO: The Twitter-verse lit up. More than 25,000 tweets with a hash tag, NBC fail, 2,500 in just one hour, including can't believe Michael Phelps came in fourth again just like 10 hours ago in the same event. And, pssst (ph), Phelps lost. NBC later. Isn't this deja vu all over again?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HOWARD KURTZ (via Skype): NBC gets hammered over this every four years, and it's in a box. It pays billions of dollars for the right to carry the Olympics and, yet, it only makes money if it puts the most popular sporting events on in prime time, which means tape delay.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHO (on camera): Primetime is where NBC makes its money, though the network paid $4.4 billion to air the Olympics through the 2020 games, makes it up in ad revenue, charging $725,000 for a single 30- second spot.
(voice-over): In a statement, NBC sports group chairman Mark Lazarus said, this audience number for the London opening ceremony is a great early sign that our strategy of driving people to watch NBC in prime time is working. The opening ceremony was the most watched in the history of the summer games. So was the first night of competition when Phelps experienced the agony of defeat. And NBC says its live streaming hundreds of Olympic events on the Web.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JARVIS: It's just hard to find it and you got to go through a bit of rigmarole to sign up for it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHO: So, what's the answer?
(on camera): Do you just want to say, come on, stop complaining?
JARVIS: I do think some of the people who are carping and complaining on Twitter maybe have too much time on their hands.
CHO (voice-over): Things likely won't change unless people flock to catch the games online instead of waiting for the prime time Olympic experience. Alina Cho, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MALVEAUX: All right. So, a lot of us, you know, tied to our smartphones these days, avoiding social media for the Olympics might almost seem impossible and the use of social media skyrocketing in the four years since the games in Beijing. Take a look at this. We're talking 2008, Twitter had about 300,000 tweets per day. But today, there are about 400 million per day, that is according to figures in "The Wall Street Journal." And Facebook had 100 million active users, so now that number is up to 900 million.
Joining us to talk about the games, social media, Justin Peters, who's an editor at the "Columbia Journalism Review," and he's covering the games for Slate. Nice to see you here. How do you -- how do you actually maneuver all of this, right? I mean, you can get -- you can get it real time.
JUSTIN PETERS, EDITOR, "COLUMBIA JOURNALISM REVIEW": Everything, yes.
MALVEAUX: Yes. So, how do you prevent from being a spoiler?
PETERS: It's not easy but you can try. What you got to do is unplug, right? If you're really adamant you don't want to know anything about what is happening in the Olympics until 7:00 at night, well, you got to stay away from Twitter, you got to disconnect from Facebook, you got to walk down the street with earmuffs on or something, do everything you can to try to avoid getting the news broken before you want to hear it.
MALVEAUX: It might look a little weird with those earmuffs. But you wrote in an article here that you've personally been a spoiler. You tell folks the results before they actually air -- and the events air on television. I want you to hear what some folks think about what you are doing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I saw the results of the 400 I.M. where, you know, Lochte beat Phelps, and I was, like, little annoyed, because I tried to avoid it the whole day.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's something like Michael Phelps you just hear before you see it at night.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Specifically, people who post them on Twitter, Facebook, some sort of social media or they'll pop up on the news headlines before I get to watch them online.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: So, Justin, how do you maneuver all of this? Because you do have a network here that is trying, you know, making some money, they say, they certainly are getting great ratings here, but there are people who are disappointed that they have lost some of the suspense in all of this.
PETERS: Well, you got to understand where NBC is coming from, first of all. They still make most of their money on the primetime slots and most people in this country are not, you know, around watching T.V. during the day, they're working. So, I got to give them a little bit of slack for saying, all right, we're going to save this stuff for when our biggest audience comes. But, you know, as you were saying, all this stuff is available online if you do want to see it. You're talking to someone right now who has been up for about 24 hours watching every single sport under the sun from archery to wrestling. And you can find it if you want, I mean, the trick is knowing when to say when, I guess.
MALVEAUX: Yes. Justin, you got to take a break there, 20 hours, that's a bit much there. You know --
PETERS: I love the Olympics.
MALVEAUX: I love the Olympics, too, but you got to take a break. Now, we've seen some tweets that have gotten someone folks in trouble, particularly athletes. You have this Greek triple jumper, she was dropped from the team over an offensive tweet about Africans. You had that Swiss soccer player sent home after derogatory tweet about Koreans. You had a British reporter had his Twitter account suspended after tweeting the e-mail address of an NBC official. How do -- how do you actually control what is taking place here? Are we seeing a different kind of event, different kind of Olympics because of all of this?
PETERS: Oh, absolutely. I don't think you can control it. I think what we're seeing for first time ever is we're seeing participants in the Olympics giving unfiltered messages while they're in competition. They're sending it out without any intermediary telling them what to say and what not to say. And it can turn out badly for the athletes who are a little bit in politic with the tweets that they use to send. But for the rest of us watching at home, I think it adds a bit of an exciting and unpredictable element that wasn't there before, and it just makes it a bit more fun.
MALVEAUX: All right. It is fun watching the Olympics, but take a break -- take a little bit of a break and tweet us, let us know what you're watching. Appreciate it, Justin. Good to see you.
PETERS: Thanks, Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: Yes.
Technology not just changing the way we watch the Olympics, also changing the way the athletes are competing. The way swimmers kick to what they we are, Dr. Sanjay Gupta is going to be along with us to take a look at how this technology is actually shaping up the London games, coming up in less than 20 minutes.
Here is what we're working on for this hour.
(voice-over): His overseas tour is over. But can Mitt Romney put it all behind him? The missteps and foreign policy fumbles.
And we know the drought is impacting food prices. But listen to this, nuclear power plants need water for cooling and no water equals no power.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: Mitt Romney is heading back to the United States after getting a warm reception in Poland. That was the final stop on his overseas trip. In a speech today, Romney praised the country as an example and defender of freedom. And he says the partnership between the U.S. and Poland is based on common beliefs and values.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Our nations belong to the great fellowship of democracies. We speak the same language of freedom and justice. We uphold the right of every person to live in peace. I believe it's critical to stand by those who have stood by America. Solidarity was a great movement that freed a nation and the Swiss solidarity that America and Poland face the future.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: Political reporter Shannon Travis, he's joining us from Washington. Good to see you, Shannon.
SHANNON TRAVIS: Hi, Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: First of all, he's wrapping up his trip in Poland. He went there at the invitation of Lech Walesa. Tell us why Poland, in particular, was important for him on this overseas trip?
TRAVIS: Yes, well, you got to figure, Suzanne, this was a two- fold goal for governor Romney in this overseas trip of the political and the practical. In terms of the practical part, he wanted to basically praise Poland and show them as being a key U.S. ally. He did that and the (INAUDIBLE) you just played -- the sound bite you just played and another key part to the speech. Also, holding it up as a model for freedom, economic freedom, Democratic freedoms and showing it -- or saying it is a model, that Poland is a model for the rest of the world. In terms of political, and there were some not so subtle political overtures to an American audience, you got to figure that, number one, there are obviously a lot of Polish Americans in a lot of key battleground states like Wisconsin and Ohio and Pennsylvania.
They are receiving that message that they heard from Governor Romney, as well as in his speech he praised the late Pope John Paul II several times. That's going to play well with a lot of American Catholics back here at home, as well as obviously in Israel, when he had a high praise for Israel as well. That will play very well with a lot of Jewish voters in a lot of battleground states, too.
So there was a political angle as well as a practical purpose.
MALVEAUX: Yes. Certainly seems like there were two audiences there, his international audience and the domestic audience, on this trip here. Not smooth sailing, as we know, for him. Several missteps overseas on this trip. The criticism of the London Olympics, and then also comments that angered Palestinians when he was in Israel. How do they think they did overall?
TRAVIS: Yes, there were the gaffes heard around the world. I mean, look, no presidential candidate who is going on a big splash abroad wants the really negative headlines that you have seen out of this. And obviously Democrats are trying to play that up. Obama for America's campaign is actually holding a conference call in about 15 minutes to play up some of the gaffes.
But if you think about it like this, Stuart Stevens is a Romney adviser, senior adviser, said, you know what, the purpose was to go over there, for it to be a listening tour, a learning tour and, again, to play up some of the key alliances with some of these key U.S. allies and that he accomplished that.
Even today, Bill Kristol, prominent conservative columnist, called this, said that his speech today was the highlight of the trip. So he's obviously speaking to two different audiences assessing the trip. But Governor Romney's campaign feels like it was, by and large, a success, Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: This is an aside, it's getting a lot of attention, I don't know if it really matters that much to voters, but there was a Romney press aide, who got angry, frustrated with reporters ,who were trying to ask questions. I want you to listen to this little exchange.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governor Romney --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- some of the mishaps on your trip.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Governor Romney, do you have a statement for the Palestinians?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What about your gaffes?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Governor Romney, do you feel that your gaffes have overshadowed your foreign trip?
RICK GORKA, TRAVELING PRESS SECRETARY FOR MITT ROMNEY: (Inaudible) people. Show some respect.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governor Romney --
GORKA: Show some respect here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We haven't had another chance to ask him questions.
GORKA: (Inaudible). This is a holy site for the Polish people. Show some respect.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: So, Shannon, you know, covering candidates and presidents, sometimes things get a little testy and reporters shout questions. That is not atypical there.
If you want to try to get some sort of response, and there is some frustration between aides and reporters, that is not unusual.
Do you think it really matters all that much to voters when they look at this exchange? Or, they're, you know, hey, we got other things to pay attention to? TRAVIS: Sure, again, given the string, again, of embarrassing headlines that have come out of this week-long trip for the governor, it is just yet another thing to pile on, just another bad news, piece of bad news.
But in the general scheme of things, this probably won't rate that much to a lot of voters. This is obviously a family channel, Suzanne, so we had to beep out what Rick Gorka, his traveling press secretary, actually said.
He later told another reporter to, quote, "Shove it." But, again, this probably won't rate that highly on a lot of voters' minds back here at home, Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: I understand he's since apologized as well. So hopefully it will be a little bit --
TRAVIS: He has.
MALVEAUX: -- you know, smoother over the rough edges there between the press corps and the Romney campaign.
All right, Shannon, thanks, appreciate it.
So imagine no lights, no air conditioning, widespread traffic jams. Well, that is the scene in India right now, where more than 600 million people are without power. That is double the population of the entire United States.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: For the second time in two days, huge blackouts crippling northern India. Now more than 600 million people are affected. We're talking about no TV, no trains, no air conditioning. It is sweltering out there. The country's shaky power grid is now being blamed. I want to bring in Chad Myers to talk a little bit about why this is happening and how this is impacting so many people.
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Weather a little bit responsible because it hasn't rained there.
MALVEAUX: Yes?
MYERS: Yes, it is monsoon season. That's when it is supposed to rain. That's when these lakes are supposed to fill up. These lakes use this power here with the dam to make hydro power, to make electricity.
Well, if there is no water in the lakes, you can't make electricity. So therefore your power grid starts to go down, because they count, Suzanne, on 20 percent of their power coming from the hydro grid.
Also now, if it is not raining, it is not cloudy. And it is hot. And if it is hot, you turn the air conditioner on, and you're using more power. So this is the issue now that this country is going through.
Here is India, all the way over here, all the way down toward Sri Lanka. There's the country itself. Turn off all the lights, make sure -- pretend it is nighttime, according to NASA, and it looks like that. There it is.
All of a sudden, most of the power that we have lost is up here across the northern part of the country. We'll get rid of that, show you here all of these states here are parts of India here, all of the states affected by this power blackout, 600 million people without power.
Now, understand, 300 other million people don't have any power anyway. Not even one light bulb in their house. And then all of a sudden, you take it for what is the U.S., we spin you around to the size of the same country, that's the same zoom in scale, 600 million without power, 50 percent of the population of India without power. That's twice the population of the U.S. without power today.
Trains are stuck on tracks. They're slowly getting this back up together, but it is being a slow, slow process. It is a booming population, wires are everywhere, trying to get this consumption with the irrigation to get crops going. You have to irrigate if it doesn't rain and then obviously you have to turn on the cooling systems, air conditioners if you don't have the rain as well to keep you cool.
Sunshine and no rainfall makes a hot climate. Indeed, a hot climate, people want to get cool. If you want to get cool, you use electricity. Sometimes the power grid goes out, and it did, now two days in a row.
MALVEAUX: Big, big problems there in India. Chad, you and I were talking about this before, I think you were -- you said you were 6 years old, you actually remember the moon landing?
MYERS: Yes. Oh, absolutely. I remember watching it on a black- and-white TV, with a tuner you have to dial back and forth. One night -- I think it was 2 through 13 were the channels we got.
MALVEAUX: Yes. Well, check it out. We're actually taking a look at this -- the iconic image of Apollo astronauts, planting the American flag in the lunar dirt. Well, hard to believe, but you know what?
Most of those flags, they've actually survived and they're still standing, because researchers examined the latest photos from NASA's reconnaissance orbiters and they see the flags are casting shadows at all the sites except for Apollo 11. So pretty cool stuff, don't you think, Chad?
MYERS: Yes. If you can find the golf ball that he hit, now then I would be impressed.
(LAUGHTER)
MALVEAUX: Yes, absolutely. Pretty cool. All right. Thanks, Chad.
MYERS: You're welcome.
MALVEAUX: When every second counts, the swimsuit you wear or the shoes you run in could make a difference, especially if you want to make it up to the Olympic podium.
And don't forget, you can watch CNN live on your computer while you're at work. Head to cnn.com/TV.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: We all know about the mental and physical training that Olympic athletes go through. But technology also plays a big part in separating the winners from the losers. Our chief medical correspondent, Sanjay Gupta, shows us some new innovations.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(MUSIC PLAYING)
GUPTA (voice-over): Tyler McGill has an excellent chance of beating Michael Phelps in the 100-meter butterfly. But his underwater kick has to improve for this to happen.
TYLER MCGILL, SWIMMER: This is me here and, as you can see, I'm in the air and Michael, along with everybody else, is still on the block. And so my reaction is ahead of everybody else's at this point. And I have a lead. You'll notice that everyone has caught up by the time we reach the 15-meter mark.
DAVID MARSH, U.S. OLYMPIC ASSISTANT SWIM COACH: The breakout portion of this race as compared to Michael, who is coming out at a little bit faster time, move over here to the 15-meter mark to the 35- meter mark, he's at 11.3, 11.2. Michael is at 10.9. So 3/10 of a difference doesn't sound like a lot, but in swimming it is a lot of time.
GUPTA (voice-over): BMW has taken video analysis to the next level, adopting its expertise in designing high-performance cars and applying it to swimming.
RICKY BERENS, OLYMPIC SWIMMER: Kicking underwater has become one of the most important parts of swimming. It is faster than on top of the water. But you really don't know why they go so fast or why you go faster than them. So this technology, adding numbers, adding equations to this, will help us evolve as swimmers.
GUPTA (voice-over): Ricky Berens is experimenting with this new technology. By marking six points where the body bends on the swimmer -- the wrists, shoulder, hip, knee, ankle and toe -- the software connects the dots.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have the kick frequency, we have the kick depth, we have the kick rate. This is really going to help U.S.A. swimming to help determine what makes a great dolphin kick. What swimmers wear affects their aerodynamic. This year, it evolved even more.
TYLER CLARY, U.S. OLYMPIC SWIMMER: The more fabric you can put on the human body, the faster it is going to be, to keep the body as uniform as possible, kind of like a torpedo.
GUPTA: Incidentally, the same goes for track and field athletes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We had a texture to the suit to make it faster. If you look really close, there's dimensions to it, texture to it. So, it turns out smooth. Does not equal fast. It shaves off 0.02 seconds. Not just a difference between first and second place, it is the difference of being on the podium or not. This is the spread shoe for the 100 meter, extremely lightweight, extremely supportive, independent loose cables that gives you a perfect fit.
GUPTA: For marathoners, shoes have to be even lighter.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Only 160 grams light. Can save yourself 90 percent, which is how much lighter than our favorite marathon shoe. At the end of the race, you would have saved yourself the weight of a car.
GUPTA: For basketball players, the weight of their shorts could impact their game. And their shoes can track their performance. Just some of the ways technology is shaping the London Olympics.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: 33. That's awesome.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MALVEAUX: That is so cool.
And Sanjay joins us.
Now I know why I run so slow. It is the shoes.
(LAUGHTER)
(CROSSTALK)
GUPTA: The new technology.
MALVEAUX: I thought we would see you in swimwear in that piece.
MALVEAUX: It is under my suit. Commercial break.
(LAUGHTER)
Show me what you've got here.
GUPTA: This is something you just saw. You can take a feel of this. You heard the comment, you want longer swimsuits, you think of Speedos and stuff, they want more fabric because they think it gives them an advantage. They give you gloves. This is from the Olympic Committee. And they give you gloves because they don't -- even pulling it on, you can tear it. It is so snug and skin tight that you use these gloves. The cap. You know, people have been talking about the caps recently. Women are typically wearing two cap caps.
MALVEAUX: Two caps.
GUPTA: One cap is a hair compression cap.
MALVEAUX: OK.
GUPTA: They put the hair near the back of their head and then a second cap as well over here on top of it to give them a better profile in the back of their head. They don't want anything to impede the way the water tracks over the skin.
MALVEAUX: The idea, he said, is just to be like a bullet. You have to be shaped like a bullet, right? A torpedo.
GUPTA: Exactly. It is all ergo dynamics. Even the goggles follow that. They have two seal, an outer seal and inner seal. This goes around your eye. But that outer area gets filled with water. So if gives you more suction against the face and also keeps the temperature constant so you're not fogging up when you come in and out of the water. Pretty cool, right?
MALVEAUX: What are they going to think of next? It seems like every time, they get more and more sophisticated. And you wonder how much of it is the body and how much is the equipment that is getting the advantage.
GUPTA: Right. I think it is a great question. I thought a lot about that. Everybody has access to this. So it is not like the United States is at an unfair advantage. Other countries have access to this sort of technology as well. But I think over time you're seeing, this year, records being broken, you know, quite a bit. And I'm sure the technology shaves off even fractions of a second. Makes a difference.
MALVEAUX: Sanjay, you have a triathlon coming up. You're going to sport this gear for us?
GUPTA: Yes. This will make me swim faster, these goggles.
(LAUGHTER)
(CROSSTALK)
MALVEAUX: You're going to win the triathlon.
GUPTA: I'm going to win. Exactly.
(LAUGHTER)
MALVEAUX: Sanjay, thank you, as always.
GUPTA: Thank you very much. Appreciate it. MALVEAUX: Appreciate it.
You can catch more coverage of the games this weekend, when Sanjay looking into the science behind doping and he profiles an Olympian who almost could not compete in London due to a heart defect. Watch "Sanjay Gupta, M.D.," Saturday at 4:30 p.m. eastern and Sunday 7:30 a.m. eastern, only on CNN.
This is a song that is going to make you want to dance.
(SINGING)
MALVEAUX: We'll introduce you to the band and tell you why you're going to want to remember who they are.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: Hi, there. Here on the "Help Desk" today, we're helping you plan for retirement. It is never too early to start.
And with me, Liz Miller and Doug Flynn.
Liz, listen to this question.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My question is regarding 401K. I have one going right now, but I'm not really sure what my target percentage should be that I'm contributing to that. And I'm about 30 years old right now. To retire comfortably, what should I be trying to put away.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: Isn't that the money question? What do you think?
LIZ MILLER, PRESIDENT, SUMMITT PLACE FINANCIAL ADVISORS: It is. First of all, particularly at 30 years old, if you can afford it, you want to put the maximum into that 401K. It is great deferred income. It's proven to be a great long-term investment for retirement. But the second part of it is does your company make a match? I always tell young people, goal one, put enough aside to get the entire match your company might be giving to a 401K or sometimes they call that an associated profit plan. And you really want to save enough to hit that. But at 30 years old, if you can do it, max out that 401K.
MALVEAUX: But should the 401K be the only investment for people? A lot of people think, I'm contributing that's enough.
DOUG FLYNN, CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER: You want to start, absolutely, get the free money from the company as we always say you want to get. But then open times switch to a Roth because of the tax- free benefit you get down the road. You don't want all your money tax deferred, one day you have to pay the taxes. It might be at a higher rate than it is now. I love the idea of getting the free money then switching to the Roth. And if you still have money, go back and fill out the rest of the 401K and put everything you in there.
MALVEAUX: Sounds like a good strategy.
If you have an issue you want our experts to tackle, upload a 30- second video with your "Help Desk" question to ireport.com.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MALVEAUX: Let me introduce you to a Swedish band called Panetoz. They have been climbing the charts with their hit "Dansa Pausa." And this is something you're going to want to see.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(SINGING)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MALVEAUX: People in the studio are dancing behind the scenes.
Panetoz formed in Sweden but members come from Finland and countries across Africa. It hit number one on iTunes and their video, Dansa Pausa," has been viewed more than two million times. Last hour, we spoke to the band, asked them how they came up with their unique sound.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NEBEYU BAHERU, PANETOZ BANDMEMBER: The music is all about afro beats. R&B, you can find anything in our music.
MALVEAUX: It is very original. Do you take a little bit from some of the hip-hop scene you see in the United States or influence from Europe or some of the African songs as well?
BAHERU: Yes, of course. We have been listening to all the music that comes from U.S., from Sweden, hip-hop. And Juan (ph) has a background as a singer. So we just mixed it up and makes (INAUDIBLE), actually.
(CROSSTALK)
MALVEAUX: What is the next move for you guys, Panetoz? Where are you going next?
PA MODOU BADJIE, PANETOZ BANDMEMBER: Taking over. The plan is to be everywhere and spread this joy, this feel good music. We have Poland. We have, like, over 40,000 in the audience that love our music. We have England coming up. We have U.S. with "Cat Crazy." We did some song remix for Rihanna. And a lot of new countries, Denmark, all these neighboring countries, they are calling for us. And they need to see this. You need to see Panetoz.
BEHERU: Yes. BADJIE: You need to be there and party with us and the feel good. It is not all about guns and the naked women and Bling Bling and everything.
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MALVEAUX: The drought is drying up water supplies for nuclear plants and some may have to cut back or even shut down. And that could shut off power as well.
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MALVEAUX: We have been talking about how a drought this summer is ruining crops, driving food prices even higher. Well, believe it or not, the impact of the drought is also extending to the country's nuclear power plants. The lack of water could lead to plants cutting back or even shutting down. That means less power to run our homes as well as our businesses.
CNN's Sandra Endo, she is looking into all of the scenarios. She joins us from Washington.
And, Sandra, first of all, talk about this issue, that these nuclear power plants need a lot of water. What kind of shape are they in now?
SANDRA ENDO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Suzanne, it is not the most immediate thing you think about when you consider the effects of extreme heat and a widespread drought. But power plants, both conventional and nuclear power plants, depend on a significant supply of reliable water to cool reactors.
Now, we're talking about up to a billion gallons a day in some cases for a large plant. And because of the severe weather this summer, there have been several instances where power plants in the Midwest and northeast need to reduce power because of the strain on its systems. And some plants have had to ask for waivers to discharge water from their plants at higher temperatures. Now, that poses an environmental threat to fresh water, wildlife.
Here is how it works. If power plants do not have enough water for cooling systems, they may need to cut back on production. If the incoming water into the plant is too warm from fresh water sources, power plants may have to reduce electricity production if the water is more difficult to cool. And if the outgoing water emitted back into rivers and lakes is too warm, it could harm wildlife like fish and turtles.
The union of concerned scientists says that is not the only problem.
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JOHN ROGERS, UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS: The question is if power plants are getting water they need, and there is not enough water in general, so who else is losing out. What does that mean for how much water farmers are getting? What does that mean for what kind of cuts we're going to be asking for from our cities and towns?
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ENDO: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says despite the drought, plants continue to operate safely. And what they're seeing now is consistent to what they have seen in the past during heat waves -- Suzanne?
MALVEAUX: So what can be done to ensure the water temperature you talked about that is being discharged from the power plants that it is not too hot. How do you control that?
ENDO: Well, this is what a lot of people may not want to hear, because besides from power plants scaling back on their energy production or asking for a waiver to discharge hotter water, the best thing for everyone to do is scale back on using electricity. But that's also very hard given the extreme heat -- Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: All right. Sandra, thank you. Appreciate it.
If you've been waiting to buy a plane ticket, might want to wait a few more weeks because prices are going down. We'll tell you how much up ahead.
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MALVEAUX: So if you have flown at all in the past couple of years, or even recently, you know firsthand airfares have been going up. Just the first three months of the year alone, average ticket costs almost 5 percent more than the year before. If you're planning a trip, you might want to wait a bit. We know airfares are expected to start dropping.
Alison Kosik at the New York Stock Exchange to talk about why this is happening and how much of a drop are we expecting -- Alison?
ALISON KOSIK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Suzanne, it's a nice surprise. These could be some pretty sizable price drops depending on where you go. This is according to Rick Seaney, the CEO of Farecompare.com. He's expecting fares to drop anywhere from 10 to 20 percent on flights beginning on August 21st.
We ran some test searches just to see. We found you can save a lot of money. See you get a trip from Newark to Los Angeles that will cost you around $533. If you travel between Thursday and Sunday in mi August, it drops almost 100 bucks if do your traveling in mid September instead. A trip from Detroit to Austin, that will save you about $50 if you wait a few weeks.
But keep in mind, some of these fares don't change at all. But, in some cases, we did see a modest decrease which is a nice surprise.
MALVEAUX: That's great. I travel all the time. This is good stuff. Good news.
(LAUGHTER) Why are we seeing this? Why is this happening?
KOSIK: For one, many kids head back to school in mid August. It's not the peak travel system for these carriers. Plus, Seaney says the demand this summer hasn't been as strong as expected. Carriers realize this. They aren't trying to push their luck by hiking fares even more.
Keep in mind, experts say you should really shop now if you're looking to travel in September and October. These sites tend to have best deals if you buy tickets between Tuesday and Thursday. One of our producers found a flight from LaGuardia to Buffalo for $116 over the Columbus Day weekend. You can get some really good discounted flights if you try to book them now -- Suzanne?
MALVEAUX: All right. I'm going to start booking. Appreciate it. Yesterday, we talked about the fact this is a huge week for economic data. We're already seeing some of it coming in here. The report showing a bit of a rebound in housing prices. Tell us a little bit about what we're learning.
KOSIK: Exactly. That price rebound shows home prices rose 2.2 percent from April to May. This is good news because it's the latest report coming in a string of readings we have gotten showing the housing market may have a recovery under way. We'll need to wait a few more months to be sure. Don't pop the champagne bottle just yet. Spring and early summer, the typically strong buying months. You'll want to see that upward trend continue into the fall.
As for the markets, you're not seeing a huge reaction because this is the first day of a two-day Fed meeting that investors are waiting on. The Fed is making its decision tomorrow on interest rates and whether or not it will pump anymore stimulus into the economy. Investigators are in the wait-and-see mode right now with the Dow down 31 points -- Suzanne?
MALVEAUX: Alison, thank you very much. We'll be watching the reports as they come in throughout the week.
It is a first for the U.S. Olympic swim team. Three athletes with African-American heritage now competing in the games.
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MALVEAUX: An outbreak of the Ebola virus kills in Uganda has at least 14 people and sickened another 34. Most of the cases occurred in a rural area in the western part of the country. Nine of the victims were members of the same family. The World Health Organization and Centers for Disease Control both have people on the ground in that area. Local health officials are now scrambling to contain it.
The beach is open in Cape Cod, but that is where a man is recovering from injuries apparently caused by a shark bite. Witnesses said they saw a fin in the water before that unidentified man went under while screaming for help yesterday. He has non-life threatening cuts on the lower parts of the legs. Seals in the area might have attracted the shark.
All eyes on the U.S. swim team at the Olympics. Besides winning multiple medals and world records, it's the first time the team has more than one person of African-American heritage.
Our Fredricka Whitfield talks to the team about diversity and what it means to people watching back at home.
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FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: 2008 Olympic gold medalist, Cullen Jones, relishes the idea of being a role model.
CULLEN JONES, U.S. OLYMPIC SWIMMER: I think that's huge. I can't tell you how many family members picked up a driver because they saw tiger woods doing it. The beacon of seeing someone that looks like you that is excelling in a sport, getting out of a bad situation, those are the glimpses of hope that people see.
WHITFIELD: Jones is part of something different about USA swimming. He's one of three athletes with African-American heritage that will compete for the U.S. The first time there's been more than one.
Growing up in New Jersey, Jones learned to swim at age five after nearly drowning at a water park. Now he helps teach other minority kids to swim through USA swimming foundations Make a Splash program. He knows it will take time before those efforts create more minority swimmers with Olympic dreams.
JONES: Good job. All right.
I don't know if it's going to be in my lifetime or not, but I just think that the ball is rolling. Make a Splash Initiative is an amazing step in the right direction. I think there are going to be other programs that will be just like them.
WHITFIELD: 17-year-old Lia Neal is just the second African- American woman to swim for team USA, following Marisa Carea (ph) who won silver at the 2004 games at Athens. Carea (ph) inspired Neil, who saw first hand the effect she had on other African-Americans after qualifying for the London Olympics last month.
LIA NEAL, U.S. OLYMPIC SWIMMER: I was taking a nap and when I woke up I saw I had gains like 30 new Twitter followers. I was like something must have happened. I looked at my mentions and I saw Alisha Keys tweeted me. I said that's a big deal. That's cool. Spike Lee also tweeted me. That was really cool.
WHITFIELD: Anthony Ervin blazed the trail as the first U.S. swimmer with African-American heritage at the 2000 games. He won gold and silver. After retiring from swimming nine years ago, he made a remarkable comeback to qualify for the London games. Despite the progress in the makeup of the U.S. swim team, he thinks it will be a while before the support gets so diverse that race won't be a topic anymore. ANTHONY ERVIN, U.S. OLYMPIC SWIMMER: I mean the race question is always going to be involved one way or another. It may not be the same exact race question that it was 10 years ago but there's always going two a race question. WHITFIELD: Fredricka Whitfield, CNN, Atlanta.
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MALVEAUX: CNN NEWSROOM continues right now with Brooke Baldwin.
Hey, Brooke.
