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President & Mrs. Obama's Christmas Message; Queen Elizabeth Gives Traditional Christmas Greeting; NSA Leaker Edward Snowden Delivered an Alternative Christmas Message from Moscow; Fifty U.S. Marines Spend Christmas on Standby; UPS Apologizes for Late Deliveries

Aired December 25, 2013 - 13:00   ET

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

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Right now, Merry Christmas messages from across the globe. President Obama and the first lady among the world leaders sending their best wishes. We'll tell you what they are saying and what's being left out.

And UPS is apologizing for a Christmas nightmare. Presents sitting in warehouses instead of under Christmas trees. They're basically saying you sent too many gifts.

And he's the man that senators turn to for advice and they got an earful from him during the government shutdown. We'll introduce you to Senate Chaplain Barry Black.

Hi there and Merry Christmas. I'm Brianna Keilar in Washington. Wolf Blitzer is off today.

And a Merry Christmas message from the president. He offered a heartfelt thanks to the troops overseas but he also offered this nugget.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Here's the good news. For many of our troops and newest veterans, this might be the first time in years that they've been with their families on Christmas. In fact, with the Iraq war over and the transition in Afghanistan, fewer of our men and women in uniform are deployed in harm's way than at any time in the last decade.

MICHELLE OBAMA, FIRST LADY OF THE UNITED STATES: And that's something that we all can be thankful for. And with more and more of our troops back here at home, now it's our turn to serve. It's our turn to step up and show our gratitude for the military families who have given us so much.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Our Athena Jones is in Honolulu, Hawaii, working very hard on this holiday. That's where the Obamas are on vacation.

And Athena, maybe not surprising President Obama didn't mention health care in his Christmas message, but that's certainly something that's top of mind for him right now.

ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It certainly is. Merry Christmas, Brianna.

The White House and administration overall has been touting the high traffic they've seen not just on healthcare.gov, the federal exchange, but also on state exchanges all across the country in the last several days as a lot of folks scramble to sign up for coverage starting January 1st.

And I should mention one more thing. The administration wants to make sure that folks who try to sign up and didn't succeed don't get too worried. Let me read for you a statement put up on healthcare.gov as the video have it here.

Sometimes despite your best efforts you might have run into delays caused by heavy traffic to healthcare.gov, maintenance periods or other issues that prevented you from finishing the process on time. If this happened to you, don't worry. We may still be able to help you get covered as soon as January 1st.

And so, what that means is that customer service representatives are going to be available starting tomorrow, not today because the call center is closed. But starting tomorrow, they'll be able to help people finish the enrollment process if they started a couple days ago and just got hung up. They're hoping they can help a lot of people finish so they can have health care coverage starting January 1st, Brianna.

KEILAR: And is this something, Athena, that everyone in all 50 states with looking to meet that deadline will have access to?

JONES: Well, this is an interesting point you bring up here because different states have different deadlines. You have the federal deadline for the federal exchange healthcare.gov but a lot of states, 14 states that includes the District of Columbia have their own deadlines. Some have extended them to Friday, December 27th. Others have a deadline of Tuesday, December 31st. And in Washington State, folks who may have had problems signing on, they're going to have till January 15th to sign up for coverage that's going to be retroactive to January 1st. So, it's all going to depend where you live. People will need to focus on their own state call and talk to their state's exchanges -- Brianna.

KEILAR: All right, Athena, thank you so much.

And of course, a very special (INAUDIBLE) to you because I know that you have been working very, very hard. It's a vacation for the president, but I know you've been putting in long hours there in beautiful Hawaii.

So thank you, Athena.

JONES: Thanks, Brianna.

KEILAR: And over in the UK, Queen Elizabeth gave her traditional Christmas greeting to British people and those celebrating around the world. The queen talked about the newest member of the royal family, 5-month-old Prince George.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUEEN ELIZABETH II, UNITED KINGDOM: He's a little larger this Christmas. As many of will know, the arrival of a baby gives everyone the chance to contemplate the future with renewed happiness and hope. For the new parents, life will never be quite the same again. As with all who are Christened, George was baptized into a joyful faith of Christian duty and service. For Christians as for all people of faith, are reflection, meditation and prayer help us to renew ourselves in god's love. As we strive daily to become better people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Now new parents Prince William and Duchess Catherine attended a Christmas church service today without little George because even little princes might make noise in church, right? So, the royal family gathered for a feast at the queen's country retreat in Sandringham, England.

And shortly after the Queen's holiday message aired, NSA leaker Edward Snowden delivered an alternative Christmas message from Moscow on London's channel 4. Snowden urged people to rally against mass government surveillance. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EDWARD SNOWDEN, LEAKED NSA SURVEILLANCE DOCUMENTS: The conversation occurring today will determine the amount of trust we can place both in the technology that surrounds us and the government that regulates it. Together, we can find a better balance, end mass surveillance and remind the government that if it really wants to know how we feel, asking is always cheaper than spying. For everyone out there listening, thank you and merry Christmas.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: OK. Let's bring in our foreign affairs reporter Elise Labott.

First off, Elise, why did he pick London's channel 4? And also it strikes me as kind of odd that Edward Snowden is giving a holiday message.

ELISE LABOTT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right. Channel 4 always looks for some kind of alternative message as you said. Sometimes it's goofy, Marge Simpson or Ali G have done it. But often it's controversial. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the former president of Iran has done it before. And Channel 4 said that Edward Snowden's decision to reveal the extent of these surveillance programs has really been one of the most significant events of the year. And in fact, British security services for their cooperation with the United States also got a lot of heat. And he's kind of rallying not just the British people but obviously the world who's watching to have a dialogue about these mass surveillance programs going on not just in the U.S. but around the world. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SNOWDEN: A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all. He'll never know what it means to have a private moment to themselves and unreported unanalyzed thought. And that's a problem because privacy matters. Privacy is what allows us to determine who we are and who we want to be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LABOTT: Well, so Brianna, it's not clearly as uplifting a message as the queen gave but one that Edward Snowden thought was important to talk about. And I might add that, you know, here in this country, even "Time" magazine, he was one of the runner-ups for person of the year. So obviously, what he did has a lot of profound consequences for the dialogue in this country and around the world about the extent that their governments are watching us.

KEILAR: It certainly does, Elise. And when Edward Snowden talks, people do listen to him, but I suspect that when you're looking at these holiday messages, his is probably the only one that mentions George Orwell's novel "1984," don't you think?

LABOTT: Yes, but he said George Orwell and this big brother that is watching us, he said that's nothing compared to what's happening today. So some of it was a little hyperbole, I think, you know, that a child would never have a private thought.

I'm not necessarily sure that's true but clearly he's trying to provoke. And you have seen over the years, he started from just leaking this information and giving it to journalists to now being a provocateur, speaking out and trying to be a voice in this debate over the importance of surveillance versus privacy issues.

KEILAR: Elise Labott, thanks so much. Fascinating and happy holiday to you, my friend.

LABOTT: You, too.

KEILAR: Well, the Taliban claimed responsibility for this morning's attack on the U.S. embassy in is Afghanistan's capital. Two rounds hit the embassy compound in Kabul. No one was hurt. The attack comes at a crucial point for U.S. relations with Afghanistan. The two countries are right now working on a security deal to define the U.S. military presence there in Afghanistan after 2012 when the NATO-led force is scheduled to leave.

Fifty U.S. marines are spending Christmas on standby in case more evacuations are needed in South Sudan. The marines were deployed to nearby Uganda. So far almost 400 Americans have been evacuated from South Sudan after violence broke out in the region.

And let's bring in Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr to talk more about this. Barbara, what are you hearing? Are these marines in Uganda on call for more American evacuations? Does it seem like they might go into South Sudan or is this very much a just in case?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think on call probably hits the mark, Brianna. They have moved the 50 marines as close as they can to South Sudan so if there also a request, an order from the state department to evacuate Americans, that would be the trigger and then the marines would go in.

They can do two things there. They can evacuate Americans and at the same time, they can provide additional security and reinforcement for the U.S. embassy in South Sudan. Right now, nothing else has happened. Everything is just sort of status quo for those marines. But there's very much a Specter here of wanting to be ready, part of the hangover, the shadow, if you will, of what happened in Benghazi, Libya when a U.S. military forces were not nearby to help out Americans in peril. And, of course, really part of it about what happened on Saturday when rebels fired at three U.S. aircraft trying to evacuate Americans and four Navy S.E.A.L.s got badly wounded. This time if they have to go income, they will go in very ready for whatever happens.

KEILAR: That's right, Barbara. And one of those Navy S.E.A.L.s was wounded particularly badly, very critical condition. Do you have any word on what you're hearing about that marine's medical condition?

STARR: We hopefully have some very good word about that Navy S.E.A.L. He today, we are told, finally is being transferred from Nairobi, Kenya, where he's undergone several surgeries for his injuries. And is going by military air medical evacuation plane back to the military hospital at Landstuhl, Germany, which, of course, has treated thousands of wounded from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq over the years. His other three buddies were already transferred there a couple of days ago, but this one Navy S.E.A.L. has had a very rough time of it.

KEILAR: So do you read that as pretty good, Barbara? Because when he stayed in Nairobi and the others went to Germany, you really got a sense of how touch and go things were. Do we take this as a really good sign that he's able to be transported?

STARR: We are told that his surgical team, a combination of expert Kenyan doctors including a vascular surgeon trained here in the United States and U.S. medical military advisors, have been able to ensure that he is able to be transferred, that he can endure that long flight.

But Brianna, as you and I have chatted, make no mistake, what happened on Saturday is quite serious. Three U.S. military aircraft full of bullet holes, four wounded troops bleeding out in the back. And those aircraft flew 500 miles in those conditions to take them back to Uganda and then very quickly put them on another plane that was able to fly all the way to Kenya. This is a story I don't think we have heard the full story of the heroic efforts to save these four Navy S.E.A.L.s. KEILAR: Yes. It is an amazing story. Barbara Starr, we'll be looking for more details for you in the coming days.

And coming up, Christmas presents left in the warehouse? The people at U.P.S. are apologizing today for fighting off more than they can chew. We have that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: You might want to think about picking up some of those forever stamps when the post office reopens tomorrow because next month, the price of stamps is going up again, this time by three cents. And on January 26th, it will be costing you 49 cents just to send a standard letter, 34 cents for a postcard. And by the way, the post office lost $5 billion last year.

Well, grandma may not be getting a thank you call from the grandkids today because the sweater she sent for Suzie or the baseball ball glove for Bobby may not have made it in time for Christmas, that is if she sent it by U.P.S.

Our Margaret Conley joins me from New York.

And you know, Margaret, when a company releases a statement simply saying we're terribly sorry, that's never good. What happened here?

MARGARET CONLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, they're backlogged and delivers may not make it in time. U.P.S. did say they're sorry. And here's more from their statement.

U.P.S. is experiencing heavy holiday volume and making every effort to get packages to their destination. However, the volume of air packages in our system exceeded the capacity of our network immediately preceding Christmas so shipments were delayed.

Now, to give you a sense of how many packages U.P.S. handled, they projected to deliver over 132 million packages just last week. That's their peak week. And the delays will impact at least that many consumers and here are how some of them are reacting.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't tell you how many countless hours we have spent on the phone dealing with this issue with people in Memphis. And they're still blaming it on the ice storm, which was 2 1/2 weeks ago. It's terribly disappointing. We ordered these things December 1st. They can't find them because there is a thousand packages on pallets in there and they can't find our package.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We got to the front of the line after wait about an hour. And they said it hasn't been processed yet.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's been here since.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CONLEY: Yes. CNN spoke with a U.P.S. spokesperson. She said factors, in addition to weather in some states, so that the period between thanksgiving and Christmas was shorter this year. She also said more people are shopping online.

Now, U.P.S. did consider doing deliveries today on Christmas day but they decided to not to have to ask their drivers to come in and work on the holiday -- Brianna.

KEILAR: My goodness. Is there anything people can do besides just wait?

CONLEY: Well, aside from giving out IOUs, watch for some companies that are offering help. Amazon alerted customers to what they say is the quote "failure of the U.P.S. transportation network." Amazon is offering to refund some shipping charges and give out gift cards.

In the meantime try to enjoy and know that U.P.S. workers, they are going to be out first thing tomorrow morning Thursday making deliveries.

KEILAR: All right, Margaret, and you know, if you did use U.P.S., maybe you sent late, you can use that as an excuse at this point I suppose. It wasn't my fault you know?

CONLEY: That's right. And it prolongs the holiday, too, Brianna and add an extra day.

KEILAR: You know, I like that you're finding the silver lining in this, Margaret. That's fantastic.

You have a very merry Christmas. Thank you.

CONLEY: You too.

KEILAR: We know it's a holiday ritual for many children, getting that photo snapped with Santa. And at a Los Angeles mall, a special Santa Claus is the main attraction. Some parents call ahead to make sure that this Santa is working before they bring their kids to the mall.

Kyung Lah is tracking the story in Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The heart of every mall at Christmas, elves, cameras, crying babies.

All to see the obligatory mall Santa, but it's a rare sort of Santa at the Baldwin Hill Crenshaw plaza in south Los Angeles.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We came to see the black Santa.

LAH: He draws crowds of pint size, preschoolers and their patient parents.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Merry Christmas. LAH: Just like every Santa in any mall America.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What you want for Christmas?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Iphone.

LAH: The pictures are characteristically Christmas, at the same time, they're not.

RENALDO SANDERS, VISITING BLACK SANTA CLAUS: They feel good about themselves by seeing someone also that looks like them. When I was little, there were none of those things. There was no black Santa in Chicago in 1953.

LAH: So it's important for them to see this?

SANDERS: Yes, it is.

LAH: Turn on the TV this Christmas, all you see is one shade of Santa. Like most benevolent characters American children grow up seeing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The only important thing is to make the children happy.

LAH: The good guy is white. But not at this mall. Other Santa speak Spanish.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Feliz Navidad.

LAH: And for the last nine holiday seasons, 77-year-old (INAUDIBLE) Paterson has greeted the crowd plopping toddlers like 2-year-old Manhattan Lamont on his lap whose parents want her snapshot with St. Nick to mean more than just a commercial card.

TYRONE LAMONT, PARENT: Kids don't see the no color. I don't think so. I didn't see color when I was little, you know. You only see color when you get older.

LAH: Nearly all the shoppers in this mall are African-American or Latino, just like the popularity of the multi-racial Santas here. There are only a handful of them in the entire country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, buddy.

LAH: That's why Santa himself has a wish this Christmas.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The malls next year will have a few ethnic Santa Clauses in all cultures.

LAH: Dreaming of a white Christmas and one in many other shades.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, sweetie.

LAH: Kyung Lah, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KEILAR: President Obama looking to get back on track. Can he turn things around in 2014 and get past his 41 percent approval rating? We'll take a look into the future next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Of at this time last year, we were looking ahead to President Obama's second inauguration and now we are looking at whether he can regain that momentum heading into 2014.

Our senior political analyst Ron Brownstein, here to break this down with us.

So Ron, let's with Obamacare, that's obviously top of mind right now. This has been real trouble for President Obama. Does the program get stronger or perhaps more importantly do perceptions of the program get stronger or will this continue to drag down the White House?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: First of all, Merry Christmas to you and everyone.

KEILAR: Merry Christmas also.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes, look. I mean, this I think is the critical question. I mean, Obamacare was the most important addition to the social safety net since Medicare and Medicaid in 1965. And when the president won re-election, even John Boehner seem seemed to be hinting that the debate was essentially over and it was entrenched as the law of the land to use his words.

But a year later, after really an incredible procession of difficulties that they're only now beginning to turn around, it's an open question again whether Obamacare can survive beyond his presidency. And I think the critical issue for him next year and really, in these last three years is can he build enough of a constituency for this program that it will in fact be difficult to undo even if Republicans win unified control of the Congress and presidency in 2016.

And the key to that is really signing up as many people as they can and showing that this can work to both expand coverage and be something that the medical establishment itself wants to preserve. I think this is by far the big question facing the remainder of his term.

KEILAR: So you said that, Ron, even if Republicans were to gain control of the Senate in addition to the house which they already control. Let's look at the midterms. Let's look at 2014. Do you think we kind of keep a status quo or do you think there's a real chance that Republicans could win the Senate?

BROWNSTEIN: There's a real chance the Republicans could win the Senate for a variety of reasons. First of all, you know, six years in is historically the midterm of a second term presidency is historically difficult for the president's party. Second Brianna, you know, we're living through this enormous divergence between the presidential year and the off year in terms of which party it benefits. The Democratic coalition now is so heavily dependent on young people and minorities who vote much less frequently in the midterm. The midterm electorate is older and whiter at a time when older whites are leading toward Republicans. So, that is kind of structural benefit.

And then, if you look at the actual battlefield, the Senate, the key Senate seats that are in play tend to be in red states that are not heavily diverse or are older electorates tough for Democrats, places like Arkansas, Alaska, South Dakota, West Virginia, all of Montana, all of these are going to be very difficult battlefields with the president's approval rating where it is today.

KEILAR: And one of the big political stories this year could be, Ron, Hillary Clinton. She has said that she'll announce this year if she's going to be in it for 2016. What do you expect her to do?

Also, I think knowing, you know, a lot of people just assume she's going to run. But we should also consider that if President Obama can't really turn things around here, that could weigh on her decision, right?

BROWNSTEIN: Right. It could weigh on her prospects certainly. I mean, you know, the history is that the assessment of the outgoing president matters more than people think. I mean, if you look at in the modern era, very high correlation between views of the outgoing president in '88 for example, views about Reagan in 2000, views about Clinton had a lot of effect how people voted in the election to succeed them.

So, if Obama cannot recover during these remaining years and ends up his presidency with an approval rating somewhere in the low 40s, that will be a weight on Hillary Clinton or any other Democrat.

Having said that, I think, you know, most people believe as long as she's healthy, she's going to run. She is as commanding a frontrunner as we have seen. There is no obvious line of argument against her from the center of the party. I mean, if you're going to run against her for the nomination, you would probably have to make a generational argument like be Gary Hart did against Walter Mondale in 1948 or maybe a populist argument from the kind of the left edge of the Democratic coalition.

But either way, she is a strong candidate for the nomination and potentially a very strong nominee for the general election, as well.

KEILAR: Yes, I can't imagine she's not going to run when you look where she is in the polls. But certainly that would be an upset story if she weren't going to.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes, absolutely.

KEILAR: Ron Brownstein, thanks so much and happy holidays to you.

BROWNSTEIN: Thank you. Yes, you too. KEILAR: Now, ahead on NEWSROOM, tens of thousands of people screaming as Pope Francis appeared on the balcony there above St. Peter's square. The Pope's popularity may continue to soar, but he is keeping his Christmas message pretty down to earth.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)