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CNN Live Saturday
Orioles Owner Say Team In D.C. Will Cost Him $40 million A Year; Bush, Kerry Campaign in Ohio, Pennsylvania
Aired July 31, 2004 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD: Politics in full trail mode today. Senators John Kerry and John Edwards make bus stops in the battle ground state of Pennsylvania. And President Bush hits Ohio with an unscheduled play date with the Cleveland Browns. And later --
JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The Democrats may have won over a very special interest group, hamsters for Kerry.
Jeanne Moos investigates the hamster (INAUDIBLE) debate. Hello and welcome to CNN live Saturday. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. And don't forget, in 30 minutes, "Dollar Signs." Today, baby makes three. We're talking about the price of having children and not just the first one. So send your questions to dollarsigns@cnn.com, or call us at 1 800 807-2620. But first here are the headlines.
There appears to be yet another hostage taking in Iraq. Al Jazeera has broadcast a new videotape released by militant Abu Musab al Zarqawi's terrorist group. It threatens to behead two Turkish truck drivers in 48 hours if they company does not stop working in Iraq.
Monsoon flood waters in and around Bangladesh are receding but the death toll is rising. Decreased water levels are revealing more bodies. Drowning, mudslides, electrocution, and water borne diseases have killed more than 1,500 people in that region.
In Bosnia, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell is calling for the arrests of former leaders accused of war crimes. Powell is also urging the country to enact economic and political reforms. Keeping you informed, CNN, the most trusted name in news.
We begin with the race for the White House. President Bush and his Democratic rival John Kerry are miles apart on many issues, but today they're literally just miles away from each other on the campaign trail. Both are courting voters in the battle ground states of Ohio and Pennsylvania. Let's start with the Kerry/Edwards campaign and CNN senior political correspondent Candy Crowley.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CANDY CROWLEY, SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Debates don't begin until fall but as George Bush and John Kerry campaign past each other in Ohio and Pennsylvania, there is a dialogue of sorts. It began when George Bush told his crowds that the economy has turned the corner. John Kerry in western Pennsylvania brought up those who don't have health insurance, those now working for lower wages than they had been and seniors without enough money to pay for their prescription drugs. He begs to differ.
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't want to run talking about turning a corner. I'm running to climb the mountain and get to the top. And that's what we're going to do.
CROWLEY: The truth is, not much news will be made on this coast to coast 15-day journey. But that's really not the point. What the Kerry/Edwards ticket wants to do is build on the momentum of the convention, taking the excitement in that four days in Boston out onto the campaign trail.
KERRY: You've got to look back here, all the way up the slopes, all the way back up into the back slopes of the streets. We've got people from all over who have come here to fight for change in the United States of America. And we thank you, all the way back, unbelievable turnout.
CROWLEY: Traveling en masse, the Kerry/Edwards team spent the last part of their campaign in Pennsylvania in the western part of the state, which tends to vote Republican. But local polls say, they think that will be different this time. They cite an increasing antipathy to President Bush and Teresa Heinz Kerry's ties to Pittsburgh. Candy Crowley, CNN, Greensburg, Pennsylvania.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: Kerry/Edwards are taking some time out to appear on CNN's "Late Edition" with Wolf Blitzer and you can catch that interview tomorrow at noon eastern, 9:00 Pacific right here on CNN.
President Bush will be in Pennsylvania later on today. But he began the day in Ohio. No Republican has been elected president without winning Ohio. Bush attended rallies in Canton and Cambridge, defending his record on the economy. He said factors beyond his control like the September 11 attacks were to blame for the country's economic problems. Job losses are a major issue in Ohio. Bush also took some jabs at the Democratic ticket by comparing and contrasting Vice President Dick Cheney with Democrat John Edwards.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I mentioned my running mate. I admit he's not the prettiest on the ticket. That's not why I picked him. I picked him because he's strong, he's steady, and he gets the job done.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Don't mess with Texas. That's the message today from first lady Laura Bush as she christened a nuclear powered attack submarine named after her home state. Mrs. Bush smashed a bottle of American sparkling wine against the bow of the $2 billion ship. She called it a very American event. The private ceremony at the Northrop Grumman Newport News shipyard in Virginia drew about 5,000 people.
Turning now to Iraq. That's where life and death negotiations began today. At stake, the fate of seven kidnapped truck drivers. A representative of the company they worked for met with a tribal leader who says he speaks for the hostage holders. They threatened to kill one of their captors yesterday if demands were not met. But a new deadline was set. That too has expired. The man representing the kidnappers says he's hopeful the hostages will be released.
And there's news of more violence in Iraq. The leader of a school for teachers was killed Friday in a town south of Baghdad. Iraqi police say he was walking home from a mosque when masked gunmen in two cars shot him to death.
Such crimes have frustrated the country's new government. Now Iraqi police say they're stepping up a major crackdown on organized crime. They've arrested hundreds of suspects and seized weapons. CNN's Matthew Chance reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Revealed in a Baghdad suburb, a deadly weapons cache, land mines, rockets, and mortars by the truckload. CNN gained exclusive access to this Iraqi police haul. Makeshift rocket launchers, crude but effective and U.S. military uniforms, 10 in all, perhaps disguises to penetrate security. Officials say the seizure is a blow to insurgents and the criminal gangs who work with them.
FALAH AL NAKIB, IRAQI INTERIOR MINISTER: In many areas, they have been working together. Our analysis, our intelligence reports, our intelligence work, has shown that many of these terrorist groups that are financing and giving -- financing those criminals to do their actions.
CHANCE: Iraq's descent into crime began as the tanks rolled in. Saddam freed thousands of convicts. There was looting and ever since, ordinary Iraqis have been targeted by kidnappers and armed robbers, gangs that operated with impunity. So you believe that the Americans' failure to address the issue of organized crime has in part contributed to the terrible security situation that Iraq finds itself in?
AL NAKIB: They didn't know actually who they were facing in the streets. Probably some of the advisors worked in the early days with the coalition forces. They were the wrong ones.
CHANCE: The new advice -- get tough. Newly trained Iraqi police have been arresting hundreds of suspects. Iraqis are starting to cooperate say police, passing on information leading to important seizures, like the weapons cache. But it's still a massive challenge for such a tiny force.
AL NAKIB: We need to have back the Iraqi army as quickly as possible. That's what one of the important things to protect the country. We are OK, we can do it as the ministry of interior security forces. We can protect our people. We can maintain security. But we need some time. CHANCE: Time to restore security and confidence the Iraqi government can act. For many Iraqis, crime is the biggest concern. People here simply don't feel safe even in their own homes. Now the police have drawn the link with the insurgency but if the criminals can be stopped, it could lend this Iraqi interim government the kind of public support and legitimacy it has so far lacked. Matthew Chance, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: An explosion in Pakistan today. At least six people were wounded at a Chinese social club in Islamabad just before dawn. The blast was apparently caused by a gas leak from an air conditioning unit. It's believed to have been an accident.
A militant group is claiming responsibility for two other explosions in Pakistan. On an Islamic Web site, the group calling itself Islamabuli (ph) brigades of al Qaeda says it was behind two failed assassination attempts against Pakistan's prime minister designate. The group warns of more attacks if Pakistan continues to cooperate with the U.S. The prime minister designate Tariq Aziz was returning from a town about 35 miles southwest of Islamabad Friday when the explosions happened. One was a suicide bombing that killed nine people and wounded 25 others.
In this political season, some in Washington are recalling when a whole team of losing senators left town. The nation's capital hasn't had a major league baseball team since the Washington Senators hit the showers for the last time in 1971. Next, is D.C. getting baseball back?
And coming up in less than a half an hour, and baby makes three. We're talking about how much it costs or should cost, to have a baby. Your first or your eighth, perhaps and ways you can save. Just e-mail your questions to "dollar sign" at cnn.com or call us at 1 800 807- 2620. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: The nation's capital celebrating the national pastime while it tries to lure a major league baseball team back to the city. CNN's Sean Callebs is knee deep in peanuts and Cracker Jacks at the Smithsonian's baseball blast. Good to see you Sean.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good to see you Freddy. Truth being known, I just put the Cracker Jacks down about five minutes ago and what a great way to spend a Saturday for residents in and around the area of D.C., touring the exhibit here at the Smithsonian, a chance to look at some of the most treasured items baseball has to offer. But for the permanent residents, the full-time residents here, perhaps it whets the appetite for a region eagerly waiting to embrace a major league baseball team once again.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CALLEBS (voice-over): Bats, hats, baseballs and other memorabilia belonging to the game's greatest, the Smithsonian's exhibit recognizing the national pastime. For now, this is as close as Washington, D.C. residents can get to major league baseball. But that could be changing.
TIM DONNER, SYNDICATED RADIO HOST: I think the fans are guardedly optimistic with an emphasis on the word guarded.
CALLEBS: The long-suffering Montreal Expos are leaving Canada. The Washington, D.C./northern Virginia area is widely considered the front runner to be the team's new home. That stirs images of the loveable losers, the Washington Senators and the city that twice lost major league baseball, the last time back in 1971.
SID THRIFT, SNYNDICATED RADIO HOST: I think when it left the second time, no one ever dreamed it would be such a struggle to try to get baseball back.
CALLEBS: The city is begging for one more chance to rekindle glory. There are critics, including powerful owner of the Baltimore Orioles, Peter Angelos. He contends a team in D.C. would cost him $40 million a year. He says there are no real baseball fans in D.C. The fans are in the surrounding areas and in the Maryland counties. They are Orioles fans and we want to keep them because we need to keep them, to keep this team economically viable and to make it competitive as our fans want it.
CAROLYN JOHNSON THOMAS, DAUGHTER OF WALTER JOHNSON: I don't know what he's worried about, then. There isn't going to be any competition if there are no fans in Washington.
CALLEBS: Carolyn Johnson Thomas is the daughter of the big train, Walter Johnson, a star pitcher who led Washington to their only World Series championship in 1924.
HANK THOMAS, GRANDSON OF WALTER JOHNSON: Why wouldn't you want to have a ballpark where the center field opens up to the Washington monument and the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial?
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CALLEBS: It sounds so great doesn't it? When the senators played here, there was a saying, "Washington, first in peace, first in war, last in the American league." Well, that will change because if they get a team, they'll be in the national league Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: So if they get a team, where would the team play? I imagine if it becomes the Expos, it would be the Washington Expos, not once again the Washington Senators, right?
CALLEBS: I think the feeling is they would change the name from the Expos. I don't know exactly what it would be. To a degree there would probably be a push to keep that, because they had it from 1900s to 1960s and lost it for one year, then '61 to '71. Where will they play? That is a great question. There are several areas in the Washington, D.C. area that they're looking at right now. Apparently one, RFK Stadium, the stadium's already there. So if there would be a new stadium built, they could at least play there in the interim. But northern Virginia, especially out near the Dulles airport area is making a big push as well, so a little competition going on. Will it reinvigorate an urban area or move out to the burbs? We'll find out.
WHITFIELD: And if it were to cost $40 million as one person in your piece said, then outside of being able to celebrate having a baseball team, what does D.C. gain?
CALLEBS: Well, Peter Angelos, the owner of the Orioles, he says it would cost him $40 million because it would take fans away from Baltimore. A lot of people say, that's probably exaggerating to a certain degree. What would it bring? There are all kinds of studies out there that if they put a team in a downtown area it would reinvigorate a certain area. But there are other people that say that those numbers are always inflated and the real benefit to having a team is just the bragging rights, saying you have a pro franchise and that adds a certain degree of panache if you will to a city. They have great hockey, basketball, other teams, football of course. So they need baseball. That is the argument.
WHITFIELD: And something tells me, Sean, that there are enough Washingtonians who actually like baseball. They're not all in Maryland and Virginia. ''
CALLEBS: Indeed, indeed.
WHITFIELD: All right. Thanks a lot.
NASA will launch a satellite Monday to look for ice on the hottest planet in the solar system. The Messenger will orbit mercury. That's never been done before. Another spacecraft came close to the planet three decades ago and that's hard to do because the planet is so close to the sun. The noontime surface temperature there is about 900 degrees Fahrenheit.
Other NASA crews are exploring the challenges of outer space without ever leaving planet earth. CNN's space correspondent Miles O'Brien reports on an aquatic station called Aquarius.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Meet the next crew NASA is sending into an extreme environment. They're not astronauts training to blast into space, at least, not yet. They're aquanauts, getting ready to splash into the deep blue sea. David Williams and his team will be descending 50 feet to the world's only manned underwater research center, Aquarius. Teams work and live for days and sometimes weeks at a time without ever surfacing. This is just a training mission and the team will return to the surface after only 40 minutes. On board Aquarius, another team of NASA aquanauts. This is their eighth day underwater.
JOHN HERRINGTON, AQUANAUT: We've been here so long that our bodies are saturated with nitrogen. And if we go to the surface, it all pops out just like you see bubbles in a soda bottle. O'BRIEN: It's what divers call the bends and it can kill you. By staying here, John Herrington and his crew avoid the tight time constraints imposed on divers to avoid getting the bends. It's called saturation diving but it is not for the claustrophobic. The quarters are tight, about the size of a Winnebago or a space shuttle for that matter.
HERRINGTON: It's remarkable to see this interaction of fish in their environment and to be a part of that.
O'BRIEN: Just watching from the window would never do. Unlike a submarine, the aquanauts can venture out into the ocean, even for hours at a time. This NASA team is testing equipment here, all headed to the orbiting outpost which has more similarities to Aquarius than just size.
BILL TODD, PROJECT LEADER: It takes about 15 hours of decompression before you're able to come back to the surface, which is very similar to the time it would take from leaving the space station to getting back to earth, returning to earth.
O'BRIEN: And that's also what these missions are about, testing the hardiness of the humans as crews as well as the gear. But whether it's inner or outer space, the view is something to write home about. Miles O'Brien, CNN. >
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: New at the box office this weekend, Denzel Washington in a remake of "The Manchurian Candidate." How will it stack up to the 1962 original? The film, about a platoon of U.S. soldiers kidnapped and brainwashed by the enemy, led to questions about eerie real-life parallels. CNN's Beth Nissen (ph) reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The 1962 film stars Frank Sinatra, Lawrence Harvey, and Angela Lansbury in a complex tale of intrigue and politics. The story, a group of U.S. infantry in Korea is captured by a coalition of Chinese, Russian, and Korea master planners and brainwashed so they are under the complete control of their handlers. The brainwashed soldiers are released. The character played by Lawrence Harvey comes home a war hero but is a secret sleeper agent for the enemy.
COURTESY METRO GOLDWYN MAYER: Normally conditioned American who's been trained to kill, then to have no memory of having killed.
NISSEN: His ultimate mission, infiltrate a national political convention and kill the presidential candidate so the vice presidential candidate, a puppet of the communists, can take his place. The story behind the film is also one of intrigue and what some see as parallel violence, links between this film about political assassination, and two actual political assassinations. The first was John F. Kennedy's in 1963, the year after "The Manchurian Candidate" premiered. There was much speculation and some police investigation into whether Lee Harvey Oswald had seen the film and been encouraged if not inspired by it. Frank Sinata, a key figure in the making of the film and a friend of the Kennedy's was reportedly distraught by that possibility.
Five years later, there was an odd connection between the film and the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. The film's director, John Frankenheimer, drove Bobby to the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles on the night he was killed. In an eerie parallel with the film in which a character is told to do something when he hears a particular line in a political speech, Frankenheimer was told by Bobby to get the car when he heard Bobby to say this line.
ROBERT F. KENNEDY: Now it's on to Chicago and let's win there.
NISSEN: By the time Frankenheimer had pulled the car around, Bobby Kennedy had been shot and lay dying. In 1972, Sinata bought the rights to "The Manchurian Candidate" and removed it from circulation, some say in remorse or guilt over possible links between the film and the deaths of both Kennedy's, others say because of a dispute over funny bookkeeping and profit distribution.
The film had been out of circulation for 23 years when it was re- released in 1988. By then it seemed less shocking and provocative, a more obvious political satire with its depiction of a McCarthy-like senator who can't settle on the number of communists in the Defense Department until he's inspired by a bottle of Heinz ketchup.
FIRST "MANCHURIAN": There are exactly 57 card-carrying members of the communist party in the Department of Defense at this time.
NISSEN: Forty years later, the original film was dated in look and language and portrayal of the enemy. But its key themes sound current, concerns about politicians manipulated by handlers with a hidden agenda.
FIRST "MANCHURIAN": So just stop talking like an expert all of a sudden and get out there and say what you're supposed to say.
NISSEN: The threat of enemies of the U.S. plotting terrorist acts. The world is not as black and white as it was. But what flickers as fear can seem awfully familiar. Beth Nissen, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: And now a very special tale of mice and men, well hamsters and their owners to be exact. When one of the furry creatures was immortalized in a speech during the Democratic National Convention, our Jeanne Moos took notice, especially since it involved a pet in peril and a rodent rescue. We'll let her explain.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Democrats may have won over a very special interest group, hamsters for Kerry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you believe John Kerry gave mouth to mouth to a hamster?
MOOS: Maybe not mouth to mouth. Pretend this is a hamster.
ASPCA VETERINARIAN: It would be very gentle compressions. It's not like this.
MOOS: CPR for hamsters became a campaign issue when John Kerry's daughter told one of her favorite stories about her dad.
ALEXANDRA KERRY: It's a silly story.
MOOS: Alexandra Kerry and her sister were kids when their dog knocked a cage containing their pet hamster Licorice off a dock. John Kerry jumped into the water and rescued the hamster.
KERRY: Hunched over the soggy hamster and began to administer CPR.
MOOS: The "New York Times" called it the best John Kerry story of the convention. At the ASPCA, a veterinarian told us, you could do CPR on a hamster and demonstrated on our fuzzy mike.
ASPCA VETERINARIAN: But I would blow and compress. Blow and compress.
MOOS: But we suspect Senator Kerry blew off the blowing part.
KERRY: There are some reports of mouth of mouth but I admit that's probably a trick of memory.
MOOS: Which brings back memories of Eddie Murphy resuscitating a rat.
KERRY: The hamster was never quite right after that, but he lived.
MOOS: As for the hamster's spin on the story, a Web site called hamsterific listed Kerry as recommended though this hamster for president site was pushing one of its own rather than Kerry for rodent-in-chief. Would President Bush jump in the water to save the hamster?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He'd probably send somebody.
MOOS: Do you think George Bush give CPR to a hamster?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think he'd probably fire on a hamster sooner.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wouldn't you turn the hamster upside down first and drain the water out?
MOOS: Like so. We are going to be so ready if any of us sees a drowning hamster. We're going to be set. And what might the little rodents say to those who accuse Democrats of pandering to the hamster vote? Kerry, better than cheese. Jeanne Moos, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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Aired July 31, 2004 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD: Politics in full trail mode today. Senators John Kerry and John Edwards make bus stops in the battle ground state of Pennsylvania. And President Bush hits Ohio with an unscheduled play date with the Cleveland Browns. And later --
JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The Democrats may have won over a very special interest group, hamsters for Kerry.
Jeanne Moos investigates the hamster (INAUDIBLE) debate. Hello and welcome to CNN live Saturday. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. And don't forget, in 30 minutes, "Dollar Signs." Today, baby makes three. We're talking about the price of having children and not just the first one. So send your questions to dollarsigns@cnn.com, or call us at 1 800 807-2620. But first here are the headlines.
There appears to be yet another hostage taking in Iraq. Al Jazeera has broadcast a new videotape released by militant Abu Musab al Zarqawi's terrorist group. It threatens to behead two Turkish truck drivers in 48 hours if they company does not stop working in Iraq.
Monsoon flood waters in and around Bangladesh are receding but the death toll is rising. Decreased water levels are revealing more bodies. Drowning, mudslides, electrocution, and water borne diseases have killed more than 1,500 people in that region.
In Bosnia, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell is calling for the arrests of former leaders accused of war crimes. Powell is also urging the country to enact economic and political reforms. Keeping you informed, CNN, the most trusted name in news.
We begin with the race for the White House. President Bush and his Democratic rival John Kerry are miles apart on many issues, but today they're literally just miles away from each other on the campaign trail. Both are courting voters in the battle ground states of Ohio and Pennsylvania. Let's start with the Kerry/Edwards campaign and CNN senior political correspondent Candy Crowley.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CANDY CROWLEY, SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Debates don't begin until fall but as George Bush and John Kerry campaign past each other in Ohio and Pennsylvania, there is a dialogue of sorts. It began when George Bush told his crowds that the economy has turned the corner. John Kerry in western Pennsylvania brought up those who don't have health insurance, those now working for lower wages than they had been and seniors without enough money to pay for their prescription drugs. He begs to differ.
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't want to run talking about turning a corner. I'm running to climb the mountain and get to the top. And that's what we're going to do.
CROWLEY: The truth is, not much news will be made on this coast to coast 15-day journey. But that's really not the point. What the Kerry/Edwards ticket wants to do is build on the momentum of the convention, taking the excitement in that four days in Boston out onto the campaign trail.
KERRY: You've got to look back here, all the way up the slopes, all the way back up into the back slopes of the streets. We've got people from all over who have come here to fight for change in the United States of America. And we thank you, all the way back, unbelievable turnout.
CROWLEY: Traveling en masse, the Kerry/Edwards team spent the last part of their campaign in Pennsylvania in the western part of the state, which tends to vote Republican. But local polls say, they think that will be different this time. They cite an increasing antipathy to President Bush and Teresa Heinz Kerry's ties to Pittsburgh. Candy Crowley, CNN, Greensburg, Pennsylvania.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: Kerry/Edwards are taking some time out to appear on CNN's "Late Edition" with Wolf Blitzer and you can catch that interview tomorrow at noon eastern, 9:00 Pacific right here on CNN.
President Bush will be in Pennsylvania later on today. But he began the day in Ohio. No Republican has been elected president without winning Ohio. Bush attended rallies in Canton and Cambridge, defending his record on the economy. He said factors beyond his control like the September 11 attacks were to blame for the country's economic problems. Job losses are a major issue in Ohio. Bush also took some jabs at the Democratic ticket by comparing and contrasting Vice President Dick Cheney with Democrat John Edwards.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I mentioned my running mate. I admit he's not the prettiest on the ticket. That's not why I picked him. I picked him because he's strong, he's steady, and he gets the job done.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Don't mess with Texas. That's the message today from first lady Laura Bush as she christened a nuclear powered attack submarine named after her home state. Mrs. Bush smashed a bottle of American sparkling wine against the bow of the $2 billion ship. She called it a very American event. The private ceremony at the Northrop Grumman Newport News shipyard in Virginia drew about 5,000 people.
Turning now to Iraq. That's where life and death negotiations began today. At stake, the fate of seven kidnapped truck drivers. A representative of the company they worked for met with a tribal leader who says he speaks for the hostage holders. They threatened to kill one of their captors yesterday if demands were not met. But a new deadline was set. That too has expired. The man representing the kidnappers says he's hopeful the hostages will be released.
And there's news of more violence in Iraq. The leader of a school for teachers was killed Friday in a town south of Baghdad. Iraqi police say he was walking home from a mosque when masked gunmen in two cars shot him to death.
Such crimes have frustrated the country's new government. Now Iraqi police say they're stepping up a major crackdown on organized crime. They've arrested hundreds of suspects and seized weapons. CNN's Matthew Chance reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Revealed in a Baghdad suburb, a deadly weapons cache, land mines, rockets, and mortars by the truckload. CNN gained exclusive access to this Iraqi police haul. Makeshift rocket launchers, crude but effective and U.S. military uniforms, 10 in all, perhaps disguises to penetrate security. Officials say the seizure is a blow to insurgents and the criminal gangs who work with them.
FALAH AL NAKIB, IRAQI INTERIOR MINISTER: In many areas, they have been working together. Our analysis, our intelligence reports, our intelligence work, has shown that many of these terrorist groups that are financing and giving -- financing those criminals to do their actions.
CHANCE: Iraq's descent into crime began as the tanks rolled in. Saddam freed thousands of convicts. There was looting and ever since, ordinary Iraqis have been targeted by kidnappers and armed robbers, gangs that operated with impunity. So you believe that the Americans' failure to address the issue of organized crime has in part contributed to the terrible security situation that Iraq finds itself in?
AL NAKIB: They didn't know actually who they were facing in the streets. Probably some of the advisors worked in the early days with the coalition forces. They were the wrong ones.
CHANCE: The new advice -- get tough. Newly trained Iraqi police have been arresting hundreds of suspects. Iraqis are starting to cooperate say police, passing on information leading to important seizures, like the weapons cache. But it's still a massive challenge for such a tiny force.
AL NAKIB: We need to have back the Iraqi army as quickly as possible. That's what one of the important things to protect the country. We are OK, we can do it as the ministry of interior security forces. We can protect our people. We can maintain security. But we need some time. CHANCE: Time to restore security and confidence the Iraqi government can act. For many Iraqis, crime is the biggest concern. People here simply don't feel safe even in their own homes. Now the police have drawn the link with the insurgency but if the criminals can be stopped, it could lend this Iraqi interim government the kind of public support and legitimacy it has so far lacked. Matthew Chance, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: An explosion in Pakistan today. At least six people were wounded at a Chinese social club in Islamabad just before dawn. The blast was apparently caused by a gas leak from an air conditioning unit. It's believed to have been an accident.
A militant group is claiming responsibility for two other explosions in Pakistan. On an Islamic Web site, the group calling itself Islamabuli (ph) brigades of al Qaeda says it was behind two failed assassination attempts against Pakistan's prime minister designate. The group warns of more attacks if Pakistan continues to cooperate with the U.S. The prime minister designate Tariq Aziz was returning from a town about 35 miles southwest of Islamabad Friday when the explosions happened. One was a suicide bombing that killed nine people and wounded 25 others.
In this political season, some in Washington are recalling when a whole team of losing senators left town. The nation's capital hasn't had a major league baseball team since the Washington Senators hit the showers for the last time in 1971. Next, is D.C. getting baseball back?
And coming up in less than a half an hour, and baby makes three. We're talking about how much it costs or should cost, to have a baby. Your first or your eighth, perhaps and ways you can save. Just e-mail your questions to "dollar sign" at cnn.com or call us at 1 800 807- 2620. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: The nation's capital celebrating the national pastime while it tries to lure a major league baseball team back to the city. CNN's Sean Callebs is knee deep in peanuts and Cracker Jacks at the Smithsonian's baseball blast. Good to see you Sean.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good to see you Freddy. Truth being known, I just put the Cracker Jacks down about five minutes ago and what a great way to spend a Saturday for residents in and around the area of D.C., touring the exhibit here at the Smithsonian, a chance to look at some of the most treasured items baseball has to offer. But for the permanent residents, the full-time residents here, perhaps it whets the appetite for a region eagerly waiting to embrace a major league baseball team once again.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CALLEBS (voice-over): Bats, hats, baseballs and other memorabilia belonging to the game's greatest, the Smithsonian's exhibit recognizing the national pastime. For now, this is as close as Washington, D.C. residents can get to major league baseball. But that could be changing.
TIM DONNER, SYNDICATED RADIO HOST: I think the fans are guardedly optimistic with an emphasis on the word guarded.
CALLEBS: The long-suffering Montreal Expos are leaving Canada. The Washington, D.C./northern Virginia area is widely considered the front runner to be the team's new home. That stirs images of the loveable losers, the Washington Senators and the city that twice lost major league baseball, the last time back in 1971.
SID THRIFT, SNYNDICATED RADIO HOST: I think when it left the second time, no one ever dreamed it would be such a struggle to try to get baseball back.
CALLEBS: The city is begging for one more chance to rekindle glory. There are critics, including powerful owner of the Baltimore Orioles, Peter Angelos. He contends a team in D.C. would cost him $40 million a year. He says there are no real baseball fans in D.C. The fans are in the surrounding areas and in the Maryland counties. They are Orioles fans and we want to keep them because we need to keep them, to keep this team economically viable and to make it competitive as our fans want it.
CAROLYN JOHNSON THOMAS, DAUGHTER OF WALTER JOHNSON: I don't know what he's worried about, then. There isn't going to be any competition if there are no fans in Washington.
CALLEBS: Carolyn Johnson Thomas is the daughter of the big train, Walter Johnson, a star pitcher who led Washington to their only World Series championship in 1924.
HANK THOMAS, GRANDSON OF WALTER JOHNSON: Why wouldn't you want to have a ballpark where the center field opens up to the Washington monument and the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial?
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CALLEBS: It sounds so great doesn't it? When the senators played here, there was a saying, "Washington, first in peace, first in war, last in the American league." Well, that will change because if they get a team, they'll be in the national league Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: So if they get a team, where would the team play? I imagine if it becomes the Expos, it would be the Washington Expos, not once again the Washington Senators, right?
CALLEBS: I think the feeling is they would change the name from the Expos. I don't know exactly what it would be. To a degree there would probably be a push to keep that, because they had it from 1900s to 1960s and lost it for one year, then '61 to '71. Where will they play? That is a great question. There are several areas in the Washington, D.C. area that they're looking at right now. Apparently one, RFK Stadium, the stadium's already there. So if there would be a new stadium built, they could at least play there in the interim. But northern Virginia, especially out near the Dulles airport area is making a big push as well, so a little competition going on. Will it reinvigorate an urban area or move out to the burbs? We'll find out.
WHITFIELD: And if it were to cost $40 million as one person in your piece said, then outside of being able to celebrate having a baseball team, what does D.C. gain?
CALLEBS: Well, Peter Angelos, the owner of the Orioles, he says it would cost him $40 million because it would take fans away from Baltimore. A lot of people say, that's probably exaggerating to a certain degree. What would it bring? There are all kinds of studies out there that if they put a team in a downtown area it would reinvigorate a certain area. But there are other people that say that those numbers are always inflated and the real benefit to having a team is just the bragging rights, saying you have a pro franchise and that adds a certain degree of panache if you will to a city. They have great hockey, basketball, other teams, football of course. So they need baseball. That is the argument.
WHITFIELD: And something tells me, Sean, that there are enough Washingtonians who actually like baseball. They're not all in Maryland and Virginia. ''
CALLEBS: Indeed, indeed.
WHITFIELD: All right. Thanks a lot.
NASA will launch a satellite Monday to look for ice on the hottest planet in the solar system. The Messenger will orbit mercury. That's never been done before. Another spacecraft came close to the planet three decades ago and that's hard to do because the planet is so close to the sun. The noontime surface temperature there is about 900 degrees Fahrenheit.
Other NASA crews are exploring the challenges of outer space without ever leaving planet earth. CNN's space correspondent Miles O'Brien reports on an aquatic station called Aquarius.
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MILES O'BRIEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Meet the next crew NASA is sending into an extreme environment. They're not astronauts training to blast into space, at least, not yet. They're aquanauts, getting ready to splash into the deep blue sea. David Williams and his team will be descending 50 feet to the world's only manned underwater research center, Aquarius. Teams work and live for days and sometimes weeks at a time without ever surfacing. This is just a training mission and the team will return to the surface after only 40 minutes. On board Aquarius, another team of NASA aquanauts. This is their eighth day underwater.
JOHN HERRINGTON, AQUANAUT: We've been here so long that our bodies are saturated with nitrogen. And if we go to the surface, it all pops out just like you see bubbles in a soda bottle. O'BRIEN: It's what divers call the bends and it can kill you. By staying here, John Herrington and his crew avoid the tight time constraints imposed on divers to avoid getting the bends. It's called saturation diving but it is not for the claustrophobic. The quarters are tight, about the size of a Winnebago or a space shuttle for that matter.
HERRINGTON: It's remarkable to see this interaction of fish in their environment and to be a part of that.
O'BRIEN: Just watching from the window would never do. Unlike a submarine, the aquanauts can venture out into the ocean, even for hours at a time. This NASA team is testing equipment here, all headed to the orbiting outpost which has more similarities to Aquarius than just size.
BILL TODD, PROJECT LEADER: It takes about 15 hours of decompression before you're able to come back to the surface, which is very similar to the time it would take from leaving the space station to getting back to earth, returning to earth.
O'BRIEN: And that's also what these missions are about, testing the hardiness of the humans as crews as well as the gear. But whether it's inner or outer space, the view is something to write home about. Miles O'Brien, CNN. >
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WHITFIELD: New at the box office this weekend, Denzel Washington in a remake of "The Manchurian Candidate." How will it stack up to the 1962 original? The film, about a platoon of U.S. soldiers kidnapped and brainwashed by the enemy, led to questions about eerie real-life parallels. CNN's Beth Nissen (ph) reports.
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BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The 1962 film stars Frank Sinatra, Lawrence Harvey, and Angela Lansbury in a complex tale of intrigue and politics. The story, a group of U.S. infantry in Korea is captured by a coalition of Chinese, Russian, and Korea master planners and brainwashed so they are under the complete control of their handlers. The brainwashed soldiers are released. The character played by Lawrence Harvey comes home a war hero but is a secret sleeper agent for the enemy.
COURTESY METRO GOLDWYN MAYER: Normally conditioned American who's been trained to kill, then to have no memory of having killed.
NISSEN: His ultimate mission, infiltrate a national political convention and kill the presidential candidate so the vice presidential candidate, a puppet of the communists, can take his place. The story behind the film is also one of intrigue and what some see as parallel violence, links between this film about political assassination, and two actual political assassinations. The first was John F. Kennedy's in 1963, the year after "The Manchurian Candidate" premiered. There was much speculation and some police investigation into whether Lee Harvey Oswald had seen the film and been encouraged if not inspired by it. Frank Sinata, a key figure in the making of the film and a friend of the Kennedy's was reportedly distraught by that possibility.
Five years later, there was an odd connection between the film and the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. The film's director, John Frankenheimer, drove Bobby to the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles on the night he was killed. In an eerie parallel with the film in which a character is told to do something when he hears a particular line in a political speech, Frankenheimer was told by Bobby to get the car when he heard Bobby to say this line.
ROBERT F. KENNEDY: Now it's on to Chicago and let's win there.
NISSEN: By the time Frankenheimer had pulled the car around, Bobby Kennedy had been shot and lay dying. In 1972, Sinata bought the rights to "The Manchurian Candidate" and removed it from circulation, some say in remorse or guilt over possible links between the film and the deaths of both Kennedy's, others say because of a dispute over funny bookkeeping and profit distribution.
The film had been out of circulation for 23 years when it was re- released in 1988. By then it seemed less shocking and provocative, a more obvious political satire with its depiction of a McCarthy-like senator who can't settle on the number of communists in the Defense Department until he's inspired by a bottle of Heinz ketchup.
FIRST "MANCHURIAN": There are exactly 57 card-carrying members of the communist party in the Department of Defense at this time.
NISSEN: Forty years later, the original film was dated in look and language and portrayal of the enemy. But its key themes sound current, concerns about politicians manipulated by handlers with a hidden agenda.
FIRST "MANCHURIAN": So just stop talking like an expert all of a sudden and get out there and say what you're supposed to say.
NISSEN: The threat of enemies of the U.S. plotting terrorist acts. The world is not as black and white as it was. But what flickers as fear can seem awfully familiar. Beth Nissen, CNN, New York.
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WHITFIELD: And now a very special tale of mice and men, well hamsters and their owners to be exact. When one of the furry creatures was immortalized in a speech during the Democratic National Convention, our Jeanne Moos took notice, especially since it involved a pet in peril and a rodent rescue. We'll let her explain.
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JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Democrats may have won over a very special interest group, hamsters for Kerry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you believe John Kerry gave mouth to mouth to a hamster?
MOOS: Maybe not mouth to mouth. Pretend this is a hamster.
ASPCA VETERINARIAN: It would be very gentle compressions. It's not like this.
MOOS: CPR for hamsters became a campaign issue when John Kerry's daughter told one of her favorite stories about her dad.
ALEXANDRA KERRY: It's a silly story.
MOOS: Alexandra Kerry and her sister were kids when their dog knocked a cage containing their pet hamster Licorice off a dock. John Kerry jumped into the water and rescued the hamster.
KERRY: Hunched over the soggy hamster and began to administer CPR.
MOOS: The "New York Times" called it the best John Kerry story of the convention. At the ASPCA, a veterinarian told us, you could do CPR on a hamster and demonstrated on our fuzzy mike.
ASPCA VETERINARIAN: But I would blow and compress. Blow and compress.
MOOS: But we suspect Senator Kerry blew off the blowing part.
KERRY: There are some reports of mouth of mouth but I admit that's probably a trick of memory.
MOOS: Which brings back memories of Eddie Murphy resuscitating a rat.
KERRY: The hamster was never quite right after that, but he lived.
MOOS: As for the hamster's spin on the story, a Web site called hamsterific listed Kerry as recommended though this hamster for president site was pushing one of its own rather than Kerry for rodent-in-chief. Would President Bush jump in the water to save the hamster?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He'd probably send somebody.
MOOS: Do you think George Bush give CPR to a hamster?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think he'd probably fire on a hamster sooner.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wouldn't you turn the hamster upside down first and drain the water out?
MOOS: Like so. We are going to be so ready if any of us sees a drowning hamster. We're going to be set. And what might the little rodents say to those who accuse Democrats of pandering to the hamster vote? Kerry, better than cheese. Jeanne Moos, CNN, New York.
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