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Campbell Brown
Over One Million Homeless in Haiti; What Will President Obama Say?
Aired January 26, 2010 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAMPBELL BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Hey there, everybody.
We are beginning tonight with the staggering task of rebuilding in Haiti. Today, two weeks after the deadly earthquake, the U.N. is putting the number of Haiti's homeless at one million, the capital city of Port-au-Prince virtually in ruins. You have, of course, seen the pictures over and over again now.
CNN chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour is there tonight.
And, Christiane, I know you spoke with the prime minister. Give us a sense of the plans at this stage. Do they have any?
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the plans are sort of in the initial stages.
It wasn't the prime minister I spoke to today, but actually the former prime minister, who was saying that one of the key things that needs to happen is to deal with how to rebuild, where to rebuild, not to rebuild the same kind of shacks that we have seen that have collapsed in many, many parts, but to do it properly and also to give people jobs, in other words, clearing rubble and help them to put them back to work, all as part not just of short-term security, but long- term recovery.
Now, the United Nations has said -- in fact, government officials here have said that they may try to move hundreds of thousands of those homeless people out of the city. But the question is where.
As yet, they have no shelter for them. As yet, they don't have the big sites really identified or prepared, nor the huge number of real heavy industrial-strength tents to bring and put up to shelter people with also sanitation, water and all the kinds of things you would require in a temporary home.
And it's particularly urgent because of the upcoming rainy season, and by the summer, the hurricane season. In terms of the long-term building, though, that is still being discussed, because there is also fears of another earthquake, and so they do not want to build up in places which are prone to more earthquakes -- Campbell.
BROWN: And, Christiane, give us your take. We know how many different international organizations are there now, are operating, are trying to help. Is there coordination between them and our government and the Haitian government, obviously, to try to develop a plan where everybody is at least working in synch and toward the same goal?
AMANPOUR: Well, look, they're trying, but there is this whole idea of the Haitian government, of course, having sovereignty. The Haitian government is in charge certainly nominally, certainly everybody paying the right kind of sensitive lip service to that notion.
But the truth of the matter is that the Haitian government itself is saying that it needs all the help that it can get. It's barely constituted. It has had so many losses, not just physical infrastructure, but actually personnel as well. And so this is a really difficult task.
Now, the United Nations has tried this so-called cluster system, where the international organizations are putting, for instance, food or shelter or medical, you know, various -- various different types of needs in various different bundles.
But there's some conflict, there's some competition, as there always is, between nations, between military and civilian, between NGO and the U.N. and other people who come here to help. That's quite common.
Here, it's having the effect of showing a little bit of lack of coordination at the moment, and it's slowing down the delivery of vital necessities, even right two weeks after the earthquake, to people who need it most.
BROWN: Christiane Amanpour for us tonight from Port-au-Prince.
Christiane, as always, thank you very much.
Although the rescue mission is primarily over, the recovery phase is only beginning now, as workers struggle to identify, to track the thousands of people who are killed in the quake.
And Anderson Cooper is joining us with that part of the story from Port-au-Prince. And, Anderson, there''s more than 4,000 missing Americans, and I know you spent part of the day at the Hotel Montana. Tell us what you found there.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, the estimate is 4,500 to 5,000 Americans are missing right now in Haiti.
We went up to the Hotel Montana, because that's really the site of the largest number of American fatalities, or at least known Americans who are still being searched for. I believe in the 50 to 60 people who are still, they believe, in the rubble, they believe there may be as many as 17 Americans still in the rubble.
It is difficult to convey what that scene is like up there. The searchers are taking it very carefully, very respectfully. It is really hallowed ground to them. They have brought in heavy equipment, some bulldozers, to move some of the large pieces of debris. The search-and-rescue teams, which are much more sort of pinpoint rescuers, they have now transitioned over to the Army Corps of Engineers and the Defense Department because there was just so much -- I mean, it was a big hotel. It is just completely destroyed and there is no sides to it.
It's on a mountaintop, so it's an extremely difficult situation for the workers who are there. They are hoping to recover as many people as possible. And that's in stark contrast to the scene elsewhere in Port-au-Prince where many Americans, frankly, are simply just going to more than likely just disappear, crushed under rubble, and their bodies will most likely never be found or just discarded.
BROWN: And, Anderson, I know that you found one case, one particular case, that really illustrates what a huge challenge identifying the victims is. Tell us a little bit about that.
COOPER: Well, 13 days ago, when we arrived here, the day after the earthquake, we had people showing us a passport of an American citizen, a woman, who they said was dead in the rubble. They pointed out the building.
We, of course, told the State Department about that information in the days after the earthquake, expecting that they would try to bring her remains out. In fact, the State Department then told us days later that she had actually been buried in a coffin in a cemetery. That turned out not to be true at all.
We just went out to the site with her husband today, who said he found her body in the rubble, pulled her body out, and when he went to go get a coffin, people came, took money off her body and then her body was taken in a bulldozer by a Haitian government vehicle, dumped into a dump truck and taken out to mass graves.
We asked the State Department today, the U.S. Embassy here, why we were given that misinformation. They said it was very confusing in those early days. They now have a system in place. They're trying to track and repatriate as many remains as possible.
But I went out to the mass graves today. And it is just shocking what the Haitian government has done out there. There are still just bodies dumped out on the ground. They could be American. They could be French. They could be any nationality. The majority of them are Haitian, and the Haitian government has just dumped them there. They're not even burying them. They have just not even gone to the effort of burying their own people.
They're simply dumped on the ground. It's completely horrific and unconscionable.
BROWN: Heartbreaking.
Anderson Cooper for us tonight -- Anderson, as always, thank you very much.
Meantime, rescue and relief teams still struggling right now to feed hundreds of thousands of people, of displaced Haitians. And take a look at some of these pictures. And we're talking about starving people really trying to surge through the gates of a food distribution point.
Look at the people here. The World Food Bank has already given out 10 million ready-to-eat meals, but the people of Haiti obviously still desperate for help and desperate for nourishment. We are told at one point U.N. peacekeepers had to use pepper spray just to try to keep order. You can see some of the images of that there.
We are going to be going back to Haiti later this hour. That's when Dr. Sanjay Gupta is going to join us from Port-au-Prince with more on the story as well.
Coming up, though, we're going to go in-depth and take a look as we have all this week on all of our programs how the government is spending your money. We are breaking down the government's massive stimulus plan, and today the price tag just went way up.
Also tonight, the FBI busts a scheme to tap the office phones of a Democratic senator, and one of the suspects, a well-known conservative activist with a penchant for embarrassing liberals.
We will explain when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: A bizarre story that is breaking tonight in Louisiana. The FBI has busted an alleged plot to tap the phones or to try to tap the phones at Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu's office in New Orleans.
Four suspects have been charged, including the conservative activist James O'Keefe. And you may remember that he is the guy whose undercover videos targeted the community group ACORN.
CNN senior correspondent Joe Johns is with us right now. He's got a whole lot more on this.
And, Joe, you have been digging into this. What do we know?
JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Well, Campbell, we just got a statement, first of all, from the office of Senator Mary Landrieu. If we can just put it up there, I will read a little bit off the top.
She said a number of things, among them, "This is a very unusual situation, somewhat unsettling for me and my staff."
The individuals responsible have actually been taken into custody. They're charged with false pretenses for the purposes of committing a felony. And she goes on to she is as interested as everyone to learn their motives.
We were also able to talk to someone tonight who knows what some of the senator's staffers are saying privately about this. That source described it as almost a bad sitcom, compared to a "Saturday Night Live" sketch.
The court records say a guy walks into the office of United States Senator Mary Landrieu in a federal building in New Orleans and says he's waiting for somebody to show up, then takes out a cell phone and starts recording pictures when two other guys walk in. The two other guys are all dressed up in outfits. They have got on hardhats, tool belts, fluorescent vests.
The source said they looked they were ready to go down in manholes, or at least that's what our source was told. And these guys start checking out the office phone at the reception desk. They claim they have got to do some repairs. One thing leads to the next. The building staff asks them for credentials.
A total of four guys end up getting arrested and charged, a pretty amazing story, Campbell.
BROWN: And, Joe, one of these suspects is the same guy who caused such a stir when he dressed up last summer as a pimp and secretly filmed his visit to an ACORN office, right?
JOHNS: Right. Right. The guy who was allegedly doing the taping with the camera phone is named James O'Keefe. And he is believed to be the same James O'Keefe whose undercover videos severely damaged the credibility of that community group known as ACORN when he dressed as a pimp and asked essentially for advice.
We haven't been able to get ahold of O'Keefe. The "Times- Picayune" newspaper said he posted bond and said -- quote -- "The truth shall set me free" when he was leaving the courthouse in a taxi.
Another guy arrested is said to the be son of an acting United States state prosecutor in Shreveport.
BROWN: OK. And what are we talking about in terms of punishment for these guys potentially?
JOHNS: Well, look, Landrieu is right. This is a felony. And if found guilty, you can guys get 10 years for malicious tampering with a federal phone system, but an attorney representing these guys called it poor judgment. He said there wasn't any intent to commit a crime.
Truth is, it does not sound like they got too far with this before they got into trouble.
BROWN: Yes, you got to wonder what they were up to, what they were allegedly up to. OK. We're going to hear a lot more on this, I'm sure, in the coming days.
Joe Johns for us tonight -- Joe, thanks very much. Appreciate it.
President Obama's first State of the Union speech just over 24 hours from now, two wars, a bad economy, political turmoil. Nobody said it was going to be easy. So, what will the president say? Our senior political correspondent, Candy Crowley, has been working her sources. She has a bit of a preview on the speech coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: President Obama will deliver his first State of the Union address tomorrow night.
CNN's live coverage starts at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time. No doubt the president had hoped to celebrate or be celebrating the passage of health care reform or an economic turnaround with that speech. Well, no such luck. So, what will he talk about now?
For that, we're going to turn to CNN senior political correspondent Candy Crowley, who has been talking to a lot of folks about the speech and has a few details for us.
And, Candy, let me just ask you, because things have sort of slowly been leaking out of various ideas he intends to hit on and just the latest is from "The Washington Post" reporting that the president is going to announce he's freezing the salaries of all his top aides.
What are you hearing about that?
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That it's true, but probably what is more important than the fact of the matter are a couple things.
First of all, when the president came in to office, top White House aides had their salaries frozen at the last year of the Bush administration for the same position. So, in a lot of ways, when you look at yesterday's rollout of the spending freeze that the president wants to announce, today's talk and chatter, leak about what's going to happen with executive salaries and keeping those frozen at a certain level, what you're hearing is what the administration is going to be talking -- what the president is going to be talking about tomorrow night, and that is the deficit.
He has heard that message, that a lot of people think way too much money is being spent here in Washington, and so it is not happenstance that these two things have been leaked out by someone, by a couple of people, many people, who have knowledge of what the president wants to propose, because that is the message, and it's not good enough just to do it for one night.
If you can do it for two days ahead of time and sort of roll the audience into the idea that the president is looking at the deficit, so much the better.
BROWN: So -- but what emphasis does he give, or how much of the speech gets devoted to health care? I mean, this has been, you know, everything in terms of emphasis over the last few months, certainly.
CROWLEY: But what the White House has heard, what the president has heard, and I think with his sort of preview speeches you have seen since the end of last week and one yesterday is that they understand that it's the economy the American people want to hear about. They understand that, within the economy, it's about the deficit and it's about jobs. So, it is not as though the administration doesn't want health care reform. Clearly, it does, and there will be mention of it in this speech. But the fact of the matter is that health care reform right now is stuck in the process level, that is, how is the Democratically-controlled House and Senate going to get this bill out? What can they get out? Because, of course, the Senate has lost that 60th vote. The election in Massachusetts has changed that dynamic.
So the president can cheerlead for health care is still important, it is a part of reducing the cost to this country, it is a part of reducing the deficit, and we must have it. But as for specifics about health care or how to get it passed, that's really on Capitol Hill right now.
BROWN: All right, Candy Crowley for us tonight -- Candy, thanks.
And let me bring in a couple of other folks to talk about this, CNN senior political analyst David Gergen, John Avlon, who is a columnist for The Daily Beast, also the author of "Wingnuts: How the Lunatic Fringe is Hijacking America." And also with us Erick Erickson, who edits the conservative blog RedState.com.
David, let me ask you, first, the talk of this salary freeze among top White House aides, along with this -- quote, unquote -- "freeze on discretionary spending," all, as Candy just pointed out, intended to show he feels the pain of average Americans, but if you're honest about it, this is all coming off a little bit gimmicky. These are not really that dramatic, are they?
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: You're absolutely right, Campbell.
The freeze for executive positions in the White House is not very meaningful to most Americans and it is a continuation. But, more importantly, on this freeze of spending within the federal government, it's important to remember that this past year under President Obama, the Congress twice passed bills that have increased the total spending on discretionary accounts for the government by 20 percent, and what he's doing is freezing at that new high level.
That is not overly impressive to budget hawks who really think we need to make a big dent in the budget. And I must say it's been sobering today, and I think the president's agenda for the coming year has also taken a hit because this whole idea of a commission to reform entitlements and to force a vote in the Congress that has been so reluctant to take on Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, which are going to drive us -- deficits right through the roof here in the next few years, that effort to form a commission was rejected today by the Senate.
And that's a setback, I think, again, for budget hawks and for what the president wants to make part of his agenda in the coming year. BROWN: So, Erick, where is the disconnect between the Senate and the public? In your view, why has sentiment turned against him when it comes to biggest challenge of fixing the economy? He's obviously trying to address what he's been hearing, but, like David said, it seems like it's just around the edges, so what's the bigger issue here?
ERICK ERICKSON, MANAGING EDITOR, REDSTATE.COM: I think the big issue with the public right now is that the president says he's going to freeze discretionary spending after it's been raised by 20 percent, but the public's concern comes from all the ancillary programs that the president is proposing, from health care, to a stimulus that a majority of Americans think was wasted, to a new jobs program.
Just today, Rob Nabors from the Congressional Budget Office was quoted in "The Hill," a newspaper on Capitol Hill, that liberals and progressives should take heart that this spending cap is only on top line. It doesn't really affect agencies, and, by the way, the president is going to continue to pursue health care and a new jobs bill which ironically he says is going to help the deficit. But very few people in the middle class in particular feel that way.
BROWN: All right, John, I want to hear from you on this, but we're going to take a quick break. Back with more with John Avlon and the rest of the panel and more about the president's speech in just a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: And we're back with our political trio, David Gergen, John Avlon, Erick Erickson.
John, we're talking about the president's State of the Union address. What does he need to say tomorrow night? We're talking about the challenges I should say he's facing going into that State of the Union address. It's an uphill climb. What does he need to say?
JOHN AVLON, AUTHOR, "WINGNUTS": Sure.
I think he needs to rediscover the Obama of '08. He needs to rediscover the themes that allowed him to connect with moderates and the middle class and independent voters. Dealing with deficit reduction is a step. The problem is, is the whole first year has been sounding a note of overspending.
And I think the Congress gave him -- the Senate gave him an opportunity today. When they voted down this bipartisan deficit reduction panel, I think that is the height of partisan cynicism and political cowardice. And it's an opportunity to say, look, this is what independents are angry at. It's not just what's going on in the White House. It's a problem with Congress with a cynical hyper- partisanship that keeps overspending no matter what party is in power.
BROWN: So, you get up there and you trash Congress when you desperately need them in order to pass your health care bill?
(CROSSTALK)
AVLON: What I think you do is you play offense. You say, look, they had 56 votes. They just couldn't hit the 60. And they had bipartisan support.
Look, politics isn't divided between left and right. That's the message independents have been saying. It's about between uniters and dividers. And that's the opportunity to make the case tomorrow night, that he's on the side of the uniters, not dividers, which is the heart of the campaign.
BROWN: David, talk to me a little bit about tomorrow night, about what he needs to say. You again addressed some of the stuff that has been leaking out, but more big picture, what does his tone need to reflect?
GERGEN: Well, Campbell, I think really effective leaders are listeners and people who show they engage in what Warren Bennis calls deep listening.
And, here, I think it's very important for the president to show the country that he is listening, that he has heard, and give voice to the anger and the anxiety that people feel about jobs, about big government, about all the rest, and say, listen, I have heard this, and then give a speech which comes out of that foundation, which shows that he's listening and here's how he's trying to respond to it.
I think that's the most persuasive way. He's going to have a lot of people who are not going to tune in tomorrow night. He's been to the country, he's been to the well a lot of times in prime time. But this is going to be his best opportunity to frame the rest of the year.
And it's an extraordinarily important time to make that pivot to a more successful presidency for him. Otherwise, he's going to have a very difficult time of it.
BROWN: And, Erick, quickly, what are you going to be listening for?
ERICKSON: I'm going to see if he goes back to the rhetoric of blaming the prior administration. There are a lot of key words the president has used in the past year that have become punchlines on "Saturday Night Live."
(CROSSTALK)
BROWN: Well, they seem to have moved beyond that. That hasn't been a big driving theme of this administration, you don't think, do you?
(CROSSTALK)
ERICKSON: No, I think it has been a big driving theme of the administration, including going back even last week to the Scott Brown victory, where there were people in the White House saying, somehow, counterintuitively, that George Bush is to blame also for the Massachusetts election.
I think that the president is going to be need to move beyond some of the parodies that are now starting to resonate with the middle class on shows like "Saturday Night Live." When he's lost Jon Stewart on "The Daily Show," he's got problems.
BROWN: All right.
Gentlemen, we will be hearing much more from you tomorrow night in our coverage of the president's State of the Union address.
Many thanks, David Gergen, Erick Erickson, John Avlon. Appreciate it.
(CROSSTALK)
BROWN: Coming up, the government stimulus plan just got a whole lot more expensive, $75 billion more expensive. How did that happen?
The vice president's point man on the economy will try to explain where all the money is going right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Tonight, a big revision to the total cost of the stimulus. Until now, you have been hearing the price tag of $787 billion. But now, drum roll, please -- the Congressional Budget Office puts the total cost at 862 billion, a $75 billion increase. A lot of reporting on the stimulus plan has just scratched the surface, a few facts, mostly opinion.
This week CNN is going beyond what has been done before and really examining the facts. Tonight, the White House is responding. And I spoke with Jared Bernstein, who is the chief economist and economic policy adviser to Vice President Biden earlier today. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Jared, let me start with today's news. As you know, the Congressional Budget Office has changed its forecast for what the stimulus is going to cost from $787 billion now to $862 billion. And earlier today, you talked about this on CNN.
You seem sort of reluctant to say whether you agree with the CBO projection. You said you needed to take a closer look at the numbers. You had a couple of hours. What do you think now? Do you agree with their new projection?
JARED BERNSTEIN, VP BIDEN'S ECONOMIC ADVISER: Well, it's not that I was waiting to agree or disagree. I wanted to look at how they did their accounting. We have our own internal accounts here at the White House, the Office of Management and Budget. And we think we're still on track with a $787 billion stimulus package. But let me say one thing about the --
BROWN: Stop right there.
BERNSTEIN: Sure.
BROWN: Why do you think their numbers are wrong? What are they adding in that you're not?
BERNSTEIN: It's not that I think their numbers are wrong. They're looking at an estimate that goes to 2019, so they actually have a pretty long tail to the spending on the act. We simply haven't looked at such a long spending tail. The way we see it, the recovery act spending ends well before that.
But let me say one thing about the CBO estimate, if I might. As you mentioned, they have an estimate of 862 billion for the stimulus package in terms of its size. They also have an interesting new estimate of 2.4 million jobs saved or created thus far.
BROWN: OK, to that point, then, let me ask you to clarify that a little bit.
BERNSTEIN: Sure.
BROWN: Because this is an issue that's also been the source of, I think, a lot of confusion, how many jobs exactly the stimulus has created, and frankly from your administration and various people in your administration, we've gotten all kinds of different numbers from 1.5 million to two million to hundreds of thousands. It almost depends on who you ask.
BERNSTEIN: One of the reasons there's a lot of different numbers is because there are different estimates out there. In fact, if you look at our own estimates or those of independent validators out there doing the same kinds of economic research that we did, what you'll find is that a $787 billion stimulus package with about half, a little more than half at work in the economy right now, generating economic activity, saving or creating jobs, has contributed about two million jobs to the economy thus far.
BROWN: All right. Let me also ask you about the big news that came out of the White House last night. The administration now proposing this freeze in discretionary spending and certainly, I think you're going to hear a number of people say in their view that this is somewhat disingenuous to propose this given that discretionary spending has gone up by, I think, 20 percent in the last two years. I mean, you've overseen this big increase in spending, so to a lot of people sort of reining it in now doesn't seem very impactful.
BERNSTEIN: I think what's really important to recognize here is that this is not an across-the-board spending freeze. This is a spending freeze where some of the components of the budget that are complimentary to this president's primary objective of raising jobs and incomes to middle-class families will come up. Other pieces will go down.
BROWN: But you also know if you're intellectually honest about this, that that is just a fraction of the budget. If you really wanted to lead an honest conversation about fiscal responsibility, wouldn't you be talking about entitlements? I mean, wouldn't you be trying to come up with a plan, a serious plan to deal with entitlements spending since everybody knows that that is the real challenge?
BERNSTEIN: Look, I think you make a great point and I think that we have been consistently and deeply intellectually honest about this point. And I think I'll convince you with two words: health care. OK?
This president has talked about the unsustainability of health care spending and its impact on the deficit since before he came into office. So let it not be thought by anyone who's viewing this segment that we started talking about deficits yesterday with a non-defense discretionary freeze.
This president was talking about the impact of health care on deficits and on bending the cost curve and what it would do to bring down the long-term deficit ever since he introduced the topic of health care reform. And you're absolutely right, Campbell, that gets to the heart of the fiscal challenge we face and that's exactly what we've been talking about.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: And that again with Jared Bernstein, chief economist and economic policy adviser to Vice President Biden.
So does the administration's explanation for the increase of the ballooning stimulus price tag hold water? Along with the other points, you just heard Jared there. We're going to have some money experts on hand to separate facts from fiction. The real economists with us when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Confusion over the real cost and effect of President Obama's stimulus still a pretty big problem right now. You just heard the White House take issue with the new, more expensive price tag, now $862 billion.
All this week as we've been telling you, CNN "Stimulus Project" is following the money. We'll tell you where it's going and how it's helping or not helping, and we're bringing in our experts to help us do that.
With us once again, Chrystia Freeland, who's U.S. managing editor for the "Financial Times. Amity Shlaes is a Bloomberg syndicated columnist and senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. And Ryan Mack is the president of Optimum Management. He's with us as well.
And Amity, you heard Jared Bernstein from the vice president's office sort of brush off this projection from the CBO now that the numbers have gone way up. It's $862 -- or $822 billion, the total cost of the stimulus, 75 billion more than we originally thought. Is that even significant? Should we be worried about it, or is it just frustrating to people when they hear these numbers and they are increasing?
AMITY SHLAES, SYNDICATED COLUMNIST, BLOOMBERG: Well, Campbell, we all knew that it would be like this, so we have to begin to look beyond this, and that means not just freezes as the White House is suggesting, but also beginning to think about growing again and about cutting back entitlements. So I don't think it surprised anyone in the United States to hear that. It's maybe a little distressing to the White House, it's embarrassing, but onward.
BROWN: But they aren't talking about cutting back entitlements. You know, you heard in that discussion, I think everything that we're hearing at least sort of being leaked out in terms of what the president is going to say is kind of incremental stuff in terms of really getting your arms around this, right?
SHLAES: Well, absolutely. We're having the wrong conversation about a few billion here -- we're talking about -- we're talking about a little freeze. It's a tiny freeze relative to what's going on. And yet the approval isn't happening for the commission to review the entitlements. Some of the entitlements aren't even that hard to change, such as social security, and yet Congress can't come to it even now. And the prerequisites for growth, we don't really have those, either, in terms of the tax code.
So where is the real discussion? Let's ban the word stimulus from our vocabulary in 2010 and have the real discussion.
BROWN: Chrystia?
CHRYSTIA FREELAND, U.S. MANAGING EDITOR, "FINANCIAL TIMES": Well, actually, I think that we need to be giving the president a little more credit for bringing in the idea of a freeze right now. I think we have to understand how delicate the economic calculations are, not just for the United States but for all the world's big economies. Because we have this issue where you had the threat of a second Great Depression, always a big subject, and so you had a decision, which I think was the right one by governments around the world. You have to pump a lot of money out.
But then you don't want government debt to grow too much, so you have to perform this really difficult pivot. You have to choose exactly the right moment to stop spending money and start saving it. And that's really, really tricky, but there's no way around it. It's what had to happen.
BROWN: But the point I think you keep hearing people make, David Gergen made it a moment ago. I asked Jared Bernstein about it, which is even jacking up spending, it's now 20 percent higher over the last two years, and now you've decided to freeze it at this much higher level. And so to a lot of people they're going, huh? That's supposed to help?
FREELAND: No, but the next step is going to be to cut spending, and I think inevitably, to increase taxes. But you have to be delicate about when and exactly how you do it. You don't want to start raising taxes and radically cutting government spending before the recovery is really strong. So it is -- it is tricky. There is no way around that.
BROWN: Ryan, what's your take?
RYAN MACK, PRESIDENT, OPTIMUM CONTROL MANAGEMENT: The tough decisions should have been made already. (INAUDIBLE) the stimulus package, in terms of it's almost like there are political decisions to put these earmarks in. How come we can't cut those out?
The good part about is the freeze is not going to come until 2011. What can we do until then? I actually think that the American people right now can start thinking about what they can do to create their own stimulus packages? You know, they got 250 social security check, we can almost make twice that amount just by cutting coupons. I mean, what can we do about negotiating our low interest rates on our credit cards and refinancing our mortgages, and making sure that we're saving more and being fiscally responsible?
These type of things without adding additional strain and debt on the government, we can do ourselves, at our own selves to create our own stimulus package. That's probably jump start our own economies within our own posts (ph) and households.
BROWN: And, Amity, you also talked about not just the ideas that we've talked about what the president is doing, what he's expected to announce but also sort of this taking on Wall Street, that the combination of all of these things has unintended consequences in terms of us going forward and how it affects the economy.
SHLAES: Well, we admire the grace of these pivots, but the reality is the market hates them. Uncertainty itself is the enemy of markets and we had a big pivot.
Now, first, we're spending stimuli. Now we're saving? Oh, my goodness, what a big change. First we loved Wall Street and the treasury has to be buddies with it to rescue the economy. Now we're turning on banks as selfish. And the stock market doesn't like that, and we paid for it, shareholders, the average American. Many Americans who did have shares paid for it last week when the president was unpredictable, unpredictably turned. So it's time to end the experiment.
BROWN: Wall Street also doesn't know, and correct me if I'm wrong, Wall Street also doesn't know if this is rhetoric or if there is going to be this massive new regulation. No?
FREELAND: I would strongly disagree not on the point about the banks, which I think is a very aggressive sort of going after Wall Street, spoiling for a fight that was a surprise. But having the president introduce this notion of pulling back on spending, of cutting the deficit, that is something that the markets have expected, that the market have wanted. It's something that has been discussed. It's talked about its exit strategy by all the major governments in the world. And actually, it is delicate. You know, what governments need to be doing right now is still spending, still stimulating the economy. But if they're smart and lucky, they need to signal to the markets we're not going to keep on doing that. And that's important because otherwise the cost of borrowing money will skyrocket. And that will hit everyone.
BROWN: My apologies to Ryan for not giving you much time.
MACK: That's all right.
BROWN: I'll give it to you next time. We're out of time. We've got to go to "LARRY KING LIVE." Larry is going to start in just a few moments.
And, Larry, tell us what you have tonight.
LARRY KING, HOST, "LARRY KING LIVE": Well, Campbell, new fears in Haiti that orphans will be adopted for illegal adoptions or child trafficking, possibly to be used as servants, even sex slaves. Who is protecting them? We'll try to find out.
Plus, President Obama is putting the finishing touches on his first State of the Union speech. What will he say? What does he need to say? A lot of opinions out there. You'll hear some of the best all ahead at the top of the hour on "LARRY KING LIVE" -- Campbell.
BROWN: All right, Larry, we'll see you in a few minutes.
When we come back, an exclusive report on the president's hand- picked stimulus watchdog. He is the guy in charge of policing all those thousands of projects to make sure they're on the level.
Then we're going to go back to Haiti for a story you haven't heard much about until now. Our Dr. Sanjay Gupta is reporting on the deep psychological crisis that so many survivors are experiencing as they struggle to rebuild, when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: This week on CNN, a remarkable undertaking. It is called "The Stimulus Project." We have assigned hundreds of correspondents and producers to looking at what happened to the stimulus money that was supposed to jump-start our economy.
Tonight, our Kate Bolduan has an exclusive interview with the government stimulus cop, the guy in charge of rooting out waste fraud and abuse, and one thing is for sure, he is not your typical Washington bureaucrat.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): An early morning carpool with his wife arriving at a nondescript building just steps from the White House. Probably not what you'd expect from the man in charge of overseeing $862 billion in taxpayer money. His name, Earl Devaney, official title, chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, affectionately known as the RAT board.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: With the appointment of Earl Devaney --
BOLDUAN: 62 years old and ready to retire, Devaney was appointed was President Obama just days after the stimulus bill was passed.
OBAMA: I pointed out just when I saw, he looks like an inspector there. He's tough.
BOLDUAN: The president announced Devaney's appointment just 10 minutes after he formally accepted the job. His wife got the news from a coworker who saw it on TV.
EARL DEVANEY, CHAIRMAN, RECOVERY BOARD: I had a hard time coming up with the right birthday present this year.
JOE BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: But I think he's done a tremendous job. It's all about credibility.
DEVANEY: Thank you, sir.
BOLDUAN: Devaney reports directly to Vice President Biden. We spent the day with him to find out how he does this job, watching out for your money.
(on camera): Anyone coming up and saying, where are my tax dollars today?
DEVANEY: No, nobody today, but I wouldn't be surprised. I think, I really do think that if you're going to steal money, this is not the money to steal. There's too many eyeballs on this.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): His staffers call him the big guy. He's a former college football lineman later a Secret Service agent turned inspector general. He's best known for helping uncover the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal at the Interior Department.
(on camera): Why should the American public trust you, trust Earl Devaney with their tax dollars?
DEVANEY: All I've ever done is try to ensure that the American people don't get ripped off or don't have their money wasted.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): Devaney says his goal for recovery.gov is to provide unprecedented transparency, but he's dealing with data collected by the people receiving the stimulus money, and that data is not always correct. We've seen reports on the Web Site riddled with errors and inaccuracies, in some cases stimulus jobs recorded in zip codes that don't even exist.
(on camera): You said the transparency can be embarrassing. From an embarrassment, you mean some kind of bottom up and top down, from the average Joe to the 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?
DEVANEY: Yes, I think embarrassing -- there was enough embarrassment to go around on the first reporting phase.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): Despite coming under fire for those so- called clerical errors, Devaney has so far maintained a rare reputation in Washington, while respected by even the toughest critics of the stimulus program.
REP. DARRELL ISSA (R), OVERSIGHT & GOVT. REFORM CMTE: Well, I think there's going to be one silver lining to the stimulus, and that's going to be the work that Earl Devaney and the whole recovery.gov is doing.
BOLDUAN: And this is the recovery operation center known as the "rock room" where "Team Devaney" tracks the stimulus money and who's getting it. This is the first time television cameras are getting a look.
(on camera): So this is essentially where all of the -- all of the data is coming in...
DEVANEY: Right.
BOLDUAN: ... that you put out on recovery.gov?
DEVANEY: Right. We take it in from the recipients. It comes in. It's in a data warehouse. And, then we start analyzing that data.
BOLDUAN: This is the nerve center.
DEVANEY: This is the nerve center.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): So far the recovery board has received more than 1,000 complaints of wrongdoing, opened 106 investigations, and has 25 criminal cases in the works.
DEVANEY: The board is set up as an independent board, not to make judgments about whether or not the money should be used for that bridge or swimming pool. Those are political decisions. Now, if money goes inappropriately, destined to be spent for a swimming pool, ends up going someplace that it shouldn't go, then we're going to be all over that.
BOLDUAN: Devaney won't release the details of ongoing investigations but lead investigator Doug Hassebrock walks us through one case they're actively working.
DOUG HASSEBROCK, ASST. DIR. OF INVESTIGATIONS: That organization is linked to a dozen other companies. All of them have been barred from government service. In fact in that particular instance, they've received over $10 million in recovery funds.
BOLDUAN (on camera): Do you think the recovery act is working? DEVANEY: I think it is. I mean, my assessment is not a political assessment, it's just an observation, is that people are going to work because of this recovery money.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): A politically savvy answer from not your typical Washington insider.
(on camera): So once all the money is out and it's in the system, what then for you?
DEVANEY: Well, then, then we hope to improve my golf game.
BOLDUAN (voice-over): Kate Bolduan, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: "LARRY KING LIVE" starts in just a few moments. But up next, victims of the Haiti quake dealing with fear and anxiety. Imagine being so afraid you are sleeping on the street by choice right now.
Our Dr. Sanjay Gupta is joining us with that part of the story, coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: More than 50 major aftershocks have shaken Haiti since the big quake struck two weeks ago tonight. And each time the ground moves, the people of Haiti experience a serious pang of fear, and our Dr. Sanjay Gupta has been looking at the psychological trauma that's on the streets of Port-au-Prince right now. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Rumor of a big wave sends thousands running to higher ground, many of them leaving behind the only possessions they recovered after the quake. These injured survivors begged doctors to leave them outside. They're too frightened to be inside.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Army Corps of Engineers have been here three times and has cleared several of these buildings every time there's an aftershock. I believe all those Haitians run outside. You know, there is so much trauma, both psychological and physical. No one wants to stay. Both staff and patients refuse to go and enter these buildings.
GUPTA (on camera): And here's another good example of exactly what we're talking about. This is a standing house but there's nobody living inside. And it's hard to overestimate the impact of all these aftershocks on someone's psyche.
They're so frightened. They don't want to be in there. They're worried that their house could come tumbling down. So instead, they live like this. They live in these tents, makeshift tents, because they simply want to be outside where they think it's safe. How scared were you?
Very scared. It's been around two weeks now since the earthquake.
Are you still scared?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, because from time to time they strike again, and I'm very stressed and my heart is beating.
GUPTA: She says there's no one to help and she has nightmares of another quake.
How many people like you are there? How many people in Port-au- Prince are going through what you're going through?
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: And Sanjay is joining me live right now. Sanjay, talk to us a little bit about the impact of PTSD that you're seeing.
GUPTA: Well, the thing about looking at the aftermath of something like this, so much attention is focused on physical injuries, and appropriately so. So I don't think there's been enough sort of evaluation or diagnosis or certainly enough treatment of some of these things. But we know, for example, after major natural disasters, for example, the tsunami, even a year out, about two-thirds of the people either have severe anxiety, severe depression or PTSD.
Campbell, as we've been talking about for some time now, getting physical injuries treated adequately has been hard. It's very concerning to see if the psychological treatment is even going to be present in any large numbers.
BROWN: And, Sanjay, talk to us a little bit about whether or not, hopeful it has, people's access to doctors for the physical stuff has improved somewhat.
GUPTA: You know, it's interesting, I think it's improved a lot in certain places. In fact, in some hospitals, including general hospital, one of the hospitals we've been reporting from, they, in fact, they had too many surgeons at one point. They had to have a meeting and say, OK, look, some surgeons have to leave this hospital and go to other places. There simply were too many people showing up there as far as doctors go.
Still a shortage of nurses, still a shortage of rehab doctors, there's a great need for prosthetics. What they're trying to do now is actually take these doctors and create these mobile surgical units and actually leave Port-au-Prince, go to Leogane, go to Jacmel, and try and take care of people there who haven't seen much care for some time. So I think that's sort of the plan. But you know, the lack of organization maybe not surprising has even affected manpower issues. Now actually, they actually have too much manpower in some places.
BROWN: And very quickly, Sanjay, at least we saw some pretty stunning images of people still just fighting to get food today. And you're still seeing that kind of thing.
GUPTA: Yes, you know, it's one of those things that's hard to measure, because I think in the first few days you had about a half a dozen food and water stations that we could see around the city of Port-au-Prince. Now you have several hundreds. So I think that there's sort of enclaves and population are getting enough, that some that are still seeing now for the first time, Campbell.
BROWN: Sanjay Gupta for us tonight. Sanjay, take care. Many thanks to you.
That does it for us. "LARRY KING LIVE" is starting right now.
