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In the Arena
Tornado Warning in Memphis; Interview With Missouri's Governor Nixon
Aired May 25, 2011 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ELIOT SPITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. Welcome to the program. I'm Eliot Spitzer.
There is a tornado warning in Memphis right now. You're looking at a picture of live shots of the skies there. It is unbelievably ominous. We're told a tornado may have already touched down there. We'll be following this closely. We'll go there in just a moment.
But first, this has been the week from hell along Tornado Alley. There are more twisters touching down tonight. CNN Severe Weather expert Chad Myers will join us shortly with the latest.
There are still a lot about tornadoes that scientists just do not understand, but tonight we have some amazing pictures to show you of research being done real time inside a real tornado.
Storm chaser Reed Timmer rode inside a twister last night in Oklahoma. Somehow he managed to launch probes to measure pressure and wind speed. You've got to see this. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Watch out for these trees. Wait for it. We've got to do it, Joel. Wait for it. Ready? Go ahead. Get a little closer. Launch. We got to go again. Get closer. Launch it again. Launch it again.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Launch, launch. Launch.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get down, get down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're good.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get down, Joel. Drop it down. Drop down. Debris hitting the car. -- the tornado! Watch -- did it go up? I saw it. Went all over the place. Wow. Huge. Are the air cans ready for this? We got to get the air cans. Stop it. Look at that vortex.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: Truly amazing stuff. You may remember we spoke to Reed a couple weeks ago. That car is built like a Sherman tank. When they said drop down, it can drop down to the street. So no wind gets under it and it can't be lifted it up into the tornado, which is what causes so much damage and death so many people. All those horrifying numbers we've been hearing about. We'll be talking to Reed later in the program.
But first, we return again to what is left of Joplin, Missouri. Last night, we brought you the story of Mike Hare, the father of Lantz. Mike is searching everywhere for his 16-year-old son. Lance hasn't been seen since Sunday when a tornado ripped him from his car. Mike came on our show last night and pleaded for help finding his son.
Since then, thousands of people from all over the country and even the world have poured on to the family's Facebook page to offer help and prayers, but none of it has brought Lance back to his family, at least not yet. They're still hoping and so are we.
Mike Hare joins us tonight from Joplin. Mike, I want to know the latest in the search for Lantz, but for those who may have missed your interview last night. Let's start with getting a description of him out there again so anybody who has information can get back in touch with us or with you. Tell us again about Lantz.
Mike, Mike, tell us about Lantz. If you're hearing me, we want to hear about Lantz, give us that description so folks can get back to you, go to your family's Facebook page and help us reach him. Tell us again how tall he is where you know about when he has been, any leads you've got.
All right, you know, I'm not sure that that connection there to Mike has been working. We'll go back to him as soon as we get that hooked up better. We're going to go to Chad Myers here who's going to tell us the latest about where there's severe weather and the latest in that potential tornado in Memphis. Chad --
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, the warning on that, Eliot, has been going now for about 20 minutes, the sirens going off in Memphis proper. The energy and the circulation is the northern half of Memphis, but now rolling over the river, literally rolling over the river.
Let's go to the video because I don't think I can explain it any better than I can show it to you.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MYERS (voice-over): The storm has just been rotating all the way from Arkansas and then across the river and into Memphis, Tennessee. There you go, this is some of the video though that we've been seeing earlier in the day.
I have the video from Memphis in my weather wall right behind me. It sure looks ominous right now, Eliot and there we go, you see that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MYERS: We believe that the one on the right there, this over here is the rear flank downdraft. Not a tornado on the ground, but under that, this would be upward wind pushing down, could get wind gusts to 80 or so miles per hour right here.
We're still waiting to see as the storm moves a little bit further to the east here maybe the wall cloud back here in the bright area with a tornado in it. It's hard to tell from the angle I'm in, but it still could drop down through here. We could still get a tornado on the ground.
With a tornado warning in effect, literally the weather service knows that the whole storm is rotating and the tornado could fall out of the sky at any time, some dramatic pictures here. Even whether this is a tornado or not, and I don't believe it is, you can still get damage from the wind coming out of the storm as the air gets forced down to the ground. It can't go anywhere. It's like pouring a bucket of water on to the ground.
When the bucket of water -- we the water hits the ground, it has to spread out. That's what the air has to do too. It has to spread out and then winds can become intense. Memphis, Tennessee, especially the northern half of the city, you should be taking cover now. There's the pyramid.
There's the river, the big story in the past couple weeks, how much flooding is going down here, water coming down a little bit in the Mississippi River. But the pyramid through here rest of northern downtown Memphis right through here, Bealle Street not that far away and that storm just very ominous.
We are going to see in the northern half of Memphis too and on up towards the north part of Shelby County, we will see probably some significant hail. Believe it or not, Eliot, we had reports today of 3-1/2 inch hail. It's a softball-sized hailstone falling out of the sky in St. Louis, Missouri in the city.
SPITZER: Man, Chad, sounds like there's no end to the horrors that can be generated this time of the year in Tornado Alley. Question for you, what is it that will take the winds, as you just said, of 80 miles an hour, devastating enough just there, and turn it into a tornado with that rotation and updraft that makes it all that much more devastating?
MYERS: It's a separate part of the storm and the mesocyclone I'm still not seeing here. It's almost like a secondary - it's a second low, a low pressure center that exists on the southwest side of the tornado and southwest side of a mesocyclone. And it's been hard to find all day long on that cell. But it would be just here -- if you look from Memphis, you look due north, it would be in this spot right there.
And we just haven't seen significant, at least in the past 10 minutes, significant enough rotation in the cell to make a tornado yet. But, you know, when you get any rotation in the storm, you certainly want to be on the ground. Now, have - you said, a confirmed tornado on the ground? I don't see it here, but there's a confirmed tornado now downtown --
SPITZER: Midtown. MYERS: In midtown Memphis. Let me back up, maybe I can get a little bit of the better view. I see rising area. The clouds that kind of hang down like we're seeing there, but confirmed tornado by some reporter, some spotter, maybe the national weather service as well. We'll keep you advised if we hear of any damage, Eliot.
SPITZER: All right, Chad. Thanks for that. Not good news obviously and let's just hope that doesn't do any severe damage in Memphis. Not a good piece of news to have a tornado in downtown Memphis obviously.
Mike Hare joins us again from Joplin. I think we've got the audio hook up working this time. Mike, I want to know the latest in the search for your son, Lantz. For those who may have missed last night, take us from the top, what do we know about Lantz, what can you tell us? So anybody who has any information can help us find him. Start at the top for us.
MIKE HARE, SON LANTZ IS MISSING AFTER TORNADO: Sunday night, I got reports that he was missing and we've been here ever since and I finally got with you guys to give the story that I gave last night about the car and Jonathan Taylor and finding him and him being in Springfield -- or in Springfield, Missouri, in the hospital, and the reports to find the car and -- it's just been a crazy deal.
The phone calls that I've received, the friends and family, thank you so much. And you guys for getting Lantz's story out there. He still hasn't been found. We've been to every place. Missing persons to the morgue and there back to here.
And we can't just stand by any more and wait. We have to - there have been reports of kids that look like him that other parents have called us, that it wasn't their child, and they want us to just sit here and wait and we can't do it no more.
We're going from Springfield, Missouri to the hospital, to Kansas City, Missouri, to Wichita, Kansas, to anywhere that we've gotten some pretty steady deals that it can be him or it could be a kid that looks like him.
SPITZER: All right, Mike, just again, he's about 190 pounds, six feet tall. His picture's been up on the screen. Your family has a Facebook page. Why don't you tell us what that Facebook page is, for people who have any leads --
HARE: Yes.
SPITZER: Give us that information.
HARE: Any leads, if you guys can put my cell phone number up there again, that would be great. Findlantzpantz at facebook.com and there's bringlantzharehome.com and between them two, we've got so many hits over in the thousands.
Last night after it aired, my phone has rung of the hook with people, prayers. I can't say enough how much it means to all of us. We've just got to find my son. He's six foot tall, 190 pounds, long brown hair, brown eyes.
He rode his bike a lot at the Bridge Ministers. I can't say enough about the Bridge and their volunteers that came out, that helped find the car with Danny Selgado. I can't say enough to what it meant just get the car out of the way and know that Jonathan Taylor is OK.
He's in the trauma unit in St. Johns in Springfield, Missouri but he's going to be OK --
SPITZER: Mike --
HARE: We just want to know that Lantz is.
SPITZER: He was in the car with Jonathan Taylor, enormous damage to the car. Has Jonathan, who's going to make it through this, you said he's been in the trauma unit, has he been in a position to assist in any way in terms of he's about to talk and sort of describe for you where they ended up or how he got out of the car?
HARE: No, he hasn't been able to tell us how he got out of the car. He can just tell us that he ended up in a van and then he was at Freeman Hospital here in town, but he woke up in a van.
It started with the windows on Lantz's car imploding and him getting into the back seat and that's the last time he's seen my son is when he jumped into the back seat. Their car flew maybe 250, 300 feet from where they got pulled into the grocery store at Dylans over the railroad tracks and then where we found the car to 250 feet.
And Jonathan don't know -- we still don't know who the good Samaritan was that took Jonathan in the van to Freeman's or if they helped Lantz, but we can't say enough because without them taking Jonathan, we wouldn't have that lead. We wouldn't have been able to find the car. We searched an 8 block by 25 block, and you can see the devastation here.
It's unlike anything I've ever seen. You see it on TV all the time. I can't say enough about all the families that are out here that aren't getting the opportunity that I am getting right now. I feel for them. I'm just lucky you guys got me right here.
SPITZER: Mike, we're going to do what we can do.
HARE: Thank you.
SPITZER: We know -- last question, we know they asked you to go in and give a DNA sample today. Any idea why that might be? What they're going to be doing with these samples? Is it good news? How do you interpret it? Where do we go from here?
HARE: The way I took it is, you know, state is OK, you know, but with all the different reports that the state was getting, you know, D.A. or somebody else higher up in the government has come in.
And they're taking it and in order -- whether Lantz is found alive or dead, they still need that identification so my mother and my ex-wife, Michelle and myself had to give swabs.
And, you know, if that leads to us finding him somewhere in a hospital or that leads us to finding him in the morgue at least we'll have closure. A lot of these families out here won't get that.
SPITZER: All right. Look, Mike, thanks so much for joining us tonight. We're praying for you. We're going to do everything we can to help you. We know you're doing everything you can. All right, be well.
HARE: Well, and I can't say enough about your CNN team that's out here.
SPITZER: All right. Thank you. Be strong.
HARE: Thank you.
SPITZER: All right, now we turn to Anderson Cooper in another part of Joplin, Missouri. Anderson, thanks for being with us.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: Thanks for having me. You know, you hear that father and I mean, there are people like that -- you run into them wherever you go. And it's really hard to listen to.
We're on three days now and there are a lot of people volunteering. They just gave a press conference saying there's 5,000 people who volunteered and stuff, but there's still 1,500 people unaccounted for and there's a lot of very frustrated parents who are being told you can't go to the morgue, you can't identify bodies, you got to wait a week or two.
So there are a lot of questions about how organized this effort is and whether it's going to be able to kind of ramp up in the next day or so to get some of these parent's answers. Of course, for many, there aren't any answers right now.
I've been out today with a family of a young man named Will Norton who just graduated high school, was going home from the graduation ceremony with his dad when the tornado struck. They were in a hummer, an SUV. His dad tried to hold on to Will.
Will according to his dad's account, Will got sucked up through the sunroof of the SUV. They haven't found him since, and I was with Will's aunt today and Will's sister, Sarah, as they were watching basically two ponds being dredged to try to find Will and they're trying to hold on to hope. Here's some of what they told me earlier today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think Sarah's mom, I think she is having the toughest time as any mama would have. You don't want to think that your kids are gone. It's really tough.
So we just ask for prayers for everybody, absolutely everybody. People that are following it on Facebook, we really love you and just pray. Pray for everybody. It's what we want.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: And now the confirmed death toll is 125. Again, they're not even giving out the number of unaccounted for. Yesterday, one official said it was 1,500, but there's no official toll or number of how many people are missing and it's kind of disorganized.
There's not really a central place where information is distributed. For instance, for Will Norton, there was a story going around that he'd been found in a hospital in the Springfield. In the Red Cross Center here, someone had actually on his picture written down found when in fact, he has not been found.
He's not in any of the hospitals. According to his family, they've called more than 100 hospitals they've said. So, you know, there's a lot of frustration and just -- it's really agonizing here. There's no other word for it.
SPITZER: You know Anderson, as you pointed out, that number, 1,500, is absolutely enormous and it sends shivers down your spine of that many families just looking for somebody.
We're also hearing reports, you're there on the ground, you're probably hearing much more of the same. There is a little bit of frustration going because word we got was hundreds of people in the morgue.
Hundreds of people -- bodies, I hate to be so graphic, being stored and people not being permitted to go in to see if they can identify their missing family members. Is there any stance here that you're getting of this frustration? Is that the case first, can you validate that? What it means?
COOPER: Well, the first I heard of it was earlier today, John King talked to a family who had been told according to John as I recall, that they weren't being allowed to go to the morgue. They were being told it might be two weeks before they were allowed to actually identify or until identifications were made of some of the people who are currently in the morgue.
I don't understand why that would be the case and I'd like to try to get further confirmation on that because we were in Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami there and Sri Lankan officials would photograph the remains of people and allow family members to try to identify them.
It's very difficult. It's very gruesome. It's not an easy task. But I know -- I mean, I've talked to family members who are missing their loved ones and they want to do whatever it takes to try to identify those who are still missing.
SPITZER: You know, Anderson, as you point out, these are very, very tough decisions. There's something kind of ghoulish about the idea of taking pictures or letting people into the morgue for that purpose. On the other hand, it is the only way to get closure and for families that are desperate for that. Have you been told why they will not let families go through this process?
COOPER: I have not. I'm going to try to find out more information about it tonight. I have not and just you mention that word closure, I -- that's kind of a TV word. I mean, when you're here on the ground, there's not -- there is no such thing as closure.
For people who have lost a loved one like this. You know, time will make things a little bit easier I suppose. But what people have seen here, what people have been through here, that's not something that's ever going to go away.
SPITZER: You're so right, Anderson. Thank you for that report. When we come back, we'll check back into Memphis where a twister has been reported in the downtown area tonight. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: CNN's David Mattingly joins us now on the phone from Memphis. David, I understand there was a confirmed tornado in midtown Memphis. What are you seeing and what can you tell us about what the situation is right now?
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Eliot, what we saw was a spectacular sight, was a wall cloud, the leading edge of this storm front that's across the Mississippi River, headed east through the city of Memphis.
This spectacular wall cloud appeared to have some rotation in it. At least that we were able to see from here open the ground. No defined funnel that was formed with this and there was some rain and some very vivid lightning coming out of it.
From our vantage point no tornado. There is a tornado warning here in the Memphis area for this county. We've been listening to sirens going off for about the last half hour, but we saw the dramatic cloud coming through. Now there's actually a huge hole in the clouds above us, some sunlight streaming in to downtown Memphis right at the moment, very dramatic.
Some rain falling. Again, some vivid lightning off in the distance as this continues to move to the northeast. And you might be able to hear some of that siren -- sirens going off right now but again you hear those stories from Joplin and it really brings in to focus that these storms are not to be trifled with, these warnings going off.
I'm sure people very much paying attention to them. Everyone around us watching the skies, watching the media to make sure they know what to do here. But again, it was quite a spectacular sight as this came across the Mississippi River and who knows what it might mean for people to the northeast of here.
SPITZER: You know, Chad Myers, we're on the -- chatting with him just a few moments ago, looking at the imagery. He said there were reports of winds up to 80, 90 miles an hour in Memphis. You've had reports of damage?
That alone is up to severe hurricane wind force I think so what is the capacity of the city to withstand that, whether or not it actually becomes a severe tornado?
MATTINGLY: Well, this city is well prepared. They have their emergency management that's been completely geared up and working daily on the problems they had with the flood. They had their resources in order. I've had conversations with them this evening and they're watching to see what this does and they're ready to respond.
SPITZER: You know, this is a city that is prepared for these national disasters. Have tornadoes gone through Memphis in the past? Is this something the city has actually experienced?
MATTINGLY: You can't live anywhere in the south without having an experience with a tornado. This is something everyone here treats as a fact of life during this time of the year and anytime the weather starts to get warm and that's what we're seeing right now. These communities prepare for this. It's part of the culture. It's part of the history. This is something they do not take lightly, Eliot.
SPITZER: All right, David. Thank you so much for that report. Let's hope that does not form into another tornado. All right, I'm joined now by storm chaser Andy Gabrielson in Memphis, Tennessee. He's on the phone. Andy, what are you seeing?
ANDY GABRIELSON, STORM CHASER (via telephone): Right now, we're just to the east of this storm. We're going northeast on interstate 40, just southwest of Lakeland, and what we have is a storm that is very powerful.
It's a classic looking supercell right now. It is taking on inflow, which is often a signature of a supercell, capable of producing a tornado. We're watching it right now.
We did see a funnel we believe about 10 minutes ago. Of course, we were in Memphis. We were looking over houses and buildings. But this storm definitely does have the potential to produce a tornado in my opinion at this time.
SPITZER: And how quickly is the storm moving right now, in which direction? Is it moving towards downtown Memphis? I mean, what information can we pass on so folks can be better prepared?
GABRIELSON: Right now, the tornadic part of - does appear that it's moved east of Memphis slightly, over the northern parts of the metropolitan area could be affected. There's also some other storms to the south. It could be bringing some rain, but right now, it appears the tornadic part of the storm is probably a little closer to Bartlett, which is some kind of east northeast of Memphis.
SPITZER: All right, Andy. Thank you so much for that. We'll have more on the tornadoes in Tennessee when we come back. We'll be back in just a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: We'll be checking back in on the tornado activity in Tennessee shortly, but first there is one miraculous story we want to share with you tonight. Ashleigh Hoke and her friend, Page Copple were driving home from their high school graduation when the tornado tore through Joplin, Missouri.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER (voice-over): Take a look at this video of the car they were in. It was literally picked up, flipped and dropped back to the ground. It is hard to imagine how, but the girls survived and they join us tonight.
Ashley's mom, Sharon Hoke is also with us. She too survived the Joplin tornado. Welcome to all three of you. I guess you're counting your blessings. It is a miracle.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is a miracle.
SPITZER: Ashley, why don't you tell us what happened?
ASHLEIGH HOKE, TORNADO SURVIVOR: I remember driving and seeing purple and blue lightning and seeing power lines just sparking everywhere, and then the rain just started pouring and Page said that she thought we needed to pull over. So we tried to pull over and before we could even get stopped, the wind started picking us up and just dragging us and we ducked, grabbed on to each other. I grabbed on to my necklace and we both prayed through the whole entire thing.
SPITZER: And then Ashleigh or Page, tell me, what is the next thing you remember? You look at this car, it's sort of a sports car look. What kind of car is it? It was a convertible, we understand?
A. HOKE: Yes, it's a convertible Mitsubishi Eclipse. SPITZER: And, I mean, it just looks like nothing more than compressed steel at this point. What do you remember about when the tornado actually hit, how you got out of the car? Talk us through getting from the car if you remember anything to getting to the hospital.
PAGE COPPLE, TORNADO SURVIVOR: I remember just being picked up and thrown all over and we just ducked and I tried to cover my head. And I just remember things hitting us and then finally it stopped and it seemed like it went on forever. And then once it stopped, I just remember I wanted to get -- we needed to get in somewhere because we don't know if it was going to start again or what. So I just remember -- I don't remember how we got out of the car but I just remember getting out of the car and just sprinting to the hospital and just trying to get out of -- like get inside somewhere.
SPITZER: Obviously the winds are still pretty fierce there right now. We just see your hair being blown real hard.
COPPLE: Yes.
SPITZER: Ashleigh or Page, have you been able to go back to the car to figure out how far the car itself was moved by this tornado when you were picked up and the whole car was carried? Have you been able to estimate that?
A. HOKE: Last night, they told us that it was probably about 50 yards that we were picked up and thrown through the air.
SPITZER: And so your car was picked up, carried through the air, kind of like -- I hate to say it, but out the "Wizard of Oz" and you're just picked out and thrown half the length of a football field. Now both of you suffered pretty severe injuries. Tell us what happened when you got to the hospital.
COPPLE: When we got inside the hospital, the hospital was hit too so we were both barefoot. We're running through broken glass and there is blood and water and ceiling tiles all over the floor. We didn't get help there really. We got bandaged up a little bit. But they had to evacuate the hospital too because there's a gas leak and they're afraid of the ceilings caving in so we had to go outside and then we were transported to the triage at Memorial Hall and that's where we got helped.
SPITZER: All right. Sharon, you know, it is devastating to have your daughter and so many members of your community go through this. But at some level, obviously, you've just got to be thanking your prayers that your daughter's alive. How do you feel having gone through all this?
SHARON HOKE, TORNADO SURVIVOR: Very lucky. I feel like it's a miracle. These two girls are -- if you could see the car -- I mean, every time I see it, I nearly drop to my knees. It's just -- it's a miracle that they're walking right now, and knowing what -- how powerful the storm was, I was about a block ahead of them in the car and knowing what she was in, I just -- I was fearing the worst. I was fearing the worst and praying for a miracle.
SPITZER: Well, the good news is your prayers were delivered. You know, good news, as we said a miracle, thankfully. You know, there are some affirmative stories, and all we can say is thank you.
Sharon and Ashleigh, Page, thank you so much for sharing your story with us. Get inside, get out of those winds.
A. HOKE: Thank you. COPPLE: Thank you.
S. HOKE: Thank you.
SPITZER: All right. Chad Myers is standing by in the Severe Weather Center.
Chad, what are you seeing now on the radar in terms of Tennessee and the surrounding states? CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, still looking at Memphis. And I'm still shaking my head whether there was actually a tornado on the ground or not. You know, a trained spotter said there was. I can't see if there was because I wasn't there. But I was watching that on there. It didn't look like a tornado on the ground.
But that storm that was rotating at least has now moved away from Memphis. Now there's just rain coming into Memphis proper, coming in from the west. No rotation. I know it looks kind of ominous there in Memphis. And you just had the sirens going on. It is not ominous right now.
But down towards Tunica though, it is a little bit ominous. A new tornado warning. Tornado on the ground, to the southwest of Tunica, not large but still rotating and it's on the ground causing a little bit of damage.
This is just -- let's go this map, this little TV set here. I want to see what I'm seeing here.
WREG, affiliate out of Memphis, looking at that storm. So still that scud that we're looking at before, Eliot. You see it? But it's not reaching the ground. It never did. I don't think it ever got to the ground. There was maybe some funnels. Maybe a little bit of rotation there, but still -- still not on the ground there to the north there.
So anyway, let's go back to this map. And this is the biggest map here. From Cleveland, they're literally down toward Mansfield and Columbus, Ohio, back to Indianapolis, these red boxes still the potential for tornadoes everywhere inside that. And then from Chicago, especially west toward Aurora, down to St. Louis and eastward from there, and there's Memphis. And I keep going, I could take this all the way down even into Louisiana, every storm is big today. And whether it makes a tornado or not, it could still make wind damage with a 50 or 60 mile per hour wind gust.
If you see a storm coming your way, get inside, get the pets inside. Stay away from the windows and just ride it out. It will be over in 15 minutes.
SPITZER: You know, Chad, as you said, it may or may not have been a tornado there in Memphis. You are saying 80-mile-an-hour winds. That is awfully severe. It can do a lot of damage.
One last quick question.
MYERS: Sure.
SPITZER: Joplin, Missouri, anything -- I mean, can we at least give an all clear signal to the folks in Joplin? We were just interviewing some folks there. The winds seem pretty severe, but any sign that anything more dangerous than just some high gusts are going to happen in Joplin?
MYERS: Well, if you look at this, you can almost just watch this -- watch this next couple frames. See that rotation right there, Eliot? It's almost like a hurricane right in there that has now moved east of St. Louis. That's the low pressure itself. And that's the low pressure that's pushing the cold air into the warm air and making the storms along that line. So that's the wind causing the weather, severe weather, further off to the east.
The wind calms down. Everything looks good for tonight. Joplin right about there. And other than maybe a rain shower for the next half hour or so, the winds die off. The skies clear tonight. And they'll probably have low temperatures down around 45. Looks pretty good.
SPITZER: All right, Chad. Thank you for that tiny little bit of affirmative news. I'm not sure we like going to you in the Severe Weather Center anymore.
MYERS: Sorry.
SPITZER: We'll be back with more on the storms in just a moment. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: Friend of the show and CNN colleague Jeff Toobin joins me now for a conversation about an issue, Jeff, that a lot of people may not want to have, and that is race and presidential politics in 2008. Of course, President Obama, not only the first African-American ever elected to be the leader of a major world power, the most powerful nation in the world but broke all sorts of barriers. Now people are asking the question, what role will race play this time around?
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: You know, we spent so much time talking about it. We talked about what effect it had with voters. We talked about what effect it had in polling. But it's sort of disappeared as an issue. I think in part because people don't want to talk about it. And in part, Barack Obama has become just a president like any other, or has he? That's really the question.
SPITZER: The question in all these lingering issues whether it was the birth certificate or some of the other issues surrounding his presidency, were those issues code for people not wanting to say we don't like him because he's African-American, which, of course, would be making a manifest to the public, a belief that is not only looked down upon by is heinous and wrong. And so the argument is have people come up with these other issues like the birth certificate to mask an underlying racism. That is something I think that's going to be played out in the re-election campaign.
TOOBIN: I think so, although I'm not sure. I mean, I have to say I am skeptical about how much it's going to be talked about and how much it's even going to be thought about because he just looks like any other president to me at this point.
SPITZER: Well, we do have a guest who has a provocative point of view on that. His name is Shelby Steele. And he has written an article for the Washington -- excuse me, for "The Wall Street Journal," not the "Washington Post." He is, of course, one of the leading intellectuals in the nation. He is African-American.
And, Jeff, what did he say in his article today? And what do you make of it?
TOOBIN: He's a conservative. He's not an Obama supporter. But what he said was because of Obama's historic place as the first African-American leader of any major democracy, he is a figure that people want to preserve where he is. They don't want to see him voted out of office, so he thinks that Obama's race makes him invincible in 2012.
SPITZER: All right. And Shelby now joins us -- we have him here from Monterey, California.
Shelby, thanks for joining us. Let me ask you this first tough question. You have a pretty interesting article as I said in "The Wall Street Journal" today. Your book a few years ago said that because Barack Obama, then Senator Barack Obama, was African-American, he could not win. Now in essence you're saying because he's African- American and appeals to the notion or cultural notion that we can elect an African-American, he can't be defeated. So which do you think it is and why?
SHELBY STEELE, SR. FELLOW, STANFORD UNIV. HOOVER INSTITUTION: Well, obviously, I got the first one wrong in my subtitle. I never actually argued that in the book. I did argue that his popularity, then as now, I think has enormous amount to do with his race. He gave the United States of America an opportunity to document our moral progress in regards to racism. He was too good an opportunity to pass up.
I don't think we knew Barack Obama that well back in 2008, but he did present that opportunity. And so I think even today there remains a good deal of goodwill, desire to see -- see him somehow do well because it means that our experiment in democracy which is the most radical in human history, will pay off.
That said, I don't think that he's invincible. I think there -- that as, again, as I argue in the article, as a mortal man, as simply a president, I don't think he's done very well and I think he's vulnerable.
TOOBIN: Shelby --
STEELE: But he has this sort of cultural charisma that others don't have.
TOOBIN: You say in the article there are arguments that are not being made by Republicans that if they were would be successful. What are those arguments?
STEELE: I think what Republicans have to do is separate the man, the mortal man, from the cultural icon. They're never going to beat the cultural icon because that icon flatters America. It says we're the greatest democracy that ever existed.
TOOBIN: How do you do that?
STEELE: If you look at the man and you look at the way he -- the way he passed his health care legislation, his stimulus bill, which has not worked, his seeming confusion with regard to the Arab spring what to do. He stays out of Libya. He goes into Libya. He comes back. So there's -- as a man, as simply a president, there -- he's vulnerable on many, many levels. As a cultural icon, he's invincible.
SPITZER: Shelby, let me agree with you about one point which is that he continues to be enormously popular and I think for a good cause. And I think you identified the reason. It does make us all feel good, as those who believe in democracy and the diversity of our nation and the American dream --
STEELE: American exceptionalism.
SPITZER: That's right. And he personifies it and that's wonderful. Where I disagree with you is that the Republicans have been shy about making the very arguments you just made. I think they've been trying to make those arguments in every conceivable way. Sometimes to a certain effect the 2010 midterm elections the president took a beating. So I don't think I buy your notion that the Republican Party has been shy about making the argument. I just don't think it has been as effective against him for reasons that are purely political we could talk about. And so I challenge your premise they haven't made the argument.
STEELE: Well, I think that -- you know, I think that the Republicans, you know, his first two years he made mistakes. He created again, as I mentioned in the piece, a virtual revolution in the middle class which is rather rare. So yes, there are people who when he is seen as a man, he is very vulnerable. Yet he came back, despite these mistakes. And I think Republicans have to if they want to have a chance against him really draw the distinction between the man and the cultural -- the cultural icon. And I don't think they've done that enough. I don't think this is -- this is something that's going to -- the only kind of thing that will determine the election but I think it represents an impressionism that makes the sort of white male Republicans look a little small in comparison to what Obama -- to the cultural icon that Obama now represents.
TOOBIN: And that isn't just --
STEELE: And Republicans have to go after that. They have to identify that as a kind of affirmative action, as a free ride. It should not at this point be relevant that his race or his cultural or historical significance. We've already made that point.
TOOBIN: But it isn't --
STEELE: And we've now have to go after him on that level.
TOOBIN: Isn't what you're talking about basically just the advantage of incumbency? The president always looks bigger, always looks stronger than the bunch of people looking to run against him. Why is Obama -- and most presidents get re-elected. What is it -- is it really just because of his race that he seems to have greater stature than his opponents?
STEELE: I think to answer that question you have to look at white America. White America elected Barack Obama. When he won in Iowa and he showed that he could get the white vote, only then did he get the black vote and become a really plausible candidate.
What -- in white America, there is -- given our history, we all -- we live with this sort of accusation that, well, maybe we're still on some inner level racist. And we wish black people badly. That is a pressure, a cultural pressure, in white life.
Obama was an opportunity to get some relief from that for at least a moment. And he remains that. I don't think it's as strong as it was in 2008. I don't think it's sufficient enough to make him invincible. But I think it is still there. There's still this sense that -- you know, that whites can say I'm proud. Maybe I'm a Republican but I voted for Barack Obama. I did the right thing, given our history.
SPITZER: Shelby --
STEELE: That is something that other candidates simply don't have.
SPITZER: Here's my thought. I think you're making some very interesting points but I think the public voted against the president voted in the midterm elections. Since then, he has gotten Osama bin Laden. The economy is beginning to come back. He is showing that he can rise above the fray and compromise. And so I think he is being viewed as a politician, as a leader, separate and apart from race. So look, I'm not sure I buy your notion the public is still unwilling to vote against him. Look, we've got to break away now, back to some of the storm issues that are confronting so much of the country
STEELE: I don't think they're unwilling. I think --
SPITZER: Finish up -- no, finish up, sir, your last thought.
STEELE: Thanks for having me.
SPITZER: Well, all right. And we'll have you back. It's a fascinating thought.
STEELE: I was just going to say, I don't think --- what I'm talking about is the determinism. It's an impressionism.
SPITZER: All right. We'll continue the conversation. Shelby Steele, thanks so much for joining us. Jeff Toobin, thank you as well as always.
Coming up next, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon joins me live from Joplin. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: It is a stunning number. As many as 1,500 still unaccounted for in the town of Joplin, Missouri, the result of the worst storm in 60 years. Joining us now is Jay Nixon, governor of Missouri, with the latest on the recovery efforts.
Governor, thank you so much for joining us. So tell us how are things going? We know there are some frustrations emerging. 1,500 or so still unaccounted for. Folks in the public troubled that they can't get into the morgue or go in to see if those who are there are, if fact, their loved ones. Where do things stand from your perspective?
GOV. JAY NIXON (D), MISSOURI: Well, first of all, the enormity of this tragedy is beginning to sink in on this close-knit community. As you get through the initial stages of recovery and working through the rubble to find, save loved ones, you move to this time where the enormity of the process is here. We're bringing in additional resources to back up the locals to make sure we can speed up the process of identification and communication at the local level so that we can hopefully relieve at least some part of that stress over the next day or two.
SPITZER: You know, just as a matter of pure mechanics, you're dealing with an area about five to six miles in dimension, mile-wide five miles long, which was just ripped apart by this tornado. These tornadoes, plural. How many more times and how many more people do you need to continue the search and rescue just in that area alone to go through the rubble, down into the basement of very house, pull up every plank that has been moved? How many more people do you think you can use to do that?
NIXON: Well, we think we've got enough people to get across this. We've got hundreds of firefighters from around the country that are assisting us. We have dogs that are helping us. We have all of that sort of stuff.
Right now, the process of really bringing that to a close and beginning to get closure on that as we move through the process and get to getting that information out for families so that we can lower the stress level and deal with the enormity of this tragedy is where our focus is. I met today with all of the local faith leaders, the ministers and whatnot. And you could see in their faces the challenge they're going to face as they preach at funerals in the weeks to come. It's enormous challenge both in destruction on the property but for the individual lives it is going to be a long time before we're able to get full recovery.
SPITZER: How do you put together right now that list of missing individuals? I mean, do you have a process whereby any family member who thinks somebody is missing goes to one central point and says we are -- I'm missing my son, you know, Joe Smith, and here's a picture of him and here's his social security number? Do you have one centralized database that you can then use to cross reference with every other hospital in the region, with any other report of missing folks? NIXON: Yes. What we've done is we brought our drug and crime control folks and highway patrol in. We brought extra shifts and we'll be working all night tonight to take all of that information, synthesize it during the night and begin in the morning to lay out list of folks who are unaccounted for, folks who are accounted for, so we can get some certainty to that part of this. I think that the tremendous amount of focus here at the local level has been on making sure every square inch of this place gets covered. We get every square inch searched.
And now, as we see the size of this, I think bringing in those extra resources, in essence taking that responsibility away from those locals, bringing in our guys to make sure we get that speeded up and get those reports out tomorrow morning is something we're committed to working all night to get done.
SPITZER: You know, just to come back at this point, I think I heard you say that you have enough people now to do that search and rescue at least within the confines of the five or six square miles that was hit directly by this tornado. But given the capacity of this tornado as we've seen, pick people up, pick up cars, pick up certainly individuals and just move them a mile, you know, huge distances, do you need to expand the radius of that search out in such a way that you perhaps need more people even than you've been asking for?
NIXON: Well, we're going to review that tonight at the situation meeting to make sure we got the resource. I just completed the meeting with the federal partners. I've had meetings today with all of our state and local partners. The bottom line is that we have tremendous number of people coming into the zone to help us right now and we had had yesterday two additional folks that we saved.
You know, it is a difficult process digging through by hand this sort of stuff, having the dogs in there, the dogs that can smell both life and death. It's just almost as if the weight of the enormity of this is coming upon the region. We will have the resources to complete that recovery task and plus making sure that we get rebirth right here in Joplin.
SPITZER: You know, to switch to a slightly different issue and I'm sure we've heard it, I'm sure word has filtered back to you as well. There are people saying, look, there are bodies in the morgue -- and I know this sounds grisly and gruesome, but there are people in the morgue. There are people, bodies that we want to go look at to see if these are our family members. What is the holdup? What is the reason that those identifications are not being made right now even if it's based on the photographic I.D. basis? What is going to happen next to permit that next step?
NIXON: Well, we're working with the locals to speed up that process. Obviously, we've seen the same challenges other people have in those things. These are individual human tragedies that need to be dealt with. We're bringing in the necessary professional resources to back up what's been, you know, a very stressed local network here, to make sure that we have the trained professionals to back up the folks here, and we're certainly committed to getting that information moving more quickly in the hours to come.
SPITZER: Is this -- is this a process right now that is being run by you as the governor of the state or is it still in the hands of the mayor, county executive? Who actually day to day makes the decisions about where to deploy the resources, where the doctors should be sent? Is that something you've taken over as the governor? Does FEMA have -- who's in charge right now?
NIXON: We're in the process of transitioning a significant amount of that to our folks. At the initial stage, grids were set up by local law enforcement with our highway patrol, with our National Guard. Once I mobilize that National Guard, then our task force southwest twister has been leading the way to help organize on the ground, keeping in essence the box size clean here so that those first responders could get over every inch. And then the bad weather we had the first two days which made it very, very difficult slowed that process down initially. But, you know, with the movement forward, we feel that we'll be able to get solid command and control to finish this job and then begin the process of understanding the depth of this tragedy and get to the rebirth of this town.
SPITZER: Yes. We only have a couple seconds left, Governor. But I understand the president's going to be visiting you, I think. Is it on Sunday? Is that when he's coming through?
NIXON: Yes, he is. We're going to have a memorial service on Sunday. We'll look forward to seeing the president speaking for all people across the country about how much we've literally had dollars coming in, prayers from all across the country. We thank everybody for their strong spiritual support.
SPITZER: All right, Governor Jay Nixon. Thank you for your time. And we know you're working as hard as you possibly can. All right. Thank you, Governor.
Good night from New York. "PIERS MORGAN TONIGHT" starts right now.
