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In the Arena

No Progress at Debt Meetings; Murdoch Phone Hacking Scandal; News Corp Damage Control

Aired July 20, 2011 - 20:00   ET

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

TOM FOREMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening and welcome tonight as a heat wave roars over the East Coast like a blast furnace, the debt ceiling talks in Washington appear to be going stone cold.

Every few hours we get another tip about some development. But they all lead to this endless circle of hell called more negotiations. You've heard all these warnings from the left, the right, and the center that the clock is ticking. The meltdown is looming. Financial Armageddon is on the way.

Today's prize for outrage goes to a Democrat. Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland who -- here's a surprise -- doesn't like some of the proposed cuts in social programs.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARBARA MIKULSKI (D), MARYLAND: Once again, the radical right is more worried about protecting their next election than protecting the greatest generation or investing in the next generation. What a sham. What a scam. I'd be tempted to just blow it off if it were not so cruel, stupid, and dangerous.

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

FOREMAN: And now tonight after all of these hand ringing, these accusations and whining, we're hearing the whole mess may end not with a bang but with a whimper. You absolutely will not believe it.

I'll be talking to two of the smartest people I know on the subject in just moment. But first a look at the other stories I'll be drilling down on tonight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FOREMAN: Fireworks in the House of Commons. First it was the Murdochs, today it was Britain's prime minister. David Cameron faced down his critics but will he keep his prime address?

And in Somalia, the worst drought in half a century. Millions of children facing starvation. Will help reach them in time? A heart- wrenching look at the face of famine.

Then after months of name calling and finger pointing, where's the deal? No, not the debt ceiling, the other deal Americans care about. Are you ready for some football?

(END OF VIDEO CLIP)

FOREMAN: We have a lot going on tonight. But let's get back to our top story.

Emergency meetings at the White House appear to have fallen flat. The president today met separately with Democratic and Republican leaders, part of the seemingly endless effort to raise the debt ceiling before the clock runs out.

The Republican leadership left the White House a short time ago and our own senior White House correspondent Jessica Yellin is there.

Jessica, what on earth is going on?

JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Tom, what's going on is meetings, process, discussion. So far no action. We are now less than two days away from the White House's own self-imposed deadline for a deal. And now some of the White House's own allies on Capitol Hill are privately saying that it is time to cut bait, stop pushing for a major deficit reduction package and find the easiest path forward to just raise the ceiling and push for the rest another time.

FOREMAN: Jessica, isn't this the very thing that just a few days ago, depending on which side you were talking to at the moment, was saying no, no, no, that's not what we needed to do? We have to grapple with this?

I mean this seems to me the very thing they said we can't do.

YELLIN: It's still the case that there are not enough votes to just simply raise the debt ceiling. So there is a political reality that in the House of Representatives it is probably likely -- the thinking is it is likely that you might need something else to be added in. So the political reality is you have to negotiate a package that does something like add in spending cuts. And that's why they're still here, going back and forth talking about it.

There's also the political truth that the White House is in the war over public perception losing less. Because they keep talking about doing the big deal. So the public is blaming the White House less and they're blaming Republicans and Congress. But that doesn't get anybody anywhere. They still have to figure out a package, Tom. And we're no closer at this moment.

FOREMAN: So the bottom line is all of the problems that we had last week, the week before, yesterday, four hours ago, we still have all those problems? We're just talking about yet another maneuver to say well, let's push it further down to road and pretend that's progress?

YELLIN: They're trying to work on it. You know what's fascinating to me is I continue to hear these outsiders who don't work in Washington describe this as this is Washington as it works. There's always a mess in Washington and they come together at the end. It's a normal Washington process.

And I'm talking to a lot of old Washington hands who have been here for decades and they are calling this one an abnormal Washington process. Because the difference with this one, Tom, is that there are these new freshmen in the House of Representatives that who really don't care about getting re-elected.

They say they came here in for this vote and you cannot sweeten this deal. You cannot win them over by adding something to the vote, really. And they don't know how this is going to end in the end. And it's a bit of a cliffhanger for everybody. And there are just a lot of baited breath hoping that with the clock ticking and a lot of pressure they'll find the votes at the very last minute. But that's part of the reason why there is so much uncertainty around these negotiations -- Tom.

FOREMAN: Wow. Jessica Yellin, abnormal for Washington, you said a mouthful there. Thanks for joining us. We appreciate it. We know you'll stick on it there.

YELLIN: Yes.

FOREMAN: It didn't take long to reach this point of course. Yesterday's hopes for a debt ceiling breakthrough apparently were dashed on this hard and fast party lines and so we're still waiting. And even a quick walk down memory lane points the way to a bumpy road still ahead.

Remember the president's idea for a grand bargain? Well, that cannot pass the House. Last night House Republicans passed their cut, cap and balance bill but that cannot pass the Senate. And then there is the Gang of Six solution as it's called. As we've just heard enthusiasm for that plan dwindled as both sides dug into the details.

So what if the clock ticks down and we still don't have a deal?

David Gergen is CNN's senior political analyst and a former president advisor. He joins me now from San Francisco. And from Berkeley, California, Robert Reich, former labor secretary.

David, talk to me about this Gang of Six solution. Twenty-four hours ago people were saying maybe this is the key. Now people are acting like that truly is yesterday's news. Why?

DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, Tom, the fizz has gone out of that bottle, I'm afraid. And it present a hope there for a few hours but it's -- you know, it remains an outline, it remains a three or four page outline. And when people began to get into it and to explore the details, they came up with very, very different interpretations of it.

And opposition today has sprung up from both sides. You know the labor unions have been out attacking it, but so has the hard right or the Republican Party. The House Republicans came out with their report last night saying it's going to raise taxes by $2 trillion. Not what Democrats believe but that's what they're arguing. Of course that tanks it on the right.

So here's where I think we are. I think the danger now is that the Gang of Six is out, I think the grand bargain is out. We're down to the Reid-McConnell plan. And I'm not even sure that can pass the House. So I worry a lot that we're like -- we're on a boat floating somewhere above Niagara Falls and we're getting closer and closer to the edge.

I think the prospects tonight have risen above 50 percent that we could actually have a default before this is over.

FOREMAN: Wow. Robert Reich, do you agree? Is that assessment too dire? Is that correct, do you think?

ROBERT REICH, FORMER LABOR SECRETARY: I think David is being a little bit dire. We still have over a week to go. And there are enough sane people in Congress who understand that the cost of no deal on raising the debt ceiling would be absolutely apocalyptic in terms of the economy, in terms of the interest rates that would soar.

The fact that creditors would not get paid, the full faith and credit of the United States would be jeopardize, there could be worldwide repercussions. And no matter where you are, Republican or Democrat, you are going to -- I think -- see the light.

Now again, Jessica reported before on this group of highly rigid, some would say ideological Republicans, Tea Party based, who were saying we only came to Washington for one reason and one reason only. I think the real question is where are they going to go? Are they going to see the light? And how many votes do they represent?

FOREMAN: That is a critical question, Robert. I can't agree more.

David, address that for a minute here. Because this does seem -- when Jessica talks about abnormal even for Washington, I've heard people around D.C. saying the same thing. They're saying we have this group of newcomers -- I've talked to some of them -- who say very directly, I don't care if I'm re-elected. I was elected to do this one thing and I'll go down in flames doing it before I'll back away from it.

How much does that affect this process?

GERGEN: It affects it a lot. But Tom, the truth is this is what they were sent to Washington by angry voters. The Tea Party did not start from the top. It's a grass roots movement that sent people to Washington with this in mind. So understand this is a very, very divided country still.

I would like to believe that Bob Reich is right. I've been in the optimist camp now for some time.

But I have to say, Bob, I'm not sure the votes are there in the House for Reid-McConnell. Certainly not as it is now. It -- the answer -- if there is going to be an answer -- is to add spending cuts of a significant amount to Reid-McConnell. Maybe up to a trillion dollars, maybe a trillion and a half.

But if they add those spending cuts with no tax increases, can you get the Democrats to vote for it? And would you get enough Republicans to go along with the Democrats to get a majority? I'm not sure the votes are there at this hour.

FOREMAN: You know, Robert, one of the things that I'm concerned about here is when I watch all of these plans, they're all coming out on very this half-formed nature where it's moving all of -- I started calling it today adjustable rate legislation. And that's the problem. Nobody seems to want to speak up because they're not sure what deal they're possibly agreeing to. Is that also part of this? That people aren't explicitly saying this is what I will do?

REICH: Well, and that's part of it, I think, Tom, because it's -- you see you've got two sides that really are irreconcilable. And so you are -- and necessarily getting out of that, if anybody wants a debt ceiling increase, you're going to have a kabuki dance, a kind of theater of the absurd in which you have so many procedural votes and so many faints this way and that way that Republicans can say to their constituents I voted against lifting the debt ceiling. I voted against raising taxes. I voted to balance the budget.

And Democrats can say to their constituencies I voted to raise taxes on the wealthy, I voted to save Medicare and Social Security, and I also voted to be responsible in the budget.

And somehow everybody can say what they need to say to their own constituencies and the can can get kicked down the road at least through the election of 2012 and the -- again the debt ceiling could be raised. But that kabuki dance, nobody knows what it's going to entail. I think it's going to be partly Mitch McConnell's plan and Harry Reid's plan and partly, as David Gergen says, some sort of set of symbolic, maybe halfway real but mostly symbolic gestures.

FOREMAN: David, let me ask you one more quick question here. Are there going to be any winners in this? I cannot see how anybody in Washington really comes out better in this.

GERGEN: At this point, no big winners. There's no question that Jessica Yellin reported that it's a perception game. If there's any winner so far it's been the president. You know he's helped himself some, or at least, as she said, he's not getting blamed as much as Republicans are being blamed.

But at the end of the day, if they do have just simply a bridge, they don't really solve the underlying problems, there is a very, very strong risk -- and Bob can speak to this better than I can -- that Standard & Poor's or Moody's, if you come up with a very small deal, they'll downgrade our credit rating. And if they do that, I think everybody in Washington gets hurt.

If all of this leads, as you say, to a whimper and then a downgrading of our credit rating at the end of the day, I think that's a defeat to everybody in Washington.

FOREMAN: And Robert, before we go -

REICH: Interest rates --

(CROSSTALK)

FOREMAN: Something about the -- I know that this has been raised before, but you touched in your blog post today about the death of financial reform. You're real concerned about it in the midst of all this -- this is also going on. This notion that really all the Dodd- Frank bill that (INAUDIBLE) in Wall Street, all this stuff, this really is not working.

Tell us just a little bit about that before we go.

REICH: Well, tomorrow is the first year birthday of the enactment of Dodd-Frank. That was going to be the financial reform bill that completely revolutionize and reform Wall Street so we would see no repeat of the debacle that we saw a few years ago. Well, unfortunately that bill or that act Dodd-Frank has been defamed.

You know it's one of the first times I've ever heard of a first birthday where the child has lost the teeth before he even got the teeth.

(LAUGHTER)

REICH: And as a result, you know, the problem there -- quite seriously the problem is that right now there is no -- there's no real change on Wall Street. The lobbyists for Wall Street have succeeded in doing what they set out to do initially with Dodd-Frank, and that is to make sure that there were loopholes big enough to drive their Ferraris through. And there are.

FOREMAN: Man. Unbelievable the way --

GERGEN: Tom, I wish -- I wish that the president had fought for Elizabeth Warren. I have come to know, like, and respect her. And I think that would have been a fight worth having even if -- at the price of losing.

FOREMAN: You know I -- I'm afraid that discussion probably passes by. But it's a shame we didn't get to talk about her more. It was an interesting time. I wish we had more time to talk tonight.

David Gergen, Robert Reich, always great to have you with us. And I'm assuming we'll have to deal so we'll be talking to you again very soon.

Coming up --

REICH: Good night, Tom.

FOREMAN: The Murdoch phone hacking scandal reached the very top today. British Prime Minister David Cameron faced the music. It wasn't pretty as vocal opposition. It was great theater for the audience, anyway. But how did he do? That story when we come back. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FOREMAN: Our "In Depth" report tonight, what else? The Murdoch hacking scandal trundles on. British Prime Minister David Cameron was pummeled in parliament today, facing more than 100 tough questions over his ties to the media empire of Rupert Murdoch.

Cameron, as you may recall, hired a top Murdoch man to be his communications director. Today he indicated he wouldn't have done that had he known what was going on at the "News of the World." Well, that's some reassurance.

This is emerging as the defense of choice in this phone hacking and bribery scandal. Deny knowledge, delay action and in effect say don't blame me. The question is, will it work?

We're joined by Nicholas Wapshott who is a senior editor for "The Times of London" who has an inside take on the key players in this scandal.

Nick, thanks so much for being here. Let's sort of crank through the crowd here. Rupert and James Murdoch, they're at the center of this whole scandal. The father and son team in all of this.

NICHOLAS WAPSHOTT, SR. EDITOR, THE TIMES OF LONDON: Yes.

FOREMAN: After their testimony yesterday no matter what we thought of it, News Corp stock rose almost 6 percent. Does this mean that they have dodged a bullet?

WAPSHOTT: Not necessarily. I mean a number of reasons why their stock may go up, and one might be, if you think that actually Rupert looked so unwell, so old that even the "Wall Street Journal" led a page saying age of proprietor not an issue. But actually it might be that they think they're going to dump the British papers, which don't make much money, and actually the corporate governance at this company may get better.

FOREMAN: Yes, I was sort to circle that, too. He didn't look very strong there. And there are these weird contractions that happened. Like in one breath he's saying, I couldn't possibly know what was going on with my 53,000 employees.

WAPSHOTT: Yes.

FOREMAN: And then somebody says, do you think it happened in the United States with 9/11? No, that couldn't have happened. Well, you just said, you don't know.

WAPSHOTT: It is the Pakistani military defense, isn't it? We didn't know that bin Laden was there or, we did know but we didn't do anything about it. I mean you can't have it both ways.

FOREMAN: Yes, exactly. Let's turn to David Cameron. He had an effective appearance in parliament today. It looked like. Is the worst behind him? WAPSHOTT: Certainly not. Because we've got a whole year's worth of judicial inquiry. All of which will keep this alive. And then we've also got the police investigation. Eight thousand people were hacked. All of those are going to --

FOREMAN: We've only heard about like 170 --

(CROSSTALK)

WAPSHOTT: Yes. Hundred and 70 have been told they were hacked. All the rest of them, for all I know, you and me were hacked. We don't know yet. And all -- so this is a running sore. And he's come up is rather like Rupert Murdoch, someone who just didn't quite know what was going on.

FOREMAN: But this is the traditional defense, though, isn't it, always? The people at the top always say I want all the credit for everything that goes right in my company, when something goes wrong, well, I don't know what those little people were doing.

WAPSHOTT: Yes, but what you did -- imagine if the president of the United States hired a disgraced newspaper tabloid editor to be his press spokesman. That's what he did. And that shows someone who's very -- got very poor judgment when it comes to personalities, which makes you wonder all the Cabinet people that he appointed. How good were they?

FOREMAN: So he's got a lot of hurdles in front of him, you think.

WAPSHOTT: Yes. I think that actually -- I mean the Labor leader could have if he had wanted put the (INAUDIBLE) and stay and he didn't do it. I just wonder whether actually they think that they're better off, the Labor Party, better off having Cameron there and weak and damaged goods to finish him off.

FOREMAN: I think it's very Machiavellian.

Let's move deeper into the weeds here. Rebekah Brooks, she defended News Corp in her testimony yesterday saying the company acted quickly and decisively in the phone hacking scandal. But she's been arrested by British police. So how did she do?

WAPSHOTT: She looked pretty shifty to me on -- at all of the Commons hearing evidence yesterday. And I didn't quite believe a word that she said. Once more, the quote you just said is plainly not true, because she didn't cure it early.

As we know, News International senior executives who could it be apart from Rebekah Brooks? Stood in way of the police investigation. Did everything to ensure that it was killed off early in 2007.

FOREMAN: What about Andy Coulson, Cameron's former chief press officer and "News of the World' editor? He was arrested earlier this month, too. So we brought him -- we talked about the impact on Cameron. Now did Cameron throw him under the double-decker bus or -- WAPSHOTT: He tried to, but I supposed that Coulson is in a position to actually dump all of the News Corp. people if he wants to. He knows where some of the bodies are buried, and I guess that's about the best chance that he's got, which is to try to implicate other people.

FOREMAN: What about John Yates? The former assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan police. He's criticized for shutting down the original phone hacking investigation. And you know I'm reminded of that old TV show "Star Trek" where every time a junior officer was with the landing party he was going to get killed.

(LAUGHTER)

FOREMAN: So what's the deal for him?

WAPSHOTT: There has to be a fall guy. I guess he's the most obvious fall guy. On the other hand I think that he wasn't a roughly honest cop. The reason that he closed down was -- as he expressed, was the fact that the News Corp -- News International executives prevented him from doing it.

But of course, what he should have done is to press on. Instead he and his boss who's then instantly employed by the "London Times" which is a News International title, they decided that actually they'd rather give up the fight. They can be criticized for that.

On the other hand I think on the whole, the top cops who've gone have done it for honorable reasons, which of course is another means of getting David Cameron. The fact is, if a top cop goes because something has happened on his watch, you would really wonder whether David Cameron when appointing a bad person shouldn't do exactly the same.

FOREMAN: You know after these hearings yesterday I was looking at it, I was saying from over here it's a little hard to tell. Is the heat on this story still rising? Or do you think it's at an apex right now? Because if I'm Rupert Murdoch or I'm David Cameron, I'm trying to say let's see if we can just hold on until it cools a little bit?

WAPSHOTT: Well, we are at that stage in the summer where everybody will go away on holiday. They'll all resume in October again. So there is going to be a bit of a lull in this story. But I can't see it really going away, as I said, because of the judicial inquiry and because of the police inquiry. It must be on the stocks for at least 12 months.

I -- there's been a market readjustment today. That might be just one day. It's in nobody's interest really to allow this story to go away. The fact is that Rupert Murdoch is on the run now. And Schadenfreude, the great German word that explains what's been going on, is that the British public really likes seeing somebody like Rupert get his comeuppance.

FOREMAN: I was so desperately hoping that Schadenfreude would show up tonight.

(LAUGHTER)

FOREMAN: Nicholas Wapshott, thank you so much for joining us here. We will be talking as it goes on with the story.

Up next, in this world-shaking Murdoch scandal, what if, what if in the end all the major players walk away essentially untouched. If you think it can't happen, think again. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FOREMAN: More on our "In Depth" report on the Murdoch phone hacking scandal. We just got some video in here a minute ago. I want you to take a look at this.

This is Rupert Murdoch -- there he is -- returning to where we are right now. Back here to New York with his wife Wendi. So he's back home here in Manhattan after his trials overseas.

Not trial as such but difficult times. So that's what it looks tonight and coming in from the hot day here. I bet it feels a little bit hotter to him.

British opposition leader Ed Miliband expressed concern today that this scandal not turn into an event, quote, "where the whirlwind blows through and nothing really changes."

How many times have you seen that happen in these stories? But with David Cameron pushing back on his critics and News Corp stock rising in the wake of Murdoch's testimony, it's possible the scandal could play out without any real consequences for some of these top level players.

Joining me now is Jeremy Peters, a reporter for the "New York Times."

Jeremy, welcome. Thanks for being here.

JEREMY PETERS, NEW YORK TIMES MEDIA REPORTER: Thank you.

FOREMAN: Let me ask you a question. You reported today that the Wall Street analysts consider the hearing a big success for Rupert and James Murdoch. But let's take a look at some of the footage from him yesterday compared to what we just saw a minute ago.

Look, he's at the table there. A lot of people said he looked like a guy who is almost nodding off, a little out of touch. Some of his questions didn't seem with it. Doesn't that have any impact on these investors and the stock folks out there?

PETERS: I think absolutely it does. And I think that what you were seeing from investors was more a function of the low expectations around this hearing. I think people thought Rupert is not the best public speaker and they were expecting under such enormous pressure that he might crack or that he might say something that somehow implicated him in knowing about this wrongdoing when it occurred.

But that didn't happen. And so what you walked away with was not an extraordinary appearance or by any means a grand slam, but it was just fine. And I think that that's really all people needed to see.

FOREMAN: Is -- to be honest with you, does James really count in all of this? I mean he's the son but as long as Rupert's around, does anybody really care how good or bad he is?

PETERS: Well, I think they do. Because he is the presumed heir apparent. Now if he had really flubbed yesterday, I think that the stock price probably would have dropped a lot. Because this is the man that you would assume is going to someday run the company.

I don't know that that's any -- that that's the case any longer. It remains to be seen what happens to James, but this scandal has sustained him and his reputation in a big way. And he will have to recover and a lot of time will have to pass before he can probably run News Corp.

FOREMAN: One of the questions I have about this is that both of these guys said, basically I had no knowledge of anything illegal going on which is what every CEO says anytime something happens which always seems to me to say you're guilty of something then. You're either guilty of not being honest about that or not really knowing what goes on in your company.

PETERS: Right, and neither of those is a very good thing, or what you would expect of a chief executive, or any senior manager at a company. And I think that's the question that they ultimately have to answer. Either what did you know or why did you allow a culture of corrupt journalists to flourish underneath you?

FOREMAN: And in the case of Rupert Murdoch, this isn't like he bought some -- you know, like digital TV line that he didn't know anything about. Or you got a snicker company. I mean, he's a newspaper guy. That's where he came from. So arguably he had the expertise. This wasn't some -- a frying pan factory that he didn't know anything about.

PETERS: Well, and one of the things that you'll hear some critics of Rupert saying is he's a man who's very engaged in his newspaper. For example, yesterday he said he probably speaks with the editor of the "Wall Street Journal" more than any other editor of papers.

That's multiple times a day and he talks to the editor of the "New York Post" on a regular basis sometimes several times a day. "News of the World," less clear how often he was engaged on their day to day business.

But it's not unthinkable to imagine Rupert calling up the phone and asking what's in the paper because - or even before then what's going to be in the paper.

FOREMAN: But in the end, I have to say my suspicion is that he's untouchable. He's so far up the ladder that he has so many people that he can cut off below him if he needs to. What do you think?

PETERS: Well, I don't know. I watched him yesterday and I saw a man who looked every bit his 80 years of age. He's been running this company a very long time. He's been tremendously successful. I think that it's not inconceivable before the end of the year there could be new leadership at the top of News Corp.

FOREMAN: And are there any other real landmines that are sitting out there right now? Obviously, we talked to Nick a moment ago, there are still investigations going on.

PETERS: Well, there are investigations on two continents and I think that those are both tremendous --

FOREMAN: If something comes up here with 9/11 victims or anything at all, that's a whole new box of tacks isn't it?

PETERS: Exactly. It also remains to be seen in Congress how loud the cries will get for a re-examination of his media holdings here. Will they try to make some effort at dismantling News Corp.'s stronghold on the media market here? I don't know, but certainly, Rupert being the politically polarizing figure that he is, you can imagine his political enemies trying to run with this.

FOREMAN: And his defenders defending him as well.

PETERS: Yes, absolutely.

FOREMAN: Jeremy Peters thanks so much for being here. It is going to be interesting to see what comes up at this point.

PETERS: Thank you.

FOREMAN: All right, coming up, is there going to be pro football on Sundays this fall? This is the question you've been asking. And if there is, will the players get more protection when they're injured? A very serious question in the midst of this. We'll ask a former player who got hit so hard, he's suing the NFL. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FOREMAN: Can you believe the NFL preseason is supposed to start next month? Fans, of course, want this four-month NFL lockout to end so it'll happen so the season won't be delayed. But owners and players remain at a standoff.

One of the biggest negotiating issues are the injuries that result from devastating hits like this one and the lack of medical coverage right now. Look at that. The players need to complete four seasons to get full medical benefits.

And the average career is shorter than that. This week several former players fired a lawsuit against the NFL and the helmet manufacturer Ridell alleging that they failed to warn and protect against long term brain injuries. Joining me now is one of the plaintiffs in that. He suffered a major concussion in his very first NFL game and then had to battle the league to pay for his brain surgery. George Visger joins me now from San Francisco.

George, thanks for being here. Let's start off very simply. Tell us the story of what happened to you.

GEORGE VISGER, FORMER NFL PLAYER: Do you have a couple days? The story is pretty convoluted, but basically I was drafted by the Jets in 1980, six-round pick and then I got cut at the end of the season.

The 49ers picked me up early in the season, third or fifth game, something like that. Brought me in on a Tuesday and practiced a couple days, Friday we fly to Dallas. We're playing the game of the week on Saturday, which was a short week for us.

Early in the first quarter, first play I'm in playing defensive tackle. I get trapped. I get ear holed by a tight end or someone. Suffered a major concussion, and the trainers told me afterwards -- I played the entire game, never missed a play.

They told me afterwards that I went through 25 to 30 smelling salts during the game, never missed a practice after that. Played a few games for them during the season, then they cut me, brought me back the last few games this season. My second year I came back and blew a knee out early in the camp. Had knee surgery and was coming back off that when I developed hydrocephalous, which is water on the brain.

They misdiagnosed that for several weeks, told me it was high blood pressure. They had me on high blood pressure pills. My brain was hemorrhaging. I had focal point paralysis among other symptoms. Then I went in for emergency brain surgery in September of the Super Bowl season.

FOREMAN: So you were in the hospital at that point in very serious condition.

VISGER: Pardon me?

FOREMAN: So you ended up in the hospital at that point in very serious condition. At what point did somebody say this could be related to that hit?

VISGER: Well, they never did. Basically what happened was I was told I could still play with a shunt in my head. They basically drilled a hole in my skull. A tube goes in my brain, there's a pressure valve in the back of my head.

And there's a tube on the side of neck into my abdomen. They drained spinal fluid out of my head 24/7. So I came back and the doctors said they were looking at a special made helmet to protect my shunt and I was all for playing. We were progressing through that season and we win the Super Bowl. Four months after the Super Bowl, and in that meantime, I was having some issues. I had never been in trouble in my life. I got arrested three times between my first brain surgery in September of '81 and the second and third brain surgeries were 10 hours apart.

FOREMAN: For what? What were you arrested for?

VISGER: I'd go out and have a couple of beers and the next thing I would know, 12 hours later I'm standing in jail with no memory how I got there. I would hear stories of me doing things that I didn't do normally.

Throwing chairs through windows, punching guys out, just totally out of character for me. So I go back to see the doctors. This was May of '82, just four months after we won the Super Bowl. I had just been arrested for the third time. I told them what was going on. They said it wasn't from the surgery.

I told them I was leaving for Mexico the next day to go fishing with my brother, Mel and his wife, we're going to down and go fishing for a few days. They do a brain scan on me, they tell me you're good to go. Leave the country. I fly down to Mexico -- I said what about drinking? They said no problem. I go to Mexico, that first night down there I had one Margarita at dinner, started having major headaches and we were just sharing a little kabana together.

So I told Mel and Nancy I'm going back to the room. I went back to the room. They stayed out that night, come in a few hours later, I'm in a coma. The pressure builds up in my brain and is crushing my brain from the inside out, took them a day or so to get me home.

New surgeon in Sacramento, he re-operates and puts the shunt in. The original hole they drilled was in the back of my head and they had to get the tube into the middle of the brain. He said that wasn't a good place.

Dr. Cobb was my new surgeon, but I was in such bad shape they didn't want to traumatize me any worse and drill a new hole. So put it in that hole. Ten hours later I'm comatose. They give me a third surgery, last rights. I'm in intensive care for I don't know how long. I have no memory of virtually the whole first year.

FOREMAN: Let me ask you about this, George. You went through all of this, and in this process -- what you told me so far is all you really heard from the league was when you were capable of playing, keep playing. But the rest of the time, were you getting any medical help on this? Was there any sense that they were behind you in this or what?

VISGER: No, nothing. I mean, I never received anything from them, any help on any of this. The second and third brain surgeries, that was like a year or so before I got back on my feet. One of my first recollections were I started getting hospital bills for brain surgeries two and three. I would say please bill San Francisco 49ers. Even with my memory as it is, I have a horrible memory. I live out of my notebooks here, 20 years of these. Every day of my life, I write down minute by minute what's going on. I still remember the 49ers address because I wrote it so many times on these bills. Please bill San Francisco 49ers, you know 711 Nevada Street, Redwood City.

FOREMAN: I want to ask you one more thing here before we run out of time though. So you went through this experience as a young football player. It's been obviously a horrendous experience for you.

What do you hope can come out of all these negotiations? Because when we hear about these talks about the NFL and the players, often people say it's a bunch of millionaires arguing about millions of dollars.

I guess some of it is, but when it comes to issues like, the question of the NFL being responsible for what happens to these young players like you, what's the best thing you could see come out of this?

VISGER: Well, it's like any other industry. I was fulfilling my obligation, my role in that industry, NFL industry. I'm an employer, if I have an employee injured on the job, you have workers' compensation that takes care of them.

To me I just cannot fail them. This has been illegal and immoral what they've done for decades. They put their employees in harm's way knowing full well that you will get injured playing. It's not if you get injured. If you play football, you will be injured.

So they have nothing set up to take care of their injured employees. What I'm hoping that comes from this is that we educate some folks coming up through the ranks. My son will never play. I loved playing football. There were two loves in my life, one was biology. I'm a biologist and two was playing football.

Those were my goals from the time I was a little kid. It breaks my heart to think of my son never playing because of the great memories I had, but the toll is just too great. It's taken on my marriage, my family. The ripple effect from traumatic brain injuries is huge. It affects so many other people.

FOREMAN: And George, I'm afraid we're going to call it done. I really appreciate you coming in and talking to us. George Visger, obviously the NFL has their own position. They always say they've been a responsible employer. But we appreciate you telling your side of the story and we'll see how the negotiations turn out. Good luck to you.

VISGER: Thank you. Appreciate it.

FOREMAN: Coming up, another vicious cycle that we have to look at. People lose their jobs and their homes then cities can't collect the property tax. Then vital services suffer like schools.

And without education, you get the picture. On and on it goes. It's being played out for real in Memphis tonight where school is out maybe forever. Stay with us.

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FOREMAN: The school year in Memphis, Tennessee, is supposed to start in a few weeks, but some 100,000 students may have no place to go. Last week, the city cut $78 million from the school budget.

Last night, the school board fought back. They voted to shut down until the city pays up. Meanwhile, Minnesota is raising $700 million by delaying aid to school districts there. This is a common scene we're seeing across the country as cash strapped government cut spending. Schools are taking the hit.

Joining us now is Steve Perry, CNN education contributor and the founder and principal of the Capital Preparatory Magnet School. Steve, thanks for being here. How common is this becoming around this country?

STEVE PERRY, CNN EDUCATION CONTRIBUTOR: Unfortunately, it's becoming more and more common. In the case of Memphis and many small towns who never really had enough money in their property taxes to run their local schools, they've always had to depend on the state and in some cases the county and federal government to pay for their schools.

So I'm a little perplexed as to why a riff between the city and the school board has led to this because some 93 percent of Memphis public schools resources actually come from outside the city.

FOREMAN: Let's talk about this general shortage of resources, though, Steve because one of the things I'm wondering about in all these cases is you're running into federal government running out of help. The local government can't handle it. The state can't handle it because every government is saying even if our head is above water, it's barely above water.

PERRY: We have spent gaudy for a long time on our schools. We have spent a lot of money and we've gotten very little in terms of an outcome. Our schools across the country are some of the lowest performing in the industrialized world.

And we as a country have not produced the next group of industry builders. In some cases, if you ask many employers, many of the kids who are coming out are not even good employees. What we need to do is we need to recognize that we, the educators bear a great deal of responsibility for the economic downturn that we're in here in this country.

FOREMAN: What do you mean by that, Steve?

PERRY: Because we're not producing the type of students that our economy needs. We're not producing students who can go off to college. Some 30 percent of our current high school graduates go off to college only to take remedial classes.

Of those kids, four out of five of them had a GPA of over 3.0. That's us, the educators. That's not the parents, that's not the economy, that's us. We have to do a better job of giving the community what they pay for.

FOREMAN: And that makes it easy if you're not doing that well for them to say hey why are we spending all that money because they're not doing that well?

PERRY: It does make it easy. In fact, it bears the question why then are we paying so much for our public education. Here's the second part of it. If it was just money then we should send our kids to prison because they have the smallest classes. They have the highest per student expenditure.

However, they're not necessarily in a place you want to send a child. It's not about just the money. It's about the quality of the product. We have seen, unfortunately, that many of us in the traditional public schools have become lazy.

We've not produced the type of results that are expected even when we're talking about the suburbs. Our kids internationally are getting whooped because we as a country are not putting enough pressure on our education system to produce solid schools.

FOREMAN: All right. Steve Perry, you know, I like the way you always lay it on the line here. You remind me that old saying if you have a problem then money is the solution, you don't have a problem.

I guess, we'll see where it goes although I'm sure a lot of schools out there would say yes, but the money's still a problem. Thank you. We appreciate it.

PERRY: Thank you.

FOREMAN: Coming up, Somalia is suffering a draught fought for the ages. You must see this. Famine is spreading across the area there. And is there any way to fix this from becoming a worldwide catastrophe? Stay with us.

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FOREMAN: Southern Somalia is a tough and dangerous place to live. There's poverty, of course, armed factions battling for control and now drought. All of that is adding up to famine.

The U.N. made it officially today 10 million people are at risk in the horn of Africa. Somalia's in the worst shape. Thousands have will be died. It's likely to get much, much worse.

Many desperate families have fled just across the border to Kenya. CNN's David McKenzie is there tonight at the daub refugee camp. David, what are the refugees finding there? Is it any better particularly for all the kids who are at risk?

DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Tom, there are a lot of very disturbing statistics in this crisis. One of them is 2 million children who could be starving in the coming months if they don't get food aid here in Africa. And it's sometimes hard to kind of really get your head around those kind of terrible statistics, but at the end of every statistic, there's often one person. In this case it's the terrible and tragic story of Sarah.

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MCKENZIE (voice-over): Arden Ibrahim (ph) carries the limp body of Sarah, his dead child. She drew her last breath at dawn. Sarah was just four. Facing Mecca, they prayed for her soul and bury her.

Severely malnourished, Ibrahim tried to get Sarah to the nearest hospital. But a ride costs just over a dollar here, more than any of these new refugees could afford. Sarah's uncle says they fled here hoping for better.

We didn't come with money from Somalia. We didn't come with anything, he says. We're refugees, but we're dying because we don't get enough help. Ibrahim's family arrives tired and hungry, but he says they were forced to beg for food for two weeks.

When they finally got given it, it didn't help. We haven't been given enough help, he says. We've been given only flour and maize. And a child sick won't get better on that. She needed more help. Now he worries he could lose another child and his daughter Decca is dangerously thin.

It's in God's hands, he says. It's not in mine. But if it stays this bad, more people will die. They call this place Balabagte, it means carcass. It's where people leave their animals to die. But Sarah says they protected her well. She's already in paradise.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCKENZIE: Tom, the dawn will break here in a few hours. Whether more fathers will be burying more children depends on whether the world will come and give some action to this crisis. The U.N. has called the famine in Somalia - Islamic militant group has for years now effectively banned or thrown out the world food program and others to reaching those areas.

If they allow access and if they can guarantee safety and security for the U.N. and others, possibly we could help feed people in Southern Somalia and that could help end this immediate crisis in the horn, Tom.

FOREMAN: I know one of the concerns from the U.N. has been that there has not been enough international aid coming in. Has that been the real choke point? That it's not showing up or simply cannot get to people? The warnings have been coming out for weeks and weeks now.

MCKENZIE: well, months, in fact, Tom. Certainly the warnings from some were coming earlier this year. Yes, that's right. The real problem is that in Somalia and these two regions of Somalia, aid hasn't been able to go there. I was here in the region at the last severe drought. Effectively they were able to get to those people and help mitigate the drop in the southern parts of Somalia. Not just the fact that they can't get in but the lack of funds.

The U.K. charity and others are saying there's a funding short of about $800 million. The U.S. says it will give more money because of this famine call, but that's not enough. The European Union and other rich countries need to give money, according to the people here toll save this crisis.

There's also a bigger issue here with climate change, higher food prices, and with livelihoods dipping over time. As the horn of Africa itself, everyone is sitting on the edge here. Any sort of crisis or lack of rain or conflict pushes them over.

FOREMAN: David McKenzie, we'll look for more reporting from you on this terrible story. And we'll look for you to join us again tomorrow night right here. We hope you'll come back and join us. From New York, I'm Tom Foreman. Thanks for being here. "PIERS MORGAN" starts right now.