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CNN Live At Daybreak
Targeting Al-Zarqawi; Never Too Young; Actress Under Fire
Aired April 27, 2005 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you, welcome to the second half-hour of DAYBREAK. From the Time Warner Center in New York, I'm Carol Costello, along with Chad Myers.
"Now in the News."
Would-be millennium bomber, Ahmed Ressam, will be sentenced this morning in Seattle, Washington. He was convicted of plotting to bomb Los Angeles International Airport on New Year's Eve 1999. He was caught with a trunk full of bomb-making materials at the U.S. border. The government is trying to put him away for 35 years.
A former top Homeland Security official will testify today that chemical plants in the United States are vulnerable targets for terrorists. He'll tell the Senate Homeland Security Committee the plants represent a grave risk to you because of weak governmental regulation.
A U.S. soldier has been killed in Afghanistan. The military says insurgents opened fire on his unit during a patrol.
And the world's largest passenger plane, the Airbus A380, took off from France about an hour ago on its maiden flight. It's been 11 years and $13 billion in the making. You know that thing is so big, Chad, it doesn't look like it would have gotten off the ground, but it did.
CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: I know. And I was watching it live, Carol, and I think the takeoff speed of that was about 80 miles per hour. I really want to find out what it was, because it didn't even look like it used more than about -- I think it used less than a mile of the runway and it was already in the air. It was really pretty phenomenal. I guess when you can park 70 cars on the wings, that's a lot of lift from those wings and you can take anything off if you get the wings big enough, I guess.
COSTELLO: It can seat up to 840 people.
MYERS: In two different layers. That's like a double-decker bus for the air.
COSTELLO: Crazy.
MYERS: Yes. Yes, well, it got off on the ground. It was a spectacular flight as it rotated up off the ground. It was really pretty fun to watch.
(WEATHER REPORT)
COSTELLO: Thank you -- Chad.
MYERS: You bet.
COSTELLO: Our top story this morning, the rise in global terrorism and controversy involving a report on terrorism. The State Department's annual report on global terrorism goes to Congress this week. And incidentally, the data for Iraq does not include attacks by insurgents on U.S. troops because they aren't considered international attacks.
Congressional aides briefed on the report say there were about 650 significant terrorist attacks in 2004 compared with 175 in 2003. Even those 175 attacks represented a 20-year high.
Congressman Henry Waxman has written Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice complaining the report will not include that data on significant terrorist attacks. Among nations and regions hit by the uptick in violence: Iraq and attacks on civilians there, Russia and that attack on the school in Beslan and the violence in Kashmir, a region claimed by both India and Pakistan.
The U.S. military says one source of that terrorism violence in Iraq is Abu Musab al-Zarqawi; and in February, they almost got him.
More now from CNN's senior Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): CNN has learned that these pictures of most wanted terrorist Abu Musab al- Zarqawi, first broadcast by CNN last month, came from a computer recovered in February by a U.S. special operations taskforce that nearly got Zarqawi himself.
GEN. RICHARD MYERS, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: We were close. And if you go much further into this, then you get into some of the operational methods, which we can't discuss.
MCINTYRE: But officials do tell CNN the U.S. was tipped off that Zarqawi was on his way to a meeting in Ramadi on February 20. His vehicle was under aerial surveillance from a predator spy plane, and checkpoints on the ground were set up to capture him.
After his truck turned to avoid a checkpoint, U.S. commandos ran it down only to find that Zarqawi apparently escaped. Two men, Zarqawi's driver and security guard, were seized, along with Zarqawi's computer, said to contain a treasure trove of intelligence, including evidence which U.S. officials say reinforces the belief Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden are cooperating on some level.
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: It may be people, may be money, may be communications, may be an oath of allegiance. Who knows?
MYERS: Instructions.
RUMSFELD: Yes. But are probably not detailed instructions,...
MYERS: No.
RUMSFELD: ... but a broad direction.
MYERS: Just broad...
RUMSFELD: Yes.
MCINTYRE: Intelligence in Iraq is getting better, Rumsfeld and Myers say, citing, as an example, the quick roundup of 10 suspects following the shoot-down of a civilian helicopter last week. So despite a recent upsurge in deadly attacks in Iraq, the Pentagon's top general remains optimistic.
MYERS: I'm going to say this: I think we are winning. OK? I think we're definitely winning. I think we've been winning for some time.
MCINTYRE (on camera): The Pentagon admits that judging solely on the number of attacks, the insurgency seems as strong now as it was a year ago. But Rumsfeld and Myers insist that's the wrong measure. They argue Zarqawi is on the run, and that ultimately Iraq's security forces, which now number some 159,000, will be able to defeat the insurgents.
Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Some progress in going after the enemy here in the States. A prominent Washington-area Muslim cleric, pictured here in the middle, you're going to see it shortly, I hope. There he is. He's been convicted of urging his followers to go to Afghanistan and help the Taliban fight the U.S. military. Ali al-Tamimi's trial centered on a meeting he held just days after the September 11 attacks. Federal prosecutors say he faces a mandatory maximum sentence of life in prison.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL MCNULTY, U.S. ATTORNEY: Al-Tamimi was convicted on all counts today after a two-week trial that occurred in Alexandria, Virginia. It's a major victory in the war on terrorism. He counseled, solicited, encouraged young men to go overseas, receive terrorism training so that they could join up with the Taliban and fight American soldiers.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Al-Tamimi is free with electronic monitoring until his sentencing in July.
Stay tuned to CNN day and night for the most reliable news about your security.
Summer is just around the corner and kids are ready to get into the pool, but that can be a dangerous combination. We'll show you ways to protect your children.
And chaos in New York when a taxi driver loses control. It was a nightmare for his pregnant passenger. We'll have the amazing details just ahead.
But first, here's a look at what else is making news this Wednesday morning.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: You're never too young to learn how to swim. It's a lesson many parents are taking to heart in the wake of a tragedy in eastern Georgia. Autopsies show a 2-year-old girl and her 3-year-old brother drowned in a pond near their home. But does that mean you should keep your kids away from the water? Federal officials say no.
CNN's John Zarrella has more from Miami.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Not long ago, 4- and-a-half-year-old Abi Stein (ph) climbed the backyard pool fence for a ball and fell in the water. His mother had left him alone for just a minute.
MRS. STEIN, ABI STEIN'S MOTHER: Luckily he learned the skills here, and when I found him, he was at the pool's edge already.
ZARRELLA: Abi had taken a children's swim program called Aqua Child. It teaches kids to get on their backs, float, catch their breath and swim to the edge when they fall into the water.
With summer upon us, the National Safe Kids Campaign is urging parents to actively supervise their young children. A Safe Kids study analyzed 490 cases of children who drowned during a two-year period. Shockingly, 9 of 10 were being supervised at the time. Safe Kids found parents are not always focused.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They talked about some alarmingly distracting behaviors, including talking on the cell phone, talking to friends, eating, reading and some even admitted to closing their eyes and relaxing while they were watching the kids around the pool or the lake.
ZARRELLA: Safe Kids recommends layers of protection: fencing around the pool, active supervision, wearing personal flotation devices and swimming lessons.
Savannah Ruby (ph) was not a happy camper at her first Aqua Child swim lesson. But halfway through the six-week program, she's coming along swimmingly. The instructor, Scott Lawner (ph), says the course is tough love. Kids cry a lot, but he says the parents understand it's worth it.
SCOTT LAWNER, INSTRUCTOR: I said to her, I go, ma'am, I'm really sorry that he hasn't stopped crying. And she said well I'd rather him cry here six weeks than me cry the rest of my life if he drowned.
ZARRELLA: Safe Kids cautions a parent's responsibility doesn't change just because a child had swim lessons. Active supervision is still the best protection.
John Zarrella, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Your news, money, weather and sports. It's 5:45 Eastern. Here's what's all new this morning.
A former top Homeland Security official will testify today that chemical plants in the United States are vulnerable targets for terrorists. He'll be testifying before the Senate Homeland Security Committee.
Another girl has apparently been abducted in Florida. Police have issued an Amber Alert for 12-year-old Margarita Aguilar-Lopez. She was last seen at a Tampa-area motel with a man who may be driving a red van.
In money news, Apple Computer is retaliating against the John Wiley & Sons publishing house. Wiley is refusing to stop the release of an unauthorized biography of Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs, so Apple's stores will no longer carry Wiley's books.
In culture, Ronald Reagan's handwritten diaries of his eight years in the White House will be published as a book next year. That's according to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Foundation and Harper Collins Publishers.
In sports, the people who run the Wimbledon tennis tournament are raising the amount of prize money to $20 million, but the men's champion will be earning $50,000 more than the women. Which makes no sense to me, because women's tennis is so much more exciting to watch -- Chad.
Chad.
MYERS: Carol.
COSTELLO: Did you hear what I just said?
MYERS: I did, and I said sure but my mike wasn't on.
COSTELLO: OK.
MYERS: They didn't queue me up there, so, but anyway.
(WEATHER REPORT)
Back to you.
COSTELLO: Actually, we were talking about women's tennis and how much more fun it is to watch with our three male crew members.
Thank you -- Chad.
MYERS: You're welcome.
COSTELLO: Yes. Those are the headlines for you this morning.
On with the news now, shall we?
A chain reaction nightmare for a pregnant woman. She was a passenger in this New York City cab, which was reduced to a mass of twisted metal, as you can see, after police say the driver set off a chain reaction crash in Times Square. The woman delivered her baby a month early. The mother is now in critical condition, along with the taxi driver and a pedestrian.
It all started when the cab collided with a station wagon, which then hit a pedestrian. Witnesses say the cab then drove around the station wagon to escape the accident and struck the same pedestrian again and then he hit several more cars.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was just a flash, so he hit everybody. I was standing right in front of the chain of reaction of the other cabs up there were just crunch, crunch, crunch.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Instead of stopping, he just kept on going really fast.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was speeding like lightning, but there was so much traffic, I don't know where he was trying to go.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Of course that taxi driver could face criminal charges. He's still in the hospital.
We take you "Beyond the Soundbite" this morning with more on this harrowing story. A trauma doctor updates us on the conditions of the driver, the passenger and her baby.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. MAURIZIO MIGLIETTA, BELLEVUE HOSPITAL: We expect him to do well, but he is still not out of the woods completely and the next 24, 48 hours will be significant to determine his prognosis. There is family at the bedside. I met with his son, and I believe he has a brother, and we're keeping them informed. We do expect him to survive, but he certainly will have some challenges in the immediate future.
The passenger of the cab, who is a young female, who, unfortunate, is eight-months pregnant and suffered some significant injuries herself. These injuries include two fractures of her cervical spine. Fortunately, she has no neurological deficit, meaning she's not paralyzed from this at this point. She had an injury to her esophagus, that she ruptured her esophagus from the blunt injury being in the back of the cab. This is a potentially life-threatening condition.
And given the concern for the baby, she was starting to have contractions yesterday afternoon into the evening. So in conjunction with our OB/GYN colleagues, she successfully delivered a baby via cesarean section last night. And the baby is doing well, at this point, and did not seem to suffer any consequence of the accident.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: The woman was on her way home from a doctor's check up when the crash happened.
A Hollywood starlet is stirring up controversy. Coming up in 10 minutes, Maggie Gyllenhaal's comments about 9/11 have some people in an uproar.
This is DAYBREAK.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: We are getting a lot of e-mail this morning -- Chad.
MYERS: Some very funny.
COSTELLO: Some very funny. Let's put the question up again so you can speak French again, because I'm enjoying that this morning.
MYERS: Great.
COSTELLO: The question is France: why can't we be friends? Or -- Chad.
MYERS: LaFrance: Pourquoi ne nous pouvons pas etre amis?
COSTELLO: Beautiful. Do you have e-mails, because I don't have -- I mean I haven't taken any off my computer yet, so take it away.
MYERS: Mary (ph) from Los Angels says how can we be friends with a country that gave us mimes?
Lauren (ph) from Los Angeles, I found that the French have kind of a love-hate relationship with America. They love our spirit, they love our movies and our blue jeans, but the French are proud of their history and culture and I think they resent that a country so relatively young, like the U.S., should hold such a prominent place in the world.
And also now from John (ph) in Toronto. Canada is a bilingual country with a long history of the English speaking and the French speaking not being so compatible. Therefore, Americans should not take the French animosity personally. I understand why the French are called arrogant. I don't understand French, but I've been to France several times.
COSTELLO: I understand.
This is from Sonny (ph) from Minneapolis. Let's see, because they resent us and we hate wimps. They're very opinionated on all issues, but couldn't defend themselves from a strong wind.
OK, we're doing this tongue and cheek.
MYERS: Right.
COSTELLO: I think we need to take a break.
MYERS: Not trying to solve the world's problems here.
COSTELLO: Exactly.
We're going to take a break. We'll be back with more.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: Entertainment headlines for you this morning.
The band Motley Crue is joining efforts to find a missing Baltimore woman. The woman has been missing since March 6 when she was supposed to meet friends at the band's show in Washington. Motley Crue is matching the $10,000 reward already offered in the case.
MasterCard is hoping Clay Aiken will help sell debit cards. They're putting his mug on prepaid cards. It's an effort to cash in on his legion of fans called Claymaniacs. However, many posters on his fan Web site think it's a bad idea and could lead to a backlash against the former "American Idol" runner-up.
Some pricey photos of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie will be hitting newsstands soon. The magazine, "US Weekly," reportedly paid half a million dollars for pictures of the couple on a beach in Africa. But the pictures apparently don't show the two in any romantic embraces. I've seen them, actually. We can't use them for legal reasons, but I've seen them. It doesn't show anything. They don't show anything.
Angry fans, that's what actress Maggie Gyllenhaal is facing these days. Why the uproar?
As our David Haffenreffer reports, it all comes down to just a few words.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MAGGIE GYLLENHAAL, ACTRESS: Because I think America has done reprehensible things and is responsible in some way.
DAVID HAFFENREFFER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Those 13 words sent sparks of scathing criticism against actress Maggie Gyllenhaal.
GYLLENHAAL: I'm realizing we may not be able to help contribute to your upcoming event. I'm really sorry.
HAFFENREFFER: She made the remarks at a screening of her new movie, "The Great New Wonderful," which tells the story of five New Yorkers living in the aftermath of 9/11.
GYLLENHAAL: For me to want to be involved in a project that includes 9/11, I think you also have to think about how America has affected the world, too, and how the world affects America.
HAFFENREFFER: It certainly affected her fan base. A Web site devoted to Gyllenhaal was flooded with angry comments. It was so bad they took the comment section off the Web site with this statement. "It's sad to see it's come to this and whether you think she's right or wrong, she has every right to voice her opinion, as do you. If you don't like Maggie -- then don't waste your time on this site."
And Maggie herself posted a response saying that she grieved, along with every American, over September 11, and -- quote -- "it is always useful, as individuals or nations, to ask how we may have knowingly or unknowingly contributed to this conflict. Not to have the courage to ask these questions of ourselves is to betray the victims of 9/11."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: You can get more entertainment every night on "ShowBiz Tonight." That's at 7:00 p.m. Eastern on Headline News.
And the next hour of DAYBREAK starts right now.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired April 27, 2005 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you, welcome to the second half-hour of DAYBREAK. From the Time Warner Center in New York, I'm Carol Costello, along with Chad Myers.
"Now in the News."
Would-be millennium bomber, Ahmed Ressam, will be sentenced this morning in Seattle, Washington. He was convicted of plotting to bomb Los Angeles International Airport on New Year's Eve 1999. He was caught with a trunk full of bomb-making materials at the U.S. border. The government is trying to put him away for 35 years.
A former top Homeland Security official will testify today that chemical plants in the United States are vulnerable targets for terrorists. He'll tell the Senate Homeland Security Committee the plants represent a grave risk to you because of weak governmental regulation.
A U.S. soldier has been killed in Afghanistan. The military says insurgents opened fire on his unit during a patrol.
And the world's largest passenger plane, the Airbus A380, took off from France about an hour ago on its maiden flight. It's been 11 years and $13 billion in the making. You know that thing is so big, Chad, it doesn't look like it would have gotten off the ground, but it did.
CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: I know. And I was watching it live, Carol, and I think the takeoff speed of that was about 80 miles per hour. I really want to find out what it was, because it didn't even look like it used more than about -- I think it used less than a mile of the runway and it was already in the air. It was really pretty phenomenal. I guess when you can park 70 cars on the wings, that's a lot of lift from those wings and you can take anything off if you get the wings big enough, I guess.
COSTELLO: It can seat up to 840 people.
MYERS: In two different layers. That's like a double-decker bus for the air.
COSTELLO: Crazy.
MYERS: Yes. Yes, well, it got off on the ground. It was a spectacular flight as it rotated up off the ground. It was really pretty fun to watch.
(WEATHER REPORT)
COSTELLO: Thank you -- Chad.
MYERS: You bet.
COSTELLO: Our top story this morning, the rise in global terrorism and controversy involving a report on terrorism. The State Department's annual report on global terrorism goes to Congress this week. And incidentally, the data for Iraq does not include attacks by insurgents on U.S. troops because they aren't considered international attacks.
Congressional aides briefed on the report say there were about 650 significant terrorist attacks in 2004 compared with 175 in 2003. Even those 175 attacks represented a 20-year high.
Congressman Henry Waxman has written Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice complaining the report will not include that data on significant terrorist attacks. Among nations and regions hit by the uptick in violence: Iraq and attacks on civilians there, Russia and that attack on the school in Beslan and the violence in Kashmir, a region claimed by both India and Pakistan.
The U.S. military says one source of that terrorism violence in Iraq is Abu Musab al-Zarqawi; and in February, they almost got him.
More now from CNN's senior Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): CNN has learned that these pictures of most wanted terrorist Abu Musab al- Zarqawi, first broadcast by CNN last month, came from a computer recovered in February by a U.S. special operations taskforce that nearly got Zarqawi himself.
GEN. RICHARD MYERS, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: We were close. And if you go much further into this, then you get into some of the operational methods, which we can't discuss.
MCINTYRE: But officials do tell CNN the U.S. was tipped off that Zarqawi was on his way to a meeting in Ramadi on February 20. His vehicle was under aerial surveillance from a predator spy plane, and checkpoints on the ground were set up to capture him.
After his truck turned to avoid a checkpoint, U.S. commandos ran it down only to find that Zarqawi apparently escaped. Two men, Zarqawi's driver and security guard, were seized, along with Zarqawi's computer, said to contain a treasure trove of intelligence, including evidence which U.S. officials say reinforces the belief Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden are cooperating on some level.
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: It may be people, may be money, may be communications, may be an oath of allegiance. Who knows?
MYERS: Instructions.
RUMSFELD: Yes. But are probably not detailed instructions,...
MYERS: No.
RUMSFELD: ... but a broad direction.
MYERS: Just broad...
RUMSFELD: Yes.
MCINTYRE: Intelligence in Iraq is getting better, Rumsfeld and Myers say, citing, as an example, the quick roundup of 10 suspects following the shoot-down of a civilian helicopter last week. So despite a recent upsurge in deadly attacks in Iraq, the Pentagon's top general remains optimistic.
MYERS: I'm going to say this: I think we are winning. OK? I think we're definitely winning. I think we've been winning for some time.
MCINTYRE (on camera): The Pentagon admits that judging solely on the number of attacks, the insurgency seems as strong now as it was a year ago. But Rumsfeld and Myers insist that's the wrong measure. They argue Zarqawi is on the run, and that ultimately Iraq's security forces, which now number some 159,000, will be able to defeat the insurgents.
Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Some progress in going after the enemy here in the States. A prominent Washington-area Muslim cleric, pictured here in the middle, you're going to see it shortly, I hope. There he is. He's been convicted of urging his followers to go to Afghanistan and help the Taliban fight the U.S. military. Ali al-Tamimi's trial centered on a meeting he held just days after the September 11 attacks. Federal prosecutors say he faces a mandatory maximum sentence of life in prison.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL MCNULTY, U.S. ATTORNEY: Al-Tamimi was convicted on all counts today after a two-week trial that occurred in Alexandria, Virginia. It's a major victory in the war on terrorism. He counseled, solicited, encouraged young men to go overseas, receive terrorism training so that they could join up with the Taliban and fight American soldiers.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Al-Tamimi is free with electronic monitoring until his sentencing in July.
Stay tuned to CNN day and night for the most reliable news about your security.
Summer is just around the corner and kids are ready to get into the pool, but that can be a dangerous combination. We'll show you ways to protect your children.
And chaos in New York when a taxi driver loses control. It was a nightmare for his pregnant passenger. We'll have the amazing details just ahead.
But first, here's a look at what else is making news this Wednesday morning.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: You're never too young to learn how to swim. It's a lesson many parents are taking to heart in the wake of a tragedy in eastern Georgia. Autopsies show a 2-year-old girl and her 3-year-old brother drowned in a pond near their home. But does that mean you should keep your kids away from the water? Federal officials say no.
CNN's John Zarrella has more from Miami.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Not long ago, 4- and-a-half-year-old Abi Stein (ph) climbed the backyard pool fence for a ball and fell in the water. His mother had left him alone for just a minute.
MRS. STEIN, ABI STEIN'S MOTHER: Luckily he learned the skills here, and when I found him, he was at the pool's edge already.
ZARRELLA: Abi had taken a children's swim program called Aqua Child. It teaches kids to get on their backs, float, catch their breath and swim to the edge when they fall into the water.
With summer upon us, the National Safe Kids Campaign is urging parents to actively supervise their young children. A Safe Kids study analyzed 490 cases of children who drowned during a two-year period. Shockingly, 9 of 10 were being supervised at the time. Safe Kids found parents are not always focused.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They talked about some alarmingly distracting behaviors, including talking on the cell phone, talking to friends, eating, reading and some even admitted to closing their eyes and relaxing while they were watching the kids around the pool or the lake.
ZARRELLA: Safe Kids recommends layers of protection: fencing around the pool, active supervision, wearing personal flotation devices and swimming lessons.
Savannah Ruby (ph) was not a happy camper at her first Aqua Child swim lesson. But halfway through the six-week program, she's coming along swimmingly. The instructor, Scott Lawner (ph), says the course is tough love. Kids cry a lot, but he says the parents understand it's worth it.
SCOTT LAWNER, INSTRUCTOR: I said to her, I go, ma'am, I'm really sorry that he hasn't stopped crying. And she said well I'd rather him cry here six weeks than me cry the rest of my life if he drowned.
ZARRELLA: Safe Kids cautions a parent's responsibility doesn't change just because a child had swim lessons. Active supervision is still the best protection.
John Zarrella, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Your news, money, weather and sports. It's 5:45 Eastern. Here's what's all new this morning.
A former top Homeland Security official will testify today that chemical plants in the United States are vulnerable targets for terrorists. He'll be testifying before the Senate Homeland Security Committee.
Another girl has apparently been abducted in Florida. Police have issued an Amber Alert for 12-year-old Margarita Aguilar-Lopez. She was last seen at a Tampa-area motel with a man who may be driving a red van.
In money news, Apple Computer is retaliating against the John Wiley & Sons publishing house. Wiley is refusing to stop the release of an unauthorized biography of Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs, so Apple's stores will no longer carry Wiley's books.
In culture, Ronald Reagan's handwritten diaries of his eight years in the White House will be published as a book next year. That's according to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Foundation and Harper Collins Publishers.
In sports, the people who run the Wimbledon tennis tournament are raising the amount of prize money to $20 million, but the men's champion will be earning $50,000 more than the women. Which makes no sense to me, because women's tennis is so much more exciting to watch -- Chad.
Chad.
MYERS: Carol.
COSTELLO: Did you hear what I just said?
MYERS: I did, and I said sure but my mike wasn't on.
COSTELLO: OK.
MYERS: They didn't queue me up there, so, but anyway.
(WEATHER REPORT)
Back to you.
COSTELLO: Actually, we were talking about women's tennis and how much more fun it is to watch with our three male crew members.
Thank you -- Chad.
MYERS: You're welcome.
COSTELLO: Yes. Those are the headlines for you this morning.
On with the news now, shall we?
A chain reaction nightmare for a pregnant woman. She was a passenger in this New York City cab, which was reduced to a mass of twisted metal, as you can see, after police say the driver set off a chain reaction crash in Times Square. The woman delivered her baby a month early. The mother is now in critical condition, along with the taxi driver and a pedestrian.
It all started when the cab collided with a station wagon, which then hit a pedestrian. Witnesses say the cab then drove around the station wagon to escape the accident and struck the same pedestrian again and then he hit several more cars.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was just a flash, so he hit everybody. I was standing right in front of the chain of reaction of the other cabs up there were just crunch, crunch, crunch.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Instead of stopping, he just kept on going really fast.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was speeding like lightning, but there was so much traffic, I don't know where he was trying to go.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Of course that taxi driver could face criminal charges. He's still in the hospital.
We take you "Beyond the Soundbite" this morning with more on this harrowing story. A trauma doctor updates us on the conditions of the driver, the passenger and her baby.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. MAURIZIO MIGLIETTA, BELLEVUE HOSPITAL: We expect him to do well, but he is still not out of the woods completely and the next 24, 48 hours will be significant to determine his prognosis. There is family at the bedside. I met with his son, and I believe he has a brother, and we're keeping them informed. We do expect him to survive, but he certainly will have some challenges in the immediate future.
The passenger of the cab, who is a young female, who, unfortunate, is eight-months pregnant and suffered some significant injuries herself. These injuries include two fractures of her cervical spine. Fortunately, she has no neurological deficit, meaning she's not paralyzed from this at this point. She had an injury to her esophagus, that she ruptured her esophagus from the blunt injury being in the back of the cab. This is a potentially life-threatening condition.
And given the concern for the baby, she was starting to have contractions yesterday afternoon into the evening. So in conjunction with our OB/GYN colleagues, she successfully delivered a baby via cesarean section last night. And the baby is doing well, at this point, and did not seem to suffer any consequence of the accident.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: The woman was on her way home from a doctor's check up when the crash happened.
A Hollywood starlet is stirring up controversy. Coming up in 10 minutes, Maggie Gyllenhaal's comments about 9/11 have some people in an uproar.
This is DAYBREAK.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: We are getting a lot of e-mail this morning -- Chad.
MYERS: Some very funny.
COSTELLO: Some very funny. Let's put the question up again so you can speak French again, because I'm enjoying that this morning.
MYERS: Great.
COSTELLO: The question is France: why can't we be friends? Or -- Chad.
MYERS: LaFrance: Pourquoi ne nous pouvons pas etre amis?
COSTELLO: Beautiful. Do you have e-mails, because I don't have -- I mean I haven't taken any off my computer yet, so take it away.
MYERS: Mary (ph) from Los Angels says how can we be friends with a country that gave us mimes?
Lauren (ph) from Los Angeles, I found that the French have kind of a love-hate relationship with America. They love our spirit, they love our movies and our blue jeans, but the French are proud of their history and culture and I think they resent that a country so relatively young, like the U.S., should hold such a prominent place in the world.
And also now from John (ph) in Toronto. Canada is a bilingual country with a long history of the English speaking and the French speaking not being so compatible. Therefore, Americans should not take the French animosity personally. I understand why the French are called arrogant. I don't understand French, but I've been to France several times.
COSTELLO: I understand.
This is from Sonny (ph) from Minneapolis. Let's see, because they resent us and we hate wimps. They're very opinionated on all issues, but couldn't defend themselves from a strong wind.
OK, we're doing this tongue and cheek.
MYERS: Right.
COSTELLO: I think we need to take a break.
MYERS: Not trying to solve the world's problems here.
COSTELLO: Exactly.
We're going to take a break. We'll be back with more.
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COSTELLO: Entertainment headlines for you this morning.
The band Motley Crue is joining efforts to find a missing Baltimore woman. The woman has been missing since March 6 when she was supposed to meet friends at the band's show in Washington. Motley Crue is matching the $10,000 reward already offered in the case.
MasterCard is hoping Clay Aiken will help sell debit cards. They're putting his mug on prepaid cards. It's an effort to cash in on his legion of fans called Claymaniacs. However, many posters on his fan Web site think it's a bad idea and could lead to a backlash against the former "American Idol" runner-up.
Some pricey photos of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie will be hitting newsstands soon. The magazine, "US Weekly," reportedly paid half a million dollars for pictures of the couple on a beach in Africa. But the pictures apparently don't show the two in any romantic embraces. I've seen them, actually. We can't use them for legal reasons, but I've seen them. It doesn't show anything. They don't show anything.
Angry fans, that's what actress Maggie Gyllenhaal is facing these days. Why the uproar?
As our David Haffenreffer reports, it all comes down to just a few words.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MAGGIE GYLLENHAAL, ACTRESS: Because I think America has done reprehensible things and is responsible in some way.
DAVID HAFFENREFFER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Those 13 words sent sparks of scathing criticism against actress Maggie Gyllenhaal.
GYLLENHAAL: I'm realizing we may not be able to help contribute to your upcoming event. I'm really sorry.
HAFFENREFFER: She made the remarks at a screening of her new movie, "The Great New Wonderful," which tells the story of five New Yorkers living in the aftermath of 9/11.
GYLLENHAAL: For me to want to be involved in a project that includes 9/11, I think you also have to think about how America has affected the world, too, and how the world affects America.
HAFFENREFFER: It certainly affected her fan base. A Web site devoted to Gyllenhaal was flooded with angry comments. It was so bad they took the comment section off the Web site with this statement. "It's sad to see it's come to this and whether you think she's right or wrong, she has every right to voice her opinion, as do you. If you don't like Maggie -- then don't waste your time on this site."
And Maggie herself posted a response saying that she grieved, along with every American, over September 11, and -- quote -- "it is always useful, as individuals or nations, to ask how we may have knowingly or unknowingly contributed to this conflict. Not to have the courage to ask these questions of ourselves is to betray the victims of 9/11."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: You can get more entertainment every night on "ShowBiz Tonight." That's at 7:00 p.m. Eastern on Headline News.
And the next hour of DAYBREAK starts right now.
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