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Live From...
Inside the Struggle to Restore Order in Iraq
Aired March 19, 2004 - 14:30 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.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Well, welcome back. From the CNN Center in Atlanta, this is LIVE FROM... I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Here's what's happening this half hour.
Rebuilding a year after the war began and in the middle of continuing violence. We'll take you inside the struggle to restore order in Iraq.
And crushed under a ton of building material, a little boy defies the odds and amazes his doctors. But first here's a look at the top stories.
Terrorists. For a fourth day Pakistani troops and suspected al Qaeda are fighting it out at this remote, heavily-fortified compound. Inside is thought to be Osama bin Laden's most trusted lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahiri but that's anything but certain.
Memories of a year ago. A senior military official says three rockets may have hit the Green Zone which is where the U.S.-led coalition is headquartered. So far though, no word of any casualties or damage.
A day of deliverance. That's how President Bush today referred to the invasion of Iraq a year ago. Speaking to dozens of diplomats, he defended the U.S.-led attack saying it has made the world safer. He also called for unity in the war on terror.
Day two of deliberations. Jurors in the Tyco trial ask and receive explanation of certain terms including criminal intent and good faith. Two former executives, Dennis Kozlowski and Mark Swartz, are accused of looting for man $600 million from the company.
It's tit-for-tat in the race for the White House. The Republican National Committee is going after John Kerry over controversial comments he made at a campaign event. Kerry said certain world leaders had told him privately they would like to see him replace Bush in the White House.
A new ad e-mailed to GOP supporters pokes fun at Kerry's refusal to name names.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Allow myself to introduce myself.
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have had conversations with leaders.
I've also had friends of mine who have met with leaders.
And I'm not going to betray the confidences of those conversations.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Need the info.
KERRY: I think there ought to be some investigation of it. I have a very close friend in Massachusetts who talked directly to people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: The DNC is hitting back with a Web video of its own. The spot takes aim at the rising federal budget deficit.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We can balance the budget in the year 2005.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That sounds like a lot of hot air to me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look out. It's going to blow.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fact, Bush cuts key education programs by 27 percent.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Kerry is chasing President Bush in the fund raising contest. It's estimated the Bush campaign has already raised as much as $170 million. Kerry, playing catchup, is planning a 20-city fund raising tour.
A year after the first bombs fell on Baghdad, a change in mission for the coalition forces. While troops still find themselves under attack, they also find themselves in demand as peacekeepers and as good Samaritans. CNN's Jane Arraf brings us a firsthand look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): In the darkness the tension of a raid just days before these soldiers are due to go home. Their sector, al Rashid, was one of the toughest in Baghdad. A year after the war, it's calmer. But the 1st Armored Division Artillery is still fighting an insurgency here.
This dawn raid was to arrest a chef (ph) suspected of murdering an Iraqi policeman. The suspect was actually licensed by the U.S. civilian coalition to carry a gun. That was before the coalition realized had he worked for Saddam Hussein.
(on camera): These are the same soldiers who are trying to help reconstruct this country but this morning they're tearing things apart trying to find weapons.
(voice-over): Increasingly the U.S. military says the Iraqi security forces are helping find those weapons. And find the insurgents using them.
This meeting, colonel to colonel. Iraqi to American. The discussion about two recent attacks, including the killing of a Sunni imam in the sector. Local mosques want armed guards. Colonel Jonathan Brockman (ph) is firm.
Even as the meeting is underway, soldiers have found a homemade bomb near where another imam was attacked. The bottom is hidden in a dead dog and the soldiers suspect there might it be another on the road.
About an hour later, a very different mission. On one of the main business streets, the Army is building a market for vendors. Here silence and wary looks eventually give way to complaints that some Iraqi businessmen are making money from the project. One officer imparts some American wisdom.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Competition is good.
ARRAF: On the other side of town, this mostly Shi'a area was one of the poorest and most depressed of Baghdad under shame. It's still desperately poor. Garbage fills the street, there's no sewage system. But as Lieutenant Colonel Michael Calvert and his men drive through the streets here, there's a very different feeling from most Baghdad neighborhoods.
Although they still occasionally find homemade bombs and suspected insurgents, it's safe enough to drive in vehicles without doors and jump out to break up traffic jams.
As in other neighborhoods, the military plays a role in local democracy. This meeting of neighborhood women held in a former Iraqi air force center is discussing what to could about the sewage.
The military says it's trying to encourage Iraqis to solve their own problems. But it's on the streets where the 1st Squadron of the 2nd Armed Cavalry Regiment has spent the most effort.
The soldiers have made a point of waving at everyone. It they don't get a wave back they're supposed to stop to see to if there are problems. When the problem is as simple as a stalled car, they get out to help.
It seems to help make friends in this neighborhood.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's your name?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My name is Calvert (ph).
ARRAF: In between the bad, one year in, there is much good.
Jane Arraf, CNN, Baghdad. (END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: Well, the online auction site eBay is now posting a growing number of items that were reported to have come from Saddam Hussein's palaces. One U.S. soldier was selling a rug he claims to have brought home. Another was peddling silverware. A spokesman for the U.S. Central Command says soldiers are not supposed to bring such back war trophies but individual commanders decide how strictly those rules are enforced.
A gorilla escapes and goes on a rampage at the Dallas Zoo. A 3- year-old was one of the victims. We'll update that for you coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: A view from above.
Well, four people including a 3-year-old child are recovering today after a gorilla attack at a Dallas zoo. The 300-pound primate broke out of his cage yesterday causing complete chaos. Before the rampage ended, the animal attacked four people. One of the victims described the attack on CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEISHA HEARD, ATTACKED BY GORILLA: I can pretty much remember most of it in bits and pieces. So I can pretty much remember -- I pretty much remember everything. It's just some of it after he actually bit my leg, it's a little bit blurred. I just can remember him grabbing my son for the second time and us getting out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Well, after a half hour chase officers fired three shots killing the 13-year-old gorilla named Jabari. Officials say they feared it would escape the zoo complex all together.
Now to the story of another survivor. A New York boy crushed under construction materials fights the odds and lives. Here's CNN's Deborah Feyerick.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Two and a half years ago, when he was 12-years-old, Stephen LoPresti was crushed under 1,000 pounds of drywall. Rushed to the hospital, had he one thing on his mind.
STEPHEN LOPRESTI, ACCIDENT SURVIVOR: I was really thirsty. That's all I wanted, something to drink.
FEYERICK: The reason as doctors and surgeons would soon learn. Except for his heart, all of his organs had been crushed.
DR. FRANK MAFFEI, GOLISANO CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL: Every single organ system at one point or another and sometimes simultaneously were severely dysfunctional or entirely failed.
FEYERICK: Doctors Frank Maffei and Karen Powers gave Stephen a 2 percent chance of surviving.
MAFFEI: Certainly this was the most serious I have ever seen.
FEYERICK: Stephen was bleeding badly and doctors couldn't find the source. They gave his family two choices.
DR. KAREN POWERS, GOLISANO CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL: One, to keep Stephen comfortable, allowing him to die knowing that he would probably die by bleeding to death. Or we could go back to the operating room and try very, very drastic measure.
FEYERICK: Surgeons would have to remove all his intestines.
(on camera): That's not the thing that's usually put on the table. So that's how serious it was? They were willing to basically go for broke.
POWERS: Absolutely.
FEYERICK, (voice-over): His mom, Stephanie, a single parent, decided to risk it all to save her only child.
STEPHANIE LOPRESTI, STEPHEN'S MOM: So I can't even imagine my life without my son.
FEYERICK: She prayed like never before. And during surgery, doctors finally found and stopped the bleeding without the drastic procedure.
STEPHEN LOPRESTI: God made me live for a reason.
STEPHANIE LOPRESTI: He has a plan for you.
STEPHEN LOPRESTI: Yes, he has a plan for me. He's got a plan for me in the future. So I'm just living and trying to figure out what that plan is.
FEYERICK: Deborah Feyerick, CNN, Rochester, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: She survived years of controversy as the wife of Jim Bakker. Now Tammy Faye Messner is in for the fight of her life. She announced she has inoperable lung cancer on "LARRY KING LIVE."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TAMMY FAYE MESSNER, TELEVANGELIST: I'm scared, but that's not wrong to be scared. It's OK. God knows I'm scared and he understands that. I don't like what's happening to me. The other day I was laying in a tanning bed and I was crying out to God, I hate what I'm going through. I hate this. I hate this. I'm so scared. What am I going to do? And the thing that bothers you, Larry, when you find out that you have an illness that could be terminal is you always think everything's the last time. And I've got to really make my mind to not think that because when I came here, I thought maybe it's the last time I'll do Larry King.
When I took the Christmas tree out this year, and there (UNINTELLIGIBLE) I didn't know if I had cancer or not, the first thing I thought, maybe this is the last time I'll take the tree out of the attic and maybe this is the last time I'll put it up.
So you have to guard your mind and constantly say, you know, it could be anyone's last time, not just mine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Well, Larry sits down with U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld tonight. He'll assess progress in Iraq an a year after the war began on "LARRY KING LIVE" at 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time.
Outside Los Angeles a small college is in shock over a possible hate crime hoax involving a visiting professor. Police the professor may have stage the crime herself, police say. CNN's Donna Tatro reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KERRI F. DUNN, ALLEGED VICTIM OF HATE CRIME: This was a well- planned out act of terrorism.
DONNA TATRO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): She led thousands of students at Claremont McKenna College in a protest against racism that shut down the school after claiming she was a target of a hate crime. But now this visiting professor, Kerri Dunn, is being investigated for setting the whole thing up.
According to police, she vandalized her own car and spray painted it with racial anti-Semitic and sexual epithets.
LT. STAN VAN HORN, CLAREMONT POLICE: Eye witnesses saw her doing that at public parking lot at Claremont McKenna College.
TATRO: Students rallied behind Dunn. But now this latest twist has some wondering.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's very devastating.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's just really sad.
TATRO: But Dunn isn't admitting to anything. Her attorney has put out a news release saying, "The police statement is irresponsible and has irreparably damaged her reputation and emotional health."
College President Pamela Gann says Dunn is innocent until proven guilty and hopes the allegations are not true. PAMELA GANN, PRES. CLAREMONT MCKENNA COLLEGE: We have to uphold the highest possible ethical values, and if she did this, she would have breached all of the community values that she have.
TATRO: Dunn is still under contract as a psychology instructor at this college of 5,000 outside Los Angeles while the district attorney decides whether to file criminal charges.
Donna Tatro for CNN, Claremont, California.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Well, here at CNN we know Wolf Blitzer is one of the hardest working journalist in the business. So what happened here?
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DONALD TRUMP, BUSINESSMAN: Wolf, I don't like the job you're doing. You are fired.
BLITZER: You're fired.
TRUMP: Whew.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Back at you. Careful how you use those words. Donald Trump is seeking trademark protection for the catch phrase "You're fired" from his hit TV show. We're fired up about Wolf's interview with Trump at 5 p.m. Eastern, 2:00 Pacific.
(MARKET UPDATE)
WHITFIELD: Well CNN broke the news of al Qaeda's No. 2 possibly being surrounded in Pakistan. Ahead in hour next hour, how the world is reacting to this on Arabic Web sites.
Plus, President Bush drums up support for the global war on terror as America marks one year in Iraq.
And later, a master of news parody makes news of his own. All ahead on LIVE FROM...
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(LAUGHTER)
WHITFIELD: Kind of contagious, isn't it? When that sound track was released in 1922, it was so popular it, went through several reprints. The laughing record now is one of 50 recordings being saved for posterity this year by the Library of Congress. Here's another one that might sound a little more familiar to you. (MUSIC -- "MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB")
WHITFIELD: You've heard that a few times. That one is from a 1917 recording that went with a children's publication called "Bubble Book."
Here's a sampling of some of the other recordings beings saved this year, Lead Belly's 1933 rendition of "Good Night, Irene," The 1941 World Series which pitted the New York Yankees against the Brooklyn Dodgers, and the Beatles also make it in, and Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run" was deemed significant enough to save. The Library of Congress is taking nominations for next year's list.
Well the children are the future, and CNN's "LOU DOBBS TONIGHT" is taking a special look at some entrepreneurial kids in the series "America's Bright Future." CNN's John King has the story of a teen whose heavenly hats the give hope to cancer patients.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN KING, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Anthony Leanna looks and sounds like any other 13-year-old, paying attention to language arts at Bay View Middle school in Suamico, Wisconsin outside Green Bay. But Anthony is hardly typical.
After school, Anthony spends his time opening up boxes filled with hats he has received from companies and individuals just to repackage them to send to cancer patients who have lost their hair.
ANTHONY LEANNA, FOUNDER, HEAVENLY HATS: I know I'm putting smiles on people's faces and the only way to achieve your goal is to put effort into it. Without effort, you can't achieve anything.
KING: He came up with the idea called heavenly Hats at the age of nine when his grandmother was diagnosed with breast cancer.
LEANNA: She had not lost her hair during chemo or anything, but my mom had showed me all the people who had lost their hair due to cancer treatment such as chemotherapy. And I decided to put a smile on their face by giving their hat to cover up what they had lost.
KING: And smiles is what he got from this cancer survivor.
KATHY EISENCHINX, HEAVENLY HATS RECIPIENT: Because when you're going through the chemo and radiation, you're not feeling well. And you really, you just -- you don't feel like dressing up and putting on the heavier wig or whatever and those hats were a godsend.
KING: Anthony started by collecting a few hundred has the from local stores to give to some nearby hospitals. But win a year and a half, the donations have exploded. He has received more than 25,000 has the and sends each one out individually to more than 100 hospitals nationwide, plus two hospitals overseas.
GLEN LEANNA, ANTHONY'S DAD: I would never imagine from what he started to begin with to where we're at today that he could ever start a program, that anyone could start a program to get this big.
KING: Now Heavenly Hats has taken over the Leanna's laundry room.
Anthony shrugs off the numerous awards he's received. His family says care and discipline are just his nature.
DARLENE CHARTIER, ANTHONY'S GRANDMA: Anthony always tells me, Grandma, you're my inspiration for this. But he's my inspiration.
KING: If you want to contribute to Heavenly Hats, check out the Web site at www.heavenlyhats.com.
John King, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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 March 19, 2004 - 14:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Well, welcome back. From the CNN Center in Atlanta, this is LIVE FROM... I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Here's what's happening this half hour.
Rebuilding a year after the war began and in the middle of continuing violence. We'll take you inside the struggle to restore order in Iraq.
And crushed under a ton of building material, a little boy defies the odds and amazes his doctors. But first here's a look at the top stories.
Terrorists. For a fourth day Pakistani troops and suspected al Qaeda are fighting it out at this remote, heavily-fortified compound. Inside is thought to be Osama bin Laden's most trusted lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahiri but that's anything but certain.
Memories of a year ago. A senior military official says three rockets may have hit the Green Zone which is where the U.S.-led coalition is headquartered. So far though, no word of any casualties or damage.
A day of deliverance. That's how President Bush today referred to the invasion of Iraq a year ago. Speaking to dozens of diplomats, he defended the U.S.-led attack saying it has made the world safer. He also called for unity in the war on terror.
Day two of deliberations. Jurors in the Tyco trial ask and receive explanation of certain terms including criminal intent and good faith. Two former executives, Dennis Kozlowski and Mark Swartz, are accused of looting for man $600 million from the company.
It's tit-for-tat in the race for the White House. The Republican National Committee is going after John Kerry over controversial comments he made at a campaign event. Kerry said certain world leaders had told him privately they would like to see him replace Bush in the White House.
A new ad e-mailed to GOP supporters pokes fun at Kerry's refusal to name names.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Allow myself to introduce myself.
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have had conversations with leaders.
I've also had friends of mine who have met with leaders.
And I'm not going to betray the confidences of those conversations.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Need the info.
KERRY: I think there ought to be some investigation of it. I have a very close friend in Massachusetts who talked directly to people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: The DNC is hitting back with a Web video of its own. The spot takes aim at the rising federal budget deficit.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We can balance the budget in the year 2005.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That sounds like a lot of hot air to me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look out. It's going to blow.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fact, Bush cuts key education programs by 27 percent.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Kerry is chasing President Bush in the fund raising contest. It's estimated the Bush campaign has already raised as much as $170 million. Kerry, playing catchup, is planning a 20-city fund raising tour.
A year after the first bombs fell on Baghdad, a change in mission for the coalition forces. While troops still find themselves under attack, they also find themselves in demand as peacekeepers and as good Samaritans. CNN's Jane Arraf brings us a firsthand look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): In the darkness the tension of a raid just days before these soldiers are due to go home. Their sector, al Rashid, was one of the toughest in Baghdad. A year after the war, it's calmer. But the 1st Armored Division Artillery is still fighting an insurgency here.
This dawn raid was to arrest a chef (ph) suspected of murdering an Iraqi policeman. The suspect was actually licensed by the U.S. civilian coalition to carry a gun. That was before the coalition realized had he worked for Saddam Hussein.
(on camera): These are the same soldiers who are trying to help reconstruct this country but this morning they're tearing things apart trying to find weapons.
(voice-over): Increasingly the U.S. military says the Iraqi security forces are helping find those weapons. And find the insurgents using them.
This meeting, colonel to colonel. Iraqi to American. The discussion about two recent attacks, including the killing of a Sunni imam in the sector. Local mosques want armed guards. Colonel Jonathan Brockman (ph) is firm.
Even as the meeting is underway, soldiers have found a homemade bomb near where another imam was attacked. The bottom is hidden in a dead dog and the soldiers suspect there might it be another on the road.
About an hour later, a very different mission. On one of the main business streets, the Army is building a market for vendors. Here silence and wary looks eventually give way to complaints that some Iraqi businessmen are making money from the project. One officer imparts some American wisdom.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Competition is good.
ARRAF: On the other side of town, this mostly Shi'a area was one of the poorest and most depressed of Baghdad under shame. It's still desperately poor. Garbage fills the street, there's no sewage system. But as Lieutenant Colonel Michael Calvert and his men drive through the streets here, there's a very different feeling from most Baghdad neighborhoods.
Although they still occasionally find homemade bombs and suspected insurgents, it's safe enough to drive in vehicles without doors and jump out to break up traffic jams.
As in other neighborhoods, the military plays a role in local democracy. This meeting of neighborhood women held in a former Iraqi air force center is discussing what to could about the sewage.
The military says it's trying to encourage Iraqis to solve their own problems. But it's on the streets where the 1st Squadron of the 2nd Armed Cavalry Regiment has spent the most effort.
The soldiers have made a point of waving at everyone. It they don't get a wave back they're supposed to stop to see to if there are problems. When the problem is as simple as a stalled car, they get out to help.
It seems to help make friends in this neighborhood.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's your name?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My name is Calvert (ph).
ARRAF: In between the bad, one year in, there is much good.
Jane Arraf, CNN, Baghdad. (END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: Well, the online auction site eBay is now posting a growing number of items that were reported to have come from Saddam Hussein's palaces. One U.S. soldier was selling a rug he claims to have brought home. Another was peddling silverware. A spokesman for the U.S. Central Command says soldiers are not supposed to bring such back war trophies but individual commanders decide how strictly those rules are enforced.
A gorilla escapes and goes on a rampage at the Dallas Zoo. A 3- year-old was one of the victims. We'll update that for you coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: A view from above.
Well, four people including a 3-year-old child are recovering today after a gorilla attack at a Dallas zoo. The 300-pound primate broke out of his cage yesterday causing complete chaos. Before the rampage ended, the animal attacked four people. One of the victims described the attack on CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEISHA HEARD, ATTACKED BY GORILLA: I can pretty much remember most of it in bits and pieces. So I can pretty much remember -- I pretty much remember everything. It's just some of it after he actually bit my leg, it's a little bit blurred. I just can remember him grabbing my son for the second time and us getting out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Well, after a half hour chase officers fired three shots killing the 13-year-old gorilla named Jabari. Officials say they feared it would escape the zoo complex all together.
Now to the story of another survivor. A New York boy crushed under construction materials fights the odds and lives. Here's CNN's Deborah Feyerick.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Two and a half years ago, when he was 12-years-old, Stephen LoPresti was crushed under 1,000 pounds of drywall. Rushed to the hospital, had he one thing on his mind.
STEPHEN LOPRESTI, ACCIDENT SURVIVOR: I was really thirsty. That's all I wanted, something to drink.
FEYERICK: The reason as doctors and surgeons would soon learn. Except for his heart, all of his organs had been crushed.
DR. FRANK MAFFEI, GOLISANO CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL: Every single organ system at one point or another and sometimes simultaneously were severely dysfunctional or entirely failed.
FEYERICK: Doctors Frank Maffei and Karen Powers gave Stephen a 2 percent chance of surviving.
MAFFEI: Certainly this was the most serious I have ever seen.
FEYERICK: Stephen was bleeding badly and doctors couldn't find the source. They gave his family two choices.
DR. KAREN POWERS, GOLISANO CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL: One, to keep Stephen comfortable, allowing him to die knowing that he would probably die by bleeding to death. Or we could go back to the operating room and try very, very drastic measure.
FEYERICK: Surgeons would have to remove all his intestines.
(on camera): That's not the thing that's usually put on the table. So that's how serious it was? They were willing to basically go for broke.
POWERS: Absolutely.
FEYERICK, (voice-over): His mom, Stephanie, a single parent, decided to risk it all to save her only child.
STEPHANIE LOPRESTI, STEPHEN'S MOM: So I can't even imagine my life without my son.
FEYERICK: She prayed like never before. And during surgery, doctors finally found and stopped the bleeding without the drastic procedure.
STEPHEN LOPRESTI: God made me live for a reason.
STEPHANIE LOPRESTI: He has a plan for you.
STEPHEN LOPRESTI: Yes, he has a plan for me. He's got a plan for me in the future. So I'm just living and trying to figure out what that plan is.
FEYERICK: Deborah Feyerick, CNN, Rochester, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WHITFIELD: She survived years of controversy as the wife of Jim Bakker. Now Tammy Faye Messner is in for the fight of her life. She announced she has inoperable lung cancer on "LARRY KING LIVE."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TAMMY FAYE MESSNER, TELEVANGELIST: I'm scared, but that's not wrong to be scared. It's OK. God knows I'm scared and he understands that. I don't like what's happening to me. The other day I was laying in a tanning bed and I was crying out to God, I hate what I'm going through. I hate this. I hate this. I'm so scared. What am I going to do? And the thing that bothers you, Larry, when you find out that you have an illness that could be terminal is you always think everything's the last time. And I've got to really make my mind to not think that because when I came here, I thought maybe it's the last time I'll do Larry King.
When I took the Christmas tree out this year, and there (UNINTELLIGIBLE) I didn't know if I had cancer or not, the first thing I thought, maybe this is the last time I'll take the tree out of the attic and maybe this is the last time I'll put it up.
So you have to guard your mind and constantly say, you know, it could be anyone's last time, not just mine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Well, Larry sits down with U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld tonight. He'll assess progress in Iraq an a year after the war began on "LARRY KING LIVE" at 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time.
Outside Los Angeles a small college is in shock over a possible hate crime hoax involving a visiting professor. Police the professor may have stage the crime herself, police say. CNN's Donna Tatro reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KERRI F. DUNN, ALLEGED VICTIM OF HATE CRIME: This was a well- planned out act of terrorism.
DONNA TATRO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): She led thousands of students at Claremont McKenna College in a protest against racism that shut down the school after claiming she was a target of a hate crime. But now this visiting professor, Kerri Dunn, is being investigated for setting the whole thing up.
According to police, she vandalized her own car and spray painted it with racial anti-Semitic and sexual epithets.
LT. STAN VAN HORN, CLAREMONT POLICE: Eye witnesses saw her doing that at public parking lot at Claremont McKenna College.
TATRO: Students rallied behind Dunn. But now this latest twist has some wondering.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's very devastating.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's just really sad.
TATRO: But Dunn isn't admitting to anything. Her attorney has put out a news release saying, "The police statement is irresponsible and has irreparably damaged her reputation and emotional health."
College President Pamela Gann says Dunn is innocent until proven guilty and hopes the allegations are not true. PAMELA GANN, PRES. CLAREMONT MCKENNA COLLEGE: We have to uphold the highest possible ethical values, and if she did this, she would have breached all of the community values that she have.
TATRO: Dunn is still under contract as a psychology instructor at this college of 5,000 outside Los Angeles while the district attorney decides whether to file criminal charges.
Donna Tatro for CNN, Claremont, California.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WHITFIELD: Well, here at CNN we know Wolf Blitzer is one of the hardest working journalist in the business. So what happened here?
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DONALD TRUMP, BUSINESSMAN: Wolf, I don't like the job you're doing. You are fired.
BLITZER: You're fired.
TRUMP: Whew.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WHITFIELD: Back at you. Careful how you use those words. Donald Trump is seeking trademark protection for the catch phrase "You're fired" from his hit TV show. We're fired up about Wolf's interview with Trump at 5 p.m. Eastern, 2:00 Pacific.
(MARKET UPDATE)
WHITFIELD: Well CNN broke the news of al Qaeda's No. 2 possibly being surrounded in Pakistan. Ahead in hour next hour, how the world is reacting to this on Arabic Web sites.
Plus, President Bush drums up support for the global war on terror as America marks one year in Iraq.
And later, a master of news parody makes news of his own. All ahead on LIVE FROM...
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(LAUGHTER)
WHITFIELD: Kind of contagious, isn't it? When that sound track was released in 1922, it was so popular it, went through several reprints. The laughing record now is one of 50 recordings being saved for posterity this year by the Library of Congress. Here's another one that might sound a little more familiar to you. (MUSIC -- "MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB")
WHITFIELD: You've heard that a few times. That one is from a 1917 recording that went with a children's publication called "Bubble Book."
Here's a sampling of some of the other recordings beings saved this year, Lead Belly's 1933 rendition of "Good Night, Irene," The 1941 World Series which pitted the New York Yankees against the Brooklyn Dodgers, and the Beatles also make it in, and Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run" was deemed significant enough to save. The Library of Congress is taking nominations for next year's list.
Well the children are the future, and CNN's "LOU DOBBS TONIGHT" is taking a special look at some entrepreneurial kids in the series "America's Bright Future." CNN's John King has the story of a teen whose heavenly hats the give hope to cancer patients.
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JOHN KING, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Anthony Leanna looks and sounds like any other 13-year-old, paying attention to language arts at Bay View Middle school in Suamico, Wisconsin outside Green Bay. But Anthony is hardly typical.
After school, Anthony spends his time opening up boxes filled with hats he has received from companies and individuals just to repackage them to send to cancer patients who have lost their hair.
ANTHONY LEANNA, FOUNDER, HEAVENLY HATS: I know I'm putting smiles on people's faces and the only way to achieve your goal is to put effort into it. Without effort, you can't achieve anything.
KING: He came up with the idea called heavenly Hats at the age of nine when his grandmother was diagnosed with breast cancer.
LEANNA: She had not lost her hair during chemo or anything, but my mom had showed me all the people who had lost their hair due to cancer treatment such as chemotherapy. And I decided to put a smile on their face by giving their hat to cover up what they had lost.
KING: And smiles is what he got from this cancer survivor.
KATHY EISENCHINX, HEAVENLY HATS RECIPIENT: Because when you're going through the chemo and radiation, you're not feeling well. And you really, you just -- you don't feel like dressing up and putting on the heavier wig or whatever and those hats were a godsend.
KING: Anthony started by collecting a few hundred has the from local stores to give to some nearby hospitals. But win a year and a half, the donations have exploded. He has received more than 25,000 has the and sends each one out individually to more than 100 hospitals nationwide, plus two hospitals overseas.
GLEN LEANNA, ANTHONY'S DAD: I would never imagine from what he started to begin with to where we're at today that he could ever start a program, that anyone could start a program to get this big.
KING: Now Heavenly Hats has taken over the Leanna's laundry room.
Anthony shrugs off the numerous awards he's received. His family says care and discipline are just his nature.
DARLENE CHARTIER, ANTHONY'S GRANDMA: Anthony always tells me, Grandma, you're my inspiration for this. But he's my inspiration.
KING: If you want to contribute to Heavenly Hats, check out the Web site at www.heavenlyhats.com.
John King, CNN.
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