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President Bush to Address Nation This Evening; A Second Chance; Pain at the Pump

Aired May 24, 2004 - 15:00   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.


KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to LIVE FROM. I'm Kyra Phillips.
DREW GRIFFIN, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Drew Griffin, in for Miles O'Brien today. Here's what's happening at this hour.

A stunning upset in the first round of the French Open today. Six-seated Andrea Agassi lost in straight sets to a French qualifier who had never won a match at the tour level. The defeat could be hard to swallow, especially since General Mills is featuring Agassi on a special edition of Wheaties designed to mark the start of the French Open.

Going after Grasso's millions: New York's attorney general is suing former Stock Exchange chairman Richard Grasso over his $188 million pay package. Grasso resigned last September as the controversy erupted. Spitzer calls the package "inappropriate and illegal." Grass so far not commenting.

Searching the Milwaukee River for two missing sisters. The girls and their brother were playing on a floating pier yesterday when six- year-old Tia Woodly (ph) fell into that swollen river. Her 12-year- old sister, Tamisha (ph), jumped in to try to save her. Officials say the girls don't know how to swim. A search yesterday failed to locate either one of them.

IN parts of the Midwest it's a stormy Monday after a treacherous Saturday and a volatile Sunday. Parts of Nebraska already raked by tornadoes are now being threatened once again by bouts of severe weather. Flooding is occurring in parts of southern Michigan, northern Illinois, Ohio and Indiana. And in Michigan alone, tens of thousands of customers are still without power there.

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: President Bush sees a break in the storm low clouds plaguing Iraq. And he will give us his outlook for peace and democracy in a prime time address just about five hours now. The venue, Army War College in Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania. CNN's Dana Bash is front and center with a preview -- Dana.

DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Kyra.

Well, Bush aides openly concede that the images, the scandal over the Iraqi prisoner abuse, the increasing violence, continued violence in Iraq, that has all contributed to essentially a sense of despair among the American people that is bringing down a lot of other things that they should feel good about, or at least better about, like the economy. So they say that this speech tonight is essentially a chance, an opportunity for the President to try to turn that sense of despair around, and also the fact that his approval ratings are following the decline in support for Iraq, to say it may look like chaos in Iraq, but, yes, there is a plan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SCOTT MCCLELLAN, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I think what he will talk about is that the future of Iraq is going to be in the hands of the Iraqi people, but that the coalition continues to have a significant role that it will play going forward. And the President will talk about that in his remarks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Now, the White House says they are going to use the June 30th deadline, a date that Americans hear about but don't really necessarily understand very well, to communicate to the American people what that plan is. Republicans have been warning over the past several days that the President simply can't re-package some of the existing policies, that he has to essentially get out there and give some new information, break new ground.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID GERGEN, FMR. PRESIDENTIAL ADVISER: I think new ground means are we going to put more troops in there, how long are we going to be there, how much of a large role, how large a role will the U.N. get, can we talk NATO into doing this. New ground is more than tactics. It's a lot more about strategy and new strategy, because I think Americans are really worried that the strategy we're on right now does not seem to be working well.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: The White House aides say do not look for any shift in policy, don't look for any announcements in, for example, increased troop levels. Don't look for any exit dates, if you will. The President will say that the exit date is whenever the job is done, and he is going to try to prepare the American people for that to take some time.

So the President will simply be laying out some of the things that have already been out there, but doing so in a more detailed way than he personally has ever done, explaining what the interim government will look like that will take over on June 30th, and what the plan is to move toward elections, explain what the role of the U.S. troops will be, vis-a-vis a multinational force that is going to take over also in Iraq, and also explain what the U.N. role is. The United States and Great Britain, of course, introduced a resolution about that today.

The President will be talking about all of those things. And the White House certainly hopes that that level of communication will help turn things around for the White House.

Back to you, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right. Dana Bash, thank you.

Don't forget, you can see the president's address live beginning at 8:00 Eastern, 5:00 Pacific, right here on CNN.

GRIFFIN: Now a heartwarming story of how America's mission has changed the lives of seven Iraqi men. They were declared traitors and then butchered on Saddam Hussein's orders. CNN's Ed Lavandara has their story now from Houston.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When seven Iraqi men first landed in Houston, it was hard to tell they were hiding scars left by Saddam Hussein.

DAVID BATY, DYNAMIC ORTHOTICS AND PROSTHETICS: When you first meet them, all their right hands are in their pockets because that's the way they walked around for nine years, with the end of their limb stuffed in their pockets.

LAVANDERA: It was a subtle, yet poignant behavior that prosthetic specialist David Baty noticed. Muslim tradition views the left hand as dirty and disrespectful, the right hand as virtuous.

BATY: The social stigma that was associated with not having a right hand affected not only these guys, but their family, their children.

LAVANDERA: Nine years ago, these men were accused of illegally using U.S. dollars in Iraq. Saddam Hussein ordered their hands be cut off and that the men be sent back to their neighborhoods as an example of what would happen if you defy the regime.

(on camera): What these men have been through as become a well- documented saga. Saddam Hussein's men videotaped their hands being cut off, and now a filmmaker is turning their story of loss and redemption into a documentary.

(voice-over): The filmmaker found the men in Baghdad and started enlisting the help of reports, doctors, prosthetic specialists, rehabilitation experts, and anyone else who could help. All the work paid off just a few days ago, when each man put on a new hand for the first time.

BATY: When they first got their hands, they all cried.

TOM DIBELLO, DYNAMIC ORTHOTICS AND PROSTHETICS: The uniqueness of the situation and the barbaric nature of the act that was performed against these men galvanized the individuals involved to do something.

LAVANDERA: In less than six weeks, they've learned what takes most people months to master. What may seem simple, like rolling a ball, actually requires difficult muscle coordination.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He has got to combine all the motions of his arm and then tell this muscle to open at the right moment to let go of the ball. It's extremely complicated. And not all of them can do it, actually.

LAVANDERA: Each hand is a $25,000 gift. But to those that made this happen, each hand symbolizes much more. One man said it's about family.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Once he got his hand, he said, "You know what? I'm really looking forward to going home, holding my son in my left hand and my daughter in my right hand, and walking down the street."

LAVANDERA: One of the men joked that when they look at their left hand, they'll say, "Made in Iraq." And when they look at the right hand, they'll think, made in America. If you look now, these men aren't hiding their hands in their pocks anymore.

Ed Lavandara, CNN, Houston.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, straight ahead, pain at the gas pump. Are we just going to have to grin and bear it? Well, we already are grinning and bearing it. Two experts drive home their ideas just ahead.

And Madonna, or Madge, if you're hip and happening to the new title, is feeling a little threatened. Find out why later on LIVE FROM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Gas prices race past $2 a gallon mark in the U.S., ands industry insiders see no sign of them slowly coming down or coming down at all. Lundberg's latest survey finds a gallon of self- serve regular jumped 14 cents in two weeks to an average of $2.07. Earlier, I got a reality check from Rayola Dougher with the American Petroleum Institute and former deputy energy secretary, Joe Romm.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOE ROMM, FMR. DEPUTY ENERGY SECRETARY: I think there's no question that your viewers are going to be facing high gasoline prices for many months and perhaps years to come. The solution is to do something on the demand side. If we don't reduce the demand, if we don't use more fuel-efficient cars, we're just going to see higher and higher demand, and that's going to give complete pricing control to the suppliers and the oil companies.

So I think, you know, we currently don't have an energy policy in this country aimed at demand. In the '70s and 80s, we pushed fuel efficiency into the marketplace, and as a result, the price of gasoline and oil went down. We've abandoned that for the last 10 years, and not surprisingly, the price of oil and gasoline are up. So I would urge your viewers, if they want to do something about their own gasoline bill, they should go out and buy a hybrid, as was reported in your story. And if you want to help nationwide, we need to push fuel efficiency standards nationwide.

GRIFFIN: Will not the market take care of that, Mr. Romm? As you saw, we saw the people lining up for the Toyota Prius, they're getting rebates on the Hummer. If the prices just stay high, aren't we eventually going to see a marketplace that's going to bring back conservative cars and cars that will get much more fuel efficiency?

ROMM: Well, I think that there are two fears here. One is that if we don't push fuel efficiency in the United States, we're going to end up importing these cars from Japan, Toyota and Honda. So I think, you know, if we want to save jobs in the country, we should adopt incentives and regulations to get every car company to be building these hybrid fuel-efficient vehicles.

Secondly, we have to care about the environment. I mean, there's this move coming out this weekend, "The Day After Tomorrow," which will raise awareness on the dangers of global warming. In order to address global warming, we have to burn less gasoline. And that means every car on the road has to be fuel efficient, not just a few people's.

GRIFFIN: Rayola, the Saudi Arabian announcement that they're going to pump more gas from the spigot -- I think they're the only ones who can simply turn on and off the flow -- will that eventually reduce prices, or are we just going to see a stabilization at these rates?

RAYOLA DOUGHER, AMERICAN PETROLEUM INSTITUTE: Well, we're going to have to wait and see how much they actually do produce and how much the other member companies -- countries agree to when they meet on June 3, and see what impact that will have on the marketplace. Prices originally went down over the weekend after OPEC met in Amsterdam, but I understand they're back up again today.

So I think that traders really want to see the oil. Show me the oil. And that's what we're waiting for.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: And we haven't seen it yet.

PHILLIPS: Well, families driving to a beach vacation are paying top dollar for gas. Once they arrive, there's potential for real danger, deadly rip currents. CNN's Julie Vallese shows us how to survive in the ocean.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JULIE VALLESE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Each year, approximately 90 million people visit America's beaches, and every one of them face the potential danger of being caught in a rip current. Sandee LaMotte's husband, a CNN reporter and bureau chief, was killed when he tried to rescue his son from a rip current last year.

SANDEE LAMOTTE, HUSBAND DIED IN RIP CURRENT: Larry started to swim the maybe two arm lengths or three that it would have taken him to get to Ryan. Right at the time that he entered the water, a wave went over Ryan's head. So he lost -- and the next thing he knew, there was no daddy.

VALLESE: The LaMotte's son, Ryan, did survive. But six people died on that same Florida beach that day. A hundred people die in rip currents every year. They occur in ocean seas and the great lakes.

CONRAD LAUTENBACHER, NOAA ADMINISTRATOR: This will be an opportunity for people to use the latest technology, not only with weather, but look at surf forecasts and look then at the surf forecasts and what the rip current vulnerabilities are at that particular time.

VALLESE: The reason so many people get caught in them is swimmers panic, become tired, and lose the struggle. Staying calm and not fighting the current is the beginning of surviving it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Swim to the side along the shoreline, and then at an angle away from the rip current toward shore.

LAMOTTE: Water is dangerous. We think about drownings, but we don't think about it happening to us.

VALLESE: Rip currents begin at the shoreline. So keep in mind you don't have to be in deep water to get caught in the current.

(on camera): The chances of drowning at a beach where a lifeguard is present, one in 18 million. Eighty percent of beach rescues are because of rip currents. So if a beach isn't guarded, swimming may be at a risk much too great.

Julie Vallese, CNN, Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: A cold-hearted judge: Paula Abdul just can't stop judging contestants. Her latest adventure next in our entertainment headlines.

And a British airline coming to the USA. That, and a check of the markets straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Checking entertainment headlines this Monday, May 24, detours from Madonna's Reinvention Tour. The material girl ditched three planned concert gigs in Israel after terrorists threatened to kill her and her children. A British newspaper says that Madonna was targeted because she exemplifies what the militants hate about the West.

GRIFFIN: Ditching singers for swimsuit beauties. Already a pro and judging "American Idol" wannabes, Paula Abdul is moving to a bigger arena, at least for one show. Abdul will serve as a judge for the Miss Universe contest in Ecuador on June 1st.

PHILLIPS: A big green ogre is a beast at the box office. "Shrek 2" clobbered the competition in its five-day debut, taking in more than $125 million. The outlook for this animated fairytale sequel is anything but grim. It's expected to set a new record for a Wednesday opening.

For those of you who love to fly Virgin when traveling outside the U.S., you may soon be able to do it within the United States as well.

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Well, that wraps up this Monday edition of LIVE FROM. Thanks for joining us.

GRIFFIN: "JUDY WOODRUFF'S INSIDE POLITICS" coming up next.

Hello, Judy.

JUDY WOODRUFF, HOST, "INSIDE POLITICS": Hi there. Thank you both.

We have a question. Are national and local news reporters too hard or too soft in their own opinion on President Bush? A new survey may provide some answers.

Plus, Al Gore jumps into the political fire over a new movie about global warming. These stories and much more when I go INSIDE POLITICS in three minutes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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 May 24, 2004 - 15:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to LIVE FROM. I'm Kyra Phillips.
DREW GRIFFIN, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Drew Griffin, in for Miles O'Brien today. Here's what's happening at this hour.

A stunning upset in the first round of the French Open today. Six-seated Andrea Agassi lost in straight sets to a French qualifier who had never won a match at the tour level. The defeat could be hard to swallow, especially since General Mills is featuring Agassi on a special edition of Wheaties designed to mark the start of the French Open.

Going after Grasso's millions: New York's attorney general is suing former Stock Exchange chairman Richard Grasso over his $188 million pay package. Grasso resigned last September as the controversy erupted. Spitzer calls the package "inappropriate and illegal." Grass so far not commenting.

Searching the Milwaukee River for two missing sisters. The girls and their brother were playing on a floating pier yesterday when six- year-old Tia Woodly (ph) fell into that swollen river. Her 12-year- old sister, Tamisha (ph), jumped in to try to save her. Officials say the girls don't know how to swim. A search yesterday failed to locate either one of them.

IN parts of the Midwest it's a stormy Monday after a treacherous Saturday and a volatile Sunday. Parts of Nebraska already raked by tornadoes are now being threatened once again by bouts of severe weather. Flooding is occurring in parts of southern Michigan, northern Illinois, Ohio and Indiana. And in Michigan alone, tens of thousands of customers are still without power there.

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: President Bush sees a break in the storm low clouds plaguing Iraq. And he will give us his outlook for peace and democracy in a prime time address just about five hours now. The venue, Army War College in Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania. CNN's Dana Bash is front and center with a preview -- Dana.

DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Kyra.

Well, Bush aides openly concede that the images, the scandal over the Iraqi prisoner abuse, the increasing violence, continued violence in Iraq, that has all contributed to essentially a sense of despair among the American people that is bringing down a lot of other things that they should feel good about, or at least better about, like the economy. So they say that this speech tonight is essentially a chance, an opportunity for the President to try to turn that sense of despair around, and also the fact that his approval ratings are following the decline in support for Iraq, to say it may look like chaos in Iraq, but, yes, there is a plan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SCOTT MCCLELLAN, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I think what he will talk about is that the future of Iraq is going to be in the hands of the Iraqi people, but that the coalition continues to have a significant role that it will play going forward. And the President will talk about that in his remarks.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Now, the White House says they are going to use the June 30th deadline, a date that Americans hear about but don't really necessarily understand very well, to communicate to the American people what that plan is. Republicans have been warning over the past several days that the President simply can't re-package some of the existing policies, that he has to essentially get out there and give some new information, break new ground.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID GERGEN, FMR. PRESIDENTIAL ADVISER: I think new ground means are we going to put more troops in there, how long are we going to be there, how much of a large role, how large a role will the U.N. get, can we talk NATO into doing this. New ground is more than tactics. It's a lot more about strategy and new strategy, because I think Americans are really worried that the strategy we're on right now does not seem to be working well.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: The White House aides say do not look for any shift in policy, don't look for any announcements in, for example, increased troop levels. Don't look for any exit dates, if you will. The President will say that the exit date is whenever the job is done, and he is going to try to prepare the American people for that to take some time.

So the President will simply be laying out some of the things that have already been out there, but doing so in a more detailed way than he personally has ever done, explaining what the interim government will look like that will take over on June 30th, and what the plan is to move toward elections, explain what the role of the U.S. troops will be, vis-a-vis a multinational force that is going to take over also in Iraq, and also explain what the U.N. role is. The United States and Great Britain, of course, introduced a resolution about that today.

The President will be talking about all of those things. And the White House certainly hopes that that level of communication will help turn things around for the White House.

Back to you, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right. Dana Bash, thank you.

Don't forget, you can see the president's address live beginning at 8:00 Eastern, 5:00 Pacific, right here on CNN.

GRIFFIN: Now a heartwarming story of how America's mission has changed the lives of seven Iraqi men. They were declared traitors and then butchered on Saddam Hussein's orders. CNN's Ed Lavandara has their story now from Houston.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When seven Iraqi men first landed in Houston, it was hard to tell they were hiding scars left by Saddam Hussein.

DAVID BATY, DYNAMIC ORTHOTICS AND PROSTHETICS: When you first meet them, all their right hands are in their pockets because that's the way they walked around for nine years, with the end of their limb stuffed in their pockets.

LAVANDERA: It was a subtle, yet poignant behavior that prosthetic specialist David Baty noticed. Muslim tradition views the left hand as dirty and disrespectful, the right hand as virtuous.

BATY: The social stigma that was associated with not having a right hand affected not only these guys, but their family, their children.

LAVANDERA: Nine years ago, these men were accused of illegally using U.S. dollars in Iraq. Saddam Hussein ordered their hands be cut off and that the men be sent back to their neighborhoods as an example of what would happen if you defy the regime.

(on camera): What these men have been through as become a well- documented saga. Saddam Hussein's men videotaped their hands being cut off, and now a filmmaker is turning their story of loss and redemption into a documentary.

(voice-over): The filmmaker found the men in Baghdad and started enlisting the help of reports, doctors, prosthetic specialists, rehabilitation experts, and anyone else who could help. All the work paid off just a few days ago, when each man put on a new hand for the first time.

BATY: When they first got their hands, they all cried.

TOM DIBELLO, DYNAMIC ORTHOTICS AND PROSTHETICS: The uniqueness of the situation and the barbaric nature of the act that was performed against these men galvanized the individuals involved to do something.

LAVANDERA: In less than six weeks, they've learned what takes most people months to master. What may seem simple, like rolling a ball, actually requires difficult muscle coordination.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He has got to combine all the motions of his arm and then tell this muscle to open at the right moment to let go of the ball. It's extremely complicated. And not all of them can do it, actually.

LAVANDERA: Each hand is a $25,000 gift. But to those that made this happen, each hand symbolizes much more. One man said it's about family.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Once he got his hand, he said, "You know what? I'm really looking forward to going home, holding my son in my left hand and my daughter in my right hand, and walking down the street."

LAVANDERA: One of the men joked that when they look at their left hand, they'll say, "Made in Iraq." And when they look at the right hand, they'll think, made in America. If you look now, these men aren't hiding their hands in their pocks anymore.

Ed Lavandara, CNN, Houston.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, straight ahead, pain at the gas pump. Are we just going to have to grin and bear it? Well, we already are grinning and bearing it. Two experts drive home their ideas just ahead.

And Madonna, or Madge, if you're hip and happening to the new title, is feeling a little threatened. Find out why later on LIVE FROM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Gas prices race past $2 a gallon mark in the U.S., ands industry insiders see no sign of them slowly coming down or coming down at all. Lundberg's latest survey finds a gallon of self- serve regular jumped 14 cents in two weeks to an average of $2.07. Earlier, I got a reality check from Rayola Dougher with the American Petroleum Institute and former deputy energy secretary, Joe Romm.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOE ROMM, FMR. DEPUTY ENERGY SECRETARY: I think there's no question that your viewers are going to be facing high gasoline prices for many months and perhaps years to come. The solution is to do something on the demand side. If we don't reduce the demand, if we don't use more fuel-efficient cars, we're just going to see higher and higher demand, and that's going to give complete pricing control to the suppliers and the oil companies.

So I think, you know, we currently don't have an energy policy in this country aimed at demand. In the '70s and 80s, we pushed fuel efficiency into the marketplace, and as a result, the price of gasoline and oil went down. We've abandoned that for the last 10 years, and not surprisingly, the price of oil and gasoline are up. So I would urge your viewers, if they want to do something about their own gasoline bill, they should go out and buy a hybrid, as was reported in your story. And if you want to help nationwide, we need to push fuel efficiency standards nationwide.

GRIFFIN: Will not the market take care of that, Mr. Romm? As you saw, we saw the people lining up for the Toyota Prius, they're getting rebates on the Hummer. If the prices just stay high, aren't we eventually going to see a marketplace that's going to bring back conservative cars and cars that will get much more fuel efficiency?

ROMM: Well, I think that there are two fears here. One is that if we don't push fuel efficiency in the United States, we're going to end up importing these cars from Japan, Toyota and Honda. So I think, you know, if we want to save jobs in the country, we should adopt incentives and regulations to get every car company to be building these hybrid fuel-efficient vehicles.

Secondly, we have to care about the environment. I mean, there's this move coming out this weekend, "The Day After Tomorrow," which will raise awareness on the dangers of global warming. In order to address global warming, we have to burn less gasoline. And that means every car on the road has to be fuel efficient, not just a few people's.

GRIFFIN: Rayola, the Saudi Arabian announcement that they're going to pump more gas from the spigot -- I think they're the only ones who can simply turn on and off the flow -- will that eventually reduce prices, or are we just going to see a stabilization at these rates?

RAYOLA DOUGHER, AMERICAN PETROLEUM INSTITUTE: Well, we're going to have to wait and see how much they actually do produce and how much the other member companies -- countries agree to when they meet on June 3, and see what impact that will have on the marketplace. Prices originally went down over the weekend after OPEC met in Amsterdam, but I understand they're back up again today.

So I think that traders really want to see the oil. Show me the oil. And that's what we're waiting for.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: And we haven't seen it yet.

PHILLIPS: Well, families driving to a beach vacation are paying top dollar for gas. Once they arrive, there's potential for real danger, deadly rip currents. CNN's Julie Vallese shows us how to survive in the ocean.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JULIE VALLESE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Each year, approximately 90 million people visit America's beaches, and every one of them face the potential danger of being caught in a rip current. Sandee LaMotte's husband, a CNN reporter and bureau chief, was killed when he tried to rescue his son from a rip current last year.

SANDEE LAMOTTE, HUSBAND DIED IN RIP CURRENT: Larry started to swim the maybe two arm lengths or three that it would have taken him to get to Ryan. Right at the time that he entered the water, a wave went over Ryan's head. So he lost -- and the next thing he knew, there was no daddy.

VALLESE: The LaMotte's son, Ryan, did survive. But six people died on that same Florida beach that day. A hundred people die in rip currents every year. They occur in ocean seas and the great lakes.

CONRAD LAUTENBACHER, NOAA ADMINISTRATOR: This will be an opportunity for people to use the latest technology, not only with weather, but look at surf forecasts and look then at the surf forecasts and what the rip current vulnerabilities are at that particular time.

VALLESE: The reason so many people get caught in them is swimmers panic, become tired, and lose the struggle. Staying calm and not fighting the current is the beginning of surviving it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Swim to the side along the shoreline, and then at an angle away from the rip current toward shore.

LAMOTTE: Water is dangerous. We think about drownings, but we don't think about it happening to us.

VALLESE: Rip currents begin at the shoreline. So keep in mind you don't have to be in deep water to get caught in the current.

(on camera): The chances of drowning at a beach where a lifeguard is present, one in 18 million. Eighty percent of beach rescues are because of rip currents. So if a beach isn't guarded, swimming may be at a risk much too great.

Julie Vallese, CNN, Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: A cold-hearted judge: Paula Abdul just can't stop judging contestants. Her latest adventure next in our entertainment headlines.

And a British airline coming to the USA. That, and a check of the markets straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Checking entertainment headlines this Monday, May 24, detours from Madonna's Reinvention Tour. The material girl ditched three planned concert gigs in Israel after terrorists threatened to kill her and her children. A British newspaper says that Madonna was targeted because she exemplifies what the militants hate about the West.

GRIFFIN: Ditching singers for swimsuit beauties. Already a pro and judging "American Idol" wannabes, Paula Abdul is moving to a bigger arena, at least for one show. Abdul will serve as a judge for the Miss Universe contest in Ecuador on June 1st.

PHILLIPS: A big green ogre is a beast at the box office. "Shrek 2" clobbered the competition in its five-day debut, taking in more than $125 million. The outlook for this animated fairytale sequel is anything but grim. It's expected to set a new record for a Wednesday opening.

For those of you who love to fly Virgin when traveling outside the U.S., you may soon be able to do it within the United States as well.

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Well, that wraps up this Monday edition of LIVE FROM. Thanks for joining us.

GRIFFIN: "JUDY WOODRUFF'S INSIDE POLITICS" coming up next.

Hello, Judy.

JUDY WOODRUFF, HOST, "INSIDE POLITICS": Hi there. Thank you both.

We have a question. Are national and local news reporters too hard or too soft in their own opinion on President Bush? A new survey may provide some answers.

Plus, Al Gore jumps into the political fire over a new movie about global warming. These stories and much more when I go INSIDE POLITICS in three minutes.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com