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Max Cleland Wants Bush to Denounce Swift Boat Ads; Terror or Coincidence?; Fay Report News Event; Mystery Illness

Aired August 25, 2004 - 13:59   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.


MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Jill Dougherty, what the Kerry campaign is insisting on is something a little more than just criticism of 527 ads. Specifically, it is this ad that they would like the president to denounce. You know, is the president trying to have it both ways here by saying Senator Kerry served admirably and yet refusing to call this ad wrong?
JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the president would argue that he -- that these groups, regardless of who they are, do have the right to express their opinion. And he believes that the Swift Boats Veterans, just like everybody else, has the right to say what they believe about this.

And then the -- the Republicans and the Bush-Cheney campaign would also say that the Democrats are doing this very same thing, except that nobody essentially is paying a lot of attention to it. They would argue that the president himself has been the subject and the object of $60 -- $63 million worth of attack ads by Democratic organizations that are out spending the Republicans. And some of them have been extremely strong, excoriating the president.

So, they would say that this is not fair, it's a double standard. And what you are seeing right here is obviously very emotional. And Senator Cleland, himself, just is his very presence is very, strong. But the Bush people would argue very strongly themselves that they feel that this is not right, that the president has come out.

He said I don't want anymore of these ads. But he's not going to get involved in specifically telling a group to stand down.

O'BRIEN: All right. Well, let's get clear on one point here. The Kerry campaign has not in any way denounced the 527 system, as it were, which allows these ads to go. But as far as I know, and correct me if I'm wrong, Jill, I don't know if the Bush campaign has asked the Kerry campaign to renounce any specific ad directed at it.

DOUGHERTY: I do not think that they have, Miles, per se. But certainly, the president, by saying all of these ads should go, all of these 527 groups should go -- in fact, he said he thought an end was put to this back when McCain-Feingold was passed. But it didn't happen.

So, they are not, I don't think, specifically saying that, that they want all ads ended. And the sad thing about all of this is, as you can see, is that just look at some of that rhetoric. That's some of the strongest rhetoric we have heard. O'BRIEN: All right. Jill -- Jill, I apologize. A little more rhetoric to offer you.

This is Jerry Patterson. He's a veteran who is a supporter of President Bush. Had attempted to deliver a letter to Max Cleland, was unable. Let's listen to him as he talks to reporters there.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who called you today to begin to put this letter together?

JERRY PATTERSON, TEXAS LAND COMMISSIONER: I was driving to Dallas for another function, and I was called by -- I forgot who it was -- a guy in the Bush campaign in Waco, that said. "You're a veteran. You are a Vietnam veteran." And I said, "Yes."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)?

PATTERSON: I don't know who -- I got a -- you know, when those phones ring and you've got the funny noise and you don't have the rear -- you don't have the number on it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did he give you his name?

PATTERSON: He did. I think it might have -- he works for Ken Mehlman. You know? So, you figure -- OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And what time was this?

PATTERSON: I don't know.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was this morning.

PATTERSON: It was this morning.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And sir, can you describe what he said to you?

PATTERSON: He said that Mr. -- Senator Cleland, an honorable -- clearly an honorable -- an American hero, a guy who gave far more than I gave -- and I was only there six months and the war ended. I left the day of cease-fire.

But was going to come and deliver a letter. And -- that they had a letter signed by veterans and if I would be also a signatory. And I said, "Yes." And he read me the letter. And I've got it right here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who wrote...

PATTERSON: And that basically -- that basically says what we're talking about.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. I thought you spoke to the president.

PATTERSON: And I spoke to the president after this was all, you know, done deal, letter drafted. And he said, "Thank you for your service." And I know the president because he was governor when I was a state senator here in Texas.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who wrote the letter?

PATTERSON: We all -- the letter was drafted by Bush-Cheney '04, and we, all of us signatories, which are myself, Duke Cunningham, Duncan Hunter, Sam Johnson, General Palmer, Robert O'Malley (ph), a Marine medal of honor recipient, James Fleming (ph), another medal of honor recipient, and Colonel Richard Castle (ph) agreed to have our names on it. And we're saying basically in the letter that you can't have it both ways. I could read it to you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Before -- were you working on veteran strategy with the Bush campaign before today?

PATTERSON: I've never worked on anything for the Bush campaign. I'm a volunteer and will probably do more volunteering.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is it the first time you talked to the president since...

PATTERSON: The first time I talked to the president since the -- in over -- maybe since the last campaign. He knew I had twins six months ago, though. He knew that I'm a 58-year-old father of six- month-old twins, and he made comment about that. How did you know that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)?

PATTERSON: Yes, they are.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you know Bob Kerrey?

PATTERSON: Yes, I do.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What -- how do you know Bob Kerrey (ph)?

PATTERSON: He's been a major contributor to my campaigns. I was a state senator, as I said, for six years. And he was a major contributor to my campaign. The interesting thing about Bob Kerrey (ph), he never called and asked me for anything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Commissioner, what do you think of the Swift Boat group?

PATTERSON: You know, I think, you know, there's a fact-checking under way. But the point is, the Swift Boat folks have a right to their piece, just as anybody that wants to attack George W. Bush have a right.

You can't selectively say bring down those 527s. I heard Rassmann say that. He said our 527s are OK and theirs are not. That was words out of his mouth.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)?

PATTERSON: Well, any -- it is fact checking. There's fact checking by the press, fact checking for a lot of (INAUDIBLE). Now, you know, we talk...

O'BRIEN: All right. We are listening to Jerry Patterson. He is the Texas land commissioner. And I might have confused matters a while ago, because I didn't understand it.

In Texas, the land commissioner is actually responsible for veterans affairs. He's going on talking about this letter which he attempted to deliver on behalf of veterans who support President Bush to Max Cleland. He still has the letter in hand.

And the plot continues to thicken on this Swift Boat controversy. The political theater is still under way. We're monitoring it all for you, of course -- Kyra.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well, catastrophe, certainly coincidence. No one knows. But the day after two Russian airliners went down three minutes and 450 miles apart, suspicions persist, and no theory is being ruled out. Though Russian officials say they see no preliminary indications of terrorism, 89 people were killed in those tandem disasters.

We get the latest now from CNN's Paula Hancocks, who just flew into the Moscow airport where both flights originated.

Paula, what have you been able to find out?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kyra, what Russian officials are telling us at the moment is not very much, the fact it could be terrorism, it could be a pilot error, it could be a technical error. They are not willing to rule anything out at the moment.

President Vladimir Putin is back in town this evening. He was on holiday in the area where the -- the destination of the second plane, in fact. But he's been meeting in an emergency meeting with the chiefs of the FSB. That's the security service over here who are leading the investigation into these crashes.

He's also meeting with his transport minister, who he has put in charge of these -- this affair. He says that his first steep is to provide information, but that information is not forthcoming because they do not know exactly what the causes are.

They have found the so-called black boxes, or the flight data recorders, which are very crucial. Three of them, they say, they found, from the two crashes. And they are looking at those at the moment. We are hoping we'll get some indication whether or not that is shedding any light on the situation.

The fact is, the first flight, there are reports of eyewitnesses saying they heard or saw an explosion or loud bang before that crash. And with the second flight, there are reports that the crew actually gave a hijack alert, suggesting that the -- the crew had come under attack before that crash happened, as well.

So, inevitably, these voice recorders are going to be scrutinized in the hope that there will be some voice recording. If the crew was in any trouble before that crash, that should be on that -- on that recorder.

Also, the data recorder should let us know whether or not there were any fuel problems, whether or not there were any technical problems. So, that's what we're waiting for at the moment.

But until then, Russian officials really aren't being drawn on what it could possibly be. They say they are increasing security, though, at some of these airports across Russia.

Now, I did fly in just a few hours ago, into the -- the airport in Moscow where both of these planes took off from. I didn't notice any significant increase in security, but I did come into the international part of the airport, as opposed to the domestic part.

Now, these two crash sites inevitably are closed off at the moment. It is dark, as you can see here, in Moscow.

There's about 2,000 people at these crash sites trying to comb through the wreckage, trying to find exactly out what could be the cause for this. They say that many of the bodies have been recovered, and they are taking relatives down to towns near the crash sites at the moment for identification -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Paula, you mentioned 2,000 people on this site. You talk about the Russian investigators. Are you able to confirm if indeed the FBI or members of the TSA could be en route to this investigation or are on the scene?

HANCOCKS: That's something that Russian officials aren't telling us at all. They're saying that it is the FSB, which is the security services here, the successor to the KGB, who are in charge of this investigation. They're the ones that will be carrying it out.

They are not giving any other indication of who else could be helping them. I should imagine if they do need international help it will be forthcoming. But at the moment, they are keeping very quiet about what could be behind it, that it could be anything, it could be terrorism. But they are not going to rule it out. But they are also not going to rule out the fact that it could just be a horrible coincidence -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Paula Hancocks covering the story from Moscow. Thank you so much -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right. A horrible coincidence, that's strange (INAUDIBLE). It often takes years, of course, to find the causes of air disasters or the perpetrators, as the case may be. And it take as lot of expertise, borne out of a lot of experience.

Joining us to walk us through where the investigators might be right now is Bob Francis, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, involved in many, many times the aftermath of airplane crashes. The one that comes to mind right now, of course, is TWA 800 in 1996.

Mr. Francis, good to have you back with us. We appreciate it. BOB FRANCIS, FMR. CHAIRMAN, NTSB: Miles, nice to be with you.

O'BRIEN: I tell you what, I want to run through. We've got a little bit of a timeline put together here, and then I want to ask you about this whole notion of this being some sort of coincidence, or whatever the term may be. First of all, these are all local times, Moscow times.

9:35 p.m.: a Tupolev 154, not unlike what would be a DC-9 or an MD80 here, takes off from Domodedovo Airport. It is headed down to Sochi, which is on the Black Sea. It happens to be where Vladimir Putin is vacationing. What that means, we don't know.

10:15 p.m.: a Tupolev 134, not unlike our 727 here domestically, takes off from the same airport. So, we're talking only a few minutes later. Headed to Volgograd.

10:56 p.m.: the Tupolev 134 headed to Volgograd disappears from radar screens in the Tula area. And then at three minutes later, at 10:59, the Tupolev 154, on its way toward the Black Sea, disappears from radar. It is found near Rostov, 600 miles south of Rostov.

Just based on those very bare facts, Bob Francis, what are the chances that there was -- you know, I've heard pilot error being invoked. That seems unlikely. And a technical difficulty that would be on two different types of aircraft so far apart.

FRANCIS: I'd say that the timing certainly a major issue. And to -- to find out two accidents happening with those kinds of similarities within a few minutes is certainly extraordinarily unusual.

You think when something like this happens it's generally -- usually in general aviation, and you may have a fuel contamination problem. On the other hand, if engines start to go out because of fuel contamination, it's hard to believe that the pilots of one or the other or both of the aircraft wouldn't have called air traffic control saying they have a problem.

So, I guess what you end up with here is not totally dissimilar from what we had with TWA, which is you've got a situation, you make -- I think a lot of people here, as they did with TWA, are assuming this some kind of a criminal act. But the prudent thing to do, and I think from what -- from what I'm hearing, it sounds like the Russians have got -- opened a criminal case, they have their equivalent of the FBI working on this.

They're also looking at recorders. They've got the equivalent of the NTSB working on it. And they're going to be waiting until they have some evidence. And not assuming and starting to take all sorts of measures, particularly if it were a terrorist act, not taking a whole lot of measures until they know what happened and what significance it had.

O'BRIEN: (INAUDIBLE) midair collisions. Can you think of another occasion outside of 9/11 where you've had, you know, this kind of simultaneous airliner crash?

FRANCIS: Not unless it -- you know, you have (INAUDIBLE), where two aircraft ran together on runways. But I can't think of any major accidents that have taken place in this manner.

O'BRIEN: All right. Your -- in your investigation of TWA 800, I believe you and the team learned a lesson about potentially putting blinders on to one particular cause. You may not have had the blinders on, but certainly we in the media might have at one point or another. We can certainly be accused of that.

Is there anything we can discount at this juncture?

FRANCIS: It's hard to believe that the media would ever have blinders on.

(LAUGHTER)

FRANCIS: You know, I think it's a mistake to discount anything at this point. I mean, I think you can -- you can take a lot of different bits of evidence, like fuel contamination or mechanical problems -- pilot error, I think you said earlier, seems highly unlikely. But let's not rule out anything.

They say they've got the recorders. I think particularly the cockpit voice recorder would be interesting in terms of the aircraft where they say that a hijacking code was -- was transmitted.

O'BRIEN: All right.

FRANCIS: You know, was that transmitted intentionally? Were they trying to send another code? Was something terrible going on?

You just -- you just don't know. But recorders can be -- can be enormously (INAUDIBLE) if they've got good fidelity, if they've got good -- good parameters.

At the same time, be careful with recorders, too, because one thing that we found is that we -- we place a lot of emphasis on recorders, and our hopes for wonderful data is always -- is always there. But we're disappointed fairly often, as well

O'BRIEN: All right. Bob Francis, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. It will be interesting to see how -- what kind of fidelities you say those recorders do have on some of those older Soviet airliners. Thanks very much for your time -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Taking you live to the Pentagon right now. We told you about this report, independent report that has been released today.

Twenty-three military intelligence personnel, four contracts working with -- contractors working with them associated with the abuses at Abu Ghraib. Just a little bit of information that's coming out of this report. Right now, General Paul Kern, side by side by the man, Army Major General George Fay, who was appointed to investigate the abuses. Let's listen in as they continue to debrief reporters on that report they did.

(BEGIN LIVE NEWS EVENT -- JOINED IN PROGRESS)

GENERAL PAUL KERN, U.S. ARMY: The findings -- what we have are listed there, and they fall into the category of the leadership and what he failed to do. Now, let me just give you two examples of abuses.

There's a case where we found where people were put into isolation.

By itself, not an issue if done properly. One person is isolated, without any light, in the conditions of the temperature extremes in the summer, very hot, and the winter, very cold, and the person is naked, that is an abuse. And we found instances of that.

I think the most horrific one that we found from my perspective is the case of where MP dog handlers were subjecting two adolescents to terror from the dogs for the purposes of playing a game between the two dog teams to see how poorly they could get these kids to behave, specifically to see if they could get their bowel movements and their urination to work. Now, I did ask General Fay if he'd please add any other facts that he'd want.

The abuses we found -- we had a very stringent definition of abuse, because no abuse is tolerated by us in the Army. So we wanted to identify each and every instance.

Each one of those are contained within those 44 incidents that we already discussed. And they range from what you might consider minor abuses, such as unlawful stress positions, where people were placed in positions that were unauthorized, discomforting, but certainly not of the range of the abuse that everybody is familiar with, relative to the pictures.

So they range from the relatively minor abuses to the very significant abuses that everybody is familiar with in the pictures.

QUESTION: Sir, unfortunately, we're here without benefit of the report, because the Army declined to release it to us before hand. So forgive us for having to ask such detailed questions. But we don't have the details.

Could you outline -- in the executive summary that we were given that talks about how most of these occurred outside the scope of interrogations, but that means some of them did occur within interrogations. Could you describe those situations?

And there is also the reference here that most of this was misconduct. But some of it was misguidance from confusing rules that came down for how detainees should be treated. So could you talk about that smaller subset that occurred during interrogations and as a result of confusion over the guidance as to how to handle the detainees?

KERN: In the first case of an example, a detainee was interrogated naked. They thought, unfortunately, that a person who had submitted that request to do it that way, that it was OK.

Butt it clearly was not. And that was one where we find that it violated the concept of humility.

In cases of where with the lack of clarity, as I showed you in the earlier chart, you had this escalating number of detainees and interrogations which are taking place during that entire period.

The people who were conducting the interrogations clearly were feeling a lot of pressure to produce intelligence, as they should have been.

That's what the purpose of the interrogation is.

And in looking for that guidance, they were submitting requests back and forth, which were never, in our view, completely clarified. And so they were using drafts of other processes that they had known, and they were asking for clarity which in the end resulted in a couple of memos which were published by the Combined Joint Task Force for them to use, but in the end did not absolutely make it clear what the boundaries were.

And I'd ask both General Fay and General Jones, who looked at both of those issues more clearly, to comment.

(END LIVE NEWS EVENT)

PHILLIPS: While the generals speak. You were just hearing from General Paul Kern. Next to him, Army Major General George Fay, talking about what has been called the Fay report, the second independent investigation that we have heard about in two day looking into the abuses that took place at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

General Kern talking about the failure of a small group of soldiers, they have said, from the 205th Intelligence Brigade and the chain of command, saying that they found a loss of moral values and serious misconduct, talking about the pictures, as revolting as they are, that violations of the law definitely took place, and it didn't reflect any type of military policy that was in place. Specifically, reporters asking about the violations, about what took place in that prison.

A number of violations, he said, that went against the concept of humility from interrogations of the prisoners naked, to unlawful stress positions, to isolation and cold and hot conditions naked. But the worst, when asked about the worst situation that they investigated, the general saying the most horrific was the MP dog handlers actually taking two adolescent boys and putting them into a position naked with dogs going at them, trying to get these young adolescents to actually urinate on the floor.

The general talking about specific violations that they found at Abu Ghraib prison -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: What is making people sick in Ohio? Investigators are trying to track down the source of a mystery illness. We'll have a report.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Well is it food poisoning, something in the water? Ohio health officials are trying to figure out the cause of a mysterious illness that has struck hundreds of visitors to an island resort. Our medical correspondent, Holly Firfer, is here with more on all of this -- Holly.

HOLLY FIRFER, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: We have the updated numbers for you. We now know that 988 people visit an Ohio island resort, they get sick. And 314 additional people report the same gastrointestinal illness symptoms, and state health officials are stumped.

Something, as you said, is in the water or the food. And they just don't know what it is. What they do know is lab tests confirm 11 cases of campylobacter, three cases of neurovirus, and one person with salmonella.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's not typical to have more than one different type of germ that is causing an outbreak. However, it's important to point out that it is not unheard of.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FIRFER: CDC, the EPA and the Ohio Department of Agriculture have been called in to help with this investigation. Tuesday, health officials began an environmental assessment of the area.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. J. NICK BAIRD, DIRECTOR, OHIO HEALTH DEPT.: We're focused on water. We haven't ruled out other causes, like food. But really, we're looking at water, wastewater and potential for cross- contamination.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FIRFER: Initial results are not expected until the end of the week. Health officials have not, however, closed the island. But they are warning residents and visitors to drink bottled water, cook food thoroughly and wash their hands often, which you should do for health precautions anyway.

O'BRIEN: I imagine it's not very good for business on the island.

FIRFER: No.

O'BRIEN: Let's talk about symptoms. How would you know you had that or just something more common?

FIRFER: Well, besides feeling awful, they -- all three of them have the same gastrointestinal illnesses. They cause those same flu- like symptoms: nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain, fever, muscle and headaches, that all usually take anywhere from a few hours to a couple of days to start making you feel sick. So, when you get it you really know it.

O'BRIEN: All right. This will set somebody back. How serious sit really, though? Is it something that could be potentially fatal? What do you about it?

FIRFER: Yes. There's certain groups of people, but for the general population it is not that harmful.

Salmonella is the second-most common food-borne illness, and it can be treated with antibiotics, as can campylobacter, which is one of the most common causes of diarrhea illness in the U.S. Neurovirus is a highly-communicable disease with no treatment. But doctors say for this you really just need to drink a lot of water and juice to stay hydrated.

But as I mentioned, for healthy people, if you get sick, you will probably be knocked out for a couple of days. But you should recover. The very young, the elderly and those with compromised immune systems are most as risk of getting a serious illness, and they must be vigilant. So, those are the groups that need to be very concerned.

O'BRIEN: All right. Holly Firfer with the latest on what's going on, on that island in Ohio. Appreciate it.

FIRFER: Sure.

O'BRIEN: Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Swift Boat sinks a campaign staffer, and a Bush campaign lawyer's revelation leads to a resignation. We're going to take it up with the "CROSSFIRE" guys.

And from slinging mud to slinging tomatoes, the food festival gets in your face just ahead.

RHONDA SCHAFFLER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Rhonda Schaffler live from the New York Stock Exchange. There's a new winning strategy on Wall Street, and it's all about playing it safe. I'll explain right after this break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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Aired August 25, 2004 - 13:59   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Jill Dougherty, what the Kerry campaign is insisting on is something a little more than just criticism of 527 ads. Specifically, it is this ad that they would like the president to denounce. You know, is the president trying to have it both ways here by saying Senator Kerry served admirably and yet refusing to call this ad wrong?
JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the president would argue that he -- that these groups, regardless of who they are, do have the right to express their opinion. And he believes that the Swift Boats Veterans, just like everybody else, has the right to say what they believe about this.

And then the -- the Republicans and the Bush-Cheney campaign would also say that the Democrats are doing this very same thing, except that nobody essentially is paying a lot of attention to it. They would argue that the president himself has been the subject and the object of $60 -- $63 million worth of attack ads by Democratic organizations that are out spending the Republicans. And some of them have been extremely strong, excoriating the president.

So, they would say that this is not fair, it's a double standard. And what you are seeing right here is obviously very emotional. And Senator Cleland, himself, just is his very presence is very, strong. But the Bush people would argue very strongly themselves that they feel that this is not right, that the president has come out.

He said I don't want anymore of these ads. But he's not going to get involved in specifically telling a group to stand down.

O'BRIEN: All right. Well, let's get clear on one point here. The Kerry campaign has not in any way denounced the 527 system, as it were, which allows these ads to go. But as far as I know, and correct me if I'm wrong, Jill, I don't know if the Bush campaign has asked the Kerry campaign to renounce any specific ad directed at it.

DOUGHERTY: I do not think that they have, Miles, per se. But certainly, the president, by saying all of these ads should go, all of these 527 groups should go -- in fact, he said he thought an end was put to this back when McCain-Feingold was passed. But it didn't happen.

So, they are not, I don't think, specifically saying that, that they want all ads ended. And the sad thing about all of this is, as you can see, is that just look at some of that rhetoric. That's some of the strongest rhetoric we have heard. O'BRIEN: All right. Jill -- Jill, I apologize. A little more rhetoric to offer you.

This is Jerry Patterson. He's a veteran who is a supporter of President Bush. Had attempted to deliver a letter to Max Cleland, was unable. Let's listen to him as he talks to reporters there.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who called you today to begin to put this letter together?

JERRY PATTERSON, TEXAS LAND COMMISSIONER: I was driving to Dallas for another function, and I was called by -- I forgot who it was -- a guy in the Bush campaign in Waco, that said. "You're a veteran. You are a Vietnam veteran." And I said, "Yes."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)?

PATTERSON: I don't know who -- I got a -- you know, when those phones ring and you've got the funny noise and you don't have the rear -- you don't have the number on it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did he give you his name?

PATTERSON: He did. I think it might have -- he works for Ken Mehlman. You know? So, you figure -- OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And what time was this?

PATTERSON: I don't know.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was this morning.

PATTERSON: It was this morning.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And sir, can you describe what he said to you?

PATTERSON: He said that Mr. -- Senator Cleland, an honorable -- clearly an honorable -- an American hero, a guy who gave far more than I gave -- and I was only there six months and the war ended. I left the day of cease-fire.

But was going to come and deliver a letter. And -- that they had a letter signed by veterans and if I would be also a signatory. And I said, "Yes." And he read me the letter. And I've got it right here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who wrote...

PATTERSON: And that basically -- that basically says what we're talking about.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. I thought you spoke to the president.

PATTERSON: And I spoke to the president after this was all, you know, done deal, letter drafted. And he said, "Thank you for your service." And I know the president because he was governor when I was a state senator here in Texas.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who wrote the letter?

PATTERSON: We all -- the letter was drafted by Bush-Cheney '04, and we, all of us signatories, which are myself, Duke Cunningham, Duncan Hunter, Sam Johnson, General Palmer, Robert O'Malley (ph), a Marine medal of honor recipient, James Fleming (ph), another medal of honor recipient, and Colonel Richard Castle (ph) agreed to have our names on it. And we're saying basically in the letter that you can't have it both ways. I could read it to you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Before -- were you working on veteran strategy with the Bush campaign before today?

PATTERSON: I've never worked on anything for the Bush campaign. I'm a volunteer and will probably do more volunteering.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is it the first time you talked to the president since...

PATTERSON: The first time I talked to the president since the -- in over -- maybe since the last campaign. He knew I had twins six months ago, though. He knew that I'm a 58-year-old father of six- month-old twins, and he made comment about that. How did you know that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)?

PATTERSON: Yes, they are.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you know Bob Kerrey?

PATTERSON: Yes, I do.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What -- how do you know Bob Kerrey (ph)?

PATTERSON: He's been a major contributor to my campaigns. I was a state senator, as I said, for six years. And he was a major contributor to my campaign. The interesting thing about Bob Kerrey (ph), he never called and asked me for anything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Commissioner, what do you think of the Swift Boat group?

PATTERSON: You know, I think, you know, there's a fact-checking under way. But the point is, the Swift Boat folks have a right to their piece, just as anybody that wants to attack George W. Bush have a right.

You can't selectively say bring down those 527s. I heard Rassmann say that. He said our 527s are OK and theirs are not. That was words out of his mouth.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)?

PATTERSON: Well, any -- it is fact checking. There's fact checking by the press, fact checking for a lot of (INAUDIBLE). Now, you know, we talk...

O'BRIEN: All right. We are listening to Jerry Patterson. He is the Texas land commissioner. And I might have confused matters a while ago, because I didn't understand it.

In Texas, the land commissioner is actually responsible for veterans affairs. He's going on talking about this letter which he attempted to deliver on behalf of veterans who support President Bush to Max Cleland. He still has the letter in hand.

And the plot continues to thicken on this Swift Boat controversy. The political theater is still under way. We're monitoring it all for you, of course -- Kyra.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well, catastrophe, certainly coincidence. No one knows. But the day after two Russian airliners went down three minutes and 450 miles apart, suspicions persist, and no theory is being ruled out. Though Russian officials say they see no preliminary indications of terrorism, 89 people were killed in those tandem disasters.

We get the latest now from CNN's Paula Hancocks, who just flew into the Moscow airport where both flights originated.

Paula, what have you been able to find out?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kyra, what Russian officials are telling us at the moment is not very much, the fact it could be terrorism, it could be a pilot error, it could be a technical error. They are not willing to rule anything out at the moment.

President Vladimir Putin is back in town this evening. He was on holiday in the area where the -- the destination of the second plane, in fact. But he's been meeting in an emergency meeting with the chiefs of the FSB. That's the security service over here who are leading the investigation into these crashes.

He's also meeting with his transport minister, who he has put in charge of these -- this affair. He says that his first steep is to provide information, but that information is not forthcoming because they do not know exactly what the causes are.

They have found the so-called black boxes, or the flight data recorders, which are very crucial. Three of them, they say, they found, from the two crashes. And they are looking at those at the moment. We are hoping we'll get some indication whether or not that is shedding any light on the situation.

The fact is, the first flight, there are reports of eyewitnesses saying they heard or saw an explosion or loud bang before that crash. And with the second flight, there are reports that the crew actually gave a hijack alert, suggesting that the -- the crew had come under attack before that crash happened, as well.

So, inevitably, these voice recorders are going to be scrutinized in the hope that there will be some voice recording. If the crew was in any trouble before that crash, that should be on that -- on that recorder.

Also, the data recorder should let us know whether or not there were any fuel problems, whether or not there were any technical problems. So, that's what we're waiting for at the moment.

But until then, Russian officials really aren't being drawn on what it could possibly be. They say they are increasing security, though, at some of these airports across Russia.

Now, I did fly in just a few hours ago, into the -- the airport in Moscow where both of these planes took off from. I didn't notice any significant increase in security, but I did come into the international part of the airport, as opposed to the domestic part.

Now, these two crash sites inevitably are closed off at the moment. It is dark, as you can see here, in Moscow.

There's about 2,000 people at these crash sites trying to comb through the wreckage, trying to find exactly out what could be the cause for this. They say that many of the bodies have been recovered, and they are taking relatives down to towns near the crash sites at the moment for identification -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Paula, you mentioned 2,000 people on this site. You talk about the Russian investigators. Are you able to confirm if indeed the FBI or members of the TSA could be en route to this investigation or are on the scene?

HANCOCKS: That's something that Russian officials aren't telling us at all. They're saying that it is the FSB, which is the security services here, the successor to the KGB, who are in charge of this investigation. They're the ones that will be carrying it out.

They are not giving any other indication of who else could be helping them. I should imagine if they do need international help it will be forthcoming. But at the moment, they are keeping very quiet about what could be behind it, that it could be anything, it could be terrorism. But they are not going to rule it out. But they are also not going to rule out the fact that it could just be a horrible coincidence -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Paula Hancocks covering the story from Moscow. Thank you so much -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right. A horrible coincidence, that's strange (INAUDIBLE). It often takes years, of course, to find the causes of air disasters or the perpetrators, as the case may be. And it take as lot of expertise, borne out of a lot of experience.

Joining us to walk us through where the investigators might be right now is Bob Francis, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, involved in many, many times the aftermath of airplane crashes. The one that comes to mind right now, of course, is TWA 800 in 1996.

Mr. Francis, good to have you back with us. We appreciate it. BOB FRANCIS, FMR. CHAIRMAN, NTSB: Miles, nice to be with you.

O'BRIEN: I tell you what, I want to run through. We've got a little bit of a timeline put together here, and then I want to ask you about this whole notion of this being some sort of coincidence, or whatever the term may be. First of all, these are all local times, Moscow times.

9:35 p.m.: a Tupolev 154, not unlike what would be a DC-9 or an MD80 here, takes off from Domodedovo Airport. It is headed down to Sochi, which is on the Black Sea. It happens to be where Vladimir Putin is vacationing. What that means, we don't know.

10:15 p.m.: a Tupolev 134, not unlike our 727 here domestically, takes off from the same airport. So, we're talking only a few minutes later. Headed to Volgograd.

10:56 p.m.: the Tupolev 134 headed to Volgograd disappears from radar screens in the Tula area. And then at three minutes later, at 10:59, the Tupolev 154, on its way toward the Black Sea, disappears from radar. It is found near Rostov, 600 miles south of Rostov.

Just based on those very bare facts, Bob Francis, what are the chances that there was -- you know, I've heard pilot error being invoked. That seems unlikely. And a technical difficulty that would be on two different types of aircraft so far apart.

FRANCIS: I'd say that the timing certainly a major issue. And to -- to find out two accidents happening with those kinds of similarities within a few minutes is certainly extraordinarily unusual.

You think when something like this happens it's generally -- usually in general aviation, and you may have a fuel contamination problem. On the other hand, if engines start to go out because of fuel contamination, it's hard to believe that the pilots of one or the other or both of the aircraft wouldn't have called air traffic control saying they have a problem.

So, I guess what you end up with here is not totally dissimilar from what we had with TWA, which is you've got a situation, you make -- I think a lot of people here, as they did with TWA, are assuming this some kind of a criminal act. But the prudent thing to do, and I think from what -- from what I'm hearing, it sounds like the Russians have got -- opened a criminal case, they have their equivalent of the FBI working on this.

They're also looking at recorders. They've got the equivalent of the NTSB working on it. And they're going to be waiting until they have some evidence. And not assuming and starting to take all sorts of measures, particularly if it were a terrorist act, not taking a whole lot of measures until they know what happened and what significance it had.

O'BRIEN: (INAUDIBLE) midair collisions. Can you think of another occasion outside of 9/11 where you've had, you know, this kind of simultaneous airliner crash?

FRANCIS: Not unless it -- you know, you have (INAUDIBLE), where two aircraft ran together on runways. But I can't think of any major accidents that have taken place in this manner.

O'BRIEN: All right. Your -- in your investigation of TWA 800, I believe you and the team learned a lesson about potentially putting blinders on to one particular cause. You may not have had the blinders on, but certainly we in the media might have at one point or another. We can certainly be accused of that.

Is there anything we can discount at this juncture?

FRANCIS: It's hard to believe that the media would ever have blinders on.

(LAUGHTER)

FRANCIS: You know, I think it's a mistake to discount anything at this point. I mean, I think you can -- you can take a lot of different bits of evidence, like fuel contamination or mechanical problems -- pilot error, I think you said earlier, seems highly unlikely. But let's not rule out anything.

They say they've got the recorders. I think particularly the cockpit voice recorder would be interesting in terms of the aircraft where they say that a hijacking code was -- was transmitted.

O'BRIEN: All right.

FRANCIS: You know, was that transmitted intentionally? Were they trying to send another code? Was something terrible going on?

You just -- you just don't know. But recorders can be -- can be enormously (INAUDIBLE) if they've got good fidelity, if they've got good -- good parameters.

At the same time, be careful with recorders, too, because one thing that we found is that we -- we place a lot of emphasis on recorders, and our hopes for wonderful data is always -- is always there. But we're disappointed fairly often, as well

O'BRIEN: All right. Bob Francis, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board. It will be interesting to see how -- what kind of fidelities you say those recorders do have on some of those older Soviet airliners. Thanks very much for your time -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Taking you live to the Pentagon right now. We told you about this report, independent report that has been released today.

Twenty-three military intelligence personnel, four contracts working with -- contractors working with them associated with the abuses at Abu Ghraib. Just a little bit of information that's coming out of this report. Right now, General Paul Kern, side by side by the man, Army Major General George Fay, who was appointed to investigate the abuses. Let's listen in as they continue to debrief reporters on that report they did.

(BEGIN LIVE NEWS EVENT -- JOINED IN PROGRESS)

GENERAL PAUL KERN, U.S. ARMY: The findings -- what we have are listed there, and they fall into the category of the leadership and what he failed to do. Now, let me just give you two examples of abuses.

There's a case where we found where people were put into isolation.

By itself, not an issue if done properly. One person is isolated, without any light, in the conditions of the temperature extremes in the summer, very hot, and the winter, very cold, and the person is naked, that is an abuse. And we found instances of that.

I think the most horrific one that we found from my perspective is the case of where MP dog handlers were subjecting two adolescents to terror from the dogs for the purposes of playing a game between the two dog teams to see how poorly they could get these kids to behave, specifically to see if they could get their bowel movements and their urination to work. Now, I did ask General Fay if he'd please add any other facts that he'd want.

The abuses we found -- we had a very stringent definition of abuse, because no abuse is tolerated by us in the Army. So we wanted to identify each and every instance.

Each one of those are contained within those 44 incidents that we already discussed. And they range from what you might consider minor abuses, such as unlawful stress positions, where people were placed in positions that were unauthorized, discomforting, but certainly not of the range of the abuse that everybody is familiar with, relative to the pictures.

So they range from the relatively minor abuses to the very significant abuses that everybody is familiar with in the pictures.

QUESTION: Sir, unfortunately, we're here without benefit of the report, because the Army declined to release it to us before hand. So forgive us for having to ask such detailed questions. But we don't have the details.

Could you outline -- in the executive summary that we were given that talks about how most of these occurred outside the scope of interrogations, but that means some of them did occur within interrogations. Could you describe those situations?

And there is also the reference here that most of this was misconduct. But some of it was misguidance from confusing rules that came down for how detainees should be treated. So could you talk about that smaller subset that occurred during interrogations and as a result of confusion over the guidance as to how to handle the detainees?

KERN: In the first case of an example, a detainee was interrogated naked. They thought, unfortunately, that a person who had submitted that request to do it that way, that it was OK.

Butt it clearly was not. And that was one where we find that it violated the concept of humility.

In cases of where with the lack of clarity, as I showed you in the earlier chart, you had this escalating number of detainees and interrogations which are taking place during that entire period.

The people who were conducting the interrogations clearly were feeling a lot of pressure to produce intelligence, as they should have been.

That's what the purpose of the interrogation is.

And in looking for that guidance, they were submitting requests back and forth, which were never, in our view, completely clarified. And so they were using drafts of other processes that they had known, and they were asking for clarity which in the end resulted in a couple of memos which were published by the Combined Joint Task Force for them to use, but in the end did not absolutely make it clear what the boundaries were.

And I'd ask both General Fay and General Jones, who looked at both of those issues more clearly, to comment.

(END LIVE NEWS EVENT)

PHILLIPS: While the generals speak. You were just hearing from General Paul Kern. Next to him, Army Major General George Fay, talking about what has been called the Fay report, the second independent investigation that we have heard about in two day looking into the abuses that took place at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

General Kern talking about the failure of a small group of soldiers, they have said, from the 205th Intelligence Brigade and the chain of command, saying that they found a loss of moral values and serious misconduct, talking about the pictures, as revolting as they are, that violations of the law definitely took place, and it didn't reflect any type of military policy that was in place. Specifically, reporters asking about the violations, about what took place in that prison.

A number of violations, he said, that went against the concept of humility from interrogations of the prisoners naked, to unlawful stress positions, to isolation and cold and hot conditions naked. But the worst, when asked about the worst situation that they investigated, the general saying the most horrific was the MP dog handlers actually taking two adolescent boys and putting them into a position naked with dogs going at them, trying to get these young adolescents to actually urinate on the floor.

The general talking about specific violations that they found at Abu Ghraib prison -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: What is making people sick in Ohio? Investigators are trying to track down the source of a mystery illness. We'll have a report.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Well is it food poisoning, something in the water? Ohio health officials are trying to figure out the cause of a mysterious illness that has struck hundreds of visitors to an island resort. Our medical correspondent, Holly Firfer, is here with more on all of this -- Holly.

HOLLY FIRFER, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: We have the updated numbers for you. We now know that 988 people visit an Ohio island resort, they get sick. And 314 additional people report the same gastrointestinal illness symptoms, and state health officials are stumped.

Something, as you said, is in the water or the food. And they just don't know what it is. What they do know is lab tests confirm 11 cases of campylobacter, three cases of neurovirus, and one person with salmonella.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's not typical to have more than one different type of germ that is causing an outbreak. However, it's important to point out that it is not unheard of.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FIRFER: CDC, the EPA and the Ohio Department of Agriculture have been called in to help with this investigation. Tuesday, health officials began an environmental assessment of the area.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. J. NICK BAIRD, DIRECTOR, OHIO HEALTH DEPT.: We're focused on water. We haven't ruled out other causes, like food. But really, we're looking at water, wastewater and potential for cross- contamination.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FIRFER: Initial results are not expected until the end of the week. Health officials have not, however, closed the island. But they are warning residents and visitors to drink bottled water, cook food thoroughly and wash their hands often, which you should do for health precautions anyway.

O'BRIEN: I imagine it's not very good for business on the island.

FIRFER: No.

O'BRIEN: Let's talk about symptoms. How would you know you had that or just something more common?

FIRFER: Well, besides feeling awful, they -- all three of them have the same gastrointestinal illnesses. They cause those same flu- like symptoms: nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain, fever, muscle and headaches, that all usually take anywhere from a few hours to a couple of days to start making you feel sick. So, when you get it you really know it.

O'BRIEN: All right. This will set somebody back. How serious sit really, though? Is it something that could be potentially fatal? What do you about it?

FIRFER: Yes. There's certain groups of people, but for the general population it is not that harmful.

Salmonella is the second-most common food-borne illness, and it can be treated with antibiotics, as can campylobacter, which is one of the most common causes of diarrhea illness in the U.S. Neurovirus is a highly-communicable disease with no treatment. But doctors say for this you really just need to drink a lot of water and juice to stay hydrated.

But as I mentioned, for healthy people, if you get sick, you will probably be knocked out for a couple of days. But you should recover. The very young, the elderly and those with compromised immune systems are most as risk of getting a serious illness, and they must be vigilant. So, those are the groups that need to be very concerned.

O'BRIEN: All right. Holly Firfer with the latest on what's going on, on that island in Ohio. Appreciate it.

FIRFER: Sure.

O'BRIEN: Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Swift Boat sinks a campaign staffer, and a Bush campaign lawyer's revelation leads to a resignation. We're going to take it up with the "CROSSFIRE" guys.

And from slinging mud to slinging tomatoes, the food festival gets in your face just ahead.

RHONDA SCHAFFLER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Rhonda Schaffler live from the New York Stock Exchange. There's a new winning strategy on Wall Street, and it's all about playing it safe. I'll explain right after this break.

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