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Tsunami Survivors in Need of Medical Supplies; Marines Join Relief Effort; Alberto Gonzales to Endure Tough Questions in Confirmation Hearings; Verizon Rated Highest in Consumer Poll
Aired January 05, 2005 - 13:00 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, CO-HOST: Tsunami death toll. The number of Americans presumed dead makes a significant jump. We'll have the details.
MILES O'BRIEN, CO-HOST: How is the U.S. military handling the overwhelming task of getting help to thousands of survivors? Only on CNN, we talk with the Marine general in charge of keeping the supplies moving.
PHILLIPS: Winter wallop: from the Midwest to the East Coast, a huge storm system dumping rain snow and ice. And the worst is not over yet. We're live from Chicago.
O'BRIEN: And can you hear me now? Well, good. "Consumer Reports" rates cell phone service and shows you how to avoid pitfalls when signing up for a plan.
From Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., the Cannon Office Building, I'm Miles O'Brien.
PHILLIPS: And I'm Kyra Phillips, at the CNN Center in Atlanta. CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: I cannot begin to imagine the horror that went through the families and all of the people who heard this noise coming and then had their lives snuffed out by this wave.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: He's seen conflict, calamity, tragedy and terror. But Colin Powell says he's never seen anything like this.
The U.S. secretary of state flew over Indonesia's Aceh province today, hours before his staff in Washington announced the presumed U.S. Death toll had more than doubled, from 16 to 36, with hundreds more still unaccounted for.
Tomorrow, Powell attends a high-level aid conference in Jakarta, as does Australian Prime Minister John Howard, who today announced his country will supplement its short-term relief campaign with a billion Australian dollars. That's $764 million U.S., earmarked for Indonesian reconstruction over five years. Europeans, meanwhile, devoted three minutes of silence today to the memory of those who perished, a number now approaching 156,000, chiefly in northern Indonesia, southern Thailand, southern India, and Sri Lanka.
CNN is everywhere: 18 correspondents and anchors from Ram Ramgopal to Richard Roth. You'll see the whole picture only on CNN.
O'BRIEN: Meanwhile in Sri Lanka, another devastated country as a result of this killer tsunami. More U.S. Marine boots on the ground.
CNN's Paula Hancocks is there. She has a live report for us -- Paula.
PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Miles.
Well, the latest figures from the Sri Lankan government is they believe more than 46,000 people have died here in Sri Lanka. Thousands more are missing, and somewhere near 800,000 people are homeless.
Now that is the one factor that they're trying to focus on at the moment. Those who are homeless have no home to go to, have very little food and water. It's the aid organizations themselves that are trying to get through to these people, many of them in remote, inaccessible areas.
There has been a fair bit of criticism that we are so far after the tsunami actually hit the southern coast and the eastern coast and part of the western coast of Sri Lanka, and still many people are without the absolute basics.
I went to Hambantota in the south-southeastern part of Sri Lanka, and I went with a U.S. aid agency, AmeriCares. We were the only people that they had seen that had brought medicine, according to the people on the street.
There was one other group there that had brought food and water, but apart from that, they said no one had come through. So even though we know that billions of dollars are being spent, billions of dollars are being donated and the aid agencies are in the country, we aren't necessarily seeing the evidence of it on the ground.
Where I am now is near Beruwala, which is the southwest of the country. And here as well, we're not seeing the evidence on the ground.
Today I went out with a local group, some Sri Lankans themselves who used to be bartenders. They now don't have that bar because, obviously, tourism has been destroyed, along with the coastline here.
And they're trying themselves to raise money to take blankets to the refugee camps, to take baby milk to the refugee camps, because they say they have not seen the international aid organizations. And there's a fair bit of anger in this area, Miles. O'BRIEN: Paula, I know you've had the opportunity to travel with some of the relief workers, in particular one doctor that you spent some time with. Just through their eyes, if you will, relate some of their experiences, what they're encountering and how they're helping.
HANCOCKS: Well, doctors -- doctor the world over, the only thing that actually makes them any different from each other is the resources. American, British doctors have all the best of the Western medicine at their fingertips.
The doctor, Dr. Jonathan Fein (ph), the U.S. doctor from Connecticut that I traveled with said that he was shocked just how much Sri Lankan doctors are struggling with the absolute basic resources that they have.
Many places we went to didn't even have antibiotics. They didn't have linens because they'd had to wrap some of the bodies in those linens. He said there was no disinfectant and the hospitals were a mess.
On a personal level, he was also very shocked. He said that he got together with these doctors, and inevitably, when doctors get together, they talk medicine. He related to them. They got on well.
But then he realized that the experiences between them were very different, as the doctor broke down in front of him, explained how he'd had to flee from the wave himself, how he'd lost members of his family, lost his colleagues, but still had to continue trying to help people in a hospital that catered for 300, with 900 people in there, with very little resources.
And he said that was very shocking to him. He's seen death. He's seen suffering, but never on this kind of scale -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Paula Hancocks, on the island nation of Sri Lanka, thank you very much.
Ever since this day after Christmas tragedy, the numbers have changed, the death toll rising dramatically. And embedded in these numbers, the loss of American citizens.
The State Department right now with a briefing, updating the number of Americans presumed dead as a result of the tsunami. Adam Ereli is the spokesman.
ADAM ERELI, STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN: ... the people who have been out of touch with their families, for quite a long time. These include, obviously, vacationers. These include people who were in the region. It's a -- it's as diverse a group as America is a population.
Yes, ma'am?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Elizabeth Beck (ph) with "The New York Times."
I know that yesterday you said that the United States is at the same place as other countries, the Nordics, in having difficulty discovering who's missing, et cetera.
But it seems, looking at the other governments, they have been able to provide these data much earlier than you are, now today. Is there anything specific that you're missing that, say, the Norwegians or the Swedes or the Finns have in order to track this?
ERELI: I don't know if I suggested we're at the same place. I -- what I was trying to communicate is that -- uh -- as far as I understand the situation, nobody has 100 percent degree of clarity on exactly where all their citizens are, including these other countries.
Now, they might have -- might have a clearer picture than we do, but they're still -- there's still doubts. There's still gray areas. There's still -- there's still unanswered questions.
I would add, however, that different countries -- and again this is something we mentioned earlier -- different countries have different procedures for accounting for and tracking their citizens.
For example, some countries -- citizens of that country have to -- are registered upon -- are accounted for when leaving the country. So that you know whether, as a national -- the national authorities of that country know whether one of their own has left the country. And they know whether that -- the national of that country has returned.
We don't have similar tracking of Americans.
In other cases, people traveling to the areas, as a general rule, go in package tours. And so working with the travel industry, it's much easier to account for a much larger percentage of the citizens in question.
So you've got -- I think relatively more -- more to work with than we do. Where you have, again as I've said, people who go out on their own for a long time and never touch base. And -- and then all of a sudden somebody asks about them and you've got to -- you've got to work to track them down.
So I think it's really a function of, No. 1, national immigration or exit and entry requirements, as well as travel patterns. And -- and -- and traveling, and how the travel industry works.
Yes?
O'BRIEN: That's Adam Ereli, at the State Department with his daily briefing. What you might have missed at the beginning there, confirmed earlier by our State Department correspondent Andrea Koppel, the State Department now saying 36 Americans confirmed dead in the tsunami disaster. Still many more missing.
But as I think you caught the gist there, as you listened to him, a lot of confusion about who might or might not have been in the region. Possibility that families have called and there might be people who have counted -- were counted that shouldn't have been or counted twice. They're still trying to sort it out.
Obviously, a very emotional and difficult task. And difficult for the families here in the United States -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Hour by hour, the vast and intricate aid operation of the U.S. Pacific Command gets vaster and more intricate. Earlier today, I spoke by phone with Marine Lieutenant General Robert Blackman in Utapao, Thailand. He is the commander of Joint Task Force 536. In other words, he oversees everything.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LT. GEN. ROBERT BLACKMAN, U.S. MARINES: We are dealing with perhaps what is the -- what will go down in history as-- as the greatest natural disaster.
We have three combined support groups: One each in Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Thailand that are providing the day-to-day execution of our relief effort.
And at the same time, here in Utapao, Thailand, we have a combined support force that is providing the overall command and control to this regional effort to provide humanitarian assistance and disaster relief.
PHILLIPS: What have the people said to you, what if they said to your Marines -- I know you're working even side by side with the royal Thai navy. What have been the person stories, the feelings, when they come to you and say, "Sir, we need your help"?
BLACKMAN: The soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines who are there on the ground providing relief have -- have been greeted with open arms. The -- just the look of relief and the appreciation that the people in Indonesia, here in Thailand and in Sri Lanka have shown to our relief effort has been -- has been extraordinary.
PHILLIPS: Here in America, we've been talking so much about Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom, wars that you, of course, have been involved with now. This is a different type of battle; it's a humanitarian battle. Tell me about the mindset and how that's changed among your men and women.
BLACKMAN: I think one -- one aspect has not changed. Whether we're here conducting humanitarian assistance or disaster relief operations, or war combat situations in Iraq and Afghanistan, every one of these young men and women is applying an incredible level of intensity and focus to their duties.
And yet what perhaps is different is that the training that they've all undergone, that we've all spent our entire careers preparing for war and fighting our country's battles. Here is an opportunity for us to save lives, to minimize the continued loss of life and to mitigate the human suffering that the people of this region are undergoing right now.
PHILLIPS: General Robert Blackman, sir, we thank you so much for your time today. And we wish you the best of luck with your mission.
BLACKMAN: Thank you very much. (END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: And in our next hour, I'll talk with the naval commander of the expeditionary strike group aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard, on a mission of mercy in the Indian Ocean.
And in our 3 p.m. hour, noon on the West Coast, a general at Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii will tell us how the Air Force is answering the call for help. It's news you'll only see right here on CNN.
O'BRIEN: And for that matter, only on LIVE FROM.
In addition to the human toll of the tsunami, the economic impact will be long term. Later this hour, we'll take you to a resort in Sri Lanka that was just beginning to make a comeback when this disaster struck.
An ambitious agenda. President Bush calling on Congress to tackle everything from tort reform to a major overhaul of Social Security. Will he get what he wants? We'll talk about that and some other matters on Capitol Hill.
And later on LIVE FROM, if you've made a resolution to lose weight, how do you pick the diet that is right for you?
LIVE FROM Capitol Hill with the report from Ed Henry, our Capitol Hill correspondent, in just a moment. Continues after a short break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: The president of the United States, George W. Bush, headed downstate Illinois today. As a matter of fact, he has arrived at Scott Air Force Base there. He's there to make a speech about tort reform.
As he was winging away aboard -- his way there aboard Air Force One, his spokesperson, Scott McClellan, told reporters that the president has written checks totaling about $10,000 out of his personal funds to various relief organizations involved in trying to begin the rebuilding and the recovery in the wake of the tsunami, $10,000 of personal donations on the part of the president.
We, of course, will bring you the president's speech live as it happens, a little bit later here on CNN.
Turning now to Iraq. The first post-Saddam election just weeks away, and those bent on disrupting it ramped up the violence again today.
A suicide bomber targeted a U.S. convoy in Baghdad in just one deadly attack today. Two civilians killed.
In Hillah, south of Baghdad, a car bomb exploded in front of a police station. At least 10 killed there, injuring more than four times that many. In Baqubah, five police officers died when a bomb detonated near them.
Near Mosul, a U.S. soldier on patrol was killed by a rocket- propelled grenade. Two others wounded.
But despite nearly 90 deaths just this week from insurgent violence, Iraq's interim prime minister insisting the election will happen and on schedule. Ayad Allawi telling reporters in Baghdad today -- we quote him now -- "We will not allow terrorists to derail the process."
And so it goes in Iraq.
The man poised to inherit the U.S. policy on dealing with the legalities, at least, of the mission in Iraq and Afghanistan faces a Senate grilling tomorrow. That may be treating it lightly.
He is Alberto Gonzales, the man chosen by President Bush to be the next United States attorney general.
CNN's congressional correspondent, Ed Henry, with us here now to tell us what lies in store.
The Congress is new, but in some ways, the story is the same, isn't it?
ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. I mean, Judge Gonzales would be replacing John Ashcroft, who was a lightning rod. And we're expecting the same kind of political fireworks tomorrow before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The key bone of contention, really, is Judge Gonzales' role as White House counsel in formulating policy on the treatment of prisoners in the war of terror.
In particular, critics zero in on an August 2002 Justice Department memo, in which they say, the critics say that the definition of torture was so narrow that it led to a lot of abuses; in particular, the abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison Iraq.
There is one line in that 2002 memo that says, quote, "These cases make clear that while many of these techniques may amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, they do not produce pain or suffering of the necessary intensity to meet the definition of torture."
It's important to point out that this policy has been reversed. Last month, the Justice Department put out a new memo, widening the definition of torture.
But what -- when I spoke to Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy of the judiciary committee yesterday, he said his real concern is that he thinks Judge Gonzales has been stonewalling.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SEN. PATRICK LEAHY (D), VERMONT: A number of us have been asking Judge Gonzales for months now about his role in the torture memos. We've never gotten a full answer. He'll be asked those questions.
I think that the direction, the nature, the tone, of the hearing will really be reflected, depending upon whether he's forthcoming. Neither he, nor the White House, has been really forthcoming so far. I am hoping he will be at the hearing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HENRY: Now, Republican senators on the judiciary committee say that's nonsense. They say that Judge Gonzales has already been forthcoming, that the real problem is that Democratic senators keep moving the goal post on exactly what memos they want to see.
And Miles, as well, Republicans point out that there are certain memos that have to be kept confidential, because when you're waging the war on terror, you can't let your enemies get a window on how you're actually waging that war.
O'BRIEN: Of course, I'm sure a lot of the senators will question that very notion of what's being hidden, whether it should be hidden.
How much, though, how much rhetorical torture is he expected to endure here? Because ultimately, he's going to be confirmed. The votes are there.
HENRY: That's right, I think that this is mostly what it's about. You're right. It's rhetorical torture. I think the Democrats want to make an example out of Judge Gonzales.
If you look at it, President Bush is -- it's almost a complete overhaul of his second term cabinet. But this is really the only nominee who's going to face a grilling and so the Democrats want to make an example of him, make their political points. But in the end he's going to get through.
O'BRIEN: Condi Rice won't get the same kind of grilling?
HENRY: Not that strong.
O'BRIEN: All right. Ed Henry, Capitol Hill, right here with us, thank you.
HENRY: Good to have you here.
O'BRIEN: Always a pleasure. All right. Appreciate it -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Dropped calls, poor service and complicated bills. Does this sound like your experience with your cell phone? Well, you're not alone. Just ahead, "Consumer Report" rates cell phone service, has some tips on avoiding the gotchas.
And later on LIVE FROM, a U.S. Navy admiral speaks to us from aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard. He's talking about his mission to help the devastated areas by the tsunami.
A huge storm closing schools, shutting down roads and leaving thousands of people without power in the U.S. We'll take you live to Chicago, where they're bracing for even more snow.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: OK. So you have the coolest cell phone on the block, swinging from your belt with the camera, the games, the hip-hop ring tones. But a fat load of good it does you if you hate your provider.
How wild are you about your wireless service? That's the focus of this month's "Consumer Reports" magazine, whose snoopers got up close with cell phone providers across the country.
David Heim is "Consumer Reports'" deputy editor. He's with us now from New York with the latest.
David, tell us about this survey. What did you discover?
DAVID HEIM, DEPUTY EDITOR, "CONSUMER REPORTS": What we found when we asked 39,000 subscribers to our web site, ConsumerReports.org, was that very few people, compared with other kinds of services we rate, very few people were really very happy with their cell phone service.
We found, for example, that 83 percent of the people who use their phone a lot had trouble making a call just in the week before the survey.
We found, as well, that one-third, 35 percent of the people we surveyed, were ready to jump ship and find another carrier, because they wanted better service.
Overall, we found that satisfaction with cell phones hasn't budged in the three years we've been doing this survey. And our survey this year was the biggest one we've done so far: 39,000 subscribers to ConsumerReports.org in 17 metro areas.
PHILLIPS: OK. I was reading that you rated 24 cell phones, plus the latest features. Who came out on top?
HEIM: Well, what came out on top really depends on the cell phone carrier that you want to have service with.
PHILLIPS: All right, start with the carrier, the best carrier.
HEIM: The best carrier in our survey -- and it's, again, the best of a kind of mediocre lot -- was Verizon. For Verizon phones, the ones that it sells, we have phones from L.G., Samsung, and Kyocera that did quite well in our tests.
In general, the kinds of phones that Verizon and Sprint use have -- are the folding, flip phone kind of design. Little bit of an edge over others in voice quality. The tradeoff is a little bit shorter battery life. Now, if you're looking for a phone to work with Cingular or T Mobile, it uses a different kind of calling network. But, again, phones from L.G., Samsung, Kyocera and in this case, Nokia, all did quite well on our tests.
PHILLIPS: All right. This is definitely what I want to talk about. Avoiding cell service gotchas. You put a little list together.
Take advantage of the trial period. Sign up for the shortest contract, even if phone costs are more. Read all the terms and conditions before signing up.
Tell us about these. I mean, I guess you don't always, I don't know, take advantage of these.
HEIM: One of the things we found in our survey of ConsumerReports.org subscribers was that almost four in 10 had trouble shopping intelligently for cell phone service. They didn't like the contracts. They found it hard to compare rates and plans.
Our advice at "Consumer Reports" is, first of all, because you won't find it out from the company, ask friends, ask neighbors. Find out who gives service exactly where you need it. And then start with those companies. Might be Verizon, might be another carrier.
All of them offer a trial period. Take advantage of it. If you don't like the quality of the service, if you're not getting calls through, if you don't like the way the phone is behaving, take it back. Don't get yourself locked into a long contract, because the cancellation penalties are quite stiff.
Also, get the shortest contract you can. One year is better than two years. And it's worth it, even if you have to pay a little bit extra for the phone up front. It allows you a little more room. If you have to get out of the contract, you can get out sooner.
And finally, look at all the fine print. You mentioned ring tones. There's lots of other things you can do today with a phone besides make a phone call. All of them carry a price tag: $1 for a ring tone, 25 cents for an picture, a dime for a text message. After a while, it really begins to add up.
Have the person you're dealing with at the carrier give you an estimate of what your bill's going to be when you use all these extra services. Don't assume that a, for example, a $39 plan is really going to cost you $39. It's going to be more.
PHILLIPS: And of course, the power of negotiation. Everything's negotiable.
David Heim, "Consumer Reports" deputy editor. Pick up your latest copy. Thanks, David.
HEIM: You're welcome. O'BRIEN: All right. It has not been a happy year so far on Wall Street. What does that mean for the rest of the year? Are the bears running?
Susan Lisovicz joining us from the New York Stock Exchange. Actually, stocks up a little bit today, right?
(STOCK REPORT)
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Aired January 5, 2005 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CO-HOST: Tsunami death toll. The number of Americans presumed dead makes a significant jump. We'll have the details.
MILES O'BRIEN, CO-HOST: How is the U.S. military handling the overwhelming task of getting help to thousands of survivors? Only on CNN, we talk with the Marine general in charge of keeping the supplies moving.
PHILLIPS: Winter wallop: from the Midwest to the East Coast, a huge storm system dumping rain snow and ice. And the worst is not over yet. We're live from Chicago.
O'BRIEN: And can you hear me now? Well, good. "Consumer Reports" rates cell phone service and shows you how to avoid pitfalls when signing up for a plan.
From Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., the Cannon Office Building, I'm Miles O'Brien.
PHILLIPS: And I'm Kyra Phillips, at the CNN Center in Atlanta. CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: I cannot begin to imagine the horror that went through the families and all of the people who heard this noise coming and then had their lives snuffed out by this wave.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: He's seen conflict, calamity, tragedy and terror. But Colin Powell says he's never seen anything like this.
The U.S. secretary of state flew over Indonesia's Aceh province today, hours before his staff in Washington announced the presumed U.S. Death toll had more than doubled, from 16 to 36, with hundreds more still unaccounted for.
Tomorrow, Powell attends a high-level aid conference in Jakarta, as does Australian Prime Minister John Howard, who today announced his country will supplement its short-term relief campaign with a billion Australian dollars. That's $764 million U.S., earmarked for Indonesian reconstruction over five years. Europeans, meanwhile, devoted three minutes of silence today to the memory of those who perished, a number now approaching 156,000, chiefly in northern Indonesia, southern Thailand, southern India, and Sri Lanka.
CNN is everywhere: 18 correspondents and anchors from Ram Ramgopal to Richard Roth. You'll see the whole picture only on CNN.
O'BRIEN: Meanwhile in Sri Lanka, another devastated country as a result of this killer tsunami. More U.S. Marine boots on the ground.
CNN's Paula Hancocks is there. She has a live report for us -- Paula.
PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Miles.
Well, the latest figures from the Sri Lankan government is they believe more than 46,000 people have died here in Sri Lanka. Thousands more are missing, and somewhere near 800,000 people are homeless.
Now that is the one factor that they're trying to focus on at the moment. Those who are homeless have no home to go to, have very little food and water. It's the aid organizations themselves that are trying to get through to these people, many of them in remote, inaccessible areas.
There has been a fair bit of criticism that we are so far after the tsunami actually hit the southern coast and the eastern coast and part of the western coast of Sri Lanka, and still many people are without the absolute basics.
I went to Hambantota in the south-southeastern part of Sri Lanka, and I went with a U.S. aid agency, AmeriCares. We were the only people that they had seen that had brought medicine, according to the people on the street.
There was one other group there that had brought food and water, but apart from that, they said no one had come through. So even though we know that billions of dollars are being spent, billions of dollars are being donated and the aid agencies are in the country, we aren't necessarily seeing the evidence of it on the ground.
Where I am now is near Beruwala, which is the southwest of the country. And here as well, we're not seeing the evidence on the ground.
Today I went out with a local group, some Sri Lankans themselves who used to be bartenders. They now don't have that bar because, obviously, tourism has been destroyed, along with the coastline here.
And they're trying themselves to raise money to take blankets to the refugee camps, to take baby milk to the refugee camps, because they say they have not seen the international aid organizations. And there's a fair bit of anger in this area, Miles. O'BRIEN: Paula, I know you've had the opportunity to travel with some of the relief workers, in particular one doctor that you spent some time with. Just through their eyes, if you will, relate some of their experiences, what they're encountering and how they're helping.
HANCOCKS: Well, doctors -- doctor the world over, the only thing that actually makes them any different from each other is the resources. American, British doctors have all the best of the Western medicine at their fingertips.
The doctor, Dr. Jonathan Fein (ph), the U.S. doctor from Connecticut that I traveled with said that he was shocked just how much Sri Lankan doctors are struggling with the absolute basic resources that they have.
Many places we went to didn't even have antibiotics. They didn't have linens because they'd had to wrap some of the bodies in those linens. He said there was no disinfectant and the hospitals were a mess.
On a personal level, he was also very shocked. He said that he got together with these doctors, and inevitably, when doctors get together, they talk medicine. He related to them. They got on well.
But then he realized that the experiences between them were very different, as the doctor broke down in front of him, explained how he'd had to flee from the wave himself, how he'd lost members of his family, lost his colleagues, but still had to continue trying to help people in a hospital that catered for 300, with 900 people in there, with very little resources.
And he said that was very shocking to him. He's seen death. He's seen suffering, but never on this kind of scale -- Miles.
O'BRIEN: Paula Hancocks, on the island nation of Sri Lanka, thank you very much.
Ever since this day after Christmas tragedy, the numbers have changed, the death toll rising dramatically. And embedded in these numbers, the loss of American citizens.
The State Department right now with a briefing, updating the number of Americans presumed dead as a result of the tsunami. Adam Ereli is the spokesman.
ADAM ERELI, STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN: ... the people who have been out of touch with their families, for quite a long time. These include, obviously, vacationers. These include people who were in the region. It's a -- it's as diverse a group as America is a population.
Yes, ma'am?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Elizabeth Beck (ph) with "The New York Times."
I know that yesterday you said that the United States is at the same place as other countries, the Nordics, in having difficulty discovering who's missing, et cetera.
But it seems, looking at the other governments, they have been able to provide these data much earlier than you are, now today. Is there anything specific that you're missing that, say, the Norwegians or the Swedes or the Finns have in order to track this?
ERELI: I don't know if I suggested we're at the same place. I -- what I was trying to communicate is that -- uh -- as far as I understand the situation, nobody has 100 percent degree of clarity on exactly where all their citizens are, including these other countries.
Now, they might have -- might have a clearer picture than we do, but they're still -- there's still doubts. There's still gray areas. There's still -- there's still unanswered questions.
I would add, however, that different countries -- and again this is something we mentioned earlier -- different countries have different procedures for accounting for and tracking their citizens.
For example, some countries -- citizens of that country have to -- are registered upon -- are accounted for when leaving the country. So that you know whether, as a national -- the national authorities of that country know whether one of their own has left the country. And they know whether that -- the national of that country has returned.
We don't have similar tracking of Americans.
In other cases, people traveling to the areas, as a general rule, go in package tours. And so working with the travel industry, it's much easier to account for a much larger percentage of the citizens in question.
So you've got -- I think relatively more -- more to work with than we do. Where you have, again as I've said, people who go out on their own for a long time and never touch base. And -- and then all of a sudden somebody asks about them and you've got to -- you've got to work to track them down.
So I think it's really a function of, No. 1, national immigration or exit and entry requirements, as well as travel patterns. And -- and -- and traveling, and how the travel industry works.
Yes?
O'BRIEN: That's Adam Ereli, at the State Department with his daily briefing. What you might have missed at the beginning there, confirmed earlier by our State Department correspondent Andrea Koppel, the State Department now saying 36 Americans confirmed dead in the tsunami disaster. Still many more missing.
But as I think you caught the gist there, as you listened to him, a lot of confusion about who might or might not have been in the region. Possibility that families have called and there might be people who have counted -- were counted that shouldn't have been or counted twice. They're still trying to sort it out.
Obviously, a very emotional and difficult task. And difficult for the families here in the United States -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Hour by hour, the vast and intricate aid operation of the U.S. Pacific Command gets vaster and more intricate. Earlier today, I spoke by phone with Marine Lieutenant General Robert Blackman in Utapao, Thailand. He is the commander of Joint Task Force 536. In other words, he oversees everything.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LT. GEN. ROBERT BLACKMAN, U.S. MARINES: We are dealing with perhaps what is the -- what will go down in history as-- as the greatest natural disaster.
We have three combined support groups: One each in Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Thailand that are providing the day-to-day execution of our relief effort.
And at the same time, here in Utapao, Thailand, we have a combined support force that is providing the overall command and control to this regional effort to provide humanitarian assistance and disaster relief.
PHILLIPS: What have the people said to you, what if they said to your Marines -- I know you're working even side by side with the royal Thai navy. What have been the person stories, the feelings, when they come to you and say, "Sir, we need your help"?
BLACKMAN: The soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines who are there on the ground providing relief have -- have been greeted with open arms. The -- just the look of relief and the appreciation that the people in Indonesia, here in Thailand and in Sri Lanka have shown to our relief effort has been -- has been extraordinary.
PHILLIPS: Here in America, we've been talking so much about Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom, wars that you, of course, have been involved with now. This is a different type of battle; it's a humanitarian battle. Tell me about the mindset and how that's changed among your men and women.
BLACKMAN: I think one -- one aspect has not changed. Whether we're here conducting humanitarian assistance or disaster relief operations, or war combat situations in Iraq and Afghanistan, every one of these young men and women is applying an incredible level of intensity and focus to their duties.
And yet what perhaps is different is that the training that they've all undergone, that we've all spent our entire careers preparing for war and fighting our country's battles. Here is an opportunity for us to save lives, to minimize the continued loss of life and to mitigate the human suffering that the people of this region are undergoing right now.
PHILLIPS: General Robert Blackman, sir, we thank you so much for your time today. And we wish you the best of luck with your mission.
BLACKMAN: Thank you very much. (END VIDEOTAPE)
PHILLIPS: And in our next hour, I'll talk with the naval commander of the expeditionary strike group aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard, on a mission of mercy in the Indian Ocean.
And in our 3 p.m. hour, noon on the West Coast, a general at Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii will tell us how the Air Force is answering the call for help. It's news you'll only see right here on CNN.
O'BRIEN: And for that matter, only on LIVE FROM.
In addition to the human toll of the tsunami, the economic impact will be long term. Later this hour, we'll take you to a resort in Sri Lanka that was just beginning to make a comeback when this disaster struck.
An ambitious agenda. President Bush calling on Congress to tackle everything from tort reform to a major overhaul of Social Security. Will he get what he wants? We'll talk about that and some other matters on Capitol Hill.
And later on LIVE FROM, if you've made a resolution to lose weight, how do you pick the diet that is right for you?
LIVE FROM Capitol Hill with the report from Ed Henry, our Capitol Hill correspondent, in just a moment. Continues after a short break.
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O'BRIEN: The president of the United States, George W. Bush, headed downstate Illinois today. As a matter of fact, he has arrived at Scott Air Force Base there. He's there to make a speech about tort reform.
As he was winging away aboard -- his way there aboard Air Force One, his spokesperson, Scott McClellan, told reporters that the president has written checks totaling about $10,000 out of his personal funds to various relief organizations involved in trying to begin the rebuilding and the recovery in the wake of the tsunami, $10,000 of personal donations on the part of the president.
We, of course, will bring you the president's speech live as it happens, a little bit later here on CNN.
Turning now to Iraq. The first post-Saddam election just weeks away, and those bent on disrupting it ramped up the violence again today.
A suicide bomber targeted a U.S. convoy in Baghdad in just one deadly attack today. Two civilians killed.
In Hillah, south of Baghdad, a car bomb exploded in front of a police station. At least 10 killed there, injuring more than four times that many. In Baqubah, five police officers died when a bomb detonated near them.
Near Mosul, a U.S. soldier on patrol was killed by a rocket- propelled grenade. Two others wounded.
But despite nearly 90 deaths just this week from insurgent violence, Iraq's interim prime minister insisting the election will happen and on schedule. Ayad Allawi telling reporters in Baghdad today -- we quote him now -- "We will not allow terrorists to derail the process."
And so it goes in Iraq.
The man poised to inherit the U.S. policy on dealing with the legalities, at least, of the mission in Iraq and Afghanistan faces a Senate grilling tomorrow. That may be treating it lightly.
He is Alberto Gonzales, the man chosen by President Bush to be the next United States attorney general.
CNN's congressional correspondent, Ed Henry, with us here now to tell us what lies in store.
The Congress is new, but in some ways, the story is the same, isn't it?
ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. I mean, Judge Gonzales would be replacing John Ashcroft, who was a lightning rod. And we're expecting the same kind of political fireworks tomorrow before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The key bone of contention, really, is Judge Gonzales' role as White House counsel in formulating policy on the treatment of prisoners in the war of terror.
In particular, critics zero in on an August 2002 Justice Department memo, in which they say, the critics say that the definition of torture was so narrow that it led to a lot of abuses; in particular, the abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison Iraq.
There is one line in that 2002 memo that says, quote, "These cases make clear that while many of these techniques may amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, they do not produce pain or suffering of the necessary intensity to meet the definition of torture."
It's important to point out that this policy has been reversed. Last month, the Justice Department put out a new memo, widening the definition of torture.
But what -- when I spoke to Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy of the judiciary committee yesterday, he said his real concern is that he thinks Judge Gonzales has been stonewalling.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SEN. PATRICK LEAHY (D), VERMONT: A number of us have been asking Judge Gonzales for months now about his role in the torture memos. We've never gotten a full answer. He'll be asked those questions.
I think that the direction, the nature, the tone, of the hearing will really be reflected, depending upon whether he's forthcoming. Neither he, nor the White House, has been really forthcoming so far. I am hoping he will be at the hearing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HENRY: Now, Republican senators on the judiciary committee say that's nonsense. They say that Judge Gonzales has already been forthcoming, that the real problem is that Democratic senators keep moving the goal post on exactly what memos they want to see.
And Miles, as well, Republicans point out that there are certain memos that have to be kept confidential, because when you're waging the war on terror, you can't let your enemies get a window on how you're actually waging that war.
O'BRIEN: Of course, I'm sure a lot of the senators will question that very notion of what's being hidden, whether it should be hidden.
How much, though, how much rhetorical torture is he expected to endure here? Because ultimately, he's going to be confirmed. The votes are there.
HENRY: That's right, I think that this is mostly what it's about. You're right. It's rhetorical torture. I think the Democrats want to make an example out of Judge Gonzales.
If you look at it, President Bush is -- it's almost a complete overhaul of his second term cabinet. But this is really the only nominee who's going to face a grilling and so the Democrats want to make an example of him, make their political points. But in the end he's going to get through.
O'BRIEN: Condi Rice won't get the same kind of grilling?
HENRY: Not that strong.
O'BRIEN: All right. Ed Henry, Capitol Hill, right here with us, thank you.
HENRY: Good to have you here.
O'BRIEN: Always a pleasure. All right. Appreciate it -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: Dropped calls, poor service and complicated bills. Does this sound like your experience with your cell phone? Well, you're not alone. Just ahead, "Consumer Report" rates cell phone service, has some tips on avoiding the gotchas.
And later on LIVE FROM, a U.S. Navy admiral speaks to us from aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard. He's talking about his mission to help the devastated areas by the tsunami.
A huge storm closing schools, shutting down roads and leaving thousands of people without power in the U.S. We'll take you live to Chicago, where they're bracing for even more snow.
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PHILLIPS: OK. So you have the coolest cell phone on the block, swinging from your belt with the camera, the games, the hip-hop ring tones. But a fat load of good it does you if you hate your provider.
How wild are you about your wireless service? That's the focus of this month's "Consumer Reports" magazine, whose snoopers got up close with cell phone providers across the country.
David Heim is "Consumer Reports'" deputy editor. He's with us now from New York with the latest.
David, tell us about this survey. What did you discover?
DAVID HEIM, DEPUTY EDITOR, "CONSUMER REPORTS": What we found when we asked 39,000 subscribers to our web site, ConsumerReports.org, was that very few people, compared with other kinds of services we rate, very few people were really very happy with their cell phone service.
We found, for example, that 83 percent of the people who use their phone a lot had trouble making a call just in the week before the survey.
We found, as well, that one-third, 35 percent of the people we surveyed, were ready to jump ship and find another carrier, because they wanted better service.
Overall, we found that satisfaction with cell phones hasn't budged in the three years we've been doing this survey. And our survey this year was the biggest one we've done so far: 39,000 subscribers to ConsumerReports.org in 17 metro areas.
PHILLIPS: OK. I was reading that you rated 24 cell phones, plus the latest features. Who came out on top?
HEIM: Well, what came out on top really depends on the cell phone carrier that you want to have service with.
PHILLIPS: All right, start with the carrier, the best carrier.
HEIM: The best carrier in our survey -- and it's, again, the best of a kind of mediocre lot -- was Verizon. For Verizon phones, the ones that it sells, we have phones from L.G., Samsung, and Kyocera that did quite well in our tests.
In general, the kinds of phones that Verizon and Sprint use have -- are the folding, flip phone kind of design. Little bit of an edge over others in voice quality. The tradeoff is a little bit shorter battery life. Now, if you're looking for a phone to work with Cingular or T Mobile, it uses a different kind of calling network. But, again, phones from L.G., Samsung, Kyocera and in this case, Nokia, all did quite well on our tests.
PHILLIPS: All right. This is definitely what I want to talk about. Avoiding cell service gotchas. You put a little list together.
Take advantage of the trial period. Sign up for the shortest contract, even if phone costs are more. Read all the terms and conditions before signing up.
Tell us about these. I mean, I guess you don't always, I don't know, take advantage of these.
HEIM: One of the things we found in our survey of ConsumerReports.org subscribers was that almost four in 10 had trouble shopping intelligently for cell phone service. They didn't like the contracts. They found it hard to compare rates and plans.
Our advice at "Consumer Reports" is, first of all, because you won't find it out from the company, ask friends, ask neighbors. Find out who gives service exactly where you need it. And then start with those companies. Might be Verizon, might be another carrier.
All of them offer a trial period. Take advantage of it. If you don't like the quality of the service, if you're not getting calls through, if you don't like the way the phone is behaving, take it back. Don't get yourself locked into a long contract, because the cancellation penalties are quite stiff.
Also, get the shortest contract you can. One year is better than two years. And it's worth it, even if you have to pay a little bit extra for the phone up front. It allows you a little more room. If you have to get out of the contract, you can get out sooner.
And finally, look at all the fine print. You mentioned ring tones. There's lots of other things you can do today with a phone besides make a phone call. All of them carry a price tag: $1 for a ring tone, 25 cents for an picture, a dime for a text message. After a while, it really begins to add up.
Have the person you're dealing with at the carrier give you an estimate of what your bill's going to be when you use all these extra services. Don't assume that a, for example, a $39 plan is really going to cost you $39. It's going to be more.
PHILLIPS: And of course, the power of negotiation. Everything's negotiable.
David Heim, "Consumer Reports" deputy editor. Pick up your latest copy. Thanks, David.
HEIM: You're welcome. O'BRIEN: All right. It has not been a happy year so far on Wall Street. What does that mean for the rest of the year? Are the bears running?
Susan Lisovicz joining us from the New York Stock Exchange. Actually, stocks up a little bit today, right?
(STOCK REPORT)
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