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Dark Mind or Bad Drug?; Military Death Benefits; Crisis Intervention

Aired February 01, 2005 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Scrambled to survive. An amateur photographer releases new video of the powerful tsunami and of the earthquake that sent the waves ashore.
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Two grandparents shot in the head as they slept. Was it the fault of a bad kid or a bad drug -- Kyra.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Picking a jury to judge Michael Jackson. Will race be a factor in the trial?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It got to the point where no one would want to hang around me. And there were people who would tell me to leave because they knew I was a loose cannon and they knew I'd flip out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: A soldier snaps after serving his country in Iraq and Afghanistan. His story of recovery and reaching out to his fellow service members.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Kyra Phillips.

O'BRIEN: And I'm Miles O'Brien. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.

PHILLIPS: Dark mind or bad drug? A South Carolina teenager on trial for killing his grandparents and torching their house told a judge today he did it. But the defense insists it's not murder. What prosecutors call the act of a dark, evil heart, the defense calls a disastrous side effect of the anti-depressant drug Zoloft.

CNN medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joins us now from Charleston with the latest -- Elizabeth.

COHEN: Kyra, the prosecution continued their case today. They're trying to convince the jury that these two slayings were the act of a child who thought these acts out very well and who was in a completely fine state of mind.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN (voice-over): Chris Pittman, looking very much like a scared young teenager, wiped his eyes as lawyers argued over whether he should be held response for the shotgun slayings of his grandparents when he was only 12. The defense said Zoloft, the anti- depressant drug Chris was taking, made him hear voices telling him to kill.

ANDY VICKERY, DEFENSE LAWYER: He was a 96-pound, 12-year-old, a boy, a shy, decent boy who was acting under the influence of a powerful mind altering drug.

COHEN: But the prosecution called this a crime of a dark heart, an evil heart.

JOHN JUSTICE, PROSECUTOR: Chris Pittman knew that what he was doing was wrong, legally and morally.

COHEN: Three years ago, after his grandparents scolded Chris for a school fight, the prosecution said the boy lay awake, waiting.

JUSTICE: Chris Pittman, after his grandparents went to bed, got that .410 shotgun and killed them both.

COHEN: The child burned down the house and fled. The first prosecution witness recounted how the bodies were found in the ashes when the fire was out.

Zoloft's manufacturer, Pfizer, has denied its drug can be linked to violence. The government has warned, however, to watch younger patients for hostility and aggression, as the drug can lead to suicidal behavior.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN: Law enforcement witnesses testified today that right after the slayings, Chris Pittman blamed the murders on a black stranger -- Miles.

PHILLIPS: Elizabeth, anybody else in the courtroom today, any other family members?

COHEN: There were. His family members were there. His surviving grandmother is there, and aunt was there.

And also there were representatives from Pfizer, which makes Zoloft. And they've been observing the trial. And also, families who say that their own children have killed themselves because of these drugs. They were also in the audience today.

PHILLIPS: Interesting. Elizabeth Cohen, thank you -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: A top priority for U.S. forces in Baghdad and the Pentagon this hour, chasing down a claim that a militant group, Mujahidin Brigade, specifically, has taken a U.S. soldier hostage. The group says its fighters killed a number of GIs -- the GI's comrades and will behead the hostage if the U.S. doesn't free Iraqi prisoners in 72 hours.

A Web posting included a photo, but its authenticity is, to some degree, in question at this hour. U.S. officials have yet to confirm any GI is missing or captured. We'll keep you posted on this one.

Keystroke by keystroke, Iraq's future government taking shape right now. Election workers in Baghdad have started sorting millions of hand-counted ballots from across the country, entering them into computers. Final results are at least a week away. Iraq's interim president says ballots ran out Sunday, keeping tens of thousands of people from voting.

Ghazi al-Yawar held his first post-election news conference today. He said it would be complete nonsense to ask foreign troops to leave Iraq now, but he speculated some should be able to go home by year's end once Iraq's own security forces are built up.

A Senate panel is taking up whether to increase military death benefits almost eightfold. Lindsey Arent is following today's Armed Services Committee hearing on the issue. She joins us now from our D.C. bureau -- Lindsey.

LINDSEY ARENT, CNN CORRESPONDENT; Well, the Senate Armed Services Committee just finished a hearing on how to increase death benefits for survivors of U.S. troops killed in combat. Now, the issue is how do you assign a dollar value to the death of a U.S. service member in combat? So far, more than 1,500 have died in Iraq and Afghanistan since October 2001.

Now, earlier today, lawmakers expressed outrage at what they say are the, "paltry and miserly sums" families get when a loved one dies in combat. And they praised at the same time President Bush for including an increase in the death gratuity in his 2006 budget proposal. But military brass expressed concern today that the new plan would exclude some troops.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LT. GEN. RICHARD CODY, U.S. ARMY: It is about service to this country. And I think we need to be very, very careful about making this $100,000 decision based upon what type of -- what type of action. I would rather err on the side of covering all deaths rather than try to make the distinction.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ARENT: Now, here's how the funds would break down. Under the current system, families of troops killed in combat receive a one-time tax-free payment from the government of $12.420. With the administration's new proposal, that benefit would grow to $100,000. In the meantime, the troops' optional life insurance coverage would also rise from $250,000 to $400,000 for those killed in a designated combat zone.

Now, under the new plan, all troops get a life insurance benefit, and the Pentagon will pay for the premiums. All told, if the proposal is passed in its current form, all U.S. troops killed in a designated combat zone would receive at least $250,000 in government benefits. And those changes would be retroactive to any service member killed in combat since October 2001. Back to you.

O'BRIEN: Lindsey Arent, thank you very much -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, we've all seen the dramatic video of the tsunamis crashing ashore across Asia in December. Now today new images as the earthquake that spawned them hit.

It's from Banda Aceh, Indonesia, and it shows speakers and equipment falling, people holding on to the ground, riveting scenes and massive amounts of devastation. The video was shot by a local resident who was about to film a marathon.

Shortly after that, the tsunamis hit, sending this river of debris crashing across the landscape. You can see it slamming into buildings and bridges and homes. Adding to the chaos and devastation, you can actually see the people there on top of the debris, desperately trying to escape it.

O'BRIEN: And a completely different experience of dangerous waters was captured on tape.

PHILLIPS: This one was at sea. Students aboard a ship get a lesson of a lifetime. Their story later on LIVE FROM.

O'BRIEN: And Michael Jackson back in court. What strategy will both sides use in the child molestation case? We'll go in depth with a legal expert.

PHILLIPS: And just ahead, he once picked up a gun. Now this former soldier is picking up the phone and a second chance to serve his country.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: U.S. soldiers in Iraq face danger day and night. But when the fighting is over, many of them are left with demons and anxieties that are too difficult to battle on their own. That mental conflict has created a new call to service. A call CNN's Frank Buckley says veterans are answering.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For two different veterans of two different wars the toll of combat has prompted a common calling. Shad Meshad served in Vietnam, Chad Reiber Iraq and Afghanistan.

Today both help fellow veterans serving soldiers and their families at this call center, the National Veterans Foundation that Chad started two decades ago. Here they provide crisis intervention and referrals. They listen to fellow combat veterans who are hurting.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, we've been there, OK, you hear me?

BUCKLEY: Less than a year ago it was Chad himself who was in pain. It began here October, 2001, Chad's first jump into Afghanistan. He was a U.S. Army Ranger on his way into battle for the first time. Before long, he would kill for the first time.

CHAD REIBER, NATIONAL VETERANS FOUNDATION: Went up the stairs, cleared a room and there was a guy in the corner, Taliban, and took him down.

BUCKLEY: Many more would die in the years that followed, fellow soldiers, the enemy, innocent civilians.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We found a lot of fragments of civilians, women.

BUCKLEY: Like warriors before him and warriors since his eyes saw things Chad wishes they hadn't. Today he's able to relive the most painful of the moments in counseling sessions with Shad.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're safe here so you can go there. Just look at it. Stop and take a deep breath. Drop your hands. Let's load up, load and release.

BUCKLEY: Ten months ago when Shad and Chad first met the young veteran, by then a Purple Heart recipient and discharged from the Army, was barely functioning.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I got to the point where no one wanted to hang around me. You know, people would tell me to leave because they knew I was a loose cannon. They knew I'd flip out.

BUCKLEY: Because he was drinking heavily, fighting and in a deep emotional pain that he refused to confront until much later, until after he nearly committed murder.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I went to a party. I put my .380 in my pocket like I always did and bumped (UNINTELLIGIBLE) you know I drank a half gallon of whiskey that day. I pulled out the weapon. I hit him on the head with it. I loaded it and I pulled the trigger and it just clicked and didn't fire and that kind of like brought me out of it and I was like what am I doing?

BUCKLEY: Chad pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon and was facing a lengthy prison term when his public defender began recruiting experts to help convince a judge that the 24-year-old veteran of two combat tours deserved a second chance. That's when Shad Meshad, who specializes in post traumatic stress disorder, first met Chad Reiber.

SHAD MESHAD, NATIONAL VETERANS FOUNDATION: He had the classic symptoms, you know, alienation, anger, very aggravated, nightmares, flashbacks.

BUCKLEY: Many of the symptoms had actually surfaced during his military service but he never once sought help from a counselor or therapist.

REIBER: That's the last thing you want to be is a weak guy on your team. It's very frowned upon and you wouldn't be respected by anybody if you ever did that.

BUCKLEY (on camera): Chad's view is consistent with those of many combat veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan who participated in an Army study published last summer in the New England Journal of Medicine. Roughly one in five combat veterans surveyed said they struggled with a mental health problem but only a quarter of those with problems got help. They said one of the biggest obstacles to getting it is the stigma attached to those who do.

COL. THOMAS BURKE, D.O.D. DIR., MENTAL HEALTH POLICY: I think that there is a perception that all of those things are true. If you seek mental health care, you're weak. Your career is over that this is going to be perceived by your buddies that you're not reliable. I don't think that that's true.

BUCKLEY (voice-over): Colonel Thomas Burke is the director of mental health policy for the Department of Defense. While he acknowledges the study's findings, the colonel says the military does offer help and it tries to encourage soldiers to seek it out.

BURKE: Today you know, the treatments are available so that soldiers with mental health issues now are not problem soldiers. They are soldiers with problems and those problems have solutions.

BUCKLEY: But Shad Meshad and Chad Reiber know a different reality.

MESHAD: What I need you to do, Shaquille (ph), is I need you to just stay with me. I hear you. I know you're upset. I know you don't want to be re-deployed. I just need some time to work with you.

BUCKLEY: They know the reality of vets who call in crisis, soldiers struggling to live with combat experiences who think they are alone.

REIBER: They want to know what I wanted that there's someone else going through the same thing and that they're not the only ones that are having a hard time sitting at a dinner table without trying to, you know, sitting on their hands because they want to flip out, you know.

BUCKLEY: For Chad, life is no longer the battle it was a year ago. He's sober and in the care of his fellow veteran Shad.

(on camera): When you see that Chad today and know where he came from what is that like for you?

MESHAD: It's powerful. I never thought I'd get this -- I'm proud.

BUCKLEY (voice-over): But it's the prospect of the untold thousands of others whose struggles haven't ended that drives both of these veterans of two different wars.

MESHAD: These are tears of joy. Also maybe there are some tears for those that just aren't going to get a chance. REIBER: I want to give everybody the chance that I had at recovery and to make something of their lives rather than just a waste, which was the path I was going.

BUCKLEY: Frank Buckley, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: And if you are a veteran in need of help, you can contact the call center profiled in this story at 1-888-777-4443.

O'BRIEN: The Department of Transportation has a word of warning about the Super Bowl. We'll have details on that in just a moment.

And death threats for a professor who compared the 9/11 victims to Nazis. There's a new development on this story a bit later on LIVE FROM.

SUSAN LISOVICZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Susan Lisovicz at the New York Stock Exchange. Coming up, as dieters lose their appetite for low-carb diets, the bread industry has a recipe to win back carb lovers. I'll tell you what's baking coming up on LIVE FROM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: All right. To hedge against inflation, the Federal Reserve likely to bump up short-term interest rates again tomorrow. Stay tuned. We'll keep you posted on that, of course.

Gallup editor-in-chief Frank Newport, always of high interest to us, listening to "American Voices," crunching the numbers for us in Princeton, New Jersey, that brain trust that it is.

Frank, what are Americans most worried about right now when it comes to the economy?

FRANK NEWPORT, GALLUP: Well, interesting, we really haven't asked this question before in this way, Miles. At least not recently.

We said, "What's the biggest financial problem facing you and your family today?" We got a wide variety of answers. But by one point, the winner is health care costs.

We'll see if President Bush mentions that tomorrow night. Too much debt, cost of living, unemployment, and then college expenses. Very interesting.

Let me break it down by a couple of interesting demographic groups here. Here's the youngest and the oldest Americans. If you're young, 18 to 29, it's not health care costs. Look on the left there. It's debt, credit cards at that age. But if you're an older American, 50 and older, it's overwhelmingly health care costs that are bothering you.

Income. Miles, we said, "What do rich people, $100,000 or more a year, worry about financially?" Well, it's college costs, which is quite interesting. That's of no concern at all down to those who make $20,000 or under. That is, again, health care costs, which really seems to be the culprit for older Americans and those who don't make much money.

O'BRIEN: Interesting. All right. Frank, let's talk about the State of the Union Address coming up. A good time to ask if folks are generally pleased with the direction the country is headed.

NEWPORT: Well, mixed feelings overall, satisfaction, below 50 percent. What we've done here is we've asked Americans about a whole variety of aspects of life in the United States today. These are the ones that Americans said they're most satisfied with.

So the president presumably tomorrow night would say these things are going well for the country: military strength, security from terrorism, race relations, role of the U.S. in world affairs and gun laws. Here are the problems.

So the president, if he follows public opinion, should address these issues tomorrow night. Americans not satisfied with the gay and lesbian situation in America today. Social Security, no doubt the president's going to really talk about that tomorrow.

Immigration, poverty, and then there it is, affordable health care. That seems to appear in all our lists. That's at the bottom. Americans least satisfied with that.

Miles, I also wanted to show you something we crunched -- you mention we crunch numbers here. 37,000 interviews we did last year where we asked people, "Are you a Republican or Democrat?" Thought I would share this with you.

These are the reddest of the red states. Utah out of the 50 states, plus the District of Columbia, has a higher percent Republican than any other state in the union. Quite interesting. Followed by Idaho, Kansas, Wyoming and Texas.

And I know you're going to ask what's the bluest of the states, what state has the most Democrats on a percentage basis? Well, it's the District of Columbia overwhelmingly. But then, all in New England and the Middle East -- excuse me, middle America, Massachusetts, Vermont, Rhode Island and New York. There you have it -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: I guess it's the usual suspects. All right. Frank Newport, thank you very much. Appreciate it.

Dieters are losing their appetite for low-carb diets, and the bread industry wants to take advantage of that. It's no wonder, right? Get it? No wonder?

PHILLIPS: Ha ha.

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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Aired February 1, 2005 - 14:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Scrambled to survive. An amateur photographer releases new video of the powerful tsunami and of the earthquake that sent the waves ashore.
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Two grandparents shot in the head as they slept. Was it the fault of a bad kid or a bad drug -- Kyra.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Picking a jury to judge Michael Jackson. Will race be a factor in the trial?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It got to the point where no one would want to hang around me. And there were people who would tell me to leave because they knew I was a loose cannon and they knew I'd flip out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: A soldier snaps after serving his country in Iraq and Afghanistan. His story of recovery and reaching out to his fellow service members.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Kyra Phillips.

O'BRIEN: And I'm Miles O'Brien. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.

PHILLIPS: Dark mind or bad drug? A South Carolina teenager on trial for killing his grandparents and torching their house told a judge today he did it. But the defense insists it's not murder. What prosecutors call the act of a dark, evil heart, the defense calls a disastrous side effect of the anti-depressant drug Zoloft.

CNN medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joins us now from Charleston with the latest -- Elizabeth.

COHEN: Kyra, the prosecution continued their case today. They're trying to convince the jury that these two slayings were the act of a child who thought these acts out very well and who was in a completely fine state of mind.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN (voice-over): Chris Pittman, looking very much like a scared young teenager, wiped his eyes as lawyers argued over whether he should be held response for the shotgun slayings of his grandparents when he was only 12. The defense said Zoloft, the anti- depressant drug Chris was taking, made him hear voices telling him to kill.

ANDY VICKERY, DEFENSE LAWYER: He was a 96-pound, 12-year-old, a boy, a shy, decent boy who was acting under the influence of a powerful mind altering drug.

COHEN: But the prosecution called this a crime of a dark heart, an evil heart.

JOHN JUSTICE, PROSECUTOR: Chris Pittman knew that what he was doing was wrong, legally and morally.

COHEN: Three years ago, after his grandparents scolded Chris for a school fight, the prosecution said the boy lay awake, waiting.

JUSTICE: Chris Pittman, after his grandparents went to bed, got that .410 shotgun and killed them both.

COHEN: The child burned down the house and fled. The first prosecution witness recounted how the bodies were found in the ashes when the fire was out.

Zoloft's manufacturer, Pfizer, has denied its drug can be linked to violence. The government has warned, however, to watch younger patients for hostility and aggression, as the drug can lead to suicidal behavior.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN: Law enforcement witnesses testified today that right after the slayings, Chris Pittman blamed the murders on a black stranger -- Miles.

PHILLIPS: Elizabeth, anybody else in the courtroom today, any other family members?

COHEN: There were. His family members were there. His surviving grandmother is there, and aunt was there.

And also there were representatives from Pfizer, which makes Zoloft. And they've been observing the trial. And also, families who say that their own children have killed themselves because of these drugs. They were also in the audience today.

PHILLIPS: Interesting. Elizabeth Cohen, thank you -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: A top priority for U.S. forces in Baghdad and the Pentagon this hour, chasing down a claim that a militant group, Mujahidin Brigade, specifically, has taken a U.S. soldier hostage. The group says its fighters killed a number of GIs -- the GI's comrades and will behead the hostage if the U.S. doesn't free Iraqi prisoners in 72 hours.

A Web posting included a photo, but its authenticity is, to some degree, in question at this hour. U.S. officials have yet to confirm any GI is missing or captured. We'll keep you posted on this one.

Keystroke by keystroke, Iraq's future government taking shape right now. Election workers in Baghdad have started sorting millions of hand-counted ballots from across the country, entering them into computers. Final results are at least a week away. Iraq's interim president says ballots ran out Sunday, keeping tens of thousands of people from voting.

Ghazi al-Yawar held his first post-election news conference today. He said it would be complete nonsense to ask foreign troops to leave Iraq now, but he speculated some should be able to go home by year's end once Iraq's own security forces are built up.

A Senate panel is taking up whether to increase military death benefits almost eightfold. Lindsey Arent is following today's Armed Services Committee hearing on the issue. She joins us now from our D.C. bureau -- Lindsey.

LINDSEY ARENT, CNN CORRESPONDENT; Well, the Senate Armed Services Committee just finished a hearing on how to increase death benefits for survivors of U.S. troops killed in combat. Now, the issue is how do you assign a dollar value to the death of a U.S. service member in combat? So far, more than 1,500 have died in Iraq and Afghanistan since October 2001.

Now, earlier today, lawmakers expressed outrage at what they say are the, "paltry and miserly sums" families get when a loved one dies in combat. And they praised at the same time President Bush for including an increase in the death gratuity in his 2006 budget proposal. But military brass expressed concern today that the new plan would exclude some troops.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LT. GEN. RICHARD CODY, U.S. ARMY: It is about service to this country. And I think we need to be very, very careful about making this $100,000 decision based upon what type of -- what type of action. I would rather err on the side of covering all deaths rather than try to make the distinction.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ARENT: Now, here's how the funds would break down. Under the current system, families of troops killed in combat receive a one-time tax-free payment from the government of $12.420. With the administration's new proposal, that benefit would grow to $100,000. In the meantime, the troops' optional life insurance coverage would also rise from $250,000 to $400,000 for those killed in a designated combat zone.

Now, under the new plan, all troops get a life insurance benefit, and the Pentagon will pay for the premiums. All told, if the proposal is passed in its current form, all U.S. troops killed in a designated combat zone would receive at least $250,000 in government benefits. And those changes would be retroactive to any service member killed in combat since October 2001. Back to you.

O'BRIEN: Lindsey Arent, thank you very much -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, we've all seen the dramatic video of the tsunamis crashing ashore across Asia in December. Now today new images as the earthquake that spawned them hit.

It's from Banda Aceh, Indonesia, and it shows speakers and equipment falling, people holding on to the ground, riveting scenes and massive amounts of devastation. The video was shot by a local resident who was about to film a marathon.

Shortly after that, the tsunamis hit, sending this river of debris crashing across the landscape. You can see it slamming into buildings and bridges and homes. Adding to the chaos and devastation, you can actually see the people there on top of the debris, desperately trying to escape it.

O'BRIEN: And a completely different experience of dangerous waters was captured on tape.

PHILLIPS: This one was at sea. Students aboard a ship get a lesson of a lifetime. Their story later on LIVE FROM.

O'BRIEN: And Michael Jackson back in court. What strategy will both sides use in the child molestation case? We'll go in depth with a legal expert.

PHILLIPS: And just ahead, he once picked up a gun. Now this former soldier is picking up the phone and a second chance to serve his country.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: U.S. soldiers in Iraq face danger day and night. But when the fighting is over, many of them are left with demons and anxieties that are too difficult to battle on their own. That mental conflict has created a new call to service. A call CNN's Frank Buckley says veterans are answering.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For two different veterans of two different wars the toll of combat has prompted a common calling. Shad Meshad served in Vietnam, Chad Reiber Iraq and Afghanistan.

Today both help fellow veterans serving soldiers and their families at this call center, the National Veterans Foundation that Chad started two decades ago. Here they provide crisis intervention and referrals. They listen to fellow combat veterans who are hurting.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, we've been there, OK, you hear me?

BUCKLEY: Less than a year ago it was Chad himself who was in pain. It began here October, 2001, Chad's first jump into Afghanistan. He was a U.S. Army Ranger on his way into battle for the first time. Before long, he would kill for the first time.

CHAD REIBER, NATIONAL VETERANS FOUNDATION: Went up the stairs, cleared a room and there was a guy in the corner, Taliban, and took him down.

BUCKLEY: Many more would die in the years that followed, fellow soldiers, the enemy, innocent civilians.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We found a lot of fragments of civilians, women.

BUCKLEY: Like warriors before him and warriors since his eyes saw things Chad wishes they hadn't. Today he's able to relive the most painful of the moments in counseling sessions with Shad.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're safe here so you can go there. Just look at it. Stop and take a deep breath. Drop your hands. Let's load up, load and release.

BUCKLEY: Ten months ago when Shad and Chad first met the young veteran, by then a Purple Heart recipient and discharged from the Army, was barely functioning.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I got to the point where no one wanted to hang around me. You know, people would tell me to leave because they knew I was a loose cannon. They knew I'd flip out.

BUCKLEY: Because he was drinking heavily, fighting and in a deep emotional pain that he refused to confront until much later, until after he nearly committed murder.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I went to a party. I put my .380 in my pocket like I always did and bumped (UNINTELLIGIBLE) you know I drank a half gallon of whiskey that day. I pulled out the weapon. I hit him on the head with it. I loaded it and I pulled the trigger and it just clicked and didn't fire and that kind of like brought me out of it and I was like what am I doing?

BUCKLEY: Chad pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon and was facing a lengthy prison term when his public defender began recruiting experts to help convince a judge that the 24-year-old veteran of two combat tours deserved a second chance. That's when Shad Meshad, who specializes in post traumatic stress disorder, first met Chad Reiber.

SHAD MESHAD, NATIONAL VETERANS FOUNDATION: He had the classic symptoms, you know, alienation, anger, very aggravated, nightmares, flashbacks.

BUCKLEY: Many of the symptoms had actually surfaced during his military service but he never once sought help from a counselor or therapist.

REIBER: That's the last thing you want to be is a weak guy on your team. It's very frowned upon and you wouldn't be respected by anybody if you ever did that.

BUCKLEY (on camera): Chad's view is consistent with those of many combat veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan who participated in an Army study published last summer in the New England Journal of Medicine. Roughly one in five combat veterans surveyed said they struggled with a mental health problem but only a quarter of those with problems got help. They said one of the biggest obstacles to getting it is the stigma attached to those who do.

COL. THOMAS BURKE, D.O.D. DIR., MENTAL HEALTH POLICY: I think that there is a perception that all of those things are true. If you seek mental health care, you're weak. Your career is over that this is going to be perceived by your buddies that you're not reliable. I don't think that that's true.

BUCKLEY (voice-over): Colonel Thomas Burke is the director of mental health policy for the Department of Defense. While he acknowledges the study's findings, the colonel says the military does offer help and it tries to encourage soldiers to seek it out.

BURKE: Today you know, the treatments are available so that soldiers with mental health issues now are not problem soldiers. They are soldiers with problems and those problems have solutions.

BUCKLEY: But Shad Meshad and Chad Reiber know a different reality.

MESHAD: What I need you to do, Shaquille (ph), is I need you to just stay with me. I hear you. I know you're upset. I know you don't want to be re-deployed. I just need some time to work with you.

BUCKLEY: They know the reality of vets who call in crisis, soldiers struggling to live with combat experiences who think they are alone.

REIBER: They want to know what I wanted that there's someone else going through the same thing and that they're not the only ones that are having a hard time sitting at a dinner table without trying to, you know, sitting on their hands because they want to flip out, you know.

BUCKLEY: For Chad, life is no longer the battle it was a year ago. He's sober and in the care of his fellow veteran Shad.

(on camera): When you see that Chad today and know where he came from what is that like for you?

MESHAD: It's powerful. I never thought I'd get this -- I'm proud.

BUCKLEY (voice-over): But it's the prospect of the untold thousands of others whose struggles haven't ended that drives both of these veterans of two different wars.

MESHAD: These are tears of joy. Also maybe there are some tears for those that just aren't going to get a chance. REIBER: I want to give everybody the chance that I had at recovery and to make something of their lives rather than just a waste, which was the path I was going.

BUCKLEY: Frank Buckley, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: And if you are a veteran in need of help, you can contact the call center profiled in this story at 1-888-777-4443.

O'BRIEN: The Department of Transportation has a word of warning about the Super Bowl. We'll have details on that in just a moment.

And death threats for a professor who compared the 9/11 victims to Nazis. There's a new development on this story a bit later on LIVE FROM.

SUSAN LISOVICZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Susan Lisovicz at the New York Stock Exchange. Coming up, as dieters lose their appetite for low-carb diets, the bread industry has a recipe to win back carb lovers. I'll tell you what's baking coming up on LIVE FROM.

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O'BRIEN: All right. To hedge against inflation, the Federal Reserve likely to bump up short-term interest rates again tomorrow. Stay tuned. We'll keep you posted on that, of course.

Gallup editor-in-chief Frank Newport, always of high interest to us, listening to "American Voices," crunching the numbers for us in Princeton, New Jersey, that brain trust that it is.

Frank, what are Americans most worried about right now when it comes to the economy?

FRANK NEWPORT, GALLUP: Well, interesting, we really haven't asked this question before in this way, Miles. At least not recently.

We said, "What's the biggest financial problem facing you and your family today?" We got a wide variety of answers. But by one point, the winner is health care costs.

We'll see if President Bush mentions that tomorrow night. Too much debt, cost of living, unemployment, and then college expenses. Very interesting.

Let me break it down by a couple of interesting demographic groups here. Here's the youngest and the oldest Americans. If you're young, 18 to 29, it's not health care costs. Look on the left there. It's debt, credit cards at that age. But if you're an older American, 50 and older, it's overwhelmingly health care costs that are bothering you.

Income. Miles, we said, "What do rich people, $100,000 or more a year, worry about financially?" Well, it's college costs, which is quite interesting. That's of no concern at all down to those who make $20,000 or under. That is, again, health care costs, which really seems to be the culprit for older Americans and those who don't make much money.

O'BRIEN: Interesting. All right. Frank, let's talk about the State of the Union Address coming up. A good time to ask if folks are generally pleased with the direction the country is headed.

NEWPORT: Well, mixed feelings overall, satisfaction, below 50 percent. What we've done here is we've asked Americans about a whole variety of aspects of life in the United States today. These are the ones that Americans said they're most satisfied with.

So the president presumably tomorrow night would say these things are going well for the country: military strength, security from terrorism, race relations, role of the U.S. in world affairs and gun laws. Here are the problems.

So the president, if he follows public opinion, should address these issues tomorrow night. Americans not satisfied with the gay and lesbian situation in America today. Social Security, no doubt the president's going to really talk about that tomorrow.

Immigration, poverty, and then there it is, affordable health care. That seems to appear in all our lists. That's at the bottom. Americans least satisfied with that.

Miles, I also wanted to show you something we crunched -- you mention we crunch numbers here. 37,000 interviews we did last year where we asked people, "Are you a Republican or Democrat?" Thought I would share this with you.

These are the reddest of the red states. Utah out of the 50 states, plus the District of Columbia, has a higher percent Republican than any other state in the union. Quite interesting. Followed by Idaho, Kansas, Wyoming and Texas.

And I know you're going to ask what's the bluest of the states, what state has the most Democrats on a percentage basis? Well, it's the District of Columbia overwhelmingly. But then, all in New England and the Middle East -- excuse me, middle America, Massachusetts, Vermont, Rhode Island and New York. There you have it -- Miles.

O'BRIEN: I guess it's the usual suspects. All right. Frank Newport, thank you very much. Appreciate it.

Dieters are losing their appetite for low-carb diets, and the bread industry wants to take advantage of that. It's no wonder, right? Get it? No wonder?

PHILLIPS: Ha ha.

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