Return to Transcripts main page

Live From...

Torture Ban Deal in White House; Elections Day in Iraq; New Orleans Rent Rising; Children Killed By Flu; Vanishing Freebies On Airlines

Aired December 15, 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: Well, they voted and they're quite proud. Now these Iraqi-Americans are meeting with the president as he's meeting with them to talk about voting in the past couple of days. Let's listen in.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: ... whether they live in Iran or Syria, for example. I've assured these good Iraqi citizens that the United States will stay with them and complete this job.

They've expressed concern about listening to the commentary that we'll leave before the job is done. They don't have to worry. We're doing the right thing, and we've got partners in peace with the Iraqi citizens. And this is a crucial part of the war on terror, as is the Patriot Act.

The Patriot Act was passed four years ago. It gave our law enforcement the tools necessary to help protect the America, the same tools that law enforcement uses, for example, against drug dealers. The Patriot Act is set to expire.

The House of Representatives, recognizing the value of The Patriot Act, voted in a bipartisan way to extend The Patriot Act. And now there are senators who are filibustering The Patriot Act. That is a bad decision for the security of the United States. I call upon the Senate to end the filibuster and to pass this important legislation so that we have the tools necessary to defend the United States of America in a time of war.

I want to thank you all again for coming. My God bless your citizens. And God bless the free Iraq.

Appreciate you being here.

Thank you.

PHILLIPS: A political showdown now resolved. Republican Senator John McCain stood his ground against the White House in his efforts to pass a legal band on the use of torture against terror suspects and his efforts appear to have paid off. McCain's proposal had already passed the Senate and yesterday the House endorsed the idea, as well. The White House had threatened to veto, but today the administration appears to have given in. More on the deal now.

Let's go to our congressional correspondent Ed Henry. So, obviously, the president meeting with ex-pats right now, but Senator McCain on his way to the White House. Is he there?

ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As we speak, he's on his way over from what I understand. It's a snowy Washington, as you know. A little bit of snow on the ground.

He's heading over there, in fact, with Senate Armed Services Chairman John Warner of Virginia. He has been the leader here, as well, working with McCain on The Hill while McCain was working directly with White House National Security Advisor Steven Hadley to hammer out the final details. Before he left, John McCain joked that the White House "it's nice down there," he said. "I once wanted to live there."

But he's not going down there for sightseeing, as we all know. He's going to seal the deal finally. After months of opposition to the McCain ban on the use of torture of detainees, the White House has finally broken down. We're being told by Republican officials up here that what we're going to see in the final details is basically "everything" that McCain wanted. A full ban on the use of torture.

There has been a lot of talk about tweaking, changing it by the White House, by Stephen Hadley, as well as from powerful House Republicans like Duncan Hunter, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. But we're being told by various Republicans they realize that given the international pressure on Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in recent weeks, also the pressure on the White House last night from that House vote showing that both chambers up here, Republican led, were pushing through bipartisan measures to ban the use on torture. The White House finally got the signal.

Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Ed Henry, live from the Hill. Thanks, Ed.

Well, congressional leaders are also trying to wrap up some big votes on the budget before they leave town for the holidays, including some potentially painful spending cuts. The Senate is expected to take up a $602 billion spending bill as soon as today. It includes a range of cuts in job training and medical research programs.

It also slices 4 percent from the president's No Child Left Behind education program. The measure squeaked through the House yesterday by just two votes and its fate in the Senate is uncertain. Democrats have already criticized the cuts as an attack on children and the poor.

Well, New Orleans, the city that went under water when Hurricane Katrina made short work of the levees, keeping out Lake Pontchartrain. The walls may be back up, but they've temporarily -- there's a lot of hard work going on right now and expensive work to do before New Orleans is even close to storm ready again. Today, the White House doubled its request for levee money to more than $3 billion. And the mayor of New Orleans told me, for the short term, he's pretty pleased.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR RAY NAGIN, NEW ORLEANS: It's enough money to give us protection that we've never had. Our levee system heights when Katrina hit were probably at 12 to 13 feet. This design will bring the heights as high as 17 feet. The big debate, I think you're referring to, is whether we should immediately built to category five standards, not only in New Orleans, but throughout the Gulf Coast of Louisiana.

And I was encouraged that there's also study money that's been put in to this bill to the tune of $4.6 million this year and I believe $8 million next year to study how to go to higher standards.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Hundreds of names, dozens of parties, a parliament, cabinet, presidency in the balance. Yet Iraq's prime minister sees today's apparently successful, relatively peaceful, fairly complex elections in simple terms. Iraqis say Ebrahim Al-Jafari, seen here casting his own ballot, have chosen voting over bombs.

CNN's Christiane Amanpour has spent this historic day in Baghdad.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're here inside the polling station which is now closed and the officials are counting the ballots. The electoral commission here did extend the balloting for an hour for those provinces and polling stations that felt they need more time. We don't know how many did extend their voting hours, but apparently, in some areas, there were significant numbers of people still outside the polling stations when the door was meant to close at 5:00 p.m. local time. So they did get an hour extra where it was needed.

We're told at this particular polling station in Baghdad, that 80 percent of those who were registered to vote here did cast their ballot. That's higher than last time around in January. And we also know, because we were in a Sunni neighborhood of Baghdad earlier today, that the Sunni turnout was very high here in Baghdad, which is a huge difference from last January's elections when the Sunni population boycotted.

Back then there was calls by the Sunni leadership not to vote as long as there was an American occupation here, and also there were significant threats from the terrorists and insurgents who had dropped leaflets threatening to turn Baghdad and people's neighborhoods into rivers of blood if they even came to the polls.

This time it is very, very different. They've turned out because they realized that they didn't have a significant voice in the parliament and now they want to change that and actually get a voice, get representation and be able to achieve their rights in that way.

Everybody is looking at this election because they want to know whether it will stop the violence and stop the insurgency. Most people, whether they be Iraqis, whether they be American military commanders here, whether they be U.S. diplomats or others, do not believe that this election by itself will stop the violence and will end the insurgency. They expect it to continue, but they hope it's a step in the right direction.

For their part, the people overwhelmingly say that security is what they are voting for. They never dreamed in their wildest nightmares that they would be living through this kind of violence. Twenty-six thousand Iraqis at least have been killed since the U.S. invasion by the insurgents in this country, according to an Iraqi body count organization. So it's a huge amount of violence that people hope will come to an end.

And they told us that that is what they were really voting for, as well as basic services, a proper economy, reconstruction, things like electricity, garbage collection, water and sewage. All of these things that were promised that have not yet come to bear.

Christiane Amanpour, CNN, reporting from Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, what you don't see in all those images of Iraqis streaming into polling stations, stuffing ballots into boxes, sticking fingers into ink pots, are the curfews, check points, boarder closures, traffic bans, backpack ban, cell phone bans that help keep the peace. Iraqi soldiers and police took the lead with U.S. forces in the background and all of it brings back memories for Todd Lindner. He's an Army National Guard captain based in Kentucky who worked the Iraqi elections back in January and October and today, though, he watched the goings on from Louisville.

Todd, great to see you again. Thanks for coming back.

CAPT TODD LINDNER, U.S. ARMY NATIONAL GUARD: Thanks, Kyra. Thanks for having me.

PHILLIPS: Well, you know, you told some really interesting stories from when you were there during the last elections. And I guess just looking at today and yesterday, what do you think of the overall process? Does it look like -- and you probably keep in touch with soldiers in Iraq now, too -- good feelings about it?

LINDNER: Absolutely. I mean, just the turnout in and of itself. And I heard you speaking of the Sunni turnout this time was much greater than it was the last time. That right there just shows the success of the process between January and October and now December.

PHILLIPS: So, when you were there for the other elections, what were the things that were on your mind that you knew were going to be a challenge versus what happened this time around? What do you think was different or more improved?

LINDNER: Security was probably more improved this time. I think they had a much better lock down on traffic and traffic ability throughout in and around the polling stations. You know, the backpack ban, the cell phone ban. All of that, I think, played a huge effect on the election this time and the security this time. Plus, you know, last time we had a lot of threats from the Sunni environment and this time they were much more intent on being part of the process, rather than hindering the process.

PHILLIPS: How much of a difference do you think it made to have the Iraqis involved in this security of this election?

LINDNER: Oh, I'm sure it made a huge difference and I'm sure that we did that initially the last time and the purposely of that was to show, you know, this is their process. This isn't our process. We're here to facilitate the process, but it's not ours. We're not voting. And I think it really helped to get people to turn out when they know that they are facilitating and they are managing and incorporating their own people into this process and making it work for themselves.

PHILLIPS: It was really interesting when you were there. You were telling me how you had to escort a lot of the polling materials. You actually took ballots to prisoners that were in jails. Tell me about that. Tell me about some of the interesting stories or what you remember from having those duties?

LINDNER: Yes, that was kind of an odd trip when we were told we were going to escort ballots out to the detention facilities because you don't really think of -- you know, we consider in the United States we think about, you know, criminals can't vote. But they haven't been prosecuted, so they're really not criminals yet.

You know, they're being detained but to take them to -- take the polling material out to those people and allow them to vote really was a different aspect of what was going on. Now we took polling material to the regular polls, and that was a good thing to, you know, you kind of get first view of them and you get to see what they look like. Of course, I couldn't read them, but it was pretty neat.

PHILLIPS: When you took them to the detention facilities, were you able to have any conversations with the detainees? Did they say, hey, captain, thanks a lot for bringing me the ballots? I mean, was it interesting interactions or was it just kind of business as usual?

LINDNER: No, we didn't have any interaction. We just dropped them off there and dropped them off with the polling officials. We didn't have any interaction with the detainees or anybody who was going to vote. We actually dropped them off quite a bit early than the actual election went down.

PHILLIPS: What kind of training did you have to go through? Were there any -- I guess was there any specialized training or interesting strategic sessions that you guys had to maybe go through or practice prior to the big day with regard to security or just helping it all run smoothly?

LINDNER: No, we didn't do any particular training specifically for that event because the training we had had, we had been in theater (ph) for a while, especially come the October elections that we had already been involved in quite a bit of security and in and around Baghdad, so we didn't do any particular training. But we definitely were familiar with where the polling sites were, where everybody was responsible, where their areas of responsibility were and that kind of stuff.

PHILLIPS: You had told me last time around you were really surprised by all the females that turned out to vote, right?

LINDNER: I was. And I'm actually surprised at the number of females that actually got voted into the parliament, you know, just this last time. I think they had like almost 90 females out of the 275 positions.

PHILLIPS: Tell me why that surprised you.

LINDNER: Being over there, you really see the oppression of the females and in Iraq. And to know that that happened, that actually that much or that many females were voted into a government where, you know, people are fighting for superiority anyway just by religious sect and you know that the females are oppressed. To see that go through, I mean, it made a huge impact on me and made me realize that, yes, this is going to work and we're making great progress.

PHILLIPS: Wow. So you saw women, I guess, in a much different light than previously. They were being -- they were more confident and more assertive and really went for it.

LINDNER: Absolutely. I mean, we saw the woman with their -- just the women who voted. And you see them with their fingers inked and they're walking down the street and it makes you feel good. It really does.

PHILLIPS: So, final question. The success of this election, definitely went much smoother this time around. Probably one more step toward getting U.S. troops to come home, yes?

LINDNER: Oh, I'm sure. I mean every day is a step towards getting the troops to come home. But obviously getting this government in place and a government that is represented throughout or represented by everybody throughout the country is a huge step.

PHILLIPS: Army National Guard Captain Todd Lindner.

Great to see you again, Todd. Thanks for your time.

LINDNER: Thanks. Take care.

PHILLIPS: Well still to come on LIVE FROM, they ran for their lives when Hurricane Katrina destroyed their city. Now New Orleans residents are trickling home, but to a housing scam? We'll have details shortly.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: They're actually heading up to the Weather Center right there. Because in parts of the East today, it's a winter wonderland. Let's get a fix on what's happening out there.

Bonnie Schneider, what's happening?

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Well, New Orleans residents are coming back home, not in great numbers yet. After all, there are hundreds of thousands of displaced families. But many making the journey back find something disturbing about their ability to pay rent and they say it isn't fair. CNN's Alina Cho is in New Orleans.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): Chiquita Simms is a New Orleans resident forced to call Atlanta home.

CHIQUITA SIMMS, KATRINA EVACUEE: This is not the way a freezer looks for a household in New Orleans.

CHO: The two bedroom apartment she shares with her son is just as empty. She sleeps on a blow up mattress in the living room. Her son got a bed last week.

SIMMS: The clock radio is our only form of entertainment.

CHO: Simms is desperate to move back to New Orleans.

SIMMS: At a time when people are down to their least and wanting to come back to contribute to the economy or wanting to come back, you can't because you can't afford it. We're priced out.

CHO: Pre-Katrina Simms paid $800 a month for a two-bedroom apartment in the uptown area. Now she's finding rents have surged by as much as 100 percent.

Would you go so far as to say that this is price gouging?

SIMMS: It's definitely price gouging.

JUDSON MITCHELL, LOYOLA LAW SCHOOL: Landlords are trying to take advantage of this situation to turn a profit.

CHO: Attorney Judson Mitchell is representing Loyola University students and faculties searching for affordable housing. The problem is three-fold. An estimated one-third of the cities homes were wiped out in the storm. FEMA workers are willing to pay top dollar for a place to live. Finally, state housing laws allow landlords to evict month-to-month tenants without cause.

MITCHELL: So the previous tenants, when they come back, they generally find that the landlord doesn't want to talk to them, does everything to avoid them. Tells them that they have to leave. And, in many cases, just straight out evicts them so that they can clear the way for these new people to come in and, you know, get those big rents.

CHO: And it's all perfectly legal.

ANDRE HOOPER, RIVERLAKE PROPERTIES: It's about our survival as landowners.

CHO: Andre Hooper manages more than 1,000 rental units in the city. He's collecting rent on half. The other half damaged in the storm are under repair at double the cost.

HOOPER: I think we've probably gone up 10 percent on the stuff that we can rent right now. But our expenses far outweigh that. I mean it's not even close.

CHO: Chiquita Simms says she could live with a 10 percent hike if only she could find it.

Because if the prices drop, you're there tomorrow.

SIMMS: I'm there tomorrow.

CHO: No question?

SIMMS: No question.

CHO: The rental hikes are not only affecting residents, they're also having a ripping effect on the local economy. Many businesses that are trying to hire workers simply can't because those workers are having a tough time finding an affordable place to live.

Alina Cho, CNN, New Orleans.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Kids and the flu. A new study finds that it kills more children than chicken pox, whooping cough and measles combined. We're going to hear from our medical correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen, when LIVE FROM continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, the bird flu has been grabbing all the recent headlines. Ordinary flu strains shouldn't be taken lightly. Complications from the flu will kill tens of thousands of Americans this year. And some, a small percentage, will be kids. Healthy kids who never got a flu shot. CNN Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen has one family's story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT, (voice over): One day last year, Emily Lastinger, a healthy, energetic three-year-old, wasn't feeling well. Her pedestrian diagnosed the flu. Five days later she was dead.

JENNIFER LASTINGER, DAUGHTER DIED FROM FLU: She was laying on the bed not breathing and I just kept looking at her like, this just can't be happening. COHEN: It's a shockingly common story. Half of all children who died of the flu the winter Emily died were previously healthy.

JENNIFER LASTINGER: She was beautifully, beautifully strong and healthy.

COHEN: Joe and Jennifer Lastinger figured Emily was so healthy she could fight the flu. Two years later, the Lastinger's say Emily did not have to die. They say she could be alive today playing with her brothers and little sister, born two weeks after her death.

Could Emily's death been prevented?

JENNIFER LASTINGER: I do believe that the flu vaccination would have saved Emily.

COHEN: So why didn't Emily get a flu shot? Ironically, her own health worked against her. Pediatricians usually don't give flu shots to healthy kids. They follow guidelines set by the Centers for Disease Control. The CDC encourages flu shots only for sick children if they're over age two. The CDC says the shot works and is safe for all kids, they just worry that if too many parents rush out to get their kids vaccinated, there won't be enough shots left for other groups like the elderly.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't have that many doses right now, so we have to build up the manufacturing capacity.

COHEN: The Lastinger's, along with other parents who have lost children to the flu, formed Families Fighting Flu. They want the CDC to encourage flu vaccinations for all children. They point out that vaccinating kids can save older people, too, since young children tend to have terrible hygiene and spread the disease to others.

Dr. John Abramson (ph), head of the CDC's vaccine advisory committee, says he can't publicly encourage parent to go out and get flu shots for their healthy kid, but he does make sure that his own healthy children are protected.

So, do you make sure that your children are vaccinated against the flu?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My children are vaccinated against the flu.

COHEN: The Lastinger's wish someone had told them about flu vaccines.

Do you ever think what if?

JENNIFER LASTINGER: Oh, only every five seconds.

JOE LASTINGER: Our lives would be different. Completely different.

JENNIFER LASTINGER: Bye, baby.

COHEN: It's too late for Emily, but they continue on hoping that their fight will save someone else's child.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN: Two winters ago when Emily died, 153 children were reported to have died of the flu. But the Centers for Disease Control says they know that number is actually probably larger. It was just that all the deaths weren't actually reported.

PHILLIPS: Now Emily died in five days. That seems so fast.

COHEN: What's sad is that it actually isn't fast according to this new study. According to this study, of those 153 children, one- third of them died within three days of getting sick. So that's an even shorter period of time. Flu can kill children very quickly.

PHILLIPS: So if your child is healthy, should you get vaccinated or not?

COHEN: Parents really need to speak to their pediatricians. And I've certainly spoken to some pediatricians who say, look, the CDC does not tell us to vaccinate healthy children, so I don't necessarily bring it up. But if a parent brings it up to me, I'll talk to them and, if they really want one, I will give it to them as long at there's not a shortage going on.

And, Kyra, this year there aren't the kind of severe shortages that there have been in other years, so many pediatricians will say, if parents ask me, I'll give them a shot.

PHILLIPS: What about babies?

COHEN: Babies under the age of six months can't get a flu shot. It just doesn't work in them. However, what this study in "The New England Journal of Medicine" recently reported, is that it might be useful or it certainly will be useful for a pregnant woman to get a flu shot. That it may convey some immunity to her unborn child and that immunity would stay with that child even for months after birth.

PHILLIPS: Elizabeth Cohen, thank you.

COHEN: Thanks.

PHILLIPS: Well, first it was free meals and then the pillows. Now one airline is doing away with another freebie for passengers. Susan Lisovicz is live from the New York Stock Exchange.

What is it, Susan?

SUSAN LISOVICZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Oh, it's the free soda, as well as the free magazines. Everything's going by the wayside, Kyra. One of the best headlines I saw on this one was "Fly like an eagle, sip like a sparrow."

Because starting next month, the low-cost carrier American Eagle will charge $1 each for a can of soda and a bag of cashews on flights into and out of Los Angeles. A spokesman for American Eagle says it's a test to see whether customers value the dollar to buy a can of soda or a can of juice. Drink up the water and coffee, because they are still free.

American Eagle is owned by the same company as American Airlines, which made headlines earlier this year when it removed pillows from its planes to save on cleaning costs. American Eagle will also experiment with selling a blanket and pillow set for $5, which, of course, you can keep. The airline says it's of a higher quality than what passengers typically get.

Shares of AMR, the parent of both American Airlines and American Eagle are jumping nearly 7 percent. And blue chips right now are edging higher, largely because of a $3 gain in shares of Altria. The Illinois Supreme Court today overturned a $10 billion class action ruling against its Philip Morris tobacco unit.

Despite those gains and a huge drop in inflation at the consumer level, it's been a tough day for the market. The Dow Industrials up just four points right now. The Nasdaq down 6 or a quarter of a percent. And that's the latest from Wall Street. Stay tuned. LIVE FROM will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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