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CNN Live Today

Violent Week in Iraq; White House Criticizes Former Education Secretary William Bennett for Explosive Comment; Organ Transplant Scandal in Los Angeles

Aired September 30, 2005 - 11:30   ET

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

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Firefighters hope that lighter winds will help them contain a wildfire spreading across parts of Southern California. The blaze is in Los Angeles and Venture Counties. It has covered more than 20,000 acres already. About 1,500 people have been forced to evacuate.
A new program to help Hurricane Katrina victims started this week. In it, FEMA is offering $2,300 to people to help pay for three months' rent. Their rental program replaces the earlier offer of $2,000 debit cards.

Gas prices are climbing this week, jumping several cents. AAA says the average price of self-serve regular hit $2.85 Thursday, up nearly 3 cents is one day.

Let's get the latest from Iraq now. A car bomb at a vegetable market left at least seven dead today in Hilla. The violence caps a bloody week in the country. Close to 200 people lost their lives. Among them, 13 U.S. troops.

CNN's Aneesh Raman is keeping watch on developments in Baghdad today.

Aneesh, hello.

ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Daryn, good morning.

Iraqi civilians, again, the target of insurgent attacks. This time a car bomb detonating in the southern Iraqi town of Hilla this morning. Now the death toll stands at eight. Among them, women and children. Upwards of 50 others wounded, Daryn. The bomb took place outside a vegetable market. It's the weekend here now. So think of it as Saturday morning back in the U.S. A large number of people who have been out on the streets, going to the market when that explosion took place.

As that was happening, Daryn, the residents of the town of Balad, which is just north of Baghdad, were starting to pick up the pieces, dealing with the gruesome aftermath of an insurgent assault that took place late on Thursday evening, a trio of car bombs detonating amidst mortar and small arms fire. The death toll from that stands at 87 people killed, upwards of 120 others wounded. Clearly coordinated, Daryn.

The first car bomb detonating on a main street there. Minutes later, as Iraqis gathered around that explosion, a suicide car bomb detonating on the same place, and then 10 minutes after that, on another main street of Balad, a third car bomb exploded in Balad.

We have been told by Iraqi officials, by U.S. officials, including President Bush, to expect a spike in violence as we heard toward the key date, October 15th, when Iraqis will go to the polls. But in the towns of Balad, in the towns of Hilla, the questions from the citizens are as basic as they get, why does this keep happening? Where is the government? Where is the security? no answers yet for them from the Iraqi government as they still try to bring about the numbers of Iraqi security forces to secure all parts of this country -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Is there any sense of anticipation or excitement looking forward to that election, or is the violence totally overshadowing that?

RAMAN: Well, there's clear anticipation, first and foremost, at the turnout. They are expecting a huge turnout by Iraqis, and that is something key that observers will be looking at. You'll recall a big turnout in January. That has been used as a rationale for continuing this process, because Iraqis are clearly invested in democracy here. So they are expecting a big turnout, but the key concern is that a constitution could get passed that does not enjoy support,and in fact has incredible opposition from the Sunni community, who are seen as key to bringing into the political fold and bringing stability into Iraq. So the numbers game will be what we'll look for on October 15th. How many people turn out, and by what margin does this constitution pass or not -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Aneesh Raman, live from Baghdad, thank you.

And in terms of the military, a changing of the guard here in the U.S. President Bush is at Fort Myer, Virginia this morning. Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers is retiring today after 40 years in uniform. His replacement is Marine Corps General Peter Pace. Myers took over shortly after the 9/11 attacks. Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq would dominate his tenure.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: He helped design a broad and innovative military strategy to win the war on terror. His leadership and flexibility were essential to the liberation of Iraq, to adapting our attacks to defeat the terrorists and help the Iraqis build a peaceful democracy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: So what is next for the general? His name has been floated as a possible Republican candidate for governor of Kansas. That's where he grew up.

Ahead, deciding who gets a transplant? Available organs are supposed to go to the sickest patients. Some say that is not what happened at one Southern California hospital. Details on this hospital scandal when CNN LIVE TODAY returns.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: This just in to CNN. We're looking at pictures live from New York City. A school bus accident involving, we believe, a parochial school. We're not sure exactly the school. But we can tell you that the accident took place on the Deagan Expressway in the southbound lanes. About 40 kids from this parochial school onboard. It does look like some kids are being treated on the scene. The information and the pictures coming to us from affiliate WABC. We will continue to monitor the situation in New York City.

We move on, though. The White House today criticized former Education Secretary William Bennett for an explosive comment, linking blacks and crime. Congressional Democrats and civil rights activists are demanding an apology. Bennett says the comment is being taken out of context. It happened on his radio show. Bennett was discussing a hypothesis in a recent book that crime is down because abortion is up. The issue came up during a call to his show.

Let's listen in.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL BENNETT, FMR. EDUCATION SECY.: Lewis in Sarasota, Florida. Hello, Lewis, last call of the day.

CALLER: Hey. How are you doing?

BENNETT: Good.

CALLER: New caller to you here and new listener.

BENNETT: Great.

CALLER: I noticed the national media is -- you know, they talk a lot about the loss of revenue or the inability of the government to fund Social Security, and I was curious, and I've read articles in recent months here, that, you know, the abortions that have happened since Roe V. Wade that loss revenue for the people who have been aborted during the last 30-something years, you know, could fund Social Security as we know it today, and, you know, the media never touches this at all.

BENNETT: Assuming they're all productive citizens?

CALLER: Assuming that they are. Even if only a portion of them were, it would be an enormous amount of revenue.

BENNETT: Maybe, maybe, but we don't know what the costs would be, too. I think, does abortion disproportionately occur among single women? No.

CALLER: I don't know the exact statistics. Quite a bit are, yes. BENNETT: All right. Well, I mean, I just don't know. I don't -- I would not argue for the pro-life position based on this, because you don't know. I mean, it cuts both -- one of the arguments, in this book, "Freakonomics" they make is that the decline in crime rate -- you know, they deal with the hypothesis that one of the reasons crime is down is that abortion is up.

CALLER: Well, I don't think that statistic is accurate.

BENNETT: Well, I don't think it is either. I don't think it is, either. Because first of all, I think there's just too much that you don't know. But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could -- if that were your sole purpose -- you could abort every black baby in this country and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do. But your crime rate would go down.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well...

BENNETT: But these far-out, these far-reaching, you know, extensive extrapolations, are, I think, tricky.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Bennett stands by his remark. He said it was a hypothetical comment that has been mischaracterized.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENNETT: I was putting forward a hypothetical proposition. Put that forward, examined it and then said about it that it's morally reprehensible. To recommend abortion of an entire group of people to lower your crime rate is morally reprehensible. But this is what happens when you argue that the ends can justify the means.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Joining us now to talk about Bennett's remarks and the controversy they have stirred up is the Reverend Al Sharpton. He's with from New York City. Reverend, good morning.

REV. AL SHARPTON, CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST: Good morning.

KAGAN: What do you think?

SHARPTON: I think they're blatantly racist. I think that even after he had said to kill people based on who they are is morally irreprehensible -- he then came back and stated as a fact that, if you did do this, even if it was reprehensible, it would, in fact, lower the crime rate. Which clearly is he -- making blacks and crime synonymous. So I think even after he recovered, he re-emphasized the offensive point in first place. And he seems to be oblivious to what he has said out of his own mouth and then confirmed after he tried to clean it up.

KAGAN: Just to quote Bill Bennett here, later he also said -- he goes, "I am not a racist. I'll put my record up against theirs." He says, "I've been a champion of the real civil rights issue of our time, equal educational opportunity for our kids."

SHARPTON: Well, first of all, he can't determine what the real civil rights issues are when he's not a victim of violations of civil rights. I think that, again, is very arrogant. He's going to superimpose upon people in the civil rights movement what the real civil rights issue is.

Secondly, what record? I mean, clearly Mr. Bennett has spent a lifetime on the conservative side, trying to do what he could to, in my opinion, stifle the civil rights movement. He is now caught with his foot in his mouth. If that wasn't enough, he came back and stuck the other shoe in his mouth.

I think not only should he apologize, I think those that have funded him and his work, we have to take a real look at them and put pressure on them. Here's a man that blatantly thinks that crime and blacks are synonymous in this country. Is this the kind of guy we need out there?

KAGAN: I don't want to get off track here, but I just want to clarify one of your comments. Are you saying that only blacks can work for civil rights?

SHARPTON: No, I didn't say blacks. I said civil rights community. There are many people in the civil rights community that are white. But Mr. Bennett is not one of them. With the civil rights movement from the days of fighting segregation to the days of today, of fighting against racial inequality or fighting against those that would impair our civil liberties, does not find Bill Bennett as one of those in that community then or now. You don't have to be black, you have to be for what is civil right, not civil wrong.

KAGAN: OK, just wanted to clarify on that comment, there. So what would you like to see happen? Would you like to see an apology from Bill Bennett?

SHARPTON: I would not only like to see an apology from him, I'd like to see those that have supported him, those that finance him and the radio stations that carry him -- have to really look at whether or not they can afford to stand with a guy who blatantly says and confirms he believes that blacks and crimes are synonymous. Because I think some of us in the African-American community and people of goodwill of all races need to really look at whether we can support radio stations that would have that kind of guy championing a point of view, when we know how he really feels.

KAGAN: All right. Reverend Al Sharpton, thank you for your comments this morning.

SHARPTON: Thank you.

KAGAN: I want to show you also, we are covering this story out of New York City. This is WABC showing us these pictures and these children. A parochial school in New York City, a bus accident on the Deegan Expressway in the southbound lanes. Clearly, some of the children have been hurt. We're not sure exactly what school they were with, but we're working on getting more information on that. That is ahead.

Also, a check of weather and business, coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: Actually, let's check what's happening here in New York City. Once again, we're following this bus accident. The Deegan Expressway, a bus carrying about 40 children from a parochial school had -- in the southbound lanes, having an accident there. Clearly, a number of the children have been injured and are being treated there on the scene. We don't have the exact school. We will work on getting more information and more pictures, live pictures, from our affiliate WABC there.

Now on to our "Daily Dose" of health news. Concern over the deadly bird flu outbreak in Asia is spreading to Capitol Hill. The Senate has now voted to spend $4 billion to defend against a potential outbreak in the U.S. The money was tacked onto a Pentagon spending bill. Most of it would be used to stockpile the anti-viral drug Tamiflu, which has shown to be effective against bird. However, our Reuters report said today that experts in Hong Kong are warning of a growing resistance to that drug.

So we're looking at now deciding who gets an organ transplant. It is based on a complex system. It's designed to get available organs to the sickest patients. But a scandal at a hospital in Los Angeles has shaken the faith of some patients who are waiting for life-saving transplants.

The story now, from CNN's Thelma Gutierrez.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

THELMA GUTIERREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Every day Colleen Mawas must fight to stay alive, with a breathing machine and 14 different medications. Colleen's liver is shutting down.

COLLEEN MAWAS, WAITING FOR A LIVER: When I first was diagnosed, my son was 12 years old. I wanted to make it to his graduation. And that was my motivation for living.

GUTIERREZ: She desperately needs a liver transplant.

MAWAS: And they said I would have -- this is in October. I would have one by Christmas.

GUTIERREZ (on camera): That was how long ago?

MAWAS: That was seven years ago.

GUTIERREZ: Seven years you've been waiting.

MAWAS: Seven years I've been waiting. GUTIERREZ (voice-over): In those seven years Colleen says she's been close to death three times.

MAWAS: I think the hardest part was watching my parents cry and watching my son and knowing that I may not see him grow up.

GUTIERREZ: Colleen is one of more than 17,000 Americans currently on a national organ registry, waiting for a liver transplant. It's a complex system that ranks patients according to need, a system that, for patients, is based on trust.

For Colleen and others like her, that trust has been breached. Breached if allegations of favoritism and record falsification within the liver transplant department at St. Vincent's Medical Center in Los Angeles turn out to be true.

GUS VALDESPINO, CEO, ST. VINCENT'S MEDICAL CENTER: We are conducting a very thorough investigation in order to restore the trust and credibility in this program.

GUTIERREZ: The investigation goes back to 2003. A donor liver arrived at St. Vincent's for a Saudi citizen known as Patient A. Oddly, the hospital says that patient was traveling and not available. So the liver is transplanted into Patient B, another Saudi, who's actually 52nd on a regional waiting list. According to the hospital, the medical records were then falsified to cover it up.

VALDESPINO: The first thing that went through my mind is shock and sadness.

GUTIERREZ: St. Vincent's CEO, Gus Valdespino, recently closed the department, sending 75 patients scrambling for a new transplant center, and said the responsibility lay with the men who ran it, Dr. Hector Ramos and Dr. Richard Lopez, seen here on the hospital's web site.

VALDESPINO: Dr. Ramos and Dr. Lopez both were part of making the decision to transplant Patient B. And knowingly circumvented UNOS policy.

GUTIERREZ: Valdespino says according to UNOS, the federal agency that oversees organ procurement, if Patient A wasn't available the liver should have gone to a dying patient at another hospital. Dr. Richard Lopez could not be reached for comment.

But Evelina Serafini, attorney for Dr. Ramos, says her client was trying to do the right thing.

EVELINA SERAFINI, DR. HECTOR RAMOS' ATTORNEY: Dr. Ramos had a patient who was very sick and dying and believed that he was dying and would die at the time.

He maintains that he's done nothing wrong either in transplanting the man or -- and had nothing to do whatsoever with any falsification of records. GUTIERREZ: Neither the hospital nor UNOS will reveal the identity of Patient B. But the hospital says the Saudi royal embassy paid $339,000 for the transplant, some 30 percent more than an American citizen with insurance, but not unusual for a foreign national.

VALDESPINO: The hospital has no indication that there was motivation to pass -- to go to this patient for monetary reasons.

GUTIERREZ: We checked with the Saudi royal embassy. A spokesman there said medical bills for any Saudi citizen brought to this country for treatment are paid by the embassy. But the embassy is still trying to figure out who these patients are.

Colleen says whatever the reason passing over people on the list is unethical. But she says this incident has rocked the confidence of some transplant patients in her support group.

MAWAS: Tell them, you know, when your time's come, it -- you know the system will work for you. If you're next -- if you're the sickest, you'll get the next organ. And now, you know, we all feel like we've been deceived.

GUTIERREZ: Colleen says she hopes this is an isolated case and that someday she'll get her liver. After all, she's already seen her son graduate high school.

Thelma Gutierrez, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAGAN: For your "Daily Dose" of health news online, just log on to our Web site. You'll find medical stories, special reports and a health library. The address is CNN.com/health.

We're back with your forecast in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: Let's take another look at what we're watching in New York City. This is a school bus accident in the Bronx on the Deagan Expressway, about 40 children onboard the school bus. They've been taken off the bus. As you can see, some of the children treated at the scene. And to give you an idea of the area we're talking about, if you're familiar with New York City, once again, the Deagan Expressway, the major road that takes you through the Bronx. Usually a very busy place, a very highway. But right now, traffic is backed up because of the response to this school bus accident. We'll continue to follow that and give you more information about what's taking place, just ahead.

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