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CNN Live Today

Alabama Church Fires; Cargo Plane Fire; Fewer Viewers Tuning Into Grammys

Aired February 08, 2006 - 10:59   ET

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

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's go ahead and take a look at what's happening right "Now in the News."
Live pictures from southern California. The L.A. area is a hotspot for wildfires this week. Right now huge walls of flames are sweeping across a rugged canyon near Malibu. The fire broke out just hours ago. More than a hundred firefighters are battling the blaze.

Bringing peace and stability to the Middle East tops the agenda at the White House today. President Bush sat down for talks with Jordan's King Abdullah this morning. At a news conference after their meeting, the two men called for an end to violent protests that have broken out over the controversial cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed.

With money on his mind, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld heads to Capitol Hill. Once again, we are looking at live pictures from the Hill.

The defense secretary will appear before the House Armed Services Committee to defend the president's proposed defense budget. The plan would boost Pentagon spending by about seven percent to $439 billion. Rumsfeld told the Senate panel yesterday that the new funds will help transform the military into a more flexible force.

In Colorado, talk about a lucky but cold dog. Firefighters from Douglas County, just south of Denver, rescued this Golden Retriever from a frozen lake. No word on how the dog got trapped in the icy water in the first place, but that one has a happy and warmer ending.

Good morning once again. Welcome back to CNN LIVE TODAY.

Checking some of the time around the world, just after 10:00 a.m. in Boligee, Alabama, just after 8:00 a.m. in Los Angeles.

From CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Daryn Kagan.

Up first this hour, Alabama police are increasing patrols around world churches today for more burned, bringing this month's total to nine. Alabama Governor Bob Riley will visit the sites of the latest fires this afternoon.

If you take a look at the map you can see they're clustered in western Alabama, near the Mississippi border.

Here now is Correspondent David Mattingly in Boligee, Alabama. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The church fires investigation in Alabama continuing today. You can see behind me in the rubble of what used to be the Morning Star Baptist Church in Boligee, Alabama, federal agents picking through the rubble, going through piece by piece with a rake, looking for any clues that they can possibly find as to how this fire was started and possibly who started it.

Of course, the question remaining, why would anyone be targeting Baptist churches in rural Alabama?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Most of the similarities we will keep close hold, but however, there are a lot of things that are pretty common. They're churches in remote areas. They're all the same denomination, of course. There are a lot of similar burn patterns.

A lot of them were burned before they were noticed. They burned for a long time before anyone noticed the fire. So those are some of the similar things that we've seen.

MATTINGLY: At this point there have been no clear suspects and no clear motive in any of the cases. Both white churches and black churches have been targeted. The only link is they are all Baptist and all in rural Alabama.

There is very little so far that investigators have been able to go to the public with either. They say that in both cases, on Friday and on Tuesday a dark SUV was spotted. According to one report, it might have contained two white men, but that's about it.

Everyone asking the public to remain vigilant, to watch their churches in hopes that this does not happen again.

David Mattingly, CNN, Boligee, Alabama.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAGAN: And now farther to the north, a major U.S. airport is up and running again this hour after today's fiery landing. The flames shot up from a UPS cargo plane on approach to Philadelphia this morning.

Our Kathleen Koch is monitoring that story from Washington.

Kathleen, good morning.

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.

And it was a very close call, Daryn. Flames were spotted coming from the cargo hold of the UPS plane as it made that emergency landing just after midnight at the Philadelphia International Airport.

The company says the plane reported a lower cargo and main deck smoke situation. Luckily, the three crew members were able to jump to safety. They were treated at a nearby hospital for smoke inhalation and released.

It took firefighters more than four hours to douse the flames, and right now there's no word yet on just what caused the blaze. But it's important to point out that smoke detection and fire suppression systems have been required in the cargo holds of passenger planes since 2001 because of the 1996 ValuJet crash. But cargo planes are only required to have detectors, not fire suppression systems. If you remember, that crash in the Florida Everglades was caused by oxygen- generating canisters.

Now, about a quarter of the cargo that is transported by air in the United States goes into passenger planes. And the FAA has been really fighting a constant battle to make sure that hazardous material stays of those aircraft. It now has roughly 124, HazMat cargo inspectors, and because of the stepped-up security inspections of cargo by the federal government looking for bombs, now it's actually finding more hazardous material that shouldn't go into the belly of the aircraft, either.

The FAA says, for example, for a one-year period through May of 2004 it discovered 11,500 improper shipments. That compared to just 3,700 for the year before.

Now, that's a tripling of violations. So, Daryn, certainly something that is a potential cause for concern.

KAGAN: OK. Beyond the stats and everything, let's go back to this idea of shipping hazardous materials by air. That just does not seem like a smart idea to me.

KOCH: Well, cargo carriers are certified to carry certain hazardous shipments by air, but there's actually a great incentive for people -- for shippers to get them onto passenger aircraft because cargo carriers, the FedExes, the UPS's of the world, only -- only really service about 20 percent of U.S. airports.

So if you're a shipper, and you want to quickly get something from point A to point B, there's a lot of incentive to sneak it onboard a passenger aircraft. And, you know, airlines make about 15 percent of their revenue carrying cargo, but they certainly don't want the hazardous materials on board their planes either.

KAGAN: No. Kathleen Koch, live in Washington, D.C.

Thank you.

KOCH: You bet.

KAGAN: Let's go ahead and take a look at what's on the legal docket today in our "Legal Briefs."

A delay in the sentencing for D.C. councilman Marion Barry on tax charges. Barry pleaded guilty in October to not filing his 2000 taxes. At a hearing just a short time ago, a judge put off the sentencing until March 9. She says Barry has not filed several necessary documents. In Laguna Beach, California, a judge says organizers of the annual Patriots Day Parade can't exclude members of the Minuteman Project. Co-founder Jim Gilchrist went to court after the parade committee turned down the group's application on political grounds. The Minuteman Project uses volunteers to patrol the U.S.-Mexican border for illegal immigrants.

The jury is expected to see more videotapes today at the trial of two former Enron executives. Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling are accused of fraud and conspiracy. They say they're innocent.

Yesterday, a defense attorney played a video of the two praising the company's growth prospects in January of 2001. That tape came during the cross-examination of the first prosecution witness.

An update on that police shooting in Chino, California. The family of the wounded man repeats calls for the officer involved to face charges. And again, we're going to caution you, this videotape can be difficult to watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get up! OK? Get up!

ELIO CARRION, IRAQ WAR VETERAN: I'm going to get up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: The deputy shot Iraq war veteran Elio Carrion after a high-speed chase. The FBI is enhancing the audio, trying to figure out the deputy's precise words. But it appears he told Carrion to stand up and began shooting when he did.

The deputy's father disputes that, telling the "Los Angeles Times" his son felt threatened.

Carrion has been released from the hospital, but he's still recovering. On CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING," his wife described watching the video.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARIELA CARRION, WIFE: I just felt my heart dropped. I mean, it's unbelievable.

He was pleading, he was telling the officer, "I'm on your side. I'm on your side. I'm in the Air Force. Please believe me."

And as the officer told him, "Get down, get down," my husband went down. And he said -- and then the officer was telling him, "Get up, get up." And then my husband was saying, "OK, I'm going to get up." And that's when he shot him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: You can join Miles O'Brien and Soledad O'Brien weekday mornings. They take it from 6:00 a.m. Eastern until 10:00 a.m. Eastern, and then we take over here on CNN LIVE TODAY.

In just a few hours, the biggest night of the year for the music industry gets going, but do the Grammys still matter in this age of downloads and ring tones? How important is the album of the year category anyway? We'll talk about that coming up.

And Fossett takes flight again. We'll tell you about the millionaire adventurer's latest mission.

Plus, "Sports Illustrated" joins forces with your lawmakers. The goal, keep steroids out of the hands of teenagers. If you don't believe it's a problem, stick around to hear why some kids are juicing up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: Biggest night in music. Tonight is Grammy night. But are you going to be tuning in to see which music greats will get the gold? The truth is, fewer of you are watching the Grammy Awards on television.

Our Entertainment Correspondent Brooke Anderson looks at why that is.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROOKE ANDERSON, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice over): When the spotlight shines on music's biggest night, audiences can expect to see plenty of flash and hear some incredible musical performances. But with the number of people actually watching the awards ceremony on television shrinking, we ask the question, why do the Grammys still matter? .

GEOFF MAYFIELD, SR. ANALYST, "BILLBOARD" MAGAZINE: Santana, perhaps the biggest week of his career, he was already number one, so the record-buying public loves him. But he wins a bunch of Grammys and then he has an even bigger sales week the week after that.

ANDERSON: That was 1999. Fast forward to 2005. The Grammy telecast suffered in the ratings due in part to stiff competition from ABC's "Desperate Housewives."

MAYFIELD: Last year's ratings were down, and yet I can tell you that there are at least 20 albums that I noticed that had noticeable sales impact because of what happened with that show.

ANDERSON: But there's far more at stake than just record sales that makes the Grammys so important to people like first-time nominee Kelly Clarkson.

KELLY CLARKSON, SINGER: I think the cool thing about the Grammys is that it's your peers voting for you. You know, it's the people in the music industry, the people that are working alongside you.

ANDERSON: And winning a Grammy can be even more powerful. Just ask Kanye West, a big winner at the 2005 Grammys who is up for eight awards this year.

KANYE WEST, SINGER: You, you could try to, like, downplay the awards and all that type of stuff, but winning a Grammy has really, like, advanced my career a lot. I've got a lot of sponsorships, I've got respect across the world.

ANDERSON: In recent years the Recording Academy has worked hard to silence criticism that the voting members are out of touch by instituting a blue ribbon voting panel to make sure they're on the mark with their nominations.

MAYFIELD: Of all the award shows -- and our magazine happens to be involved with one -- of all the award shows, it's the biggest. It's the one that makes the biggest noise.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON: And Daryn, interestingly, the Recording Academy, in an effort to attract viewers and to promote this as the biggest night of the year, has actually trademarked the phrase "Music's biggest night."

KAGAN: Oh. So I should have say said, "Music's biggest night" with a little R in the circle right there.

ANDERSON: TM, yes.

KAGAN: Yes, exactly, TM.

All right. Thank you, Brooke. You have a great time.

ANDERSON: Thanks.

KAGAN: All right.

Want to show you some pictures that we just got in to CNN as we were listening to Brooke's piece about the Grammys.

President Bush heading to New England today. I think we have those -- there you go. Well, the president going backwards and going forwards.

OK. Coming down the steps of Air Force One. He is arriving in New Hampshire. He is Manchester, New Hampshire, to talk to the Business and Industry Association, and those remarks are supposed to be coming up about 15 minutes. We will monitor what he has to say and bring you the highlights.

And there's live pictures of President Bush as he get into the car to head to his event.

From the red carpet to the catwalk, we are jetsetting to New York for Fashion Week. Sibila Vargas is backstage at the Michael Kors show. We will find out what is hot and what is not in his collection this season.

And we are expecting the president, as I was saying, to speak in New Hampshire at the bottom of the hour. Earlier, he reacted to outrage in the Muslim world over cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed. He had King Abdullah of Jordan in town in D.C. We'll tell us what he wants other world leaders to do about that growing controversy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: Millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett is on a quest to break another aviation record. This time is flight distance.

Fossett took off this morning from Kennedy Space Center on what he hopes will be a 27,000 mile flight. He spends to spend three and a half days in the air in his experimental plane.

Fossett already holds the record for flying solo around the world in a balloon. He's also the first person to circle the globe in a plane without stopping or refueling.

Of course good weather would help him on that quest. We wish him well.

Jacqui Jeras is looking at weather this morning.

Hi, Jacqui.

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Hey, Daryn.

(WEATHER REPORT)

KAGAN: Jacqui, thank you.

We are fashion forward, on the calendar, anyway. It is Fashion Week in New York. Today, Michael Kors has been showcasing his fall collection on the runway inside the venue. It is known as "The Tent." That's what the cool fashion people call it.

One of those? Well, I'm looking for Sibila Vargas. There she is.

SIBILA VARGAS, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: Here I am.

KAGAN: You were just -- oh, my goodness, Sibila.

VARGAS: It's chaotic.

KAGAN: Well, that's not the word I'm thinking of with what I'm looking at.

VARGAS: I hope that you're not looking at too much. Make sure that we don't show too much. But it is kind of chaos and a little frenzy out here as Michael Kors is getting ready to unleash his fall fashion. You know, designers come from around the world, but what's really interesting is that one of the most anticipated shows is coming from a man from our own back yard. Of course that is the fabulous Michael Kors, and he's from Long Island, New York.

I got a chance to speak with him just moments ago. This is what he said about his fall fashion line.

Oh, OK. Well, we seem to have some type of technical difficulty. But like I said, he talked about bags. Bags was the big thing right now. And unfortunately, a lot of crazy things are happening right here and I think we're going have to go -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Let me help you here, because I've got to tell you, this is one live shot that I don't mind that there's no tape to go to, Sibila.

VARGAS: Thank you for your candor.

KAGAN: I think we're doing OK.

VARGAS: I love it.

KAGAN: So he was talking about big bags.

VARGAS: Yes, big bags.

KAGAN: Now, lots of us have been lugging big bags around for a long time. It doesn't look that good. So I'm sure there's a certain look to these kinds of bags that he's talking about.

VARGAS: Yes. It's more like a suitcase, it is. And so that seems to be the big thing right now. I mean, at least that's what he was talking about in his line.

And, you know, he's kind of a showster. He likes to put on a really good show. There's a lot of theatrics.

In fact, I was reading the motivation for some of these models as they go out. They have to think of themselves as though they're on campus and they're in the most popular crowd. And, you know, everybody wants to get into their sorority, but they can't get in.

So I think Michael Kors, you know, has that down. It's like this is kind of like a sorority campus thing, a college thing. And that's going to be the motivation going out there.

It's really interesting, though. You see the designers, they all have something different. Some of the models come out a bit more serious, and then you see some that are a little bit more flirty. And that's kind of what I've learned so far, for at least Michael Kors.

Back to you, Daryn.

KAGAN: So there's character motivation. Turn around for a second. They were putting a veil over this guy behind you. Anyhow, I'm having flashbacks to my day in sports and my think in the locker room.

VARGAS: Right.

KAGAN: We'll let you go enjoy, OK?

VARGAS: All right. Thanks a lot, Daryn.

KAGAN: Sibila Vargas.

Well, that's what we call live television, folks. It wasn't such a bad thing today.

Coming up, a newspaper editor defends a cartoon that set off a firestorm of protests around the world.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: We're getting pretty close to the half-hour. I'm Daryn Kagan. Here's what's happening "Now in the News.">

In California, dry, windy conditions are fanning a 25-acre brushfire that's sweeping across a rugged canyon near Malibu, as we look at live pictures form our affiliate, KTLA. Authorities say the wildfire started just hours ago, perhaps from a burning vehicle. More than a hundred firefighters are battling the blaze from the ground and five water-dropping helicopters are tackling it from the air.

Any minute now President Bush is expected to begin a speech promising and promoting his nearly $2.8 trillion budget proposal. He's taking his message to Manchester, New Hampshire. The president will be speaking to the state's Business and Industry Association.

Bird flu has now spread to Africa. According to the World Health Organization, Nigeria is the 17th country to confirm the H5N1 virus in chickens. No human cases of the disease have been reported in Nigeria. Officials have quarantined three farms in northern Nigeria as they begin culling about 50,00 chickens.

More violent protests erupted today over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed that have sparked Muslim outrage. There were demonstrations in Kabul, Afghanistan, and five people were killed during rioting in southern Afghanistan. Hundreds of demonstrators there tried to storm a police station and break into a U.S. military base.

A top Muslim organization called for an end to the rioting.

Demonstrators also took to the streets in Bosnia. The leader of Bosnia's Muslim community call for dialogue but also criticized the Danish newspaper that first published the cartoons. The paper's culture editor defended the decision earlier on CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) FLEMMING ROSE, CULTURE EDITOR, "JYLLANDS-POSTEN": If you make a cartoon, make fun of religion, make fun of religious figures, that does not imply that you humiliate or denigrate or marginalize a religion. In fact, I brought two cartoons to make my point.

If you look at this one, this is the David star attached to a bomb, and it's made by the same cartoonist who did the cartoon with the prophet with a bomb in his turban. And the same cartoonist also made this cartoon.

And these cartoons might also be offensive to Christians and Jews, but I'm just trying to make the point that we do not explicitly point out the Muslims in order to offend them. This is the way we do things in Denmark.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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