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American Morning
Bomb Found on Plane in Baghdad; College Students Gone Wild in Boston
Aired November 23, 2004 - 08:30 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.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Security tight at Baghdad's airport this morning as new details emerge about a bomb that was found on a commercial plane yesterday in Iraq.
CNN's Karl Penhaul live for us in Baghdad with more this morning. Karl, good morning.
KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Soledad. We first found out about the discovery of this bomb on a commercial airliner in Iraq yesterday evening -- that was when the U.S. Embassy sent around a warning message to American citizens living in Iraq.
The message just a three line message pretty opaque. It didn't specify which airliner the bomb was found on, but what it does say is to suggest to all American citizens to think twice, to think very hard, about whether they really need to fly in and out of Iraq.
Now we do understand there are five commercial airliners connecting Iraq with the outside world, a mixture of those passenger airliners and also cargo airliners. We talked today to Royal Jordanian and to Iraqi Airways. Both of them say that the bomb was not found on either of their planes.
The American Embassy, though, isn't giving any more information to tell us which airliner precisely that bomb was found on, but it does come almost a year to the day after a missile was fired at a DHL cargo plane that flew into Baghdad Airport. That was struck, as we know, a year ago with a surface-to-air missile in one of its engines, although it did land safely.
It does, of course, highlight the dangers of what many of us regarded as the only safe form of travel into Iraq because the roads in and out of the country are almost impossible to travel on at this stage -- Soledad.
O'BRIEN: And a related story out of Iraq as well -- I want to ask you, Karl about this -- the second Sunni cleric gunned down in as many days -- any idea who did it and why both of these men were targeted?
PENHAUL: Well this man, Sheik Faidh Mohamed Amin al-Faidhi, was killed this morning we understand, as he approached his mosque in a village near the city of Baquba, which is just north of Baghdad. Men got out of an opal car and gunned him down.
We are told that he's a member of the Muslim Cleric's Association. We know that that association has called for a boycott of the January 30th elections, but so far there's been no claims of responsibility for the killing. We don't know if it's related to the insurgency, or whether some other faction may have carried out this killing, Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Karl Penhaul in Baghdad for us this morning. Karl, thanks -- Bill.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Soledad, thanks. Now to the hot political topic this morning involving the stalemate over intelligence reform on Capitol Hill. To exchange political jabs on this issue welcome back to Lisa Caputo, former press secretary for Hillary Clinton fresh in from Little Rock where we saw you last week.
Republican Joe Watkins is back in New York, too. Joe, nice to see you as well.
JOE WATKINS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Good to be here.
HEMMER: What's going on with James Sensenbrenner telling the vice president hang on here, I'm not going to go with this reform package?
WATKINS: Well, it's not over yet. It's not over yet. I wouldn't count the vice president or the administration out yet on this one.
I mean, Sensenbrenner has some issues. Clearly he wants something about immigration in the bill, and also Duncan Hunter has some issues as well.
I mean, Duncan Hunter is one of the other committee chairman who has a problem with the bill and their problems are going to continue to be addressed, and I think we're going to find some closure.
HEMMER: James Sensenbrenner last night on CNN said I'm not going to cave. He told that to Lou Dobbs. You think he will at some point? Lisa infers that.
LISA CAPUTO, FMR. PRESS SECRETARY FOR HILLARY CLINTON: I actually don't think he will. I think what we're seeing is the beginning of the far right of the Republican Party drawing a line in the sand, and I think clearly this is going to be a challenge to this administration since, let's not forget, the far right was the really the wing of the party that got this president elected.
And he can't ignore this wing of the party so they're going to stake their line in the sand and then we'll see where they go from there.
HEMMER: But this is the point he's making of the 9/11 hijackers. They had 63 valid driver's licenses, not invalid. It appears that's where he's setting up his defense.
CAPUTO: Yes, I mean, that among other things, I think. I mean again, Bill, I think that this is a litmus test for a much larger issue. What is the future of the Christian right? How much influence are they going to have on this?
WATKINS: I don't think so.
CAPUTO: Oh, there's no doubt about it.
WATKINS: Clearly not, Bill.
CAPUTO: You can't ignore your base.
WATKINS: You're talking about $40 million in control of 15 intelligence agencies and who gives up control of that? There's going to be a new chief for intelligence that will be appointed directly to the president. This is about internal power.
CAPUTO: And that's a department the Pentagon does not want. The Pentagon has been silent on this issue. Where's Rumsfeld been? They don't want intelligence going up to an independent head of intelligence. They've been silent on this. You just reported it in your last half hour.
HEMMER: Take her point about the Christian right.
WATKINS: Yes, yes.
HEMMER: Is there a threat in here that you see that could be valid to Lisa's point?
WATKINS: I don't see any threat having to do with the Christian right or the right wing of the Republican Party. It is true that 22 percent of those who voted on election day said that the most important thing for them happened to be moral values, so that clearly a large percentage of the voting populous, whether they're Christian right people or Democrat right people are people who care about moral values. So that's a big part of the voting record.
CAPUTO: There are no Democratic right people. I mean, evangelical...
WATKINS: You're right, the Democrats are wrong.
CAPUTO: Well. Right. As Joe would have it, we're an immoral party. I mean let's...
WATKINS: That's not the case. That's not the case. No party has a lock on morality, nobody does.
CAPUTO: But the Republicans think they do.
HEMMER: Let me take you to the second point. Judge -- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said essentially that religion neutral government doesn't fit with America's current views about how God is reflected in the money, in the military, and in the court system, telling the courts to keep this in mind when they make their rulings.
What is the suggestion... WATKINS: Well, this suggested Justice Scalia is very, very consistent with his beliefs. He is an originalist. He believes in constructing the constitution based on the way it was written by the founding fathers and he has done that all along.
He really fits what President Bush likes in a justice, which is somebody who is an impartial umpire who constructs strictly the constitution.
CAPUTO: Justice Scalia is the farthest person on the court who is objective. He is the extremist on the court and when you talk about -- you know -- what was the phrase, Bill, that he used about religion? Being...
HEMMER: "Religion-neutral government doesn't fit with an America..."
CAPUTO: A religion-neutral government does not reflect America more or less is what he's saying. How can you say that? That's like issuing...
WATKINS: He's saying that's what the founding fathers wanted.
CAPUTO: But he's issuing a directive. I mean, he's telling people, you know, of different religions that they really, you know, can't play a role here because...
WATKINS: Absolutely not.
CAPUTO: ... because you know they don't believe in a particular God. What about people who don't have a faith. I mean that's -- you can't insert religion into the process. There has to be a clear division of church and state, as the founding fathers have said.
WATKINS: And there is. Wonderfully, there is a division between church and state but the founding fathers were people of faith and there's nothing wrong with realizing that.
CAPUTO: I don't...
HEMMER: Let's leave it there. Thanks Joe, thanks Lisa. Next time...
CAPUTO: OK, take care.
HEMMER: See you, here's Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Bad behavior stemming from sports wasn't just limited to the professional arena last weekend. College students in Boston arrested on Saturday on alcohol-related charges among them seven who attend Ivy League schools.
CNN's Dan Lothian has more on students who work hard but play a little harder.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DAN LOTHIAN, BOSTON BUREAU CHIEF: This is the hangover from what Boston police describe as a weekend of co-eds out of control across the city.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All rise.
LOTHIAN: Nineteen university students or recent graduates, including five from Harvard and two from Yale and others from Boston College and Boston University, arraigned in court on alcohol-related charges.
Excessive drinking, indecent exposure, disorderly conduct. The Ivy League has gotten much of the attention.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Harvard takes the lead.
LOTHIAN: On Saturday, as Harvard was on the way to trouncing its rival, Yale, Boston police say outside the stadium the abuse of a one- day liquor license fueled disorder by some fans at a tailgate party.
CAPTAIN WILLIAM EVANS, BOSTON POLICE DEPARTMENT: What bothered me was the amount of hard liquor that the kids were drinking here. I mean, Jack Daniels, tequila and whatnot.
LOTHIAN: The Yale students were arrested at the tailgate event. The Harvard alumni at a house party not far away.
Officials at Harvard will reportedly review their events procedures in the coming weeks, but others who were picked up elsewhere say the police roundup was an overreaction.
DAVE MYONES, ARRESTED FOR UNDERAGE DRINKING: I had a single beer in my hand. Like I wasn't really doing anything wrong. I was just walking down the street.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Were you old enough to be drinking?
MYONES: No, but that's my point.
LOTHIAN: But this is not a laughing matter for Boston police who say in light of recent headlines around the issue of sports, alcohol and disorder, more people need to pay attention.
Especially to their newsletter sent around to area colleges, with alcohol guidelines, laws and warnings.
EVANS: As much as our educational piece we try to put out for the kids to behave it doesn't seem to be working.
LOTHIAN: Police, fighting to stem the flow of alcohol-related problems. Dan Lothian, CNN, Boston.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: The universities of South Carolina and Clemson have decided not to accept post-season bowl bids as punishment for Saturday's fight on the field.
The brawl broke out with just minutes to left in the game at Clemson. Tiger's defensive lineman Bobby Williamson then tackled South Carolina quarterback Syvelle Newton, appeared to keep him down a little bit too long. Individual suspensions for the players are still to come.
Later today, USC is expected to announce that Steve Spurrier will be the school's new football coach. He is replacing outgoing coach Lou Holtz. Saturday was his last game.
HEMMER: Want to see something startling? Sports section of "The New York Times" today. I'm looking...
O'BRIEN: This picture you're talking about?
HEMMER: This is the photo we were discussing earlier. This is the Clemson player with his cleat literally going right to the head of a player from the South Carolina on his stomach on the field without a helmet on, too.
O'BRIEN: That's ugly.
HEMMER: It was ugly, you're exactly right about that.
(WEATHER REPORT)
O'BRIEN: Still to come on AMERICAN MORNING, is America's obesity epidemic not as deadly as the government says it is? Dr. Sanjay Gupta takes a look up next.
HEMMER: Also one of the nation's oldest toy sellers reopens its landmark store just in time for the holidays. Back in a moment here.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: We're "Paging Dr. Gupta" this morning about the effects long-term obesity can have on the brain but first the "Wall Street Journal" reporting this morning that the CDC statistics on the deadliness of obesity might just be wrong -- Sanjay, let's start with that, actually.
A big controversy if the CDC is wrong on all these stats, it could be a big deal.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SR. MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Everyone has been quoting these statistics, the Secretary of Health, people talking about obesity being the second leading cause of death in the United States just behind tobacco, saying it was maybe even going to overtake it.
Now the CDC taking a step back. To put it in perspective, the numbers we're talking about here, they said the numbers went from 300,000 to 400,000 over a ten-year period in terms of the number of obesity related deaths. They're now saying in fact that those numbers are over blown. There's probably only about a ten percent increase over the last decade. Still bad, still more people dying than ever of obesity related deaths but not as bad maybe as they thought it was.
O'BRIEN: Let's talk about obesity related to brain loss.
GUPTA: You know they talk about obesity being related to just about every chronic disease you can think of. Cancer, arthritis, all sorts of different things. Now researchers in Sweden wanted to see can it also cause dementia?
Difficulties thinking as you get into older age. They followed 300 middle aged women for about four decades, so a long term study here, Soledad, and tried to figure out if your body mass index, that's your ratio of weight and height, was high, could you possibly have more brain loss.
Take a look at this -- these images here. Loss of brain tissue on both sides of the brain in the temporal lobes. More likely to happen if you're BMI was higher. That's what they found out here. Body mass index of about 27 they said was high enough. And just to give you a sense because people never know what that means.
A 5'7" woman, which is what I guessed your height was, about, Soledad. About 172 pounds, that's heavy, for sure but it doesn't even necessarily qualify as obese. So we're talking about moderately overweight women here.
O'BRIEN: But is there a link between brain loss and dementia?
GUPTA: Yes that's a good question and I think you sort of get into the neuroscience part of it here. If you lose that area of the brain, the temporal lobes, people tend to have difficulties with memory later on in life. That is the problem with dementia being related to obesity.
People also ask how do you get dementia from obesity at all? Well, it's probably not a direct relationship but obesity is associated with clogged arteries, associated with strokes. Over time, that might cause the same process, dementia.
O'BRIEN: This kinds of leads us nicely, actually, into talking a little bit about what you're doing for the new year, our New You Revolution. Tell us about that.
GUPTA: The New You Revolution, yes, we're very excited about it. We've got thousands of applications.
O'BRIEN: Really?
GUPTA: I don't know. Several. I couldn't go through all of them myself. Luckily I had a good team to help out with that. But thousands of people actually writing in that said they want a change of somehow, breaking bad habits.
That was the theme this year. We've just about narrowed it down. We've literally gotten applications from all over the world including soldiers in Iraq. Those remarkable stories that we've heard. We're going to narrow it down to four or five.
Next Tuesday you'll hear it first here, our final results.
O'BRIEN: Fantastic, looking forward to it.
GUPTA: All right, Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Thanks Sanjay -- Bill.
HEMMER: If you're not quite satisfied with your credit card, how about one with jewelry on it? Would you like that? Andy has that after this on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HEMMER: Welcome back.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: A toy tradition reopening just in time for the holidays and decked out credit cards, just what we need. A look at those stories and the markets as well -- Andy Serwer is here "Minding Your Business." Decked out credit cards.
ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: Yes, a little shopping stuff for you.
Let's talk about the markets first of all. Stocks were up yesterday; the Dow was up 32 points. Price of oil stabilized. That was the big catalyst. Apple was also up big time, which helped out the Nasdaq.
Apple up this morning as is Hershey's because it's buying that nut company -- nuts -- it's buying the macadamia nut company and Hershey stock is up this morning.
Speaking of shopping, FAO. Schwartz, a New York landmark is reopening on Thanksgiving, the day before the traditional biggest shopping day of the year. Closed down last January, the company went into bankruptcy and spent a long time refurbishing this company.
And you know what? It was always upscale. Now they're making it even more upscale which kind of makes sense because Wal-Mart and other toy retailers are taking away so much of that space.
It -- listen to some of the things. It's got tree houses, kennels for stuffed dogs, hundred dollar chocolate sundaes in the sundae bar, $130 Barbie's; in the baby doll section they have a woman dressed as a nurse to take you little kids in to select a baby.
I mean, it's got all these gee-gahs (ph). It sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun.
O'BRIEN: The nurse part is cute.
SERWER: And let me tell you something; it is going to be a tourist destination.
CAFFERTY: Why are you hitting me?
SERWER: I'm just trying to do the news here.
CAFFERTY: All right.
O'BRIEN: When you said nurse...
CAFFERTY: Got that nurse, nurse situation here.
O'BRIEN: For the kiddies, Jack.
SERWER: Let's talk quickly about these credit cards. MasterCard is introducing jeweled credit cards. They come in jeweled cases. Semi-precious stones on them. Look at Soledad peering at them. Semi- precious stones. But actually there's two -- there are 13 of these different ones and two of them are men's models, Jack.
CAFFERTY: Yes.
SERWER: And actually they have a little chip in them that comes with your own personalized jingle. I can just see this for you. You get jewels and it jingles.
CAFFERTY: Who comes up with ideas like this? Nonsense. I'm sure they'll be very popular. I just don't understand.
SERWER: You don't want to carry one of those cards.
CAFFERTY: No I don't. That's exactly right. Time for the "File." Thanks Andy.
Arab satellite TV networks, speaking of things the world doesn't need, Al-Jazeera has announced plans to spend $30 million to launch an English-language channel by the end of 2005.
Something to look forward to. It will be called Al-Jazeera International and it's a response to what they claim is the unbalanced reporting from Western networks. The networks Arabic service has an audience of 40 million people, its funding by the government of Qatar. Al-Jazeera runs a sports channel and plans to launch a children's channel as well as a documentary channel. So, Al-Jazeera...
SERWER: Maybe they'll have you on as a commentator sometime.
CAFFERTY: Yes, I wish they would. Actually I made the Web site there the other day.
SERWER: Yes, I know you did.
CAFFERTY: But I don't want to talk about that.
A woman in Iowa called police on Friday to file a complaint about her drug dealer. Apparently, he had sold her crack cocaine that was fake. By the time the cops arrived at the coin-operated laundry where she had called from, she was gone. Either she changed her mind or her stuff was dry and she split.
SERWER: That's bad, you can't do that.
CAFFERTY: Fake news could be edging out traditional network coverage among 20-something's. According to a new study commissioned by "Declare Yourself," a non-profit group targeting young voters, Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 say they trust Comedy Central's Jon Stewart more than they trust the reporting of Peter Jennings and Dan Rather.
SERWER: Wow.
CAFFERTY: Asked whom they trust more to inform them on politics, 17 percent of those surveyed said Tom Brokaw at NBC, then came Jon Stewart, then Jennings, and Rather was bringing up last place with just 10 percent there.
So...
SERWER: And the irony is Brokaw is retiring.
CAFFERTY: That's right.
SERWER: So Stewart is number one.
CAFFERTY: That's true.
HEMMER: Stewart got a lot of publicity.
CAFFERTY: English language Al-Jazeera and Jon Stewart, the most trusted name in news. I'm going to retire and go do something else.
HEMMER: I think the Al-Jazeera story is very interesting. We have CNN International, which has been in 214 countries and territories for, what? 2004, go back to 1985 was it when they launched? Nineteen years.
CAFFERTY: You've got the BBC. Maybe you could have like just one channel devoted only to beheadings.
O'BRIEN: Oh, come on.
CAFFERTY: You know they could have like the kiddies channel, the sports channel; they could have your beheadings channel.
O'BRIEN: See we have the edge and then we just go right over it yet again. All right, thank you, moving on. We're going to commercial.
CAFFERTY: Al-Jazeera.
O'BRIEN: In just a moment, today's top stories including the intelligence reform bill. Is it possible we're going to hear from Senator Joe Lieberman, the chief sponsor of the version that passed in the Senate? That's ahead on AMERICAN MORNING. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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Aired November 23, 2004 - 08:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Security tight at Baghdad's airport this morning as new details emerge about a bomb that was found on a commercial plane yesterday in Iraq.
CNN's Karl Penhaul live for us in Baghdad with more this morning. Karl, good morning.
KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Soledad. We first found out about the discovery of this bomb on a commercial airliner in Iraq yesterday evening -- that was when the U.S. Embassy sent around a warning message to American citizens living in Iraq.
The message just a three line message pretty opaque. It didn't specify which airliner the bomb was found on, but what it does say is to suggest to all American citizens to think twice, to think very hard, about whether they really need to fly in and out of Iraq.
Now we do understand there are five commercial airliners connecting Iraq with the outside world, a mixture of those passenger airliners and also cargo airliners. We talked today to Royal Jordanian and to Iraqi Airways. Both of them say that the bomb was not found on either of their planes.
The American Embassy, though, isn't giving any more information to tell us which airliner precisely that bomb was found on, but it does come almost a year to the day after a missile was fired at a DHL cargo plane that flew into Baghdad Airport. That was struck, as we know, a year ago with a surface-to-air missile in one of its engines, although it did land safely.
It does, of course, highlight the dangers of what many of us regarded as the only safe form of travel into Iraq because the roads in and out of the country are almost impossible to travel on at this stage -- Soledad.
O'BRIEN: And a related story out of Iraq as well -- I want to ask you, Karl about this -- the second Sunni cleric gunned down in as many days -- any idea who did it and why both of these men were targeted?
PENHAUL: Well this man, Sheik Faidh Mohamed Amin al-Faidhi, was killed this morning we understand, as he approached his mosque in a village near the city of Baquba, which is just north of Baghdad. Men got out of an opal car and gunned him down.
We are told that he's a member of the Muslim Cleric's Association. We know that that association has called for a boycott of the January 30th elections, but so far there's been no claims of responsibility for the killing. We don't know if it's related to the insurgency, or whether some other faction may have carried out this killing, Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Karl Penhaul in Baghdad for us this morning. Karl, thanks -- Bill.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Soledad, thanks. Now to the hot political topic this morning involving the stalemate over intelligence reform on Capitol Hill. To exchange political jabs on this issue welcome back to Lisa Caputo, former press secretary for Hillary Clinton fresh in from Little Rock where we saw you last week.
Republican Joe Watkins is back in New York, too. Joe, nice to see you as well.
JOE WATKINS, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Good to be here.
HEMMER: What's going on with James Sensenbrenner telling the vice president hang on here, I'm not going to go with this reform package?
WATKINS: Well, it's not over yet. It's not over yet. I wouldn't count the vice president or the administration out yet on this one.
I mean, Sensenbrenner has some issues. Clearly he wants something about immigration in the bill, and also Duncan Hunter has some issues as well.
I mean, Duncan Hunter is one of the other committee chairman who has a problem with the bill and their problems are going to continue to be addressed, and I think we're going to find some closure.
HEMMER: James Sensenbrenner last night on CNN said I'm not going to cave. He told that to Lou Dobbs. You think he will at some point? Lisa infers that.
LISA CAPUTO, FMR. PRESS SECRETARY FOR HILLARY CLINTON: I actually don't think he will. I think what we're seeing is the beginning of the far right of the Republican Party drawing a line in the sand, and I think clearly this is going to be a challenge to this administration since, let's not forget, the far right was the really the wing of the party that got this president elected.
And he can't ignore this wing of the party so they're going to stake their line in the sand and then we'll see where they go from there.
HEMMER: But this is the point he's making of the 9/11 hijackers. They had 63 valid driver's licenses, not invalid. It appears that's where he's setting up his defense.
CAPUTO: Yes, I mean, that among other things, I think. I mean again, Bill, I think that this is a litmus test for a much larger issue. What is the future of the Christian right? How much influence are they going to have on this?
WATKINS: I don't think so.
CAPUTO: Oh, there's no doubt about it.
WATKINS: Clearly not, Bill.
CAPUTO: You can't ignore your base.
WATKINS: You're talking about $40 million in control of 15 intelligence agencies and who gives up control of that? There's going to be a new chief for intelligence that will be appointed directly to the president. This is about internal power.
CAPUTO: And that's a department the Pentagon does not want. The Pentagon has been silent on this issue. Where's Rumsfeld been? They don't want intelligence going up to an independent head of intelligence. They've been silent on this. You just reported it in your last half hour.
HEMMER: Take her point about the Christian right.
WATKINS: Yes, yes.
HEMMER: Is there a threat in here that you see that could be valid to Lisa's point?
WATKINS: I don't see any threat having to do with the Christian right or the right wing of the Republican Party. It is true that 22 percent of those who voted on election day said that the most important thing for them happened to be moral values, so that clearly a large percentage of the voting populous, whether they're Christian right people or Democrat right people are people who care about moral values. So that's a big part of the voting record.
CAPUTO: There are no Democratic right people. I mean, evangelical...
WATKINS: You're right, the Democrats are wrong.
CAPUTO: Well. Right. As Joe would have it, we're an immoral party. I mean let's...
WATKINS: That's not the case. That's not the case. No party has a lock on morality, nobody does.
CAPUTO: But the Republicans think they do.
HEMMER: Let me take you to the second point. Judge -- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said essentially that religion neutral government doesn't fit with America's current views about how God is reflected in the money, in the military, and in the court system, telling the courts to keep this in mind when they make their rulings.
What is the suggestion... WATKINS: Well, this suggested Justice Scalia is very, very consistent with his beliefs. He is an originalist. He believes in constructing the constitution based on the way it was written by the founding fathers and he has done that all along.
He really fits what President Bush likes in a justice, which is somebody who is an impartial umpire who constructs strictly the constitution.
CAPUTO: Justice Scalia is the farthest person on the court who is objective. He is the extremist on the court and when you talk about -- you know -- what was the phrase, Bill, that he used about religion? Being...
HEMMER: "Religion-neutral government doesn't fit with an America..."
CAPUTO: A religion-neutral government does not reflect America more or less is what he's saying. How can you say that? That's like issuing...
WATKINS: He's saying that's what the founding fathers wanted.
CAPUTO: But he's issuing a directive. I mean, he's telling people, you know, of different religions that they really, you know, can't play a role here because...
WATKINS: Absolutely not.
CAPUTO: ... because you know they don't believe in a particular God. What about people who don't have a faith. I mean that's -- you can't insert religion into the process. There has to be a clear division of church and state, as the founding fathers have said.
WATKINS: And there is. Wonderfully, there is a division between church and state but the founding fathers were people of faith and there's nothing wrong with realizing that.
CAPUTO: I don't...
HEMMER: Let's leave it there. Thanks Joe, thanks Lisa. Next time...
CAPUTO: OK, take care.
HEMMER: See you, here's Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Bad behavior stemming from sports wasn't just limited to the professional arena last weekend. College students in Boston arrested on Saturday on alcohol-related charges among them seven who attend Ivy League schools.
CNN's Dan Lothian has more on students who work hard but play a little harder.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DAN LOTHIAN, BOSTON BUREAU CHIEF: This is the hangover from what Boston police describe as a weekend of co-eds out of control across the city.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All rise.
LOTHIAN: Nineteen university students or recent graduates, including five from Harvard and two from Yale and others from Boston College and Boston University, arraigned in court on alcohol-related charges.
Excessive drinking, indecent exposure, disorderly conduct. The Ivy League has gotten much of the attention.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Harvard takes the lead.
LOTHIAN: On Saturday, as Harvard was on the way to trouncing its rival, Yale, Boston police say outside the stadium the abuse of a one- day liquor license fueled disorder by some fans at a tailgate party.
CAPTAIN WILLIAM EVANS, BOSTON POLICE DEPARTMENT: What bothered me was the amount of hard liquor that the kids were drinking here. I mean, Jack Daniels, tequila and whatnot.
LOTHIAN: The Yale students were arrested at the tailgate event. The Harvard alumni at a house party not far away.
Officials at Harvard will reportedly review their events procedures in the coming weeks, but others who were picked up elsewhere say the police roundup was an overreaction.
DAVE MYONES, ARRESTED FOR UNDERAGE DRINKING: I had a single beer in my hand. Like I wasn't really doing anything wrong. I was just walking down the street.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Were you old enough to be drinking?
MYONES: No, but that's my point.
LOTHIAN: But this is not a laughing matter for Boston police who say in light of recent headlines around the issue of sports, alcohol and disorder, more people need to pay attention.
Especially to their newsletter sent around to area colleges, with alcohol guidelines, laws and warnings.
EVANS: As much as our educational piece we try to put out for the kids to behave it doesn't seem to be working.
LOTHIAN: Police, fighting to stem the flow of alcohol-related problems. Dan Lothian, CNN, Boston.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: The universities of South Carolina and Clemson have decided not to accept post-season bowl bids as punishment for Saturday's fight on the field.
The brawl broke out with just minutes to left in the game at Clemson. Tiger's defensive lineman Bobby Williamson then tackled South Carolina quarterback Syvelle Newton, appeared to keep him down a little bit too long. Individual suspensions for the players are still to come.
Later today, USC is expected to announce that Steve Spurrier will be the school's new football coach. He is replacing outgoing coach Lou Holtz. Saturday was his last game.
HEMMER: Want to see something startling? Sports section of "The New York Times" today. I'm looking...
O'BRIEN: This picture you're talking about?
HEMMER: This is the photo we were discussing earlier. This is the Clemson player with his cleat literally going right to the head of a player from the South Carolina on his stomach on the field without a helmet on, too.
O'BRIEN: That's ugly.
HEMMER: It was ugly, you're exactly right about that.
(WEATHER REPORT)
O'BRIEN: Still to come on AMERICAN MORNING, is America's obesity epidemic not as deadly as the government says it is? Dr. Sanjay Gupta takes a look up next.
HEMMER: Also one of the nation's oldest toy sellers reopens its landmark store just in time for the holidays. Back in a moment here.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: We're "Paging Dr. Gupta" this morning about the effects long-term obesity can have on the brain but first the "Wall Street Journal" reporting this morning that the CDC statistics on the deadliness of obesity might just be wrong -- Sanjay, let's start with that, actually.
A big controversy if the CDC is wrong on all these stats, it could be a big deal.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SR. MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Everyone has been quoting these statistics, the Secretary of Health, people talking about obesity being the second leading cause of death in the United States just behind tobacco, saying it was maybe even going to overtake it.
Now the CDC taking a step back. To put it in perspective, the numbers we're talking about here, they said the numbers went from 300,000 to 400,000 over a ten-year period in terms of the number of obesity related deaths. They're now saying in fact that those numbers are over blown. There's probably only about a ten percent increase over the last decade. Still bad, still more people dying than ever of obesity related deaths but not as bad maybe as they thought it was.
O'BRIEN: Let's talk about obesity related to brain loss.
GUPTA: You know they talk about obesity being related to just about every chronic disease you can think of. Cancer, arthritis, all sorts of different things. Now researchers in Sweden wanted to see can it also cause dementia?
Difficulties thinking as you get into older age. They followed 300 middle aged women for about four decades, so a long term study here, Soledad, and tried to figure out if your body mass index, that's your ratio of weight and height, was high, could you possibly have more brain loss.
Take a look at this -- these images here. Loss of brain tissue on both sides of the brain in the temporal lobes. More likely to happen if you're BMI was higher. That's what they found out here. Body mass index of about 27 they said was high enough. And just to give you a sense because people never know what that means.
A 5'7" woman, which is what I guessed your height was, about, Soledad. About 172 pounds, that's heavy, for sure but it doesn't even necessarily qualify as obese. So we're talking about moderately overweight women here.
O'BRIEN: But is there a link between brain loss and dementia?
GUPTA: Yes that's a good question and I think you sort of get into the neuroscience part of it here. If you lose that area of the brain, the temporal lobes, people tend to have difficulties with memory later on in life. That is the problem with dementia being related to obesity.
People also ask how do you get dementia from obesity at all? Well, it's probably not a direct relationship but obesity is associated with clogged arteries, associated with strokes. Over time, that might cause the same process, dementia.
O'BRIEN: This kinds of leads us nicely, actually, into talking a little bit about what you're doing for the new year, our New You Revolution. Tell us about that.
GUPTA: The New You Revolution, yes, we're very excited about it. We've got thousands of applications.
O'BRIEN: Really?
GUPTA: I don't know. Several. I couldn't go through all of them myself. Luckily I had a good team to help out with that. But thousands of people actually writing in that said they want a change of somehow, breaking bad habits.
That was the theme this year. We've just about narrowed it down. We've literally gotten applications from all over the world including soldiers in Iraq. Those remarkable stories that we've heard. We're going to narrow it down to four or five.
Next Tuesday you'll hear it first here, our final results.
O'BRIEN: Fantastic, looking forward to it.
GUPTA: All right, Soledad.
O'BRIEN: Thanks Sanjay -- Bill.
HEMMER: If you're not quite satisfied with your credit card, how about one with jewelry on it? Would you like that? Andy has that after this on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HEMMER: Welcome back.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: A toy tradition reopening just in time for the holidays and decked out credit cards, just what we need. A look at those stories and the markets as well -- Andy Serwer is here "Minding Your Business." Decked out credit cards.
ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: Yes, a little shopping stuff for you.
Let's talk about the markets first of all. Stocks were up yesterday; the Dow was up 32 points. Price of oil stabilized. That was the big catalyst. Apple was also up big time, which helped out the Nasdaq.
Apple up this morning as is Hershey's because it's buying that nut company -- nuts -- it's buying the macadamia nut company and Hershey stock is up this morning.
Speaking of shopping, FAO. Schwartz, a New York landmark is reopening on Thanksgiving, the day before the traditional biggest shopping day of the year. Closed down last January, the company went into bankruptcy and spent a long time refurbishing this company.
And you know what? It was always upscale. Now they're making it even more upscale which kind of makes sense because Wal-Mart and other toy retailers are taking away so much of that space.
It -- listen to some of the things. It's got tree houses, kennels for stuffed dogs, hundred dollar chocolate sundaes in the sundae bar, $130 Barbie's; in the baby doll section they have a woman dressed as a nurse to take you little kids in to select a baby.
I mean, it's got all these gee-gahs (ph). It sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun.
O'BRIEN: The nurse part is cute.
SERWER: And let me tell you something; it is going to be a tourist destination.
CAFFERTY: Why are you hitting me?
SERWER: I'm just trying to do the news here.
CAFFERTY: All right.
O'BRIEN: When you said nurse...
CAFFERTY: Got that nurse, nurse situation here.
O'BRIEN: For the kiddies, Jack.
SERWER: Let's talk quickly about these credit cards. MasterCard is introducing jeweled credit cards. They come in jeweled cases. Semi-precious stones on them. Look at Soledad peering at them. Semi- precious stones. But actually there's two -- there are 13 of these different ones and two of them are men's models, Jack.
CAFFERTY: Yes.
SERWER: And actually they have a little chip in them that comes with your own personalized jingle. I can just see this for you. You get jewels and it jingles.
CAFFERTY: Who comes up with ideas like this? Nonsense. I'm sure they'll be very popular. I just don't understand.
SERWER: You don't want to carry one of those cards.
CAFFERTY: No I don't. That's exactly right. Time for the "File." Thanks Andy.
Arab satellite TV networks, speaking of things the world doesn't need, Al-Jazeera has announced plans to spend $30 million to launch an English-language channel by the end of 2005.
Something to look forward to. It will be called Al-Jazeera International and it's a response to what they claim is the unbalanced reporting from Western networks. The networks Arabic service has an audience of 40 million people, its funding by the government of Qatar. Al-Jazeera runs a sports channel and plans to launch a children's channel as well as a documentary channel. So, Al-Jazeera...
SERWER: Maybe they'll have you on as a commentator sometime.
CAFFERTY: Yes, I wish they would. Actually I made the Web site there the other day.
SERWER: Yes, I know you did.
CAFFERTY: But I don't want to talk about that.
A woman in Iowa called police on Friday to file a complaint about her drug dealer. Apparently, he had sold her crack cocaine that was fake. By the time the cops arrived at the coin-operated laundry where she had called from, she was gone. Either she changed her mind or her stuff was dry and she split.
SERWER: That's bad, you can't do that.
CAFFERTY: Fake news could be edging out traditional network coverage among 20-something's. According to a new study commissioned by "Declare Yourself," a non-profit group targeting young voters, Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 say they trust Comedy Central's Jon Stewart more than they trust the reporting of Peter Jennings and Dan Rather.
SERWER: Wow.
CAFFERTY: Asked whom they trust more to inform them on politics, 17 percent of those surveyed said Tom Brokaw at NBC, then came Jon Stewart, then Jennings, and Rather was bringing up last place with just 10 percent there.
So...
SERWER: And the irony is Brokaw is retiring.
CAFFERTY: That's right.
SERWER: So Stewart is number one.
CAFFERTY: That's true.
HEMMER: Stewart got a lot of publicity.
CAFFERTY: English language Al-Jazeera and Jon Stewart, the most trusted name in news. I'm going to retire and go do something else.
HEMMER: I think the Al-Jazeera story is very interesting. We have CNN International, which has been in 214 countries and territories for, what? 2004, go back to 1985 was it when they launched? Nineteen years.
CAFFERTY: You've got the BBC. Maybe you could have like just one channel devoted only to beheadings.
O'BRIEN: Oh, come on.
CAFFERTY: You know they could have like the kiddies channel, the sports channel; they could have your beheadings channel.
O'BRIEN: See we have the edge and then we just go right over it yet again. All right, thank you, moving on. We're going to commercial.
CAFFERTY: Al-Jazeera.
O'BRIEN: In just a moment, today's top stories including the intelligence reform bill. Is it possible we're going to hear from Senator Joe Lieberman, the chief sponsor of the version that passed in the Senate? That's ahead on AMERICAN MORNING. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
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