Return to Transcripts main page

American Morning

Tropical Storm Katrina Gaining Strength; Deadline in Iraq

Aired August 25, 2005 - 08:00   ET

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

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Closing in -- Tropical Storm Katrina gaining strength as it moves toward South Florida, expected to become a hurricane soon. We're tracking the latest changes in the storm just ahead.
Deadline in Iraq -- negotiators trying to get all sides to finally agree on the constitution. What happens if this deadline expires without a deal?

And an emotional moment in Crawford, Texas. Cindy Sheehan returns to Camp Casey and a portrait of her son triggers some powerful emotions.

The president's also back in Crawford. And a caravan of his supporters are heading there, too.

That's all ahead on this AMERICAN MORNING.

ANNOUNCER: From the CNN broadcast center in New York, this is AMERICAN MORNING with Soledad O'Brien and Miles O'Brien.

O'BRIEN: Good morning.

Welcome back, everybody.

I'm Soledad O'Brien.

Miles O'Brien has got the day off.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: He certainly does.

I'm Carol Costello in for him.

Also ahead, we hear a lot about the readiness of Iraqi troops from politicians in Washington. In just a minute, we'll get the story from an American who has worked side-by-side with them.

O'BRIEN: He's a U.S. Army colonel. Just recently he was given the military's second highest award for valor. We're going to talk to him about what's really happening with those Iraqi troops.

First, though, a look at the headlines with Kelly Wallace -- hey, Kelly, good morning.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thanks, Soledad.

Good morning, everyone. These stories now in the news.

Tropical Storm Katrina could soon gain hurricane strength and there's a chance it might make landfall in Southern Florida late today. Residents there getting ready, bracing for the worst.

Chad Myers at the CNN Center with the latest forecast -- good morning, Chad.

What is it looking like right now?

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: It's looking like it's trying to build a new eye wall. The eye wall itself that we had about a half an hour ago collapsed on itself, never really became anything. But now another huge feeder band is rotating into the storm, trying to come around the back side. We've had an open eye wall on the west side for most of the night, because there is some drier air up here feeding into the storm and kind of killing the eye wall itself.

But the storm, as it continues to slide on off to the west, very slowly, but it is still sliding off to the west, it's in very warm water now. And the potential for very rapid development is certainly there. Also, the potential for this -- strong lines of storms coming through. That's about Port Saint Lucie. The entire area here could bring in some water spouts with it.

If you remember, yesterday we showed you that this storm is going to move across Florida, back into the Gulf of Mexico, then make a right-hand turn. Well, we also showed you yesterday how incomplete, I think, some of these computer models are. Well, they're still doing very strange things this morning.

There's the storm. Some models taking it way up, almost to Melbourne, and other ones taking it south of the Florida Keys. Rarely, rarely do we ever see this type of divergence in models this close to shore. By now, the models should have figured it out. Clearly they haven't -- Kelly.

WALLACE: But, Chad, you will be figuring it out and we will be checking in with you.

All right, Chad, talk to you in a few minutes.

MYERS: All right.

WALLACE: Thanks so much.

MYERS: You're welcome.

WALLACE: Turning now to Iraq. Muslim cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is calling for national unity as Iraqi leaders continue talks on the country's new constitution. Al-Sadr supporters and those of a rival Shia cleric clashed for a second day today. Demonstrators stormed Al- Sadr's office in Baghdad and three other cities. At least five people were killed. Ten others were wounded. We'll learn more today about which U.S. military bases could be shut down or restructured. A federal panel voted against the Pentagon's recommendations on Wednesday, deciding to keep open several major bases, including this historical naval facility in Connecticut. The fate of some Air Force bases will be part of the focus today.

And the number of people filing for bankruptcy is surging to an all time high, up 16 percent in the second quarter of this year. Financially troubled consumers are scrambling to file before a new law takes effect in October, and that measure is making it tougher to get protection from creditors.

That gets you caught up.

Now to Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, thank you, Kelly.

Cindy Sheehan is back protesting the war near President Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas and renewing her effort to meet with the president.

The president, in the meantime, resumes vacationing at his ranch this morning, after a visit with military families in Idaho.

CNN's Ed Lavandera is live in Crawford this morning -- Ed, does Sheehan still plan to stay in Crawford as long as the president does?

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's what she told us briefly yesterday. We're expecting to hear more from her here in Crawford in just a few hours.

We're at the big tent campsite, if you will, which is actually the closest protest site to President Bush's ranch. And when Cindy Sheehan returned here to Crawford yesterday, there was a mixture of reception for her -- part icy, part very open-armed here at this particular camp.

But when she arrived, making her way through the crowd of people greeting her return -- she had gone to California for the last six days to take care of her family -- there was one particular moment when Cindy Sheehan just became overcome with emotion.

Supporters here had put up a banner sized painting of her son Casey here at this particular campsite. And as you can see, Cindy Sheehan broke down emotionally, asking for friends to come around and support her.

This in the backdrop, just a few hours after Cindy Sheehan arrived here. President Bush returned to Crawford, as well. So he is back here.

There are no public events scheduled. But over the last couple of days, President Bush has been going straight at what the Cindy Sheehan's supporters here have been saying, to immediately withdraw troops out of Iraq. President Bush maintaining that that is a bad idea.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: An immediate withdrawal of our troops in Iraq or the broader Middle East, as some have called for, would only embolden the terrorists and create a staging ground to launch more attacks against America and free nations.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LAVANDERA: Now, as I mentioned, Cindy Sheehan returns here to Crawford. Even though she was welcomed back heroically here at this particular campsite, there are many people pouring into Crawford who are very angry with Cindy Sheehan and the protest that she is mounting. In fact, a caravan of pro-Bush supporters have been making their way from California to Texas, and they're expected to be here this weekend.

COSTELLO: Ed Lavandera reporting live from Crawford, Texas.

Thanks, Ed -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Somebody who's keeping a close eye on the base closings list is Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi. The naval station in Lott's hometown of Pascagoula is now slated to be closed.

Senator Trent Lott joins us this morning.

He's also the author of a new book. It's called "Herding Cats, " describing your life in politics.

It's nice to have you.

SEN. TRENT LOTT (R), MISSISSIPPI: That's correct.

Glad to be back with you, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: It's nice to see u.

Right, we were talking not so long ago, last night.

Let's talk a little bit about what's happening in Iraq. And you mention it in the book and we talked about it last night. But I want to explore it a little more fully.

Cindy Sheehan is now back at her point protesting. You have the violence continuing, essentially unabated, in Baghdad, certainly. Fifteen hundred more U.S. troops are being sent to help out. And you have poll numbers showing that many Americans think that it's not working, the strategy is not working in Iraq.

Do you think the Americans polled, the overwhelming number polled, think -- are they wrong? Is the strategy working? LOTT: Well, the American people are never wrong. They have a perception sometimes that may need to be informed. I think we have to do a better job as elected officials -- the president and all the rest of us -- in explaining what is the mission here? What are our conditions that we're looking for? Why are we still losing as many lives as we are? Are we making progress that we need to make in training and getting rid of the insurgents and economic opportunity for the people?

O'BRIEN: Is it a problem, then, with the mission -- the message? Is it a problem...

LOTT: I think it...

O'BRIEN: ... or is it that actually the insurgents are really doing well and modifying their tactics...

LOTT: Soledad, I think in politics you need to try to be honest. I think it's both. I do think that the message has not been getting out good enough and I think the president and the rest of us are going to have to do a better job.

But I do think there are some problems with what's happening there. And we have to keep reevaluating it and be prepared to change what we're doing.

O'BRIEN: Then the constitution, as they head toward a vote, there are some serious and very real concerns that it could be a constitution that's even more restrictive, potentially, than under what Saddam Hussein had. I mean, no one is going to argue that it's a bad thing to oust a dictator, but you could to some degree have it as bad, couldn't you?

LOTT: I don't believe it will be. It could be, though. I mean you have to acknowledge that. We've had certain concerns about what would they actually come up with. But I can't help but believe in the end it's going to be a pretty good document, considering what they're looking for. You know, we want to make sure that women are going to be enfranchised and can participate in every way, and all the different religious sects have, you know, rights of their own.

They're struggling with it. We struggled with our constitution for a long time, and still do sometimes.

But yet you have to have faith that the people in Iraq want to govern themselves, they want freedom and democracy. They've got centuries of problems they're trying to cope with. But, look, they are -- this is a difficult process.

And that's one of the reasons why, Soledad, from the beginning, I thought the base closure commission was not a good thing. The process has not been good. The timing is not good. A lot of these communities have just been, you know, in turmoil, worried and upset about what was going to happen.

O'BRIEN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)... LOTT: At the same time, when their neighbors or their National Guard units were overseas...

O'BRIEN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...

LOTT: ... and I've tried very hard to say no, we shouldn't do this until we've ascertained what we're going to do in terms of base closures overseas. But it is going forward and, you know, a lot of communities are going to be affected. But this is America and we'll find a way to turn this sour note into a positive one before it's over.

O'BRIEN: Let's talk about the book. And I know last night we spoke about how everyone focuses on Senator Bill Frist, who you write about it very frankly in the book.

LOTT: Yes. Sure. Yes.

O'BRIEN: And I want to ask you a question about that, although you do cover a lot.

LOTT: OK. Yes.

O'BRIEN: I mean 37 years in politics is a long time to talk about.

LOTT: Right. Right.

O'BRIEN: But you write in the book that you found him -- you think he betrayed you and that you think he manipulated your ouster. And I'm -- I mean that -- those are actually the two words, betrayal, manipulated.

Let's say he's the Republican candidate for president.

Do you then go and encourage your fellow Americans to vote for someone who you consider to be a betrayer and a manipulator?

LOTT: You know, when you do a book like this, you can paper it over or you can be honest about it. And then you can also talk about how you move forward. You deal with it. You go through a hurt, then you go through a healing and then you talk to the people that were involved.

Bill Frist has got one of the toughest political jobs in America as the majority leader and I've been involved in trying to be helpful to him where I could, because I want him to succeed because...

O'BRIEN: You want him to be the president of the United States?

LOTT: No, I'm probably going to be for somebody else. But I haven't made up my mind. I want to look at all of them and make sure which one has the greatest strengths, which one I'm the most comfortable with and which one has the best opportunity to win.

O'BRIEN: If he's the Republican candidate... LOTT: And that's not clear.

O'BRIEN: ... you'd campaign for him? I mean if he's it, if he's the one?

LOTT: Well, it would depend on how that goes.

O'BRIEN: So you might (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...

LOTT: And, you know, he might not want me to, you know? But it'll depend. But I haven't -- I've been for every Republican candidate since I've been voting every time. And so I don't imagine I would change this time.

O'BRIEN: The book is more -- is about much more than just Senator Bill Frist, obviously.

LOTT: Yes. It's a lot about the legislative process and history, people that are interested in politics and government, I think they'll find some interesting things in this book.

O'BRIEN: It's a great read.

LOTT: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: Senator Trent Lott, nice to see you.

LOTT: Thank you, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Thanks for talking with us.

LOTT: Good to see you again.

O'BRIEN: Carol.

COSTELLO: Still to come on AMERICAN MORNING, our special series "School Days." Today, tips on what you can do if your child becomes the target of bullies.

Also, a doctor's blunt advice to an overweight patient lands him in hot water. Was he just telling the truth or did he cross the line?

And an important medical question with huge political implications. Can a fetus feel pain? We're "Paging Dr. Gupta" on this controversial study.

That's just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Fighting terrorism by diverting flights. Is it helping or is it just a waste of time and money? That's the focus of this morning's CNN "Security Watch."

Dan Lothian has more.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Nicholas Genes, a medical resident, was among the 127 passengers on Al Italia Flight 618, Milan to Boston, when it was diverted to Bangor, Maine last May. Law enforcement agents dressed in black boarded the plane and surrounded one passenger, whose name had apparently been on a no fly list.

NICHOLAS GENES, DIVERTED PASSENGER: He got up quietly. I think some words were quickly exchanged. And without much of a fuss, they all walked off the plane. The whole thing happened in less than a minute.

LOTHIAN: It turned out that he was of no interest to the FBI and was deported on an immigration violation.

(on camera): Since 9/11, seven flights have been diverted because of a security alert, mostly all of them false alarms. Raising questions about the effectiveness of this effort, the cost and the threat of complacency.

(voice-over): Captain Dennis Dolan heads the Airline Pilots Association.

CAPT. DENNIS DOLAN, AIRLINE PILOTS ASSOCIATION: If you continue to have these false alarms, you get a sense of complacency amongst the traveling public, amongst the air crews and possibly even amongst the agencies that deal with this.

LOTHIAN: He argues a better pre-screening process before a plane lifts off is needed to weed out terrorists like shoe bomber Richard Reid.

DOLAN: I think we could all agree that we want to catch anyone who is a potential terrorist on the ground.

LOTHIAN: Genes, a blogger who has written about his experience, agrees, and he wonders about the cost of diversions beyond the inconvenient delays.

GENES: When you think about it, they scrambled fighter jets, apparently, to intercept our plane. They, you know, alerted all these authorities. Everyone was on high alert for a while. And for what?

LOTHIAN: A diversion can cost an airline tens of thousands of dollars, according to industry officials. But what would happen if flights were no longer diverted and a terrorist gained access to a major city or slipped through the cracks? A homeland security official says that prospect outweighs any faults in the system: "I think the system is working. First and foremost, the most important thing, of course, is to be able to identify those potential security concerns and deal with them as quickly as possible."

The government is working on getting more accurate information much faster so that people on the no fly list never make it off the ground. Dan Lothian, CNN, Boston.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

COSTELLO: Rafi Ron is a transportation security expert and president of New Age Security Solutions.

He's a former security director, too, at Israel's Ben Gurion International Airport.

And Rafi now joins us from Washington.

Welcome.

RAFI RON, NEW AGE SECURITY SOLUTIONS: Good morning.

COSTELLO: When you hear of these flights being diverted because of suspicious behavior, what goes through your mind?

RON: Well, of course, this represents a certain failure in detecting the problems while a passenger is on the aircraft still on the ground, figuring out that we have a problem when the aircraft is already up in a pressurized situation in maximum altitude is not exactly what the system is tuned to do.

But sometimes they -- these events may happen. And the problem or the decision has to be taken at that point in time can be justified to divert the plane because we don't want to take the risk, once we have identified it is there.

But the idea is how to prevent this situation altogether.

COSTELLO: Yes.

Well, let me ask you about that, about, you know, stopping the plane before it takes off.

How can you gather more accurate information? And I know the U.S. government is working on that, but in your opinion, what can you do to detect these people?

RON: Well, there are two ways to deal with this problem. The first one is using databases through the computer programs, some of which are being developed nowadays. And hopefully it will provide us with more information, more accurate information, rather than just the no fly lists that we are using today to identify suspicious individuals by name before they board the flight and the flight takes off.

But what has proven to be very, very useful and successful for Israeli aviation for many, many years are the interviews that are being conducted at the airport and understanding that the volume here in the U.S. may not allow to conduct 100 percent interviews as it is being done in Israel. I still believe that the ability to interview suspicious people at the airport is a very important element that we should add to our system. COSTELLO: Well, let's talk about identifying suspicious people. You've come up with a behavior pattern recognition program. And it's not exactly profiling.

But what is it?

RON: Yes, this is a program that we developed at Logan Airport sometime around three years ago that helped to detect people by -- suspicious people by their behavior rather than by their ethnic origin or by their race. And the idea is how do we use our resources intelligently and focus on the right people rather than just spread them across the board evenly, which may actually lead to a relatively low level of performance.

COSTELLO: Rafi Ron, president of New Age Security Solutions.

Thank you for being with us.

RON: Thank you.

COSTELLO: And stay tuned to CNN day and night for the most reliable news about your security.

O'BRIEN: Up next, we continue our "School Days" series.

Today, tips on ways to help your child cope with bullies.

You're watching AMERICAN MORNING.

We're back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: With the kids heading back to school, we're giving parents a crash course this week in some important subject areas.

This morning in part four of our "School Days" series, how to help your child cope with bullies.

Rachel Simmons is the author of "Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression In Girls."

She joins us this morning.

Nice to see you.

RACHEL SIMMONS, AUTHOR, "ODD GIRL OUT": Good morning.

O'BRIEN: It's kind of an interesting time to be talking about bullying, because it's really the first couple of days and weeks of school where kids are jockeying for their power positions.

SIMMONS: It's true, because they're just getting back from summer. Some of them have met new friends, have decided they may not want to be friends with certain people when you get back. So there's a lot of stress and tension. O'BRIEN: Little kids might say to you, mommy, so and so is picking on me or bullying. But when they get older, they get quieter. There are some signs that you say you should look for and I'll just sort of lay them out here. Silent phones, no instant messaging, personality change. In other words, things get quiet, things start to shift.

SIMMONS: It's true. You see that your child isn't socializing. Maybe she's starting to say things like I'm a loser, I'm an idiot, no one likes me. Now, I don't think that you should react if it just starts to happen for a day or two, but if it happens for longer than three days, I think that's when you start to actually intervene.

O'BRIEN: So then what's the first thing you do?

SIMMONS: Well, first of all, you don't overreact, because in the beginning, it's going to...

O'BRIEN: Oh, you know me so well.

SIMMONS: Right. In the beginning, it will be very stressful and you should expect that your child is going to have social tensions. So try not to overreact. Expect that the first month of school will have tensions.

O'BRIEN: But you're -- as a parent, you want to do something. My daughter told me yesterday there's a boy who's picking on me in camp. And truly, my first instinct was to go and find that 6-year- old...

SIMMONS: Right. Kill the child.

O'BRIEN: ... and grab him by the neck -- not kill him, but grab him by the neck and say leave my kid alone.

SIMMONS: Right. I think that's totally normal, but you also need to make sure that your child develops coping skills. You can't fix everything for your child and I think that's most important to remember. You need to let your child become resilient by actually dealing with things on her own.

O'BRIEN: You also say interview your child and empathize and validate. Let's start with the interview.

Interview them with what? About what?

SIMMONS: Ask them the who, what, where, when, why and how of what's happening. For example, sometimes things might be happening because a certain kid is there. It might be happening at a certain moment during recess or in the hallway. You can help develop the best intervention plan by interviewing, not emotionally, but very clearly and specifically, your child about what is going on.

O'BRIEN: Empathize and validate.

You just say I hear you? SIMMONS: Well, it's -- I always liken it to what happens when a toddler is learning to walk and they fall down, right? If you get freaked out and you say oh my god, what's wrong? The kids starts to cry. If you pick the child up and say it's OK, you'll be fine, let me help you, they're not going to react or you're not going to see the reflection of you and they're not going to act that way.

O'BRIEN: They take their cues on how to behave from what you're doing.

SIMMONS: Absolutely. That's right.

O'BRIEN: But you say role play with your child. One of you is playing the bully, one of you is playing, you know, the kid and giving them the right words to say?

SIMMONS: Yes, because you can't assume that your child knows how to respond to a bully. They need to practice at home. So role play. Act it out. Make it fun. Have it be a skit. And don't have the skit end in a happy way all the time. You can't tell your child that just because he or she speaks up to a bully, it's going to work out.

O'BRIEN: You've got some advice, and I've got to say, I totally disagree with it. Sit at different lunch tables. Have your, you know, tell your kid that maybe moving around and having a different group of friends all the time. I don't know one seventh grade girl that's going to pick a different lunch table to sit at every single day.

SIMMONS: You are absolutely right. And that's why I think -- I agree and I disagree.

O'BRIEN: I think we're done with this interview.

SIMMONS: OK, so what I was going to say is that I think it's important to innocent kids to sit at different lunch tables. I don't disagree with you. Kids see going to sit at another lunch table like the worst thing in the whole world.

O'BRIEN: The worst.

SIMMONS: So say to your child, if you sit at a new lunch table for three days this week, I will make your favorite dinner, I will take you out and get you something nice at the mall. It's not a bribe, but it's actually making it a little bit worth their while to do something that's hard for them.

O'BRIEN: A lot of parenting is about bribery. I really don't have much of a problem with bribery.

Moving on, though, you know, should you go to the parent? Because sometimes I've found you go to the mom, the understanding mom, and say listen, little Johnny, your son, is picking on my daughter. I think we can work this out. Let's, you know, we're all friends here. We're the adults. Ninety-nine point nine, nine, nine percent of the time it seems to backfire. SIMMONS: It does, because so many parents perceive any kind of criticism of their child as a criticism of who they are. It's very hard to see that my Johnny, my beautiful little boy, would have done anything bad, which is why I tell parents expect that your child will have done something mean. When are they going to learn if they're not learning right now?

But don't follow-up with other parents. Go to the counselors. Go to the coaches. Go to the teachers first. And if you decide to go to a parent, just remember to start the conversation with "I know my kid's not perfect either, " "I know my kid may have had a role in this."

O'BRIEN: My kid is perfect and she would never -- no, I'm kidding.

I'm kidding.

SIMMONS: That's what I was going to say. All kids are perfect.

O'BRIEN: But, no, that's really good advice, because it is hard. I mean your first instinct is to kill the other child.

SIMMONS: Yes.

O'BRIEN: It really is. And that's a bad...

SIMMONS: It's a hard thing to deal with. That's why I tell parents to try to be as unemotional as you can.

O'BRIEN: Rachel Simmons, the author of "Odd Girl Out."

Thank you.

Nice to see you, as always.

SIMMONS: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: Thanks for talking with us.

Tomorrow in the final installment of our "School Days" series, sex, drugs, alcohol and kids.

Also, if you want more information on the series, you can log onto cnn.com/am -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Still to come, a doctor's blunt advice to an overweight patient draws the attention of health officials. Find out exactly what he said just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(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