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American Morning
Saddam Hussein on Trial; Border Battle; Road to Recovery; 'Minding Your Business'
Aired November 29, 2005 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(WEATHER REPORT)
JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: The next hour of AMERICAN MORNING is right now.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Jacqui.
I'm Soledad O'Brien.
President Bush heads to south Texas and the border city of El Paso for more tough talk on illegal immigration. Does he also have a plan for troop withdrawal from Iraq? We're going to check in at the White House.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Miles O'Brien.
And patience in Iraq, security concerns and courtroom delays have some Iraqis wondering if Saddam Hussein will ever be tried. We'll have a live report from Baghdad.
S. O'BRIEN: And three months after Katrina, how far has New Orleans really come rebuilding from the storm? We're going to take you there live on this AMERICAN MORNING.
Good morning. Welcome, everybody.
M. O'BRIEN: Good to have you with us.
Yesterday we watched that whole Saddam thing. Thing, the Saddam Hussein trial unfold.
S. O'BRIEN: Thing at some point was a very accurate description...
M. O'BRIEN: It was a thing. And...
S. O'BRIEN: ... because, of course, there was not a lot of trial. There were a lot of delays, a lot of breaks, a lot of drama as Saddam Hussein had it sort of back and forth with the judge demanding the elevator be fixed so he doesn't have to walk up the flights of stairs. It was odd at points.
M. O'BRIEN: It was kind of mano-a-mono thing. It will be interesting to see if a fair trial can be done there in the current conditions of Baghdad. We start in Iraq, by the way, where attorneys for Saddam Hussein and his seven co-defendants say they are afraid for their lives. Already two defense attorneys have been killed. Monday the trial was adjourned, as we told you about. It will come back December 5. We'll see about that.
Aneesh Raman live in Baghdad.
Aneesh, good morning. So many questions about this trial and whether it can -- there can ever be a fair trial for Saddam Hussein right now in Baghdad.
ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Exactly, Miles, good morning.
That adjournment a clear sign that the security situation here is having a direct effect on this trial.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Some fear Monday's decision to adjourn Saddam's trial again is like announcing an extension of hunting season where it's as if anyone connected to Saddam's trial is fair game. It began right after Saddam's trial began in mid-October, one of the 13 defense attorneys representing the former dictator and his henchmen was found dead, killed by a single bullet.
And then two-and-a-half weeks later, the murder of another defense attorney. In the second assassination, the victim was driving near his home in western Baghdad.
One by one, it seems, the lawyers for Saddam and his seven co- defendants are being hunted down and then murdered. In fact, Monday's delay came because Saddam's co-defendants, whose lawyers were killed, need to find new ones. And if the assassin's goal is to prevent the trial from ever really starting, then the strategy could be working.
NAJEEB NIAUMI, FORMER QATARI JUSTICE MINISTER (through translator): Our friends, our colleagues had incidents. They then -- they informed us not to leave our homes and not to -- we couldn't meet our clients. We couldn't meet our clients. We had very hard circumstances.
RAMAN: So who is killing Saddam's lawyers and why? There are as many suspects as motives. From Sunni insurgents who simply want to stop the trial, to Shi'a militias. Saddam killed tens of thousands of Shi'a, and for the militias, it's possible payback time for anyone associated with the former president.
LAITH KUBBA, IRAQI GOVERNMENT SPOKESMAN: This is not an ordinary trial. This man has harmed over one million Iraqis. There is nearly one million Iraqis buried underground and their families are waiting to see justice.
RAMAN: The Iraqi government wants to provide Saddam's attorneys security, but the attorneys don't trust the government. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's essential that protection be provided for the defense. If that can't be arranged, then the question, as a last resort, does become where else could this trial be held?
RAMAN: Leaving defense lawyers in fear for their lives.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
And, Miles, in the courtroom yesterday, as well, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark who has now officially been sworn in as an advisor to Saddam Hussein's defense team -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: Aneesh, let's shift gears just a little bit, word of another kidnapping. Tell us about that.
RAMAN: Yes, four aide workers kidnapped in the capital on Saturday. One of them an American, the others were a British national and two of them Canadians. They were part of a group called Christian Peacekeepers Team, a group that's been in Iraq since October 2002 documenting human rights abuses. The American, British and Canadian governments not saying much more than that as they try to secure their release -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: Aneesh, I thought I heard what might have been gunfire behind you. Is that what I heard?
RAMAN: Yes, perhaps. It comes and goes here. At times celebratory, at times in reaction, it's hard to tell at any given moment what exactly is taking place, but it's life in Iraq.
M. O'BRIEN: Well you're nonchalance is a testament to what life in Iraq is like. All right, Aneesh Raman, please stay safe over there, you and the crew, OK -- Soledad.
S. O'BRIEN: President Bush goes to El Paso, Texas today. This will be the second straight day that he is pushing his immigration reform plan.
Kathleen Koch live for us at the White House this morning.
Kathleen, good morning to you. Are you getting a sense of urgency around immigration reform?
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: You certainly are here, Soledad. Immigration reform is one of President Bush's key agenda items that he has not been successful at getting through Congress. And some are really believing it's reaching the point of now or never.
It's been a very tough sell, opposed not only by Democrats, but by members of the president's own party. Conservative Republicans, in particular, are very concerned that the president's guest worker program would reward illegal aliens by putting them on the path to citizenship.
Now yesterday, President Bush came out forcefully in his speech, saying the U.S. can welcome immigrants to do jobs that Americans do not want while still adhering to the laws of the land.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: American people should not have to choose between a welcoming society and a lawful society. We can have both at the same time. And to keep the promise of America, we will enforce the laws of our country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KOCH: President Bush will be in El Paso, Texas today visiting border security operations, that to emphasize the fact that he does want to get tough on border security. He talked about hiring more officers, constructing fences, using monitoring devices, that, as well as building more jail cells to hold illegal immigrants in the United States and then deporting them very quickly, Soledad, once they are caught.
S. O'BRIEN: Kathleen, let me shift gears and ask you a little bit about troop numbers in Iraq. The president is going to make a speech tomorrow about that. What do you expect to hear on that front?
KOCH: Senior administration officials are telling CNN that in this speech tomorrow at the U.S. Naval Academy the president will not really go into specific troop numbers, nor specific timetables for withdrawal. They say that the speech is more designed to give insight into the president's decision-making process and really reassure Americans, reassure Congress, that he does, indeed, have a plan for drawing down troops in Iraq once Iraqi forces are trained and ready to defend the country themselves -- Soledad.
S. O'BRIEN: Kathleen Koch at the White House for us this morning.
Kathleen, thanks -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: On this day, exactly three months ago, Hurricane Katrina made landfall on the Gulf Coast. We know the massive destruction that followed for the city of New Orleans. How is the city doing now?
AMERICAN MORNING's Dan Lothian live in New Orleans this morning with a report card or a status check, whatever you like.
Good morning -- Dan.
DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Miles.
Well, with three months you would expect that a lot would have taken place, a lot of changes would have happened. But some people, and many people, in fact, in New Orleans proper, and some of the surrounding parishes, feel like they have been left behind, even as parts of the area appear to be moving forward.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's another small step on the long road to recovery. Ben Franklin Elementary is the first public school in New Orleans to reopen since Katrina.
ORA WATSON, INTERIM SCHOOL SUPERINTENDENT: It's been a long time coming, too long, but we made it.
LOTHIAN: For parents like Janie Bradford, relief, after some difficult months of moving her children from school to school.
JANIE BRADFORD, PARENT: It was rough. It was rough.
LOTHIAN: Another sign of progress at two of the city's libraries, where, for the first time since the storm, people can check out books.
SHARON KOHL, LIBRARIAN: Everybody has been wanting you know to have books to read to their kids and to just have books to read, something to do.
LOTHIAN: New Orleans might appear to be coming back to life. Some debris is being removed. Businesses are reopening. And some residents have reason to spread holiday cheer. But just around the corner, down streets still lined with mountains of debris, you'll find Rose Taylor.
ROSE TAYLOR, DISPLACED NEW ORLEANS RESIDENT: We just don't know what to do now.
LOTHIAN: And many others like her. The home she built with her husband 17 years ago in New Orleans east is destroyed.
TAYLOR: That's the kitchen and that was the living room.
LOTHIAN: Taylor now lives in a small trailer provided by FEMA as she waits for answers from her insurance company.
TAYLOR: It's hard. My children are scattered all over. We had Thanksgiving sitting in a trailer, me and my husband.
LOTHIAN: Miles and miles of devastation in New Orleans alone have left tens of thousands of others in limbo, too, many who have lost everything and those who protect what they have with blue tarp.
Mayor Ray Nagin got an earful at a recent town hall meeting in Houston as he tried to encourage displaced residents to return and rebuild.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want to know what is going to happen with me, my future, my home, because I want to go back.
LOTHIAN: But the biggest concern, levees.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Will we be safe? And right now the answer is no. LOTHIAN: To help solve the levee problem, the Dutch, who created a much-heralded flood protection system, are now being called on to help. Their ambassador to the U.S. toured the region with Senator Landrieu.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot of lessons we have learned and a lot of expertise which also can be made of use here.
LOTHIAN: Shoring up the city so residents can feel secure, so Rose Taylor can find the will to rebuild and heal.
TAYLOR: They're saying don't cry, don't feel bad about it, God did this for a reason. I don't believe that. I'm telling the whole up here (ph).
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LOTHIAN: Mayor Nagin says some 40 percent of the city still without power, 50 percent without natural gas. But of course the big problem again, the big concern, levees. Many lawmakers believing that if this city cannot be safe and secure, many people will choose not to return -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: Well, and most people you talk to there say you know where is Washington? Where is the help? And we just talked about Senator Landrieu threatening to keep the Senate in session until they at least give some indication that they will spend the money to do this. I get the sense that people there are starting to get pretty frustrated by all this.
LOTHIAN: That's true. And as we talked to some people yesterday, there is that sense of frustration. In fact, one lady telling me that she believes that too much attention has been paid in some of the areas that attract tourists, such as the French Quarter, and that neighborhoods, poor neighborhoods are being ignored.
M. O'BRIEN: Dan Lothian in New Orleans, thanks very much.
Coming up later on AMERICAN MORNING, we'll talk to the New Orleans Police Chief Warren Riley. We'll ask him what he thinks about where New Orleans is three months later -- Soledad.
S. O'BRIEN: He was the acting police chief, as you know, and now he is officially the head chief.
M. O'BRIEN: Now he's been sworn in.
S. O'BRIEN: So the head guy there.
Snow, snow, more snow falling right now across the west and in the Plain states. Dozens of minor accidents reported by police in California Sierra Nevada. And on the Plains, many travelers are still stranded after blizzards closed highways late Sunday. Thousands of people without power. And now six deaths are blamed on the storm.
Where is it headed next? Time to check the forecast with Jacqui Jeras.
Hey, Jacqui, good morning.
JERAS: Hey.
S. O'BRIEN: What's it looking like?
(WEATHER REPORT)
S. O'BRIEN: Doesn't look good. All right, thanks.
M. O'BRIEN: Thanks, Jacqui.
Coming up in the program, more on the latest delay in Saddam Hussein's trial. Does the Arab world think justice is being served? We will take a closer look.
S. O'BRIEN: Also, some bad news if you're looking to sell your house. Andy is "Minding Your Business" just ahead this morning.
M. O'BRIEN: And a quick reminder for you, AMERICAN MORNING now starts an hour earlier. We've been on for how long?
S. O'BRIEN: Look how happy and awake we look.
M. O'BRIEN: I don't look so happy there, actually. Hey.
S. O'BRIEN: You look serious and important.
M. O'BRIEN: Really. Turn your frown upside down, will you, Miles?
We're back with more in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
M. O'BRIEN: A darkened Columbus Circle this morning in New York City where I guess bad weather is coming our way. And you know that in the Midwest.
Andy Serwer is back, had his crack research team...
ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: ... get to the bottom of this Delta pilots versus executive suite pay issue.
SERWER: Well, Soledad, you were asking who makes more,...
S. O'BRIEN: I was just curious.
M. O'BRIEN: Yes.
SERWER: ... the executives or the pilots? And surprise, surprise,...
S. O'BRIEN: Right.
SERWER: ... the executives make more. And you know CEO pay and executive pay is a little bit of a difficult situation because you have base salary and then you have goodies, which is to say bonuses, which is to say stock options, which is to say deferred pay.
S. O'BRIEN: But usually it's often the goodies that are really good.
SERWER: More. More. Right. So...
S. O'BRIEN: And worth a lot more than the base salary.
SERWER: Right.
So let's talk about the CEO Gerald Grinstein. He makes now $375,000 a year in base pay. He did take a 25 percent pay cut. But, as you suggest, he probably makes hundreds of thousands of dollars more in other types of pay, although, just to be fair, you know they have really been cutting back on that.
A pilot at Delta, a senior pilot makes $169,000 a year. The chief financial officer we were talking about, Edward Bastian, he is not one of the top six most highly compensated people in the company, so his pay is not listed. But the other top executives make between $420,000 and $367,000. So figure he makes probably around $300,000. So, in other words, the chief executives, the top executives are making twice as much money as the pilots to start.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, which I understand.
SERWER: Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: I mean that doesn't ever surprise me. I guess I just want to know the bonus.
SERWER: Right.
M. O'BRIEN: Well, and there's...
S. O'BRIEN: Well then the company is in bankruptcy. I mean that...
SERWER: Yes. Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: ... when you get a bonus and you get a big treat for it...
SERWER: But then there's the whole thing. In other words, when the company is doing badly, you need to have talented people to run it.
S. O'BRIEN: I hear you.
SERWER: And so how do you attract talented people to run something? M. O'BRIEN: I understand that.
SERWER: You know.
M. O'BRIEN: But there is lingering resentment there because of the previous regime, Leo Mullin...
SERWER: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: ... and his crew, now gone, who left with an awful lot of money.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: And left the airline in not a very good way.
SERWER: They did. And they did...
S. O'BRIEN: And those golden parachutes of course.
M. O'BRIEN: Yes.
SERWER: Right. And they took a lot of money to buy back the stock, which was a really stupid move, because they were buying it back in $10 and $20 and now it's in single digits. So that was a big waste of money.
M. O'BRIEN: All right. Do we have time to talk about housing?
SERWER: I don't know. You tell me, because...
S. O'BRIEN: Sure.
M. O'BRIEN: I sort of would prefer not to, go ahead.
SERWER: All right, we'll talk about housing.
M. O'BRIEN: Go ahead and tell me how much trouble I'm in.
S. O'BRIEN: It's a very sensitive issue for Miles who just bought a Manhattan real estate.
SERWER: Yes. All right.
S. O'BRIEN: Don't listen. Don't listen.
SERWER: Well, yes.
S. O'BRIEN: Go ahead, I'm listening.
SERWER: The headline here, Miles, is the housing bubble is over. And this according to the housing industry itself.
S. O'BRIEN: Sorry, man.
SERWER: The chief economist of the National Association of Realtors saying it's passed its peak. But maybe when you have an economist saying that, Miles, it's probably not true, because they often don't know what the heck they are talking about.
M. O'BRIEN: The black science, isn't that what they call it?
SERWER: Yes.
M. O'BRIEN: Yes.
SERWER: The dismal science.
M. O'BRIEN: Dismal science. There you go, right.
SERWER: The dismal science, that's right. Decline in existing home sales in October. And this is the big thing, the inventory of homes, homes on the market for sale right now, the highest in 20 years. So you know some signs that maybe things are petering out.
S. O'BRIEN: Maybe you bought at the wrong time?
M. O'BRIEN: Just maybe.
S. O'BRIEN: Miles.
SERWER: Maybe you bought at the top. Maybe you wasted your whole family fortune.
S. O'BRIEN: It wasn't -- congratulations.
(CROSSTALK)
SERWER: Maybe it's all downhill from here, you know.
S. O'BRIEN: Could be. We're going to discuss that as we head to commercial.
Coming up this morning, much more on the president's push...
SERWER: You're welcome.
S. O'BRIEN: ... to crack down on illegal immigration. Some of his biggest supporters are now his biggest critics on this issue. We'll take a look at some of those reasons coming up next on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
S. O'BRIEN: President Bush talking about hardening the American border with Mexico. Here is how he described his immigration reform plan on Monday in Arizona.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: We're going to secure the border by catching those who enter illegally and hardening the border to prevent illegal crossings. We're going to strengthen enforcement of our immigration laws within our country. And together, with Congress, we're going to create a temporary worker program that will take pressure off the border, bring workers from out of the shadows and reject amnesty.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
S. O'BRIEN: Later this morning, the president will be talking about border security again, this time in El Paso, Texas.
CNN's senior political analyst Bill Schneider in Washington this morning.
Hey, Bill, good morning to you.
WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Good morning -- Soledad.
S. O'BRIEN: The president has had little traction on this issue over time. So why is he selling this again now?
SCHNEIDER: He's worrying about conservatives. Conservatives are very angry about this issue. All those radio talk show hosts are making a lot of hay out of their anger on this.
Right now, when Americans are asked do you approve or disapprove of the way Bush is handling the immigration issue, they are very negative. Look at conservatives, 57 percent of conservatives say they disapprove.
This is the rare issue that unites Democrats and Republicans. Democrats say they oppose the president's policies on immigration, 77 percent, but they oppose him on everything. But this is the only issue I've ever seen in which a majority of Republicans also oppose what President Bush has done on immigration. The guest worker program strikes a lot of Republicans, and most conservatives as well, as a form of amnesty.
S. O'BRIEN: The numbers when you look at Hispanic support, though, almost the opposite, right?
SCHNEIDER: Yes, Hispanics tend to be more sympathetic to the guest worker program, although they don't think it goes far enough. They would like to see it lead to citizenship. And the president's plan would require illegal immigrants to get temporary worker permits and then go back home. So they are not entirely happy with it, but there is a big division.
And the president is trying to keep a balance, a very delicate balance, between Hispanic-Americans whom he wants to reach out to and conservatives who just won't have anything to do with the temporary guest worker program.
S. O'BRIEN: Well a balance means a balancing act then. And it's a tough act, because you have to sort of come across as pro enforcement at the same time you're coming across as against illegal immigration. SCHNEIDER: That's right. It's a balancing act worthy of the Flying Wallendas to do this. And the president, I should say in his speech yesterday, was mostly on the enforcement side. It was a speech really geared to conservatives who are the most vocal and the most unhappy right now. He wants to reassure them. Why? Because they are all he's got. His approval ratings are low and his conservative base has to stay with him or he won't have anything.
S. O'BRIEN: So when you heard the president basically sum up the plan, which includes the guest worker element, what do you make of the proposal, per se?
SCHNEIDER: The proposals aren't bad. I've spoken to some experts and they say, look, if you have a program that balances tough enforcement with a guest worker program that gives people incentives to come forward and get permits, that could actually work.
There is one big problem however, Congress has to pass it, and Congress doesn't like it. There are about half a dozen alternative proposals out there being proposed by Republicans and Democrats that are floating around Congress. But what the president is talking about is going to have a tough time getting through.
S. O'BRIEN: Can we switch gears for a minute and talk about this Republican Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham in California?
SCHNEIDER: Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: You saw his absolutely tearful apology where he finally admitted, after quite a while, his guilt in this, $2 million in bribes. Do you think this sort of adds to that growing list of Republicans with ethics problems, because certainly that's how the Democrats are spinning it?
SCHNEIDER: Well, you have Tom DeLay indicted, Bill Frist under investigation, the two leaders in the two chambers of Congress. You have got Cunningham now pleading guilty. You've got the Republican lobbyist, Jack Abramoff, who is the subject of two investigations that touch on a lot of members of Congress, and it's already touched on the White House. And of course the most famous of all, the CIA leak investigation which is not quite finished yet. They were all Republicans. And I think the Democrats are going to not let people forget it.
It's also important that Republicans control everything, so they are more vulnerable. But even if Americans shrug and say it's not Republicans or Democrats, it's politicians, and they get angry at incumbents and they say we have got to throw all the bums out, most of the people who are in office right now are Republicans. So if Americans turn against officeholders and incumbents as a category, Republicans are going to suffer most of the damage.
S. O'BRIEN: Sort of no matter how you slice and dice it, right?
SCHNEIDER: Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: Bill Schneider, thanks, as always.
SCHNEIDER: Sure.
S. O'BRIEN: Nice to check in with you -- Miles.
M. O'BRIEN: Coming up in the program, Saddam Hussein was talking tough before his trial was delayed on Monday. We will look at how his act is playing in the Arab world ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: You're watching AMERICAN MORNING with Soledad O'Brien and Miles O'Brien.
S. O'BRIEN: Good morning. Welcome, everybody. Columbus Circle. You saw that little red and white tent set up?
M. O'BRIEN: Yes.
S. O'BRIEN: That's where they're going to start selling all those Christmas goods just in time for the holidays. Yes, there it is.
M. O'BRIEN: Is there a little Christmas fair out there?
S. O'BRIEN: That little tent city there.
M. O'BRIEN: So I could do my shopping right there.
S. O'BRIEN: Yes, right.
M. O'BRIEN: Or I could go online.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Your lucky, lucky family.
(LAUGHTER)
S. O'BRIEN: Knickknacks for all this year.
M. O'BRIEN: Previously chewed gum, young man, would you like some, yes.
S. O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody.
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