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American Morning
CIA: Bin Laden Photo Release Likely; The Bin Laden Compound; National Teacher of the Year; Sheryl Crow's Cooking for Healthy Lifestyles
Aired May 04, 2011 - 07:59 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Waiting for proof of death.
I'm Kiran Chetry.
The White House now struggling with the decision whether or not to release the pictures showing Osama bin Laden's dead body.
ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: We have exclusive footage inside Osama bin Laden compound.
I'm Ali Velshi.
Three days after his death we are finding out how he lived and why Navy Seals faced so much uncertainty when they stormed the terrorist's mansion.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: And record flooding possible in eight states.
I'm Christine Romans.
Levees blown up to save one town, now others are saying, what about us, on this AMERICAN MORNING.
CHETRY: Good morning to you. It's 8:00 this New York here on this Wednesday, May 4th. Glad you are with us today.
VELSHI: A lot of news we are facing, including some flooding in the middle of this country. It is getting pretty serious.
But just in to CNN this morning, some of the first backlash we are seeing from the killing of Osama bin Laden. This is new video of people who held a funeral and a prayer service for bin Laden on the streets of central Pakistan.
Of course, they had no body. This took place about 400 miles away from where bin Laden was hiding and morphed into anti-U.S. protest with over 100 people shouting and burning the U.S. flag. People praising bin Laden's sacrifice and calling him a martyr.
CHETRY: We also have some new information this morning on the incredible operation that eliminated bin Laden and the big question that remains this morning, will they release a photo of him dead? We do know that there are pictures, and some are graphic, reportedly, taken after a Navy SEAL shot bin Laden in the head.
CIA Director Leon Panetta thinks that a photograph, he says, of Osama bin Laden's body will be released at some point. Here are his words: "I just think it's important, they know we have it, to release it."
But that decision again is up to the U.S.
ROMANS: The U.S. went to great lengths to make sure bin Laden's grave would not become a shrine. And those against releasing his death photo are afraid it could become some sort of rallying cry for al Qaeda or extremists.
CHETRY: Well, Brianna Keilar joins us live from the White House this morning.
As I understand it, as you've said in your reports this morning, the White House is still deciding this. But do we have any indication on which way they're perhaps leaning?
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The White House is still deciding. Sources were telling us that the consensus was leaning towards releasing these photos. But we know that there are some sensitivities. We heard this from Jay Carney, the White House press secretary yesterday.
Well, on one hand, officials see that there may be a need for some visual proof that Osama bin Laden is dead. There's also this concern that this could be insightful. We heard from some White House officials who say they would be concerned for the safety of Americans overseas if this sort of became inflammatory, if it inflamed passions.
There's also, we should mention, some disagreement over whether to release these photos coming from Capitol Hill. Top congressional leaders are falling on both sides of this. Listen to congressman -- pardon me -- Senator Joe Lieberman and Senator Dianne Feinstein.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)
SEN. JOE LIEBERMAN (I-CT), CHAIRMAN, HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERMENTAL AFFAIRS CMTE.: Unless al Qaeda acknowledged that bin Laden was dead, it was important for the United States to release the picture of his body to confirm that he is dead.
SEN. DIANNE FEINSTEIN (D), CALIFORNIA: I just don't see a need to do it. The DNA has been dispositive. People may still doubt that. Therefore, there may be cause, I don't know, to release a photo, which I understand is very graphic.
(END VIDEO CLIPS)
KEILAR: Now, overall, Americans appear to be split on whether to release the photo, though, a majority, 56 percent, in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll said they think the photo should be released. But keep in mind, there's 39 percent who say it shouldn't. And that's still a pretty significant amount of people, guys.
VELSHI: Brianna, in a new "TIME" magazine exclusive, the former head of counterterrorism is talking about how they got information that led to Osama bin Laden. What do we know about that?
KEILAR: What you're seeing now in the wake of the killing of Osama bin Laden is a debate playing out about whether enhanced interrogation techniques as the Bush administration refer to them, are justified, if they led to the capture of Osama bin Laden. And to hear some Bush administration officials, including Jose Rodriguez, a former top CIA official in the Bush administration, they say that they feel like this is justified, that some of the information came from detainees at Guantanamo Bay, who did have these, who did experience these enhanced interrogation techniques in some cases. That included waterboarding.
But what you're hearing from the White House is they say that is not the case, it is not justified. And they say that there was a variety of sources of information that led to the capture of Osama bin Laden. I've even heard from the president's national security adviser that he feels that no information that was -- that came to be from enhanced interrogation techniques directly led to the capture of Osama bin Laden. But this is going to be a debate that continues, whether these techniques were effective and whether they are justified by the result of this.
ROMANS: All right. Brianna Keilar -- thanks, Brianna.
CHETRY: Meantime, releasing these photos of Osama bin Laden dead is a tough call. We want to know what you think as well. E-mail us, please, CNN.com/AM.
You can also tweet us @CNNAM. Or our individual accounts @KiranChetryCNN, @ChristineRomans, or @AliVelshi. We also have Facebook page, /AMERICAN MORNING. We're going to read some of them later in the show -- Ali.
VELSHI: Christine and Kiran, when the U.S. Navy SEAL team got to Osama bin Laden's compound, it looked familiar, even though they'd never been there before.
Let me show you what they knew. This is the compound from the outside. They knew the heights of the walls. And because they had practiced extensively on a mock-up of this compound, the replica was built from satellite images. They knew every detail about the interior.
This is where Osama bin Laden, that was a bedroom. It has a 7- foot wall. He was a very tall man, 6'8" -- 11-foot high wall on the side, 13, 18, 12 feet at the back. A big 10-foot high wall is where they burned the trash, two gates and a 12-foot high wall in the middle.
They knew all of that. They knew where the security gates were. But they had no idea when they were supposed to expect inside when they got in.
They weren't told that bin Laden was a target during early training.
Let me show what they didn't know. They didn't know what the inside looked like. They didn't know that Osama bin Laden was a target.
But what they did know is that -- at least this is what they found out when they got -- there were no armed guards at the compound at all. Osama bin Laden was found unarmed. That something they didn't know. They didn't know what to expect, that he would be unarmed or not.
They also know, there was some conflicting information at the beginning, that bin Laden's wife was shot in the leg. She was not the woman who was shot and killed.
But here's an interesting thing. They had a lot of bulk food in the place. It seemed that they favored Coke and Pepsi, not one or the other, and had Nestle products. But there was a lot of bulk food, which stands to reason, given the fact that we were hearing that Osama in Laden may not have left that compound for a great deal. There's new information about how much time he had actually spent in there -- Christine.
ROMANS: All right, Ali. Interesting details.
You know, this morning, Pakistani intelligence officials are responding to CIA Director Leon Panetta's reported claim that they were either, quote, "involved or incompetent" when it came to determining Osama bin Laden's whereabouts. A senior Pakistani official calls the statement totally regrettable and says Panetta, of all people, knows how much they've been doing. The official says they are embarrassed but not incompetent.
CHETRY: Interesting reaction from Pakistan.
Meanwhile, former President Jimmy Carter weighed in on the speculation that Pakistan may have known where bin Laden was hiding. He told CNN's Suzanne Malveaux that the U.S. relationship with Pakistan is all about the big picture.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: What do you think about the fact that Osama bin Laden was found in Pakistan, in a city of a $1 million home not far from Islamabad? I mean, do we think we can trust the Pakistani government, Zardari?
JIMMY CARTER, U.S. FORMER PRESIDENT: When we're in doubt about Pakistan, we have to give them the benefit of the doubt.
MALVEAUX: Why?
CARTER: Because they are so crucial. You have to remember that Pakistan probably has at least 100 nuclear weapons. And I think that our alliance with Pakistan, despite some obvious difficulties, is extremely important.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHETRY: Also, you can see Suzanne Malveaux's interview later this morning, 11:00 Eastern Time, right here on CNN.
VELSHI: All right. Right now in Libya, ambulances are rushing towards a port in Misrata. Gadhafi forces unleashed a new raid of shelling there. Rebels say five people were killed.
Earlier, a car bomb blew up outside rebel headquarters in Benghazi. Some rebels who control the city blamed the attack on Gadhafi sympathizers. No deaths were reported. The blast comes two days after a NATO airstrike killed one of Gadhafi's sons.
ROMANS: As the battle for the border intensifies, U.N. officials say more than 8,000 Libyans, mostly women and children, crossed into Tunisia last weekend. The refugees are part of tribes that have long been persecuted by Moammar Gadhafi. More than half a million people have are now said to have fled Libya for neighboring countries.
CHETRY: Here's a new video this morning. This is out of Japan, taken from a remote-controlled robot inside of reactor number one at the Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima. These pictures are coming from Tokyo Electric Power Company.
Officials say that the monitoring equipment inside the reactor confirms that radiation levels are a lot higher than previously thought. The solution they are trying now is installing fans with filters to try to bring those levels down. They're also saying they hope that they will get the crippled plant under control by the end of this year.
VELSHI: All right. A continuing conversation that we have, that everybody is having -- is what is the relationship between the U.S. and Pakistan going to be going forward? Jill Dougherty is going to be talking about that when we come back.
CHETRY: Also, we have some amazing video. A rescue caught on tape, an intense flooding nearly claiming an elderly woman. But she was pulled out of that canal. We'll have more coming up.
ROMANS: And a high school chemistry teacher from Maryland is named the very best teacher in the country, rather. Sometimes, teachers are unsung heroes. (INAUDIBLE) about this, so is the president. Michelle Shearer is live, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROMANS: All right. Extreme measures for extreme weather. Watch this.
Wow. The Army Corps of Engineers blasting out some 11,000 feet of levee along the Mississippi River, easing floodwaters threatening the Illinois town of Cairo upstream. Officials say that the move lowered the water there. But it's still about 19 feet above flood stage.
When you have the Army Corps of Engineers blowing up levees, you know that you have a serious --
(CROSSTALK)
VELSHI: A big deal, yes.
ROMANS: -- in Mississippi and Missouri River.
CHETRY: Yes. And what they're trying to do -- I mean, they are trying to decide which is the lesser of two evils. These explosions shook the ground for miles, but they also ended up diverting the water or sending the water, flooding into thousands of acres of arable Missouri farmland. This is an area that Missouri's governor, Jay Nixon, described as literally the most productive part of our continent. Understand the crops for this season wiped out.
VELSHI: That's one of the tragedies. The other one narrowly averted, check out this video in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, where levees began to crumble last week. The National Guard rescued a 93-year-old woman from a car submerged in muddy, raging floodwaters.
ROMANS: You know, the Mississippi River is expected to rise to its highest level since the 1920s in some parts of the South today. Record flooding is possible in at least eight states. WE talked about all the towns, the high watermark in the town square along the river, they're got to be notching a new one this year.
VELSHI: Rob Marciano is live in Mississippi County, Missouri, for us right now, just one of those places under threat -- Rob.
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Good morning, again, guys.
The water you see behind me wasn't here two days ago, but from the first explosion, the first nighttime explosion we showed you, that's what let the water into this floodway. This is the farmland that you were talking about that was so fertile, not so much anymore -- obviously, very much flooded.
But on the southern end of this, they had opened the drain. And this water is going down just a bit as well. Got to show that video again -- I mean, it's just so dramatic to watch earth like that be blown up and thrown above the tree tops all in an effort to kind contain the drain off this river system.
All right. So, we got a controversy here. We've got farmers that don't want this here, obviously, but they benefit from some of the irrigation that they tap into. And, you know, there's lawsuits going on and all sorts of things.
We tracked down an old time retired farmer yesterday, that was here during the big floods of the '30s and here's what he said about farmers that are complaining today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NORBERT ROWLING, RETIRED MISSOURI FARMER: Some of them are farming a lot of acres and they've just been lucky the last few years they haven't had a flood. This is one of the things that happens once in a great while here. They just have to take it on the chin.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Mother Nature giveth, Mother Nature taketh away, nontirely (ph) happy about that. Many of you live in an area, not just farmland, there are towns that are under water right now. Yesterday, we took a boat tour around parts of Southern Illinois and olive branch specifically got hard hit. We've been talking about (INAUDIBLE). We've been talking about metropolis.
Other towns that have been evacuated along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, because some of them look like this, and they're still evacuated because of it. So, this has been going on 5 to 10 days now, guys, and it's going to go on another 5 to 10 days here. The water is not going to go down very quickly because now that they've released some of the pressure, they're now releasing some water that's further off stream that they've been holding back because of all the rain they've had in the past couple of weeks
So, it's going to be a long process, and by the time this gets down to Vicksburg in two weeks, they're going to see record flooding. So, it will be a two to three to four-week process before we dump all this out into the Gulf of Mexico, and it's going to be along and wet hole until then. Back to you, guys.
CHETRY: All right. Thanks, Rob.
VELSHI: You know, you were mentioning, Christine, earlier that there a lot of people who feel that the reason that is one of the most productive parts of the nation is because the Mississippi used to overflow and flood those places.
ROMANS: Well, and then the glaciers before that. I mean, there's a lot of geological reasons why, but you know, the Mississippi river and the Missouri river too and the Ohio river, these are the arteries for this whole region. It's why it's so great and having to hold it back has then something unintended consequences all along the way.
CHETRY: And we saw that with in gulf oil, Gulf of Mexico and this martially (ph) ends this well. I mean, the same thing you build these levees, you build these diversions to get to the oil platforms, and there, obviously, is consequence down the road.
Jacqui Jeras is in the Extreme Weather Center for us to look at what's happening nationally, as well. Hey, Jacqui.
JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Hey, good morning, guys. Yes, dry weather across the nation's midsection. So, that's good with the flood situation across parts of the Midwest and Ohio Valley. Rain is possible there for tomorrow, but maybe a quarter of an inch to a half of an inch. Today, the big focus in the rain is up and down the east coast, and that's where we're going to see showers and a couple of embedded thunderstorms.
Nothing really severe expected today. Kind of a nuisance rain, and it's going to be rather steady throughout much of the day. There you can see it in New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and down the coast, and that's causing some delays already at the airport. Newark looking at 45-minute departure delays that's on the increase, and we got ground delays in Philadelphia, 40 minutes.
That means people who are at other airports across the country trying to get into Philadelphia looking at those delays which could move up. Something to keep in mind, not just a problem in the airways but also the roadways. There are literally hundreds and hundreds of roads that are closed across the Midwest because of this flooding. So, use a lot of caution, find an alternate route, and of course, you know, we're starting to inch towards that weekend.
Louisville has had quite a bit of flooding, and we've got the Kentucky Derby going on this weekend. Our cold front that's bringing the rain across the east, actually, a much cooler temperatures behind it. We're talking 10 to 20 degrees below where you should be for this time of the year. A chilly 58 in Chicago, 68 in Memphis. It feels really chilly here in Atlanta this morning, as well, guys. Things should warm up east of the Mississippi as we head into the weekend. Back to you.
VELSHI: Jacqui, thanks very much. We'll stay on top of this with you. Jacqui Jeras in our Extreme Weather Center.
I love this story. There's a high school chemistry teacher who is being awarded, from Maryland, by the way, like Kiran.
CHETRY: Last year's teacher of the year is from Iowa like Christine.
VELSHI: That's right. There has never been a U.S. teacher of the year from Toronto where I'm from.
(LAUGHTER)
VELSHI: Michelle Sheerer is the best in the nation, and we're going to be talking to her about the challenges and the success that she's had after this.
CHETRY: All right. Guess what? We have a special guest here. Sheryl Crow is coming to visit us. She has a clever cook book out making healthy eating tastes really good, as well. She's joining us coming up. Nineteen minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: She teaches high school chemistry in Frederick, Maryland, but this morning, Michelle Sheerer is breaking in a slightly more impressive title, National Teacher of the Year. She was honored at a White House ceremony yesterday. The president praising her for helping students discover the science within. She joins us now from Washington. Michelle Sheerer, congratulations. Welcome to our show. It's an honor to have you here, an honor to have teachers like you in this country.
MICHELLE SHEERER, CHEMISTRY TEACHER: Thank you, Ali, it's a pleasure to be here.
VELSHI: Hey, look, in some ways, I mean, for people like you, you've been a teacher for 14 years, you and most of the other teachers in this country are devoted to your profession. You choose it because you think it's important, not because you think you're going to get rich from it. Why you've all been under fire a lot in the last year or so? How does it feel?
SHEERER: Well, we're teachers. We focus on the positive. Our job is to go into the classroom everyday and give our students our energy and our love, and despite the conversation that may be going on around us, we always aim to keep things positive in the classroom. That's what we do for students.
VELSHI: But you're going to be out of the classroom for the next year, and I bet you that question is going to come up a lot, so what is your answer? We know we have to fix more of public education. You work at a school that was actually named one of the top 2 percent of schools in America by "Newsweek" magazine, but you know that there are schools and teachers and classrooms and students across the country who really are struggling.
SHEERER: That is true. And I really firmly believe that we need to learn from the schools and the students that are succeeding. We have a lot of examples of that in America, not just at my school, but at many schools. There are great teachers, extraordinary teachers doing brilliant things in their classrooms. And we really need to look at what they're doing to achieve success.
And it's not always a one size fits all. Teachers are different. They bring their personalities to the classroom. We're all using different strategies, different techniques. We need to be innovative, and we really need to see how we can reach all students.
VELSHI: Well, we've seen a lot of that innovation from teachers like you, from schools that you're in, from all of the examples we've all been talking about, and I hear you that there is not one size fits all, but don't you think we have enough information and research that lead us to fix all of those schools that we're still having trouble in?
SHEERER: Well, I'm not sure it's quite that simple. I know we would like to boil it down to a formula. I'm a scientist. I can certainly appreciate that. But you have to remember that the essence of education is the student teacher relationship, and we're dealing with human beings and human beings are complex, and they all bring different experiences to the table.
What we really need to look at is, what does each individual student need? What does each individual school need? And, really, try to focus on those efforts and making sure that we're reaching within communities what they need most.
VELSHI: It's a good answer. Is it practicable? Can we actually go out there and make determinations? I mean, don't we have to have systems in place to ensure that we're actually doing that. We're determining what those schools need or what those students need. I feel like that's missing from the system.
SHEERER: Well, it's true, and we are taking steps in that direction. We are embarking on a new system of common core standards where we will be using a common curriculum that will unite us as a national communities no matter where you live, that you'll be receiving the same curriculum instruction in certain areas. So, we are moving in that direction, but there's still a lot of work that needs to be done.
VELSHI: I got to ask you. You are a chemistry teacher. You specifically try and bring people into the foal who have not traditionally been students of science. All we talk about is STEM, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. We need more students going into it. How do you get more young kids to study those topics?
SHEERER: Well, you have to be excited about it. You need to open up your classroom to everybody. You need to show them that science applies to our lives. When students see that the information is relevant to their lives, they're much more willing to learn it.
You also need to be able to break it down into understandable pieces to allow students to go into the lab and to use their own hands, roll up their sleeves, get their hands on the experiments, and really become scientists themselves. Young children are scientist. Children are born with the national tendency to explore and discover.
VELSHI: Sure.
SHEERER: And we just really need to make sure that we sustain that from middle school and high school and to keep that science alive (ph).
VELSHI: You're absolutely right. We're all sort of born scientist. Michelle, congratulations to you and to all those hundreds of thousands of teachers whom you represent who toil without recognition on a daily basis to try and make lives better for all of us. Thanks for being with us and congratulations.
SHEERER: Thank you, Ali.
VELSHI: Michelle Sheerer is the 2011 National Teacher of the Year. Christine.
ROMANS: Congratulations, indeed. Great interview.
Also, next, we're going to talk about U.S. tensions with Pakistan intensifying. Pakistan really under fire for harboring in its borders the most wanted terrorist in the world. Jill Dougherty is next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: Cee Lo Green waking us up this morning. Well, I mean, you're already awake if you're watching us. That is Columbus Circle. That's not wet, is it?
CHETRY: No.
VELSHI: Fifty-five degrees and wet. It's going to be 50 degrees and wet.
CHETRY: Replay the tape. Replay the tape.
VELSHI: Which means -- you know what I don't like about rain in New York? I got to take a cab. I love walking in this city. Love walking.
ROMANS: No. What I hate about rain in New York is you can't catch a cab.
VELSHI: Right. In the province, I live in a place where you can't take the subway, so you got to take the cab. There are new cabs now. Not yet. There are going to be new cabs in New York. They are all going to be the same kind of cab, this new iconic Nissan mini-van. The first batch should hit the streets 2013. It could be short on looks depending on how you approach it. They had three vans in competition. They all kind of look the same, a little more leg room than you're used to. But here is the thing, they will have power outlets in it for your phone. I love that.
ROMANS: My favorite part is the transparent see-through roof.
VELSHI: When you are driving through town, you can look up at the buildings.
ROMANS: It is going to have a low-annoyance horn.
Gas prices now at an average of $3.98 according to AAA, just 13 cents from the all-time high. Wow, it hurts. We are watching it move up there. Maybe the worst is behind us. We will have to wait and see.
CHETRY: For the first time in two decades, the number of American households with TVs fell. New research from the Nielson company found 96.7 percent of homes have at least the one television, but that's down from nearly 99 per. The drop is blamed on some families not being able to afford new TVs and also young people opting to watch their favorite shows over the Internet.
ROMANS: Top stories now, flooding farms to save a town. Water pouring into Missouri farmland after the army core of engineers blew up a section of a levee. Water is 19 feet above flood stage.
In Alabama, people trying to recover from the tornadoes that hit last week. The governor says the state will pay for debris removal to keep the rebuilding process moving. The state's emergency agency says 250 people were killed after more than 20 tornadoes touched down. The Coast Guard searching the pacific for a woman who disappeared while on a cruise from Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, to San Diego. Officials say the 65-year-old woman went missing before the ship docked in San Diego yesterday. The FBI has now launched an investigation.
VELSHI: Pakistani intelligence officials have some explaining to do after the United States snuffed out Osama bin Laden in a compound essentially right under their noses.
CHETRY: According to two sources, CIA chief Leon Panetta told lawmakers, quote, "Either they were involved or incompetent. Neither is a good place to be." Pakistan is pushing back against that notion today.
ROMANS: Yes, absolutely. CNN's Jill Dougherty is live at the State Department for us. Jill, we are talking about Nick Paton Walsh who said he talked to a senior intelligence official who took issue with that that, saying it shows an absolute lack of trust between the two countries.
JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN FOREIGN AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: This is raising a huge issue, a rift between the two countries. Here are the questions that people are asking, how bin Laden could have been in that house. Specifically the U.S. is pressing the Pakistanis to explain things like who owned the house? Who built it? What was the type of security around it? Other questions like that.
They are also looking at the data they got from the computers and hard drives that the Navy Seals took out of that compound where they killed bin Laden. They are analyzing it very carefully. That could give some good include and information.
Also direct talks in Islamabad, the special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan for the United States Mark Grossman was there. The trip was preplanned before Osama bin Laden was killed. He met with all the top people, the president, the head of the military, head of intelligence. The subject we are told of ben laden and the operation did come up. So presumably they were discussing a lot of that.
So far, no compelling evidence in spite of the fact that Leon Panetta says this raises a lot of issues. Here is what he said to CBS.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LEON PANETTA, CIA DIRECTOR: We don't really have any intelligence that indicates that Pakistan was aware Bin Laden was there or that this compound was a place he was hiding. But having said that, this was a location very close to a military academy. It was close to other sensitive military sites. It had been there since almost five years ago. It was very unusual as a compound. I think they need to respond to the questions about why they did not know that that kind of compound existed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DOUGHERTY: And so far, you know, in that meeting with Mark Grossman, the senior officials were expressing surprise that ben laden was there. U.S. officials say that at this point, they are taking them at face value. Also, they are saying there is a possibility that the senior people might not have known but people below that who might have wanted to support Bin Laden did. That could be a possibility, we are told.
CHETRY: Jill Dougherty for us this morning at the State Department, appreciate it.
VELSHI: President Obama is going to go to ground zero to meet with 9/11 families. This is the shot that's very familiar. This is September 14th, George W. Bush going down there. He was president. President Bush is not going to be there with President Obama. President Obama had invited him. In his statement, President Bush's spokesperson says he appreciates the invite but wants to remain largely out of the spotlight.
And this isn't out of character. This is what he's done. I was trying to parse it and see if anybody knew anything else, but there didn't seem to be any tone in it or anything like that.
ROMANS: He said he is celebrating quietly with Americans.
CHETRY: When he was on his book tour, he said this is the last time you are going to see me for a while because I would like to be back on the ranch.
VELSHI: History, in his opinion, he would say it has treated him fairly on this. There is a lot of discussion as to who is to blame and who gets credit? A lot of people say he has a hand in it.
CHETRY: Also, we have been asking the question, should the U.S. release pictures of a dead Osama bin Laden? Apparently that decision is still up in the air this morning. CIA chief Leon Panetta says we probably will see a photo. Ultimately, though, it is in the hands of the White House. Our Brianna Keilar says her sources are telling her they are leaning towards releasing that picture.
ROMANS: We have interesting responses from Facebook and Twitter.
CHETRY: That right. "OK for us grown-ups, but what about our children? What do we tell them? We need to be very responsible."
VELSHI: That's the first time I have heard that reference to our children. If the picture is out there, you know the kids are going to see it.
ROMANS: Jay Carney said something, that this is not something that you want your kids to see.
VELSHI: Calvin Wilson writes on our blog "Yes, they should release pictures. I watched the video of Saddam being hung. Why can't I see a picture of bin Laden's dead body?" ROMANS: And this is from Fred on Facebook. "Frankly, I don't see why not. People all over Facebook have been treated to a fake picture which some think is genuine. I say show the real one to the world to put this behind us."
And in our last response segment, we read a comment from our blog that had a typo in it. The typo referred to "Osama" as "Obama." We regret that not catching that typo before it aired. We apologize for that.
VELSHI: We do go out of our way to try and represent the messages that come in as originally as they are.
ROMANS: And with your feedback, we run this risk of typos and the like.
CHETRY: We are going to talk to Sheryl Crow. She has a new cookbook, eating healthy. But at the same time this stuff tastes good. She will explain why she thought it was so important to get on a healthy diet, especially after she has kids.
VELSHI: My excuse is I am on the road a lot. I can't eat healthy.
CHETRY: She is on the road a lot.
VELSHI: Yes. All right, it's 38 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Interesting. Slowly but surely, more details are trickling in about exactly what was found at the compound at the raid that led to the killing of Osama bin Laden. A few new details from "Politico." According to people that were briefed, members of Congress that were briefed that Osama bin Laden at the time actually had cash totaling 500 euros, $750 U.S., as well as two telephone numbers, sewn into his clothing when he was killed. They say these are signs that he was preparing to flee the compound at a moment's notice.
ROMANS: If you are one of the people whose phone numbers it is, you can be sure that intelligence will be calling you.
CHETRY: This is why American officials say they do not want to tip-off Pakistani intelligence or military. If they had been tipped off, he could have been long gone by the time they got there.
VELSHI: I think what's fascinating is we've learned this morning, how many members of Congress knew about this?
CHETRY: At least 16 members were briefed on the possibility that they were going to launch a raid to get bin Laden.
VELSHI: It is fascinating that information did not make it out at all. That was part of the success of this mission.
CHETRY: Coming up, we're going to be talking to rocker Sheryl Crow. She has a cookbook for a healthy lifestyle. It is not just brown rice and steamed chicken.
VELSHI: I am a substantially healthy person after listening to you.
ROMANS: There is a great recipe for veggie lasagna that she says her son Wyatt loves to eat. We will find out how she gets her kids to eat the good stuff.
VELSHI: It's 44 minutes after the hour.
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CHETRY: Forty-five minutes past the hour. Now let's get you updated on the day's news.
Just in to CNN, Osama bin Laden reportedly had cash, phone numbers sewn into his clothing and was ready to flee. "Politico" reporting this morning, 500 Euros and two telephone number numbers sewn into his clothes found on his body after he was killed. Two U.S. intelligence officials reportedly told members of Congress about this at a classified briefing in the Capitol yesterday. Sure signs, at least according to intelligence officials, that he was prepared to flee his compound at a moment's notice.
Also just in to CNN this hour, new video of hundreds of Pakistanis on the street holding a funeral and prayer service for Osama bin Laden, morphing into an anti-U.S. protest, the people burning U.S. flags.
Well, the Obama administration struggling over the decision to release a photo of Osama bin Laden's corpse. The CIA director says he believes it will be made public but the White House has not yet made a final decision.
And thousands of acres of farmland under water this morning in Missouri after a levee was blasted to save a small town upstream in Illinois. Flooding is at or near record levels in parts of at least eight states.
Well, the market is open in just 45 minutes. And right now, stock futures are down slightly after a new employment report came out this morning showing 179,000 new jobs were added last month; that's coming in, though, below expectations.
Now you're caught up on the day's headlines. AMERICAN MORNING will be right back after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: It's 48 minutes past the hour.
She is a superstar in the world of music, winner of nine Grammy Awards. But this morning, Sheryl Crow is actually rocking a new cookbook.
ROMANS: It was born out of her battle with breast cancer. If it makes you healthy, it can't be that bad.
ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: That's right, exactly. She's teamed up now with her personal chef, Chuck White, to share their healthy, tasty recipes in a new cookbook entitled exactly that, "If it Makes You Healthy" Sheryl Crow and Chuck White join us now.
SHERYL CROW, SINGER: Hi guys.
VELSHI: Welcome to both you.
CROW: Thank you.
VELSHI: This would be -- we do this anyway, because you are here and we love cookbooks and we love healthy cookbooks. But --
(CROSSTALK)
CROW: You want to eat.
VELSHI: -- but what's it -- we certainly do. What is this connection to -- to breast cancer? How did -- how did this spawn a cookbook?
CROW: Five years ago -- knock on wood -- five years ago I was diagnosed and I decided instead of going the conventional route of taking Tamoxifen, I would try to really embrace a practical stance in using nutrition as being part of my staying -- staying well.
And I met with a nutritionist, named Rachel Beller who actually does the foreword in the book and learned so much about food and about the benefits of certain foods as far as staying well and building your immune system.
And I hooked up with Chuck when I was getting ready to go on the road, because I wanted to continue on with my staying on this course. And Chuck was writing recipes in Nashville, an -- and amazing cook, but also already knew so much about different components in food like spices and the benefits.
(CROSSTALK)
CHETRY: Right.
CROW: Yes.
CHETRY: I mean, food was our -- that was our original medicine.
CROW: Yes.
CHETRY: I mean food, herbs, spices --
(CROSSTALK)
CROW: Yes.
CHETRY: -- the interesting thing you write in the front, that this is not to treat or diagnose or medical condition but there are growing numbers of people who feel it's very important. And once they're cancer-free or hoping to be cancer free to really almost try to eat antioxidants. How do you do that in your cooking?
CHUCK WHITE, CHEF: I use a lot of colorful vegetables, there's a lot of use purple -- say a purple cabbage versus a regular cabbage or a purple potato. Lots and lots of colors and trying to use vegetables in season or at their peak. Trying to eat poultry or meat that's antibiotic or steroid free. So getting all of those toxins in your body really, really helps. It helps to be well.
ROMANS: We know so much more about this than we did even you know, when I was growing up. You have two little boys, you have two little kids, I have three little boys and you know, their -- their bodies are little temples. You know, we are trying to feed them with the good stuff early on. It's hard, though.
CROW: Yes.
ROMANS: They like Tater Tots (ph). But you have a vegetable lasagna now that looks delicious.
VELSHI: Yes.
ROMANS: If I could cover it about Tater Tots, my kids would eat it. But Wyatt loves the veggie lasagna. How do you -- how do you make all of this stuff good and be really dedicated to having good food for your family and your kids?
CROW: I would say that deception is big in my house and bribery.
ROMANS: Yes.
CROW: We have -- actually, one of the reasons that we did the cookbook in the first place or that I made Chuck do this, because Chuck is -- I mean we went in to meet with publishers and they said, how many recipes do you have written down? And he said, none. It's all in his head.
WHITE: They are all here.
CROW: So I made him do it because --
(CROSSTALK)
ROMANS: Wow that's cool.
CROW: -- one of the first things he ever made was avocado -- chocolate mousse made with avocado and cocoa, which is just straight up cocoa, (INAUDIBLE) avocado and little above it. So I use that as bribery with my 4-year-old because the 1-year-old will eat everything but the 4-year-old has an opinion about what he has to eat.
VELSHI: Right.
CROW: Hiding food in foods that I know he loves. Like he eats a lot of quinoa pasta because quinoa is the same very non-gluten and he thinks he's eating spaghetti which he basically is but it's not -- it's high in protein and it's not your standard.
VELSHI: You've -- quinoa the other day actually you were telling me all about it.
(CROSSTALK)
But listen, if I want to -- I -- I'd be -- we -- we talk a lot about food, we certainly eat a lot of food here. If I want to do this, do I have to get a personal chef too.
CROW: No, no let me just say, well, I don't want to -- I don't want to kind -- Chuck knows I was never a cook, I mean, not even remotely interested in it. I would eat tuna salad every single day.
(CROSSTALK)
CHETRY: So you just let --
CROW: He did put a nice tuna salad recipe in here.
VELSHI: Yes.
CROW: But you -- you made a cookbook for the people.
VELSHI: So we can -- even I could --
WHITE: Simple -- just use simple things in there. And there's a few more intricate things, there's a couple of different cuisines as well. I'm a vegan, vegetarian.
CHETRY: Yes, I had to find -- you guys have some marinade for your chicken that looked complicated. That -- it looked like it was a fancy word. I was trying to figure that one out.
WHITE: I'm not sure -- there is one with basil and apple in there.
ROMANS: Basil and apple --
(CROSSTALK)
CHETRY: No, here it is, here it is. Sherry, vinegar gastrique is that a recipe --
WHITE: Well, that's actually just a little sauce I guess, it's really basically the sugar and vinegar.
CHETRY: Because I'm doing this one.
ROMANS: That's really a nice name for sauce.
VELSHI: Yes. Gastrique.
CHETRY: Gastrique a sauce, I love it. Is it more expensive to eat healthy, I mean, bottom line for people who can get processed foods at their local drugstore? As opposed to --
WHITE: Well, I would say, it might be more expensive in the long run for health care. If you spend that extra couple of dollars a day eating healthy, you won't pay for it in the long run.
ROMANS: It is a wellness investment. That's really clear when you make the investment on the front end for wellness. That's something that's going to pay dividends on the back end, no matter what your physical -- whether it is a breast cancer diagnosis or obesity or diabetes you're just trying to get a handle on.
CHETRY: How are you? I know that this was in 2006. You underwent treatment.
CROW: Yes. I am five years -- I'm always knocking on -- whatever. I'm five years out, so that means I'm basically -- I mean I'm done. My cancer was detected really, really early. I am always preaching about how until we have an early cure, early detection and prevention is the best stuff that we have.
You know a lot of what I learned through nutrition is that what we do with regard to our bodies has a very distinct correlation to our wellness. And a lot of what's in the book -- it's a great handbook -- is stuff that we already do. It is just knowing -- it's having the power of knowledge to continue to incorporate some of the things that we already do on a daily basis.
VELSHI: Thanks to both of you for being here. Sheryl Crow and Chuck White, co-authors of "If It Makes You Healthy".
CHETRY: Congratulations. You got 100 recipes right out of your head and throw them in here. Good for you. Talk about fresh.
ROMANS: It's 54 minutes after the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: An all-day telethon kicks off this morning to help Alabama as it struggles to recover from last week's deadly storms. The state's governor also announcing Alabama will pay to clean up debris for the next 30 days to help with that daunting, daunting task of rebuilding. Those pictures still stick in my mind.
CHETRY: Absolutely. What if there was a way to build homes so that they could actually withstand a powerful tornado?
ROMANS: Actually the technology exists and Tom Foreman looks at that in this morning's "Building up America."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thousands of homes damaged or destroyed, hundreds of lives taken. Officials in Alabama and other states are still adding up the losses from those killer tornadoes.
Far away in another part of the so-called Tornado Alley near Little Rock --
It all looks perfectly normal.
John House's home is a model of new technology aimed at stopping such destruction.
JOHN HOUSE: They would have no idea whatsoever unless they went up into the attic.
Foreman: let's go up in the attic.
HOUSE: Ok.
FOREMAN: Up here we can really see the difference.
HOUSE: Right, because you have bolt together structural steel.
FOREMAN: The frame is not made of wood but of steal.
HOUSE: This is an (INAUDIBLE).
FOREMAN: John is the president of Kodiak Steel Homes and he says despite the economic downturn, despite the fact that these houses can cost up to 5 percent more than usual, folks like the Tacket (ph) family are snapping them up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You might be spending a little bit more now, but it is going to pay for it in the end. The house isn't going anywhere.
FOREMAN: Other companies make steel homes but not many. John is proud to say his can withstand 140-mile-an-hour winds for four hours.
HOUSE: Yes. I'll take it right away.
FOREMAN: Sales have declined a bit but John says not nearly as much as for other builders because people want to be even more secure in their big investments now.
HOUSE: Instead of making our homes cheaper in response to the recession, we have made our homes better.
FOREMAN: Would you have any doubts about being up in this attic during a tornado?
HOUSE: No, none whatsoever.
FOREMAN: And that he hopes will not only keep building up his business but also keep many families safer when the worse weather strikes.
Tom Foreman, CNN. (END VIDEOTAPE)
ROMANS: And we certainly know it has been a ferocious spring really for so many people, from tornadoes to flooding. And that all is still playing out as we speak.
That is going to do it for us today, though.
CHETRY: Thanks a lot for being with us. We'll see you back here bright and early tomorrow.
Right now, "CNN NEWSROOM" with Carol Costello starts. Hey, Carol.
