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American Morning
U.S. Officials Worry Libya May Become Terrorist Haven; Investigation into Bankrupt Solar Company Continues; Interview with Stephen Moore; Congress Taking a Pay Cut?; White House Under Fire; New Negotiations to Free U.S. Hikers; Cameron, Sarkozy Visit Libya; The Jackie Kennedy Tapes; SAT Scores Drop; California Schools Use Solar to Save Money; Going in Depth on Rise of Rick Perry
Aired September 15, 2011 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): The White House under fire this morning for awarding a federal stimulus loan to a solar panel company that's now bankrupt, leaving taxpayers on the hook for more than half a billion dollars.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): The case of the missing housewife takes an even stranger turn hours after Mrs. Salahi's husband claims she was kidnapped. The White House party crasher turns up -- oh, you will never guess with who.
ALI VELSHI, CNN CNAHOR (voice-over): Wow! That I want to hear.
An urban etiquette. One man's street sign crusade to get New Yorkers to improve their manners, hold their pants up on this AMERICAN MORNING.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS (on-camera): Told you once, I told you 100 times, pull up your pants.
VELSHI (on-camera): Nobody wants to see your underwear.
COSTELLO (on-camera): Good morning. It's Thursday, September 15th. Welcome to AMERICAN MORNING.
VELSHI: All right. Up --
COSTELLO: Up first this morning -- sorry about that. I was still getting over with the pants comment.
Up first, let's talk about the mission to Libya. British Prime Minister, David Cameron and French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, are in Tripoli this morning, meeting with the country's interim leaders. It's their first visit since Moammar Gadhafi was driven from power.
In the meantime U.S. officials are concerned that the post Gadhafi Libya could become a breeding ground for terrorists. CNN's Barbara Starr is following that angle of the story. She's live at the Pentagon this morning. How concerned are they?
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Carol. You know, even as these ties grow with the new Libyan government, U.S. intelligence officials say they are concerned that terrorists might be moving into Libya and setting up shop.
What they are talking about, they tell us, is not, you know, hundreds of Al Qaeda fighters moving in. But during this period of uncertainty in Libya they do see evidence that perhaps dozens of extremists have basically moved into Libya and set up a bit of an organization and looking to establish their own networks, their own controls, and while the rest of the world is still trying to get used to the new Libya and the very fledging government is trying to get organized.
And of course this is a concern because Libya is a country where there are perhaps hundreds of surface-to-air missiles, thousands of small arms, a lot of weapons out of anybody's control. So terrorists moving in becomes an increasing concern now. Carol?
COSTELLO: So are there also concerns that these terrorists could be working inside the national transitional council?
STARR: Yes. You know, they tell us that they don't think it is anything official but that people with those types of sympathies certainly may be affiliating themselves with the new government. And look, this is just one part of North Africa now, if will you. Just yesterday the top U.S. military commander for relation with Africa said he was concerned that Al Qaeda was setting up an alliance of convenience, if you will, in Nigeria, in Somalia, in -- across North Africa. So North Africa becomes a growing area of new concern now about Al Qaeda's setting up shop. Carol?
COSTELLO: Yes. And just to note for our viewers, happening right now in Libya, the British prime minister and French president are speaking along with the National Transitional Council, the new leaders of Libya, if you will. We're monitoring this and we will pass along what they say. Thank you very much, Barbara Starr.
ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: A story we have been talking about this morning, a federal stimulus loan to a solar company has Republicans demanding an explanation. Taxpayers are ticked off, too, because you are all on the hook for more than a half a billion dollars.
Here's why. It is a company called Solyndra. It's a solar panel manufacturer in California that just declared bankruptcy after receiving $535 million in federal stimulus money from your tax dollars. The White House tried to defend its decision to award the loan, providing more fodder for Republicans.
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REP. STEVE SCALISE, (R) LOUISIANA: Just Solyndra alone was touted to create 3,000 jobs. The president touted that. It will be a great success story. Of course we have seen the failure there. A lot of us are questioning this kind of double down, son of stimulus approach where they will come back and do more of this kind of same failed policy of just spending money we don't have.
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VELSHI: Dan Lothian is live at the White House this morning. Dan, what's the administration's response to this?
DAN LOTHIAN, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: They are pushing back on the criticism and mounting questions about the deal. Remember this is a program that the administration had been pushing for quite some time. Remember, the groundbreaking are the vice president was there along with other dignitaries. Later President Obama visited the company, touting it as part of the green energy future.
But there are those e-mails that suggest that there were questions about this deal being rushed in order to meet a timeline. There was one e-mail from a White House staffer saying, quote, "I would prefer that this announcement be postponed. This is the first loan guarantee and we should have full review with all hands on deck to make sure we get it right." Another e-mail from a Department of Energy staffer saying in part, quote, "The model runs out of cash in September 2011."
In an off-camera briefing with reporters yesterday White House spokesman Jay Carney says the e-mails show there was an urgency to make a decision about a scheduling matter. And he offered another defense as well in a briefing more than a week ago where he said that in business not everything works.
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JAY CARNEY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: There are no guarantees in the business world about success and failure. That's just the way business works, and everyone recognizes that. That's why there's over 40 companies, as I understand it, 40 guarantees involved in this program that merit looking at. There's no individual -- you cannot measure the success based on one company or the other.
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LOTHIAN: Carney said that there's no evidence to suggest the administration did anything wrong. He pointed out to reporters that the program through which this loan guarantee passed through was set up by the former administration. But the bottom line here is that we are talking about federal stimulus dollars, and there are a lot of questions this morning about how that money was spent, Ali.
VELSHI: All right, Dan. And then of course the questions con to arise as to whether this was a business problem or a problem of his connections. The Bush administration did look into this and didn't approve it initially. Thanks, Dan.
ROMANS: Also the story of China, competition from China. They are ahead of us on some of these technologies. And where we go to support an industry, the Chinese have much more cash behind them.
VELSHI: Should we not support fledgling industries? ROMANS: Well, there was an interesting op-ed this morning that said that Henry Ford said the beautiful thing about America, I'm paraphrasing, is failure, because then after you fail you turn around and do it more intelligently the next time.
VELSHI: The problem is we made failure into something that's very dangerous. We can't afford it as much.
ROMANS: How about this time --
COSTELLO: It takes a long time to develop green technology. It is not like we have a lot of places in which to implement it. So that industry is going to have a few failures and a few successes.
ROMANS: Except so many other countries are ahead of us on it that at some point do we ever catch up? And for the first time some people are saying for the first time we are noted the leader in a new industry or new innovation. That's been a place -- an uncomfortable place to be.
VELSHI: It's definitely a story that sort of concentrates a number of different issues as to whether we should be doing this or not.
ROMANS: New this morning, Dakota Meyer set to receive the Medal of Honor from President Obama today. The 23-year-old former marine from Kentucky cited for charging through heavy gunfire five separate times to rescue other servicemen during an ambush in Afghanistan back in 2009. He is credited with saving 36 lives. Meyer and president already met, the White House release thing photo two of the men talking over a couple of beers last night on the patio outside the Oval Office. Congratulations, young man. We thank you.
COSTELLO: Definitely so.
An official from Oman reportedly trying to negotiate the release of those two American hikers jailed in Iran. There have been conflicting reports from the Iranian government about whether or not Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer may be allowed to go free, though a lawyer for the two hikers tells CNN he has filed all of the necessary paperwork for them to be released.
VELSHI: A GOP meeting of the minds in New York City -- campaign frontrunner Rick Perry having dinner with Donald Trump. A Perry spokesman says the two talked mainly about jobs. The Donald back in June decided not to enter the Republican presidential race. He says he has not ruled out a third party run. He says if they don't come up with the right candidate may get back into the race.
COSTELLO: It looks like they went to some burger joint.
ROMANS: That's Jean George.
The scare on a United Airlines flight minutes before takeoff at Dulles International Airport. Passengers had to hustle out of the emergency slide after they spotted smoke coming from an engine, and the told the flight crew. One passenger tweeted "I am shaking. People were screaming." Still not clear whether the engine did catch fire, but Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who is 78 and battled cancer, she was one of the 179 passengers forced to slide down the chute. A court spokesperson says she's OK this morning.
COSTELLO: She is pretty tough.
VELSHI: Justices tend to be very calm and tough. I wonder if an environment --
ROMANS: She was weighing the pros and cons.
COSTELLO: I don't think she was doing that, actually.
VELSHI: She is a very tough woman. She's very impressive.
COSTELLO: A father accused of throwing his 7-year-old son overboard during a boat cruise along the California coast has now been charged with child abuse. Police say Sloan Briles was drinking before he tossed the boy 10 feet over the side of the boat. Briles claims the boy did it on his own just to show off and they were just rough housing before it happened. Someone on a nearby boat, though, ended up rescuing the boy.
VELSHI: And you can rest easy this morning. It turns out "Real Housewives of D.C." star Mikail Salahi, they one made famous for crashing the White House dinner party in 2009, she wasn't kidnapped as her husband suspected yesterday. It turns out she has run to Journey's guitarist Neal Schoen with open arms. According to Schoen's management, a sheriff's deputy has spoken Mikail. She is said to be in good friend and did not want her husband to know where she was.
COSTELLO: Couldn't someone have written that whole thing in Journey lyrics? That would have been fun.
ROMANS: I bet it will turn into a celebrity show. The walk she does, I think it was at a state dinner for the Indian prime minister. I think it is funny she keeps going, she stops him, he follows her. She knew how to walk the photographer line.
Nine minutes after the hour.
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ROMANS: Still to come this morning, 46 million people in poverty last year. So what can be done to lift people out of poverty and fix the jobs problem, give the middle class opportunity again? We are going to talk to Stephen Moore of the "Wall Street Journal."
COSTELLO: And Jackie Kennedy uncensored. A 1964 interview with the former first lady released to the public for the first time, and boy is it raising a lot of eyebrows.
VELSHI: And meet the replacement for the shuttle, the fastest rocket ever built unveiled by NASA. You are watching "American morning." we will tell you about it on the other side. It's 12 minutes after the hour. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROMANS: Welcome back to AMERICAN MORNING.
They may be your family members, friends, neighbors, co-workers, former co-workers, and according to the Census Bureau, 46 million people lived in poverty last year. The middle class is slipping in earnings power and in opportunity.
And today, we've got the president out pitching his jobs plan. So what's it going to take to get people working again?
Joining me now to talk about this and more, Stephen Moore, Senior Economics Writer for the "Wall Street Journal" Editorial Page. Nice to see you again, Stephen.
STEPHEN MOORE, SENIOR ECONOMICS WRITER, "WALL STREET JOURNAL" EDITORIAL PAGE: Hi, Christine. Great to be with you.
ROMANS: You know, what's the fix here? Because we look at numbers like these poverty and income statistics that everyone is talking about this week. And you get - you get people who support the president's policy saying this is why you have to have this jobs bill. The people who - who disagree with the president saying no, no, no, no, we've got big structural problems. These are just band-aids.
MOORE: Yes. Christine, when I looked at that report, everybody has been talking about the poverty rate, which was pretty grim. But, you know, the bigger problem I think is you look at that - that new report is that over the past decade, the middle class has actually lost income. So it really has been a lost decade for middle class families.
And what that means is that middle class workers are not getting pay raises keeping up with inflation. And it's been a long time since they had a real pay raise.
So the question, of course, is what do we do about it? You know, I'm somewhat skeptical of the president's jobs plan. We have a lot of borrowing out there already. The federal government has already slated to borrow $1.2 trillion this year.
There was kind of a surprise dropped on Monday when the president - you - remember, you and I talked about this over the weekend that the tax cuts were small businesses, but then it was announced there's going to be a big tax increase to pay for it. I'm not sure I understand the logic of a tax cut now for small businesses. But then in 2013, they get walloped with a big tax increase.
ROMANS: So I knew you and your friends at the "Wall Street Journal" editorial board are consistent in your opposition to the president trying to raise taxes or - or do anything in terms of raising revenue on that front.
I want to talk about unemployment benefits, though, because part of the president's plan would be to extend unemployment benefits again, but really encourage what they call, the White House calls innovation. New ways to get people working while they are on unemployment benefits this.
MOORE: Right.
ROMANS: Even try to start a company while they're on -
MOORE: Right.
ROMANS: -- unemployment benefits, doing - you know, working for free for another company while they're on unemployment benefits. But you don't like the extent of unemployment benefits here.
MOORE: Well, Christine, I do think that that would be an improvement what you just described. At least, you know, providing training or other types of incentives for people to get jobs while they're unemployed.
The problem with unemployment insurance, I think, the data is pretty clear on this over the last 10, 15 years that Congress has found the longer you extend unemployment insurance for workers, the more people stay unemployed. They don't start looking for work until the unemployment benefits run out.
ROMANS: But are people unemployed because there aren't any jobs? I mean, I guess that -
MOORE: Well, of course.
ROMANS: -- (INAUDIBLE) recently said to me -
MOORE: Yes.
ROMANS: -- that look at all these people who voted for Obama who were sitting on their couches eating Cheetos and just getting unemployment benefits. There's no incentive to work. There are no jobs. There aren't any jobs.
MOORE: That's - well, that's true. I mean, it's true that the president's stimulus plan didn't create any jobs. There's no doubt about that.
ROMANS: No, no. It created jobs not as many as they wanted.
MOORE: Well, for whatever purpose, I mean, think about it in these - these terms. You've got people that are working. A lot of people are out there working. And, Christine, as you know, a lot of people working two or three jobs -
ROMANS: Yes.
MOORE: -- 60 hours a week. Why should they have to pay more taxes to pay for people who aren't going out and getting a job? So, look, I think there are - it's a very tough labor market out there right now. But, you know, people have to be looking. They've got to do the extra work to get those jobs. ROMANS: Yes.
MOORE: This is a tough - this is a tough period. I mean, I'm very sympathetic to people that don't have jobs. But two years, do you really think we should be giving people benefits for two years for not working?
I think - I think one of the reasons, by the way, that we've seen a record number of people without jobs for six months, 45 percent of people without jobs have been out of a job for six months, partly because we provide those unemployment benefits.
ROMANS: You know, I mean, and you and I, we can argue - argue and agree and disagree and argue some more about it.
But I want to quickly ask you about Solyndra, this solar company that got stimulus money. This has been - it's now being held up as this big - this big example of why stimulus didn't work.
MOORE: Yes.
ROMANS: It is just one example. And we -- didn't we know that when we would be funding all these companies that some are going to make it and some wouldn't?
MOORE: Well, Christine, I heard your previous discussion about this and I was kind of wincing a little bit. Because, you know, I thought the one thing you and I agreed on is we shouldn't have corporate welfare in Washington.
I mean, why - you know, my friend, Ali and I talk about this a lot. Why should the federal government be picking winners and losers? I mean, this is why we have venture capital industry.
You know, the president talks a lot about getting rid of the oil and gas subsidies. And I'm all for that. If oil and gas is getting subsidies, let's get rid of them. But why don't we just get rid of all the subsidies for ethanol, for wind, for solar, for all these things. Get rid of the corporate welfare. Let the market pick the winners and losers. Government has never - have never been very good at picking corporate winners and losers. It's just a way of providing benefits to business.
And by the way, I hate to say this, Christine, but I do think there is a connection here between the contributions those executives - Solyndra (ph) is getting and the fact that this company looks like it was pushed front in line to get this $500 million, which, by the way, taxpayers are not going to get a penny of return on.
ROMANS: Well, we know there are multiple investigations going on and we'll get to the bottom of what exactly did happen with it. And we do know even though you're saying no more corporate welfare, we know that some of countries that we're competing with around the world, they are spending as much money as they can to get ahead of us.
MOORE: Yes, but Christine - ROMANS: That all of the (INAUDIBLE) create jobs, but their middle class (INAUDIBLE).
MOORE: What about the natural gas revolution? I mean, what's going on? You read my column last week on what's going on on natural gas all over this country, in states like Pennsylvania, West Virginia. We're getting unbelievable amounts of energy from that -
ROMANS: Right.
MOORE: -- and not a penny of subsidies.
ROMANS: Stephen Moore, another great conversation. Wide ranging as always.
MOORE: Great to see you.
ROMANS: Stephen Moore from the "Wall Street Journal." Thanks, Stephen.
MOORE: I'll see you soon.
COSTELLO: That was spirited.
VELSHI: Yes.
COSTELLO: I enjoyed that.
Now is your chance to talk back on one of the big stories of the day. The question for you this morning, what would it say to you if Congress took a pay cut?
Don't laugh. Stop it. A nonpartisan group called the Taxpayers Protection Alliance sent this letter to lawmakers urging them to cut their extravagant salaries of $174,000 a year by 10 percent. They say it would save taxpayers $100 million over 10 years.
Before you say fat chance, Democratic Congressman Sherrod Brown - Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown, I should say, has introduced legislation calling on lawmakers to wait until the age of 66 before receiving a pension. Right now, lawmakers can retire as early as age 50 with a full pension depending on years of service.
I know, you're still laughing because you've heard this before, right? Last February, as Americans faced the possibility of a government shutdown, Senator Barbara Boxer had a dandy idea.
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SEN. BARBARA BOXER (D), CALIFORNIA: If the government is forced to shut down, members of Congress and the president should be treated the same way as all other federal employees. We should not be paid.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Well, the government didn't shut down so I guess Congress got a pass on that. But seriously, if lawmakers did take a pay cut or raise their retirement age, dare I say it, would that be patriotic? Responsible? Moral? We'd like to hear it from you.
So "Talkback" question today, what would it say to you if Congress took a pay cut? Facebook.com/AmericanMorning, Facebook.com/AmericanMorning. I'll read your comments later this hour.
VELSHI: All right. Still to come this morning, Jackie Kennedy uncensored. A 1964 interview with the former First Lady released to the public. Want to hear what she had to say about Martin Luther King, Jr.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: Twenty-six minutes after the hour. Welcome back. "Minding Your Business" this morning.
Swiss banking giant UBS says it's discovered an unauthorized trade that cost the bank $2 billion. London Police say they've arrest a 31- year-old man for fraud, but will not confirm that it's related. The bank says the loss could push its balance sheet into the red in the third quarter of this year.
A check in on the markets right now, U.S. stock futures for the Dow, NASDAQ and S&P 500 are all trading higher ahead of the opening bell. This after markets closed higher for a third day in a row yesterday.
And pushing markets higher in Europe. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are vowing support for the Greece bailout. The two leaders held a conference call with Greece's Prime Minister George Papandreou late yesterday. The three insist Greece will remain in the Euro zone.
UPS unveiling a new online alert system for package deliveries. You can now sign up to receive a call, an e-mail or a text the day before and UBS will give - UPS will give you a four-hour window for when to expect the delivery.
Investors still flocking to gold, but would you invest in a gold cell phone? One Danish retailer thinks so. They're offering an 18-karat solid gold phone for about $60,000. The drawback is that the phone doesn't have any apps, e-mail or mobile Internet. It does have the cutting-edge technology of call forwarding, speed dial. And it's got a nifty little calculator on it.
Don't forget, for the very latest news about your money, check out the all-new CNNMoney.com.
AMERICAN MORNING will be back right after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: It is 30 minutes past the hour. Good morning to you. Welcome back. The White House is trying to defend its decision to award a $535 million stimulus loan to the Solyndra Corporation. The California solar panel company is now bankrupt with taxpayers on the hook for all of that money. The FBI and the Energy Department now investigating.
ROMANS: An official from Oman is flying to Iran to negotiate the freedom for two American hikers convicted of spying and sentenced to eight years in prison in Iran.
Yesterday, the Iranian judiciary said it was only considering a request to set bail contradicting the Iranian president's earlier statement that the men could be freed in a couple of days.
In the meantime, a lawyer for the two hikers says that he's filed all the paperwork for them to be released, but he does not expect the judges to act it before this weekend.
VELSHI: British Prime Minister David Cameron and French President Nicholas Sarkozy in Libya this morning to meet with leaders of Libya's National Transitional Council.
Cameron says the NATO mission must continue until to all civilians are protected and Libya's allies will help bring fugitive leader Moammar Gadhafi to justice.
COSTELLO: Have you heard the Jacqueline Kennedy tapes? Historians are having a field day with them.
ROMANS: That's right. The former first lady in her own words, in her own voice, and answering questions on tape four months after the assassination of her husband, John F. Kennedy. The interview has been kept under wraps for nearly 50 years until now.
COSTELLO: They are just so fascinating. Deb Feyerick is here to share, please.
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Once you start listening, it is very hard to stop. You know, it is so interesting because she had such strong opinions and impressions. She knew she was being recorded for history.
So in some ways maybe she did hold back. What's refreshing is the candor. This wispy, gentle voice expressing what she felt after her husband won the presidency, for example, she describes Richard Nixon's wife as looking exhausted like a cadaver, terribly bitter.
She describes one of the cabinet members as a man, quote, "terribly afraid to make a decision." She weighs in on Indira Gandhi calling her a real prune and she was taken aback by civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.'s private life.
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JACKIE KENNEDY: What I said what an incredible speaker he was during that freedom watch and you know, acknowledged how he made the call during the campaign. He told me the tape the FBI had of Martin Luther King when he was here for the freedom march. How he was calling up all these girls and arranging for a party, men and women, I mean, sort of an orgy in the hotel and everything. At first he said, well, you know, but Jack, that's so terrible. I mean, that man, you know, a phony man.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FEYERICK: You know, the people she liked she called sweet. You sense how people became entranced by this very refine and very elegant young woman who was just in her early 30s. JFK's affairs are legendary.
Listening to her speak it is clear she loves her husband. She describes her excitement buying her gifts and how we would call her from the campaign trail when she was home pregnant with Caroline and John John. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KENNEDY: I was always a liability to him until we got to the White House and he never asked me to change or say anything bit. Everyone thought I was a snob from Newport who had bouffant hair and French clothes and hated politics.
Only because I was often having these babies I wasn't able to campaign and be around as much as I could have. Jack, I wish, you know -- I'm so sorry that I'm just such a -- I knew it wasn't true. He didn't want me to change. He knew I loved him and everything I could. I campaigned with him and did it very hard.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FEYERICK: And what so interesting is you can hear various ambient noises like the plane there in the background. You hear John John at times coming in and talking to his mom or the -- ice clinking glasses.
But Jackie Kennedy really defined the role of the first lady. She undertook a complete restoration of the White House, returning it to this jewel of American history. She says while she feared that the presidency might ruin her marriage. In fact, she said was the happiest time of her life.
You really listen to her evolving and learning from her husband. There is one -- something I love. She was carrying a grudge around, somebody who had been angry at John Kennedy. And so he -- she says Jack was so sweet.
He sort of rubbed my back and said if you start to say or think you hate someone then the next day you will act as if you hate him. So he was saying don't do this. It is not worthy. He was really very political and she really learned from all of that.
ROMANS: Her daughter, Caroline, who approved all of them in their entirety being published now 50 years after the presidency. She said that she could hear her mother's voice and knew what she was thinking by the way she was saying things. And it was actually kind of a communion between the two of them listening to these tapes again. FEYERICK: When you hear that voice and saying, she was a real prune, there's no real anger or hatred, rancor. You know, that kind of tone that we intend hear a lot these days that's absent in her voice.
COSTELLO: It wasn't very nice.
FEYERICK: It was not nice, but it certainly not nasty. It's lacking in nastiness almost and that's I think what I found --
COSTELLO: Actually, it is her way of speaking that intrigues me because does anyone talk like that anymore? I mean, it is like they talked in the movies.
ROMANS: It is finishing school. Like the finishing school upper crest.
FEYERICK: Absolutely. It was a time when women were not overly prominent in politics. They didn't have that kind of strong voice. It does that mean she was not a strong woman.
In fact, she was a very strong woman. She had to undergo a lot. So it is just fascinating to listen to this time in history and her perspective as a wife, as somebody that close to the president.
ROMANS: Wow.
VELSHI: You don't like the whole prude thing. You don't think it is a nice way of calling something one a prude.
COSTELLO: No. I'm just being honest also new this morning. Thank you, Deb. That was really fascinating.
Also new this morning, the New England Patriots in damage control mode after quarterback Tom Brady told fans to start drinking early and get lubed up for the home opener on Sunday.
Well, after Tom Brady said that, the Patriots media relations came out in full force and says, Tom Brady didn't really mean to start drinking alcohol. He meant to say water so that they could stay hydrated during the game.
VELSHI: It is hot out there.
COSTELLO: Because that's what tailgating is all about.
VELSHI: Right.
ROMANS: Sarah the sea turtle back home where she belongs. She is an endangered logger head found last month off the Florida Keys.
VELSHI: This is an extra.
ROMANS: She nearly died. Veterinarians were able to save her. Yesterday she was released back into the water. Locals are offering $16,000 reward to anyone that has information that leads to the arrest of the very mean prune who speared her. VELSHI: That's crazy. That's 150 pounds, 160 pounds something that turtle.
Some new weird and whacky records have been set. Take a look at this. Her name is Chanel Tapper.
COSTELLO: I can't look at that.
VELSHI: That is some tongue. She just set the Guinness World Record for the longest tongue.
COSTELLO: Please don't that. She will do it again.
VELSHI: Come on. Come on. OK. It's 3.8 inches from tip to her top lip. I guess that's how you measure a tongue. By the way, that's not -- check out this record.
I'm going to move on from this tongue thing. The Super 11 Circus test set the record for the most dogs skipping jump rope.
COSTELLO: That's ridiculous.
VELSHI: My goodness me. That's interesting.
COSTELLO: It is only 7:38 in the morning.
Still ahead, taken it to the streets, one man's mission to improve the rude prude and obnoxious behavior. His fellow New Yorkers telling him pull your pants up, among other things.
ROMANS: No one wants to see your underwear.
VELSHI: That's it.
ROMANS: And today Roman numeral 1500. It has nothing to do with gold. It has to do with how smart generation Y is. It's 38 minutes after the hour.
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ROMANS: Romans numeral, a number in the news today. The number is 1,500.
VELSHI: Gold.
ROMANS: It has to do with how smart generation Y is. It's the average SAT score for the class of 2011. Guess what. It is going down. That's six points lower than last year, down 18 points from 2006. In case you are wondering, a perfect score is 2400.
VELSHI: One day I will say gold and I'm going to have it right.
ROMANS: And now I'm going to find a good gold.
VELSHI: Does that buck the trend? The going down six points? Have we sort of been stable? ROMANS: No. We haven't been stable. We've been slowly going down.
COSTELLO: You could argue that the SAT does not predict intelligence or how smart your kid is. It is just a test they take and learn how to take the test and memorize stuff.
VELSHI: I have been using that defense for years. The I.Q. test is all messed up, too.
ROMANS: So is the scale.
VELSHI: Testing in general I not a good reflection of my abilities.
All right, talking about school, school year begins in Los Angeles. Many of the students return in classrooms powered by the sun.
COSTELLO: Yes, powered by the sun. Schools are counting on big investments in solar power to help ease the impact of severe budget cuts. Yes, solar power. CNN's Casey Wian has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Solar panel is going up on a car port at Bird Middle School. The Los Angeles Unified School District plans to install solar power at 59 facilities by the end of next year to reduce its more than $100 million annual energy bill.
MONICA GARCIA, BOARD PRESIDENT, LAUSD: We will be able to save $114 million over the next 20 years. What that means to me is less dollars going to facilities and more dollars going to kids.
WIAN: Garcia says her district has lost $2 billion in state fund cutbacks over the past two years and laid off 10,000 employees. But it does have voter approved bond money available for capital improvement projects.
It is using some of that to invest in solar power. Banking on energy costs reductions to free up general fund money for things like teacher's salaries.
GARCIA: Kids aren't coming to board members to tell us you know how much energy we waste? Kids are coming to board members to say why don't we have solar panels on all the campuses.
WIAN (on camera): Next month, these solar panels will be providing electricity at this Los Angeles middle school. Schools are benefiting from a sharp drop in the price of solar panels. Thanks in part to increased competition from Chinese manufacturers. That's good for school budgets, but a big challenge for the U.S. solar industry.
(voice-over): Three U.S. solar manufacturers filed for bankruptcy last month. Some U.S. companies are thriving. Sun Power is installing more than 90 power solar systems at California schools this year. State and federal incentives help schools finance the projects.
BILL KELLY, SUNPOWER: Schools are capitalizing on that. And one of the ways they are capitalizing on that is borrowing money at very low interest rates and investing in solar with that borrowed money. Then in turn, they are getting savings from the solar projects, which pay back that investment and then some.
WIAN: Ten thousand solar panels are going in at five schools in the San Ramon Valley Unified School District. It expects to save $1 million to $2 million the first year, a small fraction of the district's budget, the savings that will grow over the life of the project.
KERRY KOEHNE, SAN RAMON VALLEY UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT: It saved our community money. It saved our school district money in a time in which we desperately need it. And it also helps us to reduce the carbon footprint. So, n our mind, this is a no-brainer.
WIAN: Casey Wian, CNN, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Something a little different on the sidewalks of New York, street signs alerting people to rude behavior and then urging them to mind their manners. They say things like "Pull up your pants" and "No one wants to see your underwear."
(LAUGHTER)
Other signs read "clean up after your horse. And pay attention" -- I guess that means for the horses and the carriages along Central Park.
ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: Right, as opposed to the normal New Yorkers that ride around on horses.
(LAUGHTER)
COSTELLO: OK, whatever. "Pay attention while walking," that's another sign. The signs are not official. They are actually the work of a graphic artist who's dubbed himself the Metropolitan Etiquette Authority.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: So pretty.
VELSHI: I don't know where he is putting them that that's just allowed, that you can just stick signs up. Is it part of an art installation or --
COSTELLO: He's going to get fined.
(LAUGHTER)
VELSHI: Yes.
(LAUGHTER)
COSTELLO: We'll dig into that for you, Velshi.
VELSHI: All right, still to come, something else we're going to dig into, Texas Governor Rick Perry could be your next president. So we want to know a little bit more about him. Stick around. I'm going to talk to -- to -- "Time" magazine, by the way, had an exclusive in- depth interview with the candidate. And we're going to get a sneak peak. I'm going to talk to somebody who wrote a profile about him after the break.
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ROMANS: Here's what you need to start your day.
An update on that engine fire on a cruise ship off the coast of Norway. We've learned two crew members died. Six crew members are still being treated for injuries. You are looking at a new video of that ship. We are told all 207 passengers are safe and back on shore in the town of Elton (ph).
A lawyer for the two American hikers jailed in Iran says he's filed all the necessary paperwork for them to be released on bail. But the lawyer does not expect the judges to act on it before Saturday.
NASA announcing plans to build the most powerful rocket ever, with its first flight scheduled for the end of 2017. It is called SLS. It is designed to take astronauts to unprecedented distances in space, perhaps even as far as mars. The cost, $18 billion over the next six years.
Cooler weather even some sleet and snow helping firefighters in Minnesota battle wildfire that's consumed some 160 square miles near the Canadian border. Plumes of smoke from the massive fire have now drifted into Wisconsin, Michigan and Illinois.
Teachers in Tacoma, Washington, expected to return to their classrooms today after walking off the job Monday. A state court judge has ordered them to end the strike that school administrators claim is illegal.
You're caught up on the day's headlines. AMERICAN MORNING is back in 60 seconds.
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VELSHI: All right, we're going in depth now on the rise of Governor Rick Perry. He had a Texas-size bull's eye on his back at Monday night's CNN Tea Party debate. The attacks only confirming that he is the frontrunner right now at least for the nomination. But many Americans, especially those who will vote in the general election, are only starting to find out who he is.
Joining us now is David von Drehle. He wrote the cover story on Governor Perry on this week's issue of "Time."
David, good to see you. Thank you for being with us.
DAVID VON DREHLE, EDITOR-AT-LARGE, TIME MAGAZINE: Morning, Ali.
VELSHI: David, you know, when you look at Rick Perry, there are all sorts of people have an imprecision of him one way or the other. But, in fact, he's a -- he's an exercise in contradictions. He's got views that span the political spectrum. It's not just the Texas swagger. What did you learn when writing this?
DREHLE: Well, the thing that struck me about Rick Perry is that he's a different breed of cat than we're used to seeing in presidential politics because he has never been sort of passed through the institutions of the American establishment. He never went to an Ivy League college or a military academy. He's a graduate of Texas A&M, which is outside, even for Texas, which prides itself on being outside. He grew up on a cotton farm really in the middle of nowhere in west central Texas. So, he -- he comes at American society and the issues of modern America from a very different perspective. He's very skeptical of centralized power and, you know -- but, at the same time, as you say, he's been governor of Texas longer than anyone in history. And that's an insider's job. So this contrast of inside and outside.
VELSHI: It is interesting. You say a cotton farm, and before anyone begins to wonder what that means, it was not even irrigated. It's what you call dry cotton farming. He said the only time he remembers his mother crying is when they bought the one new thing they ever bought, which was a couch. First member of his family ever to attend college.
And he has -- he's got some policies -- he's implemented some things in Texas that real conservatives and social conservatives wouldn't agree with. The idea of letting people who are not -- you know, who are children of illegal immigrants pay in-state tuition, the Gardasil controversy. How is he going to square this in the run up to a nomination where he has to convince social conservatives and Tea Party members to support him?
DREHLE: Well, this is the great question for the Republican Party in this election. They have so much unfocused sort of unformed energy on the right in the Tea Party. But this is a movement that has never participated in nominating a presidential candidate before. They weren't around even in 2008. So, the issue for them is going to be, are they going to try to find the perfect candidate from their perspective, or are they going to join in the selection of a candidate who potentially can win?
VELSHI: Right.
DREHLE: We saw on at the last debate, you know, just as you pointed out, a ganging up on Rick Perry over every sort of non-orthodox right wing position he's ever taken. And what you realistically know is, if you govern a diverse state like Texas, you're going to have to take positions that are not always right out of the Tea Party bible.
VELSHI: Let me ask you about this. When he was attacked by Michele Bachmann for taking a donation from Merck, the maker of Gardasil, about this HPV vaccination, and his response was, and I'm quoting, "It was a $500,000 contribution that I received from them. I raise about $30 million dollars. If you're saying I can be bought for $5,000, I'm offended." Turns out, it wasn't just a $5,000 donation, was it? DREHLE: No, it was about six times that, close to $30,000 over the decade. There's a tremendous amount of money sloshes around Texas politics. Campaign finance there is incredibly unregulated. And Rick Perry -- you know, this is the insider version of him. Rick Perry is a master at raising large amounts of money. And the Texas government is full of people who have supported him, who are his friends, as they say in politics. We're going to see a lot of this. This will not be the only story of campaign donors who have gone on to get contracts or to get, you know, board positions, commissioner positions in Texas.
VELSHI: There are virtually no executive positions in Texas that he hasn't touched, six of the nine top judges there.
David, great cover story, great article, great coverage of it.
David von Drehle, editor-at-large at "Time." It's the cover story this week.
DREHLE: Thank you.
COSTELLO: Thank you, sir.
(LAUGHTER)
We asked you to talk back on one of the stories of the day. The question we asked you this morning: What would it say to you if Congress took a pay cut?
This from Kevin, "Certainly not. Do we cut the pay for police officers when there's more crime? Do we lower the pay for teachers when test scores drop? No, we do the opposite. We should create incentives to attract better and brighter candidates. I'm sure there are many more qualified, capable individuals who never give a thought to running precisely because they can make a much better living in the private sector."
This from Elizabeth, "It's about time our Congress, Democrats and Republicans, make a personal sacrifice by reducing their salaries voluntarily. That would be a positive step and show this country they're willing to do their part to help. Let's see how many are willing to take this challenge."
And this from Karen, "I think Congress should cut their salaries to minimum wage with no benefits, overtime, sick leave or paid vacations, et cetera. After all, isn't this what they're asking Americans to do? They should lead by example. And this bill should be retroactive to 2009. Shared sacrifice means Congress, president, vice president, et cetera, too."
Don't think that's going to happen, Karen, but keep the conversation going, Facebook.com/Americanmorning.
ROMANS: Best one I got, somebody said they should have to live on the average unemployment check and then have to go and beg for it every six months like unemployment people do --
(LAUGHTER)
VELSHI: While I don't think that is going to do a lot to recruit some of the best minds to Congress, there's something to be said for that exercise, not just for Congress for a whole lot of people understanding that, as we get into debates about whether we should extend unemployment and how long people should get it, just try living on it for a little while.
ROMANS: Yes, exactly.
COSTELLO: Just as a symbolic gesture.
VELSHI: I like it. I think it's really worth while.
ROMANS: Ahead next hour, Grammy-wining rapper, Common, is here.
(CROSSTALK)
ROMANS: Talk about his new memoir. It's written so beautifully. Growing up on the south side of Chicago, attending Reverend Jeremiah's church, and how much the black community still has in President Obama.
You are watching AMERICAN MORNING. It's 57 minutes after the hour.
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