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SOTU: What's Obama Trying To Do?; White House Takes SOTU Message To Social Media; Tracking A Terrorist's Widow; Study: Too Much Sitting Is Bad For You

Aired January 20, 2015 - 07:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Almost half past the hour here on NEW DAY, here's a look at your headlines.

Breaking this morning: another chilling ISIS video surfaces. This time, the lives of two Japanese men are at stake, in exchange for $200 million. The jihadist in the video warns Japan's prime minister he has 72 hours to comply or those men will be beheaded. The prime minister of Japan responded by saying the international community shouldn't give in, but he stopped short of denying that Japan would consider paying that ransom.

An international manhunt continues for the suspected ringleader of the Belgian terror cell that was targeted in a deadly raid last week. Authorities believe his last-known location is Greece. Anti-terror agents in Brussels also confirming a connection between the cell and ISIS. There's mounting concern this morning that surviving members of the group may seek revenge.

Drama surrounding the sudden death of an Argentine prosecutor who had accused the country's president of working with Iran in the country's worst-ever terror attack.

Alberto Nisman was found in his apartment dead from a gunshot wound to the head it happened just hours before he was expected to give damning testimony against President Christina Kirchner. At this point officials say all signs point to suicide. However opposition party leaders are calling this an assassination.

Earthlings, I assume Chris and Alisyn that you are indeed earthlings -- or are you beings from another planet. The truth is finally out there on the web. Nearly 130,000 pages of declassified Air Force records on UFO sightings are now online.

UFO enthusiast, John Greenwald, spent two decades appealing to the government for access to these documents. He just posted the fabled files known as "Project Blue Book" as well as the 1940s "Project Sign" and "Project Grudge" on his online database want to know where the two of you stand if indeed you are earthlings.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Well, I'm intrigued. Which one of us is going to pore through the 130,000 pages? Chris, do you have time tonight?

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: I have time, but not to do that. Do you think there will be anything in it that gives a real certainty to the unknown of what was seen in the air like this could only be something that we've never seen before?

PEREIRA: Depending on who you ask, depending on where you stand on is there life out there.

CUOMO: And the government would put that in their files if there were such a thing? Very suspicious as they say down in Washington, D.C. namely a man named John King says that a lot, suspicious, the "Inside Politics" now on NEW DAY. What do you think? UFOs, up or down?

JOHN KING, CNN HOST, "INSIDE POLITICS": I'm going through the files to find my way home.

CAMEROTA: Back to the mother ship.

CUOMO: I'm sorry -- with the deflated ball, that's got to hurt, John.

KING: Deflated ball is just whining, I was at the game. They got thumped. That's what happens. Super Bowl time, let's move on. Let's be uniters, not dividers.

Let's get "Inside Politics" this morning on State Of The Union day here in Washington. With me to share their reporting and their insights are Lisa Lerer of "Bloomberg" and Ed O'Keefe of the "Washington Post."

There's a lot of discussion in part because the White House leaked so much of the details early probably discussed not just leaked the details early of the president's State Of The Union Address.

So let's get into the whys. The president tonight is going to say let's raise taxes on affluent Americans. He is going to say let's raise fees on big financial institutions and give some of that money back to the middle class, either tax credits or subsidized community college.

He does this Lisa, knowing that the Republicans like none of it and they control both chambers of Congress. So what is the political calculation coming forward with this knowing you're going to get almost nothing?

LISA LERER, "BLOOMBERG NEWS": We're going to see the president in my prediction is we'll see him do two things tonight. One is shore up his legacy. He's going to talk about how the economy recovered. He knows and his advisers know that his tenure in the White House will be judged largely in large part by the economy.

So we're going to see him make the case for how we've come out of the recovery and we're also going to see him and this is part of what you're talking about, lay out the rationale for his party going into 2016. He is still the head of the party for two more years. He wants to set the agenda for what the contours of the presidential debate are going to look like. He wants it to be framed around the issue of inequality as do many in his party.

KING: And so do the Republicans run a risk here, Ed. They just won an election and they won convincingly, 31 governors, majority in the Senate, a bigger majority in the House, where they say they ran against this, they ran against big government, they ran against Washington telling states what to do.

Yet, the president's poll numbers and your poll, "Washington Post"/ABC poll up around 50 percent now. Back at 50 percent, Democrats must be saying why January, why didn't this come last October.

But he's up around 50 percent and people feel better about the direction of the country. Let's look at the drop in wrong track from 2013 to 2015 here.

People, majority still feel we're on the wrong track, but it's way down all of a sudden. So the president is in stronger standing. Do Republicans feel any risk in saying no, no, no.

ED O'KEEFE, "WASHINGTON POST": Absolutely, they do because they've got to prove to the American public over the next two years, just as he's trying to set the agenda for his party ahead of the elections, they've got to set an agenda and demonstrate competence and ability to govern as Mitch McConnell has said, to make it less scary to have a Republican president and a Republican Congress.

And so if he continues to introduce these things that they're not going to agree with and continue to threaten vetoes on things they're moving through the capital at that time. It becomes a real challenge. They're going to have to at some point come up with something.

It's not likely to get discussed tonight. They're going to have to appear to at least give him his moment and then go back to the drawing board and try to come up with something.

LERER: And you know, you've already seen some folks that are talking about running in '16 on the Republican side talking about the inequality issue. This is something that many people in the country are very concerned about.

So this puts them in a rough spot. Do they agree with the president on anything? That's always difficult if you're a Republican to be on the same side as Obama, particularly when you're heading into a Republican primary.

It's not something Iowa voters are very keen on. It puts them in a uniquely challenging position, which, let's be honest, is a little bit the goal here.

KING: Yes, the president is trying to put them in that position. It's interesting to watch, remember, Republicans, this is the first time in the Obama administration. They control both the Senate and the House.

They can't just keep saying no. If they are going to say no, they have to have an alternative. You say especially not just for their party, but going into the 2016 cycle.

One of the interesting things about the State Of The Union address, it's always big theater. There's a question as to whether it's less than it used to be. Let's look at it from the perspective of TV ratings.

Back in 1994, four networks when Bill Clinton addressed the nation, 45.8 million viewers. Last year for President Obama, 13 different networks, 33.3 million viewers.

So more options, but fewer eyeballs, how much of that is a factor in the fact that the president was out for a week or two in advance of the speech saying here's what I'm going to do. And he seems less worried about hitting the international road pretty quickly after thinking it's fine. I've made my case.

LERER: I mean, it's a huge factor. The White House has been calling this a roll-in, rather than a roll-out, and they're trying to get the most publicity possible for these proposals. They understand the way the people consume the State Of The Union or how many people consume the State Of The Union at all has changed.

So they're trying to find other outlets to get that to people. The White House would argue they're saving the institution of the State Of The Union by turning to social media and things like that.

Other people might say look it doesn't seem very presidential to be sitting down with blue-haired YouTube stars, but I think that's the reality of the media world we live in today.

KING: Since you mentioned that, let's take a look, among those, yes, the president has done some traditional media interviews, if you will, in the lead-up and I'm sure he'll do some after the State of the Union address.

But among those who gets to sit down with the president tonight, this was announced last week, if you don't watch YouTube, then you don't know Glozell Green. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GLOZELL GREEN, YOUTUBE CELEBRITY: I have been asked to interview POTUS, the president of the United States of America. I know you're like, what did she just say? I know, the president of the United States. I'm so happy that I watch every episode of "Veep."

I need questions, please, leave your comments and questions in the comment section. I wonder if anybody -- I'm going to play it cool. Yo, what's up? I'm ready, I'm ready!

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: You got to love the lips. A lot of people say this is un- presidential. I remember when the Bill Clinton went on to Arsenio Hall with his saxophone. I think you got to go with the eyeballs are, right? Different people to watch you not just people who always --

O'KEEFE: Remember when he talked to Zach Galifianakis, "Between Two Ferns?" They could measure enough people watch that and then went to sign up for the Affordable Care Act. So to the White House, that's success. If it means talking to a blue-lipped lady, so be it. The other thing to keep in mind --

LERER: Online video viewing.

O'KEEFE: And that's the other thing, the White House itself is doing its own enhanced viewing. If you're not watching CNN, let's be honest, you should be tonight or Bloomberg or washingtonpost.com. They're doing this thing where it's like pop-up videos.

Where they're going to be throwing up charts and graphs at the same time that he's speaking. They believe there's enough of an audience for that, too, now. If it's only 30 million people, they think three million are watching online.

KING: Adopt to the environment you live in whether you like it or not. I guess, quickly on this one, a lot of talk about Mitt Romney last week and Jeb Bush, the establishment. Ted Cruz was in South Carolina at a Tea Party convention, making clear he doesn't think that's the right approach.

Listen to this, he said, if we nominate a candidate in that mold, the same people who stayed home in 2008 and 2012 will stay home in 2016 and the Democrats will win again. He has said this before, but I found it interesting that he sort of made it a point to get some attention right after this Romney/Bush boom.

LERER: Right. Look, the folks on the more conservative side of the party see this Romney/Bush infighting is great for them. Let those guys suck up all the oxygen over there and it will create more opportunities on the right.

Of course, they are going to have their -- it's not like there's an empty field. What are we up to two dozen people who have said they are running for the Republican presidential nomination?

So there are five or six guys on the more right-leaning side of the fence and so they're going to be fighting amongst each other, too.

KING: Ideological splits, generational splits, it will be interesting to watch. We'll let 2016 presidential politics step aside a little bit tonight. When you watch the president tonight, one of the subplots is watch down on the Senate floor for mostly Republicans.

But there's a Bernie Sanders down there. There's a Democrat, Elizabeth Warren. Let's watch how the Democrats who maybe, maybe, might want to run, to react.

CAMEROTA: Let's do that, John. I thought that you were going to show me a little joke about that. But, no, you were being serious.

KING: I was being serious about watching the Democrats, we decided to save the humor for tomorrow.

CAMEROTA: OK, very good. I'll look forward to that. All right, John, thanks so much. Thanks for the preview too.

All right, there's drama and mystery surrounding the global manhunt for the most wanted woman in the world. Where Amedy Coulibaly's wife may be this morning and how she got there.

Plus, is sitting the new smoking? How much sitting puts your life at risk? Dr. Sanjay Gupta is here with what we all need to know.

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CAMEROTA: She is the most wanted woman in the world, the wife of the gunman who slaughtered four innocent victims in that kosher market in Paris. This morning, she is believed to be hiding in Syria. And now we may know how Hayat Boumeddiene got there and who might have helped her.

This is a CNN exclusive. Arwa Damon is on the trail of a terrorist's widow.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hayat Boumeddiene today among Europe's most wanted women. But on January 2nd, before her name was internationally gnome, Boumeddiene and a male companion cleared customs with ease at Istanbul secondary airport.

Yet something raised a red flag with Turkish authorities and the two were placed under surveillance. They checked into this hotel on the Asian side of Istanbul, were monitored for a couple days. But after engaging in what was described as touristic activities, the surveillance stopped. All this happened in the days leading up to the Paris attacks.

(on camera): Following the Paris attacks, the Turks alerted the French that they had already in fact gathered some intelligence on Hayat Boumeddiene. The French then provided the Turks with phone numbers that they were able to use to further track her movements. Hayat Boumeddiene's last-known location was Sanliurfa, along the Turkey/Syria border.

(voice-over): It's become a key hub for transit into Syria. The touristic city saw its population swell due to the refugee influx. Just about anyone can blend into the chaotic streets and from here, there are plenty of routes to the next leg of their journey.

We meet these two men in a town close to the border. They are both professional smugglers. For the last few months, the soldiers have really cracked down, one says. But there are always security breaches and alternate routes to be exploited. The other tells us that a woman in all black paid him around two to three times the going rate. Right around when Turkish authorities believed Boumeddiene disappeared into Syria.

She said, I will give you 100 lira to get me to Syria, he recalls. She was entirely covered in black like I am now. It's the first time since the war in Syria began that either of them have taken a woman across on her own.

The smuggler says she was of medium build and guesses her age to be like Boumeddiene, in her mid-20s. She spoke classical Arabic and did not have a Syrian accent. That he claims is all he knows.

I saw the 100 lira and I did not ask anything, he tells us. On the back of a motorcycle, they headed down this border road dotted with potential illegal crossing points.

(on camera): The Turkish military stopped us before we could get to the area where this woman crossed into Syria, but it is further down the road in a similar sort of landscape.

(voice-over): There is no way of knowing if it was Boumeddiene. Within an hour of speaking to the smuggler, the woman covered in black was in Syria. Arwa Damon, CNN, on the Turkey/Syria border.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PEREIRA: All right, Arwa, thank you so much for that. Ahead, we'll change directions entirely. If you spend a little too much time sitting around on your derriere, you may be cutting your life short even if you exercise. How is that possible? We'll ask Dr. Sanjay Gupta next.

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PEREIRA: All right. Good to have you back with us. Right now you're probably at home eating, working, maybe you're on your way to commuting, doing some other sedentary activity.

A new study shows we're spending way too much time doing all of that. Prolonged sitting can cut your life short even if you exercise. We had to ask the man, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, now on his feet, by the way, to explain the findings of this new study. DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm here to

prolong lives.

PEREIRA: So talk to us about the study. What is it finding?

GUPTA: Here's what's interesting. There have been a lot of studies looking at sedentary behavior and its impact on longevity. How long you can live if you're sedentary person versus somebody who moves around a lot.

They've looked at them and combined them. No matter why you sit, watching television, in your car, whatever, too much sitting can increase your, what they call all-cause mortality. CAMEROTA: Why? What's the problem? I like sitting and I even prefer lying down. Is that the same thing?

CUOMO: Great.

CAMEROTA: Is that the same problem?

GUPTA: We human beings were not simply designed to either sit or lie for 23 hours a day and then go to the gym for an hour a day, which is what a lot of people do. We sit or lie for most of our -- that's not the way the body was sort of created.

Why it actually has increased to earlier deaths is a little bit unclear. They think it's when you stand, you increase certain pressures in areas of the body that help release good chemicals, such as HDL, which is a good type of cholesterol and different types of things.

By sitting, you're sort of telling the body, you know what, you don't need to release these sort of chemicals that are associated with longevity. That seems to be why it is. We don't know exactly why.

But we also know that even exercising, at least moderate exercise, doesn't seem to counter act the sitting. If you sit all day and exercise hard for 45 minutes, you're not getting the benefit --

PEREIRA: He's feeling smug over here. You have a smug look on your face.

CUOMO: Smug is the wrong word. I am skeptical. Here's why. Who sits for 23 hours a day, first of all?

GUPTA: A whole lot.

CUOMO: Who sits or lies down for 23 hours a day? And is this really that dominant a factor in these diseases compared to all the other things we would build into the equation, diet?

GUPTA: I don't think it's a question of saying one is greater than the other. I think what is surprising here is that simply sitting can be so bad for you, can actually increase your mortality, and that exercising doesn't necessarily counter act that.

CUOMO: You have to sit like eight hours a day.

CAMEROTA: Eight hours a day, office jobs.

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: You don't get up to pee. If you do those things, that can break it up and stop the deleterious effects.

GUPTA: If you stand up for a few minutes every hour that's one of the tips, and I think we got a bunch of tips here for people --

PEREIRA: Let's do that. GUPTA: That's the good news in all of this. It's not that hard to follow some of these steps. Simply standing up for a few minutes every half hour, every hour or so.

CAMEROTA: Every half hour.

PEREIRA: We stand up every half hour.

GUPTA: Aim to two or three fewer sedentary hours. Get up every hour. Drink a lot of water. That makes you go to the bathroom as Chris said, so, yes, it gets you up.

PEREIRA: You brought some video.

GUPTA: Here's the thing. The exercise doesn't counter act it. We have video to show what moderate activity might look like here.

CAMEROTA: No. What is this?

PEREIRA: Just moderate.

CAMEROTA: My gosh, you will use any excuse for a promo.

CUOMO: Play it to the end. Play it to the end.

CAMEROTA: You will use any excuse.

CUOMO: That's not moderate. That's 30 inches high. That's Alisyn's height.

CAMEROTA: I'm inside that box.

PEREIRA: There's one other --

CUOMO: Just an example of how --

PEREIRA: There's a study that you brought to us that I want to talk about. Look, we all have these devices. He's on his phone all the time, I'm always looking down at my iPad.

CUOMO: Trashing you on Twitter right now.

PEREIRA: There's a new study about text neck.

GUPTA: It's a real thing. People have been talking about this for some time. It's funny. I started to get this pain between my shoulder blades some time ago. When I wasn't looking down I realized it was probably due to how much time I actually had my head tilted forward.

Let me show you this quick little graphic here to give you an idea of what we're talking about. The human head weighs about 10 pounds, some heads more than others.

CAMEROTA: They're hearing you, your reference to the Cuomo head. GUPTA: That happens when you look at this. How much more force you put on the base of your neck as a result of this. You can get the same thing from reading a book, holding a rock, holding a baby.

PEREIRA: Sure.

GUPTA: But we're on these devices so much that we're starting to see this impact of what they call text neck.

CAMEROTA: How are we supposed to text, up here?

GUPTA: Well, there are a couple of things here. First of all, if you're on the devices --

CUOMO: How about bowing the neck? Kind of flex the traps?

GUPTA: Or just, you know, use more of your eyes so you're looking down as opposed to always putting your -- right?

CUOMO: That works.

GUPTA: That kind of helps.

PEREIRA: I don't know.

GUPTA: Or just not looking at the device.

PEREIRA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you so much and we have learned a lot with you.

GUPTA: I want you guys to live long.

PEREIRA: You do.

GUPTA: And be comfortable.

PEREIRA: Let us know what do you think, tweet us at NEW DAY or go to facebook.com/newday. Look up while you're doing that tweeting. Good to see you, Sanjay.

CUOMO: All right, we do have some breaking news for you this morning. ISIS has a new threat and this time there's a twist. They're saying we will behead someone out of principle unless they get paid, the lives of two Japanese men hanging in the balance. The question, will Japan pay $200 million in ransom if there is a chance to buy their freedom? We'll take you through it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ISIS is demanding $200 million in exchange for the lives of two Japanese hostages.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People in Japan are bracing for the worst right now. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A manhunt is underway for the leader of a suspected terror cell.

UNIDENTIFIED MALEL: ISIS directed this plot in Belgium.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Obama delivers his State Of The Union address tonight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We should ask the wealthy to pay a little more, invest more in the middle class.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Raising taxes on people that are successful is not going to make people that are struggling more successful.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're not just one good tax increase away from prosperity.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This record is dangled in front of her and now, yes --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Anything from the last two knee surgeries is that I love skiing. When I'm starting it I'm not thinking about winning, I'm thinking about pushing myself.

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota, and Michaela Pereira.

(END VIDEOTAPE)