Return to Transcripts main page
The Situation Room
Crammed in Cars in New York City; Secrets, Spying and Outrage; Interview With William Cohen; Crews Recover Remnants Of Seaplane
Aired December 20, 2005 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: It's 5:00 p.m. in Washington. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM, where news and information from around the world arrive in one place at the same time.
Happening now, are the president's own words on wiretapping coming back to haunt him? Did he deceive Congress and the American people? On Capitol Hill, a bipartisan barrage of criticism and calls for a formal inquiry.
In New York, millions are stalled by a mass transit strike leaving commuters, shoppers, tourists out in the cold. The mayor strikes back with tough talk against union leaders and vows to raise the stakes.
And it's 5:00 p.m. off the coast of Miami Beach, where recovery teams have started to slowly raise the wreckage of a seaplane. For one man related to 11 of the 20 victims, the loss is especially devastating.
I'm Wolf Blitzer. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
Right now, millions of New Yorkers are leaving their jobs, crammed in cars, walking for miles in the city's first transit strike in 25 years. Mayor Michael Bloomberg says the striking workers have -- and I'm quoting now -- "thuggishly turned their backs on New York City," and they're hurting the city's economy, he says, creating dangerous conditions and creating the gridlock of all gridlocks.
These are live pictures. Let's show them to you of the Brooklyn Bridge right now. You see people walking -- walking over the Brooklyn Bridge. Cars moving as well.
CNN's Adaora Udoji is in New York. She's on the streets of New York.
Give us a little sense, Adaora, what's going on.
ADAORA UDOJI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, Wolf, in New York City they always do things in a big way. It's a big strike.
We're at Penn Station, and you can see there are just hundreds, thousands of people now who are heading back from work, going outside of New York here, taking a train. Of course they cannot get on the subway or on the buses with those workers on strike.
So today they had to get creative in how they did that. I mean, there were all sorts of carpools. You also had taxis picking up multiple fares all at once. And frankly, there were many people who just stayed home.
There was, of course, some major gridlock this morning. And as you said, the mayor called the strikers selfish. He said that they were endangering the health and safety of New Yorkers. And as far as we know, there haven't been any further negotiations, so we have no idea, Wolf, how much longer this strike is going to last -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right. We're going to get back with you. Adaora Udoji, you're monitoring the situation in New York. Thank you very much.
Here in Washington, there's outrage on Capitol Hill over President Bush's authorization of secret wiretaps. And from both sides of the aisle, to a certain degree, a demand to do something about it. Will a statement the president made last year merely fan the flames? Back then he seemed to be telling Americans that all wiretaps require a court order, making no mention of the other eavesdropping he had secretly authorized.
Our White House correspondent, Suzanne Malveaux, is standing by over at the White House. But let's go up to Capitol Hill first.
Ed Henry, he's got the latest from there -- Ed.
ED HENRY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, the heat is now being turned up in a bipartisan way with two maverick Republicans saying they want an investigation.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HENRY (voice over): Two Republican senators, Chuck Hagel and Olympia Snowe, joined three Democrats in signing a letter expressing profound concern about domestic spying. The letter demands an immediate joint investigation by the Senate Judiciary and Intelligence committees. The bipartisan pressure on President Bush comes amid a heated dispute over whether Democrats privately endorsed the classified eavesdropping.
SEN. DICK DURBIN (D) ILLINOIS: Whenever the administration is caught in a situation where the intelligence is flawed or controversial, whether it was the invasion of Iraq or this spying on American citizens, their first line of defense is, well, the Democrats were in on this, they knew all about it. And that's just not true.
HENRY: Two Democrats, Senator Jay Rockefeller and former Senator Tom Daschle, say they got limited briefings and voiced private concerns to Vice President Cheney about the program. But Republican Pat Roberts fired back that, "On many occasions Senator Rockefeller expressed to the vice president his vocal support for the program. His most recent expression of support was only two weeks ago."
Both sides are also sparring over who is to blame for the failure to renew 16 key provisions of the Patriot Act set to expire at the end of the month. SEN. BILL FRIST (R-TN), MAJORITY LEADER: It doesn't make sense why leadership on the other side would celebrate killing the Patriot Act. I don't understand it. I just don't get it.
SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV), MINORITY LEADER: If the Patriot Act expires, 16th and Pennsylvania Avenue is the place where you to go to find out who is responsible for ending the Patriot Act.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HENRY: The Democratic mantra at this point is, "Extend it, don't end it." But it looks like there is no deal in sight -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right, Ed. Thank you very much.
Ed Henry on Capitol Hill.
The White House scrambling to explain a statement the president made in April of last year, years after he first secretly authorized the wiretapping without warrants.
Listen to what he said then.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There are such things as roving wiretaps. Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States talking about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way.
When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland because we value the Constitution.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Just yesterday the president had this to say about the eavesdropping being carried out on Americans without court orders.
Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: This program has targeted those with known links to al Qaeda. I've reauthorized this program more than 30 sometimes since the September the 11th attacks, and I intend to do so for so long as our nation is -- for so long as the nation faces the continuing threat of an enemy that wants to kill American citizens.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: This seeming contradiction has been a hot topic here in Washington today. Let's turn to our White House correspondent, Suzanne Malveaux. What do officials at the White House say? How do they explain this apparent difference?
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, I've spoken with White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan on several occasions today about this specific issue, and he's trying to clarify this here. What he is saying -- and I'm glad you played the full sound bite -- is that when you see it in its full context, the statement that the president made in April of 2004, he is specifically talking about the Patriot Act.
They say that the president is not misspeaking, that he is saying that nothing has changed when it comes to roving wiretaps that are basically talked about and they are specifics within the Patriot Act, that that is different than the controversy over the National Security Agency's secret spy program, which is what we are talking about and which everybody is essentially making a big fuss, a big to-do over.
I talked with an intelligence official to simply get a read on this, so whether or not this is in fact the case, and he looks at it the same way. He says he does not believe that the president is being disingenuous here when he talks about the Patriot Act and he makes that statement.
However, of course, critics are saying, look, that the president is being dishonest by omission. It is very clear that the White House did not want to advertise this particular top secret program, spying program that they had through the NSA, but that that is not what the president is specifically talking about when he made that speech on the Patriot Act -- Wolf.
BLITZER: How is this going to play out politically? At least, what are your sources over at the White House saying about this, including that "impeachment" word that some Democrats, a handful right now, are already throwing out?
MALVEAUX: Well, here's the thinking at the White House. Administration officials say, look, they're going to continue to put people out there full force, they're going to be very defiant in their tone, very aggressive in hitting back at the critics here.
Essentially what insiders are saying is that they are waiting to see how this is going to play out when the members of Congress go home. Are their constituents going to be making a lot of noise about this?
There are people inside the building who essentially say they don't believe that's going to happen. They believe most Americans are not necessarily riled up about this. They believe that -- that they are allowed to -- you know, given that this is legal, that most Americans will side with the president, side with the vice president and say, OK, if there are some exceptions here for those specifically who might be communicating with terrorists overseas, that we are going to allow this. But this does not apply for us, that this is not something that people are going to be talking about over the holiday. But again, they are going to sit. They're going to wait and see. And in January, when those members of Congress come back, specifically Republicans, they're going to see if there are complaints coming from those folks.
BLITZER: Suzanne Malveaux. Thanks very much.
Democratic Party chairman Howard Dean is weighing in. He's pouncing on that 2004 statement by the president suggesting all wiretaps require court approval.
Just moments ago, we received a new video release from the Democratic National Committee. Dean calls the administration's secret spying program shameful and an unacceptable abuse of power.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HOWARD DEAN, DNC CHAIRMAN: President Bush's secret program to spy on the American people reminds Americans of the abusive power during the dark days of President Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew. Why is it that President Bush went in front of the American people and said that a wiretap "requires a court order" after having approved a wiretap program without a court order two years earlier?
It's time for the president to be truthful with the American people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Howard Dean in a DNC release -- video release just sent out.
Are the secret wiretaps worth all this trouble? How valuable is the eavesdropping to U.S. intelligence?
Let's turn to our Justice correspondent, Kelli Arena -- Kelli.
KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, intelligence officials say that the program is very valuable in the tool that they use to fight terrorists, and they say without it, the enemy could gain an edge.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ARENA (voice over): Iyman Faris, an Ohio truck driver, pled guilty in 2003 to plotting with al Qaeda to bring down the Brooklyn Bridge. Government officials with knowledge of the program tell CNN the NSA's ability to eavesdrop on people in the United States helped authorities move against him. The president defended the NSA program as vital in the war on terror.
BUSH: So people are changing phone numbers and phone calls, and they're moving quick. And we've got to be able to detect and prevent. I keep saying that.
ARENA: The Bush administration says allowing the NSA to monitor communications between people in the U.S. and others overseas helped uncover several terror plots. John McLaughlin, the former acting head of the CIA, and now a CNN consultant, says that's true but classified.
JOHN MCLAUGHLIN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: The program was useful in detecting people who had the intent to attack in the United States. It was useful in linking them to people overseas.
ARENA: But critics still argue the benefits are not worth the cost
SEN. KEN SALAZAR (D), COLORADO: We are not going to be a free America if we become a police state.
ARENA: Now that the NSA program is public, intelligence experts worry the U.S. has lost an advantage. For example, it may be more difficult to uncover possible sleeper cells inside the United States.
MCLAUGHLIN: Programs like this, which concentrate on foreign communications with people in the United States, are one tool to find out, to detect such cells.
ARENA: When details of any intelligence operation are disclosed, security experts say al Qaeda and other enemies will change the way they communicate, denying the U.S. vital information.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ARENA: Intelligence officials say that there are parts of this program that are still secret and, therefore, salvageable. But they worry that any more public questioning about this program, Wolf, could render it completely useless.
BLITZER: Kelli Arena reporting.
Kelli, thank you very much.
And one of the men you just saw in Kelli's report, former CIA deputy director John McLaughlin, he's standing by to join us here in THE SITUATION ROOM. He and James Bamford, the author of the book "A Pretext for War," they'll join us to assess the pros and cons of the president's secret approval to spy on Americans after 9/11 without court warrants.
That's coming up in a few moments.
Time now for "The Cafferty File." Jack, once again, in New York.
Hi, Jack.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Wolf.
More bad news for the administration, this time from Iraq. Partial results for the Iraqi elections are in, and at this point things aren't looking too good for democracy. The Shiite Muslim religious coalition has a big lead, followed by Kurdish coalition and then the Sunni coalition. The secular coalition, led by White House favorite Ayad Allawi, is not leading anywhere in the country. If the Shiite coalition wins, it could mean an Iraqi government led by a conservative religious alliance with close ties to Iran.
Officials say the results could change. Final results won't be available until after January 1. Nevertheless, here's the question: Are you concerned that Iraq will become another Iran?
You can e-mail us your thoughts at caffertyfile@cnn.com.
And just to note, Wolf, we got 2,000 responses to the question during the 4:00 hour about whether the secret wiretaps constitute an impeachable offense. That is a huge response to these questions we do every day.
BLITZER: Did you do an unscientific tally?
CAFFERTY: No, not really. The perception, reading through them, is that most people say they think it is impeachable, and they feel that the law may have been broken. Not a lot of defenders of the action, but some.
BLITZER: All right. Jack, thanks very much. Jack Cafferty. We'll check back with you soon.
Up next, it's not just Democrats who are outraged over President Bush's secret approval to eavesdrop on Americans after 9/11. Some Republicans also up in arms. The president says he's protecting all Americans. Others say his actions could be illegal.
We'll assess what's going on.
And it's a stinging ruling aimed at religious conservatives. A judge rules against the teaching of what's called intelligent design in Pennsylvania schools.
We're there live in our 7:00 p.m. hour.
And it's an agonizing loss. Twenty people died in yesterday's plane crash in Miami. Eleven of them were all part of one man's family.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: Welcome back.
It's generally what happens when long-kept secrets come to light. On President Bush's admission, he secretly and repeatedly approved spying on Americans without court permission. There's shock, outrage, calls for an investigation.
Let's get some serious analysis now on what is going on. Joining us, James Bamford. He's the author of the book "A Pretext for War." And CNN national security advisor, John McLaughlin, he's a former deputy director of the CIA. James Bamford is also the author of two books on the National Security Agency, "The Puzzle Palace" and "Body of Secrets."
So you know a great deal about the subject.
You were there, John McLaughlin. You were the deputy director right after 9/11 at the CIA when this idea came up. Walk us through what happened.
MCLAUGHLIN: Well, I wasn't there for every step of the deliberations, but as I understood it at the time, this was a capability that was able to supplement the FISA procedures.
BLITZER: The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
MCLAUGHLIN: Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
BLITZER: Those courts where they do allow spying with a court order.
MCLAUGHLIN: Correct. And there was a lot of legal attention focused on it at the time by the attorney general, the White House counsel, the lawyers at NSA. And, I might say, these are not all political appointees. There were professional lawyers throughout the government who looked at it.
BLITZER: Well, the lawyers at the NSA, the National Security Agency, their career attorneys.
MCLAUGHLIN: They're career attorneys.
BLITZER: But the attorney general -- it was John Ashcroft -- was a political appointee. The White House Counsel, Alberto Gonzales, a close aide to the president, a political appointee.
MCLAUGHLIN: Yes. But I'm not a lawyer. I shouldn't be the one walking you through all of that, except to say that those who were involved in the program had an assurance that it was on a sound legal basis.
BLITZER: All right. Let's hold off on that. Let's hold off for a second, because, James Bamford, you watched the NSA over these years. You know these lawyers at the NSA.
They're career professionals. They authorized it, at least according to the White House.
JAMES BAMFORD, "A PRETEXT FOR WAR": Yes, that's the problem. All this was authorized only by the executive branch. There's a problem here.
They didn't go to the judicial branch, they didn't go to the court itself. And that's where we have the problem. The law is very clear. You go to the court, you can get the warrant, you can spy. That was the only thing that separates the NSA from the public is this court. And they went around it.
BLITZER: The director at the NSA, then lieutenant general, now general, Michael Hayden, you know him. He's a serious guy.
Do you think he would go along with something that he felt was illegal?
BAMFORD: Well, he apparently did, because it certainly is illegal. The law is very clear.
There's part of it here that, when they were creating this law, it said that the current bill recognizes no inherent power of the president to conduct electronic surveillance except through the FISA act. And by going around it, you're violating -- it's a felony. It's five years in jail.
BLITZER: So you and George Tenet -- and he's no lawyer either. He was the director of the CIA. You just took everyone's word that this was legal?
MCLAUGHLIN: Well, our attorneys looked at it as well. And let me say...
BLITZER: Attorneys at the CIA?
MCLAUGHLIN: At the CIA.
BLITZER: And these are career professionals.
MCLAUGHLIN: Career professionals.
BLITZER: And they told you?
MCLAUGHLIN: That we're on sound legal footing. And let me say that Mike Hayden is meticulous as the director of NSA about ensuring that he's on a sound legal footing. He was not prepared to do anything here that would have been in violation of the law.
And I think we can argue about the law. In fact, when you read all the opinions in the paper this morning it will make your head hurt.
At the end of the day, I think this will resolve itself to a dispute over whether the FISA Act enabled -- was sufficient and broad enough to enable the president to meet his constitutional responsibilities to protect the country.
BLITZER: Well, let's get to that, because how valuable of a tool was this extraordinary wiretapping without court -- court orders?
MCLAUGHLIN: This was an extraordinarily valuable tool for filling in a lot of blanks in our intelligence collection. Now, this was not an intention to circumvent the FISA Act. The FISA Act is very effective, it's frequently used, it's well used.
BLITZER: Why couldn't it have been just used in this incident? What did you need? What was so important?
MCLAUGHLIN: Well, what's limiting about the FISA Act is that the FISA Act was developed in 1978, long before we had this incredible technological revolution that we are dealing with now in signals intelligence. So that, for example, the FISA Act is very good at training on a target for a long period of time, following it carefully, but today, we find that terrorists change their numbers all the time.
You can get an emergency FISA, for example, and you can have the warrant approved within 72 hours. In that 72 hours, chances are they've changed numbers, changed phones and moved on.
BLITZER: All right.
MCLAUGHLIN: So you would need hundreds of FISAs to keep up with fast-moving terrorists.
BLITZER: That's the argument the White House makes, that...
MCLAUGHLIN: Well, there's another argument.
BLITZER: Well, we're going to get to that, but I want James Bamford to respond to that, that the speed -- you need speed. And the quantity of these suspected terrorists out there, you just have to act quickly, you can't go to courts every other day.
BAMFORD: Well, I'm sorry, that happens to be what the law is. The law is that you go to the court and you get a warrant.
The law was enacted with speed in mind. It said you can go out and do whatever it is you have to do without wasting one second, and then come back retroactively to do the paperwork, to get the warrant.
BLITZER: Except for one thing -- and correct me if I'm wrong. Wasn't there a different standard for a FISA wiretap, a FISA court wiretap, as opposed to the kind of wiretaps that the president had authorized without court orders?
MCLAUGHLIN: James know this as well as anyone, that for FISA you need probable cause that someone is involved in terrorism in order to get -- or in some illegal activity to get the warrant. With the activity that NSA was carrying out, the trigger was somewhat softer. You needed something to the effect of a reasonable reason to believe that the person was involved in some kind of illegal activity or terrorist activity.
It's important to emphasize here this wasn't -- this wasn't a drift net hanging over Detroit or California or Florida, scooping up conversations between average Americans. There had to be a foreigner involved, and there had to be a strong reason to believe that someone in that conversation was affiliated with al Qaeda. BLITZER: We're almost out of time, but after 9/11, wasn't it worth it to go and change the rules of the game, in effect, to try to prevent another 9/11 or worse? That's the argument the administration makes.
BAMFORD: Right. I would have had no problem of they wanted to change the rules of the game. But the executive doesn't change it. It's the Congress that changes it.
What you have here is the administration going around the only protection the public has from NSA, and doing it on their own. That's how Richard Nixon got into trouble and one of the reasons he left office.
BLITZER: We've got to leave it, unfortunately, right there. A good, serious discussion. Thanks to both of you for joining us.
James Bamford, John McLaughlin, we'll continue.
Coming up, partial results for Iraq's election. The Shiite Muslim religious coalition now in the lead. If they maintain it, it could mean an Iraq led by a conservative religious alliance with close ties to Iran.
What do you think about that? Jack Cafferty is going through your e-mail.
And a judge rules against the teaching of intelligence design in Pennsylvania schools. We'll go there live in our 7:00 p.m. hour.
You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: Let's go back to Zain for a closer look at some other stories making news -- Zain.
ZAIN VERJEE, CNN ANCHOR: Wolf, the federal government wants the public's help to find more than 500 pounds of missing explosives. Authorities are offering a $50,000 reward.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said the theft of detonators, shock tubes and explosives from a storage facility outside Albuquerque, New Mexico, was discovered on Sunday. Officials say that there is no evidence suggesting a link to terrorism.
Hundreds of people attended a funeral in Los Angeles today for executed killer Stanley "Tookie" Williams. The memorial took place in the same part of L.A. where Williams co-founded the Crips gang. Speakers included the Reverend Jesse Jackson. Williams was executed last week for killing four people. While he was on death row, he wrote children's books warning about the dangers of gang life.
And the Pentagon is reducing the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld says about 3,000 U.S. troops will pull out of the country by next spring.
There are about 19,000 U.S. troops there right now. And Rumsfeld says that they will continue to do the heavy lifting. He also says that the reduction is due to progress being made in Afghanistan and because NATO will increase its troop presence there from about 9,000 to 15,000 -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right, Zain. Thank you very much.
Coming up, another angle on spying. Is the Pentagon eavesdropping on Americans? New disclosures, new questions about intelligence operations.
And should a school board require the teaching of intelligent design as well as revolution? A judge rules on this politically charged issue. We'll have that story, 7:00 p.m. Eastern, in THE SITUATION ROOM.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: Now to the difficult work after a tragic accident -- one day after a small seaplane crashed in Miami, crews are pulling it out of the water piece by piece, hoping to piece together the picture of what happened.
We are going to go to the scene, get the latest information from our affiliate reporters on the scene.
But we will move on before we do that.
Many who did lose loved ones aboard that seaplane have close family and community ties, magnifying the impact of the crash.
Let's get some more on that.
CNN's Zain Verjee once again at the CNN Center.
Zain, this is a heartbreaking story.
VERJEE: It really is.
And the relatives, as you can well imagine, Wolf, really in shock. For one man, the loss was especially devastating, so, too, for residents of a small Caribbean island.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VERJEE (voice-over): At investigators gathered at the scene of the crash, continuing the recovery operation, grief-stricken families gathered to console one another. Their recovery will be more difficult.
LEONARD STEWART, RELATIVE OF VICTIMS: You can see there Stalomi Rolle (ph), one of the victims that was on the plane, and her sister, Genevieve Ellis (ph).
VERJEE: Leonard Stewart says he was related to 11 of the 20 people on board the seaplane and knew of them personally.
STEWART: My nickname is "Brave," but I'm holding up right now just for the family, just to be here to guide them along the way, you know? I have been through tragedies and stuff. But I think I'm a little strong at this -- at this stage. I will probably break down probably as we get nearer to the funeral time.
VERJEE: Hard-hit, too, the island of Bimini in the Bahamas. Officials there say at least 11 of the passengers were from Bimini, which has a population of just 1,600.
Relatives say many of the victims were returning from Christmas shopping in the states when the plane went down. A charter boat operator, who says he lost four family members, said people in Bimini are in a state of shock, walking around like zombies.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VERJEE: A woman who lost her sister-in-law and infant niece says everybody on the closely-knit island lost somebody. The Bimini residents say they always traveled with Chalk's Ocean Airways, saying they felt safe on the seaplane -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right, heartbreaking, indeed, Zain. Thank you very much.
Let's go back to the scene.
Derek Hayward of our CNN affiliate WSVN is there with the latest.
The wreckage is coming up. They're removing it piece by piece by piece. Derek, how long has this been going on and how long is it likely to continue?
DEREK HAYWARD, WSVN REPORTER: Well, Wolf, they have only so far recovered one section of the aircraft.
And that is the wing. It is the wing that we presume that was seen in the amateur video on fire sheering off from the rest of the aircraft, because it's all charred and burned up. And that was lying half submerged in Government Cut up against the rocks.
Before that, they spent most of the day with a high-tech FBI camera under water, documenting the layout of the wreckage. They say -- and I'm using the words of the lead investigator -- it is a very mangled aircraft, this aircraft that went down, losing all 20 lives on board yesterday afternoon.
Tomorrow -- it's now getting dark here in Miami Beech, at the Coast Guard station. They brought that wing section in. We assume now that, first light, they will be back out with the salvage team and at it again. They appear quite confident that, by the end of the day tomorrow, they will have the rest of the wreckage to the surface. BLITZER: So, Derek, that -- the amateur video you were referring to, that ball of fire that we saw follow the trail of the plane as it went into the water, we now know for sure that was the wing, not the engine?
HAYWARD: Those who have examined that and know about this type of aircraft, this Grumman, twin engine, by the way, 58-year-old aircraft, looking at that, believe they are seeing the wing sheer off.
But you're right. That has not actually been confirmed by the National Transportation Safety Board investigators themselves yet.
BLITZER: Derek Hayward of our CNN affiliate WSVN -- Derek, thank you very much.
Some digging online is now revealing new details about the company that operated that flight and the type of seaplane involved in the accident.
Jacki Schechner is checking the situation online. She's got more -- Jacki.
JACKI SCHECHNER, CNN INTERNET REPORTER: Yes, Wolf, I did some research today.
Here's what we found out about the Grumman G-73. That's the type of plane that Derek was talking about, the type of seaplane that went down, Chalk's Ocean Airways.
The company was bought by Northrop Airlines -- or Northrop Air Corps in 1994. And I spoke to them today. They said 90 -- or -- I'm sorry -- 59 of these planes were in circulation. They started from 1946 to 1951. The last one was delivered in 1951. They haven't been built since.
But what has been done since is, these planes have been retrofitted with these turboprop engines. And that's a very common thing to do, to swap out the engines to make them more modern. And these planes now, there's 31 of them, according to the FAA, in circulation right now, 10 of them with these turboprop engines.
And, according to the FAA, five of those are operated by Chalk's Airways. They're actually owned by a company out of Connecticut and operated by Chalk's. So, it's amazing the information you can find online, Wolf, but not many of these planes out there right now.
BLITZER: All right, Jacki, thank you very much.
Still to come here in THE SITUATION ROOM, could the Pentagon be spying on you -- the Pentagon? Find out what we know and what we don't know about a secret intelligence unit established after the 9/11 attacks.
And a new kind of confessional -- what if you had the chance to fess up about anything with CNN watching. In our 7:00 p.m. Eastern hour of THE SITUATION ROOM, an experiment in TV and truth-telling. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: We have learned much in recent days about the National Security Agency's eavesdropping on American citizens. That's raising questions about a possible role by the United States military in domestic spying.
Let's go live to our Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr.
What are you picking up, Barbara?
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, the Pentagon has been trying very hard to stay out of this whole mess about domestic intelligence and surveillance. But they're having a hard time of it.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
STARR (voice-over): Five months after the 9/11 attacks, the Pentagon established one of its most secretive units. This document created the Counterintelligence Field Activity, or CIFA.
No one will say how many people work there or how big the budget is. It's supposed to track any threats against the Defense Department. But now some are asking, is the Pentagon spying on Americans? This anti-war protest last March in New York was one of many demonstrations listed in one of CIFA's databases called Talon.
CAROLINE FREDRICKSON, ACLU WASHINGTON DIRECTOR: Talon is one of those databases in which the -- the Pentagon has put all sorts of information about people participating in protests, perhaps against the Iraq war, environmental demonstrations, or other types of events, have put this information on these individuals in the database.
STARR: The law allows the Pentagon to collect information about potential domestic threats. But if the information doesn't pan out, it's supposed to be deleted from all computers. In the wake of disclosures that the Pentagon inadvertently kept Talon information on Americans who are not a threat, this man, Stephen Cambone, the Pentagon's intelligence chief, ordered a review of the entire effort and ordered all his intelligence staff to get training on what's legal and what's not.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
STARR: Now, Wolf, the Pentagon insists that the disclosures about its counterintelligence, its own domestic intelligence programs, just is simply a matter of bad timing, that it came at the same time as the disclosures about the National Security Agency, that the two have absolutely nothing to do with each other.
But, indeed, just two months ago, the Pentagon's own Counterintelligence Field Activity expanded its operations even further -- Wolf. BLITZER: Barbara Starr at the Pentagon, thank you very much.
Did President Bush cross the wire with domestic spying? Are the wiretaps worth it?
The former Secretary of Defense William Cohen standing by -- he will join us to answer those questions.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: Did President Bush go too far in allowing wiretaps without court orders?
Joining us now, a key member of our CNN Security Council, the former Defense Secretary William Cohen. He was a vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee back in the 1980s. He's now chairman and CEO of The Cohen Group here in Washington.
You heard about this when we all heard about it.
WILLIAM COHEN, CNN WORLD AFFAIRS ANALYST: Right.
BLITZER: I assume you didn't know anything about it in advance. What do you think?
COHEN: Well, we live under a system in which power has to be entrusted to someone, but no one can be trusted with power.
And we also have a famous Latin phrase, which, translated roughly, is, who will guard the guardians? How are we sure that the people who we choose or elect to guard us themselves are complying with the rule of law?
So, in this particular case, the president has rested his power, under the Constitution -- and, also, he believes Congress either gave him implicit authority to him when it authorized him to go to war against al Qaeda or the Taliban. If that's the case, it is going to raise serious questions about voting for the Patriot Act again, because they -- I think members of Congress are not going to want to implicitly authorize or condone this particular activity.
So, I think what's called for are hearings, as Senator Specter has suggested we do so, in a calm, deliberate fashion. There may be very important intelligence information to be gathered. But, if it's that important, it's important also that there be rules and procedures whereby the American people can be assured that they are not being spied upon illegally or arbitrarily or that there's an abuse of power.
You can't have just the president declare, I have got the power and not have any kind of effective oversight, either by the judiciary or the Congress, if we are going to maintain this democracy in the face of increased threats of terrorism. And this is really the debate that's long overdue. What are the American people willing to trade off, if anything, of privacy and their liberty, in order to be safe and secure? That's a debate that needs to take place.
BLITZER: It sounds to me like you're sort of uncomfortable with what he did.
COHEN: I, as a former member of the administration, Clinton administration, I certainly was concerned about the leaking of sensitive information that could jeopardize our ability to collect information, but, also, having served for 10 years on the Intelligence Oversight Committee in the Senate, very sensitive to the need to keep key members of Congress fully informed of any kind of intelligence activities which call into question the power of the president.
BLITZER: They informed the chairman, the vice chairman and the leaders of both the House and the Senate.
COHEN: The question is -- that will be important to determine how expensive was that information.
For example, if a call is picked up in this country that emanates from outside the country, and that individual who is then being targeted talks to a number of other people, are those other people, who may be innocent individuals, have no notice of what this individual is up to, they suddenly could be -- had an effect of dragnet putting them into it?
Are they going to be subject to oversight by the administration? These are serious issues, which ought to be looked at very carefully, and, I would suggest, privately, or on a classified basis, initially.
But this has to be explained to the American people that there are serious intelligence issues that have to be debated. And the weighing of security vs. privacy is going to be even more important as we move into the future, because technology has far exceeded the policy that is in place today.
BLITZER: And that's the argument the administration makes, that, when you were in House of Representatives in the '70s and you observed all the abuses during the Nixon administration, you were there in '78, when they created this new FISA court, that was with old technology, before 9/11.
After 9/11, the world changed, and the old rules simply had to go away.
COHEN: Well, it's not a question of the old rules going away.
But the question is, because technology is so advanced and the ability of government to collect information on millions of people -- as a matter of fact, private companies have databases which have a profile of you and me and every citizen in this country, detailed information about who we are, what we -- where we go, how we travel, what we buy, what we sell, the price we pay. All of that is -- it's contained in databases now, some of which is marketed, or attempted to be marketed, to the government. So, the question becomes, do we want to have in place clear, very definite rules on how far the government can go in collecting information, given the tools that we now have and the facility to collect it? How far do we want them to go, without some kind of serious check and balance to make sure that the people who are guarding us are being watched as well?
BLITZER: William Cohen, thanks usual -- as usual.
Up next, commuters in New York City having to come up with new ways to get home. There are some legal maneuvers under way to talk about as well.
We will share what is going on.
And, in our 7:00 p.m. Eastern hour here in THE SITUATION ROOM, a bizarre story only our Tom Foreman can tell. We will find out what people are willing to confess with the cameras rolling.
You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: We're following the New York City transit strike here on CNN, now 14 hours in. The evening commute is under way.
But, before you head out, you will want to see what our Internet reporter, Jacki Schechner, has to show you -- Jacki.
SCHECHNER: Well, the MTA is not running, but their the Web site certainly is.
And they have plenty of traffic cams, where you can check out how the bridges and tunnels are running. For example, the Queens Midtown Tunnel, heading into Manhattan, interestingly enough -- I thought it would be more traffic streaming out of Manhattan -- but you can see how jammed that is right now.
I want to close this down for you and show you what the other sites look like. Let me see if I can get in that for you. But you can see all of the bridges and tunnels that are available on that site to show you.
And, then, also, it shows you some still photos. So, you can get one camera running up at a time. And then the other thing you can do is get some giant photos and show you what it looks like, take some still shots. Here is the Triborough in Manhattan, heading into Manhattan, also, not as bad, and then the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel on Brooklyn side.
So, when you get up in the morning, or if you're heading out to work still tonight, take a look at MTA.gov. It will give you an idea of what the traffic stream is looking like -- Wolf.
BLITZER: And she used to live in New York. So, she would know. That would be Jacki Schechner.
On the strike, though, New York's mayor says food deliveries are late. Hotels are seeing cancellations. Airlines are on edge. There's a business effect to the strike that Mayor Bloomberg calls acute.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL BLOOMBERG (R), MAYOR OF NEW YORK: From what we have been able to learn, the economic consequences of the strike range from severe to devastating, depending on the business. Retail, especially in Lower Manhattan, has been hit the hardest. Hundreds of stores haven't been able to open, and some that did had practically no business. Along one stretch of Eighth Avenue, 40 percent of the stores weren't even open.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: For a closer look at the impact on New York and small businesses, let's go back to CNN's Adaora Udoji. She's on the streets of New York -- Adaora.
UDOJI: Hi there, Wolf. You're right.
The Small Business Administration says there are 1.7 million small businesses in New York City, of course, all business being affected, with estimates of lost business ranging from $250 million to $400 million.
But, Wolf, those small businesses are going to be particularly affected, because, of course, they need every single one of their employees.
And we spoke to one today, who told us that he stands to lose a bundle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAN KOBIN, BUSINESS OWNER: My business today is probably going to do -- some loyal customers in my neighborhood, you know, came in for lunch and had martinis, and had margaritas, you know, and definitely knew that they were supporting me, and I will do probably about $1,200, $1,600. I had over $6,400 worth of business booked for today.
This has been, you know, one of the toughest years for small businesses in New York. Our -- for everybody, gas has gone way up. Our electrical bills have gone up. And what that has -- means to us is almost double, equaling almost half-a-month's rent.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
UDOJI: Now, Wolf, it's not encouraging.
From what we understand, the two sides have not been negotiating at all today. But, of course, there are lots of business owners who have both their fingers and their toes crossed that this strike in New York City, this transit strike, will not last too long -- Wolf.
BLITZER: Let's hope.
Adaora Udoji, thank you very much. What a mess in New York.
Up next, what would happen if a conservative religious alliance with close ties to Iran won the elections in Iraq? Partial results suggest it could happen. What do you think of that? Jack Cafferty has your e-mail.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: A transit strike in New York, millions of people affected. Patience called for right now.
We are watching this they. Let's go up to New York.
Jack Cafferty is watching it, together with all of us.
You're also watching the elections. Let's talk about the elections in Iraq first, Jack.
CAFFERTY: All right.
Partial results are in, in Iraq in the elections. And the Shiite Muslim religious coalition has got a big lead at this point. If they win, it could mean an Iraqi government led by a conservative religious alliance with close ties to Iran.
Officials say the results could change. Final numbers won't be available until after January 1. Maybe we got Diebold in there.
Here's the question: Are you concerned that Iraq should -- could become another Iran?
Ken in Yuma writes: "Of course Iraq will become another Iran, controlled behind the scenes by the same Shiite theocracy that controls Iran. Anyone who ever thought we could create a secular democracy in Iraq through force is smoking something that is illegal here in the United States."
Elaine in Florence, Oregon: "Why not let them have an Iranian- style government by free-choice election? Isn't that what this exercise in democracy is all about anyway?"
Glen writes from Virginia: "I'm afraid Iraq will become worse than Iran. The factions appear to be lining up in such a way that, as soon as we get out of there, it will be time for a civil war. The Sunnis and Shiites will go after each other for control of the government and the oil fields."
Brenda in Blackstone, Virginia: "I'm concerned Iraq has become another Vietnam, much too concerned to worry about whether it's becoming another Iran."
And Jim in Washington writes: "In many ways, Iraq is already a piece of Iran. When people don't trust their government to keep them safe, they fall back on their cultural context, their religions and tribes that have guided their values for centuries, if not millennia. Who can blame Iraqis for voting for what they know, trust and believe in, the same as we do?"
A couple of quick thoughts on the transit strike, Wolf. I was here in 1980. Everybody was patient the first few days. It lasted 11 days. By the end of it, everybody was up to their eyebrows and sick and tired of the thing.
One big difference, though: In 1980, there was no Internet and people didn't have computers in their homes, the way they do now. Things were relatively quiet in the city today, when I came in here around noon or 1:00, not a lot of traffic on the streets. And I think part of that is that people can stay home and work from home. If you have a telephone and a computer, you're in touch with the office without having to schlep there.
BLITZER: All right, Jack, good thought.
CAFFERTY: Schlep is a word for commute.
BLITZER: We will see you in -- see you back here in an hour in THE SITUATION ROOM.
CAFFERTY: Yes.
BLITZER: I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington.
"LOU DOBBS TONIGHT" starting right now. Kitty Pilgrim filling in for Lou -- Kitty.
KITTY PILGRIM, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Wolf.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
