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CNN Saturday Morning News
Job Creation Slows, Yet President Gets Bump Up in Approval Rating; Scientists Battle Super Toxic New Strain of E. Coli; Too Many Americans Taking Too Many Pills; John Edwards Pleads Innocent; Advantages to Not Paying Your Mortgage?
Aired June 04, 2011 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
T.J. HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone. I'm T.J. Holmes, welcome to CNN SATURDAY MORNING.
People in the morning may need to pop a pill. But how many are you taking this morning? Vitamins, prescriptions, painkillers? Could it be one too many? A closer look this morning at "Medication Nation."
Also, this might be tough for you to believe. Some experts say that people not paying their mortgage can actually be a good thing for the overall economy. Clyde Anderson is going to make sense of that this morning.
But, first, we start with claims we are getting from the president. We got this just a little bit ago, fresh new sound from the White House and the president in his weekly address, addressing those job numbers that came out yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We've got a ways to go, even though our economy has created more than 2 million private sector jobs over the past 15 months and continues to grow. We're facing some tough some headwinds. Lately, it's high gas prices, the earthquake in Japan, and unease about the European fiscal situation. It's going to happen from time to time. There are going to be bumps along the road to recovery.
We're a people who don't give up, who do big things, who shape our own destiny.
And I'm absolutely confident if we hold on to that spirit, our best days are still ahead of us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: Now, despite last month's slowdown in job creation, again, for the month of May, the president's approval rating inched up. The latest CNN/Research Poll has his approval at 54 percent. Republicans as you can imagine not necessarily happy with some of the jobs numbers. Nobody is happy with the numbers, but they're not happy with the job the president is doing. Listen to presidential candidate Mitt Romney -- this was him during a speech last night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MITT ROMNEY (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We elected someone new to be president. We didn't know much about him, didn't have much of a track record. But he was extraordinarily gifted as a speaker. His soaring rhetoric and promises of change and hope convinced the American people to give him a try.
And now, a third year into his four-year term, we have more than rhetoric to go by. We have his record. Barack Obama has failed the American people.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOLMES: Also this morning, three Republican presidential hopefuls are going after the key group of social conservatives. It's the Faith and Freedom Coalition. It's wrapping up today in Washington.
Our deputy political director Paul Steinhauser will join us in an hour from that forum.
Well, John Edwards says he was wrong but he's also saying he did not break the law. The former Democratic presidential candidate is now facing an indictment, federal prosecutors accusing Edwards of using campaign money to hide an affair with the campaign worker -- the same campaign worker that he fathered a child with.
Here now, our Joe Johns.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOE JOHNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: T.J., John Edwards was one of the last candidates standing in the 2008 race for the Democratic nomination. This time, he was standing up in court, facing a six- count indictment.
The government has charged him with conspiracy, making false statements. The government also says he took illegal campaign contributions, hundreds of thousands of dollars of donations from two individuals in the order to cover up an affair he had with Rielle Hunter during a time when his wife Elizabeth was sick and dying of cancer.
Edwards and his defense team signaled quite quickly they were going to fight these charges. First, they entered a not guilty plea and then Edwards addressed the cameras.
JOHN EDWARDS (D), FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: There's no question that I've done wrong, and I take full responsibility for having done wrong. And I will regret for the rest of my life the pain and the harm that I have caused to others. But I did not break the law, and I never, ever thought I was breaking the law.
JOHNS: Edwards was released on his own recognizance, but there were a few conditions. He's not free to leave the country, had to surrender his passport, and I was told to stay away from one of the witnesses in the case, 100-year-old Rachel Bunny Mellon who is said to have given hundreds of thousands of dollars to help Edwards cover up his affair with Rielle Hunter.
T.J., back to you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: All right. Thanks as always to our Joe Johns.
We turn to Libya where for the first time in that Libyan civil war, NATO is using attack helicopters on forces loyal to Gadhafi. These attack choppers struck military vehicles and equipment today. NATO is not saying, though, where the attacks happened. NATO says the helicopters give the mission additional flexibility to go after government troops in civilian areas.
Scientists are also scrambling to figure out the source of a super toxic new strain of E. coli. Eighteen in Europe have been killed, about 1,800 others sick. Food safety experts link the outbreak to raw produce, but they say the produce here in the U.S. is safe. At the same time, a lot of people have a lot of questions.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: In many cases, it doesn't really matter so much whether this is new or if there have been a few cases before. The bottom line is that this is rare and that doctors in the world don't have a lot of experience with it.
So, for example, they know in this outbreak, that 68 percent of the victims are women, but they don't know why, they don't know if that's significant.
And just to show you sort of the situation that we're in right now in Europe, this official told me that there are more cases of a hemolytic-uremic syndrome, that is potentially deadly kidney disease in this outbreak than in any other. So, this is the big complication that people worry about with E. coli, this disease HUS, more cases of it in this outbreak than any other outbreak we've ever experienced in the world.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: The outbreak is taking place in Europe. But at the same time, six Americans here may have been affected as well. But all six have recent links to Germany where the outbreak is most widespread. So, they believed to possibly have picked it up when traveling there.
Now, what if I told you that people who don't pay their mortgage could actually be helping the economy? Some believe that is exactly the case. But we'll need our Clyde Anderson to help us understand it. He's joining us in a moment.
But joining us right now -- say good morning, folks, to Reynolds Wolf, a forecast that includes heat but no severe storms, I don't think, right?
REYNOLDS WOLF, AMS METEOROLOGIST: For now, we're in good shape. Maybe some storms later on this afternoon. But, you know, T.J., when it comes to weather, there are things as they should be and then there are the things how they look like they're going to be in the afternoon, especially here in Atlanta, with a normal high on a day like today, 84 degrees. Today, we'll chalk it up rather to possibly the mid-90s. And more on that coming up, and more on the heat wave affecting much of the nation.
You're watching CNN SATURDAY MORNING.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: All right. Eleven minutes past the hour.
Now, say good morning once again to Reynolds Wolf. You and I on the weekends, seems like every weekend for a while we've been talking about something severe. Nice to not be talking about that, but still, heat can be severe as well.
WOLF: Oh, definitely. I don't want anyone to have the false sense of security, heat we don't have to worry about. You do, especially people who are very young, people who are -- you know, senior citizens often succumb to the heat and heat is going to be brutal today. Problem is, this is what we'd expect normally, T.J., when you get into August, September, in some cases even early October. But sure enough, this is what we're dealing with.
What we've got is we got the jet stream with a nice ridge developing right over parts of the Midwest, then right back down. That's your dividing line. On one side, you get cooler or drier air that's coming in from the north, southern half. You've got a lot of moisture that feeds up from the Gulf of Mexico.
Plus, with high pressure building up over the region, that compressing effect is going to have a pretty stabilizing effect on the atmosphere. Not a lot in terms of cloud development other than maybe some sea breeze thunderstorm in a few places. But for the most part, heat will be the story.
St. Louis, your high 97, 99 in Dallas, 93 in Atlanta. We may get higher than that when you are in fact in the heat index. Ninety-seven in New Orleans, 97 in Houston. Back into Salt Lake City, on the dividing line, you're going to see cooler temperatures, 73 in Billings, Salt Lake City, as I mentioned, 80, 56 in San Francisco and back into Boston, New York, mainly into the 70s and 80s in most spots.
Now, in terms of your weather, we have a chance of severe storms across parts of the Great Lakes, but this could happen much later into the afternoon, perhaps even into the early evening. We're not expecting a tornadic outbreak. More than anything, the potential for some flash flooding in places like, say, Columbus, Ohio, maybe even to Cincinnati, maybe even Detroit before all is said and done.
So, we're going to keep a sharp eye on that. Chicago, too, you might be dealing with some thunderstorms. Also, any flights possibly going through Chicago and any of the major airports, could see some delays there, T.J. Last thing you want to deal with.
HOLMES: All right. Reynolds, appreciate you always. You'll see you again here shortly.
Well, 13 minutes past the hour now.
A young girl says no one thinks she'll live much longer. She's addicted to pain pills. We are going inside the mind of an addict. That's a part of our "Medication Nation."
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: Quarter past the hour now on this CNN SATURDAY MORNING.
Florida taking steps to make it tougher for so-called pill mills in the state to do business. New law tracks prescription drug sales. This will be welcome news because the state attorney general office says 85 percent of illegal Oxycodone sold in the U.S. comes from Florida.
Human toll is enormous.
CNN's Amber Lyon goes in-depth for our series "Medication Nation."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AMBER LYON, CNN INVESTIGATIVE UNIT (voice-over): She was just a normal kid from a small town in Florida, until a bad breakup led her to try pain pills.
BREE SAGHY, PRESCRIPTION DRUG ADDICT: This is me and that's me and my mom before drugs.
LYON: Now, they're all she lives for.
(on camera): So it's about 11:00 in the morning and Bree just woke up. She's getting ready to have her morning fix.
(voice-over): Twenty-three-year-old Bree Saghy spends her waking hours turning prescription pills into injectable liquid.
(on camera): So you just completely turn it into a liquid.
B. SAGHY: Yes. You know it's crazy because I remember when I first started doing these occasionally. Everybody, all my friends, none of us were drug addicts. Now the whole town is.
People that I would have never thought were drug addicts are complete fiends. It's crazy.
LYON: These little blue pills here, the Oxycodone?
B. SAGHY: Oxycodone 30 milligram. And honest, roxies, blues, about to do all of those in a second.
LYON: All of these at once?
B. SAGHY: I do like 10 or 15 at a time.
LYON: Do you ever worry that you could overdose?
B. SAGHY: When you're an addict, you don't -- nothing scares you. You think you're invincible.
I need more pills.
LYON (voice-over): One hundred fifty milligrams Oxycodone shot straight into her veins. All Bree can think about is where to get her next fix.
B. SAGHY: I don't consider myself high right now. I'm not satisfied. You can just leave the door open.
JOY SAGHY, ADDICT'S MOTHER: At least we closed them down for one day.
LYON: Her mother Joy is a nurse and one of a small army of citizen activists who stands on street corners most weeks protesting outside Florida pain clinics, which have become notorious sources for illicit drugs.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look at us. We're desperate.
LYON (on camera): The majority of people out here, have they lost family members to pills?
J. SAGHY: A lot of them have, yes.
LYON (voice-over): Their protests have had an effect. New laws are being passed in state after state, including Florida, to crack down on rogue doctors.
But at home? She's powerless.
(on camera): Your daughter lives with you. She's around you all the time. How come you can't keep her from doing the pills?
B. SAGHY: She has tried.
J. SAGHY: I tried.
B. SAGHY: She's tried everything.
LYON (voice-over): Joy has had Bree committed, sent her through rehab, even had her sent to jail. Nothing worked. (on camera): Joy, you were telling me every morning when you wake up, you do your morning routine and then go see if your daughter is alive?
J. SAGHY: Yes. Walk over and check on her. Make sure she's still breathing. It's not a fun way to live. First of all, I say a prayer. I say a prayer to God before I leave for work and say, God, please let me daughter be OK when I get home.
When I get home, that's the first thing I do, is walk in and check on her. I'll stand there and I'll just look real close to see if I see her chest going up and down, you know? I mean, it's just -- it's hard. It it's hard to live like that.
LYON: There are warning labels plastered all over bottles of drugs like Oxycontin, Vicodin, Xanax. Here's another.
B. SAGHY: I'm trying to get more from one of my guys. Mom, I wish you would just -- you want me to do my daily routine, I'm doing it.
J. SAGHY: Yes, I know you are. I know.
LYON: Amber Lyon, CNN, Florida.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: OK. We're talking about that new Florida law there you see in the piece. We're going to be talking to the Florida governor, Rick Scott, tomorrow morning. We're going to talk to him about what you just saw there. But also in particular about the new law there that allows them to drug-test welfare recipients. Also a new -- something he signed an executive order that also to allows them to drug-test state employees. Join us for that.
Again, Governor Rick Scott of Florida joining us in the 8:00 hour, Eastern Hour, tomorrow morning.
We're at 20 minutes past the hour now. Skipping out on your mortgage? Can that actually be beneficial not just to you but to the overall economy? I'll let Clyde Anderson explain that, coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: All right. We're 23 minutes past the hour.
I'm joined by good friend, Clyde Anderson, this morning, our financial analyst, talking about it being a good thing -- in a way at least -- for some people to not pay the mortgage.
CLYDE ANDERSON, FINANCIAL ANALYST: Yes.
HOLMES: Now, this is what we're calling squatters' rent. Explain that first of all.
ANDERSON: Squatters rent. It's when you're facing foreclosure but you're not out of the property yet. So, a lot of times we're hearing these foreclosure proceedings are taking months and months. You know, we've heard of people staying in the home for 12 to 18 months without making mortgage payments. And so, what they're doing is not keeping these mortgage payments but they're keeping that money and they're pumping it into the economy.
HOLMES: OK. And again, when you go into foreclosure, here's a question --
ANDERSON: Yes.
HOLMES: -- you go into foreclosure but you're still in the home, are you supposed to still be paying anything or essentially you're not obligated to anymore?
ANDERSON: Well, it depends. You know, a lot of times what happens if you're doing a loan modification or you're doing some other options, they'll freeze it and they'll stop, you know, requiring you to make those payments until they kind of adjust everything.
And a lot of these banks are behind.
HOLMES: OK. Now, how does this help the economy if someone is not paying their mortgage?
ANDERSON: If they're not paying the mortgage, what they're saying is about $50 billion right now that's not going to the mortgage lenders. So, instead of that 50 billion going to the mortgage lenders, it's being pumped down to the market. So, people are buying necessities, they're buying gas, they're buying food, they're buying clothing.
And these are the things they're spending their money on. And right now, the economy needs some sort of boost and so they're taking whatever they can get and they're taking this $50 billion and counting it.
HOLMES: OK. But doesn't that hurt the banks if they're not able to collect that money and don't we -- no matter what you say about the big, bad banks -- we need them to do well as well.
ANDERSON: We do. We need them to be doing well, and also, it hurts your neighborhoods. You know, you think about it. These people are still going to foreclose on these properties. And so, you're going to lose value and people that are staying in these homes and they want to sell later down the road, they're going to lose value in their homes because of these people that are still foreclosing.
But, you know, in some cases, people can't avoid it. They're in situations where they just can't but also some are being strategic defaulters and are just not paying knowing they're moving.
HOLMES: OK. Is there a danger here? You certainly want to give good perspective because I mean, we don't want to promote this idea, if you will, saying, OK, it's actually good for the economy.
ANDERSON: Right.
HOLMES: OK. Is there a danger here in, like you say, the government -- they know the money is actually another stimulus that's going toward the economy, so they're not necessarily telling folks, giving them guidance either.
ANDERSON: Exactly, which I think that's a hard point because you mentioned the banks. Before, we've talked about the bank bailouts. So, what the government had do to come in and save the day or rescue the banks.
And now, you're seeing a situation where they're saying, OK, well, this is kind of good because you're pumping money into the country. But you're hurting the banks at the end of the day, you're hurting yourself, you're hurting your personal credit, you know, you're rolling that situation, but then you're hurting your neighborhood, you're hurting your neighbors, you're hurting the surrounding area.
HOLMES: OK. What are the other options, solutions, if you're trying to -- God forbid you get to foreclosure or before you get there?
ANDERSON: Yes. There are several things that you should look at. I mean, loan modification for one, you know, maybe you've got a high interest rate. You can go in there and get that interest rate reduced. Maybe you have an adjustable rate mortgage. Get it reduced. Maybe you can do a temporary reduction or waiving of the monthly payments. And it's really is just about talking to your mortgage lenders.
The other option is to say do a short-term repayment. So, maybe I'm six months behind, they can take that amount, stretch it over another 12 months and say this is going to be a new moment for this period of time. Or you can take the amount that you owe and then add it to the principal of the loan. To put it on the back end and then you'll just pay slightly more monthly for that time.
HOLMES: Now, are these creative ideas -- as we wrap this thing up -- are these kinds of creative ideas or these actual programs?
ANDERSON: These are actual programs. If you call your mortgage company and not run from the mortgage company, really kind of face and talk to them, communicate with them and see what options are available to you. These are some of the things they'll suggest.
HOLMES: Don't run from them. Yes.
ANDERSON: Don't run.
HOLMES: They it call to collect, though. Some people need to understand. They do run.
Clyde, good information this morning. Thanks so much.
ANDERSON: My pleasure. HOLMES: Quick break, folks. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HOLMES: Well, I'll be back with more live news at the top of the hour on CNN SATURDAY MORNING. Right now, time for the good doctor.
