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CNN Live Sunday

Baby's Toddlers Learn To Swim In New Program; John Kerry To Announce VP Runningmate As Earlier As Tuesday

Aired July 04, 2004 - 18:30   ET

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

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


CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Carol Lin. And here's a check of the latest developments at this hour.
The U.S. and Britain reportedly made a secret deal with Saudi Arabia last year to swap terror suspects. Today's New York Times says the U.S. released five Saudi terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay. In exchange, Saudi Arabia released five Britons and 2 other westerners convicted of terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia. U.S. officials deny any tradeoffs.

In New York, the rebuilding has begun on the World Trade Center site. Today, workers laid the cornerstone of the new Freedom Tower. The 20 ton slab of granite inscribed with a tribute to the people who died on September 11.

The reigning champ of Nathan's famous Fourth of July hot dog eating contest has done it again. Takeru Kobayashi of Japan ate 53 1/2 hot dogs in just 12 minutes, braking his own world record of 50 1/2 hot dogs. It's the fourth year in a row he's won the contest.

Engine problems on Air Force one threw a wrench in President Bush's campaign plans this Fourth of July. After switching to an Air Force One backup, the president went on the stump in West Virginia today. There, referring to the handover in Iraq, he told reporters that freedom had the power to change the world.

And Vice President Dick Cheney's bus tour is rolling through Pennsylvania today. Four years ago, President Bush lost the Keystone State to the Democrats. Cheney says they're trying hard to make sure that doesn't happen again. Today he attended church services in Pittsburgh, and visited the Soldiers and Sailors National Military Museum and Memorial. He'll head to Altoona tonight for a minor league baseball game.

Presumed Democratic nominee John Kerry is campaigning in Iowa today. It's part of his campaign swing through the nation's heartland. Iowa is considered one of the contested states and vital to winning the White House.

At a barbecue in Independence today, Kerry honored the contributions and sacrifices of U.S. troops.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN KERRY, (D-MA) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's tough right now for a lot of young Americans. They're in Iraq, they're in Afghanistan, they're over there defending a noble concept called democracy. They're over there fulfilling duty, because the president of the United States asked them to be there on behalf of our nation.

And no matter what we feel about how we went there, no matter what we feel -- and we feel strong things about the way that the country was led into this effort -- we honor those troops on July 4th.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack is sharing some of the political spotlight with kerry. Many consider him a top contender to be Kerry's running mate. But who knows, we might know on Tuesday when John Kerry allegedly sends out an e-mail on his own Web site, to say who he's going to pick, but we want to take a look at the short list.

How important is it, that choice for John Kerry? CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider is in our Los Angeles bureau. Nice tie, Bill. Happy Fourth of July.

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Thank you. I'm a patriot.

LIN: You are a patriot. And a wise man when it comes to this information. We're going to throw up some faces that have been talked about in the possible chase for a VP running mate.

Bill, who are the likeliest candidates of all the names that have been floating out there?

SCHNEIDER: Well, to start with this, nobody really knows everything, but everybody talks because it's the story of the moment. There are three names on everybody's list, because the Kerry campaign appears to have veted at least these three contenders: Tom Vilsack, you just mentioned, he's the Democratic Governor of Iowa, John Edwards, over there on your left, he's the senator who ran for president from North Carolina, and on the right Dick Gephardt, the former House Democratic leader from Missouri.

Those are the names on everyone's list. But you know, it's kind of odd, the list seems to be growing bigger and people are talking about the possibility of other contenders like Bob Graham, Joe Nelson, Senators from Florida. Joe Biden, who's the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee. Sam Nunn, the former Senator from Georgia. Wesley Clark, who ran for president as well. A lot of names. The list is growing instead of getting shorter.

LIN: Well, do any of them light Kerry's fire? Doesn't he need a really big push when he names this person as his VP running mate?

SCHNEIDER: What he needs is to make a media splash. He needs a surprise. Because one of the unusual things that's happened this year is since he won the primaries and effectively became the nominee in March, he's kind of receded from the news, and people have been paying less attention to him, still a lot of attention to President Bush, but less to Kerry. And what we're finding is fewer and fewer Americans have an opinion of John Kerry. Well, he's got to come back this month with a big splash, starting with his naming of his running mate and culminating in the Democratic Convention.

So the bigger the surprise in the person he names, the more attention he's going to have, the more buzz there will be an the water coolers and the more people will be talking about John Kerry. That's what he needs.

LIN: But are those any of the people that you mentioned? I mean, tell me Hillary Clinting tell me John McCain, then we're talking.

SCHNEIDER: Then we're talking a big surprise. You know, the shrewdest move he could make would be to put a Republican on the ticket with him. A lot of people talked about McCain as his apparent first choice, though he never actually made the offer, McCain said he wouldn't take it. People talked about Chuck Hagel, and now, he says he doesn't want either, the Senator from Nebraska, another Republican.

A third Republican's name has come up, Bill Cohen, who served in President Clinton's cabinet. He's a Republican from Maine, was a Senator, served as secretary of defense in the Clinton cabinet. Now people are saying what about that?

The reason why a Republican would be a real coup would be that it would instantly signify Kerry's desire to run as a candidate to unify the country and fulfill the promise that Bush made in 2000 and failed to deliver to be a uniter, not a divider.

LIN: The other day, when Tom Vilsack was asked by reporters whether he was being considered for John Kerry's running mate, Tom Vilsack's staff said, look, there haven't been any background checks done on this guy, so we don't think he's in the running. Is it possible that the campaign is floating some of these names? And if so, why would they do that?

SCHNEIDER: Yes, because they want to create a big surprise. Look, these things are inherently unpredictable. I don't know that anyone predicted that Al Gore would pick Joe Lieberman. I don't know anyone, including the wisest political minds, who predicted that George Bush would pick Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney was the chairman of the committee looking for someone to be on the ticket with George Bush. Who predicted that his father was going to pick Dan Quayle?

Very tough to predict. So the bigger the surprise, the bigger bounce that Kerry is likely to get.

LIN: All right. True that e-mail is supposed to out on Tuesday?

SCHNEIDER: Tuesday or Wednesday, we're not sure, but it's likely to be this week. We guess. Again, nobody knows, that's why we're talking about it.

LIN: All right. We're going to be logging on. Thanks, Bill. We'll see you in our primetime show at 10:00 tonight. SCHNEIDER: OK.

LIN: Remember the hanging chads? After the bitter debate over the 2000 election, you would think Florida would stay clear of voting controversies, but the Sunshine State is back in the spotlight with a new voter problem. CNN's national correspondent Susan Candiotti reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DARREN JONES, FLORIDA VOTER: They went ahead and removed me. It's like guilty until proven 2347b8.

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Darren Jones was stunned when he opened a letter last month from the Miam-Dade Elections Office.

JONES: The court system has notified the elections department of your recent felony conviction, which is not true.

CANDIOTTI: True, Jones is a convicted felon who served six months of house arrest, but that was in 1998.

JONES: So I know this couldn't be right.

CANDIOTTI: Like all Florida felons are required to do, Jones applied for and got his voting rights back in 2003, and says he proudly used his card to cast a vote in last spring's Democratic primary.

Dade elections officials admit they goofed this time, but can't explain it.

(on camera): What happened to darren jones is happening to others. CNN successfully sued Florida election officials to get a list and this is just a part of it, of 47,000 suspected felons who could be dumped from voter rolls. And like the case of Darren Jones, we found mistake after mistake.

(voice-over): At 22, Sam Heyward was convicted of buying stolen furniture, in 1986, he won back his voting rights and says he hasn't missed an election, only to discover he's on the new suspected felons list.

SAM HEYWARD, VOTER: To find that my name was still on the list and said it may have some effect on your voting privileges, and I'm like, well I don't see how, I've been voting for the last 15 years.

CANDIOTTI: The Miami Herald reports that it documented more than 2,100 errors.

Of the 47,000 named, 39 percent reportedly are black Democrats, 20 percent are white Democrats, 16 percent white Republicans.

With only about four months to go before the presidential election, 67 county supervisors now find themselves under orders from the Capitol to confirm the new so-called suspected felons list. Few, if any are happy about it.

ION SANCHO, LEON CO. ELECTION SUPERVISOR: As an elections official, asking me to conduct criminal background checks, and spend most of my time in the criminal justice system would be analogous to asking doctors to do tax returns. And this simply is not our job.

CANDIOTTI: A spokesman for Governor Jeb Bush says the list is only a tool and insists election officials will have enough time to check each name before the next election. The NAACP and ACLU settled a lawsuit against Florida two years ago. It called for improving the state's voter database.

HOWARD SIMON, FLORIDA ACLU: State officials placed an eligible voter on the list of people to be purged, that is negligence on the part of state officials.

CANDIOTTI: For Darren Jones and others, the mix-ups make them wonder what will happen in November.

JONES: It's going to happen again. Trust me, it's going to happen again.

CANDIOTTI: Susan Candiotti, CNN, Miami.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: On this July 4th, surviving a civil war with their eyes focused on the American dream. Still to come, the flight to freedom for primitive tribal Africans coming to America.

Plus, time flies when you're having fun. Meet some U.S. troops who have a whole new understanding of the age-old phrase.

And, some of them can barely walk, but they know how to save that I own lives. Still to come: aqua babies.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: Soldiers running the Baghdad version of the Peachtree Road Race tops our news from around the news right now. More than 400 U.S. soldiers started running before the sun came up to join hundreds of runners in Atlanta, Georgia. The soldiers ran a 10K around their Camp Victory base.

Switzerland celebrates: Swiss player Roger Federer wins the men's singles championship at Wimbledon. He won last year, too. He beat American Andy Roddick in four sets.

And the underdogs become the top dogs. Greece pulls off one of the biggest shockers in soccer history, winning the European Soccer Championship 1-0 against Portugal. It's the ultimate victory for the blue and white, while Portugal, which hosted the game, is still stunned.

Bad news out of the Iraq war dominates the headlines, but sometimes war creates opportunity for those seeking security and freedoms they have never known. This year alone, the U.S. will take in nearly 50,000 refugees, people who would be killed if left in their homeland. One of those groups is the Somali Bantu, so persecuted the Clinton administration gave the Bantu special status.

I recently a group resettling in Wheaton, Illinois. Their story embodies the brighter side of what it means to be American.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LIN (voice-over): Starvation, disease, mass murder: That has been the bloody signature of the Somali Civil War. Half a million people have died. Perhaps none were persecuted more than the Bantu tribe.

They were Somalia's slaves, the people with the least protection when warring gangs went on their killing sprees. The lucky ones made it to Kenya's Baren-Kakuma (ph) Refugee Camp. This is the only life Halema Mukomas (ph) ever known. She, like the most ambitious, who were trying to come to America, learned the basic ways of the west: how to use plumbing, how a stove creates instant fire.

And then the Bantu waited. Waited for five to ten years, the average it takes even the most persecuted to get INS approval to go to the United States. Halnea Mukomas and her family were coming to America, but Chicago might as well be Mars.

World relief and volunteers from a local church settled them and three other Bantu families in a modest apartment building outside Chicago in Wheaten. All the furniture, kitchen supplies, clothes, everything was donated, but that was not enough.

(on camera): It's almost incomprehensible how much this family have to learn. The Bantu have an oral history. They have never even handled paper. Coming to America, they didn't even know how to hold a pen.

(voice-over): Teachers start with the basics: how to write, turn pages, read numbers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 103.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 103.

LIN: And then write them out and count.

SUE REYNOLDS, LITERACY TEACHER: They're learning what's represented on a page, how to figure out what today's date is, what those words are across the top of the calendar.

LIN: Just navigating their apartment, the Mukomas (ph) had to catch up on 200 years of technology: faucets, cabinets, the Bantus learned how to turn knobs to open doors. Once a week, the families gather at a small apartment to learn about American customs from Issam Smeir, a mental health counselor for world release.

ISSAM SHMEIR, MENTAL HEALTH COUNSELOR: In African, people think of different way in America.

LIN: On this day, Issam was teaching about breast feeding in public. Yes, while one mother was breast feeding on camera.

SMEIR: Americans tend to like, with some women, they do breast feed their baby, but they will hide it in a way that nobody will see.

LIN: What is your greatest hope for them?

SMEIR: That they have been opressed for so many years and they were sold to slavery, my greatest hope for them is to enjoy life here and to obtain their dreams.

LIN: Halemas (ph) husband, Murede Mukomas (ph) is paying for most expenses by working in a restaurant. He wants so much more.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I'm worried about how I will own my own place, that's what I'm thinking.

LIN: He wants his son someday to work for the U.S. government. His wife, Halema (ph), is pregnant. Their next child will be born in America, a U.S. citizen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: Tonight at 10:00 Eastern, we're going to take a look at some of the most personal challenges facing the Mukomas (ph) in their flight to freedom. That's CNN SUNDAY NIGHT tonight at 10:00 Eastern.

So, does your child know how to survive a summertime splash? Still to come on CNN LIVE SUNDAY, meet babies in diapers that can weather the water.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: The U.S. military calls it a vacation from war: Hundreds of soldiers on a two-week leave from Iraq. Our David Mattingly talks to the first soldiers who ended their break and are heading back to an Iraq run by Iraqis.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They've been home for the shortest two weeks of their lives, but leave is over. For these soldiers, it's time for the long flight back, back to an Iraq that is now run by Iraqis.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hopefully now it will take the emphasis off the American soldiers and put it back on the Iraqis.

MATTINGLY: Many of these soldiers watch the handover with their families on television. A reminder of the job waiting for them as they try to lose themselves in the comforts of home.

(on camera): What do you expect to do so when you get back?

(voice-over): They now they return with mixed emotions, hopeful that the worst is over, mindful of possible dangers ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hopefully they'll step up and start taking responsibility for their own country, own people in their country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We'll still wait and see. We don't know what to expect, what the change is going to be.

MATTINGLY (on camera): When these soldiers get back to Iraq, they'll be returning more experienced than last time, they're smarter, more seasoned. But with that experience, they say has come an important lesson, to always be prepared for anything.

(voice-over): Daily episodes of violence since the handover drive the point home that the bloodshed they left behind will be waiting, a certainty that makes a new round of farewells tough for any soldier.

(on camera): Is it harder saying good-bye the second time than the first?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

MATTINGLY: In what way?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I have to leave them a second time.

MATTINGLY (voice-over): Sgt. Bonnie Collins holds her two daughters close, trying to make the most of their last hours together before mom goes back to Baghdad.

SGT. BONNIE COLLINS, U.S ARMY: Getting through this, getting on the plane will be hard, but once it's done, it's done and I'll be okay.

MATTINGLY: A 14-hour flight that begins with heartache. Destination: the now familiar, but dangerous nation of Iraq. David Mattingly, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: And now the story you've probably been waiting for, I hope. Many parents wait until their children are three or four years old before even thinking about teaching them to swim, but a program in Miami is in enrolling students as young as ten months. CNN's photojournalist Jerry Simonson takes an underwater look at these amazing aqua babies.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANGELA MICKALIDE, NATIONAL SAFE KIDS CAMPAIGN: Drowning is the second leading cause of unintentional injury related death among children in this country. Each year, about 860 children die, and another 2,700 are rushed to hospital emergency rooms.

BRIAN LILBURN, AQUA CHILD INSTRUCTOR: Survival swimming basically entails, if a kid fell in the water when their parents weren't around, that they could last that extra couple minutes to either save themselves or have somebody else come and save them.

What we teach is, we teach floating more so than any aspect of it. And what the kids can do, that's the way that they can reenforce air, but rolling on their back and floating. And that they're not exerting any energy. And then they can always rest there for as long as they need to.

SCOTT LAUNDER, AQUA CHILD INSTRUCTOR: A four years old that took lessons with us last year, had climbed the pool fence, went in after a ball, fell in, the little brother started screaming for the parents...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A minute or two later, I hear them screaming. Luckily he learned the skills here. When I found him he was at the pool's edge already.

LILBURN: The way our lessons are set up, they're ten minutes a day, and they're every day, Monday through Friday. Kids learn by repetition and consistency. It's very important for them to do something over and over again for them to retain the skills that they're being taught.

LAUNDER: Once the child does these drills a certain amount of times, it becomes a motor reflex for air. So, it's not even a thought. If they fall in or need air, they don't think about it, it's a motor reflex. And they turn on their back and float.

LILBURN: Once the kids retain the skills that we've been teaching them, they're ready to do clothes. And what we do, we do a few different scenarios where they fall into the water, and then they use their skills to get out of that situation. To roll on their back and float, either swim to the side or swim to the stairs. They do full winter gear with a light jacket, shoes, shirts, long sleeve, you know, pants and everything.

MICKALIDE: Three-quarters of the children who died in our study had never received swimming lessons from a certified instructor.

LILBURN: On top of kids learning the survival aspect of floating here and swimming, it builds their self-esteem, builds their confidence, it does so much more for them than just swimming lessons.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: And that's all the time we have for this hour.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com


Aired July 4, 2004 - 18:30   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Carol Lin. And here's a check of the latest developments at this hour.
The U.S. and Britain reportedly made a secret deal with Saudi Arabia last year to swap terror suspects. Today's New York Times says the U.S. released five Saudi terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay. In exchange, Saudi Arabia released five Britons and 2 other westerners convicted of terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia. U.S. officials deny any tradeoffs.

In New York, the rebuilding has begun on the World Trade Center site. Today, workers laid the cornerstone of the new Freedom Tower. The 20 ton slab of granite inscribed with a tribute to the people who died on September 11.

The reigning champ of Nathan's famous Fourth of July hot dog eating contest has done it again. Takeru Kobayashi of Japan ate 53 1/2 hot dogs in just 12 minutes, braking his own world record of 50 1/2 hot dogs. It's the fourth year in a row he's won the contest.

Engine problems on Air Force one threw a wrench in President Bush's campaign plans this Fourth of July. After switching to an Air Force One backup, the president went on the stump in West Virginia today. There, referring to the handover in Iraq, he told reporters that freedom had the power to change the world.

And Vice President Dick Cheney's bus tour is rolling through Pennsylvania today. Four years ago, President Bush lost the Keystone State to the Democrats. Cheney says they're trying hard to make sure that doesn't happen again. Today he attended church services in Pittsburgh, and visited the Soldiers and Sailors National Military Museum and Memorial. He'll head to Altoona tonight for a minor league baseball game.

Presumed Democratic nominee John Kerry is campaigning in Iowa today. It's part of his campaign swing through the nation's heartland. Iowa is considered one of the contested states and vital to winning the White House.

At a barbecue in Independence today, Kerry honored the contributions and sacrifices of U.S. troops.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN KERRY, (D-MA) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's tough right now for a lot of young Americans. They're in Iraq, they're in Afghanistan, they're over there defending a noble concept called democracy. They're over there fulfilling duty, because the president of the United States asked them to be there on behalf of our nation.

And no matter what we feel about how we went there, no matter what we feel -- and we feel strong things about the way that the country was led into this effort -- we honor those troops on July 4th.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack is sharing some of the political spotlight with kerry. Many consider him a top contender to be Kerry's running mate. But who knows, we might know on Tuesday when John Kerry allegedly sends out an e-mail on his own Web site, to say who he's going to pick, but we want to take a look at the short list.

How important is it, that choice for John Kerry? CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider is in our Los Angeles bureau. Nice tie, Bill. Happy Fourth of July.

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Thank you. I'm a patriot.

LIN: You are a patriot. And a wise man when it comes to this information. We're going to throw up some faces that have been talked about in the possible chase for a VP running mate.

Bill, who are the likeliest candidates of all the names that have been floating out there?

SCHNEIDER: Well, to start with this, nobody really knows everything, but everybody talks because it's the story of the moment. There are three names on everybody's list, because the Kerry campaign appears to have veted at least these three contenders: Tom Vilsack, you just mentioned, he's the Democratic Governor of Iowa, John Edwards, over there on your left, he's the senator who ran for president from North Carolina, and on the right Dick Gephardt, the former House Democratic leader from Missouri.

Those are the names on everyone's list. But you know, it's kind of odd, the list seems to be growing bigger and people are talking about the possibility of other contenders like Bob Graham, Joe Nelson, Senators from Florida. Joe Biden, who's the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee. Sam Nunn, the former Senator from Georgia. Wesley Clark, who ran for president as well. A lot of names. The list is growing instead of getting shorter.

LIN: Well, do any of them light Kerry's fire? Doesn't he need a really big push when he names this person as his VP running mate?

SCHNEIDER: What he needs is to make a media splash. He needs a surprise. Because one of the unusual things that's happened this year is since he won the primaries and effectively became the nominee in March, he's kind of receded from the news, and people have been paying less attention to him, still a lot of attention to President Bush, but less to Kerry. And what we're finding is fewer and fewer Americans have an opinion of John Kerry. Well, he's got to come back this month with a big splash, starting with his naming of his running mate and culminating in the Democratic Convention.

So the bigger the surprise in the person he names, the more attention he's going to have, the more buzz there will be an the water coolers and the more people will be talking about John Kerry. That's what he needs.

LIN: But are those any of the people that you mentioned? I mean, tell me Hillary Clinting tell me John McCain, then we're talking.

SCHNEIDER: Then we're talking a big surprise. You know, the shrewdest move he could make would be to put a Republican on the ticket with him. A lot of people talked about McCain as his apparent first choice, though he never actually made the offer, McCain said he wouldn't take it. People talked about Chuck Hagel, and now, he says he doesn't want either, the Senator from Nebraska, another Republican.

A third Republican's name has come up, Bill Cohen, who served in President Clinton's cabinet. He's a Republican from Maine, was a Senator, served as secretary of defense in the Clinton cabinet. Now people are saying what about that?

The reason why a Republican would be a real coup would be that it would instantly signify Kerry's desire to run as a candidate to unify the country and fulfill the promise that Bush made in 2000 and failed to deliver to be a uniter, not a divider.

LIN: The other day, when Tom Vilsack was asked by reporters whether he was being considered for John Kerry's running mate, Tom Vilsack's staff said, look, there haven't been any background checks done on this guy, so we don't think he's in the running. Is it possible that the campaign is floating some of these names? And if so, why would they do that?

SCHNEIDER: Yes, because they want to create a big surprise. Look, these things are inherently unpredictable. I don't know that anyone predicted that Al Gore would pick Joe Lieberman. I don't know anyone, including the wisest political minds, who predicted that George Bush would pick Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney was the chairman of the committee looking for someone to be on the ticket with George Bush. Who predicted that his father was going to pick Dan Quayle?

Very tough to predict. So the bigger the surprise, the bigger bounce that Kerry is likely to get.

LIN: All right. True that e-mail is supposed to out on Tuesday?

SCHNEIDER: Tuesday or Wednesday, we're not sure, but it's likely to be this week. We guess. Again, nobody knows, that's why we're talking about it.

LIN: All right. We're going to be logging on. Thanks, Bill. We'll see you in our primetime show at 10:00 tonight. SCHNEIDER: OK.

LIN: Remember the hanging chads? After the bitter debate over the 2000 election, you would think Florida would stay clear of voting controversies, but the Sunshine State is back in the spotlight with a new voter problem. CNN's national correspondent Susan Candiotti reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DARREN JONES, FLORIDA VOTER: They went ahead and removed me. It's like guilty until proven 2347b8.

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Darren Jones was stunned when he opened a letter last month from the Miam-Dade Elections Office.

JONES: The court system has notified the elections department of your recent felony conviction, which is not true.

CANDIOTTI: True, Jones is a convicted felon who served six months of house arrest, but that was in 1998.

JONES: So I know this couldn't be right.

CANDIOTTI: Like all Florida felons are required to do, Jones applied for and got his voting rights back in 2003, and says he proudly used his card to cast a vote in last spring's Democratic primary.

Dade elections officials admit they goofed this time, but can't explain it.

(on camera): What happened to darren jones is happening to others. CNN successfully sued Florida election officials to get a list and this is just a part of it, of 47,000 suspected felons who could be dumped from voter rolls. And like the case of Darren Jones, we found mistake after mistake.

(voice-over): At 22, Sam Heyward was convicted of buying stolen furniture, in 1986, he won back his voting rights and says he hasn't missed an election, only to discover he's on the new suspected felons list.

SAM HEYWARD, VOTER: To find that my name was still on the list and said it may have some effect on your voting privileges, and I'm like, well I don't see how, I've been voting for the last 15 years.

CANDIOTTI: The Miami Herald reports that it documented more than 2,100 errors.

Of the 47,000 named, 39 percent reportedly are black Democrats, 20 percent are white Democrats, 16 percent white Republicans.

With only about four months to go before the presidential election, 67 county supervisors now find themselves under orders from the Capitol to confirm the new so-called suspected felons list. Few, if any are happy about it.

ION SANCHO, LEON CO. ELECTION SUPERVISOR: As an elections official, asking me to conduct criminal background checks, and spend most of my time in the criminal justice system would be analogous to asking doctors to do tax returns. And this simply is not our job.

CANDIOTTI: A spokesman for Governor Jeb Bush says the list is only a tool and insists election officials will have enough time to check each name before the next election. The NAACP and ACLU settled a lawsuit against Florida two years ago. It called for improving the state's voter database.

HOWARD SIMON, FLORIDA ACLU: State officials placed an eligible voter on the list of people to be purged, that is negligence on the part of state officials.

CANDIOTTI: For Darren Jones and others, the mix-ups make them wonder what will happen in November.

JONES: It's going to happen again. Trust me, it's going to happen again.

CANDIOTTI: Susan Candiotti, CNN, Miami.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: On this July 4th, surviving a civil war with their eyes focused on the American dream. Still to come, the flight to freedom for primitive tribal Africans coming to America.

Plus, time flies when you're having fun. Meet some U.S. troops who have a whole new understanding of the age-old phrase.

And, some of them can barely walk, but they know how to save that I own lives. Still to come: aqua babies.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: Soldiers running the Baghdad version of the Peachtree Road Race tops our news from around the news right now. More than 400 U.S. soldiers started running before the sun came up to join hundreds of runners in Atlanta, Georgia. The soldiers ran a 10K around their Camp Victory base.

Switzerland celebrates: Swiss player Roger Federer wins the men's singles championship at Wimbledon. He won last year, too. He beat American Andy Roddick in four sets.

And the underdogs become the top dogs. Greece pulls off one of the biggest shockers in soccer history, winning the European Soccer Championship 1-0 against Portugal. It's the ultimate victory for the blue and white, while Portugal, which hosted the game, is still stunned.

Bad news out of the Iraq war dominates the headlines, but sometimes war creates opportunity for those seeking security and freedoms they have never known. This year alone, the U.S. will take in nearly 50,000 refugees, people who would be killed if left in their homeland. One of those groups is the Somali Bantu, so persecuted the Clinton administration gave the Bantu special status.

I recently a group resettling in Wheaton, Illinois. Their story embodies the brighter side of what it means to be American.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LIN (voice-over): Starvation, disease, mass murder: That has been the bloody signature of the Somali Civil War. Half a million people have died. Perhaps none were persecuted more than the Bantu tribe.

They were Somalia's slaves, the people with the least protection when warring gangs went on their killing sprees. The lucky ones made it to Kenya's Baren-Kakuma (ph) Refugee Camp. This is the only life Halema Mukomas (ph) ever known. She, like the most ambitious, who were trying to come to America, learned the basic ways of the west: how to use plumbing, how a stove creates instant fire.

And then the Bantu waited. Waited for five to ten years, the average it takes even the most persecuted to get INS approval to go to the United States. Halnea Mukomas and her family were coming to America, but Chicago might as well be Mars.

World relief and volunteers from a local church settled them and three other Bantu families in a modest apartment building outside Chicago in Wheaten. All the furniture, kitchen supplies, clothes, everything was donated, but that was not enough.

(on camera): It's almost incomprehensible how much this family have to learn. The Bantu have an oral history. They have never even handled paper. Coming to America, they didn't even know how to hold a pen.

(voice-over): Teachers start with the basics: how to write, turn pages, read numbers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 103.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 103.

LIN: And then write them out and count.

SUE REYNOLDS, LITERACY TEACHER: They're learning what's represented on a page, how to figure out what today's date is, what those words are across the top of the calendar.

LIN: Just navigating their apartment, the Mukomas (ph) had to catch up on 200 years of technology: faucets, cabinets, the Bantus learned how to turn knobs to open doors. Once a week, the families gather at a small apartment to learn about American customs from Issam Smeir, a mental health counselor for world release.

ISSAM SHMEIR, MENTAL HEALTH COUNSELOR: In African, people think of different way in America.

LIN: On this day, Issam was teaching about breast feeding in public. Yes, while one mother was breast feeding on camera.

SMEIR: Americans tend to like, with some women, they do breast feed their baby, but they will hide it in a way that nobody will see.

LIN: What is your greatest hope for them?

SMEIR: That they have been opressed for so many years and they were sold to slavery, my greatest hope for them is to enjoy life here and to obtain their dreams.

LIN: Halemas (ph) husband, Murede Mukomas (ph) is paying for most expenses by working in a restaurant. He wants so much more.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I'm worried about how I will own my own place, that's what I'm thinking.

LIN: He wants his son someday to work for the U.S. government. His wife, Halema (ph), is pregnant. Their next child will be born in America, a U.S. citizen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: Tonight at 10:00 Eastern, we're going to take a look at some of the most personal challenges facing the Mukomas (ph) in their flight to freedom. That's CNN SUNDAY NIGHT tonight at 10:00 Eastern.

So, does your child know how to survive a summertime splash? Still to come on CNN LIVE SUNDAY, meet babies in diapers that can weather the water.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: The U.S. military calls it a vacation from war: Hundreds of soldiers on a two-week leave from Iraq. Our David Mattingly talks to the first soldiers who ended their break and are heading back to an Iraq run by Iraqis.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They've been home for the shortest two weeks of their lives, but leave is over. For these soldiers, it's time for the long flight back, back to an Iraq that is now run by Iraqis.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hopefully now it will take the emphasis off the American soldiers and put it back on the Iraqis.

MATTINGLY: Many of these soldiers watch the handover with their families on television. A reminder of the job waiting for them as they try to lose themselves in the comforts of home.

(on camera): What do you expect to do so when you get back?

(voice-over): They now they return with mixed emotions, hopeful that the worst is over, mindful of possible dangers ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hopefully they'll step up and start taking responsibility for their own country, own people in their country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We'll still wait and see. We don't know what to expect, what the change is going to be.

MATTINGLY (on camera): When these soldiers get back to Iraq, they'll be returning more experienced than last time, they're smarter, more seasoned. But with that experience, they say has come an important lesson, to always be prepared for anything.

(voice-over): Daily episodes of violence since the handover drive the point home that the bloodshed they left behind will be waiting, a certainty that makes a new round of farewells tough for any soldier.

(on camera): Is it harder saying good-bye the second time than the first?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

MATTINGLY: In what way?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I have to leave them a second time.

MATTINGLY (voice-over): Sgt. Bonnie Collins holds her two daughters close, trying to make the most of their last hours together before mom goes back to Baghdad.

SGT. BONNIE COLLINS, U.S ARMY: Getting through this, getting on the plane will be hard, but once it's done, it's done and I'll be okay.

MATTINGLY: A 14-hour flight that begins with heartache. Destination: the now familiar, but dangerous nation of Iraq. David Mattingly, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: And now the story you've probably been waiting for, I hope. Many parents wait until their children are three or four years old before even thinking about teaching them to swim, but a program in Miami is in enrolling students as young as ten months. CNN's photojournalist Jerry Simonson takes an underwater look at these amazing aqua babies.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANGELA MICKALIDE, NATIONAL SAFE KIDS CAMPAIGN: Drowning is the second leading cause of unintentional injury related death among children in this country. Each year, about 860 children die, and another 2,700 are rushed to hospital emergency rooms.

BRIAN LILBURN, AQUA CHILD INSTRUCTOR: Survival swimming basically entails, if a kid fell in the water when their parents weren't around, that they could last that extra couple minutes to either save themselves or have somebody else come and save them.

What we teach is, we teach floating more so than any aspect of it. And what the kids can do, that's the way that they can reenforce air, but rolling on their back and floating. And that they're not exerting any energy. And then they can always rest there for as long as they need to.

SCOTT LAUNDER, AQUA CHILD INSTRUCTOR: A four years old that took lessons with us last year, had climbed the pool fence, went in after a ball, fell in, the little brother started screaming for the parents...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A minute or two later, I hear them screaming. Luckily he learned the skills here. When I found him he was at the pool's edge already.

LILBURN: The way our lessons are set up, they're ten minutes a day, and they're every day, Monday through Friday. Kids learn by repetition and consistency. It's very important for them to do something over and over again for them to retain the skills that they're being taught.

LAUNDER: Once the child does these drills a certain amount of times, it becomes a motor reflex for air. So, it's not even a thought. If they fall in or need air, they don't think about it, it's a motor reflex. And they turn on their back and float.

LILBURN: Once the kids retain the skills that we've been teaching them, they're ready to do clothes. And what we do, we do a few different scenarios where they fall into the water, and then they use their skills to get out of that situation. To roll on their back and float, either swim to the side or swim to the stairs. They do full winter gear with a light jacket, shoes, shirts, long sleeve, you know, pants and everything.

MICKALIDE: Three-quarters of the children who died in our study had never received swimming lessons from a certified instructor.

LILBURN: On top of kids learning the survival aspect of floating here and swimming, it builds their self-esteem, builds their confidence, it does so much more for them than just swimming lessons.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: And that's all the time we have for this hour.

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