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CNN Wolf Blitzer Reports
Pentagon to Develop Missile Defense System; Bacterial Infection at Marine Base Causes Still Unknown
Aired December 17, 2002 - 17:00 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.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Shields up, giving the go-ahead to a missile defense system but at a cost of untold billions, will it work?
Outbreak -- trying to contain a bacterial infection that has swept through a Marine training center.
Damage control, Trent Lott calls his own comments repugnant but is it too late? Long before the collapse, Enron was poking fun at its own accounting practices.
KEN LAY, ENRON CEO: We can add a gazillion dollars to the bottom line.
O'BRIEN: Who was in on the joke?
And 99 years after the first flight...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was a devotee of the Brothers Wright and read much of their early recorded statements.
O'BRIEN: The first man on the moon looks back and ahead.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: It is Tuesday, December 17, 2002. I'm Miles O'Brien in Washington. Wolf Blitzer is on assignment.
President Bush today ordered the Pentagon to get ready to deploy a rudimentary missile defense system, which by 2004 should provide a limited shield against long and short-range attacks. CNN's Senior Pentagon Correspondent Jamie McIntyre looks at the system which many critics say just won't work.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Even though the latest U.S. missile defense test last week failed when a booster didn't separate, the Pentagon insists its hit to kill technology has worked four of five times this year.
LT. GEN. RONALD KADISH, MISSILE DEFENSE AGENCY: Our fundamental technology of hit to kill, collision of the interceptor with the warheads that completely destroys the warheads works. MCINTYRE: The goal to produce a system of interceptors and radars that by 2004 could, for example, detect, track and knock down a missile launch by North Korea before it could hit any of the 50 United States, price tag an additional billion and a half added to the $8 billion a year the U.S. is already spending on the program.
LISBETH GRONLUND, UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS: I think it is a waste of money to deploy. I mean it's really still in the very early stages of research and development. If this were any other military system, there would be no talk of deploying it.
MCINTYRE: Still, better than nothing argues the Pentagon.
DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: I wouldn't want to overplay it. I wouldn't want to oversell it. I wouldn't want to suggest that it has a depth or breadth or capability that will take some time to evolve.
MCINTYRE: By 2005, the plan calls for 16 land based interceptor missiles at Ft. Greely, Alaska, four interceptors at Vandenburg Air Force Base in California, the use of radars in Greenland and Great Britain, modifying three Aegis ships to carry 20 interceptors and 346 new Patriot missiles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCINTYRE: The Pentagon admits initially the system will have only a limited effectiveness, but as its capability grows, Miles, so will its deterrence value.
O'BRIEN: Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon, thank you very much.
The missile defense system has its roots in the Cold War, so just how real is the missile threat today? We get more on that from CNN National Security Correspondent David Ensor.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The threat driving the president to order this initial limited missile defense deployment in 2004 can be summed up in one country, North Korea and one leader Kim Jung-Il.
The 1998 launch by North Korea of a three street No Dong missile that flew over Japan shocked U.S. and Japanese policymakers and led the Clinton administration to make plans for missile interceptors, which have now been adopted and built upon by President Bush, whose administration warns the danger is very real.
RUMSFELD: The United States can not defend itself currently against ballistic missiles coming from anywhere, from the sea or from another continent, wherever.
ENSOR: But the missile interceptor plan announced by the administration is very limited in its capability and based on a hit to kill technology that has not always worked. IVO DAALDER, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: The chance that the missile will be intercepted coming to the United States is small but it is better than zero.
ENSOR: Former Clinton administration officials like Daalder say the system is better than nothing but they say the timing of the decision to go ahead is not just about defense.
DAALDER: What is driving all of this is the fact that we're having an election in early November, 2004 and that the president wants to have a missile defense system in place at the moment that the voters are going to go to the polls.
RUMSFELD: There isn't anything we're doing in this department that it would be accurate to suggest is rooted in politics. That's just false.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ENSOR: Bush administration officials say the limited system they are starting with will at least create greater doubt for North Korea's leaders over whether they could hit a U.S. target - Miles.
O'BRIEN: Thank you very much David Ensor, live here in Washington.
Officials at one of the U.S. Marine Corps major training centers are waiting for autopsy results of a recruit who may have died from Strep A, a rare but serious bacterial infection. More than 300 people have been sickened at the Marine Corps recruit depot in San Diego, California and that's where we find CNN's Brian Cabell.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN CABELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There hasn't been much activity at the recruit depot today; in fact, all rigorous physical activity has been suspended for three days. That means no swimming, no obstacle courses, no marshal arts. The idea is that if somebody is a little bit weak there's no reason to make them sicker.
Officials are now awaiting the results, the autopsy results on Miguel Zavala. He's the young recruit, 18 years old, who died on Sunday from a rash that just worse. He died on Sunday afternoon. The strong suspicion is that he may have died of Streptococcus A.
Dozens of recruits have been hospitalized ever since. A number of them have been released but at last count 47 recruits still hospitalized, one of them in critical condition with a confirmed case of Streptococcus A.
In addition, about 4,000 of the recruits, all of them here along with their instructors have been inoculated with bicillin, that's a form of penicillin. They've also had throat cultures taken. We should get results on that tomorrow.
As for the two previous recruit deaths, officials here say those are probably not connected to the Strep A outbreak here. One of the recruits died of a cardiac arrest. The other one died of fluid on his lungs. Again, the believe is that is not connected to this latest outbreak.
How extensive is the outbreak? We may know more by tomorrow when results from the throat cultures come back.
I'm Brian Cabell, CNN in San Diego.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: He gunned down a priest accused of molesting him but now Dontee Stokes is walking the streets a free man, the surprise agreement when we return plus this. A police chase turned into a shootout, a wild ride ends in a hail of bullets. We'll have the pictures.
And Lott's mea culpa, will his appearance on BET be enough to salvage his position as the Senate's top dog? But first, today's news quiz. Who was the first African-American news anchor, Bernard Shaw, Max Robinson, Carole Simpson, or Ed Bradley, the answer coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Police pursuits top our Justice Files. Los Angeles' new police chief is considering a ban on them for minor traffic violations. And to the north in Fresno, a high speed chase last night came to a violent end.
O'BRIEN: That shootout put an end to things. A suspect is believed to have been hit at least twice. He was described as still fighting police when he was put into an ambulance. No word on his condition right now. He was wanted on drug charges.
The man accused of killing a doctor who performed abortions is facing a new charge. James Kopp has admitted shooting Dr. Barnett Slepian and was facing second degree murder charges. Now prosecutors have added one count of reckless murder with depraved indifference to human life. They say it was warranted by new evidence. Kopp could get 25 years to life.
No prison time for a former Baltimore altar boy who admits shooting a priest he says molested him. Under a deal with prosecutors, 26-year-old Dontee Stokes will likely get a combination of house arrest and probation. Stokes was acquitted yesterday as Dennis Edwards of CNN affiliate WJZ reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DENNIS EDWARDS, WJZ CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Chants that freed Dontee Stokes quickly shifted to cries of praise when a jury returned six not guilty verdicts on first and second degree attempted murder, assault, reckless endangerment, and handgun violations.
DONTEE STOKES, DEFENDANT: I'm ecstatic. I'm glad the jury found me not guilty on the counts that they did. I'm thankful. I'd like to thank God first of all foremost.
EDWARDS: Stokes' case drew national attention when he shot Father Maurice Blackwell in front of his home last May. Defense attorneys successfully argued he was suffering from a mental disorder and was not criminally responsible when he shot Blackwell with a .357 magnum handgun, a disorder triggered by alleged sexual abuse at the hands of Blackwell. The former pastor of St. Edwards Catholic Church was called to testify but refused to answer questions under his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself.
WARREN BROWN, STOKES' ATTORNEY: This is not jury nullification. If it has been jury nullification they would have found him not guilty on the possession of the handguns. They rightfully found him guilty of possessing a handgun. It had nothing to do with his state of mind at the time of the shooting.
SYLVESTER COX, PROSECUTOR: Justice, I don't know if you could say justice was served in the sense that we have a gentleman still who is injured but the jury thought that was justice and that's justice in this case.
EDWARDS (on camera): The penalty for the charges Stokes is found guilty of is three years in jail but defense attorneys plan to argue for probation.
EDWARDS (voice-over): Stokes was found guilty of three gun- related violations including unlawfully possessing, transporting, and discharging a firearm. None are as serious as the charges dismissed.
STOKES: All that has occurred has to be righted and as far as a message, maybe it will send a message that people still do care about the victims.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: That report from Dennis Edwards of our affiliate WJZ.
Dontee Stokes will be among the guests on "CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT." That's at 8:00 Eastern, 5:00 Pacific, right here on CNN.
Florida officials are calling their effort to locate missing children a success. The state's Department of Children and Families had lost track of hundreds of kids and while most have been found dozens still have not as CNN's Mark Potter reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARK POTTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The mandate, find hundreds of missing children who were supposed to have been monitored by Florida's Department of Children and Families. State officials say by that measure, Operation Safe Kids was a success.
GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: By law enforcement's willingness to work with the department and to create a better way to identify children and then to figure out going forward how to tend to their needs, I think this is really historic. POTTER: Historic perhaps but the accounting reveals plenty of problems. Of the 393 children originally identified in August as missing, 290 or 75 percent were found alive. One 17-year-old girl was murdered, leaving 102 still unaccounted for.
Of those 102, 14 are now considered adults but are still being sought by authorities, leaving 88 missing children. Of those, 68 are listed as runaways and 20 are considered endangered or the victims of parental abductions.
TIM MOORE, FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF LAW ENFORCEMENT: Nine of those 20 we think we've located but they're in other countries.
POTTER: The controversy over Florida's missing kids began with the discovery last May that five-year-old Rilya Wilson had disappeared from foster care. As it turns out, she was last accounted for in January of 2001 and still has not been found. State Representative Nan Richards says while Operation Safe Kids was an important first step, it shows serious lapses in communication between the Department of Children and Families and other agencies.
NAN RICHARDS (D), FLORIDA STATE HOUSE: Here you have actually children who were located in - missing runaways that were located in Department of Juvenile Justice facilities. I mean, you know, both of them are agencies of the State of Florida who were not talking to each other.
POTTER: State officials insist they are improving communications and monitoring as well as the reporting of missing children.
POTTER (on camera): In addition to the 88 still missing children listed in the report, state officials say they are now investigating 211 potentially new cases, putting Florida's improved child welfare system to the test.
Mark Potter CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: Fighting the flu in a bottle, find out if you can fend off a winter (UNINTELLIGIBLE) without a shot in the arm. Also, sudden support for affirmative action, a turnaround on Martin Luther King, has Trent Lott discovered a new political soul or is it politics as usual? And this...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE H.W. BUSH, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You have been fantastic to the Bush family. I don't think anybody did more than you did to support George.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: The Bushs singing praise for Enron, another political faux pas caught on tape but first a look at news making headlines all around the world. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN (voice-over): Hearing at the Hague, former Secretary of State Madeline Albright testified at the war crimes trial of a former Bosnia-Serb leader. Albright condemned (UNINTELLIGIBLE) for atrocities carried out against non-Serbs but Albright says the Serbian leader later played an important role in the peace process.
Confrontations continue in Venezuela where opponents keep trying to oust President Hugo Chavez. Despite the government's efforts to break a strike, Venezuelan oil exports remain at a standstill. The government rebels and opposition political parties have signed a peace agreement in Congo. The document calls for an end to four years of civil war, a transitional government, and elections in about 30 months.
Tank fire, an Indian Army tank burst into flames while a convoy was rolling through Kashmir causing one injury. There's no word on the cause. Indian troops and Islamic guerillas have been battling in Kashmir for years.
Smoke over Haifa, there were initial fears this explosion at an Israeli chemical plant was the work of Palestinian guerillas. Officials now say it was accidental. There are no reports of serious injuries.
Cooking up a cure, a folk healer in Kazakhstan prescribes a hot bread oven for a wide range of illnesses. Patients strip down to their underwear, crawl into the oven, and stay there up to 30 minutes. The idea, like the patients, may seem a bit half-baked but those who say they've been cured in the oven call it a job well done, and that's our look around the world.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Medical news happening right now, a pain-free weapon in the battle against the flu but is the flu mist as it is called safe? A Food and Drug Administration committee considered that question today deciding whether to approve the vaccine. CNN Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta joining us from Atlanta with the latest on that, Sanjay it sounds too good to be true. You get your flu inoculation and no shot.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: You get it through the nose, that's right. It's the flu mist as you accurately said and it's been around for some time but, Miles, the advisory committee to the FDA stopped short of actually approving it. Over a year ago, in July of 2001, citing safety concerns specifically for children under the age of five, citing asthma and wheezing being a real problem.
They brought their case again today, the advisory committee did, and this time just a few minutes ago I received a message saying that it had been gone through the advisory committee and approved now by the advisory committee for those people age five to 49. The FDA still hasn't approved this. They usually take what the advisory committee says with a great deal of thought but it still has to wait for that FDA approval.
But again, Miles, just like you said this would be a pain-free, a shot-free way to inoculate yourself against the flu, a very effective way, in some trials up to 93 percent effectiveness. It might be a very good thing, especially for those people who don't like to get shots - Miles.
O'BRIEN: Well, and those happen to be the kids, of course, who can't - apparently is not going to work out so well for them I guess.
GUPTA: Under the age of five, right, but older than the age of five this might be a good thing for them again, asthma and wheezing being the two big concerns in those kids under the age of five.
O'BRIEN: All right, there's another study that caught our eye today. It's that something old may be better than something new when it comes to treating hypertension.
GUPTA: This has been a long-awaited trial, exactly as you said Miles. It actually looks at an old-fashioned blood pressure medication and compared it to several of the new fangled blood pressure medications, if you will. Actually, let's take a look at the study what they did here.
They looked at over 42,000 people, if you can read those numbers there, 55 and older, and they decided to split these people into four groups and let me just read some of these names to you, diuretic, that's also known as a water pill; ACE inhibitor and calcium channel blocker are two very well known anti-hypertensives as well as an alpha blocker.
And what they found over time was that, first of all, the alpha blocker patients weren't getting much benefit at all, but he diuretics seemed to have better blood pressure reduction than the other two anti-hypertensives, one or two points better blood pressure reduction, but more importantly significantly, up to 38 percent, better risk reduction in the risk of heart failure.
So, Miles, exactly as you said this old-fashioned, if you will, blood pressure medication which is still commonly used, doctors are thinking that might be a much better choice. In fact, this is how one doctor put it earlier today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. PAUL WHELTON, ALLHAT STEERING COMMITTEE: If you need to begin drug treatment for your high blood pressure, then diuretics should almost certainly be your first drug of choice. If you're already being treated for high blood pressure, you should talk to your doctor to determine if your blood pressure is being adequately controlled.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GUPTA: Of course, as always, talk to your doctor, Miles, but again diuretics possibly a first line of choice there.
O'BRIEN: Well, I got to ask you before you get away. Those of us who drink coffee know it is a diuretic, a pretty effective one. Can you self medicate by drinking coffee?
GUPTA: That's a very interesting point, actually. If you talk about coffee, for example, the coffee can actually as far as getting your dosing right that's a really important point. If you actually want to get the right amount of diuretic, you need to still see your doctor and get the prescription medication in order to be able to do that right. So, coffee not a good option there as far as self medicating - Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right. All right, Dr. Sanjay Gupta making a set call for us, as always a great pleasure to see you. Thank you, sir.
GUPTA: Thank you.
O'BRIEN: All right, I'll check in with you later. Trent Lott does his best to make amends but is it too late perhaps to salvage his reputation?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's going to be hard to change those who see him as the devil and put wings on him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: We'll go live to Mississippi for reaction plus a preview of what his political future may hold. Plus, Enron on tape, a skit was supposed to be funny on some rather not so funny accounting practices and some cozying up with the Bush family. We'll explain when we return.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Welcome back, I'm Miles O'Brien. Coming up, Trent Lott does damage control, reaction to his mea culpa on BET, but first let's look at some other stories making news right now in our CNN news alert.
(NEWSBREAK)
O'BRIEN: He's under fire after praising a 1948 segregationist presidential bid. His GOP colleagues will meet in January to reconsider his leadership role. Now with his career on the line, Senator Trent Lott has issued yet another apology for his remarks, this time on Black Entertainment Television.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. TRENT LOTT (R-MS), MINORITY LEADER: I'm now trying to find a way to deal with the understandable hurt that I have caused. You can, you know, say it was innocent but it was insensitive at the very least and repugnant, frankly. There has been immoral leadership in my part of the country for a long time. Progress has been made.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Were you a part of that?
LOTT: Yes, I can't deny that and, you know, I believe that I have changed and that I'm trying to do a better job.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What about affirmative action?
LOTT: I'm for that. I think you should reach out to people.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Across the board?
LOTT: Absolutely across the board.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Is Trent Lott winning any hearts or changing any minds? CNN National Correspondent Gary Tuchman has been taking the pulse of Pascagoula, the Senator's hometown where they, of course, know him best.
How was it received there Gary?
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Miles, Pascagoula, Mississippi is not exactly a walking town. People drive everywhere and that's why drive-in restaurants like this are so popular. This drive-in restaurant, the Sonic, is a place that Trent Lott comes to himself; we are told. So we've decided to talk to people who have driven up to get their food. We've never actually talked to people live in their cars on television before during this kind of -- doing this kind of thing, but we thought we'd try it today to find out what people think about Trent Lott.
Do you know about the interview last night? What do you think of your senator?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I still think he's as great as he was when he first went in office. I think, you know, it's been too much of an issue about it. He's made his apologies. And I think people should accept it and accept what he has done in the past and what he can do in the future if they'll let him.
TUCHMAN: And that's a very cute dog you have by the way.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you.
TUCHMAN: OK, thanks for talking with us. We'll go to the car right next to us. Car after car, a lot of support for Trent Lott in this particular restaurant. Hello, there. Let me ask you, what do you think of what Trent Lott had to say during his interview and what do you think of Trent Lott?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think he's a very good senator. He's done a lot for Jackson County and its industries. He's got a lot -- done a lot, I think, for the contracts and for shipbuilding and all that. TUCHMAN: Let me ask you about what he said though. I mean he's hurt a lot of feelings.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that he was trying to help make an old man feel better and it was just misunderstood. He just said it the wrong way. But in the end, he had good intentions in mind.
TUCHMAN: OK, I want to talk -- thank you for talking. I want to talk to one more person, who's in the car next to us. And this person's kind of interesting because she's actually a middle school student who is here eating Sonic hamburgers with her father right now. And she's a middle school student who goes to Trent Lott Middle School, home of the Trent Lott Panthers. You can see Trent Lott is very well established one might say in Mississippi, has an airport, a school. And what's your name?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mary Lou.
TUCHMAN: And Mary, what grade are you in?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sixth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can you tell me what you think of Trent Lott?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm glad to have him as my senator and he's done a lot for Mississippi.
TUCHMAN: What were you telling me before? You think that the northerners have something out against southerners?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think they just blew it too out of proportion, just to get him out of the way.
TUCHMAN: I want to thank you for talking with us. Before we go and say goodbye, we want to talk to one more person here and that's the manager of the Sonic. She tells us something very interesting. As you know, Trent Lott had his news conference here in Pascagoula on Friday where he apologized several times and you're telling me -- let me get your name first.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Stephanie Magerrs (ph).
TUCHMAN: Stephanie, you're telling me that after his news conference here in Pascagoula, where did Trent Lott come right afterwards?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Here at Sonic.
TUCHMAN: Came here to Sonic?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On Friday night.
TUCHMAN: And he's a regular here?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Regular. Every time he comes home he eats here.
TUCHMAN: And what does he get when he comes to the Sonic drive- in?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A number two cheeseburger, onion ring and a vanilla shake.
TUCHMAN: What is a number two cheeseburger?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mustard. It has pickles, lettuce, tomato, onion -- the works on it.
TUCHMAN: OK, we learned a lot about Trent Lott in the last couple of weeks. You probably didn't know that about him, that he likes the number two cheeseburger when he comes to the Sonic.
One other thing we want to tell you, we've been here all day talking to people on the other side of the issue too. The main problem they have -- they've heard him apologize many times over the past few days, but they wish the apologies came before Strom Thurmond's birthday party.
Miles, back to you.
O'BRIEN: All right, Gary Tuchman in Pascagoula, Mississippi, leaving no stone unturned, no detail too small for us here at CNN. We appreciate that.
Tent Lott, of course, is the not the first politician to put his foot in his mouth and not the first to use in a bid to save a career. Howard Kurtz of CNN's "RELIABLE SOURCES" looked at some who preceded the Republican leader in the scandal hot seat.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HOWARD KURTZ, HOST, "RELIABLE SOURCES": When politicians get into trouble, the media can be their best friend or worst enemy. It all depends on whether they have the savvy to play defense before the cameras. Let's face it; television and the images it carries are very much a fact of political life.
(voice-over): Trent Lott stayed out of sight for days after praising the segregationist 1948 candidacy of Strom Thurmond. He was criticized by political insiders and the press for phoning in his remarks to a radio show on Hannity and CNN's Larry King. Only when Lott was in danger of being dumped as majority leader, did he hold a press conference and make his case on block entertainment television.
LOTT: The important thing is to recognize the hurt that I caused and ask for forgiveness.
KURTZ: Bill Clinton was a master of television. When the Monica Lewinsky story surfaced, he got angry in front of the cameras.
WILLIAM J. CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE United States: I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. KURTZ: The problem was this was misleading at best and the public later saw a very different video images of the president testifying before the grand jury.
CLINTON: It depends upon what the meaning of the word is.
KURTZ: Gary Condit refused to utter a syllable to the press for months after Chandra Levy's disappearance. Although there's no evidence of any involvement with the former intern's death, he's now soon to be former Congressman Condit.
Presidential candidate Gary Hart made the mistake of challenging the press to follow him around. When "The Miami Herald" found him in the company of a young model named Donna Race, Hart denied any hanky panky to an openly skeptical press corps.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you ever committed adultery?
GARY HART, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I do not think that's an appropriate question.
KURTZ: Hart was out of the race within days. Perhaps the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) could learn something from Hollywood. When Hugh Grant faced international humiliation for hiring a hooker, he picked the right forum to face the music.
JAY LENO, TALK SHOW HOST: What the hell were you thinking?
KURTZ: Senator Lott, of course, can't make light of a serious subject like segregation. The question now is whether his media offensive is too little and way too late.
This is Howard Kurtz of CNN's "RELIABLE SOURCES."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: So is Trent Lott making his case? Can he pull this one off? Joining me from New York for some insight to all of this is our political analyst, Jeff Greenfield.
Jeff, good to have you with us.
JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Good to see you.
O'BRIEN: The conventional wisdom is if you get in trouble, you fess up early, you apologize profusely and the public will forgive you. That hasn't happened so far in this case. Why?
GREENFIELD: No, and I think there a couple of reasons. One, I think the nature of the apologies have been -- how shall I put this -- a little unsettling. It's almost as if Trent Lott is talking as if he were found out to have said this in about 1964. To come out days later and decide that segregation is wrong just seems a little off kilter. And, frankly, to a lot of people it seems that the only reason he's saying it is that he got caught. The other thing is this appearance last night on BET with Ed Gordon; he said a couple of things that are clearly going to really make the conservatives and Republicans very angry. I mean to say, "Oh, yes, I'm for affirmative action" and to say that the leadership in the south was immoral, I mean, again, if he had said that at the start of his career, the way Jimmy Carter said that the time for racial discrimination is over back in 1970, it would have been one thing. But this, I think, is coming off late and frankly lame.
O'BRIEN: I guess I'm a little curious as to why Trent Lott, a Conservative Republican, wouldn't make a for the Republican position on affirmative action as opposed to saying, "Yes, I'm for that." I mean that's an interesting position to put himself in. He alienates himself from his own party and doesn't really convince liberals.
GREENFIELD: I think that's what I'm getting at and maybe the right phrase is tone deaf. I mean there have been a lot of conservatives for years have been arguing that the liberal big government solutions have failed and they have failed poor people. They have failed black and brown people worst.
More than 20 years ago, Ronald Reagan gave a speech to the Urban League, when he was running for president, making that case. You can argue whether he ever pursued it. Newt Gingrich in 1995 when he became speaker of the House first of all apologized for the fact that it was liberal Democrats that led the civil rights fight. And George W. Bush in his acceptance speech said we're going to put conservative ideas squarely on the side of justice and opportunity.
But that's not what Trent Lott said. He seems to be kind of groping for the right words that were somehow going to mollify people for a lengthy career. And just to be fair to Senator Lott, it's not -- you know, the Republicans have elected him twice their majority leader. No Democrat that I know went after Trent Lott's record on civil rights and affirmative action until he got himself in serious trouble with the remarks at Thurmond's birthday.
So another question we might well ask is well, if it was horrible for Trent Lott to have said this a couple of weeks ago, was it not horrible for him to have said it in 1980? And was it not horrible for people on both sides of the aisle to kind of brush it off?
O'BRIEN: All right, quickly, before we get away, Jeff. You get the sense that the support for Trent Lott at best is about an inch deep in Washington. Why?
GREENFIELD: Well, I mean, you get that sense because the White House has been doing everything but holding up big cards, you know, like in a football game with one of those card sections to say, "Please go away." The front page of "The New York Times" and "Washington post" had those classic Washington stories today with unattributed remarks from, you know, senior White House officials saying he should really go away. And the reason is they don't believe it's pretty clear that they can pursue with a unified Congress and White House now an aggressive, assertive, conservative position on areas like affirmative action and school choice where they're being led by somebody whose image now is somebody who thought that things were better in the good old days. It's just not -- it's just that -- that's an anchor that's just too heavy to carry.
O'BRIEN: Silence not so golden for Trent Lott. All right, Jeff Greenfield in New York. Thanks, as always, appreciate it.
Here's your chance to weigh in on this story. Our "Web Question of the Day" is what's your opinion of Senator Trent Lott after his BET interview? Favorable or unfavorable? We'll have the results later in this broadcast. You can vote -- cnn.com/wolf is the place. And while you're there, we'd like to hear from you. Send us your comments and we'll try -- we underscore that -- try to read some of them at the end of this program. That's also of course where you can read our daily online column. The place, once again, cnn.com/wolf.
Enron caught on tape.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SKILLING: ... HFV, hypothetical future value accounting.
RICH KINDER, ENRON: Whoa!
SKILLING: If we do that, we can add a gazillion dollars to the bottom line.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know, Rich.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Fact and fiction colliding during a bizarre corporate skit that some might see as a Freudian slip. Plus, keeping your credit report sterling. It can get away with you this time of year when you're at the mall. A consumer credit guru will join us live when we return. But first, the answer to today's news quiz.
Earlier we asked -- who was the first African-American network news anchor? The answer, Max Robinson. In 1978, ABC named him as one of three co-anchors for "World News Tonight." Bernard Shaw became the second black network anchor when he joined CNN in 1980.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: A videotape has emerged that was made for a 1997 Enron going away party for an Enron executive. In the tape, jokes were made about the company's accounting practices, which of course eventually caused Enron's collapse. CNN's Jen Rogers takes a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SKILLING: Your total from $60 million last year to $423 million this year.
KINDER: Whoa! Yes!
JEN ROGERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Every workplace has its share of jokes but this is one joke Enron may not have wanted to share with the rest of the world.
SKILLING: This is the key -- we're going to move from mark to market accounting to something I called HFV, hypothetical future value accounting.
KINDER: Whoa!
SKILLING: If we do that, we can add a gazillion dollars to the bottom line.
ROGERS: That's Jeffrey Skilling, the company's then president, joking about accounting issues on a tap made six years ago as a going away present for Enron executive, Rich Kinder (ph). At the time, of course, Enron was not the poster child for bad business practices but now that the company has collapsed under the weight of numerous accounting scandals, comments like these may be coming back to haunt executives who have since become household names, including the company's former chairman, Ken Lay.
SKILLING: You'd never do all those ugly things to people who didn't make their numbers. Would you?
ROGERS: Other big names you may recognize on the tape, two political connected prominent Texans.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Rich, I've been asked to think of one thing I can say to you on your departure of Enron, it would be this -- don't leave Texas. You're too a good man.
ROGERS: Enron, which donated more than $300,000 to George W. Bush's two gubernatorial campaigns in Texas, more than $100,000 to his presidential race and $300 to the Bush/Cheney Inaugural Fund, was a top contributor to the GOP. The Department of Justice had no comment on the tape. An Enron spokesman said he hadn't see the tape, but the Enron investigation continues. So far neither Mr. Lay nor Mr. Skilling has been charged with anything. The company's former CFO, Andrew Fastow, who does not appear on the tape, has been indicted and is out on a $5 million bond.
Jen Rogers, CNN Financial News, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: Enron's credit may be shot. What about yours, though? The answer may depend on which credit-reporting agency you ask and perhaps the kind of accounting you do too. The new study says the same consumer can get strikingly different scores. Joining me from New York with some advice on all of this is Beth Kobliner. She's author of the wildly popular book "How To Get a Financial Life -- or "Get a Financial Life."
Beth, good to see you.
BETH KOPLINER, AUTHOR, "GET A FINANCIAL LIFE": Good to see you.
O'BRIEN: All right, now, at this -- you have five tips for us on how to keep your credit report sterling. The number one is probably the most important one. We could probably get one point on this and that is pay your bills on time.
KOBLINER: Right. It sounds so obvious but actually this is the number one factor that goes into creating what's called your credit score, which is basically a report card, numerical report card, of your credit life. So paying your bills on time is key.
O'BRIEN: All right. But when you say on time, what do you mean, like the minute the bill comes in the mail? Does it matter? Or is it -- if it's within 30 days? Is that the same thing?
KOBLINER: Get it there -- yes, get it there within a comfortable margin of when it's actually due because if you have a 30-day late payment, if you're just late by a few days, that's considered a 30-day late payment on your credit report. And particularly if you're a younger person, you have a thin credit report, meaning you don't have much of a credit history. That could end up costing you thousands of dollars because you'll end up having a higher interest rate on a credit card you get or even a higher interest rate on a mortgage you get one day. So these late payments now could haunt you a very many number of years.
O'BRIEN: All right, number two, on the tote board, check your credit score. That's really easy to do these days on the Internet. It'll cost you a few bucks, but you can get those numbers, right?
KOBLINER: Yes, go to EQUIFAX, Experian and Transunion. Those are the three major credit agencies. And I would tell people to ask for their FICO credit score. The FICO score is actually...
O'BRIEN: Psycho? Did you say psycho?
KOBLINER: FICO. Not psycho. It makes you feel psycho.
O'BRIEN: That's another kind of score, yes.
KOBLINER: Right. It's FICO -- F-I-c-o. And the reason you want to ask for that score is two of those three agencies offer a FICO score is that's also the credit score that the lenders look at. So you want to be looking at what the lenders are looking at, to see how they view you as a credit risk.
O'BRIEN: All right. We got to do this in truncated form because of course; we're running short on time.
KOBLINER: OK.
O'BRIEN: Don't max out credit cards. That's one of those obvious ones that we don't need to get on.
KOBLINER: Right.
O'BRIEN: Get a free credit report. Can you get one of those a year? Is that how it works? One a year? KOBLINER: Well, if you're denied credit, you can get one. If you live in the six states that give you free ones like New Jersey, Maryland, Georgia, then you get a free report. And also, if you're unemployed and you're actively looking for work, you can also qualify for a free credit report.
O'BRIEN: All right and one final point here. This is a really important one. If you get into a pinch, you can actually put a statement on the credit report there and that goes to reporting problems to the credit agency. Explain how that all works.
KOBLINER: That's right. Well, if you have a dispute and there's a mistake, write to the credit reporting companies, one of those agencies we talked about, or call them on the 800 number and say that there is a dispute. By law they have to investigate that within 30 days. Now, if they don't resolve it to your satisfaction, basically they don't remove the negative thing you think is wrong, then you can write a 100-word statement that's put in your credit report. And when they send out your report, they'll send out that statement.
O'BRIEN: All right, Beth Kobliner, thank you very much for dealing with what is a daunting thing for many consumers, dealing with these credit agencies. They hold an awful lot of power over us. Thanks very much.
KOBLINER: They certainly do.
O'BRIEN: The book is "Get a Financial Life" and we appreciate you joining us as always.
KOBLINER: My pleasure.
O'BRIEN: It's time for us to take a break, I should say. A blast from the past launching into the 21st century, we'll take you on a front seat ride for the celebration of a man's first flight.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Today marks the beginning of a special year for aviation enthusiasts. It's the yearlong run-up to the centennial flight.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN (voice-over): It was a blustery morning that day on the outer banks of North Carolina, a perfect day for flying, as it turns out. Orville and Wilbur, the original right stuff slipped the surely bonds under power in a quartet the brief flights. The dream was suddenly a reality.
It was December 17, 1903, 99 years ago. To mark the moment and to begin a year long centennial celebration, the aviation and space cognoscente (ph) gathered at the Smithsonian's Air and Space Museum -- yes, that's actor and aviator, John Travolta -- to remember the Wrights and all those who stood upon their shoulders. NEIL ARMSTRONG, ASTRONUAT: That's the boy because I was born and raised in Ohio in a barn about 60 miles north of Dayton, and the legends of the Wrights have been in my memory for as long as I can remember.
O'BRIEN: Fellow Ohioan and fellow aerospace pioneer, Neil Armstrong, was here, a rare appearance in the media limelight. The spacecraft that took him to the moon sits in the shadow of the Wright Flyer; impressive book ends for the museum's milestones of flight gallery.
ARMSTRONG: I guess that's the story of flight in the 20th century, from the beginning -- from the very first flights at Kitty hawk to the various -- very furthest and fastest flights that man has ever made.
O'BRIEN: And there was another Ohioan here who made his own indelible mark on the sky.
JOHN GLENN, ASTRONAUT: What impresses me is every time I come here and see this thing, is how fast aviation advanced beyond the Wright brothers if you think it was only 15 years until they were dog fighting over France in World War I.
O'BRIEN: Lost amid the high praise is a stubborn embarrassment of history. Ninety-nine years ago, the Smithsonian refused to give proper credit to the Wrights and was not even interested in displaying the Flyer. Peaked with anger, Orville shipped the historic craft to a museum in Great Britain. The Smithsonian did not see the error of its ways and bring the flyer home until 1948.
AMANDA WRIGHT-LANE, WRIGHT RELATIVE: And I think Uncle -- overall, just wanted to be recognized for what was due to them, no more, no less. And he was a very honorable man and a patriot and he just wanted to be recognized as the first folks who had flown. So -- and they did.
O'BRIEN: Now, millions see the Flyer for what it was. It makes one wonder what might be.
ARMSTRONG: If we look back a century from now, we'd really be amazed at what has happened.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: Neil Armstrong. Now, the entire yearlong event will of celebration will culminate with an attempt to fly a replica of the Wright Flyer December 7, 2003. We'll keep you posted on all of that.
Well, time's running out for you to turn in your answer to our "Question of The Day." What is your opinion of Senator Trent Lott after his BET interview? Favorable or unfavorable? Log in to CNN.com/Wolf to vote. We'll have the results as soon as we come back. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) O'BRIEN: It's time now for our "Picture of The Day". It is something you definitely don't want to see in your home. Fire crews in Pasadena, California gave this demonstration today of just how quickly a dry Christmas tree can burst into flames. Among the advice of the experts, to avoid something like this, keep are your tree well watered, keep it away from heat sources, check or replace damaged lights. They say it's best to replace them every four or five years. Disconnect the lights when you're not around, especially when you go to bed, and place a smoke detector nearby. And always, on that, make sure the batteries are fresh.
That's all the time we have today. Join Wolf Blitzer tomorrow at 5:00 p.m. Eastern. Please join Wolf weekdays at noon Eastern as well for "SHOWDOWN IRAQ." Until then, thanks very much for watching. I'm Miles O'Brien in Washington. Lou Dobbs is up next with "MONEYLINE."
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Infection at Marine Base Causes Still Unknown>
Aired December 17, 2002 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Shields up, giving the go-ahead to a missile defense system but at a cost of untold billions, will it work?
Outbreak -- trying to contain a bacterial infection that has swept through a Marine training center.
Damage control, Trent Lott calls his own comments repugnant but is it too late? Long before the collapse, Enron was poking fun at its own accounting practices.
KEN LAY, ENRON CEO: We can add a gazillion dollars to the bottom line.
O'BRIEN: Who was in on the joke?
And 99 years after the first flight...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was a devotee of the Brothers Wright and read much of their early recorded statements.
O'BRIEN: The first man on the moon looks back and ahead.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: It is Tuesday, December 17, 2002. I'm Miles O'Brien in Washington. Wolf Blitzer is on assignment.
President Bush today ordered the Pentagon to get ready to deploy a rudimentary missile defense system, which by 2004 should provide a limited shield against long and short-range attacks. CNN's Senior Pentagon Correspondent Jamie McIntyre looks at the system which many critics say just won't work.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Even though the latest U.S. missile defense test last week failed when a booster didn't separate, the Pentagon insists its hit to kill technology has worked four of five times this year.
LT. GEN. RONALD KADISH, MISSILE DEFENSE AGENCY: Our fundamental technology of hit to kill, collision of the interceptor with the warheads that completely destroys the warheads works. MCINTYRE: The goal to produce a system of interceptors and radars that by 2004 could, for example, detect, track and knock down a missile launch by North Korea before it could hit any of the 50 United States, price tag an additional billion and a half added to the $8 billion a year the U.S. is already spending on the program.
LISBETH GRONLUND, UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS: I think it is a waste of money to deploy. I mean it's really still in the very early stages of research and development. If this were any other military system, there would be no talk of deploying it.
MCINTYRE: Still, better than nothing argues the Pentagon.
DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: I wouldn't want to overplay it. I wouldn't want to oversell it. I wouldn't want to suggest that it has a depth or breadth or capability that will take some time to evolve.
MCINTYRE: By 2005, the plan calls for 16 land based interceptor missiles at Ft. Greely, Alaska, four interceptors at Vandenburg Air Force Base in California, the use of radars in Greenland and Great Britain, modifying three Aegis ships to carry 20 interceptors and 346 new Patriot missiles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCINTYRE: The Pentagon admits initially the system will have only a limited effectiveness, but as its capability grows, Miles, so will its deterrence value.
O'BRIEN: Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon, thank you very much.
The missile defense system has its roots in the Cold War, so just how real is the missile threat today? We get more on that from CNN National Security Correspondent David Ensor.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The threat driving the president to order this initial limited missile defense deployment in 2004 can be summed up in one country, North Korea and one leader Kim Jung-Il.
The 1998 launch by North Korea of a three street No Dong missile that flew over Japan shocked U.S. and Japanese policymakers and led the Clinton administration to make plans for missile interceptors, which have now been adopted and built upon by President Bush, whose administration warns the danger is very real.
RUMSFELD: The United States can not defend itself currently against ballistic missiles coming from anywhere, from the sea or from another continent, wherever.
ENSOR: But the missile interceptor plan announced by the administration is very limited in its capability and based on a hit to kill technology that has not always worked. IVO DAALDER, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: The chance that the missile will be intercepted coming to the United States is small but it is better than zero.
ENSOR: Former Clinton administration officials like Daalder say the system is better than nothing but they say the timing of the decision to go ahead is not just about defense.
DAALDER: What is driving all of this is the fact that we're having an election in early November, 2004 and that the president wants to have a missile defense system in place at the moment that the voters are going to go to the polls.
RUMSFELD: There isn't anything we're doing in this department that it would be accurate to suggest is rooted in politics. That's just false.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ENSOR: Bush administration officials say the limited system they are starting with will at least create greater doubt for North Korea's leaders over whether they could hit a U.S. target - Miles.
O'BRIEN: Thank you very much David Ensor, live here in Washington.
Officials at one of the U.S. Marine Corps major training centers are waiting for autopsy results of a recruit who may have died from Strep A, a rare but serious bacterial infection. More than 300 people have been sickened at the Marine Corps recruit depot in San Diego, California and that's where we find CNN's Brian Cabell.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN CABELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There hasn't been much activity at the recruit depot today; in fact, all rigorous physical activity has been suspended for three days. That means no swimming, no obstacle courses, no marshal arts. The idea is that if somebody is a little bit weak there's no reason to make them sicker.
Officials are now awaiting the results, the autopsy results on Miguel Zavala. He's the young recruit, 18 years old, who died on Sunday from a rash that just worse. He died on Sunday afternoon. The strong suspicion is that he may have died of Streptococcus A.
Dozens of recruits have been hospitalized ever since. A number of them have been released but at last count 47 recruits still hospitalized, one of them in critical condition with a confirmed case of Streptococcus A.
In addition, about 4,000 of the recruits, all of them here along with their instructors have been inoculated with bicillin, that's a form of penicillin. They've also had throat cultures taken. We should get results on that tomorrow.
As for the two previous recruit deaths, officials here say those are probably not connected to the Strep A outbreak here. One of the recruits died of a cardiac arrest. The other one died of fluid on his lungs. Again, the believe is that is not connected to this latest outbreak.
How extensive is the outbreak? We may know more by tomorrow when results from the throat cultures come back.
I'm Brian Cabell, CNN in San Diego.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: He gunned down a priest accused of molesting him but now Dontee Stokes is walking the streets a free man, the surprise agreement when we return plus this. A police chase turned into a shootout, a wild ride ends in a hail of bullets. We'll have the pictures.
And Lott's mea culpa, will his appearance on BET be enough to salvage his position as the Senate's top dog? But first, today's news quiz. Who was the first African-American news anchor, Bernard Shaw, Max Robinson, Carole Simpson, or Ed Bradley, the answer coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Police pursuits top our Justice Files. Los Angeles' new police chief is considering a ban on them for minor traffic violations. And to the north in Fresno, a high speed chase last night came to a violent end.
O'BRIEN: That shootout put an end to things. A suspect is believed to have been hit at least twice. He was described as still fighting police when he was put into an ambulance. No word on his condition right now. He was wanted on drug charges.
The man accused of killing a doctor who performed abortions is facing a new charge. James Kopp has admitted shooting Dr. Barnett Slepian and was facing second degree murder charges. Now prosecutors have added one count of reckless murder with depraved indifference to human life. They say it was warranted by new evidence. Kopp could get 25 years to life.
No prison time for a former Baltimore altar boy who admits shooting a priest he says molested him. Under a deal with prosecutors, 26-year-old Dontee Stokes will likely get a combination of house arrest and probation. Stokes was acquitted yesterday as Dennis Edwards of CNN affiliate WJZ reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DENNIS EDWARDS, WJZ CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Chants that freed Dontee Stokes quickly shifted to cries of praise when a jury returned six not guilty verdicts on first and second degree attempted murder, assault, reckless endangerment, and handgun violations.
DONTEE STOKES, DEFENDANT: I'm ecstatic. I'm glad the jury found me not guilty on the counts that they did. I'm thankful. I'd like to thank God first of all foremost.
EDWARDS: Stokes' case drew national attention when he shot Father Maurice Blackwell in front of his home last May. Defense attorneys successfully argued he was suffering from a mental disorder and was not criminally responsible when he shot Blackwell with a .357 magnum handgun, a disorder triggered by alleged sexual abuse at the hands of Blackwell. The former pastor of St. Edwards Catholic Church was called to testify but refused to answer questions under his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself.
WARREN BROWN, STOKES' ATTORNEY: This is not jury nullification. If it has been jury nullification they would have found him not guilty on the possession of the handguns. They rightfully found him guilty of possessing a handgun. It had nothing to do with his state of mind at the time of the shooting.
SYLVESTER COX, PROSECUTOR: Justice, I don't know if you could say justice was served in the sense that we have a gentleman still who is injured but the jury thought that was justice and that's justice in this case.
EDWARDS (on camera): The penalty for the charges Stokes is found guilty of is three years in jail but defense attorneys plan to argue for probation.
EDWARDS (voice-over): Stokes was found guilty of three gun- related violations including unlawfully possessing, transporting, and discharging a firearm. None are as serious as the charges dismissed.
STOKES: All that has occurred has to be righted and as far as a message, maybe it will send a message that people still do care about the victims.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: That report from Dennis Edwards of our affiliate WJZ.
Dontee Stokes will be among the guests on "CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT." That's at 8:00 Eastern, 5:00 Pacific, right here on CNN.
Florida officials are calling their effort to locate missing children a success. The state's Department of Children and Families had lost track of hundreds of kids and while most have been found dozens still have not as CNN's Mark Potter reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARK POTTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The mandate, find hundreds of missing children who were supposed to have been monitored by Florida's Department of Children and Families. State officials say by that measure, Operation Safe Kids was a success.
GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: By law enforcement's willingness to work with the department and to create a better way to identify children and then to figure out going forward how to tend to their needs, I think this is really historic. POTTER: Historic perhaps but the accounting reveals plenty of problems. Of the 393 children originally identified in August as missing, 290 or 75 percent were found alive. One 17-year-old girl was murdered, leaving 102 still unaccounted for.
Of those 102, 14 are now considered adults but are still being sought by authorities, leaving 88 missing children. Of those, 68 are listed as runaways and 20 are considered endangered or the victims of parental abductions.
TIM MOORE, FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF LAW ENFORCEMENT: Nine of those 20 we think we've located but they're in other countries.
POTTER: The controversy over Florida's missing kids began with the discovery last May that five-year-old Rilya Wilson had disappeared from foster care. As it turns out, she was last accounted for in January of 2001 and still has not been found. State Representative Nan Richards says while Operation Safe Kids was an important first step, it shows serious lapses in communication between the Department of Children and Families and other agencies.
NAN RICHARDS (D), FLORIDA STATE HOUSE: Here you have actually children who were located in - missing runaways that were located in Department of Juvenile Justice facilities. I mean, you know, both of them are agencies of the State of Florida who were not talking to each other.
POTTER: State officials insist they are improving communications and monitoring as well as the reporting of missing children.
POTTER (on camera): In addition to the 88 still missing children listed in the report, state officials say they are now investigating 211 potentially new cases, putting Florida's improved child welfare system to the test.
Mark Potter CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: Fighting the flu in a bottle, find out if you can fend off a winter (UNINTELLIGIBLE) without a shot in the arm. Also, sudden support for affirmative action, a turnaround on Martin Luther King, has Trent Lott discovered a new political soul or is it politics as usual? And this...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE H.W. BUSH, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You have been fantastic to the Bush family. I don't think anybody did more than you did to support George.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: The Bushs singing praise for Enron, another political faux pas caught on tape but first a look at news making headlines all around the world. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN (voice-over): Hearing at the Hague, former Secretary of State Madeline Albright testified at the war crimes trial of a former Bosnia-Serb leader. Albright condemned (UNINTELLIGIBLE) for atrocities carried out against non-Serbs but Albright says the Serbian leader later played an important role in the peace process.
Confrontations continue in Venezuela where opponents keep trying to oust President Hugo Chavez. Despite the government's efforts to break a strike, Venezuelan oil exports remain at a standstill. The government rebels and opposition political parties have signed a peace agreement in Congo. The document calls for an end to four years of civil war, a transitional government, and elections in about 30 months.
Tank fire, an Indian Army tank burst into flames while a convoy was rolling through Kashmir causing one injury. There's no word on the cause. Indian troops and Islamic guerillas have been battling in Kashmir for years.
Smoke over Haifa, there were initial fears this explosion at an Israeli chemical plant was the work of Palestinian guerillas. Officials now say it was accidental. There are no reports of serious injuries.
Cooking up a cure, a folk healer in Kazakhstan prescribes a hot bread oven for a wide range of illnesses. Patients strip down to their underwear, crawl into the oven, and stay there up to 30 minutes. The idea, like the patients, may seem a bit half-baked but those who say they've been cured in the oven call it a job well done, and that's our look around the world.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Medical news happening right now, a pain-free weapon in the battle against the flu but is the flu mist as it is called safe? A Food and Drug Administration committee considered that question today deciding whether to approve the vaccine. CNN Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta joining us from Atlanta with the latest on that, Sanjay it sounds too good to be true. You get your flu inoculation and no shot.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: You get it through the nose, that's right. It's the flu mist as you accurately said and it's been around for some time but, Miles, the advisory committee to the FDA stopped short of actually approving it. Over a year ago, in July of 2001, citing safety concerns specifically for children under the age of five, citing asthma and wheezing being a real problem.
They brought their case again today, the advisory committee did, and this time just a few minutes ago I received a message saying that it had been gone through the advisory committee and approved now by the advisory committee for those people age five to 49. The FDA still hasn't approved this. They usually take what the advisory committee says with a great deal of thought but it still has to wait for that FDA approval.
But again, Miles, just like you said this would be a pain-free, a shot-free way to inoculate yourself against the flu, a very effective way, in some trials up to 93 percent effectiveness. It might be a very good thing, especially for those people who don't like to get shots - Miles.
O'BRIEN: Well, and those happen to be the kids, of course, who can't - apparently is not going to work out so well for them I guess.
GUPTA: Under the age of five, right, but older than the age of five this might be a good thing for them again, asthma and wheezing being the two big concerns in those kids under the age of five.
O'BRIEN: All right, there's another study that caught our eye today. It's that something old may be better than something new when it comes to treating hypertension.
GUPTA: This has been a long-awaited trial, exactly as you said Miles. It actually looks at an old-fashioned blood pressure medication and compared it to several of the new fangled blood pressure medications, if you will. Actually, let's take a look at the study what they did here.
They looked at over 42,000 people, if you can read those numbers there, 55 and older, and they decided to split these people into four groups and let me just read some of these names to you, diuretic, that's also known as a water pill; ACE inhibitor and calcium channel blocker are two very well known anti-hypertensives as well as an alpha blocker.
And what they found over time was that, first of all, the alpha blocker patients weren't getting much benefit at all, but he diuretics seemed to have better blood pressure reduction than the other two anti-hypertensives, one or two points better blood pressure reduction, but more importantly significantly, up to 38 percent, better risk reduction in the risk of heart failure.
So, Miles, exactly as you said this old-fashioned, if you will, blood pressure medication which is still commonly used, doctors are thinking that might be a much better choice. In fact, this is how one doctor put it earlier today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. PAUL WHELTON, ALLHAT STEERING COMMITTEE: If you need to begin drug treatment for your high blood pressure, then diuretics should almost certainly be your first drug of choice. If you're already being treated for high blood pressure, you should talk to your doctor to determine if your blood pressure is being adequately controlled.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GUPTA: Of course, as always, talk to your doctor, Miles, but again diuretics possibly a first line of choice there.
O'BRIEN: Well, I got to ask you before you get away. Those of us who drink coffee know it is a diuretic, a pretty effective one. Can you self medicate by drinking coffee?
GUPTA: That's a very interesting point, actually. If you talk about coffee, for example, the coffee can actually as far as getting your dosing right that's a really important point. If you actually want to get the right amount of diuretic, you need to still see your doctor and get the prescription medication in order to be able to do that right. So, coffee not a good option there as far as self medicating - Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right. All right, Dr. Sanjay Gupta making a set call for us, as always a great pleasure to see you. Thank you, sir.
GUPTA: Thank you.
O'BRIEN: All right, I'll check in with you later. Trent Lott does his best to make amends but is it too late perhaps to salvage his reputation?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's going to be hard to change those who see him as the devil and put wings on him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: We'll go live to Mississippi for reaction plus a preview of what his political future may hold. Plus, Enron on tape, a skit was supposed to be funny on some rather not so funny accounting practices and some cozying up with the Bush family. We'll explain when we return.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Welcome back, I'm Miles O'Brien. Coming up, Trent Lott does damage control, reaction to his mea culpa on BET, but first let's look at some other stories making news right now in our CNN news alert.
(NEWSBREAK)
O'BRIEN: He's under fire after praising a 1948 segregationist presidential bid. His GOP colleagues will meet in January to reconsider his leadership role. Now with his career on the line, Senator Trent Lott has issued yet another apology for his remarks, this time on Black Entertainment Television.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. TRENT LOTT (R-MS), MINORITY LEADER: I'm now trying to find a way to deal with the understandable hurt that I have caused. You can, you know, say it was innocent but it was insensitive at the very least and repugnant, frankly. There has been immoral leadership in my part of the country for a long time. Progress has been made.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Were you a part of that?
LOTT: Yes, I can't deny that and, you know, I believe that I have changed and that I'm trying to do a better job.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What about affirmative action?
LOTT: I'm for that. I think you should reach out to people.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Across the board?
LOTT: Absolutely across the board.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Is Trent Lott winning any hearts or changing any minds? CNN National Correspondent Gary Tuchman has been taking the pulse of Pascagoula, the Senator's hometown where they, of course, know him best.
How was it received there Gary?
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Miles, Pascagoula, Mississippi is not exactly a walking town. People drive everywhere and that's why drive-in restaurants like this are so popular. This drive-in restaurant, the Sonic, is a place that Trent Lott comes to himself; we are told. So we've decided to talk to people who have driven up to get their food. We've never actually talked to people live in their cars on television before during this kind of -- doing this kind of thing, but we thought we'd try it today to find out what people think about Trent Lott.
Do you know about the interview last night? What do you think of your senator?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I still think he's as great as he was when he first went in office. I think, you know, it's been too much of an issue about it. He's made his apologies. And I think people should accept it and accept what he has done in the past and what he can do in the future if they'll let him.
TUCHMAN: And that's a very cute dog you have by the way.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you.
TUCHMAN: OK, thanks for talking with us. We'll go to the car right next to us. Car after car, a lot of support for Trent Lott in this particular restaurant. Hello, there. Let me ask you, what do you think of what Trent Lott had to say during his interview and what do you think of Trent Lott?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think he's a very good senator. He's done a lot for Jackson County and its industries. He's got a lot -- done a lot, I think, for the contracts and for shipbuilding and all that. TUCHMAN: Let me ask you about what he said though. I mean he's hurt a lot of feelings.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that he was trying to help make an old man feel better and it was just misunderstood. He just said it the wrong way. But in the end, he had good intentions in mind.
TUCHMAN: OK, I want to talk -- thank you for talking. I want to talk to one more person, who's in the car next to us. And this person's kind of interesting because she's actually a middle school student who is here eating Sonic hamburgers with her father right now. And she's a middle school student who goes to Trent Lott Middle School, home of the Trent Lott Panthers. You can see Trent Lott is very well established one might say in Mississippi, has an airport, a school. And what's your name?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mary Lou.
TUCHMAN: And Mary, what grade are you in?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sixth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can you tell me what you think of Trent Lott?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm glad to have him as my senator and he's done a lot for Mississippi.
TUCHMAN: What were you telling me before? You think that the northerners have something out against southerners?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think they just blew it too out of proportion, just to get him out of the way.
TUCHMAN: I want to thank you for talking with us. Before we go and say goodbye, we want to talk to one more person here and that's the manager of the Sonic. She tells us something very interesting. As you know, Trent Lott had his news conference here in Pascagoula on Friday where he apologized several times and you're telling me -- let me get your name first.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Stephanie Magerrs (ph).
TUCHMAN: Stephanie, you're telling me that after his news conference here in Pascagoula, where did Trent Lott come right afterwards?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Here at Sonic.
TUCHMAN: Came here to Sonic?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On Friday night.
TUCHMAN: And he's a regular here?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Regular. Every time he comes home he eats here.
TUCHMAN: And what does he get when he comes to the Sonic drive- in?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A number two cheeseburger, onion ring and a vanilla shake.
TUCHMAN: What is a number two cheeseburger?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mustard. It has pickles, lettuce, tomato, onion -- the works on it.
TUCHMAN: OK, we learned a lot about Trent Lott in the last couple of weeks. You probably didn't know that about him, that he likes the number two cheeseburger when he comes to the Sonic.
One other thing we want to tell you, we've been here all day talking to people on the other side of the issue too. The main problem they have -- they've heard him apologize many times over the past few days, but they wish the apologies came before Strom Thurmond's birthday party.
Miles, back to you.
O'BRIEN: All right, Gary Tuchman in Pascagoula, Mississippi, leaving no stone unturned, no detail too small for us here at CNN. We appreciate that.
Tent Lott, of course, is the not the first politician to put his foot in his mouth and not the first to use in a bid to save a career. Howard Kurtz of CNN's "RELIABLE SOURCES" looked at some who preceded the Republican leader in the scandal hot seat.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HOWARD KURTZ, HOST, "RELIABLE SOURCES": When politicians get into trouble, the media can be their best friend or worst enemy. It all depends on whether they have the savvy to play defense before the cameras. Let's face it; television and the images it carries are very much a fact of political life.
(voice-over): Trent Lott stayed out of sight for days after praising the segregationist 1948 candidacy of Strom Thurmond. He was criticized by political insiders and the press for phoning in his remarks to a radio show on Hannity and CNN's Larry King. Only when Lott was in danger of being dumped as majority leader, did he hold a press conference and make his case on block entertainment television.
LOTT: The important thing is to recognize the hurt that I caused and ask for forgiveness.
KURTZ: Bill Clinton was a master of television. When the Monica Lewinsky story surfaced, he got angry in front of the cameras.
WILLIAM J. CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE United States: I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. KURTZ: The problem was this was misleading at best and the public later saw a very different video images of the president testifying before the grand jury.
CLINTON: It depends upon what the meaning of the word is.
KURTZ: Gary Condit refused to utter a syllable to the press for months after Chandra Levy's disappearance. Although there's no evidence of any involvement with the former intern's death, he's now soon to be former Congressman Condit.
Presidential candidate Gary Hart made the mistake of challenging the press to follow him around. When "The Miami Herald" found him in the company of a young model named Donna Race, Hart denied any hanky panky to an openly skeptical press corps.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you ever committed adultery?
GARY HART, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I do not think that's an appropriate question.
KURTZ: Hart was out of the race within days. Perhaps the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) could learn something from Hollywood. When Hugh Grant faced international humiliation for hiring a hooker, he picked the right forum to face the music.
JAY LENO, TALK SHOW HOST: What the hell were you thinking?
KURTZ: Senator Lott, of course, can't make light of a serious subject like segregation. The question now is whether his media offensive is too little and way too late.
This is Howard Kurtz of CNN's "RELIABLE SOURCES."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: So is Trent Lott making his case? Can he pull this one off? Joining me from New York for some insight to all of this is our political analyst, Jeff Greenfield.
Jeff, good to have you with us.
JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Good to see you.
O'BRIEN: The conventional wisdom is if you get in trouble, you fess up early, you apologize profusely and the public will forgive you. That hasn't happened so far in this case. Why?
GREENFIELD: No, and I think there a couple of reasons. One, I think the nature of the apologies have been -- how shall I put this -- a little unsettling. It's almost as if Trent Lott is talking as if he were found out to have said this in about 1964. To come out days later and decide that segregation is wrong just seems a little off kilter. And, frankly, to a lot of people it seems that the only reason he's saying it is that he got caught. The other thing is this appearance last night on BET with Ed Gordon; he said a couple of things that are clearly going to really make the conservatives and Republicans very angry. I mean to say, "Oh, yes, I'm for affirmative action" and to say that the leadership in the south was immoral, I mean, again, if he had said that at the start of his career, the way Jimmy Carter said that the time for racial discrimination is over back in 1970, it would have been one thing. But this, I think, is coming off late and frankly lame.
O'BRIEN: I guess I'm a little curious as to why Trent Lott, a Conservative Republican, wouldn't make a for the Republican position on affirmative action as opposed to saying, "Yes, I'm for that." I mean that's an interesting position to put himself in. He alienates himself from his own party and doesn't really convince liberals.
GREENFIELD: I think that's what I'm getting at and maybe the right phrase is tone deaf. I mean there have been a lot of conservatives for years have been arguing that the liberal big government solutions have failed and they have failed poor people. They have failed black and brown people worst.
More than 20 years ago, Ronald Reagan gave a speech to the Urban League, when he was running for president, making that case. You can argue whether he ever pursued it. Newt Gingrich in 1995 when he became speaker of the House first of all apologized for the fact that it was liberal Democrats that led the civil rights fight. And George W. Bush in his acceptance speech said we're going to put conservative ideas squarely on the side of justice and opportunity.
But that's not what Trent Lott said. He seems to be kind of groping for the right words that were somehow going to mollify people for a lengthy career. And just to be fair to Senator Lott, it's not -- you know, the Republicans have elected him twice their majority leader. No Democrat that I know went after Trent Lott's record on civil rights and affirmative action until he got himself in serious trouble with the remarks at Thurmond's birthday.
So another question we might well ask is well, if it was horrible for Trent Lott to have said this a couple of weeks ago, was it not horrible for him to have said it in 1980? And was it not horrible for people on both sides of the aisle to kind of brush it off?
O'BRIEN: All right, quickly, before we get away, Jeff. You get the sense that the support for Trent Lott at best is about an inch deep in Washington. Why?
GREENFIELD: Well, I mean, you get that sense because the White House has been doing everything but holding up big cards, you know, like in a football game with one of those card sections to say, "Please go away." The front page of "The New York Times" and "Washington post" had those classic Washington stories today with unattributed remarks from, you know, senior White House officials saying he should really go away. And the reason is they don't believe it's pretty clear that they can pursue with a unified Congress and White House now an aggressive, assertive, conservative position on areas like affirmative action and school choice where they're being led by somebody whose image now is somebody who thought that things were better in the good old days. It's just not -- it's just that -- that's an anchor that's just too heavy to carry.
O'BRIEN: Silence not so golden for Trent Lott. All right, Jeff Greenfield in New York. Thanks, as always, appreciate it.
Here's your chance to weigh in on this story. Our "Web Question of the Day" is what's your opinion of Senator Trent Lott after his BET interview? Favorable or unfavorable? We'll have the results later in this broadcast. You can vote -- cnn.com/wolf is the place. And while you're there, we'd like to hear from you. Send us your comments and we'll try -- we underscore that -- try to read some of them at the end of this program. That's also of course where you can read our daily online column. The place, once again, cnn.com/wolf.
Enron caught on tape.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SKILLING: ... HFV, hypothetical future value accounting.
RICH KINDER, ENRON: Whoa!
SKILLING: If we do that, we can add a gazillion dollars to the bottom line.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know, Rich.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'BRIEN: Fact and fiction colliding during a bizarre corporate skit that some might see as a Freudian slip. Plus, keeping your credit report sterling. It can get away with you this time of year when you're at the mall. A consumer credit guru will join us live when we return. But first, the answer to today's news quiz.
Earlier we asked -- who was the first African-American network news anchor? The answer, Max Robinson. In 1978, ABC named him as one of three co-anchors for "World News Tonight." Bernard Shaw became the second black network anchor when he joined CNN in 1980.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: A videotape has emerged that was made for a 1997 Enron going away party for an Enron executive. In the tape, jokes were made about the company's accounting practices, which of course eventually caused Enron's collapse. CNN's Jen Rogers takes a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SKILLING: Your total from $60 million last year to $423 million this year.
KINDER: Whoa! Yes!
JEN ROGERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Every workplace has its share of jokes but this is one joke Enron may not have wanted to share with the rest of the world.
SKILLING: This is the key -- we're going to move from mark to market accounting to something I called HFV, hypothetical future value accounting.
KINDER: Whoa!
SKILLING: If we do that, we can add a gazillion dollars to the bottom line.
ROGERS: That's Jeffrey Skilling, the company's then president, joking about accounting issues on a tap made six years ago as a going away present for Enron executive, Rich Kinder (ph). At the time, of course, Enron was not the poster child for bad business practices but now that the company has collapsed under the weight of numerous accounting scandals, comments like these may be coming back to haunt executives who have since become household names, including the company's former chairman, Ken Lay.
SKILLING: You'd never do all those ugly things to people who didn't make their numbers. Would you?
ROGERS: Other big names you may recognize on the tape, two political connected prominent Texans.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Rich, I've been asked to think of one thing I can say to you on your departure of Enron, it would be this -- don't leave Texas. You're too a good man.
ROGERS: Enron, which donated more than $300,000 to George W. Bush's two gubernatorial campaigns in Texas, more than $100,000 to his presidential race and $300 to the Bush/Cheney Inaugural Fund, was a top contributor to the GOP. The Department of Justice had no comment on the tape. An Enron spokesman said he hadn't see the tape, but the Enron investigation continues. So far neither Mr. Lay nor Mr. Skilling has been charged with anything. The company's former CFO, Andrew Fastow, who does not appear on the tape, has been indicted and is out on a $5 million bond.
Jen Rogers, CNN Financial News, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: Enron's credit may be shot. What about yours, though? The answer may depend on which credit-reporting agency you ask and perhaps the kind of accounting you do too. The new study says the same consumer can get strikingly different scores. Joining me from New York with some advice on all of this is Beth Kobliner. She's author of the wildly popular book "How To Get a Financial Life -- or "Get a Financial Life."
Beth, good to see you.
BETH KOPLINER, AUTHOR, "GET A FINANCIAL LIFE": Good to see you.
O'BRIEN: All right, now, at this -- you have five tips for us on how to keep your credit report sterling. The number one is probably the most important one. We could probably get one point on this and that is pay your bills on time.
KOBLINER: Right. It sounds so obvious but actually this is the number one factor that goes into creating what's called your credit score, which is basically a report card, numerical report card, of your credit life. So paying your bills on time is key.
O'BRIEN: All right. But when you say on time, what do you mean, like the minute the bill comes in the mail? Does it matter? Or is it -- if it's within 30 days? Is that the same thing?
KOBLINER: Get it there -- yes, get it there within a comfortable margin of when it's actually due because if you have a 30-day late payment, if you're just late by a few days, that's considered a 30-day late payment on your credit report. And particularly if you're a younger person, you have a thin credit report, meaning you don't have much of a credit history. That could end up costing you thousands of dollars because you'll end up having a higher interest rate on a credit card you get or even a higher interest rate on a mortgage you get one day. So these late payments now could haunt you a very many number of years.
O'BRIEN: All right, number two, on the tote board, check your credit score. That's really easy to do these days on the Internet. It'll cost you a few bucks, but you can get those numbers, right?
KOBLINER: Yes, go to EQUIFAX, Experian and Transunion. Those are the three major credit agencies. And I would tell people to ask for their FICO credit score. The FICO score is actually...
O'BRIEN: Psycho? Did you say psycho?
KOBLINER: FICO. Not psycho. It makes you feel psycho.
O'BRIEN: That's another kind of score, yes.
KOBLINER: Right. It's FICO -- F-I-c-o. And the reason you want to ask for that score is two of those three agencies offer a FICO score is that's also the credit score that the lenders look at. So you want to be looking at what the lenders are looking at, to see how they view you as a credit risk.
O'BRIEN: All right. We got to do this in truncated form because of course; we're running short on time.
KOBLINER: OK.
O'BRIEN: Don't max out credit cards. That's one of those obvious ones that we don't need to get on.
KOBLINER: Right.
O'BRIEN: Get a free credit report. Can you get one of those a year? Is that how it works? One a year? KOBLINER: Well, if you're denied credit, you can get one. If you live in the six states that give you free ones like New Jersey, Maryland, Georgia, then you get a free report. And also, if you're unemployed and you're actively looking for work, you can also qualify for a free credit report.
O'BRIEN: All right and one final point here. This is a really important one. If you get into a pinch, you can actually put a statement on the credit report there and that goes to reporting problems to the credit agency. Explain how that all works.
KOBLINER: That's right. Well, if you have a dispute and there's a mistake, write to the credit reporting companies, one of those agencies we talked about, or call them on the 800 number and say that there is a dispute. By law they have to investigate that within 30 days. Now, if they don't resolve it to your satisfaction, basically they don't remove the negative thing you think is wrong, then you can write a 100-word statement that's put in your credit report. And when they send out your report, they'll send out that statement.
O'BRIEN: All right, Beth Kobliner, thank you very much for dealing with what is a daunting thing for many consumers, dealing with these credit agencies. They hold an awful lot of power over us. Thanks very much.
KOBLINER: They certainly do.
O'BRIEN: The book is "Get a Financial Life" and we appreciate you joining us as always.
KOBLINER: My pleasure.
O'BRIEN: It's time for us to take a break, I should say. A blast from the past launching into the 21st century, we'll take you on a front seat ride for the celebration of a man's first flight.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O'BRIEN: Today marks the beginning of a special year for aviation enthusiasts. It's the yearlong run-up to the centennial flight.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN (voice-over): It was a blustery morning that day on the outer banks of North Carolina, a perfect day for flying, as it turns out. Orville and Wilbur, the original right stuff slipped the surely bonds under power in a quartet the brief flights. The dream was suddenly a reality.
It was December 17, 1903, 99 years ago. To mark the moment and to begin a year long centennial celebration, the aviation and space cognoscente (ph) gathered at the Smithsonian's Air and Space Museum -- yes, that's actor and aviator, John Travolta -- to remember the Wrights and all those who stood upon their shoulders. NEIL ARMSTRONG, ASTRONUAT: That's the boy because I was born and raised in Ohio in a barn about 60 miles north of Dayton, and the legends of the Wrights have been in my memory for as long as I can remember.
O'BRIEN: Fellow Ohioan and fellow aerospace pioneer, Neil Armstrong, was here, a rare appearance in the media limelight. The spacecraft that took him to the moon sits in the shadow of the Wright Flyer; impressive book ends for the museum's milestones of flight gallery.
ARMSTRONG: I guess that's the story of flight in the 20th century, from the beginning -- from the very first flights at Kitty hawk to the various -- very furthest and fastest flights that man has ever made.
O'BRIEN: And there was another Ohioan here who made his own indelible mark on the sky.
JOHN GLENN, ASTRONAUT: What impresses me is every time I come here and see this thing, is how fast aviation advanced beyond the Wright brothers if you think it was only 15 years until they were dog fighting over France in World War I.
O'BRIEN: Lost amid the high praise is a stubborn embarrassment of history. Ninety-nine years ago, the Smithsonian refused to give proper credit to the Wrights and was not even interested in displaying the Flyer. Peaked with anger, Orville shipped the historic craft to a museum in Great Britain. The Smithsonian did not see the error of its ways and bring the flyer home until 1948.
AMANDA WRIGHT-LANE, WRIGHT RELATIVE: And I think Uncle -- overall, just wanted to be recognized for what was due to them, no more, no less. And he was a very honorable man and a patriot and he just wanted to be recognized as the first folks who had flown. So -- and they did.
O'BRIEN: Now, millions see the Flyer for what it was. It makes one wonder what might be.
ARMSTRONG: If we look back a century from now, we'd really be amazed at what has happened.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
O'BRIEN: Neil Armstrong. Now, the entire yearlong event will of celebration will culminate with an attempt to fly a replica of the Wright Flyer December 7, 2003. We'll keep you posted on all of that.
Well, time's running out for you to turn in your answer to our "Question of The Day." What is your opinion of Senator Trent Lott after his BET interview? Favorable or unfavorable? Log in to CNN.com/Wolf to vote. We'll have the results as soon as we come back. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) O'BRIEN: It's time now for our "Picture of The Day". It is something you definitely don't want to see in your home. Fire crews in Pasadena, California gave this demonstration today of just how quickly a dry Christmas tree can burst into flames. Among the advice of the experts, to avoid something like this, keep are your tree well watered, keep it away from heat sources, check or replace damaged lights. They say it's best to replace them every four or five years. Disconnect the lights when you're not around, especially when you go to bed, and place a smoke detector nearby. And always, on that, make sure the batteries are fresh.
That's all the time we have today. Join Wolf Blitzer tomorrow at 5:00 p.m. Eastern. Please join Wolf weekdays at noon Eastern as well for "SHOWDOWN IRAQ." Until then, thanks very much for watching. I'm Miles O'Brien in Washington. Lou Dobbs is up next with "MONEYLINE."
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Infection at Marine Base Causes Still Unknown>
