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Your World Today

Mexico Flooding: Race to Evacuate People Stranded by Heavy Rain; Obama Sending Bush Message of Iran; Charity Controversy: Some Children May Never be Reunited

Aired November 02, 2007 - 12:00   ET

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

JONATHAN MANN, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Stranded: hundreds of thousands are trapped in one of the worst floods to hit southern Mexico.
HALA GORANI, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Diplomacy Obama style. The U.S. presidential candidate plays his hand on a big foreign policy question: what should be done about Iran?

MANN: Counting the cost of war in Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of dollars every minute, tens of millions of dollars every hour. So much money, so many Americans in the dark.

GORANI: And caramel (ph). Arab women on film like you've rarely seen them before. We'll introduce you to a young Lebanese filmmaker.

It is 10:00 a.m. in Villahermosa, Mexico, 6:00 p.m. in Beirut, Lebanon.

Hello and welcome to our report. We're seen around the globe this hour.

I'm Hala Gorani.

MANN: I'm Jonathan Mann.

From Tehran to Tabasco, wherever you're watching, this is YOUR WORLD TODAY.

GORANI: Hello, everyone.

We start this hour in southern Mexico, where hundreds of thousands are in shock after record flooding washed away everything they owned.

MANN: Many people clung to their rooftops to survive what Mexico's president called one of the worst natural disasters ever to strike the country.

GORANI: A week of very heavy rains caused rivers to overflow their banks, leaving most of the state of Tabasco under water.

MANN: That's an area the size of Belgium. And rescue workers in boats and helicopters are trying to evacuate people who are stranded by the flooding. President Felipe Calderon urged calm in the hardest-hit areas, saying the federal government is doing all it can to help. He called on Mexicans to donate water, canned goods, diapers, and just about everything to those affected.

Colleen McEdwards has more now on the devastation and the heartache.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): More than half a century has passed since the Mexican state of Tabasco has suffered flooding like this. The tiny province nestled along the Gulf of Mexico has been deluged by heavy rain for a week now. Nearly three-quarters of Tabasco is under water.

Hundreds of thousands of people are stranded. The homes of 700,000 people under water. Almost half of those have still not been reached by rescue workers as of Thursday.

One of the two waterways that brings the state capital of Villahermosa has risen two meters, about six feet above the critical level. Eighty percent of the city, under water.

Almost all public services there, including water and public transportation, are down, and those who can make it out, crowd around government offices, looking for assistance or simply news about their missing loved ones. Mexican president Felipe Calderon visited the area on Wednesday and promised the full assistance of the government.

For the most part, the rain has stopped. But more is forecast. And for most residents of this remote region, help, like a refuge in the storm, seems a long way off.

Colleen McEdwards, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GORANI: We will keep following this, rescue efforts, and all these individuals stranded right here on YOUR WORLD TODAY and CNN.

For now, though, let's check some other stories making news around the world this hour.

(NEWSBREAK)

GORANI: Well, Senator Obama is backing his words with action on Capitol Hill. He introduces a resolution Thursday emphasizing that President Bush doesn't have authority to use military force against Iran.

Let's get some analysis on this issue. Political reporter Chris Cillizza is with TheWashingtonPost.com and joins us now from Washington.

I hope I pronounced your surname correctly, Chris. CHRIS CILLIZZA, POLITICAL REPORTER, THEWASHINGTONPOST.COM: Hala, that was perfect.

GORANI: Oh, that's fabulous.

CILLIZZA: Better than all of my elementary school teachers combined.

GORANI: There you go.

Now, Chris, let's talk Obama and what he's saying about Iran. How is that going to play for him with, A, the Democratic base, and potentially his opponents in the race for the nomination?

CILLIZZA: Well, remember, when we started this race -- it seems a long time ago -- earlier this year, most of the people not named "Clinton" believed that this race would resolve around Senator Clinton's 2002 use of force resolution vote on Iraq. She voted in support of that measure.

The Obama campaign, John Edwards, former North Carolina senator, his campaign believed that that vote would make it a very hard sell for Clinton as it related to Democratic primary voters who are very anti-war. Well, it hasn't turned out that way to date. But, on a vote this 2007, a very recent vote, a piece of legislation to designate the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization, Senator Clinton voted in favor of that.

Obama and Edwards have both attacked her as saying this is -- this is 2002 all over again. Trying to link that 2002 vote with this 2007 vote and make Iran, frankly, the new Iraq in terms of the political football in this race.

GORANI: But Chris, this isn't faulting somebody for voting on -- in favor of a non-binding resolution to call the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist group. This is actually committing publicly to engaging in diplomacy with Iran, in promising, essentially, before the nomination race is even over, that there will be a relationship between the United States and the regime of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

CILLIZZA: And a huge difference, frankly, between senators Clinton and Obama on this issue. You know, this came up earlier in the year in a debate in which Senator Obama said he would talk at the highest levels with dictators, with countries that are our enemies, and that included Iran. Senator Clinton would not go down that hypothetical road, saying, I don't think it makes sense for the president to dangle those sort of things.

Senator Obama is trying very clearly to differentiate himself from Senator Clinton...

GORANI: Sure.

CILLIZZA: ... saying, I'm going to do things differently. We need to talk to people who are not friendly towards us. That's how we're going to solve those problems. Remember, his whole campaign is about bringing change to the political process, and that includes foreign policy.

GORANI: Sure. Is it going to end up hurting Hillary Clinton to not take a stand on some of these very sensitive issues and continuing to say, well, I don't know, I can't really commit at this stage, we have to study the question and figure it out later down the line? Is it going to start to hurt her?

CILLIZZA: Well, you know, I'll give you two answers.

One, I think it could from people who already view her as too political, as more willing to say the political thing rather than the honest or the thing that she believes. But, the other thing I will say is, on Iran, on Iraq, on health care, these are big, complex issues. And I think what Senator Clinton -- I've said it before -- I think she's trying to practice the politics of the practical, that you can't just say we're going to have universal health care, that there are sacrifices, there are tradeoffs. You can't just say we're going to negotiate with Iran.

She is trying to say, I have been at the highest levels, I have seen this up close, and I know that it is not just a black-and-white issue. I'm not sure whether that argument sells in a primary. It's probably more a general election.

GORANI: Sure.

CILLIZZA: But it's clearly the she's going down.

GORANI: All right. Well, we're going to follow this, of course, that goes without saying, right here on CNN, and continue also to follow your reporting.

Chris Cillizza of TheWashingtonPost.com, thanks so much.

CILLIZZA: Thanks for having me.

MANN: And a look at one of the details of running for president. You actually have to put your name in the hat.

U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton will be the last major candidate to file for a spot in New Hampshire's presidential primary, but she's expected to do that today. Turning in her paperwork anytime now to add her name to the ballot.

New Hampshire, of course, plays a huge roll in the race for the White House. It's usually the first to hold a primary election and indicates who will be the Democratic and Republican frontrunners. But the date New Hampshire will hold its primary now is still up in the air.

(BUSINESS REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GORANI: Welcome back, everyone. It is a sad situation. It's now compounded in the African nation of Chad. Some of the 103 children at the center of an international crisis may never be reunited with their families. The Red Cross says it's having a hard time finding enough information to send some of them home.

They are sure that most of them are not refugees from Darfur, though. New footage shows that one of the members of the charity was defending the charity's mission as an action of mercy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): What legitimacy do they have to assassinate a population? I don't know, so I'm not asking myself this question.

There are some children who are dying. Everybody watches and says, oh, what a shame. What a pity. The children are dying. That's it.

Us? We've stopped asking ourselves this question. We've come and we'll think afterwards.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GORANI: Now, this is the Zoe's Arc, one of the members of Zoe's Arc. This was shot before they were arrested by Chadian authorities, and attorneys for the group Zoe's Arc maintain their clients' innocence -- Jon.

MANN: The children themselves, meantime, are being cared for in an orphanage. What happens to them next is anyone's guess.

Our Nic Robertson is monitoring developments for us and joins us now by videophone from N'djamena, the Chadian capital -- Nic.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jonathan, the very latest that I can report to you from here, we have learned from Chadian authorities that all of the detained Europeans, the French aid workers, the French journalists, the Spanish air crew, and the Belgium pilot who was flying the aircraft that was going to take the children out of Chad, have all now been transferred to the central military police compound in the center of the Chadian capital, N'djamena, here.

This is a legal move. The case has been transferred from Beche (ph), which is some 500 kilometers east of here, towards the border with Sudan. They've now been transferred to the jurisdiction of the supreme court, and they are all now here in the capital of Chad.

The aid workers that we've been talking to today have been expressing their concern that some of these children may never go back to their families because some of them are so young they can't find out any information about where they came from. But what the UNHCR's protection teams are doing right now is interviewing the children, taking their photographs, trying to find out from them what they can remember about their names, about their parents, about their villages. And in the coming days, that information will be taken out to the villages where the aid workers suspect the children may be from, distributed, shown to the village elders, shown to the families, shown to the families in those villages, in the hope that they may be able to shed some light into who the children are and where they come from -- Jonathan.

MANN: Has anyone arrested or spoken to or questioned anyone from Chad in connection with this case? I would imagine someone had to be driving the vehicles that these children were loaded into.

ROBERTSON: Absolutely. That is exactly the way that aid organizations work here in Chad.

A few international workers, working with many more Chadian locals, driving, translating, local officials. So far, from the Chadian authorities, we haven't heard about them investigating, arresting, or talking to any Chadians in connection with this particular case.

That doesn't mean that it isn't happening. It may be that the Chadian authorities are playing this close to their chest. We don't have any details about that, but it would seem inconceivable, when analyzing how aid groups work here normally, that these six members of the aid organization Zoe's Arc could possibly have been working by themselves in the field -- Jonathan.

MANN: It is hard to fathom.

Nic Robertson, thanks very much -- Hala.

GORANI: Well, Condoleezza Rice, the U.S. secretary of state, is weighing in on the controversy surrounding the staffing of the American embassy in Iraq. Foreign service employees are up in arms over plans to order staffers to serve at the new embassy in Baghdad.

While on a trip to Turkey in the Middle East, Rice said the State Department does "... everything that we can to try and protect our diplomats." But commenting on the reported plan to assign staffers to Baghdad, she said, "I don't know if we will have direct assignments or not, but we are one foreign service and people need to serve where they are needed."

MANN: Wars are expensive. In the past, the U.S. has called on its citizens to help. There were war bonds during World War II, higher taxes during Vietnam. But now, as Jill Dougherty reports, many Americans have little idea how this war is being funded.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Just how much are Americans paying for the war in Iraq? Most people know it's a lot of money, but how much is a lot?

We asked some Washingtonians on their lunch hour.

(on camera): Do you know how much the war has cost?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My understanding, it's in the trillions, is it? Or a trillion dollars?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Billions of dollars.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Billions of dollars.

DOUGHERTY: They are not the only ones who are confused.

Before the war began, the U.S. Office of Management and Budget predicted it would cost $50 billion to $60 billion. But according to the Congressional Budget Office, Congress, if it approves a new war funding request for fiscal year, 2008, will have appropriated nearly 10 times that, $576 billion. And that doesn't include the war in Afghanistan.

The Defense Department now spends more than $300 million per day on the Iraq war. In just the minute it takes to order and pay for a sandwich, the country racks up another roughly $200,000.

(on camera): In dollars terms adjusted for inflation, the war in Iraq will be the second most expensive in U.S. history after World War II. But that's just the tip of the iceberg. There are other major issues -- how the war is being funded and how much it will cost in the long run.

(voice over): To pay for previous U.S. wars, presidents eventually included war funding in the overall budget. This war is being paid for with emergency supplemental funding. That makes congressional oversight more difficult.

What's more, the Bush administration has tried to add its normal military operating costs to the war budget. The results, according to one defense analyst, a tangled mess.

TRAVIS SHARP, ARMS CONT. & NON-PROLIFERATION CENTER: There's even funding that the Congressional Research Service and the Congressional Budget Office identify that they have no idea where the funding went. They don't know if it went for weapons systems. They don't know if it was operating costs in Iraq and Afghanistan.

DOUGHERTY: Then there's the long term. Economist and former presidential adviser Robert Hormats is author of a new book on how America has paid for its wars. Previous presidency notes have pushed to raise taxes and cut spending.

ROBERT HORMATS, GOLDMAN SACHS INTERNATIONAL: Americans have not paid higher taxes to pay for this war. In fact, we've had a tax cut. Nor have we seen a reduction in domestic spending. We've in effect shifted the cost of this war to future generations.

DOUGHERTY: Extrapolating from the Congressional Budget Office figures, the war in Iraq so far has cost the average American family of four more than $7,500.

(on camera): What do you think of that money?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a lot of money. It could have been used some other kind of way.

DOUGHERTY (voice over): According to a CNN poll, nearly two- thirds of Americans disapprove of the war. But Congress so far has been unwilling to cut funding over concerns for troops in the field.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you believe you should be there, then borrowing is probably OK.

DOUGHERTY: So, the U.S. keeps borrowing by selling treasury bills to foreign countries like Japan and China. And the war's ultimate price tag keeps growing.

Jill Dougherty, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MANN: People are stunned at the totals.

For viewers in the U.S., a check of U.S. headlines is up next.

GORANI: And later, a new Lebanese film tackles some themes considered taboo in the Middle East and elsewhere. We'll introduce you to the filmmakers.

Stay with us.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GORANI: Welcome back to all of our viewers joining us from around the globe, this hour, the United States is with us as well. A very warm welcome. This is YOUR WORLD TODAY. I'm Hala Gorani.

MANN: I'm Jonathan Mann.

Checking the stop stories, now. Rescue workers are scrambling trying to save the people of Mexico's southern Tabasco state. Most of the area, the size of Belgium, is flooded after a week of rain forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes. Mexico's president called it one of the worst natural disasters in his nation's history.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama outlines his stance on Iran. He tells "The New York Times", if elected, he plans to engage Tehran in, quote, "aggressive personal diplomacy", unquote. He Illinois senator also introduced a resolution saying President Bush does not have authority to go to war with Iran.

MANN: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is now weighing in on that controversy surrounding the staffing of the U.S. embassy in Iraq. Currently on a visit to Turkey, Rice said her department does everything it can to protect its employees, but ultimately, she says, staffers have to serve where they're needed.

GORANI: Well, scandals in sports are nothing new, but the allegations this week against Martina Hingis come has a shock in the world of tennis. The former world number one star vehemently denies that she used cocaine, but is quitting pro tennis because it would take too long to fight the accusations. Don Riddell has our report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DON RIDDELL, CNN INTL. CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Until her dramatic announcement, Martina Hingis would have been remembered as one of the all-time tennis greats, but news she had failed a test for cocaine at Wimbledon has stunned the sport.

JON WERTHEIM, SR. WRITER, "SPORTS ILLUSTRATED": Even given tennis' standards in these matters, this one is just absolutely bizarre right now. A lot of it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

RIDDELL: The 27-year-old was a teen sensation, becoming the sport's youngest grand-slam winner at the age of 16 in 1997. She won the Australian Open three times, Wimbledon and the U.S. Open once. Reaching the world number one ranking and banking some $20 million in prize money. She had previously retired in 2003, but this time it looks like she's finished for good.

WERTHEIM: Especially after making this comeback where she sort of got the public sympathy, she didn't necessarily have early in her career, it's really unfortunate to see her go out like this. But, I think, regardless of what happens this has to be considered a great player, certainly destined for the hall of fame.

RIDDELL: It's debatable whether cocaine would actually improve a tennis player's performance. But a failed test comes with a mandatory ban and Hingis says she doesn't want to spent years in a legal fight. She has also strongly protested her innocence.

MARTINA HINGIS, TENNIS PLAYER (through translator): There is only one more thing for me to do; to thank all of you for many years of goodwill and also to assure you that I have never taken drugs.

RIDDELL: The Women's Tour says that Hingis will be innocent until proven guilty and while she's chosen not to fight for her career, her legacy may be at stake unless she takes action. Don Riddell, CNN, Wimbledon, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MANN: Now, nothing less than a crises for couch potatoes. TV viewers in the U.S. could find themselves watching more reruns and reality shows if writers go ahead with a strike that their union is threatening. TV and screenwriters meet Friday to decide whether to strike for the first time in nearly 20 years. Those talks could be any time now. Studio producer talks meantime have stalled mainly over royalties from DVD sales and other digital versions of their work.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DAVE SCHIFF, TV WRITER: The future of TV is not going to look like what it's -- what it's been for the last 30 years. And, so, you know, it's not just for us. Who are currently working. But, you know, writers down the line. Is that we make sure that, you know, we get -- we get a piece of -- a piece of the pie.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MANN: Eventually just about everybody could be affected. It could slow production of new programs, movies, current affairs, late- night shows, even soaps, and they're the first that people are expecting might be hit.

GORANI: Well, around the world when people think of Middle Eastern women, one particular image may come to mind, but possibly not the kind of images that are portrayed in a new movie called "Caramel." Directed by a young Lebanese woman named Nadine Labaki. I traveled to Beirut a few days ago and I met her. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (subtitles): Look, Nisrine.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (subtitles): I'm not leaving this place before you fix my hair for me the way I want!

Now you call this volume?! Do you consider this pretty? If do your hair this way would you wear it like this?

GORANI (voice over): It is the breakout Middle Eastern film of the year. "Caramel." It's named for the sugar hair removal wax often used in the region and is the tragi-comic story of five Lebanese women whose lives, loves, disappointments and fears intersect in a Beirut beauty salon. That almost exclusively female haven, where secrets and confessions come out.

The scenes, taboo, especially in the Arab world. Adultery, homosexuality, sex before marriage. In this scene, Lial (ph), the main character and owner of the salon, cries over a relationship with a married man.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (subtitles): I can't look my parents in the eyes, I'm so ashamed.

GORANI: The woman playing Lial (ph) is also the film's 34-year- old director, Nadine Labaki. I caught up with her in a Beirut cafe.

NADINE LABAKI, INDEPENDENT FILM DIRECTOR: To me it's important for me to talk about these subjects because we don't have to be scared anymore and we just don't have to pretend that everything is OK. Everything is not OK. This is -- we have to stop lying to ourselves.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (subtitles): The mustache.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (subtitles): Let's pluck two hairs from each side. We can do it fast with the tweezers. We'll see about the mustache, but the eyebrows, he will need it a 100 percent.

Heat the waxing sugar for me.

GORANI: Labaki says Lebanese women are torn between East and West. With "Caramel," she wanted to show a culture where female freedoms are often weighed down by traditions, family, and religion.

LABAKI: Why are we so scared to show these emotions? And I have -- I've always had the feeling that Lebanese woman always had to lie or -- or steal her moments of happiness. She's always -- she always has to lead a parallel life in order to live the way she wants to live. And in appearance, everything seems normal. This is a contradiction.

GORANI: A contradiction Labaki has played to great acclaim in a series of innovative music videos, for Nancy Azurama (ph), one of the biggest female music stars in the Middle East.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GORANI: All right, everyone, you can see the rest of this story and many more interesting topics that we're talking about, on this month's "Inside The Middle East" at 07:30 GMT, for our international viewers, for our U.S. viewers you can always watch all these stories on our Web site, CNN.com/IME

MANN: Ahead on YOUR WORLD TODAY, a look at weakening U.S. dollar.

GORANI: We'll see how it's all affecting one small British company trying to make a living.

MANN: And you'll want to watch this. With every aspect of her life, out in the open now we get to look inside Britney Spears' checkbook. Her spending habits, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MANN: Welcome back. This is YOUR WORLD TODAY on CNN International.

GORANI: All right, we're in more than 200 countries and territories across the globe this hour and this hour, welcome to our U.S. viewers.

Do overseas visitors feel welcome in the United States? Tourism professionals say the U.S. is not rolling out the welcome mat. The Discover America advocacy group says the number of foreign visitors has plummeted since the September 11th attacks. It blames the slump on the shabby welcome, according to the group, many foreigners feel they get in the United States.

That 17 percent decline carries a hefty cost. That's $94 billion in lost visitor spending and nearly 200,000 jobs. The group is calling on the government to make it easier to get visas, to make the entry process traveler friendly, and improve communication. MANN: But the weak dollar may help lure some visitors to the U.S. Shoppers can get some great bargains as they do their Christmas shopping. A lot of businesses are noticing it. One guitar string maker, though, is singing the blues. Jim Boulden tells us why.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM BOULDEN, CNN INTL. CORRESPONDENT (voice over): This small factory south of London hums with the sound of guitar string manufacturing. Rotosound has been crafting strings for nearly 50 years. Jason and Martin How, sons of the founder, revel in Rotosound's past and present customers.

JASON HOW, ROTOSOUND: Pink Floyd, The Who, Hendrix, Chris Swy (ph) from Yes, John Paul Jones from Led Zeppelin.

BOULDEN: Rotosound counts on rock's big names to buy its heavy duty bass strings but did not count on the lightweight U.S. dollar.

HOW: There isn't anything about the strong pound that is good for us.

BOULDEN: The How brothers would be happy with the pound at about $1.70, where it was two years ago. Now, it's around $2.07.

HOW: We sell on average 6,000 sets of our bass strings every month.

BOULDEN: Those are just sales in the United States where tiny Rotosound plucks 20 percent of its turnover. It says will lose about $100,000 this year, thanks to the weak a greenback.

(On camera): Rotosound says the weak dollar hurts it in two ways. Not only is it more expensive to sell their strings into the U.S. market, but because all of their competitors are American based, it's cheaper for them to sell their strings here into the European market.

(Voice over): Though, unlike other companies, Rotosound admits currency moves have helped it in the past.

MARTIN HOW, ROTOSOUND: In '95 it was the other way round. The lowest I can remember, it was when the pound against the dollar was $1.04 to the pound. And business was booming at the time.

BOULDEN: Rotosound does not hedge its bets by playing in the currency markets. Currency experts say even small companies should think about it.

JONATHAN BEDDELL, TORFX: People key foreign exchange is daunting or complicated. It's really not. The fact is you can hedge your exposure very easily, very cheaply. Have peace of mind and really remove the risk.

BOULDEN: Jason Howe says he wouldn't dream of moving the factory to a lower-cost country. They still make the strings by hand. HOW: Bass players are very fussy. They know exactly what they want. If I send to Steve Harris (ph) of Mind Maiden (ph) something that is not quite right, we'll know straightaway.

BOULDEN: But thanks to the weak dollar, Rotosound will have to take a step it's resisted for nearly a decade. It will raise prices. And count on rock's royalty to keep on playing and paying. Jim Boulden, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GORANI: Coming up -- big-spending Britney Spears.

MANN: The troubled pop star pulls in nearly $775,000 a month. But how much does she save? You'll be amazed.

GORANI: Well, what does she spend her money on? All how do we know this? All the answers, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MANN: Welcome back. This week we've been following the travels of Tropical Storm Noel as it turned into hurricane, took more than 100 lives, and now as it moves north. A subject a lot of our viewers know all too well. They have captured some of the storm's aftermath with their own cameras. Some viewers also called in and spoke to us on the air. Here's some of their amazing accounts.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LISA KEBLINSKAS PINEDA, I-REPORTER: We just were having some major flooding down here in Vitoa (ph) and we heard they were opening up the dam even more, that's the Tivetis (ph) Dam because it was at the point of breaching.

The amount of water, it was only a little bit open. I mean, it was huge. Even the pictures you can't even imagine how huge the water was.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Lisa Pineda was one of the I-Reporters that captured image of Tropical Storm Noel as it hit the Dominican Republic and Haiti. She and her family are doing missionary work in the Dominican town of Vitoa (ph). She sent these pictures to I-Report because she says she saw very little coverage of the devastating storm in the international media.

PINEDA: It's kind of like New Orleans. But there's not any news coverage of it. You see some pictures on Dominican Today of totally flooded-out communities and people carrying their children and --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Lisa also told us some of her friends were still missing in the aftermath of the storm. Which forced tens of thousands of Dominicans from their homes. I-Reporter Bill Regan sent us these pictures from the capital of the Dominican Republic, Santa Domingo on Monday. He captured the images on a waterproof camera while out riding his bicycle. By Thursday Tropical Storm Noel was already bearing down on the Bahamas. I-Reporter Travon Patton is aspiring videographer living in Nassau.

TRAVON PATTON, I-REPORTER: I felt that maybe people around the world would like to know what is happening in the Bahamas concerning Tropical Storm Noel.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is the first time Patton has submitted anything to I-Report, but he said Bahamians have a lot of experience when it comes to preparing for tropical storms.

PATTON: Usually the television stations and our radios give the warning. They close the schools. Everyone goes and they try to buy water. They try to go to stores and get supplies. Sometimes filling up bathroom tubs with water. Also, we keep a close ear on the radio, so we can hear if any changes happen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Unbelievably, he said he saw children out trick-or-treating for Halloween as the wind and rain picked up on Wednesday. Now, that's scary.

Noel is the deadliest Caribbean storm since Jean hit Haiti in 2004 killing more than 3,000 people. The dead and missing from this storm are still being counted.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MANN: Now, for something completely different. A story ripped right out of the comic books. Mighty Mouse or call him Super Mouse.

GORANI: Check out this video. Scientists from Case Western Reserve University tweaked a gene to create a super strong mouse. And the genetically engineered rodent is in front. I guess the -- right?

MANN: Whichever one is doing well.

GORANI: Which one -- I know, I think they are both kind of flipping. It is keeping pace on the treadmill for more than half an hour.

MANN: The more mortal mouse, that's really my kind of mouse, doesn't really make it for much longer than 20 minutes. Super Mouse, though -- this is the key part -- lived longer and ate much more and had 90 percent less body fat.

GORANI: All right, can it work on humans? Scientists say it can lead to new drugs to enhance athletes' abilities, because they have the same gene.

MANN: In advance of that drug, I'll eat the mouse.

Celebrity and a lavish lifestyle seem to go hand in hand, but legal troubles, both vehicular, and custodial, haven't slowed the cash dropping free-for-all of pop princess Britney Spears. Newly released court documents, from her custody dispute with ex-husband Kevin Federline, shows Spears makes more than $737,000 a month, and, get this, she doesn't save a single dime of it.

Joining us now to talk about how a person can spend nearly $750,000 a month is "US Weekly's" Editorial Director Ken Baker.

I guess, you're here because you do it, too. I mean, how do you do it?

KEN BAKER, EDITORIAL DIRECTOR, "US WEEKLY": The headline is not only that Britney makes a lot of money, but she does spend a lot of money. In fact, she spends over $102,000 to be exact a month, goofing off. That's on entertainment, gifts, vacations. She spends just -- actually, she has mortgage payments of $50,000 a month. And, get this, she spends $16,000 a month on clothes. Yet, she only spends $15,000 in child support payments to Kevin Federline. So, she's spending more on clothes than she is on child-support payments.

On top of that she spends $5,000 a month on going out and eating at the swankiest restaurants in Hollywood. So, Britney Spears a lot of people thought was going broke, she's not going broke, she's making a lot of money, but she's spending a ton. And you're right, she's not saving any. And something that is interesting is I saw someone point out yesterday that while she spends all this money, they have two children yet each of them spends a total of zero dollars on education for their children.

MANN: You say she's not going broke. Isn't this why stars do go broke? Isn't this why we always hear about has-beens down the road being penniless and you wonder why?

BAKER: That's a good point. At this rate with her spending like this, if that income goes down, she's going to have to belt tighten. And I don't think Britney Spears has done that in a very long time.

This comes right in the middle of this very nasty custody dispute that she's having with Kevin Federline. Now, Federline is getting $15,000 a month, but it's a temporary agreement. If he gets permanent custody of those kids, he'll get double, triple, maybe quadruple that a month. So, that expense is going to go up.

And also Britney's album is out right now. It just came out on Tuesday. If that album does not sell well, if she cannot tour and make money that way, that income of $737,000 a month, which we did the math, is almost $9 million a year, if that goes away, it's all going to fall apart and she's going to learn a lesson like Michael Jackson has.

MANN: It seems like exactly the same thing. Is no one watching her money? Is there no competent adult in her life anymore?

BAKER: Well, she's fired all her managers and accountants and she's gone almost everyone, 100 percent turnover the last year. So the fact that she's out there spending money wildly is not a big shocker to those of us who have been following her.

In fact, she had an assistant earlier this year and a bodyguard who said we never got paid. So apparently she's able to spend the money entertaining herself and spending on it clothes, and whatnot, but she's not spaying the people who are working for her. That's a sign of someone who is very disorganized. And, yes, could use some professional help.

MANN: One last quick question for you. How is the album? Is she going to make any money from that?

BAKER: You know, that's the interesting thing here. She's had such negative attention for her personal life. Professionally, that album that came out Tuesday has got nothing but rave reviews. Even people who had nasty things to say about it, said, you know, it's still pretty good. So actually we expect she's going to sell close to 500,000 records in the first week, which nowadays is very good.

The first single "Gimme More" is the number one air play. It's the number one downloaded album on i-Tunes right now. So it's actually the one thing in her life that is going well for Britney Spears.

MANN: Ken Baker, "US Weekly", thanks very much.

BAKER: Thank you.

GORANI: All right, that will do it for this hour on YOUR WORLD TODAY. I'm Hala Gorani.

MANN: I'm not even going to talk about this. I'm Jonathan Mann. This is CNN.

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