Popular Vehicles, Shutting Down Production; President Preps for First State of the Union; Obama's State of the Union Address to Focus on Economy; Rehoboth Beach Boardwalk: Waste or Money Well Spent?; Taliban's Key Role in Finding Peace in Afghanistan; Middle Class Angst in America - Part 2
| By Kiran Chetry, John Roberts, Allan Chernoff, Briann |
|---|
xfdls AMERICAN-MORNING-02
<Show: AMERICAN MORNING>
<Date: January 27, 2010>
<Time: 06:00>
<Tran: 012702CN.V74>
<Type: SHOW>
<Head: James O'Keefe May be Charged With Felony; Toyota Recalling
Popular Vehicles, Shutting Down Production; President Preps for First
State of the Union; Obama's State of the Union Address to Focus on
Economy; Rehoboth Beach Boardwalk: Waste or Money Well Spent?;
Taliban's Key Role in Finding Peace in Afghanistan; Middle Class Angst
in America - Part 2>
<Sect: News; International>
<Time: 07:00>
<End: 08:00>
CHETRY: The State Department saying it is deeply concerned about the welfare of three American hikers detained in Iran still. Two Belgian tourists recently freed from captivity say they had contact with the Americans and they believe they're under intense psychological pressure to confess to crimes they did not commit. The hikers, you may remember, were arrested in fact in July after crossing into Iran from Kurdistan in Iraq. They now face trial for espionage.
ROBERTS: Tomorrow, President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will announce $8 billion in stimulus grants to develop 13 high-speed rail corridors from coast to coast. White House officials says the projects are expected to create or save tens of thousands of jobs. The grants were part of last year's stimulus project.CHETRY: Well, the political stakes are high for President Obama. Tonight in his first State of the Union address. The speech is expected to be heavy on jobs and a renewed theme of yes, we can, harkening back to the campaign. As the president looks to regain support of many frustrated voters.
Joining us now with a preview, two presidential historians, Doris Kearns Goodwin in Massachusetts this morning and Douglas Brinkley in Austin, Texas. Thanks to both of you for being with us.
DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN, PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: You're very welcome.
CHETRY: Doris, let me start with you. The president's approval ratings right now, hovering around 50 percent. There's a lot of anger out there from Americans that we haven't seen more jobs and perhaps more help from main street. And sources say the president is going to try to focus his speech on the middle class tonight. What do you think he needs to say?
GOODWIN: I think the most important thing is he's got to make the American people feel that main street and job creation is at the center of his priority. When you see a poll that 60 percent think that he spent more time thinking about big banks than about the problems of the middle class, he has to shift back perception.
I think the complicated thing is it's going to have to be a very old square deal, saying I'm for business, if they start creating jobs, I'm going to give them investment, tax credits. I'm going to target the whole thing but I'm not for business. If like the big banks, they took our money, they didn't lend it out and they gave themselves big bonuses. So it has to be able to pivot in both direction, that yes, business can be good but if business isn't, boy, I'm going to get angry. So I think those combat combination.
He also has to figure out how to communicate in smaller bites. Somehow he gives great, long speeches but they have to be able to symbolize it down like Roosevelt did with lend/lease. You're going to lend your neighbor a hose, so that your house will not go on fire when theirs does. It's that kind of metaphor that I think he needs.
CHETRY: Interesting, and Doug, in a lot of the polling jobs and the economy ranks as the two biggest issues for Americans but terrorism and national security come in pretty close there. You say the president needs to focus on national security as well tonight. Explain why.
DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: Well, there was a Zogby poll that came out this week that showed more Americans are feeling safer under the previous president, George W. Bush, than Barack Obama. That's not the kind of poll a president wants to read, and I think you have to pay attention to it, and they have been.
After Ft. Hood, after the Christmas day bomber, you see the White House trying to get a little more strident message about Homeland Security. The truth is, they have been doing a good job, as had the Bush administration after 9/11. But there's starting to be a weakness in President Obama's international posture and also his --the ability to keep the Homeland safe. So I think he needs to use some strident rhetoric in that regard.
CHETRY: And Doris, really, what is -- from a historical perspective, what is the point of the state of the union address? What are the hopes to be accomplished when the president addresses Congress and the nation?
GOODWIN: Well, you know, the president still is the only person in the country who can speak with the unified voice for the people as a whole. Congress speaks with many voices, as we've seen so much in this last year. And it's such a great ritual. I love state of the unions. I mean, they come in, everybody sitting there, the cabinet is there, and the Congress is there, and the Supreme Court is there, and the country is mobilized.
So it is his chance to really speak directly to the American people, lay out his priorities and show that he is on their side. Presidents have to be on the side of the people as against the special interests and this is a moment to do this. This is an important moment for him.
CHETRY: And Doris, you brought this up, and Doug, I'd like your take on it as well. The new CNN poll just out that says six in 10 people asked believe that the president has paid more attention to the problems of the banks and other financial institutions than he has to the problems of the middle class. So what is the takeaway from that number? How does he turn it around so that the every day average American believes that this White House is trying to better their lives?
GOODWIN: Well, it's partly a matter of tone. But go ahead, Doug. You continue.
BRINKLEY: Well, if you cut to a year ago, I think Barack Obama has a case to say the country was worse off a year ago. Look at Wall Street. It looked like it was about to crumble. We were in the middle of a great recession heading into a depression. We're not there now.
I had to deal with the banks first, but now on my second year of office the focus is going to be on jobs. We're going to do first off a government freeze but there's also going to be a lot of subsidies for things like middle class families to deal with child care or to deal with retirement benefits or to deal with student loans and that I'm there -- he's got to make himself tonight seem more the middle class American president, not a president who saved Wall Street in their moment of dire need.
CHETRY: And quickly, Doris, finish your thought. I just want to, in this context, 70 percent -- nearly 70 percent was one of the highest approval ratings for the president, as we said, now he's around 50 percent. His average has been about 57 percent. Is it an easy way to gain support by having a very strong State of the Union address?
GOODWIN: Absolutely. Even in those polls that show that approval of his presidency in terms of what he's done with it has fallen. Feelings about him as a person still remain high, strong, decisive, honest and people trust him. So if he can transfer that trust in him as a person now to the fact that he's focused on their problems, he understands their frustration.
He's got to deal something with health care. He's got to say something about it, which took a whole year. But I think the rest of it has to be pivoted like a laser, on the economy, growth and jobs.
CHETRY: Doris Kearns Goodwin and Douglas Brinkley, presidential historians, thanks so much for joining us this morning.
BRINKLEY: Thank you.
GOODWIN: You're very welcome.
CHETRY: I know you two will be watching tonight, and CNN will, of course carry the president's State of the Union address live. Tonight's primetime coverage on the State of the Union begins at 8:00 Eastern with the best political team on television. We'll be right back after a short break. It's now 38 minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning. With over 15 million people out of work and losing hope, there is a lot of angst in middle class America these days. Youngstown, Ohio is one example. A rust belt success story for so many decades, the city is now fighting for its life. 73,000 people live there. The median income in 2008? About $24,000 a year. The value of a typical home? Just $48,000.
Our Carol Costello was taking a more in depth look this morning at the problems plaguing Youngstown.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Obama, Obama.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Then-candidate Obama was no stranger here. He made 14 campaign stops in Ohio. Two in Youngstown.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Youngstown, this is our moment. This is our time.
COSTELLO: Youngstown said, yes, we can. 70 percent voted for Obama. Now many feel we really can't. Mickey Wolfe lost his job in January of 2009.
MICKEY WOLFE, 2008 OBAMA VOTER: To come in this area and make promises when you want to be elected is all great. It's really, really frustrating that, you know -- you know, that we're in this predicament.
COSTELLO: Youngstown, once a booming manufacturing town has been in an economic black hole for decades. According to the Brookings Institution, 33 percent live below the poverty level. And Youngstown has one of the highest foreclosure rates in Ohio.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Politics is always at play.
COSTELLO: Mayor Jay Williams ran as an independent candidate in 2005 and won.
(on camera): Are people angry here?
MAYOR JAY WILLIAMS, YOUNGSTOWN, OHIO: There's a sense of frustration that Washington in general just isn't getting it.
COSTELLO (voice-over): He says while Youngstown has benefited from the president's stimulus plan, the city needs even more financial help. But its application for stimulus money set aside to ease urban blight was rejected by HUD, the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
And Youngstown isn't happy. The local newspaper summed it up this way, HUD to the Mahoney Valley, drop dead. The Obama administration says that's unfair, noting Youngstown has already received $52 million in stimulus money. Money it said created or saved thousands of jobs. The auto industry bailout also preserved jobs at the city's General Motors plant.
JARED BERNSTEIN, V.P. BIDEN'S ECONOMIC ADVISOR: You could certainly find pockets throughout this country where we would very much like to have done more. But we believe we've done a lot to help.
COSTELLO: Over at Ball Busters, a local pool hall, the only kind of help they're looking for isn't finding jobs. When the president speaks on Wednesday night, they want more than help, they want a plan.
(on camera): So you want to hear, they want to hear from Barack Obama, a plan.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Exactly. Outline it.
COSTELLO (voice-over): And then tell the country how he's going to pay for it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Doesn't that sound amazingly simple? They want a plan. They want the president to outline it and they want results. They want jobs here, John. But of course that's a tall order, it's a lot more complicated than that. I'm going to go back to Ball Busters tonight, sit down with the patrons there and watch the president's
State of the Union and see how they react.
And I'm thinking he's got to give them way more than words. They want action and they want that feeling of hope they had when they voted for Barack Obama in this area.
ROBERTS: You got to wonder though, really, practically what can he give them?
COSTELLO: You know, I talked to the mayor about that. Because Youngstown has this problem of being mired in this idea that manufacturing jobs are going to come back, and they're just not. They have to kind of come up with a new economy. And the mayor is trying to do that, but he says he needs more financial help from Washington to do that, to create these new jobs, to come up with these incubators. So that people will get new kinds of work here that actually pay more than the minimum wage.
ROBERTS: We were talking about yesterday, Pittsburgh did that some years back when the steel industry moved out but it took an awful lot of money and an awful lot of time.
Carol Costello in Youngstown this morning. Carol, thanks.
CHETRY: And we are in the middle of a week long undertaking here at CNN, to find out where all of the stimulus money is going and also whether it's doing what it's meant to do, create jobs.
Our Don Lemon is live at the nerve center of the stimulus project, the CNN stimulus desk in Atlanta. Hey, Don.
DON LEMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, how are you?
You know, I was just looking at some of the stuff that Carol was talking about, talking about creating jobs, and one way they want to create about 1,000 jobs or at least help out about 1,000 workers in Ohio is through green energy, renewable energy jobs.
I want to -- so this is a book. We're looking it all up in this book, trying to find the information. So we're going to add about $3.96 million to the stimulus thing that we're working on, so far already reviewed.
Let me walk over here and showed you -- show you. These of course are the things that what we're working on. The green ones are the ones that we have gotten, so let's see if we can fix this total so far. This is going to add $3.96 million to the number of under review projects here by CNN.
So let's move this back. Specifically we're going to stay in Ohio and talk about eight counties, eight counties that are in Ohio, some of which include Cleveland, Cincinnati, Dayton, and those counties. What they're trying to do is get, what Carol said, some of these manufacturing workers, some of these auto workers back to work, and one way to do this, they're talking about creating a new economy, green energy jobs. Green energy jobs.
So what they're doing is $3.96 million, they're focusing in on, it's training, certification, all that. And -- and this is all short- term, all done on the local level to try to get these people back to work. So they're going to get $3.96 million of that.
Real quickly, let me show you, this is downtown Cleveland, which is one of the -- the counties, in one of the counties that's going to get money from this project. And again, just to sum it up for you here, eight counties in Ohio, $3.96 million for green and renewable energy going there. It should help about 1,000 workers there for training opportunities and what have you, to help and also create some jobs.
So exactly how many jobs created? Not exactly sure. How many people are taking advantage of this? We don't know. But we're working on it. When the phone lines open up, when people get to work in Ohio, we're going to be calling and making -- trying to get some information, making calls and drilling down on exactly what's happening with that program -- Kiran.
CHETRY: All right. Sounds good. Don Lemon for us. Thanks so much.
Also, tomorrow on AMERICAN MORNING, a bridge built to make residents safer. We're going to find out why folks in one small town are calling it a complete waste of their money.
The Stimulus Project all this week only on CNN and cnn.com/stimulus.
It's 47 minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROBERTS: Good morning, Pittsburgh, where right now they've got some light snow flying around. It's 24 degrees. Later on today, it will get up above freezing, 35 degrees, and will remain cloudy.
So coming up on 50 minutes after the hour. Let's get a quick check of this morning's weather headlines. Jacqui Jeras in for Rob Marciano this morning who's out in Steamboat Springs in --investigating the weather.
CHETRY: Right. Meetings (ph).
JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Somebody's got to do it, right?
ROBERTS: He's -- he's investigating the weather.
We got a lot of cold air coming down from my old home.
JERAS: Yes, we do, from Canada. Woo-hoo!
Unfortunately, it's going to end up being a real problem for a whole lot of people because that cold air is going to meet up with some moisture in the nation's midsection, really, the Southern Plains, and this is going to be one ugly storm. In fact, it could be the worst ice storm that we've seen in Oklahoma since 2007, if you remember what that did. There were people in rural areas without power for weeks and weeks. That can cause a lot of damage.
This is what we're looking at right now, which doesn't look like a whole heck of a lot on the radar pictures, some light rain showers and some snow into the higher elevations across the four corners, but as it gets into the nation's midsection we're going to really see this thing pump up quite a bit.
So ice accumulations could reach a good half of an inch, probably even up to an inch in some isolated areas along the I-44 corridor here, and that is what brings down tree limbs, that's what brings down power lines and makes travel absolutely impossible.
Backside of this system, we're going to be seeing that heavy snow into the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma. A few of you could see up to a foot of snowfall.
That cold air today up here across the upper Midwest, so that's going to be on the move, making its way on down towards the south and yet eventually making it towards the east. So temperatures are going to be a lot cooler throughout the week compared to what we saw early this week.
Airport delays, we've got 15-minute departure delays in Philadelphia right now, could reach up to 30 minutes to an hour later on today.
John and Kiran, back to you.
CHETRY: What a mess.
All right, Jacqui. Thanks so much.
Fifty-one minutes past the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHETRY: Fifty-four minutes past the hour. Welcome back to the Most News in the Morning.
It's time for your AM House Call and we're going to Haiti, where in the aftermath of the earthquake it has become painfully clear just how desperate the country is for doctors. In fact, for every physician in the country there are more than 4,500 potential patients.
ROBERTS: And to make matters worse, many medical schools have been destroyed across the country.
Our Dr. Sanjay Gupta talked with two medical students who are facing tough choices and an uncertain future.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: So you -- you would have been in class that day, but you -- you weren't. If -- if you'd been in class, I think everybody probably would have died.
RICARDO, HAITIAN MEDICAL SCHOOL STUDENT: Yes. Yes.
GUPTA (voice-over): But they very much lived, and now they have all the vitality of youth. Ricardo and Paul-Robert.
They're best friends. They have matching bags. Inseparable.
Now, they're on their way to being Haiti's future healers.
GUPTA (on camera): The way it works is you go to primary school, then you go to secondary school, and then the very best students of all go to medical school for seven years.
Paul-Robert was in his fifth year. He was this close to being the first person in his family to ever becoming a doctor when this all happened.
That's where you used to sit?
PAUL-ROBERT DERENONCOURT, HAITIAN MEDICAL SCHOOL STUDENT: Negative (ph).
GUPTA: Right over there?
DERENONCOURT: Over there. In the other side.
GUPTA: When you look at your -- your school now, what are you --what are you going to do? What is your plan?
DERENONCOURT: When I see my -- my medical school collapsed, it's very bad thing for us.
GUPTA: What -- what type of doctor do you want to be?
DERENONCOURT: I want to be a radiologist.
GUPTA (voice-over): He would be one of fewer than 2,000 doctors in the entire country of 9 million people.
GUPTA (on camera): So that -- that's the only thing that's still standing is -- is the front wall over there.
DERENONCOURT: Yes. The only thing standing.
GUPTA (voice-over): Many would look at Paul-Robert and say he's lucky. His mother survived the earthquake, siblings as well. But now it is his very future that hangs in the balance.
GUPTA (on camera): So what will you do? What are you going to do next year? What are you going to do the year after that?
DERENONCOURT: First of all, I will -- I will spend some of my time to search about what can I do for other medical school in the country.
GUPTA: So you're saying many of the medical schools here in Haiti are -- are destroyed or broken?
DERENONCOURT: Yes.
GUPTA: So you may have to leave your country.
DERENONCOURT: Maybe. I don't know.
GUPTA (voice-over): That's pretty bad news, considering how poor medicine was to begin with here in Haiti.
GUPTA (on camera): And here's a number that sort of surprised me. Even under typical circumstances, Haiti only graduates 80 medical doctors a year. Every single year.
Think about that, in a country of 9 million people, giving Haiti one of the lowest physician to patient ratios anywhere in the world. And with this, obviously those numbers get a lot worse.
GUPTA (voice-over): But for the time being, there is a lot of compassion here. Doctors from all over the world come to help.
GUPTA (on camera): What happens when they leave?
DERENONCOURT: If they leave, I think it will be very difficult for us.
GUPTA (voice-over): But what we know is eventually Haiti's medical care, and really Haiti's future, will fall squarely on the shoulders of these kids, kids like Ricardo and Paul-Robert.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GUPTA: Now, some of these numbers may seem a little bit surprising, but keep in mind that we've talked about the fact that Haiti has a very high rate of poverty, about 80 percent of the people here living below the poverty line. Only 2 percent of people actually finish high school here, so -- so going on to medical school is a very big deal, and obviously a big setback to have so many of these medical schools destroyed.
So as people think about relief for medical infrastructure long-term, if the -- if the Haiti -- if the locals here are going to take over a lot of the medical care, they're going to need to invest in those medical schools as well, long term.
ROBERTS: All right. Problems, problems, problems abounding there in Port-au-Prince. Sanjay Gupta for is this morning. Doc, thanks so much.
Top stories coming your way in 90 seconds. Stay with us on the Most News in the Morning.
