>> i don't think people realize how intimately connected we are with life in the ocean and the diminishment of life in the ocean is the diminishment of the oceans to support us. if the oceans die, we die. and people really have to understand that. >> larry: we're an ocean planet. >> we are. it should be called the planet ocean. >> yeah. >> larry: thank you all very, very much for an illuminating hour. bob, we salute you. >> thank you. >> thank you, larry. thank you, bob. >> larry: "whale wars" airs friday nights on animal planet. and it is a great show. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com >r gop go go. i'm don lemon. the search is on tonight for two american soldiers on missing and reportedly kidnapped in achlg nato says they left their compound in kabul yesterday and never came back. militants abducted both of them. also in afghanistan today, five other u.s. soldiers were killed in bombings in the southern part

of that country. to the midwest now where a massive rainfall in a has caused a dam to fail. rushing waters burst through the lake in the nearby dam. it's mostly rural and much of it is farmland. the mayor tells cnn that ten inches of rain fell across the area in about 12 hours. >> it is, you know, a very sad situation. you're talking about a catastrophic break in the dam. so that has never happened before, and, you know, once again here in the midwest and in iowa, we're dealing with, you know, record flood levels in certain parts of our state. >> and in chicago people have been using boats in the streets following a wave of torrential rainfalls. parts of the city and suburbs

got hit with more than seven inches of rain, flooding streets and interstates, knocking out power to thousands and cab selling airline flights. rescue teams in several suburban towns used boats and even helicopters to search for people stranded by the rising water. in the gulf of mexico the storm danger has passed and ships are now back at the site of the bp oil well. cnn's david mattingly has the latest. david, good evening to you. when will all the boats be back on site, back to work? >> reporter: they're all back on their way right now. in fact, the drilling platform that handles the relief well that needs to be drilled is already on scene. they hope to have that in operation just as soon as possible. but it's not just the ships and the vessels out there in the gulf they have to put back in place. these barges behind me are part in a lake here in slidell, louisiana. there are dozens of them back there. they all have to be moved back into place tomorrow.

these were actually part of the defenses for the coastal areas here to keep the oil from getting into lake ponchartrain. so there's a lot of moving parts that have to move back to where they were as they were fighting this oil. but right now all eyes are on that drilling platform. how soon can they get that back up? they're hoping within a matter of days to be back on track. but so far this storm that actually didn't happen as it fell apart on its way here has actually cost this operation probably, don, about a week. >> okay. so that's the time frame. for about a week. everyone, i ask you every time because we're hoping there's better news about the relief wells because that's what's really going to stop it, david. what's the news on that? >> reporter: well, there are two things we need to watch for. sometime later next week we're going the see them attempt these static kill. that's when they're going the pump mud, fill that well up full of this heavy liquid and essentially drown that well and render it helplhelpless.

that's going to be a big day. a time after that, we're looking at seven to ten days when they will be able to finish that relief well and finally just kill this well completely. so, again, this set us back about a week. if that storm hadn't come through, we would be seeing the end of that well right now. >> cnn's david mattingly. david, thank you very much. coming up on cnn, our special report, "who is shirley sherrod." many adults don't meet the recommended daily intake for all vitamins and minerals through diet alone. that's why there's... it helps provide key nutrients your body could be missing. one serving of boost contains twenty-six essential vitamins and minerals plus 10 grams of protein. these nutrients help promote bone health and muscle mass to help keep your body moving. achieve a balanced diet so you can live life to the fullest. find boost in the nutrition isle. brand power. helping you buy better.

that's why we created the tide "loads of hope" program, a free laundry service that provides clean clothes to families affected by disasters. [ woman ] it feels so good to be able to know that i've got clean clothes. you don't know how very basic essentials are until you have none. ♪ this is what gives us hope. [ female announcer ] you too can join us by purchasing a tide vintage t at tideloadsofhope.com. my sunglasses.

♪ people say i'm forgetful. maybe that's why we go to so many memorable places. love the road you're on. the subaru outback. motor trend's 2010 sport/utility of the year. welcome back, e everyone. shirley sherrod right now is mulling over a new job offer from the obama administration. it's a consolation of sorts for the shabby treatment she got this week after a right wing blogger unfairly portrayed her as a racist against whites. nothing could be further from the truth, however. all the same she was forced out

of her job with the agriculture department and then as the facts came out an apology. in the next hour you're going to meet a humble and remarkable woman who did everything right but still fell victim to a vicious smear. i spent the day to find out who is shirley sherrod and afterward a panel discussion on what this reveals about race in america. shirley sherrod was accused of racism. >> did you discriminate? shirley sherrod caught on tape saying something very disturbing. >> i told them get the whole tape and look at the whole tape. >> we begin tonight with the smearing of shirley sherrod. >> this is showing racism at an naacp event. >> he didn't care who he destroyed. >> shirley sherrod must resign immediately. >> i don't know who brought up the mess. >> this is a good woman. she's been put through hello.

>> at the center of this fury and frenzy. shirley sherrod, an unassuming woman from georgia, now a household name. >> shirley sherrod. >> shirley sherrod. >> reporter: burning up the air waves, thrust into a political firestorm. >> was there ever a discrimination claim filed against you. >> never. >> reporter: turning up the heat on the white house. >> on behalf of the administration ioffer our apology. >> all of this attention couldn't be farther from the ro roots, roots, though, that grounded her in the dangerous, even deadly world of racial tensions. newton, georgia, the deep south. 180 miles south of atlanta. a typical southern farming town. >> you had to get up before

daylight and get food and try to be in the field as the sun was coming up. >> reporter: walking down the streets near her home town, sherrod remembers working in the cotton fields as a young child. >> you had a sack, you know, that you put on, and the sack went over this shoulder, you know, and the opening was here. so you're bending over picking cotton and putting it in the sack. and when it gets full, then you've got to taket over to a burlap sheet and pour it on there. and you did that all day long. >> reporter: shirley sherrod's family has lived in this area since the 1800s, all farmers, sharecroppers over the years who over the years bought more and more of the land they worked. she grew up in a small home with her mother, her father, and her five younger sisters. sandra, one of them, recalled

how her father always wanted a boy. >> he called us boys napz naples. shirley was bill, my sister was gus my name was sam and they called me sam. the next cyst ter was called blue because she had blue hsh green eyes and my baby sit ter was biddy. he would talk to us at the dinner table and he would always say find yourself ant don't ever forget, help whoever you can. it was time for everyone to come in and have joy. >> but the chores weren't easy. >> we had to pump water early on because we didn't have any electric well, and we had to pump water now, not just for u., the cows had to have water, the hogs had to have water. the chickens had to have water.

so, you know, we were pumping water for everyone. we were so happy when we got an electric pump. we no longer had to pump water. >> so that was your yub bringing. >> and church. oh, don't forget church. every time the church doors opened, we were there. >> sherrod's father was a deacon. she believes it was that devotion that got their family through tough times. >> the lord will make a way somehow. my mother used to sing it around the house all the time. ♪ >> i think i know why now she would sing it because times were so hard. she always sung "the lord will make a way somehow." >> reporter: the farming was hard. being black, even harder. the 1960s, jim crow laws divided

the south and the racist. >> growing up in the segregated south for people who don't know about it, what was that like? >> we would always get the hand-me-downs from the white school. they would get the new buses, we would get the used buses. they would get the new books, we would get their used books that had pages torn out at us. >> they couldn't drink water. they had to drink water on the colored side and go to the bathroom. if they went to the restaurant to get a sandwich, you had to go to the back window and they would hand you a sandwich out of the back window. it was rough. >> reporter: and dangerous. >> we knew where to go, where not to go, and if you did, you knew what would happen to you. it was dangerous even on the highway riding along, because those sheriffs would stop people

and beat up folk. >> reporter: sherrod remembers that sheriff. >> he loved being called a gator. i never heard a gate tore make a sound myself but the sound an alligator makes was the sound he'd make. it was supposed to scare you to death. he had a sign up at his service station saying we want white people business only. yes. i grew up knowing we were powerless. >> reporter: yet at an early age shirley witnessed blacks fighting for power. it was the fall of 1961. she was just 14. ♪ >> narrator: albany, georgia, a negro fight against segregation is led by martin lieu third king. >> if necessary, we must be willing to fill up the jails all over the state of georgia.

>> reporter: civil rights leaders descended on nearby albany, georgia, through protest marches. it was called the albany movement and it lasted nearly a year. more than 1,000 protesters ended up in jail. it was unsuccessful, yet it made an impression on young shirley. you were 14 years old. >> we were supportive of the albany movement. we were raising money to support the albany movement. >> reporter: it was a tough time to live, and even tougher time to grow up. >> i didn't want to live in the south. i planned to get out of the south forever. >> reporter: you wanted to leave. >> yes. >> reporter: but that all a changed one spring day in 1965. >> they called me to the princip

principal's office. i was such a good girl. good student. i couldn't figure out why they were calling me to the office. but i went. they told me first that he had been shot. >> reporter: the murder that changed shirley sherrod's life forever. when we come back. that's why we created the tide "loads of hope" program, a free laundry service that provides clean clothes to families affected by disasters. [ woman ] it feels so good to be able to know that i've got clean clothes. you don't know how very basic essentials are until you have none. ♪ this is what gives us hope. [ female announcer ] you too can join us by purchasing a tide vintage t at tideloadsofhope.com.

>> reporter: as a young girl, shirley sherrod, she was shirley miller then, dreamed of getting out of the deep south. >> we had these big plans for me. i was trying to look at going to schools in the north, you know. back then they said a woman would find a husband or college, you know. i thought, okay. i'm not going to risk even going to a college in the south because i don't want no husband

from the south. i want go north. >> reporter: meanwhile her husband was on the verge of fulfilling one of his dreams. with five daughters, his wife was pregnant again and he was sure this would be a boy. >> he had a room built. the room back there was blue and he said this is going to be for my boy. he planned it. he said, when we go pick the baby up out of the hospital, i'm going to get you a brand new car and bring my baby home in a car. >> reporter: but the family's dreams were about to shatter. in 1965 in this field shirley's father and a white neighbor reportedly butted heads, a dispute over who owned which cattle. shirley says witnesses saw the confrontation. >> according to the others, my father told him we don't have to continue arguing. we can just go to court. and he was walking to his truck to leave. he turned around to say something and the man shot him right up here. >> reporter: shirley at school

was called to the principal's office. >> they brought me in to tell me first because i'm the oldest and then they sent for my four sisters. we were all in the office just crying. we didn't know whether he was dead or alive. >> that was our hero. that was our dad. and we had a typer that took us to the hospital and to see daddy lying out on a bed like that, it was -- it was horrible. i mean -- >> reporter: as for prosecuting the suspect -- >> he was never, ever prosecuted. to white grand jury in baker county refused to indict him. >> did it make you hate white people? >> you nknow, initially i hated

white people. i wanted to get back at white people. my initial thought was i needed to go pick up a gun and go find him but i knew i couldn't do that because it just wasn't me. >> reporter: everything had been turned upside down and shirley's plans to head north suddenly seemed uncertain. >> it was a full moon and i sat there praying and asking god to please give me an answer. i have to do something. i need to do something. >> reporter: when you prayed to that god and that full moon, what happened? >> it was almost like he spoke to me, in my mind. i didn't hear anyone talking. but what came to me was you can give up your dream of living in the north, you can stay in the south and devote your life to working for change. and i remember a calmness came over me because i had a game plan. >> reporter: after graduating from high school, shirley

enrolled in a local college for black students. her younger students integrated the all-white high school and faced a terrifying backlash. >> i was doing homework and i heard all these cars coming down the road. being we're out in the back woods in the country, that's unusual. when i looked out the window, i saw this cross, and it was burning. so i went to wake my mother. >> and i was in the bed. and she called me. she said, mother, get up here. there's a cross burning in the front of the yard. i said, what? she said cross. >> my mother was not afraid. she had children there, young children, my brother just born. of course, she went to get a gun. >> my second daughter lynn was here, i said get on the telephone and start calling for people. >> they came immediately and they put their cars in front of our house in a line and they started shooting.

>> and i went to the door, and there was this loud talking out there and i started shooting. >> they knew that our family was very active in the movement, so they were trying to scare us. >> but i really do believe some of them got sprinkled that night with buck shots because my brother-in-law and his son was out there letting it go through the wood snos that's how we stuck together. that's the strength we gained together in a civil rights movement. >> reporter: the local civil rights organizer was a transplant from virginia. where he helped found the student nonviolent coordinating committee. >> we had no idea of the monster this we were undertaking to fight. >> reporter: across the south. white officials were using every trick in the book to keep civil rights activists in check, to

keep black voters from turning out. that helped set the stage for a violent confrontation as demonstrators began to gather here at the courthouse in downtown newton on the day that became known as bloody saturday. >> i saw some whites coming out of the hardware store with axe handles, and they approached us and started beating us with the axe handles. they beat us down to the ground. >> my aunt josie, she's a little petite woman, she fell on -- she put her body over his and was hollering at them to stop beating charles sherrod because they were going to kill him. >> reporter: that didn't stop charles sherrod from driving on the back roads to meet every black american family.

>> i was banging on the door and three or four pretty girl cams to the door. they started talking about this girl, their sister, that was prettier than either one of them. i want to see this girl. so they said they got a picture. i said i want to see this picture of your sister. and i pointed at it, and i said, i'm going to marry that girl. >> he did marry shirley. it was a love story in a land of hate. phone calls became the threat of the routine. >> we're going to blow up your house, burn you down, we're going to do this, do the other. it was just the regular -- >> i would tell them to be careful. i just tell them to be careful. my heart would just bleed. i didn't know whether they would

make it there or not. >> she kept telling shirley, you got to stop. but she kept pushing. she said, mother, it's going to be all right. >> reporter: just ahead, organizing black farmers to take on the white establishment. when you have osteoporosis, like me, it helps to eat calcium-rich foods like yogurt, spinach, and cheese. but calcium, vitamin d and exercise may not be enough to keep your bones strong. so ask your doctor about once-monthly boniva. boniva works with your body to help stop and reverse bone loss.

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>> reporter: here on her family farm in baker county, georgia, shirley sherrod's experiences as a young girl would shape her professional life. with black owned farms heading toward extinction, sherrod wanted to help. >> that's when she made up her mind that she was going to stay here and try to help make a difference in this community. she's always been determined, a strong person. >> reporter: in 1967 shirley and charles set out to change the land literally, 6,000 acres to be exact. they helped create a land trust for black farmers with a long-range plan to build wealth. it was called "new communities." one acre at a time it grew into

one of the largest tracts of black-owned land in the country. >> so the whole idea of "new communities" was to go about the country, buying it in land, holding it in trust, and turning it over to local community development corporations. >> reporter: she decided to stay in the south, an achievement that would have made her father proud. but the sherrods' white neighbors viciously opposed it, often resorting to shooting at their home. >> i remember the bullet hole over my bunkbed. you know, it was, i guess, a third of my life i had the bullet hole right by where i slept. >> i was actually asleep and i was awakened by him karate chopping my door in and telling me to get down.

and you can't imagine what that does to a young child. >> reporter: in the beginning the farm was successful, but the drought-stricken '70s forced sherrods' organization to seek emergency government loan. the money came, but not for three years. by then it was much too late. according to the sherrods, white agents were in no hurry to write checks to black farmers. the property was foreclosed on. >> the first three years we made attempts to get loans from fha. this is a government program, which promoted itself as the last help that you could get from anywhere. but in our case, when i walked into the office, they told me the only way you get a loan is over my dead body. >> reporter: after losing the farm, life for the sherrod family became very different. money was tight, bills mounted.

>> i'd walk in a couple times late at night getting up and see my mother crying over bills. >> reporter: in 1984 shirley sherrod took a job at the federation of southern cooperatives, headquartered in east point, georgia. her boss was jerry. >> she was able to save a lot of farmers of all races, hundreds of farmers in georgia that were impacted by shirley. nationwide, they got probably thousands. >> one of the white farmers she helped, roger spooner. but she was hesitant to help out at first and that initial hesitation would later ignite a media frenzy. in 1999 shirley sherrod and other activists sued the u.s. department of agriculture for discrimination. ten years later, pickford versus glickman would become part of the largest civil rights in

history. >> finally last year our lawyer called me and seven-day forecast, shforecast said have you heard shirley, we won. i said really. >> she said do you want to guess how much? >> i said is it at least a million. >> she said almost $13 million. he was awarding it to me and my husband. >> weeks after the settlement, sherrod was offered a job at the very department she had success employ sued. in august of 2009 shirley sherrod became the georgia director of rural development for the department of agriculture. speculation has surfaced raising questions about whether she got the job as part of the settlement. >> one didn't have anything to do with the other. >> reporter: are you surprised this people are bringing this up? i don't know. how do you feel about people bringing it up? >> you know -- you know, it's

just another way that they try to twist the facts to make it look and seem like something else. >> reporter: during her long career fighting for civil rights, there was one life-changing moment, a story about her personal struggle over race. the story of that white farmer who came to her for help decades earlier. >> i was struggling with the fact that so many black people have lost their farmland and here i was faced with having to help a white person save their land. so i didn't give him the full force of what i could do. >> reporter: when this short edited version of the speech was posted by a right wing blogger, shirley sherrod was labeled a racist and asked to resign. but there was much more to the story. >> that's when it was revealed to me that it's about the poor

versus those who have and not so much about -- it is about white and black, but, you know, it opened my eyes. >> reporter: the next daisher rod appeared on cnn. she said her words had been twisted and taken out of context. >> what was the point? >> the point was to get them to understand we need to look beyond race. >> reporter: stepping in to back up her story, 87-year-old roger spooner and his wife eloise. >> i have someone who wants to speak to this whole controversy. her name is eloise spooner. eloise, thanks for taking the time to talk to me. what do you think of this whole controversy? first of all, what do you think of shirley? >> caller: she's a good friend. they have not treated her right. she's one i give credit to helping us save our farm.

>> reporter: the womans who father was allegedly killed by a white farmer would have her reputation rescued by a white farmer. sherrod hadn't seen or spoken to the spooners in more than 20 years. but three days after grabbing headlines across the nation -- this would change. >> i want the first hug. this means a lot to us. this means a lot to us. >> it means so much to me. >> it means a lot to us. >> to me too. thank you, thank you. >> reporter: a long awaited reunion. a picture of racial unity. >> and we are digging deeper into this controversy. you'll hear from our panel of experts about how this story spun out of control. that's next. -so you're thinking...? i agree. preferred. only meineke has options... and now 50% off brake pads and shoes.

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as you know, she was forced out of her government job this week after being falsely accused of racism toward whites. well, for the past half hour we have been revealing who she is. the facts of her life underscore just how outrageous this smear truly was. so with me now is cheryl conte and mark le man hill professor of english, education, and anthropology at columbia university. thank you both for joining me tonight. are you guying doing okay? >> pleasure. yeah. >> yes, thank you for having me. >> so, mark, the conundrum for the first black president is that he can't really delve into the issue of race. >> well, that's exactly right. but part of the reason is because president obama didn't run as the first black president or first serious balm candidate some would say. instead he ran as someone who happened to be black. he would be as some would say

incidentally black. as a result race and neutrality were around him. when he talks about race he becomes racialized and that's the last thing he want wants. we don't get into the racial conversations we could have. he promised us he had special insight because he was a black candidate and because he was half black, half white. we've seen none of that over the past two years. >> here's the thing. get that as someone who happens to be african-american and i use that but usually it's on people who are involved at least when it comes to racial issues you can say that. but that doesn't -- he is black to many people. he's not just a person who happens to be black. do you understand the distinction? >> absolutely. there's no doubt about that. over the past two years if president obama has learned nothing else he's also black to a big sector of the people, especially tea party members. he reminds people about race in

a particular way that's uncomfortable because wee o're uncomfortable about race. >> is he qualified or in some way he cannot do it. >> i think he believes he cannot do it, but yet being half raised and having been raised by white people, he is in a unique spot and he can provide a perspective that would be important, i think, to a lot of people. he has done that in the past, whether it was during the reverend wright controversy, during the skip gates, you know. when he actually does take the time to reflect, the american people enjoy a grown up and mature conversation from him. >> i posed a similar question to shirley sherrod when i interviewed her yesterday and the day before. i want you guys to take a listen, and we'll talk about it. >> you know, you heard your mama

say this ship shall pass. it's not going to last forever but it might get us to the place where we need to be. so, yes, he might get some negative press early on but we get through that and then get to really trying to deal with the issues. he's got to be willing do that. is he not doing that simply because he wants a second term, you know? i don't look at it that way. >> she is saying, mark, that the truth is the truthnd it doesn't matter if you take flack for it or not. that's her point of view and that's the point of view of many who fought the civil rights movement. >> that's exactly right. some could argue operating outside the white house we have the luxury of speaking outside the truths even when it's uncomfortable. we don't have a constituency, voting space, i'm told that the president has some type of political calculus he has to take seriously. but there are moments when you have to take a tough stance and i don't think he's consistently done that.

before he was president sean bell was shot in the streets and instead of speaking to power he said we should respect the jury's verdict. he gave what i call the philadelphia compromise where instead of really talking about the danger of white supremacy he made it seem as a white angst were the same as black angst and that's sim lot not true. now there are moments where -- with the skip gates controversy i would say he handled it properly. >> i want to move on because i want to talk about the zrivs blogger. i want to talk about the naacp. the administration many feel they threw ms. sherrod under the bus and the same with some african-american commentators who all commented in the beginning before they heard the entire clip, cheryl. so there are many who are not sure how they feel about these organizations right now. >> absolutely. the challenge for the naacp at this point is reaching the new

hip-hop generation representing the blog gers online. when they criticized -- i mean the naacp. when they criticized the tea raci they asked them to cleanse following t following the lead of black bloggers who have been calling for this for over a year. they initially were -- received a strong response from black bloggers. now the hip-hop generation has soured somewhat. the apology helped. at the same time then, you have shirley sherrod who represents the current membership of the naacp. she's 62. she's in that age. women like shirley sherrod are the ung sung heroes of the civil rights movement. they're on the bridge between the old jim crow world and the world they create. how do they keep shirley sherrod basically engaged their struggle. >> mark, i'm going to give you the last word. where do we e go from here. >> when we ran earlier a section -- a portion of this,

someone said to me, maybe this will open up and we'll start talking more about it and it will change things and i said we said that after the election of the first black president and nothing happened. now we have this moment we talk about it for a little while and nothing happened. is that what's going to happen every time, you believe? >> until we make a substantive change. until we stop allowing them to. aren't completely reactionary, you know, based on the politics of the right. this is going to happen. and until you have an obama administration that isn't, quite frankly, scared of white people, you're going to continue to see this thing happen. >> and you said the last thing, that the obama administration is scared of white people. i've heard that a lot. i've heard it on radio, i've written about it. many times perception is reality, mark. we'll see what happens with that. thank you both. thank you cheryl, thank yu mark. have a great weekend. amazing and terrifying video from canada.

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well, a check of the top stories right now. the search is on right now for two american soldiers reportedly kidnapped in afghanistan. nato said they left their compound in kabul yesterday and never came back. an afghan intelligence source says militants abducted them in logar. also more were killed in the southern part of the country. the u.s. and south korea have kicked off their military drills despite a threat of nuclear retaliation. so far there's no report of troop movement in the north. south accuses north of sinking one of its ships in march killing sailors. they say these drills are a response to that incident. police in germany are now saying at least 18 people died today during a stampede in a tunnel at a technomusic festival in duzburg. it's possible hundreds of others were hurt during love parade

2010. police say they were trying to block others from entering the see vent when the panic started. a canadian fighter pilot is recovering after he escaped a fiery crash. he was practices when his cf-18 hornet suddenly went down. you can see him eject and parachute to the ground. we'll take a look at how our cnn hero of the week is saving babies by providing big sisters for pregnant young women. this is our pool. ♪ our fireworks. ♪ and our slip and slide. you have your idea of summer fun, and we have ours. now during the summer event

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more than twice as likely to die before their first birthday than caucasian babies. this week's cnn hero works with african-americans to make sure they get proper prenatal care. take a look. >> african-american babies die two to four times the rate of other babies. as a public health administrator i use the words infant mortality every day, but until i held a dead baby in my arms i never realized that that meant counting dead babies.

i remind women they're really sisters and can help each other have healthier babies. what we're saying is you don't have to have this by yourself. >> she takes regular women in the community like me to work closely with the little sisters throughout their pregnancy and after they have the baby. >> i wanted a big sister that has accomplished a lot in life already to teach me things i don't know. >> my job is to just really help you, whether it's figuring out how are you going to pay your rent, have food in your house, doing prenatal appointments. i eat all in order to make sure you're not stressed in order for you to have a healthy baby. >> healthy babies are born into healthy communities. >> that's pretty special, huh? we grow on our on. we've been doing this long enough now that you can hear a child say i was born into the birthing project.

that means more to me than anything that i may have given up because in return i have received a whole community. >> there are only a few days left to nominate someone to be a cnn hero of the year. make a nomination at c cnnheroes.com. you have until august 1st. he's a man who will oversee the distribution of bp's $20 billion claims fund. that means kenneth feinberg is one of the most sought-after people on the gulf coast. prescription-strength medicine plus a protective ingredient so it's effectively absorbed. for 24-hour relief, try dual-ingredient zegerid otc. ♪ [ male announcer ] like summer, it's here, but not forever. the lexus golden opportunity sales event. see your lexus dealer.

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the people who live along the gulf coast are a resilient bunch. through the years they've seen hard times and hurricanes come and go but many say they've never dealt with anything like the bp disaster. so when the government's point man comes to town they will let him know. they want answered and they only want the help they deserve. >> i've about been in business since 1967. we process shrimp. we have shrimp boats. we've had camille in '69, frederick in '89.

when a hurricane comes in, we've dealt with our losses. hard, miserable, but this, we just don't know what to do. >> i'm here primarily to listen to what you want to tell me about this oil spill. >> i thought bp would pay for lost income and profits for anybody affected by this oil spill. we've been affected. >> i ain't worked since april. >> unless we get some type of help, we could close the doors permanently. >> i don't think we should be on the back burner. >> we've already closed one business, okay? >> there are some very tough questions here, i must say, even for me they're tough. >> the claim center in mobile is just down the street from the store so i stop there very frequently, but nobody knows anything. >> when you get a man from detroit in that claim office and all he know about is building ry