tv Starting Point CNN May 25, 2012 7:00am-9:00am EDT
7:00 am
>> hernandez described to the detectives how he lured young etan from the school bus stop at west broadway and prince street, with the promise of a soda. he then led him into the basement of the bodega, choked him there, and disposed of the body by putting it into a plastic bag and placing it into the trash. >> we're going to be joined in just a moment by lisa cohen, "after etan" the 2009 book is considered the definitive work on this case and it's 33 years to the day, this is a day, may 25th, that is the national missing children's day, it was named this day by president ronald reagan, the first day really that a national movement of awareness about missing children began, and it's 33 years ago to the day that this little boy disappeared, presumed killed, and now finally an arrest in this case, a case that
7:01 am
honestly, obsessed the nation and when you think about it, this is a little boy, 6 years old, who walked to school, for the first time allowed to walk to the bus stop. because of this case, another case, johnny gosh in the midwest, cases like these in the late '70s and early 1980s, really frightened a nation, quite frankly, and those days of letting a little kid walk to a bus stop are over because a whole generation of parents and their children were afraid of stranger abductions. we get to alina cho for the rest of the day's top stories. >> hurricane bud the first major hurricane of the 2012 season strengthening into a major category 3, now threatening mexico's pacific coast. here is a look at the storm from space. bud with maximum sustained winds of 115 miles per hour, and could slam into some very popular tourist spots. we want to get to meteorologist rob marciano tracking the storm for us. good morning. >> good morning.
7:02 am
we'll start with bud, which was a hurricane of category 3 strength last night, has weakened just a little bit. this is the strongest hurricane in the eastern pacific this early in the season so we're off to a quick start. movements to te north-northeast, towards manzanillo and puerto vallarta. it is weakening somewhat. the original forecast yesterday was for it to weaken and not make it to the coastline. now, the forecast is for it to make landfall later on tonight as a category 1 storm. so we're going to see waves and winds with this. we already see heavy rains in the mountainous areas just off the beach, that could create some flash floods and mudslides. the other issue is this closer to home, southeast coastline this has a chance of developing into the second tropical storm of the season that hasn't begun yet. june 1st is the first day of hurricane season. probably won't get that strong but to affect the shorelines of the southeast coast over the memorial day weekend but the area needs the rainfall. might not be a bad thing.
7:03 am
either way we're off to a quick start. >> busy hurricane season or looking like it will be. a week after the stock's disastrous debut the legal fallout from facebook's ipo is being sorted out, lawyers, regulators and shareholders are looking into allegations of misuse of privileged information by morgan stanley and others in the run-up to the ipo. facebook stock closed thursday just above $33 a share, that's $5 below its debut price, one week ago today. meanwhile, u.s. stocks finished mixed on thursday, due to ongoing concerns over europe's debt crisis and the threat of greece exiting the eurozone. the dow jones industrial average closed higher as did the s&p 500 but the nasdaq closed lower down 11 points. right now stock futures in all three indexes are trading in positive territory ahead of today's market open. a senate committee voted to cut a symbolic $33 million in
7:04 am
aid to pakistan, has outraged over the pakistani doctor in prison leading to the death of osama bin laden. he was sentenced to 33 years for treeson, he ran a vaccination program for the cia and helped the u.s. verify bin laden's presence at a compound. the u.s. is calling for afridi's release saying he was acting in the interests of america and pakistan. the official who organized the $800,000 conference in las vegas fired. jeff neely was placed on administrative leave in march when news of the lavish 2010 conference went public and now he's out and officials want him to pay for a private party he hosted in his vegas hotel room. officials say the justice department could also slap him with criminal charges. had to know that was coming. christine, back to you. >> thank you. let's get back to our top story in the arrest in the etan
7:05 am
patz case. lisa cohen is now us, she literally wrote the book on this story. you followed it for some time and know this family, emmy-award winning producer, actually. look, you researched this case for decades. there doesn't seem to be a motive yet in this arrest. still a lot of questions, but this is the most conclusive we have seen in 33 years trying to solve this. >> i think my issue with it at the moment, it's astonishing and if they've got a just confession and if this is the man who did it, then bravo. i just think it's been a very short amount of time that this person has jumped onto the horizon and, i think there are a lot of questions to be answered. >> the police were skeptical but now telling us, there's a videotaped confession, and still trying to -- again, still trying to figure out motive. let's walk through, i guess, what happened here. you did write in your book that etan told his parents he planned to stop at a store to buy a
7:06 am
soda. this man was a store clerk, a stock checker really at a store right there by the bus stop. >> um-hum, right. so he says that that's the moment when he took etan and killed him. and i -- i just think that at this point, we have his confession, and that's pretty much what we have, and i don't understand exactly what the motive was. i don't understand exactly what the time frame was. >> right. >> how he could have escaped unnoticed. >> police say he was never questioned but his name had come up, when they were canvassing the neighborhood they knew everyone who worked at one of the stores. you look at the bodega where he was working it was a few blocks away from where etan lived and disappeared, it was right next to where he was supposed to go on the bus on west broadway and prince in the soho neighborhood of new york.
7:07 am
there was a search in a nearby building. the trail which has been cold for some time has recently thawed a bit. i wonder if that had anything to play into this new revelation. >> that's typically in this case and i'm sure other cases, that's typically the chain of events. something happens, there's a development and may be completely unrelated to what subsequently happens but it causes there to be a lot of publicity. people take notice. people remember things or decide that they're going to come forward with things that aren't necessarily true, and that's often how new developments occur. >> they've had false confessions in this case before, haven't there? >> i've been trying to think of actual moments. certainly there have been hundreds and hundreds of false leads and there have been really moments when they knew that the case was solved and then it wasn't. >> right. >> i certainly know there have been false confessions in other cases. >> commissioner kelly says there's no body, no physical
7:08 am
evidence to link hernandez to the disappearance. listen. >> reporter: what is it about this confession that makes you believe this is a credible story? >> well, the fact that he had told the story to others in the past, and the specificity of what he said in the confession. >> are you concerned at all that they have a confession and that's basically it, in a 33-year-old case? >> i think when you have a 33-year-old case it's hard to find other circumstantial or forensic evidence, so i'm not sure what more they are going to find. yeah, i'm concerned. i think you have to understand exactly who this person is, what their history is, what their mental history is. he's never had a lawyer before, so -- >> you're not convinced this guy did it? >> no, i'm not but that's not necessarily that he didn't do it. it's because this just happened. i never heard his name before today so you know. >> did they search the garbage during this initial, when he
7:09 am
disappeared? they had bloodhounds canvassing the evening his mother said she didn't come home from school. >> and for days afterwards. >> did they not search the garbage? >> i think they did. one of the things i think he said, he went back to find this bag or this box that the body was in and had disappeared. i guess that's the way you would get around the fact that they were searching everything, basements, elevator shafts, rooftops, yes. >> his family lives in the same neighborhood, he has siblings or other children. how do they handle stuff like this? i mean this is the biggest development there's been. this is a family that has lived 33 years since this horrible day for them. >> i think one of the things that has drawn me to this case over the years is how incredible this family is, exactly. i mean they have lived through all of this, and they have done it with grace and they have lived the rest of their lives. they have focused on their other
7:10 am
children. i don't think they ever forget this. i think these kinds of days are particularly trying and difficult for lots of reasons, every year is a difficult, this is a difficult day for them, but they, they've got a life and they have moved on to a certain extent. you never forget this, you never quite get over it. >> thank you so much, lisa cohen. we'll talk to you again as developments unfold and as the case moves forward. thank you. ahead on "starting point," the trainer for the horse that won the first two legs of the triple crown in major trouble. will it stop "i'll have another's" run at history? one of the oldest daily newspapers now going to cut back, going part-time after 175 years. this is a sign of things to come across the entire country in the newspaper business? we'll talk about that with this morning's all-star cast headed in. hi guys. here is a track from ryan's playlist, white stripes. good morning.
7:14 am
♪ will cain's playlist, tom petty. is it a sign of things to come? "the tiles-picayune," the new orleans paper that won a pair of pulitzer prizes for its coverage of hurricane katrina. it's only going to print three days a week. it will merge into its internationinternet. christine hani joins us now and full disclosure, i got into wires and then television because i was afraid watching my friends lose their jobs in newspapers where i started because the newspaper trend for 20 years has been look this is going to be a hard way to make business in a digital world and that's proven to be true. >> absolutely. when something similar happened
7:15 am
to the ann arbor paper, went to a few days a week, they hired back a fraction of the staff so we're talking about massive cuts in the newspaper stray for jobs. it is huge. >> you look at the brands of local newspapers, "the washington post," "the new york times" and "the wall street journal" and the big national local papers but "the times picayune" have a brand that is really unmatched. how come they can't do a better job figuring out how to make money for their brand for the local news that people are so hungry for? >> they're competing with so many other types of media, dealing with online and television and their websites so you have a local market and it's expensive to produce news as you know. so in a national level it almost works more simply than at a local level where you have to get people in bureaus. i think one of the papers i spoke with had four bureaus, six to eight reporters staffed, fanning through the suburbs. it's difficult and costly work. >> it used to be there was a
7:16 am
morning paper and afternoon paper in a lot of the towns and then they merged and the morning paper and afternoon paper were the same company and then it was like in my town "the argus and "the dispatch" and then it was the "argus dispatch." how will we see them survive? >> the actual online advertise something not at the place of newspapers print advertising, so you're still better off as they say milking the cow of print advertising over online advertising. that seems to be where the market is heading. >> everyone wants to talk about the death of newspapers, they're going away. >> it's like the death mill of the american dream, they've been talking about that all the time. >> warren buffett bought 120 newspapers last week. in the future we're not going to
7:17 am
cut down dead trees and have 13-year-old boys print this on our doorsteps but people are still going to take their local newspapers. >> for those of us who worked in communications and need to bring reporters out to events, there's also the reality that as newspapers cut stuff it's harder to have local events covered, to have community events covered and i believe there's that consequence as well. >> yes, you're not going to have the resources to cover every local event, every school board meeting. that's been happening for years and years but yes. >> "the huffington post" thought local news is something people are hungry for online, patch.com online, super, super local but people still want the brand of their local newspaper. >> it's trusted. >> wherever you happen to live, you believe that brand. >> yes. >> how do they make money from that? will says they are. >> first of all i should say advanced publications which own
7:18 am
this is newspaper also owns my magazine "the new yorker" just to get that out on the table. the new houses tried this with other regional newspapers. has it worked? in ann arbor and other places where they've cut down the number of issues they are publishing each week and moved online? what has the story been there? >> it's unclear with newhouse, it's a privately held company but it stems the red ink, stems the losses that were happening when you had staff of hundreds and hundreds of people in newsrooms and didn't have the ad revenue coming in. >> what about the quality of the journalism and quality of the product? >> as we know, everyone is more stretched today than they were five years ago, ten years ago and as you say you don't have people covering every board meeting. you just don't have the breadth of reporting. >> by some prediction about a quarter of daily newspaper also have a pay wall by the end of the year and there was some excitement earlier this month when your own "new york times"
7:19 am
which has a pay wall saw a circulation jump over the previous year so people were buying subscriptions and some were buying them because of the pay wall. can that work on a local level? >> in new orleans you have a market with a low penetration of people with internet access, 36% of homes in new orleans area have internet so how many are going to go to, go online and go through a pay wall. it's not clear if that's going to work in that market. other markets where everyone's wired n you might have a different situation. >> christine haughney, thank you. have a nice weekend. the muslim brotherhood is in the lead in historic presidential elections. should the u.s. be afraid of that? new signs donald trump may be jumping back into the race for the white house. did we just read that? donald trump getting back in? we'll explain on the other side. you're watching "starting point."
7:20 am
7:21 am
i'm one of six children that my mother raised by herself, and so college was a dream when i was a kid. i didn't know how i was gonna to do it, but i knew i was gonna get that opportunity one day, and that's what happened with university of phoenix. nothing can stop me now. i feel like the sky's the limit with what i can do and what i can accomplish. my name is naphtali bryant and i am a phoenix. visit phoenix.edu to find the program that's right for you. enroll now.
7:23 am
♪ that's nice, i like it. salt "n pepa "none of your business." who is going to start with the newspapers. >> donald trump, he's banking on it. this is serious because trump genuinely helped romney in the primaries, the endorsement was taken seriously, romney embraced him and he's turning into a bit of a liability. trump says "probably the best choice of all for vp for romney would be donald trump." and there's talk he wants a speaking role at the convention. he has mused about if he doesn't get the vp nod, maybe being a
7:24 am
treasury secretary or secretary of state. >> secretary of state donald trump. >> romney has a trump problem. >> didn't he learn from oprah this is not necessarily good for ratings to become more politically active? >> that's true, this is hurting his brand because partisans on the left don't want to watch the show. >> one beneficiary out of the process is trump, brand and exposure and publicity, and i love to imagine him from ahmadinejad or somebody like that. >> imagine what romney really thinks about doon alleged trump? i'm super serious. >> i'm going to be lighter than you, lots of brides wearing uggs at their wedding, this caused outrage among my facebook friends. there's a picture here you can see, i guess it makes sense if you have a cold wedding that you'd put on the furry, fuzzy
7:25 am
boots but i think it's a fad we hope to see go away. ryan wanted to deliver the story but i took it out from under him. this is good news for free speech lovers all across america, that it is apparent lay cording to a judge in florida protected first amendment speech to go down the highway flashing your headlights at oncoming traffic to warn them, hey, speed trap, cops ahead. >> someone had to go to court for that. >> that's right, because apparently a sheriff's department in florida said you're interfering with speed traps, we're going to ticket you for the violation. he's like hey i got first amendment speech. this was a devoted activist, he would see speed traps, get out of his office couch, get in his car, get a cup of coffee and flash people as they came as kind of entertainment but apparently that's protected by the first amendment. >> who knew. stick with us. the dragon is creeping close to the international space station.
7:26 am
should kate moss be worried about how ban ki-moon caught the eye of "vogue" staffers? [ thunk ] sweet! [ male announcer ] the solid thunk of the door on the jetta. thanks, mister! [ meow ] [ male announcer ] another example of volkswagen quality. that's the power of german engineering. right now lease the 2012 jetta for $159 a month.
7:27 am
7:28 am
...is to create it. [ female announcer ] now create a new future for your skin. only aveeno positively radiant has total soy, for a whole new level of radiance. it's clinically proven to visibly reduce blotchiness, brown spots, and other past damage, while broad spectrum spf 30 helps prevent future damage. healthier, more radiant skin. it's in your future now. [ female announcer ] positively radiant. and for brighter skin, try skin brightening daily scrub. only from aveeno.
7:29 am
history being made in the heavens, the dragon space capsule about to become the first private spacecraft to link up with the international space station, the connection marking a new era in commercial space travel. cnn's john zarrella is live in miami marking the era with us. how is everything progressing up there so far, john? >> christine, it's painfully slow how this is going. you know, they've fallen a little bit behind the time line but there's a good reason for
7:30 am
that, as you mentioned this is the first time that a commercial company has ever attempted to actually hook up with the international space station so nasa is going through all the steps, they're doing lots of demonstrations, and lots of tests. at one point they brought dragon in closer to the station, then backed it away to test dragon's braking system. they are, again, moving it in closer, and now so they're running behind the time line, we thought it would be right around 8:00 a.m. eastern time that they would go ahead and have to capture where they'll use the space station's robotic arm and reach out and grab dragon but now it looks like that's going to be sliding in, you know, beyond 8:00, between 8:00 and perhaps 9:00 a.m. eastern time, when that will take place but again, it is critical that they run through all of these steps very carefully and very slowly, because again, it is the first time, and remember, christine, both of these vehicles are
7:31 am
traveling at 17,500 miles an hour. people don't realize that, when you look at these images, and then for the astronauts to reach out with the robotic arm flying at that same speed it's not easy. >> painfully slow. we'll keep watching and have a lot of fun with it. john zarrella thanks. >> sure. let's go to alina cho for the rest of the day's headlines. good morning. >> good morning to you. the man who police say confessed to killing etan patz on this day 33 years ago is scheduled to make his first court appearance later today and we are getting a first look at the suspect. look at that picture there. "inside edition" is identifying this man as pedro hear nan dez. patz went missing a block from his home on may 25th, 1979. police say hernandez admitted to luring the 6-year-old boy to the
7:32 am
basement of a store by promising him a soda, before strangling him and disposing his body in the trash. new trouble for the trainer of the horse that won the first two legs of the triple crown, we're talking about california state racing board, and they have suspended trainer doug o'neill for 45 days for high levels of carbon dioxide in a horse's blood. now o'neil was charged -- cleared of charges he gave horses something called a milkshake, that's an illegal performance-enhancing substance. this wouldn't have any effect on "i'll have another's" run at history. the horse was never implicated in anything and o'neil's suspension doesn't begin until july 1st, so he will be at the belmont stakes june 9th. an american man who tried to give al qaeda restricted army documents sentenced to 20 years in prison and ordered to pay a $10,000 fine. they say he wanted to join al qaeda and provide the organization with money and two
7:33 am
restricted access army manuals related to u.s. drones and gps equipment. he was arrested after using a fake i.d. to sneak into a houston port and board a ship that was headed to the middle east. "vogue's" latest coverboy will surprise you, u.n. secretary-general ban ki-moon titled requests re-branding africa" promoting positive images of the continent. i spoke to him just yesterday about his cover spot and he told me, "i don't have much passion for fashion, but i do have a passion for africa." his goal is to save 16 million lives on the african continent by 2015. it was quite an intense photo shoot, christine as these things go but he said he was happy with the photos. >> as all international cover
7:34 am
men and women say. >> i'll have the story in the 10:00 hour. >> a passion for fashion you have, alina. tension in egypt is still high and the country's consulate in new york an egyptian reporter and diplomat got into a physical altercation when ex--pats went to vote. he was targeted by the consul, the diplomat denies saying they wanted the reporter to stop filming so they could count votes. if no candidate gets 50% of the vote in the first round a runoff happens between the top two. joining us is author of the new book "obama and the middle east: the end of america's moment." i should say you were in the front seat with us at cnn all last year while we covered the arab spring and the implications for what was happening there and a year on, i'm wondering what
7:35 am
you think are the prospects for a democracy that looks anything like an american style. will we see anything that we recognize in democracy in the middle east? >> you're going to see a pluralistic society as opposed to liberal based democracies. i think muslims, egyptians, tunisians have to find their own models. it will not look like democracy in america but the real sit, i think these societies are moving on. the transition moving on, slower than many of us had hoped. there's a great deal. dust. it will probably take a decade or so. >> the muslim brotherhood says they have the lead. hosni mubarak played on the rule
7:36 am
that they'd power extremists. omar salim echoed egypt was not ready for democracy because democracy would unleash the forces of religious fundamentalism and bring the muslim brotherhood to power implying it is extremists of the al qaeda variety. what does egypt look like with the muslim brotherhood having a leadership role? >> even though the islamists did not play a major role in the uprisings we've seen in the last 16 months they are taking ownership of the results in egypt, and tunisia and morocco, libya and most likely jordan are the places. why? mubarak and his company played on the fears of the islamists. if you don't invest in us you'll end up with the islamists. two points. the arab authoritarian leaders played a key role in the progressive liberal forces.
7:37 am
they suppressed the opposition so that's why the arab world was polarized between would autocrates and islamists. the muslim brotherhood in egypt and the islamists in tunisia and morocco are what i call islamic centrists. they believe in the political game, they believe in citizenship as the foundation of society. they have come a long way. the united states has very little to fear from these islamists but again another major point before i said that the world that will emerge in that part of the world will not be the same that the united states had dealt with in the last 60 years. it will be assertive. it will be independent. it will be awe thennive and that's why in my book i say the end of america's moment. it's the beginning of the end of america's hegemony using the mubaraks for cronies. >> is it the risk not like the
7:38 am
countries like egypt and tunisia will follow an al qaeda model but embracing an islamist movement they follow an iranian mottle, they embrace democracy but once and then you have some theocratic regime that takes over from there? >> thank you for the question. this is the fear, iran is a failed model. the islamic, arab as are islamists do not look for iran as a model but turkey as inspiration. turkey has been able to marry democracy with authenticity. >> military imposed secularism. >> look at the way it's evolved. this tells you a great deal how far islamists have emerged. let me qualify what i said. egyptians, 50% of arabs are terrified. look at the results of the election, the partial elections. >> right.
7:39 am
>> egypt is deeply divided between an islamist constituency and a middle way constituency that says we cannot trust you. we cannot trust you as islamists because once you're in power you force your own regressive interpretations on us. >> i want to bring it back, in the book called "obama and the middle east: the end of america's moment." you say the president has failed to pursue a transformational policy. has he disappointed new his reaction to the arab spring? >> this question is not just about barack obama. this is an indictment of american foreign policy in the last six years. >> an indictment of american foreign policy. >> you cannot talk about barack obama without talking about the bitter inheritance. he inherited multiple wars on multiple fronts, iraq, afghanistan, other places, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of american troops battling in muslim lands, economic decline. image of the united states reached a low point when w.
7:40 am
george bush left so what barack obama has been trying to do is overcome what i call the bitter inheritance which he received when he came to the office. unfortunately, there are some major shortcomings and there are some major successes and the book really, you see, i was on a station, i'm not going to use the station tried to use my book to turn it against barack obama, far from it. >> a station tried to do that? >> i can't imagine what station that would be. >> saying it ended america's moment. in fact he has gone out of his way to basically try to repair some of the damage that has taken place and the reality is that part of the world has moved on and barack obama does not represent change with the dominant u.s. approach. left and the right of barack obama, barack obama is deeply anchored in the dominant narrative. he believes in what most presidents in the united states believed, realism as opposed to
7:41 am
liberalism. >> thank you so much, the book is called "obama and the middle east" thank you for the help you gave us throughout the whole arab spring and now a year later. thank you, sir. ahead on "starting point" the first in-depth interview on u.s. soil, our own anderson cooper snares what chinese human rights activist shares what he has to say, chen guangcheng on his first five days in the united states. rookie katherine legge stops by with her all female racing team and what does she think about danica patrick? you're watching "starting point."
7:45 am
that's from my playlist, it's a fun song especially for a friday before the weekend. known as the greatsest spktical spectacle in racing. this sunday, 33 drivers will start their engines at the 96th running of the indianapolis 500, 200 laps of pure adrenalin and no brakes for a distance of 500 miles. katherine legge joins me from eindianapolis live, the ninth woman to qualify for the indianapolis 500 and surrounded by her whole team, as you can see they're all women. congratulations, withal come and how do you feel? >> thank you very much. i feel very good actually. i got a good night's sleep last night for the first time in about two weeks so i feel good really today. >> do you feel ready for the race? do you feel ready for it?
7:46 am
>> yes and no. i think ready as i'll ever be. we didn't get as much testing as we would have liked but i'm ready. i've asked enough questions of my whole team and everybody around so i'm looking forward to getting it started. >> there was a scramble to qualify. you weren't quite sure you'd make it to the starting line, right? >> right, we didn't have engines until two days before and i had to pass rookie orientation practice, we're grateful we have a chevrolet in the back of my true car machine, makes all the difference. >> an engine makes all the difference in the world. you're one of seven rookies in the race. how does it feel to be a rookie. what does it mean in terms of getting your head around all those laps? >> it's definitely more of a challenge, because more of the ceremony and everything else that's going on, you don't know where you're supposed to be, when you're supposed to be there, don't know how the race is going to go so you have to rely heavily on other people's
7:47 am
knowledge and ask a ton of questions but next year when i come back i won't be a rookie anymore. >> you only have to be a rookie once. >> i hope things move as smoothly as possible. >> take me through what you're thinking at these speeds. this is why we all watch because it is so incredibly fast and thrilling, and we have video from the 2006 grand prix where a broken rear wing causes your car to flip over and into a wall, catching fire, breaking into countless pieces. you walked away unscathed, thankfully, but when -- what are you thinking at these kinds of speeds? >> well you're not thinking about the accident, that's for sure and not thinking, ahh! the whole way around either. you're very focused, you're thinking maybe a lap or two ahead, got your team in your ear, your spotters in your ear and just strategizing and think being the car and how you're going to make it back there and how you're going to pass the next person and how it's going to go next. >> on your helmet you'll have a
7:48 am
girl scout logo, you're sort of racing as a s.t.e.m. ambassador, science, technology, engineering and math, getting girls more excited about the engineering and technology to build a car, race a car, to anchor a team. tell me about that. >> it's really something that's close to my heart. i think that they are the careers that you'll need to be in, in the future and i just want the girls to follow their dreams. anything that they want to know, they have to know that it's possible now. i grew up, i was very fortunate, my parents said you can be anything that you put your mind to. i wanted to be a race car driver and i think it's important they don't necessarily have to go into racing or anything like that but they have to follow whatever they want to be and they have to pursue that with 110% knowledge that they can get there if they really, really want to. >> katherine, what is it like being in a sport that has been historically dominated by men and do you hope that showing the world that women can be wonderful drivers, wonderful racers, will help women with
7:49 am
this misperception that we're all bad drivers? >> absolutely. i think the statistics, try saying that this time in the morning, prove that we are actually not bad drivers but i think men started that rumor a long time ago. actually what truecar has done is sponsored all six of us. it is the only sport where women can compete equally and can compete equally and absolutely no reason we can't be winning races. i hope we can change that opinion. we need more girls at grassroots efforts starting racing and it's not a novelty anymore and it is changing. >> it's danica patrick and all of those women behind you. >> nice to see you. good luck to you. fast, very fast driver. i think women pay lower insurance rates.
7:50 am
doesn't it prove that women are better drivers. >> did you break news women are not bad drivers? >> just because she is doesn't mean that you are a good driver. >> i'm a terrible driver. >> a spy story unfolding one tweet at a time. how you can unravel the mystery and coming up next hour, online porngraphic video games, and cell phones constantly buzzing. is today's technology need for constant stimulation ruining an entire generation of men. >> one segment we do about how good driver women are and now we'll talk about how men are slaves to porn and video games. >> will is thin skinned this morning. don't go away. what's number two we wanna do? bring it up to 90 decatherms. how bout ya, joe? let's go ahead and bring it online. attention on site, attention on site. now starting unit nine. some of the world's cleanest gas turbines
7:52 am
a great clean doesn't have to take longer. i'm done... i'm going to read one of these. i'm going to read one of these! [ female announcer ] unlike sprays and dust rags, swiffer 360 dusters extender gets into hard to reach places so you can get unbelievable dust pick up in less time. i love that book! can you believe the twin did it? ♪ [ female announcer ] swiffer. great clean in less time. or your money back. ♪
7:54 am
would you read your favorite author's latest story one tweet at a time. pulitzer prize winning author jenner eagan is doing just that. she started last night with tweets like necessary ingredients for a successful projection, giggles, bare legs, shyness. the nufull story in the new yorker. >> this is really cool. she's an amazing author. she won a pulitzer prize for a visit from the goon squad, her novel. this takes one of the characters from that novel and she's a futuristic female spy in the 2030s and each tweet is a sort of mental note and so the entire stream is just her sort of stream of consciousness as she goes on this mission to infiltrate terrorists. i read the whole thing. i'm reading it as everyone else is as we post it. each night at 8:00 for an hour
7:55 am
the new yorker is tweeting 140 character tweet at a time until this entire thing runs its course over ten days and it's interesting. >> is it building followers make you tell how many people are reading it? >> jennifer isn't a big tweeter. she submitted the story and first criteria was it a good story and they loved it and decided to tweet it out. >> i'm not going to read a book on twitter. that's a terrible idea. but you won me over. you won me over with this detail. i think it's cool. ten straight nights from 8:00 to 9:00 a tweet per minute. you're serializing the concept of a novel. it's pretty cool. people tune in each night for one hour like you would a show. >> isn't this what we did a long time ago? isn't this what newspapers did and you bought your local newspaper from the guy or the
7:56 am
kid on the corner because you wanted the next installment. >> a lot of great literature that we read is serialized. they would wait to get the next installment of dickens work and that's how novels were done and jennifer was influenced by that serialization. >> it works because she was the one who came up with the concept. i think if an editor forced on her let's take this story and apply it to twitter, it would not have worked. it works because it was written for the medium. >> thank you for bringing that. a chinese human rights activist gives his first interview to cnn since his dramatic escape. anderson cooper tells us what he had to say and president obama narrowly leads presumed challenger mitt romney but romney is closing the gap. what will the race come down to? we'll ask dnc chair deborah wasserman schultz. . the only thing i'll let you know is that it is an, affordable product.
7:57 am
oh, i like that. let's move on to product y, which is a far more expensive product. whoaaa. i don't care for that at all. yuck. you picked x and it was geico car insurance and y was the competitor. is that something you would pay for year after year? i, i like soda a lot but for a change of pace... who have used androgel 1%, there's big news. presenting androgel 1.62%.
7:58 am
both are used to treat men with low testosterone. androgel 1.62% is from the makers of the number one prescribed testosterone replacement therapy. it raises your testosterone levels, and... is concentrated, so you could use less gel. and with androgel 1.62%, you can save on your monthly prescription. [ male announcer ] dosing and application sites between these products differ. women and children should avoid contact with application sites. discontinue androgel and call your doctor if you see unexpected signs of early puberty in a child, or, signs in a woman which may include changes in body hair or a large increase in acne, possibly due to accidental exposure. men with breast cancer or who have or might have prostate cancer, and women who are, or may become pregnant or are breast feeding should not use androgel. serious side effects include worsening of an enlarged prostate, possible increased risk of prostate cancer, lower sperm count, swelling of ankles, feet, or body, enlarged or painful breasts, problems breathing during sleep, and blood clots in the legs. tell your doctor about your medical conditions
7:59 am
and medications, especially insulin, corticosteroids, or medicines to decrease blood clotting. talk to your doctor today about androgel 1.62% so you can use less gel. log on now to androgeloffer.com and you could pay as little as ten dollars a month for androgel 1.62%. what are you waiting for? this is big news.
8:00 am
i'm christine romans. a detailed confession in the case of the first boy to appear on a milk carton. a suspect heading to court today 33 years to the day etan patz vanished. hurricane threat. bud gets bigger. it's now a major storm threatening some hot tourists spots. it's hurricane season again. have video games and internet porn rewired men? an author says a whole generation may be addicted to arousal. it's friday, may 25th. "starting point" begins right now. >> i'm not hip. i just like the beasty boys. it's friday. ryan lizza is here and also co-host of power play and will cain. we all like the beastie boys.
8:01 am
we're agreed. bipartisan choice. there's big, big developments in the story that's really been a story that's been followed for a generation. there's no physical evidence here but new york city police believe they cracked the case of who killed etan patz 33 years ago today. this is him according to inside edition. pedro hernandez. he will be in court later today. he was arrested after confessing to killing 6-year-old etan patz while the little boy was on his way to school. on may 25th, 1979, 33 years ago new york's police commissioner says they have a detailed signed confession. >> hernandez described to the detectives how he lured young etan from the school bus stop at west broadway and prince street with the promise of a soda. he then led him into the basement, choked him there and disposed of the body by putting it into a plastic bag and
8:02 am
placing it into the trash. >> susan candiotti is live at the courthouse in lower manhattan. without physical evidence or a motive at this point, why do police believe this is their man after all these years? >> reporter: that's a key question, christine. police are saying they believe him based on the details he provided to them in his confession, which they said took 3 1/2 hours, an alleged videotape confession and based on the fact he told others about this including members of his family and other people as well that he had "done a very bad thing" and killed a boy in new york city mentioning this as far back as 1981 according to police. the fact of the matter is, we don't know everything that was in that alleged confession. we do know that authorities acknowledge that they are still deeply working this investigation and trying to find
8:03 am
physical evidence if there is any and trying to also discover a motive because we have no information at this time that this man, the suspect in this case, hernandez, had any prior contact with etan patz. we know that he worked as a stock boy in that convenience store way back when and then he left but we don't know why and then moved to new jersey. worked in the construction business. was living on disability. was married. had a teenage daughter about to start college and people in his neighborhood say they are confounded to learn he may have done something like this. we do expect him to be formally charged at some point and he might appear in court as early as today. back to you. >> susan candiotti in lower manhattan. thank you. let's get to alina cho for the rest of the day's top stories. >> good morning to you. good morning, everybody. hurricane bud, the first major hurricane of the 2012 hurricane
8:04 am
season. the storm right now is strengthening into a major category 3 and is now threatening mexico's pacific coast. there's a look at it there from space. bud has maximum sustained winds of 115 miles per hour. it could slam some very popular tourist spots. meteorologist rob marciano tracking the storm for us. rob, good morning. what is it going to make landfall and how bad could it get? >> it looks like tonight. at one point yesterday we thought it wasn't going to make landfall at all and weaken but it strengthened to category 3 storm. it's the first major hurricane of the eastern pacific season but earliest we have seen a storm this strong form. there it is about 120 miles southwest of the coastline moving 8 miles an hour. 110-mile-an-hour winds. it's weakened somewhat but not dramatically. the forecast is for it to be category 1 storm at landfall sometime tonight and then begin to dissipate and kind of weaken a bit. it will rain itself out for sure
8:05 am
along the coastline here especially in the mountains and that's the danger zone as far as flash flooding and mud slides. on the other coast, here's the atlantic basin. the carolinas, florida, this storm or disturbance could become our next tropical storm as well and affect everyone from florida coastline through the carolinas over the weekend. shouldn't become that strong as far as winds go. could be a good thing relieving drought. people in north florida and southeast georgia hoping the moisture gets there. this is the second tropical storm of the season, which hasn't even started yet. off to a fast start for sure. >> a busy one. thank you very much, rob. stay with us. listen to this story. a facebook friend request helped overturn a rape conviction of a former high school football star. here's what happened. brian banks was 16 when he was convicted of raping high school classmate back in 2002. he spent five years in prison. his promising football career
8:06 am
gone. banks' accuser was awarded $1.5 million from the school. last year gibson sent banks a facebook friend request. he responded by asking her to meet with him. their meeting was secretly recorded and gibson admitted that she lied about the rape. prosecutors say she is not likely to face charges. the general services administration official who helped organize that $800,000 conference in las vegas now fired. gsa commissioner jeff neely was placed on administrative leave back in march when news of the lavish 2010 conference went public. now he's out. officials want him to pay for a private party he hosted in his vegas hotel room. the justice department could also slap him with criminal charges. > arlington national cemetery getting dressed for memorial day. american flags placed at the graves of more than 260,000 service members. it's a tradition known as flags
8:07 am
in that the army has maintained for more than 60 years. a great tradition it is. it makes you realize that memorial day is more than a day off from work and backyard barbecues. >> no question about that. thank you so much. president obama holding a narrow edge over presumptive republican presidential nominee mitt romney in three key battleground states. a new survey shows ohio voters choosing president over romney 48-42. in virginia, a smaller advantage for obama, 48-44. identical numbers in florida within the margin of error. 60 electoral votes are at stake in those three states. joining me is deborah wasserman schultz of florida. the chair of the democratic national committee. good morning to you. >> good morning, christine. great to be with you. >> i want to start with this attack on romney and time at bain capital. many see this as an attempt to disqualify romney in those battleground states so lunch bucket democrats have someone to
8:08 am
blame for their factory closing. the white house said this is their big strategy. will it play in those battleground states and if it doesn't, what's plan b? >> it is not strategy. what it is is mitt romney made his record at bain capital his experience in the private sector which is almost exclusively at bain capital and premise to voters they should elect him president. it's fair game as a result to have a close examination of how he executed practices at bain and if you look at the record, if you look at the record in my home state and in indiana and across the country, there are thousands of workers who he laid off. companies that they deliberately forced into bankruptcy. and mitt romney and his partners made hundreds of millions of
8:09 am
dollars. >> i'll be honest with you. there will be ads that will show one company saying this is an ailing paper company that went under and another bain ad will say look at this one. anderson cooper spoke to the obama spokesperson a few days ago and asked him about bain and strategy. i want you to listen to this. >> so why is what happened at bain so -- is it so egregious compared to other private equity firms? >> you know where the president stands when it comes to the financial sector. the fact is he passed wall street reform. >> i don't understand why it's okay for the president's private equity supporters to bankrupt companies and put people out of work but it's not okay for mitt romney's equity firm to do that. >> the president has support from business leaders across industries who agree with his vision. >> are business leaders -- i mean, why is it -- let me say this clearly.
8:10 am
why is it not hypocrisy for the president to take campaign donations from private equity when he's attacking private equity making that an essential part of his campaign. >> it's not comparing apples and oranges, it's comparing apples and coconuts. >> explain to me the coconuts. >> sure. accepting a contribution from a particular person involved in venture capital and criticizing mitt romney who has made his record as a venture capitalist at bain the essential focus of his credibility and qualification for being president are completely different things. so mitt romney in a way that he ran bain capital, the companies that he deliberately drove into bankruptcy, the creditors that he left with less than pennies on the dollar in return and the thousands and thousands of people who he left on the unemployment lines while making hundreds of millions of dollars in profits for himself and his
8:11 am
partners is an appropriate examination for a man who is saying that this is the reason we should elect him president. who contributes to barack obama has little to do with that because those contributors are not running for president and saying that they should be elected based on their record. >> this is will cain. let's compare apples to apples. it seems to me the criticism you're offering is that mitt romney went into businesses and laid people off. but wouldn't the apples to apples comparison be that's exactly what barack obama did when he touts the auto industry as a feather in his cap, didn't the federal government and barack obama go in and layoff thousands of autoworkers to save that industry? >> i'm so glad you used that example. that's another key difference between the way that mitt romney would run this country and the way barack obama has been. mitt romney said we should have let detroit go bankrupt. >> you're transitioning into -- with all due respect, you transitioned into that one. didn't they lay off workers?
8:12 am
>> you asked me a question. i'm going to answer the question. i may not answer it the way you want me to but i'll answer that. >> i doubt that. >> surprise, surprise. barack obama made sure that we have an american automobile industry and saved 1.4 million jobs in the pipeline all of the way up from suppliers to direct providers and that's why you see in that polling today that -- >> that's my point. >> president obama is ahead in ohio. >> that's my point. he saved that industry. did he not save that industry by laying off workers at the auto companies and didn't mitt romney -- >> no. >> produce net job growth through all of the companies that bain owned when sometimes he had to lay off workers at some companies. >> barack obama was not, is not and never has been the ceo of any of those automobile companies. mitt romney was the ceo of bain
8:13 am
capital and had direct control over decisions at those companies that bain took over. he was directly involved in whether to invest or whether to drive those companies into bankruptcy. he controlled. he was the puppeteer and people lost their jobs because of his decisions and creditors never got paid because of his decisions and he and his partners made hundreds of millions of dollars at the expense of those individuals and ed creditors. i think voters should have a right to examine that record. >> i want to ask you a question about the president's record on an issue that i think is going to be more and more in focus in this campaign and that is immigration. in 2009, 2010, 2011, the obama administration came out and bragged about the fact that under obama there was a record number of deportation, illegal immigrants being sent out of the country. is that something that this
8:14 am
president is going to run on in this campaign as immigration becomes a more central issue? >> this is yet another dramatic contrast between the two choices that american voters have. we have a choice of mitt romney who has the most extreme policy on immigration of any presidential candidate in history and barack obama who is strongly supportive and has pushed for comprehensive immigration reform against the candidate who totally opposes it. barack obama who while making sure that border security is a priority so that we don't continually have an influx of undocumented immigrants, making sure that we prioritize that we are deporting people who have committed significant crimes and put lower on the priority families. >> there's a lot of anger from hispanic leaders on the administration's deportation policy. i'm just wondering if that's
8:15 am
something that democrats are proud of. >> well, what we're proud of is that president obama and the majority of democratic office holders particularly in congress are strongly supportive of comprehensive immigration reform of passing the dream act, of making sure that we can keep people in this country who are doing nothing more than trying to make sure that they can make a better life for their families while mitt romney's solution is to make sure that we just deport them all. he expects that 12 million undocumented immigrants are just going to deport themselves. that's unrealistic. unacceptable. >> i didn't hear him say 12 million people should be deported. he said 12 million people should be deported? the government should deport people or he has said -- >> christine, what he has said is that his policy would be that we should just create an environment in which the 12 million undocumented immigrants that are here would just self-deport. >> if you deny a job, you deny the magnet for illegal
8:16 am
immigration. >> it shows how out of touch he is with needs of this economy because i can tell you in florida that although undocumented immigrants are here, they are here making sure that while they are taking care of their families and doing nothing more than being law abiding people who are here -- >> there's a difference between mass deportation and denying jobs, the magnet for illegal immigration. >> mitt romney has repeatedly said -- he embraced -- it's more than that. mitt romney's policy is to embrace fully the arizona style immigration law that would actually let police round up people who are doing nothing more than driving down the street and asking them for their papers and then deporting -- putting them into immigration, reporting them to immigration based on existing. that's why the hispanic community across this country overwhelmingly supports
8:17 am
president obama. battleground state, nationally, because they understand that barack obama is fighting for them. mitt romney wants to fight to kick undocumented immigrants out of this country. >> thank you for joining us. have a really nice weekend. talk to you soon. ahead on "starting point," activist chen guangcheng doing something he wasn't allowed to do in china giving an interview about being held at constant lockdown in china and a school bans a teen from wearing a marine corps t-shirt, a shirt he got from his brother serving in afghanistan. you're watching "starting point." it now's the time to move from to where you want to go. look up. with u.s. bank let's get the wheels turning. use our strength & stability to open new opportunities. to lend, and lift ...every business...every dream...
8:18 am
to new heights of prosperity. good things are happening. just look up. with u.s. bank. high schools in six states enrolled in the national math and science initiative... ...which helped students and teachers get better results in ap courses. together, they raised ap test scores 138%. just imagine our potential... ...if the other states joined them. let's raise our scores. let's invest in our teachers and inspire our students. let's solve this.
8:19 am
you know who you are. you can part a crowd, without saying a word. you have yet to master the quiet sneeze. you stash tissues like a squirrel stashes nuts. well, muddlers, muddle no more. try zyrtec®. it gives you powerful allergy relief. and zyrtec® is different than claritin® because zyrtec® starts working at hour 1 on the first day you take it. claritin® doesn't start working until hour 3. zyrtec®. love the air. dude you don't understand, this is my dad's car.
8:20 am
look at the car! my dad's gonna kill me dude... [ male announcer ] the security of a 2012 iihs top safety pick. the volkswagen passat. that's the power of german engineering. right now lease the 2012 passat for $209 a month. to provide a better benefits package... oahhh! [ male announcer ] it made a big splash with the employees. [ duck yelling ] [ male announcer ] find out more at... [ duck ] aflac! [ male announcer ] ...forbusiness.com. ♪ ha ha! chinese activist chen guangcheng speaking out for the first time since his dramatic escape from house arrest and arrival here in the u.s. he sat down with our own
8:21 am
anderson cooper. >> i sat down with chen guangcheng on thursday. his first extensive interview since arriving in new york over the weekend with his wife and two young children. he was speaking out now because he is concerned about the other activists left behind in china who aided in his escape and helped him get into the u.s. embassy. he's concerned about other relatives. his nephew is charged with attempted homicide. i talked to mr. chen about the years he spent in chinese prison. he spent four years and three months in a chinese present and nearly two years he was in home detenti detention. >> when you were released you were under house arrest. what was that like? >> translator: i want to clarify one thing here. when we talk about my situation in the future, let's not use the
8:22 am
word house arrest but instead let's use the word illegal detention. it's hard for me to describe what it was like during the time but let's just say my suffering was beyond imagination. >> did you feel like there was an end to it? did it feel like it was just going to go on and on? >> translator: i didn't see much hope. >> mr. chen originally was arrested in china back in 2006 after filing a class action lawsuit. he and his wife are self-taught attorneys. his wife read to him from legal textbooks and he learned the law and filed this lawsuit on behalf of women in particular who he says were forced to be sterilized and also forced to have late-term abortions because of china's one-child policy at the time. i talkeded to mr. chen about whether he regretted speaking out and something he says he does not regret and if he knew at the time what it might lead to. here's what he said.
8:23 am
you say it's natural to want to speak out against evil but many people remain silent. why do you think -- you must be very courageous? >> translator: i only feel natural reaction from my heart. my nature wouldn't let me sit by and disregard what is going on. i think everyone should act that way. >> mr. chen is in new york. he is here on a student visa and plans to study for one year at new york university and hopes to one day go back to china and whether the chinese government will allow that is not clear and whether he will choose that is not clear at this point. he's going to be studying at new york university learning more about the law hoping to learn english and he does plan to continue to speak out. >> all right. chen is calling on authorities in beijing to prosecute lawless officials who harassed and abused him, his family and his supporters. get real for today. a teen wears a marine corps
8:24 am
t-shirt to school that he got from his brother who was headed to afghanistan and he's told, hey, kid, wear that inside out. >> really? >> wait until you see why. now you can apply sunblock to your kids' wet skin. neutrogena® wet skin kids. ordinary sunblock drips and whitens. neutrogena® wet skin cuts through water. forms a broad spectrum barrier for full strength sun protection. wet skin. neutrogena®. with the bankamericard cash rewards credit card, we earn more cash back for the things we buy most. 1% cash back everywhere, every time. 2% on groceries. 3% on gas. automatically. no hoops to jump through. no annual fee. that's 1% back on... wow! 2% on my homemade lasagna. 3% back on [ friends ] road trip!!!!!!!!!!!! [ male announcer ] get 1-2-3 percent cash back. apply online or at a bank of america near you. ♪
8:25 am
i was 18 years old before i had my first fresh bun. the invention that i came up with is the hot dog ez bun steamer. steam is the key to a great hot dog. i knew it was going to be a success. the invention was so simple that i knew i needed to protect it. my name is chris schutte and i got my patent, trademark and llc on legalzoom. [ shapiro ] we created legalzoom to help people
8:26 am
start their business and launch their dreams. go to legalzoom today and make your business dream a reality. at legalzoom.com, we put the law on your side. but not how we get there. because in this business, there are no straight lines. only the twists and turns of an unpredictable industry. so the eighty-thousand employees at delta... must anticipate the unexpected. and never let the rules overrule common sense. this is how we tame the unwieldiness of air travel, until it's not just lines you see... it's the world.
8:27 am
♪ >> you can see our entire playlist every morning on our website. >> now it is time to get real. it was a gift a marine gave to his little girl while on leave waiting to deploy to afghanistan. it's a t-shirt with the marine corps mascot on it. when the little brother proudly wore it to school, the staff told him he had to turn it inside out. why? they were uncomfortable with what was on the back of this
8:28 am
t-shirt. you can see the bulldog was too anatomically correct. the point was if you're not leading, the view never changes. the officials objected to the realistic view of the dog's private parts and asked the boy to turn the t-shirt inside out. the mom pulled her kid out of school instead of giving him a different shirt. >> is that picture altered? that's exactly how it appears? you guys told me during the break that my outrage might have been premature when i have seen the back of the shirt. i'm still outraged. what's so bad about that? >> there are better celebrations of the marine corps on t-shirts than that. how old is this kid? >> he's 13. >> i changed my mind.
8:29 am
i'm with you. >> this is better than if your brother was in a frat in college and this is a beer drinking shirt. this is about leadership. >> it has a serious point. >> lead or you're going to look at that. >> you know, 13 year old boys talk about and do and that shirt is not -- >> that's coming up next. >> the shirt would have been okay if they neutered the dog. >> that's the implication. >> we all say get real. that's what we say. ahead on "starting point," a new york teen suspended for creating an anti-bullying video because it featured a fake suicide in her video. we'll talk to 15-year-old jessica barba and her family next. there they are. ♪
8:30 am
♪ i can do anything ♪ i can do anything today ♪ i can go anywhere ♪ i can go anywhere today ♪ la la la la la la la [ male announcer ] dow solutions help millions of people by helping to make gluten free bread that doesn't taste gluten free. gether, the elements of science and the human element can solve anything. solutionism. the new optimism.
8:33 am
good morning. welcome back. let's get to alina cho for today's headlines. >> the man they say confessed to killing etan patz on this day 33 years ago is scheduled to make his first court appearance today and we're getting a look at the suspect. inside edition identifies this man there as pedro hernandez. prosecution are expected to formally charge hernandez with murder later today. patz went missing just a block from his home back in 1979. police say hernandez has admitted to luring the 6-year-old boy to the basement of a store before strangling him and disposing of his body in the trash. history being made in the heavens. the dragon space capsule is about to become the first private spacecraft to link up with the international space station. maybe within an hour of contact.
8:34 am
that connection marking a new era in commercial space travel. one where nasa depends on private business to shuttle supplies and astronauts to and from space. more than 700 workers have now lost their jobs and three plants have been shut down since a lean beef product made by a south dakota based company was referred to as pink slime by a government food inspector. once that term was reported, beef products incorporated say restaurant orders dropped dramatically and plants had iowa, kansas and texas had to be closed. mortgage rates hitting another record low. fourth week in a row for that. interest rates for a 30-year fixed mortgage now under 3.8%. new homeowners can save $48 a month for every $100,000 they borrow. jon huntsman a hottie?
8:35 am
the former utah governor and gop candidate jon huntsman is one of the 21 sexiest men alive over 50. huntsman came in at number 20. that's 19 behind george clooney. our erin burnett asked the dream boat about his new recognition last night. listen. >> i was shocked to know that i even qualified. and i did find out about it this morning. the first thing that came to mind was i now have new leverage over my kids. >> that's right. >> they think their dad is a dweeb. >> who wouldn't be proud of that? that's high praise. ladies, he's a married father of seven. if you had any crazy ideas, just put those to rest. >> i would love to know what his daughters think about that. they talk about chinese currency policy at the dinner table. come on. on the hot list for aarp. thank youo much. suspended for making an anti-bullying video and facebook page that she hoped would raise
8:36 am
awareness. 15-year-old jessica barba's video telling the story of a fictitious girl who is bullied at school and online repeatedly. ♪ >> to the end there's a caption saying the girl died by suicide. there's a disclaimer at the beginning and end of this video explaining these events are not real but when jessica's school found out, she suspended her. yesterday was her first day back at school. jessica joins me now along with her parents. you did this as a school project to raise awareness for bullying and the school finds out through
8:37 am
a parent who saw it on facebook and they suspended you. you are back at school. tell me a little bit about what happened here. >> well, i believe that everybody makes mistakes and the school made a mistake but in the end they changed a wrong into a right and i get to hand in my project and that's all i could ask for. >> you hope to get an a. >> why did bullying -- why is it so important for a school project to make this video? >> i feel like bullying is a major world issue. as much as it's addressed, i would love to always have wanted to make a move in it and try to make my voice heard and how i feel about it as a kid myself who witnesses bullying all the time. >> what did you think when the school saw this creative piece of art that your child did for a school project, saw this online and said she's out of school for five days. what the did you do? >> we were very upset. we were called in and we spoke about it. >> it's clearly not real.
8:38 am
haley bennett is clearly not a real person. it's clearly a video. >> it was very upsetting. everything is all right now and she's back to school and she's getting so many praises from all over. we've even heard from people down in australia that have spoken to her on facebook. it's crazy. it's great. >> how did the school explain the suspension to you? >> well, i think what started it was with the facebook parent had read this and didn't go far enough to read that it was fake. as adults i don't think we understand facebook as much as children do. they must have got scared and they called it and school said it caused a commotion. >> i tell you, raising awareness, has the ruckus from the school overshadowed what you were trying to do or highlighted in the end what you were trying to do which is to say bullying is happening in the hallways? >> i think that it kind of highlighted it a bit because the
8:39 am
parent who calls in and they're not to blame but they did what my video is intending, speak up and speak out. they called it in because they were concerned about a child who is being bullied and they did speak up and speak out. >> prosecute your teachwere you aware? >> they knew i was doing a bullying video but not what procedures i was taking. >> do you see it in the hallways or do you want your generation to know that it's not accepted? >> i see it in the media and hallways. when i see it in the hallways i do try to stop it as much as i can. in the news media, i just feel like for i have a little nephew and cousins, i want to try to make it a better place for them to go to school. >> so great to meet you. i think that's so creative. kids using facebook, you know, to try to use your creativity for your school project is good stuff. i'm glad that the suspension has
8:40 am
been wiped off. all done. go back to school on wednesday turning in the project. let me know via facebook if you get on a on that project. ahead on "starting point," it's called arousal addiction. teenage boys addicted to their tech toys constantly creating a buzz. video games and porn ruining an entire generation of men. don't miss this one. you're watching "starting point." let's ring you up. mary? what are you doing here? it's megan. i'm getting new insurance. marjorie, you've had a policy with us for three years. it's been five years. five years. well, progressive gives megan discounts that you guys didn't. paperless, safe driver, and i get great service. meredith, what's shakin', bacon? they'll figure it out.
8:41 am
getting you the discounts you deserve. now, that's progressive. call or click today. with the bankamericard cash rewards credit card, we earn more cash back for the things we buy most. 1% cash back everywhere, every time. 2% on groceries. 3% on gas. automatically. no hoops to jump through. no annual fee. that's 1% back on... wow! 2% on my homemade lasagna. 3% back on [ friends ] road trip!!!!!!!!!!!! [ male announcer ] get 1-2-3 percent cash back. apply online or at a bank of america near you. ♪
8:44 am
when haiti suffered a massive earthquake two years ago, many people responded by donating money. but this week's cnn hero posted on facebook i am in. who is going? >> we pride ourselves on being ready and willing to go anywhere. i started in the marine corps and deployed to iraq and afghanistan. when i first saw the earthquake that hit haiti, a lot of images i felt like i had seen before driving through the streets of fallujah or afghanistan and i realized i could help out. i went on facebook and said i'm going haiti. who's in. 72 hours after that we were on our way to port-au-prince. we got to work setting up a triage clinic. we realized veterans are really useful in these types of situations. i'm jake wood and i want to help veterans transition to civilian
8:45 am
life. it started as a disaster relief organization and we realized he could help the veteran community. we bring veterans together to be part of a team once again. they are almost recharged. >> when you get out you have that feeling of what are you really doing that's important in the world? this has provided a great opportunity to help people in need. >> pull your foot back as far as you can. >> most of the work we do is medical emergency triage clinics. we've begun to chile, sudan, and here at home we've been in joplin and doing search and rescue and we helping other people is part of the healing process. >> i can't thank you all enough. >> there's really no limit to what veterans can do. we have the ability to help and we want to serve. it's a win-win situation. >> next on "starting point," is an addiction to online porn and graphic video games ruining an entire generation of men?
8:46 am
can we do anything about it? that's next. [ female announcer ] tide pods three-in-one detergent. pop in the drum of any machine... ♪ ...to wash any size load. it dissolves in any temperature, even cold. tide pods. pop in. stand out. [ man ] when i went to get my first new car, my dad said to get a subaru because they last. ♪ he drives a legacy, but i'm nothing like him. i got the new impreza. maybe i should have picked a different color... [ male announcer ] the all-new subaru impreza. experience love that lasts. ♪
8:47 am
8:48 am
dodged a bullet there. [ banker ] so we talked to them about the wells fargo priority buyer preapproval. it lets people know that you are a serious buyer because you've been credit-approved. we got everything in order so that we can move on the next place we found. which was clear on the other side of town. [ male announcer ] wells fargo. with you when you're ready to move. wanted to provide better employee benefits while balancing the company's bottom line, their very first word was... [ to the tune of "lullaby and good night" ] ♪ af-lac ♪ aflac [ male announcer ] find out more at... [ duck ] aflac! [ male announcer ] ...forbusiness.com. [ yawning sound ]
8:49 am
some call it the end of the american man. the culprit, arousal addiction. instant gratification from video games and online porn. in the new book, the demise of guys, the author writes boys' brains are being digitally rewired in a totally new way to demand change, novelty, excitement and constant stimulation and their brains are being catered to by porn on demand and by video games at a flick of the switch or click of a mouse. thanks for being here today. now this is different, you say, this arousal addiction,
8:50 am
different from the traditional addiction to alcohol and drugs. >> yes, it is. essentially with traditional addictions you want more of the same thing. with alcohol and drugs, you want more of the same. with arousal addictions, you want novelty and constant change to reach the same level of stimulation. >> it's not like becoming addicted to heroin and you want more heroin and this is you are addicted to online porn and you want different kinds of online porn and it interferes with your way to socially interact? >> the personal consequences are a little bit different. if you watch excessive amounts of porn, you're going to find it hard in real life relationships because you're developing your sexuality independently of real people. you're not going to be stimulated by them.
8:51 am
>> i was going to play devil's advocate and say in your article you reference how potentially excessive use of pornography makes it more difficult for men to be in monogamous, real world relationships. isn't there an argument to be made that having porn as an outlet for that type of variety in some ways actually makes it easier for men to remain monogamous in their real world relationships? >> that's possible but you can't overdo it. >> what we're talking about is -- >> too much of a good thing. >> did you just defend porn? >> we're talking about addiction here. arousal addiction and how that's different and young men. on this table we have seven children under the age of six. all boys. >> not actually here. we just created. >> seven young boys all very young and you have a boyfriend under 30. what does this mean for our kids? how do you keep your kids away
8:52 am
from being this rewired young to need from video games and from online porn and from this sort of arousal seeking kind of stuff? >> you know, the average kid is going to watch porn at about 11 years old. that's when sex education starts in school. unfortunately sex education is pretty inadequate. it's pretty much up to parents. >> how old are your kids? >> 5 and 3. >> 6, 4, and 2 for me. >> 4 and 1 not to this problem just yet. here's the deal. the novelty concept is what i have trouble buying. what's new here? haven't been always been adiktsadikts addicted to arousal? >> high-speed internet porn allows you to be on there 24 hours a day and click next click and move on. >> it used to be old tattered
8:53 am
"playboy" magazines hidden in the garage and you had to work at it. everyone around the crew is nodding. i'm just saying, it is different. kidsing can online and have access to porn without knowing what they're doing. >> it's more assessable and social cost of that is what? that we as men are growing up with what kind of problem? >> you're going to be socially awkward with women and girls. >> she used you. kidding. go ahead. >> you're not going to know how to interact with them sexually. the problem is when you don't educate kids, guys about porn, they're not going to recognize what they're seeing as caricatures and so they are going to think that's normal behavior and with porn, you go right to it. there's no communication. there's no foreplay, there's no buildup. it's just right into the action. >> unrealistic.
8:54 am
>> totally unrealistic expectations. >> what are we supposed to do? >> make yourselves aware of the risks to be aware of the unsi . downside. >> and lock your children in the basement. >> boys are always going to want to look at images of naked women and that's okay. you just have to let them know that what they're seeing in porn is not real. >> do you think we should talk about it. >> talk to them about it. >> at what age? how old? >> whatever you think is right. whatever you think is right. when you start noticing that they are starting to pay more attention to girls. have those conversations. >> all right. thank you. "the demise of guys." illuminating conversation for all of you. the end point coming up next. i went to a small high school.
8:55 am
the teacher that comes to mind for me is my high school math teacher, dr. gilmore. i mean he could teach. he was there for us, even if we needed him in college. you could call him, you had his phone number. he was just focused on making sure we were gonna be successful. he would never give up on any of us. it doesn't look risky. i mean, phil, does this look risky to you? nancy? fred?
8:56 am
8:58 am
point we made about immigration. debbie wasserman schultz says mitt romney wants mass deportations. >> the reason i asked her that question is because the obama campaign believes that at some point republicans will attack them from the left on immigration. a lot of people don't know this. the administration has been tough and deported a lot of people and there are a lot of people in the latino community that are not very happy with that. >> they are more worried about this president deporting people and not mitt romney deporting people. >> i think romney went too far right in primaries but some republican allied group is going to spend money in western states where hispanic matter arguing that obama has been too tough on illegal immigrants. >> i'm going to piggyback on that end point and say that i do think that voters are going to the polls with a semidifficult decision. they've been hard hit by this recession but when they go to the polls, they choose between barack obama and mitt romney who has said he would like immigrants to self-deport and said he supports arizona's model.
8:59 am
that becomes a clear choice. >> he wants illegal immigrants to self-deport. >> regardless of how many immigrants have been deported under this administration. >> tough argument to make. it will be tough to attack obama from the left. republicans to do that on immigration. it's the reason you see bain attacks. it's tough to criticize mitt romney's governorship of massachusetts from the left. these are tough arguments to make. i wanted to talk about porn and video games some more but you sucked me into immigration. >> "cnn newsroom" with carol costello happening right now. >> credibility of the confess n confession. this man, pedro hernandez in court this morning. his three-hour confession being scrutinized. is etan the only victim? the unmanned spacecraft making history right now hooking up with the international space station. you will see it live.
282 Views
IN COLLECTIONS
CNN Television Archive Television Archive News Search ServiceUploaded by TV Archive on