Return to Transcripts main page

CNN NEWSROOM

AirAsia 8501 Allegedly Climbed and Stalled; Rebels In Yemen Withdraw Their Fighters; New Footage Released Of Looting In Ferguson; 36 Measles Cases Linked To Disneyland;

Aired January 21, 2015 - 15:30   ET

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


BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: What about -- forgive me.

JOHN RANSON, RETIRED AIRLINE PILOT: Go ahead.

BALDWIN: No, no, just -- I wanted to just to jump to this also this -- this notion that this plane ascended at some 6,000 feet per minute, likening as per expert tab to -- to a fighter jet. What would -- what would cause a plane to do that?

RANSON: Well, I've been in some jet transports that could maintain that sort of climb rate for a very short period of time. But in all likelihood, and of course this is all very tentative until --

BALDWIN: Of course.

RANSON: -- we're able to review the flight data recorder info, but flying into a thunderstorm depending on the age of the thunderstorm and the size, you can hit some -- some pretty intense vertical currents that could push the airplane up that fast. I've been in some that not -- not been 6,000 feet a minute, but have been more abrupt than I would have liked. And of course the reaction that most of us are taught to do is just fly your attitude, keep your nose where it is and then don't touch the power. And wait until you pop out the other side and then try to do something then.

BALDWIN: We have heard from the CEO of AirAsia. He talked to Richard Quest, our aviation correspondent talking about getting that phone call that this plane was missing. Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TONY FERNANDES, AIRASIA CEO: That moment to that phone call will haunt me forever. We've carried 250 million people 13 years very safely. And it is not something that you can really put into words when that call comes through.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Can't put it into words, the CEO of AirAsia.

John Ransom, I appreciate your coming on. Thank you so much.

RANSON: Thank you Brooke.

BALDWIN: I do need to move along.

We're getting some breaking word that the associates of the Paris attackers may be ready to return to Europe and attack. One analyst telling President Obama didn't spend -- he didn't enough time on terror in his speech, is he correct?

Plus breaking news out in the place Al-Qaeda terrorist learn how to kill Americans? After rebels stake over the presidential palace in this particular country, word of a possible deal.

Stand by. We're there live next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: We get you to some breaking news out of Yemen. A critical ally in the U.S. war against terror. An Yemeni official says rebels have now agreed to a tentative deal with the government promising to withdraw its fighters from government buildings including the presidential palace. You've seen what they've did to this location Tuesday, pounded it. Before then taking it over. Let's go to Yemen to Nick Paton Walsh. He is the only broadcast journalist from the West Yemen.

Nick, the rebels say they're withdrawing fighters. What's the catch here?

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well this is the tentative deal Brooke. So what it basically says is that the rebels will pull out of key buildings they're occupying and the key places above those buildings that give the military advantage over it and in exchange the constitution will basically have the ability to be rewritten. As a new constitution which they disagreed with. They'll get to make a lot changes with that in consult with the government here.

Effectively, they're finding some sort of way out of this crisis. But the problem here Brooke is there's a timetable laid out. Everything has to go according to that. We are hearing early reports that perhaps some of the withdraw of who militants have began. And one may be in the buildings they're occupying. The real question people are asking though is effectively is who are the militants in the streets with guns that pushed the government into enormous concessions?

We don't know the shape of the constitution, is going to have how much power, who's going to get through the changes they want to see here. And how much power the president, President Hadi who's currently in his residence surrounded by Houthi fighters although he says he's allowed to leave will, according to one officials who spoke him. We don't know really, he is going to be a figure head or still have executive power.

And of course there's one person, the information is pointed out this doesn't bode well for the country if the power of the gun can have be rewrite the constitution that supposed to be imposed shortly. So a massive solution that one maybe far from over crisis at this point -- Brooke. BALDWIN: OK. So tentative deal there. What about just quickly, let

me ask you at the U.S. embassy. Still no evacuation?

WALSH: No and no indication at this stage they feel but is necessary. Yes, one of the vehicles was shot up two nights ago now. But that hasn't actually changed their posture as far as we understand. There will be minimal start since September, when Houthi first moved into the capital. That hasn't really changed since now, and they've always been on heightened sense of security. This is Yemen after all -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: It is indeed. Nick Paton Walsh in the capital of Sana'a. Thank you so much tonight.

We just told you about associates of these Paris attackers, how they are ready to return to Europe and attack. But President Obama did not even mention Al-Qaeda in his state of the union address last night. Mind my next guest says there's a reason for that.

Plus, forget the politics, forget the pundit we have chosen the top ten buzziest moments from the state of the union. Don't miss them. Stay right here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Who says Americans are disengaged from politics? Take a look at this map and see how the #sotu played out on Tweeter last night during President Obama's speech. The #cnnsotu got more than 44,000 mentions and counting. And let me just say, you are all a pretty clever. Here are top ten trending moments.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN (voice-over): Number ten, #boehnerface. It's never an easy job sitting directly behind the president. But this year Tweeters were especially critical of the speaker's pout and his sniffles.

And speaking of ten, number nine, before the speech, the White House fools America by tweeting this, "The president's emfomus suit. A fashion foe-pa (ph) but fear not --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The President of the United States.

BALDWIN: He went safe breaking out the blue.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good evening.

BALDWIN: Number eight, #breadbags.

SEN. JONI ERNST (D), IOWA: My mom would slip plastic bread bags over them to keep them dry.

BALDWIN: During the GOP's response Senator Joni Ernst, share the story of how she tied bread bags over her shoes on rainy days.

Number seven, who wore it best? Michelle Obama showing up in a gorgeous gray Michael Kors suit, the very same one Julianna Margulies worn in season five of "The Good Wife."

JULIANNA MARGULIES, ACTRESS: Well it's an odd day.

BALDWIN: Number six, the annual, did they fall asleep? Isn't not clear whether Ruth Bader Ginsburg took a power nap, but it totally falls on Justices Brian Kennedy to be in charge of the nudge?

Number five, girl power. A group of sophomore congresswomen shined in pink suits to advocate for more women in the chamber.

Number four, several words spoken for the first time in state of the union history.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: People who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender --

BALDWIN: But one more word not mentioned last year apparently now has earned clout.

OBAMA: We use of force against ISIL.

BALDWIN: Number three, some members bringing yellow pencils to honor terror victims in Paris. But it was Wisconsin's Gwen Moore who got the attention.

Number two, this is Energy Secretary Earnest Moniz. Smart guy but folks are talking instead about his Bob not his brains.

And the number one, the most tweeted line of the night. Got unscripted drop the mic moment.

OBAMA: I have no more campaigns to run. My only agenda -- I know because I won both of them.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: So those were all the fun moments, trending moments, moments you were all buzzing about. We're all on twitter watching that whole thing together. But let's be serious. He mentioned briefly at the start of the state of the union. But then it took President Obama more than half an hour to get back to the topic that has been headlining my shows for days and days, terrorism.

Here are some of what the president said in his address.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: In Iraq, in Syria, American leadership, including our military power is stopping ISIL's advance. Instead of getting dragged into another ground war in the Middle East, we are leading a broad coalition including Arab nations to degrade and ultimately destroy this terrorist group.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Let me bring in CNN political commentator Peter Beinart. He's also contributing editor at the "Atlantic" and the "National Journal".

Peter, great to have you back as always. You know, we've read your piece where you are really talking on, this was the headline. This was the what most talking about yesterday that sort of climatic moment as far as the economy, as far as the president's narrative last couple of years. But this terrorism narrative is much quieter. He actually mentioned ISIL, but he didn't mention Al-Qaeda which has been all over the news.

PETER BEINART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Right. Even more strikingly, he didn't say Americans were safer. If you look at the past several states of the union speeches, each time he said Al-Qaeda is on the run, they're being decimated, we have the momentum. So there was a kind of art just as there was about the economy. The economy is getting better, it's getting better, it was also about terrorism. We're getting safer, we're getting safer. You noticed that was not part of the speech. And that's what I think significant about it. It was, he wasn't able to say as he was on the economy we're really making progress here.

BALDWIN: But maybe that's the truth.

BEINART: Right. I think that is the truth. And I think that's why in some ways the whole terrorism part of the speech was kind of buried and didn't have the power, the compelling power that the domestic stuff had.

BALDWIN: Buried meaning, like asterisk footnote by the way we're still, I mean the whole bit about being at war, right?

BEINART: Well just look at the way in which he call on Congress to declare war. I mean, when you call on Congress to declare war, that's a pretty big deal. I mean, and in fact, that he mentioned it in two sentences. It was almost like throwaway line. HE was saying, we're not going to get it to big round war, we're not going to do things like in Iraq and Afghanistan, by the way, declare on ISIL.

And to me, I'm sympathetic to a lot of President Obama farm policy. But to me it represented part of the problem here. Which is that his in some ways being just as he was in Afghanistan. He does the feeling that he is being led into wars that his heart is not really in.

If you're going to take the United States to war, even if it's air war against ISIL, I think you need to make it a bigger part of your state of the union. And yet you felt this was kind of afterthought.

BALDWIN: Interesting. Let me turn to something different.

There's this opinion piece by a professor, MIT Noam Chomsky. And he writes this on CNN.com today talking about western hypocrisy pointing out the NATO attack on suburban journalist back in '99. And no one was, you know, holding up their pencils and shouting freedom of expression as they have with what happen in "Charlie Hebdo."

He writes, also ignored in the war against terrorism is the most extreme terrorist campaign of modern times. Barack Obama global assassination campaign targeting people suspected or perhaps intending to harm us some day and any unfortunates who happened to be nearby.

Says he have a point about the west being hypocritical.

BEINART: I think that we don't give ourselves the same level of scrutiny sometimes that we do to enemies. That's not to say that we're the equivalent of ISIL or Al-Qaeda, of course not. Do I think that we're targeting innocence, of course not. But I do think that especially in the early years of the Obama administration when the drone program was dramatically expanded and there was a lot of uncertainty about what the legal mechanisms were and about what the criteria were, yes, I don't think that there was enough scrutiny about what the United States does.

We have to hold ourselves to a higher standard. I think Noam Chomsky is a very prominent long-standing radical critic of American foreign policy, the kind of person who frankly doesn't show up a lot in the mainstream media. And I think those voices are important to challenge us precisely to try to live up to what Barack Obama said, to try to live up to our own ideals, recognizing that we are fallible, we're human and we can commit the same kind of mistakes, even crimes that other people can.

BALDWIN: Peter Beinart, always great having you on.

BEINART: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Thank you very much.

BEINART: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Next, this highly contagious virus in a place filled with children. We are following this measles outbreak at Disneyland. Our Chief Medical Correspondent is here, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, he will join me live coming up.

Also, brand new video just in of looting in Ferguson from inside one of the stores. Why are police releasing it now? That's the question. We have the answer coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: St. Louis County Police releasing new video that shows exactly how bold the looters were during the Ferguson chaos. You've seen the pictures of outside the stores, right. This is the first time we are seeing all these people inside. More than 180 suspected looters were caught on camera after the prosecutor revealed that the police officer who shot and killed Michael Brown would not be indicted. Police are hoping people will recognize these faces and call in and offer up help.

The memories being made at Disneyland these days not exactly all happy ones. Let me explain. At least five employees at the California theme park have come down with measles since last month. This is on top of nine previously confirmed cases among visitors to Disneyland or Disney California adventure. In all, health officials say 36 measles cases have been linked to Disney. Part of the worst measles outbreak in California, actually, in 15 years, and health officials are also looking at cases in Utah, Colorado, Washington and Oregon.

So I'm lucky enough to have the chief medical correspondent here sitting right next to me, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, talking about something that sounds a little frightening. I mean, if you're a parent really anyone, you're thinking measles.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: You think measles, you think Disneyland, those two things they shouldn't go together.

BALDWIN: They shouldn't go together.

GUPTA: And the reality is Disneyland really has nothing to do with this. Only in the sense that it's a place where a lot of people cluster and come together. It could be any -- any other place as well. What's amazing about this is you have nearly 50 cases now of measles in this country. It's a highly contagious virus. We talked about Ebola, Brooke, it wasn't that contagious. Measles is. It can spread through the air and they say if you are not vaccinated and you come in contact with someone have measles, you have about a 90 percent chance of getting it yourself.

That gives you an idea how contagious this is. So that when you have situations where a lot of people are coming together in a particular place, it can set up a situation just like this.

BALDWIN: So you were just telling me, though, in commercial that measles was declared eradicated more than a decade ago.

GUPTA: Yes. This drives the public health community crazy, you know. In 2000 we were able to say we have no measles in the United States. We have gone a long enough period of time without any new cases. We can say that's in the past. But in large part because of people not getting vaccinated, there's vaccines available that are very protective against measles, the people not getting vaccinated, one case can suddenly turn into many cases as we've seen here. Now we have six states declaring people having measles. You have 50 cases of measles already just within the first two weeks of this year. So you get an idea of just how big a problem that is. All totally preventable.

BALDWIN: So what's the take-away for I guess parents listening and not quite sure what to think?

GUPTA: You know, I think that there's been a lot of obviously concern about vaccines and a large part of it comes because of concerns about side effects from vaccines. There are studies that may have added some fuel to that fire. But those studies have been debunked. And we know that vaccines can prevent against illness without causing autism, for example, which is something a lot of parents worried about.

You know, Brooke, it was interesting as a reporter but also as a dad, I have three kids, who -- who we went through this whole process.

BALDWIN: Of course.

GUPTA: And we got our kids vaccinated and got them vaccinated on schedule, on time. And I say that only to say that I looked at all these studies, I looked at the data, these are my own children and I still got them vaccinated. And I think if people did that we wouldn't be seeing cases of measles like this. Luckily, you know it sounds like these people are going to do well. Luckily, it seems like this particular outbreak is already over. But this is potentially a fatal disease that is completely preventable.

BALDWIN: OK. I have to embarrass you just a little bit. I know you are pretty modest. But Ben Tinker, your producer sent me this. This is why I have this. Show the object. "One of journalism's most prestigious awards, more than two years investigating these two hours specials, Sanjay changed his mind and the country's mind and lead and any that really can have medicinal benefits. Incredible ceremony. Sanjay Gupta and team got the duPont Columbia Award." And there you are, who came with you?

GUPTA: The whole team.

BALDWIN: The whole family?

GUPTA: You know, that the team, and you know, Brooke as they say, like Aristotle said it, "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts." And that's the case with this team over there.

BALDWIN: Yes.

GUPTA: Yes. You know it's an amazing team. We got to spend two years flying around the world asking questions of the people who had the highest impact and put together this documentary. It's great.

BALDWIN: I mean, getting this kind of award, I remember when it was announced, by the way you take this, this is yours, not mine. But I just remember the huge applause over the network call and seeing everyone buzzing about getting to go to the ceremony last night and just so, so, so proud.

And the guy you see on TV is exactly like what you see, what you get. In the brain, I can't even imagine and the scheduling, I feel for the people who -- who have to figure out because we want like 50 of you. So --

GUPTA: You're nice to say that. Thank you. You know. it's a privilege to work here, do this work. I mean, you and I both get to experience that.

BALDWIN: Pinch myself every day. Sanjay Gupta, thank you and congratulations.

That's it for me. I'm Brooke Baldwin here in New York. We'll see you back here tomorrow.

In the meantime, "THE LEAD" with Jake Tapper starts right now.