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CNN Student News

Aired February 15, 2002 - 04:30   ET

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

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: You're watching "CNN STUDENT NEWS," seen in schools around the world because learning never stops and neither does the news.

SUSAN FREIDMAN, CO-HOST: "CNN STUDENT NEWS" has your Friday "Headlines" starting with the continuing Enron investigation. We'll also clue you in on President Bush's global warming proposal.

MICHAEL MCMANUS, CO-HOST: I'm Michael McManus in Salt Lake. Our Olympic coverage wraps up today with the cameras turned on those who made the trip to Salt Lake as well as answers to your mail.

FREIDMAN: And you'll also meet a young man who's an Olympic inspiration. Finally, have fun guessing "Where in the World" we end up.

Welcome to CNN STUDENT NEWS. I'm Susan Freidman.

A star witness in the Enron investigation takes the stand on Capitol Hill. Sherron Watkins, a vice president in the now bankrupt company, told a House subcommittee yesterday that she feared for her job when she first voiced concerns. As you may recall, Watkins is the one who wrote the memo warning former Chairman Ken Lay about accounting irregularities. Unlike other Enron executives who refused to testify by invoking the Fifth Amendment, Watkins had plenty to say.

CNN's Tim O'Brien reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TIM O'BRIEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Sherron Watkins became the third witness to contradict the testimony of Enron's former CEO, Jeff Skilling, who told the same committee last week he was unaware of any company arrangements designed to improperly inflate profits or conceal losses.

SHERRON WATKINS, VICE PRESIDENT, ENRON: My understanding was that Mr. Skilling was fully aware of them. He is a very hands-on manager.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you think it's possible that Mr. Skilling was unaware of the nature of these transactions?

WATKINS: No, I do not. O'BRIEN: Watkins said Skilling and others had duped Enron's chairman, Kenneth Lay, who she said never understood the gravity of Enron's situation. Some lawmakers were skeptical. Tauzin of Louisiana pulled out Watkins's handwritten notes to Lay warning him of trouble ahead.

REP. BILLY TAUZIN (R), LOUISIANA: The handwriting basically says to the final point, "There it is. That is the smoking gun. You cannot do this." Even with this, you still say he didn't get it.

WATKINS: I don't think so.

O'BRIEN: Several lawmakers praised Watkins for coming forward. Ed Markey of Massachusetts told her to come back if there's any recrimination at the office. But Greg Ganske of Iowa asked Watkins if she didn't have an ethical obligation to go beyond merely warning Chairman Lay?

WATKINS: To go to the press or to go to the SEC would have not given Enron a chance to try to fix it calmly, and most definitely, this news would have been inflammatory and we would be in the same position we're in right now.

O'BRIEN: Watkins said that at the same time she was warning Kenneth Lay the company was about to implode, she was unloading her own Enron stock.

WATKINS: I did sell $31,000 worth of stock in late August. And then I sold net to myself around $17,000 of stock options in early October.

O'BRIEN: Watkins said it was a knee-jerk reaction to September 11th and that she could have done a whole lot better had she sold earlier.

(on camera): Watkin's testimony was most damaging to former CEO Jeff Skilling, whose credibility with this committee is already in some doubt. Skilling's attorney told reporters that Watkins was trying to make his client a scapegoat, and he criticized lawmakers for playing along.

Tim O'Brien, CNN Financial News, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: "In the Headlines," President Bush says his new plan to fight global warming will benefit the entire world. Mr. Bush unveiled the proposal yesterday. It includes a number of tax incentives designed to encourage businesses, farmers and others to reduce pollution. The plan is designed as an alternative to the 1997 Kyoto Treaty which Mr. Bush says could of cost millions of U.S. jobs.

Major Garrett reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) MAJOR GARRETT, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The president said curbing greenhouse gases is all about trade-offs. His new policy trades mandatory pollution cuts for voluntary targets.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This will set America on a path to slow the growth of our greenhouse gas emissions.

GARRETT: The White House goal is to reduce pollution without sacrificing jobs. The Kyoto Treaty's mandatory cuts in carbon dioxide, the White House says, would have cost the U.S. $400 billion and 5 million jobs. Instead, the White House will offer tax incentives to industry to cut carbon dioxide emissions.

Mr. Bush's rejection of Kyoto stunned many European leaders, but the president was unrepentant during his first European swing.

BUSH: We didn't feel like the Kyoto Treaty was well-balanced. It didn't include developing nations. The goals were not realistic.

GARRETT: But the White House will use mandatory cuts to lower nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide and mercury emissions. To tackle global warming, it seeks lower greenhouse gas emissions and more federal research. Voluntary compliance is said to protect workers. The Bush plan also includes developing countries the Kyoto Treaty exempted. Democratic critics dismiss the Bush plan.

SEN. JOSEPH LIEBERMAN (D), CONNECTICUT: The great disappointment in the president's proposal today is that it offers no real hope of progress. It's not meaningful.

GARRETT (on camera): All four Democrats who rushed to denounce Mr. Bush on global warming are also eyeing the Democratic nomination for president in 2004. Al Gore led the charge, accusing the president of endorsing a plan that he said -- quote -- "falls short of the needs of America and the world."

Major Garrett, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOSEPH YORK, LITHIA SPRINGS, GEORGIA: Hi, my name is Joseph York. I'm from Lithia Springs, Georgia. And I'd like to Ask CNN: How viable a threat is nuclear terrorism?

MIKE BROOKS, FORMER FBI COUNTERTERRORISM TASK FORCE MEMBER: Joseph, the threat of nuclear terrorism against U.S. or U.S. interests here domestically or overseas is considered to be relatively low. One of the reasons that it is low is because it's very difficult to get nuclear material to make an actual nuclear device. The FBI has investigated over the last number of years hundreds of threats of nuclear devices all over the country. All of these threats were found to be hoaxes.

The more realistic scenario would be a dirty nuke, as it's commonly referred to, the real name of which is a radiological dispersal device. This is where radiological byproducts are taken, put onto a conventional bomb such as C4, syntax, dynamite, TNT and dispersed into the air through an explosion.

One of the other things that has to be considered are nuclear reactors. After September 11, the United States is taking a closer look at the threat of terrorism against nuclear reactors. The security at most of these facilities has been increased.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: A defiant Slobodan Milosevic speaks out in his defense at his war crimes trial. The former Yugoslav leader is charged with 66 counts, including crimes against humanity and genocide. But he says the case is nothing more than an ocean of lies.

CNN's Christiane Amanpour is at The Hague with details.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: (voice-over): Slobodan Milosevic began his presentation with a 50- minute documentary, produced by a German TV station and later denounced as distorted by highly regarded German journalists. This film claims that there were never civilian massacres in Kosovo, nor forced expulsions, as the indictment against Milosevic charges.

SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC, FORMER YUGOSLAV PRESIDENT (through translator): The population from Kosovo was expelled by the KLA because they ordered people to do so. They beat them and they killed them. That was number one. Number two, NATO through their air strikes, that is the truth behind your story about deportation.

AMANPOUR: Despite evidence to the contrary, Milosevic claims NATO's intervention in Kosovo in 1999 caused the Kosovo-Albanians to flee. He showed grizzly pictures of human remains to accuse NATO of deliberately targeting civilians. NATO has always denied that. But this is Milosevic's central theme, that it's NATO who should be on trial, and that he was just defending Serbia from Albanian separatists, that he calls terrorists.

MILOSEVIC (through translator): The Americans go right to the other side of the globe to fight against terrorism in Afghanistan, a case in point, right the other side of the world and that is considered to be logical and normal; whereas here, the struggle against terrorism in the heart of one's own country, in one's own home, is considered to be a crime.

AMANPOUR: Later, in a series of rebuttals, he challenged the prosecution charge that he knew or should have known about atrocities. For instance, about concentration camps filled with Muslim men in Bosnia.

MILOSEVIC (through translator): When I heard that there were some camps, I asked for an explanation. Is it possible that Serbs were setting up camps? And the explanation I received was the following: There are no camps. There are only prisons for prisoners of war. AMANPOUR: About the siege of Sarajevo.

MILOSEVIC (through translator): Serbia in its official government statement, while I was the president of Serbia, condemned the shelling of Sarajevo. You basically have nothing, and that is why you have to concoct things. You have to invent things.

AMANPOUR: Milosevic finished up by telling his accusers their case against him was a pack of lies.

(on camera): And that's how he's likely to continue his opening statement when he resumes again Friday morning. He said that he's been waiting many months in jail here for the chance to tell his side of the story to the public.

Christiane Amanpour, CNN, at The Hague.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: As the saying goes, what doesn't kill you can only make you stronger. They were the words that snowboarder Chris Klug lived by. He is the first Olympian to have an organ transplant, the result of a rare liver disease he battled for nearly 10 years.

Elizabeth Cohen has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is what Chris Klug looks like today, but this is what he looked like a year- and-a-half ago on his way into surgery for a liver transplant. For nine years, Chris battled a rare disease called PSC, which was slowly ravaging his liver.

DR. GREGORY EVERSON, UNIV. OF COLORADO HOSPITAL: When he was the sickest, he was in bed, jaundiced, having fever and pain and looking very ill.

COHEN: He cried the day football great, Walter Peyton, died from the same disease and feared he would be next.

(on camera): There in an old saying, "What doesn't kill makes you stronger." Do you think that applies to you?

CHRIS KLUG, OLYMPIC ATHLETE: I believe in it. I really do. And that's kind of the story of my life, you know.

COHEN (voice-over): His life began 29 years ago as a preemie in the neonatal intensive care unit.

KATHY KLUG, CHRIS'S MOTHER: So he had to struggle right in the beginning.

COHEN: Then at age 10, he almost died from severe asthma.

WARREN KLUG, CHRIS'S FATHER: And that was a very scary thing. He was struggling for every breath.

COHEN: When he was 20, doctors diagnosed his liver disease. Then, a few years later, Chris crushed his knee, not sure if he would walk normally, much less snowboard again.

(on camera): And you have a strong faith in God. Did you ever say to God, hey, what's going on here? Why did you do this?

C. KLUG: Yes. I said, hey, give me hand down here. I'm struggling.

COHEN: Chris lost about 30 pounds and tried hard to stay in shape, while he waited for a new liver.

C. KLUG: It did pass through my mind many times that this might not work out. That I could die on the transplant waiting list, and this is how it's going to end.

W. KLUG: I found it hard to pray during that time, because on the one hand, we knew that the liver that Christopher needed would come at a very high price to another family.

K. KLUG: To be honest, every time I heard on the radio or television that there was somebody on life support, you say, that's an organ donor.

COHEN: Then, in July 2000, Christ finally got the call he had been waiting for. It was time for his transplant. He flew from his home in Aspen, Colorado to the hospital in Denver. His parents watched as he was wheeled into surgery.

K. KLUG: And you are standing there, and he looks right at me and he says, "Mom, am I ready for this?" And you go -- in 30 seconds you have to answer that question, you think of all of the things have gotten him ready. And you have to answer with confidence and assuredness, and you are the mom. And you go, of course you are ready for this. You whole life has gotten you ready for this.

COHEN: The surgery was a success. No rejection problems, no complications.

C. KLUG: And I remember waking up and going, I rule! It was so funny, but I had some pretty good drugs in me. I was saying some wacky things.

COHEN: Much to his doctors' amazement, Chris was snowboarding less then two months after surgery, and four months later, he won a snowboarding world cup. Now his mission: to win Olympic gold, to encourage organ donation and to meet the parents of the 13-year-old boy whose liver saved his life.

C. KLUG: I'd like to tell them in person thank you for saving my life, for giving me another chance to pursue my dreams.

COHEN: And those dreams begin today, when Chris starts his quest for a gold medal on the mountains of Utah. Elizabeth Cohen, CNN, Salt Lake City.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: Exploring our world, here now is CNN STUDENT NEWS "Perspectives."

MCMANUS: Hello, I'm Michael McManus in Salt Lake. It's our last day at the Winter Olympic Games so we decided it would be a good time to look back on the week by taking the temperature of those visiting as well as participating. But before we do that, it's time to check the mail.

Let's see, bill, bill, just a piece of junk mail, and here's a letter. Let's see who it's from. This is from Scott Barber from Rome Middle School in Ohio. And he would like to know if Olympic rules have to change when there are technology improvements in equipment.

Well Scott, we talked to John Powers for your answer. He's a longtime writer that covers Olympic sports for the "Boston Globe."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN POWERS, "BOSTON GLOBE": That's a very good question. Actually, the Olympic motto is "Faster, higher, stronger," so they're always looking for new technology, faster skates, better suits, better track shoes, you know better poles for pole vaulting that will make that happen.

The big question has always been does everybody have the right and access to the same stuff? When the speed skaters had their new skates a few years ago, only the Dutch had them at first, and people were saying, well it's not fair, why should they have it and nobody else. So as long as everybody can have access to the same new stuff, you'll keep seeing this happen. So what you're seeing here in Salt Lake, for example, with the new skates and the new suits, it'll be even faster four years from now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCMANUS: Okay, the next letter is from Karen Brotcher (ph) from Hamburg Area High School in Pennsylvania. And she wants to know if physics play a part in snowboarding.

Well Karen, to answer your question, we went to the University of Utah and asked physics professor Dr. Rob MacLeod.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ROB MACLEOD, UNIVERSITY OF UTAH: Karen, that's a great question. And snowboarding and ski jumping are full of some terrific physics. At the simplest level, you can picture ski jumping just like you do a projectile leaving a cannon. A ski jumper shoots off the end of the ski jump, flies through the air, follows a parabolic curve and lands somewhere on the hill below. In snowboarding, it's a little more complicated because the snowboarder's on snow and so friction plays a really big role. Gravity is still the driving force for both these cases so the jumper and the -- and the snowboarder always have to go down hill. But a snowboarder has to use that gravity to keep momentum, keep the board moving and then -- and then work with the friction between the board and the snow to control it.

Ski jumper has a lot less resistance to work with because he's flying through the air, which has a lot less resistance of course. And so you can explain all this using Newton's equations of motion and get a pretty good estimate of how especially a ski jumper will move through the air. If you want to get more complicated, of course there are frictional forces and drag and lift and all these factors which you have to take into account if you really want to predict how a ski jumper is going to -- going to fly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCMANUS: Okay, there's one more letter. This one's from Harbor Elementary School in sunny San Diego, California. They want to know the most number of medals won in a Winter Olympics by the USA.

Well, speaking of snowboarding, we decided to go to none other than Ross Powers. He's the gold medal winner in the Winter Olympics Snowboarding Half Pipe competition.

Ross, take it away.

ROSS POWERS, U.S. OLYMPIC SNOWBOARDING TEAM: All right.

Well, guys, that's a great question. The answer is 13 medals. It happened in Lilihammer in '94 and Nagano in '98, and here in Utah, we're going to try to break that record.

MCMANUS: Thanks for the mail, guys, we really enjoyed your questions.

Now let's take one last trip around Salt Lake to let those here look back on the first week of the 19th Winter Olympics.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MCMANUS (on camera): Give me the temperature of everything, have you enjoyed it?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh it's terrific. It's absolutely unbelievable. The weather's amazing, everybody's super friendly, we're having a great time. We only came down yesterday. We're here for a week, here to see some hockey, a couple of other events. It's spectacular. Salt Lake City is beautiful. We're really enjoying it.

MCMANUS: Overall, your experience so far?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's good. It's good. I think Salt Lake has really done a great job. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think it's just a really good feeling. I came -- I wasn't really wanting to come and now that I'm here I'm really excited to be here so I think it's great.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We just flew in yesterday and it's been pretty cool so far, a lot of stuff to do.

MCMANUS: Let me know what you think?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's great. It's great. A little cold for me, but it's great. I love it. I've had so much fun. I mean starting to collect my pins and I love it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's really cool, and it's a once in a lifetime thing to come check out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's been great. It's been great. I've only been to -- you know I've been to a hockey game and you know up and down here and that and it's just -- I mean seeing all the people coming in and it's been -- hasn't been all the headaches that people thought it would be and it's -- the experience has been great. It's been wonderful.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Salt Lake's been a wonderful experience. I think the locals here have been great in supporting everyone coming in. It's like a big family. I've been to several of the major parties, several of the major concerts. People have been really fun. If you've ever been to a concert in some states, it gets a little too rowdy. But here it's that perfect kind of rowdy where everybody's like family and friends together, and it's been -- it's been a wonderful experience from beginning to end.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCMANUS: A great first week for many, including us. Many thanks to Utah, the city of Salt Lake and of course the world's best athletes. During our stay we met many interesting people from all over the world. Now don't forget there's still one more week to go here, but I'll see you back at CNN Center on Monday. For now, I'm Michael McManus, so long from Salt Lake.

FREIDMAN: Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are anxious to get to the bottom of Enron's collapse, but many of the company's top executives are not making it easy. Several of them, including former Chairman Ken Lay, have invoked their Fifth Amendment right not to testify.

Our Joel Hochmuth has more on that in our "Week in Review."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOEL HOCHMUTH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In a way it was a bit like walking into a lion's den. Tuesday, Kenneth Lay, the former chairman of the now bankrupt Enron Corporation, answered a subpoena and faced members of the Senate Commerce Committee. He was supposed to have appeared eight days earlier but called that off on the advice of his lawyers who were afraid the proceedings would be too much like a prosecution. Based on the lambasting Lay endured, they were probably right.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Mr. Lay, I regret that you've chosen not to explain to this committee, to the American public and to your former employees how you and others in senior management on the board of Enron apparently failed to completely fulfill your responsibilities.

SEN. BYRON DORGAN (D), NORTH DAKOTA: We have an obligation to ask how is it that 29 Enron executives and directors at the top were able to earn over $1 billion in stock sales from 1999 through mid-2001 while people at the bottom ended up losing everything.

SEN. PETER FITZGERALD (R), ILLINOIS: I'd say you were a carnival barker, except that wouldn't be fair to carnival barkers. A carnie will at least tell you up front that he's running a shell game. You, Mr. Lay, were running what purported to be the seventh largest corporation in America.

HOCHMUTH: One reason the lawmakers were so combative, Lay had already made clear he was not going to answer their questions, that he would assert his right not to testify against himself. When given a chance to speak, he stuck to that position.

KENNETH LAY, FORMER CEO, ENRON: I am deeply troubled about asserting these rights because it may be perceived by some that I have something to hide. But after agonizing consideration, I cannot disregard my council's instruction. Therefore, I must respectively decline to answer on Fifth Amendment grounds all the questions of this committee and subcommittee and of those of any other congressional committee and subcommittee.

HOCHMUTH: While Lay's appearance left committee members angered and frustrated, legal experts say under the circumstances they would have advised him to do the same thing.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ, LAW PROFESSOR, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: Don't necessarily play by their rules. Don't play in their ballpark. Take the case and bring it into a ballpark in which you can get a more friendly and legalistic reception. That's the job of the lawyer not to simply exceed to the grandstanding ploys of congressmen who are not there necessarily to learn information but to show how righteous and virtuous they are.

TOM BAER, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY: At this stage of the game, Ken Lay, whose defense appears to be that he wasn't at the switch, is just not in a position to say what he wants to say because he doesn't know what the government has, he doesn't know what the other side has, and were he to make a statement that later proved to be false, he'd be in the soup big time.

HOCHMUTH: While Lay was able to walk away from this hearing, it's clear he can't leave his troubles behind. Wednesday came word he and his wife, who say they are struggling financially, sold their exclusive multimillion dollar home in Aspen, Colorado. Meantime, a newspaper report says Lay may have misled the public at two separate times to keep Enron's problems under wraps. Then there was Sherron Watkin's testimony. While the Enron executive didn't directly implicate him in any wrongdoing, it's apparent Lay may have brushed off Watkin's warnings the company was headed for disaster. Still to be determined, were his actions illegal or simply inept?

Joel Hochmuth, "CNN STUDENT NEWS."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: Handholding, cuddling and kissing. For as long as high schools have been around, affectionate students have been showing off their love for each other. Students refer to it as PDA, otherwise known as public displays of affection. But where do you draw the line when it comes to teens being affectionate in schools?

CNN Student Bureau reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SANDY ROMAH, CNN STUDENT BUREAU (voice-over): Public displays of affection seem to an all or nothing proposition, either people despise the practice or they are part of the problem. For anti-PDA students, they are subjected to viewing the affections. It can cause an emphatic reaction.

TREVER FALLETA, AGE 18: It's okay for a boyfriend and girlfriend to be affectionate with each other in public, but I don't want to see two people going at it in the hallways.

KIM WALLER, AGE 18: I kind of laugh but it's disgusting, in my opinion.

LESLIE STOECKLE, STUDENT: Holding hands, I could care less. I hold hands with people who I'm not even boyfriends with so I think that's ridiculous. Even making out, as long as you're doing it in a corner, who really cares?

ROMAH: After checking some of the local schools, we found one school in Pennsylvania states in the school handbook that "Students are prohibited from public displays of affection towards others." Another school's code of conduct states that an "Important goal of the school is to help students develop self discipline."

(on camera): What is the motivation behind these amorous teens? And how much kissy-face should be tolerated? Believe it or not, most teens do not want to see their peers doting over each other, and they do believe there's a line that should be drawn.

FALLETA: When it's anything -- basically, if it's something you wouldn't want your parents to see, why would you want your friends to?

ROMAH (voice-over): Local school districts seem to agree that there are some things they do not want to see. They are punishing students for inappropriate behavior in school. In some schools, detention and possibly even suspension will be given to over affectionate teens that ignore the rules against PDA. Some students think the school districts are being too stringent and that schools shouldn't be in the business of limiting friendly interaction.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, they keep it under control and they know that's what weekends are for and stuff.

HEATHER ALT, AGE 17: Our school is not very fair about many things, and you can't -- like are they going to draw the line at friendship now too? You can't -- that's -- they can't take that into their own hands.

ROMAH: Though most students are against seeing PDAs in the halls, the majority of teens agree that punishment for hallway lovers is too much. Most schools have hall monitors to make sure students are where they need to be. The solution for schools may be a new type of monitor, PDA monitor. That may be the new way high schools deal with this problem.

Sandy Romah, CNN Student Bureau, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ONSCREEN: "Where in the World?"

Constitutional monarchy: Chief of State is Queen Beatrix.

Invaded and occupied by Germany in WWII.

Home of The Hague.

Can you name this country?

Netherlands.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FRIEDMAN: That wraps it up for today. I'm Susan Friedman. Have a great weekend.

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