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CNN Student News
Aired June 05, 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.
SHELLEY WALCOTT, CO-HOST: We're off and running on this Wednesday. The Golden Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II takes top billing.
MICHAEL MCMANUS, CO-HOST: And a little later on, the when's and where's of hurricane season come into "Focus."
WALCOTT: Plus, we take a peak inside an industry dedicated to helping you live longer.
MCMANUS: From medicine to the media, our "Business Report" zooms in on a couple of new newspapers.
WALCOTT: And Welcome to CNN STUDENT NEWS. I'm Shelley Walcott.
MCMANUS: And I'm Michael McManus.
Elizabeth II celebrates 50 years on the throne and her royal subjects threw a party that was, well, fit for a queen.
WALCOTT: That's right.
Her Royal Highness was just 25 years old when her father, King George VI, died, making her the head of the Commonwealth. It's been a busy 50 years. The Queen has made 251 official overseas visits to 128 different countries. She's launched 17 ships, counseled 10 prime ministers and sat for 120 portraits.
And speaking of picture perfect, the Golden Jubilee celebration was just that. The Queen's procession through London in a 240-year- old golden coach was a memorable snapshot in a week filled with pomp and pageantry.
So how have things changed since the last time Her Majesty celebrated her reign? Walter Rodgers looks back over the last 25 years.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WALTER RODGERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The royal cannon roareth again, reminders abound. This is Queen Elizabeth's Golden Jubilee, her anniversary of 50 years on the throne.
Gold guilt aside, the Queen's hair is silver now. She is 76, but one of five British monarchs to have reigned half a century or more.
Despite the pretense, the empire was never lost, however, it was, and the world, even the Queen's world, has changed hugely, even in the past 25 years since her Silver Jubilee in 1977.
SIMON PERRY, "PEOPLE" MAGAZINE: I suppose what has changed in the 25 years since '77 is a very big fall in the reverence and pedestal we might put her and her family on and that's probably reflected in, I imagine, slightly smaller crowds.
RODGERS: The crowds are smaller now, but she has changed too, more mellow, less aloof, more likely to go into those crowds trying to bridge the modernity gap. Sometimes she even behaves just like anyone else's 76-year-old mother.
Her country has changed too, less British, more an immigrant nation.
PETER DEWAR, HISTORIAN: I think of course there have been a large influx of foreigners to this country. And that again has changed them because many of those people arriving have come from countries where they haven't had a traditional monarchy.
RODGERS: The recent deaths of the Queen's mother and her sister, Princess Margaret, left Her Majesty bereft and lonely. Royals watchers suggest that's led to a softening, greater affection, especially toward her eldest son, Prince Charles.
DEWAR: I suppose that they are (UNINTELLIGIBLE) getting used to one another and their different ways, their different thought processes.
RODGERS: Even Charles' long-time companion, Camilla Parker- Bowles, is being allowed entrance into Royal circles now.
(on camera): Still the gap and the world's changes between the Queen's Silver Jubilee in 1977 and the Golden Jubilee now are nothing short of mind boggling.
(voice-over): Jimmy Carter was president of the United States then. The Soviet Union, then a superpower, has since disappeared. The Queen is still here, but her realm is much modified.
ROBERT JOHNSON, ROYAL COMMENTATOR: I think Britain is a far less significant nation than it was 25 years ago on the world stage. I think we're far closer to Europe.
RODGERS: Perhaps the greatest irony, in many minds, Princess Diana was the most dazzling facet of the Queen's 50 years. Yet Diana was unheard of just a quarter century ago and since has disappeared like a brilliant comet which came and went.
The Queen, however, is as constant as the polar star, and it is that continuity, stability and dignity which Britons are now celebrating.
Walter Rodgers, CNN, London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WALCOTT: Yesterday marked the 13th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown. Thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators were killed or wounded on June 4, 1989 when tanks and troops fought their way into the central Beijing square. More than a million people were at the square on that frightful day which is marked each year by vigils.
Yesterday, security at the square was tighter than usual, but there were no reports of protests. Many people seem to have their attention focused elsewhere, like the World Cup.
CNN's Jaime FlorCruz has the story of one woman who is fighting her own battle for democracy and for freedom for her husband.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAIME FLORCRUZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He Xintong on hunger strike, meeting journalists only to be stopped by the police. She is dramatizing the case of her husband, Xu Wenli, a dissident now serving his third year of a 13-year prison term.
HE XINTONG, WIFE OF DISSIDENT (through translator): The back of my T-shirt reads "Free Xu Wenli." They should release him because he is innocent.
FLORCRUZ: Beijing officials say dissidents like Xu threaten social stability and have forced many of them underground, in prison or into exile. While some have been quietly released, high profile dissidents remain in jail.
JEROME COHEN, LAW PROFESSOR: They should release Mr. Xu Wenli and similar figures. It doesn't do U.S.-China relations any good. It doesn't do China's reputation any good.
FLORCRUZ: When President George W. Bush visited Beijing last February, Xu Xintong had hoped her husband would be freed. It did not happen. Washington, she says, is now more preoccupied with pressing its business interests rather than human rights issues in China.
XINTONG (through translator): It's sad to be a bargaining chip. It's even sadder when the bargaining is just a show.
FLORCRUZ: Her one-day hunger strike coincides with the anniversary of the Tiananmen crackdown 13 years ago.
XINTONG (through translator): June 4 is a tragic day for our nation. So many people died, so many others have suffered. I want to show my support to them and pay my respect to the dead souls.
FLORCRUZ: But to many Chinese, June 4, 1989 is a distant memory, blurred by pragmatic preoccupations like the World Cup soccer match between China and Costa Rica.
Does he remember June 4, 1989? "Not really," says this job seeker. "Unless friends bring it up, I have no impression of it."
An estimated 100 million Chinese watched team China lose in their first ever World Cup appearance.
(on camera): Team China's 2-0 loss gave the Chinese another reason to mourn the June 4 jinx. For them, it turned out to be another sad day for starkly different reasons.
Jaime FlorCruz, CNN, Beijing.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCMANUS: And China isn't the only country cheering on their soccer team. In "Chronicle" today, we'll take a look at some worldwide companies rooting on the world's most popular team sport and counting on sponsorships for a big business pay out.
And now some Web news British style to share with you. Go to CNNSTUDENTNEWS.com and check out 50 years of monarchy. Fun facts and pictures accompany this interesting look at the Queen's reign.
WALCOTT: Last year we brought you a weather special packed with information. Among other things, Michael explained the science of storms. And we continue our "Focus" now as hurricane season kicks off.
Scientists say we're in for more powerful and forceful hurricane seasons over the next years. So the question becomes, are we ready? One of the big factors is the population increases along miles and miles of coastline. This translates into millions of people and billions of dollars in property.
John Zarrella has our report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Heads up.
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN MIAMI BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): When the big one is bearing down on you...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is going to be one of the big natural disasters in our nation's history.
ZARRELLA: ... what will you do? If you stay to ride out the storm, will you live to cry about it? Do you have any idea the terror you will experience?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You ever heard the devil breathing down your neck?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We had the devil here.
ZARRELLA: And the devil is coming again, perhaps sooner than you think.
CHRIS LANDSEA, NOAA SCIENTIST: I think we will see a $50 billion hurricane in the next 10, 20 years. That's almost without a doubt.
ZARRELLA: The reason, during the past 50 years, the population living on or near the coast from Maine to Texas has nearly doubled to 83 million people. Coastal development has boomed. In 20 years, property value has increased six fold to more than $6 trillion. And during the same period of exploding growth, major hurricanes rarely hit the U.S.
BILL GRAY, COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY: I think this is a powder keg waiting to go off.
ZARRELLA: Now after 30 years of relative quiet in the tropics, scientists say the climate has cycled back to an era of more frequent, powerful hurricanes. And in the U.S., at least 85 percent of the people living in harm's way have never experienced a major hurricane.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These people do not really know what a major hurricane can do and that really concerns me.
ZARRELLA: Max Mayfield (ph) directs the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And that's why we were agonizing here over...
ZARRELLA: Mayfield (ph) overseas a team of forecasters. The tools of their trade: orbiting satellites, hurricane hunter aircraft,...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) copy (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
ZARRELLA: ... computer models.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Guidance shows tracks in all direction.
ZARRELLA: Forecasters can track a storm across the ocean. They can tell when it becomes a hurricane.
(on camera): But two of the most critical questions, questions that may mean the different between saving thousands of lives or losing them they simply can't answer with confidence -- where exactly is the hurricane going and how powerful will it be when it gets there?
(voice-over): Because of this uncertainty, the forecasters worry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But it's moving very slowly.
ZARRELLA: Worry they will be caught off guard,...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The tropical storm warning for Belize.
ZARRELLA: ... ambushed,...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's definitely becoming much better organized.
ZARRELLA: ... as they were by Hurricane Keith. In a mere 12 hours, it morphed from a weak hurricane to a brute killer, then it slammed into Belize in Central America.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If that had happened anywhere along the United States coastline, it would have been a disaster.
ZARRELLA: The ingredients are all there.
MICHELE BAKER, EMERGENCY MANAGER: People ignoring the evacuation order, the cry wolf syndrome, insufficient transportation network, shelter deficit, you name it, these things are all compounding. When you put that on top of this population explosion in the coastal areas, we're building a case for catastrophe, no question about it.
ZARRELLA: John Zarrella, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WALCOTT: More on hurricanes now as we approach the storms from a different angle. If you live in or near a big city, you've probably been stuck in traffic before, right? Well it was probably nothing more than an inconvenience. But what if it was a life or death situation?
Our in-house storm expert returns now with a report on the catastrophic possibility of hurricane gridlock.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ZARRELLA (voice-over): As Hurricane Floyd moved north along the Atlantic coast, cars didn't move at all. Two years ago, Floyd triggered the largest evacuation in U.S. history. From Florida to the Carolinas, millions left their home, only to sit in gridlock.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Taken us four and a half hours to go eight miles.
ZARRELLA: Many weren't asked or ordered to leave, but were afraid to stay, and they added to the bumper-to-bumper mess. Floyd weakened before striking land, but next time might be different.
MAX MAYFIELD, NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER: I really fear that someday we'll have people stuck in the cars in a gridlock as the core of a major hurricane moves onshore. If they're stuck in the car and that storm surge comes in, there will be loss of life from drowning.
ZARRELLA: Hundreds, perhaps thousands may feel fears.
(on camera): Storm surge is a wall of water, sometimes 50, even 100 miles long and perhaps 20 feet high. It sweeps inland as the eye of a hurricane makes land fall.
(voice-over): And since the average error in forecasting hurricane land fall is 100 miles, no one knows where the worst storm surge will hit.
MAYFIELD: Again 24 hours, I can't tell if it's going to hit here or here or down here somewhere.
ZARRELLA: That's why emergency managers over-evacuate.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have to worry about the southwest quarter.
ZARRELLA: August 22nd, 2000: Hurricane Debbie is close enough to the Florida Keys that emergency manager Billy Wagner is worried. He's come to the National Hurricane Center in Miami for the latest information.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The thing is I need to respond to a major hurricane.
ZARRELLA: Within minutes, Wagner learns evacuation is not possible. The only two roads out of the keys are blocked.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A jackknifed truck on car sound, and a tanker truck they have to drill holes in to off load the fuel on U.S. 1.
ZARRELLA: The next day the roads cleared. Wagner orders a phase-one evacuation, tourists and nonresidents, then hurricane Debbie unexpectedly fall apart.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As Carla moves slowly in from the gulf.
ZARRELLA: A generation ago evacuation worked pretty well.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Back in the '40s and '50s and '60s, if we gave people 12 hours of warning, that was sufficient.
ZARRELLA: Not anymore. There are simply too many people and cars. Often more than the roads can handle. Many cities now plan to make highways one way out. But experts say that's not a solution.
BOB SHEETS, FORMER NOAA SCIENTIST: What I'm saying is every new community that goes up, whenever you give the permitting process for this development, they ought to be required to have a shelter right on site.
ZARRELLA: So for now, evacuation gridlock remains the nightmare scenario. So much so, one Florida county is looking for a spot along interstate 75, a parking lot of last resort, where people stuck in cars can pull into, and hopefully survive the big one.
John Zarrella, CNN, Miami.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
"CNN PRESENTS HURRICANE: WHEN THE BIG ONE HITS" Saturday 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time and Sunday 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time, 4:00 p.m. Pacific Time. WALCOTT: Yesterday we told you about the World Cup. Well like other major sporting events, it draws companies trying to market a product. And now this report on the robust ad campaigns brought to you by our very own Tim Lister.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TIM LISTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's more than just a game for the official sponsors of the World Cup, it's a massive marketing and branding opportunity, the chance to be associated with the world's most popular sporting event. Companies like Coca-Cola build worldwide advertising campaigns around the tournament.
SCOTT MCCUNE, DIRECTOR OF WORLDWIDE SPORTS, COCA-COLA: If you think about it, we'll be doing World Cup programs in more than a hundred countries around the world. And we'll be able to quantify not only the sales lift that we get around the programs but also the change in behavior of consumers and the relationships that we're able to build with consumers by linking into the passion of football.
LISTER: Coke has brought thousands of fans to Korea and Japan from around the world as part of its strategy of being involved at all levels of the game.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've come with a company, with the Coca-Cola company. We -- so we're really fortunate to have that opportunity.
LISTER: There are 28 sponsors for this World Cup. That's fewer than for the last tournament, but they're paying much, much more, upwards of $40 million each for the privilege.
For Korean car maker Hyundai, that's money well spent.
JAKE JANG, EVENT MANAGER, HYUNDAI: I mean every time the action moves around to sidelines, there's our board. So I mean -- so spectators has to get to see our Hyundai name and logo.
LISTER: As part of the deal, Hyundai receives 20,000 match tickets to entertain clients and reward dealers and employees.
Other South Korean companies that aren't even sponsors, like conglomerate LG, are taking advantage of the China team being here to woo new business in a rapidly growing market. Or using the World Cup to promote their brand while showing their patriotism.
(on camera): For the recently privatized Korea Telecom, sponsoring the World Cup is a golden, if expensive, opportunity to show off its new mobile technology and support the home team at the same time, even if its slogan "Korea Team Fighting" might be a little aggressive for the organizers.
(voice-over): Wherever you go in the streets, at the stadium, on the training grounds, at news conferences and this year on the Internet, the sponsor's logos haunt you. As part of its deal with football's governing body FIFA, Yahoo! has built an extensive Web site for the World Cup. So who pays whom? TONYA ANTONUCCI, GENERAL MANAGER, YAHOO!: There's definitely a value exchange that's happening. Yahoo! benefits tremendously from the sponsorship -- full sponsorship benefits that we receive. And further, Yahoo! is contributing a great deal to market, produce and host the official site.
LISTER: The evidence is that consumers don't know who is an official sponsor and who isn't. But does that matter? As they watch TV, they can't avoid those field side boards or those lavish commercials. And there's no shortage of official partners queuing up to do business with FIFA.
Tim Lister, CNN, Seoul.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Exploring our world, here now is CNN STUDENT NEWS "Perspectives."
MCMANUS: I've got a question for you, how long do you expect to live? The average American woman can expect to live about 79 years. For guys, the average is a few years less. Life expectancy has increased by 30 years over the last century. The increase is due in part to medical advances. But progress can sometimes bring problems.
Rhonda Rowland explains.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RHONDA ROWLAND, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Heart surgeon Dr. Bud Frazier makes heartbreaking decisions every day, which tool should he use to save a life?
DR. BUD FRAZIER, TEXAS HEART INSTITUTE: Thirty-eight-year-old woman, mother of three, died last night that I had been up with for a week. And you know, I just don't want to hear about people, you know. I mean if we just had the right technology at the right time, she'd be alive.
ROWLAND: The failing heart, that human frailty has driven Dr. Frazier to work on a total artificial heart. So far the device has been put in six men, three are still alive. Yet other scientists are betting on a less radical device, a kind of booster pump to assist damaged hearts. They're already extending life in hundreds of people.
DR. PATRICK MCCARTHY, CLEVELAND CLINIC: They're clearly going to be the future. And we think that we're on the -- on the breaking point when you'll see them much more commonly like you see pacemakers today.
ROWLAND (on camera): All of our organs, tissues and joints can potentially wear out, and now scientists believe many of them can be replaced. Scientists here at Georgia Tech are trying to create a better heart valve. It's just one example of an entire industry devoted to just that, it's been called the "immortality industry." (voice-over): Artificial blood is no longer science fiction, it's being tested in people right now. So is an artificial liver. Other scientists are trying to build tissues and organs practically from scratch in the laboratory. But medical ethicists warn, high tech comes with a high price.
JOHN BANJA, CENTER FOR ETHICS, EMORY UNIVERSITY: I mean if it was customary for human beings through these interventions to live to be 110, 120 years old, what is that going to mean for the Social Security trust fund? What's that going to mean for Medicare? What's that going to mean for our pension plans?
ROWLAND: If the industry is immortality, is the business plan to play God?
JEFFREY KAHN, CENTER FOR BIOETHICS, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA: I don't think anybody believes that by giving somebody penicillin we're playing God. But we have to ask that question about how far it's appropriate to go in extending life.
ROWLAND: Is it enough to extend life by a matter of months at a cost of thousands of dollars?
FRAZIER: All these things are philosophically good to sit around and talk about them until it's your husband or your wife or your child, then it's different.
ROWLAND: So who will make the tough decisions?
BANJA: We don't have an Ayatollah (ph) of ethics in the United States.
ROWLAND: In the end, the tough decisions may come down to money -- who wants the designer hearts and who can afford them?
Rhonda Rowland, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCMANUS: Speaking of longevity, let's talk about the newspaper. The newspaper business has been around for centuries. But when it comes to advertising, the industry is struggling through its worst period since the great depression. Why then are two businessmen starting papers of their own in the nation's two largest media markets?
Casey Wian has some answers.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Warren Clanador (ph) drives his truck about 140,000 miles a year, often on congested roads.
WARREN CLANADOR (ph), TRUCK DRIVER: Can't make any money that way. The margin's too slim to start with.
WIAN: The Texas Transportation Institute estimates traffic congestion drains $78 billion annually out of the nation's economy.
MIKE TOOHEY, AMERICAN HIGHWAY USERS ALLIANCE: Today, our society chooses to allocate public resources to social programs as opposed to investments in infrastructure which provide long-term return, but which have tremendous payoffs for our economy.
WIAN: The worst place is Los Angeles where 87 percent of residents drive to work, and the average commuter wastes eight work days a year stuck in traffic.
Expanding this one freeway intersection would yield savings of nearly $6 billion in time, fuel, and pollution, according to the American Highway Users Alliance.
But big highway projects often spin out of control. Boston's $15-billion big dig is $5 billion over budget and months behind schedule.
KEVIN MCCARTY, SURFACE TRANSPORTATION POLICY PROJECT: There are many, many things we can do to really extract more performance out of the investments the taxpayers have already made before we simply just go out and rally behind major new road investments which, increasingly, are more costly and more -- in themselves produce more delays in traffic and never really seem to relieve the problem.
WIAN: Nationwide, nearly a quarter of U.S. roads are rated rough by the Federal Highway Administration. In California, about a third need repair.
JEFF MORALES, CALTRANS: We are making massive investments in maintaining the system. That's critical. Right now, under the governor's budget this year, one out of five miles of state highway will be under improvement this year.
WIAN: But money is becoming scarce. Federal funds are linked to economic growth, so next year's budget slashes highway money by 27 percent.
(on camera): Every billion dollars spent on highway projects creates an estimated 40,000 jobs. So Congress is considering a proposal that would restore about half of the planned federal highway fund cuts. A decision is expected by fall.
Casey Wian, CNN Financial News, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCMANUS: In a world full of war and terrorist threats, many kids say it's time for peace.
Our Student Bureau tells us about one school that is taking that message to heart by erecting a symbol of harmony. Kristen Krop (ph) has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) KRISTEN KROP (ph), CNN STUDENT BUREAU (voice-over): "May Peace Prevail on Earth." This message and prayer can be found on peace poles in over 200,000 locations in more than 180 countries.
Recently, a peace pole was erected at Teachers Memorial Middle School in Norwich, Connecticut. Seventh grade students, along with the help of their guidance counselor, brought the symbol of peace to their school.
ALISON HENDEL, TEACHERS MEMORIAL MIDDLE SCHOOL: And I put the peace pole up because of the symbolism as a silent message in hope for peace in the world. I think it's a good time in both our school and the community to push for peace.
KROP (ph): The students were the leading group in the acquisition of the pole. It was an effort to make a contribution to the school that would last for years.
PHILIP PAULSEN, STUDENT: Yes, and it's better if kids see it because we learn and we take in more things than adults do because they already learned it before. And so if we learn about peace, we will grow up but learning peace and teaching (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
KROP (ph): Many students at the Middle school see the pole as a beacon of peace for the whole world.
BRITTANY COLES, STUDENT: I think peace in the world is gone because of what happened September 11. And people aren't thinking about peace anymore, they're thinking about what happened on September 11.
CHELSEY BARCLAY, STUDENT: It's there to show that there's a lot of peace in the world and that you don't have to be a certain way or do certain things to show peace. You can just if you're nice and you don't care about what other people think about you but you care about what's going on in the world, then it shows a lot of peace. And I think that's what the peace pole represents.
KROP (ph): Peace poles can be found in simple places like churches and gardens or in such extraordinary places as the Magnetic North Pole, the Pyramids of El Giza and the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima.
Kristen Krop (ph), Norwich, Connecticut, CNN Student Bureau.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCMANUS: And that wraps it up for today's broadcast. I'm Michael McManus.
WALCOTT: I'm Shelley Walcott. We'll catch you back here tomorrow. Bye-bye.
MCMANUS: Bye-bye.
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