NAACP vs. Tea Party; Capping the Oil Disaster
RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: It's not only what it does. It's what it doesn't do as well. And that's what we're going to be talking about. There are some folks out there saying, look, this reform, it still is leaving too much control in the hands of CEOs. We're going to be all over that. But, first, here's what else is coming your way. Scroll it, Danno.</s>SANCHEZ (voice-over): Here's what is making your LIST today. The NAACP has been careful not to say that all Tea Partiers are racist, so what's this Tea Party movement spokesperson say about the NAACP?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Racists have their own movement. It's called the</s>NAACP. SANCHEZ: So, the entire NAACP is racist? Wait. It gets worse.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A bunch of old fossils looking to make a buck off skin color.</s>SANCHEZ: Talk about throwing gasoline on a fiery debate. What you're hearing is a woman being Tasered by police. But wait a minute. She called police. What gives?</s>ARSENIO HALL, ENTERTAINER: Would you tell Rick Sanchez I say hello?</s>SANCHEZ: Hello back, Arsenio.</s>HALL: He gives me the material on Mel Gibson and Tiger Woods, so I can take it where CNN wouldn't let it go.</s>SANCHEZ: We will see about that. The lists you need to know about. Who's today's most intriguing? Who's landed on the list you don't want to be on? Who's making news on Twitter? It's why I keep a list. Pioneering tomorrow's cutting-edge news right now.</s>SANCHEZ: Hello again, everybody. I'm Rick Sanchez. At the very top of our LIST, you're not going to believe how much movement we have had on this BP story over the last 24 hours. First, BP is now saying -- this is important -- BP is now saying it has started the well integrity test. Remember, for the last 48 hours, we' been talking about this, this after being forced to suspend operations after a leaking piece of equipment was discovered last night. So, after we left you, they said, no, we have got to check and see if there's enough pressure and if it's going to withstand the pressure. They did that. And they found a little bit of a problem, a potential leak. According to BP, during preparations for yesterday's well integrity test, the leak was detected in something called the choke line, the choke line. We're going to tell you exactly what that is and where it is and what the impact was in a minute, because we're going to be joining a professor from Houston who's going to take us through it. So, the testing once it began it had to be delayed while the choke hub was eventually replaced. The choke hub was successfully replaced overnight and roughly 45 minutes ago, literally 45 minutes ago, BP told us that the oil well integrity test is under way. The test will take anywhere from six to 48 hours, beginning now, we hope. Before I do anything else, and before I bring in my guest, pardon me for turning my back on you, but I want to come over here and I want to show you this graphic, because this is what we're going to be using as best we can to try and illustrate what's going on now and so the professor who's joining me can take you through the explanation of what's going to happen now, where this choke hold was, et cetera. All right, let's roll this animation, Dan. And we're going to bring in the professor from University of Houston in just a minute. This it the process that we have been following all throughout. And you can see all the apparatus that was taken off on the very top of the wellhead. And now you are going to see that they're going to be bringing it back down into another -- there it is right there. So, now we have that. Remember, Chad was calling it yesterday the perfect fit, brings in the new, for a lack of a better term, a new blowout preventer that has these three areas where they can stop the oil from flowing. And, look, behold, the oil has stopped flowing. If they have to, they can bring in another pipe that will literally extract the oil or produce the oil and take it out of there. So where are we on the process right now? Joining me from Houston is Don Van Nieuwenhuise. He is a petroleum expert from the University of Houston, served us very well, been very straight with us on what's going on in this thing. First of all, as we're looking at this, Professor, we heard this night about something, the choke hold having a problem and that they sprung some kind of leak. Where on this diagram would the choke hold be?</s>DONALD VAN NIEUWENHUISE, GEOLOGIST, UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON: It's over there on -- you see a line on it right now.</s>SANCHEZ: You mean this area right in here?</s>VAN NIEUWENHUISE: Yes. There's a line coming out of that. And what you have is a line coming out of the choke -- one of the choke rams that allows them -- you have moved it away, but it allows them to actually take the pressure away from the wellhead while they're moving pipes and that sort of thing in and out of the wellhead. And it's sort of like a pressure chamber and they have to have a way to bleed off the pressure and that's what the choke line is. And there's also a kill line that allows them to bleed off pressure from the chamber that's formed when the kill rams close.</s>SANCHEZ: So that's all this area here. I have been calling this, for lack of a better description, the new and improved blowout preventer, which is kind of what this is right here, right?</s>VAN NIEUWENHUISE: Absolutely. It's like a -- almost like a production stack or a blowout preventer itself. And what's different about this from before is that not only do you have a better seal, but you also have the stack of chokes and rams that they can close down on that wellhead to top the flow to the surface.</s>SANCHEZ: And let me explain that to our viewers, what you just said. The seal you're talking about is right there. It's where this apparatus was able to get a good seal on this apparatus without having stuff that is blowing out on the sides. And by stuff obviously, I mean the oil and the hydrates, et cetera. And then what he said is, the area where they can literally choke it off is these three areas right in here where they can stop it. Now, OK, I think we get that, Professor. Now here's what we need to know. What's going to happen over the next six to 48 hours that wasn't happening before?</s>VAN NIEUWENHUISE: OK. Well, what we're going to want to see here is that we're going to want to see that the flow completely stops and as that flow is cut off, they're doing it very slowly which is a very wise thing to do. They're being extremely careful. They will be closing it slowly and we will stop seeing all the flow. And as that flow is stopped, the pressure in the well will start to build up. And that tremendous pressure, they're hoping will build up to around 8,000 to 8,700 PSI. And if it does, that means there's probably no existing leak. And in that case, they will hold that pressure as long as they can, about 48 hours, to make sure that the integrity is real and it's not just instantaneous.</s>SANCHEZ: It makes sense. It makes perfect sense. In other words, they're now going to start to test where they start to close off these chambers and hope, and we will all cross our fingers and say a prayer, that, in fact, it will not cause other problems elsewhere. That's what you mean by integrity, right? It does you no good to seal it off here if it's going to blow down there.</s>VAN NIEUWENHUISE: Absolutely. And what they're trying to do, Rick, is they're trying to see if there are any preexisting leaks because they need to know that when they do the kill operation. And, of course, they're also trying to make sure that they do not create any new leaks. So, if, for example, they had it up to a high pressure -- and this is kind of simplifying it, but if they had a dramatic and sudden drop in pressure, that would suggest that a new leak had started. But they're going to be raising the pressure very slowly, so that they see if any small leak starts to leak a little bit. They will get that pressure kick, so to speak, a small pressure kick, and they will back off on the pressure. They could suspend the whole operation instantaneously if they see a serious problem.</s>SANCHEZ: Well, it's just a matter of watching them then and reporting to the American people what's going on. We're so glad that you were able to join us to take us through this. And we will be joining you again in an hour because this thing, this process seems to move in hourly increments. If we have anything new, we will get back to you. Thank you again, Professor. We appreciate your time.</s>VAN NIEUWENHUISE: Thank you for your time.</s>SANCHEZ: All right. I want to do this. Let's go back over to the main desk over here, because I want to take you now through what is really an extremely significant story. It's another piece of legislation that we have been talking about. This time it's the financial reform vote. Let me just check to see what new information has been coming in on this, because I know there's going to be a lot of reaction coming in and I want to be able to share that with you as it comes in. Here's the nuts and bolts. You ready? It has passed now both houses. It passed the Senate 60-39 just moments ago. And we're assured the president of the United States will indeed sign this, probably in some kind of signing ceremony some time next week. There is some -- there is some blowback on this. There are some who are arguing that it doesn't go far enough, some who are arguing that too many CEOs still have too much control and are able to control their credit without releasing enough information to you and me, to the government, to the people responsible, who end up paying, like we did just several years ago during the meltdown. And there are those who are saying, well, actually, it's going too far. You know, in an effort to try to deregulate, we have now over-regulated. Both sides of that argument are being heard. You're going to be hearing here -- we have just talked to the White House. I'm going to be talking to Austan Goolsbee, one of the president's top economists, to ask him for his reaction to this. That's coming up in just a little bit. In the meantime, I want you to take a look at this video.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get in the car. Get in the car. Get in the car. Get in the car. Get in the car.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm getting in. I'm getting in.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get in the car. Get in the car.</s>SANCHEZ: What this officer does is all but reprehensible. The woman that you heard screaming, the woman screaming and crying right there, she's the one who called police to report a crime. But somehow the officer arrives and thinks that she's the criminal and starts attacking her with the Taser. There is a lot to tell on this story and I can't wait to take you through it. Also, President Obama actually gets that Wall Street reform victory I told you a little while ago. But how is that going to affect the unemployment numbers? Remember, we're about 9.5 right now. The president did warn we might go over into double digits at some point. And how is that going to affect the upcoming elections? That's next right here on the LIST. Stay with us. Boy, there's a lot going on all of a sudden. We will be right back.