Ex-KGB Man Predicts Demise of United States
WHITFIELD: Much more of the NEWSROOM straight ahead with Rick Sanchez. There he is. What is going on, Rick?</s>RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: I was just thinking, what was the one thing without which Barack Obama would not have been able to become the president of the United States? It was one of event at one time, at one moment, it was make or break, and most would argue that it probably was more of a make than a break. We are going to show it to you. We are going to analyze it, and we're going to let you see it in full, something sometime we in our business don't do enough of. That is just get out of your way and let you see it and try to understand how that moment worked. That is kind of -- I believe that is a special moment during this presidency, and there's two new polls out. One of them asks, can Barack Obama unite the country? You know, the findings are surprising on this. The other one is, is he tough enough? I mean does this guy what it takes, you know, the intestinal fortitude as I like to say.</s>WHITFIELD: Wasn't he just elected? Didn't people ask that question as they went to the ballot box?</s>SANCHEZ: Well, but yes, but no. In a country where we are divided like 45-45 and everything's decided by that little 8 to 10 percent in the middle, you expect that sometimes when you do a poll, you going to find that it is split like that? Not in this case. Tease, not in case.</s>WHITFIELD: Tease. OK. We will be watching. Happy hour at 3:00 just 11 minutes away. Thanks, Rick. We appreciate it.</s>WHITFIELD: All right, well, today is January 1st, 2009. Just may be all downhill from here for 10 well known companies. That's according to the financial news publisher 24-7 Wall Street. It put ten firms on death watch. Here they go: Chrysler, Sirius/XM, AIG, Fannie Mae, Rite Aid, "The New York Times," Nortal, Pier One, Charter Communications and the home building firm Hovnanian, and they are all predicted to be gone by this time next year. The Wall Street Web site says the brand names might still be around, but the companies behind them will actually be gone or radically different. 2008; a rough year for the U.S., and one Russian professor said it's going to get a lot worse. The former KGB analyst says the U.S. will break up next year. And it's a prediction that has made him the toast of the Russian media. Details from CNN's senior international correspondent Matthew Chance.</s>MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): An economy in free fall. Unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And growing hardships at home as recession bites. As if things weren't bad enough, now one Russian professor is predicting the eminent breakup of the United States.</s>PROF. IGOR PANARIN, POLITICAL THEORIST (through translator): I got the idea that the United States could disintegrate in the summer of 1998. I should admit that I was surprised to have come to this conclusion. Up until I started to analyzing, I had no idea that the United States had this disintegration tendency.</s>CHANCE: In brief, Panarin predicts that by 2010, the U.S. will break into pieces. Including new republics centered on states like California and Texas. The eastern states will join the European Union, he say. Canada will grab a handful in the north, while Alaska will return to Russian rule. It's all of the end result of a fractious civil war triggered, says Panarin, by moral and economic degradation, and immigrants. (on camera): It may be a crackpot theory, with no real scientific research to back it up. But what's fascinating is how it's being received here in Russia. The Kremlin has long blamed the United States for everything, from instability in the Middle East, to the global financial crisis. And this apocalyptic version of America's future is suddenly being embraced. (voice-over): Professor Panarin, a former KGB analyst who heads Russia's Diplomatic Academy, regularly appears as a U.S. commentator on Russian television and in national newspapers. Analysts say his high profile reflects anti-American sentiment here.</s>SERGEI KARAGANOV, POLITICAL ANALYST: Of course, a lot of people in the world, including in this country would like the United States to fall apart, because it has been too mighty and because it is -- it looks now that it is losing.</s>CHANCE: But Panarin says he's being proved right by events.</s>PANARIN: We're seeing indicators like the collapse of the Wall Street banks, a mortgage crisis in the USA, as well as a number of various domestic problems. Even five years ago many of those problems didn't exist and most people didn't believe my ideas. But today, when America has shown its vulnerability, people have started to take them more seriously.</s>CHANCE: And in a country like Russia, which has huge problems of its own, the demise of the United States, its old enemy, is proving a powerful distraction. Matthew Chance, CNN, Moscow.</s>WHITFIELD: All right. You're looking at the Vatican's New Year's day mass. Pope Benedict the XVI prayed for peace in Gaza, and called the violence, hate and mistrust, terrible forms of poverty. The plane arrived in the U.S. with one more passenger than it had when it left. How does that happen?