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CNN TALKBACK LIVE

Free-for-All Friday

Aired January 25, 2002 - 15:00   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: It's free-for-all Friday on TALKBACK LIVE. A bizarre field trip or kidnapping?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSH PHETSCHER, STUDENT ON BUS: He was not going to hurt us, but I'm not sure what the gun was there for.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: The case of the missing school bus.

And hockey rage, one dad is dead. The other goes to prison.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is ordered by the court after duly considering your past that you be punished by confinement at state prison for a term not exceeding 10 years, no less than six years.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: Does the time suit the crime?

Also, sexy skaters get the cold shoulder from Olympic judges.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know how to say this on television, but they are unhappy with so many crotch shots.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: And bearing their breasts for beads. You do this in public, you have the rights to the photos?

(APPLAUSE)

NEAL BOORTZ, HOST: Can you guess which one of those topics are mine? welcome to TALKBACK LIVE, "America Speaks Out". I'm Neal Boortz. My last day. This is free-for-all Friday. That means we cover it all, from buses to busts.

Our free-for-all guests today are Mark Riley, host of "Politics Live" on WLIB radio in New York. Mark, hi, how are you.

MARK RILEY, WLIB RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: How are you doing?

BOORTZ: We have Lionel, who is a former federal prosecutor and lost his last name. Used to be a criminal defense attorney. He is now a syndicated talk show host also. Lionel, nice to see you again.

LIONEL, SYNDICATED RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: One name, Neal, like God.

BOORTZ: Yes. You do have a last name, don't you, Lionel?

LIONEL: Yes, but I would rather not go into it. And by the way, I'm not a federal prosecutor, state, but that's close enough.

BOORTZ: Oh, OK, prosecutor. And we have Victoria Jones, who hosts a show on WMAL in Washington. Victoria, hi, it's good to see you again too.

VICTORIA JONES, WMAL RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: Hi, Neal.

BOORTZ: We are all going to be together in Washington in a couple weeks, aren't we too, at the (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

JONES: Yes.

BOORTZ: Now, we have four talk show hosts on, so I will be the fourth one and we will shall dominance right now. Lionel, how many years in talk radio?

LIONEL: Going on 14.

BOORTZ: Victoria?

JONES: Fifteen, but I think it's the quality of the work, not the quantity of the work that can account here.

BOORTZ: Yes, you would say that. OK. And, Mark, how many for you?

RILEY: I have been at the same place for 28 years.

BOORTZ: OK, 33 for me, so I'll go ahead and take the dean role here. We'll start with that strange case of the Pennsylvania school bus driver who took those kids for a ride yesterday. We had several break-ins in the show yesterday covering this. CNN's Deborah Feyerick is -- if I pronounced it right, if wrong, Deborah, please let me know -- she's covering the story -- it's Feyerick, I'm sorry -- covering the story and joining us now from Exeter Township in Pennsylvania. Hi?

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: How are you doing?

BOORTZ: Just fine.

FEYERICK: Well, Neal, the way it stands right now is that classes went off without a hitch today. Everything was very normal. The kids came. There were a lot of press people as you can imagine, a lot of interest in this story. But the classes, no problem. The buses came, they went, all on time, all without any surprising detours. And right now everything is pretty much getting back to normal here.

The man at the center of this, Otto Nuss, he is on his way to Philadelphia right now. He was in Maryland. Now they are transporting him. He did have a hearing earlier. And at that hearing, he was basically read his rights. He spoke with a judge. He seemed distraught. At one point, he put his head in his hands and he shook it. And his lawyer stood up and said he wants me to tell the court it was a set up. Now, nobody exactly know what is that means. However, he did appear to be sorry about what had happened -- Neal.

BOORTZ: Will he have psychological testing? Is that in the works for him?

FEYERICK: There was some testing earlier this morning as they were going over his background and certainly that's something that's going to be looked into because he did make the comment at one point, asked about whether he was taking any sort of medication specifically for any behavioral problem, and he looked at the judge and he said I'm not insane.

BOORTZ: Well, at any -- these children, I'm sure a lot of people have talked to the 13 children that were on the bus. Have any of them indicated that they were actually frightened and felt like they were at risk during this little tour?

FEYERICK: Well, they were definitely frightened. A couple of the younger kids told the bus driver that they wanted to go home. And he said no, we are not going home. But the older kids really almost made a game of the ride. They were waving at passing cars. They were even trying to get trucks to honk their horns. So they -- one eighth grader who was on the bus said that they were pretty relaxed. They were scared about the gun. That was the big question. Nobody knew why he had brought the gun, what it was doing there.

But this was an older man who was very much trusted by these children because he was just so nice for the entire semester really. He started driving back in September and they had never had any problems.

BOORTZ: Well, it almost seems kind of sad for this old guy but you can't run off with 13 kids like that in a school bus. Deborah, thank you so much for your coverage on this, we appreciate it.

Now we are going to talk to these talk show hosts about it, Victoria, and Lionel and of course Mark. Do you have anything to say on this? Whoever speaks first gets the floor first.

JONES: I think the guy is a looney and I think he needs medical care. I don't think he should be prosecuted for kidnapping. I don't think he intended that. I don't think he should be around kids any more, probably not driving buses. And he probably shouldn't have access to firearms, but I think he's a looney who needs to be looked after. He needs actually some care and mercy rather than harsh justice.

BOORTZ: Are any of you concerned now how Pennsylvania or any other jurisdiction goes about choosing school bus drivers?

RILEY: Well, you would hope that they would do a better job. And I agree that the man deserves help and needs help. But I have to say I think bringing guns around kids is a serious, serious offense and he ought to be punished for it. He needs help, but on that level, maybe not charged with kidnapping. But you just don't bring -- I have a five-year-old. I don't want anybody bringing guns around children.

LIONEL: You know, Neal, he is -- I don't think what anybody says, he's charged with and, in my opinion, guilty of false imprisonment. Anytime I take you someplace or do something with you, not let you leave, that's technically kidnapping. This guy is insane. I mean, he took him where, to drive around to see Washington? And, you know, now we are going to see background checks of school bus drivers like we are seeing with airport security people.

BOORTZ: Maybe we ought to federalize them, huh, Lionel?

LIONEL: Yes, and have them have a high school education. Remember years ago...

BOORTZ: And then be searched before they get on the school bus?

LIONEL: Remember years ago, Chowchilla? Remember this guy who took a school bus years ago. You know, this is just -- he's a pitiful old man. He has got a gun. He's a loon. I don't know what the big issue is other than the fact of lock him up. I mean...

BOORTZ: Mark, before we go to the audience, since I'm a part of the mix here too, we should not have guns around kids. I want to remind you that you over the last couple of years in three of these school shootings, not the one in the college the couple weeks ago, though the same facts are true, in three school shootings, the shooter was stopped by a civilian with guns. So there's guns around kids, Mark, being used for a good purpose.

RILEY: OK, that's being used for a good purpose. To what purpose did this guy have a gun in command of a school bus full of kids? I mean, is somebody wants to argue that this was a good purpose?

JONES: He seems to have been saying something like that it was a response to bin Laden or something. I think in his head it was for a good purpose which is another reason why the guy is a looney and he...

BOORTZ: Maybe protecting the kids.

JONES: I totally agree with Lionel that this guy is insane, and of course he shouldn't have access to guns, and of course he shouldn't have access to buses and kids. But I don't think putting him away for kidnapping for years and years and years is going to help anybody, least of all him.

BOORTZ: I agree, Victoria. And Chris has somebody in the audience already.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is Matia (ph). Matia is from Atlanta, Neal. Go ahead, Matia.

MATIA (ph): First of all, I am your biggest fan. OK.

BOORTZ: You are talking to Chris, aren't you?

MATIA: No, I'm talking to you, buddy.

BOORTZ: Thanks.

MATIA: But I think this guy -- first of all, he had a rifle on the bus, correct? What was that doing on the bus with a bunch of kids?

BOORTZ: I think it was a shotgun.

MATIA: Yes, exactly it. And if he didn't have any bad intentions, if he was just, you know, taking them for a parade around town or around three different states, whatever the hell it was, why was he turning himself in to police?

BOORTZ: I don't know.

JONES: Because he's a looney. I mean, we are looking for logic here. We are dealing with someone who is mad.

BOORTZ: So maybe he could be a talk show host.

JONES: Absolutely. He'll get a second career.

RILEY: How do mad people in charge of school children?

BOORTZ: We have to take...

RILEY: How does somebody that's mad end up being in charge of a bus load full of kids? If he's looney how does that happen?

JONES: That's very scary. That's very scary.

BOORTZ: Mark, I'm sure there's more of that...

JONES: He passed background checks.

BOORTZ: My friends, time is up. We're going to be back. We're going to put a lid on that topic and we have a lot to cover from Enron to teens to sexy for their skating outfits. Stay where you are, Free- for-all Friday. We'll be back, TALKBACK LIVE.

(APPLAUSE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ANNOUNCER: Up next, the hockey dad wants a new trial.

THOMAS ORLANDI, THOMAS JUNTA'S ATTORNEY: The family and all of Tom's friends are terribly saddened by the judge's extreme sentence.

ANNOUNCER: Is six to 10 extreme for involuntary manslaughter?

MICHAEL COSTIN JR., VICTIM'S SON: No matter how much of a sentence that you give to Thomas Junta, my dad got more.

ANNOUNCER: Should he just do the time?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ORLANDI: The family and all of Tom's friends are terribly saddened by the judge's extreme sentence. We had had hoped the judge would adopt an alternative sentence based on the numerous mitigating circumstances of a man with no prior record.

JOHN MCEVOY, ASST. DISTRICT ATTORNEY, MIDDLESEX COUNTY: The sentence today of six to 10 years to state prison obviously will not bring Michael Costin back, but it does provide, I believe, a measure of justice to the Costin family, the Reading community and the public at large.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(APPLAUSE)

BOORTZ: OK. Hockey dad Thomas Junta been sentenced to serve six to 10 years for the beating death of another hockey dad, Michael Costin. And Junta was convicted involuntary manslaughter, could have had 20 years. The judge said he wanted to give him more. Junta's lawyers are calling the sentence too extreme and they want a new trial.

Our panel of experts, Mark Riley, Lionel -- guess his last name -- Victoria Jones. OK, Victoria, is Mark (sic) Junta a looney?

JONES: No, he's not a looney. He was out of control and so was the dead guy, unfortunately. They both were -- there are no winners in this case. We have children who have lost fathers. We have a community that is devastated. He's going away for quite a long time. He's going to miss his kids growing up, and the other kids have no dad to watch them growing up. There are no winners here. What you have were two guy whose shouldn't have been fighting about something that didn't matter. That's the tragedy.

BOORTZ: Mark, Lionel, how can we avoid something like this in the future in youth sports? Just keep the parents away, maybe?

RILEY: No, I don't think you keep the parents away. Parents obviously love to watch their kids compete, love to watch their children perform. I think this sentence, in fact, sends out a message that, you know, taking a person's life at a sporting event that your child is participating in is absolutely wrong. I think six to 10 years is an entirely appropriate sentence for the fact that a man lost his life here. And I think that, at a point, there has to be a message sent that this kind of behavior won't be tolerated.

LIONEL: You know, Neal, one of the things that gets me is how we are making euphemisms, hockey dad. Hockey dad? How about killer. He's a killer. He killed this guy. He slammed his head repeatedly after protest, get off. You are going to kill him. What does this have to do with...

(APPLAUSE)

What does this have to do sports? What does this have to do with it? It's a murder and he should get more than that.

BOORTZ: Lionel, the guy was walking away. He was walking away from the confrontation when Costin waded right back into it.

JONES: No, that's not quite true.

LIONEL: So what?

JONES: He had walked away, but he had come back in. This was his big mistake. After walking away, he walks back in. Costin again, I think, threw the first punch and then the two were at it. It definitely is a killing. It's not a murder. I don't think he intended to kill him. The consequence was a death. But this was a tragedy and he certainly should be doing a good deal of time. This was not a premeditated murder.

LIONEL: Listen, I know, that's why the jury convicted him of the lesser included. This is not a slugfest. This is not fisticuffs. This is -- I mean, come on. Look at this man. It's not a hockey dad.

JONES: That's how we do it in Boston, that...

LIONEL: Put him in for more.

BOORTZ: OK. Chris has somebody in the audience here at CNN center -- Chris.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... in the 11th grade. Go ahead.

BOORTZ: Oh, you did.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Michael was a student of mine in suburban Boston at Linfield High School. He was a high school junior at the time. I knew him and I remember a quiet smile, and it's a very tragic...

BOORTZ: Well, this touches you personally then.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... situation. Very much so. BOORTZ: OK. Let me ask you this because there was testimony and we have heard that he's had some problems with the law and was somewhat of a hot head. Did you see any of this when you were teaching him?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Not in my time in the '70s at Linfield High School. And it was also a sad time for the Costin family. They were dealing with another untimely loss in the family during that era. So I only knew Michael as a very quiet, reserved and respectful person.

BOORTZ: It's amazing to all of a sudden find one of your former students in the middle of a very controversial national story like this.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a terrible tragedy and the worst part of it is that even with a sentence imposed by the court today, nothing restores Michael to his children and his family.

BOORTZ: And Junta won't be restored to his children and family for many, many years to come. Lionel, you used to be a federal prosecutor. What kind of charge would you have asked for against this man?

LIONEL: Well, again, not a federal -- doesn't matter -- but state.

BOORTZ: I'm sorry. State prosecutor.

LIONEL: No, no, that's OK.

BOORTZ: Just trying to promote you, Lionel.

LIONEL: I think the -- well, it depends upon what neighborhood you are from. I think Victoria is correct. There was no indication that this man, that Junta intended to kill Mr. Costin, that that was his intention. It was an accident. It was a -- he intended to beat the hell out of him which is what he did.

I think the charge -- I think the jury was most sapient in their verdict because it was involuntary manslaughter. I think the verdict or the sentence I guess apparently according to their state guidelines makes sense. But again, I want to keep saying this is nothing to do with sports, hockey dad, this and that. It's a brutal situation and the message is you are a grown man. You are not supposed to be hitting anybody. And if you do hit somebody with such ferocity as this and somebody dies, remember Junta. You know, kids today on TV...

JONES: And nobody will. Here's the other tragedy. Nobody who is that out of control and about to get into a fight over anything is going to think, Junta got six to 10. I'm walking away. That's the sad part.

LIONEL: Maybe one.

JONES: Maybe one. I don't think so. BOORTZ: Lionel, Victoria, Mark, we had a case here in Atlanta a couple of years ago at a baseball game where a little league dad, if you'll pardon me, took a bat to another father and busted his arm and hand up. The other father happened to be a surgeon. He was a surgeon. Put him out of work.

JONES: Wow.

LIONEL: Can I ask you a question? When did this happen? I don't about Mark or if you remember. I was in sports. It's as though somebody rang the bell and said, from now on, human beings are going to go nuts at child sporting events. When did this happen?

BOORTZ: Lionel, when I was little league in California in the 1950s, this was going -- oh my gosh, am I that old?

Hey, we have to take a break. Still ahead, the Enron meltdown information about the apparent suicide of a vice chairman, a former top Enron official. TALKBACK LIVE and we'll be right back.

(APPLAUSE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOORTZ: Welcome back to free-for-all Friday. I'm Neal Boortz. And now, they think they will find a shred of evidence against Enron? Let's take a quick look at that mess. The captain of this sinking ship, Kenneth Lay, he has already jumped overboard. He's in his lifeboat somewhere. A former auditor is pleading the Fifth in front of Congress and pointing fingers at everybody else. Congress is up to its ears in Enron campaign contributions.

And today, a former Enron vice chairman, J. Clifford Baxter, was found dead in his car. Now here's a guy who has resigned last May after questioning the company's financial practices. Now he shows up dead in a car? CNN correspondent Ed Lavandera, he's following the Enron story in Houston. And Ed, it just gets wilder and wilder.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's been a wild two and a half months for the folks who still work at Enron. We were talking to a couple of people yesterday, after Ken Lay's resignation was announced and they said that a lot of people were just starting to feel exhausted by everything. And of course, this takes a turn on a very emotional point. So it's just becoming a lot tougher for a lot of these people to handle.

BOORTZ: Well, Ed, this Baxter, if the information is correct, last May he was calling into question Enron's accounting practices. He resigned, apparently in protest, and now he shows up dead. They are talking suicide, but it has to look a little bit suspicious to some people out there. This is a guy that could have made the going very difficult for some other people.

LAVANDERA: Well, I'll leave that part for other people to say, but his name popped up in the Sharon Watkins memo that she sent to Ken Lay in August. You know, we have heard so much about this letter. But when that letter came out, in that letter she writes that Cliff Baxter was somebody who was complaining about what he thought were the inappropriate accounting practices of these partnerships, LJM partnerships, which, if you have been following the story at all, you can get an understanding of that -- because of these partnerships it's what kind of led to Enron's collapse, and that he was complaining, outspoken, to Jeff Skilling, who at the time was the president of the company, and to anyone else who would listen.

So it is definitely someone who kept to himself. He was also named in a lawsuit here that was filed in federal court in Houston. He was one of the top shareholders in Enron. He sold off hundreds of thousands of shares of stock last January, cashing out for $22 million. Sold the stock at its peek at $80 a share. So we have a lot of different pieces of information, and exactly how this puzzle all fits together is extremely unclear at this point.

BOORTZ: Well, Ed, I know you're busy, and more to cover. Thank you so much for a few moments with us on TALKBACK LIVE.

And Lionel, I'm going straight to you on this one. Again, a former state prosecutor, this guy pointing fingers, resigning in protest, now turning up dead. Does this sound any alarms with you at all?

LIONEL: It stinks! Now, what the Republicans are going to say...

BOORTZ: Say what you mean, Lionel, say what you mean..

LIONEL: ... is figure out, the Republicans are going to try to figure out some way to bring Bill Clinton into this, or Hillary, and they're going to say Vince Foster and -- listen. This thing stinks so bad. This thing is rotten. Enron had three -- over 3,000 partnerships and subsidiaries. One company per seven employees? And wait! I love the way the Republicans and the Bush people are saying, hey, we let it fail. We did the right thing! We didn't do anything!

No. That's not the answer.

BOORTZ: Lionel, they could not -- if they had done anything, you would be criticizing them for doing something in exchange for campaign contributions.

LIONEL: It goes to show you that sometimes being too connected can hurt you. This thing should sound alarm bells like nobody's business. And my favorite, too, is you hear these right-wing fascist talk show hosts who say, well, the reason why -- the reason why the Democrats are so upset over this is because they are getting back at the Republicans for WhiteWater. WhiteWater? A $300,000 failed land deal? This is enormous! This has no parallel! Oh, heads are going to roll.

BOORTZ: OK. Lionel -- while Lionel does his Ritalin dose, we're going to get Mark and Victoria in here.

RILEY: I have to say right off the top I don't think that the Congress of the United States at this point should be investigating Enron at all. Both Republicans and Democrats have taken money from this corporation. And to me, that should disqualify the entire body. There should be some independent people brought in.

I agree with Lionel, too. I imagine several people having Vince Foster moments in the wake of this guy committing suicide like this. But the bottom line is, these guys -- I don't know about the rest of you, but back in the day here in New York they used to have three-card monty players almost on every block, where guys would be flipping cards over trying to get people to pick which one was the red and which ones were the black. It seems like Enron was the greatest three-card monty players in American history.

BOORTZ: Victoria, before we leave this topic, I want your opinion.

JONES: I mean, this whole thing was like (UNINTELLIGIBLE) game. I don't know whether this man committed suicide or not. That's open to question at this point. But everything that everybody else has said is true.

And the other piece of this is we have got ruined, fragmented lives, thousands and thousands of people whose lives have been ruined because they were lied to greedy people who were already rich who wanted to be richer. And it stinks. And Congress needs to give every piece of campaign contribution they have ever had to the funds for the employees, and so does everybody in the administration. Then maybe they will be cleaned down.

BOORTZ: And you'll turn down your next pay raise, right, because you are already rich and it would stink...

JONES: I'm not already rich. No, don't try and play apples and oranges with me here, Neal.

BOORTZ: Well, I mean, you're doing some rich-bashing here, Victoria.

JONES: There's a big difference. No, I'm not doing rich- bashing. What I'm saying is these were people who already knew that the stock was going down. They knew that the employees were going to suffer, and they cashed out. That's crooked, and that's wrong. That's what I'm saying.

BOORTZ: I agree with you on that. Now, that story is going to grow more tentacles. Back to it at some other time.

It's time to move on right now after this news break. You'll be surprised. This is TALKBACK LIVE.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOORTZ: All right, everybody. Welcome back to TALKBACK LIVE: "America Speaks Out."

Now, Johnny Taliban, John Walker Lindh, is wearing a sporty little buzz cut right now. And his beard is gone. And the man who admits fighting for the Taliban is going to go on trial not for treason. And his father -- and this has to be the line of the year -- says that his son loves America.

Our talk show staff for today: Mark Riley. We have Lionel. We have Victoria Jones. And I have had enough to say about the mullah of Marin this week.

Which one of you wants to go first on this?

JONES: Wow, obviously, you are presuming he's innocent until he's proven guilty.

BOORTZ: That's for the jury, not for me.

JONES: Right.

BOORTZ: No, I have convicted him.

JONES: The thing with -- obviously, I think most people have already convicted him. The only question I have, I think this guy is a fool. I think he made some really bad choices. But they were his choices. I think al Qaeda is some kind of weirdo cult, but he walked into it with his eyes wide open.

My only question -- and I really seriously want this answered and I don't believe we are going to get an answer -- is what conditions he gave this so-called confession under. I know we want him convicted anyway. I know we don't care, but I think it's important to know. And whether he really did not want a lawyer, I want to know that, too.

BOORTZ: I don't want him convicted. I want him stripped of his citizenship and kicked out of the country.

JONES: Whatever.

BOORTZ: Then he can go anywhere he wants.

And we have somebody on the phone real quick. This is Dean.

JONES: No, you don't want him going anywhere. He'll make money. You don't want him to make money out of this.

BOORTZ: As long as he makes it somewhere else. Just get him out of this country. Get him out.

Dean from Florida -- go ahead, Dean.

CALLER: Yes, I agree with you as far as him being stripped of his citizenship and kicked out of the country. It should be decided by the fact he actually fought against U.S. national forces in Afghanistan. He might actually have had prior knowledge of September 11, too. He also should be found guilty on all charges. And the trial should be televised, because maybe this might prevent future young men or women who actually think about committing treason against our country from having second thoughts about doing that. BOORTZ: OK, Dean, I agree with everything except the televised trial.

Lionel, yes.

RILEY: Something is troubling me here. That caller just said he's guilty on all counts. He hasn't even been tried yet, for God's sake.

LIONEL: By the way, so far, the only thing -- and Mark is right -- the only thing that has happened is that they have filed an affidavit which basically supports his arrest. They are now going to go to a grand jury. He hasn't been indicted. He's presumed innocent. And yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

I got news for you. You can charge him with anything you want. That guy is going down. Is he going to get a fair trial? No way.

JONES: Of course not.

LIONEL: We don't care. Now, but here's the thing. Neal and everybody, when you are arrested, the first thing you do after you have given the speech, after you have told the cops, post Miranda, is that: I was giving it -- I gave that speech under coercion, under the apparent authority of nine Marines standing around with AR-15s. Yes, yes, yes, right.

I want to know, how does this guy gain weight? For 52 days, he's kept whatever it is. They shave him. He comes back. He's overweight. Did they drug him?

BOORTZ: Lionel, we have somebody in the audience. But I want to say, I think he's going to get one of the fairest trials in the history of this country. And I'll disagree with you on that point.

And, Chris.

STAFF: This is Jim. He is an Army veteran.

Go ahead, Jim.

JIM: Yes, I would like to say I think that they should take John Walker, along with the executives of Enron, and put them all together and they could be roommates at a federal penitentiary someplace.

(APPLAUSE)

JONES: Now, I like that. That's the best suggestion of the day. Yes, that's a good one. Let's send them all to Guantanamo Bay together, have them all mix it up.

It's really bizarre. I don't think he can get a fair trial in the sense that the government has to get a conviction. Let's talk politics here. They have to get a conviction. But Lionel is absolutely right. Everybody claims: Oh, my confession was coerced. And yet there are a small amount of people whose confessions really were coerced. And I think, if we believe in the justice system, which we do, and we are better than the people who don't believe in our justice system, then we have a duty to find out the truth.

(CROSSTALK)

BOORTZ: Mark, real quick.

LIONEL: There's something about: Why are people so worried about this guy being misguided? "He's 20. He's misguided."

No, he's not misguided. He's going down. He's going to be found guilty. He pointed a gun at American soldiers. Why are we giving like the hockey dad, this misguided youth?

JONES: Who is saying he's misguided? Only his parents. He made his own choices. No one has said he is misguided.

BOORTZ: Leave them wanting more. Leave them wanting more. That's enough about Johnny Taliban. We're going to move on now to something else: the brazen, the breasts and the beads. Oh, boy, this is going to be fun.

Stay where you are. TALKBACK LIVE will be right back.

ANNOUNCER: Still ahead: Should Olympic skaters put sex on ice?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look at this. This looks like something you might see on the Spice Channel.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: Also, street show: If you bare your breast for beads on Bourbon Street, do your private parts become public property?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOORTZ: OK. The producers of TALKBACK LIVE are pushing me to the edge today, like with this topic. Skaters, would you please leave something to the imagination for us here?

And that's the message that Olympic judges are giving the figure skaters at the Winter Games -- going to start in a few weeks. These upside-down splits and dirty-dancing maneuvers could cost the competitors points. They could lose. But some insiders say that these judges are really just old fogies not keeping up with the times. Those risque moves aren't salacious at all. They're just athletic.

Mark Riley, Lionel, Victoria Jones, who is first on this one?

(CROSSTALK)

JONES: Can you imagine how much these women are paying every month in bikini waxes? Can you imagine? I hope it's tax deductible.

BOORTZ: Victoria, I can't imagine.

JONES: I'm speaking to 51 percent of the population.

(CROSSTALK)

LIONEL: Hang on here, honey.

The only reason that anybody would ever want to watch figure skating is because of the crotch shots. You take that away and you have got your sports, just like female volley ball. I would rather drink bleach than watch figure skating.

(CROSSTALK)

BOORTZ: You have no class.

RILEY: I don't watch figure skating either.

BOORTZ: Have you...

RILEY: I watch "The Three Stooges," not figure skating.

BOORTZ: Have you ever been to a figure skating competition, Lionel?

LIONEL: No. And if I did, I wouldn't admit it.

BOORTZ: OK, well, there is expert testimony.

LIONEL: Let me tell you something, female volleyball, Gabrielle Reece, why do we watch female volleyball? Believe me, it ain't the sport. OK?

BOORTZ: Lionel, I know you had something for Tonya Harding, anyway, for awhile, didn't you, for a while?

LIONEL: I loved Tonya Harding. Are you kidding? She had spunk. But that's another story.

Listen, let's face it. This is -- figure skating is one of the few sports that women really do better than men -- figure skating, gymnastics, synchronized swimming. Come on. Who thinks of figure skating as being sexually provocative? I'm a pretty freaky guy. I never thought that.

(CROSSTALK)

JONES: I don't know. Floor gymnastics, for example, they are like lap dances, pretty much, with under age kids. Floor gymnastics is pretty sick.

RILEY: You know what? If you want to see lap dances on television, you buy the Playboy Channel. You don't have to watch figure skating for that. This is the 21st century. You can watch whatever you want to watch.

(CROSSTALK)

RILEY: Look, I think mostly women watch this stuff anyway. I don't know that many guys who watch it.

BOORTZ: I just do not understand where we got such a classless bunch of talk show hosts. I'm the only one that likes figure skating.

JONES: Neal, I like it. I love figure skating.

BOORTZ: OK, you and me, Victoria.

JONES: I love figure skating.

BOORTZ: You and me.

(CROSSTALK)

LIONEL: By the way, Neal, do you like show tunes, also? Do you like flower arranging, Neal?

BOORTZ: Yes, Lionel. I got your show tune right here, Lionel.

(LAUGHTER)

BOORTZ: OK. Let's hang up the skates. We are going to move to Bourbon Street right now, the other easy street where women bare their breasts for beads. And I just happen to have beads with me right here. And we're going to see what this audience is made up of. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOORTZ: I like Ashley's comment: "girls gone stupid."

OK, here's what we have. A blonde co-ed from Florida State bared her breasts -- this is the one -- on Bourbon Street for beads. Now, she was videotaped. It ended up in this videotape called "Girls Gone Wild." And it's on TV being advertised when we should be asleep. And now she is suing the makers of "Girls Gone Wild". She says they took cheap shots of her assets and put them on display for money.

I'm going to ask Mark Riley and Lionel and Victoria Jones, do any of you have an ounce of sympathy for this girl?

JONES: No.

RILEY: Maybe she should try figure skating.

JONES: She already -- she whipped them out. Did it for beads. If she's that cheap, is that all she wants is beads? I think she just wants a copy of the video now. She looked like she was enjoying herself to me.

And I think it's very sad and pathetic that women who decide to whip their breasts out in public later on want to turn around and say, Oh, I don't want anybody to look at them. Well, then keep them inside in the first place.

LIONEL: Air those puppies. Come on, Victoria, the whole world is waiting.

JONES: Grow up, Lionel.

LIONEL: Listen. There is a civil tort called appropriating somebody's likeness for pecuniary gain.

(CROSSTALK)

JONES: And that's the only problem with this. That's why she should get cut into the profit. She'll be happy then.

BOORTZ: She was on public property and she got paid. She got beads.

LIONEL: Do you know that there was a fellow here in New York who was taped at the U.S. Open one time eating a hot dog sloppily and David Letterman played it.

Now they are telling people that you may in fact be videotaped. Now, I know the audience is saying: Look, she went like this.

And, by the way, I'd say: Honey, you see the guy with the video camera? What do you think he's doing with that?

JONES: That's the whole point.

LIONEL: And also...

JONES: She had to have a reasonable expectation that there were people with cameras, if she could see the cameras, who were taking pictures of her. She had to know.

LIONEL: But they are selling. They are selling it and making money.

JONES: Right. So cut her into the profits, which is what she probably wants. We'll already know she'll do it for beads. Maybe she will do it for cash, too.

BOORTZ: Mark, you are being very quiet.

RILEY: Next time, they need signed release forms. This is -- God, are we actually discussing this during a time when American troops are at risk overseas? I mean, my goodness.

BOORTZ: This is Friday. We need relief.

RILEY: I know. I know. I know.

JONES: What about the sick puppies who buy these video and watch them? Why aren't we talking about them? LIONEL: Victoria, lighten up. There's nothing wrong with it.

RILEY: They were doing this in New York for a long period of time, the same thing: surreptitiously taking video shots of women in the train and that sort of thing.

LIONEL: Neal, would you look at this video? Come on, be honest now, Mr. figure skater.

BOORTZ: Well, only so I could do a good job of hosting this segment, Lionel. It's show prep.

LIONEL: Women are beautiful, Victoria. I love them. Show me one. Show me 10. I love them.

(CROSSTALK)

JONES: I'm very glad to hear it. Your own sexual peculiarities are, however, your own. Whatever they are, you are welcome to them.

BOORTZ: Hey, Lionel, you're a pig.

JONES: But this isn't the point. The point is, if she'll whip them out for beads, then just pay her off. That's my point. I have no problem with anybody whipping their breasts out at Mardi Gras. Everybody knows what that is about. She knew what it was about.

BOORTZ: Let's get somebody -- OK. See, you are asking why we are talking about it and you are more animated about this than any other topic today.

Chris has somebody in the audience.

Go ahead.

STAFF: This is Alex, Neal. He's from Germany. He has a comment.

ALEX: Well, I think it's just -- it only happens in America. That wouldn't be a problem in Europe. Or if people go out on streets and they want to have fun, they have fun. But they sue people for putting that on videotape, it's ridiculous.

BOORTZ: Alex, we are prudes, aren't we? Now, come on.

LIONEL: No, you are a prude, Neal.

BOORTZ: Oh, Lionel, you are a pig.

(LAUGHTER)

ALEX: Well, to the outside, you are, most of the time, pretty prude. But backwards, no, not really.

LIONEL: No, but the best porn in the world, Neal, is German.

BOORTZ: I'll take you as the expert on that.

(LAUGHTER)

LIONEL: Clearly.

BOORTZ: OK. We have Kim on the telephone.

Kim, go ahead.

CALLER: Hi.

I am a model. And I know different things about my rights as far as pictures and rights to pictures. And just because a girl bares her breast in public does not mean that she can't have any kind of compensation if it's then being sold after the fact.

BOORTZ: Kim, do you think she is after money or publicity? Is she after a Playboy spread, maybe a movie role somewhere?

CALLER: I think she's probably after money, and rightfully so. If somebody takes my picture, even if I'm fully clothed, and then I see a videotape of my body, whatever I might have on, and it's being sold, I have the right to whatever they are making.

(CROSSTALK)

RILEY: She is not asking the court to compensate or order compensation. She is asking that the videotapes be killed, that they not be shown.

(CROSSTALK)

JONES: It's too late. It's the world of the Internet. It's way too late. That ship has sailed. They are out there. And they are staying out there.

RILEY: Of course it is. But she's not asking to be compensated. We ought to be clear about that. She may want to be compensated, but she's not asking to be compensated.

LIONEL: She is asking for an injunction.

BOORTZ: Now, what about paparazzi? Paparazzi take pictures.

LIONEL: A great opera singer.

BOORTZ: Yes.

And they don't have to pay the artist that they snap on the -- going into the restaurants and on sidewalks and public events. So -- and, yes, they are selling their pictures. They're making money with those pictures. So what's the difference with somebody making money from a Bourbon Street videotape?

RILEY: Well, they are celebrities. And perhaps people are held to a different standard from that vantage point. But I have got to say, if someone bares their breast, certainly they ought to know that people are going to ogle. But I don't think this woman or most women that are on these videos know the economics of making them. The fact of the matter is, these guys are making humongous amounts of profits because they aren't paying anybody.

JONES: Well, that's a very good point.

LIONEL: I think it's a great American tradition.

JONES: And that's actually the only sad part about it, is that women are bearing their breasts and guys are making money out of it. That's sad, but that, unfortunately, is a reality of life.

BOORTZ: Well, that's because of people like Lionel, Victoria.

JONES: Well, apparently he is keeping them in business. Maybe he has stock. I don't know.

RILEY: Oh, look, there's millions of guys like Lionel. Don't think for a minute that men -- men love stuff like that. We are human beings.

LIONEL: Everybody in your audience right now would love to see somebody stand up right now and be nude.

(CROSSTALK)

BOORTZ: It's not going to happen, Lionel.

Chris has somebody. We have about 15 seconds.

So, go ahead, Erica.

STAFF: Go ahead, Erica.

ERICA: I just wanted to say that if you bare your breasts in public, you shouldn't be surprised that people are going to see it. But I'm curious to how she ended up seeing herself on the video anyway in the first place.

(CROSSTALK)

RILEY: "Hey, did you see yourself on TV?"

BOORTZ: My friends, we have had a lot of fun. And, sadly, we are out of time. And I want to say how much I have enjoyed hosting TALKBACK LIVE this week and how great the people here at CNN have been.

Mark, Lionel, Victoria, see you people soon. Thank you very much.

JONES: Thank you.

BOORTZ: Tune in again, TALKBACK LIVE on Monday. I'm Neal Boortz. And that does it for me. Now I get my free CNN TALKBACK LIVE coffee cup. Thank you.

(APPLAUSE)

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