..with Dr. Sanjay Gupta and TruTV's Sunny Hostin report
Crime & Punishment: Should Loughner be medicated?
Editor's note: Anderson Cooper speaks with Dr. Sanjay Gupta and TruTV's Sunny Hostin about Jared Lee Loughner's mental status.
Judge orders hearing on forcibly medicating Loughner
By the CNN Wire Staff
June 28, 2011 -- 9:55 p.m. EDT
(CNN) -- A federal judge set a hearing for Wednesday on a legal challenge to a decision to forcibly medicate Arizona shooting suspect Jared Lee Loughner in a federal prison hospital.
In an order dated Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Larry Alan Burns scheduled the hearing for the U.S. Federal Court in San Diego.
Lawyers representing Loughner contend that forcing him to take mind-altering psychotropic drugs against his will violates his rights. Prosecutors responded Tuesday that prison officials acted properly in ordering the medication, which they said was necessary for Loughner to control his schizophrenia.
Loughner, 22, is charged in the January mass shooting in which six people were killed and 13 wounded, including Democratic U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, in front of a Safeway grocery story in Tucson, Arizona. A federal judge ruled last month that Loughner was not competent to stand trial, and he was sent to the federal facility in Springfield, Missouri.
His lawyers conceded in their emergency motion filed June 24 that they were uncertain whether officials at the U.S. Medical Center for Federal Prisoners, where Loughner was transferred in late May to try to restore his mental competency, had started administering the drugs.
However, they said prison officials held a deficient hearing process and used faulty reasoning in deciding to drug Loughner against his will.
For example, Loughner had no attorney present at the June 14 hearing, the lawyers said in their motion, and officials failed to state the drug and dosage he should receive.
According to the emergency motion, authorities had earlier assessed Loughner as dangerous because of incidents before his transfer to the Springfield prison: He threw a chair against a door and spit at an attorney.
However, the reasoning by prison officials in Springfield for deciding to administer the drugs was to treat Loughner's mental illness, rather than to subdue any dangerous behavior, the motion noted.
Prosecutors argued in their response that Loughner received a proper administrative hearing on the matter, and the medication prescribed was necessary to prevent him from being a danger to himself and others.
Editor's note: Anderson Cooper speaks with journalist Erin Cunningham about a brazen attack on a hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Seven Taliban attacked Kabul's Hotel Inter-Continental in a brazen, carefully orchestrated operation that began Tuesday night and continued into Wednesday, ending with their deaths and those of 11 other people some six hours after it began, police said.
"We are still searching the hotel; the death number may increase," said Chief of Criminal Investigations Mohammad Zahir on Wednesday morning. Twelve people were wounded or injured, he added.
"The situation is secure," Interior Minister Bismullah Khan said. By then, the top floor of the hotel was ablaze, but within a couple of hours, the flames were gone, though smoke continued to rise from the wreckage.
Two security personnel were killed in the attack, he said.
By dawn, security forces were allowing reporters to approach the hotel, and some guests were seen departing.
Saiz Ahmed, a U.S. citizen in Kabul for a Ph.D. project, was among them. "I'm sure none of us thought we were going to make it," he said after having stayed on the floor of his darkened bedroom for more than five hours listening to gunfire and occasional bomb blasts. "I wrote my little will -- just in case."
The Taliban penetrated the hotel's typically heavy security in the attack, and one of them detonated an explosion on the second floor, said Erin Cunningham, a journalist for The Daily in Kabul.
Rocket-propelled grenades were launched from the roof of the hotel toward the first vice president's house. A few moments later, the hotel was rocked by three explosions, one of which knocked her off her feet, Cunningham said. U.S. forces were on the scene, she added.
At about 2 a.m., four hours after the attack began, International Security Assistance Force helicopters fired at insurgents on the roof, killing as many as three of the gunmen, ISAF spokesman Maj. Tim James told CNN.
An hour later, ISAF said the Afghan security forces had cleared the roof and were clearing the rest of the hotel.
At 4 a.m., police believed that all the attackers were dead, "but one was alive and hidden, and he started to resist" and continued to do so until 6:20 a.m., Zahir said.
At least one of the attackers detonated his explosives, said Afghan Lt. Gen. Mohammad Ayoub Salangi, the city's chief of police.
A spokesman for the Taliban, Zabiullah Mujahid, said in an e-mail that the suicide attackers entered the hotel after killing the security guards at the entrance.
"One of the suicide attackers told us on the phone that they are in the lobby and chasing guests into their rooms by smashing the doors of the rooms," Mujahid told CNN in an e-mail he sent as the incident was unfolding.
There were no indications that U.S. military or diplomatic personnel were at the hotel, U.S. officials told CNN.
The Inter-Continental is popular among international guests. A news conference had been scheduled to take place there Wednesday to discuss the planned transition of security from international to Afghan forces that U.S. President Barack Obama announced last week. Obama was briefed on the attack while en route back to Washington from Iowa, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.
Members of the Afghan National Security Forces were on the scene, but the city police had the lead, ISAF Maj. Jason Waggoner said in a statement. Waggoner said ISAF forces provided "some limited assistance."
Electricity around the hotel was shut off, said Jerome Starkey, a reporter for The Times.
The United States condemned the attack on the hotel, with State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland saying it "once again demonstrates the terrorists' complete disregard for human life."
The hotel was developed by the InterContinental Hotels Group and opened in 1969. But it has had no association with the group since the Soviet invasion in 1979, though it continues to use the name and logo without connection to the parent company.
The incident came on the same day that Lt. Gen. William B. Caldwell announced that NATO and other members of the international community involved in Afghanistan have decided to increase the number of security forces in the Afghan National Army and the Afghan National Police to 352,000.
The current number of Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police is about 300,000, the commander of the NATO training mission in Afghanistan and commanding general of the Combined Security Transition Command told the Atlanta Press Club.
The increased number will be sufficient to give the Afghans security without coalition forces having to do it, he said.
Tuesday's attack recalls a November 2008 assault on luxury hotels in Mumbai, India, which left more than 160 dead, including nine of the 10 gunmen who launched the attacks.
Officials said the gunmen targeted the Oberoi and the Taj Mahal hotels for their popularity with international travelers and tourists. The Taj Mahal was set afire.
The three-day stand-off between gunmen and police ended with the capture of Mohammad Ajmal Kasab, the only surviving gunman. Kasab was sentenced to death in 2010 and is awaiting an appeal of the decision to the Supreme Court in New Delhi. India says Kasab has told investigators that he and the others were trained for more than a year in Pakistan by Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, a banned Islamic militant group.
CNN's Reza Sayah in Islamabad, Pakistan; Tom Watkins in Atlanta; Barbara Starr, Larry Shaughnessy and Elise Labott in Washington and journalist Jonathan Boone in Kabul contributed to this report.
Prone on the floor, U.S. guest wrote his will in Kabul hotel
By the CNN Wire Staff
June 29, 2011 -- 5:55 a.m. EDT
Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Saiz Ahmed, an American Ph.D. student in Kabul studying Afghan legal history, had just eaten dinner and returned to his fourth-floor room at the Hotel Inter-Continental when he heard odd noises. His room was pitch black because the electricity was out, and he did not initially recognize the sounds.
"I thought it was construction," he said, recalling that a sign he had seen earlier in the day on the elevator apologizing to guests for work being done.
But the noises got louder, and he soon realized that it was not construction. "It was clear that people were shooting from inside the building -- a number of people I didn't know where -- and from outside," he said. "I didn't know who was who."
Over the three or four hours, the gunfire was punctuated by an explosion every 45 minutes or so, he said. "They might have been people blowing themselves up," he said, adding he heard six or seven such blasts.
As the blasts continued, he got calls on his cell phone from his relatives in Kabul, from his relatives in the United States and from the U.S. Embassy. All of them offered the same advice: Stay put.
Heeding that advice, he stayed inside the room on the floor, near a corner that he thought might be safest. But the explosions got closer.
"I've never experienced explosions that near," he said. "The ground shook."
The last explosion occurred frighteningly close. "I felt the ground move up," he said. "I was just praying that the next one wouldn't be right under me or above me or anywhere else where there were people."
Ahmed said he felt like death was imminent. "I'm sure none of us thought we were going to make it," he said. "I wrote my little will -- just in case."
He then placed the document in his pocket. It stipulates, according to Islamic law, the charities to which he wanted to donate.
Finally, after some six hours, he could hear English being spoken in the hallway yelling "fire" and urging guests locked in their rooms to come out. He followed their orders and entered the hallway, where the air was thick with dust. He and other guests there were ordered to put their hands up and identify themselves. They were escorted to the basement, where security officials checked them to ensure they were not Taliban and where relief cascaded upon them.
"As soon as we were able to get to the basement, people started praying, thanking God," he said.
After about an hour, they were released. The carcasses of cars that had been blown up littered the parking lot. Glass from the hotel windows lay in shards.
But, though they had been told the danger was over, shooting erupted nearby. Ahmed and a group of fellow guests ran down the hill on which the hotel was built.
Ahmed said he never saw the attackers and is glad he didn't. "I think I might not be here if that was the case," he said. Still, he had spent much of the night imagining what he would do if he had come into contact with them. "I could convince them that what they were doing was stupid," he said. "To target civilians like that."
But Ahmed said the experience has left him anxious to express himself to others, too, including to U.S. President Barack Obama, who announced last week that all of the 33,000 additional U.S. forces he ordered to Afghanistan in December 2009 will be home within 15 months.
"I'm very mad about this war -- on all sides," Ahmed said. "I'd say this war needs to end now. This war that his predecessor started could have been avoided. Forgive me for going off, but this is what I was thinking in my room when I didn't know if I would see my wife again, would see my family again. And I was thinking: This is the life of Afghans for the past 10 years."
The United States did not need to initiate a war nearly a decade ago to kill Osama bin Laden, whose al group carried out the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Ahmed said.
"I want everybody involved who has forces here on Afghan soil to think about that," he said. "There has got to be a peaceful solution to this. It's just crazy."
Description: Anderson answers @doug2209's question, "Is your new show going to be part news/political/entertainment? I hope that you incorporate something like "The Ridiculist" or "The Nth Degree" from the previous incarnation of your "AC360" show. I really enjoy that part of your show. Thanks, Doug."
Every so often, like, once in a blue moon, I share my position on Anderson's state of gayness. I have two opinions about it: first my own, very personal opinion that he IS Gay and dating Benjamin; second my public opinion that he IS Gay and dating Benjamin; BUT, in all fairness I have to state, as my public opinion only, that Anderson's gayness is purely an expression of good wishes for him; I have no proof of it otherwise.
Although the signs might be there, I have no word from him or Benjamin or any "good" friend of theirs, nor a photographic or recorded item that might say "Yes, I am Anderson Cooper and I am totally Gay." And without such evidence I must admit that all my writing and talking about Anderson being Gay is just that: writing and talking about Anderson being Gay.
But, as I said, the signs are all there and I have a very strong Gaydar (although with Anderson it would not have to be all that strong, a weak Gaydar would do), and a little evidence, like the pictures above and below here; they are a very positive indication of a Benjamin/Anderson love relationship.
As you very well have noticed, I post my personal opinion in this blog. My public opinion I generally prefer to keep to myself. And I will continue to post from my reality that Anderson & Benjamin are boyfriends who, now that New York has come to its senses, will be married soon and will live happy ever after!
Where did they come up with these "knock-knock" jokes? They are awful, not funny at all. Anderson is a much, much better writer of comedy one liners. No doubt about it.
June 24, 2011
Some knee-slappin’ knock-knock jokes for Anderson Cooper
“I bet at the Daily Caller, if someone tells a knock-knock joke, everyone runs to the door to see who comes in.” — Anderson Cooper
Ha ha ha! You got that right, Anderson! Why, here are a few we were “knocking” around just this morning:
Knock, knock!
Who’s there?
Anderson Cooper.
Anderson Cooper who?
So you’ve seen my ratings.
Knock, knock!
Who’s there?
Anderson Cooper. Hey, do you mind if I move around some of these clothes and shoes? It’s kinda cramped in here!
Knock, knock!
Who’s there?
Anderson Cooper.
Well, thank you for stopping by, but we really don’t need any Mary Kay.
Knock, knock!
Who’s there?
Anderson Cooper.
Oh, hi. So, okay, Anderson, I have to ask. Which part made you madder: the fact that Doug Hutchinson’s wife is only 16, or that she can get away with that outfit without waxing her chest?
Knock knock!
Who’s there?
Orange.
Orange who?
Orange you glad I didn’t say Don Lemon?
All in good fun, Anderson! We all know what a great sense of humor you and your fans have. No hard feelings, and keep up the good work. Presumably.
"Presumably"? Jim, The IDIOT; I don't have Anderson's patience and sense of humor, so, for me, Jim is a huge IDIOT!
This time there is no picture of the other Idiot, the cute but republican and founder of "The Daily Caller," Tucker Carlson.
Anderson Cooper Gay Knock-Knock Jokes Published In 'Good Fun'
By On Top Magazine Staff
Published: June 28, 2011
It's all in good fun claims the Daily Caller of knock-knock jokes outing CNN anchor Anderson Cooper as gay and a cross-dresser.
The conservative website published the jokes after Cooper suggested its staff needed a sense of humor.
“I bet at the Daily Caller, if someone tells a knock-knock joke, everyone runs to the door to see who comes in,” Cooper said in a segment last week.
“Ha ha ha!” he site chortled. “You got that right, Anderson! Why, here are a few we were 'knocking' around just this morning.”
Knock, knock! Who's there? Anderson Cooper. Hey, do you mind if I move around some of these clothes and shoes? It's kinda cramped in here!
Knock, knock! Who's there? Anderson Cooper. Well, thank you for stopping by, but we really don't need any Mary Kay.
Knock, knock! Who's there? Anderson Cooper. Oh, hi. So, okay, Anderson, I have to ask. Which part made you madder: the fact that Doug Hutchinson's wife is only 16, or that she can get away with that outfit without waxing her chest?
Knock, knock! Who's there? Orange. Orange who? Orange you glad I didn't say Don Lemon?
Is Meredith Blake the next RidicuListest? In this article she seems to agree AND disagree with Anderson's comments about Kim's butt, her sisters and Kim's butt Haters. Is she another I-don't-know-satire-if-it-hits-me-in-the-butt reporter or perhaps she's just confused. I'll watch Anderson Cooper tonite to see if he has Meredith in the dunce's seat.
About (Late) Last Night: Anderson Cooper praises Kim Kardashian for silencing butt skeptics [Video]
June 28, 2011 | 8:15am
Pity poor Kim Kardashian. Can't a girl just go about her daily routine (Starbucks, nail salon, plugging diet pills on Twitter) without everyone making up rumors about the authenticity of her famous backside? I mean, hello: She stars on a reality show. Surely that's all the proof anyone should need.
But no. Like birthers and 9/11 truthers, Kim Kardashian butt skeptics are seemingly immune to empirical evidence. So it was that, on Sunday's "Keeping Up With the Kardashians," young Kim decided the best way to quell the conspiracy theories would be to release her long-form birth certificate get X-rays of her rear.
Anderson Cooper applauded Kim's move on his show Monday night, adding Kim Kardashian haters to his "Ridiculist" because of "what they've driven Kim to do."
However, the Coop was not exactly sympathetic to Kim's plight; if you can believe it, he actually had the temerity to suggest that her butt X-ray was a publicity stunt.
"For a while now, I've had this unsettling feeling that, I don't know, something was off," the Coop began. "Like the universe was slightly out of whack, something was missing. I couldn't pinpoint ths source of the feeling, but then it hit me: No one has really been saying much about Kim Kardashian's butt lately."
As an aside, Cooper wondered, "Are butt implants really a thing?" (Indeed they are.)
The host also gently poked fun at Khloe and Kourtney (dismissively referring to both of the sisters as "the other one") as well as the doctor who administered the decisive X-ray. "I bet when that doctor was in medical school, he dreamed of one day being able to save lives, to really help people. Congratulations."
'Survivor' host Jeff Probst developing a daytime talk show
By Rick Porter
June 28, 2011 12:02 AM ET
Oprah Winfrey is gone from daytime TV, but the scramble to fill the void she's leaving is starting to feel like the last big giveaway she'll ever do.
Anderson Cooper, you get a talk show! Katie Couric, you get a talk show! Bethenny Frankel, you get a talk show! And now, "Survivor" host Jeff Probst, you get a talk show!
CBS Television Distribution announced Monday (June 27) that it's developing a daytime show with Probst for fall 2012. Couric's ABC show is also set to launch then, while Cooper hits the daytime air this fall and Frankel's project is at the pilot stage.
"I'm fascinated with human nature and thrilled that this show will allow me the opportunity to connect with real people and explore their stories on a personal level," Probst says. "As I continue with 'Survivor,' I am excited to extend my relationship with CBS with this new adventure in the world of daytime."
Probst's show is aiming for the talk-show sweet spot of celebrities, newsmakers and interesting everyday folks and will also "encourage action, change and discovery," says Aaron Meyerson, head of programming and development for CTD.
Probst has won the Emmy for best reality host every year since it was introduced in 2008. He's also a frequent guest host on "Live with Regis and Kelly" and for a time was rumored to be a possible replacement for Regis Philbin when he retires.
Anderson Cooper's hilarious expose of clueless Daily Caller writer
You know the Daily Caller. The supposed conservative alternative to Huffington Post, helmed by creepy Tucker Carlson, already has a short but storied history, its content often riddled with inaccuracies and sloppy reporting.
But nothing can approach the ineptitude of one Laura Donovan whose inability to discern satire from straight reporting caused her to describe a satirical broadcast by Anderson Cooper on CNN as if it was serious. Watch the video and don't laugh - she's young and 'has a great future ahead of her' as long as she doesn't have aspirations to be the 'next David Sedaris'. (A spell checker wouldn't hurt, either.)
I post his picture only because he's soooo cute! The son of a bitch republican.
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A Memoir of War, Disasters, and Survival," a "New York Times" best seller, is his account of the people he's met, the things he's seen and the lessons he's learned in the midst of devastation.
Dispatches from the Edge
Woven into the narrative is Anderson's struggle to understand his own family's personal tragedies. The paperback version came out May 8, 2007.
Excerpt: Dispatches from the Edge
Review: Anderson cooper's journey
'360' Blog: Anderson on the new book
Peter's Books
(3 short stories and 1 short play.)
The first installment of "The Gay Ghost Trilogy" is the story of Charles Lanier, a young gay guy who rents an apartment on Lake Shore Drive on the near north side of Chicago, and the unexpected adventures he encounters from the day he moves in. And that's only the beginning; follow up with "The Next Gay Ghost" and "The Two Gay Ghosts." Each story can be read independently from the other two installments. Or get all three books in one with "The Gay Ghost Trilogy."
"The Gay Ghost"
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"The Next Gay Ghost"
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And a One Act Play about a gay Garamatean and a gay Earthling:
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