The CNN Team in Tucson

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CNN Heads to Chile

A magnitude 8.8 earthquake struck central Chile early Saturday morning. CNN has mobilized teams to head to South America and bring us the latest news. Here's the rundown:

CNN/U.S.
Karl Penhaul, correspondent
John Zarella, Miami correspondent
Soledad O'Brien, anchor and special correspondent
Ted Rowlands, general assignment correspondent
Ed Lavandera, correspondent
Elizabeth Cohen, sr. medical correspondent
Gary Tuchman, correspondent

CNN International
Sara Sidner, international correspondent
Hala Gorani, CNNI anchor and reporter

CNN en Espanol
Daniel Viotto, anchor

CNN Chile is Chile's leading 24-hour news network. A joint-venture between CNN and Liberty Global's VTR, CNN Chile launched in December 2008. In addition to a fully staffed local news production center based in Santiago, CNN Chile has complete access to CNN Worldwide’s newsgathering resources including the support of 4,000 journalists based around the globe.




All content, unless otherwise cited, is © All Things CNN and may not be used without consent of the blog administrator.

This Week in Warzones.

Jamie McIntyre had a piece on Lou Dobbs Tonight Tuesday contrasting the war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan:

Here is the full report from Nic Robertson that Jamie referenced:

Meanwhile, two somewhat positive reports from Iraq -- first Jill Dougherty, about a new movement for Iraqi women to receive training in order to work at checkpoints in order to search local women for bombs:

And Morgan Neill has a report about the Explosive Ordinance Detail (the bomb squad, for us non-military types) and the fact that they are getting more down-time these days:

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Christiane Amanpour was invited to North Korea for some implosion fun:

...and here is her report on arrival:

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Where in the World...?

SATURDAY: Nic Robertson reported from Kabul, Afghanistan; John Vause from Beijing; Matthew Chance from Moscow; and Cal Perry from Beirut.

SUNDAY: Peter Bergen appeared on Late Edition.

MONDAY: Ed Lavendera was in Cedar Rapids, Iowa as flood clean-up began; Morgan Neill reported from Baghdad (video above); Chris Lawrence from Honolulu, Hawaii about the high cost of food there (above); Candy Crowley and Dana Bash were both in The Situation Room; Wolf Blitzer hosted Election Center.

TUESDAY: Nic Robertson phoned in from Kandahar about the airport fire (video above); Jill Dougherty reported from Baghdad about the Daughters of Iraq (video above).

WEDNESDAY: Ted Rowlands reported from Los Angeles about drilling for oil in the city; Ali Velshi reported from Fort McMurry, Alberta about bitumen oil; Christiane was in Beijing en route to North Korea; John Roberts hosted Issue #1.

THURSDAY: Christiane arrived in Pyongyang, North Korea (video above); Suzanne Malveaux was in Honolulu to do reports about Barack Obama's childhood there; Harris Whitbeck reported about the drug wars in Mexico City.

FRIDAY: Candy was in Unity, New Hampshire for the "Kumbaya rally," but back in DC in time for Election Center and AC360.

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That's it for me today, and I'm late for work (...again!!)

Monday I'm planning a Very Special Post ... and I am really looking forward to writing it!!

All content, unless otherwise cited, is © All Things CNN and may not be used without consent of the blog administrator.

CNN = Politics

It's been the weekend for the political junkies on CNN. Ballot Bowl 2008 - Round 2 - this time Live from New Hampshire.

Saturday, John King anchored 4 hours of live programming that featured clips of the candidates (live at times) campaigning in New Hampshire. What could be more picturesque than snow covered New Hampshire in January?

CNN had correspondents reporting from across the state including Mary Snow, Suzanne Malveaux, Jessica Yellin, Bill Schneider, Dana Bash and Dan Lothian.

I happen to live in one of those small states that the candidates rarely visit. So, getting to hear more than just a 15 second sound bite from their campaign speeches appeals to me.

Sunday, John King was back again to anchor another 4 hours from New Hampshire. There were more campaign stops for the CNN correspondents to cover as the clock counts down to Tuesday's primary.

Mary Snow
Suzanne Malveaux
Dana Bash
Dan Lothian
Jessica Yellin
Bill Schneider

If you turned into CNN between 7:00pm ET and 11:30pm ET Sunday night, you might have wondered if you're cable company had rearranged their channels. CNN rebroadcast the debates that had aired on ABC on Saturday night.

Charlie Gibson moderated the ABC Facebook WMUR debates. Unlike previous debates, this one offered the candidates the opportunity to discuss the topics between themselves, not just answer the questions posed by the moderator. One other unique feature of this debate was that both Republicans and Democrats were debating on the same stage, the same night. Between the two debates as the Republican candidates were leaving the stage and the Democrats where entering, Charlie Gibson asked all the candidates to remain on stage and greet one another. It was an interesting moment seeing all 10 candidates being "nice" to one another.

John King anchored CNN's coverage, but the debates aired unedited.

At the conclusion of the debate, John King was joined by Dana Bash and Jessica Yellin to analyze the ABC debates as well as the debate that had aired on Fox News during the same time slot.

Mystery Journalist

This week's Mystery Journalist was Ted Rowlands.

One last note tonight, MediaBistro's FishbowlDC reported on Friday that John King and Dana Bash were engaged. We haven't gotten any official confirmation of this, but we did notice that Dana Bash was wearing a ring on Sunday.

Those of at All Things CNN would like to offer the couple our congratulations and best wishes on this exciting news.

All content, unless otherwise cited, is © All Things CNN and may not be used without consent of the blog administrator.

YouTube Debate Round One

What a night! The first YouTube debate is in the history books.

Image credit: Matthew Rond for CNN© 2007. A Time Warner Company. All rights reserved.

If you're wondering who was responsible for which questions of the thousands submitted got asked, blame these folks:

I don't envy their jobs. Not surprising, there were obviously a large volume of really good, deserving questions submitted. Not an easy task! Just going through the almost 3,000 videos had to have been a challenge. CNN should also be commended on leaving the opportunity to submit videos open until 3:00am this morning.

If you go to YouTube, they currently have a listing of all 39 video questions that were used in tonight's debate. If you're interested, check it out soon! This page is always being updated & there's no indication on how long this list will be available.

Thanks to CNN, we have some exclusive pictures of the debate preparations.

Image credit: Matthew Rond for CNN© 2007. A Time Warner Company. All rights reserved.

I was thrilled to see that the set that was used in New Hampshire was back again for this debate.

Image credit: Matthew Rond for CNN© 2007. A Time Warner Company. All rights reserved.

Just in case you still need a score card to keep track of all the folks running this year, the participants in tonight's debate were:

Sen Mike Gravel	Sen Chris Dodd	Sen John Edwards	Sen Hillary Clinton
Sen Barack Obama	Gov Bill Richardson	Sen Joe Biden	Rep Dennis Kucinich

Since the questions were coming from the people, we were sure to get at least some that would not have otherwise been asked. Here are a few of the interesting questions posed to the candidates:

• If you had to choose any republican as your running mate, who would it be?
• How do Obama and Clinton respond to criticism that they are not black enough, not feminine enough?
• Should women register for selective service?

With the debate being held at the Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina, I thought it was very appropriate that they took a moment to recognize the over 1,100 graduates that have served in Iraq or Afghanistan and the 12 that have died since 9/11/2001.

One of my favorite lines of the night came from Gov. Richardson when he responded to the “politics over conscience on the Iraq war" question when he said, “the lives of our young troops are more important than George Bush’s legacy.”

Asking the candidates to do their own 30 second YouTube video had mixed results. Some of the candidates used it as another 30 second commercial opportunity. Others, took a lighter approach. I thought Senator Dodd’s “white hare” video was cute.

One of my favorite moments of the debate was one of the lighter ones. The question about Al Gore that was then followed up with the question from the snowman about global warming.

The little snowman was just too cute!

Anderson Cooper was an excellent moderator for the debate. He kept the candidates on topic as much as possible and allowed them to respond to comments directed towards them by the other candidates.

The post debate program included a special edition of the Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.

The commentary included:

Maria Elena Salinez from Univision and Roland Martin

Tom Foreman providing us with some fact checking on the statements the candidates made.

A special edition of the Cafferty File with Jack Cafferty.

Focus groups from New Hampshire with Mary Snow and Nevada with Ted Rowlands.

Notice the slot machines in the background?

Bill Schneider with the buzz words used by the candidates.

A report from Carol Costello about the candidate's body language.

It was interesting that the men were nervous and Sen. Clinton appeared to be the most relaxed and projected the best non-verbal cues.

Overall, I thought the debate was a huge success. I loved the idea of letting anyone submit a question & having a real chance of getting it answered by the candidates. Watching tonight’s debate was fascinating. What I found disappointing was that although many of the candidates actually answered the question that was asked. They only gave the very briefest answer to the question and then morphed their rely into their typical talking points or stump speech or redefined what they thought the person should have asked.

Tell us what you think. We'd love to hear your thoughts on tonight's debate.

What were your favorite questions?

Who were the winners?

Who were the stinkers?

The concept of this debate was truly unique and original...

Was the outcome equally as unique & original?

Do you think that it achieved its goal?

Or did it just force the candidates to get creative on how to turn the answers into a stump speech?

With any type of debate or political process, there's always someone who feels left out. How does this type of debate compare to more traditional ones? Does it foster inclusion? Or alienate those that aren't technically savvy?

You don't think that the debate coverage ends tonight, do you? American Morning's John Roberts will be broadcasting tomorrow morning from South Carolina. Do you think we'll get to see this interview in the morning?

Thanks again to CNN for providing us with some exclusive pictures from tonight's debate!