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tv   Larry King Live  CNN  June 23, 2010 12:00am-1:00am EDT

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>> wwent to irene's last night, great, great local restaurant and she served us oysters and said enjoy these. we're not getting them like we used to. it's diminishing. but it's here. it's clean. it's healthy. no one is getting sick. >> i appreciate all you're doing for the city. >> and all you're doing. you're representing the city in a beautiful way. >> i'm trying. i'm trying. appreciate it. thanks a lot. larry king starts right now. see you tomorrow night. >> larry: tonight, will the top u.s. commander in afghanistan get the ax? four-star general stanley mccrystal and his inner circle on the record, mocking the president, calling out obama's advisers, branding one of them a clown. should these shocking comments end mccrystal's career? >> i also want to make sure i talk to him directly before i make any final decisions. >> then can kevin costner rescue the gulf? the oscar winner is here to show us how a machine may clean up
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the oily mess invading our shores. plus the man who cut off his own armed to save his life. trapped, alone, he freed himself the only way he could. prime time exclusive next on "larry king live." lieutenant colonel shaver, defense studies has more than two decades of field experience, including two combat tours in afghanistan. and john schultz, co-founder and chairman of vote vets.org. he served as a captain of operation iraqi freedom. rolling stone article portrays mccrystal and his staffers of being contempt use of president
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obama. oval office meeting scheduled for tomorrow. >> i think it's clear that the article in which he and his team appeared showed a poor -- showed poor judgment. and -- but i also want to make sure that i talk to him directly before i make any final decision. so, whatever decision that i make with respect to general mccrystal or any other aspect of afghan policy is determined entirely on how i can make sure that we have a strategy that justifies the enormous courage and sacrifice that those men and women are making over there and that ultimately makes this country safer. >> larry: joining us are two outletsing american war veterans who disagree on the topic.
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john sultz, you think the general should go why? >> gone. look, he undermined the chain of commands. this has been a long-standing issue with this general, general mccrystal and the administration. he already had sort of, to be frankly honest, pushed the president with the 60 minutes interview and some of the statements he made prior to this. to go on the record and undermine the president and ambassador eikenberry, the vice president, the national security adviser, ambassador richard holbrook publicly and to allow his staff to do that, it just shows the lack of good order and discipline within his unit or within his command in afghanistan. if i had behaviored that way or colonel shaver behaved that way and undermined a brigade commander in front of our troops, we would be reprimanded. this kind of insubordination from people inside the military will not be tolerated. and it was personal attacks to make it worse. >> colonel, what's your side? >> i agree with the captain's
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assessment of the situation, but there's some, i think, mitigating issues we have to look at, realistically. general patton survived saying pretty outlandish things to the press as well. presence is there for good officers to continue. i don't want to defend mccrystal's bad actions. what i'm here to say is that the president has to consider what's best for his strategy. let me be painfully clear here. our center is not for -- break break if you're going to go with the strategy the way it is, you probably have to pick the very best guy who has the best shot of making it work. general mccrystal was part of the review process, which established it last year and from all accounts he has been able to really bring back a lot of internal focus within the forces in afghanistan. yes, he's riles some of the state department folks. that's not news. i think playing it out in front of the press is very bad.
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if i survived i would fire my staff involved in saying those outlandish things. >> they're the ones most quoted. >> yes. >> one of the bombshells in the "rolling stones" article out lines the first meeting. an adviser to mccrystal says it was a ten-minute photo-op. obama didn't know anything about him. here is his guy who was going to run his freaking war, but he didn't seem engaged. the boss was pretty disappointed. what do you make of what the colonel said, this has happened befo before? >> up and down the chain of command inside the military, standards are standards, whether you're a four-star general, brand new platoon leader, we don't undermine our chain of command at any level. so, for the commander of u.s. forces in afghanistan, the nato commander, general mccrystal, to
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allow his staff to speak to the press this way, to allow his staff to fester, that's an example of how he is talking to them. he is not taking the president's intent and putting it into the chain of command. so, he's created an environment that has festered this type of insubordination and lack of chain of command of control. if the president does not reprimand and remove general mccrystal in a way he has undermined his own authority no different than a school teacher in a class. >> the president is commander in chief, isn't he? you just don't do what the general did? >> let be very clear here. i think it was well stated by the fact that general mccrystal said very little, quoted very little in the article. most of that -- and i'm not trying to defend what was said. but these folks, he pulled out with him, came out of special operations community. what you saw was general mccrystal unplugged for better or worse. that's what it is. and, you know, when you look at what was said, look, a lot of folks in the military don't like having to deal with civilians in
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any regard because they're smarter than everybody else. it's kind of the way people look at the world. i'm not defending it. it's just the nature of the culture. what you need to look at is was the actual information something new, something that will actually diminish our ability to conduct the war? that's something the president has to judge for himself. it's not something that we can sit here on the sidelines and look at. the president has to make a decision on ways and means. does this decision to maintain mccrystal get us further on or not? frankly, larry, you need mover an eisenhower commander than a patton commander. you need to pull the allies, diplomats together and focus on achieving the objectives laid out before us. >> larry: we'll break and come back with captain soltz and colonel shaver. general mccrystal's apology is next. will it get him off the hook? heel pressure.
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>> larry: general mcchrystal has issued an apology and it says in part, throughout my career, i have lived by the principles of personal honor and professional integrity. what is reflected in this article falls far short of that standard. i have enormous respect and admiration for president obama and his national security team, and for the civilian leaders and troops fighting this war. why isn't that good enough, john? >> first off, it is not true. general mcchrystal, everybody he attacked personally were people that opposed the strategy. this sort of -- put the troops in afghanistan and somehow we're going to miraculous win. everyone he went after didn't support him. i think that's the first part. second part he hasn't lived with this integrity. i the hope the president looks at the full spectrum of this general. this is a general head of the
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special operations command with allegations of enhanced interrogation techniques used by special operations troops that didn't fall under the basic chain of command in iraq before taking over this command. the second issue is when he was the head of special operations command he signed a silver star for pat tillman knowing that he was killed by fratricide and there's a history and track record with the general mcchrystal name shown up and not followed army values of loyalty and integrity. >> larry: control knell schafer, should we judge him on how good of a job is he doing in the job he's got? >> everybody makes mistakes. i'm not defending the fact that mistakes were made here but you need to look at the overall picture. i have a book coming out this summer "operation dark heart" which focused on my time of general mcchrystal and will be an eye opener. i have information about -- enhanced interrogation. i looked -- there's good and bad on both sides of the coin on
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this and i think we need to look at the ultimate objectives assigned to this again. this is not good. i think he needs to do some deep house cleaning. frankly, if i were the commander and i allowed my staff to say these things to "rolling stone" i would fire them instantly without regard to any excuse they have. but you need to look at can we achieve victory this way with this man or is it time for a change? several names have been given to me. my cent-com contacts. believe me, there's a discussion going on about who might replace him and that's on the table. >> larry: the article also reports on mcchrystal and the staff imagining ways of dismissing vice president biden with a one liner as they prepare for a q&a in paris. are you asking about vice president biden, mcchrystal says with laugh? who's that? biden suggesting a top adviser. did you say bite me? what is the rub, john, in it
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million tear against john? >> there is no rub in the military. i think there's a lot of people that support the vice president and people in the military upset with the counter insurgency, large amounts of troops, long-term deployment operations and the vice president said let's have a global strategy and he went head to head against general mcchrystal in this debate and, frankly, lost to the president. the president was the one support that general mcchrystal had and there's absolutely nobody upset with the vice president. his son just returned from iraq who had served with the delaware national guard and he has a tremendous amount of support in the military and there's a rift with the vice president and general mcchrystal because they don't agree on what our strategy moving forward was supposed to be prior to the president's decision. >> larry: control knell schafer, what would you bet will happen tomorrow? >> well, i think clearly there's going to be a meeting with the president and i think the general mcchrystal will have a
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chance to lay out what happened, why it happened and what he'd be able to do to essentially regain favor. i think there's going to be a great deal of crow eaten by the general if he survives. there's competent officers in the wings. i know the names of several of them. they're very competent. but the question becomes, do you change horses in the middle of the race? right now we're walking up on kandahar and, frankly, we have huge problems in waziristan and talking about trying to get to december with major benchmarks to be looked at and do you want to cause a disruption, a replacement of a key commander that influences the entire battle space? >> larry: we'll know more tomorrow and we'll do a lot more on it tomorrow night. kevin costner is here next. he's a new father, too. he'll show us how he might be able to make things better in the gulf. stick around. how can you get paf without taking pills around the clock?
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>> larry: kevin costner is an actor and oscar winning filmmaker, founding partner of ocean therapy solutions, inc. he says his business developed an oil spill cleanup device that's a partial solution to the tragedy unfolding in the gulf. good to welcome him back to "larry king live." good to see you again. congratulations on fatherhood. >> thank you, thank you. >> larry: when's this all about? your company signed a contract with bp for 32 of your -- >> yeah. >> larry: when did you get into this business? >> about 17 years ago i finally had it with the images that i think everybody had been watching, the oil spills that continued, the exxon valdez in particular. but we've been seeing them up to that point and when i finally --
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the exxon valdez happened and i saw that the reaction was the exact same. the oil looked like pudding. the birds had the arms, wings, distorted images that went with the animals. people on the beach in rubber boots and pitch forks, i thought is this the best we can do? i was approached with a small technology out of the department of -- the d.o.e. department of energy. it was a little machine about six inches tall separating very severe stuff but i looked at the machine and with my brother and the scientist that invented it we thought we could scale it up to separate oil and water at high speeds and i thought we could create a first line of defense where oil spills are concerned so i grabbed about 20 scientists and engineers and three years after r&d and close to -- a lot of dollars, scaled the machine up that would actually do, in fact, that.
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clean oil and water about 200 gallons per minute. >> larry: is it doing it anywhere? >> well, it's right now it's on three ships down in the gulf. bp has agreed to buy 32 of them. they tested it in all manner of conditions in places where it was not intended. it was -- and it came through with really flying colors so they understand its applications. it's how -- it's how resourceful the machine can be. it was designed to be at first response. just a same way you would have a lifeboat or life preserver. it is there to handle oil and water and to -- it's also a machine that's created that it could -- i mean, if you put enough machines together it could create an overwhelming response to what we're seeing that the moment. >> larry: could it help this crisis? >> yes, it can. for instance, it will help. we're coming to the fight late
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but the truth is we don't know when that's going to stop, that thing that's leaking. we could be sitting over that through our lifetime. but it could be confronted right at the spot and confronted without dispersants, without any chemicals. >> larry: bp, you have contracts with bp now? >> i do now. >> larry: why can't they do it tomorrow? >> they have to scale up with the machines. i have to manufacture them. i started this 17 years ago and i couldn't keep a thousand machines on the shelf waiting for the oil industry to catch up. >> larry: you need anybody's approval to do this? >> no. >> larry: you testified before the government. >> well, they wanted to understand how a technology like this couldn't hit the light of day, sat idly on the shelves for ten years. it's a very big, important question. it's not just the fingerprints of industry. federal -- all of federal agencies, it is like an alphabet soup of who's seen that. you know? all the -- all the agencies required to deal with the safety of the american people and working on the water all saw it.
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it just -- it just seemed too expensive. it seemed like maybe we weren't going to have a spill again and we all know how silly that is. any industry that operates on a daily basis around the world, tapping the core's earth at depths that would boggle the mind, it's reasonable they'll have spills weekly and daily. >> larry: what are your dealings with bp been like? >> well, you know, again, they didn't take the machine to where it was intended to be used which is right at the point of the spill. they took it in inland. they took it to where the oil is thick like peanut butter. for a while i was wondering -- i was wondering if i was having a deja vu and trying to be failed but i think what doug suttles was doing was taking it to places before he was excited to see if it had an affect moving into shore and started with the toughest guy, the toughest application.
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and began -- and understood if it worked there, then it was going to work beautifully out in the deep water. >> larry: are you scientifically knowledgeable or are you just -- >> no. i'm -- i've always been a bit of a dreamer. i'm a total what-if guy and i really enjoy being in the room with really smart people. i saw this, you know. when i first started this, i said, look, guys, engineers, let's -- exxon valdez, how do we clean this up? the machine designed at 200 gallons a minute would have cleaned up the exxon valdez 20 machines in 5 days and given them the oil back and they would have had the asset back. so, the efficiency at which this machine works is very impressive. okay? i'm not. the machine is. the engineers are. i'm not. >> larry: how far to be built to help here? >> we have the orders of 32 and orders are starting to come in.
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and so we're in manufacturing at this moment. as the orders mount, i will have to look outside from the original plant to scale up. >> larry: where do you build them? >> they're built in carson city, nevada. they're also -- we have subcontractors around the country. >> larry: more with kevin costner. fascinating. right after this. even with an overactive bladder. i don't always let the worry my pipes might leak compromise what i like to do. i take care with vesicare. because i have better places to visit than just the bathroom. (announcer) once-daily vesicare can help control your bladder muscle, and is proven to reduce frequent, sudden urges and leaks, day and night. if you have certain stomach or glaucoma problems or trouble emptying your bladder, do not take vesicare. tell your doctor right away if you have a serious allergic reaction, severe abdominal pain, or become constipated for three or more days. vesicare may cause blurred vision so use caution
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>> larry: he's the founding partner of ocean therapy solutions, inc., and apparently has -- what do you call this thing by the way? >> what do you mean?
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>> larry: does it have a name? >> sinc, it is the sinc unit. >> larry: why hasn't it been put to use? what took years? >> well, you know, if you deal with a major corporation, you have a mandate to make profits, and if you tell your stockholders that you have spent a billion dollars on safety, they're going to look at you saying why did you do that? why did you do that? no one told you to do that. that was our dividend. a private company, you have to -- your leader has to be a very evolved guy or woman to want to do that and there are those people but you have to be a very evolved person and not see the pile jt get bigger for it to come down and the reality is safety, there's not sexy. and it's certainly not a profit center. >> larry: is bp the only company who's bought it from you? >> it is so far, yeah. and we'll see. i think it is the answer to the moratorium being lifted because
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we can't lift something without being able to respond to it in some effective we and more than just an effective way, an overwhelming way. you know, sometimes we only do so high for safety. what is the problem with getting over that bar? i think that's where the industry has to be. they have that look at this and anybody could -- you know, all you have to do is to go to the worst-case scenario and do the math. and be prepared. this is not the worst-case scenario. okay. worst-case scenario is four of these happen. five of these happen. this was -- for us to kind of go like oh my god, that's what i think people are being silly. the repercussions are terrible but for us to think this is the worst to happen, i think that's a lack of planning, a lack of foresight. >> larry: everybody's interested in spillage and concerns. what got you super interested to go full-time? there's no movie you're making now. >> yeah.
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look. when i die, i hope that my headstone is my kids visit and probably the only ones that it would just say and me made movies, too. i don't define myself by just the movies. i have had a wonderful life and not without my own bruises, you know. but it's been good and i'd like to not let my own celebrity or how people see me define who i am as a person. >> larry: why this area of concern? >> not smart enough to get us to the moon. you know? but i looked at oil spills and thought we can do better than pitch forks. i thought we could and i thought if i could bring what i have which is a dreaming mentality and the money that i have been able to amass which i never thought i would have i would throw it at this problem and i could make a difference. >> larry: when this happens, when it first occurred, what did you first think? >> i -- you know, i had this --
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i hate to admit this but i had this, well, i was almost -- >> larry: told you? >> i was almost like petulant. i knew that was wrong but there was human nature in me. i couldn't believe -- i totally believed what was happening but i just -- i had to reengage and i know, you know, i'm the actor with the magic machine. i know that that's how it was going to read so i was prepared to have my neck cut off and watch my head roll into the street by intellectuals, by cynics, but i had to reengage because, you know, i -- it was a fight worth fighting and it's -- and i didn't want this machine to be silent and so i had to speak for it. >> larry: what reaction did you get in congress? >> well, i think, you know, people are surprised. you know, sometimes i feel like a little bit of this is -- is a little bit -- i don't want to say my fault because i don't
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want to take too much but it's like maybe i didn't yell loud enough. you know? i'm looking at my own participation in this. $24 million later, maybe i didn't yell loud enough but what i was faced with was an apathy. i brought this to foreign governments. i brought this to all -- >> larry: wasn't sexy, huh? maybe we never knew about you and this. >> you know, it is like i don't always talk about the things i'm doing. you know? who cares what you're doing. >> larry: but this should have been known. >> well, i did talk about it. i mean, the people who knew about it is like a who's who when it comes to industry, comes to government agencies. i talked to the epa at the time. i talked to so many people, brought it to bear. i actually sent the many sheen to oil spills. i sent it to japan when they were experiencing an oil spill. i begged to put it on oil spills that were occurring but you -- there's a gigantic catch-22. you can't put your many sheen on an oil spill unless it's been approved and the people wouldn't approve it because it's not on
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an oil spill. the problem is that this is -- this is a highly technical -- it's really a pivot point for how we could fight oil spills in the 21st century. it's something we need to do now. it really needs to be wherever oil can come into contact with water. and the -- and short of that, we're not -- we're not being responsible to everybody else because, you know, this oil spill for as much as our heart is breaking, this oil spill is touching the shores of people faces we'll never meet around the precious gulf of mexico, our neighbors, the countries around the gulf of mexico wondering what happens to their way of life. >> larry: yeah. do you become here's that costner again? >> what's that? oh -- geez. i thought somebody, my family wanted to get in the interview. >> larry: did you become that? >> did i become what? >> larry: the annoying guy with the machine? >> i don't think so. i don't think so. i have never tried to be out in front of my machine. i i'm finally doing it now. i thought gravity would find its
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way to my door and the industry would welcome me with open arms. i did. the single biggest liability they have, i have an answer to. >> larry: when do we get the 32 ordered machines? >> they'll probably be there in anher month and a half and for those people that go, too little, too late, i guess when you're doing your money raise last night and congratulations on that, is $10 not enough? it is a lot. and i think what happens is this is -- these machines will be -- need to be in the and the public needs to demand and the government needs to demand they be anywhere where oil has an ability to come in contact with water. fresh and water. the rivers and lakes are vulnerable. >> larry: kevin, hell of a guy. good knowing you. kevin costner. what a story. if you had to cut off your own arm to survive, could you do it? we'll meet a man who did, next.
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>> larry: john metz joins us from new york. he tried to amputate his left arm when it was trapped in the furnace. he just about sawed it off clean through. melissa is john's fiancee and they're here tonight with an incredible survival story. this is 12 days since paramedics found you in your basement. how are you doing now, john? >> all things considered, larry, i'm doing pretty well. >> larry: how did the arm get caught? >> well, i was cleaning the heating elements in my 70-year-old boiler.
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dropped basically a vacuum rose adapter into the boiler and really without giving it much thought stuck my arm in between a couple of these heating elements and before i knew it my arm was trapped above my elbow. >> larry: were you in a lot of pain? >> initially, no. there was a wave of panic that really prevented me from feeling any pain. in the first few minutes as i struggled to free my arm, the pain started to set in as a result of the scraping and cutting from the heating elements themselves. >> larry: where were you, melissa? >> i was in north carolina, so we do not live in the same state and -- >> larry: oh. >> yeah. we had talked monday night and
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had i guess a spat but nothing that anyone was hanging up on one another or anything and, you know, i didn't hear from him the next day and i thought, well, that's weird. maybe he was really bothered by what had happened and, you know, maybe cooler heads will prevail on wednesday. so that was kind of what had happened without me noticing, yeah. >> larry: how many hours did it take you to decide to try to amputate your arm, yon? >> well, i spent about 12 hours i would say screaming as loud as i possibly could to try to alert my neighbors as to my predicament. after not having much success and concluding that being in a basement with basically no windows that the yelling was not going to do any good and that my
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only way to escape may be to amputate my own arm with the -- >> larry: by doing what? how did you amputate it? >> well, as it happened the drawer that i keep the saw blades for my various power tools was just within reach and i was able to secure them. and after trying the saw through the actual boiler heating elements, and getting nowhere with that, that's when i decided to use these saw blades. >> larry: where? above the elbow, below the elbow, where? >> above my elbow. the lowest i could cut. >> larry: a neighbor -- let's hear the neighbor's 911 call and find out how he got the know about it. let's listen to the call. >> west hartford 911, what is the emergency?
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>> yeah, hi. i'm standing outside my friend's house. no one's heard from him for a couple of days. his car is in his driveway and not answering the door so we don't really know what to do. >> okay, okay, okay. the car is in the driveway? >> only a day's worth of mail in the mailbox. but he's not answering his door so we didn't -- no one really knew what to do. >> i'm sending an officer. >> okay? >> just hang around here? >> just sit tight there. we'll be there in a few minutes. >> okay. thank you. >> larry: wow. all right, john. you fashioned as i understand it a makeshift tourniquet. you started to cut. how could you bear that? >> well, it was actually not that difficult. i could smell my arm essentially dying and the flesh rotting, and
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the adrenaline from the experience really allowed me to at least start the cut relatively pain free. >> larry: how much was hanging off when you finally freed yourself? >> well, i was not able to fully amputate my arm. i would say i got about nine tenths of the way through my arm before i hit a bundle of nerves that really just prevented me from going any further. >> larry: the rescuers had to come in and do the rest? >> yeah. they finished the job. >> larry: we'll be right back with john and his fiancee and meet his doctor, too. his doctor says john would have died had he not ta action. that's next. we've helped over three-quarters of a million families... refinance or purchase their home. - and that's why i love... - i love... i love being a home loan expert. ♪
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>> larry: before we get back with john and melissa and john's doctor, let's check in with anderson cooper still in the gulf naturally. anderson, what's the lead tonight? >> well, breaking news tonight on "360," larry. the president's top man in afghanistan general stanley mcchrystal heading back to washington for a face to face meeting with president obama that could cost the four-star general the job. the stunning interview in "rolling stone" mocking white house officials and ridiculing vice president biden and saying he doesn't see how general mcchrystal can survive this and will resign tomorrow. we're going to talk with the reporter who wrote the article
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for "rolling stone" and the white house dealt a blow by the courts today when a federal judge here in new orleans blocked a six-month halt in deep water drilling near in the gulf. we'll have an interview with governor jindal at the top of the hour. >> larry: that's 10:00 eastern, 7:00 pacific with anderson. we're back with john metz, his fiancee. almost amputated his arm. dr. scott ellner that finished the job john started joins us. doctor, were you at the hospital? >> i was. when john presented to our emergency department at st. francis hospital, he was in grave condition and i really have to attribute the action of the paramedics, the ems, wes hartford fire department for resuscitating john, putting in two ivs in the right arm to get
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him fluids because he was severely dehydrated and essentially he was -- he was near death when he arrived in our department. >> larry: wow. are you right handed, john? >> i am. >> larry: so you lost your left arm. right? >> yeah. really -- could have been either arm to reach down for the tool and thankfully it was my left. >> larry: what did he didn't try to amputate it, doctor? what would have happened? >> you know, larry, what happens when gangrene sets in to part of your body is the infection takes over the organ systems. and there's a release of toxins throughout the body, and essentially, it shuts down the heart, the kidneys and he was -- he was in acute renal failure. he was -- he was going to die.
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his organs were failing so by actually cutting off that dead, nonviable tissue, john essentially saved his life. it's an amazing story of survival. >> larry: melissa, were you shocked by all of this, that he had the guts, ability, whatever you might call it, to do this? >> i'm shocked by all of this. i mean, never in a million years would i ever think something like this would happen. if i am shocked that he had the strength in him to do it? no. i mean, he's incredibly brave and, you know, he is a great critical thinker, a problem solver. he's very creative. so, you know, that he would come up with some way to get out of that situation is not a huge surprise to me. but the situation itself is strange. i'm sorry. >> larry: john, did you ever think that you had bought it? >> larry, absolutely. on at least a couple of occasions.
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probably won't most notably when i first began the cut and hit one of the major arteries running through my arm. the sheer amount of blood that i began to lose had me fairly convinced that my time was very nearly up. >> larry: did you pass out? >> i did. several times. and by the third day, i was in and out of consciousness. and by the time the first responders arrived, i was almost in a catatonic state. still, still awake but really not responsive. >> larry: we'll be right back with john and melissa and the doctor. we have more than a million reasons to smile about last night's telethon. we'll give you an update, too.
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dr. ellner, will john handle a prosthetic well, above the elbow? >> you know, it is a high injury and from the get go, after john had his second revisional surgery for his left shoulder, we asked or physiatrist and team of physical therapists to come and evaluate john right away. he has a tremendous amount of strength, still, in his upper muscles of his shoulder, neck and back. and already he's demonstrating that, i think with rehabilitation, he'll be able to use a prosthesis. can i say with 100% certainty that he's going to recover fully?
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that's really up to john and the miracles of science that we have for his ability to recover functionally. >> larry: john, you are an amazing man. all we can do is salute you and in a way envy with what you were able to do. melissa, you are a lucky lady. doctor, you have a wonderful patient, doctor. >> i agree. >> larry: amazing. amazing. >> thank you. >> john metz, melissa and dr. scott ellner, all in new york. >> larry: last night you helped raise more than $1.8 million for the people and wildlife of the gulf. we hope our two-hour telethon would generate interest and donations. and it did, thanks to you and our celebrity helpers. watch. >> fishing is what i do. and i can't do it. >> larry: this is a call to action. why now? because they need us now. celebrities are manning the phone in new york and here in los angeles. we've got reporters across the gulf.
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>> talk with these stars on twitter and facebook. >> larry: ryan seacrest. >> ron artest. >> jenny mccarthy. >> larry: sting and robert redford are on the way. >> jack johnson. >> larry: jack cousteau. >> and india aleah. >> i want to dedicate this next song to all the people in the gulf who have lost their livelihoods because of this terrible oil spill. >> fishing, farming. that's all we've done. >> a lot of strong men have broken down and cried. >> consensus is that everyone is really pissed off. >> hannah, who says my father lost his job. >> people have been crying on the phone. >> donated five grande few minutes ago, donated 25 grand. >> seeing what's going on there makes me sad, mad and sick at heart. >> how is your family doing? >> terrible. >> what about everybody's children?
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this is not just ours. this is just ours for a little while. >> we're looking for somebody to really help us get this back together. >> we need help. we need help now. >> every single day, animals are dying and people are suffering. >> these animals are part of the chain. when one of the lakes goes away, the chain breaks. >> this is a catastrophe that could have been avoided. >> donate to this great cause. >> and your general arouse donations, about getting money there now. >> raising money and raise ideas as well. there's so much creativity, so much love, so much compassion. we harness that globally through cnn. >> you and chelsea are going to donate $5,000 each. >> we are. >> unemployed and donated $100, which isn't easy to do for somebody out of work right now. >> every little bit can help. >> our total so far, $1,329,200. and we're not finished.

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