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Quest Means Business
Florida Braces for Milton's Disastrous Impact; New Book Reveals Biden's Candid Views of Allies, Enemies, Also Trump-Putin Conversations. Aired 4:00-5p ET
Aired October 08, 2024 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[16:00:09]
RICHARD QUEST, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST, "QUEST MEANS BUSINESS": Closing bell ringing on Wall Street, as you can see, the market, all of a sudden went up
just after lunch. Why did that happen? Who knows? It didn't go down.
It is up 120 points. It is the best of the day, just about. So, the market is in a bit of a roar and a tear as he hits the gavel -- oh, he has already
done the gavel. I missed it. Ding.
Those are the markets and these are the main events of the day. Officials are urging Florida residents to flee before the arrival of his monster
hurricane.
Allegations that TikTok has addicted young people and harmed their mental health, 13 states are now suing the company.
And the Godfather of AI shares in today's Nobel Prize in Physics.
We are live in London on Tuesday. It is October the 8th. I am Richard Quest and in London, I mean, business.
Good evening.
If you're going to get out, get out now. That's what Florida's Governor Ron DeSantis has told people living in the states as Hurricane Milton is
barreling down, fast fast-approaching.
Look at the highways, packed trying to get out of the way. These are live pictures from Lee County in Florida, and Milton has gained strength, it is
now just shy of Category Five, that's the highest, with sustaining winds of 155 miles an hour, 250 kilometers.
As it gets closer those winds may moderate marginally, but it will double in size the actual hurricane.
Landfall is Wednesday night, somewhere along the state's Central Gulf Coast and that could include Tampa, who's fire chief has been warning that now is
the time and if you don't leave, well, that's really up to you.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARBARA TRIPP, TAMPA, FLORIDA FIRE CHIEF: We want everyone to be safe out there and want to continue to follow the news and get continuous updates
through our social media as well as the different information that has been given to you all.
We cannot stress enough when the situations get to a point that we will not be able to respond, the first responders are here for you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUEST: Now Milton's explosive growth has been fueled by this. Look, this is where we are at the moment, but bear in mind the crucial fact here is
Milton as it goes out across the Gulf of Mexico, because these are the warm waters, exceptionally warm waters, warm at the moment, and that is what
will create a fuel as it goes into the atmosphere, rises into the hurricane and give the whole thing a considerable power and punch.
So the meteorologists using pressure to measure the intensity. Typically, the lower the pressure, the more intense its biometric. Milton is the
fourth most intense storm to form in the Atlantic. You can see those numbers.
Only five Atlantic hurricanes have been stronger than Milton at the peak in terms of speed. It was also the wind speed and the strongest storm on the
planet at any point of the year.
And by the way, talking about how strong, it has already actually covered Hurricane Gilbert back in 1988, drove through the thing from Texas all the
way down into Mexico.
So the strength of these things, as you're going through them, is really phenomenal and deeply difficult.
As you can see, a tropical cyclone has become more common in the Atlantic Basin over recent decades. 2020, we always have to be careful or we just
seeing an anomaly. Well, we're not. 2020 this year is now heading towards being a record. We will see if it beats the previous.
Isabel Rosales is in Tampa in Florida.
Hi, good to see you. I mean, what can one say? Get ready, it is heading your way. Whether it makes landfall a bit up or a bit down, you're going to
feel the full force and throttle.
ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Richard, this is a one-two punch that the Tampa Bay Area has been dealing with. They dealt with Helene two weeks
ago, and now, this monster, Milton is coming their way. This could be the first time that a hurricane is hitting the Tampa Bay area directly.
This is the storm that they have been dreading here for decades. And you're looking at the biggest concern right now, a race for time to clear out this
debris. I mean, we are expecting peak winds here in the Tampa Bay area of 80 to a hundred miles per hour, gusts up to 150 miles per hour, so imagine
these pieces of plywood, nails sticking out just going into the air, those are flying missiles at that point, projectiles.
[16:05:04]
So what has happened here is that Governor Ron DeSantis has opened up all of the landfills in these impacted counties to storm debris. We have had
300-plus dump trucks driving around in these neighborhoods getting this stuff out, getting it away from where people are living, and actually
putting it in the Florida Fairgrounds, a site I have never seen before, Richard and I lived and worked here in Tampa Bay area for many years.
So the visceral side of these mountains of debris piled up in the Florida Fairgrounds, a place normally for concerts and events just incredible to
see. They've had 1,200-plus truckloads of debris dumped there in the past 24 hours.
Now, the Hillsborough Bay is in that direction. I am standing in Davis Islands, it is a neighborhood of Tampa. This is an Evacuation Zone A, a
mandatory evacuation area, and it has been sure in this main road, we see cars here and there, but eerily really quiet in there in the neighborhoods
because so many people have evacuated including Nancy Turner, who I spoke with.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY TURNER, TAMPA, FLORIDA RESIDENT: It just sounds worse and worse, you know, it looks, worse and worse since it went into a Category Five.
However, it is supposed to be three by the time it hits us. So --
ROSALES: You're not going to risk it?
TURNER: No.
ROSALES: Did you hear the words from Tampa Mayor Jane Castor that she says to the people riding it out and like Zone A, you're going to die.
TURNER: Yes, that's kind of frightening but I think she has to say that because that's certainly a possibility.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUEST: So, let's just take that. That's the problem the authorities face people who say, I am staying, and I realize the risk and I might not get
rescues, but the curious thing is what are you supposed to do? I mean, look at that debris behind you, the sheer amount of stuff.
If you stay there, that is going to come your way right on your head.
ROSALES: And officials have been all over the airwaves. They've been on social media. They've been all over the place trying to make people take
this extremely seriously.
And based on the traffic cameras, the bumper to bumper traffic, we've seen, it appears that people are taking it seriously.
I think one of the most stunning numbers, Richard, that I've seen is, from Helene, we had five to eight foot storm surge here in the Tampa Bay area.
We are looking at double that with Milton. We are looking at 10 to 15 feet storm surge.
Officials say that is un-survivable. So we have the governor right now, Ron DeSantis telling people, your window of time to evacuate, you still have
time, but that window is getting tighter and tighter. Please leave.
QUEST: One very quick question because I know viewers are going to say, so what are you going to do?
ROSALES: Yes, we are in Evacuation Zone C, so we are looking very closely at the storm surge forecast map the Pinellas County has up, Hillsborough
County has up, staying out of that and aboveground, too, but thank you for that question, Richard. I appreciate that.
QUEST: Well, yes, just, Yes, and A, I am most concerned about your safety and B, I want to make sure you're there that afterwards to put a report of
what has been happening. So there is enlightened self-interest in all of that.
Thank you very much and be safe as always, to all our colleagues who are covering these things.
ROSALES: Thank you, Richard.
QUEST: The Hurricane Milton is already expected to cost at least a billion dollars, I mean, let's be realistic, it is going to be much more than that.
The economic impact are all over the place. Look no further than the southeast, parts of which were just devastated.
The initial damage for homeowners is more than $47 billion. Economists are divided about the broader impact. Some claim jobless claims could go into
the hundreds of thousands, others say it will be relatively minimal and even if they do have them, there is a bounce-back factor.
Randall Kroszner is with me, former US Fed governor.
There is this argument, you know, well, yes, they will lose because of what happens immediately, but the rebuilding has its own. Economic sad, impact,
but overall, what will economists believe and the Fed believe about this?
RANDALL KROSZNER, FORMER US FEDERAL RESERVE GOVERNOR: Certainly, this is tragic for the families and people who are losing their homes and their
personal effects.
When you put it into the bigger picture context, I think with seeing more frequent storms and very, very strong storms, it is a bigger risk premium
that is coming in.
And so there is going to be more risk in living in these areas, there is going to be more risk and difficulty in getting insurance and that means,
it is going to be more costly to live in these areas.
QUEST: But if you're governor of the Fed or you are the budget director in Florida, you have to make policies and economic might models that now
account for climate change.
KROSZNER: For sure, and I think one of the things that you have to think about is that the cost of borrowing may go up in those areas. The cost of
insurance, the cost of just operating anything in those areas will be more expensive.
[16:10:10]
Instead of people moving away from these zones, people have been moving into these zones in the US.
QUEST: And that is a difficulty, isn't it? The Sun Belt snowbirds, if you will.
KROSZNER: Yes.
QUEST: That's moving down, and these states have done huge amounts on tax policy to attract people, no taxes -- no income tax in Florida. Does that
all look wise in hindsight?
KROSZNER: Well, it is one of the challenges of -- you know, we have competition among the states in the US as some have high taxes, some have
low taxes.
And so of course, low-tax states, no surprise, people are moving there. You've got a lot of retirees, the population is aging. So they're going to
go where the taxes are low.
QUEST: Let's talk on more general aspects about the Fed.
Yesterday, we saw the 10-year, take a bit of a blip, which suggests, I mean, when they cut rates, we were expecting two or three more before the
end of the year. What is now the expectation, do you think?
KROSZNER: So, certainly much less than that given that we are we are seeing a lot of economic resiliency in the labor market. Most recent Jobs Report
was a real blowout report. I don't think anyone expected to be that much. I think it was higher than any of the economists that expected.
QUEST: How can this be? How can it be only four weeks ago or whatever it was, you have things we need to cut by half a point, not just a quarter. We
are going to go the whole half a point, and now everyone's saying, oh, no, no, the numbers weren't quite -- it is only a few weeks.
KROSZNER: Well, there is always new data that comes out. We also shouldn't -- we should know also overreact any one particular number, but I think
people were worried that we were seeing a very substantial and rapid decline in the job market. That's clearly not the case.
Certainly, this makes a stronger case for the so-called soft landing or maybe, maybe no landing. I still think there are going to be some bumps
going ahead because interest rates have gone up very significantly and even as the Fed has kept interest rates constant before they cut, inflation was
coming down.
So, the inflation adjusted interest rate, the real interest rate has been going up very substantially. And Friedman always talked about long and
variable effects of monetary policy and so I think by the end of this year, you're going to start to see some impact of that.
QUEST: This slowdown on that we saw arguably that led to the half-point cut, largely was because we had underestimated the long tail of the very
rapid rise in rates.
How quickly do you think rates coming down, particularly say, for example, in Europe where the ECB has been more aggressive, how quickly do you think
we will see that feed into the monetary change and transmission?
KROSZNER: I think just as it took a while for the actions of the Central Banks to bring inflation down, it is going to take a while for it to have
the positive impact.
QUEST: And so -- let me just be -- let me just prove that you can't answer this question. It is a heads you win, tails I lose.
KROSZNER: All right.
QUEST: Heads I win, tails you lose. In which case you could find that preemptive cuts in rates will in eight, seven, nine months' time stoke
inflation?
KROSZNER: It is certainly possible. I think, you know, obviously the Central Banks are betting that that's not going to happen, and that's one
of the reasons why the Fed was slow to cut rates. It was one of the last of the major Central Banks to do that because of what happened in the late
70s, early 80s, when they declared victory too early, they cut rates and inflation bounced back up.
QUEST: It is so good to see you, sir, and it is especially good to see you whilst we are here together in London. Thank you.
KROSZNER: Excellent.
QUEST: An Israeli officials says Benjamin Netanyahu has postponed his Defense minister's trip to the United States. Yoav Gallant was to meet his
US counterparts on Wednesday.
Now, the prime minister of Israel has called it off because he wants to speak first to President Biden. The Israeli official also says the prime
minister wants his Cabinet to vote on Israel's response to Iran's missile attack.
Nic Robertson is in Tel Aviv.
Nic, just reading that introduction to you, I sort of became more aware there is a subtext here. There is obviously something, there is a
backstory. Why would he not want him to go? Why would he want to have another conversation? Give me the backstory to this?
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: I think you've got eyes on the backstory from Benny Gantz, who was in the War Cabinet, who is one
of the main opposition figures here and he says, look, the prime minister wants a joined up approach with his approach with President Biden, with the
Defense minister's approach to the situation out here with the US secretary of Defense, then let him go, let him have the conversation. This is the way
to keep the strength of the nation, to keep the defense of Israel and its strongest.
That gives you an idea about the subtext here, the two lines of communication. Look, there has been tensions between the prime minister and
the Defense minister. The prime minister tried to replace him a couple of weeks ago, he didn't do that because he went to war in Lebanon. But part of
the subtext of that was the fact that the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu likes to have his own line of communication with all US officials, to
dominate that channel, to set the message, to be the arbiter on all things that is said and it is a threat to him politically to have the Defense
minister with his own line of communication.
[16:15:15]
And you might just want to add in the icing on that cake, if you will, which is the quotes from Bob Woodward's new book, that President Biden has
as alleged to have said, yes, I'll stop there.
QUEST: Yes, you anticipated my next question. The vulgarity --
ROBERTSON: Oh, I am sorry.
QUEST: No, no, no. The vulgarity of the president's -- the US president's language to describe Mr. Netanyahu. Now, I don't think that the shy and
wilting flower that Netanyahu is, I don't think he is going to be at all offended per se, but he is certainly going to use it in some form of
political capital.
ROBERTSON: Yes, look, there is clearly tension at the moment between Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Biden. President Biden has said that he
wants -- he doesn't want Israel to strike Iran's nuclear sites, and he doesn't want Israel to strike Iran's economic oil facility targets, that
could drive the price of oil, the other could really force a massive escalation.
So the US president is trying to box the Israeli prime minister in about how we can straight back at Israel. Netanyahu doesn't like that. He
actually thinks this is the moment with a weak Hezbollah in the north that's always been the sort of militia that would come down hard on Israel
if it struck back at Iran, that weak, this is an opportunity for Israel to strike at Iran's nuclear facilities, that a fundamental belief among some
politicians, very likely it appears with the Prime Minister, Biden is against that.
QUEST: Nic, I am grateful to you for your time and attention tonight. Thank you very much.
In terms of what we were just referring to, the White House says it doesn't have a comment on any of the specific anecdotes in Bob Woodward's book. It
insists, that President Biden and the prime minister's relationship has never been stronger.
We will be exploring those comments later in the program. And if you go online to cnn.com, you can read the extremely good article by Jamie Gangel,
who will be joining me on exactly the profanities that were used, which certainly are not for use for a family program like this when we talk about
business and economics.
Two researchers whose work have paved the way for AI have won the Nobel Prize for Physics. They've created computer networks that function more
like human brains.
[16:19:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
QUEST: TikTok is accused in a series of new U.S. lawsuits of being addictive and dangerous for youug users, and older ones too I suspect. What
is it about the new forms of media entertainment, it's an age old refrain. It goes back - look, it's not new, this idea. Go back to when it cost a
nickel to see a silent movie and now look at the headlines of "The New York Times" on those silent movies. In the 1940s there were warnings about
movies, radio, and comic books.
In the 1980s, television was going to dumb us all down and make us all stupid. And two decades later, video games were trying to limit youth
access. But what's new here is TikTok's powerful algorithm which curates an endless stream of short form videos.
And so that's why the attorney's general of 13 states and D.C. say it's designed to be irresistible. TikTok says the lawsuits are misleading.
Andrea Campbell, the attorney general of Massachusetts says the company wants people glued to its app.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDREA CAMPBELL, MASSACHUSETTS ATTORNEY GENERAL: It is not a fair fight Companies are employing the most gifted of engineers and deploying the most
sophisticated technology just for the purpose of addicting our young people.
This is no accident. Rather, it's a result of TikTok intentionally designing its platform to keep our young people glued to their screens all
in the name of profit.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUEST: Domenic Romano is the founder and managing partner of Romano Law. Domenic's with me in New York.
Domenic, look, I sort of beg to say that we've known this for a long time. There are many apps which are designed with the reward, pleasure, dopamine
hit in the very core of the algorithm. That part is not new, so what is so different here?
DOMENIC ROMANO, FOUNDER AND MANAGING PARTNER, ROMANO LAW: Correct. The - and you pointed out in the segment - but what's different here is that the
states are noticing an intentional coercive design here intending addiction, so intending endless scrolling.
So the U.S. surgeon general has noted that in the years of ascendancy of social media between 2009 and 2019, there's been a 40% increase in youth
depression and a 60% increase in teen suicide.
The allegation is that these apps are increasing teen anxiety, depression, and body dysmorphia.
QUEST: But a lot of apps use the same concept. Maybe they're not as aggressive on the algorithm, but Instagram or - I mean they're all going to
write to me and tell me that they don't -
ROMANO: Of course. Instagram and Facebook, and there's a similar case by the attorney's general against those platforms. But here, look, TikTok has
49 - approximately 49 million daily users. Of those, and it's supposed to be only for users 13 years of age, but of the 49 million users, one third
are aged 14 and under. It is a platform that skews to a younger demographic.
And these are very serious concerns that the states have, and internal documents show an intention for that coercive design, that dopamine-
inducing scrolling. And the difference - you pointed out films and comic books, the difference is here you can be on the app forever.
In -- the New York case notes, when social media becomes the bedtime companion of our teens, it steals their sleep and in turn their mental
health.
QUEST: So what do they want? Because at one level - I mean, the drug pusher at the schoolyard gate, you can lock up and deny access. How are you going
to tell TikTok that part of your algorithm has to go, that bit is questionable to begin with. No, we're going to ban it here or there.
And by the way, if you do that, you've got a load of youngsters who are already addicted and that's going to cause a withdrawal in its own right
anyway.
[16:25:00]
ROMANO: Yes. But the solution is not to give up. The solution is not to surrender. So far there have been community guidelines. There's been self-
regulation. Clearly that hasn't worked. So, if we can, by analogy, look at what happened in the tobacco litigation or the big pharma litigation, in
tobacco, it ended in a $200 billion settlement and a $1.5 billion anti- smoking campaign. I think you're going to see greater awareness of parents and the general population of how harmful some of these platforms can be
especially to young users.
QUEST: So do you believe, I mean, there's obviously the role of education. There's the role of parents in all of this. But if this is being
deliberately constructed to be addictive, then the only solution is not to have access to it because that's like saying, just go off and do a little
bit of drugs and you'll be fine even if it may -- even though it's highly addictive.
Are we at the point where we are saying that TikTok cannot be used in a safe way?
ROMANO: Well, if you are saying that the platform should only be used by people 13 and over, and your internal documentation shows that one-third of
your users are 14 years of age or younger, that's definitely something that the platform is going to have to answer to.
QUEST: Sir, I'm grateful. Thank you. We'll talk more about it. Thank you.
ROMANO: It's a pleasure.
QUEST: This year's Nobel Prize in physics has gone to two researchers whose work has paved the way for artificial intelligence, AI. They developed
computer networks inspired by the structure of the brain. What a magnificent beast it is. Now there are nodes within this that operate like
neurons.
John Hopfield found a way for these nodes to save and recreate patterns. Geoffrey Hinton, the so-called godfather of AI, created something called a
Boltzmann machine, as you can see there. A network that can learn to classify images and data by feeding itself examples. In other words, they
learn themselves again and again.
Anna Stewart, who -- her splendid brain in her own right. So I did not understand, what do they do?
ANNA STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You sounded like you knew what you were talking about. Very good writing from our QUEST MEANS BUSINESS team.
QUEST: Absolutely. But now tell me what it means.
STEWART: Both of these characters have done incredible work laying the foundation of neural networks, machine learning, essentially the building
blocks of artificial intelligence, which honestly has made an impact whether you use facial recognition to open up your phone, or whether you
use a chat bot on a Web site, ChatGPT. All of it has started with a neural network. And these are two people that have been pioneers.
QUEST: How much can we link what they did to what we've got today?
STEWART: A huge amount, but they're not alone. There are many pioneers when it comes to AI. There are a couple of controversies I'd say today. One is
that Geoffrey Hinton is one of three so-called godfathers of AI. There's also Joshua Bengio and Yann LeCun, all three of them won the Turing Award,
which the sort of ultimate computer scientist award. So there've been many different people.
In addition to that, Richard, consider, this is the physics prize, the Nobel Physics Prize. Really what we're talking about here is computer
science, but there isn't a prize for Nobel, no Nobel Prizes for computer science. So it's fitting into physics. It's a sign of how important AI is.
QUEST: You are uniquely qualified to talk to us about this because of "DECODED." So, you are -- you spend a lot of time dealing with AI and the
issues on "DECODED." What do you make of their achievement?
STEWART: The achievement is extraordinary. And I think these people that we're speaking about today recognize the significance and potential for AI
when people didn't believe it was even possible. People thought this was a pipe dream, a machine that can learn like a human brain, it's impossible.
Now we're looking at two people winning the Nobel Prize for this, one of them quit his job because he is so worried about what he has created and he
is ringing the alarm bells.
QUEST: And what's your next edition of "DECODED" about?
STEWART: It's all about biohacking and how to live forever. Top tips coming soon on CNN.
QUEST: That's what I thought. Thank you. I'm very grateful. Thank you.
The journalist Bob Woodward's latest book is called "War" and it's behind the scenes at the White House. He looked at the relationship between Joe
Biden and Benjamin Netanyahu, and discloses calls between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. And I can tell you, never mind algorithms, it's expedited
in its blue language.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[16:32:12]
QUEST: Let me update you with our top story. The Hurricane Milton, powerful, aggressive, dangerous, and deadly, and in the next 24 hours it
will make landfall in Florida. The storm is now brushing past Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. The winds are very high, around 250K per hour.
CNN's Randi Kaye is on the ground, and look at how Florida is preparing while there is still time to do so. And they still got the remnants of
Hurricane Helene.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TIMOTHY DUDLEY, HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT DIRECTOR: This may be the worst storm that we've seen in 100 years to hit west central
Florida.
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The west coast of Florida has barely cleaned up from Hurricane Helene as this monster hurricane takes its
aim at Florida. A major hurricane hasn't made a direct hit on the Tampa Bay area since October of 1921.
MAYOR JANE CASTOR, TAMPA, FLORIDA: Helene was a wake-up call. This is literally catastrophic and I can say without any dramatization whatsoever,
if you choose to stay in one those evacuation areas, you're going to die.
KAYE: A very real sense of urgency to leave before it's too late.
SHERIFF CHAD CHRONISTER, HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, FLORIDA: Don't gamble with your life or the lives of your loved ones. The time to get out is now.
KAYE: This area could see storm surge of up to 15 feet.
MAYOR BRUCE RECTOR, CLEARWATER, FLORIDA: If you choose to stay in evacuation area, you're going to die.
KAYE: Roads are clogged as residents heed the warnings to evacuate. The search for gasoline getting more difficult as some gas stations here are
starting to run out of fuel. And for those who are staying a rush on water and plywood as residents make last-ditch efforts to board up businesses and
homes.
KT Curran and her husband, Chris, have lived on Siesta Key, an island off Sarasota, for the last 25 years. She evacuated for Helene, but her husband
stayed behind to ride out the storm.
KT CURRAN, SIESTA KEY, FLORIDA RESIDENT: That night he got no power, he had no phone, and we lost touch with him and we found out the next day there
was a five-foot surge of water in the house and he was all night in the pitch dark and five feet of water. And he sat there for hours on the top of
a neighbor's high house until the water went down a little, and then went back in the house and laid on a wet bed until light came up.
KAYE: They lost all of their belongings and the house now has to be gutted due to mold in the walls. Now staring down Hurricane Milton the couple has
still decided to stay, this time in a friend's condo on the ninth floor of a building in downtown Sarasota, which has windows built to withstand a
category five hurricane.
CURRAN: Now as this hurricane is barreling down directly on our community, it feels like maybe Helene was just a rehearsal for what's to come, that
they're talking possible 15-foot storm surge. None of us on in 100 years have seen anything like this. It is shocking.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[16:35:10]
QUEST: There's little doubt that climate change makes these storms much more dangerous. The warmer temperatures in the hurricanes intensified
faster. There's more rain and bigger storms.
Chad Myers is here to explain how it all works.
I am fascinated always, Chad, by this idea that as it goes out over the water, that warm water becomes essentially the gasoline of the thing.
CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: And it doesn't seem like 85, you know, 32 degrees Celsius water would do that much, but it is just the steam. It is
the energy that goes up in that eyewall and starts to spin. Coriolis force, of course. These really don't happen right at the equator because there's
no spin. You get them away from the equator and this is what you get, 155- mile-per-hour storm, 250K as you've said, and it's still going to be a huge impact for the Florida west coast, whether this lands as a category two or
a category three, or heaven forbid contains all of this energy because there's something right here, Richard.
This is called the loop current. The water comes out of the Caribbean between Cuba and Cancun, and parks itself up here. Then kind of runs up
toward New Orleans and then kind of loops back out toward Florida Keys. And that's the warmest water in the Caribbean. The warmest water in the Gulf of
Mexico because it's coming from either farther south. There is so much energy in this water that we're going to get the hurricane to keep to be a
hurricane itself all the way across the Florida Peninsula, even though it's going to run out of water.
It's going to have so much momentum. It's going to have so much for wind speed. I've had so many people today asked me, where is it going to hit,
and I know they're talking about the eye. But when you take a look at here, all the way from well north of where the other storms have been hitting all
year, to all the way down to Fort Myers, this is all major hurricane damage. 110, 110 miles per hour or greater.
And then all the way across to Daytona, and all the way across the Cape Canaveral where they launched the rockets, that's all hurricane force
winds. Millions of people will be without power. But the true, true damage is going to come from a five-meter storm surge because the one that just
came through with Helene was two meters and it did so much. This is going to be three meters on top of that. Nine feet on top of what came in just
with Helene proper.
So many people are going to be in the way. And I think the mayors of the cities that say you need to leave are not lying to you. I know there is
some distrust in government, and all that.
QUEST: Right.
MYERS: But they are telling you the truth that you must go.
QUEST: Chad, I'm grateful. Thank you. You and I will talk much more over the next few days. And unfortunately about the damage and death that will
follow. Thank you, sir.
The journalist Bob Woodward is giving readers a stunning look inside the private conversations of President Biden and Donald Trump. It's the book he
called "War" and we obtained a copy before it's released next week.
Jamie Gangel is in Washington, D.C.
I mean, do we -- a lot of it is interesting gossip in a sense of who said what, profanity laced that you and I called and talked about on a family
program like QUEST MEANS BUSINESS. But do we substantially believe what's being written here?
JAMIE GANGEL, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT: So a couple of things. First of all, Bob Woodward, as he always does, he has the receipts, Richard. These
conversations are based on documents, transcripts, note takers, people in the room, firsthand participants in the conversations. And so I think it is
fair to say, yes, we can believe him.
And the other thing I think we should just remember about the profanity laced, I don't think it's breaking news that President Biden likes to
swear. I think we know that. But there is something about these exchanges, many of them verbatim, where you really get the sense of what goes on
behind the scenes in a way we've never seen before.
QUEST: OK. The allegations that President Trump assisted President Putin with COVID tests and then promptly has spoken to him numerous times out of
office.
GANGEL: Right.
QUEST: The significance here, of course, is that Trump is anti, you know, what's going on with Ukraine and therefore arguably that never mind the
Hatch Act, which we could leave aside. But arguably he's meddling.
GANGEL: So big picture. Former presidents do have a history of speaking to world leaders. Jimmy Carter, both allies and, you know, enemies he's spoken
to.
[16:40:06]
President Bush 41 spoke to world leaders after he left office. The difference here, of course, is, as you say, we're talking about former
president Trump and Russian president Putin. It raises all kinds of questions.
Woodward has two pieces of fascinating reporting. One is, as you say, about the COVID test machines. Just to lay it out, this is when Trump is still in
office. It is the height of COVID. And this is -- what we have in the book is a verbatim exchange between then President Trump and Russian President
Putin.
Let me just read it to you. "Please don't tell anybody you sent these to me." Trump, "I don't care. Fine." Putin, "No, no, I don't want you to tell
anybody because people will get mad at you, not me. They don't care about me."
These were machines just to be clear that were very rare and that Trump, according to Woodward's sources, sent to Putin for his personal use. Then
there are these -- a Trump aide Woodward reports told him that Trump has had as many as seven phone calls with Putin post-presidency. We don't know
what those were about.
QUEST: Fascinating. Thank you, Jamie.
GANGEL: Thank you.
QUEST: Thank you very much. Thank you. I need to also say that the Trump campaign responded to the claims calling Woodward an angry little man. He
says the stories are all made up.
I'm made up for tonight. That's QUEST MEANS BUSINESS. I'm Richard Quest in London. Whatever you're up to in the hours ahead, I hope it's profitable.
Coming up next, "CONNECTING AFRICA."
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