Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Talkback Live

Does American Security Depend on Closing the Borders?

Aired January 09, 2002 - 15:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MAUREEN O'BOYLE, HOST: ... of the west. How mass immigration, depopulation and a dying faith are killing our culture and our country. So, Pat, thanks for being here. Are you saying that immigration is going to kill off western culture as we know it?

PAT BUCHANAN, AUTHOR, "DEATH OF THE WEST": No. What is happening in the west is this, the western nations, every single European nation, is dying, in a sense not one of them has a population that will keep it alive as it is the rest of this century.

By the end of this century, if present trends continue, Europe will lose something like two-thirds to three-fourths of its entire population, worse than the black death. What I'm saying is that in Europe, America, and Russia, as these native born die off, they will be replaced by people from China, from the Middle East, Africa, the Islamic world, Latin America who will not carry on American history and American traditions or European traditions.

O'BOYLE: And so you are saying the same things happening in America. You started off by talking about it in Europe, but you are saying we are having the same problem here that we are letting too many people in who are not grabbing hold of our culture?

What is an American culture though, Pat? Aren't we a melting pot? Aren't we various cultures that have all moved to the same land?

BUCHANAN: Right, Maureen, we do most to the same land. E Plurbus Unum, From many, one. The problem is the mass immigration coming in from Mexico now, these folks are not assimilating, they are not Americanizing. They are not learning English. They are maintaining their language, their Spanish radio, Spanish TV, Spanish tradition, and their loyalty to their country, Mexico.

So, what is happening is that certain Mexican leaders say, La Reconquista! That's title of my chapter, the reconquest by Mexico, socially and culturally of the American southwest, from Los Angeles down through southern Texas. They call the Ozlam. It's new land that belongs to Hispanics and not to anglos. And that's what is happening the southwest.

O'BOYLE: Can you can put a definition of what you mean by losing our American culture or western culture? What part of that is not parts of many cultures? Are you talking about the white culture? BUCHANAN: No. I'm talking about America has a unique culture. We have own traditions, our heroes, Washington, and Jefferson, and Lincoln. We have our own literature, we have Edgar Allen Poe, and Hawthorne and Hemingway. We have our own architecture, our own history, Pearl Harbor, the greatest generation.

I'm saying that all of this that we all believe in and love, understand and know, will have fewer and fewer people who care about it by the middle of this century. We could have 400 million people easily, half of whom are from Asia, Africa, newcomers or from Latin America, who really don't care about Eisenhower, and McArthur and Patton. And I think unless we assimilate and Americanize the immigrants who are here, stop, cut off new immigration and assimilate them as we did from 1924 to 1965, we are in danger of vulcanization and of losing our country.

O'BOYLE: I want to bring in columnist, Peter Noel. He is from Trinidad. And his mother was actually an illegal immigrant in this country, was she not?

PETER NOEL, COLUMNIST: Yes.

O'BOYLE: How do you respond to what Pat is saying?

BUCHANAN: I think he should have aptly titled the book, "The Death of the White Race." This is a lament about the extinction of white people. And my mother came here and she did two jobs. It was illegal for her to come to the country. But she came and struggled and she cleaned toilets, she cleaned floors. The people who died in the World Trade Center, who are under the rubble right now, they cleaned the floors. They are immigrants, they brought their own culture, yes, as Pat says.

They brought their own culture, but at the same time, they lived in America, thy contributed to the economy. They contributed to the economic life of the city. So, why not revel in their own culture and praise their own god. Why not?

O'BOYLE: But Peter, he says that we really need to stop having this sort of second culture, these separate cultures.

NOEL: This is a great melting pot. This is America. I mean, at the turn of the century, who came here? Italians, Irish, the Irish were police officers, the Italians did all kinds of things. These are the people who contributed to the big tall building they built the skyscrapers, and they continue to do that. I'm sure Pat has some immigrants in his family. Why doesn't he acknowledge that?

BUCHANAN: But you know, look, first calm this fellow down, but secondly, when the Irish immigrants and the German immigrants who were my ancestors came here, they came here first, legally. Secondly they came here to become Americans. They turned their back on the Kaiser in Germany. They said good-bye to the British empire.

The Jewish folks said good-bye to the czar. They brought here to become Americans. NOEL: They brought their culture, and they are still here with their own culture, Pat.

BUCHANAN: We have one American culture to which all should contribute and they are not multi-cultural.

NOEL: What is that culture?

O'BOYLE: But how is that culture defined? Pat, can you define it somehow? Because it is not clear. What is this American culture?

BUCHANAN: Look, we all have the same heroes, tradition, history, literature, language, poetry, all of the things that make up a culture of a country, and my friend, if they come from Haiti, they speak French I believe down there. He is speaking English, as far as I know, even though it is agitated English.

In that sense he is being acculturated. We are making progress with this fellow.

NOEL: Pat, let me say something, Pat I have always been an American because I lived in the Americas. I have always been an American, No. 1. I speak English regardless if what you call it, agitated. We have a melting pot in this country. People speak various languages. All we want to say is we need to preserve what is in America right now. Not talk about the extension of the white race, and that's what you want to talk about.

(CROSSTALK)

O'BOYLE: I want to hear from somebody in our audience, Pat. Hold on, we have a response.

CHRIS: This is Sein. He is a Sikh American from Georgia -- go ahead. SEIN: Yes, I am from Georgia. Pat, I have a comment to what you consider American culture. If your American culture begins at George Washington and ends somewhere today, I believe this is only part of the American culture. There was American culture before and there will be American culture afterwards. I agree with American culture, but I do not agree with only a part of it.

BUCHANAN: Yay, OK. Let's give our fried a round of applause here.

Now, let me get back to the idea -- Peter's idea of the melting pot -- because I agree 100 percent. A melting pot comes from all over the world and becomes one nation, one people. Out of many, one.

My fear, Peter, is that the melting pot has broken and we have become this salad bowl of these little encrusted groups which are at war with one another and are not becoming one. That's why we need a moratorium on immigration so we can all become one nation and one people again with a single American culture to which we all contribute.

NOEL: Pat, what is your basic fear? What is your basic fear? That you see people of color coming in?

BUCHANAN: No, no...

NOEL: You talk about the fact that there are more Mexicans coming in. Why don't you talk about the wave of why don't you talk about wave of immigrants coming in from Israel from Europe and from different places?

They happen to repopulate the United States. Why don't you talk about that?

O'BOYLE: Let's talk about economics of all this because, Pat, you feelings are that if we don't have the immigrants in America, our country will prosper, and Peter you believe that that is just the opposite.

(CROSSTALK)

O'BOYLE: Wait, one at a time -- Pat.

BUCHANAN: No, we are not going to die, die first. My book is not about economics. Let me say this: If you brought in 500 million Chinese and 500 million folks from India tomorrow to California, within 20 years 95 percent of them would be employed. So, and the GDP would rise. But it wouldn't be California as we know it. It wouldn't be a part, I believe of the United States of America, because the melting pot could not absorb that many people in that short a time.

Now let me talk about white race. There is no doubt Peter has a point. I don't want to see people I grew up with die or disappear. Every people wants to survive from the loneliest tribe of aborigines in Australia, they want to preserve themselves. I don't want to see our people die, or our culture die.

NOEL: Pat, so write a book saying we should have more babies. (UNINTELLIGIBLE) .

O'BOYLE: Well, he does say that in his book, actually, Peter. He brings that up.

BUCHANAN: Somebody has got to get Peter a copy of this book.

(CROSSTALK)

NOEL: I have the excerpt, but my point is this, you argue that they should have more babies, but you want them to be pure, Pat, and there is no such thing going on this country. There is no such thing as a pure American. You don't have a pure white race. People are intermarrying.

(APPLAUSE)

O'BOYLE: Pat, let's switch gears though. The Justice Department put 6,000 Arabs on the fast-track to deportation; absconders, as they are described. What do you feel about that and do you think, Peter, to you, the question to you, do you think that we are a basically -- that these people are being sought out?

BUCHANAN: Racially profiled?

O'BOYLE: Yes, sorry, profiling, and also, the list is much longer of Mexican Americans and is that fair?

BUCHANAN: Let me take to that first.

NOEL: That's fine. Go first, please.

BUCHANAN: First, the 6,000 that you referred to broke into our country. They are here illegally. They have broken the law. Some have criminal records. They have been ordered deported from the United States.

They are from countries that harbor terrorists. I not only agree with what the president is doing, I wonder why Mr. Ashcroft and the president didn't do it three months ago. Run them down and kick them out of this country. They do not belong here and they threaten the security of the United States and we have no reason that we should take that risk.

O'BOYLE: So, Peter, nothing more than racial profiling?

NOEL: This is exactly what we don't need. Racial profiling all over again. And again, I think my Arab brothers and sisters or my Pakistani brothers and sisters will know what racial profile is all about, because we went through that.

The same thing that Pat has not spoken out against racial profiling of African-Americans. You have right now the fear mongering of young Arab men who are in this country trying to make a living, trying to go to school, do the same things that every American should be doing, all of sudden they are permanent suspects and they are going to be kicked out of the country under the guise of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) terrorism and terrorists. And that is wrong. That is racist.

BUCHANAN: They are here! No, they are not being thrown out because they are simply Arab folks who live here. They broke the law, some committed felonies, they have been...

NOEL: Six thousand?

BUCHANAN: They are not being thrown out because they are simply Arab folks who live here. They broke the law. Some committed felonies.

(CROSSTALK)

NOEL: Where is the evidence? Where is the evidence? These people have been held incommunicado. They don't have lawyers. Their families don't know where they are.

(CROSSTALK)

BUCHANAN: This is not the 6,000. NOEL: It's more than 6,000, I'm sure. Pat, they are asking -- the government is asking people right now to snitch on Arabs, their own people. You know what they're doing? They're called snitch visas so they can stay in this country. This is wrong.

BUCHANAN: Let me tell you, if there were Irish-Americans involved in terrorism and they blew up the World Trade Center -- and I'm an Irishman -- I would turn them in. You have got to think, Peter, as an American, for a change.

NOEL: I do think as an American. I'm fair. In this country, this is the land of democracy and freedom. Everyone is entitled to a fair trial and to be presumed innocent. Right now the government is just rounding up people and sending them back. And you have already convicted them.

(CROSSTALK)

O'BOYLE: We have a response from somebody in the audience.

Go ahead.

STAFF: This is Jesus. He is an immigration attorney.

Go ahead.

JESUS: Well, first of all, a moratorium on immigration is not an answer to integration. Secondly, as far as economics are concerned, the Department of Justice, through the Immigration and Naturalization Service, does not do any kind of picking up illegals at the unemployment office or at the welfare office or at the Social Security office. They do them at work sites.

These individuals are working. The fact that they are not integrated into the system is simply because immigration cannot process these individuals who can in fact become legal residents. And, as far as leaving a nation, Patrick talks about leaving, what was it, Russia, Germany, and coming over here, because he was doing away...

O'BOYLE: We are going to have to break away right now. Jesus, we thank you for making that comment.

I would like you guys to respond, but right now I have throw to Leon in the CNN news center.

(INTERRUPTED FOR LIVE EVENT)

(APPLAUSE)

O'BOYLE: Thank you. And welcome back.

Peter Noel had to leave, but we do thank him for joining us today.

We are talking about Pat Buchanan's latest book: "The Death of the West."

Ana Maria Salazar has been on the edge of her seat waiting to get into this conversation. She is a columnist for the Mexican newspaper "Reforma." She also served as the special envoy of the Americas in the Clinton administration.

Pat's book seems to advocate a return to a 1950s morality. Does that work for you?

ANA MARIA SALAZAR, COLUMNIST: Of course not. And, in fact, I worked for the special envoy of the Americas. And I also worked for the Pentagon. I was a high-level official there. And the reason why I mention that is because I understand terrorism.

My office, in fact, was one of the offices that was hit. Fortunately, I was not there when it happened. But I consider myself a victim of September 11. And when I hear this discourse, and when I hear Pat advocating for controlling migration as a way of solving the problems of the United States, I think it is very worrisome. And, in fact, I would say that most of the ideas in his book are anti- American.

It is not American to think that controlling -- we don't control migration. We integrate migration. We have opened up our borders to those who were poor, who were needy. And that is what made this country so powerful. And, in fact, it's the most powerful country in the world.

I have to ask the same question Peter asked. What is Pat so afraid of?

O'BOYLE: Pat, can you answer that?

BUCHANAN: Well, here's the -- one thing I'm afraid of is another September 11. But...

O'BOYLE: And you are going to blame immigrants?

(CROSSTALK)

SALAZAR: Pat, stop it. Pat, Pat, Pat...

BUCHANAN: Are we going have us talk, Maureen, or are we going to have her -- just let her filibuster for a while.

SALAZAR: I'm going to filibuster.

(LAUGHTER)

SALAZAR: Pat, if you are so concerned about terrorism, you talk about the focus of migration and in connection to September 11. Let's talk about Timothy McVeigh. Timothy McVeigh was an American, an Anglo-Saxon.

(APPLAUSE) SALAZAR: And if we kind of imply -- if we will imply that we are going to have to stop, detain, investigate all white males as suspects of terrorists, I don't think you would advocate for that. When we look at all those persons who have been traitors to this nation, who have sold secrets, and we can give a number of them, most of them, 90 percent of them, have been Anglo-Saxon men.

(CROSSTALK)

O'BOYLE: We have Lina (ph) on the phone from Michigan. Can we listen to her real quick?

Lina?

CALLER: Yes. Can you hear me?

O'BOYLE: Yes, we can.

CALLER: I was really appalled at Pat Buchanan's book, because, one, his death to the West will only come when we close our doors to immigrants. And if it wasn't for immigrants, America wouldn't have ever seen and enjoyed its growth, strength and power throughout its history. And that is what sets us apart, Pat, from the whole world. It's our diversity.

BUCHANAN: Well, let me respond to that.

O'BOYLE: Go ahead, Pat.

BUCHANAN: There's between eight and 11 million in this country right now who are here illegally. They broke in line. They broke the law. They broke into our country. Thousands of them were asked questions and they were delighted by September 11. Mr. Ashcroft has arrested a thousand who may have been involved in murdering Americans.

The highest law is the security of the American people. No one has the right to break into our home and kill our people. I don't care where they came from. And the idea, quite frankly, that these folks all coming here are simply here to get jobs and things like that is clearly mistaken. Among immigrants today, the poor immigrants, the rate of crime, the rate of incarceration is double and triple what it is in the United States.

There is an enormous tax burden on American citizens; 75 percent of the American people agree with Pat Buchanan. And they ought not to be called racists for simply wanting to defend the national security in their home country.

O'BOYLE: Our audience says they don't agree with you.

(CROSSTALK)

SALAZAR: Pat, you are so wrong. You're wrong. You don't represent -- you don't represent the mainstream of America. Most Americans, either they are recent migrants or not, want exactly the same thing. They want good schools. They want to live in secure neighborhoods. They want to have a good job. That's what this is all about.

(APPLAUSE)

SALAZAR: And with your kind of rhetoric, with those kind of words, basically, you are being anti-American. You are being divisive. You are being -- you're trying to create a disunity in this nation that we have not had.

So I have to say, Pat, I'm sorry. People do not support your ideas.

(APPLAUSE)

BUCHANAN: Well, why is it second on Amazon.com four days after it was published?

The point is, Pat Buchanan's ideas are not given a hearing by the mainstream media; 75 percent of the American people want the borders closed; 95 percent want English made the American language; 95 percent want illegal aliens sent back where they came from. The elites of this country are surrendering our borders, in my judgment, and giving away the greatest country on Earth.

We had restricted immigration for 40 years from the time of Coolidge, through FDR, through Truman, through Eisenhower, through Kennedy. I grew up in that America. It was a good country, no matter what you and your friends say today.

O'BOYLE: Lee from Georgia has a comment.

Lee?

LEE: Hi.

As far as having English as the American language, I have to agree with that, because I work in a hospital. I am a nurse. I grew up in Atlanta, but I work in Colorado Springs. And I work in the ICU and the operating room. And we will have primarily Hispanic-speaking patients that have been in this country for 20 years, and they do not understand the English language.

And that can be a real problem when we are asking them about allergies, having anything to eat or drink. I mean, that can have serious consequences in surgery. And, also, in the ICU, as far as pain, expressing problems, chest pain, for instance, if they can't tell you that, that can progress into a situation that can harm them. And I think that, for that reason, people should be asked to speak the language to help themselves.

(APPLAUSE)

O'BOYLE: Let me get Ana Maria to respond to that.

How do you respond to that?

SALAZAR: Of course life is much easier in the United States if you speak English. And, in fact, if you look at the numbers, most Latin Americans, Mexican Americans that come to the United States, the second generation speaks English and they speak it very well. So I am not advocating that can we only speak Spanish or that we speak other languages than English.

What I am advocating and what I don't believe is that when you -- Pat, you talk about a culture that existed and it exists right now. The American culture is constantly changing. What we have and believe is the American culture right now will be 100 percent different in 100 years. You have to agree to that.

BUCHANAN: Well, I can't agree because...

SALAZAR: You have to agree with that.

(CROSSTALK)

O'BOYLE: You guys, we are going to disagree for a very long time, but we have to take this break. Ana Maria Salazar and Pat Buchanan -- the book is "The Death of the West." We appreciate you coming. Thanks so much for being here today.

We are going to take another break. We will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(APPLAUSE)

O'BOYLE: Welcome back to TALKBACK LIVE: "America Speaks Out."

You knew it would happen. CBS is banking that we will watch a made-for-TV-movie based on the September 11 attacks. So many of us witnessed it live right here on CNN. But would you be willing to watch the Hollywood version?

Tom Roger has some thoughts on that. His daughter Jean was a flight attendant on one of the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center. Max Robbins is joining us as well. He is the TV critic for "TV Guide." A television producer is developing the movie, which has the working title right now of "The Real Story of Flight 93." That is the plane that crashed in Western Pennsylvania.

Tom, I want to ask you first, are you ready for a made-for-TV movie about 9/11?

THOMAS ROGER, FATHER OF FLIGHT 11 VICTIM: I'm not sure that the families are ready for any dramatization of these events, with all the extreme media coverage that they have been exposed to over the last three months.

O'BOYLE: What do you think about it, Max? Do you think that it's going to fly? Will people want to watch this?

MAX ROBBINS, CRITIC, "TV GUIDE": They may. But CBS runs a real risk if they don't handle this with the utmost care and really respect the enormity and the tragedy of what happened. And I don't know. It may be a little too soon. And really I respect what Tom has just said.

O'BOYLE: Couldn't there be a backlash with viewers that are put off by it?

ROBBINS: There may indeed be.

Look, I think that this -- it's valid territory for -- whether it's film or books or whatever -- to be explored. But it may be a little bit too soon. And you don't want to look like you're profiteering from tragedy.

O'BOYLE: We've got Bill from the audience.

BILL: Hi. Earlier, I said I would watch it. But just thinking, this just happened in September. If I had lost someone, I cannot conceive watching something like that on TV.

O'BOYLE: Yes. It's pretty intense. I mean, it will take some time for this movie to be developed, won't it, Max? It won't happen right away. But the wounds are still going to be pretty wide open, I think, for a very long time.

ROBBINS: Absolutely. This is -- it will take a while.

But, at the same time, you look at movies that have been made out of real-life events. And the ones that have some import, you think of something like "Saving Private Ryan." Or ABC recently did a made-for- TV movie out of "The Diary of Anne Frank." Well, those were very poignant, very important films. But they were about events that happened over half-a-century ago. So it may be just a little too soon.

O'BOYLE: Max, the writer, Lawrence Schiller, is reported as saying that it is going to be more of a timeline about what happened when news broke that there had been this bombing of the World Trade Center.

Do you think that, Tom, that will effect it at all if it's done in more of a docudrama way instead of dramatizing it as just a movie? If it's done more like a documentary, would that help?

ROGER: Yes. CBS actually did a -- I would say a very minor docudrama of the events that happened on my daughter's flight, which was Flight 11, based on some of the things that we knew about the events that happened. And they did it in a very tasteful, respectful manner. I think, if the program that you are mentioning, if that is done in the form of a docudrama and done very respectfully, I think that will go a long way towards acceptability, certainly by the families, as well as other people.

O'BOYLE: Well, Tom, we can ask the writer, because Lawrence Schiller is now on the phone. We thank both of you for being here, Tom and Max. We appreciate your comments.

Lawrence, you heard Tom. What do you think? Will it be something that is done tastefully? Obviously, you want to do it with the family in mind.

LAWRENCE SCHILLER, WRITER: Well, No. 1, any answer I would give you to that question would be certainly self-serving, wouldn't it?

But, coming right to the point, I think one has to look at the product that I've produced over the years to understand that I produce these projects in a nonsensational manner. I am interested in dealing with nonfiction and recreating the events that took place and bringing to the public information that they have not been aware of, to educate them and to give them an experience they didn't expect to have.

And that is the way we learn. You know, when I grew up in journalism in the '50s and '60s, I worked for "Life" magazine, who was the educator of the world. "Life" magazine brought to you those first pictures of the embryo taken in Sweden. They brought you the first images of war.

Now television has taken on the role of being the educator to our country and throughout the entire world. And we have a mission. Television is not only to entertain. It is...

O'BOYLE: Lawrence, I am sure America will be watching. And we will be talking about this more before the movie actually airs.

I'm sorry to interrupt you, but we have to go. We are out of time.

SCHILLER: OK.

O'BOYLE: Thanks to all of our guests, our studio audience, and of course you at home for joining us.

We will be back again tomorrow at 3:00 for more TALKBACK LIVE: "America Speaks Out."

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com