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American Morning

'Reporter Roundtable'

Aired February 01, 2002 - 09:47   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.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: Time to fire up our weekly reporter roundtable. This morning, there are two or three issues worth dwelling on:

Joining us now Rich Lowry, who is the editor of "The National Review," and Michael Kramer, columnist for the "New York Daily News." and we're joined by Anderson Cooper. Paula had enough and left.

The Daniel Pearl story -- obviously you can't cover the news if you're dead or kidnapped or -- how do news organizations make the determination on when to send and how long to leave reporters in areas where there's high risk?

MICHAEL KRAMER, COLUMNIST, "NY DAILY NEWS": I think the first judgment they make is in terms of news value, is who else is there, because you don't want to be beat, frankly.

CAFFERTY: The competitive environment.

KRAMER: Right, so everybody goes over. I've covered a lot of war stuff, too and generally, it doesn't get to this level, obviously. There are certain things you can do. You can run around with bodyguards, but that really doesn't impede you ability to do the story. Or I think you can basically travel in packs. That's probably the best protection in war zone, is to be with your colleagues.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: I used to work in Somalia and I had four or five bodyguards at any one time with AK-47s, but I was often more scared of them than of anyone else.

KRAMER: You don't know who bought them off.

COOPER: Right, exactly.

Is any story worth this kind of risk? I mean, you're an editor.

RICH LOWRY, "THE NATIONAL REVIEW": It's just a reminder of just how incredibly brave some of these reporters are who bring back these stories and images, and frankly, it's why I went into opinion journalism rather than go in reporting.

But you know, these kidnappers are way behind the times. About 20 years ago, terrorists realized you get nothing from kidnapping and killing journalists. And all these guys are going to get if they dare do him any bodily harm, is to make them some of the most wanted criminals on the planet. It's a real lose-lose situation.

COOPER: Do you think it's the government's responsibility to go after terrorists like this who are captured -- a journalist? I mean, is it...

KRAMER: Not anymore. Not really anymore, not really any more so than going after terrorist for other reasons. I mean, we assume the risk in the legal term, we really do.

CAFFERTY: Noelle Bush picked up with trying to cash a phony prescription for Xanax. The story was -- kind of handles touch and go by the media. The touched it and moved on. And someone said Roger Clinton didn't receive the same type of treatment. And the families acknowledged that Miss Bush apparently has a substance abuse problem.

What about the handling of the story of the daughter of a Florida governor, who happens to be the brother of the president of the United States versus the actual brother of the president of the United States.

LOWRY: It's basically a non-story as far as I see it. I think children of politicians should basically be off limits. You know, she's 24, so she's not technically a child anymore. But you know, Roger Clinton was in the news because allegedly a grownup. You can argue about that. He also loved any attention -- he loved the attention he got. And finally, he had a legitimate role in pardon- gate. I mean, there were allegations that he was involved in trying to sell pardons. That was a legitimate story.

KRAMER: This is just a sad case, it really is. And I think generally speaking, the media lays off the kids.

COOPER: Do you think the media's appetite for this kind of a story, though, has lessened since 9-11?

KRAMER: I don't think it's necessarily lessened; I think it's been crowded out.

LOWRY: It has been crowded out. The Bush daughters, that story got a lot of play, and that was just, you know, someone under age trying to my by a margarita.

COOPER: "Talk" magazine had all over, and look what it did for them.

CAFFERTY: Let's move on to Enron. Ken Lay is scheduled to testify. He says he's going to. He say he's not going to hide behind the Fifth Amendment. He says he's that he's not going to ask for immunity. He's facing a ton of lawsuits and who knows what else down the road, but the story itself seems to have kind of -- some of the air has gone out of it. Is it because hasn't been tied in to the White House to the degree that the media was maybe hoping in the beginning?

KRAMER: I think that you know, that the jury is out on that really. I think the arc of the scandals is pretty familiar. If you covered Watergate, you remember there were long weeks with nothing happened, and you thought, maybe it's died, maybe it' over, and then it would burble up again.

This has legs, I still think so. And whether or not it's ever tied and becomes a political scandal, tied to the White House, or remains what essentially it is, a business scandal, it's a great story to cover, and on my two-story rule that we can cover -- we can issue them and sometimes at the same time, we can cover two stories, Enron and the war basically is it. It's one of the reasons why Noelle was crowded out.

LOWRY: If this story has legs, as far as political angle does, they're very short legs, and this story was splashed in a huge way in the front pages, because there was the expectation that it would be a Bush administration scandal, but you can't have political scandal without political wrongdoing.

KRAMER: We don't know yet.

CAFFERTY: Fellows good to see you. Thanks for coming in. We promise to have Paula here for you next week.

Rich Lowry of "The National Review" and Michael Kramer, columnist for "The New York Daily News."

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