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Lou Dobbs Tonight

Pentagon Releases Number of U.S. Troops Wounded in Iraq; 2 Most Wanted Iraqis Arrested; A Look at Going Broke in America

Aired July 09, 2003 - 18:00   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.


ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Wednesday, July 9. Sitting in for Lou Dobbs, Jan Hopkins.
JAN HOPKINS, GUEST HOST: Good evening everyone, for the first time the Pentagon has released information about the number of U.S. troops wounded in Iraq. It said just over 1,000 have been injured or wounded since the beginning of the war against Saddam Hussein on March 20. The Pentagon released that information after a request by CNN.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld today called for patience on Iraq. When he spoke to the Senate Armed Services Committee. Senior Pentagon Correspondent Jamie McIntyre reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Rumsfeld faced frustration about the rising number of attacks on American troops in Iraq and inability of the U.S. to stop them.

SEN. EDWARD KENNEDY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: I'm now concerned that we now have the world's best trained soldiers serving as policment in what seems to be a shooting gallery.

MCINTYRE: Frustration about the failure to find Saddam Hussein.

SEN. SUSAN COLLINS (R), MAINE: Unless we capture or kill Saddam, then our progress is going to be far slower.

DANOLD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: I will agree with that and I will say, however, that, in answer to your question, what's the priority, the priority is very high.

MCINTYRE: There was frustration Rumsfeld wouldn't be nailed down on whether France and Germany were among the more than 70 countries asked to contribute troops to Iraq.

SEN. CARL LEVIN (D), MICHIGAN: Is France and Germany on the list?

RUMSFELD: I'll have to ask. I would suspect they are.

MCINTYRE: Frustration about what the war is costing.

SEN. ROBERT BYRD (D), WEST VIRGINIA: Well, I'd like to know now. MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld's staff did come up with numbers, nearly $4 billion a month for Iraq and $900 million a month for Afganistan. But Senator John McCain warned Rumsfeld his unwillingness to even guess at how many troops it will take and how long they will stay is making American's uneasy.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: This whole issue of how long are they going to be there, the uncertainty, the seeing the pictures of the wounded or dead -- American soldiers -- are leading to this unease.

MCINTYRE: And there was the frustration, Senators just back from Iraq, heard from troops, who still don't know when they are coming home.

COLLINS: And over and over I heard, I'm proud of our mission, I helped free the Iraqi people, but when do I get to go home.

MCINTYRE: In response, Rumsfeld himself, sounded frustrated and made a plea for patience.

RUMSFELD: We all believed that it's important that it be done. That we -- it's important we get other countries to participate in it. We intend to see it through and it's going to take some patience. And when it's done it's going to have been darn well worth having done.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld did say the army's 3rd Infantry Division, among the first troops in Baghdad, is coming home, 1 brigade this month, 1 next month, the final one in September. And Rumsfeld said he would make some decisions this week that would allow U.S. commanders to tell other trops in Iraq when they are coming home as well -- Jan.

HOPKINS: Jamie, the question, who's going to replace them?

MCINTYRE: Well there is a rotation schedule that is being worked out. That's really what Rumsfeld will be considering. Troops from other U.S. base units will be going in, but the trick is they have to be very careful because the U.S. is stretched thin. If they send too many replacements in too soon, they won't have anybody to replace them when theire time is up.

HOPKINS: Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon, thanks.

U.S. forces in Iraq have arrested another two former members of Saddam Hussein's regime, on the most wanted list. They include a former senior official in the Revolutionary Command Council. He was the 9 of hearts in the deck of cards issued to coalition forces. The other former regime member in custody tonight is the 7 of spades. He's a former member of the -- actually the former minister of interior in Saddam Hussein's government.

Tonight a rare look at the activities of Saddam Hussein's intelligence services inside the United States. A Chicago man who allegedly spied on Iraqi opposition groups before the fall of Saddam Hussein appeared in court today. Justice correspondent Kelli Arena has the report -- Kelli?

KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right, Jan. The government alleges that Khaled Abdel-Latif Dumeisi was secretly serving as an agent for Saddam Hussein's regime. Now he's been living in the United States for ten years, heading up a company that publishes an Arabic language newspaper. Officials say a that dossier found in an intelligence safehouse in Baghdad included information on an agent in the United States who went by the code name Sirhan who was supplying information on opposition leaders to Iraqi intelligence officials.

Well the government says Sirhan and Dumeisi are one in the same. The government also says that it received information from 4 unnamed individuals in building their case against Dumeisi. Now Dumeisi is not being charged with espionage but instead with not registering as an agent with of a foreign government.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PATRICK FITZGERALD, U.S. ATTORNEY: You're telling a foreign government that here are the people in America opposed to you. We cannot tolerate people doing that here. And so I'm trying to send the message that this case is serious because people can't spy against people that live here, who come here for our freedoms.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ARENA: Officials say that Dumeisi is guilty of producing press I.D. cards for Iraqi intelligence officers. They that he received financial support from the Iraqi government to conduct his activities and that he traveled to Iraq to get intelligence gathering training.

In one instance, officials say that he secretly gathered information from one Iraqi opposition leader using a pen with a hidden microphone and camera inside. For all these allegations, Dumeisi faces 15 years in prison if he is convicted, Jan.

HOPKINS: But is it likely that he knows about other spies for Saddam in the United States?

ARENA: Well, the investigation does continue. Obviously, it does involve anyone that he contacted that the government knows that he contacted. So we may see more fallout, but the U.S. attorney in Chicago did say that he didn't want to raise expectations that this was going to lead to any great case against a lot of people.

So this could be just what it is, Jan.

HOPKINS: Kelli Arena, Justice Department.

President Bush today said that he is absolutely confident the United States and its allies were correct to remove Saddam Hussein from power. But he did not address the issue of why he said Iraq tried to buy nuclear materials in Africa. That information proved to be incorrect.

The president is in the South African capital of Pretoria tonight. Chris Burns has our report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS BURNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was a day aimed at touting President Bush's multibillion dollar rescue package for Africa to combat AIDS and poverty. But at a news conference with South African president Thobo Mbeki he couldn't escape questions about Iraq. Questions about his January State of the Union message alleging Saddam Hussein was trying to buy nuclear materials from Africa. A charge that didn't hold water. At a news conference he dodged the question.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm confident that Saddam Hussein had a weapons of mass destruction program. In 1991, I will remind you, we underestimated how close he was to having a nuclear weapon. Imagine a world in which this tyrant had a nuclear weapon. In 1998, my predecessor raided Iraq based upon the very same intelligence.

BURNS: Another Iraq related question, whether U.S. forces deployed there, in Afghanistan, and elsewhere would be stretched too thin if sent as peacekeepers to Liberia.

BUSH: We won't over extend our troops, period.

BURNS: The president has yet to commit troop there. Though there are calls for that, to prevent a shaky cease-fire from descending into a bloodbath.

Another African disaster in the making, Zimbabwe. It's on the verge of economic collapse and widespread famine under what Washington calls, the violent misrule of President Robert Mugabe.

Secretary of State Colin Powell recently criticized South Africa, a regional power, of not doing enough to bring about regime change there.

The two presidents insisted they want a quick solution.

THABO MBEKI, SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT: We didn't fight about any of that.

BUSH: We were smiling because we were certain a clever reporter would try to use the Zimbabwe issue as a way to maybe create tensions which don't exist.

BURNS: Some tension, though, at the Ford Motor plant President Bush visited. He was promoting the African growth and opportunity act that allows tariff free African exports to the U.S. boosting the idea of trade replacing aid.

Union workers outside see that and other U.S. policies as benefiting mainly American companies. That U.S. subsidies to American farmers crowd African farmers out of the world market. And Iraq again rearing its head lingering anti-war sentiment here as well. The reason for the biggest no-show to the president's visit, Nelson Mandela.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BURNS: Now, those protests notwithstanding, the president did have a dinner with South African and American business leaders to talk about that trade. At that dinner there were some singers there to greet the president. The president tomorrow goes on to Botswana near South Africa. That is probably one of the greatest paradoxes of Africa, where you have very, very high business performance, it's a diamond rich country, but at the same time they have a very high HIV infection rate, 38 percent among those 1.5 million people, among the adults among the 1.5 million people. So a tragedy there where President Bush can talk about his $15 billion initiative to fight AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean -- Jan.

HOPKINS: Chris Burns in Pretoria, South Africa, thanks.

In Liberia today, U.S. military experts continue to survey strategic points like the harbor and the airport and the capital Monrovia. Those facilities could be used by peacekeeping forces from the United States and other countries if they're sent to Liberia. Today West African countries said that they could send a thousand troops within two week if the United States provides logistics help.

And turning to a crisis in Asia with potentially much wider consequences. South Korea said today that North Korea recently reprocessed a small number of nuclear fuel rods that could be used to make nuclear weapons. The South Korean intelligence service also says that Pyongyang has tested devices to trigger nuclear explosions. Also today, a North Korean delegation arriving in South Korea, said "The black clouds of nuclear war are gathering on the Korean peninsula."

Iran is another country accused of trying to develop nuclear weapons. It is also a country where there have been growing calls for freedom. Today there were global protests to mark the beginning of pro-democracy demonstrations in Iran four years ago. Students in the Iranian capital of Tehran also tried to mark the occasion. But police and vigilante groups fought running battles with the students near Tehran University.

And still ahead tonight. Opting out: Microsoft abandons its much criticized stock options program. We'll look at whether this will change the way you're paid.

Also ahead, fighting fat. The FDA is claiming a victory in the battle of the bulge, one that could save thousands of lives.

Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen will join us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: To expense or not to expense stock options, and how to do it has been a question hanging over corporate America. However, decision on the matter from the world's largest software maker could provide the answer for many companies.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS (voice-over): Microsoft's move to restrict its stock will impact both share shareholders and employees. The AFL-CIO applauded the decision and sent a letter to other fortune 500 companies urging them to do the same. Saying options have been at the core of the scandals on Wall Street.

WILLIAM PATTERSON, DIR. OFFICE OF INVESTING AFL-CIO: Options have caused executives to adopt a very short-term approach to managing the companies. They've managed companies into short-term blips in their portfolios. It's encouraged accounting manipulation. It has demoralized employees.

HOPKINS: The Microsoft plan will be closely watched throughout the high-tech sector.

BILL FOLEY, EXEC. COMP. CONSULTANT, BILL FOLEY & COMPANY: If you're not at Microsoft, that's where it gets particularly interesting. Because if you're in a company that has a big up side opportunity, OK, options may be the play. But if you're at a company that does not have big up side opportunity, your options will start to appeal by comparison perhaps to what the Microsoft people will get.

HOPKINS: The good news for American workers is that the company did not scrap employee ownership altogether

COREY ROBEN, NATIONAL CENTER FOR EMPLOYEE OWNERSHIP: Some people are saying, well, once companies have to account for stock options, the phenomenon of broad based equity sharing is going to diminish at least somewhat. But Microsoft's making a very clear statement that at least in their case it's not.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS: DaimlerChrysler today said it may stop issuing options to its senior executives, but adds no final decision has been made. Intel and Cisco both said they do not intend to change their pay plans, and incidentally Microsoft stock fell today.

A modest pull back on Wall Street overall. The Dow was down nearly 67 points. Altria accounted for nearly one-third of that drop. Nasdaq edged up one point higher for the third straight session. The S&P 500 lost more than 5 1/2 points.

Christine Romans is here with the overall market -- Christine.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNNfn CORRESPONDENT: The Nasdaq barely eked out another 15-month high here. And volume there, were more advancing stocks than declining stocks on the Nasdaq. But the blue chips, they pulled back taking the Dow now 2 percent off its recent peak. The S&P 500 is off just 1 percent, this after blistering gains in the spring. Among the movers Altria tumbled after an analyst said it may have to post more bond in an Illinois appeal. Alcoa was downgraded a day after it's profit reports show it's earnings fell. But Citigroup hit the highest price in 15 months after Prudential said Citi could raise its dividend by 20 percent and trading there could improve. Now at the big board 15 stocks rose for every 17 that fell. Volume was the best in a week and better than the yearly average. And at the Nasdaq, it was the second 2 billion share day in a row. After the close, Yahoo! reported a rise in earnings and profit. Now you can see that stock has surged to 2 1/2 year highs recently on predictions for that solid quarter. Now that investors got that solid quarter, of course there's a little bit of selling after the bell. And also after the bell, Nike will buy its competitor Converse for $305 million. Jan, that's the late nest a handful of deals announced this week, merger and acquisition environment seems to be improving just a little bit.

HOPKINS: Heating up. Thanks, Christine Romans.

And coming up, a revelation in the fight against fat. A subtle change that could save more than 5,000 lives every year.

Medical Correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen, will have that report.

And then shaping post war Iraq. Many of you wrote in with your thoughts. We'll share some of your e-mails.

And save your energy. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham joins us with advice on how consumers can save energy and money.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: You can add two new words to your health lexicon, trans fat. It is the stuff that gives packaged cookies and doughnuts a longer shelf life, but it may shorten your life. Now information about trans fat is about to show up on your food labels. Medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joins us now with more -- Elizabeth.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Jan, many people haven't heard of trans fat. People know what saturated fats are. But trans fat are very similar. They're both fats that can clog your arteries. Now, as you said, they're going to start requiring these lists, the kind of labeling to be done in the supermarkets. It won't be required until January 2006.

Let's take a look at a current food label and see how it will differ from the new one. This is a label for Oreos. This label shows how much total fat it has and how much saturated fat it has. What it doesn't tell you is what you're going to see on the new label. The new label will say that it has seven grams of total fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat and 2.5 grams of trans fat. And so health experts say this is going to help people make better choices, because now they'll know the total amount of bad fat in all the products -- Jan.

HOPKINS: So if it's bad, why is the government waiting until 2006 to put in effect this kind of labeling?

COHEN: Many people have wondered that, why they're giving food companies that much time. One of the reasons is that the government says that food companies need the time to analyze their products, find out how much trans fat that the products have in them, and then reformulate the labels so that the labels will be different.

However, Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson said today that he hopes that these food companies will take the time not just to redo the labels but to redo the foods themselves.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOMMY THOMPSON, HHS SECRETARY: We're expecting that companies are going to say, you know, we want to make sure we got the best product out there possible. And they'll start competing with each other and they will, therefore, start reducing the trans fats in their particular products, which of course will also help the healthiness of the food people consume.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: Now, some food companies are actually a step ahead of the government. For example, the Frito-Lay company has already taken the trans fat out of some products. This product here does not have any trans fat at all. And when you turn this over, you see that they've labeled it "trans fat zero grams."

HOPKINS: Why is trans fat so bad?

COHEN: It clogs the arteries, it's very similar to saturated fat. Basically, there are two different kinds of fat. One is good fat, and the other is bad fat. Bad fats like saturated fat and trans fat actually get into your arteries and clogs them up, making you more vulnerable to heart disease and to strokes.

HOPKINS: Thanks very much, Elizabeth Cohen, telling us about something else that's bad for us.

That brings us to tonight's poll -- which is the worst for your health? Trans fat, sugar, alcohol or television? Cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll bring you preliminary results later in the show.

And now, the final results of yesterday's poll. We asked, what do, you believe is needed most to stabilize Iraq? Ten percent of you said more U.S. troops, 7 percent said fewer U.S. troops; 57 percent said more troops from other countries, and 26 percent of you said train Iraqi troops.

And now, a look at some of your thoughts. Many of you wrote about yesterday's poll asking what you believe is needed most to stabilize Iraq. Michelle Sales of Seattle, Washington wrote -- "I really think what is needed is time. Don't be so impatient."

And Robert Moon from Cincinnati, Ohio, wrote -- "President Bush has warned repeatedly that post-war Iraq would be like this. It takes time to exterminate terrorist cells, and you don't hear about what they do prevent."

Emmanuel from Greenfield, California wrote -- "I think the president should start to concentrate on the United States more than other countries. When the president took office, he signed on as president of the United States, not of Iraq."

And Pat of Chrisney, Indiana asks -- "With most of the states going broke, why is the government giving $15 billion to Africa? This would go a long way to help out here in the U.S."

Jim Gillen of Cincinnati wrote about our daily check of the national debt. "While the national debt number is impressive, it would be far more meaningful to know what the individual citizen owes." Well, Jim, we did the math. Your share is $22,853.39. And that is the same for everyone else.

We love hearing from you. Please e-mail us your thoughts at loudobbs@cnn.com.

Coming up, going broke in America. Small businesses suffering under insurmountable debt. Peter Viles reports.

And then the search for weapons in Iraq could be the president's Achilles Heel come election time. Senior political analyst Bill Schneider will have that report.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: Still no clear motive in yesterday's shooting rampage in Mississippi. Douglas Williams killed five co-workers and injured nine others yesterday at a Lockheed Martin plant. Eight of the victims were black. Despite some claims that Williams was a racist, police aren't ready to say that the murders were racially motivated.

In a series of killings in California, Vincent Brothers has been arrested in connection with the death of his estranged wife, their three children and his mother-in-law. The victims' bodies were found in their Bakersfield home yesterday. Brothers turned himself into North Carolina police today.

Tropical Storm Claudette is bearing down on Jamaica tonight. Forecasters say that the storm has weakened. Claudette's winds have slowed to 65 miles an hour, but the storm still poses a threat. Mexico issued a hurricane watch for the east coast of the Yucatan Peninsula. Tropical storm warnings are up for Jamaica and the Cayman Islands.

Rain has been falling in Indiana for six days. And now the National Guard is on the job, trying to protect homes from rising floodwaters. A state of emergency has been declared in 25 counties.

A state of excitement over tonight's Powerball drawing. A quarter of a billion dollars is at stake. That is the fourth largest Powerball purse ever. The odds of winning, more than 120 million to one.

That multimillion dollar prize would be a dream for anyone, but the reality for many people in this country is debt. Tonight, in the third part of our series "Going Broke in America," we examine debt and small business. One in three new companies doesn't live to see its third birthday. Peter Viles has the story. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PETER VILES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From wraps to riches, to Chapter 11. 1996, Clay Walker opens up the Emerald Planet in downtown Manhattan serving sandwich wraps and smoothies. And reviews were great. "Better than sex," said one restaurant guide, adding, "diehards demand more locations." So Clay Walker, like any other businessman, tries to meet demand, opens up a second store in Rockefeller Center, but then comes the bear market, September 11 and corporate cutbacks.

CLAY WALKER, FOUNDER, THE EMERALD PLANET: I was hoping that the economy would come around in time to save the business. Unfortunately, we just ran out of gas. We couldn't keep up. We couldn't pay the rent anymore, and we couldn't keep up with our expenses. So we had to, you know, file Chapter 11.

VILES: Business failure is a fact of life in America. Last year, Americans started new businesses at the rate of 2,100 every weekday. Trouble is, on average, 2,200 businesses closed every day.

Now, official statistics show business bankruptcies have actually dropped sharply over the past 15 years, from 82,000 in 1987 to just 38,000 last year, but new research indicates that one in seven personal bankruptcies, that's 207,000 last year, are related to a struggling small business.

PROF. ROBERT LAWLESS, UNLV: We've been doing a study of small businesses and bankruptcy. And what we find are that there are a lot of people out there who are showing up in the bankruptcy statistics as consumers, but in fact are in bankruptcy because of some underlying business problem.

VILES: Here's a profile of those personal/business bankruptcies. Monthly income: $3,300. Monthly expenses: $3,300. Assets: $125,000. Liability: $204,000, including $32,000 in average credit card debt on nine cards.

DEBORAH CRABBE, FOSTER PEPPER & SHEFELMAN: A lot of businesses have a very small line of credit with their local bank. And then in order to fund additional inventory or supplies or whatever, they need to keep their business operating, they often turn to credit cards.

VILES: Clay Walker, hedged his bets, each restaurant is its own company. So one is in bankruptcy and the other struggling to stay out of it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really a race against the clock. If the economy can come back quicker, we may still be in business. I'm hoping it does in time to save this store, too.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VILES: The truth is that most businesses, small businesses will never file for bankruptcy. And their main concern regarding bankruptcy is what happens to the creditors, not the filers. In other words, how are they going to collect money from customers who have filed for bankruptcy -- Jan.

HOPKINS: Good point. Thanks, Pete.

Coming up tomorrow in our special series, "Going Broke in America," we'll look at the problem of underfunded pensions. When pensions run out of money, much of the burden falls on taxpayers.

Bill Tucker will have our report.

Turning now to politics, Democrats are seizing on President Bush's pre-war miss statement about Iraq, uranium and nuclear weapons as a credibility issue. But it remains to be seen whether the president will face any public political fallout from that remark.

Senior political correspondent Bill Schneider reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST (voice-over): Here's what President Bush said in his state of the union address.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantity of uranium from Africa.

SCHNEIDER: The White House now says that statement was based on unreliable information. The admission may not cause the president great political damage. Most Americans have always given President Bush high ratings for honesty and trustworthiness. While criticism has crept up a bit since the war, the public still has confidence in President Bush's credibility by 2-1. And the public shares the president's conviction when he says about Saddam Hussein...

BUSH: There's no doubt in my mind the United States along with allies and friend did the right thing in removing him from power.

SCHNEIDER: The basic principle is don't quarrel with success.

BUSH: One thing's for certain, he's not trying to buy anything right now. If he's alive, he's on the run.

SCHNEIDER: But what if the public no longer sees the war as a success, that's the real political danger. If Americans begin to have doubts about the war, it will not be because they think the intelligence was flawed. It will be for a another reason. In fact, it has already been happening, before the credibility issue arose. The percentage of Americans who say Iraq was not worth going to war over more than doubled between the end of the war and late June. Those numbers have gone up far faster than doubts about President Bush's credibility.

Why, look at the total number of Americans killed in Iraq. Losses nearly doubled from the end of the war till late June. Roughly one American killed every day. Criticism of the war has increased at about the same rate as the number of Americans killed. The issue that's gaining traction isn't was the intelligence misleading.

It's why are Americans still getting killed?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCHNEIDER: Americans will quarrel with success only if they no longer see the policy as a success. If the situation in Iraq continues to deteriorate, then the public will ask, how did we get into this mess in first place?

And the issue of flawed intelligence could suddenly matter -- Jan.

HOPKINS: But Bill, what do the Democrats expect to gain from this issue?

SCHNEIDER: Well, there is some evidence that the intelligence services knew that the report about the uranium purchase was flawed and might have been forged long before the president spoke.

So the question they want to raise is, why didn't the president have this intelligence when he made his speech?

There's a larger motive here as well. The president has embraced the doctrine of preemptive action. He says if anyone threatens the United States, we have the right to a preemptive strike against them. That doctrine works only if our intelligence is flawless. If the Democrats can show that our intelligence is not without fault and not always reliable, then the doctrine of preemptive action doesn't stand up.

HOPKINS: Bill Schneider, thanks.

SCHNEIDER: "Tonight's Quote" comes from the Senate hearing on whether the war in Iraq was based on faulty intelligence. "The United States did not choose war, Saddam Hussein did." That is from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

And when we return, face-off. Malpractice madness: who really pays for medical malpractice claims?

Two leading experts will join us.

And what do Charlie's Angels and Hillary Clinton have in common?

They're at the leading edge of the latest women's movement.

Kitty Pilgrim, will have that report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

Senate Democrats today successfully block the Republican sponsored malpractice bill. The bill would have capped lawsuit damages to victims of medical malpractice. The measure was modeled on the way California changed its laws more than 25 years ago.

Casey Wian has our report from Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Rapidly rising medical malpractice insurance costs have forced emergency room shutdowns in Nevada and West Virginia, persuaded obstetricians to leave New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and pushed doctors onto picket lines. In some specialties malpractice insurance premiums can exceed $200,000 a year. And in some states patients struggle to find medical care.

SEN. JOHN ENSIGN (R), NEVADA: The problem is caused by out-of- control jury awards and frivolous lawsuits, which are cheaper to settle and those get settled all the time, than they are to fight.

WIAN: The American Medical Association says there's a crisis in 19 states and problem signs in 25 others. California is noticeably absent. In 1975 it capped jury awards for pain and suffering at $250,000. Malpractice premiums stabilized. President Bush and Senate Republicans proposed a similar federal law. But after lobbying by trial lawyers Senate Democrats killed it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The motion is not agreed to.

SEN. RICK SANTORUM (R), PENNSYLVANIA: People of America who as a result of this action today are not going to see any relief in the spiraling cost of malpractice premiums and the resulting unavailability of health care.

WIAN: Trial lawyers say jury awards are not the cause of rising malpractice premiums. Instead they blame bad doctors and bad investment practices by insurance companies. Cap opponents cite malpractice victims like Linda McDougal (ph), who was misdiagnosed with cancer and had both breasts removed, as examples of those who deserve big jury awards for non-economic damages.

SEN. DICK DURBIN (D), ILLINOIS: It is unfair to address the medical malpractice premium crisis in America by simply saying that victims of malpractice shall be limited in what they can receive from court. It is unfair for us to put ourselves in the place of a jury.

WIAN: But the issue the American Medical Association calls its number one priority still has a pulse.

(on camera): Several states have passed or proposed medical malpractice reforms. But it may take years for them to have an impact because of a backlog of cases filed under previous laws and because many reforms are subject to court challenges.

Casey Wian, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS: That brings us to tonight's face-off topic; rising medical malpractice topic. Dr. Donald Palmisano is the president of the American Medical Association. He is a proponent of capping medical malpractice awards. I should also point out he's not only a physician but also an attorney.

William McNary is the executive director of U.S. Action. He says insurance companies are to blame for the current malpractice crisis.

Let's start with Dr. Palmisano. The fact that Congress isn't doing anything on capping malpractice, does that leave the solution to the states like California?

DR. DONALD PALMISANO, PRES. AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSN.: Well, the states certainly need to fix their laws if they have a problem. We have six states that are stable at the present time, California being one of them. Louisiana, my state, another one of the stable states. But we are not giving up at the federal level because we have over half of the American population, over 140 million people, in distress right now because of the risk of not being able to find a doctor. A pregnant woman has difficulty finding an obstetrician. A young boy who's knocked unconscious in a football game, there's no neurosurgeon available.

So we believe that the action today was the action of a minority that's thwarting the will of the American public. The American public's in favor, they are in favor of caps on non-economic damages, the ones you can't quantify.

HOPKINS: Mr. McNary, do you agree? Do you think that caps aren't going to solve the problem?

WILLIAM MCNARY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF U.S. ACTION: No, caps aren't going to solve the problem at all. Let's be clear. If we took all of the costs of health care that were attributable to attorney fees and awards, it's only .5 percent. So clearly that's not the driving factor. There's no legal crisis here. Most doctors, are they good doctors? Yes. But do some doctors make mistakes? Yes; 5 percent of the doctors, by the way, are responsible for 55 percent of the malpractice.

And so mistakes are made. To a certain extent, most docs are being squeezed, but they're not being squeezed by consumers. They're being squeezed by HMOs who try to tell them how to practice medicine on the one end. They're being squeezed by reduced reimbursements. And finally they're being squeezed on the other end by insurance companies that price them out of the market.

What you do in this case is you have insurance rate reform, and you have better medical practices, but you don't go after the victims. That's akin to having the boss squeezing you at work and you coming home and taking it out on your wife. That's not the solution.

HOPKINS: Dr. Palmisano, your response.

PALMISANO: Well, we certainly looked at the insurance companies, and we don't have any hesitation about going against insurance companies. But in this case, in the medical liability situation, we found that the payment for claims and for the expenses actually exceeds the money they're getting in premiums, and we have a system that is allowing increasing awards. And we have a system that doesn't adequately measure negligence. It's a system that increases the costs of medical care and decreases access to care.

What this debate is really about is access to care for the patients of these United States. And we're finding all of these diversions, blame the insurance company, bad doctors, when they come up with these figures, the 5 percent, they go to the National Practitioner Databank, it doesn't even tell you what doctors -- what specialties are there. Sure, we can get rid of 5 percent of the doctors who are paying the biggest claims. We can get rid of the neurosurgeons and the obstetricians.

So the problem really is out-of-control legal awards and settlements based on the fear of increasing awards. And California's a perfect example. It was a state in crisis. The rates now are $72,000 for an obstetrician in Los Angeles. They are $249,000 in Miami.

HOPKINS: Mr. McNary, you don't think that California is the solution, do you?

MCNARY: Well, California is a good example but for a different reason. Let's be clear, that once they impose caps in California nothing happened to reduce insurance premiums. What happened to reduce insurance premiums, that consumers got together and passed Proposition 103, which called for a decrease in insurance rates, which called for prior approval before an insurance company could raise rates. They had to go to the insurance commission and make sure that happened.

Insurance rate reform is what drives down the rates and holds prices steady in California, and if the doctor wants to join us in the consumer movement for insurance rate reform all over this country, that's the right solution. But to go and try to punish the severely injured victims, that's the wrong way to go.

HOPKINS: Dr. Palmisano?

PALMISANO: Well, actually, Proposition 103 had nothing to do with lowering medical liability rates in California. There's not one instance where it lowered the rates in California. It was primarily for auto insurance, and it has never lowered a medical liability rate in California. And Louisiana, Indiana, New Mexico, Colorado, Wisconsin, they don't have Proposition 103. Proposition 103 just says if you want to raise your rates above a certain level that you have to have a public hearing on it. And you have auto insurers giving 10, 11 percent increases without public hearings.

So that's not the answer. That's another diversion. What we need to do is fix the broken system. And the broken system is one where there are lots of frivolous suits. It's a system where there's no prediction on the non-economic awards. And as a result of this, awards are going out of sight. Physicians can't pay these premiums, and the patients suffer. We have over 140 million people at risk right now. And this is a serious problem.

It was really a shame when you think that the president of the United States is in favor of this, when the House of Representatives is in favor of this, when the American public by the Gallup Poll, 72 percent are in favor of this, when the leader of the Senate, Dr. Frist, is in favor of this, and a minority number of senators have blocked this for the American public. It's really a shame.

Allow it for debate. And if you have a better version, put amendments in and let's have the debate. But allow it to go the American way and have a full debate.

HOPKINS: Mr. McNary, go ahead.

MCNARY: Well, the fact of the matter is that there is a different version of medical malpractice that's not even being considered, and it is the only bipartisan bill. So let's not talk about politics. The medical malpractice bill offered by Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois and Lindsay Graham of South Carolina is the only bill that deals with medical malpractice in a way that gets to the root causes.

What it does is, number one, it would offer tax relief to doctors who are -- to offset the rising malpractice premiums. Two, it would deal with some of the anti-competitive practices of the insurance market, which means that they will no longer be able to price fix. And finally, it actually commissions a study to get to the root causes.

This is what we need to do. And this has bipartisan support, unlike the proposal that Dr. Frist is sponsoring. And by the way, our Tennessee affiliate has called on Dr. Frist to recuse himself from the vote. It turns out that he has interest in a health care stock. He has $25 million in HCA that would benefit from this. And so he is the wrong person to be pushing this bill.

HOPKINS: Dr. Palmisano?

PALMISANO: Well, actually, the bill that he is talking about is really a Band-Aid on a bleeding artery. That's not going to get to the root cause of the problem. The root cause of the problem, we need to fix this broken liability system.

We have escalating awards. The awards have nothing to do with negligence. The famous Harvard study showed that the payment is not related to negligence. We really have sort of a jackpot type thing. And I'm sure the attorneys are going to be opposed to this, the ones who file medical malpractice suits. They get 33 1/3 percent, up to 50 percent of the award.

So let them take cases and say, hey, we'll take the case, we think you have a valid case here and let them then take it on an hourly basis after they win the case. Why should they take the economic damages of someone for a lifetime? Why should they take 33 1/3 to 50 percent? It doesn't make sense. This system's broken. The American public knows it. And we just need to get it fixed. And it will get fixed. The only question is when is it going to get fixed?

HOPKINS: Fifteen seconds, Mr. McNary, for a final word.

MCNARY: This is about Americans being judged by an impartial jury of their peers in a fully informed way. Dr. Palmisano's not talking about getting his lawyers or the insurance lawyers out of court. They're talking about putting limits on the consumer lawyers, the consumer lawyers who go in and represent victims. If we can say 12 men and women can decide death penalty cases in Texas, in life and death, surely 12 men and women can decide when a jury award, which is $250,000 by its very nature, means that it's not a frivolous lawsuit, it goes to the trial by jury, we want to keep our courts open and free.

HOPKINS: Thank you both. William McNary, the U.S. Action Committee -- Group, rather, executive director. And Dr. Donald Palmisano.

PALMISANO: Thank you.

HOPKINS: He is the president of the American Medical Association. Thanks for facing off.

MCNARY: Thank you so much.

HOPKINS: Tonight's thought is on the importance of good health. "The first wealth is health." And that is from Ralph Waldo Emerson.

A reminder now to vote in tonight's poll. The question -- which is the worst for your health? Trans fat, sugar, alcohol, or television? Cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll bring you preliminary results in just a few minutes.

Coming up, power surge. Energy costs are sharply higher. But the Department of Energy may have a solution in the works. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham will join us next.

And later, girl power. It's everywhere these days, from the box office to the best-seller list. Women are on top.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: The Energy Department has launched a program to help Americans conserve energy at home. The "Smart Energy Campaign" offers tips on how to save money on electricity bills this summer. And the department says it could help keep down costs this winter as well. Joining me now with more on the campaign is the Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham. Good to have you with us.

SPENCER ABRAHAM, ENERGY SECRETARY: Thanks. Good to be with you.

HOPKINS: So if we use less energy this summer, then there will be more to heat us in the winter? Is that the idea?

ABRAHAM: Well, actually, our crisis is in the area of how much natural gas we'll have going into the winter heating season. And right now we're a little low in terms of our storage. So one way to build the storage is to use less. That not only helps us save some energy but it also saves people at the pocketbook. And we want to do that as well.

HOPKINS: So we have to save on electricity in the summertime.

ABRAHAM: That's right.

HOPKINS: That means what? Living in warmer...

ABRAHAM: It doesn't require massive sacrifices...

HOPKINS: Turning off our air conditioning?

ABRAHAM: As we call our campaign "Smart Energy" what it means is, put an adjustable, programmable thermostat on your air- conditioning system or use more energy-efficient products including lightbulbs. Or it means better insulation in the home. All those can help. One of the things we've done as part of the campaign is build a new Web site, energysavers.gov which people can log on to and learn about ways to save money and at the same time save energy.

HOPKINS: But we should be in better shape because certainly in the east we had such a cold spring and we didn't have to use a lot of energy.

ABRAHAM: We also had a cold winter, which is really the cause of the problem. We used a lot of gas to heat homes this winter. That reduced how much we have on hand going into the warm summertime. And could conceivably be a problem for next winter. So we're trying to get ahead of the action a little bit by putting this campaign in place today.

HOPKINS: I noticed that oil prices are back up above $30. We didn't have very much of a positive effect on oil prices as a result of the war in Iraq. Why was that?

ABRAHAMA: Well, the war in Iraq wasn't designed to affect oil prices. I mean, it was designed, obviously, to deal with a tyrant who was oppressing his own people and threatening the rest of the world. The thing that I think is really important to know is that in spite of the war, in spite of a strike in the oil markets in Venezuela, we've had relatively stable prices and prices that did not go up the way they did in previous crisis situations.

So I'm not saying everything is where we'd like it, but those who were predicting $50 or $100 a barrel oil were wrong. We said we could keep the price relatively stable, and that's where it's been.

HOPKINS: But it's stable at a high level.

ABRAHAM: Well, higher than we would like. Obviously, it's a concern. That's why we hope Congress will pass an energy bill. We've been trying to get that done for three years. We hope the Senate and the House will finally get the job done so we can have an energy plan for the future that allows for more production, more conservation, and more diverse sources of energy.

HOPKINS: One of the things that's under your umbrella in the Department of Energy is all of the atomic facilities in this country.

ABRAHAM: Well, the nuclear weapons labs, yes.

HOPKINS: And there have been critical reports from the GAO about how open these plants are for the possibility of terrorists. What are you doing to make sure that that -- that these are more secure?

ABRAHAM: We've been significantly increasing our security budget for our national weapons laboratories. We've also recently put in place a high-level commission of experts to reevaluate the security at the labs to determine what additional steps we can take. And we've -- we're in the process of developing a new design basis threat, as it's called, so that we can be better prepared for the threats of the 21st century.

I believe that our lab security systems are excellent, but they always can be improved, and we take this very seriously.

HOPKINS: Thank you very much. Spencer Abraham, the U.S. Energy Secretary. Thanks for joining us.

ABRAHAM: Thank you.

HOPKINS: Coming up, the results of tonight's poll. Plus, there's a revolution taking hold across popular culture, girl power. It may not be new, but Kitty Pilgrim reports that it's kicking up a storm this summer.

And it was a street -- a sweet payback today for CNN's Tucker Carlson. Hillary Rodham Clinton serves up humble pie. We'll explain.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: Well CROSSFIRE'S Tucker Carlson today got his just desserts. Carlson had previously claimed on air that he would eat his shoe if Hillary Rodham Clinton's book, "Living History", sold more than 1 million copies. Well, Simon & Schuster today announced sales exceeded 1 million. So serving up the shoe, which for Tucker's sake was really chocolate cake, was Hillary herself. She also gave Tucker a signed book which read, Tucker, you're number 1 million in my book.

And finally tonight, girl power, from bookstores to the box office, images of phenomenal females are everywhere. Kitty Pilgrim reports on why pop culture has gone gaga for goddesses.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In case you haven't noticed, female power is back in a big way. The "Da Vinci Code," a top "New York Times" best-seller, revolves around unleashing the sacred feminine power in religion and the universe. Did you know that scientists now say the boulders at stone henage reflect female fertility organs in a particularly explicit way?

Goddesses are big. Nike has a new goddess line for women.

Food writer Nigella Lawson teaches her audiences how to be a domestic goddess.

And goddesses actually had their own party this spring at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The costume institute celebrated goddess gowns through the ages.

Screen goddesses now dress the part in trendy new goddess gowns. Jennifer Lopez wore one to the academy awards. Being feminine is powerful. Female angels put in a tough day's work with very little damage to their lip gloss. And Angelina Jolie takes girl power to the tenth power in a new movie about heroine Lara Croft.

AVIS JONES-DEWEEVER, INST. FOR WOMEN'S POLICY RESEARCH: Society itself has learned that to be smart, to be ambitious, to be intelligent and proactive and just the person that can get things done does not necessarily mean that you need to make yourself over in the image of a man.

PILGRIM: Hillary Clinton chronicled the feminine side of the Clinton White House years, and a million people are buying.

FAITH POPCORN, TRENDS FORECASTER: It's just the beginning. I mean, Hillary is selling her book out. Who do you think bought that book? Maybe Eleanor Roosevelt wrote stuff about her White House years, but this is very different. Hillary is saying, and this is a girl version.

PILGRIM: Science has obliged with a new theory on uber-female chromosomes as explained by Maureen Dowd in her "New York Times" column.

Is all this new? Of course, not. Female power is ancient and immutable. At least that's what they keep telling us. Kitty Pilgrim, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS: That's our show tonight. Thanks for joining us. For all of us here, good night from New York.

"LIVE FROM THE HEADLINES" with Anderson Cooper is next.

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





Most Wanted Iraqis Arrested; A Look at Going Broke in America>


Aired July 9, 2003 - 18:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Wednesday, July 9. Sitting in for Lou Dobbs, Jan Hopkins.
JAN HOPKINS, GUEST HOST: Good evening everyone, for the first time the Pentagon has released information about the number of U.S. troops wounded in Iraq. It said just over 1,000 have been injured or wounded since the beginning of the war against Saddam Hussein on March 20. The Pentagon released that information after a request by CNN.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld today called for patience on Iraq. When he spoke to the Senate Armed Services Committee. Senior Pentagon Correspondent Jamie McIntyre reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Rumsfeld faced frustration about the rising number of attacks on American troops in Iraq and inability of the U.S. to stop them.

SEN. EDWARD KENNEDY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: I'm now concerned that we now have the world's best trained soldiers serving as policment in what seems to be a shooting gallery.

MCINTYRE: Frustration about the failure to find Saddam Hussein.

SEN. SUSAN COLLINS (R), MAINE: Unless we capture or kill Saddam, then our progress is going to be far slower.

DANOLD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: I will agree with that and I will say, however, that, in answer to your question, what's the priority, the priority is very high.

MCINTYRE: There was frustration Rumsfeld wouldn't be nailed down on whether France and Germany were among the more than 70 countries asked to contribute troops to Iraq.

SEN. CARL LEVIN (D), MICHIGAN: Is France and Germany on the list?

RUMSFELD: I'll have to ask. I would suspect they are.

MCINTYRE: Frustration about what the war is costing.

SEN. ROBERT BYRD (D), WEST VIRGINIA: Well, I'd like to know now. MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld's staff did come up with numbers, nearly $4 billion a month for Iraq and $900 million a month for Afganistan. But Senator John McCain warned Rumsfeld his unwillingness to even guess at how many troops it will take and how long they will stay is making American's uneasy.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: This whole issue of how long are they going to be there, the uncertainty, the seeing the pictures of the wounded or dead -- American soldiers -- are leading to this unease.

MCINTYRE: And there was the frustration, Senators just back from Iraq, heard from troops, who still don't know when they are coming home.

COLLINS: And over and over I heard, I'm proud of our mission, I helped free the Iraqi people, but when do I get to go home.

MCINTYRE: In response, Rumsfeld himself, sounded frustrated and made a plea for patience.

RUMSFELD: We all believed that it's important that it be done. That we -- it's important we get other countries to participate in it. We intend to see it through and it's going to take some patience. And when it's done it's going to have been darn well worth having done.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld did say the army's 3rd Infantry Division, among the first troops in Baghdad, is coming home, 1 brigade this month, 1 next month, the final one in September. And Rumsfeld said he would make some decisions this week that would allow U.S. commanders to tell other trops in Iraq when they are coming home as well -- Jan.

HOPKINS: Jamie, the question, who's going to replace them?

MCINTYRE: Well there is a rotation schedule that is being worked out. That's really what Rumsfeld will be considering. Troops from other U.S. base units will be going in, but the trick is they have to be very careful because the U.S. is stretched thin. If they send too many replacements in too soon, they won't have anybody to replace them when theire time is up.

HOPKINS: Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon, thanks.

U.S. forces in Iraq have arrested another two former members of Saddam Hussein's regime, on the most wanted list. They include a former senior official in the Revolutionary Command Council. He was the 9 of hearts in the deck of cards issued to coalition forces. The other former regime member in custody tonight is the 7 of spades. He's a former member of the -- actually the former minister of interior in Saddam Hussein's government.

Tonight a rare look at the activities of Saddam Hussein's intelligence services inside the United States. A Chicago man who allegedly spied on Iraqi opposition groups before the fall of Saddam Hussein appeared in court today. Justice correspondent Kelli Arena has the report -- Kelli?

KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right, Jan. The government alleges that Khaled Abdel-Latif Dumeisi was secretly serving as an agent for Saddam Hussein's regime. Now he's been living in the United States for ten years, heading up a company that publishes an Arabic language newspaper. Officials say a that dossier found in an intelligence safehouse in Baghdad included information on an agent in the United States who went by the code name Sirhan who was supplying information on opposition leaders to Iraqi intelligence officials.

Well the government says Sirhan and Dumeisi are one in the same. The government also says that it received information from 4 unnamed individuals in building their case against Dumeisi. Now Dumeisi is not being charged with espionage but instead with not registering as an agent with of a foreign government.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PATRICK FITZGERALD, U.S. ATTORNEY: You're telling a foreign government that here are the people in America opposed to you. We cannot tolerate people doing that here. And so I'm trying to send the message that this case is serious because people can't spy against people that live here, who come here for our freedoms.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ARENA: Officials say that Dumeisi is guilty of producing press I.D. cards for Iraqi intelligence officers. They that he received financial support from the Iraqi government to conduct his activities and that he traveled to Iraq to get intelligence gathering training.

In one instance, officials say that he secretly gathered information from one Iraqi opposition leader using a pen with a hidden microphone and camera inside. For all these allegations, Dumeisi faces 15 years in prison if he is convicted, Jan.

HOPKINS: But is it likely that he knows about other spies for Saddam in the United States?

ARENA: Well, the investigation does continue. Obviously, it does involve anyone that he contacted that the government knows that he contacted. So we may see more fallout, but the U.S. attorney in Chicago did say that he didn't want to raise expectations that this was going to lead to any great case against a lot of people.

So this could be just what it is, Jan.

HOPKINS: Kelli Arena, Justice Department.

President Bush today said that he is absolutely confident the United States and its allies were correct to remove Saddam Hussein from power. But he did not address the issue of why he said Iraq tried to buy nuclear materials in Africa. That information proved to be incorrect.

The president is in the South African capital of Pretoria tonight. Chris Burns has our report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS BURNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was a day aimed at touting President Bush's multibillion dollar rescue package for Africa to combat AIDS and poverty. But at a news conference with South African president Thobo Mbeki he couldn't escape questions about Iraq. Questions about his January State of the Union message alleging Saddam Hussein was trying to buy nuclear materials from Africa. A charge that didn't hold water. At a news conference he dodged the question.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm confident that Saddam Hussein had a weapons of mass destruction program. In 1991, I will remind you, we underestimated how close he was to having a nuclear weapon. Imagine a world in which this tyrant had a nuclear weapon. In 1998, my predecessor raided Iraq based upon the very same intelligence.

BURNS: Another Iraq related question, whether U.S. forces deployed there, in Afghanistan, and elsewhere would be stretched too thin if sent as peacekeepers to Liberia.

BUSH: We won't over extend our troops, period.

BURNS: The president has yet to commit troop there. Though there are calls for that, to prevent a shaky cease-fire from descending into a bloodbath.

Another African disaster in the making, Zimbabwe. It's on the verge of economic collapse and widespread famine under what Washington calls, the violent misrule of President Robert Mugabe.

Secretary of State Colin Powell recently criticized South Africa, a regional power, of not doing enough to bring about regime change there.

The two presidents insisted they want a quick solution.

THABO MBEKI, SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT: We didn't fight about any of that.

BUSH: We were smiling because we were certain a clever reporter would try to use the Zimbabwe issue as a way to maybe create tensions which don't exist.

BURNS: Some tension, though, at the Ford Motor plant President Bush visited. He was promoting the African growth and opportunity act that allows tariff free African exports to the U.S. boosting the idea of trade replacing aid.

Union workers outside see that and other U.S. policies as benefiting mainly American companies. That U.S. subsidies to American farmers crowd African farmers out of the world market. And Iraq again rearing its head lingering anti-war sentiment here as well. The reason for the biggest no-show to the president's visit, Nelson Mandela.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BURNS: Now, those protests notwithstanding, the president did have a dinner with South African and American business leaders to talk about that trade. At that dinner there were some singers there to greet the president. The president tomorrow goes on to Botswana near South Africa. That is probably one of the greatest paradoxes of Africa, where you have very, very high business performance, it's a diamond rich country, but at the same time they have a very high HIV infection rate, 38 percent among those 1.5 million people, among the adults among the 1.5 million people. So a tragedy there where President Bush can talk about his $15 billion initiative to fight AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean -- Jan.

HOPKINS: Chris Burns in Pretoria, South Africa, thanks.

In Liberia today, U.S. military experts continue to survey strategic points like the harbor and the airport and the capital Monrovia. Those facilities could be used by peacekeeping forces from the United States and other countries if they're sent to Liberia. Today West African countries said that they could send a thousand troops within two week if the United States provides logistics help.

And turning to a crisis in Asia with potentially much wider consequences. South Korea said today that North Korea recently reprocessed a small number of nuclear fuel rods that could be used to make nuclear weapons. The South Korean intelligence service also says that Pyongyang has tested devices to trigger nuclear explosions. Also today, a North Korean delegation arriving in South Korea, said "The black clouds of nuclear war are gathering on the Korean peninsula."

Iran is another country accused of trying to develop nuclear weapons. It is also a country where there have been growing calls for freedom. Today there were global protests to mark the beginning of pro-democracy demonstrations in Iran four years ago. Students in the Iranian capital of Tehran also tried to mark the occasion. But police and vigilante groups fought running battles with the students near Tehran University.

And still ahead tonight. Opting out: Microsoft abandons its much criticized stock options program. We'll look at whether this will change the way you're paid.

Also ahead, fighting fat. The FDA is claiming a victory in the battle of the bulge, one that could save thousands of lives.

Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen will join us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: To expense or not to expense stock options, and how to do it has been a question hanging over corporate America. However, decision on the matter from the world's largest software maker could provide the answer for many companies.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS (voice-over): Microsoft's move to restrict its stock will impact both share shareholders and employees. The AFL-CIO applauded the decision and sent a letter to other fortune 500 companies urging them to do the same. Saying options have been at the core of the scandals on Wall Street.

WILLIAM PATTERSON, DIR. OFFICE OF INVESTING AFL-CIO: Options have caused executives to adopt a very short-term approach to managing the companies. They've managed companies into short-term blips in their portfolios. It's encouraged accounting manipulation. It has demoralized employees.

HOPKINS: The Microsoft plan will be closely watched throughout the high-tech sector.

BILL FOLEY, EXEC. COMP. CONSULTANT, BILL FOLEY & COMPANY: If you're not at Microsoft, that's where it gets particularly interesting. Because if you're in a company that has a big up side opportunity, OK, options may be the play. But if you're at a company that does not have big up side opportunity, your options will start to appeal by comparison perhaps to what the Microsoft people will get.

HOPKINS: The good news for American workers is that the company did not scrap employee ownership altogether

COREY ROBEN, NATIONAL CENTER FOR EMPLOYEE OWNERSHIP: Some people are saying, well, once companies have to account for stock options, the phenomenon of broad based equity sharing is going to diminish at least somewhat. But Microsoft's making a very clear statement that at least in their case it's not.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS: DaimlerChrysler today said it may stop issuing options to its senior executives, but adds no final decision has been made. Intel and Cisco both said they do not intend to change their pay plans, and incidentally Microsoft stock fell today.

A modest pull back on Wall Street overall. The Dow was down nearly 67 points. Altria accounted for nearly one-third of that drop. Nasdaq edged up one point higher for the third straight session. The S&P 500 lost more than 5 1/2 points.

Christine Romans is here with the overall market -- Christine.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNNfn CORRESPONDENT: The Nasdaq barely eked out another 15-month high here. And volume there, were more advancing stocks than declining stocks on the Nasdaq. But the blue chips, they pulled back taking the Dow now 2 percent off its recent peak. The S&P 500 is off just 1 percent, this after blistering gains in the spring. Among the movers Altria tumbled after an analyst said it may have to post more bond in an Illinois appeal. Alcoa was downgraded a day after it's profit reports show it's earnings fell. But Citigroup hit the highest price in 15 months after Prudential said Citi could raise its dividend by 20 percent and trading there could improve. Now at the big board 15 stocks rose for every 17 that fell. Volume was the best in a week and better than the yearly average. And at the Nasdaq, it was the second 2 billion share day in a row. After the close, Yahoo! reported a rise in earnings and profit. Now you can see that stock has surged to 2 1/2 year highs recently on predictions for that solid quarter. Now that investors got that solid quarter, of course there's a little bit of selling after the bell. And also after the bell, Nike will buy its competitor Converse for $305 million. Jan, that's the late nest a handful of deals announced this week, merger and acquisition environment seems to be improving just a little bit.

HOPKINS: Heating up. Thanks, Christine Romans.

And coming up, a revelation in the fight against fat. A subtle change that could save more than 5,000 lives every year.

Medical Correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen, will have that report.

And then shaping post war Iraq. Many of you wrote in with your thoughts. We'll share some of your e-mails.

And save your energy. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham joins us with advice on how consumers can save energy and money.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: You can add two new words to your health lexicon, trans fat. It is the stuff that gives packaged cookies and doughnuts a longer shelf life, but it may shorten your life. Now information about trans fat is about to show up on your food labels. Medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joins us now with more -- Elizabeth.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Jan, many people haven't heard of trans fat. People know what saturated fats are. But trans fat are very similar. They're both fats that can clog your arteries. Now, as you said, they're going to start requiring these lists, the kind of labeling to be done in the supermarkets. It won't be required until January 2006.

Let's take a look at a current food label and see how it will differ from the new one. This is a label for Oreos. This label shows how much total fat it has and how much saturated fat it has. What it doesn't tell you is what you're going to see on the new label. The new label will say that it has seven grams of total fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat and 2.5 grams of trans fat. And so health experts say this is going to help people make better choices, because now they'll know the total amount of bad fat in all the products -- Jan.

HOPKINS: So if it's bad, why is the government waiting until 2006 to put in effect this kind of labeling?

COHEN: Many people have wondered that, why they're giving food companies that much time. One of the reasons is that the government says that food companies need the time to analyze their products, find out how much trans fat that the products have in them, and then reformulate the labels so that the labels will be different.

However, Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson said today that he hopes that these food companies will take the time not just to redo the labels but to redo the foods themselves.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOMMY THOMPSON, HHS SECRETARY: We're expecting that companies are going to say, you know, we want to make sure we got the best product out there possible. And they'll start competing with each other and they will, therefore, start reducing the trans fats in their particular products, which of course will also help the healthiness of the food people consume.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: Now, some food companies are actually a step ahead of the government. For example, the Frito-Lay company has already taken the trans fat out of some products. This product here does not have any trans fat at all. And when you turn this over, you see that they've labeled it "trans fat zero grams."

HOPKINS: Why is trans fat so bad?

COHEN: It clogs the arteries, it's very similar to saturated fat. Basically, there are two different kinds of fat. One is good fat, and the other is bad fat. Bad fats like saturated fat and trans fat actually get into your arteries and clogs them up, making you more vulnerable to heart disease and to strokes.

HOPKINS: Thanks very much, Elizabeth Cohen, telling us about something else that's bad for us.

That brings us to tonight's poll -- which is the worst for your health? Trans fat, sugar, alcohol or television? Cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll bring you preliminary results later in the show.

And now, the final results of yesterday's poll. We asked, what do, you believe is needed most to stabilize Iraq? Ten percent of you said more U.S. troops, 7 percent said fewer U.S. troops; 57 percent said more troops from other countries, and 26 percent of you said train Iraqi troops.

And now, a look at some of your thoughts. Many of you wrote about yesterday's poll asking what you believe is needed most to stabilize Iraq. Michelle Sales of Seattle, Washington wrote -- "I really think what is needed is time. Don't be so impatient."

And Robert Moon from Cincinnati, Ohio, wrote -- "President Bush has warned repeatedly that post-war Iraq would be like this. It takes time to exterminate terrorist cells, and you don't hear about what they do prevent."

Emmanuel from Greenfield, California wrote -- "I think the president should start to concentrate on the United States more than other countries. When the president took office, he signed on as president of the United States, not of Iraq."

And Pat of Chrisney, Indiana asks -- "With most of the states going broke, why is the government giving $15 billion to Africa? This would go a long way to help out here in the U.S."

Jim Gillen of Cincinnati wrote about our daily check of the national debt. "While the national debt number is impressive, it would be far more meaningful to know what the individual citizen owes." Well, Jim, we did the math. Your share is $22,853.39. And that is the same for everyone else.

We love hearing from you. Please e-mail us your thoughts at loudobbs@cnn.com.

Coming up, going broke in America. Small businesses suffering under insurmountable debt. Peter Viles reports.

And then the search for weapons in Iraq could be the president's Achilles Heel come election time. Senior political analyst Bill Schneider will have that report.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: Still no clear motive in yesterday's shooting rampage in Mississippi. Douglas Williams killed five co-workers and injured nine others yesterday at a Lockheed Martin plant. Eight of the victims were black. Despite some claims that Williams was a racist, police aren't ready to say that the murders were racially motivated.

In a series of killings in California, Vincent Brothers has been arrested in connection with the death of his estranged wife, their three children and his mother-in-law. The victims' bodies were found in their Bakersfield home yesterday. Brothers turned himself into North Carolina police today.

Tropical Storm Claudette is bearing down on Jamaica tonight. Forecasters say that the storm has weakened. Claudette's winds have slowed to 65 miles an hour, but the storm still poses a threat. Mexico issued a hurricane watch for the east coast of the Yucatan Peninsula. Tropical storm warnings are up for Jamaica and the Cayman Islands.

Rain has been falling in Indiana for six days. And now the National Guard is on the job, trying to protect homes from rising floodwaters. A state of emergency has been declared in 25 counties.

A state of excitement over tonight's Powerball drawing. A quarter of a billion dollars is at stake. That is the fourth largest Powerball purse ever. The odds of winning, more than 120 million to one.

That multimillion dollar prize would be a dream for anyone, but the reality for many people in this country is debt. Tonight, in the third part of our series "Going Broke in America," we examine debt and small business. One in three new companies doesn't live to see its third birthday. Peter Viles has the story. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PETER VILES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From wraps to riches, to Chapter 11. 1996, Clay Walker opens up the Emerald Planet in downtown Manhattan serving sandwich wraps and smoothies. And reviews were great. "Better than sex," said one restaurant guide, adding, "diehards demand more locations." So Clay Walker, like any other businessman, tries to meet demand, opens up a second store in Rockefeller Center, but then comes the bear market, September 11 and corporate cutbacks.

CLAY WALKER, FOUNDER, THE EMERALD PLANET: I was hoping that the economy would come around in time to save the business. Unfortunately, we just ran out of gas. We couldn't keep up. We couldn't pay the rent anymore, and we couldn't keep up with our expenses. So we had to, you know, file Chapter 11.

VILES: Business failure is a fact of life in America. Last year, Americans started new businesses at the rate of 2,100 every weekday. Trouble is, on average, 2,200 businesses closed every day.

Now, official statistics show business bankruptcies have actually dropped sharply over the past 15 years, from 82,000 in 1987 to just 38,000 last year, but new research indicates that one in seven personal bankruptcies, that's 207,000 last year, are related to a struggling small business.

PROF. ROBERT LAWLESS, UNLV: We've been doing a study of small businesses and bankruptcy. And what we find are that there are a lot of people out there who are showing up in the bankruptcy statistics as consumers, but in fact are in bankruptcy because of some underlying business problem.

VILES: Here's a profile of those personal/business bankruptcies. Monthly income: $3,300. Monthly expenses: $3,300. Assets: $125,000. Liability: $204,000, including $32,000 in average credit card debt on nine cards.

DEBORAH CRABBE, FOSTER PEPPER & SHEFELMAN: A lot of businesses have a very small line of credit with their local bank. And then in order to fund additional inventory or supplies or whatever, they need to keep their business operating, they often turn to credit cards.

VILES: Clay Walker, hedged his bets, each restaurant is its own company. So one is in bankruptcy and the other struggling to stay out of it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really a race against the clock. If the economy can come back quicker, we may still be in business. I'm hoping it does in time to save this store, too.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VILES: The truth is that most businesses, small businesses will never file for bankruptcy. And their main concern regarding bankruptcy is what happens to the creditors, not the filers. In other words, how are they going to collect money from customers who have filed for bankruptcy -- Jan.

HOPKINS: Good point. Thanks, Pete.

Coming up tomorrow in our special series, "Going Broke in America," we'll look at the problem of underfunded pensions. When pensions run out of money, much of the burden falls on taxpayers.

Bill Tucker will have our report.

Turning now to politics, Democrats are seizing on President Bush's pre-war miss statement about Iraq, uranium and nuclear weapons as a credibility issue. But it remains to be seen whether the president will face any public political fallout from that remark.

Senior political correspondent Bill Schneider reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST (voice-over): Here's what President Bush said in his state of the union address.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantity of uranium from Africa.

SCHNEIDER: The White House now says that statement was based on unreliable information. The admission may not cause the president great political damage. Most Americans have always given President Bush high ratings for honesty and trustworthiness. While criticism has crept up a bit since the war, the public still has confidence in President Bush's credibility by 2-1. And the public shares the president's conviction when he says about Saddam Hussein...

BUSH: There's no doubt in my mind the United States along with allies and friend did the right thing in removing him from power.

SCHNEIDER: The basic principle is don't quarrel with success.

BUSH: One thing's for certain, he's not trying to buy anything right now. If he's alive, he's on the run.

SCHNEIDER: But what if the public no longer sees the war as a success, that's the real political danger. If Americans begin to have doubts about the war, it will not be because they think the intelligence was flawed. It will be for a another reason. In fact, it has already been happening, before the credibility issue arose. The percentage of Americans who say Iraq was not worth going to war over more than doubled between the end of the war and late June. Those numbers have gone up far faster than doubts about President Bush's credibility.

Why, look at the total number of Americans killed in Iraq. Losses nearly doubled from the end of the war till late June. Roughly one American killed every day. Criticism of the war has increased at about the same rate as the number of Americans killed. The issue that's gaining traction isn't was the intelligence misleading.

It's why are Americans still getting killed?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCHNEIDER: Americans will quarrel with success only if they no longer see the policy as a success. If the situation in Iraq continues to deteriorate, then the public will ask, how did we get into this mess in first place?

And the issue of flawed intelligence could suddenly matter -- Jan.

HOPKINS: But Bill, what do the Democrats expect to gain from this issue?

SCHNEIDER: Well, there is some evidence that the intelligence services knew that the report about the uranium purchase was flawed and might have been forged long before the president spoke.

So the question they want to raise is, why didn't the president have this intelligence when he made his speech?

There's a larger motive here as well. The president has embraced the doctrine of preemptive action. He says if anyone threatens the United States, we have the right to a preemptive strike against them. That doctrine works only if our intelligence is flawless. If the Democrats can show that our intelligence is not without fault and not always reliable, then the doctrine of preemptive action doesn't stand up.

HOPKINS: Bill Schneider, thanks.

SCHNEIDER: "Tonight's Quote" comes from the Senate hearing on whether the war in Iraq was based on faulty intelligence. "The United States did not choose war, Saddam Hussein did." That is from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

And when we return, face-off. Malpractice madness: who really pays for medical malpractice claims?

Two leading experts will join us.

And what do Charlie's Angels and Hillary Clinton have in common?

They're at the leading edge of the latest women's movement.

Kitty Pilgrim, will have that report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

Senate Democrats today successfully block the Republican sponsored malpractice bill. The bill would have capped lawsuit damages to victims of medical malpractice. The measure was modeled on the way California changed its laws more than 25 years ago.

Casey Wian has our report from Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Rapidly rising medical malpractice insurance costs have forced emergency room shutdowns in Nevada and West Virginia, persuaded obstetricians to leave New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and pushed doctors onto picket lines. In some specialties malpractice insurance premiums can exceed $200,000 a year. And in some states patients struggle to find medical care.

SEN. JOHN ENSIGN (R), NEVADA: The problem is caused by out-of- control jury awards and frivolous lawsuits, which are cheaper to settle and those get settled all the time, than they are to fight.

WIAN: The American Medical Association says there's a crisis in 19 states and problem signs in 25 others. California is noticeably absent. In 1975 it capped jury awards for pain and suffering at $250,000. Malpractice premiums stabilized. President Bush and Senate Republicans proposed a similar federal law. But after lobbying by trial lawyers Senate Democrats killed it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The motion is not agreed to.

SEN. RICK SANTORUM (R), PENNSYLVANIA: People of America who as a result of this action today are not going to see any relief in the spiraling cost of malpractice premiums and the resulting unavailability of health care.

WIAN: Trial lawyers say jury awards are not the cause of rising malpractice premiums. Instead they blame bad doctors and bad investment practices by insurance companies. Cap opponents cite malpractice victims like Linda McDougal (ph), who was misdiagnosed with cancer and had both breasts removed, as examples of those who deserve big jury awards for non-economic damages.

SEN. DICK DURBIN (D), ILLINOIS: It is unfair to address the medical malpractice premium crisis in America by simply saying that victims of malpractice shall be limited in what they can receive from court. It is unfair for us to put ourselves in the place of a jury.

WIAN: But the issue the American Medical Association calls its number one priority still has a pulse.

(on camera): Several states have passed or proposed medical malpractice reforms. But it may take years for them to have an impact because of a backlog of cases filed under previous laws and because many reforms are subject to court challenges.

Casey Wian, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS: That brings us to tonight's face-off topic; rising medical malpractice topic. Dr. Donald Palmisano is the president of the American Medical Association. He is a proponent of capping medical malpractice awards. I should also point out he's not only a physician but also an attorney.

William McNary is the executive director of U.S. Action. He says insurance companies are to blame for the current malpractice crisis.

Let's start with Dr. Palmisano. The fact that Congress isn't doing anything on capping malpractice, does that leave the solution to the states like California?

DR. DONALD PALMISANO, PRES. AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSN.: Well, the states certainly need to fix their laws if they have a problem. We have six states that are stable at the present time, California being one of them. Louisiana, my state, another one of the stable states. But we are not giving up at the federal level because we have over half of the American population, over 140 million people, in distress right now because of the risk of not being able to find a doctor. A pregnant woman has difficulty finding an obstetrician. A young boy who's knocked unconscious in a football game, there's no neurosurgeon available.

So we believe that the action today was the action of a minority that's thwarting the will of the American public. The American public's in favor, they are in favor of caps on non-economic damages, the ones you can't quantify.

HOPKINS: Mr. McNary, do you agree? Do you think that caps aren't going to solve the problem?

WILLIAM MCNARY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF U.S. ACTION: No, caps aren't going to solve the problem at all. Let's be clear. If we took all of the costs of health care that were attributable to attorney fees and awards, it's only .5 percent. So clearly that's not the driving factor. There's no legal crisis here. Most doctors, are they good doctors? Yes. But do some doctors make mistakes? Yes; 5 percent of the doctors, by the way, are responsible for 55 percent of the malpractice.

And so mistakes are made. To a certain extent, most docs are being squeezed, but they're not being squeezed by consumers. They're being squeezed by HMOs who try to tell them how to practice medicine on the one end. They're being squeezed by reduced reimbursements. And finally they're being squeezed on the other end by insurance companies that price them out of the market.

What you do in this case is you have insurance rate reform, and you have better medical practices, but you don't go after the victims. That's akin to having the boss squeezing you at work and you coming home and taking it out on your wife. That's not the solution.

HOPKINS: Dr. Palmisano, your response.

PALMISANO: Well, we certainly looked at the insurance companies, and we don't have any hesitation about going against insurance companies. But in this case, in the medical liability situation, we found that the payment for claims and for the expenses actually exceeds the money they're getting in premiums, and we have a system that is allowing increasing awards. And we have a system that doesn't adequately measure negligence. It's a system that increases the costs of medical care and decreases access to care.

What this debate is really about is access to care for the patients of these United States. And we're finding all of these diversions, blame the insurance company, bad doctors, when they come up with these figures, the 5 percent, they go to the National Practitioner Databank, it doesn't even tell you what doctors -- what specialties are there. Sure, we can get rid of 5 percent of the doctors who are paying the biggest claims. We can get rid of the neurosurgeons and the obstetricians.

So the problem really is out-of-control legal awards and settlements based on the fear of increasing awards. And California's a perfect example. It was a state in crisis. The rates now are $72,000 for an obstetrician in Los Angeles. They are $249,000 in Miami.

HOPKINS: Mr. McNary, you don't think that California is the solution, do you?

MCNARY: Well, California is a good example but for a different reason. Let's be clear, that once they impose caps in California nothing happened to reduce insurance premiums. What happened to reduce insurance premiums, that consumers got together and passed Proposition 103, which called for a decrease in insurance rates, which called for prior approval before an insurance company could raise rates. They had to go to the insurance commission and make sure that happened.

Insurance rate reform is what drives down the rates and holds prices steady in California, and if the doctor wants to join us in the consumer movement for insurance rate reform all over this country, that's the right solution. But to go and try to punish the severely injured victims, that's the wrong way to go.

HOPKINS: Dr. Palmisano?

PALMISANO: Well, actually, Proposition 103 had nothing to do with lowering medical liability rates in California. There's not one instance where it lowered the rates in California. It was primarily for auto insurance, and it has never lowered a medical liability rate in California. And Louisiana, Indiana, New Mexico, Colorado, Wisconsin, they don't have Proposition 103. Proposition 103 just says if you want to raise your rates above a certain level that you have to have a public hearing on it. And you have auto insurers giving 10, 11 percent increases without public hearings.

So that's not the answer. That's another diversion. What we need to do is fix the broken system. And the broken system is one where there are lots of frivolous suits. It's a system where there's no prediction on the non-economic awards. And as a result of this, awards are going out of sight. Physicians can't pay these premiums, and the patients suffer. We have over 140 million people at risk right now. And this is a serious problem.

It was really a shame when you think that the president of the United States is in favor of this, when the House of Representatives is in favor of this, when the American public by the Gallup Poll, 72 percent are in favor of this, when the leader of the Senate, Dr. Frist, is in favor of this, and a minority number of senators have blocked this for the American public. It's really a shame.

Allow it for debate. And if you have a better version, put amendments in and let's have the debate. But allow it to go the American way and have a full debate.

HOPKINS: Mr. McNary, go ahead.

MCNARY: Well, the fact of the matter is that there is a different version of medical malpractice that's not even being considered, and it is the only bipartisan bill. So let's not talk about politics. The medical malpractice bill offered by Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois and Lindsay Graham of South Carolina is the only bill that deals with medical malpractice in a way that gets to the root causes.

What it does is, number one, it would offer tax relief to doctors who are -- to offset the rising malpractice premiums. Two, it would deal with some of the anti-competitive practices of the insurance market, which means that they will no longer be able to price fix. And finally, it actually commissions a study to get to the root causes.

This is what we need to do. And this has bipartisan support, unlike the proposal that Dr. Frist is sponsoring. And by the way, our Tennessee affiliate has called on Dr. Frist to recuse himself from the vote. It turns out that he has interest in a health care stock. He has $25 million in HCA that would benefit from this. And so he is the wrong person to be pushing this bill.

HOPKINS: Dr. Palmisano?

PALMISANO: Well, actually, the bill that he is talking about is really a Band-Aid on a bleeding artery. That's not going to get to the root cause of the problem. The root cause of the problem, we need to fix this broken liability system.

We have escalating awards. The awards have nothing to do with negligence. The famous Harvard study showed that the payment is not related to negligence. We really have sort of a jackpot type thing. And I'm sure the attorneys are going to be opposed to this, the ones who file medical malpractice suits. They get 33 1/3 percent, up to 50 percent of the award.

So let them take cases and say, hey, we'll take the case, we think you have a valid case here and let them then take it on an hourly basis after they win the case. Why should they take the economic damages of someone for a lifetime? Why should they take 33 1/3 to 50 percent? It doesn't make sense. This system's broken. The American public knows it. And we just need to get it fixed. And it will get fixed. The only question is when is it going to get fixed?

HOPKINS: Fifteen seconds, Mr. McNary, for a final word.

MCNARY: This is about Americans being judged by an impartial jury of their peers in a fully informed way. Dr. Palmisano's not talking about getting his lawyers or the insurance lawyers out of court. They're talking about putting limits on the consumer lawyers, the consumer lawyers who go in and represent victims. If we can say 12 men and women can decide death penalty cases in Texas, in life and death, surely 12 men and women can decide when a jury award, which is $250,000 by its very nature, means that it's not a frivolous lawsuit, it goes to the trial by jury, we want to keep our courts open and free.

HOPKINS: Thank you both. William McNary, the U.S. Action Committee -- Group, rather, executive director. And Dr. Donald Palmisano.

PALMISANO: Thank you.

HOPKINS: He is the president of the American Medical Association. Thanks for facing off.

MCNARY: Thank you so much.

HOPKINS: Tonight's thought is on the importance of good health. "The first wealth is health." And that is from Ralph Waldo Emerson.

A reminder now to vote in tonight's poll. The question -- which is the worst for your health? Trans fat, sugar, alcohol, or television? Cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll bring you preliminary results in just a few minutes.

Coming up, power surge. Energy costs are sharply higher. But the Department of Energy may have a solution in the works. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham will join us next.

And later, girl power. It's everywhere these days, from the box office to the best-seller list. Women are on top.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: The Energy Department has launched a program to help Americans conserve energy at home. The "Smart Energy Campaign" offers tips on how to save money on electricity bills this summer. And the department says it could help keep down costs this winter as well. Joining me now with more on the campaign is the Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham. Good to have you with us.

SPENCER ABRAHAM, ENERGY SECRETARY: Thanks. Good to be with you.

HOPKINS: So if we use less energy this summer, then there will be more to heat us in the winter? Is that the idea?

ABRAHAM: Well, actually, our crisis is in the area of how much natural gas we'll have going into the winter heating season. And right now we're a little low in terms of our storage. So one way to build the storage is to use less. That not only helps us save some energy but it also saves people at the pocketbook. And we want to do that as well.

HOPKINS: So we have to save on electricity in the summertime.

ABRAHAM: That's right.

HOPKINS: That means what? Living in warmer...

ABRAHAM: It doesn't require massive sacrifices...

HOPKINS: Turning off our air conditioning?

ABRAHAM: As we call our campaign "Smart Energy" what it means is, put an adjustable, programmable thermostat on your air- conditioning system or use more energy-efficient products including lightbulbs. Or it means better insulation in the home. All those can help. One of the things we've done as part of the campaign is build a new Web site, energysavers.gov which people can log on to and learn about ways to save money and at the same time save energy.

HOPKINS: But we should be in better shape because certainly in the east we had such a cold spring and we didn't have to use a lot of energy.

ABRAHAM: We also had a cold winter, which is really the cause of the problem. We used a lot of gas to heat homes this winter. That reduced how much we have on hand going into the warm summertime. And could conceivably be a problem for next winter. So we're trying to get ahead of the action a little bit by putting this campaign in place today.

HOPKINS: I noticed that oil prices are back up above $30. We didn't have very much of a positive effect on oil prices as a result of the war in Iraq. Why was that?

ABRAHAMA: Well, the war in Iraq wasn't designed to affect oil prices. I mean, it was designed, obviously, to deal with a tyrant who was oppressing his own people and threatening the rest of the world. The thing that I think is really important to know is that in spite of the war, in spite of a strike in the oil markets in Venezuela, we've had relatively stable prices and prices that did not go up the way they did in previous crisis situations.

So I'm not saying everything is where we'd like it, but those who were predicting $50 or $100 a barrel oil were wrong. We said we could keep the price relatively stable, and that's where it's been.

HOPKINS: But it's stable at a high level.

ABRAHAM: Well, higher than we would like. Obviously, it's a concern. That's why we hope Congress will pass an energy bill. We've been trying to get that done for three years. We hope the Senate and the House will finally get the job done so we can have an energy plan for the future that allows for more production, more conservation, and more diverse sources of energy.

HOPKINS: One of the things that's under your umbrella in the Department of Energy is all of the atomic facilities in this country.

ABRAHAM: Well, the nuclear weapons labs, yes.

HOPKINS: And there have been critical reports from the GAO about how open these plants are for the possibility of terrorists. What are you doing to make sure that that -- that these are more secure?

ABRAHAM: We've been significantly increasing our security budget for our national weapons laboratories. We've also recently put in place a high-level commission of experts to reevaluate the security at the labs to determine what additional steps we can take. And we've -- we're in the process of developing a new design basis threat, as it's called, so that we can be better prepared for the threats of the 21st century.

I believe that our lab security systems are excellent, but they always can be improved, and we take this very seriously.

HOPKINS: Thank you very much. Spencer Abraham, the U.S. Energy Secretary. Thanks for joining us.

ABRAHAM: Thank you.

HOPKINS: Coming up, the results of tonight's poll. Plus, there's a revolution taking hold across popular culture, girl power. It may not be new, but Kitty Pilgrim reports that it's kicking up a storm this summer.

And it was a street -- a sweet payback today for CNN's Tucker Carlson. Hillary Rodham Clinton serves up humble pie. We'll explain.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOPKINS: Well CROSSFIRE'S Tucker Carlson today got his just desserts. Carlson had previously claimed on air that he would eat his shoe if Hillary Rodham Clinton's book, "Living History", sold more than 1 million copies. Well, Simon & Schuster today announced sales exceeded 1 million. So serving up the shoe, which for Tucker's sake was really chocolate cake, was Hillary herself. She also gave Tucker a signed book which read, Tucker, you're number 1 million in my book.

And finally tonight, girl power, from bookstores to the box office, images of phenomenal females are everywhere. Kitty Pilgrim reports on why pop culture has gone gaga for goddesses.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In case you haven't noticed, female power is back in a big way. The "Da Vinci Code," a top "New York Times" best-seller, revolves around unleashing the sacred feminine power in religion and the universe. Did you know that scientists now say the boulders at stone henage reflect female fertility organs in a particularly explicit way?

Goddesses are big. Nike has a new goddess line for women.

Food writer Nigella Lawson teaches her audiences how to be a domestic goddess.

And goddesses actually had their own party this spring at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The costume institute celebrated goddess gowns through the ages.

Screen goddesses now dress the part in trendy new goddess gowns. Jennifer Lopez wore one to the academy awards. Being feminine is powerful. Female angels put in a tough day's work with very little damage to their lip gloss. And Angelina Jolie takes girl power to the tenth power in a new movie about heroine Lara Croft.

AVIS JONES-DEWEEVER, INST. FOR WOMEN'S POLICY RESEARCH: Society itself has learned that to be smart, to be ambitious, to be intelligent and proactive and just the person that can get things done does not necessarily mean that you need to make yourself over in the image of a man.

PILGRIM: Hillary Clinton chronicled the feminine side of the Clinton White House years, and a million people are buying.

FAITH POPCORN, TRENDS FORECASTER: It's just the beginning. I mean, Hillary is selling her book out. Who do you think bought that book? Maybe Eleanor Roosevelt wrote stuff about her White House years, but this is very different. Hillary is saying, and this is a girl version.

PILGRIM: Science has obliged with a new theory on uber-female chromosomes as explained by Maureen Dowd in her "New York Times" column.

Is all this new? Of course, not. Female power is ancient and immutable. At least that's what they keep telling us. Kitty Pilgrim, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOPKINS: That's our show tonight. Thanks for joining us. For all of us here, good night from New York.

"LIVE FROM THE HEADLINES" with Anderson Cooper is next.

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Most Wanted Iraqis Arrested; A Look at Going Broke in America>