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Lou Dobbs Tonight

Troops Prepare for Fallujah Assault; Kofi Annan Warns Against Assault; Arafat May be Nearing Death

Aired November 05, 2004 - 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.


(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LOU DOBBS, HOST (voice-over): Tonight, massive air strikes on Falluja. American and Iraqi troops preparing to crush the anti-Iraq forces. We'll have a report.

AYAD ALLAWI, INTERIM PRIME MINISTER, IRAQ: We intend to liberate the people and to bring the rule of law.

DOBBS: Kofi Annan tonight tells the United States to back off on Falluja. Foreign policy experts and critics say Kofi Annan is meddling.

MICKEY EDWARDS, WOODROW WILSON SCHOOL, PRINCETON: He should be helping conduct the elections. He should not be setting conditions.

DOBBS: Tonight, I talk with Ambassador Peter Galbraith, who says Iraq is nothing less but a disaster.

And in this country, it's an invasion. Three million illegal aliens entering our country this year. Federal prosecutors say they're overwhelmed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's really sickening to the rank and file agents out there.

DOBBS: And covering this presidential election, how did the media do? I'll ask the media and one of its critics, Ken Auletta, why the media hates George Bush so much and why the Democrats can't win.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Friday, November 5. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion, is Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: Good evening. Tonight, American aircraft and artillery are pounding insurgent targets in Falluja.

Thousands of American and Iraqi troops are massed. They're making final preparations to assault the city. A senior U.S. commander says the attack will begin, quote, "very soon."

Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi today declared the window is closing for a peaceful settlement.

Our senior Pentagon correspondent, Jamie McIntyre, reports. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Days of air strikes and constant skirmishes have been paving the way for an assault force that sources say will be larger than the U.S. Marines had during April's aborted offensive. It includes some American Army units and, importantly, thousands of specially trained Iraqi soldiers, whose performance in the past has been spotty.

FIRST LT. LYLE GILBERT, 1ST MARINE EXPEDITIONARY FORCE: It's very unpredictable, but we have faith in them. Hopefully, they won't let us down.

MCINTYRE: In fact, the Iraqi participation, along with local citizen support, is considered key to success.

SAVIR SUMAIDAIE, IRAQ'S PERMANENT U.N. REPRESENTATIVE: The Fallujans are being subjected to a Taliban-like rule. Their houses are being commandeered. They are being threatened, and they themselves want the situation to be normalized.

MCINTYRE: While the timing is secret, the showdown has been well telegraphed. More than half of Falluja's 250,000 residents have already fled in anticipation of the offensive.

Insurgents, believed to number in the thousands, have been busy preparing defenses, attacking U.S. troops and rigging booby traps.

Located just west of Baghdad, Falluja is not just the biggest hotbed of resistance in Iraq; it's also believed to be the base of operations for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant who the U.S. hopes to capture or kill if he's there.

And while victory in Falluja is crucial, no one is predicting it will break the back of the insurgency.

MAJ. JIM WEST, 1ST MARINE EXPEDITIONARY FORCE: It is not, though, the panacea. Just by taking it out does not mean the rest of the insurgency will fall, but it will be a big chip in that block out there.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCINTYRE: After Falluja, the U.S. will reassess, see where the insurgents may have regrouped and plan the next offensive. As of now, there are no plans to send additional U.S. troops to Iraq or, for that matter, to bring any home early -- Lou.

DOBBS: And every -- every sense that you're receiving from the Pentagon tonight is that that -- that attack is imminent?

MCINTYRE: Really, they're not saying when it's going to be. They're trying to keep that a little bit of tactical surprise. But what we're told is that these soldiers know that they could get the order at any time.

DOBBS: Jamie McIntyre, our senior Pentagon correspondent. Thank you, Jamie.

Later here, I'll be talking with former Ambassador Peter Galbraith, who's just returned from Iraq. Galbraith says Iraq is nothing less than a catastrophe.

As American and Iraqi troops prepare to assault Falluja, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is apparently doing everything possible to stop a U.S.-led attack.

Annan has written a letter to President Bush, and in that letter declared an assault could anger Iraqis and undermine Iraqi elections in January.

Kitty Pilgrim reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.N. Secretary- general Kofi Annan objects to any kind of an attack on Falluja and said so in a letter to President Bush made public this week.

Annan expressed, quote, "concern about reports of major military offensives being planned by the multinational force in key localities such as Falluja," end quote. Annan wrote that the attack would hurt the chances of Iraqi elections.

Similar letters were also sent to Prime Minister Tony Blair and Iraqi interim President Ayad Allawi.

International law experts say Kofi Annan stepped over a line.

EDWARDS: He should not be saying to either the United States or Britain or to the Iraqis, especially, you know, that we're going to help you have good elections only if do you what we say. So I think he probably stepped a little over his proper bounds in this case.

PILGRIM: Annan today refused to discuss the letter he called a private communication, even though the letter was leaked to the press.

KOFI ANNAN, U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL: I know that it has leaked, but I really would prefer not to comment on that.

PILGRIM: International law experts say the letter meddles in U.S. policy and challenges Iraqi sovereignty.

ABRAHAM SOFAER, HOOVER INSTITUTION: This particular government has been approved by the U.N. Security Council. It has a right; it has a responsibility and nonetheless, the secretary-general saw fit to write this letter. So it's truly regrettable.

PILGRIM: Strategists point out that the elections are critical to the future of Iraq and need a stable environment to succeed.

IAN BREMMER, EURASIA GROUP: The best way to accomplish that, of course, is to have -- is to have these various insurgencies as acquiescent as possible, at least for that period. It's a major task. And it's not going to be -- it's not made any easier by the fact that Kofi Annan is saying that Falluja should be hands off right now.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PILGRIM: The State Department says Colin Powell has talked to Kofi Annan about the letter and, frankly, they differ about how Falluja should be handled. The British ambassador, however, expressed outrage, saying there cannot be an area as big as Falluja which is allowed to become a base of terrorism -- Lou.

DOBBS: These international experts from the Fletcher School of Diplomacy at Tufts University, the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton, the Hoover Institution all agree here. Are there any experts in international law or international relations supporting the approach that Kofi Annan has taken here?

PILGRIM: Everyone we talked to today said he definitely stepped over a line. It's meddling in the policy of member states.

DOBBS: Kitty Pilgrim, thank you very much.

Kofi Annan not the only international leader to challenge President Bush on Iraq. The name may be familiar. French President Jacques Chirac also appears to have rejected President Bush's appeal for more international cooperation.

President Chirac refused to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi in Belgium today. The French president insisted he didn't have time for that meeting because he had to fly to the Persian Gulf.

But President Chirac did find time to visit Yasser Arafat in the French hospital where he is being treated yesterday.

Also today, Chirac said he opposes full Turkish membership in the European Union. Chirac said Turkey could only participate in the European Union by expecting -- accepting, rather, some kind of special limited status.

In France tonight, Yasser Arafat is in a coma and near death. In the words of his spokesman, Arafat is between life and death. Fionnuala Sweeney is outside Arafat's hospital near Paris and has the report -- Fionnuala.

FIONNUALA SWEENEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Lou, there is a vigil continuing here tonight by supporters and well wishers of the Palestinian Authority president just outside the hospital. They have been here since last night when news of Yasser Arafat's condition had deteriorated, emerged.

But beyond that, there has been very little news. We still don't know exactly what ails the 75-year-old Palestinian leader.

What we do know is a statement issued from the hospital this evening, in which it was said that Yasser Arafat's condition had not deteriorated and it was pretty much the same as yesterday but really failed to shed any light on his condition. And then shortly after that, we had a statement read to reporters by Farouk Kaddoumi, who's the foreign minister for the PLO, and he is usually based in Tunis, a senior member of that organization.

And in that statement to reporters, he said that from now on the only source to be taken seriously regarding Yasser Arafat's health is the hospital. That any other sources, whether they be here in Paris, in Ramallah or in Israel or indeed in Washington were to be discounted. And I'm quoting here, "No other entity whatsoever apart from the medical authorities is authorized to give out any information regarding President Arafat's condition."

So beyond that we're not really not any the wiser tonight, Lou.

DOBBS: Fionnuala, still, we have not heard a diagnoses as to Arafat's illness nor a specific prognosis from the hospital or his attending physicians. Is that correct?

SWEENEY: Yes. It should be said that here in France, the hospital authorities are under absolutely no obligation whatsoever to release personal information about an individual patient.

And any statement that is released, short though it may be, from the hospital, is done in conjunction with the family.

There is a feeling among Palestinian leaders here that the rife speculation there has been over the past week, about him being in a coma, being near death, being on a life support, being brain-dead, being clinically dead, that these are rather -- lack dignity for a man who has led and is seen as a symbol of the Palestinian national cause.

So this is an attempt to row back on all that information that's been leaking out from various places. And some of it, I have to say, not necessarily accurate.

But as to whether or not we know what ails the Palestinian Authority president, we still don't -- Lou.

DOBBS: And that is the bottom line, of course. Fionnuala Sweeney from Paris.

Still ahead here tonight, three million illegal aliens will enter this country this year. It is nothing less than an invasion. Federal prosecutors, many of whom say they are simply overwhelmed, asking state and local officials not -- not -- to bring them cases of illegal immigration. We'll have that special report.

President Bush has won a majority of the popular vote, so why does the media seem to hate the president so much and why do Democrats seem unable to win an election? Media critic Ken Auletta is my guest.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Three million illegal aliens will invade this country this year. In spite of that alarming fact, federal prosecutors, some of them, are actually pushing to change law-enforcement guidelines so that even fewer illegal aliens are prosecuted.

Peter Viles reports from Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PETER VILES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): If you've heard of a crackdown on illegal alien smuggling, you have heard wrong. Federal prosecutors in San Diego now say they don't have the manpower to prosecute every smuggler. They also say they can no longer prosecute every illegal alien who has a criminal past.

Border Patrol agents are furious.

T.J. BONNER, NATIONAL BORDER PATROL COUNCIL: It's really sickening to the rank-and-file agents out there trying to do a job. They've put technology in that allows us to identify criminals crossing the border, and then, in the next breath, they say, oh, no, by the way, we're going to make it so difficult to prosecute those people, you may as well not even try.

VILES: The U.S. Attorney's office in San Diego quietly circulated proposed new enforcement guidelines in August, proposing that only illegal aliens with a recent and local criminal history be prosecuted. As for smugglers, it proposes to prosecute only those who put others at risk of death or serious injury.

Why cut all the others the break? Because these cases are hard to prove, and "Our resources are limited, and we have numerous and competing enforcement priorities." This is exactly what Congressman Darrell Issa was trying to head off last summer when he wrote to Attorney General John Ashcroft, urging a "zero-tolerance policy" for alien smuggling.

REP. DARRELL ISSA (R), CALIFORNIA: To be honest, we didn't got a straight answer at all. We're going back in just a few days, and it's going to be my top priority. I think my voters spoke very loud and clear when we had a town hall meeting attended by over 1,500 residents.

VILES: Issa is hopeful that a new attorney general will do what he says Ashcroft didn't, and that is to make prosecution of border- related crimes a priority.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VILES: Now criminal illegal aliens who are not prosecuted are sent back to Mexico. The problem with that, according to the Border Patrol, is that they know those criminal illegal aliens will simply come back to the United States -- Lou.

DOBBS: And, Pete, this directive from the U.S. Attorney in San Diego, obviously, coming down as a policy on the part of the U.S. Justice Department, correct?

VILES: Well, you would think, although we spoke to the Justice Department in Washington, and they said, in fact, they do not have a national policy on this issue. So it's at discretion of local officials. They're aware of it, they haven't moved to stop it, but they say it's not their national policy -- Lou.

DOBBS: Incredible.

Thank you very much.

Peter Viles.

Well, one man is trying to take a stand against illegal immigration in this country, a district attorney in Pennsylvania, and he's doing it with little or no help whatsoever from federal agencies.

Bill Tucker is in Pennsylvania, and he is working on this incredible story.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL TUCKER, CNN FINANCIAL CORRESPONDENT: Lou, I'm out in Eastern Pennsylvania where the North Hampton County district attorney's office has taken a very unusual step of pursuing and prosecuting illegal aliens using state statutes because it says Immigration and Customs enforcement won't respond to its call. I'll have the full story for you on Monday night.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: That's Bill Tucker in Eastern Pennsylvania.

The election barely over, the president of Mexico, Vicente Fox, wasted no time in demanding that President Bush take action on the issue of immigration.

President Fox told reporters in Brazil that Mexico wants the United States to introduce immigration reforms as quickly as possible. In fact, Fox set a deadline for action by President Bush, setting a deadline of one year.

The Mexican government is also criticizing Arizona voters' approval this week of Proposition 200 restricting welfare benefits for illegal aliens. The Mexican foreign ministry said the measure is "designed to promote discrimination based on ethnic profiling."

The Department of Homeland Security says it arrested 237 people for immigration violations, all of that as part of a security initiative during the presidential election and the days preceding it. Officials say they are not terrorist suspects.

Coming up next here, back to work. Great news for American workers and the Bush administration. Nearly two million new jobs created over the past year. We'll have a special report for you.

And the fight for Iraq. Ambassador Peter Galbraith will join me. He says the U.S. military based its war strategy on incredibly wishful thinking. He says Iraq now is nothing less than a catastrophe. Ambassador Galbraith joins me next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: There hasn't been much good news over this past year on employment, but, tonight, we have great news on the labor market. The best news, in fact, in seven months. Three hundred thirty-seven thousand new jobs were created in October, almost two million created this year.

That's not only good news for working Americans. It means most likely that President Bush won't be the first president since Herbert Hoover to preside over a net job loss in his first term.

Christine Romans reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It looks like Herbert Hoover won't have to share the title for jobs loss with President Bush.

October jobs growth was widespread. Most of the increase from services -- health care, temporary help and teachers -- and Florida hurricanes boosted construction hiring at the highest rate in four years. But manufacturing lost another 5,000 jobs.

Even the president's biggest critics concede October was a blockbuster month for job creation.

JARED BERNSTEIN, ECONOMIC POLICY INSTITUTE: It certainly came late in the game where we're three years into recovery now. So I think we're just going to have to see if this trend persists. However, no question it's a very positive report.

ROMANS: The unemployment rate did edge up, but that's because almost 400,000 people returned to the labor force, looking with renewed confidence for jobs.

TIM KANE, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: I think it's an amazing report, especially considering the head winds that were faced last month -- high oil prices, a lot of uncertainty about the election -- and just no doubt about it, businesses were hiring. We're seeing a real upsurge here.

ROMANS: The only bad news in this great news employment report: Wage growth barely kept up with inflation.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: This time last year, the economy had lost more than 2.2 million jobs under George W. Bush. Since January, almost two million jobs have been created.

Lou, what a difference a year makes.

DOBBS: Or even a few days.

ROMANS: Absolutely.

DOBBS: Christine, thank you.

Christine Romans.

Still ahead here tonight, American and Iraqi troops are preparing for an all-out assault against anti-Iraqi forces in Falluja. I'll be joined by former Ambassador Peter Galbraith. He says the United States failed to plan for the aftermath of the invasion in Iraq. He's my guest.

And in Heroes tonight, the inspiring story of an Army staff sergeant who, decorated twice for injuries in combat, refuses to give up the fight for his country and the chance to return to the fight.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: LOU DOBBS TONIGHT continues. Here now for more news, debate and opinion, Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: In just a moment, I'll be talking with former Ambassador Peter Galbraith, an eyewitness to what he called a preventable disaster in Iraq.

But, first, a look at some of the top stories.

Three days after the presidential election, President Bush has won the State of Iowa. Although Senator Kerry conceded Wednesday, the counting of absentee ballots in the state continued. Iowa had earlier been declared too close it call. That brings President Bush's electoral vote total to 286; Senator Kerry's, 252. President Bush's share of the popular vote, it's at 59-1/2 million votes; Senator Kerry's, nearly 56 million.

In California tonight, residents in Los Angeles are breathing the cleanest air there in 25 years. That's because of good weather and stricter air quality standards. Still, the region's air quality remains the worst in the country.

And an elementary school in New Jersey is set to reopen Monday, after being hit by 25 rounds of cannon fighter from an F-16 fighter jet. A National Guard spokesman says an investigation into the incident is underway. No one was injured.

Former Ambassador Peter Galbraith describes post-war Iraq as a catastrophe. He recently wrote an editorial in "The Boston Globe" entitled "Eyewitness to a Failure in Iraq."

He wrote in that article, quote, "Much of this could have been avoided with a competent post-war strategy, but, without having planned or provided enough troops, we would be a lot safer if we hadn't gone to war."

Ambassador Galbraith is a fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation joining me tonight from Washington, D.C.

Good to have you with us.

PETER GALBRAITH, CENTER FOR ARMS CONTROL AND NONPROLIFERATION: Lou, good to be with you.

DOBBS: A disaster that could have been prevented specifically how?

GALBRAITH: It could have been prevented, had the administration anticipated the breakdown in law and order that was inevitably going to happen when the U.S. troops entered Baghdad. This is exactly what happened in 1991 during the uprising in which rebels took over about half of Iraq.

It's the sort of thing that, frankly I think you would expect to happen in almost any country. If the government disappears, the Army disappears, all of the police disappear, there are going to be people who will take advantage of that situation.

But we didn't -- we didn't protect any of the ministries except for the oil ministry, and we didn't protect locations that had valuable intelligence, including intelligence on potential insurgencies...

DOBBS: I should point out...

GALBRAITH: ... and...

DOBBS: I should point out that you were actually in Iraq during April of 2003. What did you actually witness yourself and with whom did you discuss those issues?

GALBRAITH: Well, I witnessed the looting of the Iraqi equivalent of the Center for Disease Control. This was a very sensitive facility that had some of the most dangerous materials in Iraq. Live -- looters -- we know they took live HIV virus, live Black Fever virus. They may have taken other things as well.

At the same time, looters went into the Tuwaitha nuclear facility while American troops were there and removed yellow cake, raw uranium.

These were very sensitive sites. The American troops were present at these locations, but nobody had told them what was there.

When I came back...

DOBBS: I'm sorry. Did you address this with the authorities there on the ground, military and CPA, and what was their response?

GALBRAITH: Well, CPA hadn't been set up at this time, but...

DOBBS: You're exactly right.

GALBRAITH: ... but I did talk to some of the troops. The lieutenant next to the biological facility -- he said -- he was dismayed. He said I hope I'm not responsible for Armageddon, but nobody told me what was in that building.

But I -- when I get back, I trusted this with the deputy secretary of defense, Paul Wolfowitz, and I described this in great detail and said if you don't protect these sensitive facilities, they're going to be looted, and, unfortunately, that's exactly what happened for months after the U.S. went into Iraq.

DOBBS: What did Wolfowitz say to you?

GALBRAITH: Well, it was a very dismaying conversation. We spoke for nearly an hour. I could tell that he was getting angrier and angrier. I wished he was getting angry at what I was describing that was going on in Iraq, but it became very clear he was getting angry at me for saying it.

DOBBS: And at this juncture, American troops and Iraqi forces are assembled and preparing for an assault on Falluja. You've just returned from Iraq. What is your best judgment as to what is likely to transpire in the days and weeks that will lead up to the election set in January?

GALBRAITH: Well Lou, the underlying problem in Iraq is that it's very hard to recover from the mistakes that we made at the beginning. Now, obviously, we have to try to do that. But I think we're -- it's going to be very tough in Falluja. The insurgents are infiltrated among the population, not just in Falluja, incidentally, Mosul the third largest city in Iraq is as bad as Falluja, may become worse.

And there are simply not enough Iraqi forces with local knowledge who are loyal to the Iraqi government, and who are not infiltrated who can really establish order there. U.S. troops can't do it, because they don't have the intelligence, they don't have the local knowledge.

DOBBS: You -- when you say they can't do it, you mean what?

GALBRAITH: Well, they can enter the city. They can blast away at things, but they are not able to know who is in what neighborhood. In order to take control of an area, in order to pacify it, you have to have support of the local population.

I'm not saying the local population support the insurgents, many of whom are Muslim fundamentalists, but there is a significant element that does and the rest are intimidated. And in that kind of environment, where co-operation with the U.S. or cooperation with the interim Iraqi government means death, people won't do it. We won't be able to pick out the bad guys in the crowd.

DOBBS: We have very little time. We may be assisted in that respect, ambassador. In one respect, at least 300,000 civilians have left Falluja. That is perhaps the only benefit advantage. But having said that, the United States has been extraordinarily constrained to this point over the course of the past 6 months with Falluja, Ramadi, Mosul, what would you counsel, and we have just a seconds, what would you counsel the administration, what course would you have them take?

GALBRAITH: Well, I would have them consolidate the 2 parts of Iraq that are not so vulnerable: Kurdistan and the South. Let them set up their own governments, have their own security forces and then -- so you confine the problem to the Sunni Triangle. And then I would try to work with local forces that are more moderate.

But it's going to be extremely difficult. I'm not at all sure that an assault will work. I think we can enter these places, but we really may not be able to find and destroy the enemy.

DOBBS: Ambassador Peter Galbraith, good to have you with us.

GALBRAITH: Lou, good to be with you.

DOBBS: Thank you.

Turning now to our poll question tonight on Kofi Annan's letter to President Bush and to Prime Minister Blair and Prime Minister Allawi. Our question. "Do you think it is time for the Bush administration to tell Kofi Annan to stop meddling?" As our international law experts to a person suggested he was. Cast your vote at CNN.com/lou, yes or no. We'll have the results for you later in the broadcast.

And now, "Heroes," our salute to the men and women who protect and defend this country, our weekly salute. Tonight, the story of army staff sergeant Grant Ray. He was wounded in Iraq. He earned two medals for his bravery. Despite his wounds, Sergeant Ray is determined to fight again. Casey Wian has his story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Staff Sergeant Grant Ray's work day begins before dawn.

SGT. GRANT RAY, U.S. ARMY: Army, it's not hard job. I love my job. I wouldn't change my job for any other job.

WIAN: Ray had already served in Bosnia and Kosovo when he was sent to Iraq at the beginning of the war, crossing into the country from the South and moving North to Tikrit. He earned his first medal, a bronze star, 3 months later, rescuing an Iraqi woman caught in crossfire while crossing the street. Three months after that, an ambush during a routine patrol turned deadly.

RAY: Two guys got hit by an RPG. As we were returning fire, my gunner took a round and he collapsed.

WIAN: When he realized the rear vehicle wasn't moving, Ray gave orders to turn back into the so-called kill zone and retrieve the fallen soldiers.

RAY: They were deceased, and they went down fast and hard.

WIAN: Returning fire as he went, Ray sustained two injuries himself.

RAY: I had small RPG shrapnel hit me in the back side and kind of made me realize, am I taking fire from the backside? Come to find out, it was an RPG. And then my second injury, while I was returning fire holding my weapon up, I took a round right at the fingertips, and it bounced ricocheted off of my weapon. So thank God it didn't hit in the face, because it was close.

WIAN: Ray lost the tops of two fingers and was sent home to recover. Weeks later, he was back in Iraq completing the mission. His bravery earned him a silver star.

RAY: You hope that everybody can do the right thing, and not run and hide.

WIAN: Ray is a married father of 4 boys, but his experience with death and war hasn't deterred him from continuing his military career. Now he's preparing for a second deployment to Iraq. Casey Wian, CNN, reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DOBBS: Tonight's thought is on heroes. "The only use of an obstacle is to be overcome. All that an obstacle does with brave men is not to frighten them, but to challenge them." Those the words of Woodrow Wilson.

Coming up next here, they made America: the innovators, the innovations that changed this country forever. I'll be joined by Harold Evans, author of the new book that pays tribute to the countless American innovations and inventions that have changed our world.

And covering this presidential election: How did the media do this time around? I'll be joined by journalist and media critic, author Ken Auletta. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Award winning journalist, author Ken Auletta says the Kerry campaign made classic mistakes in his campaign and election. Auletta has written the annals of communications column for "New Yorker" magazine for 12 years. And is also the author of the new book "Media Man: Ted Turner's Improbable Empire" from which we are addressing you from this evening, I might point out. Ken Auletta joins me. Good to have you with us.

KEN AULETTA, NEW YORKER: Thanks, Lou.

DOBBS: Let's turn to the first issue of this campaign. What classic mistakes did you see?

AULETTA: Well, I mean, Kerry was attacked negatively by Bush in the spring, didn't respond. Attacked by the Swift Boat Veterans in August, didn't respond. Classic mistake.

Second classic mistake, the advertising Kerry did tended to be laundry list kind of ads. He favors this for jobs. He favors that for health care. Just a potpourri of different issues. Never thematic, never telling you what his values were. What he's like as a man, a person.

And Bush's ads were very different. You had a sense that he was a much more likable guy.

DOBBS: Kerry needed a narrative?

AULETTA: He needed a narrative. But he had to understand that elections are not just about issues. They're about themes and what people care about including values, which we learned is, obviously, one of the most important issues.

DOBBS: Well the remarkable thing, Ken, here, and like you and I think all of us, whether Republican, independent, or Democrat -- trying to examine what happened here. The fact is, he lost by 3.5 million votes, but he garnered almost 56 million votes. I mean that's a pretty good performance. Better than Gore in 2000.

AULETTA: Running against the president who had a bad economy, who had a disastrous position in Iraq, or one that we don't see a clear way out of and where a thousand American soldiers have died, he had a lot of disadvantages, George Bush and you could argue that Kerry didn't capitalize on them.

DOBBS: I think that that would be a safe argument certainly in terms of the attack and the vulnerability of the president. But what do you think were the biggest mistakes in terms of the media in covering this campaign?

AULETTA: I think the media makes classic mistakes -- the same mistake all the time in every election which is to treat it like a horse race.

DOBBS: We're a very slow bunch.

AULETTA: We learn slowly, right? But I believe we treat it like a horse race. We're constantly looking for a narrative, a storyline and the storyline is who's ahead of the quarter poll? Who's ahead this week, last week, and so we spent much too much time on polling and much too little time on issues.

Secondly in retrospect, you can clearly say that we didn't spend enough time looking at values. The media tended to think that the values issue was about those 11 states that were favoring a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage or the abortion issue. In fact the values issue goes much broader than that. There is a very interesting exit poll, not an exit poll but a poll in the "Washington Post" this morning in which they say that most Americans said the most important issue was values in this race. Not Iraq but values and if that number 44 percent of them identified themselves as either liberal 11 percent or moderate. So it suggests we're not just talking about evangelical Christians here. It's a big issue across the board in America.

DOBBS: You mentioned gay rights and abortion, you talk about that as a matter of values. Those would not be in my mind at least values. I would look at those as issues and certainly on this broadcast, we are committed to covering issues. We did throughout the campaign, sometimes painfully and we dare to be dull but we did not, as you charge, cover values. We didn't look out to America's heartland on this broadcast, I will say, and deal with the real values issues that I think are reflective. I'm talking about the religious values, the moral values, that are critically important at least to 21 percent of the voters.

AULETTA: But you know, Lou, and I think there is another reason for that. Which is, we live in this corridor of New York, East Coast corridor, and we tend to be divorced from some of those issues. Real people in their lives, all of us as journalist and if there is an unconscious liberal bias it is that. It's that we don't really understand the rest of America the way we might. And it's not conscious, it's not that we're saying we want to impose a liberal value system, it's that we don't understand.

DOBBS: We're stupid.

AULETTA: No, no, we're ignorant. It's not the same thing. One is conscious.

DOBBS: You got a deal. Ken, thank you very much for your insights, and thank you for writing a book about one of my very favorite people. A terrific book. It's "Media Man." I was once a foot soldier in the media world.

AULETTA: I know. I quote you in the book.

DOBBS: I noticed that and I thought I was downright eloquent. Thank you very much for being nice to me.

AULETTA: Modest as ever.

DOBBS: Ken Auletta. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Good luck with the book.

Taking a look now at some of your thoughts on this election. Peter Serano of Roseville, California. "United we can rebuild America but it will take all of the American people to accomplish this so let's stand together and put aside our differences."

Sheryl Patterson in Myrtle Creek, Oregon. "I wish I had the words to express how much the voter turnout means to me at a time when my pride in my country was at its lowest point ever, I was brought to tears by watching so many of us turn out to exercise our most precious right. I'm the proudest I've ever been to be an American."

And Mark in Sioux City, Iowa. "I believe we are on the mend to healing our great nation. My hats go off to both our great candidates this year Senator John F. Kerry and President George W. Bush. God bless America."

Great sentiments and I hope there is unanimity around them all. We love from hearing you. Send us your thoughts at loudobss@cnn.com. Send us your name and address. Each of you receives -- whose e-mail is read on this broadcast -- a copy of my book "Exporting America." Still ahead, Sir Harold Evans, author of "They Made America." He joins me to talk about the remarkable inventions and innovations that changed the country, made the world a lot better and made for a terrific book.

And Governor Schwarzenegger has already called some California Democrats girlie men. Tonight, well, he's found some more choice words for Democrats in his state. We'll have that story, and I'll be joined by three of the country's top political journalists to tell us exactly, exactly what happened in this campaign and election. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: My next guest has challenged anyone to make it through a day without relying on an American innovation or invention. He's the author of a new book, "They Made America" and it has inspired a four- part PBS series that begins Monday evening. Joining me now, Harold Evans. Good to have you with us.

This is a beautiful, beautiful book and it's one of those rare examples of great narrative, great pictures, and great stories and it's a beautiful assembly, if I may say.

HAROLD EVANS, AUTHOR, "THEY MADE AMERICA": Thank you. The amazing thing, I was lying there, and nobody has ever done 200 years of American business history enterprise. We have thousands and thousands of books about the founding fathers, pursuit of liberty, happiness, et cetera. And nothing about the men who delivered the goods. The innovators.

DOBBS: There was one quote and it's so short it's hardly worth putting up but I'm going to ask you to do so. Do we have that up on a graphic, if I can ask for that. And this from Elisha Otis. "Machines, the tools of liberty" which I thought was terrific.

EVANS: Absolutely fantastic. We found that in his sketches of elevators. Every elevator was...

DOBBS: Beautiful sketches by the way.

EVANS: Gorgeous. Robert Fulton, the same. Beautiful sketches for the steamboat and you find -- what I think is fascinating about these innovators apart of having very colorful lives is they had strong moral values. Talk about moral values in the election with Ken Auletta. These innovators very often dedicating themselves to improving mankind and they have been short-changed by historians and schools and educators and the popular culture.

DOBBS: Just talking with Ken Auletta about "Media Man" his new book and you also have a vignette, if I may, about Ted Turner, as one of those whose innovations that have changed the world.

EVANS: I love Ted Turner's attitude. He says, if you have a great idea, and 98 percent of the people say it's not a great idea. You may not have a great idea but I went ahead anyway. DOBBS: That's a very good impression.

EVANS: Ted Turner is one of the stars. I came to see Ted Turner in 1982 when I was a director at Goldcrest Films. Every network told me don't bother. He's crazy and I went to see him and he wasn't crazy, not really.

DOBBS: Well, crazy sometimes keeps people from going insane as Jimmy Buffett would have it. And also McLean, you point out in -- not McLean, in bringing globalization ahead. Containerized shipping.

EVANS: That's almost your public enemy, number one, no?

DOBBS: Why would that be?

EVANS: I'm just joking really.

DOBBS: I am sorry, I was a little slow on the uptake. No, I don't like corporate America giving away good American jobs to cheap labor markets. I love globalization. I love balanced trade.

EVANS: Malcolm McLean is a trucker from North Carolina and he sat on the dock in the '30s and watched these piecemeal efforts to load a vessel. Now, innovation was staring everybody in the face, but he was the only one to see it and exploit it. Globalization. Thousands of jobs created by Malcolm McLean.

DOBBS: And one of those stories which has not a perfect ending.

EVANS: No, he got -- he went broke in the end, but he went broke trying something big.

(CROSSTALK)

EVANS: And some people took their own lives, but the point is they enriched our own lives today.

DOBBS: Absolutely. And again, it's just a wonderful book. One of the things I thought about with McLean and a number of others in your book, great inspiration, innovation. But today the United States doesn't own a single shipping line. And it's really a statement about that globalization issue. We need to get competitive in the very, very most urgent way.

Harold Evans, you have written a wonderful book. Delightful visual experience as well as read. Terrific stuff. It is, "They Made America," and it's a four-part series that starts Monday on PBS, is that correct?

EVANS: And Ted Turner is in the first program.

DOBBS: He made the first one.

EVANS: He made the first one, no...

DOBBS: Well, my buddy Ted is going to be thrilled. EVANS: We go back to the steamboat, we come to the railway and the computer and everything. Thank you very much.

DOBBS: Multimedia man.

EVANS: Multimedia.

DOBBS: Harold Evans, thank you. Thank you very much. Good to have you here.

EVANS: Thank you.

DOBBS: Still ahead, I'll be joined by three of the country's top political journalists, and of course we'll have the results of tonight's all-important poll. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Well, joining me now from Washington, Karen Tumulty, "Time" magazine. Roger Simon, "U.S. News & World Report." And here in New York, Mark Warren, "Esquire" magazine. Let me ask you first, the idea that this is a values elections. Do you buy that entirely, Karen?

KAREN TUMULTY, TIME MAGAZINE: Well, I don't understand precisely what it means. I mean, first of all, I think one mistake we make over and over is over-analyzing the results of every election. I am old enough to remember 1992, when Bill Clinton came in with a whole bunch of new Democrats in Congress, and everybody was essentially writing off the Republican Party. And two years later, of course, everything had swung the other way.

But when you ask somebody about their values, it's a word that means different things to different people. And so, patriotism is a value. Religion is a value. But I...

DOBBS: Does it occur to you that we did not, though, in this election, really touch on religious values, and perhaps give it the same emphasis as many voters apparently did?

TUMULTY: Well, I think that -- I think that there was in fact a lot written about it. In fact, my magazine wrote a cover story with a picture of a light shining into the Oval Office. You know, "Does God Belong in the Oval Office?" I think it was talked about quite a bit, in fact.

DOBBS: And, Mark?

MARK WARREN, ESQUIRE MAGAZINE: When it comes to -- but 21 percent of the American people who voted on Tuesday said that not values per se, but moral issues drove them to the polls, that were more important to them than the war and the economy. Surprising. It's surprising to a lot of us, I think. And frankly, if the Democrats in the future don't learn that lesson and cede the moral issue playing field to the Republicans and don't try to understand why people believe what they believe and why they voted the way they vote, and don't try to make a counter argument, that there are other moral issues -- war and poverty, for instance -- then they will not learn the lessons of this election, I'm afraid.

DOBBS: What lessons are here for the Republicans, Roger? Let's give equal time. The Democrats are licking their wounds, appropriately so. The Republicans are enjoying appropriately the afterglow of a tremendous victory. But what should they be worrying and thinking about?

ROGER SIMON, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT: I don't know, what they should be worrying about? Well, I do know what they should be worrying about, that they now control the presidency, both Houses of Congress, and if things go wrong, they are going to get properly blamed. The country may be expecting great things after returning the president to office and giving him clear majorities.

DOBBS: Senator...

SIMON: They've got to deliver.

DOBBS: Senator Arlen Specter steps up, Roger, and starts telling the president of the United States what his range of appropriate choice is for Supreme Court justices. And then within 24 hours is doing a 360. What do you make of it?

SIMON: Yeah, this is not the time to challenge George Bush and his prerogatives. George Bush is coming off of a good couple of days here, Arlen. Arlen Specter won a very narrow victory in Pennsylvania, which is probably why he's worried about being too close to George Bush.

It's not that Specter doesn't count. He's one of a handful of Republican moderates who could give the president some trouble, and he's the incoming chairman of the Judiciary Committee, so he can formally give the president a lot of trouble, but he is not going to give the president a lot of trouble in the end.

DOBBS: Of course, Karen and Mark, these values discussions really touch -- the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) is the U.S. Supreme Court. Whether we are talking about abortion, whether we're talking about gay rights. The degrees of which we're going to honor the right or privilege of privacy depending on your interpretation. Where do you think we're headed in terms of the Supreme Court, Mark?

WARREN: Well, I mean, the first appointment, it seems that will be likely, will be Chief Justice Rehnquist, and that will be because he's been the leading conservative on the court so long, that will probably be a wash. But it seems that we will be seeing at least two likely appointments by this president. And he has shown a great willingness to fly in the face of anyone that "The New York Times" editorial board and everybody else desires in appointing extremely conservative justices.

DOBBS: Contravene "The New York Times" editorial board? It doesn't get any more bold than that.

WARREN: He delights in it, I think. He delights in it, I think.

DOBBS: Karen, your thoughts?

TUMULTY: Well, I do think, however, that he could, while appointing a conservative justice, could nonetheless reach out to Democrats, perhaps with a Hispanic appointment, which would be much more difficult for the Democrats to fight on ideological grounds.

SIMON: I...

DOBBS: Yes, Roger, very quickly, please.

SIMON: Yes. I thoroughly agree with Karen. More important -- I mean, he's going to find a Hispanic conservative, but more important than politics this time is the demographics, and he really owes a lot to Hispanic voters and wants to keep them in the Republican Party.

DOBBS: OK. Thank you very much, Roger Simon, Karen Tumulty, Mark Warren. Thank you all. Have a great weekend.

Well, Governor Schwarzenegger is at it again, taking another shot at Democrats in his state, after calling them girlie men earlier in the year. Governor Schwarzenegger, speaking to reporters yesterday, had a few more choice words to describe those lovable California Democrats.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Would you listen to any Democrat's tax proposals or flatly reject them?

GOV. ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), CALIFORNIA: Well, I mean, why would I listen to losers? I mean, let's be honest.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Let's be honest, as always. The results of tonight's poll, 35 percent of you say it's time for the Bush administration to tell Kofi Annan to stop meddling; 65 percent say not.

Thanks for being with us tonight. Please join us Monday evening. We begin our series on the Bush agenda. We look at whether President Bush will be able to push through his ambitious, bold economic and trade agenda in his second term.

And cracking down on illegal aliens. The district attorney of Pennsylvania leading the fight to keep illegal aliens out of his county in Pennsylvania.

And the Democratic Party suffering major losses. I'll be joined by House minority leader, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, on the future of the party and liberalism.

For all of us here, thanks for being with us. Good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" 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


Aired November 5, 2004 - 18:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LOU DOBBS, HOST (voice-over): Tonight, massive air strikes on Falluja. American and Iraqi troops preparing to crush the anti-Iraq forces. We'll have a report.

AYAD ALLAWI, INTERIM PRIME MINISTER, IRAQ: We intend to liberate the people and to bring the rule of law.

DOBBS: Kofi Annan tonight tells the United States to back off on Falluja. Foreign policy experts and critics say Kofi Annan is meddling.

MICKEY EDWARDS, WOODROW WILSON SCHOOL, PRINCETON: He should be helping conduct the elections. He should not be setting conditions.

DOBBS: Tonight, I talk with Ambassador Peter Galbraith, who says Iraq is nothing less but a disaster.

And in this country, it's an invasion. Three million illegal aliens entering our country this year. Federal prosecutors say they're overwhelmed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's really sickening to the rank and file agents out there.

DOBBS: And covering this presidential election, how did the media do? I'll ask the media and one of its critics, Ken Auletta, why the media hates George Bush so much and why the Democrats can't win.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Friday, November 5. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion, is Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: Good evening. Tonight, American aircraft and artillery are pounding insurgent targets in Falluja.

Thousands of American and Iraqi troops are massed. They're making final preparations to assault the city. A senior U.S. commander says the attack will begin, quote, "very soon."

Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi today declared the window is closing for a peaceful settlement.

Our senior Pentagon correspondent, Jamie McIntyre, reports. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Days of air strikes and constant skirmishes have been paving the way for an assault force that sources say will be larger than the U.S. Marines had during April's aborted offensive. It includes some American Army units and, importantly, thousands of specially trained Iraqi soldiers, whose performance in the past has been spotty.

FIRST LT. LYLE GILBERT, 1ST MARINE EXPEDITIONARY FORCE: It's very unpredictable, but we have faith in them. Hopefully, they won't let us down.

MCINTYRE: In fact, the Iraqi participation, along with local citizen support, is considered key to success.

SAVIR SUMAIDAIE, IRAQ'S PERMANENT U.N. REPRESENTATIVE: The Fallujans are being subjected to a Taliban-like rule. Their houses are being commandeered. They are being threatened, and they themselves want the situation to be normalized.

MCINTYRE: While the timing is secret, the showdown has been well telegraphed. More than half of Falluja's 250,000 residents have already fled in anticipation of the offensive.

Insurgents, believed to number in the thousands, have been busy preparing defenses, attacking U.S. troops and rigging booby traps.

Located just west of Baghdad, Falluja is not just the biggest hotbed of resistance in Iraq; it's also believed to be the base of operations for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant who the U.S. hopes to capture or kill if he's there.

And while victory in Falluja is crucial, no one is predicting it will break the back of the insurgency.

MAJ. JIM WEST, 1ST MARINE EXPEDITIONARY FORCE: It is not, though, the panacea. Just by taking it out does not mean the rest of the insurgency will fall, but it will be a big chip in that block out there.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCINTYRE: After Falluja, the U.S. will reassess, see where the insurgents may have regrouped and plan the next offensive. As of now, there are no plans to send additional U.S. troops to Iraq or, for that matter, to bring any home early -- Lou.

DOBBS: And every -- every sense that you're receiving from the Pentagon tonight is that that -- that attack is imminent?

MCINTYRE: Really, they're not saying when it's going to be. They're trying to keep that a little bit of tactical surprise. But what we're told is that these soldiers know that they could get the order at any time.

DOBBS: Jamie McIntyre, our senior Pentagon correspondent. Thank you, Jamie.

Later here, I'll be talking with former Ambassador Peter Galbraith, who's just returned from Iraq. Galbraith says Iraq is nothing less than a catastrophe.

As American and Iraqi troops prepare to assault Falluja, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is apparently doing everything possible to stop a U.S.-led attack.

Annan has written a letter to President Bush, and in that letter declared an assault could anger Iraqis and undermine Iraqi elections in January.

Kitty Pilgrim reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.N. Secretary- general Kofi Annan objects to any kind of an attack on Falluja and said so in a letter to President Bush made public this week.

Annan expressed, quote, "concern about reports of major military offensives being planned by the multinational force in key localities such as Falluja," end quote. Annan wrote that the attack would hurt the chances of Iraqi elections.

Similar letters were also sent to Prime Minister Tony Blair and Iraqi interim President Ayad Allawi.

International law experts say Kofi Annan stepped over a line.

EDWARDS: He should not be saying to either the United States or Britain or to the Iraqis, especially, you know, that we're going to help you have good elections only if do you what we say. So I think he probably stepped a little over his proper bounds in this case.

PILGRIM: Annan today refused to discuss the letter he called a private communication, even though the letter was leaked to the press.

KOFI ANNAN, U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL: I know that it has leaked, but I really would prefer not to comment on that.

PILGRIM: International law experts say the letter meddles in U.S. policy and challenges Iraqi sovereignty.

ABRAHAM SOFAER, HOOVER INSTITUTION: This particular government has been approved by the U.N. Security Council. It has a right; it has a responsibility and nonetheless, the secretary-general saw fit to write this letter. So it's truly regrettable.

PILGRIM: Strategists point out that the elections are critical to the future of Iraq and need a stable environment to succeed.

IAN BREMMER, EURASIA GROUP: The best way to accomplish that, of course, is to have -- is to have these various insurgencies as acquiescent as possible, at least for that period. It's a major task. And it's not going to be -- it's not made any easier by the fact that Kofi Annan is saying that Falluja should be hands off right now.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PILGRIM: The State Department says Colin Powell has talked to Kofi Annan about the letter and, frankly, they differ about how Falluja should be handled. The British ambassador, however, expressed outrage, saying there cannot be an area as big as Falluja which is allowed to become a base of terrorism -- Lou.

DOBBS: These international experts from the Fletcher School of Diplomacy at Tufts University, the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton, the Hoover Institution all agree here. Are there any experts in international law or international relations supporting the approach that Kofi Annan has taken here?

PILGRIM: Everyone we talked to today said he definitely stepped over a line. It's meddling in the policy of member states.

DOBBS: Kitty Pilgrim, thank you very much.

Kofi Annan not the only international leader to challenge President Bush on Iraq. The name may be familiar. French President Jacques Chirac also appears to have rejected President Bush's appeal for more international cooperation.

President Chirac refused to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi in Belgium today. The French president insisted he didn't have time for that meeting because he had to fly to the Persian Gulf.

But President Chirac did find time to visit Yasser Arafat in the French hospital where he is being treated yesterday.

Also today, Chirac said he opposes full Turkish membership in the European Union. Chirac said Turkey could only participate in the European Union by expecting -- accepting, rather, some kind of special limited status.

In France tonight, Yasser Arafat is in a coma and near death. In the words of his spokesman, Arafat is between life and death. Fionnuala Sweeney is outside Arafat's hospital near Paris and has the report -- Fionnuala.

FIONNUALA SWEENEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Lou, there is a vigil continuing here tonight by supporters and well wishers of the Palestinian Authority president just outside the hospital. They have been here since last night when news of Yasser Arafat's condition had deteriorated, emerged.

But beyond that, there has been very little news. We still don't know exactly what ails the 75-year-old Palestinian leader.

What we do know is a statement issued from the hospital this evening, in which it was said that Yasser Arafat's condition had not deteriorated and it was pretty much the same as yesterday but really failed to shed any light on his condition. And then shortly after that, we had a statement read to reporters by Farouk Kaddoumi, who's the foreign minister for the PLO, and he is usually based in Tunis, a senior member of that organization.

And in that statement to reporters, he said that from now on the only source to be taken seriously regarding Yasser Arafat's health is the hospital. That any other sources, whether they be here in Paris, in Ramallah or in Israel or indeed in Washington were to be discounted. And I'm quoting here, "No other entity whatsoever apart from the medical authorities is authorized to give out any information regarding President Arafat's condition."

So beyond that we're not really not any the wiser tonight, Lou.

DOBBS: Fionnuala, still, we have not heard a diagnoses as to Arafat's illness nor a specific prognosis from the hospital or his attending physicians. Is that correct?

SWEENEY: Yes. It should be said that here in France, the hospital authorities are under absolutely no obligation whatsoever to release personal information about an individual patient.

And any statement that is released, short though it may be, from the hospital, is done in conjunction with the family.

There is a feeling among Palestinian leaders here that the rife speculation there has been over the past week, about him being in a coma, being near death, being on a life support, being brain-dead, being clinically dead, that these are rather -- lack dignity for a man who has led and is seen as a symbol of the Palestinian national cause.

So this is an attempt to row back on all that information that's been leaking out from various places. And some of it, I have to say, not necessarily accurate.

But as to whether or not we know what ails the Palestinian Authority president, we still don't -- Lou.

DOBBS: And that is the bottom line, of course. Fionnuala Sweeney from Paris.

Still ahead here tonight, three million illegal aliens will enter this country this year. It is nothing less than an invasion. Federal prosecutors, many of whom say they are simply overwhelmed, asking state and local officials not -- not -- to bring them cases of illegal immigration. We'll have that special report.

President Bush has won a majority of the popular vote, so why does the media seem to hate the president so much and why do Democrats seem unable to win an election? Media critic Ken Auletta is my guest.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Three million illegal aliens will invade this country this year. In spite of that alarming fact, federal prosecutors, some of them, are actually pushing to change law-enforcement guidelines so that even fewer illegal aliens are prosecuted.

Peter Viles reports from Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PETER VILES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): If you've heard of a crackdown on illegal alien smuggling, you have heard wrong. Federal prosecutors in San Diego now say they don't have the manpower to prosecute every smuggler. They also say they can no longer prosecute every illegal alien who has a criminal past.

Border Patrol agents are furious.

T.J. BONNER, NATIONAL BORDER PATROL COUNCIL: It's really sickening to the rank-and-file agents out there trying to do a job. They've put technology in that allows us to identify criminals crossing the border, and then, in the next breath, they say, oh, no, by the way, we're going to make it so difficult to prosecute those people, you may as well not even try.

VILES: The U.S. Attorney's office in San Diego quietly circulated proposed new enforcement guidelines in August, proposing that only illegal aliens with a recent and local criminal history be prosecuted. As for smugglers, it proposes to prosecute only those who put others at risk of death or serious injury.

Why cut all the others the break? Because these cases are hard to prove, and "Our resources are limited, and we have numerous and competing enforcement priorities." This is exactly what Congressman Darrell Issa was trying to head off last summer when he wrote to Attorney General John Ashcroft, urging a "zero-tolerance policy" for alien smuggling.

REP. DARRELL ISSA (R), CALIFORNIA: To be honest, we didn't got a straight answer at all. We're going back in just a few days, and it's going to be my top priority. I think my voters spoke very loud and clear when we had a town hall meeting attended by over 1,500 residents.

VILES: Issa is hopeful that a new attorney general will do what he says Ashcroft didn't, and that is to make prosecution of border- related crimes a priority.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VILES: Now criminal illegal aliens who are not prosecuted are sent back to Mexico. The problem with that, according to the Border Patrol, is that they know those criminal illegal aliens will simply come back to the United States -- Lou.

DOBBS: And, Pete, this directive from the U.S. Attorney in San Diego, obviously, coming down as a policy on the part of the U.S. Justice Department, correct?

VILES: Well, you would think, although we spoke to the Justice Department in Washington, and they said, in fact, they do not have a national policy on this issue. So it's at discretion of local officials. They're aware of it, they haven't moved to stop it, but they say it's not their national policy -- Lou.

DOBBS: Incredible.

Thank you very much.

Peter Viles.

Well, one man is trying to take a stand against illegal immigration in this country, a district attorney in Pennsylvania, and he's doing it with little or no help whatsoever from federal agencies.

Bill Tucker is in Pennsylvania, and he is working on this incredible story.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL TUCKER, CNN FINANCIAL CORRESPONDENT: Lou, I'm out in Eastern Pennsylvania where the North Hampton County district attorney's office has taken a very unusual step of pursuing and prosecuting illegal aliens using state statutes because it says Immigration and Customs enforcement won't respond to its call. I'll have the full story for you on Monday night.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: That's Bill Tucker in Eastern Pennsylvania.

The election barely over, the president of Mexico, Vicente Fox, wasted no time in demanding that President Bush take action on the issue of immigration.

President Fox told reporters in Brazil that Mexico wants the United States to introduce immigration reforms as quickly as possible. In fact, Fox set a deadline for action by President Bush, setting a deadline of one year.

The Mexican government is also criticizing Arizona voters' approval this week of Proposition 200 restricting welfare benefits for illegal aliens. The Mexican foreign ministry said the measure is "designed to promote discrimination based on ethnic profiling."

The Department of Homeland Security says it arrested 237 people for immigration violations, all of that as part of a security initiative during the presidential election and the days preceding it. Officials say they are not terrorist suspects.

Coming up next here, back to work. Great news for American workers and the Bush administration. Nearly two million new jobs created over the past year. We'll have a special report for you.

And the fight for Iraq. Ambassador Peter Galbraith will join me. He says the U.S. military based its war strategy on incredibly wishful thinking. He says Iraq now is nothing less than a catastrophe. Ambassador Galbraith joins me next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: There hasn't been much good news over this past year on employment, but, tonight, we have great news on the labor market. The best news, in fact, in seven months. Three hundred thirty-seven thousand new jobs were created in October, almost two million created this year.

That's not only good news for working Americans. It means most likely that President Bush won't be the first president since Herbert Hoover to preside over a net job loss in his first term.

Christine Romans reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It looks like Herbert Hoover won't have to share the title for jobs loss with President Bush.

October jobs growth was widespread. Most of the increase from services -- health care, temporary help and teachers -- and Florida hurricanes boosted construction hiring at the highest rate in four years. But manufacturing lost another 5,000 jobs.

Even the president's biggest critics concede October was a blockbuster month for job creation.

JARED BERNSTEIN, ECONOMIC POLICY INSTITUTE: It certainly came late in the game where we're three years into recovery now. So I think we're just going to have to see if this trend persists. However, no question it's a very positive report.

ROMANS: The unemployment rate did edge up, but that's because almost 400,000 people returned to the labor force, looking with renewed confidence for jobs.

TIM KANE, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: I think it's an amazing report, especially considering the head winds that were faced last month -- high oil prices, a lot of uncertainty about the election -- and just no doubt about it, businesses were hiring. We're seeing a real upsurge here.

ROMANS: The only bad news in this great news employment report: Wage growth barely kept up with inflation.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: This time last year, the economy had lost more than 2.2 million jobs under George W. Bush. Since January, almost two million jobs have been created.

Lou, what a difference a year makes.

DOBBS: Or even a few days.

ROMANS: Absolutely.

DOBBS: Christine, thank you.

Christine Romans.

Still ahead here tonight, American and Iraqi troops are preparing for an all-out assault against anti-Iraqi forces in Falluja. I'll be joined by former Ambassador Peter Galbraith. He says the United States failed to plan for the aftermath of the invasion in Iraq. He's my guest.

And in Heroes tonight, the inspiring story of an Army staff sergeant who, decorated twice for injuries in combat, refuses to give up the fight for his country and the chance to return to the fight.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: LOU DOBBS TONIGHT continues. Here now for more news, debate and opinion, Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: In just a moment, I'll be talking with former Ambassador Peter Galbraith, an eyewitness to what he called a preventable disaster in Iraq.

But, first, a look at some of the top stories.

Three days after the presidential election, President Bush has won the State of Iowa. Although Senator Kerry conceded Wednesday, the counting of absentee ballots in the state continued. Iowa had earlier been declared too close it call. That brings President Bush's electoral vote total to 286; Senator Kerry's, 252. President Bush's share of the popular vote, it's at 59-1/2 million votes; Senator Kerry's, nearly 56 million.

In California tonight, residents in Los Angeles are breathing the cleanest air there in 25 years. That's because of good weather and stricter air quality standards. Still, the region's air quality remains the worst in the country.

And an elementary school in New Jersey is set to reopen Monday, after being hit by 25 rounds of cannon fighter from an F-16 fighter jet. A National Guard spokesman says an investigation into the incident is underway. No one was injured.

Former Ambassador Peter Galbraith describes post-war Iraq as a catastrophe. He recently wrote an editorial in "The Boston Globe" entitled "Eyewitness to a Failure in Iraq."

He wrote in that article, quote, "Much of this could have been avoided with a competent post-war strategy, but, without having planned or provided enough troops, we would be a lot safer if we hadn't gone to war."

Ambassador Galbraith is a fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation joining me tonight from Washington, D.C.

Good to have you with us.

PETER GALBRAITH, CENTER FOR ARMS CONTROL AND NONPROLIFERATION: Lou, good to be with you.

DOBBS: A disaster that could have been prevented specifically how?

GALBRAITH: It could have been prevented, had the administration anticipated the breakdown in law and order that was inevitably going to happen when the U.S. troops entered Baghdad. This is exactly what happened in 1991 during the uprising in which rebels took over about half of Iraq.

It's the sort of thing that, frankly I think you would expect to happen in almost any country. If the government disappears, the Army disappears, all of the police disappear, there are going to be people who will take advantage of that situation.

But we didn't -- we didn't protect any of the ministries except for the oil ministry, and we didn't protect locations that had valuable intelligence, including intelligence on potential insurgencies...

DOBBS: I should point out...

GALBRAITH: ... and...

DOBBS: I should point out that you were actually in Iraq during April of 2003. What did you actually witness yourself and with whom did you discuss those issues?

GALBRAITH: Well, I witnessed the looting of the Iraqi equivalent of the Center for Disease Control. This was a very sensitive facility that had some of the most dangerous materials in Iraq. Live -- looters -- we know they took live HIV virus, live Black Fever virus. They may have taken other things as well.

At the same time, looters went into the Tuwaitha nuclear facility while American troops were there and removed yellow cake, raw uranium.

These were very sensitive sites. The American troops were present at these locations, but nobody had told them what was there.

When I came back...

DOBBS: I'm sorry. Did you address this with the authorities there on the ground, military and CPA, and what was their response?

GALBRAITH: Well, CPA hadn't been set up at this time, but...

DOBBS: You're exactly right.

GALBRAITH: ... but I did talk to some of the troops. The lieutenant next to the biological facility -- he said -- he was dismayed. He said I hope I'm not responsible for Armageddon, but nobody told me what was in that building.

But I -- when I get back, I trusted this with the deputy secretary of defense, Paul Wolfowitz, and I described this in great detail and said if you don't protect these sensitive facilities, they're going to be looted, and, unfortunately, that's exactly what happened for months after the U.S. went into Iraq.

DOBBS: What did Wolfowitz say to you?

GALBRAITH: Well, it was a very dismaying conversation. We spoke for nearly an hour. I could tell that he was getting angrier and angrier. I wished he was getting angry at what I was describing that was going on in Iraq, but it became very clear he was getting angry at me for saying it.

DOBBS: And at this juncture, American troops and Iraqi forces are assembled and preparing for an assault on Falluja. You've just returned from Iraq. What is your best judgment as to what is likely to transpire in the days and weeks that will lead up to the election set in January?

GALBRAITH: Well Lou, the underlying problem in Iraq is that it's very hard to recover from the mistakes that we made at the beginning. Now, obviously, we have to try to do that. But I think we're -- it's going to be very tough in Falluja. The insurgents are infiltrated among the population, not just in Falluja, incidentally, Mosul the third largest city in Iraq is as bad as Falluja, may become worse.

And there are simply not enough Iraqi forces with local knowledge who are loyal to the Iraqi government, and who are not infiltrated who can really establish order there. U.S. troops can't do it, because they don't have the intelligence, they don't have the local knowledge.

DOBBS: You -- when you say they can't do it, you mean what?

GALBRAITH: Well, they can enter the city. They can blast away at things, but they are not able to know who is in what neighborhood. In order to take control of an area, in order to pacify it, you have to have support of the local population.

I'm not saying the local population support the insurgents, many of whom are Muslim fundamentalists, but there is a significant element that does and the rest are intimidated. And in that kind of environment, where co-operation with the U.S. or cooperation with the interim Iraqi government means death, people won't do it. We won't be able to pick out the bad guys in the crowd.

DOBBS: We have very little time. We may be assisted in that respect, ambassador. In one respect, at least 300,000 civilians have left Falluja. That is perhaps the only benefit advantage. But having said that, the United States has been extraordinarily constrained to this point over the course of the past 6 months with Falluja, Ramadi, Mosul, what would you counsel, and we have just a seconds, what would you counsel the administration, what course would you have them take?

GALBRAITH: Well, I would have them consolidate the 2 parts of Iraq that are not so vulnerable: Kurdistan and the South. Let them set up their own governments, have their own security forces and then -- so you confine the problem to the Sunni Triangle. And then I would try to work with local forces that are more moderate.

But it's going to be extremely difficult. I'm not at all sure that an assault will work. I think we can enter these places, but we really may not be able to find and destroy the enemy.

DOBBS: Ambassador Peter Galbraith, good to have you with us.

GALBRAITH: Lou, good to be with you.

DOBBS: Thank you.

Turning now to our poll question tonight on Kofi Annan's letter to President Bush and to Prime Minister Blair and Prime Minister Allawi. Our question. "Do you think it is time for the Bush administration to tell Kofi Annan to stop meddling?" As our international law experts to a person suggested he was. Cast your vote at CNN.com/lou, yes or no. We'll have the results for you later in the broadcast.

And now, "Heroes," our salute to the men and women who protect and defend this country, our weekly salute. Tonight, the story of army staff sergeant Grant Ray. He was wounded in Iraq. He earned two medals for his bravery. Despite his wounds, Sergeant Ray is determined to fight again. Casey Wian has his story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Staff Sergeant Grant Ray's work day begins before dawn.

SGT. GRANT RAY, U.S. ARMY: Army, it's not hard job. I love my job. I wouldn't change my job for any other job.

WIAN: Ray had already served in Bosnia and Kosovo when he was sent to Iraq at the beginning of the war, crossing into the country from the South and moving North to Tikrit. He earned his first medal, a bronze star, 3 months later, rescuing an Iraqi woman caught in crossfire while crossing the street. Three months after that, an ambush during a routine patrol turned deadly.

RAY: Two guys got hit by an RPG. As we were returning fire, my gunner took a round and he collapsed.

WIAN: When he realized the rear vehicle wasn't moving, Ray gave orders to turn back into the so-called kill zone and retrieve the fallen soldiers.

RAY: They were deceased, and they went down fast and hard.

WIAN: Returning fire as he went, Ray sustained two injuries himself.

RAY: I had small RPG shrapnel hit me in the back side and kind of made me realize, am I taking fire from the backside? Come to find out, it was an RPG. And then my second injury, while I was returning fire holding my weapon up, I took a round right at the fingertips, and it bounced ricocheted off of my weapon. So thank God it didn't hit in the face, because it was close.

WIAN: Ray lost the tops of two fingers and was sent home to recover. Weeks later, he was back in Iraq completing the mission. His bravery earned him a silver star.

RAY: You hope that everybody can do the right thing, and not run and hide.

WIAN: Ray is a married father of 4 boys, but his experience with death and war hasn't deterred him from continuing his military career. Now he's preparing for a second deployment to Iraq. Casey Wian, CNN, reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DOBBS: Tonight's thought is on heroes. "The only use of an obstacle is to be overcome. All that an obstacle does with brave men is not to frighten them, but to challenge them." Those the words of Woodrow Wilson.

Coming up next here, they made America: the innovators, the innovations that changed this country forever. I'll be joined by Harold Evans, author of the new book that pays tribute to the countless American innovations and inventions that have changed our world.

And covering this presidential election: How did the media do this time around? I'll be joined by journalist and media critic, author Ken Auletta. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Award winning journalist, author Ken Auletta says the Kerry campaign made classic mistakes in his campaign and election. Auletta has written the annals of communications column for "New Yorker" magazine for 12 years. And is also the author of the new book "Media Man: Ted Turner's Improbable Empire" from which we are addressing you from this evening, I might point out. Ken Auletta joins me. Good to have you with us.

KEN AULETTA, NEW YORKER: Thanks, Lou.

DOBBS: Let's turn to the first issue of this campaign. What classic mistakes did you see?

AULETTA: Well, I mean, Kerry was attacked negatively by Bush in the spring, didn't respond. Attacked by the Swift Boat Veterans in August, didn't respond. Classic mistake.

Second classic mistake, the advertising Kerry did tended to be laundry list kind of ads. He favors this for jobs. He favors that for health care. Just a potpourri of different issues. Never thematic, never telling you what his values were. What he's like as a man, a person.

And Bush's ads were very different. You had a sense that he was a much more likable guy.

DOBBS: Kerry needed a narrative?

AULETTA: He needed a narrative. But he had to understand that elections are not just about issues. They're about themes and what people care about including values, which we learned is, obviously, one of the most important issues.

DOBBS: Well the remarkable thing, Ken, here, and like you and I think all of us, whether Republican, independent, or Democrat -- trying to examine what happened here. The fact is, he lost by 3.5 million votes, but he garnered almost 56 million votes. I mean that's a pretty good performance. Better than Gore in 2000.

AULETTA: Running against the president who had a bad economy, who had a disastrous position in Iraq, or one that we don't see a clear way out of and where a thousand American soldiers have died, he had a lot of disadvantages, George Bush and you could argue that Kerry didn't capitalize on them.

DOBBS: I think that that would be a safe argument certainly in terms of the attack and the vulnerability of the president. But what do you think were the biggest mistakes in terms of the media in covering this campaign?

AULETTA: I think the media makes classic mistakes -- the same mistake all the time in every election which is to treat it like a horse race.

DOBBS: We're a very slow bunch.

AULETTA: We learn slowly, right? But I believe we treat it like a horse race. We're constantly looking for a narrative, a storyline and the storyline is who's ahead of the quarter poll? Who's ahead this week, last week, and so we spent much too much time on polling and much too little time on issues.

Secondly in retrospect, you can clearly say that we didn't spend enough time looking at values. The media tended to think that the values issue was about those 11 states that were favoring a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage or the abortion issue. In fact the values issue goes much broader than that. There is a very interesting exit poll, not an exit poll but a poll in the "Washington Post" this morning in which they say that most Americans said the most important issue was values in this race. Not Iraq but values and if that number 44 percent of them identified themselves as either liberal 11 percent or moderate. So it suggests we're not just talking about evangelical Christians here. It's a big issue across the board in America.

DOBBS: You mentioned gay rights and abortion, you talk about that as a matter of values. Those would not be in my mind at least values. I would look at those as issues and certainly on this broadcast, we are committed to covering issues. We did throughout the campaign, sometimes painfully and we dare to be dull but we did not, as you charge, cover values. We didn't look out to America's heartland on this broadcast, I will say, and deal with the real values issues that I think are reflective. I'm talking about the religious values, the moral values, that are critically important at least to 21 percent of the voters.

AULETTA: But you know, Lou, and I think there is another reason for that. Which is, we live in this corridor of New York, East Coast corridor, and we tend to be divorced from some of those issues. Real people in their lives, all of us as journalist and if there is an unconscious liberal bias it is that. It's that we don't really understand the rest of America the way we might. And it's not conscious, it's not that we're saying we want to impose a liberal value system, it's that we don't understand.

DOBBS: We're stupid.

AULETTA: No, no, we're ignorant. It's not the same thing. One is conscious.

DOBBS: You got a deal. Ken, thank you very much for your insights, and thank you for writing a book about one of my very favorite people. A terrific book. It's "Media Man." I was once a foot soldier in the media world.

AULETTA: I know. I quote you in the book.

DOBBS: I noticed that and I thought I was downright eloquent. Thank you very much for being nice to me.

AULETTA: Modest as ever.

DOBBS: Ken Auletta. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Good luck with the book.

Taking a look now at some of your thoughts on this election. Peter Serano of Roseville, California. "United we can rebuild America but it will take all of the American people to accomplish this so let's stand together and put aside our differences."

Sheryl Patterson in Myrtle Creek, Oregon. "I wish I had the words to express how much the voter turnout means to me at a time when my pride in my country was at its lowest point ever, I was brought to tears by watching so many of us turn out to exercise our most precious right. I'm the proudest I've ever been to be an American."

And Mark in Sioux City, Iowa. "I believe we are on the mend to healing our great nation. My hats go off to both our great candidates this year Senator John F. Kerry and President George W. Bush. God bless America."

Great sentiments and I hope there is unanimity around them all. We love from hearing you. Send us your thoughts at loudobss@cnn.com. Send us your name and address. Each of you receives -- whose e-mail is read on this broadcast -- a copy of my book "Exporting America." Still ahead, Sir Harold Evans, author of "They Made America." He joins me to talk about the remarkable inventions and innovations that changed the country, made the world a lot better and made for a terrific book.

And Governor Schwarzenegger has already called some California Democrats girlie men. Tonight, well, he's found some more choice words for Democrats in his state. We'll have that story, and I'll be joined by three of the country's top political journalists to tell us exactly, exactly what happened in this campaign and election. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: My next guest has challenged anyone to make it through a day without relying on an American innovation or invention. He's the author of a new book, "They Made America" and it has inspired a four- part PBS series that begins Monday evening. Joining me now, Harold Evans. Good to have you with us.

This is a beautiful, beautiful book and it's one of those rare examples of great narrative, great pictures, and great stories and it's a beautiful assembly, if I may say.

HAROLD EVANS, AUTHOR, "THEY MADE AMERICA": Thank you. The amazing thing, I was lying there, and nobody has ever done 200 years of American business history enterprise. We have thousands and thousands of books about the founding fathers, pursuit of liberty, happiness, et cetera. And nothing about the men who delivered the goods. The innovators.

DOBBS: There was one quote and it's so short it's hardly worth putting up but I'm going to ask you to do so. Do we have that up on a graphic, if I can ask for that. And this from Elisha Otis. "Machines, the tools of liberty" which I thought was terrific.

EVANS: Absolutely fantastic. We found that in his sketches of elevators. Every elevator was...

DOBBS: Beautiful sketches by the way.

EVANS: Gorgeous. Robert Fulton, the same. Beautiful sketches for the steamboat and you find -- what I think is fascinating about these innovators apart of having very colorful lives is they had strong moral values. Talk about moral values in the election with Ken Auletta. These innovators very often dedicating themselves to improving mankind and they have been short-changed by historians and schools and educators and the popular culture.

DOBBS: Just talking with Ken Auletta about "Media Man" his new book and you also have a vignette, if I may, about Ted Turner, as one of those whose innovations that have changed the world.

EVANS: I love Ted Turner's attitude. He says, if you have a great idea, and 98 percent of the people say it's not a great idea. You may not have a great idea but I went ahead anyway. DOBBS: That's a very good impression.

EVANS: Ted Turner is one of the stars. I came to see Ted Turner in 1982 when I was a director at Goldcrest Films. Every network told me don't bother. He's crazy and I went to see him and he wasn't crazy, not really.

DOBBS: Well, crazy sometimes keeps people from going insane as Jimmy Buffett would have it. And also McLean, you point out in -- not McLean, in bringing globalization ahead. Containerized shipping.

EVANS: That's almost your public enemy, number one, no?

DOBBS: Why would that be?

EVANS: I'm just joking really.

DOBBS: I am sorry, I was a little slow on the uptake. No, I don't like corporate America giving away good American jobs to cheap labor markets. I love globalization. I love balanced trade.

EVANS: Malcolm McLean is a trucker from North Carolina and he sat on the dock in the '30s and watched these piecemeal efforts to load a vessel. Now, innovation was staring everybody in the face, but he was the only one to see it and exploit it. Globalization. Thousands of jobs created by Malcolm McLean.

DOBBS: And one of those stories which has not a perfect ending.

EVANS: No, he got -- he went broke in the end, but he went broke trying something big.

(CROSSTALK)

EVANS: And some people took their own lives, but the point is they enriched our own lives today.

DOBBS: Absolutely. And again, it's just a wonderful book. One of the things I thought about with McLean and a number of others in your book, great inspiration, innovation. But today the United States doesn't own a single shipping line. And it's really a statement about that globalization issue. We need to get competitive in the very, very most urgent way.

Harold Evans, you have written a wonderful book. Delightful visual experience as well as read. Terrific stuff. It is, "They Made America," and it's a four-part series that starts Monday on PBS, is that correct?

EVANS: And Ted Turner is in the first program.

DOBBS: He made the first one.

EVANS: He made the first one, no...

DOBBS: Well, my buddy Ted is going to be thrilled. EVANS: We go back to the steamboat, we come to the railway and the computer and everything. Thank you very much.

DOBBS: Multimedia man.

EVANS: Multimedia.

DOBBS: Harold Evans, thank you. Thank you very much. Good to have you here.

EVANS: Thank you.

DOBBS: Still ahead, I'll be joined by three of the country's top political journalists, and of course we'll have the results of tonight's all-important poll. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Well, joining me now from Washington, Karen Tumulty, "Time" magazine. Roger Simon, "U.S. News & World Report." And here in New York, Mark Warren, "Esquire" magazine. Let me ask you first, the idea that this is a values elections. Do you buy that entirely, Karen?

KAREN TUMULTY, TIME MAGAZINE: Well, I don't understand precisely what it means. I mean, first of all, I think one mistake we make over and over is over-analyzing the results of every election. I am old enough to remember 1992, when Bill Clinton came in with a whole bunch of new Democrats in Congress, and everybody was essentially writing off the Republican Party. And two years later, of course, everything had swung the other way.

But when you ask somebody about their values, it's a word that means different things to different people. And so, patriotism is a value. Religion is a value. But I...

DOBBS: Does it occur to you that we did not, though, in this election, really touch on religious values, and perhaps give it the same emphasis as many voters apparently did?

TUMULTY: Well, I think that -- I think that there was in fact a lot written about it. In fact, my magazine wrote a cover story with a picture of a light shining into the Oval Office. You know, "Does God Belong in the Oval Office?" I think it was talked about quite a bit, in fact.

DOBBS: And, Mark?

MARK WARREN, ESQUIRE MAGAZINE: When it comes to -- but 21 percent of the American people who voted on Tuesday said that not values per se, but moral issues drove them to the polls, that were more important to them than the war and the economy. Surprising. It's surprising to a lot of us, I think. And frankly, if the Democrats in the future don't learn that lesson and cede the moral issue playing field to the Republicans and don't try to understand why people believe what they believe and why they voted the way they vote, and don't try to make a counter argument, that there are other moral issues -- war and poverty, for instance -- then they will not learn the lessons of this election, I'm afraid.

DOBBS: What lessons are here for the Republicans, Roger? Let's give equal time. The Democrats are licking their wounds, appropriately so. The Republicans are enjoying appropriately the afterglow of a tremendous victory. But what should they be worrying and thinking about?

ROGER SIMON, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT: I don't know, what they should be worrying about? Well, I do know what they should be worrying about, that they now control the presidency, both Houses of Congress, and if things go wrong, they are going to get properly blamed. The country may be expecting great things after returning the president to office and giving him clear majorities.

DOBBS: Senator...

SIMON: They've got to deliver.

DOBBS: Senator Arlen Specter steps up, Roger, and starts telling the president of the United States what his range of appropriate choice is for Supreme Court justices. And then within 24 hours is doing a 360. What do you make of it?

SIMON: Yeah, this is not the time to challenge George Bush and his prerogatives. George Bush is coming off of a good couple of days here, Arlen. Arlen Specter won a very narrow victory in Pennsylvania, which is probably why he's worried about being too close to George Bush.

It's not that Specter doesn't count. He's one of a handful of Republican moderates who could give the president some trouble, and he's the incoming chairman of the Judiciary Committee, so he can formally give the president a lot of trouble, but he is not going to give the president a lot of trouble in the end.

DOBBS: Of course, Karen and Mark, these values discussions really touch -- the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) is the U.S. Supreme Court. Whether we are talking about abortion, whether we're talking about gay rights. The degrees of which we're going to honor the right or privilege of privacy depending on your interpretation. Where do you think we're headed in terms of the Supreme Court, Mark?

WARREN: Well, I mean, the first appointment, it seems that will be likely, will be Chief Justice Rehnquist, and that will be because he's been the leading conservative on the court so long, that will probably be a wash. But it seems that we will be seeing at least two likely appointments by this president. And he has shown a great willingness to fly in the face of anyone that "The New York Times" editorial board and everybody else desires in appointing extremely conservative justices.

DOBBS: Contravene "The New York Times" editorial board? It doesn't get any more bold than that.

WARREN: He delights in it, I think. He delights in it, I think.

DOBBS: Karen, your thoughts?

TUMULTY: Well, I do think, however, that he could, while appointing a conservative justice, could nonetheless reach out to Democrats, perhaps with a Hispanic appointment, which would be much more difficult for the Democrats to fight on ideological grounds.

SIMON: I...

DOBBS: Yes, Roger, very quickly, please.

SIMON: Yes. I thoroughly agree with Karen. More important -- I mean, he's going to find a Hispanic conservative, but more important than politics this time is the demographics, and he really owes a lot to Hispanic voters and wants to keep them in the Republican Party.

DOBBS: OK. Thank you very much, Roger Simon, Karen Tumulty, Mark Warren. Thank you all. Have a great weekend.

Well, Governor Schwarzenegger is at it again, taking another shot at Democrats in his state, after calling them girlie men earlier in the year. Governor Schwarzenegger, speaking to reporters yesterday, had a few more choice words to describe those lovable California Democrats.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Would you listen to any Democrat's tax proposals or flatly reject them?

GOV. ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), CALIFORNIA: Well, I mean, why would I listen to losers? I mean, let's be honest.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Let's be honest, as always. The results of tonight's poll, 35 percent of you say it's time for the Bush administration to tell Kofi Annan to stop meddling; 65 percent say not.

Thanks for being with us tonight. Please join us Monday evening. We begin our series on the Bush agenda. We look at whether President Bush will be able to push through his ambitious, bold economic and trade agenda in his second term.

And cracking down on illegal aliens. The district attorney of Pennsylvania leading the fight to keep illegal aliens out of his county in Pennsylvania.

And the Democratic Party suffering major losses. I'll be joined by House minority leader, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, on the future of the party and liberalism.

For all of us here, thanks for being with us. Good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.

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