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Lou Dobbs Tonight
Another Deadly Day in Iraq; Popular Approval of Iraq War Falling; Pentagon Denies War Plans in Iran
Aired January 17, 2005 - 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, ballots and bombs, insurgents launch a new wave of attacks against Iraqi police and troops. What American voters think about the war in Iraq, Iraq's elections. We'll have the results of a new CNN opinion poll.
"Broken Borders": immigration and customs officials bragging about their success in catching illegal aliens, but our question tonight is what about those three million illegal aliens who succeeded in crossing our borders last year?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We also have to go after immigration fraud at the same time, because fraud is even more insidious.
DOBBS: "Assault on the Middle Class": consumer debt, personal bankruptcies skyrocketing. So just why is the White House and some in Congress more interested in so-called Social Security reform?
"Titan's Secrets": incredible new images of Saturn's biggest moon. Astrophysicist Charles Liu will be here to review those stunning pictures.
And it's Martin Luther King Day. It turns out he accomplished far more than he's given credit for. Just take a look at America today.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Monday, January 17. Here for an hour of news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.
DOBBS: Good evening.
Tonight, violence continues to escalate in Iraq, less than two weeks before the Iraqi elections. Insurgents today killed at least 14 Iraqi police and troops in two cities.
Separately, the U.S. military reported the death of an American soldier in a vehicle accident in Baghdad.
The commander of American troops in Iraq today said violence on Iraq's election today is inevitable.
Jeff Koinange reports from Baghdad.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF KOINANGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Another deadly day on the road to democracy, with Iraqi security forces bearing the brunt of an insurgency determined to derail the landmark January 30 elections.
And outside the troubled northern city of Mosul, where Christians have been subjected to attacks in the past, the Roman Catholic archbishop was kidnapped outside a private residence.
In Beurut (ph), just south of Baqubah in the Sunni Triangle, militants drove up to an Iraqi National Guard checkpoint and opened fire with automatic weapons, killing seven guardsmen and one civilian.
In the town of Baiji, 40 kilometers north of Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, a suicide bomber blew himself up at a police checkpoint, killing seven Iraqi policemen and wounding as many as 19 others.
It's not just security forces being targeted. So are polling centers like this school just outside the southern city of Basra, one of four hit by mortars, causing extensive damage.
The few candidates brave enough to admit they're running for office say the threat of violence is everywhere.
SHEIK MANSOUR ABDEL-RAZAQ AL-TAMINI, UNIFIED IRAQI ALLIANCE (through translator): There's no region in Iraq out of danger. Every day I receive threats. Every place in Iraq is the same.
KOINANGE: All this as Iraqis living outside Iraq, many of them forced into exile during Saddam Hussein's rule, began to register to vote. Close to a million exiles are expected to register from 14 countries, adding to the 14 million eligible to cast their votes at home.
(on camera) The big question is or to what degree this pre- election campaign of violence will keep Iraqis away from the polling places on election day, now less two weeks away.
Jeff Koinange, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: Despite the increasing violence, a rising number of Americans believe the Iraqi elections will be held as scheduled this month. A new CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll also shows Americans almost evenly split over whether the United States was right to send troops to Iraq.
Our senior political analyst, Bill Schneider, reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST (voice-over): Signs of an Iraq backlash are popping up. Earlier this month, former national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft, who served the first President Bush, told an audience the upcoming elections in Iraq could end up deepening the conflict.
"We may be seeing an incipient civil war," Scowcroft warned.
Outgoing Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage told National Public Radio that he and Secretary Powell have deliberately expressed reservations about the president's policies on the record. "This is what the president paid us for, to bring him our views," Armitage said last week. "He can agree with us or not, as he chooses."
President Bush is even expressing some second thoughts. Remember back in 2003 when the president said this about the Iraqi insurgents?
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There are some who feel like that, you know, the conditions are such they can attack us there. My answer is bring 'em on.
SCHNEIDER: Now he says that remark was a little blunt and had unintended consequences.
Remember Saddam's weapons of mass destruction? It was recently revealed that U.S. agents have given up looking for them.
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: The issue of weapons of mass destruction is one that we really have to look into. Why did the intelligence community get it wrong?
SCHNEIDER: Last week the National Intelligence Council said the war in Iraq may provide recruitment and training for a new class of terrorists.
MICHAEL O'HANLON, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: The Iraq mission, even if it does have benefits for getting rid of Saddam, may actually in some strange sense be helping al Qaeda.
SCHNEIDER: The number of Americans who say the United States made a mistake sending troops to Iraq has been growing.
Forty-four percent called the Iraq war a mistake just before the election, 47 percent right after the election, 50 percent in early January. And now? Fifty-two percent in the latest CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll.
It's an issue that continues to divide the country. Very few Republicans call Iraq a mistake. Almost all Democrats do. What's changed is that independents now side with Democrats on this issue.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCHNEIDER: Does the public believe President Bush has a clear plan for bringing the situation in Iraq to a successful conclusion? The answer, by nearly 2 to 1 in the latest Annenberg Survey, is no, they don't -- Lou.
DOBBS: Bill, it seems straightforward. The fact is weapons of mass destruction were not found in Iraq. That was the premise for the invasion of Iraq. The issue becomes the conduct of the post-invasion military operations. Any polls on that issue itself?
SCHNEIDER: Americans do not think things are going well in Iraq. And as I just reported, Americans do not think the president has a clear plan for Iraq. That scares them. It makes them very nervous.
In fact, it's interesting. If you ask Americans the No. 1 issue right now facing the country, a real crisis, they say Iraq. Very few, not even half as many, say Social Security.
DOBBS: Or Medicare or Medicaid or the quality of life for working men and women in this country, just to name a few other very important issues.
Bill, thank you very much. Bill Schneider from Washington.
The Pentagon today blasted a published report that the United States is conducting secret reconnaissance missions in Iraq. Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said American commandos are trying to identify potential nuclear, chemical and missile targets. But the Pentagon says the Hersh article is full of errors.
Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): One thing is certain, the U.S. is watching Iran's nuclear program closely. Sources say satellite and aircraft surveillance has been stepped up in recent months.
But is there war planning for an attack against Iran's nuclear sites this summer, as suggested by Seymour Hersh in a "New Yorker" article?
Without responding to the question of a summertime attack, Pentagon officials say Hersh is wrong. Pentagon spokesman Lawrence DiRita said in a statement, quote, "Mr. Hersh's article is so riddled with errors of fundamental fact that the credibility of his entire piece is destroyed."
Hersh believes administration hard-liners do want to attack Iran.
SEYMOUR HERSH, "THE NEW YORKER": This is a president that's going to do what he wants to do. And the only -- the only thing we can hope is that these guys are right about the world waiting for America to come and remake the Middle East and that Iran will go smoother than Iraq, because they're going to do it. I'm almost -- I'm pretty much convinced of it myself, and so are my sources.
STARR: Hersh says it is part of a broader Pentagon plan to secretly use Special Forces around the world on missions that might have been done by the CIA.
The Pentagon won't say much about Special Forces on the record. Commandos do conduct capture or kill missions in Iraq and Afghanistan and have waged attacks against al Qaeda, but Rumsfeld has indicated he doesn't want to take over CIA efforts.
Hersh insists the U.S. Central Command is updating the war plans, providing for a maximum ground and air invasion of Iran. A senior U.S. military official calls that "absolutely false" and emphasizes contingency plans are updated routinely.
WILLIAM COHEN, FORMER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: It's one thing to have contingency plans, another to actually be contemplating taking military action under the circumstances when, in fact, Iran's a very different country than Iraq.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
STARR: Now, Lou, all of this has the Pentagon very deeply concerned. They know that the mullahs in Tehran are watching and listening. It might be one thing to keep the Iranian government guessing about U.S. intentions, but nobody here wants a miscalculation and a sudden conflict that no one intends -- Lou.
DOBBS: Barbara, by way of background, it is perhaps unrealistic to think if even indeed the Hersh story were true in every way, that the Pentagon would confirm such a thing. Isn't that correct?
STARR: That's absolutely right, Lou, a lot of people are noting this Pentagon statement does not address every issue raised in the Hirsch article. There's no reason to believe they would, because of course the Pentagon does not publicly talk about war planning or Special Forces or that sort of thing. But over the last 48 hours, behind the scenes here in Washington, any number of very senior officials here are signaling not to interpret this too closely, that there is no immediate plan for any type of attack against Iran, although certainly the U.S. government, the Bush administration is watching that Iranian nuclear program very closely, Lou.
DOBBS: Absolutely. Thank you very much. Barbara Starr, from the Pentagon.
There's rising concern in Washington tonight about China's accelerating military build-up. China may buy Russian bombers capable of launching cruise missiles against American aircraft carriers in the Pacific. And the European Union may soon lift its arms embargo against China. Kitty Pilgrim has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Zhao Ziyang, the former general secretary of China's Communist Party died at the age of 85. He had been stripped of power and under house arrest for warning students during the Tiananmen protest that the government was about to move against them. The events of the Tiananmen massacre were 15 years ago, but China is still paying the price in the form of an arms embargo imposed after that crackdown.
China has been trying to build its military power. For the last 13 years it has made double-digit increases in its military budget, which experts estimate at some $65 billion. 90 percent of China's weapons come from Russia, but a year ago, French president Jacques Chirac, and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder declared they wanted to lift the arms ban. The rationale is China has joined the world community as a major trading partner for many countries. Britain last week appeared to be softening its position on the ban when Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the arms embargo was likely to be lifted in the next six months.
The Bush administration has been against lifting the arms embargo on China, because of Chinese continued poor performance in human rights, and the fear of giving China access to advance European weaponry, potentially upsetting the balance of power in the region.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
PILGRIM: The Europeans say their code of conduct for arms sales would be sufficient and the ban could be dropped. Now the code says the arms they sell could not be used for internal repression or external aggression, but once weapons are sold, it's really up to China what they use them for, so that's nice in theory, but pretty hard to enforce. Lou?
DOBBS: Well, it's absurdly impossible to enforce. And if the U.S. government position is no lifting of this embargo, why in the world is this administration continuing to pursue trade policies that results in $150 billion a year going into the treasury of China?
PILGRIM: One of the arguments for dropping the ban is china's already trading in the world community, so therefore poses no military threat. That doesn't seem to be quite -- that doesn't seem to hold together quite that well.
DOBBS: No, it certainly does not. Kitty, thank you very much. Kitty Pilgrim.
Tonight, the United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan facing a rising scandal over corruption in the UN Oil for Food program says major staff changes are likely at the institution he leads. Annan says he's shaking up his staff because some of his senior managers are leaving the United Nations. But critics say Annan has been forced to take action because of concern concerns that some of those top managers were involved in the scandal.
Condoleezza Rice faces a tough battle to win the job of secretary of state. Tonight, why Democratic lawmakers are preparing to confront the national security adviser at her confirmation hearings this week.
And "Broken Borders," border protection officials bragging about their success in stopping illegal aliens from entering this country. What about the 3 million illegal aliens who crossed our borders last year?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice appears before Congress for confirmation hearings, as her nomination goes forward as secretary of state. Democrats are likely to use these hearings as an opportunity to question not only Dr. Rice, but also the Bush administration's national security policy. Ed Henry reports from Capitol Hill.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Condoleezza Rice is such a big football fan, she's toyed with the idea of someday becoming commissioner of the NFL. For now, she just wants to be secretary of state, and Rice's love of the gridiron may be good practice for her confirmation hearings.
SEN. GEORGE ALLEN, (R) VA: While thee try to play this bump and run, try to knock her off stride, ultimately they're going to be voting for her to be secretary of state.
HENRY: Democrats plan tough questions about Rice's time as national security adviser, from her handling of terror warnings to her role in faulty intelligence reports leading up to the war in Iraq. Democrats also say Rice may be too close to the president, unlike outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell who has been seen as a moderating influence in the Cabinet.
SUSAN RICE, FORMER KERRY ADVISER: When you look at a secretary of defense who's been as forceful and effective as Donald Rumsfeld, for good or for ill, he's a tough customer, she'll have to show whether she has the stuff to stand up and fight.
HENRY: Republican committee Chairman Richard Lugar also wants her to lay out her vision for the president's second term on hot spots like Iran, North Korea, HIV/AIDS in Africa and Mid-east peace. Allies say Rice will preview the theme of President Bush's inaugural address, spreading democracy around the world. And they say the personal story of Rice, who grew up in the segregated South will help her carry that banner on the world stage.
ALLEN: As we try to advance freedom for all people in the world, regardless of their race or gender or their ethnicity or religious beliefs, I think her own life experiences makes her an even stronger person to advocate the concepts of freedom.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
HENRY: Among the Democrats grilling Dr. Rice will be Senator John Kerry who sits on the foreign relations committee, so that could make for an interesting showdown, but despite the tough questions, leaders expect that Dr. Rice will be confirmed rather easily. Lou?
DOBBS: Ed, thank you very much. Ed Henry from Capitol Hill.
Turning now to the immigration crisis in this country. Border protection officials say they arrested 1 million illegal aliens who tried to enter the country last year, but according to "Time" magazine 3 million successfully crossed our borders. Critics say much more needs to be done. Bill Tucker reports. (BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
BILL TUCKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The borders are getting tighter. Just this past weekend, 32 aliens were caught inside a ship container trying to illegally enter the United States from China. They were arrested by the Los Angeles port police. Up along the Canadian borders, agents on both sides say they're cracking down even harder to cut off would be troublemakers in advance of pressure's inauguration.
The crackdown is on. The official report from Customs and Border protection says that more than 262 million aliens attempted entry into America through 317 ports of entry last year. The result, more than 1 million arrested, including 643 people deemed by the government to be of special interest.
The head of the border patrol wasted no time in singing the praises of his agents, saying, quote, "These statistics demonstrate the breadth and scope of what the officers and agents do every day to secure our borders and make America safer."
The border patrol also notes that since September, more than 33,000 criminals have been caught trying to enter the United States. It was back in September that the Department of Homeland Security began cross-referencing its fingerprinting system with the FBI's. Critics of border security are quick to embrace the good news, but ...
MICHAEL CUTLER, CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES: It's kind of like trying to get a glass of water from a streaming fire hydrant. You will ultimately fill the glass, but think of the water that will get past that glass, and that's kind of the situation at the border right now for the border patrol.
TUCKER: Just exactly what happened to the 1.2 million people that were arrested is not clear ...
(END VIDEO TAPE)
TUCKER: But if history is any lesson, some were arrested, and sent home. Some were released into the United States with a notice to appear in a court at a later date. That under a program unofficially known as catch and release. And Lou, in case you're wondering, most of those people never bother to appear in court.
DOBBS: As we've been reporting here for some years. The fact of the matter is it bears repeating what you just said. Of over 1 million illegal aliens a 24 percent increase from the previous year, our immigration and customs officials do not know what the ultimate disposition of each of those aliens was.
TUCKER: That is correct.
DOBBS: That is incredible. Thank you very much, Bill Tucker.
A new Gallup Poll shows a majority of Americans are not satisfied with the level of immigration into this country. 62 percent of Americans say they are dissatisfied with the national policies on immigration, compared to 51 percent who are satisfied with the state of the economy, 39 percent who are dissatisfied with the nation's security from terrorism. Immigration worthy of some note in Washington, DC, I would say.
Still ahead, the assault on the middle class, how the many challenge facing the working men and women in this country are threatening their prosperity and well-being and threatening this very nation. Our special report is next.
And then red star rising, our massive trade deficit with China is worsening each day. One congressman who has seen thousands and thousands of his constituents lose jobs to China says President Bush needs to take action. He's Congressman Tim Ryan of Ohio. He's our guest next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: All this week, we're focusing on our special report on the assault on this country's middle class. Americans racked up a record number of debt, relaxed lending standards and low interest rates leading many consumers to spend well beyond their means with ramifications. Casey Wian reports from Los Angeles.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Charge it. Take out a new car loan, refinance your house and spend the equity. Seemingly everyone else is. U.S. consumers are now nearly $2.1 trillion in debt. That debt load has more than doubled in just the past ten years. Also doubling during that time, personal bankruptcies. One and a half million people are expected to file bankruptcy in 2005.
By Design Financial Solutions is a debt counseling service. Here the office declarations include curtains made from thousands of credit cards cut up by debt troubled customers.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The last payment we received was back on the 28th of December for $1,785.
WIAN: Though consumers continue to borrow, the credit counseling business is slow. Rising home prices are allowing many people to spend and stay solvent.
DAVID JOHNSON, BY DESIGN FINANCIAL SOLUTIONS: We think business hasn't increased because consumers are using the increased equity values in countries to pay off consumer debt. When interest rates go up, there's a fear that that may drive a lot more consumers into foreclosure.
WIAN: Even so, Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan says U.S. household finances are in reasonably good shape with pockets of severe stress.
ALAN GREENSPAN, FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIRMAN: We need to be mindful of the difficulties these households face. In addition, a significant decline in consumer incomes or house prices could quickly alter the outlook.
WIAN: Federal regulators are concerned about increasingly lacks underwriting requirements. Lenders are making home equity lines of credit easier to get so that they're growing at a 40 percent annual rate. More than half of all car dealers now approve auto loans before even checking with a lender.
RICHARD BROWN, CHIEF ECONOMIST, FDIC: Certainly on the radar screen of the regulators, they're looking at credit practices, they're looking at the financial situation of households and urging lenders to make sure the credit standards would be robust to more adverse macroeconomic conditions.
WIAN: Such as a sharp increase in interest rates or sudden downturn in home prices.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
WIAN: Those are the main threats facing consumers. Still, the homeowner has actually strengthened his balance sheet in recent years, largely because of rising home prices, household net worth jumped about 9 percent in 2004. Lou?
DOBBS: Underscoring the importance of those house prices is a part of the consumer's net worth. Casey, thank you very much. Casey Wian reporting from Los Angeles.
Next, red star rising. A leading congressman joins me, saying we have put ourselves at the mercy of China, but he has a plan to change all of that if a few of his colleagues -- well, more than a few -- manage to wake up.
And one man thought he had an ordinary toothache. It turned out to be something far more than a toothache. That incredible story is still ahead here.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: I'll be talking in just a matter of moments with the founder of the Congressional Manufacturing Caucus. He's talking tough with trade on China, but first these important stories.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas ordered his security forces to crack down on militant attacks on Israelis. Abbas also called for an investigation into last week's deadly terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians. A spokesman for the radical group Hamas says they will continue to launch attacks.
One town in northern Minnesota today is approaching an all-time record low temperatures, plunging to a chilling 54 degrees below zero. Minnesota's record low, 60 degrees below, set back in 1996. To give you some perspective on just how cold that is, one of the warmest temperatures in the United States today is more than 2,000 miles away, 130 degrees away from there. Residents of Woodland Hills, California enjoying temperatures of 77 degrees. President Bush today took part in a celebration of Martin Luther King Day at the Kennedy Center in Washington. President Bush credited the civil rights leader with awakening the conscience of America. King would have turned 76 this Saturday.
That brings us to the subject of our poll tonight -- do you believe that we give ourselves enough credit for the social progress we've made over the past 40 years, thanks in part to the work of Martin Luther King and others? Yes or no? Cast your vote at LouDobbs.com. We'll have the results for you later here in the broadcast.
My guest is urging President Bush to take action to stop this country's exploding trade deficit with China. Congressman Tim Ryan represents Ohio's 17th district, a district once a major steel producer, it has now lost thousands of jobs to China. Congressman Ryan joins us from Youngstown, Ohio. Congressman, good to have you with us.
REP TIM RYAN, (D) OH: Great to be on, Lou.
DOBBS: The idea of being able to turn barn the torrent of trade is pretty much one-way, of course, with China. You really think that's possible?
RYAN: I don't know if you can turn it back, but I certainly think we can do a heck of a lot more than we're doing right now. We have the Chinese basically ignoring every agreement they agreed to when they signed on with the World Trade Organization and getting away with murder, and it seems like we're not doing anything in the United States of America.
I think it's foolish to think we're going to turn back trade. Trade has been going on since the inception of time, but we need to manage it a heck of a lot better, because it's destroying the middle class here.
DOBBS: Congressman, what you're saying makes great sense, yet this administration, this Congress, your party, the Democrats, and the Republicans, have supported altogether through two administrations, the Bush administration and before that the Clinton administration, the absolutely idiotic policies that have led to they consecutive trade deficits and this explosion in one-way trade with China. What is there the U.S.-China Economic Commission -- Economic and Security Review Commission points out we've lost 1.5 million jobs because of these idiotic policies, and people are walking around Congress, with the exception of yourself, sir, and a few others saying, what me worry? What are you going to do?
RYAN: That's exactly what's going on. And what happens is the big money -- it sounds like a cliche but the big money comes and they write the rules and the United States Congress has really just become an extension and arm of corporate America today. They give so much money -- you do a great job of reporting it, Lou, and your service is invaluable, but they contribute millions of dollars to the United States Congress. They continue to get the laws written the way they want them to be written. And if you look at what's going on here, the only people really benefiting from this are the top 1 percent, or if you're participating in a multinational corporation.
Chinese government's doing well, they're now opening up trade for military goods and services as well, and the corporations here are benefiting, but nobody seems to be speaking out for the middle class in the United States of America. Jobs replacing the jobs that are leaving are $10,000 less. That's devastating our communities. We can't pass police and fire levies, we can't pass school levies, mental health levies, library levies. We can't pass any of this stuff. It's eroding the soul of America.
DOBBS: And, congressman, what would you do about it? Because you are focusing on the issue. What can be done about it?
RYAN: Well, I have a bill that wants to enforce the recommendations from the U.S./Chinese Security Commission Report, and that basically says crack down on the intellectual property violations that are going on over there, allow the workers over there to unionize, have these -- have the Chinese government stop subsidizing a lot of their employees and a lot of their work that's going on there. And more importantly, the United States of America has to take a leadership role. Since China's been in the World Trade Organization, Lou, there's been one complaint filed against them. One complaint. The U.S. has to stand up and lead the world, work with the European union, with the Japanese, build a coalition and start working through the World Trade Organization to put sanctions on the Chinese.
DOBBS: And just maybe, congressman, maybe, corporate America which is so concerned about product activity on the part of workers in this country, their education, their capacity -- they did pretty well four years ago through the entire decade of the '90s and about 200 years before that. Maybe they'll learn how to produce something they can sell abroad, because our exports are falling faster than we can see imports constrain (ph). Congressman Ryan, good to have us with us.
RYAN: Thank you.
DOBBS: Thank you.
Taking a look at some of your thoughts on reporting on Social Security and the president's efforts to bring forth what he sighs as critical reform, Charles Asher of La Crescenta, California said "Social Security is one of the government programs that has worked and will continue to work if rational people manage it. Why in heavens name are we not focusing on fixing 'No Child Left Behind' and securing our borders first?"
Barbara Ann Brosius of Cincinnati, Ohio. "Why would Republicans even think of privatizing Social Security until the budget is balanced, the Iraq War is ended, illegal immigration enforced and Wall Street brokers and CEOs are punished for manipulation and stealing of pension funds."
And P.J. of Fort Sam Houston, Texas. "As I understand it, President Bush contends that in the near future, fewer American workers will be contributing into the Social Security fund and fewer funds will be available to its beneficiaries. If there are fewer workers in America, why doesn't the president do something to stop outsourcing our jobs overseas?"
Send us your thoughts to loudobbs@cnn.com.
A simply incredible story ahead here tonight, a construction worker from Colorado was having strange pains and headaches. He attributed that pain to a toothache, until a dentist identified the real source. Patrick Lawler actually had a four-inch nail embedded in his skull. Jinah Kim of CNN affiliate KUSA reports from Littleton, Colorado.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
JINAH KIM, KUSA CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Patrick Lawler remembers it clearly. A week ago he accidentally hit his face with what he thought was the back of his nail gun. His lips bled a little bit but that was it. When he got a toothache and blurry vision in his right eye, doctors prescribe ibuprofen and ice packs.
PATRICK LAWLER, GUY WITH NAIL IN HIS HEAD: Six days icing it, taking Advil. I just thought I got hit real hard like a punch. Way off.
KIM: When he wife finally convinced him to take an x-ray at his dental office, they couldn't believe what they saw.
KATERINA LAWLER, WIFE OF GUY WITH NAIL IN HIS HEAD: I said, what did you do with the machine? Are you making a joke? They were like, no, no, it's a nail, and he's like, it's impossible. It's impossible.
PATRICK LAWLER: You've got a nail in your brain, that's pretty shocking.
KIM: The nail entered through his lip and lodged itself millimeters away from his right eye. It stopped just within his brain.
SEAN MARKEY, NEUROSURGEON: This is the second one we've seen at this hospital where the person was injured by the nail gun and didn't realize the nail had been embedded in their skull.
KIM: Last night, Lawler went in for a risky six-hour surgery. This morning, he was back to his old self against minus the nail.
KATERINA LAWLER: Here it is.
PATRICK LAWLER: Yeah, I consider myself lucky you know? You don't shoot yourself in the face with a nail every day and not have it do anything. It definitely makes one think of a profession change.
KIM: Lawler plans to display the nail in his living room. He'll probably go back to his construction job.
PATRICK LAWLER: I'm tired and sore.
KIM: But he plans to use a hammer from now on.
DOBBS: Lucky fellow indeed. Reporting, Jinah Kim of CNN affiliate KUSA.
President Bush prepares to take the oath of office. How two years of war, a divided electorate could impact his inauguration. Three of the country's top political journalists will be with us.
And Titan's secrets, what stunning new pictures are revealing about Saturn's mysterious moon. Astrophysicist Charles lie joins us next here.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Joining me from Washington, three of the country's very best leading political journalists Karen Tumulty, "Time Magazine," Ron Brownstein, "Los Angeles Times", and CNN's senior political analyst Bill Schneider. Good to have you all here. Let's begin with the president's inauguration as he begins a second term. He's talked about a moral obligation to reform Social Security. Has the president -- has he blundered in his choice of priority, Ron?
RON BROWNSTEIN, "L.A. TIMES": Well, you know, look, I mean, this is something he's wanted to do. He ran on it in 2000, he ran on it in 2004, he pushed it back. And now I think now they understand this is their mom, now or never. It is a big lift, it is a tough thing to do. There are those who argue there are other more pressing, immediate problems, there's a long term imbalance in Social Security's finances, but whether it's a crisis is a very different question as the president framed it, but whether it was the right move or no, this is the one out of the box. And as the president said yesterday, said over the weekend with the "Washington Post," we'll probably know quickly whether he has a plausible shot at making this happen.
DOBBS: Karen, is it a crisis?
KAREN TUMULTY, "TIME MAGAZINE": Well, it's certainly not a crisis the way the president is defining it. He keeps throwing around all these numbers, all these figures. Last week he said the system will be flat, bust and bankrupt by 2018. In fact what is going to happen is the amount of coming in for the first time is not be as the amount of money going out in benefits.
DOBBS: May I interject? We should say, maybe, because each year the Social Security Administration continues to project and push outward that moment at which outflows will exceed inflows to the so- called trust fund.
TUMULTY: That is absolutely true, but the fact is what he is describing as a crisis is essentially the same situation that Social Security has been in since it was established in 1935. It is a long- term funding problem, but it is one that has been dealt with over and over again by minor adjustments in the system. And what the president is proposing, these individual savings accounts, would actually make the funding problem worse, at least in the short term.
DOBBS: Bill Schneider, you reported on the president's approval rating holding up fairly well, given the fact there is so great a concern about Iraq amongst those surveyed in the latest CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll. How do you account for it?
BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Security. The president's ratings on security, on terrorism, are very, very high. Nothing else is really that impressive. Education is pretty good, but on other domestic issues, particularly Social Security, the ratings are not that good at all. It's security that got him reelected and it's the security issue, the terrorism issue that's sustaining him.
BROWNSTEIN: Lou, can I just add one thing on Social Security ...
DOBBS: As you always do, Ron.
BROWNSTEIN: I just can't resist. Karen was talking about whether the crisis language can be justified in terms of the reality facing the system. I think that those are good questions. There's also a question of whether it's even productive for the president. Because I think it does give the Democrats an out. By arguing the system is in crisis, he allows them to basically move toward the opposite position, saying there is no crisis, the president is misleading you, exaggerating the difficulty, when in fact there are long-term issues, both in terms of the imbalance between projected revenues and projected benefits, but also the larger question of whether, when you look at Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, whether even Democrats want to allow all these programs to grow at the extent they're growing and potentially squeeze out other things they're talk care about like education, health care for the uninsured, science and so forth.
DOBBS: Let's talk about education, health care, and really what has been the legacy of Martin Luther King on the day in which we celebrate the man. It seems to me -- I don't know how you feel about it. Too often we celebrate this day and don't celebrate the accomplishments this country has made through the leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King and lots -- hundreds and hundreds of other Americans. Don't you think, Karen, it's reasonable to suggest we don't give ourselves enough credit for all of the social progress that has been achieved in this country over the last four decades?
TUMULTY: Well, certainly the whole Martin Luther King holiday is about our values, and in some ways it's fitting that it should happened during inaugural week. It's the two bookends of the week. One is a chance to reflect on our values and look backward, and of course inauguration is all about looking forward.
DOBBS: But my question, really, Karen was do you think we give ourselves sufficient credit for all the things that have accomplished over the past four decades. It seems we do, as you put it, spend this week bracketed between an inauguration and Martin Luther King Day, if you would, but we don't bracket ourselves so much between what life was like in this country in 1960 and what life is like today. TUMULTY: Well, that is the whole reason we have holidays such as this one, and as -- you know, what it does, certainly in the media, it brings up a lot of stories about the progress that has been made.
DOBBS: Yes Ron. Go ahead.
BROWNSTEIN: I was going to say, you know, William Faulkner said in the civil rights era said you cannot legislate what is in men's hearts. In fact you could legislate how people behave and we have made a lot of progress in race relations and so forth in the last 40 years, but the nature of American society is to be dissatisfied and hope to do better. And we are still looking at a lot of differential outcomes ...
DOBBS: See, I disagree with you, I don't think it is the nature of American society to be dissatisfied. I think it's the nature of American society to be aspirational to want more for ourselves and their children.
BROWNSTEIN: I don't disagree with that. I think I agree. Maybe the place we can agree is says the nature of American society is to believe we always can do better. And I think for ourselves, our families and as a country, I think when we look at where we are, we've come a long way, but there's a lot to do to really ensure that all Americans have the opportunity to be all they can be.
SCHNEIDER: I grew up in the segregated South. The answer to your question is yes. There's been an enormous and remarkable social progress. When I was growing up, colored, as they were called then, and white couldn't go to the same movie theaters, had to sit on opposite sides of the ferry boat. When you went to a doctor's office it was white on one side, colored on the other side. It was amazing, it was remarkable and it was pernicious, and it was overthrown, an entire, what was then regarded as an ancient and embedded system was overthrown with I think a minimum of violence.
We have to stop and say this was a remarkable achievement. And when I explain, as I sometimes do, to young people and students what life was like then, you know, they don't believe it, they say that's ridiculous. It was never like that. You know what? They're wrong, it was.
DOBBS: And what it's like today, when you look at statistics and merely statistics, to look at the number of blacks who were achieving a four-year college degrees in 1960 versus today, to look at the number of minorities in our law schools, our business schools and our medical schools. We have a long ways to go, there is no question, but it seems that this would be an appropriate day for all of us to celebrate the accomplishments that this great nation has achieved over the course of the past four decades. I want to say thanks to each of you for being here on Martin Luther King Day and helping us celebrate some of those achievements thank you very much Karen Tumulty, Ron Brownstein, Bill Schneider.
TUMULTY: Thanks Lou. DOBBS: Tonight's thought is that of Martin Luther King Jr. on the day in which we celebrate his life and the accomplishments of this country.
"If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live."
A reminder now to vote in our poll tonight - Do you believe we give ourselves enough credit for the social progress we've made over the past 40 years, thanks in part to the work of Martin Luther King and others, of course? Yes or no, cast your vote at loudobbs.com. We'll have the results in just a few minutes.
Also, stunning new pictures from Saturn's largest moon, a leading astrophysicist joins me next, he calls the images jaw-dropping. Let me try that again. Jaw-dropping. And their impact, simply stunning. He joins us next, Charles Liu. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: More dazzling new color pictures of Saturn's moon Titan. They're nothing short of extraordinary, these images taken by the Huygens probe. It shows shades of orange on Titan's sky and on its surface. The pictures and the other data are revealing what scientists are saying what are exciting new details about what's long been one of the most fascinating places, one of the most fascinating satellites, moons. Joining me is astrophysicist Charles Liu, from the National Museum of Natural History. Charles, it's great when we have an exciting discovery to talk about like this.
CHARLES LIU, ASTROPHYSICIST: Always a pleasure.
DOBBS: What's your reaction?
LIU: When I first saw the pictures on Friday, my heart skipped a beat. This is as good as we all could have hoped for. My planetary scientist colleagues have been waiting for decades for this, and it did not disappoint.
DOBBS: The idea that we can infer, at least from the data, and from the images that we're talking about moisture that could have risen to the level of a sea ...
LIU: Absolutely.
DOBBS: ... how do we make that assessment from this distance with these images, no matter how wonderful and just extraordinary? How do we come to that inference?
LIU: Here's what we have to do. First we realize that the surface conditions are completely different from here on earth. It's 300 degrees below zero Fahrenheit almost there, so ice is solid as granite. So anything that flows there would be chemically, like liquid natural gas or something. So we understand from our chemistry here on earth what kinds of things behave what ways at those temperatures and under those pressure conditions. And when we go down and take a look, we see things that look almost like shorelines or riverbeds or creeks, and we must infer from that if chemistry is correct at all, that there must have been something flowing or having flown, or this kind of texture or dynamism is so exciting.
DOBBS: There any sense, any basis to deduce as we're looking at these animations of the Huygens probe, to deduce this is recent in any way?
LIU: It's hard to know exactly how long ago it was, but there's so much detail to it, there is so much sort of evidence that things have moved recently, that we really think this was something that couldn't have happened in the ancient, ancient past. We don't know if it happened yesterday, but we certainly notice there's been a lot going on the surface of Titan over the years. It's very exciting.
DOBBS: And over the course of that time, and from the time of -- let's go with the cosmologist's big-bang theory and accept it as if it were absolute truth and fact ...
LIU: It's only a theory.
DOBBS: ... the fact that these conditions -- Are we assuming there were volcanic conditions, then extraterrestrial bombardment? Asteroids? Considerably different physical environmental condition on Titan at one point or another?
LIU: It's hard to know. We're still speculating a lot of times. Titan is a billion miles away from the sun roughly. That's so much further out than we are at Earth only 93 million miles away. It's hard to know how much hotter or colder it might have been in the past. What we do know is under the conditions Titan is in right now, if those conditions lasted a fairly long time, then there's enough activity yet also stability there on titan that maybe some of the early signs of organic chemicals, sugars or alcohols may have combined to form proteins, amino acids. We don't know. It's very, very exciting.
DOBBS: What I do know is I look at those images and think about the success of this probe reaching all the way out to the edges of the solar system and sending back this amazing amount of information and imagery. What a world we live in, and what geniuses we have the pleasure to live with. Thank you very much.
LIU: It's inspiring.
DOBBS: Charles Liu, thank you.
LIU: Thank you.
DOBBS: Still ahead, we'll have the results of our poll and a preview of what's ahead tomorrow. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: A split result on our poll tonight. Thanks for being with us. Please join us here tomorrow. 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 January 17, 2005 - 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, ballots and bombs, insurgents launch a new wave of attacks against Iraqi police and troops. What American voters think about the war in Iraq, Iraq's elections. We'll have the results of a new CNN opinion poll.
"Broken Borders": immigration and customs officials bragging about their success in catching illegal aliens, but our question tonight is what about those three million illegal aliens who succeeded in crossing our borders last year?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We also have to go after immigration fraud at the same time, because fraud is even more insidious.
DOBBS: "Assault on the Middle Class": consumer debt, personal bankruptcies skyrocketing. So just why is the White House and some in Congress more interested in so-called Social Security reform?
"Titan's Secrets": incredible new images of Saturn's biggest moon. Astrophysicist Charles Liu will be here to review those stunning pictures.
And it's Martin Luther King Day. It turns out he accomplished far more than he's given credit for. Just take a look at America today.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Monday, January 17. Here for an hour of news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.
DOBBS: Good evening.
Tonight, violence continues to escalate in Iraq, less than two weeks before the Iraqi elections. Insurgents today killed at least 14 Iraqi police and troops in two cities.
Separately, the U.S. military reported the death of an American soldier in a vehicle accident in Baghdad.
The commander of American troops in Iraq today said violence on Iraq's election today is inevitable.
Jeff Koinange reports from Baghdad.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF KOINANGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Another deadly day on the road to democracy, with Iraqi security forces bearing the brunt of an insurgency determined to derail the landmark January 30 elections.
And outside the troubled northern city of Mosul, where Christians have been subjected to attacks in the past, the Roman Catholic archbishop was kidnapped outside a private residence.
In Beurut (ph), just south of Baqubah in the Sunni Triangle, militants drove up to an Iraqi National Guard checkpoint and opened fire with automatic weapons, killing seven guardsmen and one civilian.
In the town of Baiji, 40 kilometers north of Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, a suicide bomber blew himself up at a police checkpoint, killing seven Iraqi policemen and wounding as many as 19 others.
It's not just security forces being targeted. So are polling centers like this school just outside the southern city of Basra, one of four hit by mortars, causing extensive damage.
The few candidates brave enough to admit they're running for office say the threat of violence is everywhere.
SHEIK MANSOUR ABDEL-RAZAQ AL-TAMINI, UNIFIED IRAQI ALLIANCE (through translator): There's no region in Iraq out of danger. Every day I receive threats. Every place in Iraq is the same.
KOINANGE: All this as Iraqis living outside Iraq, many of them forced into exile during Saddam Hussein's rule, began to register to vote. Close to a million exiles are expected to register from 14 countries, adding to the 14 million eligible to cast their votes at home.
(on camera) The big question is or to what degree this pre- election campaign of violence will keep Iraqis away from the polling places on election day, now less two weeks away.
Jeff Koinange, CNN, Baghdad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
DOBBS: Despite the increasing violence, a rising number of Americans believe the Iraqi elections will be held as scheduled this month. A new CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll also shows Americans almost evenly split over whether the United States was right to send troops to Iraq.
Our senior political analyst, Bill Schneider, reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST (voice-over): Signs of an Iraq backlash are popping up. Earlier this month, former national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft, who served the first President Bush, told an audience the upcoming elections in Iraq could end up deepening the conflict.
"We may be seeing an incipient civil war," Scowcroft warned.
Outgoing Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage told National Public Radio that he and Secretary Powell have deliberately expressed reservations about the president's policies on the record. "This is what the president paid us for, to bring him our views," Armitage said last week. "He can agree with us or not, as he chooses."
President Bush is even expressing some second thoughts. Remember back in 2003 when the president said this about the Iraqi insurgents?
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There are some who feel like that, you know, the conditions are such they can attack us there. My answer is bring 'em on.
SCHNEIDER: Now he says that remark was a little blunt and had unintended consequences.
Remember Saddam's weapons of mass destruction? It was recently revealed that U.S. agents have given up looking for them.
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: The issue of weapons of mass destruction is one that we really have to look into. Why did the intelligence community get it wrong?
SCHNEIDER: Last week the National Intelligence Council said the war in Iraq may provide recruitment and training for a new class of terrorists.
MICHAEL O'HANLON, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: The Iraq mission, even if it does have benefits for getting rid of Saddam, may actually in some strange sense be helping al Qaeda.
SCHNEIDER: The number of Americans who say the United States made a mistake sending troops to Iraq has been growing.
Forty-four percent called the Iraq war a mistake just before the election, 47 percent right after the election, 50 percent in early January. And now? Fifty-two percent in the latest CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll.
It's an issue that continues to divide the country. Very few Republicans call Iraq a mistake. Almost all Democrats do. What's changed is that independents now side with Democrats on this issue.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCHNEIDER: Does the public believe President Bush has a clear plan for bringing the situation in Iraq to a successful conclusion? The answer, by nearly 2 to 1 in the latest Annenberg Survey, is no, they don't -- Lou.
DOBBS: Bill, it seems straightforward. The fact is weapons of mass destruction were not found in Iraq. That was the premise for the invasion of Iraq. The issue becomes the conduct of the post-invasion military operations. Any polls on that issue itself?
SCHNEIDER: Americans do not think things are going well in Iraq. And as I just reported, Americans do not think the president has a clear plan for Iraq. That scares them. It makes them very nervous.
In fact, it's interesting. If you ask Americans the No. 1 issue right now facing the country, a real crisis, they say Iraq. Very few, not even half as many, say Social Security.
DOBBS: Or Medicare or Medicaid or the quality of life for working men and women in this country, just to name a few other very important issues.
Bill, thank you very much. Bill Schneider from Washington.
The Pentagon today blasted a published report that the United States is conducting secret reconnaissance missions in Iraq. Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said American commandos are trying to identify potential nuclear, chemical and missile targets. But the Pentagon says the Hersh article is full of errors.
Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): One thing is certain, the U.S. is watching Iran's nuclear program closely. Sources say satellite and aircraft surveillance has been stepped up in recent months.
But is there war planning for an attack against Iran's nuclear sites this summer, as suggested by Seymour Hersh in a "New Yorker" article?
Without responding to the question of a summertime attack, Pentagon officials say Hersh is wrong. Pentagon spokesman Lawrence DiRita said in a statement, quote, "Mr. Hersh's article is so riddled with errors of fundamental fact that the credibility of his entire piece is destroyed."
Hersh believes administration hard-liners do want to attack Iran.
SEYMOUR HERSH, "THE NEW YORKER": This is a president that's going to do what he wants to do. And the only -- the only thing we can hope is that these guys are right about the world waiting for America to come and remake the Middle East and that Iran will go smoother than Iraq, because they're going to do it. I'm almost -- I'm pretty much convinced of it myself, and so are my sources.
STARR: Hersh says it is part of a broader Pentagon plan to secretly use Special Forces around the world on missions that might have been done by the CIA.
The Pentagon won't say much about Special Forces on the record. Commandos do conduct capture or kill missions in Iraq and Afghanistan and have waged attacks against al Qaeda, but Rumsfeld has indicated he doesn't want to take over CIA efforts.
Hersh insists the U.S. Central Command is updating the war plans, providing for a maximum ground and air invasion of Iran. A senior U.S. military official calls that "absolutely false" and emphasizes contingency plans are updated routinely.
WILLIAM COHEN, FORMER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: It's one thing to have contingency plans, another to actually be contemplating taking military action under the circumstances when, in fact, Iran's a very different country than Iraq.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
STARR: Now, Lou, all of this has the Pentagon very deeply concerned. They know that the mullahs in Tehran are watching and listening. It might be one thing to keep the Iranian government guessing about U.S. intentions, but nobody here wants a miscalculation and a sudden conflict that no one intends -- Lou.
DOBBS: Barbara, by way of background, it is perhaps unrealistic to think if even indeed the Hersh story were true in every way, that the Pentagon would confirm such a thing. Isn't that correct?
STARR: That's absolutely right, Lou, a lot of people are noting this Pentagon statement does not address every issue raised in the Hirsch article. There's no reason to believe they would, because of course the Pentagon does not publicly talk about war planning or Special Forces or that sort of thing. But over the last 48 hours, behind the scenes here in Washington, any number of very senior officials here are signaling not to interpret this too closely, that there is no immediate plan for any type of attack against Iran, although certainly the U.S. government, the Bush administration is watching that Iranian nuclear program very closely, Lou.
DOBBS: Absolutely. Thank you very much. Barbara Starr, from the Pentagon.
There's rising concern in Washington tonight about China's accelerating military build-up. China may buy Russian bombers capable of launching cruise missiles against American aircraft carriers in the Pacific. And the European Union may soon lift its arms embargo against China. Kitty Pilgrim has the report.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Zhao Ziyang, the former general secretary of China's Communist Party died at the age of 85. He had been stripped of power and under house arrest for warning students during the Tiananmen protest that the government was about to move against them. The events of the Tiananmen massacre were 15 years ago, but China is still paying the price in the form of an arms embargo imposed after that crackdown.
China has been trying to build its military power. For the last 13 years it has made double-digit increases in its military budget, which experts estimate at some $65 billion. 90 percent of China's weapons come from Russia, but a year ago, French president Jacques Chirac, and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder declared they wanted to lift the arms ban. The rationale is China has joined the world community as a major trading partner for many countries. Britain last week appeared to be softening its position on the ban when Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the arms embargo was likely to be lifted in the next six months.
The Bush administration has been against lifting the arms embargo on China, because of Chinese continued poor performance in human rights, and the fear of giving China access to advance European weaponry, potentially upsetting the balance of power in the region.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
PILGRIM: The Europeans say their code of conduct for arms sales would be sufficient and the ban could be dropped. Now the code says the arms they sell could not be used for internal repression or external aggression, but once weapons are sold, it's really up to China what they use them for, so that's nice in theory, but pretty hard to enforce. Lou?
DOBBS: Well, it's absurdly impossible to enforce. And if the U.S. government position is no lifting of this embargo, why in the world is this administration continuing to pursue trade policies that results in $150 billion a year going into the treasury of China?
PILGRIM: One of the arguments for dropping the ban is china's already trading in the world community, so therefore poses no military threat. That doesn't seem to be quite -- that doesn't seem to hold together quite that well.
DOBBS: No, it certainly does not. Kitty, thank you very much. Kitty Pilgrim.
Tonight, the United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan facing a rising scandal over corruption in the UN Oil for Food program says major staff changes are likely at the institution he leads. Annan says he's shaking up his staff because some of his senior managers are leaving the United Nations. But critics say Annan has been forced to take action because of concern concerns that some of those top managers were involved in the scandal.
Condoleezza Rice faces a tough battle to win the job of secretary of state. Tonight, why Democratic lawmakers are preparing to confront the national security adviser at her confirmation hearings this week.
And "Broken Borders," border protection officials bragging about their success in stopping illegal aliens from entering this country. What about the 3 million illegal aliens who crossed our borders last year?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice appears before Congress for confirmation hearings, as her nomination goes forward as secretary of state. Democrats are likely to use these hearings as an opportunity to question not only Dr. Rice, but also the Bush administration's national security policy. Ed Henry reports from Capitol Hill.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Condoleezza Rice is such a big football fan, she's toyed with the idea of someday becoming commissioner of the NFL. For now, she just wants to be secretary of state, and Rice's love of the gridiron may be good practice for her confirmation hearings.
SEN. GEORGE ALLEN, (R) VA: While thee try to play this bump and run, try to knock her off stride, ultimately they're going to be voting for her to be secretary of state.
HENRY: Democrats plan tough questions about Rice's time as national security adviser, from her handling of terror warnings to her role in faulty intelligence reports leading up to the war in Iraq. Democrats also say Rice may be too close to the president, unlike outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell who has been seen as a moderating influence in the Cabinet.
SUSAN RICE, FORMER KERRY ADVISER: When you look at a secretary of defense who's been as forceful and effective as Donald Rumsfeld, for good or for ill, he's a tough customer, she'll have to show whether she has the stuff to stand up and fight.
HENRY: Republican committee Chairman Richard Lugar also wants her to lay out her vision for the president's second term on hot spots like Iran, North Korea, HIV/AIDS in Africa and Mid-east peace. Allies say Rice will preview the theme of President Bush's inaugural address, spreading democracy around the world. And they say the personal story of Rice, who grew up in the segregated South will help her carry that banner on the world stage.
ALLEN: As we try to advance freedom for all people in the world, regardless of their race or gender or their ethnicity or religious beliefs, I think her own life experiences makes her an even stronger person to advocate the concepts of freedom.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
HENRY: Among the Democrats grilling Dr. Rice will be Senator John Kerry who sits on the foreign relations committee, so that could make for an interesting showdown, but despite the tough questions, leaders expect that Dr. Rice will be confirmed rather easily. Lou?
DOBBS: Ed, thank you very much. Ed Henry from Capitol Hill.
Turning now to the immigration crisis in this country. Border protection officials say they arrested 1 million illegal aliens who tried to enter the country last year, but according to "Time" magazine 3 million successfully crossed our borders. Critics say much more needs to be done. Bill Tucker reports. (BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
BILL TUCKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The borders are getting tighter. Just this past weekend, 32 aliens were caught inside a ship container trying to illegally enter the United States from China. They were arrested by the Los Angeles port police. Up along the Canadian borders, agents on both sides say they're cracking down even harder to cut off would be troublemakers in advance of pressure's inauguration.
The crackdown is on. The official report from Customs and Border protection says that more than 262 million aliens attempted entry into America through 317 ports of entry last year. The result, more than 1 million arrested, including 643 people deemed by the government to be of special interest.
The head of the border patrol wasted no time in singing the praises of his agents, saying, quote, "These statistics demonstrate the breadth and scope of what the officers and agents do every day to secure our borders and make America safer."
The border patrol also notes that since September, more than 33,000 criminals have been caught trying to enter the United States. It was back in September that the Department of Homeland Security began cross-referencing its fingerprinting system with the FBI's. Critics of border security are quick to embrace the good news, but ...
MICHAEL CUTLER, CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES: It's kind of like trying to get a glass of water from a streaming fire hydrant. You will ultimately fill the glass, but think of the water that will get past that glass, and that's kind of the situation at the border right now for the border patrol.
TUCKER: Just exactly what happened to the 1.2 million people that were arrested is not clear ...
(END VIDEO TAPE)
TUCKER: But if history is any lesson, some were arrested, and sent home. Some were released into the United States with a notice to appear in a court at a later date. That under a program unofficially known as catch and release. And Lou, in case you're wondering, most of those people never bother to appear in court.
DOBBS: As we've been reporting here for some years. The fact of the matter is it bears repeating what you just said. Of over 1 million illegal aliens a 24 percent increase from the previous year, our immigration and customs officials do not know what the ultimate disposition of each of those aliens was.
TUCKER: That is correct.
DOBBS: That is incredible. Thank you very much, Bill Tucker.
A new Gallup Poll shows a majority of Americans are not satisfied with the level of immigration into this country. 62 percent of Americans say they are dissatisfied with the national policies on immigration, compared to 51 percent who are satisfied with the state of the economy, 39 percent who are dissatisfied with the nation's security from terrorism. Immigration worthy of some note in Washington, DC, I would say.
Still ahead, the assault on the middle class, how the many challenge facing the working men and women in this country are threatening their prosperity and well-being and threatening this very nation. Our special report is next.
And then red star rising, our massive trade deficit with China is worsening each day. One congressman who has seen thousands and thousands of his constituents lose jobs to China says President Bush needs to take action. He's Congressman Tim Ryan of Ohio. He's our guest next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: All this week, we're focusing on our special report on the assault on this country's middle class. Americans racked up a record number of debt, relaxed lending standards and low interest rates leading many consumers to spend well beyond their means with ramifications. Casey Wian reports from Los Angeles.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Charge it. Take out a new car loan, refinance your house and spend the equity. Seemingly everyone else is. U.S. consumers are now nearly $2.1 trillion in debt. That debt load has more than doubled in just the past ten years. Also doubling during that time, personal bankruptcies. One and a half million people are expected to file bankruptcy in 2005.
By Design Financial Solutions is a debt counseling service. Here the office declarations include curtains made from thousands of credit cards cut up by debt troubled customers.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The last payment we received was back on the 28th of December for $1,785.
WIAN: Though consumers continue to borrow, the credit counseling business is slow. Rising home prices are allowing many people to spend and stay solvent.
DAVID JOHNSON, BY DESIGN FINANCIAL SOLUTIONS: We think business hasn't increased because consumers are using the increased equity values in countries to pay off consumer debt. When interest rates go up, there's a fear that that may drive a lot more consumers into foreclosure.
WIAN: Even so, Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan says U.S. household finances are in reasonably good shape with pockets of severe stress.
ALAN GREENSPAN, FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIRMAN: We need to be mindful of the difficulties these households face. In addition, a significant decline in consumer incomes or house prices could quickly alter the outlook.
WIAN: Federal regulators are concerned about increasingly lacks underwriting requirements. Lenders are making home equity lines of credit easier to get so that they're growing at a 40 percent annual rate. More than half of all car dealers now approve auto loans before even checking with a lender.
RICHARD BROWN, CHIEF ECONOMIST, FDIC: Certainly on the radar screen of the regulators, they're looking at credit practices, they're looking at the financial situation of households and urging lenders to make sure the credit standards would be robust to more adverse macroeconomic conditions.
WIAN: Such as a sharp increase in interest rates or sudden downturn in home prices.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
WIAN: Those are the main threats facing consumers. Still, the homeowner has actually strengthened his balance sheet in recent years, largely because of rising home prices, household net worth jumped about 9 percent in 2004. Lou?
DOBBS: Underscoring the importance of those house prices is a part of the consumer's net worth. Casey, thank you very much. Casey Wian reporting from Los Angeles.
Next, red star rising. A leading congressman joins me, saying we have put ourselves at the mercy of China, but he has a plan to change all of that if a few of his colleagues -- well, more than a few -- manage to wake up.
And one man thought he had an ordinary toothache. It turned out to be something far more than a toothache. That incredible story is still ahead here.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: I'll be talking in just a matter of moments with the founder of the Congressional Manufacturing Caucus. He's talking tough with trade on China, but first these important stories.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas ordered his security forces to crack down on militant attacks on Israelis. Abbas also called for an investigation into last week's deadly terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians. A spokesman for the radical group Hamas says they will continue to launch attacks.
One town in northern Minnesota today is approaching an all-time record low temperatures, plunging to a chilling 54 degrees below zero. Minnesota's record low, 60 degrees below, set back in 1996. To give you some perspective on just how cold that is, one of the warmest temperatures in the United States today is more than 2,000 miles away, 130 degrees away from there. Residents of Woodland Hills, California enjoying temperatures of 77 degrees. President Bush today took part in a celebration of Martin Luther King Day at the Kennedy Center in Washington. President Bush credited the civil rights leader with awakening the conscience of America. King would have turned 76 this Saturday.
That brings us to the subject of our poll tonight -- do you believe that we give ourselves enough credit for the social progress we've made over the past 40 years, thanks in part to the work of Martin Luther King and others? Yes or no? Cast your vote at LouDobbs.com. We'll have the results for you later here in the broadcast.
My guest is urging President Bush to take action to stop this country's exploding trade deficit with China. Congressman Tim Ryan represents Ohio's 17th district, a district once a major steel producer, it has now lost thousands of jobs to China. Congressman Ryan joins us from Youngstown, Ohio. Congressman, good to have you with us.
REP TIM RYAN, (D) OH: Great to be on, Lou.
DOBBS: The idea of being able to turn barn the torrent of trade is pretty much one-way, of course, with China. You really think that's possible?
RYAN: I don't know if you can turn it back, but I certainly think we can do a heck of a lot more than we're doing right now. We have the Chinese basically ignoring every agreement they agreed to when they signed on with the World Trade Organization and getting away with murder, and it seems like we're not doing anything in the United States of America.
I think it's foolish to think we're going to turn back trade. Trade has been going on since the inception of time, but we need to manage it a heck of a lot better, because it's destroying the middle class here.
DOBBS: Congressman, what you're saying makes great sense, yet this administration, this Congress, your party, the Democrats, and the Republicans, have supported altogether through two administrations, the Bush administration and before that the Clinton administration, the absolutely idiotic policies that have led to they consecutive trade deficits and this explosion in one-way trade with China. What is there the U.S.-China Economic Commission -- Economic and Security Review Commission points out we've lost 1.5 million jobs because of these idiotic policies, and people are walking around Congress, with the exception of yourself, sir, and a few others saying, what me worry? What are you going to do?
RYAN: That's exactly what's going on. And what happens is the big money -- it sounds like a cliche but the big money comes and they write the rules and the United States Congress has really just become an extension and arm of corporate America today. They give so much money -- you do a great job of reporting it, Lou, and your service is invaluable, but they contribute millions of dollars to the United States Congress. They continue to get the laws written the way they want them to be written. And if you look at what's going on here, the only people really benefiting from this are the top 1 percent, or if you're participating in a multinational corporation.
Chinese government's doing well, they're now opening up trade for military goods and services as well, and the corporations here are benefiting, but nobody seems to be speaking out for the middle class in the United States of America. Jobs replacing the jobs that are leaving are $10,000 less. That's devastating our communities. We can't pass police and fire levies, we can't pass school levies, mental health levies, library levies. We can't pass any of this stuff. It's eroding the soul of America.
DOBBS: And, congressman, what would you do about it? Because you are focusing on the issue. What can be done about it?
RYAN: Well, I have a bill that wants to enforce the recommendations from the U.S./Chinese Security Commission Report, and that basically says crack down on the intellectual property violations that are going on over there, allow the workers over there to unionize, have these -- have the Chinese government stop subsidizing a lot of their employees and a lot of their work that's going on there. And more importantly, the United States of America has to take a leadership role. Since China's been in the World Trade Organization, Lou, there's been one complaint filed against them. One complaint. The U.S. has to stand up and lead the world, work with the European union, with the Japanese, build a coalition and start working through the World Trade Organization to put sanctions on the Chinese.
DOBBS: And just maybe, congressman, maybe, corporate America which is so concerned about product activity on the part of workers in this country, their education, their capacity -- they did pretty well four years ago through the entire decade of the '90s and about 200 years before that. Maybe they'll learn how to produce something they can sell abroad, because our exports are falling faster than we can see imports constrain (ph). Congressman Ryan, good to have us with us.
RYAN: Thank you.
DOBBS: Thank you.
Taking a look at some of your thoughts on reporting on Social Security and the president's efforts to bring forth what he sighs as critical reform, Charles Asher of La Crescenta, California said "Social Security is one of the government programs that has worked and will continue to work if rational people manage it. Why in heavens name are we not focusing on fixing 'No Child Left Behind' and securing our borders first?"
Barbara Ann Brosius of Cincinnati, Ohio. "Why would Republicans even think of privatizing Social Security until the budget is balanced, the Iraq War is ended, illegal immigration enforced and Wall Street brokers and CEOs are punished for manipulation and stealing of pension funds."
And P.J. of Fort Sam Houston, Texas. "As I understand it, President Bush contends that in the near future, fewer American workers will be contributing into the Social Security fund and fewer funds will be available to its beneficiaries. If there are fewer workers in America, why doesn't the president do something to stop outsourcing our jobs overseas?"
Send us your thoughts to loudobbs@cnn.com.
A simply incredible story ahead here tonight, a construction worker from Colorado was having strange pains and headaches. He attributed that pain to a toothache, until a dentist identified the real source. Patrick Lawler actually had a four-inch nail embedded in his skull. Jinah Kim of CNN affiliate KUSA reports from Littleton, Colorado.
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
JINAH KIM, KUSA CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Patrick Lawler remembers it clearly. A week ago he accidentally hit his face with what he thought was the back of his nail gun. His lips bled a little bit but that was it. When he got a toothache and blurry vision in his right eye, doctors prescribe ibuprofen and ice packs.
PATRICK LAWLER, GUY WITH NAIL IN HIS HEAD: Six days icing it, taking Advil. I just thought I got hit real hard like a punch. Way off.
KIM: When he wife finally convinced him to take an x-ray at his dental office, they couldn't believe what they saw.
KATERINA LAWLER, WIFE OF GUY WITH NAIL IN HIS HEAD: I said, what did you do with the machine? Are you making a joke? They were like, no, no, it's a nail, and he's like, it's impossible. It's impossible.
PATRICK LAWLER: You've got a nail in your brain, that's pretty shocking.
KIM: The nail entered through his lip and lodged itself millimeters away from his right eye. It stopped just within his brain.
SEAN MARKEY, NEUROSURGEON: This is the second one we've seen at this hospital where the person was injured by the nail gun and didn't realize the nail had been embedded in their skull.
KIM: Last night, Lawler went in for a risky six-hour surgery. This morning, he was back to his old self against minus the nail.
KATERINA LAWLER: Here it is.
PATRICK LAWLER: Yeah, I consider myself lucky you know? You don't shoot yourself in the face with a nail every day and not have it do anything. It definitely makes one think of a profession change.
KIM: Lawler plans to display the nail in his living room. He'll probably go back to his construction job.
PATRICK LAWLER: I'm tired and sore.
KIM: But he plans to use a hammer from now on.
DOBBS: Lucky fellow indeed. Reporting, Jinah Kim of CNN affiliate KUSA.
President Bush prepares to take the oath of office. How two years of war, a divided electorate could impact his inauguration. Three of the country's top political journalists will be with us.
And Titan's secrets, what stunning new pictures are revealing about Saturn's mysterious moon. Astrophysicist Charles lie joins us next here.
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DOBBS: Joining me from Washington, three of the country's very best leading political journalists Karen Tumulty, "Time Magazine," Ron Brownstein, "Los Angeles Times", and CNN's senior political analyst Bill Schneider. Good to have you all here. Let's begin with the president's inauguration as he begins a second term. He's talked about a moral obligation to reform Social Security. Has the president -- has he blundered in his choice of priority, Ron?
RON BROWNSTEIN, "L.A. TIMES": Well, you know, look, I mean, this is something he's wanted to do. He ran on it in 2000, he ran on it in 2004, he pushed it back. And now I think now they understand this is their mom, now or never. It is a big lift, it is a tough thing to do. There are those who argue there are other more pressing, immediate problems, there's a long term imbalance in Social Security's finances, but whether it's a crisis is a very different question as the president framed it, but whether it was the right move or no, this is the one out of the box. And as the president said yesterday, said over the weekend with the "Washington Post," we'll probably know quickly whether he has a plausible shot at making this happen.
DOBBS: Karen, is it a crisis?
KAREN TUMULTY, "TIME MAGAZINE": Well, it's certainly not a crisis the way the president is defining it. He keeps throwing around all these numbers, all these figures. Last week he said the system will be flat, bust and bankrupt by 2018. In fact what is going to happen is the amount of coming in for the first time is not be as the amount of money going out in benefits.
DOBBS: May I interject? We should say, maybe, because each year the Social Security Administration continues to project and push outward that moment at which outflows will exceed inflows to the so- called trust fund.
TUMULTY: That is absolutely true, but the fact is what he is describing as a crisis is essentially the same situation that Social Security has been in since it was established in 1935. It is a long- term funding problem, but it is one that has been dealt with over and over again by minor adjustments in the system. And what the president is proposing, these individual savings accounts, would actually make the funding problem worse, at least in the short term.
DOBBS: Bill Schneider, you reported on the president's approval rating holding up fairly well, given the fact there is so great a concern about Iraq amongst those surveyed in the latest CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll. How do you account for it?
BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Security. The president's ratings on security, on terrorism, are very, very high. Nothing else is really that impressive. Education is pretty good, but on other domestic issues, particularly Social Security, the ratings are not that good at all. It's security that got him reelected and it's the security issue, the terrorism issue that's sustaining him.
BROWNSTEIN: Lou, can I just add one thing on Social Security ...
DOBBS: As you always do, Ron.
BROWNSTEIN: I just can't resist. Karen was talking about whether the crisis language can be justified in terms of the reality facing the system. I think that those are good questions. There's also a question of whether it's even productive for the president. Because I think it does give the Democrats an out. By arguing the system is in crisis, he allows them to basically move toward the opposite position, saying there is no crisis, the president is misleading you, exaggerating the difficulty, when in fact there are long-term issues, both in terms of the imbalance between projected revenues and projected benefits, but also the larger question of whether, when you look at Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, whether even Democrats want to allow all these programs to grow at the extent they're growing and potentially squeeze out other things they're talk care about like education, health care for the uninsured, science and so forth.
DOBBS: Let's talk about education, health care, and really what has been the legacy of Martin Luther King on the day in which we celebrate the man. It seems to me -- I don't know how you feel about it. Too often we celebrate this day and don't celebrate the accomplishments this country has made through the leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King and lots -- hundreds and hundreds of other Americans. Don't you think, Karen, it's reasonable to suggest we don't give ourselves enough credit for all of the social progress that has been achieved in this country over the last four decades?
TUMULTY: Well, certainly the whole Martin Luther King holiday is about our values, and in some ways it's fitting that it should happened during inaugural week. It's the two bookends of the week. One is a chance to reflect on our values and look backward, and of course inauguration is all about looking forward.
DOBBS: But my question, really, Karen was do you think we give ourselves sufficient credit for all the things that have accomplished over the past four decades. It seems we do, as you put it, spend this week bracketed between an inauguration and Martin Luther King Day, if you would, but we don't bracket ourselves so much between what life was like in this country in 1960 and what life is like today. TUMULTY: Well, that is the whole reason we have holidays such as this one, and as -- you know, what it does, certainly in the media, it brings up a lot of stories about the progress that has been made.
DOBBS: Yes Ron. Go ahead.
BROWNSTEIN: I was going to say, you know, William Faulkner said in the civil rights era said you cannot legislate what is in men's hearts. In fact you could legislate how people behave and we have made a lot of progress in race relations and so forth in the last 40 years, but the nature of American society is to be dissatisfied and hope to do better. And we are still looking at a lot of differential outcomes ...
DOBBS: See, I disagree with you, I don't think it is the nature of American society to be dissatisfied. I think it's the nature of American society to be aspirational to want more for ourselves and their children.
BROWNSTEIN: I don't disagree with that. I think I agree. Maybe the place we can agree is says the nature of American society is to believe we always can do better. And I think for ourselves, our families and as a country, I think when we look at where we are, we've come a long way, but there's a lot to do to really ensure that all Americans have the opportunity to be all they can be.
SCHNEIDER: I grew up in the segregated South. The answer to your question is yes. There's been an enormous and remarkable social progress. When I was growing up, colored, as they were called then, and white couldn't go to the same movie theaters, had to sit on opposite sides of the ferry boat. When you went to a doctor's office it was white on one side, colored on the other side. It was amazing, it was remarkable and it was pernicious, and it was overthrown, an entire, what was then regarded as an ancient and embedded system was overthrown with I think a minimum of violence.
We have to stop and say this was a remarkable achievement. And when I explain, as I sometimes do, to young people and students what life was like then, you know, they don't believe it, they say that's ridiculous. It was never like that. You know what? They're wrong, it was.
DOBBS: And what it's like today, when you look at statistics and merely statistics, to look at the number of blacks who were achieving a four-year college degrees in 1960 versus today, to look at the number of minorities in our law schools, our business schools and our medical schools. We have a long ways to go, there is no question, but it seems that this would be an appropriate day for all of us to celebrate the accomplishments that this great nation has achieved over the course of the past four decades. I want to say thanks to each of you for being here on Martin Luther King Day and helping us celebrate some of those achievements thank you very much Karen Tumulty, Ron Brownstein, Bill Schneider.
TUMULTY: Thanks Lou. DOBBS: Tonight's thought is that of Martin Luther King Jr. on the day in which we celebrate his life and the accomplishments of this country.
"If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live."
A reminder now to vote in our poll tonight - Do you believe we give ourselves enough credit for the social progress we've made over the past 40 years, thanks in part to the work of Martin Luther King and others, of course? Yes or no, cast your vote at loudobbs.com. We'll have the results in just a few minutes.
Also, stunning new pictures from Saturn's largest moon, a leading astrophysicist joins me next, he calls the images jaw-dropping. Let me try that again. Jaw-dropping. And their impact, simply stunning. He joins us next, Charles Liu. Stay with us.
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DOBBS: More dazzling new color pictures of Saturn's moon Titan. They're nothing short of extraordinary, these images taken by the Huygens probe. It shows shades of orange on Titan's sky and on its surface. The pictures and the other data are revealing what scientists are saying what are exciting new details about what's long been one of the most fascinating places, one of the most fascinating satellites, moons. Joining me is astrophysicist Charles Liu, from the National Museum of Natural History. Charles, it's great when we have an exciting discovery to talk about like this.
CHARLES LIU, ASTROPHYSICIST: Always a pleasure.
DOBBS: What's your reaction?
LIU: When I first saw the pictures on Friday, my heart skipped a beat. This is as good as we all could have hoped for. My planetary scientist colleagues have been waiting for decades for this, and it did not disappoint.
DOBBS: The idea that we can infer, at least from the data, and from the images that we're talking about moisture that could have risen to the level of a sea ...
LIU: Absolutely.
DOBBS: ... how do we make that assessment from this distance with these images, no matter how wonderful and just extraordinary? How do we come to that inference?
LIU: Here's what we have to do. First we realize that the surface conditions are completely different from here on earth. It's 300 degrees below zero Fahrenheit almost there, so ice is solid as granite. So anything that flows there would be chemically, like liquid natural gas or something. So we understand from our chemistry here on earth what kinds of things behave what ways at those temperatures and under those pressure conditions. And when we go down and take a look, we see things that look almost like shorelines or riverbeds or creeks, and we must infer from that if chemistry is correct at all, that there must have been something flowing or having flown, or this kind of texture or dynamism is so exciting.
DOBBS: There any sense, any basis to deduce as we're looking at these animations of the Huygens probe, to deduce this is recent in any way?
LIU: It's hard to know exactly how long ago it was, but there's so much detail to it, there is so much sort of evidence that things have moved recently, that we really think this was something that couldn't have happened in the ancient, ancient past. We don't know if it happened yesterday, but we certainly notice there's been a lot going on the surface of Titan over the years. It's very exciting.
DOBBS: And over the course of that time, and from the time of -- let's go with the cosmologist's big-bang theory and accept it as if it were absolute truth and fact ...
LIU: It's only a theory.
DOBBS: ... the fact that these conditions -- Are we assuming there were volcanic conditions, then extraterrestrial bombardment? Asteroids? Considerably different physical environmental condition on Titan at one point or another?
LIU: It's hard to know. We're still speculating a lot of times. Titan is a billion miles away from the sun roughly. That's so much further out than we are at Earth only 93 million miles away. It's hard to know how much hotter or colder it might have been in the past. What we do know is under the conditions Titan is in right now, if those conditions lasted a fairly long time, then there's enough activity yet also stability there on titan that maybe some of the early signs of organic chemicals, sugars or alcohols may have combined to form proteins, amino acids. We don't know. It's very, very exciting.
DOBBS: What I do know is I look at those images and think about the success of this probe reaching all the way out to the edges of the solar system and sending back this amazing amount of information and imagery. What a world we live in, and what geniuses we have the pleasure to live with. Thank you very much.
LIU: It's inspiring.
DOBBS: Charles Liu, thank you.
LIU: Thank you.
DOBBS: Still ahead, we'll have the results of our poll and a preview of what's ahead tomorrow. Stay with us.
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DOBBS: A split result on our poll tonight. Thanks for being with us. Please join us here tomorrow. Good night from New York. ANDERSON COOPER 360 is next.
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