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Amanpour
Democrats Claim Victory Over Kentucky And Virginia; Gender Gap In Election Voters; Life In Kashmir Becomes A Complete Standstill; Iltija Mufti, Daughter Of Mehbooba Mufti, Former Chief Minister Of Kashmir, Is Interviewed About Kashmir; India's Crackdown In Kashmir; Reflecting On The Internet's First Pioneering Steps. Aired 1-2p ET
Aired November 06, 2019 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[13:00:00]
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST: Hello, everyone, and welcome to AMANPOUR. Here's what's coming up.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. ANDY BESHEAR (D-KY): Tonight, voters in Kentucky sent a message loud and clear for everyone to hear.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: As Democrats surprise with big wins in Virginia and Kentucky, should President Trump be worried? We talk to the experts in critical 2020
states.
Plus, as India strips away Kashmir's autonomy, the daughter of the detained former leader joins us.
And --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VINT CERF, VICE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF INTERNET EVANGELIST, GOOGLE: If we end up with sovereignty inhibiting our ability to communicate freely, we will
lose a lot of the benefits that we've seen are possible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: The founding fathers of the internet on modern threats facing the Web.
Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Christiane Amanpour in London.
The impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump finally goes public next week and hearings will begin on Capitol Hill. Gathering momentum as
Trump suffers a major blow in several statewide elections.
Democrats have taken control of the Virginia State House for the first time in decades. And after a tight election, Democrat Andy Beshear is declaring
victory as governor of the deep red State of Kentucky. A rice the president was called on to deliver for the Republican incumbent. As an
11th hour rally in the state, he called on voters to make it about him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: If you lose, it sends a really bad message. It just sends it bad. And they will build it up. Here's a story, if you
win, they're going to make it like ho hum. And if you lose, they're going to say, Trump suffered the greatest defeat in the history of the world.
This was the greatest. You can't let that happen to me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: Well, it did happen. Now, how much can be read, though, into these results as bellwethers for 2020? To answer that, I'm joined by Scott
Jennings, a Republican campaign consultant who has worked with President George Bush and U.S. Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell. Joining us
from Louisville, Kentucky. And John Nichols, a political columnist for "The Nation," he has been watching these results closely from Madison,
Wisconsin.
Gentlemen, let us get straight to it then. Everybody wants to know what does it mean for 2020? Let me ask you, Scott Jennings, since it looks
like, at least, in these two states, you know, the Democrats had a good night.
SCOTT JENNINGS, FORMER ADVISER TO U.S. SENATE MITCH MCCONNEL: Yes. In Virginia, they certainly did have a good night. Virginia has been trending
blue. And so, I wasn't surprised to see the Democrats have a nice night there.
Over in Kentucky, I think the result is a little harder to understand, unless you've been living here, like we have for the last four years under
Governor Matt Bevin. Republicans have had a lot of success over the last few years in Kentucky, and that included winning the governor's race in
2015.
But Matt Bevin had become an extremely unpopular governor, and not necessarily because of his policies or the Republican brand, but because of
his style. He picked a fight with the public-school teachers in Kentucky, and it really caught up with him on election night.
We had several other races on the ballot for attorney general and secretary of state, by the way, which were held by Democrats that Republicans
flipped. In fact, every race on the ballot went Republican in Kentucky except for governor. So, we had some unique candidate problems here but
overall, the Republican brand in Kentucky was perfectly fine. The rest of the ticket ran about 10 points ahead of Matt Bevin, in fact.
AMANPOUR: Well, before I turn to John, let me just ask you about the Trump effect because, obviously, we did play that soundbite and it's gone all
over the place. It's a famous one, you know, "You can't let it happen to me," and it did. What does that mean for his stickiness and his sticking
power when it comes to, you know, helping a candidate because it didn't work with this -- in this case?
JENNINGS: Yes, it did not work for Matt Bevin. I would say that it worked for the attorney general, Daniel Cameron, the Republican who flipped the
attorney general's office from Democrat to Republican, was also solidly embraced by Donald Trump, endorsed by Donald Trump. Brought up onto the
stage at the rally by Donald Trump. And Daniel Cameron got a 58 percent of the vote.
So, I don't think it says a lot, honestly. Bevin was way down, all year long. I never, frankly, saw a poll, internal or external, that had Matt
Bevin ahead. He was way down all year. I do think the president's effect, Christiane, was to help boost overall turn out. And we did see Republican
turn out for the rest of the ticket go up. It just didn't translate for Bevin.
So, this was a case of having one bad apple in a bunch. But fortunately for the Republicans, one bad apple didn't spoil the whole bunch.
AMANPOUR: OK. So, to you the, John Nichols, writing for "The Nation" and, you know, you've been watching all this very carefully from the very key
State of Wisconsin. It -- you know, you had predicted or others had predicted that there was going to be a blue wave and it didn't really turn
out like that.
Obviously, Virginia, as we've discussed, was significant.
[13:05:00]
But one flip in Kentucky and in, you know, some of the others that they stayed Republican. How do you see it for the Democrats who want to make
hay out of this?
JOHN NICHOLS, CORRESPONDENT, THE NATION: Well, the Democrats will make hay and Republicans will make excuses.
And here is what we have that is important to understand. The president of the United States will, unless he is impeached and removed from office, be
leading the ticket in 2020. His promise to Republicans who are in difficult races is that he'll be able to help them. Well, Matt Bevin was
in a difficult race. Everything Scott said is true.
And so, the decision was made to focus that race nationally to bring the president in to make an all-in and very strong appeal on behalf of a vote
for Matt Bevin as a way to sustain and support Donald Trump. It didn't work.
And it's important to understand that in Kentucky in that governor's race, you saw roughly a 10-point shift to the Democrats. In Mississippi, where
the Republican won the governor's race, you saw a 13-point shift to the Democrats. It wasn't enough to deliver the state but it was a 13-point
shift. In Virginia you saw flipping of the state General Assembly and the state Senate for now full Democratic control of the state. Again, a
significant shift.
In the Philadelphia suburbs, a traditionally Republican area. Delaware County you saw a major shift to the Democrats. In Indianapolis, Indiana
and surrounding area saw a significant shift in suburban areas to the Democrats. In Mike Pence's hometown of Columbus, Indiana, I believe it is,
you saw Democrats take the city council for the first time in decades.
As I look around the country, I understand why Republicans might want to find a whole bunch of, you know, indicators that weren't so bad for them.
I think this was a significant election. I think it sent a signal that impeachment, an issue that many Democrats and a lot of Republicans said
would be a third rail that it would be very, very damaging for the Democrats to bring up impeachment. That is not the case. In fact, quite
the opposite. It looks like in the midst of this impeachment moment, far from damaging the Democrats, they had a very good night.
AMANPOUR: So, would you -- I mean, you said you had seen indicators of a blue wave and we kind of have said just now that it wasn't a blue wave. I
mean, do you think it was or not then?
NICHOLS: Of course, it was. You know, look, we have to be honest about what happened here. The fact of the matter is that in the very, very red
Republican State of Kentucky, the governorship flipped. That's a big deal. In the very, very red state of Mississippi, the Democrat got to 47 percent
of the vote, closing the gap dramatically. It didn't win but did very well.
In what was traditionally a swing state, although, I agree with Scott, trending much more Democratic Virginia, you saw a trifecta win. A great
big win for the Democrats. It's going to be very, very definitional as regards redistricting.
But I look all around the country. And when I look around the country, it's in these suburban races around Philadelphia, around Indianapolis, in
other places around the country where the Democrats just did very, very well last night. And the one takeaway I give here is to suggest that I
don't necessarily think that impeachment as a -- you know, it's going to be such a focus over the next few weeks, next few months, that impeachment
necessarily will define everything about 2020.
But what I do think is that this election tells us that we really ought to rethink how we talk about it as an issue. And it's very clear that in some
of these red states where Trump probably will win, if he's on the ballot, in 2020, it is possible to, as a Democrat, make a distinction between the
federal race, the presidential race, and what you're doing at the state level.
One really important thing I would point out, if you look at Andy Beshear in Kentucky is that he ran a race that is very instructive for Democrats
going toward 2020. He ran his numbers up big in Louisville. He had major progress in the suburbs, South of Cincinnati, and he won more than a dozen
rural counties that Donald Trump had won in 2016.
AMANPOUR: OK.
NICHOLS: That means people can actually start to split their ballot. And one important thing, take a look at Elliott County in Eastern Kentucky.
That county gave Trump a 40-point win in 2016. Last night it gave Andy Beshear, the Democrat, a 20-point. That's a huge shift.
AMANPOUR: Well, let me ask Scott Jennings then because we've been talking -- at least John has been talking a lot about the sort of suburban issue.
[13:10:00]
And you yourself, Scott, have also talked about how rural, urban, suburban is going to be a big deal now and in the 2020 general election. So, tell
us a little bit because some of these results last night are -- you know, they keep with the trend of what is happening in the move to, you know,
suburban voters and where they're moving from this time last season, last, you know, 2016.
JENNINGS: Well, I'll start with a point of agreement with my fellow panelist. I do think suburban areas have been weakness area for
Republicans. We saw it in the 2018 midterm and there were a few suburban counties in Kentucky, just outside of Cincinnati, Warren County, Bowling
Green, which is sort of a suburb of Nashville these days that trended toward the Democrats in this election.
Where Andy Beshear really won the race was running up the score in urban areas, Louisville and Lexington. He won by unheard of margins in those two
areas, which are the two biggest cities in Kentucky. And so, the trick for Democrats in Kentucky is try to run up the score in the urban areas and
hope you don't get swamped in the rural areas, and Beshear was able to do that.
By the way, there were 1.4 million votes cast and he only won by 5,000 votes despite running up those huge margins. In those same areas where the
Democrat, Beshear, made gains against Bevin, Republicans running in every other race on the ballot actually outperformed the 2015 performance and, in
fact, flipped two offices. So, those same counties where Beshear was doing well, people were voting Republican in five other races, which means they
weren't going in and punishing the Republican party, they were punishing only Matt Bevin.
So, I think it's easy to overread what happened to Bevin when you consider that voters were also choosing Republicans for so many other offices. But
it is true. If you look at Virginia, you look at the Delaware County example, Republicans do have concerns about what's happening in the
suburbs, we have concentrations of voters with college degrees.
I also think -- I don't think there was any exit polling in Kentucky but my suspicion is there was a huge gender gap here where men went more with
Bevin but win an overwhelmingly win against him. I bet you dollars to donuts that was true in Kentucky and that's going to be true in the
presidential next year, men sticking with Trump and women breaking away from him.
And then that rural urban divide was certainly on display and that's going to be even more exacerbated next year in the presidential contest. So,
some of what he said, I agree with. Some of what he said, I don't agree with. And it would be a folly, I think, to overread Kentucky when you
consider the individual dynamics that were driving Matt Bevin be out of office.
AMANPOUR: Yes. We don't want to get overread because we can all get ourselves into a big mess like we have done over many election cycles in
the recent past. But I am interested, Scott, in what you say about the female vote and the gender divide. Because, obviously, in 2016, a lot of
women, given President Trump's record, you know, on the woman issue, was surprised that such a huge number of women voted for President Trump and
were very key to his victory.
But you're saying that that's a possible shift this time around.
JENNINGS: Oh, look, if you look at the national polling on President Trump, and I saw quite a bit of polling throughout this election cycle in
Kentucky, I mean, there is a clear massive gender gap that is even bigger than it was back in 2016. You've got male voters in the United States
getting Trump, you know, fairly high marks, comparatively speaking, and female voters just pulling away from him, and that cuts across
socioeconomic boundaries, it cuts across education boundaries. You just have men going one way and women going another.
And so, you know, if you're running a national campaign, you know, there are lots of female voters in every single state and it's exceedingly
difficult to win in those states if female voters continue to pull away from you.
So, if I were strategizing for the Republicans, I would be heavily focused on the suburban areas, trying to claw those areas back by probably talking
about the economy and then doing anything I can do to try to restore some trust with female voters in the United States because it's not healthy for
a party to have such a gender gap, in my opinion. And we've seen one opening up here. And if we're not careful, it will start to affect other
Republican campaigns.
It did not in Kentucky. In fact, in Kentucky last night, the absolute top vote getter of all people running, the state treasurer, Allison Ball, got
850,000 votes. A female Republican. One of the youngest elected officials statewide in the country. And she was our leading vote getter. And our
second leading vote getter is a 33-year-old African-American, a young man named Daniel Cameron.
So, we actually had a young diverse ticket for the Republicans. And those problems we've been discussing didn't hurt them but, you know, that's not
sustainable over the long-term, which is why the party has to focus on it heading into the presidential.
AMANPOUR: So, John, and we've talked about numbers and predictions and, you know, sort of -- kind of, you know, the nitty-gritty of the
demographics. But what about the policy issues?
[13:15:00]
We heard from Scott, and I think most people would agree that on the issue Bevin was not good on education or on other things, people were angry with
his -- you know, with the way he behaved. But what about in Virginia, for instance, where I think the gun issue was prevalent? What big issues were
the vote getters last night?
NICHOLS: That's a terrific question. And we do see some universal messages on this. Education is a huge issue. And the interesting thing
about it is that it -- one of the ways in which we're starting to see the Democratic Party, which has had a real challenge, you know, for -- not up -
- until not that long ago in the suburbs and in a number of rural areas make some breakthroughs.
And it is -- what Scott is saying about Kentucky is absolutely true as regards, you know, a lot of dynamics there. But don't lose sight of the
fact that Bevin was in trouble overwhelmingly because of how he dealt with education issues and how he dealt with teachers. Similarly, in Virginia,
that was a huge issue. It was even a big issue in Mississippi, where, again, Jim Hood, the Democratic candidate for governor, brought the
Democrats way up number wise.
And so, I would argue that education is a very critical issue. It's one that the Trump administration has not done a good job focusing on at the
national level. It's also one where an interesting dynamic has come into play. And that is that, you know, not that long ago, Republicans were
quite outspoken in attacking teacher unions, unions that represent educators.
The fact is that now, when you look at the polling, unions are dramatically more popular and unions presenting teachers are actually much more popular.
And so, what you saw in Kentucky, what you saw in Virginia, what I think you've seen it in a number of races around the country is evidence that
when a Democratic candidate, even in a redder state, run strong on education issues, that really works.
The gun issues are more complex. There is an urban-rural divide there to some extent. But in Virginia, it's quite clear that the gun issues played
a huge role, I think, in some of those suburban races. And, you know, Scott speaks very well and wisely about the need of the Republican Party to
reach out to women. There is a lot of polling that shows that one of the places where the Republican Party is harming itself as regards outreach to
women, especially in the suburbs, is on those gun issues.
AMANPOUR: OK. So, let's now quickly bring it back to the polling that's out there. I don't know what either of you make, there's been a number of
polls, but a huge amount has been made of the latest "New York Times" poll which shows that President Trump remains highly competitive in the key
swing states, the ones that he won last time and that are very much within his grasp this time.
And I guess I'll ask you both. The interesting results that the "New York Times" said that they found was that in those states, Joe Biden would be
the most competitive and stood as a Democrat to possibly, you know, beat Trump in many of those states, four of them at least.
But interestingly, Elizabeth Warren was the least winnable against Trump and that was a combination, according to the questions of policy that was
considered to the left and sexism, the fact she was a woman. So, I want you to both to address that. Scott, what do you make of that? Quickly.
We've got about two minutes left. So, give me your best shot in about one minute.
JENNINGS: Sure. I teach a class at the Harvard Kennedy School on Monday nights and we were just analyzing, this Monday night, the results of that
poll. And so, my class was quite interested in what it had to say. And what we've stressed a lot about the American election is, you know, Donald
Trump can lose the popular vote by even more than he did last time and still win the electoral college. At the same time, he can lose some states
that he won last night and still win the electoral college.
For instance, you know, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, he can lose two out of the threat and hold everything else and still win the electoral
college. And so, people need to understand that these swing states are much, much closer. I think if he gets worse in the red states, he's still
going to win those electoral votes even if the margins are less. He's clearly going to lose the blue states by more than he did last time. It's
almost a virtual certainly the popular vote could be a wider gap.
What I see in the polling from the "New York Times," and it's all within the margin of error. But, obviously, moderate -- perceived moderate
Democrats are going to run better in swing states with industrial and rural areas than people like Elizabeth Warren.
Now, it did look to me like Bernie Sanders had a little bit more resilience but he hasn't faced the same media scrutiny, in my opinion, that Elizabeth
Warren has. But, obviously, a candidacy like Biden's, if he came make it out of the primary, presents more problems for the Republicans because they
perceive him as not being so hostage to the fringe left in the United States political spectrum.
[13:20:00]
So, we'll see if Joe Biden can ride that sort of electability argument to the nomination. I have my doubts. But there's no question. Trying to run
a more center left campaign than a fringe left campaign would give the Democrats far better chance to beat Trump than they have right now.
AMANPOUR: So, your response to that, John? Because clearly, there is a massive debate within the pool of candidates who are running right now on
the Democratic side. Should it be, you know, the moderate or should it be the, you know, total reform of the system progressives like Elizabeth
Warren? And again, one minute, if you can.
NICHOLS: Totally understand our timeframe. And, look, I think that you're correct to upfront say that sexism is an issue. But we were, just a moment
ago, talking about mobilization of women. And so, things will cut both ways. And I think that trying to write Elizabeth Warren off is -- because
she would be a second woman nominee of the Democratic Party is foolish. I think women are very mobilized and having a woman nominee could be a
beneficial factor in a lot of places.
But I will push back a little bit on some of this discussion because, yes, it's true that Biden runs very well but there's a tremendous amount of
polling that tells you that Bernie Sanders, who clearly has run to the left, does very, very well in these battle ground states.
In my State of Wisconsin, I'm talking to you from Madison, Wisconsin, Bernie Sanders and the Democratic primary in 2016 won 71 of 72 counties.
He continues to poll incredibly well. The same is true in Michigan. And so, what I think we come away from here is that what connect Sanders and
Biden is, they have both been very, very urgent in trying to talk about working class issues. I think Warren has done that to some extent as well.
But the fact of the matter is, that the 2020 race is a combination for Democrats. One, mobilization of energy against Donald Trump, just
disliking him. But, two, cracking that working-class vote, and that's a multiracial, multiethnic vote, reaching out to it with some bold, strong
messages. And the fact of the matter is, that education, wages, those issues have real possibility in rural areas.
The final thing I will just simply say as somebody who tracks a lot of this upper mid-West states is, that the fact that Andy Beshear did well in a
number of rural counties, carrying more than a dozen counties that Trump won, ought to be something they study. Because the fact is, there are
rural counties in these battle ground states that went way big for Trump in '16. Democrats do have to claw back some of their votes there. And I
think there's evidence of ways to do it focusing on education and on wage and economic issues.
AMANPOUR: Really fascinating and we really appreciate your insight, both of you. John Nichols, Scott Jennings, thank you so much for joining us
tonight.
So, as the politics continues to ramp up stateside, life is at a standstill across the world in Kashmir. The disputed territory split between three
nations was thrown into chaos when India announced it was stripping Kashmir of its special autonomous status, that was in August. And last week,
(INAUDIBLE) that takeover in India law, justifying the crack down as a move against terrorism.
India imposed a curfew and cut off the population's phone and internet connections. Some of these restrictions have been lifted, but reportedly
more than a million children are still not back in school and most of Kashmir's leaders have been detained. Among them, the former chief
minister, Mehbooba Mufti, whose daughter, Iltija, is speaking out, trying to get a near silent international community to listen. And Iltija Mufti
joins us now from New Delhi.
Welcome to the program.
ILTIJA MUFTI, DAUGHTER OF MEHBOOBA MUFTI, FORMER CHIEF MINISTER OF KASHMIR: Thank you for having me.
AMANPOUR: Itlija, let me ask you what the situation is inside Kashmir right now because it is incredibly difficult, as you know, for any
journalist, much less international journalists to get there in any kind of, you know, numbers to give us a regular look of what is going on. What
is happening to, to the best of your knowledge?
MUFTI: Like you mentioned, life has come to complete standstill. I'd say the state has dripped by a sense of fear, panic and anxiety. And this
unilateral and illegal decision of the Indian government has plunged Jammu and Kashmir into a state of complete turmoil. And there's been a consorted
agenda on behalf of the government to create fewer psychosis amongst the people, Christiane.
So, you know, people don't want to even speak up because of fear of reprisal. Boys as young eight years have been detained and they're being
tortured by army and military personnel. And I think, this is, you know, a matter of great concern not just for, you know, India and the subcontinent
but the entire international community.
AMANPOUR: Well, let's talk about that.
[13:25:00]
Because the international community has been relatively quiet about what happened. India is, obviously, a major partner for many, many nations,
from United States to Europe, to China and all over the world. And Prime Minister Modi has just won re-election. There's a significant difference
in the way the world has treated the moving Kashmir versus when President Putin annexed Crimea back in 2014.
What is it that you hope and how do you hope to be able to mobilize some kind of international response to what's happened?
MUFTI: Well, first of all, the Indian government has spread a lot of misinformation about the abrogation of Article 370. I would say the status
in Kashmir now is -- they are treating Jammu and Kashmir like a colony and they're seeing it -- you know, it has a very imperial role in the state
now.
And what I expect from the international community is to look beyond the trappings of trade and geopolitics. Now, I know India serves as a very
lucrative market in terms of good services and even weapons, but it's the world leaders today to decide if, you know, the values that they hold
close, if they want to uphold those values or if they'd rather side with, you know, trappings of, you know, trade and, you know, things like that.
But we need someone to stand up for us because what the Indian government has done, essentially, is that they've smuggled the (INAUDIBLE) of 8
million Kashmiris, Christiane, they're reeling under darkness and there's complete fear in the state right now.
AMANPOUR: You mentioned the U.N. resolution, that's obviously the one that calls Kashmir a disputed territory and that should be resolved amongst
parties rather than in a unilateral manner.
But let me ask you about your mother. As I mentioned, the former chief minister, who at one point, had been in coalition with Prime Minister
Modi's BJP Party and then he pulled support from that. And now, what is her situation? Is she detained? So many of the Kashmiri political leaders
have been detained. What is her situation? Do you fear for her safety?
MUFTI: Yes, I have concerns about her wellbeing. And I think that the Indian government has intentionally obliterated the ground between pro-
India politicians and separatists. And, you know, by doing this, they've obviously put pro-India, you know, politicians in a lot of danger.
Now, I've expressed concerns about the wellbeing of my mother. And yesterday, I tweeted out a letter which I sent to the administration for my
-- you know, on my mother's behalf and I've expressed apprehensions about her health and how the Indian government has responded is by curtailing my
visits to see my mother.
And clearly, there -- you know, this is some kind of a witch hunt and a vendetta and they're being very vindictive and it's completely unfair. To
this day, three months after she was taken away from, you know, her family, I don't understand on what grounds has she been detained because they think
that she's going to articulate the pain of her people. Is that a crime? Is it a crime to articulate the pain of Kashmiris, how we feel? Because
last I checked, this was very much a constitutional democracy. This doesn't feel like a constitutional democracy anymore.
AMANPOUR: Well, it's interesting you say that, of course, because India always touts itself as the world's biggest democracy in terms of most
populous. And clearly, as you say, these, you know, credentials are being questioned or under the microscope now. Where is your mother? You say
she's been taken away from her family. Where is she?
MUFTI: So, they decided to keeper in in a government-owned house that's been declared as a sub jail and she's been kept in solitary confinement,
Christiane. And I don't feel there was the need to take her away from us because, anyways, the state is under, you know, a complete curfew and it's
an unprecedented siege, the lacks of troops that are patrolling the streets of Kashmir and they have just taken her to break her spirit, to break her
emotionally and to -- you know, she's been told that if she wants to be released, she has to sign this illegal bond which basically says that if
she -- her release is dependent on signing this bond. And once she signs the bond, she can't even utter a word and she cannot, you know, hold public
meetings, rallies or even talk to people or the media itself.
AMANPOUR: So, let's just recap what's happened. You know, since August, the 8 million strong population of Kashmir has been under this curfew.
There have been roadblocks. There have been military industry, as we said, political leaders detained.
[13:30:00]
And, of course, children not in school and phone and internet cut. How much of that has been changed? We said some of these restrictions are
being lifted. How much of those specific restrictions are still in place?
MUFTI: Well, you know, Christiane, I've spent a lot of time in Kashmir in the past three months since this has happened. I have gone back and forth.
I've shuttled between Srinagar, and Delhi, and Chennai.
And I have to tell you, our lives are out of -- or we're in dystopia. There's massive Sutherlands. Every time you make call on landlines, on
cell phones, it's recorded by the Indian Intelligence Agencies.
Now, they've partially restored mobile phones and only postpaid mobile phones. And unfortunately, most Kashmiris only use prepaid. Internet is
still down. Broadband is still down.
And because of this communication lockdown, our state economy has suffered losses close to $1.4 billion. And if this was really for development, I'd
say they're just doing it in the government development.
What they want to do is Annex Kashmir. They've illegally Annex Kashmir. And that's how Kashmiris see. They see India as an illegal military
occupational force in Kashmir.
And whenever they talk about restrictions, they're lying. I just told you about mobile phones. The entire city, you know, is locked with wires,
barricades, metallic barricades, bunkers.
It's like a main vegetation of the city and the configuration of these wires is changed every two hours. And it seems like they've taken Israeli
helping not only Sutherlands but to map the city and to really I'd say oppress the people and to push them to a point where (inaudible) settles in
and this is essentially a war of attrition against Kashmiri people.
I don't know if you know but Kashmiris are observing a very strict civil disobedience peaceful movement. Their shops are shut. They're not sending
their kids to school.
But for the Indian government, they find themselves tied up in knots. Their approach towards post-aggregation in application 370 has been
(inaudible). So they don't know how to deal with the situation. They find themselves at wits end and they're just waiting for (inaudible) to set in
so the Kashmiris give up and they can go on repressing us.
AMANPOUR: Well, obviously, we have over and again requested response from the Indian government and we've been unsuccessful so far. We'll continue
to try to get them to talk to us about this situation.
But, as you mentioned, one of the reasons that they gave publicly was to bring more economic development, as you just said, also, to tamp down
violence. Now, I spoke to the Pakistan Prime Minister, Imran Khan, during the United Nations General Assembly last month, or actually the end of
September. And he was concerned about what might happen once the curfew was lifted. Let me just play this little bit of the interview that we had
together.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
IMRAN KHAN, PAKISTANI PRIME MINISTER: President Trump, head of the most powerful country in the world, he's best placed to do something about this.
At the moment, he's saying I want to help but Modi doesn't want. Why doesn't Modi want it?
Because the moment this becomes internationalized, other countries come in and mediate. They all realize that the Kashmiris won't deny their right
for self-extermination. And they will know what the human right abuses which are going on in Kashmir.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: So he also said that, you know, he was afraid that if Kashmiris pushed back against the Indians, there might be, in the words of the Prime
Minister Khan, a massacre. But what do you make of his solution of sorts that President Trump, for instance, should intervene with his ally,
President Modi, and try to mediate? What do you see is the role for the international community, whether it's the president of the United States,
the United Nations, whoever it might be?
MUFTI: I think, first of all, what the international community needs to do urgently is to stop seeing Jammu Kashmir through the prism of, you know,
the bigger Pakistani-Indian rivalry that's existed for decades. They have to see it through the eyes of an average Kashmiri, Christiane, who has
suffered immensely in the past three decades.
And I would say there's been a fragile sense of peace. And the reason why this has existed is because even the Indian government hasn't -- they've
legitimized oppression. They're legitimized it.
And they have unleashed all kinds of, you know, repression against Kashmiri people. And I really think that it's time for the international community
to see this as a problem through the eyes of an average Kashmiri, instead of just seeing it through Pakistan fermenting terrorism or India. They
really need to empathize with Kashmiri people and see that they're suffering every day.
[13:35:00]
And that's what I would expect from them. I mean India keeps using Pakistan as a stick to beat Kashmiris up but the truth of the matter is
that the leadership of Jammu Kashmir exceeded to a secular and democratic India. India keeps deriding Pakistan but we're hurtling towards an
authoritarian regime.
And I would say it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that India is becoming a Hindu Pakistan. Christiane, this is not the country that I was
born and raised in. There is -- it's becoming, it's turning into a cesspool of bigotry, of selective prosecution or the hatred against
minorities. And this is not the country that I grew up in.
AMANPOUR: You know at the moment, there has been some pushback to this Indian presence by the Militants, the Separatists Militants and there was
one of the largest killings of civilians just last week. Let me ask you -- and this has been going on for a long time.
But let me ask you, you obviously have come out of Kashmir to speak to us from New Delhi. You couldn't have done it from inside Kashmir.
Are you concerned for your own safety given that you're speaking out in this way right there in the capital of India?
MUFTI: Well, Christiane, I have to -- I'm going to say this on record that I've received indirect threats from the Indian government and I shared a
note with your producer. I'm not sure if you can put it up on your screen.
But when they took my mother, we used to communicate with each other and used to scribble notes to each other whenever we could. And one of the
first notes that she wrote to me was that they took an undertaking from her that she would not access any kind of social media and she basically
insinuated that if I used her social media, they would arrest me and arrest me on charges of impersonation, which is just incredulous. It's incredibly
stupid when you think of it.
I've also received little threats from people who run BJPs. And they're all kinds of threats like I deserved to be raped and graphic details about
how I deserve to be raped and how I'm going to be shot dead.
So yes, I'm scared for my life but, Christiane, I'm here to speak truth to power and I will keep doing it. And I'll keep doing it even if I'm the
last woman standing. It's something that's not going to stop me.
AMANPOUR: Iltija Mufti, thank you very much for joining us on this very important issue.
As we mentioned, the people of Kashmir have been living under that communication blackout now since August. And all around the world, the
Internet, of course, is vital to the way we stay in touch.
Last month marked the 50th anniversary of this creation with the celebration on the UCLA Campus where it all began. Professor Leonard
Kleinrock and his former student, Vint Cerf, now the vice president of Google, are known as the founding fathers of the Internet after they
pioneered the technology that underpins it.
Correspondent Miles O'Brien asked them to reflect on those early days and what they might do over knowing everything that we all now know.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Fifty years ago, on this campus, not far from here, you were in the midst of something very significant. Just lay
out what happened for people.
LEONARD KLEINROCK, DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR, UCLA COMPUTER SCIENCE DEPARTMENT: So the idea of this network were to allow people in one
computer to log on to a machine far away and use that machine as if they were a local user. So we created the network to allow them to connect.
And on October 29th, 1969, we had two computers connected to this network. So we could test that process. Sit at one, log on to the other. So all we
wanted to do was to log in.
Now, we're getting ready to do this but now wait a minute, this is a new technology. How we do know it's working?
So the two programmers at both ends of the network, they had a telephone connection just to make sure it's going to work. To log in, you type L-O-G
and that machine at the other end is smart enough to type the (inaudible).
Took Charlie, type the L. Said get the L? Got the L. Type the O, get the O, got the O. Type the G, got the G, crash.
It broken down. So the first message ever on the Internet was Lo. As in lo and behold.
O'BRIEN: So you don't get any credit for thinking of that but it was pretty good --
KLEINROCK: Yes. It was accidental. We weren't smart like Armstrong, giant leap for mankind. Those guys understood your world, the press, the
media. We just -- we didn't even have a camera available.
O'BRIEN: There were three people in the room. That was it. No cameras. No nothing.
KLEINROCK: Down at our end, the programmer. Down at the other end, the programmer. I walked in while this was going on. We're not a big deal.
O'BRIEN: The minute e-mail came by there, it changed very quickly.
VINT CERF, VICE PRESIDENT & CHIEF INTERNET EVANGELIST, GOOGLE: It showed up in '71. And Ray had been --a lot of us had been using a timesharing
system. You'll be able to leave messages for people on the same timesharing system.
Ray figured it out. Well, he said, you can send a file to another machine for a person on the other machine. And the question was, how did you say
we're going send this message and who to deliver it to?
And so he said, oh, well, I need some characters to separate the user part from the host where the message is supposed to go. And he looked around on
the keyboard and discovered the only character that wasn't already used by all the other operating system was the @ sign so it was perfect, user@host
and that's how e-mail got structured and it is that way today.
KLEINROCK: Once it came on, though, within a few months, it took off a 75 percent of the network traffic. And we said oh my God, this is about
people communicating and not about computers communicating. Instantly, the killer app was connecting people.
O'BRIEN: And you guys didn't necessarily see that, did you?
KLEINROCK: No. I had a vision four months before the first message articulated everything and missed that totally.
O'BRIEN: We just came off of a long summer of Apollo 50 remembrances. Your event, of course at the time, in relative of security, and yet you
could make a pretty strong argument that as it affects our daily lives, your event was much more significant.
KLEINROCK: Long-term effects, for sure. It took years, decades before it had the impact. But has a long-term life in front of it.
CERF: Well, that's because we didn't understand -- I mean, sending a person to the moon is a very clear objective. There's no question about
the drama out of all that.
The Internet today is not something that we had in our minds 50 years ago. And so it's the inverse of what happened with the Apollo program.
We started with a small capability and kept adding to it and experimenting and exploring. Until it burst on the scene in the form of the worldwide
web.
O'BRIEN: What did you guys have in your mind in those early days?
CERF: Well, we imagined it would be used simple things like file transfer, like simple communication. But really in this testing --
KLEINROCK: Remote access. As I said, machine to machine, person to machine.
CERF: Remember, Harvard was funding research and so they had a dozen universities that were pursuing computer science and artificial
intelligence. What they wanted was for rapid progress.
So they said we want all of you to share your results, your software, your computing capabilities to advance to saving the earth as quickly as you
could. So everybody was funded. So we didn't hide anything from each other.
We shared as much as we could. We were encouraged to do that.
O'BRIEN: Did you see it as a business though? I mean you're putting MCI Mail on --
CERF: Yes.
O'BRIEN: -- at that the time? RPNet then still or Internet?
CERF: No, Internet. Literally, we turned the Internet on in January 1983 and I started the MCI Mail program and MCI in December of '82.
O'BRIEN: So you were at MCI. You were the first to bring a commercial enterprise to the Internet.
CERF: I didn't --
O'BRIEN: You started this whole thing.
CERF: Well, wait, no, no, no. Don't give me too much credit.
First of all, the MCI Mail system got built in 1983 and launched. I left in 1986 to join Bob Kahn, my partner in the designing of the TCPI
protocols. And while I was working with him, I got the idea that we should allow the commercial world to use the government-sponsored backbones to
show to them that there was a business to be had.
So I got permission then, that would have been 1988, to connect the MCI Mail system to the National Science Foundation backbone which is part of
the growing Internet. That next year, in 1989, three commercial Internet services fire up.
Two years later, Tim Berners-Lee releases the World Wide Web. And two years after that, the Mosaic Browser shows up, and everybody awakens to an
Internet that looks like a magazine.
O'BRIEN: Given what we know about how the Internet has evolved, which you certainly could not have predicted 50 years ago. If it started today,
clean sheet, to build the Internet as it is today, what would it look like?
KLEINROCK: I put at least two things early on. Strong user authentication so you can prove it's you through the network. Strong file authentications
so what you send me is what you claim you sent me. It's not been altered.
And had we done that in those early days, turn it off. And slowly let it turn on as the bad things begin to happen. That would have helped.
Wouldn't have solved the problem but it certainly would have been an underlying -- it would have been built in, instead of trying to do a patch
after the fact.
CERF: So I have to -- I'm compelled to point out something. Each of you and your viewers have probably used the Internet one way or another today
to do something useful.
I have to point out despite whatever reforms you might want to argue about, this thing has had one enormous impact. And it's useful, useful and used
every single day at enormous scale.
The problems of security are solvable. The problems of abuse and behaviors, that's not a technical problem. That is the hardest one to
solve.
[13:45:00]
O'BRIEN: That's human nature. That is above your pay grade, even in the computer science lab, isn't it?
Well, here is a quick hypothetical. If you had constrained it more at the beginning, and if it was harder and there was more encryption and IDs and
password challenges, would it have been a flop?
CERF: Keep in mind that the deployment scenario did not harm the general public. It involved the collection of people who basically trusted each
other.
We're a bunch of nerds. Nobody wanted to wreck the net. We wanted to make it work.
So for a very long time during this evolution, trust was built into the system. And, frankly, trust is still built into the system. Possibly
needing additional reinforcement now, technical reinforcement and that's happening.
Technical mechanisms are being put into the net to defend against a variety of distrustful actions by some people.
O'BRIEN: You seem pretty optimistic. Are you as optimistic as that?
KLEINROCK: Not as optimistic. But remember, in those early days, the way we were funded, the way we supported our graduate students, it was a kind
of philosophy we had which I'm going to articulate in one phrase, to delegate authority to trusted parties. And there were plenty of trusted
parties.
The government funded us that way. We funded our graduate students that way. But it was based on trust.
And that trust now -- once we got to the consumer world and general public, you don't know who is out there. We assumed that initially we knew
everybody on the Internet. They're well-behaved. Once we got out there, we couldn't control that and there were bad actors.
CERF: So there are three ways to deal with this problem. The first one is to build technical means to inhibit abusive behavior and sometimes people
do that. HTPS, cryptography is one mechanism for doing that. Strong authentication is another.
The second thing you can do is deploy what I'll call post-hoc enforcement. We tell people, if we catch you doing this, there will be consequences.
That's what law enforcement is all about.
The third thing you can do is to tell people don't do that, it's wrong. And that sounds wimpy until you realize that it's like gravity. Gravity is
the weakest force in the universe but if we have a big mass, it holds people on the earth and it holds the earth and orbit around the sun.
In the social sense, if a large number of people adopt a set of norms for their society, that has a lot of social force to put people's behavior into
some sort of control.
O'BRIEN: Where we are right now, the landscape is not pretty. What happened along the way? Is it just simple as too much money, too much
profit, and there are perverse incentives in the opposite direction?
CERF: No, I think it's the fundamental problem that writing software is hard. Particularly, hard to write software that has no bugs.
And in spite of the fact, we have 80 years of experience of writing software and programmers still make mistakes. So what we need, frankly,
are better tools to discover the mistakes that we make before we release the software. Discover and implement ways of fixing the software after
it's been released, making sure that the updates come from the right places and they haven't been altered on their way.
If we don't put in those types of constraints and we will live with increasingly, say, vulnerable equipment and that has to change.
O'BRIEN: So we built this essential case of infrastructure. We rely on it in so many ways. It makes our lives better in so many ways.
But we build without any guardrails. There's not a lot of rules out there. And given what the Internet has become, it concerns about privacy and how
our lives are commoditized and sold for advertising dollars, is it time to start putting some guardrails out?
Is it time to start regulating the Internet in some fashion given the size and power of these companies?
CERF: So, first of all, I don't agree with your characterization that there are no guardrails. That's just wrong.
First of all, the Internet, as an enterprise, has a lot of different pieces to it. The protocols themselves are a form of guardrail because they
constrain the behavior of the systems.
So I would argue that there are pieces of control that are in there. I'm not disagreeing that there may be the need of additional regulation.
That is not the point. The point is it hasn't been -- it's not the wild west out there even though you might think it is.
KLEINROCK: So we have to get more constituencies engaged. For example, the users themselves are not participating in protecting themselves, not in
with good password. But demanding things of the website's service.
When is the last time Facebook asked you for your privacy policy? They haven't. They give you their privacy policy in a 20 or 30-page legal
document you can't interpret. And they say take it or leave it.
[13:50:00]
It should be and is possible where you can articulate what you want in terms of can I have your contact data base, tracking your keystrokes,
looking at your e-mail, et cetera. You identify what policy are you willing to have applied to you?
And they should present in an easy-to-understand way what they're doing, what they're asking. And then you can try a match. And if it doesn't
match, you can try to negotiate and to either come to an agreement or walk away.
But right now, you can't even do that. That's a good idea. So notice, we have our own terms of receiving service. And not only that, it's a
customized service. It's to you.
And I made the point that the website will say we can't give a customized policy to everybody. Baloney, they're already serving you ads customized
to you. They're spending that time.
CERF: So let me point out that you should go look at the Google privacy dashboard. Because we summarized all the information that we're using for
ads and we let you modulate what that privacy policy is and how it works across all of our products.
KLEINROCK: That makes you feel for Google but so many sites hide it --
CERF: I'm not -- I just want to point out that this is not an impossible problem to solve.
O'BRIEN: But can we rely on the companies to do this unilaterally, though? I mean hats off to Google for doing that. But elsewhere, we don't see
this.
CERF: Well, the incentives for doing that will come. Either companies will get regulated or they'll try to solve the problem before they get
regulated.
O'BRIEN: Are they too big?
KLEINROCK: In some ways, yes. For one thing, it does prevent the new companies bubbling up. It's an issue and it does prevent new innovation
and breakthrough technologies.
On the other hand, there are some winner take all systems here. It's kind of natural systems.
Search is an example. You go to a search engine that can crawl the most websites.
Well, how do you deal with that as a giant company? Google tells us.
CERF: So I think the real answer is that there's plenty of room for innovation. The scaling up is the side effect of the economy, the scale,
and data center construction for one thing. These are the data centers, the more efficient they could be.
So that's one of the reasons you see such large companies. But there are multiple search engines out there. And there are multiple services out
there and people are inventing new applications all the time.
O'BRIEN: So when you think about how it was formed, a government project funded by the Pentagon, purely in an academic environment, no money
motivation. And how it evolved into what it is today, there's a fair amount of irony there. Just a few comments on that evolution and that is
at all possible.
KLEINROCK: Well, the big picture is we had this wonderful system which are altruistic, scientifically driven, and suddenly it became a place where you
could buy detergent. And that's been a disappointment.
We could have predicted that have we thought about it. But it is where we are now. And the question is how do we deal with this dark side that we're
facing?
Now, certainly it delivers lots of good. But it is a dark side that is emerging and it's getting serious with the nation states, organized crime,
and the extremist. And it's no longer a juvenile behaving badly. It's some serious players trying to do damage for a variety of reasons.
O'BRIEN: Want to add to that?
CERF: So first of all, I'm much more optimistic than Len is. And here's why.
First of all, a lot of the problems that are showing up are not technical problems. The problems have to do with human behavior and the way you deal
with those is not necessarily technical.
People need to be thinking a lot more about what they're seeing and hearing. Not just on the Internet but in every other medium.
Critical thinking is important. People are not doing enough of it. We need to help them with that.
But I also feel I have to point out, as I think about the products and services that come out of Google. Think about the machine translation
capability, think about the voice understanding capability, think about self-driving cars. I just took a drive in one of them the other day.
Think about Google Maps. Think about all those applications and think about the amount of scientific data that is being exchanged all the time.
Simulations and calculations that are being done, racing ahead. I see the Internet as, still, an extremely positive element in our society.
O'BRIEN: That's the Internet we want. That's not the Internet China wants.
KLEINROCK: That's right.
O'BRIEN: So as we move forward, do we end up with two versions of the Internet? Does the controlled Internet win over what you just described?
Where will it go?
KLEINROCK: I'm concerned not just two Internets but multiple nations putting boundaries around, you know, dozens. If that happens, it's a
serious blow to what we call the open exchanging Internet.
You can't get a certain information. You can't reach certain people. And that would be a very serious blow.
[13:55:00]
And how we recover from that might be very difficult. So it would take international groups to get together and agree and we know how hard that
is.
CERF: Yes. I'm still of the belief that we can build and maintain a common system that works for everybody. But it is absolutely true that
some of the governments, especially authoritarian ones, want to control what people have access to because they want them to not know about what is
going on, either inside the country or outside the country.
That's a real problem. Some people call it the splinter net. And if that actually happens, if we end up with sovereignty inhibiting our ability to
communicate freely, we will lose a lot of the benefits that we've seen and are possible with the Internet today.
O'BRIEN: Thank you very much for your time. And happy anniversary. Congratulations.
KLEINROCK: Thank you very much.
AMANPOUR: And that's an important warning of how nations cracking down on the Internet could actually hit us all.
But that is it for now. Remember, you can always listen to our podcast, see us online at amanpour.com, and you can follow me on Instagram and
Twitter.
Thank you for watching and goodbye from London.
END
