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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Sharon: Talks can Begin Before All the Violence Ends; Andrea Yates Describes Murders on Videotape

Aired March 08, 2002 - 22:00   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.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: And at one point I said, we don't hype things at NEWSNIGHT. You know that. Well, no sooner had I hit the send button than one of our favorite viewers wrote back to say, "liar, liar, liar, remember Tommy Franks." Point taken. We hyped it to death.

So now we'll hype Monday, which is going to be a great program. I believe that. Much of this week has been spend working on it. It's been a very powerful experience. On the Sunday after the attacks, six months ago, I flew over the Trade Center site. In those days, it wasn't called Ground Zero yet. The pictures that day took your breath away and broke your heart.

Yesterday, we got back into a Coast Guard helicopter and made the same flight again, and for all that has changed at Ground Zero, and it's changed a lot, the feelings of sorrow and anger have not changed one bit.

There will also be a piece that's put together by producer Ted Winner about two people who are captured in two separate and memorable still photos that day. What has happened to those people, their lives? As I was tinkering with the script this afternoon, I thought six months is not a very long time. The memories for these two people captured in those two shots are so stark still.

And then there are the men of Engine Company 205, Ladder 118, in Brooklyn. We sat with them this afternoon in their firehouse, a firehouse that lost eight heroes that day. To them, it could have been yesterday. They were wonderful, serious and sad at times, funny and honest. So that's the hype. Watch Monday's program.

As for tonight, and I know those of you who watched last night are thinking exactly the same thing, we'll keep the lights on for you. On to the day's news we go, and we begin in the Middle East, the crisis there intensifying all week in Israel. Sheila MacVicar has been covering the story for us, and she starts the whip this evening. Sheila, a headline from there.

SHEILA MACVICAR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: After the bloodiest single day in the 17-months of uprising, after more harsh words from the U.S. administration, the beginnings of a glimmer towards peace. Prime Minister Sharon says he will talk about a cease-fire before there's an end to the violence. BROWN: Sheila, thank you, back to you shortly. The other major story of the week, of course, Operation Anaconda, and Martin Savidge has been with us all week on that from Bagram Air Base. Marty, the headline tonight.

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good evening to you, Aaron. Bad weather still having a negative impact on Operation Anaconda. Despite that though, it appears that ground forces, once it clears, may be making preparations to make the final push on al Qaeda and Taliban forces.

BROWN: Marty, back to you very quickly. Also today an important day in the trial of Andrea Yates. Gary Tuchman in Houston for the story. Gary, a headline from you please.

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, today an anguished jury watched and listened to Andrea Yates talk on videotape to a medical witness for the prosecution, and that witness says the dramatic tape helps prove that Andrea Yates knew right from wrong when she killed her five children.

BROWN: Gary, thanks a lot. We're back with all of you shortly. It's a Friday night, as usual around here, some odds and ends. One viewer said, "leftovers again?" No, this is all very fresh stuff. A really crucial part of making the War on Terrorism happen, getting the troops the supplies they need to fight it. Easier said than done, as you'll see in a piece that we put together for tonight.

The questions of racial profiling in those scary times after a national crisis, we're not talking about September 11 here but Pearl Harbor, the fate of Japanese-Americans back then, and what it says about today.

And Jeff Greenfield joins us to try and sell you a Ginsu knife. OK, maybe it will just seem that way, or as the copywriters say, you won't believe what this story will do for your Friday night, all for the low, low time commitment of about two and a half minutes. But wait, there's more.

We begin with the war, the one in the Middle East, and at least the first slivers of hope to come out of it, as Sheila mentioned. It's hard to even say that on a day that saw nearly four dozen people killed, more than any other single day so far. But today, we also saw some pretty strong pressure on Israel again from the U.S. State Department, and a major concession from the Prime Minister of Israel, in advance of the visit from the U.S. envoy to the region, Anthony Zinni. He is due to arrive next week.

But this being the Middle East, of course, a lot could happen between now and then, and probably is happening now. We go back to CNN's Sheila MacVicar.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MACVICAR (voice over): If General Zinni were here on his peace mission today, this is what he would find, Israeli tanks in the West Bank, heading for Bethlehem, helicopters gun ships searching for targets, a firefight in a Palestinian refugee camp in the Gaza Strip.

Israeli commanders say they can and will go anywhere. Palestinian militants say they will continue their attacks, even if negotiations resume. As Israel's Prime Minister pursues this war with increasing ferocity, the toll of dead and wounded mounts by the hour.

On Thursday night, Israeli forces killed a senior Palestinian security chief. He bled to death after being shot in his car. The Palestinians say this death was an assassination. The Israelis claim they had not intended to hit the general.

Israel's military strategy is costing civilian lives too. In the West Bank city of Tulkam, Israeli forces have used their tanks to surround the city, stopping gunmen and civilians. A 10-year-old boy died in this town, hit by an Israeli tank shell. The fighting is reported to be fierce.

And the violence and death caused by Palestinians during the past 24 hours includes this, a lone gunman, a Hamas militant but a hole in the fence of a Jewish settlement in Gaza on Thursday night, walked through a brightly-lit study hall and opened fire. He had an automatic weapon and grenades. Five young Israeli settlers died, more than 20 were wounded. Ten others were wounded by a suicide bomber in a settlement on the West Bank.

And there could have been more deaths, this time in Jerusalem, had a waiter not noticed a would-be suicide bomber wearing a heavy jacket on a hot day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MACVICAR (on camera): Another day, another night, Aaron, and more than 50 people dead. No people needed a peacemaker more than these, but it will be days before General Zinni gets here, and Israel is being very strongly urged to begin those cease-fire talks now. Aaron.

BROWN: All right, let's talk more about what the Prime Minister said. He had been saying all along, there will be no discussion of peace until the violence stops and then you could fill in the blank for how many days. It seemed to change a bit here and there. Why the change of heart?

MACVICAR: Well, the prime Minister himself said last night on Israeli television, this situation is terrible and we have to do something. It is clear, he said, that it is not possible to get a cease-fire, and what the Prime Minister been previously been demanding, absolute quiet for seven days.

Now it is also important to note here that the Prime Minister has reserved the right to respond if there are attacks. But what this does in large measure is take a veto out of the hands of Palestinian militants, who were sometimes using that period of time, that timeframe established by the Prime Minister, either to derail things for their own interest. It has to be said also that Israel occasionally engaged in actions which resulted in a response from the Palestinians, which further derailed the process.

But what we have now is a step from the Prime Minister, and at the same time, an apparent step from the Palestinians with the announcement that they have arrested the fifth man wanted for the murder of Israel's Tourism Minister last year.

And if that is correct, that's an important step for this reason. It lifts the travel ban, or it should lift the travel ban on Yasser Arafat, meaning not only can he leave his headquarters in Ramallah, but in that other wildcard that's in play in the Middle East right now, it means he may be free to travel to Beirut to that Arab Summit where the Saudi peace proposal will be discussed.

BROWN: All right. There's a lot there. I just want to go back and focus on one perhaps small but hugely important thing. What the Prime Minister said specifically said today, the Prime Minister of Israel, is that he will begin cease-fire talks even as the violence continues, right?

MACVICAR: Absolutely.

BROWN: OK.

MACVICAR: And yes that is a change. Now, that's an important change. It's an important step. It is clearly a recognition that he can not get what he had previously demanded, which was absolute quiet for that period of time before he would even agree to sit down. Now what he's saying is OK, we're going to start the talks about peace, but we'll see how far that gets. And remember, General Zinni doesn't get here for a couple of days.

BROWN: We shall see how it goes. Sheila, thank you. It's been a long week there for you. Sheila MacVicar in Jerusalem for us. The other war now, and thankfully we're a long way from where things stood on Monday, it seems. Allied forces now appear to have the high ground, literally. They're getting new help from Afghan forces who arrived today to keep additional enemy fighters from joining the battle, Operation Anaconda.

Those who remain look to be contained in pockets of resistance but, and there's always a but here isn't there, the resistance appears to be the fight to the death variety. Operation Anaconda may be over in a matter of days, but it is not over yet. So it's back to CNN's Martin Savidge with the latest. Marty, good evening.

SAVIDGE: Good evening to you, Aaron. As you can see in the background here, weather is the primary factor that's impacting on Operation Anaconda right now. This operation is one that is totally supported and also backed up by air. The helicopters bring in the troops that bring in the supplies, and then of course, it's the CAS, the close air support, that backs up any fighting on the ground.

For the most part, everything has been grounded for the last 24 hours, too much cloud cover, too much heavy snow coming down, very dangerous to try to operate in that high mountainous terrain, if you're doing it from the air. Still, the military says they've got enough boots on the ground. They supplied them before the bad weather came in, that they're a very effective fighting force, and yesterday the chairman - or, I shouldn't say the chairman, the chief of staff for Operation Anaconda claims that they have now destroyed over 50 percent of the Taliban and al Qaeda opposition that they believe was on the ground when this operation first began.

They also are saying they claim to hold the high ground, and it appears that once this weather breaks, a major push will be made to finally close in on al Qaeda and Taliban forces. The chief of staff also said those forces have a vote. They can either vote to surrender, that is turn themselves in, or fight to the death.

Either way, the United States and coalition forces will be only too happy to comply. They also say they've destroyed thousands of caves, Aaron, but the battle goes on, fighting no so intense the past few days. Aaron.

BROWN: Marty, thanks. Martin Savidge with the update from Afghanistan tonight. It's been a while, by the way, since we went to Camp X-Ray at Guantanamo. Servicemen there raising today a New York City flag at the front gate at Guantanamo.

Inside, the hunger strike that's been going on appears now to be dying out. Twenty or so detainees still refusing to eat, but that's down from nearly 200 last week. And the camp commander touched on that when he addressed the detainees today, but he had a warning as well.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIGADIER GENERAL MICHAEL LEHNERT, SECURITY COMMANDER: You must tell the truth during questioning. Then, and only then, will we be able to determine who will be allowed to return home. We know a great deal about many of you and lying to us will only make your stay here longer. You must take care of yourselves and exercise patience, giving yourself to the will of Allah.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: For his part, General Lehnert also has made things a bit easier inside the camp. The detainees can now wear turbans, which was the focus of the hunger strike. Prayer beads are being provided. So is tea and reading glasses, and the general has promised to address the detainees on a regular basis, once a week.

There was a moment today, a reminder to everyone that war is real, that death is painful, and that presidents, commanders-in-chief are human. The President was in Florida, wearing his heart, and it was a sad heart, on his sleeve. There's something very complicated about showing emotion when you're in the public eye, a delicate balance between looking human and looking like a strong leader.

President Reagan seemed to know the balance. President Clinton did it pretty well too, but those who didn't care for him thought it disingenuous. President Bush walked that fine line today in meeting with two families who lost loved ones in Operation Anaconda.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Next Monday will mark the six month, the date of six months from September the 11th. That's not a very long time. It seems like a long time for a lot of people I know, but when we look back at history, six months is a pretty short period of time in the War against Terror, and we've accomplished a lot.

But there are still dangerous missions left ahead. You see the al Qaeda killers trained thousands of people who hate America, who hate what we stand for, who resent our freedoms, who want to harm us still. They want to make sure that our alliance is weak. They're looking for soft spots to exploit, and we're not going to let them.

We found a bunch of al Qaeda killers recently, bunched up in Afghanistan and our military went after them, and we're making good progress. It is a sign of what's going to happen for a while, and my fellow Americans must understand that, that we'll be relentless and determined to do what is right, and we will take loss of life, and I'm sad for loss of life. And today, we've got the mom and dad of a brave soldier who lost his life, and a brother, God bless you. Thank you all for coming.

I know your heart aches, and we ache for you, but your son and your brother died for a noble and just cause. May God bless you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: The President in Florida today. Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, piecing together the morning Andrea Yates killed her five children. Part of the testimony today, a report from Houston, as NEWSNIGHT continues from New York on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Today in the trial of Andrea Yates, a high profile doctor, a psychiatrist, testified for the prosecution. His name is Park Dietz (ph). This is not the first time that Doctor Dietz has dealt with a crime on this scale. He testified against the Unibomber, testified against Timothy McVeigh, Jeffrey Dahmer.

He is somewhat of a professional witness for the prosecution in insanity cases, and today after the courtroom, the jurors watched a tape of Ms. Yates describing the day she killed her children. He said that Ms. Yates, while sick obviously, knew exactly what she was doing and exactly how wrong it was. Here again, CNN's Gary Tuchman.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TUCHMAN (voice over): Paul was the first of the Yates children to be drowned. As he was summoned into the bathroom by his mother, the three-year-old son said to her, "mommy, are we going to take a bath today?"

On a videotape interview shown in court, that's how Andrea Yates remembered the moment, the interview done by a forensic psychiatrist hired by the prosecution choked up jurors and Andrea Yates herself.

TUCHMAN: Is it still your position that Andrea Yates did not know what she did was wrong?

GEORGE PARNHAM, YATES DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Oh, absolutely.

TUCHMAN: But the prosecution's psychiatrist has a different opinion. Dr. Park Dietz testified with reasonable medical certainty, "Mrs. Yates knew the drownings were illegal and knew it was wrong in the eyes of society and God."

Under Texas law, Andrea Yates can only be found legally insane if the jury believes she did not know right from wrong. A psychiatrist hired by the defense had testified that Yates, who said she was trying to save her children from an eternity in hell, was psychotic and wasn't capable of knowing what she did was wrong.

Doctor Dietz does not disagree with the psychotic diagnosis, but told jurors this was a cold calculated plan, and that she made no effort to comfort the very children she claimed she wanted to save, as she put them in the water.

Defense lawyers admit they're concerned the sadness of jurors could affect their decision making.

PARNHAM: I think they're hopefully anesthetized to these horrible (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

TUCHMAN: But their eyes were kept on the court video screen for much of the day, with Andrea Yates testifying that six-month-old Mary was the only child who didn't struggle, because she wasn't strong enough. And that her oldest child, seven-year-old Noah, said something about being sorry as she forced him into the bathtub too.

TUCHMAN (on camera): This trial is unique in the sense that in most trials the defense has to prove absolutely nothing. It's the prosecution that has to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt. But in this case, the defense has to prove the legal insanity, and tomorrow will be a very important day for the defense. The defense will get to cross-examine Doctor Dietz. It's expected that closing arguments will come sometime next week. Aaron.

BROWN: Gary, literally tomorrow or Monday?

TUCHMAN: Tomorrow. The court is meeting in a Saturday session. It hasn't during the three-week length of this trial, but this Saturday it is meeting.

BROWN: Gary, thank you. Gary Tuchman in Houston. Is it just me or was the whole video hard to watch? Susy Spencer is a writer who has been covering the Yates case. She was with us the other night, Wednesday night I think it was, and she's back with us tonight. Susy, nice to see you again.

SUZY SPENCER, AUTHOR: Thank you.

BROWN: I'm not sure exactly if there's a question here, but maybe you'll talk about it for a second. It seems to me that Doctor Dietz actually a very smart witness in a lot of different ways, but it sums up the law and how difficult the law is in this. You get on the witness stand. You say, "yes, she is clearly psychotic. This is a very sick person, but not sick enough."

SPENCER: Well, one of the things I found most interesting is Doctor Dietz, in contradiction to every other psychiatrist, had said she was not psychotic on the day this happened, that she did not become psychotic until June 21st, the day afterwards. He says, according to him, that medical records prove this, that she was just hearing intrusive voices of intrusive thoughts and illusions when, in fact, the psychiatric nurses I talked to who dealt with Andrea Yates, who knew her, and the medical records showed that she has been psychotic for years off and on.

BROWN: And I want to go, help me understand one part of this testimony. I'm not sure that I worked through it very well today. Was he at one point in his testimony, I think it was yesterday, essentially blaming her in part for her own problems? She did not take her medicine. She didn't do this. She didn't do that.

SPENCER: Exactly. Yes. He was saying it was her fault. She was trying to be controlling, that she thought she knew more than anyone else, when that is not Andrea Yates personality at all from what I learned. And then also, one of the things I learned about psychosis, postpartum psychosis, they said the patient is incapable of making their own decisions so the family members, the loved ones, have to take charge and make the decisions for them.

BROWN: And which goes to the husband I guess, to Rusty, and the argument that's been advanced a lot, that he hardly did he part to take care of his wife and take care of his children.

SPENCER: You have lots of contradictory information on that because the medical records will say what a supportive husband he was, that he was there. She never ate or drank unless he helped her. And then you have Debbie Holmes and then also some other nurses I've talked to who say Rusty was not helpful. So where's the truth? More than likely probably in the middle.

BROWN: Debbie Holmes is the friend?

SPENCER: Yes, Andrea's best friend who said that she, you know, begged and begged Rusty to get Andrea help and pleas just went ignored.

BROWN: All right, where does the defense go with Doctor Dietz? He's a very good witness. Any sense of where they want to go with him?

SPENCER: I think probably a lot of what they'll do is hammer on the inconsistencies, how like he talks about how her story changed over time. I think they'll go back to the other psychiatrist who said that it's typical of, you know, psychosis that when you're getting better you're trying to make your rational mind figure out what the psychotic mind was thinking.

So a lot of the things that Park Dietz says to me, knowing the medical history, did not make sense. But one thing that's important to note is he had a PowerPoint presentation that's like step-by-step. He's saying everything basically three times, once when he says it, the second time when it comes up on PowerPoint, and the third time when he repeats or reads what's on PowerPoint. So that's being pretty influential, I think.

BROWN: He's a very experienced and effective witness. He's very good. The jury will have the case by the end of next week certainly?

SPENCER: Let's hope so, maybe even by the middle of the week.

BROWN: Yes. Suzy, thanks. Again, good to talk to you. Suzy Spencer in Houston.

SPENCER: Thank you.

BROWN: Thank you. When we come back, what it takes to fly a fully loaded military jet into a war zone in darkness, a very good look at a cargo operation behind Operation Enduring Freedom. This is NEWSNIGHT and it is Friday.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: If you've ever tracked a UPS package on the web, tracing all the hops and stops between the store and your home, you get a feel for the fascination behind this next story.

It's a look at a side of the war that doesn't get seen very often, the freight operation. It happens, much of it does, in the dark. This is hardly what we would call glamorous. But without it, there would be no war.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice over): It is the end of another day at the American military base at Kandahar, another day spent huddled against the dust, while fixing yet another hole in the runway. Another day spend building another tent for the more than 4,000 coalition servicemen and women already here, a day when the hardest work is barely underway.

LIEUTENANT COLONEL LAWRENCE GRAY, U.S. AIR FORCE: I'd say probably 80 percent of the stuff that's come into the airfield over the last two months has been at night.

BROWN: Ever since the Americans arrived here in force, cargo planes have been landing at night with thundering regularity, bringing in just about everything from trucks to toilet paper, practically all of it delivered in conditions of near total blackout. GRAY: Over the last 55 days, since we've been the primary guys working the air lift, we've had approximately 950 C-130 and C-17 sortis in here, offloading 33 million pounds of cargo and 11,000 passengers.

BROWN: Just about the only lights you see at night are these. And they shine 24 hours a day into the prison camp. Otherwise men and women work in flack jackets and helmets, using red and green lights to unload equipment.

RICK CHURCH, CHIEF WARRANT OFFICER, U.S. ARMY, 101ST AIRBORNE: It's our life line. If this runway goes down, the amount of soldiers we have here on the ground, we consume a lot of supplies. So it's important that we keep it open all the time.

BROWN: The average of supplies to Kandahar is so vital that a lot of soldiers are calling it a mini Berlin air lift, reminiscent of how the Americans supplied the West German capitol in the late '40's, after it had been cut off from the rest of the world by the Soviets.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: : It is extending it to the limits, but it's also testing it to the limits that the planners and people in years previous to us have built the system to withstand. And I think it's performing the way it was designed.

BROWN: The pilot, of course, is at the center of the action. At 26, he's barely old enough to legally rent a car in the United States. Yet he and his 24-year-old co-pilot, and it is hard not to think of them as kids, are at the controls of a $236 million dollar C-17 cargo plane, delivering men and machines to Kandahar.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It gets to be grueling. We pull a very, very long days and upwards of 26 hours sometimes.

BROWN: Under rules agreed to by NEWSNIGHT, we cannot give you the pilot's last name, but his first name is Jimmy. En route to Afghanistan, he guided his giant plane to a perfectly orchestrated minuet with a circling tanker, high above the Black Sea.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's shown how in the last 20 to 40 years, how small the world's actually gotten, because of the technology that we have now and the ability of our Air Force.

BROWN: The design calls for much of the men and material to begin the journey here at Dover Air Force base in Delaware, home to a fleet of giant C-5A transport planes. On this particular flight, eight humvees were packed in the cargo bay and about two dozen soldiers rode in the back.

Once on the ground at an air base outside Frankfurt in Germany, the cargo is unloaded, then distributed again, this time onto smaller C-17s for the flight into Afghanistan.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We know the importance of the job that we're doing. And we know how important the work that we do is to the people on the ground there, to keep them resupplied. And we're just doing what we're trained to do.

BROWN: On the ground in Kandahar, the activity never seems to slow down. Whether it's tracking planes and supplies on laptop computers or simply fielding calls for transportation, it's a reminder that even aside from combat, war is a costly and complicated business, stretching everyone and everything to the limits.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

Supply line. That's the work of NEWSNIGHT producer David Fitzpatrick.

It's been an interesting political week that started in California and ended in Tennessee. We'll talk about it when we come back. This NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Fred Thompson, the prosecutor turned actor, turned senator, from the state of Tennessee is retiring. In a written statement today, he says he just doesn't have the heart for another six year term.

Senator Thompson lost his daughter earlier this year, which as I recall, somewhat of a mystery how she died. In any case, his decision to retire, a very personal one. The impact, though, obviously highly political. He is the fourth Republican to announce he won't seek re- election this year.

And by contrast, every Democratic senator who is up, will. So with the Senate evenly divided, obviously, it's an important thing to note.

And we'll talk with Craig Crawford of "Hotline," the Hotline, one of the most respected political journals online, off line, wherever in the country. It's good to see you.

CRAIG CRAWFORD, "HOTLINE": Hi, Aaron.

CRAWFORD: I don't want to get sidetracked on this, but there is some mystery about the senator's daughter death, isn't there?

CRAWFORD: The report is that it was from a brain injury from a heart failure. And that's about all we know. And it is very confusing and unclear.

BROWN: Tennessee is the swing state, or at least we've always thought of it -- long thought of it that way. It's in play.

CRAWFORD: It's in play. Bush won this state by four points in the presidential election. Of course, Al Gore, as we know, that was his home state and he lost it. Not a guaranteed Republican state, but certainly been trending that way.

And this isn't what politics in the lexicon of politics would call having to defend an open seat now. The Republicans have an open seat here in this state. They don't have an incumbent running. They always prefer to have -- any party wants an incumbent in a race, because they can raise all the money and it's much easier to defend obviously.

BROWN: Lamar Alexander going to put on his final shirt and take a run at it?

CRAWFORD: You know, he got away from the plaid shirt at his last campaign for president. I've lost track of all of his campaigns for president, but in the last one, he didn't wear the plaid shirt, but he can't live it down.

He's supposed to announce on Monday. And very popular in the state. He was governor at one time and president of the university. The talk is that this has been in the works for some time. You know, Fred Thompson was talking about quitting before September 11. And then after that, with the country caught up in a war, he decided not to, and then up and changed his mind again after his daughter's death.

He's really waffled, Aaron, on this keeping this seat ever since -- the China hearings.

BROWN: Yes.

CRAWFORD: When he chaired those hearings investigation of the Clinton administration, they went so poorly. And he had to basically give up that whole investigation. And many in the party blamed him for it. And he's never been the same since, really. I think that hurt him a lot.

BROWN: All right, let's go west. California, mostly the talk has been it was just a bad experience for the White House that they bungled something out there. Is there more to it than that?

CRAWFORD: Well, if you really get into the internals, Gray Davis, the democratic governor of California, did a fascinating thing in attacking an opponent during the primaries. You know, in the opposing parties' primary.

It was actually brilliant in a way because Riordon, the former mayor of L.A., is a moderate on abortion and gun control and other issues. And so. Gray Davis attacked him from the left and said you're not really liberal on these issues. You're really conservative.

And in an amazing and just fatal decision for the Riordan campaign, they took that bait. And they said no, we really are liberal on these issues, in their own primary when they had so many conservatives voters.

So Gray Davis forced him to the left in his own primary and he lost. And he actually was also able to accentuate that the other candidate who won the nomination, Bill Simon, is the true conservative, which makes it harder for him to move to the left and become moderate. It's like a chess game Gray Davis played. And he played it very well. BROWN: Probably half a minute, which is too little time for what I'm about to ask you. But I have the feeling this was not a great week for the White House?

CRAWFORD: It wasn't. I mean, on Capitol Hill, you know, whether you look at any of the issues, the Pickering nomination, the judicial nomination for Mississippi. The Senate's not voting on it. The Senate's probably going to vote on energy policy next week, but Daschle's talking about putting that go off.

The Republicans in the House stripped the tax cuts out of the president's stimulus bill. Even the extra $48 billion for military spending is not a guarantee. This administration is not doing too well on Capitol Hill, despite the approval ratings.

BROWN: And the approval ratings still look very high.

CRAWFORD: They're trending down a little bit, but not enough to really matter. He's down into the 70's, instead of the 80's.

BROWN: Yes, well, we all should be there. Thank you Craig. Good to talk to you and we'll talk again. Thank you very much.

When we come back, responding to an attack on the United States, the lessons from a half century ago from the internment camps. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We said weeks ago that policy decisions made in a time of anger and fear are often judged harshly by history. The context then was the decision to use military tribunals. We have no idea how history will judge them or even if history will have to judge them.

There haven't been any yet, but we do know that history has not looked kindly on the decision to send Japanese Americans to camps, call them what you want, shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The country was then, too, scared and angry. The policy was designed to quell both. The decision was made a long time ago, but it is in some ways as fresh as today.

Our story is from CNN's Andrea Koppel.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A streak of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese empire.

HARUE MAE NINOMIYA, SURVIVOR OF INTERNMENT CAMP: I just kept telling my friends, they said oh, yeah you're going to have to go on. I said oh, no I'm not going because I'm a U.S. citizen.

ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Harue Mae Ninomiya was 22-years old when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. A second generation Japanese American, her parents had made their home in Portland, Oregon. NINOMIYA: We didn't actually see until we saw the newspaper, you know, pictures of the bombing and the sinking of all those ships and such.

GEORGE KATAGIRI: I felt so self conscience, you know. I knew I had the Japanese face. I knew that I was an American citizen, but I knew that everybody viewed me as being Japanese.

KOPPEL: On December 7, 1941, George Katagiri was a 15-year-old teenager in Portland. War hysteria had gripped the nation. Anyone who looked Japanese was treated like a potential spy.

KOPPEL: What was the the atmosphere like that? I mean, that was the headline, "Portland to be first Jap-free City." That was really in the newspaper?

KATAGIRI: Yes. And whenever an article appeared in the newspaper, regardless of how ridiculous it was, you believed it. People had a tendency to believe it. It's in print.

KOPPEL: Then in February 1942, President Roosevelt ordered the U.S. military to round up everyone of Japanese descent on the west coast. Anti-Japanese posters were plastered on telephone poles. People had to register and received a family ID number.

I see that there are a couple big duffel bags and suitcases. How much did the typical family bring with them?

KATAGIRI: Well, the orders were you could only bring what you can carry.

KOPPEL: Within weeks, 120,000 men, women and children, two- thirds of them American citizens, were forced to sell their homes, close their businesses, and move into one of 10 heavily guarded camps. George Katagiri and others from Oregon moved into temporary quarters, cramped cubical like this one constructed in a Portland exhibition center, which used to house livestock.

NINOMIYA: I just cried so hard. My dad said to me, he says, the word used is "shitakganai," meaning you can't help it. He says we just got, must do what the government orders to us do.

KOPPEL: Kenny Namba did more than just follow orders. The 17- year-old enlisted in the U.S. Army's 442 regional combat team, leaving his family back in the camps.

KENNY NAMBA: We were unique because we were all Japanese Americans. The other thing that was unique is we had something more to fight for. We had to establish all over again our patriotism.

KOPPEL: The 442 became the most decorated unit in U.S. military history. Namba himself was awarded the Purple Heart and Bronze Star.

NAMBA: We're approaching the epi-center of Japantown.

KOPPEL: During the war, Japantown went out of business. There are still reminders, but today Japantown has become Chinatown.

(on camera): We are now just a couple blocks away from what used to be Japantown. Here along the Walanit (ph) River, I want to show you something. It is a very simple, yet incredibly special memorial to the Japanese American citizens of Oregon. And here there are poems, like this one, that have been carved into granite. There's a bill of rights down there. It's as much a reminder of a painful past, as it is a warning about the current climate of fear in our country today.

NINOMIYA: When September 11, God, all day I just shook. I shivered. You know. Pearl Harbor came back to me.

KOPPEL (voice-over): 60 years after she was forcibly imprisoned, Harue Mae Ninomiya, now almost 83, helped organize an exhibit of internment memorabilia. The theme, can history repeat itself? In a show of support, a member of Portland's Arab American community was invited to speak as part of an afternoon reunion of Japanese Americans

In the months since the September 11 attacks, Arab Americans, Muslims and those who look Middle Eastern have become the new targets of suspicion in the U.S.

NINOMIYA: I want to give them moral support that it should not happen to them what we had experienced.

KOPPEL: Ninomiya doesn't mean to compare what is happening with Arab Americans today with their treatment during World War II. She says there's a world of difference.

NINOMIYA: I know that some of them are going through perhaps something like we did, but I really don't think that there will be any such thing as concentration camps.

KOPPEL: Instead, Ninomiya, George Katagiri and Kenny Namba believe it's important to keep telling their stories.

KATAGIRI: I don't think it will happen with the Arab community, because we are standing up for them. And I think people are more enlightened today.

KOPPEL: A hope from a much older generation, that a nation learned from a past mistake.

Andrea Koppel, CNN, Portland, Oregon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Segment 7 tonight. Jeff Greenfield next. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Worked so well last night, the ratings were good, we thought we'd try it again. Is the lighting guy even here today? Somewhere. There he is. Perfect. Thank you. That's how it happened last night. Finally from us this evening, we've been asked often what happened to Jeff Greenfield. Jeff's program used to come on right after ours. And it was canceled a short time ago. And by the way, where were the media writers when that happened? And people wanted to know what happened to Jeff, and what's he doing, and how is he.

Well tonight, here's an answer. He's doing two things actually. He's boning up for new career and he's shopping.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Friends, how often has this happened to you? You're watching television late at night, when a commercial comes on for an amazing incredible product that you have to have, but by the time you grab that pencil the number's gone, or maybe you just don't trust the whole telemarketing thing.

Wouldn't it be great if you could come face-to-face with all those incredible, amazing products?

Well, now you can. Not sold in any stores, they say. Not any more. In this store in downtown Santa Barbara you can actually walk right in and pick up, look at, touch, see and feel all those incredible labor saving devices you could only see on late night TV.

(voice-over): Yes, they're all here, the Turbo cooker at 59.99. The wine out, just $5.99. The California duster. $9.99. But wait. There's more. The steam buggy, at an incredible $129.99. And of course the classics you know and love from long ago.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is one of the very, very original infommercial products. And it was called the Chop-o-matic way back when. And it still sells today.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's what makes Chop-o-matic so amazing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because it slices and dices.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And makes julienne fries in seconds.

GREENFIELD: There you go.

And Jill McLane should know. She and some friends cooked up the idea of the as seen on TV store about six years ago. Now she's got three California stores. She says people may come to chuckle, but they stay to buy.

JILL MCLANE: They come in going whom that's all the stuff you see on TV. And it's not worth anything. And then, they'll come through and all of a sudden they're at the checkout stand with 3 or 4 items.

GREENFIELD: And who can blame them? There's the bacon wave, that turns your microwave into a fryer. And of course, the classic Ginsu knives.

Because it can cut through.

MCLANE: Lead, pipes, shoe.

GREENFIELDS: Steel, diamonds. There are the current favorites.

MCLANE: The most popular right now is the Oxi Clean. You can put this in your laundry. You can mix it up as a paste and put it on your grout in your bathroom.

GREENFIELD: The Turn your abs into steel while doing nothing products. And hair care for the follically endowed?

It's a home haircutting system and like you are to cut your own hair.

MCLANE: I have tried this. I cut my buyer's hair. And it worked surprisingly well.

GREENFIELD: And the follically challenged.

MCLANE: You spray it on the color of your hair.

GREENFIELD: Right.

MCLANE: And then you comb your hair over it.

GREENFIELD: Any famous network personalities come in looking for this? I don't want to mention any names, but...

So chuckle, if you will, at the site of these late night images come to life. Jill McLane is chuckling all the way to the bank. Isn't that amazing?

I'm Jeff Greenfield for NEWSNIGHT.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: The pocket fisherman. That's all. Special program on Monday. Join us for that. We'll see you at 10:00 Eastern. Good- night. Have a good week.

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