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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Recall Election Winding Down; White House Staffers Meet Internal Deadline in Leak Investigation

Aired October 07, 2003 - 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: Good evening again, everyone.
An hour from now the polls close in California. Some hours after that, maybe a few, maybe a lot, we'll know the results. If the polls are right, and they usually are, Gray Davis will soon be history and Arnold Schwarzenegger will be the governor.

He may win with substantially less than half the votes cast. He will surely set out to govern a state deep in debt with few friends in the state's legislature to help him out. Looked at it that way losing doesn't seem quite so bad.

Election night begins the whip. Judy Woodruff at Schwarzenegger headquarters, Judy a headline from you please.

JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: Well, Aaron, at this point there are far more press people here than there are supporters but, you know, for a campaign that just last Thursday was thrown back on its heels with serious allegations by a number of women claiming that Schwarzenegger had harassed them sexually, tonight the faces we see all smiles -- Aaron.

BROWN: Judy, thank you, good to have you with us.

On to the Davis camp where Candy Crowley is standing by, Candy a headline from you.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, take everything Judy just said and turn it upside down. You have the mood here at the Davis campaign headquarters all day long. Aides have been saying it looks bad. Gray Davis says he is in it until the end but the end may be very near -- Aaron.

BROWN: Candy, thank you.

And, finally, back to the White House in Washington. It has a problem it wishes would go away. That would be the leak. Our Senior White House Correspondent with us again tonight, John a headline.

JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, all but a relative few White House staffers met an internal deadline today to turn over any documents they might have relative to the investigation and as that deadline passed tonight there's word the FBI has begun to contact people here telling them interviews very soon -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, thank you, back to you and the rest shortly.

Also tonight on NEWSNIGHT, another in our series of reports on America's war wounded, tonight the toll taken on the doctors and the nurses who are treating them, Nissen reporting again from Landstuhl, Germany.

Also former Senator Max Cleland joins us not to talk about the war but to talk about the wounded and the road they must take.

And later, we'll have signs of hope for two Major League baseball's longest suffering teams, a look at the Red Sox and the Cubs. Could it be a World Series for both?

And what NEWSNIGHT would be complete without a little rooster and a lot of morning papers? We'll have that.

And just because we'll add an accordion player to the mix, with an ode to the election all that to come in the hour ahead.

We begin tonight for the last time, we suspect, with a story that has fascinated many, horrified some and for better or worse kept California on the front pages for weeks now.

In just about 57 minutes the polls will close and we'll begin learning whether Californians have fired their governor and, if so, who they have chosen to replace him.

Whatever the outcome, you can't say this hasn't been important or interesting or in the end fun, fun for us at least and certainly for our political team including Candy Crowley who begins our coverage tonight.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CROWLEY (voice-over): The questions are simple on election day.

Who did you vote for?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK, hasta la vista baby.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Voted no on the recall.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For Arnold, sure.

CROWLEY: Who did you vote for today?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I voted against the recall.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And your name please?

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: Arnold Schwarzenegger.

CROWLEY: The formalities of voting aside he has reached that point where no last name is required.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Arnold, how confident are you?

SCHWARZENEGGER: Well, we don't know. It is up to the God now.

CROWLEY: The balloons are in place in Arnold land. Aides have been upbeat all day touting overnight poll numbers that they claim are back to pre-groping levels. Win, lose, or draw Arnold is the headliner in the show but Gray is the story.

Reelected less than a year ago, Gray Davis is about to become the first governor of California to be recalled or a comeback kid of the sort that might even surprise Bill Clinton. Conventional to the end in this most unconventional of races, Davis offered the required upbeat assessment but there was something else.

GOV. GRAY DAVIS (D), CALIFORNIA: Life has a lot of surprises but Sharon and I are people of faith and we know that all we can do is respond to the challenges confronted us.

CROWLEY: Election night headquarters for the Davis campaign lack any of the usual paraphernalia, no bunting, no banners, no balloons, a certain feeling of inevitability has fallen over Gray world.

Sources inside and close to the campaign have grown increasingly negative over the day. It doesn't look good, said one source, not promising said another. No matter how it goes it will be a while before we know whether California wins or loses.

TIM COSTA, RECALL SPONSOR: Democracy is working exactly the way the founders of this recall process wanted it to work.

CROWLEY: But this recall was expensive. It was controversial. It was confusing and it got ugly. Critics fear it will make California the land of eternal elections and as serious as the stakes were it was part circus.

MARY CAREY, PORN STAR/ GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: You know I've been left out of most of the serious roles but I (unintelligible) funny ones.

CROWLEY: But say this for the process it got their attention. They lined up at daybreak outside some polls. They were still coming at night set in, a record turnout for a non-presidential year is expected.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CROWLEY: In an interview less than an hour ago with CNN's Larry King, the governor was both defiant and accepting saying he will fight to the end but he will play the hand that's dealt him -- Aaron.

BROWN: If there was one moment when -- go back to the beginning when this recall started -- that galvanized the attempt to oust Gray Davis what would it be?

CROWLEY: I think it's when people started getting those -- when that car tax tripled. You know all politics is local and when what the government is doing comes into your house in an envelope and it costs you money that tends to get people very angry and it came on top of an economy that's bad. A lot of people felt they'd been misled by the governor but I really think it was that car tax that just set them off.

BROWN: And are you finding anybody in the Davis camp who sees a silver lining tonight?

CROWLEY: You know the most optimistic assessment I got was well it's uphill. They did say, look, about an hour ago this is when Davis' strongest supporters, that is union members, are getting off work. You know they can go to the polls but, you know, they even sounded like a little late for that.

BROWN: Candy, thank you and thank you for terrific work which will continue in our coverage after the polls close.

We're also joined now by Judy Woodruff who, of course, anchors "INSIDE POLITICS" on CNN, Jeff Greenfield, our Senior Analyst; our Senior Political Analyst Bill Schneider. We'll throw you all into the mix. It's good to have you all with us.

Judy, let's start here and maybe I'll ask all of you the same. Do you have a feeling that once Mr. Schwarzenegger decided to get in this thing was over?

WOODRUFF: Well, you could almost say that, Aaron, because quite frankly what one of Schwarzenegger's supporters said to me tonight was if Dianne Feinstein had decided to run his guess is that Arnold Schwarzenegger would not have gotten in it because they felt that she was the only Democrat in the state who could have gotten on the ballot, on the replacement ballot, so-called replacement ballot and come out and defeated Governor Davis.

So, once Schwarzenegger got in, it was, I think, you know, the handwriting was on the wall to use a terribly overused cliche. He had the money. He had the energy. He had the name recognition to put it mildly. It was, you know, it was all over at that point (unintelligible).

BROWN: Jeff, go ahead and weigh in on that and add to that, if you will, something that Candy mentioned which is perhaps we are now entering a phase of the land, in her phrase, the land of eternal elections.

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SENIOR ANALYST: Well, if you go back and look at the early numbers, Bustamante, Cruz Bustamante was leading Arnold Schwarzenegger, which is why I believe in addition to the car tax, in addition to Darrell Issa, the conservative Republican throwing $2 million of his money so that the recall could happen the pivotal moment for me was the debate because it was after the debate that Schwarzenegger began establishing a clear lead in the polls.

Bustamante was on record as wanting to do all kinds of nice things for illegal aliens, illegal immigrants and for raising various taxes and Schwarzenegger looked conversant enough to let the public do what it wanted to do anyway which was to get rid of Gray Davis.

BROWN: Yes.

GREENFIELD: Now, on the other point, it turns out that if Gray Davis survives tonight by some miracle he's protected from a recall for six months but as far as I can tell under the law they can start recalling Arnold Schwarzenegger as soon as the inauguration is over.

I don't think they will. I think that the appetite here is let's see what happens now that we've got this astonishing new mix if the polls are right and let's see what the new guy in town can do.

BROWN: And, Bill, national implications here, assuming here for a moment a Schwarzenegger victory does this make it significantly easier, for example, for the president to carry California?

BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: No and a lot of people, Republicans may be celebrating but first of all Schwarzenegger would not have won, if he wins, by running as a partisan Republican. He ran as an outside and by voting for him, if he wins, the voters would be making this statement. Times are tough. We want change. Outsiders are in. None of those statements is good news for President Bush.

BROWN: Does it have, do you think, national implications beyond the presidential race? Ought we look at this as any sort -- as the beginning of a national trend in the way sometimes we talk about California?

SCHNEIDER: Well, I think voters have always treated this outside of California as a circus, a carnival. Here in California they separated out the non-players, the porn stars, the smut peddlers, the sitcom actors and decided this was a serious process.

The thing to remember about this race is voters in California are angry. They've been angry for months with Gray Davis. They think that he didn't tell them the truth even when they reelected him. They said he didn't level with us. He didn't handle the electrical crisis very well.

They are mad and they knew -- for a long time they said we don't want to keep him as governor but we wonder is there someone else credible that we can vote for? That anger may be shared by voters around the country who may decide, like California voters, that this is an empowering process. If I had a word to describe California voters' mood tonight it is empowered.

GREENFIELD: If I may, Aaron, just quickly.

BROWN: Please.

GREENFIELD: The empowerment argument is precisely the argument that Howard Dean is using so far with some pretty good success in a very different way in the democratic process. Through the Internet, through his speeches, he's saying to people don't be helpless about this. If you're angry do something about it. You have the power. That's why the recall, which has been familiar to California not as the recall but as the initiative and referendum, they know that they can take power in their own hands. I don't think this is going to spread nationally.

I mean in Nevada they're trying to recall Governor Guinn but he got reelected with two-thirds of the vote and the democrats, he's a Republican, are saying the whole thing is stupid. I think this is a limited utility in that sense but the empowerment argument that's a biggie.

BROWN: Judy, do you think in Washington where you hang out that politicians generally are aware that the electorate, if Jeff is correct and he frequently is, is this angry and this unsettled?

WOODRUFF: No, I don't. I think that people view what happened in California not so much as an anomaly but at least at this point unique to California. I agree with Jeff.

You could look at what Howard Dean has done and you could say there are voters out there who are angry at President Bush but do I think that it's now going to be the way things get done in Washington that we're going to see recall efforts all over the country?

I don't think so. I mean I think there is clearly anger out there about the war in Iraq. There's some anger of people who don't have jobs but we're not at the point where this is going to take off and spread like wildfire across the country.

BROWN: Judy, just a final question to you. Again, assuming for a moment that it is Mr. Schwarzenegger who wins tonight and the polling indicates that, the pre-election polling not the exit polling, what sort of problems does he face once he actually gets to Sacramento?

WOODRUFF: He goes to Sacramento, Aaron, and he is dealing with a Democratic dominated State Legislature. Both the State House and the State Senate virtually all the elected state officials are Democrats so it is not going to be easy.

Having said that there are already some signs tonight, including from the leader of the State Senate, a Democrat John Burton (ph) that he is prepared to work with Arnold Schwarzenegger if he is elected. So, people -- there are partisan views, hard feelings but people are pragmatic as well. They know the state's business has to get done.

BROWN: Judy, thank you. Jeff and Bill thank you as well. You'll all be on hand throughout the evening. We appreciate some time tonight. Thank you.

As we said at the top, the polls remain open in California for about another 45 minutes, 47 minutes or so. When they close the network will start bringing you the early returns and, if conclusive, the results of our exit polling but no exit polling until the polls close. The coverage begins hard on the heels of NEWSNIGHT, 11:00 Eastern time tonight. On to other news now starting with the investigation into who, if anyone, in the Bush administration outed a CIA employee or operative. "I have no idea whether they'll find the leaker." That's what the president said today. "Partially," he said, "because in all due respect to your profession," meaning the press, "you do a pretty good job of protecting leakers," reporting the story for us tonight our Senior White House Correspondent John King.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KING (voice-over): At a morning cabinet meeting the president sounded a bit skeptical when asked if he is confident those responsible for the leak will be caught.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Now this is a large administration and there's a lot of senior officials. I don't have any idea. I'd like to. I want to know the truth.

KING: Press Secretary Scott McClellan said he had nothing to do with the leak but gave reporters a rough estimate of documents he turned over to comply with the Justice Department request that went to some 2,000 White House staffers.

The Justice Department deadline for those documents is two weeks away but the investigation is overshadowing other Bush priorities, so White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales set a Tuesday internal deadline.

And, Chief of Staff Andy Card told White House staffers in this memo to do what it takes to comply by the deadline because the sooner the investigation is over the sooner we can all return our full attention to doing the work of the people.

McClellan acknowledges questioning three prominent White House aides because of speculation in media accounts. Senior Adviser Carl Rove, Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Lewis Libby and National Security Council Aide Elliot Abrams all denied any role in the leak. Democrats complain the president's lawyer is reviewing the documents before investigators get them.

SEN. CHARLES SCHUMER (D), NEW YORK: There ought to be a full investigation, an independent counsel without any of these bottlenecks.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: We are told tonight five hours after that deadline passed that only a few White House aides missed it. They were said to be traveling or have other extenuating circumstances. We are also told tonight some calls placed into the White House today from the FBI and other investigators putting aides on notice they could be interviewed quite soon -- Aaron.

BROWN: Well, let me just pick up something the president said for a minute. You've probably used the phrase senior administration officials. About how many people does that apply to? KING: Well, it depends how you define it. I try to be relatively judicious in applying it but you could apply it to a great number of people. If you just take cabinet secretaries, their deputies, the assistant secretaries and the deputy assistant secretaries that would get you into the realm of hundreds of people. Now, who could have access to this information? Certainly dozens, I could probably build you a list of 100 pretty quickly.

BROWN: And the point of the White House counsel reviewing the documents before they're turned over to the Justice Department.

KING: The White House says standard operating procedure has always been that way in past administrations and in the few investigations so far in this administration. Democrats say it's unfair because it gives the president's lawyer who, of course, has an interest here in protecting the president a heads-up on what the investigators are getting from aides.

There's two key points. One, the White House counsel's office said it will weed out anything that is obviously irrelevant, news clippings, things that the investigators don't need to see.

But there is still a question of this. There will be a great deal of classified information in this material. The White House is saying it does not anticipate invoking executive privilege but it will not rule it out.

That is if there is something sensitive in that information the White House says it might withhold it from investigators on the grounds that it is sensitive when it comes to national security and in the White House view not relevant to the investigation. That could become a sticking point.

BROWN: John, thank you, our Senior White House Correspondent John King.

Ahead on the program we'll look at the deteriorating situation in the Middle East.

And later, the stress of dealing with the constant flow of war casualties, Beth Nissen with another in her continuing reports on the war wounded.

And later, we lighten things up a bit just in time, a terrific story about hope that does spring eternal for the baseball fans of Boston and Chicago, the Red Sox and the Cubs.

This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: And soon we'll have three more names to show you, three more American soldiers died in Iraq today, one just west of Baghdad, two others in the south, all three victims of roadside bombings, the first of three combat fatalities in Iraq since Friday. In Israel today another ratcheting up of tension, Prime Minister Sharon spoke out for the first time since the air raid on Syria, retaliation for the suicide bombing in Haifa on Saturday. He said if necessary his country will strike again.

Meantime, a new Palestinian cabinet sworn in today, smaller by two-thirds than the last one this one dominated by ministers loyal to Yasser Arafat.

Clearly, the Israelis have changed the game some, new pressures, new players, to what effect is a fair question and one we'll ask our next guest. Mamoun Fandy is a senior fellow at the United States Institute of Peace on leave now from Georgetown University and professor we're glad to have you with us tonight.

If the Israelis were sending a message the other day is there evidence yet that the message was received and, if so, by whom besides the Syrians?

MAMOUN FANDY, SENIOR FELLOW, THE U.S. INSTITUTE FOR PEACE: Well I think, Aaron, it was an important and big message that the Israelis sent. They actually sent this message also a month ago when Israeli warplanes flew over Syria, over Damascus and the Syrians did not get the message that time and this time around they decided to hit Syria.

It's a major move in the whole geopolitical scene in the Middle East. It's a message that's being sent all over the place to whoever, as President Bush said, on the wrong side on the war on terror. So, everybody is taking notice in the Middle East. The menu of options in front of everybody is limited including the Syrians themselves.

BROWN: The Syrians, let's talk about the Syrian options for a bit. They really don't, in terms of a military option, they don't really have one do they?

FANDY: They don't have a military option. The Syrians really the only thing that they do now is really run for political cover with the Arab League and the U.N. but the military option is limited.

You have to remember in Lebanon, the Israelis and the Syrians fought it out in Lebanon and, at one time, the Syrians lost some 87 planes to none so they know they don't have a prayer in front of the Israeli military.

BROWN: Looking beyond the rhetoric that comes from Arab states at moments like this are there any signs that other Arab countries will put pressure on Syria to stop its support of terrorist groups?

FANDY: Well, they have to. I mean first of all many Arab states cannot side with Syria right now and in the Gulf states the most important states, the rich ones are busy with their own internal problems as well as terrorism.

Egypt has a lot at stake with the United States as well as with the Israelis so probably they will talk to -- they will talk the talk to the Syrians but they will walk the walk with the Americans. So, in a certain way probably pressure will be brought to bear on the Syrians and try to provide them with some political cover to shut down these operations without anybody noticing because also the political consequences for the young President Assad internally if he shut down immediately then it would be very costly.

BROWN: Being the great believer that I am in the law of unintended consequences what can go wrong here?

FANDY: Lots of things can go wrong. I mean you're really looking at an arch of chaos from Lebanon to the occupied territories to Iraq and also all political action is being done by movements rather than by states, by Hamas, by Hezbollah, by Jihad and everybody else.

So, there is a great deal of miscalculations that can happen and you and I would know, if this is a response to Haifa, we would know that probably in a week or two another suicide bombing will occur so the Israelis have to respond again and at that time you don't know what the response might be.

Syrians are known also for miscalculation. They kept their border quiet for the last 30 years but with the new president I think they do not have the wisdom of Assad, Sr. and probably they might do something wrong.

BROWN: Do you think it's possible that we are on the edge of a great and horrible war in the Middle East?

FANDY: Well, I mean if you look at the players really it looks like it. I mean you have the Syrians and the Iranians are making proxy wars whether they are in Iraq, in southern Iraq for the Iranians as well as in northern Iraq for the Syrians.

You have a deteriorating situation in the territories. You have a great deal of problems taking place in Lebanon itself so really unless something really major happens, I mean domestic wise for the Syrians either it is peace and shut down these operations or war. I mean this is a big taboo that's been broken a few days ago, 30 years border was quite and now the taboo is broken, so anything can go wrong.

BROWN: Professor, it's good to have you with us tonight. Thank you.

FANDY: Thank you, Aaron.

BROWN: Thank you.

A few more items from around the country before we take a quick break starting with Oklahoma Senator Don Nickles, the second ranking Republican in the Senate and today he said he will not seek reelection after 20 years in politics. He's returning to the private sector. He's expected to become a lobbyist.

A Senator's wife is safe tonight after quite an ordeal. Kathleen Gregg, the wife of New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg was taken by armed men from her suburban Washington home to a bank. They forced her to withdraw some money and then they vanished.

And a Federal Appeals Court in Denver has overruled the district court judge allowing the Federal Trade Commission to enforce the national do-not-call registry. The stay, however, is only temporary until the challenge by telemarketers works its way through the courts.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT another in our reports on America's war wounded. Tonight the toll of the constant (unintelligible) the wounded take on those who are there to heal them.

Around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Tonight another in our occasional series of pieces on the war's wounded, in this installment their long road home and the people helping them along the way. By any stretch of the imagination a hospital that sees thousands of sick and injured patients and loses only two ought to be among the happiest places on earth. So, why are the faces so drawn? Why is the tension so thick? Why do the tears come so easily?

Here's NEWSNIGHT's Beth Nissen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Major combat may be over in Iraq, but not here. At Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, Army and Air Force medical teams are still fighting hard every day to save the lives, the limbs, the prospects of those medevaced in from Baghdad and Kuwait.

LT. COL. RONALD PLACE, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: If anything, we're seeing more patients now than we were during the actual combat phase.

NISSEN: Landstuhl's eight O.R.s operate on 12-hour shifts almost around the clock.

LT. COL. ELIZABETH BOWIE, HEAD OPERATING NURSE: We have done as many as 32 surgical cases per day, depending what's going on in Iraq.

NISSEN: Landstuhl's nurses see it all.

1ST LT. TINA HALL, AIR FORCE NURSE: Extremities, fractures, amputations.

STAFF SGT. ARTHUR TIMMS, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: Heat stroke, heat exhaustion.

HALL: Gunshot wounds, shrapnel wounds, motor vehicle accidents.

NISSEN: Many here worry that they are starting to wear down, to show the strain of seeing incoming casualties almost every day for six months. Many of the wounded have serious blast wounds, head injuries.

TIMMS: The hardest part is to see them when they first get here. You try not to let your emotions come out when you see how badly they're hurt.

NISSEN: Emotions are very close to the surface.

PLACE: Bad days are these young soldiers with horrible injuries. And they're just kids.

NISSEN: It is wrenchingly hard for even battle-hardened commanders.

COL. RHONDA CORNUM, COMMANDER, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: I've pulled people out of wrecked helicopters and dead people. And they were people I knew sometimes. But somehow, when you get to the operating room and you're getting gravel out of some kid's leg and he's younger than yours, that's really hard.

MAJ. FELICIA HOPKINS, ICU CHAPLAIN, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: Staff experiences trauma also. People see us in uniforms and think we're kind of so systemic, we do everything route step, route step, route step. What you're really seeing is the person in the uniform, the mother who may be a surgeon, the nurse who's a single parent who has a teenager that she left behind.

NISSEN: Work in the wards is especially hard for reservists such as Staff Sergeant Arthur Timms. He painfully misses his wife, the two teenagers, and a 4-year-old he left back home and may not see for a year. Work in the ICU, he says, helps give him perspective.

TIMMS: I can't complain. When you think about complaining, just open one of those doors and look in one of those beds.

NISSEN: Those beds are always full. As fast as Landstuhl stabilizes patients and air evacs them to military hospitals in the U.S., there's another planeload of incoming wounded.

Regular stress counseling sessions help staffers cope. Doctors and nurses say they also draw courage from their patients, who often set an example of selflessness, of greater concern for their buddies than themselves.

CORNUM: A guy will come in, and he's -- a part of his foot's missing. And his question is, what happened to the guys that I was with? That's their biggest concern. They are great Americans.

NISSEN: Almost every day, more of those Americans arrive. Landstuhl staffers start another hard 12-hour shift, trying to stabilize the patients, support each other, fulfill their mission.

MAJ. STEPHEN LINCK, LANDSTUHL REGION MEDICAL CENTER: These kids are over there doing their best. They deserve to have us do our best. So we're just going and try and keep taking the best care of them we can, try to put them back together.

NISSEN: And keep working toward the day when the buses no longer come, when the last casualty is treated and on the way home.

Beth Nissen, CNN, Landstuhl, Germany.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, we'll talk with former Senator Max Cleland, not about the right and the wrong of the war, but about coming home. The senator joins us in a moment. We take a break first.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: And much more ahead on the program. Max Cleland joins us, morning papers, a little baseball. Lots to do.

We take a break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It is one thing to see the pictures and hear the voices. We did a moment ago in Nissen's report from Landstuhl hospital. We can feel for the doctors. We can root for the patients. We can all hope for the best. But we cannot know.

Max Cleland can know, in Technicolor, the lows and, perhaps just as important, the possibilities. He left an arm and both legs in Vietnam, then went on to a distinguished career in public service, including two terms in the U.S. Senate. Currently, he's a member of the national commission investigating the 9/11 attacks. And he's been a staunch critic of the war in Iraq.

But that is not the role he has here with us tonight. We're to talk about the wounded and their road back.

And we are most pleased to have you with us.

MAX CLELAND, FORMER U.S. SENATOR: Thank you, Aaron.

BROWN: You were just at Fort Stewart yesterday. A lot of those guys had come home. Some of them did not come home. Some of them came home pretty banged up. What was your sense of their feelings about it all?

CLELAND: Well, the overarching feeling I had at the 3rd Infantry Division headquarters at Fort Stewart, Georgia, was the feeling of incredible pride in the tremendous courage these soldiers have, and their families as well, living day to day, not knowing exactly what's going to happen to their loved one, and also now not knowing where that loved one is going to be deployed next, whether Korea or back to Iraq.

So I think America needs to understand that there's a tremendous amount of courage that is in the people in the 3rd Infantry Division and in our military and in those families. That being said, what I think is the untold story of the war is this trickle of casualties that seems constant, every day. But it mounts up. We've lost well over, what, 400 or 500 killed in action. The 3rd Infantry Division itself lost 45 there in Iraq. It was on the spear, the point of the spear going into Baghdad. That's more casualties than any infantry division or mechanized division has taken since Vietnam.

You've also had almost 2,000 casualties now in Iraq, arms lost, legs lost, eyes lost, and, in many ways, careers and futures lost. That toll is being exacted every day.

(CROSSTALK)

CLELAND: There's a plane that flies into Andrews Air Force Base every night, not just into Germany, but to Andrews Air Force Base every night, and has a load of these casualties. I can identify with that, because I was there 35 years ago.

BROWN: We've said here that we think this has been a much- neglected story.

I wonder if you think or if you remember from your own experience whether these men and, in some cases, women, feel neglected as well, that those who have died are recognized in ways that those who are wounded are not.

CLELAND: I think that we have to make sure that not only those who give the supreme sacrifice are honored.

And down at the 3rd Infantry Division headquarters at Fort Stewart, they have warriors walk, where the 45 that have lost their lives are there in granite plaques and in trees planted in their honor and flags placed by those trees. But the wounded, they're kind of invisible. In many ways, they slip away into the dark of night. And they're left to figure out this war for themselves and what their future's going to be.

Now, they get great care, I want you to know. But the war for them is not over. And for many, it will never be over. They'll carry these scars the rest of their lives.

BROWN: One of the great differences to date between your war and this war is, when soldiers come home this time, they are coming home to be far more warmly received than they were then, whether healthy or wounded.

CLELAND: Thank God. Thank God. I mean, I thank God that the American people have not turned against the warrior.

In the Vietnam War, you couldn't separate -- people in this country couldn't separate the war from the warrior. They turned against the war. They turned against the warrior. They didn't mean to. They just did. And thank God that's not happened yet. That's my concern about the Iraq war going on and on and on in this guerrilla warfare environment in which we find ourselves in terms of the American military there, that it will take its toll on support, not just for the war, but the warrior. We can't let that happen again.

So one of the things that I wanted to do was go down and tell those soldiers how much this country appreciated them. They understand that. They get it. We just can't let this war go on too long, because, ultimately, it will take its toll. It is taking its toll on the families. It is taking its toll on the soldiers. But right now, they're performing a tremendous service for our country just by exercising their personal courage.

BROWN: Senator, it's always good to see you, and, on this subject, particularly so. Thank you.

CLELAND: Thank you.

BROWN: Former Senator Max Cleland.

We'll take a break from some of the heaviness of this day, whether it be war or politics, and talk about baseball and a couple of long-suffering teams with long-suffering fans.

We'll take a break first before that. This is NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: The joke around the office this week -- or at least the joke around the office that we can tell -- went something like this: You'll know the world is coming to an end if the Cubs and the Red Sox make it into the World Series, because there's no way God would let either of them win.

Now, we're not picking favorites here. The mere fact that both teams are still playing in October certainly has the fans wondering if decades of futility might finally be coming to an end.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): Four more victories for each team is all it would take, very much in the realm of baseball probability. And then, if it were to happen, something not seen in almost a century would take place for an ill-prepared and somewhat disbelieving nation. The Cubs and the Red Sox, winners at last, would play each other in the World Series.

HAL BODLEY, "USA TODAY": Can you believe that? I think it's the greatest story that baseball could possibly conceive. And it's a great renaissance of the game. I just can't imagine it happening, but it's about to happen.

BROWN: Not just yet. But the Red Sox, who won a cardiac-arrest game against Oakland on Monday, are at least thinking about it.

DEREK LOWE, BOSTON RED SOX: That would be an unbelievable matchup.

GRADY LITTLE, BOSTON RED SOX MANAGER: I know that a lot of people are talking about that. A lot of people are thinking about that. And you never know. It could happen.

BROWN: As for the Cubs, they defeated the Atlanta Braves over the weekend, their first playoff series win of any sort since 1908. Their fans would relish any Cubs World Series, especially one with the Red Sox.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That would be great. That's what we're waiting for.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And why are you waiting for that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because it's been a long time for both teams and that would be the ultimate World Series.

BROWN: Both teams are said to have curses hanging over them like so much black velvet. The Red Sox curse emanates from the 1920s, when the team owner sold Babe Ruth -- yes, that Babe Ruth -- to the hated Yankees. No World Series victory since. And the Cubs haven't been on baseball's center stage since World War II, 1945.

CHARLIE STEINER, YANKEE BROADCASTER: I think the winner will be the loser, because part of the charm has been their futility. Now, all of a sudden, one of those teams, if they win, they're like everybody else. So they would lose some of that charm.

BROWN: But many of the knights of the keyboard, as Ted Williams called baseball writers, admit they would like to see this one.

BILL FINNEY, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": Reporters aren't supposed to be rooting for anybody. You try to be outside of that sort of thing. But you have to. You have to be pulling for this series, because it would be as interesting and compelling perhaps as any World Series that ever happened in baseball.

BROWN: A great deal of history must be overcome first. As for the here and now, Chicago must get past Florida's Marlins and Boston must get past the dreaded New York Yankees. We'll see.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The minute that they clinch and it's set that the Cubs and Sox are going to the World Series, hell is just going to break over and freeze. People are going to die. And pandemonium is going to strike loose. There's no way that that's ever going to happen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Well, it seemed like a good idea to us, though.

Morning papers after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Well, it seems a little early, but it's time to check morning papers from around the country and around the country.

Not too early to have tomorrow's edition of "The New York Times." And now I can see it. I guess I'll mention this. What the heck. "Voter Survey Points to Recall and Schwarzenegger." That's "The New York Times"' take on the exit polls they're receiving. But we haven't looked on ours, or at least unsealed the envelope. Right. "U.S. May Drop Attempt to Vote on Iraq in the United Nations." The Bush administration continued to have trouble getting a majority of countries to support its position at the Security Council, so they may just forget the whole thing.

And what else did I like here? Perhaps nothing. Oh, what am I saying? "U.S. Can't Locate Missiles Once Held in Arsenal of Iraq. A Risk to Planes is Seen." Sleep well tonight, huh? Better keep track of those missiles.

"The Boston Herald"'s lead is a little more straightforward, if you don't mind. "You're history, Babe. Forget the Curse. These Red Sox Are Ready to Rock." Well, we hope it's a great series. We don't take sides, do we? Cubs/Red Sox would be fun though, would it?

How we doing on time?

"The San Francisco Chronicle." "Voting Appears to be Smooth, as Millions Cast Their Ballots. Lines Long in Many Locations Around the State," pretty straightforward. This is a very good story that has gotten too little attention: "Congress Debates Liability on MTBE. Immunity from claims has been proposed." It was a gasoline additive that was supposed to clean the air. I think, pretty much now everyone agrees it's fouling the water. And it's a very good debate that's going on. It says a lot about politics in the country, in part because no one has heard much about it.

"Times Herald-Record": "180 on Casinos. Pataki Does Turnaround on Tribes." Indian gaming, there isn't any -- or there's very little in the state of New York, for reasons I've never understood.

And let's end this with "The Chicago Sun-Times." I guarantee you this headline will change if you're in Chicago, because they'll put the ball game on the front page. But the ball game isn't over yet.

"Ex-Convict Reynolds Runs for Congress." He's going after an old seat held by a former ally, Jesse Jackson. "Red hot" is the weather in Chicago tomorrow.

We'll take a break. That's morning papers. We'll take a break. Then the accordion guy is showing up.

We're right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Feels like a bonus segment, doesn't it?

Finally from us tonight, despite all we have done -- and we've done a lot -- in the name of portraying the California recall election as anything but a circus, there is this, a small thing perhaps, except for his mother. After a long absence -- and some might say not nearly long enough -- we welcome back tonight the accordion man. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (singing): California, here I run. Larry Flynt says join the fun. No sleeping, no keeping track of them all, who's quaking, who's shaking. It's Gray Davis I recall.

When Schwarzenegger's muscles flexed, Gary Coleman looked perplexed. They'll run an avocado next, guacamole, yum-yum-yum. Bustamante, you can't lose. Come on, Busta, move their Cruz. Please save from us Davis and all his debt. You're loyal, his foil. So you went and hedged your bet.

And when the governor's race is done, who will be the lucky one? Arianna Huffington. California, here I run. California, here I run. Yes. Politics and surf and sun. Each day a, each way, a candidate's born, some nutty, some smutty. Mary Carey stars in porn. For old and young and tall and short, it's the newest leisure sport. Tell that 9th appellate court, California, here I run.

Please don't postpone it. California, here I run.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALES (singing): Welcome to the recall, California.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rolling blackouts.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: It's been a while. That's our report for tonight. We're all back tomorrow, 10:00. Well, he's not back.

We're all back tomorrow at 10:00 Eastern time.

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





Internal Deadline in Leak Investigation>


Aired October 7, 2003 - 22:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening again, everyone.
An hour from now the polls close in California. Some hours after that, maybe a few, maybe a lot, we'll know the results. If the polls are right, and they usually are, Gray Davis will soon be history and Arnold Schwarzenegger will be the governor.

He may win with substantially less than half the votes cast. He will surely set out to govern a state deep in debt with few friends in the state's legislature to help him out. Looked at it that way losing doesn't seem quite so bad.

Election night begins the whip. Judy Woodruff at Schwarzenegger headquarters, Judy a headline from you please.

JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: Well, Aaron, at this point there are far more press people here than there are supporters but, you know, for a campaign that just last Thursday was thrown back on its heels with serious allegations by a number of women claiming that Schwarzenegger had harassed them sexually, tonight the faces we see all smiles -- Aaron.

BROWN: Judy, thank you, good to have you with us.

On to the Davis camp where Candy Crowley is standing by, Candy a headline from you.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, take everything Judy just said and turn it upside down. You have the mood here at the Davis campaign headquarters all day long. Aides have been saying it looks bad. Gray Davis says he is in it until the end but the end may be very near -- Aaron.

BROWN: Candy, thank you.

And, finally, back to the White House in Washington. It has a problem it wishes would go away. That would be the leak. Our Senior White House Correspondent with us again tonight, John a headline.

JOHN KING, CNN SR. WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, all but a relative few White House staffers met an internal deadline today to turn over any documents they might have relative to the investigation and as that deadline passed tonight there's word the FBI has begun to contact people here telling them interviews very soon -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, thank you, back to you and the rest shortly.

Also tonight on NEWSNIGHT, another in our series of reports on America's war wounded, tonight the toll taken on the doctors and the nurses who are treating them, Nissen reporting again from Landstuhl, Germany.

Also former Senator Max Cleland joins us not to talk about the war but to talk about the wounded and the road they must take.

And later, we'll have signs of hope for two Major League baseball's longest suffering teams, a look at the Red Sox and the Cubs. Could it be a World Series for both?

And what NEWSNIGHT would be complete without a little rooster and a lot of morning papers? We'll have that.

And just because we'll add an accordion player to the mix, with an ode to the election all that to come in the hour ahead.

We begin tonight for the last time, we suspect, with a story that has fascinated many, horrified some and for better or worse kept California on the front pages for weeks now.

In just about 57 minutes the polls will close and we'll begin learning whether Californians have fired their governor and, if so, who they have chosen to replace him.

Whatever the outcome, you can't say this hasn't been important or interesting or in the end fun, fun for us at least and certainly for our political team including Candy Crowley who begins our coverage tonight.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CROWLEY (voice-over): The questions are simple on election day.

Who did you vote for?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK, hasta la vista baby.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Voted no on the recall.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For Arnold, sure.

CROWLEY: Who did you vote for today?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I voted against the recall.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And your name please?

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: Arnold Schwarzenegger.

CROWLEY: The formalities of voting aside he has reached that point where no last name is required.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Arnold, how confident are you?

SCHWARZENEGGER: Well, we don't know. It is up to the God now.

CROWLEY: The balloons are in place in Arnold land. Aides have been upbeat all day touting overnight poll numbers that they claim are back to pre-groping levels. Win, lose, or draw Arnold is the headliner in the show but Gray is the story.

Reelected less than a year ago, Gray Davis is about to become the first governor of California to be recalled or a comeback kid of the sort that might even surprise Bill Clinton. Conventional to the end in this most unconventional of races, Davis offered the required upbeat assessment but there was something else.

GOV. GRAY DAVIS (D), CALIFORNIA: Life has a lot of surprises but Sharon and I are people of faith and we know that all we can do is respond to the challenges confronted us.

CROWLEY: Election night headquarters for the Davis campaign lack any of the usual paraphernalia, no bunting, no banners, no balloons, a certain feeling of inevitability has fallen over Gray world.

Sources inside and close to the campaign have grown increasingly negative over the day. It doesn't look good, said one source, not promising said another. No matter how it goes it will be a while before we know whether California wins or loses.

TIM COSTA, RECALL SPONSOR: Democracy is working exactly the way the founders of this recall process wanted it to work.

CROWLEY: But this recall was expensive. It was controversial. It was confusing and it got ugly. Critics fear it will make California the land of eternal elections and as serious as the stakes were it was part circus.

MARY CAREY, PORN STAR/ GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: You know I've been left out of most of the serious roles but I (unintelligible) funny ones.

CROWLEY: But say this for the process it got their attention. They lined up at daybreak outside some polls. They were still coming at night set in, a record turnout for a non-presidential year is expected.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CROWLEY: In an interview less than an hour ago with CNN's Larry King, the governor was both defiant and accepting saying he will fight to the end but he will play the hand that's dealt him -- Aaron.

BROWN: If there was one moment when -- go back to the beginning when this recall started -- that galvanized the attempt to oust Gray Davis what would it be?

CROWLEY: I think it's when people started getting those -- when that car tax tripled. You know all politics is local and when what the government is doing comes into your house in an envelope and it costs you money that tends to get people very angry and it came on top of an economy that's bad. A lot of people felt they'd been misled by the governor but I really think it was that car tax that just set them off.

BROWN: And are you finding anybody in the Davis camp who sees a silver lining tonight?

CROWLEY: You know the most optimistic assessment I got was well it's uphill. They did say, look, about an hour ago this is when Davis' strongest supporters, that is union members, are getting off work. You know they can go to the polls but, you know, they even sounded like a little late for that.

BROWN: Candy, thank you and thank you for terrific work which will continue in our coverage after the polls close.

We're also joined now by Judy Woodruff who, of course, anchors "INSIDE POLITICS" on CNN, Jeff Greenfield, our Senior Analyst; our Senior Political Analyst Bill Schneider. We'll throw you all into the mix. It's good to have you all with us.

Judy, let's start here and maybe I'll ask all of you the same. Do you have a feeling that once Mr. Schwarzenegger decided to get in this thing was over?

WOODRUFF: Well, you could almost say that, Aaron, because quite frankly what one of Schwarzenegger's supporters said to me tonight was if Dianne Feinstein had decided to run his guess is that Arnold Schwarzenegger would not have gotten in it because they felt that she was the only Democrat in the state who could have gotten on the ballot, on the replacement ballot, so-called replacement ballot and come out and defeated Governor Davis.

So, once Schwarzenegger got in, it was, I think, you know, the handwriting was on the wall to use a terribly overused cliche. He had the money. He had the energy. He had the name recognition to put it mildly. It was, you know, it was all over at that point (unintelligible).

BROWN: Jeff, go ahead and weigh in on that and add to that, if you will, something that Candy mentioned which is perhaps we are now entering a phase of the land, in her phrase, the land of eternal elections.

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SENIOR ANALYST: Well, if you go back and look at the early numbers, Bustamante, Cruz Bustamante was leading Arnold Schwarzenegger, which is why I believe in addition to the car tax, in addition to Darrell Issa, the conservative Republican throwing $2 million of his money so that the recall could happen the pivotal moment for me was the debate because it was after the debate that Schwarzenegger began establishing a clear lead in the polls.

Bustamante was on record as wanting to do all kinds of nice things for illegal aliens, illegal immigrants and for raising various taxes and Schwarzenegger looked conversant enough to let the public do what it wanted to do anyway which was to get rid of Gray Davis.

BROWN: Yes.

GREENFIELD: Now, on the other point, it turns out that if Gray Davis survives tonight by some miracle he's protected from a recall for six months but as far as I can tell under the law they can start recalling Arnold Schwarzenegger as soon as the inauguration is over.

I don't think they will. I think that the appetite here is let's see what happens now that we've got this astonishing new mix if the polls are right and let's see what the new guy in town can do.

BROWN: And, Bill, national implications here, assuming here for a moment a Schwarzenegger victory does this make it significantly easier, for example, for the president to carry California?

BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: No and a lot of people, Republicans may be celebrating but first of all Schwarzenegger would not have won, if he wins, by running as a partisan Republican. He ran as an outside and by voting for him, if he wins, the voters would be making this statement. Times are tough. We want change. Outsiders are in. None of those statements is good news for President Bush.

BROWN: Does it have, do you think, national implications beyond the presidential race? Ought we look at this as any sort -- as the beginning of a national trend in the way sometimes we talk about California?

SCHNEIDER: Well, I think voters have always treated this outside of California as a circus, a carnival. Here in California they separated out the non-players, the porn stars, the smut peddlers, the sitcom actors and decided this was a serious process.

The thing to remember about this race is voters in California are angry. They've been angry for months with Gray Davis. They think that he didn't tell them the truth even when they reelected him. They said he didn't level with us. He didn't handle the electrical crisis very well.

They are mad and they knew -- for a long time they said we don't want to keep him as governor but we wonder is there someone else credible that we can vote for? That anger may be shared by voters around the country who may decide, like California voters, that this is an empowering process. If I had a word to describe California voters' mood tonight it is empowered.

GREENFIELD: If I may, Aaron, just quickly.

BROWN: Please.

GREENFIELD: The empowerment argument is precisely the argument that Howard Dean is using so far with some pretty good success in a very different way in the democratic process. Through the Internet, through his speeches, he's saying to people don't be helpless about this. If you're angry do something about it. You have the power. That's why the recall, which has been familiar to California not as the recall but as the initiative and referendum, they know that they can take power in their own hands. I don't think this is going to spread nationally.

I mean in Nevada they're trying to recall Governor Guinn but he got reelected with two-thirds of the vote and the democrats, he's a Republican, are saying the whole thing is stupid. I think this is a limited utility in that sense but the empowerment argument that's a biggie.

BROWN: Judy, do you think in Washington where you hang out that politicians generally are aware that the electorate, if Jeff is correct and he frequently is, is this angry and this unsettled?

WOODRUFF: No, I don't. I think that people view what happened in California not so much as an anomaly but at least at this point unique to California. I agree with Jeff.

You could look at what Howard Dean has done and you could say there are voters out there who are angry at President Bush but do I think that it's now going to be the way things get done in Washington that we're going to see recall efforts all over the country?

I don't think so. I mean I think there is clearly anger out there about the war in Iraq. There's some anger of people who don't have jobs but we're not at the point where this is going to take off and spread like wildfire across the country.

BROWN: Judy, just a final question to you. Again, assuming for a moment that it is Mr. Schwarzenegger who wins tonight and the polling indicates that, the pre-election polling not the exit polling, what sort of problems does he face once he actually gets to Sacramento?

WOODRUFF: He goes to Sacramento, Aaron, and he is dealing with a Democratic dominated State Legislature. Both the State House and the State Senate virtually all the elected state officials are Democrats so it is not going to be easy.

Having said that there are already some signs tonight, including from the leader of the State Senate, a Democrat John Burton (ph) that he is prepared to work with Arnold Schwarzenegger if he is elected. So, people -- there are partisan views, hard feelings but people are pragmatic as well. They know the state's business has to get done.

BROWN: Judy, thank you. Jeff and Bill thank you as well. You'll all be on hand throughout the evening. We appreciate some time tonight. Thank you.

As we said at the top, the polls remain open in California for about another 45 minutes, 47 minutes or so. When they close the network will start bringing you the early returns and, if conclusive, the results of our exit polling but no exit polling until the polls close. The coverage begins hard on the heels of NEWSNIGHT, 11:00 Eastern time tonight. On to other news now starting with the investigation into who, if anyone, in the Bush administration outed a CIA employee or operative. "I have no idea whether they'll find the leaker." That's what the president said today. "Partially," he said, "because in all due respect to your profession," meaning the press, "you do a pretty good job of protecting leakers," reporting the story for us tonight our Senior White House Correspondent John King.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KING (voice-over): At a morning cabinet meeting the president sounded a bit skeptical when asked if he is confident those responsible for the leak will be caught.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Now this is a large administration and there's a lot of senior officials. I don't have any idea. I'd like to. I want to know the truth.

KING: Press Secretary Scott McClellan said he had nothing to do with the leak but gave reporters a rough estimate of documents he turned over to comply with the Justice Department request that went to some 2,000 White House staffers.

The Justice Department deadline for those documents is two weeks away but the investigation is overshadowing other Bush priorities, so White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales set a Tuesday internal deadline.

And, Chief of Staff Andy Card told White House staffers in this memo to do what it takes to comply by the deadline because the sooner the investigation is over the sooner we can all return our full attention to doing the work of the people.

McClellan acknowledges questioning three prominent White House aides because of speculation in media accounts. Senior Adviser Carl Rove, Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Lewis Libby and National Security Council Aide Elliot Abrams all denied any role in the leak. Democrats complain the president's lawyer is reviewing the documents before investigators get them.

SEN. CHARLES SCHUMER (D), NEW YORK: There ought to be a full investigation, an independent counsel without any of these bottlenecks.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: We are told tonight five hours after that deadline passed that only a few White House aides missed it. They were said to be traveling or have other extenuating circumstances. We are also told tonight some calls placed into the White House today from the FBI and other investigators putting aides on notice they could be interviewed quite soon -- Aaron.

BROWN: Well, let me just pick up something the president said for a minute. You've probably used the phrase senior administration officials. About how many people does that apply to? KING: Well, it depends how you define it. I try to be relatively judicious in applying it but you could apply it to a great number of people. If you just take cabinet secretaries, their deputies, the assistant secretaries and the deputy assistant secretaries that would get you into the realm of hundreds of people. Now, who could have access to this information? Certainly dozens, I could probably build you a list of 100 pretty quickly.

BROWN: And the point of the White House counsel reviewing the documents before they're turned over to the Justice Department.

KING: The White House says standard operating procedure has always been that way in past administrations and in the few investigations so far in this administration. Democrats say it's unfair because it gives the president's lawyer who, of course, has an interest here in protecting the president a heads-up on what the investigators are getting from aides.

There's two key points. One, the White House counsel's office said it will weed out anything that is obviously irrelevant, news clippings, things that the investigators don't need to see.

But there is still a question of this. There will be a great deal of classified information in this material. The White House is saying it does not anticipate invoking executive privilege but it will not rule it out.

That is if there is something sensitive in that information the White House says it might withhold it from investigators on the grounds that it is sensitive when it comes to national security and in the White House view not relevant to the investigation. That could become a sticking point.

BROWN: John, thank you, our Senior White House Correspondent John King.

Ahead on the program we'll look at the deteriorating situation in the Middle East.

And later, the stress of dealing with the constant flow of war casualties, Beth Nissen with another in her continuing reports on the war wounded.

And later, we lighten things up a bit just in time, a terrific story about hope that does spring eternal for the baseball fans of Boston and Chicago, the Red Sox and the Cubs.

This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: And soon we'll have three more names to show you, three more American soldiers died in Iraq today, one just west of Baghdad, two others in the south, all three victims of roadside bombings, the first of three combat fatalities in Iraq since Friday. In Israel today another ratcheting up of tension, Prime Minister Sharon spoke out for the first time since the air raid on Syria, retaliation for the suicide bombing in Haifa on Saturday. He said if necessary his country will strike again.

Meantime, a new Palestinian cabinet sworn in today, smaller by two-thirds than the last one this one dominated by ministers loyal to Yasser Arafat.

Clearly, the Israelis have changed the game some, new pressures, new players, to what effect is a fair question and one we'll ask our next guest. Mamoun Fandy is a senior fellow at the United States Institute of Peace on leave now from Georgetown University and professor we're glad to have you with us tonight.

If the Israelis were sending a message the other day is there evidence yet that the message was received and, if so, by whom besides the Syrians?

MAMOUN FANDY, SENIOR FELLOW, THE U.S. INSTITUTE FOR PEACE: Well I think, Aaron, it was an important and big message that the Israelis sent. They actually sent this message also a month ago when Israeli warplanes flew over Syria, over Damascus and the Syrians did not get the message that time and this time around they decided to hit Syria.

It's a major move in the whole geopolitical scene in the Middle East. It's a message that's being sent all over the place to whoever, as President Bush said, on the wrong side on the war on terror. So, everybody is taking notice in the Middle East. The menu of options in front of everybody is limited including the Syrians themselves.

BROWN: The Syrians, let's talk about the Syrian options for a bit. They really don't, in terms of a military option, they don't really have one do they?

FANDY: They don't have a military option. The Syrians really the only thing that they do now is really run for political cover with the Arab League and the U.N. but the military option is limited.

You have to remember in Lebanon, the Israelis and the Syrians fought it out in Lebanon and, at one time, the Syrians lost some 87 planes to none so they know they don't have a prayer in front of the Israeli military.

BROWN: Looking beyond the rhetoric that comes from Arab states at moments like this are there any signs that other Arab countries will put pressure on Syria to stop its support of terrorist groups?

FANDY: Well, they have to. I mean first of all many Arab states cannot side with Syria right now and in the Gulf states the most important states, the rich ones are busy with their own internal problems as well as terrorism.

Egypt has a lot at stake with the United States as well as with the Israelis so probably they will talk to -- they will talk the talk to the Syrians but they will walk the walk with the Americans. So, in a certain way probably pressure will be brought to bear on the Syrians and try to provide them with some political cover to shut down these operations without anybody noticing because also the political consequences for the young President Assad internally if he shut down immediately then it would be very costly.

BROWN: Being the great believer that I am in the law of unintended consequences what can go wrong here?

FANDY: Lots of things can go wrong. I mean you're really looking at an arch of chaos from Lebanon to the occupied territories to Iraq and also all political action is being done by movements rather than by states, by Hamas, by Hezbollah, by Jihad and everybody else.

So, there is a great deal of miscalculations that can happen and you and I would know, if this is a response to Haifa, we would know that probably in a week or two another suicide bombing will occur so the Israelis have to respond again and at that time you don't know what the response might be.

Syrians are known also for miscalculation. They kept their border quiet for the last 30 years but with the new president I think they do not have the wisdom of Assad, Sr. and probably they might do something wrong.

BROWN: Do you think it's possible that we are on the edge of a great and horrible war in the Middle East?

FANDY: Well, I mean if you look at the players really it looks like it. I mean you have the Syrians and the Iranians are making proxy wars whether they are in Iraq, in southern Iraq for the Iranians as well as in northern Iraq for the Syrians.

You have a deteriorating situation in the territories. You have a great deal of problems taking place in Lebanon itself so really unless something really major happens, I mean domestic wise for the Syrians either it is peace and shut down these operations or war. I mean this is a big taboo that's been broken a few days ago, 30 years border was quite and now the taboo is broken, so anything can go wrong.

BROWN: Professor, it's good to have you with us tonight. Thank you.

FANDY: Thank you, Aaron.

BROWN: Thank you.

A few more items from around the country before we take a quick break starting with Oklahoma Senator Don Nickles, the second ranking Republican in the Senate and today he said he will not seek reelection after 20 years in politics. He's returning to the private sector. He's expected to become a lobbyist.

A Senator's wife is safe tonight after quite an ordeal. Kathleen Gregg, the wife of New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg was taken by armed men from her suburban Washington home to a bank. They forced her to withdraw some money and then they vanished.

And a Federal Appeals Court in Denver has overruled the district court judge allowing the Federal Trade Commission to enforce the national do-not-call registry. The stay, however, is only temporary until the challenge by telemarketers works its way through the courts.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT another in our reports on America's war wounded. Tonight the toll of the constant (unintelligible) the wounded take on those who are there to heal them.

Around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Tonight another in our occasional series of pieces on the war's wounded, in this installment their long road home and the people helping them along the way. By any stretch of the imagination a hospital that sees thousands of sick and injured patients and loses only two ought to be among the happiest places on earth. So, why are the faces so drawn? Why is the tension so thick? Why do the tears come so easily?

Here's NEWSNIGHT's Beth Nissen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Major combat may be over in Iraq, but not here. At Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, Army and Air Force medical teams are still fighting hard every day to save the lives, the limbs, the prospects of those medevaced in from Baghdad and Kuwait.

LT. COL. RONALD PLACE, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: If anything, we're seeing more patients now than we were during the actual combat phase.

NISSEN: Landstuhl's eight O.R.s operate on 12-hour shifts almost around the clock.

LT. COL. ELIZABETH BOWIE, HEAD OPERATING NURSE: We have done as many as 32 surgical cases per day, depending what's going on in Iraq.

NISSEN: Landstuhl's nurses see it all.

1ST LT. TINA HALL, AIR FORCE NURSE: Extremities, fractures, amputations.

STAFF SGT. ARTHUR TIMMS, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: Heat stroke, heat exhaustion.

HALL: Gunshot wounds, shrapnel wounds, motor vehicle accidents.

NISSEN: Many here worry that they are starting to wear down, to show the strain of seeing incoming casualties almost every day for six months. Many of the wounded have serious blast wounds, head injuries.

TIMMS: The hardest part is to see them when they first get here. You try not to let your emotions come out when you see how badly they're hurt.

NISSEN: Emotions are very close to the surface.

PLACE: Bad days are these young soldiers with horrible injuries. And they're just kids.

NISSEN: It is wrenchingly hard for even battle-hardened commanders.

COL. RHONDA CORNUM, COMMANDER, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: I've pulled people out of wrecked helicopters and dead people. And they were people I knew sometimes. But somehow, when you get to the operating room and you're getting gravel out of some kid's leg and he's younger than yours, that's really hard.

MAJ. FELICIA HOPKINS, ICU CHAPLAIN, LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: Staff experiences trauma also. People see us in uniforms and think we're kind of so systemic, we do everything route step, route step, route step. What you're really seeing is the person in the uniform, the mother who may be a surgeon, the nurse who's a single parent who has a teenager that she left behind.

NISSEN: Work in the wards is especially hard for reservists such as Staff Sergeant Arthur Timms. He painfully misses his wife, the two teenagers, and a 4-year-old he left back home and may not see for a year. Work in the ICU, he says, helps give him perspective.

TIMMS: I can't complain. When you think about complaining, just open one of those doors and look in one of those beds.

NISSEN: Those beds are always full. As fast as Landstuhl stabilizes patients and air evacs them to military hospitals in the U.S., there's another planeload of incoming wounded.

Regular stress counseling sessions help staffers cope. Doctors and nurses say they also draw courage from their patients, who often set an example of selflessness, of greater concern for their buddies than themselves.

CORNUM: A guy will come in, and he's -- a part of his foot's missing. And his question is, what happened to the guys that I was with? That's their biggest concern. They are great Americans.

NISSEN: Almost every day, more of those Americans arrive. Landstuhl staffers start another hard 12-hour shift, trying to stabilize the patients, support each other, fulfill their mission.

MAJ. STEPHEN LINCK, LANDSTUHL REGION MEDICAL CENTER: These kids are over there doing their best. They deserve to have us do our best. So we're just going and try and keep taking the best care of them we can, try to put them back together.

NISSEN: And keep working toward the day when the buses no longer come, when the last casualty is treated and on the way home.

Beth Nissen, CNN, Landstuhl, Germany.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, we'll talk with former Senator Max Cleland, not about the right and the wrong of the war, but about coming home. The senator joins us in a moment. We take a break first.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: And much more ahead on the program. Max Cleland joins us, morning papers, a little baseball. Lots to do.

We take a break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It is one thing to see the pictures and hear the voices. We did a moment ago in Nissen's report from Landstuhl hospital. We can feel for the doctors. We can root for the patients. We can all hope for the best. But we cannot know.

Max Cleland can know, in Technicolor, the lows and, perhaps just as important, the possibilities. He left an arm and both legs in Vietnam, then went on to a distinguished career in public service, including two terms in the U.S. Senate. Currently, he's a member of the national commission investigating the 9/11 attacks. And he's been a staunch critic of the war in Iraq.

But that is not the role he has here with us tonight. We're to talk about the wounded and their road back.

And we are most pleased to have you with us.

MAX CLELAND, FORMER U.S. SENATOR: Thank you, Aaron.

BROWN: You were just at Fort Stewart yesterday. A lot of those guys had come home. Some of them did not come home. Some of them came home pretty banged up. What was your sense of their feelings about it all?

CLELAND: Well, the overarching feeling I had at the 3rd Infantry Division headquarters at Fort Stewart, Georgia, was the feeling of incredible pride in the tremendous courage these soldiers have, and their families as well, living day to day, not knowing exactly what's going to happen to their loved one, and also now not knowing where that loved one is going to be deployed next, whether Korea or back to Iraq.

So I think America needs to understand that there's a tremendous amount of courage that is in the people in the 3rd Infantry Division and in our military and in those families. That being said, what I think is the untold story of the war is this trickle of casualties that seems constant, every day. But it mounts up. We've lost well over, what, 400 or 500 killed in action. The 3rd Infantry Division itself lost 45 there in Iraq. It was on the spear, the point of the spear going into Baghdad. That's more casualties than any infantry division or mechanized division has taken since Vietnam.

You've also had almost 2,000 casualties now in Iraq, arms lost, legs lost, eyes lost, and, in many ways, careers and futures lost. That toll is being exacted every day.

(CROSSTALK)

CLELAND: There's a plane that flies into Andrews Air Force Base every night, not just into Germany, but to Andrews Air Force Base every night, and has a load of these casualties. I can identify with that, because I was there 35 years ago.

BROWN: We've said here that we think this has been a much- neglected story.

I wonder if you think or if you remember from your own experience whether these men and, in some cases, women, feel neglected as well, that those who have died are recognized in ways that those who are wounded are not.

CLELAND: I think that we have to make sure that not only those who give the supreme sacrifice are honored.

And down at the 3rd Infantry Division headquarters at Fort Stewart, they have warriors walk, where the 45 that have lost their lives are there in granite plaques and in trees planted in their honor and flags placed by those trees. But the wounded, they're kind of invisible. In many ways, they slip away into the dark of night. And they're left to figure out this war for themselves and what their future's going to be.

Now, they get great care, I want you to know. But the war for them is not over. And for many, it will never be over. They'll carry these scars the rest of their lives.

BROWN: One of the great differences to date between your war and this war is, when soldiers come home this time, they are coming home to be far more warmly received than they were then, whether healthy or wounded.

CLELAND: Thank God. Thank God. I mean, I thank God that the American people have not turned against the warrior.

In the Vietnam War, you couldn't separate -- people in this country couldn't separate the war from the warrior. They turned against the war. They turned against the warrior. They didn't mean to. They just did. And thank God that's not happened yet. That's my concern about the Iraq war going on and on and on in this guerrilla warfare environment in which we find ourselves in terms of the American military there, that it will take its toll on support, not just for the war, but the warrior. We can't let that happen again.

So one of the things that I wanted to do was go down and tell those soldiers how much this country appreciated them. They understand that. They get it. We just can't let this war go on too long, because, ultimately, it will take its toll. It is taking its toll on the families. It is taking its toll on the soldiers. But right now, they're performing a tremendous service for our country just by exercising their personal courage.

BROWN: Senator, it's always good to see you, and, on this subject, particularly so. Thank you.

CLELAND: Thank you.

BROWN: Former Senator Max Cleland.

We'll take a break from some of the heaviness of this day, whether it be war or politics, and talk about baseball and a couple of long-suffering teams with long-suffering fans.

We'll take a break first before that. This is NEWSNIGHT from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: The joke around the office this week -- or at least the joke around the office that we can tell -- went something like this: You'll know the world is coming to an end if the Cubs and the Red Sox make it into the World Series, because there's no way God would let either of them win.

Now, we're not picking favorites here. The mere fact that both teams are still playing in October certainly has the fans wondering if decades of futility might finally be coming to an end.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): Four more victories for each team is all it would take, very much in the realm of baseball probability. And then, if it were to happen, something not seen in almost a century would take place for an ill-prepared and somewhat disbelieving nation. The Cubs and the Red Sox, winners at last, would play each other in the World Series.

HAL BODLEY, "USA TODAY": Can you believe that? I think it's the greatest story that baseball could possibly conceive. And it's a great renaissance of the game. I just can't imagine it happening, but it's about to happen.

BROWN: Not just yet. But the Red Sox, who won a cardiac-arrest game against Oakland on Monday, are at least thinking about it.

DEREK LOWE, BOSTON RED SOX: That would be an unbelievable matchup.

GRADY LITTLE, BOSTON RED SOX MANAGER: I know that a lot of people are talking about that. A lot of people are thinking about that. And you never know. It could happen.

BROWN: As for the Cubs, they defeated the Atlanta Braves over the weekend, their first playoff series win of any sort since 1908. Their fans would relish any Cubs World Series, especially one with the Red Sox.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That would be great. That's what we're waiting for.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And why are you waiting for that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because it's been a long time for both teams and that would be the ultimate World Series.

BROWN: Both teams are said to have curses hanging over them like so much black velvet. The Red Sox curse emanates from the 1920s, when the team owner sold Babe Ruth -- yes, that Babe Ruth -- to the hated Yankees. No World Series victory since. And the Cubs haven't been on baseball's center stage since World War II, 1945.

CHARLIE STEINER, YANKEE BROADCASTER: I think the winner will be the loser, because part of the charm has been their futility. Now, all of a sudden, one of those teams, if they win, they're like everybody else. So they would lose some of that charm.

BROWN: But many of the knights of the keyboard, as Ted Williams called baseball writers, admit they would like to see this one.

BILL FINNEY, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": Reporters aren't supposed to be rooting for anybody. You try to be outside of that sort of thing. But you have to. You have to be pulling for this series, because it would be as interesting and compelling perhaps as any World Series that ever happened in baseball.

BROWN: A great deal of history must be overcome first. As for the here and now, Chicago must get past Florida's Marlins and Boston must get past the dreaded New York Yankees. We'll see.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The minute that they clinch and it's set that the Cubs and Sox are going to the World Series, hell is just going to break over and freeze. People are going to die. And pandemonium is going to strike loose. There's no way that that's ever going to happen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Well, it seemed like a good idea to us, though.

Morning papers after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Well, it seems a little early, but it's time to check morning papers from around the country and around the country.

Not too early to have tomorrow's edition of "The New York Times." And now I can see it. I guess I'll mention this. What the heck. "Voter Survey Points to Recall and Schwarzenegger." That's "The New York Times"' take on the exit polls they're receiving. But we haven't looked on ours, or at least unsealed the envelope. Right. "U.S. May Drop Attempt to Vote on Iraq in the United Nations." The Bush administration continued to have trouble getting a majority of countries to support its position at the Security Council, so they may just forget the whole thing.

And what else did I like here? Perhaps nothing. Oh, what am I saying? "U.S. Can't Locate Missiles Once Held in Arsenal of Iraq. A Risk to Planes is Seen." Sleep well tonight, huh? Better keep track of those missiles.

"The Boston Herald"'s lead is a little more straightforward, if you don't mind. "You're history, Babe. Forget the Curse. These Red Sox Are Ready to Rock." Well, we hope it's a great series. We don't take sides, do we? Cubs/Red Sox would be fun though, would it?

How we doing on time?

"The San Francisco Chronicle." "Voting Appears to be Smooth, as Millions Cast Their Ballots. Lines Long in Many Locations Around the State," pretty straightforward. This is a very good story that has gotten too little attention: "Congress Debates Liability on MTBE. Immunity from claims has been proposed." It was a gasoline additive that was supposed to clean the air. I think, pretty much now everyone agrees it's fouling the water. And it's a very good debate that's going on. It says a lot about politics in the country, in part because no one has heard much about it.

"Times Herald-Record": "180 on Casinos. Pataki Does Turnaround on Tribes." Indian gaming, there isn't any -- or there's very little in the state of New York, for reasons I've never understood.

And let's end this with "The Chicago Sun-Times." I guarantee you this headline will change if you're in Chicago, because they'll put the ball game on the front page. But the ball game isn't over yet.

"Ex-Convict Reynolds Runs for Congress." He's going after an old seat held by a former ally, Jesse Jackson. "Red hot" is the weather in Chicago tomorrow.

We'll take a break. That's morning papers. We'll take a break. Then the accordion guy is showing up.

We're right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Feels like a bonus segment, doesn't it?

Finally from us tonight, despite all we have done -- and we've done a lot -- in the name of portraying the California recall election as anything but a circus, there is this, a small thing perhaps, except for his mother. After a long absence -- and some might say not nearly long enough -- we welcome back tonight the accordion man. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (singing): California, here I run. Larry Flynt says join the fun. No sleeping, no keeping track of them all, who's quaking, who's shaking. It's Gray Davis I recall.

When Schwarzenegger's muscles flexed, Gary Coleman looked perplexed. They'll run an avocado next, guacamole, yum-yum-yum. Bustamante, you can't lose. Come on, Busta, move their Cruz. Please save from us Davis and all his debt. You're loyal, his foil. So you went and hedged your bet.

And when the governor's race is done, who will be the lucky one? Arianna Huffington. California, here I run. California, here I run. Yes. Politics and surf and sun. Each day a, each way, a candidate's born, some nutty, some smutty. Mary Carey stars in porn. For old and young and tall and short, it's the newest leisure sport. Tell that 9th appellate court, California, here I run.

Please don't postpone it. California, here I run.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALES (singing): Welcome to the recall, California.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rolling blackouts.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: It's been a while. That's our report for tonight. We're all back tomorrow, 10:00. Well, he's not back.

We're all back tomorrow at 10:00 Eastern time.

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