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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Democrats' Free-For-All Debate; Schwarzenegger Announces Transition Team

Aired October 09, 2003 - 22:30   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.
The campaign for the White House is being waged on both the East and West Coast today; Democrats out in Arizona in a free-for-all debate that was provocative at times, enlightening at times, and a bit amusing at times.

The president on the East Coast before another military audience, arguing again the case for the war, which, in and of itself, may be a sign of trouble. Months ago, the country was convinced. It is less so now. But for all their doubts, will the country believe that a Democrat, whoever emerges, will keep them safer than Mr. Bush? Both sides were at work today and both sides get their say tonight.

We begin "The Whip" with a dose of what we can expect in the year ahead, presidential politics.

Dan Lothian out in Phoenix, Arizona tonight.

Dan, a headline from you.

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Democrats vying to become the next president of the United States did meet on the same stage for the fourth official debate. And this time, when it comes to Wesley Clark, the gloves came off -- Aaron.

BROWN: Dan, thank you.

Back to California, where the job of running the government replaces the hobby of complaining about it.

Frank Buckley in Los Angeles tonight.

Frank, a headline from you.

FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Aaron.

The $8 billion operating deficit is about to become Arnold Schwarzenegger's headache. Today, he took the first step in taking on the deficit by announcing his auditor and the rest of his transition team. And there are some surprises -- Aaron.

BROWN: Frank, thank you.

TO eagle, Colorado, Kobe Bryant case in court.

Jeffrey Toobin there tonight for us.

Is that right, Jeffrey?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, sir. Hi, Aaron.

For once, it wasn't rumors about the Kobe Bryant case. It was actual evidence in court for the first time, an extraordinary day. The victim's story is told in vivid detail. And, Aaron, parental guidance isn't suggested on this story. It's required.

BROWN: Jeffrey, thank you. And I now recognize you. It's a tighter shot.

To Washington, D.C. now for some new developments on the sniper case.

Kathleen Koch covering that.

Kathleen, I always recognize you. A headline tonight, please.

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, many people said after last year's sniper spree that someone would simply have to be crazy to commit such random cold-blooded murders. Now, after court filings today, at least one sniper suspect will be making that case -- Aaron.

BROWN: Kathleen, thank you and the rest. Back to you all.

Also coming up, Mariane Pearl, the wife of the slain reporter Danny Pearl and the struggle to maintain hope in the face of tragedy.

Why did the FBI rescind an award it planned to give an Arab- American? That story is coming up.

And finally, of course, the award-winning morning paper segment. Wait, it hadn't won any awards. But it will -- all that and more in the hour to come.

We begin tonight with the debate in Phoenix. In addition to being a pretty fair batting-around of the issues, it was also a demonstration of the kind martial art peculiar to the campaign trail, the use of the velvet shiv, candidates trying to cut down their opponents, all without breaking a smile or getting blood on their ties. With nine candidates, a couple of front-runners, a few more who want to be, there was plenty of that going on.

We're joined from Phoenix tonight by CNN's Dan Lothian -- Dan.

LOTHIAN: Well, Aaron, I think that there weren't any real surprises.

Coming into tonight, it was expected that Wesley Clark would have to come under some attack from the other Democrats. As you remember, when he was in New York during the last debate, it was really hands- off for Wesley Clark. Whenever he was asked any particular questions about issues that he had not yet formulated, he said, listen, I've only been in this race for some nine days or so. I still need time to put together my platform.

And he was let go with that. But all along, we had been reporting that, tonight, the other Democrats would come after him. And they certainly did. The other issue, too, that we knew that the Democrats would be focusing on tonight would be on President Bush and the war in Iraq. And, once again, that was true, criticism coming from Democrats, saying that Bush should have never gone into Iraq and he doesn't have a plan to get out -- Aaron.

BROWN: Well, let's talk about Wes Clark for a bit. And we'll perhaps get some taste of the debate before we let you go here. The general was -- it seemed to me in the parts of the debate that I heard -- was attacked in part for being a kind of Johnny-come-lately Democrat.

LOTHIAN: Well, that is correct, Aaron.

As you may recall, he supported Reagan. He supported Nixon. There was a videotape of him at an event in 2001, where he was saying a lot of nice things about Republicans. And how he defends himself, he says: At that time, I was not really partisan. That's basically his response to this. So, yes, he has to defend this record of the come-lately to the Democratic Party. At least, that's how the other Democrats are looking at it, that: You supported Republicans. You seemed to always be saying great things about Republicans. And now, all of a sudden, you're saying, I'm a real Democrat.

And Clark insists that, yes, that's what he is. He says: I'm a Democrat. And he will always list out to you all the various issues that he agrees with the Democratic Party. He says he's a Democrat, not a Republican -- Aaron.

BROWN: As was there, to your ear, at least, much new ground broken, or was it essentially a replay of the nine individual messages the candidates have been trying to get out now for months?

LOTHIAN: I really don't think that we heard anything new tonight. We heart Dean continuing, saying, I've been against this war from the very beginning and others criticizing him for that.

But, yes, he has been steadfast on his opposition to this war. And beyond that, there was nothing really new. I mean, the big issue tonight that were we expecting is, would they go after Wesley Clark? And tonight, they did. The other issue, would they go after President Bush? And they did. The first few questions in the first minutes of the debate, that's what it was.

And then the second half of the debate, they did get into some of the other issues that are important to voters here in the state, issues such as health care, such as immigration, such as trade. It was a different -- it was an interesting type of debate, because what they did was, they opened it up as a town hall meeting. And that was a chance, after the correspondents asked the candidates questions, then it was a chance for the people to ask the questions that are important to them -- Aaron.

BROWN: Dan, thank you very much.

It's a little bit of putting the cart before the horse here, as we've been scrambling to get Dan's piece, his slice of the debate together. And we have it together.

And so here's some of what it sounded like.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LOTHIAN (voice-over): As supporters of the Democratic presidential candidates and protesters clamored for a voice on the sidewalk, the clear voice on the platform shouted at President George Bush and his policy on Iraq.

REP. DENNIS KUCINICH (D-OH), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Our involvement in Iraq was based on lies.

LOTHIAN: Criticism shifted to retired General Wesley Clark, who wasn't given a pass in this debate about his shifting position on the war in Iraq.

SEN. JOSEPH LIEBERMAN (D-CT), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He recommended and would have supported the resolution. After the war, he wrote a piece in "The Times of London" praising President Bush and Tony Blair for their resolve. When he became a candidate, he said he probably would have voted for the resolution.

WESLEY CLARK (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Let me tell you what my story is. I always supported taking the problem of Saddam Hussein to the United Nations and bringing international resolve to bear.

LOTHIAN: Then Clark was questioned about his credentials as a Democrat and his record of supporting Republicans. The retired general tried to set the record straight.

CLARK: I did go into a Republican fund-raiser, because I was nonpartisan at that point.

LOTHIAN: Clark, on the defensive, was quickly reminded where he was.

LIEBERMAN: Welcome to the Democratic presidential campaign.

LOTHIAN: The candidates briefly touched on health care, tax cuts and Social Security, before the debate turned into a town hall meeting and the audience got a chance to talk.

Back outside the theater, this "Democracy Caravan" is traveling the country to give Americans a voice by taking their questions directly to the candidates on the campaign trail.

DAVID SCHWENK, DEMOCRACYCARAVAN.ORG: That way, the voice of the people will be heard more, because we're afraid that, right now, special interests and corporate lobbying control politics.

(END VIDEOTAPE) BROWN: Dan Lothian's report from Phoenix.

Judy Woodruff moderated the debate. That you're still standing is impressive to me. We very much appreciate it. It was a lot of work out there.

(CROSSTALK)

BROWN: Was it tense in the hall? Does there seem to be a kind of -- was there a congeniality about it?

JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: Aaron, there was a little bit of tension before it got under way. But by the time we started the questions, I think the ice had been broken.

I don't know if you could tell from watching on television, but the audience, the auditorium at this beautiful theater we're standing in front of was absolutely packed, everybody there reacting. There were a lot of reactions during this debate. So I think that helped break any tension that was there. People were ready. They came ready to roll.

I heard you talking to Dan about, was there news made and what happened? I think these candidates came tonight ready to unload, to some extent, on each other.

BROWN: To mix it up a bit.

Just a couple of observations I'm curious -- that -- from watching it on TV. And I'm curious, from where were you, if you saw it differently. I thought Congressman Gephardt was very good tonight, very strong.

WOODRUFF: He was animated, Aaron. He feels passionately about some of the issues that he talked about, middle-class America, when he talked about growing up and how his life has taken the turns that it has. He talked about health care. He talked about Iraq.

He -- I think he did come across very strongly. Now, I've seen him before in other fora where he has been as passionate. I think this was a chance for tonight for him to show that passion again.

BROWN: And it was a pretty good dust-up for General Clark. He knew he was -- he knew he was in political combat tonight.

WOODRUFF: I talked to General Clark right after the debate, Aaron. And he said: I came here expecting this. He said: I knew, because I've been moving up in the polls, he said, I knew that they were going to come after me, and they did.

He was a little frustrated he didn't get more rebuttal time. But, of course, in a debate like this, nobody feels they have gotten enough time. But I thought you did see -- and you and Dan were just speaking about this -- you did see not just Dean, Kerry, but Joe Lieberman going after him. And it reflects the fact he's only been in the campaign a few weeks and, already, he is moving up in the polls. And the clock is ticking.

We are getting closer to the first primary in January. These candidates have got to stand out from the pack, if they have any chance of capturing the nomination.

BROWN: And just one thing that Bill Schneider mentioned to Larry King after the debate, which I hadn't thought of in quite that way, but I think he was absolutely right. Gephardt certainly, and the others to a degree, are not running away from Bill Clinton. They are running towards the Clinton economy.

WOODRUFF: Yes, I think that's right. I mean, there have been -- there's been a lot of -- we heard in the Gore/Lieberman campaign of 2000 -- in the aftermath of that, Aaron, there was a lot of second- guessing about whether Al Gore should have embraced Bill Clinton more.

I think these Democrats have decided -- and maybe it's crystal clear why they're doing it -- the George Bush economy has been going down. They're happy to embrace Bill Clinton's administration, because you had growth, you had jobs. So it looks pretty good with the distance of 2 1/2 years.

BROWN: Judy, terrific job tonight. That is not easy to do. I can't imagine.

WOODRUFF: Thank you. Thank you.

BROWN: And you did great tonight. I was proud of you. Thank you.

WOODRUFF: Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it.

BROWN: Judy Woodruff.

WOODRUFF: Good to see you, Aaron.

BROWN: Good to see you, Judy Woodruff out in Phoenix, where I suspect it's a bit warm still tonight.

On to other business. We were asked an intriguing question about California today. A friend said, if Cruz Bustamante had won, would we here cover live his announcement of a transition team? The answer, probably not. But the experienced politician didn't win. The novice did. And for a while at least, what he does, who he appoints, how he conducts himself is news, should be news, and, given the sheer size of California, ought to be covered as the national story we believe it to be. So the governor-elect made some news today.

Frank Buckley reports it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BUCKLEY (voice-over): Borrowing a phrase from the era of his wife's uncle, Jack Kennedy, Arnold Schwarzenegger said he would seek out the best and the brightest for his administration, his 68-member transition team reflecting the diversity he expects to see in his Cabinet.

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR-ELECT: People that are to the left, people that are to the right and people that are to the center.

BUCKLEY: Among the transition advisers, former Secretary of State in the Reagan administration George Shultz, former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, former Republican Governor Pete Wilson, all of them involved in Schwarzenegger's campaign.

But new names on the Schwarzenegger team included surprises, like Susan Estrich, who ran the failed Democratic presidential campaign of former Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis.

SCHWARZENEGGER: You will see people all the way from Bill Simon, all the way to the other side, Willie Brown.

(LAUGHTER)

BUCKLEY: That was the reaction of GOP political consultant Alan Hoffenblum as he heard the pairing of conservative businessman Bill Simon and liberal San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown. But Hoffenblum says, Schwarzenegger has it right in concluding that he'll need the parties to work together.

ALAN HOFFENBLUM, REPUBLICAN POLITICAL CONSULTANT: There's a lot of hope out there that Arnold Schwarzenegger's going to bridge some of those schisms between the two extremes and force both Republicans and Democrats to work together to get us out of this fiscal crisis.

BUCKLEY: Schwarzenegger says he's confident legislators will play ball.

SCHWARZENEGGER: But I don't see a problem there. If there is a problem, you can be assured that I will go directly to the people, because the people of California have made it loud and clear, made it very clear that they want change.

BUCKLEY: But while Schwarzenegger talked transition, a final shouted question from a reporter hinted at a lingering issue from the campaign that may follow him to Sacramento.

QUESTION: Are you still going go look into the specifics of sexual allegations, governor-elect, as you said over the weekend?

SCHWARZENEGGER: Old news.

QUESTION: No, it's not.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BUCKLEY: And if you couldn't hear what Schwarzenegger said, he said about the sexual harassment allegations, old news.

Schwarzenegger, meanwhile, is moving forward with the first order of business in his new administration, even before he takes office. Today, he announced that Donna Arduin, who is Florida's director of the Office of Policy and Budget, is taking a leave from her job there to head up an independent audit of the state budget in California. Schwarzenegger says there will be cuts ahead, given the $8 billion operating deficit. Schwarzenegger has to submit the budget by January -- Aaron.

BROWN: Frank, thank you, Frank Buckley out in Los Angeles tonight.

Iraq next. In a week that saw the White House appear to seize control of the reconstruction effort from the defense secretary and put it in the hands of the national security adviser, today saw Congress try to seize control from her. Even as a House committee controlled by Republicans gave the administration the money it wants, it also approved a measure that would prevent any official not confirmed by the Congress -- read that, the national security adviser -- from coordinating or spending the money.

Some are calling this the Condoleezza Rice amendment. And it is yet another unwanted complication for the president.

Here's CNN's Suzanne Malveaux.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Six months since Baghdad fell, President Bush continues to defend his decision to go to war.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I acted because I was not about to leave the security of the American people in the hands of a madman.

MALVEAUX: But it was a deadly anniversary day: 10 Iraqis, a Spanish diplomat and an American soldier killed in attacks. Mr. Bush insists, this is just a small part of the picture, that schools, utilities and even security in Iraq improve every day.

BUSH: It's a lot better than you probably think. Just ask people who have been there. They're stunned when they come back -- when they go to Iraq. And the stories they tell are much different from the perceptions that you're being told life is like.

MALVEAUX: Before a friendly audience of National Guard and reservists in New Hampshire, Mr. Bush kicked off day two of the White House's aggressive effort to counter criticism of its postwar policy in Iraq. But the administration's P.R. blitz is drawing criticism, too.

JOE LOCKHART, FORMER CLINTON WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I think they ought to spend a little more time working through a substantive plan and a little less time worrying about their P.R. problems.

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), MINORITY LEADER: They're now putting together a P.R. offensive. And I think offensive is probably a pretty good word for it, offensive to go out to defend their proposal.

MALVEAUX (on camera): But Mr. Bush did win a victory in Congress today, when a House committee approved nearly all of the $87 billion funding package for Iraq and Afghanistan, as the White House wanted in grants, not loans. It now clears the way for the legislation to go to the full House next week.

Suzanne Malveaux, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Ahead on NEWSNIGHT: the latest on the D.C. sniper case; plus, up next, new developments in the Kobe Bryant sexual assault case in Colorado; and a bit later, a conversation with Mariane Pearl, other members, too, of the slain journalist's family, Danny Pearl, of course, on the eve of what would have been his 40th birthday.

A break first. From New York, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Scott Turow, the author and the lawyer who served on Illinois' death penalty commission, summed it up pretty welcome last night on this program. People, he said, support the death penalty to balance the moral books, no other reason. For the ultimate evil, he said, people demanded the ultimate punishment.

And few would argue that the sniper killings of 10 people in the Washington, D.C. area last year were anything but evil, plain and simple, which makes any defense a tough one and the one offered today by lawyers for Lee Malvo, that essentially he was brainwashed, especially so.

Here CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KOCH (voice-over): His lawyers say he was young, impressionable and brainwashed, that Lee Malvo was so controlled by older suspect John Muhammad during last year's sniper spree that the then 17-year- old couldn't tell right from wrong.

CRAIG COOLEY, ATTORNEY FOR MALVO: The degree of indoctrination is so significant in this case that we would be remiss in our responsibilities if we failed to put that issue forward for a jury to make a determination of it.

KOCH: But prosecutors insist, the report from Malvo's court- appointed mental health expert shows no insanity. And as for the defense citing other private experts who say indoctrination is a mental illness...

ROBERT HORAN JR., VIRGINIA PROSECUTOR: Well, that's not a mental illness that's in the book. That's one that's invented.

KOCH: Legal experts say the brainwashing defense has limited success.

JOSEPH DIGENOVA, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY: Well, it's not a strategy generally that works very well, because jurors are not predisposed to believe that people lose free will. Now, in a case of someone that young, jurors might be disposed to believe brainwashing, when there is a disparity in the age between the Svengali and the Trilby.

KOCH: Meanwhile, the judge in John Muhammad's separate trial has ruled defense attorneys can't introduce evidence about his state of mind, because he has refused to be examined by the prosecution's mental health expert.

(END VIDEOTAPE) '

KOCH: As for Lee Malvo, his state of mind will now be carefully dissected. The question is, will claims of brainwashing be enough to convince a jury he isn't guilty or simply to spare him the death penalty? -- Aaron.

BROWN: Has he been examined by state psychiatrists?

KOCH: Lee Malvo?

BROWN: Yes.

KOCH: He has not. But in court today, the judge did ask him if he would submit to such an examination. And he said, yes, that he was willing to cooperate.

BROWN: Did he speak or did his lawyers speak for him?

KOCH: Yes, he did, just briefly, saying that he would cooperate, that he would submit to the examination.

BROWN: OK, Kathleen, thank you very much -- Kathleen Koch in Washington.

On now to the case of Kobe Bryant and the woman, of course, who says he raped her. A detective told that young woman's story today. In her version, innocent kissing became an act of violence, mutual flirting became a violation, in her version. His, of course, will be different.

Rape cases are often messy affairs. And this one showed signs today of being very messy indeed.

Here's CNN's Gary Tuchman.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The 19- year-old woman who has accused Kobe Bryant of sexually assaulting her says the basketball player put his hands around her neck and forced himself upon her.

This was just a small portion of the graphic testimony at a preliminary hearing, where the prosecution revealed evidence publicly for the first time. According to Eagle County sheriff's Detective Doug Winters, who interviewed the accuser, Bryant checked into a hotel in Edwards, Colorado, and asked the 19-year-old hotel employee for a tour.

The woman acknowledged to the detective she flirted with Bryant and did consent to kissing him on the mouth and neck. But that, she said, is where the consent stopped. The detective testified -- quote -- "He began to grope her, touching her breasts and buttocks area." He continued by saying, she told him Bryant restrained her by the neck, turned her around, bent her over a chair and had sexual intercourse.

Pictures were shown of injuries to her jaw and her private area. Defense Attorney Pamela Mackey cross-examined the detective. Were there red marks, bruises, scratches or finger marks on the alleged victim's neck? The detective said, no. But he did tell prosecutors that blood from the woman was found on Kobe Bryant's T-shirt.

The judge will decide from the preliminary hearing if there is probable cause to bring this case to trial. But the day came to a premature end after Kobe Bryant's attorney asked the detective if her injuries were -- quote -- "consistent with someone who has had sex with three different guys in three days."

The prosecution, already angry because the defense attorney said the accuser's name in the court six times, objected. And the hearing was called off for the day.

(on camera): The judge said it will be continued next Wednesday. So Kobe Bryant, who sat in the courtroom for most of the day with a serious expression, left in a motorcade, knowing that he'll have to return next week.

Gary Tuchman, CNN, Eagle, Colorado.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We're join by Jeffrey Toobin, our legal analyst out in Colorado tonight.

They were playing hardball, Jeffrey.

TOOBIN: Aaron, I've been in a lot of courtrooms. This was one of the most dramatic, involving, extraordinary days I have ever seen. And the way it ended, with this reference to these three alleged -- having sex with three men in three days left people with their jaws hanging open. It was just wild.

BROWN: And the prosecution objected to that on what basis?

TOOBIN: Well, there is rape shield laws. The whole idea behind rape shield laws is that women are not expected to have their sexual history put on display.

And while this may not have been a technical violation of the rape shield law, because it wasn't introduced to show her propensity for having sex, it was shown to explain an injury, I thought it was an incredibly sleazy move not to do this with any advance notice. And I thought it was a sign that this trial is going to be in the gutter from day, as it was, and it's only going to get uglier.

BROWN: Tell me what you mean. I want to frame this my way, if you don't mind. Tell me what you mean by in the gutter? Now, here is Mr. Bryant, who has an enormous amount to lose here.

And he is entitled, I think we both would agree...

TOOBIN: Absolutely.

BROWN: ... to the most aggressive defense that he and his team can muster. So when you use the term in the gutter, tell me what you mean.

TOOBIN: I mean playing by the rules. The rules are, you don't mention a rape victim's name in open court. And maybe you make a mistake once. Maybe you make a mistake twice. Pamela Mackey used her name six times. That doesn't seem like an accident to me.

And when you're talking about prior sexual history, two decades ago, three decades ago, legislatures around this country made a judgment that sexual history of women was not relevant, because it simply is not relevant to the crime of rape. That's been on the books for years. You don't violate that on your own as a lawyer without getting the judge's permission first to use that sort of -- kind of evidence. I thought it was sleazy and appalling. Aggressive defense, absolutely, but you've got to play by the rules.

BROWN: What would the point have been of mentioning her name six times?

TOOBIN: Well, I think it is a signal to -- that her name -- I mean, her name is known to many of us who cover the case. But there were also members of the public in the courtroom. This is -- people don't want their names mentioned when they are rape victims.

BROWN: Yes.

TOOBIN: This is a decision we leave to rape victims to publicize, not to defense lawyers, not to journalists.

BROWN: No, I understand that. Jeffrey, are you saying that it was a kind of legal shot across the bow? It was a warning that, you're going to regret coming forward with this? What is your interpretation of the reason?

TOOBIN: I think it is a shot across the bow. I think it's driving home to her the cost of coming forward. I think it was -- it was an act of intimidation on the part of defense. And I really thought it was inappropriate.

BROWN: About a half a minute. The detail that came out today, any of it surprising? Any of it change your view of the complexity of the case, the problems faced by either side?

TOOBIN: A lot of it was surprising.

I mean, most of this evidence had not come out before. I'll tell you one thing -- two pieces of evidence. One, Kobe Bryant was wearing a T-shirt. On his T-shirt was the victim's blood. It's going to be tough to explain that in terms of consensual sex. Also, the detective testified that the woman, the victim, alleged victim, went to a bellman immediately after the incident and reported her distress.

I think the bellman's testimony could turn out to be very powerful corroboration of the woman. That will be a dramatic moment in this trial, when it happens several, several months from now.

BROWN: Jeffrey, thank you -- Jeffrey Toobin in Eagle, Colorado, tonight. Really nice job. Thank you.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT: A family copes with tragedy on the eve of slain journalist Danny Pearl's 40th birthday. His wife and family talk about keeping his message of hope alive.

Around the world, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Tomorrow would have been Danny Pearl's 40th birthday and we're certain that his family in Southern California and his widow here in New York City are coping with an array of emotions tonight. They grieve, of course, but his widow is now a mom, his parents are now grandparents, and their lives, as they remind us, are not locked in a tragedy of yesterday, which is not the Pearl way, not for any of them.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): Time passes. His son, Adam, is 16 months now, and knows nothing of the sadness that still lingers here in the very backyard where his father, the father he will never know, grew up.

Someday he will get answers, answers from his mother and the family.

MARIANNE PEARL, WIDOW OF DANIEL PEARL: When he grows up and he needs to find out what happened to his father -- it's one thing to just say "This is what happened, deal with it," you know, and it's another thing to say, "This is what happened, but."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: October 10 would have been the 40th birthday of journalist and musician Daniel Pearl.

BROWN: The but is a determined effort to see that Daniel Pearl's murder nearly two years ago now would not be memorialized in pain. Rather in the music he loved, played at venues all over the world, like this one in Jerusalem the other night, for the 2nd Annual Daniel Pearl Music Day.

JUDEA PEARL: If you think about it, there aren't many faces today that both a Muslim and a Westerner can point to and say "This is an emissary of goodwill."

RUTH PEARL, MOTHER OF DANIEL PEARL: We feel we are doing some good, we are continuing Danny's life work. We are in a way keeping him alive, the way we feel about it.

BROWN: It has not been easy for the Pearl's of course. His sister's, Michelle and Tamara, are both married now, without their brother looking on.

TAMARA PEARL, SISTER OF DANIEL PEARL: It's something I think about a lot, obviously. How could humanity have come to such a cruel place. But when I think of Danny, and that was really his gift, is that he didn't doubt. He didn't doubt the inherent goodness of humanity. He didn't doubt it. And so I just have to reference him and feel him and I feel it too.

BROWN: Marianne Pearl, for her part, has just finished a book about her husband's murder, "From a Mighty Heart." She offers no self-pity, simply resilience.

MARIANNE PEARL: The most important thing was that, you know, there was no reason that Danny's life would be hijacked by Danny's death. He, you know, he worked hard to be who he was, and that what is to celebrate. It's not a point to just like focus on the last hours or weeks, you know, of his life.

BROWN: Still, life is not yet on firm ground.

RUTH PEARL: Of course, we will always miss Danny. It's a hole in the heart, and that's not going to change through the years. Time does not make that much difference in that loss.

MARIANNE PEARL: It's not normal yet, we're still in surreal land, but little by little.

BROWN: But for the family at large, there is an overriding sense of optimism.

MICHELLE PEARL, SISTER OF DANIEL PEARL: I think it gives people hope to see that we didn't turn to anger and we didn't turn to hatred in the face of a completely ludicrous event. We maintain our hope.

BROWN: And an overriding sense of mission.

JUDEA PEARL: I vow to take revenge for the ideology that took Danny's life. We vowed to fight the hatred that killed him.

MARIANNE PEARL: To me, you know, I think the base of my strength and maybe his family's strength was his own courage. I think -- I am convinced that Danny did not reject who he was because people hated who he was. There was also in him a spirit of defiance until the end. And I think for me my belief is that that is also the base of our own power.

He had the courage. How can we fall? I mean we can't.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: The Pearl family on the even of what would have been Danny Pearl's 40th birthday.

Still to come on the program, a little bit later we check morning papers. Up next, a reality check on the situation in Iraq, six months after the fall of Baghdad. A break first on CNN.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Correspondent Rod Nordland has seen Baghdad before and after, if you will. He's the Baghdad bureau chief for "Newsweek" magazine. I'm very pleased to have him with us again as we have before.

The president, Rod, talked about the Iraq that he wants Americans to see, an Iraq of schoolchildren back in class, of hospitals back treating people, a place that is certainly not perfect, but not a sea of violence. Give me a reality check.

ROD NORDLAND, "NEWSWEEK": Well, the schools are back, but there were schools before the war, too. Kids were attending school before. The hospitals were working before, although they had lots of problems, and perhaps they're marginally improved now.

In most ways, things are just now getting back to where they were before the war, and it's a little specious for the coalition to claim that that's an accomplishment, to get back to sort of ground zero as it were.

BROWN: The security situation I guess is really in two forms; the security of American troops on the ground and the questions of security for Iraqis to go about their daily lives. Address both of those. Is it getting better?

NORDLAND: Sure. It's getting much better for Iraqis. They feel safe in their homes now. Businesses are opening on a more or less normal schedule. The curfew is much shorter, and they credit that mainly to the Iraqi police, which the coalition has helped to refound, and it's made it safer, at least on the streets in the cities. The highways and in rural areas it still can be pretty dangerous.

At the same time, however, it's gotten much more dangerous for foreigners, for internationals of any sort, and for coalition troops. The attacks on them have not let up. They've continued at pretty much the same steady pace, something like 15 to 20 attacks every day, perhaps more because there's a lot of under-reporting of these attacks. And the other thing is that most Iraqis do not give the coalition credit for the improvement in the security in their lives. They give the Iraqi police the credit, and they use that as sort of further evidence that the occupation should come to an end.

BROWN: When you talk about the attacks as being under-reported, is it because nobody gets hurt or because they're simply not reported by the coalition?

NORDLAND: No, the coalition doesn't report them. For instance, we found out that three days ago now a grenade was set off in a crowd where a lot of soldiers were present, American soldiers, trying to keep control. 13 soldiers were wounded, never reported. We never heard a word about it. 13 American soldiers wounded, 9 of them serious enough to be medevacked.

They do report soldiers who are killed in action, but lots of smaller incidents, which are not small for the men involved -- in some cases they're maimed or very seriously injured -- just under-reported entirely.

BROWN: You talked mostly about soldiers there. Go back to talking about foreigners, Westerners. Is it -- not to make you the story, but in just trying to go about your life in Baghdad, do you feel threatened?

NORDLAND: Very much so. I mean, the comforting thing is, it's a big city of 5 million people and the attacks are relatively few every day, so the chances of it being you are fairly small.

But that said, we make a lot of efforts to kind of minimize those chances, and I think most of us now don't go out on the streets unless we have a journalistic mission to do. We don't go out shopping, for instance. We don't hang out in restaurants, and we do a lot of things to try to minimize our exposure on the streets.

And personally, when I'm out on the streets, working, you know, I'm always watching behind me, because of the possibility of somebody walking up with a gun and just doing it. I mean, that's happened on quite a number of occasions, and it's pretty clear now that everybody here is a target. Certainly soldiers are much more of a target than I am, and a lot of my colleagues, for instance, are more reluctant to go out with soldiers than to go out on their own, because their such a target.

BROWN: Are they -- is it just -- are they wanting to rob you? Is that it? Or are they just wanting to kill Westerners?

NORDLAND: No, I don't think robbery is a concern anymore. I mean, there's always some risk in a place like this for that. But no, the concern is the targeted assassination of somebody because they're a Westerner, and I think now there's just no doubt at all that any Westerner, any international here, is a target.

Yesterday, a Spanish diplomat was killed. That was clearly an assassination. Two guys with handguns chased him down the street and shot him when he fell, and they had come to his house looking for him in a very carefully planned operation. His security guard was off duty between -- one shift had changed at 7:00 in the morning, a new one was coming at 8:00. In between, they came to his house when he was unguarded.

BROWN: You've done terrific work for the magazine, for "Newsweek" magazine. We appreciate your time. It's early out there for you.

Be safe, Rod. Thanks very much. Rod Nordland, of "Newsweek" magazine, the bureau chief now in Baghdad. And that's a pretty stark assessment.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT the honor the FBI took back, why an Arab- American lost out on a prestigious service award. We'll tell you that story. Morning papers coming up too. A break first.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: This next story caught our eye while we were doing morning papers last night. Depending on who you ask, it is either a tale of the smearing of an Arab-American who deserves a metal for his service to the country after the attacks of September 11, or it is the belated recognition that in the name of not offending Arab-Americans the federal government nearly honored someone who sympathizes with terrorists and terrorism.

Anyway you look at it, it's a mess, and a reflection perhaps of just how awkward things can get here in the new normal.

From Detroit tonight, here's CNN's Martin Savidge.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Imad Hamad is supposed to be in Washington, receiving a top award for helping the FBI. Instead, he is sitting in a restaurant near his home of Dearborn, Michigan wondering what happened.

For over two yeas Hamad, an Arab-American, has been a liaison between federal authorities and Detroit's huge Arab-American community, which has been the focus of public suspicion, even hatred, in the post-9-11 world.

It was the head of the Michigan office of the FBI that personally recommended Hamad for the honor.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He goes forward to interact with law enforcement to try and help relieve those tensions or to address those issues. His role has been critical here.

SAVIDGE: FBI headquarters in Washington agreed. But conservative political commentator Debbie Schlessel felt...

DEBBIE SCHLESSEL, COMMENTATOR: Outrage and shock.

SAVIDGE: She wrote a column on her Web site blasting Hamad's selection, saying that he was an outspoken supporter of terror.

SCHLESSEL: He's gone on TV defending homicide bombers, defending videos that teach 3-year-old kids to become homicide bombers, calling that patriotic, and there are a host of other things.

SAVIDGE: Schlessel is also angry that Hamad would share the spotlight with another award recipient, flight attendant Madeleine Sweeney, who calmly described to the FBI the hijacking of her plane moments before it struck the World Trade Center.

Just two days before the award ceremony, Hamad was told by the FBI his invitation and the honor were canceled. Hamad denies that he is a terrorist sympathizer and downplays any disappointment over the award.

IMAD HAMAD, ARAB-AMERICAN: At the end of the day, you know, I do what I do to serve my community. I do what I do to be of service to my nation and my country here, and I take pride in everything I did.

SAVIDGE (on camera): There is no doubt in Debbie Schlessel's mind that her column and public reaction to it were responsible for the FBI's change of heart.

(voice-over): The FBI denies that. Other sources tell CNN the problem is not with Hamad, but some of the people he associates with, and that those connections could later prove an embarrassment for the FBI.

No matter what the reason, Hamad is left eating at home in Michigan rather than celebrating with a dinner in D.C.

Martin Savidge, CNN, Dearborn, Michigan.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Before we take a break, a few more items making news around the country.

First, Pat Robertson, no stranger to controversy, and he's drawing fire tonight for agreeing with an author who suggested nuking the State Department.

"I think that's the answer," Reverend Robertson said, during an interview. "When you say if you could just get a nuclear device inside Foggy Bottom, I think that's the answer."

State Department spokesmen today called the remarks "despicable."

Very cool rescue off the coast of Texas. A woman feel off a shrimp boat Tuesday night. She was in the water until last night. She swims to an abandoned oil rig, where she somehow manages to pain S.O.S. on it, and someone spots it, calls the Coast Guard. Yes. And they rescue her -- former Coast Guardsman I am. Finally, to Philadelphia and the very slow, very careful process of moving the Liberty Bell 1000 feet into its new home. A team of engineers went along, monitoring for cracks. That would be new cracks, of course. That's kind of cool, too, isn't it.

Morning papers after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: I'm telling you right now, I do not have the "Chicago Sun Times" tonight, so those of you who only watch the entire program to find out the weather in Chicago in some clever phrase, it's time to go to bed.

Here we go. Morning papers from around the country.

"USA Today," the nation's largest newspaper and most colorful, too. This is a great story. We probably should have done this tonight, guys. "Cancer drug shows promise, slashes recurrence after breast surgery." This made a lot of front pages, or it will tomorrow, I guess, is the right way to put it.

Also, Kobe Bryant, pretty much on all the front pages. "Detective: Bryant's accuser felt pain." That will come back again.

"The Aspen Daily News," out there in Aspen, Colorado, down here, OK. "Kobe free newspaper feels owner's wrath." They're writing a story about their own paper. "Aspen Daily News" owner Dave Danforth (ph) leveled sharp criticism at his newsroom Thursday after the staff ran a front page editorial announcing they were putting a stop to daily Kobe coverage. Perhaps not the best day to stop it.

"The Daily Camera," which is the newspaper in Boulder, Colorado, "Details from Bryant's accuser," is the headline there. I'm going to try and get a bunch in tonight.

"The Washington Times," there was a reason -- there were two. "Church group rips U.S. leader's" -- the "Washington Times" played this story very hard. The Episcopalian rift over gays. And down in the other corner, "Pope decries scandalous clergy behavior, stresses the gift of celibacy." They also put, I don't know why, I mean, I know exactly why -- "Stock market hits highest level of '03; recovery seen as robust." "Where are the jobs," I think you'll hear people say to that.

The breast cancer story on the front page also of the "Miami Herald." "Breast cancer drug called success."

We've got a minute left. I can feel that in my brain.

"The Philadelphia Daily News," which of course is the people paper -- I don't' know what that means. "New twist in probe; Feds seized mayor's wireless device." And so the headline reads "Streets Blackberry jam.' Get it? I do. I like that headline.

The other paper in Philadelphia, "The Philadelphia Inquirer," which apparently is not the people paper, "Street computer seized" is their headline.

Terry (ph), tell me how we're doing on time. 15 seconds.

Here we go. "Don't have a cow. Beef costs up," the "Cincinnati Inquirer's" headline on a front page story. What's the weather in Chicago. Superb tomorrow. Thank you, guys.

We'll see you all tomorrow on a Friday edition of the program. Until then, good night from all of us.

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





Transition Team>


Aired October 9, 2003 - 22:30   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.
The campaign for the White House is being waged on both the East and West Coast today; Democrats out in Arizona in a free-for-all debate that was provocative at times, enlightening at times, and a bit amusing at times.

The president on the East Coast before another military audience, arguing again the case for the war, which, in and of itself, may be a sign of trouble. Months ago, the country was convinced. It is less so now. But for all their doubts, will the country believe that a Democrat, whoever emerges, will keep them safer than Mr. Bush? Both sides were at work today and both sides get their say tonight.

We begin "The Whip" with a dose of what we can expect in the year ahead, presidential politics.

Dan Lothian out in Phoenix, Arizona tonight.

Dan, a headline from you.

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Democrats vying to become the next president of the United States did meet on the same stage for the fourth official debate. And this time, when it comes to Wesley Clark, the gloves came off -- Aaron.

BROWN: Dan, thank you.

Back to California, where the job of running the government replaces the hobby of complaining about it.

Frank Buckley in Los Angeles tonight.

Frank, a headline from you.

FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Aaron.

The $8 billion operating deficit is about to become Arnold Schwarzenegger's headache. Today, he took the first step in taking on the deficit by announcing his auditor and the rest of his transition team. And there are some surprises -- Aaron.

BROWN: Frank, thank you.

TO eagle, Colorado, Kobe Bryant case in court.

Jeffrey Toobin there tonight for us.

Is that right, Jeffrey?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, sir. Hi, Aaron.

For once, it wasn't rumors about the Kobe Bryant case. It was actual evidence in court for the first time, an extraordinary day. The victim's story is told in vivid detail. And, Aaron, parental guidance isn't suggested on this story. It's required.

BROWN: Jeffrey, thank you. And I now recognize you. It's a tighter shot.

To Washington, D.C. now for some new developments on the sniper case.

Kathleen Koch covering that.

Kathleen, I always recognize you. A headline tonight, please.

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, many people said after last year's sniper spree that someone would simply have to be crazy to commit such random cold-blooded murders. Now, after court filings today, at least one sniper suspect will be making that case -- Aaron.

BROWN: Kathleen, thank you and the rest. Back to you all.

Also coming up, Mariane Pearl, the wife of the slain reporter Danny Pearl and the struggle to maintain hope in the face of tragedy.

Why did the FBI rescind an award it planned to give an Arab- American? That story is coming up.

And finally, of course, the award-winning morning paper segment. Wait, it hadn't won any awards. But it will -- all that and more in the hour to come.

We begin tonight with the debate in Phoenix. In addition to being a pretty fair batting-around of the issues, it was also a demonstration of the kind martial art peculiar to the campaign trail, the use of the velvet shiv, candidates trying to cut down their opponents, all without breaking a smile or getting blood on their ties. With nine candidates, a couple of front-runners, a few more who want to be, there was plenty of that going on.

We're joined from Phoenix tonight by CNN's Dan Lothian -- Dan.

LOTHIAN: Well, Aaron, I think that there weren't any real surprises.

Coming into tonight, it was expected that Wesley Clark would have to come under some attack from the other Democrats. As you remember, when he was in New York during the last debate, it was really hands- off for Wesley Clark. Whenever he was asked any particular questions about issues that he had not yet formulated, he said, listen, I've only been in this race for some nine days or so. I still need time to put together my platform.

And he was let go with that. But all along, we had been reporting that, tonight, the other Democrats would come after him. And they certainly did. The other issue, too, that we knew that the Democrats would be focusing on tonight would be on President Bush and the war in Iraq. And, once again, that was true, criticism coming from Democrats, saying that Bush should have never gone into Iraq and he doesn't have a plan to get out -- Aaron.

BROWN: Well, let's talk about Wes Clark for a bit. And we'll perhaps get some taste of the debate before we let you go here. The general was -- it seemed to me in the parts of the debate that I heard -- was attacked in part for being a kind of Johnny-come-lately Democrat.

LOTHIAN: Well, that is correct, Aaron.

As you may recall, he supported Reagan. He supported Nixon. There was a videotape of him at an event in 2001, where he was saying a lot of nice things about Republicans. And how he defends himself, he says: At that time, I was not really partisan. That's basically his response to this. So, yes, he has to defend this record of the come-lately to the Democratic Party. At least, that's how the other Democrats are looking at it, that: You supported Republicans. You seemed to always be saying great things about Republicans. And now, all of a sudden, you're saying, I'm a real Democrat.

And Clark insists that, yes, that's what he is. He says: I'm a Democrat. And he will always list out to you all the various issues that he agrees with the Democratic Party. He says he's a Democrat, not a Republican -- Aaron.

BROWN: As was there, to your ear, at least, much new ground broken, or was it essentially a replay of the nine individual messages the candidates have been trying to get out now for months?

LOTHIAN: I really don't think that we heard anything new tonight. We heart Dean continuing, saying, I've been against this war from the very beginning and others criticizing him for that.

But, yes, he has been steadfast on his opposition to this war. And beyond that, there was nothing really new. I mean, the big issue tonight that were we expecting is, would they go after Wesley Clark? And tonight, they did. The other issue, would they go after President Bush? And they did. The first few questions in the first minutes of the debate, that's what it was.

And then the second half of the debate, they did get into some of the other issues that are important to voters here in the state, issues such as health care, such as immigration, such as trade. It was a different -- it was an interesting type of debate, because what they did was, they opened it up as a town hall meeting. And that was a chance, after the correspondents asked the candidates questions, then it was a chance for the people to ask the questions that are important to them -- Aaron.

BROWN: Dan, thank you very much.

It's a little bit of putting the cart before the horse here, as we've been scrambling to get Dan's piece, his slice of the debate together. And we have it together.

And so here's some of what it sounded like.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LOTHIAN (voice-over): As supporters of the Democratic presidential candidates and protesters clamored for a voice on the sidewalk, the clear voice on the platform shouted at President George Bush and his policy on Iraq.

REP. DENNIS KUCINICH (D-OH), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Our involvement in Iraq was based on lies.

LOTHIAN: Criticism shifted to retired General Wesley Clark, who wasn't given a pass in this debate about his shifting position on the war in Iraq.

SEN. JOSEPH LIEBERMAN (D-CT), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He recommended and would have supported the resolution. After the war, he wrote a piece in "The Times of London" praising President Bush and Tony Blair for their resolve. When he became a candidate, he said he probably would have voted for the resolution.

WESLEY CLARK (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Let me tell you what my story is. I always supported taking the problem of Saddam Hussein to the United Nations and bringing international resolve to bear.

LOTHIAN: Then Clark was questioned about his credentials as a Democrat and his record of supporting Republicans. The retired general tried to set the record straight.

CLARK: I did go into a Republican fund-raiser, because I was nonpartisan at that point.

LOTHIAN: Clark, on the defensive, was quickly reminded where he was.

LIEBERMAN: Welcome to the Democratic presidential campaign.

LOTHIAN: The candidates briefly touched on health care, tax cuts and Social Security, before the debate turned into a town hall meeting and the audience got a chance to talk.

Back outside the theater, this "Democracy Caravan" is traveling the country to give Americans a voice by taking their questions directly to the candidates on the campaign trail.

DAVID SCHWENK, DEMOCRACYCARAVAN.ORG: That way, the voice of the people will be heard more, because we're afraid that, right now, special interests and corporate lobbying control politics.

(END VIDEOTAPE) BROWN: Dan Lothian's report from Phoenix.

Judy Woodruff moderated the debate. That you're still standing is impressive to me. We very much appreciate it. It was a lot of work out there.

(CROSSTALK)

BROWN: Was it tense in the hall? Does there seem to be a kind of -- was there a congeniality about it?

JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: Aaron, there was a little bit of tension before it got under way. But by the time we started the questions, I think the ice had been broken.

I don't know if you could tell from watching on television, but the audience, the auditorium at this beautiful theater we're standing in front of was absolutely packed, everybody there reacting. There were a lot of reactions during this debate. So I think that helped break any tension that was there. People were ready. They came ready to roll.

I heard you talking to Dan about, was there news made and what happened? I think these candidates came tonight ready to unload, to some extent, on each other.

BROWN: To mix it up a bit.

Just a couple of observations I'm curious -- that -- from watching it on TV. And I'm curious, from where were you, if you saw it differently. I thought Congressman Gephardt was very good tonight, very strong.

WOODRUFF: He was animated, Aaron. He feels passionately about some of the issues that he talked about, middle-class America, when he talked about growing up and how his life has taken the turns that it has. He talked about health care. He talked about Iraq.

He -- I think he did come across very strongly. Now, I've seen him before in other fora where he has been as passionate. I think this was a chance for tonight for him to show that passion again.

BROWN: And it was a pretty good dust-up for General Clark. He knew he was -- he knew he was in political combat tonight.

WOODRUFF: I talked to General Clark right after the debate, Aaron. And he said: I came here expecting this. He said: I knew, because I've been moving up in the polls, he said, I knew that they were going to come after me, and they did.

He was a little frustrated he didn't get more rebuttal time. But, of course, in a debate like this, nobody feels they have gotten enough time. But I thought you did see -- and you and Dan were just speaking about this -- you did see not just Dean, Kerry, but Joe Lieberman going after him. And it reflects the fact he's only been in the campaign a few weeks and, already, he is moving up in the polls. And the clock is ticking.

We are getting closer to the first primary in January. These candidates have got to stand out from the pack, if they have any chance of capturing the nomination.

BROWN: And just one thing that Bill Schneider mentioned to Larry King after the debate, which I hadn't thought of in quite that way, but I think he was absolutely right. Gephardt certainly, and the others to a degree, are not running away from Bill Clinton. They are running towards the Clinton economy.

WOODRUFF: Yes, I think that's right. I mean, there have been -- there's been a lot of -- we heard in the Gore/Lieberman campaign of 2000 -- in the aftermath of that, Aaron, there was a lot of second- guessing about whether Al Gore should have embraced Bill Clinton more.

I think these Democrats have decided -- and maybe it's crystal clear why they're doing it -- the George Bush economy has been going down. They're happy to embrace Bill Clinton's administration, because you had growth, you had jobs. So it looks pretty good with the distance of 2 1/2 years.

BROWN: Judy, terrific job tonight. That is not easy to do. I can't imagine.

WOODRUFF: Thank you. Thank you.

BROWN: And you did great tonight. I was proud of you. Thank you.

WOODRUFF: Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it.

BROWN: Judy Woodruff.

WOODRUFF: Good to see you, Aaron.

BROWN: Good to see you, Judy Woodruff out in Phoenix, where I suspect it's a bit warm still tonight.

On to other business. We were asked an intriguing question about California today. A friend said, if Cruz Bustamante had won, would we here cover live his announcement of a transition team? The answer, probably not. But the experienced politician didn't win. The novice did. And for a while at least, what he does, who he appoints, how he conducts himself is news, should be news, and, given the sheer size of California, ought to be covered as the national story we believe it to be. So the governor-elect made some news today.

Frank Buckley reports it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BUCKLEY (voice-over): Borrowing a phrase from the era of his wife's uncle, Jack Kennedy, Arnold Schwarzenegger said he would seek out the best and the brightest for his administration, his 68-member transition team reflecting the diversity he expects to see in his Cabinet.

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR-ELECT: People that are to the left, people that are to the right and people that are to the center.

BUCKLEY: Among the transition advisers, former Secretary of State in the Reagan administration George Shultz, former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, former Republican Governor Pete Wilson, all of them involved in Schwarzenegger's campaign.

But new names on the Schwarzenegger team included surprises, like Susan Estrich, who ran the failed Democratic presidential campaign of former Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis.

SCHWARZENEGGER: You will see people all the way from Bill Simon, all the way to the other side, Willie Brown.

(LAUGHTER)

BUCKLEY: That was the reaction of GOP political consultant Alan Hoffenblum as he heard the pairing of conservative businessman Bill Simon and liberal San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown. But Hoffenblum says, Schwarzenegger has it right in concluding that he'll need the parties to work together.

ALAN HOFFENBLUM, REPUBLICAN POLITICAL CONSULTANT: There's a lot of hope out there that Arnold Schwarzenegger's going to bridge some of those schisms between the two extremes and force both Republicans and Democrats to work together to get us out of this fiscal crisis.

BUCKLEY: Schwarzenegger says he's confident legislators will play ball.

SCHWARZENEGGER: But I don't see a problem there. If there is a problem, you can be assured that I will go directly to the people, because the people of California have made it loud and clear, made it very clear that they want change.

BUCKLEY: But while Schwarzenegger talked transition, a final shouted question from a reporter hinted at a lingering issue from the campaign that may follow him to Sacramento.

QUESTION: Are you still going go look into the specifics of sexual allegations, governor-elect, as you said over the weekend?

SCHWARZENEGGER: Old news.

QUESTION: No, it's not.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BUCKLEY: And if you couldn't hear what Schwarzenegger said, he said about the sexual harassment allegations, old news.

Schwarzenegger, meanwhile, is moving forward with the first order of business in his new administration, even before he takes office. Today, he announced that Donna Arduin, who is Florida's director of the Office of Policy and Budget, is taking a leave from her job there to head up an independent audit of the state budget in California. Schwarzenegger says there will be cuts ahead, given the $8 billion operating deficit. Schwarzenegger has to submit the budget by January -- Aaron.

BROWN: Frank, thank you, Frank Buckley out in Los Angeles tonight.

Iraq next. In a week that saw the White House appear to seize control of the reconstruction effort from the defense secretary and put it in the hands of the national security adviser, today saw Congress try to seize control from her. Even as a House committee controlled by Republicans gave the administration the money it wants, it also approved a measure that would prevent any official not confirmed by the Congress -- read that, the national security adviser -- from coordinating or spending the money.

Some are calling this the Condoleezza Rice amendment. And it is yet another unwanted complication for the president.

Here's CNN's Suzanne Malveaux.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Six months since Baghdad fell, President Bush continues to defend his decision to go to war.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I acted because I was not about to leave the security of the American people in the hands of a madman.

MALVEAUX: But it was a deadly anniversary day: 10 Iraqis, a Spanish diplomat and an American soldier killed in attacks. Mr. Bush insists, this is just a small part of the picture, that schools, utilities and even security in Iraq improve every day.

BUSH: It's a lot better than you probably think. Just ask people who have been there. They're stunned when they come back -- when they go to Iraq. And the stories they tell are much different from the perceptions that you're being told life is like.

MALVEAUX: Before a friendly audience of National Guard and reservists in New Hampshire, Mr. Bush kicked off day two of the White House's aggressive effort to counter criticism of its postwar policy in Iraq. But the administration's P.R. blitz is drawing criticism, too.

JOE LOCKHART, FORMER CLINTON WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I think they ought to spend a little more time working through a substantive plan and a little less time worrying about their P.R. problems.

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), MINORITY LEADER: They're now putting together a P.R. offensive. And I think offensive is probably a pretty good word for it, offensive to go out to defend their proposal.

MALVEAUX (on camera): But Mr. Bush did win a victory in Congress today, when a House committee approved nearly all of the $87 billion funding package for Iraq and Afghanistan, as the White House wanted in grants, not loans. It now clears the way for the legislation to go to the full House next week.

Suzanne Malveaux, CNN, the White House.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Ahead on NEWSNIGHT: the latest on the D.C. sniper case; plus, up next, new developments in the Kobe Bryant sexual assault case in Colorado; and a bit later, a conversation with Mariane Pearl, other members, too, of the slain journalist's family, Danny Pearl, of course, on the eve of what would have been his 40th birthday.

A break first. From New York, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Scott Turow, the author and the lawyer who served on Illinois' death penalty commission, summed it up pretty welcome last night on this program. People, he said, support the death penalty to balance the moral books, no other reason. For the ultimate evil, he said, people demanded the ultimate punishment.

And few would argue that the sniper killings of 10 people in the Washington, D.C. area last year were anything but evil, plain and simple, which makes any defense a tough one and the one offered today by lawyers for Lee Malvo, that essentially he was brainwashed, especially so.

Here CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KOCH (voice-over): His lawyers say he was young, impressionable and brainwashed, that Lee Malvo was so controlled by older suspect John Muhammad during last year's sniper spree that the then 17-year- old couldn't tell right from wrong.

CRAIG COOLEY, ATTORNEY FOR MALVO: The degree of indoctrination is so significant in this case that we would be remiss in our responsibilities if we failed to put that issue forward for a jury to make a determination of it.

KOCH: But prosecutors insist, the report from Malvo's court- appointed mental health expert shows no insanity. And as for the defense citing other private experts who say indoctrination is a mental illness...

ROBERT HORAN JR., VIRGINIA PROSECUTOR: Well, that's not a mental illness that's in the book. That's one that's invented.

KOCH: Legal experts say the brainwashing defense has limited success.

JOSEPH DIGENOVA, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY: Well, it's not a strategy generally that works very well, because jurors are not predisposed to believe that people lose free will. Now, in a case of someone that young, jurors might be disposed to believe brainwashing, when there is a disparity in the age between the Svengali and the Trilby.

KOCH: Meanwhile, the judge in John Muhammad's separate trial has ruled defense attorneys can't introduce evidence about his state of mind, because he has refused to be examined by the prosecution's mental health expert.

(END VIDEOTAPE) '

KOCH: As for Lee Malvo, his state of mind will now be carefully dissected. The question is, will claims of brainwashing be enough to convince a jury he isn't guilty or simply to spare him the death penalty? -- Aaron.

BROWN: Has he been examined by state psychiatrists?

KOCH: Lee Malvo?

BROWN: Yes.

KOCH: He has not. But in court today, the judge did ask him if he would submit to such an examination. And he said, yes, that he was willing to cooperate.

BROWN: Did he speak or did his lawyers speak for him?

KOCH: Yes, he did, just briefly, saying that he would cooperate, that he would submit to the examination.

BROWN: OK, Kathleen, thank you very much -- Kathleen Koch in Washington.

On now to the case of Kobe Bryant and the woman, of course, who says he raped her. A detective told that young woman's story today. In her version, innocent kissing became an act of violence, mutual flirting became a violation, in her version. His, of course, will be different.

Rape cases are often messy affairs. And this one showed signs today of being very messy indeed.

Here's CNN's Gary Tuchman.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The 19- year-old woman who has accused Kobe Bryant of sexually assaulting her says the basketball player put his hands around her neck and forced himself upon her.

This was just a small portion of the graphic testimony at a preliminary hearing, where the prosecution revealed evidence publicly for the first time. According to Eagle County sheriff's Detective Doug Winters, who interviewed the accuser, Bryant checked into a hotel in Edwards, Colorado, and asked the 19-year-old hotel employee for a tour.

The woman acknowledged to the detective she flirted with Bryant and did consent to kissing him on the mouth and neck. But that, she said, is where the consent stopped. The detective testified -- quote -- "He began to grope her, touching her breasts and buttocks area." He continued by saying, she told him Bryant restrained her by the neck, turned her around, bent her over a chair and had sexual intercourse.

Pictures were shown of injuries to her jaw and her private area. Defense Attorney Pamela Mackey cross-examined the detective. Were there red marks, bruises, scratches or finger marks on the alleged victim's neck? The detective said, no. But he did tell prosecutors that blood from the woman was found on Kobe Bryant's T-shirt.

The judge will decide from the preliminary hearing if there is probable cause to bring this case to trial. But the day came to a premature end after Kobe Bryant's attorney asked the detective if her injuries were -- quote -- "consistent with someone who has had sex with three different guys in three days."

The prosecution, already angry because the defense attorney said the accuser's name in the court six times, objected. And the hearing was called off for the day.

(on camera): The judge said it will be continued next Wednesday. So Kobe Bryant, who sat in the courtroom for most of the day with a serious expression, left in a motorcade, knowing that he'll have to return next week.

Gary Tuchman, CNN, Eagle, Colorado.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We're join by Jeffrey Toobin, our legal analyst out in Colorado tonight.

They were playing hardball, Jeffrey.

TOOBIN: Aaron, I've been in a lot of courtrooms. This was one of the most dramatic, involving, extraordinary days I have ever seen. And the way it ended, with this reference to these three alleged -- having sex with three men in three days left people with their jaws hanging open. It was just wild.

BROWN: And the prosecution objected to that on what basis?

TOOBIN: Well, there is rape shield laws. The whole idea behind rape shield laws is that women are not expected to have their sexual history put on display.

And while this may not have been a technical violation of the rape shield law, because it wasn't introduced to show her propensity for having sex, it was shown to explain an injury, I thought it was an incredibly sleazy move not to do this with any advance notice. And I thought it was a sign that this trial is going to be in the gutter from day, as it was, and it's only going to get uglier.

BROWN: Tell me what you mean. I want to frame this my way, if you don't mind. Tell me what you mean by in the gutter? Now, here is Mr. Bryant, who has an enormous amount to lose here.

And he is entitled, I think we both would agree...

TOOBIN: Absolutely.

BROWN: ... to the most aggressive defense that he and his team can muster. So when you use the term in the gutter, tell me what you mean.

TOOBIN: I mean playing by the rules. The rules are, you don't mention a rape victim's name in open court. And maybe you make a mistake once. Maybe you make a mistake twice. Pamela Mackey used her name six times. That doesn't seem like an accident to me.

And when you're talking about prior sexual history, two decades ago, three decades ago, legislatures around this country made a judgment that sexual history of women was not relevant, because it simply is not relevant to the crime of rape. That's been on the books for years. You don't violate that on your own as a lawyer without getting the judge's permission first to use that sort of -- kind of evidence. I thought it was sleazy and appalling. Aggressive defense, absolutely, but you've got to play by the rules.

BROWN: What would the point have been of mentioning her name six times?

TOOBIN: Well, I think it is a signal to -- that her name -- I mean, her name is known to many of us who cover the case. But there were also members of the public in the courtroom. This is -- people don't want their names mentioned when they are rape victims.

BROWN: Yes.

TOOBIN: This is a decision we leave to rape victims to publicize, not to defense lawyers, not to journalists.

BROWN: No, I understand that. Jeffrey, are you saying that it was a kind of legal shot across the bow? It was a warning that, you're going to regret coming forward with this? What is your interpretation of the reason?

TOOBIN: I think it is a shot across the bow. I think it's driving home to her the cost of coming forward. I think it was -- it was an act of intimidation on the part of defense. And I really thought it was inappropriate.

BROWN: About a half a minute. The detail that came out today, any of it surprising? Any of it change your view of the complexity of the case, the problems faced by either side?

TOOBIN: A lot of it was surprising.

I mean, most of this evidence had not come out before. I'll tell you one thing -- two pieces of evidence. One, Kobe Bryant was wearing a T-shirt. On his T-shirt was the victim's blood. It's going to be tough to explain that in terms of consensual sex. Also, the detective testified that the woman, the victim, alleged victim, went to a bellman immediately after the incident and reported her distress.

I think the bellman's testimony could turn out to be very powerful corroboration of the woman. That will be a dramatic moment in this trial, when it happens several, several months from now.

BROWN: Jeffrey, thank you -- Jeffrey Toobin in Eagle, Colorado, tonight. Really nice job. Thank you.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT: A family copes with tragedy on the eve of slain journalist Danny Pearl's 40th birthday. His wife and family talk about keeping his message of hope alive.

Around the world, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Tomorrow would have been Danny Pearl's 40th birthday and we're certain that his family in Southern California and his widow here in New York City are coping with an array of emotions tonight. They grieve, of course, but his widow is now a mom, his parents are now grandparents, and their lives, as they remind us, are not locked in a tragedy of yesterday, which is not the Pearl way, not for any of them.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): Time passes. His son, Adam, is 16 months now, and knows nothing of the sadness that still lingers here in the very backyard where his father, the father he will never know, grew up.

Someday he will get answers, answers from his mother and the family.

MARIANNE PEARL, WIDOW OF DANIEL PEARL: When he grows up and he needs to find out what happened to his father -- it's one thing to just say "This is what happened, deal with it," you know, and it's another thing to say, "This is what happened, but."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: October 10 would have been the 40th birthday of journalist and musician Daniel Pearl.

BROWN: The but is a determined effort to see that Daniel Pearl's murder nearly two years ago now would not be memorialized in pain. Rather in the music he loved, played at venues all over the world, like this one in Jerusalem the other night, for the 2nd Annual Daniel Pearl Music Day.

JUDEA PEARL: If you think about it, there aren't many faces today that both a Muslim and a Westerner can point to and say "This is an emissary of goodwill."

RUTH PEARL, MOTHER OF DANIEL PEARL: We feel we are doing some good, we are continuing Danny's life work. We are in a way keeping him alive, the way we feel about it.

BROWN: It has not been easy for the Pearl's of course. His sister's, Michelle and Tamara, are both married now, without their brother looking on.

TAMARA PEARL, SISTER OF DANIEL PEARL: It's something I think about a lot, obviously. How could humanity have come to such a cruel place. But when I think of Danny, and that was really his gift, is that he didn't doubt. He didn't doubt the inherent goodness of humanity. He didn't doubt it. And so I just have to reference him and feel him and I feel it too.

BROWN: Marianne Pearl, for her part, has just finished a book about her husband's murder, "From a Mighty Heart." She offers no self-pity, simply resilience.

MARIANNE PEARL: The most important thing was that, you know, there was no reason that Danny's life would be hijacked by Danny's death. He, you know, he worked hard to be who he was, and that what is to celebrate. It's not a point to just like focus on the last hours or weeks, you know, of his life.

BROWN: Still, life is not yet on firm ground.

RUTH PEARL: Of course, we will always miss Danny. It's a hole in the heart, and that's not going to change through the years. Time does not make that much difference in that loss.

MARIANNE PEARL: It's not normal yet, we're still in surreal land, but little by little.

BROWN: But for the family at large, there is an overriding sense of optimism.

MICHELLE PEARL, SISTER OF DANIEL PEARL: I think it gives people hope to see that we didn't turn to anger and we didn't turn to hatred in the face of a completely ludicrous event. We maintain our hope.

BROWN: And an overriding sense of mission.

JUDEA PEARL: I vow to take revenge for the ideology that took Danny's life. We vowed to fight the hatred that killed him.

MARIANNE PEARL: To me, you know, I think the base of my strength and maybe his family's strength was his own courage. I think -- I am convinced that Danny did not reject who he was because people hated who he was. There was also in him a spirit of defiance until the end. And I think for me my belief is that that is also the base of our own power.

He had the courage. How can we fall? I mean we can't.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: The Pearl family on the even of what would have been Danny Pearl's 40th birthday.

Still to come on the program, a little bit later we check morning papers. Up next, a reality check on the situation in Iraq, six months after the fall of Baghdad. A break first on CNN.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Correspondent Rod Nordland has seen Baghdad before and after, if you will. He's the Baghdad bureau chief for "Newsweek" magazine. I'm very pleased to have him with us again as we have before.

The president, Rod, talked about the Iraq that he wants Americans to see, an Iraq of schoolchildren back in class, of hospitals back treating people, a place that is certainly not perfect, but not a sea of violence. Give me a reality check.

ROD NORDLAND, "NEWSWEEK": Well, the schools are back, but there were schools before the war, too. Kids were attending school before. The hospitals were working before, although they had lots of problems, and perhaps they're marginally improved now.

In most ways, things are just now getting back to where they were before the war, and it's a little specious for the coalition to claim that that's an accomplishment, to get back to sort of ground zero as it were.

BROWN: The security situation I guess is really in two forms; the security of American troops on the ground and the questions of security for Iraqis to go about their daily lives. Address both of those. Is it getting better?

NORDLAND: Sure. It's getting much better for Iraqis. They feel safe in their homes now. Businesses are opening on a more or less normal schedule. The curfew is much shorter, and they credit that mainly to the Iraqi police, which the coalition has helped to refound, and it's made it safer, at least on the streets in the cities. The highways and in rural areas it still can be pretty dangerous.

At the same time, however, it's gotten much more dangerous for foreigners, for internationals of any sort, and for coalition troops. The attacks on them have not let up. They've continued at pretty much the same steady pace, something like 15 to 20 attacks every day, perhaps more because there's a lot of under-reporting of these attacks. And the other thing is that most Iraqis do not give the coalition credit for the improvement in the security in their lives. They give the Iraqi police the credit, and they use that as sort of further evidence that the occupation should come to an end.

BROWN: When you talk about the attacks as being under-reported, is it because nobody gets hurt or because they're simply not reported by the coalition?

NORDLAND: No, the coalition doesn't report them. For instance, we found out that three days ago now a grenade was set off in a crowd where a lot of soldiers were present, American soldiers, trying to keep control. 13 soldiers were wounded, never reported. We never heard a word about it. 13 American soldiers wounded, 9 of them serious enough to be medevacked.

They do report soldiers who are killed in action, but lots of smaller incidents, which are not small for the men involved -- in some cases they're maimed or very seriously injured -- just under-reported entirely.

BROWN: You talked mostly about soldiers there. Go back to talking about foreigners, Westerners. Is it -- not to make you the story, but in just trying to go about your life in Baghdad, do you feel threatened?

NORDLAND: Very much so. I mean, the comforting thing is, it's a big city of 5 million people and the attacks are relatively few every day, so the chances of it being you are fairly small.

But that said, we make a lot of efforts to kind of minimize those chances, and I think most of us now don't go out on the streets unless we have a journalistic mission to do. We don't go out shopping, for instance. We don't hang out in restaurants, and we do a lot of things to try to minimize our exposure on the streets.

And personally, when I'm out on the streets, working, you know, I'm always watching behind me, because of the possibility of somebody walking up with a gun and just doing it. I mean, that's happened on quite a number of occasions, and it's pretty clear now that everybody here is a target. Certainly soldiers are much more of a target than I am, and a lot of my colleagues, for instance, are more reluctant to go out with soldiers than to go out on their own, because their such a target.

BROWN: Are they -- is it just -- are they wanting to rob you? Is that it? Or are they just wanting to kill Westerners?

NORDLAND: No, I don't think robbery is a concern anymore. I mean, there's always some risk in a place like this for that. But no, the concern is the targeted assassination of somebody because they're a Westerner, and I think now there's just no doubt at all that any Westerner, any international here, is a target.

Yesterday, a Spanish diplomat was killed. That was clearly an assassination. Two guys with handguns chased him down the street and shot him when he fell, and they had come to his house looking for him in a very carefully planned operation. His security guard was off duty between -- one shift had changed at 7:00 in the morning, a new one was coming at 8:00. In between, they came to his house when he was unguarded.

BROWN: You've done terrific work for the magazine, for "Newsweek" magazine. We appreciate your time. It's early out there for you.

Be safe, Rod. Thanks very much. Rod Nordland, of "Newsweek" magazine, the bureau chief now in Baghdad. And that's a pretty stark assessment.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT the honor the FBI took back, why an Arab- American lost out on a prestigious service award. We'll tell you that story. Morning papers coming up too. A break first.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: This next story caught our eye while we were doing morning papers last night. Depending on who you ask, it is either a tale of the smearing of an Arab-American who deserves a metal for his service to the country after the attacks of September 11, or it is the belated recognition that in the name of not offending Arab-Americans the federal government nearly honored someone who sympathizes with terrorists and terrorism.

Anyway you look at it, it's a mess, and a reflection perhaps of just how awkward things can get here in the new normal.

From Detroit tonight, here's CNN's Martin Savidge.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Imad Hamad is supposed to be in Washington, receiving a top award for helping the FBI. Instead, he is sitting in a restaurant near his home of Dearborn, Michigan wondering what happened.

For over two yeas Hamad, an Arab-American, has been a liaison between federal authorities and Detroit's huge Arab-American community, which has been the focus of public suspicion, even hatred, in the post-9-11 world.

It was the head of the Michigan office of the FBI that personally recommended Hamad for the honor.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He goes forward to interact with law enforcement to try and help relieve those tensions or to address those issues. His role has been critical here.

SAVIDGE: FBI headquarters in Washington agreed. But conservative political commentator Debbie Schlessel felt...

DEBBIE SCHLESSEL, COMMENTATOR: Outrage and shock.

SAVIDGE: She wrote a column on her Web site blasting Hamad's selection, saying that he was an outspoken supporter of terror.

SCHLESSEL: He's gone on TV defending homicide bombers, defending videos that teach 3-year-old kids to become homicide bombers, calling that patriotic, and there are a host of other things.

SAVIDGE: Schlessel is also angry that Hamad would share the spotlight with another award recipient, flight attendant Madeleine Sweeney, who calmly described to the FBI the hijacking of her plane moments before it struck the World Trade Center.

Just two days before the award ceremony, Hamad was told by the FBI his invitation and the honor were canceled. Hamad denies that he is a terrorist sympathizer and downplays any disappointment over the award.

IMAD HAMAD, ARAB-AMERICAN: At the end of the day, you know, I do what I do to serve my community. I do what I do to be of service to my nation and my country here, and I take pride in everything I did.

SAVIDGE (on camera): There is no doubt in Debbie Schlessel's mind that her column and public reaction to it were responsible for the FBI's change of heart.

(voice-over): The FBI denies that. Other sources tell CNN the problem is not with Hamad, but some of the people he associates with, and that those connections could later prove an embarrassment for the FBI.

No matter what the reason, Hamad is left eating at home in Michigan rather than celebrating with a dinner in D.C.

Martin Savidge, CNN, Dearborn, Michigan.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Before we take a break, a few more items making news around the country.

First, Pat Robertson, no stranger to controversy, and he's drawing fire tonight for agreeing with an author who suggested nuking the State Department.

"I think that's the answer," Reverend Robertson said, during an interview. "When you say if you could just get a nuclear device inside Foggy Bottom, I think that's the answer."

State Department spokesmen today called the remarks "despicable."

Very cool rescue off the coast of Texas. A woman feel off a shrimp boat Tuesday night. She was in the water until last night. She swims to an abandoned oil rig, where she somehow manages to pain S.O.S. on it, and someone spots it, calls the Coast Guard. Yes. And they rescue her -- former Coast Guardsman I am. Finally, to Philadelphia and the very slow, very careful process of moving the Liberty Bell 1000 feet into its new home. A team of engineers went along, monitoring for cracks. That would be new cracks, of course. That's kind of cool, too, isn't it.

Morning papers after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: I'm telling you right now, I do not have the "Chicago Sun Times" tonight, so those of you who only watch the entire program to find out the weather in Chicago in some clever phrase, it's time to go to bed.

Here we go. Morning papers from around the country.

"USA Today," the nation's largest newspaper and most colorful, too. This is a great story. We probably should have done this tonight, guys. "Cancer drug shows promise, slashes recurrence after breast surgery." This made a lot of front pages, or it will tomorrow, I guess, is the right way to put it.

Also, Kobe Bryant, pretty much on all the front pages. "Detective: Bryant's accuser felt pain." That will come back again.

"The Aspen Daily News," out there in Aspen, Colorado, down here, OK. "Kobe free newspaper feels owner's wrath." They're writing a story about their own paper. "Aspen Daily News" owner Dave Danforth (ph) leveled sharp criticism at his newsroom Thursday after the staff ran a front page editorial announcing they were putting a stop to daily Kobe coverage. Perhaps not the best day to stop it.

"The Daily Camera," which is the newspaper in Boulder, Colorado, "Details from Bryant's accuser," is the headline there. I'm going to try and get a bunch in tonight.

"The Washington Times," there was a reason -- there were two. "Church group rips U.S. leader's" -- the "Washington Times" played this story very hard. The Episcopalian rift over gays. And down in the other corner, "Pope decries scandalous clergy behavior, stresses the gift of celibacy." They also put, I don't know why, I mean, I know exactly why -- "Stock market hits highest level of '03; recovery seen as robust." "Where are the jobs," I think you'll hear people say to that.

The breast cancer story on the front page also of the "Miami Herald." "Breast cancer drug called success."

We've got a minute left. I can feel that in my brain.

"The Philadelphia Daily News," which of course is the people paper -- I don't' know what that means. "New twist in probe; Feds seized mayor's wireless device." And so the headline reads "Streets Blackberry jam.' Get it? I do. I like that headline.

The other paper in Philadelphia, "The Philadelphia Inquirer," which apparently is not the people paper, "Street computer seized" is their headline.

Terry (ph), tell me how we're doing on time. 15 seconds.

Here we go. "Don't have a cow. Beef costs up," the "Cincinnati Inquirer's" headline on a front page story. What's the weather in Chicago. Superb tomorrow. Thank you, guys.

We'll see you all tomorrow on a Friday edition of the program. Until then, good night from all of us.

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