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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Coalition Authority Headquarters Under Attack; Bush Meets With Bremer; Investigation Into Riyadh Bombing Continues

Aired November 11, 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.


WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening from Washington at the end of a very gray and somber and meaningful Veteran's Day.
The country is at war. On an almost daily basis an American dies in combat often more than one. There are questions tonight, new questions, about whether in fact the fighting will yet pick up and with it too the dying.

For people in Pittsburgh and Des Moines and Port Huron, Michigan, in big cities and small towns alike, Veteran's Day might once have meant a parade or a white sale or at the most a quick history lesson. It doesn't anymore, at least not on this Veteran's Day.

The whip begins with that reality. Another day of developments in Iraq and CNN's Matthew Chance starts us off with a headline -- Matthew.

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, thank you. The headquarters of the U.S.-led coalition authority in the Iraqi capital Baghdad is again shaken by a series of explosions. There were no casualties reported but this is an audacious attack which underscores just how bold these anti-U.S. insurgents have become here in Iraq.

BLITZER: Matthew, we'll be getting back to you.

Let's move on to the White House now and the president's day which included a meeting with the top American in Iraq. He happens to be in Washington right now. CNN's Dana Bash with the duty tonight, Dana the headline.

DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, for the president the tradition and ceremony of Veterans Day gave way to a detailed defense of his Iraq policy and an urgent and unexpected visit from Iraq's Civil Administrator Paul Bremer. We'll tell you why -- Wolf.

BLITZER: All right, Dana, stand by.

Next to Riyadh and the rapid fire investigation into Saturday's bombing. CNN's Nic Robertson with that, Nic a headline from you please.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, Saudi authorities say they've detained several people they believe are responsible or connected to the bombing over the weekend, also apparently al Qaeda has now made a claim of responsibility that to a Saudi political weekly magazine -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Thanks very much, Nic. We'll get back to all of you shortly.

Also ahead tonight some interesting new issues popping up in the presidential campaign. We'll tell you all about those issues.

And later, a fascinating trial and a surprising, many will say even shocking verdict in the case of an accused millionaire killer.

And, a giant from the early days of television is gone. We'll take a closer look at the career of Art Carney.

And, in Segment 7, we'll look at one South Carolina town that's paid an extraordinary price for the war in Iraq, all that coming up in the hour ahead.

But we begin with something an unnamed American official told the Reuters News Agency today about the sudden return to Washington of Paul Bremer, the Chief U.S. Administrator in Iraq.

"When decisions need to be made," the official said "Bremer comes" and some decisions apparently need to be made right now, decisions regarding the pace of transition to Iraqi control and possibly the tempo of the fight against Iraqi insurgents, neither appears to be going very well right now nor quickly enough for the White House something we'll take up with CNN's Dana Bash in just a moment.

First though another difficult day in Iraq, here's CNN's Matthew Chance.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHANCE (voice-over): It was an attack from increasingly bold insurgents yet another strike at the heart of the coalition. Inside the heavily guarded Green Zone officials say they sheltered in basements as the mortars or rockets rained in. Eyewitnesses spoke of a major blast.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Suddenly we heard very big explosion which has taken place here near this school. This is an extraordinary explosion.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By your service you have made our nation safer.

CHANCE: For the 130,000 U.S. troops in Iraq this Veterans Day has already earned extraordinary meaning. All are now veterans themselves and as they remember comrades who have died few need reminding of the difficulties still ahead. Staff Sergeant Mark Coulter spoke at a Baghdad Veterans Day ceremony.

COULTER: I know sometimes it's hard. Sometimes it's difficult and there's probably not a person in this room that's like, you know what, I'm just sick and tired of this but remember we are all a part of something that's larger than ourselves and maybe in the future someone else will stand up and tell the story about what you're doing now.

CHANCE: November has already proved the bloodiest month for U.S. forces since the fall of Baghdad. The downing of a Chinook helicopter near Fallujah left 16 dead. Six more died when their Black Hawk was shot down near Tikrit. Exactly who's behind the now daily attacks continues to frustrate coalition commanders.

LT. GEN. RICARDO SANCHEZ, U.S. ARMY: During the last few weeks the pace and intensity of our offensive military operations has increased. We are taking the fight into the safe havens of the enemy and the heartland of the country where we continue to face former regime loyalists, criminals, and foreign terrorists who are trying to isolate the coalition from the Iraqi people and trying to break the will of the coalition and the international community. They will fail.

CHANCE: It seems that in this insurgency the foreign fighters of al Qaeda remain outnumbered by Iraqis bitter these U.S. and coalition forces are still here.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHANCE: Well, Wolf, I think I lost contact with you in the studio but let me just tell you what I was going to say at the end of that report that General Sanchez said that 5,000 people are being detained in various facilities across Iraq in connection with these insurgents' attacks against U.S. forces.

He also said earlier today that 20 of those individuals are being investigated on suspicion of belonging or having links with the al Qaeda network. It still seems though that the vast majority of these insurgents are Iraqis themselves, disgruntled at the fact that their country is being occupied by that U.S.-led coalition -- back to you.

BLITZER: Thanks very much Matthew Chance in Baghdad for that report.

Let's move to the White House now where Paul Bremer got a grilling from President Bush's national security team and met briefly with the president himself. For his part, the president again today cautioned Americans to be patient where Iraq is concerned even as he paused to remember those who have died there; the report from CNN's Dana Bash.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month the president lays a wreath at the tomb of the unknowns, honors 19 million living veterans and those still serving.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They have liberated two nations, Afghanistan and Iraq. BASH: Beyond the commemoration urgency about Iraq and a detailed defense of his policy. The president accused al Qaeda affiliated groups seeking revenge of forming an alliance with Saddam loyalists to kill U.S. troops.

BUSH: Recent reporting suggests that despite their differences these killers are working together to spread chaos and terror and fear.

BASH: Source say that information is part of a new report detailing the scope and source of the attacks on the ground and was discussed at hastily arranged White House meetings with Iraqi Civil Administrator Paul Bremer and top national security officials.

Also at issue White House concern the U.S. picked Iraqi Governing Council is ineffective and may not meet a December 15th deadline paving the way for elections.

Nearly 400 servicemen came back from Iraq not as veterans but casualties of war. Thirty-eight from Iraq buried at Arlington National Cemetery including Captain John Robert Teal laid to rest just last week killed by a roadside bomb northeast of Baghdad.

EMMIE TEAL, MOTHER OF CAPTAIN TEAL: He said there's only one thing I want to make real clear and it's in my will I want to be buried at Arlington in my full dress uniform, full military honors.

BASH: Captain Teal's mother Emmy received the sympathy letter Mr. Bush sends to families of those who died. She says she wants the U.S. military to be more aggressive in retaliating against those who killed her son.

TEAL: When they're fighting down and dirty you got to get into the ditch and get dirty.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BASH: And a more aggressive security strategy and political transition will top the agenda here tomorrow morning. Paul Bremer heads back to the White House to meet with the president and his national security team to talk about how to more quickly transfer governing power back to the Iraqi people -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Dana, there's a CIA assessment of the security situation in Iraq that's now circulating here in Washington. I know you know about it. What else can you tell us about it?

BASH: Well, what we know about it, Wolf, and first of all this is a topic that they did discuss here at the White House and will likely tomorrow but it is essentially laying out some of the concerns and really some of the growing concerns on the ground in Iraq essentially saying that some of the Iraqi people who were not involved in the insurgency are now becoming more involved, are becoming more active in coordinating some of these attacks and that is the major concern here. Not only is it happening in and around Baghdad but into the north and the south where the attacks were not as aggressive. That is something that the president wants to talk to Paul Bremer and other top national security officials about.

BLITZER: An ominous assessment indeed, Dana Bash at the White House thanks, Dana, very much.

From the Pentagon today came confirmation that if much of Iraq is struggling through a post-war period in one portion of Iraq the war goes on. This is the so-called Sunni Triangle which has been a problem from the beginning and clearly the main challenge today.

Here's CNN's Jamie McIntyre.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With attacks against U.S. troops on the rise in Iraq, counterattacks are up too. American commanders report anti-insurgent engagements have doubled in recent weeks up to about 30 to 35 a day.

Citing what sources say is fresh intelligence President Bush contends 93 percent of the anti-U.S. attacks are occurring in a relatively small area, five Iraqi provinces that make up a 200 square mile Ba'athist triangle.

BUSH: Here the enemy is waging the battle and it is here that the enemy will be defeated.

MCINTYRE: The U.S. believes some of the attacks are being conducted by foreign fighters but it's having a hard time finding clear links to al Qaeda.

SANCHEZ: At one point we had up to about 20 suspected al Qaeda members but as we have continued to refine and interrogate we have not been able to establish definitively that they were al Qaeda members.

MCINTYRE: Sanchez says he thinks several hundred terrorists have entered Iraq from Syria, Egypt, Sudan and Yemen but the Pentagon still believes its primary foe remains the remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime.

GEN. RICHARD MYERS, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: The first thing in being able to take care of the current threat we face is to understand who the enemy is and we certainly know that the former regime elements, the Ba'athists if you will, are the major part of that.

MCINTYRE: The Pentagon says with each successful raid, with each discovery of arms, the U.S. is getting closer to breaking the resistance.

(on camera): And the Pentagon says it has passed a milestone in the Iraqization of the security forces. With 131,000 Iraqis under arms the Pentagon says that number now surpasses the number of U.S. troops in the country. Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: On to Saudi Arabia now. Officials there questioning people in connection with the deadly terror bombing on Saturday, no word yet who or how many people have been talked to or taken into custody.

A top spokesman for the royal family told CNN today he is convinced this was the work of al Qaeda and that it wasn't a botched attempt to kill Americans. Al Qaeda, he insisted, also wants to kill Muslims. Whatever the case, Saudis and other Arabs today no longer believe themselves immune from attack.

Here's CNN's Nic Robertson.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (voice-over): Just yards from Saturday's massive car bomb, Lebanese dentist Ziad Salmai (ph) leads the way through the remains of his house.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was hiding here, just here. You can see maybe this is the only and the safest place here because you don't have glass here.

ROBERTSON: Returning now to retrieve valuable possessions he's amazed he survived.

(on camera): The bomb went off right outside here.

(voice-over): Elsewhere in the compound other families prepare to leave packing up what they can salvage. Turkish accountant Samir (ph) thought security at the compound was good but worries who can make him safe now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Security is good or not good but, you know, how I know this good or not good, yes this is.

ROBERTSON: Picking up his child's broken toys, Egyptian businessman Amir (ph) like all here contemptuous of their attackers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't know why actually. We don't know why. We don't know what's the reason behind this. Definitely it's not in the Quran or in Islam.

ROBERTSON (on camera): Saudi officials are vowing to track down al Qaeda, to fight them to the bitter end. The destruction here is an indication just how bloody and difficult that battle could be. Knowledge of a prior attack, the Saudi officials say they had in this case, it seems is not enough to stop those attacks happening.

(voice-over): Among American women here diverse views over just how troubling that uncertainty is. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Clearly it seems that no matter how many safety features we install there's still that part and the fear factor is definitely there.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't live on a compound (unintelligible) and I feel just as safe now as I did yesterday and the day before.

ROBERTSON: For all at this well-to-do gathering, however, concerns for children now top priority.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And when you see a checkpoint right by your children's school my first thought was do I drop them off at school or do I take them home? Are they safer inside of a Saudi school or in a car with their American mother?

ROBERTSON: Back outside the destroyed housing compound tightening security likely the solution most here will be taking for some time to come.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON: But it's not just this visible security, the Saudi officials say, has been increased. They say they are now getting more intelligence tip-offs from Saudi people, people who are disappointed with what they've seen in the last few days. People are angry that they've seen Muslims attacked by other Muslims -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Nic, we know that there are many Americans who work in the oil industry and other industries in Saudi Arabia. Do you get any indication they're getting out of there, they're picking up and leaving?

ROBERTSON: You know most of the people we've talked to, mostly Americans we've talked to here and there are 35,000 of them in Saudi Arabia, they're telling us, the majority are saying look they're concerned. There are places they're not going to.

They're perhaps not going out in the evening, staying on the compound but really it is rare to hear them say look if it gets worse we're going to leave. Many of them who live here, Wolf, really enjoy the lifestyle they have here, enjoy some of the comforts of living here and they don't want to lose it and at the moment things haven't reached that kind of level -- Wolf.

BLITZER: CNN's Nic Robertson in Riyadh for us tonight, thanks Nic very much.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, more on what Paul Bremer's surprising visit to the White House may mean.

And later, the millionaire who admitted the killing but was found not guilty of murder, we'll have the details.

And we'll also look back at the career and contributions of Art Carney. He died at the age of 85.

This is NEWSNIGHT from Washington.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Our deepest condolences to their families.

More now on Paul Bremer's hasty return to Washington and the possible factors behind it. With us now, Richard Stevenson, he's the White House correspondent for "The New York Times." He's filing on the story for tomorrow's edition. Richard thanks very much for joining us.

He was just here a couple of weeks ago, Paul Bremer. All of a sudden he comes back a mystery surrounding it. What do you hear? What's going on?

RICHARD STEVENSON, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT "NEW YORK TIMES": Well, there are a couple of things. One, they've got a December 15th deadline to report to the U.N. Security Council on how they're going to draft a constitution.

The Iraqi Governing Council, the appointed body that is supposed to begin work on this has become almost dysfunctional in the American view. They need to find some way to jump-start that process and get it moving.

More broadly, I think there is a growing sense in the administration from the president on down that this just isn't going fast enough in Iraq that the process of transferring authority to the Iraqis, not just on security grounds but also politically has to move faster than it is.

And that Bremer's seven-step plan to begin to draft a constitution, get it ratified, hold elections over the next year or two is a little bit too leisurely for the situation that they find themselves in now.

BLITZER: Now you speak to White House officials on a daily basis a lot of them, off the record, on background. What the president has suggested today in his speech at the Heritage Foundation here was very upbeat. The U.S. is winning, going to win, not going to retreat at all.

But on a day-to-day basis you get the impression that things aren't going well at all and this latest CIA report that's now circulating here in Washington paints a very gloomy assessment, not only in the Sunni Triangle but potentially all around the country.

STEVENSON: Look, I mean there's no question that they face a problem there now. There have been almost 40 Americans killed there in the last ten days alone. You heard General Sanchez in Baghdad today talking about the growing difficulty that they face.

This was a guy who ten days ago or so dismissed the terrorist attacks as operationally and militarily insignificant. Today he actually used the word war very advisedly to describe what they're going through there. There's really a change in attitude I think everywhere both on the military side, on the political side, about what needs to be done to get this situation under control, to show the American people, the Iraqi people and other countries around the world that we know what we're doing and we have an exit strategy and that we're going to begin to in a meaningful way turn this process over to the Iraqis.

BLITZER: And there are some suggesting to do in Iraq what the U.S. did in Afghanistan, create this provisional government and give them power, real power even without a constitution.

STEVENSON: That was one of the subjects that was discussed today in the White House Situation Room, Bremer, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, the whole top national security team got together to talk about what they can do to accelerate this process.

One of the ideas on the table is to use the Afghan model of having an interim, un-elected leader to provide some way to provide -- some way to transfer sovereignty to a respected Iraqi leader and then hold elections further down the line.

BLITZER: Is there an Hamid, is there a Karzai in Iraq because there's been a lot of speculation about Chalabi, for example, being that guy but there's a lot of people who don't like him.

STEVENSON: I think, you know, Chalabi's star has undoubtedly dimmed somewhat within the administration.

BLITZER: Who is the Hamid Karzai of Iraq?

STEVENSON: You got me and I think that's one of the big problems they face as they look to the Afghan model to work in Iraq and I'm not sure they have an answer to that yet.

BLITZER: All right, Richard Stevenson thanks very much from "The New York Times." We'll be reading your dispatch tomorrow morning.

STEVENSON: Thanks for having me.

BLITZER: A few more items now from around the world starting with an outbreak of fighting in Afghanistan. American and Afghan forces reportedly clashing with two small groups of rebel fighters in the eastern portion of the country, no American casualties according to the Pentagon, one on the rebel side. There are reports, so far unconfirmed, that Taliban forces have chosen Ramadan to launch a series of new raids on Americans in Afghanistan.

Richard Armitage, the Deputy Secretary of State, is in Egypt. He met today with the head of the Arab League who urged the United States to put more pressure on Israel. The Palestinian problem, he says, is fueling terrorist attacks in the region and around the world. Secretary Armitage politely differed with him on that.

And the U.N. today put a bottom line on Israeli efforts to build a barrier through and around much of the West Bank. The reports say it would put nearly 15 percent of West Bank land on the Israeli side and disrupt the lives of more than half a million Palestinians. The Israeli government calls the barrier or some call it a wall or a fence necessary for security.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT the millionaire and the murder and the jury said that he wasn't guilty of the killing he admitted committing. We'll explain. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Certain stories have certain endings. You almost know them in advance. Consider this. A man shoots his neighbor, cuts up his neighbor, stuffs his neighbor in trash bags and dumps them in Galveston Bay, admits to it all. He goes to trial. He goes to trial in Texas. Think you know where this one ends? One hint, it won't be the death chamber and it might not even be prison.

From Galveston here's CNN's Ed Lavandera.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We, the jury, find the defendant Robert Durst not guilty.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN DALLAS BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): How does a jury find a man not guilty who admits he shot his neighbor, cut up the corpse, dumped the body parts in Galveston Bay and then tried to hide from authorities? Some members of that jury tried to explain.

JOANNE GONGORA, JUROR: We all kept coming back to that original charge. Was it an act of self defense or an accident how Mars Black (ph) met his death and that's the question that we answered in our verdict.

ROBBIE CLARAC, JUROR: We can't convict someone on our thoughts or what we think or what we perceive or what we speculate. We can't do that. We went on the facts that was presented to us from the prosecution and we could not convict him. He is not guilty.

DEBORAH WARREN, JUROR: There were people that cried. There were people that fussed and argued. My stomach is still knotted up but we did the best with what we had and whether it agrees to you all or to anyone else out there in America this is what we came up with.

LAVANDERA: Most jurors said they did not believe much of Robert Durst's testimony. Despite that, they say, the prosecution presented too many different explanations as to why Robert Durst would murder his neighbor.

CHRIS LOVELL, JUROR: We're going to convict Mr. Durst but here's your reason why, A, B, C, or D. Pick one and we're going to send him away. Well, that's not the way it works. Tell me what happened.

LAVANDERA: Prosecutors say they're dismayed and disappointed in the verdict but also say they respect the jury's decision. When asked if they thought Robert Durst would be a threat whenever he gets out of jail the prosecutor would only say... KURT SISTRUNK, PROSECUTOR: Mr. Durst is not going to be invited to my for any house for any reason at all.

LAVANDERA (on camera): Mr. Durst isn't a free man just yet. He's still in jail, indicted on a bail-jumping charge. If he's convicted of that crime, he could be sent to jail for 10 years. But, still, that's far less than the life sentence he avoided in his murder trial.

Ed Lavandera, CNN, Galveston, Texas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: And with us now in Galveston is Rick Pienciak, who covered the trial gavel to gavel for "The New York Daily News."

Rick, thanks very much for joining us.

For our viewers who weren't covering, watching this trial very closely, remind everyone what's so special about Robert Durst.

RICK PIENCIAK, "THE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS": Well, he's a member of one of the wealthiest real estate families in New York City, the Durst Organization. It's not very high profile. But, certainly, at least $2 billion in assets, we are told the family has. And so he has got a one-fourth interest in that, which means he's worth at least $500 million.

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: Yes, I was going to say, what was he doing, though, in Galveston?

PIENCIAK: Well, that's what I was going to say.

The other part of it is that, in 1982, his first wife disappeared. And since that time, he's been the subject of a lot of scrutiny about that disappearance. At the time, they believed that she had disappeared in Manhattan. And that's mainly because Mr. Durst said he put his wife on a train from Westchester County, when they had a weekend house. Authorities now believe that Mr. Durst never put his wife on a train and she never left Westchester County.

The critical part about Galveston is that, on November 11 of the year 2000, both "The New York Daily News" and "The New York Times" published large articles announcing, revealing that the New York State Police, and, then, it turned out the Westchester County district attorney, Jeanine Pirro, had reopened an investigation into that disappearance.

And, at the trial, we heard that, on November 13, two days after those articles were published, Durst left New York City and moved to Galveston. He came here dressed as a woman. He rented a $300-a-month two-room apartment dressed as a woman, took the name of Dorothy Ciner, who was actually his first girlfriend in ninth grade in high school in Scarsdale, New York. BLITZER: How did his lawyers manage to convince this jury that he's innocent, not guilty, of what seemed to so many to be almost a slam-dunk case?

PIENCIAK: Well, part of it, Wolf, is that they admitted to everything they couldn't deny. Everything they couldn't dispute, they admitted to.

So, basically, that means they admitted that he committed the murder. The gun found in the trash behind the apartment, they admitted that was the murder weapon. Mr. Black's head, the victim, Morris Black, his head was never found. When Mr. Durst dismembered the body and dumped all the body parts in Galveston Bay, there's two scenarios.

Either the head was dumped in the bay with everything else and it floated away or he took the head separately and disposed of it, so that it would never, ever be found, so that a complete autopsy couldn't be performed. And so, therefore, the prosecution had a very difficult time in establishing the exact cause of death.

For example, if Mr. Black had been shot in the back of the head, if the head was around, the autopsy would have shown that. If he was shot at a distance, the autopsy would have shown that. So what you had is Mr. Durst taking the stand and telling a story that basically couldn't be disproved. It's like proving the negative. And the prosecutor had a hard time doing that. And the jury bought into the fact -- in fact, they held it against the prosecution that they didn't produce the head.

BLITZER: You listened to every minute of the testimony. You watched this trial gavel to gavel. How surprised, if at all, were you by the verdict?

PIENCIAK: Well, I've been writing stories for the last three, four days about this jury. In fact, one of our headlines was, "Durst Jury Deliber-Eats." They'd been complaining about the food.

One day, they went out to an expensive restaurant for lunch. The county has to pay the bill. The judge said, no more meals. You're going to eat in here. The judge said, you can stay late. They wouldn't stay late. Some of the people smoked. The smokers would go out for a break. The nonsmokers wouldn't go out. So it started to take on a little bit of a "Looney Tunes" mode to the whole thing.

Some of us were beginning to think that it was going to be a hung jury. I don't know how accurate this information was. But it seems now that it was probably accurate. This morning, I heard a rumor in the hallway that the vote last night was something around seven for not guilty -- excuse me, nine for not guilty -- no, excuse me. I'm right -- seven for not guilty, three undecided, and two guilty.

So, this morning, when I heard that there was a verdict, I assumed, if my information was correct, there was no way that that was going to somehow shift to 12 people saying guilty. So, in the last 24 hours, I really wasn't that surprised that something other than guilty came back.

BLITZER: Pretty amazing case, if you think about it.

Rick Pienciak of "The Daily News" in New York, covering it in Galveston, thanks very much for joining us on NEWSNIGHT.

And still to come: campaign 2004 and what may be the death of campaign finance reform; as well as some new ads taking issue with the president's visit to the aircraft carrier. You remember that.

And later: a South Carolina town paying an enormous price for freeing Iraq.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Much more NEWSNIGHT ahead, including a look at why campaign finance reform may be a dead issue.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Remember when President Bush landed on the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln on May 1? It was one of those made-for-TV moments, a glorious photo-op that might find its way into the presidential campaign. Well, it has, but not as anyone thought.

As Jeff Greenfield reminds us, politics is a very strange and unpredictable business.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SR. ANALYST (voice-over): When President Bush landed on the deck of the carrier Abraham Lincoln last May in full flight garb, a lot of nervous Democrats were sure this image would appear in campaign commercials next year.

When the casualty toll kept rising all spring and summer and fall, and the president's approval ratings on Iraq went down, some Republicans worried that that aircraft carrier image might show up in Democratic ads.

(on camera): Well, now the first commercial using that image has begun to air. It's from a Democratic contender, Senator John Kerry. But the purpose isn't what you might think.

Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, KERRY CAMPAIGN AD)

NARRATOR: Who can take on George Bush and change the direction of the nation? John Kerry, a leader on national security, a decorated combat veteran.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD (voice-over): Notice anything special? It's what isn't being said or shown. Look at it again.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, KERRY CAMPAIGN AD)

NARRATOR: Who can take on...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD: The shot of President Bush on the carrier is only shown for a few seconds. There isn't any criticism of Bush or his Iraq policy at all.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, AD)

NARRATOR: He opposed anti-satellite weapons.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD: By contrast, look at this ad. It's from the 1998 campaign of the first George Bush. And it shows his opponent, Michael Dukakis, in a famously unsuccessful photo-op of Dukakis in a tank. After reciting Dukakis' defense record, it zeros in on a big close-up, the candidate as Snoopy.

(on camera): But, in this commercial, Senator Kerry's target isn't President Bush at all. Instead, he's asking Democrats to consider what kind of candidate can stand up to Bush on national security issues, a decorated former combat veteran with national security and foreign policy experience, not, for instance, a former Vermont governor with no such experience.

So, in this first use of the carrier image, the purpose is not to attack, nor to praise President Bush. Instead, the target of this image is Howard Dean.

Jeff Greenfield, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: Campaign spots, of course, are nothing without the money to put them on the air. And there's news on that front as well. Former Governor of Vermont Howard Dean has announced he'll forego federal funds, in order to spend as much as he wants in key states. That's a blow to campaign finance reform and another move to try to pull ahead of his competitors.

Joining us now to talk about it is Elaine Kamarck from Harvard University. She's a former aide to Vice President Al Gore, a seasoned political watcher of a lot of campaigns.

Elaine, thanks very much for joining us.

Does this represent an end to campaign finance reform as we thought it would occur during these presidential campaigns?

ELAINE KAMARCK, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: It certainly does, Wolf. What Howard Dean has done is nothing short of revolutionary. He has completely changed forever the way people are going to raise money in presidential races. And he's done this in the right way. Everybody who ever wanted campaign finance reform talked about having a system where you raise small dollars from lots and lots of people. That's exactly what Howard Dean has done.

In doing so, he has moved himself from the back of the pack to the front of the pack. And I can't imagine that, in the future, any candidate will forgo the Internet and the grassroots fund-raising that Howard Dean has done. And, therefore, we are back to the future when it comes to campaign finance reform.

BLITZER: Well, three years ago, George W. Bush -- forego those matching funds, the campaign, the federal funding, to raise as much as he wanted. Isn't Howard Dean simply following in George Bush's footsteps?

KAMARCK: It's a completely different model.

George Bush has a lot of very wealthy contributors. They bundle very large checks and they hand over very large bundles of checks. We all know how that game works. George Bush's campaign last time, George Bush's campaign this time is a big-money campaign. It's exactly the kind of campaign that we don't want. Howard Dean's is a small-money campaign, 500,000 people, average contributions of $77. Nobody's going to buy a presidency for $77.

BLITZER: All right, you're a good Democrat, Elaine, but George Soros is a billionaire. If you read "The Washington Post" today, you saw that he is pledging $15 million -- $15 million -- to defeat George W. Bush. Is that a little sum of money from a lot of different campaign sources?

KAMARCK: No, it absolutely isn't.

But one thing to remember and to remind our audience is that, as much as we've wanted campaign finance reform, we do have something called the First Amendment. No campaign reform proposal ever has been able to forbid a wealthy person from spending as much money as he or she wants to spend to communicate a message in the democracy. So, campaign reform quite aside, you're not going to stop the George Soroses of the world, whether you like them or not.

BLITZER: Well, if you're George W. Bush and his supporters and you hear George Soros and other millionaires and billionaires who are Democrats saying they're spend as much as they want to get him out of the White House, you can't blame him for wanting to raise $200 million to keep himself in the White House.

KAMARCK: And he will raise $200 million. And they will have plenty of George Soroses of their own.

The fact of the matter is that we have been remarkably unsuccessful in the last 20 years in controlling campaign finance. Every time we pass a law, there's some other law. The astonishing thing about Dean is that his mark, his pledge to raise $200 million in $100 increments is actually something he can achieve. It looks very achievable. Nobody, even four years ago, would have thought that was possible.

BLITZER: Off the top of your head, very briefly, Elaine, can you mention one Republican fat cat ready to put $15 million into this race?

KAMARCK: No, but I'm sure there's plenty of them out there. And I'm sure, in the coming days, we'll see of a couple of them putting money into this race.

BLITZER: Well, this is not exactly what campaign finance reform was supposed to be, McCain-Feingold legislation notwithstanding.

Elaine Kamarck, thanks very much for joining us.

KAMARCK: Thank you.

BLITZER: One quick programming note: We'll be sitting down with Governor Dean tomorrow afternoon. Our interview will run tomorrow night on this program. And, of course, we'll be excited to talk to Governor Dean, see how he's going to raise all that money.

Just ahead tonight on NEWSNIGHT: a sad story -- Art Carney, a look back at the career of a truly remarkable pioneer in television.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Long before there was a Kramer, was there a Norton. And years before Fonzie said, "Hey," Norton said, "Hey, Ralphie boy." Norton, Ed Norton, was the guy upstairs from and comic foil to Ralph Kramden. Both characters are immortal, but the men who created them, sadly, are not.

Jackie Gleason died years ago. And today, we learned that Art Carney died over the weekend. He was 85, with a lifetime of great characters behind him and one Ed Norton.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER (voice-over): He wore an unbuttoned vest over a white T- shirt and, sometimes, he took forever to do one simple thing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

JACKIE GLEASON, ACTOR: Come on, will you!

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: But Art Carney knew exactly what he was doing and became a household name, playing Jackie Gleason's neighbor, Ed Norton, on the classic television comedy "The Honeymooners."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

ART CARNEY, ACTOR: King of the castle. I got it right in the back of my head.

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Carney played Ed Norton to the hilt. Jackie Gleason is quoted as saying, the instant he saw Carney, he knew he would have to work twice as hard to get a laugh.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

GLEASON: Come on!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Art Carney was that good.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

CARNEY: Hello, ball!

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Carney was a lot more than Ed Norton. He made over 25 movies between 1941 and 1993. In 1974, he won the Academy Award for best actor for his performance as an old man on the road with his cat in "Harry and Tonto." Art Carney was World War II veteran, injured in the leg at Normandy. It left one leg permanently shorter than the other, but you'd never know it watching him perform.

He was a private man, the polar opposite of Ed Norton, the character he will be identified with as long as there are television sets and reruns. He was buried without fanfare today, on Veterans Day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: We will always remember Art Carney.

As NEWSNIGHT continues, segment seven and a visit to one town where the price for freeing Iraq has been extraordinarily high.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Today may be the day to honor all those nameless, faceless veterans who have served the United States. But in Orangeburg, South Carolina, it's a day to remember Darius and Anthony and Vorn. Army Specialist Darius Jennings, Sergeant Anthony Thompson, and Private Vorn Mack have all been killed in Iraq since August. All came from Orangeburg, where the desire to serve seems undimmed by the losses. Here's CNN's Martin Savidge.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For the 2,000 students and faculty at Orangeburg Wilkinson High School, it started in August. It happened again in September, and just last week, it happened once more.

MARILYN WILSON, GUIDANCE COUNSELOR: I think we're still in shock. It's tragic. It's a tragic occurrence.

SAVIDGE: In the span of three months, the small town of Orangeburg, South Carolina, population less than 15,000, has lost three young men to the war in Iraq.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody kind of knows everybody, and they're affected in one way or the other, either through work or the church or the school.

SAVIDGE: At the high school, 85 percent of the students qualify for either free or reduced lunches. And for many, the military is not just a way to see the world, but their only hope of seeing a college classroom. One hundred eighty students are in the school's junior ROTC program, but the soldiers' deaths have some rethinking those plans.

MAJ. FRANK DOUGLASS, ROTC DIRECTOR: I think those who came in with the intent of going into the military, I think they're pretty much steadfast, where others who weren't sure probably have changed their minds.

SAVIDGE (on camera): How many of you are actively thinking about going into the military after school? Over half of you.

(voice-over): But in this class, we found no changes of heart.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's been something I wanted to do for awhile. So it's a career that I want and it's a risk I'm going to take.

SAVIDGE (on camera): And have your attitudes changed as someone who is guiding a young person.

WILSON: No, I'm still going to give them all of the options that are available to them.

SAVIDGE (voice-over): The attitude of English teacher Angela Lee, who taught two of the former students, hasn't changed either. If a young person wants to go into the military, that's fine. She just wants something more.

ANGELA LEE, ENGLISH DRAMA TEACHER: I just want all of my students back. I want them back home.

SAVIDGE: Martin Savidge, CNN, Orangeburg, South Carolina. (END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: Just ahead, we'll update our top story and preview tomorrow.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: A quick check now of our top story. America's top man in Iraq, Paul Bremer, came back to Washington today for a hastily- arranged meeting with top officials over at White House; at issue, the pace of turning over administration control to Iraqis, as well as the continuing security problems -- more evidence of those after nightfall in Baghdad, as explosions were heard in the so-called Green Zone, where the U.S. forces are based.

Tomorrow on NEWSNIGHT, we'll go to a town where the whole idea with special kids is to make them feel not special, but just like everyone else. That's NEWSNIGHT tomorrow, 10:00 p.m. Eastern.

That's NEWSNIGHT for tonight. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. I'll see you back here tomorrow night.

Now, for those of you watching in the United States, please stay tuned for "LOU DOBBS TONIGHT," for our international viewers, "World News."

Good night.

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





With Bremer; Investigation Into Riyadh Bombing Continues>


Aired November 11, 2003 - 22:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening from Washington at the end of a very gray and somber and meaningful Veteran's Day.
The country is at war. On an almost daily basis an American dies in combat often more than one. There are questions tonight, new questions, about whether in fact the fighting will yet pick up and with it too the dying.

For people in Pittsburgh and Des Moines and Port Huron, Michigan, in big cities and small towns alike, Veteran's Day might once have meant a parade or a white sale or at the most a quick history lesson. It doesn't anymore, at least not on this Veteran's Day.

The whip begins with that reality. Another day of developments in Iraq and CNN's Matthew Chance starts us off with a headline -- Matthew.

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, thank you. The headquarters of the U.S.-led coalition authority in the Iraqi capital Baghdad is again shaken by a series of explosions. There were no casualties reported but this is an audacious attack which underscores just how bold these anti-U.S. insurgents have become here in Iraq.

BLITZER: Matthew, we'll be getting back to you.

Let's move on to the White House now and the president's day which included a meeting with the top American in Iraq. He happens to be in Washington right now. CNN's Dana Bash with the duty tonight, Dana the headline.

DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, for the president the tradition and ceremony of Veterans Day gave way to a detailed defense of his Iraq policy and an urgent and unexpected visit from Iraq's Civil Administrator Paul Bremer. We'll tell you why -- Wolf.

BLITZER: All right, Dana, stand by.

Next to Riyadh and the rapid fire investigation into Saturday's bombing. CNN's Nic Robertson with that, Nic a headline from you please.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, Saudi authorities say they've detained several people they believe are responsible or connected to the bombing over the weekend, also apparently al Qaeda has now made a claim of responsibility that to a Saudi political weekly magazine -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Thanks very much, Nic. We'll get back to all of you shortly.

Also ahead tonight some interesting new issues popping up in the presidential campaign. We'll tell you all about those issues.

And later, a fascinating trial and a surprising, many will say even shocking verdict in the case of an accused millionaire killer.

And, a giant from the early days of television is gone. We'll take a closer look at the career of Art Carney.

And, in Segment 7, we'll look at one South Carolina town that's paid an extraordinary price for the war in Iraq, all that coming up in the hour ahead.

But we begin with something an unnamed American official told the Reuters News Agency today about the sudden return to Washington of Paul Bremer, the Chief U.S. Administrator in Iraq.

"When decisions need to be made," the official said "Bremer comes" and some decisions apparently need to be made right now, decisions regarding the pace of transition to Iraqi control and possibly the tempo of the fight against Iraqi insurgents, neither appears to be going very well right now nor quickly enough for the White House something we'll take up with CNN's Dana Bash in just a moment.

First though another difficult day in Iraq, here's CNN's Matthew Chance.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHANCE (voice-over): It was an attack from increasingly bold insurgents yet another strike at the heart of the coalition. Inside the heavily guarded Green Zone officials say they sheltered in basements as the mortars or rockets rained in. Eyewitnesses spoke of a major blast.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Suddenly we heard very big explosion which has taken place here near this school. This is an extraordinary explosion.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By your service you have made our nation safer.

CHANCE: For the 130,000 U.S. troops in Iraq this Veterans Day has already earned extraordinary meaning. All are now veterans themselves and as they remember comrades who have died few need reminding of the difficulties still ahead. Staff Sergeant Mark Coulter spoke at a Baghdad Veterans Day ceremony.

COULTER: I know sometimes it's hard. Sometimes it's difficult and there's probably not a person in this room that's like, you know what, I'm just sick and tired of this but remember we are all a part of something that's larger than ourselves and maybe in the future someone else will stand up and tell the story about what you're doing now.

CHANCE: November has already proved the bloodiest month for U.S. forces since the fall of Baghdad. The downing of a Chinook helicopter near Fallujah left 16 dead. Six more died when their Black Hawk was shot down near Tikrit. Exactly who's behind the now daily attacks continues to frustrate coalition commanders.

LT. GEN. RICARDO SANCHEZ, U.S. ARMY: During the last few weeks the pace and intensity of our offensive military operations has increased. We are taking the fight into the safe havens of the enemy and the heartland of the country where we continue to face former regime loyalists, criminals, and foreign terrorists who are trying to isolate the coalition from the Iraqi people and trying to break the will of the coalition and the international community. They will fail.

CHANCE: It seems that in this insurgency the foreign fighters of al Qaeda remain outnumbered by Iraqis bitter these U.S. and coalition forces are still here.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHANCE: Well, Wolf, I think I lost contact with you in the studio but let me just tell you what I was going to say at the end of that report that General Sanchez said that 5,000 people are being detained in various facilities across Iraq in connection with these insurgents' attacks against U.S. forces.

He also said earlier today that 20 of those individuals are being investigated on suspicion of belonging or having links with the al Qaeda network. It still seems though that the vast majority of these insurgents are Iraqis themselves, disgruntled at the fact that their country is being occupied by that U.S.-led coalition -- back to you.

BLITZER: Thanks very much Matthew Chance in Baghdad for that report.

Let's move to the White House now where Paul Bremer got a grilling from President Bush's national security team and met briefly with the president himself. For his part, the president again today cautioned Americans to be patient where Iraq is concerned even as he paused to remember those who have died there; the report from CNN's Dana Bash.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DANA BASH, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month the president lays a wreath at the tomb of the unknowns, honors 19 million living veterans and those still serving.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They have liberated two nations, Afghanistan and Iraq. BASH: Beyond the commemoration urgency about Iraq and a detailed defense of his policy. The president accused al Qaeda affiliated groups seeking revenge of forming an alliance with Saddam loyalists to kill U.S. troops.

BUSH: Recent reporting suggests that despite their differences these killers are working together to spread chaos and terror and fear.

BASH: Source say that information is part of a new report detailing the scope and source of the attacks on the ground and was discussed at hastily arranged White House meetings with Iraqi Civil Administrator Paul Bremer and top national security officials.

Also at issue White House concern the U.S. picked Iraqi Governing Council is ineffective and may not meet a December 15th deadline paving the way for elections.

Nearly 400 servicemen came back from Iraq not as veterans but casualties of war. Thirty-eight from Iraq buried at Arlington National Cemetery including Captain John Robert Teal laid to rest just last week killed by a roadside bomb northeast of Baghdad.

EMMIE TEAL, MOTHER OF CAPTAIN TEAL: He said there's only one thing I want to make real clear and it's in my will I want to be buried at Arlington in my full dress uniform, full military honors.

BASH: Captain Teal's mother Emmy received the sympathy letter Mr. Bush sends to families of those who died. She says she wants the U.S. military to be more aggressive in retaliating against those who killed her son.

TEAL: When they're fighting down and dirty you got to get into the ditch and get dirty.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BASH: And a more aggressive security strategy and political transition will top the agenda here tomorrow morning. Paul Bremer heads back to the White House to meet with the president and his national security team to talk about how to more quickly transfer governing power back to the Iraqi people -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Dana, there's a CIA assessment of the security situation in Iraq that's now circulating here in Washington. I know you know about it. What else can you tell us about it?

BASH: Well, what we know about it, Wolf, and first of all this is a topic that they did discuss here at the White House and will likely tomorrow but it is essentially laying out some of the concerns and really some of the growing concerns on the ground in Iraq essentially saying that some of the Iraqi people who were not involved in the insurgency are now becoming more involved, are becoming more active in coordinating some of these attacks and that is the major concern here. Not only is it happening in and around Baghdad but into the north and the south where the attacks were not as aggressive. That is something that the president wants to talk to Paul Bremer and other top national security officials about.

BLITZER: An ominous assessment indeed, Dana Bash at the White House thanks, Dana, very much.

From the Pentagon today came confirmation that if much of Iraq is struggling through a post-war period in one portion of Iraq the war goes on. This is the so-called Sunni Triangle which has been a problem from the beginning and clearly the main challenge today.

Here's CNN's Jamie McIntyre.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With attacks against U.S. troops on the rise in Iraq, counterattacks are up too. American commanders report anti-insurgent engagements have doubled in recent weeks up to about 30 to 35 a day.

Citing what sources say is fresh intelligence President Bush contends 93 percent of the anti-U.S. attacks are occurring in a relatively small area, five Iraqi provinces that make up a 200 square mile Ba'athist triangle.

BUSH: Here the enemy is waging the battle and it is here that the enemy will be defeated.

MCINTYRE: The U.S. believes some of the attacks are being conducted by foreign fighters but it's having a hard time finding clear links to al Qaeda.

SANCHEZ: At one point we had up to about 20 suspected al Qaeda members but as we have continued to refine and interrogate we have not been able to establish definitively that they were al Qaeda members.

MCINTYRE: Sanchez says he thinks several hundred terrorists have entered Iraq from Syria, Egypt, Sudan and Yemen but the Pentagon still believes its primary foe remains the remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime.

GEN. RICHARD MYERS, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: The first thing in being able to take care of the current threat we face is to understand who the enemy is and we certainly know that the former regime elements, the Ba'athists if you will, are the major part of that.

MCINTYRE: The Pentagon says with each successful raid, with each discovery of arms, the U.S. is getting closer to breaking the resistance.

(on camera): And the Pentagon says it has passed a milestone in the Iraqization of the security forces. With 131,000 Iraqis under arms the Pentagon says that number now surpasses the number of U.S. troops in the country. Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: On to Saudi Arabia now. Officials there questioning people in connection with the deadly terror bombing on Saturday, no word yet who or how many people have been talked to or taken into custody.

A top spokesman for the royal family told CNN today he is convinced this was the work of al Qaeda and that it wasn't a botched attempt to kill Americans. Al Qaeda, he insisted, also wants to kill Muslims. Whatever the case, Saudis and other Arabs today no longer believe themselves immune from attack.

Here's CNN's Nic Robertson.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (voice-over): Just yards from Saturday's massive car bomb, Lebanese dentist Ziad Salmai (ph) leads the way through the remains of his house.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was hiding here, just here. You can see maybe this is the only and the safest place here because you don't have glass here.

ROBERTSON: Returning now to retrieve valuable possessions he's amazed he survived.

(on camera): The bomb went off right outside here.

(voice-over): Elsewhere in the compound other families prepare to leave packing up what they can salvage. Turkish accountant Samir (ph) thought security at the compound was good but worries who can make him safe now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Security is good or not good but, you know, how I know this good or not good, yes this is.

ROBERTSON: Picking up his child's broken toys, Egyptian businessman Amir (ph) like all here contemptuous of their attackers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't know why actually. We don't know why. We don't know what's the reason behind this. Definitely it's not in the Quran or in Islam.

ROBERTSON (on camera): Saudi officials are vowing to track down al Qaeda, to fight them to the bitter end. The destruction here is an indication just how bloody and difficult that battle could be. Knowledge of a prior attack, the Saudi officials say they had in this case, it seems is not enough to stop those attacks happening.

(voice-over): Among American women here diverse views over just how troubling that uncertainty is. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Clearly it seems that no matter how many safety features we install there's still that part and the fear factor is definitely there.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't live on a compound (unintelligible) and I feel just as safe now as I did yesterday and the day before.

ROBERTSON: For all at this well-to-do gathering, however, concerns for children now top priority.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And when you see a checkpoint right by your children's school my first thought was do I drop them off at school or do I take them home? Are they safer inside of a Saudi school or in a car with their American mother?

ROBERTSON: Back outside the destroyed housing compound tightening security likely the solution most here will be taking for some time to come.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON: But it's not just this visible security, the Saudi officials say, has been increased. They say they are now getting more intelligence tip-offs from Saudi people, people who are disappointed with what they've seen in the last few days. People are angry that they've seen Muslims attacked by other Muslims -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Nic, we know that there are many Americans who work in the oil industry and other industries in Saudi Arabia. Do you get any indication they're getting out of there, they're picking up and leaving?

ROBERTSON: You know most of the people we've talked to, mostly Americans we've talked to here and there are 35,000 of them in Saudi Arabia, they're telling us, the majority are saying look they're concerned. There are places they're not going to.

They're perhaps not going out in the evening, staying on the compound but really it is rare to hear them say look if it gets worse we're going to leave. Many of them who live here, Wolf, really enjoy the lifestyle they have here, enjoy some of the comforts of living here and they don't want to lose it and at the moment things haven't reached that kind of level -- Wolf.

BLITZER: CNN's Nic Robertson in Riyadh for us tonight, thanks Nic very much.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, more on what Paul Bremer's surprising visit to the White House may mean.

And later, the millionaire who admitted the killing but was found not guilty of murder, we'll have the details.

And we'll also look back at the career and contributions of Art Carney. He died at the age of 85.

This is NEWSNIGHT from Washington.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Our deepest condolences to their families.

More now on Paul Bremer's hasty return to Washington and the possible factors behind it. With us now, Richard Stevenson, he's the White House correspondent for "The New York Times." He's filing on the story for tomorrow's edition. Richard thanks very much for joining us.

He was just here a couple of weeks ago, Paul Bremer. All of a sudden he comes back a mystery surrounding it. What do you hear? What's going on?

RICHARD STEVENSON, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT "NEW YORK TIMES": Well, there are a couple of things. One, they've got a December 15th deadline to report to the U.N. Security Council on how they're going to draft a constitution.

The Iraqi Governing Council, the appointed body that is supposed to begin work on this has become almost dysfunctional in the American view. They need to find some way to jump-start that process and get it moving.

More broadly, I think there is a growing sense in the administration from the president on down that this just isn't going fast enough in Iraq that the process of transferring authority to the Iraqis, not just on security grounds but also politically has to move faster than it is.

And that Bremer's seven-step plan to begin to draft a constitution, get it ratified, hold elections over the next year or two is a little bit too leisurely for the situation that they find themselves in now.

BLITZER: Now you speak to White House officials on a daily basis a lot of them, off the record, on background. What the president has suggested today in his speech at the Heritage Foundation here was very upbeat. The U.S. is winning, going to win, not going to retreat at all.

But on a day-to-day basis you get the impression that things aren't going well at all and this latest CIA report that's now circulating here in Washington paints a very gloomy assessment, not only in the Sunni Triangle but potentially all around the country.

STEVENSON: Look, I mean there's no question that they face a problem there now. There have been almost 40 Americans killed there in the last ten days alone. You heard General Sanchez in Baghdad today talking about the growing difficulty that they face.

This was a guy who ten days ago or so dismissed the terrorist attacks as operationally and militarily insignificant. Today he actually used the word war very advisedly to describe what they're going through there. There's really a change in attitude I think everywhere both on the military side, on the political side, about what needs to be done to get this situation under control, to show the American people, the Iraqi people and other countries around the world that we know what we're doing and we have an exit strategy and that we're going to begin to in a meaningful way turn this process over to the Iraqis.

BLITZER: And there are some suggesting to do in Iraq what the U.S. did in Afghanistan, create this provisional government and give them power, real power even without a constitution.

STEVENSON: That was one of the subjects that was discussed today in the White House Situation Room, Bremer, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, the whole top national security team got together to talk about what they can do to accelerate this process.

One of the ideas on the table is to use the Afghan model of having an interim, un-elected leader to provide some way to provide -- some way to transfer sovereignty to a respected Iraqi leader and then hold elections further down the line.

BLITZER: Is there an Hamid, is there a Karzai in Iraq because there's been a lot of speculation about Chalabi, for example, being that guy but there's a lot of people who don't like him.

STEVENSON: I think, you know, Chalabi's star has undoubtedly dimmed somewhat within the administration.

BLITZER: Who is the Hamid Karzai of Iraq?

STEVENSON: You got me and I think that's one of the big problems they face as they look to the Afghan model to work in Iraq and I'm not sure they have an answer to that yet.

BLITZER: All right, Richard Stevenson thanks very much from "The New York Times." We'll be reading your dispatch tomorrow morning.

STEVENSON: Thanks for having me.

BLITZER: A few more items now from around the world starting with an outbreak of fighting in Afghanistan. American and Afghan forces reportedly clashing with two small groups of rebel fighters in the eastern portion of the country, no American casualties according to the Pentagon, one on the rebel side. There are reports, so far unconfirmed, that Taliban forces have chosen Ramadan to launch a series of new raids on Americans in Afghanistan.

Richard Armitage, the Deputy Secretary of State, is in Egypt. He met today with the head of the Arab League who urged the United States to put more pressure on Israel. The Palestinian problem, he says, is fueling terrorist attacks in the region and around the world. Secretary Armitage politely differed with him on that.

And the U.N. today put a bottom line on Israeli efforts to build a barrier through and around much of the West Bank. The reports say it would put nearly 15 percent of West Bank land on the Israeli side and disrupt the lives of more than half a million Palestinians. The Israeli government calls the barrier or some call it a wall or a fence necessary for security.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT the millionaire and the murder and the jury said that he wasn't guilty of the killing he admitted committing. We'll explain. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Certain stories have certain endings. You almost know them in advance. Consider this. A man shoots his neighbor, cuts up his neighbor, stuffs his neighbor in trash bags and dumps them in Galveston Bay, admits to it all. He goes to trial. He goes to trial in Texas. Think you know where this one ends? One hint, it won't be the death chamber and it might not even be prison.

From Galveston here's CNN's Ed Lavandera.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We, the jury, find the defendant Robert Durst not guilty.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN DALLAS BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): How does a jury find a man not guilty who admits he shot his neighbor, cut up the corpse, dumped the body parts in Galveston Bay and then tried to hide from authorities? Some members of that jury tried to explain.

JOANNE GONGORA, JUROR: We all kept coming back to that original charge. Was it an act of self defense or an accident how Mars Black (ph) met his death and that's the question that we answered in our verdict.

ROBBIE CLARAC, JUROR: We can't convict someone on our thoughts or what we think or what we perceive or what we speculate. We can't do that. We went on the facts that was presented to us from the prosecution and we could not convict him. He is not guilty.

DEBORAH WARREN, JUROR: There were people that cried. There were people that fussed and argued. My stomach is still knotted up but we did the best with what we had and whether it agrees to you all or to anyone else out there in America this is what we came up with.

LAVANDERA: Most jurors said they did not believe much of Robert Durst's testimony. Despite that, they say, the prosecution presented too many different explanations as to why Robert Durst would murder his neighbor.

CHRIS LOVELL, JUROR: We're going to convict Mr. Durst but here's your reason why, A, B, C, or D. Pick one and we're going to send him away. Well, that's not the way it works. Tell me what happened.

LAVANDERA: Prosecutors say they're dismayed and disappointed in the verdict but also say they respect the jury's decision. When asked if they thought Robert Durst would be a threat whenever he gets out of jail the prosecutor would only say... KURT SISTRUNK, PROSECUTOR: Mr. Durst is not going to be invited to my for any house for any reason at all.

LAVANDERA (on camera): Mr. Durst isn't a free man just yet. He's still in jail, indicted on a bail-jumping charge. If he's convicted of that crime, he could be sent to jail for 10 years. But, still, that's far less than the life sentence he avoided in his murder trial.

Ed Lavandera, CNN, Galveston, Texas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: And with us now in Galveston is Rick Pienciak, who covered the trial gavel to gavel for "The New York Daily News."

Rick, thanks very much for joining us.

For our viewers who weren't covering, watching this trial very closely, remind everyone what's so special about Robert Durst.

RICK PIENCIAK, "THE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS": Well, he's a member of one of the wealthiest real estate families in New York City, the Durst Organization. It's not very high profile. But, certainly, at least $2 billion in assets, we are told the family has. And so he has got a one-fourth interest in that, which means he's worth at least $500 million.

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: Yes, I was going to say, what was he doing, though, in Galveston?

PIENCIAK: Well, that's what I was going to say.

The other part of it is that, in 1982, his first wife disappeared. And since that time, he's been the subject of a lot of scrutiny about that disappearance. At the time, they believed that she had disappeared in Manhattan. And that's mainly because Mr. Durst said he put his wife on a train from Westchester County, when they had a weekend house. Authorities now believe that Mr. Durst never put his wife on a train and she never left Westchester County.

The critical part about Galveston is that, on November 11 of the year 2000, both "The New York Daily News" and "The New York Times" published large articles announcing, revealing that the New York State Police, and, then, it turned out the Westchester County district attorney, Jeanine Pirro, had reopened an investigation into that disappearance.

And, at the trial, we heard that, on November 13, two days after those articles were published, Durst left New York City and moved to Galveston. He came here dressed as a woman. He rented a $300-a-month two-room apartment dressed as a woman, took the name of Dorothy Ciner, who was actually his first girlfriend in ninth grade in high school in Scarsdale, New York. BLITZER: How did his lawyers manage to convince this jury that he's innocent, not guilty, of what seemed to so many to be almost a slam-dunk case?

PIENCIAK: Well, part of it, Wolf, is that they admitted to everything they couldn't deny. Everything they couldn't dispute, they admitted to.

So, basically, that means they admitted that he committed the murder. The gun found in the trash behind the apartment, they admitted that was the murder weapon. Mr. Black's head, the victim, Morris Black, his head was never found. When Mr. Durst dismembered the body and dumped all the body parts in Galveston Bay, there's two scenarios.

Either the head was dumped in the bay with everything else and it floated away or he took the head separately and disposed of it, so that it would never, ever be found, so that a complete autopsy couldn't be performed. And so, therefore, the prosecution had a very difficult time in establishing the exact cause of death.

For example, if Mr. Black had been shot in the back of the head, if the head was around, the autopsy would have shown that. If he was shot at a distance, the autopsy would have shown that. So what you had is Mr. Durst taking the stand and telling a story that basically couldn't be disproved. It's like proving the negative. And the prosecutor had a hard time doing that. And the jury bought into the fact -- in fact, they held it against the prosecution that they didn't produce the head.

BLITZER: You listened to every minute of the testimony. You watched this trial gavel to gavel. How surprised, if at all, were you by the verdict?

PIENCIAK: Well, I've been writing stories for the last three, four days about this jury. In fact, one of our headlines was, "Durst Jury Deliber-Eats." They'd been complaining about the food.

One day, they went out to an expensive restaurant for lunch. The county has to pay the bill. The judge said, no more meals. You're going to eat in here. The judge said, you can stay late. They wouldn't stay late. Some of the people smoked. The smokers would go out for a break. The nonsmokers wouldn't go out. So it started to take on a little bit of a "Looney Tunes" mode to the whole thing.

Some of us were beginning to think that it was going to be a hung jury. I don't know how accurate this information was. But it seems now that it was probably accurate. This morning, I heard a rumor in the hallway that the vote last night was something around seven for not guilty -- excuse me, nine for not guilty -- no, excuse me. I'm right -- seven for not guilty, three undecided, and two guilty.

So, this morning, when I heard that there was a verdict, I assumed, if my information was correct, there was no way that that was going to somehow shift to 12 people saying guilty. So, in the last 24 hours, I really wasn't that surprised that something other than guilty came back.

BLITZER: Pretty amazing case, if you think about it.

Rick Pienciak of "The Daily News" in New York, covering it in Galveston, thanks very much for joining us on NEWSNIGHT.

And still to come: campaign 2004 and what may be the death of campaign finance reform; as well as some new ads taking issue with the president's visit to the aircraft carrier. You remember that.

And later: a South Carolina town paying an enormous price for freeing Iraq.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Much more NEWSNIGHT ahead, including a look at why campaign finance reform may be a dead issue.

This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Remember when President Bush landed on the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln on May 1? It was one of those made-for-TV moments, a glorious photo-op that might find its way into the presidential campaign. Well, it has, but not as anyone thought.

As Jeff Greenfield reminds us, politics is a very strange and unpredictable business.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SR. ANALYST (voice-over): When President Bush landed on the deck of the carrier Abraham Lincoln last May in full flight garb, a lot of nervous Democrats were sure this image would appear in campaign commercials next year.

When the casualty toll kept rising all spring and summer and fall, and the president's approval ratings on Iraq went down, some Republicans worried that that aircraft carrier image might show up in Democratic ads.

(on camera): Well, now the first commercial using that image has begun to air. It's from a Democratic contender, Senator John Kerry. But the purpose isn't what you might think.

Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, KERRY CAMPAIGN AD)

NARRATOR: Who can take on George Bush and change the direction of the nation? John Kerry, a leader on national security, a decorated combat veteran.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD (voice-over): Notice anything special? It's what isn't being said or shown. Look at it again.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, KERRY CAMPAIGN AD)

NARRATOR: Who can take on...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD: The shot of President Bush on the carrier is only shown for a few seconds. There isn't any criticism of Bush or his Iraq policy at all.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, AD)

NARRATOR: He opposed anti-satellite weapons.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREENFIELD: By contrast, look at this ad. It's from the 1998 campaign of the first George Bush. And it shows his opponent, Michael Dukakis, in a famously unsuccessful photo-op of Dukakis in a tank. After reciting Dukakis' defense record, it zeros in on a big close-up, the candidate as Snoopy.

(on camera): But, in this commercial, Senator Kerry's target isn't President Bush at all. Instead, he's asking Democrats to consider what kind of candidate can stand up to Bush on national security issues, a decorated former combat veteran with national security and foreign policy experience, not, for instance, a former Vermont governor with no such experience.

So, in this first use of the carrier image, the purpose is not to attack, nor to praise President Bush. Instead, the target of this image is Howard Dean.

Jeff Greenfield, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: Campaign spots, of course, are nothing without the money to put them on the air. And there's news on that front as well. Former Governor of Vermont Howard Dean has announced he'll forego federal funds, in order to spend as much as he wants in key states. That's a blow to campaign finance reform and another move to try to pull ahead of his competitors.

Joining us now to talk about it is Elaine Kamarck from Harvard University. She's a former aide to Vice President Al Gore, a seasoned political watcher of a lot of campaigns.

Elaine, thanks very much for joining us.

Does this represent an end to campaign finance reform as we thought it would occur during these presidential campaigns?

ELAINE KAMARCK, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: It certainly does, Wolf. What Howard Dean has done is nothing short of revolutionary. He has completely changed forever the way people are going to raise money in presidential races. And he's done this in the right way. Everybody who ever wanted campaign finance reform talked about having a system where you raise small dollars from lots and lots of people. That's exactly what Howard Dean has done.

In doing so, he has moved himself from the back of the pack to the front of the pack. And I can't imagine that, in the future, any candidate will forgo the Internet and the grassroots fund-raising that Howard Dean has done. And, therefore, we are back to the future when it comes to campaign finance reform.

BLITZER: Well, three years ago, George W. Bush -- forego those matching funds, the campaign, the federal funding, to raise as much as he wanted. Isn't Howard Dean simply following in George Bush's footsteps?

KAMARCK: It's a completely different model.

George Bush has a lot of very wealthy contributors. They bundle very large checks and they hand over very large bundles of checks. We all know how that game works. George Bush's campaign last time, George Bush's campaign this time is a big-money campaign. It's exactly the kind of campaign that we don't want. Howard Dean's is a small-money campaign, 500,000 people, average contributions of $77. Nobody's going to buy a presidency for $77.

BLITZER: All right, you're a good Democrat, Elaine, but George Soros is a billionaire. If you read "The Washington Post" today, you saw that he is pledging $15 million -- $15 million -- to defeat George W. Bush. Is that a little sum of money from a lot of different campaign sources?

KAMARCK: No, it absolutely isn't.

But one thing to remember and to remind our audience is that, as much as we've wanted campaign finance reform, we do have something called the First Amendment. No campaign reform proposal ever has been able to forbid a wealthy person from spending as much money as he or she wants to spend to communicate a message in the democracy. So, campaign reform quite aside, you're not going to stop the George Soroses of the world, whether you like them or not.

BLITZER: Well, if you're George W. Bush and his supporters and you hear George Soros and other millionaires and billionaires who are Democrats saying they're spend as much as they want to get him out of the White House, you can't blame him for wanting to raise $200 million to keep himself in the White House.

KAMARCK: And he will raise $200 million. And they will have plenty of George Soroses of their own.

The fact of the matter is that we have been remarkably unsuccessful in the last 20 years in controlling campaign finance. Every time we pass a law, there's some other law. The astonishing thing about Dean is that his mark, his pledge to raise $200 million in $100 increments is actually something he can achieve. It looks very achievable. Nobody, even four years ago, would have thought that was possible.

BLITZER: Off the top of your head, very briefly, Elaine, can you mention one Republican fat cat ready to put $15 million into this race?

KAMARCK: No, but I'm sure there's plenty of them out there. And I'm sure, in the coming days, we'll see of a couple of them putting money into this race.

BLITZER: Well, this is not exactly what campaign finance reform was supposed to be, McCain-Feingold legislation notwithstanding.

Elaine Kamarck, thanks very much for joining us.

KAMARCK: Thank you.

BLITZER: One quick programming note: We'll be sitting down with Governor Dean tomorrow afternoon. Our interview will run tomorrow night on this program. And, of course, we'll be excited to talk to Governor Dean, see how he's going to raise all that money.

Just ahead tonight on NEWSNIGHT: a sad story -- Art Carney, a look back at the career of a truly remarkable pioneer in television.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Long before there was a Kramer, was there a Norton. And years before Fonzie said, "Hey," Norton said, "Hey, Ralphie boy." Norton, Ed Norton, was the guy upstairs from and comic foil to Ralph Kramden. Both characters are immortal, but the men who created them, sadly, are not.

Jackie Gleason died years ago. And today, we learned that Art Carney died over the weekend. He was 85, with a lifetime of great characters behind him and one Ed Norton.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER (voice-over): He wore an unbuttoned vest over a white T- shirt and, sometimes, he took forever to do one simple thing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

JACKIE GLEASON, ACTOR: Come on, will you!

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: But Art Carney knew exactly what he was doing and became a household name, playing Jackie Gleason's neighbor, Ed Norton, on the classic television comedy "The Honeymooners."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

ART CARNEY, ACTOR: King of the castle. I got it right in the back of my head.

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Carney played Ed Norton to the hilt. Jackie Gleason is quoted as saying, the instant he saw Carney, he knew he would have to work twice as hard to get a laugh.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

GLEASON: Come on!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Art Carney was that good.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE HONEYMOONERS")

CARNEY: Hello, ball!

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Carney was a lot more than Ed Norton. He made over 25 movies between 1941 and 1993. In 1974, he won the Academy Award for best actor for his performance as an old man on the road with his cat in "Harry and Tonto." Art Carney was World War II veteran, injured in the leg at Normandy. It left one leg permanently shorter than the other, but you'd never know it watching him perform.

He was a private man, the polar opposite of Ed Norton, the character he will be identified with as long as there are television sets and reruns. He was buried without fanfare today, on Veterans Day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: We will always remember Art Carney.

As NEWSNIGHT continues, segment seven and a visit to one town where the price for freeing Iraq has been extraordinarily high.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Today may be the day to honor all those nameless, faceless veterans who have served the United States. But in Orangeburg, South Carolina, it's a day to remember Darius and Anthony and Vorn. Army Specialist Darius Jennings, Sergeant Anthony Thompson, and Private Vorn Mack have all been killed in Iraq since August. All came from Orangeburg, where the desire to serve seems undimmed by the losses. Here's CNN's Martin Savidge.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For the 2,000 students and faculty at Orangeburg Wilkinson High School, it started in August. It happened again in September, and just last week, it happened once more.

MARILYN WILSON, GUIDANCE COUNSELOR: I think we're still in shock. It's tragic. It's a tragic occurrence.

SAVIDGE: In the span of three months, the small town of Orangeburg, South Carolina, population less than 15,000, has lost three young men to the war in Iraq.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody kind of knows everybody, and they're affected in one way or the other, either through work or the church or the school.

SAVIDGE: At the high school, 85 percent of the students qualify for either free or reduced lunches. And for many, the military is not just a way to see the world, but their only hope of seeing a college classroom. One hundred eighty students are in the school's junior ROTC program, but the soldiers' deaths have some rethinking those plans.

MAJ. FRANK DOUGLASS, ROTC DIRECTOR: I think those who came in with the intent of going into the military, I think they're pretty much steadfast, where others who weren't sure probably have changed their minds.

SAVIDGE (on camera): How many of you are actively thinking about going into the military after school? Over half of you.

(voice-over): But in this class, we found no changes of heart.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's been something I wanted to do for awhile. So it's a career that I want and it's a risk I'm going to take.

SAVIDGE (on camera): And have your attitudes changed as someone who is guiding a young person.

WILSON: No, I'm still going to give them all of the options that are available to them.

SAVIDGE (voice-over): The attitude of English teacher Angela Lee, who taught two of the former students, hasn't changed either. If a young person wants to go into the military, that's fine. She just wants something more.

ANGELA LEE, ENGLISH DRAMA TEACHER: I just want all of my students back. I want them back home.

SAVIDGE: Martin Savidge, CNN, Orangeburg, South Carolina. (END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: Just ahead, we'll update our top story and preview tomorrow.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: A quick check now of our top story. America's top man in Iraq, Paul Bremer, came back to Washington today for a hastily- arranged meeting with top officials over at White House; at issue, the pace of turning over administration control to Iraqis, as well as the continuing security problems -- more evidence of those after nightfall in Baghdad, as explosions were heard in the so-called Green Zone, where the U.S. forces are based.

Tomorrow on NEWSNIGHT, we'll go to a town where the whole idea with special kids is to make them feel not special, but just like everyone else. That's NEWSNIGHT tomorrow, 10:00 p.m. Eastern.

That's NEWSNIGHT for tonight. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. I'll see you back here tomorrow night.

Now, for those of you watching in the United States, please stay tuned for "LOU DOBBS TONIGHT," for our international viewers, "World News."

Good night.

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With Bremer; Investigation Into Riyadh Bombing Continues>