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CNN Crossfire
Should France Have Veto Power?
Aired February 11, 2003 - 19:00 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.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: CROSSFIRE.
On the left, James Carville and Paul Begala.
On the right, Robert Novak and Tucker Carlson.
In the CROSSFIRE tonight: A scary warning. Get ready for more terrorism.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) that could include the use of a radiological dispersing device, as well as poisons and chemicals.
ANNOUNCER: And has you know who surfaced again?
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: He talks to the people of Iraq and talks about their struggle and how he is partnership with Iraq.
ANNOUNCER: Plus, why does Saddam Hussein isn't a bigger threat to peace as President Bush.
Tonight on CROSSFIRE.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Live from the George Washington University, Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson.
TUCKER CARLSON, CO-HOST: Good evening and welcome to CROSSFIRE. Tonight, now that we've heard Osama bin Laden will pep talk for Iraq will the doubters of the Saddam Hussein-al Qaeda connection be offering an apology? We doubt it but we will debate it anyways.
Also pollsters have been asking Europeans who is the biggest threat to peace? The results are so revolting, so completely unreasonable we can't tell you about them now, we'll tell you later.
First, we start with the best political briefing in Television our political alert.
This afternoon the Al-Jazeera broadcast a new audio tape of ranting and threats allegedly recorded by Osama bin Laden. The voice on the tape warns Arab states not to support an U.S. attack on Iraq. And stresses the importance of suicide attacks against Americans. We are with you, the voice tells Iraqis. Existence of the tape was disclosed earlier today by Secretary of State Colin Powell who told the Senate Budget Committee. He had already seen the transcript and that bin Laden claims partnership with Iraq. Powell told the senators the tape would show the world why it needs to be concerned Iraqi ties to terrorism.
PAUL BEGALA, CO-HOST: I am flabbergasted at this administration's ability to use anything that happens as an excuse to attack Iraq. We should be attacking Osama bin Laden who is not in Iraq. He's got bases in Iran, in Pakistan, in Yemen, in Syria, go after them, lets kill Osama bin Laden and let's worry about the connection later.
CARLSON: Nobody disagrees, we have to get Osama bin Laden. That is the highest priority of this government. But however the countries you named do not have state support for terrorism and Iraq does. And we know. Unless you're accusing Colin Powell of lying and I doubt you are.
We know and we agree that since 1993 the government of Iraq, that is Saddam Hussein, has had a relationship formally with al Qaeda. That's a big deal. We have to do something about it and pretending we have to go after Syria is not an excuse for acting as (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
BEGALA: If you want to attack Iraq, attack Iraq, but don't pretend that the best way to get al Qaeda is to attack Iraq. The best way to get al Qaeda is to attack al Qaeda where they are, where they live and that's what we ought to be. And in fact, this is just going to be a recruiting tool for Osama bin Laden if we got war with Iraq.
CARLSON: You have more information than the federal government, so you got to go into it.
BEGALA: CIA Director George Tenet told the Senate Intelligence Committee that al Qaeda, not Iraq, is planning to attack targets in the United States and the Middle East. Perhaps with chemical weapons or radioactive dirty bombs. Director Tenet, told the Senate Committee that these attacks are based on the most specific intelligence we've seen, and an attack could come as soon as this week when the Hajj concludes. The Hajj is a pilgrimage to Mecca made by millions of faithful Muslims every year.
Meantime, Robert Mueller told the senators that al Qaeda will remain for the foreseeable future, the most immediate, serious threat facing this country. Of course, in his new budget, President Bush propose increasing homeland security by 7 percent total cost of 41 billion dollars. By contrast, the president wants to cut tax for the rich by $100 billion, 250 percent more than the total for homeland security. After all, as Mr. Bush likes to say, if we don't cut taxes for the rich, terrorists will have won.
CARLSON: I'm going to ignore the deeply unfair last line, but will just ask you theoretical question.
If someone spent more money on his car than his children's education and most people do, does that mean he loves his car.
BEGALA: You haven't paid tuition, brother.
CARLSON: Most people, you may not know this, but most people send their children to public school, which is free.
BEGALA: Actually I do.
CARLSON: So, if a person spends more money on his car does that mean he loves his car more? No.
BEGALA: If you spend more money on tax cuts. Homeland defense cost a lot of money. We don't have a free public education system. We don't have a free homeland security system. We have to pay for it. We pay for it by taxes. Bush wants to cut tax instead of keeping us alive, it's irresponsible. It's nuts.
CARLSON: Bush wants to cut tax instead of keeping us alive. OK.
BEGALA: That's the first job of the president to protect the homeland.
CARLSON: Senator Gary Hart traveled to San Francisco today to lay out the Democratic opposition to war with Iraq. In his speech, Hart denounced America's quote, "Aggressive and arrogant behavior toward Iraq." As well as the Bush administration's quote, "preoccupation with military superiority."
Then he summed it up, this is a quote. "This secret dream of empire represents hunger for power at its worst." In other words, the United States going to war with Iraq, not because Saddam Hussein is a dangerous lunatic who threatens Western civil and has knocked the authority of the U.N., NATO and the rest of the civilized world.
Instead, he says the U.S. Is going to war because it harbors a secret dream of empire." Remember, this is not from Al-Jazeera or the Iraqi Ministry of Information, but it could be both, instead it's the opinion of the one of the Democratic presidential candidate. One his parties deepest thinkers on forgiven policy. And one more thing, Hart also alluded to dark forces pushing for war in his words quote, "Americans who find it hard to distinguish their loyalties to their original homelands from their to American and it's national interest."
Who do you suppose he was referring to? I think we know, don't we?
BEGALA: That last line was....
CARLSON: I think we know exactly he's referring to. He was talking about Jewish Americans.
BEGALA: Are you going to let me finish? I'm trying to agree with you for once in your life and keep interrupting me, Christ. That last line was loathsome, it was loathsome. And I think it's really wrong for people on both sides of this debate. Senator Hart is against the war as I am. It's wrong for him to ascribe motives, particular awful dark motives like that to people who support the war. Equally wrong for people on the right, you have not been among them, but many of our friends on right have been, who suggest if we oppose this war that we're unpatriotic or we hate American.
CARLSON: I have never heard that once, name one.
BEGALA: Andrew Solvent (ph).
CARLSON: Andrew Solvent, I read him everyday. I've never heard him say that, ever.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Conservative writer, who said it was treason for the Democrats not to applaud Bush.
CARLSON: Besides Ann, I can't think of a single one.
BEGALA: Well, Australian Prime Minister John Howard was meeting with President Bush yesterday, while he was doing so, naked women, hundreds of them used their bodies to spell out no war on a hillside in Australia. The women of course, protesting the upcoming war in Iraq. Which follows last week's protest in New York's Central Park in which naked women laid on the snowy ground in 20 degree weather to spell out no Bush.
In response White House aides are rumored to be contacting right wing women's groups to come to Washington take off their close and spell bomb those Iraqi bastards on the White House lawn. Said one White House aid, recruit the women has been a lot easier then you thought. Apparently Republican women who have more experience in being frigid and laying still. So you see that's just...
CARLSON: It's obvious that is spoken like someone who is has never been with a conservative woman. And for that I can agree with.
BEGALA: That I'm proud of.
CARLSON: When the Al Gore for president campaign, you must remember that, when it first began to unravel back in 2000, Gore decided to move his staff and headquarters out of Washington to Nashville. The idea being if we go to Tennessee, people will think you're authentic. Voters aren't so easily fooled it turns out.
But don't tell John Edwards that. The Edwards presidential campaign hasn't completely collapsed yet, and already Edwards is pretending he's just another down home southern guy. According to this mornings "Washington Post," the Edwards campaign has rigged its phone system to make it appear that the staff is working out of North Carolina. Most Edwards aides are, in fact, safely inside the Beltway, of course. But to reach them on the phone, you must dial not 202 for Washington, but 919 for Raleigh. Pretty tricky. Now all Edwards needs is some way to disguise the fact that he used to be a trial lawyer specializing in Jacuzzi cases.
BEGALA: Let me tell you about one those. One of those cases, in fact the one I think you may be referring to, the one he's most famous for, was a 5-year-old girl named Valerie Lakki (ph). She was caught in the drainage of a pool, she was disemboweled for the rest of her life. She has to go through 12 hours on a feeding tube. John Edwards sued the corporate bastards that should have protect her. God bless John Edwards for doing that. If that's the kind of advocacy he'll take the presidency. He'll be a damn good president
CARLSON: He got rich from that little girl's suffering. He ought to be embarrassed about it.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: There were 13 other example, that corporation knew about little kids being damaged by their product, they did nothing to protect them and thank god we have some people that are willing to protect us.
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: And getting rich in the meantime, good work, I love that.
BEGALA: Opposed to Dick Cheney got rich selling oil field equipment to Saddam Hussein. All of a sudden Tucker going to criticize who people earn a living.
Well, CROSSFIRE fav. John Kerry announced today he will undergo prostate surgery tomorrow at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Kerry's doctor, Patrick Walsh (ph), says the hopeful Democratic presidential hopeful has a very early and curable form of cancer. Dr. Walsh says he has a 95 percent chance of being cured.
Of course, we at CROSSFIRE wish Senator Kerry nothing but the best. We love when he comes on our program as some of his competitors do not. We look forward to his swift return. Kerry at age 59 is a highly decorated combat veteran. So we he's tough enough to get through surgery. Of course for those of you keep score at home, even after his surgery, Senator Kerry will still trail Vice President Cheney by four heart attacks, a pacemaker, a three quadruple bypass surgeries, skin cancer (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and a near fatal allergic reaction to a eating a pomegranate. A medical update. God bless John Kerry.
CARLSON: I don't know, I think I've got a pretty good sense of humor, but I don't think the vice president's health problems are that funny, actually.
BEGALA: I think that it's great that he's practicing as vice president and people should give John Kerry the same -- the benefit of the doubt.
CARLSON: I think it's sort of an awful thing to say, actually.
BEGALA: What? That -- all those are true things. I got them right off the...
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: According to you, and I think that's sad. And I don't think it's worth mocking, actually.
BEGALA: No, I think it's very inspiring.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: He's a heart beat away from the White House.
CARLSON: Ooh, that's a mean thing to say.
Senate Democrats announced today they have enough votes to block Miguel Estrada's appointment to a post on the federal court of appeals. The obstruction in question is a filibuster, a last ditch legal maneuver that has been used only one other time in American history to prevent a vote on a judicial nominee. So Democrats can keep Estrada from getting the job. They still haven't explained why they want to.
Even now, no Democrat has produced a single word, not one, uttered or written by Miguel Estrada that is offensive, unacceptable or outside the legal mainstream. Nothing.
Instead: here's the argument. Estrada is too rich for a Latino. Senator Patrick Leahy all but said that out loud last year. Estrada has conservative friends. This, of course, is not an argument. It's McCarthyism.
And finally, despite his 15 cases before the Supreme Court, his years in public life and his lengthy legal career, we still somehow don't know enough about what Miguel Estrada thinks about the law. Please. You'll notice there's not a shred of evidence any of that. The Democrats are happy to destroy Estrada's nomination anyway because they can.
BEGALA: Miguel Estrada is a 41-year-old man. He has not had a lengthy legal career. He's a very well educated, very well off young man with very scant experience to sit on the second highest court in the land. Given that, he has a special, all, I think, nominees have an obligation, but it is a special one given his dearth of public experience, to tell us this views on issues. He hasn't done so.
This is not an entitlement. Miguel Estrada does now serve a seat. He has to earn it by telling us his views on issues.
CARLSON: But I'm just interested. You have mentioned now, as you have a number of times earlier, that he's rich. Why is that relevant?
BEGALA: He is.
CARLSON: But what does that have to do with anything?
BEGALA: That's all I know about him. I know he's rich. I know that he's very well educated. He's an immigrant from Honduras, as I understand it. His father was a banker. This is all I know because he won't tell us his views about issues, Tucker.
CARLSON: OK. Well, maybe you should read the 15 cases he's argued before the Supreme Court.
BEGALA: Those aren't -- first off, those aren't necessarily his views. He did say something instructive, though. He told the senators that he never looked at the Rowe vs. Wade abortion case the way a judge would look at it. That's how he dodged saying his real opinions on the case.
CARLSON: So he deviates with the abortion religion. I'm sorry...
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: He said he never looked at it as a judge. Actually, he'd looked at on behalf of a Supreme Court judge when he clerked for the Supreme Court. So even that little nugget is kind of at odds with the fact.
CARLSON: So he's violating the central faith -- the central tenet of the faith, which is legal abortion.
BEGALA: He's not telling the truth.
CARLSON: Yes he is.
BEGALA: He's not telling the truth. That's my problem with him.
Well, Osama bin Laden is apparently still alive. His al Qaeda terrorists may be getting ready to strike here again. In a minute, we'll ask a couple of U.S. senators if the federal government is doing enough to meet the rising terrorist threat.
Later, from South Korea to the south of France, it seems everyone is mad at us. But are the protesters angry with America or just President George W. Bush?
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(AUDIO/VIDEO GAP)
BEGALA: ... intelligence, who doesn't make a lot of public appearances and who doesn't mince words testifying on Capitol Hill. Here's a piece of his testimony. Why don't you take a look at it?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE TENET, CIA DIRECTOR: The intelligence is not idle chatter on the part of terrorists or their associates. It is the most specific we have seen and it is consistent with both our knowledge of al Qaeda's doctrine and our knowledge of plots in this network and particularly its senior leadership has been working for years.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BEGALA: Should we be doing more to get al Qaeda first, before we go after Saddam Hussein and Iraq, Senator?
SEN. KIT BOND (R) MISSOURI: Well, Paul, I was there and listened to his testimony and I think if you follow the testimony and what the entire range of U.S. forces have done between the CIA, the department of defense, our law enforcement officials and our allies,we are doing everything we can to get Osama bin Laden. And we are doing everything that we can to identify, disrupt and stop terrorist activities.
And they're not just al Qaeda, as George Tenet mentioned today. There are a number of other terrorist operatives in the United States, who could, if they wanted to, engage in terrorist activities.
BEGALA: Let me press that point...
BOND: So they are doing -- I have followed it very closely. I heard you say earlier, we ought to be focusing on al Qaeda. I'd be hard pressed to find out what you would do that the CIA, the Department of Defense, the Department of Justice, the FBI could be doing that they're not.
BEGALA: Let me give you a suggestion then, Senator, since you've...
BOND: Sure.
BEGALA: ... given the opportunity.
When President Bush stood up and enunciated this Bush doctrine, he told countries around the world, wonderfully, brilliantly, if you harbor or house or tolerate terrorists in your country, we're going to give you one chance to clean them out and then we're going to do it for you.
We know from published reports, this is not intelligence information, published reports, that there are al Qaeda camps in a host of countries with the tacit approval of those governments, Iran, Syria and others. Why aren't we bombing those camps?
BOND: Well, first, they have gone after al Qaeda. They disrupted the Taliban, they drove the Taliban out of Afghanistan and they have worked with other countries to get the terrorists out.
Most countries in the world that have terrorists, southeast Asian countries like Malaysia and Indonesia are cooperating with us to go after the terrorists. The reason that they are -- that we're going after Iraq is because we're still at war with Iraq. There was a conditional ceasefire in Iraq, conditioned upon his agreeing to and abiding by all the resolutions.
Hasn't done a single thing. He's continued to amass weapons of mass destruction, launched attacks on his own people, threatened Kuwait. He has continued the efforts. That's why he is still the No. 1 nation target and we are pursuing al Qaeda in many countries throughout the world.
CARLSON: Senator Stabenow, I think, and I'm sure you agree, Americans right now today are more afraid of terrorist than they are been in a long time.
SEN. DEBBIE STABENOW (D), MICHIGAN: Absolutely.
CARLSON: The Osama bin Laden tape, the administration came out recently, yesterday and said these are the steps you can take, and there aren't many of them, but to protect yourself from a potential terrorist attack. I want you to listen to Senator Tom Daschle's response to the administration's suggestions. Here's Senator Daschle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. TOM DASCHLE (D-SD), MINORITY LEADER: This new admonition that people ought to go out and buy duct tape as a response falls far short, I think, of anyone's expectation. It ought to be -- ought to be reconsidered. We have to do better than duct tape as our response to homeland defense.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: Now, on the day that Osama bin Laden, this tape comes out, there you have Senator Daschle positioning himself politically essentially. He's not offering any new suggestions for what you can do to protect yourself, he's merely criticizing the administration with an eye toward the future, isn't he? Isn't that what's going on?
STABENOW: Not at all. In fact, we've got to do a whole lot more than duct tape, Tucker. The reality is that we are not funding Homeland Securities in the communities, our hometowns. I've done nine different meetings across Michigan, meeting with sheriffs, police chiefs, firefighters, local emergency medical personnel, hospital personnel.
Everybody says the same thing, they can't do it alone. There has to be a federal partnership. We have communities where the police department can't talk to the fire department on the radio or where the city can't talk to the county. Where they're not able to get the training that they need or add the personnel.
And my frustration, this is not a partisan issue, my frustration is we have been trying since shortly after 9/11 to get dollars directly to the local communities and the administration has not supported it. In fact, last summer, we passed in Congress by a majority vote of all of us an emergency supplemental, we sent it to the president and he said he would not declare the Homeland Security funds in there as an emergency, $2.5 billion that would right now do a whole lot more than duct tape in order to help our local police departments.
CARLSON: Some of what you said are bipartisan concerns. Everybody wants there to a better partnership between local police and the federal government. However, Senator Daschle gets up there and says, Look, the things the administration told you to protect yourself are bogus, they will not protect you. I want to know, and I want you to tell us what specifically Americans should be doing to protect themselves, because he shot down their suggestions. What are better ones?
STABENOW: What he's doing is expressing a grave frustration that we all have after repeated opportunities when we've been trying to say let's give dollars to our local communities, the police chief, the firefighters, the EMS workers, they can't do it alone and constantly we are rebutted.
We had two different votes in January. Senator Byrd put forward two different amendments that were not supported by the administration. In fact, officials in the Homeland Security Department said it wasn't necessary.
Well, I can tell you in the state of Michigan, and I'm sure it's all across this country, it is necessary. We need bioterrorism training, we need radio equipment, we need more officers on the street, we need support for emergency medical personnel...
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Did you make a mistake in voting against that funding that Senator Stabenow just talked about?
BOND: No, but I want to congratulate you in spite of Tom Daschle, you went out to try to get duct tape today, and I commend you for it...
BEGALA: Tom Daschle did not say what Tucker said he said.
(CROSSTALK)
BOND: That was a cheap shot, I know. But on this program, who can pass up a cheap shot.
BEGALA: Say anything you want.
(CROSSTALK)
BOND: You know what is really frustrating to me is we are still working on the appropriations bills from last year. I hate to be partisan about it, but since Senator Daschle couldn't even pass a budget, we couldn't pass 11 of the 13 bills that had the money in it for things like (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and I have worked on a bipartisan basis with Senator Mikulski, with whom I've work very closely.
We are adding money, significant amounts of money for Fire Act Grants to make sure that our fire departments are equipped and prepared, whether they're volunteer or whether they're career. We are providing those moneys.
Now, I used to be a state official. I was a governor of a state. And we always could use more money from the federal government. But we have to make sure that we spend it well and I think that Tom Ridge is in a position to spend it well and I believe that the Fire Grant money has been spent well. Senator Mikulski and I started this three years before the 9/11 and they are spending it well. I'm proud of what they're doing.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Senator Stabenow, you hang on just a second. We're going to take a break. But please, both of you, keep your seats.
When we come back, we're going to ask these senators why -- whether, I'll be fair, whether our president is putting our money where his mouth is on the issue of homeland security.
And then, seems like the whole world hates us. Well, who's to blame? Is it American policy or the American president? Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEGALA: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. On a day that a new tape purportedly from Osama bin Laden surfaced, the FBI director told Congress the al Qaeda network still remains the most immediate and serious threat facing our country and will for the foreseeable future. The administration, however, remains fixated, in the eyes of many of us, on attacking Iraq.
We are debating priorities with Republican Senator Kit Bond of Missouri and Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow of Michigan.
CARLSON: Senator Stabenow, in his State of the Union address, as you know the president laid out part of this case for going to war with Iraq. I want to read you what you read in response to the president's State of the Union address.
You said, that night, "Nothing that he said convinced me that we're there yet, that the case has been made," end quote.
Very quick list of some of the things we know. We do know Iraq attempted to assassinate an American president. We know that the country has weapons of mass destruction and will use them. We know the country's in violation of 1441, the U.N. resolution. We know that the country's behind the murder of Lawrence Foley, a U.S. diplomat. We know that they're aligned with al Qaeda and have been since 1993. And we have today's bin Laden tape. What else do you need to know?
STABENOW: Well, first of all, it's not about whether or not I trust Saddam Hussein or whether or not we should dismantle his weapons of mass destruction. That's not what this is about.
It's a question of how we do that. I commend the president for going to the United Nations. That's what many of us felt he should do. Colin Powell has been moving forward. But we still have the opportunity for the U-2 flyovers, some other efforts that can go on in terms of inspections before that final decision is made. And I would hope we would have a broader coalition than we do today. Let me go back to our other discussion though. And that is the fact that as we ramp up, we hear the chatter that the CIA director talks about coming more and more towards us, more concern about what's going to happen to us here in the United States.
And while we are all focused on Iraq right now, we are in a situation where we are not providing resources and even our local folks are working double and triple time. And I have to say in Michigan, we're on the border, I was in Port Huron Michigan where they have to worry about an international bridge, a railroad tunnel, a waterway separating ourselves from Canada, drinking supplies, a nuclear power plant. We have so much on the plate of our local officials that they have got to have support from us. We can't just talk about it.
BOND: But Debbie, wait a minute. If you say we're just talking about it, you take a look, and if you listened to the entire testimony of Director Tenet, of FBI Director Mueller, we have captured suspects, we are using every means at our disposal, working with our allies abroad as well as local law enforcement agencies...
STABENOW: I appreciate that.
BOND: ... to do everything we can. Let me finish, please.
STABENOW: I appreciate that.
BOND: What they outlined today is a truly extensive and a very difficult job to track down these terrorists. And there is no question that terrorism is a threat. And when we issue warnings that there is terrorist chatter and we have to be prepared, some of the political critics say, well, we shouldn't be doing that. Now what do you want?
I mean we should know that we're on high alert. We should know what we can do as individual citizens. And we are -- we have seen a very comprehensive effort that's ongoing, and we're supporting in the Congress to track down, stop the terrorists...
BEGALA: Your own state -- you mentioned in the last segment you were the governor of Missouri. Your own state's director of homeland security, Colonel Tim Daniel, said he's not getting the help he needs from the feds. Why not?
BOND: Well I have some differences with Mr. Daniel. We have provided assistance to the state of Missouri. We have provided assistance to local firefighters. We have provided assistance continually, ever since I've been here. I've provided assistance to the States. The States got to get up off of their rear ends and do some of it themselves.
(APPLAUSE)
BEGALA: Is that a federal function?
BOND: It is a federal function. But law enforcement is also a state and local function. And we're not going to be able to fund it all. There's no way...
BEGALA: Not with that tax cut we're not.
BOND: That has nothing to do with it.
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: I'll give you a very quick last word.
STABENOW: Let's talk about the reality. We have a situation where the president has proposed a budget for homeland security that is barely any larger than last year's. We have substantial increases in the Department of Defense, which I have supported. But when it comes to homeland security, the president wants to cut or eliminate the cops program, which is first line and responders on our streets.
When we look at the dollars going to the local folks, the first person that walks in that door when something happens is a our local firefighter or police officer, or you're walking into the emergency room of the hospital. We are not doing what is necessary to help them.
CARLSON: I'm sorry, Senator...
BOND: We're providing more help than we have ever provided before. It is also a...
CARLSON: On that note, I'm afraid we're going to have to end. We're completely out of time. Senator Bond, Senator Stabenow, thank you both very much.
(APPLAUSE)
CARLSON: Next in a CNN NEWS ALERT, White House reaction to the latest bin Laden tape. Later, where are the allies? We'll examine some of old Europe's truly revolting opinions. You actually won't believe them. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(NEWS ALERT)
BEGALA: Anti-American attitudes seem to be going all around the world. When we come back next, we will ask why President Bush hasn't been as successful as his father was in rallying world opinion for a war against Iraq. You're watching CNN, the most trusted name in news.
(APPLAUSE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEGALA: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. We're coming to you live from the George Washington University here in downtown Washington, D.C., home of the Colonials.
You know throughout the Cold War, and even after the Cold War, the United States could usually count on support from Europe, moral if not material support. But no more. Latest evidence came today in a poll of our very closest ally Great Britain. When asked this question, "Who poses the biggest threat to world peace," here's what our friends in Britain said.
Thirty-two percent of them said the United States. Twenty-five percent said Iraq, 26 percent said North Korea. Clearly, the Bush administration has failed to make its case across the pond.
In the CROSSFIRE, UPI chief international correspondent Martin Walker. He's also a senior fellow with the World Policy Institute. With him, Stephen Hayes of the "Weekly Standard."
(APPLAUSE)
BEGALA: Thank you, Martin. Good to see you sir.. Mr. Hayes, thank you for doing this.
CARLSON: Martin Walker, OK, a lot of Americans have been amused by France for a long time. But a lot of them are coming to the conclusion that, who needs France? I'll give you two quick examples. Senator Kit Bond was just on here. In the commercial break he said, "Going to the war without France is like going dear hunting without an accordion." Who cares?
The second example comes from Congressman Pete King, a congressman from New York, a Republican. He said today -- The Associated Press quote -- "We may have to restructure NATO, form a new alliance, which the French will not be part of. We cannot allow a second-rate country to have veto power or obstructionist power over American foreign policy."
(APPLAUSE)
CARLSON: So tell me why that's not true. France is a second- rate country. Why should they have veto power over our foreign policy?
MARTIN WALKER, CHIEF UPI INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well I guess George Washington wouldn't have agreed with you about the fighting qualities of the French. He was pretty grateful for General Lafayette, as I recall.
CARLSON: Yes, long time ago, though.
WALKER: Long time ago, but then again, don't forget you've been allied with France twice. First world war, second world war. I'm glad you've actually asked a Brit to talk about this. We're the experts. We've beaten them more than anybody else around.
But the fact is that Chirac represents something. Chirac is now, I think, representing European public opinion, according to all of the polls I've seen. Rather more I'm afraid than Tony Blair is. And I think the real important difference is this is not the Warsaw Pact, a group of yes men. This is NATO, an alliance of free states, who are allowed to have free opinions. And if they've got an argument to say, let's go one extra mile to try and avoid war and contain Saddam, let's listen to them. They've been allies.
BEGALA: Well, in fact, Stephen, hasn't that been part of our problem? After 9/11, the entire world was on our side. Jacques Chirac of France was the first head of state to come here. Even the thugs in Syria and Libya were at least saying the right things, probably never would have done the right thing. But how did our president blow it?
STEPHEN HAYES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": The president didn't blow it. It was nice that Jacques Chirac was the first one over here. We have to go back further and look at 1999. France, when it came to the question of even reconstituting an inspection regime, didn't want to do that. They didn't vote yes in favor of reconstituting the regime.
So now they're in favor of putting the inspectors in, more inspectors, regional offices. I mean they want to do all of these new things that are inspector focused (ph). Three years ago, they didn't even want inspectors in. So is France an ally? I don't think so.
CARLSON: But actually, Martin, I think Stephen Hayes makes a great point. France and Germany are not serious about disarming Saddam Hussein. Moreover, I think they have a pretty weak moral case to make. I'll give you one of among many examples.
Khidir Hamza, Saddam's bomb maker on our show the other day, something very much like this. This is actually from "The Wall Street Journal." He says, "France, Germany, and to a degree Russia, are opposed to U.S. military action in Iraq mainly because they maintain lucrative trade deals with Baghdad, many of which are arms related."
Again, why should we listen to countries that are profiting from someone that we want to depose?
WALKER: Well you're listening to Saudi Arabia, you're listening to Turkey, you're listening to other country who we all know have been side stepping the sanctions regime. I mean that's a facts of life.
I think the real weakness of the Bush administration's case is that last week Colin Powell answered the wrong question. The question he answered at the U.N. is, is Iraq cheating? Yes, we all know they'll cheat as far as they can get away with it. What he didn't answer was the question, is war now the only option or is there something short of war that can contain, constrain, Saddam Hussein?
We've got some more weeks to go. Let's give it a shot and see just how far we can.
HAYES: You might think that was the question that Colin Powell was answering, and you might think that Iraq is indeed cheating. What's unclear is whether Jacques Chirac thinks Iraq is cheating. He said yesterday, we don't even know that those weapons exist. I mean that's a mind-blowing thing to say. WALKER: Anymore, anymore.
HAYES: Anymore? You have to believe then that Saddam unilaterally disarmed after inspectors left and then forgot to tell the international community. Oh yes, slipped my mind.
(APPLAUSE)
(CROSSTALK)
WALKER: I'm not going to try and defend Saddam Hussein. I think the frog (ph) is indefensible.
HAYES: Try and defend Jacques Chirac; that's almost as difficult.
WALKER: I certainly can. The defense about Jacques Chirac is simply saying, let's give this a bit more time to play out. There ought to be something short of a war that's going to kill thousands of people, and it's probably the kind of war that exactly what Osama bin Laden wants us to do.
I can't think of a better wet dream for Osama bin Laden than to have several thousand plump western American British military targets in there ready for the knives, the snipers, the guerrilla attacks on just about every person al Qaeda's got. It's just what Osama bin Laden wants us to do. Let's think about this, let's push it further, and let's try and bring the international community with us.
CARLSON: Well, on that though, we're going to take a quick commercial break. But the "plump" line, oh, shivers.
In a minute, we'll ask our guests why anyone in the U.S. should care what the French and Germans think. Later, we'll hear from a viewer who sees right through Paul Begala's claims about a lot of things. It's going to be a great "Fireback." Stay tuned.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CARLSON: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. Last week, Secretary of State Colin Powell showed the world how Saddam Hussein is hiding his weapons of mass destruction. But in Great Britain, 61 percent of the people polled said Powell's evidence wasn't enough for them. Twenty- one percent felt his evidence was fabricated, made up, a lie.
We're talking about Europe's head-in-the-sand attitude with UPI chief international correspondent Martin Walker and Stephen Hayes of the "Weekly Standard."
BEGALA: Stephen, in our last segment, we were all sharing Tucker's indignation at the French selling arms, really, to Saddam Hussein. And I wonder if you share my outrage that Dick Cheney, who is now our vice president, ran an oil field equipment services firm that sold equipment to Saddam Hussein as well.
HAYES: Well there's no question that in the previous administrations throughout the '80s we supported Saddam. It wasn't the right thing to do.
BEGALA: This was 1998, though. No, no, no. This was 1998.
HAYES: The problem we see is that France and Germany have been doing this since the sanctions. We're going to go in. I think one of the things...
BEGALA: This was during the sanctions. Sorry to press it, but I've never had a conservative with the stones to say, yes, it was wrong for Dick Cheney's firm to evade those sanctions...
(CROSSTALK)
HAYES: One of the most important things we're going to find when we go in is we're going to find -- we're likely to weapons parts that say "Made in France 2001." And that helps explain why France is so reluctant right now.
CARLSON: Martin Walker, we read a poll coming in here that a lot of people in Great Britain think that Colin Powell is a liar. I want to put up another poll, though, that I think is even more crackpot.
WALKER: I'm not sure they said he was a liar. I think the opinion poll said that they weren't convinced by his argument.
CARLSON: Twenty-one percent said he fabricated evidence.
(CROSSTALK)
WALKER: You can probably get one in five people to (UNINTELLIGIBLE) anything.
CARLSON: Is that true?
WALKER: I think so.
CARLSON: Well then answer this. Here's a poll in Great Britain. "Who poses the biggest threat to world peace?" Twenty-six percent said North Korea; 25 percent said Iraq; 32 percent said the United States.
So I guess my question to you, Martin Walker, is, if half the people in Kuwait or Pakistan think the Israelis are behind 9/11, we don't say we need to win them over. We say that's crazy, this is an unreasonable point of view, and it's beneath contempt, we're not going to deal with it. Why shouldn't we have the same attitude towards polls like that?
WALKER: Well because the Brits are probably the only reliable ally that the United States has got right now. Tony Blair is putting his entire political career on the line.
CARLSON: Yes.
WALKER: As he said just the other day in parliament, "People ask me why I'm risking everything." It's because he believes it and because he thinks the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) is on his side and he can pull people around to his point of view. My feeling is that, in the usual British bellicose way, once the troops go in the opinions will switch around. But what you're really talking about here is a real indictment of the most pitiful failure of this Bush administration to communicate their case against this thug, Saddam Hussein.
CARLSON: So if people in Britain are deeply and...
(CROSSTALK)
WALKER: It's a public relations disaster by the Americans.
BEGALA: Here's what then Governor Bush promised in his foreign policy during the campaign, Stephen. Take a look. This is in the debates.
He said, "If we're an arrogant nation, people around the world will resent us. If we're a humble nation but strong, they'll welcome us." He was right then, but he has been nothing but arrogant since he took office. Isn't that true?
HAYES: No. As Ronald Reagan said when he took office, it's more important to be respected than it is to be loved. I mean I think if we hadn't spent so much time over the past eight years trying to be loved by everyone at all times...
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: ... to a war in Kosovo, which was a just war. That's called American leadership, Stephen.
HAYES: He had less support, less international support when he rallied international and American opinion in February of 1998 than President Bush has today. And then he didn't even have the kohanas (ph) to use Madeleine Albright's indelicate phrase to do something about it.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Well you missed a whole war, brother. I don't know what you were doing in 1999, but he won a big war.
CARLSON: We're almost out of time. But I hope you'll be honest enough to admit that a lot of the European dissatisfaction with American foreign policy has to do with Israel. Many people in Europe don't like Israel. Some don't think it should exist. And people in Europe are mad that the U.S. (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
WALKER: I think it's a minor factor, compared to the resentment that built up over Kyoto, the international communal court, American steel (ph) sanctions, the American farm bill, the land mines bill, and all the other examples that really cheese (ph) people off by making them think that this administration wasn't listening to their allies. Allies who, after all, had given 110 percent offers of support after 9/11. The French main newspaper, "Le Monde," said we're all Americans now. The Europeans said we invoke Article V of NATO. An attack on one is an attack on all. And this administration just doesn't seem to care about having allies, all it wants is yes men.
CARLSON: OK. Blaming the victim.
BEGALA: That will have to be the last word. Stephen Hayes, from the "Weekly Standard," Martin Walker, form UPI, thank you both very much.
(APPLAUSE)
BEGALA: Next, one of our viewers wants to join President Bush in his secure, undisclosed location. Learn all about it in our "Fireback" segment. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CARLSON: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. It's time to hear your voice. Throw open the doors and let your opinions come flowing in. Time for "Fireback." Here we go.
Henry Schacht of Chicago writes, "The argument that Bush places a higher priority on tax cuts than he does on homeland security due to the funding difference between the two is ridiculous. Most people spend far less on food than they do on their cars or home mortgage, but that doesn't mean that food is not a priority for them."
Very smart, Henry Schacht.
BEGALA: Very dumb, Henry Schacht, no. You know what, I hope you enjoy that tax cut when bioterrorism attacks are going on and we haven't help first responders answer it. That's nuts. It's absolutely nuts.
CARLSON: Well that's a pretty heavy charge, Paul.
BEGALA: Margaret Haugh of Chicago, Illinois writes, "Perhaps the American public would be more supportive of a war in Iraq if we all had undisclosed locations to hide in when our enemies decide to retaliate. When W. reserves me a bunker in his rabbit hole, maybe I'll be more eager to beat the war drums."
(APPLAUSE)
CARLSON: Well that's incredibly small minded. Next up is J.A. Sveinson, of Winnipeg, Canada, a foreign country, writes, "Maybe the reason France and Germany are confounding the Bush Blitzkrieg is that they know a fascist when they see one."
But we know that's not true, because we know that if Bush were a fascist, they would be collaborating with him by now. That would get him on board.
BEGALA: By the way, speak of fascists, our very able and hard working graphics department in Atlanta put up the wrong flag. I know that you noticed and...
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: As a student of vexology...
BEGALA: Vexology, the study of flags, we had the South Korean flag up, when of course we meant to have the North Korean flag.
CARLSON: Of course we did. Sure we did.
BEGALA: Everybody here was just stunned. John Michels of Sioux Falls, South Dakota writes, "Tucker, how do you keep the light reflecting off Paul's head out of your eyes? When James Carville is on, is that double light reflection for you? It's a wonder you can still debate."
It's all that brightness I think he's talking about.
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: Yes sir?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Joe Bacarro (ph) from Fairfax, Virginia. Just a nonpolitical question. Just a simple curiosity. Should a terrorist attack take place very soon on American soil, would that strengthen public opinion for the war in Iraq or would it weaken it?
CARLSON: Boy, I have absolutely no idea. I see the Bush administration's push for war in Iraq as completely disconnected from political considerations. It's a political risk, if nothing else. So, boy, I just hope that doesn't happen I guess.
BEGALA: I have no idea. I do believe, god forbid, bullets start flying and we go to war in Iraq, the American public will rally around it, as we have to. We only have one president. Even if he makes a decision I disagree with, I think as a patriotic American you got to go and support it. But another terrorist attack, I have no ability to perceive the political ramifications.
From the left, I'm Paul Begala. Goodnight for CROSSFIRE.
CARLSON: And from the right, I'm Tucker Carlson. Join us again tomorrow night -- that would be Wednesday -- for yet more CROSSFIRE.
Aired February 11, 2003 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: CROSSFIRE.
On the left, James Carville and Paul Begala.
On the right, Robert Novak and Tucker Carlson.
In the CROSSFIRE tonight: A scary warning. Get ready for more terrorism.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) that could include the use of a radiological dispersing device, as well as poisons and chemicals.
ANNOUNCER: And has you know who surfaced again?
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: He talks to the people of Iraq and talks about their struggle and how he is partnership with Iraq.
ANNOUNCER: Plus, why does Saddam Hussein isn't a bigger threat to peace as President Bush.
Tonight on CROSSFIRE.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Live from the George Washington University, Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson.
TUCKER CARLSON, CO-HOST: Good evening and welcome to CROSSFIRE. Tonight, now that we've heard Osama bin Laden will pep talk for Iraq will the doubters of the Saddam Hussein-al Qaeda connection be offering an apology? We doubt it but we will debate it anyways.
Also pollsters have been asking Europeans who is the biggest threat to peace? The results are so revolting, so completely unreasonable we can't tell you about them now, we'll tell you later.
First, we start with the best political briefing in Television our political alert.
This afternoon the Al-Jazeera broadcast a new audio tape of ranting and threats allegedly recorded by Osama bin Laden. The voice on the tape warns Arab states not to support an U.S. attack on Iraq. And stresses the importance of suicide attacks against Americans. We are with you, the voice tells Iraqis. Existence of the tape was disclosed earlier today by Secretary of State Colin Powell who told the Senate Budget Committee. He had already seen the transcript and that bin Laden claims partnership with Iraq. Powell told the senators the tape would show the world why it needs to be concerned Iraqi ties to terrorism.
PAUL BEGALA, CO-HOST: I am flabbergasted at this administration's ability to use anything that happens as an excuse to attack Iraq. We should be attacking Osama bin Laden who is not in Iraq. He's got bases in Iran, in Pakistan, in Yemen, in Syria, go after them, lets kill Osama bin Laden and let's worry about the connection later.
CARLSON: Nobody disagrees, we have to get Osama bin Laden. That is the highest priority of this government. But however the countries you named do not have state support for terrorism and Iraq does. And we know. Unless you're accusing Colin Powell of lying and I doubt you are.
We know and we agree that since 1993 the government of Iraq, that is Saddam Hussein, has had a relationship formally with al Qaeda. That's a big deal. We have to do something about it and pretending we have to go after Syria is not an excuse for acting as (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
BEGALA: If you want to attack Iraq, attack Iraq, but don't pretend that the best way to get al Qaeda is to attack Iraq. The best way to get al Qaeda is to attack al Qaeda where they are, where they live and that's what we ought to be. And in fact, this is just going to be a recruiting tool for Osama bin Laden if we got war with Iraq.
CARLSON: You have more information than the federal government, so you got to go into it.
BEGALA: CIA Director George Tenet told the Senate Intelligence Committee that al Qaeda, not Iraq, is planning to attack targets in the United States and the Middle East. Perhaps with chemical weapons or radioactive dirty bombs. Director Tenet, told the Senate Committee that these attacks are based on the most specific intelligence we've seen, and an attack could come as soon as this week when the Hajj concludes. The Hajj is a pilgrimage to Mecca made by millions of faithful Muslims every year.
Meantime, Robert Mueller told the senators that al Qaeda will remain for the foreseeable future, the most immediate, serious threat facing this country. Of course, in his new budget, President Bush propose increasing homeland security by 7 percent total cost of 41 billion dollars. By contrast, the president wants to cut tax for the rich by $100 billion, 250 percent more than the total for homeland security. After all, as Mr. Bush likes to say, if we don't cut taxes for the rich, terrorists will have won.
CARLSON: I'm going to ignore the deeply unfair last line, but will just ask you theoretical question.
If someone spent more money on his car than his children's education and most people do, does that mean he loves his car.
BEGALA: You haven't paid tuition, brother.
CARLSON: Most people, you may not know this, but most people send their children to public school, which is free.
BEGALA: Actually I do.
CARLSON: So, if a person spends more money on his car does that mean he loves his car more? No.
BEGALA: If you spend more money on tax cuts. Homeland defense cost a lot of money. We don't have a free public education system. We don't have a free homeland security system. We have to pay for it. We pay for it by taxes. Bush wants to cut tax instead of keeping us alive, it's irresponsible. It's nuts.
CARLSON: Bush wants to cut tax instead of keeping us alive. OK.
BEGALA: That's the first job of the president to protect the homeland.
CARLSON: Senator Gary Hart traveled to San Francisco today to lay out the Democratic opposition to war with Iraq. In his speech, Hart denounced America's quote, "Aggressive and arrogant behavior toward Iraq." As well as the Bush administration's quote, "preoccupation with military superiority."
Then he summed it up, this is a quote. "This secret dream of empire represents hunger for power at its worst." In other words, the United States going to war with Iraq, not because Saddam Hussein is a dangerous lunatic who threatens Western civil and has knocked the authority of the U.N., NATO and the rest of the civilized world.
Instead, he says the U.S. Is going to war because it harbors a secret dream of empire." Remember, this is not from Al-Jazeera or the Iraqi Ministry of Information, but it could be both, instead it's the opinion of the one of the Democratic presidential candidate. One his parties deepest thinkers on forgiven policy. And one more thing, Hart also alluded to dark forces pushing for war in his words quote, "Americans who find it hard to distinguish their loyalties to their original homelands from their to American and it's national interest."
Who do you suppose he was referring to? I think we know, don't we?
BEGALA: That last line was....
CARLSON: I think we know exactly he's referring to. He was talking about Jewish Americans.
BEGALA: Are you going to let me finish? I'm trying to agree with you for once in your life and keep interrupting me, Christ. That last line was loathsome, it was loathsome. And I think it's really wrong for people on both sides of this debate. Senator Hart is against the war as I am. It's wrong for him to ascribe motives, particular awful dark motives like that to people who support the war. Equally wrong for people on the right, you have not been among them, but many of our friends on right have been, who suggest if we oppose this war that we're unpatriotic or we hate American.
CARLSON: I have never heard that once, name one.
BEGALA: Andrew Solvent (ph).
CARLSON: Andrew Solvent, I read him everyday. I've never heard him say that, ever.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Conservative writer, who said it was treason for the Democrats not to applaud Bush.
CARLSON: Besides Ann, I can't think of a single one.
BEGALA: Well, Australian Prime Minister John Howard was meeting with President Bush yesterday, while he was doing so, naked women, hundreds of them used their bodies to spell out no war on a hillside in Australia. The women of course, protesting the upcoming war in Iraq. Which follows last week's protest in New York's Central Park in which naked women laid on the snowy ground in 20 degree weather to spell out no Bush.
In response White House aides are rumored to be contacting right wing women's groups to come to Washington take off their close and spell bomb those Iraqi bastards on the White House lawn. Said one White House aid, recruit the women has been a lot easier then you thought. Apparently Republican women who have more experience in being frigid and laying still. So you see that's just...
CARLSON: It's obvious that is spoken like someone who is has never been with a conservative woman. And for that I can agree with.
BEGALA: That I'm proud of.
CARLSON: When the Al Gore for president campaign, you must remember that, when it first began to unravel back in 2000, Gore decided to move his staff and headquarters out of Washington to Nashville. The idea being if we go to Tennessee, people will think you're authentic. Voters aren't so easily fooled it turns out.
But don't tell John Edwards that. The Edwards presidential campaign hasn't completely collapsed yet, and already Edwards is pretending he's just another down home southern guy. According to this mornings "Washington Post," the Edwards campaign has rigged its phone system to make it appear that the staff is working out of North Carolina. Most Edwards aides are, in fact, safely inside the Beltway, of course. But to reach them on the phone, you must dial not 202 for Washington, but 919 for Raleigh. Pretty tricky. Now all Edwards needs is some way to disguise the fact that he used to be a trial lawyer specializing in Jacuzzi cases.
BEGALA: Let me tell you about one those. One of those cases, in fact the one I think you may be referring to, the one he's most famous for, was a 5-year-old girl named Valerie Lakki (ph). She was caught in the drainage of a pool, she was disemboweled for the rest of her life. She has to go through 12 hours on a feeding tube. John Edwards sued the corporate bastards that should have protect her. God bless John Edwards for doing that. If that's the kind of advocacy he'll take the presidency. He'll be a damn good president
CARLSON: He got rich from that little girl's suffering. He ought to be embarrassed about it.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: There were 13 other example, that corporation knew about little kids being damaged by their product, they did nothing to protect them and thank god we have some people that are willing to protect us.
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: And getting rich in the meantime, good work, I love that.
BEGALA: Opposed to Dick Cheney got rich selling oil field equipment to Saddam Hussein. All of a sudden Tucker going to criticize who people earn a living.
Well, CROSSFIRE fav. John Kerry announced today he will undergo prostate surgery tomorrow at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Kerry's doctor, Patrick Walsh (ph), says the hopeful Democratic presidential hopeful has a very early and curable form of cancer. Dr. Walsh says he has a 95 percent chance of being cured.
Of course, we at CROSSFIRE wish Senator Kerry nothing but the best. We love when he comes on our program as some of his competitors do not. We look forward to his swift return. Kerry at age 59 is a highly decorated combat veteran. So we he's tough enough to get through surgery. Of course for those of you keep score at home, even after his surgery, Senator Kerry will still trail Vice President Cheney by four heart attacks, a pacemaker, a three quadruple bypass surgeries, skin cancer (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and a near fatal allergic reaction to a eating a pomegranate. A medical update. God bless John Kerry.
CARLSON: I don't know, I think I've got a pretty good sense of humor, but I don't think the vice president's health problems are that funny, actually.
BEGALA: I think that it's great that he's practicing as vice president and people should give John Kerry the same -- the benefit of the doubt.
CARLSON: I think it's sort of an awful thing to say, actually.
BEGALA: What? That -- all those are true things. I got them right off the...
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: According to you, and I think that's sad. And I don't think it's worth mocking, actually.
BEGALA: No, I think it's very inspiring.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: He's a heart beat away from the White House.
CARLSON: Ooh, that's a mean thing to say.
Senate Democrats announced today they have enough votes to block Miguel Estrada's appointment to a post on the federal court of appeals. The obstruction in question is a filibuster, a last ditch legal maneuver that has been used only one other time in American history to prevent a vote on a judicial nominee. So Democrats can keep Estrada from getting the job. They still haven't explained why they want to.
Even now, no Democrat has produced a single word, not one, uttered or written by Miguel Estrada that is offensive, unacceptable or outside the legal mainstream. Nothing.
Instead: here's the argument. Estrada is too rich for a Latino. Senator Patrick Leahy all but said that out loud last year. Estrada has conservative friends. This, of course, is not an argument. It's McCarthyism.
And finally, despite his 15 cases before the Supreme Court, his years in public life and his lengthy legal career, we still somehow don't know enough about what Miguel Estrada thinks about the law. Please. You'll notice there's not a shred of evidence any of that. The Democrats are happy to destroy Estrada's nomination anyway because they can.
BEGALA: Miguel Estrada is a 41-year-old man. He has not had a lengthy legal career. He's a very well educated, very well off young man with very scant experience to sit on the second highest court in the land. Given that, he has a special, all, I think, nominees have an obligation, but it is a special one given his dearth of public experience, to tell us this views on issues. He hasn't done so.
This is not an entitlement. Miguel Estrada does now serve a seat. He has to earn it by telling us his views on issues.
CARLSON: But I'm just interested. You have mentioned now, as you have a number of times earlier, that he's rich. Why is that relevant?
BEGALA: He is.
CARLSON: But what does that have to do with anything?
BEGALA: That's all I know about him. I know he's rich. I know that he's very well educated. He's an immigrant from Honduras, as I understand it. His father was a banker. This is all I know because he won't tell us his views about issues, Tucker.
CARLSON: OK. Well, maybe you should read the 15 cases he's argued before the Supreme Court.
BEGALA: Those aren't -- first off, those aren't necessarily his views. He did say something instructive, though. He told the senators that he never looked at the Rowe vs. Wade abortion case the way a judge would look at it. That's how he dodged saying his real opinions on the case.
CARLSON: So he deviates with the abortion religion. I'm sorry...
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: He said he never looked at it as a judge. Actually, he'd looked at on behalf of a Supreme Court judge when he clerked for the Supreme Court. So even that little nugget is kind of at odds with the fact.
CARLSON: So he's violating the central faith -- the central tenet of the faith, which is legal abortion.
BEGALA: He's not telling the truth.
CARLSON: Yes he is.
BEGALA: He's not telling the truth. That's my problem with him.
Well, Osama bin Laden is apparently still alive. His al Qaeda terrorists may be getting ready to strike here again. In a minute, we'll ask a couple of U.S. senators if the federal government is doing enough to meet the rising terrorist threat.
Later, from South Korea to the south of France, it seems everyone is mad at us. But are the protesters angry with America or just President George W. Bush?
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(AUDIO/VIDEO GAP)
BEGALA: ... intelligence, who doesn't make a lot of public appearances and who doesn't mince words testifying on Capitol Hill. Here's a piece of his testimony. Why don't you take a look at it?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE TENET, CIA DIRECTOR: The intelligence is not idle chatter on the part of terrorists or their associates. It is the most specific we have seen and it is consistent with both our knowledge of al Qaeda's doctrine and our knowledge of plots in this network and particularly its senior leadership has been working for years.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BEGALA: Should we be doing more to get al Qaeda first, before we go after Saddam Hussein and Iraq, Senator?
SEN. KIT BOND (R) MISSOURI: Well, Paul, I was there and listened to his testimony and I think if you follow the testimony and what the entire range of U.S. forces have done between the CIA, the department of defense, our law enforcement officials and our allies,we are doing everything we can to get Osama bin Laden. And we are doing everything that we can to identify, disrupt and stop terrorist activities.
And they're not just al Qaeda, as George Tenet mentioned today. There are a number of other terrorist operatives in the United States, who could, if they wanted to, engage in terrorist activities.
BEGALA: Let me press that point...
BOND: So they are doing -- I have followed it very closely. I heard you say earlier, we ought to be focusing on al Qaeda. I'd be hard pressed to find out what you would do that the CIA, the Department of Defense, the Department of Justice, the FBI could be doing that they're not.
BEGALA: Let me give you a suggestion then, Senator, since you've...
BOND: Sure.
BEGALA: ... given the opportunity.
When President Bush stood up and enunciated this Bush doctrine, he told countries around the world, wonderfully, brilliantly, if you harbor or house or tolerate terrorists in your country, we're going to give you one chance to clean them out and then we're going to do it for you.
We know from published reports, this is not intelligence information, published reports, that there are al Qaeda camps in a host of countries with the tacit approval of those governments, Iran, Syria and others. Why aren't we bombing those camps?
BOND: Well, first, they have gone after al Qaeda. They disrupted the Taliban, they drove the Taliban out of Afghanistan and they have worked with other countries to get the terrorists out.
Most countries in the world that have terrorists, southeast Asian countries like Malaysia and Indonesia are cooperating with us to go after the terrorists. The reason that they are -- that we're going after Iraq is because we're still at war with Iraq. There was a conditional ceasefire in Iraq, conditioned upon his agreeing to and abiding by all the resolutions.
Hasn't done a single thing. He's continued to amass weapons of mass destruction, launched attacks on his own people, threatened Kuwait. He has continued the efforts. That's why he is still the No. 1 nation target and we are pursuing al Qaeda in many countries throughout the world.
CARLSON: Senator Stabenow, I think, and I'm sure you agree, Americans right now today are more afraid of terrorist than they are been in a long time.
SEN. DEBBIE STABENOW (D), MICHIGAN: Absolutely.
CARLSON: The Osama bin Laden tape, the administration came out recently, yesterday and said these are the steps you can take, and there aren't many of them, but to protect yourself from a potential terrorist attack. I want you to listen to Senator Tom Daschle's response to the administration's suggestions. Here's Senator Daschle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. TOM DASCHLE (D-SD), MINORITY LEADER: This new admonition that people ought to go out and buy duct tape as a response falls far short, I think, of anyone's expectation. It ought to be -- ought to be reconsidered. We have to do better than duct tape as our response to homeland defense.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: Now, on the day that Osama bin Laden, this tape comes out, there you have Senator Daschle positioning himself politically essentially. He's not offering any new suggestions for what you can do to protect yourself, he's merely criticizing the administration with an eye toward the future, isn't he? Isn't that what's going on?
STABENOW: Not at all. In fact, we've got to do a whole lot more than duct tape, Tucker. The reality is that we are not funding Homeland Securities in the communities, our hometowns. I've done nine different meetings across Michigan, meeting with sheriffs, police chiefs, firefighters, local emergency medical personnel, hospital personnel.
Everybody says the same thing, they can't do it alone. There has to be a federal partnership. We have communities where the police department can't talk to the fire department on the radio or where the city can't talk to the county. Where they're not able to get the training that they need or add the personnel.
And my frustration, this is not a partisan issue, my frustration is we have been trying since shortly after 9/11 to get dollars directly to the local communities and the administration has not supported it. In fact, last summer, we passed in Congress by a majority vote of all of us an emergency supplemental, we sent it to the president and he said he would not declare the Homeland Security funds in there as an emergency, $2.5 billion that would right now do a whole lot more than duct tape in order to help our local police departments.
CARLSON: Some of what you said are bipartisan concerns. Everybody wants there to a better partnership between local police and the federal government. However, Senator Daschle gets up there and says, Look, the things the administration told you to protect yourself are bogus, they will not protect you. I want to know, and I want you to tell us what specifically Americans should be doing to protect themselves, because he shot down their suggestions. What are better ones?
STABENOW: What he's doing is expressing a grave frustration that we all have after repeated opportunities when we've been trying to say let's give dollars to our local communities, the police chief, the firefighters, the EMS workers, they can't do it alone and constantly we are rebutted.
We had two different votes in January. Senator Byrd put forward two different amendments that were not supported by the administration. In fact, officials in the Homeland Security Department said it wasn't necessary.
Well, I can tell you in the state of Michigan, and I'm sure it's all across this country, it is necessary. We need bioterrorism training, we need radio equipment, we need more officers on the street, we need support for emergency medical personnel...
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Did you make a mistake in voting against that funding that Senator Stabenow just talked about?
BOND: No, but I want to congratulate you in spite of Tom Daschle, you went out to try to get duct tape today, and I commend you for it...
BEGALA: Tom Daschle did not say what Tucker said he said.
(CROSSTALK)
BOND: That was a cheap shot, I know. But on this program, who can pass up a cheap shot.
BEGALA: Say anything you want.
(CROSSTALK)
BOND: You know what is really frustrating to me is we are still working on the appropriations bills from last year. I hate to be partisan about it, but since Senator Daschle couldn't even pass a budget, we couldn't pass 11 of the 13 bills that had the money in it for things like (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and I have worked on a bipartisan basis with Senator Mikulski, with whom I've work very closely.
We are adding money, significant amounts of money for Fire Act Grants to make sure that our fire departments are equipped and prepared, whether they're volunteer or whether they're career. We are providing those moneys.
Now, I used to be a state official. I was a governor of a state. And we always could use more money from the federal government. But we have to make sure that we spend it well and I think that Tom Ridge is in a position to spend it well and I believe that the Fire Grant money has been spent well. Senator Mikulski and I started this three years before the 9/11 and they are spending it well. I'm proud of what they're doing.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Senator Stabenow, you hang on just a second. We're going to take a break. But please, both of you, keep your seats.
When we come back, we're going to ask these senators why -- whether, I'll be fair, whether our president is putting our money where his mouth is on the issue of homeland security.
And then, seems like the whole world hates us. Well, who's to blame? Is it American policy or the American president? Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEGALA: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. On a day that a new tape purportedly from Osama bin Laden surfaced, the FBI director told Congress the al Qaeda network still remains the most immediate and serious threat facing our country and will for the foreseeable future. The administration, however, remains fixated, in the eyes of many of us, on attacking Iraq.
We are debating priorities with Republican Senator Kit Bond of Missouri and Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow of Michigan.
CARLSON: Senator Stabenow, in his State of the Union address, as you know the president laid out part of this case for going to war with Iraq. I want to read you what you read in response to the president's State of the Union address.
You said, that night, "Nothing that he said convinced me that we're there yet, that the case has been made," end quote.
Very quick list of some of the things we know. We do know Iraq attempted to assassinate an American president. We know that the country has weapons of mass destruction and will use them. We know the country's in violation of 1441, the U.N. resolution. We know that the country's behind the murder of Lawrence Foley, a U.S. diplomat. We know that they're aligned with al Qaeda and have been since 1993. And we have today's bin Laden tape. What else do you need to know?
STABENOW: Well, first of all, it's not about whether or not I trust Saddam Hussein or whether or not we should dismantle his weapons of mass destruction. That's not what this is about.
It's a question of how we do that. I commend the president for going to the United Nations. That's what many of us felt he should do. Colin Powell has been moving forward. But we still have the opportunity for the U-2 flyovers, some other efforts that can go on in terms of inspections before that final decision is made. And I would hope we would have a broader coalition than we do today. Let me go back to our other discussion though. And that is the fact that as we ramp up, we hear the chatter that the CIA director talks about coming more and more towards us, more concern about what's going to happen to us here in the United States.
And while we are all focused on Iraq right now, we are in a situation where we are not providing resources and even our local folks are working double and triple time. And I have to say in Michigan, we're on the border, I was in Port Huron Michigan where they have to worry about an international bridge, a railroad tunnel, a waterway separating ourselves from Canada, drinking supplies, a nuclear power plant. We have so much on the plate of our local officials that they have got to have support from us. We can't just talk about it.
BOND: But Debbie, wait a minute. If you say we're just talking about it, you take a look, and if you listened to the entire testimony of Director Tenet, of FBI Director Mueller, we have captured suspects, we are using every means at our disposal, working with our allies abroad as well as local law enforcement agencies...
STABENOW: I appreciate that.
BOND: ... to do everything we can. Let me finish, please.
STABENOW: I appreciate that.
BOND: What they outlined today is a truly extensive and a very difficult job to track down these terrorists. And there is no question that terrorism is a threat. And when we issue warnings that there is terrorist chatter and we have to be prepared, some of the political critics say, well, we shouldn't be doing that. Now what do you want?
I mean we should know that we're on high alert. We should know what we can do as individual citizens. And we are -- we have seen a very comprehensive effort that's ongoing, and we're supporting in the Congress to track down, stop the terrorists...
BEGALA: Your own state -- you mentioned in the last segment you were the governor of Missouri. Your own state's director of homeland security, Colonel Tim Daniel, said he's not getting the help he needs from the feds. Why not?
BOND: Well I have some differences with Mr. Daniel. We have provided assistance to the state of Missouri. We have provided assistance to local firefighters. We have provided assistance continually, ever since I've been here. I've provided assistance to the States. The States got to get up off of their rear ends and do some of it themselves.
(APPLAUSE)
BEGALA: Is that a federal function?
BOND: It is a federal function. But law enforcement is also a state and local function. And we're not going to be able to fund it all. There's no way...
BEGALA: Not with that tax cut we're not.
BOND: That has nothing to do with it.
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: I'll give you a very quick last word.
STABENOW: Let's talk about the reality. We have a situation where the president has proposed a budget for homeland security that is barely any larger than last year's. We have substantial increases in the Department of Defense, which I have supported. But when it comes to homeland security, the president wants to cut or eliminate the cops program, which is first line and responders on our streets.
When we look at the dollars going to the local folks, the first person that walks in that door when something happens is a our local firefighter or police officer, or you're walking into the emergency room of the hospital. We are not doing what is necessary to help them.
CARLSON: I'm sorry, Senator...
BOND: We're providing more help than we have ever provided before. It is also a...
CARLSON: On that note, I'm afraid we're going to have to end. We're completely out of time. Senator Bond, Senator Stabenow, thank you both very much.
(APPLAUSE)
CARLSON: Next in a CNN NEWS ALERT, White House reaction to the latest bin Laden tape. Later, where are the allies? We'll examine some of old Europe's truly revolting opinions. You actually won't believe them. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(NEWS ALERT)
BEGALA: Anti-American attitudes seem to be going all around the world. When we come back next, we will ask why President Bush hasn't been as successful as his father was in rallying world opinion for a war against Iraq. You're watching CNN, the most trusted name in news.
(APPLAUSE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BEGALA: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. We're coming to you live from the George Washington University here in downtown Washington, D.C., home of the Colonials.
You know throughout the Cold War, and even after the Cold War, the United States could usually count on support from Europe, moral if not material support. But no more. Latest evidence came today in a poll of our very closest ally Great Britain. When asked this question, "Who poses the biggest threat to world peace," here's what our friends in Britain said.
Thirty-two percent of them said the United States. Twenty-five percent said Iraq, 26 percent said North Korea. Clearly, the Bush administration has failed to make its case across the pond.
In the CROSSFIRE, UPI chief international correspondent Martin Walker. He's also a senior fellow with the World Policy Institute. With him, Stephen Hayes of the "Weekly Standard."
(APPLAUSE)
BEGALA: Thank you, Martin. Good to see you sir.. Mr. Hayes, thank you for doing this.
CARLSON: Martin Walker, OK, a lot of Americans have been amused by France for a long time. But a lot of them are coming to the conclusion that, who needs France? I'll give you two quick examples. Senator Kit Bond was just on here. In the commercial break he said, "Going to the war without France is like going dear hunting without an accordion." Who cares?
The second example comes from Congressman Pete King, a congressman from New York, a Republican. He said today -- The Associated Press quote -- "We may have to restructure NATO, form a new alliance, which the French will not be part of. We cannot allow a second-rate country to have veto power or obstructionist power over American foreign policy."
(APPLAUSE)
CARLSON: So tell me why that's not true. France is a second- rate country. Why should they have veto power over our foreign policy?
MARTIN WALKER, CHIEF UPI INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well I guess George Washington wouldn't have agreed with you about the fighting qualities of the French. He was pretty grateful for General Lafayette, as I recall.
CARLSON: Yes, long time ago, though.
WALKER: Long time ago, but then again, don't forget you've been allied with France twice. First world war, second world war. I'm glad you've actually asked a Brit to talk about this. We're the experts. We've beaten them more than anybody else around.
But the fact is that Chirac represents something. Chirac is now, I think, representing European public opinion, according to all of the polls I've seen. Rather more I'm afraid than Tony Blair is. And I think the real important difference is this is not the Warsaw Pact, a group of yes men. This is NATO, an alliance of free states, who are allowed to have free opinions. And if they've got an argument to say, let's go one extra mile to try and avoid war and contain Saddam, let's listen to them. They've been allies.
BEGALA: Well, in fact, Stephen, hasn't that been part of our problem? After 9/11, the entire world was on our side. Jacques Chirac of France was the first head of state to come here. Even the thugs in Syria and Libya were at least saying the right things, probably never would have done the right thing. But how did our president blow it?
STEPHEN HAYES, "WEEKLY STANDARD": The president didn't blow it. It was nice that Jacques Chirac was the first one over here. We have to go back further and look at 1999. France, when it came to the question of even reconstituting an inspection regime, didn't want to do that. They didn't vote yes in favor of reconstituting the regime.
So now they're in favor of putting the inspectors in, more inspectors, regional offices. I mean they want to do all of these new things that are inspector focused (ph). Three years ago, they didn't even want inspectors in. So is France an ally? I don't think so.
CARLSON: But actually, Martin, I think Stephen Hayes makes a great point. France and Germany are not serious about disarming Saddam Hussein. Moreover, I think they have a pretty weak moral case to make. I'll give you one of among many examples.
Khidir Hamza, Saddam's bomb maker on our show the other day, something very much like this. This is actually from "The Wall Street Journal." He says, "France, Germany, and to a degree Russia, are opposed to U.S. military action in Iraq mainly because they maintain lucrative trade deals with Baghdad, many of which are arms related."
Again, why should we listen to countries that are profiting from someone that we want to depose?
WALKER: Well you're listening to Saudi Arabia, you're listening to Turkey, you're listening to other country who we all know have been side stepping the sanctions regime. I mean that's a facts of life.
I think the real weakness of the Bush administration's case is that last week Colin Powell answered the wrong question. The question he answered at the U.N. is, is Iraq cheating? Yes, we all know they'll cheat as far as they can get away with it. What he didn't answer was the question, is war now the only option or is there something short of war that can contain, constrain, Saddam Hussein?
We've got some more weeks to go. Let's give it a shot and see just how far we can.
HAYES: You might think that was the question that Colin Powell was answering, and you might think that Iraq is indeed cheating. What's unclear is whether Jacques Chirac thinks Iraq is cheating. He said yesterday, we don't even know that those weapons exist. I mean that's a mind-blowing thing to say. WALKER: Anymore, anymore.
HAYES: Anymore? You have to believe then that Saddam unilaterally disarmed after inspectors left and then forgot to tell the international community. Oh yes, slipped my mind.
(APPLAUSE)
(CROSSTALK)
WALKER: I'm not going to try and defend Saddam Hussein. I think the frog (ph) is indefensible.
HAYES: Try and defend Jacques Chirac; that's almost as difficult.
WALKER: I certainly can. The defense about Jacques Chirac is simply saying, let's give this a bit more time to play out. There ought to be something short of a war that's going to kill thousands of people, and it's probably the kind of war that exactly what Osama bin Laden wants us to do.
I can't think of a better wet dream for Osama bin Laden than to have several thousand plump western American British military targets in there ready for the knives, the snipers, the guerrilla attacks on just about every person al Qaeda's got. It's just what Osama bin Laden wants us to do. Let's think about this, let's push it further, and let's try and bring the international community with us.
CARLSON: Well, on that though, we're going to take a quick commercial break. But the "plump" line, oh, shivers.
In a minute, we'll ask our guests why anyone in the U.S. should care what the French and Germans think. Later, we'll hear from a viewer who sees right through Paul Begala's claims about a lot of things. It's going to be a great "Fireback." Stay tuned.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CARLSON: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. Last week, Secretary of State Colin Powell showed the world how Saddam Hussein is hiding his weapons of mass destruction. But in Great Britain, 61 percent of the people polled said Powell's evidence wasn't enough for them. Twenty- one percent felt his evidence was fabricated, made up, a lie.
We're talking about Europe's head-in-the-sand attitude with UPI chief international correspondent Martin Walker and Stephen Hayes of the "Weekly Standard."
BEGALA: Stephen, in our last segment, we were all sharing Tucker's indignation at the French selling arms, really, to Saddam Hussein. And I wonder if you share my outrage that Dick Cheney, who is now our vice president, ran an oil field equipment services firm that sold equipment to Saddam Hussein as well.
HAYES: Well there's no question that in the previous administrations throughout the '80s we supported Saddam. It wasn't the right thing to do.
BEGALA: This was 1998, though. No, no, no. This was 1998.
HAYES: The problem we see is that France and Germany have been doing this since the sanctions. We're going to go in. I think one of the things...
BEGALA: This was during the sanctions. Sorry to press it, but I've never had a conservative with the stones to say, yes, it was wrong for Dick Cheney's firm to evade those sanctions...
(CROSSTALK)
HAYES: One of the most important things we're going to find when we go in is we're going to find -- we're likely to weapons parts that say "Made in France 2001." And that helps explain why France is so reluctant right now.
CARLSON: Martin Walker, we read a poll coming in here that a lot of people in Great Britain think that Colin Powell is a liar. I want to put up another poll, though, that I think is even more crackpot.
WALKER: I'm not sure they said he was a liar. I think the opinion poll said that they weren't convinced by his argument.
CARLSON: Twenty-one percent said he fabricated evidence.
(CROSSTALK)
WALKER: You can probably get one in five people to (UNINTELLIGIBLE) anything.
CARLSON: Is that true?
WALKER: I think so.
CARLSON: Well then answer this. Here's a poll in Great Britain. "Who poses the biggest threat to world peace?" Twenty-six percent said North Korea; 25 percent said Iraq; 32 percent said the United States.
So I guess my question to you, Martin Walker, is, if half the people in Kuwait or Pakistan think the Israelis are behind 9/11, we don't say we need to win them over. We say that's crazy, this is an unreasonable point of view, and it's beneath contempt, we're not going to deal with it. Why shouldn't we have the same attitude towards polls like that?
WALKER: Well because the Brits are probably the only reliable ally that the United States has got right now. Tony Blair is putting his entire political career on the line.
CARLSON: Yes.
WALKER: As he said just the other day in parliament, "People ask me why I'm risking everything." It's because he believes it and because he thinks the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) is on his side and he can pull people around to his point of view. My feeling is that, in the usual British bellicose way, once the troops go in the opinions will switch around. But what you're really talking about here is a real indictment of the most pitiful failure of this Bush administration to communicate their case against this thug, Saddam Hussein.
CARLSON: So if people in Britain are deeply and...
(CROSSTALK)
WALKER: It's a public relations disaster by the Americans.
BEGALA: Here's what then Governor Bush promised in his foreign policy during the campaign, Stephen. Take a look. This is in the debates.
He said, "If we're an arrogant nation, people around the world will resent us. If we're a humble nation but strong, they'll welcome us." He was right then, but he has been nothing but arrogant since he took office. Isn't that true?
HAYES: No. As Ronald Reagan said when he took office, it's more important to be respected than it is to be loved. I mean I think if we hadn't spent so much time over the past eight years trying to be loved by everyone at all times...
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: ... to a war in Kosovo, which was a just war. That's called American leadership, Stephen.
HAYES: He had less support, less international support when he rallied international and American opinion in February of 1998 than President Bush has today. And then he didn't even have the kohanas (ph) to use Madeleine Albright's indelicate phrase to do something about it.
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: Well you missed a whole war, brother. I don't know what you were doing in 1999, but he won a big war.
CARLSON: We're almost out of time. But I hope you'll be honest enough to admit that a lot of the European dissatisfaction with American foreign policy has to do with Israel. Many people in Europe don't like Israel. Some don't think it should exist. And people in Europe are mad that the U.S. (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
WALKER: I think it's a minor factor, compared to the resentment that built up over Kyoto, the international communal court, American steel (ph) sanctions, the American farm bill, the land mines bill, and all the other examples that really cheese (ph) people off by making them think that this administration wasn't listening to their allies. Allies who, after all, had given 110 percent offers of support after 9/11. The French main newspaper, "Le Monde," said we're all Americans now. The Europeans said we invoke Article V of NATO. An attack on one is an attack on all. And this administration just doesn't seem to care about having allies, all it wants is yes men.
CARLSON: OK. Blaming the victim.
BEGALA: That will have to be the last word. Stephen Hayes, from the "Weekly Standard," Martin Walker, form UPI, thank you both very much.
(APPLAUSE)
BEGALA: Next, one of our viewers wants to join President Bush in his secure, undisclosed location. Learn all about it in our "Fireback" segment. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CARLSON: Welcome back to CROSSFIRE. It's time to hear your voice. Throw open the doors and let your opinions come flowing in. Time for "Fireback." Here we go.
Henry Schacht of Chicago writes, "The argument that Bush places a higher priority on tax cuts than he does on homeland security due to the funding difference between the two is ridiculous. Most people spend far less on food than they do on their cars or home mortgage, but that doesn't mean that food is not a priority for them."
Very smart, Henry Schacht.
BEGALA: Very dumb, Henry Schacht, no. You know what, I hope you enjoy that tax cut when bioterrorism attacks are going on and we haven't help first responders answer it. That's nuts. It's absolutely nuts.
CARLSON: Well that's a pretty heavy charge, Paul.
BEGALA: Margaret Haugh of Chicago, Illinois writes, "Perhaps the American public would be more supportive of a war in Iraq if we all had undisclosed locations to hide in when our enemies decide to retaliate. When W. reserves me a bunker in his rabbit hole, maybe I'll be more eager to beat the war drums."
(APPLAUSE)
CARLSON: Well that's incredibly small minded. Next up is J.A. Sveinson, of Winnipeg, Canada, a foreign country, writes, "Maybe the reason France and Germany are confounding the Bush Blitzkrieg is that they know a fascist when they see one."
But we know that's not true, because we know that if Bush were a fascist, they would be collaborating with him by now. That would get him on board.
BEGALA: By the way, speak of fascists, our very able and hard working graphics department in Atlanta put up the wrong flag. I know that you noticed and...
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: As a student of vexology...
BEGALA: Vexology, the study of flags, we had the South Korean flag up, when of course we meant to have the North Korean flag.
CARLSON: Of course we did. Sure we did.
BEGALA: Everybody here was just stunned. John Michels of Sioux Falls, South Dakota writes, "Tucker, how do you keep the light reflecting off Paul's head out of your eyes? When James Carville is on, is that double light reflection for you? It's a wonder you can still debate."
It's all that brightness I think he's talking about.
(CROSSTALK)
CARLSON: Yes sir?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Joe Bacarro (ph) from Fairfax, Virginia. Just a nonpolitical question. Just a simple curiosity. Should a terrorist attack take place very soon on American soil, would that strengthen public opinion for the war in Iraq or would it weaken it?
CARLSON: Boy, I have absolutely no idea. I see the Bush administration's push for war in Iraq as completely disconnected from political considerations. It's a political risk, if nothing else. So, boy, I just hope that doesn't happen I guess.
BEGALA: I have no idea. I do believe, god forbid, bullets start flying and we go to war in Iraq, the American public will rally around it, as we have to. We only have one president. Even if he makes a decision I disagree with, I think as a patriotic American you got to go and support it. But another terrorist attack, I have no ability to perceive the political ramifications.
From the left, I'm Paul Begala. Goodnight for CROSSFIRE.
CARLSON: And from the right, I'm Tucker Carlson. Join us again tomorrow night -- that would be Wednesday -- for yet more CROSSFIRE.
