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Glenn Beck

Democrats Turn to Attack Mode

Aired September 11, 2008 - 19:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GLENN BECK, HOST (voice-over): Tonight, Democrats in full-fledged panic. You can make all kinds of excuses about the lipstick on the pig, but how do you explain this?

REP. STEVE COHEN (D), TENNESSEE: Barack Obama, who was a community organizer, like Jesus, who our minister prayed about. Pontius Pilate was a governor.

BECK: Now Hollywood is getting in on the act.

MATT DAMON, ACTOR: It`s like a really bad Disney movie, you know. The hockey mom, you know.

BECK: Plus, Joe Biden now says Hillary may have been a better vice- presidential candidate. And you know what? The Amber alert is still up. And you know what? I think he`s right.

And also, it has been seven years since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Are we safer now than we were then? And why? Why is there a huge hole still at the World Trade Center site?

All this, and more, tonight.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BECK: Hello, America.

I have to tell you, I -- I`ve never seen attacks on a candidate like I have seen attacks on Sarah Palin. I`ve never seen anything like it.

Back at the beginning of this campaign, I said -- when I said that Barack Obama was going to be the next president of the United States, I said, unless he starts acting like a typical politician. Then he`s going to be in trouble. He set the bar very high for himself. And that time is right now. I can`t believe what`s happening.

As his poll numbers have started slipping, Obama is going into attack mode with negative imagery, and all the nasty bits that come along with it. So here`s "The Point" tonight.

The Obama campaign is imploding, and it`s not necessarily because of Obama. It`s the Democratic Party. They`re going crazy. And here`s how I got there.

Yesterday I told you about Barack Obama`s "lipstick on a pig" comment. Well, he was on -- was it -- Letterman last night. He explained it as John McCain`s policies being the pig, and the lipstick being Sarah Palin. I don`t know if that makes it really any better. Are you just saying that she`s sexing up his policies? That explanation sounds like you just removed one foot and inserted the other one.

Then the chairwoman of the South Carolina Democratic National Committee said that the -- that Governor Palin, quote, "Her primary qualification seems to be that she hasn`t had an abortion," end quote. Is anybody going to get offended by this?

I mean, it`s popular to take down Sarah Palin as a religious zealot and everything else, but, wow, how do you explain, then, this that also happened yesterday?

Watch this videotape. This is Tennessee`s Democratic congressman, Steve Cohen, making a comparison between Barack Obama and Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: Barack Obama was a community organizer like Jesus, who our minister prayed about. Pontius Pilate was a governor.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Can you imagine if I compared anyone to Pontius Pilate? My candidate as, you know, Jesus? This is not just absurd; this is offensive. It should be to everybody.

I`m especially surprised since Representative Cohen is Jewish and has been the victim of religious smears himself. He, of all people, should know that there are lines you just don`t cross. You don`t really want to compare somebody to somebody that, you know, killed Jesus. Never ends well.

The reason I say that the Obama campaign is imploding, is that all of these things have happened in the last 24 hours. And I ain`t done yet. In the last 24 hours, not just in Washington, Hollywood has come out. Now the Hollywood hit squad is starting making the rounds.

Here is Matt Damon with his review of Governor Sarah Palin.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAMON: It`s like a really bad Disney movie. You know? The hockey mom, you know, "Oh, I`m just a hockey mom from Alaska." And she`s the president. And it`s like she`s facing down Vladimir Putin. And using the, you know, the folksy stuff she learned at the hockey, you know, rink. It`s just -- it`s absurd.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: That`s tough talk from the guy who made "Oceans 12" and "13." I saw both of them, Matt. Shhh.

Tonight, America, here`s what you need to know. The Democrats need to decide if they`re going to be kind of people behind the politics of change or the politics of destruction. It`s almost like they found, you know, the Republican in Karl Rove`s bag of dirty tricks. So far, guys, it looks like your choice is pretty clear.

Amy Holmes is a CNN political contributor. Michael Reagan is a radio talk show host, best-selling author, and Republican strategist. And John Fund is the editorial writer for the "Wall Street Journal" and author of "Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens Our Democracy."

John, I want to come -- I want to come to you. Maybe next week we`re going to get into that. I want to talk a little bit about that.

Mike, let me start with you first. It`s amazing to me how -- at the same time -- that Matt Damon video goes on to go into her religious views, and how extreme she is. And at the same time that`s coming out, you`ve got a guy in the well of the House of Representatives comparing Obama to the messiah, and Sarah Palin to Pontius Pilate.

MICHAEL REAGAN, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: This is something that`s unbelievable for the business you and I are in, Glenn, that they keep on coming up with these things.

But you`re right. There is politics in destruction, and they want to destroy Sarah Palin, because they know that she was the game changer with the McCain campaign. She solidified the base of the Republican Party, which John McCain could not do on his own. You and I have talked about that.

And they feel if they destroy her, they can win the election. It`s not about Barack Obama, whether he can be a good president. They feel they have to destroy Sarah Palin for him to even get there.

BECK: John, it`s not that they`re worried. I think they`re in full- fledged freak-out. And I don`t mean just Obama. I mean the Democrats. I think they`re starting to think, "Uh-oh, this -- we`re going to lose this thing." And they appear to be revealing themselves as angry, bitter people that will do anything to grab power.

JOHN FUND, AUTHOR, "STEALING ELECTIONS": Well, I look at it a little bit more sympathetically. Every four years they have a reoccurring nightmare, which is they`re about to win the election. They`ve nominated some hero or some great guy, and suddenly the Republicans with a bag of, quote, "dirty tricks," unquote, snatch the election from them at the last minute. And they`re once again caught holding ashes.

Well, I think that fear is what`s leading to what I call Palin Derangement Syndrome, and Palin Derangement Syndrome is characterized by an inordinate fear that somehow Sarah Palin is going to change the political game this fall.

Look, I think this race is going to settle down into a pretty conventional race on issues. The debates are finally going to bring the issues to the fore. And I think a lot of this excitement about Sarah Palin will fade.

But for right now, there`s no doubt that Democrats have lost a lot of white women because of the Sarah Palin pick. And they are worried because this race is dead even, and that`s not what it was a month ago.

BECK: OK, Amy. The women issue, I mean, I can`t -- my wife saw just the pig thing, and I actually stood up for Barack Obama with my wife. Last night we were watching the news. And she -- for the first time she saw that, you know, the line about the pig. And her breath was taken away.

She went, "Oh, my gosh."

And I said, "Wait, he was talking about the policies," et cetera, et cetera. How much more can the women of this country take against Sarah Palin before they just say, what the hell do you people even stand for?

AMY HOLMES, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: Well, and we`re seeing with the polling data that all of these attacks on Sarah Palin are driving white women, especially, into the arms of the Republican Party.

Now, these are voters that Democrats need in order to win the presidency. But with all of these attacks on Sarah Palin, and the lipstick and, you know, when you see on the Web sites the way they go after her. Matt Damon with his just totally idiotic remark. I mean, it`s like a bad Matt Damon movie where he plays a super secret spy who`s lost his memory and doesn`t know how to get out of it.

I mean, it`s ridiculous. And I think that Barack Obama needs to put the focus back on the issues. And as John Fund said, I think the debate will certainly push that forward. But right now, boy, they`re flailing.

BECK: Michael Reagan, your father was -- I mean, honestly, we were thinking about it last night, a friend and I -- we`re losers. But we were talking about the presidents. And how many real, honest-to-goodness people were -- were who they said they were.

Your father, I believe, was who he said he was. You can see it in his own writings and in his own speeches. Everybody liked Ronald Reagan, because he was -- he was who he was.

REAGAN: Real.

BECK: He was real. Now they`re going after Sarah Palin in this Matt Damon video for being somebody who is real and dismissing any kind of real- life experience as anything of any value.

REAGAN: This is what really has got the Republicans where they are right now with her. They know that she`s real.

I wrote an op-ed piece the other day, Glenn, about, in fact, Sarah Palin, and how much she reminded me of my father. I said nobody thought Ronald Reagan would come back wearing a dress and having five children.

BECK: You`re right.

REAGAN: That`s exactly who came back. And when she speaks, she doesn`t need a teleprompter, because she`s speaking from the heart. Ronald Reagan spoke from the heart.

And what the Democrats can`t do is speak from the heart. They never have; they never will. And they don`t know how to deal with someone who, in fact, does speak from the heart like Sarah Palin or Ronald Reagan. They`ve got two candidates who don`t know where their heart is.

FUND: And you know, it`s interesting, Glenn...

BECK: Yes.

FUND: ... there are other parallels with Reagan. I think the Democrats underestimated Sarah Palin, like they underestimated Reagan. Remember, Sarah Palin was a broadcast major in college.

BECK: Exactly.

FUND: The first job out of college was sports announcer.

BECK: Yes.

FUND: Do you remember someone else who was a sports announcer just out of college?

BECK: Yes.

FUND: Ronald Reagan. Michael`s father.

BECK: OK, guys. Hang on just a second. I want to continue this conversation and take a little bit of a turn and show you some more videotape, as well. That`s coming up.

We`re also going to talk about the Clinton mojo. Can Bill Clinton or Hillary Clinton save Barack Obama? The only two-term Democratic president in the last half century met with his party`s nominee for lunch in Manhattan today. Will Bill hit the campaign trail? Or did Barack kiss the ring a little too late?

Also, seven years after the horrific attacks on September 11, 2001, family members are still walking down into a big hole in the ground to pay tribute to their loved ones. It`s a disgrace. We`ll talk about that, and so much more, with the former NYPD commissioner, Bernie Kerik about the security holes and that hole in the ground that he says still exists.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Back with me are Amy Holmes, CNN political contributor; Michael Reagan, radio talk show host, Republican strategist; and John Fund, editorial writer for the "Wall Street Journal."

Guys, I want you to watch two pieces of video here and then give me your thoughts on it. This is Olbermann in an interview with Barack Obama on Monday. Listen to what he says to the candidate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEITH OLBERMANN, MSNBC ANCHOR: Maybe the most compelling moment of your acceptance speech in Denver was that one strongly-voiced word, "enough." Have you thought of using, on the campaign trail and in your speaking engagements, more exclamation points? Have you thought of getting angrier?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: OK. That`s what he said to the candidate. Now, three days later, I think this was Wednesday, when they were talking about the pig and lipstick, listen to what Obama said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D-IL), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: Because then we go another year or another four years or another eight years without addressing the issues that matter to you. Enough.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: OK. Do you think anyone in the Obama campaign thinks it`s a wise idea to follow Keith Olbermann`s advice?

HOLMES: You`re in a lot of trouble when Keith Olbermann becomes your campaign manager.

BECK: Yes. I mean, Michael, let me start with you, because your father got it, and Sarah Palin gets it. And Obama has gotten it, for most of the time. It`s what has got him this far, is the message of hope and being a uniter, and not splitting people apart. If he goes down this negative road and is pissed off, he`s dead in the water.

REAGAN: Morning in America is what Ronald Reagan brought you back in the 1980s. And that`s exactly what Sarah Palin and John McCain are bringing to you in 2008. Morning in America, positive dream moving forward. Barack Obama is going negative. The "enough" line from MSNBC time is absolutely off-base.

But again, Sarah Palin and Ronald Reagan didn`t need somebody to give them a line. They just gave the line naturally. And what you`ve got is Barack Obama looking for somebody to give him a line that may, in fact, work. And right now, he`s had a bad two months.

BECK: John, do you think that -- do you think that Obama, if he -- I mean, he`s really in a box that he`s created for himself, and he`s got to stay in that box or the whole thing comes apart, don`t you think?

FUND: One of the things polls have shown us is young people were tremendously excited about Barack Obama. He was a breath of fresh air. He was going to transcend the old politics.

Well, now that we`re in the fall campaign, it`s sounding more and more, as you said, like the old politics. And young people, polls show, are increasingly less enthusiastic. They may still want to vote for Barack Obama, but they may not drag their friends to the polls with them.

HOLMES: And here`s the problem with that box, is that when he does the transcendent rhetoric, the messianic message, while that connects with young voters, and I think what you called the Chardonnay-sipping crowd, it lies very cold, it`s very flat with those working-class, blue-collar voters that he`s doing so poorly with.

BECK: Let me go -- let me go here. And Amy, I believe, and I think the Republicans have finally done this, where you can vote for something and not against. You know, they were never going to win if they were just saying, hey, John McCain, he`s better than Barack Obama. You don`t win an election.

Well, now the tables have turned. And it looks like you`re voting for Palin, and the argument from the Obama camp is, no, no, no, not Palin. You can`t have her. She`s a religious zealot, et cetera, et cetera.

They`ve got to do something. What do you think about this idea of Obama going after Charlie Rangel and saying, "You know what? We stand for something. We stand for ethics. We want to clean up our own house."

Here`s a guy who`s in charge of writing the tax code and says he didn`t understand he was supposed to pay these taxes on this vacation homes that he owned. And he also had four homes in New York that were part of subsidized housing for the poor. And asking for his resignation. I think that would make a difference. Do you?

REAGAN: Well, the fact...

HOLMES: I think that would be awfully risky for him to do that, in that he needs Charlie Rangel to be out there on the campaign stump for him.

But I do see your point about trying to get that reform message that John McCain is so successful with, and trying to put some meat on the bones. What does change mean? And that`s what the voters keep asking the Obama campaign. When you talk about change and hope and you say you want to lead us, where are you leading us to? He tried to give some more definition, more specifics.

REAGAN: Glenn -- Glenn, with the Democrats, it`s always, always talk. They never follow through with it. And it was always talk. They thought they had an issue. Sarah Palin and John McCain just absolutely cleaned the plate when you talk about reform.

BECK: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Hang on just a second, Michael. That is not entirely true. John McCain cannot clean the plate on that issue. Sarah Palin has been able to clean the plate. And that`s -- and that`s why, for the first time, you have seen someone who is engaged in the kind of change that America`s looking for.

You can talk about it. But Amy was right, you know, what kind of change, what does that really mean? It means that you take your own party on and call the dirt bags out, like she did, in Alaska.

REAGAN: And she has done that. And Barack Obama sitting there in Illinois has never done it with Chicago, and what`s going on in Chicago. Never called out his own dirt bags, whether it be Charlie Rangel or whomever it might be. He will never do that, because his party will not allow him. They will turn on him if he does.

HOLMES: I would say he has thrown some people under the bus: his grandmother, his former pastor.

BECK: He didn`t -- he did not -- it took him a long time to throw his pastor underneath the bus.

John, do you think it`s unreasonable for him or do you think it would be meaningless for him to take on a real ethical issue and say, "Look, I`m going to -- this guy needs to go"?

FUND: Look, Glenn, look at the Chicago Daley machine. David Axelrod, Mayor Daley`s strategist, is Barack Obama`s strategist. Barack Obama has never said boo about the Daley machine`s corruption and all of the vote fraud that takes place there. That`s in my book.

And I have to tell you, for Barack Obama to do that would be refreshing, but it would be unprecedented in his career. He has accommodated himself to the Daley machine. He has not fought the Daley machine.

HOLMES: And the problem also is that it would be seen as me-tooism, an election-year gambit. Would people really take it seriously when he stands up for the first time two months before the presidential election?

BECK: No. No. I just -- I just cannot believe that we are sitting here with the Congress that said they were going to be the most ethical ever, and here`s Charlie Rangel. And no one in America is taking this guy on. Nobody -- he`s going to -- the Republicans have asked him to resign. Do you think that`s ever going to happen? This guy is going to -- this guy will die in office.

REAGAN: When they do those kinds of things, Glenn, it`s a badge of honor. They put it at the top of the resume, not the bottom of the resume.

BECK: OK. Guys, thanks a lot.

Coming up, every American has their own unique way of remembering the anniversary of September 11. The state of Virginia has adopted the official symbol, the freedom flag. I`ll tell you all about it next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: It is the seventh anniversary of September 11 attacks. And people all over America and the world are mourning, memorializing, showing each other support, in some cases, unfortunately, yelling at each other.

The commonwealth of Virginia has designated the freedom flag as their official symbol of remembrance. I`m proud now to be joined by Chip Harris. He`s the executive director and CEO of Freedom Flag Foundation.

You know, Chip, I met you, what was it, just under a year ago, and you showed me this flag. I had never, ever even seen it before, yet it is -- it is not only the official flag in Virginia, but other states are adopting it as well. Can you explain what the symbols all mean here?

CHIP HARRIS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR/CEO, FREEDOM FLAG FOUNDATION: Well, the star in the center of the flag, on the left side of the flag, Glenn, is -- stands for all the people who have ever lived and died for freedom. The bars around the star represent the Pentagon and our armed services, our protection of freedom. And the blue "C" stands for all Americans that are united together for freedom.

The top red bar represents Flight 93 that hit the Pentagon. And then the two broad stripes in the middle, the red ones, represent the Twin Towers and the bloodshed of all of the victims there. And all the crew members and passengers on both of those jets. The bottom red stripe stands for Shanksville and the flight -- I`m sorry, it`s Flight 93 in Shanksville. It`s Flight 77 in Washington.

BECK: Yes.

HARRIS: For Flight 93, and the crew and passengers of that. And then you have the three white stripes, which stand for the Port Authority workers and police officers and firefighters who all worked tirelessly during and after the attacks.

BECK: I will tell you that I -- you know, you watch the program, I know. And anybody who watches the program, until I got this -- until I got the little pitchfork that I`m currently trying to shovel out the bull crap out of Washington, I was wearing the freedom flag on my lapel a lot.

You have a goal of getting this into half of the schools by September 11, 2010, or 11?

HARRIS: 11. That would be the tenth -- that would be the tenth anniversary.

BECK: Right.

HARRIS: The idea behind freedom flag, Glenn, is it was created as a one-person show. Richard Melito created it. He put it in his restaurant. And the idea behind it was he wanted his patrons to see something that had the symbolism of 9/11. Something that they`d look at, that would remind them of it.

BECK: And so you want...

HARRIS: And it went from there into schools.

BECK: OK. And you want at least half of the schools for the tenth anniversary to have one of these flags. How can the average person get a flag? How can they get -- these are great lapel pins. How can you get them?

HARRIS: You can come onto our Web site which is Freedom Flag Foundation, FreedomFlagFoundation.org. And all the information is there about the purpose of the flag, the history of the flag, how it came about to be a state symbol. And on top of that, is -- it`s a page where you can sponsor everything. Actually sponsor a school.

BECK: I will tell you -- I will tell you that I have one of these flags, and if I were home today I would be flying it in front of my home today.

HARRIS: That`s great.

BECK: And in the children`s school, as well. Please get involved.

Chip, thank you very much.

HARRIS: Thanks a lot, Glenn. We appreciate it.

BECK: You got it.

Coming up, Barack Obama says that as president, he`d make strategic investments, creating five million green jobs. Uh-huh. "Real Story," next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Well, by now, here we are on the seventh anniversary of September 11th; you`ve probably seen one of those "Are we really any safer?" stories on television. Those probably didn`t include new information and threat assessment from one of the key players on that day. Former New York City police commissioner Bernard Kerik joins me in a minute. And you don`t want to miss what he has to say.

But first, welcome to the "THE REAL STORY." With all the economic troubles that we`re facing, boy, we could use a savior, couldn`t we? Where did I put that savior?

Somebody who could come in and turn some water into wine, or gasoline, feed 5,000 people with a couple of fish, and bail out Lehman brothers and Washington Mutual in his spare time. I just wish we had somebody like that. Good news for you, I think we`ve found our man.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. STEVE COHEN, (D) TENNESSEE: Barack Obama was a community organizer like Jesus, who our minister prayed about. Pontius pilot was a governor.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Wow. By the way, that`s not some crackpot making the comparison; it`s an elected crackpot standing there in the well of the House of Representatives, Tennessee congressman Steve Cohen. No word from Cohen`s Messiah on the wine or fish stuff. But how does he -- how is he going to solve the economy problems?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA, (D) PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: And I`ll invest $150 billion over the next decade in affordable, renewable sources of energy, wind power and solar power, and the next generation of bio-fuels; an investment that will lead to new industries and 5 million new jobs that pay well and can`t be outsourced.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: That is fantastic. 5 million brand spanking new jobs that the government is creating. I love it. And they`re permanent, did you hear that? High-paying jobs, can`t ever be outsourced. Wow. Can he absolve me of my sins while he`s at it? Of course, Obama is not the only one to have this idea.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. HILLARY CLINTON (D) NEW YORK: I ran for president to promote a clean energy economy that will create millions of green collar jobs.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Millions of green collar jobs. Isn`t that great?

Let me tell you something, if we`re banking on the future of our economy on magical new green jobs, we`re in even more trouble than I thought. And I think we`re in a lot of trouble.

"THE REAL STORY" is, green jobs are just like carbon credits, or I love this one, John McCain`s favorite, cap-and-trade programs. None of them create any wealth, they destroy wealth. They shift it around. Or in a term that Obama would understand, they redistribute it. You know what I`m saying?

It`s easy to understand how this Ponzi scheme works if you think about it on a much smaller scale. Let`s say that you live in a town, maybe Wasilla, Alaska, where there are five people that are unemployed. One day the city council of that small, small, small, small Alaskan town announces that they`re sinking into the sea and they`re investing $1 million to create five new high-paying brown collar jobs to save the city.

Now let me ask you this question, do you think that all five of those jobs are going to be filled by the exact same five people who are now looking for work? Which is exactly what Obama and Clinton assume will happen. Or expect you to buy into.

Or do you think that maybe, just maybe, some of the people who are flipping burgers or pumping gas are running another company might want to triple their salaries by changing jobs?

The truth is, that adding green collar jobs only means you`re losing white and blue collar ones and sticking the taxpayers with the bill.

Although, given their success in running fine, upstanding companies like Amtrak, or Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, I don`t know why anyone would be worried about the government, quote unquote, "investing any of our money." I mean, what`s the problem there?

Although, I do have to make one disclaimer, none of what I said applies to Barack Obama. After all, when you can heal lepers and give sight to the blind -- heal -- you can surely overcome the rules of economics.

John Stossel is the co-anchor of ABC News` "20/20," syndicated columnist, author of "Myths, Lies and Downright Stupidity - Get Out the Shove, Why Everything You Know is Wrong." You have a problem with Obama investing $150 billion of our money into green collar jobs, John?

JOHN STOSSEL, CO-ANCHOR, ABC NEWS "20/20": I have a problem with politicians investing, because it`s not their money. That`s what you do when you invest. And politicians are spending our money. And the conceit that you will create jobs, I think you told it pretty well.

But it was first explained to me in a story by Frederick Pastia, the French economist, who said it seems if you go break somebody`s window, that that creates jobs. Because the shop keeper has to hire a glassmaker, and someone to clean it up and so forth, doesn`t that create jobs?

But that`s the seen gained. What you miss is the unseen loss. The money the shop keeper spent on the window he might have spent buying a pizza, or hiring a tutor to teach him something; or a hundred other things. Those are the unseen loss.

BECK: I also have a problem with the ideas, I`m quoting, that they`re creating cannot be outsourced. And they`re permanent. What kind of job is that?

STOSSEL: A government job.

BECK: Oh.

STOSSEL: It can`t be outsourced. But of course, outsourcing isn`t a bad thing either. The Dartmouth study found companies that outsourced the most, hired the most people in America. Free trade is good for us.

BECK: Let me switch the guns and turn the guns here on McCain, because we`ve been going after Obama here. I just talked to Governor Pawlenty, who was thought to be a running mate for John McCain. And he actually tried to tell me, because I said, you know, your candidate believes in cap-and-trade, for the love of Pete. What is that, besides just taking money from the rich and giving it to somebody else, or taking the money from a small business and giving it to GE?

He said, well, there`s ways to do it right. What way can you think of, John, to do cap-and-trade and not call it a scam?

STOSSEL: I can`t imagine that it would work. First of all, trade`s good. I`m all for trade. But cap is the issue. So that means you have to have chimney police deciding how much everybody can pollute, and then buying and sell these things invariably becomes a scam. If global warming really is a problem, and it`s man-made, a carbon tax is a far more honest way to punish people.

BECK: You have the farmer`s almanac. I`m more of a Thomas Jefferson guy. I would rather -- instead of some sort of scholar telling me, I`d rather listen to the farmers.

Farmer`s Almanac came out today and said, it looks like that we`re going into a period of global cooling now. How are these people going to get green collar jobs and cap-and-trade done if we`re going into global cooling?

STOSSEL: Well, I would say the Farmer`s Almanac is about as reliable as a lot of what you hear from the media. So let`s not go by that. Look, there are a lot of serious scientists who are truly worried. And it`s possible that man is contributing to global warming, and it`s possible that it will be a real problem. But cap-and-trade isn`t going to solve it. And let`s be sure we really have a problem before we bankrupt ourselves doing that.

BECK: You know, people don`t think that -- I mean, if I hear one more person say, the United States can`t go under. We`re the United States of America; the arrogance here that is going on.

We have Fannie and Freddie going under. I mean, what time is it, we might have just purchased Lehman Brothers as well. You know, Washington Mutual is on the horizon. The big three automakers want a handout now. How much more can we take on and create $150 billion worth of new technology to create jobs?

STOSSEL: Well, we can`t create those jobs, because government takes it from one hand and gives to another, and keeps some for its trouble. That doesn`t create any jobs.

But you`re totally right, these bailouts are disgusting. Both candidates have said, oh, yes, GM, we`ll give you billions of dollars. None of that really matters compared to Medicare, where we`re trillions of dollars in the hole. Those promises can`t be kept unless they inflate the currency to nothing.

BECK: John, real quick. Governor Palin, is she going to get a fair treatment tomorrow on ABC, "20/20"?

STOSSEL: I hope so. Charlie Gibson`s a good guy. I have great faith that he`ll be smart and fair.

BECK: Good. We`ll see you. Thank you very much, John.

Coming up, the ranking member of the house intelligence commit tee and former New York City police commissioner Bernard Kerik joins me to talk about America`s security on 9/11.

That`s next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: So many of us woke up this morning, and didn`t really realize it until we turned on the TV, or turned on the radio. It has been seven years since Islamic extremist terrorists carried out the worst attack on American soil in our nation`s history.

The world has been a very different place since then. Airport security, color-coded terror alerts. Is your life anything like it was seven years ago?

When you put aside all of the talk and politicking, are we any safer today than we were back in 2001? Congressman Pete Hoekstra is the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee to help us answer that question.

Congressman, are we any safer today?

REP. PETE HOEKSTRA, (R) MICHIGAN, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: Well, there`s certain things that we`ve done, I think, much better than what we were doing prior to 9/11/2001.

We now have a strategic direction in the intelligence community. We have -- we`re better at information sharing. We`ve got more global partners working with us in this -- dealing with this threat with radical Jihadists. And our people at the front lines, the people that see this threat the closest; they really are integrated in dealing with the threat.

Now, on the flip side, when you take a look at, have we transformed the intelligence community, the answer is, absolutely not. It has grown with the additional -- with the addition of the DNI, Director of National Intelligence.

Our objective was to transform the community, make it more flexible, more agile and more responsive to the threats that are out there, instead, it`s gotten more bureaucratic. There`s a whole new lair of bureaucracy that has slowed the process down.

And the other thing, the bureaucrat infighting here in Washington continues, especially between the intelligence community and the Department of Defense. Those are two major disappointments. Those are things that are barriers to making our intelligence community more effective, and keeping us safer.

BECK: You know, I have to tell you, Congressman, I`m still torn on this. I hate to give people more power than they should have in Washington. But I saw a story, I`m sure you read about the terrorists in Great Britain, they were planning this, you know, large attack.

They weren`t convicted because we couldn`t release information that we had. The British couldn`t release in court what they had. And so these guys basically are walking away. They`re not being convicted for trying to blow up all those airliners. It`s frustrating.

HOEKSTRA: It`s very, very frustrating. You know, sometimes we run into real conflicts when we enter into the legal process, about what we need to do to make sure that we keep our sources and methods secure, so that the enemies do not know how we get information, how we discovered these kinds of threats. We`ve stopped a number of threats since 9/11, and at the same time, how do we make sure that these folks that wanted to attack the United States or whatever are prosecuted.

BECK: I have to tell you, I wouldn`t have guessed on 9/11 that we would have -- two things, that, a, we wouldn`t have had another terrorist attack, and b, that this thing would still be a big scar in New York. I would have sworn we would have had a building there by now.

Let me give you this. This is the front page of "USA Today;" "U.S. Starts Scanning Incoming Air Cargo." This is the headline today. How is it that we are -- we`re still not scanning our cargo? We`re still not looking for radioactive materials coming in.

HOEKSTRA: I think that`s one of the frustrations that you see here. Because as we`ve gone through this, I said, we`ve got a strategic direction in the intelligence community. But because we have not streamlined the decision-making process and because we still have bureaucratic infighting here in Washington, we`ve been unable to take the strategic direction and actually implement it and get it done. We know what we need to do, but the bureaucracy is standing in the way.

BECK: You know what, I have to tell you, that is the kind of change America is hoping for, is just do the right thing. Congressman, I appreciate your work on this September 11th for coming in. Thank you very much.

HOEKSTRA: Great. Thank you.

BECK: Let`s turn to another guy who was actually there on the ground in New York City back in 2001, former New York City police commissioner, Bernard Kerik.

Bernie, right at the GOP convention, Keith Olbermann started talking about how you should be drawn and quartered if you play footage of 9/11 on television. Nobody, it seems, in the media at least, wants to have anybody remember 9/11. Why should we see these images? Why should we remember it, more than just once a year?

BERNARD KERIK CHAIRMAN, THE KERIK GROUP: Well, we should remember it, because when we forget it, we`re going to get complacent. When we get complacent, they`re going to come back and do it all over again.

History has shown us back from -- take it back all the way to 1982, when they bombed the Beirut Embassy. These people have enormous patience. They can wait us out. They`ve done it over and over again. And I don`t want it to happen again in the future. I think people have to be reminded constantly what happened on that day, why, who the enemy is, and the threats we face in the future.

BECK: You know, I have to tell you, Bernie, I don`t know if you`ve seen this yet, but they did a poll around the world on who perpetrated 9/11. Down in Mexico, the citizens of Mexico, 33 percent say that Al Qaeda did it. 30 percent of the Mexican population say that America and the American government blew up the World Trade Center.

It`s a growing belief around the world. It`s already growing here in America. Are you worried about the threat from within? Not only with Islamic terror, but also nut jobs here in America?

KERIK: Well, the nut jobs are usually just that, and they`re nut jobs. I`m not as worried about that as I am the internal home-grown radical extremists.

You know, we`ve seen them in London. We`ve seen them in Europe. The last bombing of the Piccadilly Circus, two of them were born in the U.K.

We have a number of areas right now where we have children, kids that are being born in this country, sent of to madrassas in Pakistan and other areas. They`re indoctrinated with radical extremist beliefs and then brought back to this country. They`re American citizens. And they`re basically going to be chameleons embedded in our communities.

For us, that`s going to be a horrible thing if we don`t deal with it, and deal with it correctly, because there will be chameleons in our society waiting for somebody to pull the trigger.

BECK: They don`t have to be sent over off to Pakistan. Bernie, you and I both talked about it. We`ve got crazy Islamic extremists schools in our own country, in Virginia. And yet you still -- we reported on this over a year ago, and the year before that. And you still can`t get the school books into the hands of the State Department because they won`t do anything because the school is funded by Saudi Arabia; that`s in Virginia.

KERIK: Yes, I know. It`s a constant problem. And I think that`s why the focus has to be on what happened on 9/11, who the enemy was. And I think people in this country they`ve got to go after their legislators.

You know, we have to look at issues like that. We have to look at the immigration laws. We have to look at the ways that we`re dealing with enemy combatants right now to make sure that we don`t discharge someone out of Guantanamo Bay and they wind up in Afghanistan, killing our troops today as we sit here.

BECK: Bernie, what is the -- what is the one thing that you personally took away from -- on 9/11? When you think of this day seven years ago, what is the one thing that you take away?

KERIK: You know, there`s so many things from that day. But I think the biggest overall issue, or overall thing that I`d have to reflect on is the resilience and the unity of the country after we were attacked.

It was enormous. It was grand. It was -- it was something I had never seen before, but just as -- as united as we were then, the longer and the further we get away from September 11th, the more divided we have become with all of this political rhetoric. That stuff has got to stop.

BECK: Bernie, all my best. Thank you very much.

KERIK: Thank you.

BECK: Back in just a minute.

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BECK: Today seven years after 9/11, a new poll has been released asking the world who they believe is responsible for the attacks. The results are depressing.

The highest percentage of people who believe Al Qaeda is responsible was in Kenya with 77 percent. That is a significant amount higher than any of the supposedly refined and sophisticated European countries.

You might expect that a country like Egypt would have only 16 percent of their people thinking that Al Qaeda was responsible; 43 percent of Egyptians believe that it was the Jews.

What about closer to home or our oh, so helpful allies to the south, Mexico, who share a porous border with us are split on the issue; 33 percent think that it was Al Qaeda that was responsible for 9/11, 30 percent believe it was the United States government.

But it`s not just foreign countries. According to a Rasmussen Report Poll from May, 35 percent of Democrats now believe George W. Bush knew about the attacks in advance. How can that possibly be and I`m not saying it was just Democrat, I think it was Al Gore, that number would be reversed. The Republicans would be saying that. It`s a side effect of the extreme frustration with our government and it comes from both sides.

I played this clip earlier and it`s just another example of how low some people in our government will sink. It`s Representative Steve Cohen from Tennessee. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: Barack Obama was a community organizer like Jesus who our minister prayed about, Pontius Pilate was a governor.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: This is some of the most ridiculous things I`ve ever heard. First of all, why would you want to compare your candidate to Jesus? I mean, have you heard people making fun of him or anybody treating him like he`s a Messiah?

It`s a mystery to me. But Mr. Cohen, it is particularly agonizing coming to from you. Earlier this year, in his own congressional race, Cohen who is Jewish was attacked with this ridiculous flyer.

Look at this, Memphis Congressman Steve Cohen and the Jews hate Jesus. You`d think a guy who has had to deal with stupid attacks like this, horrific attacks in his career would try to make a political point to not compare someone with a guy who ordered the execution of Jesus. Are you serious?

We all that say we should never forget September 11th and it is true. Islamic extremism is one of the biggest threats posed to our nation and our way of life. But let`s not forget the promise that we made to ourselves and others that we were going to be united and we were going to be the people we deserved to be; the people who we really are.

From Los Angeles, good night, America.

END