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In the Arena
Crisis at Fukushima Nuclear Complex; Gadhafi Forces Back on Offensive
Aired March 29, 2011 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ELIOT SPITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, I'm Eliot Spitzer. Welcome to the program. E.D. Hill and Will Cain join us again tonight.
Guys, what are you working on?
E.D. HILL, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I'm going to speak to Democrat Dennis Kucinich. He has wanted to impeach the president but not anymore. Now he's got a new idea and he'll tell us what that is.
SPITZER: Can't wait. He's wanted to impeach every president.
All right. Will, what have you got for us?
WILL CAIN, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart is before the Supreme Court with the potential to be the -- a defendant in the largest class action in American history. You and I are going to talk about whether this makes any sense as a class action suit.
SPITZER: All right. Biggest company in America, biggest employer in America, now maybe the biggest lawsuit in America. Interesting stuff.
Now to our top story tonight. With everything happening in Libya, it's been days since we've talked about Japan. But I have to tell you tonight the situation there is perhaps more critical than it has been at any point since that terrible earthquake and tsunami almost three weeks ago.
Most experts now believe three of the six reactors have had partial meltdowns -- hear it again, three meltdowns. There are just 500 workers there and they're waging a heroic battle to limit the scope of this ongoing catastrophe. These workers are cut off from the world, working 12-hour shifts in hazardous, potentially lethal conditions.
They often sleep on leaded mats to protect them from radiation. There's little food available, some workers are said to be living on crackers.
Listen to this e-mail sent by one of the workers. "Crying is useless. If we're in hell now, all we can do is crawl up toward heaven." Many of these workers come from the region hardest hit by the earthquake and the tsunami. They've lost their own families. It's absolutely heartbreaking.
Meanwhile today we learn that the measures used to control the damage at the plant are themselves creating new hazards. Fresh water is being poured into the four damaged reactors, forcing thousands of gallons of now contaminated water to flow into runoff tunnels just 200 feet from the seashore. Radioactive elements have been detected in the seawater and in the soil near the plant.
The crisis may be just too much to handle even for Fukushima's heroic crew.
Let's get the very latest on this dangerous situation from CNN's Paula Hancocks in Tokyo.
Paula, first, I just don't get it, this food shortage. Explain to me how it can possibly be there isn't enough food for these workers who are putting their lives on the line.
PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Eliot, to be fair, it has surprised us all when we found out about this. What we're told by TEPCO is that they have two buses a day that come into the plant and bring supplies. Clearly it's not enough.
They are looking into it. But what we know at this point is that the workers have two meals a day, maybe crackers for breakfast and canned goods or rice for dinner. They have limited water. They can't have showers because there's not enough fresh water to have showers, which you'd think in that situation you would want to shower every day.
They're sleeping on the floor either in conference rooms, just 500 meters away from the reactors themselves. If there's no room in the conference room, then they'll sleep in a stairwell or outside the bathroom.
So conditions really are incredibly difficult for these workers. And remember, many of them have lost family members. They are disaster victims themselves.
In that e-mail that you mentioned, that person also mentioned later in the e-mail that, "We will deal with this crisis first, then we'll have to deal with the fact that we are disaster victims." Eliot?
SPITZER: The human toll here, the magnitude of this -- and we don't often enough mention 10,000 minimum who lost their lives in the earthquake and the tsunami. And the men and women who are inside the reactors, they're putting their lives on the line.
What is the radiation that they're being exposed to and how is that being controlled or tested for it?
HANCOCKS: Well, we're told at this point by officials that none of them have actually reached the limit. Of course, there that 250 millisieverts we keep hearing about. The limit that they can have in one year. Many of them may be are halfway to that point. What we're hearing from officials is that they know that they will have to swap people out.
They have to find other experienced workers to be able to swap them out and to be able to give them a break. And obviously when they hit that peak that they're not allowed anymore, they'll -- they won't be able to work in the area and there will be work to continue with.
So that's certainly a worry. They have radiation tests before and after every shift, we're told by TEPCO, so they monitor the situation very carefully. But they are actually living on the plant, as well. Three days on, one day off. And during that one day, they're bussed 20 -- 12 miles away and then they're allowed to have a shower, then they're allowed to have some rest -- Eliot.
SPITZER: You know, what is going on? Is the public in Japan beginning to distrust and lose confidence in both the government and TEPCO, the company that owns these reactors? Kind of upset at the way information has sort of seeped out of the -- both the government and the company?
It seems radiation is coming out of the plant faster than information is coming out of the government. Is the public getting upset about this?
HANCOCKS: They'd certainly like some more information. I think everybody would like more information. Of course, this doesn't just affect Japan. This could have implications around the world. And there have been some very unfortunate mistakes by TEPCO.
For example, on Sunday, they said they found radiation 10 million times the level it was supposed to be. Later that day, they then said, actually we meant 100,000 times. Now these kind of figures are very alarming for people here in Japan. Certainly it seems as though they're blaming TEPCO more than they're blaming the government because there is also a feeling that this is unprecedented.
A huge earthquake, an incredibly devastating tsunami, and then the nuclear crisis. So people really are pleased with the government and the way they're trying to deal with the tsunami victims but less pleased when it comes to the nuclear issue.
SPITZER: You know one of the things, Paula, that I was told by somebody who's reasonably close to that industry is that the government and the company there are almost one and the same. There really is no division. And the two are so merged in terms of how they function that there is no real regulatory oversight of the company.
And I would imagine in Japan that is going to be something that gets pushed and probed and poked after this crisis has abated.
All right. Paula, thanks so much for joining us.
All right. Joining us tonight with his expert analysis on the dangerous situation at the Fukushima Daiichi plant is CNN contributor Jim Walsh of MIT.
Jim, thanks so much for joining us tonight.
JIM WALSH, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Good to be with you, Eliot.
SPITZER: Jim, I just want to begin with sort of a question that I hope doesn't get people exercise -- or just the opposite. All this talk now about partial meltdown, what does that mean? If three of these plants have had a partial meltdown?
WALSH: I'm glad you're asking that question because we use meltdown in common language here in the U.S. We talk about a financial meltdown or a kid that has a meltdown. And it's associated with the worst possible outcome that you can imagine.
And really what we're talking about with respect to the nuclear rods -- the fuel rods in those reactors is really a range of different things. You know, imagine there's a candle and you warm the candle and the candle begins to deform, it gets to bend a little bit. Well, that's sort of a partial meltdown.
And then maybe after deforming and bending it melts a little bit. That's a partial meltdown. And then if it also melts and, you know, flows down as hot wax to the bottom of a dish, that's a full meltdown.
But there are a lot of degrees in between. But none of them are welcome. Let's be clear. None of it is good. But the worst part, a full meltdown, is some distance from a partial meltdown.
SPITZER: Now what does it then mean -- we have the statement today that three of the six reactors have had a partial meltdown. What does that mean in terms of long-term radiation leaks, the long- term capacity to clean up the site, and the risks that are attendant to the design of this type of nuclear reactor of which there are a fair number here in the United States?
WALSH: Yes, that's exactly the right question to ask, Eliot. And it turns on this. Does the containment vessel, that thick wall of concrete and steel that surrounds the reactor, is it whole? Does it maintain its integrity?
So if it does -- if it is whole, if it's -- if there are no cracks, if there are no breaches, then you can get a meltdown, a partial meltdown like you did at Three Mile Island. But that radioactivity is contained. If there are leaks, if there's a hole, a breach, and that radioactivity seeps out into the broader environment, that's the concern.
And unfortunately in the last several days -- I mean we've always suspected that there might be something going on here because of the isotopes we're seeing outside in the environment. But as of yesterday, we're getting these large amounts of water outside of unit two that seem to suggest that there is a crack in the containment vessel.
So that's the combination you don't want to have. You don't want to have a meltdown combined with a crack in the containment vessel, which is the last line of defense, because you don't want that material to seep out into the broader environment.
That's the danger. It's really if there is -- if there are problems with the containment vessel.
SPITZER: You know, and that's what we keep hearing. When these radiation spikes occur not only inside the facility themselves but farther and farther away, that indicates that somehow that radiation is going through, whether it's the pipes and the water, the water having absorbed the radiation, or the crack and it's getting into the soil, that the scope -- how far away from these reactors at the end of the day do people now think sort of people won't be able to live? There will not be any activity for 10, 20, 50 years? How far out does that circumference extend?
WALSH: Well, I think right now, you know, as with all things related to this crisis, Eliot, the real answer is we don't know. You know, in terms of high radiation levels, we're not seeing that except for occasional spots outside the broader reactor area.
We saw plutonium in the last 24 hours, plutonium that may have come from the reactor core. Plutonium that heavy metal, it doesn't travel very far. So I think the hope here is that most of the radiation is contained to the area immediately around the plant.
The worry is that either it gets down into the ground water and then travels outside of the plant area, or that there's a subsequent explosion, a steam explosion, something inside the reactor, and then that like Chernobyl would then carry up material up into the atmosphere and be spread by the atmosphere. But so far, it's localized, and the best hope is that it will remain localized.
SPITZER: You know, Jim, it's been going on three weeks now that we've been watching these events unfold. Tell me, is the trend line going in the right direction at this point?
I mean, we obviously get distracted by Libya and other crises around the world. But if we come back three weeks from now and say, have we solved this crisis, are we more likely to be fully resolved in terms of the risks at these plants?
WALSH: You know I wish I knew. I mean, I've been talking with my colleagues and saying, well, what is the endgame look like here? Because it seems like this is -- every day we have victories. Like today we had electricity is finally restored to all the control rooms in all four of the major reactors. Reactor units one, two, three, and four.
That's good. But then in the last two days we found plutonium in the immediate outside grounds which is not particularly dangerous as it currently stands, but signals that there's a problem with stuff leaking out and this radioactive water that's showing up in trenches and also in the basements at the facility.
So every day is pluses and minuses. And you don't know what's going to happen next. You would like to think that we're on a generally -- you know, generally moving towards managing this, a little better every day. That something bad doesn't happen. But every day there seems to be a new puzzle, and it's not clear how it's going to end. So that's why there's uncertainty.
SPITZER: All right. Jim Walsh, thank you for sharing that analysis with us.
Coming up, President Obama says the noose is tightening around Gadhafi, but that's not how it looked on the ground today in Libya. A live report from there coming right up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: A day after President Obama declared we, quote, "stopped Gadhafi's deadly advances," the Libyan dictator is back on the offensive. In what is turning into a lethal see-saw civil war, Gadhafi's forces have recaptured the momentum and are marching east once again.
Gadhafi forces took back the city of Bin Jawad and then pushed the rebels to the outskirts of nearby Ras Lanuf. This is the fourth time in the past month the cities have changed hands.
With us to discuss the latest developments is international correspondent Arwa Damon from rebel-controlled Ajdabiya.
Arwa, you talked with some of the opposition fighters. What did they tell you about what's going on there?
ARWA DAMON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, what they've been describing is more of a street-to-street battle taking place. They say that they were pushed out of Bin Jawad because of the heavy bombardment, artillery tanks, rockets by Gadhafi's forces. But also because they say they were being fired on from within Bin Jawad itself.
They were caught up in an intense street-to-street fight. They said they held their ground for around seven hours but could not hold it any longer. They then retreated to Ras Lanuf where again they came under heavy artillery bombardment. They tried firing back with the weapons that they have using rocket-propelled grenades, artillery, multi-barrel rocket launders.
But the bottom line is they don't have the equipment, the weaponry, or the military expertise to be able to sustain this for very long. And this most certainly is a turn in momentum in what we have been seeing taking place here.
We saw the opposition pushing westward fairly easily thanks to those airstrikes, but then yesterday they hit the tribal lands that are very pro-Gadhafi around his hometown of Sirte.
And that is where they began to come across resistance, not just by Gadhafi's military, Eliot, but by residents who they said were armed by Gadhafi and were willing to stand up and fight for him. And this most certainly is a very, very difficult change in dynamics here for the opposition.
SPITZER: Well, Arwa, what are the opposition forces saying? Do they believe that if the airstrikes resumed with the intensity they've been at in prior days, that would shift the momentum back in their favor? Or do they say -- see this as a much more problematic realty that they simply won't be able to push back into parts of Libya which are, in fact, loyal to Gadhafi?
DAMON: Well, Eliot, the opposition is heavily reliant on those airstrikes, and the minute we see them retreating, a number of fighters will flow past us and ask why the coalition isn't bombing Gadhafi's positions. And so they do believe that if the airstrikes continue to strike Gadhafi's military positions, they will be able to continue to advance because at the end of the day, these opposition fighters, they're not a military force.
They don't have training. They don't even wear body armor. They hardly know how to handle their weapons with the necessary discipline. They lack basic military concepts of command and control. And they most certainly lack the capability to be able to put together a cohesive military strategy to be able to take on the type of military machine that Gadhafi has at his disposal.
And so yes, they do firmly believe that the airstrikes need to continue with that same intensity. And if they don't, they do realize that they will continue to lose ground as we have been seeing them lose ground.
But the other issue, too, is that when they were moving westward initially, they were moving through friendly territory. The cities and towns were either pro-opposition or where the opposition in and of themselves. That, of course, changed once they hit areas where residents supported Gadhafi.
And that's another issue they're going to have to deal with because they cannot expect nor do they want airstrikes to be hitting civilian locations. But this could very well be turning into the sort of street-to-street battle where the opposition is pitted against Gadhafi loyalists, civilians who are armed, and Gadhafi's military.
SPITZER: All right. Thank you, Arwa, for that take on what's going on over there. Stay safe. And we'll talk to you more later on.
Now to the president. In several interviews today he said he doesn't rule out arming the Libyan rebels, and he's confident Gadhafi will ultimately step down.
Let's bring in show regular James Traub.
At what point does this intervention run its course? Do we need to change strategy? Just last night we heard sort of the legal and philosophical foundation for it. Today we're seeing the gritty reality of a war that is at best a seesaw battle.
JAMES TRAUB, CONTRIBUTING WRITER, NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE: Yes, I think Sirte, as your reporter said, is going to be the big problem because the military -- the coalition bombing force is not going to be able to obviously -- as she said, bomb civilians in Sirte. And so until now, the civilians have been the victims of Gadhafi's forces. In a place like Sirte, the civilians are part of Gadhafi's forces.
If you can't bomb that city, it's going to be very hard to see how the rebels are going to take the city. If the rebels can't take the city, they won't be able to move on to Tripoli. So it could be at that point that you're going to say, all right, what else can be done not in terms of the political and diplomatic issues that Obama talked about last night but in terms of other military measures like arming the rebels. That's where the issue may arise.
SPITZER: And that, of course, is what the president was hinting at today saying we would consider arming the rebels, something we have not yet done, at least to public knowledge.
Would that fundamentally change the dynamics, though? Because as you just said in Sirte you have folks who are loyal to Gadhafi. I know we sort of think that's an impossibility but the reality is that tribal loyalties are there.
TRAUB: Sure.
SPITZER: And he is -- you know, he's been the -- the ruler for 42 years. Therefore, there are some folks who are loyal to him.
TRAUB: Right.
SPITZER: What happens then when we begin to hit that stalemate? How does President Obama then navigate through that difficult negotiation?
TRAUB: OK. Look, there are obviously other things going on at the same time. We are bombing barracks in Tripoli. We have ships that are bombing communications and air defense and so forth. So I think the hope has to be that over time military action, not just through the form of the direct bombing of those cities but also other acts over time will sap the will of the military and then I think the hope is people will start peeling off.
Because as you point out, the mere act of arming those folks is going to help. But if you have people who have no idea what the hell they're doing, giving them a bigger gun is not going to solve the problem. So they need to get defections from Gadhafi's army which began happening but essentially stopped happening once the tide has turned over the course of the last two weeks.
SPITZER: Well, you just said the critical thing. As the tide turns the likelihood of defection is the likelihood of people peeling off from the Gadhafi loyalist camp must diminish. And I think the confidence that certainly was demonstrated by the president today in his words in a number of interviews, and Secretary of State Clinton as well who talks about those closest to Gadhafi perhaps defecting, I think everybody is waiting for that magic moment to occur.
But as the -- as the warfare tilts in favor of Gadhafi, you just have to think less likely than more likely.
TRAUB: Yes.
SPITZER: So what changes this dynamic?
TRAUB: And I think the other question you have to ask is since Obama made the point in his speech last night that the U.N. Security Council resolution does not give the coalition the right to engage in regime change, but of humanitarian protection, what's going to happen when the coalition bombing looks more and more like it has nothing to do with humanitarian protection?
Is that going to drive the coalition apart? And is Obama going to have to pull back because the Germans, the Turks, even the Arabs say, no, no, that's not what we had in mind, that's too aggressive?
SPITZER: Look, I think the idea all along has been that the legal phrasing of the U.N. resolution was elastic enough so that the coalition could do enough to make it look like it was helping civilians but realistically it was helping the military advance of the opposition forces. The two would converge, Gadhafi would fall, and who would be in the position to say --
TRAUB: Right.
SPITZER: -- you had exceeded the bounds of the U.S.
TRAUB: Right. But in Sirte -- it's in Sirte where you could see that conflict. That is, there you can't bomb the civilians, can you? Because the civilians are the very people you're opposing, but you're supposed to be there in order to defend them. So if Sirte turns into a battleground, a fundamental battleground, if the rebels even get back to Sirte, then the question of what the allies can do in order to weaken the Libyan -- Gadhafi supporters could seriously provoke tension inside the coalition.
SPITZER: That moment, unfortunately, is quickly approaching. It's going to be a fascinating and problematic moment.
All right. James Traub, as always, thank you so much.
TRAUB: Thanks.
SPITZER: Coming up, another crucial issue President Obama needs to focus on. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: A betrayal of who we are. Last night President Obama said that if the United States did not act in Libya it would be a betrayal of who we are. Strong words, but do they answer critics who say that our endgame and mission in Libya remain unclear?
Joining me now to discuss this and some other issues as well, Nick Gillespie, editor in chief of Reason.com, and Katrina Vanden Heuvel, editor and publisher of "The Nation." All right, welcome to you both.
All right, Nick, I'll give you the first shot. Did the president persuade you last night that there was a moral reason to be there?
NICK GILLESPIE, EDITOR IN CHIEF, REASON.COM: No. There is a moral case to be made that you want to help people who are going to be massacred. That has very little if nothing to do with American foreign policy or with that action or the role that the U.S. took in this action.
I think it was a disastrous speech, and unfortunately among other things, it extends the period where America does not have a serious conversation about foreign policy or creates a matrix that guides our decision-making of where do we go in and where do we stay out, and why, for how long, et cetera.
SPITZER: Look, Katrina, you're kind of at the other end of the political spectrum from Nick. And there's a harsh realism in what Nick is saying. Morality is not our foreign policy. Do you agree with Nick on this?
KATRINA VANDEN HEUVEL, EDITOR AND PUBLISHER, THE NATION: Well, I certainly agree with Nick that we need a new matrix for our foreign policy. I think there's a terrible disconnect between the national security establishment in this country and the people on many levels.
But I do think that there is a role for protection of civilians. I think there's a role for values in our foreign policy. I'm not a raw realist, I'm also a liberal internationalists and I believe that the U.N. Security Council mandate was an important one to get.
But we have exceeded in many ways that U.N. security mandate and the president did not go to the Congress, which I also think was important. And last night he vowed to -- no ground troops. He also spoke of the cost and benefits --
GILLESPIE: And (INAUDIBLE). Yes.
VANDEN HEUVEL: But we -- the unintended consequences of this and the danger for the region which is unspoken, which is we see an Arab awakening. He spoke of the need to intervene in order to protect that awakening. But the narrative has been the Arab people --
GILLESPIE: Yes.
VANDEN HEUVEL: -- doing their own evolution.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: But let me --
GILLESPIE: Yes.
VANDEN HEUVEL: And this could --
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: Give me one second. Two skeptics from either side of the political spectrum.
GILLESPIE: Right.
SPITZER: Is this that rare moment where those in the center are converging and saying, look, both political parties, sort of left center, right center, saying we got the U.N., there's an international mandate. This is a moral purpose to keep a madman, Gadhafi, from --
GILLESPIE: Yes, but you know, first off, it's far from clear that we're going to prevent more slaughter. It's far from clear in Serbia, you know, that the no-fly zone which is -- has always talked about in this kind of pillowy, soft language of peaceful patrolling.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Yes.
GILLESPIE: And in fact, it's not clear that the no-fly zones were determinative in Yugoslavia or in Serbia --
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: But wouldn't that give (INAUDIBLE) for more intervention --
GILLESPIE: No. No, it wouldn't. Actually what it would be is that the reason why Milosevic got kicked out of Serbia is because the people rose up. The people in Libya were rising up, people throughout the Arab world are rising up. Why turn it into an American issue?
VANDEN HEUVEL: We are -- but we are in danger now of possibly being involved in another war, third war in a Muslim country. An occupation this country cannot afford. There have to be other ways to craft humanitarian intervention. The U.N. Security Council could play a role, but for the moment, Eliot -- and goes back to Nick's point about the need for national security thinking -- we have a humanitarian intervention concept, responsibility to protect. That is well developed.
We do not have the institutions.
(CROSSTALK)
VANDEN HEUVEL: The capacity to protect civilians in a way without a hyper-militarized, as we're seeing, hyper-militarized --
SPITZER: Can I say something --
VANDEN HEUVEL: Environment.
SPITZER: I thought you guys -- you guys are fighting with each other.
GILLESPIE: No, no.
SPITZER: This isn't fair, I thought -- why am I doing the defending of the morality of the U.S. foreign --
VANDEN HEUVEL: But this is interesting. No, no, no.
(CROSSTALK)
GILLESPIE: What is the morality? Because what you're saying is OK, what we're going to do is we're going to go in and drop a bunch of bombs and then everything will be fine. That's not the way that it works. And I would agree that there's room for morality --
VANDEN HEUVEL: There is.
GILLESPIE: -- in foreign policy. This ain't moral, and it's also -- it extends Bush's -- you know Bush's record of totally, you know, grabbing executive power. Why did Obama -- if he had a moral case to make, why didn't he make it to Congress?
VANDEN HEUVEL: I don't -- that's fair. But I do think last night he tried to make the moral case --
GILLESPIE: Yes, afterwards. Come on. We --
VANDEN HEUVEL: And you know what? Let's be honest.
(CROSSTALK)
VANDEN HEUVEL: You know what the doctrine of Obama -- you know what the Obama doctrine is right now? It's an interesting hybrid of humanitarian intervention meets realism.
GILLESPIE: Yes.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Because he's talking about using American force, both for national interest and using creative international force on behalf of morality.
SPITZER: Let's ban the use of the word doctrine.
GILLESPIE: Right.
SPITZER: Doctrines are after the fact, but they're not --
GILLESPIE: Obama's not talking about war, which is another part that stinks about this. It's like call a spade a spade. Call -- you know, call a lipstick with pig whatever. You know, it's like this is a war. You're dropping bombs, you're adding troops --
SPITZER: I'm with you. It's a war. He probably should have gone to Congress, although there hasn't been a declaration of war since 1942.
GILLESPIE: No, no, no, it's true.
VANDEN HEUVEL: I know.
GILLESPIE: But he could have gotten an authorization for it. SPITZER: You mention the Arab awakening.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Yes.
SPITZER: There is something genuine out there sweeping North Africa and the Middle East.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Absolutely. Tunisia.
SPITZER: Had we let Gadhafi reassert control, would this not have sent a message to Assad, to the other autocrats who are ruthless? You can get away with it -- and would that not have put us on the wrong side of history?
VANDEN HEUVEL: Well, you know what? You raise -- listen, television isn't a good complexity. I don't know the answer to that, but the other answer is that we are -- the West has intervened now in a region where we have the possibility of realigning our foreign policy so it's not aligned with autocracies and repressive military apparatuses, but is with a new democratic change in the region. And I think that we could risk endangering the narrative. We have seen people in the Arab world rising up to reclaim their destiny.
GILLESPIE: You know what, we've got the Arab League to say yes, we're with you until you actually start doing something.
VANDEN HEUVEL: The day after they protested.
GILLESPIE: Yes. You know, and don't expect the U.N. to follow through on various things in a way that aligns with American interests. Part of the problem is you go after Gadhafi, you start bombing. Then other autocrats say, hey, you know what, I'm trying to give up power here but the U.S. is going to bomb me anyway.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Yes.
GILLESPIE: So I'm going to go for broke.
SPITZER: No, this is not an easy negotiation --
GILLESPIE: I think it should point out in a lot of different ways.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Well, you know, now we need to mediate a way out. The Italians are talking about finding a way out. You know what's going to happen -- I spoke to one expert on this region today, and he say you're going to have to see a lot of amnestying of people around Gadhafi if you want to see a transition and a way forward that might emerge in some democratic system of governance. You're not going to see Jeffersonian Democrats, but allow the people of Libya to control their destiny, find a way out. If America has troops on the ground or the international coalition and we're in an occupation and a quagmire, this country's war weary -- this country is war weary, Eliot. We need a way to find protection of civilians without occupation.
SPITZER: I agree with much of this. We are war weary. Putting troops on the ground, and the president has said specifically we won't. Probably would be counterproductive at this point, which s is why the idea of air power, giving the insurgents the opposition enough to get over the top and get rid of Gadhafi.
GILLESPIE: You're buying into, you know, military hype that this stuff is all surgical, it's easy to do.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Yes.
GILLESPIE: You know, all sorts of things go wrong immediately.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Unintended consequences.
GILLESPIE: And then there's the intended ones. Because you're telling me that Obama last night -- why we're pretending that he was being honest with us like he's different than every other president. We're not putting ground troops in, ground troops are in today.
You know, come on. Do --
SPITZER: Well, look --
GILLESPIE: Was LBJ not, you know, not hosing us?
SPITZER: I don't want anybody to think I am not obviously fully aware of the stark realities of the difficulties. On the other hand, I hear nihilism in what you're saying --
GILLESPIE: What is nihilism? You know, we send transports to bring people out of Libya. You know, don't say it's nihilist because we invade everywhere we say that there's humanitarian needs.
SPITZER: I'm with you when it comes to Afghanistan and Iraq. This one I think had a different role.
VANDEN HEUVEL: We do need -- we do need -- we do need to find a way to address humanitarian needs in the context of our national security.
GILLESPIE: Yes.
VANDEN HEUVEL: The danger is also NATO. NATO is playing such a key role, and the president is trying to say America's stepping back. But who is the pre-eminent power in NATO? Which country has the capacity?
GILLESPIE: NATO --
VANDEN HEUVEL: So there are a lot of things. The key is we find a way out and that we bring back the ability to reinvest in our country. I'm not an isolationist, but we need nation-building at home, Eliot, while we find a way in the international coalition to protect civilian rights.
GILLESPIE: I think the real question is that we don't need to find a way out. We need to find a way not to get into these situations until you have the backing of the American people, until you've made your case. And, you know, in the Cold War there was a consensus. It's not one that I agreed with. And I suspect that the nation didn't either for different reasons. But there was a consensus, it was formed and hashed out over decades and over -- after many years -- we have not done that. Obama has not done that.
SPITZER: Here's what I would say about that. I think the national consensus will be with the president after the speech and after we hear more. The public follows the president on foreign policy when a speech such as last night is delivered. It is harder now in the midst of the war.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Yes.
SPITZER: But I think he will get the public --
VANDEN HEUVEL: I saw a poll -- I saw a poll just coming here. A majority support protection of civilians, a vast majority very worried about a quagmire.
SPITZER: Sure. Well, look, after Afghanistan, after Iraq, how can you not be?
VANDEN HEUVEL: And after Iraq, yes.
SPITZER: What we have not gotten to is the budget issues that are implicated by this and, of course, that we need to --
VANDEN HEUVEL: Terrible implications.
SPITZER: So I hope you guys will come back. We'll continue that. Obviously there's a possible government shutdown --
GILLESPIE: All I can say is I think it will be a beautiful day when the Pentagon has enough money to bomb all the schools having bake sales.
SPITZER: All right. Nick's comment sardonic and we take it as sardonic not nihilist when you say that. All right.
VANDEN HEUVEL: We need to end this.
SPITZER: Katrina, Nick, thank you so much for being here.
VANDEN HEUVEL: Take care.
SPITZER: All right.
Coming up next, the world's largest retailer, the nation's highest court, justices will decide if a giant discrimination suit against Wal-Mart can go forward. We'll explain what's at stake.
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SPITZER: There's an epic battle being waged before the Supreme Court right now over whether or not to allow the largest class-action suit in history to go forward. The case pits what could be 1.5 million women against Wal-Mart, the largest employer in the country. The women claim Wal-Mart systematically denied them promotions and equal way.
Will Cain is here with me now. We're joined by the lead plaintiff, Betty Dukes and Joseph Sellers, lead attorney arguing the case.
Welcome to both of you, to all of you. Betty, let me start with you. Tell us what happened that led you to file a lawsuit against Wal-Mart. Tell us quickly. This is TV. We don't need the whole complaint. Tell us what drove you to do this.
BETTY DUKES, PLAINTIFF, DUKES V. WAL-MART STORES, INC.: Well, back in 2001, I did file the lawsuit against Wal-Mart because prior to that in recent years I had suffered a disparity of treatment in lack of promotion for a position as well as pay. And I did see a consistency that the men in my store was more favored in open positions that became available.
SPITZER: All right. Now, Joe, you had your day in court today arguing before the Supreme Court. Every lawyer's dream come true. But let me ask you one question about it -- you acknowledge, am I correct, that there is no policy of discrimination at Wal-Mart. Rather, you're saying there were people, managers at every store who discriminated individually, and yet you're saying you want the company to be held liable. You only want one trial. What about the notion of individual justice where one person has to prove he or she was actually discriminated against?
JOSEPH SELLERS, LEAD ATTORNEY, DUKES V. WAL-MART STORES, INC.: This case, Eliot, is based on a theory of discrimination that doesn't require proof of discrimination individually because we found a pattern here of discrimination that extends throughout the company. We found evidence of women being underpaid compared to men in every single division in which the company does business in this country.
WILL CAIN, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Joe, Will Cain here. I want to be real clear about the debate. The debate is not whether or not there has been discrimination at any of the 3,400 Wal-Mart stores in the nation. It's about -- Miss Dukes herself may have been discriminated against. The Wal-Mart acknowledges that some of these women have been. This case is about whether or not the 1.5 million women that you brought together for a class action have a common discriminatory experience.
Now, I'm just real curious about this. You suggest there's a policy and culture, the Wal-Mart way that has created a systemic discriminatory environment. Eliot asked if there was a specific policy, you didn't give one. But you also argue that each of the store managers have too much discrimination, that there is no policy and they're able to do whatever they want, and that's led to discriminatory environment. It's almost as though you're arguing against yourself, that there's no need for opposing counsel. How do you reconcile your two arguments? SELLERS: We reconcile our arguments the same way Wal-Mart's personnel policies operate. Wal-Mart gives its store managers and other managers a lot of discretion in making pay and promotion decisions. And at the same time, through the Wal-Mart way, it has a strong corporate culture in which it inserts gender stereotypes adverse to women. So for instance, in Wal-Mart training program that every manager must complete in order to become a manager at Wal-Mart, they ask a question that's so frequently asked that it's now one of the frequently asked questions -- why are there so few women in management. And the response provided, the standard response is because men are more aggressive in seeking advancement. That's the lesson they give to every Wal-Mart manager. And when those managers are considering whether to promote women, that's the kind of message they rely on.
SPITZER: Well, Joe, let me ask this question -- in my lawyering days, a deep believer in the class-action suit as a way to vindicate rights of people individually, can't go to court to pursue remedies for moments when they feel they've been discriminated against, for instance. Tell us what is the disparity, the wage disparity that you say is statistically shown between men and women or women and men at Wal-Mart and how does that compare to wage disparities elsewhere throughout the economy?
SELLERS: I've been practicing civil rights law for 30 years. I have never seen a case that where the wage disparities are as significant and consistent adverse to women as they are here. In every single of the 41 divisions in which this company does business in this country, women are underpaid compared to men who are doing the same work at the same stores at the same time. Even though women on average have higher performance and longer seniority, they're still underpaid compared to men in every one of its divisions.
SPITZER: All right. Joe Sellers, Betty Dukes, thank you for staying with us and putting this before us. It's going to be a tough case, an important one for the Supreme Court to resolve. And here to help us is CNN's senior legal analyst, Jeff Toobin, who is at the Supreme Court today.
First, Jeff, why is this case so important? The entire business community has wrapped its arms around Wal-Mart's perspective. And then what do you make of how the Supreme Court reacted?
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SR. LEGAL ANALYST: Well, it's important simply because of the money. When you have 1.5 million potential plaintiffs, all of whom are looking at at least multiple thousand dollars in awards, even a company of Wal-Mart's size is at some risk. And, of course, if women can sue Wal-Mart, women can sue other big companies. So there is a very concerted effort on the behalf of the Chamber of Commerce, on behalf of the American business community to take Wal-Mart's side in this case.
SPITZER: How do you read the Supreme Court?
TOOBIN: It was a good day for Wal-Mart today. I thought Wal- Mart really looked like a winner in that courtroom. Not surprisingly, a conservative Supreme Court that tends to side with defendants in civil rights cases, in plaintiffs' litigation. As always in the current Supreme Court, you look at Anthony Kennedy because he is so often the swing vote, and Kennedy asked a question -- Kennedy expressed a discomfort about the issue that Will mentioned which was how do you have a policy on one hand which at least on its explicit terms says no discrimination, and lots of discretion of individual managers who may or may not discriminate? The paradox of an overall policy and all that discretion was hard for him to say you can have one trial with all those plaintiffs in one case.
CAIN: And if Kennedy is the indicator, as you said, it doesn't look good for the plaintiffs. It seems like the defendants' answers are, Jeff, statistics. Look, if there's all these women that there's disparity in what they make versus men, and it's prima facie evidence of discrimination. It's as though the only answer could be discrimination.
TOOBIN: Well, the plaintiffs are -- I think you said defendants. The plaintiffs are relying very heavily on statistics.
CAIN: Right.
TOOBIN: And several justices seem troubled by that. I mean, there are very good statistics for the plaintiffs here. You have 80 percent of the hourly workers at Wal-Mart are women. Thirty-three percent of the management are women.
CAIN: Right.
TOOBIN: The financial disparities, you just heard about. But the law especially currently is not just discrimination in result, you have to find discrimination in fact. You have to find discrimination against these plaintiffs.
SPITZER: There's another point here, will. I think we should clarify. Not too sound too wonky into lawyering, this is a case at the first stages. The question is can they go to trial. Can they try to prove their case?
Statistics, as Jeff said using the legal words, they pay a lot of money in law school to learn prima facie. You can begin your case on the statistics, then you have something else down the road. But the questions is can they use the statistics? And just so it's clear, Justice Ginsburg, and I just want to quote what she said today. "The company gets reports month after month showing that women are disproportionately passed over for promotion and there's a pay gap between men and women doing the same job. She clearly was sympathetic to the plaintiffs here.
TOOBIN: That's right. And one real difficulty that Joe Sellers had I think -- and it seemed almost unfair -- is that this is such a beginning stage of this stage. I mean, it's 10 years old and the legal system moves slowly. But it was like the justices saying, well, why haven't you proved your case yet? All he's asking is to be able to make this case, much less to make -- you know, much less to have proved it at this point. CAIN: The point is also that the plaintiffs are trying to use statistics to show that all these women had a common discriminatory experience. And that is tough to swallow.
SPITZER: Well, to do that at the first stage of the pleading anyway. This is a monumental case. Jeff Toobin, Will Cain, thank you.
When we come back, one of the president's biggest critics on Libya and why he did not like what he heard last night. We'll tell you.
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SPITZER: Not everyone heard what they wanted from President Obama last night when he spoke to the nation about our mission in Libya, especially Dennis Kucinich, one of the leading antiwar voices in Congress. E.D. has more on this now -- E.D.
E.D. HILL, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Yes. Well, Congressman Kucinich has been a loud voice of dissent on Libya. He and a bipartisan coalition are now trying to block funding America's part in the NATO military mission there. He's even said that the president committed an impeachable offense in attacking Libya. He joins us now live from Washington.
Congressman, thanks for being with us.
REP. DENNIS KUCINICH (D), OHIO: Good evening.
HILL: You know, Eliot was alluding to this earlier in the program. And I find it interesting, as well, that you've got Republicans and Democrats both in support of the efforts in Libya and in opposition to it, you know, coming together in these weird groups. Why do you think that is?
KUCINICH: Well, in the case of the coalition that we put together, we are speaking to the fact that the president has exceeded the constitutional authority of his office. And it's so important to understand what's happened here. It's not an academic argument. What the president has done is to drive a stake into the heart of representative government by declaring that he has the executive privilege to wage war whenever he wants. That is not a small matter. The whole basis of our government, a representative government, is that Congress is elected by the people. The president's elected through the electoral college and this action that he's taken is very dangerous constitutionally.
HILL: Yes. Specifically, the war powers resolution says that the president has the power in a national emergency created by an attack on the U.S., its territories, possessions, that sort of thing. But last night the president said, no, even when America's not directly threatened. So that does seem to signify --
KUCINICH: The Obama doctrine goes beyond, goes beyond the constitution, goes beyond the war powers act, goes beyond the U.N. mandate, goes beyond the purpose of NATO. We're in a brave new world of military action here.
HILL: Let me ask you about the NATO resolution because, you know, last week we had heard that America's -- America's role was going to be scaled back within days if not, you know, very soon within a couple of weeks. Yet, over the weekend we saw especially with the air forces that we used a much bigger presence with the A-10s and the AC -- I think it's 130s, do you think that we are now overstepping that initial mission?
KUCINICH: Well, look, the news today, 2,200 Marines and sailors are heading for Moorhead, North Carolina, today off the coast of Libya, to go to an area off the coast of Libya. We have air assets there, naval assets. We have to ask ourselves, what's this all about? Why is it?
Of course, we're overstepping the mission. And not only that, there's another question that comes into play -- who is NATO? NATO essentially has interposed itself above the U.N. because if you read the U.N. resolution and I would urge to do so if you haven't already done it --
HILL: I have.
KUCINICH: Well, then you didn't see NATO mentioned at all. So how does NATO get in this? And you know what NATO stands for, North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Now look, unless you're geographically challenged, the North Atlantic doesn't include the Gulf of Sidra, doesn't include the border of the Afghanistan-China border. But NATO's there. We've got another problem to look at here which is NATO, which frankly, you know, the United States pays 25 percent of the military cost --
HILL: Right. So --
KUCINICH: But NATO is a force into itself.
HILL: You know, you mentioned China, and I did find it interesting because a lot has been made about this -- this U.N. resolution that was passed.
Well, there wasn't anybody voting no, but there were five big countries that abstained from voting because they said, well, the Arab League is on board so we won't vote no, we'll just kind of step back. And those were, you know, China, India, Germany even. And many of the reasons they gave were that they weren't sure about this mission, where it was clear, where it could easily be overstepped. If we saw and the president says this, it was such a clear-cut humanitarian issue to stop being a butcher, why didn't everybody else see it that way?
KUCINICH: Well, you're right on a couple counts here. First of all, Brazil, Russia, India, China and Germany all abstained for the reasons that -- that you set forth. Now, when we're talking about humanitarian war, there's an oxymoron there. We have to be careful of -- as we pursue it. Because inevitably it's going to mean that these very people that we claim we're concerned about are going to get hurt. Because as we -- as NATO continues to provide air cover for the rebels when they get into pro-Gadhafi territory --
HILL: Right.
KUCINICH: -- its' inevitable that there's going to be a loss of life. It's going to happen.
HILL: And, Representative, we started seeing the Arab League start complaining about that the very first day of action.
Congressman, thank you very much for being with us.
KUCINICH: Thank you.
HILL: All right -- Eliot.
SPITZER: All right. Thank you, E.D.
We'll be right back.
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SPITZER: All right. Back with E.D. and Will. Will, last night, we heard a speech from the president and suddenly we're hearing about an Obama doctrine. Do you know what it is and do you like it?
CAIN: I could try to be cute but no, I don't, and you don't, and E.D. doesn't. Because you know what --
SPITZER: You don't know what it is, or you don't like it?
CAIN: No, I don't know what it is. Because you know what, in the end, President Obama doesn't know what it is. There is no Obama doctrine. There is no case for this war.
I find it fascinating that you had Nick Gillespie and Katrina Vanden Heuvel, you have me and Dennis Kucinich, people from across the ideological spectrum that cannot make sense of this. That does not as you suggested make it centrist.
HILL: To me, it is the Bush doctrine with a lack of clarity.
SPITZER: Well, you know what, I think there's an element to both of what you're saying. The reality is all doctrines are really made after the fact to justify what we're doing. This one makes sense. We'll talk more about it in the days ahead.
E.D., Will, thanks so much.
"PIERS MORGAN TONIGHT" starts right now.
