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CNN Live At Daybreak

Should Airport Security Personnel be Federal Employees?; Just How is President Bush Handling Crisis?

Aired October 29, 2001 - 08:36   ET

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

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Time now for "Sound Off" on the issue of airport security. The House takes up the subject this week. Divided over whether airport security employees should be federalized, the president wants those workers to stay in the private sector, and the White House is sending signals, if the president doesn't like the results, he'll issue his own executive orders. The outcome will likely affect everyone who flies.

And today on "Sound Off," should airport security personnel be federal employees?

And with us to debate both sides vigorously, because it's Monday morning and everybody is feeling wide aware are Rich Lowry, editor of "The National Review," who says a private system means more accountability, and in Washington, Michelle Cottle, senior editor of "The New Republic." Cottle argues for federalizing airport security, saying the government should protect its citizens.

Good to see the two of you. Welcome.

MICHELLE COTTLE, "THE NEW REPUBLIC": Good morning.

RICH LOWRY, "THE NATIONAL REVIEW": Good morning.

So, Michelle, what is your strongest argument about privatizing?

COTTLE: I'm arguing for not privatizing. I'm saying that the current system, what we've been working with all these years, we've seen how this work. You wind up with people who are poorly paid, who don't know what they're doing, and just have no idea what to look for in these situations.

ZAHN: Rich Lowry.

LOWRY: Well, I think, Paula, the important thing here is to have a workforce that is accountable, and if something goes wrong, can be held accountable and even fired, and Europe and Israel have about a 20-year jump on the U.S. in dealing with these sort of problems. They've had problems with hijackings, much more serious problems with hijackings, for a longer time, and what they've found is that it makes no sense to have the government set the minimal standards, and then private company come in and reach the goal and reach the objective that the government sets. ZAHN: All right. So, Michelle, what is your specific objection to into kind of framework?

COTTLE: Well, it's wonderful if it is going to work. Unfortunately, I still think that the profit motive is going to, down the road, undermine any kind of effort, and you also have the issue what we have now. You have high turnover in these airports. I mean, yes, you can argue that there's a problem if you have federal tenure and people aren't concerned about always being fired. But what you have now is airports can't keep people on the job. More than 100 percent turnover in a year? That's no way to run this either.

ZAHN: But, Michelle, you no doubt heard the argument for civil service rules, that if you have a complaint against someone, that they might be booted upstairs and do worse damage in another department.

Do you recognize that that is a problem?

COTTLE: I certainly recognize that this is a problem in a lot of different areas in the government, but you have to look at your alternatives, and the alternatives that we're working with are where you have people who aren't on the job for more than two weeks, and they're off doing something else, and you're constantly having to retrain people. And, yes, the federal workforce offers a certain degree of security help people get in these jobs, and obviously, work on not to have bureaucratic the tenure problem. But what are our alternatives here?

ZAHN: Rich, what are our alternatives? And explain to us why you think having these employees in the private sector will make them perform any better.

LOWRY: Well, the private sector is good at two things. One, it's good at innovating and finding new ways to do things, which would be a nice feature to have here. They are also good at holding people accountable, and the fact is, if Michelle's argument held, Israel would be totally insecure, because there airports would be totally unsafe, because all these airport security workers in Israel are not government employees. The same would hold for Europe. You know, socialist Europe, 85-95 percent of airport security workers work for private firms. So this is the model that's worked all over the world. And look, Michelle is right, it is a problem having airport security be the airlines's responsibility, because they do have a conflict of interest. They're going to want to cut costs, but that's why the House bill take it out of their hands.

But also take it out of the FAA's hands, which has done a great job here. Congress is badgering the FAA for five years to set some minimal security standards, and it never did it. So clearly, we need a new system, but we don't need to federalize the whole thing.

ZAHN: Michelle, why don't you come back to the point that Rich just responded to about the profit margins of airlines, and I think -- I don't have your exact words here, but I took a note here, that your fear is, as they become more concerned about profits, they will become less concerned about this security system in place. Take that a step further. What is your chief concern?

COTTLE: Well, that's always going to be an issue. I mean, they're getting a huge bailout from the federal government, and already they're complaining about certain security measures that they were making noises earlier, that if they got the bailout they would take, like screening luggage or handling issues like that, I mean, it's just the nature of the beast. The airlines run on a tight margin the time. They're constantly facing bankruptcy, and there were problems with certain airlines right before they got this bailout. Without this bailout, some of the airlines were in serious trouble.

So you know, you're always facing these issues, and the federal government, if we don't federalize, you are still going to have to have a huge degree of oversight, maybe you don't necessarily make it federal, but if you're going to have private companies, you are going to have to have the government watching really, really closely, to make sure that they are not cutting corners.

ZAHN: I don't want to completely take the punch out of what the two of you are debating about this morning, but Rich Lowry, if this is true, and CNN is confirming this, this is our reporting, that if the president is willing to impose his own version of airport security through executive order, and he's not happy with the bill Congress comes up with, then it will allow the government to contract with private companies to buy airport security and baggage security.

Does this completely defuse the debate?

LOWRY: Well, that's a threat they're holding out there to get more leverage. The White House would really prefer not to go that route. He'd prefer to sign a law that Congress passes, but I think it is a good sign that he is now engaged on this issue, and seems willing to fight for his own position.

For the longest time, it was just Tom DeLay, who was fighting for the president's position, and really getting beaten up for it, and I think Bush's position is completely responsible, and reasonable, given the experience overseas, and he should be willing to go to the mat for it.

ZAHN: So, Michelle, your reaction to this prospect of an executive order?

COTTLE: I'm going to be interested to see if he takes it that far. I don't know, Paula. It's going to be a problem for him, because, I mean, I know Rich's example of Israel, but in the U.S., people are not accustomed to those kind of security measures. In Israel, they grill you hard on all kinds of things, and the airline's faced with disgruntled passengers complaining about this thing, you know, would more than likely be tempted to fold and remove some of those security measures, where in that case, then it would be good to have the federal government behind you, saying, no, this is what we're going to do.

ZAHN: All right, you two, Michelle Cottle, Rich Lowry, thank you very much for that energetic debate. Appreciate both of your insights, and we'll be following this very closely. Once again, Major Garrett reporting that the president is considering this executive order. Rich Lowry saying he doesn't think it will go that far, but we will be here to keep you posted.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: I wonder about passengers, though. I think they're willing to go through the gauntlet.

ZAHN: I think so. I mean, you are flying more than I am these days.

O'BRIEN: Getting on the airplane yesterday, I went through four ID checks, had to turn on my computer twice. I admit I felt inconvenienced, but when I thought about the big picture, I just -- I had no problem.

ZAHN: Inconvenienced is one thing. Were you ticked off, Miles, or were you...

O'BRIEN: I kept it altogether.

ZAHN: Good.

O'BRIEN: Just in time this week, "Time" magazine's White House correspondent John Dickerson drops by. The cover story in this issue, the chief executive on the spot. Just how is President Bush handling this crisis? John and his colleagues write, and we quote now, "For a president who likes his facts straight and his decisions clean, the advice George W. Bush got from his top aides was no help at all" -- end of quote.

John Dickerson joining us now from Washington.

Good to have you with us, John.

JOHN DICKERSON, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Thanks for having me.

O'BRIEN: All right, a lot of Monday morning quarterbacking already through all of this. We are breaking new ground in this country. Are these cheapshots against administration?

DICKERSON: Well, you are right, there a lot of criticisms, and some of them are cheapshots, but a lot of the criticism is coming from within the president's own party, and I think the most interesting factor, most important fact here, is for a president who demands results, there were republicans, supporters of the White House, who said, he should be demanding a higher performance from the people he's picked to take care of homeland security, and it's not necessarily that they need to have all the answers; it's just they need to have the appearance of being able to manage this trouble at home, and there was some raggedness last week.

O'BRIEN: I've got to say it seems as if there's an awful lot of impatience out there in this country. Short attention span. We've been talking about that an awful lot, the fact that this only happened September 11th, only three weeks into a bombing campaign, and already the carping has begun, what does that tell you about this country and the political tone in general here?

DICKERSON: It is interesting, I think there is a split. This White House has been used to, ever since they ran a campaign out of Austin, Texas instead of coming to Washington, they've been used to the carping, a lot inside their own party, and so they've learned how to deal with that, and this is of a similar order, and they keep coming back to public polls that say the American people are with the White House, they feel confident about the steps the president and his administration are taking, and so they chalk some of this up to the sort of whining from Republican insiders that they hear from Washington, but it was of a volume last week that makes it a little hard to just write it off, as more carping, but I think, again, they feel the public is still behind them.

O'BRIEN: So maybe it is possible, as we look at some of these pictures, which are the first allowed inside the White House since this whole crisis began. You will see them in time. Maybe this could potentially backfire on these who criticize the president, if in fact, what you say is true, the American public is standing four square behind administration and has more patience than we give them credit for.

DICKERSON: Indeed. That's why a lot of this criticism comes sort of hidden, and not that many people are going on television or going on the record to talk about this, but it's something the White House feels acutely enough, that they're going to work very hoard to get Tom Ridge the director of homeland security out there three times a week now being the one voice of the administration, and they're going to have the president this week do a few events that engage him more on the homeland front to sort of beat back this perception that while they are able to manage the war oversees, they are having a tougher time managing it at home.

O'BRIEN: John, as you talk about Tom Ridge and the pair of Tom's that have been advising the president, Tommy Thompson, Tom Ridge, the two former governors, all kinds of conflicting information came out, understandably so, because after all, who knew anything about this.

The question I have is, to what extent is the concept of spin being put to rest? I say in the pejorative sense, because perhaps these gentlemen were just trying to make us feel a little bit better, bit nevertheless, it seems as if what the American people want more than anything is just the straight truth.

DICKERSON: Well, that's right, you're right, Miles. And that's one of the big complaints last week, is that people just wanted some kind of answer, even if that answer was, we don't know. Now the White House comes back and says, the minute we say we don't know, people say, well, why don't you know? And so there is mix between there between spin and just downright confusion, and I think one of the moments most troublesome for the White House is on this question of just how deadly the anthrax found in the letter to majority leader Tom Daschle, just how bad it was. There were some initial reports more than 10 days ago that it was quite bad indeed, and then last week, finally, we had official confirmation from the White House that that was the case. People have focused on that event in particular as an example of, you know, why did it take the White House so long to come up with this answer when early indications were that it was quite bad.

O'BRIEN: All right. John Dickerson is with "Time" magazine.

We appreciate you joining on this "Just in Time" segment. Maybe they all need to go to the Giuliani school of crisis management.

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