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Lou Dobbs Tonight
Condoleezza Rice Answers Critics; U.S. Commanders Promise Overwhelming Response in Iraq
Aired April 08, 2004 - 18:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for April . Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion, Lou Dobbs.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LOU DOBBS, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Tonight, Condoleezza Rice answer her critics in public and under oath.
CONDOLEEZZA RICE, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: There was no silver bullet that could have prevented the 9/11 attacks.
DOBBS: Two members of the 9/11 Commission are our guests tonight, Democrat Jamie Gorelick and Republican Slade Gorton. Former presidential adviser David Gergen is also with us tonight.
And another day of fierce fighting in Iraq and more American casualties. U.S. commanders promise an overwhelming response, but insurgents now control three southern Iraqi cities.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We use the full force of our weaponry to deal with the enemy.
DOBBS: In "Broken Borders" tonight, our special report. Federal agents face an almost impossible mission, tracking down hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens.
And the economy and jobs, a critical issue in this election campaign, a critical issue for millions unemployed. Three of the country's top economists join me to assess prospects for new jobs.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Thursday, April 8. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion, Lou Dobbs.
DOBBS: Good evening.
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice today said there was no silver bullet that could have prevented the terrorist attacks of September 11. Rice vigorously defended White House policy under oath and in public in an extraordinary session of the September 11 Commission. Rice said the al Qaeda was at war with the United States before the September 11 attacks, but we were not at war with them.
Bob Franken reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you swear or affirm...
BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The White House had finally agreed to allow National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice to give sworn testimony to counter damaging criticism.
RICE: There was no silver bullet that could have prevented the 9/11 attacks.
FRANKEN: But her repeated claim the administration had taken every possible precaution was sharply challenged by Democratic members of the 9/11 commission.
Richard Ben-Veniste on how much President Bush was told in the summer of 2001 about threatened terrorist attacks possibly inside the U.S. and a still classified presidential daily briefing meeting on August 6.
RICHARD BEN-VENISTE, 9/11 COMMISSION: Isn't it a fact, Dr. Rice, that the August 6 PDB warned against possible attacks in this country? And I ask you whether you recall the title of that PDB.
RICE: I believe the title was, "Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States."
FRANKEN: Even the title remains officially classified. But Rice insisted it was a historical summary, not a warning.
There were repeated challenges for the White House to fully declassify the whole document and the national security presidential directive, completed on September 4, just a week before the attacks. Rice said it laid out a series of actions aimed at eliminating al Qaeda. The president told her he was tired of swatting flies.
BOB KERREY, FORMER U.S. SENATOR: Can you tell me one example where the president swatted a fly when it came to Al Qaeda prior to 9/11?
RICE: I think what the president was speaking to was...
KERREY: No, no. What fly had he swatted?
RICE: Well, the disruptions abroad was what he was really focusing on...
KERREY: No, no...
RICE: ... when the CIA would go after Abu Zubaydah...
KERREY: He hadn't swatted...
RICE: ... or go after this guy...
KERREY: Dr. Rice, we didn't... RICE: That was what was meant.
KERREY: We only swatted a fly once on the 20th of August 1998. We didn't swat any flies afterwards. How the hell could he be tired?
FRANKEN: He was referring to an unsuccessful cruise missile attack authorized by President Clinton.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FRANKEN: And we're learning tonight that very quietly President Clinton appeared for three hours in a closed session before the 9/11 Commission. Very little information about the testimony, except in a statement from the commission, his testimony was called forthcoming.
As for that presidential daily briefing of August 6, the White House is telling us tonight that there's work going on to try and declassify part of it -- Lou.
DOBBS: Bob, thank you very much.
Condoleezza Rice's testimony came two weeks after the 9/11 Commission heard from terrorism adviser Richard Clarke. Clarke testified that the administration ignored the threat of al Qaeda. Rice strongly rejected that charge. She also said Clarke's policy recommendations would not have prevented the September 11 attacks.
Kitty Pilgrim reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): First a critical book. Then scathing testimony. Today, the rebuttal. Clarke charged on March 24...
RICHARD CLARKE, FORMER COUNTERTERRORISM ADVISER: I asked for a series of briefings on the issues in my portfolio, including counterterrorism and cybersecurity.
PILGRIM: Rice today.
RICE: All that he needed to do was to say, I need time to brief the president on something. But...
TIMOTHY ROEMER, PRESIDENT, CENTER FOR NATIONAL POLICY: I think he did say that. Dr. Rice, in a private interview to us he said he asked to brief the president...
RICE: Well, I have to say -- I have to say, Mr. Roemer, to my recollection...
ROEMER: You say he didn't.
RICE: ... Dick Clarke never asked me to brief the president on counterterrorism.
PILGRIM: Did the Bush administration give the al Qaeda threat proper attention? Clarke says:
CLARKE: I believe the Bush administration in the first eight months, considered terrorism an important issue, but not an urgent issue.
PILGRIM: Rice denies that.
RICE: We also moved to develop a new and comprehensive strategy to try and eliminate the al Qaeda network. President Bush understood the threat and he understood its importance.
PILGRIM: Did Richard Clarke warn of an attack? He says:
CLARKE: I continued to say it was an urgent problem. I don't think it was ever treated that way.
PILGRIM: Rice responds:
RICE: By no means did he ask me to act on a plan. It would not be appropriate or correct to characterize what Dick wrote to me on September 4 as a warning of an impending attack.
PILGRIM: And did anyone have enough knowledge to prevent the 9/11 attack?
CLARKE: President Bush was regularly told by the director of central intelligence that there was an urgent threat.
RICE: We did not have on the United States threat information that was in any way specific enough to suggest that something was coming in the United States.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PILGRIM: Condoleezza Rice, before today's hearing, gave more than four hours in private testimony to the 9/11 Commission and today she agreed to do more, if necessary. Nothing, however, has been scheduled yet -- Lou.
DOBBS: Thank you, Kitty.
Later here in the broadcast, I'll be talking with two members of the 9/11 Commission, Democrat Jamie Gorelick and Republican Slade Gorton.
As Condoleezza Rice was giving testimony before the 9/11 Commission in Washington, the war in Iraq continued. The head of U.S. forces in Iraq, General Ricardo Sanchez, said the uprising could go on for some time. The general was speaking as U.S. Marines were fighting their way into parts of Fallujah and the U.S. Army prepared to launch an offensive against Shiite militiamen. The military said six more U.S. troops have been killed in this fighting.
Walt Rodgers reports from Baghdad -- Walt.
WALTER RODGERS, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Lou. U.S. forces appear to have regained the combat initiative throughout much of Iraq, although three cities in southern and central Iraq appear to be partially, at least, in the hands of the Shiite rebels. The battle for Fallujah continues. It is now in its fifth day. There, U.S. Marines are fighting to eliminate the Sunni Muslim fighters. These Fallujah fighters know that for them, this is a fight to death.
Even with the United States controlling the air, it is not an easy fight. The Iraqis are more than a little tenacious. They fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a main battle tank, injuring the crew, although none of the injuries was life-threatening. For the Iraqi insurgents, Fallujah is their town, their home, and their last stand. A Marine being spokesman said the U.S. forces are making inroads into the city, the same spokesman adding, the Marines are winning every firefight they engage in.
Still, another Marine was killed today. And on another front, there has been an opening which has startled everyone. The Iraqi insurgents are beginning to kidnap hostages, seizing three Japanese today. Those were aid workers and journalists. A shadowy group calling itself the Mujahedeen Squadrons claimed responsibility. And they said, unless the Japanese pull their coalition forces out of this country, those three hostages will be burned alive within three days.
Also kidnapped today, two Palestinians, that is to say, Israeli Arab workers, aid workers here. They too are in the hands of hostages -- Lou.
DOBBS: Any sense from the coalition command there, Walt, tonight as to how long they think it's going to -- how much time will be required to regain control of those three southern cities in Iraq and to establish some sort of control over the population?
RODGERS: Lou, earlier today, General Ricardo Sanchez says that one of those cities, Kut, will be retaken imminently. Kut, though, shouldn't be too difficult.
The problem is when you get to An Najaf. That is a rather substantially large city. It's a Shiite city. It's the home to the Ali Mosque. And it is filled with, now, Muqtada al-Sadr's fighters. And the United States Army isn't going to move on them easily or quickly, particularly now we're going to into a major Shiite holiday. That is to say, the Army will move very, very gingerly if and when it ever decides to go into An Najaf -- Lou.
DOBBS: Walt Rodgers, thank you, reporting tonight from Baghdad.
Former presidential adviser David Gergen says the United States now faces the biggest challenge in Iraq since the invasion a year ago. David Gergen is the director of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, joining us tonight from Wichita, Kansas.
David, thanks for being here. Let's start, if we may, with Iraq. We now see three cities under the control, most of those cities, at least, under the control of the militia. The United States fighting, it looks like, an all-out pitched battle to regain that control. Your assessment?
DAVID GERGEN, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: We do have an overwhelming force there and we have the best military in the world that is fighting bravely.
So I would assume that we can, in fact, as Walter Rodgers just reported, reassert dominance very quickly in those cities and retake them probably with a good loss -- a major loss of life.
But what we're now seeing is a spreading of violence and spreading anti-Americanism among the Shiites, who, as you well know, represent the bulk of the population, some 60 percent and very importantly were at the heart of our strategy for rebuilding Iraq. They were going to be the pillar of stability for us in Iraq. And to have this break-off radical group now taking us on in a much more vigorous way than anybody ever expected, taking hostages, so that we have to go back after them with major force, only means there's going to be -- as we establish dominance, there's going to be growing resistance to the United States among the Shiite population.
And how we then turn over Iraq, a fragile state like that, to an Iraqi government, I think is beyond the comprehension of most experts.
DOBBS: David, let's turn, if we may, to Condoleezza Rice's testimony, an extraordinary session of the 9/11 Commission.
GERGEN: Sure.
DOBBS: How did she acquit herself in your view?
GERGEN: I think she definitely helped the administration today, Lou. The very fact that she went up and testified in public and under oath was positive. It helps to dispel the notion that the administration was trying to hide on these questions.
Equally important, of course, the content of her answer and her poise under fire I think bolster the case that the administration did not, was not negligent before 9/11. And it's just hard to see, based on the evidence that is there now, how a majority of the commission would conclude that somehow the Bush administration, President Bush himself, was somehow personally responsible for 9/11. It has much more the sense of Pearl Harbor.
Having said that, I don't think the administration has escaped unscathed from these last couple of weeks. The coming together of 9/11 and all the questions about the leadership of the administration and the president during the 9/11 period, pre-9/11, along with the violence and the near chaos, sense of near chaos, in Iraq, I think those things are starting to conflate, smush together in the public's mind, so that the president's leadership and the country's sense of unity about the war on terrorism has been badly damaged. DOBBS: Damaged, yet there is no alternative but to prosecute the war against radical Islamist terror. There is no alternative but to prosecute successfully the war in Iraq. What should, in your judgment, the president, this administration do going forward on both of those fronts?
GERGEN: Well, it does seem to me there are two issues now in front of us that have to be confronted very quickly.
One is, do we need a lot more troops in there? I thought they moved properly yesterday to perhaps slow down the troop rotations, bolster the number of troops that are there on the ground, from 130,000 or so to maybe 150,000, 155,000. We may need more than that to prevail.
But the second issue is how we now go through the handoff. The June 30 date that has been set seems especially artificial. And we don't even know who we're turning it over to. It strikes me increasingly, there must be a way that we can not only bring in the United Nations, but to postpone the deadline, so that we would gradually turn authority over to the United Nations. They would treat it almost like a trusteeship for, say, a few months and then go to the Iraqis and we could perhaps give to it some sort of U.N. authority right around June 30, so we wouldn't be the sole occupiers or sole -- the people really in charge there totally, and find a way that we can work it out with the Iraqis so that they know they're going to get sovereignty.
It's still going to come. They're going to have their elections next year, but we're not in the situation of turning something over in this artificial deadline to a group of people who we don't know who -- even know who they are and nobody can figure out and once you turn it over on June 30, who the heck is really in charge. What happens if there's more violence in one of these southern cities? What happens if there's another radical cleric who comes forward and mobilizes these people?
Who is going to make the calls about whether we go after them or not? Are we going to have this Iraqi government make those for the U.S. military? If they're really in charge, they're supposed to do that. But, hey, it's our people who are being threatened. We're going to want to make that call.
We need a much cleaner and clearer process. And right now, I don't think the American people sense we have a plan for how to deal with it. That's why I think we ought to play for some time and see if we can bring the U.N. into this as a co-partner in this process and turn it over to them later than June 30.
DOBBS: David, I hear you saying that you are looking for a far clearer communication. In fact, we've heard the secretary of defense referring to this latest uprising, those initiating and carrying it out, as, again, thugs and gangsters, instead of referring to the Shia cleric himself, Muqtada al-Sadr, and his followers, in a way almost trivializing the insurgents that are asserting themselves right now. The lack of clarity about strategy and vision, is it in your judgment that the administration has decided they've said enough about it, or is it that they truly don't have a, if you will, an end game here?
GERGEN: Well, it's unclear whether there are internal divisions in the administration and they can't quite make up their mind about what they want to do.
I do think they've been truly taken by surprise by the extent of the Shiite uprising and now by the taking of the prisoners, this kidnapping, gruesome kidnappings. And certainly, we were taken by surprise by what happened in Fallujah, with the desecration of the bodies and the horrors that came out of that.
But I think that they're feeling their way along on this. I think they're taking it a day at a time. But it's giving the country a sense that, yes, we need to prevail in this and, yes, we want to support our troops, but what the heck are we trying to accomplish here now? Who are we trying to turn this over to? And who is the enemy? We're now fighting Shiites we thought were going to be the heart of the new government. They were going to be the heart of new Iraq.
So I do think that the -- this communications issue -- the parallels with Vietnam are mostly all wrong, it seems to me. But what we did lack in Vietnam was a clear strategy and we lacked the enunciation of a clear strategy from the Johnson administration. And then the Nixon administration tried to come in and clean it up, but it took a long time without a clear strategy there for a long time.
And I think that the Americans now are looking for some guideposts and some sense, OK, if we're going to be sacrificing American soldiers, five, six, 10 a day, what's the purpose and how -- what's the end play point here and how are we going to get out of this? Americans are going to be willing to stick with the president if they think there's a clear plan and a clear purpose.
But right now, the big danger sign for the president is not only on the battlefields in Iraq, but it's here at home, where the polls are heading down on the percentage of Americans who are willing to keep our troops there. And this is one, as you just said, we must prevail here. And if he loses support at home, if the majority of Americans say we don't know what we're doing there, let's come home, it gets to be really difficult for the commander in chief.
DOBBS: David Gergen, thank you.
GERGEN: Lou, thank you.
DOBBS: Still ahead, I'll be talking with two members of the 9/11 Commission, Democrat Jamie Gorelick and Republican Slade Gorton.
Also, urban warfare in Iraq, American troops battling insurgents in Iraq's towns and cities. General David Grange is our guest.
And in "Broken Borders," our special report tonight, hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens loose in this country. Federal agents struggling to catch them. We'll have a special report.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: U.S. troops in Iraq are tonight engaged in heavy fighting with insurgents in urban areas of the Sunni Triangle. There are likely to be more battles, city battles, ahead as the Army launches its offensive against Shiite militiamen, and the Marine Corps as well.
Urban warfare is one of the most challenging forms of combat that any army can face.
General David Grange joins me now in "Grange On Point" tonight.
General, first, the images of that Marine crew of that M1-A1 badly wounded from an RPG strike against that tank, that isn't supposed to happen.
RETIRED BRIG. GEN. DAVID GRANGE, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, there's not a weapon on the battlefield that some system cannot take out. And even the toughest, the most advanced vehicles are neutralized by terrain.
In other words, when they have to get in close to certain areas in combat, other weapons that normally wouldn't matter to a 70-ton machine do. And also, how you take on a tank, and we don't want to get into that, but how you take on a tank can affect its vulnerability.
DOBBS: Does this suggest, because now we've been there for a year and we can all vividly remember the tremendous success of our armored divisions and our cavalry rolling into Baghdad -- does this suggest that the Iraqis, the insurgents and particularly in the Sunni Triangle have learned something about combating our armor that we should be very concerned about?
GRANGE: Absolutely.
All forces, no matter how rudimentary, learn from their first blood. And combat brings it out, techniques. Plus, the techniques are shared by other insurgent groups throughout the world. They have a network on how to defeat powerful armies. And in urban combat, it works.
DOBBS: Urban combat, which is obviously what so many of our men and women in uniform tonight are facing in Iraq, it is that very combat that the secretary of defense and the entire command structure is trying to avoid here. It's unavoidable now. What do you expect to unfold?
GRANGE: Oh, I suspect and feel very strong that the coalition forces will prevail. It's not going to happen overnight. It's going to be a tough fight. There's going to be more casualties. But the coalition forces will prevail. The Marines, the soldiers, airmen, all of them involved in this have trained extensively in urban combat. And though urban warfare negates some of the prowess of a world- class military, they'll win.
DOBBS: As we watch those men and women in combat, casualties being taken, as they engage the Iraqis, whether they're Shia, whether they're Sunni, it's really of no matter in the casualties that we're talking. Throughout the Arab world, these pictures are being watched. They're seeing the most powerful military on the face of the Earth rolled back by what the secretary of defense referred to as thugs and gangsters.
What in the world is that saying to the Arab world and what in the world are we doing to permit ourselves to get into this kind of situation after a year's experience in country?
GRANGE: Well, some of the insurgents should have been nipped in the bud early on. Some were allowed to grow to a stronger than they were. And some quite frankly we may not have known about. We should have, but we didn't.
The guerrilla has an advantage with using people as cover and camouflage, using the buildings, using the media, disinformation, to fight it. But what now has to happen is that the world needs to see the coalition smash this insurrection.
DOBBS: I get the sense, listening to you, General, that you think it's going to take a little longer than what we're being led to believe right now by the Department of Defense. How long do you think -- and I know you can only offer your best estimate here -- how long do you think it's going to take? How protracted, how tough?
GRANGE: Well, I think combat up in the Fallujah area will happen much faster than down south, for two reasons. One is that they pretty well have already committed themselves to the fight. Once you commit, you got to follow threw.
Down south, as they retake police stations and different outlying buildings, it's a different story than going after al-Sadr and his 3,000 hard-core guerrilla element. The timing is very important and we want the conditions right for the coalition before they move down to do that. If they do it too quick, I have a feeling they're draw on many more supporters. So they shouldn't get tied down to a timeline. Let the commander on the ground decide on the time. But it's going to take a while.
DOBBS: General David Grange, thank you.
GERGEN: My pleasure.
DOBBS: Still ahead here tonight, federal agents fighting a losing battle along the border, chasing hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens. There are too many of them, there is too much work and not enough resources. We'll have that special report.
And Condoleezza Rice defends the administration's record before the September 11 Commission. We'll talk with two members of the commission next.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: The top story of the day, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice testifying under oath before the 9/11 Commission.
Joining me now, two members of that commission who questioned her today. Jamie Gorelick served as deputy attorney general under President Clinton. Former Republican Senator Slade Gorton represented the state of Washington for 18 years. They both join us tonight from Washington.
Thank you both for being here.
JAMIE GORELICK, 9/11 COMMISSION MEMBER: Delighted.
DOBBS: Commissioner Gorelick, first, are you satisfied with what you heard from Condoleezza Rice today?
GORELICK: Well, she provided ample testimony. She was very articulate in her statements. We have a lot of follow-up questions, though, and a lot to go over with her in private session, I think.
DOBBS: And, Slade Gorton?
SLADE GORTON, FORMER U.S. SENATOR: Condoleezza Rice did what she wanted to do there. She met her mission, which was to present, you know, her point of view and the administration's point of view. That's not completely our mission.
Our mission is to find out everything relevant that happened leading up to 9/11 and immediately thereafter. Jamie is entirely correct. We have more questions for her, many of the answers to which are classified. And we'll get those behind closed doors.
DOBBS: The August 8 PDB, the president's briefing, came up prominently. Are we to expect that that, to now, classified document will be ultimately declassified and made public?
JAMIE GORELICK, (D) 9/11 COMMISSION MEMBER: I think they will. I mean, right now, it's being discussed in a sort of tantalizing way for the American public. We have asked, persistently, that it be declassified, because it's been the subject of attention for so long. And other things that we've asked to be declassified, we got two of them this morning.
So I think that the White House ought to be a little more comprehensive right now and decide what it wants to put out and let people see for themselves what these documents say.
GORTON: It should be declassified and I think it will be declassified.
DOBBS: And the remaining 57 documents from the Clinton administration that have not been declassified, are you satisfied, Mr. Gorton, that that will be the same?
GORTON: Well, in that case, it's not so much from our perspective that they haven't been declassified. We haven't gotten them yet and they are relevant to our mission. They may not be the most important documents of the literally hundreds of thousands we've gotten, but they are important and we fully expect that we will get all of them so they can inform our ultimate report.
DOBBS: Do you agree, Jamie Gorelick?
GORELICK: I agree with Slade completely. And now that we've found out why it was we didn't get certain Clinton administration documents that were withheld by the White House, we're now going to issue a parallel request for the similar Bush administration documents.
We have to be, as Slade says, absolutely complete or as complete as we can possibly be within the time constraints we have to do the kind of report the American people deserve for us to do.
DOBBS: That complete picture, the American people for fully, first of all, deserve and complete and full understanding of what did or did not transpire leading up to September 11. Is it your best judgment, right now, that in a bipartisan fashion, that this commission will be able to succeed in that mission?
GORTON: In the very first meeting that we had, we looked at one another, often as strangers, and said that if we couldn't come up with a unanimous report on the facts leading up to 9/11, it wouldn't be worth a great deal. And I think the collegiality among the members of the commission, our desire to do this job right, is something that I have greatly enjoyed and I'm quite optimistic that we're going to meet that goal.
GORELICK: I agree with Slade, as I usually do.
DOBBS: Let me ask you, a number of people have characterized the exchanges between Condoleezza Rice and Benveniste, and Kerry as being partisan in tone. I would like to see -- I would like to get a sense from both of you as to whether you thought so because my -- I took away from it really more a difference in personality if you will, than partisanship. Slade Gorton?
GORTON: Richard Benveniste is a magnificent trial lawyer and you saw a good trial lawyer's cross-examination of a witness. I wasn't offended by it. He had a perfect right to answer those questions, and Condoleezza Rice didn't bend under them. She answered them in a way that she wished. No, you know, I don't think so at all. All of our witnesses are there for a purpose and harsh questions of them are perfectly appropriate.
GORELICK: You know, I think it's very hard for people to believe that you could have five Democrats and five Republicans approaching the same task in a collegial fashion or that they're asking questions just because they're good questions to ask. I think both of -- all of us, we tried to be tough and ask the right questions. But also, to be polite.
Now, she, you know -- I only got three questions out because she gave very long answers.
DOBBS: I noticed that.
GORELICK: And so, you know, one might criticize me for not having been a little more intrusive in the way that Benveniste was. You work with what you've got and use the techniques you know how to use.
GORTON: I was more fortunate, I got seven questions and answers to all of them.
GORELICK: I've been kidding, she answered way more Republican questions than Democrats. We can do the count.
DOBBS: It'll be an interesting -- we've not done the count here, but it was an interesting ratio. I'm sure that that inverted with the appearance of President Clinton before you for four hours this afternoon. I know under the rules...
GORTON: No, that's not true. President Clinton was just wonderful.
DOBBS: I wasn't referring to President Clinton being less than wonderful. I was referring to that ratio between Republicans, Democrats succeeding.
GORELICK: No, no. Everyone got their questions in with him, and he actually answered questions we hadn't asked, and it was a very full and rich -- and he gave us one hour more than the time was scheduled for.
And President Clinton has done a lot of thinking since he left the presidency about issues like this. And his advice, I think, and some of his thoughts will be extremely valuable to us in writing our final report.
DOBBS: Well, I want to thank you for the time you've given us here tonight. You've got a very important job ahead of you. I would like to ask you, as people watched Condoleezza Rice today testify, is it incorrect to assume that this early stage, before you've drawn your report, that simply the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the CIA, that this was a massive intelligence failure, that was years in the making and, and certainly, was present in the months and weeks leading up to September 11, a broken system that had been tolerated for simply too long, even in the main mission, if you will, for domestic intelligence, that is, the FBI in its normal law enforcement role and a CIA which had, frankly, inadequate resources? Is that an unfair conclusion at this early stage, Jamie Gorelick?
GORELICK: Well, just on your last point, I'm not sure that the CIA had inadequate resources, at least in the counter-terrorism arena. I think -- and that's -- the FBI had lots of resources as well in the counter-terrorism area. Maybe more than they could digest. I don't think we are at the point where we can reach conclusions. We haven't even had the law enforcement hearing, which will be, I think, quite interesting to your viewers next week. We have two attorneys general and two FBI directors. And, you know, there's been a lot of finger pointing and a lot of fingers have been pointing at the bureau. So that hearing should be quite interesting. But I'm not going to state any conclusions right now.
DOBBS: I'll give you that opportunity quickly, Slade Gorton.
GORTON: Obviously, there were some failures in communication among these various agencies, but I would, as Jamie, be totally unwilling to use words like massive and to make a conclusion -- come to a conclusion at this point. We are doing our very best to get all of the evidence in hand before we come up with these conclusions.
DOBBS: Slade Gorton, Jamie Gorelick, we thank you and the rest of your fellow commissioners for your hard work in this difficult enterprise. Thank you.
GORELICK: Thank you.
DOBBS: Still ahead here, the battle to recapture hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens being released by immigration officials after they're captured. We'll have that special report for you.
And then, some of the best news for the labor market in years. We'll be talking with a panel of the best economists in the country. Ed Yardeni, Allen Sinai, Donald Strosheim (ph): jobs, growth, prosperity. At hand, we'll hear what they have to say. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: As we reported here last night a lack of detention space forces Border Patrol Agents release thousands of illegal aliens entering the country each year. Now immigration officials are trying to recapture many fugitives and send them out of the country.
Casey Wian has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Federal agents plan strategy before launching raids to capture fugitive illegal aliens.
BLITZER: Before you guys knock, make sure the perimeter is set up to ensure that in case somebody does jump out a window or something, that we'll be there to meet them.
WIAN: Three teams of immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents, or ICE, will spread out across San Diego looking for a few of the 5,600 illegal aliens here under deportation orders. Nationwide, more than 400,000 illegal aliens are loose.
MICHAEL MAGEE, ICE DEPUTY FIELD DIRECTOR: All the people we're looking for are fugitives that were apprehended once already. The Border Patrol or investigations or inspections at the port of entry caught these people and then we let them go.
WIAN: Lack of detention space is one reason many of tonight's targets have elevated authorities for years. This team's first target is not at his listed address. Agents interview neighbors, then head to the next target, the convicted drug dealer and gang member. Driving into his apartment complex, agents spot him driving out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He just went past.
WIAN: He's quickly caught and a heart wrenching discovery. A terrified toddler, the fugitive's daughter, is in the back seat of his car.
Agents call his wife.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have your husband in custody right now at the intersection.
WIAN: She picks up the sobbing girl while her husband is on his way back to Mexico. 45 percent of the fugitives ICE catch are criminals.
(on camera): ICE Agents here in San Diego apprehend around 50 fugitive aliens every month. The problem is a hundred are added to the list every month.
MICHAEL GARCIA, ASST. SECRETARY ICE: Our goal is to stabilize the ratio of people who are now becoming absconders or fugitives and the number of people we're removing from the country.
WIAN: In San Diego, only four agents are assigned to fugitive operations full type. The field director says he has enough work for 18. On this night, they caught nine of their 13 targets, but because detention space is short, other illegal aliens will be released so the most dangerous stay behind bars until they're deported.
Casey Wian, CNN, San Diego.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: That brings us to the subject of "Tonight's Poll." Do you believe the United States should spend more money to assure absolute security of our borders and shores?
Cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll have the results later in the broadcast.
Well, when we continue, "Exporting America," the jobless recovery. The politics of economics in an election year.
Alan Sinai, Donald Straszheim, and Ed Yardeni, will join us. Please stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Positive sign on jobs in this country. The number of Americans filing for first time benefits falling to the lowest level in more than 3 years. That report comes after the economy added another 300,000 new jobs in March, but more than 8 million Americans are still work looking for work.
Joining me now, three of the country's top economists, Edward Yardeni, chief investment strategist for Prudential Equity Group. Alan Sinai, chief global economist, president of Decision Economics. Donald Straszheim, president of the Straszheim Global Advisers, joining us tonight from Los Angeles.
Good to have you with us. Let me turn to you first, Donald Straszheim, this number on industrial jobless claims, how much would we make of it?
DONALD STRASZHEIM, PRES. STRASZHEIM GLOBAL ADIVSORS: This is an important additional positive sign that the labor markets are finally doing better. It's been a long, hard struggle. We got good employment numbers last week for the month of March and this is another good one today. People ought to be encouraged about the jobs picture right now.
DOBBS: Do you agree, gentlemen?
ED YARDENI, CHIEF INVESTMENT STRATEGIST, PRUDENTIAL EQUITY GROUP: I agree, it's sort of deja vu all over again. In the early 90's there were fears about a jobless recovery and we saw unemployment claims drop dramatically in '93 and '92, the employment numbers came through. And by the way that was the first reported data. When they finally did all the revisions, they found there were actually a lot more jobs created in '92 and '93.
ALAN SINIA, CHIEF GLOBAL ECONOMIST & PRESIDENT DECISION ECONOMICS: I'd say it's a better labor market. It's not an easy labor market. It's getting better and we keep getting better.
DOBBS: Because it's a presidential election year, a lot of focus being placed on the unemployment numbers, as they well should, irrespective of whether it's a presidential election year. We have a high amount of underemployment in this country. We have a high amount of discouraged workers out there right now. It's going to take a real move here to help people who have been struggling for work over the last couple of years.
YARDENI: Absolutely. I mean, it was several years into the first half of the 1990s before really things started to improve. A lot of people have suffered. It's been a very difficult economy for the past several years. But I think we're finally starting to see some signs of life here.
DOBBS: I know each of you has your own personal political views and we're not going to get into your political views here tonight. But we've heard Senator Kerry say he's going to create 10 million jobs over the next four years. We heard President Bush say he's going to create 2.6 million jobs this year. Is there any reason in the world any voter out there should be listening to any one of these forecasts about jobs being created over the next four years? I'll start with you, Don Straszheim.
STRASZHEIM: I think both numbers, quite frankly, are nonsense. We're not going to go back to the 250,000 jobs a month that were created in the '93 to '99 period, importantly because of one of the issues you talked about on the show, which is the outsourcing and attraction of hiring -- many companies are hiring. They're just not hiring here. I don't think we'll see Kerry's numbers. I can't imagine where we're going to get the 10 million jobs, nor Bush's over the next year.
SINAI: Those figures are based on historical relationships, which 'aren't really working now in the new world, new technology, new productivity. I think what voters ought to look at are the plans of the candidates to achieve whatever job growth they tell us they're going to achieve, forget the numbers.
The question is, how are they going to do it?
What are the plans?
Do they make sense?
DOBBS: Do you agree, Ed?
YARDENI: At the end of the day, the economy will will create the job and the policy has something to do with it. But we create jobs. Businesses create jobs.
DOBBS: You know, we used to say that. We used to say governments don't create jobs, economies do. The fact is, over the last three years, government jobs are what have been created.
YARDENI: Yes, to a certain extent that's true for the past couple years, but I think you're going to see private sector jobs really starting to take off, particularly in the services area.
DOBBS: I think we're all more than ready for that. You know, we're going to come back to you, Don Straszheim right after this break. We're here with Ed Yardeni, Alan Sinia, Don Straszheim, three of the best economists in the country. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Well, apparently, these gentlemen offering us their best guidance on economics, suggest that we should be skeptical of either party's projects on jobs.
Let me turn to Don Straszheim.
How skeptical should we be about budget projections -- deficit projections from either party?
STRASZHEIM: Well, Lou, very skeptical. Our government is over committed. We've got a big deficit now that's grown rapidly in the last couple years because the economy has fallen out from under us and because a lot of Homeland Security and defense spending together. But that's not really the issue right now. The issue is the long run unsustainability because we have made the commitments years and years out, especially on entitlements payments. That's the real issue and neither President Bush nor Senator Kerry, I think, has got handle on how they're going to attack this problem.
DOBBS: Alan.
SINIA: Let's keep in mind that part of the deficit's a byproduct of recession and tax cuts that were absolutely necessary to get the economy, U.S. and global, up and running again. It was the right medicine. The tax cuts were the right medicine for a tough situation for the U.S. economy. A byproduct of the medicine are deficits and other things will create bigger deficits. Everybody agrees on the numbers, even (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and years ahead. And what Don is getting at is the entitlements, social security, Medicare, Medicaid are the biggest part of the awesome negative numbers and we've got to get focused on that. And neither candidate, so far, has faced up to those entitlements and how ho too deal with it, particularly healthcare costs, which are a big burden on the budget and on American corporations. One of the reasons why companies don't want to hire people.
DOBBS: And whether they want to hire people or not, people make up an economy. The sustainability of the budget deficit, Ed, what about the sustainability of this trade deficit which has been in deficit now for almost 28 years.
YARDENI: It's been around for a long, long time and so far, Americans have mostly benefited from it because we've gotten good products from overseas. In exchange, foreigners have choose to buy our securities. There's always the risk at some point, they may tire of that. Hasn't happened so far. But I wouldn't want to push a half trillion dollar trade deficit. At some point, we have to have narrowing.
DOBBS: Do you agree, Alan?
SINIA: Yes when you have both of them together.
DOBBS: You have a trillion dollars right there.
(CROSSTALK)
Everywhere you look, there's a half trillion dollars lurking.
SINIA: At the moment, it's not a problem. Down the line, it could be a big problem that operates on the market and operates on the economy.
STRAZHEIM: Lou, I think the trade deficits are going to stay big for some time. The primary reason is our trading partner countries, who we want to export to, have very weak growth. Japan's been weak for a long time, a little better now. Europe is still weak. We need stronger growth there. And also, these trade deals are basicly consensual. We send them our dollars, they send them their goods and those jobs their production sends to us very important to those other countries.
DOBBS: Though I think some people might argue. I don't know if you'd agree, Don that we're sending a lot of IOU'. We're net borrower. We are with out question a debtor nation. We talk about half a trillion dollars wherever you look. Over 5 percent of the GDP. We look to the pension guarantee agency alone. That's another half trillion dollars in liabilities, and that doesn't even include looking to the healthcare whether it be Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. So some huge problems before us. Are you optimistic, gentlemen?
We've got 30 seconds. Are you optimistic about the future here, the near future?
YARDENI: I am, I think most problems are politically solvable and doable. I think we just have to deal with them and I think we will.
DOBBS: Don Straszheim.
STRASZHEIM: Lou, I am optimistic over the next 6 to 12 to 18 months on the U.S. economy. Longer term, we need to attack the long- term problems. I haven't seen the political will to do that yet.
SINIA: Always optimistic.
How can he we be otherwise in a country like this?
DOBBS: If you've got a job.
SINIA: Oh, it's been a lot worse. It's been a lot worse than it is now.
DOBBS: It doesn't help a person who doesn't have a job.
SINIA: I agree with that. But still, we can be optimistic. Business is terrific. We're going to get more jobs. The deficit is, in dealing with them early, in a preemptive way, very, very important for the long-run health of our economy.
DOBBS: Alan Sinai, Ed Yardeni, Don Straszheim in California, thank you gentlemen for being with us.
Still ahead, the results of "Tonight's Poll." We continue in a moment. Please stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: The results of our poll, 86 percent of you say the United States should spend more money to assure security of our border and shores, 14 percent do not.
That's our show for tonight, thank you for being with us. Please join us tomorrow. 9/11 Commissioner James Thompson will be here to share his reactions to the testimony of Condoleezza Rice.
And Senator Carl Levin, ranking member of the Senate's Armed Services Committee on the latest violence in Iraq and the Coalition's response.
We'll hope you'll be with us. Thank you for being with tonight. For all us here good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.
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Aired April 8, 2004 - 18:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for April . Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion, Lou Dobbs.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LOU DOBBS, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Tonight, Condoleezza Rice answer her critics in public and under oath.
CONDOLEEZZA RICE, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: There was no silver bullet that could have prevented the 9/11 attacks.
DOBBS: Two members of the 9/11 Commission are our guests tonight, Democrat Jamie Gorelick and Republican Slade Gorton. Former presidential adviser David Gergen is also with us tonight.
And another day of fierce fighting in Iraq and more American casualties. U.S. commanders promise an overwhelming response, but insurgents now control three southern Iraqi cities.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We use the full force of our weaponry to deal with the enemy.
DOBBS: In "Broken Borders" tonight, our special report. Federal agents face an almost impossible mission, tracking down hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens.
And the economy and jobs, a critical issue in this election campaign, a critical issue for millions unemployed. Three of the country's top economists join me to assess prospects for new jobs.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Thursday, April 8. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion, Lou Dobbs.
DOBBS: Good evening.
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice today said there was no silver bullet that could have prevented the terrorist attacks of September 11. Rice vigorously defended White House policy under oath and in public in an extraordinary session of the September 11 Commission. Rice said the al Qaeda was at war with the United States before the September 11 attacks, but we were not at war with them.
Bob Franken reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you swear or affirm...
BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The White House had finally agreed to allow National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice to give sworn testimony to counter damaging criticism.
RICE: There was no silver bullet that could have prevented the 9/11 attacks.
FRANKEN: But her repeated claim the administration had taken every possible precaution was sharply challenged by Democratic members of the 9/11 commission.
Richard Ben-Veniste on how much President Bush was told in the summer of 2001 about threatened terrorist attacks possibly inside the U.S. and a still classified presidential daily briefing meeting on August 6.
RICHARD BEN-VENISTE, 9/11 COMMISSION: Isn't it a fact, Dr. Rice, that the August 6 PDB warned against possible attacks in this country? And I ask you whether you recall the title of that PDB.
RICE: I believe the title was, "Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States."
FRANKEN: Even the title remains officially classified. But Rice insisted it was a historical summary, not a warning.
There were repeated challenges for the White House to fully declassify the whole document and the national security presidential directive, completed on September 4, just a week before the attacks. Rice said it laid out a series of actions aimed at eliminating al Qaeda. The president told her he was tired of swatting flies.
BOB KERREY, FORMER U.S. SENATOR: Can you tell me one example where the president swatted a fly when it came to Al Qaeda prior to 9/11?
RICE: I think what the president was speaking to was...
KERREY: No, no. What fly had he swatted?
RICE: Well, the disruptions abroad was what he was really focusing on...
KERREY: No, no...
RICE: ... when the CIA would go after Abu Zubaydah...
KERREY: He hadn't swatted...
RICE: ... or go after this guy...
KERREY: Dr. Rice, we didn't... RICE: That was what was meant.
KERREY: We only swatted a fly once on the 20th of August 1998. We didn't swat any flies afterwards. How the hell could he be tired?
FRANKEN: He was referring to an unsuccessful cruise missile attack authorized by President Clinton.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FRANKEN: And we're learning tonight that very quietly President Clinton appeared for three hours in a closed session before the 9/11 Commission. Very little information about the testimony, except in a statement from the commission, his testimony was called forthcoming.
As for that presidential daily briefing of August 6, the White House is telling us tonight that there's work going on to try and declassify part of it -- Lou.
DOBBS: Bob, thank you very much.
Condoleezza Rice's testimony came two weeks after the 9/11 Commission heard from terrorism adviser Richard Clarke. Clarke testified that the administration ignored the threat of al Qaeda. Rice strongly rejected that charge. She also said Clarke's policy recommendations would not have prevented the September 11 attacks.
Kitty Pilgrim reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): First a critical book. Then scathing testimony. Today, the rebuttal. Clarke charged on March 24...
RICHARD CLARKE, FORMER COUNTERTERRORISM ADVISER: I asked for a series of briefings on the issues in my portfolio, including counterterrorism and cybersecurity.
PILGRIM: Rice today.
RICE: All that he needed to do was to say, I need time to brief the president on something. But...
TIMOTHY ROEMER, PRESIDENT, CENTER FOR NATIONAL POLICY: I think he did say that. Dr. Rice, in a private interview to us he said he asked to brief the president...
RICE: Well, I have to say -- I have to say, Mr. Roemer, to my recollection...
ROEMER: You say he didn't.
RICE: ... Dick Clarke never asked me to brief the president on counterterrorism.
PILGRIM: Did the Bush administration give the al Qaeda threat proper attention? Clarke says:
CLARKE: I believe the Bush administration in the first eight months, considered terrorism an important issue, but not an urgent issue.
PILGRIM: Rice denies that.
RICE: We also moved to develop a new and comprehensive strategy to try and eliminate the al Qaeda network. President Bush understood the threat and he understood its importance.
PILGRIM: Did Richard Clarke warn of an attack? He says:
CLARKE: I continued to say it was an urgent problem. I don't think it was ever treated that way.
PILGRIM: Rice responds:
RICE: By no means did he ask me to act on a plan. It would not be appropriate or correct to characterize what Dick wrote to me on September 4 as a warning of an impending attack.
PILGRIM: And did anyone have enough knowledge to prevent the 9/11 attack?
CLARKE: President Bush was regularly told by the director of central intelligence that there was an urgent threat.
RICE: We did not have on the United States threat information that was in any way specific enough to suggest that something was coming in the United States.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PILGRIM: Condoleezza Rice, before today's hearing, gave more than four hours in private testimony to the 9/11 Commission and today she agreed to do more, if necessary. Nothing, however, has been scheduled yet -- Lou.
DOBBS: Thank you, Kitty.
Later here in the broadcast, I'll be talking with two members of the 9/11 Commission, Democrat Jamie Gorelick and Republican Slade Gorton.
As Condoleezza Rice was giving testimony before the 9/11 Commission in Washington, the war in Iraq continued. The head of U.S. forces in Iraq, General Ricardo Sanchez, said the uprising could go on for some time. The general was speaking as U.S. Marines were fighting their way into parts of Fallujah and the U.S. Army prepared to launch an offensive against Shiite militiamen. The military said six more U.S. troops have been killed in this fighting.
Walt Rodgers reports from Baghdad -- Walt.
WALTER RODGERS, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Lou. U.S. forces appear to have regained the combat initiative throughout much of Iraq, although three cities in southern and central Iraq appear to be partially, at least, in the hands of the Shiite rebels. The battle for Fallujah continues. It is now in its fifth day. There, U.S. Marines are fighting to eliminate the Sunni Muslim fighters. These Fallujah fighters know that for them, this is a fight to death.
Even with the United States controlling the air, it is not an easy fight. The Iraqis are more than a little tenacious. They fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a main battle tank, injuring the crew, although none of the injuries was life-threatening. For the Iraqi insurgents, Fallujah is their town, their home, and their last stand. A Marine being spokesman said the U.S. forces are making inroads into the city, the same spokesman adding, the Marines are winning every firefight they engage in.
Still, another Marine was killed today. And on another front, there has been an opening which has startled everyone. The Iraqi insurgents are beginning to kidnap hostages, seizing three Japanese today. Those were aid workers and journalists. A shadowy group calling itself the Mujahedeen Squadrons claimed responsibility. And they said, unless the Japanese pull their coalition forces out of this country, those three hostages will be burned alive within three days.
Also kidnapped today, two Palestinians, that is to say, Israeli Arab workers, aid workers here. They too are in the hands of hostages -- Lou.
DOBBS: Any sense from the coalition command there, Walt, tonight as to how long they think it's going to -- how much time will be required to regain control of those three southern cities in Iraq and to establish some sort of control over the population?
RODGERS: Lou, earlier today, General Ricardo Sanchez says that one of those cities, Kut, will be retaken imminently. Kut, though, shouldn't be too difficult.
The problem is when you get to An Najaf. That is a rather substantially large city. It's a Shiite city. It's the home to the Ali Mosque. And it is filled with, now, Muqtada al-Sadr's fighters. And the United States Army isn't going to move on them easily or quickly, particularly now we're going to into a major Shiite holiday. That is to say, the Army will move very, very gingerly if and when it ever decides to go into An Najaf -- Lou.
DOBBS: Walt Rodgers, thank you, reporting tonight from Baghdad.
Former presidential adviser David Gergen says the United States now faces the biggest challenge in Iraq since the invasion a year ago. David Gergen is the director of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, joining us tonight from Wichita, Kansas.
David, thanks for being here. Let's start, if we may, with Iraq. We now see three cities under the control, most of those cities, at least, under the control of the militia. The United States fighting, it looks like, an all-out pitched battle to regain that control. Your assessment?
DAVID GERGEN, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: We do have an overwhelming force there and we have the best military in the world that is fighting bravely.
So I would assume that we can, in fact, as Walter Rodgers just reported, reassert dominance very quickly in those cities and retake them probably with a good loss -- a major loss of life.
But what we're now seeing is a spreading of violence and spreading anti-Americanism among the Shiites, who, as you well know, represent the bulk of the population, some 60 percent and very importantly were at the heart of our strategy for rebuilding Iraq. They were going to be the pillar of stability for us in Iraq. And to have this break-off radical group now taking us on in a much more vigorous way than anybody ever expected, taking hostages, so that we have to go back after them with major force, only means there's going to be -- as we establish dominance, there's going to be growing resistance to the United States among the Shiite population.
And how we then turn over Iraq, a fragile state like that, to an Iraqi government, I think is beyond the comprehension of most experts.
DOBBS: David, let's turn, if we may, to Condoleezza Rice's testimony, an extraordinary session of the 9/11 Commission.
GERGEN: Sure.
DOBBS: How did she acquit herself in your view?
GERGEN: I think she definitely helped the administration today, Lou. The very fact that she went up and testified in public and under oath was positive. It helps to dispel the notion that the administration was trying to hide on these questions.
Equally important, of course, the content of her answer and her poise under fire I think bolster the case that the administration did not, was not negligent before 9/11. And it's just hard to see, based on the evidence that is there now, how a majority of the commission would conclude that somehow the Bush administration, President Bush himself, was somehow personally responsible for 9/11. It has much more the sense of Pearl Harbor.
Having said that, I don't think the administration has escaped unscathed from these last couple of weeks. The coming together of 9/11 and all the questions about the leadership of the administration and the president during the 9/11 period, pre-9/11, along with the violence and the near chaos, sense of near chaos, in Iraq, I think those things are starting to conflate, smush together in the public's mind, so that the president's leadership and the country's sense of unity about the war on terrorism has been badly damaged. DOBBS: Damaged, yet there is no alternative but to prosecute the war against radical Islamist terror. There is no alternative but to prosecute successfully the war in Iraq. What should, in your judgment, the president, this administration do going forward on both of those fronts?
GERGEN: Well, it does seem to me there are two issues now in front of us that have to be confronted very quickly.
One is, do we need a lot more troops in there? I thought they moved properly yesterday to perhaps slow down the troop rotations, bolster the number of troops that are there on the ground, from 130,000 or so to maybe 150,000, 155,000. We may need more than that to prevail.
But the second issue is how we now go through the handoff. The June 30 date that has been set seems especially artificial. And we don't even know who we're turning it over to. It strikes me increasingly, there must be a way that we can not only bring in the United Nations, but to postpone the deadline, so that we would gradually turn authority over to the United Nations. They would treat it almost like a trusteeship for, say, a few months and then go to the Iraqis and we could perhaps give to it some sort of U.N. authority right around June 30, so we wouldn't be the sole occupiers or sole -- the people really in charge there totally, and find a way that we can work it out with the Iraqis so that they know they're going to get sovereignty.
It's still going to come. They're going to have their elections next year, but we're not in the situation of turning something over in this artificial deadline to a group of people who we don't know who -- even know who they are and nobody can figure out and once you turn it over on June 30, who the heck is really in charge. What happens if there's more violence in one of these southern cities? What happens if there's another radical cleric who comes forward and mobilizes these people?
Who is going to make the calls about whether we go after them or not? Are we going to have this Iraqi government make those for the U.S. military? If they're really in charge, they're supposed to do that. But, hey, it's our people who are being threatened. We're going to want to make that call.
We need a much cleaner and clearer process. And right now, I don't think the American people sense we have a plan for how to deal with it. That's why I think we ought to play for some time and see if we can bring the U.N. into this as a co-partner in this process and turn it over to them later than June 30.
DOBBS: David, I hear you saying that you are looking for a far clearer communication. In fact, we've heard the secretary of defense referring to this latest uprising, those initiating and carrying it out, as, again, thugs and gangsters, instead of referring to the Shia cleric himself, Muqtada al-Sadr, and his followers, in a way almost trivializing the insurgents that are asserting themselves right now. The lack of clarity about strategy and vision, is it in your judgment that the administration has decided they've said enough about it, or is it that they truly don't have a, if you will, an end game here?
GERGEN: Well, it's unclear whether there are internal divisions in the administration and they can't quite make up their mind about what they want to do.
I do think they've been truly taken by surprise by the extent of the Shiite uprising and now by the taking of the prisoners, this kidnapping, gruesome kidnappings. And certainly, we were taken by surprise by what happened in Fallujah, with the desecration of the bodies and the horrors that came out of that.
But I think that they're feeling their way along on this. I think they're taking it a day at a time. But it's giving the country a sense that, yes, we need to prevail in this and, yes, we want to support our troops, but what the heck are we trying to accomplish here now? Who are we trying to turn this over to? And who is the enemy? We're now fighting Shiites we thought were going to be the heart of the new government. They were going to be the heart of new Iraq.
So I do think that the -- this communications issue -- the parallels with Vietnam are mostly all wrong, it seems to me. But what we did lack in Vietnam was a clear strategy and we lacked the enunciation of a clear strategy from the Johnson administration. And then the Nixon administration tried to come in and clean it up, but it took a long time without a clear strategy there for a long time.
And I think that the Americans now are looking for some guideposts and some sense, OK, if we're going to be sacrificing American soldiers, five, six, 10 a day, what's the purpose and how -- what's the end play point here and how are we going to get out of this? Americans are going to be willing to stick with the president if they think there's a clear plan and a clear purpose.
But right now, the big danger sign for the president is not only on the battlefields in Iraq, but it's here at home, where the polls are heading down on the percentage of Americans who are willing to keep our troops there. And this is one, as you just said, we must prevail here. And if he loses support at home, if the majority of Americans say we don't know what we're doing there, let's come home, it gets to be really difficult for the commander in chief.
DOBBS: David Gergen, thank you.
GERGEN: Lou, thank you.
DOBBS: Still ahead, I'll be talking with two members of the 9/11 Commission, Democrat Jamie Gorelick and Republican Slade Gorton.
Also, urban warfare in Iraq, American troops battling insurgents in Iraq's towns and cities. General David Grange is our guest.
And in "Broken Borders," our special report tonight, hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens loose in this country. Federal agents struggling to catch them. We'll have a special report.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: U.S. troops in Iraq are tonight engaged in heavy fighting with insurgents in urban areas of the Sunni Triangle. There are likely to be more battles, city battles, ahead as the Army launches its offensive against Shiite militiamen, and the Marine Corps as well.
Urban warfare is one of the most challenging forms of combat that any army can face.
General David Grange joins me now in "Grange On Point" tonight.
General, first, the images of that Marine crew of that M1-A1 badly wounded from an RPG strike against that tank, that isn't supposed to happen.
RETIRED BRIG. GEN. DAVID GRANGE, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, there's not a weapon on the battlefield that some system cannot take out. And even the toughest, the most advanced vehicles are neutralized by terrain.
In other words, when they have to get in close to certain areas in combat, other weapons that normally wouldn't matter to a 70-ton machine do. And also, how you take on a tank, and we don't want to get into that, but how you take on a tank can affect its vulnerability.
DOBBS: Does this suggest, because now we've been there for a year and we can all vividly remember the tremendous success of our armored divisions and our cavalry rolling into Baghdad -- does this suggest that the Iraqis, the insurgents and particularly in the Sunni Triangle have learned something about combating our armor that we should be very concerned about?
GRANGE: Absolutely.
All forces, no matter how rudimentary, learn from their first blood. And combat brings it out, techniques. Plus, the techniques are shared by other insurgent groups throughout the world. They have a network on how to defeat powerful armies. And in urban combat, it works.
DOBBS: Urban combat, which is obviously what so many of our men and women in uniform tonight are facing in Iraq, it is that very combat that the secretary of defense and the entire command structure is trying to avoid here. It's unavoidable now. What do you expect to unfold?
GRANGE: Oh, I suspect and feel very strong that the coalition forces will prevail. It's not going to happen overnight. It's going to be a tough fight. There's going to be more casualties. But the coalition forces will prevail. The Marines, the soldiers, airmen, all of them involved in this have trained extensively in urban combat. And though urban warfare negates some of the prowess of a world- class military, they'll win.
DOBBS: As we watch those men and women in combat, casualties being taken, as they engage the Iraqis, whether they're Shia, whether they're Sunni, it's really of no matter in the casualties that we're talking. Throughout the Arab world, these pictures are being watched. They're seeing the most powerful military on the face of the Earth rolled back by what the secretary of defense referred to as thugs and gangsters.
What in the world is that saying to the Arab world and what in the world are we doing to permit ourselves to get into this kind of situation after a year's experience in country?
GRANGE: Well, some of the insurgents should have been nipped in the bud early on. Some were allowed to grow to a stronger than they were. And some quite frankly we may not have known about. We should have, but we didn't.
The guerrilla has an advantage with using people as cover and camouflage, using the buildings, using the media, disinformation, to fight it. But what now has to happen is that the world needs to see the coalition smash this insurrection.
DOBBS: I get the sense, listening to you, General, that you think it's going to take a little longer than what we're being led to believe right now by the Department of Defense. How long do you think -- and I know you can only offer your best estimate here -- how long do you think it's going to take? How protracted, how tough?
GRANGE: Well, I think combat up in the Fallujah area will happen much faster than down south, for two reasons. One is that they pretty well have already committed themselves to the fight. Once you commit, you got to follow threw.
Down south, as they retake police stations and different outlying buildings, it's a different story than going after al-Sadr and his 3,000 hard-core guerrilla element. The timing is very important and we want the conditions right for the coalition before they move down to do that. If they do it too quick, I have a feeling they're draw on many more supporters. So they shouldn't get tied down to a timeline. Let the commander on the ground decide on the time. But it's going to take a while.
DOBBS: General David Grange, thank you.
GERGEN: My pleasure.
DOBBS: Still ahead here tonight, federal agents fighting a losing battle along the border, chasing hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens. There are too many of them, there is too much work and not enough resources. We'll have that special report.
And Condoleezza Rice defends the administration's record before the September 11 Commission. We'll talk with two members of the commission next.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: The top story of the day, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice testifying under oath before the 9/11 Commission.
Joining me now, two members of that commission who questioned her today. Jamie Gorelick served as deputy attorney general under President Clinton. Former Republican Senator Slade Gorton represented the state of Washington for 18 years. They both join us tonight from Washington.
Thank you both for being here.
JAMIE GORELICK, 9/11 COMMISSION MEMBER: Delighted.
DOBBS: Commissioner Gorelick, first, are you satisfied with what you heard from Condoleezza Rice today?
GORELICK: Well, she provided ample testimony. She was very articulate in her statements. We have a lot of follow-up questions, though, and a lot to go over with her in private session, I think.
DOBBS: And, Slade Gorton?
SLADE GORTON, FORMER U.S. SENATOR: Condoleezza Rice did what she wanted to do there. She met her mission, which was to present, you know, her point of view and the administration's point of view. That's not completely our mission.
Our mission is to find out everything relevant that happened leading up to 9/11 and immediately thereafter. Jamie is entirely correct. We have more questions for her, many of the answers to which are classified. And we'll get those behind closed doors.
DOBBS: The August 8 PDB, the president's briefing, came up prominently. Are we to expect that that, to now, classified document will be ultimately declassified and made public?
JAMIE GORELICK, (D) 9/11 COMMISSION MEMBER: I think they will. I mean, right now, it's being discussed in a sort of tantalizing way for the American public. We have asked, persistently, that it be declassified, because it's been the subject of attention for so long. And other things that we've asked to be declassified, we got two of them this morning.
So I think that the White House ought to be a little more comprehensive right now and decide what it wants to put out and let people see for themselves what these documents say.
GORTON: It should be declassified and I think it will be declassified.
DOBBS: And the remaining 57 documents from the Clinton administration that have not been declassified, are you satisfied, Mr. Gorton, that that will be the same?
GORTON: Well, in that case, it's not so much from our perspective that they haven't been declassified. We haven't gotten them yet and they are relevant to our mission. They may not be the most important documents of the literally hundreds of thousands we've gotten, but they are important and we fully expect that we will get all of them so they can inform our ultimate report.
DOBBS: Do you agree, Jamie Gorelick?
GORELICK: I agree with Slade completely. And now that we've found out why it was we didn't get certain Clinton administration documents that were withheld by the White House, we're now going to issue a parallel request for the similar Bush administration documents.
We have to be, as Slade says, absolutely complete or as complete as we can possibly be within the time constraints we have to do the kind of report the American people deserve for us to do.
DOBBS: That complete picture, the American people for fully, first of all, deserve and complete and full understanding of what did or did not transpire leading up to September 11. Is it your best judgment, right now, that in a bipartisan fashion, that this commission will be able to succeed in that mission?
GORTON: In the very first meeting that we had, we looked at one another, often as strangers, and said that if we couldn't come up with a unanimous report on the facts leading up to 9/11, it wouldn't be worth a great deal. And I think the collegiality among the members of the commission, our desire to do this job right, is something that I have greatly enjoyed and I'm quite optimistic that we're going to meet that goal.
GORELICK: I agree with Slade, as I usually do.
DOBBS: Let me ask you, a number of people have characterized the exchanges between Condoleezza Rice and Benveniste, and Kerry as being partisan in tone. I would like to see -- I would like to get a sense from both of you as to whether you thought so because my -- I took away from it really more a difference in personality if you will, than partisanship. Slade Gorton?
GORTON: Richard Benveniste is a magnificent trial lawyer and you saw a good trial lawyer's cross-examination of a witness. I wasn't offended by it. He had a perfect right to answer those questions, and Condoleezza Rice didn't bend under them. She answered them in a way that she wished. No, you know, I don't think so at all. All of our witnesses are there for a purpose and harsh questions of them are perfectly appropriate.
GORELICK: You know, I think it's very hard for people to believe that you could have five Democrats and five Republicans approaching the same task in a collegial fashion or that they're asking questions just because they're good questions to ask. I think both of -- all of us, we tried to be tough and ask the right questions. But also, to be polite.
Now, she, you know -- I only got three questions out because she gave very long answers.
DOBBS: I noticed that.
GORELICK: And so, you know, one might criticize me for not having been a little more intrusive in the way that Benveniste was. You work with what you've got and use the techniques you know how to use.
GORTON: I was more fortunate, I got seven questions and answers to all of them.
GORELICK: I've been kidding, she answered way more Republican questions than Democrats. We can do the count.
DOBBS: It'll be an interesting -- we've not done the count here, but it was an interesting ratio. I'm sure that that inverted with the appearance of President Clinton before you for four hours this afternoon. I know under the rules...
GORTON: No, that's not true. President Clinton was just wonderful.
DOBBS: I wasn't referring to President Clinton being less than wonderful. I was referring to that ratio between Republicans, Democrats succeeding.
GORELICK: No, no. Everyone got their questions in with him, and he actually answered questions we hadn't asked, and it was a very full and rich -- and he gave us one hour more than the time was scheduled for.
And President Clinton has done a lot of thinking since he left the presidency about issues like this. And his advice, I think, and some of his thoughts will be extremely valuable to us in writing our final report.
DOBBS: Well, I want to thank you for the time you've given us here tonight. You've got a very important job ahead of you. I would like to ask you, as people watched Condoleezza Rice today testify, is it incorrect to assume that this early stage, before you've drawn your report, that simply the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the CIA, that this was a massive intelligence failure, that was years in the making and, and certainly, was present in the months and weeks leading up to September 11, a broken system that had been tolerated for simply too long, even in the main mission, if you will, for domestic intelligence, that is, the FBI in its normal law enforcement role and a CIA which had, frankly, inadequate resources? Is that an unfair conclusion at this early stage, Jamie Gorelick?
GORELICK: Well, just on your last point, I'm not sure that the CIA had inadequate resources, at least in the counter-terrorism arena. I think -- and that's -- the FBI had lots of resources as well in the counter-terrorism area. Maybe more than they could digest. I don't think we are at the point where we can reach conclusions. We haven't even had the law enforcement hearing, which will be, I think, quite interesting to your viewers next week. We have two attorneys general and two FBI directors. And, you know, there's been a lot of finger pointing and a lot of fingers have been pointing at the bureau. So that hearing should be quite interesting. But I'm not going to state any conclusions right now.
DOBBS: I'll give you that opportunity quickly, Slade Gorton.
GORTON: Obviously, there were some failures in communication among these various agencies, but I would, as Jamie, be totally unwilling to use words like massive and to make a conclusion -- come to a conclusion at this point. We are doing our very best to get all of the evidence in hand before we come up with these conclusions.
DOBBS: Slade Gorton, Jamie Gorelick, we thank you and the rest of your fellow commissioners for your hard work in this difficult enterprise. Thank you.
GORELICK: Thank you.
DOBBS: Still ahead here, the battle to recapture hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens being released by immigration officials after they're captured. We'll have that special report for you.
And then, some of the best news for the labor market in years. We'll be talking with a panel of the best economists in the country. Ed Yardeni, Allen Sinai, Donald Strosheim (ph): jobs, growth, prosperity. At hand, we'll hear what they have to say. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: As we reported here last night a lack of detention space forces Border Patrol Agents release thousands of illegal aliens entering the country each year. Now immigration officials are trying to recapture many fugitives and send them out of the country.
Casey Wian has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Federal agents plan strategy before launching raids to capture fugitive illegal aliens.
BLITZER: Before you guys knock, make sure the perimeter is set up to ensure that in case somebody does jump out a window or something, that we'll be there to meet them.
WIAN: Three teams of immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents, or ICE, will spread out across San Diego looking for a few of the 5,600 illegal aliens here under deportation orders. Nationwide, more than 400,000 illegal aliens are loose.
MICHAEL MAGEE, ICE DEPUTY FIELD DIRECTOR: All the people we're looking for are fugitives that were apprehended once already. The Border Patrol or investigations or inspections at the port of entry caught these people and then we let them go.
WIAN: Lack of detention space is one reason many of tonight's targets have elevated authorities for years. This team's first target is not at his listed address. Agents interview neighbors, then head to the next target, the convicted drug dealer and gang member. Driving into his apartment complex, agents spot him driving out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He just went past.
WIAN: He's quickly caught and a heart wrenching discovery. A terrified toddler, the fugitive's daughter, is in the back seat of his car.
Agents call his wife.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have your husband in custody right now at the intersection.
WIAN: She picks up the sobbing girl while her husband is on his way back to Mexico. 45 percent of the fugitives ICE catch are criminals.
(on camera): ICE Agents here in San Diego apprehend around 50 fugitive aliens every month. The problem is a hundred are added to the list every month.
MICHAEL GARCIA, ASST. SECRETARY ICE: Our goal is to stabilize the ratio of people who are now becoming absconders or fugitives and the number of people we're removing from the country.
WIAN: In San Diego, only four agents are assigned to fugitive operations full type. The field director says he has enough work for 18. On this night, they caught nine of their 13 targets, but because detention space is short, other illegal aliens will be released so the most dangerous stay behind bars until they're deported.
Casey Wian, CNN, San Diego.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLITZER: That brings us to the subject of "Tonight's Poll." Do you believe the United States should spend more money to assure absolute security of our borders and shores?
Cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll have the results later in the broadcast.
Well, when we continue, "Exporting America," the jobless recovery. The politics of economics in an election year.
Alan Sinai, Donald Straszheim, and Ed Yardeni, will join us. Please stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Positive sign on jobs in this country. The number of Americans filing for first time benefits falling to the lowest level in more than 3 years. That report comes after the economy added another 300,000 new jobs in March, but more than 8 million Americans are still work looking for work.
Joining me now, three of the country's top economists, Edward Yardeni, chief investment strategist for Prudential Equity Group. Alan Sinai, chief global economist, president of Decision Economics. Donald Straszheim, president of the Straszheim Global Advisers, joining us tonight from Los Angeles.
Good to have you with us. Let me turn to you first, Donald Straszheim, this number on industrial jobless claims, how much would we make of it?
DONALD STRASZHEIM, PRES. STRASZHEIM GLOBAL ADIVSORS: This is an important additional positive sign that the labor markets are finally doing better. It's been a long, hard struggle. We got good employment numbers last week for the month of March and this is another good one today. People ought to be encouraged about the jobs picture right now.
DOBBS: Do you agree, gentlemen?
ED YARDENI, CHIEF INVESTMENT STRATEGIST, PRUDENTIAL EQUITY GROUP: I agree, it's sort of deja vu all over again. In the early 90's there were fears about a jobless recovery and we saw unemployment claims drop dramatically in '93 and '92, the employment numbers came through. And by the way that was the first reported data. When they finally did all the revisions, they found there were actually a lot more jobs created in '92 and '93.
ALAN SINIA, CHIEF GLOBAL ECONOMIST & PRESIDENT DECISION ECONOMICS: I'd say it's a better labor market. It's not an easy labor market. It's getting better and we keep getting better.
DOBBS: Because it's a presidential election year, a lot of focus being placed on the unemployment numbers, as they well should, irrespective of whether it's a presidential election year. We have a high amount of underemployment in this country. We have a high amount of discouraged workers out there right now. It's going to take a real move here to help people who have been struggling for work over the last couple of years.
YARDENI: Absolutely. I mean, it was several years into the first half of the 1990s before really things started to improve. A lot of people have suffered. It's been a very difficult economy for the past several years. But I think we're finally starting to see some signs of life here.
DOBBS: I know each of you has your own personal political views and we're not going to get into your political views here tonight. But we've heard Senator Kerry say he's going to create 10 million jobs over the next four years. We heard President Bush say he's going to create 2.6 million jobs this year. Is there any reason in the world any voter out there should be listening to any one of these forecasts about jobs being created over the next four years? I'll start with you, Don Straszheim.
STRASZHEIM: I think both numbers, quite frankly, are nonsense. We're not going to go back to the 250,000 jobs a month that were created in the '93 to '99 period, importantly because of one of the issues you talked about on the show, which is the outsourcing and attraction of hiring -- many companies are hiring. They're just not hiring here. I don't think we'll see Kerry's numbers. I can't imagine where we're going to get the 10 million jobs, nor Bush's over the next year.
SINAI: Those figures are based on historical relationships, which 'aren't really working now in the new world, new technology, new productivity. I think what voters ought to look at are the plans of the candidates to achieve whatever job growth they tell us they're going to achieve, forget the numbers.
The question is, how are they going to do it?
What are the plans?
Do they make sense?
DOBBS: Do you agree, Ed?
YARDENI: At the end of the day, the economy will will create the job and the policy has something to do with it. But we create jobs. Businesses create jobs.
DOBBS: You know, we used to say that. We used to say governments don't create jobs, economies do. The fact is, over the last three years, government jobs are what have been created.
YARDENI: Yes, to a certain extent that's true for the past couple years, but I think you're going to see private sector jobs really starting to take off, particularly in the services area.
DOBBS: I think we're all more than ready for that. You know, we're going to come back to you, Don Straszheim right after this break. We're here with Ed Yardeni, Alan Sinia, Don Straszheim, three of the best economists in the country. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: Well, apparently, these gentlemen offering us their best guidance on economics, suggest that we should be skeptical of either party's projects on jobs.
Let me turn to Don Straszheim.
How skeptical should we be about budget projections -- deficit projections from either party?
STRASZHEIM: Well, Lou, very skeptical. Our government is over committed. We've got a big deficit now that's grown rapidly in the last couple years because the economy has fallen out from under us and because a lot of Homeland Security and defense spending together. But that's not really the issue right now. The issue is the long run unsustainability because we have made the commitments years and years out, especially on entitlements payments. That's the real issue and neither President Bush nor Senator Kerry, I think, has got handle on how they're going to attack this problem.
DOBBS: Alan.
SINIA: Let's keep in mind that part of the deficit's a byproduct of recession and tax cuts that were absolutely necessary to get the economy, U.S. and global, up and running again. It was the right medicine. The tax cuts were the right medicine for a tough situation for the U.S. economy. A byproduct of the medicine are deficits and other things will create bigger deficits. Everybody agrees on the numbers, even (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and years ahead. And what Don is getting at is the entitlements, social security, Medicare, Medicaid are the biggest part of the awesome negative numbers and we've got to get focused on that. And neither candidate, so far, has faced up to those entitlements and how ho too deal with it, particularly healthcare costs, which are a big burden on the budget and on American corporations. One of the reasons why companies don't want to hire people.
DOBBS: And whether they want to hire people or not, people make up an economy. The sustainability of the budget deficit, Ed, what about the sustainability of this trade deficit which has been in deficit now for almost 28 years.
YARDENI: It's been around for a long, long time and so far, Americans have mostly benefited from it because we've gotten good products from overseas. In exchange, foreigners have choose to buy our securities. There's always the risk at some point, they may tire of that. Hasn't happened so far. But I wouldn't want to push a half trillion dollar trade deficit. At some point, we have to have narrowing.
DOBBS: Do you agree, Alan?
SINIA: Yes when you have both of them together.
DOBBS: You have a trillion dollars right there.
(CROSSTALK)
Everywhere you look, there's a half trillion dollars lurking.
SINIA: At the moment, it's not a problem. Down the line, it could be a big problem that operates on the market and operates on the economy.
STRAZHEIM: Lou, I think the trade deficits are going to stay big for some time. The primary reason is our trading partner countries, who we want to export to, have very weak growth. Japan's been weak for a long time, a little better now. Europe is still weak. We need stronger growth there. And also, these trade deals are basicly consensual. We send them our dollars, they send them their goods and those jobs their production sends to us very important to those other countries.
DOBBS: Though I think some people might argue. I don't know if you'd agree, Don that we're sending a lot of IOU'. We're net borrower. We are with out question a debtor nation. We talk about half a trillion dollars wherever you look. Over 5 percent of the GDP. We look to the pension guarantee agency alone. That's another half trillion dollars in liabilities, and that doesn't even include looking to the healthcare whether it be Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. So some huge problems before us. Are you optimistic, gentlemen?
We've got 30 seconds. Are you optimistic about the future here, the near future?
YARDENI: I am, I think most problems are politically solvable and doable. I think we just have to deal with them and I think we will.
DOBBS: Don Straszheim.
STRASZHEIM: Lou, I am optimistic over the next 6 to 12 to 18 months on the U.S. economy. Longer term, we need to attack the long- term problems. I haven't seen the political will to do that yet.
SINIA: Always optimistic.
How can he we be otherwise in a country like this?
DOBBS: If you've got a job.
SINIA: Oh, it's been a lot worse. It's been a lot worse than it is now.
DOBBS: It doesn't help a person who doesn't have a job.
SINIA: I agree with that. But still, we can be optimistic. Business is terrific. We're going to get more jobs. The deficit is, in dealing with them early, in a preemptive way, very, very important for the long-run health of our economy.
DOBBS: Alan Sinai, Ed Yardeni, Don Straszheim in California, thank you gentlemen for being with us.
Still ahead, the results of "Tonight's Poll." We continue in a moment. Please stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
DOBBS: The results of our poll, 86 percent of you say the United States should spend more money to assure security of our border and shores, 14 percent do not.
That's our show for tonight, thank you for being with us. Please join us tomorrow. 9/11 Commissioner James Thompson will be here to share his reactions to the testimony of Condoleezza Rice.
And Senator Carl Levin, ranking member of the Senate's Armed Services Committee on the latest violence in Iraq and the Coalition's response.
We'll hope you'll be with us. Thank you for being with tonight. For all us here good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.
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