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Lou Dobbs Tonight

Bush Delivers Heated Attack Against Kerry; Two Experts Disagree on Future of United Nations

Aired October 06, 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.


LOU DOBBS, CNN ANCHOR: Rising concern tonight that we could be in store for a nightmare election in a number of states. Not only concerns about electronic voting, but, in our special report, we detail how the election could easily be rigged in several states.
President Bush today delivered a heated attack against Senator Kerry.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Senator Kerry has a strategy of retreat. I have a strategy of victory.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Senator Edwards said President Bush is attacking Senator Kerry because the president has no new ideas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS (D-NC), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This president is completely out of touch with reality, and it showed again in his speech today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Stunning new revelations about the United Nations oil- for-food scandal, corruption at the highest levels of the U.N.

In tonight's Face Off, two international experts will debate whether the United Nations is now relevant or whether, in fact, it should be shut down.

And the CIA's top weapons inspector says Saddam Hussein did not have any stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Senator John Warner, is my guest.

ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Wednesday, October 6. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: Good evening.

President Bush today launched one of his strongest attacks yet against Senator John Kerry. President Bush blasted Senator Kerry on the war on terror and the economy, just two days before the second presidential presentations. President Bush said Senator Kerry has what he called a strategy of retreat for Iraq and an economic program that will raise taxes for nearly a million small business owners.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: My opponent is one of the few candidates in history to campaign on a pledge to raise taxes, and that's the kind of promise a politician from Massachusetts usually keeps.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: President Bush also accused Senator Kerry of being a tax- and-spend liberal, and the president labeled himself a compassionate conservative.

The president's speech was designed in part to overcome perceptions that the president failed to win last week's presidential presentations. Today, President Bush again made a clear link between the war in Iraq and the global war on terror.

Kitty Pilgrim reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Bush in Pennsylvania today said going into Iraq was clearly tied to stopping terrorism at home.

BUSH: We had to take a hard look at every place where terrorists might get those weapons, and one regime stood out: the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.

PILGRIM: The president fleshing out his position for the benefit of voters because this exchange between President Bush and John Kerry during the foreign policy debate left the president on the defensive.

SEN. JOHN K. KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: In answer to your question about Iraq and sending people into Iraq, he just said the enemy attacked us. Saddam Hussein didn't attack us. Osama bin Laden attacked us. Al Qaeda attacked us.

BUSH: Of course I know Osama bin Laden attacked us. I know that.

PILGRIM: But now President Bush and Vice President Cheney in their last two public appearances are clarifying the connection between Iraq and September 11, refining the message in case there is any doubt about their position that Iraq was a state that sponsored terrorism.

BUSH: There was a risk -- a real risk -- that Saddam Hussein would pass weapons or materials or information to terrorist networks. In the world after September the 11th, that was a risk we could not afford to take.

PILGRIM: And Vice President Dick Cheney in virtually the first minutes of the debate with John Edwards: RICHARD CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The effort that we've mounted with respect to Iraq focused specifically on the possibility that this was the most likely nexus between the terrorists and weapons of mass destruction.

PILGRIM: Iraq continues to dominate the election debate and shows no sign of fading.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PILGRIM: Now there is a reason for both candidates to press this point so strongly. Fifty percent of people in the most recent Gallup poll feel that the war in Iraq is part of the war on terrorism, and even now 42 percent of people polled said they still believe Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11 attacks -- Lou.

DOBBS: Kitty, thank you very much.

Kitty Pilgrim.

Senator Edwards today led the Democratic counterattack against President Bush. That's because Senator Kerry is in Colorado where he is preparing for Friday's presidential presentation. Senator Edwards said President Bush today offered the same old tired ideas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EDWARDS: There are no new ideas. There are no new plans. This president is completely out of touch with reality, and it showed again in his speech today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Vice President Dick Cheney also on the offense today at a town hall meeting in Tallahassee, Florida.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHENEY: John Edwards goes out there and says we're going to crush the terrorists. The problem with that is there isn't anything in John Kerry's background since -- oh, for the last 30 years that gives you any reason to believe that he would, in fact, be tough in terms of prosecuting the war on terror.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Two opinion polls conducted after last night's presentations declared different winners. One poll said Vice President Cheney won. The other said Senator Edwards won.

Senior Political Analyst Bill Schneider is here. He's been doing his own research. He joins me now from Washington.

So, Bill, definitively, who won?

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, research you wanted, research I'll give you.

I'm the fact check nerd, and I can tell you that we counted the number of times John Kerry's name came up in the debate. The answer: 65. What about George Bush? The answer: 8. Well, if you add in references to "the president," you get a total of 35 mentions of either Bush or the president.

That is very strange because this is supposed to be a referendum on the incumbent. Should the voters rehire him or fire him? But there was twice as much attention in this debate to John Kerry. That's a problem for Kerry because Dick Cheney and President Bush are trying to make this -- and, so far, they're succeeding in making this -- a referendum not on the president's record but on John Kerry's record, the record of a senator from Massachusetts.

DOBBS: By that definition then, Bill, Vice President Cheney succeeded in defining the debate. Therefore, is he the winner?

SCHNEIDER: It looks like he succeeded in his mission, which was to make this debate about -- to frame it as a debate about John Kerry's record. As long as the Republicans continue to do that, I think they're going to continue to get the upper hand.

DOBBS: Bill, you are -- spend a great deal of your time in our nation's capital, and you're beginning to sound like one of those people with whom you associate so closely and whose efforts, words and ideas you analyze. Who do you think won?

SCHNEIDER: Aha. Well, I think Cheney framed the debate around John Kerry, and, in that respect, he did win. I thought there were moments when John Edwards scored some points, toward the end when the debate entered the domestic agenda, because Edwards is more of a populist and he can talk kitchen table talk. But, for the most part, the debate was about national security, and, on that issue, I think a stature gap, an experience gap favored Dick Cheney.

DOBBS: Bill, would you agree with my assessment that this was a considerably more elevated presentation, if not debate, than last Thursday's between the presidential candidates?

SCHNEIDER: Yes. Oh, certainly, it was. And I thought particularly Dick Cheney gave a more imposing and authoritative presentation. He looked presidential, and, in a way, that doesn't really help President Bush because he's the one who's supposed to -- he is the president. I mean, he's supposed to look presidential. I think a lot of Bush's supporters were dismayed by his performance. They were encouraged by Cheney, but Cheney's not the president.

DOBBS: All right. Quickly, what do both campaigns have to do? What do both candidates have to accomplish over the next 48 hours before St. Louis?

SCHNEIDER: Well, you know that this -- in the next couple of debates, it's going to be focused on domestic issues. St. Louis is a town hall form, and I think the Democrats are eagerly looking forward to the idea that they're going to finally get a chance to talk about the domestic agenda.

But what did President Bush do today? He talked -- he gave an economics speech, but he cast the whole thing in terms of the war on terror and 9/11. The president wants this entire election campaign to be framed around the war on terror, 9/11, just like the Republican Convention.

You ask President Bush or Vice President Cheney about the economy, they're going to talk about 9/11 and the war on terror. That's the way they're going to try to continue to frame it.

DOBBS: Bill, as you know, I'm wary, if not outright skeptical, of national polls, but what are the state-by-state polls showing right now? What do they mean in your analysis?

SCHNEIDER: Well, I looked at some state polls that have come out since that first debate, which presumably changed the momentum, but we're not seeing John Kerry really picking up very much support, as a lot of people anticipated.

In Florida, it's still too close to call. One poll shows 2 points ahead for Kerry, one 2 points ahead for Bush.

New Hampshire ought to be a sure thing, even though it voted for Bush last time. That was because of Nader's presence on the ballot. It's a neighboring state for John Kerry, the Boston media market, but that poll since last week's debate still shows an absolute dead heat: 47 Bush, 47 Kerry.

And a big surprise: New Jersey, which Al Gore carried by 16 points, shows a Kerry lead of just 3 points.

Those are polls taken since that first debate, and they're failing to show much Kerry momentum.

DOBBS: Bill Schneider, as always, thank you, sir.

SCHNEIDER: Sure.

DOBBS: Final confirmation today of what we've all known for quite some time: Saddam Hussein had no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. The CIA's top weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, says Saddam Hussein destroyed those stockpiles long before the outbreak of the war. But Saddam Hussein maintained the capability to resume WMD production in the future.

Our National Security Correspondent David Ensor has the report -- David.

DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Lou, the careful analyst hired by the CIA to lead the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq found himself in the glare of TV lights with his words parsed by both parties in this election year. His key finding, as you mentioned, giving ammunition to Democrats who charge that the president went to war over stockpiles of weapons that were not there. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHARLES DUELFER, CIA WEAPONS INSPECTOR: It is my judgment that retained stocks do not exist.

ENSOR (voice-over): Charles Duelfer said his team has found no weapons, does not expect them to be found, and no evidence of any meaningful chemical, biological or nuclear weapons programs activity since the mid 1990s.

That said, Duelfer said Saddam Hussein himself, now a prisoner, has admitted he wanted to keep whatever weapons he could, given U.N. sanctions.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Is there any doubt in your mind that if Saddam Hussein were in power today and there were no restrictions or sanctions placed on him that he would be attempting to acquire weapons of mass destruction, Mr. Duelfer?

DUELFER: To me, I think that's quite clear.

ENSOR: Still, Duelfer's Iraq survey group has spent $900 million thus far, said one senator, who questioned the point of it all.

SEN. EDWARD KENNEDY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: Why does the search keep going on and on and on, and aren't we at the point where we have to admit the stockpiles don't exist and then what's obviously become a wild goose chase?

DUELFER: You say wild goose chase. I mean, we've had a couple of people die. We've had many people wounded. And to tell them they've been involved in a wild goose chase to me is -- it's not really what we're doing. We were meant to find what existed with respect to WMD. We weren't tasked to find weapons. We were tasked to find the truth of the program.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ENSOR: Duelfer says most of the work is done, although the Iraq survey group recently got its hands on thousands of new pages of documents on WMD. Nine hundred linguists in Qatar are now working their way through them -- Lou.

DOBBS: David, thank you very much.

David Ensor, our national security correspondent.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan today said he is not surprised by the Duelfer report. Annan said U.N. inspectors did not find any evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq before the war.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KOFI ANNAN, U.N. SECRETARY GENERAL: I think it indicates that the inspectors had an impact. The U.N. inspection did what it was supposed to do. (END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Much more on the CIA report ahead. Much more on the United Nations as well. And I'll be joined by Senator John Warner, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, to assess this conclusive report on the absence of weapons of mass destruction.

Also ahead, shocking new details tonight about the rampant corruption within the United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq. We'll have that special report.

And a heated Face Off, a debate on whether or not the United Nations is now irrelevant. Now two international experts ready to go. They hold obviously very different views. They'll be with us next on Face Off.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: A major development tonight in the investigation of the scandal within the United Nations oil-for-food program. A congressional committee has expanded its investigation now to include the handling of Iraqi oil money after the fall of Saddam Hussein. That committee is seeking information from the Bush administration and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which manages the development fund for Iraq.

This investigation has also revealed more about what the United Nations knew about Saddam Hussein's abuse of the program and all that it ignored.

Bill Tucker reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BILL TUCKER, CNN FINANCIAL CORRESPONDENT: A congressional hearing suggested Saddam Hussein used the United Nations oil-for-food program as a private bank account.

REP. CHRISTOPHER SHAYS (R), CONNECTICUT: It was a leaky sieve. It enabled Saddam to get $4.4 billion. It was a joke.

TUCKER: The money was supposed to go to the Iraqi people to buy food and medicine. Instead, kickbacks and skimming were rampant, and billions went to build Saddam palaces and possibly to also buy illegal weapons.

REP. TIM MURPHY (R), PENNSYLVANIA: We knew Saddam Hussein was corrupt, and his tactics of ruthless violence were a way of life. One would think the U.N. would be aware of this and structure the program in such a way so as to guard against it.

TUCKER: France, Russia and China were well aware of it. One U.S. ambassador to the U.N. testified that any attempt to look into the problem met resistance from those U.N. members.

SHAYS: Do you feel this story should come out? AMB. PATRICK KENNEDY, U.S. REPRESENTATIVE TO U.N. MANAGEMENT & REFORMS: Absolutely.

SHAYS: Do you feel this story should come out even if it embarrasses our allies?

KENNEDY: Absolutely.

SHAYS: Do you believe it should come out even if it embarrassed some allies and makes it more difficult to get their cooperation in Iraq?

KENNEDY: Absolutely.

TUCKER: Some international companies, such as Dutch-based Saybolt, the French bank BMP and Swiss-based Cotecna, which at one point employed the son of U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, are suspected of allowing Saddam Hussein to cheat on the oil programs and build his military. Representatives from those companies sat there and said they didn't have the power to stop it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TUCKER: And as part of its investigation, the committee also drafted a letter to Defense Secretary Rumsfeld requesting detailed information on the accounting of the development fund for Iraq. The committee in essence saying that as long as we're looking and checking, we might as well make sure the U.S. house is in order as well -- Lou.

DOBBS: Bill Tucker.

Thank you very much.

The deepening scandal at the United Nations oil-for-food program is renewing in part the debate about whether the United Nations is relevant to world peace and U.S. foreign policy. The United Nations' role, in fact, has been a very hot-button issue in this presidential campaign. And all of this brings us to tonight's Face Off.

Joining me tonight from Washington, D.C., Ariel Cohen from the Heritage Foundation, who says the United Nations is bankrupt both politically and morally. In Washington as well, Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies. Ms. Bennis says that in terms of the war in Iraq, the United Nations commanded more influence and relevance than perhaps ever in their history.

Good to have you both with us.

Let me say to you first, Phyllis, the idea of commanding more prominence and importance may strike some as odd. Why do you say that?

PHYLLIS BENNIS, INSTITUTE FOR POLICY STUDIES: Because it was in the period of the run-up to the war when people around the world, both governments and populations, were adamantly opposed to this U.S. drive towards war.

Governments were saying no to the U.S. demand that they support the war. Poor countries on the Security Council were saying no. The United Nations itself became both a venue and a player in the opposition to the run-up to war.

And, in doing so, it not only followed the precepts of the U.N. charter that talk about fighting against the scourge of war, but it took seriously the notion of representing the people of the world who were saying no.

DOBBS: Your response, Ariel?

ARIEL COHEN, FELLOW, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: The United Nations does not represent people of the world. It's not a democratically elected body. The United Nations, unfortunately, has a track record of failure when it comes to preventing abuse and murder of the weakest members of the global community.

Look what is happening today in Darfur, look what happened in former Yugoslavia, when the United Nations again and again failed to protect genocide or genocide-like activities committed, unfortunately, with the acquiescence of the United Nations' personnel on the ground.

DOBBS: Phyllis?

BENNIS: And in all of those situations, we have the major powers, most precisely the United States, along with France, Russia, other major powers, preventing the United States from -- sorry -- preventing the United Nations from doing the job that it was set up to do and that it was trying to do on many of those occasions. Have there been huge...

COHEN: Phyllis, you cannot have it both ways.

BENNIS: Sure, I can. The notion that -- sorry. The notion that the United Nations is always going to be successful -- of course not, but the notion that the world community of governments that established international law -- the United Nations charter, of course, is what gives us the basis for international law.

DOBBS: Phyllis, Phyllis, Phyllis. What is the greatest success -- you -- you know, actually, Ariel left out a number of other significant failures of the United Nations, particularly in genocide, referencing the Sudan and his reference to Darfur. But Rwanda is one of the great stains.

BENNIS: Rwanda. Absolutely.

DOBBS: And what in the world has the United Nations accomplished? I hear you talking about the ideals, which I think any rational person in the world would agree with, but what has the United Nations successfully accomplished?

BENNIS: You know, Lou, when Colin Powell said two years ago that terrorism flourishes in areas of poverty and despair, in those areas, it is the United Nations more than any other institution in the world that are there trying to solve the problems that give rise not only to terrorists themselves, but as much or more give rise to those people who would support terrorist activities.

DOBBS: The United Nations...

I'm sorry. Go ahead, Ariel.

COHEN: Terrorism today flourishes in the areas where radical Islamist indoctrination is allowed to flourish. The United Nations has not come with a definition of terrorism after 30 years of debate. The United Nations had not done anything to prevent this brainwashing of thousands of -- tens of thousands of Muslim boys from becoming jihadis.

I'm sorry. The United Nations demonstrated that it is absolutely clueless how to fight terrorism. The United Nations can be left to the task it may be able to do, which I'm not sure that it can, and that is humanitarian assistance. But even in humanitarian assistance, Phyllis, you know as well as I ...

BENNIS: It's not only about humanitarian impact.

COHEN: Excuse me.

BENNIS: If we're serious about stopping terrorism...

DOBBS: Phyllis...

COHEN: With the humanitarian assistance in West Africa, for example, the U.N. personnel was found guilty of abusing children there.

BENNIS: Right.

COHEN: United Nations gave Saddam $4.4 billion...

BENNIS: No, the United States...

DOBBS: Let me...

BENNIS: ... gave the -- gave Saddam Hussein the weapons...

COHEN: Excuse me. I...

BENNIS: ... that he used.

DOBBS: Excuse me. Excuse me, both of you.

Ariel, thank you.

Phyllis, your point?

BENNIS: My point on Saddam Hussein was that it was the United States who provided the seed stock for biological weapons. DOBBS: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Wait, wait. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We have a record in which the United Nations could have resolved much. I think you would agree with me. Had Kofi Annan and the United Nations over that period of time not acquiesced to Saddam's refusal.

BENNIS: No, because...

DOBBS: Excuse me, please. Had not acquiesced to Saddam Hussein's refusal. One could make a very good argument that there could have been an effective weapons inspection through that period from 1998 in which the United Nations was barred, to which Kofi Annan acquiesced, and the Security Council and the major powers.

So let me ask you this again and as straightforwardly as I possibly can, what are the principal successes by the United Nations?

BENNIS: First of all, I think it's important to correct something on the history, and that is that it was the United States and its allies on the Security Council who knew precisely what was going on in Iraq. They were the ones in charge of dealing with all the contracts...

DOBBS: Oh, wait, wait.

BENNIS: ... that we're now hearing is the responsibility of Kofi Annan.

DOBBS: I'm sorry.

BENNIS: That was a Security Council set of decisions.

DOBBS: I'm sorry.

All right. Let me turn this back to Ariel. Let me ask you this. Without the United Nations -- and what is extraordinary today in our ideological polarization, the polemics that capture all of this, the fact is the United Nations has a set of ideals that are laudable.

Is there any way in which the United Nations can be reformed, brought into a meaningful, effective role so that we do not have to suffer these failures, whether the fault of Third World nations or great powers?

COHEN: Lou, I think that the United Nations reform was tried and tried again, and the United States is footing the bill for the United Nations more than any other nation in the world, and to come back and blame our country for not being supportive of the U.N. when we are the biggest financier of the U.N. is ludicrous.

We tried everything. We probably need to start from the scratch with a league of democracies where democracies, not dictatorships like Libya which was allowed to chair the U.N. Human Rights Commission, like Syria that was allowed into the human rights bodies of the U.N., like other dictatorships which...

DOBBS: All right. Let's...

COHEN: ... which are...

DOBBS: Let's give Phyllis the final word here very quickly, Ariel. Thank you very much.

BENNIS: I think that we have to be very clear that we live in a world in which we cannot be safe if people around the world do not feel safe. We need a new definition of what it takes to fight terrorism. We have to look at what causes terrorism. We have to look at legal solutions...

DOBBS: Oh, my God. We know what causes terrorism...

BENNIS: ... including...

DOBBS: ... and the fact is that terrorists -- what are you suggesting?

BENNIS: But, Lou, why do people support it? It's true. Terrorists cause terrorism. That's true.

DOBBS: Why do they support it?

BENNIS: But why is it that people around the world sometimes think it's...

COHEN: Because they're...

DOBBS: Well, you're opening up...

COHEN: Because they're brainwashed.

DOBBS: ... a whole other question, and the fact of the matter is there is much -- it is far too complex an issue to suggest that we could resolve that in one sitting here on this broadcast, even as perceptive as our audience and as motivated as our guests, such as you.

We thank you very much here for being here, Phyllis, Ariel. Thank you both very much. We'll come back and we'll get to those issues as well, but it's going to take us a little more than one night's discussion. Thank you.

That brings us to the subject of tonight's poll. Do you believe the United Nations in the pursuit of peace is most often helpful or unhelpful? Please cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll have the results later in the broadcast.

Also ahead here tonight, new evidence that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction before the U.S. invasion. Senator John Warner, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, is my guest.

And then, growing concerns about another election nightmare. How several states have simply failed to confirm new voters are, in fact, residents of their state or even U.S. citizens. And no laughing matter: The shipment of American jobs to cheap foreign labor markets. It's also hurting the people behind some of this country's most beloved entertainment.

That and a great deal more still ahead here. Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: LOU DOBBS TONIGHT continues. Here now for more news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: The top CIA weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, today said Saddam Hussein had no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction before the outbreak of war in Iraq. Duelfer delivered his report to the Senate Armed Services Committee. I am now joined by the chairman of that committee, Senator John Warner.

Senator, good to have you here.

SEN. JOHN WARNER (R-WV), CHAIRMAN, ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Delighted.

DOBBS: This is a definitive report. Does this conclude the issue as to whether there was or was not weapons of mass destruction?

WARNER: Just moments ago I wrapped up the hearing, and Mr. Duelfer is going back. There's work to be done. But basically, no major stockpiles have been found, and the likelihood is it's not going to occur. But he also added that all the intelligence services worldwide thought Saddam Hussein had those weapons and he himself as a professional working for the U.N. and a former inspector, he likewise thought they had weapons. So it just -- this idea that Bush went it alone is wrong. The world was convinced that he had them, and for good reason -- because he'd used them against these neighbors, and we knew that he had them in '91.

DOBBS: But we are also told now, Senator, reliably, by CIA sources in fact, that the centrifuges, which were part of the evidence of weapons of mass destruction in this case, obviously nuclear, were known to be of the wrong dimension, in fact made of the wrong material to be used in the production of nuclear weaponry at least. Does that trouble you as well as the chairman of the committee?

WARNER: Yes, Lou. I've gone through that. And there was a diversity of opinion within the Department of Energy, the CIA and other components of our intelligence gathering about those tubes. But I'd like to go back to Duelfer. It was an important testimony. And I asked him the first question. I said, Mr. Duelfer, is the world better off with Saddam Hussein now in captivity and facing the rule of law in his own country? Yes, Senator. And did you feel that the diplomacy, if allowed to continue, would have achieved that same result and removed this dictator? He said no, he felt that diplomacy wouldn't do it.

DOBBS: Senator, as you recall, and I take the points precisely, but as you recall, the Bush administration initially talking about regime change placed the entire basis and seeking the approval of the United Nations security council to bring Iraq to task was based on the presence of weapons of mass destruction.

WARNER: Not the entire, Lou. That's where you and I disagree.

DOBBS: Well, may I cite my source?

WARNER: Yes.

DOBBS: February 5 at the United Nations security council, Secretary of State Colin Powell setting forth a presentation that relied in its entirety upon the presence of weapons of mass destruction, including mobile laboratories that were biochemical in nature as well as the presence of a nuclear threat.

WARNER: Well, Lou, I will not try and dispute the accuracy of the quote that you're giving me, but having sat through endless hearings, not only on my committee, but also I'm a member of the intelligence committee...

DOBBS: Yes, sir.

WARNER: There were a number of reasons other than the generally held view by all the intelligence agencies worldwide that weapons of mass destruction posed a threat, not only to the region but the potential for those weapons to slip out into terrorists' hands.

DOBBS: Senator, I'm not for a moment suggesting that there may not have been good reasons and critical reasons in which the United Nations should support and the United States Congress should support a decision to go to war against Saddam Hussein. But what I am suggesting is the reasons articulated at the United Nations were based on WMD which we now are told at least to this point rather definitively did not exist. My question to you is this, sir, with the fact that those intelligence agencies, not only U.S. intelligence agencies but the weapons, as you point out, the weapons inspectors of the United Nations and other intelligence services around the world were utterly wrong about what was happening in Iraq, how concerned are you about the level of intelligence that's being generated today? How critical is it to reform our intelligence agency? And how urgently and quickly can we have an effective intelligence operation carried out by this government?

WARNER: Lou, what better answer can I give you than about 20 minutes ago the Senate final passage of its version of the revision of our intelligence structure? The vote was 96-2, and the two absentees regrettably were Kerry and Edwards. But nevertheless, that's a strong message that the Senate is committed to try and strengthen our intelligence system and remove those problems that could have contributed to some of our problems in connection with 9/11. That's it.

DOBBS: We appreciate the update. And Senator, we thank you very much for being here.

WARNER: Thank you.

DOBBS: We thank you very much. Senator John Warner, the chairman of the Senate armed services committee.

Coming up next here, drawing jobs overseas. Some of the country's most highly valued specialized jobs are being exported to a cheap foreign labor market half a world away. Our special report coming up next.

Also ahead, bracing for an election nightmare on November 2. Why it may be startlingly easy for anyone to vote in this country without proving either state residence or U.S. citizenship.

And which candidate has the edge going into these second rounds after last night's vice presidential face-off? We'll hear from three of the best political journalists in the country next. Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: The shipment of American jobs to cheap foreign labor markets now extends far beyond India and China to countries literally all over the world. Animation is one of this country's fastest- growing industries and should translate into lots of jobs for Americans. But instead, the jobs are being exported to cheaper artists, in this case in South Korea. Sohn Jie-Ae reports from Seoul.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SOHN JIE-AE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The lives of Bart Homer and the rest of "The Simpsons" may seem as American as apple pie. They come to life through the hands of South Korean artists.

"Sometimes it's so funny we have to stop and show each other," says Park Eun-Joo.

It seems humor, along with cheap labor, transcends national boundaries in the world of animation. For decades South Korean animators have been responsible for drawing a wide range of U.S. cartoons such as "Bugs Bunny," "Tom and Jerry," and "The Simpsons." Animator Nelson Chin has a wall full of awards and several Emmys for his work on "The Simpsons" and other shows.

In the early 1970s Nelson was drawing cartoons like the "Pink Panther" in the U.S. and saw the potential.

NELSON SHIN, AKOM PRODUCTION: United States, they have a lot of work, right? How are they going to train people, you know, just like that?

JIE-AE: U.S. companies couldn't and didn't. Especially since countries like South Korea already had a pool of artists willing to do it for much less.

LEE YONG-BAE, KAYWON SCHOOL OF ART & DESIGN (through translator): Labor costs of completing an animation series in the U.S. would have been at least double.

JIE-AE: Official figures say in the peak years from the eighties to early nineties the amount of animation business flowing from the U.S. to South Korea reached $100 million every year. Based on this booming market, South Korea's animation industry flourished. More than 14 universities teach animation and turn out some 3,000 artists every year. But now the market has changed. While "The Simpsons" is still drawn in South Korea, some of the other U.S. animation studios now head to even cheaper countries like India, Thailand, and of course China. Nelson doesn't believe Bart Simpson will ever be drawn in these countries, but there seems to be no denying the fact that the outsourcees are now being outsourced. Sohn Jie-Ae, CNN, Seoul.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DOBBS: And taking a look now at some of your thoughts about outsourcing, the exporting of America,

Jean Lemke in Shorview, Minnesota, "Lou, apparently corporate greed has overcome conscience with regard to the exposure of America's private information: our legal, medical and financial records and data can all be accessed now by the click of a key on the computer. It appears our borders leak in both directions, illegal aliens in, our personal information going out."

Evelyn Phillips in Starkesville, Louisiana, "Do we have anything left to outsource? We can not stand much more of this. We are on the brink of being a third-world country."

Send us your thoughts at loudobbs@CNN.com. Send us your name and address as well, because each of you whose e-mail is read on the broadcast receives a copy of my new book "Exporting America."

Coming up next, new fears of an election nightmare this November 2. New voter registration programs relying on voters to use, that's right, the honor system. We'll have a special report for you.

And then, President Bush launches a new assault against Senator Kerry. We'll be talking with three of the country's top political journalists, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Alarming new concerns tonight about the integrity of this country's voting system just 27 days before we vote for president. The rush to register new voters all across the country has all but eliminated the screening process in a number of states. Now many new voters will be going to the polls next month with no verification whatsoever that they are in fact residents of the states in which they're voting or citizens of the United States at all. Lisa Sylvester reports from Washington.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It may be easy to sign up a new voter. It's not easy to verify they are actually eligible to vote. In states like Maryland, people who register to vote as part of a voter registration drive, do not have to show identification when they sign up or on election day. And there are no requirements to prove citizenship or age.

LINDA LAMONE, MARYLAND BOARD OF ELECTIONS: Voter registration in the United States has historically been the honor code, at least in Maryland it has. Until the help America Vote Act was enacted, there was no legal requirement in Maryland whatsoever that the voter provide any kind of identification.

SYLVESTER: The help America Vote Act was passed after the Florida debacle. But in Maryland, it only requires mail-in registrants prove they are who they say they are, with anything from a utility bill to a paycheck.

Voter registrants have to check a box and sign a form under penalty of perjury that they are a U.S. citizen, of voting age, and not an ex-felon. But the system is ripe for fraud, says Maryland delegate Don Dwyer.

DON DWYER, MARYLAND HOUSE OF DELEGATES: The requirement of being a citizen in order to vote is as American as apple pie is, and unfortunately, in this country that is being eroded.

SYLVESTER: Dwyer introduced a bill in Maryland that would require new voters show a birth certificate or proof they are a naturalized citizen. And it's not just a problem in Maryland. While the rules vary by state and county, other jurisdictions like California also do not have to prove citizenship. But get out the vote groups are concerned asking people for more information could disenfranchise legitimate voters on election day.

HANS RIEMER, ROCK THE VOTE: There could be millions of people who won't be able to vote on November 2, 2004, literally millions of people who get turned away from the polls on election day. And the problems are stemming from sometimes election officials are uninformed. Sometimes they're malicious. Sometimes people purge voter lists improperly.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SYLVESTER: State election offices check voter rolls against death records and court records for felonies, but there is no national citizenship registry. So officials say it's impossible to audit their lists to make sure everyone is a U.S. citizen -- Lou.

DOBBS: I can't think of much that you could have reported tonight, Lisa, that would have been more troubling to those concerned about the integrity of this election process this year. Thank you very much, Lisa Sylvester.

In the campaign tonight both sides are claiming they have the momentum following the one and only vice presidential presentation last night. Joining me now to discuss the outcome of the debate and what we can expect in the days ahead, Karen Tumulty, national political correspondent for "Time" magazine in Washington. Roger Simon, political editor "U.S. News & World Report" in Chicago. And joining me tonight from New York, Mark Warren, executive editor at "Esquire" magazine. Good to have you all here.

Karen, who won?

KAREN TUMULTY, TIME: Boy, I tell you, I think that both of these guys were really at the top of their game. And while they had very different styles and very different arguments to make, I think that it's hard to pick a winner.

DOBBS: Is it as difficult for you, Roger?

ROGER SIMON, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT: The American people won, Lou. They always do.

(LAUGHTER)

DOBBS: You guys are covering too many of these folks.

SIMON: I think there's more than one Republican today who's asking why Dick Cheney is at the bottom of this ticket and not the top. He seems to know more than President Bush. He seems to express it better than President Bush.

DOBBS: Does he know more than Senator Kerry?

SIMON: We're never going to find out. There's no head-to-head contest between those two.

DOBBS: Well, there wasn't a head-to-head contest between President Bush either, but you seem to think that he knows more than President Bush. Did Senator Kerry show you superiority of knowledge over Vice President Cheney last week?

SIMON: I thought Kerry did very well. I thought Cheney did very well. And I thought both stylistically were far better than the president was, and both seemed to have a command of the facts. Unfortunately, if you like both of them, you can't vote a split ticket that way.

DOBBS: It's an interesting mix and match concept offered up to us tonight by "U.S. News & World Report." Mark, I don't know what "Esquire" magazine will have to offer, but what's your judgment? Who won?

MARK WARREN, ESQUIRE: It was an astonishing contrast in styles. Certainly it was the caffeinated kid versus the immovable object. Given that this was a format that was friendly to the vice president, he's so accustomed to it, and that Senator Edwards held his own, held his ground, I would say that it certainly was a draw as far as debating points go, but he survived and so thus prospered, I think.

DOBBS: Would we all agree that this debate was at such a much more elevated level than the presidential debate last Thursday? Karen, I'll start with you. Since I've asked you, I think it's only fair that I give you my judgment. Just as I thought Senator Kerry was a clear winner last week, I think it was also very clear that the vice president was the winner last night. But I think that frankly the elevation of the debate was such that Senator Edwards benefited as well. What do you think, Karen?

TUMULTY: By elevation of the debate, I think that what people want to walk away from a debate with is a very clear idea of what the differences are, what your choice is, what the two parties are offering, and I think that couldn't have been clearer.

Senator Edwards was arguing that if you want a change in direction vote for the Democrats. And Vice President Cheney made far more eloquently and persuasively than the president himself the argument that experience and that this administration's judgment is what counts.

DOBBS: Roger?

SIMON: I think both, actually, were good, substantive debates. Debates is -- good substantive presentations. I don't really see that this one was much more elevated in terms of the issues discussed than the one in Coral Gables. What we remember from Coral Gables, though, is not the substance but the style, frankly, because the president wasn't very good stylistically.

DOBBS: Mark?

WARREN: The thing I was most struck by is when this debate finally turned halfway through to domestic issues, it's almost as if somebody let the air out of the balloon. It's clearly the animating issues in this campaign four weeks out from the election are national security. And inside that issue the salient question, salient fact is that Iraq is burning, and whoever's interpretation of that fact carries the day wins the election.

DOBBS: Thank you. We'll be back with our panel of political journalists in just one moment. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Not much movement in the state by state polls, Karen, for Senator Kerry at this point yet this administration has been buffetted by the statements by Paul Bremer that mistakes were made, and he enumerated several, including the fact there aren't enough troops in Iraq. Now the CIA's top weapons inspector says there were no WMD. Just how much can this administration withstand of this assault of facts that are contradictory of policy?

TUMULTY: Well, I think that is why the first thing that you heard Senator Edwards say last night was that this administration hasn't been telling the truth. The administration knew that this report was coming today. They started trying to spin it yesterday, saying that it actually bolsters their claim that Saddam Hussein had intent and capability. But their claim had been that Saddam Hussein had possession of these weapons of mass destruction, and particularly their most alarming claim was about nuclear weapons. Now we find out that not only did he not have them but his capacity to get them was deteriorating. So I think this is a pretty sharp blow to the administration's credibility.

DOBBS: Roger?

SIMON: I think you've seen the Republican position many times. It was stated by President Bush in his debate, stated by Dick Cheney in his debate. And it goes this way -- it really doesn't matter why we invaded Iraq. It doesn't matter that our intelligence was faulty. It doesn't matter that we knowingly or unknowingly misled the American public because the result was good. It is better to have Saddam Hussein in a jail cell than in a presidential palace. And so we are to be forgiven all the reasons we stated for why we went into Iraq.

DOBBS: Then why in the world aren't Senator Kerry and Senator Edwards ahead in this race?

WARREN: The country's quite evenly divided. I mean, certainly this might have impact on the very slim margin, slim group of undecided voters. This is not a good report for the administration certainly. And this reflects this new front opened up by Senator Edwards last night. In addition to attacking the judgment of the administration, they are now attacking repeatedly the candor of the administration with the American people.

DOBBS: And they're attacking candor, but the attacks are just as fulsome and in my judgment just as effective and strident in the case of the Bush administration against Senator Kerry and Senator Edwards. How effective was the statement, for example, Karen, "senator gone" the reference to Senator Edwards, newspapers referring to him as senator gone because of the number of votes that he's missed? How effective is that sort of thing?

TUMULTY: Oh, I think that that was a very effective criticism of Senator Edwards. As charismatic as he is on the stump, as well as he did in his own presidential race, the fact is that in North Carolina had he not run for president, had he decided to run for re-election there, there was a real chance he would have been beaten. And his approval in his own home state was not that high.

DOBBS: And Roger, at this juncture with this race statistically a dead heat in most of the polls, the Washington ABC poll, as you pointed out quite correctly here now showing a five-point lead for the president, what do you expect in the next couple of days leading up to this second debate?

SIMON: I think we're going to see if Senator Kerry can make as much ground on domestic issues as he has made on Iraq, as Mark has correctly said, the air seemed to go out of the debate last night when it switched from Iraq to domestic issues. On the other hand, the format in St. Louis is a very strange one. It's a town hall, but it's a pseudotown hall. The Bush administration...

DOBBS: Do you mean like the others have been pseudodebates? Is that right? SIMON: A little worse. In a town hall people stand up and ask real questions. In this, from what I read, the questions are prescreened by the moderator...

DOBBS: Roger, I've got to interrupt. We are out of time. I'm being given, as they say, a hard wrap. I want to say thank you very much, Roger. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow. Karen, thank you very much. Mark, thank you. Mark Warren.

Still ahead here the results of our poll. A preview of what's ahead tomorrow. Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: The results now of our poll. 69 percent of you say the United Nations in the pursuit of peace is most often helpful. 31 percent of you say it is unhelpful. Thanks for being with us tonight. Please join us tomorrow. Ron Christie (ph), former domestic policy adviser to President Bush, Vice President Cheney joins us ahead of the next round of presidential presentations. Please join us. For all of us here, thanks for being with us tonight. Good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com


Aired October 6, 2004 - 18:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LOU DOBBS, CNN ANCHOR: Rising concern tonight that we could be in store for a nightmare election in a number of states. Not only concerns about electronic voting, but, in our special report, we detail how the election could easily be rigged in several states.
President Bush today delivered a heated attack against Senator Kerry.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Senator Kerry has a strategy of retreat. I have a strategy of victory.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Senator Edwards said President Bush is attacking Senator Kerry because the president has no new ideas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN EDWARDS (D-NC), VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This president is completely out of touch with reality, and it showed again in his speech today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Stunning new revelations about the United Nations oil- for-food scandal, corruption at the highest levels of the U.N.

In tonight's Face Off, two international experts will debate whether the United Nations is now relevant or whether, in fact, it should be shut down.

And the CIA's top weapons inspector says Saddam Hussein did not have any stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Senator John Warner, is my guest.

ANNOUNCER: This is LOU DOBBS TONIGHT for Wednesday, October 6. Here now for an hour of news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: Good evening.

President Bush today launched one of his strongest attacks yet against Senator John Kerry. President Bush blasted Senator Kerry on the war on terror and the economy, just two days before the second presidential presentations. President Bush said Senator Kerry has what he called a strategy of retreat for Iraq and an economic program that will raise taxes for nearly a million small business owners.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: My opponent is one of the few candidates in history to campaign on a pledge to raise taxes, and that's the kind of promise a politician from Massachusetts usually keeps.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: President Bush also accused Senator Kerry of being a tax- and-spend liberal, and the president labeled himself a compassionate conservative.

The president's speech was designed in part to overcome perceptions that the president failed to win last week's presidential presentations. Today, President Bush again made a clear link between the war in Iraq and the global war on terror.

Kitty Pilgrim reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Bush in Pennsylvania today said going into Iraq was clearly tied to stopping terrorism at home.

BUSH: We had to take a hard look at every place where terrorists might get those weapons, and one regime stood out: the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.

PILGRIM: The president fleshing out his position for the benefit of voters because this exchange between President Bush and John Kerry during the foreign policy debate left the president on the defensive.

SEN. JOHN K. KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: In answer to your question about Iraq and sending people into Iraq, he just said the enemy attacked us. Saddam Hussein didn't attack us. Osama bin Laden attacked us. Al Qaeda attacked us.

BUSH: Of course I know Osama bin Laden attacked us. I know that.

PILGRIM: But now President Bush and Vice President Cheney in their last two public appearances are clarifying the connection between Iraq and September 11, refining the message in case there is any doubt about their position that Iraq was a state that sponsored terrorism.

BUSH: There was a risk -- a real risk -- that Saddam Hussein would pass weapons or materials or information to terrorist networks. In the world after September the 11th, that was a risk we could not afford to take.

PILGRIM: And Vice President Dick Cheney in virtually the first minutes of the debate with John Edwards: RICHARD CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The effort that we've mounted with respect to Iraq focused specifically on the possibility that this was the most likely nexus between the terrorists and weapons of mass destruction.

PILGRIM: Iraq continues to dominate the election debate and shows no sign of fading.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PILGRIM: Now there is a reason for both candidates to press this point so strongly. Fifty percent of people in the most recent Gallup poll feel that the war in Iraq is part of the war on terrorism, and even now 42 percent of people polled said they still believe Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11 attacks -- Lou.

DOBBS: Kitty, thank you very much.

Kitty Pilgrim.

Senator Edwards today led the Democratic counterattack against President Bush. That's because Senator Kerry is in Colorado where he is preparing for Friday's presidential presentation. Senator Edwards said President Bush today offered the same old tired ideas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EDWARDS: There are no new ideas. There are no new plans. This president is completely out of touch with reality, and it showed again in his speech today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Vice President Dick Cheney also on the offense today at a town hall meeting in Tallahassee, Florida.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHENEY: John Edwards goes out there and says we're going to crush the terrorists. The problem with that is there isn't anything in John Kerry's background since -- oh, for the last 30 years that gives you any reason to believe that he would, in fact, be tough in terms of prosecuting the war on terror.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Two opinion polls conducted after last night's presentations declared different winners. One poll said Vice President Cheney won. The other said Senator Edwards won.

Senior Political Analyst Bill Schneider is here. He's been doing his own research. He joins me now from Washington.

So, Bill, definitively, who won?

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, research you wanted, research I'll give you.

I'm the fact check nerd, and I can tell you that we counted the number of times John Kerry's name came up in the debate. The answer: 65. What about George Bush? The answer: 8. Well, if you add in references to "the president," you get a total of 35 mentions of either Bush or the president.

That is very strange because this is supposed to be a referendum on the incumbent. Should the voters rehire him or fire him? But there was twice as much attention in this debate to John Kerry. That's a problem for Kerry because Dick Cheney and President Bush are trying to make this -- and, so far, they're succeeding in making this -- a referendum not on the president's record but on John Kerry's record, the record of a senator from Massachusetts.

DOBBS: By that definition then, Bill, Vice President Cheney succeeded in defining the debate. Therefore, is he the winner?

SCHNEIDER: It looks like he succeeded in his mission, which was to make this debate about -- to frame it as a debate about John Kerry's record. As long as the Republicans continue to do that, I think they're going to continue to get the upper hand.

DOBBS: Bill, you are -- spend a great deal of your time in our nation's capital, and you're beginning to sound like one of those people with whom you associate so closely and whose efforts, words and ideas you analyze. Who do you think won?

SCHNEIDER: Aha. Well, I think Cheney framed the debate around John Kerry, and, in that respect, he did win. I thought there were moments when John Edwards scored some points, toward the end when the debate entered the domestic agenda, because Edwards is more of a populist and he can talk kitchen table talk. But, for the most part, the debate was about national security, and, on that issue, I think a stature gap, an experience gap favored Dick Cheney.

DOBBS: Bill, would you agree with my assessment that this was a considerably more elevated presentation, if not debate, than last Thursday's between the presidential candidates?

SCHNEIDER: Yes. Oh, certainly, it was. And I thought particularly Dick Cheney gave a more imposing and authoritative presentation. He looked presidential, and, in a way, that doesn't really help President Bush because he's the one who's supposed to -- he is the president. I mean, he's supposed to look presidential. I think a lot of Bush's supporters were dismayed by his performance. They were encouraged by Cheney, but Cheney's not the president.

DOBBS: All right. Quickly, what do both campaigns have to do? What do both candidates have to accomplish over the next 48 hours before St. Louis?

SCHNEIDER: Well, you know that this -- in the next couple of debates, it's going to be focused on domestic issues. St. Louis is a town hall form, and I think the Democrats are eagerly looking forward to the idea that they're going to finally get a chance to talk about the domestic agenda.

But what did President Bush do today? He talked -- he gave an economics speech, but he cast the whole thing in terms of the war on terror and 9/11. The president wants this entire election campaign to be framed around the war on terror, 9/11, just like the Republican Convention.

You ask President Bush or Vice President Cheney about the economy, they're going to talk about 9/11 and the war on terror. That's the way they're going to try to continue to frame it.

DOBBS: Bill, as you know, I'm wary, if not outright skeptical, of national polls, but what are the state-by-state polls showing right now? What do they mean in your analysis?

SCHNEIDER: Well, I looked at some state polls that have come out since that first debate, which presumably changed the momentum, but we're not seeing John Kerry really picking up very much support, as a lot of people anticipated.

In Florida, it's still too close to call. One poll shows 2 points ahead for Kerry, one 2 points ahead for Bush.

New Hampshire ought to be a sure thing, even though it voted for Bush last time. That was because of Nader's presence on the ballot. It's a neighboring state for John Kerry, the Boston media market, but that poll since last week's debate still shows an absolute dead heat: 47 Bush, 47 Kerry.

And a big surprise: New Jersey, which Al Gore carried by 16 points, shows a Kerry lead of just 3 points.

Those are polls taken since that first debate, and they're failing to show much Kerry momentum.

DOBBS: Bill Schneider, as always, thank you, sir.

SCHNEIDER: Sure.

DOBBS: Final confirmation today of what we've all known for quite some time: Saddam Hussein had no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. The CIA's top weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, says Saddam Hussein destroyed those stockpiles long before the outbreak of the war. But Saddam Hussein maintained the capability to resume WMD production in the future.

Our National Security Correspondent David Ensor has the report -- David.

DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Lou, the careful analyst hired by the CIA to lead the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq found himself in the glare of TV lights with his words parsed by both parties in this election year. His key finding, as you mentioned, giving ammunition to Democrats who charge that the president went to war over stockpiles of weapons that were not there. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHARLES DUELFER, CIA WEAPONS INSPECTOR: It is my judgment that retained stocks do not exist.

ENSOR (voice-over): Charles Duelfer said his team has found no weapons, does not expect them to be found, and no evidence of any meaningful chemical, biological or nuclear weapons programs activity since the mid 1990s.

That said, Duelfer said Saddam Hussein himself, now a prisoner, has admitted he wanted to keep whatever weapons he could, given U.N. sanctions.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Is there any doubt in your mind that if Saddam Hussein were in power today and there were no restrictions or sanctions placed on him that he would be attempting to acquire weapons of mass destruction, Mr. Duelfer?

DUELFER: To me, I think that's quite clear.

ENSOR: Still, Duelfer's Iraq survey group has spent $900 million thus far, said one senator, who questioned the point of it all.

SEN. EDWARD KENNEDY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: Why does the search keep going on and on and on, and aren't we at the point where we have to admit the stockpiles don't exist and then what's obviously become a wild goose chase?

DUELFER: You say wild goose chase. I mean, we've had a couple of people die. We've had many people wounded. And to tell them they've been involved in a wild goose chase to me is -- it's not really what we're doing. We were meant to find what existed with respect to WMD. We weren't tasked to find weapons. We were tasked to find the truth of the program.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ENSOR: Duelfer says most of the work is done, although the Iraq survey group recently got its hands on thousands of new pages of documents on WMD. Nine hundred linguists in Qatar are now working their way through them -- Lou.

DOBBS: David, thank you very much.

David Ensor, our national security correspondent.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan today said he is not surprised by the Duelfer report. Annan said U.N. inspectors did not find any evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq before the war.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KOFI ANNAN, U.N. SECRETARY GENERAL: I think it indicates that the inspectors had an impact. The U.N. inspection did what it was supposed to do. (END VIDEO CLIP)

DOBBS: Much more on the CIA report ahead. Much more on the United Nations as well. And I'll be joined by Senator John Warner, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, to assess this conclusive report on the absence of weapons of mass destruction.

Also ahead, shocking new details tonight about the rampant corruption within the United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq. We'll have that special report.

And a heated Face Off, a debate on whether or not the United Nations is now irrelevant. Now two international experts ready to go. They hold obviously very different views. They'll be with us next on Face Off.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: A major development tonight in the investigation of the scandal within the United Nations oil-for-food program. A congressional committee has expanded its investigation now to include the handling of Iraqi oil money after the fall of Saddam Hussein. That committee is seeking information from the Bush administration and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which manages the development fund for Iraq.

This investigation has also revealed more about what the United Nations knew about Saddam Hussein's abuse of the program and all that it ignored.

Bill Tucker reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BILL TUCKER, CNN FINANCIAL CORRESPONDENT: A congressional hearing suggested Saddam Hussein used the United Nations oil-for-food program as a private bank account.

REP. CHRISTOPHER SHAYS (R), CONNECTICUT: It was a leaky sieve. It enabled Saddam to get $4.4 billion. It was a joke.

TUCKER: The money was supposed to go to the Iraqi people to buy food and medicine. Instead, kickbacks and skimming were rampant, and billions went to build Saddam palaces and possibly to also buy illegal weapons.

REP. TIM MURPHY (R), PENNSYLVANIA: We knew Saddam Hussein was corrupt, and his tactics of ruthless violence were a way of life. One would think the U.N. would be aware of this and structure the program in such a way so as to guard against it.

TUCKER: France, Russia and China were well aware of it. One U.S. ambassador to the U.N. testified that any attempt to look into the problem met resistance from those U.N. members.

SHAYS: Do you feel this story should come out? AMB. PATRICK KENNEDY, U.S. REPRESENTATIVE TO U.N. MANAGEMENT & REFORMS: Absolutely.

SHAYS: Do you feel this story should come out even if it embarrasses our allies?

KENNEDY: Absolutely.

SHAYS: Do you believe it should come out even if it embarrassed some allies and makes it more difficult to get their cooperation in Iraq?

KENNEDY: Absolutely.

TUCKER: Some international companies, such as Dutch-based Saybolt, the French bank BMP and Swiss-based Cotecna, which at one point employed the son of U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, are suspected of allowing Saddam Hussein to cheat on the oil programs and build his military. Representatives from those companies sat there and said they didn't have the power to stop it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TUCKER: And as part of its investigation, the committee also drafted a letter to Defense Secretary Rumsfeld requesting detailed information on the accounting of the development fund for Iraq. The committee in essence saying that as long as we're looking and checking, we might as well make sure the U.S. house is in order as well -- Lou.

DOBBS: Bill Tucker.

Thank you very much.

The deepening scandal at the United Nations oil-for-food program is renewing in part the debate about whether the United Nations is relevant to world peace and U.S. foreign policy. The United Nations' role, in fact, has been a very hot-button issue in this presidential campaign. And all of this brings us to tonight's Face Off.

Joining me tonight from Washington, D.C., Ariel Cohen from the Heritage Foundation, who says the United Nations is bankrupt both politically and morally. In Washington as well, Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies. Ms. Bennis says that in terms of the war in Iraq, the United Nations commanded more influence and relevance than perhaps ever in their history.

Good to have you both with us.

Let me say to you first, Phyllis, the idea of commanding more prominence and importance may strike some as odd. Why do you say that?

PHYLLIS BENNIS, INSTITUTE FOR POLICY STUDIES: Because it was in the period of the run-up to the war when people around the world, both governments and populations, were adamantly opposed to this U.S. drive towards war.

Governments were saying no to the U.S. demand that they support the war. Poor countries on the Security Council were saying no. The United Nations itself became both a venue and a player in the opposition to the run-up to war.

And, in doing so, it not only followed the precepts of the U.N. charter that talk about fighting against the scourge of war, but it took seriously the notion of representing the people of the world who were saying no.

DOBBS: Your response, Ariel?

ARIEL COHEN, FELLOW, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: The United Nations does not represent people of the world. It's not a democratically elected body. The United Nations, unfortunately, has a track record of failure when it comes to preventing abuse and murder of the weakest members of the global community.

Look what is happening today in Darfur, look what happened in former Yugoslavia, when the United Nations again and again failed to protect genocide or genocide-like activities committed, unfortunately, with the acquiescence of the United Nations' personnel on the ground.

DOBBS: Phyllis?

BENNIS: And in all of those situations, we have the major powers, most precisely the United States, along with France, Russia, other major powers, preventing the United States from -- sorry -- preventing the United Nations from doing the job that it was set up to do and that it was trying to do on many of those occasions. Have there been huge...

COHEN: Phyllis, you cannot have it both ways.

BENNIS: Sure, I can. The notion that -- sorry. The notion that the United Nations is always going to be successful -- of course not, but the notion that the world community of governments that established international law -- the United Nations charter, of course, is what gives us the basis for international law.

DOBBS: Phyllis, Phyllis, Phyllis. What is the greatest success -- you -- you know, actually, Ariel left out a number of other significant failures of the United Nations, particularly in genocide, referencing the Sudan and his reference to Darfur. But Rwanda is one of the great stains.

BENNIS: Rwanda. Absolutely.

DOBBS: And what in the world has the United Nations accomplished? I hear you talking about the ideals, which I think any rational person in the world would agree with, but what has the United Nations successfully accomplished?

BENNIS: You know, Lou, when Colin Powell said two years ago that terrorism flourishes in areas of poverty and despair, in those areas, it is the United Nations more than any other institution in the world that are there trying to solve the problems that give rise not only to terrorists themselves, but as much or more give rise to those people who would support terrorist activities.

DOBBS: The United Nations...

I'm sorry. Go ahead, Ariel.

COHEN: Terrorism today flourishes in the areas where radical Islamist indoctrination is allowed to flourish. The United Nations has not come with a definition of terrorism after 30 years of debate. The United Nations had not done anything to prevent this brainwashing of thousands of -- tens of thousands of Muslim boys from becoming jihadis.

I'm sorry. The United Nations demonstrated that it is absolutely clueless how to fight terrorism. The United Nations can be left to the task it may be able to do, which I'm not sure that it can, and that is humanitarian assistance. But even in humanitarian assistance, Phyllis, you know as well as I ...

BENNIS: It's not only about humanitarian impact.

COHEN: Excuse me.

BENNIS: If we're serious about stopping terrorism...

DOBBS: Phyllis...

COHEN: With the humanitarian assistance in West Africa, for example, the U.N. personnel was found guilty of abusing children there.

BENNIS: Right.

COHEN: United Nations gave Saddam $4.4 billion...

BENNIS: No, the United States...

DOBBS: Let me...

BENNIS: ... gave the -- gave Saddam Hussein the weapons...

COHEN: Excuse me. I...

BENNIS: ... that he used.

DOBBS: Excuse me. Excuse me, both of you.

Ariel, thank you.

Phyllis, your point?

BENNIS: My point on Saddam Hussein was that it was the United States who provided the seed stock for biological weapons. DOBBS: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Wait, wait. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We have a record in which the United Nations could have resolved much. I think you would agree with me. Had Kofi Annan and the United Nations over that period of time not acquiesced to Saddam's refusal.

BENNIS: No, because...

DOBBS: Excuse me, please. Had not acquiesced to Saddam Hussein's refusal. One could make a very good argument that there could have been an effective weapons inspection through that period from 1998 in which the United Nations was barred, to which Kofi Annan acquiesced, and the Security Council and the major powers.

So let me ask you this again and as straightforwardly as I possibly can, what are the principal successes by the United Nations?

BENNIS: First of all, I think it's important to correct something on the history, and that is that it was the United States and its allies on the Security Council who knew precisely what was going on in Iraq. They were the ones in charge of dealing with all the contracts...

DOBBS: Oh, wait, wait.

BENNIS: ... that we're now hearing is the responsibility of Kofi Annan.

DOBBS: I'm sorry.

BENNIS: That was a Security Council set of decisions.

DOBBS: I'm sorry.

All right. Let me turn this back to Ariel. Let me ask you this. Without the United Nations -- and what is extraordinary today in our ideological polarization, the polemics that capture all of this, the fact is the United Nations has a set of ideals that are laudable.

Is there any way in which the United Nations can be reformed, brought into a meaningful, effective role so that we do not have to suffer these failures, whether the fault of Third World nations or great powers?

COHEN: Lou, I think that the United Nations reform was tried and tried again, and the United States is footing the bill for the United Nations more than any other nation in the world, and to come back and blame our country for not being supportive of the U.N. when we are the biggest financier of the U.N. is ludicrous.

We tried everything. We probably need to start from the scratch with a league of democracies where democracies, not dictatorships like Libya which was allowed to chair the U.N. Human Rights Commission, like Syria that was allowed into the human rights bodies of the U.N., like other dictatorships which...

DOBBS: All right. Let's...

COHEN: ... which are...

DOBBS: Let's give Phyllis the final word here very quickly, Ariel. Thank you very much.

BENNIS: I think that we have to be very clear that we live in a world in which we cannot be safe if people around the world do not feel safe. We need a new definition of what it takes to fight terrorism. We have to look at what causes terrorism. We have to look at legal solutions...

DOBBS: Oh, my God. We know what causes terrorism...

BENNIS: ... including...

DOBBS: ... and the fact is that terrorists -- what are you suggesting?

BENNIS: But, Lou, why do people support it? It's true. Terrorists cause terrorism. That's true.

DOBBS: Why do they support it?

BENNIS: But why is it that people around the world sometimes think it's...

COHEN: Because they're...

DOBBS: Well, you're opening up...

COHEN: Because they're brainwashed.

DOBBS: ... a whole other question, and the fact of the matter is there is much -- it is far too complex an issue to suggest that we could resolve that in one sitting here on this broadcast, even as perceptive as our audience and as motivated as our guests, such as you.

We thank you very much here for being here, Phyllis, Ariel. Thank you both very much. We'll come back and we'll get to those issues as well, but it's going to take us a little more than one night's discussion. Thank you.

That brings us to the subject of tonight's poll. Do you believe the United Nations in the pursuit of peace is most often helpful or unhelpful? Please cast your vote at cnn.com/lou. We'll have the results later in the broadcast.

Also ahead here tonight, new evidence that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction before the U.S. invasion. Senator John Warner, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, is my guest.

And then, growing concerns about another election nightmare. How several states have simply failed to confirm new voters are, in fact, residents of their state or even U.S. citizens. And no laughing matter: The shipment of American jobs to cheap foreign labor markets. It's also hurting the people behind some of this country's most beloved entertainment.

That and a great deal more still ahead here. Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: LOU DOBBS TONIGHT continues. Here now for more news, debate and opinion is Lou Dobbs.

DOBBS: The top CIA weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, today said Saddam Hussein had no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction before the outbreak of war in Iraq. Duelfer delivered his report to the Senate Armed Services Committee. I am now joined by the chairman of that committee, Senator John Warner.

Senator, good to have you here.

SEN. JOHN WARNER (R-WV), CHAIRMAN, ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Delighted.

DOBBS: This is a definitive report. Does this conclude the issue as to whether there was or was not weapons of mass destruction?

WARNER: Just moments ago I wrapped up the hearing, and Mr. Duelfer is going back. There's work to be done. But basically, no major stockpiles have been found, and the likelihood is it's not going to occur. But he also added that all the intelligence services worldwide thought Saddam Hussein had those weapons and he himself as a professional working for the U.N. and a former inspector, he likewise thought they had weapons. So it just -- this idea that Bush went it alone is wrong. The world was convinced that he had them, and for good reason -- because he'd used them against these neighbors, and we knew that he had them in '91.

DOBBS: But we are also told now, Senator, reliably, by CIA sources in fact, that the centrifuges, which were part of the evidence of weapons of mass destruction in this case, obviously nuclear, were known to be of the wrong dimension, in fact made of the wrong material to be used in the production of nuclear weaponry at least. Does that trouble you as well as the chairman of the committee?

WARNER: Yes, Lou. I've gone through that. And there was a diversity of opinion within the Department of Energy, the CIA and other components of our intelligence gathering about those tubes. But I'd like to go back to Duelfer. It was an important testimony. And I asked him the first question. I said, Mr. Duelfer, is the world better off with Saddam Hussein now in captivity and facing the rule of law in his own country? Yes, Senator. And did you feel that the diplomacy, if allowed to continue, would have achieved that same result and removed this dictator? He said no, he felt that diplomacy wouldn't do it.

DOBBS: Senator, as you recall, and I take the points precisely, but as you recall, the Bush administration initially talking about regime change placed the entire basis and seeking the approval of the United Nations security council to bring Iraq to task was based on the presence of weapons of mass destruction.

WARNER: Not the entire, Lou. That's where you and I disagree.

DOBBS: Well, may I cite my source?

WARNER: Yes.

DOBBS: February 5 at the United Nations security council, Secretary of State Colin Powell setting forth a presentation that relied in its entirety upon the presence of weapons of mass destruction, including mobile laboratories that were biochemical in nature as well as the presence of a nuclear threat.

WARNER: Well, Lou, I will not try and dispute the accuracy of the quote that you're giving me, but having sat through endless hearings, not only on my committee, but also I'm a member of the intelligence committee...

DOBBS: Yes, sir.

WARNER: There were a number of reasons other than the generally held view by all the intelligence agencies worldwide that weapons of mass destruction posed a threat, not only to the region but the potential for those weapons to slip out into terrorists' hands.

DOBBS: Senator, I'm not for a moment suggesting that there may not have been good reasons and critical reasons in which the United Nations should support and the United States Congress should support a decision to go to war against Saddam Hussein. But what I am suggesting is the reasons articulated at the United Nations were based on WMD which we now are told at least to this point rather definitively did not exist. My question to you is this, sir, with the fact that those intelligence agencies, not only U.S. intelligence agencies but the weapons, as you point out, the weapons inspectors of the United Nations and other intelligence services around the world were utterly wrong about what was happening in Iraq, how concerned are you about the level of intelligence that's being generated today? How critical is it to reform our intelligence agency? And how urgently and quickly can we have an effective intelligence operation carried out by this government?

WARNER: Lou, what better answer can I give you than about 20 minutes ago the Senate final passage of its version of the revision of our intelligence structure? The vote was 96-2, and the two absentees regrettably were Kerry and Edwards. But nevertheless, that's a strong message that the Senate is committed to try and strengthen our intelligence system and remove those problems that could have contributed to some of our problems in connection with 9/11. That's it.

DOBBS: We appreciate the update. And Senator, we thank you very much for being here.

WARNER: Thank you.

DOBBS: We thank you very much. Senator John Warner, the chairman of the Senate armed services committee.

Coming up next here, drawing jobs overseas. Some of the country's most highly valued specialized jobs are being exported to a cheap foreign labor market half a world away. Our special report coming up next.

Also ahead, bracing for an election nightmare on November 2. Why it may be startlingly easy for anyone to vote in this country without proving either state residence or U.S. citizenship.

And which candidate has the edge going into these second rounds after last night's vice presidential face-off? We'll hear from three of the best political journalists in the country next. Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: The shipment of American jobs to cheap foreign labor markets now extends far beyond India and China to countries literally all over the world. Animation is one of this country's fastest- growing industries and should translate into lots of jobs for Americans. But instead, the jobs are being exported to cheaper artists, in this case in South Korea. Sohn Jie-Ae reports from Seoul.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SOHN JIE-AE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The lives of Bart Homer and the rest of "The Simpsons" may seem as American as apple pie. They come to life through the hands of South Korean artists.

"Sometimes it's so funny we have to stop and show each other," says Park Eun-Joo.

It seems humor, along with cheap labor, transcends national boundaries in the world of animation. For decades South Korean animators have been responsible for drawing a wide range of U.S. cartoons such as "Bugs Bunny," "Tom and Jerry," and "The Simpsons." Animator Nelson Chin has a wall full of awards and several Emmys for his work on "The Simpsons" and other shows.

In the early 1970s Nelson was drawing cartoons like the "Pink Panther" in the U.S. and saw the potential.

NELSON SHIN, AKOM PRODUCTION: United States, they have a lot of work, right? How are they going to train people, you know, just like that?

JIE-AE: U.S. companies couldn't and didn't. Especially since countries like South Korea already had a pool of artists willing to do it for much less.

LEE YONG-BAE, KAYWON SCHOOL OF ART & DESIGN (through translator): Labor costs of completing an animation series in the U.S. would have been at least double.

JIE-AE: Official figures say in the peak years from the eighties to early nineties the amount of animation business flowing from the U.S. to South Korea reached $100 million every year. Based on this booming market, South Korea's animation industry flourished. More than 14 universities teach animation and turn out some 3,000 artists every year. But now the market has changed. While "The Simpsons" is still drawn in South Korea, some of the other U.S. animation studios now head to even cheaper countries like India, Thailand, and of course China. Nelson doesn't believe Bart Simpson will ever be drawn in these countries, but there seems to be no denying the fact that the outsourcees are now being outsourced. Sohn Jie-Ae, CNN, Seoul.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DOBBS: And taking a look now at some of your thoughts about outsourcing, the exporting of America,

Jean Lemke in Shorview, Minnesota, "Lou, apparently corporate greed has overcome conscience with regard to the exposure of America's private information: our legal, medical and financial records and data can all be accessed now by the click of a key on the computer. It appears our borders leak in both directions, illegal aliens in, our personal information going out."

Evelyn Phillips in Starkesville, Louisiana, "Do we have anything left to outsource? We can not stand much more of this. We are on the brink of being a third-world country."

Send us your thoughts at loudobbs@CNN.com. Send us your name and address as well, because each of you whose e-mail is read on the broadcast receives a copy of my new book "Exporting America."

Coming up next, new fears of an election nightmare this November 2. New voter registration programs relying on voters to use, that's right, the honor system. We'll have a special report for you.

And then, President Bush launches a new assault against Senator Kerry. We'll be talking with three of the country's top political journalists, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Alarming new concerns tonight about the integrity of this country's voting system just 27 days before we vote for president. The rush to register new voters all across the country has all but eliminated the screening process in a number of states. Now many new voters will be going to the polls next month with no verification whatsoever that they are in fact residents of the states in which they're voting or citizens of the United States at all. Lisa Sylvester reports from Washington.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It may be easy to sign up a new voter. It's not easy to verify they are actually eligible to vote. In states like Maryland, people who register to vote as part of a voter registration drive, do not have to show identification when they sign up or on election day. And there are no requirements to prove citizenship or age.

LINDA LAMONE, MARYLAND BOARD OF ELECTIONS: Voter registration in the United States has historically been the honor code, at least in Maryland it has. Until the help America Vote Act was enacted, there was no legal requirement in Maryland whatsoever that the voter provide any kind of identification.

SYLVESTER: The help America Vote Act was passed after the Florida debacle. But in Maryland, it only requires mail-in registrants prove they are who they say they are, with anything from a utility bill to a paycheck.

Voter registrants have to check a box and sign a form under penalty of perjury that they are a U.S. citizen, of voting age, and not an ex-felon. But the system is ripe for fraud, says Maryland delegate Don Dwyer.

DON DWYER, MARYLAND HOUSE OF DELEGATES: The requirement of being a citizen in order to vote is as American as apple pie is, and unfortunately, in this country that is being eroded.

SYLVESTER: Dwyer introduced a bill in Maryland that would require new voters show a birth certificate or proof they are a naturalized citizen. And it's not just a problem in Maryland. While the rules vary by state and county, other jurisdictions like California also do not have to prove citizenship. But get out the vote groups are concerned asking people for more information could disenfranchise legitimate voters on election day.

HANS RIEMER, ROCK THE VOTE: There could be millions of people who won't be able to vote on November 2, 2004, literally millions of people who get turned away from the polls on election day. And the problems are stemming from sometimes election officials are uninformed. Sometimes they're malicious. Sometimes people purge voter lists improperly.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SYLVESTER: State election offices check voter rolls against death records and court records for felonies, but there is no national citizenship registry. So officials say it's impossible to audit their lists to make sure everyone is a U.S. citizen -- Lou.

DOBBS: I can't think of much that you could have reported tonight, Lisa, that would have been more troubling to those concerned about the integrity of this election process this year. Thank you very much, Lisa Sylvester.

In the campaign tonight both sides are claiming they have the momentum following the one and only vice presidential presentation last night. Joining me now to discuss the outcome of the debate and what we can expect in the days ahead, Karen Tumulty, national political correspondent for "Time" magazine in Washington. Roger Simon, political editor "U.S. News & World Report" in Chicago. And joining me tonight from New York, Mark Warren, executive editor at "Esquire" magazine. Good to have you all here.

Karen, who won?

KAREN TUMULTY, TIME: Boy, I tell you, I think that both of these guys were really at the top of their game. And while they had very different styles and very different arguments to make, I think that it's hard to pick a winner.

DOBBS: Is it as difficult for you, Roger?

ROGER SIMON, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT: The American people won, Lou. They always do.

(LAUGHTER)

DOBBS: You guys are covering too many of these folks.

SIMON: I think there's more than one Republican today who's asking why Dick Cheney is at the bottom of this ticket and not the top. He seems to know more than President Bush. He seems to express it better than President Bush.

DOBBS: Does he know more than Senator Kerry?

SIMON: We're never going to find out. There's no head-to-head contest between those two.

DOBBS: Well, there wasn't a head-to-head contest between President Bush either, but you seem to think that he knows more than President Bush. Did Senator Kerry show you superiority of knowledge over Vice President Cheney last week?

SIMON: I thought Kerry did very well. I thought Cheney did very well. And I thought both stylistically were far better than the president was, and both seemed to have a command of the facts. Unfortunately, if you like both of them, you can't vote a split ticket that way.

DOBBS: It's an interesting mix and match concept offered up to us tonight by "U.S. News & World Report." Mark, I don't know what "Esquire" magazine will have to offer, but what's your judgment? Who won?

MARK WARREN, ESQUIRE: It was an astonishing contrast in styles. Certainly it was the caffeinated kid versus the immovable object. Given that this was a format that was friendly to the vice president, he's so accustomed to it, and that Senator Edwards held his own, held his ground, I would say that it certainly was a draw as far as debating points go, but he survived and so thus prospered, I think.

DOBBS: Would we all agree that this debate was at such a much more elevated level than the presidential debate last Thursday? Karen, I'll start with you. Since I've asked you, I think it's only fair that I give you my judgment. Just as I thought Senator Kerry was a clear winner last week, I think it was also very clear that the vice president was the winner last night. But I think that frankly the elevation of the debate was such that Senator Edwards benefited as well. What do you think, Karen?

TUMULTY: By elevation of the debate, I think that what people want to walk away from a debate with is a very clear idea of what the differences are, what your choice is, what the two parties are offering, and I think that couldn't have been clearer.

Senator Edwards was arguing that if you want a change in direction vote for the Democrats. And Vice President Cheney made far more eloquently and persuasively than the president himself the argument that experience and that this administration's judgment is what counts.

DOBBS: Roger?

SIMON: I think both, actually, were good, substantive debates. Debates is -- good substantive presentations. I don't really see that this one was much more elevated in terms of the issues discussed than the one in Coral Gables. What we remember from Coral Gables, though, is not the substance but the style, frankly, because the president wasn't very good stylistically.

DOBBS: Mark?

WARREN: The thing I was most struck by is when this debate finally turned halfway through to domestic issues, it's almost as if somebody let the air out of the balloon. It's clearly the animating issues in this campaign four weeks out from the election are national security. And inside that issue the salient question, salient fact is that Iraq is burning, and whoever's interpretation of that fact carries the day wins the election.

DOBBS: Thank you. We'll be back with our panel of political journalists in just one moment. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Not much movement in the state by state polls, Karen, for Senator Kerry at this point yet this administration has been buffetted by the statements by Paul Bremer that mistakes were made, and he enumerated several, including the fact there aren't enough troops in Iraq. Now the CIA's top weapons inspector says there were no WMD. Just how much can this administration withstand of this assault of facts that are contradictory of policy?

TUMULTY: Well, I think that is why the first thing that you heard Senator Edwards say last night was that this administration hasn't been telling the truth. The administration knew that this report was coming today. They started trying to spin it yesterday, saying that it actually bolsters their claim that Saddam Hussein had intent and capability. But their claim had been that Saddam Hussein had possession of these weapons of mass destruction, and particularly their most alarming claim was about nuclear weapons. Now we find out that not only did he not have them but his capacity to get them was deteriorating. So I think this is a pretty sharp blow to the administration's credibility.

DOBBS: Roger?

SIMON: I think you've seen the Republican position many times. It was stated by President Bush in his debate, stated by Dick Cheney in his debate. And it goes this way -- it really doesn't matter why we invaded Iraq. It doesn't matter that our intelligence was faulty. It doesn't matter that we knowingly or unknowingly misled the American public because the result was good. It is better to have Saddam Hussein in a jail cell than in a presidential palace. And so we are to be forgiven all the reasons we stated for why we went into Iraq.

DOBBS: Then why in the world aren't Senator Kerry and Senator Edwards ahead in this race?

WARREN: The country's quite evenly divided. I mean, certainly this might have impact on the very slim margin, slim group of undecided voters. This is not a good report for the administration certainly. And this reflects this new front opened up by Senator Edwards last night. In addition to attacking the judgment of the administration, they are now attacking repeatedly the candor of the administration with the American people.

DOBBS: And they're attacking candor, but the attacks are just as fulsome and in my judgment just as effective and strident in the case of the Bush administration against Senator Kerry and Senator Edwards. How effective was the statement, for example, Karen, "senator gone" the reference to Senator Edwards, newspapers referring to him as senator gone because of the number of votes that he's missed? How effective is that sort of thing?

TUMULTY: Oh, I think that that was a very effective criticism of Senator Edwards. As charismatic as he is on the stump, as well as he did in his own presidential race, the fact is that in North Carolina had he not run for president, had he decided to run for re-election there, there was a real chance he would have been beaten. And his approval in his own home state was not that high.

DOBBS: And Roger, at this juncture with this race statistically a dead heat in most of the polls, the Washington ABC poll, as you pointed out quite correctly here now showing a five-point lead for the president, what do you expect in the next couple of days leading up to this second debate?

SIMON: I think we're going to see if Senator Kerry can make as much ground on domestic issues as he has made on Iraq, as Mark has correctly said, the air seemed to go out of the debate last night when it switched from Iraq to domestic issues. On the other hand, the format in St. Louis is a very strange one. It's a town hall, but it's a pseudotown hall. The Bush administration...

DOBBS: Do you mean like the others have been pseudodebates? Is that right? SIMON: A little worse. In a town hall people stand up and ask real questions. In this, from what I read, the questions are prescreened by the moderator...

DOBBS: Roger, I've got to interrupt. We are out of time. I'm being given, as they say, a hard wrap. I want to say thank you very much, Roger. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow. Karen, thank you very much. Mark, thank you. Mark Warren.

Still ahead here the results of our poll. A preview of what's ahead tomorrow. Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: The results now of our poll. 69 percent of you say the United Nations in the pursuit of peace is most often helpful. 31 percent of you say it is unhelpful. Thanks for being with us tonight. Please join us tomorrow. Ron Christie (ph), former domestic policy adviser to President Bush, Vice President Cheney joins us ahead of the next round of presidential presentations. Please join us. For all of us here, thanks for being with us tonight. Good night from New York. "ANDERSON COOPER 360" is next.

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