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Presidential Race a Statistical Tie; Massive Turnout, Scare Tactics Could Ultimately Affect Election Results; More Trouble for Vioxx-Maker Merck
Aired November 01, 2004 - 14:32 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.
TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And welcome back. From the CNN Center in Atlanta, this is LIVE FROM. I'm Tony Harris.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Kyra Phillips. Here's what's all new this half hour.
Did the maker of the arthritis drug Vioxx know about potential problems years ago? We'll have reaction to a published report just ahead.
HARRIS: And where are the showdown states leaning. With just hours to go before Election Day, we'll check in with the Gallup poll.
Let's do it right now. For the first time ever, a Gallup poll has found a tie in the final pre-election presidential poll. The latest CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll shows President Bush and John Kerry in a dead heat, both with 49 percent of likely voters when undecided voters are factored.
Joining us from Princeton, New Jersey, is Frank Newport, Gallup editor-in-chief, to talk about the significance of the pre-election tie. OK, Frank, get us started. Where do we find -- where do we stand with these final estimates?
FRANK NEWPORT, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, GALLUP: Well, you're absolutely right. It's a dead-even tie. It's the first time technically, but there have been other years -- you know, Gallup goes back to 1936 -- where we've said it's too close to call. In fact, we said that before the 2000 election, and it was.
You go back to 1968, that was Humphrey and Nixon, too close to call. And actually, the first Nixon race against John F. Kennedy, also too close to call. So, there have been other very close races. And in fact, those race ended up being very close. We'll see what happens to this one.
Just to show you our October popular vote numbers, likely voters, it was 49-49 when the month began. As the curtain rose on October, I might say, it was tied. We went through some changes. Bush gained a little. But now as the curtain closed on October yesterday on Halloween, guess what? Back at 49-49. The popular vote rounded in 2000 was 48-48. So, in some ways, we're where we were, I would say, four years ago.
Let me show you a couple of wild cards, Tony, in this race. There are still, believe it or not, as of our poll through yesterday, voters who say they are uncommitted. Now, that means that they may have a choice, but they say they could change their mind. Thirty- three percent of this group, about nine or 10 percent, say they are leaning to Bush but could change their mind. Thirty-one percent leaning to Kerry, but could change their mind. And another 30 percent of our likely voters in this group say they don't know who they're going to vote for, and that could make the big difference.
And Tony, we've heard a lot about first-time voters. I've represented for you here those voters in our likely voter pool who said they didn't vote in 2000, and they go for Kerry, 52-39. So, that's another wild card. If lots of them show up tomorrow, it certainly could benefit John Kerry -- Tony?
HARRIS: OK, now Frank, you've made the point several times during the campaign that there's a link between presidential job approval and re-election chances. Where do we stand heading into tomorrow?
NEWPORT: Well, I wish that I could say, "A-ha, there's the key. I can now predict for you who's going to win." But guess what? Bush's job approval rating is right at 50 percent. (INAUDIBLE) it was 48 in our final national (INAUDIBLE) reading as of yesterday. So, a little below 50 percent. And that's kind of the symbolic line.
But this, again, doesn't allow us to predict the -- follow me, the last two presidents who lost were Bush's father and Jimmy Carter in 1980, and both of those had job approval ratings in the 30 percent range in October. And so, Bush is not nearly as bad as that. But Clinton in '96 and Reagan in '84 and so on back, the guys who won had job approval ratings well above 50 percent. So, Bush is in neither of those camps. He's in a gray zone, and that's why we keep coming back and saying, Tony, I wish I could tell you exactly who's going to win tomorrow, but I can't.
HARRIS: You can't. You can't. No one can at this point. It's up to us to go out and decide it ourselves. Frank Newport, from the Gallup Organization. Frank, thank you.
NEWPORT: You bet.
PHILLIPS: All right. We've been checking in with John Kerry and also President Bush on this Election Eve. We were having a little technical problems in Milwaukee a little while ago. Well, we got that tape in, everything's OK. Here's a chunk of what John Kerry had to say at his rally in Milwaukee just a few minutes ago.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: For the last two years, I've been privileged to travel all across this country, been privileged to meet with you in your homes, been privileged to listen to your stories, to the struggles of so many millions of Americans. I've met those people, the five million some of them who have lost their health insurance. I met the people who have lost their jobs and then had to suffer the indignity of unbolting the equipment they used to work on, put it in a crate, and send it to a place like China for somebody else to work on.
I've met people -- I've met people who are now working two jobs to earn the same amount of money that they used to earn, while we see the price of everything go up, incomes for Americans have gone down. George Bush keeps choosing the wealthy, the powerful, the drug companies, the oil companies. I think the White House ought to be occupied by a champion for the middle class and those struggling to get in it.
So, I've heard your struggles and I share your hopes, and together we have a chance tomorrow to move America forward, to start to make the difference in the lives of so many millions of Americans and in the character of our country itself. That's what this is about.
So, if you believe -- if you believe that we can create better jobs here than the jobs that we're sending overseas. If you believe that we can provide healthcare that's affordable and accessible to all Americans. If you believe that we should be allowed to import prescription drugs from Canada and have Medicare be able to make a bulk purchase and lower the cost to taxpayers. If you believe -- if you believe that that 17,000 page tax code that's supposed to belong to you belongs to the lobbyists and the powerful and we ought to change it, make it work for Americans.
If you believe that our kids shouldn't have school doors shut in their faces in the afternoon because they don't have enough money to have an after-school program. If you believe -- if you believe that teachers shouldn't have to dig into their own pockets in order to put materials in front of our kids in America. If you believe that we're too dependent on Mid East oil and we could tap into America's genius and creativity.
If you believe, as I do, that America's best days are ahead of us, then join me tomorrow and change the direction of America! Thank you! Let's go make it happen! God bless you all!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: That was a portion of John Kerry there in Milwaukee. Earlier in the day, the president of the United States had also had a rally there in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Now, Air Force One arriving in Des Moines, Iowa. After the president leaves Iowa, he'll move on to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and then Dallas. John Kerry heading to Detroit, Cleveland, and then Toledo.
Now, the election is in the home stretch, and candidates are sprinting to the finish line. We've been telling you about this all day. Both President Bush and John Kerry campaigning furiously in key battleground states. What we want to know is what can they do, and what should they be doing at this late date to get people to vote for them?
The man with the answers is media strategist Robbie. He joins me now live from New York. Great to see you, Robbie.
ROBBIE VORHAUS, MEDIA STRATEGIST, VORHAUS & CO.: Kyra, hello. And boy, this is great race, isn't it?
PHILLIPS: It's pretty interesting. I have a feeling it's going to be a long week, Robbie.
VORHAUS: It's going to be a long week, but the surprise that I think that we could all see is if this is a landslide. And then, what we're going to see is that all the pollsters and all the media pundits and -- are -- were shown again that the American people are a lot smarter than we are.
PHILLIPS: Well, you know, everyone's been talking about the October surprise. What do you think about the election surprise? You were saying all these newly registered voters, who knows, they'll come out. Like you said, it could be a landslide. And the surprise could be all these unexpected voters coming in and picking their candidate.
VORHAUS: Well, that's right. I mean, pollsters can only look at people who talk to them. Pollsters can only look at their statistical model. But you know, Eminem was on "Saturday Night Live" Saturday night, and, at the end of his first song, held up a sign and said vote.
And if we have a huge turnout -- and it's expected that we're going to have the largest single turnout in American history -- and a large percentage of those people have not been counted by the pollsters, and they vote for one candidate or the other, it may be a very short week for us and for those candidates.
PHILLIPS: All right, spin master, what could happened that could change the course of this election tomorrow? There's a couple of things that could happen. You said possibly some last minute surprise endorsements?
VORHAUS: Well, if a star came out, if somebody -- if an athlete of great renown, if some star were to come out, if a group of people were to come out and, sometime today or early tomorrow, and to say, "You know what? We've been very quiet, but we can't be quiet anymore. This is who we're voting for."
The other thing that could happen, of course, is if there were some catastrophic event, whether natural or manmade, and that would certainly change the focus of that election to that event. And at the same time, if one of the candidates were to make a terrible mistake. They're tired. They've been on point. Sometimes when you get that way, you get a little goofy and you say something that you think is funny and it absolutely turns the campaign on its ear. And that's what we're all going to be looking for.
PHILLIPS: All right. You've been a strategist for a long time. Now, level with me, the Redskins/Packers game and this whole prediction -- let's really put this in perspective. Could this change the course of what could happen tomorrow?
VORHAUS: Well, I talked to a Princeton physicist who went through all of the statistics and said, "You know something? That's a very interesting statistic. But I'm sure that if you run enough analysis, you can find some other race or something else that's going to predict that."
It says that if the Redskins lose their last game of their home season, then the incumbent will lose, also. And apparently, for the last 17 presidential elections, that's been accurate. So, the Packers won, according to this statistic, Kerry will win tomorrow.
PHILLIPS: Interesting. We'll see who turns out to vote in Wisconsin and others -- all kinds of things we could follow from there.
All right, finally, scarism -- the explosives, Osama bin Laden tape.
VORHAUS: That's right.
PHILLIPS: Why are we seeing so many scare tactics in the final day coming here toward the end? Can I call it a tactic, I guess?
VORHAUS: It is a tactic, Kyra, because what no one is teaching us is is we become manipulatable when we're scared. All of a sudden, we keep seeing this ratcheted up. It's more and more frightening, and we start fearing for our lives. We care about our children. We care about our family. We care about our community. So, we're going to vote with how we feel that we are more protected.
Now, if this Osama bin Laden tape made people believe that the Bush administration should stay in, or if somebody else said that we feel that there should be a change here, they're going to vote out of that fear. But the reality is is that we need to be teaching consumers and the American public and people how to be detached.
"You know, there's an old expression, "Be open to everything, but attached to nothing." And I think that that's the way we should have seen this Osama bin Laden tape.
PHILLIPS: Robbie Vorhaus, I think the only fear I have is that we won't be finished Wednesday. I think it's going to...
VORHAUS: Can I vote -- put in a write-in vote for you, and that way that I...
PHILLIPS: Robbie...
VORHAUS: I won't have any problems with that vote.
PHILLIPS: You know, charm -- it gets him everywhere. Charm gets him everywhere. Robbie Vorhaus...
VORHAUS: Better America for Kyra Phillips.
PHILLIPS: I love you too, Robbie. Thanks a lot.
VORHAUS: Thank you, Kyra. Good to see you.
PHILLIPS: All right. Good to see you. And CNN's special Election Night coverage does begin tomorrow night at 7:00 Eastern. I'm blushing. Trust CNN to track the votes, exit polls, and any legal challenges. Plus, dozens of reporters will be out coast-to-coast bringing you any new developments throughout the night.
We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: You know, earlier we asked you to tell us if you weren't planning to vote tomorrow and why not. We've got a bunch of e-mails. Let me share a couple of them with you.
This is from Anthony: "I'm a college student at NYU who is not voting in the upcoming presidential election. I am uncomfortable with the idea of voting, because I do not feel they have enough knowledge about each candidate, despite having seen all of the debates, and just because I'm 18 doesn't seem reason to cast a groundless vote."
Let's move on and get this e-mail from Mark: "It's such a hassle to vote on Election Day. You have to find your polling location, find a parking spot and wait in long lines. Why can't we have the option to vote on the Internet? It would make life much easier for everyone."
And do we have time for one more? OK, let's do another one. From Dave: "I will not be voting in tomorrow's election. Why? Because I'm from Kansas, and with or without my vote, this state will go Republican. I would be voting if the states split the electoral college votes to the nearest percentage of popular votes."
OK, we'll leave it there. Thank you for your responses. Good stuff. Good stuff -- Kyra?
PHILLIPS: That is good stuff.
Well, we've been talking about all these political predictions. Now, do they make sense? What do they mean? Well, I'll tell you what, they don't mean anything to our pundits of CNN's "CROSSFIRE." They've already picked their winners. Hosts Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson join us now live from New York to talk about the race. It's just too close to call.
Hi, guys.
PAUL BEGALA, CO-HOST, "CROSSFIRE": Hey, Kyra. How are you doing?
TUCKER CARLSON, CO-HOST, "CROSSFIRE": Hey, Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. I'm doing OK. I'm getting ready for a long week. I'm sure you guys are, too.
I guess I want to ask you, first of all, Tucker, what do you think? Will we see a clear winner? CARLSON: I think we will. I think we will see a clear winner. These -- I mean, you know, it's impossible to make a valid model based on an event that happens only four years, but historically, large number of voters comes to the same conclusion at the end of an election process, and I think we'll probably see something like that now.
I certainly hope so. I mean, no matter who wins, I think it's important that the victor have the majority of the popular vote, something that hasn't happened since 1988. I think it's bad for America to have a disputed election or even a president who didn't get the majority of the popular vote. So, yeah, I definitely hope that happens.
PHILLIPS: Paul, what do you think?
BEGALA: It will happen, yes. In other words, we will have a winner, and it will be on Tuesday night -- Wednesday morning, perhaps. But I know the polls all say that it's too close to call. There's two problems with the polls.
What generally the pollsters don't tell you is in more than 75 percent of the cases, the challenger gets the lion's share of the undecideds, and that makes sense, right? The incumbent's had four years to make his case. The challenger has come on. If people are still undecided at the end of the race, the challenger is going to get those votes. So, I think any undecided that are out there are very highly likely to be for Kerry.
And second, the turnout models on which, very prudently, the pollsters are basing their projections are traditional patterns of turnout. In every indicator I get -- anecdotally, talking to friends in all these swing states, looking at early voting patterns -- is that this will be an extraordinarily large turnout. And so, I think that bodes very well for Kerry, too.
So, I think Kerry will win solidly, and we'll know on Election Night.
PHILLIPS: All right. Perfect segue -- you mentioned polls. You guys are being way too quiet, way too calm right now.
Let's listen to Dick Cheney from the speech in Des Moines, and I want to get your reaction. You know where I'm going.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DICK CHENEY (R), VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The thing that I find amazing about it is that John Kerry's first response was to go conduct a poll. You went out and went into the field with a public opinion poll to find out what he should say about this tape and Osama bin Laden.
It was as though he didn't know what he believes until he has to go and check the polls -- stick his finger in the air, see which way the political winds are blowing. (END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Tucker, is that true? John Kerry can't make a decision without taking a poll?
CARLSON: You know, if Dick Cheney says it, I believe it. I mean, I'm sure he did take a poll, which itself -- you know, I mean, it's less than a week before an election. Candidates take polls. Maybe just because I live in Washington, I personally don't think it's such a big deal. But it's a metaphor for a problem that actually is a big deal. And that is it's not clear to me what John Kerry thinks about Osama bin Laden, aside from the obvious point: He's evil.
The Bush administration, by contrast, has come out and given an explanation -- whether you buy it or not -- for why bin Laden and al Qaeda hate us. Cheney -- I mean, rather Kerry has not. He has given no sense that he understands why these people hate us. And it's kind of hard to fight a war on terror unless you begin at step one, which is who are we fighting and what motivates them?
PHILLIPS: Paul, final thoughts. Do we care whether they take a poll or not to make their decisions?
BEGALA: Well, that's silly. I mean, the vice president has, in ending his political career today, disgraced himself, as he did from the beginning of his political career.
CARLSON: Oh, come on.
BEGALA: No, he's an embarrassment. The Bush campaign has some of the best pollsters in the business. They poll every single day. And for a fact, as soon as the bin Laden tape came out, Kerry came out and gave a statement. He could not have physically conducted a poll in that time.
"The New York Times" has an interesting thing. It shows the really ultimate hypocrisy of President Bush, who likes to say, "I don't govern by the polls. I don't like polls." He is so deeply invested into the minutia of polls, so obsessed with him is he, "The New York Times" reports today, that his deputy chief of staff went out to Home Depot and bought a bunch of screens and started painting on them different jargons, because the president is so into the notion of how many -- what percentage of Republicans passed the screen in this poll or that poll.
CARLSON: I suspect it was a joke. I suspect it was a joke, Paul.
BEGALA: No, but it's a joke because it's playing on the president's obsession with polling. And so, what Mr. Cheney is doing, as he often does, is projecting the sense he finds into his own heart onto Mr. Kerry.
CARLSON: OK, now we're getting theological again. On that note -- I can't keep up. The second we start talking about...
PHILLIPS: And as soon as they start getting a little funky, I get the hard wrap in my ear. Yeah, all of a sudden (INAUDIBLE).
Paul Begala, Tucker Carlson, thanks, guys. I'll watch you tonight.
CARLSON: Thanks, Kyra.
PHILLIPS: OK.
HARRIS: Well, new questions facing Merck this afternoon. Up next, we'll find out what the drug company might have known about Vioxx before it was pulled off the market.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: More trouble for the drugmaker behind the recalled pain reliever Vioxx. "The Wall Street Journal" reports internal e-mails and other documents proved Merck knew of Vioxx's safety problems long before pulling it off the shelves in September.
CNN Chris Huntington is live from New York with more. Hello, Chris.
CHRIS HUNTINGTON, CNN FINANCIAL NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Tony.
Well, Merck's stock right now is down more than $3 a share. It's below $29. That on revelation that the drugmaker's own internal documents and e-mails show that Merck executives knew for years that Vioxx could lead to heart trouble. Documents also show that Merck had a long running strategy to counter any safety concerns about Vioxx.
Documents and e-mails are currently under a court gag order as thousands of former Vioxx users are suing Merck. But lawyers working on those cases and Congressional staffers who are investigating what Merck knew about the dangers of Vioxx confirmed to CNN that Merck had a detailed strategy to protect Vioxx and deflect criticism about its safety.
For instance, the documents show that Merck had a tactic it called "dodgeball" that involved sending memos to Merck sales representatives coaching them how to, quote, "dodge dozens of difficult questions about Vioxx and heart trouble."
Details of some of the documents and e-mails were reported, as you mentioned, in "The Wall Street Journal" today. Merck responded in a statement today saying in part that, quote, "past experience of other companies in such situations suggest that documents will be deliberately presented out of context to advance the interest of the parties who have started Vioxx litigation."
It goes on to say "None of the documents can obscure the fact that Merck acted responsibly and appropriately as it developed and marketed Vioxx." But Merck also points out, saying that it "does not intend, at this time, to address specific documents, as many continue to be subject to court orders that prohibit their disclosure," end quote. Now, Merck, of course, pulled Vioxx from the market back in late September. And really, at the time, it said that it did so because of new studies pointing to the complications of Merck and heart attacks. But in fact, several studies dating back to the late '90s, including even one done by the FDA this summer, showed an elevated risk for serious cardiovascular problems for patients who took Vioxx -- Tony?
HARRIS: OK. Chris Huntington reporting live for us from New York. Chris, thank you.
And that wraps up the second hour of LIVE FROM.
PHILLIPS: Up next, 90 minutes of political headlines with "JUDY WOODRUFF'S INSIDE POLITICS" live from New York -- Judy?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: In the news now -- new details are emerging about last week's videotape from Osama bin Laden. He refers to Halliburton as a shady, administration-backed corporation. That's according to U.S. analysts. And Al-Jazeera TV has now released a full transcript. Bin Laden refers to President Bush as, quote, "the liar in the White House," end quote.
Police in Israel say a 16-year-old boy was the suicide bomber in a blast that killed three people this morning in Tel Aviv. Thirty- five others were wounded, four of them seriously, at an open-air market. Palestinian militants claim responsibility for that attack.
Voters will not only pick a president in the elections, some also will decide the controversial issue of banning same-sex marriage. It's on the ballot in 11 states, including four battleground states -- Arkansas, Michigan, Ohio, and Oregon.
All the latest political and campaign news just ahead with Judy Woodruff -- I promise she's coming up right now.
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Aired November 1, 2004 - 14:32 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And welcome back. From the CNN Center in Atlanta, this is LIVE FROM. I'm Tony Harris.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Kyra Phillips. Here's what's all new this half hour.
Did the maker of the arthritis drug Vioxx know about potential problems years ago? We'll have reaction to a published report just ahead.
HARRIS: And where are the showdown states leaning. With just hours to go before Election Day, we'll check in with the Gallup poll.
Let's do it right now. For the first time ever, a Gallup poll has found a tie in the final pre-election presidential poll. The latest CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll shows President Bush and John Kerry in a dead heat, both with 49 percent of likely voters when undecided voters are factored.
Joining us from Princeton, New Jersey, is Frank Newport, Gallup editor-in-chief, to talk about the significance of the pre-election tie. OK, Frank, get us started. Where do we find -- where do we stand with these final estimates?
FRANK NEWPORT, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, GALLUP: Well, you're absolutely right. It's a dead-even tie. It's the first time technically, but there have been other years -- you know, Gallup goes back to 1936 -- where we've said it's too close to call. In fact, we said that before the 2000 election, and it was.
You go back to 1968, that was Humphrey and Nixon, too close to call. And actually, the first Nixon race against John F. Kennedy, also too close to call. So, there have been other very close races. And in fact, those race ended up being very close. We'll see what happens to this one.
Just to show you our October popular vote numbers, likely voters, it was 49-49 when the month began. As the curtain rose on October, I might say, it was tied. We went through some changes. Bush gained a little. But now as the curtain closed on October yesterday on Halloween, guess what? Back at 49-49. The popular vote rounded in 2000 was 48-48. So, in some ways, we're where we were, I would say, four years ago.
Let me show you a couple of wild cards, Tony, in this race. There are still, believe it or not, as of our poll through yesterday, voters who say they are uncommitted. Now, that means that they may have a choice, but they say they could change their mind. Thirty- three percent of this group, about nine or 10 percent, say they are leaning to Bush but could change their mind. Thirty-one percent leaning to Kerry, but could change their mind. And another 30 percent of our likely voters in this group say they don't know who they're going to vote for, and that could make the big difference.
And Tony, we've heard a lot about first-time voters. I've represented for you here those voters in our likely voter pool who said they didn't vote in 2000, and they go for Kerry, 52-39. So, that's another wild card. If lots of them show up tomorrow, it certainly could benefit John Kerry -- Tony?
HARRIS: OK, now Frank, you've made the point several times during the campaign that there's a link between presidential job approval and re-election chances. Where do we stand heading into tomorrow?
NEWPORT: Well, I wish that I could say, "A-ha, there's the key. I can now predict for you who's going to win." But guess what? Bush's job approval rating is right at 50 percent. (INAUDIBLE) it was 48 in our final national (INAUDIBLE) reading as of yesterday. So, a little below 50 percent. And that's kind of the symbolic line.
But this, again, doesn't allow us to predict the -- follow me, the last two presidents who lost were Bush's father and Jimmy Carter in 1980, and both of those had job approval ratings in the 30 percent range in October. And so, Bush is not nearly as bad as that. But Clinton in '96 and Reagan in '84 and so on back, the guys who won had job approval ratings well above 50 percent. So, Bush is in neither of those camps. He's in a gray zone, and that's why we keep coming back and saying, Tony, I wish I could tell you exactly who's going to win tomorrow, but I can't.
HARRIS: You can't. You can't. No one can at this point. It's up to us to go out and decide it ourselves. Frank Newport, from the Gallup Organization. Frank, thank you.
NEWPORT: You bet.
PHILLIPS: All right. We've been checking in with John Kerry and also President Bush on this Election Eve. We were having a little technical problems in Milwaukee a little while ago. Well, we got that tape in, everything's OK. Here's a chunk of what John Kerry had to say at his rally in Milwaukee just a few minutes ago.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: For the last two years, I've been privileged to travel all across this country, been privileged to meet with you in your homes, been privileged to listen to your stories, to the struggles of so many millions of Americans. I've met those people, the five million some of them who have lost their health insurance. I met the people who have lost their jobs and then had to suffer the indignity of unbolting the equipment they used to work on, put it in a crate, and send it to a place like China for somebody else to work on.
I've met people -- I've met people who are now working two jobs to earn the same amount of money that they used to earn, while we see the price of everything go up, incomes for Americans have gone down. George Bush keeps choosing the wealthy, the powerful, the drug companies, the oil companies. I think the White House ought to be occupied by a champion for the middle class and those struggling to get in it.
So, I've heard your struggles and I share your hopes, and together we have a chance tomorrow to move America forward, to start to make the difference in the lives of so many millions of Americans and in the character of our country itself. That's what this is about.
So, if you believe -- if you believe that we can create better jobs here than the jobs that we're sending overseas. If you believe that we can provide healthcare that's affordable and accessible to all Americans. If you believe that we should be allowed to import prescription drugs from Canada and have Medicare be able to make a bulk purchase and lower the cost to taxpayers. If you believe -- if you believe that that 17,000 page tax code that's supposed to belong to you belongs to the lobbyists and the powerful and we ought to change it, make it work for Americans.
If you believe that our kids shouldn't have school doors shut in their faces in the afternoon because they don't have enough money to have an after-school program. If you believe -- if you believe that teachers shouldn't have to dig into their own pockets in order to put materials in front of our kids in America. If you believe that we're too dependent on Mid East oil and we could tap into America's genius and creativity.
If you believe, as I do, that America's best days are ahead of us, then join me tomorrow and change the direction of America! Thank you! Let's go make it happen! God bless you all!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: That was a portion of John Kerry there in Milwaukee. Earlier in the day, the president of the United States had also had a rally there in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Now, Air Force One arriving in Des Moines, Iowa. After the president leaves Iowa, he'll move on to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and then Dallas. John Kerry heading to Detroit, Cleveland, and then Toledo.
Now, the election is in the home stretch, and candidates are sprinting to the finish line. We've been telling you about this all day. Both President Bush and John Kerry campaigning furiously in key battleground states. What we want to know is what can they do, and what should they be doing at this late date to get people to vote for them?
The man with the answers is media strategist Robbie. He joins me now live from New York. Great to see you, Robbie.
ROBBIE VORHAUS, MEDIA STRATEGIST, VORHAUS & CO.: Kyra, hello. And boy, this is great race, isn't it?
PHILLIPS: It's pretty interesting. I have a feeling it's going to be a long week, Robbie.
VORHAUS: It's going to be a long week, but the surprise that I think that we could all see is if this is a landslide. And then, what we're going to see is that all the pollsters and all the media pundits and -- are -- were shown again that the American people are a lot smarter than we are.
PHILLIPS: Well, you know, everyone's been talking about the October surprise. What do you think about the election surprise? You were saying all these newly registered voters, who knows, they'll come out. Like you said, it could be a landslide. And the surprise could be all these unexpected voters coming in and picking their candidate.
VORHAUS: Well, that's right. I mean, pollsters can only look at people who talk to them. Pollsters can only look at their statistical model. But you know, Eminem was on "Saturday Night Live" Saturday night, and, at the end of his first song, held up a sign and said vote.
And if we have a huge turnout -- and it's expected that we're going to have the largest single turnout in American history -- and a large percentage of those people have not been counted by the pollsters, and they vote for one candidate or the other, it may be a very short week for us and for those candidates.
PHILLIPS: All right, spin master, what could happened that could change the course of this election tomorrow? There's a couple of things that could happen. You said possibly some last minute surprise endorsements?
VORHAUS: Well, if a star came out, if somebody -- if an athlete of great renown, if some star were to come out, if a group of people were to come out and, sometime today or early tomorrow, and to say, "You know what? We've been very quiet, but we can't be quiet anymore. This is who we're voting for."
The other thing that could happen, of course, is if there were some catastrophic event, whether natural or manmade, and that would certainly change the focus of that election to that event. And at the same time, if one of the candidates were to make a terrible mistake. They're tired. They've been on point. Sometimes when you get that way, you get a little goofy and you say something that you think is funny and it absolutely turns the campaign on its ear. And that's what we're all going to be looking for.
PHILLIPS: All right. You've been a strategist for a long time. Now, level with me, the Redskins/Packers game and this whole prediction -- let's really put this in perspective. Could this change the course of what could happen tomorrow?
VORHAUS: Well, I talked to a Princeton physicist who went through all of the statistics and said, "You know something? That's a very interesting statistic. But I'm sure that if you run enough analysis, you can find some other race or something else that's going to predict that."
It says that if the Redskins lose their last game of their home season, then the incumbent will lose, also. And apparently, for the last 17 presidential elections, that's been accurate. So, the Packers won, according to this statistic, Kerry will win tomorrow.
PHILLIPS: Interesting. We'll see who turns out to vote in Wisconsin and others -- all kinds of things we could follow from there.
All right, finally, scarism -- the explosives, Osama bin Laden tape.
VORHAUS: That's right.
PHILLIPS: Why are we seeing so many scare tactics in the final day coming here toward the end? Can I call it a tactic, I guess?
VORHAUS: It is a tactic, Kyra, because what no one is teaching us is is we become manipulatable when we're scared. All of a sudden, we keep seeing this ratcheted up. It's more and more frightening, and we start fearing for our lives. We care about our children. We care about our family. We care about our community. So, we're going to vote with how we feel that we are more protected.
Now, if this Osama bin Laden tape made people believe that the Bush administration should stay in, or if somebody else said that we feel that there should be a change here, they're going to vote out of that fear. But the reality is is that we need to be teaching consumers and the American public and people how to be detached.
"You know, there's an old expression, "Be open to everything, but attached to nothing." And I think that that's the way we should have seen this Osama bin Laden tape.
PHILLIPS: Robbie Vorhaus, I think the only fear I have is that we won't be finished Wednesday. I think it's going to...
VORHAUS: Can I vote -- put in a write-in vote for you, and that way that I...
PHILLIPS: Robbie...
VORHAUS: I won't have any problems with that vote.
PHILLIPS: You know, charm -- it gets him everywhere. Charm gets him everywhere. Robbie Vorhaus...
VORHAUS: Better America for Kyra Phillips.
PHILLIPS: I love you too, Robbie. Thanks a lot.
VORHAUS: Thank you, Kyra. Good to see you.
PHILLIPS: All right. Good to see you. And CNN's special Election Night coverage does begin tomorrow night at 7:00 Eastern. I'm blushing. Trust CNN to track the votes, exit polls, and any legal challenges. Plus, dozens of reporters will be out coast-to-coast bringing you any new developments throughout the night.
We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: You know, earlier we asked you to tell us if you weren't planning to vote tomorrow and why not. We've got a bunch of e-mails. Let me share a couple of them with you.
This is from Anthony: "I'm a college student at NYU who is not voting in the upcoming presidential election. I am uncomfortable with the idea of voting, because I do not feel they have enough knowledge about each candidate, despite having seen all of the debates, and just because I'm 18 doesn't seem reason to cast a groundless vote."
Let's move on and get this e-mail from Mark: "It's such a hassle to vote on Election Day. You have to find your polling location, find a parking spot and wait in long lines. Why can't we have the option to vote on the Internet? It would make life much easier for everyone."
And do we have time for one more? OK, let's do another one. From Dave: "I will not be voting in tomorrow's election. Why? Because I'm from Kansas, and with or without my vote, this state will go Republican. I would be voting if the states split the electoral college votes to the nearest percentage of popular votes."
OK, we'll leave it there. Thank you for your responses. Good stuff. Good stuff -- Kyra?
PHILLIPS: That is good stuff.
Well, we've been talking about all these political predictions. Now, do they make sense? What do they mean? Well, I'll tell you what, they don't mean anything to our pundits of CNN's "CROSSFIRE." They've already picked their winners. Hosts Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson join us now live from New York to talk about the race. It's just too close to call.
Hi, guys.
PAUL BEGALA, CO-HOST, "CROSSFIRE": Hey, Kyra. How are you doing?
TUCKER CARLSON, CO-HOST, "CROSSFIRE": Hey, Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. I'm doing OK. I'm getting ready for a long week. I'm sure you guys are, too.
I guess I want to ask you, first of all, Tucker, what do you think? Will we see a clear winner? CARLSON: I think we will. I think we will see a clear winner. These -- I mean, you know, it's impossible to make a valid model based on an event that happens only four years, but historically, large number of voters comes to the same conclusion at the end of an election process, and I think we'll probably see something like that now.
I certainly hope so. I mean, no matter who wins, I think it's important that the victor have the majority of the popular vote, something that hasn't happened since 1988. I think it's bad for America to have a disputed election or even a president who didn't get the majority of the popular vote. So, yeah, I definitely hope that happens.
PHILLIPS: Paul, what do you think?
BEGALA: It will happen, yes. In other words, we will have a winner, and it will be on Tuesday night -- Wednesday morning, perhaps. But I know the polls all say that it's too close to call. There's two problems with the polls.
What generally the pollsters don't tell you is in more than 75 percent of the cases, the challenger gets the lion's share of the undecideds, and that makes sense, right? The incumbent's had four years to make his case. The challenger has come on. If people are still undecided at the end of the race, the challenger is going to get those votes. So, I think any undecided that are out there are very highly likely to be for Kerry.
And second, the turnout models on which, very prudently, the pollsters are basing their projections are traditional patterns of turnout. In every indicator I get -- anecdotally, talking to friends in all these swing states, looking at early voting patterns -- is that this will be an extraordinarily large turnout. And so, I think that bodes very well for Kerry, too.
So, I think Kerry will win solidly, and we'll know on Election Night.
PHILLIPS: All right. Perfect segue -- you mentioned polls. You guys are being way too quiet, way too calm right now.
Let's listen to Dick Cheney from the speech in Des Moines, and I want to get your reaction. You know where I'm going.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DICK CHENEY (R), VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The thing that I find amazing about it is that John Kerry's first response was to go conduct a poll. You went out and went into the field with a public opinion poll to find out what he should say about this tape and Osama bin Laden.
It was as though he didn't know what he believes until he has to go and check the polls -- stick his finger in the air, see which way the political winds are blowing. (END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Tucker, is that true? John Kerry can't make a decision without taking a poll?
CARLSON: You know, if Dick Cheney says it, I believe it. I mean, I'm sure he did take a poll, which itself -- you know, I mean, it's less than a week before an election. Candidates take polls. Maybe just because I live in Washington, I personally don't think it's such a big deal. But it's a metaphor for a problem that actually is a big deal. And that is it's not clear to me what John Kerry thinks about Osama bin Laden, aside from the obvious point: He's evil.
The Bush administration, by contrast, has come out and given an explanation -- whether you buy it or not -- for why bin Laden and al Qaeda hate us. Cheney -- I mean, rather Kerry has not. He has given no sense that he understands why these people hate us. And it's kind of hard to fight a war on terror unless you begin at step one, which is who are we fighting and what motivates them?
PHILLIPS: Paul, final thoughts. Do we care whether they take a poll or not to make their decisions?
BEGALA: Well, that's silly. I mean, the vice president has, in ending his political career today, disgraced himself, as he did from the beginning of his political career.
CARLSON: Oh, come on.
BEGALA: No, he's an embarrassment. The Bush campaign has some of the best pollsters in the business. They poll every single day. And for a fact, as soon as the bin Laden tape came out, Kerry came out and gave a statement. He could not have physically conducted a poll in that time.
"The New York Times" has an interesting thing. It shows the really ultimate hypocrisy of President Bush, who likes to say, "I don't govern by the polls. I don't like polls." He is so deeply invested into the minutia of polls, so obsessed with him is he, "The New York Times" reports today, that his deputy chief of staff went out to Home Depot and bought a bunch of screens and started painting on them different jargons, because the president is so into the notion of how many -- what percentage of Republicans passed the screen in this poll or that poll.
CARLSON: I suspect it was a joke. I suspect it was a joke, Paul.
BEGALA: No, but it's a joke because it's playing on the president's obsession with polling. And so, what Mr. Cheney is doing, as he often does, is projecting the sense he finds into his own heart onto Mr. Kerry.
CARLSON: OK, now we're getting theological again. On that note -- I can't keep up. The second we start talking about...
PHILLIPS: And as soon as they start getting a little funky, I get the hard wrap in my ear. Yeah, all of a sudden (INAUDIBLE).
Paul Begala, Tucker Carlson, thanks, guys. I'll watch you tonight.
CARLSON: Thanks, Kyra.
PHILLIPS: OK.
HARRIS: Well, new questions facing Merck this afternoon. Up next, we'll find out what the drug company might have known about Vioxx before it was pulled off the market.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HARRIS: More trouble for the drugmaker behind the recalled pain reliever Vioxx. "The Wall Street Journal" reports internal e-mails and other documents proved Merck knew of Vioxx's safety problems long before pulling it off the shelves in September.
CNN Chris Huntington is live from New York with more. Hello, Chris.
CHRIS HUNTINGTON, CNN FINANCIAL NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Tony.
Well, Merck's stock right now is down more than $3 a share. It's below $29. That on revelation that the drugmaker's own internal documents and e-mails show that Merck executives knew for years that Vioxx could lead to heart trouble. Documents also show that Merck had a long running strategy to counter any safety concerns about Vioxx.
Documents and e-mails are currently under a court gag order as thousands of former Vioxx users are suing Merck. But lawyers working on those cases and Congressional staffers who are investigating what Merck knew about the dangers of Vioxx confirmed to CNN that Merck had a detailed strategy to protect Vioxx and deflect criticism about its safety.
For instance, the documents show that Merck had a tactic it called "dodgeball" that involved sending memos to Merck sales representatives coaching them how to, quote, "dodge dozens of difficult questions about Vioxx and heart trouble."
Details of some of the documents and e-mails were reported, as you mentioned, in "The Wall Street Journal" today. Merck responded in a statement today saying in part that, quote, "past experience of other companies in such situations suggest that documents will be deliberately presented out of context to advance the interest of the parties who have started Vioxx litigation."
It goes on to say "None of the documents can obscure the fact that Merck acted responsibly and appropriately as it developed and marketed Vioxx." But Merck also points out, saying that it "does not intend, at this time, to address specific documents, as many continue to be subject to court orders that prohibit their disclosure," end quote. Now, Merck, of course, pulled Vioxx from the market back in late September. And really, at the time, it said that it did so because of new studies pointing to the complications of Merck and heart attacks. But in fact, several studies dating back to the late '90s, including even one done by the FDA this summer, showed an elevated risk for serious cardiovascular problems for patients who took Vioxx -- Tony?
HARRIS: OK. Chris Huntington reporting live for us from New York. Chris, thank you.
And that wraps up the second hour of LIVE FROM.
PHILLIPS: Up next, 90 minutes of political headlines with "JUDY WOODRUFF'S INSIDE POLITICS" live from New York -- Judy?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PHILLIPS: In the news now -- new details are emerging about last week's videotape from Osama bin Laden. He refers to Halliburton as a shady, administration-backed corporation. That's according to U.S. analysts. And Al-Jazeera TV has now released a full transcript. Bin Laden refers to President Bush as, quote, "the liar in the White House," end quote.
Police in Israel say a 16-year-old boy was the suicide bomber in a blast that killed three people this morning in Tel Aviv. Thirty- five others were wounded, four of them seriously, at an open-air market. Palestinian militants claim responsibility for that attack.
Voters will not only pick a president in the elections, some also will decide the controversial issue of banning same-sex marriage. It's on the ballot in 11 states, including four battleground states -- Arkansas, Michigan, Ohio, and Oregon.
All the latest political and campaign news just ahead with Judy Woodruff -- I promise she's coming up right now.
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