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American Morning

America Under Attack: Bush Arrives at Washington Hospital Center

Aired September 13, 2001 - 11:32   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.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We want to go to this picture live now. Once again, this is the arrival of the current President Bush, his son, President Bush arriving at Washington Hospital Center.

He had mentioned this earlier, he is showing up here to show his support for those that survived the plane crash into the Pentagon on Tuesday and are at this hospital recover from their injuries.

LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: You know, we just heard the former President Bush pretty much get to the end of his remarks about this current situation, he's calling it a "new era" as far as the U.S. is concerned.

And as we're seeing now, the former -- President George W. Bush is about to get out of the vehicle, and I think he may have already gotten out.

KAGAN: Let's go ahead and bring in our Kelly Wallace, who's standing by at the White House.

Kelly, the president mentioned earlier that he was coming here to show his support. of course, he can't visit everybody in the hospital who's recovering from the tragedy of Tuesday.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: No, exactly, Daryn.

You heard him say he wishes he could comfort every family, every family and every victim of this tragedy. The president going to this hospital. I believe the first lady expected to join the president here to visit with victims of, of course, the crash into the Pentagon. And, also, the president wanting to thank all the doctors and nurses who have been working very hard, pulling in overtime hours, really doing everything they can to help the victims and comfort them.

Daryn, I was just struck, as we listened to the former president, just about sort of the similarities here. There's just so much to talk about. You know, the former president saying that he talks to his son quite regularly. He said, well, he's been doing that since George W. Bush has been little boy, and so he's going to continue that. He says they don't always talk about policy, very much sometimes it just sort of close family staying in touch.

But we do know that the president... KAGAN: Kelly, let me just interrupt you for a second because there we see the president and Mrs. Bush as they go ahead and walk into the hospital.

But I did pick up on the same thing as you were saying, that he was talking about his relationship, father and son, former president, current president. And also, as he was making his remarks, the former president, you reminded the wealth of experience that former President Bush has, as head of intelligence community, as an ambassador, as vice president under President Reagan, and of course, as president. He has to be an enormous resource, not just for the country, but especially for his son.

WALLACE: Exactly. And we've always asked -- we just asked Ari Fleischer, in fact, yesterday, because we know that the president did talk with his father on Tuesday aboard Air Force One; that was after, I believe, certainly some of the attacks were already underway.

The White House never commenting exactly on the sort of subject of the conversation; they say, sometimes the president talks to his father as a father and sometimes more for advice.

But just as you're mentioning, you have the former president, many of the top officials in his administration who handled the Persian Gulf War. His Defense Secretary Dick Cheney serves as the president's vice president. And of course, Colin Powell, who is now of course the secretary of state. And there are just a lot of similarities. You heard the former president say that his son, his administration is trying to build an international coalition, and then after the U.S. does that the president will determine what to do. Well, there have been a lot of comparisons made with the international coalition that the former president put together to, of course, deal with the Persian Gulf War and Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.

Another similarity in terms of going to Congress, and you even heard the former president mention the importance of going to Congress. The president calling for some type of joint resolution, which would basically -- a use-of-force resolution, the U.S. to retaliate for those attacks; that resolution being compared to a resolution passed by Congress in 1991 that gave his father, really, the authority, the go ahead, for force against Iraq after the invasion against Kuwait.

So just so many similarities really between his father's administration and in a way with the president is coping with right now -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Kelly Wallace at the White House.

Kelly, thank you very much.

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