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Parker Spitzer
What Role Should Government Play in Fighting Recession?; A Closer Look at 'I Want Your Money'; Interview With Alan Dershowitz
Aired October 15, 2010 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KATHLEEN PARKER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening. I'm Kathleen Parker.
ELIOT SPITZER, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Eliot Spitzer. Welcome to PARKER/SPITZER. Tonight, we discuss the single most important issue framing these midterm elections, what role should government play in getting us out of this recession? And let's face it, there are two fundamentally different view of that, one of the Tea Party Republican view, which says government should do less, and the Democratic view, which says government has got to do more.
PARKER: A new movie opens tonight. It is called "I Want Your Money" and it is a conservative argument for dramatic cuts in spending. The founding released two weeks before the midterm election. Anyway you look at it, it is a political statement. Let's take a quick look at a clip from the film.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, what you doing here?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This? Oh, I'm redistributing the wealth. I learned in school spreading the Wall Street is good for everyone.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I learned from real life that it is not. What about the guy you're taking money from?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, so it's good for 75 percent of the people. Isn't taking money from one person to make three others happy a good thing?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No. It's a very bad thing. In fact, there's a word for it. It's called theft.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But it will better the lives of three-fourths of the people.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Actually, it will make life worse for 100 percent of the people. And we call that socialism.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't stand how all you conservatives say socialism, like it is a dirty word.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's funny, I feel the same way about how you liberals use the word capitalism. (END VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: You know, I just got to say, it is not just this is bad propaganda, this movie make a mockery of history, a mockery of economics. I know it is going to be all over country. I'm kind of curious who's behind it.
PARKER: There are many things that are misleading about it, but it does speak to a larger concern and, you know, certainly in conservative circles that the government is expanding at too rapid a rate, we're spending beyond our means, et cetera, et cetera, we know the arguments. What I'm more interested in is the fact that the conservative side of the aisle has finally caught up a little bit with Hollywood. This is essentially the mirror image of Michael Moore, it's not maybe as family...
SPITZER: As vitriolic.
PARKER: Yeah, exactly. Well, there's that.
SPITZER: Well, we saw pieces of. It is cartoonish, quite had literally. Cartoon characters mixed in with real interviews. But, what bothers me, you're right, this is the conservative response to what frankly Democrats in Hollywood have done very well, which is to use film as a medium to make a political argument. This doesn't do it, though.
PARKER: Well, you know, the Republicans and conservatives have long felt and justifiably so that Hollywood is a propagandist to arm for the Democratic Party. No, no, no, because look. Let's look, no matter what you say, we can all agree that most people in Hollywood tend to be more liberal, they tend to belong the Democratic Party and the evidence of this is there are conservatives out there who essentially have formed an underground community because they're afraid to come out in the open.
SPITZER: Kathleen, I will concede that point to you, but I'm going to say right now that isn't what worries me or concerns me. What worries me is what happens to our economy and what I see as the argument of the Tea Party and the Republican Party is so disconnected from fact, from history, from economics that it worries me that its appeal is going to be expanded by a cartoonish film like this. Again, we don't even know who financed it, who is behind it and I think that's a shame.
PARKER: Actually, did you take a valium? I never heard you speak that slowly?
SPITZER: You know, I'm trying to get my arms around it.
(CROSSTALK)
PARKER: I have to tell you what I'm mostly concerned about.
SPITZER: Yeah. I'm going to answer the question's no, but that's all right. PARKER: The left has its films and the right has their films and everybody -- to me, it is a political coagulant. And I worry that we will harden our views as we go along. This film is, you know, we know there is some historical inaccuracies in it, but it speaks to the people who want to believe this particular message and I am philosophically more attuned with the conservative view than the liberal view when it comes to these things, but I get turned off quickly when I hear words put into someone's mouth that were not true.
SPITZER: That's right. For instance, this movie calls President Obama a socialist and I think that just shows...
PARKER: Well, Obama says basically socialism is good.
SPITZER: But, here's what bothers me, and I know you make fun of the way I love numbers. The reason I love numbers is because they're facts and I think if you drill down to facts in a real understanding of economics, then the answers that make sense, they begin to appeal to everybody and it isn't quite as simple as big government, little government. It's a government that believes in markets, competition, the integrity out there, which requires government do some things but not others. And if we talk about it in that common sense way, not like this cartoon character film, then we can bring everybody into that one...
PARKER: I don't disagree with a word you said. I know I'm supposed to, but that was a rational statement you just made. Rare, but rational.
All right, now let's get to our "Headliner" segment. That right- wing film we have been talking about "I Want Your Money," the director Ray Griggs stopped by for a special screening with us and I tried unsuccessfully to get Eliot to be nice to him. Fair warning.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SPITZER: Joining us now for a headliner interview, the filmmaker of "I Want Your Money," Ray Griggs. Thanks for coming in.
RAY GRIGGS, FILMMAKER: Thanks for having me.
PARKER: Ray, congratulations on your release today. For a minute, just describe what the movie is for those who don't know about it.
GRIGGS: Actually, my film is Reaganomics versus Obamanomics. And basically it contrasts the two roads we can go down, one is the current administration or trying to go back to the conservative values and beliefs of that of Ronald Reagan.
SPITZER: And just so it's clear, it was -- the release was timed to come out right now before the election so you could have sort of -- make a political statement.
GRIGGS: Absolutely. I wanted to give people proper tools to take with them on November 2 so they make wise decisions on what course to take.
PARKER: Now, you have made this film outside the usual Hollywood movie system. In other words, you say you've self-financed. Is that right?
GRIGGS: Right. I self-financed the production end of it, where I got private investors for the P&A. Going through self-distribution, because, you know, naturally a studio wouldn't pick this up just because of the concerns of the liberal left in Hollywood. And you know, it was a...
PARKER: There is lots and lots of money being spent on advertising just this week, so you've obviously gotten funding help from other sources.
GRIGGS: Right, that's the independent financer for the P&A, which is prints and advertising. But, again...
PARKER: Can you tell us who any of those are?
GRIGGS: No. I won't get into that.
PARKER: Is that available anywhere. I mean, would we see that in the film credits? No?
GRIGGS: No. Just because of the political nature of it, because a lot of people think, oh, well, they're political activists, it is not...
PARKER: But they may well be political activists, but if you stand by the content of the film, it shouldn't really matter, right, if it is laid out in a way that seems factual and credible, then I would think people would be proud to put their names on it.
GRIGGS: Well, yeah, I know.
SPITZER: Well, one of the things, we called you earlier, because we saw the movie coming out, you did some articles, we are intrigued because it kind of stands in opposition by design to some of the other movies that have been out there that take a very different political perspective, so we called you for a copy of it and you sent back an interesting e-mail. and we appreciate your being here, but the e-mail said, don't have my glasses on, but it said, "I did, however, provide you with video clips," but before that, you said, "I am not releasing screeners of my film to any film critics or network stations that generally promote a liberal view."
GRIGGS: Correct.
SPITZER: Do you kind of view us as being the liberal media. I mean, we think we're fair and open to all perspectives, but...
GRIGGS: Well, we'll see how this interview pans out.
SPITZER: Fair point. But, we just want you to be here to explain... GRIGGS: And that's why. I thought I'd give you the benefit of the doubt and be fair.
SPITZER: Appreciate that.
GRIGGS: I thought I would be fair and show people, you know what, we'll cross the line.
SPITZER: Who do you put -- just out of curiosity, who do you put in that sort of liberal world view category other than us, I suppose?
GRIGGS: Every station out there. You got ABC, NBC. They have given Obama this -- they don't hold him accountable.
SPITZER: Can we come back to the movie. Give us in one sentence what is the ideological statement you want the viewer to have at the end of this movie?
GRIGGS: I would like people to go back to the conservative values and beliefs that Ronald Reagan had.
SPITZER: And by that, you mean theoretically lower taxes and control of spending?
GRIGGS: Control the spending and smaller government.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RONALD REAGAN, FMR U.S. PRESIDENT: From time to time we have been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior, that government for, by and of the people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: Can I come at it from a slightly different perspective. Because I saw in an interview you did you said that 62 percent of the public doesn't pay taxes. Is that -- am I correct in that's what you said?
GRIGGS: Right.
SPITZER: You know that's totally wrong.
GRIGGS: OK, why is that?
SPITZER: Because the -- the vast majority of people, I would say 95 percent of people pay taxes. They pay sales taxes, they pay payroll taxes, they pay all the taxes that you incur every day. When people work, there are withholding taxes to pay for Social Security system. Now, the income tax, which is only one of the many, many taxes we pay, is marginally progressive, but everybody pays the other taxes.
GRIGGS: Right, but I was actually talking about the income tax. SPITZER: Well, that's not what you said and it is a huge difference because if you look at the tax burden, what you'll see is that people who are right in the middle pay about, you know, we have got numbers here, people who are right in the middle, the average person will pay about, you know, 14 percent of all of his or her income in taxes.
GRIGGS: Right.
SPITZER: Federal taxes. That ignores the state's. And the people at the very, very top only pay 24 percent. So people in the middle are paying 14 percent, people in the top 24 percent, people one notch lower, about 7.5 percent. So, that's, you know, some progressivity, but not a whole lot, right?
GRIGGS: Where did you...
SPITZER: This is (INAUDIBLE) from the Brookings Institute. These are numbers from the IRS and all the others. I mean, these are very...
PARKER: OK. Eliot, did you bring your charts and graphs here, today?
SPITZER: No. No.
PARKER: I didn't think you did. Can we talk about the movie and the politics? I know you want...
GRIGGS: I'm not an economist. There is plenty of people you can get on besides me to find out about...
PARKER: You can find a gazillion people who agree that we -- people who work hard don't want to hand over all their money to the government, who will then redistribute it to other people.
SPITZER: But wait a minute.
PARKER: But, if you're a good capitalist, you agree with that, come on.
SPITZER: No. I'm a capitalist. I'm not a foolish libertarian. And what I would say is that if you're distributing a movie to 500 cinemas in which you call the president a socialist, you better have a foundation for that, wouldn't you think?
GRIGGS: OK. You said you're a capitalist?
SPITZER: Oh, yeah.
GRIGGS: So you -- but then why are you for government getting bigger and bigger and bigger...
SPITZER: I'm for government that ensures the competition works. And unlike President Reagan and President Bush, who made deals with the big banks to permit them, to permit the very, very rich to take money from the hard working middle class, we believe...
PARKER: And Clinton.
SPITZER: To a certain extent, but not as much as the others. We believe that markets have to work, which means competition, which means to be technical, competition law or antitrust law, which President Reagan and both President Bushes' tried to destroy. So the real capitalists are the ones who believe in competition and markets. Not the sort of gamesmanship that President Bush perpetrated. So I think before you call the president a socialist and send this movie out to 500 movie theaters with a movie whose funders you won't disclose to us, you should tell us what your foundation is for that.
GRIGGS: OK. Well, let's forget history, OK.
SPITZER: No, we can't forget history. You can't forget history. I'm sorry. You can't.
GRIGGS: Just for a minute because I want to talk about what is currently going on right now, because that's the real issue at hand. I mean, we can debate and get analysts and try to figure out how we got to this point. But the point is, today, OK, do you feel this current administration, OK, is doing a good job?
SPITZER: Well, I will say this, I think they have been much too cozy with Wall Street. I think that the reality is the stimulus needed to be bigger, not smaller. Business is sitting on $1.8 trillion of cash that it is not investing because there is no demand and the lack of demand is precisely what FDR had to confront in the depression. The answer to that, and this is standard Keynesian economics, and it works, is you create demand by getting people to spend, either through a tax cut, or direct government spending. I mean, this is Econ101, that appreciated by everybody from Alan Greenspan to Larry Summers. And so the answer is you create demand, and that's what the Obama administration is trying to do because the Bush administration ran us over a cliff.
PARKER: Well, and, Ray, you agree with that, correct?
GRIGGS: I do. And there is a lot there that we agree -- I see we are on similar terms, but just how we get there. I do believe in smaller government and I do agree in creating demand and capitalism, pursuing the American dream. But I believe in a smaller government not interfering into our business and our lives telling us how much we can make and everything else.
PARKER: I read somewhere that in some cities, in some communities, people bought entire theaters full of seats for your film.
GRIGGS: They have. San Diego, Kansas City, Texas. There is people already that went in and just bought entire seats of the theater to, I guess, give out tickets or you know, whatever the situation is, so there is a growing response from it. You know, the amazing thing, now we can talk about the film, the amazing thing about the film, we have 3.5 million hits on YouTube. You look up "Inside Job" or any of these other documentaries out there, "Fahrenheit 9/11," they don't have that mass number of YouTube hits. So, there is a crying demand out there from the middle to -- there is an interest. It sparks an interest.
SPITZER: I applaud you for making the movie. I think it is what all citizens should do, participate. It's going to be creative, it is fun, based on what the part we saw and don't wish you nothing but the best success.
PARKER: How does it end? How does it end?
GRIGGS: Basically I tell the people, you know, we have to make a serious difference in November. And make a sound decision and choose wisely and make sure if you choose a Republican to get in office, that they have the same conservative values and beliefs as Ronald Reagan.
PARKER: You're a good sport, Ray. Thanks a lot. Appreciate it.
SPITZER: Best of luck. We really mean it. We'll be right back.
PARKER: Stay right there.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHEN MOORE, WALL STREET JOURNAL: Do you think Barack Obama's capable of doing what Bill Clinton did so effectively after he lost that midterm election where he moved to the middle?
ARIANNA HUFFINGTON, HUFFINGTON POST: The problems we're facing are not about left and right. The middle class is crumbling and that's not a left-wing issue, it's not a right-wing issue, it is about the heart of America and that's the problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: Now time are for "The Arena," joining us tonight, Arianna Huffington, who is the co-founder and editor in chief of the "Huffington Post" and author of the provocative and absolutely a must- read "Third World America." And of course, Stephen Moore, senior economics writer for the "Wall Street Journal" editorial page. Thank you both for joining us.
Steve, let me begin with you. We have been discussing a movie that, you know, which is take my money, "Take Your Money," steal somebody's money...
(CROSSTALK)
It so bothered me. And in it bothered me and you're in it. And in the move, you use the phrase fiscal child abuse to describe the trajectory we're on as an economy. But, I want to contrast that with something you said back a couple of months ago, in February of this year.
MOORE: You've done your homework.
SPITZER: With Google these days, who can't. Right? "We should try to maintain the American model, low tax rates, keep government spending under control, that's what led to the great prosperity of the '80s and '90s." The problem is, what drove the prosperity of the '80s and '90s, and in fact, your choice presidents, President Reagans and President Bush left us with the hugest deficits in history. So, even this...
(CROSSTALK)
MOORE: Cleaning up? He took a trillion dollar deficit and made it much worse.
SPITZER: ...Reagan, on of the biggest deficit in history.
MOORE: Yeah, but what Barack Obama should have done when he came into office is clean up the fiscal mess. And I think the reason that people are so angry is we have made it so much worse. I mean, under the president's budget, he wants to borrow $10 trillion over the next 10 years. Eliot, that's more money than the United States borrow from 1776 through 2005.
SPITZER: There is a demand crisis in this nation. The demand crisis is the reason that businesses aren't investing. There is no demand, and if you don't spend and this is Keynesian economics that worked throughout the past eight years.
MOORE: Right, exactly. No, here's the thing. You know, this is the line that the left makes, is that it is a demand crisis. It isn't, it's a competitiveness crisis. We got to get serious in this country about making ourselves competitive against China, Germany, Europe, Japan. We can't do that with high tax rates, with...
(CROSSTALK)
HUFFINGTON: Listen, whether you call it a demand crisis or a competitive crisis, we've got to grow the economy. And we're not going to grow the economy with a Republican policy which basically are all about cutting taxes, including for those making over $250,000.
MOORE: The job creators.
HUFFINGTON: But, hold on a second. Job creators. Those include a lot of people on Wall Street who moved from making things to making things up. They're not exactly job creators, they're not wealth creators, they're just casino gamblers and that's one of the problems we are facing and you need to come to terms to with that and stop defending them. And the other thing...
MOORE: I'm for wealthy people. We need more wealthy people in this country. We need to make people rich.
HUFFINGTON: (CROSSTALK) you know, Ayn Rand would not be in favor of what's happening on Wall Street, because she was in favor of wealth creators who were also producing value for their shareholders, for the stake holders, that's what's missing right here. And that's what's hurting the middle class.
And on top of it, you guys have to get serious about our military spending. If you're serious about the deficit you cannot ignore the fact that we're spending $2.8 billion a week on Afghanistan, on a war that is unnecessary, propping up the corrupters. What is your excuse for that?
MOORE: I'm not a military expert.
HUFFINGTON: Oh come on. That's such a copout.
MOORE: I'm not copping out, I'm just saying. But I will say this, we cannot have a functioning economic...
(CROSSTALK)
HUFFINGTON: Hold on.
SPITZER: This is fun for me just watching you guys at it.
MOORE: My point is, if we don't win the war against terrorism, none of this other stuff works.
HUFFINGTON: And you think Afghanistan...
MOORE: I do.
SPITZER: How many al Qaeda members are in Afghanistan?
MOORE: (INAUDIBLE) when people are blowing up buildings and blowing up schools in the United States.
HUFFINGTON: What does this have to do with Afghanistan where there are fewer than 100...
PARKER: Steve is an economist, so let's take him there, rather than. I saw the film, or pieces of it, it was entertain, OK? It was entertaining. But the point of it seems to be that the government -- we need less government regulation to no government regulation. But given what we have been through, is that a realistic approach?
MOORE: Well, let me just give you an example. I mean, we've cut down on all the drilling. I just was just with Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana, we've shut down drilling in the Gulf and that means thousands of lost jobs. I think, you know, we have nearly the highest corporate tax rates in the world, I think that puts our businesses at a significant competitive disadvantage. Think about this, why do you think New York is losing jobs to states like Texas?
SPITZER: Let's talk about the issue that Kathleen raised. Let's talk about the issue that Kathleen raised, which is regulation. Let's put aside the marginal tax rate for a minute and I think we could have a whole separate discussion about that. What Kathleen asked you, is do you want to go back to the Wild West of Wall Street that Arianna described, a great line I hadn't heard before, "they're not making things, they're making things up," and that is exactly right, even today in terms of mortgage foreclosures, don't we need reasoned regulation of Wall Street to ensure integrity there?
MOORE: Of course we do.
SPITZER: Your editorial page opposed every case I made when I said they're lying, they're scheming, deceiving...
MOORE: Hold on. Wait a minute. I think it is just the opposite. We were the people, 10 years ago, that blew the whistle on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It was your friends like Barney Frank and others who said...
SPITZER: I said, Steve, wait one minute, I said AIG was a...
MOORE: We passed a financial reform legislation.
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: Steve, when I said AIG is a scheme and is going to bring us down, you guys defended it, then you defended it today. When I said...
MOORE: I still don't understand what AIG did, so I...
HUFFINGTON: But you see, that's the problem. Complexity is not a bug for Wall Street. It is a feature. You know, they're hiding behind complexity. So the fact that it is so hard to regulate them is not an accident, it is intended.
SPITZER: Your tax cuts extending them for the rich as Arianna said, and she opposes it, obviously, would add a trillion dollars every year to deficit. Where are you going to cut?
MOORE: First of all, the four years after those terrible Bush taxes for the rich we had the biggest revenue gains in the history of the United States. The way to get the economy going is to keep tax rates low. I don't want to have America look like New York. I want America to look like Texas, which is booming right now.
SPITZER: Oh, my goodness. Now you're getting my heart pounding faster.
MOORE: I knew that would get you.
HUFFINGTON: But, Steve, would you agree that the easiest way to actually get jobs at the moment would be a payroll tax holiday. Wouldn't that be more effective?
SPITZER: I wouldn't have a problem with that one.
(CROSSTALK)
MOORE: Can we agree the next step would be to repeal Obama care?
HUFFINGTON: Would you agree on one other thing that even if we had full employment, we would need major infrastructure projects in this country? MOORE: What are we doing in Washington for last 10 years is spending money on infrastructure.
HUFFINGTON: You're talking about competitiveness. How can we compete when you look at the infrastructure of China, what they're spending at the moment to create a 21st century infrastructure, what is your concern about competitiveness?
MOORE: What about businesses expanding? Sitting on a trillion dollars of cash now, they're not spending it because they're afraid of Washington.
SPITZER: Let me give you a choice. Which would you rather have as an expenditure of tax dollars, the $12.9 billion that was given to Goldman Sachs, hundreds of dollars for the AIG credit default swaps they didn't deserve or you build another tunnel between New York and New Jersey.
MOORE: Neither. Neither. We have to -- are you in favor of the trillion and a half dollar deficits every year?
SPITZER: No, of course not. Of course not.
MOORE: We have to stop the spending.
SPITZER: But, the question is how. Where would you cut?
MOORE: I would get rid farm subsidies, I'd get rid of the Department of Education, I would get rid of the Department of Energy, I would get rid of the Labor Department, I would start means testing Medicare, so it doesn't go -- I mean, there is something maybe we could agree on. Why are seniors getting Medicare, why we provide -- I there are so many things we could do that would...
SPITZER: Some are sensible.
(CROSSTALK)
HUFFINGTON: On farm subsidies? Can we all agree on...
SPITZER: Nobody here's going to Iowa soon to run for president so that's an easy thing to agree.
PARKER: Let me ask you a quick political question. What do you think President Obama's plan is for November 3?
MOORE: I want to hear this.
HUFFINGTON: I think he's planning to try to mitigate the losses if that's what you mean.
PARKER: Most likely.
HUFFINGTON: To try and encourage the young people who came out in 2008 in unprecedented numbers to come out again. I think it is unlikely because they're not going to come out just because he's asking them. They came out because they really believed he was going to change the way Washington worked and he hasn't.
PARKER: Well, the problem is they grew up, graduated from college and couldn't find a job.
HUFFINGTON: Well, exactly.
PARKER: Coming up next, a Texas councilman takes a stand and puts politics aside and makes an emotional and very brave speech. You need to see this.
SPITZER: We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The school is not just for the adults who choose not to support me, this school is for the young people who might be holding the gun or the rope or the pill bottle. Give yourself a chance to see how much better life will get.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: Now time for "Taking a Stand." You know, I'm always imploring the president and just about everybody else to take a real stand for something. Well, this week a councilman in Ft. Worth, Texas, Joel Burns, did just that.
PARKER: Burns gave a moving national speech about the harassment of gay teenagers and his own personal journey. He started with a sorrowful recap of recent suicides around the country, like the suburban Houston teen, Asher Brown.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOEL BURNS, TEXAS COUNCILMAN: A couple of weeks ago after being bullied at school, Asher went home, found his father's gun and shot himself in the head. His father found Asher dead when he came home from work. Asher was 13 years old. I'd like for you to look at his face.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: But then Burns switched gear and brought up his own story of grown up gay. Just a heads up, there is some strong language here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BURNS: One day when I was in the ninth grade, just starting Crowley (ph) High school, I was cornered after school by some older kids who roughed me up. They said that I was a faggot and that I should die and go to hell where I belonged. That erupted the fear that I had kept pushed down that what I was beginning to feel on the inside must somehow be showing on the outside. Ashamed, humiliated and confused, I went home. There must be something very wrong with me, I thought. Something I could never let my family or anyone else know.
I have never told this story to anyone before tonight. Not my family, not my husband, not anyone. But the numerous suicides in recent days have upset me so much, and have just torn at my heart, and even though there may be some political repercussions for telling my story, this story is not just for the adults who might choose or not choose to support me. This story is for the young people who might be holding that gun tonight, or the rope or the pill bottle.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PARKER: Echoing the recent videos made by celebrities such as Ellen DeGeneres and Tim Gunn, Burns ended his speech with comforting words addressed to teenagers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BURNS: Yes, high school was difficult. Coming out was painful, but life gets so much better for me. And I want to tell any teen who might see this, give yourself a chance to see just how much life -- how much better life will get. And it will get better.
You will get out of the household that doesn't accept you. You will get out of that high school and you never have to deal with those jerks again if you don't want to. And the attitudes of society will change. Please live long enough to be there to see it. And to the adults, the bullying and the harassment has to stop. We cannot look aside as life after life is tragically lost.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: You can find more about this remarkable speech by Joel Burns on our Web site CNN.com/parkerspitzer.
PARKER: You know, some things don't require editorial comment and this is one of those. But I do want to add one thing, which is that every community in this country needs to examine its policies on bullying. There should be zero tolerance, and every parent in this country needs to talk to their own children about being kind to their classmates. We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SPITZER: Can there be peace with Hamas still controlling Gaza?
ALAN DERSHOWITZ, HARVARD LAW PROFESSOR: No, there can't be perfect peace. The Palestinians have marginalized themselves. They can only give peace on the West Bank. They can't give peace in Lebanon. They can't give peace in Iran. Iran is the 800-pound gorilla in the room. There won't be peace in the Middle East if there's a nuclear Iran.
(END VIDEO CLIP) (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SPITZER: Welcome back. Here's a question. What do O.J. Simpson, the state of Israel and Mike Tyson have in common? The answer, Alan Dershowitz, perhaps the most aggressive, most famous lawyer in the world defended all of them and usually -- I was going to say always, but not always, but usually won.
Alan, it is great to have you here.
DERSHOWITZ: Great. I could give a list of people what do I have in common. That would be people I taught, including you.
SPITZER: I was going to get to that. The other name there you could add there would be Claus von Bulow.
DERSHOWITZ: Right.
SPITZER: And with full disclosure, I was one of those little kids. In "Reversal of Fortune,' great movie if you saw it, Alan, of course, masterminded the reversal of that conviction. I was one of the little kids in the movie who helped research it.
DERSHOWITZ: Couldn't have done it without you.
SPITZER: Yes, yes, they all say that sometimes. All right.
First, cut to something interesting that I heard a rumor about, Netanyahu, the U.N., what is this rumor, is it true?
DERSHOWITZ: It's true. Prime Minister Netanyahu urged me to become Israel's ambassador to the U.N. And reluctantly I had to turn it down.
SPITZER: Why?
DERSHOWITZ: Because as an American I couldn't be perceived because it isn't true as having dual loyalty. What if there was a conflict between America's interest and Israel's interest?
SPITZER: Have you ever had somebody of joint citizenship serve in the U.N.?
DERSHOWITZ: Not in the U.N. But, of course, the ambassador to the United States, Michael Orrin, was an American citizen.
SPITZER: Right.
DERSHOWITZ: He had to give up.
SPITZER: He gave it up.
DERSHOWITZ: I would have been the third person who was an American. First was Albert Einstein who was offered the job of president in Israel.
SPITZER: Right.
DERSHOWITZ: The second was a guy named Fisher, who was the head of the Bank of Israel. Unfortunately, I had to turn it down. I would have loved to do it.
SPITZER: We could spend a lot of time on issues coming out of the Mideast East conference. What I want to do right now is talk about the issue of torture. You have taken some what many considered to be difficult positions on torture? First, what is your position about torture?
DERSHOWITZ: I'm against torture, but it's going to happen. If we ever had a ticking bomb terrorist case and in my new novel --
SPITZER: Which we'll get to, we'll sell the book, right?
DERSHOWITZ: I have a torture scene with a ticking bomb nuclear terrorist case.
SPITZER: You're using parlance.
DERSHOWITZ: If there were a terrorist who were caught and he knew that there was a nuclear bomb in the harbor of New York that was going to kill a million people, we would torture him. So -
SPITZER: Would that be the right moral decision?
DERSHOWITZ: No. But if we're going to do it, I want to make sure that we do it with accountability and visibility and not under the radar screen so I propose torture warrant. I'm not in favor of torture.
SPITZER: Torture warrants seems like --
DERSHOWITZ: I prefer torture warrants.
SPITZER: OK, now --
DERSHOWITZ: Death warrants are not unusual. I don't favor the death penalty, but I favor death warrants.
SPITZER: We'll get to that in a second. But come back to what I said before, I want to make sure people heard. You still think it would have been morally wrong to torture that person in the ticking time -- ticking bomb situation.
DERSHOWITZ: It's always morally wrong to torture, but we're going to do it.
SPITZER: But you're going to do it.
DERSHOWITZ: We're going to do it and if we're going to do it, I want to make sure there's accountability.
SPITZER: All right now.
DERSHOWITZ: And visibility.
SPITZER: Bush administration, waterboarding, they did all those things. Did Dick Cheney do what was right or wrong?
DERSHOWITZ: Wrong. Absolutely wrong.
SPITZER: OK.
DERSHOWITZ: What he did was tortured and they did tortured promiscuously. They never could have gotten a warrant.
SPITZER: What was so special -- OK, now, you say a jurisprudence of torture.
DERSHOWITZ: Right.
SPITZER: What does that mean? How would a court make that determination?
DERSHOWITZ: We have jurisprudence of search and seizure. We have jurisprudence of a whole range of things. Why not torture? We have to decide it's a high enough level of probability, a high enough level of likelihood, last resort, nonlethal. And then the judiciary supervisor, they have to dirty their hands.
SPITZER: So basically, you're basically pushing it off to a judge to say I, a judge, will say you can torture this person.
DERSHOWITZ: Nothing should ever be done in a democracy that's not done within the rule of law. If we don't want to have torture warrants, then we should not torture.
SPITZER: OK.
DERSHOWITZ: But we're going to have to --
SPITZER: Now, switch to death penalty. You clerked for Justice Goldberg back in the early 1960s. My recollection and I remember this from my days when I was working and doing research for you, you wrote one of the earliest memos saying to the justices of the Supreme Court the death penalty should be unconstitutional.
DERSHOWITZ: Absolutely.
SPITZER: You subscribe to that view?
DERSHOWITZ: I subscribe to the view the death penalty as administered in the United States, not as a moral issue, but the way it's administered, poor people don't -- only poor get executed. Primarily it's an issue of race and gender. It's not administered fairly. In the abstract, I can see the argument for the death penalty. But as a constitutional matter, we don't know how to administer it constitutionally.
SPITZER: But we're jumping around so quickly because time in this medium is so short. DERSHOWITZ: I know.
SPITZER: Let's talk about the Middle East for a minute. Frustration abounds everywhere because we simply haven't been able to get a breakthrough. I'm not going to ask who's right, who's wrong. It's a one dimensional question. How can it be that after this many years we can't figure out a compromise settlement?
DERSHOWITZ: We have. It was offered in 2000 and 2001. Unfortunately because of Arafat's untimely death, if he had died two years earlier and not rejected the offer in 2001, we'd be celebrating the tenth anniversary. We can get there now. All we need to do is get to the point where you agree on borders. Once you agree on borders, settlements become a secondary issue.
SPITZER: So in that context, why can't there be some sort of understanding about not building settlements until we give the negotiators time to agree on borders and then you only build where the final lines are going to be drawn?
DERSHOWITZ: Makes a lot of sense but there should also reciprocally a freeze by the Palestinians on incitement. They should stop inciting violence. Let there be a mutual freeze. Let's get on with the process.
SPITZER: Can there be peace with Hamas still controlling Gaza?
DERSHOWITZ: No. There can't be perfect peace. The Palestinians have marginalized themselves. They can only give peace on the West Bank. They can't give peace in Lebanon. They can't give peace on Iran. Iran is the 800-pound gorilla in the room. There won't be peace in the Middle East if there's a nuclear Iran.
SPITZER: Is Israel going to need, feel compelled to strike Iran if they get close to that moment?
DERSHOWITZ: Hardest question in the world. I met with all the Air Force generals when I was in Israel with the prime minister and I know the answer, nobody knows.
SPITZER: Nobody knows. Which is the way they have to keep it.
DERSHOWITZ: Of course.
SPITZER: You've written a book. This is not about one of your trials. This is fiction.
DERSHOWITZ: Fiction. My third novel.
SPITZER: Third novel.
DERSHOWITZ: Realities ripped from the headlines.
SPITZER: Well, tell us about it.
DERSHOWITZ: It's all about peace finally comes to the Middle East. The head of the Palestinian Authority, the prime minister of Israel, the president of the United States, they're about to shake hands and a terrorist attack kills them all. A young Jewish woman from Cambridge, based on my daughter, goes to work in the human rights program on the West Bank. She falls in love with a Palestinian. She gets into trouble. Her father has to come to rescue her, double flag operations, nuclear terrorism, twist after twist after twist, reality- based fiction.
SPITZER: But you're framing moral issues, moral questions throughout this book.
DERSHOWITZ: Absolutely. Just like I've done in my previous books.
SPITZER: That's right.
DERSHOWITZ: The main characters in my book --
SPITZER: (INAUDIBLE) for you.
DERSHOWITZ: Right. Moral issues -- and you know, people who read it tell me it's a page turner. The reviews have been great. And I'm thrilled with having read it.
SPITZER: I have one here.
DERSHOWITZ: Yes. Well, read it and tell me one thing.
SPITZER: Yes.
DERSHOWITZ: You will be surprised at the end. You will never figure out who done it.
SPITZER: All right. All right. I'm going to hold you that. If I figure it out beforehand, I'm going to call you.
DERSHOWITZ: You bet. OK.
SPITZER: Alan, great friend, honored to have you here. Thank you very much.
DERSHOWITZ: My pleasure. Good luck on the show.
SPITZER: We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEVE KORNACKI, SALON.COM: There's a higher percentage of people calling themselves conservatives today than there were two or three or four years ago. If you want to make people conservative, put Democrats in power. If you want to make people more liberal, more progressive, put Republicans in power. The ultimate --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) PARKER: It's time now for "Our Political Party," a provocative conversation with the kind of smart opinionated guests you'd want to sit down to at any good party. Let's see who's at the table tonight.
Arianna Huffington has come back with us. She is the founder and editor-in-chief of "The Huffington Post." Steve Kornacki is a regular party boy with us. He is an editor at Salon.com.
SPITZER: And, of course, Paulina Porizkova, also a regular here, supermodel, blogger and friend of the show. And Ed Rollins -- you know --
(LAUGHTER)
I don't know if I can even top that, but he's now a CNN political analyst for those who haven't seen him, and to our minds a super analyst.
ED ROLLINS, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: Thank you.
PARKER: Well, we only invite beautiful women to our party, obviously.
SPITZER: And beautiful men. I had to say it.
PARKER: It really got to you, didn't it?
All right. The trailer is out for Sarah Palin's "Alaska," her new TV series on TLC. Let's take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sarah, are you ready.
SARAH PALIN (R), FORMER ALASKA GOVERNOR: Oh, gosh, we are somewhere that people dream about.
Family comes first. This has got to be that way. No boys, go upstairs.
This is flipping fun. How come we can't just ever be satisfied with tranquility? I'd rather be doing this than in some stuffy old political office. I'd rather be out here being free.
NARRATOR: An all-new eight-week television event. Sarah Palin's "Alaska."
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PARKER: OK, this is a very highly produced, scripted eight-hour movie for free ad for Sarah Palin. Are we at a point now where, you know, the candidates can just skip the old playbook. She's got her Facebook page. She's got YouTube productions and now this.
ROLLINS: If John McCain picks the vice president, you have 98 percent name I.D. the next day if it works. This is going to be a great thing for her. She gets to be independent. She gets to be in her environment. A lot of people are going to watch the show.
SPITZER: Why are they going to watch this?
ROLLINS: Because there's a curiosity. There's a curiosity.
PAULINA PORIZKOVA, MODEL AND BLOGGER: It looks like a -- lengthy, like, (INAUDIBLE) commercial or something to me. I mean, now supermodels can be political candidates.
ARIANNA HUFFINGTON, THE HUFFINGTON POST.COM: You know, you have to give her credit by the fact that she really knows how to do social media. I mean, look at her Facebook reach. The fact that she doesn't really need to give an interview to "The New York Times", she can just post something on her Facebook wall?
SPITZER: Who's behind her? Nobody seems to believe and I shouldn't say this but that she can come up with this entire media plan. Who's scripting this for her? It's brilliant.
PARKER: Well, she has plenty of advisers.
ROLLINS: But no serious political consultants. I mean, her husband is there. There's a couple involved raising money. But there's no big-name serious people.
Now, obviously people have come and put this together. People put other things together, but there's nobody saying no, you can't do this or yes, you should.
SPITZER: So is this an intuitive sense of what's going to play out there in the public if she has the sense of it?
ROLLINS: And she has a great trust with her husband. And so far that's the team.
STEVE KORNACKI, SALON.COM: But do you realize of all the Republicans who do not currently hold office, who are considered contenders for the 2012 presidential nomination, only one does not currently have a contract with the FOX News Channel. That's Mitt Romney. Every other one of them is a paid contributor to a television channel. That's the new way of campaigning.
HUFFINGTON: But I think what she's doing is beyond that.
KORNACKI: Sure.
HUFFINGTON: You know, she has really tapped into something.
ROLLINS: Alaska is the last frontier. And if a woman can conquer Alaska, which is the premise of this segment and having run governor, it radiates along --
(CROSSTALK) PARKER: It's her best setting, though. It's her best setting and it is a beautifully done film. And she gets to be against this beautiful -- this majestic backdrop of Alaska. That's a smart move.
HUFFINGTON: That doesn't mean she's qualified to be president.
PARKER: That's right.
(CROSSTALK)
PORIZKOVA: That's the problem.
SPITZER: We had Richard Viguerie on the show, and I don't know if you saw Richard Viguerie. I think as one of the leading lights, the creator of mass mail and the conservative movement, he said, and I don't know if I agree with him, he said this is a center right country, politically. Is that where we are?
HUFFINGTON: No, it is absolutely not a center right country.
SPITZER: Where are we?
HUFFINGTON: Where we are is in a huge new game. And we just have been around the country promoting my new book on "Third World America" and, you know, a lot of people --
SPITZER: Let's say it, "Third World America."
HUFFINGTON: "Third World America."
SPITZER: All right. You should read it.
HUFFINGTON: And you know what, a lot of people are deeply anxious, not just the people who have lost jobs and have lost homes, but the people whose relatives have lost jobs, whose kids are graduating from college and can't get jobs. So what we are facing is really just a deep need to sort of reset our values, see where the future is.
SPITZER: You're saying we don't fit on that spectrum at all.
HUFFINGTON: No, we don't fit on the spectrum at all. I think it's the people who are stuck in the New York, Washington axis who want to sort of portray everything as a left-right issue.
ROLLINS: The problem with people in the middle, and you're going to see this after this election, you have to be on the left or the right to get elected and you're basically wiped out if you're in the middle.
KORNACKI: I feel like this country, if you want to try to define it ideologically, it feels center right right now. And I think that's a function of having Democrats run the White House and run both chambers of Congress.
I think that the one way to move -- you have polls that show there's a higher percentage of people calling themselves conservatives today than there were two, three or four years ago. If you want to make people conservative, put Democrats in power. If you want to make people more liberal, more progressive, put Republicans in power.
The ultimate example of this is when we had a true, pure Republican Congress in 1995 that tried to do true, pure conservative things. They forced a showdown with the president of the United States over cuts in Medicare. The president said no and the country backed him on after putting that Congress in power.
PARKER: I think a lot of times it's some people saying I'm not that. Whatever that is, I'm not that.
SPITZER: I think the public is waiting for a complete redefinition of what this means. There's so many cross currents. Somebody is going to stand up and capture the imagination the way Barack did when he was running. He's lost it. Somebody will do it and redefine these polls and what all these numbers mean anyway.
PARKER: This is the most agreeable party we've ever had.
(LAUGHTER)
Thanks to all of you for joining us. We have a party every night on "PARKER SPITZER."
SPITZER: We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ISHA SESAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Isha Sesay. "PARKER SPITZER" continues in a moment. First, the latest.
Pro-Publica reports the FBI was warned about one of the process in the Mumbai attacks three years before it happened. According to the report, the man's wife told the FBI he was a member of the terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba and trained extensively in its Pakistani camps. CNN continues to work the story. A senior administration official tells us, quote, "This isn't the whole story and there are sources and methods to be protected".
Mexico has temporarily suspended the search for David Hartley. His wife claims he was shot to death while they were jet skiing on the Mexican side of Falcon Lake.
And all but two of the rescued Chilean miners are out of the hospital. Don't miss "Countdown to Rescue," an "AC 360" special report on the miners at 10:00 p.m. Eastern.
That's the latest. Now back to "PARKER SPITZER."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PARKER: Before we go, a quick postscript. There's a few more weeks until the election, a few more days before we see the last of the political ads and the yard signs and the bumper stickers and the billboards. I must say, I'm not going to miss them, Eliot.
SPITZER: Oh, come on, Kathleen. It's part of the American landscape. It is democracy. A little bit messy sometimes but I love every bit of it.
PARKER: Well, here's one billboard that probably won't go away.
It says, "Mr. President, I need a freakin job."
SPITZER: You know what? I hope the president didn't see that one driving by in the limo. Not going to improve his spirits one little bit.
Anyway, there it is. Thanks so much for being with us. Have a great weekend.
PARKER: Please join us on Monday. Good night from New York.
"LARRY KING LIVE" starts right now.
