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On the Story

SATURDAY EDITION

Aired September 07, 2002 - 10:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KATE SNOW, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to California, the rest of the West and to all of our viewers across North America. Welcome to CNN's SATURDAY EDITION. I'm congressional correspondent Kate Snow.
Today we'll look back to 9/11 and how the atmosphere in Congress has changed over the year.

MARIA HINOJOSA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Maria Hinojosa, CNN urban affairs correspondent in New York -- how the terror attacks changed New York and the city so many of us call home.

ROSE ARCE, CNN PRODUCER: I'm Rose Arce, CNN producer -- what were the special challenges of covering the September 11 story on the streets of New York?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: I'm Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr -- the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon and the war on the terrorism that followed.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen -- victims of September 11 and their families, what's the emotional toll on them and the rest of us?

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: I'm White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux. We'll talk about how the past year changed President Bush, his team and his policies. We're waiting for the first release of the president's weekly radio address just a few minutes from now.

(INTERRUPTED BY NEWS UPDATE)

MALVEAUX: One thing that really struck me this week that I want to talk about is really the administration seemed to change -- to change its position somewhat; a realization that President Bush did not make his case for striking Iraq.

He called lawmakers to come into the White House. He's been making calls to U.S. allies throughout the week. And today, he's meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

It seems to me there is truly a recognition within the White House itself that, "Look, there was a split, there was this division. It was pilling out into the public. And that really, everybody needs to get on board again with the message."

White House aides that I was talking to really say that they want to make sure that this president has the support of Congress, lawmakers and U.S. allies. And I think that President Bush realized this week that the United States cannot go it alone.

SNOW: But, Suzanne, is he getting that support? Because you mentioned he was on the phone yesterday with key allies. He's meeting with Tony Blair today. Is it working? Is the message getting across? Because it seems like he didn't get much of a warm reception from some of those allies.

MALVEAUX: You're absolutely right, Kate. He really didn't get a warm reception. There was a spokesperson from Russia as well as from France both who said that they did not believe that military action was really the appropriate step to take. Really, Prime Minister Tony Blair is the only person who has expressed any type of support for regime change, short of Israel saying that, "Yes, OK, we'll go ahead and entertain military action."

But the president was on the phone with, you know, French President Jacques Chirac and Russia's Vladimir Putin and China's leader, all of those calls. And the White House tried to back off a little and say, "Well, the expectations weren't that we were going to change anybody's minds about this. We're just starting these talks."

But you're absolutely right: There is very little indication that he has swayed anyone's opinion in support of military action.

STARR: Suzanne and Kate, it appears the one reason may be he simply hasn't come up with the intelligence -- the hard core intelligence that would show that there is a clear and present danger from Iraq. They showed some satellite photographs this week, but those were very quickly dismissed as being old information and not very compelling.

And it just doesn't appear that he's made his case, because he doesn't appear to have the intelligence yet to convince everyone overwhelmingly that Iraq is an imminent danger that requires military action now.

MALVEAUX: And I think, Kate, you probably have some insight to this as well, because Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle came out of those meetings and said that, no, he didn't see -- he didn't hear anything that was really new even after those meetings.

SNOW: He didn't say, "new," Suzanne, but I talked about this with him again yesterday here in New York. And he said, you know, "We did -- I don't want to reveal what kind of information it was." He wouldn't categorize it as new, but he did say that they made a better case than he had heard. He learned more than he had heard before.

I wonder, I guess this just continues now next week, the president gearing up towards this U.N. speech, right?

MALVEAUX: Well, absolutely. I mean, this is going to be huge. This is something that White House aides have told me is a defining moment for President Bush to make his case before the international audience to see if he can drum up the kind of support. There are a lot of skeptics who say, "Well, what is one speech going to make a difference?"

SNOW: Suzanne, we're going to have to take a quick break. Suzanne, sorry, we're going to take a quick break...

MALVEAUX: Sure.

SNOW: ... and listen to President Bush's weekly radio address.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS) BUSH: ... nation will pause to honor and remember the lives lost on September the 11, we must also remember a central lesson of the tragedy: Our homeland is vulnerable to attack, and we must do everything in our power to protect it.

We protect our country by relentlessly pursuing terrorists across the Earth, assessing and anticipating our vulnerabilities, and acting quickly to address those vulnerabilities and to prevent attacks.

America needs a single department of government dedicated to the task of protecting our people. Right now responsibilities for homeland security are scattered across dozens of departments in Washington. By ending duplication and over lap, we will spend less on overhead and more on protecting America.

And we must give the Department of Homeland Security every tool it needs to succeed. One essential tool this new department needs is the flexibility to respond to terrorist threats that can arise or change overnight. The Department of Homeland Security must be able to move people and resources quickly, without being forced to comply with a thick book of bureaucratic rules.

For example, we have three agencies working to safeguard our borders: the INS, the Customs Service and the Border Patrol. They all have different cultures and different strategies, but should be working together in a streamlined effort. Other federal agencies dealing with national security already have this flexibility: the FBI and the CIA and the new Transportation Security Administration. Seems like to me if it's good enough for these agencies, it should be good enough for the new Department of Homeland Security.

In addition, the new secretary of homeland security needs the authority to transfer some funds, limited funds, among government accounts in response to terrorist threats.

This requirement is nothing new. Such authority is presently available to numerous agencies, including the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Energy.

The House of Representatives has passed legislation that would ensure the flexibility and authority needed for the Department of Homeland Security to effectively carry out its mission.

The legislation now in the Senate would not. The Senate bill would not allow the new secretary of homeland security to shift resource or streamline functions in response to a terrorist threat without a time-consuming approval process. And the legislation would keep in place a process that can take up to 18 months just to fire an employee.

The Senate bill also provides no transfer authority for the secretary of homeland security. Under the Senate bill, the secretary would have to ask the president to submit a supplemental budget request to Congress and then wait for Congress to act every time new terrorist threats presented a need for additional funding.

In this war in terror, this is time we simply do not have.

Even worse, the Senate bill would weaken the president's well- established authority to prohibit collective bargaining when a national security interest demands it. Every president since Jimmy Carter has used this authority. And a time of war is not time to limit a president's ability to act in the interest of national security.

Senators need to understand I will not accept a homeland security bill that puts special interests in Washington ahead of the security of the American people. I will not accept a homeland security bill that ties the hands of this administration or future administrations in defending our nation against terrorist attacks.

America has been engaged in this war for nearly a year, and we've made real progress. Yet more work remains.

A new Department of Homeland Security will help us to protect our country, but only if it has the tools to get the job done.

I urge the Senate to follow the House's lead, and pass legislation that gives the department the flexibility and authority it needs to protect the American people.

Thank you for listening.

MALVEAUX: Now President Bush is really going to make his case before the international community on Thursday before the United Nations General Assembly. The White House aides that I talked to really say there are a lot of hands that are involved in this speech, because it is so important to the president. I mean, we're talking about not only his chief speechwriter, Michael Gerson, but also his national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, as well as, we were told, Secretary of State Powell and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, all of them having a hand in what he is going to say on Thursday.

And what we've been told is that he's going to make the argument that Saddam Hussein is a threat to the world. He has had a history of breaking his U.N. agreements.

And what is really going to be new about this, is that he is going to talk about -- this is something that the administration has been bantering about for a while, and is really top of the radar -- is a U.N. Security Council resolution that says, "We expect and demand unfettered access for weapons inspectors to go inside of the country." If that doesn't happen, there will be some sort of punitive action. And that hopefully the language within that resolution will be broad enough to allow France or Germany, Russia, others to come on board instead of voting against it.

HINOJOSA: But, Suzanne, here's a question. I mean, he may be looking for the international support, but when you look at the numbers, there are a lot of Americans across the country that still do not back the president on this. What is he going to be able to do at that point to convince the American public that this is the right way to go?

MALVEAUX: Well, you know, one of the things that he's going to do -- is really -- that's going to be so important is September 11, because we've been told that that really is going to be a precursor or pretext to what he is going to say September 12, in really outlining that case for the war on terror and going inside of Iraq, if necessary.

And if September 11 really -- he is going to be on Ellis Island, we are told, with the Statue of Liberty in the background, a really very important backdrop. And he is really going to try to rally the American people on that day, telling them that, you know, "We are united in this -- September 11 in this tragedy, and that we need to take this one step forward."

His day is going to be very, very full. It's going to start off in Washington with services. And then, of course, end up in ground zero at the end of the day.

HINOJOSA: Well, from international discussions about terrorism to very personal reactions, how New York and New Yorkers have fared since September 11: That's coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HINOJOSA: Outside the hospital, people are coming in trying to help, to donate blood. Essentially, everybody here at this hospital is in a state of shock. I mean, I walked into the testing area and the women here who usually just draw blood are also extraordinarily moved and shocked. They're moving in and out of the emergency room to try to help as many people as possible.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HINOJOSA: Welcome back to SATURDAY EDITION. I'm Maria Hinojosa in New York.

Well, it's hard to believe a year has passed. I mean, listening to that -- actually this is the first time that I'm hearing myself on that day on September 11. So it's really quite strange to hear how I sounded that day.

I had just seen the first tower collapse. And I know that I'm one of the people now who really defines my life pre-September 11/post-September 11. There's just -- there's a definitive difference for me and so many in my generation.

And I think that what's happened for a lot of New Yorkers, we have learned somehow to live with fear every day. And each one of us has done it in a different way. But we -- so many of us have changed. Although there are also many New Yorkers who still, one year later, have not gone down to ground zero. They just can't.

COHEN: Maria, you live in New York; I don't. The days that followed September 11, you must have just wanted to held (sic) your family so tight to you, so close to you.

HINOJOSA: You know, Elizabeth, that's why it's so hard to put this into context, where we were a year ago, well, almost a year ago, because this was -- of course, this is where I live. This is where I'm raising my children. You know, at night you'd kiss them, say "I love you," put them into bed. And you would feel safe.

And I remember that those first several weeks after 9/11, there was a not a feeling of safety at all. I mean we really -- I at least, certainly and may others -- felt like we were under attack, that we never knew what was going to come to next.

I mean, I remember talking to my husband about my fear. And he said, "What are you worried about?" And I said, "Well, I think that they're going to dropping bombs across Manhattan." And he had to kind of calm and say, "That's not going to happen."

But it's been that kind of process of realizing where we were, the kind of fear -- I mean, there was -- at that time my husband and I decided we were never going to separate from each other. And I can tell you right now my husband is with my kids in the country and I'm here. That's a huge step forward for us, but it took a very painful year for that to happen.

ARCE: Maria...

SNOW: Maria...

ARCE: ... interesting to me that people keep talking about, "Do we want to relive September 11?" They worry about the anniversary and say, "Is this going to take us back there?"

Yet, when I look at that, you know, that live shot that you did, that's at St. Vincent's Hospital which is just a few blocks from our house. And I know that at that hospital, the missing posters are still up on the side of the hospital. People still walk by and look at them. They still recognize people. There's flowers being dropped off every day.

We're not really reliving September 11 here in New York. We're still living September 11. It's an ongoing thing. It's not like...

SNOW: I have a question...

ARCE: ... things have gone back to the way they were before.

SNOW: I have a question for Maria and for Rosa, because I was here yesterday and I was down on Wall Street. Congress came here to New York yesterday. And we were standing right next to the New York Stock Exchange right in the heart of the financial district, and I heard two people in front of me talking to each other in business suits saying, "Why don't they just go away?" And they were referring to the media. They said, "Why don't we just forget all of this? Why don't we just move on?"

And I wonder how pervasive is that, Maria? How many New Yorkers feel like there's so much attention being given to the anniversary and they'd just rather -- would just rather move on and forget it?

HINOJOSA: You know, the thing about it, Kate, is there is no one response. I know right now of at least three family members who lost someone in 9/11 who have left New York, who have gone far away. One of them is in Ecuador. Another is in a spa where she can't get any television because they can't go there.

On the other hand, you speak to some people and they say, "The media is just overwhelming us with this." Well, look, the media, we don't know how to do this right either. We're trying to figure it out. We need to give information. We need to focus on that day. But we also don't know who much or how little. I think we're all trying -- there's no one right response.

And that's what makes it difficult. I think in a way we just have to leave, all of us, to, kind of, process this how we may, and somehow that helps us to move forward.

But there are a lot of New Yorkers, a lot of them -- I live uptown -- who have not gone down to ground zero, who don't want to go down there. It's still much too close to home.

ARCE: And I don't think we know where to move on to. I mean, where are we supposed to move on to? Everyone keeps saying, "We've got to get beyond this, we've got to get past this." Where's "past this?" Where's past September 11? Because past September 11 really isn't September 10 of last year. We're in a completely different place.

And I don't think people have settled in their minds, "Can we feel safe again in the city? Are things going to go back to whatever normal is? What is that new normal?" as it were, something that Maria has talked about a lot in the stories she's done for CNN.

Where are we? How should we feel? What's the next step? What's going to happen?

HINOJOSA: It's interesting because, you know, there was -- we -- a lot of New Yorkers have always lived with fear. I mean, there was always, you could get mugged, you could get robbed, you could get hit by, you know, gun fire. We've always lived with that. But this, you're right, Rose. It's like, well, where do we go? We're not all going to move. We have to learn how to do this. And I think what I've learned from the family members is that it's just one step forward. One baby step forward every day. And some days you go backwards. Some days you really don't feel so good at all. But we can't escape this. It's part of our generation, of what we have to face, or what we have to learn.

And I can just hear myself talking to my kids. "Oh my gosh, back then when you were so little" -- and being able to hopefully, if we're lucky enough to be able to say, and my God, we have been able to move on, that hopefully at that point there will be peace.

But we don't know. We're all learning how to do this, teaching each other how to do this. That's the one nice thing is that we have at least some of us, and generally certainly we have been able to talk to each other, help each other. And with the families as well to move forward.

ARCE: And that's what we're going to talk about next, from the impact on the city to the impact on the journalists who covered it. Back to the biggest story of our lives, when CNN SATURDAY EDITION continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARCE: There's a haze everywhere. It's very, very difficult to see. But there has been a -- a whole area has been covered by soot and ash. I'd say it looks almost like snow. There was people who were coming up the street running from the scene of this new explosion. You can see them slipping on the ash and literally having to drag each other up the street. There's an incredible amount of panic here in downtown Manhattan.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ARCE: Welcome back to CNN's SATURDAY EDITION. I'm CNN Producer, Rose Arce.

And, wow, is it unnerving to listen to that. I have to say it's like you report so many stories and news breaks around you, and you try to remain calm, and you try to focus on your job. But I have to say that in my, you know, 15-plus years of being a reporter in New York City, I've never felt so rattled as I did that morning when I realized that this wasn't just any story. It wasn't just another breaking news story where I could, kind of, spend my day thinking, "Where are we going to broadcast from? What are we going to say? What do we need to know?"

I knew that this was bigger and that this was something different, and that I could get hurt that day. And my friends could get hurt that day. This was happening in my backyard. This was just a few blocks from my house.

And I wonder, how many of the rest of you were, sort of, sensing that that day, that this was going to be different, and this could end badly for a lot of people, and for some of us even.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, Rose...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rose...

SNOW: We were -- I was sensing that too, at the Capitol, which I'll talk about later in this show.

But I want to ask you, because I don't know if our viewers know as much about you as I do. I know where you were, and I know what you did. Can you tell us more about what you did on that day? Because it is such an amazing story. And particularly, the fact that your cell phone died, and that that's why you didn't go back into the towers. You wanted to go into the towers.

ARCE: Oh, absolutely. I have been a reporter in New York for 15 years, as I said. And in 1993, when there was a bomb that exploded in the basement of the World Trade Center, I was a television producer then too. And I managed to get down there. And I got inside the garage, and got some of the first pictures of it, and interviewed people as they ran out.

My goal that day was, I was going to get into the north tower of the World Trade Center. That's what I kept saying to myself. And I live downtown.

In fact, I'm Maria Hinojosa's producer. We were supposed to be covering the New York primary that day. And it was, you know, it was this beautiful day. And it was going to this regular day. And then this all happened. And I thought, "I've got to get inside that building."

But I raced down there. And when I was just short of being able to get into the towers, I realized that Maria wasn't there. I didn't have a camera person there. And my cell phone wasn't working. And because my cell phone wasn't working, I said to myself, "I've got to get to a phone. I've got to call in to CNN, because somebody's got to be reporting from down there."

And that's what stopped me. It was really, it was coincidence, it was happenstance that I didn't get inside...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know what, Rose...

ARCE: ... the first floor of that building.

HINOJOSA: Here's what's incredible, Rose, because I don't even know if I've told you this, but that day -- Rose lives downtown and I live uptown. And I was, as soon as I could on a subway trying to get down, I got down as far as 17th Street. And that's where I was able to call into the office. They told me I was going to be going to St. Vincent's Hospital. And literally two minutes later, I watched the first tower collapse.

And the only thing I was thinking about, was I said, "I know Rose has to be there. She is my producer. She's a fabulous journalist. I know she's there." And I just thought, "I just lost an incredible friend and producer."

And that's the way we lived it. You know, we just -- when you saw that, you didn't know how many strangers were lost. But for us as journalists, it was like how many of our own were gone as well.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rose -- I have to ask you...

STARR: It's funny, in the Pentagon, I think we had a bit of a different experience. Because, like the other members of the Pentagon press corps, I was actually -- along with Jamie McIntyre, our senior Pentagon correspondent, I was in the building when we got struck here in Washington.

And we had known what was going on in New York that morning. In fact, we'd already started reporting that story. But I was, you know, out in the hallway just outside our broadcast area, when, in a very dramatic fashion, our building was under attack. And people start screaming, "Get out! Get out! Get out! We've been hit."

And it's very compelling, because when you hear those words, when you work on military issues and you hear the words, "We've been hit," there is no doubt in your mind that you are under attack.

And I think for most of us in the Pentagon press corps, the feeling was slightly different. It was immediately we knew in an instant at that time, at that place, the country had gone to war.

There was no hesitation in the Pentagon. We were immediately under attack and everyone, including the entire Pentagon press corps, was struggling for a few minutes to get out of the building; 20,000 people nearly all safely evacuated, of course.

ARCE: You know, Barbara, it's so interesting what you're saying, because you're talking about military people saying, "I've been hit."

And I remember being downtown and hearing this low roar as this plane came in -- as the second plane came in. And everyone just stopped. And it took a little child who was standing near a school yard where I was, who looked up into the sky and just pointed and said, "Look, Daddy, they're doing it on purpose."

And that was the first sign that I had that we had, in fact, been hit. It wasn't really until this little kid said what we were all just, kind of, starting to think.

HINOJOSA: But Rose, how do you think...

ARCE: This was something bigger.

HINOJOSA: ... but, Rose, who do you think that we, that we as journalists -- you and I work together every day. We have every day since September 11. How do you think that we have changed, that you have changed as a reporter, post-9/11?

ARCE: I think that I'm much more sensitive. I think that we're all much more sensitive, not just to the pain of the people who have been affected by this, but we're much more sensitive in general to anything that's happening around us. We're much more on the ready, as it were.

I mean, I absolutely expect something to happen soon.

STARR: Well, Rose, you know, it's funny that you say that. I agree, sensitive. I saw some things that day, interviewed some people, things, you know, you just did not expect to happen.

People have asked us as reporters in the Pentagon, "Did we take it all personally?" Because of course reporters are trained to observe only; we take nothing personally. But I've got to tell everybody, I took this very personally.

You know, I was in that building. Osama bin Laden dropped a plane on my head as well. I took it very, very personally. And at the Pentagon, it's still personal a year later.

Coming up, we'll talk about more about the attack on the Pentagon and how the military moved quickly for preparations for the president's war on terrorism.

But first, this news alert with Marina Kolbe in Atlanta.

(NEWS ALERT)

SNOW: Still ahead on this special SATURDAY EDITION marking the anniversary of September 11, we'll talk about the attack on the Pentagon and the war it began, the emotional toll of 9/11 and now victims and others coped and the political fallout from the terror attacks. Is Congress back to business as usual?

All coming up on SATURDAY EDITION.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

STARR: An important source of information about the news of the day, the 9/11 anniversary and the war on terrorism can be found online at CNN.com, AOL keyword CNN.

Welcome back to CNN SATURDAY EDITION. I'm Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr.

One year ago Wednesday, I was at the Pentagon when the jetliner slammed into the huge building.

It -- of course, I think like everyone else, Suzanne, the memory I have that it was a gorgeous day here in Washington. You woke up, it was a beautiful late September summer morning. And suddenly the world changed. For everybody in America, the world changed.

And I guess I keep trying to remember, "What was a I doing five minutes before all of this happened?"

MALVEAUX: Right, sure.

STARR: Just so unexpected.

MALVEAUX: Sure. You know, you brought up the fact that it's personal, that you took it personally.

And I know that Rose and Maria, you had very personal experiences in ground zero. And I guess, I mean, I really want to know, was there a point where you separated the reporter self from the real person normal self?

Because when I was -- I was in Chicago at the time, and I watched it unfold on television like many people. And just to give you an indication of where we were going with our thinking, my story was the return of Michael Jordan to the NBA. That's what we were focusing on.

And I ended up later on going downtown and doing an interview. And there was a point really when I was inside one of these high rises, and we were watching the towers come down. And I think that's when the question was, "How does this impact us?" you know, people who were in the Midwest at the time, who were really quite removed from what was going on.

And I remember that transition from reporter Suzanne, to I'm on the phone making calls to my family in Washington, making sure they're OK. Got in touch with my family. And then went back into reporter mode, starting interviewing people who were on the street, who were worried about the Water Tower and the Sears Tower being attacked next.

I mean, did that happen at any point in your...

STARR: Absolutely, for every member of the Pentagon press corps. We've all talked about it. For all of us, we all had to take five minutes and really urgently try and reach our families on the phone.

Because all of our families, all of our friends, know that we work in the Pentagon. They would turn on -- you know, the prospect of my parents turning on the TV seeing the Pentagon in flames and knowing I'm inside, but not knowing where I was.

So in my case, I was very lucky. I got a hold of family members before they turned the TV on out on the West Coast.

HINOJOSA: Barbara, it's Marie here...

ARCE: Barbara, can you remember what went through your mind...

HINOJOSA: ... Barbara, what I want to ask you is, I wonder because I so often think about the previous terrorist attack on this land before 9/11, which was April 19 in Oklahoma City. And the number of people who died at the Pentagon is higher than the number of people who died at Oklahoma City. And yet I wonder how you, as a Pentagon correspondent, as someone who lives in Washington and in the Washington -- feeling, do you feel consistently overshadowed and forgotten because so much attention is placed here in New York and what happened here?

STARR: You know, it's a very interesting piece of psychology, Maria, because I've talked to a lot of very high level military people and enlisted people, over the last year about this.

The Pentagon is just a very different situation than New York. I don't know how else to describe it. Military people always, for years and years, have considered themselves a target for terrorism. They will tell you that's the cost of doing business. They know they are a target. They are trained to respond.

Working in the Pentagon, I can tell you it's quite similar I suppose to the White House. Very tight security all of the time. There had always been a sense that the Pentagon could possibly be a target for something like a car bomb. Of course, nobody assumed this would happen. So that day, there was just an immediate understanding that the Pentagon had gone to war.

And that has been the psychology at the Pentagon I would say for the last year, especially as we've not moved into this debate about Iraq. Because what military people are telling us, very high level military people, they see a confluence happening here now a year later. Oddly enough, just as we come up on September 11, the question for the U.S. military is now not, "What about bin Laden, what about al Qaeda?" but it really is, "What about Iraq?"

And the White House has put this agenda forward and has put it in front of the military. The military is trying to respond to it.

And I would be interested in Suzanne's view, because what I hear mostly from Pentagon officials is this: "We know we have to do something about Iraq. We understand Saddam has to go." But one year later the military will tell you their major concern is, "What about al Qaeda? What about bin Laden? Do we have to go after Saddam right now, because what happens if we get bogged down in Iraq and Osama bin Laden launches another attack against the United States?"

SNOW: Barbara, there was a report this week though -- it's Kate -- there was a report this week that perhaps some of the military would rather, sort of, abandon what's going on in Afghanistan. My sense was maybe even give up on Osama bin Laden.

Is there that sentiment too, that they've done all they can there?

STARR: I don't think it quite goes that far. I mean, they are -- finding bin Laden frankly is just going to be a good luck -- good luck if they can do it. It's really a needle in a haystack at this point.

But it's an interesting issue. It brings Iraq and bin Laden back together. If the military goes into Iraq, they need a lot of special forces. If those guys are tied down on the border with Pakistan, it makes it all the much tougher. There's just a lot of hard choices that have to be made.

MALVEAUX: And Barbara, to your question too, you were saying -- you were asking before -- and to your question, I think the White House, of course, is really trying to make the argument, the link between al Qaeda and bin Laden, making the argument that that's why we really need to go into Iraq. I mean, I think that's going to be a difficult thing to do.

STARR: Tough argument to make. Tough argument to make.

COHEN: Barbara, you've talked a bit about the emotional toll on those of you who were at the Pentagon on the day of the attacks. When we come back, we'll talk about the emotional toll on those who searched for missing loved ones on September 11.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COHEN: Welcome back to CNN SATURDAY EDITION. Those were the sounds of folks who came to the corner of Lexington and 26th Street in the days immediately after the 9/11 attacks.

Lexington and 26th Street is where families gathered to file with the police reports of those who were missing. Journalists like me gathered at that street corner and the people came to us. They wanted to get those pictures on television so much. They really felt that if those pictures were on TV that somehow, some one out there would have seen that person or would have heard from that person.

Let's hear from two of the family members who I interviewed back in September of last year.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One of his good friends, Dennis McHugh (ph), his boss, Eddy Marnovitch (ph). I mean, these are people, you know, that we used to see all of the time. And now it seems, kind of, surreal, you know, hanging up missing posters of brother all over New York City. It's unbelievable.

COHEN: If you think your father might be out there somewhere, what would you want to say to him?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to tell him that we all miss him. His little nephew, Luke, misses him. And that we're strong, we've got hope.

COHEN: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.

COHEN: Erin (ph), I've been talking to these families for two days now and all of these stories are very much like this. People are just hoping that their relatives are out there somewhere. And they're begging us to talk about them, to show their pictures, hoping that if someone has seen them that they might be able to identify them and give some information.

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COHEN: I will, of course, never forget Vinny Commage (ph). He is the man who you just saw me interview. His father, Rocco (ph), was a window washer for the World Trade Center. He had worked there since the 1970s. He had survived the 1993 bombing, but he lost his life on September 11.

I also want to talk a little bit about some of the other things that I'll always remember. You saw those gospel singers. People just came from all over New York City to this corner. They knew that was where those families were, to comfort them.

There was a little girl who made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches -- she couldn't have been more than 7 or 8 -- who came to that corner to give out her sandwiches. She thought that the family members might be hungry.

HINOJOSA: I wonder, you came to New York and you were there at that very, very sad place. And then for those of us who live here, you know, I've been dealing with the families all year. And I have learned extraordinary life lessons from them.

I'm wondering, what was the thing you learned from the -- or the moment that changed you the most of the time that you spent here in that first week, right after September 11?

COHEN: Well, there was certainly a moment while I was out there on that corner, Maria, that made me stop. I mean, at a certain point, it was story after story after story. But there was a moment where I just stopped cold in my tracks, where I went up to a woman who was holding two pictures. And I said, "Which of these people are you missing, ma'am?" And I said, "I'm missing both of them."

And I said, "No, no, which one are you missing?" And she said, "No, this is my son and daughter. They both worked at Windows on the World. And I am missing both of them." And unfortunately, she never found either of them.

And that made me stop in my tracks.

As far as what I've learned from them, I learned so much from these families. I think for the rest of my life I'll really be indebted to them, because they showed such strength. I mean, all of the people who you just saw, they went up and down Manhattan, hospital to hospital, to the morgue, to the armory, never stopped hoping, never stopped looking. Their energy and their strength were really incredible.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Elizabeth, you and I went to college together...

HINOJOSA: And you what, Elizabeth, I think for me one of the things that has continued is that -- one of the things that has continued, Elizabeth, that they, the family members who I talked to really have to talked to almost every day if not every week since September 11, and I've said this a lot: They have taught me that, you know, when we -- all of us come -- this has put us at, kind of, a fork in the road. And we can either chose to die or sadness or fear, or we chose to just move one foot in front of the other.

And I see them one year later and many of them are in absolute still grief and mourning. And yet what I have seen from them, what they have taught me is that we as human beings, this is the only thing we can do is move forward. It's...

STARR: That's really true. That's really true.

MALVEAUX: I actually want to talk about United Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, because I covered that for four days. I jumped in a car in Chicago and drove September 11 for the day, and was in Shankesville, Pennsylvania, about midnight, started covering that crash site. And what was really incredible was really just the first 24 hours, the stories that started coming out about the heroes, the people aboard that flight. And there was just the -- the cell phone calls and some of the stories from people.

There were a number of people who right there, we saw just this huge crater and people collecting on their lawns, spread out in their kitchen tables, documents, pill bottles, a doll's head, just the kind of evidence from the plane that was so moving.

And even then, I mean, there was a sense of frustration really in terms of information. Some people thought, "Well, maybe the plane had been shot down. You know, why was it here in this field?" And then that story just emerged, and it was just amazing.

SNOW: From personal impact, we're going to move on to political impact.

I know there's so much more to talk about. We'll touch on more of it.

But remember that first night, remember the members of Congress? They buried political differences. They sang with one voice.

More on that day and the past year when CNN SATURDAY EDITION continues.

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SNOW: I'm a couple of blocks away from the Capitol right now. I can tell you that about a half hour ago, the Capitol Building itself was evacuated. It was a little bit chaotic. Everyone was running out of the building. People ran a couple of blocks away. We have now been pushed back by security. We're within two blocks of the Capitol.

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SNOW: A reminder of the huge uncertainty that first day as the U.S. Capitol, the White House, other government buildings were evacuated. And a reminder that most political differences were forgotten a year ago on that day.

The thing that struck me in our last conversation, I wanted to say to Elizabeth, is that so many people experience this day on television, on cable TV. My sister called me later and said, you know, it didn't seem the same from Portland, Oregon where she lives, as it was from where we were, from where I was. And I think the lawmakers, it's just worth point out that we all had, myself included, basically a near-death experience on that day. I was running across the Capitol lawn. And I grabbed a police officer and said, "What's going on?" And he said, "There's a plane, and it's headed toward this building." And I thought to myself, "How far away from the Capitol do I have to be to live and to not die if a plane hits the U.S. Capitol Dome?"

And that was the most traumatic thing for me obviously. But also for all of those lawmakers. And I think it impacted them for months after that.

STARR: But you know, Kate, my question is -- call me skeptical. We saw this week a lot of bipartisanship corporation. We are seeing a lot of it as we come up to the one-year anniversary. But I'm a bit skeptical. Are we back to politics as usual, or did 9/11 really change Congress forever?

SNOW: I don't know. I don't know the answer to that, Barbara. I think it definitely changed it in those first weeks, to an extent that I'm not sure people understand.

You know, I was talking to Senator Daschle about this yesterday. I've talked to Dick Gephardt about this, and Tom DeLay, the leaders of the House and Senate. Remember they were taken away by a helicopter, and they went to a bunker -- a secret bunker somewhere? The nine of them sat in that bunker together for hours. And all they had in there was a television set. And they watched CNN. And I'm told that it was just this incredibly moving experience that none of them will ever forget, because these are people that don't even talk to each other. They don't get along. But there they were in this room forced to talk to each other. I think that sticks with them. I really -- I still believe that.

ARCE: It sticks with them, but I wonder about the American public. Because, you know, here in New York, Rudy Giuliani got to be effectively president for a day. I mean, he was really the only leader that was on TV, engaged out in the streets, leading, making big decisions. And I wonder now, coming into the November elections, if there's anybody else out there who emerged as, sort of, you know, a leader who got, kind of, a -- should we say, a bump of credibility from this.

SNOW: Well, the president, of course. He got a big bump of credibility.

I also wonder about what's going to happen next week. And I don't know the answer to this, but with the anniversary -- and we're in the middle of debating this homeland security bill in the Senate right now. The Senate's stuck on that. I wonder if there will be a bump, sort of, where they do reunite again next week. Because if thinking back to that time, it may -- it changed all of us. And when you think back, maybe that will influence them to be a little more bipartisan.

Well, we thank you for watching CNN SATURDAY EDITION. We'll end it on that note. A news alert is coming up next, followed by "PEOPLE IN THE NEWS," and survivors of the September 11 attacks.

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