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On the Story

How Long Will U.S. Troops Stay in Iraq?; Iraqi Women Now Face Dangers of Kidnapping, Rape; Congress Grills Tenet

Aired July 19, 2003 - 10:00   ET

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

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


BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Welcome to CNN's ON THE STORY, where our journalists have the inside word on the stories we covered this week. I'm Barbara Starr on the story of the questions inside the military on how long troops must now stay in Iraq.
RYM BRAHIMI, CNN INT'L CORRESPONDENT: I'm Rym Brahimi in Baghdad on the story of how this dangerous peace in Iraq holds special dangers for women and girls who now face the new threat of being kidnapped or raped.

ELAINE QUIJANO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Elaine Quijano on the story of the CIA director summoned to Capitol Hill this week, forced to explain who knew what before the war.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Elizabeth Cohen in Atlanta on whether millions of us suffer from something we thought was just a problem for children, Adult Attention Deficit Disorder.

LIZ NEISLOSS, CNN U.N. PRODUCER: I'm Liz Neisloss in New York on the story of how the United States may have to go back to the United Nations to bargain with the same countries that wouldn't back its war in Iraq.

GERRI WILLIS, CNNfn PERSONAL FINANCIAL EDITOR: And I'm Gerri Willis on the story of the latest buzz on interest rates and whether the man behind the controls, Fed Chief Alan Greenspan is getting the attention he used to get.

Also on our menu, should Uncle Sam force restaurants to tell all, from fat to calories about what you want to order?

And the debate over elderly drivers after an 86-year-old man in California may be charged with the deaths of 10 people.

And at the end of hour, we'll listen to the president's weekly radio address released just a few minutes from now.

We want to hear from you, e-mail us at the story@cnn.com.

COHEN: (AUDIO GAP) on the medical beat, Capitol Hill, what about the story that's that so many of us were talking about yesterday and today? Basketball superstar Kobe Bryant charged with assaulting a 19- year-old woman in Colorado. Bryant admits having sex. He claims it was consensual and that he's innocent. This is going to be a hard case for him to prove as our legal analysts were telling us here on CNN earlier today. He has already said that he did have sex. Now he has -- it's going to be turned into a really a he said-she said in many ways.

STARR: And Elizabeth, it's interesting. I mean the news media, as we all saw this week, paid so much attention to the story. It's an interesting thing. Is it because of a potential crime? Is it because of his fame? Is it because of a situation of another role model for children being held up to public scrutiny? Why so much attention? I'm not sure I know the answer to that.

QUIJANO: Well, you know it's interesting. I mean this is a person who definitely not a Dennis Rodman. This is person who had a squeaky clean image, the kind of person who could land a multimillion deal with Nike, with Sprite, McDonald's. So, I mean this is not your typical NBA bad boy story. I think it was unexpected.

WILLIS: You bet. You know the basketball fans I talked to they love Kobe Bryant and they are not convinced at this point. They think that he's probably done nothing at all; certainly not you know consensual sex. Nothing out of line here, but we're just going to have to wait and see.

NEISLOSS: And it may cost him a lot of money, actually, Gerri because this guy was worth a lot of money in terms of endorsements. I think he was something like No. 3 from the sports figures right now. So it remains to be seen what those companies will decide to do.

STARR: That's an interesting question for Wall Street because they put an awful lot of money into endorsements. And it's a high- risk proposition for them if it goes badly if public opinion turns against someone.

WILLIS: Oh, you bet. You know I think that you know the big dollars behind these sports figures, they get bigger and bigger and bigger every year. And you don't even have to be someone who has a really long career or track record in basketball to get the big bucks. We're seeing people coming up from China, first year in the -- you know the big leagues and they're getting big dollars, big endorsement fees. You know, the business of sports is almost bigger than sports itself.

STARR: And has there ever been an assessment that these endorsements really pay off for companies? Do they get the business in return?

WILLIS: Well, that's a really interesting question. I think that some people do pay out, Michael Jordan, for example, really proven track ridiculous. But some of these younger people coming up, you've got to wonder, is this really working for those companies?

QUIJANO: Yes. Well, one thing we obviously though have to keep in mind, besides that, are the people involved. I mean you've got a wife. You've got a victim here, and 19-year-old woman. That's a very young, difficult age. She is going to be thrust in the middle of this incredible storm now for months and months and months. Who knows how long this is going to play out. So certainly, you have to think about that as well.

You know I watched a little bit of that news conference where Kobe Bryant came before the cameras and he said, look, I committed adultery. He admitted it with his wife sitting there. I mean can you image what she must be going through. And they have, I understand, a six-month-old child. Just a tremendously sad story for everybody involved.

STARR: For all of the people involved.

COHEN: I'm sure we'll be talking more about this as time goes on. But let's move on now to Barbara Starr on the story on Iraq and when are they going to come marching home again -- Barbara.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. JOHN ABIZAID, CMDR., CENTRAL COMMAND: It's very, very important to all of us to make sure that our soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines know when they're coming home.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STARR: Well, that was the General John Abizaid, the head of U.S. Central Command this week signaling that the Pentagon brass is very aware that troops and their families are getting restless. And indeed, one of the things General Abizaid said is he acknowledged for the first time publicly, troops may spend a full year in Iraq before they come home. Very, very long duty for these guys in very difficult conditions.

QUIJANO: That's so devastating for the families, Barbara, I mean who are really anticipating seeing their loved once return.

STARR: The No. 1 story this week is troop morale this. Indeed, is it a problem? I'm not sure you know how many years has it been since we have seen the Pentagon brass have to talk about the question of morale and how long troops will stay? It's been decades since that's been the front and center issue for the U.S. military in the way that it was this week.

BRAHIMI: Actually -- Barbara, actually, we just had a press conference only an hour ago by Ricardo Sanchez who's the main person here in charge of U.S. troops. And a lot of questions were directed at the return of U.S. troops. And one reporter, in particular, interestingly enough, asked him about how the U.S. coalition forces or coalition authorities were doing in terms of schedule. Now, Ricardo Sanchez said, well, we're ahead of schedule. So then the reporter said, well, that means that the troops might be coming back sooner. And that was something that was very difficult to answer for Ricardo Sanchez.

You get a sense that they're really not knowing what to say anymore?

STARR: I spoke to this week to one of the highest-level people in the U.S. military, a face we all would recognize on television. We spoke on very deep background and he made that exact point, Rym. He said he felt finally like they were mishandling the story that they weren't getting the message out. He said we've got to be more clear, more direct. And the General Abizaid on camera said the same thing. We have got to give the troops some certainty. At least let them know when they're coming home.

And the notion that they're on plan may be a bit difficult for the Pentagon to continue to offer that thought, because clearly, they are facing a number of ongoing security issues that they had not anticipated that are proving to be very, very tough to solve.

NEISLOSS: Barbara, how does -- that's actually what I am quite curious about because you hear about the security issues. So how does it square with bringing troops home and then also the need to put more bodies on the ground in Iraq?

STARR: Well, you know you could ask yourself. We asked the question, why are U.S. troops stretched so thin? That's the phrase we hear. Stretched so thin. Not enough troops to go around. And that's clearly because the longer duration that allies are not offering up the number of troops for the mission perhaps that the U.S. had hoped for. And the security issue just really continues to be a problem.

What they have said, it's not a matter of boots per square inch. You know putting a hundred thousand troop in isn't going to solve the problem. They've got to get better intelligence on who is launching these attacks, who's really opposing them and begin to deal with those opposition forces. I'm sure, Rym, you're hearing the same thing, probably.

COHEN: Barbara, do you get the feeling there's any division within the military, some people saying, look, we need to get our soldiers home more quickly. And other saying let's stay and let's finish the job even if they're unhappy about it.

STARR: Well, clearly, they're going to stay as long as the president you know orders them to be there. The question this week that got a lot of attention was are they allowed to publicly be in descent with the administration. There were soldiers on television who were interviewed who said that they really no longer were supporting the president or the secretary of defense in these policies. And the question is can these troops be disciplined for making, shall we say, rude remarks about their national leaders?

But it's a deeper question, why are these young soldiers so disheartened that they would go on television and say these things?

QUIJANO: I know. That's an enormous sign right there. I mean somebody who is trained in the military system feels that strongly and so passionately enough to speak out against his boss on television in an interview. I mean that tells you how much of a problem this is becoming.

STARR: And I would say the thing that struck me this week is the problem; the issue of morale, the reality of the war is now coming to the hallways of the Pentagon. I have to tell you, an Army officer stopped me in the hallway. He deals with scheduling funerals, not a pleasant business but something that has to be done.

He deals with scheduling funerals in the hallway and he stopped me to tell me that his biggest problem right now is finding -- each and every funeral, they try and find an Army general who is available, who can get on a plane and go to a funeral wherever it is in the United States and lend support to the families. It's becoming a problem.

I mean they have so many now. They can deal with it, but it's clearly something that they have to do. And the last one he did, there was a -- it was for a 19-year-old widow. And he said he was very -- it really hit him at that point.

WILLIS: Heartbreaking. Those numbers have gone to 34 now, right?

STARR: Exactly.

BRAHIMI: Well, one result of this new lawlessness here in Iraq, as you'll note is new fear among women and girls of a new problem, kidnapping and rape. I'll be back on this story in just a moment.

ANNOUNCER: Rym Brahimi is a CNN international correspondent and reported from Baghdad during the war in Iraq. She has a masters in English Literature from the University of Paris and a journalism degree from Columbia University. She speaks French, Italian and Arabic.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): It's true Saddam was bad, but at least it was safer then.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRAHIMI: This is one of the new problems that women in Iraq are facing, basically forcing them in many cases to stay at home rather than go out to work or to a university because they're afraid they'll be either kidnapped or raped.

Now, that young woman was just one of many women who didn't like particularly the regime of Saddam Hussein, but who now feel or say at least that it was safer then. Even -- one person I spoke to even said I know about the mass graves. That was dreadful but now I can't sleep at night because I'm afraid for my three daughters. And that's something we've been hearing about.

We went to police stations. People acknowledge it's happening. It's happening for all sorts of reasons: being gangs that want ransoms, being rape just pure rape, being revenge attacks on people they think who were former Baath Party members, and the go after their wives or their daughters. It's really a very sad situation. And the consequences, of course, mean that A, if you can go to a university or to work, well, we have to be escorted and no matter what your age. And if you don't have that, well, as a woman you are forced to stay at home. This at a moment when finally this is a country that's in rebuilding and as everyone know arks woman's place is crucial in a society.

STARR: Well, Rym, tell us, is this -- is there a sense that this is pervasive now throughout Iraq? Is this just in Baghdad? And do Iraqi women feel that U.S. soldiers can help protect them? Do they have any confidence in the United States?

BRAHIMI: It's very difficult for them to actually go to U.S. soldiers to ask for that. They are happy in some areas that they're there. To go back to your first question, it does con-- affect mainly Baghdad. Not exclusively because policemen told us that they were finding girls here and there in other provinces that were maybe kidnapped in Baghdad. But basically, it is in the capitol, which is basically the most difficult place to manage. People find it also very difficult to talk about rape as you can imagine. This is a very traditionalist society and rape is very much taboo.

COHEN: Presumably there's supposed to be a police force, Rym that is supposed to protect people from this. Is that police force a mixture of American forces and trained Iraqis? How does that work?

BRAHIMI: Well, usually you go to a precinct and it's being guarded by U.S. troops and some of them are sort of still maybe training. There's some training going on with police forces, they go on joint patrol, for instance. But the police forces in Iraq that we spoke to had a lot of complaints. They said that a lot of them were police officers and they had to take orders from soldiers from the U.S. Army, which they thought was demeaning. They didn't like the fact that they weren't given weapons. A lot of complaints there.

On the other hand, the U.S. says, well, you know there are human rights issues that they haven't learned yet that they're still training to understand.

But basically, when it comes to this women issue, the husband of this woman you saw crying there saying her 16-year-old daughter been kidnapped 10 days ago, said her husband went to the precinct. And the policemen said, well, Baghdad is like a sea there's not much we can do. And we have a lot of other issues to deal with. We can help you find your daughter.

And again, it's seen as very taboo. People do try to help. Police try to help and police tray to help. But again, they can help when it's a question of gangs. Otherwise they say that they are powerless to do anything.

NEISLOSS: Rym, Kofi Annan just released a report about Iraq, actually his first look at Iraq. And he said that one of the factors might have been this presidential decree that Saddam Hussein issued at the end of 2002 that basically, let all of the criminals out of the jails.

But to just ask you about another big important factor in the week for Iraqis, the Governing Council that was just put together. How is that being received? Is this something the U.S. created?

BRAHIMI: Well, definitely it's seen as something that was raised by the U.S. One of the people I spoke to said, well, it's just a theater, just a play and the U.S. has brought a bunch of actors and they're just going to enact what Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator here tell them to act. Certainly, it has been established in very, very close consultation with the U.S., nobody is unaware of that.

Now, some people -- there are a lot of mixed feelings. Some of people say they are prepared to give them a chance and to see if they can properly deliver on the main issue, such as security, such electricity and water. But there are a lot of other people who resent the fact that these people they say, majority of them come from outside. Basically, their line is they haven't suffered like we have. How can they talk in our name? How can they know what we've been through to help us fix our problems?

And the other thing that really annoyed a lot of people here and antagonized a lot of people, their first decision, making April the 9 a national holiday and they canceled all of the holidays from the Baath Party. Which was fine. But April the 9 is seen as many people here, not as the day they got rid of Saddam Hussein necessarily, but as the day that Baghdad fell. It's extremely humiliating. And people say, well, do you know any country who would actually use it as a national holiday the day that its capitol fell?

WILLIS: Rym, a lot of frustration on the ground about the change in that day, getting rid of that holiday, but also this week the big news that Saddam Hussein is out with a tape, apparently Saddam Hussein's voice. What was the reaction on the street? If there was so much frustration with the U.S., are people excited about this tape?

BRAHIMI: You know it was a very strange day. It was, obviously, as you remember the 17 of July. Which is -- which marked what previously would have marked 35 anniversary of the accession to power by a coup of the Baath Party. And on that day, first you had a rumor throughout the whole of Baghdad saying that the U.S. had captured Saddam Hussein. You had celebrations even in some areas. And then half an hour later this tape came out with suppose lead the voice of Saddam Hussein.

Now some people that we spoke to previously -- we've spoken to previously in the week that said that they were still afraid that remnants of the party might still intimidate them, were all out celebrating. And it really seemed that they were celebrating out of fear more than anything else. That celebrating that he was still alive in a way, just chanting songs-- pro-Saddam songs. But it wasn't very clear whether they were doing this out of fear or just to be cautious or whether they really believed in what they were doing.

A lot of other people said, well, you know we really want the U.S. to clear this because otherwise, we will be afraid that he's still around. I spoke to one expert...

COHEN: Rym, thanks... BRAHIMI: ... somebody who actually worked very closely with Saddam Hussein and he says that that was definitely Saddam Hussein's voice. And the errors that he made in reading, that was him.

COHEN: Rym, thanks so much for joining us. We know that you have to get back on the story. Tell us what are you working on today?

BRAHIMI: Well, I knew you were going to ask this. So I took a list of the headlines of newspapers just to give you an idea of all of the things that we would really love to work on. First of all, one of the newspapers, "Qusay's Wife Kidnapped In Tikrit" the wife of the son of the president. "War Declared In The Streets, A Place For Prostitution." "Al Sahaf," the former information ministry "Sells Saddam's Secrets For $200,000.

There are just a whole lot of stories going around here. Not all of them are accurate. There's a lot of rumor in that, but definitely that gives us a lot of things to do here in Baghdad.

COHEN: Well, there's no end to the stories it seems in post-war Iwack --Iraq. You have your work cut out for you, Rym.

And from the dangers in Iraq to new health questions here at home. We've heard about -- we've heard about attention deficit disorder for children, but is it now for adults also? Now, don't get distracted on back ON THE STORY in two minutes.

ANNOUNCER: Elizabeth Cohen is a CNN medical correspondent. She joined CNN in 1991. Earlier, she worked as a newspaper reporter in Washington and Albany. She has a masters degree in public health.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. NED HALLOWELL, PSYCHIATRIST: They're going so fast. They're doing so much and they're so saturated with information overload. The symptoms of ADD can look just like the symptoms of modern life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: That was psychiatrist Dr. Ned Hallowell. Dr. Hallowell told me, you know what? I think about 5 percent of Americana adults have ADD, that's what the studies show. But 55 percent of Americans have what he calls "modern life." You've got e-mail and telephone and children and all sorts of other things that you need to pay attention to. And so you really don't have ADD, you just maybe feel like you have ADD and that's the controversy.

Eli Lilly, a major pharmaceutical company, has started an ad campaign that is aimed at telling Americans if you're feeling distracted, disorganized, fidgety, maybe you have ADD, and you should contact your doctor. Some people say they're trying to pad their bank account and not actually trying to help people. Others say, oh, good. Now maybe adults with Attention Deficit Disorder will finally get some help. WILLIS: Elizabeth, one of my friends was just diagnosed with ADD as an adult, a fellow. And I'm wondering did he have it? Did he have it as a kid and no one ever discovered it or is this something new?

COHEN: You know that's an excellent point because one of the things that people miss, -- excuse me about adult ADD is that by definition if you have adult ADD you had it as a child. That's according to what the experts say. The medical definition of adult ADD is that you had it as a child. You can't develop it as an adult. Now, maybe you didn't have it diagnosed as a child, but you had a disease as a child. And so, that would certainly put some people who think they ADD -- that would make some doctors say you know what? You don't because as a kid, you really did just fine.

QUIJANO: Elizabeth, I wanted to ask you about this idea on a different subject, of putting nutrition information alongside fast food menus. When you go to a McDonald's, you're going to maybe see how many calories you're about to take in on a Big Mac, is that right?

COHEN: That's right. You'll look up at the menu board and it will tell you small fries and tell you the calories and a Big Mac and tell you the calories. And...

QUIJANO: I don't want that.

COHEN: I know. Well, that's what many people say is they'd rather just go eat. They don't want to know how many calories are in their food. And this according to several proposals that are in front of several states and also in front of the legislature for the District of Columbia.

And the way that it would work is at fast food restaurants, as I described. And then at sit-down restaurants that are above a certain size -- larger than a certain size, you would look at men and you it wouldn't have just the calorie, it would have fat, it would have the sodium, it would have the carbohydrates. It would have all of the information you could possibly want.

Some people say it would help Americans make better choices. Some people say Americans don't really care. They just want to eat good food.

STARR: Well, what's the re-- excuse me. What's the restaurant industry's view on this? Do they think it's going to hurt business? Could it be better for business? You know should they buy stock in lettuce companies now?

COHEN: That's right. Some restaurants that cater to a health conscious clientele are in favor of this. In fact, there's a restaurant here in Atlanta that's really kind of a healthy food restaurant. They put up not just that information, they'll even tell you how if this could work on the Atkins Diet. How many Weight Watchers points it is. I mean they tell you more than they could ever want to know.

But other restaurants, of course, aren't so crazy about this idea because it would show just how much fat is in the foods that you're eating. Now, government regulators and consumer advocates say this is exactly what we want. And what they're hoping is that if restaurant do have to put this information on, well, maybe they'll reformulate their food and make it healthier.

NEISLOSS: I'm not so convinced though; this is really going to make a huge dent. I'm sure you remember, McDonald's tried its lean version of a hamburger and something healthier, and I think that totally collapsed. So, I imagine this may help some people. But I just -- I don't know. The people that really want to eat McDonald's may they still go and do it.

COHEN: Right. Many people agree with you, Liz. And they say when McDonald's came out with the McLean Deluxe people didn't want it. It ended up going off the menu. Although you'll notice now that they have put many salads on there. They've put yogurt on there. So they seem to be getting back to that.

And so many people do say is this going really to help? The more table labeling that we've had over the years, the fatter Americans get. But some say, well, look, there is a subset of Americans who do want to know. They should be able to learn what it is. They shouldn't have to go to the McDonald's web site to learn how much fat is in the Big Mac. They should just be able to look up and see it.

And again, this isn't aimed just at consumers. This is also aimed at getting companies to say, well, gosh if I've got to say that you know my sandwich has 33 grams of fat. Maybe I should make it lower in fat.

WILLIS: Elizabeth, I was really struck by this story about the 86-year-old driver. And I'm wondering, is this a medical issue? Or is this something that states and local government should be concerned about passing laws to tighten down on older drivers?

COHEN: Right. Some laws -- some states already do have different laws for different requirements for older drivers. They say older drivers can't just renew their driver's licenses in the mail. They need to actually come in and take certain tests or they need to have a doctor sign a document saying that their vision is OK and they're OK to drive. And some people think more states ought to have that requirement.

But other people point out that yes, 86-year-old George Weller does apparently allegedly seem to have been involved in this accident where the death toll is now 10. But by many measurements, younger drivers are actually more dangerous than older drivers. That your average 17-year-old driver is actually more dangerous than your average 86-year-old driver. So, if they did try to have more requirements for older drivers, there would -- you would probably hear about it from some of those older American groups.

NEISLOSS: Well, Elizabeth. From the health of Americans to the well-being and vitality of an organization that looked pretty weak and demoralized just a few months ago. I'll be talking about how the United Nations is back in the middle of the debate. And you can almost hear a chorus of diplomats singing, I told you so. We've all go we'll be back in a minute how's yours coming along?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KOFI ANNAN, SECRETARY-GENERAL, UNITED NATIONS: Think you've also noticed that a rare demonstration of enthusiasm, where the Liberians are cheering and praying and pleading with the U.S. to come.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NEISLOSS: United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan made the rounds in Washington this week talking about Liberia and Iraq.

Welcome back. We are ON THE STORY.

Right there Annan, you heard asking for, pleading for help on Liberia. He did meet with George Bush this week. George Bush told him in a meeting, look, let's not get bogged down. We don't want to get bogged down in Liberia. What is our exit strategy? He wants to know how quickly U.N. peacekeepers come could come in if the U.S. were to contribute. How quickly could the U.N. take over?

They fear getting bogged down. They want to know what the next step would be. But again, this week we are now seeing even today, a cease-fire in Liberia is breaking down. It is a humanitarian disaster and the U.N. is saying help is needed right away.

COHEN: Liz, why would the U.S. have to go back to the U.N. to ask permission? How does that work?

NEISLOSS: Ah. OK. On the subject of Iraq, that's the other sort of big discussion that Annan had in Washington this week. It's really about sharing the burden for the U.S. The U.S. wants troops from other countries to come in. They need to find a way to do it. Countries, Germany, France, India have told, particularly this week; have said, look, we cannot do anything unless we have authorization from the U.N.

So the U.S. will have to go back to the table and try to get the authorization that it needs. It may not be so easy. As a Chinese diplomat basically to me this week, look, the U.S. thought it was going to be so ease. They'd walk interest Iraq and they would just find open arms.

QUIJANO: Liz, I wanted to ask you, who will represent Iraq now? I mean this country is being built. It's in the process now of trying to get back on its feet. Who goes back now to the United Nations and sits there as the representative of this still being formed country?

NEISLOSS: Oh, it's a very good question. This week, in fact -- this coming week, we're going see the first kind of diplomatic foray from Iraq. This new Governing Counsel is going to send three individuals. The tricky part is in terms of who represents Iraq; there are six diplomats, actually sitting in the Iraqi mission in the New York representing the Saddam Hussein government. So these delegates will come this week and they will speak as expert, but not on the part of Iraq. That question is going to have to be decided by the General Assembly. And for now, if anyone is going to put in a request to represent the government, it would have to be there as the sovereign authority. So it seems that the U.S. is going to want to keep that on ice for the time being.

STARR: Liz, you know it seems like there ought to be a reality check out there that people are seen about this question of going back to the United Nations for a resolution. Because so much of it is really, as you said, a reflection of the U.S.'s inability to get other countries to contribute troops of their own volition without a U.N. resolution. I mean, even this week, I believe Russia said it wanted to see something out of the United Nations.

But will that solve the problem for these countries? Or are some of them holding back because they believe it's still a war and they don't want to be in a combat situation?

NEISLOSS: Well, first of all and the question of irony, there's a huge irony and the U.S. having to go back. There isn't a diplomat to found -- to find that doesn't actually see this. They do genuinely say that a resolution would be needed to satisfy constituents, basically, back home who didn't support the war.

But this return to the U.N. also opens the door to deal making that could go on. Deals, business deals, potentially for countries that have been shut out of Iraq. So this is an opportunity to return for the authority for troops, but also there may be a little play there.

STARR: But also if the U.S. goes back, gets a resolution out of the United Nations, does the U.S. military, does the Bush administration then give up its total control over the reconstruction and the post-war process to other countries and possibly to the U.N.?

NEISLOSS: Well, I think that's -- the devil will be in the details of the negotiating, I think. It's not going to be a waltz for the U.S. to just go back to the U.N. and say here's the resolution, sign on the dotted line. OK, send your troops. I think that that is where the negotiating is going to be done.

Kofi Annan actually suggested this week that proposed a new resolution might be a way of authorizing police training, other ways the U.N. could get involved. So I don't think the door is totally closed on what pieces might have to be negotiated away.

QUIJANO: All right, Liz. Well, you can bet that many leaders at the U.N. and around the world are carefully watching the political battle brewing here in Washington over what intelligence President Bush and his team had about Iraq before the war. I'm back on that story in two minutes.

ANNOUNCER: Elaine Quijano is a national correspondent for CNN News Source. She files reports for more than 700 television station affiliated with CNN. She joined CNN in 2000. Earlier, she worked as a reporter in Tampa and Champagne, Illinois and she graduated from the University of Illinois.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think the intelligence I get is darn good intelligence. And the speeches I have given were backed by good intelligence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: President Bush at the center of a storm over "darned good intelligence." A storm that blew up some powerful political winds this week and promises more to come for the president and his top spy, CIA Director George Tenet.

Welcome back. We are ON THE STORY.

And you know this was a situation that really kind of mushroomed over the past couple of weeks. It started with a comment and really centered on the 16 words, these now infamous 16 words that were in the president's State of the Union Address that had to do with a report that he cited. A British report saying that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa. Now, that was later to be found based in part on some forced documents.

And now Democrats are saying that President Bush may have misled the country about how solid some of this pre-war intelligence was. The Bush administration has fired back saying that, look, these are some of the same people who are going to be running for office. And they are simply trying to stoke the political fires here and keep this alive.

NEISLOSS: If -- yes. Elaine, it's just amazing. I have to say at the U.N. months ago, they were saying those document related to uranium and Niger, they were false. But the story obviously had a lot more life to it. What you are finding? Is this a line in a speech? Is this really about credibility? What are you hearing?

QUIJANO: Well, it's a little bit of both. I mean you hear from some Democrats who say, look, how can we ever trust the word of the president when there is so much doubt about this one particular line. How do we know that this is not just part of a larger pattern? Perhaps, of exaggerated evidence out there. And they also bring up the issue of how can we then go on to the international stage and try and talk about things like North Korea with any measure of credibility when in fact this is something that is suspect.

So they are bringing up some issues of that future but at the same time, of course, Democrats are really trying to put kind of chinks in the armor of the president here. And kind of poke holes wherever they can in terms of his credibility. And this is an issue they really have latched on in just the last week or so.

STARR: Well, that's the point you know the White House was making this week. No one expects the president of the United States to be a fact checker, a researcher of every detail in his own speeches.

But the question really goes more to his senior staff. Why did they not have the basic knowledge or did they have the basic knowledge? Was there in fact, some political agenda by senior staff members that led to some of this happening. Was there more here than meets the eye because it sure doesn't look at the moment like CIA Director George Tenet. He may have apologized and may have taken responsibility but he's not really taking a fall for this.

QUIJANO: Well, that's true.

STARR: Not yet anyway.

QUIJANO: That's true. Absolutely. And he's still in play place. And it's interesting because the White House has felt so strongly about these attacks on President Bush's credibility that yesterday they unclassified eight pages of a 90-page document that had to do with prewar intelligence because they wanted to build up their case. And say, look President Bush was not just pulling this information from out of thin air. Here is a report that was based on intelligence services information that also talks about other countries in Africa that Iraq was possibly trying to seek uranium from.

These classified documents talked about Somalia, perhaps in the Democratic Republic of Congo. So that line, they go back to that line and they say it was technically correct. He cited British intelligence that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa. So, they sort of are trying to put all of this behind them now.

WILLIS: But you know, somebody else on the offensive, Prime Minister Tony Blair. He comes to Washington and talks to both Houses of Congress. I'm thinking the kind of reception he got there, he's not going back to the House of Commons.

QUIJANO: Yes, that's exactly right. And it was such a compelling speech, I mean on a lot of different levels. You know even though there was this back biting going on, and it was such an acrimonious tone on the Hill going into his visit. You never would have guessed that from the number of ovations and the number of interruptions and bursts of applause that he got. I mean it was quite a rousing speech.

And you know even Democrats who had up until that point been so belligerent and really trying to attack the president. You know they acknowledged -- they showed their respect for him. And they certainly made it sound as though there wasn't any kind of dissension. That they certainly were all for you know standing behind the U.S.'s actions when you know in reality they still are questioning, as I said, some of that prewar intelligence.

COHEN: Elaine, take us back to last winter when the president made the speech. These 16 words about the uranium, was this a major argument that he made for going to war or one of many minor arguments?

QUIJANO: Well, that's the thing, the White House says, look, we certainly did not go to war over the 16 words. That really -- it was a much larger case that we have put forth. And certainly anybody that looks at the information will see you know that this was, obviously, it was mentioned but it was not the central portion of the White House's argument.

And you know there were reservations expressed within the Bush administration. The State Department and the CIA had expressed concerns about this intelligence. So there was some discussion about it. But at the same time the Bush administration is maintaining that, look, we are not centering -- we did not enter our plans to go to war on these 16 words.

And they also are saying that we do not yet know whether or not that's false. As I said, going back to the Somalia reference and the NIE documents. Going back to the Democratic Republic of Congo, they said, look, it could still be the case that Iraq was in fact seeking uranium from Africa.

WILLIS: Well, if the Bush team is keeping one eye on Iraq. The other is watching the economy. What it means for your job, your income and what you can afford to buy. I'm back ON THE STORY in two minutes.

ANNOUNCER: Gerri Willis is personal finance editor with CNNfn. She is the author of the "Smart Money Guide For Real Estate Investing." She was a 1992, Knight-Bagehot Fellow at Columbia University. And in 2000 won the American University and ICI Education Award for Excellence in Personal Finance Reporting.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALAN GREENSPAN, CHAIRMAN, FEDERAL RESERVE: Some of the residual war-related uncertainties have abated further. And financial conditions have turned decidedly more accommodative.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIS: Federal Reserve chairman serving up a carefully, crafted, mildly optimistic view of the future.

Welcome back. We're ON THE STORY.

Federal Reserves Chairman Greenspan this week getting all of the attention. He was saying, well the economy looks like it's getting a little bit better and believe you me, I'm going to keep interest rates low. Well the bond market reacted immediately selling off, that pushed rates higher.

The thing I wanted to talk about is that higher rates is going to be bad for some investors, particularly people who were buying new homes and getting mortgages. An interesting report out from the Mortgage Bankers Association this week showing that they believe that issuance of mortgages will be down 45 percent next year. And the reason you should care about that if you're not in the market is that it can really hurt the economy.

What's been going on over the last year to two years is that the market -- or the economy itself has been propelled by consumers spending and primarily on houses as people either refinance, take some equity out of their home or they buy a new home and they start spending on carpeting and paint, et cetera, et cetera. So, a sort of worrisome trend today.

I just want to mention, too, that in addition to that, numbers on unemployment have been very, very scary. And I think that's the thing we really need to be paying attention to here now, jobless rates at a 20-year high.

STARR: Plus protections of record deficits, I believe this week.

WILLIS: Yes, $455 billion. That's a record high. Not great for the economy, doesn't really help the economy. And the question, of course, how big does it go because it doesn't include a lot of numbers. A lot of reinvestment going on in Iraq by the U.S. right now that's not included. And Greenspan was just saying this week that it doesn't include anything for boomers who are retiring and will put a big load on the Social Security system.

STARR: Do people believe the tax cut has now worked its way into the economy or is that still something the administration hopes for in the future?

WILLIS: Well, we are just getting those child tax credits this week and the next few weeks. So we'll see how that works out. But it's an open question how much people are actually going to spend? You know the last time around that we did this, most people saved the money or they used it to pay off credit cards.

QUIJANO: Gerri, I wanted to ask you about this report out by this group that talked about the recession having ended? What was this about?

WILLIS: Right. Exactly. They said it was just an eight-month recession. But you know, people out there who are unemployed lost their jobs; I think they're thinking something quite different. And In fact, think about it, I mean it was you know easy enough getting through the recession; the hard part has been the recovery as people continue to lose jobs.

STARR: Absolutely. Mm.

NEISLOSS: And on the job loss front, I mean I think even today President Bush said that the tax cuts will spur the economy and in turn that will help unemployment. How is that message received looking at the huge deficit?

WILLIS: Well, I think people out there are wondering when is this all going to happen? When is this going to take place? And of course, it takes a long time to percolate through the economy because what you're getting is consumers will continue to spend. That that money will go into the pockets of people who own businesses, who will eventually spend more money.

But I have to mention one thing quickly, which is that rising greats will help some people and that's the people on fixed incomes who have had a heck of a time raising money recently.

COHEN: Gerri, given this bad news about deficits and about unemployment, is there any finger-pointing going on yet?

WILLIS: Well, I think the Democrats are going to be all over this in the coming election. This is going to be their big issue. And remember, the president's father had a huge problem with this issue. It's often cited as the reason he lost the election. So you're going to see this coming back again and again, unless there's some quick immediate turnaround. I think we're going to be dealing with this issue, talking about it for a long time to come.

STARR: And there's no indication is there, from the Bush administration, from the White House of any economic course correction on their part. They are committed to this for the long haul.

WILLIS: They're committed to this. They're committed to the tax plan they laid out. They're continuing at pace with this. And I think the big questions are should more money be pumped directly into the pockets of people who are less well off than the people who are very well off? This is the key factor that the Democrats are going to play. I think it's going to be an issue that we're going to be debating.

Another issue that is going to be coming front and center here is, can people continue to save for retirement? This is a big issue that's only going to build as we find these huge deficits coming in the future on Social Security. And I think you know this is increasingly the issue that people just don't want to deal with.

QUIJANO: Gerri, what about mortgage refinancing? Is that over?

WILLIS: No. You know as a matter of fact, you know the weekly numbers were out just this week. And there was a bit of a falloff in refinance activity and that was in a week that rates did not fall. So I think as the rates start to pick up, you'll see some of that fall off.

But there was a big expansion actually, in people buying new homes. You know this housing market has had legs that nobody expected. It's a shocking, really how fast and how furious it's been able to continue. And of course, it's raising doubts with some people. Can it? Will I be losing value in my home? Are prices actually going to go down? Of course, that market moves incredibly slowly, thank God it's not as quick as the stock market, which trades up and down every day.

NEISLOSS: But with all of the low interest rates have people been piling on more debt? I know for a while we were all talking about the levels of personal debt and that being a problem. So where does that factor in? WILLIS: Well, you know it's interesting; personal debt has gone higher, bankruptcies have ticked higher. But you know you've got to realize there's a bit of an irony in the idea that people are always telling consumers, don't borrow so much money, quit running up that credit card debt. And on the other hand it's the only thing that's kept this economy going is the fact that consumers were willing to spend.

You know they saw their incomes climb pretty dramatically you know through the '90s boom and even into the last couple of years. So I think that it's been hard for consumers to put the brakes on. But you know, now that we see so many layoffs. I think that the question of consumer-spending coming up is going to be paramount.

QUIJANO: All right. Thank you to all of my colleagues and thank you for watching ON THE STORY. We'll be back next week.

Still ahead at the top of the hour, "PEOPLE IN THE NEWS," focusing this week on Tour de France champ, Lance Armstrong trying for his fifth consecutive win.

At 12 noon Eastern, 9:00 a.m. Pacific, "CNN LIVE SATURDAY," with a report on crop circles and the people who believe in them.

And at 1:00 p.m. Eastern and 10 a.m. Pacific, CNN's "IN THE MONEY" looks at how North Korea gets the money to pay for nuclear weapons.

Coming up at the top of the hour, a news alert but first, the president's weekly radio address.

(BEGIN AUDIO TAPE)

BUSH: Good morning.

Next week, the United States Treasury will begin printing and mailing more than 25 million child tax credit checks, putting over $12 billion back into the hands of American families. These rebates are the result of the Jobs and Growth Act I recently signed into law, which increases the child tax credit from $600 to $1,000 per child.

And because this new law reduced income-tax rates, businesses earlier this month lowered tax withholding for worker paychecks. Now those workers and their families have a lighter tax bill and more take-home pay.

With the child tax credit rebates and the lower tax rates taking effect, America's families will have more of their own money to make purchases, pay their bills, save for their children's education and invest in a new home or business.

There are hopeful signs that our actions are contributing to economic growth. Individual investors are showing greater confidence, leading to a significant rise in the stock market. And thanks to our efforts to reduce taxes on stock dividends, dozens of major companies have announced plans to either increase their existing dividend payout or pay dividends for the first time, putting billions of dollars in cash into shareholders' pockets.

Earlier this week, I met with leading private economists, who see a faster rate of economic growth in the coming year and a half. The U.S. housing market is robust, strengthened by low mortgage rates and rising after-tax incomes. Inflation is low, retail sales have been rising, and productivity growth, the most important indicator of economic strength, remains high.

My administration remains focused on faster economic growth that will translate into more jobs. Now that Americans can keep more of what they earn, we can expect to see rising demand for goods and services. And as demand increases, companies will need more workers to meet it.

We will continue to take action on a broad agenda for more growth and jobs. We are pressing the Senate to join the House of Representatives in passing an energy bill to assure stable and affordable energy supplies. And we're pressing the Senate on litigation reform, so small businesses and manufacturers can focus on creating jobs instead of fighting frivolous lawsuits. I'm asking both houses of Congress to create re-employment accounts for those seeking jobs, so they can pay for job training and child care and other costs of finding work.

Faster economic growth will bring the added benefit of higher revenues for our government. And those new revenues, combined with spending discipline in Washington, D.C., are the surest way to bring down the deficit. My budget for fiscal year 2004 calls for a modest increase in discretionary spending of only 4 percent, or about the same increase as the average American household budget. I urge Congress to make spending discipline a priority, so that we can cut the deficit in half over the next five years.

Government does not create prosperity. Government can, however, create the conditions that make prosperity possible. The Jobs and Growth Act of 2003 was based on the fundamental faith in the energy and creativity of the American people. With hard work and daily determination, entrepreneurs and workers are moving this economy forward. The American economy is headed in the right direction, and we can be confident of better days ahead.

Thank you.

(END AUDIO TAPE)

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




Face Dangers of Kidnapping, Rape; Congress Grills Tenet>


Aired July 19, 2003 - 10:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Welcome to CNN's ON THE STORY, where our journalists have the inside word on the stories we covered this week. I'm Barbara Starr on the story of the questions inside the military on how long troops must now stay in Iraq.
RYM BRAHIMI, CNN INT'L CORRESPONDENT: I'm Rym Brahimi in Baghdad on the story of how this dangerous peace in Iraq holds special dangers for women and girls who now face the new threat of being kidnapped or raped.

ELAINE QUIJANO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Elaine Quijano on the story of the CIA director summoned to Capitol Hill this week, forced to explain who knew what before the war.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Elizabeth Cohen in Atlanta on whether millions of us suffer from something we thought was just a problem for children, Adult Attention Deficit Disorder.

LIZ NEISLOSS, CNN U.N. PRODUCER: I'm Liz Neisloss in New York on the story of how the United States may have to go back to the United Nations to bargain with the same countries that wouldn't back its war in Iraq.

GERRI WILLIS, CNNfn PERSONAL FINANCIAL EDITOR: And I'm Gerri Willis on the story of the latest buzz on interest rates and whether the man behind the controls, Fed Chief Alan Greenspan is getting the attention he used to get.

Also on our menu, should Uncle Sam force restaurants to tell all, from fat to calories about what you want to order?

And the debate over elderly drivers after an 86-year-old man in California may be charged with the deaths of 10 people.

And at the end of hour, we'll listen to the president's weekly radio address released just a few minutes from now.

We want to hear from you, e-mail us at the story@cnn.com.

COHEN: (AUDIO GAP) on the medical beat, Capitol Hill, what about the story that's that so many of us were talking about yesterday and today? Basketball superstar Kobe Bryant charged with assaulting a 19- year-old woman in Colorado. Bryant admits having sex. He claims it was consensual and that he's innocent. This is going to be a hard case for him to prove as our legal analysts were telling us here on CNN earlier today. He has already said that he did have sex. Now he has -- it's going to be turned into a really a he said-she said in many ways.

STARR: And Elizabeth, it's interesting. I mean the news media, as we all saw this week, paid so much attention to the story. It's an interesting thing. Is it because of a potential crime? Is it because of his fame? Is it because of a situation of another role model for children being held up to public scrutiny? Why so much attention? I'm not sure I know the answer to that.

QUIJANO: Well, you know it's interesting. I mean this is a person who definitely not a Dennis Rodman. This is person who had a squeaky clean image, the kind of person who could land a multimillion deal with Nike, with Sprite, McDonald's. So, I mean this is not your typical NBA bad boy story. I think it was unexpected.

WILLIS: You bet. You know the basketball fans I talked to they love Kobe Bryant and they are not convinced at this point. They think that he's probably done nothing at all; certainly not you know consensual sex. Nothing out of line here, but we're just going to have to wait and see.

NEISLOSS: And it may cost him a lot of money, actually, Gerri because this guy was worth a lot of money in terms of endorsements. I think he was something like No. 3 from the sports figures right now. So it remains to be seen what those companies will decide to do.

STARR: That's an interesting question for Wall Street because they put an awful lot of money into endorsements. And it's a high- risk proposition for them if it goes badly if public opinion turns against someone.

WILLIS: Oh, you bet. You know I think that you know the big dollars behind these sports figures, they get bigger and bigger and bigger every year. And you don't even have to be someone who has a really long career or track record in basketball to get the big bucks. We're seeing people coming up from China, first year in the -- you know the big leagues and they're getting big dollars, big endorsement fees. You know, the business of sports is almost bigger than sports itself.

STARR: And has there ever been an assessment that these endorsements really pay off for companies? Do they get the business in return?

WILLIS: Well, that's a really interesting question. I think that some people do pay out, Michael Jordan, for example, really proven track ridiculous. But some of these younger people coming up, you've got to wonder, is this really working for those companies?

QUIJANO: Yes. Well, one thing we obviously though have to keep in mind, besides that, are the people involved. I mean you've got a wife. You've got a victim here, and 19-year-old woman. That's a very young, difficult age. She is going to be thrust in the middle of this incredible storm now for months and months and months. Who knows how long this is going to play out. So certainly, you have to think about that as well.

You know I watched a little bit of that news conference where Kobe Bryant came before the cameras and he said, look, I committed adultery. He admitted it with his wife sitting there. I mean can you image what she must be going through. And they have, I understand, a six-month-old child. Just a tremendously sad story for everybody involved.

STARR: For all of the people involved.

COHEN: I'm sure we'll be talking more about this as time goes on. But let's move on now to Barbara Starr on the story on Iraq and when are they going to come marching home again -- Barbara.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. JOHN ABIZAID, CMDR., CENTRAL COMMAND: It's very, very important to all of us to make sure that our soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines know when they're coming home.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STARR: Well, that was the General John Abizaid, the head of U.S. Central Command this week signaling that the Pentagon brass is very aware that troops and their families are getting restless. And indeed, one of the things General Abizaid said is he acknowledged for the first time publicly, troops may spend a full year in Iraq before they come home. Very, very long duty for these guys in very difficult conditions.

QUIJANO: That's so devastating for the families, Barbara, I mean who are really anticipating seeing their loved once return.

STARR: The No. 1 story this week is troop morale this. Indeed, is it a problem? I'm not sure you know how many years has it been since we have seen the Pentagon brass have to talk about the question of morale and how long troops will stay? It's been decades since that's been the front and center issue for the U.S. military in the way that it was this week.

BRAHIMI: Actually -- Barbara, actually, we just had a press conference only an hour ago by Ricardo Sanchez who's the main person here in charge of U.S. troops. And a lot of questions were directed at the return of U.S. troops. And one reporter, in particular, interestingly enough, asked him about how the U.S. coalition forces or coalition authorities were doing in terms of schedule. Now, Ricardo Sanchez said, well, we're ahead of schedule. So then the reporter said, well, that means that the troops might be coming back sooner. And that was something that was very difficult to answer for Ricardo Sanchez.

You get a sense that they're really not knowing what to say anymore?

STARR: I spoke to this week to one of the highest-level people in the U.S. military, a face we all would recognize on television. We spoke on very deep background and he made that exact point, Rym. He said he felt finally like they were mishandling the story that they weren't getting the message out. He said we've got to be more clear, more direct. And the General Abizaid on camera said the same thing. We have got to give the troops some certainty. At least let them know when they're coming home.

And the notion that they're on plan may be a bit difficult for the Pentagon to continue to offer that thought, because clearly, they are facing a number of ongoing security issues that they had not anticipated that are proving to be very, very tough to solve.

NEISLOSS: Barbara, how does -- that's actually what I am quite curious about because you hear about the security issues. So how does it square with bringing troops home and then also the need to put more bodies on the ground in Iraq?

STARR: Well, you know you could ask yourself. We asked the question, why are U.S. troops stretched so thin? That's the phrase we hear. Stretched so thin. Not enough troops to go around. And that's clearly because the longer duration that allies are not offering up the number of troops for the mission perhaps that the U.S. had hoped for. And the security issue just really continues to be a problem.

What they have said, it's not a matter of boots per square inch. You know putting a hundred thousand troop in isn't going to solve the problem. They've got to get better intelligence on who is launching these attacks, who's really opposing them and begin to deal with those opposition forces. I'm sure, Rym, you're hearing the same thing, probably.

COHEN: Barbara, do you get the feeling there's any division within the military, some people saying, look, we need to get our soldiers home more quickly. And other saying let's stay and let's finish the job even if they're unhappy about it.

STARR: Well, clearly, they're going to stay as long as the president you know orders them to be there. The question this week that got a lot of attention was are they allowed to publicly be in descent with the administration. There were soldiers on television who were interviewed who said that they really no longer were supporting the president or the secretary of defense in these policies. And the question is can these troops be disciplined for making, shall we say, rude remarks about their national leaders?

But it's a deeper question, why are these young soldiers so disheartened that they would go on television and say these things?

QUIJANO: I know. That's an enormous sign right there. I mean somebody who is trained in the military system feels that strongly and so passionately enough to speak out against his boss on television in an interview. I mean that tells you how much of a problem this is becoming.

STARR: And I would say the thing that struck me this week is the problem; the issue of morale, the reality of the war is now coming to the hallways of the Pentagon. I have to tell you, an Army officer stopped me in the hallway. He deals with scheduling funerals, not a pleasant business but something that has to be done.

He deals with scheduling funerals in the hallway and he stopped me to tell me that his biggest problem right now is finding -- each and every funeral, they try and find an Army general who is available, who can get on a plane and go to a funeral wherever it is in the United States and lend support to the families. It's becoming a problem.

I mean they have so many now. They can deal with it, but it's clearly something that they have to do. And the last one he did, there was a -- it was for a 19-year-old widow. And he said he was very -- it really hit him at that point.

WILLIS: Heartbreaking. Those numbers have gone to 34 now, right?

STARR: Exactly.

BRAHIMI: Well, one result of this new lawlessness here in Iraq, as you'll note is new fear among women and girls of a new problem, kidnapping and rape. I'll be back on this story in just a moment.

ANNOUNCER: Rym Brahimi is a CNN international correspondent and reported from Baghdad during the war in Iraq. She has a masters in English Literature from the University of Paris and a journalism degree from Columbia University. She speaks French, Italian and Arabic.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): It's true Saddam was bad, but at least it was safer then.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRAHIMI: This is one of the new problems that women in Iraq are facing, basically forcing them in many cases to stay at home rather than go out to work or to a university because they're afraid they'll be either kidnapped or raped.

Now, that young woman was just one of many women who didn't like particularly the regime of Saddam Hussein, but who now feel or say at least that it was safer then. Even -- one person I spoke to even said I know about the mass graves. That was dreadful but now I can't sleep at night because I'm afraid for my three daughters. And that's something we've been hearing about.

We went to police stations. People acknowledge it's happening. It's happening for all sorts of reasons: being gangs that want ransoms, being rape just pure rape, being revenge attacks on people they think who were former Baath Party members, and the go after their wives or their daughters. It's really a very sad situation. And the consequences, of course, mean that A, if you can go to a university or to work, well, we have to be escorted and no matter what your age. And if you don't have that, well, as a woman you are forced to stay at home. This at a moment when finally this is a country that's in rebuilding and as everyone know arks woman's place is crucial in a society.

STARR: Well, Rym, tell us, is this -- is there a sense that this is pervasive now throughout Iraq? Is this just in Baghdad? And do Iraqi women feel that U.S. soldiers can help protect them? Do they have any confidence in the United States?

BRAHIMI: It's very difficult for them to actually go to U.S. soldiers to ask for that. They are happy in some areas that they're there. To go back to your first question, it does con-- affect mainly Baghdad. Not exclusively because policemen told us that they were finding girls here and there in other provinces that were maybe kidnapped in Baghdad. But basically, it is in the capitol, which is basically the most difficult place to manage. People find it also very difficult to talk about rape as you can imagine. This is a very traditionalist society and rape is very much taboo.

COHEN: Presumably there's supposed to be a police force, Rym that is supposed to protect people from this. Is that police force a mixture of American forces and trained Iraqis? How does that work?

BRAHIMI: Well, usually you go to a precinct and it's being guarded by U.S. troops and some of them are sort of still maybe training. There's some training going on with police forces, they go on joint patrol, for instance. But the police forces in Iraq that we spoke to had a lot of complaints. They said that a lot of them were police officers and they had to take orders from soldiers from the U.S. Army, which they thought was demeaning. They didn't like the fact that they weren't given weapons. A lot of complaints there.

On the other hand, the U.S. says, well, you know there are human rights issues that they haven't learned yet that they're still training to understand.

But basically, when it comes to this women issue, the husband of this woman you saw crying there saying her 16-year-old daughter been kidnapped 10 days ago, said her husband went to the precinct. And the policemen said, well, Baghdad is like a sea there's not much we can do. And we have a lot of other issues to deal with. We can help you find your daughter.

And again, it's seen as very taboo. People do try to help. Police try to help and police tray to help. But again, they can help when it's a question of gangs. Otherwise they say that they are powerless to do anything.

NEISLOSS: Rym, Kofi Annan just released a report about Iraq, actually his first look at Iraq. And he said that one of the factors might have been this presidential decree that Saddam Hussein issued at the end of 2002 that basically, let all of the criminals out of the jails.

But to just ask you about another big important factor in the week for Iraqis, the Governing Council that was just put together. How is that being received? Is this something the U.S. created?

BRAHIMI: Well, definitely it's seen as something that was raised by the U.S. One of the people I spoke to said, well, it's just a theater, just a play and the U.S. has brought a bunch of actors and they're just going to enact what Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator here tell them to act. Certainly, it has been established in very, very close consultation with the U.S., nobody is unaware of that.

Now, some people -- there are a lot of mixed feelings. Some of people say they are prepared to give them a chance and to see if they can properly deliver on the main issue, such as security, such electricity and water. But there are a lot of other people who resent the fact that these people they say, majority of them come from outside. Basically, their line is they haven't suffered like we have. How can they talk in our name? How can they know what we've been through to help us fix our problems?

And the other thing that really annoyed a lot of people here and antagonized a lot of people, their first decision, making April the 9 a national holiday and they canceled all of the holidays from the Baath Party. Which was fine. But April the 9 is seen as many people here, not as the day they got rid of Saddam Hussein necessarily, but as the day that Baghdad fell. It's extremely humiliating. And people say, well, do you know any country who would actually use it as a national holiday the day that its capitol fell?

WILLIS: Rym, a lot of frustration on the ground about the change in that day, getting rid of that holiday, but also this week the big news that Saddam Hussein is out with a tape, apparently Saddam Hussein's voice. What was the reaction on the street? If there was so much frustration with the U.S., are people excited about this tape?

BRAHIMI: You know it was a very strange day. It was, obviously, as you remember the 17 of July. Which is -- which marked what previously would have marked 35 anniversary of the accession to power by a coup of the Baath Party. And on that day, first you had a rumor throughout the whole of Baghdad saying that the U.S. had captured Saddam Hussein. You had celebrations even in some areas. And then half an hour later this tape came out with suppose lead the voice of Saddam Hussein.

Now some people that we spoke to previously -- we've spoken to previously in the week that said that they were still afraid that remnants of the party might still intimidate them, were all out celebrating. And it really seemed that they were celebrating out of fear more than anything else. That celebrating that he was still alive in a way, just chanting songs-- pro-Saddam songs. But it wasn't very clear whether they were doing this out of fear or just to be cautious or whether they really believed in what they were doing.

A lot of other people said, well, you know we really want the U.S. to clear this because otherwise, we will be afraid that he's still around. I spoke to one expert...

COHEN: Rym, thanks... BRAHIMI: ... somebody who actually worked very closely with Saddam Hussein and he says that that was definitely Saddam Hussein's voice. And the errors that he made in reading, that was him.

COHEN: Rym, thanks so much for joining us. We know that you have to get back on the story. Tell us what are you working on today?

BRAHIMI: Well, I knew you were going to ask this. So I took a list of the headlines of newspapers just to give you an idea of all of the things that we would really love to work on. First of all, one of the newspapers, "Qusay's Wife Kidnapped In Tikrit" the wife of the son of the president. "War Declared In The Streets, A Place For Prostitution." "Al Sahaf," the former information ministry "Sells Saddam's Secrets For $200,000.

There are just a whole lot of stories going around here. Not all of them are accurate. There's a lot of rumor in that, but definitely that gives us a lot of things to do here in Baghdad.

COHEN: Well, there's no end to the stories it seems in post-war Iwack --Iraq. You have your work cut out for you, Rym.

And from the dangers in Iraq to new health questions here at home. We've heard about -- we've heard about attention deficit disorder for children, but is it now for adults also? Now, don't get distracted on back ON THE STORY in two minutes.

ANNOUNCER: Elizabeth Cohen is a CNN medical correspondent. She joined CNN in 1991. Earlier, she worked as a newspaper reporter in Washington and Albany. She has a masters degree in public health.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. NED HALLOWELL, PSYCHIATRIST: They're going so fast. They're doing so much and they're so saturated with information overload. The symptoms of ADD can look just like the symptoms of modern life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: That was psychiatrist Dr. Ned Hallowell. Dr. Hallowell told me, you know what? I think about 5 percent of Americana adults have ADD, that's what the studies show. But 55 percent of Americans have what he calls "modern life." You've got e-mail and telephone and children and all sorts of other things that you need to pay attention to. And so you really don't have ADD, you just maybe feel like you have ADD and that's the controversy.

Eli Lilly, a major pharmaceutical company, has started an ad campaign that is aimed at telling Americans if you're feeling distracted, disorganized, fidgety, maybe you have ADD, and you should contact your doctor. Some people say they're trying to pad their bank account and not actually trying to help people. Others say, oh, good. Now maybe adults with Attention Deficit Disorder will finally get some help. WILLIS: Elizabeth, one of my friends was just diagnosed with ADD as an adult, a fellow. And I'm wondering did he have it? Did he have it as a kid and no one ever discovered it or is this something new?

COHEN: You know that's an excellent point because one of the things that people miss, -- excuse me about adult ADD is that by definition if you have adult ADD you had it as a child. That's according to what the experts say. The medical definition of adult ADD is that you had it as a child. You can't develop it as an adult. Now, maybe you didn't have it diagnosed as a child, but you had a disease as a child. And so, that would certainly put some people who think they ADD -- that would make some doctors say you know what? You don't because as a kid, you really did just fine.

QUIJANO: Elizabeth, I wanted to ask you about this idea on a different subject, of putting nutrition information alongside fast food menus. When you go to a McDonald's, you're going to maybe see how many calories you're about to take in on a Big Mac, is that right?

COHEN: That's right. You'll look up at the menu board and it will tell you small fries and tell you the calories and a Big Mac and tell you the calories. And...

QUIJANO: I don't want that.

COHEN: I know. Well, that's what many people say is they'd rather just go eat. They don't want to know how many calories are in their food. And this according to several proposals that are in front of several states and also in front of the legislature for the District of Columbia.

And the way that it would work is at fast food restaurants, as I described. And then at sit-down restaurants that are above a certain size -- larger than a certain size, you would look at men and you it wouldn't have just the calorie, it would have fat, it would have the sodium, it would have the carbohydrates. It would have all of the information you could possibly want.

Some people say it would help Americans make better choices. Some people say Americans don't really care. They just want to eat good food.

STARR: Well, what's the re-- excuse me. What's the restaurant industry's view on this? Do they think it's going to hurt business? Could it be better for business? You know should they buy stock in lettuce companies now?

COHEN: That's right. Some restaurants that cater to a health conscious clientele are in favor of this. In fact, there's a restaurant here in Atlanta that's really kind of a healthy food restaurant. They put up not just that information, they'll even tell you how if this could work on the Atkins Diet. How many Weight Watchers points it is. I mean they tell you more than they could ever want to know.

But other restaurants, of course, aren't so crazy about this idea because it would show just how much fat is in the foods that you're eating. Now, government regulators and consumer advocates say this is exactly what we want. And what they're hoping is that if restaurant do have to put this information on, well, maybe they'll reformulate their food and make it healthier.

NEISLOSS: I'm not so convinced though; this is really going to make a huge dent. I'm sure you remember, McDonald's tried its lean version of a hamburger and something healthier, and I think that totally collapsed. So, I imagine this may help some people. But I just -- I don't know. The people that really want to eat McDonald's may they still go and do it.

COHEN: Right. Many people agree with you, Liz. And they say when McDonald's came out with the McLean Deluxe people didn't want it. It ended up going off the menu. Although you'll notice now that they have put many salads on there. They've put yogurt on there. So they seem to be getting back to that.

And so many people do say is this going really to help? The more table labeling that we've had over the years, the fatter Americans get. But some say, well, look, there is a subset of Americans who do want to know. They should be able to learn what it is. They shouldn't have to go to the McDonald's web site to learn how much fat is in the Big Mac. They should just be able to look up and see it.

And again, this isn't aimed just at consumers. This is also aimed at getting companies to say, well, gosh if I've got to say that you know my sandwich has 33 grams of fat. Maybe I should make it lower in fat.

WILLIS: Elizabeth, I was really struck by this story about the 86-year-old driver. And I'm wondering, is this a medical issue? Or is this something that states and local government should be concerned about passing laws to tighten down on older drivers?

COHEN: Right. Some laws -- some states already do have different laws for different requirements for older drivers. They say older drivers can't just renew their driver's licenses in the mail. They need to actually come in and take certain tests or they need to have a doctor sign a document saying that their vision is OK and they're OK to drive. And some people think more states ought to have that requirement.

But other people point out that yes, 86-year-old George Weller does apparently allegedly seem to have been involved in this accident where the death toll is now 10. But by many measurements, younger drivers are actually more dangerous than older drivers. That your average 17-year-old driver is actually more dangerous than your average 86-year-old driver. So, if they did try to have more requirements for older drivers, there would -- you would probably hear about it from some of those older American groups.

NEISLOSS: Well, Elizabeth. From the health of Americans to the well-being and vitality of an organization that looked pretty weak and demoralized just a few months ago. I'll be talking about how the United Nations is back in the middle of the debate. And you can almost hear a chorus of diplomats singing, I told you so. We've all go we'll be back in a minute how's yours coming along?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KOFI ANNAN, SECRETARY-GENERAL, UNITED NATIONS: Think you've also noticed that a rare demonstration of enthusiasm, where the Liberians are cheering and praying and pleading with the U.S. to come.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NEISLOSS: United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan made the rounds in Washington this week talking about Liberia and Iraq.

Welcome back. We are ON THE STORY.

Right there Annan, you heard asking for, pleading for help on Liberia. He did meet with George Bush this week. George Bush told him in a meeting, look, let's not get bogged down. We don't want to get bogged down in Liberia. What is our exit strategy? He wants to know how quickly U.N. peacekeepers come could come in if the U.S. were to contribute. How quickly could the U.N. take over?

They fear getting bogged down. They want to know what the next step would be. But again, this week we are now seeing even today, a cease-fire in Liberia is breaking down. It is a humanitarian disaster and the U.N. is saying help is needed right away.

COHEN: Liz, why would the U.S. have to go back to the U.N. to ask permission? How does that work?

NEISLOSS: Ah. OK. On the subject of Iraq, that's the other sort of big discussion that Annan had in Washington this week. It's really about sharing the burden for the U.S. The U.S. wants troops from other countries to come in. They need to find a way to do it. Countries, Germany, France, India have told, particularly this week; have said, look, we cannot do anything unless we have authorization from the U.N.

So the U.S. will have to go back to the table and try to get the authorization that it needs. It may not be so easy. As a Chinese diplomat basically to me this week, look, the U.S. thought it was going to be so ease. They'd walk interest Iraq and they would just find open arms.

QUIJANO: Liz, I wanted to ask you, who will represent Iraq now? I mean this country is being built. It's in the process now of trying to get back on its feet. Who goes back now to the United Nations and sits there as the representative of this still being formed country?

NEISLOSS: Oh, it's a very good question. This week, in fact -- this coming week, we're going see the first kind of diplomatic foray from Iraq. This new Governing Counsel is going to send three individuals. The tricky part is in terms of who represents Iraq; there are six diplomats, actually sitting in the Iraqi mission in the New York representing the Saddam Hussein government. So these delegates will come this week and they will speak as expert, but not on the part of Iraq. That question is going to have to be decided by the General Assembly. And for now, if anyone is going to put in a request to represent the government, it would have to be there as the sovereign authority. So it seems that the U.S. is going to want to keep that on ice for the time being.

STARR: Liz, you know it seems like there ought to be a reality check out there that people are seen about this question of going back to the United Nations for a resolution. Because so much of it is really, as you said, a reflection of the U.S.'s inability to get other countries to contribute troops of their own volition without a U.N. resolution. I mean, even this week, I believe Russia said it wanted to see something out of the United Nations.

But will that solve the problem for these countries? Or are some of them holding back because they believe it's still a war and they don't want to be in a combat situation?

NEISLOSS: Well, first of all and the question of irony, there's a huge irony and the U.S. having to go back. There isn't a diplomat to found -- to find that doesn't actually see this. They do genuinely say that a resolution would be needed to satisfy constituents, basically, back home who didn't support the war.

But this return to the U.N. also opens the door to deal making that could go on. Deals, business deals, potentially for countries that have been shut out of Iraq. So this is an opportunity to return for the authority for troops, but also there may be a little play there.

STARR: But also if the U.S. goes back, gets a resolution out of the United Nations, does the U.S. military, does the Bush administration then give up its total control over the reconstruction and the post-war process to other countries and possibly to the U.N.?

NEISLOSS: Well, I think that's -- the devil will be in the details of the negotiating, I think. It's not going to be a waltz for the U.S. to just go back to the U.N. and say here's the resolution, sign on the dotted line. OK, send your troops. I think that that is where the negotiating is going to be done.

Kofi Annan actually suggested this week that proposed a new resolution might be a way of authorizing police training, other ways the U.N. could get involved. So I don't think the door is totally closed on what pieces might have to be negotiated away.

QUIJANO: All right, Liz. Well, you can bet that many leaders at the U.N. and around the world are carefully watching the political battle brewing here in Washington over what intelligence President Bush and his team had about Iraq before the war. I'm back on that story in two minutes.

ANNOUNCER: Elaine Quijano is a national correspondent for CNN News Source. She files reports for more than 700 television station affiliated with CNN. She joined CNN in 2000. Earlier, she worked as a reporter in Tampa and Champagne, Illinois and she graduated from the University of Illinois.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think the intelligence I get is darn good intelligence. And the speeches I have given were backed by good intelligence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUIJANO: President Bush at the center of a storm over "darned good intelligence." A storm that blew up some powerful political winds this week and promises more to come for the president and his top spy, CIA Director George Tenet.

Welcome back. We are ON THE STORY.

And you know this was a situation that really kind of mushroomed over the past couple of weeks. It started with a comment and really centered on the 16 words, these now infamous 16 words that were in the president's State of the Union Address that had to do with a report that he cited. A British report saying that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa. Now, that was later to be found based in part on some forced documents.

And now Democrats are saying that President Bush may have misled the country about how solid some of this pre-war intelligence was. The Bush administration has fired back saying that, look, these are some of the same people who are going to be running for office. And they are simply trying to stoke the political fires here and keep this alive.

NEISLOSS: If -- yes. Elaine, it's just amazing. I have to say at the U.N. months ago, they were saying those document related to uranium and Niger, they were false. But the story obviously had a lot more life to it. What you are finding? Is this a line in a speech? Is this really about credibility? What are you hearing?

QUIJANO: Well, it's a little bit of both. I mean you hear from some Democrats who say, look, how can we ever trust the word of the president when there is so much doubt about this one particular line. How do we know that this is not just part of a larger pattern? Perhaps, of exaggerated evidence out there. And they also bring up the issue of how can we then go on to the international stage and try and talk about things like North Korea with any measure of credibility when in fact this is something that is suspect.

So they are bringing up some issues of that future but at the same time, of course, Democrats are really trying to put kind of chinks in the armor of the president here. And kind of poke holes wherever they can in terms of his credibility. And this is an issue they really have latched on in just the last week or so.

STARR: Well, that's the point you know the White House was making this week. No one expects the president of the United States to be a fact checker, a researcher of every detail in his own speeches.

But the question really goes more to his senior staff. Why did they not have the basic knowledge or did they have the basic knowledge? Was there in fact, some political agenda by senior staff members that led to some of this happening. Was there more here than meets the eye because it sure doesn't look at the moment like CIA Director George Tenet. He may have apologized and may have taken responsibility but he's not really taking a fall for this.

QUIJANO: Well, that's true.

STARR: Not yet anyway.

QUIJANO: That's true. Absolutely. And he's still in play place. And it's interesting because the White House has felt so strongly about these attacks on President Bush's credibility that yesterday they unclassified eight pages of a 90-page document that had to do with prewar intelligence because they wanted to build up their case. And say, look President Bush was not just pulling this information from out of thin air. Here is a report that was based on intelligence services information that also talks about other countries in Africa that Iraq was possibly trying to seek uranium from.

These classified documents talked about Somalia, perhaps in the Democratic Republic of Congo. So that line, they go back to that line and they say it was technically correct. He cited British intelligence that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa. So, they sort of are trying to put all of this behind them now.

WILLIS: But you know, somebody else on the offensive, Prime Minister Tony Blair. He comes to Washington and talks to both Houses of Congress. I'm thinking the kind of reception he got there, he's not going back to the House of Commons.

QUIJANO: Yes, that's exactly right. And it was such a compelling speech, I mean on a lot of different levels. You know even though there was this back biting going on, and it was such an acrimonious tone on the Hill going into his visit. You never would have guessed that from the number of ovations and the number of interruptions and bursts of applause that he got. I mean it was quite a rousing speech.

And you know even Democrats who had up until that point been so belligerent and really trying to attack the president. You know they acknowledged -- they showed their respect for him. And they certainly made it sound as though there wasn't any kind of dissension. That they certainly were all for you know standing behind the U.S.'s actions when you know in reality they still are questioning, as I said, some of that prewar intelligence.

COHEN: Elaine, take us back to last winter when the president made the speech. These 16 words about the uranium, was this a major argument that he made for going to war or one of many minor arguments?

QUIJANO: Well, that's the thing, the White House says, look, we certainly did not go to war over the 16 words. That really -- it was a much larger case that we have put forth. And certainly anybody that looks at the information will see you know that this was, obviously, it was mentioned but it was not the central portion of the White House's argument.

And you know there were reservations expressed within the Bush administration. The State Department and the CIA had expressed concerns about this intelligence. So there was some discussion about it. But at the same time the Bush administration is maintaining that, look, we are not centering -- we did not enter our plans to go to war on these 16 words.

And they also are saying that we do not yet know whether or not that's false. As I said, going back to the Somalia reference and the NIE documents. Going back to the Democratic Republic of Congo, they said, look, it could still be the case that Iraq was in fact seeking uranium from Africa.

WILLIS: Well, if the Bush team is keeping one eye on Iraq. The other is watching the economy. What it means for your job, your income and what you can afford to buy. I'm back ON THE STORY in two minutes.

ANNOUNCER: Gerri Willis is personal finance editor with CNNfn. She is the author of the "Smart Money Guide For Real Estate Investing." She was a 1992, Knight-Bagehot Fellow at Columbia University. And in 2000 won the American University and ICI Education Award for Excellence in Personal Finance Reporting.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALAN GREENSPAN, CHAIRMAN, FEDERAL RESERVE: Some of the residual war-related uncertainties have abated further. And financial conditions have turned decidedly more accommodative.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIS: Federal Reserve chairman serving up a carefully, crafted, mildly optimistic view of the future.

Welcome back. We're ON THE STORY.

Federal Reserves Chairman Greenspan this week getting all of the attention. He was saying, well the economy looks like it's getting a little bit better and believe you me, I'm going to keep interest rates low. Well the bond market reacted immediately selling off, that pushed rates higher.

The thing I wanted to talk about is that higher rates is going to be bad for some investors, particularly people who were buying new homes and getting mortgages. An interesting report out from the Mortgage Bankers Association this week showing that they believe that issuance of mortgages will be down 45 percent next year. And the reason you should care about that if you're not in the market is that it can really hurt the economy.

What's been going on over the last year to two years is that the market -- or the economy itself has been propelled by consumers spending and primarily on houses as people either refinance, take some equity out of their home or they buy a new home and they start spending on carpeting and paint, et cetera, et cetera. So, a sort of worrisome trend today.

I just want to mention, too, that in addition to that, numbers on unemployment have been very, very scary. And I think that's the thing we really need to be paying attention to here now, jobless rates at a 20-year high.

STARR: Plus protections of record deficits, I believe this week.

WILLIS: Yes, $455 billion. That's a record high. Not great for the economy, doesn't really help the economy. And the question, of course, how big does it go because it doesn't include a lot of numbers. A lot of reinvestment going on in Iraq by the U.S. right now that's not included. And Greenspan was just saying this week that it doesn't include anything for boomers who are retiring and will put a big load on the Social Security system.

STARR: Do people believe the tax cut has now worked its way into the economy or is that still something the administration hopes for in the future?

WILLIS: Well, we are just getting those child tax credits this week and the next few weeks. So we'll see how that works out. But it's an open question how much people are actually going to spend? You know the last time around that we did this, most people saved the money or they used it to pay off credit cards.

QUIJANO: Gerri, I wanted to ask you about this report out by this group that talked about the recession having ended? What was this about?

WILLIS: Right. Exactly. They said it was just an eight-month recession. But you know, people out there who are unemployed lost their jobs; I think they're thinking something quite different. And In fact, think about it, I mean it was you know easy enough getting through the recession; the hard part has been the recovery as people continue to lose jobs.

STARR: Absolutely. Mm.

NEISLOSS: And on the job loss front, I mean I think even today President Bush said that the tax cuts will spur the economy and in turn that will help unemployment. How is that message received looking at the huge deficit?

WILLIS: Well, I think people out there are wondering when is this all going to happen? When is this going to take place? And of course, it takes a long time to percolate through the economy because what you're getting is consumers will continue to spend. That that money will go into the pockets of people who own businesses, who will eventually spend more money.

But I have to mention one thing quickly, which is that rising greats will help some people and that's the people on fixed incomes who have had a heck of a time raising money recently.

COHEN: Gerri, given this bad news about deficits and about unemployment, is there any finger-pointing going on yet?

WILLIS: Well, I think the Democrats are going to be all over this in the coming election. This is going to be their big issue. And remember, the president's father had a huge problem with this issue. It's often cited as the reason he lost the election. So you're going to see this coming back again and again, unless there's some quick immediate turnaround. I think we're going to be dealing with this issue, talking about it for a long time to come.

STARR: And there's no indication is there, from the Bush administration, from the White House of any economic course correction on their part. They are committed to this for the long haul.

WILLIS: They're committed to this. They're committed to the tax plan they laid out. They're continuing at pace with this. And I think the big questions are should more money be pumped directly into the pockets of people who are less well off than the people who are very well off? This is the key factor that the Democrats are going to play. I think it's going to be an issue that we're going to be debating.

Another issue that is going to be coming front and center here is, can people continue to save for retirement? This is a big issue that's only going to build as we find these huge deficits coming in the future on Social Security. And I think you know this is increasingly the issue that people just don't want to deal with.

QUIJANO: Gerri, what about mortgage refinancing? Is that over?

WILLIS: No. You know as a matter of fact, you know the weekly numbers were out just this week. And there was a bit of a falloff in refinance activity and that was in a week that rates did not fall. So I think as the rates start to pick up, you'll see some of that fall off.

But there was a big expansion actually, in people buying new homes. You know this housing market has had legs that nobody expected. It's a shocking, really how fast and how furious it's been able to continue. And of course, it's raising doubts with some people. Can it? Will I be losing value in my home? Are prices actually going to go down? Of course, that market moves incredibly slowly, thank God it's not as quick as the stock market, which trades up and down every day.

NEISLOSS: But with all of the low interest rates have people been piling on more debt? I know for a while we were all talking about the levels of personal debt and that being a problem. So where does that factor in? WILLIS: Well, you know it's interesting; personal debt has gone higher, bankruptcies have ticked higher. But you know you've got to realize there's a bit of an irony in the idea that people are always telling consumers, don't borrow so much money, quit running up that credit card debt. And on the other hand it's the only thing that's kept this economy going is the fact that consumers were willing to spend.

You know they saw their incomes climb pretty dramatically you know through the '90s boom and even into the last couple of years. So I think that it's been hard for consumers to put the brakes on. But you know, now that we see so many layoffs. I think that the question of consumer-spending coming up is going to be paramount.

QUIJANO: All right. Thank you to all of my colleagues and thank you for watching ON THE STORY. We'll be back next week.

Still ahead at the top of the hour, "PEOPLE IN THE NEWS," focusing this week on Tour de France champ, Lance Armstrong trying for his fifth consecutive win.

At 12 noon Eastern, 9:00 a.m. Pacific, "CNN LIVE SATURDAY," with a report on crop circles and the people who believe in them.

And at 1:00 p.m. Eastern and 10 a.m. Pacific, CNN's "IN THE MONEY" looks at how North Korea gets the money to pay for nuclear weapons.

Coming up at the top of the hour, a news alert but first, the president's weekly radio address.

(BEGIN AUDIO TAPE)

BUSH: Good morning.

Next week, the United States Treasury will begin printing and mailing more than 25 million child tax credit checks, putting over $12 billion back into the hands of American families. These rebates are the result of the Jobs and Growth Act I recently signed into law, which increases the child tax credit from $600 to $1,000 per child.

And because this new law reduced income-tax rates, businesses earlier this month lowered tax withholding for worker paychecks. Now those workers and their families have a lighter tax bill and more take-home pay.

With the child tax credit rebates and the lower tax rates taking effect, America's families will have more of their own money to make purchases, pay their bills, save for their children's education and invest in a new home or business.

There are hopeful signs that our actions are contributing to economic growth. Individual investors are showing greater confidence, leading to a significant rise in the stock market. And thanks to our efforts to reduce taxes on stock dividends, dozens of major companies have announced plans to either increase their existing dividend payout or pay dividends for the first time, putting billions of dollars in cash into shareholders' pockets.

Earlier this week, I met with leading private economists, who see a faster rate of economic growth in the coming year and a half. The U.S. housing market is robust, strengthened by low mortgage rates and rising after-tax incomes. Inflation is low, retail sales have been rising, and productivity growth, the most important indicator of economic strength, remains high.

My administration remains focused on faster economic growth that will translate into more jobs. Now that Americans can keep more of what they earn, we can expect to see rising demand for goods and services. And as demand increases, companies will need more workers to meet it.

We will continue to take action on a broad agenda for more growth and jobs. We are pressing the Senate to join the House of Representatives in passing an energy bill to assure stable and affordable energy supplies. And we're pressing the Senate on litigation reform, so small businesses and manufacturers can focus on creating jobs instead of fighting frivolous lawsuits. I'm asking both houses of Congress to create re-employment accounts for those seeking jobs, so they can pay for job training and child care and other costs of finding work.

Faster economic growth will bring the added benefit of higher revenues for our government. And those new revenues, combined with spending discipline in Washington, D.C., are the surest way to bring down the deficit. My budget for fiscal year 2004 calls for a modest increase in discretionary spending of only 4 percent, or about the same increase as the average American household budget. I urge Congress to make spending discipline a priority, so that we can cut the deficit in half over the next five years.

Government does not create prosperity. Government can, however, create the conditions that make prosperity possible. The Jobs and Growth Act of 2003 was based on the fundamental faith in the energy and creativity of the American people. With hard work and daily determination, entrepreneurs and workers are moving this economy forward. The American economy is headed in the right direction, and we can be confident of better days ahead.

Thank you.

(END AUDIO TAPE)

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Face Dangers of Kidnapping, Rape; Congress Grills Tenet>