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Inside Politics
President Bush offers Long-Term Vision for Europe
Aired June 15, 2001 - 17:00 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.
ANNOUNCER: Live from Washington, this is INSIDE POLITICS with Judy Woodruff.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The Iron Curtain is no more. Now we plan and build the house of freedom.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: With the Cold War laid to rest, President Bush looks to Europe's future.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN MILITARY AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Isn't it ultimately your responsibility?
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: You bet. I agree with him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: Pentagon Chief Donald Rumsfeld talks to us about the Vieques bombing fallout and more.
And, bye-bye, Bayh. The would-be presidential bid that won't be.
Now Judy Woodruff takes you INSIDE POLITICS.
JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you for joining us. The backdrop was symbolic: Warsaw, Poland, in the heart of the old Soviet bloc. There, President Bush not only offered his long-term vision for Europe, he set the stage for the immediate future, his pivotal talks tomorrow with Russia's President Vladimir Putin.
Our senior White House correspondent, John King, has more on the speech billed as the centerpiece of Mr. Bush's European tour.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN KING, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A wreath-laying at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and at the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial tributes to painful memories in Europe's past, on a day the president tried to put his stamp on its future. BUSH: No more Munichs. No more Yaltas.
(APPLAUSE)
BUSH: Let us tell all those who have struggled to build democracy and free markets what we have told the Poles: From now on, what you build, you keep. No one can take away your freedom or your country.
KING: Mr. Bush favors expanding the 19-nation NATO military alliance and the 15-member European Union economic and political partnership, with an eye to the east, and embracing more former Soviet client states. Poland joined the NATO alliance two years ago, and the president held it out as example, recalling his father's visit here in 1989, his call for a Europe, whole and free.
BUSH: This free Europe is no longer a dream. It is the Europe that is rising around us. It is the work that you and I are called on to complete.
KING: It is talk that makes Russia nervous, but the president says Moscow has nothing to fear.
BUSH: NATO, even as it grows, is no enemy of Russia. Poland is no enemy of Russia. America is no enemy of Russia.
(APPLAUSE)
KING: Mr. Bush meets the Russian leader Saturday in Slovenia. Missile defense is a Bush priority for that session, and Poland's president offered his endorsement.
PRES. ALEKSANDER KWASNIEWSKI, POLAND: It is necessary to create effective security system for new world, for global world after World War II and after Cold War.
KING: But aggressive U.S. research would violate the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty, and the president wants Mr. Putin to renegotiate.
BUSH: I will make the case, as I have to all the European leaders I have met on this trip, that the basis for our mutual security must move beyond Cold War doctrines.
KING: Mr. Bush also will press Russia to end sales of missile technology to Iran.
(on camera): The two leaders will be together just a few hours, and the White House says it expects no breakthroughs. But Mr. Bush says he wants to make clear he in no way considers Russia to be the enemy, and says he also wants to take the measure of a man he hopes to one day call a friend.
John King, CNN, Warsaw.
(END VIDEOTAPE) WOODRUFF: Here in the United States, the backlash continues against the Bush administration's plan to end Navy bombing exercises on Puerto Rico's Vieques Island. Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott today joined the ranks of Republicans who oppose the decision, and who say Congress can block it. Navy Secretary Gordon England seemed to offer lawmakers a way to do that. He said that he would reconsider his decision to end the drills in two years if Congress does not agree to rescind its requirement for a referendum on the island, and if the Navy later won that vote. But for now, England says it is better to pull out of Vieques.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GORDON ENGLAND, SECRETARY OF THE NAVY: It's better for us to be in control, for us to take the initiative, for the Department of Navy to decide how we will proceed in the future in training our forces, rather than leave it to local referendum.
My judgment, leaving that to local referendum, is a very bad precedent. I would much rather be in control of this situation, have us make the decision, have us control our destiny.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WOODRUFF: England insisted the plan to leave Vieques Island was his, based on his believe that alternative training methods can be found. He denied that the decision was dictated by the White House for political reasons.
Amid the flak over the Vieques decision, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is pointing a finger at the Clinton administration. Rumsfeld sat down with CNN military affairs correspondent Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon today. Here is an extended excerpt from their interview.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MCINTYRE: Mr. Secretary, thank you very much for being with us.
RUMSFELD: Thank you.
MCINTYRE: Lots of angst up on the Hill about the decision to abandon Vieques as a training range after May of 2003. Were you surprised by the reaction from some conservative, pro-defense Republicans? You know these guys pretty well.
RUMSFELD: Sure, and they are terrific people. And there is very strong feeling on both sides of this issue. There are people up there on the Hill who have been strongly opposed to bombing, using Vieques as a bombing range. There have been people up on the Hill who have a very clear understanding that if we're going to send young men and young women over to the Gulf and be in danger, that they need to arrive there well-trained, and having experienced the kind of live fire that will prepare them to do the best possible job to protect themselves and to perform their taste. That's a dilemma, when you have very strong interests on both sides. The Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and the secretary of the Navy have made a decision, and I think that there's no question that they've balanced this properly, and we'll have to find ways over the coming period of two or three, four years, to find ways that we can see that we get the training that's needed in other ways. And we're aggressively looking for ways to do that.
MCINTYRE: I realize that Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz and the Navy secretary were the men intimately involved in this, in resolving this issue. But isn't it ultimately your responsibility, Mr. Defense Secretary, to provide the adequate training? How does this walking away from this referendum in November square with the idea that the U.S. troops have to be trained properly before they go into dangerous situations?
RUMSFELD: Well, the prior administration made an agreement with the government of Puerto Rico that there would be an referendum, and that they would leave the Vieques training range in 2003 if they lost to referendum. That's the arrangement that was made, and we have to live with that.
Now, the question as to whether or not there will be a referendum is up to the Congress. The Congress has a requirement that there be one. There may very well be one, there may not be one, and that's something that's been now teed up for others to decide.
MCINTYRE: Well, I'm going to move on, but I just want to clarify one thing. Are you saying that essentially the Clinton administration lost Vieques when they agreed to that settlement that included a referendum?
RUMSFELD: Who knows? All I know are the facts, and the facts are that that arrangement was made before this administration came into office, and there it is. You have to live with it. You have to live up to your word in life. I can assure you that we are going to find ways, one way or another, to see that the men and women who go to the Gulf have the same kind of training that we're giving the men and women who go out in the Pacific, for their deployments. And we simply must do that.
MCINTYRE: And you're not concerned that you may lose other training facilities in the United States or around the world because they'll take a page out of the book of the protesters in Vieques?
RUMSFELD: Oh, this is an issue that didn't start, or won't end, with Vieques. It started decades and decades ago. And, it's interesting, you know, they build an air station somewhere in America, and a lot of -- there's no one there, it's vacant land. Then all of a sudden, people move around it, and suddenly there's a lot of people living around it and they say: What in the world do we have this air base here for?
That's part of life, and we have to constantly look at that issue of encroachment. And -- but no, I think that this is an issue that's been going on for decades and decades. MCINTYRE: U.S. Relations with Europe: you just returned from travel to Europe. President Bush is in Europe now. The sense that I got when I was travelling with you to Europe was that many Europeans are skeptical about whether the threats that you talked about are real and immediate, and whether the missile defense that you talked about deploying is workable in any reasonable time frame. How do you bridge that gulf between the European perceptions and the U.S., in terms of making this alliance work?
RUMSFELD: Well, first of all, there is no Europe, in a sense. It's a piece of real estate with a number of nations that are there, some of which are in NATO, some aren't. Some are in the EU, European Union, some are not. Some are in neither. And so I've always been kind of bemused by the way the articles appear in the press: "Europe thinks this."
Not so. A large number of the countries that I met with are very positive on -- fully understand the nature of the threat. A large number of them support the idea of being able to have some capability to defend their populations from ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction.
MCINTYRE: The big concern seemed to be the ABM Treaty, and we hear from time to time...
RUMSFELD: True.
MCINTYRE: ... someone say that scrapping the ABM Treat or amending it would result in a new arms race. You don't buy that?
RUMSFELD: No. No, I don't at all. I mean, who's going to race? I mean, Russia is not going to race. Russia's economy is about the size of Holland's or Thailand's. It's a -- they do not have the economic capability to race. We have no intention to race with anybody.
The ballistic missile defense that we're talking about is designed to deal with small handfuls of these capabilities. Russia has thousands of ballistic missiles and warheads, I should say -- nuclear warheads.
Now, that's just not a fact that it would lead to an arms race. It will not.
The problem is that you've got a treaty that was developed in the early 1970s, or 1970, that has as its sole purpose preventing the United States and the old Soviet Union from defending themselves against ballistic missiles. That made sense then. That was the Cold War. They were an enemy then. They're not an enemy today. We're not worried about Russia launching ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads at the United States.
When you go to sleep at night, you don't worry about it. When I go to sleep at night, I don't worry about it. The reality is, however, that these weapons are proliferating throughout the world and people unlike them are getting them: the Saddam Husseins of the world. And they aren't -- they don't behave according to the same sets of rules. And I think that a policy of vulnerability to ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction in the hands of someone like Saddam Hussein is not a policy at all -- it's mindless. And we simply ought to recognize that, set aside that treaty, go beyond it, recognize the Cold War is over, get over it, change our language, change our approach, fashion a new construct that makes sense for the 21st century.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WOODRUFF: Jamie McIntyre's interview today, part of it, with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Secretary Rumsfeld also noted that he is willing to approve future military contacts with China now that Washington and Beijing are putting their April standoff over the U.S. surveillance plane behind them.
Our Friday political roundtable and "The Play of the Week" will be coming up, but first, the list of Democratic hopefuls for president just got smaller. We will talk with one senator who says he'll take a pass on the 2004 campaign.
Also ahead, Democrat Tom Daschle said America would pay a price for the Bush tax cut, but Daschle's party is paying for TV ads that congratulate a fellow Democrat for making the cuts reality. And later, is the Kennedy era coming to a close in Massachusetts? A look at the electoral future of the younger generation. This is INSIDE POLITICS.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOODRUFF: Ever since Evan Bayh was elected Indiana secretary of state when he was just 30 years old. Democrats have seen him as a natural for higher office. This afternoon, however, Senator Bayh announced that he will not run for president, at least not in the year 2004. Bayh said that a presidential campaign would take too much time from his family.
CNN senior political correspondent Candy Crowley has more on Evan Bayh's decision to remain on the sidelines.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There are nine or so Democrats considered to be considering a run for president. Now there's one less.
SEN. EVAN BAYH (D), INDIANA: I just had nagging doubts about whether it was possible with the all-consuming demands of being a candidate for president, whether I wouldn't be essentially abandoning my children at a very special time in their life, and I just didn't think that was the right thing to do.
CROWLEY: Head of the Democratic Leadership Council, an influential group of moderates, Senator Evan Bayh is a freshman Democrat from Indiana, governor there for eight years, son of former Senator Birch Bayh, who ran for president in '76. Camera-friendly and ambitious, the younger Bayh is the father of twin 5-year-old boys. It is because of where they are in their lives, he says, he is opting out of the 2004 speculation -- most of it.
BAYH: The decision about vice president is out of your hands. It's three years down the road, and it would involve a 3-month campaign, not a 3 1/2-year campaign. So the impact on my kids -- because they would be older and I wouldn't be gone constantly for, you know, years and years -- wouldn't be nearly the same.
CROWLEY: Usually, at this stage of the game, 3 1/2 years away from an election, politicians play coy. Whatever else, to be seen as considering a run for the Oval Office gives you a certain cache, a public platform of sorts. But the buzz was a mixed bag for Bayh, whose bid for president would have coincided with his Senate re- election race in 2004. A Democrat in a state that elected George Bush by 16 percent, his votes against Attorney General John Ashcroft, against the Bush budget have caused him some grief.
The editorial pages of the conservative "Indianapolis Star" accused Bayh of voting liberal because "To be viewed as presidential timber, one must vote in lockstep with Washington's mainstream Democrats, who are usually pretty far to the left of mainstream Hoosiers."
Bayh, said one leading Indiana Republican, is "getting hammered."
The senator says his back-home critics were noted, but not influential in his decision. Still, if the decision is influential on his critics, what the hey.
BAYH: Now people won't question my motives. They'll know Evan is doing what he thinks is right, he believes in this, and let's listen to what he has to say -- not always wondering, well, is this just some political motivation of some kind.
CROWLEY: If nothing else, the incoming fire from the home front underscored the difficulty Bayh would have had running as a Democrat for senator in mostly conservative Indiana while trying to secure the support he would have needed as a national Democrat running for president.
(on camera): Headline news in Indiana, Bayh's buy is little more than a footnote in the field of those still considered to be still considering a race in 2004. This week, House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt considered it while in New Hampshire, and next week former Senator Bill Bradley and current Senator John Kerry will consider it while in Iowa.
Candy Crowley, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WOODRUFF: Senator Bayh is home in Indiana now to promote a government-funded fatherhood initiative, and he joins us now to talk about his decision to stay out of the presidential race in the year 2004.
Senator, I know you were listening to Candy Crowley's report. What about that argument from Republicans in your home state that it's hard for someone like you to run because it in order to do that you'd have to be in lockstep with the liberals in the Democratic Party.
BAYH: You know, Judy, I weighed some of these political considerations, but ultimately concluded that that was just background noise because there are pluses and minuses to anything. And this was a deeply personal decision that will allow me to do right by all the people I care about, the 6 million people of Indiana who've entrusted me with representing them in the United States Senate, and two little boys at home who deserve more than an absentee father.
So, you know, in public life you do what you think is right. You always have some critics, and you let the political chips fall where they may. So that kind of thing really didn't factor into my thinking.
WOODRUFF: Why announce it now?
BAYH: I thought it was the straightforward and candid thing to do, Judy. Frankly, some people said to me, look, you ought to let the speculation go along for six months, or 12 months. As Candy was saying in her report, it lends a little cache to you.
But, you know, with the growing realization in my heart that, while the time may come one day when it is the right thing to do, when my kids are a little bit older, that it was not the right thing to do now, I felt that that would be less than forthright with the people who support me and care about me to engage in that sort of, you know, political calculation.
So I thought being candid now was the right thing to do. I also thought that, look, if I'm going to do this, like anything else I've done in my life, I'm going to give it 100 percent. And I like to be judged on my best effort, not doing something only halfway.
And the final thing is, I mentioned in the report to her, now people will know that I'm championing the issues I care about, that I believe in them, and there's not a political agenda that's being pursued beneath the surface.
WOODRUFF: Do you think you could have won, had you run?
BAYH: Well, we'll never know. I was flattered, Judy, by the expressions of support, many -- many of them unsolicited, from financial people, from grassroots organizers, from substantive policy people. I think we could have put together a very strong effort in all of those areas.
But, you know, if it's not right for the people you care most about, these two little boys who are in their formative years, their most sensitive years, it just wasn't the right thing to do. So we'll never know. But the one thing I do know is that I would have not been doing right by my kids at the time that they really needed me, and that would be something I would have had a hard time living with.
WOODRUFF: Well, I know a lot of people will, certainly, respect you for putting family first.
Senator, have you analyzed the race enough to think about, or to conclude, what it's going to take to beat George W. Bush, or what it would take, I should say, to beat George W. Bush in 2004?
BAYH: I have thought about that, Judy. And I think the most -- the single most important thing for whoever we nominate is to have a compelling vision of a better America -- of positive things that we can do to give people more opportunity that resonate in their daily lives: better quality health care, better schools for our kids, more economic opportunity, an energy policy that makes sense.
And contrast that in a respectful way with some of the policies of President Bush that may be out of step with what mainstream Americans are looking for.
So I think a positive vision, on the one hand, that has credibility with people in their daily lives, and then a respectful contrast with the current administration, saying how they could do things a little better.
I think that, overall, is what people
(AUDIO GAP)
... and that sort of thing, those things will fall into place if you have the right kind of ideas for the American people.
WOODRUFF: Will it matter what wing or what part of the Democratic Party the nominee comes from? Whether it's someone from the moderate center of the party, if you will, or someone more to the left, more liberal?
BAYH: I do think it matters. I think, at least for the foreseeable future, we're going to have two kinds of presidents in our country. I think we'll either have Republican presidents, or we'll have moderate Democrats. Because I think people want to know that Democrats can be fiscally responsible -- that we can favor economic growth and an expanding economy, that we're for a secure national defense, and that we -- an important aspect here, Judy, that we will champion the tradition values -- the enduring values that have always made our country great, like strengthening families to help raise kids. That's why I'm at home here in Indiana today, championing that issue.
So I think those are the kind of things that resonate with the American people. They resonate with swing voters, mainstream Americans. And I think those are the kind of things that our party should stand for, and that centrists embody best. WOODRUFF: I hear what you're saying, Senator, about centrism and about health care and schools and energy and so forth, but this country was very much divided right down the middle in November at the time of the election. It appears still to be divided.
How does one go about bringing that together, or at least enough together to win an election with a majority of both the electoral and the popular vote?
BAYH: Our country has been too divided. And I think the way you get away from that is to reject the fallacies of the far right and the far left, and to advocate policies that people understand are common sense and represent the future, not the divisions of the past.
And I think you just go down it issue by issue on the things that people care about -- jobs, health care, schools, fiscal policy, and taxes -- and be candid with people, embrace bipartisan cooperation where we can.
I think the worst thing for our party now would be to obstruct President Bush solely for the sake of obstruction. Where we can cooperate and accomplish things for the American people, we have a responsibility to do that, just as we have a responsibility where we have a disagreement to offer an alternative and then take that to the people in the next election.
So I think the way we bring Americans together is both in the tone and the substance of how we pursue the campaign. And I hope we nominate somebody who will embody both.
WOODRUFF: All right. Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, who announced today he will not run for president in 2004 -- may be interested in the vice presidency down the line in that year, but who was just telling me he'll be active in the United States Senate and is head of the Democratic Leadership Council.
Once again, Senator, thank you very much.
BAYH: Thank you for having me, Judy.
WOODRUFF: We appreciate it.
And one bit of unfinished business from the last presidential campaign: a former aide to a Bush campaign media adviser has pleaded guilty to mail fraud and perjury. Juanita Yvette Lozano faces up to 10 years in prison and half a million dollars in fines. She admitted yesterday that she stole a videotape of George W. Bush practicing for his debate with Al Gore. The tape and a briefing book were mailed to former Democratic Congressman Tom Downey, who was assisting Gore with his debate practices. Downey then turned the materials over to the FBI, who used a post office surveillance tape to identify Lozano as a suspect.
A White House victory in the Senate, but a potential loss in the House. Up next, we'll hear from the president and from a Republican Congressman who is siding against the White House on a key issue. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BUSH: The senate overwhelmingly voted for an education bill that I had submitted to the Congress. It is a piece of legislation that will reform public education in America. It is a meaningful, real reform.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WOODRUFF: President Bush won a legislative victory yesterday when Congress passed his education reform bill. But next week the president faces a new challenge when the Senate is expected to take up a proposed patient's bill of rights.
The president opposes a version of the bill that enjoys wide bipartisan support. And earlier this week, Republican Congressman Charlie Norwood of Georgia broke off negotiations with the White House and re-endorsed his House version of the bill which is opposed by the president.
Representative Norwood joins me now, and thank you very much for being here.
REP. CHARLES NORWOOD (R), GEORGIA: Judy, it's a pleasure.
WOODRUFF: You held off in February going -- back with the original version of the bill. You said you were going to talk to the White House, you got an inch close to reaching an agreement.
NORWOOD: People need to understand that President Bush wants the bill too. And we're not very far apart on any of these bills. We're within the 90 percent range in agreement on everything.
WOODRUFF: Well, what's the inch?
NORWOOD: We couldn't cross the line on the most difficult of the bill which is requiring insurance companies to be responsible for their actions when they practice medicine known as liability. They have to be held liable when they harm people in this system of managed care.
WOODRUFF: Why do you feel so strongly about that?
NORWOOD: Well, I've been in this all my life. Now, I've only been working on this bill 6 years, this month is the anniversary. I've treated patients for 30 years. I've watched this system change from the early 70s into what we have today. And basically Congress itself made the change and allowed then the insurance companies to do the things they are doing today.
So I hold Congress -- I hold us responsible too -- and I'm trying to make the corrections that I believe Jacob Javits would have made in 1974 and '75 had he had time. For us to preempt all health care laws in the states, and that's what the federal government did, and the federal government to be totally silent on how health care is managed in this country is not what Senator Javits intended.
WOODRUFF: Now, the White House is saying it's all right to let people go to court in the federal court, but not the state court. Why is it not enough to use the federal courts to resolve these matters?
NORWOOD: Well, the other side of that question is why isn't it enough to use the state courts to resolve these matters of quality-of- care issues that historically have done that. There is no jurisprudence in the federal courts regarding quality of care. There is only common law and jurisprudence in the state courts. We would preempt every state law if we went into federal court that is out there today.
That's what got us into trouble in 1974 -- preempting state laws.
WOODRUFF: Is the White House now all but isolated on this issue?
NORWOOD: No, not at all. I'm working with them now. We're going to pass our bill. We're going to pass the Ganske-Dingell-Norwood bill.
WOODRUFF: Now, that's the bill that allows the suits in the state courts?
NORWOOD: That's correct. But we tried to compromise and we did in that bill. Not all suits go to state court in our bill, it's complex, but part of our suits go into federal courts too. And it's dealing with contractual damages. When it's a matter of medical necessity they go to state courts. But we're going to pass our bill in the House.
The Senate is going to pass the McCain-Edwards-Kennedy bill which is our bill.
WOODRUFF: And then what happens at the White House?
NORWOOD: Then we're going to conference. And the last thing I said to the president's men down in the White House, I'll meet you at conference and I'll be as reasonable there as I've tried to be over the last 4 months because I know the president wants a bill as much as I do. Now reasonable people can come to a conclusion. I think we need the prove to the president that the people will have their will in the House and we will pass our bill. We will win, but it will be helpful for them to see that we are going to win.
WOODRUFF: But on this sticking point you keep coming back to on holding the insurance companies responsible, being able to sue in the state courts. Do you think the president ultimately is going to have to come around on that?
NORWOOD: Yes, I do bet we're going to do things a lot of things for him to get there. We're going to do a lot of things to limit the amount of liability that this president wants, that I'm not going to fight him on. We're going to try to make it easy as we can for him to go into state courts. In my heart, and I got to know Governor Bush pretty good in the campaign and after -- and we've talked a lot about this issue.
In my heart I don't believe they really intend or wish to preempt Texas and Georgia state law which going to federal court does. And I think we're going to work this out. This is a good president and he wants this job done.
WOODRUFF: Quick last question: Does anybody in the White House agree with you or are they a united front?
NORWOOD: Well, of course they are united. My staff is united too. I would be disappointed if one of them broke off and was agreeing with me. But we've had so many discussions since February on this that we all very clearly understand where we are. We think that once we show the White House that the people will have their way and the majority of Congress wants the Ganske-Dingell-Norwood bill -- I've been so many bills....
WOODRUFF: Your name is back on there again.
(LAUGHTER)
NORWOOD: They will see that's what we've got to do and that's what the people want.
WOODRUFF: All right, Congressman Charles Norwood of Georgia. Thank you very much. We appreciate your being with us today.
NORWOOD: You bet. Glad to be with you today.
WOODRUFF: Thank you.Great to see you.
And now an item from the All Politics' local department. Many Democrats led by Senate Majority leader Tom Daschle were adamantly opposed to President Bush's tax cut plan. But that has not stopped Democratic strategists from turning one senator's "yes" vote on the tax cut to political advantage back home.
A new television ad running in Montana sells the tax cut that Tom Daschle once called disastrous as a major accomplishment for Max Baucus who just happens to be up for reelection in 2002.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, POLITICAL AD)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... Baucus' bipartisan approach and tireless leadership, the tax cut is better for working families right here in Montana. A bipartisan tax cut for working families. An independent leader helping Montana work it's way back. Max, keep up the fight.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WOODRUFF: As senior Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, Baucus helped to craft and sell the final tax cut deal. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and the Montana Democratic Party are paying for the ads. It is a state that President Bush carried by 24 points last year. A history of success and possible evidence of decline, next on INSIDE POLITICS. Is the Kennedy name losing it's luster with voters? A look at how the new generation is faring when INSIDE POLITICS returns.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOODRUFF: No member of the Kennedy has ever lost an election in Massachusetts. But in recent years the newest crop of Kennedys have seemed less invincible than their older relatives. CNN's Boston bureau chief Bill Delaney has more on what some say is a political dynasty showing signs of decline.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL DELANEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Something seems to have ended when 36 year-old lawyer and environmental activist, Max Kennedy, son of Robert F. Kennedy seemed about to start a run for Congress in Massachusetts venerable 9th district.
MAX KENNEDY, ENVIRONMENTAL ACTIVIST: One party (LAUGHTER) has consistently favored the few at the expense of the many.
DELANEY: An at times strange, at times halting speech at Harvard. And though most of it was at least reasonably well delivered, the press pounced, declaring Max not ready for the big time. Then Max had his name linked to accused murderer Michael Skakel, his cousin. Both involved in a serious altercation with a policeman at Harvard while at college.
And then Max Kennedy decided not to run for Congress after all, echoing the recent decision of his brother, former Congressman Joe Kennedy not to run for governor.
(on camera): And something shifted in long Kennedy-crazed Massachusetts. President John F. Kennedy was born in this house, in Brookline, Massachusetts, just outside Boston. Once upon a time, his name, the Kennedy name, would have been more than enough to get elected in this state to just about anything.
(voice-over): But now, not nowadays, making for a sure shot in the place like the ninth district, where revered Congressman Joe Moakley who passed away in May long held sway, and where Max trailed badly in polls against the number of bare-knuckled local contenders, like three well-informed, used-to-the-stump state senators.
BRIAN MOONEY, "BOSTON GLOBE": You can't just walk in, put your name on the ballot, even if you are a Kennedy and win anymore. The meritocracy has worn out here over the mystique of the Kennedys, I guess.
DELANEY: Max's uncle, Senator Ted Kennedy, still looms as a colossus in Massachusetts, and there are Kennedys, like Ted's son Congressman Patrick Kennedy of Rhode Island, and Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Maryland lieutenant governor, who carry on the name and the legacy. But where rough-and-tumble Boston Mayor John Francis "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald, Max and Joe's great grandfather, set things whirling back in 1910, in Massachusetts a different time.
MOONEY: I think the media is part of it. I mean, you know, for years, "The Globe" was were considered the Kennedy house organ. It's not like that anymore. He was -- Max was roughed up quite a bit, maybe more so than his missteps warranted.
Joe was basically driven out of the 1998 governor's race by, you know, the press and television. The time has passed. I mean, it really has. I mean, we're into the third generation now, and these things never last forever. There are no dynasties. Even the Bushes will pass.
DELANEY: Though in the matter of Kennedys making political music in Massachusetts, this generation may just be skipping a beat. Third generations, after all, do have a way of producing fourth generations.
Bill Delaney, CNN, Boston.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WOODRUFF: A David versus Goliath fight. An underdog defeats the Washington establishment for a "Political Play of the Week," when INSIDE POLITICS returns.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOODRUFF: Now, a "Political Play of the Week" suggestion from the INSIDE POLITICS inbox. Jacqueline Dyson suggests giving the play to Vieques, because, quote: "The political cloud of this tiny island was stronger than long-time conservative GOP congressional leaders, uniformed military leaders and members of the Bush cabinet," end quote.
Well, our Bill Schneider joins us now. Bill, what do you think?
WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, Judy, Vieques was certainly our viewers' favorite "Political Play of the Week." But who was the political genius behind it? President Bush? Karl Rove? Governor George Pataki? Al Sharpton? Who's the player behind the "Political Play of the Week?"
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SCHNEIDER (voice-over): President Bush's decision to end the Navy's bombing practice runs on Vieques island in 2003 is a costly decision that has failed to satisfy opponents.
REP. JOHN CONYERS (D), MICHIGAN: I don't think we should wait two years to do it.
SCHNEIDER: And enraged his conservative base.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "WOLF BLITZER REPORTS") WOLF BLITZER, HOST: And if for political reasons, the White House ordered the Navy to stop, you'd be surprised?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'd be surprised, dismayed and would fight it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCHNEIDER: Political reasons? What political reasons? White House political strategist Karl Rove seemed to play an important role in President Bush's decision. The growing power of Hispanic voters has been very much on Rove's mind.
KARL ROVE, SENIOR WHITE HOUSE ADVISER: They were 2 percent of the turnout in '92. They were 5 percent of the turnout in '96. They were 7 percent of the turnout in 2000.
SCHNEIDER: How did Bush do among Hispanic voters last year? Look at the four largest states. He got about half of the Florida Hispanic vote, which is heavily Cuban-American and conservative, over 40 percent in his home state of Texas, just 28 percent in California, where Republicans have alienated Hispanic voters with what they perceive as anti-immigrant measures. And New York? Just 18 percent.
Most Hispanic voters in New York are Puerto Rican, as in Vieques, an issue that's become a cause to New Yorkers as varied as Governor George Pataki, who lobbied the White House hard to stop the bombing, and Al Sharpton, who went to jail for the cause.
But they're Johnnies-come-lately to the issue. The figure who made Vieques a personal cause and who forced the president's hand on the issue is Puerto Rico's new governor, Sila Calderon.
GOV. SILA CALDERON, PUERTO RICO: I'm taking the message to the White House, to Congress, to the Navy, to the Defense Department that this is something that's not fair. These people are suffering. Their health is affected, their children are in danger, and something must do done.
SCHNEIDER: President Clinton had worked out a deal with her predecessor to hold a binding referendum on Vieques next November, with two choices on the ballot. Puerto Rican voters could allow the bombing to continue and get $50 million in development aid, or they could force the Navy to leave by May 2003. Governor Calderon got elected in part because of anger over that deal.
TOM RIEHLE, PRESIDENT, RIEHLE RESEARCH: Governor Calderon promised in the election that she would do whatever she could to end the bombing immediately.
SCHNEIDER: First, she brought a lawsuit. This week, she signed a law authorizing a referendum on July 29. The new referendum, while non-binding, offers a third choice: stop the bombing now. Polls show an overwhelming majority of Puerto Rican voters favor that choice. Before the voters could say what they want, President Bush stepped in and ordered a bombing halt two years from now. RIEHLE: She comes out a big winner. This is the first time that the White House has clearly come out on the side of those who want the Navy to find an alternative place to bomb.
SCHNEIDER: Governor Calderon wins, and she gets to keep her issue.
CALDERON (through translator): I think the White House took positive and correct steps to move us to a just and permanent solution, but the announcement of continued bombing prevents me from abandoning the measures I started in the name of the Puerto Rican people.
SCHNEIDER: It's quite something to have your cake and eat it, too. In fact, it's the "Political Play of the Week."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCHNEIDER: Hispanic voters in the 50 states have never been a really united force. Cuban-Americans and non-Cubans differed over the Elian Gonzalez issue. Immigration is not an issue for Puerto Ricans, who are Americans by birth. Vieques became an issue not just to Puerto Ricans, but to the entire Hispanic community. And President Bush does not want to be on the wrong side of that issue.
WOODRUFF: Evidently not. Bill Schneider, thanks very much. Have a good weekend.
Was the international charm offensive a success? Ahead: our roundtable guests rate the president's European mission, on style and substance.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOODRUFF: Now the views from our Friday roundtable. This week's guests: Michael Elliott of "TIME" magazine, our own senior political correspondent Candy Crowley, and CNN senior analyst Jeff Greenfield, he's in New York.
Jeff, the Bush message that he's making, that he's putting out in Europe, is this winning some converts?
JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SENIOR ANALYST: I don't know. I guess it depends on whether or not you read some of the more phlegmatic stuff in the European papers or listen to the White House -- the idea that he's convinced them all that missile defense is going to be a good idea.
I'm not sure, and I'm also not sure whether, in light of the GE- Honeywell decision by the European Union, whether the president's political agenda has been trumped by the possibility that globalization may have run up against a European roadblock. That may wind up being the biggest headline of this week. It may dwarf what Bush has done in Europe.
WOODRUFF: Candy Crowley, how is the president -- if he's not winning people over completely to the argument, is he at least winning respect?
CROWLEY: You know, I think this takes, sort of, time. Every American president goes through what's sort of a European hazing, it seems like. And certainly he is going through that from the streets, although we've heard nothing but politeness coming out of the meetings.
There were awfully low expectations from the Europeans going into this, so I think you've got to say, look, they came out, they said, you know, he knew what he was talking about. Did he win over everybody to his missile defense and to his lack of support for the Kyoto treaty? I doubt it. But, you know, this is a continuing process.
WOODRUFF: Michael Elliott, a continuing process? You mean, it's not all said and done after one trip?
MICHAEL ELLIOTT, "TIME" MAGAZINE: No, I think Candy Crowley got it absolutely right. The president soared over a very low bar this week.
I thought he did just fine. Frankly, I think the speech he gave in Warsaw today was perfectly adequate, more than adequate -- didn't break any kind of great new ground. It was rather similar to the speech that President Clinton gave in Prague seven years ago. It was rather similar to the speeches that his father gave 10, 12 years ago. But I thought he did just fine, frankly.
WOODRUFF: Jeff Greenfield, how does one define success on a mission like this one?
GREENFIELD: You know, that's a very good question, because I'm one of those who believes that the sound and fury around some of these trips is usually overstated, and sometimes we don't know the real impact of a trip until much later.
I mean, I go back to the disastrous meeting between Kennedy and Khrushchev in Vienna at the start of his presidency, and I think a couple of months later the Berlin Wall went up, in part, because Khrushchev decided that the new president simply didn't have the tensile strength to resist him.
So it may well be that we're not going to know the answer to your question until we see the reaction months later, when and if a real missile defense program is put before the Congress and the world. I mean, I know "too early to say" is a journalistic cliche; in this case, it may well be the only proper thing to say.
WOODRUFF: Candy, while the president has been in Europe, what's been making as much headlines as anything has been the administration's decision on -- to stop bombing exercises in Vieques. What happened here?
CROWLEY: Well, you know, what happened here in terms of the decision is that he seems to have made everyone unhappy. You have the Navy and the conservatives saying, wait a minute, we can't give up the bombing exercises in Vieques. And you have the people in Vieques and the Latino community in the United States saying, wait, you're not going to do it until 2003? I mean, what's the deal? We want it stopped now.
So, he's clearly made no one happy. What strikes me, is I do wonder who he talked to about this. Now, much is being said about how Karl Rove, his political strategist, was there. Certainly they don't want to lose the Latino vote coming up in 2004. It's becoming increasingly important. We are seeing some of that come to play in this decision.
But what strikes me is, who the heck did they blow this by to see who it would please?
WOODRUFF: Michael Elliott, so much going back and forth about whether -- to what extend was it a political decision, to what extent was it a military decision. How are you reading it?
ELLIOTT: Well, it plainly was not a military decision. I mean, I think we've learned enough over the last few days and, indeed, the months that this issue has been in play to know that the Navy are unhappy about this. There aren't that many beaches on the East Coast or in the Caribbean where they can carry out these live-fire exercises.
So I think it was a political decision. There's something of a pattern here, in terms of the president's courting of the Hispanic vote. He saw President Fox of Mexico twice before he met President Putin of Russia. His first trip -- his first stop on the trip to Europe, if you note, was in Madrid to see the Prime Minister Aznar and the king.
Now, we know from history that Republicans can win substantial proportions of the Hispanic vote outside their home states. I mean, I remember in 1990, the first time that Pete Wilson ran for governor of California, before he tripped up on the immigration issue, he did just fine with Hispanic votes.
So I think there's a record here that Republicans can do well. And I think the president and his political strategists are being very, very smart.
WOODRUFF: If that's the case, Jeff Greenfield, how come the reaction has been so uniformly critical?
GREENFIELD: Well, because he didn't satisfy either side. I mean, obviously if he'd continued the bombing, the Navy and the conservatives would have said, that's standing up to special interests. If he had ended it immediately, it would have been a victory.
You know, just one other thing on the table: One of the most direct political consequences of Vieques is the fate of a Brooklyn -- of a Bronx politician named Adolfo Carrion Jr. He's a city councilman running for Bronx borough president. He is in jail for 40 days for participating in the protest, which means that he has to run most of his primary campaign from his prison cell.
And I'm thinking that the real political play is, if he can win from a prison cell, like James Michael Curley, the old mayor of Boston, it may start a whole flood of politicians to get into prison so they can be seen as martyrs to their people.
So we ought to keep an eye on that race up here, Judy.
WOODRUFF: All right, believe it or not, we are out of time.
Jeff Greenfield in New York, Candy Crowley here in Washington, Michael Elliott, thank you all three, and I hope to see you again very soon. Thanks a lot.
Fighting a losing battle: A look at a commander in chief trapped by a war abroad and the politics at home. That story and much more ahead in the next 30 minutes of INSIDE POLITICS.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOODRUFF: A presidential pairing marked by divisions. What's at stake in tomorrow's U.S.-Russia summit?
Also ahead...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
AL SHARPTON, CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER: To think that I would get 90 days for a protest, 90 days for a nonviolent, peaceful protest.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WOODRUFF: Activist Al Sharpton speaks out from jail on the Vieques controversy that landed him there.
And later, just in time for Father's Day, we will focus on efforts to reconnect absent dads with their children.
Welcome back to INSIDE POLITICS. President Bush says he is eager to look Vladimir Putin in the eye tomorrow and develop a trust between himself and the Russian leader. During a speech in Poland today on Europe's future, Mr. Bush said the United States will seek a constructive relationship with Moscow. But that goal is complicated by U.S. plans to build a missile defense shield, despite Russia's objections.
CNN's Jill Dougherty is in Slovenia for the Bush-Putin summit.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JILL DOUGHERTY, CNN MOSCOW BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): Just like in this U.S.-Russian exhibition baseball game in Moscow, the key players for Saturday's summit are suited up and ready to play ball.
It's Russian President Vladimir Putin's first face-to-face meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush, and he has been preparing carefully for it, according to a senior Kremlin aide, even studying English.
Mr. Putin's introduction to the Bush administration was rocky, filled with spy scandals and disagreements about Mr. Bush's plan to build a missile defense shield. A senior Russian presidential aide admits there was a pause in the U.S.-Russian relationship, but says Moscow is now ready for a quote, "constructive, stable and predictable relationship with Washington."
Vladimir Putin, his aides say, will carefully listen to George W. Bush's explanation of his missile defense plan, but any unilateral action by the United States, they warn, would undermine strategic stability.
VLADIMIR PUTIN, PRESIDENT, RUSSIA (through translator): This is a global question of high interest for everyone, and I expect his personal position concerning this problem. I want to hear it directly from him, not from the president's administration, not from the press.
DOUGHERTY: And Russia still has questions.
IGOR IVANOV, RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTER (through translator): We still don't have answers for the question of what that system is going to consist of, and we are planning to get those answers during our consultations, and to make our comments on them.
DOUGHERTY (on camera): Both leaders will try to size each other up personally to understand what motivates their fellow leader.
PUTIN (through translator): I think that he'll be interested in listening to the Russian position expressed by the head of state.
DOUGHERTY (voice-over): So, as the Russian and U.S. teams warm up for their match, both sides are questioning whether they can still play by the same rules, and at this summit neither team is expecting a home-run.
Jill Dougherty, CNN, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WOODRUFF: Here in Washington, at the Pentagon today, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld pressed President Bush's argument in favor of a missile defense shield. Rumsfeld says that he is not concerned that a U.S. retreat from the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty would trigger a new arms race with Moscow.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUMSFELD: We're not worried about Russia launching ballistic missiles with nuclear weapons at the United States. When you go to sleep at night, you don't worry about it. When I go to sleep at night, I don't worry about it.
The reality is, however, that these weapons are proliferating throughout the world and people unlike them are getting them, the Saddam Husseins of the world, and they don't behave according to the same sets of rules.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WOODRUFF: Rumsfeld discussed a number of subjects in his interview with our military affairs correspondent Jamie McIntyre. Jamie joins us now from the Pentagon.
Jamie, is the secretary confident now that the European and Russian opposition to this missile defense shield is going to melt away?
MCINTYRE: Well, he's not going that far, but he is expressing the belief that the United States continues to make this argument that it makes no sense these days for the U.S. to leave itself vulnerable to attack that might have made sense during old days of the Cold War, when there was just the U.S. and the Soviet Union.
They believe that that argument eventually will carry the day, and in our interview today, Rumsfeld made a point that he doesn't think Europe is monolithic, that in his recent trip to Europe, in which he visited seven countries in seven days, he found a lot of support for the U.S. concern about the threat from the spread of ballistic missiles, the need to have a defense while there's still some skepticism about how immediate that threat is, and whether the U.S. missile technology will work any time soon.
WOODRUFF: And Jamie, I heard, as we carried earlier on the program a portion of your interview, I did hear him say that Europe is not necessarily united on that. So, he does see some divisions on the continent?
MCINTYRE: While he was there, he met with -- while he was in Europe, he met with the new Russian defense minister, and he didn't want to talk about how that meeting went, but it went pretty well, and the impression that I think the United States came away with is that they may yet be able to convince Russia that there may be something to replace the ABM treaty with, something that they can move beyond that preserves the security agreement between the two countries, but allows the United States more flexibility to deploy missile defenses.
Not just for the United States but also for the European allies, and I think the Bush administration that that's a key aspect, that Europe not see missile defense as something just for the United States, but something that would also provide some measure of protection for European countries.
WOODRUFF: And just quickly, Jamie, on the decision announced -- the administration announced yesterday to stop bombing exercises on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques, any sense from Secretary Rumsfeld today that they are rethinking that, given the enormous opposition they are running into?
MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld is taking sort of a hands-off approach to this, saying that he has really left it to the Navy secretary and his deputy defense secretary, although he pledged to find a new place to practice. An interesting comment today from the Navy secretary, who said this was his decision, not a political decision made by the White House. He did indicate that he would be willing to reconsider if Congress were to go ahead and force that referendum in November, and if the Navy should happen to win that referendum, he said that would change everything. But at this point, the Navy is committing to pulling out of Vieques in May of 2003, and he is convinced they can find perhaps not another site, but maybe another way of training that would be just as effective for the Navy.
WOODRUFF: And also, I guess polls showing that unlikely that they would win, the Navy would win that referendum.
MCINTYRE: And the Navy thought that if they got some of the money, they could turn those polls around.
WOODRUFF: All right. Jamie McIntyre at the Pentagon, thank you very much.
In the Vieques controversy, civil rights activist Al Sharpton is one of the more high-profile opponents of the bombing exercises. Sharpton has been in jail for almost a month on federal charges stemming from his protest of the Vieques drills.
CNN's Brian Palmer spoke to Sharpton today at the Metropolitan detention center in New York City.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN PALMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Good morning, Reverend Sharpton.
SHARPTON: How are you doing.
PALMER (voice-over): The beard and jumpsuit are new, and the Reverend Al Sharpton has lost weight, but the issues are familiar.
SHARPTON: To think that I would get 90 days for a protest, 90 days for a nonviolent, peaceful protest.
PALMER: Sharpton was arrested last month with three prominent Latino politicians from New York for trespassing on a military installation in Vieques, Puerto Rico.
Then, after weeks of protests, President Bush announced the Navy's use of the island for bombing exercises would end in May 2003.
(on camera): What's your reaction to that?
SHARPTON: It shatters the whole national security question that has been raised from the beginning, and it says really that what we have tried to dramatize with civil disobedience is valid. Clearly, if they could move in two years, then they can move now.
PALMER: In recent years, Sharpton has broadened his focus from local issues affecting the African-American community to national and international causes, all of which has expanded his political focus, too. He's forming an exploratory committee to run for president of the United States.
SHARPTON: We need to enter into the national debate in 2004 with a clear candidate that will not try and be an imitator of the right- wing or some kind of Republican in Democrat clothing.
PALMER: Sharpton has never held public office, but he has run: twice for Senate, and once for mayor of New York City. He lost in the Democratic primary each time.
Four years after his last bid, Sharpton says he's ready to run, and to be taken seriously.
SHARPTON: Because there's still this innate thing, that if you have money and if you're a white male, you can talk presidential. If you've served people, you've got to go through all these hurdles.
PALMER: But Sharpton is known for protesting and rallying, not managing or governing.
SHARPTON: We don't build housing. We don't do things that others do. We deal with social justice. And anyone would have to admit, in the last decade we've been at the forefront of the social justice movement.
PALMER (on camera): Reverend Sharpton has two months left to serve. A federal court denied his appeal for release, but his attorney says he will take Sharpton's case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Brian Palmer, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WOODRUFF: A new emphasis on fatherhood by society and by government. Coming up next: Ron Brownstein talks with the founder of a group dedicated to promoting responsible fatherhood.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOODRUFF: In recent years, studies have illustrated what many generations took for granted: the importance of fathers in the lives of their children cannot be overestimated. According to statistics from the National Fatherhood Initiative, children who live absent their biological father are more likely to face a variety of challenges, including educational, health and emotional problems. The evidence has caught the attention of politicians as well.
As we head into Father's Day weekend, CNN political analyst Ron Brownstein of "The Los Angeles Times" introduces us to the growing movement dedicated to raising the status of fatherhood.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST (voice-over): The separation of fathers from their children can be enormously painful for the fathers and children alike. It also imposes a huge cost on society. The millions of American children who grow up without a father in their lives are much more likely to be poor and, in many cases, at greater risk of drug abuse and trouble in school.
In the past decade, a fragile network of grassroots groups has set out to help reconnect absent fathers with their children. Their mission is to teach young men how to support their sons and daughters, financially and emotionally, even if they live apart from the children's mother. It is hard, unglamorous, frequently frustrating work.
But Joe Jones, the director of the Center for Fathers, Families and Workforce Development in Baltimore, knows it is essential work, a critical step in rebuilding the bonds of community and family in America's most troubled neighborhoods.
(on camera): Joe, how did you get involved in this? Why did you establish this program?
JOSEPH JONES, CENTER FOR FATHERS, FAMILIES AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT: Well, you know, many years ago, when I was a little boy, age 9, my mom and dad, who were married, eventually separated and divorced. And I ended up living with my mom. And eventually, at age 13, got involved in illegal drug use. And for 17 years I was, you know, an addict.
And I was fortunate enough, through God's intervention and family support, to turn it around. And I realized how important having two parents together raising a child is, and how much it devastated me.
I think it's also important that we think about the emotional attachment between a father and child. If you haven't received love from someone as you've grown up, how are you going to be able to give love to somebody else? In some cases it may happen, but I think, overall, there's a huge emotional deficit that occurs when you have people growing up fatherless.
BROWNSTEIN (voice-over): In Washington, a broad coalition, ranging from President Bush to centrist Democratic Senator Evan Bayh to the liberal Congressional Black Caucus are pushing legislation to dramatically increase federal support for programs like this.
Jones says the help can't come soon enough.
JONES: We've had two young people, who are poor, who conceive a child together. They are family whether they are married or not, and they walk into our welfare office because they need some resources because the girl is now pregnant, she needs to nourish herself so she can nourish the child. The father, the only thing that they ask him for is his name, Social Security number and address so they can begin to collect child support to pay back the system for the welfare benefit she receives.
I think it would make much more sense, as a taxpayer, which I happen to be, if I was going to give my money to a family and help support them stay together. BROWNSTEIN (on camera): As you suggest, the fathers have been part of this debate. It's primarily been to talk about tougher enforcement of the child support laws.
What do you think of that emphasis?
JONES: Well, I think, clearly, when anyone enters into an intimate relationship and they create a child, they should be financially responsible for their child.
However, there is an emotional side to this, and there's also a distinguishment (sic) that we need to be clear about. There may be folks who are considered deadbeat dads, but there's also a group of fathers that are considered dead-broke dads. They are low-income dads who basically aren't on the radar screen of child support. Child support continues to construct child support orders for these guys. They live underground. They aren't part of the work force, and child support spends money trying to chase them down.
I think if we would look at them as being a vital part of our society, a vital part of their children's lives, and we begin to work with child support in partnership to acknowledge that they are dead- broke dads, and then provide a set of services that helps them to pay their child support order on time, be a part of the workforce, receive additional education and training so they can increase their wages over time and be involved in a family unit.
It took us a long time to recognize men as something other than providers and protectors. We can be nurturers, but as a society, we've always socialized men to sort of like be, you know, go to work and go to war. Now we talk about something a little different, about being intimate with our children, to have dads saying: I love kids.
I mean, quite often the men who are in our program have never had a relationship with their own fathers, where they said, I love you dad or dad has said, I love you, son. And so I think we still have some societal issues to work on, as well as gender issues to work on.
BROWNSTEIN: What you're doing is breaking a cycle of generations, really.
JONES: Absolutely.
BROWNSTEIN: Thank you, Joe Jones.
JONES: Thank you, Ron.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WOODRUFF: And that was Ron Brownstein's interview.
Former first father Bill Clinton is about to watch his only daughter mark a milestone. Chelsea Clinton is scheduled to graduate from Stanford University on Father's Day. For the first time, the history department ceremony reportedly will be a closed, ticketed event because the former president and Senator Hillary Clinton will be there. Chelsea, apparently, will continue her education at Oxford University in Britain, just as her father did.
A conflict with heavy political consequences: A president's personal struggle with an unpopular war. Ahead, conversations of President Lyndon Johnson.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(AUDIO GAP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... be in great danger unless they have 75,000 more, and if they get 150, they will have to have to have another 150. And then they'll have to have another 150.
BRUCE MORTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): True. The United States would eventually have more than half a million men in Vietnam. Mansfield...
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
SENATOR MICHAEL MANSFIELD (D), MONTANA: But I was a little bit distressed that so many Republicans voted against his bid yesterday, and particularly a man like George Aiken.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
MORTON: Aiken, a Vermont Republican, would urge the U.S. simply to declare victory and leave. Mansfield...
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
MANSFIELD: Oh, he thinks it is too late, and he is tremendously disturbed about the situation in Vietnam.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
MORTON: Johnson asked about a possible new approach to Congress. Mansfield...
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
MANSFIELD: Well, he could if make another approach to Congress. I think really the roof will blow off this time because people who have remained quiet will no longer remain silent.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
MORTON: In fact, the first real Congressional revolt came the following year, in 1966.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you think we ought to send all these troops without a debate?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, sir. I think that we have got too many in there now, and we have been bombing the North without any appreciable results showing for us in the South. We just build up more hatred. You get these people tied more closely together, because they are tied by blood.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that's true, and I think you've done nearly everything you can do except make it a complete white man's war. And if you do that and you might as well say goodbye all of Asia and to most of the world.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that is right. Therefore, where do you go?
(END AUDIO CLIP)
MORTON: Later that same month, June 21, Johnson and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara...
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I am very depressed about it because I see no program from either Defense or State that gives me much hope of doing anything except just praying and gasping to hold on during the monsoon and hope they will quit. I do not believe they're ever going to quit.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
MORTON: By the end of that year, 1965, 1,516 Americans had died in the Vietnam War. By the time the war ended in 1975, the American death toll was almost 60,000. And another casualty was Lyndon Johnson's presidency. Challenged in the primaries by Eugene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy, Johnson chose not to seek reelection.
His vice president, Hubert Humphrey, lost the White House to Richard Nixon in the election of 1968.
Bruce Morton, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WOODRUFF: It's hard to believe it was only a little over 30 years ago. That's all for this edition of INSIDE POLITICS. But, of course, you can go on-line all the time at CNN's allpolitics.com, AOL keyword CNN. Our e-mail address is insidepolitics@cnn.com.
This weekend programming notes: Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott will be among WOLF BLITZER'S guests Sunday on LATE EDITION. That's at noon eastern.
I'm Judy Woodruff. "LOU DOBBS MONEYLINE" is next.
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