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CNN Live Event/Special

Anderson Cooper's Final Thought

Aired July 29, 2003 - 19:56   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.


ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Finally you may have heard today that the Pentagon under pressure from Congress killed its plan to create a futures market in which people would in effect bet on the likelihood of specific terrorist events. It was called a policy analysis market, PAM for short, and it was based on the idea money might motivate the emergence of information, information about terror. The same way that existing futures markets sometimes yield accurate predictions about politics or about business.
Well, PAM was ghoulish. There's no doubt about it. But it can also be argued the stock market is ghoulish as well, because it takes the likelihood of terror into account every day. Senator Barbara Boxer said "there was something sick about PAM." "Not in keeping with our values," said Senator Hillary Clinton. The program was killed, and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said maybe the people behind PAM got too imaginative.

The question some are asking now is when you're evaluate an anti- terror plan, should questions of taste be the most important factor, or questions of effectiveness? Put another way -- after September 11, is there really such a thing as an anti-terror plan that's too imaginative?

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






Aired July 29, 2003 - 19:56   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Finally you may have heard today that the Pentagon under pressure from Congress killed its plan to create a futures market in which people would in effect bet on the likelihood of specific terrorist events. It was called a policy analysis market, PAM for short, and it was based on the idea money might motivate the emergence of information, information about terror. The same way that existing futures markets sometimes yield accurate predictions about politics or about business.
Well, PAM was ghoulish. There's no doubt about it. But it can also be argued the stock market is ghoulish as well, because it takes the likelihood of terror into account every day. Senator Barbara Boxer said "there was something sick about PAM." "Not in keeping with our values," said Senator Hillary Clinton. The program was killed, and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said maybe the people behind PAM got too imaginative.

The question some are asking now is when you're evaluate an anti- terror plan, should questions of taste be the most important factor, or questions of effectiveness? Put another way -- after September 11, is there really such a thing as an anti-terror plan that's too imaginative?

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