The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I`m Jim Lehrer.

On the NewsHour tonight: the news of this Monday; then, the latest on the deadly shootings at Virginia Tech today; an assessment of the resignations of six Iraqi cabinet members loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr; a NewsHour report about full voting rights for residents of the District of Columbia; and a look at the troubles of World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz.

(BREAK)

JIM LEHRER: More than 30 people were shot to death today at Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg, Virginia. It was the deadliest mass shooting in American history.

This morning, two people were killed in a dorm. Two hours later, a gunman killed 30 others, and then himself, in a classroom building. But late today, campus police would not say it was all the work of one man.

CHIEF W.R. FLINCHUM, Virginia Tech Police Department: We have one person that`s deceased in Norris Hall that was the shooter. We do not know if the two incidents are connected. That`s part of the investigation that we`re looking into; we`re trying to determine whether they are or are not related.

JIM LEHRER: We`ll have more on this story right after the news summary.

A powerful storm lashed the East Coast again today, and the death toll reached nine. Since Sunday, the huge nor`easter has brought flooding, snow and even one tornado in South Carolina.

Waves pounded the coastline in Massachusetts and other states today. Flood warnings were in effect across the Northeast, where some places got up to eight inches of rain.

New Jersey had some of the worst flooding. Acting Governor Richard Codey said it forced hundreds to flee.

ACTING GOV. RICHARD CODEY (D), New Jersey: Over 1,400 people have been evacuated from their homes at this time. There are 34 shelters open throughout our state, and there are slightly over 1,200 people that have been sheltered.

JIM LEHRER: In higher elevations, the storm dumped heavy snow, including 17 inches in Vermont and the Adirondacks. Nearly 800,000 homes and businesses lost power, from North Carolina to Maine. The storm also tied up air traffic, with more than 600 flights canceled.

President Bush and Democrats pressed each other to give way today on funding the war in Iraq. Both the House and Senate have approved funding bills that include timetables for a U.S. pullout. The president has warned he`ll veto any such measure.

Today, he said again any delay only hurts the troops already in Iraq.

GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States: Listen, I understand Republicans and Democrats in Washington have differences over the best course in Iraq. That`s healthy; that`s normal; and we should debate those differences. But our troops should not be caught in the middle.

JIM LEHRER: Mr. Bush is set to meet with congressional leaders on Wednesday. He offered today to discuss any way forward in the funding impasse. But on Sunday, Vice President Cheney said he was "willing to bet" Democrats will ultimately back down.

In response, Senate Majority Leader Reid insisted Democrats are standing firm.

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV), Senate Majority Leader: Our offer is that the president sign our bill. We have given the president more than what he asked for, for the troops. We all know that this supplemental appropriation bill should have been in his regular budget. We should not have had to do it in this manner.

JIM LEHRER: The House and Senate are to begin negotiating a final version of the funding bill this week.

In Iraq, the U.S. military announced seven more Americans have been killed since Saturday. The toll for the war now tops 3,300.

Also today, six Iraqi cabinet ministers quit on orders from Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. They protested the government`s refusal to set a date for U.S. forces to leave. The head of the Sadr bloc said setting a timetable for the withdrawal will now be done in parliament.

The move came amid signs death squads linked to Sadr have resumed killing. More than 40 bodies were found in Baghdad in the last 48 hours. We`ll have more on the political story in Iraq later in the program tonight.

Jury selection began today in Miami in the trial of terror suspect Jose Padilla. He`s a U.S. citizen, accused of supporting terror groups worldwide and plotting attacks. Padilla was arrested five years ago as an enemy combatant. U.S. officials said he plotted to set off a bomb containing radioactive material; that allegation is no longer part of the case.

White House officials gave new support to Attorney General Gonzales today. He still faces a Senate committee hearing on the firings of eight U.S. attorneys. In his prepared testimony, Gonzales wrote, "I never sought to mislead the Congress or the American people about my role."

Today, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino was asked if Gonzales` job is on the line at the hearing.

DANA PERINO, White House Spokeswoman: One day`s hearing does not necessarily mean -- I`ve heard it described as make or break. And I would submit to you that the attorney general, as you`ve reported, has been as forthcoming as he possibly can be, has laid it out all out on the table for them. And tomorrow he looks forward to answering their questions.

JIM LEHRER: The hearing had been set for tomorrow, but the committee has postponed it because of the shootings at Virginia Tech.

Sudan agreed today to let the U.N. send attack helicopters and 3,000 peacekeepers to Darfur. It came after months of resistance and growing international pressure. In Washington, a State Department spokesman called it "a partial step forward," but he said Sudan still wants too many limits on the U.N. force. More than 200,000 people have been killed in Darfur since 2003.

The Pulitzer Prizes for 2007 were announced today. In journalism, the Wall Street Journal won twice, including the public service prize for investigating a stock options scandal. And the Portland Oregonian won for breaking news. It reported on a family missing in a blizzard.

The prize for commentary went to Cynthia Tucker of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. In the Arts, Cormac McCarthy won the fiction prize for his novel, "The Road." Lawrence Wright took the non-fiction award for his book, "The Looming Tower: Al-Qaida and the Road to 9/11."

The nation`s largest student-loan provider, Sallie Mae, will be sold for $25 billion. The announcement today said the buyers included J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank of America, and two private equity firms. The sale came as Sallie Mae and the college loan industry face growing scrutiny from federal and state regulators.

On Wall Street today, stocks rallied on the news of the Sallie Mae buyout and improving retail sales. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 108 points to close at 12,720. The Nasdaq rose 26 points to close at 2,518.

And that`s it for the news summary tonight. Now: the killings at Virginia Tech; the resignations in the Iraqi cabinet; voting rights in the District of Columbia; and the troubles of Paul Wolfowitz.

(BREAK)

JIM LEHRER: Jeffrey Brown has our Virginia Tech coverage.

JEFFREY BROWN: The day began with an emergency call to police just after 7:00 a.m. reported shots fired at a residence hall on the Virginia Tech campus. West Ambler Johnston Hall is a co-ed dormitory that houses 895 students at Virginia Tech, a 135-year-old land grant school in the mountains of Southwest Virginia, some 250 miles from Washington, D.C.

Two people were killed in the dorm. More than two hours later, and while the campus was supposedly under lockdown, the shooting began again in an engineering building, Norris Hall, on the other side of the sprawling 2,600-acre campus.

A student witness outside the building, using a cell phone video camera to tape the scene, recorded a hail of gunshots. Late this afternoon, Virginia Tech`s President Charles Steger and University Police Chief W.R. Flinchum spoke to reporters.

CHARLES STEGER, President, Virginia Tech: I want to repeat my horror and disbelief and profound sorrow at the events of today. People from around the world have expressed their shock and their sorrow and endless sadness that has transpired.

I`m really at a loss for words to explain or to understand the carnage that has visited our campus. I know no other way to speak about this than to tell you what we know. And let me do that now.

It is now confirmed that we have 31 deaths from the Norris Hall, including the gunman; 15 other victims are being treated at local hospitals in the Roanoke and New River valleys. There are two confirmed deaths from the shooting in Ambler Johnston dormitory, in addition to the 31 at Norris Hall.

We have not confirmed the identity of the gunman, because he carried no identification on his person. And we are in the process of attempting that identification.

Norris Hall is a tragic and a sorrowful crime scene, and we are in the process of identifying victims and in the process of notifying next of kin.

CHIEF W.R. FLINCHUM, Virginia Tech Police Department: The information we had on the first incident led us to make the decision that it was an isolated event to that building, and the decision was made not to cancel classes at that time. We had information from witnesses and the evidence at the scene that led us to believe the shooter was no longer in the building and more than likely off-campus.

JOURNALIST: More than likely. Why?

CHIEF W.R. FLINCHUM: I`m not going to release that at this time.

JOURNALIST: Could you tell us if you believe that the shooter was, in fact, a student here?

CHIEF W.R. FLINCHUM: From the first incident? We do not know at this point.

JOURNALIST: From either incident.

CHIEF W.R. FLINCHUM: We do not know at this point.

JEFFREY BROWN: Back in Washington, congressional leaders led moments of silence in memory of the dead. In the House...

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), Speaker of the House: And we ask for a moment of silence to be observed in this body. Would we all please rise to observe the moment of silence?

JEFFREY BROWN: ... and in the Senate.

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), Senate Minority Leader: I`ll offer my condolences for this unspeakable tragedy to which the majority leader has been referring and join him in calling for a moment of silence.

JEFFREY BROWN: President Bush addressed the nation late this afternoon.

GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States: Schools should be places of safety and sanctuary and learning. When that sanctuary is violated, the impact is felt in every American classroom and every American community.

Today, our nation grieves with those who have lost loved ones at Virginia Tech. We hold the victims in our hearts, we lift them up in our prayers, and we ask a loving God to comfort those who are suffering today.

JEFFREY BROWN: Classes at Virginia Tech have been canceled through Tuesday, and a convocation ceremony will be held in memory of today`s victims.

And for more on this day`s events, we turn to Lindsey Nair, who`s covering the story for the Roanoke Times. I spoke to her a short time ago.

Lindsey Nair, it sounds like there`s still some question about whether these two incidences are related and whether there was, in fact, only one gunman. What can you tell us about that?

LINDSEY NAIR, Roanoke Times: Well, you`re right about that. The officials are still saying that there were two shootings that they consider separate at this time, just in terms of their investigation, so they have not confirmed whether they are related or not.

And I just don`t know for sure why, but my impression is that they -- it`s just too early in the investigation for them to feel comfortable linking the two of them. Again, you already know, I`m sure, that there were about two hours that passed between the two incidents, so I`m guessing there`s still a lot of piecing together to be done, you know, in terms of what happened during that time frame.

JEFFREY BROWN: Have your reporters learned any more about the identity of the gunman who did kill himself?

LINDSEY NAIR: We don`t have a name for that individual. We do know that he obviously was a male. They`re not even saying yet whether he was a student at Virginia Tech or not. There have been some reports that he had a girlfriend or an ex-girlfriend on campus and that that might have been a motive of sorts for what happened today.

Somebody at the press conference earlier asked whether one of the individuals who was shot and killed in the first incident was the suspect`s girlfriend. And the police chief replied that it was not, so that is still up for interpretation.

JEFFREY BROWN: Now, the two-hour gap that you referred to between the two shootings, what is known about what was going on, on campus at that time? For example, were students warned about the first shooting?

LINDSEY NAIR: I think that`s going to be one of the lingering questions for a day or two. What we know is that the first 911 call came in around 7:15 and that the police were on scene at the dormitory investigating that shooting, that they knew they had a couple of fatalities there.

What they had said, without really elaborating much, was that there was a possibility, they thought, that that was a domestic-type shooting and that it was an isolated event. The information they had was that was an isolated event.

And they also had some information that made them believe that the shooter that was off-campus and even perhaps on his way out of state. They didn`t elaborate on what made them think that, but the interpretation would be that they considered it an isolated incident and really didn`t see the need to shut campus down.

Students were notified that there was a shooting, but one fact that we`d heard was that the e-mails took, you know, a couple hours to go out to students.

JEFFREY BROWN: And then the second shooting, where many more people were killed, what did you learn from the briefing today or from your reporters in the field?

LINDSEY NAIR: The second shooting, we`ve learned that there were more than 30 fatalities in that shooting in Norris. Norris is an engineering dormitory. At least one of those dead, I believe, was a faculty member.

They had said that -- there had been some reports that the gunman may have locked himself in the dormitory, but police have not confirmed that. You know, some reports that he may have somehow chained or locked the doors from inside and the police were not able to get in. There were some questions about that asked at the press conference, and the police chief declined to say for sure if that had happened.

You know, from what we`re told, the shooter did die inside Norris. And there was no shootout between the police and the shooter. So they also said that there was not just one room where the crime scene in Norris was, that there were fatalities scattered around the building. But they declined to say specifically, you know, how widespread it was inside that building.

JEFFREY BROWN: One last thing. There were reports in the last week or so of several bomb threats there on the campus. What`s known about those? Is there any sense of a link between those and today`s shootings?

LINDSEY NAIR: I`ve heard over and over again today that there is speculation that there`s a link. Officials have said that they are considering the possibility that there is a link, but they haven`t said whether they know for sure. So I know that, you know, it`s, if nothing else, a strange coincidence that that happened then.

Of course, you probably already know this is the second shooting, you know, that affected Tech in Blacksburg over the past year or so. So that, the bomb threats, and now this is obviously a very disturbing chain of events.

JEFFREY BROWN: All right. Lindsey Nair of the Roanoke Times, thanks very much.

LINDSEY NAIR: Thank you.

JEFFREY BROWN: And some reaction now from campus. For that, we turn to Kevin Anderson, a Virginia Tech student and the associate news editor for the school`s newspaper, the Collegiate Times.

Kevin, first, this two-hour gap between shootings, did the students that you`ve talked to today know about the first shooting?

KEVIN ANDERSON, Collegiate Times: Yes, they did. I mean, I woke up around, you know, the time that the second shooting happened, but I had woken up to several IMs from some of my friends -- or instant messages on AOL stating that there had been a shooting in West A.J., or West Ambler Johnston. But most of the people did know, yes.

JEFFREY BROWN: So I know you`ve been collecting stories and talking to students there today. Was it a chaotic situation? Was it a normal situation? How would you describe it?

KEVIN ANDERSON: It was extremely chaotic. And it was very orderly chaos, I mean, if you could say that. But everyone, you know, they realized what was going on. They cooperated well with everyone. There wasn`t any sort of, you know, panic or anything like that.

People just, you know, agreed with the safety precautions that the police made for the campus, and they followed everything very well. I mean, it`s chaotic in the sense that people want to know what`s going on and they can`t know, but then, in the same sense, it`s very orderly.

JEFFREY BROWN: Well, I mentioned those two hours between shootings. Are there questions now -- people you`re talking to there -- about the warning system, about whether people were told enough and had time to get off campus or something more could have been done?

KEVIN ANDERSON: Well, the reason behind this -- the way I look at it is that the West Ambler Johnston shootings were an isolated event that had nothing to do with the rest of the campus. I mean, the building holds 800, almost 900 students.

So the university was right in shutting down or in locking down the building. And security guards and officers and things like that were present at the building at the time, I mean, as soon as the report was made that there was a shooting in the building.

However, because, you know, they thought that the shooter had stayed in the building, it didn`t seem that they needed to lock down the rest of the school.

JEFFREY BROWN: And, Kevin, what`s the mood there now among students?

KEVIN ANDERSON: I mean, I would have to say it`s a solemn mood. I mean, everyone has been, you know, touched by, you know, what`s going on here. But, you know, all in all, it`s very solemn, very quiet.

JEFFREY BROWN: All right. Kevin Anderson of the Collegiate Times at Virginia Tech, thanks very much.

KEVIN ANDERSON: Thank you.

(BREAK)

JIM LEHRER: A shakeup in the Iraqi government. We start with some background narrated by NewsHour correspondent Spencer Michels.

SPENCER MICHELS, NewsHour Correspondent: Shiite cleric Muqtada al- Sadr`s political movement dealt Iraq`s fledgling government another blow today, when six cabinet ministers resigned, including the minister of health.

NASSAR AL-RUBAIE, Leader, Al-Sadr Parliamentary Bloc (through translator): We deem it necessary to issue an order to the Sadr bloc ministers to withdraw immediately from the Iraqi government.

SPENCER MICHELS: The head of al-Sadr`s parliamentary bloc spoke to reporters in Baghdad this morning. The main reason behind the move: Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki`s refusal to set a timetable for U.S. troop withdrawal.

NASSAR AL-RUBAIE (through translator): We demand a timetable for the withdrawal of occupation forces. This is an essential topic for us. The government should have a stance towards this matter.

SPENCER MICHELS: But the 30 members of parliament who are loyal to al-Sadr have not offered up their resignations. The bloc makes up about a quarter of that body.

Al-Sadr himself has not been seen since the U.S.-led security plan was put in place in February. In a written statement, he said he hoped new ministers would be free of sectarian agendas. It read, "I ask God to bestow upon the people an independent, devoted government to be like a candle in the night, away from occupation."

Prime Minister al-Maliki has repeatedly echoed the Bush administration`s refusal to set timetables.

NOURI AL-MALIKI, Prime Minister, Iraq (through translator): We see no need for a withdrawal timetable because we are working as fast as we can. We feel what will govern the departure of international forces are the achievements and victories we manage to obtain on the ground, not a timetable.

SPENCER MICHELS: It was al-Sadr`s support that originally secured al- Maliki`s election to prime minister a year ago, but the alliance has been a shaky one. In November, al-Sadr`s bloc began a two-month boycott of the government, after al-Maliki went ahead with meetings with President George Bush.

Since then, al-Sadr has staged several protests. Last Monday, his supporters rallied tens of thousands to the streets of Najaf, on the fourth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad, to demand the expulsion of U.S. troops.

In Washington, the Bush administration said that al-Sadr`s withdrawal from the government did not mean al-Maliki has lost his majority in parliament.

JIM LEHRER: Margaret Warner takes the story from there.

MARGARET WARNER: So what`s behind Muqtada al-Sadr`s withdrawal of his cabinet ministers? And what does this mean for the government of Prime Minister Maliki?

For an assessment of all that, we`re joined by Juan Cole, professor of Middle East history at the University of Michigan. He`s author of "Sacred Space and Holy War," about Shiite politics and history.

And Rend al-Rahim, the former Iraqi ambassador to the U.S. under an earlier interim government, she`s now a senior fellow at the United States Institute of Peace, which works to promote democracy and prevent conflict worldwide.

Welcome to the program, both of you.

Professor Cole, what do you think is behind this move on al-Sadr`s part?

JUAN COLE, University of Michigan: Well, the al-Maliki government was a national unity government. The withdrawal of Sadr`s ministers is an indication that he thinks it`s not a national unity government. And he refuses to have his people serve in a government that won`t set a timetable for withdrawal of foreign military forces from the country.

So he`s putting pressure on al-Maliki to negotiate a timetable, to commit himself to the ultimate withdrawal of U.S. troops. I think his cabinet ministers also are dismayed by the increasing dysfunctionality of the government. They`re afraid it`s collapsing.

They were there to provide services to people and get the credit for that. If they`re not going to get any credit, then there`s no point in holding those posts.

MARGARET WARNER: And what do you think is behind it, Rend al-Rahim?

REND AL-RAHIM, Former Iraqi Ambassador: Yes, I have a little bit of a different take on this, because I think, whereas the ostensible reason is the refusal of Maliki to set a timetable, the troop withdrawal, I think the real reason is that the Sadrs have been really battered within this framework of the security plan.

They`ve been specifically targeted in Sadr City. They`ve been targeted in Diwaniya. They`ve clashed with the British forces in Basra. And they have come under enormous pressure.

And their view is that the Maliki government is not protecting them, that they`re exposed, and Sadr needs to take a stand. To retain his credibility with his own people, he needs to be visible against this encroachment on his powers and his abilities.

So I would interpret his resignation really as a protest, as a way to establish credibility in the face of this enormous military pressure that`s coming against him. And don`t forget: He has been unable to appear in public for weeks and weeks.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Cole, do you see the same kind of political motivations underneath this?

JUAN COLE: Well, it`s certainly the case that al-Sadr`s movement is under a lot of pressure from the Americans, but actually Prime Minister al- Maliki warned al-Sadr that this was coming. I think he got an undertaking from the Sadrists not to respond with violence, and there have been a few hundred commanders arrested. The fighting is there in Diwaniya.

But I don`t think that al-Sadr is doing so badly out of all of this. I think his movement has become more and more popular with the Shiite masses in the south. They want the Americans out. The demonstration in Najaf was enormous; perhaps hundreds of thousands came out, as a sign, I think, that the Shiite south is increasingly insisting on a light at the end of the tunnel with regard to this military occupation.

Remember that we`re all concerned, as we should be, about these events at Virginia Tech today. In Iraq this is a daily event. Imagine how horrible it would be if this kind of massacre were occurring every single day. And the people of Iraq feel that either the Americans are not stopping it or they`re actually causing it.

MARGARET WARNER: Rend al-Rahim, the leader of Sadr`s bloc in parliament said, "Now we will set the timetable for withdrawal in parliament." What do you think that really means? Sadr`s people are staying in the parliament. Do you think they mean to try to wrest control of that policy from the Maliki government?

REND AL-RAHIM: Yes, well, you know that they did try that in January and February. Actually, all of the Sadrist bloc withdrew from parliament for two months. And this did not stop parliament from continuing to function. Actually, it was in recess for part of the time.

But they came back without the Sadr members, and they managed quite well. And at that time, when the Sadrists came back, they tried to list the withdrawal on the agenda of parliament, and there was no response from parliament.

Remember, they only have 13 members out of 275. And they really need a majority, not only to be able to vote something like that in, but also to get it to a debate point. They`re going to find that very difficult.

So, although they may try, They failed in February, March. They`re probably going to fail again. And they`re very aware of that, by the way. I think that they may try, because part of their credibility in the Iraqi street is precisely this political posture, the kind of moral high ground that they take. But in terms of being able to affect anything, I don`t think that`s possible for them.

MARGARET WARNER: So, Professor Cole, what impact do you think this has on the Maliki government? And weave into that, if you would, the basis of Sadr`s support, which is still the poorer segment of the Shiite population, is it not?

JUAN COLE: Well, Sadr`s movement is a poor people`s movement. Its original base of support was the slums of Baghdad, the Marsh Arabs of Amara and so forth. But it has increasingly grown beyond that. A lot of middle- class people in the south are beginning to adopt it. I think, if there were provincial elections in the south, it would sweep to power in the provinces.

And I disagree. I think the Sadr movement, when it withdrew from parliament, was able to prevent there being a quorum on a number of occasions. I think this is one more sign that the al-Maliki government is gradually collapsing.

The Sunni-Arab delegates to parliament are talking about withdrawing. The Fadhila Party, or the Islamic Virtue Party from Basra, has withdrawn from al-Maliki`s coalition. I think we`re near to the point now where you could imagine a vote of no confidence against al-Maliki in parliament.

And 121 delegates to parliament have, in fact, signed off on a demand that a timetable be set for U.S. withdrawal. It`s not quite a majority, but that has been reported into committee and will come back out for the whole parliament to consider.

MARGARET WARNER: Do you think that`s possible? I know you think this is not so terrible for the government, but can you envision a scenario, as Professor Cole sketches out, in which this could actually lead to the collapse of the government?

REND AL-RAHIM: No, I think it`s hardly likely. I don`t think that they withdraw -- remember, the members of parliament are still there in parliament. It is those three ministers and three ministers of state, by the way. All in all, they control a little bit more than 10 percent of government and of parliament. And I do not think...

MARGARET WARNER: I`m sorry, I thought they were a quarter of the seats in parliament?

REND AL-RAHIM: No. They`re a quarter of the seats of the Shiite United Alliance...

MARGARET WARNER: Oh, United Alliance.

REND AL-RAHIM: Yes, so they`re 30 out of 130 or something like that, but they`re just a little more than 10 percent of the parliament. I do not think their withdrawal is going to impact anything.

And, indeed, I think if Maliki goes ahead and appoints technocrats and independents in those cabinet seats, we will probably find a much better performance than we have had so far.

MARGARET WARNER: So let me ask you both -- and I`ll begin with you, Professor Cole, briefly -- what steps do you expect to see from Maliki to respond to this?

JUAN COLE: Well, I think al-Maliki will appoint technocrats to replace the Sadrist ministers. I think that weakens him, because the way the Iraqi government has been set up, the ministries are sources of patronage. They`re ways of rewarding political allies. Technocrats are just individuals; they don`t bring any political capital.

I think al-Maliki is in a very difficult position. He clearly has thrown in with the Bush administration. He won`t ask for a timetable. And I think this demand for a timetable, as the demonstration in Najaf showed, as these resignations show, is growing in importance in Iraqi politics. I think there`s some possibility that this government just ends up dysfunctional.

REND AL-RAHIM: Yes, I think Sadr, in fact, has painted himself into a corner. He`s regarded by everyone as the maverick, black sheep of Iraqi politics. I don`t know that he has anywhere to go from here.

MARGARET WARNER: But I`m asking about Maliki. Does he have anywhere to go? I mean, has he made any progress on the political reconciliation that this surge is designed to create political space for him to...

(CROSSTALK)

REND AL-RAHIM: I think Maliki needs to move forward on political reconciliation now. I don`t think -- the Sadrists weren`t necessarily the only roadblock, although they were part of the roadblock to political reconciliation.

They were against the new law on de-Baathification that has been tabled in parliament. I must say, they were not the only ones against it, but they were a major voice against it. And it may well be that -- of course, they`re still in parliament, but it may well be, if they`re weakened, he can move forward a little more quickly.

MARGARET WARNER: Rend al-Rahim and Juan Cole, thank you both.

REND AL-RAHIM: Thank you.

(BREAK)

JIM LEHRER: Now, the fight for full voting rights in Washington, D.C. NewsHour congressional correspondent Kwame Holman has our report.

KWAME HOLMAN: Thousands of Washingtonians, including long-time activist Reverend Graylan Hagler, turned out this afternoon to rally for the right to a full vote in Congress, something residents here have never had.

REV. GRAYLAN HAGLER, Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ: It`s a continued, nagging issue for us, because we live, like anybody else, in the United States. We have our homes; we have our neighborhoods; we have our aspirations, our hopes, and our dreams that can be shifted by anybody else. And we don`t have the power or the voice or the vote to begin to hold back the types of political agenda that is often thrust upon us.

KWAME HOLMAN: The federal government, which has governing control over the District of Columbia -- D.C., as it`s known -- allows the city`s residents to send one delegate to Congress. For the last 17 years, Eleanor Holmes Norton has been that person. She is permitted to vote in committee, but lacks full voting power on the House floor where final legislation is approved.

DEL. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON (D), D.C. House Delegate: My constituents want the vote, because on major issues they feel deeply, and they feel denied. They feel denied when they can`t open the paper and find out how their representative voted on x, y, z.

They believe in democracy. They believe that, if I could vote, they could have an effect on issues. And they`re mad that they`re not allowed to have that effect.

KWAME HOLMAN: Norton represents the nearly 600,000 people who make up the district, three-quarters of whose registered voters are Democrats. More than half the population is black.

Despite rising property values and a booming downtown economy in Washington today, Norton, the city council, and several mayors have struggled over the years to deal with crime waves, high unemployment, and poor schools.

And so the lifelong D.C. resident has used every opportunity to promote the benefits full representation might bring to the city. She`s enjoyed some free publicity from Comedy Central talk show host Stephen Colbert, who`s put a humorous twist on her plight.

STEPHEN COLBERT, Host, "The Colbert Report": I checked your voting record. You have not voted once while you`ve been in office. Do you want to defend that?

DEL. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON: Well, our government is imposing taxes on the residents of the District of Columbia without giving us a vote in the House and the Senate.

STEPHEN COLBERT: Isn`t that for states? You`re not a state.

DEL. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON: We`re not a state. It`s in the Constitution.

STEPHEN COLBERT: But it`s "We the people of the United States" is what the preamble of the Constitution says. But you`re not in the United States. You`re in the District of Columbia. Those aren`t states.

DEL. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON: It has gotten the message of voting rights and our denial of the same out as nothing else has, because I can always depend on Colbert to make a joke out of the fact that the district doesn`t have voting rights.

KWAME HOLMAN: Washingtonians actually had no voting rights at all until 1964, when a constitutional amendment gave them the right to vote in presidential elections. And it wasn`t until 10 years later that the federal government allowed residents to elect a city council and a mayor.

Repeated efforts over the last three decades to secure a full-fledged vote in Congress have failed, disappointing countless local residents.

WASHINGTON RESIDENT: It really feels like we`re paying taxes, we`re just people that are here, and our voices do not count. It`s simple. It`s unfair, and our voices should count.

WASHINGTON RESIDENT: This is the nation`s capital. We should have the right to vote.

KWAME HOLMAN: But change may be near. Norton and Virginia Republican Tom Davis, whose congressional district lies just a few miles from Washington, have teamed up to push a widely supported bill that would give the district a vote in the House chamber.

REP. TOM DAVIS (R), Virginia: Here in the nation`s capital, heart of the free world, they`re not even given a vote in Congress. The city`s own budget comes before Congress for approval. The city residents don`t get final approval on that. And to me, you know, it`s disjointed. This is natural.

KWAME HOLMAN: The Norton-Davis bill would balance the new seat for the District of Columbia with an additional seat for heavily Republican Utah. That trade-off was key to securing early bipartisan support for the measure, and the push for congressional representation in Washington has more momentum behind it today than at any time in recent years.

WASHINGTON RESIDENT: I think it`s an excellent opportunity for the city, as well as the region. I think it should make some very positive changes in a very short period of time.

KWAME HOLMAN: But there still are many formidable Republican opponents of the Norton-Davis bill, who say granting the city a House vote would be unconstitutional.

CONGRESSMAN: There are constitutional questions on this issue.

KWAME HOLMAN: They cite Article I, Section Two, which says, "The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several states."

White House aides cited that constitutional argument last month, when announcing they would recommend a presidential veto of the Norton-Davis bill. Election law expert John Fortier defended that reasoning.

JOHN FORTIER, American Enterprise Institute: Well, the Constitution decides who`s represented in Congress and not Congress itself.

KWAME HOLMAN: Congressman Davis questioned the strength of that argument and his opponents` motive for using it.

REP. TOM DAVIS: You have a lot of members who are opposing this saying it`s unconstitutional, we need a constitutional amendment. So when you go up and say, well, will you join me then in supporting a constitutional amendment to give the city a right to vote? They say "Oh, no. I won`t do that." So it`s kind of an excuse as you go.

KWAME HOLMAN: But Republican critics of the bill see a hidden Democratic agenda. They believe passage of Norton-Davis could lead to a permanently Democratic House seat and set a precedent for eventually giving the district two voting senators, also likely to be Democrats.

So when Norton-Davis came to the floor last month, Republicans derailed the bill by attaching to it language that would overturn the district`s strict handgun laws. Lamar Smith of Texas.

REP. LAMAR SMITH (R), Texas: My colleagues on the other side of the aisle have suggested today that District of Columbia citizens have the right to a vote in Congress. If that`s the case, then they must also agree that the citizens of the district should have the constitutionally guaranteed right to possess firearms.

KWAME HOLMAN: That maneuver took Democratic leaders by surprise and forced them to pull down the bill. Norton was outraged at the Republican tactics.

DEL. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON: I mean, this is not a motion to recommit. It`s a motion to shoot the bill dead.

KWAME HOLMAN: Democratic leaders have pledged to sidestep any GOP attacks when the bill is brought back to the floor later this week. Local Republican leaders, all of whom support D.C. voting rights, hope their party tones down its tactics. Many fear the gun ban ploy, combined with the administration`s veto threat, are further souring the GOP`s image among the African-American community in Washington and beyond.

Bob Kabel is the city`s top Republican official.

ROBERT KABEL, D.C. Republican Committee: Well, I think it`s very damaging. I think it will damage urban Republican parties like ours, because I think we`ll be one more reason that Democrats and others will say, "You shouldn`t be voting Republican if you`re an urban dweller."

WASHINGTON RESIDENT: It upsets me. It really does. It really does.

KWAME HOLMAN: Many of the city`s long-time residents feel that those opposing the Norton-Davis bill are interested only in keeping control of Washington in the federal government`s hands.

WASHINGTON RESIDENT: To have Congress oversee our own progress here in the district seems a little micromanagement-style to me. You know, let the district run its own affairs.

KWAME HOLMAN: Norton hopes to bring her constituents a real vote, and she remains cautiously optimistic.

DEL. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON: Well, when they asked Martin Luther King how long, he said, "Not long," and I`ve got to believe that. Most people thought we would never get this far.

And it`s going to be a struggle. That`s what living here in the nation`s capital has been for 200 years. We never got anything without struggling for it.

KWAME HOLMAN: If the House approves the D.C. vote measure, it still must pass the Senate before going to the president`s desk.

(BREAK)

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, troubles at the World Bank.

The bank`s semi-annual meeting in Washington this weekend was overshadowed by calls for its president, Paul Wolfowitz, to resign. At issue: Wolfowitz`s involvement in the compensation and promotion of an employee who is also his girlfriend.

Wolfowitz became president of the World Bank in 2005. Soon after, Shaha Riza was assigned to the State Department to avoid a conflict of interest, but she remained on the bank payroll, and Wolfowitz helped arrange a pay raise for her, bringing her total salary to nearly $200,000 a year tax-free.

The World Bank`s Staff Association has called for Wolfowitz to step down. On Thursday, the bank`s board of directors said it was investigating the matter and, quote, "will move expeditiously to reach a conclusion on possible actions to take."

Late last week, Wolfowitz apologized, saying he shouldn`t have been involved.

PAUL WOLFOWITZ, World Bank President: I made a mistake for which I am sorry. But let me also ask for some understanding. Not only was this a painful personal dilemma, but I had to deal with it when I was new to this institution, and I was trying to navigate in uncharted waters.

I didn`t volunteer to get involved in this. I didn`t get involved for any personal reasons, but rather to resolve something I think posed institutional risk. I didn`t hide anything that I did. And I`m, as I said, prepared to accept any remedies that the board wants to propose.

JIM LEHRER: Member countries issued a statement this weekend that the matter was of great concern for the bank`s reputation.

Since its creation in 1944, the World Bank has always been headed by an American, nominated by the president and confirmed by the bank`s board. The bank`s original purpose was to finance reconstruction of nations devastated by World War II.

But today, the 185-nation lending institution focuses on developing countries. It provides long-term loans for education, agriculture and industry at low rates. In return, developing countries are supposed to improve their economies, limit corruption, and foster democracy.

Wolfowitz was nominated by President Bush to head the bank in 2005. Before that, he was deputy defense secretary and a key architect of the Iraq war. In his two years as the president of the bank, Wolfowitz has called for withholding aid to countries that don`t fight corruption.

Yesterday, Wolfowitz insisted he intends to stay.

PAUL WOLFOWITZ: Look, I believe in the mission of this organization, and I believe that I can carry it out. I`ve had many expressions of support, as well as the things that you referred to. I come back to what we agreed to in that communique, which is that we need to work our way through this. The board is looking into the matter, and we`ll let them complete their work.

JIM LEHRER: More on this story now from Krishna Guha of the Financial Times. Just for the record, Krishna, I misspoke just now when I said that fostering democracy was one of the purposes of the World Bank. That`s not true, is it?

KRISHNA GUHA, Financial Times: No, it`s not. The World Bank promotes good governance in the countries that it deals with, but it doesn`t have an explicit political agenda to promote democracy.

JIM LEHRER: OK, that correction having now been made, are there serious pressures now by the bank board to get rid of Paul Wolfowitz?

KRISHNA GUHA: That`s right. Indeed there is, but the board is divided. And the divisions reflects divisions among the international community as to what to do about Mr. Wolfowitz.

European nations in particular feel that he`s committed a very grave breach of corporate governance, and they would very much like to see him out. They`re not quite sure how aggressively they should push for it.

The U.S. is standing by Mr. Wolfowitz. And the other countries all have different opinions as to what should be done, as well, so there isn`t yet no consensus as to what should happen in this affair.

JIM LEHRER: All right, explain to us the governance and how the board -- who makes up the board, and what their power is. Give us a little lesson here on the World Bank governance.

KRISHNA GUHA: Absolutely. Well, the World Bank has 24 executive directors. Each of these directors represents either one of the big shareholder governments, like the U.S. or the U.K. or Japan, Germany, or a cluster of some of the smaller ones. They act as representatives of their country or countries on the board.

So, in theory, they are the guys who will make the ultimate decision about what should happen to Mr. Wolfowitz. But in practice, these are mid- level bureaucrats; they will do what their bosses in the national capitals tell them to do.

JIM LEHRER: So it`s really an election by countries rather than by people, right?

KRISHNA GUHA: Well, that`s right, except even that isn`t, strictly speaking, true, because although in a legal sense -- and it`s like a formal sense -- the board decides who is president, as I think you mentioned in your preamble, ever since the foundation of the World Bank, the tradition has been that the U.S., as the largest single shareholder, gets to choose who runs the bank.

JIM LEHRER: OK. Now, Wolfowitz, as we ran the clip from yesterday, he is saying, I`m not going anywhere. Is there a process, a procedure that could be followed by this board if they`d made a decision -- let`s say of the 24, there was some kind of majority consensus that Wolfowitz should go. Is there a process to make him go?

KRISHNA GUHA: The problem is, there really isn`t. We`re in uncharted waters here. And that`s exactly the phrase that one of the board directors used with me when I spoke to him about this.

The problem is the gift of nominating the bank president has always been given to the United States` president, so the idea that he could then get voted out by the board, perhaps against the objections of the U.S., runs against the entire practice of the bank since its foundation.

So the thinking is, it would be quite extraordinary if this ever got to the point where we`d actually be calling a confidence vote with countries taking different sides at the board. No one wants to go there; they`re desperately trying to figure out a way of squaring this so they can have reach eventually a consensus.

JIM LEHRER: And, of course, for the record, the president, President Bush, and his spokespersons, have clearly said they support Paul Wolfowitz and are in favor of his continuing. And that`s a big thing, right?

KRISHNA GUHA: That`s a very big thing, but it`s not quite the whole game. You see, it`s probably in the president`s gift -- no, it is in the president`s gift to stop anyone driving Mr. Wolfowitz out of the bank, but Mr. Bush can`t give Mr. Wolfowitz a manageable bank to run.

You see, the staff are in revolt. There`s nothing the president can do about that. The bank is in the midst of a fundraising round, where it needs to raise close to $30 billion to replenish its main lending facility for all these poor countries. The vast majority of that money doesn`t come from America. Much more comes from Europe.

So Mr. Wolfowitz, and by extension the president, have to consider the opinions of other countries, too.

JIM LEHRER: All right. Based on your reporting, what would you say the -- just let`s go through the factors that are now pressing against Wolfowitz and toward his departure, obviously, the personnel thing that everybody has talked about.

But aren`t there other issues, too, some internal things in the bank, as well as his history as deputy defense secretary? Are they also at play here, too, do you think?

KRISHNA GUHA: No question. No question. I mean, look, to be fair to Mr. Wolfowitz, there have been a group of people who`ve never given him a fair shot. Ever since he came in with all the baggage he carried from the Iraq war, there have been people who have simply wanted to be shod of him from the very beginning.

But there have also been issues of his own making that have made him enemies within the bank and its shareholders, two big things, I would say. First of all, when he came in, after a little while, he made the anti- corruption and good governance a great crusade of his.

Now, it`s a very important issue, and many would agree he was right to raise it firmly, but he did so in a manner that alienated a lot of his own staff and a lot of the shareholder governments. They thought that he was suggesting that no one else had taken it seriously before he arrived and that he was deciding who was corrupt and who wasn`t in a rather ad hoc and slightly arbitrary manner.

The other big beef a lot of people have is his management style. When Mr. Wolfowitz arrived, he brought with him a number of trusted aides, not very many, but very close advisers. And career bank veterans, some of whom have 20, 30 years of development experience, got very angry when these newcomers ended up making a lot of the main decisions.

JIM LEHRER: So some people have suggested though that the personnel issue is really an excuse because of these other -- in other words, these other things were already there, the Iraq war thing plus the two issues you just raised, that if those issues weren`t there, the personnel thing would never have caused the heat that`s on him right now. Do you agree? What does your reporting reflect on that?

KRISHNA GUHA: I would rephrase that and put it in a slightly different way. It seems to me an open-and-shut case that he blundered in a serious manner, as far as corporate governance is concerned, in this issue.

JIM LEHRER: He`s admitted and said he made a mistake.

KRISHNA GUHA: The question then is, how much political capital can he draw on in a moment like this, where it is an open debate in a sense as to whether this is a resignation offense or not?

In such a situation, it depends enormously on whether you can draw on reserves of support among your staff, among your colleagues, among your board directors, or whether, in fact, you`ve burnt so many bridges that, in your moments of need, people aren`t willing to come up and fight for you.

JIM LEHRER: If, in fact, he does leave, what`s the process for replacing him?

KRISHNA GUHA: Well, again, this is a more open question than you might think. By convention, the U.S. president would simply choose another World Bank chief, and that probably is what would happen.

But there`s been, for a time, a growing chorus of demand saying, this stitch-up, by which the U.S. gets to nominate the boss of the World Bank, and the Europeans in return get to nominate the boss of its sister institution, the IMF, which deals with international finance, this stitch- up, people say, shouldn`t carry on.

So if Mr. Wolfowitz were run out of town, there`d be a demand for a completely fresh approach to deciding who ran this institution. And that`s something the administration would have to consider, as well.

JIM LEHRER: Has there already been discussion of that? I don`t mean about Wolfowitz, but if we -- when the time comes to select a new president, whenever it comes, we`re going to do it a different way?

KRISHNA GUHA: Not yet at the official level. This is not something that the administration has ever talked about. It`s not something that the other major governments involved in the bank have ever talked about.

But it`s a serious debate already, if you like, among the experts in this field, among NGOs, among academics, among former officials of these institutions. So it`s not something that we should preclude.

JIM LEHRER: OK. Thank you very much.

KRISHNA GUHA: Thank you.

(BREAK)

JIM LEHRER: And, again, the other major developments of this day.

Thirty-two people were shot to death at Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg, Virginia. It was the deadliest mass shooting in American history.

A powerful storm lashed the East Coast.

And the U.S. military announced seven more Americans have been killed in Iraq.

A reminder: You can download audio versions of our reports and listen to them on your computer, iPod, or other MP3 player. To do so, just visit the Online NewsHour at PBS.org.

We`ll see you online and again here tomorrow evening. I`m Jim Lehrer. Thank you, and good night.