The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight: A summary of the news, our own debate about the University of Michigan affirmative action cases accepted by the U.S. Supreme Court, Paul Solman's second report in his series on corporate CEO pay and performance, some new perspectives on tests for prostate cancer, and a Roger Rosenblatt essay on a body of work.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: Iraq promised today to declare its weapons programs by Saturday, one day before a UN deadline. A government spokesman said the document would include unspecified "new elements." But, he said, "those new elements don't mean that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction." The statement came as UN weapons inspectors in Iraq tested their new powers by going to a presidential palace. In the past, the Iraqis frequently barred access to palace sites. We have a report from Neil Connery of Independent Television News.

NEIL CONNERY: A dramatic early morning call by UN weapons inspectors in Baghdad. Alsadude is one of Saddam Hussein's presidential palaces, and no one was expecting the inspectors. The UN officials waited at the gates for nearly ten minutes. They came well prepared with maps and plans of the palace, but hadn't banked on such a frosty reception. But eventually they are allowed in, and get to work. Two hours later, the inspection is over and the Iraqis open the gates to the media. Alongside a soldier from the elite Republican Guard, I walked through the grounds of this huge presidential palace up to the gates of the entrance hall. After some last-minute checks, the huge doors open. Inside: Soaring white marble walls, lit up by a golden chandelier. This is one of several such sites in the country. This is the first visit by weapons inspectors to a presidential palace under the new UN resolution. In the past special arrangements had to be made but today there was no notice. The inspectors seem determined to flex their muscles. As with all their visits so far, the UN made no comment about what happened inside.

JIM LEHRER: Later, an Iraqi general said the inspectors were "happy" with the palace visit. At the UN, Secretary-General Annan said the day's events were a good sign.

KOFI ANNAN: I think, of course, that is an indication that the inspectors are using their new authority effectively. They have the right to inspect and go anywhere, and they have demonstrated that they are determined to use this new authority and there's also a good indication that the Iraqis are cooperating. But as I said, this is only the beginning.

JIM LEHRER: But President Bush again voiced doubt about Iraq's intentions. He warned again today Saddam Hussein not to try to "deceive his way out of disarming." Turkey will let the U.S. use its air space and military bases if the UN approves military action against Iraq. The Turkish government announced that today in Ankara, after talks with Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. Some 50 U.S. aircraft already patrol northern Iraq from bases in Turkey. Saudi Arabia complained today it had been "unfairly maligned" in U.S. reports of terror links to Saudi charities. In Washington, a top Saudi adviser said the kingdom had been relentless in going after terrorists. But he acknowledged investigators had not tracked down all the money donated to the charities.

ADEL AL-JUBEIR, Adviser to Saudi Crown Prince: Are all the funds accounted for? I believe in some of the charities they're not. Do we have any evidence that those funds went to terrorist groups? No, we don't. Does that mean none went? I can't answer that question. But we have no direct link.

JIM LEHRER: The Saudis announced a high commission will now monitor the country's charities, and new banking rules will make it easier to trace donations. A U.S. federal health advisory panel will no longer oppose routine prostate cancer screening for men. But it won't recommend the screening, either. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force outlined its position today in a publication called "The Annals of Internal Medicine." It said after ten years of research, the findings are still mixed on whether early detection actually saves lives. We'll have more on this story later in the program. On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost more than 119 points, closing just under 8743. The NASDAQ fell more than 35 points, or more than 2%, to close under 1449. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to affirmative action again before the U.S. Supreme Court, Paul Solman's second report on CEO pay and perks, testing for prostate cancer, and a Roger Rosenblatt essay.

FOCUS AFFIRMATIVE ACTION

JIM LEHRER: The Supreme Court's decision to revisit race in university admissions, and to Ray Suarez.

RAY SUAREZ: At issue before the nation's high court: a pair of affirmative action lawsuits against the University of Michigan. The Justices agreed to hear the cases yesterday. One involves Barbara Grutter. Six years ago, when she was 43, the former consultant applied to the university's law school, and was rejected despite what she considered strong qualifications. Grutter, who has not attended an alternative law school, says she didn't get in because she's white.

BARBARA GRUTTER: I think that I was discriminated against in the admission process, very specifically, because I believe they have different criteria based on race.

RAY SUAREZ: The law school considers race as one of several factors for admission. Jeffrey Lehman is the dean.

JEFFREY LEHMAN: It's not a colorblind society. Opportunity is not distributed with regard to race. And therefore in order to have a racially integrated student body, it is necessary to pay attention to race in the admissions process.

RAY SUAREZ: Grutter sued Michigan, and a federal judge last year deemed the law school's consideration of race unconstitutional. That decision was later overruled on appeal. The second case involves Jennifer Gratz. She applied to the university's undergraduate campus at Ann Arbor in '95. Gratz was waitlisted. She spoke to the NewsHour in 1997.

JENNIFER GRATZ: It made me question everything I've ever wanted to do. It made me question my talents. I was embarrassed, and I was upset.

RAY SUAREZ: So Gratz, who later went on to Michigan's Dearborn campus, also challenged the university. She noted that Michigan-Ann Arbor accepted African Americans and Latinos with similar credentials. She lost. A different federal judge sided with Michigan, citing the "educational benefits" of a racially diverse student body. To bolster its argument, the university cited a landmark Supreme Court case from 1978, known as the Bakke Decision. On one hand, the Court deemed illegal a quota system-- saving a preset number of slots for minorities. On the other hand, it endorsed racial diversity as a "compelling government interest." Jeffrey Lehman, the Michigan law dean, says the Bakke decision has led to what he calls a "moderate form of affirmative action."

JEFFREY LEHMAN: The kind that says, "no quotas, fair competition for all seats," in which race is a factor, but not the overwhelming factor-- one of the many factors in admission. It's the right policy for our country at this time, and I'm confident that the Supreme Court will continue to keep it as the law of the land.

RAY SUAREZ: That court will hear oral arguments on the Michigan cases next spring, and rule by July.

RAY SUAREZ: We pick up the story now with Terence Pell, president of the Center for Individual Rights, which is representing the white students in these cases; he is the former deputy assistant education secretary for civil rights policy during the Reagan Administration; and Christopher Edley, professor at Harvard Law School, and as special counsel to President Clinton, Professor Edley led the White House review of affirmative action programs.

Terry Pell, is it significant that the court wants to hear these two cases now?

TERENCE PELL: I think this is very good news. We have conflicting lower court opinions all over the country. Some courts say colleges can look at race as much as they want. Other courts say they may not look at race at all. This is why we have a Supreme Court, to settle these issues, to declare once and for all what the law is, uniformly across the entire country.

RAY SUAREZ: Professor Edley, was a new case needed with this patchwork quilt that Terry Pell talks about?

CHRISTOPHER EDLEY: I can't disagree. I think there's quite a bit of confusion in the lower courts. And more importantly I think there is some confusion in higher education. While the overwhelming majority of the leadership in these selective institutions very much believe that race- conscious affirmative action to promote diversity is essential, they are confused about what is legally permissible so a definitive ruling from the Supreme Court I think is overdue. They've been ducking it for a couple of years. And they've reached out to take a case where the record is reasonably full.

RAY SUAREZ: And given what's alleged by these two women, given the way they've structured their pleas, does this have a lot... is a lot at stake for these institutions that you mention and for the law across the country?

CHRISTOPHER EDLEY: I think a great deal is at stake. One common misconception is that the court's ruling will only apply to public institutions. And that's not correct. While the equal protection clause of the Constitution will apply to public actors, Title 6 of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 makes that same basic set of principles applicable to private universities and colleges that accept government money, and almost all of them do in financial aid or in research funds. So this ruling could have very sweeping effects within the 10% of higher education that is selective and employs some form of affirmative action.

RAY SUAREZ: Do you agree that there's possible wide applicability?

TERENCE PELL: I do agree. I think Professor Edley is exactly right. This will carry over to the private schools, at least those that receive federal funding. I think there's another way in which this could have a wide significance. If the Court says that diversity, manufacturing a certain mix, a certain racial mix 6 of students is a constitutionally permissible goal for the state and it's reasonable to expect that other state agencies will also make the same argument, that it's in their interest, that it's in the government's interest to have, for example, a certain racial mix on our juries or that it's in the interest of federal agencies to have a certain racial mix of policy makers. Once the court says or if the court says that diversity, which means in this case achieving a certain percentage mix, racial mix, of students or applicants or workers, then that principle can apply in other instances and in other circumstances, and the door is open for a number of parallel claims by other government agencies.

RAY SUAREZ: Is that really one of the big targets of your agency, that it take down that idea that there's a state compelling interest in creating diversity.

TERENCE PELL: That's right. We think that the idea of diversity is so vague that it's really empty, and we do not believe that the state has a constitutional right to prefer one applicant over another applicant on the basis of their skin color solely to achieve, quote unquote, diversity. We think that there may be reasons for the state sometimes to prefer applicants on the basis of race but diversity is just simply too amorphous a goal to license the state to be picking and choosing on the basis of skin color.

RAY SUAREZ: Professor Edley, amorphous or a compelling state interest?

CHRISTOPHER EDLEY: Well, a compelling state interest. And I don't want to get into a debate about whether diversity is the right word. I think the best way to think about this is whether these institutions are going to be allowed, as they have been for the last 25 years, since the Bakke case, are going to be allowed to continue to define what they think they need in the mix of students and faculty in order to achieve their mission, in order to pursue excellence. These institutions have concluded that the best educational environment, the best way to serve the society in which they're situated is to see to it that their institutions are inclusive, that that produces excellence. There's also a disagreement, we obviously have a disagreement about what the current state of the law is. I think in my view and certainly the view of most courts, the controlling opinion in the Bakke case established that diversity can at least in some circumstances provide the compelling interest that will justify carefully constructed race-conscious decision-making. One of the questions in this case will be when the Supreme Court affirms that principle, will they affirm it in a way that also strengthens the claim for inclusivity in other contexts, in employment and housing and so forth or conversely if for some reason the Supreme Court concludes that diversity is not a compelling interest in higher education, will they do that in a way that casts doubt on whether diversity and inclusion are important for an urban police department, are important for prison guards, are important in a variety of other contexts?

RAY SUAREZ: How do you respond?

TERENCE PELL: Look, I think you have to look at what diversity means. Surely there are some types of diversity that are educationally valuable. If you ask students, for example, what types of diversity they value, they say things like ideological viewpoint, religious background, socioeconomic background. But racial diversity comes pretty far down on the list. So when schools like Michigan claim they want diversity, you have to ask exactly what kind of diversity it is they want and does that kind of diversity justify the use of racial preferences? We can all agree that it's important for a school to have a diversity of viewpoints and political outlooks. I don't think we all agree that engineering a racial mix of students, engineering a certain combination of skin colors adds to the educational environment of a school.

RAY SUAREZ: Let me understand some things... go ahead. I'm sorry.

CHRISTOPHER EDLEY: Well, it's certainly clear that we don't all agree on that. But in fact within higher education, there is overwhelming agreement among the leaders of higher education on faculties and even in student bodies the research indicates, the social science research indicates, for example, that students overwhelmingly identify racial and ethnic diversity as a source of educational enrichment in their lives. Faculty and students both report overwhelmingly in independent surveys that it changes the content of what happens in the classroom, in students learning from one another outside of the classrooms. One of the important things about this case I think is that there is a social science evidence component in the record. And while it's disputed, there's plenty of information there I think for the Justices to look at to see that the argument in favor of creating excellence through inclusion isn't just hand waving by a bunch... by a bunch of... a few people at elite schools but rather this is a very widespread, a widespread concern that makes it compelling, and it's supported by social science evidence.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, how do we not end up right where we are now with Bakke sometime in the future with Grutter and Gratz? If this has been the controlling precedent in this area of law, yesterday states, whole circuits of the federal courts have gone their own way, could we be having this argument again in some other form in ten years or twelve years?

TERENCE PELL: I would hope not. I mean I would hope that the Supreme Court would put an end to this. In fact, we have a laboratory example of what happens when you do put an end to this. California and Texas have done away with race conscious admissions for the last five years. And minority enrollment at those... in those states has, you know, is stable and in fact increased at many of those schools. In fact today every single public school in California and Texas has enrollment of underrepresented minorities that exceeds 10%. And that's key because 10% is the number that Michigan says is the threshold, the minimum threshold that you need of minority students to have a critical mass of minority students. The fact is schools in California and Texas are getting that critical mass without using racial preferences, and that's a critical point. That's the way the country needs to go.

RAY SUAREZ: Professor, quick response.

CHRISTOPHER EDLEY: Well, I just don't think that that's factually correct. The track record in Texas is quite mixed. At one of the flagship campuses, the University of Texas in Austin, the undergraduate numbers have basically recovered to the levels that they were five or six years ago. That's not the case in graduate schools and it'snot the case at Texas A&M, the other flagship school in Texas. Sometimes it works; sometimes it doesn't. There are a lot of unique factors. Many things have to be done in order to make some of these alternatives work. In California the situation is even more mixed. There have been declines over time. And by no means is California or the flagship institutions serving a reasonable proportion of Latinos in particular, which is of course an extremely fast growing component of the population in California. There's... there are at least two major issues: One is the quality of the educational environment and how much learning goes on and how diversity improves that core educational mission. But the other thing to think about particularly -- I teach at a law school -- is are these universities serving the professions, serving the society, producing leaders for a diverse, an increasingly diverse nation, increasingly diverse workplaces and professions.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, the arguments come later in this session and I'm sure we'll revisit this issue. Professor Edley, Terry Pell, thank you both.

SERIES EXECUTIVE EXCESS?

JIM LEHRER: Now, part two of our series on executive pay and performance. Last night, our business correspondent Paul Solman of WGBH-Boston looked at the causes of the growth in C.E.O pay. Tonight: How free is the marketplace that determines pay? Here again, Paul Solman.

PAUL SOLMAN: Earlier this year at Babson College, a business school outside Boston-- a discussion of the $100 million- a-year pay package of former Tyco CEO Dennis Kozlowski.

PAUL SOLMAN: How many of you think the contract Kozlowski had was over the top, unreasonable, unethical in the sense of what he deserved to make? How many of you think it was not unethically high, that it was reason what he was getting?

MAN: I don't want to say he makes too much money, because then I cut myself off. I'd love to make that amount of money.

PAUL SOLMAN: This attitude helps explain the ambivalence afoot in America these days. In the past few decades, most of us have experienced modest pay raises at best, and they are put off and, if not shocked, by the huge CEO pay packages of recent years: Oracle's Larry Ellison and his $3/4 billion in 2001; Apple's Steve Jobs, nearly $400 million in the year 2000; Michael Eisner's roughly $1 billion take since becoming CEO of Disney. Nobel Prize-Winning economist George Akerlof puts it bluntly.

GEORGE AKERLOF, University of California, Berkeley: This is very bad behavior, just to pay yourself out a large amount. The public is very angry about such behavior, and in fact, rightly so.

PAUL SOLMAN: But many members of the public also feel, like these business students, that CEO mega-pay is justified.

WOMAN: I think one of the things that's really great about our culture is that we believe that we all can rise to the top, and we all can be CEO's who have this kind of compensation plan, and so therefore when somebody negotiates a plan like that for themselves, we're completely behind it.

PAUL SOLMAN: Now, this was early June, before Kozlowski's indictment for stealing $600 million in company funds. Still, at the time of our Babson College taping, he'd already been indicted for evading sales taxes on 19th century paintings, and had resigned. But to the Babson students, that didn't change the basic principle of economics.

MAN: It's laissez faire. If the market was willing to pay him five gazillion... then he deserves to be paid that amount to do something.

PAUL SOLMAN: Six.

MAN: Six gazillion, whatever.

PAUL SOLMAN: A gazillion, a gazillion. The students were voicing an old theme in economics that's been revived, even revered, in recent years: Laissez-faire-- let the market be free, and those who deserve to, will get their just rewards. That's become the standard explanation for why CEO pay has shot up in their lifetimes, from 40 times the average worker's pay in 1970 to more than 100 times in 1990 to some 500 times today. It's even used to justify lavish retirement packages, like Jack Welch's from GE. Lifetime tickets to New York's Yankee stadium and Boston's Fenway Park, a Manhattan penthouse, and numerous other perks that came to light in his divorce case, and that critics like Graef Crystal now mock.

GRAEF CRYSTAL: When this thing broke, I think you had... you had Queen Elizabeth II checking into a local London hospital with a severe case of perk envy.

PAUL SOLMAN: Jack Welch's response? The free market was just doing its thing.

JACK WELCH: Do shortstops over here deserve that much? Do anchors on television deserve that much? Free markets aren't perfect. Capitalism isn't perfect. But it's the best system we have.

PAUL SOLMAN: CEO pay consultant Joseph Bachelder agrees.

JOSEPH BACHELDER: There aren't that many outstanding professional athletes, and not that many outstanding executives to lead major U.S. corporations.

PAUL SOLMAN: But is the market for CEOS as free as the market for athletes? We put the question to the pioneer of free market bargaining in sports, former baseball union lawyer Marvin Miller.

PAUL SOLMAN: A number of people say that CEO compensation is the same as the high salaries that are paid to, for example, baseball players. Is that true? False? Ridiculous?

MARVIN MILLER, Retired Baseball Union Lawyer: I choose ridiculous. ( Laughs ) You have to consider how salaries are set and by whom in each case.

PAUL SOLMAN: In baseball, salaries are set by owners spending their own money. And even the richest of them, like the guy who owns the Yankees, have an interest in keeping salaries down. Pay expert Graef Crystal.

GRAEF CRYSTAL: George Steinbrenner isn't going to give you a nickel, if he can avoid it. He's the owner and it's his money, and he doesn't want to pay those baseball players any more than he has to. And I'm sure he just agonizes over what he does pay them.

PAUL SOLMAN: But who pays the CEO? A board of directors, usually hand-picked by the CEO.

MARVIN MILLER: When your salary is determined by people who are beholden to you, as is the case of CEO's, then there's no... there are no brakes. The sky is the limit.

PAUL SOLMAN: The key point is that in free market, laissez- faire economics, you're paid for performance. And with some exceptions, that's how it works in sports: The best performers tend to make the most money. But are the CEO's who make the most money, like Michael Eisner of Disney, which owns the world- champion Anaheim Angels, the best performers on their playing field?

SPOKESMAN: Congratulations to Disney, to Michael Eisner.

PAUL SOLMAN: Well, Disney's stock's been under siege, and hundreds of studies show little if any correlation between CEO pay and company performance, as measured by profits or stock price. So in economic terms, perhaps this is a bigger story than just the advent of CEO mega-pay. Indeed, critics like Robert Kuttner charge that it shows one thing: the forces necessary to make free markets fair have lost their grip.

ROBERT KUTTNER, Editor, The American Prospect: Unions have gotten weaker. Government regulation has gotten weaker. SEC disclosure has gotten weaker. So there'snobody shining lights on this. And the ability of insiders to have conflicts of interest has gotten stronger. That's why CEO compensation completely unrelated to whether the company is doing well or badly has exploded.

PAUL SOLMAN: In fact, more and more economists are wondering if the CEO pay market is free, or rigged. Case in point: The windfalls CEO's have been making in stock options. Harvard Business School's Brian Hall explains.

BRIAN HALL, Harvard Business School: A stock option is the right to purchase the stock at a particular price that's set in advance. So for example, if the current stock price is at $50, most executives will receive a stock option with an exercise price of $50. So obviously, if the stock price rises to $70 or $100, or $570, they make the profit between the new price and the old price.

PAUL SOLMAN: The theory, says Hall, was that options would align CEO pay with performance. If the stock shot up, the CEO's options would be worth big money for having enriched the shareholders. But instead, says Berkeley's George Akerlof, CEO's had an unfair advantage, could persuade investors to be bullish, even about a firm with bearish prospects.

GEORGE AKERLOF: They have a very big incentive to see that their stock price goes up. Well, what determines whether the stock price goes up?

PAUL SOLMAN: Perception, says Akerlof-- how well buyers of stock think firms are performing.

GEORGE AKERLOF: And how well the buyers think that the firms are doing depends of course upon the information they have. Instead of being an incentive for CEO's to do well, these stock options have been a very big incentive for CEO's to do badly.

PAUL SOLMAN: In other words, says Akerlof, CEO's can manipulate financial information to boost the stock price, so they can cash in their options. We've seen illegal examples of this at Enron, for example, known as the crooked "E." But George Akerlof won his Nobel Prize for pointing out, in this paper on lemons in the used car business, that unequal information can give anyone the incentive to trade on it, which in turn can corrupt a market, like that for used cars, or CEO's.

GEORGE AKERLOF: The public thinks this is an issue of left versus right. We should have either free markets or regulated markets.

PAUL SOLMAN: But Akerlof thinks freedom and regulation go hand in hand. After all, it took the so-called lemon laws to restore confidence in the used car market.

GEORGE AKERLOF: So let's have free markets. But when you have the free markets, you also have to watch over them.

PAUL SOLMAN: That's why Akerlof thinks a more vigilant, well- funded SEC is so important, why the current disarray at the Commission has him so concerned. But free market enthusiasts, for their part, aren't worried. The market itself will adjust, they say-- is already doing so. After all, the stocks of firms with manipulative CEO's seem have plummeted. Moreover, some big institutional money managers are now putting pressure on boards to become more independent and reign in CEO pay

KURT VONEGUT (television commercial): I have always depended on the kindness of fiduciaries.

PAUL SOLMAN: -- institutions like TIAA-CREF, which represents Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., It's ads boast, and millions of current and future retirees. TIAA-CREF will be henceforth voting its shares to eliminate stock options for CEO's, says V.P. Peter Clapman.

PETER CLAPMAN, TIAA-CREF: We want them to buy stock. We want them to have significant equity holdings where they will feel the pain of a loss the same way we, you and I feel the pain of a loss.

PAUL SOLMAN: In the end, then, for those who believe in laissez-faire markets, Clapman's shareholder activism is an example of inevitable self- correction, that stays true to the spirit of free market capitalism. Pay consultant Joe Bachelder puts it somewhat differently.

JOSEPH BACHELDER: You want to get a certain price for your house. You want to get a certain price for your stock. Why shouldn't a CEO seek to get the price that he or she wants for his or her services?

PAUL SOLMAN: But to those who think this market needs plenty of help, it may be a case of too little, too late.

ROBERT KUTTNER: But if you take a long enough view, the country eventually recovered from the great depression. The market worked. But in the meantime, there was a lot of pain and suffering that was unnecessary. You shine enough light of publicity on this, even these shameless companies maybe get shamed into changing their policies. But that's not a case of markets working. That's a case of markets failing and then investigators catching the scoundrels and forcing reform.

PAUL SOLMAN: That's true of those who've arguably broken the law, think Kuttner and others; and more controversially, they think it's also true of those CEO's who made great gobs of money in the name of a supposedly free market.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight: Prostate cancer testing and a Roger Rosenblatt essay.

FOCUS PROSTATE CANCER TEST

JIM LEHRER: Now, testing for prostate cancer, and to Gwen Ifill.

GWEN IFILL: Millions of men will undergo one of two tests to determine whether they have prostate cancer this year. These tests, including the PSA, or Prostate-Specific Antigen test, are now routinely given to men over the age of 50. But how effective are they? A government task force has been studying that question, and has come up with a mixed answer. Joining me now is the chairman of that task force, Dr. Alfred Berg. He also heads the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Washington. So, Dr. Berg, what are we to make of these test results? Is a PSA test taken after the age of 50 an effective predictor of cancer death?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, our group found the evidence was insufficient to recommend for or against routine prostate cancer screening, and the reason is that we have inconclusive evidence that screening and early treatment improves health outcomes. So we were unable to determine whether the balance of benefits and harms favored benefits or the harms.

GWEN IFILL: In 1996, your group, as I understand it, also just flat out said that these screenings aren't really worth it. So this has been a move back toward the middle kind of, hasn't it?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, I wouldn't overstate the change. There are two things that have happened. First of all, of course, in the last six years there's been more scientific evidence; but secondly, the methods that we've used to do these reviews and the criteria that we use to reach our conclusions have changed. So that we now consider, for example, not only the quality of evidence but the balance of benefits and harms. So we have new evidence, new methods and new criteria and now a new recommendation.

GWEN IFILL: You talk about the balance of benefits and harms. What is the argument against just getting the screening anyway? Is there a problem of getting the screening or is there a problem with what you do with the information you get?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, all screening programs have some potential down side. In the case of screening for prostate cancer, if you have a positive screen, you usually need to go under some sort of evaluation to determine whether prostate cancer is there or not -- usually prostate cancer biopsy. If the biopsy is positive, then treatment using either surgery or radiation are the most common. All of those things can cause adverse events either associated with the procedures themselves or later on complications.

GWEN IFILL: How big is the problem? Right now, give us a sense of how big a killer, I guess, prostate cancer is now in the general population?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, prostate cancer is an extremely important problem among men in this country. Probably 3% of men will die of prostate cancer -- about 189,000 new cases a year, and about 30,000 deaths. It's the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths right behind lung cancer for American men.

GWEN IFILL: And if you have this PSA blood test and it shows that you have or there is an indication that there may be cancer cells in this test, is it always a definite sign that there is cancer or are there false positives sometimes involved in this test?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, you're exactly right. Actually most of the positive screening tests are false positives. Anywhere from 80 to 75% of the initial screening tests prove to be false positives on subsequent evaluation.

GWEN IFILL: If 75% of the tests are false positives, and you're one of that 75% and your doctor still recommends surgery, are you just over treating 75% of the people who take this test?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, it's important to draw a distinction between the evaluation for prostate cancer and the treatment for prostate cancer. When I talk about false positives, that's the number of tests that are positive initially that prove not to be prostate cancer. So those individuals who have a positive screening test but then prove not to have cancer obviously would not be treated.

GWEN IFILL: So if you do get a treatment, if you do get surgery, what's the potential down side? What are the side effects?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, surgery or radiation

GWEN IFILL: Or radiation.

DR. ALFRED BERG: ...They have effects immediately. It's of course extremely rare but people do die from surgery. But more commonly side effects can happen years later. There can be incontinence of urine, inability to control the bladder, impotence, erectile dysfunction, bowel problems.

GWEN IFILL: So the trade-off isn't necessarily a good one.

DR. ALFRED BERG: No. It's a very difficult decision because you're trading off potential benefits that are unproven but huge, the possibility of being saved from dying from prostate cancer against potential harms which are also significant.

GWEN IFILL: What are we as laymen and lay women to make of these kinds of findings? Periodically we hear the same types of reports from mammograms, pap smears and now about prostate cancer affecting men. What are average people who are worried about their health and they're concerned about the potential for contracting a deadly disease, what are they to make of this information?

DR. ALFRED BERG: I think the important message is that patients need to take control of this decision. They need to get information from their clinicians about the potential benefits, about the potential harms, but then they need to take into account their own personal circumstances, their own personal risk, their personal values and preferences before they make a decision whether or not to be screened.

GWEN IFILL: Is that decision influenced by how old you are? Would you make a different decision if you're 50 than if you're 80?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, absolutely. Prostate cancer, of course, is much more common as men age. If you live to be 100, you probably have a 100% chance of having cancer cells in your prostate gland. On the other hand, the older you are and the more other medical problems that you have, the less likely prostate cancer screening would be of benefit. So it's a trade-off between increasing age with increasing risk but also increasing likelihood that something else will be the major health problem, not the prostate cancer.

GWEN IFILL: Let me throw another problem into this mix. Another report released by a different group on Monday says that black men have a higher rate, a bigger chance... a greater chance of getting the deadlier, faster-moving cancers and therefore would benefit more from this increased prostrate screening. Isn't that a different message than the one you're sending today?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, first of all I think it's important to point out that even among African-American men we don't have evidence that screening improves health outcomes. So if we did that have evidence it would make sense that African-American men should be screened. Right now though what we're recommending is that everyone should assess their risk. African-American men are at higher risk. On the other hand, Asian-American and Hispanic men are at lower risk. So it's a combination of risk, age, personal preferences and values.

GWEN IFILL: When we talk about the accuracy of these tests, is there some way to make them more accurate? Is this an ongoing project or is this something we just have to understand it's going to be an unsure outcome?

DR. ALFRED BERG: There's a great deal of research going on trying to answer exactly that question because what we really like to know is when we detect a cancer at screening, is it a cancer that would be best left alone or is it a cancer that really needs to be treated? So there's a great deal of research going on right now to try to answer that question.

GWEN IFILL: Is there any discussion also going on about how you convince someone if they have cancer that it shouldn't be treated. How do you tell someone they have cancer which they are led to believe is a deadly disease that they should just watch and wait?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Well, I think that the first choice should be whether or not you have the screening test done. You really shouldn't have the screening test done unless you're willing to the evaluation and the potential treatment. So the choice really should be made before you get to that difficult decision.

GWEN IFILL: So the choice, just to be clear, should be made before you get the test or after you get the result of the test and before you opt for treatment?

DR. ALFRED BERG: Our recommendation is that you ought to consider the potential benefits and harms before you have the test and make the decision on that basis and not wait until you have a positive test in order to decide whether you want further evaluation and treatment.

GWEN IFILL: Dr. Alfred Berg, thank you very much for joining us.

DR. ALFRED BERG: You're quite welcome.

ESSAY- BODY OF WORK

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, essayist Roger Rosenblatt considers the meaning of the phrase, "a body of work."

ROGER ROSENBLATT: At a celebration of E.L. Doctorow recently by the "Kenyon Review," mention was made of Doctorow's "body of work." Interesting phrase, "body of work." Unlike the body you were born with, this one is put together by oneself, part by body part, over the long years-- elbows, eardrums, eye sockets, torsos, anklebones--of work. Inevitably, some parts will work better than others. But with a first-class writer one is aware that one is in the presence of something significant-- indeed, indispensable -- some body. So it has been with Edgar Doctorow, whose body of work is composed of such features as "Welcome to Hard Times," Billy Bathgate," "Ragtime," "Loon Lake," "World's Fair," "The Book of Daniel," "The Waterworks," "City of God." X-ray that body, and thrill at an entire world revealed, consisting of the monologues of Victenstein and Einstein, exploding horses, the execution of the Rosenbergs, the Hindenburg, Looms, wild dogs on the attack, Dutch Shultz rooms with Stanford White. Gun fights in the streets. All these parts sprung from a single head in a variety of moods. In a way, the body of work is a body of moods. So we take in the body of work of, say, Robin Williams, whose talent leaps from one mood to its opposite number.

ROBIN WILLIAM: Now racism -- I'm going honey you have to pick a race first. Michael is talking about racism.

ROGER ROSENBLATT: While Williams was touring the country in a kind of desperate reprise of the comic stand-ups of robin the younger, his other mood was producing a brilliant performance on the movie screen, of the brooding, lonely figure in "One Hour Photo." When Williams' body of work is finally glued together, one wonders how Garp will marry Mrs. Doubtfire. But one trusts it will work out. The magic about a body of work is that its DNA can be erratic: A forehead from one place, a big toe from another. Yet the creature is recognizable, nonetheless, from head to toe. Mark Twain's mood swings produced tom sawyer, the confidence boy; and the confidence man, the devil himself. One may catch Louis Armstrong claiming that he "ain't misbehavin'" and wailing in the sorrow of "black and blue." Frank Lloyd Wright, Cole Porter, Michael Jordan, Vermeer, Shakespeare himself. A body of work from a body of moods, and a body of ups and downs. It didn't matter if these people were in a slump from time to time, or if, after a time, they lost it altogether. There was still time enough to produce a body of work-- the failures, the depressions, all miraculously absorbed, ennobled even, and made beautiful by the outnumbering triumphs, the flashes of ecstasy. For us lesser lights, this is all mildly heartening. The body of work. Everyone has one-- carpenter, parent, doctor, friend. Somehow, everybody pulls himself together. Of course, the higher the wire act, the more conspicuous the day of judgment. But it isn't done for judgment. It's the work that matters only. Only the work, piece by piece, day by surprising day, when one awakens full of hope and vinegar and produces a colossal dud, and when one awakens cloaked in gloom and produces the masterpiece of a lifetime. Part by body part. A body of work, like a benign Frankenstein monster, an angelic Frankenstein Monster who stands on his own after a while, and all the world exclaims,

SPOKESMAN: "it's alive!"

ROGER ROSENBLATT: I'm Roger Rosenblatt.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major developments of this day. Iraq promised to declare its weapons programs by Saturday, one day before a UN deadline. And a federal health advisory panel will no longer oppose prostate cancer screening, but won't recommend it either. The panel said it's still unclear whether the testing saves lives. We'll see you online, and again here tomorrow evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.