The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

MARGARET WARNER: Good evening. I`m Margaret Warner.

On the NewsHour tonight: the news of this Thursday; then, charges against Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu and new questions about campaign money; the racial divide sparked by the arrest of six high school students in Jena, Louisiana; and the first in our series of interviews with Democratic and Republican presidential candidates, tonight, Kansas Senator Sam Brownback.

(BREAK)

MARGARET WARNER: The Senate overwhelmingly rejected a bid today to cut off funding for the Iraq war. It`s the latest defeat for Democrats trying to change war policy.

Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senator Russ Feingold sought to cut off funding for combat operations by next June. The measure got only 28 votes, far short of the 60 needed to cut off a GOP filibuster after the two sides sparred on the floor.

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV), Senate Majority Leader: I understand that the Senate is a deliberative body. It was created to prevent haste and promote consensus. But what we`re seeing here on this issue, the issue of the war in Iraq, is a far cry from deliberation. It`s obstruction, strictly outright obstructionism.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), Arizona: I keeping hear, as I did from the distinguished majority leader, it`s time to change course, it`s time to change course. Well, we did change course. Thank God we changed course. And that new course has been succeeding, latest information today. Have we got a long, hard, tough struggle ahead of us? Of course we do.

MARGARET WARNER: After the vote, the Senate took up another proposal to withdraw U.S. combat troops by next June; that, too, was expected to fail.

In Iraq today, the number-two U.S. commander said car bombs and suicide attacks in Baghdad are at their lowest in a year. Army Lieutenant General Ray Odierno acknowledged civilian deaths are still too high. But he said al-Qaida is "increasingly being pushed out of Baghdad and even fleeing Iraq."

Separately, a Pentagon report said Iraqis won`t take over security in all 18 provinces until at least next July. The target date had been this November.

At a news conference, President Bush acknowledged it`s been slow going.

GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States: The goals are the same, and have we achieved them as fast? No, we haven`t. But, however, having not achieved them doesn`t mean we ought to quit. It means we ought to work hard to achieve the goals, because the end result is the same, whether the goal is done in November or in July, and that is a country that can govern itself, sustain itself, and defend itself, and is an ally against these extremists and radicals.

MARGARET WARNER: The president also said he wants to know what happened in a shooting involving guards from Blackwater USA. The Iraqis say 11 civilians were killed. Today the American embassy said guards from the private security firm are still in Iraq, pending an investigation. The embassy said they`re not working for now because officials they protect are staying inside the Green Zone in Baghdad.

Al-Qaida`s two leaders issued new messages today. In an audio recording, Osama bin Laden condemned President Pervez Musharraf for putting pressure on Islamic militants in Pakistan, saying Musharraf was showing "submissiveness" to America. Bin Laden said it "makes armed rebellion against him and removing him obligatory."

Separately, Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaida`s number-two, boasted that the U.S. is losing in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

A major Democratic fundraiser was charged today with federal campaign finance violations and massive business fraud. Norman Hsu raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for Senator Hillary Clinton in her bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, and for many others. Clinton has said she`s returning the money.

Today in New York, U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia said Hsu defrauded investors of $60 million.

MICHAEL GARCIA, U.S. Attorney, Southern District of New York: Hsu is also charged with using others, including some of his fraud victims, as straw donors to make tens of thousands of dollars in illegal campaign contributions to various candidates for U.S. Congress and president. In addition to unsealing these charges today, earlier FBI agents seized five bank accounts -- four, excuse me, four bank accounts used by Hsu to carry out this criminal activity.

MARGARET WARNER: Hsu already faces sentencing in California on grand theft. We`ll have more on this story right after the news summary.

The small town of Jena, Louisiana, was inundated with protesters today. Thousands marched in a show of support for six black teenagers who`ve been charged in the beating of a white classmate. The case sparked racial tensions because prosecutors took no action against three white teens accused of hanging nooses from a tree on school grounds. We`ll have more on this story later in the program.

Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns resigned today. He plans to return to his home state of Nebraska, where he`s expected to run for the U.S. Senate seat now held by Republican Chuck Hagel. Hagel`s announced he will not seek another term. For now, Johanns` deputy, Charles Conner, will take over as acting secretary of agriculture.

A sports arbitration panel today ruled Floyd Landis must forfeit his 2006 Tour de France title. The ruling affirmed a test showing the American cyclist used synthetic testosterone to power his comeback victory. He`s now banned from cycling for two years, retroactive to January 30th. His lawyers called it a "miscarriage of justice" and said they`re considering a final appeal.

The chairman of the Federal Reserve warned today the mortgage and credit crunch has been worse than expected. Ben Bernanke told a House hearing that financial losses have far outstripped even the worst estimates. He said that`s why the Fed cut interest rates this week, but he was noncommittal on the question of further cuts.

BEN BERNANKE, Federal Reserve Chairman: Ultimately, our objective is to try to meet Congress`s dual mandate of maximum sustainable employment and price stability, and we took that action with that intention. There`s quite a bit of uncertainty, so we`re going to have to continue to monitor how the financial markets evolve, how their effects on the economy evolve, and try to keep reassessing our outlook and adjusting policy in order to try to meet that dual mandate.

MARGARET WARNER: At his news conference today, President Bush acknowledged the housing and credit markets are facing "unsettling times." But he insisted again the economy is fundamentally strong.

On Wall Street today, stocks fell on concerns about surging oil prices and the tumbling dollar. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost more than 48 points to close at 13,766. The Nasdaq fell 12 points to close at 2,654.

And that`s it for the news summary tonight. Now: campaign fundraising charges; questions of justice in Jena, Louisiana; and a close- up of Republican presidential candidate Sam Brownback.

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MARGARET WARNER: As federal prosecutors in New York charged businessman Norman Hsu with defrauding investors of $60 million, they also accused him of illegally making contributions to political candidates in other people`s names. The pyramid business financing scheme outlined in today`s charges is similar to one Hsu was convicted of running 15 years ago but fled before being sentenced.

Hsu was a prolific Democratic fundraiser in recent years, until his legal troubles came to light a few weeks ago. He`s raised more than $850,000 for Hillary Clinton`s presidential campaign, $19,500 for Barack Obama`s political action committee, $23,000 for Bill Richardson`s gubernatorial campaign, and also contributed to the Senate campaigns of Democrats Tom Harkin, Mary Landrieu, Frank Lautenberg, Mark Pryor, Jack Reed, and Jay Rockefeller, among others.

Clinton, Obama, and Richardson have said they`ll either return the donations or give them to charity.

For background on Hsu, we turn now to John Wildermuth, a reporter with the San Francisco Chronicle. And, John, welcome, thank you for joining us.

First of all, let`s look at the business-related charges today. What was the scheme under which he managed to fleece investors some $60 million?

JOHN WILDERMUTH, San Francisco Chronicle: Well, apparently it was essentially a Ponzi scheme, which means you tell people, "If you give me money now, I will return that money with interest after I make an investment and, maybe in a year, maybe less than that, six weeks, six months." And after the first people get their money back, they say, "This is a great deal," and they give more money and more money.

And the Ponzi scheme keeps working until there aren`t any more investors. And then whoever`s running the scheme, Mr. Hsu in this case and in the California case, then has a tendency to disappear with the money.

MARGARET WARNER: Now, this California case I gather was very, very similar. He was convicted 15 years ago, yet he`s only now going to appear for sentencing. How did that happen?

JOHN WILDERMUTH: Well, it`s similar, but it`s a lot smaller. It was about a million dollars. And what it was is it came down, Ponzi scheme, invested, took off with the money, but he was arrested, went through court, and pleaded no contest to grand theft charges. And they said, "OK, fine, show up at sentencing." He never appeared. That was 15 years ago. Prosecutors thought he took off for Hong Kong, but a few years later he was back in New York City.

MARGARET WARNER: Now, when and how during this period, I guess, he was on the lam did he emerge as a major Democratic fundraiser?

JOHN WILDERMUTH: Actually, there`s no record of him being involved in politics at all until 2003 when he made a $2,000 donation to John Kerry. And what happens then, if you make a donation to a political candidate, your name is on the list. And more and more people keep coming and saying, "How`d you like to donate to us?" And Mr. Hsu very quickly got a reputation for someone who wouldn`t say no. Always had the money, was always willing to give it to a Democratic candidate.

MARGARET WARNER: So now explain, again, going back to today`s charges on the campaign financing side, what is it alleged he did in his role as a money raiser, obviously now giving a lot more than $2,000?

JOHN WILDERMUTH: Well, right now under the laws of the campaign finance, the most a person can give to a candidate is $2,300. Well, that`s not enough to run a campaign like the presidential campaigns, where they`re looking at having to raise $100 million or more. So what you do in that case is you find people that will donate their $2,300 but can also find a lot of other people that will donate $2,300.

Now, if you ask your friend to give Hillary Clinton $2,300, that`s fine. But if you ask your friend to give Hillary Clinton $2,300 and tell them that you will then give them the $2,300 to repay them, that`s a crime, and that`s what he`s being accused of.

MARGARET WARNER: And then the federal prosecutor also said further that he actually pressured some of his investors, as well, to actually give money.

JOHN WILDERMUTH: Well, that`s a hard one, really, because when you say "pressure," you know, you go and you say, "Hey, you ought to donate. I think you ought to donate money to Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama or anyone." And that person then has to decide whether they should give the money.

Now, the pressure comes strictly from the person himself who says, "Well, gee, if I don`t give the money that Mr. Hsu wanted me to donate, maybe Mr. Hsu won`t include me in his investment plans, and maybe I won`t make as much money." This happens every single day in corporate America when, for example, the head of the insurance industry asks various insurance executives to donate money.

MARGARET WARNER: So now get back to the story of Mr. Hsu. How did suspicions about the way he went about raising money, back to the way he bundled this money and the straw donors, as you said, how did that come to light a few weeks ago?

JOHN WILDERMUTH: Well, it didn`t come to light until the Wall Street Journal wrote a story about Mr. Hsu, saying that Mr. Hsu has become, in a very few number of years, a major Democratic donor, and many of his friends have also become major Democratic donors, including some people that you wouldn`t expect would be the sort of person that can give hundreds of thousands of dollars in political campaigns.

MARGARET WARNER: And, in fact, the Journal went and found a family or a couple in California that really seemed not very plausible as a major donor?

JOHN WILDERMUTH: Certainly. The family is in Daly City, which is right next door to San Francisco, and there`s five members of the family. The father of the family is a mailman. They live in a home -- which they own, it`s a nice home -- but it`s a distinctly middle-class area. But in the course, since the last two years, 2005, they`ve given more than $200,000 to Democratic candidates across the nation. And that should raise some red flags, and it certainly did.

MARGARET WARNER: All right, John Wildermuth of the San Francisco Chronicle, thank you so much.

And for a closer look now at how presidential campaigns rely on and vet these so-called bundlers, we turn to Ken Gross, former enforcement chief of the Federal Election Commission, now an election lawyer in private practice in Washington, D.C., and Craig Holman, legislative lobbyist for Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group that monitors the bundling activity of the presidential campaigns on the web site WhiteHouseForSale.org.

And welcome to you both.

Craig Holman, explain how a man with this checkered legal background could even emerge as essentially one of Hillary Clinton`s top 15 campaign fundraisers without raising some red flags. How does that happen?

CRAIG HOLMAN, Legislative Lobbyist, Public Citizen: Well, first of all, I want to point out, this is the first presidential election season in which we`re going to see the major candidates spend $1 billion to get elected president. To spend that kind of money, they need to tap into any source of funds that they can find.

So even though there is some minimal scrutiny of a quick background check of some of the bundlers, none of the campaigns have exercised any sort of systematic, thorough check. So someone like Norman Hsu who suddenly reliably provides bundled contributions starting, you know, at smaller contributions and adding up to eventually about $850,000 to Clinton, $1 million all together to various states and federal candidates, and people are not going to be asking questions. They need that money.

MARGARET WARNER: Do you agree, Ken Gross, that essentially they say, "Boy, we`ve got a live one here," and they don`t look too closely?

KEN GROSS, Former Enforcement Chief, Federal Elections Commission: No, I don`t think that`s entirely fair. Many campaigns, major campaigns at the federal and state level have rather thorough vetting systems, both in checking backgrounds of people, as well as people who volunteer on vetting committees to sort of give a human element to the process, particularly for large donors, those who are going to collect a lot of money.

Norman Hsu was sort of the perfect storm. His troubles back in California pre-dated the Internet, so you couldn`t Google him, you couldn`t find anything. He was on the board of a university in New York City. He had been giving for a few years to a number of candidates. And he had the kind of troubles in his background that were really difficult to pick out, and I think that was the problem with Norman Hsu. Campaigns do have vetting systems, but his case was the perfect storm.

MARGARET WARNER: Is that the case that really the vetting systems, Craig Holman, are essentially to Google someone`s name, and therefore he was hard to catch, based on a `92 conviction?

CRAIG HOLMAN: Well, so is almost everybody. I mean, essentially, the most thorough vetting system that campaigns have been using is something like a quick Google check, and it ends there.

I mean, you know, at this point, there`s more than 2,000 bundlers providing campaign funds to the presidential candidates. They`re not going to sit there and do a very thorough vetting of all those 2,000 bundlers. So it`s a very quick, very sloppy check that is going to let a lot of Norman Hsus through the system.

And as a matter of fact, I do want to point out, I mean, granted Norman Hsu has hit the news with a furor, but he`s not the only one. I mean, we are already starting to find other bundlers that have very questionable pasts that may, in fact, be laundering campaign funds for almost all the presidential candidates. We`re going to see a lot more Norman Hsus coming out of the woodwork.

MARGARET WARNER: Do you agree, Kenneth Gross, a lot more Norman Hsus?

KEN GROSS: Well, there are going to be others, with hundreds of millions of dollars being contributed at $2,300 a clip, but I don`t think it`s fair to say that all these campaigns are doing is a quick Google search and going away. Sophisticated vetting systems have been implemented in a number of campaigns that have different levels of review. If it`s an unknown, they`ll go further. And if anything pops up, they`ll go further.

In his case, nothing came up on the initial review. He was a known quantity, at least in the last few years, and set forth a bad set of circumstances.

But it`s just too cavalier to say that these campaigns are doing a quick Google search and looking the other way for their major contributors, because I`ve been involved in setting up vetting systems, and they are more careful than that. But when a Hsu comes out of the woodwork, I`m sure there will be some further intensifying of the vetting system. Money has to be invested in that process; otherwise, it will create political problems, not so much legal problems for the campaigns, but political problems.

MARGARET WARNER: And, Ken Gross, we need to explain to our viewers, you`re a little out of sync in terms of our video and audio, but we can hear you just fine. So let me follow up with a question to broaden it out here. How dependent have these campaigns become in recent years on this practice of bundling, which, we should point out, is perfectly legal? Do you agree with Mr. Holman, in other words, that because now they would need to raise so much and the limits are where they are that these bundlers have become incredibly valuable, both among Democrats and Republicans?

KEN GROSS: Absolutely. As was said, a $2,300 contribution isn`t going to buy you anything in today`s markets. And we`re talking literally hundreds of millions of dollars.

So the only way you`re going to amass a campaign that raises ultimately $300 million or $400 million potentially for the nominated candidates is to assemble a certain group of people, national finance committee people, who are willing to raise $100,000, $200,000, $300,000.

Last cycle, George Bush had what he called his "Rangers" that committed $250,000 at a couple of thousand a clip and, of course, that`s what`s going on this time, as well. It is permissible, but it does raise the ante, and it is worrisome for a situation like this to come along, so these campaigns do need to invest in vetting systems and, if they`re not good enough, they need to improve them.

MARGARET WARNER: Craig Holman, is it just up to the campaigns? In other words, does the FEC have no responsibility here or any other federal agency?

CRAIG HOLMAN: Under this new form of bundling that we`ve seen going on since 2000, that is absolutely the case. I want to emphasize how that reflects that there is very little vetting going on. All this bundling activity is done behind closed doors. There is no disclosure of who the bundlers are, how much money they`re bringing in, what business they`re associated with, what occupation they are. There`s no disclosure to the public.

MARGARET WARNER: So let me interrupt you. Explain that. When these campaign spending reports or, excuse me, finance reports come out, and you see everybody`s name and occupation, what you`re saying is, if that person actually gave his check to Mr. X, that`s not told to the public, in other words, if it was channeled or bundled by somebody else?

CRAIG HOLMAN: That`s right. The new form of bundling that we`re seeing going on now is someone like Norman Hsu will go to the campaign and say, "I want to bring in a half-a-million dollars or a million dollars for your campaign, but I want to make sure you know I get credit for it."

So the campaign will assign that bundler a number, say 432, and the bundler will go out, solicit contributions from his or her business associates or colleagues, have them mail in the checks themselves, but ask them to write the number 432 on the memo of the check. That way the campaign knows that the bundler brought in half-a-million dollars, but the public hasn`t got a clue.

MARGARET WARNER: Ken Gross, briefly from you a response to that. Do you think that should change at least?

KEN GROSS: There`s really nothing new about bundling, and even at this sophisticated level. It went on in a major way in the last couple of elections. One thing that we have seen is really the demise and the death of the public financing process.

After Watergate, as part of those reforms, public financing was passed, and the general elections of prior campaign, major candidates have been publicly funded without private financing, and now we`re seeing that go by the boards. So part of the problem is, is that there is such a demand for money on the process, but it is not anything particularly new, the idea that you`re committing and getting credit for contributions. That has been the process for years and will be the process going forward.

MARGARET WARNER: All right, Kenneth Gross and Craig Holman, thank you both.

CRAIG HOLMAN: Thank you.

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MARGARET WARNER: Now the criminal prosecution of six students in Jena, Louisiana, and the national reaction it has provoked. Jeffrey Brown begins our coverage with some background.

JEFFREY BROWN: Today`s marches in Jena, Louisiana, a town of about 3,500, were to protest the treatment of Mychal Bell and five fellow African-American high school classmates who have become known as the Jena Six.

THE REVEREND AL SHARPTON, Civil Rights Activist: No justice...

CROWD: No peace!

AL SHARPTON: Free the Jena Six!

JEFFREY BROWN: Bell was convicted in June by an all-white jury on adult felony counts of aggravated battery and conspiracy in the beating of a white schoolmate.

The troubles in Jena began last September, when a black student asked his principal if he could sit under this tree, known as the white tree, traditionally a gathering spot for Jena High School`s white students. He was told "yes" and did. The next day, two nooses were found hanging from the tree`s limbs. The three white students involved were suspended for the act but not charged with any crime.

That set in motion a string of racially motivated incidents, including a series of fights, a fire set in the main building of Jena High School, and then, in December, the beating of Justin Barker by Mychal Bell and five friends. Barker was treated and released the same day from a local hospital.

His six attackers were charged first with attempted murder and expelled from school. The murder charges were later reduced. Jena`s black community protested that the black students had been dealt with far more harshly than the whites.

Last Friday, the conviction of Mychal Bell was overturned by the state court of appeals on grounds that he should have been charged as a minor. But Bell, who had a prior juvenile record of violence, remains in jail as prosecutors consider an appeal.

In Jena, some local residents said the demonstrators coming from outside were overreacting.

JENA RESIDENT: I just want people to know that we`re not all racists. A lot of this got blown out of proportion from a lot of them not getting their facts straight.

JEFFREY BROWN: But some protestors say this case is emblematic of a wider problem.

JENA PROTESTOR: Jena is just a microcosm of what is happening in the United States as a whole.

JEFFREY BROWN: And the shade tree at the center of the dispute? School officials recently cut it down.

MARGARET WARNER: Jeff spoke to two people on the scene in Louisiana earlier this evening.

JEFFREY BROWN: And now we`re joined from Jena by Howard Witt, a correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. He`s been covering the story since this spring.

Howard, the prosecutor in the case has denied that race played any factor, correct?

HOWARD WITT, The Chicago Tribune: Yes. Yesterday, the prosecutor, Reed Walters, broke his long silence on the case and came out and talked to reporters. He said that race had nothing to do with this, he was simply prosecuting what he called a "brutal crime," and he indicated that he didn`t understand what the furor was about.

JEFFREY BROWN: Now, you`ve been reporting this case for some time. Do people there tell you that the racial tensions are longstanding?

HOWARD WITT: Indeed, they are. White people generally in this town will deny that, but black people will tell you all kinds of stories. And there`s lots of emblems of that in this town.

There`s a barbershop in town where the barber refuses to cut black men`s hair. He says that that would anger his white clients, because they don`t want him using the same utensils on blacks as whites.

This is a town that in 1991, when David Duke, the former leader of the Ku Klux Klan, ran for governor of Louisiana, the white voters of this town delivered the vast majority of their votes for David Duke. So there`s a lot of indicators in this town that there`s some pretty harsh racial attitudes.

JEFFREY BROWN: On the other hand, we`ve shown some white residents in our set-up who think that they`re being unfairly portrayed. Are you hearing a lot of that from the white residents in town?

HOWARD WITT: Yes, indeed. Many of them do say that. Today, many of the white residents were out on their front porches standing with their arms crossed, glaring as the demonstrators walked past. They were pretty much insistent that their town is being unfairly portrayed.

But what you have here is really just a profound difference in perceptions of the racial divide which we see across the country. Basically, the whites here did not think that the noose incident was any big deal. They all think it was a prank and a joke. Whereas black people here and across the country, when you tell them about it, they are profoundly troubled by it, because nooses are such a potent and hateful symbol for them.

JEFFREY BROWN: Now, what was the atmosphere like there today?

HOWARD WITT: I would have to say it was almost celebratory. This was like the biggest black family reunion you`ve ever been to. You had tens of thousands of African-Americans here from across the country. Many of them rode for 20 hours or more on buses to get here. They were chanting; they were marching.

They were all -- there was young, old. There were people pushing kids in strollers. There were old people in wheelchairs. It was really a very celebratory, but also somber event, in which people felt they had to be here to witness this demonstration.

JEFFREY BROWN: So what happens next in the legal case? Mychal Bell remains in custody, correct?

HOWARD WITT: Yes, he does. And the prosecutor, district attorney, has vowed to continue to prosecute him now in juvenile court, apparently. He`s also said nothing about reducing the charges against the other five defendants. So the prosecutor is pretty much digging in his heels and intends to go forward with this case.

A lot of the civil rights leaders here are hopeful that now that this case is in the wider court of public opinion that perhaps he`ll come under some political pressures to relent, but the prosecutor himself shows no signs of that.

JEFFREY BROWN: Although I understand that the prosecutor yesterday had also something more to say about the original incident involving the nooses?

HOWARD WITT: He did. It was actually quite remarkable. Every town leader, the school superintendent, the mayor, and every other white town leader here has insisted that the nooses were a prank, they were a joke, they didn`t matter.

Yesterday, Reed Walters, the prosecutor, actually said the noose incident was not a prank. He said it was a disgusting and abhorrent action that brought disgrace upon the town. And he lamented, he said, that he couldn`t find a way to actually charge those white students with any crime. He said he looked but couldn`t find an applicable statute that would apply.

JEFFREY BROWN: All right, Howard Witt of the Chicago Tribune, thanks very much.

HOWARD WITT: My pleasure.

JEFFREY BROWN: And now some of the larger issues raised by this case as seen by Ted Shaw, president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. The fund has been working with the legal counsel for Mychal Bell.

Well, Mr. Shaw, why did this case in one small town grow into a national cause?

THEODORE SHAW, President, NAACP Legal Defense Fund: I think it grew into a national cause for, really, three reasons. One, if this incident had taken place 50 years ago, it would have fit right into that time, and I think people reacted because of the starkness of the racial discrimination and disparity that`s going on here. And, of course, they think of Jena as an example of a throwback to the 1950s, `40s.

But the second thing is that I think this is resonating with African- Americans and other people of goodwill throughout the country because people increasingly are aware of the way the criminal justice system is chewing up black men and young black boys, in particular. We have what we call a school-to-prison pipeline, where discipline issues at the elementary and secondary school levels, they quickly result in people being prosecuted as adults, and being taken out of schools, and put in the criminal justice system, criminalized in ways that affect them for the rest of their lives. So I think that`s the reason that this is resonating.

But the other thing that I want to underscore, the third point is, is that the Supreme Court decided in June that voluntary integration efforts are unconstitutional. This started in a public school context with racial tensions, and there was apparently segregation within the schools, the tree, the nooses, et cetera. And I think that`s the other reason why this is resonating, because a lot of people are trying to will us to a point where race doesn`t matter when, in fact, it still does, and this is another sign of that. That`s what Jena reflects in this country, the fact that race is still with us.

JEFFREY BROWN: So by going there and by bringing attention to it, what kind of larger impact are you hoping that will come out of this?

THEODORE SHAW: Well, I think it`s important to signify that we care about this issue. It`s an issue that we`re working on. At least for the Legal Defense Fund, I had to be here today. I just came from a meeting with Mychal Bell`s parents for a few minutes, and we know that it`s important to be here.

But what is happening here is organic. Folks are coming here from around the country. This is the stuff that movements are made out of. Now, I can`t tell you that this is going to be something that`s a lasting movement, but I`m telling you, people are here today because they just can`t take it anymore. And they want to stand up and say, "This is wrong, and we want something done about it."

That`s organic; it`s real. And we`re here today because, as the Legal Defense Fund, we represent the interest of black Americans, with respect to race and racial discrimination. So we`re here; this is the place we should be.

JEFFREY BROWN: Well, I did wonder where you think this is going next, because my understanding is that the issue -- this particular case spread largely by the radio, through the Internet, through word of mouth, and sort of gathered steam over a number of months. So where does it lead to, do you think?

THEODORE SHAW: Well, I think there are two things going on. There are actually, of course, six cases. Each one of these individuals has their own legal proceeding, even though people talk about them as the Jena Six. And so they`ve all got to be defended separately.

But the other thing that`s going on is the larger political movement here and the attention that is being brought by all the people around the country who gathered here today, and those that can`t be here and support justice for not only the Jena Six, but for young black men and women who are being ensnared in the criminal justice system.

I think where this leads to is a more searching examination of our criminal justice practices and policies across the country, as well as trying to resolve this case so that these young people`s lives aren`t destroyed. It`s not a question of innocence; it`s a question of equity; it`s a question of people being treated fairly. Because this was not a one-sided conflict.

JEFFREY BROWN: All right. Ted Shaw of the NAACP, thank you very much.

THEODORE SHAW: Thank you.

(BREAK)

MARGARET WARNER: Finally, the start of a series of conversations with Democrat and -- excuse me -- the start of a series of conversations with Democratic and Republican presidential contenders who are competing in the primary contests.

Tonight, Ray Suarez talks with Republican Senator Sam Brownback. He`s represented the state of Kansas for 11 years.

RAY SUAREZ: Senator Brownback, welcome to the program.

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK (R), Kansas: Thank you, pleasure to join you.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, you`ve been traveling the country at a time when the country`s been talking a lot about the Iraq war. What are you telling voters along the way about how you would deal with America`s involvement in Iraq?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: I`d tell them that I think we`ve had a very good military working, doing extraordinary things, and I think we`ve got a terrible political solution on the ground in Iraq. And we shouldn`t criticize our -- you can be against the war, and you can be against it on a policy basis, but the military, General Petraeus, they`re doing everything they`re asked to do.

But we`re not getting a political solution on the ground. So I`m pushing a three-state soft partition, and I think that`s where we`ve really had a failure taking place. It`s not been on the military side, but it`s been on the political side.

We`re holding a resolution, I hope to get it to the floor this week, pushing for a soft partition, still one country, but leaving the Kurds in control of the north, giving the Sunnis control of the west, Shia the south, and Baghdad still a federal city. I think that`s the political solution that can allow us to pull back from the front lines and get our troop losses down, which is what people care so deeply about.

RAY SUAREZ: Do you think there`s more support, not only in the national legislature, but in the country for something that shortens the timeline and creates a durable solution?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: Absolutely. That`s what people want. I`m convinced the way they look at it, the American people, and the way I look at it, is that they don`t want to lose in Iraq, but they don`t see us on a track to win. So there`s this -- I don`t want to lose this, I don`t think we should lose it, but it doesn`t seem like we`re going on a route to win.

And the military can only create space for the political to act, and now they`ve created some space. But the political isn`t acting, because the structure is such that you`re almost guaranteed to have a weak Shia government in control in Iraq that can`t really deal with problems. That`s why I keep pushing this soft partition.

And I fundamentally believe, at the end of the day, that`s what`s going to take place in Iraq. Iraq is much less a country than it is three groups held together by exterior forces, held together by the Turks, the Saudis, and to some degree by the Iranians. And I think we have to recognize those realities.

RAY SUAREZ: That puts you at odds with the White House and the Defense and State Departments.

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: Not really. They`re not opposed to it; they just don`t support it. I was talking with the Kurdish ambassador to the United States last night, Mr. Barzani, who`s a relative of the leader of the Kurds. He just says the administration just needs to not oppose it, because this structure is allowed in the Iraqi constitution. The administration just doesn`t believe we can force the Iraqis on a certain political answer.

My response to that is, we`re putting blood on the line everyday, we`re putting billions of dollars into this. We can knock some political heads, particularly because you`ve got these old ancient rivalries between the Sunnis and Shia that we`re not going to solve, but we`ve got to get in some political durability before the American people`s timeframe runs out, which I think is coming pretty quick.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, it seems that the president has already come to terms with the fact that whoever is president next is going to have Iraq on his or her plate. Let`s say it`s you. How are we involved from 2009 Inauguration Day for the next four years after that?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: I think we remain involved; I think you have to have a long-term U.S. commitment to Iraq. The key is getting our death losses down.

We`re in Bosnia 15 years after the Dayton Accords and the split there, soft partition. We`re in South Korea 60 years after the Korean War. We can be there a long time if we`re not losing soldiers. That`s why I continue to push the soft partition and then moving our troops back from the front of the line and from policing to where they would be in bases in the Kurdish region, in the Sunni region, and hopefully in the Shia region, as well, and then take actions from there, but not being involved in the policing and not having this daily, weekly loss of U.S. lives.

RAY SUAREZ: As a presidential candidate, have you found that the war has sort of filled up the windshield, blotted out the sky, made it harder to talk about other things that you want to talk about?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: It has, although I have to say, on our side of the aisle, immigration has more dominated the windshield, if you will, than even the war, just this really tough, visceral debate we`ve been having as a nation about immigration policy, about illegal immigration. And people support immigration, but they don`t support illegal immigration, and so getting that reality on the ground here to reflect people`s ideas has really been the dominant issue.

RAY SUAREZ: When it`s been so hot, the national debate, how does a candidate go out there, in different parts of the country where the issue plays differently, and try to convene some sort of conversation about it? What do you tell people you want to do about immigration?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: Yes, it`s tough, because immigration -- if you look at the last 100 years in the United States, immigration politics has always been difficult, and it`s always been a viscerally held issue. And always the group coming in is never good enough for the groups that already got here, you know? The Chinese were not good enough; then the Italians, they`re not good enough; then the Irish. You know, I mean, it`s always kind of waves.

And we`re a nation of immigrants, and we know that, and we celebrate it, and it`s a great strength of the country. But I find the way you have to talk about this is really to say, "Look, we`re going to enforce the laws. The laws are the law, and we`re going to enforce it. We`re going to strengthen the southern border; we need to build a fence across it, across most of it. I think we need to have virtual fencing in some areas. We need to enforce it at the worksite."

And then, I think, after we get the enforcement, we show the country we`re going to enforce the laws, I think we should look at ways to change it to make the system work, because I think the system itself is broken. So I`d support things like a guest-worker program to see if we can get ways to make the system itself work so that we have a legal immigration system and not an illegal immigration system.

RAY SUAREZ: What do you propose about the millions who are already here?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: Yes, that`s been the toughest piece of the puzzle. And I think right now what we have to do is enforce the law and then, in the future, I would hope we could look at something like a guest- worker program, but not one that`s special for people that are here now, but a guest-worker program. If you want to get in it, great, God bless you. You`ve got to go to your home country; you`ve got to sign up; you`ve got to follow the process.

RAY SUAREZ: So there is a path to citizenship, in your view, of how this works in the future?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: No, not a path to citizenship. It`s a path to a legal status and a guest worker, and not new paths to citizenship. If you can get in one of the old paths that currently exist -- and there are many, and we take more immigrants than any other country around the world, and I`m glad that we do. I think this is a strength of our country. But I think people should get in the lines that are already set.

RAY SUAREZ: Can the lines that are already set handle 12 million people?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: I don`t know that they can, and I don`t know that a number of people would qualify for those current lines. That`s why I talk about a guest-worker program for people, many of which that just want to be here and work, or others that don`t qualify for one of the current routes into citizenship in the United States.

It`s a tough issue, and I`m not proposing a perfect solution. It`s not. There isn`t one. But I think we`ve got to try to work ourselves through the situation that we`re in, and I think this is the most workable for us as a country.

RAY SUAREZ: When employers who are very influential in your party say, "Senator, you`re killing me here. I won`t be able to get people to put roofs on my houses, bring in my strawberries, pick my lettuce. The near-term pain is pretty severe," how do you answer that?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: Well, it`s severe there, but I don`t think it`s anywhere as tough as the very person you`re talking about. You can talk about employees, but these are people. And how do you deal with the person? And then they build relationships.

I mean, that`s where I find it much more difficult, because I believe in the rule of law. I think we should enforce the rule of law. I also believe in being a compassionate society. And so you`ve got this juxtapositioning of a rule of law against a compassionate society, and I think we should be a compassionate country.

That`s where I find the toughest rub, and that`s where I come with enforcing the law, but a guest-worker program that I would hope people could qualify for and get in as they follow the process that everybody else does.

RAY SUAREZ: In a crowded field, after we talk about Iraq and immigration, why do you want to be the guy who`s in that crowded field to make sure gets on the national agenda? What is it that we`re not talking about because those are the two sort of giant signposts on the road to Campaign `08?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: What I want to talk about is rebuilding the family, because I really believe, in my heart and soul, that if we would rebuild and strengthen the family structure in the country, you`d start to really deal with a number of the most difficult problems we`re having in the country today, in poverty, education, and in crime, but we`ve broken the family structure up.

We`re in Washington, D.C., right now; 56 percent of the children here are born out of wedlock. You can raise a good child in a single-parent family, but it`s much more difficult. My wife and I are raising five children, and it`s tough between two people, let alone with one that`s working full-time, and is stressed out, and coming home to a lot of difficulties.

That`s what I think as a fundamental -- and I`m a person that believes in fundamentals, that if we as a government get the fundamentals right, much of the thing moves well and the country moves well. If we get the fundamentals wrong, you have a lot more difficulties, and you generally have to fill government in the slots where your difficulties grow. So this is a basic that I really think we`ve got to do a lot better at.

RAY SUAREZ: But as the chief executive of the United States, you`re sort of at the top of that flowchart. How does the president affect whether people get married, or stay married, or stay in a long-term relationship to raise their children?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: You talk about it, and the words do create. When Ronald Reagan stands out in front of the Berlin Wall and says, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall," he didn`t have a bunch of tanks there and said, "OK, let`s start now," but the words themselves create it.

I think a president calling on the American people, saying, "You know, I know there are difficulties in family situations, I know there are bad marriages that exist, but, folks, we can do better here in the country, and it`s important for the next generation that we try harder and that we try to do more, and that we have systems like our welfare system."

Right now, if you get married, you lose all your benefits. That`s insane! We should give people bonuses for getting married, and sending signals and talking about it to the society.

And talking about, too -- I`m a recovering lawyer. In this country today, it is far easier to get divorced from somebody you`ve been married to for 10 years and have three children by than to fire somebody that`s worked for you for one year. Is that wise?

Now, I know there are problematic marriages and there are abuses that take place, but is that the right kind of system we should be looking at? I think we should talk about it a lot more.

RAY SUAREZ: Hasn`t the incidence of divorce sort of leveled off from the big explosion that came in the `60s and `70s? Aren`t we seeing a sort of mediation in the impact that divorce has in the number of marriages?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: You`re seeing some, but prior to the `60s, you were at a 5 percent divorce rate, and you`re seeing this level off at -- depending on whose figure you look at, and whether it`s first, second, or third marriages, somewhere, you know, of a third to a half of the marriages still dissolve.

So, yes, you haven`t seen -- during the `80s, you were seeing a clip up at a very high rate, and it`s leveled off. But it`s leveled off at a high rate. It needs to really come back down and people really work harder at their commitments.

The studies on this really are pretty pronounced, too, that children do better raised between a mom and a dad, and that people who will stay married five years after they start their having troubles, and when some got divorced, if they`ll just stay in it for five years, sometimes just even plugging their ears, they`re happier at the end of five years than people that broke their marriage commitment.

And I am not perfect by any means, but we have not had a good national conversation about this, and it`s critically important.

RAY SUAREZ: There are people who are going to hear you say that and say, "I`m in a family. I`m in what I think of as a family, but I don`t think Senator Brownback of Kansas means me when he says that, because the definition that fellows like him use is too narrow." And you mentioned it yourself, a man and a woman married with children.

Over the last 50 years, for good or ill, we`ve evolved a lot of different structures, of blended, of people who create community and create family as they can and where they have. Are you ready to also say to them, "You`re a family, because you`re making it work, because you`re raising those children"?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: I`m willing to not only say that, I`m willing to say, "God bless you for working at it." And we should celebrate every child that`s raised in this country that comes through and that really does well for themselves and for their family.

I`m ready, and I say it now all the time. But if you look at the social data, and Senator Moynihan really put me on these issues as much as any. He was the first real cultural commentator. Culture is more important than politics and government.

Now, you can use government and politics to shape culture, but us holding up and honoring and recognizing that the best place here is a stable environment for these children to raise your next generation is something we have not had a legitimate national conversation in a dispassionate setting, not condemning anybody, but just saying, "Look at what happens here when we put more children in a more difficult, unstable setting."

And that`s what we should try to have as much as possible, is just a dispassionate setting and discussion, because I think it also resonates in people`s hearts.

RAY SUAREZ: You`ve called yourself the real conservative in the race. Why? There are a couple of other guys I think who would disagree with you there.

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: Well, they might, but I`ve got 4,500 votes behind that, and I`ve got a rating on that. I also call myself a bleeding-heart conservative, because I think the conservative movement has to move forward, has to be a movement that solves real problems today, has to be a movement of heart, as well, solves real problems that hits people in their hearts.

So it has to solve problems like poverty. It needs to solve problems of people in other places around the world, like in Darfur. So I just -- I am a conservative. I just think it`s got to be a conservative that`s a bleeding heart, that really cares, and that puts forward solutions on health care and other things that is where people live.

RAY SUAREZ: When you came to Washington, you said one of the things you wanted to do was close down the Department of Commerce, the Department of Energy, the Department of Education, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. I think I got them all.

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: You got them.

RAY SUAREZ: When you`re president, would you want to still move ahead on that? Should those departments that are some of the ways that people even connect with government, they hear from somebody from one of those departments, should they not exist?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: The point was that I was making at that time is that we`ve got more than enough government and it doesn`t solve, in many cases, a lot of our problems, that if we would get a good structure in place, we could do it. And, no, I`m not going to move to eliminate those agencies.

But what I will do is put in place a commission that reviews government agencies and recommends annually a block of programs to be eliminated, like we do on military bases. We`ve got a base closing commission that reports every two to three years. It says, "These 200 bases should be eliminated" and then gives Congress one vote on the whole package, deal or no deal, eliminate them all, keep them all, because it drives people insane, the wasted federal spending. Everybody runs against it. It never happens.

But I think you`ve got to change the system. And this commission process -- one we currently use on BRAC, military bases -- applied to the rest of the government I think can start to get at that.

And then you take that money and you spend it on higher program needs, like declaring war on cancer, which I would love to see us do. We`ve got a tsunami of cancer set to come on as the boomer generation hits their peak cancer years. You`re going to see a huge growth in the total number of cancer cases. We should be at that war now, but you`ve got to have money to do it, and here`s where you get it.

RAY SUAREZ: Finally, the Constitution says the president should be a native-born citizen over 35.

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: I qualify.

RAY SUAREZ: You qualify. But like a couple of 100 million other people, why should you be president?

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: I think it`s the basics. You know, I`m amazed at this nation. I was raised on a farm in eastern Kansas, and I`m running for president of the United States. I grew up taking care of the pigs. I love this country that, you know, somebody can do something like that.

I think it`s that living of the American dream. It`s a consistent philosophy. It`s an experience in foreign policy, which we haven`t particularly talked about, but I`ve chaired the Middle East Subcommittee, I`ve chaired the South Asian Subcommittee.

And it`s that desire to rebuild the family, which is a basic, renew the culture, which is another basic, revive the economy, which is a key one for us to do, so we can grow and prosper, and sustain ourselves in this generation-long fight we`re in with militant Islamists. We`re in a fight. We`re going to be in this fight for a long period of time.

I want us to pull together like we did against communism, to contain it, to contain this branch, this wing of militant Islamists. It`s not all Islam. It`s not a majority. But it is a dedicated branch, and we`re going to be in this fight for some time. I think I`m the person rightly tooled to be able to do that.

RAY SUAREZ: Senator Brownback, thanks for joining us.

SEN. SAM BROWNBACK: My pleasure. Thank you.

MARGARET WARNER: For more on the presidential candidates and campaign, visit our Vote 2008 site at PBS.org.

(BREAK)

MARGARET WARNER: Again, the major developments of the day.

The Senate rejected legislation to cut off funding for the Iraq war.

Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu was charged with federal campaign finance violations and massive business fraud.

And thousands of demonstrators marched in Jena, Louisiana, showing support for six black teenagers arrested in the beating of a white classmate.

We`ll see you online and again here tomorrow evening, with Shields and Lowry, among others. I`m Margaret Warner. Thanks for being with us. Good night.