The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. MacNeil: Good evening. I'm Robert MacNeil in New York.

MR. LEHRER: And I'm Jim Lehrer in Washington. After our summary of the news this Tuesday, we look at what is happening inside Iraq, followed by a preview of an important election in Ireland, a conversation with Catholic theologian Father Richard Neuhaus about what to expect from the Clinton presidency, and a Clarence Page essay about Malcolm X. NEWS SUMMARY

MR. MacNeil: Humanitarian efforts to save the starving nation of Somalia could be in jeopardy. That was the word today from a group of relief organizations struggling to help as many as a million and a half people facing hunger in the East African nation. The aid agencies said they may be forced to end their efforts unless the United Nations provides immediate security forces to the area. They called on the United States to put pressure on the U.N. The warning came as a relief ship near the port of Mogadishu was shelled. Officials said no one was hurt, but the ship was forced back to sea. It was one of four ships that had been waiting a week to unload food because of a dispute between two warlords. The relief organizations criticized the United Nations for failing to take tougher action against the warring factions. John Hammock of Oxfam America spoke at a Washington news conference.

JOHN HAMMOCK, Oxfam America: It's time to stop pussyfooting around. It's time for governments and the United Nations to take Somalia seriously and to take every necessary step to reach people who are in dire straits. At this point, at a time when Americans are having Thanksgiving, at a time when we're going to sit down to a turkey dinner, what we're asking for is sufficient security so that we can get a bowl of rice, some cornmeal, some grain to the people of Somalia so that they not starve to death.

MR. MacNeil: Thirty-five hundred U.N. troops have been authorized to provide security but have not been deployed because of failed negotiations with the various clans that control the country. Relief workers estimate that tens of thousands of Somalis will die by the end of the year unless basic food and medical care get through. Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Caspar Weinberger pleaded not guilty today to a charge he lied to Congress about the Iran-contra Affair. The former Secretary of Defense was indicted October 30th, after an earlier charge of obstruction was abandoned. He and prosecutor James Brosnahan spoke to reporters outside the court. Weinberger called the case against him "a grotesque abuse of prosecutorial power."

CASPAR WEINBERGER, Former Secretary of Defense: I'm innocent of all of these charges. I have not lied, and I never have, and I never intend to. And I look forward to complete vindication, but I think it's extremely unfortunate that my family has to go through this terrible ordeal not because of anything I have done, because I have become a pawn in what is clearly a political agenda as is shown by the return of the indictment four days before an election containing documents that they have had for some two years.

JAMES BROSNAHAN, Prosecutor: Let me explain that this case has nothing to do with politics. It has everything to do with government. Nobody need be concerned that this trial will be other than a fair trial for Mr. Weinberger. You can take that to the bank. He's going to get a fair trial and it's going to be up to the jury to determine these issues.

MR. LEHRER: Weinberger's trial on five counts of making false statements and perjury is scheduled to start January 5th. CIA Director Robert Gates said today Iran could pose a serious military threat in three to five years. He told the Associated Press Iran is buying large amounts of weapons and aircraft from North Korea and Russia. The United Nations Security Council today formally rejected Iraq's call for a lifting of sanctions. Iraqi officials told the Council they were fully complying with the Gulf War cease- fire resolutions. The Security Council unanimously rejected that claim. We'll have more on the story right after this News Summary.

MR. MacNeil: In economic news, durable goods orders to U.S. factories jumped 3.9 percent in October. It was the sharpest gain in 15 months. The Commerce Department attributed it to a rebound in demand for transportation and defense products. Durable goods are big ticket items such as appliances and vehicles expected to last at least three years. Consumer confidence in the economy also rose this month according to a business research group. The Conference Board said it was the first increase since June.

MR. LEHRER: German police offered reward money today for information leading to the capture of people behind yesterday's fatal neo-Nazi attack. Three ethnic Turks were killed when their house in Northern Germany was firebombed. It was the latest and the worst in a wave of anti-foreigner violence in Germany, and it has provoked an angry reaction. David Simmons of Worldwide Television News narrates this report.

MR. SIMMONS: A day after one of Germany's most vicious neo-Nazi attacks, the country is outraged by the spiral of violence. Friends and families of the three Turks killed in Monday's firebomb mourn their dead. Germany's president, Von Weitzeger added his condemnation during a visit to Mexico. He said the attacks can't be allowed to continue and the radical right must be crushed. German authorities launched a massive hunt for the killers. They offered a $30,000 reward for information leading to their arrest, mindful perhaps of accusations that they haven't done enough to stop the violence. The German car company, Opel, quickly upstaged the government by posting more than twice that amount. Opal's managing director, David Herman, noted that 20 percent of plant employees are foreign.

DAVID HERMAN, Chairman, Opel: We want to show that at least one German company can stand up and be counted in the battle against right wing extremism.

MR. SIMMONS: In Hanover and elsewhere, the attack galvanized the anti-Nazi demonstrators. Sixteen people have died in Neo-Nazi attacks this year and many fear it will only get worse unless the country fights it collectively. For this little Turkish girl, that realization has come too late, her life having already been lost in Germany's brutal wave of xenophobia.

MR. MacNeil: The last U.S. forces withdrew from the Philippines today, ending nearly a century of U.S. military presence in its onetime colony. The departure followed a ceremony closing Subic Bay Naval Base, the Navy's largest installation in the Western Pacific. The Philippines refused to renew a lease for the base last year. Today's departure marked the first time in some 400 years that the Philippines was free of foreign troops. A Chinese jet liner carrying 141 people crashed into a mountain in Southwest China today. There were no survivors. The Boeing 737 was on a domestic flight to a popular tourist destination. Nearly all the passengers were Chinese. The cause of the crash was not known. It was China's worst aviation disaster and the fifth fatal crash in four months for the country's state run airlines.

MR. LEHRER: And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to an update on Iraq, some important elections in Ireland, what to expect from the Clinton presidency, and a Clarence Page essay. FOCUS - STATUS REPORT

MR. LEHRER: Iraq is our lead story tonight. The United Nations Security Council today rejected Iraq's claim that it was abiding by Gulf War cease-fire agreements and thus denied Iraq's demand that economic sanctions against it be lifted. Our look at those and other questions about Iraq and the man who still rules it, Saddam Hussein, begins with a view from Iraq. It is in this report by Correspondent Paul Harrison of the independent production company Insight News. He reported under Iraqi censorship.

MR. HARRISON: Iraqi singer Sadoon Jaber sings with the confidence that Saddam Hussein is one of his fans. His lyrics criticize Saudi Arabia for allowing the hated Americans into Saudi's holy lands. Like every Iraqi, he knows instinctively what to sing and what to say in order not to incur the wrath of the regime.

SADOON JABER, Singer: The singer is like a mirror, must sing what he feel, what people feel, and I feel that's the case we live now, embargo we live now, this song is suitable with this case, and I sing it.

MRS. ALA BASHIR, Pediatrician: Nobody can imagine what the war can do when we had no electricity, we were living in the dark. It had very bad effects on us. Any way, the time has past, and 42 days it was, they were really very long, long days and nights, and we don't know when our home is going to be bombed. I think that is enough for us to be punished for error. It is a good punishment.

MR. HARRISON: It's two years since the U.N. imposed sanctions on Iraq. After the war's devastation, Baghdad has been rebuilt. Since the crushing of the rebellions and the recent coup attempts, control over individuals has increased. You can't trust your brother in Iraq. You live in fear. Goods are available in the shops and markets, but the spiraling inflation rate means the money is virtually worthless. Cooking oil has gone up from 60 fils to 30 dinars, an increase of 60 percent. Only the government and the privileged can afford the luxuries.

MRS. ALA BASHIR: Many families, they are devastated or very poor. The only thing what they see now is how to get your food and how to get the simplest things.

KASSON ABID: [speaking through interpreter] Before the war, everything was available in our market and prices were low. Water was safe to drink and a bottle of Pepsi cost no more than 60 fils. Now it's three dinars. It's a conflict just between two Arab countries and they interfered to solve the problem and caused us a lot of harm and treated us badly. Why don't they just let us alone? Why do they put the economic embargo on us?

MR. HARRISON: Raw sewage is pumped directly into the River Tigress. Strict sanctions mean lack of spare parts affect everyone. The ancient river, itself, has become a health hazard.

ADNAN JABERO, General Director, Water & Sewage, Baghdad: We had more than five hundred broken pipes in the sewage network, and this, in turn, caused sewage to flow up stream in the network and find its way or path through the rain water, rain water protectors and the manholes into the streets of the city. About 60 square kilometers of Baghdad was completely covered with sewage, and sewage entered the houses of some people in Baghdad. The United Nations has considered water as one of the humanitarian items that should not be covered by sanctions but, in fact, water is covered by the sanctions, and we feel bitter because we don't understand how the United Nations agreed to export spare parts and material needed for treatment of water for drinking and at the same time none of the government, none of the governments is willing to do so.

MR. HARRISON: For most, meat is now a meal time luxury. Those who can afford daily rice are still vulnerable to the dangerous viruses that thrive in the city's contaminated water supply. Not enough medical supplies are getting through. They are supposed to be exempt from the embargo. These incubators are still functioning, but the hospital lifts don't work and the air conditioning has failed. Many of the suffering children will never see their next birthday. Twenty die here each week.

MRS. ALA BASHIR: I couldn't imagine one day, especially in a city like Baghdad, who has had such a long history of civilization, and to see the children, they are starving. They are not having the simplest necessities of life and good health. We have now children, they are suffering of diseases we not used to have for some time. I mean, now we have polio, for example, because of the lack of vaccinations. Now we have malnutrition. I think this can't continue forever. I mean, this is abnormal, and our life has all changed in every respect.

MR. HARRISON: A mother's grief as yet another child dies, bitten by the sharp teeth of the sanctions that strike at random.

MRS. ALA BASHIR: With the sanction and the country is isolated from the outside world. Eighteen million people are isolated. What are expectations for the youth? What is their future? It is -- many people think there is no future for our children.

DR. ALA BASHIR, MD and Sculptor: I sit at my work two months ago because basically, you know, about the suffering of Iraqi people through the sanctions, international sanctions, because I felt, you know, it is not human at all, you know, that Iraqi people they should suffer from international sanctions. They can't understand why these sanctions continue. They can't expect civilized people, you know, behaving this way at all. The war is over. The Iraqi army pulled out of Kuwait, and this is the target of the war. It is finished. Iraqis, they are now in Iraq -- why does sanctions continue on? I mean, we feel, I mean, somebody is trying to kill us. This is death. This is not -- [mumbling] --

MR. LEHRER: Now, four perspectives on the state of affairs in and about Iraq. Kanan Makiya is an author of the forthcoming book on Iraq, Cruelty and Silence. He's a fellow at Harvard University. He's also a member of the Iraqi National Congress, the coalition of opposition groups. Marshall Wiley is a former U.S. Ambassador to Oman, head of the State Department's Interest Section on Iraq and of the U.S./Iraq Business Forum. Dr. Najmaldin Karim is president of the Kurdish National Congress. James Placke is a former deputy assistant U.S. Secretary of State for the Near East. He's now with Cambridge Energy Research Associates, an energy policy group in Washington. Amb. Wiley, the U.N. Security Council decision today to keep the sanctions on, was that the right thing to do?

AMB. WILEY: Well, I think we need to re-examine that policy in the light of what has happened in recent months with Iraq. It seems that our unstated policy is to keep the sanctions in place until Saddam Hussein goes out of power but what is actually happening is that we are hurting many people in Iraq without really affecting his power because he has enough resources to take care of his army and his intelligence people in his own tribe, in his immediate power structure, so he seemed to be doing a lot of damage to the population of Iraq, and I'm not sure what we are accomplishing in terms of really undermining Saddam, which I believe is the real motive behind our policy.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Makiya, in Boston, Saddam Hussein, he starts a war, he loses it badly, thousands of his people die, and now, as we just saw on that tape, thousands of his people are suffering because of economic sanctions because of that war, and yet, as the ambassador says, he's still in power. Why?

MR. MAKIYA: Well, the -- one thing that your film clip, if I might just say, didn't bring out is the collapse of law and order inside Baghdad and all over Iraq, especially in the Southern parts of the country, so the picture of him solidly based in Baghdad and getting stronger and stronger every day is simply not true. Twenty percent of the country is outside of his country. There have been elections. I just came back from a trip in Northern Iraq. We have constant contact and communication with people inside Baghdad. The picture of him getting stronger and stronger is not the case. This is a robbing regime. It is true that it has taken a very long time and he's still in there and he could still take a much longer time. Part of that problem is that the Iraqi opposition took a long time to get its act together, but that is now beginning to happen, and the other part of the problem is, as I think one of the ladies interviewed in that film mentioned, people are isolated, cut off from the outside world. That has been turned by the regime against Iraqis and successfully. They've managed to convince large numbers of Baghdad is especially that, in fact, the world is out to penalize them for, for the, for the occupation of Kuwait, and I think that picture is, is not the case.

MR. LEHRER: Do you agree with Amb. Wiley that the sanctions are doing more harm to innocent people than they are to Saddam Hussein and his people's hold on the country?

MR. MAKIYA: You have to know who you're dealing with. This is the very same regime that announced that it never attacked chemical - - its own citizens with chemical weapons. I handled the remnants of those gas canisters up in the North of Iraq. I saw them. I felt them in the village of Sher Hussan, which was attacked in '87. The very regime that claims that it has complied with these U.N. sanctions is the regime that denies until today that it ever dropped those bombs.

MR. LEHRER: Okay. Mr. Karim, how do you feel about whether or not the sanctions are accomplishing what -- well, one of the things apparently they were set out to do, which is to weaken Saddam Hussein, his hold on the country?

DR. KARIM: Well, there's no question that sanctions hurt innocent people in Iraq, but we have to remember one thing, that the reason the Iraqi people are suffering is not because of the sanctions, it's not because of the outside world. It is because of Saddam Hussein, and as long as the enemy is in power, the suffering will continue. Let everybody know that Iraq, itself, has imposed sanctions on the people that considers being part of Iraq, and those are the people of Kurdistan. Since last year, exactly a year ago November, sanctions have been imposed on Kurdistan. There is no fuel, nothing goes into the Kurdish region, and if you send your people to go and survey the situation, you see people are shivering there, they are starving, they are dying from cold, and I think that the sanctions should continue because the first thing Saddam will do if the sanctions are lifted is not feed the Iraqi people, but to re-arm itself, and also we have to remember that Saddam Hussein's government is the one who refused the $1 1/2 billion that has been allocated by the United Nations for humanitarian help. It's Saddam Hussein's government that's refusing humanitarian help and cooperation with the United Nations. It's not the outside world that's causing the Iraqi people to suffer.

MR. LEHRER: Do you agree with Mr. Makiya that things -- that Saddam Hussein's power is on the wane, there are signs that he's losing it?

DR. KARIM: Well, I -- I'm sort of in-between Mr. Wiley and my friend, Kanan Makiya. I think Saddam Hussein is not as weak as they talk about him, but I don't think he also has the grip on the power that Mr. Wiley says that he does because Iraqi Kurdistan is a de facto state now. He has no control over Iraqi Kurdistan, and I think this --

MR. LEHRER: And how much is that of the country roughly?

DR. KARIM: Well, the area that's totally out of his control is about probably 20 percent of the country. It doesn't include all of Iraqi Kurdistan, because the most important province of Kerchuk is still under his control, and that's what I was going to actually talk about is to effectively weaken his power base is to take his economic, the economic power away from him. And I think taking a place like Kerchuk away from him and using that oil for humanitarian health to feed the Iraqi people and the people in Kurdistan will weaken him significantly, but just to have sanctions, without anything else, is probably going to drag on and will not have an immediate effect.

MR. LEHRER: Yes.

MR. MAKIYA: Could I also add that he's also imposing a policy of sanctions on the South of the country in a massive and very dramatic way, that those food supplies, the needed food supplies and medicines, the medical supplies that are getting through are not being distributed in the South of the country, where the most serious case of disease, malnutrition and so on, are all occurring, and this is also part of the country which he controls. At night time he doesn't control even some of the major cities. There are hit and run guerrilla attacks going on all the time. And when I was in Northern Iraq, there are large numbers of people being taken up from the marshes areas where the resistance is going on and carried up and shot just South of Irbiel. I met one person who managed to escape from there. There is a policy of massive repression going on even as we talk now, and of economic sanctions North and South of the country, so what we're looking at is a fortress Baghdad situation here which is primarily what got portrayed in the film.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Placke, do you agree with that, we're talking about a fortress Baghdad and the rest of the country is slowly disintegrating and, and going its own way away from Saddam Hussein?

MR. PLACKE: I'm not sure that the country is disintegrating, but, yes, there is a fortress Baghdad. Unfortunately, sanctions are a blunt instrument, and while they do induce some of the, the terrible things that we've seen in the film clip in the way of suffering for the general public, the purpose of sanctions still is to force compliance with the variety of U.N. conditions that the regime has still not met as was evident in the Security Council discussion just today. Without sanctions, really Saddam Hussein would be able to restore his power base and to the extent to which food and medicine are being denied to the population, that, it seems to me, is a function of Iraq government priorities and policy. The resources are there; they're just being used on other things.

MR. LEHRER: You mean they could get in there.

MR. PLACKE: They are getting in there.

MR. LEHRER: They are getting in there, but they're just not being used to help the, the children we saw in the hospital, and the people who have hunger problems and all the rest.

MR. PLACKE: In part they're being distributed on a selected basis, of course, with priority to the supporters of the regime, and to its mainstays in the security services. In part, resources that could be used for food and medicine are simply being used for other purposes.

MR. LEHRER: How do you explain Saddam Hussein's ability to, to transfer the heat for the discomfort in his own country? In other words, he's that leader of the country and yet he's able, apparently, up to this point to convince his folks that it's not his fault, it's the fault of the outside world.

MR. PLACKE: I doubt that any Iraqi inside Iraq is going to appear on a foreign program and make that kind of statement.

MR. LEHRER: Sure.

MR. PLACKE: I think in their own minds they have no confusion about how they got into this present situation and who's responsible for it. But it's not something that you can voice an opinion about anyway.

MR. LEHRER: Is it also not something you can do anything about?

MR. PLACKE: I think --

MR. LEHRER: I asked the question a while ago about what about Saddam Hussein, I thought to myself, I wish I had a nickel for every time I've asked that question in the last two years, and it seems to be he's still always there, Mr. Placke. Why?

MR. PLACKE: He's still always there because he has raised repression to I think a new height even in the 20th century and it's a very effective weapon to protect him --

MR. LEHRER: Explain that. How does he repress -- how does he keep people in their places the way he does?

MR. PLACKE: The security services in Iraq are really all pervasive. There have been many coup attempts but none of them successful. Any suggestion of dissension or opposition is met with ruthlessness and repression, and it has become a water tight compartment around Saddam, and those who are responsible for maintaining it that way also realize that if Saddam Hussein goes, they go with him, so it's a strong motivation.

MR. LEHRER: Amb. Wiley, what do you think of that? How long can that continue? Is that -- first of all, do you agree with James Placke's view of it, and if so, how long can that go on?

AMB. WILEY: Well, I think that he could stay in power for sometime to come because as Jim says --

MR. LEHRER: For months, years?

AMB. WILEY: It could last out into years, yes, because he has control of all the levers of power, and although he has a very repressive regime, I would say that his situation is not all that unique. There are other countries around the world that have dictators who are in comparable positions and who stay in power for many years, in spite of considerable suffering in the parts of the population. And this is what has happened in Iraq, and I think it is U.S. interest to feel, to figure out how we can deal with this phenomenon in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East in a way that will further our own interests the most.

MR. LEHRER: Meaning what? What should we do?

AMB. WILEY: Well, I think we ought to broaden our question of our goals to go a little beyond the question of Saddam Hussein, himself. If we do succeed in getting rid of Saddam Hussein, then what? I think our longer-term goals really have to be in terms of how we can create stability in that part of the world and peace so that it will protect our own access to oil, among other things, and protect our interest in the area. And just getting rid of Saddam Hussein in itself will not achieve that goal, desirable as this may be from a humanitarian point of view.

MR. LEHRER: The head of the CIA, Robert Gates, said today that Iran was re-arming itself, buying all kinds of things from Russia and North Korea. Should that play a part in U.S. policy?

AMB. WILEY: Well, I think it did and it should.

MR. LEHRER: It did once before, as we all know.

AMB. WILEY: Yes. And I think correctly so. And I believe now there has been quite a bit of concern expressed in the media recently about the growing power in Iran, but I've seen almost no discussion of how this could be balanced, and how we can create a balance of power in the area that will contain this growing power on the part of Iran. Instead, we seem to be determined to remove all of the high-tech weaponry from Iraq, in spite of the fact that Iran has three times Iraq's manpower. I think we ought to look at this in terms of how we can maintain peace and stability, and that does not necessarily mean that we want to remove all the high-tech weapons in Iraq in order to do this.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Karim, do you and your fellow Kurds hear that kind of thing? Do you say, oh, my goodness, hear we go again?

DR. KARIM: Well, I'm glad that this question came up because we're trying to go back to the same policies which have proven wrong, that has proven disastrous. It resulted in two big wars with Iran and invasion of Kuwait. It resulted in genocide against the Kurdish people. I think the way, the way to oppose this -- and I hope the new administration will take this of course -- is to take all the options as far as what should happen in Iraq, and that should include even disintegration of Iraq, and formation of an independent Kurdish state should be in the cards. And I -- I am very, very encouraged by past statements of the people and specifically Sen. Gore in the past as far as his thinking about how to deal with Saddam Hussein, war crime acts against Saddam Hussein, withdraw recognition from this government, give the right of self- determination to the people. The only free election in the region has happened in Kurdistan for the past how many years, and also, we have to remember the present formula, which is the present day Iraq, has not worked. It has resulted in war after war. The Shiites are not happy. The Kurds have been suggested to all kinds of repression, the same thing with the Shiites, and so separation of Iraq and disintegration of Iraq should be an option. And going back and arming Iraq just because Iran is getting stronger is just putting us through the same, taking us back to the same place where we were two years ago.

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Makiya, how do you feel about that?

MR. MAKIYA: I disagree with Mr. Karim here and your previous speakers on this point. I think the disintegration -- the longer Saddam Hussein stays in power, the more certain is the disintegration of Iraq likely to happen, and also the more frightening are its consequences for the region, the more likely are states like Iran and other neighboring states to interfere and to turn Iraq into a kind of theater like Lebanon was for many, many years. This could be a source of instability for literally years, decades to come.

MR. LEHRER: So the No. 1 priority, in your opinion, should remain getting rid of Saddam Hussein?

MR. MAKIYA: Absolutely, because --

MR. LEHRER: All right.

MR. MAKIYA: -- because the longer he stays in there, the more likely the country is to disintegrate.

MR. LEHRER: All right, gentlemen, again, we'll have you all back again some day and ask some of the same questions again. Thank you very much.

MR. MacNeil: Still ahead on the NewsHour, the Irish vote on abortion, more expectations of President Clinton and essayist Clarence Page on Malcolm X. FOCUS - RIGHT TO CHOOSE

MR. MacNeil: We turn now to the politics of abortion. The current battleground is the republic of Ireland, where abortion is constitutionally banned. There are three referenda on the ballot in tomorrow's general election. Voters are being asked to decide whether women should have access to information about abortion clinics abroad, whether they should have the right to travel abroad to obtain an abortion, and whether abortion should be allowed in certain limited circumstances, such as when a mother's life is threatened by her pregnancy. Correspondent Alex Thompson of Britain's Independent Television News has this report.

MR. THOMPSON: The ferry noses out into Dublin Bay bound for England. For Irish women, this is the traditional route to an abortion. Every year, at least 4000 young, frightened women make the voyage, and the current referenda won't change that very much. Some traditions may change though. On the Dublin wall, the graffiti reads, for abortion information phone 679-4700. If Ireland votes yes on the information issue, it will be legal to advertise foreign abortion clinics. The days of studying the graffiti will be over.

YOUNG WOMAN: There was nowhere I could go because information was illegal. I had to basically go and look on the back of toilet doors where I'd seen abortion information and then a phone number that was illegal.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Ma'am, I can't actually give it to you over the phone. What I would recommend is for you to go to see one of our pregnancy counselors at our clinic.

MR. THOMPSON: Dublin's Family Planning Association can't give abortion clinic information over the telephone, but they say they're the only advisory service to give such information during counseling sessions due to a legal loophole.

LORNA MOXHAM, Irish Family Planning Association: It's just -- it's just kind of a loophole we can actually provide that service under EC regulations, you know, because we're affiliated with this. We're actually referring them to a pregnancy advisory service who can then take it from there, you know, in Britain.

MR. THOMPSON: The abortion referenda have polarized opinions among those directly affected, young people. This is Youth Defense, opposed to all abortion under any circumstances, including medical complications and rape. They use sharp tactics, photos of very late abortions, many taken outside Europe, and a model fetus, and they picket politicians' houses who oppose their views.

SEAN O'DONNELL, Youth Defense: We're trying to communicate to the Irish people the exact truth and the horror of what abortion is, that it kills babies and it injuries women, and to do that, we have to show posters of aborted babies. The media don't like it over here, and the political parties don't like it because we're drawing support away from them.

[YOUNG MEN TALKING TO OLDER MAN]

MR. THOMPSON: These Defense canvassers are on the doorsteps well into the night in Central Dublin, supporting their anti-abortion candidates in the election and encouraging a "no" vote on the referenda. But also on the streets are youth for choice, young people who want information, the right to travel to get an abortion, and ideally the right to have one in Ireland one day. If Ireland voted yes to all three referenda, it would merely speed up the process of making the journey to England, but there would still be very little counseling available to women going to the clinics, leaving a country where even medical opinion divides sharply over the abortion issue.

DR. BERRY KIELY, Doctors for Life: We are very happy that we can say that there is never a situation in which a mother's life can be saved only from an abortion, and that, in fact, abortion doesn't treat anything. Interestingly enough, you'll notice that I think both in the U.K. and in the U.S., the term "therapeutic abortion" is now no longer used because doctors recognize the fact that it's not therapeutic, it doesn't help you treat anything, and so they tend to use the more honest term, if you like, just abortion.

MR. THOMPSON: Other doctors disagree and believe current restrictions may actively endanger pregnant women.

DR. FIONA BRADLEY, Doctors for Freedom of Information: What we want is women who are pregnant and who have serious illnesses can be sure that they will receive whatever treatment is necessary, and we feel that this amendment will not allow that, and, therefore, would like to see legislation, rather than another constitutional amendment to deal with this issue.

MR. THOMPSON: Irish society, culture and politics are dominated by the influence of the Catholic Church. In the current election, political leaders prefer to let the people decide yes or no with their own conscience. The Catholic Church has, in effect, done the same thing, saying Catholics can vote either way, so long as they believe they're protecting the unborn child. The majority in Ireland remain firmly opposed to abortion, though some critics say both the church and state have fudged the issue, and point out that a minority of several thousand will continue to ignore the church's teachings to come over to England to get their abortions, and the referenda will make no difference to that. CONVERSATION - WHAT NEXT?

MR. MacNeil: Next tonight, we continue our current series of conversations with a wide array of people on their expectations to the presidency of Bill Clinton. We're joined tonight by Father Richard John Neuhaus, a Lutheran turned Catholic theologian who has written extensively about religious values in politics. He's president of the Institute on Religion and Public Life and editor of its monthly journal. He's the author of many books, including The Catholic Moment, The Paradox of the Church in the Post Modern World, America Against Itself, and most recently Doing Well and Doing Good, the Moral Challenge of the Free Economy. Father Neuhaus, thank you for coming.

FATHER NEUHAUS: It's a joy to be here.

MR. MacNeil: What do you expect of President Clinton?

FATHER NEUHAUS: Expect, what do I wish, what do I expect? I think what I expect and maybe wish as well is that he will continue on a trajectory that one can arguably say he's been on for the last 15 years in trying to move the Democratic Party more into, if not the center, at least into conversational distance with most Americans, that is, I think he has taken the lessons of the 1972 McGovern debacle very much to heart, and he could have a real opportunity, especially when he speaks about a new covenant with America, for example, to engage in a kind of political discourse, because, you see, he doesn't have a mandate. He has only 43 percent of the vote. He knows he has to reach out, and covenant is a kind of a nice biblically resonant concept, if you will, for reaching out in trying to rebuild trust in a deeply confused and divided and conflicted society. And that, I think, would be a very significant contribution. There is reason to believe he might do that. There is a lot of reason to believe he might not.

MR. MacNeil: Well, let's go into that, but just to know where you come from, as they say on this. Would you, because you're known as a conservative on many political issues, would you have thought the country in better hands if George Bush had remained President?

FATHER NEUHAUS: Oh, you ask a difficult question. I think the election was not so much the election of Bill Clinton, but it was clearly the rejection of George Bush, that is, the 20 percent to Perot, and the 43 percent to Clinton. And while one certainly does not wish to be unkind, I think one must in justice say that Mr. Bush almost invited that rejection. We have to hope for the best now with President Clinton. We have to hope that what he did in order to secure the nomination, which is understandable, he had to really lock himself in tightly to a certain number of pretty extreme interest groups in the Democratic Party on issues such as abortion, school choice, homosexual rights construed as civil rights. Now the question is: Can he -- now that the party is his - - can he move to make the American people, this deeply conflicted, divided people, his constituency and something like a covenant and something like a conversation that will elevate the politics of our time?

MR. MacNeil: I was going to ask about this covenant. As you say, it resonates deeply with the whole Judeo Christian tradition. If you had the drafting of the covenant, what would it be?

FATHER NEUHAUS: I think it would be something like this, that on the issues in which we are in great moral conflict, indeed, there's a kind of culture war going on. Some of us have called it a coulture kamp, using the German term, a real war over the definition of America. If he were serious about that conversation and that covenant, I think he would look back and say, what is politics about? It's not just getting and keeping power and exercising power, and it's certainly not just management. You know, Aristotle said 2500 years ago in Athens, and I don't think it's ever been said better, said, what is politics? He says, politics is an extension of ethics. And the political question is: How ought we to order our life together? How ought we to order our life together? And the odds in that definition of politics clearly and unmistakably says politics is a moral enterprise. We have at present a de-moralized, not simply in the sense of discouraged and divided, but a de-moralized political arena. This campaign did almost nothing to address that problem.

MR. MacNeil: Why is the, the electorate or the political polity de-moralized? What had de-moralized it, and how can Clinton address that? Should he address it?

FATHER NEUHAUS: Well, because I think the, many of the American people, millions upon millions, sense that there is something like a crisis, it's often called the values crisis or a crisis of culture, but it's a crisis about knowing what it means to be America, what does it stand for, what are the expectations, what are the stories and the truths and the virtues that we're going to transmit to the next generation? Our schools are in deep, deep turmoil over this issue. And here we had a campaign, because everybody said it's about the economy, and I think one has to criticize President Bush very severely for permitting that to be the definition that prevailed. It's not -- that's not what Americans are most disturbed about today, I think -- at least many, I think most by all the survey research data we have -- are disturbed about what kind of people are we and what kind of people are we going to be.

MR. MacNeil: Can they -- you quoted Aristotle -- let me quote another non-Christian, Bertol Brecht to you, who said, as ironic - -

FATHER NEUHAUS: We think of Aristotle as a kind of premature Christian.

MR. MacNeil: All right. Anyway, Brecht, who clearly wasn't a Christian and was a Marxist, said jokingly, but with irony, "First comes food, and then come morals." Can the American people think of these concerns of moral values and who they are until they feel more secure about their economic status? Because hasn't the last 10 years or so thrown into question the American assumption ever since the Second World War that each generation is going to be somewhat better off than the previous one, which is a profound psychological change?

FATHER NEUHAUS: That may or may not be, but Brecht's statement that you cite is a statement of, it seems to me, awful cynicism. It's a de-humanizing cynicism. We are not simply animals in need of ingesting things to keep us going. People say that, well, when you deal with politics as economics chiefly you're dealing with a hard question. They call politics a hard question. I think we use "hard" in the wrong way there. The really hard -- often we say a hard question because it simply is simple. The difficult questions are the really hard questions, questions about who belongs to the human community to which we accept common responsibility as it relates to abortion, as it relates to the radically handicapped, as it relates to euthanasia, questions about how do we empower the poor to have the same kind of choices and the same kind of participation in the education of their children that the rich already have in our society.

MR. MacNeil: Do you -- do you have confidence, having observed Clinton and what he's achieved so far, that he has the fiber or whatever it is to address these moral questions and lead them?

FATHER NEUHAUS: I certainly don't want to, you know, discuss the things that have been perhaps already too much discussed in terms of his personal life and the question of morality but his political vision, his sense of America. I think there are moments, there have been moments in this campaign, there have been moments in his career in which he has evidenced a sense of America as a moral experiment, which is like the founders. I mean, the founders could say, you know, our constituting document, the Declaration of Independence, we hold these truths to be self-evident, and then on the great seal of the United States, novos orto seclorum, a new order for the ages, very audacious, perhaps people would say arrogant language, presumptuous language, but I think Clinton has that sense. Now I hope he does not have it in the way that in the past it has been used to inflate the importance of politics. I hope he has a sense of America as an experiment, not in which he is the great political leader coming down from Mt. Sinai, establishing a new covenant, but in which he is sensitively engaged in conversation, respectful conversation, with the way most Americans really care about their children, about their schools, about crime, about neighborhoods.

MR. MacNeil: Are you hopeful he is?

FATHER NEUHAUS: Well, of course, an alternative to hope is to despair, and despair is a sin.

MR. MacNeil: Do you think he is?

FATHER NEUHAUS: I want to hope he is. I want to hope that he will take advantage of what now clearly is an opportunity that he has that no Democrat has had since the McGovern campaign, and that is to move the party into conversation with most Americans, to break out of the iron cage of very narrowly defined, interest groups with agendas that manifestly are not supported by the American people. But, you know, Democratic experiment, which means it's raucous and diffused and filled with contradictions, and it's going to continue to be.

MR. MacNeil: Let me ask you another question. How should the American dream be defined, or, if necessary, re-defined now that for the first time almost in this century, but certainly the first time in a couple of generations there is peace, there is no enemy at the gates?

FATHER NEUHAUS: Well, right, and a negative definition, namely that we were the alternative to communist totalitarianism, was always very limited in its capacity to rejuvenate the American experiment. I'll tell you, Robin, I think it's being tested today in a way that it's not been tested since the issue of slavery in the mid 19th century by the so-called "life questions," abortion being the center of it, but the whole realm of questions by which we define the community for which we accept common responsibility, and that I think is the issue in the abortion debate, for example. It's not when does life begin. I mean, that's a scientific matter in which all reasonable people agree. It's a question of what are our moral obligations and how do we define gradations of protection and participation in the human community, and I think that -- and this now is a dreadful scenario, the flip side of the hopes I expressed earlier, is that if President Clinton were to move vigorously to, for example, get passage of the Freedom of Choice Act in Congress, and if he then were to do as at times he has said he would, put on Justices in the Supreme Court for whom it would be necessary to pass the litmus test on Roe Vs. Wade, we would have a divide, a conflict of moralities in our public life much more intense than anything we have seen quite possibly since the 19th century debate over slavery. There would be a lot of Americans. It's a frightening prospect.

MR. MacNeil: That's a very big statement. I'd love to continue, but we have used our time. Father Neuhaus, thank you for joining us.

FATHER NEUHAUS: A joy to be with you. ESSAY - MALCOLM'S LEGACY

MR. LEHRER: Finally tonight an essay about Malcolm X. The essayist is Clarence Page of the Chicago Tribune.

[MOVIE SEGMENT]

MR. PAGE: In the end, critics say, the movie "Malcolm X" lives up to all its hype. It's an epic film, Spike Lee's greatest achievement, but that doesn't begin to explain the ethic of interest the memory of Malcolm X has generated, especially now, a time of rising racial tension on many of our campuses and in many of our cities. Long before this movie opened, Malcolm's face was popping up probably everywhere you turned, Malcolm X T-shirts, as well as baseball caps, designed originally to publicize the movie, quickly became a powerful symbol of something else, the new audience Malcolm X has found 27 years after his death, even among those too young to remember the man or the era in which he lived. We're wearing him, reading about him, and in some cases fighting over him. No sooner did celebrated filmmaker Spike Lee announce he was making a movie about Malcolm X than celebrated writer Ameri Baraca, among others, tried to stop him. Baraca claimed Lee couldn't be trusted to portray the true Malcolm, which brings up an interesting question: Who is the true Malcolm, and why is he so important to so many people in the 1990s? His life offers ample material for legends. Born Malcolm Little, 1925, father reportedly killed by klansmen, became a pimp and a street hustler, went to prison where he converted to the Black Muslim religion of Elijah Mohammed, expelled by Mohammed in 1963, after he said the Kennedy assassination was an example of chickens coming home to roost. He went to Mecca, discovered orthodox Islam, founded a new multinational black unity movement, assassinated in 1965 in a Harlem theater, three followers of Elijah Mohammed were convicted.

MALCOLM X: The white man is the oppressor.

MR. PAGE: Malcolm X was the man the establishment loved to hate, an angry alternative to the non-violence of Martin Luther King, yet, he's been admired by supporters as diverse as the rap group Public Enemy and the new conservative Supreme Court Justice, Clarence Thomas. His legacy remains a visible part of the American scene. When we say black or African-American instead of negro or colored, when we see Cashes Clay give up his slave name to become Mohammed Ali or Lou Al Cinder become Karim Abdul Jabar.

SPOKESPERSON: Make that dream your reality.

MR. PAGE: When we hear community leaders talk about black pride, self-defense, pooling resources and building strong families, we are hearing the legacy of Malcolm X, old ideas, but he gave a new force, a new energy, and new angry style to them.

SPOKESPERSON: We are America! This is our rock! This is our home.

MR. PAGE: The story of Malcolm X, aman who went from pimp to preacher to popular icon, is more than just a black story. It's a story of our capacity as human beings to change. It is those changes that lie at the heart of the dispute between Spike Lee and his critics like Baraca who feared that Malcolm would be portrayed as too much of a pimp and not enough of a prophet. One can only wonder what Malcolm, himself, would have thought of this tug of war over his legacy. He probably would be pleased that Spike Lee owns his own production company, that he's creating jobs, including new union jobs for blacks who never had them before, and he probably would be pleased that Ameri Baraca gave up his slave name, Leroy Jones, and was keeping up the old fight. But would he be pleased that some of his followers have used his anger to justify demagoguery, like the racial hatred that exploded in Brooklyn between blacks and Jews after a traffic accident last year, and has continued to simmer? Malcolm always distinguished attitudes that were pro-black from those that were anti-white. A hero's death frees his or her followers to make of their legacy what they want it to be. If any part of Malcolm's legacy should not be lost, it's the need he stressed for positive action, not racial hatred. One can only imagine what he might say today about how so many of his people are still enslaved by poverty, drugs, crime and unemployment. More of us than ever before are calling ourselves black and African-Americans, he might remark, but we cannot yet call ourselves free, not until we all are free. I'm Clarence Page. RECAP

MR. LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Tuesday, relief organizations in Somalia said they may be forced to suspend aid unless the United Nations sends security forces to the area immediately. Former Defense Sec. Caspar Weinberger pleaded "not guilty" to a charge he lied to Congress about the Iran-contra Affair, and CIA Director Robert Gates said Iran could pose a serious military threat in three to five years. Good night, Robin.

MR. MacNeil: Good night, Jim. That's the NewsHour for tonight. We'll be back tomorrow night with another conversation about expectations, this time with Robert Nevil, dean of the College of Theology at Boston University. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.