The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight, Elizabeth Farnsworth explores the controversy over a museum exhibition in New York; Spencer Michels updates the Pinochet extradition story; Mark Shields and Paul Gigot offer their Friday night analysis; Terence Smith has another report on our agenda 2000 mail; and essayist Roger Rosenblatt talks some baseball. It all follows our summary of the news this Friday.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: The U.S. unemployment rate remained low in September. The Labor Department said today it held at 4.2 percent, the lowest rate in nearly 30 years. President Clinton asked the Senate today to delay voting on the nuclear test ban treaty. It had been scheduled for Wednesday. He said it did not have the two-thirds majority needed to ratify a treaty. He spoke at a news conference with Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien in Ottawa.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: I will say again, they should put it off, and then they should agree to a legitimate process where Republican and Democratic Senators think about the national interest. They have total control over when it comes up...not me. If it had been up to me, we would have started on this two years ago. We would have had six months of hearings, two weeks of debate, lots of negotiations and this whole thing would have been out of the way a year and a half ago.

JIM LEHRER: Republicans argued the treaty would leave the United States vulnerable. They said compliance would be hard to verify because some low- level nuclear tests cannot be detected. Later, President Clinton went to the French-speaking province, Quebec. Its leaders want to secede from Canada. But Mr. Clinton told them the United States preferred a united, democratic Canada. Arguments over a controversial art exhibit were heard in a New York federal court today. Lawyers for the Brooklyn Museum of Art asked a judge to prevent New York City from withholding its $7 million subsidy. Mayor Rudolph Giuliani has declared the exhibit of British art, entitled "Sensation," offensive and threatened to cut off public funds. We'll have more on this story right after the News Summary. A British magistrate ruled today former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet can be extradited to Spain. He has been charged there with torture while president of Chile. Today's ruling will be appealed, and the final decision on whether Pinochet is actually extradited will be made by the British government. That decision is still months away. The 83-year-old Pinochet has been living in a rented mansion outside London under house arrest. We'll have more on the story later in the program tonight. In Mexico today, soldiers joined the search for survivors of widespread flooding and mud slides as the deathtoll continued to climb, officials said at least 230 people have been killed, dozens more may be buried under the mud. Tens of thousands are homeless. Three days of torrential rains inundated nine central and southern states. The investigation into the bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa last year has produced another suspect. A Tanzanian man was arraigned on murder charges today in a New York federal court. FBI agents arrested him yesterday in South Africa as he was about to be deported. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to the Brooklyn Museum controversy, a Pinochet update, Shields and Gigot, an agenda 2000 mail report, and a Roger Rosenblatt essay.

FOCUS - SENSATION

JIM LEHRER: The art fight that grows in Brooklyn. Kwame Holman begins.

KWAME HOLMAN: Since it opened at New York's Brooklyn Museum of Art last week,

"Sensation" indeed has caused one...and drawn crowds from curators and critics to simply the curious. Fully titled, "Sensation: Young British Artists from the Saatchi Collection"...and carrying a mock health warning...the show features 90 works from the collection of British advertising magnate Charles Saatchi. Among them: Damien Hirst's "A Thousand Years" ... composed of flies, maggots, a cow's head, sugar, and water.... another Hirst work, "This Little Piggy went to Market, This Little Piggy Stayed Home"... a split pig carcass floating in formaldehyde; Marc Quinn's, "Self"...a bust of the artist made from nine pints of his frozen blood; and -- most controversial -- Artist Chris Ofili's work titled "The Holy Virgin Mary;" it is this work -- a depiction of a black Madonna adorned with elephant dung and sexually-explicit photos -- that was deemed by New York's Mayor Rudolph Giuliani "anti-Catholic." The city acted to revoke the museum's

lease and remove its municipal funding unless it took down the show.

MAYOR RUDOLPH GIULIANI: If I ignored it, then the argument would be on the other side: How can you ignore something as disgusting, horrible and awful as this? And my view is you do what you think is right. I believe opposing this is the right thing.

KWAME HOLMAN: Museum officials responded quickly insisting "Sensation" would be

displayed as planned.

AROLD LEHMAN, Director, Brooklyn Museum of Art: This is an important exhibition. I mean, this is a defining exhibition of a decade of the most creative energy that's come out of Great Britain in a very long time. And that's why we did it, these works are challenging, and thought provoking, and some are very beautiful, some are very difficult to look at.

KWAME HOLMAN: The very public showdown stirred emotions inside and outside the arts

community and forced many to choose sides. From the political world, Mayor Guiliani's potential opponent for a Senate seat, Hillary Clinton, said that while she doesn't like the art....

HILLARY CLINTON: It is not appropriate to penalize and punish an institution such as the Brooklyn museum that has served this community with distinction over many years...

KWAME HOLMAN: At the museum a mixed public reaction could be found.

MUSEUM GOER: I can't believe that this has caused this commotion.

MUSEUM GOER: I don't know. I don't have an adverse reaction to it. You know, it's someone's view on something.

MUSEUM GOER: I'm furious about this. This is a tremendous insult to the mother of my God and to me.

MUSEUM GOER: I think it's a disgrace that people can bash other people's religion.

KWAME HOLMAN: The fight over "Sensation" is the latest skirmish in a long battle over

controversial art that receivespublic funding. It's included disputes over the proposed

exhibition of photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe at Washington D.C.'s Corcoran Gallery of Art in 1989; a 1995 contemporary art performance in Minneapolis in which one actor cut another to draw blood; and almost yearly battles in Congress over funding for the National Endowment for the Arts. In the Brooklyn case, the museum receives $7 million a year, or about a third of its budget, from the City of New York. Today, a federal court in Brooklyn heard the museum's plea for an injunction to block the city's actions against its lease and funding until the entire exhibition issue is resolved. "Sensation" is scheduled to remain at the Brooklyn Art Museum through early

next year.

JIM LEHRER: Elizabeth Farnsworth has more.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Two lawyers involved in the Brooklyn museum case join us. Michael Hess is counsel for Mayor Guiliani and the city of New York City. Floyd Abrams, works frequently in First Amendment cases and is representing the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

Mr. Abrams, what exactly are you asking the federal court judge and what is the status of the case as of the end of today?

FLOYD ABRAMS, Attorney for Brooklyn Museum: We're asking Judge Gershon to issue a preliminary injunction barring the city from engaging in any more punishment of the museum because it put on a perfectly lawful art show. We're asking the court to enter an order saying stop withholding the money that you've already agreed to pay, stop trying to drive the museum out of its home for 106 years, stop trying to get rid of the board of directors, all because the mayor of the City of New York, Mayor Giuliani doesn't like an art show. The current status is that we argued it today. We're going to submit some papers next week to the judge. And I think all of us expect a pretty prompt ruling after that.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And, Mr. Hess, let's get the facts straight about exactly what the city has done. What have you done?

MICHAEL HESS, Corp. Counsel, City of New York: Well, up to now the city has done two things. We've filed our own independent lawsuit in Brooklyn seeking to evict the museum from their building because they violated a lease and an obligation under that lease and contract as to the type of shows that they're supposed to put on. And second of all, the October payment from the city to the museum has been withheld.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And why are you doing this?

MICHAEL HESS: Well, the basic reason is because, as I said, the museum has a contract and a lease going back over 100 years with the city, which gives some obligations to the museum, as well as obligations to the city. For the first time in the course of that lease, the Brooklyn Museum has violated that obligation to put on an exhibit that really is to have open access to the public, to train young people in artistic things, and to really put on an appropriate show for the citizens of the city. This they're not doing, actually by their own admission, because while their lease specifically says that the museum should be open to young people to schoolchildren, at the start of this exhibit, one of the strictures put on the exhibit by this museum is that no one under 17 may attend unless accompanied by an adult. That alone violated the lease without getting the mayor's approval and caused the mayor to react the way he did.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mr. Abrams, what is your response to that?

FLOYD ABRAMS: Well, what the museum is trying to do was to be as responsible and serious as possible by saying this is a really challenging exhibition. This is an exhibition which is best scene by kids with adults. The mayor, however, took the position that he had the authority to decide whether children could be kept out. And he said, no, I will not approve; I will not give my authorization to have children only allowed in the museum with adults. So the museum, trying to avoid litigation on this issue, the museum came in and said, all right; we'll let the children in, we'll post warning signs around -- and they've done that -- and we'll post advisories and tell parents we really think your kids ought to see it together with you. It's just a shame it worked out this way. This is a very interesting, provocative, challenging, controversial effort, which the people of Brooklyn, the people of the New York, the people of America ought to have a chance to see. It's just a shame that because of the efforts of Mayor Giuliani we almost lost that. And the museum is paying very dearly for holding to its principles.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mr. Hess, what is the city's view of the art in this exhibit? What's wrong with it from your point of view?

MICHAEL HESS: Well, the city's view of the art is that it's totally inappropriate, certainly for children, and beyond that, it's really not even for the general public the kind of exhibit that taxpayers should pay for. I think the viewers should understand that the mayor is not saying that this art should never be shown anywhere. This is not an occasion where the mayor has said let's burn the paintings or let's lock them up. He' saying they can be shown in a private gallery. They can be shown in a private museum. But because of the nature of the art itself, the more than controversial, the actual upsetting, violent, disgusting view of some of these paintings, they shouldn't be supported by taxpayer money. So that's the real focus of this. It shouldn't be supported by taxpayers= money, and it violates the lease that the Brooklyn Museum entered into, which lease talks about shows appropriate for schoolchildren.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mr. Abrams, the museum's response to why taxpayers should B why taxpayers= money should go to this art?

FLOYD ABRAMS: Taxpayers= money ought to go for culture because it's good for taxpayers. Taxpayers= money ought to go to the Brooklyn Museum as it has for a hundred years because the Brooklyn Museum serves the public; it serves it by having 125,000 school kids visit every year. It serves it by teaching kids. It serves it by having exhibitions of a variety of sorts. One sort is a particularly challenging, controversial sort. It's good for the people of Brooklyn and New York to have a choice for them to decide whether to go to this exhibition, and for the mayor to react by throwing the museum out, by having one of his aides say to the head of the museum, take that one picture down, that picture down B you take it down or we're cutting off all aid -- seems to me contrary to the whole notion of freedom of expression in America.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mr. Hess?

MICHAEL HESS: Well, I think the mayor's view, and to speak for a moment about that one picture, which has been the center of controversy, that picture is a picture entitled "The Virgin Mary" and it's a picture, as was said before, of the Virgin Mary surrounded by small vaginas and covered with elephant dung. Now the mayor, in seeing that, said that's not appropriate. It's not controversial only. That's a word that the museum uses: Controversial, challenging. It's much more than that. In the mayor's view, it's totally inappropriate to use taxpayers= money to put that up on the wall. In addition, we feel that, again because there is a contract between the museum and the city, there's an obligation on the museum's part to look at what they're putting up on the wall before they do it. And to limit this kind of painting. The museum's director has said, no, he doesn't feel it's his obligation at all. He takes the show as he received it from London, and just puts everything up on the wall. We think that violates the contract and the lease. And if he won't do it, then it becomes the city's obligation, since we're on the other side of that lease, to look at what's going up on the wall. And when something as vile as that -- because it absolutely does derogate someone's religion, because of that the mayor draws the line and says this isn't controversial or challenging art, this is way over the line, and the taxpayers shouldn't=t pay for it.

FLOYD ABRAMS: You know what...

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: But, Mr. Abrams, very briefly -- I have to move on to our other guests -- but very briefly respond.

FLOYD ABRAMS: The mayor is saying, in effect, if there is a book in the library that we fund, I can take it out if it's offensive. That is profoundly dangerous, profoundly dangerous, and that's why we had to go to court.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: All right. Thank you both very much.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And now some commentary on the implications of this case from David Ross, director of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and formerly head of the Whitney Museum in New York, and Matthew Rees, a writer on politics and culture for the Weekly Standard magazine.

Mr. Ross, before we get into some of the specifics, let's look at the broader picture. What do you think is at stake here beyond this specific case? What's at stake?

DAVID ROSS: Well, I think the main issue is whether or not as a nation, if we want to really generalize this, we respect what artists do, what they try to do, the effort that they make to take their most personally held feelings about themselves, their place in the world, and their place in society, their sense of religiosity that they may hold very privately and try to express that to others. That is the essence of being an artist; one human being expressing something extremely private and personal and trying to touch other people with that effort. That's what we celebrate. That's the essence of why we so carefully have to protect the freedom of artists to be able to explore their own feelings, to be able to communicate freely and not have the fear that by communicating something that may offend someone else, that somehow they may bring upon them the wrath of government.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mr. Rees, what do you think is at stake here, beyond the Brooklyn case itself?

MATTHEW REES: Well, Mr. Ross and his allies are framing the issue as one of artistic independence, when the issue really is subsidized irreverence or subsidized decadence in many respects. He says that the issue at stake is whether or not we're going to take artists seriously. I'd like to see all of the other examples in which Mr. Ross thinks we're not taking artists seriously. It's not as if museums are shutting down displays throughout America. The reality is that this is an extreme case with an extreme exhibit that involves $7 million of taxpayer money. And I think there's a very strong argument for certainly not having the government fund these sorts of exhibits, and perhaps displaying a little bit of judgment when deciding whether or not to put these kinds of exhibits on display.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Before you respond directly to that, as a museum director, how do you see your responsibilities to the public to not offend certain sensibilities?

DAVID ROSS: I think every museum director, every curator, every board of trustees which, by the, is the governing body here -- there is a board of trustees at the Brooklyn Museum, just as there is at SF MOMA --has a responsibility to think clearly and carefully about what they present and to make judgments based on their own sense of aesthetic value and quality. Now, that said, these are the most debatable terms we can have. And when we have issues like those that are raised by Chris Ofili's paintings, those issues should be openly and broadly debated. I don't in any way reject the idea that there are people who find the work offensive and difficult and maybe even disgusting and insulting to the sense of who they are, and their own sense of their relationship to God. That's a very serious thing. But in relationship to that feeling, the obligation then is to talk about it; to let the expression of that work of art generate a useful dialogue, because this work of art is a serious thing. It's not something that was just done to make someone angry or to insult someone. Chris Ofili is a very serious painter. Now, let me respond quickly, if I can, to the other comments, because $7 million is a big number. But that's not what is being used by the city to fund this exhibition. As we know, no city money is going into funding this exhibition. That's the money that goes into providing the basic resources, one-third of the budget of that museum so that the city of New York and especially the people of Brooklyn can be served by this great museum. And the real issue here isn't that there are hundreds of examples of other cities and other mayors and other museums being similarly attacked for works of art that may be unpopular or difficult. The problem is the precedent this sets. If one mayor, one city, can reach into a great museum like the Brooklyn Museum and threaten it and bring it to its knees based on the feeling of that mayor, which I don't doubt is a sincere feeling, then I think the doors are open to a kind of censorship that would create an enormous chilling effect in this nation.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Matthew Rees, your view of that?

MATTHEW REES: They like to frame this around things like the First Amendment. There is no government right to subsidized art. This is not an issue of the government shutting down newspapers or publications or displays that it simply doesn't like and finds offensive. This is a case in which you have an exhibit exist is offensive to millions of people who live in New York City. And I think it would actually set a very useful precedent if it suggested to some of the artists and the people who put on the displays that perhaps they should think twice before having an exhibit like this at a city-funded museum.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: And, Mr. Rees, what about the argument that the trustees could fire the director or nobody would come to see it if it was really offensive to people, what about just letting that sort of procedure take care of it?

MATTHEW REES: I think that would be perfectly reasonable if there were not government money at stake. And I think also there is...we're all adults here. I like to think we are. And the ideas that perhaps some of these people will show a little bit of judgment and realize that perhaps this is so offensive and the idea that it should be on display at a city museum, they know that this was going to create a great deal of controversy and it's going to bring attention to the museum. But at what price?

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mr. Ross, I wanted to ask you about that. There is a commercial aspect to this that offends some people, too, that the museum did this because it would make news, it was provocative and that's what museums have to do to get people to them now. What's your response to that?

DAVID ROSS: Well, the Brooklyn Museum does many things to bring people to it, just as well all do. I think the Monet show brought a lot of people and there is nothing much provocative about Monet today, although in his own time there were people who hated it. The reality is that when government decides to support museums or libraries, then the rules of the First Amendment apply. So since we are in that condition, the kind of decisions that have to be made by those who have the stewardship of our museums as their responsibility are made within the framework knowing that the First Amendment grants us certain protections. I believe that that board of trustees and I know that Arnold Lehman and his colleagues thought about that all very seriously. The commercial side of this is that it is an easy attack. Was this show considered to be popular? We already knew it was popular from its showing in London. But I think if Arnold didn't believe that the works in there and the artists in that show were worthy of serious merit and worthy of generating a critical discussion, around the exhibition of their newest work, then I don't think he would have done it. Yes, there's a little show business in museums these days, but there's nothing wrong with that.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Matthew Rees, we're just about out of time but very briefly your response?

MATTHEW REES: Well, I don't think there's anything particularly avant-garde about this. I think what would be truly radical, perhaps would be to put on more traditional classical, representational art that would appeal to our better interests as opposed to this, which appeals to our more prurient interests.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: All right. Thank you both very much for being with us.

UPDATE - TO STAND TRIAL?

JIM LEHRER: The extradition battle over Chile's General Pinochet. Spencer Michels has our update.

SPENCER MICHELS: Opponents of General Augusto Pinochet chanted in London today that the only right decision is extradition, as they awaited a decision on the former Chilean leader's legal fate. When the ruling came down from a British judge that Pinochet should be sent to Spain to stand trial on charges of torture and conspiracy, a roar went up from the crowd. The army general ruled Chile for 17 years from the time he took power in a coup in 1973 until he stepped down in 1990 to become a Senator for life. Pinochet has been under house arrest in Britain for more than a year now. Last October he was arrested in London -- where he was recovering from back surgery -- at the behest of Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzon. Garzon alleged Spaniards were among those who suffered during the Pinochet era, and that the European Convention on the suppression of terrorism obligates Spain to identify and hold suspected international terrorists. The arrest warrant lists 34 specific incidents of torture since 1988. Pinochet was leader of a military coup that, with U.S. backing, overthrew democratically-elected President Salvador Allende, who was a socialist. He died during the bombing of the presidential palace, possibly a suicide. The new right-wing regime was notoriously brutal toward opponents and those suspected of leftist leanings. The Chilean Truth and Reconciliation Commission listed 3,200 Chileans and foreigners who were executed, murdered, or disappeared and thousands of others who were subjected to extreme forms of torture. In London today, elated anti-Pinochet demonstrators, who have been pushing for punishment for the general, reacted to today's decision.

ARIEL DORFMAN, Chilean Writer: Well, I think that the most important thing is that it's been proven that no matter how powerful you are, how rich you are, you cannot be above the law. For 17 years he was above the law.

SPENCER MICHELS: One American urging extradition is Michael Moffitt. He blames the general for the 1976 car bombing in Washington that injured him and killed his wife and her boss, Orlando Letelier, Allende's defense minister and ambassador to the U.S..

MICHAEL MOFFITT, Husband of Victim: Now it is time heard from the victims, for these are the people who have suffered at the hands of Pinochet, his dictatorship, his murders, his tortures and his bloody executioners.

SPENCER MICHELS: In Washington today, Spanish lawyer and former Allende associate Juan Garces argued that torture is a crime under international law.

JUAN GARCES, Spanish Lawyer: That means in the international community, and Chile in particular, have accepted that no one can take refuge for escaping justice when he's accused of torture.

SPENCER MICHELS: In Chile's capital, Santiago, Pinochet allies have been fighting any trial in Spain and urging his return home.

GEN. CORTES VILLA, Director, Pinochet Foundation: (speaking through interpreter) There is a belief on the part of Pinochet that it is unjust not for him as a person but it violates Chile's sovereignty. Chile has to be unified.

SPENCER MICHELS: Many Chileans still support Pinochet and credit him with overhauling the country's state- controlled economy in the 70's and 80's. They say Chile's current prosperity is a free-market model for other developing countries.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: (speaking through interpreter) He is the best president Chile has ever had. He looked after the poor, got rid of all the slums around the country, got rid of the poverty belts, and now these people have risen to the middle class, have good homes, and now think about work, you see? Almost everybody.

SPENCER MICHELS: In Britain, Pinochet's most celebrated defender is Former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. She credits Pinochet with bringing democracy to Chile, and for siding with Britain during its 1982 war against Argentina over the Falkland Islands. She spoke on Wednesday on behalf of Pinochet.

MARGARET THATCHER: The chance of Senator Pinochet receiving anything resembling what we in Britain would recognize as justice in a Spanish court is minimal; not least because key witnesses for his defense run the risk of immediate arrest if they set foot on Spanish soil. What is planned there is a show trial with a pre-ordained outcome. We will fight on for as long as it takes to see Senator Pinochet returned safely to his own country.

SPENCER MICHELS: The 83 year-old Pinochet did not attend today's court session due to failing health, but he issued a statement. AI am not guilty of the crimes of which I am accused. The events in Chile have nothing whatsoever to do with Spain. It is clear that my extradition is politically motivated and being pursued clearly for political reasons.@ Pinochet's lawyers said they will appeal today=s ruling to the high court, claiming too much time has elapsed since the alleged crimes. The process could go on for months. The final decision on extradition rests with the British equivalent of the U.S. Attorney General, the Home Secretary.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, Shields and Gigot, Agenda 2000 mail, and a Roger Rosenblatt essay.

FOCUS - POLITICAL WRAP

JIM LEHRER: And here to a look at the week of politics with syndicated columnist Mark Shields and "Wall Street Journal" columnist Paul Gigot. That didn't come out exactly right. You are to do this, the two of you. Okay. The vote yesterday in the House on health care, the right to sue an HMO was upheld by a very sizable vote in the House. Everybody interpreted this as a defeat of the leadership of the House of Representatives, the Republican leadership. How do you read this?

MARK SHIELDS: Everybody is right. The House control has been lost by the Republican majority and the Republican leadership. The agenda is not of their making. To lose... Tip O'Neill when he was Speaker of the House had a very simple rule. A Speaker never speaks on any issue unless the Speaker's side prevails because the Speaker can't afford to be on the losing side of an important fight. And Denny Hastert, who made his reputation as a leader of the Republicans, for his handling of health care, went into the well yesterday and made his pitch and saw 68 members of his own party walk. The only thing I can compare to in recent history is 1994 when the Democrats majority lost their control of the House on the crime bill. And they never recovered. And I think we're going to see a long time before Republicans recover.

JIM LEHRER: What happened yesterday?

PAUL GIGOT: I disagree with Mark in the broader sense that the Republicans have completely lost control of the agenda. I mean they did pass a tax cut, although it was vetoed, that was still a sign of being able to organize. But on this one, he's absolutely right this. I mean, this wasn't just a riot. This was a wildebeest herd running across the African plain from the lions - and not just 68 votes on final passage -- 29 Republicans were lost on their preferred alternative. Now you hear a lot...

JIM LEHRER: Which was voted on before they got to the final bill, the Norwood-Dingell bill?

PAUL GIGOT: And which failed. I've heard a lot from Republicans about how we only have a five-seat majority. And that's true. But you lose 29 of your own on your preferred alternative, that's much bigger than five. Five committee chairmen voted against them and two voted against them on the other. It was a rout.

JIM LEHRER: And some people are suggesting that there was just a simple misreading of where this story was, that too many other Republican leaders saw it in Washington lobbying terms rather what was going out in the country as far as the public's feelings toward HMO's.

PAUL GIGOT: I don't agree with that. The reason I don't is look what happened in the Senate. The Senate managed to put together, a Republican Senate earlier put together an alternative that was not as onerous, not as regulatory; didn't have the right to sue that would help the trial lawyers; had a real alternative cohesion to it and they managed to pass that, and keep their people on board. So there wasn't a way to do it.

MARK SHIELDS: The House is always a keener and more direct reflection of public attitudes and public will both in its strengths and weaknesses. I don't think there is any question this was a popular move; this was an insurgency up from the grassroots. Jim, I was in Washington when Medicare passed. There was not a stauncher lobby in opposition, a more formal one, than the American Medical Association. To see the American Medical Association lined up with people like John Dingell, liberal Democrat from Michigan, and Charlie Norwood, a dentist Republican from Georgia pushing against the insurance companies, it was formidable and it was reflective in my judgment. I would say this -- the whole agenda nationally has changed; twelve or fifteen years ago all the issues cut the Republicans way -- welfare, crime, tax cuts, getting tough on the Soviets, big defense. Now the Republicans had a big edge... advantage over the Democrats on those issues twelve or fifteen years ago. The tax cut, Alan Simpson, the old Republican Senate Republican whip, said the tax cut this year didn't amount to a sparrow's burp in a windstorm. It doesn't have the traction anymore. And the issues that do matter to people, whether it's patients' bill of rights or health care or education, are issues where the Democrats have the advantage. It isn't just Denny Hastert's fault. The agenda has moved away from the Republican Party.

JIM LEHRER: There's another, of course there's another thing on the other side of the ledger this week, Paul, and that is the Senate held fast against the President and the Democrats on the nuclear test ban treaty and the President today said, okay, let's delay it. Should that be considered a victory for the Republicans?

PAUL GIGOT: I think so. I think this is an example where the Republican leadership in the Senate again has held together. It goes back, the opposition, seven, eight months where Jon Kyl of Arizona went to Trent Lott, Jon Kyl being one of the experts on arms control and said the President is going to get us on this at some point; he's going to surprise us with this sometime this year or early next. Let's get organized. Quietly behind the scenes brought in experts, James Schlesinger, former Secretary of Defense, very influential with a lot of members and slowly opposition built, and sure enough the President brought a vote and the Democrats said we want a vote. We want a vote. Trent Lott said a couple weeks ago, okay, we'll give you a vote. Little did the white House know because they haven't talked to enough Republicans, that they didn't have enough votes to pass it and now I think it's pretty significant embarrassment for the President and his foreign policy.

JIM LEHRER: How do you read it?

MARK SHIELDS: I think that tactically there's no question Republicans have the advantage here. I think substantively they don't. I mean I think what's lost here is we're in sort of a political tactic back and forth. The United States embarked upon a nuclear test ban voluntarily in 1992 under President George Bush. I mean, we have had a superiority and it's been in our interest whether it's India, Pakistan, to limit nuclear testing. I think it's inarguably in our national interests and the world's interests. I just am amazed that Republicans think that this is going to be a great victory for hem.

PAUL GIGOT: Jim, when Dick Lugar, Republican of Indiana, big supporter of bipartisanship foreign policy, supporter of every arms control treaty I can think of, in my memory, says this is a stinker of a treaty, something is wrong with the treaty -- the CIA says it's not verifiable -- that's been very influential with people. So, I think on the substance of this, the Republicans are right as well as on the politics.

MARK SHIELDS: When the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stands up there when we've got 11 testing places in the Soviet Union, in Russia, 11 in China, 30 in the Soviet Union, I mean I think you take a risk for peace. I think it's worked well in the past and I think it would work well now, but the Republicans, listen, these are folks that need a victory. And if this is their victory, I hope they enjoy celebrating it.

JIM LEHRER: And that will be put off until after the next election, we're talking...

PAUL GIGOT: The president doesn't want to commit to that. That's the rub. The Republicans don't trust him frankly not to bring it back before the election next year where it's much harder for people running to resist the President. But I think they'll probably exact that promise before it's over.

JIM LEHRER: All right. Speaking of presidential politics, let's move on to George W. Bush. He made a speech he made in New York City earlier this week and it caused a bit of a stir. Here's a clip of it.

GEORGE W. BUSH: Too often on social issues, my party has painted an image of America slouching toward Gomorrah. Of course, there are challenges to the character and compassion of our nation, too many broken homes and broken lives. But many of our problems, particularly education, crime and welfare dependence, are yielding to good sense and strength and idealism. We are demonstrating the genius for self-renewal at the heart of the American experiment. Too often my party has focused on the national economy to the exclusion of all else, speaking a sterile language of rates and numbers, of CBO and GNP. Of course we want growth and vigor in our economy, but there are human problems that persist in a shadow of affluence. And the strongest argument for conservative ideals, for responsibility and accountability, and the virtues of our tradition is that they lead to greater justice, less suffering and more opportunity. Too often my party has confused the need of limit government with a disdain for government itself. But this is not an option for conservatives.

JIM LEHRER: Paul, what is George W. Bush up to?

PAUL GIGOT: Well, it's well beyond triangulation -- the old phrase about Bill Clinton running against Democrats and Republicans in the Congress at the same time. This is kind of running, I think -- he's basically saying a lot of things about conservatives that other conservatives have said to try to recast himself in conservatism from outside of Washington to the more reform-minded, successful, pragmatic kind of conservatism that the Republican governors have been able to practice. It's less right versus left as a change than it is kind of outside of Washington versus inside of Washington. And I think it's a fascinating tactic. And so far it seems to be working.

JIM LEHRER: Working?

MARK SHIELDS: Well, I have to say I like the musical number, slouching to Gomorrah. Slouching to Gomorrah and slinking to Sodom, I guess, is next. I kind of like the ring of that. Last week, Paul said this is not the way to get the Republican House back in power, when he talked about...when George Bush talked about balancing the budget on the backs of the poor. And it strikes me this is not triangulation the way Bill Clinton did it. Bill Clinton did it after the Republicans won the House in 1994. And it was a reelection strategy. George W. Bush is the only hope the Republicans have to keep the Congress -- the only hope.

JIM LEHRER: To keep the Congress?

MARK SHIELDS: To keep the Congress. And Republicans recognize that; 178 of them endorse him -- didn't endorse him because of his education policy, which we learned about this week, or his position on farm subsidies. They endorsed him because he's a winner, because he's running ahead in the polls. And that's it. He's a very likable fellah, don't get me wrong. But if he weren't running ahead in the polls, they wouldn't endorse him. They know he is the only ticket back in. I think that's important. I think that what he is doing is he is recognizing, Jim, most of all that the issues are not working for the Republicans in 1999 and 2000, the issues I mentioned of health care and education. He's cutting down the angle on every single issue. There's no way you can look and say this guy is Tom Delay, this guy is Dick Armey who is sort of seen as the poster boy of the Republican House. This guy is different. He is a compassionate conservative. That's the perception that people have of George W. Bush. He had as good a week this week as I've ever seen a non-incumbent presidential candidate have in New York. He spent repeated time in the company of minority groups. He's comfortable there. This is something that most presidential Republican nominees don't do except in a week when the Democrats are holding their convention and there aren't that many cameras around. He does it, he does it easily, comfortably. He brought George Pataki, the governor, and Rudy Giuliani, the Capulets and Montagues of the New York Republican Party, together. I mean, he really - he had a terrific week in New York.

PAUL GIGOT: There was a difference between what he did last week and this week. Last week he sandbagged the Republican in Congress -- he didn't tell them. This week the speech was said in advance. The timing last week was bad in a crucial time of the negotiations. He echoed Clinton's language - Clinton's attack, the backs of the poor. This time he did it in a way, I think, that a lot of other conservatives have criticized conservatives. I mean, he basically see we want to be optimistic. That's something Mark has praised Ronald Reagan for an awful lot. That's the only way you can have a governing conservatism in this country is if it has a smile on its face. It's not -

JIM LEHRER: Is he saying, the way you read it, he is saying I'm not one of those and he's pointing to Tom Delay and the ghost of Newt Gingrich and Dick Armey and those people who are still running the House of Representatives?

PAUL GIGOT: This is part of the price Republicans are paying for the public image that Newt Gingrich developed over time. Fairly or unfairly, he did have a public image that put the Republicans and seemed to be more divisive and the country is not in a divisive mood. It's not in a confrontational mood. We have peace and prosperity. They feel good about themselves except some things on the moral front and certainly in education. And Mark , the one thing I do agree with Mark on is that some of the old Republican themes of the 80's, taxes and foreign policy, don't work as well as they do in a time of peace and prosperity. So a Republican candidate had better be credible, had better have something to say about education. And George Bush has a good record on education. He better have something to say about health care and other things. So, that only makes sense, and there's a lot in that speech, I can tell you in education, a lot in that speech, but the National Education Association and Al Gore are not going to like.

MARK SHIELDS: The last measurement of public opinion by the "Wall Street Journal"-NBC News poll, Bill Clinton was at 58-37 favorable in his job rating, higher rating than Ronald Reagan or Dwight Eisenhower, our last two-term President, had in their last year. The Republican House and the Republican Congress was minus nine. That's a 30-point swing. That's what George W. Bush is dealing with. He's not taking on Bill Clinton frontally. He is distancing himself from an unpopular Congress and at the same time acknowledging that the only way to keep the Mark et is clutching oh, so gratefully and so feverishly to his coat tails.

JIM LEHRER: But he doesn't have the Republican nomination yet.

PAUL GIGOT: He doesn't, but he's as big a lead as I can remember anybody having at this stage. Now there is a danger here and Mark is right. There is a danger you can dispirit your base and hurt getting a Republican House and you can also create an opening. I mean, John McCain is creeping up above 20 in New Hampshire, Steve Forbes in Iowa. So he has to be careful about how far he takes this and be sure that people don't think he is running against his own base.

JIM LEHRER: We have to go.

MARK SHIELDS: Okay.

EMPHASIS - ELECTION 2000 - CAMPAIGN AGENDA

JIM LEHRER: Now, more on our special emphasis on what the 2000 presidential campaign should be about. We started asking individuals and groups that question 15 weeks ago. We also invited viewers to participate via the On-Line NewsHour and by mail. Terence Smith has another report on that response.

TERENCE SMITH: Campaign finance reform is the subject of renewed legislative efforts in congress this week and the stuff of Supreme Court arguments put forth this week, it is also the issue cited most often in E-mails and letters sent to the NewsHour in our Agenda 2000 series. The series asks viewers to tell the NewsHour what issues they would like to see discussed by the presidential candidates. Almost 1,200 of the nearly 10,000 responses have mentioned campaign finance reform as the most pressing issue in electoral politics today. An overwhelming majority of those respondents are calling for a change in the way campaigns are financed. Maurice J. Salem of East Fishkill, New York speaks for many:

MAURICE J. SALEM, East Fishkill, New York: I believe that we must first resolve the campaign financing problem before we can tackle any other issue. We cannot possibly expect the candidates' response to the issues to be relevant or sincere because it is the source of the candidates' campaign funds that will determine the issues and the candidates' position on the issues.

TERENCE SMITH: Chris Corcoran of Colorado Springs strikes a similar chord:

CHRIS CORCORAN, Colorado Springs, Colorado: I would very much like to have the politicians start focusing on the people rather than on corporate interests. I think that's the primary reason that so many feel like their lives are out of their control despite this so-called prosperity. The government has been handed over to the highest bidder.

TERENCE SMITH: Catherine Burke of San Gabriel, California, recommends public funding of campaigns in order to combat the perceived disenfranchisement of the electorate:

CATHERINE BURKE, San Gabriel, California: In politics there is a golden rule: Whoever has the gold rules. If we the people pay for the election campaigns we will rule; if not, we won't. The present system precludes dealing with key problems in our society, especially the problems of those who do not have D.C. lobbyists. It also makes all politicians look dishonest as all, except the very rich, have to raise money.

TERENCE SMITH: Will Shapira of Minneapolis sees the issue in more dire terms:

WILL SHAPIRA, Minneapolis, Minnesota: Unless we totally eliminate campaign contributions and go to a system of publicly funded campaigns we will continue to widen the gap in this country between rich and poor; we'll also be fomenting social unrest and before too much longer, threatening the very fabric of our society, the future of democracy and our nation, itself, in my estimation.

TERENCE SMITH: Shapira is pessimistic about the prospects for reform:

WILL SHAPIRA: Asking a corrupt Congress to reform itself may be likened to the fox policing the henhouse: It just ain't gonna happen.

TERENCE SMITH: Like many respondents, Seymour Wiesenfeld of Fairfield, Connecticut, considers campaign finance reform as central to restoring equality.

SEYMOUR WIESENFIELD, Fairfield, Connecticut: How can we as a nation declare our system of government fair and equal when the big money interests control our elected officials? It's time to reform the election process and nominate candidates based on their abilities to govern on the issues that are best for their constituents as a whole without tainting the system in favor of a privileged few.

TERENCE SMITH: But some viewers see the issue in a different light. Mack Rollie of Tucson, Arizona thinks that reform will not serve the interests of the people but those of the media. He writes: "It is interesting to me that any politician who supports campaign finance reform is loaded with praise and recognition from the press. Upon reflection, it seems obvious that the effect of laws restricting campaign contributions and spending will be to increase the power of the major media, not the people. Big media each and every day can and do blanket our country and the world with stories and news that persuade and even control voters on issues and candidates. Media stands to gain even more in dominance and power by adoption of campaign contribution limitations, as proposed.@ Michael Cerniglis of Madison, Wisconsin, thinks another mainstay of modern campaigning should be paid more attention:

MICHAEL CERNIGLIS, Madison, Wisconsin: With the presidential election over a year away, we are already beginning to hear questions and concerns over campaign finance reform. At the heart of the issue is negative advertising. The harsh reality is, however, that negative advertising is extraordinarily effective. But, for a democracy to work, it must be made up of an educated populace, and the ease with which public opinion is swayed with negative ads is a disheartening example of just how unsophisticated voters can sometimes act. The fact that negative ads work is a far greater threat to democracy than unfettered electoral spending will ever be.

TERENCE SMITH: None of the responses so far has mentioned the most frequently cited complaint of critics of campaign finance reform, namely, that limits on spending inhibit freedom of speech and could violate the First Amendment. Nonetheless, a recent poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press says 74 percent of Americans believe political donors wield too much influence in the American political process. Running a close second with 64 percent is the news media. But only 8 percent believe the voters to be too influential.

JIM LEHRER: A reminder again that you can participate in our agenda 2000 project by visiting our web site at pbs.Org/NewsHour and also by regular mail to: The NewsHour, Box 2626, Washington, D.C., 20013.

ESSAY

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, as the Major League baseball playoffs continue, essayist Roger Rosenblatt notes the loneliness of pitchers.

ROGER ROSENBLATT: Around the eighth inning of Kevin Kostner's "perfect game," in the new, terrible-but-I-cried-like-a-baby-anyway movie "For Love of the Game," his catcher tells him that their lowly Detroit Tigers are the best team in baseball today becauseof you.

KOSTNER: I'm going home.

ACTOR: You and me, one more time?

KOSTNER: Why not?

ROGER ROSENBLATT: That kind of compliment can only be paid a pitcher because a pitcher can, on occasion, constitute the whole game. Yet he is alone in the game, elevated above the others on a mound in the center of the field, distant and on his own. In the Major League play-offs, the pitcher becomes centrally important, especially in the heady home run era of the likes of Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire. His job is to frustrate such people by misinterpretation, to fool, anger and disappoint them; he gives and takes away. But the essential nature of his position is that he is alone in the game. And so he may have a special appeal these days as a cultural figure. These are times when more and more people are seeking the solitary adventure to remind themselves of basic human qualities. Usually they seek adventure vicariously by reading stories about "The Perfect Storm," "Into Thin Air" and "The Endurance." They seem to long for a moment of naked solo risk, but the soft and comfortable modern world doesn't give them that. If people wish to succeed alone they must be alone with others, alone in the game, their place of business, their social life, their Internet. They must be just like a pitcher, like the Red Sox Pedro Martinez, the best pitcher in the game. He wins for his teammates, yet lives in his own atmosphere, as they say, "his zone." Once in a rare while a pitcher will pitch a perfect game: 27 up, 27 down. Yankee fans have pleasurably seen two such miracles in the past two seasons: Last year by David Wells, this year by David Cone.

SPORTSCASTER: Pops up unplayable. A perfect game by David Cone.

ROGER ROSENBLATT: "For Love of the Game" gives us yet another against the Yankees, which proves the movie fiction. But perfection in baseball, as in other things, is the exception that proves the rule. And the rule for the pitcher is individual struggle in the midst of others. You can lose a game because of someone else's error, someone's laziness or incompetence or your own. You're alone in the game but you're also part of the team and the game is not yours, which may be why so many pitchers look and seem like nut cases on the mound. They grow vast mustaches like Oakland's Rollie Fingers. They stomp around like Al Hrabowsky, the "Mad Hungarian." Or they have conversations with the baseball like the Tigers' Mark "The Bird" Fidrych.@ Even with the apparently normal ones, like Atlanta's Greg Maddux, or L.A.'s Kevin Brown, one suspects that there's some wonderful screw loose somewhere. How could it be otherwise? When he's got his stuff, he's all alone; when he's off his game, he walks away alone. The greatest pitchers I ever saw beside Martinez were Whitey Ford, Early Wynn, Bob Gibson, Tom Seaver, Don Newcomb, and the Dodgers' Sandy Koufax, Koufax being the best. He, too, pitched a perfect game, against the cubs in 1965. In a perfect game a pitcher is more alone than ever. People don't want to talk to him, to jinx him. He sits apart from his teammates on the bench. This they show in "For Love of the Game." The farther the game goes, the more distant he becomes, until the end, when his teammates all pile on him and cheer like crazy, as they did for David Cone, but they pile off, too. And in his next outing, there is the pitcher again, like the rest of us, starting over, trying to prove himself, by himself, in the crowded world. I'm Roger Rosenblatt.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Friday: The U.S. unemployment rate stayed at 4.2 percent last month, the lowest in nearly 30 years. And President Clinton asked the Senate to delay a vote on the nuclear test ban treaty because it did not have enough support. We'll see you on-line and again here Monday evening. Have a nice weekend. I'm Jim Lehrer.