The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MS. WOODRUFF: Good evening. I'm Judy Woodruff in New York.

MR. LEHRER: And I'm Jim Lehrer in Washington. After our summary of the news this Friday, relief agency officials and others react to the proposal to send a U.N. military force to stop the dying in Somalia. Fred De Sam Lazaro reports on the Mall of America, David Gergen and Mark Shields analyze the politics of the week, and we close with an Amei Wallach essay. NEWS SUMMARY

MR. LEHRER: White House Spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said today mounting a large United Nations military force in Somalia remained in the diplomatic stage. He said stronger military action was needed to make sure relief supplies get distributed. The lives of some 2 million Somalis are considered at risk from starvation or disease. Fitzwater said a U.N. decision on the next step is expected within the next several days. The United States has offered to send up to 30,000 troops as part of a larger U.N. force. They would be charged with protecting food, medicine, and other aid from feuding warlords. Fitzwater spoke in Maine, where President Bush is vacationing.

MARLIN FITZWATER, White House Spokesman: This is a diplomatic phase where the U.N. decides what course it wants to take. The United States is, of course, supportive. We want to do whatever we can to make sure that food gets into Somalia. There are starving people there. Reports of starvation are well documented. And the fact is that the violence and the factional fighting and the warlords and so forth are preventing the aid getting in not only from the United States, but from other countries as well. And it's just simply a matter that we've reached a point where something must be done to assure that those deliveries get through.

MR. LEHRER: One of Somalia's main warlords today welcomed the prospect of further U.N. military intervention. Gen. Mohammed Farah Adide blocked the deployment of a 3500 member U.N. peacekeeping force earlier this year, instead, allowing only 500 U.N. troops in. Adide said today he thought U.S. forces might help him gain control of the country. We'll have more on this story right after the News Summary. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: In U.S. economic news, personal income rose 1 percent in October, the largest increase in 10 months. In a separate report, the government reported consumer spending was also up. It increased .7 percent last month. The news came on a day that is typically the busiest shopping day of the year. Retailers are optimistic that this year will be better than the past several. President-elect Clinton was doing his part, greeting shoppers at a mall in Glendale, California. He and his family are vacationing with friends nearby. Earlier, Mr. Clinton met with former President Ronald Reagan. The two men talked about the transition process and Mr. Reagan's first year in office. The former President also presented Mr. Clinton with a jar of red, white, and blue jellybeans.

MR. LEHRER: There was a mild earthquake today near Big Bear Lake, California, about 75 miles East of Los Angeles. No injuries were reported. Scientists said the quake measured 5.4 on the Richter Scale and was really an after shock from two quakes which hit the area June 28th.

MS. WOODRUFF: There was an unsuccessful coup attempt today against Venezuelan President Carlos Andres Peres. This evening, the government imposed a curfew and temporarily suspended constitutional rights. During the uprising at least 19 people were killed. Hundreds were wounded and a bomb exploded near the presidential palace. The rebellion was believed to have been led by a group of military officers that made a similar attempt last February. Peres went on national television 10 hours after the uprising and declared the coup leaders had surrendered. The German government today banned a neo-Nazi group called the Nationalist Front. Germany's interior minister said the action should be seen as a "unmistakable warning to extreme right wing organizations." The government has been trying to end a growing wave of violence aimed at foreigners and Jews. Today's action came shortly after a memorial service was held for three Turks who were killed when their apartment building was firebombed on Monday. We have a report narrated by David Simons of Worldwide Television News.

MR. SIMONS: Germany's shattered Turkish community paid its respect to the woman and two children killed during the brutal neo- Nazi attack. Emotion ran high as thousands mourned their loss. This attack marked a turning point in the current wave of neo-Nazis and so frighteningly reminiscent of Germany in the 1930s. Foreign minister Klaus Kinko attended the memorial service for this innocent child and her two relatives. The angry crowd threw eggs as he began to speak. Tired of words, Germans want the government to take action and stem the growing tide of neo-Nazism which is sweeping their country. The foreign minister expressed his sadness to the crowd at the loss of innocent lives.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sixteen people have been killed in nearly eighteen hundred right wing attacks in Germany this year.

MR. LEHRER: Voters in Ireland have rejected allowing abortions when necessary to save a mother's life. They approved two other constitutional amendments which permit women to travel abroad for abortions and abortion information to be distributed in Ireland. Fire swept through one wing of Austria's Hapsburg Palace. Many of the nation's art treasures and valuable books are kept there, and all were saved. The stables forthe famous Lithozaner stallions are near the palace. All 69 of the horses were taken to a nearby park. Officials do not know what caused the fire. Damage was estimated at nearly $100 million.

MS. WOODRUFF: That's it for our summary of the day's news. Just ahead on the NewsHour, the proposal to send U.S. troops into Somalia, the Mall of America gets ready for the holidays, Gergen & Shields, and an Amei Wallach essay. FOCUS - SOMALIA - RESCUE MISSION

MS. WOODRUFF: First tonight, we do turn to the troubled nation of Somalia and a discussion of the U.S. proposal to contribute as many as 30,000 American troops to a United Nations multilateral peacekeeping force. A draft resolution is now being circulated at the United Nations. It would authorize large scale military intervention to provide security for relief workers there and to permit the delivery of food and medicine. White House Spokesman Marlin Fitzwater today described the urgent need which prompted a U.S. proposal.

MARLIN FITZWATER, White House Spokesman: The situation overall is very moving and, of course, we've all seen the stories and so forth of starving people in that country, but mainly it's a deteriorating situation that allowed us not to be able to provide the aid that has been going there in recent months, so we've been doing a pretty good job with the other countries of the world in getting food shipments in there, but now that's coming to a halt, and that's a situation that is no longer tenable.

REPORTER: Marlin, is there any question that these forces would have to be under the U.s. control? There's a report in the New York Times.

MARLIN FITZWATER: Well, we're talking about through the U.N., working through the U.N. They'd be part of a U.N. force, and operational aspects like that are something that's, that's quite a ways off, but that can all be worked out. We've worked with the U.N. before. We would look forward to doing it again, and that's a proper forum to do this.

REPORTER: Some relief agencies have said that they think by sending troops in it may make things even worse in Somalia. Is that a consideration?

MARLIN FITZWATER: Well, I think that it's very difficult to understand in the sense that food simply can't get through. The relief organizations have done a good job, and they have been a very important factor there in providing food and assistance, but they're not getting through. They're not getting their airplanes in. They're not getting their trucks in, and if they have other solutions, well, I'm certain that the U.N. is willing to listen to them, but right now it looks like some form of military activity is the only way to ensure the safety of these shipments.

REPORTER: And is President Bush confident that American military forces would be secure and protected if they were to become engaged in Somalia?

MARLIN FITZWATER: Well, the President has spoken out very many times. He would not permit troops where he wasn't sure what the objective was and how the mission could be accomplished.

MS. WOODRUFF: Joining us now to discuss the U.S. offer, Philip Johnston is the president of the relief agency CARE. He has also been appointed by the U.N. to implement the current United Nations relief effort on the ground in Somalia. Said Samatar is a Somali professor of African history at Rutgers University. He has written five books on Somalia. Barnett Baron is vice president for international programs at the relief organization Save the Children. Leslie Gelb is a columnist for the New York Times. And finally Tom Getman is director of governmental relations for World Vision, a private, voluntary organization also at work in Somalia. Les Gelb, let me begin with you. When Marlin Fitzwater says this is in the diplomatic stage, what do you think he means?

MR. GELB: He means that the U.S. Government is now trying to get the U.N. to agree with its position, namely to authorize the use of force, mainly U.S. force, to go into Somalia as quickly as possible, set up a security zone, and see that the food is delivered and that the violence is sharply reduced.

MS. WOODRUFF: So what, at what stage is this being considered? I mean, we were told today there were closed meetings at the U.N., and we don't have any report on what, if anything, was, was the outcome of that. What should we look for from the United Nations?

MR. GELB: I think the U.N. won't automatically agree to the U.S. proposal. I think there is opposition. There's opposition, as you'll hear tonight from some of your other guests, in the relief organizations, and there's opposition from some African nations who don't like the idea of outside military intervention.

MS. WOODRUFF: Philip Johnston with CARE, you've been appointed, as we said, the coordinator on the ground in Somalia representing the United Nations. Did this proposal come truly from the United States? It wasn't a matter of someone going to the United States and saying, it's time for you to do this? What's your understanding?

MR. JOHNSTON: I think there has been a prolonged period when there's been displeasure at the quality of effectiveness of the program in Somalia. You cannot lose between two and three thousand a people a day over a prolonged period of time and not create an enormous amount of pressure to improve the thing. We are still losing to starvation a thousand people a day. And despite all of the problems that this creates for people in terms of protecting the relief supplies, it also provides a huge stimulus to get the job done.

MS. WOODRUFF: What do you mean huge stimulus? What are you -- by having twenty-five, thirty, thirty-five thousand American troops over there, along with other troops from other countries.

MR. JOHNSTON: Exactly. They don't all have to be American. It is necessary for that to be a U.N. effort. It is best if it's multinational, and it is best that it be focused on the relief program, not getting involved in politics, not getting involved in other kinds of things, but strictly in the area of the delivery of protection of humanitarian supplies and personnel.

MS. WOODRUFF: Well, as we understand it, that's all -- that's what the United States is talking about right now, to aim precisely at the relief effort.

MR. JOHNSTON: Right.

MS. WOODRUFF: When you say multilateral, multinational, how multinational are we talking about? I mean, how many countries have to be part of this so that it doesn't look as if it's just a U.S. - -

MR. JOHNSTON: Well, the moment the Pakistani troops are there, the Canadians, the Belgians, the Nigerians have committed to go, and they should -- that commitment should certainly be pursued so that as a minimum there are five nations and better that there be more.

MS. WOODRUFF: What about numbers? Or do you have a feeling -- you just were back from Somalia last Saturday -- you're leaving tonight after this program to go back -- do you have a feeling for how many, a sense of how many troops we're talking about to secure the safety of these relief supplies?

MR. JOHNSTON: It is important, it is important to make sure that whatever troops are in Somalia are under the jurisdiction of the commanding general from whatever country and that he can move them around the country as, as needed, which is not at the moment permitted. Secondly, I believe that we could, we could do the job with 15,000 troops. I don't believe we have to have 30.

MS. WOODRUFF: Let me turn to you, Barnett Baron, with Save the Children. Is this the right thing to be talking about doing at this point?

MR. BARON: I think it's essential that it be done under the auspices of the United Nations, that it cannot be seen as a unilateral American effort. There has been a great deal of frustration at the inability to deliver food supplies, to see that they get to the right people, and to protect workers. But the issue, the proposal as presently stated does raise a number of concerns. We are concerned about the safety of relief workers. Between now and the time that an effective forces in place, relief workers are easy targets. Secondly, after a military operation is in place there are relief workers all over the country right now. We don't know where the military operation will be. So that leads to a second concern. Yes, the short-term objective is to get the relief supplies through, but that's an open-ended commitment.

MS. WOODRUFF: You're saying what happens after that when you've got thousands of troops in place?

MR. BARON: Exactly. There is no government in place. There is no obvious political solution. There are no obvious political forces to line up behind. We can't take over and run the country.

MS. WOODRUFF: But what exactly is your -- you say, you know, that the relief workers are a concern. Why? What do you think is going to happen, might happen?

MR. BARON: There are an awful lot of armed people, teen-agers and others, running around the country. I've never seen so many weapons so widely dispersed. There's a lot of frustration or may be a lot of frustration over what as seen as an American, or perhaps even a U.N. intervention in sovereign affairs. If these armed kids want to take out their frustration, they're not likely to go up against the 82nd Airborne. They're more likely to look for easy targets.

MS. WOODRUFF: Tom Getman, in Washington, with World Vision, do you have some of the same concerns?

MR. GETMAN: Judy, we in World Vision want to add our congratulations to the government finally responding to the 12 private voluntary organizations and treaties, but, yes, the complex disaster leads one to have to say the only thing maybe worse than too little, too late is too much, too late. And even though Somalia has given up its right of national sovereignty because it has not protected its citizens, we must be very clear that additional troops will add to the tension, will add to the risk of our people on the ground. I just came back from East Africa, meeting with our people who are working in Somalia, and it is very, very difficult day in and day out for those people to survive. We in the agencies have already had 20 of our number either killed or severely wounded. So we're talking a very serious subject here. We are all responsible for giving the food out, but another mandate we have is to protect our people on the ground. And I must remind us all that what we asked the U.S. Government to do was not only increase the number of troops but to increase the support for the U.N. mediation role.

MS. WOODRUFF: What do you mean?

MR. GETMAN: We think that there has to be an extraordinary effort in the region with Africans included in the, in the formula to get people to the point where there will be zones of tranquility, where there would be zones where there would be no guns. Even if we evacuate the agency personnel in these days, it's going to be very, very difficult, because some of them can't get out and some of them won't get out. So we think that mediation has to occur as troop build-up is occurring.

MS. WOODRUFF: Prof. Samatar, when you hear some of these concerns expressed now by the same relief agencies who are asking for help, what do you say to them? How do you -- are those legitimate concerns that they express?

PROF. SAMATAR: They are legitimate but I would say don't be too concerned. First of all, I welcome the United States also to deploy troops in that country as a creative bluff, if I may so. It is a bluff because the President and his advisers know that Somalia, there is neither need nor the desire to commit 30,000 U.S. troops to Somalia.

MS. WOODRUFF: You're convinced that the United States is not serious, that it's just bluffing? Is that what you're saying?

PROF. SAMATAR: Well, I expect that at this point that it is in the bluffing stage. Now, the bluff may be called, of course. I call it a bluff because they know that many troops will not be necessary to pacify that country because a great many parts of the country are, in fact, in peace. There is a misconception that all of Somalia has gone to hell. All of Somalia has not gone to hell. There is a long, triangular corridor between the Mogadishu, Bidoa, the provincial, and Kismayel. And in my opinion, 5,000 troops will be sufficient to pacify that area.

MS. WOODRUFF: Les Gelb, if that's the case, if 5,000 is sufficient, why is the United States talking about twenty-five or thirty thousand?

MR. GELB: Well, if the administration is serious about that number -- the professor may be right, that it's a bluff -- if they're serious about it, it's because the Pentagon insists on going in with maximum capability, with maximum force. They want to take no risks. But I think the effect in Somalia would be to commit forces far in excess of what would be needed to, to keep a large part of the country secure and deliver the food. But, if I may, Judy, I'd like to step back and address some of the other arguments.

MS. WOODRUFF: Please do.

MR. GELB: Because while these gentlemen represent heroic organizations, and I think their arguments are, are ones that we need to heed and deal with, I truly find the arguments bizarre, because we are talking about a situation now where there are a thousand people dying a day from starvation and from the violence. It's hard for me to imagine how that's going to get better unless there is military intervention. Now we can't simply count on the U.N. I wish we could. But there have been other countries who have pledged to deliver forces there and just haven't done the job. For whatever reason, they haven't done it. The United States is willing to get in there and do it quickly under U.N. auspices. Let's do it. And if there's a problem with the safety of the relief workers, let's deal with that, either pull them out, or pull them into more secure areas. But don't simply abandon the people because of the problems of relief organizations.

MS. WOODRUFF: Mr. Baron, how do you respond to that?

MR. BARON: They're not talking about abandoning people, and I certainly agree that the number of relief workers in Somalia is far smaller than the number of Somalis who have already perished. The issue is whether there's, whether we are taking action on the hope that there's a quick fix to a very complex problem, or whether we are defining objectives in a way that will facilitate a political solution, a long-term solution. Neither the United States nor the United Nations can take over and govern that country, nor should this be a model for the way we deal with other, similar situations that are going to arise in the years ahead.

MS. WOODRUFF: You were shaking your head, Les Gelb.

MR. GELB: First, I don't want us to take over the country, and I don't think we could if we wanted to. I'd like the fighting to be put under some control so that there would be some basis for negotiation. Right now, you don't have a country, you have anarchy, as these gentlemen will be the first to tell you.

MR. GETMAN: Judy, to lessen the possibility of the law of unintended consequences, we must see this as a pivotal event in the eyes of the African people, and if we want to avoid having our C- 130s landing in Kenya without any pre-negotiations like happened last time, or pallets dropping on people's heads and killing them like happened on the Turkish mountains with the Kurds, then the - -

MS. WOODRUFF: You're talking about Iraq, people in Iraq?

MR. GETMAN: That's right. And if we really want to make this a time when people are going to feel good about U.S. intervention, with however many troops we have, then it's important for us right now at the diplomatic level to be negotiating with all of the countries of East Africa to do this together with them, and have African troops on the ground with us.

MS. WOODRUFF: Philip Johnston, does he have a point?

MR. JOHNSTON: Well, I think he has a point, but we have been in the negotiation, the political negotiations, for six months at least with Amb. Sahnoun and precious little progress has been made, and yet, every single day, X thousands of people have perished. So I am clearly of the view that it is time to be militarily aggressive, put the troops on the ground, and save the lives of these people.

MS. WOODRUFF: Mr. Getman, isn't that such a compelling argument that it's very difficult to go up against it?

MR. GETMAN: I think we should have troops on the ground, but as I say, if we move in there with a huge number of troops, huge number of American troops, it's going to be very difficult to see it as anything but U.S. neo-colonialism. We want our aid workers protected, and we want those people fed. We must do it now. We can't wait for a month. They're talking about it's going to take a month to do this. So let's move, but let's do all of the negotiations in the region that need to be done at the same time.

MS. WOODRUFF: All right. Prof. Samatar, you were nodding.

PROF. SAMATAR: If I may do so, I'd like to address three misconceptions about this whole Somalia crisis. One is that of Somalia as a country crawling with warlords, that it is impossible to do anything or any force that gets in there do so at their peril.

MS. WOODRUFF: You're saying that's a misconception.

PROF. SAMATAR: It's a misconception. At least, there are no warlords in the sense that westerners think of that term. There are only freelance gangsters. For example, Gen. Adide; there are supposedly strings over the warlords. His fortunes solely depend on the dynamics of war. As long as he can lead his opportunistic followers to the next village to raid, he will have followers, but the moment he deprives them of the capacity to raid, I would risk my neck and say that he will be deserted.

MS. WOODRUFF: But you had a relief ship that last week was hit by what, mortar --

MR. JOHNSTON: Artillery shells.

MS. WOODRUFF: -- by artillery shells.

PROF. SAMATAR: Yes, that's true.

MR. JOHNSTON: But they came from the North.

MS. WOODRUFF: Right.

PROF. SAMATAR: That's because of the estimated 25,000 armed individuals in and around Mogadishu, probably less than 4,000 are under the control of either Adide or Ali Mahadi. The rest are freelance looters who if confronted with a serious force, in my opinion, will run because they're used to terrorizing unarmed civilians. They have never faced a serious force that will shoot back at them.

MS. WOODRUFF: You're saying they'll put down their arms. In fact, last night on the program, Congressman John Lewis of Georgia and Congressman Dale Emerson of Missouri told Jim that they hoped, they had some reason to believe that this might happen.

MR. JOHNSTON: Judy, can I make the point that young men carry guns as a method of survival. Guns provide opportunity to get food, to get assets of whatever nature. It is important in the process of looking at the problems of Somalia to begin the process of putting people back to work. To have 100 percent unemployment is a recipe for absolute disaster. The relief program we run in Somalia, that CARE operates in Somalia, is the largest employer of Somalis in the whole country. And that is a, that is a bad thing.

MS. WOODRUFF: So you're saying, get in there, do something, whatever the number of troops that it takes? Is that --

MR. JOHNSTON: Right. But then there has to be things done in the economic area to ensure that, that people have an opportunity to derive a livelihood without the use of a gun.

MS. WOODRUFF: Mr. Baron, with Save the Children, you don't have an argument with that, do you?

MR. BARON: Not at all, not at all. In fact, I think that's an essential recipe for any long-term solution. The point of my concern, and it's not opposition, it's concern about the military intervention, is my lack of absolute confidence, if such a thing is possible, that all of the bases are going to be touched, that the negotiations with the U.N. -- after all, we are trying to strengthen the laws of the United Nations. We have pledged our support to that agency. I would have to see something perceived as a unilateral action that undermines the ability of the U.N. to intervene.

MS. WOODRUFF: And, in fact, there was a report today in your newspaper, Les Gelb, that quoted U.S. officials as saying that they were insisting that they had command over any U.S. forces that went into Somalia. Does that -- does that contradict the ability of the U.N. to maintain control over --

MR. GELB: That's a problem. There's no question about it. But while I think it is very important to build up the role of the U.N. as a peacekeeping, peacemaking body, it's even more important to save those lives. And for six months, the U.N. has just dawdled. Other countries have pledged troops. They haven't sent them. We can dawdled more about the institution building. We can participate in legalisms. We can express our concerns, but a thousand people are dying a day and the way to stop that is to insert force. And the stakes are enormous.

MS. WOODRUFF: Mr. Baron.

MR. BARON: The stakes are enormous in Somalia. They're enormous in other parts of the world as well. This is a rather selective intervention. Unfortunately, I think the years ahead are going to see more situations of this kind. There's instability in central Asia. Are we going to send troops to Tadjikistan? We have not sent troops or pledged to send troops to Bosnia. I'm not proposing that we do. I'm concerned about a narrow focus on an immediate situation to the detriment of long-term solutions and institution building.

MR. GELB: I think you do what you reasonably can in each situation. We're not going to be able to solve all these situations, going about political settlement, and all the fighting entirely, but you do what you can, and in this case, we can stop the slaughter, and we can feed the people.

MS. WOODRUFF: Just quickly.

MR. JOHNSTON: I think it has to do with scope. The reason we're going into Somalia is there are two million people hanging there. They are going to die unless we do something right now.

MS. WOODRUFF: I'm sorry. We're going to have to leave it there, but we thank all you for being with us. Mr. Getman, Mr. Gelb, Mr. Baron, Mr. Johnston, Prof. Samatar, thank you all. Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, the Mall of America, Gergen & Shields, and an Amei Wallach essay. FOCUS - SHOPPING SPREE?

MR. LEHRER: Traditionally this day after Thanksgiving is the biggest shopping day of the year, the start of the holiday season in which retailers make most of their annual profits. Those profits have been slim for the past two years, but hope this year is for a turnaround. Fred De Sam Lazaro of public station KTCA- Minneapolis-St. Paul reports on those hopes from the biggest mall in America.

MR. LAZARO: When the Vikings and Twins stopped playing ball at this site a few years ago, the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington decided to lure crowds back with America's other favorite pastime, shopping, major league shopping. This Mall of America has the equivalent of 78 football fields of retail space to meet every conceivable need or want, including a large amusement park. The mall was first proposed during the mid '80s with all the heady economic optimism at the time. Canadian developer Nader Ghermezian promised the largest mall in the world, modeled after one his company had built in Edmonton.

NADER GHERMEZIAN: [August 1985] It is mind boggling. You don't understand. Just come down there, you'll see it. It is brass, marble, glass, fountains, birds, trees, rides. It's fantastic! It's unbelievable!

MR. LAZARO: A lot changed by the time the Mall of America opened in August. Though still gigantic, it is considerably scaled down, second in size to the Canadian mall, and three of its four anchor chain stores are in severe financial trouble. With plenty of hype and a relatively steady regional economy, the mall has drawn good- sized crowds, many from hundreds of miles away. The brisk business has made Macy's first midwestern store the best performer in the troubled chain.

SUSAN MOLLER, Macy's Manager: This is truly the star of the company, so in this store we're not feeling some of the pressures that we would feel on the East and West Coast.

MR. LAZARO: Jim Anderson says his Mall of America Sears Store has infused much-needed profits into the parent company. Sears has hemorrhaged huge amounts of red ink lately.

JIM ANDERSON, Sears Manager: Business has really picked up in the last couple of weeks, which seems to be a real positive up-surge, confidence, call it whatever you want, so I think in this particular mall the shopping patterns are suggesting holiday buying is a little bit early, and hopefully, that's the way it's going throughout the entire country and the community.

MR. LAZARO: Indeed, throughout the Minneapolis-St. Paul community, retailers are reporting a surge in early holiday shopping, suggesting an overall net increase in business. Even downtown merchants here in Minneapolis and in St. Paul report marked increases in recent days. They expected to lose many customers to the new mega mall. While traffic seems to be up, a key factor this season will be what shoppers are buying, how much they're spending. Akshay Rao is a business professor at the University of Minnesota.

AKSHAY RAO, Business Professor: People are going to buy more functional kinds of things, particularly given the onset of the Christmas season, I think, than more symbolic kinds of things. It will see more spouses exchanging home improvement products with each other, as opposed to perfumes and golf clubs.

MR. LAZARO: Rao says there's plenty of anecdotal information that suggests persistent consumer wariness.

AKSHAY RAO: Car and tire sales are up. People are perhaps holding onto their old cars longer and so are replacing their existing tires, or postponing the purchase of new cars. This is one reasonably persuasive story that, that people are still being cautious.

MR. LAZARO: The degree of caution varies geographically, at least in Target, Mervans, or other stores of the Dayton Hudson Corporation. Kenneth Macke is chairman.

KENNETH MACKE, Chairman, Dayton Hudson: Look at the Pacific Northwest. You would say, gee, the consumer there really feels good, and business has been very good there. It's been good in some parts of the Midwest. It's been good in Texas and Florida. On the other hand, take California. It's very soft in California.

MR. LAZARO: Macke says the consumer mood remains mixed, but he says many people are relieved the elections are over. Christmasy ads could be just the tonic for an economic recovery.

KENNETH MACKE: As a consumer, that has to lead you out. I think the consumer needs to feel good, and Christmas, if you can't feel good for Christmas, I don't know what season can make you feel good.

MR. LAZARO: Is the state of the economy at all a concern of yours when you go shopping?

DIANE CHRISTENSEN, Fargo, North Dakota: No, not at Christmastime.

MR. LAZARO: Kids have a good time? I mean, is it important to you that you spend a certain amount at Christmastime?

DIANE CHRISTENSEN: Oh, yeah. I go a little way overboard sometimes, but they enjoy it, and I enjoy giving.

MR. LAZARO: Retailers have been doing as much as they can since October in some cases to stimulate that good Christmas feeling. They have allies in many a household.

MR. LAZARO: What are you writing to Santa Claus?

EVAN ANDERSON, Ashland, Nebraska: A car set. Batman too.

MR. LAZARO: The persuasive charm of such requests to Santa can soften the firmest parent resolve to buy only practical gifts.

MATT ANDERSON, Ashland, Nebraska: We'll splurge a little bit, especially on the kids here. He's just one of three, and so he likes train sets and stuff like that, so we're going to be practical to a point and maybe stretch a little bit, but nothing that we're going to have to, you know, be sorry for come January or February.

MR. LAZARO: The worry about January and February credit card bills could be an indication consumers are looking to stretch their dollars as far as possible.

MATT ANDERSON: I'm really looking at where I spend my dollar and try to get the most value to it.

ZOILA CALDERON, Albert Lea, Minnesota: Well, everything is so expensive we're trying to look for, you know, sales and all.

MR. LAZARO: That emphasis on value is one reason discount chains like Wal-Mart and K-Mart are profit leaders as is Dayton Hudson's Target division. Value has become the religion even at up scale Macy's.

SUSAN MOLLER: And as you walk through the store, you'll see signage that really points out to the customer where the values are, and that seems to be really important.

MR. LAZARO:There are also some signs from consumers that their values have changed since the decade just past. Conspicuous consumption is on the way out, many retail experts say, and increasingly, shoppers are making a moral as much as economic decision to cut back even at the Mall of America, perhaps the biggest symbol of the extravagant '80s.

LINDA LONGERBONE, Indianapolis, Indiana: There are so many people that are in need and people on the street that it just doesn't seem right to spend a lot on Christmas, because we have plenty. We have everything we need.

MR. LAZARO: That attitude has retailers like Kenneth Macke worrying anxiously by the chimney this season.

KENNETH MACKE: I lose sleep about wondering, you know, how big a sleigh is Santa Claus going to bring, and is he going to get it filled in the Target, in the Mervans and the Daytons and the Fields and the Hudson stores, you know?

MR. LAZARO: All in all, Macke expects most retailers will see gains from 3 to 5 percent this season over last year's depressed levels. Macke says that portends a slow and gradual economic recovery in 1993. FOCUS - GERGEN & SHIELDS

MR. LEHRER: Now some Friday after Thanksgiving talk from our analysis team of Gergen & Shields. David Gergen is editor at large of U.S. News & World Report. Mark Shields is a syndicated columnist. First gentlemen, on Somalia. Mark, will the American people support U.S. troops being sent there?

MR. SHIELDS: I think we would support troops being sent if the case were made, Jim. The case has to be made in a couple of different ways. First of all, what our objective is, how do we measure success? The discussion earlier pointed out the problem that there is no government there. But America -- and there's no established order, so how do we do it? I mean, how will we know when we have succeeded? Obviously, when a thousand people a day stop dying, that'll be one measurement. But the other thing is Americans, Americans are pragmatic people. We are, we don't want to be called mean spirited. We're not. But we don't want to be called saps either. And right now we have, is we have sort of a generous, compassionate enterprise that is being totally thwarted, totally frustrated. 80 percent of the food is either being diverted, stolen, or traded for guns. And it isn't getting through. So I mean, we're faced with a choice. We want to help people, continue sending the aid, but in order to send it we have to make some way sure that it's going to get through to those most in need.

MR. LEHRER: David.

MR. GERGEN: Jim, I think the American people will support American assistance to Somalia if, as Mark says, the case is made publicly so that people understand what this is all about and why it's in our interest and why we're helping people who may starve. Secondly, if they think that the mission is limited in time, it has a specific focus and objective, as Mark says, and I think thirdly, I think they do want to see that it's part of a multinational effort. The United States is not playing policeman. There are two - - lingering in the background, I think there are two recent events, which I think are going to convince people how we ought to handle these things. One is the Persian Gulf War. After the Persian Gulf War, one saw in the polls an enormous increase in support for acting multinationally, acting with other nations, not acting alone, people like that as a way of handling our problems in the future. The other incident to look back upon is Lebanon. When we sent troops in with no purpose, they stayed out there for a long period of time, and nobody understood why they were there, and then when the Marines were killed in the barracks, we brought them home, because it was an unsustainable operation. This operation, if it has a specific idea in mind, I think people will support it. If it's not on the level, they won't. It seems to me the way it's shaping up I think they will support it. I think the President needs to come forward and explain it. He already can count on, on Gov. Clinton's support. Gov. Clinton in the last 24 hours has said, yes, he would support this sort of thing. So I think the administration is in a good position to move forward.

MR. LEHRER: We had two Congressmen on here last night, as Judy reminded folks a while ago, and I asked them whether or not they could explain to their constituents why a young American man or woman might lose his or her life in Somalia, which is basically a relief effort, and they said, yes, they thought they could make the case.

MR. SHIELDS: Well, then I think --

MR. LEHRER: It's one thing to have a mission.

MR. SHIELDS: That's exactly right.

MR. LEHRER: But it's another if -- let's say those young thugs don't throw their guns away.

MR. SHIELDS: That's right.

MR. LEHRER: And let's say they start shooting.

MR. SHIELDS: Yeah.

MR. LEHRER: And some Americans start dying.

MR. SHIELDS: I think you put your finger on it. I mean, Americans will be part of it, Jim, if they're in at the take-off. And the only way they're going to be on for a bad landing, if it turns out to be a bad landing, in the sense that going in we went in with our eyes open, but the information honestly and completely given to us.

MR. LEHRER: And the President, David, is going to have to tell the American people --

MR. SHIELDS: That's right.

MR. LEHRER: -- you must understand there are risks involved here.

MR. SHIELDS: That's right.

MR. LEHRER: And people may die.

MR. GERGEN: Absolutely.

MR. LEHRER: And Americans may die.

MR. GERGEN: I think he needs to explain very clearly what this is all about. And every time we have failed to explain what it's about, as in Lebanon, and again for a while, a long while against the Sandinistas, the support drained away. You can only count on Americans for supporting something for a short period of time and certain time. I think he can do this, Jim, but it is lingering in the back of everybody's mind, of course, is this notion, if we go in here to stop starvation --

MR. LEHRER: Then there's Bosnia.

MR. GERGEN: -- then there's Bosnia, and this is clearly --

MR. LEHRER: Mr. Baron mentioned that in the discussion a moment ago.

MR. GERGEN: Yes, he did. And it seems to me what I thought Les Gelb was absolutely on point about let's move forward with this, but the other people from relief organizations, like Barnett Baron, were right in saying, let's get it right this time as we do it. Why don't you bring in the relief agencies to the State Department, coordinate this with them now so that when we face the Bosnians in the future, we have a precedent of how to handle it well to make it successful.

MR. LEHRER: All right. Let's go on to the, to the subject of the economy, which we also saw a piece on, a piece by Fred De Sam Lazaro, and that goes to the Clinton transition. There was good economic news this week, Mark, and yet, President-elect Clinton was going to go ahead with his economic summit. What is that really all about? I thought he was elected with an economic plan.

MR. SHIELDS: He had a plan. Did you ever see the plan? It's in a book. It's a best selling book. It's in bookstoresall over America. Unfortunately, the plan is subject to revision. The original intention, political intention stated or at least unstated, was for that summit, was to pull people together and to make the case that my gosh, we need dramatic change, and Bill Clinton is probably the answer, and it kind of built up steam that things really are bad, and that's why we need change and kind of light that fire. This week, of course, we had a report that the strongest quarterly growth in the entire Bush era, a little late for the President, can't have made his own Thanksgiving much easier, but there's only three economic factors that still count politically, I think, in spite of the economic growth, which is good news. The three are, Jim: unemployment figure, the interest rate figure, and the inflation figure. And unemployment continues, as Michael Boskin, the chairman of George Bush's Council of Economic Advisers put it, unemployment still is a problem. In spite of the fact that this is good economic news, I think what it does politically is it takes some of the urgency out of a need for Clinton's moving dramatically the hundred days or whatever else, and I don't think it removes the need by any means, but it takes some of the urgency, and I think it certainly weakens the case for the middle class tax cuts that Clinton had advocated.

MR. LEHRER: Do you agree there that there could be a tendency now, David, to say, oh, wait a minute, maybe we don't need something, need to do something so quickly after all, maybe we'll get lucky here and things will continue to get better, and wow! wasn't that terrific?

MR. GERGEN: Well, I think Bill Clinton may be very lucky. Remember, when Ronald Reagan first came into office, the day he went into office, the hostages came home. Now Bill Clinton may be rescued. The economy's getting better, but it's important to remember though, Jim, that the original plan that Clinton proposed was devised with a notion that it was for the long haul, that the economy would be in recovery.

MR. LEHRER: And he keeps saying that every day.

MR. GERGEN: That's right. And I think that's smart. This does not lessen the need for an urgency about the first 100 days. The Clinton people have said all along just to get the economy back on track is not sufficient. If we get back to the old track, that's a track at least to lower and lower wages for 70 percent of the people in this country. We have to change -- you know, raise the track. So there's a lot to be done. I do think it takes some of the pressure off for a big stimulus program that went beyond his original plan.

MR. LEHRER: So he could use the summit to talk more long range than short range?

MR. SHIELDS: I think that. I think it strengthens the hand of those, the deficit reduction talks, whether in the Congress or even in Clinton's own camp, will say in order for long-term economic well-being in the country, we've got to attack this deficit, and I think, I think that their hand is strengthened. The other thing, Jim, is there's two kinds of presidential elections we have in this country. We have a change of direction election or change of speech direction -- election. And most elections are change of speed, you go a little bit to the left, go a little bit to the right. Nixon in 1968 was a little bit to the right. Kennedy in 1960 was a little bit to the left. We only had really two big change of direction elections, Reagan in 1980, when he changed the relationship between the government and the voters, and FDR in 1932. The Clinton race looked like it had the potential tobe a change of direction election. I mean, it was going to go in a wholly different and dramatic direction. I think what -- with this economic news has made it a little bit change of speed now, maybe go a little bit faster, and I think, I think the sense of momentum behind his plan, it's going to make it tougher for him. He's going to have to -- just as George Bush has to make the case on Somalia and United States involvement, Bill Clinton is going to have to make a strong case to the American people on what his specific economic objectives are.

MR. GERGEN: You and I may disagree a little bit on the economic summit. I happen to think it's a good idea, because I think it allows Bill Clinton to make some modest adjustments in his plan, as he goes into January, but it also allows him to begin building a consensus behind whatever it is he wants to do over the long haul.

MR. LEHRER: Whether it's a modification of what he has already proposed --

MR. GERGEN: Yes.

MR. LEHRER: Or something --

MR. GERGEN: And he can have a two-day teach-in, in effect.

MR. LEHRER: Sure.

MR. GERGEN: As he builds support for it, and I think, and I disagree with Mark on one other point. I do think his long range plan does represent change of direction, not his short-term plan, but his long-term plan is very much different.

MR. LEHRER: Mark mentioned Ronald Reagan. Bill Clinton met with Ronald Reagan today. David, do the two men have anything in common, other than the fact they were both governors and both have been elected President of the United States?

MR. GERGEN: The first time I knew Clinton liked jellybeans. Well, I guess he likes most things like that. It's been so striking to me to talk to the Clinton people as they've gone back and reviewed other presidencies, other transitions, how they keep coming back to the Reagan transition and the Reagan takeover as being the model that they want to follow, and this visit today I think was very symbolic and very important. They intentionally went to see Reagan to send a message to Reagan Democrats, you know, you can stick with us still, but [b] very importantly, they clearly want to emulate what Reagan was doing his first few months, not in substance, obviously, but in, in style, and in taking charge quickly and setting an agenda for the country. They think that's the one presidency that succeeded in that since Franklin Roosevelt.

MR. SHIELDS: Both of these guys have very much in common. Both have a boyish, almost invincible confidence in his own ability to charm the birds out of the trees. Ronald Reagan believed that, that he could sit down with any political adversary and through a couple of stories, a little charm, show them that he didn't have the horns, as the gipper used to put it, and Bill Clinton, his own charm has served him very well. So, you know, the BS quotient in that room today had to be awfully high, Jim, it really did.

MR. GERGEN: Can I add one other point?

MR. LEHRER: Sure.

MR. GERGEN: What I find really interesting, talking to Clinton people they are still, they are in a permanent campaign. They see the presidency as the continuation of a campaign.

MR. LEHRER: I was just going to ask that. Is he still running?

MR. GERGEN: Yes. And what they are building, they are building a long-term coalition, Jim, and it's so striking. They see the West as opening real possibilities for the Democratic Party.

MR. LEHRER: Well, he was out there at the mall this afternoon, a mall --

MR. SHIELDS: He ought to learn, he ought to learn one fundamental thing from Ronald Reagan of substance, and that is, what Ronald Reagan was able to do was to take a real vacation. When Ronald Reagan went on vacation -- I'll tell you what Americans really don't like their Presidents doing is taking all those damn briefing books. I mean, they want to think when a President goes on -- I mean, it's become a photo op where the three guys in the blue suit fly in to brief you on whatever, and I'd just like to see the guy get away.

MR. LEHRER: Speaking of getting away, thank you both. ESSAY - HOMECOMING

MS. WOODRUFF: We close tonight with an essay. Amei Wallach, New York Newsday's art critic, has some thoughts about an artist's homecoming.

AMEI WALLACH: William H. Johnson once painted himself with a pipe as a latter day Vincent Van Gogh, glowering, intense, his face turned so the ear shows. The year was 1937, half a century after Van Gogh's death. And Johnson was African-American, not red-headed Dutch. But it's tempting to buy his analogy. Like Van Gogh, he was the outsider, in his case born light-skinned to rural Southern black parents in 1901. Also like Van Gogh, Johnson spent the last years of his life in an insane asylum, in his case Central Islip State Hospital on Long Island. There he moldered from the age of 46 in 1947 until his death in 1970 in the final stages of syphilis- induced madness. Tempting as the parallels are, however, Johnson's tragedy and his triumph are clearly his own, and purely American. Johnson began to find himself through art after he fled the South in 1918 for New York. At the National Academy of Design, he was a star pupil and became fluent in the fundamentals of European style, instead of the newspaper cartooning he'd aspired to. A favorite teacher urged him to continue in the only place it was possible to be black and a painter in the 1920's, Paris. Paris in the 1920's was the intellectual center of the western world. Americans like Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald flocked to it, and black artists like jazz singer Josephine Baker and the poet Langston Hughes found a degree of freedom, personal acceptance, and even success not possible in America. More than a decade before, Pablo Picasso had invented cubism there. But Johnson identified with Van Gogh's much older, expressionist tradition. He took the style with him when he went home to paint his family in Florence, South Carolina, and he continued to develop that style after he again fled to Europe from an America hostile to blacks and artists. This time he settled in Denmark. He painted Scandinavia's people and its fiery sunsets and the jostling abstract shapes of its springtime valleys, and he married the Danish weaver, Holga Crockey. In 1938, the threat of World War II drove Johnson and Holga back to America. He came home to Harlem and completely reinvented his art, and that is why "Homecoming" is the name of the exhibition organized by the Smithsonian's National Museum of Art which currently is touring the country. In Harlem, Johnson transformed himself from a very gifted artist dependent on Europe to the brilliant original painter he had always wanted to be, a painter, he said, "of my people." He gave up everything he'd learned to do it. He stripped himself of the fancy brush work, the layered paint, all the things he was good at, to arrive at his breakthrough paintings with their ingenuous colors, their accessibility, their naivety. He did it by getting inside the heart of his culture. In painting after painting he invented ways to transpose to canvas Harlem's jivy rhythms and dances, its speech patterns and clothes, and also the Southern spirituals and folk art he grew up with. Part of his heritage was racism and violence. He painted that too, after a white policeman shot a black soldier in the arm, igniting a riot in August of 1943. By the end of that year, his wife was dead of breast cancer. It was all too much, social and psychological traumas and the advancing syphilis. Johnson disintegrated. His paintings became chilling, brutal scrawl, or schoolbook diagrams railing at racism and promising redemption. But they were never less than powerful. In 1947, he entered the asylum, never to paint or emerge again. Just before his death in 1970, after 23 years of insanity, all Johnson's thousand and more paintings which his friends had rescued were given to the Smithsonian. Every New York museum had turned them down. There have been exhibits since, but Johnson remained pretty obscure until a Howard University student, Richard J. Powell, discovered him on the Smithsonian's walls. He made Johnson's art the subject of a doctoral thesis, a book, and now this show. Van Gogh was recognized as a major artist almost as soon as he died. William H. Johnson though had to wait for a new attitude towards African-Americans and African-American art to begin to gain that kind of recognition. Let's hope this time it's the beginning he deserves. I'm Amei Wallach. RECAP

MS. WOODRUFF: Again, the main stories of this Friday, White House Spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said stronger military action was needed to get relief supplies to starving people in Somalia. A United Nations decision about sending such a force, which could include thousands of U.S. troops, is expected within several days. In U.S. economic news, both personal income and consumer spending rose in October, and there was an unsuccessful coup attempt against the government of Venezuela. Good night, Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Good night, Judy. Have a nice weekend. We'll see you on Monday night. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.