The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I`m Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight: The news of the day; then, a look at the sudden revolution in airline fares; a tsunami report from Indonesia on recovery efforts; a tsunami conversation with author Simon Winchester; a preview of the Palestinian presidential election this weekend; and the analysis of Mark Shields and David Brooks.

JIM LEHRER: The tsunami death toll rose sharply today, with another 7,000 bodies found on Sumatra, in Indonesia. That made at least 100,000 killed in that one country and more than 147,000 overall. Searchers in Indonesia found the new bodies in a coastal town that`s been largely cut off. U.N. Secretary-General Annan flew over that area today. And later, he said he`d never seen such destruction, and he defended the U.N.`s response to the crisis.

KOFI ANNAN: I think it`s unfair to say that we were tardy. I think we moved as quickly as we can. You also have to understand, the U.N. is as strong as its members. We are as capable as the members help and allow us to be. We have no assets. We need to rely on governments. Without the support, as I said, of the United States and other people with logistical capability, we would not have been able to move, and in fact you would have said we have been very, very late.

JIM LEHRER: In Sri Lanka today, Secretary of State Powell wrapped up a week-long trip to the hardest-hit countries. He took a helicopter tour and later he said he`d report to the president on the magnitude of the disaster.

COLIN POWELL: Twelve countries spread over thousands of miles, all struck by a single event, single catastrophe. And the international community has mobilized in a way that I have never seen before to help the affected people to rebuild their homes, their schools, their businesses, but above all, to rebuild their lives.

JIM LEHRER: There were also more moves to help tsunami victims today. The United States and six other leading industrialized nations agreed to freeze debt repayments from the stricken nations. And a telethon in Saudi Arabia raised S84 million. The Gulf oil states have faced criticism they`re not doing enough to help. The U.S. Defense Department confirmed today it`s begun a review of operations in Iraq. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld ordered retired Army Gen. Gary Luck and a team of specialists to go to Iraq next week. The New York Times reported they`ll focus on the training of Iraqi forces, among other things. They`re to report back in a few weeks. Also today, the Washington Post reported the Army is considering longer, more frequent call-ups for Army reservists. The account also said officials are considering a permanent increase in the regular Army, of 30,000 troops. That could cost S3 billion a year. But a Pentagon spokesman insisted today no one has made an>r such proposal. In Iraq today, a top U.S. Military official warned there may be spectacular attacks before the elections on Jan. 30. Air Force Brig. Gen. Erv Lessel said there is no hard intelligence, but he said insurgents want to cause mass casualties. Nearly 100 Iraqis have been killed this week alone, and nine U.S. troops died yesterday. That makes a total of 17 Americans killed so far this month. All tolled, more than 1,340 U.S. troops have died in Iraq since the war began; more than 10,000 others have been wounded. Most have been from combat. In Washington, President Bush voiced optimism today about keeping the Iraqi elections on track. He acknowledged major security problems in four of the country`s eighteen provinces. But he said delay is not the answer.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Well, I want everybody to vote and I understand that parts of the Sunni area are being targeted by these killers. And their message is "if you vote, we`ll kill you." But real message is that "we can`t stand democracy," And, you know, if the free world steps back and lets these people have their way, it will be "we can`t stand democracy here and we can`t stand democracy there." And we`ll never address the root causes of terror.

JIM LEHRER: The president dismissed fears the elections could deepen the divide between Iraq`s Sunni and Shiite Muslims. And in a related development today, Iraq`s neighboring countries urged all Iraqis to take part in the elections. Jordan had earlier called for postponing the vote, but it joined in this new appeal. Palestinian presidential candidates wound up campaigning today, ahead of Sunday`s election. Interim leader Mahnioud Abbas is the front-runner. And today he campaigned just outside Fast Jerusalem, but canceled a trip to the city itself. A spokesman blamed Israeli security arrangements. We`ll have more on the Palestinian campaign later in the program tonight. A Mississippi man, Edgar Ray Killen, pleaded not guilty today to murdering three civil rights workers in 1964. James Chaney, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman were killed while trying to register black voters in the so-called Freedom Summer. Killen was arraigned today, after being arrested in Philadelphia, Mississippi. He`s now 79 years old and has always denied any role in the crime. In 1967, seven people were convicted of civil rights violations in the case, but until now, no one was ever charged with murder. The case was reopened in 1999. The U.S. economy added 157,000 jobs in December. The Labor Department reported that today. It also said the overall unemployment rate held steady at 5.4 percent. The new jobs figure brought the total for last year to 2.2 million jobs created, the most in five years. In 2003, there was a net loss of 61,000 jobs in the United States. President Bush named the leaders of a new commission today to simplify the nation`s tax code. He chose former Senators Connie Mack, a Republican, and John Breaux, a Democrat, to head the commission. They said today, "Everything`s on the table." The panel`s report is due by August. On Wall Street today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost nearly 19 points to close below 10,604. The NASDAQ fell one point to close below 2089. For the week, the Dow lost nearly 2 percent; the NASDAQ 4 percent. And that`s it for the News Summary tonight. Now it`s on to: Airline fares; a tsunami report from Indonesia; a tsunami conversation; the Palestinian elections; and Shields and Brooks.

FOCUS - AIRLINE SHAKEOUT

JIM LEHRER: Jeffrey Brown has our airlines story.

JEFFREY BROWN: A new fare war has broken out among airlines, but this one could have major long- term consequences for the entire industry. It began Wednesday when Delta Airlines, the nation`s third- largest carrier, announced it would slash fares and simplify its entire pricing system, reduce the ticket change fee to $50, eliminate and the Saturday night stay requirement and put caps on one-way fares for domestic flights, so that a customer buying a ticket even at the last minute would pay no more than $499 for coach and $599 for first class. The move is a direct response to competition from low-fare airlines, such as Southwest and JetBlue, whose lower costs allowed them to turn a profit in 2004 even as the traditional major players lost billions. Yesterday, one of those, American Airlines, followed Delta part way, announcing fare cuts. And now others, including United and Continental, say they`ll reduce fares in many markets.

JEFFREY BROWN: Joining me now with more on all this is George Novak, program administrator for the Aviation Institute at George Washington University. Welcome to you.

GEORGE NOVAK: Thank you.

JEFFREY BROWN: We`re all used to the idea of a fare war, but this is something much more than that, isn`t it?

GEORGE NOVAK: It is. This is a major change in how the U.S. Airlines are going to structure their fares. It`s a difference for passengers, how much they will pay, and it`s a difference for passengers in the restrictions, so this is more than just the summer fare war we`ve seen in the past to get passengers in. This is a way of changing the way that our legacy carriers are doing business.

JEFFREY BROWN: What do we mean by simplifying the fare infrastructure? We all get on planes and we all look around at each other and everybody has paid something different, correct?

GEORGE NOVAK: Correct.

JEFFREY BROWN: So why is Delta moving to a simpler system? What is in it for them?

GEORGE NOVAK: For Delta, simplification means cost savings for them. It also means less confusion for passengers. And I think they`re hoping that this lower fare structure, along with a less confusing structure, when passengers are on the Internet, when they`re talking to their travel agents, this confusion, reducing that level of confusion, they hope is going to put passengers in their planes along, obviously, with the fare cuts.

JEFFREY BROWN: This is the way the low-cost carriers function right now.

GEORGE NOVAK: Right. There are only a couple types of fares when you fly a Southwest or JetBlue. You don`t have a confusing menu when you go to book on those airlines. I think that`s what Delta is trying for and I think the other carriers are following that now.

JEFFREY BROWN: The idea of instituting a fare cap. This is aimed at the last minute customer. I assume that would mostly be the business market.

GEORGE NOVAK: In many cases but other times it`s leisure passengers. The majority of that will be business passengers and that`s why it has always been a high fare because business... they`ve always assumed business passengers could pay more because they had to get somewhere. But this happens to leisure travelers also, where they need to get somewhere for a family emergency, for a last-minute vacation, and it frees up a lot of opportunities for people to fly. And again, the hope is that this will put people in the airplanes.

JEFFREY BROWN: And to what extent has that kind of leisure passenger or business passenger, the last- minute customer, moved to the low-cost carriers?

GEORGE NOVAK: There has been a migration of both business and leisure passengers to these low cost carriers. And they now control, depending on which figures you read, between 25 percent and 32 percent of the market, which is significant.

JEFFREY BROWN: So as we`ve said now some of the other traditional large airlines have moved in the same direction but not gone quite as far as Delta, correct? Tell us what is their strategy? What are they doing now?

GEORGE NOVAK: Right now I think they`re reacting. And they`re in a mode where this took many of the carriers by surprise. They`re in a reaction mode. So very quickly they`re trying to put together a package which says to the flying public, "Okay, you can get that deal on Delta. You can also get it here on American." And we`ll see moves by Northwest, by United, most likely by U.S. Airways in the coming weeks saying, "We`re instituting the same savings and the same structure that Delta have is - has started, so you can fly on us, too."

JEFFREY BROWN: So far the fare cuts that they`re making are in these markets where there is a lot of competition.

GEORGE NOVAK: Yes. Where there is not competition, there is no... there is no incentive whatsoever for them at this time to lower their fares. And in this industry right now, they need revenues. And so the average fare is going to have to remain about the same as it is right now, so the fares where there is no competition are very likely to increase - very likely to increase because these airlines have to make the money somewhere.

JEFFREY BROWN: Now, all of this comes, of course, at a time when the airline industry is bleeding and the notion is they need more revenue. The idea that lower fares could bring in less revenue, one of my colleagues said this looks like a mutual suicide pact. Is it possible to read it that way?

GEORGE NOVAK: It`s widely held right now that we are looking at a loss - additional loss of revenue in the coming year between two and a half and three and a half billion dollars because of these reduced fares. Now, the hope is in the longer-term, beyond that year, in the two- year, maybe two- to-three-year period, that the number of passengers will increase. You`ll make that up in volume. So the marginal revenue per passenger will decrease, but you`ll increase the number of people flying and eventually get back to the revenue level. So it could take some time, though.

JEFFREY BROWN: But the question is: can all of these airlines do it and survive for that period of time?

GEORGE NOVAK: My prediction is no. I don`t think that all the majors can survive a deep change in the way that they do business right now, particularly in a reduction in revenue at a time when they`re in trouble.

JEFFREY BROWN: So this shake-out that we have been hearing about for a long time, this action can really push that ahead?

GEORGE NOVAK: I think this is one of the major events. We`ve been waiting for this shake-out for some time. It has been predicted for years. I think this may be the blow, that Delta`s change in their fare structure, in the way that they do business with their passengers, this may be the event that changes the industry and probably result in a loss of one or two major carriers in the United States.

JEFFREY BROWN: So for customers, let`s look at how this affects them. In the short term, this has to be good because prices come down. Is that right?

GEORGE NOVAK: Oh, definitely. I think passengers are going to enjoy the fares they see this spring, this summer, through the year. And I think that they now know what the carrier is doing and that the other carriers are going to meet that. There is going to be competition and that competition is very likely to last for a year. Now, if it costs a couple of carriers their corporate lives in the meantime, passengers are going to benefit from that, but the carriers may not.

JEFFREY BROWN: Are there long-term risks for consumers?

GEORGE NOVAK: The long-term risks for consumers is if this does cost the United States a couple of their major carriers, particularly in rural areas, outside of the major metropolitan areas, if service is reduced, they`re going to be the first ones to suffer. If service remains in those areas, they`re very likely to sec monopolistic pricing, which is going to be very, very high, to get from one place to another. In Die Dakotas, in the Midwest, anywhere outside of major metropolitan areas, they will sec an increase in fares, which could take place fairly soon.

JEFFREY BROWN: For people even now, it`s winter, it`s cold, people are starting to think about summer vacation plans. What do they do right now?

GEORGE NOVAK: Well, I`d say book on the carriers you are comfortable booking on because the fares are low. Right now, in response to Delta`s actions, fares have fallen this week and American has followed Delta`s lead; Northwest and Continental will; United is likely to. USAir is likely to, and so there will be very low fares for the coming months, but people should book and get the seats now because that is not an unlimited number of seats. Every seat on that aircraft is not at those low fares.

JEFFREY BROWN: But keep an eye on the airlines in the meantime over the long-term.

GEORGE NOVAK: Keep a very close eye. Watch the news.

JEFFREY BROWN: Thank you very much, George Novak.

GEORGE NOVAK: Thank you, Jell. FOCUS - AFTERMATH

JIM LEHRER: Now, an update on the tsunami recovery efforts. Jonathan Miller of Independent Television News reports from Aceh Province in Indonesia.

JONATHAN MILLER: For the bereaved survivors of the horrors visited on this benighted city, the great mosque of Banda Aceh was today an oasis of peace. After 29 years of war, it seems the Acehenese have no more tears left to cry. They have borne this tragedy stoically, these fervent Muslims, fatalistic about their terrible plight. "Thanks be to Allah. We have remained faithful," the imam said. "We are suffering, sick, hungry, stressed, but God sent us this tsunami as a warning." We have sinned," he said. "We lie, steal and lull" He asked God for forgiveness. He also noted the international response to the disaster and told the Acehenese people to start rebuilding their lives. The 17 Seahawks for the USS Abraham Lincoln are now flying 45 dawn-to-dusk missions a day, carrying 45,000 kilos of rice, canned foods, milk powder, water, and high energy biscuits to 15 sites down the west coast. U.S. sailors volunteer each day to come ashore and load aircraft. A Marine expeditionary force with its own fleet of choppers will be operational off the devastated tow n of Malabo within days, doubling the U.S. airborne relief operation.

LT. COMMANDER JOHN BERNARD, USS Abraham Lincoln: We can see the people coming to get the food and getting the food. Initially when we first started doing this, a lot of the survivors weren`t familiar with helicopter operations so they would kind of surge towards the helicopter. Using interpreters and then getting used to the way we work now, they wait until we depart before they come and get the food. But we`re confident that we are making a difference every day.

JONATHAN MILLER: Return flights are still bringing back injured 12 days after the tsunami struck. Now the traumatic wounds they typically see are increasingly badly infected, often gangrenous; dirty water and the hot moist climate is a paradise for bacteria. Here Australian medics are evacuating seriously injured to other hospitals on Sumatra.

MICHAEL HUGGINS, World Food Program: All around the airport today you can see militaries from, you know, more than fifteen/twenty countries here setting up and getting ready to play a part in the humanitarian response. You know, we have American helicopters taking WFP food down the coast; we have the Australian army flying in food from other parts of Asia to help us to make sure we have enough food to reach the people. So it really is a phenomenal response.

JONATHAN MILLER: C-130 transporters land one after the other. Today alone the World Food Program flew in 265 tons of food aid. Less than a week ago, there was virtually nothing in place.

JIM LEHRER: Now a conversation about natural disasters and their wider effects, and to Margaret Warner.

MARGARET WARNER: Natural disasters often affect people and societies in ways that transcend the physical devastation. To explore that, we turn to British writer Simon Winchester author of "Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded, August 27, 1883." This 2003 bestseller was about a catastrophic volcanic eruption close to the scene of the current disaster. And, Mr. Winchester, welcome. Thanks, for joining us.

SIMON WINCHESTER: Thank you.

MARGARET WARNER: First of all, tell us about the parallels in the two events themselves, between the eruption of Krakatoa 120 years ago and what we just witnessed.

SIMON WINCHESTER: Well, it was extraordinarily similar, really. It happened in geologically almost exactly the same place: The sort of suture line between the Australian plate on one side and the Eurasian plate on the other. The one in Sumatra ten days ago was technically a little bit different, but the India and the Burma plates are essentially the same thing. So 300 miles separate the two events, and the effects of them were almost the same, although one was a volcano and the other was an earthquake, but they both generated tsunamis. In addition, the volcano generated an enormous bang. It was the largest sound ever generated on the surface of the planet, at least since mankind has been around to record it. It sent a plume of ash and smoke and rock 13 miles up into the upper atmosphere and then created four enormous tsunamis, which radiated outwards- just as the ones at Banda Aceh did some while ago- and killed what used to be the largest number killed in any volcanic eruption on the planet: 40,000. But it`s a figure that pales into insignificance compared to this Indian Ocean disaster, but much the same physical effects. These enormous waves, rather taller, about a bundled and twenty, a hundred and thirty feet, and moving much more rapidly, about eight or nine hundred miles an hour because the affected areas were much, much closer to where the volcano erupted, but 40,000 people died and a lot of devastation.

MARGARET WARNER: And then what other effects did it have-- you outline some of these in your book- beyond the physical devastation, beyond the deaths?

SIMON WINCHESTER: Well, the extraordinary thing that happened, specifically in Java and Sumatra, is that this event was immediately picked up by the religious leaders, who in those days were Muslims. The area was rapidly being converted from Hinduism to Islam. There were a lot of Arabs there who were priests or mullahs, and they said within a matter of days of the devastation, that this was clearly a sign from Allah- Allah, who was annoyed, specifically angered by the fact that the Javanese and the Sumatrans were allowing themselves to be ruled by white, western, infidel Dutch imperialists. "Rise up and kill them: is essentially what the mullahs said, and sure enough, within a matter of days, there was a degree of killing of Dutch soldiers and bureaucrats. Then the mullahs said, "No, no, no, don`t do this in a piecemeal fashion, do it in an organized fashion." And sure enough over the next few years, careful planning went underway, triggered by Krakatoa, and five years later there was a massive rebellion, which was the beginning, one might say, of the end of Dutch rule in Java and Sumatra and the beginning of the creation of what is now the most populous Islamic state on Earth, Indonesia.

MARGARET WARNER: Now, in a piece you wrote recently, you say this is not an isolated incident and in terms of having this sort of kind of profound social and psychological change from a natural disaster, and you point to one in the United States. Tell us about that.

SIMON WINCHESTER: Well, indeed, San Francisco. I`ve just finished researching and indeed writing a book which is coming out in October on the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, April 18. And oddly enough- I mean, I didn`t anticipate this when I started work- this also had a religious impact. The big difference I think between San Francisco and Krakatoa on the one hand and what happened at Banda Aceh on the other, is that all these events were transmitted around the world very rapidly because the news of them was by electricity and the undersea cable and Morse Code and the Reuters news agency, these events were known about very, very rapidly indeed. So people around the world had the information, but they didn`t have the understanding. And so there was a worldwide sense of bewilderment, that terrible things had happened, but there was no rational explanation for them. And so people turned in large numbers to God as an explanation. They did so in Krakatoa, and equally they did so also in San Francisco. And specifically what happened in San Francisco is that there was a very, very small movement beginning in southern California of Pentecostalist Christians, people who spoke in tongues, who believed in revelations by way of signs from heaven. The first meeting of this little Pentecostalist church took place on the Sunday just before the San Francisco earthquake. Wednesday came the earthquake. The pastors in the church said this is evidently a sign from heaven, from God, that He is angered by the licentiousness, the wanton behavior of San Franciscans. The result of this was that the next Sunday, the church, which had only attracted a few hundred disciples before, was swamped with thousands upon thousands of people. And the American Pentecostalist movement was in a sense born out of the San Francisco earthquake and remains today one of the largest and most politically relevant Christian movements in America.

MARGARET WARNER: Do you think the fact that we live in a more "scientific age" today, or that at least we understand the scientific phenomenon that led to, say, this earthquake and tsunami, changes the likelihood of similar profound effects?

SIMON WINCHESTER: I do. It is interesting, if you look at another recent devastating seismic event, which was the Tang Xian earthquake in China in 1979. Then still there wasn`t total understanding of what had happened, and because Mao Zedong died at about the same time, the Chinese government at the time attempted to link these two events. But ever since the 1960s when the whole phenomenon, the whole science of plate tectonics has became generally understood in the world, there is now the facility for a rational explanation. And although you are going to see around the Indian Ocean the Buddhists are going to behave in Sri Lanka and Thailand in a rather different way towards this tragedy than, let`s say, the Hindus and Tamil Nadu, generally speaking, mankind accepts the scientific the rational explanation, and I think the kind of reaction that one saw in 1893 and 1906 isn`t going to be duplicated, with one exception though.

MARGARET WARNER: Go ahead.

SIMON WINCHESTER: With one exception. In northern Sumatra at the moment, it has been widely reported that the mullahs there have said to their people that this is a sign from God, that the Muslims in northern Sumatra are not good Muslims, that they`re drinking, that they`re having premarital sex, that they`re behaving in a way that is not the way that is laid down in the Koran. And so there is an attempt to link this to God; whether or not it will wash I don`t know. I think science is probably going to be the dominant explanation.

M ARGARET WARNER: Well, that is exactly what I was going to ask you about because we`ve read those same stories here, that what the imams are saying at least in Aceh Province. So what will you be looking for around the region in determining whether in fact this horrific disaster triggers deeper social or political change?

SIMON WINCHESTER: Well, it`s going to be very interesting to see, generally, the reaction of the region to the United States. I think this is almost the most fascinating aspect. I don`t think we are going to see a resurgence, for instance, of fundamentalist Islam in northern Sumatra. I don`t think the Indians, the Sri Lankans are going to react in a particularly fanatical -- if I can use that in non-offensive way - religious way towards this. I think there is generally a rational explanation but a great interest on it and how the West is reacting to it. And I think that the way that the United States, in particular, has reacted is already going down very well. So I think the political reaction is going to be much more important and interesting than the religious one.

MARGARET WARNER: Simon Winchester, thanks so much.

SIMON WINCHESTER: Thank you.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight: The voting Palestinians, and Shields and Brooks.

FOCUS - PALESTINIAN ELECTION

JIM LEHRER: Ray Suarez lias our Palestinian story.

RAY SUAREZ: This Sunday, more than a million Palestinians will have the chance to vote for a president, only the second time they`ve had that opportunity. There`s little suspense about who`ll win the election and plenty of concern about how smoothly it will go. This time the front-runner isn`t Yasser Arafat. He died in November. It`s Arafat`s longtime lieutenant and former prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas. On this, his last day to campaign, Abbas laid a wreath at Arafat`s grave site, but chose not to go to Jerusalem because of security concerns. He campaigns with heavy security. Abbas` main rival is Dr. Mustafa Barghouti, a prominent Palestinian physician. SPOKESMAN: You are arresting a presidential candidate...

RAY SUAREZ: While campaigning today, he was detained for an hour by Israeli police as he attempted to pray at Jerusalem`s al Aqsa Mosque. The election comes against the backdrop of four years of armed confrontation with Israel and efforts to revive the long- stalled peace process. Abbas has pledged to restart talks and urged Palestinians to refrain from violence. Another issue: The implementation of Israel`s proposed unilateral withdrawal from Gaza. And Israeli officials have talked about ceding control of some West Bank cities to the Palestinians should Abbas win. But Abbas`s words have on occasion inflamed Israelis. Here`s what he said Tuesday after an Israeli strike that killed seven Palestinians in Gaza.

MAHMOUD ABBAS ( Translated ): We mourn the souls of our martyrs who were killed today by the tank shells of the Zionist enemy in Beit Lahiya.

RAY SUAREZ: That statement brought swift condemnation from Israel.

SILVAN SHALOM: He is using now terms that were not heard for a very long time, and we believe that during his election time or during his election campaign, he can`t use such kind of statements.

RAY SUAREZ: Abbas has also said the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their ancestral lands now in Israel should be honored. That`s a right Israel has categorically refused to consider. Many of those refugees- some four million- are not allowed to vote in Sunday`s election because they live outside the Palestinian Authority`s jurisdiction. Only Palestinians who live in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem can vote. Among those who say they "ill not go to the polls: More militant groups who view Abbas with suspicion. Two groups who wage war with Israel, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, have vowed to boycott the elections.

RAY SUAREZ: Now an on-the-ground look at the campaign in preparation for Sunday`s election. For that we`re joined from Jerusalem by Les Campbell, director of Middle East programs at the National Democratic Institute in Washington. NDI is a nonprofit organization that promotes democratic activities worldwide.

And Les Campbell, as far as your observers can tell, are conditions in place for free and fair balloting among the Palestinians this weekend?

LES CAMPBELL: Well, I guess we`ll find out if it`s free and fair in a day or two once the voting has happened, but the technical preparations are good. The Palestinians have a very accomplished independent election commission, which has done actually a remarkably good job under difficult conditions preparing. They have a good voters list, although there are some issues with the list that we can probably get into. Polling workers are trained and in place and I think the building blocks are there. There are a number of, I guess what I would describe as political issues that are outstanding, but the technical issues at least at this juncture look good.

RAY SUAREZ: Well, you refer to the electoral commission working under difficult circumstances. Is putting together an election under occupation a complicated thing?

LES CAMPBELL: Well, you could say that. I mean, there are just simple things. The election workers had to move from town to town and city to city, and they had to get through hundreds of checkpoints. And the Israelis, I have to say, have facilitated much of that movement. But every day is a new challenge. Some election workers, for example, were trapped in Gaza for more than four days with important papers and materials. There were many, many frustrating days. And it`s not just frustrating for the election commission, the technical workers; it has also been difficult for candidates, parties and campaign managers. So yeah, organizing an election under these conditions, when so many things are out of the control of the Palestinians, has been a challenge, to put it mildly.

RAY SUAREZ: You referred to some difficulties with the voter list. What were the difficulties and how many people ended up on it?

LES CAMPBELL: There is an interesting situation. The election commission actually had begun voter registration for local elections a few months ago prior to Yasser Arafat falling ill and dying. The Palestinians had decided to go ahead with local elections and the commission started to register people. They did a good job. In fact, our organization, NDI, monitored that registration period. We tested the list, we vetted that list and found it was accurate. It contained about 1.2 million names out of a potential total of roughly 1.7 million, 1.8 million, and everyone thought it was tine. Yasser Arafat passed away, the presidential election was called, they had 60 days to run the election and they decided to use the same voter registration, which made perfect sense. About a month ago though, in what has been characterized as somewhat of a political decision, the Palestinian legislative council passed a decree ordering that the Palestinian civil registry, which is the general list of all Palestinian citizens, a much less accurate and up to date list, they decreed that that also be used. So now we have this interesting situation with two separate lists and (hat has necessitated two different voting places for people on the lists. And while we are not anticipating that this is necessarily a huge flaw, it certainly could lead to confusion on Election Day and I guess, at worst, could lead to duplicate voting.

RAY SUAREZ: Is it clear where the polling places are and is there enough freedom of movement to get people from where they are to where they have to vote?

LES CAMPBELL: Well, it`s clear where the polling places are, and in fact, most Palestinian areas, towns, villages, they`re relatively small. People know the schools and schools are the main polling places, and in fact, schoolteachers are the main poll workers. So, you know, again, on these sort of technical issues they`ve done a great job, they really have. They have slips that tell them where they`re voting. Freedom of movement more broadly is a much more difficult question. And we have been looking at that for a number of months, and now we have a group of 80 people on the ground talking to a variety of Palestinians and Israeli officials about freedom of movement. It`s unclear now what will happen. From the Israeli side, they have promised to facilitate the movement of voters freely through checkpoints, through the barrier of separation w all. On the Palestinian side, they have promised to do their utmost not to cause disruptions or violence in these days leading to the election and on Election Day. But one of the tasks of the observers, like myself and our group, is going to be to see if voters can move freely, if they`re able to cast their vote, if there aren`t undue holdups or delays. I really think this whole question of freedom of movement is... will likely be one of the key issues that we address as observers.

RAY SUAREZ: The man said to be the leading candidate in this election is one of the founding members of Fatah, Yasser Arafat`s faction. How are other political forces, factious, parties, movements involved, and have calls for boycotts started to look like they`ll suppress turnout?

LES CAMPBELL: There is a leading candidate. No doubt about it. Abu Mazcn, Mahmoud Abbas - he goes by the two names-- is clearly ahead. That`s not because of manipulation. He is inheriting and playing up on his long relationship with Yasser Arafat. Most of the posters and ads that you see here with Mahmoud Abbas have him close to Arafat; they have... you know, he`s playing on the legacy. And he has the lead, there is no doubt about that. But there are credible campaigns being run. The person that many people believe is in second place, Mustafa Barghouti, is running an extremely effective campaign. He got a lot of press today, for example, with some issues in Jerusalem. He seems to be gaining in the polls, not enough probably to prevail, but we don`t know. Another candidate from the Palestinian people`s party, an established smaller party, and there are four others. There are seven people. I would say four to five of them are running credible campaigns. So there`s a campaign. You know, thinking about the election a little bit and what we are going to look at as observers, the fact that there is a clear leading candidate is not really a factor in our work. We`re really interested in whether or not Palestinians are able to freely cast a vote for the person of their choice. We`re interested in whether or not this reflects the political will of Palestinians, and, you know, I guess we`ll see on Sunday.

RAY SUAREZ: Today Palestinian gunmen opened fire on Israeli soldiers in the West Bank. Does this leave you worried as you enter the weekend about a peaceful weekend?

LES CAMPBELL: I think what we worry about from an election point of view is the effect of this violence on the turnout. There have been calls for boycotts from the more extreme factions like Hamas and Islamic Jihad. I think one of... maybe the most important issue on Sunday and when we analyze on Monday, is going to be whether or not these threats of boycott and this violence has depressed the turnout, because I think the issue of how many people come out to vote reflects very directly on the perception of the strength of the mandate of the winner. So I think that will be an extremely important issue come Sunday night and Monday.

RAY SUAREZ: Les Campbell, joining us from Jerusalem, thanks a lot.

LES CAMPBELL: Oh, you`re welcome. It was a pleasure.

FOCUS - SHIELDS & BROOKS

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, the analysis of Shields and Brooks: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks. The Alberto Gonzales nomination, David; have you heard anything or know anything that disqualifies Alberto Gonzales to be attorney general of the United States.

DAVID BROOKS: No, he is a short stocky guy but that`s no problem. No, I think he will be the attorney general. I think he`s going to sail through this committee vote there. Were some protests and issues raised but lie will be the attorney general.

JIM LEHRER: No issues that bothered you?

DAVID BROOKS: Well, not in particular. You know, I think one of the things that he has tried to do, the administration has maybe not been always successful but has been to deal with this problem. We go to Afghanistan. We have got people who are not normal soldiers first of ail. Second of all, they`re not normal prisoners because they want to die. They`re divorced from life. All of our techniques in interrogating people like prisoners is based on the idea that they`re basically like us, that they want to go home to their families so we had a unique situation over there, and we had to figure out how to deal with it -

JIM LEHRER: Post-9/11.

DAVID BROOKS: - right after 9/11, and he was part of the discussions. Now, in some of the discussions, the Bibby Memo, where they said you know, you can basically almost kill the people, did we go over the line, were those terrible memos? Yes. But he was part of the discussions and I think he was right that maybe the Geneva Conventions should not necessarily apply to those people. And I think he was right to deal with that issue. And, you know, I`m sort of stuck in-between. On the left you`ve got sometimes some hysteria that won`t even address this problem of how do we deal with al- Qaida types. On the right you`ve got a bunch of cliches, we can`t do a Marquis de Queensbury rules; it`s a new world. We`ve got to be tough. And so a lot of us are kind stuck in the middle, and I think that he is, too, so I have some sympathy for him.

JIM LEHRER: Are you stuck anywhere on Gonzales?

MARK SHIELDS: I think Gonzales will be... he is no John Mitchell, let`s get that.

JIM LEHRER: Is he a John Ashcroft?

MARK SHIELDS: Is he a John Ashcroft: He is, do I think he will be confirmed? He will be confirmed. He is intellectually qualified, certainly his education credentials qualify. I thought, Jim, the most dramatic moment in the hearings was when Sen. Lindsay Graham, the Republican from South Carolina, a man who has been a military lawyer, said that the administration`s tactics were playing cute with the law, and that

JIM LEHRER: On this issue of interrogation -

MARK SHIELDS: On this issue of interrogation -- and that it severely undermined the United States` standing and our ability to maintain and claim the high moral ground. And I thought, as I watched that and listened to Gonzales, that how you feel about it depends on how you feel about Abu Ghraib. If you really think that`s an open wound in the United States, that the pictures and the photograph of the evidence of what was done here has hurt us permanently; hurt the United States and its mission and its efforts in the Muslim world, then I think you probably, you know, were not satisfied with Gonzales`s answers.

DAVID BROOKS: Abu Ghraib, those people were not interrogating anybody. They were just torturing people. That was just sadism. That wasn`t part of any interrogation process. It was the middle of the night. And it wasn`t any part of rational effort to get information. I don`t even know if they asked questions. They just were out of control. But the interrogation process is a much, you know, - and there have been atrocities in that, too. I don`t want to whitewash that.

MARK SHIELDS: There have been.

DAVID BROOKS: But the interrogation process and how we react at Gitmo, how we react in Iraq, these are issues that I think we should have memos about. You know, every week we sit here and we watch on Fridays the soldiers that have been killed in Iraq and -

JIM LEHRER: We have some more tonight.

DAVID BROOKS: And we know very little about the insurgents. And we have got to somehow do a better job in knowing about the people who are killing the faces we see every Friday night. And this is part of that process. And I think his role has been utterly appropriate.

MARK SHIELDS: I question its appropriateness in this sense, Jim.

JIM LEHRER: The process or Gonzales`s role?

MARK SHIELDS: Gonzales`s role. Gonzales`s entire career, other than the time at Vincent and Elkins - has been spent in the service of George W. Bush -- basically his counsel in Texas, counsel in the White House and that one year on the Texas Supreme Court.

JIM LEHRER: Appointed by then Gov. Bush.

MARK SHIELDS: By then Gov. Bush. And I had the feeling, as you look at what he has done, I mean yes, we repealed the Bibby Memo now two years after the fact.

JIM LEHRER: This was the torture memo.

MARK SHIELDS: This was the torture memo. It basically said anything goes up to -

JIM LEHRER: As long as yon don`t kill them. MARK SHIELDS: Take an organ out. That`s the level of pain we are talking about. And you know, I really think, Jim, that this is serious stuff, and that fie has to be held accountable for his position on it. And I don`t think that this committee is going to do it. And I`ll be very honest with you. I think for political reasons... I mean, the political reason is very simple. The biggest demographic increase George W. Bush had between 2000 and 2004 in the entire electorate was among Latino voters. The president is aware of that. He has nominated Mr. Gutierrez at Commerce; he`s nominated Mr. Gonzales to be attorney general. Democrats, intimidated, terrified at this important, growing constituency, could be slipping away, are not going to choose this to make a tight, it could be an important symbolic figure, especially when Henry Cisueros, the former mayor of San Antonio, stood up and endorsed him and he was introduced by Ken Salazar, the new Democratic Latino Hispanic senator from Colorado. So, I mean, the reality is one thing and the argument in the debate is something else.

JIM LEHRER: What about David`s point? Move Gonzales away from it for a moment. David`s point is that what he said about, you know, that those on the right argue one thing but those on the left, you know,... if you cannot... how do you handle the special situation of people like post-9/11, Afghanistan folks, Taliban and all of that?

MARK SHIELDS: David got half the answer right. You have to know more about these people. You really do. You have to understand them. You can`t use... I mean I know nobody who has been involved in this who believes in torture; that torture is an effective... I know nobody in uniform who sanctions torture.

JIM LEHRER: Just the opposite.

MARK SHIELDS: That`s right but....

JIM LEHRER: It doesn`t work.

MARK SHIELDS: Lindsay Graham pointed out, not only does it not work, but what it does is it makes vulnerable American soldiers and Marines who do fall into the hands of the enemy -

JIM LEHRER: Because tit for tat and all of that.

DAVID BROOKS: They torture them anyway because al-Qaida is not playing by the rules. Anyway, we are learning more about what al-Qaida knew; they had a handbook of how to deal with these situations. And the handbook said they can`t do anything to you, and the problem with these specific soldiers, with the religious fanatics, is they want to be martyrs. You can`t - you can`t play on their normal human reactions, which we assume and which our entire interrogation system is based on. And from what I`ve read, the one time you can actually get information out of these sort of prisoners who are perfectly happy to die is when you have a stressful situation where they think there are no rules. Now we`ve got to have rules so we don`t get Abu Ghraib, but somehow you have to give the prisoner the impression there are no rules.

JIM LEHRER: Quickly David, how do you respond to Mark`s point about the fact that Gonzales is so close to the president? Is that a liability or is that an asset?

DAVID BROOKS: Well, it`s both. It`s a liability in the case that sometimes the attorney general has to look into scandals and things like that. And the utter dependence is a problem. On the other hand, the attorney general also is carrying out policies from the administration initiating policy and having the trust of the president I think is tremendously important. I think with John Ashcroft, one of the things that was dysfunctional about that relationship, he and Bush were not particularly close and I think at times it messed up the system.

MARK SHIELDS: As an unabashed admirer of Robert F. Kennedy, there was nobody closer to a president than Robert Kennedy, and I think he ranks as a superb attorney general....

JIM LEHRER: So that`s not a liability.

MARK SHIELDS: I don`t think it is a liability but Jim, there is going to be a host of future litigation that comes before the attorney general as a direct consequence of the Abu Ghraib trials and the Abu Ghraib convictions and all the other torture. I mean Abu Ghraib is not an isolated incident. We`ve now discovered the FBI has documented over two years this kind of treatment and mistreatment, so....

JIM LEHRER: Not by the FBI but by others.

MARK SHIELDS: That`s right, by Americans.

JIM LEHRER: Those reports are trickling out and....

MARK SHIELDS: They`re going to come before Gonzales.

JIM LEHRER: David, the House Republicans changes in the ethics rules. The dust has now cleared on that. How do you read what finally happened?

DAVID BROOKS: Well, and a little sanity returned. I think bending the rules was a big mistake. I think a lot of Republicans voted to bend those rules for Tom DeLay, felt guilty about it, felt secretly ashamed. If you secretly asked did you vote for him, they all said yeah, I wouldn`t vote for changed rules. I have high ethical standards but they did under pressure by their leadership. But I think they came to their senses, and they have improved the situation. Listen, I think they have to recognize that the biggest single threat to the Republican majority is the relationship on K Street with corporate lobbyists and the corruption that is entailed in that. And corruption is the thing that is going to bring the Republicans down, if anything. So having super high standards, not that they have super high standards but at least they`re not lower than they were too much a year ago, is just totally necessary for self-preservation.

JIM LEHRER: Mark?

MARK SHIELDS: I agree with David. I think they`re in trouble on K Street; I think they`re in trouble with being too close to corporate interests and I think that the hearings before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee will document that in rather glaring and graphic and terrifying detail. But, Jim, they are to be commended. It was a shrewd political move to back down, to change those rules because it would have been a liability but at the same time don`t ignore the fact that they have weakened the ethics process by saying that in order for any ethics complaint to move forward now, there has to be a majority, that a tie vote --

JIM LEHRER: Used to not be that way so.

MARK SHIELDS: That`s right. So if you are going to stack the committee, are you going to get another chairman who`s as independent as Hefley has been, the Republican from Colorado, in the past?

JIM LEHRER: Do you think that`s a major change?

DAVID BROOKS: I think there`s a danger though if we are hoping - we`re waiting for the House Ethics Committee to police the House, we are going to be in trouble. It has sometimes done a good job but not in general --

JIM LEHRER: Quickly, President Bush announced today, Mark, a bipartisan commission to reform the tax code; former Senators Mack, Republican and Sen. Breaux, Democrat. Is this really going to happen, do you think? It has been on the agenda, the president`s agenda. What do you smell?

MARK SHIELDS: I think, Jim, that you know, based upon the 9/11 Commission, commissions have a new life and new stature in Washington. That was fascinating because it was investigating a mystery. No mystery when President Bush wants to do and no suspense what this commission is going to come up with. It`s going to come up with lowering the tax on unearned income, capital investment and interest dividends and it`s going to raise it on earned income.

JIM LEHRER: Is that --

DAVID BROOKS: Maybe, maybe not. I think they could have a consumption tax. What I`m hoping for personally is that they don`t file in August but they complete their work in a few weeks because I think one needs to have - you have got to combine tax reform with Social Security reform which is floundering and talk about the payroll tax.

JIM LEHRER: Okay, finally before we go, Mark, you wanted to say something about Bob Matsui, the Democratic congressman from California who died last weekend.

MARK SHIELDS: He died, Jim, at the age of 63 - 28 - 26 years in the House from Sacramento. A remarkable man.-I mean, a man of enormously strong convictions but totally open mind and politics with Bob Matsui was never personal. His convictions were real but he had political opponents but he never had a political enemy. There were no political enemies in his life and at his memorial service, Hillary Clinton, put it well, she said, given the rancor and the short tempers and the frayed nerves of Washington, we ought to stop every once in awhile have a Matsui moment. And boy that was a wonderful -

JIM LEHRER: Very nice phrase. Thank you both very much.

JIM LEHRER: And, once again, to our honor roll of American service personnel killed in Iraq. We add them as their deaths are made official and photographs become available. Here, in silence, are seven more.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major developments of this day: Another 7,000 bodies were discovered in Indonesia. That brought the tsunami death toll to more than 147,000. The U.S. Defense Department confirmed it`s begun a review of operations in Iraq. The main focus is on training Iraqi forces. And a U.S. general in Iraq warned there may be spectacular attacks before elections on Jan. 30.

JIM LEHRER: Washington Week can be seen on most PBS stations later this evening. We`ll see you online and again here Monday evening. Have a nice weekend. I`m Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.