The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight: A summary of today's news; President bush's words of welcome, and our own Newsmaker interview with Afghan interim prime minister Hamid Karzai; a report from Houston on the impact of Enron's collapse; and a debate about historians Stephen Ambrose and Doris Kearns Goodwin's use of other writers' words.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: President Bush today headed toward a confrontation with Congress over how his energy policy was made. He said he would not let the General Accounting Office have documents on Vice President Cheney's energy task force. The congressional watchdog agency wants to know about Cheney's meetings with executives of Enron and other companies. The President said to comply would weaken his office, now and in the future.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Well, the question about the General Accounting Office is this: Should an administration be allowed to have private conversations in this office without everybody knowing about it? And this is a part of how you make decisions is to call people in and say, "What's your opinion? What's your opinion on stem cell? What's your opinion on energy? What's your opinion on the war? In order for me to be able to get good, sound opinions, those who offer me opinions or offer the Vice President opinions must know that every word they say is not going to be put into the public record.

JIM LEHRER: The GAO is expected to decide this week whether to sue the White House for the information. In another Enron development, more than 400 current and former Enron employees sued the company today. They want to be compensated for the loss of their retirement savings. They accused top executives, including former Chairman Kenneth Lay, of hiding the company's "precarious" financial situation. The United States will finance and train a new military and police force for Afghanistan. President Bush made the announcement today after meeting with Afghan leader Karzai at the White House. He also said U.S. forces would support a peacekeeping force in Afghanistan, but not be part of it. In an interview with the "NewsHour," Karzai said he wanted the peacekeepers deployed beyond Kabul to bring security to the countryside. We'll have that interview in a few minutes. The President met with his national security team today on the status of Afghan war captives. They discussed whether, and how, the Geneva Convention applies to the detainees. Later, Mr. Bush ruled out calling them "prisoners of war." Beyond that, he said he needs to consider legal arguments about their status. In Afghanistan today, government troops and U.S. Special Forces stormed a hospital in Kandahar and killed six members of al-Qaida. The Arab fighters had been holed up there for nearly two months, and had refused to surrender. No Americans were hurt in the nine-hour fight. Late today 14 U.S. Soldiers were injured when their helicopter made a hard landing in eastern Afghanistan. They were from the 101st Airborne. In Nigeria today, search teams recovered at least 200 bodies in Lagos. The victims drowned last night, trying to escape explosions at an army weapons depot. We have a report from Tristana Moore of Independent Television News.

TRISTANA MOORE, ITN: All afternoon rescue workers have had the gruesome task of recovering bodies. After the fires broke out last night, people fled in panic. It was pitch black, and they couldn't see where they were going -- some, jumping into a canal, not realizing how deep the water was, they drowned. The fires raged all night long. Some reports suggested they started in a market and then spread to an arms dump at a military barracks. Artillery shells triggered more than 20 explosions, destroying factories, shops and homes. First light and the extent of the damage was clear to see. The windows of the city's Mandela Hospital were shattered. Unexploded artillery shells littered the streets. In a country accustomed to military coups, the Nigerian government was quick to point out that this was an accident. It's still not known what caused the explosions. Many questions remain: Why was there an arms dump so close to such a densely populated residential area? And why were the authorities so slow to react?

JIM LEHRER: Nigeria's President promised a full investigation of the disaster. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to the man in charge of bringing Afghanistan back alive; an Enron update

from Houston; and the historians' plagiarism debate.

FOCUS - TAKING QUESTIONS

JIM LEHRER: President Bush spoke with reporters today outside the white house as he welcomed Afghan leader Hamid Karzai. Here are some excerpts.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: The United States is committed to building a lasting partnership with Afghanistan. We will help the new Afghan government provide the security that is the foundation for peace. Today peacekeepers from around the world are helping provide security on the streets of Kabul. The United States will continue to work closely with these forces and provide support for their mission. We will also support programs to train new police officers and to help establish and train an Afghanistan national military.

REPORTER: We understand that you do not want to commit American troops to peacekeeping forces in Afghanistan. Why not, sir? And do you have any concerns that there will be enough forces to give Mr. Karzai the kind of security he needs?

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: We are committing help to the ISIF in the form of logistical help, in the form of a kind of a bailout-- if the troops get in trouble, we will stand ready to help; in the form of intelligence. Plus, I have just made in my remarks here a significant change of policy, and that is that we're going to help Afghanistan develop her own military. That is the most important part of this visit, it seems like to me, besides the fact of welcoming a man who is... stands for freedom, a man who stood for freedom in the face of tyranny. We have made a decision, both of us have made the decision that Afghanistan must, as quickly as possible, develop her own military, and we will help. We'll help train and we... and Tommy Franks, our General, fully understands this, and is fully committed to this idea. So better yet than peacekeepers-- which will be there for a while, with our help-- let's have Afghanistan have her own military.

REPORTER: Mr. President, in holding the detainees in Cuba in the manner in which the United States is, is one of the signals you're sending that in this new kind of war, as you've described it, the Geneva Conventions are outdated and don't apply in the conflict with al-Qaida?

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: No, no, the Geneva Conventions are not outdated, and that's... It's a very important principle. First of all, Terry, we are adhering to the spirit of the Geneva Convention. When you say, "you're holding the prisoners in the manner you are," we're giving them medical care. They're being well treated. There is no allegation... There may be an allegation, but there's no evidence that we're treating them outside the spirit of the Geneva Convention. And for those who say we are, they just don't know what they're talking about. And so-- let me finish-- and so, I am looking at the legalities involved with the Geneva Convention. In either case, however, I make my decision, and these detainees will be well treated. We are not going to call them "prisoners of war" in either case, and the reason why is, al-Qaida is not a known military. These are killers. These are terrorists. They know no countries. And the only thing they know about countries is when they find a country that's been weak, and they want to occupy it like a parasite.

REPORTER: The Saudi interior minister today said that a majority of those being held at Guantanamo-- more than a hundred-- are Saudi citizens, and asks that they be returned to Saudi Arabia for questioning.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Well, I appreciatehis request, and we'll, of course, we'll take it under consideration. There are a lot of detainees around the world as a result of this first phase in the war against terror. There's a lot in Pakistan. There's a lot in Afghanistan. And there are 179, I believe -- or whatever the number is -- in Guantanamo Bay. So there's a lot of Saudi citizens that chose to fight for al-Qaida and/or the Taliban that we want to know more about. And if... And so we'll make a decision on a case-by-case basis as to whether they go back to Saudi Arabia or not. I appreciate his suggestion.

JIM LEHRER: Mr. Bush also said the U.S. will open a $50 million line of credit to help finance private business projects in Afghanistan. That's on top of the $297 million the U.S. pledged last week at the International Donors Conference.

NEWSMAKER

JIM LEHRER: Now our Newsmaker interview with Hamid Karzai, the interim Prime Minister of Afghanistan. I talked with him this morning at Blair House just before he met with President Bush.

JIM LEHRER: Mr. Prime Minister, welcome.

HAMID KARZAI: Thank you.

JIM LEHRER: What do you plan to tell the President at your meeting today?

HAMID KARZAI: My first thing will be to we thank him for helping Afghanistan fight terrorism, for helping Afghanistan liberate itself from the clutches of terrorism. Terrorism was actually the power there; it was the government. It wasn't an element there. It wasn't somebody that was there and as a group or as a force. It was the political authority in Afghanistan, and now I know that it would not have been possible without the help of the United States and the rest of the international community so I've going to thank him.

JIM LEHRER: And in a way is it not a fact that if those terrorists who were headquartered in Afghanistan had not attacked the United States on September 11, the Taliban and those terrorists would still be in charge in your country?

HAMID KARZAI: Probably, yes. We kept telling the United States for the past five or six years of the presence of the terrorist forces in Afghanistan -- of the dangers that could, you know, make the world see through - of the dangers that they could pose to the world - of the dangers that they could pose to the United States. We were in a dialogue with the United States for five days on this very question -- and unfortunately the incident in New York happened with such a tremendous loss of life and that caused the reaction, which was right, which was on time. The only thing is that I'm sorry that it had to take that kind of a calamity for us to work against terrorism.

JIM LEHRER: Why did the people of Afghanistan tolerate the Taliban for so long?

HAMID KARZAI: They didn't tolerate them; they had no way out Only we did not know how deep that hand was in Afghanistan - only we did not know how incapacitated Afghan people were. When I used to call people from Afghanistan to come and meet with me, when they came to see me in Pakistan, I would tell them, go and fight against these guys, go and defeat them, and I'll give them some help, they would say, Hamid, it's impossible - it's a much larger force than you can imagine -- I would say, no, you've lost heart, you've lost guts, but when I moved into Afghanistan four months ago and I saw the real situation, they proved right; I was wrong. The depth of that problem was much wider, much deeper than I imagined. They were the government with money, millions and millions and millions of dollars. You name it, they had it, so it was impossible for our people without money, without guns, without help, and with- with the kind of instability and the war that was going on for so many years in Afghanistan to be able to defend themselves against those people. That did not mean that the Afghan people wanted them. The Afghan people were disgusted with what they were doing in Afghanistan; they just wanted an opportunity. So when the opportunity came in the form of the help of the United States, they struck, and you saw that they succeeded in a month.

JIM LEHRER: But that's what so confusing. If they were so powerful that they could control this country, why were they put on the run so quickly, why were they destroyed so quickly?

HAMID KARZAI: They were powerful in terms of the materials that they had; they were not powerful in terms of the public support. The display of power was the display of material -- not people's will. The moment the people got the opportunity to work against it, they did. And people always told me - especially - all along for the past many years they kept saying -- when I told them to go and fight against the Taliban terrorism - they kept saying, Hamid, bring us help from the United States -- that will do it - and other major countries. If you do not, on our own we are not capable to do it - because the neighbors were somehow working and helping the Taliban - and they had a wider relationship in the world as with radical elements everywhere, so we had to have backing and when we got the backing, we did it.

JIM LEHRER: Militarily, is it pretty much over?

HAMID KARZAI: Yes. They're no longer, as I mentioned earlier, the government of Afghanistan - they're over - they're finished militarily. They're just fugitives on the run and hiding, and that's difficult to do because we have to go and take them from caves and hideouts and homes, et cetera. It's like you were looking for a criminal that's hiding somewhere. Sometimes it takes you years to find a criminal; sometimes you may find it the next day - it's a question of luck

JIM LEHRER: There are some Americans who believe that it will never really be over at least for the United States; it will never really be over until Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar are either dead or in captivity. Do you share that feeling?

HAMID KARZAI: I think that it's not that serious - not that strong, but I think they're right in a way. We must finish the symbols of terrorism, and these two people are the symbols of that. We must find them and we must try them, and the world community should see their faces on trial on TVs.

JIM LEHRER: But from your point of view, that's all they are now are symbols?

HAMID KARZAI: They're just fugitives -- not even symbols in that sense. They're on the run; and we will catch them.

JIM LEHRER: But some people would suggest that there is something that has grown out of all of this called "Osama bin Ladenism" - and that there are still people - not maybe as many in Afghanistan -- but in the rest of the various parts of the world of Islam, who support what this man stands for. How do you read that? You've been talking to an awful lot of people in the last few weeks.

HAMID KARZAI: Well, in Afghanistan, people hate him because he has caused so much suffering to the Afghan people. It's unbelievable destruction when you go there and see it with your eyes -- the loss of life, property, and all that - and because of what he did to innocent people here. The Afghan people really see the pain that the American people went through because they have experienced the same pain so they understand, there's no sympathy there; there's hatred for him there in Afghanistan. In the rest of the Muslim world I think, no - I was talking in Saudi Arabia and in other countries, with people there, there isn't the kind of sympathy that is felt here for that man; he's considered a terrorist - a bad man There are elements, there are people who are horrible and who may be with him. It was not ideology; it was criminality that drove them, that drove them in Afghanistan and in America, and in the rest of the world, and criminals over there all the time. These people were the political types -- and that element must vanish; we must fight jointly against that. That criminals act in the name of politics and ideas - that should stop - that's a continuing struggle and it will take some time and we must go ahead and do it and not relax in it at all.

JIM LEHRER: You mentioned the destruction that has happened in your country. Tom Friedman of the "New York Times" was on our program recently, and he compared rebuilding Afghanistan to building something on the Moon. He had gone there; he had seen what the ground looked like. How would you describe the task of making your country a nation again?

HAMID KARZAI: Monumental, huge, big -- but it will be an honor for anybody to build Afghanistan - to help.

JIM LEHRER: It can be done?

HAMID KARZAI: Yes, why not, sure. We will do it. We have to.

JIM LEHRER: How long is it going to take?

HAMID KARZAI: As long as it will take. We will not stop, and if we stop, we will be bringing back these bad people to Afghanistan - so we should go on, we should begin -- today - it should begin tomorrow, and we should go on for a number of years - and if you help us, the United States of America and other major countries, we will do the physical part of the country very well, very soon - reconstruct roads, reconstruct schools, reconstruct hospitals and all that, but politically we must continue toward to stabilize the country, to make it stand back on its own feet as a nation state, to make it have a defense force, to make it have a police force, to make it have institutions - democratic institutions -- to make it collect its own revenues so it begins to generate its own funds, its own money - and to regain --

JIM LEHRER: Which it does not do now --

HAMID KARZAI: Which it does not do now because there's nothing to build on.

JIM LEHRER: There's no industry -

HAMID KARZAI: When we went to Kabul -- not only that - when you come to Kabul, there is a huge industrial park with hundreds of factories all ruined. When you come to Kabul, you see that the central bank did not have a penny in it, would you believe that? And this is a country that just - prior to the invasion by the Soviet Union - had in its bank, if I'm not very much mistaken -- at least $700 million as reserve - that's way back in 1970s - but if we had that kind of resources and reserves - and lots of gold and other things - and by the time we arrived in Kabul a month ago the central bank did not have a penny to pay even for the minor repairs - the Taliban minister of finance and others when they were running away went to the bank, broke it, and ran away with five point something million dollars - twenty-two million Pakistani rupees. Now, no Afghan ever that has run away from Kabul -- has gone to the bank to loot it; they did. So these guys that worked in the name of ideology were basically, as I mentioned earlier, criminals - moochers. They used Islam as a cover for criminality, for drugs, for, you know, smuggling, for all horrible things; they were neither representatives of the Muslims, nor of the Arabs, definitely not of Afghan, because they killed us.

JIM LEHRER: A couple of specific things -- there are now 5,000 -- about to be 5000 international troops in Kabul for peacekeeping security purposes, and you have said now that you want more troops to go outside of Kabul. Where does that stand? How many troops do you need? And what's the situation that needs to be fixed?

HAMID KARZAI: The idea of having the peacekeepers in other parts of the country basically is something that came from the Afghan people. It did not come from the international community; it did not come from us in the government. It came from the people that visit us every day -- the day we took office till last week when I began to visit abroad. The people of Afghanistan are asking for the presence of the international security force in other parts of the country because this force brings a sense of guarantee to them, because this force gives them the sense that the international community is with us now, that we will not be left alone in the region to the neighbors or other things. It is not for internal stability; it's not for using as an internal elements. There's no such thing as an internal opposition to Afghanistan - it's the measure of the international guarantee of staying and commitment to Afghanistan that the Afghan people want, and that's why they asked for it, and I think they're right.

JIM LEHRER: Finally on a personal, personal level - you and I now are sitting and talking at Blair House across the street from the White House. Tomorrow night you are going to be a special honored guest of the President of the United States at his State of the Union, which is a really big deal here in the United States. Could you imagine anything like this happening to you just a few weeks ago?

HAMID KARZAI: Well, to be in America, and to be the guest of the United States people and the President is an honor, it is a great thing. Afghanistan is a country that has suffered a lot. Afghanistan is a country also that has somehow contributed to the world community by fighting for certain basic things. First we fought against terrorism and we defeated the Soviet Union, and our sacrifice in a way liberated a lot in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. We are a deserving people. The recognition that America has now given to Afghanistan is a wonderful, wonderful thing. The recognition that the international community has given to Afghanistan is a wonderful, wonderful thing, and if I can represent my people in the right way, I will be very honored and I am glad and pleased that I'm in America, a guest of the American people, and we like it.

JIM LEHRER: Mr. Prime Minister, thank you very much.

HAMID KARZAI: Thank you very much.

JIM LEHRER: Then after our formal interview ended, Karzai talked about how he first sneaked into Afghanistan from his exile in Pakistan, as the U.S. campaign against the Taliban and al-Qaida began.

JIM LEHRER: It is amazing.

HAMID KARZAI: It is amazing.

JIM LEHRER: To sit here and be talking to you like this.

HAMID KARZAI: It is amazing. When I went inside the country four months ago on two motor bikes and four people, I took a chance. Before I moved on the border I took a chance with my friends that were sitting with me in that room, in a little hut in the village on the borders. I said, guys, we are going to take a chance. 60% dead; 40% alive. You must make sure that you make the right decision. Those who don't....

JIM LEHRER: In other words, there was a 60% chance you would die.

HAMID KARZAI: I would die and 40% chance that we would live. It was actually 80% chance that we would die. And 20% chance that we would be living but I told the people there 60 and 40 in order to not scare them too much. In my own mind I thought I was going to be 80% dead.

JIM LEHRER: That was when? Four months ago.

HAMID KARZAI: Four months ago when I first....

JIM LEHRER: When you first went back in.

HAMID KARZAI: When we first moved into Afghanistan because we went right through the main highway which was controlled by the Taliban and the borders and all that. Within one month, we were a force there in the central part of Afghanistan in the mountains with guns and people and clergy, mullahs, everybody. People wanted change. They wanted it so badly.

JIM LEHRER: As he went into Afghanistan Karzai way accompanied by a small unit of American Green Beret advisors who helped him elude the Taliban.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, more fallout from the fall of Enron, and the Ambrose-Goodwin story.

UPDATE - FALLOUT

JIM LEHRER: Enron's hometown and the continuing impact of the company's collapse: Betty Ann Bowser reports.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: In Houston there has been a new revelation almost every day about Enron, once known as the city's ultimate corporate good citizen. The headlines tell the story: Alleged financial mismanagement; the resignation last week of Chief Executive Officer Kenneth Lay; and then, on Friday, news that the former Deputy Vice Chairman J. Clifford Baxter had committed suicide. Like other Enron executives, he lived well here in this Houston suburb, but quit last year after warning Enron was engaged in questionable accounting practices. Some of the 4,000 employees who lost their jobs in the Enron collapse are still reeling from all this, and trying to figure out how to put their lives back together.

SPOKESPERSON: Do you have the certificates?

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Ex-Enron worker Nathan Childs and his wife got some help last week, a check from a new non-profit organization called ex-Enron Employees Relief Fund. Since being laid off December 3, Childs and his wife have had to give up their apartment and hospitalize their oldest child, and then, on January 3, 29-year-old Adena had a stroke.

NATHAN CHILDS, Former Enron Employee: Well, pretty much we don't leave the house anymore.

ADENA CHILDS: Doctor's appointments.

NATHAN CHILDS: Just to go to the doctor's appointments, and we drive 90 miles round-trip to the hospital at least four times a week for her therapy sessions, for doctor's appointments.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Do you have medical insurance?

NATHAN CHILDS: No, or my medical benefits ran out December 31, and her stroke was on January 3, so of course nothing's covered.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Rebecca Rushing put the relief fund together. She is also an Enron employee who was laid off. Rushing recently landed a new job as a receptionist with a Houston oil exploration firm.

REBECCA RUSHING: I just wanted to follow up with you and let you know we received your request.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Although thrilled with her good fortune, rushing was haunted by the heartbreaking stories she heard about other laid-off people.

REBECCA RUSHING: I think each individual story in some way has gotten to me. I've heard stories about people who have, you know... Went to get food stamps, and it was so humiliating to them because these people, they've never had to go through that type of process before. And they were asked, "how much is in your bank account? Let me see how much money is in your purse."

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Other organizations have pitched in to help former Enron employees deal with their myriad of problems, but Rushing's relief fund is the first organized by the laid-off workers themselves.

REBECCA RUSHING: First of all, I want to say a big thank you to everybody who has contributed to our fund; it's just been very, very overwhelming to me, and I am so appreciative. (crying) I'm so appreciative... Okay. I am so appreciative of what everybody has done and so many people that are going to be able to be helped by people who gave to our fund. I am so excited to say that today we will be able to help about 30 people and be able to give out between $40,000 and $50,000.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: It started out a week ago with less than $200; then, as word about it spread, the fund mushroomed to over $70,000 overnight, fueled mostly by politicians who donated money they received from Enron in their last political campaigns.

SPOKESPERSON: These are copies of the checks that we paid on behalf...

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Even though she lost most of her retirement fund at Enron, former Enron accountant Sue Nix helped Rushing set up the relief fund. At 57, Nix was hoping to retire in a few years; now she'd be happy to just find a job.

SUE NIX, Former Enron Employee: It's very hard, because they will, first of all, select a person who's much younger. Second of all, if you're heavyset, it's still discrimination, but they will always take a pretty younger woman even if you're a back- office type or worker. I get up in the middle of the night and sit in the chair and read the paper again and again, to hopefully get sleepy. About daybreak, then I'll feel sleepy, maybe nap for an hour or two.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: And what are you thinking at those moments -- is it that you're worried?

SUE NIX: Yeah. Worried that everything you've worked for, that you have materially, that you don't have to go out there and sell your car or sell your home just to be able to eat next week.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Another Fund recipient, Bill Peterson, was laid off as a computer specialist while he was undergoing chemotherapy.

BILL PETERSON: Yeah, we sold our second car. We have our house on the market. We're going to sell our house. We've had it for 15 years.

CATHY PETERSON: That's all we can do. You know, we've never, our married lives, been without life insurance or medical insurance. We've been professional people.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: And the Petersons are very angry at Enron's former top brass.

BILL PETERSON: They're the ones that cashed in a lot of their options and, you know, $101 million for Ken Lay. What was it, 70-something for Jeff Skilling? I mean, gee, that's... I could live on that.

CATHY PETERSON: I would say we're disappointed because to be an Enron employee was like being a Marine. They were the best of the best. They only hired the best of the best. We've lost our pride. To say you're an Enron employee, it was like the Green Berets of the Marines. Anyone who worked at Enron was a team player, a hard worker, a go-getter. You looked at the end goal, never, never at your own needs even. And she was a queen. She was a "Titanic" that couldn't be sunk, and she was. And like the "Titanic," it's amazing who made the lifeboats.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: But it isn't just the rank and file who are hurting. Enron gave millions of dollars to community programs. It promised $6 million this year alone to the United Way, which made after-school programs like this one possible in poor neighborhoods. Now that money is in doubt.

ACTOR: Everybody knows where I'm at.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: And Enron was a huge presence in the arts community. The Alley Theater lost $75,000. But that's not what worries director Paul (Peter) Tetreault.

PETER TETREAULT, Director: The indirect is sort of the fallout from no longer having Enron as a corporate citizen. There will be all the employees that are subscribers and patrons to the Alley Theater who, when they gave money, they had a great matching plan. There will be the businesses that Enron was an important client of theirs that gave them a lot of money so that they were then able to, in turn, turn around and give us corporate contributions. I'm more concerned about that than the actual "here's the check from Enron that supported XYZ Program."

BETTY ANN BOWSER: And although the Houston Ballet took only a $30,000 hit from a $12 million annual budget, that's not what executive director C.C. Conner thinks is the problem.

C.C. CONNER, Executive Director, Houston Ballet: I think more in this town, it's a psychological loss of one of the very visible leaders isn't there leading. It feels, I think, a little bit scary, especially in view of where the economy is in general. If our largest corporation was still there leading when other companies are maybe having a hard time in a downturn in the economy, we'd feel more secure than one that was one of the most visible now not having that presence. (Singing opera)

BETTY ANN BOWSER: The Houston Opera lost $100,000 in contributions from Enron. In an effort to keep attendance up, former Enron employees who held season tickets to the opera this year have been offered free ones for the next season. It's been like that throughout the cultural community: Give a little bit here, tighten the reins a little bit there, but the big unresolved question for everybody is, who will fill Enron's very big shoes?

FOCUS - WRITING HISTORY

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, some noted historians, and the dispute over notes they took. Margaret Warner has that story.

MARGARET WARNER: In the last several years, authors Stephen Ambrose and Doris Kearns Goodwin have garnered much attention, including here on the "NewsHour," for their best- selling histories. But in the last two weeks they have attracted a different kind of notice: Charges of plagiarism and improper citations for passages of their books apparently taken from other writers. Ambrose has authored thirty books, eight in the last five years, on everything from world wars to American Presidents.

TOM HANKS: I'll see you on the beach.

MARGARET WARNER: And he's consulted on a number of movies, including "Saving Private Ryan."

STEPHEN AMBROSE: There was only one engine working, he was losing gas, it was a desperate situation.

MARGARET WARNER: Last August, Ambrose talked on the NewsHour about his latest book, "The Wild Blue." Then, three weeks ago, the conservative magazine "The Weekly Standard" reported that "whole passages of 'The Wild Blue' were barely distinguishable from those in 'Wings of Morning' by Thomas Childers." For example, Childers' 1995 work included this passage: "Up, up, up, groping through the clouds, no amount of practice could have prepared them for what they encountered: B-24s, glittering like mica." In "The Wild Blue," published six years later, Ambrose wrote: "Up, up, up he went, until he got above the clouds. No amount of practice could have prepared the pilot and crew for what they encountered: B-24s, glittering like mica." Ambrose did not put quotations marks around the passage, but did mention Childers in footnotes. Beyond Childers' book, Ambrose has recently acknowledged that he borrowed words and phrases from two other sources for "The Wild Blue." In recent days, four additional Ambrose books have been called into question for the same reason. Ambrose has apologized and promised to credit original sources in future editions. For his part, Childers, a history professor at the University of Pennsylvania, has dropped an Ambrose book from his syllabus, and he says he wants a personal apology. On campuses elsewhere, professors and students have debated whether Ambrose committed plagiarism. In Merriam-Webster's dictionary, "to plagiarize" is "to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own." Ambrose pleads not guilty. "If I am writing up a passage," he told the "New York Times," "and part of it is from other people's writing, I just type it up that way and put in a footnote. I wish I had put the quotation marks in." Still, he said, "I tell stories; I am not writing a PhD dissertation." Two weeks after the Ambrose article, the "Weekly Standard" published a similar piece on Doris Kearns Goodwin.

DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN: My favorite story has to do with tip O'Neill at JFK's inauguration.

MARGARET WARNER: Goodwin, who has chronicled Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and FDR, appears regularly on the "NewsHour's" panel of historians. Her 1987 book "the Fitzgeralds and the Kennedys" spent five months on the "New York Times" best-seller list, but the "Weekly Standard" found "dozens" of passages strikingly similar to those in three other books, including Lynne McTaggert's "Kathleen Kennedy." In 1983, McTaggert wrote, "Mrs. Gibson gave a tea in her honor to introduce her to some of the other girls, hardly a routine practice for new recruits." Goodwin's book contained a nearly identical passage, except that she used the full name, "Mrs. Harvey Gibson." Goodwin reached a private monetary settlement with McTaggert in the late 1980s and added new footnotes to a subsequent edition. McTaggert told the "Weekly Standard" that she settled after threatening to sue for copyright infringement, and she said of Goodwin, "it's a shame that she allowed this to happen." We asked Goodwin today how it did happen.

DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN: I absolutely believe professional standards for historians need never be sacrificed in popular history. I love footnotes. I think they are actually a pointer to historians of the future, and it's critical to credit the people who have plowed the fields before. What happened in my case was, 15 years ago, in my first big work of history-which covered 900 pages, 3,500 footnotes, everything longhand-- my technique of citation proved not to be foolproof in the end. I used to take notes on the books in longhand, mark passages for quotes, and also write my running commentary on the storyline along with them, used those notes to write the draft, and at the very end would recheck every one of those 300 books to make sure the quotes were accurate and make sure the citation was right. Somehow, in that process, a few of those 300 books did not fully get rechecked. There are citations all along the way, but some of the phrases should have been in quotes rather than simply cited.

MARGARET WARNER: Goodwin explained why she paid one author, and insisted on confidentiality.

DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN: When I was told by one of the authors, McTaggert, that some of the phrases of hers had appeared in my work, I just felt so bad about it. I was more than willing to authorize the publishers to settle with her on a monetary basis and keep it confidential. So it wouldn't have to be before the world that I had made this mistake, and somehow 15 years later it has now come back.

MARGARET WARNER: Goodwin insists she was not guilty of plagiarism.

DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN: There is absolutely no intent to appropriate anyone's words as my own, which is what plagiarism is. In fact, since there are citations everywhere along the way from these authors, it would be pretty stupid to try and be appropriating someone's words along the way and point the way to those authors. It was simply a mistake in technique. I'd like to believe that I will never, ever make it again. I've learned how to remedy what was wrong with that technique. This was 15 years ago, and I'd like to believe it made me a better historian in that first work of mine of history.

MARGARET WARNER: Goodwin said she now does her research on a computer, keeping quotes from sources and her own comments in separate files, and, when drafting her book uses a special footnote key to credit sources directly into the text as she writes.

MARGARET WARNER: Joining me now to discuss this are Jerah Johnson, a history Professor at the University of New Orleans, where he worked with Stephen Ambrose. He's written widely on European History and the history of the American south. Eric Foner is a history Professor at Columbia University. He's written seven books on various periods in American history, and is past President of the American Historical Association. And Timothy Noah is a writer with the online magazine, "Slate." He wrote a piece last week criticizing Goodwin. We invited Stephen Ambrose to participate in this segment, but he declined. Tim Noah, starting with you. Do you think what Stephen Ambrose and Doris Kearns Goodwin have done amounts to plagiarism?

TIMOTHY NOAH, Slate Magazine: I do think it's plagiarism. I think you have a case here where two academic historians or at least former academic historians are distorting the definition of plagiarism. Plagiarism does not have to be deliberate. It can be inadvertent. I'm particularly surprised to see Doris Kearns Goodwin make that claim because she sits on the board of directors, the board of overseers at Harvard University where this is stated quite clearly in a handbook given to freshmen.

MARGARET WARNER: Explain what you mean by that.

TIMOTHY NOAH: Everybody who is a freshman at Harvard University takes freshman composition course. It's required. Called Expos. There's a handbook that's given to all of these freshmen, and it says quite clearly if you borrow... It doesn't have to be an entire sentence. If you borrow a lengthy phrase and you do not put quotation marks around it, that's plagiarism whether you did it on purpose or not and whether you included a footnote or not. The quotation marks are the key thing that defines plagiarism.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Johnson, how do you see it? Plagiarism?

JERAH JOHNSON, University of New Orleans: No. No. No. No. Absolutely not. Simply errors. Simply errors.

MARGARET WARNER: What do you mean errors?

JERAH JOHNSON: Well, I mean, ms. Goodman's case is just a prime example of how easy it is for any of us to make these kinds of errors. I agree with her definition of plagiarism, that it's a conscious act, a deliberate act, a calculating act to simply steal someone else's work. And that is not what has happened here.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Foner, how do you see this in terms of whether what happened here was plagiarism?

ERIC FONER, Columbia University: Well I think it was by any scholarly definition because plagiarism doesn't really depend on the motivation. It depends on the evidence that we have before us. I actually found Professor Ambrose's response rather more damaging in a way. At least ms. Goodwin has admitted that a serious problem took place. Professor Ambrose's explanation that when he finds a good story he just plugs it into his own writing, that's not what most of us consider writing to be. Even if you put quotations around it or put a footnote, writing is putting these things into your own words, creating your own argument, not just sort of scavenging other people's books and taking their good writing and putting it out as your own words. I think that at least in the Ambrose case, it's writing too much too fast too sloppily, and it does go over into this realm of plagiarism, which is presenting someone else's writing as your own.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Johnson, what do you say to the point Tim Noah raised about what students are told and I think disciplined for in this area?

JERAH JOHNSON: Certainly. A student should be. They have to be taught and they should be taught. It takes a long time. It's not just freshmen. Our beginning graduate students have a terrible time understanding when to footnote and where to footnote and how to use quotations. It takes a very long time to get people trained.

MARGARET WARNER: But I mean do you think there should be a double standard or a different standard for college students than Professors -- or historians?

JERAH JOHNSON: No, it's all the same standard but again I go back to what I said originally. We all make errors, students and professional historians alike.

MARGARET WARNER: Tim Noah?

TIMOTHY NOAH: Again, I think the rules... I'm only familiar with the rules at Harvard. But if you make such an error as an undergraduate, an 18-year-old at Harvard, they have very stern sanctions against it. You are typically asked to leave the university for two semesters. You're not even allowed within the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts. You'll lose all of the credit hours that you've accumulated until then, which means a lot of lost money. And you have something put permanently on your record that states that you did something dishonest when you were an undergraduate.

JERAH JOHNSON: Is Mr. Noah saying that Harvard students are not allowed to make errors?

TIMOTHY NOAH: They're not allowed to make this error apparently.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Foner, what's your view of this question about the standards to which students are held?

ERIC FONER: Well, obviously if a student turned up, if a freshman turned up with a paper with these errors I would probably give him a stern warning, send him back and have him rewrite it. If it were someone a little further advanced, the penalty would be more severe. But, you know, I think that there's... The problem here goes beyond these two individuals. You have the publishers who refuse to acknowledge these infractions and refuse to withdraw the books from publication. No one has taken Professor Ambrose's books off circulation. They're making too much money for the publisher. He's under pressure every year to produce a new bestseller. As I say, there's just... It's become a kind of cottage industry here, producing these books. When you produce so much so fast, you can't do it. I don't care how prolific you are, writing is time consuming. It's difficult. Putting it in your own words is a difficult thing to do. But that's really what we expect from a writer. I think that the way that this has happened with Professor Ambrose certainly recently makes you wonder about his whole method of producing his books.

MARGARET WARNER: So I take then, Professor Foner, that you don't think there should be a different standard for so-called popular history?

ERIC FONER: No, you know, this is not a question of popular history. There are many popular historians on the bestseller list. James McPherson of Princeton, David Kennedy, my own colleague Simon Shama. They've written popular accessible works. Nobody has accused them of this sort of infraction. It's not a question of the audience you're writing for or even the style in which you're writing. It's adhering to what Mr. Noah said are very commonly accepted standards of attribution and of making sure that it's your own writing and not just passing off the work of someone else as your own.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Johnson, do you think that there is a... That the danger can come when you have what's called these blockbuster historians. I'll just use Stephen Ambrose as an example - but who has written eight books in five years. I mean is it really possible to do serious research and original thinking and write a book of history in a year?

JERAH JOHNSON: Well, I certainly don't think the problem is the rapidness of the writing in Ambrose's case. Ambrose is simply a phenomenally hard-working historian. If I had worked as hard as Ambrose did for the past 40- something years I could have as many books as he has, but I have not worked that hard. That's all Steve knows how to do is work.

MARGARET WARNER: Tim Noah, in your column, you also took issue with what you called... With the payment to Ms. McTaggert in the Doris Kearns Goodwin case. Address that issue.

TIMOTHY NOAH: I think that's very problematic. I think when you have a situation where a case of plagiarism comes to light, it shouldn't be hushed up. That happened in this case. We don't know how many other cases this happens with other authors. I think that one thing that may come out of this-- I hope-- is that publishers will learn that you can't do that. If it turns out that one of your authors has plagiarized, you have to go public with it because the consumer, the reader, has to know. It's a kind of consumer fraud.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Foner, what do you think of that idea?

ERIC FONER: I hope that happens but I'm rather skeptical. I think... I think publishers are not going to be willing to withdraw or make public information about best-selling books, which are an important part of their bottom line. As to Professor Johnson, I'm sure Professor Ambrose is a very hard-working person, but there are many other historians who are also equally hard working. They don't produce a book a year. It's humanly impossible to produce as many books so fast as Professor Ambrose has and give each one the care and the originality that is required by professional standards.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Foner, earlier you said something, a couple of times actually that made me think you're putting a little blame on... Even on publishers who are pushing some of these prolific writers to be more prolific if they're really big sellers?

ERIC FONER: Well, you know, the Wall Street Journal a couple of years ago had an article about Professor Ambrose and his relation with his publisher. This is quite unusual for a historian to be viewed that way. The publisher was pressuring him to write more. He at that point was saying he might retire but he's such an important part of the bottom line of Simon and Schuster that they were figuring out incentives to keep him writing. So I think the publishes are in cases far worse than these where books come to light which are totally plagiarized publishers keep them in print, they keep them in circulation, if they're selling. I think the publishers are part of the problem here.

MARGARET WARNER: So, Tim Noah, what would you like to see publishers do?

TIMOTHY NOAH: Well, I think when we say publishers actually, there is a common publisher in this case. It was Simon and Schuster in both the Goodwin case and Ambrose case. I think Simon and Schuster is really under an obligation to lead the way in terms of reform here. Indeed the same editor was involved with both authors, Alice Mayhew. I'd like to see her lead an industry-wide reform. One thought I had was to get all authors in book contracts to sign away their right to sue someone else for plagiarism. That would remove the financial incentive to come up with a quiet deal when something like this happens. Instead you go public with it. Maybe some sort of clearinghouse could be set up by the publishers to adjudicate these things.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Johnson, what do you think of that idea?

JERAH JOHNSON: Basically, I agree with what both gentlemen have said. Sad to say it is money driven largely and publishers have gotten a little sloppy. There's no question about that. I would like to see all this happen, but again I agree with Professor Foner, I don't think it really is going to happen.

MARGARET WARNER: Professor Foner?

ERIC FONER: Well, you know, there are other ways. The American Historical Association has a professional division, which hears complaints of plagiarism. There aren't that many. I don't want people watch to go get the impression that large numbers of historians are stealing the work of others and publishing them under their own name.

JERAH JOHNSON: Exactly.

ERIC FONER: These are isolated instances. They're unfortunate. Most works of history can be trusted at least in terms of their originality. But the American Historical Association does hear these complaints. They issue rulings. The largest sanction against a scholar is really what has happened here: Publicity and simply some diminution of their reputation. I think that's worth, you know, more of a problem for a scholar than perhaps the amount of money involved.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Professors both and Tim Noah, thank you all three.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major developments of this day: President Bush refused to let the General Accounting Office have documents on the Vice President's energy task force. The watchdog agency may sue for the information. And on the "NewsHour" this evening, Afghanistan's interim leader Karzai said he wanted peacekeepers deployed beyond Kabul. We'll see you online and again here tomorrow evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you, and good night.